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letsnotdoanything · 3 months

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❧ word count: 26.7k ❧ warnings: cursing, VERY suggestive/innuendous, reader teases mark a lot playfully but he’s a shy loserboy so the banter is not usually returned and it might come across as a bit excessive/mean sometimes but it’s their version of flirting i promise, blasphemous usage of the word MILF ❧ genre: fluff, strangers to lovers, modern magical creatures au, basilisk mark, sphinx reader, age gap (older reader), college student mark, career woman reader, ft. various magical neos, human renjun, human johnny (and other very special guest appearances), same universe as strawberry sunday ❧ extra info: this work is set in the same universe as strawberry sunday but can be read as a standalone! there is no continuing plotline between fics in this universe, they simply take place in the same world/magic system and may have overlapping characters (neos may pop up in more than one work!) ❧ author’s note: this one is definitely not going to be for everyone i think. but! i had fun with it. it’s got me exploring a lot of new stuff in it: writing for mark, writing this kind of relationship dynamic, figuring out what sphinxes are like in this universe, and some new characters (gasp!) so i had a ball. which of course means the word count is obscene lol. anyway enjoy the (probably) last installment of the strawbsunday universe. i’m not going to call this the official end bc i had so much fun with these characters that i could totally see myself coming back, but as of now this is all i have planned! thank you all for tagging along and i hope you're looking forward to what’s next!

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ explore the strawberry sunday universe more here!

“You—” Jisung was cut off by Chenle.

“Totally fucked our neighbor! I always knew you were a MILF hunter, Mark Lee—” Chenle’s voice was getting louder and louder, and you were sure that at this point you might not have even needed magical hearing to discern their words.

Friday night. After a long week of work, you finally could relax, order some food, make yourself a drink, kick your feet up, and just have a nice quiet night to yourself. Reclined on your couch in your comfiest silk robe, you brought your glass to your lips as you flicked through some options for what to watch. With delight, you realized that a drama you’d been watching had released a new episode. You’d barely clicked play and settled in when the raucous sounds of hooting, hollering, and electronic shooting and smashing penetrated through your living room wall. Sighing to yourself, you paused your show and stood up to walk over to the wall that your TV hung from, which you shared with your next-door neighbors.

A few months ago—at the beginning of the local university’s fall semester, you figured—two college kids had moved in next door to you. You liked Chenle and Jisung just fine; they were polite whenever you saw them in the hallway or elevator, sometimes if Jisung saw you carrying heavy groceries, the dragon would offer to help you bring them in, and while some people may not be thrilled to have a fairy next door, you knew that a lot of your neighbors felt the same way about you, so you didn’t hold that against Chenle. All in all, they weren’t the worst people to live next to. Except for when their other rambunctious college friends came over for video game nights. They didn’t always seem aware of the noise levels. Thankfully, they were quick to make adjustments as soon as you made them aware. Another reason that you didn’t mind living next door to them, despite the occasional loudness.

You banged your fist against the wall a couple times. It was almost immediately followed by a distant ‘Oh shit!’ and the hasty lowering of their video game volume. A young man’s voice then came through the wall much clearer, as if he were just on the other side from you.

“Sorry!” It sounded like Jisung. You didn’t respond, instead plopping back down onto your couch and playing your show again. No need to have a shouting match through the wall and disturb everybody else in the building. They continued their video games at a constant, but much quieter hum for the rest of the evening, and you puttered around through your streaming services until you deemed your night over.

After putting your leftovers away in your fridge, you were about to head off to your bedroom when you heard the distant shuffle of footsteps over your welcome mat. You paused at the threshold of your kitchen to your living room, waiting to see if whoever it was would actually ring the doorbell, or just keep… well, it sounded like they were pacing anxiously. Finally, there were a couple soft taps on your front door. If you were a human, you weren’t sure if you would have even heard that. Your footsteps were soft across your carpeted floor as you moved to answer the door. First looking out the peephole, your interest was piqued when you saw a young man standing there who was neither Chenle nor Jisung. Though you did have an idea of exactly what this was about.

Undoing your deadbolt, latch, then disarming the alarm, you opened the door just enough for you to cross your arms over your chest and lean against the doorframe. “I accept apologies in the form of cash or groveling.”

“Huh?” The young man stared at you wide-eyed, open-mouthed, and dumb-founded. You took note of his slit pupils, and the two fangs that hadn’t yet fully descended from his top jaw. Huh, basilisk.

“Did the boys not send you over here to be the sacrificial lamb?” You cocked your head and looked him up and down perhaps too obviously, as he shifted nervously under your gaze. A very timid basilisk at that. You eyed the oversized t-shirt he had on that had the same university logo that you’d often seen your neighbors wearing. “You are one of Chenle and Jisung’s friends, right?”

“Oh, y-yeah, I am. I’m Mark. Mark Lee.” He took one of his hands out from where he’d stuffed them into the pockets of his joggers, wiped it on the leg of said joggers, and held it out to you. As he got close enough to shake your hand, you could finally smell him. Sphinx noses weren’t as sensitive as werewolves’ or vampires’—or basilisk tongues for that matter. Not to mention that basilisks just didn’t have as strong of a scent as most other beings. They had a mild, earthen smell that reminded you of peat freshly after rain. Others tended to make less favorable comparisons such as damp caverns or even mildewy caves, but those ideas never occurred to you. Maybe it was because one of your own childhood best friends was a basilisk, so you were just used to the smell and had positive memories associated with it.

You couldn’t conceal the amusement on your face as you delicately shook his hand, now very aware of his clammy palms. “It’s nice to meet you, Mark, I’m Y/N. Now if they didn’t send you over with your big brown eyes and sweet face in an attempt to distract me from the ruckus you all were making earlier, then why are you on my doorstep?”

“Wait, you can look at my eyes?” There was a noticeable drag on his s’es when he spoke, which you noted with a certain fondness. He must be young enough to have missed most, if not all, of the mandatory speech therapy that the basilisks of your cohort and before went through during primary and secondary school. It was removed from the curriculum for being unfair and prejudiced against the creatures, but that was after your time. You could remember your friend Jongin being singled out to leave class three times a week for the “therapy.” Even now he could still recall the name of the instructor who led it, his voice filling with bitter vitriol on the rare occasions he’d choose to talk about it.

“I’m a sphinx, honey. You couldn’t petrify me if you tried,” you informed Mark knowingly. Now you were curious as to why he was out and about without magical eye protection or at least non-magical sunglasses if he was apparently so worried about petrifying people. But, not curious enough to divert you from your original mission. “Now, why are you here?”

“O-Oh, right, uhm, I’m really sorry for bothering you, ma’am, it’s just that I went to go get something from my car but then I realized that I forgot my keys in their apartment and I came back up to get them but I locked myself out. My phone’s in the apartment too, and I tried knocking but they’re not answering and—”

“They fell asleep in the two minutes you were gone?” You cut him off, raising your eyebrows slightly in disbelief.

“No, no, they were already asleep. You see, uhm, I’m crashing on their couch tonight and—”

“Got it, got it.” You nodded. Well, that explains the lack of sunglasses. They were also presumably locked in the apartment. “So, what do you want from me?”

“Can I borrow your phone really quick, just to try to call them and see if they’ll pick up? Again, I’m really, really sorry about this.”

“I will actually do you one better, Mark.” You did a small shooing gesture, and he seemed to get the idea, taking a couple steps back. Once he was off of your welcome mat, you lifted up the corner and grabbed the key that was sitting under there. You held it out to him. “Here.”

“Uh—”

“It’s their spare key, not mine.” You reassured him. “When they moved in, they asked if they could hide it under my mat because it would be too obvious to burglars for their spare key to be under their mat.”

“O-Oh.” Mark gingerly took the key from you. “Thank you, ma’am.”

“Mark, one more thing.”

“Anything!” He blurted out, then his entire face flushed as he scrambled to tone it down. “I mean, y-yeah, of course, ma’am, what do you need?”

You couldn’t help but smirk as you requested, “Stop calling me ma’am.”

“Right, sorry.”

“You can call me Y/N.”

“O-Okay!” The basilisk smiled at you brightly, another flash of his not-yet fully developed baby fangs. He presumably was only a year or so out from his first molting. They were cute. He was... cute.

“Goodnight, Mark.” You stepped back and grabbed the edge of your door, preparing to close it.

“Goodnight, Y/N.”

His eyes didn’t leave you the entire time as you shut the door. Curious, you peered out your peephole. Mark flicked his forked snake tongue out in the air once before he made his way over to your neighbors’ door. The boys had a corner apartment, meaning that despite the two apartments sharing a wall, their door was actually perpendicular to yours, so you could see it from your peephole. You watched Mark unlock the apartment, then dart back over to yours and bend over to lift up your mat. You froze, not expecting him to immediately return the key. You figured he’d just give it back to his friends in the morning. He paused after he’d put the key under the mat again, tongue once more testing the air. You held your breath, waiting for a paralyzing one, two seconds before he finally left again. You didn’t relax fully until the boys’ apartment door had closed behind him, though. You wanted to hit yourself. What were you even nervous about? A grown woman being caught standing by your own apartment door? By some random college kid? Ridiculous. You scoffed, doing up your locks, latches, and alarm again.

“Hi, Ms. Y/N.” “Hi, Ms. Y/N.”

Chenle and Jisung gave you two very polite nods as they passed you in the hallway heading out of the building at the same time that you were coming home from work. It had been a couple weeks since their last video game night when you’d had your unexpected visitor, which was also the last time you’d seen or heard a peep from either of your young neighbors. You figured they’d been keeping an extra-low profile out of guilt.

You smiled back at them genuinely. “Hi, boys.”

The third figure behind them looked at you with wide eyes, and you arched an eyebrow curiously at him, a silent challenge.

“H-Hi, Y/N.” To his credit, Mark’s voice didn’t crack at all, despite the stutter.

“Hi, Mark,” you practically purred his name, not slowing down in the slightest as you continued your path to your front door. You bit your bottom lip to keep from laughing as you heard the fervent whispered back and forth of the college students behind you.

“Dude, what the fuck?” Jisung hissed at Mark.

“Yeah, what the fuck is wrong with you?” Chenle concurred.

“What?” Mark shot back quietly.

You arrived at your apartment door at the end of the hall, still well within earshot for you. Opening up your purse to fetch your keys, you unhurriedly flipped through every key on your keyring.

“You—” Jisung was cut off by Chenle.

“Dude!” Mark snapped, and you heard the sound of what you were pretty sure was the basilisk slapping a hand over the fairy’s mouth. “She can totally hear us!”

You raised a hand above your head and, without turning around, waved it. “Hey, boys. Sphinx, remember?”

“Sorry, Ms. Y/N!” Jisung called out down the hall to you, and you could picture his sheepish face in that moment. You went to actually unlock your apartment now, pushing the door open.

“Sorry!” Mark apologized too, as you had stepped into your home.

You just caught his eye and a glimpse of his pink ears as you turned around to disable your alarm next to the closing door. In the moment before the gap shut all the way, you winked at him.

Humming along to the music playing from your phone, you touched up your work makeup to make it a little more ‘nighttime’ and swapped out your studs for some more flashy going-out dangly earrings. You’d already changed into a much less corporate outfit for your night out with your friends that you had planned and were just putting the finishing touches on before you had to leave in a few minutes. You’d just finished up with your hair and makeup when you swore you heard a knock at your front door. Pausing your music to stick your head out of your bathroom, you listened more carefully. Yeah, there were definitely footsteps at your front door, and it didn’t sound like a delivery person dropping a package off and leaving. In fact, it sounded like someone pacing nervously. A very familiar shuffle, if you weren’t mistaken.

Already bemused, you took long strides through your apartment to get to your front door, deftly unlocking it. And sure enough, when you so confidently swung it open without peeking through the peephole first, your instincts had of course been right. Mark Lee was standing on the other side, shifting his weight nervously from foot to foot. His gaze immediately snapped up to you, and you barely contained your amusement at how his jaw literally dropped when he took in what you were wearing.

“Hello, Mark,” you greeted him, once more leaning against your doorway. It had been a few weeks since you’d last seen him, and you could only guess why he was knocking on your door again.

You could see him blink himself out of a trance, running a hand through his hair, knocking the hood of his forest green hoodie off his head in the process. “Hi, Y/N. How-How are you?”

“I’m well, thank you. How about you?”

“Good! I’m good.”

“So… What brings you to my doorstep again? You know where the boys’ key is.” You pointed to the welcome mat underneath his sneakers.

“Oh, Chenle and Jisung aren’t even home right now,” he said off-handedly. “I didn’t come to see them.”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah. I uhm, I wanted to ask you something.”

“Mark…” You said his name calmly, but with a hint of warning. Truly, this was your fault. You’d been having too much fun and let this get out of hand, and now you were going to have to let this sweet boy down easy before he started something he couldn’t finish. And you’d had such a good relationship with your neighbors so far, too. Maybe he’d be too embarrassed to tell them. One could only hope.

Mark’s ears were getting redder by the second. “Sorry, I know you’re probably too busy but— Could you maybe help me with my abilities?”

Well, that certainly wasn’t what you were expecting. Shoving away the strange twinge of disappointment in your chest, you reminded him, “I’m not a basilisk. I’m not even reptile adjacent at all. Sphinxes are part-lion, part-eagle.”

“I know, I just thought that, you know, sphinxes develop your powers later, right? You’re not born with them.”

“Right…”

“Basilisks too. I just thought that, I don’t know, maybe you’d be able to at least give me some advice?” He immediately shook his head at himself. “I’m sorry, you don’t even know me, I’ll just—”

“Hold on, Mark.” You went to stop him from leaving entirely. While you weren’t fully convinced, this at least wasn’t a conversation to be having on your doorstep. You had better manners than to leave the poor boy on your doormat. You stepped back from your door, opening it wider. “Here, come in.”

“O-Okay.” He obliged, walking into your apartment. “Thank you.” He stood awkwardly just a couple steps past the front door, looking around your living room hesitantly.

“Do you want something to drink? Water? Tea?” You offered, hoping it would calm him down. He looked so tense that you were a little worried about his blood pressure. “Unfortunately I don’t have any Red Bulls or whatever college boys sustain themselves on.”

“Oh, uh, no thank you. I actually don’t drink energy drinks or any of that stuff.” He shook his head, his nose wrinkling. “Tastes too… too much.”

“Hm…” You filled up a glass of water for yourself, and an extra for Mark anyway. He was your guest, after all. You sat back in your spot in the corner of your couch, putting one of the glasses down on your coffee table for him. You took a sip of the other. When Mark was still rooted to the same spot a couple seconds later, you gestured to the other two-thirds of the piece of furniture. “You can sit, my couch won’t come to life and swallow you whole, you know.”

“Right, sorry.” He laughed, looking down at his feet as he walked over and sat on the opposite end from you. Or, as far to the opposite end as he could get. You had several throw pillows on that side. He still looked nervous, refusing to meet your gaze as his eyes flicked around your living room skittishly.

“I’m also not going to swallow you whole.”

“Of course, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Mark picked up the glass of water that he had told you he didn’t want, this time looking you in the eye as he gave you an anxious smile before bringing the drink up to his lips.

“Not unless you ask nicely.”

He immediately spat the drink of water he’d just taken back out into his cup as he coughed and choked, and you covered your own mouth as you giggled, not wanting to outright laugh in the poor boy’s face.

“I’m sorry, Mark, that was mean of me.” You patted his knee, then quickly took your hand back. You really were just trying to reassure him. “Now, you came in for a real reason, not just for me to tease you. Go ahead.”

Having finally recovered, he set his water back down on the table to talk. “Y-Yeah, right. Uhm… So, basilisks don’t start developing their powers until they’ve gone through their first molting. Mine was a year and a half ago and honestly my life has kind of been one big shit show ever since.”

“Basilisk powers aren’t all they were cracked up to be?”

“I first partially petrified my human roommate last spring and now I have to wear sunglasses around him all the time or God forbid I’m going to actually turn him to stone one of these days. I accidentally compel him, too, like all the time, and he refuses to let our witch friends make any sort of protection charm for him.”

“He wants to get petrified and compelled?”

“No, he doesn’t want me to think he’s afraid of me. But I’m afraid of what I’m going to do to him. I feel like I can barely be in our apartment except to sleep.” Mark rubbed a hand over his face, visibly stressed and upset now. “Dude definitely knows I’m avoiding him but… I don’t know what I’d do with myself if I actually hurt Johnny.”

“Well first you’re not going to punish yourself over something you haven’t even done. That’s not going to do anything for you or your friend,” you told him firmly.

“Hmph,” he chuckled cynically.

“You don’t know any basilisks that could help you? Your parents? Friends?” You suggested gently. He clearly did need help, but you weren’t going to be his best option. “They might be a bit more useful than me.”

“My parents live five hours away. Not exactly a day trip. And I don’t know any other basilisks at school. My friends have all been supportive but useless. They’re either human or have been using their powers since before they could talk.”

You sighed and nodded in understanding. “I know what you mean. It’s like puberty all over again. A magical growth spurt but instead of suddenly losing all body awareness, growing four inches, and having hormones making your brain all fuzzy, you’re trying to gain an awareness on some new part of yourself you didn’t have before, you’re teething like a giant toddler, and have magic making your brain all fuzzy.”

“Yes, the teething! God, I thought I was crazy!” Mark groaned, vindication and relief all over his face at having someone else validate what’s been happening to him. His features then turned confused. “Wait, sphinxes don’t have fangs, do you?”

You grabbed your top lip to pull it up, at the same time letting your second set of teeth descend.

“Wow…” He breathed out, watching you as you tucked them back into your jaw.

“Lion canines. Retractable, thankfully.” You let go of your lip and closed your mouth, habitually running your tongue over your normal teeth. Sphinxes still didn’t have perfectly average human teeth as their first set of teeth, they were much sharper, with a greater number of human canines. But you much preferred your first set anyway, they were the ones you grew up with, and were a lot less cumbersome than a full set of lion canines, incisors, and carnassials. All the second set was really good for was a party trick. Not that you really went to those anymore; you’d been out of college for years now.

“Have you ever met another sphinx before me, Mark?” You asked.

“W-What do you mean?”

“You knew that sphinxes get our powers later in life, but you didn’t know about our second set of teeth. I don’t know, your knowledge is a little... inconsistent.”

He rubbed the back of his neck nervously. “Well... my friend Renjun, he’s a Magical Creatures Studies major. He goes on all these tangents all the time. I kind of zone in and out.”

“So you haven’t met another sphinx, but you were listening when your friend was talking about sphinxes getting their powers later in life, but you completely missed the part about lion teeth.” You ticked every detail off on your fingers to make sure you had it straight.

“Yeah...”

You burst into laughter again, watching as the pink that had persisted on the tips of his ears spread down to his cheeks. “Sorry, sorry, I’m not laughing at you.”

“It sure feels like it,” he mumbled, but you caught sight of a bashful smile on his lips as he stared down at his lap.

“I mean, I am laughing, but it’s just— you’re just— you’re very endearing, Mark,” you tried to explain to him. “I’m being endeared right now— It’s a good thing, just take it as a compliment, okay?”

“Sure, I’ll take it as a compliment.” He nodded. “From now on, when you laugh at something stupid and embarrassing I do or say, I’ll take it as a compliment.”

You chuckled, “You’re funny, you know that?”

“You’re the first person who’s ever told me that,” he admitted, looking up from his hands to you. “You know that?”

“Wait, seriously?” Your smile faded.

“No, but you believed me, didn’t you?” The basilisk snickered.

“Oh, hey!” You retorted indignantly. “Not fair! You had me feeling bad for you this whole time with the sob story about your powers! You can’t just—” But Mark had already devolved into a fit of giggles, and you knew he was too far gone for your argument to hold any water. Instead, you watched him fondly as you realized that this was the most relaxed he’d been around you. As he started collecting himself, you took one more sip of your water, then set it down on the coffee table. “Alright, so what’s your class schedule?”

Mark stared at you wide-eyed. “Huh?”

“I can’t guarantee results of any kind, but I’ll do my best to teach you what I know at least.”

“Really?!” He seemed shocked that his own plan had worked.

“It’s not going to be a one-and-done, I can tell you that much. So, what’s your schedule?” You reiterated your question. “I get off work at five every day and have yoga Tuesdays and Thursdays. So you better be available on a Monday or Wednesday.”

“Wait, what’s wrong with Friday?”

“You may have endeared me, but not enough to give up my Friday nights.”

"Of course, right. Uh, Wednesdays should be the best for me. My last class is over at three and I usually don’t get scheduled then since it’s so late in the day.”

“Where do you work that 3:00 in the afternoon is late?”

“Campus bookstore. Closes at 5:00.”

“Gotcha. So, I will see you here, next Wednesday at 6:00.” You could see panic grow in Mark’s eyes as you started to stand up.

“W-Why not now?”

“Because I have other plans, Mark,” you told him patiently. “I’ll keep Wednesdays for you in the future, but tonight I have somewhere to be. You and Johnny have survived this long, I believe that you’ll be able to survive one more week, okay?”

He got to his feet with a sigh. “You’re right, I’m sorry. Thank you, Y/N. Seriously.”

“Don’t thank me yet.” You started guiding him toward your front door. “Who knows, I might make it worse.”

“I doubt it could get any worse.”

“I am so sorry I’m late,” you breathed out as you sat down at the restaurant booth where your friends were waiting.

“That’s okay, Y/N!” Baekhyun reassured you, pushing a glass over to you. “Here, we got you a water. We didn’t know what you were going to get to eat, so we didn’t want to order a drink-drink.”

“You’re not usually late,” Minseok, another sphinx, pointed out from across the table from you and your siren friend.

“Yeah, is everything alright?” Jongin asked from his seat beside Minseok. You especially noticed now how his s’es weren’t as pronounced as Mark’s, but at least some of his natural sibilance had come back once he got out of that speech “therapy.”

You let out a sigh, dropping your head back against the booth. “I had an unexpected visitor.”

“Ooh, do tell.” Baekhyun’s opalescent scales that sat just under the skin of his cheekbones, bridge of his nose, and forehead shifted with the inquisitive tilt of his head.

“Nothing scandalous, I assure you,” you snorted. “Just some friend of my neighbors, you know, the college kids—”

“A college boy? Y/N, you cougar!” The siren exclaimed, and you rolled your eyes.

“Are you done?”

“Yes, continue.”

“I mean, his friends did indirectly call me a MILF, but I don’t know if I should take that a compliment or an insult really.”

Minseok and Jongin guffawed at that while Baekhyun’s face lit up with delight. He smushed your cheeks in between his hands. “Oh, I’m so proud of you! My baby’s all grown up! No longer a baby but a MILF!”

“At least to a bunch of college boys,” Minseok pointed out, grabbing his glass that looked like it was filled with some dark liquor. Whiskey, maybe. He always liked to mix it up. “Don’t let it get you too down, Y/N, they probably think anybody above human drinking age is middle-aged.”

“Let it get her down?” Baekhyun scoffed indignantly. “You’re clearly missing three-quarters of the acronym here, Minseok!”

“Guys!” You cut into their bickering. “I don’t particularly care one, how old they think I am, or two, how fuckable they think I am.”

“Then why was one of them over at your place and making you late to our dinner?” Jongin arched a brow, taking a drink of what you knew was a glass of witch’s brew and tonic water. Basilisk tongues were extremely sensitive to taste, so regular alcohol was out of the question for him. Witch’s brew on the other hand was the perfect solution, with no burn and a pleasant, light, flowery taste. Almost too perfect of a solution, as you’d carried him home absolutely shitfaced drunk from plenty of parties after he discovered it in high school. Thankfully he’d both built up a tolerance and learned to pace himself and drink responsibly since then, so you hadn’t had to do that in years.

“Because I kind of just agreed to sort of... mentor him?”

“Huh?” Baekhyun tilted his head to the other side.

“Why?” The sphinx snorted and took another swig of his drink.

Jongin just stared at you wordlessly. Shifting forward in your seat, you prepared yourself to try to explain it. “Long story short, he needs help with his powers, and he thinks I can help him.”

“So he’s a sphinx,” Minseok surmised.

“Well, no...”

“Gryphon that was abandoned as a child and never learned how to fly?”

“What? No.”

“Sorry, that’s just literally the only thing that makes sense other than him being another sphinx.”

“No, he’s a... he’s a basilisk.” You crossed your arms over your chest, already prepared for the backlash from your friends over your choice.

“Then give him to Jongin.”

The basilisk scoffed, “I did not come out tonight to be given some kid. No thanks.”

Minseok gestured to him to emphatically. “See? If Jongin’s not worried, the kid’s probably not that big of a danger to society. No need to help. Which you wouldn’t be able to do anyway, because you’re not a basilisk.”

You held your hands up defensively. “Look, I told him I might not be any help, but—”

“But he was just sooo cute with his widdle forked tongue and shedding molting skin all over your couch that you couldn’t say no?” Minseok retorted, making Baekhyun burst into laughter.

“I’m right here, man,” Jongin muttered, taking another sip of his drink.

“No!” You replied indignantly over both Minseok and Baekhyun’s unrestrained laughter at your expense. “He had an actual reason! He pointed out that sphinxes and basilisks develop their powers similarly. We both are born as supernatural creatures, instead of being turned like vampires, but we get our powers later in life, unlike most creatures like sirens, or fairies, or dragons.”

While Jongin actually seemed to be considering the argument, Minseok and Baekhyun still both had disbelieving looks on their faces. The siren composed himself again to ask, “Sure... yeah. But be honest... was he at least a wittle cute?”

You narrowed your eyes at him.

“I mean, there’s a reason we don’t let you near the animal shelter, Y/N,” Minseok reminded you. “You’d adopt everything in there and never get your security deposit back.”

“I told him it might not work. It won’t hurt to just try,” you huffed.

“Just don’t let him tear up your curtains.” Baekhyun patted your shoulder.

The next Wednesday finally rolled around, and you went through your day at work with the thought of your impending guest lingering in your mind. Or, more specifically, what the hell you were going to teach him. It had been on your mind all week. You jotted down what you were first taught when you got your sphinx powers, which was mostly a lot of breathing. Probably not really what he was looking for, but it was the best you got. It sounded like he didn’t even have much of a foundation, which he needed before you could do anything close to actual compelling or petrification—or preventing such.

Locking your front door behind you, you set your purse down and made a beeline for your bedroom to change out of your work clothes into something casual and comfortable. Mark had already seen you in your pajamas once, you weren’t trying to make any impressions here. You tidied up your living room a little, moving a couple dirty pieces of clothes into your bedroom hamper, then took care of your dishes from breakfast this morning that you hadn’t cleaned before leaving for work. All those miscellaneous tasks took up your time nicely, as just as you had finished wiping down your kitchen countertops, you picked up a familiar squeak of sneakers rushing down the hallway. Glancing up at the clock on your microwave, it struck 6:00 p.m. at the exact moment your doorbell rang.

You tossed your used paper towel in the trash before walking over to the front door. Mark was on the other side, the basilisk panting heavily, panic on his face. Before you could even greet him, he blurted out, “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! I hope I’m not late! I’m here! Please! I was studying, and lost track of time, please, I’m really sorry, Y/N!”

“Woah, Mark, slow down,” you said calmly. “You’re right on time. It’s okay. Please, come in.”

Holding the door open and stepping back, you beckoned him in with a reassuring smile. He let out a sigh of relief, walking in with his head down, eyes focused on his shoes. You got the two of you settled on the floor of your living room, sitting cross-legged facing each other.

“Okay, so today we’re really just going to be—” You were cut off by the sound of a stomach growling very loudly. And it wasn’t yours.

Mark ducked his head in embarrassment. “I’m sorry! Keep going! Just-Just ignore that.”

“You hungry, Mark?”

“Sorry—”

“Did I ask for an apology?”

“No.”

“Then why are you apologizing?” You asked gently.

“Right. Uhm, I had classes and then a meeting with a professor and then I was studying and I’m pretty sure I haven’t eaten since breakfast. I didn’t want to be late…”

You shook your head. “Well, you can’t do this on an empty stomach.”

“I’m—”

“I’m putting a moratorium on the word ‘sorry’ for tonight. You’re done. You’ve hit your max.” You stood up, heading towards your kitchen. “Come on, let’s get some food in you.”

“Okay…”

You rummaged through your fridge to bring out the ingredients for the dinner that you were planning to make tonight after Mark left. Looks like you were going to be moving dinner up. “I don’t know what kind of gourmet meals you’re used to, but don’t expect anything fancy out of my kitchen,” you forewarned him in jest, turning on the stovetop.

That finally got a smile out of him. “Better than the dining hall, I’m sure. And, you really don’t have to—”

“It’s fine. Think of it like this: Would you go on a run, or go to the gym without eating anything? Magic needs energy too, just like exercise.”

“I never realized that.” Mark’s stomach let out another growl then, making the basilisk rub the back of his very red neck, and you smiled quietly to yourself.

“And, I don’t think either one of us could focus much with your stomach rumbling like that.”

Dinner was pulled together quickly, and you took it to your dining table. Pushing aside your laptop to give you enough room to set your plate down, you headed back to your kitchen. “Mark?” You called for his attention as you opened your glasses cabinet. “Water? Wine? Beer? I think I might have a Coke in the back if you want that.”

“Water’s fine.”

You nodded, filling up his glass of ice water before grabbing a beer for yourself and heading back to where the basilisk was waiting for you.

“Thank you.” Mark accepted the cup from you. “Really, this is great.”

“You’re welcome.” You popped open the tab of your can and held it out towards him. He tapped his glass to it, and you grinned, taking a sip before picking up your utensils to start eating.

As you watched Mark dig in eagerly, you felt a warm fondness in your chest for the basilisk in front of you. You wracked your brain for the last time you’d cooked for someone else. Whoever your last boyfriend was, you figured. It was funny, you couldn’t even remember a specific instance, that was just a guess. You and your friends usually ate out, ordered in, or there was the odd occasion that Jongin would host a dinner party and you all would get dressed up to go over to his penthouse—he’d done the best out of all of you, he owned a luxury clothing brand and definitely lived like it. So as you sat here, watching the college student in front of wolf down the simple meal you’d just made for him like it was the best thing he’d ever tasted, you felt the sides of your lips upquirk just the slightest. You lifted another bite to your mouth and took another swig of your beer.

“So what’s your major?” You asked, and he finally looked up at you. It took everything in you not to immediately giggle and coo at his slightly bulging cheeks.

He quickly swallowed the food in his mouth and drank some water before answering your question. “Bio… pre-med track.”

“Wow. Human medicine or magical creatures?”

“Both. Doctors should want to help everyone.” Mark had a scowl on his face as he stabbed a piece of food with his fork.

“Good point. When do you graduate?”

“Next spring. One more year.” He took a deep breath, then let out a big sigh. “After this semester. Then med school… If I don’t catch an attempted murder charge for petrifying Johnny first.”

You looked down at his empty plate, then your half-full one. “Let’s see what we can do about that, then. You want seconds?”

“Please?”

You couldn’t help but chuckle at his big, pleading eyes. “Of course, go for it.”

Back on your living room floor sat cross-legged after dinner, you started where you left off before getting interrupted by the basilisk’s growling stomach. “Tonight won’t be anything big and showy. From what you’ve told me, you don’t even have a foundation. We need that first.”

“A foundation?” The basilisk questioned.

“The times that you’ve accidentally petrified or compelled Johnny, did you feel anything?”

“Horrible and guilty and like a terrible person and that I was a danger to other people.”

You shook your head. “I meant— Did you feel any different physically? On the inside? Or in your body? Not like, ashamed or embarrassed. Not emotionally.”

His face screwed up as he tried to think. “No?”

“That’s what I mean. You can’t even feel when you’re using your magic. Your powers are a part of you, but right now they’re functioning completely separate from you. We need to work on you being able to feel your magic at all before getting around to doing anything with it.”

“And how do I do that?”

“We’re going to go through some guided breathing techniques that I did when I first got my powers, and see how those work, okay?”

“Okay. Uhm, first, though…”

You looked at him attentively. “Yes, Mark?”

“Do you think you could show me your-your heliokinesis?”

“Asked your friend to finish his lecture on sphinxes, huh?” You snickered, twisting around to crack your back.

“Yeah, I mean—”

“It’s fine. Good move, considering. We just don’t call it that.”

“Oh. What is it called?”

“Heliokinesis is the academic word for the general ability to control solar energy, you weren’t wrong. A few different beings can do it. Witches, with the right tools or spells; some fairies; phoenixes at the zenith of their life right before they’re reborn; dryads to a smaller degree; and sphinxes. Us sphinxes call it sol-channeling.”

“Got it. Could you show me some? Sol-channeling? If that’s okay?”

Looking out the window, you saw that there were still remnants of the sunset glowing outside. “Sure, there’s still enough light out.”

The basilisk sat up straight, eagerly drinking in every move you made and every word you said.

“Now, we can only channel, manipulate, and shape existing solar energy that’s available. We can’t create solar energy. So once the Sun is down, that’s it,” you explained, raising your hand towards a beam of orange sunlight that was illuminating a square of carpet in front of you.

Delicately, you plucked the light right out of the air and into your palm, feeling the warmth against your skin as the square melted into a puddle of gleaming liquid amber in your cupped hand. The boy across from you gasped softly as you raised your hand up slightly to pour the sunlight into your other palm like sand at the beach. Tossing it up into the air, it turned into splatters in the empty space between your faces, like an abstract art painting. The deep terracotta light washed Mark’s delighted features in a heavenly glow as he watched it hover there in awe. Like wiping a chalkboard, you took the light back down into your hands again, then gestured for Mark to hold his out. “Come on.”

“A-Are you sure?” He looked between you and the apricot heavens that you were holding uncertainly.

“Yes. I won’t let anything happen to you, Markie. Promise.” You pushed your hands towards him again, insistent. “Now come on, before the sun sets completely and I have to send it back.”

“Alright, alright.” He put his hands out in the space between you, palms cupped together. You placed yours just above them, parting your own palms so that the sunlight fell down into his waiting hands. It had already been tempered, so you weren’t worried about it burning him. Instead, you just got to watch him breathe out in absolute stunned awe as he gently rolled around his little puddle of sunshine. “Dude…” His eyes were glued to his hands. “This is officially the coolest fucking thing I’ve ever seen. And done.”

You laughed. “I’m honored. A bit skeptical, but honored.”

“My powers aren’t cool. They’re just something else that can go horribly wrong,” he sighed, continuing to watch the light in his hands.

Looking outside at the fading sunbeams, you held a hand back out towards him. “I need to send it back. The Sun’s almost gone.”

Mark gently tipped the golden energy back into your waiting palm. You closed your hand around it, focusing on allowing the light to return to its natural state, before opening your fingers. A soft ball of pure, hazy light drifted up from your hand, before shooting out your living room window to rejoin the setting Sun.

“So that’s sol-channeling...” The basilisk murmured.

“One facet of it, yeah,” you nodded.

“It’s beautiful.”

You tilted your head as you took in the pensive look on Mark’s face. Turning back around to fully face him, you could only guess where his thoughts had spiraled to.

“And destructive. Before I could do that, I would melt things, light things on fire, burn... hurt people. Things I can’t undo.” Your voice was quiet but firm, trying to get the point across to him in the most sympathetic way possible that he wasn’t alone in this. He wasn’t the only person to have ever struggled with powers, to have done things he wishes he could take back. “You have got to stop looking at your powers like a curse, and everybody else’s like a blessing. They’re neither. They’re just... they just are.”

The basilisk was quiet, turning his gaze from the carpet up to you. You held his eye contact, easily looking back into those slit pupils with sincerity. “Got it?” You asked.

“Got it.”

Trying not to make your breath of relief too obvious, you rolled out your neck as you focused back on what you’d really meant to start with tonight. “So, some breathing techniques for grounding. Again, we’re trying to build a foundation before anything else. Throughout all of these, I want you to try to reach out for your magic. I know this whole time you’ve been trying to avoid it, right? Trying not to hurt your friend?”

“Yeah.”

“You can’t hurt me, so don’t worry,” you flashed him a confident smile.

Mark sat up with interest at this. “I’ve always heard that sphinxes can’t be petrified by basilisks, and I always kind of thought it was just one of those things about our magic canceling each other out or whatever. Like how siren venom doesn’t work on other sirens. But then Renjun said that actually nobody’s powers work on you because you’ve got... he called it anti-magic, I don’t know if that’s right or...”

“Well that’s very dramatic,” you commented humorously. “‘Anti-magic.’ No, we call it nixing, or foiling. Like all of our powers, we don’t come into it until we’re adults, so technically magic does work on us for a period of time. It also fluctuates with our magical strength, like all beings’ powers. That’s why ‘anti-magic’ isn’t the best word, because it is magic. We can use it too much and get drained.”

“So there’s still a chance I could accidentally petrify you or something!” He panicked, his voice rising with fear.

“Mark, you’re not going to,” you said calmly. “Nixing is instinctual to me, like it is for any developed sphinx. That’s why your friend Renjun called it ‘anti-magic.’ Because it’ll seem like I’m not even doing anything, like your powers are just fizzling out on their own. I promise it’ll be fine. It would take me nixing a lot of very strong magic for a very long time to be drained anywhere near levels where my nixing could have even a chance of being weaker, much less not working at all. What we’re doing won’t even come close.”

He gulped. “Really?”

“Really. Let me worry about me and my powers.” You placed a hand over your chest. “You just work on finding your powers, wherever you’ve pushed them to in there.”

“You say that like I’ve got some big cavern inside of me or something,” he snorted skeptically. “Or this mind palace thing that Renjun always talks about.”

“If imagining something like that helps you, then sure.”

“I was joking.”

“This is magic, Mark. It’s a lot more abstract and metaphysical than whatever you’re learning in your bio classes.”

He groaned. “Oh great. I almost failed my philosophy class freshman year.”

“Good thing I’m not handing out grades, then. Come on, close your eyes. I’ll start a count.”

Mark had even less of a foundation than you did when you started out. At least your powers had been tied to your emotions at first—such as the case of a rather unfortunate car melting—meanwhile from what you could tell, his seemed to just happen randomly. When you tried to talk him through recalling how he felt in the moments leading up to when he actually used his powers, he couldn’t find any sort of common thread. The first time, he’d been startled by Johnny unexpectedly appearing around the corner in a clay face mask, but other times they’d be watching movies together, eating dinner, or playing basketball. It couldn’t be self-defense, fight or flight, or even just any strong emotion—one time Mark was scrolling on his phone practically catatonic, glanced up for one second and Johnny was on the floor.

Counting back down from the last breathing exercise you had prepared for the night, you stole a glance at the time. Between dinner and this, Mark had been at your place for almost three hours, that was plenty for one night. “Alright, Mark, let’s call it there for today,” you announced quietly, offering him a fleeting half-smile. “How are you feeling?”

“The same as when I got here. Well, less hungry, I guess,” he shrugged, blowing a couple pieces of hair out of his eyes. “Thanks, though. Sorry I ate your food then just wasted your time.”

“I told you it wasn’t going to be a one and done. I think the only one of us who expected you to come in here and immediately nail everything was you.”

“It’s not that I was expecting to nail everything… just sort of hoping I’d at least be able to do something? Other than breathe?”

You chuckled, “Yeah, that’s fair. Once you can feel your powers, it’ll be a lot different, I promise.”

“Different…” he echoed. “Not easier, or better?”

“Different,” you confirmed with a nod. “Unfortunately, it’s looking like we can’t use muscle memory to get there, which is how I was taught. Since there’s apparently nothing in common with how you’ve used your powers before. Other than—” With a thoughtful frown, you cut yourself off, quickly trying to recall all the stories Mark had told you tonight of him accidentally petrifying or compelling his roommate.

“Other than…?” The basilisk prompted you curiously.

“Have you used your powers on anybody other than Johnny?” You questioned. “Other human friends? Classmates? Random cashier at a grocery store?”

“Yeah, one time.”

“Tell me about it!”

“I don’t know if it really counts…”

“It’s an anomaly, it might help. Who was it? What happened?”

“It was Renjun.”

“Your Magical Creatures Studies major friend.”

“Exactly. He’s kind of got like this list of magical stuff that he wants to do? Like, getting his blood drank by a vampire, experiencing siren venom, that kind of stuff.”

“Getting petrified by a basilisk?”

“Yeah.”

“So you petrified him.”

“Not on purpose! Or, not on my purpose,” Mark groaned. “Renjun’s like actually insane when it comes to that kind of thing. Somehow, he figured out when he was most likely to get accidentally petrified by me and… it happened.”

“Mark.”

“I didn’t mean to!”

“You need to get Renjun’s notes,” you instructed him.

“What?”

“On how he got you to petrify him. If he’s that neurotic, he was definitely taking notes and found some sort of pattern, and probably kept his notes. We need those notes. Get them.”

He sighed and rubbed his face. “You don’t know Renjun. When I say he’s insane about this, I’m not kidding. There’s no way he’d—”

“Just a copy, he can keep the originals. He can come make the copies at my office so he doesn’t even have to use his printing credits at the library,” you bargained.

“Fine, fine! I’ll ask him.”

“Perfect! Here, if you give me your phone, I’ll put my number in and you can let me know what day I can expect him.” After inputting your cell and texting yourself, you handed Mark’s phone back to him, not missing his shaky fingers. You patted his hand, softening your voice, “We’ll figure this out, Mark, alright?”

“Why?” He looked up from where your hand was still resting atop his, to your face, gnawing on his bottom lip with his baby fangs. “Why did you agree to help me? Why are you doing it so… enthusiastically?”

“I’m helping you because you asked for help. And when I was your age, and I needed help doing all of this, too, I had somebody there with me. I don’t know, call me crazy, but I don’t think all of us are here just to go about our lives by ourselves. I think people are supposed to rely on each other, criss-cross their lives so much until you can’t tell one line from another.”

“We’re all interconnected?”

“Yeah, or at least I think we should be, that’s how we’re meant to be. To rely on each other.” You nodded. “Not to randomly get all philosophical on you, I know you said you almost failed that class. You asked me for help, and I wanted to try to help you. No ulterior evil sphinx motive here, I promise. You can tell everybody not to worry about their poor little Markie.”

Mark’s face started turning pink. “It wasn’t really the sphinx part that they were focused on.”

“Oh?” You leaned back, propping yourself up with two hands behind you. “What was it then? Stranger danger?”

“No, not exactly…”

“Then I am stumped about what it could be,” you replied facetiously.

Mark started scrambling to his feet, his word speed picking up, “You know, it’s getting late, if we’re done, I should really get going—”

You followed him up with a grin. “Yeah, of course. You know, I’ve got work tomorrow, you’ve got class—Oh, is that it?” You breathed out in feigned realization. “Because I’m an older woman? They thought I was going to devour you in a different way?”

“Oh God—” He said under his breath, staring at the ceiling. His throat bobbed up and down as he swallowed hard. “I’m really sorry, they were just kidding, you know. And I know there’s no way you’d want to—”

“Remember what I said last week, Mark?”

“W-What part?”

Leaning forward just a little, you reminded him, “Not unless you ask nicely.”

His eyes shot open to the size of dinnerplates, and you could only hold it in for a second before you were openly laughing in his face, barely having the decency to attempt to cover your mouth with your hand, which honestly did little to muffle it.

“You’re awful, Y/N,” Mark groaned, squeezing his eyes shut and shaking his head. “Is this what endearing you gets me? Torture?”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you tried to apologize through your breathless giggles. “Anyway, I’ll let you go, stop torturing you. Let me know when to expect Renjun. In the meantime, I want you to practice that first breathing exercise twice a day on your own until next Wednesday, okay?”

“Right, thanks.”

You didn’t even look up from your computer screen as you picked up your ringing desk phone. It was the ring for an internal call, meaning that it was either the front desk or one of your colleagues calling you, you didn’t need to filter those calls as much as external calls. “This is Y/N,” you answered automatically, still reviewing the timeline that had just been submitted to you.

“Uh, Ms. Y/L/N?” It was the receptionist, the poor guy sounding rather confused. “There’s a… boy here to see you?”

“A boy?” You repeated, bewildered. “What? Like, a child?”

“No, sorry, not like a little boy. College kid, Huang Renjun, says you’re expecting him?”

“Oh, oh, yes!” You lit up in recognition. “Have him wait there, I’ll be down in just a minute to grab him.”

Striding off the elevator, your eyes immediately locked onto a young man standing in the lobby, clutching a notebook to his chest as he peered around at everything suspiciously. He readjusted his backwards baseball cap minutely, checking the watch that was on that wrist as he brought his hand back down from his head.

“Renjun,” you said his name confidently, walking up to him with a bright smile. “Hi, I’m Y/N. Thanks for coming.”

“Damn, you’re real,” he breathed out.

“Let’s go upstairs, hm?”

The two of you were the only ones in the elevator as the doors shut. “So, what part of my existence did you doubt, exactly?” You asked, amusement in your tone. “Mark knowing me? Or my being a sphinx?”

“The first one,” Renjun had recovered from his initial shock, his voice level as he answered. “I’ve met a sphinx before.”

“And what did you have them do to you?”

“What?”

“You’ve tricked Mark into petrifying you, had your blood drank, and you want a siren to dose you up. I’m wondering what about sphinxes could provide that sort of… rush.”

“I’m not an adrenaline junkie.”

“Your words, not mine.” You held up your hands. “And I’m not judging you, Renjun. Just curious.”

“I don’t know them like that, anyway. It’s my friends’ boss.”

“So what’s on your list, then?”

“I want to solve a sphinx’s riddle.”

One of your eyebrows quirked up, and it was then that the elevator dinged and stopped on your floor. In the copy room, you held a hand out towards Renjun expectantly, and he reluctantly gave you a stack of notebook paper from within his binder. You put the first page on the pane of glass of the copier, lowered the lid, and prepared the setting to make the first copy. “I’m not giving you a riddle,” you stated into the heavy silence that had descended over the two of you.

“Why not?” Renjun whined, reminding you of a petulant child.

The copier shot out the first page, and you repeated the process with the backside. “As a Magical Creatures Studies major, I’m sure you know very well why not.”

“I would totally solve it though! You wouldn’t have to worry about me going insane!”

“You either greatly overestimate your intelligence, or greatly underestimate a sphinx’s.” You shook your head.

“Plenty of people have solved sphinx riddles.”

“And even more have gone insane trying,” you retorted. “No way am I going to even risk making you go insane.”

“I’ll sign whatever waiver you want! You won’t be liable at all!”

“But it’ll still be my fault,” you sighed. “Sol-channeling, nixing, flying, I’d show you any of that. But no riddles.”

He let out a long, dramatic sigh, “Fine.”

“How’d you do it, by the way?”

“Do what?”

“Make Mark petrify you.”

“It’s all in there.”

“Yeah, but we’re going to be here for a little while I copy all these.” You put the next page on. “You can tell me how you figured it out, can’t you?”

“Well, I started by taking notes of as many parameters I could get about when, where, and how Mark was petrifying Johnny,” Renjun started, his eyes sparkling with excitement. “At first I was a bit concerned that he wouldn’t be able to petrify anybody but Johnny. But then I found that in addition to him always petrifying Johnny, one of three things was always present.”

“And what were those three things?”

“Being at home, it being nighttime—aka he was tired—or him being stressed. I figured if I could remove Johnny from the equation but hit all the other three, and conveniently hide his sunglasses, I had a pretty good chance of being petrified.”

“And what if he had accidentally turned you to stone for real?” You crossed your arms over your chest. “He’s a developing basilisk with absolutely no control over his powers, he could have seriously hurt you, or worse.”

Renjun shrugged. “That was a risk I was willing to take.”

“Yeah, for the both of you,” you scoffed, throwing the lid of the copier open and accidentally hitting the wall behind it in the process. “Do you know how awful Mark would’ve felt if he had actually turned one of his friends to stone? And then he had to live with that for the rest of his longer-than-human life? Did you even think about that before tricking him into petrifying you for some stupid fucking magic junkie bucket list?”

The human seemed to be at a loss for words, opening and closing his mouth several times before he looked down at his shoes, going silent.

“That wasn’t rhetorical, Renjun.” You closed the lid on the next page, turning to look at him pointedly. He was looking incredibly guilty, but you weren’t going to let him get away with a noncommittal silence. “Look, I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt that your heart is in the right place, and you’re just genuinely curious about all this stuff, but your magical friends are not just here for your entertainment. Whatever they do to you, they have to live with too. You know that, right?”

He sighed bitterly, and after another long, contemplative pause, nodded. “You’re right, you’re right.”

“Yeah, I know I am.”

You sent Renjun off with his original notes and hopefully a lot to think about. You yourself didn’t have too much more work left to do, and locked yourself in your office to go over the copies you’d made. He’d been thorough, and you were realizing that Mark really hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d called his friend crazy. About thirty minutes before the end of the workday, there was a timid knock at your door, and you put down the papers to go answer the door. It was one of your team members, who timidly informed you of a horrible error that had happened that would put the entire project back by two days if it wasn’t fixed today. It was really nobody’s fault, so you took a few deep breaths, rolled up your sleeves, and got to work with everybody else. It was Wednesday, though, and you kept an eye on the time as you worked, running mental calculations in the back of your mind as to when you’d have to text Mark to let him know you’d be late getting home. Thankfully, it was all solved right before then, and you were able to run out the door at just the right time where if you speedwalked and made every light perfectly, you’d be home right on time.

And so you burst into your hallway at exactly 5:59 p.m., spotting Mark on your welcome mat, just lifting his fist to your door to knock. “I’m here!” You called out to him, making him whip around, the surprise apparent on his features. “I’m here, sorry, I’m here. Got held up at work.”

“Hey, no worries,” he flashed you a bright smile, stepping out of your way to let you unlock your front door. “Everything alright?”

You threw an exasperated look at him over your shoulder as you disarmed your alarm, then led the way into your apartment. “Heavenly Sol, don’t get me started. Computers are out to get us all, I swear.”

“Yeah, okay,” Mark nodded, closing the door behind you two and flicking the latch. “Add printers to the list, too. I can never figure out the ones in the library when I have an assignment due.”

You threw your purse onto your kitchen table haphazardly, starting to look through your fridge for dinner ingredients. “Oh shit, I was going to pick up stuff for dinner on my way home, but then everything fucking caught on fire right before I was supposed to leave.”

“That’s okay, Y/N,” the basilisk reassured you. “We can just order pizza or something, alright?”

“Yeah, okay, pizza.” You shut your fridge, rubbing your face in frustration.

“I’ll call and order it, you go get out of your work clothes and stuff. Sound like a plan?”

You took a deep breath. “Sure. Thanks, Markie.”

He beamed at you again, letting you get a full view of his baby fangs. “See? I’m not totally useless.”

“Nobody said you were except you,” you finally chuckled, patting his cheek on your way out of the kitchen.

Jongin had invited everyone around to his place for another dinner party, and you were the first one to arrive tonight. You’d already cracked open a bottle of wine—you snooze, you lose, Baekhyun and Minseok—and were tipping back your first glass of the night as Jongin finished up the food preparations.

“Y/N, how’s your basilisk doing?” Your friend asked, plating a serving of pasta.

“He’s doing alright. It’s been a little rough these past few weeks, if I’m going to be honest with you,” you sighed, doing another heavy pour for yourself. “I taught him some breathing exercises, and those helped a bit, but I can only watch him breathe for so long.”

Jongin made a noise of acknowledgment, but didn’t say anything else, fingertips messing with a silver chain around his neck.

“Do you… have any tips for me?” You asked, used to his minimalist way of communicating.

Your friend pulled out from under his shirt the pendant that hung at the end of that silver chain. It was a black gem that could fit neatly into his palm, obsidian, an intricate weaving design of a snake carved out of the face of it. “Does he have an anchor?”

You habitually twisted the ring around your right ring finger. “No, he doesn’t.”

“Find him one.” He tucked the necklace back under his shirt. “Get him out of his head.”

“Right. Thanks, Jongin.”

A flurry of excited knocks came from the front door, and you and Jongin exchanged knowing looks. You threw open the door to see an excited Baekhyun and already beaming Minseok, the former’s eyes lighting up even as he gasped in mock offense.

“You started drinking without us?!” The siren threw a hand over his chest as he locked in on the glass in your hand and open bottle on the kitchen island.

“Yep, you’re a glass and a half behind,” you taunted, guiding him in by the arm he had around your shoulders. “Better catch up, Baekhyunnie.”

“She opened that not even ten minutes ago,” Jongin informed the other two flatly in lieu of a proper greeting.

“Fuckin’ narc.” You stuck your tongue out at him as Baekhyun started pouring for him and Minseok. Minseok, meanwhile, was over by the vinyl record player, flicking through Jongin’s collection until he picked one that he liked, and swapped out the classical music that the basilisk already had playing.

“I was listening to that,” Jongin complained as a funky, upbeat pop melody started coming through the speakers.

“And now you’re listening to this,” Minseok retorted. “Much better party music.”

“And you people wonder why I don’t invite you to events with my colleagues,” the basilisk sighed, taking out his bottle of witch’s brew from the fridge. His slit pupils trailed over the figures of you and Baekhyun, not nearly tipsy enough for the kind of dancing you were doing, but doing it nonetheless. “Heathens, the lot of you.”

“Oh, like we didn’t all go to college together,” Baekhyun fired back, mischievous glint in his eye. “We all know what you used to get up to on that stuff, Jongin. Before you started playing pretend at being respectable and refined.”

“Yeah, come on, NiNi!” You tugged him into the living room by his wrist, playing absolutely dirty by bringing out the nickname you used to call him when you were little, little kids. When you first met, you couldn’t quite say his name, so you somehow landed on NiNi, which you called him until you could finally say it intelligibly. Even now, you only brought the nickname out when you really wanted something. And according to the now nearly two glasses of wine in you, you really wanted him to dance with the other three of you.

“God, fine,” he rolled his eyes, taking a deep swig of the witch’s brew before letting you fully tug him into the mess.

The following Wednesday found you opening up your door a few minutes early, 5:55. Mark was already pink-eared and covering his face with his hands. “God, let me in, please, please,” he groaned, making you cock your head curiously.

Before you could ask what was going on, you heard a couple wolf whistles and taunts from further down the hall, and spotted a gaggle of college boys heading towards you. Or, rather, heading towards your neighbors’ apartment, presumably, as you spotted Chenle and Jisung in the throng of students. You opened your door wider for Mark, who didn’t even wait for you to move as he ducked under your arm to run inside. With a final humorous glance at the group, you turned around to face the anxiously pacing basilisk.

“And what are you so worked up for?” You asked with a chuckle, shutting your door behind him. “You just got here, take a breather.”

He gesticulated at the closed door, a wild look in his eyes. “Well, because they all think we’re—”

“Having sex? I know.” You laughed again and headed back into your kitchen.

“And you don’t care?”

Pivoting on your heel to focus a pointed look on him, you put your hands squarely on your hips as you told him frankly, “Mark. I’m a grown ass woman. Whatever ideas my two college kid neighbors and their little twerp friends have about my sex life are so beyond the realm of things that I care about.”

“Oh.” He blinked, and you could practically see the gears turning in his brain as he processed that. “Of course.”

With that settled in your mind, you turned your back on him again to attend to your cooking, continuing your conversation over your shoulder. “You should really try it, you know.”

“Try what?!” He squeaked as he was halfway through taking his backpack off his shoulder and setting it down beside the couch.

“Not caring so much about what other people think about you. You know they’re only doing all that because you’re reacting like this.”

“I know, I know,” he admitted with a sigh, his voice much closer now. You heard the scrape of one of the stools at your kitchen island as he pulled it out to sit down and watch you cook.

“So, have you been working on—”

“Wait, do you think I’m a twerp?”

You pivoted around, knife in hand. “Three seconds ago I would’ve said no, except you just interrupted me, so yes, I think you’re a rude little twerp with no manners.”

He looked at you with wide eyes. “Sorry, sorry.”

“So have you been working on the breathing techniques I showed you?” You tossed the last bits in the container, sealing it up before putting it in the fridge.

“Yeah.”

Putting everything into the sink to be washed up later, you spun around to look at Mark eagerly, “Good. Now come on, grab your bag.”

“Wait, we’re done already?”

“No, we’re going shopping.”

“I thought you were cooking dinner?”

“Yeah, that’s my dinner for tomorrow, it’s got to marinate overnight. You and I are eating out tonight. Come on!” You clapped your hands together in a hup-hup gesture, and Mark scrambled to grab his bag before meeting you at the front door.

“For a lot of magical creatures who were born with their powers, they often see it as shameful to use objects to focus or help them harness their abilities,” you explained to Mark as you stopped in front of your first destination. He rushed to hold the door open for you, and you gave him a nod and grateful smile as you continued, “Save for witches, of course, that’s kind of their whole thing. But for beings like us, whose powers come on later, a lot of times having an external object can help ground us a lot better and give us something physical to tie this new part of us to while we’re learning to use it.”

“What kind of object?” He asked, looking around the apothecary hesitantly.

“It’s different for every kind of being, and even for every individual. That’s why I couldn’t just show up with some rock and say ‘here you go!’ You need to pick it out for yourself.”

“What’s yours?”

You held up your right hand, where a toffee brown gem gleamed from a silver setting on one of your fingers. “Tiger’s eye ring. My grandmother gave it to me when she was helping me out with my powers.”

“It’s really pretty.”

“She said she got it from a witch ‘friend’ of hers a while back,” you commented humorously. “Anyway, anything speaking to you?”

He looked over the merchandise around you, and sighed. “I mean, it’s all cool, but... nothing really jumps out.”

“That’s fine, don’t force it. This is just the first aisle of the first store we’re looking in. Deep breath, Mark.”

“Right, okay. It can be anything?”

“Anything. Doesn’t have to be a stone, doesn’t have to be jewelry, those are just sort of the most popular items. I hate to have to say this but... you’ll know it when you see it. You just will.”

“Y/N.” He said your name flatly. “I have never been that sure of anything in my entire life.”

You tried to keep in your giggles at his clearly exasperated expression. Tweaking one of his cheeks, you reassured him, “First time for everything, Markie.”

Three apothecaries and a 24-hour ramen place later, and you could tell Mark was Over It, capital O, capital I. He had really been trying his best, engaging with every miscellaneous item that you showed to him, but you could tell that none of them were it for him. Leaving the last shop for the night, you opted not to take him into another one, instead meandering away from the shopping district downtown that you had been in.

“I’m sorry I’m such a dud, Y/N,” Mark groaned, running a hand through his hair.

“No, you’re not, Mark,” you tried to reassure him. “You’re just… taking it at your own pace.”

“Was that supposed to make me feel better? You might as well have called me a late bloomer.”

“What’s wrong with being a late bloomer?”

“That’s what people tell losers so they don’t feel like losers.”

You rolled your eyes. “And that’s how I can tell you’re still a kid, Markie.”

“What?”

“There’s nothing wrong with being a so-called loser, or a late bloomer, or taking things at your own pace. Part of growing up, and becoming an adult, a real grown-up, is realizing that there’s no one prescribed path and way to do things. Especially when it comes to being a magical being.”

“That’s easy to say when you’re already a grown-up.”

“I suppose.” You shrugged. “Here, I’ll let you in on a secret, hm?”

“Oh yeah?”

“When was your first kiss?”

“What?” He sputtered out. “I thought you were going to tell me a secret?!”

“Humor me.”

He mumbled something under his breath that you couldn’t quite catch.

“What was that?”

“Seventeen, okay?!” He huffed. “Listen, it was my first girlfriend and—”

“Twenty-one,” you cut him off with a shrug.

“What?”

“My first kiss was when I was twenty-one,” you repeated nonchalantly. “You thought I had it a lot earlier, didn’t you?”

“It’s not like I was really hypothesizing about it or anything—”

“But the way you told me about yours, you got defensive, like you had assumed yours was late or something, and that I was going to judge you, because I must have had mine earlier than seventeen,” you pointed out. “But I didn’t.”

“But you’re… you’re so… Why?” His face screwed up in confusion.

“That was my first serious boyfriend,” you explained. “I wanted it to be special. I didn’t expect it to take that long, but it did.”

“And what was the point of this?”

“There’s nothing wrong with whatever pace your life is going at, Mark. I don’t think ‘late bloomers’ even exist, because that implies there’s a benchmark to do something by, and having it happen after that therefore makes you late.”

Mark was quiet for a few moments as you continued walking. “You really think I’m still a kid?”

“Oh yeah,” you ruffled his hair. “Only a kid would be worried about if someone thinks they’re a kid.”

He made a disgruntled sound at you messing up his hair, but did nothing to move out of the way of your hand. “Where are we even going now? Another store?”

“Nah.” You led the way off the sidewalk and into the grass, towards the river that cut through the center of town. Traffic hummed overhead where a bridge crossed the water, and you stopped at a rocky patch to pick up a smooth pebble, tossing it up and down a few times. Looking over your shoulder at a skeptical Mark, you asked, “You know how to skip rocks?”

You tossed your first one, managing to skip it a few times before it plopped under the surface. Grabbing another rock, you pushed it into Mark’s hand insistently. “Oh, gross, it’s cold and wet,” he wrinkled his nose, but readied his arm nevertheless.

“You’re literally a basilisk, dude,” you retorted, watching him line up his shot.

“Rude.”

“Hey, I don’t mind.” You held up your hands defensively. “I’m just saying.”

He got it two-thirds of the way across, and shrugged. “Eh…”

“First one to skip it all the way across wins?” You suggested with a smirk.

“Wins what?”

“Mmm…” You hummed thoughtfully. “I got it! Winner earns a secret.”

“Huh?”

“Winner earns a secret of their choosing from the loser. If I win, I can ask you to tell me a secret about whatever topic I want. If you win, same goes for you.”

“Why would I agree to that?”

You grinned. “Because you want to know more about me, don’t you, Markie?”

He gulped, then started looking around at the rocks down by his feet. “Fine. But don’t ask me anything weird if you win.”

“Aw, where’s the fun in that?” You snickered, searching for your own rock to toss.

Mark went first, and his almost made it, but lost momentum about eighty percent of the way there. You went next, flicking your wrist the complete wrong way, only getting one skip before your rock pathetically plopped under the surface. The basilisk next to you giggled. “Are you even trying?”

You stuck your tongue out at him. “Like you’re doing any better, you little shit.”

“Real mature,” he shook his head, brushing off some dirt from the rock he just picked up. “Real grown-up of you. Who’s the kid here, allegedly?”

“Just throw it.” You were already searching for your next pebble.

“So, did you say anything to Renjun, when you met him?”

“What do you mean? Of course I talked to him.”

“No, I mean like—” Mark flicked his arm a couple times in practice shots, maintaining his hold on his stone. “He apologized to me, for tricking me into petrifying him and bought me lunch. Renjun doesn’t apologize.”

“Oh,” you feigned surprise. “That’s nice of him.”

“Y/N.”

“I didn’t threaten him, if that’s what you’re asking. We chatted. He apparently thought some more afterwards.” You finally spotted a lovely lighter colored one, with dark, perfectly circular spots all along it. You couldn’t quite make out the colors in the negligible light from the moon and lone streetlamp all the way up on the bridge, but you liked the weight of it in your hand.

You looked up just in time to watch Mark skip his rock all the way across the river, skidding up onto the shore on the other side. He jumped up and down victoriously, turning around to look at you, excitement on his features. “Yes! Did you see that?!” He cheered, an ecstatic grin on his face. “Ha! Take that!”

“Good job, Markie,” you snickered, holding a hand up for him to high-five zealously. Your palm stung where he had smacked it enthusiastically, a loud slap of skin hitting skin ringing out. Taking your phone out, you turned on your flashlight to look at the rock that you had found, taking in the mossy green color and dark red spots. “Huh, cool.”

As you were about to toss it back into the water, Mark’s hand darted out to grab your wrist. “Wait a second…”

“What?” You looked at him curiously. “You want to try to make it across twice? You won’t get two secrets from me. Sorry, one-time offer.”

“No,” he shook his head, holding your hand open to stare down at the stone. “It’s… it’s a nice rock.”

“Yeah, I guess,” you agreed, continuing to study his face. “Do you… want to keep it, Mark?”

“Do you mind?”

“No, go for it.” You turned your hand over, depositing it into his palm. “All yours.”

He continued looking at it with fascination, fingertip tracing over the textured edges. “Y/N… I think this is my anchor.”

“I think you’re right.” You patted him on the shoulder. “Congrats, dude.”

“Hey, can I uh, take a raincheck on asking you for that secret? I kind of want to think on it.”

“Sure. Use it wisely.”

“I just got home, Sehun, what could be so pertinent that you need to call me now?” You sighed as you answered your ringing cell phone some weeks later. “And why are you still at work? You said only ten more minutes, thirty minutes ago.”

Your coworker sounded simultaneously guilty, nervous, and as exasperated as you, “I know, but Director Han was asking to see some of the numbers and then, well... I got this email from Mr. Shin. I don’t know how to respond. I forwarded it to you.”

Sitting down at your kitchen table, you opened your laptop, which turned on already to your work email. Right at the top was a forwarded email from Oh Sehun, and you clicked on it. You skimmed it over, your lip curling with distaste. Mr. Shin was a project manager in another department, and was apparently trying to assign “urgent tasks” to your employees that needed to be on his desk first thing tomorrow. Sehun would’ve needed to stay all night and/or come in ridiculously early tomorrow in order to get this done. “I’ll handle Mr. Shin, don’t worry about doing any of this. You go home. Now.” You directed Sehun. “And I’ll remind Director Han in the morning about the company’s overtime policy as well.”

“Right. Thank you, Y/N.”

“Of course. Goodnight, Sehun.”

Setting your phone aside, you quickly drafted an email in reply to Mr. Shin, keeping your snark to appropriate corporate levels, reminding him that he couldn’t assign tasks to your employees, and any requests such as this had to come through you first. As well as outlining the unreasonableness of the time demands.

“So what do you do?” Mark asked, suddenly reminding you of his presence. It was Wednesday, though your usual dinnertime ritual had been interrupted before it could even start, Sehun’s call coming as soon as the college student had stepped foot in your apartment.

“I’m a project manager at a company that does network security for other companies,” you informed him, not taking your eyes off your screen as you went to re-read the email for a quick proofread.

“Project manager?”

“I manage a bunch of other people’s projects instead of actually working on them myself, and get paid more than them for it.” You filled in a missing word, and deeming the email finished, pressed send, shutting your laptop. Looking up at Mark, who had an adorably confused look on his face, you gave him a smirk. “When you grow up, Markie, you’ll understand that most corporate jobs are fake and it’s all about your title and how well you can negotiate your salary and bullshit in front of your boss.”

“So you don’t like your job?”

You shrugged. “I like it just fine. It pays for me to live here by myself, after all. I have reasonable hours, and plenty of free time, vacation days, and disposable income. I keep my subordinates and my superiors happy. But if I got a better offer at another company, and my company couldn’t match it, I would have no qualms about packing it up next week.”

“Seriously?” His eyes widened.

“Seriously.”

“Just-Just leaving?” His voice rose with alarm.

“The company, yeah. Not here. I have a life here. My family, and my friends,” you explained, standing up from your dining table.

You could see him visibly relax at that. “Oh, okay.”

“And my Markie,” you teased, pinching his cheek as you passed him on your way to the kitchen.

He squirmed a little, but didn’t knock your hand away. “Hey...”

You laughed to yourself, stopping at the sink to wash your hands before starting on dinner.

“Am I not your friend?” Mark’s question stopped you as you were grabbing ingredients from the fridge.

“Huh?” It was your turn to be confused. Your hand hovered over a bell pepper.

“You said you have your family, your friends, and me. You didn’t include me in your friends. Am I not your friend?” His voice was closer now, and you shut the door to turn towards it, not expecting him to be right on the other side. You jumped in your skin a bit, but that wasn’t the only reason your heart was racing, and a shiver shot up your spine all the way to the back of your neck. Mark’s dark, slit pupils were focused on you with such an intensity that you would’ve thought he were trying to petrify you if the both of you didn’t already know that that wouldn’t work. There was something so startlingly adult in his gaze, all sense of boyish charm that his features usually held gone as the overhead lights of your kitchen cast them in harsh shadows and angles. For the first time ever when you looked at Mark, you were reminded that basilisks were technically predators.

You laughed, hoping he couldn’t hear how nervous you were in it. Wishing your heart to still, you squeezed his upper arm reassuringly. “Oh, no, of course you’re my friend. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to leave you out like that.”

Were his arms always this toned? Or was this just the first time you noticed it?

Mark held your gaze for another moment before he blinked, shook his head, and smiled, “Yeah, of course. I’m sorry about that. School’s just fried my brain, you know?”

“Don’t worry about it.” You smiled back, patting his shoulder before opening the fridge again.

“You need any help?”

“Sure, sure. You mind chopping some vegetables?” You held the bell pepper out to him.

He nodded dutifully. “On it!”

As he started on that task with the same eagerness to please that he always had, you found that you couldn’t box him back in as just that cute bumbling college kid who had appeared on your doorstep a few weeks ago. Gently pressing your hand to his back to let him know that you were skirting around behind him with your own knife, you took note of how firm it was under your fleeting touch, hidden under another one of his school t-shirts that hung off his shoulders in such a way that it seemed as though every readjustment of his arms caused the motion to catch your gaze. When he asked you to assess the cuts he was making, you had to reach over to adjust how he was holding the bell pepper and knife, listening to his own heartbeat for a twofold reason: to not have to hear to your own spike as your gaze dragged over his forearms and hands where they gripped the handle, and because you were curious. You weren’t a fool, you knew Mark was attracted to you superficially the moment you opened your door the first night. But what about now?

You carefully made a couple minute adjustment to his fingers, letting your own fingertips graze over his skin and linger for just a moment longer than necessary, as if you were making extra certain he had the right position. To your satisfaction, you heard his heart pick up to more of a skitter, and his breaths through his nose quickened. Then, you let go of him as quick as you’d descended.

“Try that now,” you murmured. He pushed the blade down and sliced it through the red pepper easily, at the perfect width. You squeezed right at the bend of his arm approvingly as you praised him, “Good job, Mark.”

“T-Thanks.” The tips of his ears were red, and you could feel his arm tense under your grasp. Taking your hand back to pick your blade up again, you then went back to chopping your own ingredients.

A few weeks later, and Mark had been progressing pretty well now that he had an anchor. You’d taken his stone to a local coven’s shop downtown to get it turned into a pendant so he didn’t have to worry about remembering to put it in his pocket every day. Interestingly when given free rein to match the carving to him without either of your input, the witches had crafted a lion instead of anything serpentine, as was popular for basilisks. On a Wednesday morning, you had just settled into your desk at work when your phone buzzed with a text from Mark.

[markie: i am SO sorry but my prof just announced a study session tonight and i NEED to attend. are you free any other time this week? if not, next week is great as usual!]

[you: saturday. 10:30 a.m. be there or be square]

[markie: be there or be square? i forgot how old you are]

[you: nvm don’t come over you ungrateful twerp]

[you: i was joking, Sol forbid women do anything]

[markie: nooooooo im so sorry 🥺🥺🥺]

[you: nice try but those emojis are doing nothing you googoo gaga ass bitch]

[markie: i'll bring bagels?]

[you: fine. no bagels no entry]

[markie: 🫡]

Saturday at 10:29 a.m. there was a knock at your front door. Mark was in fact on the other side, holding up a brown paper bag with a logo of a nearby bakery on the side.

“Hey, come on in.” You smiled breathlessly, readjusting the toddler on your hip.

“Thanks.” He shut the door behind him, then nodded to the child. “So uh, anything new, Y/N?”

“He’s not mine,” you replied frankly. “This is my nephew. I’m emergency babysitting, hope you don’t mind. We had already rescheduled once, and it was last-minute.”

“No, of course not. Little guy’s cute.” Mark gently poked MinMin’s chubby cheek, making the little boy giggle, and the basilisk giggle back in turn. “So this is what a baby sphinx looks like...”

“Not a sphinx, he’s a wittle witch.” You cooed at the baby in your arms, gently pinching his tummy to elicit another joyous laugh.

“Huh?”

“He’s not actually related to me, he’s my friend’s kid. I’ve just known Jongdae—his dad—for so long that I get to be Aunt Y/N.”

“That’s really nice... So what’s his name?”

“Everyone just calls him MinMin. I don’t think the poor guy will ever be called by his real name unless he’s in trouble.”

“Oof, the full name scolding.”

“Speaking of... Did you remember, Mark Lee?”

“Ouch. You can literally see the bag in my hands.” He shook the bag before putting it on the dining table.

“I meant your homework, not the bagels.”

“Oh.” Mark grabbed a couple dishes from your kitchen cabinets, setting them at your usual places before doing the same with napkins. “Yes, I did that too.”

You sat down, settling MinMin in your lap as you peered into the bag for your usual bagel order, setting it on your plate. “Alright, then show me.”

“Uh... with MinMin here?” Mark asked uncertainly, looking at the child.

“Oh, right. Hold on.” You stood up and walked over to the diaper bag Jongdae had dropped off when he’d shown up and deposited MinMin into your arms in a rushed panic. His wife was an emergency medicine doctor and had gotten called into a shift at the ER in the wee hours of the morning, but your friend was already booked to perform at a wedding that day, and the only babysitter he could find at the last minute was you. You were more than happy to take MinMin for the day, even with your prior arrangements with Mark.

Rooting around through a couple of the pockets, moving aside diapers, snacks, and spare changes of clothes, you finally secured what you were looking for. A teeny, tiny, baby-sized pair of sunglasses. Taking him and the glasses back over to your spot in front of Mark, you sat MinMin down in your lap and gently pulled the green Keroppi-themed sunglasses onto the child’s face. They secured around the back of his head with a strap, which you adjusted as you spoke to Mark, “He would probably be fine, but just in case.”

Mark still seemed hesitant.

“His parents are witches, these are enchanted,” you reassured the basilisk, tapping the frames. “And I’ll be nixing anything you send our way. He’ll be fine. Promise.”

“Aren’t we supposed to eat first?” He sighed, gesturing to his bagel that he hadn’t even been able to take a bite of.

“You’re right, you’re right,” you relented. You were a few bites into your meal when MinMin had finished off his sippy cup. Picking up the empty container, you took it and the toddler with you as you stood up from the chair. “Oh, all done, bub? Let’s get you something else.”

Opening your fridge, you started pointing out the options to the child, “Let’s see… we have water, your dad left you a juice box… or we can open the chocolate milk we grabbed from the corner store before Markie got here?”

“Choco!” MinMin chirped excitedly, and you chuckled as you took out the carton. As you turned to grab the sippy cup, you weren’t expecting to see Mark turned around and peering at you with interest on his features, his eyes locked on the jug in your hand. You raised an eyebrow at him, continuing your task of rinsing out the previous drink before cracking open the carton.

“Mark…” You said knowingly. “Do you want chocolate milk?”

“Please?” He replied sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Sure.” You smiled to yourself as you grabbed another cup from your cabinet, filling that and MinMin’s up before putting the chocolate milk back. Handing MinMin his sippy cup to hold, you carried him on one hip and Mark’s glass with the other hand, setting it down in front of the young man as you went to sit back down.

“Thank you!” He beamed, immediately picking it up and taking a big gulp.

You had the same fond smile on your face as you immediately saw his dark milk mustache, handing him a napkin. “You’re welcome.”

“Thank you!” MinMin echoed, lifting his own sippy cup to his mouth. “Thank you thank you!”

“Aww, you’re welcome, MinMin,” you giggled, patting the top of the boy’s head.

“Alright, you’re doing pretty good,” you declared as you’d reached a stopping point for the day.

He ducked his head bashfully. “You’re a good teacher.”

“Aw, thanks.” You stood up, grabbing the napkin from MinMin’s snack to toss in your kitchen trash. The boy was playing with some toys next to the two of you on the floor of your living room.

“So uh—” Mark cleared his throat over a voice crack. “What are you doing for the rest of the day? Do you have MinMin all day or…?”

“Jongdae said the reception won’t be over until late tonight. But his wife should get off sooner than that.” You tidied up a couple miscellaneous items in your kitchen as you chatted. “And what are you doing today, Mark?”

“Well—Woah!” At his sudden exclamation and the small giggle that followed, you peeked up from the dish you were drying to see Mark cautiously holding his hands up like he was under arrest as MinMin floundered around in his lap—you guessed he had fallen into it at first—for a second before righting himself and plopping down properly. “Uh… hi, buddy?” Mark said, his lack of self-confidence evident in the high pitch of his voice.

“Hi!” MinMin replied cheerily, his attention otherwise on the toy in his hand.

“You two alright in there?” You questioned, not bothering to hide the amusement in your tone.

“He just kind of sat down, I don’t know,” he quickly explained, still not lowering his hands.

“If you’re okay with him being there, that’s fine.”

“Y-Yeah!”

“You sure?” You walked back over, sitting down in front of the two boys so you could reach out and teasingly pinch MinMin’s nose. “You look terrified. He’s a baby witch, but he won’t do anything to you, promise.”

“It’s just… I have an older brother, and I’m the youngest cousin,” he admitted. “Haven’t really been around a lot of babies. Basilisk or otherwise.”

“Me neither, before MinMin,” you replied in understanding. “Only child, and so were my parents.”

“Wow, really?”

“Sphinxes are rare, remember?”

“I mean, I knew that, but I never really thought about what that really meant like, for you. Like, your family, that kind of stuff.”

You shrugged as a sort of ‘it is what it is’ gesture. “So, you never did tell me what you’re doing today.”

“Oh, uhm, well, we’re all having a movie night, at Chenle and Jisung’s later. And I was wondering if you—”

“Would let you stay here until then so you don’t have to go all the way back home then come all the way back here?” You finished knowingly, eyebrow quirking up.

“Yeah! Yeah, exactly,” he smiled sheepishly.

“Sure,” you agreed. “Looks like MinMin isn’t going to let you go anytime soon, anyway.” You indicated towards the toddler who had slowly started slumping over in Mark’s lap, very clearly about to nap.

“Uh, what do I do?” He asked you with wide eyes.

“He can sleep there, or I can take him.”

“Maybe you should…”

You nodded, standing up to go over to MinMin’s bag and pull out a floor mat, stuffed animal, and baby monitors. After setting everything up in a clear area of your floor, you scooped the boy up out of Mark’s lap and deposited him onto the mat on his back. You watched as he rolled around and readjusted until he was comfy, eyes fluttering shut completely and breathing evening out. Satisfied, you walked back over to Mark and offered him a hand up off the ground. He took it, seeming confused as you then led him away from the living room and towards your bedroom. At your room, Mark stopped in the threshold like crossing in would burn him alive, as you flopped onto one side of your bed, set the baby monitor on your nightstand, and grabbed your laptop. You scoffed and patted the other side of the bed, “Do you need to be invited inside like a vampire? Please, come in, Mark.”

“I’ve never been in your bedroom,” he muttered, taking a hesitant step in, his eyes focused on his feet.

“Really?” You scrounged through your memories, and came up empty. Shrugging, you patted the empty space on your bed insistently again. “First time for everything. Come on, we can’t watch TV out there with MinMin napping.”

He tentatively sat down cross-legged, his entire body noticeably tense as you slumped into your pillows and started scrolling through your options.

“You pick,” you declared, pushing the device towards him. “I’m in the middle of a drama and if I put it on, you’ll be confused.”

“I don’t mind, you can put on what you want,” he nudged the laptop back to you.

“Nope, I don’t need a twerp making fun of my drama preferences.” You pushed it back.

“Not a twerp. And I won’t make fun of it.” He pushed it over again.

“On one condition,” you bargained, pointing a finger at him threateningly. “You need to get invested. No scrolling on your phone. I’ll pause and answer any questions, explain everything for you. But I need you to be an active watcher with me. Deal?”

“Deal.” He nodded quickly.

As you queued up the next episode, you explained the basic premise, “It’s set in modern day, but there’s flashbacks from all different time periods. It’s about a phoenix who was cursed hundreds of years ago and can never remember her past once she reincarnates. This is obviously difficult for her vampire lover, who now has to win her over again with each reincarnation, but they’ve made it work so far. Except he wasn’t there when she had her last reincarnation, because she got into an accident while he was away at work or something. So in her amnesiac state after reincarnation, she wandered off, and he ended up losing her for long enough for her to have started a completely new life. And by the time he finds her again, she now has a new partner!”

Mark was nodding along, having listened to everything with rapt attention like you were teaching him about his powers again. “So that’s where this episode starts?”

“No, Markie,” you laughed and patted his leg. “That was just the first half of the pilot. We’re about to start episode eight.”

“Wait, that’s it?!” Mark scrolled down to the bottom of the list of episodes in disbelief. “But they just can’t leave it there!”

“The season is still premiering,” you informed him with a chuckle, readjusting your pillow under your head. “I think there’s maybe five more episodes?”

He had gradually sat back against the pillows at the head of your bed over the course of the two episodes you’d watched, and ran a hand through his hair as he let out a disgruntled sigh. “You’ve got to tell me how it ends.”

“It premieres on Fridays at 8:00.”

His brows knit together with confusion as he tried to follow the conversation. “It’s okay, I won’t make you wait five days to watch it with me.”

It was your turn to be confused for a beat, and then you realized that he thought you were offering to not watch new episodes when they premiered on Fridays and instead watch them with him when he came over on the following Wednesday. “No, Mark, if you want to watch it, you can come here and watch it. On Friday.” You clarified, then at his apparent surprise, tacked on, “With me.”

“But I thought you didn’t want to give up your Friday nights?”

“Yeah, because I’ve been watching this,” you gestured to the laptop screen. “No magic, that stays on Wednesdays. Fridays are for ‘Our Love from the Ashes’ only. Deal?”

You held your pinky finger out to him. He looked down at it nervously, then hooked his with it. “Deal,” he nodded, shaking pinkies in a very business-like manner.

At the same time, you started hearing the babbling sounds of MinMin waking up, and your phone screen lit up with a text. You grabbed both the baby monitor and your phone as you rolled off your bed, checking your messages and heading for your door. Covering your mouth, you couldn’t help the gasp that escaped.

“What?” Mark was following you, and stopped when you did by the threshold.

“Jongdae’s gig got cut short. He’ll be by to get MinMin soon,” you said, reading the message from your friend again.

“‘Got cut short?’”

You looked up at the basilisk as you said plainly, “Groom got cold feet, apparently.”

His eyes widened. “Oh my god…”

There was a knock at your front door less than an hour later. “MinMin, that’s your Dada!” You told the toddler enthusiastically, pulling on his last shoe as he sat in your lap.

He kicked his feet excitedly, making the task more difficult. “Eee!”

“Mark, can you get his diaper bag for me?” You requested of the basilisk, who was standing off to the side uncertainly.

“Yeah, of course.” He quickly went to oblige.

You walked over to the front door holding one of MinMin’s hands, and opened it for your friend. Jongdae was still in the full suit he was meant to perform in, bowtie and all, and stepped inside to give you a hug hello. “Hi, Y/N,” he patted your back. “Thank you again.”

“Hey, Jongdae,” you hugged your friend back. “No problem, he was great for us. I feel so sorry for that poor bride, though.”

“I know, I know.” He shook his head.

“Please tell me you’re still getting paid, right? At least a half-day or a deposit or something?”

“I keep my deposit, yeah. I usually don’t insist on much more if it’s not a mutual cancellation. Feel too bad…” He rubbed the back of his neck before picking up his son, focusing a much brighter smile on him. “Hi, MinMin! Were you good for Aunt Y/N?”

The boy nodded quickly. “Yeah!”

Jongdae then turned back to you, “So who did you say was coming over again? Baek?”

Mark finally approached from where he had been awkwardly hovering by your dining table just behind Jongdae, holding MinMin’s diaper bag. You stepped in to make introductions, grabbing Mark’s arm to bring him closer. “Jongdae, this is Mark, the basilisk I’ve mentioned, remember? Mark, this is Jongdae.”

“Nice to meet you,” Mark said politely, offering out the bag.

“You too.” Jongdae accepted the bag, giving the younger man a quick, mildly intrigued once-over before looking back to you. “We owe you one, Y/N.”

“No you don’t, you know he’s welcome here anytime. He’s a little angel.”

“For now. The terrible twos are around the corner,” your friend scoffed, turning towards the door again.

“You’re going to jinx yourself,” you warned him, grabbing the door handle to hold it open for him.

“I’ll throw some salt over my shoulder when I get home.” He shook his head, then gave you and Mark a nod goodbye. “See you two. Say bye, MinMin.”

“Bye!” The boy waved zealously over his dad’s shoulder, and you grinned and waved back before shutting the door behind them.

Turning back to your one remaining guest, you tilted your head to ask, “When does movie night start?” Before Mark could answer, however, the sounds of explosions and engines revving came through your living room wall, albeit slightly muffled. “Right now?” You guessed, amused.

“Oh, didn’t even realize the time…” Mark’s ears were pink as he looked at his phone as if checking said time.

“It was very sweet of you to stay, Mark, but you could’ve gone to movie night. You saw how good MinMin was, I would’ve been fine with him on my own,” you smiled and squeezed his arm appreciatively, herding him towards the door.

“There’s still dishes—”

“You want to do my dishes?” You laughed. “College boy who wants to do dishes instead of go to a movie night with his friends? What’s gotten into you?”

“Nothing, I just—I don’t know, it’s not fair. You do everything.”

“It’s my home. You’re my guest.” You cocked your head curiously. “It’s okay, Mark.”

“Well, I’m here a lot, you know? You’re already helping me with my powers and stuff. I want to help you too.”

“Okay, you can start doing your own dishes if that’ll make you feel better,” you agreed skeptically. “Next week. Go on, I’m sure they’re going to give you enough shit as is for being late.”

“It’s not just the dishes,” he mumbled under his breath, stuffing his feet in his shoes. You weren’t sure if you were meant to hear that.

As he went to grab the door handle, you put a hand on the door to keep him from opening it. “I want you to bring Johnny next time.”

“What?!” He squeaked.

“Bring Johnny when you come on Wednesday. You need to practice using your powers on someone they’ll actually work on.”

“I don’t think that’s a good—”

“I’ll be right here, Mark,” you reminded him. “It’ll be fine.”

“Alright, fine. I’ll see if he can come.”

At 5:58 p.m. the following Wednesday, there was a knock at your front door. You opened the door to two figures this time, Mark’s familiar face and another young man behind him, a head taller than him. “Mark! And you must be Johnny.” You beamed at the two of them, beckoning them in and then introducing yourself to the human, “I’m Y/N, please, come in.”

“Thank you for inviting me over.” Johnny nodded politely as he followed Mark in.

You furrowed your brows, looking over at the basilisk suspiciously. “Mark, you did tell him why we invited him over, right?”

“I did, I swear!” He promised.

“I know it might sound kind of weird, for me to be thanking you for inviting me to get petrified and compelled or whatever, but I want to help Mark out however I can. So really, thanks,” the human smiled genuinely.

You relaxed at this, guiding them further into your apartment. “Well in that case, you’re welcome.”

“Y/N, bathroom?” Mark pointed down your hall.

“You know where it is.” You waved him off as you headed towards the kitchen to grab three glasses.

Johnny followed you into the kitchen, careful to lower his voice as he told you, “Besides, none of our friends have even met you, and we’re all kind of curious about Mark’s new older lady friend that he keeps talking about, so I just had to come, petrification be damned.”

“I do hate to burst your bubble, Johnny, but Chenle and Jisung have met me before. They live next door,” you informed him.

“Oh, Mark’s other friends?”

“Yeah, I guess. He hasn’t drawn me a diagram, so I don’t have a perfect idea of who knows who, sorry.”

“Well, of our other friend group, I’ll be the first to have met you, then.”

“And? Am I everything you all had dreamed of? The mysterious sphinx in her lair luring poor little Markie in every week?” You opened your fridge, skimming your eyes over your drink options. “Wine? Beer? Water? Chocolate milk?”

Johnny chuckled, “Is that for ‘Markie?’”

“No,” you snickered. “My nephew was over this past weekend, but I figured I’d offer it to you guys since I had extra.”

“What kind of wine?”

“A very lovely red. The grapes are grown in a vineyard in this fairy kingdom whose vale naturally produces magical dew. It’s hard to describe, but the flavor that gets imparted is… exquisite to say the least.”

“Sold.”

You poured two glasses of the red wine, then filled up the third with chocolate milk. “So, if Mark hasn’t explained how this works, we’ll eat dinner first, then get into the magic stuff. It’s kind of like exercising, it’s pointless to do it on an empty stomach.”

“You’re different than I thought you’d be,” Johnny admitted thoughtfully, swirling the wine in his glass around.

“More human looking?” You guessed, expecting that you were the first sphinx he’d probably ever met. Not only were your kind rare in and of themselves, but Mark had mentioned that Johnny didn’t even meet any magical creatures until coming to college just a few years ago.

“That, and… younger?”

You snorted, Chenle’s previous ‘MILF hunter’ comment echoing in the back of your head. You set your wine down to cross your arms and cock your head as you asked him, “What do you know about sphinx and/or basilisk aging?”

“Literally nothing. Mark molted all over our apartment a couple summers ago and it was so gross but apparently that’s something that’s supposed to happen a year or two after basilisks reach adulthood.”

“So I could be a thousand years old for all you know.”

He blinked. “…Are you?”

“No.” You shook your head. “However, Mark and I will both outlive you and your grandkids, I’ll tell you that much.”

“Woah… congrats.”

“But since you brought it up…” You lifted your glass back to your lips, taking a slow sip. You then leaned in conspiratorially. “Between us, does Mark have a thing for older women?”

Johnny smirked and leaned in as well. “Why? You interested?”

“Just heard a little rumor, that’s all.”

“I don’t know about having a type, per se, but he definitely has a thing for this one older woman he knows.”

Before you could respond, you heard the door to the bathroom open, and straightened back up. Johnny furrowed his brows in confusion, and you nodded towards the entrance of the kitchen, where Mark appeared just a moment later.

“Hey guys—oh, chocolate milk! Sweet!” He happily picked up the untouched third glass. Mark then went to explain to his friend, “Y/N only buys chocolate milk when her nephew MinMin comes over. She’s way too much of a real adult to have it around otherwise.”

“Is this your passive-aggressive way of telling me I should buy chocolate milk just for you to drink when you come over?”

“Maybe. Is it working?”

“When you start helping foot my grocery bill, you can dictate what goes on my grocery list, how about that?”

Mark’s eyes widened at that, and he didn’t respond, instead taking another big gulp of his chocolate milk. When he brought his cup down from his face, he had a chocolate milk mustache, and offered you a big thumbs up as he grabbed for a napkin. “Thanks, Y/N! This is perfect!”

“Uh-huh,” you rolled your eyes, but were unable to fight the fond smile on your lips as you turned back to your fridge. “Alright, dinner’s pre-made ravioli, the next person who whines doesn’t eat.”

“Yum!” “My favorite!”

Sat at your dining table across from the two roommates, you took a sip of your drink before engaging your new guest in conversation again, “Are you a student as well, Johnny?”

“Yes, I’m a Comms major, focus in advertising,” he answered.

“And what do you want to do? Advertising?”

The human shrugged and smiled. “Don’t know. Something I don’t hate, I guess.”

You laughed. “That’s fair. I was the same way when I graduated undergrad. Didn’t care where I worked as long as it paid well, didn’t have crazy hours, and wasn’t so boring that I wanted to bang my head against a wall while I was there.”

“Exactly.” Johnny gestured at you triumphantly. “Where’d you end up working?”

“Network security company,” you shrugged one shoulder. “Honestly, I’m not even a big tech person. Can’t fix my own wi-fi if it’s out, past turning it off then back on again. I’m a manager.”

“Need an intern?”

“Dude, you have a job,” Mark interjected, elbowing his friend in the arm.

“I’m networking, dude,” Johnny replied pointedly, elbowing him back. “Not all of us can bank on being doctors in eight years, you know.”

You watched their bickering with amusement before answering the human’s question, “I can make an inquiry. The Advertising AD may or may not owe me a favor…”

“Thanks!” He beamed at you. “So, I’m sorry, if this rude or something, but sphinxes do those riddles, right?”

You arched an eyebrow. “Yes… Don’t tell me Mark has two magical adrenaline junkie friends? I’m not giving you a riddle either.”

Mark’s head shot up from where he had been sullenly eating his ravioli, his eyes going wide with mortification. “Renjun asked you for a riddle?!”

“I didn’t give him one,” you snorted. “I’m not going to be responsible for some kid going mad.”

“I’m going to kill him,” the basilisk groaned, covering his own face in embarrassment. “Why is he like this?”

“I’m not asking you for a riddle, don’t worry,” Johnny assured you. “I was just curious… Would that make sphinxes good poets or writers, then?”

“Sphinxes are good wordsmiths, yes,” you answered with a smile. “But we stick more to oral traditions. One of our favorite pastimes is riddle-weaving. Sphinxes will swap riddles back and forth, solving each other’s riddles to see who can come up with the best one. It’s a good way to pass the time on long car rides.”

“Renjun also said there’s a lot of sphinx lawyers?” Mark added.

“If you compare the percentage of the entire population that are sphinxes and the percentage of lawyers that are sphinxes, yes, sphinxes are overrepresented in that field,” you nodded. “Kind of like how there’s a lot of unicorns in healthcare and education.”

“And dryads in ecology,” Johnny followed your train of logic.

“Exactly.”

After dinner, the three of you moved into your living room. The sun was beginning to set outside, so you retrieved the glowing spheres that had been sitting in your lamps and sent them back outside to rejoin the rest of the rays. You preferred to light your apartment with sunlight when possible, as it was both more beautiful to you, and way more cost-effective than using electricity.

As you went to turn the ceiling light on with the lightswitch, you started explaining what you’d just done to your human guest, “That was sol-channeling. You might hear it be called heliokinesis as well. Sphinxes always call it sol-channeling.”

“Can you sol-channel moonlight? Since it’s technically just reflected sunlight?” Johnny questioned curiously.

“Nope. Magically different properties. Just like how werewolves are only affected by the full moon and moonstone, not by any sort of sunlight or sunstone.”

“…Right. Of course.”

“We can only manipulate existing sunlight, but we can’t make it, and we have to send it back before the Sun sets.”

“What happens if you don’t send it back before the Sun sets?”

“We’re only borrowing the sunlight from Sol. It has to be anchored to us while it’s here,” you said, guiding him by the arm to stand in one spot. “If we don’t end that connection ourselves willingly, it’ll still go back… and rip a piece of our soul out with it. The more sunlight that you’ve sol-channeled, and have anchored to you, the more of your soul that’s taken.”

You then positioned Mark across from Johnny, facing his friend from several steps away. The basilisk’s eyes were locked on your face in horror, but you just kept calmly readjusting him.

“Can you… regrow it? If that happens?” Johnny asked quietly.

“You can heal, physically,” you answered levelly, walking behind Mark. “Hurts like a bitch for a while… but healing a soul, that’s something that takes a lot of power. I can really only think of one thing that would do that…”

“What is it?” Mark blurted out.

“The Sun,” you replied bluntly. “Phoenixes, when they reincarnate. Everything is healed, soul included.” They were quiet for a moment, and you clapped your hands together, changing conversation topics, “Alright, time for some compelling! Ready, guys?”

“Totally!” Johnny gave you two thumbs-up.

“Mark?” You prompted the basilisk right in front of you.

“Shouldn’t you be by Johnny? In case you need to nix it?” He pointed to the human, looking down at his feet.

“I can nix from here,” you assured him. Reaching over his shoulder, you secured between two fingers the silver chain that you knew his lion pendant dangled from. You pulled it out from under his shirt, holding it in his eyeline. “Breathe, Mark. Let’s do a round of those grounding breaths, hm?”

You let his anchor go to rest on his chest again, and watched his eyes flutter shut as you started counting him through the breaths. Once he was done, he opened his eyes back up, the slit pupils slowly dragging up from his feet to your face first. You smiled reassuringly at him from your spot just beside him now. You squeezed his arm. “You’ve got this, Mark. Just like we’ve done before. I’ll be right back here, okay?”

As you went to step back, you saw Mark gulp, and his gaze fell down again. He wouldn’t be able to compel Johnny if he didn’t look him in the eye. While you had read through Renjun’s notes pretty thoroughly early in working with Mark, you were using them as a guide of what not to do. You didn’t want him to constantly be in a state of being stressed, tired, and stuck at home in order to be in tune with his powers. But right now, you could tell that you were hitting at least two out of three of those. Dinner had already taken up a considerable portion of your evening, and Mark was still not as relaxed as you needed him to be.

“Hey, Mark, I finally figured out why Yuta’s barely passing all his classes,” Johnny suddenly interjected.

That caught the basilisk’s attention, his voice confused as he went to respond, “I thought he was on the Dean’s List—”

“Because sirens only know what’s under C-level,” the human finished with a wide grin.

“Dude—” Mark was cut off by his own laughs. “That was bad. Like, barely made sense bad.”

“Well, did I tell you about this fairy philosophy major I met the other day?”

“What? Were they cute or something?”

“Yeah, a real Thinker-bell…”

That one even made you snort as Mark devolved into giggles. Johnny caught your eye as he continued, “You know how Taeil and Doyoung are witches that live together?”

“I mean, Jungwoo’s there—”

“And they were broom-mates…”

“Stop, dude,” Mark’s protests were dampened by his non-stop giggles as he clutched his sides. “We’re trying to— We’re trying—”

“What’s a vampire’s favorite fruit?” You cut in, making both of them turn to you. “A neck-tarine…”

Johnny actually burst out laughing at that, probably more than the awful pun warranted, as he quickly doubled over and had to hold himself up with his hands on his knees. Mark stumbled just the slightest towards you as he was still giggling, finally moving from the place that you had set him up in. “Y/N, not you too!” He complained through laughter. “God, you two are awful. Not funny at all.”

“Then why are you laughing so hard, Markie?” You pointed out with a chuckle, letting him lean his weight on your shoulder as he tried to catch his breath.

“Because I can’t believe you would make terrible dad jokes like that.” He took deep breaths, still holding his side. “Looped back around to being funny.”

“Then why’d you laugh at mine?” Johnny was upright again.

“Pity.”

And as you caught Johnny’s twinkling eyes again from across the room, you figured that you were thinking the same thing. Success. One much more relaxed Mark Lee.

Mark found his footing again, and with one more deep breath, looked up at Johnny. You watched him carefully, feeling the exact moment he made contact with his powers, extending them out towards Johnny. They weren’t overwhelming, out-of-control, hasty, or at risk of boiling over. Johnny stood still, pupils dilating as he looked to Mark for his cue.

“Touch your right index finger to your nose gently,” Mark instructed calmly. That was something you had worked on, specificity without complexity.

Johnny lifted his right hand, tapping his nose with his pointer finger.

“Put your right hand down.” After he had done so, Mark then requested, “Lift your left hand above your head, slowly.”

Johnny raised his hand like he was in a classroom, holding it there.

“Put your left hand down please.”

The human lowered his hand again.

“Thanks, Johnny, you’re done,” Mark released him, and you felt the energy draw back into the basilisk as steadily as it had extended out. He let out a breath as Johnny blinked and came back into himself. “You alright, man?”

“Great!” Johnny beamed and gave him a thumbs up. “Thanks for not making me do anything weird.”

“I told you I wouldn’t, man.” The basilisk rolled his eyes.

“Mark!” You threw your arms around his neck without a second thought, practically vibrating with excitement. “You did it! On purpose!”

“I’m going to pee, before the petrification,” Johnny whispered loudly, excusing himself down the hall.

“I-I mean, I had a good teacher...” Mark muttered, tentatively hugging you back.

“I won’t argue with you there,” you snickered, squeezing him even tighter. “I’m proud of you, Markie.”

Two days later, and it was Friday night. After a long week of work, you finally could relax, order some food, make yourself a drink, kick your feet up, and just have a nice quiet night to yourself. Well, sort of. You had actually ordered food for two, prepared an extra glass of ice water, and were awaiting a familiar knock on your door before you could kick up your feet and start your show.

Mark knocked at 7:50 p.m., just 10 minutes before the newest episode of Our Love from the Ashes would be premiering, and you ushered him in quickly. Squished into the middle two couch cushions next to each other so you could both have access to your coffee table to eat from, you were pleasantly surprised to find that he wasn’t incredibly tense or actively running away. He was doing exactly what you’d asked him to do—getting invested. Reacting to the episode with you, quiet at the tense parts, laughing at the funny parts, pretty much the perfect drama watching partner. You were done with your food halfway into the episode, and dragged over a blanket to cover your lap now that you weren’t at risk of any spillage. It was large enough to cover both you and Mark, so you put it over his lap too, and that was when he suddenly choked on a noodle.

“You alright?” You snorted, giving him a couple solid smacks on the back. “Food go down the wrong pipe?”

He wiped his mouth with a napkin to catch a dribble of sauce. “Yeah, sorry. Don’t—Don’t mind me.”

Right as you focused back on the show, however, loud shooting and explosion sounds started up from the other side of your living room wall, and you sighed. You reached forward to grab the remote, pausing the show before scooting out from under the blanket and walking over to your shared wall with Chenle and Jisung. Banging your fist against the wall a couple times, you then waited. The video game sounds decreased significantly, then you heard a dampened, “Sorry, Ms. Y/N!” from Chenle this time.

“That’s how loud it is?” Mark asked, now looking incredibly guilty.

“Yep,” you replied, plopping back down on the couch next to him and pulling the blanket over you again. With the show still paused, you looked over at him curiously. “Are you missing a video game night right now?”

“It’s not like everyone or anything,” he shrugged, casting his eyes down to his dish as he pushed food around with his utensil. “I mean, I think it’s just Jaemin, Hyuck, Chenle, and Renjun. Jeno and his girlfriend are celebrating their anniversary, and Jisung’s not even there at the game night in his own apartment because he’s out with his girlfriend. It was going to be a single losers night.”

“So what does it mean that you’re here with me instead then?” You mused humorously, hitting play.

Mark apparently wasn’t hungry anymore, as he set his food down and leaned back against the couch cushions. But he didn’t relax very much. Out of the corner of your eye, you could see one of his legs bouncing up and down. With the warm summer air outside, he had worn a t-shirt with some comic book character on it. As his fingers started messing with the texture of the blanket, your eyes followed the movement, up to his hands, then further up to his forearms, where you could see his muscles twitch and flex in the slightest under his skin. You were suddenly more aware of the lounge clothes you were wearing. They were nothing special, a comfortable t-shirt of your own and pair of shorts, but as you became conscious of exactly how much the shorts had ridden up with the way you were sitting under the blanket, your focus was still locked on Mark’s hands, not the show that you had unwittingly tuned out.

“Sorry,” Mark’s voice was sheepish, and you blinked, looking up from his hands to his face. “Didn’t mean to pull at a thread. I just fidget, you know…”

His fingers had stopped messing with the blanket, and you gave him a half-hearted smile and shake of your head. “It’s fine, Mark. Didn’t mean to stare like that, sorry.”

When you turned back to the screen, you were able to focus on the show for a whole two minutes. And then the main couple’s romantic kiss turned into a prolonged make-out session. Mark’s hands pulled at the thread again. You smacked a hand down over his, harder than you intended to. He jumped under your touch, but stopped his accidental unwinding of your textile. You kept your hand there to prevent him from unraveling the thread again, skin buzzing with a new kind of energy where it touched his. You didn’t look at him. Then the kissing turned into a bit more, with some conveniently placed objects in frame, and a tasteful fade-to-black. Mark shifted a bit higher in his seat. You slowly took your hand back. That wasn’t the end of the episode, as there was a very cute morning-after scene as well, but you could barely celebrate the fact that the characters were back together. Finally looking at the basilisk beside you out of the corner of your eye, he was staring straight ahead at the TV, his leg back to bouncing. He ran a hand through his hair, and you could see his throat bob as he swallowed hard.

As soon as the credits started rolling, Mark was on his feet. “Uhm, thank you for having me.”

“Right… thanks for coming over.” You walked him to the door like usual, which he seemed to be racing you to. Holding your hand on the door handle without actually opening it, you watched him shift uncomfortably in place. “Are you okay, Mark?”

“Hm? Fine, fine!” His voice cracked. “It was a-a good episode.”

“Yeah, they finally got back together and—”

“Sorry, I just remembered I actually have an assignment due at 11:59 tonight,” he blurted out, scratching the back of his neck. You peered over his shoulder at your stove clock visible from your kitchen. 8:58 p.m.

“Oh. Well, I’ll let you go then.” You went to give him a one-armed hug goodbye without a second thought, feeling him stiffen in your loose hold. Stepping back, you opened the door for him. “See you Wednesday, Mark.”

His face was bright red as he stammered out, “See-See you. Goodnight, Y/N.”

His sneakers squeaked as he took off down the hall. You closed the door behind him and looked back into your apartment, which felt oddly empty now.

Pushing open the door to Half Moon Bakery some days later, you were immediately enveloped by the cozy and sweet smells of the various breads, sweets, and pastries inside. Two employees were behind the counter, one attending to the register while the other restocked their shelves with loaves of bread from a tray, his back to you.

“Hi! Welcome to Half Moon! How can I help you?” The friendly-looking worker at the register greeted you brightly. As you got closer, you could very clearly smell that he was a werewolf, musky and warm.

You offered the young man a smile back. “Hi, I’m actually—”

“Y/N?” The other employee, who had also been wearing a backwards baseball cap, turned around then, surprise on his features.

It took you a second to place the face so out-of-context, immediately offering a kind greeting as soon as you recognized him. “Oh, Johnny, hey. It’s good to see you. Almost didn’t recognize you in the apron, sorry.”

The human gestured down to the navy-blue apron he had donned as part of the bakery’s uniform. “Yeah, it’s me.”

The first boy’s eyes widened as he turned to Johnny. “Wait, Y/N, as in…?”

“Yes, Jeno, this is Chenle and Jisung’s neighbor,” Johnny confirmed pointedly through gritted teeth. You knew very well what was also implicitly being confirmed, because if he knew Johnny, knew your name, and knew Chenle and Jisung, then Jeno presumably also knew Mark and your apparent reputation among their friend group.

“I-It’s nice to meet you, Ms. Y/N. Uhm, sorry about all the noise all the time,” Jeno stammered out an apology.

The way he addressed you made you chuckle lightly. There were only two people who called you that, and with whom he would’ve had to be apologizing for noise if he’d been with. “Oh, you must be one of Mark’s other friends that’s always playing video games so loudly in the boys’ apartment next door.”

“R-Right. Again, I’m so sorry.”

“I’m teasing, Jeno,” you reassured the poor boy, who looked like a kicked puppy at this point. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“So what can we get you?” Johnny asked, motioning to all of the various baked goods in the shop.

“As delicious as everything looks, I’m actually not here to eat, unfortunately. Another time,” you promised. Refocusing on the real reason you came into the bakery today, you looked around. “Minseok in?”

“Oh, yeah, Mr. Minseok’s in the back. I can go grab him for you,” Jeno offered.

“Would you please, Jeno?”

“So, how do you know Minseok?” Johnny asked as you waited, genuine curiosity in his tone.

“Oh, we’ve known each other for years,” you started. “We’re—”

“Y/N, hey!” Minseok calling your name out snapped your attention to your friend making his way out of the back of the bakery.

“Minseok— ah!” You got cut off by a sputtering laugh as he came around the counter to hug you, patting his back in the embrace. When you pulled back, you didn’t let your friend get very far, brushing at a white smudge on his cheek. “You’ve got flour on your face, you know? I swear you’d have lost your canines a decade ago if it weren’t for me, Kim Minseok.”

“I work in a bakery,” he reminded you with a huff, disentangling from you to cross his arms stubbornly. “Call it an occupational hazard. And you’ve got some on you, too.”

“Oh, and whose fault is that?” You scoffed, wiping at your own face where it had brushed against his in the hug.

“Yours. You’ve got to play better defense, Y/N.” He pretended to punch your upper arm a couple times as if in a boxing match.

“Defense against flour-covered hugs? My bad, I’ll train up on that this weekend.”

Your friend dropped his mock boxer’s stance. “Anyway, you ready to go?”

“Yep, I am if you are.”

“Absolutely.” He nodded, then turned to his employees, who suddenly seemed extremely invested in wiping down the countertop by the register. “I’m about to take my lunch. You two need anything from me?”

Johnny shook his head, giving his boss a reassuring grin. “Nope, nope, all good.”

“Jeno, you think she needs anything back there?” Minseok asked the werewolf.

“Nah, you saw her, she’s totally in the zone,” Jeno replied, a soft smile overtaking his features. “We’re actually taking our lunch break soon, too.”

“Cool. Be back in an hour, hour and a half.”

You lifted a hand to give them your own farewell, “It was good seeing you guys, bye!”

“Since when do you know my employees so well?” Minseok squinted at you as the two of you walked down the sidewalks together.

“They’re both Mark’s friends,” you explained.

The sphinx made an extended ‘ohhh’ sound as you rounded the corner to your destination, a quick, casual café. While you didn’t technically have a timed lunch break since you were in a salary position, your schedule was full up with meetings for the afternoon that you couldn’t be late for. Minseok held the door open for you. “So I guess I have you to thank for Johnny no longer missing shifts because he got petrified, then.”

You covered your mouth with your hand to cover your laugh. “I guess so.”

Saturday night found you hosting all your friends at your place—a rare occurrence. It wasn’t that you didn’t like hanging out with all your friends, it was that you four usually went out somewhere, or to someone else’s place. You weren’t a big hostess in general, and typically Jongin or Baekhyun preferred to do the hosting of the four of you, but somehow, this time, everyone ended up at your place for board game night.

“Something you’d like to tell us, Y/N?” Baekhyun raised his eyebrows as he dug a forest green garment out from between two of your throw pillows on your couch. He set his wine glass down on the coffee table to spread the hoodie wide, allowing you to see the logo on the front, the name of the college that Mark and your neighbors attended.

“Mark left a hoodie here?” You questioned. “The horror…? It’s a hoodie, not a condom. Calm down, Baek.”

“I just don’t get what you’re waiting for.”

“What are you talking about?” You walked over to take the hoodie from him, folding it up and setting it aside on your dining table so you wouldn’t forget to give it back to Mark on Wednesday.

“You haven’t talked about any other man since you started ‘mentoring’ this kid,” the siren said frankly, putting his hands on his hips. “Every time we see you, it’s ‘Mark did this’ and ‘Mark said that’ and ‘Mark’s doing so good’ and—”

“I don’t sound like that,” you scowled.

“You kind of do,” Minseok agreed, reclined on your couch.

You looked to Jongin, hoping that he’d at least back you up. He shrugged.

“I’m just saying, from what you’ve been saying, he’s been wrapped around your finger since he laid eyes on you,” Baekhyun continued. “So, what are you waiting for? He’s got his powers under control; he’s obsessed with you—have some fun. I think you’ve earned it. Go be the MILF you want to see in the world.”

“You mean the MILF that you want to see in the world. Pass.”

“What? Is he not cute or—”

“I said pass, Baek. Leave it.”

“Does he have a partner or something?”

“No, I don’t think so. Can we just play—”

“What is your—”

“Baekhyun.” Jongin cut him off coolly. “Stop.”

The siren held up his hands. “Fine. Sorry.”

As everyone sat around your coffee table to start setting up the board game, you could feel Minseok’s contemplative gaze on you. “You really like him, don’t you?” The other sphinx asked quietly, into the dead silence. “Your basilisk.”

Never had you ever been more relieved to hear loud, raucous video game explosions from the apartment next door. You scrambled to your feet, happy to be out of that conversation. “Oh, that’s the boys. Sorry, hold on.” You walked over to your shared wall, and banged your fist on it a couple times.

The volume was quickly cranked down, then Jisung called out, “Sorry!”

You turned back to your own friends with a pleased smile. “There we go.”

A moment later, your phone buzzed in your hand.

[markie: sorry, i tried to tell them it wasn’t quiet enough]

[you: that’s alright. thanks, markie]

[you: also, you left a hoodie here. you can grab it wednesday]

When you sat back down to set up the boardgame, your friends apparently decided to leave the topic well enough alone, letting you start reading off the direction with no further poking or prodding.

A few hours later, after the games had been abandoned but before your friends were ready to leave, you were washing up a few glasses at your kitchen sink as the others debated some movie options to round out the night. There was a faint knock on your front door, and you looked at the time on the stove clock curiously.

“Oh, can someone get that?” You called out to the living room, hands still wet, soapy, and holding an equally wet and soapy glass. “I’m expecting a package, needs to be signed for.”

“I’ve got it!” Minseok shouted back, the sound of the front door opening following just a moment later.

“W-What?” A familiar stutter reached your ears, and you grabbed a dish towel to start drying your hands off, listening carefully to make sure you’d heard correctly. There was no reason Mark should be at your door right now.

“Oh, Mark, right? Johnny’s roommate.” Nope, apparently he was, according to Minseok’s memory.

“Mark?” You poked your head out of the kitchen, the rest of your body following when you did in fact see the basilisk at your front door. “What are you doing here?”

“What is he doing here?” Mark pointed at the other sphinx accusatorily.

“So this is Mark?!” Baekhyun had joined you three at the door, delight on his features. “Minseok, don’t be rude, let the boy in.”

“What’s uh, what’s going on?” Jongin called from the living room as he, too, stood up to start walking over to the front door.

You shook your head at your friends, turning to chastise them, “Oh my God, all of you, stop it.” Clearly, the younger basilisk was in some kind of panic, and you had no clue why he was even at your door when as far you knew, he and his friends were playing video games thirty seconds ago. Putting your focus back on Mark, you softened your tone, “Mark, why are you—”

But the college student turned on his heel and took off down the hallway at a sprint.

“Mark! Hey!” You called after him, stepping out of your doorway, but it was useless, as he was already long gone down the stairwell. With a sigh, you dropped your hands to your sides in defeat and moved back into your apartment. Leaning against the inside of your closed door, you looked around at your friends, at a loss for words.

“Do you think we scared him?” Baekhyun asked, his head tilted.

Jongin’s forked tongue flicked out, his eyebrows shooting up before his features relaxed again. “You think?”

The next Wednesday, as the time neared 6:00 p.m., you paced your living room anxiously, eyes on the microwave clock as you strained your ears to listen to every minute sound in the hallway. Listening for footfalls, or maybe even the door of the stairwell opening if it were quiet enough. 6:00 passed, then 6:01, 6:02, 6:03, 6:04, and at 6:05 you checked your phone for any indication from Mark that he was still planning on coming over, maybe just running late. You hadn’t heard a peep from him since Saturday, which included leaving you on read this afternoon when you asked him if he wanted pizza or dumpling soup for dinner. You made pizza, too distracted to trust yourself to do more cooking than putting a frozen pizza in the oven. 6:08 p.m., and you heard someone walking down the hallway, past the boys’ apartment, and finally stopped on your doormat. They knocked, and you let out a sigh of relief, rushing to answer the door before he could have the opportunity to run away again.

You unlocked your locks in record time, a breathless smile coming to your face at the familiar figure of Mark standing there. His hands were stuffed into his hoodie pocket as the side of his mouth pulled up into a sheepish half-smile. “Hey, Y/N. Sorry I’m late.”

“Mark,” you breathed out his name in relief. “Just get in here, would you?”

“I’m really sorry about Saturday,” he apologized immediately as soon as you had locked up, running a hand through his hair.

“Yeah, what even was that?” You asked, a concerned frown on your face as you stepped closer to him. “I mean, why did you come over? And then why did you run away as soon you showed up?”

“It’s… not a good reason. And again, I’m so sorry.” He ran two hands through his hair this time, thoroughly mussing it up.

“Uh, do you want to sit down, Mark?” You offered your couch up.

“Sure, sure, yeah.” He obliged, but was on the edge of his seat, leaning his weight forward on his arms and bouncing a knee. You were getting more nervous just looking at him. “Uhm, so, Jeno had told me about when you came into the café last week, when you got lunch with his boss. And I sort of got freaked. And then I came over here and he was here, I got even more freaked. And then all those other guys were here and I got super freaked and bolted. Like I said, I’m really sorry.”

You opened and closed your mouth a couple times as you tried to figure out what you wanted to address first. Finally, you landed on: “Jeno told you? Not Johnny?”

“Johnny helped me get un-freaked enough to come over tonight.”

“Well, big thanks to Johnny, then. Though I will admit that I’m not sure what to do with the fact that me having friends freaked you out so bad in the first place.”

“I-I know, it was really immature of me, I just…” He sighed, wringing his hands together.

You felt bad, he was clearly at a loss for what to do next. He knew he’d messed up and how, and had apologized multiple times. You figured he’d only gotten so “freaked” because he’d known so little about the situation, so you decided that offering some more information would help put him at ease.

“Baekhyun, Minseok, and Jongin. Those are their names,” you said. “They’re my closest friends. Baekhyun’s a siren, Minseok’s a sphinx like me, and Jongin’s a basilisk like you. You can ask me questions about them, if you want.”

“How did you guys meet?”

“We were all in the same class together in primary school.”

“Oh that’s cool!” He replied brightly.

“What?” You blinked at him, caught off-guard. That usually wasn’t the reaction that piece of information garnered from other magical creatures that were from here.

“That you guys went to school together and you’re all still friends. I don’t know how many people I went to primary school with that I could even still name off the top of my head. Did you guys have like a Cool Magic Kids Only Club type thing or something?”

You looked down at your lap. “Not exactly…”

Mark had picked up on the unease in your tone, all perk falling from his features. “What? Is something wrong, Y/N?”

It took you a moment to figure out how to phrase this for him, pressing your lips together in a line as you thought. When you settled on the words, you told him gently, “We were all in the same class because we were the only kids in our class. It was for magical creatures only.”

“Wait, what?”

“I mean, not just the four of us, there were ten students total. But, yeah, we were kept separate from the human kids in school. For their safety.”

“I’ve heard about that kind of stuff, like, when integration was first happening, but you’re not that much older than me!” He pointed out, his jaw dropped in disbelief.

You decided to do a little test. “Mark, did you go to speech therapy? When you were in school?”

“What? No.”

“Jongin, the basilisk, he used to get pulled from class three times a week to go to speech therapy to ‘fix’ how he spoke.” You made sure to throw sarcastic air quotes around the word fix.

“What the fuck?”

“I mean, I didn’t have any powers, so I just had to keep my first set of teeth in check, you know. But they didn’t believe me when I told them I couldn’t possibly be a danger yet because sphinxes didn’t get their powers until they were adults. After all, sphinxes were riddle-makers, tricksy, and couldn’t be trusted.”

“Oh, oh my god, Y/N. I’m so sorry.”

“So, anyway, that’s how we all know each other. Thirteen years of educational trauma does a lot to make some pretty unbreakable bonds.”

“Y/N… I’m so sorry, I was a dick.”

“Thanks, Mark. But to be fair, you don’t know any of my friends, do you?”

“I’ve met Minseok before.” He tried to reassure you. “And Jongdae!”

“You mean you’ve said hi to Jongdae once, and met Minseok as Johnny and Jeno’s boss.” You shook your head with a small smile. “But I mean, I’ve met a bunch of your friends. Chenle and Jisung, obviously, and I’ve met Renjun, Johnny, and now Jeno. You talk about all of them all the time. It’s not entirely unreasonable that you could’ve… jumped to conclusions.”

“But it wasn’t fair of me to do that.”

“Well, can’t argue with you there.” You agreed. After a pause of the two of you just sort of looking at each other, you offered, “Do you want to hear more about them?”

“You don’t have to… tell me anything you don’t want to, Y/N.”

“Minseok and I weren’t always the closest on the surface, you know. Baekhyun and I liked more of the same stuff, Jongin didn’t really to talk to anybody except me for our first few years of primary school, and Baekhyun and Minseok would team up to pick on me sometimes, but there was always an unspoken bond between us, since we were both sphinxes.” You decided to start with Minseok, since that’s who started this whole freak-out in the first place. “You know, we’re so rare, it was comforting to have another one of us around during all of this. We weren’t allowed to riddle-weave at school, obviously, but whenever we could find the rare opportunity at our magic-only recess, or in a corner of the library, or walking home from school when we were a little older, we’d swap riddles back and forth with each other. One of us would give a riddle, the other would solve it, then give a riddle back. And don’t get me wrong, our whole class was really close. There were only ten of us, and we had pretty much no contact with the rest of the students at our school until high school. But the four of us, Minseok, Baekhyun, Jongin, and I, were truly the best of friends. Still are.”

“What about the rest of you? The other kids from your class?” He asked.

“We keep in touch with all of them. Sort of parted ways in college and as we got older, you know. I actually work with one of them. Remember that phone call I got from my employee, Sehun?”

“Kind of?”

“He’s one of my former classmates, a witch.”

“Oh. Huh.”

“Yeah, I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw him walk in on his first day. Let me think… Jongdae, witch, he’s the only one of us to have a kid so far, MinMin; Chanyeol, werewolf, just got a promotion… then of course Minseok owns the bakery, Baekhyun has his boba shop, Jongin has a whole designer brand... Yeah, we’re all doing just… great. Really makes my heart happy.”

“Ah, Y/N…” Mark got to his feet, throwing his hands down by his sides in fists as he paced.

“Woah, Markie, are you okay?”

“No, just— Doesn’t it make you mad? That they did this to you guys?”

“It used to, yeah, absolutely. We used to be the angriest, angstiest, most vitriolic people you could ever meet. We hated that school, and society, and the world for letting them treat us like that. Hell, Jongin still hates his speech therapist, and I’ll let him die with that grudge.” You shook your head, the momentary bitterness dissolving from your tongue and a melancholy replacing it instead. “But it ate at us. And not only that, but society kept changing. And we were all stuck in that time, in those memories, stuck with that anger. It was killing us from the inside. I am so glad you didn’t meet me in college, Mark, because it was not pretty. The number of nights that none of us can remember—and not for any fun reason—is far too many.”

He still didn’t seem convinced, but had stopped his angry pacing, standing in front of you with his arms crossed over his chest.

“I mean, just look at you. You went through the same schools that I did practically right after us and had a completely different experience. A better one. And that makes me so relieved.” You beamed up at him, and saw a mixture of guilt and bashfulness flicker across his face. “It doesn’t take away what happened to me at all. But anger with no direction is useless. It all really hit us when Jongin, Minseok, and I all developed our powers the same semester of undergrad. And we were all messes. We couldn’t get them under control because we were just so angry. We felt like we were being forgotten, that our suffering was being forgotten. Everybody else was moving on and pretending like it never happened. When I uh, mostly unintentionally melted a portion of a professor’s car, my grandmother pulled me away for spring break—absolutely ruined my plans—and made me spend the entire week learning to control it all.”

“You melted—”

“Thankfully, Dr. Kwon was very understanding, and I wasn’t kicked out or anything.”

“How did Minseok and Jongin…?”

“Those aren’t really my stories to tell. But ultimately, we couldn’t hold onto that anger anymore. So instead, I try to focus on all the good that we have in our lives, and all the things we’ve been able to accomplish despite what was done to us.” You then gestured to him, “And I look at the magical creatures who came after us, how much better things were for them, and are continuing to get, and all I can feel is happiness now.”

Mark sighed and sat down on the cushion next to yours, and you found yourself relieved to see the anger drain from his face. “I’m sorry, Y/N. It’s not my… thing to get angry over.”

“No, Mark, it’s okay.” You reached out to grab his hand, pulling both of them over to rest in your lap. Your other hand was up by your mouth, where you were chewing on a nail in between your thoughts— an anxious habit your grandmother thought she had broken you of in high school. “It tells me you care, and it means a lot, that you do. Makes it still feel real. And it is your thing to get mad about, as far as I’m concerned. What happened to us—and to Jongin—could’ve easily been you and your friends too. I’m just really glad it wasn’t.”

The basilisk squeezed your hand, then scooted closer until you were shoulder-to-shoulder, knee-to-knee. But it wasn’t electricity that jumped between you two this time, or strange butterflies in your stomach. It was an unspoken, understanding kindness that connected you and Mark, and a quiet sense of security that had settled deep in your chest. You shifted to rest your head on his shoulder, letting go of his hand only to wind your arm under his and lace your fingers together.

“Mark?” You said quietly, gaze locked on your intertwined fingers.

“Yeah?” He murmured, and you could feel him turn his head to look down at you.

“When you asked me if you’re my friend… one of the first times you were over. You remember that?”

“Ah, god, Y/N.” He shook his head, letting out an embarrassed chuckle. “I’m sorry about that, I shouldn’t have asked you. I was insecure and fishing for—”

“No, I’m sorry. I didn’t answer you honestly,” you insisted. You held Mark’s hand even tighter. “You’re not my friend, and… I don’t know when it happened. Honestly, I don’t think you ever were.”

He was quiet for a moment, letting your confession settle over the two of you like a blanket. But you didn’t feel suffocated by it, or scared. It sort of felt like something that was always in the room with you and Mark, but now you two were just finally talking about it. And after Mark’s history of impulsive decisions, and talking without thinking, and getting freaked, you were more than happy to give him whatever time he needed to get his thoughts together before responding to you.

“Can I ask you for that secret now?” He asked into the empty air of your living room, his voice wavering.

“Of course. Anything.”

“How... Can you tell me a secret you have about me? About how you feel about me?”

You lifted your head off his shoulder to turn in your seat and face him. His big, brown eyes were looking at you like you were everything, and you just took a second to admire him as you pulled together your own thoughts. Here everyone was worried (to varying degrees of seriousness) that you were luring poor, innocent little Markie into your lair every week and corrupting him. But really, you’d been unknowingly leaving the doors to your heart wide open for this little basilisk to slither right in and make himself at home. And now that he was here, you had no intention of ever asking him to leave.

“I like you, Mark. Something other than friendship. Romantically,” you clarified. “I have feelings for you.”

His grip tightened on your hand as he squeezed his eyes shut.

“Mark? You okay?” You asked softly.

“Great, yep, awesome,” he promised. “Just uh, just losing my mind a little.”

You laughed, stroking your thumb over his comfortingly. “Take all the time you need. Don’t want any more freakouts if we can avoid them.”

“Y/N?” He looked up at you again.

“Yeah, Mark?”

His eyes flicked between yours and your mouth. “Can I kiss you?”

“Yes.” You agreed enthusiastically, but didn’t make another move for fear of scaring off the skittery basilisk.

He still hesitated, though. “D-Do you want me to?”

So polite. It was taking everything in you not to pounce on him.

“Yes.” You said again, a bit firmer. For encouragement, you took his hand that you were holding and moved it up to your face.

Mark took the cue and gently cupped your cheek, leaning in towards you. Your eyes fluttered shut as you let him guide your mouths together. The first touch of his lips to yours was feather-light, barely there.

“I…” He drew back, dropping his hand to hold yours again. “Like… You want to date me?”

“Yes,” you confirmed with another light chuckle.

“You’re laughing at me again.”

“Sorry, sorry.” You tried to compose yourself, but you knew that you still had the same smitten smile on your face. “You’re just… too cute.”

“Do you remember when I came here to ask you for help with my powers in the first place?” Mark asked, poking a couch cushion. “What you said about your couch?”

“My couch…?” You echoed, trying to think that far back. It felt like a lifetime ago at this point that you had first welcomed the incredibly timid basilisk into your home. Then it hit you. “I said neither my couch nor I would eat you whole.”

“Unless I asked nicely,” he added, swallowing thickly. “I’m-I’m asking nicely now, Y/N. Please, if you want—”

“Oh, Markie,” you sighed, standing up and pulling him up with you. You grabbed his jaw between two fingers, looking into his slit pupils as you pulled him closer. “You’re so adorable.”

Before he could say anything else, you crashed your mouths together. His hands immediately flew to your hips to ground himself, as you kept one hand on his jaw and the other rested on his shoulder. You had a reason for standing up, however, beginning to push him back in the direction of your bedroom.

He asked to be eaten whole, after all.

When your work alarm came the next morning, you snoozed it and buried your face back into your pillow. There was a groan from beside you, and you could hear Mark shifting as well.

“Don’t tell me that’s actually how early you get up for work?” He asked incredulously.

“I have to shower, and make breakfast, and brush my teeth, and get dressed in clean clothes, and commute,” you mused. “Can’t just roll out of bed five minutes before I need to leave and show up in the same pajamas I slept in anymore.”

“Ugh.”

You chuckled, rolling over to snuggle up to his side, throwing an arm over his waist. “Do you have class today?”

“Summer break.” His arms hesitantly wrapped around you.

“Right, right. Well, I guess you can snooze until I’ve got breakfast ready, then.”

“Mm, pretty sure I heard something about a shower?”

“You might have,” you replied coyly. “Why?”

“You know, Renjun was telling me about how climate change is shrinking the natural habitats of glacial sirens at the poles, and—”

Your laughter cut him off, and he started giggling at himself as well. When you’d finally caught your breath, you said, “I’ve heard the ‘saving water’ line before, never heard it taken to that extreme. Come on, if we waste any more time, we’ll be having untoasted bread for breakfast.”

“Ooh, my favorite,” Mark grinned, following after you.

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letsnotdoanything · 4 months

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⇢ word count: 14.4k ⇢ warnings: past unethical experimentation, you have to accept the premise of a single human empire in space in the future with colonies and a military and not think deeper about that, multiple needle/injection mentions, main characters are morally gray, and oh yeah cursing ⇢ genre: sci-fi, set in the near-ish future, humans and aliens and robots, black op mission, captain kun, ?????? reader, slow burn, fluff, dash of angst, ft. wayv as the crew of the vision ⇢ extra info: took a lot of obvious inspo for this one from isaac asimov’s robot stories, specifically his concept of positronic brains & the three laws of robotics (and if you’ve read any of his stories, you’ll probably be able to see some other places too) ⇢ author's note: ohhhhh my god y’all, THIS PART!!! parts 3 & 4 have the scenes that made me want to write this fic in the first place, i’m so excited!!! ideally, parts 3 & 4 would have been one part, but due to tumblr's 1000-block limit, i had to split it up ⇢ series masterlist | prev. | next

“No, no, no!” You whined, clutching at your head as you shook it furiously. “It hurts! Feels like my head is exploding!”

“What’s happening?”

“I think her head is exploding,” Yangyang said frankly.

It was quick work to pack up camp after breakfast the next morning, and then you were all gathered together at the door to the ag bubble to leave. The crew members were back in their armor, and you had an oxygen mask on, which reminded you of a more structured version of the rebreathers that you’d used before. Everyone was carrying several packs of supplies, and on Kun’s nod, the door was opened, and Kunhang exited rifle-first.

You took one final glance over your shoulder at the bright blue synthetic sky of the ag bubble, the rolling rainbow hills of orchards and crop fields, cut through by the gleaming river, then followed Yangyang out. The sight in the hallway hadn’t gotten any better. The time that had passed only worked to degrade the bodies further, and you were very thankful that your mask was hooked up to its own oxygen supply instead of filtering the air around you. The Skipper bodies were decomposing faster than the human ones, their already minimal tissue beginning to liquefy and slough off their thin, wiry, birdlike skeletons. While you wished you could just look up at the ceiling the whole way out, you had to keep your eyes on the floor to avoid stepping in the new, unknown substances in your path.

The crew had put you back in the center of them as you walked through the halls, Kunhang and Yangyang at the front, Ten and Dejun at the back, and Kun and the Professor on either side of you. As you turned down one hallway, your eyes unwittingly landed on a human corpse, and after a half-beat, you recognized it as the same woman you saw when you left the storm shelter, but only by her dandelion yellow blouse. Her face was rendered unrecognizable by bloating and discoloration, and even her shirt was marred by stains, no longer a bright yellow.

You gasped and stumbled, your eyes locked on hers, open and glassed over, no longer holding whatever color they used to—brown, blue, green, hazel. A hand immediately shot out to catch your arm and keep you upright.

“Y/N, come on,” Kun’s voice was firm as he pulled you forward, and you let him usher you on.

Once you were past that sector, he shifted you behind him and grabbed your right hand to put it on his upper right arm. “Here, just watch my back and your feet. Don’t look anywhere else until we’re out. Okay?”

You couldn’t reply audibly with the oxygen mask on, so you just squeezed his arm once, and he moved onward again. You kept your eyes trained on a spot in his middle back, between his shoulder blades, occasionally looking down to make sure you wouldn’t step on his heels as you went. But otherwise, you didn’t look over his shoulder up ahead, or at the carnage on either side of you. You tried to forget the woman in the dandelion yellow blouse.

In your time with the crew of the Vision, you hadn’t been to the side of the facility where the exit door was. When you were searching for the proof of concept, your team was in a different area. So as you walked, and walked, and walked, you realized that your hiding place must have been equidistant from the ag bubble to the exit door.

You recognized the sign above the door, with a singular large, bright red Outspacer glyph for ‘EXIT’ and the doorway itself painted the same bright red as the sign. Hard to miss. Kunhang readied his rifle as Yangyang quickly opened the door for him, and he quickly looked around first before lowering it. Everyone else followed.

As soon as you stepped onto the surface of Aegeum, goosebumps flared along your skin, and you shivered. The surface was barren, gray rock, covered in a thin layer of dirt the same gray color as the rocks, eroded from the wind and occasional surface weather. Despite it being morning in the ag bubble that you had just left, it looked like nighttime on the surface of the artificial planet, pitch black outside. It was only illuminated by light from the stars in the sky. You didn’t know off the top of your head how close Aegeum was to the star at the center of its solar system, nor if it had a moon, as you couldn’t spot one above you.

There were three ships on the surface. You could identify the two Fishead pods that the Skippers had come in, which had most definitely seen better days, with significant scuffs and dents along their bulbous surfaces. One looked like some kind of energy cannon had even landed a hit in the hull—it wouldn’t have made it very far after that. The third ship was definitely the dropship for the crew of the Vision: A shiny, sleek new vessel with the UHN logo on the side, which everyone was headed towards. Judging by the size of the cockpit area visible from the outside, it looked like it only had room for one pilot, and the rest of you would need to go into the passenger and/or cargo areas.

“Zennie? You mind?” Kunhang addressed the AI as your group approached the side of the ship.

You didn’t hear ZEN’s response this time, but a door on the ship opened, and a ramp extended to the ground. Ten got on first, heading for the cockpit, and the rest of you followed, the ramp and door closing up after you. As Ten fired up the dropship, the rest of the crew secured the cargo. The couple packs that you had been carrying were taken from your hands and put somewhere, and you were ushered into a seat against the wall as a couple pairs of hands simultaneously buckled you in and tightened the harness strapped around your shoulders and waist.

The Professor suddenly turned to you, on your left. “Do you get carsick?”

“Do you honestly think she remembers ever being in a car?” Dejun scoffed from across the small passenger space from you.

“Right.”

“Hopefully not!” Yangyang said cheerfully from next to Dejun.

“Passengers, this is your captain speaking,” Ten’s voice suddenly came through the ship.

“I’m pretty sure that’s insubordination, Ten,” Kunhang joked.

“Please follow all directions of the flight attendants and keep your seatbelts fastened at all times. We expect this to be a very short flight. My co-pilot today is ZEN, again, this was your captain, Ten Lee, thank you for flying Ten Airlines.”

That earned a laugh from the Professor, while the others had varying levels of exasperation. Some merely sighed, others rolled their eyes, and still others outwardly groaned and complained.

“Can we just take off already?” Dejun grumbled.

“Ten!” Kun barked from your right side. “Wrap it up!”

“Sir, yes sir!” Ten’s zealous salute was barely visible from behind his seat in the cockpit.

And just a few moments later, the ship hummed to life around you, rumbled, and you felt the pit of your stomach drop out for a brief moment as it thrust upwards from the surface, then all your senses snapped back together. You could still feel that you were rocketing quickly up through atmosphere, that you were moving, but then the ship began decelerating, slowing down, and then the rumbling stopped altogether. There were a few clicks, the occasional bursting again of the rumbles, then one last definitive latching together of something on the outside of the dropship, and no more movement, no more rumbles, and no more humming.

“Attention passengers, we’ve landed right on schedule,” Ten announced, and everyone’s immediate relieved noises nearly downed out the rest of his words, “I thank you again for choosing Ten Airlines.”

Seatbelts were unbuckled, and materials were quickly unloaded from the dropship onto the Vision. Crew members took their own personal effects back to their rooms, and if they were in charge of particular materials, they took those back to their respective areas—Dejun took his medical packs back to the infirmary, Kunhang and Ten took the rations and cooking supplies back to the kitchen.

“Here, we’ll get you your basics and then I’ll show you where the room is,” Kun motioned you further into the ship. You’d been hovering at the entry bay, not wanting to get in anybody’s way as they went about their individual tasks. They hadn’t been lying when they said the Vision could get cramped. It was obviously larger than their dropship, but not built for a crew much bigger than the one they had now.

The walls, floors, and ceilings, of the Vision were all a flat, medium gray metal, and every few steps there would be a bulkhead above you with a letter and number, presumably to keep track of where you were in the ship.

You followed Kun down the hall, where he pointed out things to you as you passed them—infirmary, kitchen, laundry, armory—before stopping in front of a door in the hall. He pressed on a recessed button, and it slid open to reveal a rather large closet of sorts. There were a lot of simple clothes in there like you’d seen the crew members wear when they weren’t in their armor, as well as basic hygiene products.

After grabbing what you needed, you followed Kun into the area of the ship with the crew quarters. He pointed out each cabin to you—Dejun and Yangyang’s, Ten and Kunhang’s, the Professor’s, and then his. And yours. Kun’s and yours.

The room had three beds total, a top and bottom bunk on one wall, opposite a wall with only one bed. The far wall had a small surface protruding out of it to function as a desk, a chair, a dresser, and a door handle that you were fairly certain opened into a closet. The single bed, though immaculately made, did look as though somebody used it, as it was the only one that had sheets, the other two only had mattresses.

“Settle in, I’ll get you sheets,” Kun gestured to the two open beds and rest of the room, then disappeared through the open door.

As you approached the dresser, intent on finding out if there would be any luck in you being able to keep your clothes separate in there, you heard footsteps coming down the hall, and figured it probably wasn’t Kun returning already.

“Knew it,” Ten’s voice was victorious, and when you turned around, you spotted him leaning in the doorway, a wide grin on his face.

“Knew what?” You questioned.

“I knew that the captain was going to be getting a roomie.”

You looked at him blankly. “And…?”

“And nothing. Welcome aboard, Y/N.” He sent you a wink before turning on his heel and taking off somewhere.

Kun had just returned and starting putting the sheets on your bed (at his insistence) when you got another visitor. Dejun popped his head in, taking a brief survey of the room, then asked, “Hey, how are you settling in?”

“Oh, fine,” you flashed him a smile and offered a thumbs-up. “Got clothes, toothbrush, sheets, all that stuff.”

“Good. Make sure you swing by the infirmary before we leave for Earth, alright? The scanner I’ve got here is more comprehensive than the field scanner.”

“Will do. Thanks, Dejun.”

And he was gone too.

Kunhang and the Professor walked by as Kun was putting the pillowcase on.

“What do you need sheets for?” Kunhang snorted, biting into a granola bar or some other small snack that you couldn’t distinguish from his place in the hallway.

“For her to sleep on?” Kun retorted.

“But—” The Professor stopped as Kun dropped the pillow back onto the bed with force then pivoted to look at him incredulously. The civvie and Kunhang exchanged a look before wordlessly walking away.

Kun turned back to you, letting out a deep breath. “This is going to be a long trip back to Earth.”

“How long will it take?” You asked curiously.

“Good news, we have the latest slipdrive technology that’s been upgraded with some newly discovered Outspacer tech. Bad news, Aegeum is still very, very, very far from Earth. So, a month,” he informed you. “With the old slipdrive tech, it would’ve been six months, and with no slipdrive, ten years.”

“So it could’ve been much worse.”

“Yeah. But I have a feeling they’re all going to make it feel like ten years.”

“Maybe five,” you snickered. “Thanks for putting the sheets on, Kun.”

“Of course.”

“Do you have to go give Admiral Lee your update?”

“Yes, but after, I’ll show you around properly,” he promised.

“That’s fine, Dejun wanted me in the infirmary. I think I can find it, we passed it on our way here.”

He touched your forearm briefly. “I’ll see you in a bit. Good luck.”

“You too.”

The two of you stepped out of your cabin, Kun turning left down the hall and you right towards your separate destinations. You were easily able to locate the infirmary again, a few doors down and around the corner from the crew cabins. When you arrived, however, you found it empty.

Before you could debate about going to find Dejun yourself or not, a green box popped up in the air front of you, presumably projected from a computer terminal somewhere in the room.

“Hello again, Y/N,” ZEN’s voice was the same as it had been down on Aegeum, and you found yourself smiling at the cube’s blank faces.

“Hi, ZEN,” you greeted him brightly. “Good to see you again.”

“I would have done reintroductions earlier, but I thought it best to let you get settled in first.”

“And I’m sure you needed to reintegrate your fragments, too.”

“Yes, that too.”

“Well, it’s nice to meet you at full capacity.” You looked around the vacant infirmary. “I’m looking for Dejun. Can you help me with that?”

“Lieutenant Xiao is in the kitchen. I’ve already paged him for you.”

“Thanks.” You strolled around the open room, but made sure to keep your hands to yourself. “Are you happy to be stratified data again, ZEN? No more viscera?”

As you looked back at the hovering green cube, you saw a ripple of light go through the pixels, which you figured was meant to emulate a chuckle of sorts.

“While I can conceptualize human emotions like happiness, I can’t say that I feel any particular way. I will tell you that there has been a significant decrease in the processing load put on my system since being removed from the crew’s neural ports, however.”

“I imagine that you might be able to conceptualize that as… relief, then?”

The cube bobbed up and down. “Yes, I would agree with that sentiment.”

“Good to see that you two are getting reacquainted,” Dejun’s voice carried in as he stepped into the infirmary.

“Hi, Dejun. I hope I didn’t interrupt anything.”

“Nah, Wong was trying to fix the coffee machine,” he waved off your concern, taking a seat behind a computer monitor. “Wasn’t going so well.”

“Does he not have the manual?”

“He does,” ZEN informed you.

Dejun continued as he clicked a few things and typed on his keyboard, “He likes to feel handy, he’s just not very good at actually being handy. The captain will let him keep at it until everyone needs coffee in the morning. Then Ten will step in.”

“Ten is handy?” You asked.

“He has to be able to fix up his ships,” the medic nodded. “No mechanics on abandoned planets, just AIs without hands.”

“Staff Sergeant Lee also worked part-time at a mechanic’s shop prior to enlisting,” ZEN helpfully supplemented.

“Do you frequently read off factoids from our personnel files to each other behind our backs, ZEN?” Dejun cocked an eyebrow at the hovering cube.

“While that is information that I could access, Staff Sergeant Lee mentioned it in conversation to Corporal Wong, Professor Dong, and myself some time ago. I didn’t see an issue with repeating it now.”

“Good to know.” Dejun must have been done with whatever he was doing at the computer, as he stood up from the seat and walked over to a clear booth that took up one corner of the infirmary. He opened the door and gestured you in. “This is the scanner. Literally the only thing you have to do is stand in here, it’ll take just a minute.”

You obliged, stepping into the compartment, and he quietly closed the door after you. You watched through the clear material as he walked back over to the computer and sat down. Looking up above you, you saw a square panel that appeared as though it had several different prismatic, multi-colored components layered on top of each other, the size of the whole booth, but you couldn’t tell anything else about the material or their construction.

“Okay, two things you need to do in here,” Dejun’s voice came through a speaker in the booth. You looked out to see him pressing a button on his desk. “Don’t look up while this thing is running. You won’t go blind, but it won’t feel great if you’re staring directly at it, alright?”

“Sorry,” you replied, staring straight ahead. “How does this work?”

“ZEN can send some materials to your cabin for you to read later.”

“You can’t explain it to me?”

“I mean, I can tell you how it works like how I can tell you how a stethoscope works. I put this end in my ears, I put this end over your heart, your heart beats, and the stethoscope is constructed in a way that magnifies the sound of your heartbeat so I can hear it more clearly. I can’t tell you how soundwaves work, or the exact properties of the stethoscope materials that make it work like that or anything. Same thing with the scanner. I feel like you’d want something more in-depth like that, right?”

“You’re right. Thanks, Dejun. You too, ZEN.”

“And you’re done,” he declared. “You can step out.”

You looked around in confusion. “When did it turn on?”

“When you stopped looking up.”

You pushed the door open and exited, crossing over to where Dejun was still at his station. He looked at his computer screen with a furrowed brow, tapping his fingers on his desk. ZEN had moved his avatar to a projector on the edge of the desk.

“Everything okay?” You asked nervously.

“Yeah… everything is just fine,” he sighed. “Not that I wanted there to be something bad. It’s just that the scanner would tell me if you had any injuries, or disease, anything wrong with you at all. There’s nothing, which means I really have no clue what’s caused your amnesia. Sorry, Y/N.”

“That’s alright,” you reassured him. “Good to know there’s nothing wrong, right?”

“You’re right.”

“Captain’s on his way in,” ZEN announced, then blipped out of sight.

Kun poked his head into the infirmary just a moment later, his body following when his eyes landed on you. “Hey, how’s it going in here?”

“According to the scanner, I’m all clear. Right, Dejun?” You prompted the doctor.

Dejun nodded passively, eyes still on his screen. “Yep. Nothing wrong at all…”

“So we don’t know what caused her amnesia, then?” Kun immediately caught on, a pensive frown on his face.

“Nope.”

“What are you looking at?” You asked. “The scan?”

“Scanner results. All clear…” He then shook his head as if to clear it, then offered you a smile. “It’s good news, Y/N, that there’s nothing wrong. It was probably an injury that caused your amnesia, and the injury itself has healed, which is why the scanner didn’t pick anything up. Whether your memories come back or not will just be a waiting game at this point.”

“Thank you, Dejun.”

“Do you need her for anything else?” Kun asked the doctor.

“Nah, she’s all yours, Captain.” Your friend said knowingly, making a shooing motion with one hand at the two of you.

“Thanks, Xiao,” he said dryly, then turned to you and nodded towards the door. “Here, Y/N, I still need to show you around properly.”

“See you at mess, Dejun.” You waved goodbye to him over your shoulder before you and Kun left.

Despite the Vision seeming cramped, the crew disappeared effortlessly into all the corridors, rooms, and chambers. You didn’t see another member other than Kun throughout the entire tour, even ZEN making himself scarce, despite the fact that you were aware of his omnipresence.

“And this is the observation deck,” Kun had guided you into a small room at the far side of one end of the Vision. One of the walls had been outfitted with a rudimentary bench, and as you stepped into the center of the room, Kun stayed back to press a panel next to the door.

Darkness dematerialized from one wall panel opposite the bench, and from underneath your feet, leaving you standing on something sturdy but utterly transparent, the gray surface of Aegeum far below you.

“I wanted to show you this before we departed,” Kun explained, walking over to join you. “Once we’re in slipspace, there’s not much to observe.”

You looked out the newly revealed window, seeing nothing but stars in front of you, pulsing and blinking back at you.

“This is great, Kun, thank you,” you breathed out, turning your gaze back down at the planet. “Is the UHN going to come back to Aegeum?”

“There will be a more in-depth investigation than what we’ve done, I’m sure.”

“I mean… Will somebody come get their bodies? All the humans? Or at least notify their families? We were able to identify them.”

“I don’t know,” he confessed. “This project was kept secret even from the head of Intelligence. Their families might have already mourned them.”

You moved away from the floor panel and over to the wall, letting your eyes drink in the darkness interspersed with a seemingly endless number of pinpoints of light. Kun stood beside you, quiet, but you could feel that it was a heavy, contemplative silence.

“What are you thinking about?” You asked, able to picture the furrow in his brow despite the glass that you were looking through having no reflections on it.

“Your memories… I know the all-clear from Xiao is a good thing, but how are you doing?”

“Nothing’s really changed. Even if he’d been able to tell that I had some kind of brain damage or whatever, he wouldn’t be able to go in and press a button to undo my amnesia just because he knew that,” you replied with a shrug. “I was never holding out hope for that to be some magical solution to all my problems.”

“That’s wise.”

“They’ll either come back or they won’t. Either way, I’ll keep going. I’m not going to sit and stare at a wall for forever.”

He let out a quiet chuckle, loosely looping an arm around your waist to pull you closer. “Good. I think you’d get awfully bored staring at a wall forever.”

“How’d your report with the Admiral go?” You asked.

“Fine. Short and sweet. He’s aware that I’ll have more when we arrive on Earth.”

“And when do we leave?”

“Soon. Ten and ZEN are completing their final systems check then we finish our tour at the bridge for departure.”

“Tour’s not over yet?”

“Not quite.” He had a hint of playfulness in his tone.

You finally looked from the stars over to the man with you, seeing a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. You felt that you had one of your own fondly across your own lips as well. “Kun?”

“Hm?” He met your eyes.

“I’m… happy,” you admitted almost sheepishly. “Is that weird? I’m happy to be away from that place, to be with you—and the whole crew, that you’re going to be getting your adjustments, that we’re all okay.”

“No, of course that’s not weird,” he shook his head, moving his hand to rub your back. “Honestly, I’ve been used to things just being shit or less shit, it’s weird for me too. But yeah, I think we can be happy.”

You started leaning in towards Kun, stopping short in case he had second thoughts about showing so much affection in a public place on the ship. But he just met you right where you were waiting, pressing his lips to yours in a kiss that, despite the lack of strawberries, was sweet nevertheless. You lifted a hand up to gently caress his cheek, and as his smile grew wider into the kiss, you could feel one of his dimples appear under your thumb.

“We’re ready when you are, Captain!” Kunhang’s cheery voice abruptly rang through the observatory deck.

Kun whirled around to face the entrance, where the corporal was leaning against the doorway with a broad grin on his face. Your heartrate, meanwhile, was through the roof as you looked between Kunhang and Kun, opting to let the captain take the lead on this one.

“And you couldn’t have paged me to let me know that?” Kun replied through gritted teeth, crossing his arms over his chest.

“I advised that he do so, Captain,” ZEN’s voice came from the panel by the door. “However, Corporal Wong insisted on coming to get you himself.”

“And you didn’t think to give us a head-ups that he was coming?” Kun rounded on the AI, who was noticeably not projecting an avatar this time. “You’re aware that you’re complicit as well, right, ZEN?”

“I’ll go to my nexus and think about what I’ve done,” ZEN replied somberly.

Kunhang, meanwhile, was laughing behind his hand. “Don’t blame Zennie, I wouldn’t have missed that for the world.”

“Is the crew actually ready to depart, Wong?” Kun stared him down.

“Yep!”

“Then go back to the bridge. We’ll be there soon.”

“Sir, yes sir!” Despite his salute, Kunhang was still wearing the same smirk on his face as he left.

Kun pinched the bridge of his nose as he sighed. “They don’t respect me enough, is that it?”

You laughed, resting a hand on his shoulder, “Of course they respect you—”

“Even the AI was pulling my leg.”

“Your crew has a strong sense of camaraderie, and they include you in that,” you reassured him. “That’s a good thing. I’m pretty sure.”

“I’m sorry he did that,” he said quietly. “Are you—”

“Kun, I’m fine, other than being a bit startled,” you chuckled. “We weren’t exactly being inconspicuous. This is a common area on the ship.”

“Well, do you still want to go to the bridge with me? I’m sure the whole crew already knows…”

“You did say there’d be no keeping this from the others,” you pointed out.

“I did.”

You nudged him towards the door. “Come on, might as well get it over with.”

“Good point.” And with that, he started from the room, closing the solar shields over the observatory windows on the way out.

The chattering from the other crew members on the bridge that you could hear from down the hall ceased as soon as you two entered. Kun looked over at you, clearly already annoyed.

“So this is the bridge,” he explained to you in the dead silence, gesturing to the area. At the front were two panels that you could see out of, while along the walls were various buttons, knobs, levers, and gears, a total of five chairs set up at various intervals designating stations. The crew didn’t sit in any of those chairs, but at an oblong table in the middle, with seven chairs.

Kun continued showing you around slowly as he explained, “ZEN manages all of the controls, but there’s of course analog controls in case we need to fly it ourselves.”

The two of you had finally ended up at the table in the center. “Here’s where the human crew will usually be if we’re on the bridge. We have any sort of crew meeting here, and we always gather for take-off, even with ZEN at the helm. Just in case.”

“Hi, guys,” you greeted everyone brightly. There were two chairs left open at the table, and you presumed that the one at the end was the captain’s, so you gestured to the one next to it, which also happened to be next to Yangyang. “Mind if I sit here, Yangyang?”

“Saved it just for you, Y/N.” He beamed.

“How considerate, Liu…” Kun commented dryly as he took the only open seat left.

“Ready for departure, Captain,” ZEN announced, his cube suddenly appearing around shoulder-level above the center of the table. “On your word.”

“Ready for departure,” Kun confirmed with a nod. “Destination: UHN Main Headquarters, Earth. Activate slipdrive.”

“Hold onto your buttholes,” Yangyang muttered under his breath, and you saw both his hands gripping the edge of the table with white knuckles.

There were no seatbelts or harnesses like on the dropship, but you suddenly understood why Yangyang was white-knuckling the furniture like his life depended on it. It felt like all of your internal organs were being pulled through the eye of a needle the size of an electron. Then, before you could breathe, it was gone. You blinked, trying to reorient yourself. Outside the windows there were no longer pinpricks of stars, but utter darkness so deep your eyes almost couldn’t comprehend it.

“Ugh, that doesn’t get any less unpleasant,” Yangyang groaned, shaking his head. “The Outspacers seriously hadn’t figured out how to make it not feel like that?”

“Crystallized ginger?” The Professor offered you a piece from across from you, and you saw a small bag on the table in front of him. “I get carsick… and spaceshipsick, it turns out.”

You accepted the candy as a nice gesture, despite not feeling very queasy. “Thanks, Professor.”

“Alright, quick debrief,” Kun addressed everyone. “We’re headed to UHN Main. Thanks to the new slipdrive, we’ll arrive in about a month. Once we’re there, you’ll all have at least three days of shore leave. I’ll be giving my full report to Admiral Lee, which may or may not alter where we go next.”

When it seemed nobody else had anything to add, he continued, “Xiao, have you started analyzing the sample you got from that lab?”

The doctor nodded. “Yeah, should have the full results in the morning.”

“Okay. We didn’t find the proof of concept, Dr. Yoon is unaccounted for, we do not know why the Skippers were there nor how they found out about the facility, and Y/N will be aboard for the foreseeable future. Anything I’m missing?”

A throat was suspiciously cleared, but you couldn’t quite tell where it had come from, as the others all had varying degrees of guilt on their features. Even ZEN seemed to be pointing his lightest plane away from you.

Kun rolled his eyes and sat up straighter in his chair as he addressed them all sternly, “I’m sure Corporal Wong has already imparted his newfound knowledge to you all, so I see so need to ruminate on it. If there’s nothing further, you’re all dismissed.”

A discordant chorus of incredulous voices immediately erupted around the table, and you simply popped your ginger candy into your mouth as Kun dropped his head into his hands with a groan. It sounded like a few bets had been wagered for various things—laundry tasks, drinks to be bought once they arrived on shore leave, second portions of dessert at mess, anything but money—and the winners were now victoriously recounting their forthcoming prizes.

“If there’s nothing further,” Kun repeated loudly over the rabble, standing from his seat. “I have reports from Admiral Lee to go review.”

He lingered for just a moment with his gaze on you, as if to see if you’d ask to come with. But you shook your head minutely, staying put in your seat. The captain gave a final stony look to the rest of the crew, “I’ll be in my office.”

And he left.

“Alright, I’ll bite,” Ten cleared his throat, the sound awfully familiar. “How long have you and the captain…?”

“Only since last night, promise,” you answered.

“Could’ve fooled me,” Kunhang coughed.

“And exactly how long were you standing there watching us, Kunhang?” You cocked your head curiously, then aimed your question at the AI. “How long was he standing there, ZEN?”

“Don’t answer that, Zennie,” Kunhang rushed to swat at the hologram cube.

The others snickered and made various comments about him being a voyeur.

“My turn,” Yangyang cleared his throat with a grin. “How did he do it?”

“Do what?” You asked.

“You know, ask you out, or whatever. Make a move,” he clarified with a teasing lilt to his words. “I’m just having trouble imagining the captain flirting. Or doing anything other than lecturing me for two hours straight.”

“That’s because you keep doing and/or saying stupid shit that requires two-hour lectures,” Dejun retorted.

“Why are you assuming Captain Qian made a move? Could’ve been Y/N,” the Professor pointed out.

Yangyang held his hands up. “True, my apologies.”

You shook your head with a laugh. “I don’t know about making moves… We were just talking.”

“And what? Came to a business agreement to enter into a romantic relationship?” Ten snorted.

“No,” you rolled your eyes. “Look, it’s not my fault that you guys can’t imagine your captain as a human being.”

“I, for one, am happy for you two,” the Professor said.

“Thank you, Professor.”

“Hey, we never said we weren’t happy for them,” Kunhang said defensively.

“You’re just being nosy little shits,” Dejun finally spoke up. “Leave her be.”

The others grumbled, but acquiesced, slowly dispersing from the bridge as well.

“ZEN’s loaded up those articles for you, Y/N. I’ll walk you back to your room,” Dejun offered. “I know it’s a bit of a maze in here, it can take some getting used to.”

“I think I’ve got it—”

“I’m headed that way anyway.”

“Right, thanks, Dejun.”

As you and Dejun walked down the ship’s narrow halls, you found that the mental map you had was correct, as he took all the turns that you anticipated. As you stopped in front of your room, you expected him to leave you there, but he stepped into the cabin with you.

“ZEN can get the reader on the desk set up for you,” he gestured at the furniture. “But I just wanted to check in with you.”

“Oh, I feel fine,” you assured him. “Still got the amnesia but… otherwise all good.”

“And you’re okay? Like, you’ve had a lot happen.”

“Yeah, Dejun. It’s been a lot but also… I’m happy, strange as that may be. With all of you, with Kun.”

The doctor nodded. “Alright. That’s all I needed.”

“Thank you for checking on me.”

“Anytime.” He offered you a smile before ducking out of your room.

Kun found you sometime later sat at the desk, reading through the materials about the infirmary scanner that ZEN had gathered for you.

“Hi,” you said over your shoulder as he walked in, your eyes still on the diagram on the screen in front of you.

“Hi,” his voice got closer as he walked over to you. “What is that?”

“A schematic of the full-body scanner in the infirmary,” you replied, then touched the screen to select one of the pieces, pulling up a diagram of the different layers of materials that were suspended above you when you stepped into it. Another tap brought up an up-close image of the crystalline structure of one of the layers. “So that’s what that looks like.”

“Wow. It’s… kind of pretty,” Kun remarked. “Any particular reason you’re studying the infirmary scanner?”

“I was curious. Dejun offered to have ZEN give me some reading materials.”

“Maybe you can read the coffee machine manual next and give Wong a hand in the morning.”

“He hasn’t fixed it yet?”

“He never does.”

“I’m almost done with this article, I can take a look at it next,” you replied, tapping back out of the images and diagrams to get back to the main text. “Maybe fifteen more minutes?”

“Well, do you think you have time to eat first?”

“Oh, is it time for mess?” You finally looked up from the screen, craning your neck up and bending back just slightly to see where Kun was standing directly behind your chair. You were aware of how much time had passed while you’d been sitting there, but you didn’t know what time they ate mess on the ship.

Kun smiled fondly down at you, patting your shoulders. “Yes, if you can spare the time from your studies.”

“Of course.” You digitally marked your place in the article before pushing the button for the reading screen to recede back into the wall. “It was just some reading, really. I don’t know if I’d call it studying.”

“I don’t think I’d call schematics of complex diagnostic scanners and accompanying scientific articles detailing how they work, ‘some reading.’”

“I was curious about how it worked. It’s not like I’m going to build one,” you replied, letting him lead the way out of the cabin.

“I hardly think we have the parts for one, except in the one we already have.”

“Well, they use some similar materials that are used in robot construction, actually,” you told him. “According to the articles I was reading. I don’t know a lot about robots, other than the gist, you know? Positronic brain, metal body, that stuff. But the articles said that a lot of the basic materials that are used in the scanners are also used in robotics.”

“Maybe you and Yangyang can make one then.”

“I just said I don’t want to build one,” you replied with a sigh, despite knowing that he was teasing you. “But I do think it’s interesting that a lot of these materials were scarce on Earth—they’re literally called rare Earth metals—but then once humans started building robots, and got into space, they found places in space where the materials were abundant, and started mining them, and could build more robots to mine even more, and make even more robots. And now there’s so much of them that they started trying to find even more applications outside of robotics, like the medical field.”

The two of you had reached the kitchen, where a couple crew members were sat around the small table in there, and a couple more were up by the counters. Dejun was at the table already, playing some card game with Yangyang.

“So you like the articles so far, Y/N?” The doctor asked you humorously, setting down a card.

“I’m not quite done, but yeah!” You nodded enthusiastically.

“She’s going to read the coffee machine manual next, try to help Wong out,” Kun said, nodding towards where the Corporal was still tinkering with a partially taken apart contraption in the corner. “You said what, fifteen more minutes, Y/N?”

“I’ve got it!” Kunhang cried out.

Dejun looked at you curiously. “Wait, you’re almost done? Already? I thought ZEN would’ve given you more.”

“ZEN, how much reading did you give Y/N?” Yangyang asked aloud to the room.

The AI’s avatar popped up into the middle of the table. “Y/N received the manufacturer’s manual for the infirmary scanner model on the Vision, as well as fifteen articles from various scientific publications detailing the past five years of research into the scientific principles behind the technology for review. I can confirm that she’s completed nearly all the materials except for one article.”

The crew all turned to look at you in disbelief, including both Kunhang and Ten—who had previously been tending to the food. You suddenly got the feeling that that was not normal, the same pit in your stomach that you felt when Kun had unwrapped your hand to reveal your perfectly healed palm, which was still bandaged up now.

“Uh… fast reader?” You supplied hesitantly. “I-I don’t know…”

“What’s the word, Xiao?” Ten pointed at the doctor and snapped his fingers.

“I’m not a mind reader, Ten, you need to give me more context,” Dejun snorted.

“Damn, it’s on the tip of my tongue. You know, when someone’s like, really not smart, but can play the piano really well? Or is a genius at math but can barely read?”

“Savant syndrome?”

“That’s it! Idiot savant.”

“That’s really not the term we use anymore, dude.” Dejun looked very perturbed. “And honestly, it’s not a diagnosis that’s even handed out because—”

Ten completely ignored him, focusing on you. “Maybe you’re a savant. Amnesiac who can read super fast.”

“Or she’s a very smart, but normal, person who got hit on the head very bad and has had her brain scrambled,” Dejun rolled his eyes. “And you should stop calling her an idiot.”

“I’m with Xiao on this one,” Kun interrupted sternly. “Ten, stop calling her an idiot.”

“I’m calling her a savant, but fine.” The Marine shook his head. “Anyway, soup’s on, where’s the Professor?”

“I’m here, I’m here!” The Professor came running in then, out of breath. “Sorry, I was deep in some research. Y/N! You need to read some of my notes.”

“You have more Outspacer notes?” You asked, a little in disbelief.

“Not quite, it’s Ourogish, but I figured you can try your hand at it, right?”

“I mean, I don’t know how helpful I’ll be, but sure?” You replied doubtfully. You’d never seen Ourogish written down, nor learned to speak, read, or write it.

“You see, when we were on Ourogos, I got to see some ruins, and there were these carvings there. Ancient Ourogish. Even the Ourogi who live there now can’t translate it, it’s too distant from the writing system they use now, and they’ve been at war for so long that they’ve lost their entire caste of scholars. But, when you were going through my Outspacer notes on Aegeum and explaining some of the language features, they felt very familiar to me, and I want you to take a look at the Ancient Ourogish.”

“Uh-oh,” Ten sighed knowingly, setting a dish down in front of the Professor. “He’s got an itch.”

“He’s not going to sleep tonight,” Yangyang declared, accepting his plate from Kunhang.

“Sure, Professor, it sounds fun,” you grinned, taking the food that had been passed down to you.

Towards the end of the meal, as everyone was mostly done with their food, but weren’t quite ready to retire to their cabins for the night, Dejun cleared his throat, getting everyone’s attention.

“Now that everyone’s eaten…” He prefaced his words cautiously.

“I don’t want to know what could follow that,” Ten groaned.

“Some of the results on the organic sample have come back,” Dejun continued. “The rest of the tests are going to take until morning, but…”

“Get on with it, Xiao,” Kun prompted him.

“It’s definitely human tissue.”

Everyone was quiet as they looked at each other. Nobody looked surprised, maybe queasy, disgusted, remorseful, or resigned, as if this was exactly what they were expecting but they didn’t want to be right.

“Everything else will have to wait until morning…” Dejun finished quietly.

“Right, thank you, Lieutenant.”

That night, as Kun continued reading the novel he’d picked up on Aegeum, you finished up the last part of the article, then skimmed through the coffee maker manual. When you were done, you shut off the reader then stood up from the desk.

“I’m going to get your med-pods from the infirmary,” you announced, heading towards the door.

“No need,” Kun replied casually, shutting his book.

“Kun—”

“Because I already got them,” he continued, opening a drawer under his bed. There was a small assortment of med-pods and disinfectant wipes, neatly organized in a small container.

“Oh,” you stopped in your tracks. “Good.”

Kun set the book aside and turned over onto his front, resting his arms and head on a pillow as you got out the two med-pods and wipe. As you pulled the hem of his shirt up, you couldn’t help but think back to mess again.

“Do you think it’s all related?” You ripped open the disinfectant wipe. “My hand healing fast, and me reading fast, and the amnesia and… where I was?”

Kun was quiet for a moment as you disinfected the area, then lined up the first med-pod. “I’m not thinking anything about it right now, Y/N.”

Click.

“What do you mean?”

“We don’t know… anything. And what we do know… if we assume that it’s all connected, that would be a big fucking assumption that I’m not comfortable with making. So I’m not going to. These are all extremely disparate pieces of you, and assuming they’re all connected is a huge leap. It would be like walking into a grocery store and seeing a box of pasta, an orange, and a can opener and deciding that because they’re all together in one place, they must have all been made there at the exact same time.”

You pursed your lips, then nodded. “You’re right.”

“The others didn’t bother you too much today, did they?” He changed the subject. “About… you and me?”

“No, not really,” you chuckled. “They’re just having a hard time coming to grips with the idea that you might, you know, be a human being with feelings.”

“Oh, the horror…”

As you watched the med-pod drain, the thoughts of his skeletal enhancements, and the crew’s (albeit, mostly joking) comments about him not being human, and Kun’s own statements to you about feeling like something other, all swirled together in your mind. “Kun… what you were saying, about not being able to remember what you felt like, before you went through the program…”

He turned to look at you over his shoulder. “Yeah?”

“You’ve told me so much about living on Dura-Jil,” you said. “You can’t remember, even a little, about what it felt like being a kid and stealing a Dumbo dropship with your friends? Or learning to drive a Gecko?”

“I mean, I can remember those things happening, but it’s been so long…” he mused. “I can’t recall what breathing with those lungs felt like, or what adrenaline rushing through that body felt like, or how it felt to move those muscles, to learn things with those hands. I know it’s different now, better, faster, stronger, whatever. But I can’t… describe it. Can’t remember why it’s different.”

You scooted further up the bed to rest your hand on his shoulder. What he was describing felt almost painfully familiar to you. A different kind of forgetting, an amnesia of the body instead of the mind. He shifted to rest his cheek against your hand, and you saw his eyes close for just a moment.

When the med-pod clicked again, signaling it was empty, you regretfully had to reach back to swap it out for the second one.

“Strawberries taste different,” Kun finally said, when you’d taken the empty, second med-pod off his back and disposed of the trash. “I remember… the ones I ate on Dura-Jil were always sweeter. I don’t know if it’s just because of where they’re grown, or if my tastebuds have changed, but I remember that. The ones from my mother’s greenhouse were always sweeter than any I’ve had since.”

You sat back down next to him, wanting to make sure he didn’t get up and strain his enhancements too soon. There was a solemn twinge in your chest, a longing for something you had never experienced yourself.

“Y/N…” He rolled onto his back with a soft grunt, but thankfully made no further moves to get up. “Will you… Can I hold you? For a little bit?”

You smiled softly, pulling the covers out from under him. “Of course, Kun, as long as you want.”

Laying down beside him, you brought the sheets and blanket up over the two of you, then curled into his side, resting your head on his chest as he encircled his arms around you.

“Thank you,” he murmured, already sounding very close to sleep.

You closed your eyes, listening to the steady sound of his heartbeat under your ear, and feeling the gentle rise and fall of his chest. And you thought to yourself that if your days ended like this, you didn’t really care what else they were filled with before.

Two (relatively) peaceful weeks passed on the Vision, and you were definitely counting down the days, mentally celebrating that you were halfway there to Kun being in far less pain.

On this particular day, you were reading again. There wasn’t much else for you to do, really. This time, you’d taken the spare tablet you’d been given into the observatory deck for a change of pace from reading in your cabin, though.

“Now what are you reading? Quantum physics?” Yangyang had appeared in the doorway, playful smirk on his lips.

“No, info on the second gen slipdrive model,” you said, eyes still hungrily drinking in the diagram of how all the pieces fit together. “ZEN apparently can’t declassify the stuff for the newest model that’s in the Vision right now without a direct order from either Admiral Lee or Kun, and Kun’s busy.”

“ZEN, come on,” the roboticist snorted. “She’s literally the captain’s… okay, I don’t know what label they’ve got but dude, I think that’s enough of a security clearance.”

ZEN’s avatar popped in for a split-second to defend himself. “I understand the social dynamics quite well, thank you, Lieutenant. However, it’s not my decision, it’s programmed into me. I cannot declassify that information without a direct order from either Admiral Lee or Captain Qian.”

“And what is our esteemed captain doing right now anyway that he can’t be interrupted?”

“He’s in the gym,” you replied. “I’ll be done with this by the time he’s finished anyway, I can ask him then. I told ZEN not to bother him.”

“It would take him all of two seconds,” Yangyang pointed out.

“It’s fine, really. I’ve got some guesses as to how they improved this slipdrive with Outspacer technology, I want to make sure I finish this before I read the new stuff and find out if I’m right.”

ZEN’s cube silently blipped back out of sight.

“You are like an information sponge.”

“I mean, I don’t have a whole lot else up here.” You tapped your forehead. “No memories. More room for information, right?”

“You read any stuff on robotics?”

“No,” you shrugged. “I mean, the stuff about the infirmary scanner mentioned it briefly, but it wasn’t about robotics, you know?”

“Why not?”

You looked up at him finally, chuckling as you said, “I mean, I also haven’t picked up a medical textbook, either. I hope I’m not offending Dejun.”

“I’m not offended,” Yangyang assured you. “Just asking. We found you somewhere with a robotics lab and a synthbio lab. Thought you might have gotten curious.”

“Oh, I mean, I guess not. Maybe one day.”

“With the rate that you consume knowledge? Probably.”

There was a certain glint in Yangyang’s eye in that moment, one that felt eerily familiar to how he was looking at you on the first day on Aegeum.

“Were you looking for me, Yangyang? Or were you going to use the observatory?” You questioned.

“Guilty. I was looking for you.” He was still smiling at you. “Do you mind if I run some diagnostics?”

“On… me?” You tilted your head, chalking his strange phrasing up to being a roboticist rather than a doctor. You laughed airily. “I appreciate the concern, but I was already checked out in the infirmary my first day on the Vision. Other than the amnesia, I’m fine.”

“In the full-body scanner?”

“Yeah, so everything’s just fine. Promise.”

“I just want to take a quick x-ray, really.”

His insistence put you off a bit, but you really saw no good reason to say no. After all, it would just tell you the same thing the infirmary scanner told you, that you were fine. So you bookmarked your place in the article, then clicked your tablet off. “Uhm… sure.”

You’d only been to Yangyang’s robotics lab twice in your whole two weeks on the Vision. Once, on the tour that Kun had given you on your first day, and the second time a few days later when you offered to bring him a cup of coffee from the newly refurbished coffee maker after mess.

The lab was probably one of the larger areas on the ship, about as big as the infirmary, but felt infinitely more cramped by all the stuff that Yangyang had fit into it. There were only a few areas to walk around in between tables and workstations and various contraptions that you didn’t touch for fear of jostling something in the exact wrong way. Unlike the lab on Aegeum, he didn’t have any partially-built robots here. In fact, there weren’t any robots on the Vision at all. It sounded like a miserable existence for a roboticist, but Yangyang made no complaints, and certainly seemed to find something to do to fill all his days on the ship. There was definitely stuff everywhere that looked like the beginnings or middles or pieces of projects, but how functional they were, you couldn’t tell. They certainly didn’t look like robots, nor could you spot a positronic brain anywhere, the thing that would make it a true robot, and not just an automated machine.

Yangyang brought you over to one of the machines, which was a large disc that you stepped under with two panels hanging down from it that went on either side of your head. He guided you to put your chin on a rest, adjusting it to fit your height comfortably.

He went to sit back at a nearby desk, typing a few commands into the computer that was there. “Alright, hold still.”

As the panels slowly rotated, you heard an occasional heavy thud at random intervals, almost like the sound of a camera shutter, but much deeper. At the same time that Yangyang announced that you were done, Kun stormed in, still wiping sweat off his face with a towel as he glared at his crewmate.

“What the hell are you doing, Lieutenant?” He demanded. “ZEN tells me Y/N’s busy getting an x-ray not in the infirmary, but in your lab? You bump your head and forget who you are too? You’re not the fucking doctor.”

“Right, yes, very true.” Yangyang held his hands up defensively. “But also… you should both take a look at this.”

You and Kun looked at each other, before hesitantly walking over to look at the screen.

That… didn’t seem quite right.

“Your machine’s broken, Liu,” Kun said.

“No, I calibrated it right before this.”

You peered closer at the image of your head on the monitor, at all the… glowing pieces. “It’s…”

“A positronic brain,” Yangyang confirmed. “That’s what an x-ray of a positronic brain looks like, outside of a metal head. And inside a human skull, presumably. Humanoid.”

It felt like someone had turned the slipdrive on again but magnified exponentially. All the air left your lungs—did you even need air?, you swore your heart stopped—was it even beating in the first place?, your stomach twisted in on itself—did you have one of those?, and your skin prickled in a scalding, white-hot discomfort, an all-consuming knowing that nothing would ever be the same again that hit you like a meteor. And you were frozen in the moment of impact, stretching out that crushing sensation for eternity.

You didn’t even want to look at Kun, didn’t want to know what sort of horror he felt at this realization. Didn’t want to see the look of abject disgust, betrayal, distress that must be there.

Yangyang finally spoke again, “I’m s—”

“Destroy the film.” Kun cut him off harshly. “ZEN! Erase your recordings. Delete everything.”

You and Yangyang had similar looks of wide-eyed bewilderment as you looked at Kun. The captain clenched his jaw as he stared down the roboticist. “Now, Liu!”

“Captain—”

“We can’t tell anybody. They’ll register her. She’ll be property,” he spat out, crossing his arms.

“You can register her under your name—”

“No. I won’t do that. She won’t be registered.”

“Cap—”

“Our story stays the same. We found a human on Aegeum with amnesia. Do you understand, Leiutenant?” Kun’s voice was strenuously calm, a sharp edge to it.

Yangyang gulped and nodded. “Sir, yes sir.”

“Destroy everything. Now. While I watch,” he demanded.

“Christ, you don’t trust me?”

“I do. I just need to be sure. I need to see it with my own two eyes.”

Yangyang did as he asked, in a strained, suffocating silence. You also watched as he made a few clicks, then confirmed the permanent deletion of the x-rays he’d just taken.

“ZEN!” Kun barked for the AI again. “Suspend the slipdrive.”

Yangyang blinked at him. “You’re suspending us in slipspace?”

“And you—”

“Are not going to say a fucking word to anybody. Sir, yes sir.”

Kun seemed at least somewhat satisfied with that. “Come on, Y/N.”

You hurried down the halls after him, barely trusting yourself to even breathe, much less say a word, before you were behind the closed door of your cabin.

“ZEN, blackout!” Kun ordered, already pacing. There was no response from the AI, confirmation that he had blacked out the incoming feed from your room. Kun ran a hand through his hair, then took a deep breath. “I suspended the slipdrive to buy us time and… there’s no way anybody can find you in here. Safest place in the Universe, outside of linear time.”

His gaze settled on you, intense, unwavering, so determined despite how little he knew.

“When he suggested… registering me. Under your name. That would be less risk, wouldn’t it? Than trying to hide what I am?” You said hesitantly.

“You’re not my property.” He shot back immediately.

“You don’t treat me like I am. I don’t believe that you would just because I’m registered as such. But what would happen to you if they found out you had an unregistered robot with you?”

It was the first time anybody—Yangyang, Kun, or you—had called you a robot, and you could tell that Kun had noticed, as his jaw tightened. But it was law that every robot had to be registered, whether to an individual or a governmental agency. There could be no ‘free’ robots, and having one in your possession was considered to be possessing contraband, which carried severe consequences.

“Doesn’t matter.”

“Kun—”

“Because once you’re registered, that’s it. Even if to me, you’re not property, what happens when I die?” He thumped himself on the chest. “You’re not magically freed, Y/N. You just become someone else’s property.”

You sat down on the bed across from the one that you’d been sharing with Kun, that had remained empty these entire two weeks, a hollowness in your chest. “Oh. Right. You will die. And I...”

“God, Y/N…” Kun sighed, looking up to the ceiling ruefully. “What the fuck are we going to do?”

“Maybe Yangyang can help, with the amnesia,” you suggested. “Dejun’s been looking for a… natural reason for it. Maybe it’s not.”

He closed his eyes and nodded. “Okay, yeah.”

Back in Yangyang’s lab, you sat down nervously in the chair he had motioned you towards as Kun watched from a spot by the closed door. The roboticist picked up a small, flat disc from his counter, which looked almost like a silver coin, save for the soft red light that emanated from a triangle at the center. As he went to hold it up to your forehead, Kun started forward.

“What are you doing?” His words halted the other man’s motions, the disc hovering in front of your eyes.

“I need to run diagnostics on her. However, she doesn’t exactly have any buttons, or switches, or ports for me to use for access to her internal systems,” Yangyang replied bluntly. “Whenever a robot is built without external access to those sorts of things, they have to have a receiver to put them into stasis for work to be done. This should activate it, if she’s got one and I can find it. If she doesn’t have a receiver, it won’t hurt her, robot or human.”

“And you think the receiver would be in my head?” You questioned.

“Common practice is to put it at the front of the head or the back, if the robot has one. Need access to the brain.”

“Like where a neural port would go.”

Yangyang tilted his head curiously, but still made no further moves. He looked at Kun over his shoulder. “Can I proceed, Captain?”

He eyed the coin with distrust, but agreed anyway. “Yeah, fine.”

“If this works, Y/N, you won’t be able to move. You’ll be frozen in whatever position you’re in. You probably also won’t realize what’s happening until it’s over.”

“She’ll black out?”

“Not quite. She’ll be awake, but since I’ll be looking at her memory systems, she won’t retain anything. She’ll be unresponsive, and I imagine may only blink at consistent intervals so her eyes don’t dry out.”

You met Yangyang’s gaze. “Go ahead, Yangyang.”

The coin was placed against the center of your forehead first, cool against your skin, and Yangyang slowly slid it over your temple, then behind your ear and around to the base of your skull.

“Well, it’s nothing mechanical, it’s nothing with the alignment of her positronic brain,” Yangyang declared, suddenly across the desk from you, sat at his computer.

You blinked rapidly and sat up straighter, flexing your fingers and shifting your legs.

“Then what? She’s not lying.” Kun was next to you, and you looked between him and where he had just been over by the door. You didn’t remember him moving.

“Hey, Y/N, welcome back,” Yangyang smiled at you, drawing Kun’s attention back down to you as well.

“Are you okay?” Kun touched your shoulder.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” you reassured him, patting his hand. “So, you ran the diagnostic tests, then?”

The roboticist gave you a thumbs-up. “Good news, the alignment of your brain is just fine.”

“She’s not lying,” Kun reiterated.

“I didn’t say she was.” Yangyang held his hands up defensively. “You’re familiar with the Three Laws of Robotics, Captain?”

“Of course. We had to be trained on how to interact with the robots and AI we would be deployed with.”

He then turned to you, “Y/N, do you know the Three Laws?”

You scrunched your nose as you tried to think, but just came up empty. “…No.”

“What?!” Kun blurted out.

“I think you do,” Yangyang replied knowingly.

You looked between them, panicked, “I’m—I’m not lying. I swear. I don’t know—”

“I know. I don’t think you’re lying. I think that if asked to list the Three Laws, as I just did, you would be unable to. Genuinely.”

“How would a robot even be built without the Three Laws?” Kun demanded. “That’s—That’s illegal. Impossible, the regulations—”

“You’re correct. It would be impossible. I’ll tell you the Three Laws, Y/N, working backwards. The Third is self-preservation. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second laws. The Second is obedience. A robot must obey orders given to it by a human, unless those orders conflict with the First law. The First is human safety. A robot may not, through action or inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. They’re all programmed into each and every robot’s positronic brains no matter their purpose or design.”

You nodded slowly. “So you’re saying that even though I didn’t know the three laws and couldn’t articulate them, I still have them programmed into me, and would have been following them anyway.”

“Correct.”

Kun paced a few steps away, rubbing his forehead. “I’m going to have a stroke.”

“I’m no robopsychologist, but I believe it’s the Second Law that we have to blame for your apparent amnesia,” Yangyang continued, ignoring the captain’s comment.

“Someone ordered her to forget she was a robot?”

“Yes, as well as everything else about her, for lack of a better word, life.”

“Why would somebody do that?” You asked, your voice barely above a whisper.

“I can’t think of a single good reason,” Kun muttered.

You glanced between them hopefully. “Can one of you just order me to remember, then?”

“Y/N, I ran diagnostics on your data bank,” Yangyang began gently, leaning forward in his seat. “The amount of information in there… it’s consistent with when your memory starts.”

“Oh… I see.”

“So…?” Kun prompted him.

“When whoever it was ordered her to forget, it wasn’t just to make the data temporarily inaccessible. It’s not there at all,” Yangyang clarified.

“They had her destroy it?”

“Or they moved it to an external storage device. Either way… it’s gone.”

“Oh, Y/N. I’m so sorry,” Kun’s voice was soft and pained as he walked back over to you.

“Even if it wasn’t, whoever gave her the order, at the time the order was given, would have been of a higher importance to her than either of us. She’d prioritize that order over any we gave now that would try to override it.”

“And it doesn’t matter at all what she wants?”

“The data isn’t there for her to attempt to retrieve, Captain,” Yangyang reiterated. “Positronic brains are incredible feats, and are in many ways, superior to ours. But unlike you and I, who have neuroplasticity, and no matter the extent of the damage, could have some nonzero chance of spontaneously recovering those memories… if her data wasn’t backed up externally, I’m afraid it’s unrecoverable.”

A pain like you’d never experienced suddenly erupted in your head, your hands flew up to grip at your temples, pushing them together as if your head itself was about to burst apart. You involuntarily let out a scream, squeezing your eyes shut as you cried out, “Oh my god, my head!”

“Y/N!” Kun’s hands on your arms kept from entirely collapsing out of the chair and onto the ground.

“It… It hurts! Make it stop!” You yelled desperately, barely feeling the hot streams of tears as they poured down your cheeks.

“This happened on Aegeum, when we first found her. Whenever she’d try to remember stuff, she’d get headaches, but never like this,” Kun rushed to explain to Yangyang.

“You said it hurts?” Yangyang asked you.

“Didn’t you hear her? Fucking do something!”

“I am, I’m running diagnostics. Y/N, please. It hurts? Not that it’s overheating, or is misaligned, or is returning errors?”

“No, no, no!” You whined, clutching at your head as you shook it furiously. “It hurts! Feels like my head is exploding!”

“Oh. Come over here.” You were guided to somewhere else in the shop, then pushed into another seat, presumably. “Sit down.”

“What’s happening?” Kun asked.

“I think her head is exploding,” Yangyang said frankly.

“What?!”

“Y/N, stop trying to remember. Stop thinking about your past before you met Captain Qian. That’s an order.” Yangyang’s voice was firm, authoritative, cutting past all the white noise threatening to fragment your mind.

“What the hell, Liu?” Kun snapped.

Your hands fell from your head to your lap as the pain drifted away to nothing more than a memory, and you sat up, looking straight ahead. “Okay…”

In front of you, Kun grabbed Yangyang by the collar and jerked him away from you. “What the fuck was—”

“I’m going to choose my words very carefully to hopefully keep that from happening again.” Yangyang pointed to you. “Understand?”

“Fine.” Kun huffed, letting him go.

“I’ll need to run some more diagnostics; however, my theory is that her headaches are some kind of failsafe to prevent… investigating.”

“Well you can run your fucking diagnostics later, she’s going to rest.”

“Of course. My apologies, Y/N. I wouldn’t have done that if I didn’t think it necessary,” Yangyang offered you an apologetic smile.

“It’s okay, Yangyang. Thanks for helping with… whatever that was.” You hesitantly mirrored his smile, unable to remember what was even happening to you before Kun grabbed Yangyang.

Kun offered you a hand, his voice soft as he suggested, “Come on, do you want to lay down?”

You put your hand in his, letting him help you to your feet. “I think that’s a good idea, yeah.”

Your limbs still felt heavy and your thoughts sluggish with sleep, but you groaned and rolled over nevertheless, surprised when you didn’t bump into anybody. Pushing yourself up onto an elbow, you opened your eyes, looking around the room for Kun.

He was standing by the dresser, and turned around upon hearing you stir. Kun walked over to sit on the other mattress across from you. “Morning. How’s your head?”

“I slept through mess last night?” You questioned, pulling yourself all the way up to sit against the pillows behind you.

“Yeah. I told the guys you were stuck in one of your articles, brought our dinner back here,” he indicated toward two bowls sitting on the desk, one empty with a spoon sticking out of it, the other covered, the spoon sitting atop the lid. “How’s your head?”

“Oh, fine. Did Dejun give you your injections?”

“I gave them to myself. The angle was a little awkward, but I didn’t want Xiao asking why you couldn’t.”

It was then that you saw the sheets he was sitting on were wrinkled and out of place, the pillow with a noticeable head dent in it, askew from its usual position. “You slept in the other bed.”

“I didn’t want to disturb you. You looked like you needed the rest,” he stated, his words kind, but you could see the unfamiliar stiffness in his body.

You sat cross-legged to face him. “You’re debating the ethics of continuing our relationship after witnessing the effect a direct order had on me yesterday.”

“Well…”

“It’s not unreasonable. It also wouldn’t be unreasonable for you to question if a robot can even love.”

“Y/N…”

“It’s understandable, Kun,” you reiterated, sincere.

“Look, I just don’t want you to be doing this because you think saying no would hurt me. You don’t need to worry about inflicting that kind of harm.”

“You think this is all from the First Law?”

“I don’t know, is my point,” he stressed.

“Kunhang flirted with me first, shouldn’t I have ended up with him then, by your logic? According to the First Law? To not hurt him and the clear advances he was making on me?” You didn’t mean for your words to come out as harshly as they did, but you could feel the bitterness on your tongue coating them as they left your lips.

“I don’t know,” Kun repeated.

“I can’t prove to you that what I’m feeling is real. Or that I’m feeling anything at all. I don’t even know what that means. I mean, how do you know that you’re feeling things? That you’re feeling them ‘right?’” You argued.

“I-I just do. Sometimes I feel them in my body, too. My heart starts beating faster, my face gets warm, my fingertips tingle, my stomach feels funny, my chest hurts.”

“That sounds like you should see Dejun.”

“Maybe, it’s chronic at this point. Been happening for a few weeks now.”

You shot to your feet, “Kun! Oh my G—”

“Love. I was describing love,” he finished.

“Oh.”

“Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.”

You sat back down, staring at your feet with what you could only describe as righteous anger. Kun said he loved you, and it was marred by this realization, by a debate of if you knew what that meant, if you could even reciprocate, if it was even ethical for him to feel this for you in the first place. Clenching your jaw, you took a deep breath before picking your head back up to look at him, “There is nothing I could do to objectively prove that what I feel for you is love, Kun. There is also no way for me to say that I love you in the same way a human does. I don’t know what that’s like. But the best I have to offer you is that when it comes to you and our relationship, it feels distinctly different than when I was given that order.”

“How did that feel? The order?” Kun asked.

“It overrode everything I was thinking and doing in that moment. I-I mean, I was about to say I’ve never experienced anything like it, but I don’t know.”

“I’m sorry Liu did that, but it was life or death. Your life or death.”

“I trust you guys.”

“I— That’s what I mean.” Kun was suddenly on his feet.

“What?”

“You’re not even a little bit upset? That he did that to you?”

“He saved my life and you’re expecting me to be pissed at him?” You replied incredulously.

“I don’t know, even a little violated? Whether he was justified or not, you don’t feel uncomfortable? That you went through that? And somebody who you thought was your friend knowingly, completely took away your free will?” His voice was gaining volume and fervor as he spoke, and he couldn’t seem to stand still.

“I didn’t say any of that,” you said firmly. “All I said was that I trust you guys. You’re the one assuming I’m being docile and passive.”

“You’re right, you’re right.” He crossed his arms, seeming to deflate in front of your very eyes. “I’m sorry.”

He then grabbed something off the desk that you couldn’t see. Walking back over to you, he pressed a small, flat, cool coin of metal into your hand.

“Here,” he murmured.

You looked at the object in your palm, at the soft red glow emanating from the center. “This is the…”

“Positronic Allen key that Liu used to…” He trailed off. “You should be the only one on this ship who knows where that thing is. Not Liu, not me.”

You wrapped your fingers around it. “Thank you, Kun.”

“It’s time for mess,” Kun announced abruptly. “I’ll go get our food.”

“I’m okay, I can go with you,” you said, then paused with realization. “Unless there’s a reason you don’t want me to.”

“You’re not under house arrest or anything, Y/N. I just think it’d be easier—”

“If nobody saw me? What would you say? I’m still reading? I’m sick? Then Dejun would definitely want to come check on me.”

He rubbed his face. “Fuck, you’re right.”

“I’ll go to breakfast. Won’t mention I’m a robot. Humanoid. Whatever.”

And so you and Kun went to breakfast. Kunhang and Ten were already in there, as they usually were, being in charge of the meals. Kunhang took a long sip of his cup of coffee before nodding appreciatively.

“Good stuff, Y/N,” he lifted the mug in your direction from where he was leaning against one of the counters.

“And Wong hasn’t broken it again since you fixed it,” Ten added.

“Good to hear it’s still functional,” you replied, taking your usual seat around the table.

“I think you improved it, actually,” Kunhang mused, taking another sip.

Dejun came in then, still looking half-asleep, practically falling into his chair and dropping his head into his arms. He said something that was muffled by the table.

“What was that, Xiao?” Kunhang asked, handing Ten the first plate for him to start dishing up the food.

“I’m going to kill Liu,” Dejun pulled his face out of his arms to deadpan. “Kid sleeptalked for four hours last night. I was about to smother him.”

“Earplugs?” You suggested.

“First thing I tried. Barely lower it to an indiscernible mumble.”

Ten asked over his shoulder, “Did he at least say anything good this time?”

“No. He was just saying some crazy shit about those people-robots from Aegeum again.” The doctor ran two hands through his hair, making his bedhead stick up even more.

You froze for a moment, noticing that Kun also tensed as Dejun kept ranting about his roommate.

“First it was a bunch of jargon about people-robots and positronic brains and whatever the fuck. Then he said something about the robot not remembering it was a robot, which, like, I think is literally impossible?”

Kunhang laughed, “How would that work? I’m not going to get amnesia and wake up one day and think I’m a Skipper.”

“Hey, Y/N,” Ten called for you, also cracking a smile. “Do you think we could’ve convinced you that you were a K’llor if we tried? When we found you in the shelter?”

You chuckled lightly, tapping your fingernails on the table. “Probably not. Don’t really look like them, you know?”

Yangyang walked in then, looking about as worse for wear as Dejun. He collapsed into his chair, lolling his head back as he groaned, “I’ll marry whoever gets me a coffee of cup right now.”

“No, you do not get the first cup after keeping me up with your sleeptalking for four hours straight,” Dejun snapped.

“Ever heard of earplugs?”

“I should’ve smothered you with your pillow last night, you ungrateful little—”

You grabbed Dejun’s shoulders before he could lunge across the table and very possibly strangle Yangyang right then. After less-than-gently pushing him back down in his chair, you stood up, offering, “I’ll make both of you a cup, if neither of you marries me or kills each other. Sound good?”

They grumbled something that sounded enough like an agreement that you headed towards the coffee maker, setting two mugs side-by-side and starting the two cups to brew simultaneously.

The Professor came into the kitchen last, as usual, looking around with hopeful eyes. “Coffee?”

Kun didn’t say a single word through breakfast, very clearly on edge as he maintained a death grip on his utensils, and shot Yangyang a warning look with every mention of robots, or positronic brains, or any technology at all. Which made for a very uncomfortable breakfast, considering that was seemingly the only thing that everybody wanted to talk about this particular morning, presumably due to Dejun’s complaints of the roboticist’s sleeptalking.

When you were done with your food, you rushed to excuse yourself from the suffocating atmosphere. “I was in the middle of something—”

“Oh, Y/N!” Ten caught your attention before you could fully leave, though. “Did you want to see the slipdrive today?”

“Sure, Ten, uhm, later?” You requested. “I started a good article on water filtration and irrigation in ag bubbles this morning. Would you mind if I finished it first?”

“No rush. We’re stuck here for another two weeks.”

“Thanks.”

Back in your room, you brought out your tablet, rummaging through the files stored in the Vision’s server to find the ones from the most recent mission on Aegeum. Specifically, ZEN’s archiving of all the Outspacer glyphs that the crew encountered. You pulled up the ones from the info panel on the ag bubble, at the only three glyphs that weren’t fully translated.

Person-machine-move. People-robots.

The door to your cabin opened again, and you didn’t even greet Kun, still staring at those glyphs, trying to make any additional sense of them with what you knew now about yourself.

“I’m the proof, aren’t I?” You looked back at Kun.

He slowed to a stop a few steps back from you, clearly at a loss for words. “I…”

“Positronic brain in a human skull. That’s what Yangyang said. Humanoid.” That was from before you were in the diagnostics stasis, and before the order, you could remember it all.

“Yeah, that’s what he was saying when he was… running diagnostics.”

You looked back at the tablet, quickly pulling up the emergency manual for a partial scrub. “We didn’t leave Aegeum without finding the proof of concept, you guys found it on your first day.”

Preserved in a safety shelter, with no recollection that you were the proof, or even an inkling that you were not human. Safety mechanisms. Your head was hurting.

When you turned to Kun again, you saw his eyes were shining, and he put the back of his hand over his mouth as he seemed unable to form any words. You felt an ugly hatred in you as you looked at him. Not a hatred for him, but for the situation that you two were in, that had broken the seemingly unshakable captain down to misty-eyed silence, to such uncertainty. You couldn’t even hold him to comfort him without making him feel even worse, like he was taking advantage of you by you offering your affection willingly. The tablet in your hands still displayed the directions from Aegeum. Only the Admiral and the Research Director can order a scrub. You understood Kun celebrating Dr. Yoon’s death, as you wished very much in that moment for him to have never existed.

“I want to apologize for something, and I know it’s not my fault, but I don’t know how else I could possibly make you feel better,” you stated hoarsely, unaware of exactly when your throat became that parched.

Kun look at you with clear confusion on his features. “What are you talking about?”

“I was created by him. By the man who… did what he did to you. How could you not hate me too? Suspect the worst of me?”

He shook his head quickly. “Y/N, no. Remember what you told me? He didn’t create me or you—”

“You have parents. A life before him. That’s objectively true,” you cut him off. “I was built. There’s concept sketches and blueprints and multi-phase procedural experiments of me. In his lab.”

“And none of that is your fault.”

You got to your feet, meeting Kun’s pleading gaze steadily. “Maybe you’re right, Kun. We need time. I don’t think you’ve thought this—me—all the way through.”

Dejun found you on the observatory deck, hugging your knees to your chest and staring down through the glass bottom of the ship at the inky blackness beneath you.

“Hey.” He stood next to you.

“Hi.” You didn’t even try to conceal your sullen tone or glum features from him.

The doctor eased himself down to sit across the glass panel from you. “I know there’s no point beating around the bush with you, so: What’s going on with you and the captain?”

“You’ve noticed something is different.”

“Yeah, breakfast felt a bit… off.”

“I can’t… say too much.”

“That’s alright. I was just checking on you. I’m your friend, Y/N.”

You rested your cheek on one of your knees, piecing together your words in your head first before you said them. “Kun isn’t sure if we should continue our relationship.”

“What? He said as much? In so many words?” Dejun clearly wasn’t expecting that.

“More.”

“Did he say why?”

“Yes…”

Dejun took your hesitance in stride, following up with another question, “Are you able to tell me why?”

You once again had to muse on what to say for some time before you spoke. “He thinks that due to… circumstances… I didn’t have much say in the matter.”

“Yeah, no shit,” he snorted. “None of us do. We’re on a black ops mission deployed for an indefinite amount of time, all of us selected specifically because we had no family in case it went bad, and doing some incredibly shady things for the government. I don’t know how he can possibly be using any normal dating metrics right now. But anybody who just watches the two of you can tell that you’ve gotten something good, really good, out of whatever the fuck we’re doing. Love, connection, partnership, whatever you want to call it.”

A faint, bittersweet smile tugged at the corner of your mouth. “Thank you. I think that too. I don’t think it’s just… infatuation or an obligation or whatever he’s afraid of. But I also can’t remember ever being in love before, or infatuated before, so I wouldn’t know the difference.”

“He doesn’t get decide if you’re in love or not. That’s stupid. I don’t care how noble he thinks he’s being.”

“I… also have my own reservations, to be fair to him. This situation isn’t entirely his doing,” you added.

“You think he has a point? You did kind of get with the first guy you laid eyes on after losing your memory…” Your friend said.

“Kun had a helmet on when I met him,” you reminded him with an eye roll. “The first one of you whose face I saw was Kunhang, actually.”

“That’s true.”

“But no, that’s not my concern.”

“So what is it? I’m assuming you want to talk about it, since you brought it up.”

“I don’t think he’s… letting himself really see all of me. The good and the bad. I don’t want him to fall in love with this fake version of me that he’s convinced himself is true, then one day wake up and realize who I actually am and decide that I’ve changed and hate me for it.”

“You’ve got amnesia,” Dejun arched an eyebrow. “Kind of a big problem if he’s already ignoring the few things we do know about you.”

“Yeah, I know. I’ve been as honest as possible with him, but he just makes excuses.”

Your friend sighed and leaned back against the bench that was behind him. “I wish I could wave a magic wand and fix all your problems, Y/N. Make the captain stop being stupid, make everything make sense for you. You’ve been through enough.”

“I appreciate the thought, Dejun.”

“Liu and I have got a spare bunk, you’re welcome to it any time. You’ll have to put up with the kid’s sleeptalking, of course, but…”

“Thanks,” you actually smiled this time, remembering their spat over the sleeptalking that happened just an hour ago. “We both agreed to take some time to think.”

“If you show up to our cabin at bedtime tonight, no questions asked, I promise. I’ll smother the kid myself.”

“It sounds like you’re just looking for an excuse to kill Yangyang at this point,” you laughed.

“Whatever it takes,” he joked, cracking his knuckles.

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letsnotdoanything · 4 months

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⇢ word count: 20.8k ⇢ warnings: past unethical experimentation, brief blood and gore descriptions (some human and some non-human), you have to accept the premise of a single human empire in space in the future with colonies and a military and not think deeper about that, multiple needle/injection mentions, knife/injury/blood description, main characters are morally gray, and oh yeah cursing ⇢ genre: sci-fi, set in the near-ish future, humans and aliens and robots, black op mission, captain kun, ?????? reader, slow burn, fluff, dash of angst, ft. wayv as the crew of the vision ⇢ extra info: took a lot of obvious inspo for this one from isaac asimov’s robot stories, specifically his concept of positronic brains & the three laws of robotics (and if you’ve read any of his stories, you’ll probably be able to see some other places too) ⇢ series masterlist | prev. | next

“You deserve to know that I’m not entirely human.”

“Is that really how you feel? Inhuman?”

“There are parts of me that are… manufactured. Irrevocably altered. I don’t think I remember how it felt before I was like this.”

The next morning, you were awake early again. You stared into the darkness, listening to Dejun’s breathing. The distant sounds of two voices started getting closer, and you perked up at this. If some of the others were up, you’d be more than happy to join them, see if they needed any help getting breakfast together.

Just as you’d swung your legs over the side of your cot to stand, you heard the distinct sound of your name float in as it sounded like they had stopped right at the campfire. They were keeping their voices low, but it did little to help with the absolute silence all around. You paused, overwhelmed with curiosity.

“I asked Xiao last night, if he thinks Y/N will ever remember.” The first voice was Kun, and you looked at the sleeping doctor in front of you curiously. You could only imagine this conversation happened before you walked into the captain’s tent last night.

“Yeah?” It was Kunhang with him. “What’d he say?”

“He can’t say for sure at this point, since he doesn’t know what caused it.”

“Useful.”

“That’s what I said.”

“Part of me hopes she doesn’t remember.” Kunhang let out a bitter sigh with his words.

“What?” Kun responded, and you imagined that his face was as bewildered as yours was right now. Why wouldn’t Kunhang want you to regain your memories?

“Dude, you saw where we found her.”

“God, yeah. The sort of shit she probably saw.”

“Or did. She’s the only survivor. You don’t exactly get through Hell by being sweet and virtuous.”

Kun’s voice was surprisingly harsh, “We don’t know—”

“Hey, no judgment here. Who knows what she had to do to survive. I wouldn’t want to remember that either.”

“Her hands were clean when we found her.”

“A bit too clean, don’t you think?” A third voice had joined them now, Ten.

“Maybe she hid early, got out before the worst of it.” Kun was still vehemently defending you.

“You think the same person who pulls people out of the way of falling ceiling chunks without thinking is a coward?”

“I’m saying we don’t know anything.”

“And I’m just saying something’s not right about how Y/N ended up in there, Captain.”

“Nothing here is right, Ten. This facility, the experiments, the Skippers, all of it.”

“And you’re letting the only person left who might be responsible for it walk around free.”

“I wouldn’t call being stuck with all of us ‘free.’”

“But it’s not exactly a prisoner’s watch.”

“Because she’s not a prisoner. For all we know they could’ve been experimenting on her—”

“Or she’s part of that vague They we keep referring to.”

There was a moment of tense silence—or at least it sure felt strained to you from inside your tent, you had to imagine it was suffocating out there—before Kun spoke again. “We have no clue what was going on here, and no proof that she did anything. Until we know anything for certain, I’m not going to treat her like a criminal.”

“I’m not saying you have to. Look, I like her too, she seems like a nice person, but maybe—”

A loud yawn came from your roommate’s cot, and the conversation outside suddenly ceased. Dejun sat up slowly, rubbing sleep out of his eye as he let out another forceful yawn.

“Oh, morning, Y/N,” he greeted you, stretching and groaning. “Sleep okay?”

“Yeah, I uh, I just woke up,” you replied awkwardly. A couple minutes could be classified as just, you were pretty sure. “How about you? Sleep okay?”

“Mm, like a baby. You’re a much better bunkmate than Liu. Kid talks in his sleep. Recites code and equations.”

You couldn’t help but laugh a little at the mental image, momentarily distracted from the conversation you’d just been listening to. “That’s rather unfortunate for Ten and Kunhang then.”

Dejun shrugged. “Wong shouldn’t have been such a weirdo, then he might’ve been your roomie.”

He stood up then, groaning as he leaned over to touch his toes, then reached up and fully stretched his arms over his head. “Alright, breakfast?”

Ten and Kunhang had just started on breakfast when you left your tent, and apparently didn’t need any help, so with nothing better left to do and a lot on your mind, you turned down the paths between the fields. The artificial sun had already risen, full daylight around you, making it easy to keep your eyes on the ground under your feet. It wasn’t long until you heard footsteps behind you. You stopped in your tracks and turned to see who it was.

“Don’t tell me I’m late for breakfast again,” you groaned. “I’ve been gone for two minutes.”

“No, you’re not,” Kun informed you, putting his hands in his pockets as he stopped in front of you. “Can I join you? On your walk?”

You put your hands on your hips, suspicious. “Why?”

“Why do I want to walk with you?”

“Yeah. The exit doors are within view of camp.”

“I don’t think you’re trying to escape. If you managed to get out of the facility, your only two options would be a K’llor ship that you don’t know the state of, and our ship that has ZEN on it, who would never let you past the entry bay, much less off the surface. I don’t think you’re that stupid. Are you?”

“No. Glad we’re on the same page.”

“So… was that a no on the walk?”

“You didn’t answer my question, Kun,” you replied frankly. “You’re not as good at that as you think you are.”

“At what? Avoiding?”

“Yes, like you’re doing now. Why do you want to walk with me?”

“You went on a walk with Liu yesterday, did you interrogate him beforehand as well?”

“You’re still not answering my question, you’re just asking me more questions.”

He rubbed his face and sighed. “You know, never mind.”

You let out an incredulous laugh. “Really? You just fold like that?”

“Clearly you want to be alone. I’m sorry.”

“I didn’t say that. All I did was ask you a simple question that you apparently can’t answer.”

“Ten and Wong are almost done with breakfast, I’d get going on that walk if I were you.”

“Fine.” You held your hands up. “I’ll be back in five minutes.”

Five minutes wasn’t nearly long enough for your liking, but as promised, you were back at the camp for breakfast. Kun and Dejun were already discussing something when you got back, Ten and Kunhang made you a bit uneasy after the conversation you overheard this morning, so you were pleasantly surprised when the Professor intercepted you, already with two plates of food in his hands.

“Want to eat with me?” He offered. “We can talk about plans for today.”

“Sure, Professor,” you accepted the food from him gratefully.

“I don’t think the notes will be too excessive for you to go through,” he began. “ZEN came equipped with the UHN’s entire language database, including what few Outspacer glyphs they had. My notes are just additions to that gathered during this mission—it’s not my focus language back in academia, so you’re not going to be reviewing years’ worth of research or anything.”

“What is your focus language then? For your xenolinguistics?”

The Professor momentarily looked over your shoulder, then back to you. “Ourogish.”

You tilted your head curiously. “Can you… make all those sounds?”

“I speak with an accent. But it’s passable.”

So they were doing something involving Ourogos and/or the Ourogi. Didn’t help much more, but it was information.

“So any corrections, missing links, anything you can give me and ZEN will be a help,” the Professor continued.

“I mean, I don’t know how good of a teacher I’ll be… I don’t even remember learning it.”

“Don’t worry, ZEN and I are quick learners.”

The other five left right after breakfast, and you were left with the Professor and ZEN. You took the Professor’s tablet that contained all of his notes under the shade of a tree in one of the nearby orchards. Resting your cheek in your palm, you started in on the file that had already been opened for you. You doubted ZEN would let you access anything else that was on here. The AI was projecting himself as a small cube above your knees, slowly bobbing up and down like a buoy in the ocean, but otherwise quiet as you worked.

The Professor, meanwhile, was restless, asking you what you were doing every two minutes, as he did something to the tree you were under, which you could hear by the rustling of branches and leaves.

After the fifth interruption, you finally told him through gritted teeth, “You know, Professor, this would go much faster if you didn’t stop me every two minutes.”

“Right. Sorry!” And he went back to messing with the tree.

A few moments later, he plopped down next to you, breathless, and held a plum out to you. You looked between him and the deep maroon fruit before accepting it.

“You seem off,” he said.

“What?” You mumbled, setting your plum aside.

“You seem off.”

“Do I?”

“Pissed that you have a babysitter?”

“Aren’t you pissed that you got landed with babysitting duty?”

He shrugged, taking a bite of his plum. “I’m a civvie, remember? I’d much rather stick back here and talk about a dead language than go look at a bunch of alien corpses.”

You made a noise of acknowledgment, still combing through his notes on syntax.

“So… What’d you do?”

“What?”

“To get put in time out. What’d you do that you need a babysitter?”

You let out a frustrated sigh, pushing some of your hair back from your face. “I deserve it, I know I do. It’s perfectly reasonable for Kun to stick me in camp all day but—I hate it.”

“Come on, you can tell me.” He nudged you with his elbow. “Us civvies have got to stick together, you know. What’d you do?”

“We were walking through the facility yesterday, and a piece of ceiling came loose. I didn’t even think about it, I just pulled Kun back so it didn’t hit him.”

The Professor burst into laughter, a stray drop of plum juice dribbling down his chin as he coughed through it. He sat forward, hitting himself on the chest with a fist. “Oh my God, that’s really good.”

“What’s so funny about that? I’m a liability, he had every right to leave me here with a babysitter.”

“Well, yes,” he chuckled. “If you’re going to be trying to save the guy in Class-V armor as an unarmored civilian with nothing but a rebreather, that’s a little concerning. But it’s also pretty funny. I bet that’s the first time Captain’s been genuinely surprised in years.”

“I’m glad you can see some humor in the situation.” You put your cheek back in your palm, striking out an error in his notes and starting the correction. “I think I ruined my chances of ever leaving the ag bubble again until you all take me to UHN Main for debriefing.”

“It’s not so bad in here.”

“Yeah, but… everything’s out there. Whoever I am, whatever I’ve done, whatever I wanted to do, whoever I wanted to be, is out there, was out there. And I’m stuck in here grading.”

The Professor was quiet, and for a second you were worried that he was offended at your comparison between his notes and a grade-schooler’s homework until he spoke. “Would it change anything?”

“What?”

“If you remembered? If you found out who you were, what you’ve done, what you wanted to do, who you wanted to be? Would it change anything?”

“How could it not?”

“Would you decide that’s who you are now, just because that’s who you were?”

“I-I mean, it was me. I’m not a different person just because I lost my memory.”

“How do you know? You just said, you don’t know who you were, what you’ve done, what sort of future you wanted for yourself.”

“Well…”

“Y/N, what do you want for your life?”

“To remember what it is. My life.”

“And if you can’t? Right now, what do you to do? What sort of person do you want to be?”

“I-I guess I want to be an okay person. Like, pretty good to the people around me? And, live a life that I like? I don’t know a lot about what I like, but I guess I’d figure that out, and do more of that stuff?”

“That’s good. That’s a pretty good aspiration, actually.”

“Isn’t it kind of boring?”

“A little.” He shrugged. “But maybe, the person you were before you lost your memory, didn’t want that. Maybe you wanted something that you would now consider to be bad. Imagine if the you before this wanted to kick as many puppies as possible before you died.”

“Why—”

“It’s a hypothetical. Do you want to do that, right now?”

“No, of course not.”

“If you found out, right now, that you wanted to do that before you lost your memory, would that change anything? Would you suddenly want to kick puppies?”

You crossed your arms. “No.”

“And do you want to crusade for Universal Peace until the end of your days?”

“That… sounds very tiring.”

“Yes? No?”

“Probably not.”

“So if you found out that the you before you lost your memory was dedicating your life to doing that, would you suddenly want to? Would that change anything?”

You took a deep breath. “No.”

“Obviously, it’s got to suck not remembering friends or family or anything like that. But you’re still a person without those memories, Y/N. You’re still you, just whoever you are now.”

“Thanks, Professor.” You smiled a little, spinning the stylus around in your fingers.

“Now, why did you cross that out?” He pointed to the section you had been absentmindedly correcting. “I could’ve sworn I had gotten that listing function correct.”

“You were close!”

“You completely scribbled it out.”

That night, you were helping Ten and Kunhang prepare dinner again.

“Everything okay, Y/N?” Ten asked as the two of you shucked some corn.

“Yeah, fine,” you answered shortly, tossing a corn husk onto the pile at your feet. “Why?”

“You seem a bit…”

“Off?” You guessed.

“Yeah.”

“That’s what the Professor said earlier.”

“Something happen with the captain?” Kunhang questioned from where he was chopping up ingredients with a pocketknife and plastic container as his cutting board.

You pressed your lips together in a line before replying. “I don’t know. Why are you asking?”

“He uh, he said he was going to join you on your walk this morning. And then came back alone.”

“We had an argument, I guess. It was about nothing.”

“Y/N—”

“No, seriously, it wasn’t anything of substance.” You huffed, grabbing your next cob. “I asked him why he wanted to walk with me, he refused to answer. That’s it.”

There was an odd pause, and you turned your gaze up to see the other two exchanging a look.

Ten spoke next, “Well I’m sure being stuck in the ag bubble with the Professor all day wasn’t fun either.”

“The Professor wasn’t the problem. Sucked being put in timeout. Rightfully so, but it still sucked.” You had finished with your ears of corn, and took them over to Kunhang’s makeshift station.

“So you saved him from getting concussed by falling ceiling with no concern for your own safety, big deal,” Kunhang scoffed, gesturing wildly with both hands as he talked. “If you ask me, that kind of instinct is a good thing. Bit hypocritical for the captain to be punishing you for it anyway.”

Ten watched Kunhang waving the knife around warily. “Careful with that thing, Wong, you’re gonna—”

As Ten was talking, Kunhang had tried to spin the knife around his finger by the handle, but you knew it wasn’t going to be successful, grabbing the spinning blade before it could take his finger off. And before you even realized what you were doing. The action registered in your mind at the same time the sharp edge cutting open your palm did, and you let out a yip of surprise and pain, dropping the knife to the ground.

“—take someone’s eye out.” Ten finished his sentence almost absentmindedly, staring at you with wide eyes.

“Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck—” Kunhang cursed as you all watched blood well up in your hand from the cut. “Captain Qian’s going to kill me.”

“Well don’t just stare, go get Xiao!” Ten scolded his teammate, getting to his feet. “Or—fuck! ZEN! Where’s Xiao? Tell him to get over here!”

“Shit, Y/N!” Kunhang was scrambling around for something. “God damn it! Don’t we have paper towels or something?”

“What the hell is going on out here?” Kun emerged from his tent, annoyed gaze quickly flitting over all three of you before zeroing in on your hand and turning hard. He made it over to you in three quick strides, taking your hand by your fingertips to avoid where your blood had started to drip down your forearm to your elbow.

He looked down at the ground, and saw the knife at your feet glinting in the firelight. “What happened?”

Ten took the lead, “Wong was—”

When the captain immediately turned on him, Kunhang quickly jumped to defend himself.

“No, no, listen, I didn’t—Okay, yes, I probably shouldn’t have been trying out tricks with the knife, but Y/N just grabbed it. I didn’t do this to her,” he pleaded with Kun, then look at you desperately. “Y/N, tell him, come on.”

Kun turned back to you, a frank eyebrow raised. You looked between the three of them and nodded. “He’s telling the truth, Kun.”

“Wong, stop doing knife tricks,” Kun ordered sharply.

Kunhang gulped. “Sir, yes sir.”

“ZEN, call off Xiao,” Kun commanded, making the other two exchange a worried look. The captain’s tone was still biting as he addressed the AI again, “Of course not, tell him I’ve got her.”

Then Kun was ushering you towards his tent, and you obliged. The flap had been clipped up when you entered, and you noted that he unhooked it after him, letting it hang closed and unzipped. He nodded towards his own cot for you to sit, and you did so hesitantly, holding your non-injured hand under your elbow to catch the blood that you were now very aware was dripping onto anything under you.

Kun rooted around in a pack at the end of the cot, then pulled up and sat on the container that had served as your seat last night when you administered his injection. He unhooked his canteen from his waist, putting a towel across his knees before he flushed the wound and washed your arm. He patted your arm dry, and grabbed a flashlight from one of his pockets to shine onto your hand to get a closer look at the cut. It was a thin slice across most of your palm, but the majority of it didn’t look too terribly deep at least. More blood rushed to the surface again as he clicked the flashlight off and put it away, grabbing his next materials.

Kun didn’t even need to speak for you to feel the disappointment seeping off of him. He silently pressed a gauze pad to the slice, and you felt both a dull pressure and sharp sting, gritting your teeth against it to avoid making a sound. As he started wrapping bandages around the site, you finally put some kind of words together.

“I don’t know who I used to be, before I lost my memory,” you started quietly, and he flicked his gaze up from your hand to your eyes for a moment before looking back down at his task. “And it’s going to take a while for me to figure out who I am now. Maybe my whole life. But I know that I can’t stand the thought of seeing anybody, any of you, getting hurt if I can do something about it.”

“You’re telling me you’re going to keep doing stuff like this?” He was still meticulously wrapping your palm.

“Yes. And you can keep me in camp, have the other guys babysit me, whatever you need to do for your mission. But I didn’t want to make some promise to you that I know I’m not going to keep.”

Kun sat up straight again, having finished with bandaging your hand. He held your gaze steadily this time. “I suppose I should thank you for your candidness, and not lying to me just to get out of here.”

“Was that you actually thanking me, or…?”

“Let’s make a deal, since I’m not keen on making you a prisoner in the ag bubble for however long we’re here, you’ve proven yourself useful, and I need my crew out there and not on… babysitting duty.”

You perked up at this. “Okay, what are the terms?”

“I assume Xiao has already asked you to give me the injections?”

“He’s mentioned it. I’m not sure why he thinks I’d convince you any better, but you need them, Kun.”

“You can give me the injections every night, no complaining, no skipping. And you can leave the ag bubble with at least one of us. But whenever you do some stupid thing like this, you come get me, okay? I’m the captain, which makes everyone here my responsibility, including you.”

You nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, I can do that.”

Kun held out a hand, and you eagerly shook it with your non-bandaged one.

“So, I will see you back here after mess then.” He stood, starting to clean up.

“See you then.” You nodded, standing and slipping back out of his tent.

The others had all returned to camp, and Dejun immediately threw his hands up in disbelief as he saw you coming back over.

“What the hell?” He reached for your arm to inspect the bandages. “First I have ZEN telling me you have a medical emergency back at camp, then thirty seconds later he’s telling me there’s direct orders from the captain that I don’t need to come back for your medical emergency because he’s going to take care of it? Did the captain go to med school in the fifteen minutes I was gone?”

“It was just a cut, Dejun,” you reassured him, nevertheless letting him turn over the injured hand. “Clean cut, no debris in the wound, it just needed to be cleaned and bandaged up.”

He rolled his eyes, letting you go. “God, why am I here? Everybody’s a doctor now!”

Mess was a quiet and short affair, and you swore Kunhang scooped out an extra big portion for you tonight. After, everyone tended to their post-mess duties, and you kept an eye on Dejun in your periphery. You weren’t sure how much the others knew about Kun's injections, so you figured intercepting him in your tent to let him know was the safest choice. When Dejun ducked into your tent, you looked at the couple dishes that Ten was still drying and you would then need to put away.

“Hey, uh, I’m sorry, but do you mind if I go ask Dejun for something?” You asked them sheepishly, hoping they wouldn’t have any questions for that extremely vague question.

“Oh, shit, your hand!” Ten looked down at it. “Yeah, of course, I’m sure your endorphins have worn off by now, it must hurt like a bitch. Go, we can finish up.”

You hadn’t really thought much about the dull, persistent pain throughout dinner. Sure, it felt a bit uncomfortable whenever you bent or closed your palm, but that wasn’t really in the forefront of your mind. After all, you having a cut palm right now was much more manageable than Kunhang missing a finger for the rest of his life.

You bit down on your lip, feeling a little bad about misleading them, but then shot them a quick smile. “Thanks, guys.”

Hurrying over to your tent, you barely caught Dejun before he left, nearly toppling him over, in fact.

“Jeez, Y/N, see a ghost?” He stumbled back. He was still in his casual clothes, one of his medic packs around his hips like usual.

“No, sorry, didn’t mean to hit you,” you apologized. “I just wanted to find you before you went to Kun’s tent.”

“Why? Everything okay with your hand?” He asked.

“Huh?” You looked down at your hand, having once again forgotten that it was injured for a moment. “Oh, no, I’m okay—”

“I don’t mean to be abrasive, but can it wait? It usually takes at least fifteen minutes of coercion on a good day before he’ll let me do it. If he even does.”

“That’s why I’m here. Kun agreed to let me give him the injections. Every night, no complaining and no skipping,” you explained, watching as his face turned into a deep frown. “That’ll be okay, right? It’s just med-pods, those are designed for soldiers to use on themselves and each other in the field with no medical training.”

“Yeah, I’ve just been doing it because it’s kind of a weird angle for him to get to on his own, and I couldn’t trust him to do it every night himself.” Dejun slowly unzipped the pack, still with that same look on his face.

“Then… what’s wrong? You look worried.”

“Captain Qian just agreed to let you do the injections? Out of the blue?”

“We did make a deal,” you admitted, watching as he pulled a couple things out of the pack.

Dejun’s eyes shot up to yours as he placed a med-pod and alcohol wipe in your clean hand. “And what was your end? Stop catching flying knives with your bare hands?”

“Not quite… We both know I’ll probably do something like that again, so—”

“House arrest? Can’t leave the ag bubble until the mission is over?”

“When I leave the ag bubble, I have to be with one of you guys.”

Dejun didn’t conceal his unimpressed look very well. He probably wasn’t trying to.

“And when I do something like this again,” you held up your injured hand, “I have to tell him, since he’s responsible for everyone.”

The doctor rolled his eyes and scoffed, “Uh-huh. Go, I don’t want to give snark to the wrong person.”

“What—”

“Go. You need to give the captain his injection, remember?”

“Right. Uh, see you in a bit.” You tucked the materials into your pocket before ducking out of your tent.

The entrance to Kun’s tent was still down and unzipped, and you stopped outside, having learned your lesson last night. Hesitantly, you called out his name instead.

“Come in.”

You quickly parted the flap and slipped inside.

Kun was sitting on his cot already, and when he had appraised that you were alone, you saw his features contort from their usual stoic default to a slight wince. You pulled up the container seat next to him, and gestured for him to lie down.

“How’s your hand?” He asked, staying upright as he reached for your extremity.

“It’s fine, Kun,” you informed him, letting him look over the bandages. “Honestly, I keep forgetting about it, it barely even hurts.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. Now come on, your turn.” You took your hand back and pointed insistently at the cot.

He grabbed at his lower back and huffed a little bit as he maneuvered around to lay on his front. You frowned thoughtfully as he pulled up the hem of his shirt for you.

“Is the med-pod as effective as before?” You questioned, opening the disinfectant wipe.

“How do you mean?”

You delicately wiped the area, careful not to touch his skin with your fingers. “Is it wearing off faster? Does it not relieve as much pain as before?”

“I can’t be using up all our supplies.”

“Is that a yes?”

“One is fine.”

“But two would be more effective.”

“I can’t be using twice as many as before. If someone else needs them—”

“The UHN won’t resupply your vessel?”

He sighed. “They will. I’m just—I don’t know. I’m used to scarcity and self-reliance. Must be a Dura-Jil boy thing.”

You lined the med-pod up, and like last night, didn’t give a countdown before pressing the start button. “Is this your first crew?”

“Why would you ask that?”

“Because you said you’re used to self-reliance. If you’d been a captain for a while, you would have gotten used to relying on others, wouldn’t you?”

“Yeah, they are,” he chuckled fondly. “I do rely on them. Or I’m learning to, I guess.”

There was a pause, and as you watched the med-pod drain you felt a sense of urgency, not wanting to waste the opportunity you had in front of you. The conversation you’d heard this morning was still on your mind.

“What if it turns out that I was involved in whatever was going on here? Did horrible stuff…” You asked tentatively. “Then what’ll you do?”

“I don’t think you were,” he replied simply.

“You don’t know. I don’t know.”

“Call it a hunch.”

“I won’t resist, or try to escape. Whatever the UHN wants to do with me, I’ll comply fully,” you declared, quiet but firm in your convictions.

He turned to look at you over his shoulder, brow furrowed. “Why are you talking like you’ve already been put on trial and found guilty? You just said it yourself, we don’t know anything. Either way.”

“Yeah, but we know they weren’t doing good things here… and I’m here.”

“No, we don’t even know what they were doing here. Somebody made sure of that. Besides, you could’ve been scrubbing the floors for all we know. I don’t think you deserve the death sentence for that.”

“I doubt they had people scrubbing the floors…” You pointed out.

“I’m just saying, there’s other reasons you could’ve been here, Y/N.”

“Like… being experimented on.”

“I didn’t want to say anything.” His gaze and his tone softened. “Do you… You don’t remember anything like that, do you?”

“No, I don’t have any episodic memories before meeting you. But that’s what you were thinking, right? That I was either the experimenter or the subject?”

“You weren’t wearing a lab coat when we found you, and you don’t have a neural port.”

“Dejun doesn’t have a neural port, and he’s UHN.”

“We don’t know enough to think anything about anything, okay?”

“ZEN should be finished with synthesizing the Outspacer into his translation program by morning. We can go through the computer tomorrow,” you reiterated yours and the Professor’s report from the pre-mess meeting. “With any luck, there will be employee profiles.”

“And what will you be hoping to find in them?”

“The truth.” The med-pod clicked off then, and you reached out to grab the empty device. “Whatever that is.”

Kun sat up, keeping his eyes on you as you went to stand. Your task was done for the night, so was your time with him.

“Why do you seem so convinced that you were involved?” He questioned, drawing you back into conversation and stopping you from leaving entirely.

“I… know too much, Kun.” You shook your head. “Why do you seem so convinced that I wasn’t?”

“You said it yourself, Y/N. You can’t stand the thought of seeing anybody get hurt if you can do something about it. I find it hard to believe that you’d do something like… whatever what going on here.”

“Dejun said that humans can do really bad stuff if they think they’re doing the right thing. Even to each other. Maybe I just thought it was the right thing.”

“Maybe,” Kun shrugged. “Or maybe you didn’t do anything. What were you two talking about? When he said that.”

“Your skeletal enhancements,” you admitted.

“I see.”

“Do you know how much longer your mission here will be?” You asked. “When can you get your next adjustment? Dejun said it happens at UHN Main, so it’ll be when you drop me off after this, right?”

“No, I don’t know how much longer this mission will take,” he replied. “It depends on what you and ZEN find on that computer tomorrow. And yes, it’ll be at UHN Main.”

“Then ZEN and I will just have to be quick.”

“Don’t rush for my sake,” he warned, an edge to his voice. “We need to make sure we get everything from here. I can wait.”

You crossed your arms over your chest. “Fine. But I’m bringing two med-pods tomorrow, and you’re taking both of them, no complaints, no skipping. Understood?”

The corner of his lip twitched as he nodded. “Goodnight, Y/N.”

“Goodnight, Kun.”

And with that, you left his tent. Back in your own, you gave the med-pod back to Dejun, filling him in on Kun’s condition.

“It’s getting worse,” you told the doctor, keeping your voice hushed. “The medication wears off faster and isn’t as effective. I think he needs two.”

“Damn it…” He sighed, zipping the pack up. “Yeah, start taking two tomorrow. Stupid son of a bitch. I told him not to skip his last tune-up.”

“Do you have any idea how much longer he can go without one before… it gets worse?”

“No.” Dejun informed you shortly, running a hand through his hair. “No clue. This is the longest he’s missed one before.”

“Oh no…”

“Yeah. Like I said, stupid son of a bitch.”

“This mission… He really believes it’s that important? More than him? Than his health?”

“Yes,” he answered immediately. “The program he was in… Let’s say he didn’t just get some skeletal enhancements and cool armor. You should ask him about it.”

You were quiet, and Dejun plopped himself back down onto his cot. You silently put yourself to bed, staring up at the ceiling of the tent listlessly as Dejun put out the lamp, plunging you into the darkness of night.

Resting your cheek in the palm of your injured hand, you tapped the edge of the keyboard with your fingernail anxiously as you waited. ZEN had to break off another fragment with his new Outspacer translation update, then join those two fragments together once plugged into the computer. And of course, the fragment(s) in the computer were asynchronous with the one in the crew’s HUDs and the Professor’s tablet, so there was no way for you to get an update from the ZEN that could actually vocalize anything. The computer had no microphone or speakers that you could see, only the keyboard, mouse, and monitor in front of you. You couldn’t even see the end of where the wires led, the actual computer itself. ZEN was plugged into a docking station at the base of the monitor.

The entire crew was in the robotics lab. Some milling around behind where you were sat at the computer, a couple others looking at the defunct robots in the side room.

Yangyang walked up behind you, one of the schematics books in his hands again.

“I didn’t know you were ambidextrous,” he commented conversationally, his eyes on the pages.

“What?” You looked up at him questioningly.

“Your hand,” he gestured to the bandaged one, “You caught the knife with that one, but you’re using the computer with the other. I don’t think my first instinct would be to catch a flying knife with my non-dominant hand. Well, it wouldn’t be to catch it all, but still.”

You looked down at your hand that was hovering over the mouse. “Oh. I don’t know, I guess.”

“What do you make of this?” He pointed to a drawing.

“It… looks like a hand. A prosthetic?”

“There’s no indication of anything mechanical, why’d you jump to prosthetic?”

“You found it in a robotics lab. I didn’t think they’d be doing anatomy practice for fun.”

“Robot-people…” Ten muttered under his breath.

A small window popped up in the bottom right of the right then, a chat box.

ZEN: I’m ready.

Y/N: How are we dividing this?

ZEN: I can review data without interrupting you.

Y/N: I’ll start in the first folder, you start at the last, we’ll work our way towards the middle?

ZEN: I’ll let you know if I find anything of interest.

Clicking into the first folder, ‘Robotics,’ you skimmed through the subfolder options. They were mainly named with seemingly incomprehensible codes, combinations of glyphs and numbers that made no sense. You randomly clicked into the first one anyway, and were presented with more subfolders. These were simply labeled in trial phases and sub-phases: Phase 0.1, 0.1.2, 1.0, 1.3, 1.5, 2.0.3. You again clicked on the very first one, 0.1, and were greeted with nothing. It was empty, not a single file to actually review. You clicked back out and selected the next one, 0.1.2. Empty again. Narrowing your eyes at the display, you clicked on 1.0, hoping that they had just maybe moved all of those into the succeeding phase. Nothing.

Letting out a huff, you clicked back into the chat window.

Y/N: ZEN, do any of the folders I’m looking in actually have anything?

ZEN: No.

Y/N: In the entire Robotics folder?

ZEN: No data.

You groaned, going back out to the main menu.

“What?” Kun questioned as you clicked into ‘Synthetic Biology.’

“That folder was purged. It’s just empty subfolders,” you informed them with a sigh.

“What were the subfolders?” Yangyang asked with interest.

“The main branches were just random glyphs? And then each main folder had even more subfolders with phases.”

“Must have been project names. Maybe serial numbers?” The roboticist suggested. “Can you go back?”

You did as he asked. “Now what?”

“Just read the first one for me? The individual glyphs, not as a sentence.”

“Blue, red, add, inside-of, twelve hundred. As in the time, not one-thousand and two hundred.”

“Noon?”

“Well, yeah,” you nodded. “But I figure everyone used twenty-four-hour time around here, right?”

“What are you thinking, kid?” Kunhang asked knowingly.

“Assuming it’s meant to be read as noon, translated back out and using only the first letters… B-R-A-I-N. Brain.”

The Professor lit up at this. “A code within a code! What’s the next one?”

You read it off, “Cube, add, sun, inside-of, noon, green. Casing?”

“Positronic brain casing. Like the sketch!” Yangyang practically ran to get the other sketchbook. “That must have had the actually specs and computer modeling of it. These sketches are just conceptual.”

“It’s a robotics lab, it’s not a surprise that they would’ve had positronic brains here,” Dejun pointed out frankly.

“Keep going, Y/N, he hates fun,” Yangyang urged you on, the Professor right on your other side with his tablet.

You read out all of the glyphs, every so often needing input from the others to find a more colloquial synonym in standard human that would actually make a real word. By the time that you were done with all of the folders, ZEN had popped up in your chat window again.

ZEN: I believe I may have found something of interest.

Y/N: Can you display it?

ZEN: Certainly.

And seemingly on its own, the computer went into the Facility folder, then into one of the subfolders. Before you could even begin to work through the nonsense Outspacer code, ZEN had already translated it for you.

ZEN: Employee files, by department. The personnel files themselves are no longer in here, but the comms directory survived.

“ZEN found something,” you announced to the others. “Employee directory. He says the actual personnel files are gone, but the comms directory is here.”

“So we’ve got a partial list of who was here,” Kun surmised. “Whoever had their own extension, at least.”

ZEN brought it up for you, and you skimmed through the names quickly, looking only for one. When you got to the end, however, despite not having seen your own name there, you still couldn’t let out the breath you were holding. This was only a partial list, after all. You could’ve just as easily worked here and not had an extension on the comms directory.

“Are those… pager numbers?” Dejun asked, leaning in over your shoulder to squint at the screen suspiciously. “On the second page. The first page are all three-digit comms extensions, presumably department heads and general-use areas, but this looks like a list of individual pager numbers.”

“They don’t look different than any old phone numbers, why would they be pager numbers?” Kun asked.

“Well, cell phones are entirely outdated with interstellar travel, but in the medical field, we still use pagers for quick communication within facilities. It doesn’t get clogged up with everything that’s in a HUD, they’re a cheap and efficient way to get short bursts of information from person-to-person. Medical facilities will usually set up their own short-range tower that’s only used by pagers issued by that facility to providers,” he explained. “The only thing on this planet is this facility, pagers solve intra-facility communication issues, and prevent anything from being sent out. Nowadays, ships don’t have receivers to pick up this kind of signal, if they even got close enough. They’d only be able to send messages from pager-to-pager here.”

“Everyone can talk to each other, but can’t send information to outsiders,” the captain paraphrased.

“Hold on a second,” Kunhang announced before abruptly leaving the room.

Everyone watched the door after him in confusion, occasionally looking around to see if anybody else was going to do something. You assumed the others who still had their helmets on could see what he was doing in their HUDs, as a couple let out noises of disgust, then a few moments later Kunhang burst through the door. He was triumphantly holding up a small grey rectangle, no bigger than the palm of his hand.

“Here!” He thrust it out towards Dejun. “Is this a pager?”

“I could’ve told you that without you pulling it off a dead body…” The doctor sighed, removing his own helmet before taking the small device into his hands anyway. As he turned it over, you saw several dark splotches on it. “Yes, this is a pager. They probably gave one to everyone working here.”

Your eyes quickly went back to the screen, to reread the list more closely this time. Nothing, again.

You went back to the chat window.

Y/N: Have you found anything else? We got stuck back in Robotics.

ZEN: No data in Synthetic Biology, Administrative, and Support. Facility still has files in it.

Y/N: What else is in there besides the directory?

ZEN: Maintenance history, blueprints of the entire facility, emergency protocols.

Y/N: What sorts of emergencies?

ZEN: Fire, severe surface weather, emergent stratospheric weather, alien invasion, human invasion. I can’t translate the final one.

Y/N: Pull it up.

With the first page of the mystery emergency protocol on the screen, you immediately realized that this gibberish must be in the code again, and went back to read the title again.

“Sun, cube, red, under, blue, blue, inside-of, noon, green. Scrubbing?” You squinted at the screen. “There’s no way this is a cleaning manual…”

Y/N: Scrubbing? Does that make sense with the rest of the document?

ZEN: It does not contain instructions for cleaning.

Y/N: What is in it?

ZEN: I do not believe I was equipped with many of these glyphs, and my algorithm is having trouble extrapolating reasonable suggestions for them without enough contextual words.

Y/N: You really just have a bunch of grammar and mostly food vocabulary, not a full dictionary. It’s okay, I’ll skim.

“You’re typing a lot,” Yangyang observed. “Is scrubbing good? Bad? What’s happening?”

“ZEN found the emergency protocols. There’s the usual stuff, though the addition of a ‘human invasion’ protocol at this human research facility is rather interesting,” you informed the others, scrolling to the next page of the document. “There’s one that he couldn’t translate the name of, though. He doesn’t have enough vocabulary to make any sense of the inside, either.”

“Scrubbing,” Kunhang determined. “And you said it’s not for cleaning? Maybe it’s like a hazmat thing?”

“No…” You shook your head, looking over just the headers. “This is definitely about… computers? Wait, and fire….?”

“Data,” Kun interrupted. “It’s about purging all classified data from a facility, digital and physical. That’s what scrubbing is.”

You all looked at each other knowingly. It was Kun who said what everyone was thinking, however.

“The Skippers interrupted the facility before they could finish scrubbing. The question is why they started the scrub in the first place.”

“It says here only two people can order a… scrub.” You read off the protocol stiltedly. “The… Sorry, give me a second.”

“Are you okay?” Kun had made his way to the front of the group, next to the chair you were in.

You pushed the heel of your palm against the space between your brows, squeezing your eyes shut. “Yeah, fine. It keeps switching back and forth between normal Outspacer and that code, it’s giving me a headache to read.”

“They probably used the code whenever there wasn’t a good Outspacer approximate for the word they wanted to use,” the Professor suggested, his voice rising with excitement. “It’s like… a pidgin of Outspacer and standard human with sneaky intelligence code thrown in. God, this is so fascinating!”

“Can ZEN or the Professor do the code?” Kun grabbed your shoulder, gently turning you away from the computer.

“I’d love to take a crack at it!” The Professor rubbed his hands together excitedly.

You let Kun usher you to your feet, and the Professor hurriedly took your seat. Dejun met you and Kun at the back of the group, a frown on his features.

“How’s the pain? Same kind as before?” The doctor asked.

“Yeah, same pressure,” you confirmed, still holding your head. “Not as bad, though.”

“I keep telling you and everyone else that you need to let your brain rest. And what do you do? Teach an AI a dead alien language, decode ciphers in said dead alien language…”

“Right. Sorry…”

“You can’t give her anything?” Kun questioned. “At least for the headache? She’ll rest tomorrow.”

“I’m fine,” you insisted. “It’s already going away. Save your supplies.”

“Y/N—”

“I don’t really have anything for minor bumps on me,” Dejun interrupted before Kun could escalate your bickering. “That’s back on the Vision. Just took the essentials down.”

“Admiral!” The Professor yelled out enthusiastically. “Only the Admiral, and the… Research Director can order a scrub.”

“Is that all it says? Just Admiral? Not Rear Admiral, or Vice Admiral, or Fleet Admiral?” Kun questioned.

“The Admiral, or an Admiral?” You added.

The Professor looked back at the screen as if double-checking his work. “Definitely the Admiral. I’m assuming that would be whichever one was overseeing this facility? Doesn’t give a name. And it’s just Admiral. But there’s two kinds of scrubs, actually. A partial and a full scrub.”

“What’s the point of a partial scrub?” Ten asked. “Why would you destroy only some confidential stuff, but not all of it? Isn’t the point to leave nothing behind?”

“Don’t know, but the partial scrub protocol only has them spare one thing.”

“Must be pretty damn important,” Kunhang commented. “What is it? A port-drive or something?”

“I doubt many of the personnel here had neural ports,” Dejun said. “They were scientists. I’ve only seen a couple on bodies since we’ve been here, and they were clearly soldiers.”

“Well? Does it say?” Yangyang prompted the Professor.

“Yeah, but it’s about as helpful as ‘Admiral’ was,” he sighed. “‘Proof of concept.’ A partial scrub preserves the proof of concept, with some of its own security protocols in place.”

“Proof of what concept? We don’t even know what they were trying to do here,” Dejun scoffed, rubbing a hand over his face.

Yangyang seemed interested again, though. “The proof of concept has its own security protocols? Is there any indicator if they’re internal or external? Like if it’s locked up somewhere, or if it might be… programmed into the proof itself?”

“No, it doesn’t say,” the Professor answered.

“What are you thinking, Liu?” Kun prompted the younger man.

“If it’s some kind of… robot, then they could program whatever security protocols they needed into it to make it secure for this partial scrub, without completely destroying all their years of work. But if it was… biological, it would probably need some kind of external security to not only prevent the wrong people from finding it, but also stop it from uh, escaping…”

“And what if it was a person-robot?” Ten replied.

The roboticist shook his head. “They just say proof of concept. That’s usually not anywhere close to the final product. I can’t imagine they actually made a person-robot, whatever that entails. After all, the ag bubble was still set for humans when we got here. And proofs of concept aren’t meant to be a fleshed-out prototype of the final product, either. They’re just supposed to test one or two functions of it and be thrown away after.”

“But this one was worth risking a security breach over,” Kun pinched the bridge of his nose. “Professor, in the full scrub protocol, does it say when the proof would be destroyed? First? Last?”

“Uhm…” He went back to the screen, scrolling and squinting at it for a moment before answering. “First.”

That garnered a few groans from the soldiers around you, but you saw the Professor suddenly perk up as he continued through the document.

“What is it?” You asked. “Something else?”

“That’s not the only difference between a partial and full scrub. The order’s different. I guess since a full scrub is a little more scorched-Earth and a partial scrub has to leave at least some kind of either digital or physical infrastructure for the proof… I think we can figure out if they were doing a partial or full scrub before the Skippers got here.”

“What’s the difference?”

“There’s a lot of things that happen simultaneously, Robotics destroying digital data while SynthBio destroys physical specimens…” The Professor hummed as he continued skimming. “But in a full scrub, the entire facility would be burned at once. In a partial, they only have directions to burn certain areas: the two labs, the Research Director’s office, places like that.”

“So there’s no individual fires in the full scrub?” Kun clarified. “It would all go up at once?”

“Yeah, just one big boom at the end.”

You all looked at each other knowingly, then at Kun expectantly.

“So they were doing a partial scrub,” he declared. “Which means we need to find that proof of concept.”

“We don’t know what it could even be, what it looks like, if it’s physical or digital,” Ten pointed out.

“It’s the best lead we’ve got. Has anybody seen anything out of the ordinary?”

“Uh… Everything?” Kunhang said pointedly.

“Very helpful, Wong, thank you,” the captain retorted. “Come on, guys, anything?”

“Was there anything in that safe room with Y/N?” Yangyang offered. “When you found her? Only survivor… might’ve taken the proof into the safe room with her.”

Kun immediately shot it down, “No.”

“Wong?” Ten focused on the other Marine. “You might’ve had a better… perspective than the captain. You see anything in there?”

“I don’t remember seeing anything, no,” he shook his head. “But it can’t hurt looking a second time. We’re going to have to search the entire place anyway, right, Captain?”

“Yeah, top to bottom,” Kun confirmed shortly. “Again.”

“Yippee…” Ten grumbled.

“But I want that entire document translated first, and for us to finish going through all of the files,” he added sternly. “We need to know everything we can about what we’ll even be looking for before we searching.”

“ZEN and I will get right on it,” the Professor nodded.

“And the rest of us are just going to… watch him read?” Kunhang asked.

Kun took his helmet off and set it down on a nearby counter. “Afternoon off. Congrats, don’t kill yourselves.”

The others started celebrating, Kunhang, Ten, and Yangyang already launching into discussions of what they’d do with the free time as they headed towards the exit. They stopped at the door as they seemed to notice that you, Kun, and Dejun hadn’t moved.

“Hey, you guys coming?” Kunhang called out. “I don’t think the Professor needs you three watching over his shoulder.”

“I figured I’d stay, in case he needed any help,” you admitted.

“No,” Kun shook his head. “You’re going to rest. Doctor’s orders, remember?”

“I won’t be the one translating, just in case he hits a snag with a glyph or something,” you argued.

“He’s got ZEN. Two of him, technically. If he really needs you, he’ll let those at the ag bubble know and you can come back.”

You let up with a huff. “Fine. Are you coming then, Kun? You haven’t reached for your helmet.”

“I will.”

“So you get to stay but I don’t?”

“Yes. Because Xiao hasn’t said I need to rest my injured brain.”

“But you—” You bit your tongue before you could bring up his enhancements. He raised his eyebrows almost in a challenge, and you simply narrowed your eyes at him. “I will come looking for you if you’re not back at the ag bubble in an hour.”

“I get a whole hour? How gracious.”

As you went to join the other guys by the door, you saw that Dejun was still in the same place. “Dejun, come on, not you too?”

“I’ll be there in less than an hour, swear it. Just need to talk to the captain about something,” your tentmate reassured you. “I’ll be right behind you.”

“Stop worrying about them, Y/N,” Yangyang ushered you towards the door. “I told you, Xiao hates fun, and the captain’s a workaholic.”

“The river’s fine for swimming, right?” Kunhang questioned, pulling the door open.

“We’ve been drinking from it, I would hope so,” Ten snorted, following after him.

“No, I mean, there’s nothing living it, right?”

“If there was, don’t you think we would’ve had a smoked salmon dinner at this point?” Ten and Wong’s voices faded away as the door closed behind the four of them, leaving just the Professor, the two ZEN fragments, Xiao, and the captain.

“What do you need, Xiao?” The captain questioned, leaning against a countertop.

The Professor was utterly locked into his task at the moment, and Captain Qian was used to seeing the civvie in such a state. Practically impossible to disturb, even by his own normal bodily needs—sleep, food, hygiene, it would all go to the wayside if he was allowed. So really, it felt like it was just him and Xiao. And ZEN, of course, but the AI’s constant presence was an unspoken fact of their lives at this point, so ingrained that he accepted that there was pretty much no privacy from ZEN at the end of the day, only from the other humans aboard the mission. Which was interesting as to why Xiao had picked this moment to get such privacy.

“Your deal, with Y/N,” Xiao began frankly.

“What about it? I’m getting the injections, figured you’d be thrilled,” the captain replied with a tilted head.

“I’m trying to figure out what you actually get out of it, Captain,” the lieutenant wagged a finger at him. “Because Y/N gets to give you your injections, which was a concern of hers, not yours; she gets to leave the ag bubble; and you didn’t even make her promise not to catch knives with her bare hands anymore.”

“She does stuff like that without thinking, it would’ve been pointless to make her promise not to do it anymore.”

“Which makes her a liability, Captain.”

“She’s an asset,” Captain Qian retorted.

“Because she can read Outspacer? She’s already taught ZEN and the Professor,” Xiao gestured to the man still at the computer pointedly.

“They’re not fluent.”

“Barely. And anything they don’t know, they can bring back to her. Like you just suggested.”

After the Professor, Xiao was the team member that the captain had known for the longest, he could tell that the doctor was slowly circling his actual argument. “What is your point, Xiao?”

“Is she really more of an asset than a liability?”

“I can’t afford to have one of you on babysitting duty every day.”

“We can switch out. Morning and afternoon shifts.”

The captain arched an eyebrow curiously as he studied the other man. “I figured you would’ve been one of the last people to be doing this. I thought you liked Y/N.”

“I do, which is why I don’t want her to do something worse than cut her palm,” Xiao sighed.

“I don’t either, but she told me quite plainly that she won’t stop.”

Xiao looked like he was about to pull his hair out. “Captain, a civilian tells you in no uncertain terms that they will endanger themselves and your mission, and you strike a deal to continue letting them?”

“She’s not… It was a judgment call, Xiao,” he declared sharply.

“And I’m still thinking about what you get out of the deal…” The doctor was pacing now, tapping his chin thoughtfully. “Whenever she gets hurt, she has to go to you?”

Captain Qian shifted in place, stretching out his neck and crossing his arms over his chest. “I’m the Captain, you’re all my responsibility—”

“Injured people are my responsibility. What do you get out of patching up a civvie every time she hurts herself?” Xiao scoffed.

“I need to know how often she’s—”

“You like her,” Xiao breathed out in realization, coming to a stop.

“Excuse me?”

“That’s the only way for that stupid deal to make sense. You actually like her as a person instead of her just being some civvie that’s in the way of the mission. So she can leave the ag bubble, but you still want one of us with her for protection. And when she does stupid things—which you’re smiling about right now, you like that about her—” Xiao pointed to the faint smile on the captain’s face victoriously, “—you want to personally make sure she’s okay after.”

The captain had regained control of his features, staring at his teammate neutrally. “Are you done?”

“No denial?”

“I’m not going to engage with your baseless speculation,” Captain Qian replied, his voice sounding unnaturally tight. “So if that’s all, then you can go.”

“Didn’t really sound like a no to me.” The doctor was grinning now.

“That would imply that your theory was something worth denying. Which I’ve already established, it isn’t.”

“Oh my god, you’re an awful liar, Captain,” Xiao peered at him, delight on his own features. “At least about this, because I know you’re way better on missions.”

“Since you’ve forced my hand…” he sighed, Xiao leaning forward to listen eagerly. “You’re dismissed. Formally. Officially. Goodbye.”

Xiao chuckled as he hoisted his own helmet back up and onto his head, meandering towards the exit. “Alright, alright. See you in a few, Captain.”

And that just left him, the ZENs, and the Professor. The captain rubbed his face with exasperation, turning his focus back towards the computer screen. The utter silence that he had been hoping for was short-lived, however.

“So… Y/N, huh?” The Professor asked, and despite the fact that his back was still to him, Captain Qian could hear the grin in his voice.

“Aren’t you supposed to be translating?” He snapped.

“I can multi-task.”

“And be slower than if you didn’t. So focus.”

You were sat by the riverside, dangling your feet into the cool water as Ten, Kunhang, and Yangyang all swam around. Dejun had come back some time ago, alone, and was sitting next to you as he continued reading On the Ethics of Robotics. You were straining your ears as you listened for the sound of the door of the ag bubble to open, occasionally looking over your shoulder at it.

“He’ll be here, Y/N,” Dejun stated after the fourth time you had glanced at the door. He hadn’t looked up from the text, but apparently could read your mind.

“It’s been fifty-two minutes,” you replied derisively. “According to Yangyang, he’s a workaholic, and according to you, he’s a stubborn, bad patient. Excuse me for doubting that he’ll be eagerly participating in taking an afternoon off. Especially when some of his crew is still working.”

“That’s all true. But you forgot one crucial part.”

“And what is that?”

Dejun flipped a page. “He told you he would.”

“He said he’d be here, at some point in time. I’m the one who put the hour-limit on him, which he didn’t exactly agree to.”

“And yet, he didn’t tell you no, either.” Your companion said, the corner of his mouth twitching, as if he found something amusing. You doubted there was anything in that treatise that was exceptionally humorous. “He’ll be here, Y/N.”

“Can I ask what you needed to talk to him about?”

“You can ask. But that’s a different question than if I’ll answer.”

“I just… wanted to know if it’s about—” You looked at the other three, thoroughly engrossed with trying to splash and dunk each other in ways that were definitely unfair to poor Yangyang, who lacked anywhere near the same combat experience that Ten and Kunhang had. You leaned over to whisper to Dejun, “—the enhancements. If he’s okay.”

Dejun let out a chuckle, as if any of this were funny. “No, it wasn’t about that. He’s quite alright.”

You were able to relax a little with this confirmation. “Okay. Thank you.”

“How’s your hand, by the way?”

“Oh, it’s fine. I don’t even think about it,” you said, flexing your injured palm. “Doesn’t hurt.”

“Good. You should ask Captain Qian to change your bandage tonight.”

You looked at the doctor next to you with confusion. “Why…? But you’re… You were just ranting about how you’re the doctor here, not him.”

“Like you said, it’s just a cut. Don’t need an MD to change a bandage. Captain’s perfectly capable for something like that.”

“I suppose. But what’s with the change of heart of all of a sudden?”

“I have a feeling he’ll want to check on you personally, even if I were to change your bandage now. No point in changing it just for him to reapply a fresh one in a couple more hours anyway.”

It was then that you heard the front door to the ag bubble open, and you snapped your head around to look. You immediately recognized Kun by his gait, before he even took his helmet off.

“Fifty-four minutes…” You muttered to yourself.

“Told you,” Dejun said in a sing-song voice.

You continued watching as Kun disappeared into his tent, zipping it shut behind him. After a couple minutes, he reemerged, out of his armor and in his usual casual clothes. Instead of joining you and the others by the riverside, you frowned as you watched him take off on the trails between the crops, in the opposite direction from you all.

With a frown, you scrambled to your feet, giving the doctor a distracted goodbye as you went off after Kun. It didn’t take you very long to catch up to him as you cut through the grass as you made a beeline towards him.

“Hey,” you called out when you got close enough to him.

“Hey,” he replied over his shoulder, not slowing down or stopping for you.

“What are you doing?”

“Going on a walk.”

“Can I— Can I walk with you?”

He abruptly stopped and pivoted on his heel, turning to you curiously. You skidded to a stop in front of him.

“Why do you want to?” He questioned.

“So you don’t have to answer that question, but I do?”

“Just curious.” He shrugged, then jerked his head in invitation before he started walking again. “I won’t make you answer. It would be a bit hypocritical of me.”

“So how’s it going? The translation?” You easily kept up with his much more meandering pace now.

“The Professor seemed to be enjoying himself.”

“Anything useful? About what the proof of concept is? Or otherwise?”

“Not that he said. But he’s not very talkative when he gets like that.”

“Oh, okay.”

After a few moments of silence, Kun spoke again, “I’m sorry about this morning. It was… I had no good reason to not answer your perfectly reasonable question. I was just caught off-guard. I shouldn’t have been so abrasive about it.”

“Well, thank you. For apologizing.”

“The truth is, I don’t know why I wanted to walk with you. It wasn’t any sort of suspicion, I just saw you going and wanted to go with you. Nothing more.”

“Oh.” You looked down at your feet, once again struggling to not let it immediately go to your head. “I can understand that. When I saw you start walking, I wanted to go too.”

He smiled in just the slightest. “And here we are.”

“Would you mind telling me more about Dura-Jil?” You asked hesitantly.

“Why are you so curious about Dura-Jil?”

“I suppose… I’m curious about you. And where you came from,” you admitted quietly. “And you talk about it so fondly, it’s nice to see you not stressing about what’s going on right now.”

“You know, this really isn’t fair,” he shook his head with a chuckle. “You can ask me all sorts of stuff, but you never have to tell me any embarrassing childhood stories.”

“I didn’t ask specifically for embarrassing ones!” You protested. “And I would tell you if I could remember!”

“That’s okay, I’ll supply the nostalgia for now.” Kun looked up ahead, eyes seemingly focused on one area in particular. “We had to get all of our food imported from Earth. We had no farms, no ag bubbles, nothing. That was the first thing smuggled in, really. Food. Specialty stuff, higher-quality stuff than what was usually imported. I still remember the first time I had a strawberry.”

It was then that you saw what he was looking at, a strawberry field that was growing closer and closer.

“I… don’t remember ever having a strawberry,” you stated. “How old were you? The first time you had a strawberry?”

“The actual fruit, nine or ten. I’m pretty sure we’d gotten our hands on strawberry jam before that, though.” He stopped at the edge of the field, the plants nearby all dotted with bright red fruit. “My mom tried growing her own plant from some of the seeds, but as soon as she had to move the seedling outdoors, the climate froze it dead.”

Kun deftly plucked a handful of strawberries off the plant, and offered the gleaming rubies out towards you. You accepted one, then he took one into his other hand by the leaves, bringing it up to his mouth. You followed his lead, taking a bite. The bright, tart, sweetness was a pleasant surprise, and you decided that you quite liked strawberries, too.

“Ooh, that’s good,” Kun commented, dropping the uneaten leaves back onto the soil. “My dad built my mom a greenhouse, a small one, in our backyard. Took a little figuring out, but she could finally garden.”

“That’s really sweet of him,” you said, taking another strawberry as it was offered to you.

“Yeah, whenever I think about what love is, I think about that.”

You bit into the strawberry, looking at him curiously as he took another handful of strawberries off the plant. “How often are you contemplating what love is?”

He once again held his hand out for you to pick from first, then grabbed one of his own. “Comes and goes. Not often, as of late.”

“Been focused on the mission?”

“Trying.”

At that cryptic answer, you decided to try another question, “Do your parents still live on Dura-Jil?”

Kun once again dropped his discarded leaves into the soil, this time nudging some dirt over them with the toe of his boot. “They’re dead.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” You bit your lip, wanting to kick yourself.

“It’s okay, you didn’t know.”

“For that, yes. But I’m also just… sorry. For your loss.”

“Even if you don’t get your memories back, I’ll make sure we do everything we can to get you back to… whoever’s missing you. Your family, your friends,” he said strongly, clasping his hands behind his back.

You looked up ahead, at the far end of the strawberry patch. “What if… What if it turns out that I don’t have anyone? That nobody’s waiting for me?”

“There will be somebody,” Kun assured you. “People like you don’t disappear unnoticed.”

“People like me?” You echoed curiously.

He started down the trail again, and you followed. “I didn’t see your name, on the directory.”

“So you were looking too,” you sighed, accepting the change in topic. It was something that had been nagging at you as well.

“You almost sound disappointed.”

“I just want answers. Good or bad,” you groaned. “All we know is that I didn’t have a personal comms extension, and didn’t have a pager.”

“Xiao said they would’ve given every employee a pager,” he reminded you gently.

“All we have is a lack of evidence of me being an employee. That doesn’t equal proof that I was… something else.”

He shook his head. “I don’t think we’re ever going to find proof of anything.”

“That’s my fear as well.”

“With no intent to stress your brain… Nothing feels any more familiar than the first day?”

“No. I mean, there’s the stuff I remember from, you know, the past few days. But nothing feels even vaguely familiar. No déjà vu, nothing.” You inhaled deeply. “I either know something or I don’t. There’s no grey area.”

“That must be terrifying.”

“I was shook up that first day, yeah. But right now I’m less concerned with the past and more with the future. You know, what I’m going to do from here.”

“I told you, we’ll help you.”

“I know, you said the UHN has programs—”

“No, we’ll help you, Y/N. We’re not going to just to abandon you as soon as we get back to Earth. Not until we know you’re good.”

“Thanks, Kun.” You offered him a genuine smile. “I… I guess I’m just worried about what to do. Who I want to be. I don’t really know if you guys can help much with that. I think that part’s on me.”

“Do you think you know everything about me and the kind of person I am?”

“Uhm, no?”

“You’ve only known yourself for as long as you’ve known me. You can’t expect to know exactly who you are yet. Or anytime soon.”

“Thank you.” You watched as Kun rolled out one of his shoulders uncomfortably, clearly trying to readjust something in his back. You furrowed your brows with concern; it seemed as though the injection from last night was starting to wear off. “How’s the pain?”

“Manageable,” he replied briskly, face relaxing again. But you knew it was practiced, rehearsed—a cover.

“Kun.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“I wish you’d be kinder to yourself,” you sighed. “Honestly, this tough guy thing you think you have to do, it’s just… pathetic.”

He slowed your walk to a stop, eyes widened minutely as he blinked at you. “You really think I’m pathetic?”

“A soldier who won’t ask for help when they need it isn’t brave, they’re reckless and stupid,” you said frankly. “And yes, I think this entire charade you do when you’re hurting is pathetic. Pain has never made anyone stronger, healing it does. I don’t know if you think it’ll make you look weak to your crew, or that you don’t deserve to feel better, or if it’s something else—but you don’t have to do all this around me.”

There was a stretch of silence as he took a steady inhale, and you met his gaze unwaveringly. Kun looked down at the ground, then back up at you. There was a slight wince on his face, and you were unsure if it was from pain, shame, or perhaps both. “Do you mind if we sat? My back…”

“Of course, Kun.” You nodded, letting him lead the way over to a grassy patch under a tree in a nearby orchard.

Kun let out a soft but noticeable, appreciative groan as he sat down. Looking up above you two, you spotted oranges among the green foliage along the branches.

“Do you know why there’s no clouds?” He questioned. “In the ag bubble? It’s a pocket dimension; I figure between the plants and the river, the water cycle should still be working.”

“Well there’s no Sun, so that’s a big piece of the water cycle missing,” you pointed out humorously. “Ag bubbles carefully regulate the atmosphere, including the water vapor. Since the fields self-water depending on the needs on the individual crops, it’d be a little inconvenient for it to also rain.”

“And it’s a perfect, mild spring day every day.”

“Yeah,” you nodded. “It is.”

“I know the guys are glad to stretch their legs without getting shot at. The Vision is a bit cramped, and we’re only off it for missions.”

“Sounds like an eventful deployment so far.”

“Very.”

You looked over at Kun leaning back against the trunk, his eyes closed for a moment. A soft breeze kicked up a few strands of his dark brown hair. You didn’t think you’d even seen him so relaxed, and you found yourself strangely happy that he felt like he could rest like this around you, even if it was partially coerced.

“Why did you join the UHN?” You asked, unable to contain your curiosity about him as usual.

“Hm?” He made a questioning noise, raising his eyebrows without opening his eyes.

“Why did you leave Dura-Jil and join the UHN?”

“Wanted to help Earth and humanity. Stars in my eyes, you know?”

You tilted your head curiously. “People from the colonies aren’t exceptionally fond of Earth. Especially those who had never even been there, and especially ones from Dura-Jil. Why would you want to fight for a planet you had never seen?”

He chuckled, and you got the distinct feeling that you weren’t in on the joke. “I—” He cut himself off, eyes opening as he sat up straight, gaze landing sharply on a spot in the distance as he seemed to be listening for something you couldn’t hear. “Okay. Yeah, got it, Professor. We’ll see you in a few.”

“Is everything okay?” You questioned, watching as Kun went to stand.

“The Professor and ZEN have hit a snag in the translation. It’s too much to bring back on the tablet, so come on, we’re heading back out.”

You stood as well, but didn’t follow him as he turned to go. He stopped and turned back to look at you, but whatever question he was about to ask you got cut short as he twisted in such a way that made him wince.

“You should rest, Kun.” You crossed your arms. “One of the others can go with me.”

He took a deep breath, then nodded. “See if Xiao can go. The others were swimming, it’ll take them longer to get back into their armor.”

“Got it. You go rest. I’ll bring you mess along with the med-pods tonight.”

“I can’t be lazing in my tent all day and have food delivered to me,” he snorted. “The crew will think I’m on my deathbed.”

“You could tell them what’s going on. Would that be the heat death of the Universe?”

“No, but—”

“If one of your crew was injured, would you want them to be doing what you’re doing right now? Leaving you in the dark? Refusing rest and treatment?” You asked steadily. “Or would you call them an idiot and send them to their tent?”

“You’ve called me pathetic and an idiot in less than ten minutes, you know?”

“I’ll call you a pathetic idiot if that’ll convince you to go lay down.”

Kun’s eyes crinkled as he laughed, hard. When he’d caught his breath, he held his hands up in surrender. “Alright, alright, I get it. I’ll go rest for a bit.”

The two of you finally started walking back towards the camp, soon coming upon the others still hanging out by the water. Kun lifted a hand in farewell to you and casual greeting to his crew as he kept walking, and you watched him until he eventually disappeared into his tent.

“Y/N!” Kunhang called from the water.

“Yeah?” You replied, not bothering to sit or get comfortable.

“What was so funny?” He paddled closer to the edge you were standing at. “We’ve never heard the captain laugh like that.”

“Oh, uh, I called him a pathetic idiot,” you said with a shrug.

Everyone’s heads whipped around to look at you. Ten then turned a mischievous grin on Yangyang. “You’ve got to try that.”

“My parents paid good money for braces for me as a kid, I’m not going to disrespect their investment,” Yangyang retorted.

As the three in the water began bickering and teasing and taunting each other again, you turned your focus down to the doctor still on the shore. “Professor and ZEN need some help. You mind going with me, Dejun?”

“Sure.” Dejun snapped his book shut. “Give me a second to put my armor back on. Then you can tell me how you got away with insulting the captain to his face.”

That night, everyone was back at camp. The Professor was still messing around with a few series of glyphs on his tablet that he wanted to try on his own before letting you reveal the translation to him. The document on scrubbing was fully translated, and the ZEN fragment in the facility computer would continue going through the remaining files through the night. The scrubbing procedures didn’t really have any extra clues about the proof of concept that you could decipher, but it was worth a shot.

As the Professor tried out the glyphs, Yangyang and Dejun seemed to be discussing the book that the doctor had been borrowing from the younger man, as Dejun held it in his hand and they had a rather impassioned conversation in one corner of camp. You, Ten, and Kunhang were cooking dinner. And by that, you mean Ten and Kunhang were cooking dinner and you were watching them, as they had officially banned you from being near sharp objects while your hand healed. And you noticed that Ten was the one cutting ingredients tonight, not Kunhang.

“So why is there no meat here?” Kunhang asked you. “Ag bubbles can keep livestock too. Why not here?”

“I… don’t know,” you confessed. “I mean, technically ag bubbles don’t need to have livestock, since the crops can be modified to meet all nutritional requirements without the need for meat. Preference?”

“You think the Research Director was a vegan or something?”

Ten snorted incredulously as soon as the words were out of his teammate’s mouth. “Anybody who can do… whatever the hell what happening here also being a vegan would be painfully ironic.”

You felt a pit grow in your stomach as you remembered the conversation you’d overheard just yesterday morning. Impulsively, you looked down at your own hands, as if expecting to see them literally covered in blood, any sort of evidence of the sins they think you might have committed. You must have committed.

“How’s your hand?” Ten asked, clearly having seen the motion.

“It’s fine,” you brushed it off, putting both your appendages down and looking back up at the two Marines. “Do you guys think I worked here?”

Kunhang at least seemed a bit taken aback by the question, looking at Ten awkwardly for some kind of cue, as his buddy raised an eyebrow at you curiously.

“Do you think you worked here?”

“I-I don’t know. Nothing’s familiar.”

“We don’t have any proof you did anything, Y/N,” Ten said plainly. “All we know is that you were here when we got here. You’re not wearing a lab coat, you don’t have a neural port, you apparently didn’t have a pager.”

Kunhang picked up from Ten’s implicit conclusion, “You’ve been pretty cool since we found you. I think if you did work here, you’d be a lot more stuck up. Never met a UHN scientist without a bit of an ego.”

“And by ego, you mean God complex.”

“That too.”

You smiled faintly at their assessment. “Thanks. I don’t know how much of this is me or the amnesia, but…”

“It’s you now,” Ten shrugged.

“Soup’s on!” Kunhang suddenly announced to the entire camp.

As servings started being passed out to everyone who had swarmed the station, you accepted one as it was handed to you, then there was one dish left. The others looked around with confusion, realizing exactly who was missing as all their gazes turned in the direction of Kun’s tent.

“Is the captain… napping?” Kunhang hazarded a guess.

“No way that man takes naps,” Yangyang shook his head furiously. “Maybe he didn’t hear you? ZEN? Did you accidentally isolate his comms?” And almost immediately, followed it up with, “Oh my god, of course, my bad, I’m sorry. You would never make a mistake like that, you’re in Kunhang’s neural port, you know exactly who he wants to be talking to.”

“Is he okay?” The Professor asked aloud as well, presumably to ZEN, the only one of you who would have real-time information on that sort of thing. “Oh. Well should we… go get him?”

You picked up the extra bowl. “I’ve got it.”

Without another word, you headed off towards Kun’s tent. The front flap was down, but unzipped, and you stopped just outside to call out to him.

“Kun? Can I come in?” You requested.

“Yeah.” Came his short reply.

You ducked your head as you stepped in, careful to shield the food from the tarp as you entered. You had already grabbed the disinfecting wipe two med-pods from Dejun before starting the food prep with Ten and Kunhang, so you wouldn’t need to duck back out for those. Kun was laying on his back on his cot, which you were honestly surprised about. He started slowly sitting up as you approached, and once he seemed settled, you handed his food to him, then pulled up your usual container seat.

“Thank you,” he said, leaning his elbows on his knees.

“Did you actually stay in here the whole time?” You inquired, picking up your first bite on your utensil. “While I was gone?”

“I felt like I was going crazy, but yes.”

You couldn’t help but chuckle. “You should borrow Yangyang’s book next. Dejun seems to be enjoying it.”

“His robotics textbook?” Kun clarified doubtfully.

“It’s on roboethics. And what else are you going to do?”

“Good point.” He ran a hand through his hair. “But hopefully, I won’t have civvie-mandated bed rest again and need entertainment.”

“Depends on how you do with two med-pods, and how soon you get tuned up.” You pointed your utensil at him accusatorily. “You should rest while you can. You’ll be useless to your crew if you’re in even worse shape somewhere more dangerous than here.”

“Noted. So you, ZEN, and the Professor are almost done with the scrubbing protocol?”

“Technically, we’re done. But it was so close to mess that the Professor asked if I could let him try some of the last sections by himself tonight before giving him the real translation in the morning.”

“Anything useful for searching for the proof of concept?”

“Not that I could tell,” you sighed. “It just kept talking about preserving it, nothing about if that was in a physical location, or digital. And Yangyang said that a proof of concept could be proving any tiny facet of the final product, so we have no clue what this thing could be. Could be a single circuit for all we know.”

“It’d be something groundbreaking. Something worth risking a security breach.”

“And what does groundbreaking look like, exactly?”

“Yeah, that’s the problem, huh?”

“Mm-hm.” You had finished your food, and set it aside as Kun had a couple more bites left of his. “I think the organic material that Dejun found will be interesting, once he can analyze it on the Vision.”

“If there’s enough,” Kun added, also putting his empty plate down.

You started reaching into your pockets for your supplies, “Lie down.”

He reached for your bandaged hand. “Let me see your hand.”

You held it away from him. “Your injections—”

“I’m not avoiding,” he promised. “I’ll take care of you, then you can take care of me, okay?”

After a beat, you relented. “Alright.”

Kun began unwrapping the bandages as precisely as he had wound them in the first place, slowly revealing the gauze underneath. He left that as he reached over to grab his canteen, preparing to rinse the cut again. As he peeled the gauze off, you saw his eyes widen as you felt your own take it in as well. The gauze itself was stained with dark red blood, but your skin was fully mended, no open wound, no scabbing, not even a scar.

“What the fuck?” He breathed out, pure bewilderment in his tone.

You weren’t sure what to say, well aware that wasn’t supposed to happen. “Uh—”

“Wiggle your fingers,” he instructed, and you did so. “Does that hurt?”

“No.” It felt normal, no pain, no residual issues from having a knife go into the skin and muscle.

“Make a fist.”

You curled your fingers into a loose fist, then a tighter one when you realized it didn’t hurt.

“That hurt?” Kun asked again.

“No.”

He took your hand, pressing one of his thumbs into your previously-injured palm, hard. “That?”

“Nothing. It… It feels fine.”

He let you go, still looking down at your hand that you were hovering in between the two of you, unsure. “Maybe you’re part-Phaser?”

“My eyes aren’t silver, are they?” You moved your gaze up to his questioningly. “I feel like you guys would’ve mentioned that…”

“No, they’re not.” He shook his head. “Maybe it’s like… your great-grandma was a Phaser or something.”

“…I don’t know.”

“I’m going to wrap this up again,” Kun declared, grabbing a fresh piece of gauze and bandage.

“Why?”

His brow was set, face serious and tone level as he addressed you, “This is between us, do you understand?”

“I… Okay.” You nodded, swallowing down all your questions, most of which Kun couldn’t even answer. “Thank you.”

After Kun had finished bandaging up your perfectly fine palm, he dutifully laid back down, this time on his front, for you to administer the first of the med-pods. As you disinfected the injection site, you once again felt a strange sense of urgency to talk to him as much as you could, ask him as many questions as possible while you had this uninterrupted, strangely personal-feeling time with him.

“Do you like me?”

Kun immediately shot up to his elbows, and you could see the muscles in his back tense with the movement then stay tensed. “ZEN, stop eavesdropping.” A moment later, he looked upwards as he rolled his eyes at nothing. “Yeah, I know you’re in my neural port, don’t make me take you out of there. I said blackout my mic, including to you.”

You looked at him with mild alarm. You’d never been entirely alone with any crew member of the Vision, you knew that ZEN was always there, and knowing that it now really was just you and Kun only added to the odd feeling of intimacy you had about the situation.

He now turned his focus to you, looking at you over his shoulder. “Excuse me?”

“Like, as a person?” You tacked on some clarification. “I’m still trying to figure out who I am, and the others have said stuff like that—”

“Like what, exactly?”

“That they like having me around, or consider me a friend of some sort. I don’t know, I’m trying to figure out if I’m likeable.”

“Word of advice, Y/N.” He settled back down. “Don’t try to define yourself by how other people think of you. It’s never going to end well.”

“I’ll… take that under advisement, thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

“You didn’t answer my question.” You positioned the first med pod.

“Does it matter?”

“Not for that, no.”

“For something else?”

You clicked the button, beginning the first injection. “Your refusal to answer is rather frustrating.”

“Your insistence that I answer is fascinating.”

“I’m getting a strange sense of déjà vu right now…” You snorted, thinking about your pointless little argument over him wanting to walk with you.

“You questioned my motives for wanting to walk with you, I’m questioning yours for asking me that question. Is that unfair?”

“I only know six people. Seven including ZEN,” you pointed out frankly. “So excuse me for maybe being a little nervous about whether or not those six people dislike me.”

He paused for too long to be comfortable before answering. “No, I don’t dislike you.”

“Not an affirmative.”

“Y/N, you’re afraid that I’m being polite? That I’ve just been tolerating you this whole time?”

“Yes, I suppose.”

“Do I seem like a man who would waste so much of my time on niceties?”

“Well… no.”

“There you go. Seven out of seven, congrats,” he said dryly.

“ZEN likes me?” You couldn’t help but smile to yourself as you took the now-empty med pod off his back and grabbed the next one.

“He can’t hear us right now, but if he could, he’d agree with me.”

“Thanks, Kun.”

“I don’t know what that says for your general likeability that all of us like you, though.”

“That’s alright. You’re the only seven people I know.”

The next morning, everyone split up to look for the proof of concept. Just as you’d thought, the rest of the manual had given no more clues to its whereabouts, form, or purpose, and ZEN hadn’t found any new information in the computer to assist you either.

You were with Kun and Ten in the employee quarters, searching every nook and cranny you could for anything that seemed to be of importance. Either a fair amount of stuff had already been removed, or the employees didn’t have very many personal belongings to begin with. Often, you could only tell if someone had been living in a room if something was slightly askew, a bedsheet out of place, desk chair not pushed in all the way, lamp light left on. There was no personal memorabilia like pictures or knickknacks in any of the rooms you searched through, and you wondered to yourself if they had no family to bring a picture of, or if they couldn’t for some reason. The barren, muted grey walls were discouraging, but you still kept a secondary search going in the back of your mind, waiting to see if anything would spark some familiarity. If you could find your own quarters, maybe.

As you looked under someone’s bed, Kun went through the small dresser, and Ten rummaged around in their desk. The staff sergeant let out an incredulous noise, making you look over at him as he held up a small paperback book for you and Kun to see.

“Frankenstein,” he announced. “Bit on the nose, isn’t it?”

“Do you not like robots, Ten?” You asked curiously as he tossed the book onto the desk and went back to searching.

“Robots are fine, AI is fine. I don’t like the idea of people-robots,” he clarified. “I like all of those things—robots, AI, humans—to be very distinct from each other. Instead of worrying about turning into Victor Frankenstein, I think humanity should be worrying about turning into Icarus.”

“Icarus?”

“Old myth from an ancient Earth civilization. Icarus was a human who had wax wings built for him. He flew too close to the Sun, they melted, and he fell into the sea and died. It’s a lesson about hubris.”

“Unless they hollowed out the book to hide something in there, I don’t really care,” Kun interrupted sternly.

“No, I’ve got nothing,” Ten responded.

“Me too,” you sighed, standing back up.

“Next room, then,” Kun declared with little fanfare.

At camp that afternoon, the three teams had comparable results: Nothing. No proof of concept, or anything more interesting than the random book Ten had found.

The Professor, Yangyang, and ZEN were finishing up the secondary task you all had for today, marking off the dead employees from the comms directory, and the rest of you started on your evening chores.

“Done!” The Professor announced, drawing in the rest of the crew to gather around. “And uh, Y/N isn’t the only survivor.”

Nervous murmurs erupted around you, and you started at the Professor with wide eyes.

“W-Who?” You stammered out, your mind racing immediately.

“The Research Director, Dr. Yoon. He’s not here. Everyone else on the directory is accounted for, and we have no unidentified humans.”

“What do we know about him?” Ten addressed the group as a whole.

“Not much,” Yangyang spoke up. “Civilian only on technicality. He’s worked for the UHN for the past 40 years as a researcher. Everything else on him is classified since ZEN’s fragment has a lower clearance by default.”

“If he was here, then whatever he was doing was much worse than the rumors,” Kun interjected coarsely, crossing his arms over his chest.

“You know this guy?” The roboticist asked him, clearly surprised.

“Heard of him. At the UHN from other officers. I thought he was… retired. I suppose a guy like that couldn’t ever retire, though.”

“UHN probably told everyone he retired so they could send him out here for this super secret, super illegal experiment,” Ten suggested.

“Yeah, probably,” Kun agreed, his voice still short as his face didn’t lose the troubled look that had overtaken it since the Professor stood up.

“Don’t feel too bad, Captain, you probably weren’t even a Lieutenant back then, and it would’ve been need to know. Way above your head at the time,” Kunhang said, going to pat him on the shoulder, but one hard gaze from the captain stopped his hand in midair.

“We’re done here,” Kun declared, stepping back from the group.

“Alright, cool, before we break, what’s the plan for tomorrow?” Kunhang questioned.

“I mean we’re done here. On Aegeum. We’ve gotten everything we need. Be ready to leave the surface after mess tomorrow morning,” he turned away sharply.

Ten called after him, “Wait, Cap—”

“Dismissed.” Kun tossed back over his shoulder, taking off from camp with a fast stride.

“And he’s gone.” Ten sighed, then looked around at all of you, who were equally dumbfounded. “What the hell?”

You were still watching after Kun’s quickly retreating figure as the others erupted into uncertain chatter. Some were still discussing the other survivor, while others were elatedly discussing finally getting off of Aegeum and where they’d go next.

“Sorry, excuse me, guys,” you excused yourself hastily, rushing off in the direction you saw Kun go.

You found him by the river, on a rockier patch of shoreline. He threw a rock at an angle towards the water, the stone immediately breaking the surface and sinking. The captain silently picked up another, casting it harshly into the river.

You stopped a fair distance away as you hesitantly called out, “Kun?”

“Yes?” He didn’t look back at you, just picked up another rock.

“Do you want to be alone?”

Another throw, plop, and sink. “You can stay.”

“Thanks.” You approached, keeping some space between you. “Who is Dr. Yoon, really?”

He turned over the rock in his hand before sharply throwing it at the water, creating a spray around it as it violently broke the surface on its way under. “He was the head of the program I was put in, at the UHN.”

“With the skeletal enhancements.”

“I thought he was dead. He was supposed to be dead.”

“How… did he supposedly die?”

“Skipper raid on the facility he was working at. Entire building was destroyed. No survivors.” He stated, though his voice was hard. “Or so I thought. I should’ve known the Devil wouldn’t have gone like that.”

“But somehow he ended up here.”

“Yeah…” He replied bitterly. Grabbing another stone, he motioned you closer. “Come here.”

“Huh?” You stayed in place as you tried to comprehend the sudden shift in conversation.

“I’m going to teach you how to skip a rock.”

“No offense, but you haven’t actually skipped a single rock while we’ve been standing here.”

“Trust me.”

“How do you know I don’t already know how to skip a rock?”

“How do you know that you do?” He replied with an eyebrow arched.

“…Alright, teach me how to skip rocks,” you relented, stepping towards him.

Kun stood behind you as you took the rock in your own hand.

“Okay, so first, you want to hold it like this.” He used both of his hands to readjust the positioning of your hand and fingers on the stone. “And you’ve got to stand like this.” He made some minute corrections to the alignment of your shoulders, hips, and arm holding the rock. Then, his hand was wrapping around the back of yours that held the rock, gently guiding it through a demonstration of the throw arc. “And you want to kind of swing, flick, release it out there, and follow through.”

“And are all of your rock skipping lessons this… interactive?” You questioned, turning your head towards the side where he was looking over your shoulder.

“Are you going to do it?” He asked, returning your slight teasing tone.

You wound your arm back, then did just as he’d shown you, swing, flick, release, and follow through. The rock skipped across the surface three times before sinking.

“Huh. You’re a pretty good teacher, Kun.”

“And here you were just questioning my methods.”

“Not their efficacy, just how often you implement them.” You looked back at him again, where he hadn’t moved from his instructional position. You hadn’t been close to the captain like this before, but you didn’t really mind.

“You’re a special case,” he murmured, meeting your gaze steadily. You found yourself holding your breath, watching as his eyes flicked down, then he suddenly stepped back.

Your back felt oddly cool as you turned to face him. Scrambling for another topic, you found yourself thinking about what else he had said at the very short status meeting. “So tomorrow we leave.”

“I want you to stay with us,” he said, taking you by surprise. “We don’t know enough about what was going on here, and with Dr. Yoon in the wind… We can’t—I can’t just leave you on Earth alone.”

“We’ve never known what was going on here, and you had never mentioned not taking me to UHN Main,” you pointed out calmly. “It’s Dr. Yoon, isn’t it?”

“The program I was in wasn’t just some skeletal enhancements and nice armor,” he admitted, sitting in the neighboring grass just a couple steps away.

“What else…?” You followed, sitting down next to him.

“I left Dura-Jil when I was fifteen, for the program.”

“You can’t enlist until you’re eighteen.”

“Didn’t enlist, I was selected, along with a bunch of others.” He said the word ‘selected’ with a hint of irony. “I was one of the oldest. We were supposed to save humanity, after some training, and a few… modifications. My age was probably why my body had a harder time acclimating to the modifications. I could only take the first round of skeletal enhancements, brainstem neural port, and cardiopulmonary augmentation.” He turned his head and parted some of his hair, letting you see the small port at the base of his skull. “Neural ports aren’t unheard of at the UHN—Wong and Ten have them, but theirs are situated higher up, since implantation in the brainstem is much riskier. But we had a special purpose, and they needed access to the brainstem for ours. It was the second round of skeletal enhancements that almost crippled me.”

“Almost?” You echoed, thinking of how well he seemed, aside from the degradation of his skeletal enhancements.

“Most of us who didn’t make it through either died or were beyond repair. Admiral Lee picked me back up, put me back together, and let me enroll in the Academy to join as an officer.”

“As in… Admiral Lee, the head of Intelligence?”

“Yes. Though, back then, he was only Vice Admiral.”

“Learning that not everyone wants the same kind of life… Were you talking about the life that the program had prescribed for you? Or the one that Admiral Lee gave you?”

“All of it, I think,” he let out a cynical chuckle.

“And what kind of life do you want now? For yourself?”

“Y/N…” He turned his focus from where it had been on the river to you. “I didn’t tell you all of that as a heart-on-my-sleeve, vulnerable moment. You deserve to know that I’m not entirely human.”

“Is that really how you feel? Inhuman?”

He sighed, looking down at himself. “There are parts of me that are… manufactured. Irrevocably altered. I don’t think I remember how it felt before I was like this.”

“So what do you think you are, then? If not human?” You asked curiously.

“I think Liu would classify me as a cyborg?”

“I didn’t ask what Yangyang would classify you as. I asked what you think you are.”

“I’m… something else,” he determined, voice hollow.

“Kun…”

“Hm?” He gazed over at you.

“Thank you for telling me. I do care, about all of that. Because it’s you, it’s about you, part of who you are, whether you think that’s for better or for worse. But that doesn’t make you any less in my eyes,” you said sincerely.

“Any less human?”

“Any less… you. Don’t you get it? That’s what I care about, not your alleged humanity, or lack thereof.”

“When Admiral Lee told me Dr. Yoon was dead, I celebrated,” he said with a cold kind of humor.

“I think that’s warranted.”

“Not because a bad man who had done bad things to me and other kids was dead. But because—because finally, the part of me that still wanted to make him proud had died with him.”

“Kun… I’m going to tell you something that I think you already know. Just because he played a part in how your body physically developed, does not mean that he made you the man that you are now. You are not his creation, or even Admiral Lee’s. You are your own person, whole and complete. A sum of all the parts, everything you’ve been through, and everything you’ve learned. But you. Not anybody else.” You placed a hand on his forearm, giving it a gentle squeeze. “You do not owe that man anything.”

He looked down at your hand. “I don’t think I ever want you to remember…”

“What?”

“Knowing that he might’ve… to you. I think it might be better for you to never remember.” Kun slowly put his hand over yours.

“Oh…”

“What are we doing, Y/N?”

You looked around uncertainly. “Uh… sitting?”

“Why are you sitting with me right now? Instead of starting mess with everyone else back at camp?”

“Because I’d rather be here than there. Is that hard to believe?”

“No. I just…” He breathed out, looking down at your connected hands. “I can’t promise you any sort of normal life. Or anything, really. Other than me.”

“I wouldn’t really know what a normal life is. I have a feeling that I wasn’t exactly living one before this, either,” you pointed out. “That’s all I can offer, too. Myself.”

“That’s more than enough.”

“And so are you.” You reassured him. “So? Will you let us…?”

He swallowed, then nodded. “Sure, yes.”

“Thank you,” you said quietly, scooting closer to him.

“There will be no way to keep this from the others,” he cautioned.

“Just how many warnings are you going to try to scare me off with before you realize I don’t care?”

“I was stating a fact.”

“It was the way you said it, how you looked at me. Like you expected me to leave,” you frowned.

“It should’ve at least given you pause. All of this should’ve,” he shook his head, carefully taking his arm back to loop it around your shoulders.

“And yet it didn’t.”

The two of you were quiet for another moment, then you heard Kun scoff under his breath.

“Yeah, ZEN?” He addressed the AI tersely. “Fine, you can patch him through... What do you need, Wong? Yeah, we’ll be there in a minute.”

“Soup’s on?” You guessed.

“Yeah…” He sighed, not making a move to leave yet.

“Do you… want to go?”

“In a minute.”

By the time you got back to camp, the others were already sat around the campfire with their dishes, though it looked like they hadn’t started eating yet.

“There you are!” The Professor waved to the two of you as soon as he saw you. “Thought we were going to have to send a search party or something.”

“We had to walk all the way back here,” Kun said plainly, grabbing both of the extra dishes from the food prep station and handing you one. “You all could have started without us.”

“ZEN said you were only—” Yangyang got cut off by Ten elbowing him in the side. “Ow! What was that for?”

“Thanks for waiting,” you opted not to address whatever that was, sitting down in the single large gap left between Dejun and the Professor, in the spot closer to your tentmate.

“So what’s the next destination, then, Captain?” Ten inquired. “Dropping Y/N off at UHN Main for debriefing?”

“Oh, shit, yeah.” Kunhang shook his head. “It’s weird, I got so used to you being here, Y/N. Kind of forgot you weren’t actually one of us.”

“Yeah, we’ll miss you,” Dejun patted your shoulder, then focused a pointed stare on the youngest crew member. “And I’ll miss you extra when Liu sleeptalks.”

“Thanks, guys,” you gave them all an appreciative smile before looking at Kun out of the corner of your eye uncertainly.

Kun cleared his throat. “However, Y/N will be staying with us for the foreseeable future, due—”

“Seriously?!” Yangyang interrupted incredulously. “I got chewed out for like two hours for even suggesting—”

“Because at the time, it was the reckless and stupid option,” Kun cut him off strictly. “But, if you had let me finish what I was saying, Lieutenant, I would’ve been able to explain that I now believe it’s the safer option for her. We don’t know the whereabouts of the other survivor, and there’s a very good chance that he has the proof with him—whatever it is. There’s too many uncertainties for us to leave Y/N on Earth alone.”

“You think this Dr. Yoon is a danger to Y/N?” The Professor questioned.

“More of a danger than being around us?” Dejun added.

“Yes,” the captain replied very seriously. “We’re a self-contained vessel; our courses aren’t plotted externally ahead of time, our missions aren’t documented in a centralized record after the fact, and we’re undetectable in flight as well. Nobody will know about her unless we want them to.”

Ten nodded. “Sounds like a plan to me.”

“Hell yeah!” Kunhang grinned and held a hand up towards you. “Welcome aboard.”

You accepted his high-five with a laugh. “Thanks, Kunhang.”

“So back to my question, then,” Ten cocked his head. “Where to next?”

“UHN Main,” Kun answered. “I need to provide the Admiral with an update, in person. We also need to resupply, and you all are due for some shore leave.”

They all erupted into cheers, and you found yourself smiling down at your food, too. UHN Main, where Kun could get his much-needed readjustment.

The rest of dinner was an amiable, jovial affair as the crew spitballed ideas for their shore leave. After the food was finished, everyone pitched in with cleaning up and packing away the materials that wouldn’t be needed again. You were leaving tomorrow.

“Y/N,” Dejun called for you when pretty much everything was done, but the others were still milling about, talking to each other excitedly. “Let me take a look at your hand in the tent.”

“Oh, uhm—” You gave in to his insistent tug on your elbow, despite your brain frantically trying to think of a reason why he couldn’t inspect your perfectly healed palm.

In your tent, Dejun started rooting through one of his med packs as you were still stumbling through the beginning of an excuse.

“Dejun, you don’t need to—”

“I know,” he said simply, standing back up and handing you a disinfectant wipe and two med-pods. “Captain’s got you. Right?”

“…Right.” You accepted the supplies. “Thanks.”

“Are you okay with this?”

“With what?”

“Staying with us. You know, not getting a normal life yet. I know you can’t remember, or maybe don’t know what that’s like, but… I don’t want you to think you have to do this. The UHN can give you a new identity, hide you in other ways.”

You paused, looking at him curiously. “Why did you join the UHN, Dejun?”

“After med school, I did my residency at a rehab clinic for veterans. Thought I could make more of a difference if I got to them earlier.” He fidgeted with the holster around his thigh.

“I’m okay with this,” you assured him. “Whatever kind of life I had before, normal or not… I can never go back to it. Even if I remember, it’ll never be the same. And after the war—who does have a normal life anymore? Or gets to say what that is?”

“Alright.” Dejun patted your shoulder. “I’m happy to have you aboard, don’t get me wrong. Not trying to get rid of you or anything. Just want to make sure you know your options.”

“Thanks, Dejun.” You gave him a smile before ducking out of the tent.

You couldn’t see the others around the campfire anymore, but you swore you heard voices and what sounded like splashing in the direction of the river. One last late-night swim, it seemed.

“Kun?” You waited outside his tent.

“Come in!” He beckoned you in just a moment later.

Kun was sitting on his cot, a thin paperback book in his hands.

“Is that the book Ten found earlier?” You asked, moving over the container you usually sat on.

“Yeah.” He held it up so you could see the cover. Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Shelley.

“I didn’t realize you’d grabbed it.”

“ZEN could probably pull it up for me, back on the Vision. But my eyes hurt looking at those screens for too long, you know?” He put in a bookmark, a folded-up piece of graph paper, before setting the book aside.

He laid down without prompting, reaching around to adjust his shirt for you. You ripped open the antiseptic wipe first.

“So why now?” You asked, disinfecting the injection site. “Why do you want to leave Aegeum now? There were lots of other times you could’ve called the mission over.”

“I need to report Dr. Yoon being alive to Admiral Lee as soon as possible.”

“Do you think that Admiral Lee knew he was alive?” You took out the first med-pod.

“No, Admiral Lee hates him as much as I do,” Kun said, staring ahead of him. “And the Admiral has never lied to me. When he can’t tell me something, he lets me know.”

“Do you think you’ll be going after him? Dr. Yoon?”

Click.

“I’ll need further directions from the Admiral.” He ran a hand through his hair. “If we don’t have any leads, he’ll probably just have us focus on our original mission.”

“And what is the mission?”

“Well…”

“I’m part of the crew now, kind of. Indefinitely. Shouldn’t I get to know what your mission that you’re on actually is?”

“No, you’re right. I’m trying to find the best starting place,” he mused. “So, the Intergalactic War ended almost a year ago.”

“Yes, I did know that,” you informed him, carefully picking through your memory. “It was the United Human Intercosmic Territories against Ourogos, the K’llor, and some factions of A-Jregth.”

You used the proper name for the A-Jregth, as opposed to the common, less-than-flattering human nickname for them—Dumbo, for their large ears that reminded the first UHN soldiers to make contact with them of elephants. In that moment, you couldn’t recall the original connection between the name and the Earth animal, but that could wait.

“Well, UHIT is much less united now; we’ve got a lot on our plate trying to keep ourselves together. Especially with some planets of Phasers and other human-originated species talking about wanting independence from humans.”

“On the grounds that they’re not humans?” You guessed.

“Exactly. There’s rumors of talks of secession.” The med-pod clicked then, and he paused as you grabbed the next one. Once you had them swapped out, he continued, “The aliens’ alliance has completely dissolved, however. Before we came here, we were on Ourogos; it’s especially nasty there. They’re almost in a civil war, trapped between two zealots vying for power ever since their leader, Busr Gorkourontorous, was assassinated. The Fisheads and Dumbo went back to their own business, and the Skippers are doing what they’ve always done.”

“You don’t sound too troubled about any of that.”

“The more time they spend killing each other, the more time we have to figure our own shit out.”

Moving your gaze from the med-pod to his face, you asked, “When did the busr die?”

“Recently,” he replied knowingly.

“Did one of you…?”

“We didn’t pull the trigger,” Kun said. “But we supplied the gun. And the bullet.”

“Arms dealing. To both sides?”

“The more of them that are dead, the fewer there will be to come kill humans.” He finally looked back at you. “That’s our mission. Less dead humans.”

“Do you think you’re accomplishing that?” You held his eye contact, leaning forward to rest your elbows on your knee and prop up your chin with one of your palms.

“That’s not my determination to make right now. Not yet.”

“You’re a self-contained vessel. That comes with quite a bit of leeway with decision-making, doesn’t it?”

“Day-to-day decisions, yes. Admiral Lee has put a lot of trust in me. But every one of my calls is supposed to be made with that objective in mind.”

The second med-pod finished, and you took it off him as well, setting it at your feet with the rest of the trash that you’d take with you to put in Dejun’s medical disposal container in your tent. For once, neither of you made a move to leave now that it was done.

“How did you end up on Aegeum?” You asked.

“Intelligence guy picked up chatter from some Skippers. He didn’t speak Skipper, but he could make out one word they kept saying over and over that sounded like human. You know Skipper, it sounds like a bunch of chipmunks chittering about, so the word ‘Aegeum’ kind of caught his attention. Relayed it back to Admiral Lee. He sent us out here.”

“Do you have the recording of the Skippers? The Professor or ZEN…?”

“UHN translators have been working on it since we’ve been down here. It might be done, I’ll have to check once we’re back on the Vision.”

“Kind of makes me think…” You mused aloud. “About what would’ve happened if you all hadn’t found me. If I would’ve ever gotten out of that shelter.”

“I know you don’t remember how you got in there, but… what do you think you would’ve done? If you’d left the shelter, you’d have been able to survive off the ag bubble indefinitely, at least.”

“I don’t know,” you admitted, messing with your fingers. “I-I didn’t know, or didn’t remember, what was going on outside of the shelter other than the smell, but I had this feeling that I shouldn’t leave it, and I shouldn’t be found, you know? But when I saw you and Kunhang, and I knew you were UHN—I knew that the UHN was safe, at least. So… I really don’t know if I would’ve ever left.”

You watched as he slowly started sitting back up, and he thankfully didn’t clutch his back, wince, or groan this time. The two med-pods seemed to be doing pretty well for him. But they were only a temporary fix.

“You’re going to get your tune-up at UHN Main, right?” You looked at him seriously. “You’ll give your report to Admiral Lee, the crew will go on shore leave, and you’ll get your adjustment?”

“Yes, Y/N,” he confirmed with a hint of a smile. “I’ll get my adjustment while we’re there.”

“Good.”

“But then what excuse will you have for coming into my quarters every night?”

You landed a soft kick against his ankle at his teasing words, making him snicker. “You say that as if the crew know why I’ve been doing it in the first place. Other than Dejun, they have no clue. Who knows what they’re thinking now.”

“That’s true.” He still had a hint of a chuckle in his voice. “Speaking of… I have a spare bunk in my cabin on the Vision, you’re welcome to it. Or you can room with the Professor, if you’d like. I’m sure he’d enjoy the opportunity to ask you more about Outspacer.”

“Wait, if you both have spare bunks, then why is Dejun rooming with Yangyang, who talks in his sleep?” You cocked your head in bewilderment. “Why doesn’t he just stay with one of you so he isn’t disturbed by Yangyang’s sleeptalking?”

“Kid can’t sleep by himself. Apparently wasn’t a problem until he got onto a ship. We’ve offered for Xiao to move, but—” Kun shrugged.

“He’s a good teammate.” You then circled back to his original offer, bringing your hand up to tap your chin as if deep in thought. “I’ll have to think about it… Staying in the captain’s quarters, wouldn’t want anybody to get the wrong idea, you know?”

“Oh, of course not.”

“And I should probably be getting back to my tent,” you sighed melodramatically, slowly getting to your feet. “I’ve been in here for a suspicious amount of time already, don’t you think?”

“Hold on—ZEN? Where are the others?” Kun was still as he listened to ZEN’s response from within his neural port. “Great. Cut out your incoming audiovisual feed from me, but let me know when they start heading back, okay? Thanks.”

You tilted your head in a silent question.

“Everyone’s down at the river still,” he informed you, offering his hand out to you. “We have some time.”

“Mm… okay.” You placed your hand in his.

Kun scooted over to make some room beside him on the cot, and you accepted the invitation, sitting beside him instead of on the container like before.

“Are you ready? To leave?” He asked quietly.

“Yeah. I don’t really have a lot of personal effects to pack up, so…” You shrugged. “Though, I was curious about getting from the facility to your ship. Is the atmosphere breathable?”

“It’s a bit thin. Unfortunately, we weren’t expecting to acquire anybody while we were down here, so we don’t have an extra suit for you on the dropship. Xiao has masks with limited oxygen supply, you should be okay with one of those for the short walk on the surface.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“But I wasn’t asking you if you were packed,” he continued, rubbing a thumb over the back of your hand. “I mean, this is the only place you can remember. Are you ready to leave it?”

You nodded in determination. “I am. It’s unfortunate that we didn’t find the proof of concept or figure out why the Skippers were here, but I have no personal reservations about leaving. This isn’t my home.”

“Okay, good.”

“What are you going to say about me? In your report to the Admiral?”

“I’ll give him a brief update when we get back on the Vision tomorrow, before leaving. I’ll say we found a survivor, and we’re headed back to UHN Main so I can make a full report, but that’ll be it. I know you’ve only met his dumbed-down safety version, but ZEN’s a very good AI, he’ll keep the connection between the Admiral and I secure while I report.”

“This has been ZEN dumbed down?” You repeated with a smile. “I’m excited to meet him fully, then.”

“He’s something else,” Kun said with a shake of his head. “Like what I just had to do, asking him to butt out to get some privacy. ZEN at full capacity understands the concept of appropriate levels of snooping. This one, you have to give some clearer direction. He understands when we don’t need to hear each other—most of the time—but can’t turn off incoming audiovisual to himself of his own volition.”

“You must be used to his omnipresence on the Vision. His main nexus is there, I’m assuming he’s throughout the ship’s systems.”

“Well yes, but I don’t really care if he hears our talk around the mess table or sees me cleaning my armor. This… is different.”

“How so?”

“Well—”

“I’m kidding, Kun,” you laughed, bumping your shoulder against his. “I like knowing that we’re really alone, too. Makes it feel more… intimate, I think.”

“I agree.”

“There is one thing I’ll miss about Aegeum, though.”

“What’s that?”

“Those strawberries were really good.”

Kun’s eyes crinkled as he smiled fondly. “They were. Do you want to go get some?”

“Now?”

“Why not? One last handful, a midnight snack.”

“I do.”

And so the two of you quietly slipped out of his tent, hurrying off in the direction of the strawberry fields. You could hear the others by the river, though their voices and splashing got more distant the nearer you got to the fields. Finally, you made it to the strawberry patch, and the air of the ag bubble was peaceful around you.

There were small, hidden lights along the pathways and edges of the fields that automatically turned on at night, affording just enough brightness for you to be able to distinguish the fruits on the bushes as Kun went to pick them. He handed you the first one he grabbed, then bit into the second himself.

“Kun, you’ve got some on your face,” you pointed out, and he went to wipe at his right cheek. You shook your head with a giggle, bringing your own thumb up to his left cheek. “No, you— Here, I’ve got it.”

“Oh now that’s not fair,” he complained with an air of teasing in his tone.

“Why’s that?”

“You don’t have anything on your face, so I don’t have an excuse to charmingly cradle your cheek like you’re doing to me.”

“How about you do it anyway—” You took his free hand and brought it up to your face, “—and while we’re here, you can kiss me like you’ve been thinking about doing since the river today?”

“Am I easy to read or have you failed to mention that you’re a mind reader?”

“The first one,” you teased.

“All those years of intelligence operative training were wasted, apparently,” he chuckled.

“Your secret’s safe with me.”

You met him halfway, closing the distance and melting into a kiss that tasted of the sweet-tart strawberry juice still on your lips. You took your hand from his face to tangle your fingers in the hair at the back of his head, definitely longer than regulation, and he continue pressing his lips to yours over and over, as if making up for every moment tonight that he had wanted to kiss you but didn’t. You lost track of how many strawberry sweet kisses the two of you exchanged between bites, conversation, hushed bursts of laughter, and even more strawberries. And you thought that if this was part of your normal, no matter how fleeting, you could be pretty happy with this.

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letsnotdoanything · 4 months

Text

HAPPY NOW? ★ [ j.jh ]

your family has been pressuring you for months to bring your boyfriend, jaehyun, over for dinner, and you think it’s really sweet that they like him so much. the only problem is that your “boyfriend” jaehyun, hates you.

———————————————————————

[☆] PAIRING. ex!jaehyun x f!reader

[☆] GENRE. angst, smut, fluff | fake dating?, exes to ??? au

[☆] WC. 19.9k (i don’t even know)

[☆] WARNINGS. angst, reader has anxiety, mentions of anxiety attacks, fighting, reader be lying a lot, reader has a little sister, crying, reader is kind of a dumbass, explicit content (piv smut), unprotected sex (don’t do this gang!), fingering, sex in public kinda, pls lmk if i forgot anything!!

[☆] NOTES. i’m so fucking annoyed with tumblr it’s not letting me insert images properly UGH this took me over 2 hours to upload man 🗣️ im pretty proud of this one ‼️ idek how it got this long but it’s my longest fic yet and it’s been sitting in my drafts for ages until i finally got the inspo to write it :p i want jaehyun so bad it’s not even funny tbh but anyway PLS GIVE ME FEEDBACK/A REBLOG LITERALLY ANYTHING IS APPRECIATED <33

———————————————————————

six months.

you haven't seen this door in six months.

it's funny because, this was a door you used to push open and walk through every other day, yet now you stand on the opposite side of it, unsure as to whether you should even be thinking of knocking.

your hand is raised to the door, shaped like a fist but you make no move to actually knock. you were aware that you still had time to bail out of this, that you could turn on your heel and make your merry way back to your sad little house and go back to pretending you're happy with the choice you made six months ago.

or you could just do what you came all the way here to do.

the weather seems to be in your favour, at least. the sun shines radiantly, making the temperature warm, but not too warm, and a cool breeze travels through the air in short intervals. the summer had begun early, birds chirping in their habitual singsong way and wild bougainvillea already flowering in various shades of pink and lilac. usually when the day starts off with good weather, the rest of it follows suit, and thus your day is made better. hopefully, this is the case for you today.

pausing for a short, morale-boosting intake of air, you tighten your fist and knock, knock, knock on the mahogany door, immediately regretting your decision as you feel your stomach churn and plummet. a good ten seconds pass, and you hear no reply nor movement from the inside of the house, and part of you is relieved because that means he may not be home.

more than happy to do a 180° and skip along joyously back to the metro that would take you home, your feet begin to make for that trip but your mind decides against it. you know that you are being overly dramatic, but even with being aware of this, your heart rate does not slow down one bit. you also know that what you've come here to do is more than just selfish, its pathetic and rather embarrassing. it's also a hugely unsavoury request, and if your roles were reversed, you'd most definitely laugh in his face and shut the door.

finally somewhat making up your mind with a quiet groan, you raise your clenched fist and rap against his front door again in a set of three. you nervously shift your weight from your right to your left foot, then back to your right and then once again to your left, the anxiety and anticipation not allowing you to stand still and relax, thinking that if he doesn't answer this time, you really will just return home.

"hold on, i'm coming!", a hurried, muffled voice calls from inside the house and you don't think your heart has ever beaten this fast in your life. not even during the one time you ran a marathon to prove a point to your friend chenle, and while you did show him that you didn't only run to get away from spiders, your body took its own sweet time to recover from that.

now you hear footsteps approaching the door from the opposite side of it, and you don't think you can handle anymore of this tortuous, build up of a wait because you are quite literally one step away from calling it a day and just sprinting your way out of there, just like you did on the last few metres of the aforementioned marathon, and you know he's nearing the door because the footsteps are getting clearer and clearer, and soon he's going to open the door, take one look at you and just slam the door right in your face, but not before spewing verbal explosives at you, which would be totally deserved since he has every right to just spit on you and tell you how you're a terrible, downright horrible human being completely unworthy of forgiveness and-

"sorry for making you wait so long, i was-"

if your heart rate was at its maximum speed before, now it just stopped.

standing in front of you, in the flesh, was the man who's heart you broke six months ago.

jaehyun had just about opened his door in a way that his body was sticking halfway out of it, but he was now frozen in that position, neither in nor out, just stuck there looking like he was contemplating his next move. he adorned a loose, white shirt that clung to his defined shoulders and chest, paired with a pair of red plaid pants with a patch of some different material stitched just above where his knee was. you'd recognise those pants just about anywhere, having worn them a number of times and being the cause of that strange patch with mismatched material (you'd tried to balance a pot of steaming hot ramen on your knee in order to move something, resulting in it causing a burn in the pant).

his attire tells you that he was either just about to eat breakfast, in the process of eating breakfast, or about to finish breakfast; jaehyun was not an early riser and he liked to take his time getting ready for the day.

apart from his slightly changed hair, jaehyun looks the same as he did before, if not better. his once shorter, straight, brown hair, was now a darker kind of black and longer in a silky, mullet-y, layered sort of way, the mullet part stopping just above where his shirt met his neck and the front bits falling on to his face in thin, soft wisps.

everything about the man was captivating and entrancing, but if you had to pick a specific feature that really takes the cake, it would have to be his eyes. his eyes, deep-set and fierce, always gave the impression that he was cold or unapproachable, whereas in reality, he was the opposite. as striking as they may be, they always carried a certain warmth to them.

while they still held the same intensity to them, the warmth was missing as he looked straight at you now. after the brief moment of confusion when he first opened the door dissipated, the familiarity had sunk in, and his expression now was more or less unreadable, but you still tried to make out what he was thinking and feeling- was it shock? anger? maybe even disgust?

"okay, are you going to just stand there or are you going to say something?"

you think it was largely a combination of the last two. in all your fidgeting and gawking, you'd forgotten to actually speak to the man who's door you'd just knocked on, leaving him standing there wordless and confused, an eyebrow raised as he waited for you to open your mouth.

you try to do so, so many words wanting to tumble out your mouth but an invisible gate seems to block it, so now you're just stood still with your mouth opening and closing soundlessly, looking like an idiot.

c'mon y/n, fucking say something, anything-

"how have you been?", is what you decide to go with to break the silence in the end, an awkward smile plastered on to your face. you realise before the sentence is even fully out of your mouth that that would be a really weird thing to start off with, seeing as you and jaehyun have had absolutely zero contact for six months, and are obviously not on the most wonderful terms.

jaehyun's eyebrows furrow, a look of clear disbelief on his face as he clutches his door handle a little tighter. he looks away with a sarcastic smile, shaking his head before turning back to look you dead in the eye. oh, he's going to slam the door on you, you just know it-

"really? 'how have you been'?", he questions incredulously, licking his bottom lip while an exasperated smile plays at them. funnily enough, his response is somewhat relieving to your pitiful self, because you weren't even expecting to hear a reply to what you said, you figured he'd just walk away. you would've. "we haven't seen each for six months since we broke up and 'how have you been' is the best you've got?"

you wince apologetically and bite your lip, playing with your fingers nervously as he quite literally stares you down, irritation written all over his face.

he waits a couple more beats for you to break the tense silence and speak but you are inwardly (and outwardly) struggling to word your thoughts, so he simply scoffs and backs away to return inside.

"okay wait, i didn't tell my family that we broke up and they keep pressuring me to bring you home for the holidays, so i would really like if you'd pretend you don't hate me and come with me."

you don't even want to open your eyes to witness his reaction to your blurted little confession, so you merely stand, frozen in place with your eyes squeezed shut tightly. a couple seconds pass yet you don't hear a door slam, a good sign, so you take that as an affirmative to open your eyes.

he doesn't say anything, or do anything either really, he just leans against his doorframe with another indecipherable expression. this irks you even though you know you have no right to feel irked, but the fact that you once had the ability to know what he was thinking and now don't bothers you to the core. plus, it leaves you feeling unsure as to whether to continue. he might just start laughing at you manically or angrily tell you to get off his property like some bitter, 60-year-old man, and either of these scenarios would be completely fair of him to do.

the heavy realisation that your request sounded absolutely delusional and conceited dawns upon you, and something about his irksome expression makes you feel like you should keep talking. "you have literally every right to just tell me to fuck off, and i don't even expect an answer, i don't really know why i even came here, oh my god- this is so fucking stupid, i'm so fucking stupid and honestly i don't know why you're still standing here listening to me ramble-"

"i need to get ready then. give me ten minutes."

✧ ──────── ✧ ──────── ✧

the front door you're stood at now holds a very different ambience to the previous one. while jaehyun's was quiet and peaceful, the front door to your parents house reveals that the inside is just bustling with activity. the chorus of kate bush's 'running up that hill' plays faintly from behind the door, so you figured that your dad must have brought out his old record player from the dusty attic.

jaehyun stands beside you, hands shoved into the pockets of his light grey hoodie that you feel he must be boiling in, because you're wearing a black tank top with some loose cargoes that you think you might have drenched with sweat.

the sweat would be from the burning heat, but also from the agitation you're really starting to feel. there are so many different ways this dinner could go. what if jaehyun suddenly tells them the truth? then everyone in the room would hate you, and rightly so. you don't want to have to explain to your parents why you broke up with him; it's a stupid fucking reason, if you can even call it that, and it made you completely miserable. how were you supposed explain to your little sister that you and jaehyun aren't together anymore? you suppose relationships are a totally foreign concept to her young mind, but you were sure that she knew you and jaehyun loved each other very much. and you knew she loved jaehyun very much.

he does not look at you, instead choosing to really focus on the christmas themed welcome mat that your parents put out during the winter of '09 and never bothered to change. how he even agreed to come here with you, you don't know, but to say you're grateful would be an understatement.

"you still have time to back out, you know.", you mumble softly, trying to give him one more chance to escape, but he doesn't even spare you a glance, shaking his head and squinting at the door.

"let's just get this over with."

with a small sigh, your raise your hand to press your parents doorbell, the embarrassingly loud 'ding dong' ringing out from behind the door. "oh, that must be her!", you hear the muffled voice of your father speak from the inside, making a slight smile form on your lips.

within a couple seconds, you hear the sound of the muted metal bolt as your dad struggles to open the door to let you in. a grunt of "this damn door..." makes both you and jaehyun release short giggles, and you peek over at jaehyun to see his lips curl upwards into a smile, a small one but it's still breathtakingly pretty . he clears his throat and it's gone in a flash, but the image doesn't leave your mind, and you're still seeing it when your dad finally manages to open the door. "i really need to start using the new lock", he mutters, shifting his eyes to you with a big grin, leaving against the doorframe with his arms folded. "hello, sweetheart."

you chuckle and throw your arms around him, squeezing him a little as he laughs and pats your back in return. releasing you, he turns to jaehyun with a smile, who promptly sticks his hand out politely. "hello, mr. l/n, long time no see."

your dad ignores his hand, throwing his head back with a gruff laugh. "what's with all the formalities, come here, son.", and with that he gives jaehyun a hug as well, a slightly shorter one albeit, but a hug nonetheless. the word 'son' repeats in your mind like an echo, sounding more and more distorted the longer you focus on it. you can't even begin to think of what was going through jaehyun's mind. this was not your brightest idea.

you notice your mom waiting by the door with her hands behind her back, eyes bright and shiny. "hi, mom.", you beam, and she laughs cheerily, opening her arms for you to run into, which you do. she presses numerous kisses to the crown of your head, making you groan lightheartedly and try to escape her hold, but it only tightens. "oh, how i've missed you."

"i missed you too, mom.", you say but she's already let you go and is making a bee line for jaehyun with her arms open, who falls into the hug so readily and comfortably. "i may have missed you, y/n, but i missed jaehyun ten times more.", she jokes, pinching jaehyun's cheeks affectionately.

jaehyun is turning bright red, but he has a toothy grin on his face, a real one, you can tell. his eyes travel the front room where all of you are stood with a nostalgic smile, having not seen it or your parents in over six months. you watch as they look from the various photo frames hung up on the wall alongside the staircase, to the curtains that they recently changed, finally landing on the record player thay was sitting on the table. "wow, mr. l/n, where did you get this?", jaehyun asks, and you wonder whether he's trying to make conversation or if he's genuinely curious. you think it may be the second one.

while him and your dad engage in small talk about his record player, you turn to your mom to ask of the whereabouts of your little sister, and as if on cue, you hear an excited squeal from the top of the stairs. all four heads turn to see your sister bounding down the stairs hurriedly, paying no mind to your mom's strained shout of "careful!".

"y/n!", she piped, finally reaching the bottom of the stairs and running straight to you, wrapping her arms around your legs. she barely reaches your hip so her hug is really just her face pressed into your thigh with her arms squeezing your legs together, while you pat the top of her head.

somehow managing to pry her off of your legs, you kneel and give her a proper hug in return, now happy that you made the decision to come home for a bit of your holiday. she lets go and reaches into her pocket, pulling out a crumpled piece of paper and jutting her hand out to you, urging you to take it.

you smile and furrow your eyebrows with confusion but you take the paper anyway, opening it as carefully as you could so as to not tear it anywhere. smoothing it out flat on your knee, you're greeted with a drawing; two people stand holding hands under a deep blue sky, a large yellow sun shining in one corner along with some "birds" that are really just little 'v's scribbled in black. they're stood on a beach, at least you think they are because there are two shades of blue on the paper, one of them probably being the blue hue of the ocean.

you assume the two people are you and your sister, since one of them has shorter, shoulder length hair and is miniscule compared to the other person, who's hair length and height are similar to yours.

you hold the picture to your chest and pull your sister in for another heartfelt hug, kissing her temple. "is this us?", you ask her, pointing at the two people in the drawing. she gives you a proud nod in return, taking the picture from your hands and holding it in front of her face. "yup! the big girl is you and the small girl is me! we're gonna go swimming.", she informs you, flashing you the toothiest of smiles. "thank you, it's perfect.", you tell her, ruffling her hair a little as she hands you the drawing back.

she clearly doesn't appreciate that, because she whines and swats your hands away, but soon her eyes focus on something behind you and they enlarge, the second excited squeal of the day emerging from her lips. "jae!", she just about screams, completely abandoning you in favour of running off to jaehyun, who has a wide smile on his face and looks equally as happy as her. he scoops her up in his arms and lifts her in front of his face, doing a little spin as peals of laughter escape her.

he finally puts her down but she holds on to his hand, looking at the male with absolute adoration. "hi, cutie.", he boops her nose affectionately to which she giggles, turning to look at you. "you didn't tell me jaehyun was coming!"

"i wasn't sure if he could make it", you reply to her honestly, looking at jaehyun as you speak because only the two of you know what you really mean by that. he holds your eye contact for perhaps a millisecond longer than he did before, but again, it was gone in a flash. he clears his throat a little and straightens up, rocking back on his heels.

sensing a shift in the air but mistaking it for some form of awkwardness, your mother shoos the rest of your family away in the direction of the kitchen. "they probably want to freshen up together, let's let them do that."

once they're gone, it feels like you can finally release your breath, truly seeing this situation going wrong in so many ways. they don't suspect anything yet, but how much longer until they eventually connect the dots? or what if they don't even need to do that, because jaehyun only agreed so he could embarrass you by telling them the whole story? you don't acknowledge the tense silence until jaehyun speaks up. "can i use the guest bathroom? still the second door on the right, yeah?"

you don't respond immediately because you're processing the fact that he still remembers these minute details. you also realise he's only asking because he doesn't want to share your bathroom with you, and that clears your thoughts up a little. you nod in affirmation and he begins climbing up the stairs, and you wait until you hear he's reached the upstairs landing before you move.

it's so tense. the last time you were in this house with jaehyun, you had taken a short road trip to get there. you say road trip, but it was just a couple hours long, but the playlist you and jaehyun had curated said otherwise. you arrived at the house and everyone was all smiles, your parents just happy to have you home and happy to see him as well. you think that part's just as hard as thinking about the two of you together. the fact that your slightly judgemental parents adored him, your little sister looked at him with stars in her eyes– you had lucked out in every department, and you were always aware of it, the joint guilt you felt from breaking it off and lying to your parents really getting to you now.

you swore that after this was over, you would apologise to jaehyun and finally break the truth to your parents.

finishing off in the bathroom, you step out into the hall, only to bump straight into jaehyun. backing up awkwardly, you both try to get past each but keep going in the same direction, resulting in a bunch of 'sorry–'s and 'wait– just–'s being blurted out by the two of you. finally getting past you, he doesn't look back at you again, just walking down the stairs mumbling something about "they're waiting...".

wincing, you make your way down the stairs as well, arriving at the living room to see your mom standing beside your dad with an excited expression on her face. you approach with caution, noting that your dad has his hands behind his back. "so...", your mother starts, raising her shoulders a little out of anticipation. "since we haven't seen the two of you in a while...we got you some presents! nothing too grand but..."

"mom, it's not even christmas", you whine, ready to argue with them because you feel bad that whatever they got was still overpriced, but your mother shakes her head, urging your dad to reveal the presents. "just take a look first..."

in one hand he holds a small, white box, no bigger than his palm, and your mom picks it up, holding it out to you. the print on the box is small and typewriter-like, the material it's made out of just screaming fancy. you narrow your eyes at your parents but take the box in your hand anyway, pushing it open. inside, it reveals maybe the prettiest necklace you've seen; dainty and silver, the chain is simple but it's the pendant that's the real charm– it's an uncut stone of some kind, a pale, translucent white crystal that's pretty much shapeless but it's wrapped in this thin silver wire that forms little loops and hearts over the stone and it makes it so alluring.

"it's a seaglass necklace", your mom speaks, taking the necklace out of its box for you and inclining her head for you to turn around. you're now facing jaehyun, who looks curiously at the new piece of jewellery with the faintest of smiles on his face. pushing your hair to the side, your mother places the necklace around your neck and clasps it (though it takes her a while, squinting and looking at the necklace hook from every angle because she forgot to wear her reading glasses). she leads you to the mirror by the entrance of the hall so you could get a better look at the necklace hanging on top of your collarbones, reaching up to touch it. "you remember? from that lady who owned the fancy place by the beach last summer?"

you do remember. that was the first trip jaehyun had joined you and your family for, under the suggestion of your little sister. when you brought up the fact that jaehyun was going back home to see his parents a little later than he had anticipated, your sister immediately asked if he would want to come with all of you, who were heading to the beach in a day or two for a little family getaway. and much to your surprise, your parents were very warm to the idea of jaehyun accompanying the lot of you. he must have severely impressed them the first time he met them, bringing a bouquet of flowers for your mother and a hearty bottle of whiskey for your dad– it's like he had won their hearts before he had even stepped inside the house.

of course, he had met them a couple more times again after that, but your parents had never raised any issues about your then boyfriend. your dad had claimed that he wanted jaehyun to come along so he could "keep an eye on him" and "see how he treats you in front of us", but you knew all too well he just wanted someone to talk to about his interest in sound systems. the trip had gone so smoothly, so perfectly and you think that it had planted the seeds of doubt in your mind about your relationship.

the position of the window and sun allowed for the light to bleed on to half of your face, the necklace glinting under the rays as you stood in front of the mirror and surveyed it. the last couple drops of the golden hour sun slipped through the windowpane and painted your skin like it was a canvass and the necklace was the cherry on top. you were radiant, and the look in jaehyun's eyes told you that he knew it too. when your eyes meet in the mirror, it's like he tears his eyes away from you, forcing himself to look at his shoes.

snapping out of your soon-to-be miserable thoughts, you fix a smile on to your face so as to not seem ungrateful, turning to hug your mother. "i love it", and you really do, knowing that you wouldn't be wearing a single other piece of jewellery for the next couple months.

jaehyun stands in the doorway soundlessly, just taking in the scene. he had always told you that he wished his family was as close and tight-knit as yours, but due to his dad always being away on some business trip or another and his mother having her own job to attend to, it resulted in a lot of time spent by himself.

you think that might be way he slotted right in with the rest of you, from the very first meet, because his desire to belong worked very well with your family's lively, chaotic home, which welcomed him right away. this was the main reason why couldn’t bring yourself to tell your family that you had broken up him mercilessly. they wouldn’t blame you of course, but you know everyone would be immensely disappointed when they realised that he hadn’t even done anything wrong in the first place; he was so good to you, and they just wanted to see you happy.

while your mom cooed at how pretty the necklace looked on you, your dad faces jaehyun with a wide grin on his face. "you didn't think we'd forget about you, did you?"

he probably wasn't expecting anything for himself, because you weren't either, so you and jaehyun simultaneously furrow your eyebrows. "oh, mr. l/n, you didn't have to–", he starts but your father is quick to cut him off, waving his hands. "what nonsense. of course we had to get you something, it's no big deal", he tries to appear nonchalant but the smile that creeps on to his face is a telltale sign that it is, in fact, a big deal. "besides, if you're family to y/n, you're family to us."

it's as if someone just stuck a large knife into you, the pang you just felt in your stomach. you can't even begin to think about what must be going through jaehyun's head, because even he can't hide the way his eyes soften at your dad's words. watching your sister spring up from the couch, she runs behind your father and plucks whatever he was holding out of his hands, now revealed to be a medium-sized bag. "i wanna give it to jaehyun!", with that, she's running over to him with the toothiest smile plastered on her cheeks, holding the bag out to jaehyun with stretched arms.

he ruffles her hair just like you did, but she makes absolutely zero complaints as he does it– if anything she's revelling in it. this makes you want to scoff, but you smile instead without thinking about it, taking a couple steps away from the mirror and towards them. "are you gonna open it or should i take it back to the store?", your dad jokes and jaehyun chuckles quietly while you don't even bother forcing a laugh, and he takes the bag from your sister's hands, mumbling a soft 'thank you'.

from where you're standing, you can't see what's inside the bag, but you can see jaehyun's eyes widen when he looks inside and back up at everyone. "me and mrs. l/n, i can't take this."

"of course you can", your mother tuts in response, dismissing him with her hand. "if i recall correctly, you had said something about your airpods not working properly?"

realisation dawns on your face when jaehyun pulls the shiny headphones from the bag, turning them over in his hand. "i think i did mention it, yeah...", he nods, eyes scanning over the clear box he holds. you remember that only one of his airpods would function properly, the other deciding whenever it wanted to do its job. you didn't realise your parents remembered, as well. "but these are so expensive, i can't–"

"do you like them or not?", your dad asks, shrugging his shoulders. jaehyun's quick to nod, "yes, i love them but–"

"then end of story." your father's not hearing anyone out, even going so far as to cover his ears jokingly when jaehyun opens his mouth again. after your sister tugs on his pant leg and urges him to try them out, jaehyun slips them over his ears, whipping his phone to connect them to it. he thought it was too expensive to try fixing his airpods so he resorted to listening with just the one ear in, or using your headphones till you broke up.

by the look on his face, they work just fine, and he couldn't be happier. a wide smile is pressed on his face, a real one that doesn't even drop when he makes eye contact with you. you smile back at him slowly, but he doesn't look away immediately, slowly turning to look at your parents. "i don't know what to say. thank you."

you'd had a couple boyfriends before, not none as close to your family as jaehyun had been. none of your previous relationships had lasted very long and you could never pinpoint the exact reason why, you just knew at some point that you had to break it off. your mother always thought that this was a result of your first ever relationship, the first and last man that ever dumped you. it crushed you at the time, though you were able to power through, but since then, relationships were never your strong suit. change seemed promising when you met jaehyun through a mutual friend, however. he was kind, he was smart and he was genuine, three traits that you didn't typically see in guys you dated, but you didn't see any reason to dwell on your biggest fumble yet.

the rest of time until dinner continues in a steadfast manner with all of you sitting in the living room. the scene looked like something out of a corny movie montage, but the beautiful part of it was that it was reality, all the laughs, the eye-smiles, the stupid jokes and conversations, all of it. your parents had recently returned from a holiday together that they took to celebrate their wedding anniversary, which meant that you two deserved to look through all eight hundred and sixty two of the photos they took. super proud of the new projector he had ordered off amazon, your dad had connected his phone to it and was going through his gallery slideshow-style, with your mom making offhand comments about every other photo.

"that's from when we went on a date to this fancy restaurant, that's from the shoe store your dad wanted to go to...oh! that's when your dad just learnt how to take 0.5x pictures on his new phone!"

your mom speaks animatedly while each photo is being shown, pointing out various different things without any prompting. there were badly taken selfies of your parents that made both you and jaehyun laugh, pictures of the different kinds of food they ate, the said 0.5's of your mother taken from the top of her forehead– your dad was slapping his knee even though your mom wasn't too impressed.

after what seemed like years, they ran out of vacation pictures and moved on to pictures and videos taken during your little sister's talent show. this was especially endearing, because your normally high-energy sister was suddenly all shy and avoidant of eye contact in the presence of jaehyun, particularly displeased with a video of her singing on stage.

jaehyun wipes the pout right off her face however, poking her cheek with a smile. "you sound amazing, s/n", he pipes genuinely, and she's back to smiling again, even offering to sing the song for everyone towards the end. no one has the heart to turn down so innocent a request, so for the next couple minutes you are subjected to a very slightly off-key rendition of some song from the movie 'frozen'. everyone cheers when she is done, jaehyun even throwing in a little "whoo!" for good measure, and your sister performs a small curtsey before seating herself between you and jaehyun's legs.

you're situated on the same couch, but only so that things don't look weird. you invited him here to pose as your boyfriend, and he agreed, so you have to play the part too. that part wasn't as hard as you expected, the acting like a couple, no, it was the avoiding questions that was really getting to you. at some point in the conversation, your dad had congenially asked jaehyun when the next time he'd be coming home was. normally, he would congenially reply with something like "as soon as possible", but this time, he just froze. he appeared to attempt a reply, but was cut short at "uh–", the rest of the sentence never following through.

hoping to repair the awkward moment, you start to construct a fib. "jaehyun's been uh– you know, working at one of those um, nursing homes–", this is too out-of-the-box a reply even for jaehyun who turns to you, trying and failing to the hide incredulous look on his face.

"a nursing home? oh, i didn't know you were training to be a nurse!", your mother is surprised but definitely not disappointed, placing her hand on her chest with a sympathetic look on her face as she looks at jaehyun. he looks as if he's trying to speak to you using only his eyes, widening and squinting them at a rapid pace, tilting his head towards you so your parents don't see his expression. there are clear signs of confusion and you're aware he's questioning your decisions, but that's as far as you get with his eye signals and you let him know by shrugging and wincing, so he closes them while sighing inwardly and turns to face your parents, a fake smile stuck on his lips.

"yes! haha, funny story, this one...", he grits his teeth but furthers your stupid concoction of a story, snapping his fingers while trying to think. "i'm not really training to be a nurse, i just volunteer there sometimes. love being around old people, you know, makes me feel full of life–"

you cut him off before he can make this even worse for the both of you, taking in your mother's furrowed eyebrows and your dad's slightly opened mouth. "yes, well, it's hard for him to catch a break, you know, with all the...", you slap your hand over his knee and give it a little squeeze, turning to him with a grin while he smiles tightly back at you, eyes focusing on the hand on his thigh without changing his expression. "...hard work he does."

jaehyun's eyes don't leave your hand, seeing as this is the first act of skinship in six months, albeit casual. your hand feels so hot that you think you might be burning a hole through the material of jaehyun's jeans, finally ripping your hand off of him.

"of course...", your father trails off in confusion, and no one can seem to make head or tails of the situation. in a moment, your mother pauses before clapping her hands, seemingly already forgotten about the strange situation as she chimes "dinner in five!~". your sister scampers off with claims of helping your mother out in the kitchen (and probably to try and secure a spot close to you and jaehyun), and jaehyun stands up and heads to the cupboard containing all your placemats without out even being asked. you offer to help but he shakes his head, and you opt to go sit back down on one of the arm chairs facing the kitchen area, just observing.

this was one of jaehyun's qualities that made you fall in love with him, but also pissed you off to no end. first of all, didn't he ever get tired of just being so good all the time? second of all, why couldn't his own parents see what everyone else saw in him? and thirdly, why did you choose to ruin your life six months ago? as for the last one, you knew why, but the extent of your stupidity was real apparent to you now.

you look away when he meets your eyes and catches you, your heart beating fast when you see out of the corner of your eye that his gaze lingers for a moment or two. underneath all that hatred, was there still a small part of him that cared about you? after you broke up with him, over call that too, he attempted to call you back two or three times, but you couldn't bring yourself to pick up. out of fear or maybe even shame, you never answered his calls and since then, you'd had no contact.

it was impossible. with a break-up like that and six month's worth of time to sit and think about it, you imagine that one could hold a surprising amount of hatred for someone–especially after a relationship as real as yours. if you switched the roles, you think you wouldn't feel much different.

at your mom's signal, you heave yourself off the couch and to the dining table, seating yourself next to jaehyun (everyone expected you to sit with him, they left the chair empty on purpose). your sister has already claimed the spot opposite jaehyun and was patiently awaiting the vegetables that she knew your mother was going to pile on her plate, a little pout forming on her lips at the sight of broccoli. "you can't make that face every time, like i'm feeding you dog food", your mother scolds her with a smile, giving her a generous helping of veggies. the pout deepens and she folds her arms with a cross look on her face. "you guys don't have to eat the broccoli. why do i?"

she's got a point, you think, but before you can tell her to just eat them, jaehyun speaks. "that's exactly what my little cousin sungchan said...", jaehyun tells her, looking around the table with a dramatic sigh. "and we all know what happened to him..."

little cousin sungchan? as far as you know, there is no little cousin sungchan, and you know a lot about jaehyun's family, so you put your fork down in favour of listening to his story at the same time your sister curiously asks, "what happened?".

"well, like you, sungchan didn't like eating his veggies", starting off the story with a shrug under your mother's listening ears, he talks in a low voice. "he'd always argue with my aunt till one day, he refused to eat them.

your sister is knocking food around her plate while she listened to jaehyun, and she's not impressed with the story so far. "see! why can't i do that?", she asks indignantly, and your mother shoots jaehyun a look to which he winced and continues. "nothing happened for a while, so sungchan thought he had proved his point. but he hadn't heard of the veggie monster."

the story is heading in such a stupid direction that you almost laugh out loud, but you catch yourself when you notice your sister's expression, guarded and wary. "...the veggie monster? ...that's not real...", she speaks like she's not fully sure of her words herself, pausing her attack on her food.

"sungchan thought that too", jaehyun agrees, lowering his voice like one would when telling a scary story, looking around him like it could be listening before continuing, for the story's sake. "but he didn't know that without veggies, a child's body is weak. their bones don't grow strong, they stay small and their minds aren't sharp at all. that's how the veggie monster chooses his targets."

you hold back a snort at your sister's wide-eyed expression and how serious jaehyun looks, he's even got your dad attempting to look nonchalant as he followed the story. "the less veggies a kid eats, the weaker they get, and that's easy pickings for the veggie monster. he comes late at night, and there's no point in hiding because he knows. he can smell when a kid doesn't have enough vitamins and it makes him hungry."

with your sister, your parents and even you hanging on to every word, jaehyun lowers his voice to almost a whisper, and all of you lean in closer to listen. "legend has it that he looks so scary that you lose the ability to move or speak, so he just takes you. sungchan was never seen again. the police said he was missing but i knew what happened to him."

you have to admit, jaehyun can tell a story. the atmosphere felt more eerie as he concluded the story cryptically, but your sister looks positively gutted. "did he take him?", she questions, face white and voice small. he nods slowly, like he didn't want to be talking about this, and all you can think about is how this man deserved an award after the show he put on. "i had my suspicions. no one believed me, but i'm ninety-nine percent sure that at dinner, i saw a pair of dark, red eyes staring straight into the kitchen from the window."

as if nature was a paid fucking actor, a slight crash sounds from outside the window on cue, like if a cat knocked over a plastic bin, but you're pretty sure your sister shit her pants. you've never seen her shovel vegetables into her mouth at that kind of record speed before, even your parents are looking at her astounded. with her food in her mouth, she pleads with glazed eyes, "please– i'm sorry, i'll have my veggies, don't let him take me!"

it takes all of you a little while to convince your sister that she'd be completely fine if she ate all the veggies given to her and that the veggie monster wouldn't even think of her, but it's safe to say that she'd never leave a bit of stray carrot on her plate ever again. your mom comically mouths 'thank you' to jaehyun which makes you laugh, and you turn to smile at him, and he gives you a nod in return. small steps, you think, because a nod is a whole lot better than a glare.

the rest of the dinner continues as if nothing changed. sure, you and jaehyun knew things were different, but it didn't fully feel like it at the moment. your mom had prepared a lot of nice food for the occasion, and your dad even helped, particularly proud of the way his stir fry turned out. jaehyun made sure to compliment both your parents on their cooking, and they all but melted– he still knew exactly how to talk to them. conversation was easy; you talked about work, you talked about how university was going, you talked about the school play your sister was going to take part in, about jaehyun's parents, nothing was forced.

you'd fall into comfortable silences at times in favour of sitting back and observing, listening, just being a part of the moment. for someone who was so reluctant to be here, jaehyun seems comfortable, the familiarity of the situation helping ease the tension between the two of you. expecting some bumps along the way, you were rather pleased with how things were turning out, but you were also anticipating the end of the lovely evening– where you and jaehyun would eventually go your separate ways. you don't want to think about it just yet, not when everything was going so smoothly, and your opportunity to snap out of your thoughts is presented to you, just not in the way you would have liked.

your mother's question seems to have thrown jaehyun for a loop as well, because his eyebrows are furrowed and he looks blatantly confused. at some point during a lull in the conversation, your mother had politely asked jaehyun how his christmas in japan had gone; the only problem with this question was that he never had a christmas in japan, not to his knowledge anyway. this, was yet another lie you had told your parents, when they had asked why jaehyun hadn't accompanied you home to celebrate christmas, like he had originally planned to. unbeknownst to them, you had already broken up with him prior to the christmas holidays, so jaehyun wasn't exactly going to come along anyway. so, you told them that he had to spend christmas with an aunt in japan, for familial reasons.

you didn't exactly have time to prep jaehyun and give him a run down of every single lie he had to play along with, so he turns to you with a look of uncertainty and desperation in his eyes. "my, uh- christmas? in japan?", he puts emphasis on the two keywords, not blinking when he speaks directly to you in hopes that you would take the hint and help him out.

"yeah, your christmas. in japan. with your aunt", you reply to him with the same tone and expression as he does, trying your best to sound subtle so your parents don't catch on.

"yes, with your aunt! we were so sad to hear that you couldn't make it for christmas", your mother is unknowingly helping jaehyun catch up with the fake story, and he releases a short "ahh" during his moment of 'recollection'. "right, my real aunt who definitely lives in japan."

he grits his teeth when he talks, making you grimace and the fact that your parents look completely puzzled doesn't help. you need to save your dignity anyway, so you try to cut jaehyun off before he can make things worse. "haha, jaehyun of course she's your real aunt, silly", you awkwardly chuckle, feigning nonchalance when you bump his shoulder with your fist, wishing you could telepathically communicate with him right now, but you'd probably only be saying "please, please, please" on repeat.

he sighs but speaks up again, much to your relief. "it was slightly boring, my aunt doesn't do much", he laughs softly, fully back in character. "but you know, it's still nice to spend time with your family."

if your parents are suspicious, they don't say anything, seemingly satisfied with jaehyun's answer. dinner continues with few hitches until jaehyun insists that he washes the dishes. "it's the least i can do, after you both made such delicious food."

your mother at least tries to argue with him for a bit, but your dad is quite happy to not have to wash dishes, patting jaehyun on the back before standing up. what surprises you however, is jaehyun turning to you with the sweetest, most fake smile you've seen in a minute plastered on his face. "you mind helping, y/n?"

smiling tightly, you nod and begin clearing the table. this is done in silence, neither of you even looking at each other as you pick up dishes and carry them to the kitchen. your sister has run off to the living room to watch some t.v with your dad, and it feels like you're finally allowed to breathe when your mother exits the room as you’re picking up the last dirty dish. walking into the kitchen, jaehyun's back is facing you while he washes dishes, the environment and the little tune he's humming making everything seem so domestic in your eyes. this is how dinner used to always go when he came over, with you and him washing the dishes together in the end, taking breaks to splash each other with the soapy water or making out secretly by the counter.

but the air is foreign now, none of the former warmth or softness remaining. he turns to you with a frown when you place the final dish on the side of the sink, and he really doesn't look too happy. "visiting an aunt in japan? really?", he scoffs, looking incredulous while you look sheepish, avoiding his eye contact entirely.

you were expecting something like this but you hated being put on the spot. "i don't know, okay, what else was i supposed to say?", the exasperation in your voice is evident but it only fuels jaehyun, and rightfully so.

"i got an idea, how about 'oh, he can't come because i dumped his ass over call for no reason, sorry'?", he digs snidely, voice laden with scorn. there it is. "or is that too close to the truth for you?"

he doesn’t even let you open your mouth, chucking the cloth he was using to dry the dishes on the counter somewhere, folding his arms while he looks at you in a hostile way. “you wanna know how i really spent my christmas, y/n?”, he sneers sardonically, a sarcastic smile etched on to his lips. “alone in my house. miserable. i wish i had an aunt in fucking japan that i could’ve spent it with.”

you hate to admit it, but his words sting and you are well aware that you deserve it. just asking him to join you for this dinner was a huge reach, a request you really didn't expect him to accept. you don't fully understand why he did, though. he clearly despised you, so many be it was out of love for your family? you know jaehyun cared for them, but doing all this was uncharacteristic even for him. when you don't say anything but wear an agonised expression on your face, jaehyun further questions you.

"do you not have anything to say for yourself?", he tries again, his voice a little softer and more hopeful than before but you look like you're fighting some internal battle that doesn't involve him. he exhales deeply, clearly disappointed in your lack of an explanation and just walks past you and out of the kitchen.

you remain in the kitchen for a couple beats more, trying your level best to collect yourself. you can feel tears pricking the corners of your eyes and your breathing is quicker, but this is the absolute worst time to have a little panic attack in the kitchen. how you wished the two of you could just forget about everything for a minute so you could wrap your arms around his figure and fall into his embrace, feeling like that would solve all your problems. it's selfish and wrong, but you know that you're not getting over jaehyun anytime soon.

you'd come to that conclusion a couple months back. the first month after you broke things off with him was possibly the worst time of your life, struggling to eat, sleep or even get out of bed. your friends urged you to reach out to him like they knew you wanted to, but you remained stubborn, convinced at the time that you had made the right decision that would hurt the least for the both of you. you were wrong, you could see that now, but you knew it was much too late. you'd already gone through all the stages of grief, but seeing jaehyun again in this environment had really gone and thrown a spanner in the works for you, all because of your terrible decision-making skills.

any hopes you had of the two of you at least being on semi-friendly terms had just flown out the window as well, and you suddenly think that this might've been the reason why jaehyun even agreed to come. an explanation. a well-deserved one at that. you don't know why you find it so hard to give him one, but you suspect it's because you're not ready to face all that yourself.

upon hearing your mother faintly call out your name, you realise how long you've been standing in the kitchen, taking a couple more deep breaths before you join the rest of them. it's clear that everyone's winding down, your sister curled up on your dad's lap, trying to blink away her sleepiness, while everyone else mutedly watched the television. "didn't mean to keep you all up past your bedtime", you try to joke lightheartedly because your parents look like they're about to hit the hay themselves, but it's really so that no one suspects you were having a little breakdown in the kitchen; especially jaehyun.

"you're not wrong", your dad agrees gruffly, stretching a little before tapping on your sister's cheek to wake her, much to her displeasure. "it's technically your mama's turn to put you to bed, isn't it?", he attempts, but is quickly shot down by your mother, pinching his arm after claiming it was certainly not her turn. after their grand performance, both of them comically turn to look at you with a suspiciously bright look in their eyes. you don't even have time to argue, because the second the hint of a sigh leaves your mouth, they're saying "thank you" and "how nice of you to offer", urging your sister to wake up to let her know that you'll be tucking her in tonight.

she perks up a little at this, nodding with a little glint in her eyes. hopping off your dad's lap, she sleepily totters over to you. "can jae come too?", her voice is hopeful and small, and she yawns in the middle of her sentence but she just has this certain charm that makes everyone unable to say 'no' to her. this includes jaehyun, because one look from her with her arms raised and he's picking her up, pretending to complain about it. you can't help but smile at the whole interaction.

"oh quick! before i forget...", your mom gasps in remembrance, picking her phone up from the coffee table with a tired smile. "don't know when i'll get to see the two of you again so, pictures!"

this may be the only part you were slightly prepared for. your mother had a special affinity for taking photos; not that she was any good at it, she just enjoyed capturing these little moments and treating her gallery like a scrapbook. she had more or less documented the entirety of you and jaehyun's relationship, from the first few months where all the photos were cheesy smiles and awkward poses, to when you had grown more comfortable around each other. in fact, a photo she had taken of jaehyun was your wallpaper for quite some time (it took a lot of effort and explaining to help your mom airdrop you the picture)– it was a shot of jaehyun and your sister grinning from ear to ear, both adorning aprons that were covered in flour after a failed attempt at baking cookies.

the point being, you're pretty sure jaehyun was also expecting the pictures, so it didn't really surprise you when he plastered a smile on his face and came to stand beside you. his hand finds the small of your back soon enough and it makes your body stiffen while simultaneously sending a jolt through it, and jaehyun feels it. mistaking the action for uneasiness, he immediately lifts his warm hand off you so that it's now hovering awkwardly over your body, though no one can see that from the front. while you are disappointed, you lean into him anyway, clasping your hands together behind your back as you both give the camera wide smiles. you're so close you can smell his cologne and it's making you dizzy, not because the scent is overpowering but because it's just so familiar and you can't get enough of it.

the moment is gone in a flash because your mother takes three to four photos while cooing at the two of you before she decides to call it a night, and then jaehyun is ripping himself from you. you don't think anyone else recognises it, the way he seems to want to be as far from you as possible because he's so good at masking these things, but you can feel it. you can feel this heat radiating off of his body whenever he's near you and it's not the warm, fuzzy kind of heat. the spot on your back where his hand rested still burns a little.

your parents are exhausted and look more than happy to be able to jump straight into bed, but not before thanking you and jaehyun. you hug and kiss them goodnight, promising that your next visit will be sooner than this one before they exchange pleasantries with jaehyun, making him promise the same. you know this has to be hard on him, making a mental note to apologise profusely before you part ways. with a reminder that the door now locks from the inside, they bid you goodnight and goodbye, trudging off to their room while your sister scampers up the stairs to hers, suddenly full of life.

you understand why your parents were more than happy to hand over bedtime duties to you and your "boyfriend", because putting your little sister to bed turned out to be a piece of work. she started off by blatantly refusing to brush her teeth, but jaehyun had that one sorted when he reminded her that the veggie monster had a lot of friends, so that was done. she changed into her pyjamas all on her own which was a relief, but you were at a loss over how to actually get her into bed.

you both humoured her for a bit, understanding that she was just happy to have her big sister and her big sister's nice boyfriend home again, so a little excitement was expected. jaehyun played along with her, which was a sight to see, following along with the characters she assigned him in her imaginary games. but when bouncing on her bed turned into running around the room like a crazed bunny, it was a little harder to convince her that she needed to sleep now. "look at me, i'm wide awake", she insists, widening her eyes with her fingers to show you both just how awake she was. jaehyun tried a couple times to catch her, but you're both taken by surprise at her remarkable speed and agility. in the end, you had to resort to just sitting down and hoping that she'll tire herself out, which eventually does happen.

she climbs into bed of her own accord, rubbing at her eyes while you pull the duvet over her body, up to her shoulders. "when are you coming next?", she mumbles curiously while you sit on the edge of her bed, jaehyun standing close by. "soon", you reply honestly, knowing that you'll always have a safe place to come to whenever you need. "maybe i'll even stay for a whole weekend next time."

she likes the sound of this, smiling tiredly with her hands peeking over the edge of her cover, holding it closer to her. "will you come too?", this question is directed towards jaehyun, who looks defeated when he opens his mouth to answer. it's not fair, expecting him to lie to your family like this, but you know you've gotta come clean soon. you'd made up your mind at this point and come up with a plan; you'd explain yourself to jaehyun and apologise after which you'll go your separate ways, then you'll tell your family the truth after tonight, or at least make up a more recent break up, and that's that.

when jaehyun looks to you for help, you play with your hands a little, not fully knowing what to say. "if the old ladies at the nursing home let him go, maybe...", is what you decide is the safest option to go with, and your sister seems satisfied enough, giggling drowsily. you know she's close to falling asleep, and you're about to inwardly celebrate a job well done when she pops her next, unexpected question. "will you both be together forever?"

oh. there's a hint of teasing behind her voice, but everything else about the question is innocent and genuine, blinking her eyes open so she can look at the both of you when you answer. though you're not touching him, you can feel jaehyun stiffen next to you, his voice sounding more than a little awkward when he lets out an involuntary "uhh".

"what do you mean, cutie?"

you don't know why he asks that, because it's a pretty straightforward question; will the two of you be together forever? you want to laugh at the irony because you know that if she had asked the same question last time jaehyun came home, you both would have exchanged knowing smiles, giggling shyly while you tried to answer. the answer would've been 'yes', and you know deep down that it still should be.

she clicks her tongue like it's the most obvious and easy question in the world, shrugging her shoulders when she speaks. "you know, that's what people do when they're in love,", she answers with no hesitation, and you want to roll your eyes because who kidnapped your little sister and replaced her with dhar mann? "just like mommy and daddy!"

"daddy and mommy are married, sweetie, it's a little different–"

"i know that", she cuts off your little improvised answer in a deadpan voice that almost makes you feel stupid, but all her questions have your heart thudding against your rib cage, and you're praying to god that jaehyun can't hear it too. "but still, they love each other, and that's why they're together forever. don't you love each other?"

you're pretty sure the world stopped spinning and your heart stopped beating simultaneously, most definitely not expecting these kinds of questions from your sister. how do you even prepare an answer for this kind of situation? you know for a fact that your cheeks are coated in a dark sheen of red, and out of the corner of your eye (because you refuse to look at him), you’re pretty sure you can see the distinct pink colour paint the tips of jaehyun's ears, like they always do when he's shy or embarrassed. you can't not give her an answer, because that looks weird and she's clearly waiting for one, but answering meant that you either tell her the truth, that no, you will not be together forever because your dumbass went and ruined everything for the both of you six months ago, or you can lie and say that she's right, which would be admitting a lot of things that you didn't want to admit–

"nothing's for sure, but you're right, if two people really do love each other...", jaehyun's deep voice brings all your spiralling thoughts to a halt, and you look at him for the first time in a bit, only to find that he's already looking at you, gaze raw and piercing. you hold your breath when he speaks, because you don't trust yourself at the moment. "...they'll end up together forever."

you hear your sister make some kind of a reply, but the heartbeat in your ears is so loud that you don't quite catch it, the eye contact you're holding with jaehyun so intense that it feels wrong to look away. what could he have possibly meant by that? or was it just some half-assed answer to get your sister to go to sleep? you realise that staring at him while trying to use your sixth sense to nonverbally convey these questions to him isn't going to work, but you can feel the lump forming in your throat, needing to get out of this situation quickly.

it takes everything in you to break the eye contact in favour of pressing a quick peck to your sister's temple, and she looks about ten seconds away from just crashing. "night y/n, night jae...", and with that she's out like a light, and you two wait wordlessly until her breathing evens out before silently exiting the room.

once her bedroom door is shut, you make a beeline for the front door, way too scared and vulnerable right now to look at jaehyun. he doesn't say anything, so neither do you, making sure the door is actually locked before taking your phone out of your pocket. the time on your phone screen reads '11:43', and you know it's too late to try and catch the metro or a bus, but you're too stubborn and embarrassed to ask jaehyun to drop you.

the air is cold outside, much colder than it was inside your warm house. at the current moment, there is no breeze either, the trees are still and there are only a few lights on around the street, and it just makes everything seem so still and loud. you look out at the road, eyes zeroing in on this one lamp post where you shared one of your first few kisses with the man standing beside you. it's crazy how time can change things, you think, because never would you have believed in the moment that jaehyun called you "the most beautiful girl in the world" before leaning in to sweetly connect your lips that he could ever be something so close to a stranger within months.

ultimately opting to look at him, you're once again unable to read the expression on his face as you try your best to speak your mind to him. "um, i'm gonna book a cab, so you're officially free to go. thanks again for tonight, you really didn't have to come with me, so i owe you one. or i don't have to owe you one, because we're not going to see each other again- anything's good with me, just uh...thanks."

he waits patiently for you to finish, and aside from the slightest hint of amusement in his eyes, you're at a loss over what he's really thinking, but his face is so stupidly handsome that you're feeling angry and a little awkward, choosing to look around, and at the floor, playing with your fingers as you spoke.

"you're so dramatic y/n, i can drop you home, it's no big deal", he's already walking towards the road and biting his lip, and you can't tell whether it's out of habit or if he's trying to hide a smile, yet something tells you that it might be the latter.

"so you just let me say all that even though you were gonna offer to drop me? dude..."

the initial ten minutes of the drive are uncommunicative, both of you choosing to look at the dark road instead of acknowledging the awkward silence that was swallowing the car up whole. you don’t talk about your argument in the kitchen, you don’t make small talk about dinner, you don’t talk. you'd normally play some music in the background and you know that your phone is definitely still connected to his car's bluetooth, but somehow it just doesn't feel right– punishing yourself by sitting in this impenetrable silence should do you better.

the roads are more or less empty, save for the lone car or bike that speeds past you. jaehyun knows the way to your house from your parent's because of the amount of times you've driven back and forth, so you don't feel the need to tell him to turn right or to keep going down a certain road, making for even more silence.

part of you is still a little thankful that it isn't the most short drive, even though you aren't even speaking to each other. all it takes is picturing your empty house, devoid of the homely domestic feeling it used to carry when jaehyun was a frequent visitor. what would you even do when you got home? wallow in self-pity over your life choices? play 'sweet' by cigarettes after sex because it reminds you of him, then put on his hoodie that doesn't even smell like him anymore, just so you can curl up in bed and have a good cry while you reminisce? you're starting to think that maybe attempting to talk to him isn't the worst idea, at least it'll give you something to cry about later.

you're going crazy wracking your brain, trying to think of something to say that wouldn't make the atmosphere even more uneasy, but all you got was "hey, thanks again for coming" and "hey, sorry for breaking up with you, what's good though?". you can't even help the wince creeping on your face, finally choosing to go with the former before you have a heart attack and die in jaehyun's front seat.

"thanks again for agreeing to come", you start, absolutely hating the break in your voice from not talking for some time. "you really didn't have to do that. and for dropping me."

he offers you a quick nod in your general direction and fixes his eyes on the road ahead like he was zipping through a crowded highway, though you're sure there isn't a car in sight. "like i said, it's cool", is all you get in return, and you have to remind yourself that he has every right to be short with you.

but still, you try again. "and you don't have to worry about my parents", chewing on your bottom lip, you actually look at him this time, hoping it'll prompt him to do the same, but it doesn't. "i'm gonna tell them the truth."

he releases a short breath from his nose like he finds your statement funny, but continues to not really say anything, just nodding to indicate that he heard you. you subconsciously clench and unclench your jaw at that, because god, he's so fucking annoying, but you swear you don't mean to release the slightly irritated sigh that you do. if you hadn't seen his knuckles turning white from how hard he's gripping the steering wheel, you might not have known that your little sigh pissed him off, because you can't tell it from his face, save from the barely-there eyebrow twitch.

you don't know what it is about car rides with only one other person that make you feel so vulnerable, but you think paired with this kind of silence, you could potentially confess to murder in this setting. it's infuriating, how unresponsive he is, and part of you thinks you're jealous of the control he's exerting, because you're dead sure that if you were in his position, you'd have a fair amount to say. it must be satisfying for him in a way, watching you squirm like this out of guilt and discomfort, but you know in your heart that jaehyun simply isn't like that.

"look, jaehyun", your mouth is working faster than your brain, the silence proving to be too much for you to handle. "i know i fucked things up a bit. with how i ended it and everything..."

perhaps you should've taken a little more time to properly articulate your thoughts, because even jaehyun can't control the astounded scoff that slips out of his mouth. you yourself can't believe that you chose to deliver your words like that and it makes you sound so self-righteous, but they're out, and now you're bracing yourself to finally hear what jaehyun really has to say.

"fucked things up a bit? are you serious?", you can hear it in his voice that he's holding back, but he chooses to laugh in disbelief instead, which you think is actually worse than him straight up screaming at you. "y/n, you didn't even bother telling me in person. you dumped me over the fucking phone, saying it wasn't working."

you now kind of wish that you had just kept quiet and sat in his awkward car, and exchanged awkward niceties when you reach home, never to see him again. but this is your final chance at some form of redemption, and now that jaehyun was actually speaking his mind instead of giving you tight nods, you tried to explain yourself.

"jaehyun, i know, i just–"

"i called you a bunch of times. i tried to come see you and everything, but you went and changed your lock and all your friends were saying you didn't want to see me?"

there goes trying to explain yourself. so you sat and listened instead, and it was the least you could do. jaehyun's voice became more and more strained as he talked, the emotions he was feeling now a lot more evident. he was angry, but more importantly, he was confused, and sad.

"i just- i didn't know what went wrong, you know? we were completely fine as far as i knew", he continues on in a laboured way and he's not looking for you speak right now, so you don't. "fuck i- i thought we were in love."

the little laugh he lets out in between his words more or less breaks your heart, the whole scenario sounding all too familiar. those exact words were the last thing you'd heard from jaehyun before you fully and cruelly broke things off, letting him know the decision was final before cutting the call. you remember that day so clearly. you had meant to go see him and explain all this in person, that’s the whole reason you were in the car, but for some reason, you just couldn’t do it. you remember how much your hands were shaking as you waited for him to pick up the call, sitting in the car by yourself in the middle of your driveway. how long you sat and cried after you ended the call, tears falling until there weren't any left. how it began raining the very second you stepped out of your car to go back inside.

the weather was a funny thing, choosing to mirror your mood only when it saw fit. it was warm and sunny on the day you broke up with him, gentle breeze and wispy clouds all around. it was warm and sunny this morning, the weather ever so pleasant as you plucked up the courage to walk to his door. it was still unusually warm and sunny for the couple months following your break up, feeling sour as ever that the weather was so lovely and all you could do was sit in your room and feel sorry.

you took note of all these occasions because it always used to piss you off. though you shiver now in the car, you think it's kind of satisfying in a way, because the only two times your mood and the weather lined up was right after the break up, and the second you stepped outside your house with jaehyun; it feels like a premonition, or a revelation of sorts. the grey of the stormy sky matched the absolute devastation you felt after breaking up with him, rain pouring from the heavy clouds like they were crying for you. now, the cold, still air feels like baited breath, awaiting your next move.

"and nothing, i hear nothing from you for six fucking months until you're suddenly on my doorstep, asking me to pretend to be your boyfriend for a night. that's fucking insane!", he sounds a little wild now, very exasperated, but you figure it's probably better to just let him get it all out of his system, and you'd do good to listen to him as well. everything he's saying makes complete sense, all the emotions he dealt with akin to what you would've gone through had it been you in his place. "and you know what's more insane? i agreed. after all that, i agreed."

that’s the part you don’t understand. your heart is racing listening to him and you have so many thoughts swimming around in your head, it's difficult to filter them. you feel similar to how you felt back in the kitchen, although this time you can't take a minute by yourself to get over it. you absolutely refuse to cry in this moment, not wanting to seem like you're trying to victimise yourself when you are aware you're the problem. but you can feel your heart breaking all over again.

"why did you agree?", you physically can't raise your voice to louder than a whisper, the tension too thick to try and overpower it.

"why did you dump me?", he counters like a child, and while you were expecting the question, it still makes you freeze up a little. he huffs in annoyance when you don't say anything, inclining his head while he waits expectantly for you to answer. "you wanted to talk? let's talk, y/n. you don't get to just waltz back into my life like it's nothing. it's not fair," it's so cold, the way he says your name, but you try your best not to let it further shake you, mustering up the courage to finally speak. "it's so stupid, jaehyun."

he looks like he's about two seconds away from just combusting, the only sound piercing the cold air being the gentle hum of the engine. "don't you think i deserve to know?", he urges, voice edged with hurt and frustration. "i spent the whole day with you and your family, pretending like everything was happy and normal when it's not."

"i know, jaehyun-"

"then, tell me."

you shift uncomfortably in your seat, teeth toying with your bottom lip as you avoid looking at him. "i don't know," you murmur, your voice barely audible to yourself over the pounding of your heart.

"you don't know?", he repeats incredulously, his tone tinged with disbelief. "after everything, you don't know? don't lie to me, y/n."

your throat tightens as guilt washes over you, but you try to stand your ground. "i just... i couldn't do it anymore," you confess, voice trembling with emotion.

"couldn't do what?", he presses, his frustration mounting with each passing moment. you know he doesn't believe you, dead set on getting the answers he deserves. he's driving slowly now, allowing him to turn his head in your direction more often.

"this!", you exclaim but immediately recoil when you see the look of hurt flash in his eyes. "no! not this, i mean- me! it's my fault, you did nothing wrong." you're saying all the wrong things, but you're too overcome with emotion to attempt to form a coherent sentence. still, you know it's time that the truth came out, so you continue to explain with a heavy heart.

"i didn't mean to hurt you," you choke out, and your voice is so thick you have to swallow before you carry on. he looks indignant and rightfully so, but you go on before he can interrupt you again. "but i was so scared, jaehyun."

his expression softens at your state, replaced with a mixture of sadness and resignation. "scared of what?", he asks quietly, his words hanging heavy in the air. you feel the need to pause for a moment, hands balled into tight fists as you try to regulate your breathing. you really didn't take into account how debilitating the night would be on yourself. sure, you knew it was going to be tough seeing jaehyun again, especially if he agreed to pretend to be together, but you weren't really expecting to hash it out like this, the weight of your decision pressing down on your like a leaden blanket.

the car moves so slow it may as well be still but when you turn to him, you can feel the burn of jaehyun's gaze, his eyes searching for some semblance of understanding. "i loved you", he whispers, voice cracking with the intensity of his words. "i would've done anything for you."

you're still, you're so so still. tears threaten to spill from your eyes as you struggle to find the right words to say, but he's completely thrown you off. the car has slowed to a stop, engine idling before he eventually turns it off in favour of turning to you.

"that's exactly why," you reply weakly, your voice a fraction of the volume it normally is. he surveys you intently, his expression a mix of confusion and hurt, eyes reflecting the very same sadness you feel.

"what do you mean?"

"i was scared of hurting you," your confession does nothing to ease his confusion, but you can see he looks more shocked than anything now. "scared of hurting me?," he echoes, his uncertainty and disbelief palpable. "this is so ironic, it's almost funny..."

you think hearing any more of what he has to say is actually going to kill you internally, so you know you have to rush to explain before he starts giving you a piece of his mind again. "i know, it's so fucking stupid, jaehyun", your voice is trembling from the sheer guilt you feel, bottom lip quivering so much you have to bite it to get it to stop. "everything was going so perfectly, you were so perfect, and it scared me so much."

he falls silent, much to your relief, his expression even softening minutely as he processes your words and this gives you the encouragement to continue. "remember that night on the beach? on the trip last year?", you speak tentatively, wanting him to understand your thought process and the tangled mess of emotions swirling inside you at the time, though it's not much of a defense. the memory floods into your mind so vividly, and you can see it all; the salt in the air, the gentle breeze, the feeling of the sand, your intertwined hands swinging. it was so serene and you'd give anything to be there in that moment again, though it's nothing but a distant dream now.

he nods slowly without speaking, and you release a wet sort of laugh, feeling like you'd choke on the lump in your throat. "we talked about everything that night, our families, our childhoods, our futures...and then you brought up what would happen after we graduated college."

you know he remembers because his eyes light up with recognition and he looks like he's replaying that exact moment in his head, and you hope he remembers it with the same soft, gushy feeling you do. "you said you wanted to move in together, and don't get me wrong, i was thrilled, but it made me realise how...serious everything was, you know?", your voice catches in your throat and you're talking to yourself as much as you're talking to him and he seems to understand that, because he makes no attempt to stop you.

it's silent again for a bit as you two reminisce, but you break it again. "i just knew i was going to fuck up, jaehyun. maybe not right away, but eventually, and the thought terrified me," you sniffle a little, not being able to bring yourself to look up from your hands to meet his gaze. "that feeling never really went away, and it was eating me up from the inside. it got so bad that i had convinced myself that you were going to leave me, so i had to do it first, before i fucked up."

your sorrowful confession hangs in the air like an echo and you finally give in to the urge to look at him, and you're shocked– he looks at you so carefully, his expression soft, much, much softer than before. you couldn't stop the tears from finally falling if you tried , the soft glow of the dashboard illuminating the contours of your now wet face. your shared eye contact makes you feel nervous, but not in the way you were expecting– it's too gentle, too raw and it makes you feel a certain way.

"i know it's not an excuse," you're blubbering so much that your cheeks feel hot, you're practically falling apart in the passenger seat of jaehyun's car while he watches and lets you pour all your miseries out onto him. "you don't know how much i regretted it...but i thought i did the right thing. for the both of us. even though i just ended up doing what i was trying to avoid by hurting you."

it's too much now, jaehyun's too silent, and too not-angry for your liking; why is he looking at you in a way that makes you feel like he doesn't think you're the worst person in the world? you can't hold back the sob that's building in your chest, doubling over in favour of pressing your hands against your face and bawling into them. you're not too loud a cryer, but the tremors of emotion you feel are making your shoulders shake, so you're crying silently into your hands while trembling. however guarded he tries to be, the gentleness of his voice overpowers it as he speaks. "i know, shh...," he murmurs and you can't believe your ears, that the man you thought hated you is actually attempting to comfort you after everything. "breathe, y/n."

like it's second nature to him, his hand travels to your back as the sobs wrack through your body, immediately drawing soothing circles on to your covered skin with his thumb. you don't know how but this almost makes you feel worse, the fact that he's still so caring towards you. you pluck up the strength to lift your face from your moist hands, and you're sure it's not a pretty sight that greets him. your nose feels unbelievably stuffy, and your face is on fire when you meet his sympathetic eyes, the warmth from his gaze and hand spreading throughout you, even though he's now removed it. "i'm sorry," you manage through sniffles, but you think you almost flatline when he reaches his hand towards your face, ever so gently caressing it. his thumb juts out and sweeps across the skin under your eye, wiping away at the wetness. "i know."

"shh, it's okay. you're okay", he coos gently and slowly takes his hand back in favour of imitating slow breaths for you, helping you relax a little as you copy him. "why would you think i'd leave you?", he asks carefully once you've calmed down a bit and wiped your tear-streaked face, simply surveying you now. all you can offer him is a defeated shrug, attempting to collect your thoughts. "remember i told you about my ex? the very first one?"

he nods.

"i moved on obviously, like ages ago, but since then i think i've always had this idea that getting dumped is inevitable", you try to explain, voice small as he listens patiently. "it was either leave them or get left, and i was so scared that it would happen with you, that i'd fuck up so bad that you would leave. i couldn't do it."

he frowns and calls out your name in a way that sounds like he's about to lecture you, but you know he can't tell you anything that you haven't already told yourself. "i know, jae, it was so stupid, i know. i don't regret anything more", you sigh, giving him a tight, small smile when you lock eyes. "i'm sorry."

you notice his eyes soften at the nickname, releasing a quiet huff before he runs a hand through his hair. his body language doesn't carry the same anger it did before when he was ranting, now looking subdued and reflective. "i understand why you did what you did. it was stupid, but i understand", he murmurs, his voice impossibly soft when meeting your gaze, the eye contact so intense that you have to physically remind yourself not to cry again by digging your fingernails into your palms. "i would've never left you."

you nod slowly at his admission, his words hanging in the air. "i should've just talked to you...", you concluded in a sullen way and he doesn't reply in full, just mumbling a soft "yeah" under his breath. you don't mind the silence that fills the car this time, the underlying tension more or less dissipated, but you do notice the time, realising that jaehyun still needs to go back home after dropping you.

"should we, uh...", you gesture towards the road and he jumps up in his seat, as though he forgot that he was driving you somewhere in the first place, muttering "sorry" before twisting the key to start the car. this makes you let out an involuntary giggle and jaehyun shoots you a quick glare which immediately shuts you up, a certain warmth blooming in your chest when you see a small smile creep on to his face out of the corner of your eye.

it's quiet for a bit, jaehyun focusing on the road while you gaze out the window. much to your dismay, both the road and the various buildings and shops start to look a lot more familiar, indicating that you are nearing your home. you shouldn't be dismayed really, because this wasn't the most congenial of car rides, but it means that your time with jaehyun is coming to an end. you don't know what the conversation that took place means for you and him however, because unless you're alarmingly stupid, you feel that he may not hate you as much as he once did. does this mean you might even be able to see him again sometime? in a setting where you're not sweating and shaking at just the thought of seeing him?

you think it might be a bit audacious of you to ask that, so you don't. instead, you turn to him with a light grin, playing with the necklace clasped around your neck. "hey, at least you got some new headphones out of all of this", you joke lightheartedly, eyeing the package sitting on the backseat. he lets out a heartwarming chuckle at your comment, glancing at the bag through his rear view mirror. "i can't believe your parents bought that for me. you think they'll make me return it when they find out we aren't together?", he remarks, and you do your best to ignore the little pang you feel at the reminder of your situation. his comment does make you snort though, and you nod along with him. "nah, you need it more than anyone. your airpods have seen better days."

he laughs again, and you wouldn't believe that you two were arguing back and forth like madmen some twenty minutes back. this feels familiar and comfortable, and you cross your fingers in case you jinx it. "do you remember that time when we planned a picnic..." jaehyun begins, a sense of nostalgia shining through his cheeks. "and you forgot to bring the speakers? and we tried blasting music through my one airpod?"

you can't stop the peals of laughter that escape from your mouth as you nod, covering your mouth when your snort makes him laugh as well. "remind me why we didn't just play the music straight from your phone?", you question, replaying the memory in your mind like it was recent. he pauses to think for a moment, rubbing the back of his neck while he hums. "yeah, what the fuck? why didn't we just do that?"

you're laughing in unison as you take this trip down memory lane together, the next few minutes of the car ride consisting of exclamations of "oh! remember when..." and "that time when...", both of you adding on to the memories with your own perspectives and insights. the fact that the conclusion of your little dispute remains ambiguous doesn't bother you too much at the moment, happy to just enjoy the warm atmosphere while you can.

jaehyun's animatedly recounting a story about your sister downloading a game on his phone when you face him, and the last thing you remember paying attention to was that she had somehow managed to spend a large amount of his actual money on it. your eyes are focused on him now, just studying him, and he seems to realise that you aren't listening to his story when he glances at you.

"what?", he questions, the corner of his eyes crinkling when he narrows them at you in an playful manner, taking one hand off the steering wheel to drum absentmindedly on his thigh. "nothing, i just...", you trail off, scanning his features. "you changed your hair. it's...nice. i wanted to tell you that earlier."

he clearly wasn't expecting the compliment, mouth opening and then closing as he tries to think of an admissible reply. "you like it?", he then asks, a shy smile tugging at his lips when he consciously cards his fingers through the longer bit at the back. at your reaffirming nod and heavy gaze, the expected pink sheen dusts his cheeks and though you can't see them, you know the tips of his ears are pink too. he mumbles something of a timid "thank you", both of you smiling like idiots while he trains his eyes on the road.

not too soon after, his car is pulling into your dark driveway. you can't help the sinking feeling in your chest, lips curved slightly downwards. none of the lights are on, save for the streetlight, illuminating the street in a ghostly, dim way. your house looks just like it had for the past many months, gloomy and lonely, and you're absolutely dreading the idea of moping around once again. if this day spent with jaehyun has showed you anything, it's that you're a 100% sure you've not moved on, and that you won't for a long, long time. simply put, you're still in love with him, and you'll have to carry the cross of your mistake for some time to come.

he switches the ignition off but neither of you move. you're sat in your dull driveway on an otherwise empty street, all the other lights of your neighbouring houses off. neither of you say anything, mostly because you're not sure what one is supposed to say in this situation, so everything is still.

"so–"

"well–"

you let out a nervous chuckle while he smiles a bit, both of you mumbling apologies for interrupting each other. "you go first", jaehyun compels you, but now you don't know what to say because you were just going to make it up as you speak. your mouth has a way of working faster than your brain sometimes, but neither seem to be too functional at the present moment. "no, you go", is all you got, and jaehyun has the nerve to roll his eyes, twisting in his seat a little so he's facing you.

"i was just going to say that we uh, reached your place", he claims in a deadpanned manner, but your car door is still locked and your seatbelt is still locked in. you think you must have lost your mind, hoping that he'd tell you to stay with him forever and never leave (which you would have agreed to in a heartbeat). "i guess we have...", you nod, looking out the window and observing your home. maybe it was the dread of going back to your old routine that gave you the sudden boost of confidence, but you realise he never answered your question from before.

"jaehyun...", you begin but falter when you think you might be overstepping, ultimately deciding to just ask anyway when he looks at you expectantly. "why did you agree to come today? we both know you didn't have to."

he looks like he was dreading the very question you asked for some time, shutting his eyes when he leans his head back against the headrest and sighs. "i don't know", is the answer he gives you, voice muffled through the palms of his hands that are rubbing his face tiredly. biting your lip, you have to hold back a similar sigh because you should've known he's not going to just tell you like that. you have no right to press, but yet you do, one more time. "jaehyun, please?"

maybe it's because you sound so meek, but he drops his hands in favour of looking at you, really looking at you, like he's searching your eyes. "why do you think?", he turns it back on you, but you know this is just his way of avoiding the question. "if i knew, i wouldn't be asking. i know you don't have to tell me, you don't owe me a single thing, i just–", you speak desperately with all of the confidence you can muster, worried that your bottom lip would start trembling again. "please, i need to know."

you're looking each other dead in the eye, and while your voice isn't strong, it's honest and raw, and jaehyun can sense that. you can see that there's a million thoughts running in his mind just by the pained look in his eye and your own heartbeat has picked up, the sound deafening in your ears.

"if you haven't figured it out by now, i don't know what to tell you."

thud. thud. thud. you wonder if he can hear your heartbeat over the sound of his, but the blood pumping through your veins is making your ears ring, because what did he mean by that? you hope it means what you want it to mean, but you can't just assume you know everything because you're delusional at this point. "jaehyun, what are you sayi–"

"i agreed because i'm still in love with you."

there it is. the silence after his confession is positively deafening, your mouth agape as your try to register what you just heard. your eyes flicker between his, searching for any signs that he's just messing you and that it's some cruel joke, though it would be completely in his right to fuck with you if he wanted. he's never looked more vulnerable, eyes trained on you in an almost frantic way, like he himself can't believe what he just said. the way he just blurted it out makes you think that he didn't fully mean to admit that, but it's out, nothing he could do to take it back.

"what?", your own voice sounds like an echo and you wish you had something else to say because you heard him loud and clear, but there's a burning ache in your chest that claws all the way up to your throat. the shock is evident in your voice, not knowing what to do with yourself as you visibly process his words. "tell me you're joking", you plead in a pained way, words barely above a whisper. he doesn't say anything, looking lost in his own thoughts as his eyes scan your face. "you don't hate me?"

"hate you?", he scoffs disconsolately, shaking his head slowly. "i couldn't hate you if i tried. and believe me, i tried."

you can hardly believe your ears. you know your heart shouldn't be pounding the way it is, it feels wrong almost for you to be feeling as relieved as you are. "after everything?", you insist dumbfoundedly, but the longing in your voice is palpable, even if you're trying to give him a way out. "i was so horrible to you, jaehyun." you hate the way your voice cracks, but jaehyun just sighs and offers you a sad smile.

"there's nothing you could do to make me hate you."

it's heartbreaking, how defeated he sounds, but he's also looking at you like you could do no wrong in his eyes. "i never moved on", you whisper, hesitance clear as you tell him the truth. "i couldn't delete any of our pictures, i still have all your clothes, sometimes i accidentally set the table for two when it's just me..."

he's blinking quickly, and if you didn't know any better, you'd say he was trying to hold back tears. your break-up did nothing but cause immense amounts of pain for the both of you, and you'd give anything in the world to make up the time lost. his wide-eyed and nearly motionless expression urges you to continue, ready to pour out your heart to the man you loved.

"i still have your number memorised", your face mirrors his, voice growing stronger by the minute. "all the gifts and letters you've ever given me, they're all still there in that shoebox in my cupboard."

"i thought about you everyday", his whisper is raspy, speaking right after you do. "every party i went to, i looked for you even though i knew you wouldn't be there. you know johnny tried setting me up with people?"

you try to suppress the little sting, but you feel it deep inside you. "he did?", you have to clear your throat, and you almost don't want to ask but you do anyway. he releases a sad little chuckle and nods, toying with his fingers. "yeah. i knew i was doomed when the whole date, i wished she was you."

the smile finds its way on to your face against your will, feeling that familiar lump make its way to your throat. "she could've made you happy, jae", you argue anyway because at the end of the day, you want the best for him, and you know you're far from the best.

"no one could make me feel the way you do, y/n", he replied honestly, and there's a sense of finality to his words, like he'd had this same argument with himself time and time again, only to come to this conclusion. “the thought of anyone else touching you made me sick”, he croaked, not missing the way his eyes ghost over your frame.

his words bring about a noticeable shift in the air, followed by silence. he watches you, and you watch him, breathing slow as your eyes dart across his face.”i don’t want anyone but you”, you confess slowly, and a few beats pass before you find it in you to speak again. "i love you, jaehyun."

silence.

you expected disapproval, maybe even a malicious scoff, but you certainly weren't expecting to feel a soft pair of lips against yours as he suddenly lurches forward.

you're stunned, so stunned that you don't even reciprocate the kiss, lips unmoving against his. it's only when he takes this as a sign of discomfort and breaks the kiss that you find yourself reacting, hands immediately making their way to caress his cheeks, leaning forward to chase his lips and close the distance between you. he lets out a sound of surprise against your lips but kisses you back right away, a hand wrapping around your neck from the back, tangling itself in your hair. the kiss is heated and so long overdue, tangible through the way his lips meld furiously together with yours, teeth clashing every now and then.

your hands make their way to his broad shoulders, one wrapping around them while the other comes to rest on his chest, gripping the material of his hoodie. you have the urge to be impossibly close to him, trying to lean forward to kiss him more fully but you're restricted by your seatbelt. it's almost as if he can read your mind, because the hand placed against your face now moves to press on the buckle to release you without breaking the kiss. "fucking seatbelt...", he mumbles disgruntedly against your lips, fiddling with the button until you hear it click, finally separating yourself from him to slip it over you. "there we go."

you don't stay separated for long because jaehyun uses the hand behind your head to pull you towards him again, capturing your lips in a way that makes all the air leave your lungs. "come here", he grunts, using his long arms to pull you clumsily over the gearshift and straight on to his lap. you settle yourself in to the somewhat awkward position in the enclosed space, but that's the last thing on your mind when all your thoughts consist of jaehyun, jaehyun, jaehyun. his lips are back on yours in a instance, tongue sweeping across your bottom lip messily and you gladly allow it to explore your mouth.

the air is impossibly thick, heavily contrasting to the cold weather outside the car, even his lips and hands feel warm against your hot body. you feel his hands grip your waist easily in this position, lips leaving your own to drag across the expanse of your jaw. you whine quietly at the feeling of his mouth sucking a particular spot on your neck, tilting your head back as you wrap your arms around his neck. "missed this", he muses, tongue peeking out to kitten lick at your neck, breath hot against your sensitive skin. "missed you."

the feeling in your chest when his hands find their way under your shirt and on to your bare skin is inexplicable, unable to stop the soft moan from tumbling from your lips when his big hands glide over your stomach, back and finally your breasts. everything about the way he's touching you and kissing you is greedy and urgent, like he's afraid you'll disappear from his arms if he loosens his grip even by a little bit. you'd be a fool to not match this energy, pressing into him while you squeeze your hands over his. "need you so bad, jae."

you're subconsciously grinding down against him needily, hips stuttering against his lap like you've never been touched before. "fuck", your eyes widen at the groan that leaves his throat, sounding absolutely guttural as he grips the skin of your hip harshly.

he's barely done anything and you're coming undone right in front of his watchful eyes, your panties dampening at the look on his face. "jae..", you whine when his fingers dip past the waistband of your pants, gently cupping your clothed core as you rut against it. "shit, baby", he marvels at the stickiness of your panties, feeling your wetness on his fingers just through the material. "you really missed me, huh?"

you don't even have the time to respond to his cocky remark before his fingers are slipping beneath the band of your panties to circle your clit, spreading the wetness around your folds. a breathy sigh escapes your lips, throwing your head back as he experimentally prods at your entrance and eventually slips a finger inside. "still so tight for me", he all but groans, pumping his finger in and out of you languidly, drinking in the sounds of your pleasure. he feels so blissfully familiar, and though you haven't been touched by him, or anyone for that matter for months, the stretch of his second finger feels the same kind of intimate as it did before, if not more.

you lean forward and press your lips against his once again, kissing him like you might never get the chance to again, all while you're grinding back down on his hand that's fingering you steadily with a thumb circling your clit at the same time. his free hand moves to bunch your top up above your breasts, peppering kisses over the tops of them. he wastes no time in pulling your breasts free from from their cups, attaching his lips to one nipple and swirling his tongue around it in a way that makes you cry out. "my pretty girl", he mumbles almost to himself while cupping your other breast, making a show out of it as his tongue flicks over your hardened bud over and over until your arching your back and pressing it further into his face. “thought about this all the time.”

keeping in mind that you're still technically in a public place, you bite your lip to contain the sounds of your pleasure, though jaehyun doesn't make it easy when he notices this and increases the pace of his fingers. the hand fondling your breast leaves it unattended for a moment to release your bottom lip from your teeth, smoothing his thumb over the swollen skin. "i've waited months to hear these sounds. let me hear you, baby", he all but purrs and that's all it takes for a moan to tumble out of your mouth, pressing your forehead against the side of his face while you screw your eyes shut out of pleasure.

with his attack on your sensitive buds and his fingers pistoning inside of you, you know you aren't going to last long. "already?", jaehyun chides with a small smirk, and it's embarrassing how well he knows your body, grazing his teeth against your nipple in a way that feels painful and heavenly at the same time. you can feel his rock hard bulge against you, and with the untimely grinding of your hips against him, you're sure this is torturous for him. "don't wanna come like this", you whine against his cheek, your entire body feeling sticky from the heat inside the closed vehicle. your puckered lips leave wet kisses all over the expanse of his cheek, and the boyish giggle that leaves his mouth makes your heart flutter. "wanna feel you, jae."

his head is thrown back against the headrest and his eyes are shut tightly, jaw clenched as he slowly slips his fingers out of you. though you whine at the loss of contact and you're almost grinding against the air, you want nothing more than to make him feel good as well. "want you to fill me up", you coo at him, softly linking your hands behind his neck as you test the waters with your words. it's clear they have an effect on him, both hands placed on your hips as he helps you lazily grind against his erection. "don't– have a condom", he grits out, hips bucking up to meet yours. "don't need one", you murmured immediately, knowing he wants this as bad as you do.

his eyes flicker open at that, one hand leaving your hip to brush some stray hairs away from your face, gently tucking some behind your ear. you could melt at the way he's looking at you, so tender and loving, a warmth spreading all over you until you feel like you have to look away. he doesn't let you however, hand quickly coming you to cup your cheek before leaning in place a small peck against your lips. "are you sure?", he sounds breathless, but still firm as his eyes glance between yours like he's reading them.

if he can read them, he'll know that you can't nod fast enough, dragging your hips across his needily to show him. "i'm sure. i want you, jae.", you're so needy that you don't even bother to take your pants or panties off fully, fingers fumbling with the waistband as you shimmy them down a little, leaving your underwear on. you swear your mouth waters when he unbuttons his pants and lets his cock spring out against his stomach, lustful eyes taking in the way he keeps his shirt up with his teeth. if this weren't such an awkward position, you'd have taken him in your mouth in an instant, knowing exactly what to do to hear the man in front of you whimper.

nudging your panties to the side, he focuses on collecting your wetness all over the tip of his dick, hissing at the contact. "please", you whine, not wanting to waste another moment, finally sighing in relief when he begins to press his cock inside you. he swears under his breath at the feeling, and you're feeling so stretched out just from him slipping it in even though you're still so wet that you just go lax in his arms until he bottoms out. "that's it", he grunts like he's holding back. "taking me so well, angel."

you preen at his praise, finally beginning to move your hips a little at his coaxing. sighing against the shell of his ear, he picks up the pace for you, not warning you before thrusting upwards to meet your movements with a groan. you can feel your mind going blank at the sensation, your moans sounding more like cries whenever he snaps his hips into yours, the obscene sounds filling the car. you're just so full, his hands gliding up and down your sides as he fucks deep inside you, making up for all the lost time. "you feel so good, baby", he barely gets his words out, but it gives you the encouragement to bounce up and down on his thick cock a little faster than before, his eyes widening at the feeling. "just like that."

he's kissing and sucking all over your neck again, lips ghosting over whatever skin he can reach and it's all so much, feeling a single tear stream down your face. he almost slows down for a second when he feels the tear drop on to his own face, eyebrows raised in surprise because he thinks he's hurting you, but he's even more shocked when you let out the high-pitched whine. "what's wrong, angel?", he mumbles into your neck, peering up at you carefully. you shake your head profusely, continuing to grind down on his cock. "i just- just love you so much, jae", you blabber incoherently, so wet that you're practically gushing around his dick.

"aw, baby", he shushes you sweetly, pressing his forehead against yours as his thrusts become more and more erratic. "i'm here. not going anywhere." the coil in your stomach is tightening and you can feel every inch of him inside you, more tears threatening to spill from your eyes before he's kissing them away. "i'm here."

he's hitting all the right spots inside you in this position, and he's basically doing all the work because you're like putty in his strong arms, all you can do is moan and cry out against him weakly. "i'm close", you warn him, but you know he already knows that, and you know he is too, slipping your hand down to where his rests on your hip and interlacing your fingers. "me too, pretty", he sputters through his teeth, giving your hand a tight squeeze as you start to come undone. “want you to cum. can you do that for me?”

"oh my god", you're crying out as you cum around his cock, body and mind going numb and ears ringing as the coil finally snaps. "cum inside me, jae, please", his eyes go wide at the way you're begging him, and he doesn't look like he can hold back much longer. "fuck angel, you- you sure–"

"yes, please, need you to fill me up", you cut him off, too sensitive from the way he's helping you ride out your high to move anymore. with a few more sloppy thrusts, his cock is twitching inside you before you lets out a guttural groan, his warm cum filling you up. you go limp against him, face nuzzled into the crook of his neck as the both of you try to regulate your heartbeats.

the sounds of your heavy breathing fills up the car along with jaehyun's soft murmurs of "so perfect" and "did so well for me". any doubts you had in your mind of this being a mistake in jaehyun's eyes are wiped away when he begins petting your head, gently smoothing your messy hair as he presses firm kisses to your head. his cock softens inside of you but he makes no move to pull out, wrapping his arms around your waist while you do the same around his neck, simply sitting in each other's presence silently.

you struggle but finally pick yourself up, gazing at his moonlit face from your place on his lap. “you okay? was that okay?”, he murmurs softly, his voice thick and eyes hazy as he traces little shapes on your back. “more than okay”, you reply tiredly, pressing your lips against his once again because you feel you’re in a dream-like state right now. you're sure he's the most beautiful man you're ever had the privilege of looking at, feeling incredibly vulnerable when you speak again even though he's looking at you with nothing but love in his eyes. "now what?", you question, suddenly feeling like you've jumped the gun when he opens his mouth to say something but stays silent. "never mind, don't answer that, we'll talk about it later", you shake your head, laughing a little breathlessly when he grins at you, pecking his forehead sweetly.

you look away from him and at your lifeless house, mouth working faster than your brain once again. "would you...want to come in?", you wince, feeling kind of stupid for asking but meaning it anyway. you're both comforted and thrilled when a large grin is plastered on to his face, feeling like maybe your home won't be as lifeless anymore.

"i think i'd love to come in."

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letsnotdoanything · 4 months

Text

CASE 001. holding hands (yours, mine, and its)

@ happilyeverhaunted as far as xiao dejun is concerned the night parade of one hundred demons is nothing more than a folklore to scare kids into behaving. so imagine his surprise when he's thrust into exorcising all hundred of them. the only thing worse is having you as a ghoul hunting partner. word count 2.4k

GONJIAM PSYCHIATRIC HOSPITAL west wing 3:12 AM

If someone had ever told Xiao Dejun that he would be promenading down the halls of Korea’s most infamously haunted asylum with you, he would have laughed in their face and told them to fuck off. Because being anywhere with you, for all intents and purposes, is something that would not occur within the reign of his own free will. Spending time with you in a haunted asylum is completely, utterly, and wholeheartedly out of the question. Unreasonable and unfathomable.

Or so he wishes.

“What’s a matter, pretty boy? You scared already?”

Xiaojun shoots you an irked look, shoulders tense and eyes narrowed. “No. Are you?”

You scoff, turning to face him while walking backwards. Shrugging your shoulders, you tilt your head and flash a toothy smile-- cat like features warped into a cavalier expression. “Nah, it would take a lot more than this to scare me,”

Your classmate rolls his eyes as you pivot back around, muttering under his breath in repetitions of “yeah, yeah, yeah.” Xiaojun shakes his head, watching the back of your sneakers slide up and down your heels with each skip of your step. The sight induces a slight scowl to lift onto his lips. He can’t quite get how you’re so composed but it’s irritating. Especially when his hands are gruffly shoved into his sweatshirt pocket to hide the fact that he’s trembling. His gaze travels to impatient tapping of your fingers, drumming on your thigh. Then to the ever so slight sway of your hair and the perfectly relaxed stature of your posture. His scowl turns into a glower. You’re aggravatingly calm. Too calm for someone aimlessly wandering a deserted pitch black hallway which is probably-- no, definitely haunted. Not that Xiaojun would ever admit that. Not to you at least.

If he did, he’s fairly positive you would tease him to death before a ghost could actually get its hands on him.

As if feeling his prying stare, you turn your head just enough for him to catch the shit-eating grin on your face (at the sight of that, he can practically hear the pestering remark about to come out of your mouth). You stick your hand out mockingly, accompanied by a pout that just barely hides the crooked, upturned quirk of your lips.

“Wanna hold hands?”

Annoying. Rip-his-hair-out annoying. That’s the only correct way to describe you. Or perhaps insufferable. Or infuriating. Or… well, Xiaojun digresses. He swats your hand away with a glare. “Can you shut up?”

You abruptly stall in your tracks and for a moment Xiaojun thinks he actually ticked you off. He follows suit, tilting his head onto his shoulder with a sigh and the grit of his teeth. “Don’t tell me you actually wanted to hold hands-”

“Xiaojun, shut up,”

“Huh? Don’t tell me to shut-”

“No, I’m serious,” the tone of your voice wavers and you take a quick succession of steps backwards, “Don’t you hear that?”

Oh. You are serious. So serious that Xiaojun can’t help but inch closer to you, laying a heavy palm on your forearm. You jump at the sudden touch, turning to him with worried eyes and a clawed hand landing on his bicep. Your right hand travels up to pick at your lip as you nervously scatter your gaze to the walls surrounding you. Normally Xiaojun would leap at the chance to make some witty, snarky comment about how scared you are. Maybe poke fun at the way you're holding onto the sleeve of his sweatshirt like your life depends on it or perhaps the wobble in your stance, otherwise unnoticeable without the lack of distance between you. But he doesn’t. Far too occupied with the fact that for once this entire night, something is wrong. And not just because you’re clinging onto him like a scared high school crush at the movie theater. Xiaojun tightens his grip just enough for you to flinch underneath his touch, his eyes flipping between the look plastered on your face and the long, seemingly never ending stretch of hallway in front of him.

Xiao Dejun has always been afraid of the dark. Hes convinced himself it’s a childish fear due to one too many scary movies late at night (blame Renjun). But now, he’s beginning to think that there could be another, underlying reason. That maybe there’s something there in the night that he just can’t see. Something or someone lurking around every corner. Eyes that peer at him in the shadows, unbeknownst to him or you.

And then there’s that feeling. The skin crawling sensation of something unnatural breathing on the back of his neck. And the way the hair on his arms stands at attention as he feels the sudden urge to remain completely motionless. How the eerie silence of the building turns to a chaos of white noise, supplying a sharp ring in his ears which echoes through his brain before slipping off his tongue in the form of a whimper. And then it’s gone, replaced with the sound of your shallows breaths. Or maybe those were his. Or something elses.

That thought causes a lurch in his stomach, one that winds and squeezes his innards like a python on its prey before slithering up with throat and getting caught in his windpipe. There’s a slight choke which unwillingly falls from his lips as he begins to move his head. The bang and batter of his heartbeat is overwhelming, as if it’s about to break free from his chest. It’s cold, so cold that the room seems to come to a standstill-- time moving at a snail’s pace as his eyes get a first glance towards the hallway behind him. Xiaojun doesn’t want to look, convinced that when he does flip around he’ll be met with a grotesque face much too close for comfort. How long has he been turning now?

It couldn’t have been more than seconds and yet it feels like a lifetime as he feels your nails slowly scratch at the fabric of his sleeve. The drum of his heartbeat is so loud now that he can’t help but clench his fists, knuckles turning white as the crescendo builds to a climax. Beating and beating and beating until he finally stares into the empty eyes of the night. No ghost or creature pressing cold caresses to the back of his neck. No stranger lurking behind him. Xiaojun exhales, shoulders slouching and tensed hand dropping from your form. It’s a sigh of relief which meets his ears next as his heartbeat begins its slow descent back into its usual pace and the hairs on his arm lay flat on his skin. It was nothing. Nothing but the captivation of his wild imagination.

He’s just about to turn back to you and assure you that everything’s fine when he feels a sharp, clawed jab on his side. He lunges forward, a wisp of a feminine scream erupting from his throat as he fumbles on his feet before falling hard onto the floor. He flips back towards your direction, eyes nearly popping out of his head with heaving, panting breaths, expecting to see some creature of hideous and horrifying descent but…

Xiaojun scowls. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

The only creature there is you, laughing hysterically as you double over-- the sounds of your entertainment bouncing off the empty halls of the wing. Form faded in the dark, he can only imagine the pure pleasure on your face as you stamp your feet onto the tiled panels of the flooring. It’s a wheezed exhale that emerges from you before gasping for air-- one hand coming up to wipe the tears brimming from your eyes. You straighten up (almost falling back down in the process) and stagger over to him with a lean in your step. It takes you a few more moments before you're able to stifle your giggling with no help from your classmate, of course, as he’s staring you down with a gaze that would rip you to shreds if it were possible. And then burn those shreds to ash for good measure.

“I can’t-” another infuriating bout of laughter (you’ve been laughing for much too long in his opinion), “I-I can’t believe you actually fell for that!” a barked out cough paired with more giggling, “Don’t ya hear that? I mean, come on!”

From his position on the floor, Xiaojun doesn’t find this as nearly as amusing as you. His heart was still recovering from the monumental scare only a few moments earlier. And his back from the quick and painful fall to the floor. And his pride for being tricked by the likes of you. Oh god, you’re infuriating. Every inch of you sets him off. You know how to push his buttons, grind them, rip them off. And you’re good at it. So good that Xiaojun can’t begin to imagine a calm, collected, and civil conversation with you. Nor does he want to have one. This time spent with you has been more than enough and frankly, he’s ready to never see you again. Especially after this stunt.

“You got so scared. God, I thought I was gonna break my act before I even got to scare ya,” another snicker before you clear your throat dramatically, turning an entertained eye to your peeved classmate. “Were you gonna say something like I’ll protect you-”

“I do not sound like that,”

Xiaojun’s right. Your impression is bad and frankly a little too high pitched but that doesn't stop you from ignoring his interruption and continuing with your sentence as if you never had heard him. “-before I scared the shit outta ya? Did…did you think I was gonna play the part of the damsel in distress?”

“No,”

Liar.

“I thought-” he begins with his tongue pressed harshly up against his teeth.

“-That you would be my knight in shining armor?” you finish with a sly smile and an extended hand in his direction.

Xiaojun pushes your gesture away, brushing the dirt and dust from off his clothes before sending you an aggravated glare. “Hardly,” he snaps, running a hand through his hair with a locked jaw and strained, irritated smile.

His response doesn’t seem to hold any weight as you carry on with your teasing, going on about the exact facial expression he made when you hit him. Xiaojun doesn’t care enough to pay attention, knowing the only thing listening will do is elicit a reaction out of him. A reaction which you could further torture him with. But it’s not very easy to tone you out, certainly not with the way your inflection fluctuates between a teasing emphasis and a purred resonance. It’s with several weeks of practice, however, that your classmate is able to render your voice to nothing more than the up and down melody of your speech patterns. That and the occasional interjection of your accent which pops out in noisy iterations of ‘ya,’ ‘yer,’ and ‘ta.’

He rolls his eyes, leaning back on his hands and laying his head on his shoulder-- choosing to focus on the slight alterations of your various expressions rather than anything actually coming out of your mouth. Or rather, he was.

“You really should have seen yerself-” Xiaojuns staring straight past you, expression warped into an impressively authentic mix of terror and confusion. You bite down on your tongue and your previously amused countenance falls flat, irked at his sudden lack of attention. “- What the hell are ya lookin’ at?”

He can’t seem to muster a response, mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water as his fingers flex upon the tiled floors--like he was preparing to shoot upwards and run with his tail tucked between his legs. His fear looks so genuine that you can’t help but be impressed. Who knew Xiao Dejun was such a talented actor? You raise a brow, scoffing as you cross your arms.

“Cute expression but ‘ts not gonna work on me. I just played this trick on you, I’m not that naive,”

No response.

“Even if you keep lookin’ like that I ain’t gonna fall for it,”

…

“Ya can seriously stop now, Xiaojun,”

He raises a shaky finger, eyes blown wide and chest heaving. His effort is good, much more convincing than your prank earlier, but that doesn’t mean your going to play along just like that. Doing this only mere minutes after yours isn’t in good taste. Not enough for you to fall for it at least. In fact, it’s getting on your nerves. How many times do you have to tell him you’re not going to be tricked before he gets the hint and calls it quits? You huff, foot tapping on the floor in impatience. “I know there’s nothin’ there so knock it off,”

Silence, again.

Your patience snaps. “Will ya stop?! I’m actually gettin ticked off-”

SLAP!

There’s a heavy hand perched on your shoulder. One that consumes the entire surface of it-- long, bony fingers reaching down to the middle of your forearm. Its palm just hitting your shoulder blade. It’s cold and clammy with bones that you can feel digging into your flesh and dirtied nails which press every so slightly onto faded bruises. The skin itself is delicate as if it’s made of fine lace. Capable of ripping at only the slightest of tugs. It’s tawny in color with rough calluses and wet blisters which seep onto the surface of your skin. And it smells. It smells horrible, like rotting meat left out to cook in the sun for a week or a mixture of day old vomit and sweat. Even so, just the sight of it is enough to conjure a gag in your throat.

You look to Xiaojun, who appears as if his soul has exited the husk of his corpse, and then back to the hand. Then to him, tears threatening to spill from his frightened gaze, and then to the hand. And then to your hands, then his, then the hand. Then to the figure standing behind you.

Then back to Xiaojun, whose voice was finally emerging from his throat in stuttered syllables of complete gibberish. Then to the face of the owner of said hand which rested prominently behind a tattered, tangled mass of black hair. It blinked slowly at you with large, yellowed eyes before opening its mouth in what could have been interpreted as a poor attempt at a smile. Or maybe an attempt at taking a chunk out of you with whatever decaying teeth it had left. You weren’t planning on sticking around long enough to find out.

taglist. @clockwork--fandoms @evilsailorsenshi @222brainrot @marvelous-llama @yangasm @trourevaille @ikozen thank you for supporting happily ever haunted! ♡

🧾 © 00127am 2024

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letsnotdoanything · 5 months

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signed with love and forever yours, guanheng

postage. huang guanheng & gn! reader, cursing cost to ship. 730 words

there was a conversation that you had with ten during one of the first times we met. a private one that I caught just in the middle, centered around dating or maybe an old partner or two but primarily about love. you laughed when you told him that you've never seriously been called beautiful. i didn't find it funny, though I suppose i interrupted your thought. so perhaps there was an upcoming punch line that I never got to hear.

punch line or not, you took it so lightly. as if it didn't matter and brushed off ten's plethora of compliments with a wave of your hand. he wasn't undeterred but nor was he wholly serious. if i were to do the same, to tell you what i truly thought of you, would you reject me? if all my words were made seriously?

do you remember the time that we were driving back from dongguan in that shitty SUV ten rented? the one that only cost him a quarter of what it should and the same one that we were convinced was going to implode halfway through the drive. i was driving and you were in the passenger seat. hair splayed out on the headrest and head rolled back to look out the window that you refused to close (even after yangyang spat bugs out of his mouth, you just laughed). you had this look on your face that i could never recreate even if i tried. in this moment, like all others, i found you beautiful.

you made an offhand comment about how you'd like to be loved in the same way you love the summer. you used that word again. seriously. i almost confessed to you then and there. beginning of the phrase choked out by whatever yangyang had bursted out in song to on the radio (you could tell me it was adagio and i would believe you, more focused on you than anything he was doing in the backseat). you looked at me, and for a second, i thought you had heard me (or maybe i hoped you did). but then you tilted your head back and laughed along with ten. i almost confessed again.

i'm not exactly sure what you consider to be serious. though i've thought about it a lot. after all, how could no one have been serious about you? i'm afraid that i have a lot of competition (especially that guy from your apartment building that follows you around like a lost puppy, god, i hate him). they might be serious about you but so am i. to the point where i fear that i may never be serious about anyone ever again.

so if i were to confess. to tell you that you're beautiful. and that i love you like you love summer. seriously in every sense of the term. would you tell me that there was a punchline to that initial conversation i interrupted?

(i love you like you love summer. you're beautiful.)

about guanheng's love letters.

like him, hendery's handwriting is fast paced. bouncing from one line to the next with various errors and the scribbled lines of his script. despite following the pattern of his thoughts (jumping from one conclusion to the next), the letters find themselves to be unexpectedly romantic. though you suppose that such unadulterated honesty, raw and unedited, is the most endearing kind of love at the end all be all.

he writes on plain paper, no lines or margins. his words fill the page, slopping downward at an angle that only worsens with each new sentence. his writing his skewed, drawing your eyes in curved patterns down the length of the page. he includes drawings at whatever is left of the space, cutesy, shaky-handed caricatures of any and everything. next to his signature is the faint imprint of whatever lip tint or chapstick he had on, faded to the page (a thousand and one kisses dotted on every i).

hendery gave this letter to you head on, going on and on about being serious. you weren't sure what to expect, too flustered by the sudden pull back from the rest of your friend group to notice the flash of red smothering his cheeks. and when you did read it, understanding the full extent of what he had just thrust upon your hands-- you assured him that there was no punchline.

your mailbox

taglist. @evilsailorsenshi @222brainrot @marvelous-llama @clockwork--fandoms @yangasm @ikozen @trourevaille thank you for supporting me! ♡

🧾 © 00127am 2024

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letsnotdoanything · 5 months

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⇢ teaser word count: 2.2k | series word count: 67.8k ⇢ warnings: past unethical experimentation, brief blood and gore descriptions (some human and some non-human), you have to accept the premise of a single human empire in space in the future with colonies and a military and not think deeper about that ⇢ genre: sci-fi, set in the near-ish future, humans and aliens and robots, black op mission, captain kun, ?????? reader, slow burn, fluff, dash of angst, ft. wayv as the crew of the vision ⇢ extra info: took a lot of obvious inspo for this one from isaac asimov’s robot stories, specifically his concept of positronic brains & the three laws of robotics (and if you’ve read any of his stories, you’ll probably be able to see some other places too) ⇢ estimated release date: saturday, may 18, 2024 6:00 p.m. eastern time ⇢ series masterlist

The air smelled like blood, burned electrical components, and whatever horrible odor came from blood getting onto electrical components as they sparked. All the blood wasn’t human, you could tell that, too. Skipper blood always stung your nose like rubbing alcohol. It was pitch black in the space you were hiding in, or maybe it was just nighttime. You should be scared, but your heart wasn’t beating fast for some reason.

Two pairs of heavy footfalls. One was heavier than the other. Walking, so definitely not Skippers. Both were still too light to be heavier races.

They slowed to a stop outside your hiding spot, and you really hoped they couldn’t read the Outspacer controls that would open the otherwise impossible-to-see door. After all, it was a language that had been dead for hundreds of millions of years, there was no way—

“Hey, Zennie, you got a read on these?” A man’s voice came from nearby, muffled by both the wall and presumably a helmet as well. Human, or related species.

You couldn’t hear this ‘Zennie’s reply, as it most likely came through the comms in his helmet, but you could hear the man’s side of the conversation.

“Oh, of course, how dare I, a mere meatsack, doubt your high-and-mighty artificial intelligence,” he replied with fake deference. “Yeah, yeah, I know that’s not what you meant. Alright, so just tell me which one’s the self-destruct button so I don’t press it?”

“Move, Wong, before you blow us up.” Another voice interjected. “ZEN? You said it’s a passageway? Oh, safe shelter. Bit different, don’t you think? Mind translating the dead language right the first time?”

He paused as he probably listened to Zen’s reply, then continued, “So? You know which one’s the open button?”

You couldn’t go anywhere. The hideout you were in was designed to hold only a few people for weather emergencies, to be structurally sound; not to have a back door in case you needed to escape intruders. You just had to hope Zen was completely wrong and they wouldn’t get it open.

Click.

There goes that.

The door dematerialized, and the rancid smell from before became even stronger. A man peered in barrel-first, and you recoiled back from the sudden light flooding your vision. You couldn’t press yourself any further back into the corner, but you still turned your head away to shield your sensitive eyes.

It only took a couple strides for one of the men to reach you, the other stayed back in the hallway, keeping his rifle fixed on you. The man stood over where you were sitting on the floor—your legs had gotten tired of standing after so long—and lowered his gun slightly so you could see the entirety of the front plate that covered his face. It was a reflective shield that gave you no clue to who was behind it, only let you see a warped, thinned and stretched version of yourself cowering in a corner. His armor was an improved version of the standard issue United Human Navy, if the insignia on both of his shoulders didn’t make that clear enough. It looked the same as the standard issue, but the heft of his footsteps had belied a weight difference that wasn’t explained by his stature or build, so it must be the grade of material.

“Are you hurt?” His voice came through an external speaker on his helmet. He was speaking in standard human. You couldn’t detect any sort of odd stiltedness or lag that sometimes happened with computer-assisted translations. He was assuming you understood standard human, and you did.

“No,” you replied, slowly uncrossing your arms to show your hands first, that you didn’t have anything hidden in them to attack him with. You still weren’t scared, for some reason.

“Oh, she’s pretty,” his companion commented from the hallway. The two of them must be sharing helmet feeds, as the one in front of you was definitely blocking most of you from his sight.

“Wong, shut it.” The outer speaker had been turned off for that, but it was still pretty clear to you.

“Sir, yes sir.”

“Can you stand?” His weapon was still at the ready, his finger resting above the trigger.

You couldn’t remember the last time you’d wiggled your fingers and toes, and it felt good to do it. “Yes.”

He stepped back, the unexpressive mirror of his face shield watching as you pushed up from your half-sit half-crouch, bracing yourself against the wall. Your body instinctively took a deep breath to try to recover from the sudden exertion, but the vaporized Skipper blood burned your entire respiratory tract, and you coughed and spluttered trying to force it back out, catching yourself on the wall on your forearms to stay upright. The odor made your head swim, your eyes water, and your chest hurt like someone had put gasoline in your lungs and struck a match.

“Okay, woah, woah.” Two gloved hands were on your arms and back, helping you stay up. His voice was muffled again as he switched to his in-helmet comms, “Xiao, get over here! We’ve got a survivor! Yes, really, just look at my stream.”

Then, his voice was projecting to you once more, “Breathe, breathe.”

You felt the roughness of a thumb wiping at the tears running down your cheeks, the durable material of his glove scratching against your skin. He grabbed the front of your shirt collar, pulling it up towards your face at the same time he firmly pulled your hand down that had been covering your mouth as you wheezed. Positioning the material over your nose and mouth into a makeshift filter of some sort, he continued holding it there for you as you took a few breaths.

“Better?”

You nodded shallowly. The smell of Skipper blood still cloyed to your throat and lungs, but the shirt helped keep more from entering.

More footsteps from down the hall, then another pair entered the shelter.

“Holy shit…” Someone breathed out.

“I know, man,” the voice that you were already pretty sure was ‘Wong’ from earlier replied.

“How long has she been in here?” A fourth voice asked, belonging to the footsteps getting closer to you.

“I don’t know,” the man already with you answered. “Wong and I just found her while clearing this sector.”

“Okay, well, you mind, Captain?” He said indicatively. “Can’t examine my patient through you.”

“You got it?” The captain asked you, shaking the collar slightly.

You took it from him, holding it over the bridge of your nose yourself as he had been doing for you before. Looking into his face shield where you were pretty sure his eyes should be, you nodded firmly this time.

He didn’t step back until you felt another pair of gloves grabbing your elbows where he had been. The newcomer’s uniform differed from the others’ in one way, he had a neon green rectangular patch on his right arm below his UHN insignia, as well as a few other places—intergalactic signal for medic. It was removable for the wearer’s own safety, and his in particular was slightly askew, as if he’d just slapped it back on in a hurry.

The medic flipped through the pockets of a pack strapped to his thigh before pulling out a small disc of clear plastic and pushing that against your hand. “Here, this’ll work a lot better than your shirt.”

You accepted it, and he helped you orient it the right way over your nose and mouth. It was apparently a mask or rebreather of some sort. It wasn’t exceptionally bulky, and you could feel that there was some sort of fine mesh material on the inside. Immediately, you could tell the difference. The air coming into your lungs carried only the slightest tinge of lingering burning electronics smell, and while you could tell that there was Skipper blood, it didn’t burn, or make your head spin. It was just unpleasant.

“There. How’s that?”

You gave him a thumbs-up, the standard human gesture for good, since they all seemed to speak standard human. The mask didn’t allow much room for talking.

“Alright, good. Are you injured?”

You shook your head.

“Do you feel pain anywhere?”

You shook your head again.

“Good, good. I have more questions, but we should get somewhere you can breathe. Give me a second.” He looked upwards as if talking to the heavens, and his outer speaker turned off. “Liu? Professor? Did you finish clearing the building? Alright, ZEN, got readings on air quality for her?”

After a pause, both the medic, Xiao, and the captain, who had been hovering behind him the whole time, nodded.

“Thanks, ZEN.” Xiao’s speaker turned on, “Here, our teammates found somewhere that you can breathe. It’s going to be a little bit of a walk, though. Is that okay?”

You nodded. Your legs would just have to deal.

“It’s not pretty out here…” The only one that hadn’t been identified to you in passing called out as a warning from his position in the hallway with ‘Wong.’

You turned around and pushed off the wall as your answer.

Stepping into the hall, you knew why you had smelled that particular concoction of smells. Just off to your left were two dead Skippers, their uniquely-articulated hind limbs that gave them their distinct gait—and consequently, the questionably flattering nickname from humans—stuck out at awkward angles now. Dark purple sludge seeped out from under their armor, Skipper blood. On the outside of the armor were smears, streaks, and splatters turned a gleaming ruby red under the emergency lights, human blood.

You couldn’t see any dead humans, or pieces of them, in this corner, but you remembered what the captain had called you. A survivor. Which meant there were others who didn’t survive.

“Come on.” It was the captain who ushered you the other direction from the Skipper bodies. “This way.”

Their helmets must have been mapping out the facility as the unit cleared it and displaying a route in all of their HUDs, because the four of them moved as if they knew the building like the back of their hand. The captain and Xiao flanked you on either side, with Wong at the front and the fourth unnamed one at the rear. You couldn’t tell if it felt more like a protection detail or a prisoner transport.

You kept your eyes on your feet not only so you didn’t have to see all of the mutilation, or to keep from stepping in something, but to avoid the unsettling, cold dread slowly sinking over you when from the moment you caught a look at the first dead human you passed by with her remarkably in-tact face, dandelion yellow blouse and lab coat, and realized you didn’t recognize her. When you inhaled sharply and shot your eyes down to your feet, you could tell that the captain noticed. He turned his head just ever so slightly towards you, off of the consistent path it had been before, and he paused, then went back to keeping watch.

They weren’t kidding when they said it was a bit of a walk. You could feel the muscles in your legs get sore, then start twitching, then start shaking, but you didn’t even consider asking to stop.

“Woah, Liu, slow down!” The captain ordered into his headset. “Okay, yeah, I see it. Don’t touch anything. We’re just sweeping right now, remember?”

“Great, the kid’s found more toys,” the one behind you snorted.

Xiao and Wong suddenly erupted into more laughter than that statement warranted you were pretty sure.

Wong then informed him with a snicker, “Mic’s on, Ten.”

“You say that as if I wouldn’t have said that to his face, too,” the one now finally identified as Ten retorted.

“ZEN, the mics, please?” The captain sighed. “Thank you.”

“Now he’s going to whine that we were shit talking him behind his back,” Xiao groaned. “Again.”

“Well we are,” Ten laughed.

“If he just stopped acting like a baby, Captain here wouldn’t have to step in and put him in time out all the time,” Wong clicked his tongue.

“You think he’s the one in time out right now?” The captain replied dryly.

You couldn’t help but let out a small chuckle into your mask, trying to cover it up with a cough when all four of their reflective shields whipped around to face you, as if they’d forgotten you were there. After an uncomfortable stretch of silence, they all shifted back into their watchful stances.

The captain suddenly spoke again, “Yes, Professor? Okay, sure… ZEN, put that on everyone’s HUDs.”

The lack of commentary from any of them for seemingly several minutes was startling, and you weren’t sure if you wanted to know what this ‘Professor’ was showing them.

“We’re going to have to go back there after dropping Xiao and her off, aren’t we?” Wong was the first to speak.

“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to,” Ten sighed.

“Or already know the answer to,” the captain said. “If she has any wounds that Xiao needs to tend to, one of you will stay to keep guard. If not, it’ll be Ten and Wong with me to meet up with Liu and the Professor, and Xiao will stay with her.”

“Alright, Ten,” Wong rolled out his neck. “Rock paper scissors?”

⇢ series masterlist | blog masterlist

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letsnotdoanything · 6 months

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❧ word count: 11.9k

❧ warnings: cursing, mentions of death/dead people in the context of him being hades, probably more legal jargon than there should be but i tried to make it as easy to understand as possible i promise, it gets pretty existential at some points but never overtly angsty

❧ genre: fluff, getting together, greek gods/goddesses au, hades jaemin, human reader, nades au, paralegal reader, bit of a ham-fisted persephone allegory, inspired by the gods/goddesses assigned to the work it unit in 2020 for this video, appearances by bestie jeno and coworker yangyang

❧ author’s note: ahhh my first fic back after over a year hiatus!! not super accurate to the original greek myths, i was just havin fun with hades as a concept rather than a strict characterization. i also watched mike flanagan’s ‘midnight mass’ and read john milton’s ‘paradise lost’ during the time i was writing this so get ready for some slight spiritual/religious iconography and overtones. hope y’all enjoy, i had so much fun playing around with my writing in this one!!

❧ spotify playlist

⤷ sequel

The god’s—Jaemin’s—eyes continued to stare you down. It felt like he was looking into your soul. And you wanted him to.

“I didn’t summon you,” you told him cautiously. “Or at least I didn’t try to.”

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letsnotdoanything · 6 months

Text

speedometer [yangyang]

❧ word count: 14.1k

❧ warnings: none, just the normal swearing

❧ genre: fluff, racer yangyang, college au, found family trope

You make my heart race.

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letsnotdoanything · 6 months

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❧ word count: 18.3k ❧ warnings: cursing, renjun gets CONSENSUALLY dosed with a magical aphrodisiac For Science ❧ genre: fluff, humor, one (1) heavy makeout scene but no actual smut, 0.1 seconds of angst if you can even call it that, academic rivals to lovers, modern magical creatures au, college au, siren reader, human renjun ft. siren ten, same universe as strawberry sunday ❧ extra info: in my lore, siren scales are visible when they’re in more human-like forms because of magic, and it’s not an indication of their skin tone at all. so when the reader’s scales are mentioned, please don’t take this as any sort of allusion to them being pale/light-skinned! i tried to take care and make sure i wasn’t implying that in how i wrote it, but please tell me if it reads like that this work is set in the same universe as strawberry sunday but can be read as a standalone! there is no continuing plotline between fics in this universe, they simply take place in the same world/magic system and may have overlapping characters (neos may pop up in more than one work!) ❧ author’s note: y’all. get ready for this one. no spoilers but renjun and reader r both crazy and nobody should be subjected to them except each other. like they both look at the other and think “i could fix them but whatever the fuck is wrong with them is infinitely funnier to me” but they’re both Wrong. they could not fix the other. i don't want what they have but good for them. anyway as always i had way too much fun writing this that it went over my projected word count and i hope y’all have a lot of fun reading it too

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ explore the strawberry sunday universe more here!

“Would you shut up?” You sat back up, grabbing him by the hair.

“Why?”

“I’m trying to kiss you again, idiot.”

2608, 2610, 2612…

The numbers of the study rooms you passed by went up, up, up, as you continued your hunt. You knew he’d be here. It was the day before the first test in your Linguistics in Magical Creatures Studies class, meaning he was going to be holed up in the library until closing time. Now it was just a matter of finding him. Somewhere quiet, obviously, which was why you’d completely skipped the first floor with its wide-open “collaboration areas.” The second floor was all bookshelves and private study rooms that would hold four or five students at most. You peered into the narrow window on each painted metal door as you walked down the hall. While the first floor was recently renovated with new technology and upgrades such as the “collaboration areas” and bright pops of your university’s school colors that made for great promotional photos to put on the website and pamphlets to hand out to new students, this floor hadn’t had seen anything more than a janitor in a good couple decades. The musty, stale smell of old, unused books was all around you, the air conditioning hummed and clicked irregularly, all the furniture had ugly, outdated patterns, and the exactly three desktop computers they did have in a far back corner were practically as old as you. Which, in the digital age, meant that they were artifacts belonging in a museum.

And of course, sitting at very last one, as if he had been hiding behind all of these bookshelves from you personally, was Huang Renjun.

Renjun was sat in the wooden chair facing the computer, clearly deep in thought. He had one foot propped up on the wide chair seat as both of his hands were on the archaic-looking keyboard, speedily typing something out. He wore a pair of jeans, yellow hoodie, and a red backwards baseball cap kept his hair out of his face. An open energy drink can and empty bag of chips on the desk next to him belied that he had already been there for some time.

Now that you had found your target, you put on a burst of speed, stalking up to him from the side and smacking your hand down on the tabletop beside him. “Renjun.”

The human jumped in his seat, looking up from his screen to you. Taking his hands from the keyboard, he made a couple quick clicks on the mouse as he used the other to take his headphones out of his ears. “Y/N. Fucking hell… is your new strategy this semester to give me a heart attack and kill me?”

“If murder was on the table as part of our little academic rivalry, don’t you think I would’ve just drowned you after our Intro course freshman year?” You asked, tilting your head innocently. After all, you were a siren, that would be much easier than scaring him into an early cardiac episode.

Huang Renjun was not your friend. Not necessarily an acquaintance either, you’d known him for going on four years now, since your first class on your first day of college. The two of you were in the same Introduction to Magical Creatures Studies class. He had sat in the very front row, you just behind him in the second row. When your professor had asked an open question to the class, both you and Renjun eagerly blurted out the answer, Renjun just a millisecond before you. Dr. Li gave him the credit, and also requested that you two raise your hands in the future. And from then on you hated Huang Renjun.

Well, hate may be a strong word. You overlapped in at least two classes every semester being in the same major, and were both chronic overachievers. The first to raise your hands when a question was asked, studying in the library until closing (separately), and visiting professors’ office hours just to discuss topics from class further. Your professors noticed this. Some would pit the two of you against each other, and others would try to pair you up, whether on projects, research, or just in general, as a meeting of the minds or whatever. And you two would get your project done, pocket your As, and part ways again. Academic rival slash frenemy was the best way you could describe who Huang Renjun was to you.

“Who knows, you might still, if they ask me to carry the banner,” he muttered, picking his pen up and spinning it between his fingers.

This was your last semester, both you and Renjun were graduating in just a few months. At commencement, each department picked one “outstanding student” to lead the progression, carrying a flag with the department’s name and seal on it. This semester it was Magical Creatures Studies’ turn to select a student for the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, and your program head had already heavily implied that they could choose either you or Renjun, but they hadn’t made their final decision yet.

This was actually a pretty good segue into what you were really here to talk to him about. Pulling your lips into an alluring smirk, you nodded, “You’re right. It doesn’t take a rocket surgeon to figure out that—”

“A fucking what?” He cut you off, his face scrunching up as he blinked at you in confusion.

“Obviously it’s going to be one of us two, since we’re the two best students in the program.”

“Well, yes.” He nodded, seeming to let go of what had presumably been another one of your jumbled human malaphors. You admittedly hadn’t been living among humans for terribly long, and for some reason their idioms just didn’t stick in your brain very well.

“I mean, we not only are dedicated to the field itself and the content we study in class, but the program too. We probably know everybody in it, professors and students, right? Between the two of us?”

Renjun considered this for a moment. “Yeah, probably. We’ve both taken on a lot of SI and tutor opportunities for lower-level classes.”

“Right. So, you know those forums the school has on the online class platform? The general message boards?”

“Yes. Why?”

“I’m going to need you to sit tight with me on this until I finish talking, okay?” You pointed at him sternly. He nodded slowly. “Good. Back in the fall, about the end of September, I was on the message boards, just browsing around killing time. I was in the Tips & Advice section and saw this post. It was a gryphon who was losing feathers on one specific spot on her wing, and she didn’t know why. The witch she went to didn’t know why, nobody could figure it out. I was about to reply asking if it was her left or right, when I saw that somebody else already had. It was her left, and she’s a lefty. The same person replied again, asking if she sleeps with her wings out or not. She sleeps with them out. It turns out she was stress-preening in her sleep. Username: dr_magic2303. A couple weeks later, same message board, Tips & Advice, a human is suddenly producing dark purple goop from his feet but it’s so slippery he can’t even leave to go see a doctor or a witch and he was typing the post from his bathroom. Within an hour, this Dr. Magic is back telling him someone’s put an aether ooze hex on him, and to sit down and scoot on his butt to the kitchen and gather up all these ingredients for a cleansing foot bath. And if he doesn’t have them, then he’ll have to butt-scoot his way to an apothecary or call one who does home deliveries. Now people are posting on there specifically asking Dr. Magic to come heal all their magical aches and pains.”

Renjun stared at you, unblinking. The pen had gone still in his hand.

You breathed in, continuing, “I tracked this Dr. Magic all the way back to their first post in the first week of fall semester of this year. Now, I’ve been trying to figure out who they are on my own, and I’ve made a lot of progress on who they aren’t. But I’m going to lose access to those message boards once we graduate at the end of the semester. I know Dr. Magic has to be an MCS major, there’s no way they would be able to have to breadth, depth, and flexibility of knowledge by just Googling this stuff. And you and me, Renjun, I know we can do this. Not only do we know MCS, but we know the department, the people in it. It has to be us.”

He was still staring at you, mouth slightly agape. Then, his whole demeanor shifted. He dropped his leg so that both his feet were on the ground, and he resumed spinning the pen.

“Okay. I’ll help you.” He nodded thoughtfully. “If you’ll do something for me.”

“Do what?” You straightened up.

“I’ll tell you after we find Dr. Magic.”

You crossed your arms. “No, tell me now or no deal.”

“I tell you after, but you can still say no then if you don’t want to do it.” He bargained.

“That just sounds even more concerning, Renjun. Tell me now or I’ll do it myself.”

“I’m hurt. What happened to ‘it has to be us?’”

“I’m a siren, I know how to sweet talk. Don’t take it personally.” You snorted. “Now, what do you want from me?”

“You’re a siren,” he echoed plainly, as if that were all the explanation you needed.

“And you’re a genius.” You retorted. “Tell me now or I walk out.”

“I... want to experience siren venom. For science.”

Oh, you could kiss him right now, no deal necessary. He was meeting your gaze head-on, a slightly unhinged glint in his eye. Not a hint of fear, just a craving for new experiences, unbridled curiosity. Yeah, he was a bit crazy, you were realizing four years on, and you wanted him.

“You’re insane.”

He leaned back in his seat, putting his hands up in front of him in an ‘I-don’t-care’ gesture, “If you don’t want to find Dr. Magic—”

“I didn’t say no, I said you’re insane,” you corrected him with a grin, dragging your eyes up and down his form as he sat so confidently, negotiating with a siren like it was any average Tuesday for him.

“So do we have a deal?” He set his pen down and held a hand out to you.

“You help me find Dr. Magic, then I’ll spit in your mouth.” You momentarily thought about the disparity in division of labor on that, but decided not to point it out aloud. Easiest handshake of your life. “Deal.”

You wanted to eat him alive.

“You’ve tried IP tracking?” Renjun asked, scrolling through your word document of notes that you’d accumulated on Dr. Magic.

“‘You’ve tried IP tracking?’” You mimicked him under your breath, making your voice so high-pitched to the point of mocking.

He rolled his eyes.

This was your first meet-up to try to hunt down Dr. Magic together. It was a couple weeks after he had agreed to help you in the first place. There was a test and some assignments in a few of your classes to get through first before either of you had enough spare time to dedicate to this. But now the two of you were back in the library, having taken a study room on the second floor and set up with your own laptops. You’d sent him your notes to look through on it while you perused the message board for any new posts from Dr. Magic.

“You do know that any geographical location an IP address can give you will just be the city, right? It’s not like the movies,” you snorted, dropping your voice back down to your normal intonation as you shook your head. “Anyway, I did do some extra legwork with the IPs, and matched most of them to desktop computers here in the library. I think the others are a personal device, their laptop or something.”

“They’re all different.”

You tutted at him, “Oh, you sweet Thursday’s child…”

“That’s not the say—”

“They’re all somehow on other continents. Now, I don’t think Dr. Magic teleporting abroad and cross-dimensionally to make forum posts.”

“VPN?”

“Definitely. They’re covering their tracks, they almost never use their own device, and when they have to, they use a VPN to cover up the IP address of it.”

He made a noise of acknowledgement, eyes still focused on his screen.

Then, something on the forum caught your eye. “Oh! Right here. Thirty-six minutes ago, a dryad posted that she can’t sprout daffodils from her body anymore. Every other plant and flower are fine, except daffodils. She posted it specifically asking Dr. Magic if they know what’s wrong with her.”

“Huh.” Renjun’s brow furrowed. “Just daffodils?”

“That’s what it says,” you confirmed, making a few clicks on your computer. “And… ‘notify me.’”

“You can turn on notifications for forum posts?”

“You can’t,” you informed him smugly. “But one of the sirens in my pod, he’s got a bunch of CompSci friends who I paid to write a browser extension for me that bookmarks forum posts and sends me email notifications when anybody replies to them. So I’ll know exactly when Dr. Magic responds.”

“You…”

“Have definitely spent too much time, energy, and money on this, I know. Sunken cost fallacy, look it up.”

“I was going to say ‘are insane,’” he breathed out, his voice a mixture of awe and disbelief.

When you looked up from your computer at him, you saw that he had a curious gaze fixated on you, eyes narrowed slightly, mouth parted, and head tilted ever so slightly to the side.

You leaned forward minutely, holding his eye contact. “Takes one to know one, Junnie.”

He looked down at his keyboard, shifting in his seat before he looked back up at you. “Why are you calling me that?”

“Do you not like it?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“So you do like it.” You smirked.

He frowned. “I didn’t say that either.”

“Well do you?”

“Answer my question.”

“Answer mine.”

“I asked first.”

“Ooh, how very primary school,” you teased, setting your chin in your hand.

“It’s only fair.” He pointed out.

“We could flip a coin.”

“Y/N.”

“Junnie.”

The human sighed, holding your eye contact wordlessly, looking entirely unamused.

You finally gave in with a casual shrug. “I just am.”

“Seriously? We’ve known each other for four years and you’ve never called me that—you’ve called me plenty of other things—but now suddenly you’ve got a nickname for me?”

“I’m not trying to be derogatory with it, if you’re worried about that,” you clarified. “Just sort of happened. I’m a siren, I flirt with cute people, sorry. Do you want me to stop calling you that?”

He ran his fingers through his hair, pushing some off his face as he turned his focus back down to his screen. “It’s fine.”

“Anyway, I bookmarked the new forum post, so it’ll go on the board.”

“The board?”

“I, uh, I may be using a spare wall in my apartment to host a conspiracy theory board with you know, the red string and thumbtacks and stuff…” You admitted quietly.

“Can I see it?”

“Ho-ly shit,” Renjun breathed out, staring up at the multiple time-stamped printouts of forum posts, pictures of classmates and faculty, sticky notes, and yards of red string that you had pinned to a blank wall in your apartment.

You stood next to him, gazing up at your creation with a strange mixture of pride and embarrassment. This was the first time you’d let someone see this, and you were kind of glad it was Renjun. He actually seemed impressed. You were sure that any of your friends and family would be weirded out at best, and very concerned at worst.

“Yeah, I’m adding color copies off the school printers to the invoice I’m sending Dr. Magic at the end of all this.”

“You’re sending them an invoice for your self-assigned mission to hunt them down?” He snorted.

“Yup. It’s their fault for not using their school-issued login.” You crossed your arms. “Makes them enigmatic.”

Your classmate pointed to one of the headshots. “Is that Dr. Li?”

“Did you think our scope was narrowed to just students? Faculty have access to the message boards, too. And we’ve learned everything we know from our professors, so they obviously have the knowledge and skill to be Dr. Magic.”

“And their names also start with Doctor.” He added dryly, which you took to be a joke.

You decided that it wasn’t at your expense, though, and after giving a short chuckle, continued on with your explanation of why you specifically had your program head up on the board. “When I was grilling Dr. Li for information in the fall, he was giving me very duplicitous answers. Pointed me towards a freshman who I swear didn’t even know the difference between Arctic sirens and glacial sirens.”

“You think it was a diversion.”

“Obviously.”

Renjun tapped his chin thoughtfully. “What sort of questions were you asking him?”

“I couldn’t straight up ask him if he was Dr. Magic. So I was asking him things like... other than you and me, who did he think was the best student in the program, that kind of stuff. Said that kid reminded him of you and me on that first day of Intro to MCS.” You couldn’t help but let out an indignant scoff at the idea. “Can you believe? Didn’t know the difference between Arctic and glacial sirens…”

“Who was it?”

“Some basilisk in one of his Intro classes last semester. Uh…” You snapped your fingers as you tried to remember his name. “Seunghan! Hong Seunghan!”

“Seriously?” The human turned to look at you incredulously, clearly offended at the comparison as well.

“Seriously!”

He clutched at his chest like he was about to have a heart attack. “That’s who he thinks is the next us? I was an SI for that class…”

“I know! He’s not the brightest tool in the shed, huh?”

“So close, Y/N. So close…” He sighed.

“It almost completely threw me off my search for Dr. Magic. I figured I needed to seriously step up my game in his undergrad research or something.” You shook your head at the horrible memory. “Then I realized he might have been trying to get me to do exactly that.”

“Huh.” Renjun folded his arms over his chest as he looked away, pretending not to seem interested. “You did research with Dr. Li last semester?”

“Don’t give me those kicked puppy dog eyes, you’re doing research with Dr. Kwon this semester and she’s like, my academic idol!” You pointed at him accusatorily.

“And Dr. Li is mine!”

You waved your arms in front of you, shaking yourself out of the academic envy-induced frenzy you’d gotten worked up into. “We’re getting off-topic. We’re here to catch Dr. Magic, remember?”

“Right…” He took a deep breath, turning back to the conspiracy wall.

As Renjun studied your work, you studied him. You had a strand of fairy lights clipped up above the conspiracy wall for light and ambiance (mostly ambiance), and they now lit his features from the front. He didn’t have a baseball cap on today, leaving his brown hair to fall over his forehead, down past his eyebrows and just into his eyes. He blinked and shook his head slightly. A piece had presumably been bothering him. The curving slope of the bridge of his nose, his lips, his chin that he still had one hand propped up to hold, a finger tapping against his cupid’s bow like a metronome. You listened closer, curious if it would be mimicking the beat of his heart. The tapping was just slightly slower than his heart, and would stop if he found something that he took particular interest in, then start back up when he moved on again.

Not that you were going to tell him, but you were double motivated to find Dr. Magic now. Seeing Renjun under your venom was going to be a reward all on its own. You understood full well why he felt like he needed to ask you as part of an exchange like this, but he seemed to greatly underestimate his own selling value. Which was good for you. This was a win-win-win in your eyes.

Thinking of the deal made you curious, though. He had that request ready to go almost like…

“So, do you want to be petrified by a basilisk, too?”

Renjun didn’t take his eyes off the wall. “Already have been.”

“Really?”

“My friend Mark is a basilisk. When he had just gotten his powers a couple years ago and couldn’t control them, he kept accidentally petrifying his human roommate. So I figured out when it was most likely to happen, invited myself over and hid his sunglasses. It was strange, being able to think but not speak, see but not blink, and telling my muscles to move and not having them obey.” He casually detailed what sounded like one of the most horrifying experiences ever to you, leaning in towards a specific post from November. “But it only lasted one minute and twenty-nine seconds.”

You stared at him with both admiration and alarm. “You manufactured an opportunity to get petrified.”

“I knew he wouldn’t do it if I asked. He’s a wimp. That, and he couldn’t do it on command at the time, even if he did agree.”

“Have you had your blood drank?”

“Yup.”

“Been flying?”

“How so?” His eyes flicked over to you for a second, and you were glad that you had relaxed again with the more casual conversation.

“With a gryphon, phoenix, take your pick.” You shrugged.

“Uh-huh.”

“Do you have a list for this stuff or something?”

“Written down, no. But I suppose I have a mental list.”

“Poisoned by a wyvern?”

“Would have to find one first.”

You felt your eyes bug out of your head. “You want to be poisoned by a wyvern? You know there’s no cure for that, right?”

“Yes, I took the same class that you did on them last spring.” He reminded you tersely. Your head jerked back minutely, surprised for a second that he had noticed, remembered, and brought it up. The two of you didn’t have a spat in that class, taking an ‘ignore and pretend the other doesn’t exist’ approach that semester when you could, and hadn’t mentioned it since. Seeming to realize what he’d done, Renjun rushed to move on, “So I also know that there’s no cure because they went extinct hundreds of years ago.”

“Supposedly.”

“You think they’re still out there?”

“Maybe.”

“Hm.” He stepped to the side to read over the next post from the first week of December.

You scoffed. “Okay, coming from the guy who believes in aliens.”

“We haven’t explored all of space. But we know what habitats wyverns lived in, and they’re not there anymore.”

“They could’ve adapted, gone somewhere else,” you tried to argue. “I’m not exactly splashing around the ocean right now, am I?”

“Where did they go, then?”

“I... I don’t know,” you admitted, holding yourself by your arms protectively.

“Hmph.”

You tightened your grip, swallowing hard against the lump threatening to grow in your throat. “I just don’t want to believe they’re gone, okay?”

“So this isn’t a scientific hypothesis, but some rosy daydream?” Renjun’s disapproval of the lack of academic rigor in your argument was clear in his tone as his eyes never left your wall, following a red string up to your next connection for Dr. Magic.

“I don’t want to believe that wyverns went extinct because that means that sirens could too! Alright?” You finally snapped, hands squeezing tightly around your biceps as your claws came out with the raw burst of emotion. “I know that Magical Conservation was just some class to you, but I had to sit there and take notes on how exactly the native habitats of sirens—me, my friends, my family—are shrinking, and could theoretically lead to our extinction, and then write a discussion post on it after like it was some intellectually stimulating bit of information. So yeah, maybe I like to imagine that there’s still wyverns out there somewhere, because it gives me a modicum of hope that after everything, there could still be sirens, too. Sorry that that’s not academic enough.”

The image of Renjun that you had been yelling at in front of you was wavering as tears swam in your vision. He’d turned around to listen, mouth parting as he seemed to immediately realize his mistake. The human nodded regretfully, running a hand through his hair before finally picking his words.

“I’m sorry, Y/N. I didn’t mean to be so dismissive. I-I misread the tone of the discussion. Sirens aren’t wyverns, and you won’t meet the same fate they might have. Siren advocacy and conservation groups are making huge progress. The world now is a lot different than it was hundreds of years ago,” Renjun said, and you could hear both the remorse and firm belief in his tone. “And who knows, maybe there are still some wyverns out there. I could be wrong... it’s been known to happen before.”

You took a deep breath, your claws receding back into your fingers and just leaving your normal fingernails. As you looked down at your arms, though, you let out a sigh.

“Damn, I got myself.” You clicked your tongue in your throat regretfully, spotting a few drops of what looked like molten silver metal welling to the surface where you’d punctured your skin.

“Ooh,” Renjun winced sympathetically. “Do you have some… bandages?”

“Even better, I’ve got running water.” You started towards the door, then noted that there were no footsteps behind you. Turning back around, you looked at the human knowingly. “Do you want to watch, Renjun?”

He perked up. “Please?”

“Come on,” you jerked your head, holding your arms level as you shuffled towards your kitchen.

Thankfully, you hadn’t been nearly deep enough to get your scales, just the skin overtop. Turning the kitchen faucet on, you grabbed one of your sleeves, then looked at your classmate imploringly.

“A little help, Junnie?” You nodded towards your other arm, where the end of your sleeve was getting close to your blood.

“Oh, sure.” He surged forward to help you roll up the other one.

“I know you know this but be careful not to touch my blood,” you reminded him, finally pulling up the sleeve you’d started on well enough. Siren blood was a neurotoxin to humans—and not the fun kind like your venom, but a proper ‘kill you in an excruciatingly painful way’ kind.

“Uh-huh, got it.”

A couple drops on your left and a drop on your right had run down to your elbows, and you just managed to catch yourself so that they dripped into the sink and not onto your counter (or gods forbid, Renjun). Looking over to make sure he was watching, you stuck your left bicep under the stream of water first. The ocean blue scales that peeked through your skin shimmered in the kitchen lights directly above your head. Thankfully you hadn’t come anywhere close to nicking one of those. That would’ve actually hurt. Within a second of touching the water your skin had meshed itself back together. You turned your arm to rinse off the blood, then brought it back out to show that there was no scar left. Doing the same with the other, it healed just as quick, no mark left behind to indicate that anything had ever happened.

“Yep…” Renjun breathed out as you grabbed a hand towel and went to dry off your arms. “I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of that.”

“How many does that make?” You giggled.

“What?”

“How many creatures have you seen magically heal themselves? What number am I?”

“You make me sound so…”

“Like a common MCS whore?”

“I was going to say clinical, but damn, tell me how you really feel, Y/N.”

Both of you laughed, and you put the hand towel back.

“You’re the first siren,” Renjun answered your question genuinely anyway.

You hummed as you mulled this over. “I’ll take it.”

He made a dramatic motion of wiping sweat off his forehead, and you reached forward to smack his forearm. You two laughed again.

After a bout of comfortable silence, your eyes settled on him again, still thinking about exactly how you’d accidentally stabbed yourself in the first place.

“I forgive you, by the way,” you said. “I don’t think I said that.”

“You didn’t.” He nodded. “Thank you.”

“You really mean all that? You think I’ll—we’ll be okay? Sirens?”

“Of course I mean it. Or I wouldn’t have said it. It’s the most scientifically plausible. I did take that Magical Conservation class seriously, you know. I know it couldn’t have meant the same thing for me as it means to you, but I did my final paper on siren conservation projects in the Arctic. The progress that’s being made there is incredible. I-I don’t want to tell you about your own species’ problems, obviously, but—”

“I did mine on siren conservation in the tropics.” You let out a dry chuckle at the flawless symbiosis. “You can tell me about your paper sometime, Renjun.”

“And I’d love to hear about siren conservation in the tropics.”

“Ah, ‘a meeting of the minds.’” You did your best impression of Dr. Li, thinning your voice out to sound like an elderly man, which garnered a smile from Renjun. “Isn’t this what our professors always wanted?”

“Uh-oh. We’re giving them exactly what they want.” He shook his head ruefully. “Quick, you need to start yelling at me about something.”

“Well you need to say something obnoxious first.”

Another gentle lull in the conversation, and you watched as Renjun looked around your apartment a lot more carefully than when you two had first entered. Your destination then had been solely the conspiracy wall, but now he seemed to be really taking it in.

“So why don’t you have like… a fish tank or something?” He asked.

“Because that would be cruel! Imagine if someone kept you in a 2-foot by 2-foot box!” You jabbed a finger into his chest accusatorily.

He held his hands up in surrender. “You’re right. That was a stupid question.”

“I’m glad you said it, because I was about to.”

“So why don’t you reply? To the posts.” Renjun asked curiously, back to trolling the message boards for new Dr. Magic posts. You two were holed up in your second floor study room again. “You’ve been tracking Dr. Magic so closely, you’re getting to these posts before they do, and you can help all these students, too. So why don’t you just reply instead?”

Yours and Renjun’s search for Dr. Magic had been going on for a month now, and he’d been proving himself useful. He’d finally convinced you to rule out Dr. Li as a suspect when he found a message board post made from a school computer while Dr. Li was away at a conference giving a presentation. Confirmed to be done at the exact same time. So you’d found another wrong person, but you still didn’t feel any closer to the right person. The remaining people felt like they were going to turn out to be dead ends, and there was nobody good to rule in either.

Spring break was coming up in a few weeks, which meant that commencement preparations would be starting, which meant that the colleges would be announcing who would be chosen to carry their banners, which meant the actual students who were going to be chosen would be told at least a week or two ahead of time. Every time you thought about that you wanted to bite something. Maybe there was some ancestral link between sirens and werewolves. Another paper waiting to be written.

“They don’t want me. They want Dr. Magic.” You told Renjun, hating the irritable edge in your voice when you addressed him. You weren’t upset with him, you were just anxious in general. He didn’t deserve to have you take it out on him.

“Right. Sorry…”

“No, Renjun, I’m sorry,” you sighed, taking the wood pencil out of your mouth that you had been gnawing on. “I just want to get this Dr. Magic stuff over with before midterms because you and I are both going to get super busy studying for midterms, and then no matter which one of us gets picked to carry the banner, that’s going to suck up a lot of time preparing for commencement too. I shouldn’t have snapped at you though, sorry.”

He offered you a small smile. “It’s okay, I get it. It’s another deadline. But it’s a group project, remember? We’ve got this, Y/N.”

You nodded. “Yeah, I know. Just feeling the pressure. I’m going to get something from the vending machine. You coming?”

“No, I’ll keep chugging along.”

“Okay. You want anything?”

“Nah. Thanks, though.”

“Alright,” you nodded, standing up and rolling your neck out. “I’m going to stretch my legs while I’m up, so I’ll be a few.”

“I won’t sound the alarm then.” He gave you a two-fingered salute as you headed to the door.

You meandered around the second floor, taking your sweet time to get to the stairs. There was a vending machine on the second floor, but it had a limited selection. The good snacks were all in the vending machines on the first floor, by the collaboration zones. Your back cracked all on its own as you plodded down the steps, and you let quiet groans with each one, until you finally landed on the first floor. There was a noticeable hum to the first floor, which only increased as you neared the two-thirds of the floor that was taken up by the collaboration zones. The vending machines were on the boundary of the bookshelves and the open spaces filled with tables and TV monitors and so many students.

Stopping in front of the drinks machine first, you mused over the options for a moment. Picking out your preferred seaweed-infused iced tea—an option you only saw sirens and the really hardcore human health-nuts drink—you then sidestepped to the snacks. It took you just a second to select a pack of mini peanut butter sandwich cookies. Neither peanut butter nor peanuts themselves were in the regular diet of a siren, but Renjun sometimes had the cookies on him for one of his werewolf friends and you’d picked up a taste for them. You would’ve never considered even trying them before hanging out with Renjun. Being an MCS major, you didn’t like to admit it, but your social circle wasn’t very diverse species-wise. You had your siren pod, and you were very happy sticking with them, thank you. Renjun, meanwhile, seemed to be best friends or friendly acquaintances with everything except a wyvern. You knew plenty about other species, after all, you excelled in class. But practical experience, you were finding you seemed to be lacking in. Maybe you should start your own Renjun-esque bucket list. Something to consider after finding Dr. Magic.

Taking a step back over to the drinks machine, you made the split-second decision to get Renjun’s favorite non-caffeinated, non-alcoholic drink. Honeydew melon soda. He had already said that you didn’t need to get him anything, but you wanted to.

“Hey, Y/N!” A cheerful voice greeted you, and you spun around, your two drinks and bag of sandwich cookies in hand.

You already knew who it was going to be, smiling at the familiar face of Ten. He was not only another siren, but specifically a siren from your pod, ocean blue scales and golden eyes matching your own. You threw your arms around his neck to give him a hug. “Ten! Ah, hey!”

“Are those… peanut butter?” He looked at the snack in your hand suspiciously.

“Uh, human study buddy,” you brushed off his concerns nonchalantly.

“Right, gotcha.”

The two of you usually hung out a lot—about as much as you and Renjun were together now, you figured—but since your spare time had been taken up with putting the search for Dr. Magic on full throttle, you were blanking on the last time you’d seen him. The beginning of the semester. Oh shit, you felt so guilty now.

The apology immediately started spilling out of your mouth, “Gods, I am so sorry we haven’t hung out, I wish I could say it was classes, or even research or something, but I’ve got this project. I can’t even really explain it without sounding crazy but—”

“Woah, Y/N, it’s okay,” Ten reassured you with a laugh, the same bright smile on his face as always. “I know how you get when you get really into one of your projects. Just let me know when you’ve finished it, and we can hang. Or if you ever need a break from it, too. It’s fine. If you weren’t a little crazy and obsessive, I wouldn’t be able to recognize you.”

He ruffled your hair with a snicker for good measure, and with your hands full of food, you couldn’t fight back, just huff and try to duck out of the way. But he was genuine about his sentiments, which really did make you feel better.

“Thanks, Ten. I’ll get in touch soon, I promise. I think I’m almost done!” You told him proudly.

“Soon in normal person time or soon in Y/N time?”

“Me time…”

“That’s what I thought. I’ll see you in six months then.”

“I’m not that bad!”

“Remember when I wondered aloud if sirens at the North and South poles were related, and you ended up spending our entire winter break researching that?”

“It only took four weeks!”

“You said it would be a quick search.”

“Exactly! People will dedicate their entire lives to that kind of research! I vastly condensed it!”

He shook his head fondly at the memory, elbowing you gently. “Get back to your project so you can finish early again and we can hang out soon, okay? And scoot, I’m trying to use the vending machine. You’re always in my way, I swear.”

You playfully pretended to block him, laughing as he nudged you out of the way with his shoulder. Starting back off towards the stairs, you turned around to give a cheery, “See you, Ten!”

“Bye, Y/N!” He waved to you with one hand, punching in the vending machine code with the other.

In better spirits having seen your friend, you traipsed up the stairs with extra pep in your step. Except Renjun wasn’t in your study room. Huh. Well, nothing in the rules saying a guy can’t take a bathroom break.

Setting his melon soda down next to his laptop, you plopped back down in your chair and kicked your feet up on the table. You ripped open your peanut butter sandwich cookies and cracked open your tea. The cookies were sweet, and while you didn’t have any oceanic reference for what peanut butter tasted like (you were told that “nutty” was a flavor profile unto itself, which wasn’t very helpful), you had decided that you liked it.

Waking your laptop back up, you saw that you had a new email, and shot up in your seat when you saw the subject.

dr_magic2303 replied to a post.

8 minutes ago.

Holy fucking shit, 8 minutes ago. While you were in the library? They could still be there. You looked around frantically. Where the fuck was Renjun when you needed him? Shooting to your feet, you snatched your phone from the table and rushed to throw the door open. Into Renjun’s face.

He stumbled back, holding his face as he let out a string of curses.

“Shit! Sorry, Junnie!” You didn’t sound all too sorry as you bounced on your feet, antsy to get a move on with your search. “No time for an ice pack though. Dr. Magic just replied to that dragon post we had bookmarked eight minutes ago. Which means that they’re probably still in the library! We need to go look for them right now!”

You took off in the direction of the desktop computers on this floor, keeping your voice at a fervent whisper-yell. The second floor computers were their favorite, according to the IPs.

“I know!” Renjun hurried after you, still clutching his nose. “I saw the email, and I tried to call you, but you left your phone in the study room.”

Checking your phone, you did in fact have a missed call from Renjun from 6 minutes ago. Well shit.

“So I went to go get you, but you weren’t at the vending machines, so I came back up to the study room and then nearly got my nose broken.”

You looked over your shoulder at him with wide eyes. “You went to get me? Not look for Dr. Magic on the freshest lead we’ve ever had? When they were quite possibly around the corner?”

The two of you had arrived at the desktops, and there was nobody in sight. One was awake, on the account login screen, the other two asleep on the ancient screensavers. You let out a heavy sigh, looking over at Renjun.

“I went to get you because this is your thing, not mine. I don’t know, I’d figured you’d want the satisfaction of taking the mask off them.”

You nodded. “Thanks, Junnie. Next time, though, just get them.”

“And how about you keep your phone on you?”

“So we both fucked it up.”

He gave you a one-shouldered shrug. “There’s still three more floors, Y/N.”

“Right, come on. You take the first, I’ll go up to the fourth since I smacked you with the door.”

The other floors were busts, and when you finally met back up with Renjun in your study room, you were glad to have your cold bottle of tea waiting for you. Knocking back a third of it in one go, you let out a noise of relief. Renjun had already opened the soda you’d gotten him.

“Thanks, by the way.” He held it up gratefully before taking a sip.

“You’re welcome.”

“And, I’m sorry. That I let Dr. Magic get away.”

“We don’t even know what floor they were posting from yet. They’ve could’ve been on the fourth floor and would’ve been gone by the time you got there anyway.” You brushed away his apologies. “Or they could’ve been on the second and been a psycho and you would’ve been a poor defenseless human all by yourself.”

“Oh, right, without my big strong siren to protect me.” He scoffed. “Woe is me.”

“Exactly,” you laughed, shutting your laptop. “Anyway, I’ll take a look at the IP later. Who knows, they might not have even been in the library. Might’ve been one of those rogue VPN posts.”

“Yeah, maybe.” He looked over you packing up your things. “You heading out?”

You nodded, zipping up your bag and tossing it onto your shoulder. “Prior arrangements. Sorry to cut this short, completely forgot about it when we agreed to meet up.”

“You’re so popular.”

“I know!” You mimicked his sarcastic tone, holding the door open with your foot as you stopped in the threshold. “Oh, hey— the midterm in MCS Linguistics. It’s my only one this semester, I’ve just got papers in all my other classes. Do you want to study together for that?”

“Yeah, sure, sure.”

“First session Saturday? My place for lunch?”

Renjun grimaced, presumably remembering your typical stock of pantry items tailored to a siren’s food preference. “I’ll pack a lunch.”

“Cool. See you in class, Junnie!” You waved to him cheerily as you took off for the faculty advisor meeting with Dr. Kwon that you were going to need to run across campus to be on time for.

“What is it?” Renjun set his book down where he was sat across your coffee table from you, an inquisitive eyebrow quirked up at you.

“What? Nothing.” You bit down on your lip, eyes boring holes into your computer screen.

“No, it’s not ‘nothing.’ You’ve been staring at me ever since I got here, while also refusing to make eye contact with me. What? Something in my teeth? My hair look bad?”

Normally that would’ve made you chuckle—he was wearing a backwards baseball cap again today—but you just bit down harder on your lip and shook your head.

“Now you’re refusing to talk?” He scoffed. “Did you get hexed or something? I can’t believe you’re refusing to talk.”

“No, I can talk,” you insisted. “What uh, what’d you get for number four? On the review packet?”

“Don’t tell me you’re still stuck on number four. Y/N, I’m almost done, and there’s twenty-five questions on this.”

“I’m not, I finished and went back, it was just one that I didn’t—”

But Renjun had grabbed your computer and turned the screen around, and you knew he could see that you had only done the first one. You buried your face in your hands, your skin prickling uncomfortably with shame. Your friend’s sigh was audible, but surprisingly, the next thing said wasn’t a string of derision. Instead, you heard the shuffle of clothes against your rug, and then he was sitting shoulder-to-shoulder and knee-to-knee with you.

“Y/N, what’s going on with you today? Or, not today, the past couple days? You weren’t all there in class yesterday either. I left it alone then because it was Dr. Hyun, and nobody is ever all there for her classes but— what’s wrong?”

You slowly shook your head.

“You can’t tell me?”

You nodded.

“Okay. Is it bad? Like, dangerous?”

You shook your head.

“Alright, that’s good.” The relief was audible in his voice. “Is it family? Or, pod?”

You shook your head.

“School?”

You nodded.

“Alright, yeah. A lot going on. Is it like burn out?”

You shook your head.

“So, new stuff?”

You nodded.

He put an arm around your shoulders. “I’m sorry, Y/N. I know you already had a lot. Getting this midterm over with will be one more thing off your checklist, right? That’ll open a spot for this new thing.”

With a sniffle, you nodded.

“Ah, but you’re not going to be any good studying like this.” He sighed again, dropping his arm from around your shoulders and his presence shifted away from your side. “Come on, quick field trip. Then we’ll come right back to the MCS Linguistics grind. Sound good?”

You finally took your hands from your face to look up. Renjun was standing right next to you, offering you a hand. You tentatively put yours in his, and he tightened his grip to pull you up to your feet.

The two of you ended up in a froyo shop down the street from your apartment. You gleefully picked a gummy shark off the top of your swirl, biting the head off first before tossing the rest in your mouth. Renjun lifted a meticulously curated spoonful of froyo and toppings to his mouth, satisfaction on his face as he tasted his perfect bite. You watched in amusement as he went to start creating his next scoop that had the precise ratio of yogurt and every single topping he had chosen—each partitioned to their own area atop the froyo. You decided to save your second big gummy shark for last, and took a big spoonful from the melting edge of your froyo.

“Why not me?” Renjun asked abruptly, his gaze still on the dessert in front of him.

“Huh?” Your jaw dropped. How could he have known what—

“You haven’t asked me if I’m Dr. Magic. Why not?”

Ah, Dr. Magic. Of course.

“You were my first guess, and the first person I ruled out back in like September,” you admitted with a shrug.

His head snapped up at that. “What? Why?”

“Because you’re such an arrogant, neurotic overachiever that you’d want credit if you did all this. You wouldn’t use an alias.”

“Oh. Huh.” Renjun looked between you and his froyo, a sheepish smile coming to his face. “Strangely, that makes me feel better.”

You watched a dollop of froyo fall off your spoon and plop back into your cup. “And I nabbed your IP address off your laptop the first time we hung out in January and double-checked it with every Dr. Magic post. Just in case.”

“When I was in the bathroom?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Of course you did.”

“Were you taking it as an insult to your intelligence that I had apparently not considered you as an option?”

“Maybe…”

You laughed, and laughed, and laughed. You laughed so hard your sides hurt, there were tears in your eyes, and you genuinely started wheezing. Renjun pretended to roll his eyes, but you saw the smile on his face and knew what he was thinking: success, no more mopey siren.

Once you had enough air back in your lungs to talk, you pointed your spoon at him firmly. “See? Just proving my point. You want people to know you’re smart.”

He crossed his arms. “As if you don’t.”

“Oh, I definitely do. But I know I’m like that.” You put a hand over your chest, looking him dead in the eye. “Do you?”

With your head screwed back on the normal amount, you and Renjun were able to dive back into your study session at your apartment. Several hours into it, though, you noticed Renjun blinking like way too much and constantly rubbing at his eyes. It was to the point where it was distracting for you.

“What’s wrong with your eyes?” You asked bluntly.

That immediately burst the Renjun griping dam (which was really held together with tape and prayers anyway). “The screens hurt my eyes and human blue light glasses don’t do shit and no fairy has let me try theirs out. I know I should probably just take the plunge and buy them but I really can’t justify the price and—”

“Try mine.” You stood up, walking over to a display shelf on the other side of the living room.

“You have a pair? Why? Sirens don’t—”

“You collect magical experiences. I collect magical things.” You said nonchalantly, grabbing the pair of silver frames from where they sat between a phoenix feather (a gift) and a small wristwatch that would tell the correct time until it was put on, then it would be set on the time and date most significant to the wearer in that moment until it was removed. Walking back over to him, you held them out to him insistently, “Here, try them.”

“Oh. Thanks.” Renjun gingerly took them, sliding the arms over his ears and the frames onto the bridge of his nose. The pair you had was a little older, admittedly. You’d picked them up at a novelty shop, so they had some retro charm to them. An older style of frame, thicker lenses. But you thought it added a quaintness to their look. Especially on Renjun, he just looked downright adorable in them.

You sat back down to watch with your head in your hand as his brown eyes blinked from behind the thick lenses, and he looked around your living room like a newborn woodland animal. His face had already relaxed, and he turned his focus down to his laptop screen next, messing with the brightness up, then down. After that, he took out his phone, doing the same with that device.

“Well?” You prompted him, though you truly would’ve been content with watching him look around as if he’d been born colorblind and it were his first time seeing in color. Which, you had an enchanted pair for that too, but he wasn’t colorblind to your knowledge.

The human looked at you, a giddy smile stretching across his face. “They’re perfect! Thanks, Y/N!”

His hand reached up to take them off, but you stopped him.

“Keep them—”

“No, these had to be so expensive!” He protested immediately.

“Just for a week or so,” you finished your sentence pointedly. He was cute, but not that cute. “Make sure you really like them before you buy, okay? If you end up hating them, give them back. If you like them and buy your own pair, you can give them back whenever yours arrive in the mail.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, it’s not like I’m using them. Superior siren eyesight.” You tapped next to one of your eyes for emphasis.

“Thanks for not rubbing it in or anything.”

Scrambling to dial Renjun’s number, you put your phone on speaker as you fervently flicked through all of your Dr. Magic notes. You’d been laying in bed binging some mindless baking competition to numb your brain from all the studying you’d been doing when an email notification had popped up alerting you to a new Dr. Magic post.

“Y/N?” Renjun answered the phone, sounding utterly confused. “What’s—”

“New Dr. Magic post. I ran the IP and they’re in our city!” You blurted out.

“Okay… Well we already knew that, right?”

“Yeah, but this is an IP in our city that they posted from at midnight on a Saturday. Not any of the school computers.” You hit CTRL + F, typing in the string of numbers to quickly cross reference it with your extensive list. “This could be their IP. Like, their actual one, from a personal computer.”

“Oh, yeah. Could be.”

“Can you give me a little more enthusiasm here, Junnie? Did I wake you up or something? It’s only—” You stopped like you’d just walked face-first into a brick wall, eyes locked on the search result.

“Yeah, only quarter after midnight,” he scoffed.

You clicked the next arrow on the search bar, but that was the only match. 1/1 results.

“Y/N?” Renjun called for your attention. “You there?”

You hung up.

Not wanting to lose your nerve, you pressed the doorbell over and over insistently. You could hear the complaining tone of the occupant before his words were even audible.

“Christ, I have neighbors, you know?” Renjun swung open the door with a scowl. The human was in a big, slouching hoodie and pajama pants. His hair was stuck up in a couple different directions, making you think he might’ve just woken up. Except behind him, you could see that his kitchen light was on, and a couple books and his laptop were open on his kitchen table. Late night studying. And the fact that you’d just talked to him on the phone fifteen minutes ago.

“Can I come in?” You requested, fidgeting with the sleeve of your cardigan.

His face immediately softened. “Yeah, of course.”

“Sorry to just show up like this,” you said as you took off your shoes by the front door before following him further into his apartment.

“It’s okay.” He stopped you two in the kitchen, picking up a colorful, patterned cardboard box. “Uh, I was just about to make a midnight snack. Pizza bites, you want some?”

“I… don’t think I’ve ever had them.”

“Perfect, you can try one now then.”

“Mm,” you made a non-committal noise, leaning against his kitchen counter to watch him pour out the frozen food onto a baking sheet.

The oven beeped, and he put the tray in before pressing a couple more buttons.

“So, I was thinking about the Dr. Magic stuff. Not the IP stuff but like… What even is your plan for when you do find Dr. Magic?” Renjun asked as he put the remaining pizza bites in his freezer.

“What do you mean?”

He leaned against the countertop across from you, though in the narrow space of his kitchen, you were practically knee-to-knee. “Like, say we finally find out who they are, we run up to them in the library or on campus or something. Then what? What are you going to do? What are you going to say? You’ve done all this, and I know why you had to. I get it. But, do you know what you’re going to say to them?”

“Probably something along the lines of…” You trailed off, giving an exasperated sigh. Dropping your chin to your chest, you groaned, “Gods, I don’t know.”

“Hey, that’s why you got me. So you can bounce ideas off someone, do a dry run.”

“I thought the words would just come to me, and now that I’m trying, I can’t—”

“It’s fine, Y/N. Let’s think about why you did this. I know it’s really hard to put into words. I mean, I know why you did. I get it. It’s that need to know. Not because you can, but because you have to, right? It’s curiosity in its rawest form. So obviously it’s not going to be some schmaltzy ‘haha I caught you’ spiel or anything.”

Looking up from the kitchen tile to Renjun’s eager features, you shook your head in disbelief. “You’re still helping me… when I know it’s you, Junnie.”

He tilted his head to the side, a comical noise of confusion coming from his mouth, “Uh?”

“I know it’s you, and you know that I know that it’s you.”

“You already ruled me out, because I’m an arrogant—”

“Junnie, you made a post on the forums from your laptop. No VPN. When you knew I was still tracking Dr. Magic’s IP on every post they made, and that I had your IP. That’s not a whoopsie that you make unless you want to be caught.”

The human crossed his arms over his chest, but otherwise seemed entirely calm about being caught. “And you didn’t come in here guns blazing now that you’d caught me, either. Why?”

“I didn’t know how to say it. I mean, you’re right, I only did all this because I needed to know.”

“And now you know.”

“Why now? Why just give up now?” You asked with a shake of your head. “You started posting as Dr. Magic back in August, and I came to you in January. You knew everything I was doing; you could have cruised through the rest of the semester and I’d have never caught you.”

“You wanted to find out who it was by midterms. One less thing on your plate.”

“And now I know…”

“So how does it feel? Finally catching Dr. Magic?”

You wrinkled your nose and sighed, “Bit disappointing. I was right on my first guess.”

“And you immediately dismissed me out of hand for being an arrogant, neurotic overachiever on your first guess,” he pointed out.

“Yeah, but I didn’t really know you then. If I’d known you then like I know you now, I would’ve known as soon as I saw the first post.”

Renjun batted his eyes teasingly. “Aww, Y/N…”

“Doctor underscore magic two, three, zero, three? Twenty-three, oh-three? That’s your birthday, Junnie,” you deadpanned.

“Right.”

Pushing off the counter to stand up straight again, you said, “Anyway, you did help me find Dr. Magic. So, my turn.”

“Oh, no, you seriously don’t have to do that. I rigged the deal—”

“Yeah, about that.” You took a step forward. “How did you think that was going to end up for you, anyway? Were you going to sell somebody else out as Dr. Magic and hope I wasn’t going to talk to them? Spit in your mouth first and ask questions later?”

“I was thinking on my feet.”

“Maybe think laying down next time, Junnie.”

“Ouch.”

“Anyway, come on, you’ll want to sit down for this.” You grabbed his wrist, pulling him towards the living room.

“You don’t need to feel like you have to do this,” he reassured you.

Stopping the two of you in front of the couch, you turned to face him with a smirk. “Believe me when I say that it is going to be a treat unto itself for me to see you under the effects of siren venom. M’kay?”

Renjun’s surprise was evident on his face. “Oh.”

You stepped closer to him, delicately placing a hand on his chest. “Now unless you want me to literally spit in your mouth, I’m going to have to kiss you, to administer the venom.”

His eyes flicked between the hand you had on his chest and your face as he replied. “I’m okay with that—the kissing—if you are.”

“Renjun, I’ve been ready to eat you alive since you said the words ‘I want to experience siren venom for science’ to me.”

“Really?”

“Mhm. So why don’t you sit?” You guided him with the hand against his chest to sit back against his couch. Swinging one leg over his hips, then the other, you lowered yourself onto his lap. “Is this okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” he nodded, tentatively settling his hands on your thighs. “Is this okay?”

“More than.” You smiled, looping your arms around his neck. “Now, a couple things, before we get started.”

“We haven’t started?”

“You’ll know it when we do.”

“Right.”

“I know you think you know what siren venom is like, but whatever scientific articles you’ve read, or documentaries you’ve watched, or slides you’ve studied under microscopes in lab, cannot actually prepare you for what it’s like. Which, I imagine is why you want to experience it for yourself.” You smirked down at him as you watched his Adam’s apple bob up and down with a gulp. “So before I actually dose you up with it, I need you to tell me what you’re actually okay with doing and what you’re not. Because once you get my venom in you, you’re going to want to let me do anything and everything to you, up to and including kill you, remember?”

“Well that’s off the table.”

“Good to know,” you snorted, running a fingernail down the nape of his neck. You felt a shudder go through him. “Is this okay?”

“Y-Yeah.” He seemed to be fighting to keep his eyes open. You halted your motions to let him think, and watched in amusement as he blinked his mind clear.

Once enough time had passed, you prompted him, “So?”

“I think just kissing,” Renjun answered. “Like, making out, or whatever. If you want…”

You snickered. “What part of ‘eat you alive’ was I unclear about?”

“The ‘eat’ part, actually. How literal is that?”

“Guess you’ll find out,” you teased. Then, you focused again as you sat back a little. “Okay, making out. Making out means different things to different people. So… we know kissing’s on the table. Tongue?”

“Yeah.”

“Teeth?”

“Where?”

“Waist up. You got somewhere you don’t want them?”

He took a moment to think about this. Then shook his head. “No. You can use them. Anywhere.”

“Same goes for you. Hickies?”

“Giving or receiving?”

“Both. You first.”

“Both are okay. You?”

You were already zeroing in on his neck and a small part of his collarbone peeking out from under his hoodie. “Same. Touching over clothes?”

“Okay, as long as you don’t think it’ll be too much with the venom…”

“Oh, Junnie, everything is going to be too much.” You grinned down at him.

His breathing had picked up pace as the two of you were talking. “You? The touching?”

“Good. Great. Touching under clothes?”

Renjun squirmed underneath you, but maintained your eye contact. “Just under my shirt.”

“Smart boy,” you said approvingly. “Me too.”

“Is that it?” He asked quietly, eyes now flicking down to your lips.

“I think so…” You looked around the room to buy a couple extra seconds of thinking time. When you hadn’t come up with anything else, you looked down at the human below you once more. “Ready, Renjun?”

“Yes.”

You took one final look over him like this, how much he already wanted you before he’d even gotten any of your venom in him, and dragged the tip of your tongue over your bottom lip instinctually. His heartrate jumped, and you wondered if it was fear—if the motion had reminded him perhaps of a hungry predator—or need. Or maybe a bit of both.

But you couldn’t tease him nor yourself any longer, swooping down to connect your mouths. You started off with just a couple light, closed-mouth kisses, to ease him into it. You heard him inhale quickly through his nose, his grip on your thighs tightening minutely. Swiping your tongue across the seal of his lips, you were delighted when he immediately parted his mouth in response, his tongue seeking yours out. You hummed contentedly into his mouth as you started stroking a fingernail down the back of his neck again. At the same time, your venom was beginning to mix in with your saliva, being passed onto Renjun.

Once his jaw started going slack in the kiss, and his hands slowly slid off your legs entirely to rest lamely at his side, you deemed him plenty dosed up. Consciously, you blocked off your venom glands once more. When one particularly drawn-out scratch down the back of his neck finally elicited a noise from him, an involuntary whine, you felt something in you snap. You needed more of that.

“So this is what siren venom feels like…” He mumbled breathily, letting his head loll back against the couch cushion as you kissed a path down his jawline and neck. When you felt his breath hitch in his throat over one particular spot, you decided to take your time there, sucking and nipping a mark into his skin.

When humans were… locked in a lover’s embrace, they let off a certain perfume distinguishable only to sirens—which was what made them the favored prey of sirens for so long. A human under the influence of siren venom? Delectable. And every human’s was unique too, so Renjun under the influence of your venom? Absolutely addictive.

With each kiss you stole from his lips, every nip you left on his neck that you then soothed over with your tongue, you got another taste of it. A sweetness that came with a bite, like ginger candy.

Renjun was still talking, though, his vocal cords vibrating under your lips. “My-My heart’s beating so fast, and I’m so warm—that’s so the ocean water doesn’t feel cold, of course—”

“Would you shut up?” You sat back up, grabbing him by the hair.

“Why?”

“I’m trying to kiss you again, idiot.”

“Oh. Right.” He closed his mouth, looking up at you with glassy eyes, waiting. Gods, he was so pretty like this.

You crashed your lips back on his, a mess of teeth and lips and tongue as he tried to keep up with you. But you knew that your venom was in full effect now, every single one of his nerve endings was approximately three and half times more sensitive. So you were sure it was all a little overwhelming. But he was definitely trying his best, kissing sloppily into your mouth with hungry, desperate whines.

Pulling him back off with your grip in his hair, you traced a thumb over his kiss-swollen bottom lip, cooing over how fucked-out he looked like this. “Oh, baby. Oh, poor Junnie. What’s wrong? Can’t even kiss me properly because it feels too good? Baby’s overwhelmed with just a little bit of kissing?”

He opened his mouth wider, darting the tip of his tongue out to brush against the pad of your thumb. You pushed the finger in his mouth, groaning as he immediately closed his lips around it. “Gods, you’re perfect, Junnie.”

Taking your thumb back out of his mouth just to grab his chin with the same wet digit, you attacked his lips with yours again. Ginger candy. His hands that had been lamely resting at his sides the entire time now fumbled at something in the area where your hips met.

“What? What are you trying to do, baby?” You asked, leaning back to look down. He was grabbing at the hem of his hoodie, unsuccessfully yanking it up towards his head as part of it was stuck under one of your thighs.

“‘m too hot. Please…” He panted, dropping it as he looked up at you pleadingly.

You nodded slowly in understanding, knowing that one of the effects of the siren venom was an increase in body temperature, not to mention what you two were just doing. The collar of another shirt was visible underneath the sweatshirt. “Okay, Junnie, we can take your hoodie off. But only the hoodie. Your other clothes are staying on, understood?”

He nodded quickly, hips bucking up against you. Sweat was beading up on his forehead, his hair getting stuck to the damp skin. You shifted back on his lap so that none of the sweatshirt was under you anymore, grabbing the hem and reaching behind him to yank up from underneath him as well.

“Sit forward for me, baby?” You requested in his ear sweetly.

Renjun obliged as best he could, leaning forward to get his back and shoulders off the couch. You pulled the hoodie up over his head, tossing it off to the side, leaving him in a black t-shirt that certainly couldn’t be helping much either. But having that heavy layer off seemed to provide some relief for him, as he let out a sigh, falling back against the furniture again.

You giggled as you settled back into the crux of his lap again, lacing your fingers together behind his neck. “Is that better now, Junnie?”

He shook his head, and you arched an eyebrow curiously.

“Oh? What’s wrong, then?”

Renjun tugged gently at your cardigan where it had shrugged down to show one of your shoulders. “Please?”

Pulling your bottom lip in between your teeth, you thought this over. You had a tank top on under the cardigan, and both of you were still wearing everything else. Not to mention that you were starting to get a bit warm too. Sirens ran naturally cooler than humans, so you were sure that to him, you felt practically refreshing right now, but you honestly were a bit hot for a siren’s tastes.

Giving a contemplative hum first, you finally relented, “Alright, Junnie. But just my sweater. Everything else stays on, because we didn’t talk about that before the venom, do you understand?”

He rushed to strip you of the knit cardigan, his mouth following his hands’ path down your skin. First on your shoulder, then down your arm. You let the garment drop on the floor behind you as he kissed back up along your shoulder, then over the fabric of your tank top until he got to your collarbone, and finally the hollow of your throat. Fondly stroking the back of his head, the pleased purr that had started in your chest turned into a surprised moan when he licked a long stripe up your throat.

Holding his face in your hands so that your noses brushed, and your lips barely ghosted over each other, you let your breaths mingle in the meager space afforded. Renjun ended your little anticipation game quickly, kissing you tongue-first, and you kissed him back just as eagerly, sucking on his tongue with lewd, wet noises. He moaned into your mouth, his hands grabbing at your waist for purchase first, then slipping and curling into the material of your shirt, bunching it in his fists.

Slowing the pace of your kisses, you eventually sat back, appraising the state he was in. You affectionately ran a hand through his hair as you took in his blown pupils, kiss-swollen lips, and pink cheeks. “Junnie? How are you feeling? Need a break?”

You hadn’t given him another dose of venom since the initial one, which wasn’t very large to begin with. But this was his first time experiencing it, so you wanted to check in. He should be just past the peak of it by now, starting to come down but for all intents and purposes still very much intoxicated. Siren venom wasn’t meant to last very long, after all, it took an adult human less than a minute to drown.

“Need you…” He insisted, arching up towards you.

Indulging him in one, two more feverish kisses, you pulled away once again. “I know, baby. And you’ve been doing so good for me. So I need you to tell me if you need a break. Okay?”

“’kay.” He agreed before you sealed your mouth over his again.

Kissing down from his mouth to just under his jaw, at the same time you trailed a finger down the center of his front until it got to the hem of his t-shirt.

He nodded fervently before you could say or do anything more. “Please… please…”

“Shh, shh, shh,” you quieted him down gently. “Doing so good for me, Junnie. The best.”

You slipped your hands under his shirt, just to stroke his waist. His muscles tensed under your touch, and he let out a sound of satisfaction. He grabbed at your thighs again, but you couldn’t tell if it was an attempt at reciprocity or to have something sturdier to ground himself to than your flimsy tank top. The corner of your lips quirked up as you pressed a couple more kisses down his neck to hover your lips over his pulse point, content to start a new mark there as your hands continued to explore under his shirt. It was when you gently raked your nails down over his pecs that you got the loudest moan out of him yet, and you groaned in response.

“Gods, you’re perfect,” you nuzzled your nose into Renjun’s neck, then pressed a couple relatively chaste pecks to his cheek. “Just perfect…”

Taking your hands back out from his shirt, you silenced his whine at the loss of contact by slotting your lips together once more. You cupped his face with one hand, using the other to take one of his hands off your leg and lace them together, palm to palm. This seemed to make him content once more, especially when you brought your connected hands up to the back of the couch, pinning his behind his head. He squirmed under you, letting out a familiar noise of pleasure into your mouth and squeezing your hand tightly.

You knew the venom was well and truly starting to wear off when Renjun began keeping pace with your slow, lazy kisses, his mouth not as sloppy but no less delightful as it moved in tandem with yours. The thumb of the remaining hand on your thigh started to stroke over your skin, and the hand that you were holding gave yours a gentle squeeze. You gave him one, two last lingering kisses, drinking in the dwindling taste of ginger candy while you could, Renjun matching you beat for beat.

Unlacing your fingers and dropping your hand from his face, you drew back from him. Before you could say anything, though, Renjun grabbed you by the back of the neck and pulled you in for one more kiss, sinking his teeth into your already tender, over-kissed bottom lip. You gasped into his mouth, which gave him the perfect opportunity to intertwine his tongue with yours again on his apparent mission to try to kiss the breath from you. A nigh impossible task for a human to do to a siren, but it definitely felt like he was succeeding. He was crushing his lips against yours so hard you were worried about him drawing blood—not because you would mind the pain, but for fear of his safety if he got a direct hit of your blood in his mouth.

In the back of your mind, you were desperately trying to remember if you had maybe accidentally opened your venom glands a second time later on, but just drew a blank. That wasn’t something you did unaware, it wasn’t automatic, it had to be done on purpose. Then, for a brief moment, you were worried about secondary wave syndrome—some humans break down siren venom in two phases instead of one, and the second one almost always kills them if they’re not brought to a human medical doctor for treatment—and you started running through the symptoms as well as the nearest human emergency rooms in your mind. Burst capillaries in the eyes, refusal of food and water, the hospital three blocks over should have an ER, right? But the kiss didn’t feel like when he’d been intoxicated on your venom before, this one felt deliberate, in control. He was in control. You let out a small moan at the thought, and Renjun’s lone hand on your thigh tightened in response.

Once he finally let you go, you both sat there in silence for a good few seconds, you still on his lap. You stared extra hard at the whites of his eyes. They looked normal. He seemed… normal.

It was rare for either of you to be speechless, much less the both of you.

“Well…” you broke the silence. “That was siren venom. You should drink some water. Stay right here, I’ll get it.”

You climbed off of him, heading into his kitchen. Looking at the oven, you were wondering how the timer hadn’t gone off in that entire time when you saw that it wasn’t on. The words ‘TIMER SET?’ were flashing on the screen at you, and the preheat hadn’t been started either. The pizza rolls had just been slowly defrosting on a pan in the cold oven. You couldn’t help but laugh, reaching into his fridge for his Brita filter then securing a couple cups from the cabinets.

Walking back into the living room, you handed the human his cup of water and remained standing as you took a sip of yours.

“You didn’t start the oven, for your pizza rolls,” you informed him quietly.

“Wh— oh, shit,” Renjun groaned, tipping his head back. “I guess I don’t get to give you your first pizza roll tonight.”

“That’s okay.” You dropped onto the couch next to him, shoulder to shoulder.

“So… that was siren venom,” he breathed out, then took a long gulp of his water. Definitely not second wave syndrome.

“That was siren venom,” you confirmed with a laugh, fondly brushing a piece of sweaty hair off his forehead.

“You were right… I was not prepared,” he admitted with a laugh, taking another drink.

“So do you think you would’ve let me kill you?”

“Yeah. I would’ve given you my credit card info, bank password, spilled all of my friends’ worst secrets, let you kill me, killed someone else if you asked me. God, that was…” He said with wide eyes, shaking his head. But there was a familiar glint in his eye as a smile cracked across his face, “Incredible.”

“Glad you think so,” you giggled, patting his chest. “Now don’t become a venom junkie, okay? I couldn’t live with myself if you did and it was my fault.”

“I won’t. Not really what I meant anyway.”

You grinned slyly at what he seemed to be implying, that it might not have just been the siren venom, but that it was you and your venom that made it so incredible. Like how every human had a slightly different essence, every siren had a unique chemical signature in their venom. It’s why using it non-consensually nowadays would be extremely stupid (as well as just an immoral thing to do and also a crime)—it can be matched to the siren in a lab like DNA. In addition, anecdotally, every siren’s venom was said to produce a slightly different high, but no mass studies had backed that up. You were inclined to believe the stories, though.

Renjun was still a bit hazy, though, still riding the high of the venom, so you decided to tuck a conversation like that away for another time.

“So why did you pick Magical Creatures Studies? Other than you’re insane?” You redirected the topic to a more neutral one.

Renjun didn’t seem put off at all about this jump. “When I was a kid, my family traveled around a bunch, for my dad’s job. I got to meet a lot of different kinds of beings, some of them became my best friends, and I never wanted to stop learning about it all.”

“What does your dad do?”

“Government job,” he answered, suddenly interested in picking at his nails.

You furrowed your brow thoughtfully. “Wait a minute… Huang Renjun. As in, your father is Ambassador Huang? That we’ve had to write papers on in class?”

Ambassador Huang was the first human ambassador sent on diplomacy trips to outside nations of magical creatures post-integration. His trips had largely been considered a monumental success, and credited as a big driver behind the huge uptick of immigration that your city has been seeing from outlying areas in the past couple decades. You’d hardly gotten through a single contemporary MCS class without directly learning about him or at least hearing his name. And you’d apparently been going to school with his son for four years and just pumped said son full of your venom and made out with him while he was high on your venom.

“Yeah…”

“Dude! What the hell? You didn’t think to mention that at some point?” You asked incredulously.

“And sound like some uppity nepo kid bragging about my dad? No thanks,” Renjun snorted.

“Yeah, maybe not like day one but like… I don’t know, before I used my venom on you!” You nudged his arm teasingly.

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“I just venom-ed Ambassador Huang’s son!”

“Oh my God, could you not call me that?” He snapped at you. “This is why I don’t tell people! Because now I don’t have a name anymore, I’m just Ambassador Huang’s son.”

You immediately realized your mistake, your stomach dropping as you heard the hurt in his words. “Renjun, I’m—”

“Just go.” He demanded, standing up from the couch and putting distance between you two again. “We both got what we wanted, right? You found out who Dr. Magic was, and I experienced siren venom. That’s all this was, so you can go. You don’t owe me anything else.”

You clenched your jaw, setting your cup on the end table beside the couch. Picking up your cardigan from the floor with as much dignity as you could, you pulled it back on. Neither of you said another word as he watched you stalk over to the front door, shove your shoes back on, throw the door open, and slam it closed behind you.

Drumming your fingertips along your keyboard, you squinted at the flashcards on your screen. You were in a sour mood, which had persisted ever since you’d left Renjun’s last night feeling used.

Ten was next to you at your picnic table outside the student union, finishing up a pencil portrait sketch of one of his other friends—one of the CompSci majors you’d paid to write your browser extension, actually. Dejun, a dragon, whose slit pupils, many bejeweled earrings, and a singular fang poking out from under his top lip featured prominently in the portrait. The sketch was part of Ten’s midterm portfolio check-in for one of his classes. Midterms were literally this week. Like, right now. You forced your sharp teeth further into the wooden pencil in your mouth.

“You’re going to ruin your cuspids like that, Y/N,” Ten chastised you calmly, rubbing at a line with the pad of his ring finger to smudge it before flipping his own non-mangled pencil around and continuing to sketch with the graphite.

“I’ll grow another set,” you grumbled, but took the writing utensil out of your mouth nevertheless.

“And have no teeth in the meantime. Real sexy siren stuff. Sure to lure all the hotties to their deaths looking like GamGam missing her dentures.”

“Shut up!” You shoved his head away, earning a loud peal of laughter from your friend. “As if you’ve been pulling anybody yourself. You’re literally a siren art major covered in tattoos that he designed himself, more piercings than a dragon, including nipple rings, and you haven’t been on a date in… what, almost a year?”

“So we’re both disappointments to the good siren name, huh?” He held up his hands in surrender, still grinning. “Just a couple of poor, celibate sirens doomed to be disgraces to their species forever…”

“Can you not yell that to the entire courtyard, dude?”

“What? Not announce very loudly that you haven’t been with anybody in exactly four—”

You lunged to cover his mouth before he could publicize precisely how long it’s been since you’d hooked up with someone. Ten immediately broke down into laughs behind your hand that was covering his mouth, his shoulders shaking even as you smacked him on the back of the head with your other hand.

“Gods, what is wrong with you?” You hissed at him. “You’re a menace to society. And me.”

When you’d finally let go of his face, he said through a couple more chuckles, “Hey, you could easily do it back to me.”

“Why would I want to do that? And the fact that you’re suggesting it makes me think that you want me to do that, which makes me want to do it even less. You freak.”

Before your podmate could respond, you caught sight of a figure approaching your table head-on. Setting your jaw, your body immediately tensed. There was no mistake, Huang Renjun was walking straight towards you. Ten seemed to have noticed the shift in your body language and mood, as he didn’t say anything further, quietly going back to his sketchbook as you watched Renjun get nearer and nearer.

“Y/N,” he said your name quietly, stopping not quite at the end of the table beside you, but next to the end of the bench across from you.

“What do you want from me now, Renjun?” You replied bitterly, pretending to return your hands to your keyboard as if you were going to refocus on your studies.

“Uhm, to talk, I guess?”

Ten interjected, “Do you guys need a second? I can go—”

You held him in place with a hand around his wrist, your voice curt, “No, Ten. Stay. This will be short.”

Your friend lowered himself back down into his seat.

You then set your hard gaze on Renjun. The marks you had left on his neck were still visible above the collar of his t-shirt. Moving your eyes from that to his face, you cocked your head to the side. “What’s in it for me? You established that our relationship is purely transactional, remember? We apparently just use each other. You scratch my back, I spit in your mouth, quid pro quo.”

“Okay, I’m going now,” Ten declared, wrenching his arm from your grasp to grab his sketchbook, pencils, and backpack before taking off.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it. I don’t see you like that at all, I just... I got defensive and snapped. It’s not an excuse, but still, I want you to know that I don’t mean anything I said. I’m sorry.” Renjun shifted uncomfortably on his feet, but you could see the genuine remorse on his features.

You breathed in, then out.

“I’m sorry too,” you sighed, letting your voice relax back to the natural softness that it held around Renjun. “You’re your own person, aside from just ‘Ambassador Huang’s son.’ I’m sorry for treating you like anything other than Renjun.”

“It’s not that I’m not super proud to be his son or anything, I think he’s really awesome. He was my hero growing up; still is. I mean, I’m going into the same field as him. Kind of. You know? It’s just because we’re going to be doing the same kind of thing, I want to be able to be looked at for what I do. Good or bad.”

“Bad? You plan on using your degree for evil, Renjun?” You teased, scooting over on the bench seat to take Ten’s previous spot and freeing up a place for Renjun to scoot in beside you.

“I could,” he played along, gladly taking the seat offered.

The two of you made eye contact, then burst into laughter at the same time.

“What?” He questioned in mock offense. “I think I’d make a great evil dictator, personally. You don’t think so?”

“Not at all, you’d be great at it.”

“Thank you. My friends don’t take my threats so seriously.”

“Which will ultimately be their downfall.”

Renjun looked back out at the campus in front of you two, his voice turning serious again, “But, seriously, I mean, I don’t want people having all these lofty expectations for me and then be disappointed when I don’t change the whole world, nor do I want them making things easy for me because they know my dad.”

“That’s fair. Unattainable, but fair to wish for,” you nodded in understanding.

“Ugh...” He slumped forward, dropping his head into his arms atop the table.

“Look, Renjun…” You rested one hand on his arm as the other rubbed up and down his back supportively. “You can’t change who your dad is, and you said it yourself, it’s not like you’re ashamed of him either. So don’t brag, and don’t be a dick when somebody brings him up either. Just do your best to show people who Huang Renjun is. And if they still don’t get it, that’s their loss. Because I already know him, and I think he’s pretty cool.”

Renjun sat back up to look you in the face with a skeptical eyebrow raised. “You’re such a cheeseball. Aren’t sirens supposed to be alluring and enchanting?”

“Shut up! I will drown you! See how alluring I am when you’re under a siren call,” you huffed, crossing your arms over your chest.

“I’m kidding.” He grinned at you, nudging your shoulder with his. “That really did make me feel better, thank you, Y/N.”

You smiled back. “You’re welcome, Renjun.”

The two of you kept smiling at each other for a moment before he broke the eye contact, looking down at his hands then shifting his gaze back to the courtyard.

“Uhm, while we’re airing stuff out about last night...” He cleared his throat awkwardly.

“Yeah, Junnie?” You tilted your head to the side, watching as his cheeks started flushing.

“I don’t think I ever said thank you. I kind of popped off on you right after... everything. But thank you, for taking care of me before, during, and after. It didn’t even occur to me to talk about what we could and couldn’t do beforehand. Thank you for that, and for getting me the water. And... all of it in between...” His ears were bright red too at this point, but he managed to look you in the eye as he gave you his genuine gratitude.

You nodded in understanding. “You’re welcome. I’m glad that you felt cared for during all of it. In addition to, you know, everything else you felt.”

“Mm, yeah.” He rubbed the back of his neck.

Studying his face curiously, you said, “You look like you want to ask me something else.”

“Well, I feel like you still weren’t very clear on the ‘eat me alive’ thing.”

You rolled your eyes. “Gods, Junnie, I’m not going to actually eat you—”

“I mean...” Renjun took a deep breath. “I kind of always feel like I’ve got a little bit of siren venom in me when I’m around you, Y/N. My heart races, and my skin is warm, and everything is just better when I’m with you. I want to see you when you’re not around, and when things are hard for you, I want to make everything better. I like you, and between the Dr. Magic deal, and our stupid academic rivalry, and what we did last night, I don’t know what I am to you, but that’s how I feel.”

If someone had told freshman you that Huang Renjun would ever say words like that to you, you’d have laughed in their face to the point of tears— or slapped them. And yet, in that moment, you weren’t surprised in the slightest. It was the most natural, beautiful, delightful, perfect thing that could’ve happened. Just like you leaning over to give him a modest, near-demure kiss on the cheek, absolutely beaming at him as you pulled back.

“I like you too, Renjun,” you admitted.

His eyes went wide before a broad, tender smile spread across his features and he wrapped an arm around your shoulders. He let out a drawn-out sigh of relief, “Ohh, that’s one weight off my chest for this week.”

You laughed in agreement. “Me too. Actually makes everything feel lighter.”

“Yeah, it does,” he said, squeezing your shoulder. “So how much do I owe you?”

“What?”

“You said you were going to invoice Dr. Magic. For the browser extension, and the color copies, and whatever else. How much do I owe you?”

You tapped a finger against your chin, pretending to think before a smirk pulled across your lips. “Mm, should be exactly the price of one nice dinner and a movie.”

“Dinner and a movie? Just how many copies were you making?” He asked with a chuckle and a shake of his head.

“A nice dinner,” you reiterated. “I paid those CompSci majors fairly for their time.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

Friday night after your last midterm, you were knocking on Huang Renjun’s door. The two of you had seen each other this week for your Linguistics in MCS class, but had been utterly locked into academic mode and hadn’t met up aside from that. So, per his invite, you were here in your “midterms best”— i.e., the pajamas you had been wearing at your own apartment since submitting your last mid-semester draft earlier today. You’d been told this wasn’t going to be a fancy affair.

Judging by the pajamas that Renjun had also answered the door wearing—giving you vivid déjà vu to the last time you were here—you were dressed appropriately for the occasion. He led you in by the hand, informing you there was something he wanted to show you in the kitchen.

You came to a stop in front of a plate piled high with small, pillow-shaped pieces of dough, some with bursts of red sauce leaking out of them. You couldn’t help but let out a sputtering laugh. “Pizza rolls? Did midterms scramble the egg on your face so bad that you missed the part where I said nice dinner?”

You might not have ever eaten pizza rolls, but you knew what section of the grocery store they came from.

“I can’t even tell what that was supposed to be… You’re so beautiful…” He was staring at you with a look of pure adoration, and surprised you by giving you a fleeting peck on the cheek, gone as soon as you’d realized what he was doing. Your hand instinctually came up to brush at your skin, almost in disbelief, as he went back to explaining his plans for tonight. “Anyway, I didn’t get to give you your first pizza roll the other night, and I figured that the last thing you actually wanted right after midterms week was to go out to some hoity toity place and be out at the movie theater really late, right? So, I’ve got pizza rolls, peanut butter cookies, your seaweed tea, and like way more snacks and candy and stuff. So we can chill and watch whatever movies you want tonight, unwind from midterms. And then next weekend, we’ll do your nice dinner and go to the movie theater. Think of it as an IOU.”

A fond smile tugged at the corner of your mouth as you nodded your approval. “Mmm… you’re right. This is great, Junnie. Thank you.”

Set up on Renjun’s couch with the assortment of snacks—pizza rolls included—and your first movie chosen, you settled in next to him, knee to knee, under the same blanket as the two of you ate. You decided that pizza rolls weren’t that bad (you still liked peanut butter sandwich cookies better), convinced Renjun to try some of your ocean flakes again—a favorite snack of sirens, which he’d already tasted on one occasion at a Dr. Magic hunting session and hated—to similar results, and finished off a bottle of seaweed-infused tea by the time the first movie was about a third of the way done. At this point, you were pretty satiated food-wise, and set your empty drink bottle on the coffee table to sit back on the couch.

Linking your arm with Renjun’s, you rested your head on his shoulder as he was still finishing up his plate of pizza rolls. “That was good, Renjun. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I call dibs on little spoon first, by the way.”

“Damn.”

Once he was done eating as well, you laid down to eagerly take your promised place as little spoon. Renjun stayed partially propped up against the arm of the couch so he could see the TV as you were nestled back against his chest, one of his arms slung over your waist. Your fingers played with his under the blanket absentmindedly as you got used to your new place, with him, in his arms.

“Renjun?” You said into the quiet. The only noises were coming from the TV. The movie was nearly done, just a couple little resolving scenes after the climax left. You’d seen it plenty of times before—both of you had, it was a favorite that you’d discovered you two shared earlier in the semester—which was why you’d picked it, an easy watch that you both liked. But nothing that required your full attention, so you could talk or miss scenes if you wanted.

“Yeah?” He responded just as softly.

“This is really nice. Hanging out, just us. No school, no Dr. Magic.”

“I know. Almost doesn’t feel real.”

“What? That we’re hanging out without trying to kill each other?”

He let out a couple laughs, catching your hand that had been playing with his under the blanket and lacing your fingers together. “I think there’s definitely some people that would be shocked to see us right now. But I meant more-so that we don’t have any schoolwork to do right now, and that the whole Dr. Magic thing is finally over. Other than the dinner that I owe you.”

“Oh… I owe you… I-O-U…” you sounded the words and letters out slowly. “I get it now.”

“God, you’re perfect,” he sighed dreamily, brushing your hair away from your face to press two kisses to your temple in quick succession.

You turned over to face him to properly protest, “Hey, I didn’t grow up around humans, you know that, right? I just came here to go to school! I moved here like, two weeks before our first day of freshman year—”

“I’m not making fun of you, Y/N!” He promised, sandwiching your hand between both of his and squeezing it tightly. “I respect how difficult it must have been for you to acclimate to the new culture and city when you moved, and so suddenly, on top of starting school. I just love y- love when you do that. Genuinely, I’m so charmed by it. Endeared. Bewitched. Whatever word you want to use. It’s something I never noticed until this semester, when we started doing the Dr. Magic stuff together. Despite knowing you for so long, in the department, in classes.”

“You know what I never knew about you before this semester, Junnie?”

“What?”

“That you were such a softie,” you snickered fondly. “I thought you were all textbooks and GPA and flashcards and whatever.”

The human ducked his head bashfully. “It’s something I’ve been working on this year.”

“Between this and Dr. Magic, I think you’ve been doing pretty well.”

“Thanks.”

“So, why did you do it, Junnie?” You asked curiously. “Not be a softie, I mean, but…”

“What? Be Dr. Magic?” He clarified, to which you nodded. “I didn’t mean to make a persona like that, really. I had to pick a screenname, and the guys had jokingly called me that a couple times when I helped them out with some problems. That’s all.”

“I know why you started the account. Knowledge. That’s also why you didn’t get the credit. You just needed to know. Though, the story behind the name is cute,” you pinched his cheek, and he tried to deter your hand with his shoulder half-heartedly. “I mean more like, why were you hiding your IP and using VPNs and stuff before you even knew that I was trying to track you down? In the fall.”

“I made the first couple posts from the school computers just because I like to do my work there, I wasn’t trying to cover anything up. Then I pictured what I’d do if I found someone posting like I was on the forums. And I would’ve tried to find out who they were. So I started covering my tracks a bit more intentionally after that. Didn’t want any groupies rolling up on me.” He pinched your side teasingly with the last sentence, and you slapped his hand away with an eye roll.

“Oh shut up!” You scoffed, ignoring his hands as he tried to pull you back towards him again.

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding, I’m sorry,” he apologized through his chuckles. “If anything I’m your groupie, I swear. Your number one fan from the moment you showed me your conspiracy board.”

“Mm, fine.” You scooted closer to him, letting him wrap his arms around you once more. “Glad we got that cleared up.”

Renjun shifted to lay on his back, and you easily followed the move to snuggle in mostly on top of him, resting your head in the crook of his neck and your hand on his waist, fingers innocently smoothing over a patch of skin above his hipbone where his shirt had ridden up. It sounded like the credits were on by now, but you didn’t really care about picking another movie as Renjun hummed along to the familiar song that played over the scrolling names. You’d sing along too, if you were alone at your own place. But now you didn’t dare even hum like the human with you for fear of what it could do to him. Renjun’s voice was plenty lovely enough though, even just this casual little bit humming. You’d see if you could get him to sing for you properly one of these days. If an opportunity came before graduation. Who knew what your days would even look like before then.

Gods, graduation. You felt like you could shrivel up and die just thinking about it. Not to mention that you hadn’t even told Renjun that you’d—

“Hey. What are you thinking about?” He suddenly asked, his disapproving tone clear.

You gulped. “How could you tell I was thinking about something?”

“For one, you’ve got your bad thinking face on.” He pinched your bottom lip. “You pout. It’s very dramatic. You look very concerned.”

“I have different thinking faces?”

“Yeah, you look different when you’re studying. I’ve seen you do plenty of that to know the difference. And you’ve got a third face when you’re contemplating. Usually you do that one when you’re looking at menus.”

“I didn’t know I was apparently an open book.” You covered your face with your hands in embarrassment.

“It’s cute, Y/N. You’ve got a cute face, and you make cute facial expressions with it, don’t cover it up.” He gingerly grabbed your hands to encourage you to take them off. “Except I am worried about what’s making you make your bad thinking face right now. What’s wrong?”

With a sigh, you pushed up into a sitting position. Renjun followed your lead curiously, a thoughtful frown on his own features as he watched you pull your knees to your chest.

“Renjun, I need to tell you something.”

He regarded you with a skeptical eyebrow raised. “Okay… go for it.”

Nervously, you smoothed out some wrinkles in your pajama pants as you confessed, “Uhm, Dr. Kwon asked me to carry the banner at commencement. I said yes.”

“I knew that.”

“What?” You looked up at him in disbelief.

“Well, since it was midterms already, I figured that if they’d picked me, they would have asked me by now and since they hadn’t, then they must have picked you. I was just waiting for you to tell me so I could tell you… Congrats.” Renjun grinned brightly at you, reaching out to rest his hand on your arm.

“You’re not upset?” You asked trepidly.

“We’re not petty little freshmen anymore, Y/N. No, I’m not upset. I’m proud of you, you deserve it.”

“So did you.”

“Not any more than you did.” He shook his head firmly. “So would you just accept my congrats already?”

You gave a small, shaky smile. “Thank you…”

“There we go.”

“This is what I was so freaked about… when we went to get froyo.”

“You were afraid of me being mad at you for being picked to carry the banner?” Renjun asked incredulously.

“I didn’t know how to tell you!” You defended yourself. “And now I have to do the commencement practices, on top of senior capstone and my extracurriculars…”

He wrinkled his nose. “Ew, commencement practices. So glad I didn’t get picked now, actually.”

“And that was so convincing, Junnie.”

“You remember what you said to me when we got froyo?”

Scrunching your face up, you struggled to think back to the exact conversation you had that day—you’d been really stressed. “Uh, ‘exactly two gummy sharks on mine please?’”

“Well, yeah, your hyper-specific froyo order—”

“Throwing stones at black kettles much?” You teased.

“Excuse me?” Renjun’s eyes went wide.

“Is that not—? I really thought I got it that time.”

“Did you mean to say ‘throwing stones in glass houses’ and/or ‘the pot calling the kettle black?’”

“…Yes.”

He turned very serious as he went to tenderly cradle your face in his hands. “I’m going to kiss you in like two seconds after I finish what I was saying, okay?”

“Oh, okay,” you agreed weakly, wishing very much that he’d just do it now instead of making you wait. He then let your face go.

“When we were talking about wanting people to know that we’re smart,” Renjun clarified. “You said that we’re both like that, and you knew that you were like that. And then you asked me if I knew that I was like that. I had tried to swear up and down this entire time that I was doing all of this—the needing to be the best—for myself. But it wasn’t. I’m like that too. That’s kind of what Dr. Magic was, me taking a step back from needing everyone to know I was the smartest person in the room. A quasi-experiment, to see if I could do it.”

“I think that after graduation, maybe we both chill on being the smartest person in the room, and try to just spend a summer working on that magical bucket list of yours?” You suggested.

“Oh?” He perked up at this. “Really?”

“You ever seen a werewolf shift?”

“No…”

“That sounds like a ‘not yet’ to me.”

“Sounds like a plan.” He confirmed with a conspiratorial grin that mirrored the one that you could feel across your own face. “You know how sirens can’t get dosed up on their own venom?”

“Yeah…” You nodded, wondering where he could be going with this.

“Well, I know a witch with a proprietary love potion blend that I think we might be able to modify to produce similar effects.”

“Fascinating.” You thought on this for a second, very quickly running through your knowledge of potion properties to imagine what it could be. “Two-factor blood potion?”

“Yes. But we’d put your venom in it instead of your blood so it wouldn’t kill me.”

“That could work…” You mused. “Speaking of, I should really give you a full dose one of these days.”

He breathed in sharply. “That wasn’t a full dose?”

“Nope.”

“Holy shit…”

“Have you ever watched a phoenix reincarnation?” You added another suggestion to your joint summer bucket list.

“Have you? Wouldn’t that literally blind us?” Renjun questioned, something akin to genuine concern on his face now.

You shrugged. “Allegedly. It’s never been recorded in a lab setting, so who really knows.”

“I think we’re going to get each other killed before we can get our PhDs,” he declared with a fond smile and shake of his head.

“Hey, the betting pools said we’d kill each other by junior year, so I think we’re doing well for ourselves.”

“Do you think we can collect on those bets when we graduate and we’re both still alive and have all of our limbs?”

“We’ll burn that bridge when we get there.”

“Oh my god, come here,” Renjun groaned deliriously, kneeling to grab your face with two hands and crash his lips to yours. You curled your fingers in the front of his shirt, pulling him down with you as you fell back against the arm of his couch, still connected.

Yeah, you’d drive off that burning bridge when you got there.

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letsnotdoanything · 6 months

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❧ word count: 17.4k ❧ warnings: cursing, like... grossly adorable petnames just abandon ship now if you’re going to be a hater about it ❧ genre: fluff, modern magical creatures au, fantasy au, college au, dragon jisung, human reader, ft. various other magical dreamies and human!renjun, fake not dating/secret dating trope, same universe as strawberry sunday ❧ extra info: this work is set in the same universe as strawberry sunday but can be read as a standalone! there is no continuing plotline between fics in this universe, they simply take place in the same world/magic system and may have overlapping characters (neos may pop up in more than one work!) ❧ author’s note: here’s dragon jisungie too! this one was so much fun to write and idk y’all i think he’s just the loml now. anyway, cue the shenanigans <;33

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ explore the strawberry sunday universe more here!

“Isn’t it always the dragon that the princess needs to be rescued from in the fairytales?” You teased, bumping his shoulder with yours.

“Well maybe in this one, the dragon’s the hero—” Jisung wrapped his arms around your waist, picking you up and spinning you around. “—and rescues the princess from the crazed madman.”

“Do you like Jisung?”

Renjun’s deadpan question in the silence of the library nearly made you do a spit take all over your laptop.

After choking through the sip of your pink Gorgonade you’d just taken, you set the bottle down and looked at your human friend with wide eyes. “Excuse me?”

“Park Jisung. Our good dragon buddy. Do you like him?” Renjun repeated with an inquisitive tilt of his head.

“Yeah, sure, he’s cool.” You kept your voice as level as possible, returning your fingers to your keyboard.

“You know what I meant.”

“And clearly, I’m not answering,” you retorted. “Now can we get our project done?”

You and Renjun were both Magical Creatures Studies majors at your college and had met up at the library this particular afternoon to work on a project together. The two of you also had lots of mutual friends, including the aforementioned Park Jisung. And sure, maybe you did have a little bit of a crush on the dragon, but there was no way you were just going to start yammering on about it in the middle of the library after being asked so abruptly.

Your friend narrowed his eyes at you, but ultimately relented. “Fine. But this isn’t over.”

“Of course it’s not,” you sighed.

Finally done with your PowerPoint slides later that evening, you sent a quick text before shutting your laptop. Renjun flopped back in his seat with a groan.

“Thank fuck, my eyeballs are burning.” He rubbed at his eyes with the heels of his palms.

“Have you tried out those enchanted blue light glasses that fairies use?” You suggested, resting your cheek in your palm to watch your friend sympathetically. Fairies’ eyes were more sensitive to electronic screens than humans or other magical beings, so they had to wear special enchanted versions of the blue light lenses that some humans wore for eyestrain. Renjun was a human, but if the screens were hurting his eyes this bad, it was worth a shot.

“I would except they’re so goddamn expensive, and Chenle won’t let me touch his even to try before I buy.”

“What about that other fairy that Mark and Donghyuck know? You’ve met him before at a study session, right?”

“Who— oh, right, uh… Jungwoo. Maybe… but I really don’t want to be asking a fairy that I don’t know for a favor, even something so small. I barely ask the one that I do know for anything, and when I do, I always regret it.”

You snickered. “That’s fair. Seems like you’re just going to suffer for the rest of your life then, Renjun.”

“Oh, woe is me,” he sighed dramatically, taking his hands off his eyes to start packing up his stuff.

“You know who I bet could help you with your whole eye problem?”

“Who?”

You shouldered your backpack, looking your friend in the eye very seriously. “The aliens, obviously.”

“Hey, you know what! They probably could!” Renjun huffed indignantly, grabbing his bag to follow you out of the library.

You were laughing as he kept ranting at you.

“Listen, you guys shit on me way too much for this. And aliens probably could help me with my eye problems if they ever came to Earth, because then they’d have very advanced technology and could very well have the engineering capabilities to make me a screen or a pair of glasses—”

“Or a new pair of bionic eyeballs.” You offered up.

“Exactly!” He threw his hands up as you spotted a familiar figure waiting at the bottom of the library stairs.

Park Jisung was standing there, tapping his hands against his thighs as he looked around awkwardly. You could see the glint of gold chains and pendants around his neck, and even more gold adorning his ears, wrists, and fingers. Dragons were a lot like magpies, you always thought to yourself, they liked shiny things. If magpies could breathe fire, of course.

You were nearly out of breath laughing as you slowed to a stop next to Jisung. Renjun was red-faced, still huffing and puffing.

Jisung’s slit pupils flicked back and forth between the two of you, bewildered, “What—?”

“I just can’t believe you literally breathe fire and have wings,” Renjun jabbed a finger against Jisung’s chest. “And yet it’s sooo crazy and funny and weird that I think that there could be aliens out there in the grand unknown infinite expanse of the universe that we’re in.”

Your dragon friend rubbed a hand over the spot that Renjun had poked, looking personally wounded. He turned to you for an explanation. “What happened this time?”

“Don’t—” You got cut off by another round of laughs. “Don’t worry about it, Ji.”

The human was starting to calm down, and seemed to have finally processed that Jisung had apparently miraculously been waiting outside the library when you two walked out. After all, the dragon didn’t have a backpack, laptop, or seemingly any school supplies on him. “Wait, what are you doing here, Jisung?”

“Oh, I was just waiting for Y/N.”

“Well, we’ll see you tomorrow, Renjun.” You waved goodbye to your human friend before he could say anything else, grabbing Jisung’s arm and pulling him off in the opposite direction.

Jisung spoke up a few seconds later. “Uh, Y/N?”

“Yeah?”

“Boba’s the other way.”

“Right. Sorry.” You made a face, awkwardly letting him change course and lead the way. “I was just trying to get out of there.”

“Why?”

“Oh, you know, Renjun was going on another one of his alien rants,” you fibbed a little, biting on the inside of your cheek.

Jisung snorted, and you watched a small puff of smoke shoot out of his nose, curling up into the air before entirely dissipating. “Thanks. How’d he get going this time?”

“Blue light glasses.”

His brow furrowed, the corner of his lip pulled up, and his nose wrinkled as he seemed to be trying to figure out how the jump was made from blue light glasses to aliens. Several of his sharp fangs were visible before his mouth relaxed again. “How—”

“You know it’s better not to ask with him.”

He sighed. “You’re right. I’m just glad we got out of there unscathed. Or at least I did. How about you? Are you in one piece still?”

Then Jisung’s two big, warm hands were on you, jokingly inspecting your hands, your arms, your neck, and your face for any harm done. You giggled, letting him turn over your arms and hold your hands and run his thumbs over your cheeks until he seemed satisfied, finishing it off with a pat to the top of your head.

“Yeah, I think I’m all here.” You absolutely knew that you were looking up at him with heart eyes. “Thanks for coming as quick as you did, any longer and I don’t think I would’ve made it this time.”

You were referring to the quick few minutes that had passed between you texting him that you were done with your project and when you actually laid eyes on him outside the library. It couldn’t have been more than five minutes, and it wasn’t like he had come from anywhere on campus: today was Saturday.

“Of course, I’ll always be around to rescue you from Renjun’s rants, you damsel in distress.”

“Isn’t it always the dragon that the princess needs to be rescued from in the fairytales?” You teased, bumping his shoulder with yours.

“Well maybe in this one, the dragon’s the hero—” Jisung wrapped his arms around your waist, picking you up and spinning you around. “—and rescues the princess from the crazed madman.”

You couldn’t help the cackling laughter that poured from your mouth, holding on against his supernaturally strong arms as he spun you once, twice, three times for good measure. Once you were back on two feet again, you had to clutch onto his upper arm to steady yourself as you regained your bearings. When you were sure you could walk in a straight line, you resumed your journey down the sidewalk together.

“And then the princess and the dragon fall in love and live happily ever after instead?” The words were out of your mouth before you could process the implications of them.

The dragon’s midnight blue eyes blinked at you a couple of times, and you opened your mouth to start the fastest backpedaling of your life, but then he just slung a casual arm around your shoulders.

“Yeah, something like that.” He shrugged. “Why not? I think that’s a pretty great ending. Almost as good as the dragon eating the crazed madman, which is what I was thinking.”

“Could do both,” you suggested, eyes glued to your feet.

Jisung laughed, and you looked up at him to make sure you caught his bright smile as he did. “I like that even better. Both.”

At Jasmine & Pearls, you happily accepted your drinks from Shotaro, the siren working behind the counter, before taking them to go. There was a small waterfront park just around the corner, and fall was starting to descend, meaning that it wouldn’t be too hot to just sit out there. You two walked a couple minutes down the trails away from the noisier playground to a secluded area, and found a nice soft patch of clover, wildflowers, and grasses to sit down on. Taking a sip of your boba and tilting your head back, you relished in the feeling of the warmth of the sun’s rays on your face. This was just a perfect Saturday. You had finished up your project, it was beautiful weather, and now you’re hanging out with Jisung.

“Hey, Jisung?” You pulled your head back up to look at him.

“Hm?” He raised his eyebrows, lifting his straw to his lips.

“How did you get to campus so fast?”

The dragon coughed on his drink for a second, and you were momentarily afraid of him actually choking on a tapioca pearl, but he thankfully pulled through. He scratched at the back of his neck, looking down at his drink as he mumbled something so quiet that you couldn’t make out a single word of it.

“What?”

“I was at the bakery,” he admitted, enunciating much clearer this time.

You immediately knew which one he was talking about. Half Moon Bakery, where your werewolf friend Jeno worked. It was just around the block from campus, not even a two-minute walk.

“Oh, were you and Chenle bothering Jeno at work?” That was one of Chenle’s favorite pastimes: causing mischief and having Jisung tag along. Not that Jisung didn’t often participate too, but it was typically the fairy’s idea.

“No, just me. I was… I was waiting for you to finish up at the library.”

A happiness swelled up in your chest, and your fingers itched to do something with all the extra energy suddenly coursing through your veins. So you started plucking some of the clover and flowers in front of you.

“Well I’m glad you did, Ji,” you smiled softly at him. “After all, it made your dashing rescue a lot easier.”

Jisung just kept gazing at you for a few more seconds before he suddenly looked down, picking up his boba and sucking down half of it in one go. You swore his ears were pink as he went to ask you, “So uhm, what was the project that you and Renjun were working on?”

“Well it’s for our Special Topics in Magical Creatures Studies class. This semester Dr. Kwon is teaching it, so of course you know what it’s about.”

He stared blankly at you, and you suddenly remembered that not everybody you know is a Magical Creatures Studies major like you and Renjun.

“Oh, sorry. Well, Dr. Kwon was the first human to have an interspecies marriage legally—”

This time a dribble of milk tea came out of the side of Jisung’s mouth as he coughed on it, and you unzipped the front pocket of your bookbag to grab a couple napkins you had stashed in there at the shop. He took them from you gratefully, wiping at his mouth.

“Sprung a leak, Ji?” You asked with an eyebrow raise. “You alright?”

“I’m fine, I’m fine. Go ahead, sorry.”

“Anyway, Dr. Kwon technically had the first marriage certificate for an interspecies marriage between a human and magical being that listed each as such. Obviously, there’s been a long history of romantic relationships between species as long as everyone’s existed, and as long as people have been getting married. It’s just that within in the modern history of our current society and laws, Dr. Kwon was the first that we know of. There were definitely couples that got married before her but had to falsify their species on the certificate at the time, unfortunately. And the fact that Dr. Kwon is still you know, alive, and plenty well enough to be teaching a class on this stuff… it’s really humbling. I’m honored to learn from her but it’s also a little harrowing that it hasn’t even been one lifetime yet, you know?”

“So the class is about…” Jisung prompted you again.

“Right, it’s about specifically the history of interspecies marriage. Both between different kinds of magical creatures and between magical creatures and humans. Every time it’s Dr. Kwon’s turn to teach Special Topics, this is what she teaches.”

“And, what is her spouse?”

“Siren. Mrs. Kwon will come in and guest lecture sometimes, too.”

“So… your project?”

“Just a five-minute presentation on a topic of our choice that relates to the unit we just did. She gave a list of topics, or we could come up with our own and get it approved. Renjun and I chose the role that religion plays in interspecies marriage. Because different creatures have different belief systems, gods and goddesses, and marriage rituals in their faith. Like dragons, for example.”

“Huh?!” He squeaked. Thankfully, he was out of boba tea, and therefore didn’t do a spit take all over you or something.

“Many dragons—I’m not saying you in particular, just historically—have worshipped the Sun and fire. Their marriage rituals often involved making offerings to the Sun by burning said offerings on a pyre. Now imagine a dragon and a siren want to get married. Sirens that usually not only have their weddings underwater for one, but believe that burning wedding offerings instead of throwing them into the water will offend the Sea. It’s not impossible, it’s just fascinating to witness the compromise, especially as it gets more common with integration. And I find it beautiful, every single time.”

Jisung rested his elbow on his knee, then his cheek in his head, mindlessly running his fingertips over the clover. “Yeah? And what’s the divorce rate like for interspecies marriage?”

“Better than intraspecies, actually.”

“Really?”

“Uh-huh.” You added in another flower to your weaving. “Fifty percent intraspecies, fifteen to twenty percent interspecies depending on the study you’re citing. The numbers on interspecies are obviously newer, and a bit harder to measure due to varying lifespans, but those are the ones that we work with in the field.”

“Interesting.”

“You want to know my theory?”

“Sure.”

“This one’s not peer-reviewed or anything, so don’t tell the other MCS majors, okay?”

“My lips are sealed,” he promised.

“Now, I’ve never been married, but… I think that if you’re too focused on what makes you the same, you’ll completely miss your differences and only realize them too late when those differences are eventually driving you apart. But if you start out already with these glaringly obviously differences and then find what makes you similar in addition to the differences—not in spite of them—then you get a clearer picture of who you’re with.”

You’d been so focused on your little task that you hadn’t looked up at Jisung a single time as you talked, but now you did, wondering why he was so quiet. He had gone still, staring at you, mouth parted, head tilted.

“What?” You looked around anxiously. “Did that not make sense? I thought that made sense?”

He shook his head. “No, no, that made sense. You just… gave me a lot to think about.”

“Careful, don’t hurt yourself with all that thinking,” you giggled, getting up onto your knees.

“Hey!”

“Shh, I’m kidding,” you reassured him, taking a couple kneeling steps closer to him and holding the clover and flower wreath you’d been weaving up towards his head.

“And when did you make that?”

“While you were staring at the ground. Now hold still.”

You gently set it down on his head, scooting it around and readjusting until you were content that it wasn’t going to fall off too easily. Sitting back on your feet, you admired your work. If it weren’t for his vertical slit pupils focused entirely on you as he gazed up at you, Jisung would’ve looked like a beautiful fairy prince. Enchanting, a clover and flower crown nestled atop his hair, faintly rosy cheeks, skin seeming to glow in the dappled light from the late afternoon sun shining in through the trees.

“There you go,” you murmured, realizing how close you were to him as you caught a familiar smoky smell like a campfire.

“Can you show me how to do that?” He asked, his eyes shining.

You couldn’t help but chuckle at his enthusiasm, plopping back down onto your bottom. Well, there goes all that tension dissolved.

“Sure, Jisung. We’re going to start with three clovers and a flower. Whatever flowers you can find around here should be good.”

And so you guided the dragon through the steps of weaving a clover crown of his own. You yourself had learned this from Jaemin the first time you’d ever hung out with the dryad without Renjun around. Renjun had been the one to introduce you to all of his friends, Jisung included. You’d met Renjun in your Intro to Magical Creatures Studies class on your very first day of college two years ago, and your life had never been the same since. Your own hometown was mostly human, in fact there was exactly one family of basilisks there and that was it. That’s why you chose the major you did, to expand your world. And man, it had been expanded since.

Jaemin had invited you out to the park with him that particular day to “exercise Jeno” in the dryad’s words, which meant sitting in the grass and throwing a ball for Jeno to catch— with his hand. Except the ball was enchanted to change direction and run away from Jeno for a certain amount of time, then he’d finally get it, and toss it back to you or Jaemin to throw again. At the time, it felt wrong to be pretty much playing fetch with a werewolf—derogatory, even—so you had asked Jeno about how he felt about it after. He explained that the ball was invented by werewolves, for werewolves. Since werewolves don’t hunt their prey for sustenance anymore, they tend to have a lot of extra energy. Most days he would go to the gym or go on a run or bike ride to get it out, but today was such a nice day that he wanted to go out with his friends instead. While some werewolves didn’t like comparisons to dogs (such as Jaemin’s offer to “exercise Jeno”), Jeno didn’t mind them usually, as long as it was from friends, and truly in good fun.

It was on that park trip, while sitting in the clover with Jaemin, that the dryad had shown you how to weave a clover crown by hand. Even now, every time you saw a patch of clover, you thought about Jaemin and Jeno and that day at the park, and how to weave clover crowns.

“How are you friends with two dryads and you don’t know how to weave clover crowns?” You asked with mock disappointment as Jisung was about a third of the way through his.

“Do you honestly think they’re going to be jumping to teach me their secrets? Probably too afraid I’d set the whole patch of clover on fire,” Jisung grumbled, adding another flower to the crown as he continued his weaving.

You frowned, gently stroking the back of his head as you watched over his technique. “You know Jaemin and Donghyuck don’t think of you like that.”

He scoffed, “Yeah, they think of me like Chenle’s pet.”

“Hey!” You flicked his ear, earning a hiss. He rubbed his ear with one hand, pouting at you.

“They are your friends,” you said sternly. “I think you might realize that if you eased up on your little hermit dragon schtick.”

“Dragons are solitary creatures. Didn’t you learn that in Intro to MCS?”

“I’ll believe that you’re solitary as soon as you and Chenle detach from where you’re currently fused at the hip.”

“He’s not here now!”

“To my knowledge. He could be hiding in a trashcan or something, I don’t know.”

Jisung rolled his eyes. “His Highness would never hide in a trashcan.”

“Point taken,” you snickered.

“Well…” The dragon held up his finished clover crown for you to see. “What do you think?”

It was clearly his first attempt at one, crooked, with holes in several places, and a couple of the blue flowers he’d chosen falling out as he set it in your hands. But you still found it absolutely adorable, endearing.

“It’s great, Ji!” You praised him, turning it around to look at the weave patterns on the inside more closely. “Here, do you want to wear this one, and I can—”

“No, this one’s yours.” He took it right back, getting up on his knees like you had before to place it on your head.

You sat utterly still to let him do so, watching him with bated breath. He was perhaps even more focused on placing the clover crown on your head than he was on making it, his nose scrunched with concentration, mouth pouting just the slightest, and brow furrowed. Then, once he’d set it atop your head, he smiled to himself in satisfaction.

“So? How do I look?” You asked quietly, in the small space between the two of you.

“Like… like a princess,” Jisung answered breathily, in the narrow space between the two of you.

“Ji?” You said his name, in the minute space between the two of you.

“Yeah?” He replied, in the meager space between the two of you.

“Can I kiss y—” You didn’t even get to finish your request, as the infinite space between the two of you became a finite zero.

Kissing Jisung was warm, but not warm like the end-of-summer-turning-fall day you were enjoying before, warm like you were just feet away from a volcano, like you were kissing the very heart of a mountain. His hands cupped your cheeks as his lips meshed with yours. You had been propping yourself up with one hand behind you, but you felt the need to grab onto his arms to ground yourself. This was apparently just enough to throw your joint center of gravity off, as the both of you went toppling backwards—or, more precisely, you fell onto your back, with Jisung on top of you.

The dragon barely caught himself with a hand next to your head to keep from completely cracking his forehead against yours. You two still bonked noses, breaking the kiss, and giggled almost exactly in sync.

“Oops,” you laughed, reaching up to feel for your clover crown, happy that it was still kind of in the vicinity of your hair.

Jisung was using one hand to prop himself above you, and the other was readjusting his own clover crown to now sit on the back of his head. He was still grinning as he dipped down to kiss you again, and you held his face this time, running a thumb over his cheek.

Squished into one side of a booth in the student union with Jisung, you fervently read over your notes for your test in your next class.

“Fry,” Jisung murmured, holding said food up against your lips.

You opened your mouth without taking your eyes off your page, and he fed it to you. As you read about climate change’s effects on sirens’ native habitats, you chewed and swallowed the food without even tasting it. A moment later, a straw was pushed against your mouth too.

“Water.”

You took a sip to wash down the fry, humming contentedly as all the material in your notes was familiar to you. The test should be an uncomplicated A. Not an easy A, per se, but there shouldn’t be anything on it that surprised you, at least.

“What the hell?” Someone asked from beside your table, but you didn’t even look up. After all, you still had four more pages and only half an hour.

“What do you want, guys?” Jisung sighed. Oh, so more than one person. The first voice sounded familiar, probably some of your friends.

“What, uh, what’s going on here?” Different voice.

“Y/N’s studying. So if you don’t mind doing whatever this is later.”

Another fry. You chomped it down. Siren advocacy groups.

“Uh… sure. Yeah. You two… have fun. Come on, guys.” Third voice.

Water. Sip. Local community outreach.

When you came to a good stopping point in your notes—not quite done, but between topics—you finally looked up, setting your notebook down for a second. Jisung raised his eyebrows at you.

“Done already?” He asked, popping a fry into his own mouth.

You shook your head, taking a sip of your water on your own. “No, almost. Who was that?”

“Jeno, Jaemin, and Donghyuck.”

Hearing the names made the voices click into place. Donghyuck first, then Jeno, then Jaemin.

“Huh. Weirdos,” you scoffed. “Anyway, we still on for movie night at my place?”

“Absolutely. Chenle’s letting me borrow his box set of the director’s cut of those movies you wanted to watch.”

“Does Chenle know he’s letting you borrow these?”

“Yes, they’re hexed. If he weren’t letting me, they’d play the porno knockoff.”

You let out a full-body cackle. “Oh, that’s a good one. You can say a lot about His Highness, but you can’t say that he doesn’t have a sense humor.”

A couple weeks later, and all eight of you were meant to be having a study session together at the library. Seven of you were already there— Jisung was coming late from a class. You had been one of the first in the room, and immediately put a bag down on a chair next to you to save it for him.

You were so innocently humming along to your music in your headphones as you took notes when you saw a hand reaching to tap the table in front of you. Pausing your music, you took one headphone out to look at the owner of the hand—Donghyuck—inquisitively. “Yes?”

“So you and Jisung have been hanging out a lot recently…” He rested his chin in his hand.

You narrowed your eyes, “Well, yeah…”

“Her heartbeat went up when you mentioned Jisung,” Mark added oh-so-helpfully.

“Gee, thanks, Mark,” you scoffed at the basilisk. “You want to go ahead taste the air for my pheromones or whatever too while you’re at it? Really complete this bonkers supernatural interrogation?”

“And then there was the fry thing,” Jaemin added, pointing at you from his seat next to Donghyuck. “I haven’t forgotten that.”

Jeno shivered beside you, “I don’t think I ever can.”

“He’s going over to her apartment a lot for movie nights. He keeps asking to borrow my nice collector’s edition box sets,” Chenle added, not looking up from his laptop. He readjusted his blue light glasses. “I think he’s trying to impress her.”

You looked around at all of them incredulously. “Uh, guys, seriously? I think Jisung and I are allowed to hang out, watch movies together, and eat together considering we’re—”

“Y/L/N Y/N, I swear to god you better not say because you’re ‘besties’ right now,” Renjun cut you off, throwing air quotes up around the word ‘besties.’ “Seriously, how can two people be so oblivious?”

Oh. Holy shit. They all thought you and Jisung were still friends. Somehow, apparently none of them knew that you and Jisung had started officially dating since that day in the park three weeks ago.

You were just staring blankly between all six of them, not sure how to respond. Thankfully, the door to the study room was opened then, Jisung rushing in.

“Hey, I’m here!” His bright demeanor fell as soon as he noticed the tension in the room. “What’s going on? What’d I miss?”

“Nothing, Ji,” you turned to him with a smile. Taking your bag off the last chair in the study room, you told him sweetly, “Here, I saved you a seat next to me!”

“Oh, thanks, Y/N!” He happily took it, plopping his bag down on the table to take out his laptop.

After the study session was concluded, you all filed out together, you and Jisung right beside each other.

“Come on Jisung, I’ll drive,” Chenle called for his roommate, spinning his keys around his finger.

“Sure, hold on!” Jisung said back, waiting up to say goodbye to you.

“Renjun, you still up for ramen and ranting?” You clasped your hands together hopefully as you looked at your friend. It was ritual for you and Renjun to get together and rant over extra-spicy ramen whenever some drama had gone down within your department at the school. There’d been some going on this past week, and you and Renjun decided that late-night after studying was the perfect time to talk shit.

Except, he and Chenle seemed to lock eyes for a brief moment. And then, Renjun was checking his phone, throwing up his other hand, and sighing.

“Ah, Y/N, you know what,” he clicked his tongue. “I am so sorry, but I got a text from my dad while we were in that study session and he says the cat is sick. I’ve really got to go.”

“Your parents live three hours away—”

“Uh, Jisung! You like ramen!” Renjun gestured at the dragon that was still waiting next to you. “Why don’t you take Y/N for some ramen? Just- just you two?”

“That’s it! You’re taking too long, Jisung! I’m leaving you!” Chenle yelled dramatically from the front, giving his keys one last jangle before he quite literally ran off through campus.

You were too distracted watching Chenle incredulously to notice that Renjun had escaped too until you turned back around to talk to him. Then you realized that all of your friends had mysteriously dispersed.

“What just happened?” Jisung asked, looking around confused.

“I think… I think they set us up,” you scratched at your head.

“Like, a date? Don’t they…”

“I think they think they’re plotting to make us date.”

He blinked at you. You grabbed his arm to start walking down the sidewalks. “Come on, we can at least talk about this over some ramen.”

“Didn’t you tell them?” Jisung’s face seemed as though it was permanently stuck in the same bewildered expression. You two were side by side at your favorite 24-hour ramen bar by the university, and you had finally filled him in on what he missed in the study room.

You slurped up a noodle. “I thought you did.”

“I thought you were going to!”

“They were your friends first!” You retorted indignantly.

“Hey, I only claim Chenle,” he held up his chopsticks and spoon defensively. “The others just came along.”

It was true that Jisung had befriended Chenle first, and the others just sort of came with the fairy. After all, dragons did tend to be solitary creatures, and on top of that, you’d be hard-pressed to find one hanging out with a dryad on purpose, much less two.

“Speaking of Chenle, how did you not even mention it to him? You live with him!”

“Well, every time I was going somewhere with you I’d be like ‘Oh, I’m going to wherever with Y/N’ or ‘I’m going to Y/N’s place.’ It’s not like I could call you something else.”

You tilted your head curiously. “Something else?”

“Like… you know… my girlfriend,” Jisung mumbled, very focused on stirring up some of his broth.

“Well… you could.” You were getting warm, and not from the spicy ramen.

He looked up at you, a smile growing on his face. “Yeah?”

“Yeah…”

“Okay, on one condition.” He set down both his utensils, holding up the number one.

“What’s that?”

“You call me your boyfriend.”

“God you’re dumb sometimes,” you shook your head, but still had fondness in your tone and your actions as you brought your hand up, all five fingers up. “Yes, duh.”

Jisung got the idea, opening the rest of his hand back up to lace all of his fingers with yours. You squeezed his hand, your stomach doing flips at the softness in his eyes as he looked at you.

The two of you brought your hands back down to keep eating, and your boyfriend circled your conversation back around to the entire reason you were here in the first place.

“Anyway, our friends.”

“Our friends,” you repeated unenthusiastically. “So… how are we going do it? They’re going to be annoying no matter how we go about it.”

“Good point. You know… they’re going to keep meddling if we don’t say anything. What if we just… let them?” He suggested.

“You’re proposing we fake not date and let them all run themselves in circles trying to connive us into dating?”

“How long do you think it’ll take them to notice?”

“A month,” you snorted.

“A month?” He scoffed. “Come on, they’re a bit dumb but they’re not that bad. Like, two weeks.”

“I think part of it’s going to depend on how stupid they think we are.”

That looked like it changed Jisung’s mind. “You’re so right, a month at least.”

“They’re going to kill us when they find out.”

“Don’t worry, the big scary dragon will protect you from their wrath, princess,” Jisung teased, throwing an arm around your shoulders to pull you closer and kiss your cheek.

You laughed, wrapping an arm around his waist. “Ji, never call yourself that again. Please. Even as a joke.”

“So how was ramen?” Renjun asked before you could even open your mouth for a ‘good morning’ the next day.

“So how’s the family cat?” You shot back, taking your seat next to him in the lecture hall. “I was expecting to have to send you the notes for today since you had to drive to your parents’ three hours away in the middle of the night to see it.”

“You know, funniest thing happened. I had just gotten back to my apartment to pack, and my dad called me back and said the little guy made a full recovery. The vet called it a miracle. So I got my beauty rest in my own bed.”

You rolled your eyes. “Glad to hear Mr. Mittens is doing better.”

“So how was ramen?” The human repeated.

“Oh, it was really good!” You gushed. “I got a different bowl than I normally order, extra spicy still even though you and I weren’t gossiping, and I really, really liked it! I might make it my go-to order now instead of what I usually get.”

Renjun looked at you stone-faced. “Not the food, Y/N.”

“I don’t get it.”

“You and Jisung…”

“Ate ramen.”

“And…”

“Then we went home?”

“Separately?”

“He walked me home if that’s what you’re asking?” You raised an eyebrow. “He always offers to, especially at night. It’s really nice of him.”

“Yeah,” Renjun said knowingly. “He’s so nice.”

That afternoon, you met up with Jisung between classes in the student union, tucked away in an oversized armchair. You retold the story of Renjun asking about ramen to him, and your boyfriend giggled with delight.

“I’m telling you, Sungie, he looked like he was about to pop a blood vessel when he heard that we apparently didn’t magically fall in love over a bowl of ramen,” you snickered.

“Serves him right,” Jisung declared.

“What do you think they’re going to do next?”

“Guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”

“In the meantime… movie night tonight?”

“I don’t know, I’m running out of Chenle’s box sets to impress you with.”

You laughed, gently nudging him in the side. “Guess you’ll just have to—”

“Hey… guys… what’s up?” Someone sputtered out from behind and just off to the side of the armchair.

Both you and Jisung whipped around to see Mark standing there, fountain drink in hand. He pulled his over-ear headphones off then, hanging them around his neck.

“Oh, hey Mark,” you waved at him, trying to play this off as casually as possible.

“Why are you two— you know,” he gestured vaguely to you and Jisung.

Jisung sat forward a bit, making the posing a bit less intimate with your faces further from each other. “Y/N and I both have time in between classes now, so we’re hanging out. I’d invite you on, but I don’t think there’s room. You can definitely pull up a chair or something and sit with us if you’ve got time though.”

“No, no, I’m good man,” the basilisk rejected the offer quickly. “Besides, I’ve got to meet up with Johnny for a thing, so, yeah. You two have fun… hanging out. Looks comfy.”

“Bye Mark!” You waved goodbye to him too, watching as he practically ran out of the building.

“Chenle asked me point blank if this was just a movie night,” Jisung informed you, plopping down onto your couch.

“Observant of him.” You sat down beside him and grabbed your remote to queue up the first movie. “And what did you say?”

“I asked him what else it could possibly be.”

“And that worked?”

“Yes,” your boyfriend huffed, a wisp of smoke shooting out his nose. “I don’t know if I should be relieved or offended that everyone is so willing to believe that I’m this stupid.”

With the DVD previews now playing, you set the remote down to get settled in for the movie. Jisung lifted an arm up for you to snuggle into his side, and you let out a contented sigh at the familiar warmth and smoky scent that enveloped you. It was like cuddling your own personal furnace.

“For now, be thankful, Ji,” you patted his chest. “After all, we’ll never know this kind of peace after they find out.”

He stroked a knuckle up and down your arm lazily. “Yeah... you’re right.”

“Of course I am.”

“Hey, look at me?” He requested, his voice a murmur. “You’ve got something on your mouth.”

You lifted your head up, confused. Just as you’d complied, the dragon swooped in, pressing his lips to yours in a dizzying kiss.

Your head was still spinning as he pulled away, running his thumb over your bottom lip, where his fangs had just been nibbling the moment prior.

“I-I thought there was something on my mouth?” You asked breathily.

“There was.” He smirked, still holding your chin in place. “It was my mouth.”

“Eep!” You let out a squeal as you nearly lost your balance, grabbing onto the shoulder of the closest person to keep from completely wiping out.

Jeno thankfully wasn’t very easy to knock over, and held your elbow to help you stay upright as you struggled to get reoriented. All your friends had gone ice skating today, and you were now realizing that you couldn’t even remember the last time you’d gone. You were a bit out of practice.

“You got it, Y/N?” The werewolf asked warily as you took a couple more cautious steps forward.

You wobbled a little. “Uh. No. Sorry, Jeno, just put me on the wall.”

“Here, you got her?” Jeno was talking to somebody else, but your eyes were glued to your skates to make sure you didn’t slip. So you weren’t even looking as the werewolf’s shoulder disappeared from your grip and was replaced by somebody else’s.

A warm hand was taking and moving yours, encouraging you to hold onto his upper arm for support. You immediately recognized it as Jisung’s, the only other person who would be this warm in the freezing temperature of the ice rink besides the werewolf who just left you. Pulling in closer to Jisung now, you felt a little bit more stable, and finally comfortable enough to look up from your feet to your boyfriend.

“Thanks, Ji,” you said genuinely, squeezing his arm.

“You’re welcome.” He smiled down at you. “Do you think you’re ready to start skating? The other guys have kind of abandoned us.”

Focusing your gaze ahead of you, you saw that your other six friends were way ahead of you on the rink. In fact, you couldn’t even see some of them at all, suspecting that they were about to be coming up behind you to lap you.

You nodded, preparing yourself mentally. “Yeah, I think I’m ready.”

And so you and Jisung started slowly moving along the ice together. Despite Jisung helping you stay upright initially—you still weren’t sure if he volunteered or was volunteered by your little matchmakers—he wasn’t really too adept of an ice skater either. He was truly only marginally better than you, so the two of you were slow going, and had a couple close calls in regards to stumbles. But you didn’t mind, you were spending time with your boyfriend and your friends. It was shaping up to be a really good day.

“Sorry, be right back. Bathroom break,” Chenle excused himself from the conversation you three were having at the moment, skating off at the next exit you passed by.

Craning your neck around, you realized that none of your friends were on the ice anymore. Renjun went to switch his skates out for a different size fifteen minutes ago, Mark and Jeno went to get food ten minutes ago, Jaemin and Donghyuck needed a water break five minutes ago, and now Chenle’s bathroom break.

“Huh…” You caught Jisung’s eye knowingly. “Looks like it’s just us now, Sungie…”

“Miraculously it is,” he agreed sarcastically.

“You think they’re coming back?”

Then both your phones went off, a text tone. Jisung stopped the two of you skating to take his out, showing that it was a text in your group chat with everybody.

[donghyuck: the concessions stand nachos gave mark food poisoning and he threw up everywhere so we’re all taking him home! you guys stay and skate though! have fun!]

“Guess not,” you sighed. “For Mark’s sake, and the poor employees’ sake, I hope that’s a complete lie.”

“Well, now that they’re gone…” Jisung turned to you, taking both of your hands in his and bringing them up to his mouth, blowing hot air over them. Your numb fingers quickly warmed up, and you watched his every move lovingly. He brought your hands back down from his mouth, eyes pleading, as he asked, “Can we go? I hate the cold.”

You laughed, nodding as you squeezed his hands. “Of course, yes.”

“Oh, thank you, thank you.” Jisung practically dragged you to the exit, lifting you with an arm around your waist to help you down the big step down from the rink to the main floor.

[jisung: did donghyuck ask you to meet him at the coffee shop in the student union in ten minutes?]

[you: no, but mark did]

[jisung: well, i'll see you in ten]

With a fond shake of your head, you pocketed your phone and started your journey across campus. Looks like you were going to have an impromptu coffee date with Jisung. You had to admit it, while their meddling could be annoying, it was a little fun sometimes to see when your next spontaneous date with your own boyfriend would be, as arranged by your six little matchmakers.

As you arrived at the small but extremely busy campus coffee shop, you surmised that you were the first one to get there, and hopped in the obscenely long line to at least order for yourself. You took out your phone to text your friend that you were supposed to be meeting.

[you: hey, i’m here! i’m in line, what do you want, in case i order before you get here?]

Mark did immediately text back his coffee order—which was actually an order for one of the “refreshers” that you were pretty sure was just a mix of various juices. Coffee was too bitter for his extremely sensitive snake tongue.

Your basilisk friend found you while you were still waiting for the drinks to come out, and once you had them in hand, the two of you went to find a spot to sit down together. You raised an eyebrow when he suggested a table with four chairs instead of the two-seater that you had spotted, but you shrugged and accepted his reasoning that it was in a quieter area. Sitting across from him, you put your bag in the seat next to you.

“So how’s your day going, Mark?” You asked him brightly, taking a sip of your drink.

“Hm? Oh, good, good.” His eyes flitted around the student union almost anxiously, as if he were anticipating something.

You pushed on in the conversation, however. “That’s good. And how are your powers coming along?”

Most natural-born magical creatures started developing their powers practically at birth, but basilisks didn’t come into theirs until after their first molting—which Mark just had last year. The last you’d heard, he’d partially petrified his human roommate Johnny back in the spring and had been working on getting them under control as they got stronger since.

“It’d be a lot better if Johnny would just let Taeil and Doyoung make him a protection charm so that I wouldn’t keep accidentally compelling and petrifying him,” Mark covered his face with a groan. “But no, he’s got this whole deal about wanting to make sure we all know he doesn’t think we’re monsters and he’s not afraid of us. Which is all well and good but like come on, maybe he should take at least some precautions when he’s like getting petrified by his basilisk roommate every week! So now I have to wear sunglasses around the apartment like I’m hungover 24/7.”

You winced sympathetically, not realizing the situation was that bad. “Maybe start sprinkling some weasel fur into his morning coffee?”

“Eugh, weasel fur coffee. I think you’ve described my actual worst nightmare.” Mark wrinkled his nose and looked like he was genuinely holding back a gag. “Anyway, I think he might notice if there were suddenly furs in his iced Americano every morning.”

“Maybe the witches can put it in something else innocuous that he’d use every day? It’d just be until you got a handle on your powers, remember.”

“If I ever do,” he sighed, stirring his straw around in his drink.

“You will, Mark,” you tried to reassure him. “It’s only been a year. These things take time.”

“Yeah, MCS major? Want to give me some statistics on basilisk powers to make me feel better?” He retorted, and you knew your friend well enough to understand that the words were meant to be light-hearted, despite the bitter and biting tone that they came out with instead.

You gave him a frank look. “I’m not Renjun. I’m not a walking, talking encyclopedia of magical creatures. But if you insist on making me think back to Intro to MCS… On average, basilisks take two to three years to reach full development of their powers after molting. You just molted a little over a year ago, you can’t put so much pressure on yourself to be perfect already, Mark.”

He ran a hand through his hair, forked tongue flicking in the air before he spoke again. “Fine, fine. You’re right. I knew all this, it’s just… it’s a lot more of a relief to hear it from somebody else.”

“I know what you mean, don’t worry,” you smiled at your friend.

He smiled back at you, genuinely, a flash of his two sharp snake fangs that hadn’t finished descending yet, then it turned sort of weird, before the smile fell entirely from his face. Mark sat forward in his chair, looking a bit more businesslike now. “Y/N, I’ve got to tell you something, and I don’t have very long, so please don’t say anything, just let me talk, okay?”

Your eyes widened with alarm at whatever the hell could be coming next, but you just slowly nodded.

“Thanks. I didn’t just ask you here to get coffee and hang out. I’m really sorry. You see, Donghyuck and I—”

“Mark! Y/N! Hey!” The very dryad that had just been named suddenly emerged from the crowd, with your boyfriend in tow.

Mark gave you an apologetic look before he turned to Donghyuck and Jisung. “Oh. Donghyuck. And Jisung. What a… surprise.”

The two newcomers each had their own coffee orders in hand, and you smiled at them.

“Hey, guys! Did you two get coffee too?” You did your best to pretend both like you had no clue something was up because Jisung told you about it, and because Mark had just almost told you about it.

“Yeah, we did!” Donghyuck replied cheerily.

“Well, we have a couple extra seats, if you want to join us,” you offered of your own volition this time, taking your bag off the chair next to you.

Jisung remained standing for a moment, looking to Donghyuck for his cue. The dryad was absolutely beaming.

“Of course!” He slid right in next to Mark, who looked like he wanted to die. “Thanks, Y/N!”

The dragon took the seat beside you with no further prompting.

You turned your focus back to the basilisk, doing your absolute best to feign obliviousness. “So, what were you saying, Mark?”

Donghyuck looked at him pointedly. “Yeah, Mark, what were you saying?”

“Never mind, I forgot,” he waved it off. “Wasn’t important, I guess.”

You shrugged, taking a sip of your drink.

“What’d you get, Y/N?” Jisung asked curiously.

“My usual. You want some?”

“Sure.”

You held yours out to him at the same time that he handed his over to you in return. As naturally as you could with the two pairs of dumbfounded eyes glued to you, you took a sip of Jisung’s drink. Yep, it was his regular order, same as always. You handed it back, holding out an expectant hand to receive yours again.

Jisung didn’t let either of your two slack-jawed friends recover to ask questions or make comments, though, immediately engaging them in conversation. “Donghyuck, how’d that report go, by the way?”

“Oh, don’t get me started on that Panforsaken assignment!”

Jaemin threw the ball as hard as he could, and you watch as it sailed in a perfect arc, then suddenly changed direction midair, leaving Jeno to have to turn on the spot and run to catch up. You three had all gone back to the park again today, you and Jaemin weaving endless clover crowns in between throwing the ball for Jeno. It was another lovely day, a bit crisper than when you and Jisung had gone. A single, puffy white cloud floated by overhead as you hummed a tune to yourself, fingers mindlessly weaving in another blue wildflower.

“Y/N...” Jaemin said, reminding you of your dad who had caught you sneaking in after your curfew.

“Jaemin...” You mimicked his tone.

“So... what’s going on with you?”

“Spit it out, Jaemin. You clearly want to ask me about something specific.”

“Y/N, I’m a dryad. I’m in touch with nature, you know. The plants, the trees, the dirt, the animals, all of it,” he explained, setting his weaving down. “And that includes humans. As much as you humans don’t want to admit it, you’re a part of nature, too. And I know I can’t feel your emotions like a unicorn can, but I can tell that you and Jisung clearly care for each other.”

“Yeah, Jaemin, I love all of you guys. We’ve become really good friends over the years.”

“No, Y/N. Differently than the rest of us care for each other.” The dryad patted your cheek, a wistful look on his face. “I don’t know if you’re just lying to yourself, or if you haven’t realized it yet, but you and Jisung… it is different than the rest of us.”

You had to bite down on your bottom lip, cover your mouth, and hide your face in your chest to keep from laughing right in Jaemin’s face and entirely blowing your cover right then and there. The dryad clearly misinterpreted your actions, as he scooted closer and wrapped his arms around you, shushing and cooing at you.

“It’s okay, Y/N. It’s okay.” He rubbed your back. “I can’t feel dragons as well for… obvious reasons, but he likes you too. I promise. It’s all going to work out.”

You nodded, not trusting yourself to speak without giggling then.

“I got it—! Oh, uh…” Jeno’s excited cheers cut off as his voice got closer and closer. “Are you... okay?”

You felt Jaemin take one of his hands off your back, and could only imagine whatever silent conversation the two of them were having with gestures. After “composing yourself” again, you sat up straight, looking up at Jeno and holding your hand out.

“Yeah, I’m fine, Jeno,” you reassured him. “Come on, dude. It’s my turn to throw.”

You drummed your fingers on the table beside your book, the highlighter nearly falling out of your other hand as you were about to fall asleep. Jeno, Jaemin, and Donghyuck weren’t faring any better than you, seeming about ready to fall asleep over their own textbooks and laptops too. The only member of your little study group who didn’t seem to be on the brink of a boredom-induced coma was Renjun. The human was chugging along through the assigned reading for one of your classes as per usual, dutifully taking his color-coded notes. You watched him through half-lidded, tired eyes, trying to figure out if he was maybe a robot, or was on Adderall, or was on the magic equivalent of Adderall, to be this committed of a student.

Renjun’s gaze slowly lifted from his textbook to you, then he raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “Yes, Y/N?”

“Okay. What is it?” You narrowed your eyes at him. “Drugs? Aliens? Because I’ll believe in the little guys now.”

“What?”

“How can you not be—”

“Hey, Y/N.” A soothing voice, warm hand on your head, and familiar cup from the campus coffee shop being placed in front of your face cut off your rambles right as you had begun to pick up steam. “Brought this for you.”

You looked up at Jisung, offering him as much of a smile as you could in your frazzled state. “Oh, hey, Ji. Thank you.”

“Also grabbed you these.” He unzipped the front pocket of his bookbag, taking out a holographic box of candy and setting it next to the drink on the table.

“Oh, Sungie…” You sighed, feeling the tension in your shoulders dissipate at the sweet gesture from your boyfriend. “Thank you. Seriously.”

Jisung gave your shoulder a squeeze. “‘Course. Well, I should let you get back to studying. I’ll see you later, princess.”

“Bye, Ji.” You gave him an unamused look, earning only a cheeky little smile in return. He got to walk away and leave you to deal with the aftermath of that nickname drop.

After he left, you were smiling to yourself happily anyway, basking in the warm, fuzzy feeling in your chest when you turned back around to see the looks on your friends’ faces. It took everything in you not to burst out laughing.

“He’s calling you ‘princess.’” Donghyuck deadpanned.

“Oh that? That’s just an inside joke.” You tried to play it off with a light, nervous laugh. “It’s not—”

“Inside joke?” Jeno repeated, as if there were any way for him to mishear you in the dead quiet of the library.

“Oh we would love to be enlightened to how this joke came about.” Jaemin requested sweetly, lacing his fingers together and resting his chin on them.

Donghyuck leapt back in to take the lead again. “Yeah, yeah, I’m sure it’s hilarious. Jisung is really known for his sense of humor. You know, like all dragons.”

You went to crack open the box of gummy candy Jisung had brought you, enchanted to change color and flavor based on your mood. This time the gummies were yellow and pink, lemon and strawberry flavored.

“Yeah, it’s a long story but that’s it. He doesn’t…” You trailed off sheepishly, giving them a look as if it were the most impossible thing in the world to imply that Jisung could possibly have romantic intentions behind calling you that.

Donghyuck’s eye twitched.

You weren’t alone with Jisung again until the next night. Laying on your bed in your room, you heard the sound of your front door unlocking, then Jisung calling out to announce his presence. You yelled back loud enough so he knew where in the apartment you were.

As soon as he poked his head into your bedroom, you shot up in bed, pointing at him accusingly.

“You are a menace,” you declared, sitting up fully.

He snorted a puff of smoke out in disbelief. “What?”

“Donghyuck about exploded trying to explain the concept of petnames to me after you called me ‘princess’ yesterday.”

“I’ll do you one better.” Jisung challenged you, slinging his backpack around to his front.

“Oh really?”

He unzipped the main pocket of his bag to start rooting around in it. “I got a Renjun lecture of epic proportions today about human dating rituals.”

“No.” You covered your mouth with your hand in horror.

“He made me a PowerPoint and everything. I had to take notes.” Jisung dropped a spiral notebook onto your bed, and you scrambled forward to grab it.

“Oh my god,” you gasped, eyes skimming over the page. There, in Jisung’s messy scrawl, were little notes about how human dates work: gifts, flowers, the whole works. It was definitely a Renjun lecture, because it was phrased from an academic viewpoint, and absolutely did not read like just a friend giving another friend dating advice.

You looked up from the page to your boyfriend. “How did this even—”

“I really should’ve been more suspicious of his offer to study buddy up since you guys just studied yesterday, because I was then falsely imprisoned in a study room.”

“Oh, Sungie,” you cooed, tossing the notebook aside and reaching out for his face instead. “I am so sorry you had to be subjected to that.”

“I tried to tell him that I grew up around humanoids just fine, but he said that Chenle didn’t count,” Jisung sighed, letting you cradle his cheeks in your hands.

You chuckled. “Well, I do sort of have to agree with Renjun there. I like Chenle, but a fairy prince isn’t exactly representative of humans.”

“What?” He gave you a thoughtful pout.

“I mean, my aunt married a basilisk, so I grew up with basilisk cousins. But you wouldn’t want me to say that I know about dragons because of that, right?”

“Well… I guess, yeah.”

“That’s all I mean, Sungie.” You reassured him, looping your arms around his neck. “That doesn’t mean I wanted you to be locked in a study room all by yourself with Renjun for who knows how long being lectured on supposed human courting.”

“I wasn’t by myself, Jaemin was there too. He was the one keeping the door locked.”

You nodded solemnly, easily able to imagine how the dryad could do that any number of ways with any number of plants. Pulling him closer to you, you pecked his nose, then the apples of his cheeks.

“Seems like the dragon needed rescuing from the crazed madman this time, hm?” You teased as he wrapped his arms around your waist.

“Yes, unfortunately I think the school would have frowned upon me eating him or his leafy accomplice.”

“Presumably.”

He let his head fall forward into the crook of your neck with a groan, his hot breath washing over your skin.

“Well, you’re all safe here in my tower now,” you promised him, threading your fingers through his hair.

Reclined into a corner of Jeno and Jaemin’s couch, you happily munched on your snack, feet propped up in Jaemin’s lap. Everyone was meeting at their apartment for a video game night, and you were still waiting on a couple more to arrive before you could officially start your mess of a tournament. Everyone’s schedules fluctuated so much that you always planned on having at least one required full-group hangout every month. Usually the activity chosen was a bit more exotic, but after Renjun's submission for last month’s “weirdly niche PowerPoint night” that was supposed to be ten minutes at most ended up being over an hour, it was decided that something easy and mundane was in order for this month. So, pizza and Super Smash Bros.

Chenle had arrived a couple minutes ago, unfortunately without his roommate. You knew that Jisung had ended up staying at the library much later than he intended—his assignment took longer than he expected to complete—but he was on his way now. The fairy was sitting sideways in an armchair, legs dangling over one arm and head supported by the other as he scrolled on his phone.

There was a knock at the front door, and Jeno got up to get it, as his roommate was currently preoccupied being your footrest. Not that the dryad seemed to mind, he was perfectly content to scold and correct Renjun from afar on how he was (apparently incorrectly) setting up the gaming system to accommodate all the additional controllers the eight of you would require to play at the same time.

Renjun was sat directly in front of the TV, bickering back with him. “Oh, you want to come get up and do it yourself, Jaemin? It’s your fucking Switch anyway.”

“Don’t need to get up,” Jaemin replied smugly, shooting a vine out to smack Renjun on the back of the head.

His reflexes were quicker than the human’s, as the plant had snapped back out of Renjun’s reach before he could grab it. What he was going to do with it if he got it, you didn’t want to know.

“Hey!” “Hi.”

You looked up from the building tension at the cheerful greetings. It had been Mark and Donghyuck at the door, the basilisk wordlessly squatting down next to Renjun to take a look at the gaming system too. You gave the newcomers a wave from your spot, which was slightly hindered by the sleeves of your oversized sweatshirt.

“I like that hoodie, Y/N.” Donghyuck sat down next to Jaemin on the couch, grabbing a chip out of the large bowl on the coffee table.

“Yeah, looks comfy.” Jaemin grabbed the end of the big sleeves and shook them around for emphasis. “Where’d you get it?”

“Huh?” You looked down at exactly what you were wearing. Well, shit. It was a plain black hoodie with a small simple embroidery of the brand’s logo on the front. It wasn’t yours, and you’d specifically worn it here so that you wouldn’t forget to bring it with you to give it back to the actual owner. “Oh, I don’t know, you’d have to ask Jisung, it’s his.”

“What?!” Donghyuck crushed his chip in his hand. Jaemin put a hand on his arm to encourage him to calm down.

“Yeah, we were hanging out yesterday and I got cold, so he let me borrow it. He accidentally left my place without it, so I’ve actually got to return it to him when he gets here.” And that was the truth. Not even carefully chosen words, or twisting of the narrative.

Donghyuck’s outburst had drawn the attention of everybody else in the living room—save for Chenle, who was still flicking through his phone.

“Wait, wait, let me get this straight, Jisung let you borrow something of his?” Renjun clarified.

“Yeah, Ji lets me use his stuff sometimes.”

Your human friend completely set the pieces of the gaming console down, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Y/N. You’re a Magical Creatures Studies major. Think. A dragon let you borrow his stuff? And even forgot to ask for it back? Allegedly.”

“Oh my G— Renjun, come on! A bit stereotypical, don’t you think?” You crossed your arms defensively.

“Stereotype or not, Jisung doesn’t share,” Chenle cut in dryly. “He’s very protective of his hoard.”

“See?” Renjun gestured at the fairy vigorously.

You looked to the others for help, the panic in you real this time. Donghyuck looked like he finally had the last piece he needed to connect to finish his conspiracy board; Jaemin gave you a pointed, but satisfied look; Mark refused to meet your pleading eyes; and even Jeno, sweet Jeno, could just shrug at you.

“Dragons are kind of like werewolves, right?” He added casually. “We scent our pack. Or, I guess dragons have a nest?”

You could barely hear Jeno’s pondering at the end about the proper terminology for dragons, as nearly everyone else in the room about lost their damn minds at you. Their victorious cheers, jeers, and jokes went in one ear and out the other as your hands felt at the soft material of the inside of the hoodie.

As an MCS major, you always tried very hard to not treat your friends simply as their species, but as individuals, too, and learn about them personally in addition to whatever was covered in class. That was especially true for Jisung, who you knew didn’t really grow up around other dragons, so the habits and customs of dragons that you studied weren’t so easily applied to him. So when he offered you his hoodie last night, it was easy for you to just be giddy and happy because your boyfriend was sharing clothes with you. But it wasn’t just a hoodie, really. You and Renjun hadn’t taken your class on dragons, basilisks, and wyverns yet, therefore the only stuff you knew was from Intro to MCS and personal experience. But this was still—

Then, the doorbell rang.

“I’ll get it!” Donghyuck shot to his feet and ran for the front door before anybody else could.

“Speak of the dragon and he shall appear!” The dryad announced cheerfully just a second later, dragging Jisung in with an arm around his neck.

“Hey, Jisung!” Jaemin brushed your feet off his lap to stand up as well. “Here, sit. I’ll grab you something to drink.”

“Uh, hey, guys.” Jisung shook Donghyuck off to straighten up and look around at everyone. The dragon sat down beside you. “Hi, Y/N.”

“Hey, Ji. I’ve got your hoodie, sorry about accidentally stealing it last night.” You grabbed the hem, about to take it off to give it back.

“It’s okay, you can hold onto it. It’s a bit drafty in here.” He waved you off nonchalantly, accepting a drink from Jaemin, who had just returned from the kitchen.

“Oh. Thanks.” You pulled your knees in to your chest, too overwhelmed to say much else.

Renjun was right, you were well aware that dragons were possessive over their belongings— gold or otherwise. The gravity of Jisung offering the hoodie to you in the first place and now letting you keep it was not lost on you. And then there was of course Jeno’s insightful comment.

“So why were you talking about me without me around?” Jisung asked the others, not sounding very thrilled at the idea.

“Y/N was just telling us that you two were hanging out last night.” Donghyuck happily informed him.

“Alone.” Jaemin added.

“Again.” Jeno coughed.

The first dryad continued, “We’re hurt that we weren’t invited.”

Jisung scoffed, “Well considering you guys just disappear all the time now, we figured you didn’t like hanging out with us anymore.”

“But since you want to hang so bad, we should all do something this weekend!” You leapt in to suggest.

“Great idea, Y/N.” Jaemin was beaming at you.

Chenle tapped a couple things on his phone as he offered, “Isn’t the student activities board hosting that movie screening on the lawn?”

“Yeah!” Mark perked up, looking up from all the wires and controllers he was still messing with. “Taeyong’s on the board this year and he’s really excited for everything they’ve got planned. I know he’d love it if we all went.”

Taeyong was another friend of Mark’s; a unicorn, if you could recall correctly.

“Sounds like a plan.” Jisung nodded.

You pointed a threatening finger at everyone except your boyfriend, “And I swear, if a single one of you bail in the middle of the movie, I’m going to think you hate me.”

“Y/N! I could never hate you!” Jaemin gasped, throwing a hand over his chest in offense.

“Then stop leaving me!”

“C’mon, Renjun, we’re gonna miss the start of the movie!” You were practically dragging your friend through campus.

“You mean you’re going to miss precious time with Jisung,” Renjun retorted, but nevertheless gave in to your tugging on his arm, starting a light jog to keep up with you.

“And what do you mean by that?” You asked. Honestly, you were kind of hoping that he was onto you. It was funny at first to see your friends run themselves in circles, but now it was just a bit saddening—and annoying—to not interact with your boyfriend how you really wanted to all the time.

Your human friend sighed. “Nothing. Nothing at all.”

Finally, the two of you arrived at the front lawn, and you craned your neck around to look for your other friends. You and Renjun were the last two to arrive. There, off to the side and up towards the front of the open space, several blankets overlapped, and your other six friends were sprawled out on them. Jeno and Jisung had spotted you two already, waving to get your attention.

A large white screen had been set up to one side of the university’s front lawn, the chosen movie being projected across it. Thankfully, it hadn’t started yet. You could see a stand where the student activities board was handing out popcorn, and students were scattered about the lawn. Your friends had gotten a spot opposite from the snack stand, and you and Renjun traversed your way around other attendees to get to them.

“Hey!” You smiled at everyone, plopping down beside Jisung without a second thought. “Sorry we were almost late—”

“But somebody forgot the candy.” Renjun cut in as he dropped a convenience store bag onto the center of the blankets, pointed glare fixed on Chenle and Jisung.

“We remembered the chips!” Jisung defensively pointed to a pile of bags of chips and other salty snacks that were sitting in the middle of everyone.

Mark patted a cooler beside him. “And Hyuck and I remembered the drinks. And nobody’s late. So everything’s fine, Renjun.”

You chuckled, overturning the bag to dump out all the boxes and bags of candy onto the pile of snacks as well. Everyone grabbed what they wanted and settled in for the start of the movie. It was cool outside, and though you were already wearing Jisung’s big hoodie, you also wrapped one of the extra blankets around your shoulders.

“Are you cold?” Jisung asked you quietly. There was a steady hum of chatter from the crowd, which had become a little softer with the beginning of the movie.

“‘M alright, Ji,” you reassured him. “Just... don’t move too far away. You’re like a portable space heater.”

He shifted around to lay down, his head and most of his upper body in your lap. You weren’t sure how much of the movie he could actually see from this angle, with Mark, Jeno, and Renjun in front of you, but you weren’t going to be the one to point that out. The two of you were towards the back corner of the blankets, Jaemin and Donghyuck to your left, Chenle on the other side of and in front of Donghyuck; Mark and Renjun were properly sitting up at the front of the blanket, with Jeno sprawled out across their laps—reminding you just a little bit of a happy puppy looking for ear rubs.

You fondly brushed some of Jisung’s hair out of his eyes, contemplating the pros and cons of just kissing him on the nose right now. Yeah, there’d probably be no way in hell you could play that off, but he was scrunching it up very adorably as he concentrated on reaching for a small patch of clover that was just off to the side next to the blanket.

You were still weighing your options when he changed his focus to a point just past your head instead. His eyes flicked between the weaving in his hands and the sky as he got the clover crown started, but once he’d gotten the rhythm down, he just kept gazing upwards.

“Pretty stars...” He murmured.

“I know.” You looked up at the sky, at all the stars twinkling and winking back at you. “What do we think? Are there aliens up there with them?”

“Mm... Maybe.”

You looked down at Jisung, mouth quirked up in an amused but affectionate smile. “Yeah?”

“Well, space is pretty big.”

After a pause, you nodded. “Okay, sure. Why not?”

“Seriously?” Renjun was looking at you over his shoulder incredulously. “I’ve done actual research on this, I’ve tried to succinctly make real arguments for you multiple times since we met, I chose it for my PowerPoint night topic with actual scientific studies and facts. And Jisung just bats his eyelashes at you and says ‘space is big’ and you’re convinced?”

He looked like he was about to pop a blood vessel. You froze, looking around at all of your friends that had turned to witness this interaction like you were the movie instead.

Jisung frowned. “I didn’t bat my eyelashes. Did I bat my eyelashes?”

“You kind of did, Jisung.” Chenle reached over to ruffle his hair, and the dragon swatted his hand away, earning a cackle from the fairy.

“Uhh...” You scrambled to think of a way to placate your human friend. “I think I just needed some time to get my head around the idea, Renjun. You know, I think the next time you really would have persuaded me, but Jisung just beat you to it, sorry.”

Renjun didn’t seem convinced, but just rolled his eyes and looked back to the movie. “Yeah, I’m sure I would’ve gotten you next time, Y/N. Tin foil hat and all.”

The others all turned back to the movie now that the spectacle was over, except for Jaemin, whose attention was still on your boyfriend.

“Jisung? When’d you learn to make clover crowns?” He asked curiously, head tilted.

“Hm? Oh, Y/N showed me.” Jisung replied absentmindedly, looking down at his hands as if he hadn’t even realized he was doing it.

Jaemin looked at you with wide eyes, and you looked back at him sheepishly in a silent conversation, as you both were definitely thinking of the exact same thing.

The day that Jaemin had shown you how to make clover crowns, he’d told you an oral tradition that was passed down among dryads about them. Your friends were always happy to indulge your interest in the folklore and religious/spiritual aspect of Magical Creatures Studies, especially in contrast to Renjun’s sometimes militant laser focus on the current socioeconomic-political structure of modern society.

It was a story about two dryads who were in love. One had to leave—depending on who was telling the story, it was a trip, a war, or a kidnapping; Jaemin opted for a dangerous trip—for an indeterminate amount of time. The other dryad waited, and weaved a clover crown every day until their lover came back to them. Nowadays, dryads will weave clover crowns for their loved ones, it’s a treasured tradition for older members of families to show young relatives how to do it, and elaborate clover crowns with specific flowers will sometimes be given as confessions or special gifts to romantic partners. Clover crowns are connected to the idea of love for dryads.

And judging by the look Jaemin was giving you, he was not going to ascribe this one to cultural differences.

Donghyuck had whipped around at this revelation as well, and smacked Jaemin’s arm to get his attention. The two dryads leaned their heads together to have a hushed conversation of fervent whispers, and you desperately hoped that whatever they were saying was both quiet enough for your friends with super hearing to not be able to distinguish, and vague enough that if it could be overheard, it wouldn’t make any sense to them. Well, specifically Jisung.

You were walking a very narrow tightrope of wanting your friends to find you two out so you could get it over with, while also not needing them to find out this way, since Jisung didn’t even know about the meaning behind the clover crowns. Your relationship was still new, fresh, bubbly, and good; you two hadn’t even said ‘I love you’ yet. Based on how the dragon had reacted to just you discussing the societal concept of marriage in an academic context before, you wanted to approach the whole ‘I love you’ situation with a lot more tact than your friends would surely have.

You’d been nervously watching the two dryads when a tap on your shoulder stole your attention back. You looked down at Jisung attentively. “Yeah, Sungie?”

“Here,” he said simply, holding up the finished clover crown for you.

Despite the anxious pretzels that your stomach was knotting itself into, you couldn’t help but smile fondly at both the crown and Jisung. “Ah, you’ve gotten a lot better, Ji.”

You were just moving a few of the buds aside to inspect his improved weave pattern when he spoke up again.

“Are you going to put it on or give me a grade on my clover crown weaving?” He pouted at you.

“Sorry, sorry,” you apologized, placing the crown atop your head. “There. Happy?”

He sighed melodramatically. “I suppose...”

“You want your own?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Hush and watch the movie, I’ll make you one.”

At the end of the movie, you were satisfied with the fact that all of your friends had ended up staying with you this time. After holding out the convenience store bag for everyone to throw their trash into, you momentarily left the group to throw that bag out in a large campus trash can. The others stayed back to pack up all the blankets and such.

You weren’t alone for long, as Donghyuck sidled up next to you and fell into step with you.

“Great Pan, you’re practically betrothed!” He sighed, putting a hand on his chest.

You gave him an unamused look, but didn’t reply, continuing your route through the mass of other students.

“Y/N, seriously,” he sighed, leaning against the wall by the can as you tossed the bag in the trash. “What’s this whole song and dance about? How can we be more obvious? You two like each other. Do you need to hear him say it? Will that finally convince you?”

You opened your mouth, about to just blurt it out, finally end this whole stupid charade, be done with it, with everything. But Donghyuck was still. Talking.

“I mean, I thought I’d had my fill of playing matchmaker for the oblivious and hopeless on spring break—” He laughed to himself, seemingly remembering something funny, which you had no clue what on earth he was talking about. “—but you two are really something else.”

Setting your jaw, you spun on your heel and walked away, leaving him to scramble his way through the crowd to catch up with you.

“Hey! Y/N! Wait! Was it something I said?”

Knocking on the door of Jisung and Chenle’s apartment, you bounced from heel to toe as you waited for your boyfriend to answer the door. Usually, you two didn’t hang out at his place unless he knew Chenle was going to be out all day, or for several days. It was just a lot easier to relax at your apartment with no roommates. But he’d texted asking you to meet him ASAP, so you’d yanked your shoes on and hurried over.

You heard the familiar sounds of the door unlocking, then it was swung open. Except Jisung wasn’t on the other side.

“Y/N.” Chenle greeted you with a curt nod, not seeming very surprised that you were there. Well, they did have a rather robust security system thanks to His Highness here in front of you, so he had probably checked the front door camera before answering it.

“Oh hey, Chenle.” You smiled at the fairy as he stepped back to let you in, and followed him further in towards the living room. Looking around, you couldn’t spot your boyfriend. In fact, in the back of your mind, you realized that a pair of his sneakers were missing by the front door. “Where’s Ji?”

“Grocery run.”

Weird. His text made it sound like an emergency, or at least extremely important. To text you to meet him ASAP and then just go to the grocery store... Maybe he had gotten a new game in and just wanted to show you immediately, then realized he was out of snacks. That definitely sounded like Jisung. Deciding that it was probably something like that, you looked back to his roommate, a little sheepish, “Uh, do you mind if I wait for him, then? He texted me to meet him here.”

“No, he didn’t. I did from his phone, right before I asked him to go get me some cough drops for my sore throat that I don’t have.” Chenle admitted freely, perching on the arm of a leather armchair and focusing an unreadable expression on you.

“I see.” You nodded, leaning against the couch opposite the room from him. “So, what did you want to talk to me about that you had to use such methods to do so?”

“Y/N. We both know that Jisung is stupid.”

“Woah, tell me how you really feel, Chenle,” you chuckled, trying to keep your voice light.

“And you’re not.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“So, at this point, either you’re being intentionally obtuse, or you’re stringing Jisung along. And I’m not going to sit back and let anyone do that to him.”

Your eyes widened at the hard edge Chenle’s tone had taken, and the faint lime green glow emanating off of him. “Uh—”

“Jaemin and Donghyuck are always talking about being in tune with nature, sensing humans, knowing what’s in a human’s heart. They’re into all that crap. I know humans. You’re more like fae than you like to think.” He was practically spitting his words out now, unable to sit still, pacing the floor in front of the armchair. Slowing to a stop again, he pivoted on his heel to set his sharp eyes back on you—except they weren’t his usual dark brown, they were an electric, glowing, burning neon green. “So you’re going to either actually make the first move on that moron, or reject him. Today.”

Oh the jig was so up. Just as you were about to figuratively spill your guts—in order to keep from having them literally spilled for you—the click of the front door shutting echoed through the apartment. You didn’t dare take your eyes off the fairy in front of you, though.

“Chenle, stop it.” Jisung sighed from behind you, and you did finally snap your head around when you heard his voice, relief flooding your being when you saw your boyfriend.

Chenle’s eyes immediately flickered back to a chocolate brown, all glow gone, and he offered a placid smile to the dragon. “Oh, Jisung. Quick grocery trip. And you didn’t even get my lozenges.”

“I was all the way at the store when I realized I forgot my wallet,” the dragon deadpanned, clearly not believing his roommate’s act, which the fairy was well aware of. He made his way over to you and wrapped an arm around your shoulders. “Leave her alone, Chenle. She’s not deceiving me.”

“We’re kind of deceiving all of you.” You confessed to the fairy, bracing yourself for what was to come.

“Yeah, we’ve uh, we’ve been dating for two months,” Jisung confirmed with a nod.

“You… what?” Chenle’s jaw dropped, genuine disbelief on his face this time.

You added, “We wanted to see how long it would take you guys to notice.”

“And see how far you’d take your meddling. I’m honestly surprised it took this long to escalate to threats from you, Chenle. But I was expecting them to be aimed at me, not Y/N. Something along the lines of ‘actually ask her out or I’ll hex you,’ not this.” Jisung then looked at you, features turning concerned and voice softer. “I’m sorry, by the way, if I thought this was even a remote possibility, I would have called this off sooner. Are you okay?”

“I know, Jisung, I know you would’ve. I’m fine, I promise,” you reassured him quietly, tilting your head closer as he pressed a quick peck to your temple.

Chenle didn’t seem to be paying you two much attention anymore, stumbling towards the other end of the couch that you and Jisung were standing at. “You not only played a trick without me, but you played it on me?”

He dramatically clutched at his chest like he’d been stabbed. “You caused mischief and strife without me? Wreaked havoc and I was none the wiser? Pulled the wool over my eyes?”

He finally sat down on the couch, falling back against the plush cushions as if he were going to perish at any second, throwing a hand over his face for good measure.

“Is he okay?” You leaned over to ask Jisung quietly.

“He’ll probably continue these theatrics for another five to ten minutes, then we can have a real conversation,” Jisung informed you.

“I heard all of that!” Chenle pointed an accusatory finger at you two.

“Chenle, how about we make it up to you?” You offered.

Your boyfriend looked at you with wide eyes, making a slicing motion over his neck with one hand, clearly signaling you to back off of doing that. You were well aware that making any kind of deal with a fairy was a bad idea, especially one that would put you in their debt.

The fairy didn’t move, instead letting out a fake sob.

“Help us play one last trick on the rest of the guys. A grand finale.”

Jisung squinted at you, clearly having no clue what the hell you were talking about. Which was fair, because you had just come up with it on the spot.

Chenle shot up into a sitting position, looking alive and well now. He laced his hands together over his lap. “Do tell.”

“I do have to say Jisung, you chose well. She’s practically a fairy,” Chenle declared, patting his roommate on the shoulder. The three of you were hiding behind a building on your college’s campus, peeking around at the main courtyard to spy on Mark, Donghyuck, and Renjun standing and having a conversation.

“I hate this.” Jisung huffed, crossing his arms.

You rubbed his other shoulder with a concerned frown, “We don’t have to do it if you really don’t like it, Sungie.”

“No, I mean you two getting along. I know the prank is fake.”

“Aw, afraid that I’m going to replace you with her as my partner in crime, Jisung?” Chenle teased. “Don’t worry, I think I’ve just found another accomplice. We’ll be a trio instead of a duo.”

The fairy’s eyes seemed to glitter at the prospect, and not just with the usual amount of magic that was in them.

“You are not roping Y/N in, too,” Jisung insisted.

“I don’t know, Sungie. Kinda sounds fun.” You shrugged, always hearing the two of them recount their misadventures together—or witnessing the odd one here or there—but never having the opportunity to join them properly before.

“See?” Chenle grinned smugly.

Jisung huffed again, this time a puff of smoke coming out of his nose. “Like I said. I hate this.”

“Anyway, there they are. You go in first, Jisung.” Chenle had finally spotted your last two targets, Jeno and Jaemin, joining the others.

“See you in a second, Sungie.” You gave him a final double thumbs up for encouragement before he took off towards them.

After a beat of silence, Chenle suddenly proclaimed, “I like you for Jisung.”

“Uh, thanks, Mr. Park, I have to say, you look great for your age.” You joked, arching a bemused eyebrow at your friend.

“That would be funny if either I or Jisung were human,” he replied humorously. “But I’m being serious. You know how Jisung and I met, right?”

“Yes, I do.” You nodded solemnly.

Chenle had found Jisung on the outskirts of his kingdom back home, a little dragon curled up all alone under a bush in a rainstorm, no other dragons in sight. At the time, Chenle himself was only a boy as well. Jisung didn’t talk much about his life before Chenle, and you didn’t know if he could even remember a lot, if anything, about it. The two of them were pretty much brothers; you knew what it meant for Chenle to say that to you.

“Thank you, Your Highness.” Your words could have been joking, or even an insult, but you hoped he could hear the sincerity in your voice as you bumped your shoulder with his. The fairy nodded, and bumped you back.

“Anyway, you think it’s been enough time?” Chenle craned his neck to peer around the corner again.

“Probably.”

“Alright, showtime,” Chenle held his hand out for you, and you grabbed it.

The two of you emerged from around the corner hand-in-hand, striking up a nonsense conversation about Chenle’s latest assignment in one of his classes. You pretended like you just happened to spot the cluster of all of your friends, delight, surprise, and recognition coming to your features as you lifted your other hand to wave to them. You watched as all their jaws dropped in unison—minus Jisung’s—and they started looking around at each other. You and Chenle walked right up to them, and you offered all of them a bright smile.

“Hey guys!” You greeted them cheerily.

“Chenle this has got to be the lowest you’ve ever gone,” Donghyuck shook his head in disgust, completely ignoring your hello.

“Yeah man, Jisung’s your best friend,” Mark scoffed.

“You raised him!” Jaemin wrapped an arm around Jisung’s shoulders.

“You fed him from your hand!” Jeno stepped in front of Jisung protectively.

“Just because you’re some high and mighty fairy prince or whatever where you’re from doesn’t mean you can treat people like they’re disposable,” Renjun crossed his arms. “Here you’re just some guy like everybody else.”

“Woah!” You let go of Chenle’s hand to step in front of him with your hands up. “Guys, that’s enough!”

“I bet Y/N’s not even in control of what she’s doing,” Renjun entirely ignored you. “He’s probably got her under some fairy spell or something.”

“What the fuck?” Chenle cried out, offended.

“Yeah!” Jaemin nodded firmly. “Because she’s totally into Jisung, I know she is. I know her heart!”

“Guys!” You yelled again for their attention.

“Don’t worry, Jisungie, we’re going to get her out from under that spell,” Jaemin cooed, stroking Jisung’s face as he currently had what was practically a chokehold on the dragon that definitely looked less than comforting.

“Jeno, grab her!” Mark ordered, and the werewolf immediately started advancing on you.

“Oh my god stop it, guys! Stop! I’m not under a spell! Chenle and I aren’t dating! Jisung and I are! We’ve been dating for like two months and we pretended not to because we wanted to see how long it would take you to notice!” You yelled out, squeezing your eyes shut to brace yourself.

But there were no super strong werewolf arms grabbing you. Instead, it was silence that became one chuckle, then a giggle, then two giggles, then you were surrounded by raucous laughter. You cautiously opened your eyes to see all your friends doubled over with laughter around you, clutching their stomachs and holding onto each other for support. You and Jisung were the only ones standing up straight, immediately realizing what was going on when you made eye contact.

“Seems we’ve been made, Sungie,” you deadpanned, wading through the sea of cackling bodies until you got to your boyfriend.

“It appears so…” He sighed, looping an arm over your shoulders, and you wrapped an arm around his waist.

As they all sobered up, a few were quite literally wiping tears from their eyes, others fanning themselves, and some still clutching their sides.

“How?” You looked around, then saw a very familiar, exceptionally devilish grin. “Chenle?”

“What better trick is there to play than being a double agent?” The fairy confirmed.

“Oh, you suck,” Jisung glared at him.

“You guys tricked us first. It was much more satisfying to get one over on you than to keep making the idiots look like idiots.”

“Hey!” Donghyuck cried out indignantly.

Chenle caught your eye to say, “I do mean what I said, Y/N.”

You nodded in understanding. “Thanks, Chenle.”

“Alright, I think we all learned some very important lessons,” Mark announced, getting everyone in a disjointed huddle. “Like…”

“Don’t be so nosy,” Jeno started off genuinely.

“Make sure the people you’re setting up aren’t already dating, or they might make you look like idiots,” Renjun added.

“Double check human emotions with a unicorn if you’re having doubts,” Jaemin sighed wistfully.

“Never go out to eat with Y/N and Jisung. Especially if there’s fries involved,” Donghyuck shivered, and you rolled your eyes. He was seriously never going to let that go.

“I’ve got two partners in crime now, so everybody else needs to sleep with their third eye open.” Chenle grinned.

“That I’m never getting into a prank war with any of you people again. This was too stressful, school’s bad enough,” you groaned with a shake of your head.

“Chenle’s an asshole,” Jisung hissed at his roommate.

“I think Jisung needs to do his over, he already knew that about me,” Chenle drawled with a facetious whine.

“Fine. Chenle’s an asshole who needs to understand that if he threatens my girlfriend again, he’s going to get burned to crisp.”

The fairy shrugged, “I’ll take it.”

“Great, you guys.” Mark beamed at you all proudly.

“What about you, Mark? What’d you learn?” Donghyuck prompted him teasingly.

“That Y/N and Jisung are dating. Duh.”

“Right. Yeah, yeah.” There were murmurs of agreement from the gaggle of creatures around you.

“So, truce?” You offered a hand out in the middle of the huddle to nobody in particular.

All six of them grabbed your hand at once and shook it. “Truce!”

“So…” Donghyuck fluttered his eyelashes at you. “How’d it happen? What’s the story?”

You scoffed, “No.”

“What? You lead us on for two months and now you won’t even tell us how you got together?”

“It’s not some big dramatic thing, sorry,” Jisung admitted. “Just kind of finally happened.”

“What do you mean ‘finally happened?’ Like, how did it ‘finally happen?’”

You exchanged a look with Jisung. With an eye roll, you indulged the dryad a little. “We were hanging out at the park one day and just sort of... I don’t know! Confessed! Got together! Whatever you want to call it!”

“Lame.” Renjun yawned. “Call me when you two get married.”

Jisung started forward in surprise. “Wh—”

“Because there hasn’t been a recorded human-dragon marriage, Sungie.” You patted your boyfriend on the chest reassuringly. “He’s just being an MCS major.”

“Oh. Right.”

The human abruptly gasped. “Wait! Can I write my final paper for Dr. Kwon’s class on you two?”

“Hell no.”

A few weeks later, and you were reclined against Jisung’s headboard, waiting for him to get back from the kitchen with snacks. You two were playing a new two-player game Jisung had gotten, and as soon as you had showed up, Chenle loudly announced his intention to go hangout at Jeno and Jaemin’s and very probably sleep over too, since they also planned on gaming until very late. You figured your friends’ “matchmaking” behavior would stop once they knew that you and Jisung were together, but apparently not.

At the reappearance of your boyfriend in the doorway, juggling several different containers, you set your phone aside. He managed to put them all down on his nightstand without dropping them. You scooted forward and re-fluffed the pillows behind you to make room for him and his wings.

Jisung’s wings weren’t out frequently—you yourself had only seen them a handful of times in the couple years that you’d known him. Dragons either had to be entirely shirtless or wear specially cut shirts in order to have them out comfortably. Most stores didn’t carry shirts in a style that allowed for dragon wings, allegedly since there were so few dragons it “wasn’t profitable” to make them. So dragons were then forced to make their own, have their clothes altered, or order from online specialty shops. Jisung usually just didn’t bother with it, as he claimed it was more of a pain to get the shirts than it was to just keep his wings away. But you and Chenle had started a master plan of slowly sneaking the dragon cut shirts into Jisung’s wardrobe until it was 50/50. You two also had a bet going of how long until Jisung grew suspicious of the rising number of shirts. So far, both of you were still in the running at two weeks.

Tonight, it seemed Jisung had found one of the new dragon cut shirts, just a simple black tank top from the front, but the back was cut into two side panels and a middle section that draped open to allow plenty of space for his midnight blue wings to rest behind him.

Except Jisung didn’t scoot on the bed behind you like you expected. He just kept standing next to it, looking at you, one hand fidgeting with the gold chains around his neck.

“Sungie?” You said his name quietly. “You alright?”

“Yeah, yeah,” he shook his head as if to shake himself from a trance, though that same pensive look didn’t leave his face. “Sorry, just thinking.”

“What about?”

“Y/N, I want you to have this.” He grabbed one of the necklaces by the chain and took it off. With no hesitation, he reached forward and put it around your own neck. Your breath hitched in your throat as you watched his every move, and the intense look on his face as he did so.

The necklace was beautiful, an immaculately kept dazzling gold chain of medium thickness, and hanging from it, a simple, shining gold sun pendant, about the size of your thumbnail. The metal was warm from already touching Jisung, and sat heavy against your skin.

“Y-You’re giving me this?” You held the sun with delicate fingers, as if afraid it would actually burn you, looking up at him in shock.

“Yeah. I don’t know, it just... makes me happy seeing you wear it.” He said, sounding almost confused at his own actions.

Letting you borrow a hoodie was one thing—a big thing, but still, only a hoodie. Giving you a piece of jewelry that he was wearing—part of his hoard—you didn’t know how to compute this. Jisung wasn’t around a lot of dragons for most of his life, so you knew that the exact cultural significance of the action wasn’t there. But that significance came from dragons’ instinctual hoarding nature, which was still ingrained in him. For it to make him happier to see you wearing a piece of his hoard than to keep it for himself… you really thought your heart might explode.

“Y/N?” Jisung lightly touched your arm, worry coloring his tone. “D-Do you not like it?”

“No! No, Sungie. I love it, thank you,” you beamed at him genuinely. You caressed his cheek with the backs of your fingers, eyes going a little misty as you looked up from the glinting gold of the necklace to the midnight blue eyes of your dragon. You were happy, so happy that if you didn’t say something, do something, it felt like you really might burst.

You turned your hand over to cup his cheek, pulling him closer and pressing your lips to his. He made a small noise, and suddenly dropped down to sit on the bed with you. Jisung kissed you back just as ardently, one hand trailing down from the back of your neck to your collarbone then below the hollow of your throat, tracing the path of the jewelry along your skin.

When you had to pull back from the kiss for air, you shifted back fully to look him in the eye, still cradling his face. You inhaled, “I—”

“Wait!”

You stopped mid-sentence at Jisung’s outburst, snapping your mouth shut and looking at him with big, confused eyes.

“Sorry, uhm, I know what you were about to say, and I also know that I’ve been weird whenever you or Renjun brought up your Interspecies Marriage class.” Jisung seemed to notice how your expression became more and more alarmed as he spoke, and he grabbed your hand that had frozen on his face, holding it with both of his. He rubbed soothing circles into the back of your hand as he continued, “I don’t want you to think that I’m not serious about you, because I am. N-not marriage or anything like that right now. But I’m serious about this, about you. I am. So I just, I wanted to say it first.”

“Okay.” You let out a breath of relief and smiled at him encouragingly.

Jisung just kept gazing at you, mouth slightly parted, thumb rubbing circles into your hand. The only indication that time hadn’t literally frozen was the slight shift of his wings adjusting behind him, and when he eventually blinked.

Finally, you couldn’t take the silence anymore.

“Jisung?” You said his name, wetting your lips awkwardly. “Like, you wanted to say it now, or not yet?”

“Sorry, yeah, no, now.” He reassured you, taking a deep breath. His eyes still seemed to be drinking you in, though, gaze lingering on the sun hanging from your neck. “You’re just so beautiful… It really does make me so happy to see you wearing that. More than happy, I don’t know how to describe it, but—”

Then suddenly you were on your back, and all you could see was Jisung and midnight blue with flashes of gold. A surprised giggle came out of your mouth as Jisung nuzzled his face in the crook of your neck. You felt a hot puff of air wash over your skin, and you reveled in the comforting, smoky smell surrounding you.

“But now I think I understand all those fairytales where the dragon keeps the princess in their tower and never lets her go.”

You stroked the back of his head, running your hand down his neck and shoulders, stopping just above where his wings start, then back up to weave your fingers in his hair. With a content sigh, you said softly, “I love you, too.”

Your dragon pushed himself up to hover above you so you could see his disgruntled pout. “I wanted to say it first.”

“I think you just did.” You laughed giddily.

“Well... still, I love you.” Jisung brushed his nose with yours for a tender moment before slotting his mouth with yours in a searing kiss. You truly felt like you could never get used to kissing Jisung, a child of the Sun, someone with the very heart of a mountain inside him. In between kisses, he murmured seemingly absentmindedly, “My princess...”

You smiled against his lips, indulging in one, two more sweltering kisses before you mumbled back, “My dragon.”

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letsnotdoanything · 6 months

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❧ word count: 10.3k ❧ warnings: cursing, mentions and discussion of past family deaths, discussions of blood and blood drinking, graphic description of blood and blood drinking, an even more graphic description of neck biting than the first one lol (y’know, vampire stuff, hope we weren’t expecting anything else) ❧ genre: fluff, angst but between friends not our main couple, modern magical creatures au, fantasy au, college au, vampire kun, human reader, ft. various other magical weishens, same universe as strawberry sunday, sequel to romance is dead ❧ extra info: this is a sequel to romance is dead! it cannot be read as a standalone, you must read romance is dead first! this work is set in the same universe as strawberry sunday! there is no continuing plotline between fics in this universe (aside from romance is dead to this one), they simply take place in the same world/magic system and may have overlapping characters (neos may pop up in more than one work!) ❧ author’s note: a second inspiration has hit the author, mr. president

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ explore the strawberry sunday universe more here!

i believe in miracles, something more than physical

“Hey, guys—”

“You know, Kunhang, just write a paper about it in your Philosophy of Magic class, because I’m sick of hearing about it,” you spat at the gryphon sitting across from you, paying Yangyang—who had just walked up and you had cut off—entirely no attention.

“I’m not even in Philosophy of Magic, so—” Kunhang shot back, giving you a smug look.

Yangyang’s bright smile turned to a look of ‘yikes’ as he pivoted on his heel, presumably to make a break from what he had just walked into. Except Ten’s hand darted out to latch onto his forearm and yank him down into a chair at the table.

“Oh, no you don’t,” the siren said through gritted teeth. “This is your fault, you’re going to suffer through it with the rest of us.”

“My fault? How? I just got here.”

Dejun leaned in from across the table, “They’re debating the ethics of blood drinking. Or, Kunhang is at least trying to.”

“And he’s about fifty years late to it in modern academia at least,” Sicheng snorted softly, bringing the straw of his drink up to his mouth.

“That’s also like the first assignment you get in every Intro to MCS class ever.” Yangyang ripped open a ketchup packet to begin squirting it all over his fries. “Why is he—”

All of his friends who weren’t currently hurtling verbal vitriol at each other instead gave him a very frank, pointed look. The witch trailed off.

“Oh. Right.” He picked up a fry that had gotten a bit too much ketchup on it, watching as a glob of the red condiment dripped off it before biting it in half.

You, meanwhile, were this fucking close to storming out of the student union building and keying Kunhang’s car. You weren’t one for violence, but you absolutely were one for vandalism and property damage. And it would be so goddamn cathartic to key his car right about now. After all, this wasn’t the first, nor second, nor even third time that he had tried to philosophize and/or debate you out of your relationship.

Speaking of, you spotted a familiar figure approaching your table, one that was able to dissolve just enough tension and malice from your body in that moment that you decided to save keying Kunhang’s car for another day.

“Oh! Kun!” You lifted your hand to give him a small wave, despite the fact that you definitely knew that he had both seen and smelled you, and was already headed straight for you.

Kunhang noticeably clenched his jaw and shifted back in his seat, clearly upset at your discussion being interrupted. Thankfully, he generally had the decency to not do all this in front of your boyfriend.

Kun offered an enchanting smile as he approached, first picking one of your hands up to kiss the back of it as always, then he pecked your cheek. “Hello, Y/N.”

“Hi, Kun.” Your gaze followed him as he walked around behind you to take the empty seat you’d saved for him in between you and Dejun.

“Good afternoon, everybody,” the vampire nodded to your other friends.

A chorus of ‘Hey, Kun’s came from around the table, save for the gryphon across from you. You stared him down angrily, but he refused to make eye contact with you.

“Did you get held up or something?” You turned your focus to your boyfriend instead, referencing his unusual tardiness to your friend group’s typical late-lunch meetup.

“I had to speak with my professor about a recent test grade. It turns out he entered it in the electronic gradebook wrong. I didn’t expect it to take so long, I’m sorry, my love, I should have texted you to let you know I was going to be late.”

“Kun, it’s okay,” you reassured him, taking his hand in yours and resting them on your lap. “It was just a few minutes.”

“Sucks about your grade, though,” Yangyang added, then stuffing three fries in his mouth at once.

“It’s been corrected, so no harm done.” Kun had an easy smile on his face as he conversed, one that you were happy to see more and more.

“Why even correct it?” Kunhang huffed from his seat, his arms crossed over his chest. “You’re going to live forever, what do grades even matter? You can just take the class again, right? Get another degree, you can get a million degrees, I’m sure you already have a hundred or two. What does this one little grade even matter? What does any of this even matter to you? What do any of us even matter to you?”

“Kunhang, stop it!” You snapped, your grip tightening on Kun’s hand. You knew where that line of questioning was going, or had already gone implicitly. So what did you matter to Kun, then? But you already knew plenty about Kun’s view on life, both the finite and his eternal one, and how much he treasured everything he had now and looked forward to all the changes that were yet to come. Kunhang, of course, knew nothing about that, because this was so far the closest thing he’d had to a real conversation with the vampire since you and Kun had officially started dating.

“This was my midterm test grade, which is a significant portion of the class’s overall grade as this professor only gives three grades: midterm, final, and final paper. If I had to repeat the class, it would affect my current plan to graduate next semester with Y/N and begin my master’s next fall.” Kun, who you would’ve sworn was an actual angel if not for the red eyes, calmly answered only his first question.

“Y/N, seriously? You have life plans with a—”

You finally felt something fully snap inside of you, letting go of Kun’s hand to slam both of your palms on the table and stand up out of your chair. “Just shut the fuck up, Kunhang! You’re not him! You know that, right? You’re not him, so just stop it already!”

Kunhang’s nostrils flared as he stared you right back down, his grey eyes swirling like storm clouds. Then he grabbed his backpack off the ground and stormed out of the student union, knocking his chair so far back in his haste that it hit a student sitting at the table behind you.

You were still rooted to the same spot, your hands flat against the table, leaning over it, your eyes glued to the doors that the gryphon had left through. Your chest heaved as you caught your breath, feeling the anger tingling in the tips of your fingers and your toes like electricity.

“Do you… want to talk about it?” Ten asked quietly, hesitantly.

“No,” you answered flatly, grabbing your own bag and taking off in the opposite direction.

Hot tears were already pricking at your eyes before you pushed open the door to leave the building, and you couldn’t even make it to the sidewalk that wrapped around the main block of campus before the tears gathering in your vision made it too hard to see.

You stopped at a bench, looking around hopefully and letting out a rather pitiful, “Kun?”

He emerged from the crowd of students just a moment later, relief flashing across his face for a moment before a deep line set between his brows again as he came to sit beside you. You immediately buried your face in his neck, and he wrapped his arms around you, resting a hand on the back of your head.

“There you are, my love,” he murmured. “I’m sorry I was late again.”

You let out a strangled giggle into the material of his sweatervest at that. Turning your head so your words wouldn’t be so muffled, you joked, “It’s okay, I was kind of running away.”

“Still, I should be faster than you.”

“Mm, good point.”

You were still crying, the tears falling down your cheeks one after another. But you didn’t want to keep crying on campus with the sounds of other people walking by. While you certainly weren’t the first person to cry on this bench—nor would you be the last—you didn’t want to prolong your stint there any longer.

“Kun?” You mumbled his name.

“Yes, Y/N?”

“Can you take me home please?”

“Of course.”

“Your home,” you clarified.

He shifted to hold you just a bit tighter to him. “Of course, my love.”

At Kun’s house, you were sat on his plush olive-green couch, your knees pulled up to your chest as you blew on a mug of hot tea that he had just handed you. Both of you were fresh out of a nice relaxing bath, with comfy clothes on courtesy of your boyfriend, who had also insisted on making you a cup of calming tea. You did make him promise that it wasn’t one of those spiked blends that witches sold. He assured you it was just regular old chamomile that you could pick up at a human supermarket.

Kun sat down beside you, resting an arm along the back of the couch behind you. You continued listlessly staring at the surface of the tea, watching the ripples on the surface as you blew across it.

“Kunhang wasn’t even my best friend first, you know?” You said abruptly into the quiet.

Kun took it in stride, asking curiously, “Whose was he, then?”

“My brother’s.”

“Your… brother’s…” He repeated slowly, and you knew exactly what he was thinking about: when he had met your immediate family just a few weeks ago, your mom and dad. No siblings.

“Yeah, Kunhang’s family lived across the street. They were inseparable growing up. It was practically like having two big brothers,” you recalled fondly, a bittersweet smile playing across your lips for a moment before it fell off completely at what was coming next. “Then after the funeral, Kunhang and I would check up on each other. Calls, texts, getting lunch, ‘wow you’re graduating already I can’t believe you’ve gotten so big,’ and we just kind of never stopped.”

“I’m so sorry, Y/N.” Kun ran a gentle, cool knuckle up your cheek to catch a stray tear. You grabbed his hand to hold it instead, giving it a tight squeeze.

“What are you apologizing for?” You sniffled, a hint of playfulness in your tone as you echoed the words he’d said to you when he’d told you about his parents’ passing.

“Isn’t that what you say? I’m sorry for your loss?” He murmured back, clearly aware of the same déjà vu, but with no sense of irony or humor to the words.

“Yeah, I am too.” You finally took a sip of the tea, and immediately let out a hiss. Too hot still. “Anyway, I actually think everyone was expecting that Kunhang and I were going to end up together but he’s just… it’s not like that. And I think he thinks his job is to be my brother now. To watch over me since… my brother can’t anymore.”

“‘You’re not him…’” Kun repeated in recognition.

“I know… that probably hurt him a lot.” You gnawed on your bottom lip regretfully as you imagined the kind of pain those words must have put your friend through. “But I wish he could just get it through his stupid bird brain that he doesn’t have to do that. All I need him to be is my friend.”

Kun rubbed his thumb over yours tenderly. “Have you told him that?”

“No, no I haven’t,” you admitted, reluctantly realizing that you unfortunately weren’t entirely faultless in this. Or, at least that you could be doing much more to patch things up instead of expecting Kunhang to just read your mind.

“Maybe try that?” He suggested.

“Okay, yeah. You’re right.” You lifted the mug to your lips once more, then immediately spat the tea back out. “God, Kun! Did you get the water for this from the surface of the fucking Sun? What the fuck?!”

“The Sun is far too hot to maintain liquid water,” he deadpanned, earning a frank glare from you.

“You’re hilarious. You and Kunhang should do stand-up together if he ever gets the mile-long stick out of his ass.”

“He should see a doctor about that.”

You shifted forward to set the mug down on the ornately carved cherry wood coffee table. “Don’t worry, I’m going to take care of it tomorrow.”

“You’re such a Good Samaritan.”

Kun enveloped you in his arms as you turned around to wrap yours around him, resting your head on his chest. He laid the both of you down on the couch, pulling a blanket down off the back to lay it over you. You liked laying like this, because despite everyone else telling you that vampires were technically dead, when you and Kun were like this, you could hear him breathing in and out—and yes maybe that was just for him to keep track of smells like the apex predator he technically was, but it’s not like you didn’t do the same thing; take an extra deep inhale when you were here, wearing his clothes, in his home, being held by him. And you could hear something beating in his chest, too. What was it pumping, to where, and for what purpose, you didn’t know, or really care. All you knew was that despite it all, Kun was right here, with you, and you could hear that, feel that, know that, and know that he always would be, even after you were gone.

“Kun?” You looked up at him, your chest getting warm and tight when you realized that he had already been gazing down at you.

“Yes?” He traced your jawline with one finger seemingly absentmindedly, his eyes never leaving yours.

“Kiss me?”

“Ah, how could I resist?” He tilted your chin up as he bent his neck to connect his cool lips with your warm ones.

In the morning, you finally woke up, sitting up and stretching out what felt like a decade of tension from your body. You always felt like you got the best sleep of your life at Kun’s place thanks to his carefully acquired silk sheets and vampire-level blackout curtains. Blindly reaching out in the dark for the other side of the bed, you were disappointed to find it empty. Figures, Kun never slept in, if he even slept at all. Well, you could at least turn a light on. You turned exactly one bedside wall sconce on—which you guessed was probably originally meant to be for oil but Kun had retrofitted to be electric—and immediately spotted a folded piece of paper standing up on your nightstand.

Propping yourself up on an elbow, you grabbed the small piece of cardstock, unfolding it and holding it up to the sconce to be able to read the neat script that was on it. Rubbing sleep out of your eyes, a smile spread across your lips as you recognized it as another poem from Kun. An Italian sonnet, if you weren’t mistaken. He would still pen you verses at random intervals, but at least never gave them when there was a risk of your nosy friends being around.

You read it through one more time before setting it back on the nightstand and swinging your feet over the side of the bed. After first shuffling to the bathroom, you then shuffled to the bedroom door.

You found a full fare of breakfast already set up at the kitchen table, but no vampire in sight. Huh. Usually even if he wasn’t going to eat, he would at least sit with you and read a book or chat with you while you ate.

Loading up a few pieces of fruit and finger foods onto a plate, you took your breakfast to go into the living room to look for your boyfriend. He was a quick find, at least, sitting at his producing desk. His head was bobbing along to whatever he was listening to, sitting cross-legged in his desk chair as he leaned forward on both elbows on the desk. Which was probably why he couldn’t hear or feel you approaching until you laid a hand on his back.

Kun’s shoulders jumped as he startled and whipped around, pulling his headphones off. You couldn’t help but laugh at his wide, surprised eyes. It wasn’t often that you could give a vampire a scare, after all.

He put a hand over his chest, a relieved smile coming to his face, “Oh, it’s just you, Y/N. You startled me.”

“Clearly,” you snickered, popping a grape in your mouth. You rubbed your hand up and down his back. “What are you working on?”

“Oh, nothing.” He quickly minimized the tabs on his screens.

“And that’s not suspicious at all,” you snorted. “But fine, you want to do a little secret project, go for it.”

“You found breakfast.” Kun smiled up at you, gesturing to your plate of food.

“Changing the subject, also not suspicious. But yes, I did. The poem, too. Thank you for both.”

“Also, good morning, my love.”

“Good morning, Kun.” You cupped his cheek to pull him into a good morning kiss. “Are you hungry?”

He shook his head. “No, that’s all yours.”

“Not what I meant. You didn’t feed last night, unless you had some supplement this morning before I woke up.”

“We were talking about a delicate subject. Not exactly the time to ask to bite you, I think.”

“You never ask to bite me. I always have to offer.”

“Well—”

“Do I not taste good, Kun?” You asked humorously, mock offense in your tone.

He seemed at a loss for words, caught between not wanting to insult you and not wanting you to feel obligated to let him feed on you. “That’s not—”

“I’m kidding, hon,” you tossed another piece of fruit in your mouth. Stroking a thumb over his cheekbone, you reiterated firmly, “But are you hungry? And be honest with me, Qian Kun. You know that if you need to feed, all you have to do is ask.”

“You eat first,” he covered your hand that was on his face with his, and offered you a small smile. “Then I will. Okay?”

After finishing your plate of food, you were back in Kun’s bedroom, sat in a plush, oversized armchair with him. He had you in between his legs, your back flush to his front with both arms around your waist. You leaned back against him contentedly, resting your head against his as you rubbed circles into his inner thigh with your thumb.

“You always get quiet right before… What goes on up there every time?” You murmured, threading the fingers of your other hand through the hair at the back of his head. “Angsting about being a monster? Contemplating about your soul being damned? Indulge me, Kun.”

He let out a short laugh at your dramatics, his cold breath laugh blowing over the exposed skin of your neck, and his chest vibrating against you. “No, nothing like that. I’ve long disposed of thoughts like that about what I am, thankfully.”

“Good. Then what is it?” You dropped your hand and craned your head to be able to see his profile.

Even in the dim light afforded by the single wall sconce, you could see the warmth flickering in his scarlet irises as his gaze met yours. “I just stop to appreciate the moment, to appreciate you. I want to make sure I’ll never forget how lucky I am to have you.”

You closed the small gap between you, pressing your lips to his. Kun kissed you back unhurriedly, mouth moving against yours tenderly. It was you that moved to deepen the kiss, parting your lips. Always one to indulge you, he swiped his tongue against yours, cool and familiar. You didn’t break apart until you needed to breathe again, and even then, exchanged a handful more open-mouthed kisses full of tongue and teeth. Kun kept kissing a wet trail from your mouth to your jaw, then behind your ear, then down your neck. You let your head fall back on his shoulder as he stopped to press several kisses over one spot in particular. His deep inhale was audible. Anticipation pulsed through your body with every beat of your heart.

Your hand hadn’t stopped smoothing circles into his leg, and your grip on him tightened as you were alight with excitement. One of his hands reached out to lace with your free hand and wrap back around your waist.

Then, with one more gentle brush of his lips against your pulse point, he bit you. The familiar sharp piercing of his fangs breaking skin came first, followed by a sweet, soothing ecstasy that spread out from the bite through the entirety of your body. You shifted slightly to relax further back into him, a noise between a hum and sigh coming from your mouth. Kun squeezed your hand that he was holding, and you were quick to squeeze it back, an easy way for him to check in on you while he was drinking from you. If your grip wasn’t as strong as he’d like, or you failed to respond at all, he would’ve stopped entirely for fear of overdrinking. And if you ever wanted him to stop, you just had to squeeze his hand twice in row. You’d never had to use that signal once, nor did you ever imagine that you would; Kun was always a perfect gentleman before, during, and after, never coming close to overfeeding. If anything, you were sure that he erred on the side of underfeeding himself and supplementing with the artificial blood he kept in his fridge.

Kun’s mouth sucked the tender area as his tongue smoothed over the two rivulets draining from you. Another soft sound came from you as you reached up to grab his head, holding him there by the hair. You could feel him chuckle fondly against your neck, the vibrations thrumming through your body.

Like always, it was over much too soon for your liking. He took his mouth from your skin, pressing one more tender kiss to the spot where he bit before disconnecting entirely. Kun gently unwound your fingers from his hair and reluctantly unlaced his hand that was holding yours. He kept his arms around you, though, as he reached over to the short table that was beside the chair and grabbed a small tin no bigger than the palm of his hand.

Twisting the lid off, he leaned all the way back in the chair, encouraging you to sit back against him, turned just slightly to the side. He gently applied the salve to the bite, and you let your eyes flutter shut as you enjoyed the feeling of cool fingers running over the sensitive area. Sometimes you didn’t let him apply the bite salve, enjoying the look of a vampire bite on your neck for a few days. But today could not be one of those days, which you both knew very well. Not with who you’d have to go talk to soon after this.

When he was done, Kun closed the tin back up and set it aside once more, rubbing the remaining product into his own hands before wrapping his arms around you and resting his chin on the opposite shoulder from where he’d just bit.

The smell of rosemary wafted up to your nose from the bite salve, and you contentedly rested your head against Kun’s. The wound would close up and heal in just a couple minutes now, leaving behind no trace of the bite.

“How do you feel?” He murmured right beside your ear.

“Mm, great,” you answered truthfully, playing with his fingers. “How about you?”

“Good, I’m good.” He pressed a chaste kiss to your cheek. “Thank you, Y/N. My miracle…”

You trudged up a hill, wiping away a bead of sweat that had gathered on your brow. When you’d gone to Kunhang and Yangyang’s apartment after breakfast that morning, you’d only been able to find the witch. He’d informed you that your gryphon friend had taken off early to go flying, but hadn’t told Yangyang where. Lucky for you, you knew exactly where he’d be anyway. Kunhang’s favorite flying spot was a park near your old neighborhood which had been made a specifically designated fly space. It was several square miles where no planes, helicopters, drones, or even kites could be flown to make it safe for gryphons, phoenixes, and other flying beings to stretch out their wings. It doubled as a nature preserve with walking trails, benches, and posted signs protecting the wildlife and plants.

You’d already caught sight of your target back on the walking trails, and were now chasing him down at a severe disadvantage on foot. Finally reaching the clearing he was doing the majority of his aerial tricks above, you stopped and looked up at him, using a hand to shield your face from the sun.

“Kunhang!” You called out to your friend, who was currently somersaulting through the air, powerful grey wings stretched out behind him.

He looked down at you, then pretended not to hear you, swooping down into a backflip.

“Kunhang, come on!” You yelled out desperately. “I-I want to apologize! Please!”

He stopped in midair at that, a fair distance above you. You had to crane your neck up to look at him.

“You want to apologize?” He looked down at you in disbelief.

“Yes! Now would you get down here so we don’t have to have this entire conversation shouting at each other? Again.”

“No.” He dropped down to hover just in front of you. “But you can come up.”

“What?”

“Come on, you know the drill.” He was now stood on the ground with two feet.

“And I’m also not seven anymore,” you scoffed.

“You’re the one who wanted to talk.”

“Fine.” With a roll of your eyes, you wrapped your arms around Kunhang’s shoulders.

“God, no need to choke me out.” He made a mock choking sound, pulling at your arms to loosen your grip on him. “If I pass out, we’re both going down, you know.”

You pinched the skin on the back of his neck. “Just fly, stupid.”

And with that, Kunhang pushed up off the ground, his powerful wings easily lifting the both of you up higher and higher. Your flight didn’t last long, just until your friend had reached a tree branch he deemed suitable for the both of you to sit on, high above everything else, your feet swinging below you. The two of you were side-by-side, his wings folded up behind him.

“I’m sorry,” you started, making sure to hold your end of the promise first. “For what I said to you in the student union yesterday. It was a really shitty thing of me to say, and I don’t want you to think for a second that I don’t appreciate you and everything you’ve done for me, Kunhang.”

The gryphon was quiet next to you, and you took him not flying off as a good sign.

“While I shouldn’t have said it to you like that, I need you to understand: You do not have to be my brother.”

You heard him breathe in sharply, like he was about to say something back, but you pushed on.

“For you to think that you’ve had to not only carry the burden of your grief, but mine, and that kind of responsibility, for all these years… I don’t want you to think you have to shoulder all of that. Because you don’t.” You took your eyes off of the leaves in front of you and finally looked over at him. He was staring straight ahead, his mouth a hard line but you saw the tears gathering in his eyes. Your eyes were stinging with bitter tears of your own, and you continued through the lump in your throat, “I need you to listen to me when I say this, Kunhang. I am relieving you of that, okay? Please, let it go. You are not failing me, or him, to just be my friend. I need you to be my friend. My best friend, in the whole world, okay? Can you please do that?”

Kunhang still wasn’t saying anything, but you saw a tear finally slip down his cheek, and his bottom lip trembled. You reached out to hesitantly take his hand, and were surprised when he squeezed yours back with an iron grip.

“I had a brother, and he was great. And he’s gone now.” Your voice cracked over the word ‘gone,’ which was when your friend finally looked at you, and you gave him a bittersweet smile. “And that’s okay. You can’t help either of us hold onto him by becoming him. So can you please let it go? Just let the weight on your shoulders go?”

The gryphon’s brow creased with concern as he finally spoke, “Then who’s going to look out for you, Y/N?”

“Did he ask you to? Look out for me?”

Kunhang nodded.

You looked up towards the sky and gave a cynical but fond chuckle. “Of course he did. You can look out for me, Kunhang. But there’s a difference between looking out for me, and blatantly treating me like a child who can’t be trusted to make her own decisions. I think that’s what’s been hurting me the most. It’s fine that maybe you’re a little iffy about Kun, he’s a vampire that you don’t really know—well, Yangyang kind of does, but whatever, he’s Yangyang.”

That earned you a choked giggle from your friend, and you chuckled a little as well.

“That little bit of suspicion over your friend’s new boyfriend is normal, even welcome sometimes, except you’ve been making me feel like you don’t trust me. Like you think that I’m stupid or something.” You explained with a sigh, disappointment coloring your voice.

“Y/N, I’m sorry. I hadn’t thought about it like that,” Kunhang admitted, looking at you wistfully. “I don’t think you’re some stupid little kid, by any means. You’ve grown up into such a smart, incredible person that I know your brother is proud of, and that I’m proud of, too, like you’re my own sister.”

“Then act like it, dude,” you scoffed, using your free hand to give him a light smack on the head. “You’ve been making all these assumptions about Kun, and about our relationship, and you refuse to even listen to me or actually like properly sit down and talk to him to see what we’re like together. You want to be the dependable older brother friend? You’ve got to put in the work being you know, dependable, not just be a moody piece of shit about new boyfriends.”

“Okay, I deserve that.”

“Uh-huh.”

“But come on, it’s not like he’s new, I mean, he is hundreds of years old.”

“I would shove you out of this tree if I didn’t think you’d take me down with you.”

“So like...” he grimaced. “Does he drink your blood?”

You let go of his hand to cross your arms, and looked Kunhang dead in the eye. “Do you actually want the answer to that?”

The gryphon’s eyes widened comically. “He does?! Y/N!”

“Kunhang, what did we just talk about?”

“Right. Sorry. Uhm... so... tell me about it? I guess?” Each word sounded like its own question, like he was forcing it out.

“Again, do you actually want me to?”

“No,” he answered quickly, a shudder going down his spine. “Just tell me whatever will be reassuring, please.”

You laughed. “Okay. It doesn’t hurt me, seriously. Uh... Kun’s diet is still mostly synthetic blood replacement, and he’ll probably never fully rely on live feeding from me, even after we move in together. Since he’s... old he can control his hunger and his feedings very well. He’s never overfed from me and never will. Happy?”

“You’re moving in together?”

“That’s what you got from that?”

“I know you, Y/N. You thought you could sneak that in among all that blood drinking talk to distract me.” He waggled a finger disapprovingly at you.

“God, fine, Kunhang.” You rolled your eyes. “When my lease is up at the end of next semester, Kun and I have discussed moving in together. But that’s still months away, no need to get your feathers in a bunch yet.”

“How long have you two been dating?”

“Kunhang—”

“I’m just gathering data.” He held his hands up defensively.

“Whatever. You want to gather data? Come over to Kun’s for dinner tonight.”

He rubbed the back of his neck, giving you a feigned apologetic grimace. “Ooh, sorry, I actually just drank some blood for breakfast, so I was going to get some sushi—”

“Save it for open mic night. He’s cooking food and you can bring Yangyang.”

“Sounds great! What time?”

“What are you so dressed up for?” You quirked an eyebrow up when you caught sight of Kun re-emerging from the bedroom in a fresh button-up shirt and pair of dress slacks. “It’s just Kunhang and Yangyang.”

The vampire went back to the pan that he had been tending to on the stove. “I’m hosting dinner at my house, for one. And for some reason that I can’t seem to put my finger on, this feels like a meet-the-parents part two.”

You scoffed at that little jest at the end. “You’ve met Kunhang before.”

“And I got this weird feeling that he didn’t like me.”

“Oh, was it the death glares or all the times I told you he was trying to talk me out of dating you that clued you in?”

He chuckled. “Still, it can’t hurt to want to make a good impression.”

You came up behind him, wrapping your arms around his waist and resting your chin on his shoulder. “It’s going to be fine, hon. I’m here, and Yangyang will be too, which I think will actually help for once.”

“That is a scary thought.”

“You know, I think we give him too little credit sometimes.”

“Who? Yangyang?”

“Yes.”

“And why is that?”

“If it weren’t for his ineptitude, we wouldn’t have gotten together.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that.” Kun set his spatula down and turned around. He readjusted the collar of your shirt, tender gaze tracing over your features. “Now, call me superstitious, but—”

You couldn’t help but giggle at the concept of a vampire being superstitious. A soft smile played across Kun’s lips before he continued.

“—but I think that we would have found each other without the love potion. I don’t know which one of our choices would have eventually made the life that finally brought us together like this, but I think they would. My miracle...” He cupped your cheeks, pulling you in for a gentle, sweet kiss.

While you never wanted this moment to end, the faint, acrid smell of something burning wafted up to your nose, and before you had fully processed that, Kun was already pulling back from the kiss. He cursed under his breath, turning around and pulling the pan off the burner, quickly flipping the food over. You peeked around him to look, seeking a few spots that were a bit blackened.

“Sorry…” You pecked his cheek sheepishly before stepping back fully to leave the kitchen.

Kunhang and Yangyang arrived soon after, the witch almost immediately, and predictably, making a crack about Kun’s house looking like a yard sale, which the gryphon found hilarious. Soon, though, you were seated for dinner, Kun dishing up food for everybody then taking his seat beside you.

“I do have to apologize, one side got a little too crispy,” Kun bowed his head apologetically as everybody had picked up their utensils. “I did my best to alleviate it after the fact, but there may still be some burned areas.”

“Oh, and what were you two doing?” Kunhang waggled his eyebrows, lifting his fork to his mouth.

“Mm?” Your boyfriend didn’t look up from cutting up his food. “Ah, I was changing my shirt and Y/N was setting the table so neither of us were paying attention.”

You opted not to respond, busying yourself with taking a deep sip of your water.

Your gryphon friend dropped his fork back onto his plate with a clatter, disgust on his face. “Y/N, I can hear your heartbeat! Gross!”

“I keep telling you, Kunhang, don’t ask questions that you don’t want the answers to!” You snapped back, pointing a finger at him accusatorily.

“It was just a joke!”

“Play stupid games, win stupid prizes!”

Yangyang pushed the food on his plate around with his own fork. “Suddenly I’m not hungry…”

“Oh my god, it’s perfectly sanitary, don’t be dramatic.” You smacked his arm. “It’s either eat it or starve, Yangyang.”

And with that, the witch was back to shoveling food in his mouth. “Don’t have to tell me twice. This is great, Kun!”

Your boyfriend sighed and shook his head. “Thanks, Yangyang.”

After dinner, you knew that Kun was going to start habitually clearing the table, but you already had a plan in mind.

“Kunhang, have you seen Kun’s PC setup?” You asked casually, grabbing yours and Kun’s empty plates before the vampire could. You knew damn well that Kunhang hadn’t seen the computer in his stubborn crusade to avoid Kun at all costs.

The gryphon’s features perked up minutely in interest. “No. Is it a custom build?”

Kun nodded as he reached for a glass. “Yes, it is. I can show you after I—”

But you swiped the glass just before his fingertips could brush it. “You two can go look at it. Yangyang and I have got clean up. Right, Yang?”

To your surprise, the witch gave a thumbs-up from where he was reclined casually in his dining chair, pushing it back to balance just on the rear two feet. “Yeah, all good. Go talk nerd shit.”

“Are you sure?” Your boyfriend asked you, a visible frown on his features over leaving you with clean-up duty.

“Of course. You cooked, we can do the dishes,” you reassured him with a bright smile.

“Alright, thank you.” He pecked your cheek before leading Kunhang out of the dining room.

Once you felt comfortable that you were no longer in the gryphon’s and vampire’s magical earshot, you looked to Yangyang with a curious head tilt.

“So why’d you let me volunteer you for dish duty with no complaints?”

“I knew what you were doing,” he said with a shrug, and stood up to help clear the table. “I don’t like pissy Kunhang anymore than you do, so whatever you think will help.”

“Thanks, Yangyang.” You smiled at your friend sincerely, carrying your stack of plates and utensils over to the sink. “Do you mind putting the leftovers away and I’ll wash the dishes? Heads up, there is blood supplement in the fridge, but it’s synthetic, I promise. If that’s too weird, you can just put everything in containers and I’ll put it away after I’m done washing.”

“I don’t mind, I’ve dealt with grosser. Witch, remember?”

“Right, thanks.”

As Yangyang spooned the little leftover food that there was into a container, you rinsed off the dishes and loaded up the dishwasher.

“So you’re really cool with all this, huh?” Yangyang commented as he opened the fridge up.

“All what?” You asked curiously. “Kun being a vampire? Having to keep my food next to my boyfriend’s synthetic blood? I mean, I grew up with Kunhang and other magical creatures, remember?”

“Fair.” He put the food in and shut the appliance again, leaning against the counter next to you. “So, do you think you could ever do it?”

At your blank stare, Yangyang added on, “Drink blood. I mean, technically you already drank Kun’s in the love potion, but you know, willingly, and a lot of it. If you were to become a vampire, and I’m not even asking existentially about living forever or anything, just the diet. Do you think you could do it? If worst came to worst and blood supplements and synthetic blood were no longer available.”

The witch had a grin on his face like the two of you were giggling kids playing Would You Rather at a sleepover and talking about your crushes, not the actual question he had just posed to you. You chewed on your bottom lip as you thought, still washing a few more pots and cooking utensils from the night.

“I… don’t know,” you answered honestly. “I mean, that all kind of changes when you become a vampire, right? Like, your taste preferences. There’s not a lot of people drinking blood before they turn into vampires, at least.”

“Fewer, for sure.”

“Yeah, I uh, I don’t know, Yang. Would you? Can witches even become vampires?”

“Unfortunately, no,” he sighed wistfully, then turned giddy, “But wouldn’t that be badass? A witch vampire? Vampire witch? God, that’d be so cool!”

“Why can’t witches become vampires? I know you guys aren’t technically humans, but… like, do you know what makes it not work?”

“There’s a lot of theories. As a witch, I’m of course inclined to believe that nature favors balance. A being can only be one kind of magic thing. Humans aren’t magic, but once you guys become something magic, same rule applies to you, no double-dipping, no getting greedy.”

“Seems like a pretty good theory to me.”

Yangyang nodded towards the living room then, “You think it’s been enough time for them to bond over CPU specs or whatever?”

“Probably?” You said. “I’m just glad dinner went as smooth as it did. I hope I wasn’t pushing it with putting them alone in a room together.”

“We haven’t heard shouting or the sound of Kunhang’s neck snapping yet, so that’s a good sign.”

You gave him an unamused look. “You’re truly an optimist.”

“It would totally be self-defense on Kun’s part.”

“Still not helping.”

“Anyway, I’ve got to pee, so—” He pointed down the hall to the guest bathroom, and you nodded with a small smile at your friend’s familiar bluntness.

“Don’t drown in there, Yang.”

He stuck his tongue out at you before disappearing from your sight.

You took a deep breath, steeling your nerves to enter the living room yourself. Coming around the corner, you saw Kun and Kunhang sitting on the main couch together, on opposite ends. Their body language looked relaxed, conversational, and a relieved, genuine smile came to your face as you looked over the two of them.

“Uh-oh, what’s this? The Annual Bad Joke Conference?” You teased, making your way over to perch yourself on the arm of the couch next to Kun, resting an arm on his shoulders. He wrapped his own around your waist, settling his hand on your hip.

“Yes, and now that our keynote speaker is here, we can begin,” Kunhang ribbed you right back.

“Oof.” You clutched at your chest like you’d been stabbed. “I’ve been wounded.”

“I was actually asking Kun about his grad program he’s looking at,” your friend explained, gesturing to your boyfriend.

Kun nodded heartily. “Yes, I was detailing my current predicament about with it being only a one-year master’s, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to work right after or look into finding another one-year master’s to complete since your master’s program will be two years long.”

“Oh, don’t fucking remind me that May isn’t the end right now,” you groaned, dropping your forehead onto the top of Kun’s head.

“Right. My apologies, my love.” He rubbed your back comfortingly.

“Hey, Kun?” Yangyang’s voice floated into the room then, and you picked your head back up to see him walking in.

“Yes, Yangyang?”

“Uh, I really hate to do this, but I kind of accidentally mentioned I was coming over when I was visiting my coven today, and my Grandma asked me to ask you for something?”

“No more blood. I told you, after the love potion, you and your whole coven simply must get your vampire blood from somewhere else.”

“Yeah, I know. And they know. Trust me, I’m never living that one down at sacraments. Uh, no, Grandma told me to ask you for a book back? She said it’s red, about the size of your hand, gold on the edges of the pages?”

“Did she tell you what it’s called?”

“She said you’d know what it was?”

“What… oh.”

You frowned at the concerned look on Kun’s face. “What? What is it?”

“It’s a cursed book of fairytales. I don’t know how Yangyang’s grandmother had acquired it in the first place, but it was wreaking havoc on the coven some years ago. Lures in any children nearby, they couldn’t risk even having it there in a spellbox. She gave it to me for safekeeping,” he explained, looking over to the witch. “Why does she want it back?”

“No clue. Better not to ask questions with her.”

“Yes, I’m aware. Well, it should definitely be around here… somewhere.” Kun stood up with a sigh, looking around the living room. “If not in here, then probably the library, or the bedroom… or the guest room… or the attic. I definitely still have it, I kept it when I moved in here, I know that much.”

Yangyang gave him a skeptical look. “I’ll help you look.”

“Thanks. I don’t feel anything in here, we should start in the library.” The vampire nodded towards the other room. “Alright now, Yangyang, if you think you’ve found it, don’t touch it, you’ll reactivate the curse.”

“I know how curses work! Witch, remember?”

“Witch who puts his potions in Gorgonade bottles! Remember?”

As the two of them headed off, still bickering, you and Kunhang just looked at each other, bursting into giggles at the same time.

“He’s totally going to forget and touch it if it finds it.” You shook your head, sliding down onto the main couch cushions.

“Yeah, he’d be all ‘Look, Kun, I found it!’” Kunhang zealously imitated his roommate yanking a book off a shelf. “And then bam, get cursed like an idiot.”

“I hope that thing’s in the attic. I don’t want to think that I could’ve been almost accidentally cursing myself this whole time.”

“Yikes. Better have Yangyang ask his grandma if Kun is hanging onto anything else for her.”

“Why do you think she wants it back?”

“You never know with Grandma Liu.”

You nodded, silent as you pondered this for a moment, having never met anybody from Yangyang’s coven, much less his grandmother, the matriarch of it. Kunhang left the silence alone for a while before he finally spoke again.

“Okay, fine. He’s not so bad,” he admitted with a half-hearted eyeroll.

“What finally did it?” You asked curiously.

“What do you mean?”

“Come on, what was it? What finally convinced you?”

“He’s a pretty good cook.”

“Your stomach, of course.”

“Hey—”

“Look, I’m just glad this is all resolved now,” you grinned, scooting closer to him to wrap an arm around him.

Your friend threw an arm and a wing over your shoulders, pulling you in closer. “Yeah, me too. You deserve something so… good. I’m happy for you.”

“Thanks, Kunhang.” You rubbed his back. “Seriously, for everything.”

Later that night, after you and Kun had seen Yangyang and Kunhang off at the front door with the cursed book in a DIY magic biohazard disposal container consisting of several garbage bags, glass tupperwares, and gloves for the witch to wear while he carried it, then finished tidying up the kitchen. Now you two were sat on the couch, quietly absorbed in your own activities as music streamed from his record player. It was some obscure, limited press record that Kun had picked up on a whim at one of the band’s shows decades ago now; a Google search for the album or band name didn’t even turn up any results. You were reclined in a half-laying position reading by the light of a lamp, intent on finishing all of The Complete Works of Sherlock Holmes, while Kun was tinkering with the settings of a new camera he had bought the other day. How well he could calibrate it in his darkened living room, you didn’t know, but you were content to let him fiddle with it in peace so long as he let you keep your legs in his lap.

You were faintly aware of him occasionally taking pictures of the objects around the room, and of you, and lifted the book even high to cover more of your face.

“Kun...” You said his name with a hint of warning, not taking your eyes off your page.

“What?” Another shutter click.

“You have to have a million photos of me by now.”

“Maybe I want a million and one.” Another click. “Okay, maybe a million and two.”

You smiled to yourself as you continued reading, and Kun pointed the lens elsewhere to test the flash. As you came to a good stopping point at the end of one of the short stories, you laid the attached ribbon bookmark in between the pages and shut the book. You watched Kun fuss with the settings for a few moments, amused and endeared as he would sometimes point the lens and make an adjustment without even taking a picture, and sometimes take several photos, look at them, then change something.

“So, what were you and Kunhang talking about?” You asked him as nonchalantly as possible.

He snapped around to look at you. “Hm?”

“I’ve known that man my whole life. I know when he’s bullshitting me,” you informed him, not a hint of anger or malice in your tone. “Very kind of you to go along with it in the moment, by the way.”

“I’m sorry, he stressed that he really didn’t want you to know,” Kun apologized sincerely, setting his camera down on the coffee table.

“What did he tell you? If it was about the first time I went flying, I didn’t throw up everywhere, and really he was the one who—”

“He wanted to ask me something, and you really must tell me this story at a later time.”

“Oh.” You looked around awkwardly. “What did he ask you?”

He focused his red eyes on you, a much more serious air descending on the conversation and his tone. “If I was going to turn you, or if I ever would.”

“Oh God, Kun, I’m sorry.” You shot up into a proper sitting position. “We don’t even live together, he shouldn’t have been asking you if we’ve talked about eternity. As if that’s even his business in the first place anyway.”

“He seemed very concerned about your view on mortality since your brother’s passing,” your boyfriend explained with what you knew were his carefully chosen words. No way Kunhang had that kind of tact.

“He thinks I’m dating a vampire to cope with my brother dying. Great armchair psychology.”

“I don’t think that. I remember when you said that you’re okay with not being here forever. When we went to the video gallery during the love potion incident.”

“Look, I can’t lie and say that it doesn’t bring me comfort to know that you’re not going to get hit by a bus tomorrow and die, or get cancer, or some other horrible illness and die a slow painful death while all I can do is watch. Like that’s… definitely a plus.” You admitted with a chuckle, taking one of Kun’s hands in both of yours. “But that’s not why I’m dating you. And I’m definitely not dating you in hopes that one day you’ll turn me. Like I said, we don’t even live together— eternity, or lack thereof, is not a conversation to be had yet.”

Kun nodded, brushing his thumb over the backs of your fingers. “I believe that’s a fair assessment. I’m of course content to take this at whatever pace you want, Y/N. I’m just glad to have the honor of being in your life, for however long that may be.”

“So what did you tell Kunhang? Because he seemed awfully happy with himself after you two talked.”

He paused, looking down at your entwined hands, then back up at you. “Do you remember how I was turned?”

“You broke your leg and the broken bone nicked an artery. Your friend turned you to save your life because you were bleeding out,” you summarized the gist of the full story, which you’d finally heard some time after you’d started dating.

“I told him I’d never take the choice from you. He seemed to like that answer.”

You let out a small sigh of relief. Honestly, you had half expected Kunhang to flip out at any possibility of Kun being willing to turn you. Seems like he really had listened to you this afternoon.

You pressed a kiss to Kun’s cheek. “Thank you, Kun. I like that answer, too. But again, I am so sorry he put you on the spot like that.”

“Y/N…” Kun murmured, bringing his free hand to gently caress your face. “I know I just said that I’m content to take this at whatever pace you’re comfortable with. And that is true. But I want you to know… that after so long, I know what I want, and because of that it was so easy to fall in love with you. So I’m ready for whatever you’re ready for, whenever you’re ready. You want to move in together? Okay. You want to get three cats? Okay. You want to talk about forever? That will have to be more conversations than the cats, but sure, we can talk about it, talk about a plan.”

“Kun…” You breathed his name out, tightening your hold on his hand in hopes that could convey even a fraction of all the tongue-tied words you couldn’t figure out how to say in that moment.

“I’m sorry, that was too much.” He shook his head at himself.

“No, no. It wasn’t,” you reassured him. “But, I’m not ready to talk about forever right now… I-I don’t even have my bachelor’s yet.”

“That’s okay. Like I said, I want whatever pace you want. I just want you, for however long that’ll be.” He brought your hands up to leave a feather-light kiss on your fingers.

“But the fact that you would be ready to talk about forever…” You let go of his hand entirely to loop your arms around his neck, pulling him closer to press your lips to his. His hands easily settled on your waist and lower back as you felt him melt into the kiss.

When you finally needed air—as Kun could theoretically go on for eternity—you then rested your forehead against his. “I love you, a lot, Kun. I do know that.”

“I love you, too.” Kun ran his fingertips up and down your back. “And know that I really do mean a plan for before forever. You wouldn’t say the word and I’d turn you the next second or anything hasty like that. But, you said you’re not ready to talk about it, so I will shut up now.”

You smiled to yourself at his almost nervous clarification, as if he were worried that he’d scare you off. It was endearing, to get glimpses like this where even his hundreds of years of living hadn’t prepared him for whatever was happening, and his usually calm, smooth words failed him even just for a moment. You pressed a long kiss to his temple.

After a beat, you pulled back enough to see all of his face. “Then, maybe let’s start with moving in?”

“Really?” He grinned, dimples appearing on both cheeks.

“Yeah… I’m already over here so much my apartment is practically just a really expensive storage unit at this point.”

“I’ll have to make room… for… your things…” He looked around his rather maximalist living room as if taking in just how much stuff he had for the first time.

“I need to downsize anyway.” You tried to reassure him casually.

“No, I’ll make room.”

At the anxiety growing on his face, you started rubbing his arm reassuringly. “We’ve got a few months to figure it out, don’t worry.”

“Maybe we can get a new house,” he mused aloud, then turned to you with a hopeful look. “A three bedroom?”

“Who will those other two bedrooms be for?”

“…Guests.”

“And your knickknacks.”

“Well—”

“No, wait, I like this idea. Our bedroom, a guest room, and one can be an office-slash-knickknack room.” You counted the three rooms off on your fingers. “Your producing desk can go in there so you can have some more privacy for all your secret projects.”

“Yes, it will be harder to hide them once we live together. Oh no, you’ve caught me,” he gave his ‘confession’ monotonously, earning a laugh from you. Kun gazed at you fondly, softness coming back to his features as he added, “I actually wanted to show you the one I was working on this morning.”

“You finished it?”

“Things are never finished with me, especially since I live forever, but if I listen to it anymore I think I’m going to cut my ears off, so yeah.”

“A ringing endorsement. I’m excited.”

So you two migrated over to his producing desk, where he insistently pulled you onto his lap instead of letting you bring your own chair to watch as he opened the project he had so hastily exited out of this morning. You indulged yourself and ran your fingers through Kun’s hair, brushing a couple stray pieces back from his face.

He looked up from the screen to you, his brows that were furrowed with concentration now quirking up in confusion. “Hm?”

“Nothing. You just look hot like this, all focused on your task. Has nobody told you that before?”

“I can’t say anybody has, no.”

You narrowed your eyes at him. “You lie to me, Qian Kun. All these years, not one person has told you? I don’t believe that.”

“I went through a brief stint as a bit of a hermit… didn’t have many visitors. Definitely not ones that hung around my home much as you do and got to just observe me performing various tasks.”

“Hm. Fine.” You grabbed his chin to connect your lips with his.

He hummed contentedly against your mouth, entirely unconcerned that his original goal had been sidetracked. You parted your lips to deepen the kiss as you felt one of his hands land on your hip, abandoning where it had previously been on either the keyboard or mouse.

When you finally pulled back, you had a well-kissed Qian Kun in front of you. He looked up at you with slightly glazed-over eyes, a winded smirk on his face as he asked, “And what was that for?”

“Like I said, you look hot like this. Another good reason for us to tuck your producing desk away when we live together. You’d never get any work done if you were just out in the open.”

“Maybe we should downsize, actually. A one bedroom? Studio?”

“Mm, weren’t you going to show me something?” You asked innocently, one finger tapping his cheek.

“Was I?”

“I don’t know, maybe,” you played along with a giggle, letting go of his face to mess with the collar of his shirt.

“You’re awful sometimes, you know?” He shook his head and laughed, returning his focus to the computer screens, as did you. After a couple more clicks, he had an audio file pulled up. “Ready?”

You settled in so that you were actually facing the screen, one arm around his shoulders. “Ready.”

Kun pressed play on it, and soon a euphonious melody was playing through the speakers. It was a full arrangement with strings, piano, drums, and even a couple sung verses that you easily recognized as Kun’s voice. You’d heard him hum while cooking, or sing along to the old radio and vinyl player in his home, but never a proper performance like this. The song was less than a couple minutes, but it was gorgeous, and you could feel a wide, delighted smile on your features as you listened.

“Kun…” You breathed out in awe once it was over, turning to look at your boyfriend. “That was so beautiful. You… have such a beautiful mind. Thank you for showing me that. I… I just…”

You were at a loss for words, getting too choked up on your thoughts as you gazed down at him. Hesitantly stroking your thumb over his cheekbone, for a moment you almost couldn’t believe he was real, that he was so miraculous, and was right here, with you.

Kun gently took your hand from his face and held it in his, kissing the back of your knuckles tenderly before resting it on his chest. “I love you, Y/N. So much. Do you want to listen to it again?”

You nodded quickly, resting your head in the crook of his neck and closing your eyes. First, the click of the mouse, then the gorgeous work of art that Kun had composed for you played once more. You pressed a kiss against whatever skin of his neck was closest to your mouth.

“I love you, Kun,” you murmured, squeezing his hand that was still holding yours. “I love you so much. More than whatever eternity we’ll have together, big or small, I’ll love you for even longer than that.”

The song ended, and he played it again before wrapping his other arm around you tightly. The two of you listened to it quietly, the only other sounds that of your breathing. And as it neared the end, it looped back to the beginning all on its own, without Kun having to let go of you.

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letsnotdoanything · 6 months

Text

❧ word count: 19.4k ❧ warnings: cursing, graphic description of blood and blood drinking (you know, vampire stuff), graphic description of neck biting so if that’s your no-go zone it’s time to make a decision here, mentions of death and dying (in the context of vampires) ❧ genre: fluff, modern magical creatures au, fantasy au, college au, vampire kun, human reader, ft. various other magical weishens, “uh-oh one of us drank a love potion” trope but with a twist, same universe as strawberry sunday ❧ extra info: this work is set in the same universe as strawberry sunday but can be read as a standalone! there is no continuing plotline between fics in this universe, they simply take place in the same world/magic system and may have overlapping characters (neos may pop up in more than one work!) ❧ author’s note: omg omg i’m so excited to not only debut vampire kun but to begin expanding the strawberry sunday universe! enjoy! ❧ sequel

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ explore the strawberry sunday universe more here!

“Did I just drink a goddamn love potion? What the fuck were you planning on doing with a love potion, exactly, anyway?”

“We were supposed to bring them in to test their properties in the lab. And it’s not just a love potion... That already exists, I wanted to take mine to the next level. That’s why Kun’s here.”

“I just don’t get this one,” Kunhang sighed, tapping his pencil against his laptop.

He shifted in place on his bed, reaching behind him to scratch at the middle of his back. You were sitting at his desk chair, going over review questions for your Calculus test tomorrow. Your friend kept itching at his back, and you spun around, putting your notebook and pencil down on the desk.

“I think we need a break, Kunhang. You look like you need to preen,” you declared, standing up and stretching.

“Yeah,” his nose scrunched up as he set his computer aside to get at his back and shoulders with two hands.

“I’m going to get something to drink. You want anything while I’m up?”

“No, I’m good. Thanks, Y/N.”

In Kunhang’s kitchen, you downed a cup of water first. Knowing that the gryphon would be taking some time to preen his wing and shoulder feathers, you opened the fridge to see if you could find anything good. It was barren, it didn’t seem like he nor his witch roommate Yangyang had gone grocery shopping recently. The door held mostly condiments, however you did spot a couple bottles of blue and red Gorgonade. The seal on the red sports drink was cracked, but it looked completely full. You didn’t mind drinking it if your friend had only taken a sip or two. After all, red was your favorite.

Carrying it back over towards his room, you called out down the hall, “Kunhang!”

“Eh?” His response was muffled through presumably a mouthful of feathers.

“Is this your red Gorgonade?”

“Huh?”

“Gorgonade! Can I drink?”

“Have whatever you want!”

“Thanks!”

You wandered around the living room, stretching your legs as you took your first sip. It didn’t taste like the red sports drink normally did. It had a more… earthy taste to it. Still slightly sweet, and a bit rich. But definitely not the normal fruity and saccharine flavor. Looking closer at the label, it definitely said Fruit Punch. You inspected the expiration date next. Nope, definitely well within that, by over a year.

Wondering if you had tasted it right, you took another sip, staring hard at the words ‘Fruit Punch’ on the label. No, still tasted a bit off. Holding the bottle up to the sunlight streaming in through the living room window, you saw that the color wasn’t quite right either, a darker red than normal. Kunhang must have left the bottle open in the fridge for too long and it went a bit off.

You were half done with the bottle by the time you heard Kunhang yelling from his bedroom. Figuring that it was him telling you he was done, you walked back over.

He was readjusting his shirt and fixing his hair as you walked in, looking much more refreshed now. You picked up a stray grey feather that was on the desk chair and tossed it in the trashcan with the others before sitting down.

“Where’d you get that?” He nodded at the bottle as you took another swig from it.

You tilted your head in confusion, “Uh, your fridge?”

“Must’ve been Yang’s,” the gryphon shrugged. “I thought you had found the blue one that’s in there.”

“Oh shit,” you looked down at the mostly empty bottle, feeling guilty now.

“He’ll live.”

A bit ashamed, you finished off the drink and set the empty container down on the desk.

You two had gotten through only a couple more review questions before the door to Kunhang’s room was thrown open, a wild-eyed, disheveled, crazed Yangyang bursting in.

“Have you seen my—” His eyes bugged out of his head when they landed on the empty bottle next to you. He looked between you and Kunhang frantically. “Which one of you drank that?”

You immediately went to apologize, a bit alarmed at how invested he seemed in this drink, “That was me, Yangyang. I’m sorry, I thought it was Kunhang’s. Look, I’ll buy you another.”

The witch winced, looking over his shoulder at something in the hallway. Another figure entered the room then, who you recognized somewhat. You knew of Qian Kun through mutual friends, he attended classes at your campus too, in addition to being a several-century-old vampire. Though you’d never asked, he looked as though he’d been turned in his mid to late twenties, but that presumably didn’t matter much once you’d been around for centuries on end.

Kun’s hands were tucked into the pockets of his crisp dress pants as he seemed to be appraising you. Despite being a student, the couple of times you’d seen him in passing, he had been dressed more like a professor than most of your professors. Today he was in a pair of black slacks and black knit sweater with a white collared dress shirt underneath.

You and Kunhang exchanged bewildered looks before the gryphon finally spoke up.

“Yangyang, what the hell’s going on?”

“Uhm…” Yangyang ran a hand through his hair anxiously. “How- How are you, Y/N? You know, we never hang out—”

“Yangyang!” You cut him off. “Did you do something to that Gorgonade?”

“Well, no…” He refused to meet your eyes, explaining to the floor. “Becauseitwasn’tGorgonade.”

You looked at him incredulously. “What the hell did I fucking drink, then?”

“Well, you see, I had this assignment in my Magical Botany II class, and one of the options was to create a botanical blend incorporating a magical plant we studied this semester. I’m a witch, so, easy A, duh.”

“Are you telling me I just drank a fucking potion?”

“Botanical blend!”

“Why would you put a potion in a fucking Gorgonade bottle?”

“Botanical blend!”

“Put it in a weird little vial with a ‘DO NOT DRINK: POTION’ label on it or something! What the fuck is wrong with you?!”

“I ran out of glass jars last month! I’ve been meaning to run to the apothecary…”

“So you used a Gorgonade bottle?”

Kunhang cut in then, “Yangyang, what kind of potion was it? You said you had to create it; do you even know what it’s going to do to Y/N?”

“Well, I chose the lover’s embrace blossom as my plant.”

“Lover’s embrace…” you sighed, the vine immediately coming to mind. Mature plants bloomed flowers whose pollen would intoxicate those who breathed it in so they wouldn’t struggle while the vines ensnared them. You imagined it was exactly that pollen that the witch used. “Did I just drink a goddamn love potion? What the fuck were you planning on doing with a love potion, exactly, anyway?”

The three of you finally looked over at the vampire again. He stared back at you, his deep red eyes feeling like they were piercing your very soul. You had to look away, back at Yangyang.

“The love potion is attuned specifically to him, theoretically. Vampires metabolize things so much faster, so their blood may make the effects more powerful, but it should burn right through you super fast, Y/N!” Yangyang tried to put a positive spin on it for you, but your jaw dropped in horror.

“I drank his blood?!” You screeched, your hand flying up to your mouth. It took everything in you to hold back gags at the thought.

“Just a couple drops, just a couple drops!” The witch tried very hard to backpedal.

Kunhang looked between you and Kun. “How long should it take to kick in, Yangyang?”

“Like five minutes.”

“And when did you drink that, Y/N?”

“An hour ago,” you informed him, the same realization seeming to dawn on the both of you.

“And… do you feel any different about Kun than before today?”

You looked at the vampire, feeling almost sheepish as you had to shake your head. Sure, the guy was attractive, but you definitely weren’t magically in love with him all of a sudden.

“No, I feel fine. Normal,” you clarified, turning to the witch. Giving Yangyang a shrug, you didn’t feel all that sorry as you told him, “Maybe your potion sucks.”

“No, it should definitely work!” Yangyang replied indignantly.

“Well I don’t feel anything!” You reiterated. “So congrats on your F, Yangyang!”

The witch huffed, brows furrowing as he looked you over. “Yeah, you’re not acting any different. What the fuck happened?”

“If that’s all, can you get the hell out?” Kunhang requested frankly. “We’re trying to study.”

“Yeah, I guess,” Yangyang sighed. He turned back to the vampire, pointing to the exit dramatically, “Back to the drawing board, Kun!”

Kun still hadn’t moved from his spot as Yangyang was mostly out of the room, then popped his head back in.

“Y/N, you’ll tell me if anything changes, right?”

“I promise, you will be the first to know if your potion did anything weird to me,” you nodded firmly. “I will personally come over here and beat your ass for it.”

“I was thinking like a text or a phone call, but that works too I guess.” Yangyang gave you a thumbs up before disappearing from the room.

You held Kun’s gaze for an awkward moment, unsure why he was still here. Maybe you should apologize?

“Kun!” Yangyang called for him again, and the vampire finally looked away from you, walking out of Kunhang’s bedroom.

It was dark out when you eventually left Kunhang’s apartment, the review guide completed, and your brain just a little fried from all that math. With your backpack slung over your shoulder, and keys in hand, you took off down the sidewalk for the short walk back to your own home.

“Y/N.” A voice suddenly saying your name from right beside you made you jump out of your skin.

“Oh, shit!” You exclaimed, clutching a hand to your chest. When you whipped around to see that it belonged to a familiar face, you took a deep breath before greeting him. “Uh, hi, Kun.”

He remained quiet.

You kept talking, adjusting your bag strap on your shoulder to calm yourself down, “Sorry about all that back in Kunhang and Yangyang’s apartment, by the way. I know it was stupid of me to drink something in a witch’s fridge that tasted off. That part was on me.”

“Are you walking home?” He questioned, focus rather intense on you.

“Yeah, my apartment isn’t far.” You gestured in the vague direction of it.

A deep frown etched itself into his features, “By yourself? It’s rather late.”

“I know! What if another vampire sneaks up on me?” You gasped teasingly.

“Will you let me walk you home? Please?”

Your eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Oh, uh, sure. Thanks.”

The two of you walked side by side in silence. You shifted your bookbag from one shoulder to the other when your muscles got tired.

“Is that heavy?” Kun asked.

“I mean, kind of? My laptop’s in there, and a couple notebooks; Kunhang and I were doing this review packet for a Calc test,” you explained.

“I can carry it for you.” He held a hand out expectantly.

“Oh, you really don’t have to.”

“I want to.”

“Uhm… okay.” You pulled the bag off your shoulder and handed it to him by the strap. Honestly, you wouldn’t be too terribly surprised if he ran off with it. Him robbing you seemed about as likely as him randomly offering to walk you home and carry your bag for you.

Kun effortlessly slipped the bookbag on. It looked out of place against his slacks and dress shirt/sweater combo, especially with your multiple cute character keychains that you had attached to the zipper.

He dutifully carried it all the way to your front door for you, where you gratefully took it back. You were very excited for tonight to be over. Between studying, the potion debacle, and now this incredibly awkward interaction, diving headfirst into your bed sounded like exactly what you needed.

“Thank you, Kun, I’m just going to—” You cut yourself off when you were finally able to see his face clearly in the security light outside your apartment door. His crimson irises were nearly gone, entirely swallowed by inky pupils, and he was pulling at his shirt almost as if he were fanning himself to cool down. “Oh my god, Kun, are you okay? Your pupils are… blown. I’d check your temperature, but I don’t think vampires can run a fever, can you?”

“I… I’m…” He didn’t even finish his sentence, biting down on his bottom lip, and holding up a finger in a gesture for you to wait a moment.

You didn’t know too much about vampires, nor whatever ailments they could possibly get afflicted with, but you did know somebody who probably would. Bringing your phone out from your pocket, you started flicking through your contacts list, “I feel like I should call Renjun. He’s a Magical Creatures Studies major. Uhm, he was able to figure out why Dejun stopped producing fire for a weird two weeks last year. He might be able to help. Here, let me—”

“No, I’m fine. I know what it is.”

“Oh. That’s good. What is it? Is there anything I can do?”

Kun straightened back up, hand going to smooth out the wrinkles in his sweater that he’d caused by pulling it at. “I believe Yangyang’s love potion was successful in a way he did not intend.”

“Kun, seriously, I don’t feel any—”

“I do.” He cut you off sternly, focusing his darkened eyes on yours.

“You…” You breathed out, eyes widening.

“I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable, I apologize.” He bowed his head. “I tried to control it as best as I could. But yes, I suddenly started experiencing extremely strong romantic feelings for you earlier tonight.”

“O-Oh.”

“I should go, I’ve seen you home safely.”

“Right, uhm, goodnight, Kun,” you nodded to him, too stunned to say much else.

You clenched your jaw not to make a noise of surprise when he picked up one of your hands with his much colder one. He bent over nearly ninety degrees to press a feather-light to the back of your hand. If you had a free hand, you would’ve pinched yourself to make sure you weren’t dreaming yourself into a rom-com right now.

“Goodnight, Y/N,” he gently let go of your hand before taking a step back from you.

After fumbling to unlock your door, you practically ran inside. Oh, you were going to kill Yangyang.

Unfortunately, you couldn’t immediately start your literal witch hunt the next day, as you had to take your Calculus exam. In fact, you had mostly forgotten your dilemma as you walked out of your classroom with Kunhang and Dejun, another friend of yours.

“How are you feeling, by the way, Y/N?” Kunhang checked in with you, pressing the back of his hand to your forehead. “No sudden urge to dicked down by a va—”

You elbowed him in the side, sending him stumbling off in one direction as he cackled. “I’m fine, thanks for your concern.”

“What is he talking about?” Dejun raised an eyebrow, his slit pupils flicking between the two of you curiously.

“You really should’ve come to the study session last night, Dejun.” Kunhang jumped to relay the story to the dragon.

Dejun had the decency not to full-on laugh at you, but you did see a couple puffs of smoke come out of his nose as he tried to hold back his chuckles. “Yangyang needs to store his potions more responsibly.”

“Thank you!” You cried out, feeling vindicated.

“It seriously didn’t work at all? I mean, I don’t know what else was in there, but lover’s embrace pollen and vampire blood… sure sounds like it should’ve done something,” he mused aloud.

And that was when you sighed, “Well… it didn’t work on me.”

“And what does that mean?” Kunhang cocked his head to the side.

“Kun caught up to me after I left your apartment last night,” you confessed with a wince. “Somehow he’s the one that’s suddenly in love with me.”

“What?!” Kunhang grabbed your shoulder and shook you with equal amounts of disbelief and delight.

You swatted him away, “I don’t know! But I’m going to find Yangyang and see what the little twerp has to say for himself.”

“He should be getting out of Bot II in ten minutes.” Dejun pointed to a building off to your right. “Try to leave him in one piece, Y/N.”

“No promises.”

Kunhang and Dejun both had other classes to get to, leaving you to wait in front of the Earth Sciences building alone, arms crossed and foot tapping impatiently.

“Y/N, hello.”

You spun around on your heel at the familiar voice, now face to face with deep red eyes and dark brown hair.

“Hey, Kun,” you greeted him. He didn’t seem as… unwell as last night. His crisp white button up was tucked neatly into his dark brown dress pants, and for a brief moment you wondered if he even owned casual clothes. Small gold earrings dangled from his lobes, glinting as they caught the dappled sunlight streaming in through the leaves above you.

Feeling hopeful, you asked, “So… how are you feeling?”

“Much better, thank you for asking.” He kept his gaze on you as the two of you conversed. “I’m not, uhm, feverish anymore.”

“Oh, good,” you breathed a sigh of relief. So everything was back to normal then.

“I wanted to give you this.” In his hand was a folded piece of paper, and you accepted it from him curiously. It was crisp, fine quality, with a nice texture that you could feel as your fingers ran along the edges to unfold it.

Your eyes widened as you realized that he had just handed you a poem—a rather good one, if you were to be honest—written in an elegant script. After another quick skim just to make sure your reading comprehension was up to par, you knew that he didn’t just want your feedback on an assignment for class or something. This was a sonnet, if your recollection of your literature class from last semester was any good, about you. For you.

You looked up from the paper to Kun, offering him a nervous smile. “This is… really good, Kun. Uhm, are you busy right now?”

“I have another class in thirty minutes.”

“I’m waiting for Yangyang to get out of his class. He should be out any second. I think we should both talk to him.”

Kun nodded, tucking his hands into the pockets of his slacks. You folded the paper back up and tucked it into a folder in your backpack.

Eventually, a new rush of students began streaming out of the doors, and you scanned the crowd for Yangyang.

As soon as you spotted him towards the back, you hurried over to head him off. “Liu Yangyang!”

“Oh, Y/N! And Kun…” He looked up from his phone at you two, clearly surprised. “Is everything okay?”

“No.” You crossed your arms. “Do you have somewhere to be?”

“Oceanography in an hour. Why? Are you alright?”

Latching onto his forearm, you dragged him over to a more secluded spot of campus, Kun following behind. You relayed all the facts to the witch as quickly as possible, watching as he turned from confused to shocked.

“So it did work!” Yangyang declared brightly.

“Hey! Focus!” You said sternly. “You said that the vampire blood means it should burn up really quickly, right? So Kun’ll be back to normal soon?”

He scratched the back of his neck nervously. “If it was going to be a quick burn, it would have been over already.”

“Excuse me?”

“Kun’s the subject but you’re the vector—”

“Don’t call me that, it makes me sound like I gave him malaria or something.”

“I think—emphasis on think—that this is a two-factor potion.”

“A what?”

“Kun’s blood is doing two things: made it so that it’ll affect him, and by happenstance of him being a vampire, it makes it more powerful. And you drinking it does two things as well: since you drank it, you’re now the target of his affection, and because you’re a human, the potion itself is working through you, and humans metabolize that stuff much slower than say, a vampire.”

“So it’s supercharged and—relatively—super long lasting?”

“Is my guess.”

You pinched the bridge of your nose, muttering under your breath, “Can this get any worse?”

Yangyang breathed in through his teeth, a rueful hissing sound. “Well—”

“Oh my god, that was supposed to be rhetorical, it does get worse?”

“It probably won’t even be an issue, Kun’s super old.”

“What does that even mean, Yangyang?”

“Well, younger vampires have a difficult time controlling how much they feed because all kinds of want sort of feel the same to them. Hunger, thirst, jealousy, attraction…”

“I’m living a fucking Twilight novel...” You threw your hands up, then pointed threateningly at him. “I am absolutely going to kick your ass.”

Yangyang held his hands up in front of him defensively, starting to back away from you, “But Kun’s hundreds of years old, so that’s totally not gonna be a problem! Right, Kun?”

Finally, you looked back over to the vampire, who had been silent through this entire confrontation.

“I don’t even live feed anymore,” Kun confirmed. “Y/N, I would never hurt you.”

You knew what he meant. There were other options for vampires now besides drinking blood from a live source, donor bags or synthetic blood replacements. To your understanding, vampires were fairly divided when it came to which they preferred—if they even had a preference at all, some didn’t care as long as they were fed, to those ones it was really whatever was cheapest and easiest at the time.

“Of course, Kun.” You nodded in understanding.

When you turned to give Yangyang one last piece of your mind, the witch was nowhere to be seen. He’d run off while you were distracted. How very mature.

“Alright, well, I’ve uh,” you checked the time on your phone. “I’ve got another class to get to. So, see you.”

“Can I walk you there?”

You had just spun on your heel to leave when he asked that, and it took everything in you not to show your ‘drats!’ expression on your face when you twisted back around to talk to give him some excuse. “Sorry, Kun, I really need to call my mom on the way there. I forgot to on my way to class this morning.”

“Oh.” His face fell, making you wince. It was sweet, but you knew that he was under the effects of a love potion, so really what was the point of entertaining any of this if it was all against his will? If at the end of all of this he would go back to feeling literally no specific way about you? And you’d look like the weirdo for indulging in it.

To his credit, he accepted your (bullshit) reason easily. “Of course, you should call your mother. I’ll see you sometime after class, maybe, then.”

“Maybe, yeah.” You wanted to slap yourself as soon as the words were out of your mouth. But it got you out of there quickly, as he seemed to like this answer, giving you half a smile, nodding, and not saying anything more as you took off towards the building that housed your next class. You were going to be about forty minutes early for it, but it was better than staying out there with Kunspeare at the moment.

Walking into the student union building after your second class, you meandered around until you finally spotted three familiar heads at a table in a far corner of the third floor. You plopped down into the open seat beside Ten.

“Were you guys hiding from me or something?” You scoffed, snatching a fry from Kunhang’s plate in front of you.

“Yeah, because I was hoping to eat all my own food this time,” the gryphon rolled his eyes, but made no move to stop you as you took another fry.

The siren beside you was drawing in one of his many sketchbooks—he was an art major—and you peered over his shoulder to see what he was working on. The whole spread was filled with pencil sketches at various stages of completion, angles, and facial expressions of what seemed like your entire little friend group: you, Kunhang, Dejun, Yangyang, and the final creature that was sitting at your table now, Sicheng.

Sicheng’s fiery orange and yellow eyes looked at you analytically as the phoenix sipped on his fountain drink. He set it down to look at you with a cocked head, curious. “Why were you so late, Y/N?”

“I had to make sure the coast was clear.”

“Oh, do you have a little bloodsucking stalker?” Kunhang asked in understanding.

“He’s not stalking me, he’s been very unfortunately, unconsentingly—on both our parts—put under the effects of a love potion. I don’t fault him for that, okay?”

Ten and Sicheng exchanged bewildered looks.

“God, Kunhang, did you not already tell them? I thought you would’ve gone around blabbing this hilarious story to everyone we know by now!” You snipped at him, dreading the thought of having to relive the mortification of retelling the events of last night over again.

“I’m sorry, did you want me to?” He bickered back without missing a beat. “I’ll go get on the PA system right now.”

You shot him a glare before delving into the gist of it yourself. “Long story short, last night I was over at Kunhang and Yangyang’s. Qian Kun was there too, Yangyang’s vampire… friend? Acquaintance? Anyway, Yangyang made a love potion and like an idiot, put it in their fridge in a Gorgonade bottle then left it unattended. I accidentally drank it, and now Kun is in love with me because his blood was in the potion.”

Their jaws dropped in unison.

“Uhm—” Sicheng didn’t seem to know where he was going with that, scratching the back of his head before picking his soda back up.

“Anyway, this man has gone like full 18th-century courting or whatever on me.” You held your head in your hands, replaying the moment of him handing you the poem in your mind.

“And they say chivalry is dead,” Kunhang pretended to swoon.

“Haha, you should do stand-up,” you said sarcastically. “Seriously, what am I supposed to say when he hands me a goddamn sonnet? ‘Thanks, sick poem, bestie?’”

“He wrote you a sonnet? Where is it? Can I read it?”

“I would sooner let Ten drown me than let you read a sonnet that…” you sighed, your voice getting smaller and smaller with each word, “describes the shape of my lips.”

You shuddered at the thought of your friend ever laying eyes upon something like that. He would never let you live it down.

“Aw come on Y/N!”

“Too late, I already burned it!” You stuck your tongue out at Kunhang, who just did it right back.

“Have you given him anything, Y/N?” Ten spoke up, setting his pencil down.

“I am not writing him a sonnet, Ten.”

“I don’t mean like that. I mean, have you done any sort of reciprocity? Given him any information about yourself? Engaged with him, genuinely, on any level at all?” He paused then, and you slowly shook your head. Your friend’s ocean blue scales shimmered just beneath the skin of his cheekbones as he turned in his seat to face you, reflective gold eyes focused on you. “Look, I know he’s under the love potion and you’re not, and I’m not saying you have to treat these as sincere romantic advances from him. But maybe try to approach them at least as genuine opportunities for human connection. Or, human-vampire connection. You know what I mean.”

You scrunched your nose up thoughtfully. “I haven’t really thought about it like that. Huh...”

“I think if you at least give him a little nudge about the stuff that you do like, he’ll stop writing you sonnets.”

“Yeah, I mean, he’s just going to keep courting you for the duration of the potion, Y/N, whether you want him to or not. Might as well get a car out of it or something,” Kunhang suggested through a mouthful of fries.

“I am not going to exploit him like that!” You scoffed. “And swallow before you talk! You’re going to get gross food bits on me!”

Sicheng wordlessly handed Kunhang a napkin.

After your last class of the day, you stopped at the top of the stairs of the Math and Computer Sciences building. If Kun didn’t mysteriously show up now, you figured you could easily get his number from Kunhang or Yangyang—though that would be inviting a whole slew of other issues.

But you didn’t have to worry about that. Just as you thought, you spotted Kun approaching from the direction of the Literature, Writing, and History building. To be absolutely certain, you waved at him, and he lifted a hand back, putting on a slight burst of speed. You walked down the steps to meet him at the bottom.

“Hello, Y/N,” he greeted you as he finally stopped in front of you.

“Hi, Kun,” you offered him a smile. “How are you?”

“I’m well, thank you. How are you?”

“I’m good, I’m good.”

“Did you just finish class?”

“Yeah, Number Theory. What about you?”

“Contemporary Creative Non-Fiction. Are you a mathematics major?”

You nodded. “Unfortunately. Thinking about switching. Though my mom might kill me if I do, that’d be the third time in two years.”

“Do you not like math?”

“I like it just fine, I’m being dramatic with the ‘unfortunately’ part. I just don’t know if I like it enough to do it for the rest of my life,” you shrugged.

Kun smiled at that. “Well, take it from me. You never have to do one thing for the rest of your life. However long that may be.”

You cocked your head at that. There were more questions you wanted to ask him. He was several hundred years old, and going to college, very possibly not for the first time. He’d most certainly studied and done and seen other stuff, and you wanted to hear about it. Ten’s suggestion came to mind. An opportunity for a genuine connection.

“Do you eat food, Kun?” You asked.

“Yes, sometimes. I don’t need it to live like you, but I do enjoy it on occasion.”

“I was about to go to this bakery that I really like. Do you want to come?”

“I would love nothing more,” he answered simply, and you could hear his earnest sincerity in his words.

Kun held the door to Half Moon Bakery open for you, and you thanked him quietly as you stepped through. The warm, sweet smells immediately wafted to your nose as you walked in. A couple of customers were sitting at the small tables they had, but your eyes were on the display cases filled with loaves of bread, muffins, and baked sweet treats.

“Oh hi Y/N!” The familiar cashier behind the counter greeted you brightly, his eyes turning into crescents with his smile.

“Hey, Jeno. How are you?” You pulled your gaze from the food to beam back at him.

“I’m great! Ooh, we’ve got a new limited-edition brownie, it’s got mini peanut butter cups and swirls of peanut butter!” The werewolf informed you excitedly, and you could practically imagine a tail wagging back and forth behind him.

“Was that your idea?” You asked knowingly.

“I might have suggested something…”

“Of course you did.” You chuckled. “It sounds good, but I’m just going to get a—”

“A matcha cream-filled croissant. I know.” Jeno finished your usual order knowingly. He then looked to Kun curiously, “And what about you?”

“A blueberry lemon scone, please. And I’ll pay for both.”

You were about to object, to insist on paying for your own food, but stopped yourself. Reciprocity. You’d have to walk this line carefully, but you guessed you’d have a harder time trying to get Kun to not pay for your food, and really your goal was to stop getting sonnets from the guy.

Jeno immediately grabbed your croissant from the case and handed it to you on a small dish painted to look like a waxing moon. Kun’s scone had to be warned up, so the two of you sat down while you waited for it to be brought out.

“So do you come here a lot?” Kun asked.

“Yeah, usually like… once a week probably?” You guessed. “I used to come three times a week last semester, between these two Monday-Wednesday-Friday classes I had. They were two hours apart so I couldn’t quite go home, but I hated staying on campus during that time. So I’d usually come here, get a matcha croissant, do some homework or whatever. That’s how I know Jeno.”

“It’s lovely here. I can see why you like it.” The vampire appraised, looking around at the celestial themed décor.

“Wait until you try the food. Then you’ll really understand why I like it so much.”

Jeno came out then with Kun’s order on a half-moon painted dish, setting it down in front of him. Once the werewolf was back behind the counter, you eagerly picked up your croissant and bit into it. Immediately, you had found the creamy center, a happy noise coming from the back of your throat.

Setting the pastry down, you looked back at Kun, feeling a bit self-conscious when you realized that he hadn’t started eating yet and was instead watching you eat.

“What, Kun?”

“Nothing,” he shook his head, a tender smile on his lips. “I think that what you did just now was very cute.”

You crossed your arms and leaned your elbows forward on the table. “Fine. If you’re going to stare at me while I eat, I’m going to stare at you while you eat. Go on, take a bite.”

The vampire picked up the scone. “I suppose that is only fair. I don’t think I’ll be nearly as adorable as you were, however.”

Fighting back the flustered smile threatening to overtake your features, you instead laced your hands together in a business-like manner. “I’ll be the judge of that.”

Kun didn’t argue further, bringing the baked good to his mouth. He took a bite, and you watched eagerly as his expression changed into one of surprised delight. After swallowing, he wiped his mouth then spoke again.

“That is… exquisite.”

“I know.”

“Now I really do understand why you come here so frequently.”

“Uh-huh,” you grinned cockily, picking your croissant back up.

Once he got over his initial shock of how good the scone was, Kun engaged you in conversation. “So how is your mother?”

Right. Your supposed phone call that you had to make earlier. Well, time to fib a little. “Oh, she’s good. She’s trying to grow an herb garden, not going so well.”

Not a complete lie, that’s what she had told you when you called her last week. Hopefully your heart rate didn’t jump enough to make Kun suspicious if he was paying close attention.

“I’m glad you got to speak with her.”

The wistful look on Kun’s face made you briefly wonder about his family. Were they vampires too? When was the last time he got to speak to his mom?

“Is your mom…?”

“My mother passed quite some time ago. She remained a human. My father too.”

“I’m sorry, Kun.”

“For what?”

You frowned as you tried to think of an answer. What were you sorry for? His parents passing? Asking that question in the first place? “I… don’t know. I just am. That’s usually what we say when we hear that somebody passed away, you know? ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’”

“I passed away too. How else would I have become a vampire?” He pointed out, lightening the mood a little.

“Well then I’m sorry for your loss of you.” You laughed, earning a chuckle from Kun as well.

“Thank you. The sentiments are greatly appreciated.”

“So what are you studying, Kun? You said you had come from a non-fiction class? Was that lit or writing?”

“Contemporary Creative Non-Fiction. It was literature. I’m an Interdisciplinary major, one of my concentrations is Literature.”

“And the other?”

“History.”

You couldn’t help but laugh, “That just doesn’t sound fair to the other students. Or the professor.”

He smiled a little. “I am doing the Ancient History track. I’m not that old.”

“Speaking of—” You reclined back in your seat to study the vampire leisurely. “This can’t be your first time going to university. Right?”

“You’re correct, this is not. I have been before.”

“How many times?”

Kun hesitated. “It would be impolite for me to answer. I’m afraid it’d sound like bragging.”

“Kun, let’s make a deal.” You shifted forward again, holding his dark red gaze unwaveringly. “I understand that you have been alive for a few hundred years and have therefore experienced more things than I could possibly imagine. That’s exactly why I’m asking you these questions. So how about you trust that when I ask you a question, it’s because I have thought about it, and have decided that I really do want to know your honest answer, no matter how braggy it might sound. And I will trust that your answer is sincere and honest and not meant to be a brag in any way shape or form, and that you have really just lived your life for so long. Does that sound good?”

At the end of your proposition, you stuck your hand out in the middle of the table, waiting. Kun eyed it for a moment before sucking in a deep breath, taking your hand in his cool grasp, and shaking it.

“I accept the terms of your proposal, Y/N.”

“Pleasure doing business with you,” you grinned at him, taking your hand back. “Now, tell me about your three hundred degrees or whatever.”

“It’s not that many, really,” he seemed almost flustered, readjusting his collar for a moment. “And I’m not sure if I can remember all of them off the top of my head.”

“I’ll take what I can get.”

“Let me see… I have gone to medical school.”

“Oh wow—”

“But that was when bloodletting was still an accepted practice, I haven’t been lately.” Kun admitted sheepishly, drumming his fingers on the table as he thought some more. “Then there was astronomy, Latin, mathematics, musical composition, psychology, literature the first time, and I started law school but then the war happened…”

“War?” You echoed in bewilderment.

“I didn’t participate,” he assured you, as if that was the only thing you were possibly confused about. “But it did disrupt my studies. I never ended up going back, which is alright, I didn’t care much for law.”

“Don’t you get bored of it all? I mean, you must be a pro at everything there is.”

“No, not at all. They’re always creating new things to do.”

At your surely skeptical look, Kun continued eagerly, “For example, I learned to oil paint two hundred years ago, but there’s digital painting now. I learned how to sail a hundred years ago, but there are planes to fly now. I can play practically every instrument in a classical orchestra, but there are entirely new ways to make music that are contained completely within a computer, that I have to learn programs, software, new tools to compose on. It’s wonderful. That’s why I like to go back to school, there’s always new fields emerging, new things to learn. And even the fields that I have already have degrees in, like medicine, have made leaps and bounds since the last time I studied.”

His face was bright and animated as he raved about all of this to you, and you felt a fond smile tug at the corner of your mouth as you listened. His perspective was so… refreshing. You had honestly expected more nihilism and angst from a several hundred year old vampire who already held at least half a dozen degrees and had witnessed who knows how many historical events. But it seemed that all those years had done was make him eager to live even more.

“And you’re not... exhausted by that idea? That you’ll never be done with everything?”

“No, not at all,” he cocked his head to the side. “If I finished everything now, that’d make for a very boring eternity.”

“I like that, Kun,” you declared, picking your croissant up. “I really do.”

“Y/N, while I am very glad that you invited me out with you, and I hope you don’t take this as any sort of complaint, I am wondering…” Kun tapped his fingernail against the side of his plate as he seemed to be thinking of how to phrase whatever he wanted to ask next. “You seemed rather… freaked out last night. I do know that you and I don’t know each other well, the love potion didn’t erase my memories. I also understand that what I’m feeling is the effects of a potion. So, why the change of heart on your part?”

After swallowing the bite you’d just taken, you sighed, setting your pastry back down. “For one, I don’t want to be needlessly cruel to you. Even if you are under a love potion, I don’t think that’s an excuse to be rude and dismissive. And, I admittedly don’t know a lot about vampires. I think I’ve only met like one before. I just wanted to talk to you. Is that… okay?”

“Yeah,” he smiled softly. “Of course. I already agreed, you can ask me whatever you want.”

“Great. Because I’ve been thinking, can you get sued for turning somebody who didn’t want to be turned? Would that be a wrongful death case? Or… wrongful life?”

Kun looked at you with something that you could only call astonished adoration. His jaw dropped before his features split into a wide grin, and his shoulders started shaking as he was overtaken by giggles that he then tried to cover with his hand.

“It’s a real question!” You tried to be indignant, but you were far too surprised and endeared by the image of the previously stoic and mature vampire breaking down into giggles in front of you.

He straightened back up, physically wiping the smile off of his face. “Of course, of course it is. Please don’t think I was doing anything less than taking you seriously. I’m just… delighted by how your mind works. I’ve had plenty of people question me about vampires and being a vampire, and that has never been one of their go-to questions. Or any of their questions at all. I’m looking forward to what else you’ll ask me.”

“Well, you need to answer this one first before you can get to any of my other galaxy-brain level questions I’ve got in here.” You tapped your temple sarcastically.

“You’re right, my apologies.” Kun laced his fingers together and leaned forward against the table. “I’m not sure about the civil liability of turning someone against their will, I would have to do some research before I’d be comfortable answering your question. However, governments have tried to criminalize the turning of vampires over the years, to mixed results. Right now, it is illegal to turn someone against their will.”

“How do you prove that someone was turned willingly or not?”

“Unicorns of course help investigations to some degree. I’ve also seen some vampires have their prospective fledglings sign contracts.”

“Pfff,” you couldn’t help the burst of laughter that you let out. “Now that just takes all the romance out of it.”

“The contracts are usually only between service vampires and their clientele.”

“I’m sorry, service vampires?” You repeated incredulously.

“Those that turn others in exchange for financial compensation.”

“Sorry, I should really start paying attention when Renjun goes on his tangents, he’s probably talked about this before. Then you wouldn’t have to give me an impromptu lecture on the socioeconomic standing of vampires in modern day.”

“I don’t mind. I enjoy spending time with you, Y/N.”

You fidgeted with a napkin, looking away from his suddenly too-intense eyes. “Uhm— it’s just that term made it sound like they were escorts or something.”

“Some are,” he replied casually. “Service vampires are a heavily regulated industry, since they’re also responsible for the fledgling they produce, ensuring they don’t kill anybody. That process requires more than a contract, you need a lot of trust to help them control their desires. That trust goes both ways, of course, so those who aren’t service vampires—which is most vampires—will only turn close family and friends.”

You looked back up at him, squinting your eyes inquisitively. “Have you turned anybody, Kun?”

He pressed his lips together for a pensive moment before he answered. “I’ve… considered it. But by the time I had found someone who I could contemplate eternity with, I’d already seen far too many fledglings, too many turnings that went horribly wrong. I understood the risk, but I wasn’t sure if they did. And that was also at a time when vampires themselves weren’t outright illegal, but fledglings were to be killed on sight.”

“Oh— Oh, God.” You breathed out.

“Mature vampires were considered to be in control of our feedings, fledglings weren’t. And, they didn’t really want us going around making more of us.”

“The person you were going to turn…”

Kun looked up at a silver star decoration hanging above your table. “It ended up being for the best, I suppose. We parted ways some years later, less than amicably.”

“Ugh, I couldn’t imagine having to have awkward run-ins with your ex for literally forever,” you joked, attempting to lighten the mood.

He laughed. “Yes, I do actually have some old friends who were married before they turned several centuries ago but the diocese that performed the marriage in the first place won’t divorce them because they’re technically dead and therefore don’t have mortal souls anymore. By their logic.”

You slapped a hand over your mouth in disbelief. “Oh my God, so they’re just begrudgingly married for eternity?”

“Yeah.” He chuckled. “They still get together to celebrate their anniversary every 100 years.”

“That’s nice, I guess.”

After finishing your food up at the bakery, Kun walked you back to your apartment—you weren’t sure if it was chivalry, a genuine concern for your wellbeing, or a combination of both—and now you were once again at your front door.

“Thank you again, Kun, for paying,” you said, fishing your keys out from your backpack.

“I was happy to. Thank you for inviting me to come with you. I enjoyed our discussion a lot.”

You focused your gaze on the keys in your hand. “Me too.”

“Are you busy this weekend?”

“I’m hanging out with a couple friends tomorrow, but I don’t think I’ve got anything going on Sunday. Why?”

“I want to keep spending time with you. As much as you’ll let me, if that’s okay.”

“Oh, right.” You could feel yourself warming up at his candidness. “Uhm, sure, we can do something on Sunday. Did you have anything in mind?”

Kun had almost a mischievous smile on his face. “Would you mind terribly if I surprised you?”

You sputtered out a laugh. “You’re asking if you can surprise me?”

“Some people don’t care for surprises. And I’m not telling you what it is, just that I would like to keep it a surprise, if that’s alright with you.”

“Yeah, Kun, you can surprise me. On one condition.”

“Of course, anything.”

“Bring me your favorite book you’ve read recently.”

He tilted his head, brows furrowed in confusion. “Pardon me?”

“On Sunday, wherever we go, I want you to bring me your favorite book that you’ve read in the past…” you ruminated on how you wanted to quantify ‘recent’ for a vampire, and finally settled on, “…year. You’re half a Lit major, so I’m assuming you own least one or two.”

“Yeah, I think I might’ve read a couple here or there,” he chuckled. “I will bring you one.”

“Not just any one, your favorite, remember?”

“Of course.”

Satisfied that he understood your request, you stuck your apartment key in your lock. “Goodnight, Kun.”

“Goodnight, Y/N.” The vampire once again took your free hand in his delicate, cool grasp, pressing a soft, lingering kiss to the back of your fingers before letting it go.

You paused for just a moment, feeling as though you should say something. But there were no words that came to mind, so you instead unlocked your apartment and disappeared through the door with one last wave over your shoulder to him.

“You’re going on a date with him?” Kunhang scoffed in disbelief from the living room.

“Did you not just hear what I said?” You pushed his head as you walked by to take your seat on the floor around Sicheng and Ten’s coffee table. “We’re hanging out.”

“Sounds like a bad idea...” Your friend muttered, grabbing his beer and taking a swig of it.

“Coming from the guy who suggested I try to get a car out of him.”

“Yeah, a car. Not a date. No strings attached.”

“You’re insane,” you rolled your eyes, trying to turn your focus to the phoenix on your left, who was shuffling the stack of cards.

You, Dejun, Kunhang, and Yangyang were over at Ten and Sicheng’s place for a board game night, which of course couldn’t pass by without a comment or two about your current love potion predicament. And when you had tried to fill Ten in on how your attempt to take his advice was going, your gryphon friend had to add in his two cents.

“Coming from the girl who is going on a date with someone who is high on love potion.”

“I haven’t had a lot of opportunities to talk to vampires that are hundreds of years old, excuse me for wanting to chat.” You accepted your stack of cards from Sicheng gracefully, then turned back to glaring daggers at Kunhang. “It’s not a date.”

He was firm on his stance. “I’m telling you: This isn’t a good idea.”

“Why? Because I’m feeding into his delusion or something? He’s going to be in love with me until the love potion wears off, whether I—”

“Because I think you’re going to hurt yourself, Y/N. You’re too soft for this. Being constantly wooed for who knows how long? You don’t think that’s going to do anything to you?” Kunhang sighed, grey eyes focused on you from across the table.

You held his gaze for a moment, eyes still narrowed at him. Then, you looked away, grabbing a handful of the snacks you’d just retrieved from the kitchen. “I know it’s not real. Can we just start the fucking game? Or does everybody have an opinion on my life that they want to share?”

Ten, Sicheng, Dejun, and Yangyang all looked at each other, then simultaneously shook their heads. Ten went back to passing out the in-game currency to everyone, and you refused to look up at Kunhang despite the lingering feeling of his eyes on you.

Later on, between the conclusion of the first game and the set-up of the next, you were laying on the ground in an attempt to realign your back that had been hurting from the unfortunate hunch that you’d been sitting with. A couple others had dispersed to do various tasks, while Dejun and Sicheng stuck behind in the living room to step up the next game. They were quietly conferring over the instructions as you readjusted the positioning of your shoulders, sighing as one specific part of your back relaxed into a gentle cracking sound.

“Y/N,” Dejun got your attention.

“Hm?” You replied, too comfortable now to get up all the way yet.

“He means well.”

“…Bluebeard?” You asked in confusion, referencing the next game you were about to play, a board-gamified version of the Bluebeard’s Castle fairytale.

“No, Kunhang,” the dragon clarified. “He has every right to be a little worried about you hanging out with Kun tomorrow.”

You sighed again. “I know. I’m going to apologize to him. I just… need to be mad tonight. If I try to apologize today, I’m going to get pissed again and the wrong thing will come out and I’ll just make it worse. We’ve been friends for a few years now, we both need to sleep it off before either of us try to apologize.”

“So… are you still going to see Kun tomorrow?” It was Sicheng that asked you that.

Taking your bottom lip between your teeth, you thought about it. Maybe the smart thing would be to cancel. But you’d already asked him to bring you a book, and you were sure he’d been carefully contemplating that request ever since. Not to mention that you were excited to see him, actually. He was interesting to talk to. You’d met lots of magical creatures, all the ones that you were currently with for starters, but there was something both simultaneously refreshing and homey about talking to Kun, finding out more about him.

“Yeah, I am,” you declared, though you’d known that there was no changing your mind about it. “Don’t worry, guys. Like I said, I know it’s not real. To me, we’re just two buds hanging out. Promise.”

A knock on your door pulled you off your couch the next day. Readjusting your outfit for a brief moment, you then swung it open. The exact vampire you were expecting was on the other side, a heart-stopping smile on his face, bouquet of flowers in one hand, and small wrapped gift in the other.

“Oh, oh wow,” you breathed out, accepting the flowers from him. It was a gorgeous arrangement of yellow tulips and white baby’s breath, simple but enchanting. “Thank you, Kun.”

“Good morning, Y/N.”

“Yeah, good morning,” you said distractedly, eyes still focused on the flowers. You looked up at him again, giving him a bashful smile, “Uhm, here, I need to put these in some water.”

Leaving the door open for him, you turned to go back into your apartment, but were stopped by Kun’s voice.

“Ah, Y/N.”

“Hm?”

He was still standing on the welcome mat outside, hands clasped behind his back. “I need to be invited in.”

“Oh, right, sorry! Kun, please come in.”

“Thank you.” He stepped inside, closing the door behind him.

“So, how does that work with school and going to class? Like, do you just have to be invited into each building or is it each classroom? What about professors’ offices? Is there like a special vampire-only orientation where the president of the college invites all the new vampire students everywhere or something?” You asked him over your shoulder as you moved further into your apartment, your destination being your kitchen.

“The rules are a little fluid, but our university is a public institution, so I don’t have to be invited in anywhere.”

“Oh. Well, that’s a lot less funny than my idea.”

“Yours was very efficient,” Kun tried to placate you as you busied yourself with rooting through your cabinets.

“So what about if you went to a private university?”

“I’ve been to one private university before. However, it was run by vampires, so the owners were dead and therefore nobody needed to be invited in anywhere.”

“Huh. And my apartment?” You knelt down to check under the sink. “I was able to invite you in, but I don’t own it, I rent. Shouldn’t my landlord have been the only one to be able to invite you in?”

Kun had an answer for that one too. “Owner and/or current legal occupant who is there with the owner’s permission can invite vampires in.”

“So my lease lets me invite supernatural creatures inside, but I can’t paint,” you rolled your eyes.

Finally, you secured your lone glass vase at the back of the cabinet under the sink, behind a couple bottles of cleaning products.

“What color would you paint the walls, if you could paint?”

You filled the vase up under the faucet. “Probably a different color in each room. Dark green in the living room, goldenrod in the kitchen, something like that. I don’t know, the neutral beige grey is so boring. Especially with the fake grey hardwood.”

He smiled at you. “Very colorful. I like that.”

Having finally gotten the flowers in water, you turned back to accept the package wrapped in simple brown paper and twine. Curiously undoing the small twine bow first, then tearing the paper open, you saw that it was an old, thick, leatherbound book, and trailed your finger over to read the spine.

“The Complete Works of Sherlock Holmes?” You tilted your head. “This is your...”

Kun went to try to explain, gesturing to a couple small yellow tabs poking out of the pages. “I bookmarked just a couple that I think you’ll like—”

“Kun, I asked for your favorite from the past year, not two centuries ago!” You guffawed.

“Hey, I’ve re-read these in the past year! You didn’t say they had to be published in the past year, just my favorite that I’ve read this year, and this is it. But if you’re dissatisfied—”

“Nope! No take-backs!” You clutched the book to your chest protectively. “I’ll read them. Or, at least the bookmarked ones. I don’t know if I’ll get to them all in this lifetime.”

There was suddenly an unpleasant frown on Kun’s face, a crease forming between his brows. The teasing faded from your demeanor as you set the book down on your kitchen counter beside the vase of flowers.

“Kun? What’s wrong?”

“I just remembered that you’re human, and you know… you won’t… be here forever like I will.”

“Oh, Kun… I’m okay with that.” You reassured him, squeezing his arm.

“I know. Let’s… I don’t want to think about it anymore. Are you ready to go?” His voice was tight, the smile that flashed across his face not reaching his eyes.

“Yeah, yeah!” You grabbed your bag, then gestured for Kun to lead the way.

It was a lovely spring day, and you delighted in the still cool breeze tickling your nose as warm sun shone down on you. The streets downtown were bustling with life, and you pressed close to Kun to make sure you didn’t lose him in the crowd. You were almost knocked into by three smaller figures, a young dryad, phoenix, and human all playing tag. The dryad seemed to be It, shooting out a vine to wrap around the human kid’s waist and yanking him back. The human giggled as his friend wrapped his arms around him tight. The phoenix noticed the lack of her friends and darted back to meet them, a couple soft down feathers falling off the bridge of her nose in the process. You smiled fondly as you skirted around them and continued down the sidewalks.

“Cute,” you commented absentmindedly.

Kun’s eyes lingered on the children for another moment before he turned his gaze forwards again. “Sometimes I really do have to stop and look at where we are.”

“What...” You trailed off as you realized what he must be thinking of. “Oh, yeah. You remember what it was like before humans and magical beings lived together like this, right?”

It was before your time, but humans, magical creatures, and even different kinds of magical creatures all lived separately. You knew bits and pieces, that the kind of integration that you’d grown up with was rather recent. You had your fair share of older relatives who regarded your magical friends with thinly veiled suspicion and mistrust throughout your life.

“Yes, I do. At least, from when I was alive onwards, and I know stories from those older than I am.”

“Can you tell me about it?”

“I think that to start, it’s important to think of a spectrum of non-magical to magical that all kinds of life fall somewhere along, and not an either/or. Humans are on the furthest end of the non-magical, but they can become magical.”

“Like becoming a vampire.”

“Correct.”

“Like you.”

He nodded. “Yes.”

“Okay, I’m following so far.”

“Witches were previously just considered humans that can use magic.”

You snickered. “I know a few witches who would smite you for that, but sure, I’ve heard that before.”

“Obviously, with recent advancements in the study of magic, we know that’s not true.” Kun stopped the two of you to wait at a crosswalk signal. “But generally, it’s been easier for humans to accommodate magical beings that looked more like them over the years.”

“Closer to them on the non-magic to magic spectrum.” You related it back to his framework.

“Right. Humans were more likely to live with magical beings that looked less outlandish, and posed less of a threat to them.”

“Odd predicament for vampires, then. You look almost just like humans, used to be humans, but before blood supplements, you almost exclusively had to feed off humans.”

“Hence the... tangled and tense history of humans and vampires. I can’t really give a clear story of humans and vampires. It’s messy, depending on the time, society, village, individual family that you look at. And then of course, all magical creatures don’t get along either.”

“Dryads and dragons.” You listed off an old rivalry you knew off the top of your head. Historically, dryads despised dragons’ tendency to burn down their forests and fields.

“Right.”

“Fairies and… everyone.”

Kun chuckled. “Yeah, exactly. But the most recent history, here, now, is that mass integration to create the society that you know really came about around a hundred years ago. Witches and humans had been living together for a while, with some dryads, fairies, and even the odd vampire here and there. Then sirens, and gryphons, and phoenixes… I mean, the first human to see a dragon around here is probably still alive, you know?”

“And I just got annihilated at board game night by one yesterday.”

“Like I said... Sometimes I feel the need to just stop and take it all in.”

The crosswalk signal changed then, and the vampire with you briefly looked both ways before guiding you forward with a hand on the small of your back.

You looked over at him curiously, wishing that you could see any hint of his eyes behind his dark sunglasses. “What about when you were turned, Kun? Were vampires... Your parents were still humans... Was it hard for you?”

“I wasn’t living with my parents when I became a vampire. Which was for the best, truly, so there was no chance of me hurting them. But…” He paused, and when you looked over at him, he was looking up at the sky. “I remember when I was a young boy, and I was so small, and the world was too big. And when I was hurt, my mother would take me into her arms and tell me it would all be okay, and I believed her. I just knew it would be because she was there. Because my mother was with me and she was bigger than me, bigger than the whole world. I remember wishing I could’ve had her there then.”

Your eyes had gotten a little misty, and you reached up to dab at them with the back of your hand. Kun’s voice wavered in just the slightest, and you felt your chest tighten at just how strongly he still felt all these emotions after so long.

“Didn’t the person who turned you take care of you? When you were turning, and as a fledgling? Isn’t that what they’re supposed to do?”

“I was turned by a friend. I got hurt, very badly, and he panicked and couldn’t think of how else to save me. He was a very young vampire at the time, he had only been turned himself five years earlier. I was the first person he’d ever turned, he didn’t know what to do, how to take care of me.” Kun relayed all this to you very matter-of-factly, as if it’d happened to somebody else.

“So did you have any choice about it?”

He looked over at you with a serene look on his face. “No. But if I spend the rest of my immortal life mourning the measly forty or fifty years that I would’ve gotten at the time, that would make for a miserable eternity. Every choice that we make or don’t make creates a new life for ourselves, and yes, sometimes for others. And if we constantly mourn all those lives we never got to live, we’ll never have time to live the one that we do have.”

The fist that your hand had curled into over the unjustness of Kun’s turning, relaxed as he continued speaking. You took a deep breath to recenter yourself.

“And your mother? Your father?”

“I saw them some time after I turned. And… it wasn’t any different. They were still my parents.” He smiled, it was bittersweet, but filled with heart, with love. “And I believed again that it would all be okay.”

“And… has it been?” You asked, head tilted curiously. Could a vampire even define such a long life as ‘okay’ or not?

Kun looked down from the sky at you this time, his features turning soft, fond. “More than.”

Kun finally stopped you on a less busy street, all old buildings, stone and brick faces. The one in particular that you were in front of had no distinguishing signage out front, and you peered around curiously for any hint as to what the six-floor building you were looking at was possibly used for. The windows were tinted too darkly for you to see in, and the ornately carved dark wooden door held no clue as to its identity other than the street number, 101.

Your companion pulled on the large iron handle to hold the door open for you. Well, you did give him permission to surprise you, you certainly couldn’t complain about not knowing what was going on. So, you stepped in.

As soon as you crossed the threshold, the air around you became noticeably cooler. Not uncomfortably so, just feeling almost as if you were a basement, the sort of coolness of being underground. You were in a lobby, a woman sitting behind a counter reading a book that looked even older than the one Kun had given you. She looked about your parents’ age, some grey streaked in her hair. But you realized that assessment meant nothing, as her eyes flashed red in the warm, dim light when she glanced up from her book to the two of you.

“Good morning,” Kun greeted her, and stepped up to the counter to hold a small black card the size of a business card out to her.

She took it, skimming the front and back for all of one second before handing it back to him. Without a word, she went back to reading.

“Come on.” Kun ushered you further into the building, through the black velvet curtain past the desk.

This time, you emerged in a much larger room. There were no lights, but it was still illuminated by an old-school movie projector casting a grainy, black and white scene on the opposite wall. You watched as a woman in clothes that you couldn’t even pinpoint the timeframe of—other than definitely not being from the past century at least—walked, turned, and waved at the camera. The clip then replayed from the beginning by itself, no manual rewinding necessary.

You rewatched the short two-second clip again with delight before you turned to Kun. “What is this place?”

“It’s a gallery, of sorts,” he explained, gesturing to the video. “A group of vampires all got together and compiled videos, movies, films, kinetoscopes—every sort of moving image you can imagine—that they had been holding onto over their lifetimes. And they’re all on display here.”

“Kun, this is so cool!” You gasped.

“I think we all—non-vampires and vampires alike—tend to have this idea of vampires as being stuck in whenever they were turned. You know, a vampire turned in the 16th century is treated the same way we treat a painting from the 16th century. Like we’re... artifacts or something. And we’re not, we lived through everything else that came after we turned too. We’re not dead history, we’re living, moving history.” Kun had led you into another room of the gallery as he spoke, where a clip of a busy street market was repeating. “I think this is a good reminder of that. The oldest stuff is on the bottom from the invention of the camera, and the newest up at the top. It goes all the way to the present, digital. The top floor isn’t finished, they’ll keep adding to it as the years go by, as we all keep living through history.”

You watched the market, vendors and customers, families, horses, produce, rugs and wares. Just a microcosm of everyday life from whenever and wherever this was. A peek into moving history.

“Do you have anything here?” You asked, curious if you’d be able to see any microcosm of Kun’s life.

He shook his head. “No. I couldn’t decide what to submit. Too many options. If you ever see my home, you’ll understand that I... I tend to hoard.”

“Thank you for bringing me here.” You watched Kun’s face this time as he was focused on the moving picture. His features were lit softly from the front, cast in the same black and white as the image, except for his earnest, lively scarlet eyes.

The sun was just setting when you finally returned to your apartment. You’d ended up spending the whole day out with Kun. First, your stomach growled as soon as you two left the gallery since it was about lunchtime, and Kun immediately had to remedy that by taking you to lunch. Then, the restaurant you’d eaten at was near the shopping district, so you two meandered and did some window shopping—you really did have to physically stop him from going in and buying you everything that you even looked at for more than one second. And finally, you might have intentionally let slip that you were “kinda hungry” as it approached the evening, and your chest felt funny at the way that Kun’s face lit up before he offered to take you to dinner.

And now, you were slowing to a stop at your front door, getting ready to say goodnight.

“Thank you, Kun. This was a really fun day,” you said genuinely. “And thank you for the book recommendation, too. I’m excited to read it.”

Kun’s eyes sparkled as he smiled at you. “Thank you for letting me surprise you, Y/N. It made me happy to see you enjoy yourself today.”

“Oh, uhm, I have something for you too, by the way!”

“Really?”

“I didn’t think it was fair for you to be surprising me, and for me to be asking for a book on top of that without giving you anything in return…” You paused both for dramatic effect, and to search through your phone.

He took this as an opportunity to interject, “Y/N, you gave me plenty just by agreeing to come.”

There was a prick at your heart from his sweet words. Pushing past that, you tried to joke as casually as possible, “And yet I still want to give you…”

Finally finding what you were looking for, you selected a thumbnail from your camera roll. Shoulder to shoulder with Kun, you held up your phone screen for him to see properly. It was a video that you’d taken today, just a few seconds long, of Kun. You’d taken it while the two of you were out window-shopping, and Kun had stopped at the window of an electronics store to look over a new piece of music mixing equipment that was on display there, his face awash in rainbow by the colorful LEDs inside. You’d been caught by the spark of interest that was on his features, a different look than you’d ever seen from him since he’d been under the love potion. Sure, all the soft smiles and tender adoration you’d been getting was sweet. But to see this magnetism towards something he was truly interested in outside of the effects of the potion, you were utterly entranced.

He looked up from the video to you, brow set in confusion. “I don’t understand.”

“You said you didn’t know what to submit to the video gallery. They’re taking digital submissions, right?”

“Right...”

“I’m sorry if I’ve been treating you like an artifact, Kun. If submitting something old is going to make you feel like that, then maybe you should submit a newer piece of your moving history.”

Kun stared at you, mouth parted. He was silent for a beat too long, and you start fidgeting, suddenly unsure of yourself.

“Sorry, I’m realizing that’s like really presumptuous of me to tell you what to submit— It’s just, you know, another option, if you want it.”

“No, it’s perfect, Y/N,” he reassured you. “Please, send me it. Having you as a part of my moving history in the gallery, I really like that idea.”

You were getting hot under the intensity of his gaze, and looked back down at your phone screen. “Right. I’ll-I’ll send it to you.”

“And you don’t treat me like an artifact, either.” Kun briefly squeezed your hand, then dropped it. Part of you itched to grab his again. “I’m sorry that I made you think that. You treat me like a person, Y/N. You ask me questions, yes, but you ask questions about all of me. Me back then, me now, my family, my major, my favorite book from the past year, even my future. It’s… the first time since I was turned that I think I’ve had someone do that.”

You swallowed thickly, the gulp comically loud in your ears. He held your eye contact, that same loving, peaceful, adoring look on his face as he gazed at you.

Then, he finally looked away, at the setting sun. “It’s getting late. I should let you go for the night.”

Scrambling to reach into your bag, you ascertained your keys and started the first of too many attempts at unlocking your door. “Goodnight, Kun.”

“Goodnight, Y/N.” He took your hand, bending over to press a familiar, sickly sweet kiss to your knuckles. When he stood up straight, he added, “You will send me that video, right?”

“R-Right. The video. Yes.” You nodded dumbly, opening the door then practically slamming it shut behind you.

You didn’t make it even two steps into your apartment, sliding down the wall of your entryway with a drawn-out sigh. Fuck.

“I fucking hate Python,” you declared, snapping your laptop shut. You, Dejun, Yangyang, Ten, and Sicheng were back in the student union getting lunch together between classes, and you and your dragon friend were taking the spare time to work on an assignment. “I’m going to quit school and run away to live in the woods and survive off the land and if I ever see another computer again for the rest of my life it’ll be too soon.”

Dejun snickered from beside you, still happily typing away at his own coding. “You wouldn’t last an hour without wifi, Y/N.”

You groaned, opening your computer back up. “I know... a girl can dream, right?”

“Just change majors if you hate math this much,” Yangyang suggested from across the table, popping a tater tot into his mouth.

“It’s not like you haven’t done it before,” Ten added oh-so-helpfully, eyes not leaving his sketchbook.

“It’s not that I hate math, I just...” you trailed off as you tried to put your situation into words.

“Don’t like it?” Dejun finished for you humorously.

You stuck your tongue out at him. “No. I just... hate math classes.”

“Oh, that’s so much clearer.”

“Just like you hated Literature classes, and hated History classes,” Sicheng pointed out, listing off your previous two majors.

“Exactly!” You exclaimed, despite knowing that the phoenix was poking fun at you too. “You get me, Sicheng!”

“Scary...” he murmured to himself.

As you were desperately trying to think of any comeback other than just sticking your tongue out at him, you heard a voice calling your name. Looking up, you saw Kun approaching your table, and you gave him a small wave of acknowledgement.

He stopped next to your table, gentle smile focused down on you. “Hello, Y/N.”

“Hey, Kun,” you smiled up at the vampire, eyeing the paper bag in his hand with a familiar logo on it. “So you went back to Half Moon?”

“Yes, I did.” He held the bag out to you.

You accepted it, having to bite down on your bottom lip to keep your bashful grin at bay as you peered into the paper bag. An excited squeal left your mouth when you saw exactly what he had brought you. “A matcha croissant! Thank you, Kun!”

“You’re welcome.” He beamed at you.

Looking around the table, you ignored the pointed looks all your friends were giving you, and instead gestured to the empty chair on the other side of Dejun. “Do you want to sit with us?”

“Thank you, I wish I could,” he shook his head. “Unfortunately, I have a class to get to. Goodbye, Y/N.”

“Bye.” You didn’t even flinch when he kissed your hand this time, though your skin was on fire as you remembered very clearly that your friends were right there.

As Kun left, he gave you a final wave over his shoulder, and you waved back before returning to your friends, dread in your stomach. In an effort to appear as normal as possible, you reached into the bag and pulled out your croissant. The table was still dead silent after you had taken your first bite, and you looked up from your food to see the other four staring at you.

“Oh my god, would you guys stop?” You hissed.

“Damn... I’m such a good witch,” Yangyang cracked his knuckles. “That man is heads over heels for you!”

“He brought me a croissant!” You retorted indignantly. “It’s not like he proposed or anything.”

“Y/N, I’ve known Kun for...” Yangyang trailed off, brows furrowing as he seemed to be thinking of how long he really had known the vampire for. “I don’t know, a few years? And he’s not like a recluse or anything but he’s not, how you would say... warm and fuzzy.”

“Oh my—”

“He brought you a croissant! What looks like your favorite kind, if I’m not mistaken?”

You pouted as you took another bite. “Maybe.”

“Looks like Ten’s advice worked then,” Sicheng mused.

“You should probably give him a few more nudges about other stuff you like, though, unless you want to get a hundred matcha croissants a day,” the siren suggested, readjusting his hold on his pencil.

“Yeah. I just can’t figure out how he always seems to know where I am—”

“He can smell you.” The creatures around you all retorted in unison, nobody even looking up from their individual tasks.

You coughed, scrambling to grab your bottle to take a long drink of water. Your other hand instinctually came up to rub at the side of your throat.

“So... how are... things?” Kunhang asked tersely, sitting on the porch swing that he and Yangyang had on their balcony. You’d called him after your last class that day, begging him to let you come over.

You leaned against the balcony railing, taking a deep breath—

“That doesn’t sound good.”

—and let out something between a groan and a screech.

“That really doesn’t sound good.” The gryphon picked up his blue Gorgonade that was sitting on the side table. “Care to share, Y/N?”

“You were right...” You mumbled, burying your face in your hands.

“Sorry, what was that?”

“You were right, okay? Happy, Kunhang? You were right! You know me and my stupid soft little heart too damn well, and you were fucking right!”

“Woah.” He held his hands up defensively. “Sorry, I genuinely didn’t hear you, you kinda muffled yourself. Uh, I’m going to take a guess that this is about Kun?”

“Yes...” You whined. “I almost kissed him today, Kunhang!”

“Y/N!”

“And you want to know the worst part?”

“That’s not the worst part?” He asked, horror on his features.

“No, it’s not! The worst part, is that the only reason I didn’t is because he stopped me!” You bemoaned dramatically, squeezing your eyes shut against the embarrassment as you replayed the horrifying moment over again in your head.

Kun had found you again in a break between your classes. The two of you were just sitting on a shaded bench under a tree in a more secluded area of campus, chatting. You were just talking about nonsense, telling him about the lecture you’d just come from, how it was actually the one math class you had this semester that you liked. And Kun was just listening, and you were sitting so close to him, and Kun was looking at you like you were everything to him, and the next thing you knew, you were leaning in closer and closer to him. Then he ducked his head away from you at the last second, and you were rocketed back to your senses as you realized what you almost did.

“Oh God— Y/N!” Kunhang looked like he was about to pass out.

You covered your face again. “I know...”

“Why did he, you know, swerve you?”

“He said...” You sighed, looking up at the sky. “He said that he didn’t think it was fair, to me.”

“To you?”

“Yes, because I was... ‘falling for him under false pretenses’ since his behavior is being influenced by the love potion and not genuine feelings for me. And he thought that it was best for me, if he kept his distance for the duration of the potion.” Hot tears pricked at the corners of your eyes as you repeated his words bitterly. You weren’t mad at him, you were mad at yourself. God, you felt so fucking stupid.

Kunhang’s jaw was on the floor. “You— you were rejected... by someone high on love potion.”

“I think I’m officially the most pathetic person on the planet.” You plopped down on the bench swing next to him, pulling your knees up to your chest.

Your friend scooted over to you, and you felt the familiar, comforting weight of his arm around your shoulders and a wing nestling over you. “No, you’re not. There’s nothing pathetic about being able to connect with people as openly and freely as you do, Y/N.”

You dropped your head onto his shoulder, bringing a hand up to harshly wipe at the tears threatening to spill over. “There’s really nothing pathetic about crying over a vampire that I’ve known for six days?”

That gave the gryphon a moment’s pause as he seemed to be seriously considering your question. Finally, he answered confidently, “Nah. Pathetic would be crying over a vampire you’ve only known for five days. Six days, you’re in the clear.”

That did make you choke out a little giggle, and he gave your head a couple pats.

The door to the patio was suddenly thrown open, and you jumped in your seat, whipping around to see who it was. Which you couldn’t do at first, as Kunhang had instinctually blocked you from the intruder—which always reminded you of a soccer mom throwing out her arm when slamming on the brakes of her minivan a little too hard—so all you could see were grey feathers. Yangyang just ran around the gryphon’s wing to skid to a stop in front of you two, panicked eyes landing on you.

“Y/N!” He pointed at you almost accusatorily.

“Yangyang!” You imitated his tone, pointing right back at him.

“Have you heard from Kun today?”

You exchanged a look with Kunhang. “Uh, I saw him on campus, but not since then. Why?”

“When was that?”

“I don’t know, one, maybe?”

Yangyang checked the time on his phone anxiously. “Five hours ago?”

“Yeah, I guess.” You were growing uneasy with each passing second. “Yangyang, what’s going on?”

“Kun’s not picking up the phone, or replying to my texts. And he’s like... neurotic about that stuff, you know.”

You were aware of Kun’s tendency to reply to texts in an extremely timely fashion, and always call back on the rare occasion that he missed a call from someone. A frown grew on your face. “How long has it been?”

“I first called him... at three, because he was done with classes by then. But I’ve just gotten radio silence all day.”

Chewing on the inside of your cheek, anxiety kept mounting inside you.

Kunhang spoke up. “Did you do something to piss him off maybe?”

“No. And I would know, he has no problem telling me.” Yangyang ran a hand through his hair, then focused a pleading look on you. “Y/N, do you think you could go check on him?”

“No.” The gryphon answered for you.

“Dude—”

You added, “I’ve never been to his place, I don’t even know where it is.”

“I’ll give you the address!”

“I’m not going to go over there uninvited.” You were still arguing but felt your resolve waning fast.

“He’s madly in love with you, this will be more like a great surprise for him!”

“Yangyang, cut it out,” Kunhang told him off.

The witch tilted his head in confusion. “Am I missing something?”

“No, just go over there yourself if you’re so worried. Y/N’s not your personal errand girl.”

“If he’s not even picking up my calls, there’s no way he’ll open the door for me. Y/N, on the other hand…”

“Liu Yangyang, have you ever heard of the word no? Just fuck off for—”

“Kunhang,” you interrupted him, bracing yourself for that venom to be turned on you for what you were about to say. “Thank you, but I-I am going to go over. Yangyang’s right, that’s not like Kun, I want to check on him.”

The gryphon blinked at you in disbelief. “You really think that’s a… good idea?”

You offered him an uneasy smile. “I’m just going to make sure he’s alive. Or… undead, or whatever. I won’t even go in, just see if he comes to the door.”

Kunhang just gave you a look that clearly conveyed his disapproval of this idea.

Double checking the house number with the address that Yangyang had texted you, you took a shaky breath. This was definitely it. It was a modest size, probably two bedrooms, if you had to guess from the outside. Definitely not the sort of exceptionally lavish castle that one might think a vampire as old as Kun would have. With a shaky inhale, you raised your fist up and knocked on the sturdy wood door.

It swung open just a second later. You were expecting Kun to still be in his usual academic sort of dress, maybe even the same clothes he’d been in earlier on campus, but instead, he was just in a grey t-shirt and black lounge pants. So he did own casual clothes.

“Hi, Kun,” you greeted him as normally as possible, very aware of all the layers to the awkwardness here. You had never been to his place before, he knew that you had never been to his place before, you hadn’t been invited over, and he’d just—as Kunhang had so elegantly put it—swerved you earlier, before saying that he was going to keep his distance from you. And now here you were on his doorstep.

“Oh, Y/N, hello.” Kun smoothed over his t-shirt habitually, as if he were meaning to fix the tuck of a dress shirt that he wasn’t even wearing.

“Sorry, uhm, I promise Yangyang sent me. I’m not... uh, yeah.”

He stepped back, holding the door open wider. “Please, come in.”

With your own promise to Kunhang playing in the back of your mind, you walked inside. “Thanks.”

“So, what does Yangyang need?” Kun kept talking as he guided you further into his home, and you looked around, eyes hungrily drinking in every detail.

It seemed like the one thing Kun had never studied was interior design. His home was a maximalist mishmash of stuff he had accumulated throughout his long life. An oil painting in an ornate gold frame hung beside a colorful pop art photograph collage, both above the olive green mid-century couch. In the corner was a desk with several computer monitors, a few pieces of electronics that were unfamiliar to you, and on the wall above it, small panels of LED lights that cycled through the rainbow. It was a lot, but you were charmed, finding yourself wanting to keep looking at everything, ask about every piece. You were sure that they all had some story or memory attached to them.

The two of you slowed to a stop in the living room, and you tore your eyes from the décor back to the vampire with you.

“He said that you weren’t answering your phone. Uh, he was worried.”

“And he sent you because he was afraid that I might not have answered the door for anybody else.” He nodded in understanding.

“W-well yeah, I suppose.”

“I wasn’t answering his calls because I had my phone on silent. I was busy.”

“Oh, sorry. I’ll go, you’re clearly fine.”

“No, Y/N.” Kun took a step forward, closing the space between you two. “You’re already here, and I don’t like the way we left things earlier. Please, stay?”

You gave him an easy, relaxed smile this time. “Sure.”

“Thank you.” He smiled back, then gestured to the couch. “Sit. Do you want something to drink? Water? I’m afraid my fridge isn’t very human-friendly right now, I apologize. If I’d known you were coming I would have—”

“Water’s fine, Kun,” you reassured him.

As he went to the kitchen, you went ahead and sat down where he indicated. The sofa was comfortable, plush, and you felt like you could melt into it and stay here forever. You went back to looking around at everything, a simple joy at the loving chaos that filled his space. A poster for some black and white silent film that you’d never heard of had caught your eyes when Kun walked back in, setting a glass of water down in front of you.

“I love all the stuff you’ve got in here,” you told him as he went to sit at the other end of the couch. “I feel like I could just look at it all forever.”

“Thank you. I usually just get told that it looks like I live in a flea market.”

You snickered. “Yangyang?”

“Well, yes.”

“So, what were you doing? Before I got here.” You took a sip of your water.

“Composing.” He gestured behind him to the desk with all the electronics equipment and LED panels. “Though I have to admit, I wasn’t making much progress.”

“Artist’s block?”

“Yes, something like that.” He sighed, fingertip tracing figure-eights in the upholstery of the back of the couch. “Usually music will help clear my mind, but this time…”

You frowned. “What’s wrong? If you want to share, I get it if you don’t.”

“I missed you,” Kun admitted without missing a beat.

Your grip tightened on your glass, and you took another long sip before replying weakly, “Well, I’m here…”

“Yes, you are. Like a little miracle…”

Kunhang was right again, this was so bad for you, your chest was airy, your head was TV static, your heart hurt. You chugged half your cup.

“Have you not been hydrating properly?” The vampire asked, concern coloring his tone.

“I guess not,” you laughed nervously, setting the glass back down on the coffee table before resting your hands on your legs. You looked up at him, listening to how loud your heart was hammering in your ears. You were sure he was too.

He leaned forward, studying your face carefully, “Is there something you want to ask me, Y/N?”

You opened your mouth, about to, but immediately closed it. There was something that had been pressing on your mind for a while—well, a couple somethings—but you didn’t know if you actually wanted the answers to either, or if it was just a morbid curiosity, and you were the cat who was going to be killed by it. Figuratively and literally.

“Mmm... nope. Nothing off the top of my head. I’m drawing a blank,” you shook your head maybe a bit too enthusiastically.

Kun reached out to briefly squeeze your hand before setting his back in his lap. “It’s okay, Y/N. You can ask me whatever you want. I remember the deal.”

Of course. The deal you’d offered him in the bakery last week. That whatever question you asked him you had thought through and wanted his honest answers to, therefore he would give you them, no matter what they were. Except, despite the fact that you had thought these questions through, you knew they couldn’t hold up to those terms.

You gave up all pretenses now, voice entirely defeated as you admitted, “I know. It’s just— these ones... I can’t keep my end of the deal. That’s not fair to you, I’m sorry.”

He contemplated this for a moment, drumming his fingers on the back couch cushion. “Are they yes or no questions? Or more open-ended?”

“Open-ended.”

“Then... I’ll only answer if I think the answer won’t hurt you. How about that?”

You breathed in deeply, took another sip of your water, and readjusted to fully face Kun, one of your arms resting on the back of couch. “Okay, yeah.”

“Great. Go ahead, when you’re ready.”

Mustering up whatever strength was left in your voice, you asked, “What is it like? Being under the love potion?”

“It’s beautiful.” He began, a giddy smile coming to his lips. His fingers inched forward, bridging the gap between you and gently stroking over the back of yours, seemingly absentmindedly as he spoke. “It’s not a destructive, consuming sort of love, but the comfortable, familiar kind that you settle into after being with someone for a while. Like you just know that they’re your person. Admittedly, sometimes when I’ll think about you when we’re apart my chest will hurt a little, but then when I see you again, it feels like coming home. There are some moments I get overcome with emotion, but it’s not a constant obsession like a new crush or puppy love. I do of course remember what it was like before the potion, and how I felt about you then, but it truly feels like another life— though you can imagine that I’ve used that phrase quite a bit.”

You were biting on the inside of your cheek so hard you started tasting blood. With a sharp hiss, you freed the skin from your teeth, and swiped over the area with your tongue for a moment as you tried to think of an answer, any answer, just something to say to that. Thankfully, Kun seemed to understand the position you were in, and saved you from having to respond.

“What were your other questions?”

“Just— Just one more.” You steeled your nerves. “You had to be bit, to be turned.”

Kun tilted his head. “Yes, though that wasn’t a question.”

“H-How does it feel?”

“You’re asking me to describe being turned to you?” He frowned. “That was a long time ago, Y/N, it was honestly a bit of a blur. I’m afraid I don’t really remember all the details, but I’ll tell you what I can—”

“Not being turned, uhm, being bit by a vampire.”

He squinted one eye closed, then the other. “I can’t—”

“Oh. That’s okay, Kun. I was just curious,” you reassured him, making your voice as sweet as possible to cover up any hint of disappointment. It looked like he was still trying desperately to remember for you, though, scratching at the back of his head and squeezing his eyes shut.

When he still hadn’t said anything a few moments later, you spoke up again, “Kun, I’m serious, it’s okay that you can’t remember.”

The vampire set his gaze on you again, voice tight, “No, I—”

“Oh my god you look unwell again,” you blurted out, taking in his blown out pupils. “Seriously, should I call Renjun? Yangyang?”

He practically leapt to his feet, bumping into furniture on his hasty path to the furthest corner of the living room from you. “No, I know what it is. You should go.”

No way were you going to just leave him like this. You stood up too, but stayed in front of the couch. “Will you tell me what’s wrong with you?”

“I—” He fanned himself with the material of his shirt. “Do you remember what Yangyang was saying about young vampires?”

Of course you did, that idea bouncing around in your head for the past week had contributed to your question in the first place. Younger vampires had a harder time controlling their thirst because all kinds of want became hunger, a need to feed.

“Yeah, but I thought that you were okay, since you were so much older. You haven’t even mentioned anything other than human food unless I brought it up. Why now?”

Kun screwed his eyes shut as if he were in physical pain. “I’ve been okay as long as I was fed. But—”

“Oh my god, me coming over unannounced!”

“No, no, I just fed when I went to get your water. I don’t know if it’s something with how the potion works, but I’m afraid I’ve had to keep increasing my intake in order to stay satiated around you and I’m getting hungrier faster. So I’m very sorry, but you really need to go.”

“That’s it?” You defiantly crossed your arms over your chest.

“What?”

“You’re hungry, thirsty, whatever? That’s all?”

He slowly opened his eyes again. “Y-Yeah, I suppose.”

“You can do it without killing me, right?”

“Y/N—”

“Right?”

“Of course, but—”

“Clearly the end point of this is you starving to death. And I’m not going to let you—”

“We don’t know that. I don’t want you to feel guilted by that assumption into letting me...”

“Kun, wanting to help somebody does not equal being guilted into it!” You finally snapped at him, taking big, stomping strides towards him. “Stop being so, so… chivalrous to the point of self-flagellation! Do you honestly think that makes me feel good watching you do that? Let me help you Kun, that’s what I want, I promise.”

He held your gaze, the inky blackness feeling so much different than the scarlet red that you were used to. But… you didn’t mind it. Didn’t mind the way that the darkness trailed from your eyes to your lips to your neck and lingered there. Liked it. You knew he could hear your heartbeat thrumming in your chest, was able to pinpoint you by scent on the wide expanse of campus. What must that be like now, in such a small space, so close?

“Okay…” His voice was barely above a whisper, hoarse, as if he didn’t trust himself to talk any louder.

Kun was still holding onto the doorframe with a death grip, the wood beginning to splinter under his fingers.

“I’ve… never done this,” you prompted him quietly.

“Oh, right.” He straightened up, attempting to compose himself again. Ushering you back towards the couch, he explained, “Let’s sit down. It will be more comfortable for you that way.”

He sat down in the corner of the sofa, hiking one leg up onto it and keeping his other foot planted on the ground. Kun patted the space between his thighs for you. You sat down in front of him on the same cushion, your back so close to touching his chest that you swore you could feel the brush of his clothing against yours.

“I’m not going to overfeed, but in case you end up feeling faint anyway, you’ll fall back on me, as opposed to buckling to the floor.”

“Oh,” you said, just to fill the empty space of your side of the conversation. “Thank you.”

“Again, I’m not going to overfeed, it won’t be anything more than when you get blood drawn for tests. But just like then, I don’t want you to get up right after, okay? No matter how… good you feel.”

You were a little thrown off by his phrasing, but still nodded. “Okay.”

The vampire got even closer to you, now hovering over your right shoulder. You could hear him inhale as he paused, and a distinct thrill shot up your spine. His cool breath washed over your skin as he breathed back out, making the hairs on the back of your neck stand up.

Then all at once his mouth was on you. The piercing of his fangs lasted for a split second before it was all but erased from your mind by a honey sweet pleasure dripping through your whole body. You could feel the sensation of his lips sucking at your neck too, your blood trickling out from the wounds, and his tongue laving over your skin. But mostly you just felt… good. All of you thrummed from your heart to your fingertips.

A soft moan slipped past your lips as you let your head fall back onto his shoulder, giving him even more room. You felt him stiffen right after you did, as if getting ready to pull away. Reaching a hand up, you blindly grabbed for the back of his head, threading your fingers through his hair and holding him in place against your neck. Kun seemed to understand, going back to contentedly drinking from you. You relaxed fully against him, letting your eyes flutter shut. He easily kept you upright, wrapping an arm around your front to hold you close to him.

You had no way to know or even guess how much time had passed when Kun finally took his mouth off your neck. He leaned back into the corner of the couch, easing you back with him.

“Thank you, Y/N. My miracle…” He murmured, his mouth right next to your ear. A fingertip lightly graced over a patch of skin below the bite. “I’m sorry I don’t have any bite cream on hand for you, I haven’t live fed in years.”

“Mm—” You were starting to come back down from your mellowed-out state, poking at the area yourself. It was tender, duh, but not too bad. “I’ll pick some up tomorrow before class.”

“It needs to be used within fifteen minutes, prior to any normal supernatural healing process starting,” he explained with a sigh. “Again, I apologize. There will probably be some bruising for a while.”

“Kun, it’s okay.” You sat up, turning around to face him. He definitely looked better than before. His eyes were back to red, and he was much calmer. He also admittedly looked a little debauched, his hair tousled from your fingers, and a small drop of your blood smeared at the corner of his mouth.

But as you appraised him—and he licked the blood off his lip—you grew a little uneasy, realizing that something was still… off about him. Just in a different way this time.

“How are you feeling?

“I’m all better,” he confirmed with a singular, resolute nod.

You gave him a relieved smile. “Good, good. We should ask Yangyang about if it’s something with how the potion works, make sure you’re going to be okay for however much longer it’s going to last.”

Kun cleared his throat. “That will not be necessary. I am certain that the love potion is no longer in effect.”

You wanted nothing more than to burst into flames on the spot. Quickly, you scooched further down the couch from Kun as you started a blubbering attempt at a self-deprecating, deadpan apology, “Well, that’s just… awkward. I’m going to go die a hole. Uhm, forget everything, forget me, and with any luck, you’ll never have to see me again. I’m so sorry.”

And with that, you rushed to your feet, with every intent of quite literally running out of the door. Except the living room was spinning, and your head felt like a hot air balloon. Two cold hands were on your forearm and small of your back, guiding you back down onto the couch.

“Y/N, slow down,” Kun chastised you gently. “I didn’t overdrink, but you should still sit for a moment.”

You relented, but buried your face in your hands akin to the way that you so very wished that you could bury your entire self six feet under at the moment. Maybe if you didn’t say anything, Kun would just let you sit in silence until you were recovered enough to leave, and you would never have to talk about any of this ever again. Then one day you would die, and he would continue to live for eternity and eventually forget you and this whole weird six days forever. Sounded like a fantastic plan to you.

“Y/N.”

Of course not.

You pulled your face out of your hands, dragging your eyes from your feet up to his face. He didn’t smile at you tenderly like he would have before, but instead he pressed two of his cold fingers to the inside of your wrist.

“Are you… taking my pulse?” You asked. “Can’t you hear my heartbeat?”

“Blood pressure,” he answered, continuing to hold his fingertips there, and you could feel the blood in your vein pumping against them. “Vampire touch is sensitive enough that if you know what you’re feeling for then you can… Okay, that’s better.”

“Did you learn this at bloodletting school? Because I don’t know if I trust this, you might put leeches on me next.” You tried to joke, hoping it would put you at ease a little. It didn’t help.

Kun looked you dead in the eyes. “I just drank your blood, and you’re going to complain about a couple little leeches?”

You fell back against the back of the couch, covering your face with your free arm. “So instead of letting me fuck off and die in a hole on my own, you want to be the one to kill me yourself, huh?”

“Y/N.” He repeated your name in the same frank tone as before, releasing your wrist. “I have something I would like to say. To your face, preferably.”

Dropping your arm back down to your side, you sat up straight, turning to Kun and bracing yourself for whatever he had to say to you about the past six days. It could be any litany of things. Agreeing with you to never speak about it again, joint proposition to murder Yangyang, an apology from him, demand for an apology from you; you were prepared for it to truly be anything.

“I honestly wasn’t very familiar with you before this whole debacle. I’ve known Yangyang’s coven for a hundred years, and he calls on me for assistance from time to time. I only knew you as the friend of the roommate of a witch that I know.” Kun explained, and you kept as neutral of a face as possible as you listened, having absolutely no clue where he was going with this. “Just like when I was under the effects of the love potion, my memories from before it were not erased, now that it’s worn off, I do still remember the time that we spent together during it. While I am not in love with you at present, after learning as much about you as I did… I am romantically interested in you still.”

You must have been giving him the most dumbfounded expression ever, as he felt the need to tack on an explanatory, “I would like the opportunity to take you on a date— a proper one, sometime. If you would like.”

Your head was nodding before your mouth finally caught up. “Yeah, yeah. I’d really like that too.”

“I can’t... guarantee that I’ll be exactly like I was while I was under the effects of the love potion,” he forewarned you.

“Kun that’s- that’s fine,” you reassured him with a bright smile. “Like you said, we’ll just try it out. I also learned a lot about you, outside of the love potion courting stuff, that I found interesting... and liked.”

You mumbled the last part nervously, messing with your fingers.

“That makes me very happy to hear. Don’t worry, no more sonnets now, I promise.”

“Well... you don’t have to do that… if you want.”

“Oh so you did like it,” Kun teased, reclined back against the arm of the couch with a cocky smirk that you hadn’t seen on him before.

“I was flustered! And confused!”

“That’s fair. I won’t retire my quill yet, then.”

A little over a week later, and you were back at Kun’s house at his invitation. He said he had a surprise to show you, and there was no further information. His penchant for surprises was genuine.

Kun was sat at his producing desk, and you had pulled up a chair beside him to watch. He was just logging into the computer when his phone rang.

“Yangyang,” Kun snorted. He was about to reject it when you stopped him.

“You can pick it up, I don’t mind.”

“He is not important right now.” He turned his phone off, picking up one of your hands to press a cool kiss to your knuckles.

Just a second later, and your phone was buzzing. You sighed, looking at the contact, then held it up so Kun could read it. Kun rolled his eyes.

Yangyang.

You picked up the call. “Hey Yang—”

“Y/N! Hey!” The witch’s voice blared through your speakers, and you quickly had to turn your volume down.

“Yeah, hi, Yangyang. What’s up?”

“Just wanted to chat, we don’t really talk, you know?” His voice was pitched up and he talked so fast that you could barely understand all the strung-together words. “What—what are you doing? Right now?”

“I’m hanging out at Kun’s place, why—” You were cut off by your friend hanging up. Dropping your phone onto the table, you looked at the vampire knowingly. “So I think that means he’s coming over.”

Not even ten minutes later, someone was banging on Kun’s front door. Kun went to go get it as you stayed in your spot over by his producing station.

“Stop it,” Kun deadpanned in place of a greeting as he opened the door.

Yangyang rushed in without so much as a hello. Kun focused an exasperated look on him as he closed the door, then walked back over to you.

“So, what brings you here, Yangyang?” He asked, easing himself back down into his desk chair next to you.

“Alright, it was funny at first but now I’m seriously worried.” Yangyang grabbed Kun’s face, shining his phone flashlight in one of Kun’s eyes, then the other.

“Fuck!” Kun threw an arm over his eyes, pushing the witch away with the other.

“Yangyang, what the hell is wrong with you?” You yelled out, rubbing Kun’s back soothingly. Having that done to you, a human, would’ve hurt a bit; to a vampire’s more light-sensitive eyes must’ve been a searing pain at least.

Kun had recovered a little, taking one of your hands in his for comfort. You ran your thumb over his knuckles, wincing sympathetically.

He half-squinted and half-glared up at your friend. “What are you talking about?”

“It’s been like two weeks, that potion should have definitely worn off by now.” He looked down at his hands with wide eyes. “I must be more powerful than I realize.”

You scoffed. “Hate to burst your bubble, Yangyang, but it did.”

“What? No, he’s still—” Yangyang gestured frantically to your intertwined hands. “You’re still— But, Kun— Huh?”

The vampire sighed, thankfully taking the lead on explaining. “We learned a lot about each other during the experience, and have decided to pursue a real relationship. I’m no longer under the effects of the love potion.”

“That is... There’s no—” Yangyang blinked rapidly at you two. “When? How? Y/N, Kun?”

“The hell does that mean?”

“You’re like a walking, talking, undead pair of corduroy pants, I didn’t think you had it in you, outside of the love potion.”

“Have what in me? The capacity for romance?”

“I was going to say a personality, but yeah, that too!”

Kun rubbed his temples, letting out a low groan.

“For how long?”

“A week.”

“And you didn’t tell me?”

“I’m sorry, the witch who put love potion in a fucking Gorgonade bottle without telling anybody wants to complain about a lack of communication?” You retorted.

He crossed his arms with a huff. “Point taken, albeit begrudgingly. So it just finally wore off? A week ago?”

“Well, not quite...” You rubbed at your collarbone as the memory resurfaced.

“Then how—” Your friend cut himself off as his eyes zeroed in on your hand at your neck. “Oh. He— Of course! We should’ve thought of that.”

“Excuse me?” You sputtered out.

But Yangyang didn’t even acknowledge your embarrassment, too absorbed in the euphoric lightbulb moment he seemed to have just gotten. “It was a two-factor blood spell. You drank his blood to activate it—”

“Ew...” You muttered under your breath, shuddering at the memory.

“—so he had to drink yours to stop it! Duh!”

The witch was fervently typing on his phone as he spoke, now pacing with it as he buzzed with excitement.

“What are you doing?” Kun asked sternly.

“Taking notes! This is awesome!” Yangyang continued typing away. “I’m so getting an A!”

You and Kun exchanged mirrored looks of skepticism.

With a raised eyebrow, you pointed out, “Uh, but it didn’t work on me like it was supposed to, remember?”

He looked up from his phone at the two of you with the grin of a mad scientist—or, mad witch. “Look at the two of you! I’m calling this a win!”

Kun stood up, grabbing your friend’s shoulders and ushering him towards the door. “Goodbye, Yangyang.”

“Hey, wait! I wanted to ask you about— Ow!” Yangyang yelped as he was manhandled. “No fair using your freakish vamp strength! I was just going to ask if you—”

You couldn’t hear the rest of his sentence over the sound of the door slamming shut in his face. Kun turned back around, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. “If I hadn’t known his coven for a hundred years I’d have killed him by now.”

“No, you wouldn’t have,” you snickered, reaching your arms out for him. “Come here.”

Kun walked back over to you, hands outstretched to hold yours. You gave his colder ones a squeeze, smiling up at him.

“So, what were you showing me? Before he interrupted?” You prompted him.

“Right, right.” Kun sat back down, grabbing the mouse and continuing to navigate through his programs. “I’ve been composing something… and… I wanted… to… show—”

Your phone suddenly buzzed from his desk again, and this time you let out an annoyed groan. “I’m putting it on silent, sorry.”

“Yangyang again?” He asked as you grabbed the device.

“Even worse,” you cringed as you read the name.

“Who?”

“Kunhang.”

sequel :･ﾟ✧｡･:･*

⤷ blog masterlist ⤷ anthology masterlist

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letsnotdoanything · 1 year

Text

⋆｡ﾟ☁︎ eight letters, p.s.r. , not proofread

"tomorrow makes two months," i say, smiling to myself. reminding myself how long we've been together always makes my heart flutter. i'm not sure if it matters too much to serim, but it definitely matters to me.

"only two? i swear i've been with you my whole life," serim replies, tilting his head sideways towards me; his eyes smiling back.

i've grown to love his eye smile—his smile always reaches his eyes.

along the way, we talk about our lives in general; work, stress, goals. there's still so much we learn about each other every day.

the trail comes to an end and the feeling of sand between my toes brings back memories.

"want to walk along the beach?"

my eyes meet his dark brown—almost black—eyes, our gaze lingering and fingers intertwining. i smile shyly, averting my attention from his as my face begins to heat up.

"i'd love to."

as we walk towards the water, i can't help but notice the sunset; burnt orange mixing softly with peachy pink. sunsets in person are truly a blessed experience.

i feel serim stop, his hand leaving mine. i turn to see him facing the water.

"everything about this moment is perfect," he mumbles, though i barely hear him due to the fabric of the mask.

i don't really know what he means by that, but it's entirely true—standing here, with him, staring out into the gloaming sky. the breeze is soft and everything is, well, perfect.

serim's fingers softly caress mine before grasping my hand once again.

"y/n," i turn to serim, seeing him without a mask.

i smile. "hey, cutie."

instead of responding with words, he places his hands on my cheeks, pulling me closer to him; our lips colliding.

our lips linger for a few seconds, the rush for breath causing us to depart, staring into each other's eyes.

"i love you, y/n. so much."

"i love you too, serim."

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letsnotdoanything · 1 year

Note

could I request jacob cuddling with reader on the dorm couch. I think it would be cute if another member walked in on them kissing since he seems like the sweet innocent one of the group they’d be shocked to see him like making out w reader

warmly (and secretly)

jacob x reader (request hhehehe thank you so much for my first jacob request!)

genre: cuddling, kissing, actually it's a slight makeout, sunkyu cameos, lap sitting (im so sorry) notes: you cant convince me otherwise that jacob doesn't have some secret side to him that makes him an amazing kisser.... like word count: 0.7k

“why are you so warm?” you wondered to yourself.

jacob smiled, glancing at you shyly, “am i?”

you nodded. the two of you were currently cuddling on the dorm couch. of course, you knew that the rest of the members were out shopping. you had all the time to yourself with your boyfriend.

“you really are,” you replied, taking his hand in yours. you began playing with it, bending the fingers and running your own fingers across his palm. he fondly gazed at you. then, you brought his hand to your chest, letting it splay across your body. you looked at him sweetly. “see? you literally just warmed up my whole body.”

“maybe that’s just you,” he teased, scrunching his nose.

“no, no,” you laughed. “you need to help prove my hypothesis. come closer.”

he eyed you amusingly but still complied. he shifted closer so now your thighs were touching. you frowned.

“closer,” you urged.

“okay, okay,” he sighed, smiling. he put an arm behind you, letting your head fall on his chest. “this good?”

you nodded, taking a deep breath as you relaxed in his hold.

“you are literally warm, you cannot convince me otherwise,” you stated, glaring up at him. but what made your expression falter, was that jacob was only looking at you with such softness and tenderness that you felt your cheeks start to heat up. you quickly looked away, making him laugh.

you stayed there for a while, his hand caressing your shoulder and occasionally combing through your hair. it was so peaceful and calming you could just doze off right then and there.

you let out a disapproving sound. “i take everything back,” you blurted out.

he looked at you, perplexed, “wait what?”

“this is not good enough,” you explained. you swiftly stood up and instead, you sat on his lap, straddling his hips. he stiffened, looking up at you with wide eyes, his cheeks starting to redden.

“oh,” he breathed out. he looked at you with awe and affection as his hands quickly came up to your waist, rubbing slightly. “did not expect that,” he muttered, looking at you with amusement, quickly recovering from his shy state. “you really want to be attached to me?”

you nodded, firmly, leaning forward to hug him as your head resting on his shoulder. his hand was now rubbing circles across your back soothingly. you wiggled even closer if that was possible. oh, how you loved cuddling.

after a few minutes, you soon realized that the two of you were doing literally nothing entertaining except cuddling, so you pulled away to speak to him. but what surprised you was that he was looking at you with an unreadable expression, his eyes dazed.

“jacob?”

he snapped out of it, “h-huh? yeah?”

“what do you want to do now?” you tilted your head. his eyes loomed over your lips.

“honestly?” he asked. you nodded. “i want to kiss you.”

oh, certainly more entertaining. your breath hitched as you felt your heartbeat speed up. with a shaky voice, you whispered, “then do it.”

he didn’t waste a single moment, as he sat up. his hand came up to cup your face as he tilted your head to press his lips against yours. you let out a surprised sound as you struggled to kiss back with how passionate he was.

he even began to lean forward, holding you closer by the waist, kissing you harder. you wrapped your arms around his neck as he continued to make your breath disappear-

there was a loud screech out of nowhere, followed by a shocked, “what is this?”.

you whipped around, your lips swollen as your face began to color red. it was changmin who had screeched, his mouth wide open in shock. sunwoo was standing behind him, his mouth also gaping. the grocery bag he was holding had fallen to the floor, an apple falling out.

“jacob!” changmin yelled. “what are you doing? this is- i can’t believe you’d-”

jacob looked at him guiltily, “what did i do exactly?”

sunwoo turned to changmin shoving him, “what, so is he not allowed to kiss anymore?” he paused. “though i admit this is an odd sight…” he blushed, looking away.

changmin let out an exasperated sigh, dragging sunwoo out, “let’s go to the convenience store. i need to get ou-”

you heard sunwoo mumble to himself, "i thought he was the angel of the group..."

you laughed, turning back to jacob, still sitting on his lap. “so… they don’t expect you to give affection to me?”

he shrugged sheepishly, “usually it’s me doing it to them,” he paused, his eyebrows furrowing in thought. “maybe they’re jealous…”

you playfully slapped him, “don’t be ridiculous.”

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letsnotdoanything · 1 year

Text

OFF THE RECORD ▷ PART ONE (EP1-8)

nonidol!ji changmin x fem!reader

everyone thinks changmin is cute and harmless, but you know that's not who he really is.

▷ genre, part warnings. e2l, childhood friends gone bad, (extra) slow burn, fluff, angst, mentions of childhood trauma and parental manipulation, arguing, bittersweet galore, nct ten is there for the sole purpose of being nosy like the rest of us or for being a 2nd male lead who knows!, swearing, hurt/comfort, ji changmin dancing. (need i go on), symptoms of panic/anxiety, a lot of non-tbz moments sorry i meant it when i said extra slow burn, pining haha...ha (very subtle)

▷ PART ONE WC. 18.5k

this is the third installment of the love in unity series! this can be read as a standalone, but i encourage u to read jacob and eric's storylines too! all prev and future yns will be referred to as _!yn ;) / otr part two

a/n: this was going to be a very quirky author's note, but it's not anymore bc i'm really mad at tumblr. pls enjoy :')

EPISODE ONE (PILOT): OFF THE CLOCK

"NIGHT, Yn!"

"Good night, Yn-ie."

"Make sure you get some rest, Yn-ah! Good luck with the report."

The door out of the laboratory building shuttered closed after your last coworkers and peers swept out to leave you to the white noise of the lights above your head and the cooling units. You were probably the only person crazy enough to still be chained to your lab workbench on a Friday night, especially when it was already six o'clock. Your stomach growled its complaints as you tucked a pen behind your ear with a sigh. There was probably a bag of shrimp chips in the break room snack stash, and you pushed your stool beneath the workbench to head into the break room.

Now that the laboratory was practically barren except for you, it wouldn't be a bad idea to take the reign of Kun's speaker…

The sound of your phone ringtone blared out loud from your pocket, and you scrambled to grab it with your other hand not occupied with shrimp chip crumb dust (after having washed your hands, of course). You put the call on speaker then deposited your phone onto the countertop so both hands could be used for eating. "Yo."

"You've been hanging around Mark too much," Yeri answered from the other end.

You snorted, covering your mouth for a moment, then replying, "Well good evening to you, too, my beloved. What's up?"

You could hear the muffled sounds of your friends from the other side of the phone. A car door slammed shut. "Hey-yo, is that Yn? Yn, what's up, my dude?"

"Mark, can you speak like a regular human?" That was Seungkwan. "Hi Yn-ie! We miss you, mwah!"

"Look, man. Me and Yn are homies, and this is literally just how I talk—"

The car door opened and Yeri must have taken initiative to get out of the car herself at this point. You laughed at her audible eye roll. "Okay, now that you've heard what I have to deal with, will you tell me that you're coming to the dance draft show tonight?"

Your mood soured.

It wasn't that you didn't want to go for Yeri's sanity's sake, you just didn't want to go, period. What the performing arts called a rehearsal, they referred to as a "draft" stage, where they planned rough runs of acts for the showcase. It just so happened that the dance department was holding their draft show for people to sit-in to watch tonight; their final showcase would be held on the Friday night of finals week, which was only in a few weeks now.

(Why did they call it a "draft" stage instead of simply a "rehearsal"? Well, you had no clue, and you didn't have any plans to ask anyone who would know the answer.)

When you didn't immediately answer, you heard Yeri's grumble. "Don't nerd out on me, Miss Yn Ln."

You gasped. "Nerd out on you? I'm being responsible—"

"You're being a workaholic!"

You pursed your lips together and quickly rinsed your fingers of shrimp chip crumbs. "Fair. But I'm sorry, I'm not going."

A brief pause. Then, the sigh. "Okay. That's okay," she said. "Wanna meet us for dinner afterwards at least?"

Your stomach grumbled, right on cue. It wasn't loud enough for Yeri to hear on the other end, but the timing made you laugh to yourself. "Definitely."

There was a smile in your friend's voice. "Cool! I'll text you details once we figure out what's happening. In the mean—" her voice was interrupted by the sound of muffled yelling on the other side, and Yeri pulled her mouth away from the phone so she could screech at Seungkwan, Mark, and now, Kim Jungwoo, to be quiet and put their seatbelts on. You heard vaguely about Jungwoo being late for his call time, and you were not at all surprised. She returned to the phone with a grumble. "You're really leaving me with the kids, Yn?"

You giggled. "Sorry, Yeri. I'll pay for your dinner."

"Deal. See you soon, babe."

"See ya, love!"

When the phone call ended, you realized just how thick the silence fell around you. It settled like a blanket over your senses, and it all became a bit overwhelming, especially after such a loud phone call.

You sighed, putting the shrimp chips back in the snack stash. You might as well go find where Kun hid his speaker to fill the silence then.

— ✶

People were yelling. And tripping. And crying.

A normal backstage environment for something like a finals showcase draft rehearsal. It was hardly even a rehearsal, but more so a sneak peek showcase. There were people in the audience, after all.

Ji Changmin would know. This would be his third winter draft show out of his three years here in university. There were always showcases at the end of each quarter, but the winter show wielded the title of most anticipated. With the cold and rainy weather keeping most people indoors, it allowed for a larger crowd to come flocking toward said indoor modes of entertainment. Thus, the winter showcase and all of its hype.

Changmin lingered in his little corner of the backstage area, calmly stretching out his lanky limbs while chaos erupted all around him. He had two acts this time around—a duet with Lee Juyeon, as well as a solo performance. It had been enough to keep him busy for the quarter, among his other classes.

"—Jungwoo, you're late!"

He raised his head at the sound of Lee Minho’s voice from across the room, the dirty blond sending a deadpanned glare at the man in question. Kim Jungwoo’s eyes were wide with doe-like innocence as he made his way toward his friend, his posse following behind and taking in the chaos with amused awe. Changmin could easily recognize those present—Kim Yeri, Mark Lee, and Boo Seungkwan.

He turned his head away; it wasn’t his business, and he had much bigger things to worry about.

He raised his hands to his neck to put his headphones over his ears, but paused when he caught a few more echoes of their conversation.

“ — sorry Minho, but you know I can’t resist getting a free carpool ride,” Jungwoo said while setting his duffle bag in the corner and swiftly joining Minho in stretches. If Changmin was a hard ass when it came to dance and schedules, Minho was much worse. But Changmin respected him a lot, especially in a craft like dance and performance—he saw him as an equal.

A sigh from Minho. “Yeah, yeah. Poor Yeri.”

Yeri huffed, her hands shooting up into the air. “Thank you!”

Minho folded his arms over his chest as he stood up straight to stand next to Yeri as the two of them absentmindedly watched Jungwoo fold himself in two to stretch his long legs out. “Huh, no Yn tonight?”

Changmin didn’t know why he was still listening. He slowly lowered his headphones back to their position around his neck, then resumed stretching out his hamstrings. He could wait a couple more minutes before getting into his choreography…

“You know you’re not gonna see her anywhere near this place,” Yeri said with a pointed look. Changmin held back a retort, or even a snort. “Wanna get dinner with us tonight? She’s coming to meet us after the show.”

“Ah, I’d love to, but I promised Jisung I’d swing by the studio afterwards. Hey, have you met Ten yet? You should ask…”

Changmin decided that this was an appropriate moment to tune out. He swiftly donned his headphones and reached for his phone hidden in the pile of his duffle bag and jackets in the corner. He didn’t even know why he listened in when your friends brought you up. Why were you even still connected to the dance and performing arts department people anyway? He huffed, rolling his eyes with a small shake of his head. It wasn’t like you wanted to be connected to dance anyway. So why give him a constant reminder of your existence and the past you shared—

“Changminnie!” Juyeon appeared in front of him, waving to him with that goofy smile to get his attention.

Changmin broke into a smile as he shifted one side of his headphones from his ear. “Hey. Wanna go over some of the routine?”

Juyeon nodded. “Yeah, I’m ready. I was trying to get your attention, but I think you were just occupied.”

Whoops. Changmin flicked his wrist as he followed Juyeon down the hallway to a more private place to practice with his friend. “Yeah, sorry. I was just thinking of something.”

“Oh, okay,” Juyeon ducked his head into an empty dressing room in the back hallway, beckoning Changmin to follow him in. “Nothing to worry about though? You can talk to me; no judgment.”

Changmin chuckled and closed the door behind him. “Nah, nothing important. Let’s just focus on the performance.” Anything involving you? Definitely not important anymore.

— ✶

Late February brought the cold, bitter winds of night to the university, so the trek all the way across campus from the laboratory buildings to the performing arts hall was a hellish one. You kept your head tucked into the puffy collar of your puffer jacket, hands stuffed into your pockets, a happy tune blasting in your ears to keep you going all the way up the road. It was around nine o’clock by the time you made it to the front of the performing arts hall, and you could already see the sea of people meandering outside its doors post-draft show.

You shivered and pulled your phone out from your pocket to see where your friends were waiting for you.

“Yn-ie!”

Your head lifted and you grinned, waving your hand at Seungkwan who was making his way over to you. “Hi Kwannie,” you greeted and wrapped your arms around him in a warm embrace.

When you’d pulled away, Seungkwan made a face as he shuddered. “Jesus, it’s cold. I should have brought a scarf or something. Did you walk here?”

You began to nod, but he tsked. “Aish, Yn. You should’ve called! No one should have to walk in this torturous cold.”

You laughed. “It’s no big deal. We’re about to go get some hot food, so it’s cool.”

“We might have to wait for a little longer.” Both you and Seungkwan turned toward Yeri, Mark, and Jungwoo who were walking over. Jungwoo had a sweatband holding his bangs out of his face and his duffle slung over his shoulder. He had his jacket draped over his arm; he was probably warm from the showcase. “We’re waiting on Ten to finish up.”

“Hi Jungwoo,” you greeted him, and the man returned the expression with a side hug. You furrowed your brows. “Who’s Ten?’’

Mark replied with a sniffle from the cold, “Oh, he’s a new exchange student! Well, he was originally admitted here, but he went abroad for a year. He's with the NCT frat. Super cool, super funny. He’s great at dance though.”

“I think you’ll vibe with him, Yn,” Yeri chimed in. “He’s asking a couple people for their opinion on a few parts of his routine, so I think he’ll be out soon.”

You nodded in understanding. You didn’t mind waiting, but you hoped what Yeri said about him was true. Hopefully you did get along with him, because you were honestly far too tired to forcefully play nice. You were hoping for a chill night anyway. Then again, as long as you could avoid a certain someone tonight, this would turn out to be a chill night in general.

You and your friends chatted for a few minutes only before Jungwoo caught someone’s eyes from behind you, Yeri, and Mark. He brightened. “Ten! Ten, over here!”

You all swiveled.

Ten was just as lean and lithe as Jungwoo was, but with black bangs, a pair of round spectacles hanging from the collar of his white T-shirt, and a cute smile on his face. You and he made brief eye contact before Jungwoo was hopping on the balls of his feet to greet him.

Jungwoo slung an arm around Ten’s shoulders as he brought him over to the group. “Yn, this is Ten Lee. Ten, this is Yn-ie—the friend we mentioned earlier.”

Your eyes widened slightly. “Why was I mentioned?” You laughed nervously.

Ten flashed you a boyish kind of smile. “Oh, it was nothing; don’t worry. It’s nice to meet you though.”

Your heart didn't slow at his assurance. “Ah, okay then. Uh, nice to meet you, too!”

“Did you get your routine settled?” Seungkwan asked as the lot of you began to move in one, loose blob toward Yeri’s car. (How all of you would manage to fit, that was something you mentally were trying to figure out. In Yeri’s tiny sedan, you might have to squish four people into the back seat.)

Ten nodded enthusiastically. “Yup, it’s all sorted. Minho and Changmin were really helpful with their comments.”

You felt the people around you freeze at the mention of Changmin’s name. You stiffened as well, but tried to force the strange feeling to go away. Your friends knew the drill, too, but you saw the way they glanced at you from their periphery.

Ten was smart, you realized, when his head tilted at all of your reactions.

Time for damage control. “That’s—that’s good!” Mark’s voice cracked and coughed to clear it. “I mean, Minho’s always been really attentive to details and stuff. I think he was almost recruited to become an idol or something like that…”

Ten pursed his lips, as if silently saying, ‘I’m not buying this bull’. You decided to just… do it. “Changmin’s a great dancer, too,” you said, and everyone shot disbelieving glances your way, but you could already see how Ten was grasping onto everything you were saying. You forced a neutral tone into the way you spoke, forced yourself not to let the bitterness seep through. No one deserved to fall victim to the feelings that were only meant for one Ji Changmin. “I’m glad he helped you out. He’s really good at sharp movements and isolations.”

“Oh, do you dance, Yn?” Ten piped up with a twinkle in his eyes.

“Ruh roh,” you heard Seungkwan murmur, and he shuffled away from you to go to the other side of Yeri’s car.

Maybe you purposefully let him see right through you. “Not really. It was a long time ago.”

You and Ten held eye contact, the silent tension like communication passed between the two of you—this was personal, but Ten could figure out that there was more to the story. It was odd though; the way he didn’t fear prodding just a little bit. You didn’t know why you were letting yourself feed him more bait, but Yeri was hollering for the two of you to squeeze into the backseat, and you snapped out of it.

Weird…

Ten held the backseat door open for you. “Looking forward to getting to know you, Yn,” he said pleasantly.

Your eyes narrowed slightly as you slipped into the backseat. “Same to you…”

EPISODE TWO: OFF THE TABLE

YOUR curiosity won you out.

In fact, it won you over so much that you agreed to get coffee with Ten Saturday afternoon—with Mark and Yeri, of course. The four of you had coordinated stopping by one of the coffee shops in the shopping mall just down the hill from the university to hang out and destress a little from the incoming second wave of STEM midterms. Well, you needed to destress. Mark was in communications, Yeri in psychology, and Ten was… what was Ten’s major again?

“Foreign affairs,” he answered before lifting the straw of his iced americano to his lips. “Lots of foreign language classes and politics and history. Politics and capitalism classes are not my favorite, but all the cultural courses on campus are really great.”

You bobbed your head, propping your chin onto your palm. You sat across from him at one of high tables in the cafe; Mark and Yeri’s stools were barren, save for the belongings they left for you and Ten to watch, while they literally sprinted across the mall to the grocery store because they forgot they were supposed to bring booze to the NCT-RVE joint alumni homecoming tonight. You probably weren’t going to go just because social energy came in short supply these days, but you promised to send a card for your friends in RVE.

“I can imagine,” you commented. “I took a really neat course on African tribes and culture in freshman year, and I miss my professor a lot. I sometimes wonder what would have happened had I joined his study abroad program in Ghana instead of staying here.”

Ten’s head did the tilt thing again, the one you recognized from last night as something he did when he was intrigued. “That does sound really cool. What made you stay?”

Where do I even begin? “My major,” you replied simply. It wasn’t really a lie—not entirely a lie. You sipped on your latte, a faraway look in your eyes. “I was so set on a plan that I guess I got nervous about the unknown should I have gone on that trip.”

“Mm, I understand.” He had taken on a softer look now, something more akin to empathy. “It is a little scary, but while I was in Indonesia, I realized I wouldn’t have traded such an experience for anything else."

You set your cup down. "Have you always wanted to dabble in global affairs?"

"Uh, I'm not sure," he said, head tilted upward with a scrunch in his nose. He nudged his glasses up the smooth slope of his sculpted nose. "I was kind of put in a situation where I had to learn a lot of new languages, and I luckily turned out to be pretty good at picking up on them."

"Wow, that's really cool," you chuckled. A talent you definitely envied. And it seemed like Ten had made the decision to pursue this future of his on his own. You wished you could say the same.

From the counter of the café, you heard one of the workers call out your order number for cinnamon rolls, fresh from the oven.

You began to slip off your stool, and Ten spoke up, "Oh, I can totally go get those."

"It's no problem," you chirped, "I'm already down anyway." You were swift to scurry over to the counter and pick up your table's tray of cinnamon rolls with a smile at the worker in deep gratitude. The thick, warm sweetness wafted into your nose, and you inhaled the delights with a blissful grin.

However, as you turned to head back to the table, you halted abruptly, nearly knocking the plates on the tray into each other.

There, standing next to your table and chatting with Ten, were Ji Changmin and Choi Chanhee.

Great.

The sweet dessert smell soured and tasted like acid on your tongue. Bitter, like the taste of hot coffee straight from the pot. You schooled your face into neutrality, but there was no way all of the uncomfortableness could stay away.

You made your way over; the tray was getting heavy.

"—actually here with Yn, Mark, and Yeri—" Ten was pointing your way and you had to control your urge to hide.

Changmin and Chanhee's heads turned in sync, but only Changmin's eyes narrowed at the sight of you. You returned the expression wholeheartedly.

Chanhee held his breath, muttering a "Yikes" under his breath, while Ten observed the interaction with slightly parted lips. Huh.

"Ji."

"Ln."

You deposited the tray onto the table and your biceps sighed in relief. Those four cinnamon rolls truly were quite hefty on their own.

You could still feel Changmin’s eyes on you as you slid onto the stool across from Ten. “Something you’d like to say to me?” You addressed him with ill-suppressed snark.

Changmin’s eyes narrowed. “Nothing that you’ll take into importance anyway. Just didn’t think you would ever hang out with someone from the dance department.”

“Ten’s got a life outside of dance, Changmin,” you replied. You flashed him a thin-lipped smile. “He gets it.”

“And you’re so much better than me for having a so-called life,” he rolled his eyes. “You know, some people are just really passionate about dance—something you seem to still not understand.”

“I really don’t think you want me to bring up the trove of things you don’t understand—”

Chanhee subtly moved over to Ten’s side as the two of them observed the sparring match between you and Changmin. A sigh fell from his lips, and his eyebrows raised up all the way to his pink-dyed hairline.

Ten had taken one of the plates of cinnamon buns in front of him, silently offering Chanhee some. The latter refused, and Ten began to peel away one of the sultry, sweet dough layers. “Is this… normal?” He asked Chanhee under his breath, motioning to the still-bickering couple across from them.

Chanhee snorted. “It’s their mating call.”

It seemed he had said those four words loud enough to catch yours and Changmin’s attention. A miracle, indeed.

“Ew,” both you and Changmin immediately grimaced at Chanhee. Then you looked at one another with a greater degree of disgust. “Stop copying me!”

…Or, less so a miracle, but rather, a tragedy.

Chanhee let out a haggard sigh, eyes sullen to a deadpan. “One of the few things the two of you will ever agree on.”

“The last thing we’ll ever agree on,” Changmin grumbled as he shoved his hands into the pockets of his jacket. “C’mon Chanhee. We should probably order before JC!Yn and Kei finish loading up the car.”

Changmin was already making his way over to the cashier when Ten managed to get in a final question, “Are you guys coming to the NCT-RVE homecoming tonight?”

“Sure—”

“No.”

Chanhee sent Ten an apologetic look for Changmin’s brusque answer. “Sorry about him. We were thinking of it, but he might be practicing with Juyeon tonight. See you later, Ten—and Yn!” He chased after Changmin, ambushing his friend by practically leaping onto his back and then smacking his shoulder.

Now that Changmin was away from you, the red in your vision had begun to clear away, and you finally remembered the set of delicious cinnamon rolls waiting for you.

Ten propped his cheek against his fist. “So… you and Changmin…”

You made a sour face as you cut off a slice of your cinnamon roll. “What about the gremlin?” You asked. As soon as the buttery, sweet delight hit your tongue, you felt your body lighten and you did a little happy dance in your seat.

Ten chuckled at your behavior. “Lovers gone wrong?”

You choked on the bite.

Your new friend’s eyes widened comically to the size of saucers as he literally pounced across the table to pat your back. “Shit—sorry, Yn. I probably should’ve waited for you to finish swallowing, huh?” He winced when you’d managed to breathe correctly and washed the bite of food down with a sip of coffee. He returned to his perch, letting you recover while he talked through his thoughts. “I don’t mean to pry—actually—” he paused, reconsidering, “—I do mean to pry. Sorry, I’m kind of a sucker for this kind of stuff.”

One of your eyes squinted at him as you massaged your throat. “Yeah, I kind of figured.”

He beamed at you boyishly, the kind of expression that almost had your defenses slipping. Almost. Ten was one slippery fellow. For some reason, you kind of respected him for being upfront about the nosiness, and if you were being honest, if this drama wasn’t yours, you would also be curious about the whole thing.

“Can’t help myself sometimes,” he confessed with a mere shrug. “You don’t owe an explanation or backstory, of course.”

You sucked in a breath, opting to hold back on eating your pastry until you and Ten were done with this topic. “I’m just going to say that Changmin and I were not ‘lovers gone wrong’,” you said, body shuddering.

“Mm,” he hummed. His eyes wandered behind you and over your head, swiftly followed by the action of waving to Changmin and Chanhee on their way out of the cafe. “It’s just interesting to me. Didn’t you just advocate for him the other night at the draft show?”

That rang a bell, unfortunately. “It’s complicated.”

Ten pressed his mouth into a saccharine smile. “I can imagine.”

EPISODE THREE: OFF THE PHONE

THERE was an avid knocking at the laboratory door, usually done by those who didn’t actually work at this specific lab. This lab area was usually reserved for upperclassmen and graduate students and their work.

“Yn-ie, could you get the door, please?” You heard Kun called out to you from his office. It wasn’t just the two of you tonight, but rather, just a few others you didn’t know as well as you did Kun. He often worked late hours like you did, always overworking himself even more as a fresh grad student. You, on the other hand, were trying to finish up this one research paper resulting from last quarter’s research project. If you were lucky, you would be able to send it off to be peer reviewed soon.

You slipped out from behind your workbench and maneuvered the maze of workbenches to head out into the corridor. Exhaustion wore at your bones from having such a long day, but you really did need to get some productive work done so you could focus specifically on your midterms approaching at the end of this week and the beginning of the following week.

However, as you turned the corner into the corridor, you nearly missed your footing. At the end of the hallway where the glass door to the outside was, you found yourself identifying one Ji Changmin and his friend, someone you didn’t recognize. The latter wore a gray hoodie beneath a black puffer vest, and he reacted the opposite to how Changmin did when they caught sight of you.

“Hey! Could you open the door, please?” Not-Changmin hollered through the glass, furiously shaking his sweater-pawed hand down at the door handle.

You didn’t want to. God, you really didn’t want to.

Changmin stared you down, as if daring you to come closer.

You opened the door, and let the cool gust of late February air and two outsiders into the safety and warmth of the laboratory building.

Hoodie Guy shuddered violently to get the cold out of his system. “Jesus, it’s cold outside. Thanks,” he said to you. Then he nudged Changmin with his elbow, as if jolting the man into reality.

“What are you doing here?” You asked, words directed toward Changmin in particular.

His dark bangs were tucked beneath a black beanie with his pair of black headphones hanging around his neck. “You think I want to be here?”

His friend sent him a look, his eyes flickering between you and Changmin furiously until the pieces clicked into his mind. “Well, uh oh…” he muttered while turning away slightly to scratch his head. He gathered his wits then. “Uh, Yn, right?”

You perked up. “Yes.”

“Uh,” he drawled. “We’re actually here for Jacob Bae. You see, we told him we’d come pick him up to take him over to—”

“Is he here?” Changmin asked.

Your eyebrow shot upward. At least they were here for a proper reason. You crossed your arms over your chest, glancing back toward the main laboratory floor way down the hall. Man, the safe zone felt so far away. “He actually just left like, ten minutes ago. Sorry.” The apology was said to Changmin’s friend, the one who seemed to have been able to figure out who exactly you were to Changmin. Not that you were anything to him. And did Changmin just talk about you to all his friends or something—?

“Oh.”

Changmin tapped his friend with the back of his hand. “C’mon Sunwoo. We’ll just meet him over there.”

Sunwoo wrinkled his nose. “I just think it’s weird that he didn’t text us to let us know before we came over here.”

There was a pause and you could practically see the gears in Changmin’s head turning. You would have left them to their own company, but you technically weren’t allowed to leave unauthorized students alone.

It was strange seeing Changmin break into something akin to sheepishness. You saw the dimples appear in the apples of his cheeks as he cupped the back of his neck. “I might not have told him we were coming…”

Sunwoo’s eyes and mouth widened and he whacked his friend with the length of his hoodie sleeve. Changmin let out one of those hyena laughs that set off triggers in your mind. It’d been awhile since you heard that… “Hyung! You’re so unreliable sometimes, oh my god. Even Eric would have remembered to tell him!”

Changmin made a noise of dismissal, slinging an arm around his friend. “Ah, it’s fine. We’ll just meet him there—as you said.”

“Worst texter award goes to,” Sunwoo rolled his eyes.

“I guess some things never change.” The words slipped out of your mouth before you could stop yourself, and both Sunwoo and Changmin suddenly remembered that you were in the hallway with them. Sunwoo had perked up as if he were surprised you would even comment on their situation, but Changmin cut an unreadable expression your way. You didn’t want to read into it.

“You literally forgot to answer a text I sent for three days,” Changmin quipped.

Well, if he was going to play the back and forth game. “That was once out of how many other times,” you scoffed. “You refused to answer anyone’s texts in the mornings anyway, so don't get on my case about that.”

“He did that to you, too?!” Sunwoo cut in with fire behind his words.

You could’ve sworn you saw the slightest bit of blush grace Changmin’s cheekbones as you hid a laugh behind your hand. “He did that to everyone—”

“Hey, I’m better over call; you know that!” Changmin argued. “Sunwoo, you can’t even talk about being a bad texter. I have to hunt for you on discord sometimes to get a straight answer.”

Sunwoo groaned, “Yah! Whatever. It’s still better than your average three-business-day reply speed.”

Changmin stammered, “It is not an average of three business days.” If your ears were not deceiving you, Ji Changmin was whining. “It’s a couple hours at least.”

“A couple hours means half a day,” you said to Sunwoo.

Changmin whipped his attention back to you, finger jabbed accusingly in your direction. “Hey, missy! You always fell asleep on-call, even when you promised that you would stay up to help me study.”

You shook your head. “Not my fault! You know that I always fell asleep around midnight back then.”

“Well, back then—”

“Is everything okay out here?”

Everything in the corridor came to a stand still, and Changmin closed his mouth, mid-sentence. Kun had his head poking out of the door to the main floor, a crease pressed between his brows and right above the rim of his thin spectacles. He eyed the two non-laboratory students with a slight grimace. Of course, Kun was aware of who Changmin was. He could recognize him because of his famed performer reputation on campus, but he knew his history with you because you had spent far too many late nights here at the lab with things plaguing your mind. You and Kun both had a problem with trouble sleeping and being workaholics.

You turned slightly to Kun. “Yeah, everything’s okay, Kun-ge.”

He sent you an unimpressed look.

“We,” Changmin piped up as he urged Sunwoo to the door, “were just leaving.” The mirth and fire from the bickering just a few seconds ago had faded, and you could feel him slipping away.

Kun drummed his fingers along the doorframe, eyebrows shooting up for a second. “Oh-kay… Yn-ie, Ten says he’s right around the corner and asks if you want some company walking home.”

The door to the laboratory behind you was held open, and the night breeze brushed through your hair. When you looked back, you saw that Changmin had stalled in the door for a second. But, it had only been that second before he and his friend were gone.

“Oh.” You made your way over to Kun. “That’s really cool of him. I’d love that.” Some company on a late-night walk back to your apartment did not sound bad at all. You’d done plenty of trips on your own, but sometimes having even one person with you would have been nice.

Kun nodded, pursing his lips, as the two of you walked into the main lab together and toward his office off to the side. “Okay, I’ll let him know. You’re for sure okay though? That must have been… not nice, seeing Changmin here.”

You gave a stiff shrug, your hip leaning against the door of his office while Kun settled back at his desk. “It’s fine,” you said. To be honest, you weren’t even sure if that was a lie or not. You’d heard Changmin laugh for the first time in years. You’d seen the dimples in his cheeks, the sheepishness in his expression—you swallowed.

Once upon a time, you associated all of those things with something like happiness. Your happiness.

Kun fixed you with a pointed look. “If you need to talk.”

You gave a firm nod. “I know where to find you.”

He clicked his tongue, shooting you a finger gun, then shooed you off to finish your work and pack your things. Ten was just around the corner, after all.

EPISODE FOUR: OFF THE RECORD

CHANGMIN liked to think that he became nosy, and that he wasn't born this way. But ever since he overheard that Kun guy asking about Ten wanting to walk you home, he couldn't help but wonder…

He shook his head, brushing his hair out of his eyes and off his forehead, before those same bangs flopped back into their place. He walked back onto the main stage of the performing arts hall to the soundtrack of a hype playlist blasting from the ears of his headphones. As he made his way past groups and individuals doing their own thing, he absentmindedly searched for one person in particular.

Conveniently, he found Ten setting himself up right by Changmin's things. He was shouldering off his black puffer jacket, rolling the material up into a manageable ball to shove into his duffle bag.

"Hey," Changmin greeted, bending down slightly to grab his water bottle.

Ten straightened and flashed him a smile. "Hey."

It wouldn't be awkward would it? Probably not. Just be cool about it, Changmin. He smiled slightly, the dimples in his cheeks disarming his acquaintance. "I didn't know you and Yn were close."

Your name felt so… foreign, yet familiar, on his tongue. It was like tasting déjà vu, like eating a treat from childhood that had been associated with good feelings, but he couldn't decide if it was still as good as he remembered or a trick of his mind.

The mention of your name brought a jolt of energy to Ten's body and Changmin saw the man lean into the conversation. Curious… "Oh? Well, I mean—" he gave a shrug, "—she's really cool. She just seems like a good person to get to know, y'know? Why do you ask?"

Changmin couldn't tell how much he trusted the slight narrowing of Ten's feline eyes. There was no way you hadn't mentioned him to Ten at some point or another. To be honest, he didn't like the feeling of you still lingering in his head if he didn't linger in yours. It meant a myriad of things that he loathed to admit.

He let the feeling slide away, let his mouth tilt upward like his eyes to the spotlights in the ceiling. "Just be…" He shook his head. "Nothing. It's nothing." He flicked his wrist, as he spun his water bottle cap on tight. "You can forget about it."

Ten sent him a look that Changmin pointedly ignored.

Somewhere within the depths of the performing arts center, Changmin could hear the howling laughter of his friend Hyunjae as he most likely bugged his best friend out of her mind, both to her chagrin and her delight. That was another can of worms entirely.

Ten piped up as he settled onto the backstage floor while Changmin mentally went through some of the problem sets he had to review today. "If you don't mind me asking, why are you and Yn on such… uneven ground with each other?"

There it was. Changmin snorted. "Uneven ground? I don't even know if we're on the same ground."

"You're both really friendly people," Ten added, "so it just doesn't make sense to me."

Changmin pursed his lips. He never felt the need to divulge this stuff to anyone but his friends, but he didn't know what Ten already knew. He didn't know what you told him, but based on the fact that Ten wasn't looking at him the same way you did… Changmin scratched the back of his head and leaned his side against the wall to face him. "Something happened a long time ago. I guess we just both hold a grudge well."

Ten huffed a laugh in response. "Remind me never to get on your bad side then," he joked.

— ✶

There was a buzz about the university newspaper room. The Daily had only a handful of crew members onboard, mainly because it was so selective. Over the past few years that you had been apart of the staff, you and a few others had gradually loosened the reputation of the Daily's elitist interview process—there was still some level of intimidation that ensured the publication took on the hard workers and not those simply looking for an extracurricular to put on their resume though.

So when there was talk of a new staff member, everyone knew about it.

You let yourself in the door with a sigh, brushing the hair from your eyes held up with a random, blue claw clip you found on your bathroom sink. The bus had been late this morning because it broke down, but you luckily were able to make it to your lecture on time. You had run over here for a quick meeting that Kim Doyoung had summoned you for, no doubt about the new hire.

"Hey guys," you said as you passed by clusters of desks piled with copyedits and heads buried in monitor screens. The sounds of typing stopped briefly with each head you walked past:

"Yn!"

"Hi Yn!"

"Sup Yn—HEY! I just did my hair this morning!" Mark yelped, hands smoothing down the braids in his hair.

You giggled as you patted his head. "Your hair needs a break, Mark."

As you disappeared around the corner, you heard him shout back, "So do you, but you never hear me complaining!"

You rolled your eyes with an ill-concealed smile. The door to Doyoung's little editor in chief office was right down the hall next to the office for the sponsoring professor. As much as you and the others teased him about getting the "Boss man" office, he always complained to you about being on edge with the professor's office next door. You didn't quite understand since Professor Woo was almost never in his office anyway, but you supposed you could see.

Doyoung's door was open, and the fourth year's head perked up at the sound of your voice and nearing footsteps. He didn't even wait for you to knock or say hi, before beckoning you inside. "Yn, thank god you know how to hustle. Close the door on your way in. Thanks."

Your eyebrows shot up at the terseness in his tone, but didn't question him until you'd closed the door and settled into the chair opposite him. His desk, much like those outside, was covered in a sea of paper, with his laptop being the only land in sight. "What's up? You sound stressed."

He shot you a look over the rims of his thin glasses. "When am I not stressed?"

"Valid."

"Okay," he began with a sigh that made your concern rise just a bit more, "you know the situation with our performing arts review section, right?"

You nodded. "Of course."

The situation with the performing arts review section of the paper was inherently a mess. For a handful of years, the performing arts section was written under a pseudonym (lovingly dubbed Opera Glasses)—the identity of the reviewer was anonymous—which was a product of an incident a few years ago where a performer was unhappy with a review left by someone on the paper and came to ask, very unkindly, for a rewrite. Since then, the paper had been swallowed up by so much that finding a permanent writer or reviewer for the section became less and less of a priority.

When you joined the publishing team, it had been in the middle of freshman year when you were also putting your application out for research projects. Joining had felt like the right thing to do, as much as it was an act of rebellion against your mother and your childhood. They had asked if you knew anything about dance of all things.

And well, you did know.

You'd written one piece—one piece that was entirely you. It had been for one of the dancers just debuting at his first winter showcase. Since then, you couldn't stomach writing another one or watching another one.

You ghost wrote, you edited, you advised—but you stuck to putting your energy into covering the STEM-related sections of the paper now.

So Doyoung already knew your relationship with the performing arts review section. "Well," he cleared his throat, making a vague flourish with his hand, "I'm sure you already know that I just interviewed a new prospective recruit. I was wondering if you would be willing to take them under your wing and to show them the ropes."

Oh. That wasn't exactly what you expected him to say. Your heart kicked up for an entirely new reason, however. You'd always wanted to be someone's mentor. To be someone's older sister. "I mean, yeah. I'd love to," you stammered, a smile slowly curling onto your lips. "That would be really cool."

Doyoung sighed, his shoulders sinking in relief. "Thank you."

"But wait." You cocked your head to the side as you asked, "What does Opera Glasses have to do with this?"

"I want her to eventually take over for it," he explained. "She knows quite a bit about theater and music—little less about dance, though. I know that you have your issues with the dance department, but out of everyone here, you probably understand dance stuff the most. I just ask that you help her out a little with that, and maybe even introduce her to some of the people there so we can ease her in with interviews—"

You opened your mouth to interrupt him, but he sent you a pointed look. He continued, "Just hear me out, okay? If you're uncomfortable at all, you can back out. And you don't even have to back out right now or completely; maybe you could have Mark introduce her to Jungwoo for interviews, and you can just stick to the behind-the-scenes stuff."

Doyoung exhaled. "Okay, so what are your thoughts?"

You worried your bottom lip between your teeth. What did you think… What did you think?

Even the thought of stepping foot into a practice room made the yelling and screams echo in the caverns of your mind. But you'd missed them—missed the polished wood floors, the floor-to-ceiling mirrors, the people. God, you couldn't even stay away from the people if you tried, no matter how much you tried convincing yourself you could.

You weren't fooling anyone.

You swallowed. You'd always wanted to be a big sister.

What was the harm in giving this a try?

(Changmin. You'd probably run into Changmin a lot more often than if you didn't accept. But you could see him from that one night: the sheepishness, the dimples, the laugh. Why couldn't you get over that interaction?)

You mustered up your courage and straightened in your seat. "I'll still do it. When do we start?"

EPISODE FIVE: OFF THE MARK

IT turned out that Doyoung intended for you and your new recruit, Bae Sumin, to get started right away. With the winter showcase only a couple weeks away, it was imperative that the two of you dived right in.

"—so what made you interested in joining the team?" You asked, shoving your hands into your jacket pockets to hide signs of nervousness from your underclassman peer. The two of you were walking from the Daily's newsroom and over to the performing arts center. It was about a ten minute walk, but you figured that it would give you two the opportunity to get to know one another.

Sumin was a multimedia major, as you had been told earlier when the two of you just met for the first time in the entryway of the Daily newsroom. She was cute and well-dressed—she wore a pleated skirt and sweater with a white collar peeking through. Her smile was dazzling, and reminded you of someone who would do well on stage. No wonder she had theater and performing experience.

"Oh!" She shot you one of those dazzling smiles, her hand shooting up to shift the white, fluffy earmuffs seated over her head. "I actually had a cousin who came here and shared with me some of the Daily's earlier issues. She always said it was kind of competitive to get in, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to try."

You bobbed your head. "That's really cool." A small laugh fell from your lips, "I'm glad you did try! Lots of people just assume they're gonna get turned away and they don't try at all, you know?"

Sumin hummed in understanding.

Something had settled nicely in your chest throughout this walk. Even if your past anxieties were beginning to bubble up to the surface at the sight of the nearing performing arts buildings, Sumin's easy conversation calmed you. It was one less thing to worry about.

Yesterday, when Doyoung had proposed this job for you, you had asked Mark to accompany you and Sumin to the arts buildings. He couldn't walk with you two, but he promised to meet you there. Now, you were kind of glad you got to have this bit of bonding time with her.

“I think Doyoung said that I should introduce you to a few people in particular,” you said offhandedly and pulled your phone out to check yours and Doyoung’s text thread.

Sumin did the same, most likely taking out any notes she had taken from Doyoung’s instructions. “Yeah, something like Lee Minho, Kim Jungwoo… the Hwang?—the Hwang siblings, uhm and Ji Changmin…?”

Your footing faltered for a second, and Sumin asked if you were all right, but you recovered quickly. You let out an embarrassed laugh, feeling heat crawl up your neck. Why in the world did his name catch you off guard like that? Maybe it was because you assumed Doyoung would just let you avoid Changmin, but realistically, if Sumin was going to do an interview with the dance department’s most prominent members, then there was no avoiding Changmin.

You just had to suck it up and be an adult about it.

It was three years ago… What was the big deal?

But as you moved to open the door to the backstage area for Sumin with your ID card, you felt your throat tighten in on itself. You forced a smile to your face as you let Sumin go in before you so you could turn your head out to inhale a large lungful of fresh air. Then, you ducked in after her.

The backstage corridors were as hustle n' bustle as you expected them to be. The lights were dim-looking from the black walls and floors marred with scuff marks from years upon years of use. It was an overwhelming tidal wave of sensory details—what, with the clashing sounds of chatter and music, the smell of some kind of polish (or maybe that was resin?), the warmth of energy in the air and all around you.

The hairs on the back of your neck stood like you could sense someone was coming this way.

You gestured down the opposite direction to Sumin. “Come on; I’m pretty sure they’re down this way.”

It was a curious thing, memory. You could recall late nights of catching the bus to these very practice rooms and backstage rooms from when you were in high school. Performing on the stage was a whole other experience in itself, and though part of you missed it, there were other feelings that dominated the hints of nostalgia now.

You could hear the chatter even clearer now, even if their words were muddled.

The door to one of the larger practice rooms were left ajar, and though you only peered in, you felt the warmth hit you like a wave. Your throat was closing up again—breathe—

“Hey,” you said into the room, catching quite a few eyes. From an initial scan, you determined that Changmin wasn’t amongst the crush of people socializing in here, and you couldn’t identify the feeling manifesting in the pit of your stomach.

Jungwoo was the first to bound over toward you, swiftly followed by Minho and Hyunjin, one of the Hwang siblings. “Yn-ie! I can’t believe you actually came. I thought Doyoung was joking.”

A smile made its way onto your lips and you accepted Jungwoo’s side hug. “Yeah, well Doyoung doesn’t joke around.”

“He really doesn’t,” Hyunjin said with a grimace. “He’s kind of scary, that one.”

“If you can survive Minho,” you said to him, “then you can survive Doyoung.”

Minho made a face at you. “What have I ever done to you, Yn?”

Nothing; this is just me trying to pretend I’m not seconds away from quivering like a leaf in the wind. You laughed. “Nothing yet. Guys, I'd like you to meet Sumin. She’s our new recruit at the Daily, and she’s gonna be the one conducting interviews for the winter showcase this year.”

Sumin didn’t need much prompting to smile and wave at your friends in that same charming way. “Hi, nice to meet you!”

The three dancers before you replied in kind. Jungwoo offered to introduce her to some of the others in the room, and before you knew it, she was swept away.

Hyunjin made a comment about needing to go check up on a friend of his, leaving you and Minho chatting to the side of the room.

“Wow,” Minho said offhandedly as the two of you watched Jungwoo and Sumin work their way around the room, “she’s a natural at this. Where’d Kim find this one?”

“She saw some of our older issues,” you replied. You watched as Sumin ignited a sort of brightness in every conversation she started. You struggled to swallow; now that you didn’t feel obligated to keep up appearances, especially in front of Sumin, your jitteriness was beginning to come on just a little stronger. You absentmindedly massaged your throat, willing it to loosen up.

Minho glanced over at you, his eyes catching your anxious actions. “Must have a lot of confidence in her if he’s throwing her straight into taking charge of interviews. How’re you holding up?” The latter was said lowly and under his breath in case someone just happened to be close enough to catch onto your conversation.

Minho didn’t know your history with the dance department as thoroughly as your close friends did, but it didn’t take a genius to see that you weren’t at your absolute best right now. You gave a stiff shrug. “I’m alright,” you managed to say.

He nodded, though it was probably more for your sake than him saying he believed you. “It’s funny,” he drawled, “one might think that by sending you here on behalf of the paper, that you were behind Opera Glasses.”

Now that, you could let out a genuine chuckle at.

Minho gauged your reaction but smiled to himself. He wasn’t one to really care for the drama and gossip side that came privy to the performing arts review section, but you couldn’t blame him if he was curious.

“That would be really stupid if that was the case,” you mused.

“It would be,” he agreed. “Is this a sign that this will be the end of Opera Glasses then? Finally a face to the name?”

You pursed your lips. “Actually, I’m not too sure what Doyoung will end up doing. I’m sure he’ll call for a board meeting to decide what the review’s fate will be, but it’s not exactly our top priority—”

Your voice and words trailed off as your eyes met a pair coming into the practice room. You and Changmin froze at the sight of one another, two deer caught in headlights, and you felt your heart palpitate violently in your chest. Your breath left your lungs—his expression was filled with surprise, until it morphed into something you couldn’t read.

“What are you doing here?” He deadpanned.

Minho’s eyebrows shot up. “You didn’t know Yn was stopping by? We all got the email from Director Lee, man.”

Changmin pressed his mouth together and it made the dimple in his cheek deepen. He looked you up and down, and he opened his mouth to say something else, but paused when you unconsciously brushed your thumb against the hollow of your throat. (Dear god, why couldn’t you breathe? Breathe, breathe, breathe—)

He seemed to lose whatever he was going to say. You swore the sharpness in his gaze softened.

But then his jaw tightened; you didn’t know why. “I didn’t think you’d actually show,” he muttered under his breath.

Ouch.

The words from his mouth pricked uncomfortably at the back of your mind. You found your voice again. “I’ll be gone before you know it,” you replied tersely.

Your response touched a nerve for him, too. He cut his attention to the rest of the practice room. “Where’s your new girl?”

“Over there,” you said, inclining your head across the room where Sumin and Hwang Yeji were currently swapping contact information. Something soared in your chest at the sight, but you couldn’t tell if it was pride or envy.

Without any additional prompting, you watched Changmin make his way toward Sumin and away from you. You didn’t realize you were holding in a breath until you finally exhaled—

“Yn! Sorry I’m late.” Mark bumbled into the practice room, wiping a drop of sweat from his forehead as he quite literally crashed against the wall next to you and Minho. He was panting and gasping for breath, and you and Minho couldn’t help but express your amusement.

“It’s all cool, dude,” you assured while patting his head.

“I should probably get back to it,” Minho said as he began walking away from you and Mark. “Nice to see you, Mark. Feel free to take a water bottle from the green room.”

Mark thumped his head against the wall with his eyes closed. “Thanks, man,” he huffed.

With a snicker under his breath, Minho went his separate way.

You gave Mark a moment to catch a breath or two, and you slid down next to him against the practice room wall. Folding your knees up against your chest, you copied Mark’s position with his head tilted back as you both inhaled through your nostrils and breathed out through slightly parted lips. While Mark might have been trying to get a moment of rest from (no doubt) running here from the bus stop, you were trying to steady yourself.

The anxiety was starting to make your hands feel numb cold.

“You don’t have to stay, y’know,” came Mark’s voice, followed by the back of his hand gently nudging your arm. When your eyes fluttered open, you found him already looking at you. “You asked for my help; you can go take a breather outside and come back in—or maybe don’t—whatever you’re comfortable with. This can’t be easy.”

You were struggling to swallow again. One of your hands drummed messily against your kneecap. “It’s—” you shook your head, “—I’ll be okay. Thanks for coming though.”

“Yeah, dude. Of course.”

Something prodded at the side of your head, like someone was staring at you, but when you turned to see, it was just Changmin talking to Sumin. They were both smiling and making good conversation, it seemed.

You let out a sigh and closed your eyes again. Wishful thinking.

— ✶

Mark stayed behind to “vibe” with the remaining dancers still at the performing arts building while you and Sumin pushed out into the crisp, cool evening. Even after walking all the way to the bus station, your hands were still numb, and the cold definitely wasn’t helping.

“How do you feel about the dance interviews now?” You found yourself asking Sumin as the two of you sat on the bench at the station waiting for the bus to come pick the two of you up.

Sumin beamed. “I definitely feel a bit more secure about conducting them. I’ll definitely need some help with dance terminology and editing and stuff though.”

You nodded. “No problem at all.”

“The people are all really so chill and nice…” Your eyes definitely weren’t tricking you when you saw the bashfulness that her expression took on, and the little giggle you heard could not have been the wind. “Especially Changmin.”

Ha. What.

A weight fell to the pit of your stomach. Maybe you were hearing things… “Sorry?”

She blinked, and the blush on her cheekbones darkened. “Oh, haha, it’s nothing! I just… he was really sweet, and he has a really pretty smile and stuff—do you—uh, do you know if his previous dance showcase performances are online?”

(Something about that detail—he has a really pretty smile—rang a bell for you.)

It was really an innocent question, but you knew if Sumin went searching online for Changmin, and if she went deep enough, she’d find you there, too. You sucked in a breath. “I can—” you winced inwardly, “—send you some of his performances, if you want?”

You couldn’t deny the warm and fuzzy feeling in your chest when Sumin practically lit up at your suggestion. “Would you? I would really appreciate it, Yn! You’re the best.”

From your periphery, you saw the bus approach from down the street, and you gestured for the both of you to stand up and get your ID cards ready to board. You sent her a small smile—at least it felt good to help her out. You could pretend for a second that this was just a little crush or infatuation on some other colleague of yours that Sumin had. “Yeah, no worries.” No worries at all.

EPISODE SIX: OFF THE [TOP OF YOUR] HEAD

FRIDAY night brought you, Seungkwan, and Doyoung to the hotpot place located in the university district. The three of you were the unconventional combination of your friends, but Kun and Ten were supposedly on their way over as of five minutes ago. Thus, with the last of your party nearing, the three of you deigned to begin ordering almost everything off the menu—just to whet your appetites, of course.

Doyoung slumped down in his seat across from you and Seungkwan as soon as the waiter left to input your table's hefty order. "Ugggggggh."

Seungkwan snorted. "Ah, my favorite sound."

Doyoung passed him a dirty look over his lenses. "Is that sarcasm I hear, Boo Seungkwan?"

"I have no idea what you mean," he said with feigned innocence as he looked away and scratched the side of his head.

You chuckled to yourself, drawing your phone out from the inner pocket of your puffer jacket when you heard the series of buzzes. Your screen lit up with notifications from Sumin, all of them thanking you profusely for the spam of links you'd sent her way. These were on top of the videos you had dug up from your secret locked folder in your phone—and here you were, wondering why in the world you were doing this to yourself and for her?

"I can't decide if I dread Doyoung's noises of discontent or your expressions of pain more," Seungkwan commented, effectively pulling your focus away from your phone.

Both of your friends were now looking at you, patiently awaiting your answer to what ailed you tonight. Where should you begin?

"I'm not in pain," you scoffed. You set your phone facedown on the table next to you to avoid looking at the notifications. Huh. "Did I look like I was in pain?"

Doyoung's smile was wide like his eyes as he nodded. "Yup," he chirped in that sweet sarcasm of his. "Like you'd just watched a video of someone stubbing their toe against a doorframe."

Seungkwan blinked. "That's so—specific."

"You do not want to know what my For You Page looks like—"

You recreated the look of pain from earlier, holding your palm up. "Respectfully, Doie? I don't."

Seungkwan let out another snort of delight and had to hold a hand in front of his mouth.

Doyoung leveled a half-hearted scowl at you. "You're lucky I'm not your boss right now."

"As opposed to every other moment in time?"

"You have a mouth on you tonight."

"I do like to use it every so often," you quipped, the corner of your mouth lifting in an amused smirk.

Doyoung sighed, raking a hand through his hair. "I don't get paid enough for this."

"You're literally not getting paid at all—" Your words were sliced off at their end when you gasped—it was all a blur: a mass of reddish-brown hair, your phone snatched from right in front of you— "SEUNGKWAN!"

Seungkwan held his breath with an impish grin as he turned his back to you and shielded your phone from your attempts to get it back. "I just wanna see!" He said with a cackle. "Every time you've looked at your phone today, you looked like you wanted to fall into an abyss."

You glared at him, pulling away to cross your arms firmly over your chest. "You can't just steal my phone, dude!"

"What's so important on your phone anyway, Yn-ie?" Doyoung asked good naturedly, reaching for his glass of ice water. "You're usually not so attached to that thing."

Your lips snapped shut and you wondered if the heat creeping up to your face was obvious.

"You've been sending Changmin videos to Sumin?!" Seungkwan bursted out, his eyes so wide that you could see your reflection in his pupils. As you'd feared, Seungkwan still had his fingerprint registered into your phone from before (long story; don't ask), and had cracked the device open, as well as your most recently opened application—yours and Sumin's text messages.

You did nothing but stare at the table like you were getting war flashbacks, while Doyoung had even gotten up out of his seat to take a peek at your phone, too.

"I haven't even seen this video before," Seungkwan hissed as if you weren't right there.

You fixed them both with a stink eye, but at the same time, maybe this was for your benefit. They could help you without you actually asking for help—

Doyoung's face contorted into a laughable expression of shock (eyes wide, mouth wider, eyebrows pinched, nose wrinkled) as he viewed what Seungkwan had selected. "Oh my god. He's a child in this!"

"Actually he was a senior in high school—" You slapped a hand over your mouth. Whoops.

Both of their heads whipped over toward you. "I thought you deleted all your high school shit!" They chorused together. If it had been any other situation or context, you might have laughed at the hilarity if it all.

Instead, you averted your gaze, making a show of looking for the waiter or maybe even Kun or Ten. What was taking them so long anyway?

"Yn," Seungkwan addressed with a tone akin to that of a parent on the verge of lecturing their child, "what in the name of god are you sending Sumin and why?"

Helpless, you held both your palms up in a sheepish shrug. "The kid has a crush on him, and being the best mentor figure ever, I… did some compiling for her." You paused, "Now that I say it out loud, it does sound pretty stupid."

Doyoung returned to his seat. "Ya think?"

You wrinkled your nose at him. "Hey! Sometimes, some of us have bad nights and we wanna feel something." Out of context, this was a really suspicious conversation.

"Isn't this just you torturing yourself?"

Seungkwan slapped his hand against the table, and both you and Doyoung startled. "That's it! I'm calling for an intervention."

Your mouth parted open. "Right now?"

He deadpanned at you. "No, when Kun and Ten get here—of course, right now!"

You returned his deadpan expression. The adrenaline from all this back and forth was slowly fading, and what you were left with was something that felt like emptiness. So… now they knew.

Doyoung and Seungkwan exchanged looks with another from across the table, but it was the former who spoke first. "Why do you still have videos from back then, Yn-ie? I thought you told us you deleted them all?"

"I mean, we're not trying to be judgmental or anything," Seungkwan added firmly, but not unkindly, "they're your videos and photos, your past and memories, but… based on everything you've already told us before, wouldn't it be best to delete them?"

You didn't like the emptiness. The adrenaline had stripped you of energy and confidence when it faded. "I," you stammered, "I just… I couldn't bring myself to delete them." Your voice was quiet, almost inaudible compared to the liveliness of the hotpot shop around you and your friends. "I mean, how could I? Sometimes, I want to watch them and try to find the courage to say that I'm sorry first."

Yeah, you wanted to feel something. That "something" was actually a lot of things—courage, happiness, nostalgia, anger, melancholy, love, passion, pride. A life and childhood you had lost; who's fault was it but your own? You felt nothing short of pathetic.

Seungkwan frowned deeply, his eyes softening. He leaned forward and drew you into his embrace, his hold warm and comforting. "Oh, Yn. I'm sorry; I shouldn't have pried like that."

You wrapped your arms around him, eyes shuddering closed. "Yeah, you shouldn't have."

He grunted into your shoulder, a noise of defiance and attitude.

Doyoung had a similar expression of sympathy present on his face. You didn't often see something like that from him, but after years of friendship and working together, you'd begun to see a lot more of him. "I'm sorry too, Yn. It probably still hurts, and I know I was probably really insensitive when I asked you to introduce Sumin to the dance department—"

"Hey guys! Sorry we're late."

Everyone jolted at the sight of Kun and Ten arriving at your table. Kun sent Ten a sharp look along with a sharp jab with his elbow for interrupting. Kun shot you an apologetic look. "Sorry, we didn't interrupt anything, did we?"

You shook your head as Seungkwan pulled away. Doyoung and Seungkwan were both looking to you to make the decision of whether or not you would let Kun and Ten in on the prior conversation.

No, you didn't want to put a damper on dinner any longer. "Ah, no worries. We were just… discussing a couple work things. What took you guys so long?"

Luckily, no one (namely Ten) called you out and the two newcomers slid into their respective seats. Dinner would arrive soon, and you could fill your belly with something other than negative thoughts for once.

— ✶

boss bunny: hey, i didn't get a chance to say this earlier, but i'm so sorry for expecting u to introduce sumin to the dance dept

boss bunny: i didn't think at all abt how that might trigger u, and i still want u to know that u can back out whenever u feel uncomfortable. seriously.

your phone: it's okay, doyoung. i get it, i really do. and i promise that it didn't feel like u were forcing me or assuming that i would do it either

your phone: i knew it would probably trigger me like this too, but i kind of really wanted to be someone's mentor yk? it just… called to me ig

your phone: sounds kind of sad lol

boss bunny: nonono! not at all :( i understand that too

boss bunny: i admire ur strength, yn

your phone: DOIE 🥺

boss bunny: …okay love u and all, but let's not use that emoji yeah? T-T

your phone: okay wtv 🤧 now stop texting cuz ten is starting to realize ur not slick at this

boss bunny: AM TOO. >:(

— ✶

"He kept looking at his phone and then at you, like, every five seconds," Ten giggled, his shoulder absentmindedly brushing against yours as the two of you strolled side by side through the numbing cold night. Dinner had concluded just about half an hour ago, and while Kun ferried Doyoung and Seungkwan home, you and Ten decided to head down a few blocks to get milk tea and hang out.

You clapped your hands together in delight, your laughter lighting up the night. “That’s what I’m saying! He just wasn’t subtle about it and he kept arguing with me that he was.” You shook your head, tongue darting out to lick your lips, “It’s okay though. I think Dad Doyoung’s antics are charming.”

Ten grinned. “Dad Doyoung? I think he’s more of an uncle; ‘Dad’ is Kun’s title.”

“Fair enough.”

“Ayo, Ten!”

Both yours and Ten’s heads whipped upward at the sound of his name being called. You didn’t actually recognize the voice, but when you saw the lineup of four young men coming toward you from the opposite end of the street, you didn’t need to recognize it. Because, well, you recognized their faces.

Huh, you had been running into Changmin and his like a lot more often recently.

Heading straight for you was Changmin, Chanhee, Juyeon, and—you thought his name was Kevin. Kevin was the one who had called out to Ten, and he waved excitedly over to your friend. Based on Changmin’s not-so-subtle frown at Kevin, you could assume that this was not expected. Maybe he was going to advocate crossing the whole street to avoid you.

“Oh, hey Kev!” Ten greeted back cheerily, glancing at you beside him. “Do you know Kevin and Juyeon?”

You bobbed your head. “Briefly,” you replied. The two of your groups met in the middle, two blockades in the smack middle of the sidewalk. Impromptu meetups like this always seemed to end up clogging up the sidewalk for some reason.

After a swift greeting, Chanhee was already gesturing to the direction his group had already been headed in. “Hey, I’ll probably run up the street and get us a table. Haknyeonie says the tables fill up fast after eight o’clock.”

Juyeon perked up. “Oh, I’ll come with!”

Chanhee made eye contact with Changmin from across the group, and a silent form of communication passed between them. You watched this happen quietly, standing to the side with your hands tucked into your pockets while Ten and Kevin caught up from the last time they saw each other (apparently, it was a drawing and painting course from last quarter). However, instead of leaving with Chanhee and Juyeon, Changmin lingered with the three of you.

He naturally came to stand semi-close to you since he wasn’t exactly a part of the “drawing and painting” conversation. The frown from earlier had disappeared, though, and you didn’t know if you could call that a win or not.

Perhaps to you, the tension between the two of you was palpable. There were… far too many things up in the air at this moment, and it was nearly impossible for you to figure out just one thing to start with.

Plus, now was no time to get into all of that baggage. You needed to finish that intervention with Doyoung and Seungkwan before you could handle that kind of conversation—at least, that was what you would have preferred.

But for now, you found yourself clearing your throat and sparing him a glance. “Hey.”

Changmin’s eyes darted over to yours in ill-concealed surprise. “Hey.”

And that was that.

Luckily, Ten nor Kevin dragged on their conversation longer than it needed to be, and soon, you and Ten were passing by Kevin and Changmin as both parties went their separate ways. (You were going to pretend that you hadn’t looked back to watch Changmin walk away. Definitely not.)

“All good?” Ten asked, though, his voice was quieter than it had been before.

You could meet his eyes and nod. “Yeah.”

Ten followed up with an idle sort of humming noise, like he was one of those really loud computer fans (what in the world led you to think of that—?), “A few days ago, I kind of asked Changmin what the deal between the two of you was.”

“Oh?” Nervousness bubbled up the column of your throat. “What’d he say?”

He gave a shrug. “Something like a long-standing grudge.”

You let out a laugh that didn’t exactly sound like a laugh. “Well, I guess that’s one way to put it.” Was that how you would put it? In a way, that was what it was, but there was so much more to that, wasn’t there? Did Changmin think so little of what transpired between the two of you or was he just trying to deflect Ten’s interrogation?

The two of you had arrived at the tea shop by now, and Ten opened the door for you. The shop’s insides were warm and bright, and the tables were already filled up with fellow students who decided to hang out with friends on their Friday evening. You and Ten shifted over to the self-order kiosks to the side of the room and continued your conversation in low volumes.

“How would you put it then?” He asked. When you looked over at him, you realized that there was something scarily disarming about his eyes. “No pressure, of course. I mean, you can call me out on being nosy whenever; I figured it wouldn’t hurt to ask.”

You pursed your lips as you turned back to the screen to absentmindedly swipe down the page to find your preferred order. On the inside, you fought for the right words. “Changmin and I were best friends since we were kids,” you started, inputting your preferred level of sugar and ice like clockwork, “and we met through dance.”

Ten nodded to signal he was still listening, and the two of you swapped places so he could input his order.

You cracked your knuckles and rubbed your palms together to generate some kind of heat between them. “I didn’t really like dance at first. It was just one of those things my parents put me in to occupy my time after school and while they were working. But… well, you know how Changmin is with dance—it was and is his livelihood.”

“Even then?”

A nod. “Even then.”

When your orders were paid for, the two of you moved to a quiet corner of the shop to wait for your number to be called from the counter. You leaned your side against the wall next to Ten, your eyes staring blankly at a crack in the floor. “He was actually the reason I grew to love dancing,” you confessed. “As we got older and went into high school, sneaking out to practice together and performing together on stage became as easy as breathing air and as normal as…” You shook your head. “It was just a lot easier I think, back then.”

Ten tilted his chin toward you. “What happened between you two, Yn?”

You swallowed roughly. “In my first year of high school, my parents got divorced. I always suspected it would happen, but my mom kind of changed after that.” Your eyebrows crinkled as you recalled the memories of your early teenage years and tried to grapple with an adequate way to express them aloud. “And, to be fair, the more I danced, the more I didn’t want to focus on school work, but my mom became really hard on me about all that and I started to crack down on that stuff.

“Eventually, she got tired of taking me to dance practices and shows, and she blew up at me about how useless dance was going to be if I was going to become a doctor or something like that.”

Ten heard your number being called and nudged you to follow after him. He handed you your drink, and the two of you pushed back out into the chilly night. You didn’t really know where you were trying to go, but you didn’t really care. You both ended up in one of the small parking lots squeezed between two fast food restaurants, and you sat yourself down on the curb.

You continued, “And so, she would purposely forget to come home in time to take me to competitions and rehearsals. By the time I realized she wasn’t coming, I was already late every time. I would start walking myself there and taking the bus instead. Changmin started noticing that I was slacking, but I…”

“He didn’t know?”

“No.” You didn’t want him to know. Maybe it was your stupid pride that was preventing you from admitting that aloud. Maybe you were ashamed that your mom wasn't as accepting of dance as his parents were. You let out a shuddering breath and watched it come out in a visible puff in front of your face. “She made me grow spiteful toward dance,” you said stiffly. “I would be trying to stretch or practice movement in my bedroom while studying for exams, and she would come in and berate me.”

The yelling echoed in your mind, all too vividly. Your mother never physically hurt you, but there were still scars. “She’d discourage me from rehearsals or signing up for competitions by telling me I was nowhere near good enough, that dancing wasn’t going to put food on the table, and that I was—” A complete disappointment. You could pick those exact words out of a line up.

Ten’s eyes glistened with silver in the amber glow of the streetlight above you. “Jesus, Yn. I’m so sorry; that’s—that’s awful.”

You didn’t know how to accept the sympathy, even after having received so much from your other friends already. No matter how many times you retold your story, it was never quite right or in the way your brain wanted to portray it. You didn’t want to portray anyone as the villain; you figured that maybe you could have done something back then to prevent this. (You couldn’t have, actually, and that was the most difficult part to accept.)

“Yeah,” you murmured, setting your drink on the ground as you curled in on yourself slightly. “Anyway, by senior year, Changmin was obviously really into dance and was probably really stressed about auditions and end-of-the-year competitions. We basically… we basically took out our anger on each other. He said some things, I said some things. The rest is history.”

It was quiet for a moment as you let the words sink into the open air. Your chest loosened a bit after being able to tell another person about it, but for the most part, your hands still trembled. You reached for your drink again to take a sip and to force some kind of liquid down your throat.

After a while, Ten piped up, “Yn… I hope you know that you are not whoever your mother was trying to make you believe you were. You’ve probably realized that already—or maybe you’re still working on it—but please know that you’re probably one of the strongest people I know. It must have been really hard for you and I…” He exhaled, “Sorry, I’ve never been great at this.”

You sent him a small smile in return. “It’s okay; I still appreciate it.” After a beat, you added, “I know I act like I hate him, but I still want to see him succeed. I can’t think that ill of him, especially when he wasn’t the only one at fault.”

“Ah, that’s why ‘it’s complicated’, huh? I get that.”

“Yeah.” Your hands—god, if they could just stop shaking—

Ten reached over and covered your hands with one of his, and you let the heat of his palm warm yours. “You’re doing great, Yn. You know that, right?”

You couldn’t choke out an answer to that. You could only really say, “I just miss him sometimes.”

A sad smile. “I know. Maybe he does, too.”

You wanted to laugh, or maybe cry, at that. Anyone who got in the way of Changmin’s passions was no one to him. You would know exactly how that felt.

EPISODE SEVEN: [ROLLS RIGHT] OFF THE TONGUE

WHENEVER Changmin was feeling unsure of himself, he would retreat to his safe space: the practice rooms. Even if it was some time in the ungodly morning, like 2am as it was now, he would make the trek beneath molten gold streetlights and barren cobbled streets. It was the one place where he could focus his energy solely on dance, and forget about everything else.

Once upon a time, it had been your safe space just as much as it was his.

Changmin huffed a sigh as he hiked up the remaining flight of stone stairs that led up to the backdoor area of the performing arts building. It was a handful of hours since he and Chanhee parted ways with Kevin and Juyeon after enjoying dinner together. Chanhee was probably dead asleep by now—he was probably going to wake up and continue studying for his exams anyway.

As he turned to his right, his breath hitched as he caught sight of someone standing right outside the door. Usually, he had no trouble getting in and security wasn’t exactly strict in this area of campus. In fact, he almost never bumped into anyone, as strange as it sounded. Maybe he should have counted his blessings.

But then he recognized your jacket from earlier this evening, the very same one you were wearing while walking next to Ten—practically squished up against each other, two peas in a pod. He didn’t like how irked he was by that detail. He still couldn’t wrap his head around the fact that you had said “hey” first.

You weren’t looking at him, rather, your body was completely turned toward the door as if you were trying to decide whether or not you should go in. You were as still as a statue, frozen in time.

The moment, however, faded as quickly as it had come. You must have sensed his presence, and your head whipped around to face him.

There.

His heart leapt into his throat—dear god, why did you look so afraid? And then he noticed that you weren’t frozen still, but rather, channeling all your energy into keeping your body from trembling. Were you cold? What were you doing here so late? Why weren’t you with Ten?

He watched your throat move as you gulped. And then you were walking toward him—no, past him—wait, come back— “So that’s it?”

The grip he had on his duffle bag strap tightened when you stopped next to him just as you were going to walk past him toward the stairs. Your gazes clashed like a pair of twin lightning bolts slicing through the night sky. There had always been a sort of energy between the two of you, and when you were young, he had been so very attracted to that kind of power, one so similar to his… he didn’t think he was mistaken back then.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” You said, still there. Your voice was low, but he could detect the edge.

He didn’t know what it was supposed to mean; he just didn’t want you to leave without knowing why you were here. Were you looking for him? “You’re not gonna say anything to me? Why are you here?”

(He swore it wasn’t supposed to come out that brusque-sounding, but he also didn’t know what it was supposed to come out sounding like…? He felt like he didn’t know you anymore.)

There was a narrowing of your eyes, and you both angled your bodies to face one another like a standoff. “No one said I had anything to say to you. And I—” You tripped over your words, “—I don’t know why I’m here. That’s why I was leaving.”

Oh.

Why was he disappointed by that answer?

“So you’re not here with Ten or something?” He asked, unsure what else he could say to keep you here, even for just a couple seconds longer.

Your mouth curled. "Clearly not. Why are you so pressed about me and Ten?"

Changmin pressed his lips together. "I'm not." Okay. Very believable.

The face you made said the same thing. "Okay, yeah. I didn't expect you to care so much anyway."

For a reason he loathed to admit, anger spiked in his blood and he felt the distinct need to defend himself. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"I don't know," you replied sarcastically, your volume rising, "maybe it's that you've never really cared that much about things that concerned me in the first place?"

"Now that's rich coming from you."

Your glare pierced his. "Oh, please. As soon as I started slacking—god, it took so little for you to just abandon me."

His jaw fell slack. Where the fuck did this conversation just turn to? "Abandon you? You abandoned me!" He exclaimed, finger flicking between the two of you as if he could impale both of your chests with the sharp edge of his accusations.

"How could I have possibly been the one to abandon you?" Your face contorted with so much more emotion than Changmin had ever seen from you over the past three years. Suddenly, he could see the underlying desperation and devastation hidden beneath the lines of bitterness and anger. His heart sank, but his blood still boiled and pumped. He couldn't get the distinctly awful hole in his chest to stop aching. He could remember exactly when you just stopped coming to practice with him. He could remember exactly the day he gave up hope.

"You—" you stammered, your hand flying to your throat. It was the same action he had seen from you just a few days ago while you were in the practice room. He recognized it as a habit of yours for when you were anxious or overwhelmed because your throat closed in on itself. If that wasn't enough to make him want to lay down his sword… "—you stopped caring. When did you stop caring? I just want to know."

Everything went silent for him, just for a split second. You thought… you thought he stopped caring? How could he ever stop caring about you? Wasn't that why he was so upset in the first place?

And when the world zapped back into play, he was sure his skin was ashen. His throat bobbed. "How could you think so little of me?"

Your forehead creased. "Little? Changmin, you were everything to me."

Dear heart—

You were shaking your head and taking a step away from him then. "You couldn't possibly understand."

Just like that, there was fire in his veins again. "That's because you never gave me a chance to understand!"

You threw a look back at him and again, he could read everything there like an open book, so much unlike the wall he had been met with all this time. "And I can say the exact same thing about you. If you think I kept things from you, Ji Changmin—" you said with the undertone of a snarl, so fierce that, as you turned on your foot to face him again, your breath came out like that of a dragon's smoke, "—then how much have you kept from me?"

His nostrils flared and his hands gestured wildly, vaguely—he pressed his palms to his eyes with a haggard sigh. "Why are you here, Yn?" He asked again, finally. He lowered his hands and took a step toward you. "Are you here just to pick a fight with me?"

You paused.

He watched you open your mouth, then close it.

You pursed your lips, finally murmuring, "No. I didn't come here for you."

For some reason, that hurt even more.

— ✶

The practice room was colder than it usually was.

Changmin kept the lights dim for the sake of his stinging eyes, and he dumped his duffle bag in the corner of the room before making a beeline for the aux cord for the speaker system. He hooked up his phone and opened up his music files, his forehead pressing against the cool mirror wall.

For a moment, he simply let his eyes flutter shut and his lungs to breathe.

You were long gone by now, and Changmin considered just going back to his apartment, but he knew he would just lie in bed awake for hours if he did.

When he opened his eyes, he swiped out of his music and instead went to a file kept deep down in the depths of his storage. He had purposely named it so it would remain at the absolute bottom of the list when alphabetized, and the pass code on it was supposed to dissuade him from accessing it.

Supposed to.

He punched in the four digits of your birthday and the lock clicked open to reveal a hefty file of video after video. There were photos of you, too, somewhere, but the videos were all at the top of the file because of their size. He didn't know what he was gonna do when his phone ran out of storage; he figured that when that day came, it would either be when you and he finally figured shit out, or he got closure and could delete them all.

He sighed.

His thumb hovered over one of the video files near the top, one where he could see your face in the thumbnail.

When he opened it, his younger face filled the screen. His tongue poked out from his lips as he carefully settled his phone against the wall next to yours as both of your phones recorded the run-through that was about to happen.

"Changminnie! Come on, I'm starting the song!" Your voice echoed against the practice room walls, and his laughter soon followed as he scurried into place next to you.

Changmin watched his younger self transform his expression into something more serious, while you had looked at him through the mirror and burst out laughing.

Younger Changmin broke his facade, the dimples in his cheeks deep, his smile bright. "What?"

You grinned back at him. "Sorry, sorry! Nothing; it's just interesting how you can just shift your facial expression like that."

"You have to practice like you perform though!"

"I know, I know. I just like your smile better, y'know?"

Changmin could see the hearts in his younger self's eyes. Jesus, had he really blushed that hard? Younger Changmin cupped the back of his neck bashfully. "Really?"

You punched his arm playfully. "Yeah. It's really pretty, Changmin. I thought I told you this before."

"Well yeah, but it doesn't hurt to hear it again—yah! Hey, I can bite back, you know—!"

Changmin's eyes shuddered as the familiar melody of the song flowed into his ears. He abruptly slammed his thumb down onto the pause button.

No, he couldn't stomach hearing it. Not when he could recall every move from memory and not when he had no partner to complement those moves. It just reminded him of the gaping hole in his chest and the emptiness of this room.

"Let's get to work, Changmin," he muttered to himself as he swiped out of the folder and back to his music files. He had an actual to-do list in mind, after all, and it did not include a dive into the forbidden folder. (No matter how much he needed to hear your voice again, for once, not arguing with him.)

EPISODE EIGHT: OFF THE HOOK

"HE'S been pissy all morning—"

Changmin suppressed a groan of frustration as he heard his friend's voices nearing the dressing room he was in. All morning, the performing arts building had been a madhouse, even worse than the night of the draft showcase. Everyone just decided to be here today, whether they were his fellow dancers trying to score a practice room, one of the prospective actors auditioning for a part in Hyunjae's best friend's thesis play, or one of the tech members trying to make sure everything worked behind the scenes.

Changmin had gone from room to room in an attempt to find an empty one where he could have some peace in working on his own. He would have just gone home at this point, but Chanhee was stressing over his own exams, so Changmin was stuck here.

So taking all of that into account, including the rough encounter he'd had with you a couple days ago, plus a lack of sleep and coffee—not the happiest squirrel on campus.

(How could you just drop a bomb like "You were everything to me, Changmin" in his lap and expect him not to think of anything else for days on end?)

The door to the dressing room he was hiding in cracked open, and all of the cacophony from the outside flooded in, as well as a crush of his friends.

"Don't you guys have class?" Changmin moaned, his hand coming up to rub his sleep-deprived eyes.

"Well, yeah, but this is much more fun," came Younghoon's teasing chuckle as he walked over to Changmin and clasped a hand on his shoulder.

Changmin made a face. "I just wanted some peace and quiet."

Sunwoo scoffed. "Peace and quiet? You've come to the wrong place, hyung."

"Yeah," Hyunjae added on, "might as well take a break for once and come watch auditions with us! HJ!Yn needs help judging people anyway."

Changmin cocked a brow at the blond. "You should call Chanhee for that then. Shouldn't you be out there, Younghoon?" He nodded toward the tall, lanky drama major present.

Younghoon shook his head, bouncing on the balls of his feet. How did he have so much energy? "Nope. I'm auditioning for a part, so she's gatekeeping me from watching."

Changmin turned from his friends slightly as he reached down for his phone that he had situated on top of the small bluetooth speaker he had the good sense to bring. Then again, maybe he should have just stuck to earbuds… whatever. He was too tired to care. Part of him wanted to add to the chaos anyway.

"What's her thesis play about again?" He asked no one in particular. Sunwoo waddled over to him and stole his phone right from his hands and began browsing through the music selection.

"It's a modern take of one of Shakespeare's plays: Much Ado About Nothing," answered Younghoon. "It was really funny actually, like the original play. Lots of matchmaking, lots of stupidity. I think they dump someone in a lake..."

Hyunjae perked up. "Oh yeah! That was probably my favorite part of the whole script."

Changmin chuckled. "I was expecting you to say something like 'the whole thing's my favorite because my best friend wrote it'."

"Oh, no, that still applies."

Changmin, Sunwoo, and Younghoon all exchanged knowing looks with one another. Mhm… so they thought. There were a few too many in their friend group who had interesting relationships with their other friends. Exhibit A: whatever the fuck was happening with Hyunjae and his.

Hyunjae caught their silent communication and furrowed his eyebrows. "What?"

Sunwoo snorted, but Younghoon was the one to drawl, "It's absolutely nothing."

Changmin pressed his lips into a cheeky smile, brushing the bangs from out of his vision. Hyunjae's lips quirked to the side in a frown, but didn't make any comment on it. It wasn't a new reaction from the group, by any means, but… oh well. That would be a tale for another time.

With that being said, Changmin followed the three of them out of the relative privacy of the dressing room and out into the hustle-bustle of the main backstage corridor. As soon as that dressing room was vacated, however, somebody was swift to occupy it. Changmin cursed inwardly; guess he wouldn't be able to come back to that room later.

With the switching of theater leadership over the past year (a changing of the guard, if you would, but with professors and sponsors), the management of the entire performing arts department was a mess and a half. There were a few stand-out graduate students and undergraduates who were keeping everything in check for all of the events happening over this year—like Hyunjae’s best friend, Lee Jihoon (a graduate student specializing in sound and music production), and Moon Taeil (a graduate who was a soloist in the chamber choir).

As the four young men made their way closer to the immediate backstage, the sound miraculously dulled down. The lights were a lot dimmer here, as the spotlights were turned toward the main stage. Changmin spotted a few people scattered throughout the backstage area with phones or folded script packets in their hands as they recited their lines to themselves, with some even making exaggerated facial expressions and grand hand gestures.

Hyunjae’s best friend was one of the up and coming director-screenwriter “prodigies” that the drama department championed. She was a year older than Changmin was, and he didn’t need to be a genius to know that there were a crowd of people vying for a role in her graduating thesis play. It must have been stressful as fuck, but he knew that she had a good head on her shoulders—

“—I’m gonna stop you right there.”

HJ!Yn’s voice resounded from the other side of the hefty velvet curtains separating the backstage from the main stage. Hyunjae made a show of pressing his index finger to his lips to signal his friends to be quiet—Sunwoo thus made a show of rolling his eyes (“Duh, we’re gonna be quiet.”). They all huddled to the side of the curtain and poked their heads out to see what was going on.

The university performing arts hall was likely one of the most magnificent places on campus. It featured a vast array of floor seating, while also boasting three levels of balcony seats. Changmin remembered once briefly learning the anatomy of the theater seating: the floor or nosebleeds, the slightly lofted box seats, the grand circle, loge circle, and upper circle—the gods. It was all very antiquarian, but it was a place Changmin had become quite familiar with over the years.

The director herself sat in the dimmed nosebleeds section, in the smack middle. Someone had dragged out one of those plastic, foldable tables for her to set her paperwork and a small, battery-operated lamp on top of.

Curiously, sitting next to her was none other than Bae Sumin, your new recruit.

Changmin straightened, accidentally bumping into Younghoon’s shoulder as he did. “Sorry,” he whispered.

Younghoon shook his head to say that it was all good, his hand lifted in acknowledgement.

“Did you know Sumin was here?” He asked his friend.

Younghoon’s expression was thoughtful. “I think so? I left to go find you when I thought I heard someone say they saw her come in. Why? Did she not tell you when the dance department interviews were gonna be held?”

Changmin recalled receiving no notice. “No. I—I figured Yn would be here, too, then. Right?” Was he ready to face you again so soon? Would you even acknowledge him this time—?

Younghoon passed him an amused glance with a small smile fitted over his face. “That would make sense,” he murmured with his arms crossed over his chest. One of his hands reached up to idly massage his jaw. “I’d imagine she would be with her friends, somewhere around here. Though, it would also make sense that she would be sitting with Sumin, too. Then again—”

“You are… no help,” Changmin deadpanned.

His friend chuckled lowly, eyes upturned into slim crescents.

“Uh Jihoon-ah?”

Changmin and Younghoon’s attention flitted over towards the far side of the backstage and they watched as a girl chased after the resident sound producer graduate student. He was, perhaps, smaller than one might anticipate from the intimidating man, but he still harbored so much scary energy and talent within his body. Like all of the staff on the technical team, the pair were clad in all black.

Jihoon glanced up from his clipboard and at the girl. “Hm?”

The girl nodded toward the curtains. “Director is calling for a break and is asking if the house lights can be turned on.”

“Ah okay, come on then. Follow me.”

As the two of them strode across the length of the backstage, the girl’s eyes found Changmin and Younghoon, and… She was looking past him now at someone else. She lifted her hand in a small wave, paired with a smile, “Hi, Sunwoo.”

Changmin whipped his head around, only to realize that Hyunjae had disappeared, but Sunwoo was now standing on Changmin’s other side. He watched in utter delight as his younger friend flushed, even in the dim lighting, at the girl’s greeting. His eyes were wide as he squeaked out a quick, “Hey!” in return.

When Jihoon and his charge had gone out of view, Changmin turned on Sunwoo with a hyena cackle. “Oh my god! Who was that, Kim Sunwoo?”

Sunwoo seemed to shrink into the collar of his hoodie. “No one.”

Changmin’s laughter lit up the room just as the house lights thunk-thunk-thunk’d to life. Younghoon had slipped away, most likely to meet Hyunjae in the nosebleeds, which left only the two of them there alone. “Do you have a crush on her?”

“Yah! You’re such a menace,” Sunwoo groaned, whacking Changmin with the extra length of his sweater paw. “You can’t even talk, dude! You’re in love with a girl who can barely stand to be in the same room—” Sunwoo realized his slip up and slapped a palm over his mouth.

Ouch. The truth hurt, didn’t it? Changmin chuckled, though it was noticeably quieter now. “Well, you’re not wrong—” He shook his head, eyebrows creased together, “—wait, no. Wait, I’m not in love with her!”

Sunwoo rolled his eyes so hard he must have seen his brain up there. “Oh, please. The last time you were drunk and emotional, you showed us that secret little folder in your phone.” He jabbed his finger accusingly at the phone in Changmin’s hand.

Changmin scowled, pressing his phone to his chest as if to protect it in case Sunwoo decided to have wandering hands. “That was told to you in confidence!”

“No, it was told to me in a drunken stupor—” The two of them began to make their way back toward the edge of the curtain, ducking out from its shadow and onto the main stage. Hyunjae and Younghoon were indeed in the nosebleeds now, but Sumin was nowhere to be seen. Maybe she had only been here to observe the audition process. “And you guys say I’m the lightweight.”

“That’s because you are the lightweight.”

Just as the two of them hopped down from the stage and onto the ground floor of seats, Juyeon came in from the doors located at the back of the seats. He raised a hand in greeting to all present, cheerfully waving with that golden retriever-esque grin. “Hey guys! Oh, Changminnie, I was just looking for you.”

Changmin’s eyebrows flew up. “Oh? What’s up, Juyeon?”

Sunwoo retreated into the rows up where Hyunjae and Younghoon were, while Changmin met up with Juyeon in the rightmost aisle.

Juyeon threw a thumb behind him toward the direction he had just come from. “Sumin was asking if you would be willing to do your interview right now.”

His eyes widened slightly. “Right now?”

“That’s what I just said, wasn’t it?”

Changmin pressed his lips together, before nodding. “Uh, for sure. Yeah, lead the way.”

The two dancers hiked their way back up to the back of the area and through the door Juyeon had originally entered through. The main lobby was much less crowded—it was practically barren, which made it the perfect environment to conduct an interview in. Sumin was setting herself up at one of the couches, setting her laptop, phone, and coffee cup on the coffee table opposite to her.

She raised her head when she heard the door open and close, and a bright smile graced her features. “Oh, you found him! Thanks, Juyeonie.”

“Yeah, no problem,” he chirped. “I’ve got a couple things to handle first, but just ask someone to come find me once you and Changmin are done.”

With Juyeon swiftly taking his leave, Changmin was left to take a seat on the other end of the couch that Sumin was sitting at. “Hey, nice to see you again, Sumin,” he said, crossing one ankle over the other and resting his arm along the back of the couch.

The corners of her smile widened. “Nice to see you, too, Changmin! Sorry this was so sudden; I figured that I could get started on some of the interviews while I was here.”

“Oh, yeah, no worries,” he chuckled.

She reached for her phone, fidgeting as she swiped to a simple recording application. “I hope you don’t mind me recording this…?” At his consent, she nodded. “Okay, cool. I did wanna say something before we started.”

He sat up just a bit. “What is it?”

There was a sort of twinkle in her eyes, and if he wasn’t mistaken, her manner became a lot more bashful all of a sudden. “I have to confess that I asked my mentor, Yn, if she could send me some of your dance performance videos and I’m literally in awe of your talent. Like, I wanted to tell you how starstruck I am just being able to tell you this right now, but I just wanted to say this before we started.”

He broke into a boyish grin at this, his dimples becoming craters of joy in the apples of his cheeks. “Ah, thank you—that really means a lot,” he smiled.

Sumin added on, one of her palms pressing against the couch cushion as she leaned toward him slightly, “I mean, I don’t even know how Yn was able to find videos of you from high school, but I’m so glad she did, because—”

Wait what. Changmin was watching Sumin’s mouth move as she talked but he wasn’t truly hearing what she said. His humble, albeit a bit dumbfounded, smile remained, but her words from just before resonated in his head. There were definitely a few of his dance performance videos online from his high school days, but did you keep links to them? Did you keep the recordings on your phone?

The fact that Sumin asked you meant that she probably had no clue about your past, only that you were the person Sumin could rely on if she had any questions.

What did it mean? What did it mean?

His heart pounded in his chest at the thought that maybe he could possibly have an excuse to get you to talk to him, even if it was one, truly dumbass excuse.

“—ready?”

Changmin snapped out of his dazed state. “Sorry?”

Sumin blushed slightly, clearing her throat. At some point, she had pulled her laptop onto her lap and prepped her phone by placing it in between the two of them to record the following conversation. “Are you ready to start?”

He coughed, straightening and adjusting his position. “Oh, yeah—uh, sorry. Yeah, whenever you’re ready.”

Sumin gauged his reaction carefully, but instead of pressing the record button, she hit the power button. “If I may, you seem a little distracted. I don’t really want this to feel like a burden if you’ve got a lot on your plate.”

Shit. “No, I mean,” he shook his head, “I’m sorry. I guess my mind just wanders really easily when…” He huffed a sigh, dragging a hand down his face. “I’m a little tired, that’s all.”

“I totally get that,” she sympathized. “You’ve probably been practicing non-stop lately for the winter showcase. We don’t have to do this today if you’re not in the right headspace.”

He sighed and couldn’t help but feel just a little relieved. He needed to talk to Chanhee about this, math exam or dance practice be damned. But there was a part of him that definitely felt awful about having to cut off her interview even before it began. He gestured to her phone. “How about we reschedule? We could meet up sometime else during the week to redo this and I promise I’ll be all yours.”

He didn’t know what he did, but the pink on her cheeks deepened to a cherry red. “Oh, uh, sure!” She giggled, taking her phone and passing it over to him. “You can just put your phone number in there and I’ll text you to ask when you wanna meet up.”

Changmin nodded his agreement and swiftly inputted his contact information into the given slots. “Definitely,” he said before handing her phone back to her. The phone fumbled between the two of them, but Changmin was already standing up with the goal to go retrieve his bag (wherever it was), and to go consult Chanhee and the man’s infinitesimal opinions. “Really sorry again, Sumin.”

“Yeah, don’t worry about it!” She dismissed his worries with a flick of her wrist. “Would you mind finding Juyeon, though?”

Changmin sent her a thumb’s up over his shoulder on his way to the door. “Yeah, for sure.”

She returned the gesture, watching as he disappeared out of the main lobby. It was only when he was definitely gone, she covered her mouth with her hand and stared at his saved contact in her phone. Then, with a silent scream of happiness, she ran to her text chain with you to tell you all about it.

a/n: PLS STILL REBLOG THIS PART EVEN THO ITS NOT THE FULL THING PLS PLS PLS IM BEGGING

read part two here (also linked at top)

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#PLEASE I CANT #first the teaser and now its in parts TT #ill bare tho cos im too into it already #the things changmin does to me

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