We headed to the observation room and began the process of simultaneously monitoring and analyzing the brainwaves of Cat and Sun Woosung. Unlike Sun Woosung, who lay on the machine with a device attached to his head, Cat’s readings had to be gathered by placing a sensor-equipped measuring device inside the sealed space. As a result, the data was inevitably less precise.
Grrr.
“Good boy.”
Every time Cat glared at the machine, clearly irritated by its presence, I tapped on the wall to divert his attention.
“Should I keep staying like this?”
Sun Woosung, who seemed to be deliberately avoiding looking at Cat beyond the wall, glanced my way with cloudy eyes and pointed to his lying position. I gave a nod in response.
“Yes.”
“Is this part of the standard checkup procedure after every return to the ship? I assume there’s nothing wrong.”
“We’re examining a slightly different aspect than the hospital tests.”
I replied while briefly glancing at the monitors around me. Relying on facial expressions or atmosphere to gauge one’s state was far less reliable than observing real-time changes in brain activity. In essence, we were attempting to visualize the level of intimacy between Cat and Sun Woosung.
Of course, since a comprehensive analysis was required, multiple cameras had been installed in the observation room—beyond the usual ones used to observe Cat—based on Sun Woosung’s prior consent.
“You can just relax today. If you start feeling sleepy, go ahead and rest.”
“……Do we have to do this every time I come here?”
Surrounded by Cat’s glaring eyes, dozens of cameras, and my own stare, it was obvious that sleep was the last thing on his mind. To prevent Cat from becoming agitated, everyone except me had been asked to leave the room—yet even under these minimal conditions, Sun Woosung looked uncomfortable. Had everyone been present, he might’ve been just as on edge as Cat.
“No, it won’t be done every day. Frequent disruptions to your sleep pattern could negatively impact your health, Colonel.”
Sun Woosung stared silently at me. He seemed indifferent. Pretending not to notice, I continued.
“Monthly tests should be sufficient to observe any meaningful changes.”
“…….”
Only then did Sun Woosung finally turn his head forward again.
Beep. Beep. In the now-quiet space, the faint sounds of machines echoed. Sun Woosung had changed out of his uniform and into the comfortable clothes I had prepared. He lay flat without moving a muscle, staring up at the ceiling without blinking. To help him sleep, I adjusted the lighting to make the room a little dimmer.
I stood with my arms crossed, watching the graphs flicker across the monitor.
“Even monsters have different levels of intelligence, don’t they?”
Unexpectedly, Sun Woosung spoke first again. I turned my gaze toward him.
“S8A152… Why was that monster rated so highly?”
His calm eyes remained fixed on the ceiling.
“I brought it in myself, so I remember. We managed to capture it while it was still asleep, so I never saw it go berserk until much later.”
“……Ah.”
That was something I hadn’t known. Since Cat had always radiated murderous intent like a proper monster, I’d assumed its hostility toward Sun Woosung was just par for the course. But maybe it remembered him as the one who forcibly removed it from the surface, and had been holding a grudge ever since. That possibility briefly crossed my mind. I glanced over at it.
Pressed close to the glass, the black-furred beast stared directly at us—or more accurately, at Sun Woosung. Its lips curled up on one side, exposing sharp teeth in a way that looked like it was baring its fangs at a sworn enemy. Now that I knew the background, its expression seemed even more vicious.
I closed my mouth and tapped my elbow with my index finger a few times.
“Cat… has relatively high learning capabilities. It’s even picked up parts of human language.”
For the first time, Sun Woosung’s eyes widened slightly.
“You mean it can talk?”
I nodded at the subtle tremble in his voice.
“More like communication than actual conversation, I’d say.”
Like humans, the less intelligent monsters behave in a more one-dimensional way. For example, if food is placed inside a hard box, they’ll simply charge at it and break the box apart—only to end up with shards embedded in the food and unable to eat it. And then they’ll do the exact same thing again and again without realizing why it doesn’t work. Always driven purely by instinct and impulse.
On the other hand, there are monsters who, after a few attempts, manage to wedge their claws into the box, break it just right, and extract the food intact. Monsters with higher intelligence, capable of detouring and strategizing to achieve their goals. Among them, there are those who, from the start, only attack the structure of the box itself—like Cat.
Of course, the smartest monster I’ve ever seen was still Rai, who managed to hide his cunning for an impressively long time. The idea that a monster could grasp the concept of solving a cube… I still remember how astounding that was.
Grrowl.
Cat shifted its gaze from Sun Woosung to me, letting out a low rumble as it stared. I met its eyes and lifted the corners of my lips.
“It can manage one-on-one communication with me, though only to a limited extent for now.”
“…….”
“But eventually, you’ll be able to do it too, Colonel. If the two of you become partners, even being able to understand each other’s condition and basic needs would be more than enough.”
Whenever that partnership might come to be.
“Partner?”
Sun Woosung murmured the word with a peculiar expression, then—for the first time—turned his gaze toward the wall. As if waiting for that very moment, Cat snapped his head toward Sun Woosung and bared his jaws wide.
ROOAARR!
“…….”
“…….”
The roar was so powerful, it created the illusion that the wall itself was trembling.
“Someday,” I added softly after a brief silence.
***
After the awkward silence, Sun Woosung looked up at Seo Suho, who had fallen quiet. That finely sculpted face, sharp jawline, and pale skin—so cold they looked like they’d leave a chill on contact—kept drawing his eyes. The features were still reminiscent of the past, yet somehow much calmer now.
In the near-silent atmosphere where only the monster occasionally let out low growls, old memories began surfacing as if under a hypnotic spell.
The incident that had led to the reinforcement of the ship’s monster containment facility—it was still baffling, no matter how many times he went over it. That a monster had broken out and destroyed the home of a research couple was undeniably tragic, but not outside the realm of possibility. The fact that such an event had never occurred before didn’t mean it couldn’t.
But what he could never wrap his head around was how the monster had protected the person who was with it at the time. He had seen it with his own eyes—how it wrapped that school-uniform-clad body securely within its own, shielding it from every threat.
Every monster Sun Woosung had encountered before either ripped its own kind in half or crushed them mercilessly. The moment they set foot on the ground after disembarking from a fighter jet, the beasts would catch the scent of humans and charge in with bloodshot eyes, driven by hunger and hostility. Depending on the situation, they would either evade, confront, or be captured—but engaging such physically superior creatures never came without risk.
When he thought of all those whose bodies were never recovered because of the monsters, it became even harder to accept the idea of one shielding a single human from a collapsing building.
“Please… Rai!”
…Actually, somewhere in the back of his mind, the idea hadn’t seemed completely impossible. The building that collapsed at the scene wasn’t just any household—it was also a research facility attempting communication with the monsters. And when you factored in Seo Suho’s demeanor…
Perhaps it was due to the influence of his researcher parents, or maybe because he’d grown up alongside the monster from a young age, but Seo Suho seemed to treat the creature protecting him like family. Sun Woosung had noticed as much when Suho tried to dissuade the Reconnaissance Unit from attacking the beast. Could it be that the monster, too, harbored similar emotions? The thought had once crossed his mind—absurd as it sounded.
But it didn’t feel fake. Not at all. When Suho realized his parents had died, he had tried to charge at the monster without a second thought. The expression on his face in that fleeting moment—Sun Woosung could still recall it vividly.
That ghastly pale skin where bloody lacerations and smears of red stood out starkly, lips trembling and blue with shock, empty eyes shedding silent tears.
His body trembled uncontrollably, no matter how tightly Sun Woosung had held onto him.
“……Colonel Sun Woosung?”
A voice laced with uncertainty pulled him back. Turning his head, he found Seo Suho looking at him while glancing between the monitors and Sun Woosung’s complexion.
Sun Woosung had witnessed death that could only be described with the most brutal, sickening language. He had even stood on the brink of such a death himself. That instant when it felt like his heart was being crushed—perhaps that was the most intense sensation a living person could experience.
Yet, somehow, it wasn’t those horrifying moments that had etched themselves most deeply into his memory.
It was the broken expression of another—tears falling like a machine gone haywire—that had frozen itself more solidly in his mind. And he couldn’t understand why that memory still resurfaced from time to time, even now. Especially considering that back then, Seo Suho had been a complete stranger to him.
