DD Volume 1 Part 3.4

3. Zero Gravity (4)

“Ugh.”

Yeonsoo, who hit his head on the wall, stood up while rubbing his forehead with his palm. He sat crouched in front of the fish tank, seeming to have fallen asleep. When he checked the clock on his phone, it was around 4 o’clock in the morning.

He stretched and met Beresht’s eyes. It was observing Yeonsoo closely nearby, just as he had seen him before falling asleep. Yeonsoo let out a tired smile.

“Don’t you sleep?”

Just like almost all living creatures sleep to relieve accumulated fatigue, fish also sleep. Some fish may enter a hibernate state when the water temperature drops. However, this deep-sea fish in front of him seems to never sleep.

“Then, do you want to play with me?”

Before going home, Yeonsoo wanted to do something for Beresht. Since he had nothing to give, he wanted to at least give him some time. After all, he had received the only universe in the world as a gift from him.

Yeonsoo didn’t know why Beresht had dropped its scales. It could be just a specific behavior of this creature that he didn’t know yet, or it could have been triggered by some mechanism for reasons unknown. Perhaps, it was Beresht’s own way of consoling him for his loneliness, Yeonsoo thought. It might not be true, but he wanted to believe it, so he decided to believe it.

He got up from his seat and headed towards the back of the laboratory. He then took out two sets of thousand-piece jigsaw puzzles that Alex and Yeonsoo had hidden together. They had bought the same ones to make a bet on who would complete it first.

He climbed up to the entrance of the tank on a ladder. He flipped over one puzzle and poured it into the cage haphazardly, then came back down again.

Yeonsoo sat a little away from the tank so that Beresht could see it well. He extended the puzzle with one hand and tapped the edges with the other. It was a sign to take a good look at what he does.

He had made a similar gesture when demonstrating the cube last time. If Beresht had solved the cube back then, he thought he might recognize his gesture this time too.

Spreading a thousand pieces on the floor, Yeonsoo started solving the puzzle. First, he divided the puzzle pieces by color.

“To complete this, we need to sort the pieces by similar colors first. That’s the basics. Pieces of similar colors tend to gather in similar positions.”

As he explained, he glanced at Beresht. He seemed uninterested in the puzzle and kept looking at him. Laughter once again came out of Yeonsoo’s mouth. It seemed that Beresht was more interested in observing himself solving the puzzle than the puzzle itself.

“The first part we need to make is the border. The border pieces are easy to find, and once we make the border, we can see the shape and connect the rest.”

Yeonsoo’s fingers, which were moving quickly, started to pick up speed. The shape began to form little by little, starting to form the border.

“The pieces that are cut straight at the edges are the ones that fit the border of the puzzle….”

While solving the puzzle with his hands, he continuously moved his lips without taking a break. Along with puzzle-solving tips, small talks gradually began to flow.

“When I was young, I didn’t have many memories of doing something with my mom. So, when my friends said they went somewhere with their moms, I was really jealous.”

When Yeonsoo paused for a moment and looked up at the tank, Beresht continued to watch him as if it would always be there beside him. It felt strangely cozy and safe.

“I only did a puzzle with my mom once. Of course, it wasn’t just for fun. Maybe she wanted to see me solving puzzles from the side because I solved puzzles so quickly. But pretending not to know my mom’s expectations, I solved the puzzle at the slowest speed I could that day. It was so nice to know that I was playing with my mom like the other kids. So, I wanted to prolong that time…”

Under the large shadow of the deep-sea creature, time seemed to flow slowly, like a gentle current. Yeonsoo gradually felt his eyelids growing heavier. But just one more piece, he thought, just one more piece, and he missed the moment to get up. Yeonsoo collapsed among the puzzle pieces scattered on the floor. And then he fell asleep.

⊹˚. ♡.𖥔 ݁ ˖ ⊹˚. ♡.𖥔 ݁ ˖

“Dr. Han! Dr. Han!”

His body shook. Yeonsoo tossed and turned a few times before barely lifting his eyelids. He saw Kei’s face right in front of him.

“Are you crazy? When did you even come here?”

Kei’s face was filled with astonishment.

“Ah….”

Yeonsoo blinked his eyes with a dazed look on his face.

“What time is it now? Did you come to work?”

Yeonsoo asked calmly, rubbing his eyes, and Kei let out a sigh and laughed.

“It’s past 9 o’clock. What is this? A puzzle?”

“Oh, that. I came by briefly last night because I left something here, and I didn’t feel like going home, so I just stayed here. I was bored, so I thought I might as well do a puzzle….”

Yeonsoo made a half-hearted excuse with a tired expression. Kei didn’t seem to believe it, but it didn’t matter. He could endure any nagging, considering what had happened yesterday.

“So, you stayed up all night here playing with Beresht and doing puzzles? Haah. Why don’t you set up a playroom or something?”

Kei rubbed his temples as if he had a headache. He looked much more tired than Yeonsoo, who had slept uncomfortably for a long time.

“Are you not thinking straight? I told you not to get carried away, to be careful.”

“……”

“Did that idiot who jumped in without thinking ever thought he would end up like that?”

Yeonsoo furrowed his brows slightly.

Jeremy, was it? Kei had mentioned that Jeremy had exhibited strange behavior before jumping into the tank. One of those incidents was when he was found collapsed in front of the tank. Considering he also collapsed in front of the tank just now like Jeremy, it wasn’t unreasonable for Kei to be concerned.

He admitted that he is captivated by that beautiful creature, however, he didn’t want to be killed in vain like Jeremy. There must be a way. Yeonsoo wanted to find that way.

“…I’m sorry. I’ll be careful.”

“Yes. Please be careful. I don’t want to see pieces of human flesh and organs floating in the tank again.”

Kei smiled faintly, but his tone of voice was ominous. Yeonsoo nodded obediently.

Then, for a moment, he froze like someone who had just thought of something. He ran quickly to the ladder next to the tank and started to climb it swiftly.

“Why are you going up there?”

“I left something behind!”

“Why do you keep leaving things behind?!”

Kei’s shouting from below didn’t reach Yeonsoo’s ears.

With a dazed expression, Yeonsoo looked at the beautiful masterpiece neatly laid out on the floor. It was Van Gogh’s “Starry Night,” completed puzzle pieces, shining brightly.

He must have fallen asleep around 4 to 5 o’clock in the morning. According to Kei, it was now around 9 o’clock. That means Beresht completed a thousand-piece puzzle in about 4 hours. Even people skilled in puzzles take more than 5 hours to complete a thousand-piece puzzle…

Haa. Yeonsoo let out a sigh. He didn’t expect this. He just wanted to give Beresht what he had. He wanted to share something similar. He expected Beresht to just imitate and play with what he had showed, like playing with puzzle pieces.

If Beresht had really completed the puzzle, it wasn’t a matter of mirroring human behavior anymore. Perhaps its intelligence was beyond that of a human.

His heart raced. A sharp intuition rose within him. Like an ancient symbol, there must be something deeper as it delves into that unknown creature.

Yeonsoo looked down at the dark surface of the water with sunken eyes.