Be My Baby - Vol.1 Chapter 0 Part 3
“What a waste…”
Seonwoo, who had successfully crawled out after a full 40 minutes, kept muttering the same words even while riding in a taxi.
“What a waste,” “You should have given it to me instead. It would have been a good specimen,” he mumbled with a face like he had lost his country. The driver glanced nervously at the rearview mirror, but Seonwoo didn’t notice. He was completely unaware that he looked a bit scary right now.
“Ah… No matter how much I asked, he wouldn’t give it… He could have just given me a little…”
When he forcibly asked for semen from not only his friends but also acquaintances for specimen collection during infertility research, everyone was shocked but eventually visited the lab. But only that person gently refused with a smile, saying it was absolutely not allowed.
He was clearly smiling, but his face said “Do you want to die?”, so Seonwoo didn’t dare ask again after that. But now, to have washed away something so precious, it was driving him crazy with regret.
But he couldn’t not shower in that situation either.
“Haa… It was really hard-to-get sperm…”
Anyway, since genes are all relative, most are classified as preferential unless it’s based on disease, intelligence, or physical strength criteria. Therefore, the words dominant and recessive mean the difference in the possibility of expression, not literally meaning superiority or inferiority.
But when it comes to Eungyo-hyung‘s genes, he could confidently say they were absolutely superior.
Of course, there’s a lot of personal bias in that opinion. But anyone could see that hyung’s appearance, physique, intelligence, athletic ability, and various other aspects were overwhelmingly superior.
Although genetic science has advanced a lot, it’s not possible to set absolute standards for which genes are right. They can only remove factors that might cause disease or crime, and during artificial insemination, consider the appearance, personality, physical strength, and build of both families to process it so that the genes that are more preferred based on reality are expressed.
That’s whyhyung‘s genes are even more necessary.
These days, people go through a stage called pre-fertilization plastic surgery before pregnancy and childbirth, but even this process doesn’t result in a perfect child.
From the beginning, you need good seeds to bear good fruit. As his father always said, no matter how hard science tries, it can’t steal seeds. If this same process continues, relatively superior genes might remain after 3 or 4 generations, but even then, perfect genes cannot exist.
This is not only his opinion but also the extremely common opinion of all genetic engineers, but Eungyo-hyung was a bit different.
His genes were perfection itself.
“Ah… What a waste… If I had kept some, I could have gotten pregnant right away…”
Of course, there are some ethical issues, but if he had kept even a little, he could have gone straight to the lab and artificially inseminated the egg he made a year ago using his own cells, and just put it in his womb… but…
“Ah… That’s in my womb…”
Due to the sudden termination of the project, among the experimental subjects that had to be discarded inevitably, the No. 1 egg made with his genes and blood was now in his own womb.
It seemed too wasteful to just throw away the blood drawn for it, so just before the order to discard the experimental subjects came down, he went to his brother and had it inserted in his lower abdomen.
That egg, a kind of organism, didn’t cause any rejection reaction, to the point where he had forgotten he was carrying it. Of course, it has a lifespan, so he’d have to take it out soon…
“I don’t want to open my belly…”
It’s a simple procedure, and if it’s his brother, he’d perform the surgery without leaving a trace, but still, he didn’t feel like it. As he stared blankly out the window, the car stopped in front of a familiar building.
“Sir, we’ve arrived.”
“Thank you.”
After completing the payment, Seonwoo got out of the taxi awkwardly, and saw Seyoon standing under the gleaming huge building.
“You were waiting?”
“Because you’ve never once found my office properly on your own.”
To Seyoon’s question of how it took 40 minutes to just take the elevator to the 22nd floor, turn right down the corridor, then turn into the inner corridor and reach the third office, Seonwoo averted his gaze, pretending not to know.
He seemed to be aware that he had an extremely poor sense of direction. That was somewhat fortunate.
“Follow me.”
As Seyoon spoke and entered the cafe on the left side of the lobby, Seonwoo followed him into the cafe about one and a half beats late. Being early morning, the cafe was quite empty.
Seonwoo toddled along following Seyoon, who was crossing the quiet cafe and entering a room. Once again, he sat down on the chair in an awkward posture inside the glass door.
And looking down at the table, two cups of coffee were already placed there. He thought it was typical of the impatient Seyoon.
“If you were going to do this, you could’ve just told me to come to the cafe.”
“I thought of it after I arrived at work.”
Seyoon was so shocked by Seonwoo’s bombshell declaration that he wasted time going back to get the bag he had left behind, and on the way, he was so out of it that he made a right turn when he should have gone straight, taking a long detour. Because of this, his mental state was already shaken before he even got to work.
In that state, after arriving at work, he stopped by the cafe to buy coffee first to gather his wits. But thinking about it, if it was true that he had engaged in reproductive activity as he claimed, wouldn’t it take even longer than the usual minimum 40 minutes it takes this guy to get from the front of the building to the office? So he decided to just wait here himself.
He had no desire to be kind to a man nearing thirty, but it was an unavoidable choice due to the instinct as Lee Seonwoo’s guardian ingrained during school days.
This is why people should make good friends in high school. If you go astray then, you ruin your whole life. Just like himself.
“First, I’ll ask the most important thing.”
“What?”
“Did you really do it?”
“…Probably?”
In fact, the evidence was crystal clear, but since he hadn’t heard a definitive answer from Eungyo-hyung’s mouth, Seonwoo gave a vague answer. It was an attitude unbecoming of an engineering doctor who always speaks based solely on facts, but it couldn’t be helped now.
It’s not something to go around talking about with his own mouth in a situation where there’s a victim. Unless Eungyo-hyunghimself goes around talking about it.
So Seonwoo just sipped his coffee, telling him to judge for himself. Seyoon, sitting right across from him with his arms folded, closed his eyes tightly as if in despair and let out a sigh.
It was a sigh of lamentation, thinking this lacking bastard really went and did it.
“Haah…”
Seeing Seyoon take off his glasses and press his brow as if troubled, Seonwoo glanced at him discreetly. To his attitude that seemed to be waiting for him to resolve this embarrassing situation quickly, Seyoon asked again.
“Who knows about this now?”
“Only you.”
At Seonwoo’s all too normal statement that no matter how lacking he is, he doesn’t go around bragging about such things here and there, Seyoon narrowed his eyes. He looked like he had a lot to say but was holding back because the situation was urgent.
“Then, from now on, forever, to anyone, absolutely don’t tell. Especially to Kang Eunsoo.”
When Seyoon threatened that if that bundle of brother complex who always goes around shouting “My brother, my second brother, Eungyo-hyung” were to find out about this, he might hang you upside down in the middle of Gwanghwamun Square, Seonwoo quickly nodded.
“I understand. I absolutely won’t tell.”
In fact, Seonwoo was a bit scared of the vicious Kang Eunsoo, so he was planning to absolutely not say anything for the time being. But since Seyoon said not to, he decided not to, forever.
“Good. Then Eunsoo is taken care of. Now let’s reconstruct the incident. How much do you remember from yesterday?”
“…Drinking with you guys.”
“The meeting with Eungyo-hyung?”
“I don’t remember at all. My memory cuts off at talking about the Al project.”
Although he remembers intermittently after that, the memory of the most important part was still cut off. He had no idea whyhyunghad bothered to take him to his own house, that whole process was gone in a chunk.
“Why didhyungtake me to his house?”
“I told you, it was the same as usual. Around midnight, we were wrapping up and all leaving together when Eungyo-hyunghappened to come out of a room in that bar. He had a friend gathering too. But how could you possibly pass by Eungyo-hyung?”
At those words, Seonwoo nodded while drinking his coffee.
“That’s right. There’s no way I could.”
To Seonwoo’s somewhat dirty comparison that a dog would sooner stop pooping than he would ignore Eungyo-hyung, Seyoon pretended not to hear and continued.
“And after that, just like always, you rushed at him saying he broke off his engagement so he should give you sperm, and hyung pushed your forehead to block you. Thenhyung‘s friends laughed saying, ‘Oh, it’s theAirhead? Is he still following you around asking for sperm? Just give him some since he’s asking,’ and you rushed at them again saying ‘See, they’re telling you to give it.’”
Seyoon nodded, recalling last night’s memory, saying you were really a sight to see then. He should have recorded it, but he was too surprised to film.
“I thought you were like a zombie then, but hyung, as always, bravely ignored you and walked past. Tohyung, you weren’t even a zombie, just a passing fly or mosquito. Up to there was the same as usual. The problem is…”
After saying that much, Seyoon paused for a moment, took a sip of coffee, and then started to recite the highlight scene from yesterday exactly as it happened.
“You wrote ‘Please give me sperm’ with a marker on hyung’s car that had just come out. Sohyungfinally exploded. He dragged you away saying he would fix your filthy drinking habit once and for all today.”
The moment Seyoon’s explanation ended, saying that’s all he saw, a memory flashed by like a scene from a movie.
The scene of taking out a marker from his bag, climbing onto the hood of hyung’s black sedan that the valet had brought out, and writing ‘Please give me sperm♡’ with a bright smile.
At that moment, Seyoon noticed the color drain from Seonwoo’s face. That he had remembered that part.
Whether that’s fortunate or unfortunate is yet unknown.
“Well, anyway, the accident has already happened. If you’ve caused an accident, you need to deal with it.”
“…How?”
“You have to do it the usual way.”
“You mean kneel and beg for forgiveness?”
“You know well.”
“Will that be enough?”
“I don’t know if that will be enough or not, but for now, you have to beg, what else can you do? No matter how I think about it, it seems like you pounced on him. Our society has agreed to call such an act sexual assault, you know.”
Coming from a lawyer, it felt even more realistic. Seonwoo banged his head hard on the table.
“Finally, evenr_pe. Someone like me should die! What’s the point of living! Die, you r_pist!”
As Seonwoo banged his head on the table with a loud thud, Seyoon frowned as if it was noisy. Self-loathing is fine, but he wished he would do it more quietly.
Honestly, Seyoon agreed that Seonwoo needed to be taught a good lesson, so he wanted to leave him like this for a while, but there wasn’t much time and it was too noisy, so he decided to comfort him at this point.
“Well, generally that’s true… But don’t despair too much. You might have pounced, but given Eungyo-hyung‘s build and that grip strength, throwing someone like you away would be nothing to him, so if he let it happen, it can’t be considered rape.”
Anyway, Eungyo is a head taller than Seonwoo, and their body sizes differ by about twice at a glance. Not only is there a big difference in length, but the thickness is also very different. Anyone can see that Eungyo wouldn’t be overpowered. Far from being overpowered, he’s someone who could throw away a pouncing Seonwoo with one hand.
For that reason, even if Eungyo were to file a lawsuit, it would be difficult to prove Seonwoo’s guilt in court. So, telling him to stop banging his head noisily, Seyoon held Seonwoo’s forehead, and Seonwoo looked up at Seyoon with sparkling eyes.
“Really?”
“Objectively speaking, yes. Someone like you with no physical coordination, no athletic ability, no sense of direction. No, forget that… Anyway, for someone like you who seems to have never done any exercise in your life except for chewing food and breathing, it would be nothing for that hyung to subdue you. His grip strength and muscle strength are even better than professional athletes.”
Eungyo was famous for setting the highest records for three consecutive years in the physical fitness tests during high school, beating even the school’s soccer and basketball players.
Running, pull-ups, sit-ups, and so on. There’s no way someone like that couldn’t push away Seonwoo, who seems to have no muscles except for his sphincter.
“That’s right, isn’t it?”
At Seonwoo’s anecdote implying he had been thrown once before, Seyoon thought about asking if he was really thrown, but he didn’t bother to say it out loud. It’s fine as long as he didn’t die.
“Then, it won’t go to court, right?”
“Well, not criminally, but you still need to get forgiveness first.”
What Seonwoo did might be difficult to prosecute criminally, but civilly, there’s enough material to fill ten bundles of dried yellow corvina. If Eungyo decides to make an issue of everything from high school until now, forget yellow corvina, it’s a sweet potato field. It’s an endless string of issues.
So Seyoon seriously advised him to resolve this situation first, before Eungyo really gets determined and sues him for 10 years of stalking behavior.
“Anyway, even if hyung doesn’t forgive you, beg sincerely. If possible, record it all on video. That can be a mitigating factor in court too. And even if not for that, haven’t you caused quite a lot of trouble so far? It’s only because it’s Eungyo-hyungthat he’s let it slide, if it were me, I would have sued you long ago.”
In that sense, Eungyo-hyung is really a bodhisattva, Seyoon added, and Seonwoo strongly agreed. Not just a bodhisattva, but a living Buddha. No, even a piece of Buddha wouldn’t be able to endure that much.
Even his own older brother said, “If I were that person, I would have run you over with a car,” when he saw the video of him causing trouble.
“Okay. It seems you understood quicker today, so we’re done. Dismissed. You can go now. I have to go to a morning meeting now.”
After checking the time on his wristwatch, Seyoon stood up, and Seonwoo, following suit, started to move, still wobbling.
While Seonwoo was crossing the cafe at an almost crawling speed, Seyoon quickly cleared the cups and left the cafe, ignoring Seonwoo who was walking like a newborn goat, and went to the front of the building to catch a taxi.
That too was a kind of instinct. As someone who had long played the role of Seonwoo’s guardian, or rather, supervisor.
Once again affirming that one should make friends wisely, Seyoon opened the back door of the taxi, told the destination first, and then put Seonwoo in.
Still with muscle pain, Seonwoo climbed into the back seat of the taxi slower than usual, and after he finally settled in and fastened his seatbelt, Seyoon left a final instruction.
“For now, go home and rest a bit, then call Eungyo-hyungin the afternoon and apologize properly.”
“…”
“Then, go.”
“You go in too.”
After saying goodbye and closing the door, Seyoon stepped back and the car slowly started to move. Sitting in the car that moved smoothly without noise or vibration, Seonwoo started to blink slowly.
When he came out, he was so shocked that he was wide awake, but after meeting Seyoon, the tension was released. Perhaps because of that, drowsiness washed over him. It was an unusually warm sunny day. Feeling the cozy sunlight gently caressing his whole body, Seonwoo slowly closed his eyes.
And he fell into a very deep sleep.
****
