『What's Inside the Case』
It was a rainy night.
The back-alley bar was filled, as usual, with the smell of cheap liquor and cigarettes, while neon lights blurred beyond the windows. There were few customers.
Nights like this usually meant work.
Hornet sat at the counter, slowly nursing his drink.
Being a courier was a boring job, but as long as things remained boring, he stayed alive.
The problem was when they stopped being boring.
The bartender indicated the back door with nothing but his eyes.
Someone was waiting for him.
Hornet finished his drink, stood up, and walked into the room at the back of the bar.
A fat man was sitting there.
His face was sweaty, his suit was cheap, but the briefcase sitting on the table was far too expensive to belong beside him.
"You're Hornet."
The man wiped the sweat from his face with a yellowed handkerchief.
"That's what they call me."
Hornet answered without expression.
"It's a simple job. Take this to a certain church."
The man pushed the briefcase toward him.
"What's inside?"
"You don't need to know. Don't open it."
Hornet picked up the case.
It was lighter than it looked.
And yet, it had a strange weight to it.
Not the weight of iron or gold.
Something worse.
"How much?"
"You'll be paid when the delivery is complete."
Hornet gave a faint smile.
"I don't hate that arrangement."
That was all there was to the job.
Walking through the rain-soaked city, Hornet lit a cigarette.
The church was about twenty minutes away.
Normally, that would have been the end of it.
But this night was different.
The moment he turned into an alley, the atmosphere changed.
Men in black appeared.
Three of them.
No—there were more.
One after another, they emerged from the shadows beneath the streetlights.
Hornet dropped his cigarette.
"That's a lot of company for a nighttime stroll."
The answer was gunfire.
Bullets shattered the wall.
Hornet immediately twisted aside and drew two pistols from his holsters.
The first shot dropped one of them.
The second pistol erupted in flame.
The men in black scattered, bullets flying through the rain.
Hornet sprinted down the alley and slipped into an abandoned factory.
Rust-covered steel beams.
Broken windows.
Not a bad place for a gunfight.
Moving from shadow to shadow, he pulled the triggers.
His ammunition ran out.
Hornet grabbed the rifle from one of the fallen men and opened fire again.
Sparks.
Shouts.
The smell of iron.
Several minutes later, the factory fell silent.
The men in black lay scattered across the floor.
None of them moved.
Hornet let out a long breath.
"...Quite a job."
He placed the briefcase on the floor.
Now that he had come this far, he couldn't help wondering what was inside.
The courier's rule was simple: never open the package.
But this city wasn't kind enough to let a man live long just by following the rules.
Hornet reached for the latch.
Then it happened.
"It is too soon for humans."
A voice.
From nowhere.
Hornet turned around.
There was no one there.
"Who are you?"
There was no answer.
Instead, light poured through a broken section of the roof.
It was supposed to be a rainy night.
Yet that one spot was as bright as daylight.
The briefcase began to tremble.
The next moment, it was engulfed in light—
and vanished.
As if it had never existed in the first place.
Hornet stood there for a while.
"...This is just great."
The job wasn't finished.
And the package was gone.
Hornet returned to the bar.
But there was no one in the back room.
He questioned the bartender.
"A fat man. He had a briefcase."
The bartender shook his head.
"Never had a customer like that."
The other customers gave him the same answer.
No one knew anything.
It seemed the man had never existed in the first place.
Hornet left the bar.
The rain was still falling.
As he walked through the alley, he lit another cigarette.
He could feel eyes watching his back.
He turned around.
No one was there.
And yet, something was definitely there.
Something that wasn't human was watching this world from far away.
Hornet exhaled a cloud of smoke.
"...I don't like it."
The rain did not stop.
『What's Inside the Case』 — The End