Chapter Text
Jeongin has heard Chan’s stories of Jaebum many times.
Chan’s only friend is the catalyst for everything, the reason they’ve survived for this long, and even if Chan didn’t talk about him with palpable affection, Jeongin would still have liked him automatically simply out of gratitude. He knows Jaebum was a unit leader, one who was as protective of his unit as Chan is, and he knows Jaebum kept Chan sane before Unit Nine was there to take care of him.
He also knows that Unit Seven is incomplete; Chan had mentioned their names one night, with Miroh’s foggy sky sprawled out above them like rotten egg whites, voice soft in sympathy and tight with old outrage. Jackson. Mark. Yugyeom. Trapped in District cryo cells until a use is found for them.
Jeongin remembered their names far longer than he probably should have, haunted by their faceless identities and the knowledge that he all too easily could’ve shared their fate.
Privately, he’s also wondered how Jaebum and his unit handles it. That kind of grief must be an unimaginable weight to bear.
Jaebum seems outwardly alright, at least, but Jeongin is too busy staring to get any sort of accurate emotional read on him. He knew Unit Seven’s escape had gone poorly, knows they’re living in one of the most dangerous parts of Cle, could easily guess that there had to have been some sort of casualties because of it, but this-
This was nothing like what he expected.
Jeongin has never seen anything quite like him. Jaebum is a patchwork of skin and machinery, something that exists in the blurry, nebulous space between human and other . One of his eyes is a warm brown that crinkles up when he says hello to them; the other is a brilliant, luminescent cyan with a pinprick of a pupil that briefly flashes red as he takes them all in. Wires arc across the lines of his face, outlining his cheekbone, his eye sockets, his jawline in faint streaks of silver and gold. His left arm is a prosthetic from the elbow down, made of at least six different types of metal and clearly a homemade job. Veins of that same cyan weave their way around every wire and false joint, pulsing gently like a heartbeat and leaving his fake arm looking more alive than his real one.
Anyone else who looked like him might come across as terrifying, but Jaebum is so visibly pleased to meet them that Jeongin isn’t intimidated by his presence in the slightest. He shakes all of their hands with impressive enthusiasm, something akin to wonder glittering in his eyes.
“I always wondered what your Unit would look like,” Jaebum says to Chan when introductions are finally finished, “if and when you got one. They seem perfect for you.”
Chan absolutely beams at him. “I love them so much,” he replies, voice overflowing with affection. “They’re everything to me.”
Jeongin ducks his head shyly, his husbands making similar gestures of embarrassment beside him. It’s one of the stranger compliments he’s received in his life, but Jaebum is so earnest and Chan is so, well, Chan that Jeongin doesn’t bother dwelling on it.
“Would you like to come back home with me?” Jaebum offers. “I’m sure you’ve been on the road a while to have ended up here.”
Chan glances behind him to gauge everyone else’s reactions. Finding nothing of concern, he turns back to Jaebum. “We’d love to.”
Jaebum smiles the widest he has yet. “Wonderful.”
They have to leave the truck behind to get to Jaebum’s house. The terrain in Yellow Wood is evidently near-impossible to navigate safely for anyone unfamiliar with its quirks, and if they were to try, it’s apparently not unlikely that they could fall into a sinkhole. Jaebum promises he’ll have someone come out to fetch it later -”no one’s around for miles, it won’t get stolen”- and bids Unit Nine to follow him, starting off into the grass the instant he determines everyone is ready.
They walk for what could be minutes or hours, the sun burning overhead and the terrain unchanging. For a while they follow along the fence, but at some point only Jaebum recognizes they begin to head deeper into the fields, in the general direction of a tiny stand of trees on the far horizon. The only thing that breaks up the crushing monotony of it all is the occasional touch of one of his husbands: every brush of hands or gentle pat to his shoulder keeps Jeongin grounded and moving until they finally reach their destination.
Jae had once called the Yellow Wood “a good place to escape to,” and by all standards he’s right. Jaebum’s house is so generally decrepit on the outside that Jeongin would assume it was abandoned if he didn’t know better, surrounded by a wasteland of dry grass and sandy soil. In the distance, another enormous chain-link fence looms, half torn down and its original purpose long lost to time.
It was probably once a beautiful home, with two stories and a full wraparound porch, but by now the paint on the wood has all but faded and a solid third of the roof’s shingles are missing. The windows aren’t boarded up, but most of them sport massive cracks, and a few have holes in them haphazardly covered by strips of duct tape.
No one would live here by choice, certainly. The whole scene makes pain flare in Jeongin’s chest, another sharp ache of mourning for the home they’ve left behind. Still, Jaebum ushers them into his house with such a level of enthusiasm he might as well be inviting them into a palace, and his kindness is enough to keep Jeongin’s head above water for a little while longer.
The inside is more impressive than the outside, though that’s an admittedly low bar to clear. It’s clean, at the very least, the furniture and walls worn but well-kept, and the mess of random objects strewn about every hard surface in sight speaks to just how lived-in the house is. Regardless of its structural state, this is a home treasured very much by its occupants.
“I think the others are upstairs,” Jaebum says half to himself, then turns to face the eight of them fully. “I’ll be right back. Feel free to make yourselves comfortable.”
The eight of them exchange uncertain glances, unsure of just how genuine Jaebum’s invitation is, but he’s already vanished up the stairs and out of sight. With no other options, they make the silent decision to trust Jaebum at his word and troop into the house’s sitting room. A large brown leather couch against one wall is large enough to hold all of them if they squeeze in, so they do exactly that, arranging themselves into a complex tangle of limbs that will doubtlessly cut off everyone’s circulation in a matter of minutes and settling in to wait.
It’s not long before several sets of footsteps come bounding down the stairs, each step in uncannily perfect unison. The eight of them look towards the sound automatically, just in time to see Jaebum reappear with two people behind him. They make their way to the center of the room, standing awkwardly next to Jaebum and offering shy smiles.
“This is my- my unit,” Jaebum says softly.
The first thing Jeongin notices is that they all look tired, the sort of world-weary that no amount of good fortune could ever wash away. Their smiles are just a little too forced, their gazes just a little too vacant. The emptiness of their expressions doesn’t come off as intimidating, though- if anything, looking at them just makes Jeongin sad.
The first of Jaebum’s teammates introduces himself as Bambam. His smiles are by far the most frequent in comparison to his teammates, effortlessly lighting up the room despite the way they never seem to linger for more than the barest of moments.
The other is named Youngjae, which Jeongin just barely manages to catch after he nearly whispers his introduction. He has soft features and a softer smile, strangely delicate for someone who was once a soldier; still, his most distinctive trait is the permanent foggy gleam in his eyes, looking like a sheet of ice over a puddle.
They’re quiet. Jaebum is the only one who seems “normal,” as relative as that label is, but Jeongin can see the way his cheekbones jut out, the way his hands flutter nonstop and how he can never sit still for long. Calling them broken feels wrong, but they’re all nursing their fair share of cracks.
(In the back of Jeongin’s mind, some awful little voice whispers that Unit Seven doesn’t look very different from how his husbands had been after they’d made it through sector nineteen.)
“What about your second?” Chan asks, when it’s clear no one else will be joining them. “Did...something happen?”
Jeongin watches the members of Unit Seven carefully, trying to determine if Chan’s just accidentally ripped open an old wound. Fortunately, they don’t react in any negative way- Bambam even smiles to himself at the question.
“Jinyoung?” Jaebum supplies. There’s a fond grin on his lips, but something in his eyes is just a little bit sad. “He’s right here.”
“Whe-” Chan starts, glancing around the room as if Jinyoung is going to jump out at him.
“Hello,” a voice says from the walls, and everyone except for Unit Seven jolts. “Nice to meet you, Unit Nine!”
Jeongin looks around curiously, and quickly notices the presence of what looks to be a tiny camera and speaker mounted in one corner of the ceiling, looking like no District technology he’s ever seen. Its mere presence unsettles him, despite knowing that no former soldier would allow District surveillance into their home, and Jeongin has to force himself to look away. This must be the mysterious Jinyoung’s “body,” or at least a part of it.
“He’s an AI?” Chan asks in wonder.
Jaebum nods. “Basically. We had to ‘borrow’ some tech from a few places and put his brain into a computer. He got hurt really bad a couple years back, and that was the only way he’d be able to live.”
“I used to be stuck in just a tablet,” Jinyoung adds, sounding almost pouty. “But now I’m linked into just about everything in the house.” As if to demonstrate, he rapidly flicks a nearby lamp on and off until he earns an amused smile from Felix.
“Yeah,” Jaebum says, and for a fraction of a second there’s something impossibly sad swirling in his eyes.
“Enough about us,” Bambam speaks up, watching the eight of them with obvious curiosity, “what brought you all the way out here?”
“We came from Miroh,” Jisung begins, and from there they begin to seamlessly speak as a collective, sharing the highlights of what they’ve been doing since they first escaped the compound all those months ago. Unit Seven listen with rapt attention, nodding and making soft noises of joy and dismay in all the right places.
“Have you heard about the assassination attempt on Park?” Changbin asks.
“Who hasn’t?” Jinyoung says cheerfully. “It’s just about the only thing we’ve talked about these past few days.”
“Well… that was us,” Hyunjin explains, ducking his head in apparent shyness.
If anyone in Unit Seven wasn’t already staring directly at Unit Nine, that’s certainly enough to draw their attention.
“What?” Bambam asks, gaping at them.
A small spark of pride lights up in Jeongin’s chest at the look on his face. He’d almost forgotten just how much of an achievement even managing to get a scratch on President Park really is.
“Us and a few- friends,” Changbin says, his slight grin fading at the mention of everyone back in Miroh, “teamed up to do it. They taught us how to start a riot, and we took care of the rest.”
“You’ve been busy since you escaped, huh?” Jinyoung remarks.
“Speaking of that-”
Everyone turns to look at Jaebum, who flushes slightly at the sudden attention.
“I know you probably don’t know, but,” he begins, slow and uncertain, “My teammates, are they-”
Chan smiles comfortingly at him. “They were still in cryo, last I saw them. They looked healthy.”
The sigh Jaebum heaves at his words is both deeply relieved and incredibly tired. He runs a hand through his hair, and for a moment he looks far older than he really is, as all of the crippling stress and loss he’s been through manifests itself into one utterly broken expression.
“That’s good,” he says at last, inflectionless. “I’m glad.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t have taken them too,” Chan tells him.
Jeongin hadn’t been aware that was ever even a possibility. Then again, he hadn’t known the story about Unit Seven at all until after he’d left the District, so he supposes there’s a lot he still doesn’t know about the world he once lived in.
Jaebum shakes his head forcefully. “Don’t be. Your unit comes before everything else. Don’t ever make that mistake.”
“I know,” Chan murmurs. “Trust me, I know.”
They meet eyes for an indefinitely long moment, staring into each other’s souls as if trying to speak through nothing but thoughts alone.
Chris,” Jaebum says quietly. “For what it’s worth, I’m glad you succeeded.”
Chan smiles wryly. “Me too.”
A solemn, vaguely awkward silence falls over the room. Jeongin very carefully avoids meeting anyone’s eyes. How do you follow up something like that with polite conversation?
“Alright,” Jaebum says eventually. “Let’s see what we can do about getting a room set up for all of you.”
Strangely enough, the house has a number of extra bedrooms, all empty but clean and recently dusted, almost as if they’re being held for someone. They’re offered the one farthest away from every other occupied room in the house, a touching attempt at allowing them a sense of privacy. The instant they accept the offer, the three corporeal members of Unit Seven immediately set to carrying in a couple of spare mattresses for them so they can sleep as a collective.
Jaebum disappears soon after that, saying something about looking into getting their truck brought to the house, and suddenly the eight of them have been left to their own devices. Minho disappears almost immediately without so much as a word of goodbye, and everyone else is left staring at the spot where he just was with varying amounts of concern.
There’s not much anyone can do about it, however -Minho can only be found when he wants to be found- so eventually everyone else drifts off to find something to do, be it working on getting a meal thrown together with Unit Seven or just poking around their new accommodations.
Jeongin, desperate for a moment to himself to think and breathe, takes to exploring the upper floor of the house. It’s nothing impressive, just a handful of bedrooms and nearby bathrooms, but he takes his time looking over each. One bedroom ends up sticking out more than the others, mainly because of the massive window on one wall, which lets in a brilliant beam of afternoon sunlight that dances across the floor as clouds pass overhead.
The room is empty, of course, but in a way that suggests it’s waiting to be filled, like someone could come in and make it their own at any minute. There’s scarcely any dust floating in the patch of sunlight on the floor, and there’s not so much as a cover on the overhead light fixtures. There isn’t even one of Jinyoung’s cameras hung in a corner.
It’s perfect for Jeongin’s purposes, if nothing else. He finds himself melting to the floor without really meaning to, back pressed against the wall and head leant back against it. The drywall is cool against his skin. He sighs, curling in on himself and resting his cheek on his knees.
For the first time in what feels like weeks, he lets himself feel unabashedly, with no one around to protect or stay strong for. The deep ache in his heart that he ignores more often than not rises to the surface almost immediately, bringing with it all of the anxiety and sorrow and righteous fury that have been roiling within him since they left Miroh. It’s too much to quantify, to describe as anything other than overwhelming, and Jeongin feels positively miniscule in the face of it.
Unit Seven is weird and their house is weird and his family is being weird too, and all Jeongin wants is to just go home and pretend none of this ever happened. Fuck killing Park, fuck saving Clé- he’d never speak a word of protest against the District again if that’s what it would take to let him and his husbands go home to Miroh.
But almost no one cares about what Jeongin wants, and the handful of people who do aren’t in the position to fix everything just because he’s upset. Everyone else is suffering just as badly as he is, if not worse, and he’s not going to let his selfish misery inconvenience anyone other than him.
He’s submerged deep in his thoughts of self-pity when the air shifts ever-so-slightly beside him. Jeongin jolts, almost reaching for a weapon he doesn’t have, before realizing it’s only Youngjae and forcing himself to relax. He’s somehow more ghostlike on his feet than even Minho, a true feat, and Jeongin tries not to feel intimidated as he meets his soft, distant gaze.
“Did you-” Youngjae begins, then cuts off as if he’s been choked by some unseen force. Jeongin patiently waits for him to continue. “Do you want to sleep in here?”
“No, that’s okay,” Jeongin tells him, and Youngjae's shoulders slump in obvious relief. “I have my room with everyone else.”
“Okay,” Youngjae says, trying and failing not to sound too pleased.
Jeongin briefly debates asking about it and finally decides to press- if he’s going to be living here for the foreseeable future, he wants to know why several of the rooms in this house are so clearly off-limits. “Is this room- for anything?” The question comes out awkward and stumbling, a poor attempt at avoiding offense.
Youngjae doesn’t say anything for a long, long time, instead staring into the empty bedroom with hazy eyes and an inhuman sort of stillness. “It should be,” he murmurs at last, so soft Jeongin almost doesn’t catch it at first.
Oh. Guilt suddenly wells up in Jeongin’s throat, sharp and painful. “I-” He has no idea what to say. Honestly, he shouldn't have asked at all. He misses his members when they’re gone for just a day; the thought of any of them being gone for even a fraction of the length Youngjae has been without his family is so terrible he can barely consider it.
“It never gets any easier,” Youngjae continues, voice still far away, and Jeongin stares, entirely transfixed. The very air around them has stilled and time seems to have gone honey-languid, the very universe pausing to give space to Youngjae and his pain. “Don’t ever lose anyone in your unit. It’s like-” he trails off, unable to find the words, and as Jeongin watches, a crystalline tear drips down his cheek, glittering in the light and finishing his sentence more profoundly than words ever could.
“We’re not Unit Seven anymore. Not without them. We’ve recovered, mostly, but we’ll never be what we were when we were whole.”
Jeongin tries to imagine what it would be like to live as Youngjae does, surrounded by just as many ghosts as he is people. He can’t do it. Jeongin knows he wouldn't survive if any one of his teammates were to die or be taken, much less half of them. He’s not sure there would even be a reason for him to live.
All this time Youngjae has been watching him, gaze boring into him as if reading his thoughts. The only trace of emotion on his face is that of vague curiosity, but a shiver runs down Jeongin’s spine all the same. No offense to Youngjae, but he never, ever wants to end up like him.
“Food’s almost ready, Innie!” Changbin calls from downstairs, and the instant Jeongin glances towards the sound, Youngjae vanishes to who-knows-where.
“Coming!” Jeongin calls, slowly climbing to his feet. One hand subconsciously reaches up to rub just beneath his eyes, and he frowns as he realizes he’s trying to wipe away tears he hadn’t even cried.
He looks one more time into the empty room, then darts down the stairs.
Living with Unit Seven is an uncannily surreal experience. Unit Nine has never cohabitated with anyone other than themselves before, so living in a household with four other people takes some getting used to.
Fortunately, Unit Seven implicitly understands many of their idiosyncrasies, sharing a number of instinctive habits with Unit Nine, so they don’t have to try very hard to behave “normally” for their benefit. Unit Seven doesn’t so much as blink at their clinginess, the amount of weapons they possess, their wildly varying sleep schedules; in return, Unit Nine politely ignores that sometimes Youngjae and Jaebum sit in the house’s empty bedrooms for hours at a time, and the fact that Jinyoung is the only entity in the house capable of holding extended conversations without continually wilting more and more under the weight of sheer emotional exhaustion.
Everyone has their own issues, their own skeletons in their closets. Jeongin certainly isn’t going to judge, not when Unit Seven are functioning infinitely better than he ever would if he were subjected to the same fate. Beyond the profound, omnipresent melancholy of their hosts, the four of them are quite nice to be around. They’re perfectly kind, thoughtful hosts, happy to accommodate any need Unit Nine might have as best as they possibly can.
It’s a bit hard to get to know them on a personal level, given the circumstances, but Jeongin and his husbands are nothing if not persistent. It’s not like they have anything better to do than socializing, anyway.
Unsurprisingly, Chan is the first to have any real luck with Unit Seven, but he had a massive head start to begin with. It’s strange to see him so immediately comfortable with people outside of Unit Nine, but the remains of Unit Seven welcome him with open arms, eyes bright and eager to discuss the stories they’d heard from both before and after Unit Nine’s escape. It seems Jaebum has told as many stories of Chan as Chan had told his unit of Jaebum.
Unit Seven also has access to news channels, District-sanitized though they may be, and they’re happy to share the knowledge they’ve gathered with Unit Nine. Unsurprisingly, there’s a massive manhunt for the eight of them, pictures from their soldier days splashed across every surface they’ll fit on, and everyone in Clé is being offered an impressive reward for any information they may have. Interestingly, they’re not being branded as attempted assassins- instead, all of the signs and videos claim that they’re recently escaped soldiers with a thirst for civilian blood, as armed and dangerous as they come.
That particular claim isn’t overly concerning; anyone with half a brain will be able to put together that the District beginning a manhunt right after the president’s near-assasination is no coincidence. The promise of a reward, however, is a far more serious issue. While no one in Miroh knows where they are now, there are certainly a number of people who know where they lived, and they could easily make it impossible for Unit Nine to ever return home again.
Yet when Jisung mentions that concern to Jaebum, he waves it off instantly. “You’re not going to get reported,” he informs them with utmost confidence. “No one’s dumb enough to do that.”
“Why wouldn’t they?” Changbin asks. “With the amount of money they’re offering…”
“Well, for one thing, no one wants the District prying into their business any more than they already do, and anyone who thinks they actually make good on their reward offers would have to have been born yesterday,” Jaebum explains easily, with an air that suggests he knows all of this from personal experience. “Snitching is just a good way to get yourself interrogated and thrown into prison for being a ‘co-conspirator.’”
The knowledge eases Jeongin’s worries slightly, but he can’t help but wonder about how their friends in Miroh are doing. He has no idea if everyone got home safe after the riots started, and Jae-
Jeongin isn’t sure he’d ever forgive himself if Jae were to end up dead as a direct result of their actions.
With nowhere to go and no goal to be chasing, the days quickly begin to bleed together. Occasionally he chats with Jinyoung, trying to gain a better understanding of how his systems work, but most of the time Jeongin can’t tear his eyes away from the news, hoping for some snippet of information about Miroh. He has yet to see anything, but persists all the same, clinging to the closest thing to a sense of purpose he has.
Today is yet another day like all the others before it, and Jeongin is hanging in his usual spot, the loveseat closest to the TV. Everyone else is off- somewhere, likely enjoying the sunshine. There isn’t much to do in the house, so being outdoors is the only real reprieve from the endless boredom of being stuck in the infinite wasteland that is Yellow Wood.
In all honesty, Jeongin is getting sick of the unrelenting sunlight- it hasn’t rained in what feels like weeks, and everything is so hot and dry that he feels like he’s being baked alive whenever he steps outside. In a way, he’s become rather spoiled; if Jeongin were to tell the him who had just escaped from the District that he’d someday grow sick and tired of sunlight, he’d probably get smacked for trivializing something as profoundly precious as the sun.
“What’cha watching?” Bambam asks, popping his head in through the doorway. Jeongin jolts halfway off the couch in surprise, and he immediately raises his hands in surrender. “Sorry, sorry!”
Jeongin waves him off, tossing his head slightly to resettle his hair. “It’s fine. I was just thinking.”
Bambam hums in affirmation but doesn’t ask further, which Jeongin is deeply grateful for. Instead he leans against the wall and starts to watch the TV with Jeongin, listening with rapt attention as a reporter with too-starched hair cheerfully prattles on about something to do with agricultural production. It’s truly, supremely boring, which is half the reason why Jeongin spaced out in the first place.
“The news won’t show you anything useful,” Bambam tells him after a minute. “It’s what they don’t talk about that matters more.”
Jeongin’s confusion must show plainly on his face, because Bambam huffs a laugh and gestures towards the screen. “See how they’re talking about Sector- what is it, thirty-five? A place full of nothing but farms? Have they shown you a single shot of a city yet?”
Jeongin thinks for a moment. “No,” he says eventually, realization beginning to dawn on him. “So you’re saying they’re only showing rural areas because-”
“There’s riots happening in all of the cities,” Bambam finishes.
Jeongin’s mouth falls open slightly. “All of them? Why?”
“You tried to kill the president. Did you really think everyone else would just sit by and watch it happen?”
...Well, yeah, kind of- their whole goal was to keep civilians out of the conflict. While Jeongin is too embarrassed to speak the thought aloud, his silence must say enough, because Bambam sighs almost affectionately and moves to sit down next to him.
“You might not have killed Park, but you just gave every single rebel group and vengeful civilian in Clé the perfect opening to cause some chaos and fight for change. Things probably won’t settle down for weeks- if they settle down at all.”
Jeongin gapes at him. It makes sense now that he says it -utter hatred of President Park might be the one thing everyone in Clé has in common- but he’d assumed their assassination attempt was nothing more than a failure, not the single spark needed to throw the whole country into chaos.
“I know it’s really easy to think the whole world is just you and your unit,” Bambam says gently, “but Clé is a million times more complicated than you think. It’s a million times more complicated than I think. There are people here who have spent every second of their lives working to overthrow the District. You just gave them the biggest window of opportunity they’ve had in decades- they’d be stupid not to take it.”
Jeongin makes a contemplative noise, mind racing to adjust to this new alteration of his worldview. He and his husbands may have managed to destabilize the entire government.
“Can I...ask you something?” Jeongin says tentatively.
“Shoot,” Bambam replies easily.
“Why didn’t you ever try anything like this?” He can’t imagine Unit Seven saw all of the same suffering his unit did and felt no desire to help, yet here they are, as far away from it all as they can be.
“Why did you?” Bambam asks with a wry smile. “There’s only so much loss you can go through before it breaks you completely. We didn’t even get to escape before hitting that threshold. After that, you don’t want to do anything else. You just lick your wounds and stay out of trouble as best as you can.”
“Oh.” Right. If Jeongin were to lose half of his unit, he probably wouldn’t have the drive to attempt a coup either.
Before he can apologize for his question, however, Bambam continues. “Honestly, it’s good that you aren’t like us. Maybe you’ll actually be able to make things better for everyone.”
“That’s a lot to hope for,” Jeongin says carefully. He’s- flattered, he thinks, by Bambam’s faith in him and his unit, but if their assassination attempt has taught him anything, it’s that promising things they can’t necessarily deliver is a dangerous practice.
“Maybe,” Bambam says with a shrug, “but it’s better than having no hope at all.”
Jeongin can’t argue with that.
The conversation sticks in his head for days. Every time he returns to it, something new holds his attention, like an infinitely-faceted gem that throws light in every possible direction. He’s not sure what to do with the knowledge that Bambam, and Unit Seven by extension, believe in their Unit with such unwavering certainty.
What have they done to earn that trust? And, more pressingly, what can they do to keep it?
It’s not a question Jeongin has any idea of how to answer. He’s never been a planner, one to pull things from thin air and bring them to life without any base to start from. Jeongin has always been better at improvising, at taking stock of the resources around him and manipulating them into doing whatever he needs done. In Miroh, where you can get your hands on just about anything for the right price, Jeongin had the power to do whatever he wanted. But in Yellow Wood, where even the very earth seems to have given up on fulfilling its purpose, he’s essentially useless.
It’s all absolutely infuriating. Jeongin hops down the stairs just a little too violently, taking a vicious sort of pleasure in the way the wood thuds below him with every step. He’s not really sure where he’s going, but he knows he needs to move, to do something other than sit around getting stuck in his own head all day.
A pair of voices are audible in the kitchen, which Jeongin quickly identifies as Jaebum and Jinyoung. Their conversation seems serious, and Jeongin pauses in the hallway so as not to interrupt. As such, he ends up unintentionally eavesdropping, frozen by indecision just around the corner from the kitchen.
“I know I obviously don’t have the same spatial concerns to think about, but I wouldn’t mind it if they stayed long-term,” Jinyoung says. “I like them. Everyone does.”
“I like them too, and Chris-“ Jaebum sighs. “It’s so good to see him again. He’s done better for himself than I ever could’ve hoped for.”
“But?” Jinyoung prods gently.
“But nothing,” Jaebum answers with a huff. “I meant what I said.”
“I know you did. I know you’re happy for him,” Jinyoung says softly, “but you’re allowed to be jealous, too. It’s only human.”
“I’m trying to ignore it, but every time I see them it just reminds me of-”
“I know dear, I know,” Jinyoung hums.
“I miss them. I miss you.”
They’re in love , Jeongin realizes, and the thought fills him with a deep, inexplicable sadness. He can’t imagine what it would be like to be in love with someone you could never touch, never see. While he likes to pretend to hate physical contact, Jeongin is fully aware he’s touched each one of his teammates in some way every single day since their escape from the compound. The contact grounds him, reminds him that his family is there and safe .
If he couldn’t have that basic comfort- he’s not sure what he’d do.
When a beat of mournful silence pauses the conversation between Jaebum and Jinyoung, Jeongin decides he’s eavesdropped long enough. He makes sure to walk extra loudly into the kitchen, and by the time he steps through the threshold Jaebum looks as serene as always, sipping a glass of water and leaning against the counter. He smiles at Jeongin as he enters, and Jeongin politely ignores the cracks in it.
The very next day, Jeongin is treated to another glimpse into the internal mechanisms of Unit Seven’s relationship. He’s having another casual conversation with Jinyoung about his systems when Jaebum pops in, and waves politely as Jinyoung offers a cheerful greeting. Jaebum smiles back automatically.
Instead of simply moving on like he usually would, though, Jaebum sits down across from Jeongin to listen to their discussion.
“What are you two talking about?” he asks curiously.
“The usual,” Jinyoung says with amusement. “Me, myself, and I.”
“How much more could you have to ask him?” Jaebum asks Jeongin, bemused. “His systems aren’t that complicated.”
“It’s a bit more philosophical today,” Jinyoung informs him. “We’re talking about how to make me real again.”
“I was just saying that you could -theoretically, at least- download his consciousness into a body,” Jeongin says. “It wouldn’t be too difficult to manage on a technical level.”
No different than how the District programs their cops, at least. The parts might be a challenge to acquire, but if Unit Seven really wanted Jinyoung back, they could do it.
“To do that, we’d be killing an innocent person,” Jaebum points out. “We would be making the conscious choice to better Jinyoung’s quality of life at the expense of someone else’s existence. We’ve talked about it, and that’s not a choice anyone wants to make.”
A pause. “Plus, it would never be him, you know? It would always be Jinyoung’s mind in a stranger’s body.”
“If only someone could build me a robot,” Jinyoung says wistfully.
The corner of Jaebum’s mouth quirks up. “I wish we could, too.”
To Jeongin, he says, “No matter who we might end up choosing, we’d still be wiping their consciousness out of existence. If we do that, how are we any better than the District? Our motives might be purer, but we’re still doing the exact same thing.”
If one of his members was trapped in a digital void, doomed to an eternal life of watching the world from afar, would he be willing to destroy an innocent person’s existence to bring them back? Part of him, the bit that had nearly made him throw up while they were in Sector 19, screams no, no, never again! But the rest of him, the part that loves his members so fiercely it aches, is far less certain.
“It’s not wrong to love someone so much you’d kill for them. But you should be mindful of just who you end up killing.” Jaebum’s gaze is soft, but his expression is so solemn that for a moment Jeongin wonders if he knows what happened in Sector 19, if he can see the enormous weight they’ve all been slowly collapsing under for the past week.
“Good advice,” Jeongin comments absently, unsure of what else to say.
One half of Jaebum’s mouth twitches up. “You tend to learn a few things when you’re out here this long.”
Silence follows his statement, but it’s comfortable; a moment for the two of them to collect their thoughts and patch up any mistakenly reopened wounds. Jinyoung hasn’t spoken up in a while, and in the back of his mind Jeongin wonders if he’s left altogether.
(He’d mentioned to Jeongin once that he doesn’t feel things quite like his human teammates. There’s no physical component, he’d explained, pausing to pick out the right words. I don’t have a heart that speeds up when I’m nervous. I don’t have blood that can boil when I’m angry, or a mouth that can smile when I’m happy. I know what I’m supposed to feel, and I respond accordingly, but it’s never automatic or unconscious. Every emotional response I have, I consciously create.
Jeongin hadn’t been sure of what to say. No wonder Jinyoung is the most emotionally healthy person in Unit Seven- he physically can’t feel the weight of grief. Jeongin still doesn’t know if that’s a blessing or a curse.)
“I’m sorry I interrupted your discussion,” Jaebum speaks back up, looking genuinely regretful. Pushing his chair back, he moves to stand up; without really thinking about it, Jeongin does the same.
“It’s okay,” Jeongin replies easily. “Oh, and Jaebum?”
Jaebum hums, already halfway out the door.
“Thank you,” Jeongin says. For taking us in. For understanding. For taking care of Chan all those years ago.
Jaebum smiles, fragile and lovely like a newly-bloomed flower. “There’s nothing you need to thank me for.”
Being in a house full of ghosts has proven to be contagious. Jeongin speaks less these days than he has in months, takes every step in near-silence. Emotions in this house are not meant to be experienced with any degree of outward intensity; each and every feeling should be muted and pushed strictly inward so as not to disturb the dust or anyone who might hear it through the walls.
Still, he’s hardly the worst one off. If Jeongin is now a ghost, then Minho has become downright imaginary, entirely invisible unless one consciously focuses their attention and thought on finding him. Minho hasn’t been talking to anyone lately, hasn’t even been around beyond the absolute minimum. Even Jisung can’t escape this treatment, though he’s the only person Minho willingly touches.
Jeongin doesn’t think it’s something they did, despite what appearances may suggest. Whenever Minho pushes someone away from him, it’s always gentle but firm, with no intention to hurt. He’s never cutting or loud when he tells people to leave him alone.
Minho, it seems, is the one who’s hurting.
It could be any number of the traumas they've experienced recently weighing on him, but they have no way of knowing without asking, something Minho seems entirely determined to escape. Normally the eight of them would take the time to talk things out, likely in some sort of group cuddle pile, but considering Minho’s current dedication to avoiding them, achieving even one of those things would take a miracle.
Jeongin wishes he could tell Minho what Bambam had told him, but it’s near-impossible to catch him for long enough to say good morning, much less have an in-depth conversation. He always has somewhere else to be, some perfectly plausible excuse on his lips the instant Jeongin opens his mouth. Short of physically stopping him from leaving, there’s nothing they can do.
As the days pass, slow and filled with a simmering sort of tension, the problem only worsens. Minho has become so good at avoiding his unit that he barely speaks at all, and everyone else gradually and begrudgingly backs off, hoping he’ll come to them eventually.
They all keep waiting for an opportunity that never seems to come.
As if sensing their need to have some collective time to themselves, Jaebum asks them one morning to go pick fruit for the house, directing them to what was once an orchard but is now the local woodland, entirely overgrown but still producing plenty of fruit. He sends them off with a list of things to gather and a set of driving directions before anyone can even properly agree to his request, and Jeongin wonders for what seems like the millionth time how Jaebum is always so profoundly insightful.
So the eight of them obligingly head out to what’s left of the forests of Yellow Wood, the drive slow and peaceful. Minho insists upon driving, despite his normal disdain for it -it’s just so boring, I always feel like I’m going to fall asleep- and no one protests. Jisung commandeers the passenger seat automatically, and no one opposes that, either; he’s probably the only person Minho would tolerate sitting with.
They split the list between themselves, dividing into pairs to each find a fruit. The forest is still more or less divided into sections, the largest and oldest trees creating firm borders between each type of fruit despite the smaller, more rebellious shoots of different species beginning to spring up around them.
Chan and Changbin disappear into the woods almost immediately, single-mindedly focused on their goal, but everyone else is slower getting out of the truck. Something needs to happen today, with the opportunity they’ve been given, but no one’s quite sure of how to kick things off.
Felix ends up being the one to crack. “I didn’t want to bring this up in the house,” he says carefully, “but… what are we going to do long-term? We can’t stay here forever.”
There’s a pause as everyone thinks, the issue they’d been collectively avoiding now out in the open air. Felix is right- they can’t keep leeching off of Unit Seven forever, but they can’t exactly walk right back into Miroh, either.
“We have to go back home,” Hyunjin says immediately, forcefully. He sounds like he’s had his arguments prepared for a while. “We can’t just let the District keep doing what they are.”
There’s a long moment of silence among the group- a dark one, thick with tension.
“No,” Seungmin says at last. He pauses the moment the word leaves his mouth, like he didn’t mean to have said anything at all, but he continues just as strongly. “Why should we risk our safety? We have everything we could ever need right here.”
“People are dying , stuck in that terrible system that treats them like they’re not even human,” Hyunjin fires right back, “and we can help them. We need to help them.”
“We don’t need to help anyone,” Seungmin replies coldly. “We already tried being heroes, and look how that worked out.”
Minho visibly flinches, gaze dropping to the floor. Jisung cautiously reaches over and rests a hand on his thigh, but Minho doesn’t even seem to process the gesture.
Hyunjin, unaware of what’s happening beside him, runs a frustrated hand through his hair. “How can you just sit by and let the District keep doing what they’re doing?” he demands. “Do you care about anything? What about Unit Seven? What about Jae?”
“I care about us ,” Seungmin spits. “I care about keeping the eight of us safe. Nothing else matters.”
For the briefest of seconds Hyunjin’s gaze softens, but with a slight head shake the righteous fury is back in full force. “Chan,” he says, whirling around to look for him. “Where is he? He’ll agree with me.”
“He’ll make the best decision for the group, so no, he won’t,” Seungmin snaps back. In an impressive display of athleticism, he leaps out of the back of the truck and starts running in the direction Chan and Changbin had disappeared off to. Hyunjin, not to be outdone, follows right on his heels.
Without making a sound, Minho leaves next, choosing to climb up and over the truck’s door in lieu of opening it. Jeongin doesn’t manage to catch a good glimpse of his expression, but from what he can see, it’s intimidatingly stony, the sort of look Minho usually only wears when he’s about to kill someone and is shutting all of his feelings out.
In a far less graceful gesture, Jisung throws the door open and falls out of the passenger seat, shooting a brief, anxious look towards Jeongin and Felix before darting off after Minho.
Now entirely alone, Felix and Jeongin exchange glances. There’s a minute where the only sound that can be heard is the whistling of wind through the trees, the faintest cry of a bird from somewhere in the distance.
“What do you think we should do?” Felix asks at last, voice soft and almost nervous.
Jeongin thinks for a moment. “I want to keep the eight of us safe,” he says, slowly. Felix nods. “But, at the same time, I want to do what we can to make things better.”
Felix nods a little more vigorously at that. “Me too. I think we should help Unit Seven and Jae too, if we can. And… honestly, I just miss home.”
“Me too,” Jeongin murmurs. It feels like some sick joke that they lost their home so soon after they’d finally earned it. He even misses the things he hadn’t liked, like how Jisung never remembered to put his spray paint away when he went out tagging, or how any food he brought home from the market would be inevitably stolen the moment he turned his back. “I don’t want anyone to get hurt, obviously, but living here is…”
“Yeah,” Felix agrees. “We can’t keep doing this.”
Jeongin couldn’t agree more.
Contented with the knowledge that they’re more or less on the same page, the two of them finally climb out of the truck and head into the forest. They hold hands as they walk, the contact mutually grounding them both, and Jeongin doesn’t complain about the way Felix grips his hand so tightly it hurts.
They make short work of collecting two bags of apples, their assigned fruit, chatting lightly as they search through the trees. Through some unspoken agreement, they keep their conversation topics light, discussing the weather and what they want to eat later in the day. The knowledge that they’re going to have a Discussion later looms over it all like a thunderhead on the horizon, not yet a threat but rapidly sneaking up on them all the same.
Despite their efficiency, the apple trees are in one of the deeper sections of the orchard, so they end up being the last pair to make it back to the truck.
They arrive to a concerning sight- namely, Seungmin and Hyunjin visibly arguing, while the rest of their unit watches with varying degrees of discomfort. Clearly whatever conflict resolution they’d attempted had been a failure.
Jeongin takes hold of Felix’s wrist and guides him in a wide circle around the pair, visible enough not to startle them but unobtrusive enough to avoid disturbing anything. It’s only once they’re properly beside everyone else that Jeongin properly listens to the argument going on in front of him.
“You’re being irrational,” Seungmin says shortly, arms folded across his chest. “I get that you don’t like it here. But that doesn’t mean we should just drop everything for some half-baked attempt at heroism.”
“It isn’t ‘half-baked,’” Hyunjin snaps, “it’s finishing what we started. We all agreed to kill Park, and we all agreed to protect our friends back home any way we could. How the hell is hiding out here helping with any of that?”
“We did our best to kill Park. It didn’t work. We can’t exactly pop back into Miroh and finish the job in an afternoon,” Seungmin points out sharply. “And our friends knew the risks when they decided to help us. We owe them our gratitude, not our lives.”
“That’s so-” Hyunjin roughly runs a hand through his hair. “Where the fuck is your sense of empathy?”
“Right here,” Seungmin tells him. “With our family. You know, where it’s supposed to be.”
Hyunjin lets out a frustrated noise, and Seungmin eyes him reproachfully.
In the end, what happens next is honestly an accident, but that objective truth will hardly matter in the face of the emotions that follow.
Hyunjin storms away right as Seungmin takes a step forward, and they end up smacking into each other, shoulders and hips colliding with all the force of their collective anger. Hyunjin stumbles from the impact, shoulder twisting backwards too sharply to be painless, but Seungmin is the one who ends up falling to the ground. He seems to trip on something -a rock, an unruly weed- as he collapses, and it twists his ankle in a way that ankles should never be forced to bend.
“Fuck,” Seungmin hisses, clutching at his boot with a white-knuckled grip.
Chan is by his side in an instant, one hand on Seungmin’s shoulder and the other straying towards his injured leg. “Are you alright?”
Everyone else presses as close as they dare, surrounding him in a tight circle out of an instinctive urge to both comfort and protect. Minho silently crouches down in front of Seungmin’s foot, ready to check it over for breaks at a moment’s notice.
Seungmin takes a deep breath, blinks away the tears that had automatically welled up from the force of him hitting the ground. He doesn’t look like he’s in excruciating pain, at the very least.
“Is your ankle-” someone asks.
“I think it’s fine,” Seungmin says, twisting it experimentally. “Definitely not broken.”
With a hand up from Changbin, he’s on his feet and testing his leg out in moments. He seems more or less alright, at least well enough to make it back to the truck, so with a few more gentle touches of reassurance everyone else breaks their circle to fall into a more natural formation.
Well, everyone except for one person- Hyunjin. He looks absolutely horrified, hands pressed over his mouth and eyes welling up with tears. He can’t tear his eyes off of Seungmin.
“Hyunjin-” Seungmin begins, but Hyunjin refuses to give him a chance to speak.
“No. Just- just stop.” Hyunjin snarls, eyes flashing as tears well up within them like a flash flood during a thunderstorm. “Just stop and leave. Me. Alone.”
“We’re not going to just abandon you out here,” Jisung says sharply.
“I don’t care,” Hyunjin tells him fiercely. “I’m not going back with you whether you like it or not.”
Then Minho of all people speaks up, voice soft but easily commanding everyone else’s attention. “Promise you’ll come back within an hour.”
“What?” Hyunjin asks dumbly. He looks more surprised that Minho is directly addressing him than anything else.
“If we leave you here,” Minho tells him, with a tone that leaves no room for argument, “you promise that you’ll be back at the house in an hour. If you don’t, we’re coming to find you.”
Silence for a long moment.
“Fine,” Hyunjin says curtly. “One hour.”
“Good,” Minho says, and with that he turns around and starts walking back towards the truck. Hyunjin watches him go for a moment, then darts off into the woods before anyone else can force him to stay.
Jeongin glances over at Seungmin to find him staring at Hyunjin’s retreating form with open longing in his eyes, looking a second away from chasing him down. Slowly, careful not to startle him, Jeongin wraps an arm around his shoulder. Seungmin flinches slightly as the contact, but upon processing its source he relaxes, turning to bury his head in the crook of Jeongin’s neck. “Fuck,” he mutters hoarsely, voice wavering. “Fuck.”
“Come on,” Jeongin says softly, running his hand up and down Seungmin’s bicep comfortingly. “We shouldn’t keep everyone waiting.”
“You’re right,” Seungmin sighs, and he allows himself to be led back to the truck without complaint, eyes concerningly glassy the entire time.
They make it back to the house not five minutes before the sky opens up to a downpour, the rain so fierce it splatters down in sheets harsh enough to hurt.
“Where’s Hyunjin?” Jinyoung asks when they get through the door, worry audible even in his perpetually semi-distorted voice.
“He’s… taking some time for himself,” Seungmin says, bitterness seeping into his voice.
“Ah,” Jinyoung says, politely choosing not to press. “Will...he be back soon?”
“He will,” Chan says firmly, as if he can make his statement true by speaking with enough conviction.
Despite the fact that they don’t really need to be waiting at the door for Hyunjin to come back, the seven of them do it anyway, crowding into the front hallway and staring out the front window unblinkingly. It’s impossible to see very far into the pounding rain, but no one is deterred in the slightest.
The minutes tick by in silence. Jeongin hasn’t been watching the time, but he knows it’s been almost an hour, and Hyunjin is still nowhere in sight. If he doesn’t come back, what are they going to do? Finding him in a storm this bad would be nearly impossible, but they can’t exactly leave him out in the storm-
“There,” Jisung whispers, pointing out into the rain. The seven of them squint out the window, straining to detect any hint of Hyunjin, and eventually a dark figure comes into view, so thoroughly rain-soaked it looks more shadow than human. A knot in Jeongin’s chest comes undone at the sight. Despite everything that’s happened and everything still to come, at least Hyunjin is safe and by his husbands’ sides.
They watch his approach with rapt attention until he finally climbs up onto the porch and out of the rain. The door opens achingly slowly, Hyunjin clutching onto it with one hand to ensure it doesn’t creak. He slips inside the moment the gap is wide enough to accommodate his body, glancing behind him to check that the door shuts in silence.
When he catches sight of the rest of his unit waiting for him, Hyunjin’s eyes go wide and he freezes in the doorway. No one moves for a long moment.
“Welcome back,” Jisung says, too loud in the otherwise silent entryway.
Hyunjin’s gaze drops to the floor, and he begins to kick off his sopping-wet boots. “Thanks,” he mutters.
When he’s done, he glances up at them furtively, hair falling into his eyes and softening his expression. In that moment, he just looks small, hunched in on himself from equal parts cold and shame. Nothing like the fiery-eyed storm of righteous fury he’d been earlier.
Chan smiles at him, eyes brimming with love so immense it could drown someone, and holds up a towel. “May I?”
For a second, it seems like Hyunjin might be stubborn enough to refuse him, but eventually he bows his head, wet hair dripping into his face, and allows Chan to begin drying him off. Chan doesn’t say a word to him, gently tilting his head in any direction he needs it to move, and everyone else watches in respectful silence of the intimate moment before them.
When he’s done, Chan runs a gentle thumb over Hyunjin’s cheekbone, and the gesture is enough to make tears well up in his eyes. Hyunjin glances away, unable to meet the intensity of Chan’s gaze.
Felix appears after a moment with a pile of neatly-folded clothes in his arms. Hyunjin takes them slowly, uncertainly, and darts off to go change without meeting anyone’s eyes.
“Let’s have a discussion in our room when everyone’s ready,” Chan says, with a quiet sort of authority in his voice that implies it’s not optional. He gets six nods in reply.
Jeongin takes a moment to himself before going into the bedroom, locking himself in the upstairs bathroom and washing his face with lukewarm water until he feels slightly less like his world is falling down around him. His reflection watches him the entire time, with too-wide eyes and uncomfortably long hair tangling at his shoulders. He stares at this wild, anxious version of himself for perhaps too long, wondering when they became the same person.
It’s always been a given that Jeongin will have his unit by his side. It was true back when he knew scarcely more than his own name, and it was true when they’d exchanged necklaces on that freezing day in Honey Park, using their newfound freedom to swear themselves to one another for eternity.
But now, with Minho not talking and Seungmin and Hyunjin fighting and everyone else so damn miserable all the time, he can’t be sure that his husbands will always be there to help each other when they need it. That thought is perhaps the most terrifying thing he’s realized since he first escaped the compound, and it makes him grip the edge of the sink so tightly his knuckles turn white.
When Jeongin forces himself to step out of the bathroom, the sky has grown a bit darker, rain still pattering against the house in a gentle rhythm. No matter the result of this upcoming discussion, no one will be leaving the house again for a while.
Jeongin takes one step into their room and is immediately smacked in the face with the sheer tension in the air, thick enough to choke him before he’s said a word. It takes a surprising amount of his self-control not to walk right back out. They’ve never had a disagreement that fueled this much resentment between them.
(If Jeongin is honest with himself, it terrifies him.)
Minho is more or less trapped in one corner, clearly having been caught by surprise. Chan is sitting almost directly in front of the door, turned towards Minho just enough that any move he might make to escape would be noticed instantly. He’s curled up in a ball against the wall, looking like he’s trying to phase into it, and stubbornly refuses to meet anyone’s eyes.
Hyunjin is sullenly leaning against the far wall, arms folded tightly across his chest and his head hung low, damp hair falling into his face and obscuring his eyes. He looks ready to snap at the first person who dares to approach him, and Jeongin wisely chooses to keep to the other end of the room.
Everyone else has formed a loose circle on the mattresses, dead quiet and hunched in on themselves. They look like they’re about to attend a funeral.
Great, Jeongin thinks sarcastically. This is going to go just wonderfully.
When everyone is finally together and settled, Chan wastes no time in getting to the heart of things. “Okay,” he says, clapping his hands together. “We clearly need to have a discussion on what our future is going to look like.”
Silence for a moment.
“I think we all agree we can’t stay with Unit Seven forever,” Changbin begins when no one else moves to say anything. “We don’t have to leave tomorrow, but we need space for ourselves that doesn’t come from someone else’s charity.”
“So we can either find another place to live in Yellow Wood, or we can figure out how to go home,” Jeongin summarizes.
There really is no easy answer to any of this- no one would be happy living in Yellow Wood, but going back to Miroh would be incredibly dangerous, and Jeongin would rather have his husbands alive and miserable than dead at the hands of the District.
“I agree with what Hyunjin said earlier,” Jisung chimes in. “Sitting here and doing nothing isn’t right.”
“But, at the same time, going home to Miroh would be a massive risk. There’s a very real possibility it could result in our capture or deaths,” Chan points out.
“I know Yellow Wood isn’t home for us, but it might have to become that. No home is worth dying for,” Jeongin says neutrally, eyes carefully trained on the floor in front of him. “I’m willing to risk a lot of things for us to go back to Miroh, but not anyone’s life.”
“It’s admittedly a risk, yes, but isn’t everything we do?” Felix says. “None of us are happy here- hell, look at us right now! I’m not saying I know what to do, but staying in Yellow Wood would do nothing to fix any of our issues.”
“No one’s going to like me saying this,” Seungmin says quietly, “but I’d rather have you all unhappy and alive than watch you die chasing an unreasonable fantasy.”
“It’s our home, not a fantasy.” Hyunjin speaks for the first time, voice low and hoarse. “It’s where we belong.”
“And there could be a hundred District soldiers waiting for us the moment we get there,” Changbin points out. “You’ve seen the news- everyone in Miroh knows our faces now. How are we going to stay discreet?”
“The fact that we’re trying to do the right thing doesn’t mean that we’re guaranteed success. You need to learn that lesson, Hyunjin, before we lose more than just a building.” Seungmin is watching Hyunjin with an unreadable darkness in his eyes.
Hyunjin glowers at him and mutters something likely better left unheard.
“No matter what, I don’t think we should return to Miroh unless everyone agrees to it,” Chan says evenly. “To take a risk like that, we’d need to be fully in sync. We’re clearly not at that point yet.”
“Well, we can’t just sit here and... and rot!” Hyunjin snaps, some of that earlier fire smoldering in his eyes again. “We can’t roll over and fucking die, not now. We’ve come too far to just give up.”
“I’m not saying we’re going to,” Chan says calmly. “But we make decisions as a group. If we’re going back to Miroh, everyone needs to agree to that.”
Hyunjin’s eyes sweep almost desperately around the circle, searching for traces of support in their eyes. Jeongin can’t quite meet his gaze, knowing full well he won’t give Hyunjin the answer he’s looking for.
“Fine,” Hyunjin snarls, eyes flashing. “If you won’t do anything, I will.” With that, he climbs to his feet and storms off somewhere deeper into the house.
Felix immediately moves to chase after him, but Seungmin gently catches his wrist before he can get very far. “Give him time,” he says, voice soft and defeated. “Let him cool off first. He won’t listen to anyone right now.”
Felix frowns but acquiesces, choosing instead to settle back down and latch onto Changbin. Despite his minimal role in the conflict, he still looks not unlike a kicked puppy- Felix always hates it when they fight. Jisung leans over and pats his thigh comfortingly, and the gesture is enough to mollify him slightly.
“Let’s discuss this again in the morning, okay?” Chan says, doing a very poor job of hiding the way his skin blanches and the glassiness of his eyes. “When everything isn’t as tense.”
Jeongin nearly scoffs. A good night’s sleep isn’t going to do much to bridge the massive ideological divide between them. Honestly, he’s not sure anything will.
Jeongin glances around briefly to find Minho has disappeared yet again. Hopefully he’s with Hyunjin. If nothing else, they can offer each other some silent support, something they both desperately need.
When he eventually finds himself tangled together with Felix as they settle in for the evening, Jeongin doesn’t bother to protest. The touch is an oasis of comfort in the stormy seas of tension, even if Felix tends to cuddle like his life depends on it. At least he can be sure Felix won’t be storming out on him anytime soon.
He only falls asleep when Felix’s breath finally evens out next to him.
When morning dawns, Jeongin only feels marginally better, the remaining tension and gloom in the atmosphere seeping through his skin and leaving him inexplicably tense and anxious. He can’t help but feel like something terribly bad is coming, try as he might to shake the feeling off.
It certainly doesn’t help that he’d woken up cold and essentially alone. The only other person still asleep is Changbin, curled up in the center of the mattress on the other side of the room and arms still half-wrapped around some phantom body already gone for the morning.
Jeongin yawns and stretches, languid movements effecting an air of relaxation he doesn’t feel. He forces himself to sit up, then stand as quickly as he can manage. Some inexplicable instinct tells him that he doesn’t want to be the last one up today.
Moving with the same level of care he might use on a stealth mission, Jeongin quietly covers Changbin with the closest blanket and tucks him in as best as he can. How deep of a sleeper Changbin is varies wildly from night to night, so Jeongin always errs on the side of caution whenever he does things like this. Once he’s sure Changbin hasn’t woken up from the disturbance, he leaves him to rest, slipping out of the bedroom and carefully closing the door behind him.
As he makes his way through the hallway and down the stairs, an unusual quiet hangs in the air, with no voices audible elsewhere in the house and no sound coming from the kitchen. If anything, it’s too quiet- even the birds are more muted today, almost as if the fog of tension in the house scared them away. Jeongin doesn’t like it. There’s far too much empty space for his mind to wander in, too many gaps for unpleasant thoughts to sneak in through.
He’s halfway through making a collective coffee pot for the house when someone pads into the kitchen behind him. Jeongin doesn’t bother to turn around, still too sleepy to bother with pleasantries.
“Good morning,” Chan hums, voice still slightly rough from sleep. If Jeongin were to turn around, he knows his husband would look like an adorable mess, hair puffed out in every direction like a chocolate cloud.
“Good morning,” Jeongin replies, as Chan wraps a loose arm around his shoulders and presses a kiss to his cheek. Jeongin smiles at him, the moment too soft for him to feign irritation, and leans into the gentle touch. It’s a relief to know that some things will never change; the sun shines, water flows, and Chan will love him no matter what happens.
“Chan! Chan!”
Chan whirls around, his warmth disappearing, and Jeongin, too surprised to be upset at the loss of contact, turns around with him. They both immediately meet eyes with a pale, terrified-looking Felix. “Lix?” Chan asks. “What’s-”
“Jisung and Minho,” he blurts, eyes wide and panicked. “And Hyunjin. They’re gone.”