#'tear it all down stop having boxes be the main response to everything dammit'

[thesixthstar]

Just gonna say one post for Ace Awareness week really, but its a point i rarely, if ever, see made, and I’d appreciate if you (yes, you!) would read it and at least think on it despite it being a wall of text and my being a rambler. (This is kinda an ace and aro message bc for me, personally, being ace-spec and being aro-spec are intertwined in ways I cannot separate, and because imo those two IDs face certain issues together, or at least similar issues for similar reasons)

Supporting aspec people and identities doesn’t just mean supporting allo aces in relationships with other allo aces, or allo aros who are sexually active (though supporting those cases is absolutely required and imo bare minimum). Supporting aspec people and IDs involves supporting us when we question what relationship norms look like, and in building relationships that fall outside of the norm without writing them off, or pretending that “this relationship model is Just Like the Normal One! We’re not That Different!!!”

Like yes, its good to normalize relationships that aren’t currently recognized in the Mainstream (Mostly Heteronormative) Handbook of Partnership Models (and where are y’all getting these copies of the handbook that define “friendship” in the weird ways i’m seeing? what edition was that?). But imho an honorable goal would be to stop requiring that our relationships look normal to you.

I spout this off about a lot of Handbook Accepted relationships too, but the idea of what a relationship Should Be Like, outside of just. an honest attempt on all parts to create a healthy dynamic that maximizes happiness, is often harmful to a lot of relationships. 

I’ve avoided using certain terms in this post (some on purpose some just bc thats how i talk/write), and if that makes it sound really broad, and less specific to asexuality in particular, that’s because it is. Aspec folks feel this, when we hear how “selfish” we’re being in relationships with allosexual partners, or when our QPR or platonic life partnership, or other Arrangements* gets written off as “just friends”, or even worse “just friends, and how stupid are you for thinking you’re the only one with a Best Friend, how stupid are you for thinking your clearly-different situation is different?”. If you talk to polyamorous folks** about this, you’ll likely hear a similar story about what folks outside of their communities consider a “real” relationship. Honestly? If you talk to the most bland looking heterosexual couple, how many of them will have a good handful of relationship issues based on what the gf/bf/wife/husband is “supposed” to do, bc they’re basing their relationship off a one-size-fits-all model, rather than addressing what they and their partner want and need out of each other and themselves? Lots. Most of whom won’t admit it because they think their problem is that they’re failing at the System, rather than the System failing them. 

I usually don’t bring this up, especially during Ace Awareness Week and other such events, because I’m so used to being the Asexuality 101 teacher to many of my friends (since I was 15 basically), touting the “I’m asexual, but dont worry, I’m Just Like You!” line to make it seem approachable to outsiders, and this is really not an entry-level convo to have with a lot of folks, but i’m sick of never bringing it up. Its a conversation that has to happen and i’m apparently the only one in my little corner of the internet with a weird personal manifesto to write on the subject. 

If this kind of break-down of concepts in this particular way is new to you, or your immediate reaction is “fuck all of this”, or even “aspec IDs and polyamory aren’t the same! how does it make sense to compare the two” then I have this to say to you: Hello! Welcome! I hope you’ll take a little while to be open-minded and think about these issues from a few different angles! I know it took me a good few years to navigate myself to these opinions*** and I never would have gotten there without a healthy mix of well meaning individuals ready to talk out tangled concepts without contempt. I should hope it’s obvious from this post that I don’t consider the experiences and struggles of all groups with these constructs to be equivalent to each other. But the primary reason I consider myself an inclusionist is that that’s how a community works. The more people we have coming to the table with their experiences, sharing in good faith, and fucking listening to each other, the better this turns out for all of us. 

*You’ll forgive me for not being up to date on the terminology I hope, because I’m not hip with what the aspec kids are up to, and also for not trying to list Every Permutation of Non-romantic Partnership, as the idea of trying to find, label, and file into boxes every kind of animal our minds create is counter to the whole spirit of this post

**i write about polyamorous folks here as a “them” and not an “us” bc I have No Earthly Idea whether I might potentially identify as poly or not. that identity question is not important to me atm, and while I know plenty of poly folks, and have Disk Horsed some with many of them, i've never actively been in a poly relationship, and its not an ID i’ve ever actively worn, so i won’t pretend to know that from the inside experience.

***can you believe I went from “the A is not for ally! but why are poly folks asking to be included? they’re not in the same boat at all!” to genuine inclusionism without ever having had an overt conversation about it with a single soul? it was all subconscious shifting in understanding in values and the first time I realized where all my opinions had shifted on that topic, is wasn’t a surprise, but it was a “....huh” moment

[thekidultlife]

100 Things I Learned About Love | Vernon!Android AU

Pairing: Hansol Vernon Chwe x female!reader

Genre: SCI FI!! Action, Romance, Angst(?)

Word Count: 22.2k (yes another giant fic)

Warnings: A bit of death and gore

A/N: Well, I’m gonna say sorry first to the anon who requested a vernon android au when we were just starting this blog (like three yrs ago) and I only managed to finish it now;; 

So this fic is a continuation (and is in the same universe) of the Jihoon Android AU The Coldest Human; The Warmest Robot. It is primarly inspired by the book “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” by Philip K. Dick and the anime “Beatless”. This one here has also elements from Huxley’s “A Brand New World” (because I just love reading dystopian novels for some reason). I kind of mashed everything together to create the world! 

This will be the 2nd part of a four part series! Next would be Soonyoung’s story and then finally Joshua’s! This series kind of explores the whole world I created for it. Jihoon’s story introduced the whole world and the relationship between android and creator, while Hansol’s story explores the world of bounty hunters! I still haven’t decided fully with what to do with the rest but I hope you enjoy this one!!

Tag List: @haotheheckk, @smthingabtlove!! (because they asked to skskks)

If mornings had any color, it would be a disgusting green. Afternoons, electric orange. Midnights, as dark as crude oil. Cities were built upon lines of flickering yellow, as streets were colored with the void of space; dark, desolate, and meaningless.

Society is tinted with the same shades of emptiness. Dressed in uniform white body suits—hair covered entirely as it was deemed unhygienic—only the face bore the resemblance of the classic human being, as if it was a mask. Serene smiles and polite gestures were exchanged almost to a hundred times; laughter was hollow and chemically induced, as with tears and frowns. Frivolity and superficiality were the main trends. 

As what they appear to be, is what they are actually are.

Welcome to the West Martian colony!

“Here ya go. The case’s now yours, doll,” your boss tossed a folder filled with papers on the polyester table. “Choi quit a few days ago after retiring Woozi.”

Your head perked up immediately as soon as you heard the news; disbelief painted on your face.

“What? Why?” you asked, standing up with mouth agape. He was one of your idols, your role models; the reason why you went into this line of work.

“He’s not talkin’, doll. Sadly. Told me it’s personal. But can’t blame him really, this business is gettin’ old.”

Your boss with his thinning hair and scotch-tapped broken glasses, sipped from a coffee stained mug; seemingly too overused for years of constant coffee drinking.

Yet you loved this place—this pseudo-police department home to bounty hunters of West Mars, with its crumbling brittle plastic window blinds and its moldy paper odor—all a different world than that of the city around it. You loved how it was like something straight from an Earth comic book; classic, rustic, and homey; a sheer contrast to the minimalist style of the new century.

“So what do we have here? Some andy from the Orion branch?”

A finger flipped through the factsheet with brows raised and lips in a tiny pout as you scanned the information laid before you. There were several official photographs of the unit after it was made, but none were security cam shots.

“So, from the organization…SVT-class Type-12 Vernon. The name’s too Western.”

Your boss shrugged. “The org’s just pastin’ names on their andys like butter on bread, dolly.”

“Guess so. But this Vernon just looks someone my age,” you remarked, munching on the biscotti within your arm’s reach.

“It’s an andy, YN. A hundred years, and it’ll still look the same. Now off ya go, better start retiring ‘em or you’re gonna get retired first.”

Sighing, you stood up and brushed the crumbs off your skinny jeans. Bending over, you picked up your briefcase filled with a laser gun and a V-T scale equipment as you bid your boss a short goodbye.

In reality, you didn’t want to leave the home base.

One particular reason was that you’d be taking the hovercraft and start cruising around the godforsaken city, not that it believes in any god for as long as you could account for. The city was an abomination, a stubborn mulish creation born out of rejection of the old, ancient ways—ways that had led to the destruction of the Earth, ways you still hold on to despite migrating to Mars. Despite being physically present, and even born in the red planet, you knew your heart was still back on Earth. You were proud to be to be human, with ancestry from the noble home planet, and everything which diminishes humanity is your enemy.

—you paused.

Lips parted, eyes transfixed.

A thousand snowflakes suspended on the air as if you were in a colony-sized snow globe. You continued to wonder, because you had never before seen snow in its truest, purest form, and everything you knew about them was from data gathered on Earth.

You removed your glove to touch one floating. It was cold, you shivered. However, it did not melt as you expected it to be as it only glistened against the dark backdrop of the city night like holographic particles.

“What the—!”

As if deliberately cutting you off, the hovercraft swiveled across the air, its power flickering on and off until it was unable to balance itself, swerving up and down across the night sky. You held on to the metal rails, as the turbulence brought you to your knees, the alarm systems of the vehicle blaring on your ears.

“Fucking hell…!” You cursed, grabbing your laser gun as the vehicle plunged you towards the empty streets of the city. Fortunately enough, you were trained to encounter these sorts of problems and thus, you were able to jump towards the nearest rooftop before the hovercraft exploded upon impact to the asphalt road.

Sighing, you watched the flames burn plastic and metal as if you couldn’t believe what you had just experienced. Well, of course it was unbelievable. So far, the only adventure you had experienced in your whole life was your day-to-day job of ‘retiring’ andys, which could get a bit messy but those were on balmier days. Normally, it wouldn’t get pass you to laser a hole on an andy’s head, but if you’re doing it like ten to twenty times a week, it could get boring.

Bam—!!

Your thoughts were placed in a halt as several other hovercrafts continued to fall from the sky like shooting stars, except that people could get killed. But havoc proceeded as it did, where lines of self-driving cars suddenly powered on and chased after human beings who had heard the crash and checked what had happened.

“What the fuck is happening?” you whispered, eyes peering on the alley beneath you. Hopping on several rooftops and sliding down the gutter towards the ground, you cautiously approached the main road, seeing if there was anyone who was in trouble. Luckily, there wasn’t anyone loitering around at this hour anymore.

You checked your intercom for any news or announcements from your home base or from the AI government, yet there was none. As it were, your intercom was actually having trouble projecting a hologram or following any of your commands seemingly halfway hacked.

“Dammit, I couldn’t get hold of HQ,” you grumbled, running towards a nearby police android to alert its human command center. “Hey, could you get in touch with your district station? It’s getting chaotic here.”

Yet the android only stared at you, its eyes blank as if you were a mere holographic image. The artificial smile on its face, which was made to comfort humans interacting with it, seemed more sinister than welcoming. The prolonged silence causing your heart to thump in anxiety.

“Hey? You heard me? Tell the—”

“Hi there. I’m Akiro. What can I do to help you?” It’s human voice making shivers crawl down your skin.

“I said, alert the district station! Haven’t you detected the level of violence—”

“Hi there. I’m Akiro. What can I—Hi there. I’m Akiro—Akiro—Hi—Hi there. H-H-H-Hi-i-i-i—”

The malfunction was obvious in its speech. It wasn’t unusual for an android to malfunction but when it began moving closer and closer to you, you took a step back, dread treading on your spine. Androids made you uneasy as humans once felt ill at ease with clowns—its artificial expressions making its lack of a soul even more prominent, triggering your fight or flight response.

It continued to move towards you until a snowflake dropped on its head, stopping as if it was suddenly glued to the ground. You hesitantly walked closer to it, inspecting its dead eyes to see if it had returned to normal. Raising an arm, you reached for its control box hidden behind its neck.

It grabbed your wrist, without warning. You gasped and began struggling to release yourself from its vice grip, yet you knew how strong androids were.

“Fuck it!”

“Hi there—Hi—I’m A-A-A-Aki-Akiro,” the android continued talking as if its movements were controlled by a remote system.

You moved to reach for your laser gun at your back pocket but the android was swift enough to twist your arm in a lock on your back. It pushed you to the ground as you grit your teeth at the scrapes on your knees and elbows, but you couldn’t break free.

“What can I do to help you?”

You groaned. “Maybe letting go of my fucking arm?”

Gathering your wits, you pushed yourself off the ground, rolling sideways and then kicking the android who was thrown off-balance with your two feet. As it fell to the ground, you grabbed your laser gun and without hesitation, pulled the trigger to blast off its processor.

As the headless android dropped to the asphalt, you sighed in relief as the adrenaline continued to pump into your veins, breathing heavily from all the action. You didn’t understand why the android was behaving out of its initial program and attacking you, a human, who it was supposed to protect.

While you were resting, the glaring headlights of a self-driving car were flashed towards your direction.

Disoriented, you froze to the ground as you tried to make do of your situation and surroundings. However, just like the android, the car sped right towards you in its maximum speed, as if it was trying to kill you. As soon as you heard its tires screech, you willed yourself to move away as the car missed you in just a few centimeters—throwing you to the ground and slammed itself towards the nearby wall.

Without even letting you take a breath, an arm was encircled around your neck, making you unable to breathe; its grip tightening gradually. Two other androids—one a police android, the other a personal helper—faced you with their blank stares as if they were zombies ordered to kill any human on sight.

The helper android had your laser gun on its possession as it slowly aimed it on your head. Panic rose as you tried to remove the arm locking you in place. Mentally, you were cursing at how you had underestimated the situation and let yourself die under the hands of goddamn androids.

Silently, the android pulled the trigger and you braced yourself for impact.

Except it didn’t come.

Your eyes were forced open when you heard the sound of metal dropping to the ground. What you saw had your eyes widen in astonishment as another small disk stuck itself on the police android’s head and split it into individual pieces. In a few seconds, you were dropped onto the ground, choking on your knees as the pieces of the android holding you fell into heaps next to you.

“Are you okay?”

A warm voice asked as a hand was offered to you. You looked up to see doe-like eyes gazing at you with a curious but a worried expression. His slightly curly caramel colored locks fell to his forehead softly as if it were made of the finest materials.

You nodded silently, still stunned by everything happening around you.

When you didn’t take his hand, the mysterious man carried you on his back as he walked you away from the site. While you were being carried, you noticed how he was ‘destroying’ the approaching rogue androids with a disc-like device which would stick on their skin and eventually ‘disassembling’ them to several parts.

“W-who are you…?” you finally asked, your voice returning despite still being painful.

Grabbing another disk from his pocket, the guy hurled it towards an incoming self-driving car which had it stopping, its parts detaching themselves automatically.

“I’m called Hansol. The snowflakes are nanobots which hacks the AI in androids and cars and drives them into killing humans. Unfortunately, I don’t have the capabilities to stop it,” he replied, his voice kind of removed, which had you wondering if he was an android or not. “Though I think Jihoon can.”

“Then…this…this will all continue?” you asked unbelievingly. You didn’t want it to continue, of course. More people would die and you still weren’t sure to what extent the casualties are because of this sudden outbreak.

“The snowflakes will lose its power when its controller is far away. So far, Joshua is already gone from this area.”

“Joshua? An android?”

“Yeah. SVT-class Type-03 Joshua. We came here together, and I tried to convince him out of it, but he wants to test out his abilities.”

Having enough evidence, you pushed yourself away from Hansol and landed safely on the ground with an abhorrent look on your face.

Aiming your laser gun at him, you shouted. “You’re an android too, aren’t you?”

Hansol simply gazed at you with his piercing eyes—tempting you to retract your accusation.

“Yes, I am. SVT-class Type-12 Vernon,” he replied, then looking down on the ground as he scratched his nape. “I like the name Hansol better though, so I want to be called Hansol from now on.”

You grinned. Your prey presented itself right in front of you without you giving an ounce of an effort.

“I’m supposed to retire you, you know?” you remarked, still aiming the gun at him. “And I will.”

Hansol stared at you with a frown on his lips, obviously disliking the fact that he was about to ‘die’ tonight. In fact, he didn’t want to die. He had a lot of things he wanted to do, so many questions yet unanswered.

“I’m…I…I don’t know how to plead. The data is incomplete in the cloud, but, um…don’t shoot me…please,” Hansol replied as he raised his arms.

You were obviously taken aback by his plea. You couldn’t count how many androids begged for their lives because there were none. He was the first one who ever did it.

Shaking thoughts of doubt, you tried to reason with yourself.

Androids don’t plead. They escape. Kill.

The most efficient way out is what they do.

“How am I supposed to believe you?” you shouted back; your finger threatening to press on the trigger. “You might be using analog hack for all I know.”

He scratched his nape again, unable to give an appropriate answer. “Well…I guess I could only ask you to trust me.”

You laughed sarcastically. You have never seen an android use deception so badly.

“If that’s too much to ask, then I guess this is it,” he continued, looking at you again straight into the eyes with his evocative gaze.

You just couldn’t believe what you were hearing. For all the years you spent hunting androids, never had you encountered one who had basically given up without any chase or struggle, especially from one who had every capability to squash you like an ant. You couldn’t help the itch to ask.

“Why? Why give up?”

Hansol shrugged, his gaze on the yellow lines outlining the faraway city buildings. “If I fight back, I will hurt you. I don’t want to hurt you.”

You gazed right into his eyes for a moment, trying to gauge the truth in his words, trying to calculate if he was using analog hack against your weakness as a human being. You dislike androids but never had you seen one like him.

“How should I know that?” you shouted again; laser gun still aimed at him. “Using tricks like reverse psychology…I’ll give you an A+ for creativity.”

“I’m not lying,” the android instantly replied. “If you have to kill me, then there is nothing I could do. I made a vow to myself never to hurt humans because that’s the right thing to do. I don’t want to see anyone suffer because of what I did. For some reason, it pains me as well.”

If only you could see how wide your eyes were, or how your lips parted in disbelief the moment you heard him. It almost gave you goosebumps. The air that hung underneath his every word felt so real and heavy that you would have never thought it was uttered by a mere android.

Androids and morality? Fucking hell…who would’ve thought you’d string those words together in the same sentence.

He was more human than most people living in the city. An android—known for their lack of soul; born only to be enslaved by their own programming; without their own thoughts, their own convictions.

But here is one in front of you, willing to die for his own principles; saying it pains him to see you hurt. That is not what androids do. Not in a million years.

What the hell is he then?

You threw your arms up in the air and tucked the laser gun in its holster as you made one big, ugly groan.

“Oh fine! Fuck it! I give up!”

Whether or not he will run away or he will kill you, you didn’t care anymore. It was a risk. You blame your biological flaw to see human traits in objects if he ever did harm you, but whatever, you decided to trust him.

With a small smile and a tiny huff, Hansol walked towards you slowly.

Heart hammering against your chest, you were deathly afraid that he might twist your neck or blast a hole through your chest. You couldn’t be so sure with these androids.

As soon as he had reached you, Hansol placed a hand on top of your head; your eyes squeezed tightly shut as if trying to brace for something bad coming. Yet as soon as you felt his hand, you opened your eyes and gave him a quizzical look.

He only smiled.

“Thank you for trusting me.”

The following morning was the same as ever. Except, not.

“—last night which appears to be a massive AI hack on neighboring Sectors 3, 4 and 7—“

With eyes heavy and a cup of coffee, you pressed another button.

“—71 people dead and more than a thousand injured, hospitals are in full capacity as of the moment—“

Another press of a button.

“—and take a deep breath. Happiness is found within Mercer as we continue to ascend up on the hill—“

“What a load of crap,” you muttered, turning to another channel. It was still six in the morning and you were already in a painfully awful mood. It could’ve been easily fixed with a Penfield Mood Organ but that was another can of shit you’d rather not touch with a ten-foot pole.

“—Mrs. Kim?”

You hadn’t caught on with what the news anchor was asking Mrs. Kim, but you could already take a gander that it was definitely about last night.

“My husband…He was just…he was truly a hero,” Mrs. Kim answered, wrecked by staggered sobs and sniffling of noses. You continued to watch, wondering what had happened to Mr. Kim—crushed by a car? Ran down by a flaming rogue hovercraft? Murdered by an andy?

“Your husband a hero, Mrs. Kim?” The interviewer repeated, coaxing the other for details. You waited for the dramatic reply after Mrs. Kim had settled herself down from the crying fit she was having.

“Yes…someone was stealing our ducks last night—“

You paused.

“During the whole chaos?”

“Yes, sir,” she sniffed and you rolled your eyes. “He—he tried protecting them yet they murdered him! Those bunch of foul-hearted bastards! Our ducks! Our Muscovy ducks…they were fifty grand a piece—“

You switched the TV off, now more tired and irritated than you were when you had turned it on about an hour ago. If you were asked to name one trend which just tasted like shit to you, that would probably be the current craze over owning animals. The whole Mercerism thing was only running second to that.

“I, uh…made some pancakes,” a foreign but familiar voice interrupted your thoughts, making you turn your head towards the doorway. With your eyes set upon Vernon, or Hansol, as he liked to be called, you instantly recalled what had happened last night.

You wondered if your brain disappeared that time or your common sense simply deteriorated because there was no way you would let a half-a-million-dollar bounty money just run free. Not to mention that he has all the capabilities to decapitate you in a millisecond.

Inwardly groaning, you gave him a small glance as he waited for your response with sheer curiosity. At least he followed you to your apartment and now you have a free housekeeper.

But that was last night, this was today. You can certainly do something about it, but you weren’t really in the mood for it. A headache was threatening to split your brain into half and racking your brain about the moralities and the whys of your decision last night wouldn’t really help anyone.

“Oh, right, right,” you replied absentmindedly, removing yourself from the cover of your flannel blanket and walked towards the dining room of the small apartment your meager earnings could afford.

It was a simple place. White walls, dirty carpet, and a worn-out sofa which had seen better days. Kitchen was slightly okay—the once white tiles now yellowed with age; the grout covered in black mold of unknown origin. The view was horrendous; covered up by dark globs of factory shadows and the ever-present rumbling of the monorail as it passes by.

Being a bounty hunter wasn’t exactly a glamorous job. It wasn’t like you were the police, who, as a matter of fact, are now mostly made up of androids. A bounty hunter does the nitty-gritty jobs the police wouldn’t do; such as hunting androids. Yet you liked this job. Even if it was stupidly exhausting.

Settling on your chair, you gazed at the expertly done pancakes and bacon, sending wonderful scents of home to your senses. You wondered why you had never thought of getting a helper android for yourself with how convenient they are, yet considering the fact that one helper was an inch away of killing you last night, it was better that you hadn’t.

“I hope you like them,” Hansol said, placing a bottle of maple syrup on the table. “I searched the cloud and it says you liked pancakes and bacon.”

Awkwardly, you nodded at him and then looked down on the piping hot breakfast on your table. You continued to gaze at it, the burnt patterns on the pancake beginning to take form of an image in your head, and then back at Hansol who was just standing at the side.

“You don’t like it?” he asked, as soon as he noticed the blank look on your face, curious if the cloud made some mistake.

“N-no! It’s…it’s fine,” you replied, waving your hands to and fro. “I just, um…are you just going to stand there?”

Hansol raised his brows at your question, his doe eyes widening just a bit. “Ah, me? Yeah. Isn’t this the right way?”

“The right way?” you asked, your forehead creasing.

“Yeah, the right way. I’m an android so I can’t sit with you. I heard from the cloud.”

“Why not?”

Hansol shrugged, the kitchen towel in his hands hanging. “Heard it’s inappropriate according to human table etiquette. Besides I don’t need to eat and I don’t really get tired.”

Sighing, you rolled your eyes at his response. “Human standards, what a load of bull. You just standing there makes me uncomfortable. So, you either sit down or you scram.”

You could tell that he was definitely taken aback, and began wavering if he should follow you or not. In the end, Hansol was forced down on the chair in front of you with a nervous look, awkward in his seat as you continued to stare at him.

Finally acknowledging that everything was alright, you began to drip maple syrup on your pancakes. The android was only watching you and your actions—very typical android behavior; gathering data from its surroundings.

“So, you’re Hansol?” you began, slicing through the three-tiered pancake tower with a knife.

“Yeah. Vernon is my model name, but I want to go by my own name.”

You raised your brows at him, biting into a forkful of food. “Cool. You picked that name on your own?”

“Yeah. It was the name of a musician I liked, so I took it.”

“Oh,” was the only thing you could say, because deep inside your head, you were already in a state of confusion.

For all the years working as a bounty hunter, this was the first time you’ve ever seen an android want to name himself after a musician he liked. Hell, this was your first time seeing an android have preferences. Usually, they would reflect the preferences of the human being they were talking to, but you haven’t even said anything about yourself to him other than your name.

No. He probably accessed the cloud or something. Androids of his caliber usually have better access to the place data miners dump people’s personal information.

Is this how advanced the Nexus 9 really is? If so, this could potentially cause a stir among bounty hunters. If they can’t identify their prey, things could potentially end up disastrous.

“You do know I’m assigned to retire you? Or kill you, to be exact. Not sure why we’re still using euphemism towards damn machines but whatever,” you pushed on, curious of how he would respond, thinking if there was anything more to the Nexus 9.

“Yeah, you told me last night,” he replied immediately and at the most flippant way; as if he wasn’t talking about being killed by the person in front of him.

“And…you’re not worried?” you asked, eyeing him up and wondering what was currently running in his processor. “I could just whip out my laser gun and fire a hole through your head while I eat this pancake, you know?”

Hansol leaned his head to the side, looking as if he was trying to process an answer to your question.

“I’m not worried. I mean, if you wanted me dead, you would’ve done it already,” he replied, as a matter-of-fact.

“What if I’m just too lazy to do it today? I could do it any other day I want, any time I want, and the thing is, you robots can’t even predict it with your fancy algorithms,” you smirked at him, your prejudice against androids showing through.

Yet even with your provocations, Hansol remained calm.

“It doesn’t matter. The fact that you haven’t done it yet means a lot to me. That’s why I trust you.”

At his answer, you simply frowned; unamused that he rebutted you with a good response and by the time he replied, you had already ran out of rocks to throw at him. So, in the end, you simply scoffed and finished your pancake, leaving him by the dining table with an irate glare.

Hansol watched your retreating back as he began to clean up the mess on the table. He was truly being honest with his words—he trusted you, and if he dies at your hands, well, that was it. Even though he didn’t really want to think of that possibility.

It was strange that the thought of you betraying his trust hurt more than the thought of dying.

“I’m going to work now. Don’t even think about leaving this place,” you told him as soon as you returned from the bedroom, all geared up. “There are other bounty hunters out to get you, and I don’t want them to get my bounty money.”

Silently, Hansol nodded as he saw you pick up your work equipment and your laser gun in a manner that seemed routine. Before you took another step further however, you stared into his eyes, thinking, pondering what you were about to do.

Slowly, you raised your arm and allowed the laser gun on your hands to unfold, pointing towards his direction. You saw the crosshairs between his doe-like eyes—an image you frequently saw seconds before you blow a hole through an andy’s processor. A decision made in a fraction of a second can ultimately change your life—that if you simply pressed the trigger within your grasps, Hansol would no longer move, or talk, or look at you with evocative gazes.

At that moment, you had all the power between “life and death”, as he unquestioningly relinquished it all to you by simply standing there in his spot in front of the kitchen counter.

Hansol felt himself tense up despite his calm exterior. He could already see it, just after thinking about the possibility, yet he never thought reality felt more painfully sharp than his thoughts were.

Your fingers brushed against the trigger. Just one press and he will be gone and you will be rich. Just another day as a bounty hunter. Could you do it?

You sighed.

In the end, you lowered your gun and turned to the other direction as if nothing had happened.

“I’ll be late for work,” you simply remarked, more to yourself than to anyone and then left him there in the kitchen, still stunned. You wondered if your shoulders felt burdened because of the heavy gun or because of the decision you just made.

Quick footfalls echoed across the dreary hallway.

The place stunk like hospital antiseptic and muriatic acid; matching the dim-lit atmosphere illuminated by only a few incandescent bulbs hanging every two meters. There were glass windows every so often, and if you took your time to peer through, you would see rows and rows of human-sized cylinders filled with a greenish liquid; all connected by wires the size of your torso to a place you simply assumed was the power supply.

“What an ironic place to hide for an andy,” you remarked as you looked around. Your partner this time, by the name of Morrison, scoffed amusingly at your comment.

“Who would’ve guessed they’re in a fertilization plant?”

You frowned. “What a gloomy place to be born in.”

Exactly as the name suggested, fertilizations plants ‘manufacture’ children. While that is as disgusting as you thought it was, that is the reality of the world you live in. While there are a few rare exceptions, people no longer have sex—it was too animalistic, too impure of an act to participate in.

Thus, the solution to a declining population is just to make babies just like how factories make your easily reproducible mug sitting on your kitchen counter. You couldn’t even deny the awful truth that you were made in one of these factories (you know, just like your mug). And more disappointingly, there was truly no ethical problem, because the world today only worships one god: Purity, in its coldest and most cruel manifestation.

In the end, aren’t we simply androids as well? Just made up of blood and guts?

“So? Have you caught on to that SVT andy yet?”

Morrison suddenly asked, dragging you back from your inner thoughts. You took a double take.

“The what—?”

“The SVT-class andy,” he clarified, “you know, the Vernon one.”

The mere mention of his model name made you purse your lips in annoyance. If only you could say that he was in your apartment doing some arbitrary thing an android would do if they were left alone.

“Still nothing. I was supposed to do an initial search last night but after being caught in all that chaos, I just went straight home,” you lied, having no choice. There was no way you would let everyone know you have something worth half a million bucks in your dingy, totally unsecure apartment.

“Well, no one could have it easy with these military grades. They’re craftier than your average andy after all,” he shrugged, giving you a pat on the shoulder. “Remember when Choi Seungcheol took almost three months to locate SVT-class Woozi? Man, I could still remember coming with him to a dozen places just to look for leads.”

As soon as Morrison reminisced memories with the former chief, you feel a bit heavy hearted. You did look up to him as your hero.

“You ever knew why he left?” you asked.

Morrison only shrugged. “Some say he just got tired of this awful job. Some say he was getting married. Most of them are just gossip anyway.”

You only sighed. “I guess we might never know the truth.”

“C’mon! Choi wouldn’t want you depressed! Straighten those shoulders! We have an andy to face!” your partner smiled, again giving a strong shove on your back. “Today’s just a commercial grade escapee. It wouldn’t be that hard. Peyton had it already detained and ready for questioning.”

Sucking in a huge amount of air and exhaling loudly, you prepped yourself up for some wonderful, heart-palpitating action.

“Alright! Let get it!”

As soon as the both of you entered the room, which was definitely a locker room prepared by the factory staff for your visit, you could already see the subject sitting quietly in front of a steel table; a dim white bulb only giving light to the gloomy room. It was definitely a classic cult-style interrogation room you’ve seen in vintage silent films.

“Good day to you sir,” Morrison greeted as he set his fedora on top of the table and prepped his V-T scale. “I am Agent Will Morrison. You are under suspicion of being an android and we will be administering this test to confirm it or not.”

“I told him so many times already! I’m being framed! The manager hates me and he’s been spreading those rumors!” the man screamed, his face heavy with fear and anxiety.

“We’ll see. If that’s the truth, then there’s no need to worry,” you retorted back with a clipped tone.

You then placed your hands on his shoulders, asking him to wear specialized VR glasses and then carefully arranging the electrodes attached to a spectrometer on his face.

“Settle down now. You don’t want to affect the test results, right?”

At your cleverly concealed threats, the man stopped his outbursts and looked at you in fear. You simply smiled at him before giving Morrison the go signal.

Identifying and hunting androids almost every single day of your life, you couldn’t even count in your head how many times they went for this flimsy cover-up story. They probably thought they were being clever or something.

“So, Jonathan West, age 35 and working as a plumber in one of Sector 3’s fertilization plants, correct?”

“Yes, sir,” the man replied, unbeknownst to him, the test was already starting.

“You are accused as the android who committed the Palmaide Apartment murders wherein six people were discovered to be brutally murdered and then embedded inside the concrete walls of the apartment.”

“Sir! I’m not android! Please believe me! I have a wife and two kids….! I-I can’t possibly be the murderer!”

You slid unnoticed under the shadows beside Agent Peyton, although still nearby enough to the subject that it would be easy to subdue it down if it goes berserk.

Watching the test being conducted for the nth time, you could easily claim to have memorized all hundred and fifty questions in the questionnaire.

Most questions are practically the same—asking how you would react to certain and usually gruesome scenarios—all designed to gauge micro-expressions and reactions. It is a common belief that androids do not have these sophisticated and almost undetectable movements on your face. Hence, the electrodes.

“I want you to immerse yourself in a certain situation,” you could hear Morrison speak as he turned on the virtual reality system. “Tell me what you think of it.”

Here it comes. Your thoughts turned rancid as you recalled the contents of that video. It was made to intentionally cause distress in humans—limbs being torn, live vivisections, disgusting lobotomies and other gruesome things that could make your stomach lurch; and more importantly, it is intentionally shown to be done to people the subject knows in real life.

Tests such as the Voight-Kampff Scale however are hardly perfect. Humans are complex creatures and are fundamentally unpredictable variables. Different people react to one single scenario in a million different ways. Even if you are looking for signs of empathy—a true testament of humanity—not everyone exhibits it the same way.

That’s why, no matter how many times you’ve blasted a hole through an andy’s head, you would always have this unreasonable nagging feeling underneath your gut that screams you might be wrong. You might actually kill an innocent person.

As you stood there and studied Jonathan West, you realized that his expression turned from disturbed to one of sheer horror. It was quite easy to know, to be honest—he turned pale and looked as if he just wanted to pluck his eyes out and forget that he ever seen what he was seeing right now. It was too real to be simple analog hack.

“Sir…I-I…please make it stop! Please, please….I can’t look anymore,” He muttered weakly, looking as if he was really going to puke big time, which prompted Morrison to immediately close the virtual reality system.

The man was still panting when it was shut down; visibly distraught by what he had seen. Agent Peyton, who was silent during the whole ordeal, then went to the man and asked him if he was alright. In the end, Peyton gave him a glass of water before the test proceeded as it should.

In your opinion, after that display, the subject was already leaning to the ‘most likely human’ side of the spectrum. He wasn’t making red flags which could mark him as an android, though he had a few quirks such as making a rather hollow laugh. Some humans have that kind of laugh, so you didn’t really mind it.

There are days when the excitement of discovering an android wouldn’t really pay you a visit. Sometimes, humans are mistaken as androids either because of their personalities, or by people who simply don’t really like them. Just like how it was in this case.

After a series of more questions and tests, Morrison was also convinced that Jonathan West was human. Besides, the processor level of the android you were looking for wasn’t capable of doing such complex analog hacks.

Even after a deliberation between the three of you outside of the room, it became a unanimous decision to exonerate the subject of any of the accusations placed on him. While you were still a bit doubtful, both Morrison and Peyton—men of more experience than you have as a bounty hunter—agree that West was human and the rumors simply might have been caused by office politics.

“Mr. West, the three of us have finished deliberating and we have decided that you are indeed as human as you could be,” Morrison began, sitting on the same seat he had been for the past few hours.

The man let out a heavy sigh of relief as he made a bashful smile. “Oh my god! Thank you so much, my good sir! Thank you! Thank you!”

Studying the exchange just beside Morrison, you made a small smile. In the end, you didn’t make a mistake and he still had a chance to live. Accidentally killing someone just because of some careless assessment was something you’d rather not go through in your entire life.

“Well, we thank you for giving us your time,” Morrison said as he stood up and walked towards the man, extending a hand. “And we apologize for the inconvenience.”

West shook his hand as they walked towards the door with you and Peyton following closely behind. It was finally over, and you could finally think about what you’d have for lunch. It’s been a while since you had some simple sandwiches. Going for a Subway down 14th Street would be great.

Your eyes found themselves again watching the man and your partner Morrison. You can’t stop smiling at how peaceful the day had become, contrary to what you were expecting.

“It’s no problem, sir!” West exclaimed. “Thank you for trusting me.”

You halted. Your smile faltering.

Those words rang loudly like a deafening siren in your head.

Someone had said those exact same words to you the day before, but for some reason, right now, those words made you shiver in dread; fear dropping down the pits of your stomach.

You instantly averted your alarmed eyes towards West who had been looking back at you as well.

He gave you a blank look.

He knew. You knew.

In just a span of a few seconds, you immediately seized his wrist, twisting it behind his back before tackling him to the ground. You saw the glint of a concealed knife in West’s hands before it flew away to some indiscriminate area of the room.

The man struggled yet he was pinned down by your whole body weight, unable to move—a tactic you learned through experience by subduing andys day in and day out.

Without a second thought, you grabbed your laser gun and fired it center of his forehead. The man lay still in a matter of seconds.

Your heart was beating wildly. You had finally done it.

For a moment, you feared that you might see blood and pieces of bone after the bright light of the laser dissipated. Yet when you finally stood up, huffing, the only thing you saw was the bright red glow of metal heated to melting point.

The two men beside you only stared at the motionless body of the andy with stunned expressions in their faces; unable to believe that they had almost made a grave mistake.

Everything it did was an incredible display of analog hacking.

Because androids are incapable of creating actual emotion, they simply react to the environment and transmit the appropriate response as dictated by the cloud and by their own programming as a means to communicate properly with humans. Using this technique and the fatal flaw of humans to anthropomorphize objects, androids are able to give the impression of ‘humanness’, of having a soul. That is analog hacking.

By ‘hacking’ through people’s ability to empathize, androids are able to deceive, to give a feeling that they too have a soul. It almost killed all of you today.

Eventually, your colleagues’ stares migrated to your direction while you were still gathering yourself.

“What?” was the only response you gave.

It was only until later that noon, as the three of you enjoyed a wonderful lunch at the 14th Street sandwich joint, when Morrison finally put an end to his curiosity.

“Say, YN,” he began, his mouth full of sandwich. “That andy earlier. How’d you know it wasn’t human?”

You were in the middle of sipping from your can of soda when he opened that question. You could only scrunch your brows together, looking for the right way to answer the question.

“Well…” you replied, unsure of how to say it. “I just…I guess I just knew. There’s really no secret behind it. We just exchanged looks and I knew he was about to stab you.”

Peyton nodded. “Pure instincts, huh?”

You knew he was only acknowledging your reason, yet to you, it felt like he was questioning whether you were telling the truth or not. And to be perfectly honest, you were lying by omission.

Because after all, you can’t just tell them that the way that andy said those words and the way Hansol said it, felt so drastically different.

It only took as far as thirty minutes for Hansol to get bored of your characterless apartment and began to get curious about the city of West Mars. Peeking from your dirty windows, all he could see were the tall skyscrapers, fluorescing still despite the morning sunlight, and the numerous utilitarian-looking factories doting the Martian landscape.

He guessed this was a neighborhood no one really fancied to go to, other than those who actually live here—the specials, the dirty, the outcasts. Even after a few hundred centuries, human civilization barely took one foot forward. Even after the Earth had died and most of the population moved to space colonies, life was still the same. There were still oppressors and the oppressed.

Hansol clutched his tightening chest; his eyes still transfixed at the smoke belching from the factory chimneys.

It had been months since he began to feel something. At first there were small bursts of ‘pressure’ in his chest, just some unexplainable pangs of ‘pain’, ‘guilt’, and ‘conscience’— it all began when his fellow android Joshua started murdering people. Six people; a family.

Hansol couldn’t bear to watch it and tried to stop him, yet he also got embedded into the wall with them. The only thing saving him was his ‘second brain’ or a backup processor installed only in him, which was supposed to aid him in his tactical assessments. Otherwise, he’d be dead as well.

He tried to save those people, but he had been a few hours late. In the end, he could only call the police. All this time, whenever he recalled that certain memory, he had to hold himself together. All sorts of things swirled inside him that he thought he might have had a hydraulic leak, but there was nothing physically wrong with him upon inspection.

Jihoon called it ‘emotion’, as soon as Hansol contacted him—born from the rumored empathy organ installed inside all the SVT-class androids. It blurred the lines between human and machine. Hansol couldn’t understand it, even until now, he didn’t have a tight grasp on such an abstract concept. All he knew is that he didn’t want to see anyone get hurt because of him anymore.

Just like those six people.

Caught himself in reverie, Hansol decided to explore the city some more. Staying in your apartment seemed to be making him…reflect. If that was the right word.

He silently apologized to you as soon as he stepped out of the front door, a bit guilty that he had to disobey. But he wanted to do a few things first, and most of them involves going out of your apartment. If he could just go out and then be back before you were back from work, it was as if he never went out in the first place. Well, at least to you.

Going wherever his feet took him, Hansol found himself out of the slums and in the middle of the busy city center.

The tall buildings from the distance were now like crystal towers before him, extending to eternal heights to the heavens beyond. The bright lights of large TV screens flashed in vivid technicolor as it sang ads for the miraculous Penfield Mood Organ, while the throngs of people clad in all white body suits walked across the glowing asphalts beneath their feet.

The thrum of city life vibrated all throughout the crossing like a magnetic field pulsing at every nanosecond; almost undetectable by an indifferent crowd, yet to Hansol, it was almost as if electromagnetic waves were coursing through his skin.

He placed his hand over his chest; trying to ground himself as soon as he felt his heart (if he did have one) soar over something much bigger than life. He tried to put his finger on what to call it, but he guessed the closest he could describe it would be something akin to what humans call ‘wonder’, or ‘amazement’ or ‘astonishment’.

 “Good morning, sir! I am Akito, the police android! Is there anything I can help you with?”

Just like that, Hansol’s bubble was popped as soon as the android appeared. It seemed like he had been standing in the middle of the city center for far too long that it made him quite suspicious.

“No, I…I’m about to go anyway. Thanks, Akito,” Hansol replied, still quite disoriented from the sudden intrusion, but left his place eventually.

Wandering around the area, he noticed a variety of shops and stores, and even some that he didn’t really understand what for. Yet when he was browsing over the different designs for the white body suits most people seemed to enjoy wearing (not like it had other designs), he found what he was looking for.

Well, first on the agenda, then.

After a rather filling lunch, you and your colleagues went out of the restaurant and hopped into the company hovercraft to go back to the office. Since the whole hunting went surprisingly well and ended earlier than expected, there weren’t any hunting jobs scheduled for the rest of the day.

As you laughed at the joke Morrison cracked about how Peyton didn’t utter a single word for the first six months when he joined the company, you spotted a rather familiar figure from the distance.

You frowned and inwardly groaned.

“Boys, I think I have a few errands to do in the city center. You go on ahead,” you told them as they looked at you in bewilderment but reluctantly agreed.

“Well if that’s the case, see you tomorrow, YN,” Morrison replied as he wore his hat again. “Good work today!”

“Thanks! Good working with you two as well!” you told them and the pointed at Peyton playfully. “Better start working on your goodbyes too. See ya!”

As soon as there where gone, making sure that their hovercraft were already a few miles away from where you were standing, you marched irately at the subject of your irritation. It seemed he had moved places from where you had first seen him but you doubted if he had seen you as well.  

“Mister, mister! Do that again!”

It did take time for you to finally locate him since he was pretty much easy to spot relative to the city dwellers who were in all-white body suits. Voices of children were getting louder as you went deeper inside the nearby park, and finally, you caught up to him blowing bubbles in sizes no one would probably be able to do other than him.

“Hansol,” you called behind his back, your hands on your hips and frown on your face. “Why’s your hair black?”

Eventually he turned around and saw your rather upset expression which made him avert his gaze back to the ground. The children around him (and yes they were wearing those stupid body suits) looked at the both of you in wonder, surprised that their entertainment aka Hansol had stopped blowing bubbles all of the sudden.

“Who’s she, mister?” a child asked, probably confused at your sudden appearance. “Your girlfriend?”

“Oh, no,” Hansol replied, ready to explain everything. “I’m actually an android—”

Letting him finish was something you’d rather not do, so you immediately covered his mouth.

“Sorry kids, we’ve gotta go now!” You apologized and then managed to drag him out of the park, away from all those children.

Reaching a faraway bench at a rather remote place, you made him sit and contemplate about what he had done. Hansol seemed to know what was wrong and proceeded to sulk at the far end of the bench with a downcast look.

“Well?” you began, your arms crossed and your brows furrowed. Standing in front of him like that, it only made him feel a bit more guilty.

“I, uh…I’m really sorry…” he replied, still unable to look at you. He didn’t calculate the fact that you might be in the same area as well thus his plan had failed. He should consider attaching a GPS tracker on you.

“Didn’t I specifically tell you to not go out of the apartment?” you reprimanded him. “You could be seen by my colleagues and you’d be dead!”

“Sorry…I just wanted to change my appearance so I could hide more easily.”

You groaned and sighed heavily.

“You could be killed! You were lucky it was me who caught you the other night! You think other bounty hunters would just magically trust you if you asked them pretty please?”

“Then why did you?”

Hansol threw back a question right at you like a curve ball and it hit you hard right at the gut. Taken aback, you simply pursed your lips and glared at him.

“Please don’t ask me that,” you replied and then abruptly turned around. “C’mon. Let’s go back.”

 Watching your retreating back, just like this morning, Hansol silently regarded you and your response. In the end however, he couldn’t understand anything, and eventually rose up from his seat and followed you home.

“Tell me more about yourself.”

You asked one day, as the both of you enjoyed a quiet breakfast on a Sunday morning.

It was clear to you that Hansol was not your ordinary android. He does things and says things which clearly were not ‘android’ by nature. As someone who identifies and hunts down androids for a living, you thought you already knew how to distinguish a human being from an android, but considering your confusion towards Hansol, it seems like you clearly do not.

Which is why, you had to ask.

“Me? Uhh…” Hansol scratched the nape of his neck, thinking what parts of himself should he tell you because there really was a lot of information about him. “Well…I’m an android designed for tactical assessments.”

You raised your brow at him, clearly pondering why that was the first thing he wished to share with you. “What does that mean?”

“Oh, I, uh…I gather data, consolidate them and then give an assessment of what choices the enemy could make during battle. I just give information and it’s Jihoon who would give the orders and the others would do the fighting. I’m a non-combatant type.”

“So that’s why your only weapon are those disks. They’re for self-defense,” you replied, leaning back. “Anything else?”

Hansol only stared at you, caught off guard that he had to provide more. “Uh…my birthday is on February 18.”

You nodded at him, unsure how his processor actually works, because it seems like he’s been giving you random things about him. “You mean your manufacturing date. Andys don’t give birth.”

“You could say it like that, but I like to think it’s my birthday,” he replied, and you arched another brow at him as you took a sip from your cup of coffee.

“Why?” you asked. The more Hansol talked, the more you sink into bewilderment. You regarded yourself as someone who could tell the difference between an android and a human being, yet right now, as you conversed with Hansol, that fine line was beginning to get blurry.

“I think,” he began, snatching you away from your thoughts, “I think there’s just something special with a birthday than a manufacturing date. It’s like…how do I say this…if you have a birthday, you matter as an existence. You were born to leave a mark in this world. As an android who isn’t exactly ‘alive’, I’d like to know what mark I would leave.”

Utterly speechless was what you were after you had heard Hansol’s explanation. It was weird, truly weird how he had the self-awareness to question his purpose, and you were sitting there wondering if any of the androids you had retired before had thoughts like this. If they did, you weren’t so different to a murderer as you thought you were.

As guilt began to spiral inside your gut, you tried to rationalize your concerns. Hansol was just different, probably using a novel way to use analog hack. Yeah, he’s probably analog hacking you—pretending to have deeper thinking and consciousness which he could easily access through the cloud. That scenario had the highest probability to be true.

“Oh, wow,” you replied hesitantly, gazing at the empty plate before you. “I—uh…I don’t think I’ve ever met an android like you.”

“Really?” he asked, his voice seemingly curious. “I guess maybe because we have an up-to-date processor….”

“Maybe you’re right.” You quietly scoffed. Are the organization’s labs really that advanced to even mimic human thought?

Smiling, you stood up from your seat. “Why don’t we take a breath of fresh air?”

Hansol glanced at you with a questioning look. “Where are we going?”

“Oh, just a trip to the grocery store.”

Hansol had several presumptions before he arrived to the West Martian Colony, before he had met you.

From what he had gathered in the cloud, human beings are always unpredictable. They were not run by any program, any command, not like his kind who were bound to the beck and call of a few strings of code. Humans follow their “heart” or whatever that means. They are selfish and cold, kind and warm.

Hansol was definitely apprehensive. He had never met any human being aside from his creator and a few scientists who would come and go into the labs like a cold draft. Yet despite that, Hansol knew deep down, that he doesn’t hate people. He certainly doesn’t hate you.

His brothers’ views towards humans were varying however. Hoshi, or Soonyoung was a lot more carefree, though he believed in the traditional roles of an android servant and a human master. Jihoon was too preoccupied with figuring what was wrong with him that he didn’t seem to care about them (though it seems like he has that sorted out now, according to his last status report). On the other hand, Joshua disliked people. He always made it clear to his brothers that humans were weak and that androids had long outpaced their creators.

Clear enough to make him murder people just to show you how he looks down on them.

It was interesting listening to them in past back in the labs. However, now that he had escaped and had met you, these memories began to resurface in his processor. Hansol had no idea why, to be honest. Was it because he was beginning to interact with a real human being in a much closer environment? That would be an interesting theory to explore, but right now, Hansol had to focus on where you were taking him.

“—are you sure you haven’t met another android before?” you asked him, the first part of your question he hadn’t caught. “I mean; don’t you have that info in your cloud?”

Hansol hummed, scratching his head. “I have my brothers and I met a few police androids, but other than that, I don’t have much experience. As for the cloud, it only stores pure information. We cannot derive actual experience from it.”

“Ah, I guess that’s right,” you replied, realizing that maybe it was like gathering information about something only through a book. It’s likely not going to make anyone instantly good at something.

For a while now, Hansol had been studying you. He was quiet about it, but he always wondered why you haven’t retired him yet. It was no secret that he was your assigned target, but surely, a mere plea from that night wouldn’t change your mind in an instant. Humans are so unpredictable.

“Hmm…we should sit here,” you suddenly said, stopping before a stone bench. “This has a great view of the shopping plaza.”

As you had said, it indeed held a spectacular view of the massive plaza just a few steps in front of you. There were several boutiques, cafes, stores of every shape and size—yet of course, it was as drab as it can be.

Everything was white, as Hansol stared at one giant building, from the stone ground to the shops, buildings and even the latex suits people wore as they walk around. The only redeeming feature it had were the ever-changing holographic ads shown on the white walls.

“Looks stupid, doesn’t it?” you remarked as you seated yourself on the bench with a cold expression.

“Is that why you’re not wearing those suits?” he asked as he sat beside you, glancing at the plaza.

“Everyone else in this city is stupid,” you told him, ignoring his question.

“Why?”

You snorted loudly. “Look at them Hansol. Why are they wearing those stupid suits from head to toe?  Look at how they’re all smiling so happily as if everything’s alright. It’s stupid.”

Hansol continued to stare at them, gazing at every face, every being in that plaza. Of course, he could remember all of them because of his impressive processor, yet despite that, he couldn’t understand what you were trying to say.

“But those are just clothes,” he replied, shrugging.

“Not sure if an andy like you would get it. But it’s more than a fashion trend. It’s an ideology.”

Ideology. He turned that word over and over inside his mind, trying to milk out anything substantial from that word alone. A way of thinking. What are these people thinking then whenever they decide to wear those body suits? Why would they do that?

Your questions seemed to have opened a whole new world for Hansol to explore. Human ideology; there were so many of that from the old century alone—liberalism, fascism, socialism. Why do humans subscribe to these thoughts and beliefs? And what would that mean to him as an android? Would he be able to subscribe to an ideology? Or had he always believed in one, just never realizing it?

If that’s the case, would he be able to find his purpose in it?

“What do they believe in?” he asked you, now fascinated.

Glad that he asked, you immediately replied.

“Purity. Cleanliness. Everything that is old is dirty, bad, and everything that is new is clean, good. I mean, I could understand why. It’s our fault that the Earth is basically a one big garbage dump. Maybe we just want to wash our hands clean from all of that guilt. I don’t know.”

“Why is that stupid then? I think that’s a valid reason.”

“That’s true,” you replied. “But that was how it was back then. It used to be an ideology. Now, after hundreds of years had passed, it had been so ingrained into the culture that no one really asks why is clean good and dirty, bad. People are being ostracized because of this and no one really understands why. It just seemed to have become desensitized. It’s true meaning forgotten.”

“What do you mean?”

You scoffed. “Ask one of them why they where those body suits and I bet you they would answer it with something like ‘it’s clean’ or some sort of bullshit. Ask why the Penfield mood organ is such a huge trend nowadays, or why they would submit themselves to chemicals just to induce happiness.”

“People couldn’t bear to feel any longer. Emotions have become so burdensome that it’s just easier to change your mood with one press of a button. They just do whatever other people do and, in the end, it became some sort of a mob mentality.”

For once, Hansol saw true despair in your eyes. Even if you appear to hate how the world is, he knew you were just deeply sad at how things ended up. Anger is after all, expressed when you are too sad to cry.

It struck a cord inside his processor, for some reason, as he felt the urge to do something to make you feel a little bit better. He didn’t understand why, but he knew what he should do.

Silently, Hansol took your hand, his fingers slowly intertwining with yours. He felt warm, was what you immediately thought while you anticipated what he was about to do.

“It must be lonely living in this city. There are people all around you but they all feel like ghosts. Passing by, passing through the walls and then disappear without a trace,” he began as he kept on gazing at your connected hands, talking as if he was expressing his actual thoughts.

“Hansol…?”

“That’s why, as this city becomes more and more alienating…” he continued; his honest eyes piercing right through yours. “I’ll be your friend.”

For a moment, you gazed at him, too stunned to even utter a sound. It was just a simple proposal of friendship, yet why does your heart feel like it’ll burst from the seams?

“W-why…?” you asked, becoming more and more conscious about how he was gripping your hand so tightly; his thumb brushing your skin in slow soothing circles.

“Why, you ask…I’m not even sure myself, but,” he replied, “Maybe I just want to make that sad look on your face disappear.”

You pursed your lips, head totally blank for any response.

You shouldn’t just say that to anyone, you know?

Not to me who’ve never felt something like this before.

The sound of lasers fired. Muffled voices; indiscernible against the background battle noise.

It was another day out in the field, and you were lucky there were five of you hunting a military grade android. During hunts like this, you don’t usually share the earn; it was all for the experience. Besides, how much would you even get if the bounty was divided upon five people?

You zeroed in on your prey. Shooting a laser beam at its direction, you deliberately let it miss as the android dodged it. When it had stopped running, you slid on the gravel and kicked its feet off the ground, then turned around faster than it could recover. As you aimed your two laser guns at it, the image of Hansol flashed in your brain, which made you hesitate to press the trigger.

“YN! Watch your head!”

To return to your apartment with a bandaged forehead and a huge frown on your face was enough to let the door slam behind you. It was both stupid and humiliating to falter in the middle of a simple mission like that, especially if the reason was the android living in your apartment.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. You were supposed to retire Hansol several months before yet here you are still hung up and getting more and more sentimental towards him as the days pass by.

You couldn’t help it. You were only human.

If he wakes you up in the morning with a smile and some PB & J; if he talks about his sudden interest in various things with an eager look; if he greets you as you return home from work, dinner on the table and then asking you about your day; if he holds your hand and says he’ll be your friend—could you even stop yourself from softening up?

You were clearly angry with yourself to let this whole thing get to this point.

Were you really that lonely that you would even find comfort in an android?

Tossing all of your equipment—V-T scale, laser gun and leather bag—on your worn-out sofa, you went straight to your bedroom and found the subject of your frustrations, sitting on the bed and looking at the window with a rather pondering gaze.

“Say, YN,” Hansol started, without even waiting another second to pass by. He probably knew that you were going home the moment you left the office.

“What?” you replied, unbuckling the holsters on your belt and all the safety gear you had on your body. “I’m not in a good mood so make it quick. I just got hammered by an android.”

Before he replied to you, Hansol decided to turn around and look at you with those eyes that seem to gouge the truth from the depths of your being. It made you halt all your fussing and returned his stare back at him.

“How do you know the difference between an android and a human being?” he asked which made you turn your head slightly. What a simple question to ask a bounty hunter.

“Well, isn’t that obvious?” you replied as you placed your hands over your hips. “Humans have empathy while androids don’t.”

“But what if something was invented to make android experience empathy? What then?”

You blinked several times at his second question and then began chuckling. “You mean an empathy organ? Sorry to burst your bubble but that’s not even real. It’s an urban legend.”

Hansol made a side eye as he pondered what he was going to say next, his expression basically unchanged.

“Just hypothetically speaking, if an empathy organ does exist, how would you know the difference now?”

“Eh…if we’re hypothetically speaking, then I don’t really know. I wouldn’t be able to hunt anymore if that’s the case. I can��t risk making a mistake and kill someone, not to mention that if androids begin crying before me and beg me for their lives, I wouldn’t be able to shoot them at all.”

As soon as you uttered those words, you paused and contemplated.

You gazed back at him—realization dawning on you; your eyes wide with incredulity.

It was no longer a matter of if. Someone had already begged you for their life and you didn’t shoot them.

No. No way.

That’s not possible.

At your silence, Hansol never confirmed or denied your realization and simply stared at you with those powerful eyes; waiting for you to finally digest it all.

“This isn’t hypothetical at all, is it?” you finally asked, your expression uneasy.

“No, it isn’t.”

You sighed frustratingly but it made sense.

If Hansol really has an empathy organ, everything he did—asking you to trust him, his un-Android like responses, him holding your hand—everything made so much sense. And while it did provide some answers, it gave you more questions as well.

First of all…

“H-How is that possible?!”

Hansol shrugged at your sudden outburst. “That’s why we escaped from the organization. We don’t know how it works or if it’s really installed inside of us, so we went our separate ways.”

“So…so…!” you pointed your finger at him, still incredulous. “There’s more of you?”

“Yeah. All of the SVT-class androids have empathy organs installed while we were being made in the organization’s laboratories. At least that’s how Jihoon suspected it.”

“Jihoon?”

“Yes. SVT-class Type-07 Woozi. He stayed behind the labs to search for our original creator. He did find her daughter and they’re working on an experiment to test the validity and the effectivity of the empathy organ.”

For a minute you felt like the ground was going to swallow you whole. There was too much go on, too much information that you can’t properly process them all. Falling on your knees to the ground as you leaned against the bed for support, you felt like you were going to have an aneurysm.

“YN? Are you ok?” Hansol dashed to your side in Mach speed, his hand easily finding your back.

For Pete’s sake! You’re the reason why I’m not ok!!

“I’ll get you a glass of water and some ice for your head injury. It seems like it could be the cause of your headache,” he told you and the disappeared towards the kitchen, completely oblivious of your dilemma.

Goddamn it.

Didn’t Choi Seungcheol retire Woozi already? If the andy’s still alive then did he fail the mission? If he did, then why did he confirm that he retired Woozi?

And then it seems like there are more empathy organs out there. Not to mention I’m living with an andy who’s supposed to have one.

It wasn’t even two minutes before Hansol was back with a glass of water which you promptly drank, and then allowed him to settle himself behind you while he was giving a cold compress to your head—all done without complaints because you were too lost in your thoughts.

No. No. No.

An empathy organ is just a myth! Something like the Holy Grail or something! It’s impossible for Hansol to have one!

But…it just fits so well with all the strange things he had done so far! Who android would hold your hand just because you looked sad?

Wait. Get yourself together, YN.

Hansol is just a weird android.

He’s totally chill and a bit spaced out. He sometimes says really deep stuff and then comforts you so gently that your problems just melt away.

That’s…That’s what androids are supposed to be right?

Without even realizing, Hansol had already wrapped his arms around your waist. It was only until you were done with your internal monologue that you realized the warmth you felt from behind you.

“Wha-what are you doing!” You exclaimed, though still unable to move because of how he was holding on to you tightly.

“Oh, this?” he began, completely oblivious to your embarrassment. “I’m embracing you. I wanted to know if it feels as warm as what the cloud tells me.”

You groaned, struggling to get free. “Don’t patronize me! I know what a freakin’ hug is! Now, let me go!”

Instead of opening his arms, Hansol instead pulled you closer to him, making you flush even more. “Sorry. Just endure it a bit longer. The data I’ve gathered is still incomplete. Besides, now that you know about the empathy organ, it’s safe for me to test it on you, right?”

“What! I never—”

As soon as you met his eyes, you were unable to finish the rest of your words. There he was again with those eyes that just makes you screech into a complete halt. It was so intense that it almost gave you shivers down your spine.

“Do you really hate it?” he asked again. “I’ll let you go.”

You allowed a few moments to pass by—the sound of passing cars and the incessant ticking of the clock was what you could hear, as well as your faint breaths.

“Fine. Do whatever you like,” you finally conceded and leaned against chest. It was warm.

With a calm smile, he nuzzled against your shoulder. “How did you get that injury?”

“Oh, this? I almost got my head whacked by an android,” you replied plainly, almost forgetting that you were actually having a bad day because of what had happened.

“That’s unusual.”

“You could say that again. I just got…distracted.”

Hansol raised his brows at your reply; noting the pause between your words. Since he cannot place his chin on your head, he decided to prop himself on your shoulder, his lips near your ear.

“Was it because of me?”

You jumped at the sound of his voice being so near to your ear. It made you ticklish and pulled back away from him just for a tiny bit.

“You’re too close!” you exclaimed, flushed and uncharacteristically nervous. “And I didn’t get distracted because of you!”

He sighed at your response. “Sorry. But I’m glad it wasn’t because me. I’ll be troubled if I distract you from your work.”

Pursing your lips, you only returned to your original position in silence. You have been distracted me from work since the beginning.

“Maybe I can help you?” Hansol continued talking when you didn’t reply.

“With what?” you chuckled cynically. “Hunting androids? Don’t you feel bad about killing your own kind?”

“Well, some humans don’t feel bad if they kill other people. What’s the difference?”

You scoffed. “Touché,”

“I’ll help you if you’re in trouble.” He pressed on and you could only groan in exasperation. While he tends to be a bit spacey, he can also be stubborn. It’s not like you can stop him if you refused.  

“You’re weirdly obstinate—”

About to add an explanation, your words were cut short however by the doorbell. You stood up to get it but got dizzy from the sudden change that Hansol decided that you better sit down and rest.

As he padded his way across the living room, Hansol opened the door to see no one except for a bag of food on the ground. He tried to look around and assessed the surroundings, yet he found nothing suspicious.

Confused, he leaned his head to the side and eventually decided to take the food inside. It didn’t seem harmful.

“Wonder who that was,” he muttered before going back inside.

As a freeloader, Hansol took it upon himself the responsibility of maintaining your apartment in tip-top shape. From the floor to the ceiling; to every nook and cranny he finds—he made sure that everything was sparkling clean to the point that you thought you went to a different apartment when you went home.

It was easy to pretend he was a regular every day helper android since he always kept to himself at most times, and other than visiting a regular antique vinyl shop in an indefinite area of the city, he never really did anything out of the blue.

Hansol had two leeks, one in each hand as he assessed which one was the best using his state-of-the-art processor. The engineers at the labs probably never thought his military grade processor would be used in this way but it was extremely helpful. He tossed the one on his left to his grocery cart and the other back to the stall—concluding that it was already at 40% freshness and most of the chlorophyll and other biominerals had died out.

One of his responsibilities was making sure that groceries and other supplies in your apartment were well-stocked. And while it did make you furious at how he easily hacked into your bank account to access money, you eventually gave him permission to go on grocery trips for you because of how he efficiently did everything.

He turned his cart to the left, its squeaky rusting wheels making it hard to keep it moving in a straight line.

Next stop was the chicken aisle. He remembers seeing a photo of you in the cloud as you enjoyed a bucket of chicken nuggets, and he plans to make them for dinner that night. Halting the troublesome cart before the freezers, Hansol checked the display if there were any of the chicken nuggets he wanted to buy.

“This one’s too expensive…” he told himself in contemplation.

“Hi! I’m Martin of Fresh Daily Chicken! How may I help you?”

And there were those androids again.

Hansol knew they were just following their program but it was getting on his nerves. They kept on bothering him every single time he went out that it was very tempting to just dissemble them in front of his eyes.

“I’m fine, Martin. You can go help someone else,” he replied, wondering if there was an edge to his tone as he returned the chicken back to the freezer.

Instead of leaving though, Martin gripped Hansol’s arm tightly, as the other stopped and glared at the android with suspicion. In a beat, Hansol flicked his hand away and stood still for a moment, assessing the situation at hand. Nanoseconds pass, he finally realized what was happening.

“Joshua. What are you doing here?”

His voice was filled with animosity; his eyes like fire flickering. Hansol knew his brother was up to no good as soon as he showed up using a hacked android.

“Sharp as ever, aren’t we?” the android replied, the tone of its usual monotonous voice reflecting the malice of the hacker behind it all. “I guess I should expect no less from an android made to evaluate things.”

Hansol wasn’t having any of this small talk. “If you don’t have anything important to say, I’m leaving.”

“And what? Play house with your bounty hunter?” the android sneered. “She doesn’t trust you as much as you trust her, you know?”

Hansol threw daggers at the android with his eyes. “What are you talking about?”

It made a rather hollow chuckle. “Did you forget how despicable humans are? She’s planning on retiring you and your pleading won’t help you now. That’s why…”

“That’s why what?” Hansol felt uneasy.

“That’s why I’ll help you finish her off first.”

Like the wind howling, the android’s words felt like a siren blaring right into his ears. If he had any blood, it would’ve been boiling by now. If only looks could kill, the android would’ve been long dead.

“No. I don’t need your help and I never will. Get fuck out of here before I—”

“Fine, fine,” it responded rather dismissively, unperturbed by Hansol’s threats. “But if you need me, I’m just one call away.” 

And just like that, Joshua disappeared. “Hi! I’m Martin of Fresh Daily Chicken! How may I help you?”

Hnasol sighed and returned to his grocery shopping.

“Empathy organ?”

A boisterous laugh was all you could hear across the otherwise silent donut shop. You frowned, clearly annoyed.

“Didn’t know ya believe in those bullshit urban legends, YN.” Your boss replied, crumbs falling down his shirt, and thus has been looked at disgustedly by the people around you.

“Just answer the damn question, please,” you replied, giving him a not-too-pleased expression.

“What can I say?” he shrugged, “It ain’t real.”

You hold off clicking your tongue, and instead averted your gaze to the window beside you, towards the quiet concrete and asphalt streets of West Mars. Thinking that you could achieve something by bribing your boss with donuts, was a dashed dream. He easily dismissed the notion, now munching on some more donuts you had bought with your own pay.

“Doesn’t matter if it’s real or not. I just want to hear what you know about it,” you insisted, pushing your plate of donuts to his side.

He gulped in some coffee. “Well, for one, we don’t know where it is. Rumors say it was made by an engineer in the org, and they died without telling anyone.”

An engineer in the org? You felt like you have two pieces of the puzzle right below your nose, yet you couldn’t wad through the multitude of memories you had.

“Some say it was silently waiting in that engineer’s lab, but not gonna lie, doll, I myself don’t think it’s in there. Can’t be too easy,” he eagerly chomped on a bavarian. “It was prolly never built, kinda a blueprint of some sort.”

“Why?”

“What do you mean why?” Your boss chuckled again. “It’s just not possible! Look, have you ever heard of the phrase ‘good in theory but not in practice’? It’s just like that. You can’t build something science can’t even understand.”

You slumped on your chair, disappointed at his replies.

“C’mon now, doll. Stop digging around urban legends and focus on getting more andys to retire,” he continued when you didn’t reply. “Besides, you still got that SVT andy on your plate, don’t ya? Better set your eyes on that. These military grades ain’t just your ordinary tin foil man.”

Sighing, you silently berated yourself for letting this situation go out of hand.

“Alright. I’m still working on it though.”

You really weren’t. The fact that Hansol was still alive and kicking after several months since you the assignment dropped to your lap was proof that you were procrastinating. And becoming weaker.

You cursed yourself.

“Just a little warning for you. These andys, like the SVT line, are notoriously good at analog hacking. So, do be careful with handling them. Just because they told you you’re friends, ain’t gonna stop them from killin’ you when it suits them. They’re smarter than you’d expect.”

Pursing your lips, you felt your boss’ words weigh down upon you like a pile of stones.

You shouldn’t have trusted Hansol.

It was a gamble you shouldn’t have made in the first place.

The sun was already high and bright; blinding your eyes with its garish lighting as you stood before an android you just made into Swiss cheese with the number of holes you created a few seconds ago. Kicking off the dead weight, you decided to find the other one.

Another day out in the field means another chance to falter and fail even in a simple mission. You had already hesitated once and it had cost you a head injury. If you hesitate again, what would it cost you this time around?

It was getting into your nerves.

Was it truly wise to trust Hansol all this time?

Even if he had no intention of hurting you, it was your job to retire runaway andys before they harm anyone. Therefore, it makes sense to shoot him dead with a laser gun; no questions asked.

Then what was stopping you?

You stalked the andy a few meters away from you like a lion in a hunt; eyes laser focused and ears picking up every minute shuffle. The laser guns on both your hands were ready to shoot yet it wasn’t the right time or place.

Running a few meters away, you shot a few laser beams into the air; the sound echoing across the apartment rooftops in resounding waves. Your target tensed up; alarmed at how the sound was nearby.

You laid your trap.

The android began calculating the most efficient way out and then stood up from its hiding place, unaware that it was the moment you were waiting for. It jumped towards the nearest building and crouched beside a water tank, sniffing the air of your presence.

You grinned. “Looking for me?”

The android looked up, its eyes blank but you knew it was surprised. With two laser guns on both your hands, you aimed at it from the top of the water tank, the sun casting a glare over you. Lunging from its position, it made a narrowing escape as it sacrificed one leg to a laser beam.

It was all over.

You caught up and then threw it to the ground with one harsh kick. Stepping over its torso; effectively pinning it down, you took one good look.

“Did you know that it takes about three minutes for the Nexus 7 processor to calculate the next best move?” you told the android, despite knowing it wouldn’t really listen to you. “Enough time for me to set you up.”

“In the past, it only took you a minute.”

The android rebuked you, making you scrunch up your brows. How the hell did it know that?

“You’ve grown weaker, bounty hunter,” it continued, a grin creeping up to its lips; making its rather soulless expression more unnerving. “Could it be that you like us now?”

“Shut up,” you replied, aiming the two guns at its head. “That’s not going to stop me from retiring you.”

“What if I beg for my life then? Will you spare me now?”

You stopped.

The hands clutching your guns became unsteady. Its words zeroed in at your predicament just like how you had obliterated its leg with numerous laser beams—mocking you; taunting you with your weakness for Hansol.

“You think you could separate androids into your moralistic categories of good and bad? That android is only using you, you know? Like poison, gradually weakening your resolve until you could no longer pick up your laser gun. And when that time comes, he would strike and he will kill you.”

Your temper flared up.

You pressed the triggers furiously, your foot holding it still as laser after laser shot through its head. Even if the head was no longer recognizable, you continued to shoot just to please the rage and frustration weighing inside of you.

As the concrete beneath your feet began to weaken, you eventually stopped; realizing what you were doing all this time. Breaths heavy and eyes wide, you stared at the android which became, more or less, bits and pieces of burnt metal and hydraulic cables.

It still irritated you, so kicked it as far as you could so you wouldn’t be able to see it.

When you returned to the office to hand over the post-hunt report, Morrison was waiting for you t your desk; the serious and alarmed look on his face making you anxious.

“Morrison,” you acknowledged him, tossing your report to your table as well as your various work equipment. “What brings you here?”

“YN. We need to talk,” he replied, his tone of voice not so different that you had originally assumed which only heightened the tension of the situation.

As you followed behind him, you wondered what he wanted—was it about your dwindling work performance? Are you getting fired?

You only knew the answer to your questions when he stopped by a deserted hallway and then faced you. It was all your fears could ever hope for.

“Please tell me YN, that the person living in your apartment isn’t the SVT andy, Vernon.”

Your heart, along with your gut immediately dropped.

“W-what…”

“A few months ago, I saw you with someone walking around the city. I thought it was your boyfriend so I ignored it. The other day however, I heard you got injured so I went and delivered you dinner. That’s when I realized that the person you’re with was the SVT andy.”

If only the ground could swallow you whole. If only you could disappear at that exact moment. You had no explanation. You had been found out. You had nothing in your defense and the only thing you could do was hang your head low and avert your gaze out of guilt and shame.

“YN…”

“I’m sorry…” you replied, voice just above a whisper.

“Is that andy holding you hostage? Is it threatening you?” Morrison asked out of concern as soon as he saw you. “I could help—”

“No. This is my own doing,” you replied. “This is my own fault.”

“Then…why?” he asked. “Among all of us here, you were the one who hated them the most. Have you become sentimental towards them?”

“How the hell would I know!” You screamed as you tremble in both rage and despair. “Do I look like I’m enjoying it right now? Look at how weak I’ve become! Look how I almost died just because I hesitated to pull the trigger!”

“YN…I—”

“Shut up. All of you shut up,” you cut him off. “This is my problem and I’ll solve it on my own.”

Turning to the side, you marched down the hallway and left Morrison stunned and worried about you.

You tightened your fists until your knuckles turned white. Guilt, shame, anger—everything swirled inside of you like a thick soup; slowly pushing you downwards to a spiral of turmoil.

Androids would always be androids no matter what they say. Hansol was only using the way he knew he would survive. Even if it meant deceiving you.

You were angry.

More to yourself than anybody however.

How could you let yourself be swayed by an android’s sweet talking? You felt like an idiot; trusting his words, getting soft and sentimental for a mere android. You were weak and you hated it. Like slow moving magma, your rage was scalding you from the inside until you could no longer bear it. You pushed pass the entrance way and escaped to the streets of West Mars.

How could you be so susceptible? How could you allow him to easily manipulate you using your own desperate need for companionship? How could you allow yourself to succumb to such a baser kind of human emotion?

As a bounty hunter, you should’ve tossed all of them aside a long time ago. You should’ve been erased that weakness when you first began.

Yes, it was lonely. But in order to succeed, one must be alone on top of the mountain with no one to depend on.

You allowed the day to pass you by. As the afternoon became night and the flashing lights of the city returned to illuminate the streets with animations at a million frames per second, you sat high above a building and watch it al unfold like flowers blooming at night. As the dark skies slowly encroached the sunset reflecting the red dunes of Mars, you waited for the exact moment to solve all of your problems.

Problems of your own doing is something you have to solve by yourself. It was your fault that you believed in him when you clearly knew you shouldn’t have. Even if it weighs your heart, the guilt you felt was heavier.

You shouldn’t have allowed things to get to this point. Thus, you reap what you sow.

Head still swimming, you returned to your apartment at the wee hours of the morning. It was the perfect time; the calculated time—because you knew Hansol was at the living room, charging up next to a wireless charging station he himself had built. You saw him at that exact position; sitting, leaning against the wall with head hung low as a circular light glowed underneath the skin of his nape.

You knew what you have to do.

He was defenseless before you; asleep and unaware of what you are about to do. It was perfect this way— he couldn’t say anything, he couldn’t do anything, he couldn’t feel anything.

As you looked at his sleeping figure, you couldn’t help but notice how his now dark hair tumbling against his forehead in a soft caress, how his long eyelashes padded gently across his skin, how his soft breaths echoed across the room. Even at these last moments, he still caught you off guard.

Yet beautiful things erode and fade away like the fleeting spring.

You raised the laser gun to his forehead, your finger already by the trigger.

You can do it YN. Just one press and he’ll be gone. All your problems will be gone, and you’ll be able to return to your everyday life. You’ve done this so many times already.

He’s only an android.

‘…Vernon is my model name, but I want to go by my own name.’

He can be easily manufactured again and again like a replaceable object.

‘…As an android who isn’t exactly ‘alive’, I’d like to know what mark I would leave.’

Your hands trembled as your chest tightened into a vice grip. You couldn’t breathe.

Stop it.

He’s only using you for his own means. You don’t matter to him.

‘I’ll be your friend.’

‘Maybe I just want to make that sad look on your face disappear.’

He looked so peaceful, so innocent and so forgiving. Not like you who had been dirtied by the sins of humanity. You knew that even if you shot him, he would still smile and say ‘I understand.’

Shut up. Shut up. Shut up!

He’s just faking everything. He’s just deceiving you YN.

‘Thank you for trusting me.’

You screamed one painful cry; your knees giving way and sunk to the carpet in a thud. Hands propping you up as tears continued to stream down your face, you couldn’t stop crying all the pain you held inside for all these years. It was too painful.

You can’t do it.

“Just kill me now, goddamn it!” you shouted yet your eyes were looking at the floor, too scared to know if he was awake or not. “If you’re planning to kill me eventually, then do it now! Kill me now while I still trust you!”

In the midst of your endless sobs, you felt strong arms pull you into a tight embrace; wrapping you with all the love and warmth he could muster in one single action. You could only bury yourself to his chest, clutching to his shirt as if you were holding on to him for support.

“Kill me now, Hansol…”

“I won’t kill you YN. I have no intentions of ever hurting you,” he whispered as he brushed your hair gently with his fingers.

“How could you fucking say that!” you exclaimed; screams muffled. “I keep on hurting you! Hell, I even pointed a gun to you while you were sleeping! How…how could you just forgive me like that…”

“You only did what you needed to do, and if you need to kill me, then I wouldn’t mind dying. I understand that there are things you must sacrifice.”

As soon as you heard those words, you looked up to him with aghast. You could see that despite what he had said, you saw a flicker of pain in his eyes; a sadness that was accepted because there are things you simply cannot change.

“W-why…?” you asked as your heart poured out for him. “Why are you saying that even though it hurts you…?”

Hansol made a small smile and wiped away the tear stains away from your cheeks. “Because you’re the first person who ever trusted me, and it made me so happy to stay by your side all this time. That’s why even if it hurts, I feel relieved that I can at least make you happy in return.”

Stabbing pain filled your chest as if you were being pierced through by laser beams numerous times. You could feel yourself tremble as tears threatened to spill from your eyes once again; grasping to his shirt as if he might slip away any time soon.

“You fucking idiot…!” you muttered through your sobs. “You think I can still retire you after saying that? I can’t do it. I can’t…Hansol…I don’t know how or why but you matter so much to me now.”

His hand that was on your cheeks continued to caress you as gently as he could; not letting you go until you stopped crying. For some reason, he felt touched that you were pouring out all of your thoughts to him among all people in the world.

“I always kept myself so busy all this time just to distract me from all the loneliness I was feeling. I always try to be tough and cold so that my emotions wouldn’t get the best of me. But…but you showed me something I had thrown away a long time ago. You cared for me even though I tried to kill you so many times and it hurts so much how you are able to forgive me like that. I don’t deserve any of these, Hansol. I don’t deserve you.”

As he comforted you, he could feel his chest swell with so much emotion. You were crying for him, and he couldn’t help but share a bit of that pain as well. Picking up your hand, he slowly intertwined his fingers around yours and gazed at you with those eyes that easily seized you; body and soul.

“I feel like I should be saying something now but I don’t know what,” he whispered. “That’s why, I’ll just show you how I feel.”

Cupping your cheek with his hand, Hansol slowly reduced the distance between the two of you until his lips met yours in a soft and gentle kiss. It was warm and peaceful and light—as if everything which held you down were released and swept away by the cool breeze. You held on to his hand tightly, never letting go of this exact moment as you etched it vividly into your memory.

As the both of you pulled away, you gave him a small bashful smile.

“I think ‘I like you’ would be the best thing to say,” you whispered to him as he gave a toothy grin.

“You finally smiled,” he remarked as he allowed your foreheads to touch.

“Because of you.”

The both of you stayed that way until you felt your heart calm down. That night seemed to have uprooted all of your being—everything that you have built upon yourself for all these years was turned upside down. It was like a transformation; yet rather than frightening, it felt cathartic in some sense.

“Say, YN,” Hansol started, breaking the companiable silence the two of you shared. “Why did you become a bounty hunter?”

“Hm?” you hummed, gazing at your carpet as if it was the most interesting thing in the world. “Good question. Why did I become a bounty hunter?”

“You don’t know the answer?”

“I do know why,” you replied as you became more contemplative. “I think I was just too angry at the world. Angry that I was all alone; angry that no one really cared. So, I searched for ways to release that anger. That’s when I found myself wanting to be a bounty hunter.”

He pulled you closer, nuzzling to your shoulder; wanting to give comfort to the both of you. “Did you grow up like that?”

Amused by his question, you chuckled. “The thing is, when you are made from a glass incubator, it feels like you’re an artificial existence. Even if there are parents or siblings, most of them just kind of want to play house or something. When they’re done, you get thrown out. That’s it. And somehow just like that, I ended up all alone.”

Hansol was quiet, feeling like you weren’t done talking yet.

“When I met you…when I got to spend time with you, it felt like I was in a foreign territory. I wasn’t used being taken care of. It’s always just me so, I was scared as fuck that maybe this wonderful thing wouldn’t really last. That maybe you were just deceiving me and I was being an idiot for believing that life would finally give me some slack.”

You continued. “That’s why, I thought…let’s just end this with my own two hands. That way I can still have my dignity intact.”

As soon those words left your lips, the android embracing you hugged you tighter—a silent declaration that he was never going to let you go; that you deserved better and he will give everything just to make you happy.

“I don’t think I can ever leave you, YN. I was lucky that it was you who I met that night. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be able to understand myself or what I was feeling. I wouldn’t be able to experience a normal everyday life if I hadn’t met you. You have become someone important to me as well.”

At that night, as you finally fell asleep on Hansol’s shoulders, he easily carried you to your bed and gently laid you there without making a sound. Unable to resist, he slipped under the covers and silently watched your chest breathing in and out.

It was the first time he felt this way. It was unbelievable.

Combing your hair as softly as he could, Hansol contemplated this future with you. He was incredibly happy, if that was how the beautiful feeling in his chest should be called—how you embraced him tightly, how you grinned at him and held his hand. Those were things he could never forget.

With that said, he had to ensure that everything would stay as it is as long as it could. Using the built-in network among the SVT-line androids, he made a call.

Beep. Beep.

Click.

“Hello, brother? It’s me, Hansol. I need your help.”

The sun was still shining like any other day; as if it was unbothered by the egregious happenings of your life. Just like how it was during your first day as a bounty hunter.

Yet everything was different now. The anger that you held on to for far too long was released to the polluted city air just like scattered ashes of a bygone age. Now you have to rebuild yourself from scratch; to start anew and live differently than what you were doing all these years. Yet you weren’t alone this time, you had Hansol to support you along the way as the both of you rediscover life and the whole point of it.

That’s why it’s important to cut the few loose strings you had and tie them securely so they wouldn’t unravel in the future.

It was your last day on the job. Your last hunt.

“YN.”

You heard Morrison call you, turning to the direction where you had heard him. You were about to leave with your hovercraft to the designated location where the andy was reported yet he had stopped before you ever could.

“Last time, I—”

“It’s ok,” you cut him off. “I think I needed it to realize what I truly want to do with my life. Being a bounty hunter taught me a lot but I guess we just overgrow things.”

“Are you sure?” he asked you.

“Yes, you could say I was happy with my decision.” You scratched the nape of your neck. “You know, I think I understand now why Choi Seungcheol left.”

Morrison grinned. “Oh, really now?”

“Yeah. I think he realized the same thing as I did,” you replied, hands on your pockets. You just can’t live with anger in your heart.

Your partner genuinely smiled at you and give you a pat on the back. “Well then, it was great working with you, YN. You’ve been phenomenal.”

“Thank you. It was a pleasure working with you as well Morrison,” you grinned. “Now, time to go for my last hunt.”

“Good luck. Don’t go easy on the andy now,” he replied while you hopped into your hovercraft.

“You bet I won’t,” you replied, smiling. “Well, see you later then!”

With those words, you turned on the hovercraft as it slowly ascended to the skies. You could see down below Morrison who was looking up at you with a bittersweet smile on his face. This business was indeed dying.

“Alright. Time for my swan song.”

Your destination for today was in Sector 12, where all the warehouses and cargo facilities were located as they enter the West Martian colony. The andy in question was a normal escapee posing as a cargo boy—which was as common as it could get.

You hoped that your last andy should’ve at least been a little more challenging. But alas, you can’t have everything.

Turning the steering wheel to the side, you avoided a tall building and continued cruising through the sector with nothing much in mind. That is until something entered the hovercraft; making it shake through the skies like a rogue vehicle.

You clung to the wheel as you braced the impact, avoiding getting tossed to the air like a pancake. Still recovering from the shock, you were greeted by a punch which completely obliterated the hovercraft’s UI and had just missed your head by a hair.

Turning around, you saw that it was the android you were supposed to retire today—seemingly fallen from god knows where to your lap. Just like how Hansol just came to you that night. Lucky.

“Don’t underestimate me, fucker,” you exclaimed as you grabbed its arm with both your hands and levered it with your shoulder to the air, sending it flying to one of the buildings below. Taking your two trusty laser guns, you jumped off of the already derailing hovercraft before it plummeted to the ground in an explosion of fire and smoke.

Landing safely to one of the rooftops, you spotted the andy running away from you.

“Hey! Don’t get cowardly now!”

Shouting, you continued to shoot laser beams at its direction, pissed that it was playing some game of tag. With a head start of a few meters and an exceptional speed, there was no way you could ever catch up to an android. The only way you could ever gain an advantage was to play the strategy game.

Disappearing from view, you hid yourself as you pursued it; minding your distance so it wouldn’t be able to detect your presence with any of its scanners. Since the andy you were after had a Nexus 6 processor, it can see you through thermal readings which had a scanning radius of a few meters.

Confused of your vanishing act, the android in question stopped running and looked around. There was no sign of you yet you can see it using a special set of goggles which was luckily inside your pocket than in the hovercraft.

As it walked in search of you, you fired your laser guns to the distance which predictably alarmed the android and dashed to where it came from. And just like that, you were able to lay your ambush—jumping out from high ground and trapping it in place.

When do they even learn? You’ve done this technique so many times that it was hardly clever strategy to you anymore.

You shot it with your laser gun, missing its head in just a few centimeters. That however, was a fatal mistake as it swerved your leg around, tripping you to the ground in the process. Without stopping, the android then aimed for your head with its fist which could’ve easily broke your skull if not for the fact that you rolled out of the way just in time.

Even if your head was still reeling and you were still on the ground, you kicked its torso with both your feet as it staggered and lost balance. You ran off somewhere, picking up both your laser guns as it continued to pursue you.

Man, I judged this way too early.

Now that the tables have turned, the both you found yourselves inside a warehouse complex devoid of any human or andy. It was kind of strange that there was no one in sight except for the both of you, yet you shouldn’t really be wondering about that when an andy is after you with a huge metal pipe.

Now that you think about it, why was it even running after you? And why did it attack you in the first place? Shouldn’t it be running away from you?

You couldn’t find time to answer those questions when a pipe was hurled at your direction, hitting the cargo container you were hiding behind and piercing through the metal. You could’ve died if not for your quick reflexes. Clearly annoyed at being in the defensive, you faced the android square on and fired your laser guns at it as fast as you could.

A laser beam hit it on its chest and then on its legs, creating rather large gaping holes on its body. When you were near enough, you kicked it hard; crashing against the doors of the warehouse which opened upon impact. In one final blow, you shot through its processor at point blank.

It fell down to the ground in one swoop. It was all over. The final hunt was done.

“YN…?”

You heard your name being called by a familiar voice you never expected to hear while you were in the middle of a hunt. In an instant, you turned your head and saw with great surprise the person you had trusted the most.

“Hansol? What are you doing here?”

“No, what are you doing here?” he answered back. “You shouldn’t be here!”

“Looks like the final guest has arrived.” A figure from the shadows appeared; a gentle expression was on his face yet there was something dark looming just underneath his presence. “Took me some time to get you moving but looks like it went well.”

“Joshua, what’s the meaning of this?” Hansol asked, his eyes dark like coal; brimming with suspicion and fury.

“Joshua? Isn’t he one of your brothers and wasn’t he the one responsible for the AI hack that night?” You asked Hansol with incredulity bearing in your eyes.

You were standing there in the midst of it all, mouth ajar and eyes wide; unable to follow what was happening. You didn’t understand why Hansol was there or why he seemed to dislike his brother. If anything, it all seemed to suspicious.

“You’re right, YN. I am one of Hansol’s brothers and the AI hack was my work,” the android calmly replied which made you feel uneasy.

“And there’s no meaning at all, brother. I just wanted to meet YN,” he replied, shrugging with a carefree smile. “And besides, you did ask for my help.”

“I didn’t ask for your help. I came because you threatened to hurt her.”

Hurt me? You dared to take a look at Joshua who seemed to notice your apprehension yet only smiled so serenely—making it even more menacing.

“Ah, as honest as ever, huh?” Joshua replied as he pocketed his hands. “Or not.”

There was no denying that Hansol gazed at Joshua with contempt; the first time you have ever seen him display such a negative emotion. You now wondered what Joshua had done in order to push Hansol, who was as kind as ever, to treat him that way.

“Did you forget what happened to that family of six a few months ago? You know, that one in Palmaide.”

Joshua continued when Hansol refused to reply. You blinked several times at his words, feeling like you were familiar with the story one way or another. At the mere mention of the memory, Hansol immediately grit his teeth; sending death glares to the other android.

“Oh? Why are you looking at me like that?” Joshua asked, and then grinned, a malicious lilt in his voice appearing all of the sudden. “You didn’t tell YN, did you?”

“Tell me what?” you answered back with a clipped tone. “Tell me what, Hansol?”

In the midst of your questions, Hansol could only furrow his brow and purse his lips. He turned his head to the side, unable to face you.

“I-I…I’m sorry. I just…I always wanted to tell you…” he began, his voice unsteady.

“What is it?” you asked again, completely alarmed and afraid of what he might say.

“I—”

“He’s partly responsible for six deaths in the Palmaide Apartments.”

Joshua was the one who answered for him; malaise dripping from every word like thick poison. You could only gaze at him with disbelief and turned to Hansol for an explanation yet he couldn’t even look at you.

“Is that true, Hansol?” you asked, your voice a mere whisper; smelling the scent of betrayal.

“I…I didn’t want to hurt them,” he answered you as he trembled like a leaf in the wind. “Joshua was—”

“I did most of the killing but he just stood there, you know? Watching as I sliced open everyone and bury them to the wall,” Joshua interrupted. “Why the wall you ask? Don’t you think human guts look pretty when displayed?”

“You sick fucker!”

You pointed both laser guns to Joshua who only looked at you curiously even though you were shaking with anger. He seemed totally unperturbed by everything; a testament that he was far from sane.

“You shouldn’t be pointing your gun at me,” he replied as he leaned his head to the side. “Hansol was only lying to you, you know…saying he cares about you. Soon enough, I’ll be dissecting you and he’ll just watch me do it with those eyes you love so much.”

You wondered if the empathy organ really exists; wondering if Joshua had one or if Hansol had one. They could really be deceiving you for all you know. Back and forth, you tossed possibilities and motives inside your head, unsure of who to believe.

In the end, you gradually moved the guns to Hansol’s direction; your eyes meeting his. He looked hurt, but you could never really tell if that was real or something faked. Even if you had so many years of experience, the true test of your instincts was at that exact moment. It was only you who could determine who to trust.

Joshua grinned at the whole situation.

“You, move!”

You ordered which Hansol promptly followed, walking to the left and in front of Joshua. Still with the guns pointed at him, you continued to shout.

“Hansol, explain to me what happened.”

With your demands, Hansol flinched and then bit his lip, scared of what you would say if he told you the truth yet obeyed you nonetheless.

“At that time, I was so shocked—I just…I didn’t know what to do,” he began as he fiddled with his fingers. “I tried to stop Joshua…and we got into a fight. I lost and the next thing I knew I was in the wall as well…”

“YN, I’m…I’m really sorry…I-I—” he continued as his voice trembled and his heart beating wildly. “I didn’t know what you’ll say. I tried to save them but I was too late…the whole thing…it scares me sometimes. I don’t want it to happen ever again. That’s why I want to protect people as much as I can…”

About to say something, the sound of slow clapping stopped you from continuing. You gazed at Joshua who was looking at the whole thing with an amused expression.

“How heroic. You can’t obviously fall for that, YN, can you?” the android remarked, his arrogance obvious. “Don’t you think it’s now time to shoot?”

“You’re right,” you replied with such a cool and calm voice; as if a decision had finally dawned on you.

Hansol feared for the worst but like he said, there was nothing he could do if you decide to kill him. If that’s what makes you happy, then he understands. If that will make you more at peace, then he can forgive you. It hurts but it hurts him more if he sees you in despair.

You breathed in, and then breathed out. With eyes that seem to pierce right through Hansol’s being, you gazed at him with those clear looks as you pointed your gun at him.

“Keep still!”

You shouted at Hansol while the other tensed up. It was not a moment to falter.

In a heartbeat, you pressed both triggers. Hansol closed his eyes and braced for the impact. Even with death at his doorstep, he can proudly say that he loves you.

“You bitch!”

Hansol could hear Joshua curse from behind him, prompting him to open both of his eyes and realize what you had just done.

Shooting two laser beams at Hansol’s direction, you deliberately missed it a few centimeters off so it would instead hit Joshua, who was right behind him. The other was of course fuming mad. Before Hansol could reorient himself however, you grabbed his hand and began running.

“I’ve seen way better acting than yours, motherfucker!” You screamed with delight as you saw Joshua bending over to a partially burnt arm and leg; throwing murderous glances at you.

“What…?” Hansol asked but you only grinned at him, squeezing his hand.

“Let’s go! I don’t think I can wipe him out with just that.”

Dashing towards the exit, you were stopped by throes of androids who blocked the way. You clicked your tongue—totally forgetting that Joshua’s main ability was designed to overwhelm the opponent— and tried to find another way out.

“Ah, even that wouldn’t work, huh?” the voice behind you resounded across the empty warehouse. “I tried so hard to eliminate you, YN. If I didn’t, Hansol would never give up his weak mindset of protecting people. Too bad.”

While he was busy with his evil villain monologue, you were trying to find a way out of your situation. The entrance was blocked and you could take a gander that the whole building was surrounded as well. You had totally forgotten about his abilities, and Hansol couldn’t be of much help either since he was never made for this kind of combat. Oh for Pete’s sake!

“Oh well, so much for trying,” he sighed. “Everyone, you can dispose of them now.”

Shit.

You gazed at Hansol for an answer yet you noticed that he was only standing there with the most composed expression he could ever muster in a situation like this.

“We have to get out of here, Hansol!” you exclaimed, seizing his hand yet he didn’t budge a single inch at all.

He was just staring at one random spot in the warehouse.

“What…”

“Sorry I was late.”

A voice you have never heard before now echoed across the area. You looked up and saw someone standing by the mezzanine, leaning against the rusted railings as if they had no care in the world.

“Jihoon. You took your time,” Hansol responded, smiling.

“Why are you here?!” Joshua shouted, now even more furious at the turn of events. For some reason, you sensed that he had just lost his upper hand.

“Hansol asked for my help. So, I came,” Jihoon replied while you noticed black diamonds floating high above the air and settled in to surround the whole place. “He knew you were bound to cause some trouble, and you did.”

“If you think you’re one step ahead of us, we are two steps ahead of you,” Hansol continued. “Jihoon and my abilities are a good match after all.”

The android who was at the center of it all was silent as he trembled with sheer rage. If you could describe the tension weighing down all of you inside that warehouse, it would be like a dense core of a black hole—as if everything was compressed to the point of singularity. You were very much afraid but you knew you were not alone.

In a quiet voice, Joshua muttered. “Get them. Kill them all.”

Without even waiting for a second, the androids from outside marched in, making you take a step back. As soon as they entered however, the androids were immediately electrocuted; shaking in a frenzy before plummeting to the ground still twitching due to the remaining electrons passing through their conductors.

“Jihoon can easily stop all of those androids. That is his main ability as a tactical adviser,” Hansol explained as he caught your shoulder. “But we should go now. Joshua will probably go after us.”

In one breath, Hansol picked you up from the ground and carried you over his shoulder; sprinting out of the warehouse by kicking a hole through the roof. You didn’t want to be carried this way but you understood why. Hansol was far faster on foot than you; besides, it was easier to shoot this way.

As expected, Joshua came running after you; cursing both your names. You began to fire at him yet he was too fast and the whole ride on Hansol’s shoulder was a little too bumpy. It wasn’t as effective as you imagined it would be.

“This won’t work” you told him, trying to distract the android chasing after you. “At this rate, my laser gun would run out of batteries, and your energy would get depleted before we could ever chase him out.”

“What are you suggesting then?” Hansol asked, climbing on top of a cargo container tower.

For a moment, you were silent as you thought of how to defeat your agile enemy.

“Say, those diamond things your brother uses…they’re the ones doing the electrocuting, aren’t they?”

Hansol nodded as he dodged the iron beams being hurled at you both. “Yes, they’re made of specials alloys that conduct well with electricity and a special aluminum coating to protect it. They can be spread out as far as a hundred meters in radius.”

You grinned. “Perfect. Now, this is what we’re going to do.”

It had been quiet for a while.

Joshua clearly lost the both of you when you made use of a container full of flour to mask your escape earlier. But he wasn’t going back. He was incredibly furious and the both of you needed to pay before he could make Jihoon suffer.

He paused and looked around. Something was in the air but he didn’t know what it was.

Without warning, a laser beam appeared out of nowhere and hit him behind his shoulder; making him stumble forward and almost pushing him to the ground. Before he could even recover, another one came flying from a different direction—now to his left.

“Calculate the angle for me, Hansol,” you ordered; a massive railgun at your grasps. It was a sleek black gun that was propped up behind a cargo container.

The both of you were actually far from where Joshua was at but with the help of Jihoon’s diamond things—as you aptly described it—scattered across the sector, you were able to locate Joshua as well as shooting him from a distance in various directions.

How? Well…

“39.9 degrees up, 5 degrees to the right, yes…” Hansol replied as he watched over your shoulder.

Immediately, you found the right coordinates and fired the railgun—the sound of its energy loading up increasing the adrenaline in your veins. The laser beam hit one of the diamonds floating above you, but instead of destroying it, the magnetic field generated by the diamond bent the laser beam as it ricochets to another diamond a few distance away, sitting at a perfect angle to hit Joshua. Like a game of BBTan.

There were several diamonds sitting just above the two of you which you alternated with so that Joshua wouldn’t be able to tell where the laser beams were coming from.

“Good thing Jihoon brought Soonyoung’s railgun,” Hansol remarked as he fixed your goggles from before; adjusting it so that he can transmit signals to it.

“Soonyoung’s another brother right?” you asked as you adjusted the crossfires of the massive gun. “Is he dangerous?”

“If you’re asking if he’s dangerous to humans like Joshua, then no,” he readily replied. “As a military-grade android, then yes. He’s the true combatant-type. I don’t think any bounty hunter can deal with him.”

You whistled. “That’s scary. I’m glad he’s not the one I was assigned to hunt.”

“He’s too carefree to be able to pull off something like this though, and Jihoon has him on a leash anyway. I’m not worried.”

Chuckling, you pulled your attention off of the railgun and turned to Hansol. “Is he still moving?”

“He’s at a weakened state now. I think I’ll handle this on my own. This is something between us, after all.”

“Sometimes I envy your sense of composure,” you remarked as you sighed. “Don’t die on me.”

“I don’t plan to.”

Just as he had said, Hansol stepped out of one of the cargo containers to face a rather battered Joshua. Using his state-of-the-art processor, he assessed that Joshua was only hanging due to the immense anger he feeling and one powerful strike can finish him off in an instant.

“Didn’t think you’d show up,” Joshua remarked his face marred with bruises and burnt marks.

“I thought maybe you’d want to give up,” Hansol replied. “I don’t want to hurt you any more than this.”

Joshua furrowed his brows as he threw daggers with his eyes at Hansol. “Save me the heroics. I’m not weak like you. I don’t need humans to help me.”

“We’re made with the same materials; the same blueprint, Joshua. You have to accept that you have an empathy organ inside of you, and rejecting it any further would lead you to deteriorate.”

“Don’t make me laugh. The empathy organ isn’t real!” He scoffed. “Jihoon made a wrong interpretation of the data he gathered.”

“I disagree,” Hansol replied. “The data I have gathered says otherwise. It was consistent to Jihoon’s findings.”

“Who would’ve guessed you got smitten by that bounty hunter! I guess I just have to convince you out of it,” Joshua grinned.

Without warning, Joshua sprinted from his position; throwing a high velocity kick towards Hansol’s direction. Hansol immediately blocked it with his arms and clutched Joshua’s ankle; smashing him down to the ground in an explosive crash.

Through the cloud of dust, Joshua hurled debris towards Hansol’s direction which he easily dodged. However, he wasn’t prepared when the other android suddenly flew at his direction; hands outstretched to grab on Hansol’s neck.

Hansol immediately countered, ducking below and grabbing the other’s neck in a chokehold before slamming Joshua back to the ground. He picked him up soon after and tossed him faraway like a curve ball. Joshua caught himself flying and saw himself crashing to the concrete floor; shards of rock and dust clouds up in the air.

“You know you’re no match for me if I use my predictive algorithms,” Hansol remarked as he looked down on Joshua who was lying on the floor. “Especially at that state.”

The other android grinned as he wiped leaked fluids from his lips. “I’m impressed. By asking Jihoon for help, the only one who could counter my AI hacking, then have your girlfriend shoot lasers to weaken me, and then finally attacking me one-on-one where you have the upper hand—your android side is showing.”

“I never denied my identity as an android. I will always be made of artificial materials. But I will not deny the fact that I have developed emotions and a consciousness of my own,” Hansol answered. “We will always be creatures of myth—a cold android swayed by their own emotions.”

Joshua spat on the floor; disgusted by his brother’s words. “I will never be like you!”

Again, he sprung from the ground and dashed towards Hansol.

The other easily countered everything his brother threw at him. As Joshua hurled an uppercut, Hansol dodged and smashed his fist at Joshua’s stomach; the other immediately curling.

“Stop this already!” Hansol pleaded; his chest tightening at how stubborn his brother could be, even to the point of near death.  

“Fuck you.”

Joshua stood up, trying to land a blow on Hansol yet he was already struggling to stand upright. Hansol dodged the attack as he pushed Joshua away, putting in more distance between them. Every time Joshua tried to strike, he only ducked, dodged or jumped above the other.

“You’re looking down on me, huh? You think you’re above everyone else just because you think you understand yourself!” Joshua shouted.

“I’m not! Why are you even doing this?” Hansol replied as he bit his lip. He can no longer bear looking at his brother who he once looked up to.

“He’s right, you know?”

Jihoon’s voice resounded across the area, floating diamonds following just behind him. “It’s time for you to stop.”

Joshua clicked his tongue, knowing full well that he can’t take on both Hansol and Jihoon at the same time. With barred teeth, he glared at both his brothers.

“We’re not done here yet.”

With those words, he jumped off the building where a hovercraft caught him and escaped away from the city skylines. Hansol and Jihoon watched as their brother left, realizing that they must take significant measures to prevent Joshua from hurting anyone ever again.

“Did you do what I told you?” Jihoon asked Hansol, who only nodded in response. “We’ll have to deal with him sooner or later.”

“He’s not going to stop, is he?” Hansol responded as Jihoon turned around and waved his hand.

“It’s going to take a lot to stop him. We might need Soonyoung after all,” he replied, and then stopped walking, averting his gaze to Hansol. “While we’re planning things, you should enjoy this down time with your girlfriend. Things might get a little heated soon.”

Somewhere inside a fully automated café, Hansol was sitting beside you as he observed the people walking to and fro outside the busy street. He had been staying with you since that night and he was more than satisfied to explore his newfound freedom with you.

“So, you quit as well, huh?” a deep voice echoed across the café filled with people dressed in weird latex suits—you three being the only people dressed normally.

“There’s…I just don’t know…Seungcheol,” you replied, looking at your cup of macchiato with a pensive expression. “Sometimes, I get nightmares.”

The other man chuckled. “That those andys you retired might be human, right? Me too.”

You gave a bitter smile. “Humans and androids all seems to identical nowadays. Especially with that new research about human-android relationships…I feel like I’m killing humans when I retire androids…”

Seungcheol mirrored your expression.

“I felt the same. I felt like that for years…and the last one I did, SVT-class Type-07 Woozi…I couldn’t do it anymore. That android was too close to a human being. It was protecting its girlfriend,” Seungcheol recounted, as you looked at a newspaper article featuring a top scientist with a blond android leading the research on humans and androids, on top of the table.

“That line…there were rumors that there was an empathy organ embedded on its androids,” you remarked, relaying a very well-known information.

“He’s part of that line, isn’t he?” Seungcheol asked with a father-like knowing grin as he sipped his coffee—his eyes staring at the direction of a distracted Hansol.

You threw a smirk at him. “I couldn’t retire him. How could I refuse if he asked me to trust him?”

Your companion chuckled. “These andys knowing what to throw at us bounty hunters. But I didn’t regret letting that android live.”

You glanced at Hansol, and as soon as he realized your gaze, he looked at you curiously. “Me too. I think I’m at peace more than I was before. I didn’t realize it, but I was being stubborn.”

“You don’t dislike them anymore?” Seungcheol asked.

“I still dislike all this baloney,” you scoffed, pointing at your surroundings filled with people in white overalls with expressions induced by chemicals. “But I don’t dislike him.”

Seungcheol raised his brows at you. “I’m surprised you accepted the existence of an empathy organ.”

“I can’t deny that I’m skeptical about it, but I also can’t deny the fact that Hansol is different compared to all the androids I’ve met before. He made me realize how much anger I was hiding inside of me. He doesn’t make me feel lonely as this city does.”

“People are living in spaces separate from each other…not caring, not loving. It’s funny, you know?” you continued when your companion didn’t reply. “Androids are becoming more human, as humans become more robotic. You’d wonder what the future holds for us.”

He nodded in understanding.

“Yeah, you’d wonder.”

[ambiguousdisorderken]

christmas time.

what about dean and cas going christmas shopping together huh? what about cas buying stupidly cute plushies and board games for jack and dean saying how the kid's neither a toddler nor an actual kid blah blah so obviously dean ends up swiping his credit card to pay for an overpriced set of legos. it's star wars, okay? which does nothing to erase the smug look from cas’ face.

he also ends up paying for all the plushies and board games and tees (”seriously cas, spongebob?” to which cas flatly states “jack likes yellow”) and (fugly) sweaters and a pack of ridiculous reindeer antlers headbands. for fuck’s sake. is this the type of person dean is now?

then again, he could be doing worse.

on the way to the car, dean asks what cas wants for christmas, but cas only smiles and says there's no need for dean to trouble himself with that. dammit cas. 

"so what, opening boxes and tearing wrappers off, that’s just for jack?" he half jokes, hoping for cas to hint at whatever he may need or want for himself, anything. if cas can name it, dean can get it.

"well, he is our kid, dean. i believe it's common for parents to just sit and watch throughout the unwrapping process." cas states matter-of-factly. "isn't it?" he adds, maybe to get confirmation.

definitely to get some sort of response. not whatever dean is offering, which is... nada.

cas just stands there, nose reddened by the cold and hair wind-swept.

as if he hasn't flipped dean's world topsy-turvy with that one array of words. cas is, for all it matters, jack's father, no questions. and, objectively, dean knows jack is family as much as sam and cas are.

hell, dean feeds jack properly (he’s hitting the produce section more often these days) and watches crappy shows and cartoons because jack wants to (scooby-doo will outlive us all, bitch) and he even taught jack how to drive, the memory of which still shocks him to this day, trusting baby into the kid’s uneducated hands. as for jack, he’s called him ‘dad’ on occasions, and dean treasures deeply each and every one of them, but it’s not something he can brag about with the cashier at the local liquor store that also sells nougats or the one at the grocery shop that carries a specific brand of juice or the one at the 24/7 pharmacy on main where he went get cough drops when jack came down with a mundane yet nasty case of flu, okay. so maybe, if only a little, he really is going all paternal on the kid. sue him. but this... put in simpler words, viewed from cas' perspective? if cas is jack's father and jack calls dean his dad and –okay sammy is also raising the kid, but his family has never been nothing if a little dysfunctional, and the dude’s been spending an awful lot of time at eileen’s, whatever– then that means–

"dean, are you okay?" cas asks tilting his head a little, and it tugs something in dean’s heart. the gesture reminds him of jack. their goddamn child. the same one they're raising. together. and who’s the reason that, three days before christmas, he and cas went to multiple jam-packed stores at the frigging mall, that’s more than an hour and a half drive away from the bunker to buy a bunch of christmas presents.

fuck.

overcome the brain-freeze, dean realizes they're a family. and the word, his long-term security blanket for all emotional outpours, takes a whole ass new meaning.

a family.

they even have the damn cutesy dog.

dean stares at cas and eyes the excessive amount of shopping bags he's holding. he smiles, and cas mirrors it.

if dean was corny, he'd think of how the pale sky threatening to snow makes cas look angelic again, now that his grace has been lost to the empty. but dean's not a pathetic sap, so he settles for the thought of cas looking like a very human blessing, as well as the only gift dean will ever want, not only for christmas but for all the days he's got left to live on this earth. and in heaven. maybe for forever.

"'m okay" he finally replies with a smile stretching the words. "more than okay, cas."

cas nods, quiet contentment wrinkling the corners of his eyes.

definitely for forever.

on the way to the bunker– no, on the way home, they make a few stops to gather supplies for the unforgettable dinner that dean has in mind (pie trifecta is what's got him the most excited. it's pie!) and some shit to decorate too.

cas goes on merrily talking about their holiday plans and jack's childish enthusiasm for everything christmas related, which, in turn, makes cas look also childlike, and damn if that isn't making dean feel giddy too.

dean feels drunk, like he drank one too many cups of that frozen kiddie champagne they saw at the store with elsa smirking at the front of the label. he laughs at nothing, at everything. cas is right there with him, echoing the sheer self-indulgent joy that suffocates them.

he veers for one last stop. this is a sort of first for all of them, this type of christmas. it has a different, warmer, tone to it. safe and mushy and loving and all that. so what if he wants to get it right?

on the radio, mariah the-traitor carey, proclaims, in that 90s pop glitzy voice of hers, all i want for christmas is you.

as they pull in at the tree farm snowflakes begin to fall gently on the windshield. with the engine dead, the temperature has dropped low enough to have their breaths turn into misty clouds, yet dean is burning under the collar of his jacket.

fuck.

he's a grown-up man in his forties and he’s freaking out. except, he isn’t.

except he's in some sort of magic trance because right in this very second he feels – no, he is a teenage boy, sweating. breathing all but forgotten and reduced to a nervous wreck, a train wreck. scared shitless.

he's a boy in his car about to kiss his crush.

and just like a reckless teenager, he does. he kisses cas, not before getting a silent confirmation from cas' tentative yet hopeful gaze and chapped pink lips.

he doesn’t know how long they kiss, it could’ve gone on endlessly, with how smooth their lips glide against each other despite the stubble and with how cas comes up for air to hold dean’s face in both his hands, with how he speaks those same words he confessed not so long ago, this time with nothing but his devoted touch and his all too caring eyes. it could’ve gone on endlessly, but it slowed down once the windshield got covered in white and the sky turned from light blue to a silvery hue.

cas knows, he does. he’s always known. but dean’s done with truths left unspoken, and if he’s happy with what he’s got right now, then saying it will give him the golden ticket right into fucking paradise on earth. it should be difficult, but it’s not. it comes to him as easy as a lovefool’s sigh.

“i love you too, cas. i love you so much.”

this year they won’t only have a christmas, they will actually celebrate it. and no, dean won’t need the excuse of standing beneath the mistletoe to kiss cas – former angel of the lord, now father of his child– but he’ll be damned if he won’t do it anyway just to wring out a squeal of surprise from their kid. jack will be over the moon, dean’s sure of it.

he couldn’t be doing any better.

[moiralovestowrite]

A Titan’s Gamble Chapter 4

The moment Ryan stepped into the Spider’s den a horrible stench overcame him. The man’s dark brown eyes instantly watered, it was so powerful it almost knocked the Titan off his feet, causing Drifter to let out a chuckle. The older man was used to this, the shit he smelt when he was out on his own trying to survive, this was fresh air compared to his adventures. It was a mixture of gasoline, blood and sweat. There were other scents hidden within the stench but Ryan wasn’t exactly interested in finding out what they were. Drifter walked ahead of the man with Erebus directly by his back, she was clearly protecting him, making sure nothing could get to him when his attention was forward. They must have done this thousands of times. Their movements were almost snake like, they trusted each other to the moon and back. Ryan was behind the woman, constantly checking over his shoulder. As they walked the Titan thought he realized his role in this whole operation. He was the muscle, Drifter was going to use him to try and scare whatever was down there. The Titan prayed that he could fit the role and that nothing went awry. Little did the man know that he wasn’t there to strike fear into anyone. He was part of a deal. After a few minutes of thin hallways, they made their way up to one of the strongest fallen in the universe. Drifter had said it’s name was Spider, the only law on the Shore. The creature was bigger than any Fallen Ryan had ever seen. It’s stomach bounced as the Eliksni spoke and coughed, it’s eyes were like daggers piercing into someone’s soul. It held a royal kind of energy, someone who gives orders and plans attacks. Ryan knew very little of the Fallen. The Titan in a way felt responsible for the Traveler leaving the Eliksni. The strange god had decided to bless them, abandoning the Fallen, letting them suffer in the darkness and made them become pirates, mercenaries, desperately trying to find a new home. It turned the Titan’s stomach, causing Ryan to try and forget any information about the race. It only reminded the Guardian that the Traveler could leave them without even a moment’s notice. “Ah, if it isn’t my little...Friends.” The Spider spat his words at the Drifter, his right arm fiddling with what appeared to be a dead ghost while his other arms rested on his legs. The Titan’s eyes snapped onto the dead ghost shell, anger beginning to rise. What the hell?! The Eliksni smirked, seeing that he had caught Ryan’s attention. The creature’s gaze moved on from Drifter’s form and onto the Guardian. “I see you brought a new pet.” Clearly this was a jab at Erebus but the woman neither moved nor spoke. What’s your name?” The Titan’s fist clenched as he attempted to tear his eyes off the dead ghost. Quickly, his brown eyes met with the fat Spider’s, it was clear the creature was trying to dominant him. “Ryan. Maybe stop playing with a dead thing huh? Show it some respect.” The Titan snapped, refusing to let his eye contact with Spider sway. The creature was silent for a moment before he broke into laughter. “Have it your way.” Suddenly, Spider crushed the ghost shell within his hand and let the bits of metal tumble to the ground. “Whoops…” Ryan’s eyes sharpened as he felt his face turn hot. The Titan’s form flinched as he felt a cold hand on his back through his armor. It was Erebus attempting to calm him down. She moved from Drifter, standing next to the Guardian giving him a look. With a deep breath Ryan tore his eyes away from Spider, allowing the Fallen to win the battle of dominancy and took a step back. Erebus gave the man a nod of thanks before she made her way back over to Drifter. The Fallen watched the woman return to her boss’s side. The creature had an interest in her, if only he could get his fingers on the snake. If he had her, Spider was certain Drifter would do anything to get her back. “Maybe someday I can see under that mask, perhaps I would lessen the price of some supplies.” The Spider purred at the woman. The brunette did not respond as she stood silently next to her boss. She was like a brick wall. Drifter purred right back at Spider. “See, she only does that for people she likes, maybe toss in a few extra things and we can see about next time huh?” The fallen clearly did not appreciate the teasing but he let it slide for the moment. “You did your part. The Glimmer is on it’s way to the tower, no tricks. Here’s your payment.” The Spider gestured to one of it’s foot soldier's holding a rather large black box. It had a strange energy humming from it. The old man’s smile was all teeth as he snapped his fingers. Erebus moved instantly, walking over to the Fallen Spider had by his side. The creature was holding the package as tightly as he could, terrified of the girl. She could almost taste the Eliksni’s fear. The woman ripped the package from the creature’s four arms and returned to her bosses side. Drifter opened the package in Erebus’s grasp as she held it out for him. With a satisfied smile, Drifter closed the package and gave Spider a nod. “Now, I have another deal for ya. I heard you were having problems with a prince.” The giant fallen’s head tilted, clearly interested in what Drifter had to say. The Shore had become an absolute mess. “I know someone who’s more than willing to take the man out, maybe even help with the Trickster and the others. For the right price.” Ryan’s eyes widened. This was it, the moment Drifter proved he would help the Titan out. But this wasn’t what they discussed. Was Drifter using him as a pawn? “And what is that price…” The Spider growled, his fingers beginning to twitch. “Simple, ya know that power supply you’ve been hiding from me? Maybe old Drifter can finally get his hands on it.” The creature went deep into thought as he debated the deal. It was clear the Eliksni didn’t trust the Drifter but the thought of restoring law to the shore and destroying those bastards was more than appealing. All of Spider’s trade routes would be clear and perhaps a Guardian wandering through the place could bring a new kind of fear and respect to the Spider. All those who dare to disobey would meet a painful end by the hands of a Titan. It was too good to be true. Ryan’s face twisted with emotion as he glared at the Drifter. He didn’t like this, this was gonna end badly, the man just knew it. After minutes of silence, no one moving and no one daring to make a sound, the Spider let out a sigh and put on his best face. “A deal’s a deal. You get the power supply the moment the shore’s clean to my standards. If it isn’t done by two weeks, you can kiss the power supply and your glimmer to the tower goodbye.” Drifter’s shoulders visibly flinched. The old man knew this was a terrible idea but he had to place it all on the Titan. With a charming smile and a shrug of his shoulders, Drifter nodded and spoke. “Sounds like a deal to me. Care to give us a lead?” The man asked in a rough voice. It was clear Drifter was playing a part, attempting not to care, pretending that this didn’t matter to him at all but in truth everything was riding on this. He needed that power supply, this is why he needed Ryan in the first place. Gambit wouldn’t be able to grow and evolve without it, of course the most stuck up creature in the universe had their grubby little fingers on it, unable to tell it’s worth. “The Rider has a den, not far from the main road. You can grab her attention easily if you can find her pikes. Her garage is nearby...” The Spider purred once more before giving a wave of his hand. Instantly the foot soldiers by his sides began to raise their weapons and walk towards the group. “See you in two weeks my friends.” Drifter quickly began to back up, Erebus stood in front of her boss as she gestured for the Titan to follow. Ryan had no complaints as he followed the two out of the den.

The moment they stepped out of the horrid den Ryan took a deep breath, thanking the Traveler that he didn’t have to take in that stench anymore. Ryan’s fists began to twitch as his mind screamed in anger. That fucker, this wasn’t part of the deal! He would help out but not like this! Cayde-6’s murderer was still out there and they were chasing one of his lackeys?! What good would this do?! Drifter’s hands went deep into his hair as his mind traveled from thought to thought. This became more intertwined with his own goals than he had wanted. If Ryan couldn’t do this, he could kiss everything goodbye. The woman saw the stress in Drifter’s eyes and gave the man a gentle pat on the back. The Drifter turned his gaze to Erebus and smiled at her genuinely. Ryan didn’t even think the man could be genuine about anything. “So was this always your plan? Use me to get what you want? Our goals cross paths and you think you can just use me?” The Titan’s voice was rough and deep, glaring at the two as he began to take long strides towards them. Erebus was quick to stand in front of Drifter, like it was a habit to protect the man. “Hey hey, Easy!” Drifter carefully moved from behind the woman’s protection and gave Ryan a look. “Ya knew I needed something from you from the start, You agreed to this...remember?” The older man’s voice was like gravel as the Titan sighed and placed a hand on the back of his neck. He was too hot headed for his own good some days. Drifter was right, he was the one who agreed to help with deals even if it ended in misery. Plus, rouge was straight forward with him the day they met. Dammit, why was Ryan like this? Swallowing his pride, Ryan looked Drifter in the eye and crossed his arms against his chest. “I’m sorry.” “Sorriest thing I’ve ever seen.” The man spat out.

“Boss, do you really want me to help?” The woman asked, confused on Drifter’s plan. He had always kept her as a guard, constantly by his side. If she hid her face and never spoke, no one would know where to look for her, she was as good as a ghost. Drifter liked it that way, she was his dirty little secret, a plan B that never expired. If she got caught and someone noticed her then that plan B would be good as gone. With a nod, the older man spoke seeing the confusion in his partner’s eyes. “Listen, if he doesn’t do this, we can kiss Gambit goodbye.” The woman’s teeth grit as worry covered her face. She didn’t like leaving Drifter alone for too long. The man always found trouble. “Then you have to promise me that you’ll stay on the Derelict and you wait.” Drifter laughed and patted the woman on the shoulder. “Hey who’s the boss here?” The man joked, attempting to lighten the mood. Erebus sighed and quickly hugged the man before she pulled back, refusing to give him anytime to react. Drifter was terrible with affection. “We’ll see you soon boss.” Drifter’s face slightly brightened with a red before he smirked, winking at the woman. With that, the man transported onto the Derelict and began his long wait. Erebus turned to Ryan, the Titan was already figuring out routes and ways to reach the Rider. “Alright, where do we start?” The woman asked, walking right up into the Titan’s personal space. Taking a step back from the snake lady Ryan spoke. “Here.” The man pointed to the road directly in front of them. “Apparently she has a den you can only enter if you have the keys, her goons have to them. They’re all riding pikes, we’ll need to steal two in order to get into the den either way.” The brunette nodded before she quickly ran into the middle of the road. A group of Scorn were already heading their way, luckily enough it was exactly the one’s they wanted. Each pike had a special flag on the back, The Rider had groups of her scorn riding around the Tangled Shore every twenty minutes or so as a fear tactic. Nothing could get on the roads without being shot down by those pikes. Erebus wasn’t waiting around. Leaving Drifter to his own devices meant she could be returning to a ship completely engulfed with flames. As the Scorn aimed their pikes for the girl, she waited. “Three...Two...ONE!” She cried out, her hands slammed upon the dirt road causing a giant wall of ice to shoot up from the ground. Each Scorn smashed into the wall, their pikes flying in different directions while the bodies of the Eliksni lay battered and broken. The ice vanished in an instant and the woman ran for one of the lesser destroyed bikes. “Grab one!” Erebus called out to the Titan who had been standing there with his jaw completely dropped. What was that power? There was no way it was from the Traveler. Now that the man thought about it, he had never seen the woman pull out a ghost. What was she? Shaking himself back into action, Ryan ran for the bodies of the Scorn. Each one was laying like a rag doll, their limbs facing different directions. As Ryan quickly searched the corpses he found what seemed to be two gold plated keys for the den. Perfect. As he grabbed a pike, Erebus quickly revved her engine and began to drive, Ryan was quick to follow. “So where are we going?!” The woman called out, looking beside her. The Titan was incredibly good at driving that damn thing, almost a natural. He caught up to her in seconds which was impressive. “To the Boils!” The woman nodded as the two shot through the Tangled Shore.

It only took them minutes to arrive. The Tangled Shore looked huge but in reality it was quite a small place. As the two drove, their eyes instantly fell upon what seemed to be a raiding party. It was directly in front of what had to be the Rider’s den entrance if the Spider had been telling the truth. Cabal had set up shop and the Scorn were fighting tooth and nail to get rid of them. The Titan watched as scorn harassed and destroyed the disgusting creatures. A part of him didn’t want to stop it, he enjoyed watching the Cabal get wrecked after what they did to the tower and the Traveler. The creatures took everything from them, this was like free therapy. Erebus was quick to jump off her pike and run towards the mess of fighting. Her hands became engulfed with ice but the Titan was quicker. Suddenly a flaming hammer flew past the woman’s head, her eyes widened as she jumped to the side, barely dodging the projectile, startled from the attack that came behind her. The hammer flew into the group of Scorn and Cabal, causing flames and a small explosion. The creatures flew through the air, dying almost instantly. The woman’s brown eyes were filled with confusion. She had never seen the light used this way. Another hammer flew towards the scattering enemies, quickly taking them out and ending their life's in a second. Were all Guardian’s this strong? DID HE JUST SUMMON A HAMMER?! The Titan’s body was covered in flames as he stood beside the shocked snake lady “What, you never see a Titan fight before?” The man teased. The woman shook her head. “Not like that…” Erebus was fairly sheltered in a way. Drifter was the only lightbearer she knew. He was there the day she was re-born and any other Guardian she crossed paths with were normally so corrupt by the Darkness that they couldn’t use anything other than Stasis. It was strange to see a Titan using his powers so fully, un-tempted by the dark. Ryan felt proud for a moment, normally he was the one impressed by the girl. He still didn’t know what powers she had, the man had no understanding of the Dark and it’s ice. One day he would. But it was too soon for that. The two quickly made their way into the tunnel behind the dead Cabal.

“Zavala, what’s happened to you?!” Ikora cried out, blood dripping from her stomach. The Titan glared down at the woman as she struggled to get to her feet. The Vanguard had lost his mind, there was no light in his eyes, only darkness and grief. The Warlock had simply wanted to check up on her friend but before she could even get a word in, a bullet shot directly through her form. Ikora didn’t dare summon her ghost, fearful of what her former friend would do. “I Woke Up.” The man snarled out taking loud thundering steps towards the woman. The warlock quickly began to back up, not wanting to hurt her fire team member. “Woke up? You’re making no sense! Look at you, Cayde wouldn’t want this!” With quick movements, Zavala aimed his sidearm at Ikora once more and pulled the trigger. The Warlock struggled a dodge, causing her form to leap to the side, crashing into the man’s bookshelf. “He would realize that this was the way.” Ikora’s teeth grit as she attempted to run for the office door. She had to get Shaxx. Another bullet fired.

“RYAN!” Yogi’s voice broke through the Titan’s head as the man used a stolen pike to jump over boiling water. The ghost was trying desperately to get his Guardian to focus, calling out enemy locations left and right. The moment the two entered the den Scorn were on them instantly. Ryan and Erebus had been lucky enough to steal pikes and shoot down wave after wave of them but they were struggling to keep up with the Rider. Her laughter taunted the Titan as the man went as fast as he could after her. “YOU’RE SLOW!” The creature sung out, taking turns faster than Ryan could register them. As the Rider prepared to take another corner and lose the man, Erebus’s pike flew out from no where, the woman had angled it perfectly from above. The Rider looked up a second too late, the creature realized that she couldn’t escape as the flying pike rammed straight into her bike and form. Erebus had jumped off seconds before the collision, her body tumbling onto the harsh rocks. The Rider’s pike exploded, flames roaring from the scrapes of the bike. Ryan pulled his pike to a stop, he scrambled from the bike, attempted to reach the woman’s form but before he could even take a step the Rider emerged from the flames, roaring with anger. Her shot gun blasted straight for the Titan, Ryan’s feet came to a halt as his brain went into panic mode. Shit. He had no escape from the bullets. Suddenly an ice wall shot straight up in front of the Titan, taking the bullets like they were no issue. Erebus struggled to her feet, her body covered in ice. Her mask had split in the middle, struggling to stay on her face. “It’s On Bitch.” The woman hissed, charging at the Scorn. Ryan smirked as the ice wall vanished, running to the woman’s side as he’s form became covered in flames. A red hot hammer appeared in the man’s hands as he began throwing them at the Rider while Erebus threw a fist full of ice, it traveled along the ground, colliding with the Rider’s form, freezing the Scorn so that the hammer could hit her square on. The creature cried out in pain as the two pummeled her, Ryan’s fists sank deep into the creature’s skin while Erebus’s ice sliced part of the Scorn’s arm off. The fight ended almost as soon as it started. The shot gun blasts couldn’t land a solid hit on the two, The woman was too quick and Ryan’s flaming body simply melted the bullets. They were an insane team. The creature let out one last pitiful laugh before she collapsed onto the ground, her body shaking as blue blood dripped from her form. A smirk crossed onto the Rider’s lips as she gasped. “You-you’ll die just like The Cayde-6!” Suddenly the Scorn pulled a small green button from her clothing pocket, her thumb slammed the button as her eyes rolled back into her head. Loud beeping echoed from every corner of the den, Erebus’s eyes filled with fear as she grabbed onto the Titan’s arm. “RUN!” She cried out. Ryan reacted instantly. “Sparrow, NOW!” Yogi was quick to comply, Ryan grabbed onto the woman, holding her by the waist and pulling her onto the bike as Ryan drove as fast as he could towards the den’s exit. The beeping began to quicken as he took the turns better than before. “Hurry!” The woman cried, her eyes scanning the area. She was so busy chasing the Rider down she hadn’t noticed the entire area was covered in old land mines, bombs, every kind of explosive. As the two reached the last turn before the exit, the bombs let out one last beep before exploding. They were so damn close to escaping. A loud bang emerged from deep within the cave before a cloud of fire, metal and dust began charging the two. The power of the bombs rocked the two off the sparrow and they flew through the air. Their bodies flew out of the den’s exit, crashing and tumbling as flames burst forth. Metal and god knows what else shot out of the Den’s entrance hitting both Erebus and the Titan, hard. Their forms became cut and bruised, they struggled to find cover as the ground shook. The woman crawled on her hands and knees behind a weak pillar of stone while the Titan scrambled for a dead cabal. He propped the creature up and hid in front of it like he was using a shield. After minutes of endless pain, the flames calmed and the last bit of metal flew out from the cave. It was over.

The Rider was a taste of what was to come. The two may have been battered and bruised but it was only the beginning. Ryan smiled through bleeding lips, The woman knew how to fight, she was like a hunter and a warlock mixed into one. Watching her defeat crowds of Scorn in a matter of seconds was nothing short of exhilarating. Erebus smiled back at Ryan, blood trickling down from her nose and onto her lips. The Titan was a wonderful ally, he was strong, fast, he took more hits than she thought he could. A part of her thought they would make a wonderful team. Another part of the woman realized that he was still a goody two shoes and she would have to pay him to keep his mouth shut. Snitch. Erebus’s broken mask dangled from her ears before she got annoyed and ripped it off completely. Ryan’s left leg was completely shattered and his stomach was bleeding rapidly. The woman watched with worry in her brown eyes. She couldn’t hide it, she had grown attached to the Titan. Before she could even step in to help, Yogi appeared instantly, scanning and gently healing each of his partner’s wounds. “Do you have to be this reckless?!” The ghost growled out. The Titan laughed as his leg healed in a matter of seconds. Ryan got to his feet like he hadn’t been completely destroyed by an explosion. Erebus gripped onto her broken arm and struggled to her feet, limping as she walked. They needed to get to the Derelict. Ryan decided to bite, asking a question he didn’t think he had to ask. “Do you have a ghost?” Erebus laughed weakly, her hand clutching her broken arm. “I do.” She said simply, not giving the Titan the information he wanted. “Then heal.” Ryan’s form stood in front of the girl, refusing to let her continue until she recovered. The brunette turned her gaze away from the man and looked like she was deep in thought. After minutes of silence and Ryan refusing to budge the woman let out a sigh of defeat. It was clear they were going to be working together for awhile so might as well bite the bullet now. “I can’t. My ghost can’t...do things yours can. Look, Boss man can patch me up, I’ll be ready for the next Scorn in no time, now please. This really fucking hurts.” Annoyance filled the air as the woman shoved past the Titan. She appreciated the act of kindness but it was not wanted. Ryan’s eyes filled with confusion as he took in Erebus’s words. “What do you mean it can’t? Is it damaged? All ghost’s can, what do you mean it can’t!?” His voice grew louder as he pressed the issue. “Now isn’t the time, My arm is broken, I’m bleeding, can I please get to my ship before I die and Boss man sobs over my corpse?! He’s a real ugly crier.” Ryan’s jaw tightened as the man kept his words inwards. He wanted nothing more than to keep pressing, he knew he could get his answers this way. “Then will you tell me why after?” The Titan grabbed Erebus by the shoulder, causing the woman to flinch in pain. “FINE! NOW PLEASE!” She shouted, before ripping from the Titan’s grip.

As the two transported onto the Derelict Erebus fell to her knees. Damn this fucking hurt. Tears were beginning to form in her eyes but she was quick to shake them away. Drifter’s large form quickly came into view as he stared at the two. “Moira!” The man cried out, he rushed to her side, helping the woman get to her feet. “Shit. I’ll fix ya up kid.” Ryan’s eyes widened. Moira? Was that the girl’s real name? Before the Titan could even offer to help Drifter began to pull her form towards one of those strange machines he had at the tower. He called it a bank didn’t he? The woman was placed into a flimsy looking chair and the man pulled out a small white mote. The Titan’s eyes filled with even more confusion as the snake lady took it into her hands and began to...absorb it? With a flash of darkness, all lights on the Derelict went out. “The hell!?” Ryan cried out, running over to where Drifter and Erebus once were. Suddenly the lights returned and the woman was standing by Drifter’s side, her wounds completely healed and her mask repaired. Erebus smiled gently at Drifter, joy and much more in her eyes. But Drifter didn’t return the look, his eyes were fixed on the Titan who was staring at them like they were monsters. “How…” The older man stepped away from Erebus as the girl quickly straightened her jacket and fixed her hair. She seemed completely unbothered by the Titan seeing what had just happened. She had trust for him, unlike the Drifter. “Ya say something kid?” The rouge lightbearer asked with a hiss in his tone. “What. Was. That?” The Titan demanded, not giving in to Drifter’s fear tactic’s. The man smirked and laughed. “Something you ain’t ready to deal with.” Ryan snarled, Yogi appearing by his side. “She’s not a Guardian...She’s made of-” Suddenly Yogi got caught off as Ikora’s voice rang through the ghost’s body “RYAN! WE NEED YOU, NOW! GET TO THE TOWER!” There was screeching, crying, the sounds of flames. Suddenly the feed was cut and the group were staring at each other with confusion. “We need to go, Now.” Yogi stated, turning to look at the Drifter. “Let’s go.” The Derelict began to make it’s way back to the tower. No one could have prepared them for what came next.

[lachalaine]

drabble . a hangover and two

disclaimer: emilia is jackie’s childhood best friend, and not necessarily the nicest person ever. if she seems excessively rude, it’s because she is. she’s got the biggest ego on the continent borne of being very, very rich and very, very spoiled, and rather just enjoys throwing her money and power around and being the most aggravating presence possible. she has her good sides as well ( just buried severely deep ). regardless, her main countenance is not the best. particularly, she is the type to walk over people if she deems them unworthy, and that’s almost everyone. it’s just the way she is and that’s that. pls keep that in mind if u read, thank you. 

* this has talk of a one night stand and a copious amount of alcohol, please be warned thank u

She wasn’t the type to come around very often, and that much was true.

For how much she might have played a part in Jackie’s formative years, and for how much she’d loved to make her presence known when she was actually around ( so loud and so proud and so unapologetically annoyingly Emilia ) the truth of the matter was, the blonde only tended to slip her way out from whatever obscure part of the world she’d lazed her days about in when she’d finally deemed her esteemed attendance to be – well – most opportune, really.

Which in translation really just meant when her instincts were blasting clamorous and off key that Jackie was currently stuck in a most compromising position of which could not miss.

In this case –

“Why is there a very ugly stranger waiting for you outside your house?”

When she was flat out drunk and nursing a hangover. Apparently.

As you do.

Truth be told, the resonance of the blonde’s lilting accent was honestly enough to startle the plastered girl almost fully cognizant.

Perhaps the most terrible wakeup call ever, truly.

“Oh fuck.” And Jackie knew this script only far too well by now.

But she’d still fucking hated it, dammit. “No, please no, Emilia ---“ Incoherent mutterings of the most debilitated kind, the kind that might’ve made one almost pity her.

Almost.

She wasn’t really that lucky. “Why are you here?”

The smile her suffering brings to the blonde reeks of sheer delight.

And if that wasn’t a cause for concern - she didn’t know what was.

“Now, now – no need to sound so excited to see me, Dulcet. As knackered as you are –” A sharp cackle of amused laughter even as lacquered crimson lips stretched into an amused grin, long nails tugging teasingly at the thick comforter that hid her best friend from view, her viridian eyes alight with a shimmer that was perhaps only just a smidgen all too bright.

It only makes the DJ clutch the material around her just that much tighter.

If only she could sink into the fabric and never come back up again --- oh gods, please help her.

“You should have expected I would arrive sooner or later.”

Please.

The gods response? 

No.

“Emi.” Jackie whines softly into her pillows, the most that she can manage when she feels so absolutely trashed. Even within the confines of her bed, from where she’d burrowed herself in like some kind of burrito – oh lords, it was too much. “Please, god forbid. Not today. I just had. The worst night. In the history of nights. Seriously, I feel like absolute shit and I could just – “

“Retch?” The echo of a loud and most obnoxious sound, much like air being sucked through an empty Starbucks straw. A Venti. Espresso Frappuccino. Non-fat but with extra chocolate syrup and a double helping of whipped cream. Sugar, sugar, sugar. 

( jackie hated how much she’d remembered that even in the throes of her suffering, fuck her sideways, bloody hell )

…oh no. it was happening.

She wasn’t human enough for this. 

Yet Emilia continued onwards with her litany much without pause. “Pass out? Die? Do tell which one it might be, darling, and I’ll either have a trash can or a funeral prepared for you either way. Alexander will take care of it, won’t you, love?”

“Of course, my lady.” The corresponding utterance of a subdued voice, most polite and most obedient. The kind that’d made Jackie deflate only that much further.

Between the both of them and their combined forces, she was turning into a soggy ass pancake. As expected. Business as usual, so you might say. “I can have a plot of land dug and prepared for Mademoiselle Jackie in the course of half an hour. Fifteen minutes, if urgently required.”

…well. That was a very promising response, first thing in the morning.  

Somehow, she’s not at all aghast by it anymore.

What did that say of their friendship, truly? 

She would hate to ask. 

“…how did you even get in here?” She asks instead, tone most wary and uncertain, though somehow sounding already resigned to her fate. “I had the locks changed a month ago when I lost my keys, I could swear.”

The soft wiggle upon her bed, as the blonde made herself more comfortable. “Don’t underestimate my capabilities, Dulcet. I had a backup key made the very evening that you had it changed. Can’t have any barriers whilst getting into my protégé’s house. But, please, before you go on into all that personal boundaries speech and all that jazz – “ The female already cutting her off, even when she was still trying to make sense of the words, holy fucking shit. “Don’t try to change the subject.“ Another too loud sip, another clench of Jackie’s nails into the mattress in a bid for self-restraint, the sound of a doorbell ringing faintly off in the distance –

‘Why was this woman her best friend, goddess help her – ‘

“I ask again: why is there an ugly bloke of a man ringing your doorbell? And holding your knickers, of all things.”

--- that caught her attention.

“WHAT?” She was popping up from the covers like a jack in the box well before the uttered sentence could properly settle, and quite frankly, the expression on the Brit’s visage honestly couldn’t be anymore more pleased.

It was like the smile of a shark that’d smelled blood in the water.

Bingo.

And Jackie was whatever sorry son of a bitch sea lion that had gotten caught in its trap.

Shit.

“Ah – so you do actually possess mobile capabilities. Wouldn’t you wonder at that, Alexander? I am so amazed.”

The most playfully amused smirk even as red lips remained sealed around her straw, while her butler’s expression as he’d stared down at them both appeared as though it truly couldn’t be anymore blasé then it already was, really. His short response was just as annoying. “Yes, my lady. Much enthused, it is truly a miracle.”

why jackie ever bothered to put up with either of them, she would never know.

“Oh, screw you both!”

But she was down and shoving herself beneath the covers again without a second thought.

And yet her moment of weakness had been enough, as blonde so quickly reached out and grasped at the edgings of the covers with a steel grip, tearing it up and off her incapacitated victim with a dark grin. “I would say yes to that offer, love, but three is a crowd and you don’t swing that way the last I checked. Unless something’s changed, of which case I would say I am absolutely aghast that you would not tell me, but I trust you to fill me in on every little bit eventually.” A sassy wink, a relentless attack. Jackie would have no escape from her at this rate. Not if she’d had anything to say about it.

And truly. Emilia had a lot to say about everything, all the damn bloody time, Jesus Christ. It was like she never shut up.

( on her fucking grave, bitch. )

“At least, on anything of what I don’t already know about you, more or less. But we’ll talk about that later. We shift instead our discussion to today’s most important concern, of which case, I must say, you cheeky, cheeky girl –” She’d tittered, tossing her cup backwards and not even checking to see if Alex had caught it. She was fairly certain he would have, in any case.

Considering how often she threw things, his reflexes were superhuman at this rate, really. But anyway, as she was saying, back to the main point behind this visit -

Her best friend’s shitty life choices. Exhibit A, of which she’d practically crooned to the poor girl with an all too amused little giggle, the sound conspiratorial in every sense of the word as she’d leaned down, down, down, down, down –

“I really can’t believe you walked out without your knickers.”

Shit. Wait. What?

If the Brit was trying to give her a heart attack, it was working.

For as it was, all Jackie could seem to do was stare up at the ceiling with wide eyes filled with the most optimal amount of dread, and even she couldn’t deny the sudden and pervasive feeling of absolute doubt.

Her heart echoes a stuttered pulse within her chest, and her whisper when it resounds – is only but a mere breath. “...are you fucking serious right now?”

Emilia’s smile when it spreads – is damning. “Look out. The window~”  

Jackie blinks. Jackie stares. Jackie is really, really, severely, absolutely and terribly uncertain.

But her heart is pounding at her to move. And she’s up. Up and suddenly rolling herself off the bed with naught but a little thump, where she hits the ground hard; and with a long suffering groan, and despite the unsteadiness ( and oh, she really was about ready to hurl, holy shit ), she’s up on her feet and wobbling her way half off towards the hallway without a second thought.

She stops on the landing, she works her way to the window, and with face pressed flat against the clear glass – she feels her heart drop.

And for the third time in a row this drabble ( or was it the fourth? fifth? who knows? ) –

Holy fucking shit.

“He has my underwear.”

Bad adult choices 101 – how not to have a one night stand, whoops.

“Mhm.” Emilia hums as she inches up against the window with her, looking all as though a pampered cat that’d acquired two villages worth of both cream and tuna. “Black and lacy and waving it up and down like the Union Jack. You do know how to choose them, darling. Your drunken decisions would haunt you. It’s fully on brand, I must say.”

Honestly, she’s not even sure how she would have managed to respond. Her soul was fast spiraling into an endless abyss at the proof of her negligence, and Jackie truly feared she was going to go down with it.

How had he even managed to figure out where she’d lived?

The despair of such notion only triples when the man finally halts his godforsaken doorbell ringing and chances a quick glance upwards – merely a moment, really – but Jackie only has just enough awareness left in her to grab the blonde by the shoulder and duck!

It’s far too late, of course.

“BABY!” His sudden screeching proves that point well enough, oh boy.

But she’s on her knees and digging her nails into Emilia’s shoulder before she can stand to even plan an alternative action otherwise, crap.

Is she having a heart attack? It certainly feels like it. And yet Emi, bless her soul, is far too amused to really fucking care.

Really, she’d lived for this, truly. Who else could you have found to be the embodiment of the protag of a rom-com without even trying? 

She was so lucky.

Maybe.

“Provided you are done trying to claw a huge chunk of my shoulder off my body, perhaps we can discuss how you plan to take care of this before the paparazzi show up?”

The look Jackie grants her at that remark with seems to be all kinds of staggering, and the blonde almost feels a surge of pity.

Almost.

She wasn’t that type of person. 

“Earth to Jackie. Oi bitch, wake up.” A short slap against her cheek, if only enough to snap her out of it.

If anything, all the stinging gesture manages to do is make her even more panicked.

Both hands quickly relegates to the Brits shoulders without nary a second thought, and even Emilia – in all her persistent amusement – muses if perhaps she might have gone just a wee bit too far off the edge this time.

Jackie’s whisper to her sounds like the beginnings trails of insanity. “You need to get rid of him.”

“BABY, MY LOVE, COME OUT PLEASE – “

Nani the fuck? 

“Excuse me, you need me to get rid of that?” The look on her face was pure disdain etched into a picture. “Are you absolutely kidding me? The man sounds like a step away from being a desperate git, he hasn’t even said your name yet, which probably means he forgot it. I am not subjecting myself to that.”

“Emilia. Please.” The softness of her voice was not at all equal to the focused intensity of which laced her very being. “I need you to do this for me. On the love of our fucking friendship – “

“Oh god, Jackie.” The toss of her head, platinum blonde locks shifting with the movement as she’d waved the younger female away. “Don’t beg. You know that’s beneath you.”

Excuse her??

“Emi – I am so fucking plastered off my ass I am going to fucking puke on you. That man has my underwear, which means I made the walk home without them, and he knows where I live even though I’m pretty sure I had him passed out cold when I left this morning and I don’t remember telling him anything and with all due respect, I do not think anything is capable of being beneath me at the moment except my fucking grave.”

“Of which I can still have prepared in but a moment, Mademoiselle.” The short pipe up in the background wasn’t helping.

“Alex.” Sanity was evidently not a word in her vocabulary when Jackie finally looked up at him. “I will fucking slaughter you, do not test me.”

A short shrug, an almost amused nod. “As you wish.”

Her concentration shifts back down to viridian hues without missing a beat. “You need to take care of him. But be nice about it if you can. But just -- please. It is a need.”

“It is a need for you to calm down, that’s what you need. I did not fly here all the way from Bali to solve your boy troubles, Jackie. I merely flew here just to laugh at them --- eep!”

If mahogany hues could burn, then perhaps – the blonde mused - she would be on fire right now.

“Please.”

That was no longer a request.

Five minutes later, and she was finally opening the front door with a look upon her face that spoke quite distinctly of her absolute disdain.

If the poor man felt like he’d belonged more accurately squished at the bottom of her heel, it was honestly because he - quite very bluntly - did.

In her expert opinion, at least.

And she was an expert in all her opinions, but of course. 

“Are you done ravaging the doorbell yet, you twit?”

The guy was American, and so he couldn’t quite understand the insult. But also, it appeared he didn’t take to context clues all too well.

That or he was evidently still hung over off his ass.

Whatever. 

“Sorry, I just.” The male began, not actually having expected someone to open the door and yet already scrambling for words, perhaps not even having thought about his actual game plan before he’d come by. It certainly seemed to be the most logical explanation, really. He’d been driven to follow after the girl based on something inexplicable really, he’d just - “The DJ girl. Is she - is she here? I just wanted. To see her. She was gone this morning and I couldn’t find her and she didn’t give me her number and you know I had to ask – “

“She’s not available.” She cuts him off. A short response, a curt and both cutting stare.

How harsh, she hadn’t even let him finish.  

“Not for the next half of a century, at least. But she will have her knickers back though, if you please. Thank you for bringing it.”

The laundry basket she’d kicked out towards him drilled in the fact that he wasn’t even worthy of an explanation beyond that.

He’d stared down at it, and then looked up, and then down again, and then up.

It was quite like watching a puppy really. Unfortunately - 

She wasn’t much a fan of dogs.

The short cock of her head once more, as though that was answer enough. “Well put them in, won’t you? I don’t have all day.”

He was clutching at the piece of lingerie like it was his lifeline now.

‘How terribly depressing.’

“I – but – is she - really not here?” He’d asked, the words sounding almost stilted on his lips.

“No, she’s not.” The female drawled, already rolling her eyes in the picture of absolute irritation. “She’s gone, actually. Lying in a ditch somewhere and questioning her life choices, probably, but regardless, can you please?” Another light kick, a lowly uttered tut beneath her lips. “Put them in?”

Either the guy was slow or he was just very much attached to a woman he’d barely spent even five hours with, good god.

He still hadn’t let go of her underwear.

“But – are you sure? I saw her. People saw her. Come home. Her hair – “

Somewhere by the banister, Jackie was slamming her head against the wall and trying not to groan.

By the doorway, Emilia was heaving a long suffering sigh.

“She’s much a fan of violet, I will tell you that much. Anything that you think is her hair is literally just her couch, her bed sheets, her wallpaper and even her dishes. I’d give you a tour of her place but this isn’t a museum. So god for-fucking-bid – the underwear. Now.”

There must have been a spike to her tone, one that was sharp enough to make the man flinch.

But still. He tried.

“…can I wait for her? I’m sure – she’ll want to see me – after the night we had –“

Another shuddering knock from upstairs, the woes of a plastered woman cursing herself to the high heavens above. It was enough to make anyone look up. 

Emilia didn’t even bother. 

“Not a chance.” The female uttered, lyrical tone not even missing a beat. “In fact, I doubt she even remembers your name. Alcohol tends to do that to her, no offence. Which, I might ask – what is your name, by the way? For short term memories sake.” For it wasn’t so much that she’d cared, but it was always good to have this kind of information on hand for potential blackmail.

At the slightest glimpse of interest, at perhaps a chance to gain some form of entrance, the man puffed up his chest with a sharp nod. “Kale.”

A short stop. A loud screech. The perch of a thin and neatly trimmed brow. 

She couldn’t quite believe this. “Kale?”

“Yes.”

“…like the vegetable?”

“…yes?”

Oh, he was far too proud for a man with a name like that.

“Say no more.” She’d waved him off, much like a woman ridding herself of flies. “Gods, she really must have been drunk off her arse last night. No matter. You can leave now, and never come back again. Drop the knickers or I’ll have my men take care of yours.”

Well – that hadn’t gone the way he’d expected it to. 

“What?”

A roll of her eyes, a mere snap of her fingers. And before he knew it

--- there were three dudes boxing him in. Breathing down his neck. Intimidating him even by mere presence.

Had they been there the entire time?

It would certainly appear so.

They’d just learned all too well to be discreet until needed, that was all.

Suffice to say though, that at the very least – he’d dropped off the underwear without much trouble after that.

Yet Emilia, when she finally stalks her way upstairs, along the look of absolute disdain now directed at her wasted best friend sprawled out along the floor – she’d just had to ask, after all –

“You had sex with a man named Kale?”

As if Jackie’s heart wasn’t already due to give out on her. Of all the fucking things to care about - “Emilia, I swear to god – “

“I am so disappointed in you. Of all things. Kale. You couldn’t just fuck a bloody carrot. A zucchini. A cucumber. No, you go for fucking Kale instead. Jesus Christ, no wonder you hated it. Not to mention, you really need to rethink your strategy of not wearing wigs when you go out with plans to get fucked. Your bum is a sitting duck with these men, have you not realized that?”

Jackie doesn’t know she has it in her to answer the blonde at all anymore honestly. Perhaps she would have. Perhaps she would have not. Regardless, and without further ado, with no small amount of drama --

It appears she passes out. Right out of it. Just like that. 

Boop. 

To the slightest prod of a designer heel - there is no response. “-- is she dying, Alex?”

Said butler appeared as though he could only nod. “Perhaps, my lady. I cannot quite say – “ A low and most suffering groan emanated from the girl, and all too soon, he was quickly rethinking that thought. “It would certainly appear so.”

And for perhaps the first time that afternoon, the blonde doesn’t scoff. In fact, she doesn’t bother to do anything anymore but just release and all too heavy sigh. 

“Hmm. Pity. Do pick her up then, I suppose.” The slight nod, even as she’d quickly turned on her heel and moved to make her way down the hall. “We’ll take care of the rest, as usual.” 

“Shall I prepare the funeral then, my lady?” The servant had the gall to ask, already bending down to pick up the passed out female, cradling her in his arms much like one would handle overly precious cargo.

One that was lightly snoring and stunk of a distillery, at least. 

How charming. 

He didn’t mean that statement in sarcasm.

For all as ironic as it was, she really was as precious as they would come. 

At least they would think so, really. 

“Hardly, Alex. We’ll bother with her funeral only after we prepare her bath. The bloody girl is still as hopeless a turtle as ever, wouldn’t you say? All these years and she’s still the same absolute mess.”

The smile the male sports as he follows after his lady appears to be if anything -- only all too pleased. And he knows for a fact that the same amusement is only ever matched by the blonde. 

Not that they would ever tell, of course. 

“As ever, madam. A very curious turtle indeed.”

But perhaps, just as they had back then, they’d rather much appreciated her that away after all.

FIN

[chaoscheebs]

Cloud’s Return to Streamland

So, hey, enjoy some canon-happened-but-also-Cloud-streams-games flavor of Gamer Cloud stuff that I wrote at 2am.

--------

Game, check.

Microphone, check.

Streaming program set up?  Check.

Alerts set up?  Check.

Webcam ready?  Reluctantly check.  Cloud never really felt comfortable being visible on these streams, but the fans seemed to like it.  Plus…  Honestly, after he disappeared from streaming for weeks and after what happened recently, they’d probably be reassured to see him alive and sorta well right now.

He moved the arrow on screen to the “start streaming” button and clicked it. No turning back now…  He’d be lying if he didn’t keep the “Now Loading” animation screen Denzel pulled together for him up a little longer than normal to delay the inevitable, though.  It’d give people time to check their mail and social media and see he was up and running, he justified.

He couldn’t stall forever, however; already the chat was having a fit and flooded with messages like, “he’s back omg!”, “what happened are you ok!?!?!?!”, and “dude I saw the news you were totally boss holy shit”

Chuckling a bit at the latter sort of messages, he switched to the standard stream setup, showing the bright, colorful game he has chosen, the chat to the right of it, and himself in the upper corner, dressed more like a tired college student than the visual kei badass look he normally tried to rock when on the job.  “Hey,” he said, giving the camera a little wave.  “So, a lot of things happened while I was taking a break from streaming, but the good news is I’m not in any immediate danger of dying anymore, so that’s pretty baller.”

Not surprisingly, chat didn’t slow down a bit, now ranging in responses from “haha cool I know that feel too bro” to “same, fuck geostigma, it can stay gone” to “you were in danger of dying before????????”

Cloud couldn’t help but smile; it was nice to see the cure was making the rounds outside his little corner of the world too.  “Right on, tableflippro, it absolutely sucked, being on the receiving end and watching someone else close to me suffer.  Would not recommend.”

He picked up the controller from the table, moving the arrow on the game between the new game, load game, and options on screen as he tried to figure out how he wanted to say the things he wanted to say.  “So, yeah…” he began, “I was pretty sick for a while there. Between that, and the stress from that, and… um…”—New Game, Load Game, Options, New Game—”… some things I hadn’t really dealt with that happened to me finally smacking me in the face, I wasn’t…”—Load Game, A, Save 1, Save 2, Save 3—”I wasn’t exactly in any sort of state to do much but drown in a bucket of my own wangst and depression and push everyone away.  So…  Sorry if I made anyone worry with my sudden disappearance.”

His eyes flicked back to chat.  The general theme now mostly condolences and asking how he was now.  He could try to sugarcoat things, downplay it a little, but…

Taking a steadying breath, he replied, “I wish I could say I was 100% better now, but that’d be a damn lie.  I’m not OK.  After everything I’ve dealt with in my life, I’ll probably never be 100% better.  Having a load taken off of me doesn’t mean I’m not still pretty fucked up.  Plus Geostigma may be gone, but it still did a number on me and recovering from the damage it did still sucks.“

He finally loaded a save file, taking his cute round character to the world map.  “But.. Having that load taken off of me has helped.  Not having to worry about me or the kid dying anytime soon helped.  Learning to maybe forgive myself a little for not being good enough to save a couple people important to me has helped.  Figuring out I’m not alone has definitely helped.”  He made the character walk around in aimless circles and repeatedly duck and look up as he continued to speak.  “So…  I’m not doing great, but I’m not feeling like absolute trash, so… improvement.”

He saw one particular reply in chat and laughed.  “Exactly, Eternal_Damnation, I’m a trash can, not a trash can’t.  I’m not about to give up on trying to make things better anytime soon.  I’m pretty sure Aerith would rise from the Lifestream to smack some sense into me if I gave up.”

That set off a new flurry of questions, mostly “who’s eris?” and a couple surprising “was that the pink lady with the spiky guy??????”s, which, honestly, was kinda reassuring to see.  Cloud wasn’t going crazy, at least regarding that.

Hitting pause, he said, “First of all, to those who saw the pink lady and spiky guy, go to freaking bed, it’s like midnight and you’re all like 8, tops.”

One very familiar username exclaimed, “I am not 8!”

Cloud let out an embarrassing snort-laugh.  “You’re close enough, Denzel.  Go to bed, and if you’re gonna sneak staying up late, maybe don’t out yourself by talking to me.”

“But I can’t sleep,” was the swift reply.

Trying hard to look like a serious business parent and kinda failing, Cloud said, “At least lie down for a while, and if that doesn’t help, you can come chill with me for a bit until you get tired, OK?”

There was a begrudging “OK” from Denzel’s username, and it fell silent once more.  Cloud unpaused the game and entered a level, only to faff around more once his tiny pink character gained an ability.  “… anyway, I guess I never did talk about Aerith much here, huh?  It hurt too much to think about, honestly.  But…”  He started demoing random moves with the character without really leaving the first screen.  “… she deserves to be talked about.  She saved us all, y’know?  She was strong, like, magically.  That stuff that stopped Meteor?  That was her.”

This only made the chat ask even more questions.  More questions than Cloud really wanted to answer.  But slowly, painfully, he did.  He knew himself; if he didn’t do it now, talk about this now, when would he ever?  So, he talked.  He talked about a woman who was kind, a woman who was patient enough to cultivate flowers in barren Midgar.  He talked about how the same woman threated to rip the balls off a mob boss and how it was the part of the funniest-slash-most badass thing he would ever be part of.  He talked about a woman full of confidence that she would fix the mess they were collectively in and come back to tell the tale.  He talked about a woman who was right about the first part, but not the second.  He talked about a woman who he felt was still looking after him, even now.

(He did, however, skip the part where she convinced him that wearing a dress was the only way to save Tifa.  Some things, chat did not need to know.)

By the time he was done talking, he had completed roughly half a stage and had the character destroy the cap off a sentient mushroom person and make it look sad.  “So, yeah…” Cloud said, his voice wavering, “… we may not have known each other all that long, but…  I miss her a lot.”  He could feel the tears stinging his eyes and mentally cursed.  He did not need to do this now, not after trying to reassure people he was doing better, dammit.

He threw out a quick, “I’ll be back,” muted the microphone, and brought up the break time screen.  He then leaned back in his seat, covered his eyes with a hand, and let out a strangled cry as all the things he’d been holding in let themselves out.  He cried for Aerith, for obvious reasons; for poor Zack, still half-forgotten in the fog of Cloud’s memories and deserving better than that; for his mother and for all the years he lost; for Tifa, who was still alive but deserved better than having to deal with a emotional wreck of a friend.

So lost in tears he was, he didn’t even register the warmth at his side until he started to calm back down.  Next to him was the same kid he had not long ago told to go try to go to sleep, holding a tissue box that had been plucked off the table.  “… you all right?”  Denzel asked.

Cloud started to nod, but turned it into a shake of his head as he reached for a tissue.  “Not really,” he managed to say, “but I’ll manage.  You happen to see what chat’s saying now?”

Denzel shrugged.  “Mostly them worrying again, but I told them you’ll be all right,” he said, waving to the chat section of the screen.

“Thanks,” Cloud said.  He paused, then asked, “So, still can’t sleep, huh?”  The boy shook his head.  “… y’wanna play the game for a bit while I go splash some water on my face and try to not look like a disaster?”

“Sure,” Denzel replied, holding his hand out for the controller.  Cloud passed it to him, rose from his seat, and walked away. Once he was out of view, Denzel switched back to the main stream set-up and unmuted the microphone.  “Hey, Cloud needed a couple more minutes, so I’m taking over.  So, what was he—jeez, did he not even finish one level?  Let’s fix that.”

[meliecho]

Hearts and Heroes: One Shot - chpt 8: Phantom Power

Summary: Blue’s team rescued Sun from her nightmare. Now they’re faced with saving her from the ultimate end within her coma using a risky tactic that’s never been attempted.

----------------------------------

The Markihub...

 Mark hit the floor of the hub running.

His team followed close behind, weaving easily around the center stage and through clusters of people gathering in the main hall. Though they were battered, tired, and ready to drop, they pushed that aside to deal with later.

Sun’s left arm dangled limply at her side, exposing the faint, flickering heart on her sleeve for everyone to see.

No one expected a team to come barreling out of the vortex like an army of Terrorlings tailed their asses. Muttered shocked conversations breezed past them, morphing together in a cloud of plosives and syllables.

“Whoa, what the hell?”

“What’s going on?”

“Dudes, where’s the fire?”

“Who’s that?”

“That’s Blue’s team. They look like shit.”

“Glad I wasn’t part of that mission.”

“Who’s Mark carrying?”

“I’ve never seen her before.”

“Is that their target? She looks really hurt.”

“What’s up with her heart?”

He ignored them. Their voices drowned out by the memories of the last time he’d watched someone’s heartlight go out. Not again, please not again…

He pivoted on the ball of his foot and hurried down the hall to the infirmary.

Four people from three different teams were currently recovering from various injuries. Two guys sat facing each other on the same bed talking low about their last mission. One of them with shaggy dark hair, sporting a bandage on his left cheek and wearing a white, black and green lettermans jacket talked about how he hoped the fight would leave a scar.

“Dude, keep dreaming,” his best friend, a guy with medium-length light brown hair snarked.

“We are, you dick.”

“You have a baby face only your mom can love.”

“I don't want a baby face. I want a scar.”

“See previous comment.”

A girl with two-toned jagged-cut red hair, purple glasses, and a black shirt curled up on a bed in the front right row vaguely listening to the guys while she waited to heal, and a brunette girl in a black shirt and gray flannel sat crosslegged on her bed in the middle row to the right.

Tiny Box Tim wrapped a bandage around the brunette's forearm and gave her a potion. “This is the sixth time you've been in here. You should really spend more time in the training room. I recommend buddying up with another mage to help you control your magic, Kate.”

Kate sighed. “I know. I'm Sorry. I'm trying, but I'm just not getting the hang of it.”

“You've only been here a few weeks. It takes time. You have a lot of power, so don't give up.”

She smiled. “Thanks, Tim.”

Jade dashed ahead to open the door and entered first. Mark charged in on his heels. “Tim!”

Tim’s attention swiveled from Kate to the group that burst into the waiting area. The first thing he noticed was how bedraggled and beat up they looked. The second was the limp body of an unknown girl draped over Mark’s arms. He turned back to Kate. “That healing spell will take a minute to work, so just rest ok?” He jumped down and bobbled up the center aisle.

Kate watched the frantic group curiously. Mark was with them. She smiled at first, though her mood changed to concern at the girl in his arms. The team's appearance mirrored people escaping from a war zone. What happened to them, and who was this girl? Their mission target? She covered her mouth slightly. That girl looked unconscious, and her heartlight barely existed. What hell did they go through to rescue her?

“Guys? What happened?” Tim looked upward.

“We got sent into the nightmare of a coma patient. That’s what happened,” Red blurted out. He was tired, irritated, and worried.

“She’s in a coma in your world?” Tim’s big blue eyes grew two sizes. “No wonder I had a bad feeling about that mission.” He motioned them forward. “Bring her over here, quickly.”

They followed the bouncing box to a middle bed on the left side of the room where Mark carefully laid her on the clean white sheets. The infirmary's occupants watched on in curiosity.

Tim hopped up next to her for a closer examination. He hovered his tiny round hand over her mouth to check her breathing. Even though this was the dream world, and the humans here didn’t have bodies, their spirits were so accustomed to the instinctual act of breathing that they would do it without thinking about it.

He peered intently at the pink heart, which now exuded so little illumination that it only cast Tim’s square face in its glow. “Oh dear. This is bad. This is very, very bad. I haven’t seen a case like this since—” he paused looking upward at Mark. They shared a moment of knowledge. He’d been on that fateful mission with him.

“Is there anything you can do?” Purple’s voice squeaked. She felt so useless since her magic was depleted and she couldn’t even attempt a small healing spell yet.

“Please tell me you can save her,” Peach said in desperation.

“Don’t worry, guys I’ve got this.” Tim rubbed his hands together and focused all of his healing magic on Sun.

A swirl of white energy built up around her body, washing over her in a water pattern, and expelling upward. Any physical injuries she had were now in the process of quick-heal, but the light on her sleeve continued to flicker like a dying neon sign.

Tim pursed the lines creating his lips into even thinner lines so his mouth looked like a single pen stroke. He tried again, gritting his teeth and pushing as much of the magic spell into her as he could.

The pink glow brightened slightly. Sun’s eyes cracked open momentarily, then closed. The light dimmed back to a level less than before. The flickering slowed to a painfully slow pulse so it resembled bradycardia.

Tim’s little body slumped, and he pressed his balled up hands to the mattress.

“You almost had it. Why’d you stop?” Jade asked.

He looked up at the 6 people around the bed. “I’m giving it all I have. I need to rest for a second.” He settled back onto his little box bottom. “You said she’s in a coma, but this feels like something sucked her dry. You guys maybe want to tell me what happened out there?”

Blue gave him the abridged version. When she reached the point in their story about the tower, she stopped and looked to Mark. He’d been alone with Sun and Shadow for a while, and she had no idea what happened before her team arrived. All she knew was that there was a fight, and he’d kicked ass and got his kicked in the process.

“I fought a Somni-Demonling – a powerful one.” He paused and took a breath. “I managed to weaken it enough for her to get rid of the Terrorling latched onto it.” He filled them in on the fight, though conveniently left out the part about pretending to be Dark in order to lure Shadow out of its host. They didn't need to know that part, or that during the entire act, he'd felt Dark squirming in disgust at being mimicked and mocked. It wanted out to do this itself, sending out the sense that it thought of its host as a pathetic charlatan. He'd told it to fuck off and moved forward with his plan.

Tiny Box Tim’s jaw hit the sheets. “She has a Somni? But…but that’s impossible. Only a Hero Class person can create a Somni, and the sense I get from her is not at that level.”

“Tell that to Shadow,” Red spat. “She’s a real bitch. It actually got strong enough to leave her.”

Blue held Sun’s right hand in hers for comfort, or support, or whatever she needed. “We guessed it was because she’s been stuck in the dream world for so long that it gained enough energy to form and it just kept growing stronger. It must have taken months.”

“Her dream was super real,” Purple said. “I had to keep reminding myself I was asleep.”

“Sun doesn’t remember the waking world at all,” Jade spoke up. “Not even her own name.”

“Sun?” Tim asked.

“Mark named her ‘Sun,” Blue explained. “He wanted to call her something stupid like ‘falafel’ or ‘Flobberdy’ later on, but we really couldn’t come up with anything better than Sun.”

“It was ‘Fuweep,’ and you’re right,” Mark came back.

Tim’s eyes went to each of them, then back to the girl on the bed. She wasn’t unconscious yet, but barely holding on, so he knew she could hear this conversation. “It’s hard enough on someone who’s Hero Class to take on a Somni-Demonling inside them, but for a regular class person, it might be too much. She won, but it took everything she had to win. In order for her to expel that Demonling attached to it, she must have held onto something incredibly valuable to her.”

“So, what are you waiting for?” Red pushed, “Do something else. Use a med pack, or a crystal, or a fucking bandaid. You’re the healer, Tim. Take responsibility for the people in your infirmary.”

“Red, shut up,” Blue snapped. “He’s trying. We talked about this.”

“Screw that! He quit after two tries! If her light goes out, she might actually die for real!”

“She will,” Mark stated softly. His deep voice silenced them. “But we’re not going to let that happen. Tim,” he faced down the tiny box, “there has to be something you can do; some tactic, or hidden item, or…anything you've picked up over the years. Anything at all.”

Tim’s eyes drooped. He couldn’t read his friend’s mind, but he knew exactly what was going through his head. “No matter what I do, it won’t be enough to replace the life energy she's lost.”

A heavy sorrow fell over the team.

“You mean…that’s it?” Peach whispered. “We saved her, but she’s still doomed?”

“It was that light bulb when she plugged it in,” Purple sniffled. “She didn’t want anyone who lived in her dream to suffer because of her. Her dream was around long enough that she thought someone real might actually live there. She did it for one person who might or might not exist.” Her voice broke. “That light bulb contains her life.”

“Dammit!” Red plowed his fist into the wall. The surface cracked, then repaired itself. “It’s not fair! She’s so stupid!”

Blue kept shaking her head in disbelief. Small tears pooled at the corners of her eyes. “It can't end. Not like this.”

Tim didn't want to look any of them in the eye. “I'm sorry. I’m afraid this is beyond my abilities.”

“No. No.” Mark raked his hands through his hair. “No. No. NO!” He ripped off his glasses and launched them across the room. They shattered against the back wall into pixelated bits. A second later, they rematerialized on the mattress. The other four recovering heroes leaned back in shock. No one had ever heard his outburst in person like that. This was real, helpless frustration exploding in anger that filled the room from its sharp, dissonant wave. “That's bullshit! I will not lose her, too! I will not accept, that! She’s here! We got her out of that clusterfuck to where it's safe! She defeated a Demonling! She repressed a powerful Somni she shouldn't even have! She’s trying to live! So, no! No, I won't accept that answer for one god damn fucking second! Because we can not do this. We can not give up on her life!”

“Mark, chill,” Blue felt Sun’s hand lightly squeeze hers, “She can hear you. I can feel your hostility from here.”

“You guys don't get it! I—“ He gripped tufts of his dark hair in his fists and turned away. The urge to destroy something just because he needed a target overwhelmed him, because he couldn't physically punch the crap out of the thing taking Sun.

Tim’s eyes lit up. “Blue, you gave me an idea. It might not work, but—”

Everyone’s attention locked onto the small Somni.

Mark planted his hands on the mattress, “We’ll do it,” he said without hesitation. “I don’t care what it is. We did not go through that damned nightmare just for it to end here.”

“I’ve never tried anything like this before. It’s risky.”

“Every first attempt at something is risky,” Purple said, “but it we don’t try, we’ll be the worst kind of losers in the world.”

“Sun's our friend,” Blue chimed in. “We might not really know her, and she doesn't know us, but that's not going to stop us from doing everything we can to save her life. If Tim has an idea, I say we listen to him.”

“We promised her she wouldn’t be alone anymore,” Jade looked down at her still form. “I don’t break promises.” The others could tell their determination stemmed from their own life experiences.

“What do we have to do?” Peach asked. She’d grown close to the little box since her rescue mission and quickly befriended him. She felt like an older sister to him. “Just tell us, Tim. We trust you.”

Tim hopped across the bed. He picked up the glasses and held them for a moment, staring at the half black-wire frames cupping the lenses. The memory of looking through these glasses at the incident played on the backs of these lenses from Mark's point of view. He understood how much that person in those memories had mattered.

Tim offered them up. “I’m going to need your help for this one, pal. Are you ok?”

Mark exhaled, calming down. He put the glasses back on. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m good.” At the understood request, he picked up the tiny box in both hands, making sure Tim faced outward. “What’s your plan?”

Tim wasn’t quite sure how to word this without it coming off as awkward, though he knew no matter how eloquently he put it, the ‘awkward’ aspect couldn’t be avoided. “I need you to be a battery.”

“A battery?” Blue blinked over at them across the bed.

“I don’t have enough energy on my own, but if I pull from Mark’s as an external source to make up the difference, I think I can replace what she’s lost.”

“I see what you’re saying,” Purple stood and moved next to them. “It’s like when I use a spell. I have to tap into the MP to power it, and I can feel that drain.”

Peach snapped her fingers. “I get it! If I had a battery to draw from, my spells would be much stronger. I'd be OP. It would be so meta.”

“But that’s the life energy of another person. Isn’t that dangerous?” Jade asked.

Tim nodded. “Extremely. Probably. Most likely very.”

“You want to use me as phantom power?” Mark clarified. It made sense. Since Tim was his Somni, it had a direct link to him.

Tim nodded. “It’ll be rough. You’ve been through a lot on this mission already, which is why I’m worried.”

“I’ll record a light video when I wake up and sleep for the rest of the day to recover.” Mark’s grip tightened along with his resolve. “Do it. Just be careful.”

They both knew he was talking about steering clear of Dark’s energy. Tim rubbed his hands together and held them palms (or what would be palms on the little spherical appendages) down. “Here goes everything.” He focused on the healing spell once more.

It swirled upward around Sun’s body again, rushing over and through her like a visible wind.

Her heart line diminished to a barely visible, slim pink brush stroke. That brush stroke disappeared.

“We're losing her,” Blue gripped her hand tightly. “Hold on, Sun. Please. We're here.”

Tim reached his breaking point, and began pulling life energy from that other connection. The spell intensified, becoming thicker, brighter, and more powerful.

Mark’s fingers hooked into the wooden sides of the little box. He’d felt the drain of energy from using magic before—though he rarely used it—and the rush of increased strength from buffs. This was slightly different, drawn directly out of him into Tim as a focal point and out into the spell like someone unraveling a thread from an old sweater. To hell if he’d ever watch someone’s heartlight go out again. “Come on, Sun, come on.”

The pink heart’s glow faded back into existence, dimmed, then grew again in a slow, iambic pulse.

Mark's breath hitched in his throat, but he refused to give in. All he could see was the face of the one he'd failed to save, and his promise to never let that happen again so long as it was within his power.

Blue noticed her teammate faltering. “Guys,” she hurried over, and with the rest of her team, they all reached out to help.

Tim pulled from the new sources in tandem with his friend's. If he had sweat glands, little beads of perspiration would appear on the wood grain of his forehead.

The spell ignited into a pillar of white ribbons that moved around and through Sun.

She opened her eyes and inhaled deeply.

The world existed in a watercolor vignette. At first, it was nothing but pink light, then other colors swirled in.

She saw each of their faces locked in pure concentration, but more than that, she felt everything from them wash through her, and stay. The defeated Somni stayed quiet, weighted under the new torrent of life. What is this? Is this...them? Who they are?

Her eyes closed once more to the intensity of the transfer. Each of their faces appeared clearly in her minds eye:

Peach’s calm, caring, yet fierce nature.

Jade’s faith in their friends, resilience, and smart-ass humor.

Red’s fiery passion, tenacity, and unyielding loyalty to those he let in.

Purple’s gentleness, intelligence, and compassion.

Blue’s fearlessness, strong leadership, and radiant confidence.

And Mark’s stubborn drive, warm goofball heart, and honest sincerity.

All of it flooded through her, replacing more than what she’d lost. They were giving a part of themselves to keep her alive. This was a group act of pure selfless love not for a loser, or someone the world abandoned to this coma, but for 'Sun,' the real person. Her birth name didn’t matter. They were saving her because they cared about her, not some persona. She felt it from all of them; 'we'll stay here. We promise. We believe in you.'

“I believe in you. I know you can do this”

The emotions swelling through her entire body threatened to burst out of her chest within the cocoon of light. I don't want to go. I want to stay with all of you. I don't know you, but I don't care. You're the most important thing in my life. I promise...I’ll live. For everything you’ve done for me, I swear to god, I will live!

A tear slipped from her left eye down past her ear to the scarf.

The heartlight stabilized, brightened, and let out a brilliant pink flash that sent a shockwave through the room. Even the people staring in awe on the beds felt it.

Everyone slumped, exhaling. Peach dropped to her knees while Purple leaned on the metal bars of the bed’s foot board. Red dropped so his head hit the mattress, and Jade flopped onto their back onto the bed behind them. Blue’s knees gave out and she fell to the edge of Sun's bed with her head resting on her arms.

Mark stayed strong, lock-jawed, and continuing as the last one. His muscles trembled from the exertion, but he didn't care. He was locked in a memory loop of a fatal failure forced to the front of his mind's eye by Dark, who took this opportunity of fatigue to torment its host.

“Mark,” Tim tapped his arm, “Stop. I understand, but you have to stop.”

The spell dissipated into the air, leaving the room normal once more.

His shoulders slouched and he collapsed to sit on the bed behind him. He could barely lift his head.

Tim hopped out of his hands—which had lost their gorilla grip—and jumped across to examine Sun. He cast a brief 'status check' spell. About 40% of the life energy within her belonged to Mark. The rest of it, about 20% each, came from the others. Hers was a speck of yellow within that chaotic mix. It began to gradually grow, accepting the colors around it.

“Did we do it?” Peach looked up. “Is she ok?”

“We better have,” Red mumbled. He leaned back against the other bed and draped his arms over his knees. “I wasn't expecting it to take that much. I guess she was...almost gone.”

Mark forced his head up. Sun's breathing normalized, and the pink heart light settled to a normal, solid radiance. She was stable. She'd survived.

Tim regarded the weary group with a smile. “She'll be fine. You did it. She just needs to rest.”

A collective sigh of relief left the group.

Jade simply lifted their arm to show the victory 'V', then let it flop behind Mark. “I need a vacation after this.”

Purple smiled and brushed strands of black and lavender hair from her face. “We found her and we saved her just like we promised. I knew we would.”

Blue pushed herself up to sit on the other side with Mark between her and Jade. “Good job, team. I'm proud of you.”

“Achievement; unlocked,” Jade sat up. “So, now what?”

“Now, we take a fucking break.” Red grunted as he got to his feet and shuffled over to a bed in the row ahead of them to faceplant into a pillow. If he woke up now, he'd be a mess stuck in his exhausted body. He did not need to explain to his family why he'd be biting everyones' heads off for no apparent reason. He'd recover here in the infirmary first.

Purple claimed the bed to Sun's right, and Peach and Jade collapsed onto the last two beds in Red's row.

Blue put in enough effort to set Tim on the floor and stumbled over to the nearest bed across the aisle where she could see her entire team passed out and recovering. She smiled. They were kind of amazing. Yeah, they were sometimes annoying with some in-fighting, and occasionally completely out of battle sync on bad days to the point where Mark and Red would shout in unison, 'He started it! I did not! You did!', and sometimes she wanted to wring their necks, but all in all, these nerds were the best team she could ask for.

Tim patted Mark's leg and jumped to the floor to head back to the desk for his own pick-me-up.

Mark remained with his elbows on his knees and his hands hooked together in front of his mouth, watching over Sun. He'd will himself to stay asleep for as long as he could to make sure she opened her eyes, and kept them open.

He knew he was bad at keeping promises, but this one he needed to keep, for her, for himself, and for everyone who believed in him.

------------

((Notes: The following OCs appear as cameos with permission from their creators. Amazing artists. :) Thanks, guys! 

 Kate belongs to Browniefox - http://browniefox.tumblr.com/

The two boys and the girl in the infirmary belong to Flutter - https://trainer-lieun.tumblr.com/)

------------

TBC

Prologue: A Light in the Darkness

Chapter 1: Weekend Warriors

Chapter 2: Something’s Suspishy

Chapter 3: Chasing the Sun

Chapter 4: The Nightmare’s Truth

Chapter 5: Light and Shadow

Chapter 6: Lifeline - part 1

Chapter 7: Lifeline - part 2

Chapter 8: Phantom Power

Chapter 9: Mark’s Past

Chapter 10: A Second Chance

Chapter 11: Learning to Breathe

Epilogue: Ad Infinitum

[nessackerman]

REQUEST! - MC with a tragic past x 707/Saeyoung

Hiiiiiiii there little beans!

So... okay, maybe it’s a little too long (?) But I wanted this request to be like a “mini one-shot” so I could explain the character as you wanted it to be. There’s no way I could write about an MC like that by writing an scenario...  Am I explaining myself? Dammit, sorry ;;

And one more thing before you read this... so, I think this is the first time I write such a long post in english, like I said it’s not my main language although I do write and talk in english almost every day (I’m studying English and Spanish language and literature at university) but it’s not that easy to me yet... So just that, if you find mistakes or any typo please tell me nicely and be patient with me, I’m trying my best ಥ_ಥ

This was a difficult request tbh, but you know what? I LOVE CHALLENGES! So, here you have! I really hope you enjoy reading this and please tell me if you like it and request and ask and askdfnsdf no im not nERVOUS YOU aRE ;; omfgfuck

~

The first thing Saeyoung did when you joined the RFA was do a background check, he didn't found much and that really surprised him, everyone has something, either is good or bad, but you? You were clean.

He found some profiles on different social media platforms but that was it, you didn't interact that much with people, no actualized information about family or friends, just a few photos and the list of where you had studied and worked within these years. The only interesting thing he found about you was something about adoption, he found out you became orphan when you were ten and then they adopted you and you spent the rest of your days in Korea. 

That made Saeyoung wonder... What kind of past might be hidding under the covers? You were always so shy and serious, at first he thought you were the poor version of Jumin, dammit, your politeness and your serious manners almost fooled him. But, for some reason, he started seeing something that the other members of the rfa didn't seem to notice, your serious attitude was just a façade to hide how damn broken you were inside. Maybe he knew something was wrong, maybe he knew you were wearing a mask because he was wearing his own mask to hide his own demons. Maybe that was why you could unterstand him better than anyone, and you were able to say what he needed to hear in the exact moment he needed to hear it.

He didn't know anything, he tried to search more than a couple of times something that could have led him to understand why you were like that, what had happened to you... he tried to pull the threads of the adoption issue but nothing came out, just names and dates, nothing relevant. It almost seemed like you were a ghost, a fantasy of his shattered mind to release some pain, to feel loved... 

You always tried to avoid talking about your past and he did too, it was something mutual but, when everything went bat shit crazy and Saeran appeared and you finally discovered Saeyoung's past... You felt kind of guilty, guilty for not being able to tell him about yours too, every damn time you tried but couldn’t tell him felt like a knife stabbing your chest. 

You felt that you owed him that much, the truth, the... the pieces to the puzzle you were, you wanted him to fully understand you, and for that to happen you needed to tell him the truth. Not telling him was betraying his confidence in you and you just couldn't afford losing him, not ever, not in a million years. He was the only thing you had, he made you feel loved for the first time in... well, too many years, and you couldn't risk that, just... you could never risk that much.  

So one day, after three months of dating, you gathered the courage to tell him the truth. You cried, it was the first time in years you opened to someone, so everything you had been hidding inside a box in your heart suddenly opened and floded your entire being; every memory, every word, all the lonely nights suddenly came to your eyes and your lips. You cried, and sobbed and hiccuped and you explained him all about you, what you remembered and what you knew from your adoptive parents, everything. 

You remember you had a poor family but you were happy and everyone was kind and loyal, you had such lovely, brave parents... But the fairy tail ended once the war started in your country, with such bad luck that your house was in the same district were the rebellious were hidding. 

It was days since you had eaten, the war had stopped the whole city on an hiatus and without a job your parents couldn't gain money and without money there was no food... so they sneaked out to try to get something to eat for you and that was the last time you saw them, they got killed in the middle of a gun fight.

The only memory you have after that it's about you, wandering through the streets, crying and calling your parents until someone picked you up and the nightmare begun. You were alone, the people who picked you up used to beat you up and used you as a slave until war paused and someone from the gobernment found about you and picked you up to south Korea. 

Your adoptive parents were good people, you needed time and therapy but you finally could start to love them and be kind and more open to them. They died in a car accident when you were twenty and you ended up alone once again, that was the moment you decided you wouldn't open to anyone again, you wouldn't love or care for anyone again, everyone that you loved ended up dead, that was the reason why it was so hard to get to open to Saeyoung, and you still were afraid to fully love him...

All the time while you were trying to explain yourself Saeyoung was hugging you, kissing your tears away, kissing your hair, your forehead, your hands, every scar you have... He tried to gave you strenght to continue and smiled tenderly every time you stopped to breath and wash your tears. 

He was finally able to pick up the pieces from the puzzle but he couldn't believe how bad, how traumatic your past was, how broken you might be inside, he couldn't even imagine how fucking hard that could have been for you. He cried too that night, he couldn't sleep in days thinking about your history. He tried to be the best person for you since that moment, the most lovely and tender and understanding, always there when you might crash down from memories suddenly floding you head, always there to hug you to sleep after every nightmare. Always there.

He understands you're not a prankster like him, he still do prank you anyways, he loves teasing you and see you laugh, he adores you. Oh, and that time you bought that "MEME GUIDE FOR DUMMIES" He felt something warming up in his soul, that was so cute... He laughed a bit tho, the moment had been pretty hilarious. Nonetheless, he will do whatever it takes to make you happy, even if that means watch romantic movies and take long walks or go buy you some ice cream at 3AM at that Mc Donalds drive thru at the other side of the town.

That's one of those nights, you had a nightmare and he couldn't sleep either so... It was something like this:

You were sweeting and moving to much in bed, he tried to cuddle you but then you started screaming and crying and he had to wake you up.

-Hey! MC...MC! MC are you okay? Please wake up babe, you're scaring me, wake up my angel... -He tries to wake you up with sweet words and tender touches.

When you finally wake up you're dead scared and still crying and sobbing. He sits in the bed with his back to the header, you're lying on your side in a fetal position, in between his legs and with your head on his chest (I don't know if it's clear, if not I'll search and post a photo of this posture). He's the sweetest and the most understanding boyfriend you could ever ask for. 

-Okay, it's okay little alien, I'm here, I'm not going anywhere, I'm here with you... -He sing-songs, like a lullaby, calming you down.

-They... they were... and you... -You try to speak but still the fear is more powerful than you.

-Shh babe, I'm here with you, listen to my heart, it will be alright alien -He says with a sweet voice, slowly running his fingers through your hair, giving you all the time you need to recover.

After a while you're relaxed and feeling almost at bliss, he's like a balm, his voice, his touches, his kind and lovely words... He's the best thing that has happened to you, the best thing ever.

-I love you, you don't know how much... don't ever leave me, please Saeyoung... -You say and then you re-position yourself to be able to kiss him.

And you do, slow and smooth, you try to express how you feel through the kiss but it's not long before you two start wanting more and run out of air, you move away from each other lips just to breath and clash again in a quite suffocated kiss, he cups your cheeks in his hands and you put yours in his shoulders so you don't lose balance and you sink your nails on his flesh, his response is almost immediate, he moans and brokes the kiss to grasp for air. 

-MC... You... I... I love you -He says and looks at you with tender eyes.

Sometimes you love teasing him, you're not a cheerful person, you're quite serious most of the time to be honest, but tonight you feel like teasing him a little now that you're feeling better -maybe it's your way of avoiding your thoughts tonight, who cares, if it works for you then it's okay- so you stand up from bed and look at Saeyoung, who's looking back at you with a mix of lust and confusion.

-I want ice cream, let's go to Mc Donalds's drive thru! -You say all of a sudden, and you obviously think it's not going to work, you think he's going to grab you by the waist to drag you back to him and kiss you again... but, oh, dear... you're quite surprised when he stands up too.

-Let's go then, nothing I wouldn't do for my little alien! -And he smiles and starts dressing, leaving you standing there, half naked and confused af.

So that's how you end up in a Mc Donalds's drive thru at 3 AM to buy a fucking McFlurry. That's how it is, one moment you're crying in the middle of a nightmare, then you're kissing him and an hour later you're buying ice cream. You're happy just like that, it may seem crazy... but you love that, you're in love with him, with his madness, with every inch of him, you're in love with the life you're living, even if it's hard as hell sometimes.

And one day you're going to marry him in the space station, that's for sure.

~

That’s it, have a nice day little beans  (っ◔◡◔)っ ❤