It was a road Nayoung did not recognize, a highway of sorts, but barren of almost any vehicular activity whatsoever. She was in the back seat of a Ford Focus with Jieqiong sitting beside her, switching between looking cautiously at the two strangers in the front of the car and looking out the window at the foliage under the glaring sun. She didn’t like nor trust the two girls even one bit, one was too obnoxious and the other one looked really shady. However, she’d have to put up with them for now.

Jieqiong, on the other hand, seemed to be getting along with the obnoxious one, Jenny was her name, as they were chatting animatedly about nothing in particular, Nayoung managed to hear bits and pieces about topics like fashion and clothes, but otherwise the conversation was agonizingly boring for her.

The other girl, the one that spoke to them last night in the alley, was dead silent like Nayoung, keeping her eyes on the road ahead of them. She would occasionally shush Jenny and Jieqiong when the volume of their voices went up, but she would always turn back and keep her head forward without any other comment.

Nayoung stopped looking at the greenery at the side of the road to focus again on the strangers just in time to catch Eunjin observing her through the rear mirror. The silent girl quickly turned her head back but it was useless, Nayoung had already caught her looking.

She started to get more paranoid, fidgeting in her seat constantly, she regrets letting them take her gun, all thanks to Jieqiong persistence, when they got in the car. She would feel better if she had her gun with her, without it she was reduced to a nervous mess. She was already knee deep in preparing an escape plan should any more red flags appear when she felt a gentle grip on her left hand.

She looked to it, then up, then down again, then up again in an uncoordinated and chaotic sequence. Jieqiong was looking at her, a warm smile on her face, while she drew circles with her thumb on the back of Nayoung’s hand. Both of them remained there, looking at each other.

Nayoung felt suddenly at ease, she relaxed her tense shoulders and let her head fall on the headrest while breathing deeply. That was something she both liked and disliked about Jieqiong, the girl was able to crush Nayoung’s usual collected demeanor one moment and reconstruct it entirely the next. Nayoung found out that she was particularly weak to her smile and, frankly, she did not like that.

She let her eyes close for a moment while Jieqiong continued talking with Jenny and the previous day fatigue came rushing to her and, eventually, she fell asleep.

By the time she woke up the sun was already setting down although everything was still well illuminated, the car was now traversing a forest on a dirt road. She felt something heavy in her shoulders and looked at her side just to see Jieqiong fast asleep with her head snuggled against her neck.

She looked at the front, Eunjin was obviously awake but Jenny seemed to be sleeping too.

“So, what did you do?”- Eunjin spoke in a whisper, although the curiosity in her voice was noticeable.

“Excuse me?”- Nayoung asked back softly so as to not wake Jieqiong up.

“Exactly what you heard, what did you do to end up running from them?”

“I was a little too curious for my own good”- She decided to be a little cryptic about it, giving information about her to complete strangers was not a good idea.

“Ah, a classic… curiosity killed the cat”

The conversation that had started abruptly ended abruptly too, they didn’t speak anymore the rest of the trip since Nayoung didn’t bother to answer, almost half an hour later they reached a rustic looking mansion that was seemingly abandoned. The front windows were broken, vines plagued and climbed up the marble and nothing was left of the front door except for the hinges. Truly a depressing sight.

“Why does it always have to be an abandoned building?”- The ex-cop mutters under her breath, feeling a sense of dread at the sight.

“Wake your friend up, we’re here”- Eunjin talks to her as she shakes Jenny, who now looked like a newborn puppy with her eyes squinted.

Nayoung did as she was told and woke Jieqiong up before getting out of the car to follow the other two. Jieqiong was still drowsy and walked sluggishly, one hand rubbing her eyes and the other latched into Nayoung’s forearm. The four of them entered the house before being stopped by Eunjin.

“Jenny, park the car underground, you two, follow me.”- Eunjin orders to the sleepy girl

Jenny nods and turns back, exiting the mansion again. Meanwhile, Nayoung started following Eunjin again, they reached a lugubrious kitchen and Eunjin halted, the girl then positioned herself behind an old looking fridge and started moving it. Nayoung was about to move in to help her when the brunette just halted her with a hand, signaling that she didn’t need any help. Once she finished moving it a set of stairs was revealed, illuminated only by an intermittent light.

“Go down, they’ll be waiting for you two in the first room to the right, I have to go set up the night perimeter before the sun goes down.”

Both Nayoung and Jieqiong nod and the former cop takes the lead, going down slowly and ever vigilant with her guard up. The subfloor was nothing like the ground floor or the exterior of the house, everything looked more technological and new, there were various computers and machines Nayoung didn’t recognize. It wasn’t a very big room, it had a couple of doors and the ceiling and walls were made out of stainless and well-polished metal.

“What do you think this is?”- Jieqiong, who was now fully awake, asked while taking a look at one of the computers.

“I don’t know, it resembles some kind of underground bunker, I’m getting a bad feeling about this”- Nayoung answered while analyzing the submarine-looking metal door.

“That’s the door Eunjin was talking about”- Jieqiong disregarded Nayoung’s bad feeling, causing the older girl to grumble, as she skipped towards the metal door in front of Nayoung.

Jieqiong didn’t need to open the door since it apparently was unlocked, she just pushed it eagerly and went inside, Nayoung followed quickly. In the room were two girls, one was a blonde with a short bob cut wearing a shoulderless black shirt and some shorts, not the kind of clothes Nayoung would wear during the winter, and was typing away in a computer, completely immersed.

The other girl had jet black hair and her eyes were unfocused.

She was wearing a sweatshirt and some jeans and was more properly dressed for the winter’s climate. She was currently sitting, reading a book, well, not exactly, since by the looks of it the book was written in braille. One didn’t need to observe too much to figure out that the girl in question was blind.

The sound the door made when it opened had attracted the attention of both occupants, who were now looking in their direction. The atmosphere remained a little awkward until somebody spoke.

“Chae, is that you?”- Jieqiong was the first one to break the silence.

“I was still myself last time I checked”- The blind girl answered, a clear smirk and the next thing she Nayoung saw was an ecstatic Jieqiong lunging with her arms open at the woman.

Nayoung felt a pang in her chest.

“My name is Eunice, a pleasure to meet you”- The blonde came to Nayoung’s side and extended her hand

Nayoung forcefully unglued her eyes from the intimate hug that Jieqiong and the blind girl were sharing to pay attention to the other girl.

“Nayoung, Im Nayoung, now do you mind telling me what this is about”- Nayoung stretched her hand and returned the handshake. She wanted to get to the point and leave as quick as possible, the place still made her wary and she still didn’t trust these people.

Eunice turned around and snapped her fingers at Chaeyeon, effectively gathering the attention of Jieqiong and her.

“Let’s get to the point the, we heard your story and we wanted to recruit you, then one of our scouts said she saw you with Jieqiong, which used to be a friend of Chaeyeon”- She said, pointing at the girl whom Nayoung still had to hear talk-“So we had even more reason to track you down. We sent a couple of people to search for you but you are one of the most elusive individuals I’ve had the pleasure of meeting”

“Recruit me, for what?”

“Wait, Chae, they told me you went abroad when they replaced the branch…”- Jieqiong interrupted Nayoung, sending a disapproving gaze to Chaeyeon while ignoring the one Nayoung was giving her.

“It was a lie, pinky”- The blind girl answered factually, still stoic.

“I told you not to call me that!”- Jieqiong complained and tried to pout, sticking her lower lip out. Nayoung took that as a sign that the conversation would soon take a turn for the worse, the stupid kind of worse, if she doesn’t intervene.

“SO what did you want to recruit me for?”- She raises her voice and that’s enough to halt Jieqiong’s antics

“Let me explain, we were a part of the organization that is hunting you. The current leader of the circle killed the previous one and took his place, claiming he died under natural circumstances, one member of our division, the daughter of the branch director, found out about the murder and tried to expose him” –Eunice turns somber and starts explaining everything in detail, although Nayoung understands very little of it, thus her head fills up with questions that would have to wait - “The first thing the usurper did was create an assassin group and try to purge everyone inside the headquarters, some of us survived, but almost everyone died that day”

Eunice stops at that and it’s Chaeyeon the one who continues, the girl had gone back to sitting in the seemingly comfortable armchair she was sitting on when Jieqiong opened the door, and this time the book was in her lap.

“The northern division, our division, was assaulted by a terrorist group under the name of “16”, he sent them there to find and kill this girl and everyone inside. They failed, the girl is here, with us, and we need her to uncover his schemes to the rest of the circle main branches, but almost every administrator of the assassinations departments knows about us and has strict orders to kill the girl on sight, we need allies”

Nayoung can sense the hopelessness in Chaeyeon’s voice, she wasn’t going to lie, the cause was pretty hopeless. Fights against criminal organizations only went well when you had an army to fight back… Either that or you have to be Liam Neeson.

“How many people do you have right now?”- She decided to ask, maybe the cause wasn’t that hopeless after all and they had the backup of some kind of powerful international organization or something.

“Six, seven if you count the little girl, although she does not know how to fight” –Eunjin deadpanned, she probably picked on Nayoung’s worries - “So, what do you say, would you be willing to help us?”

“Not a chance”- Came Nayoung’s reply

“Yes we will”- Jieqiong firmly assured them.

Nayoung immediately turned her head to look at the Chinese girl, she was smiling only that this time the smile carried solid determination instead of the habitual cuteness. And, even though it would hurt her, Nayoung still had to bring her feet back to earth nonetheless.

“We are not staying Jieqiong, this is a death sentence”- Nayoung said dully

“They need our help, we can’t abandon them”- Jieqiong face her and, just for a moment, Nayoung was crushed under her stare, still, she returned to her stone-self quick enough to fire back a remark.

“We are trying to run from them, not challenge them directly, remember?”- Maybe she could reason with the energetic girl.

“I won’t abandon a friend”-Jieqiong stare didn’t subside and Nayoung could feel a headache approaching. She felt a sharp pang on her head and a hand went to her forehead while she used the other one to support herself on a nearby metal table, then she heard Jieqiong again - “Are you alright?”

“We can give you ti