Umji got up early, she stretched her tired limbs and turned to look for Sowon when she remembered. Sowon wasn’t here.

“Oh, Yewon ah, good morning.”

“Good morning momma.”

“Did you sleep well?”

“Did you?”

The old lady chuckled.

“We’ll take a taxi after breakfast, you can wake the others now. Breakfast will be ready in a few minutes.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sowon blinked, groaning at the pain throughout her body, she tried to clear her vision.

“Why is it so bright?”

Sowon internally cringed at how hoarse her voice came out before remembering why she was probably in pain for.

```````````

Sowon wiped the last cup on her rack before stepping out from behind the counter to take her five-minute break, taking a seat outside, she sipped her free drink.

She watched a little nuko walk on the sidewalk, it turned around every few seconds as if afraid of someone chasing them.

Intrigued by the color of the nuko’s eyes, she continued to watch until she realized the nuko was going to walk into the traffic blindly because it was too busy checking behind herself.

Running out into the street, Sowon scooped the nuko up and ran back to the curb.

“Hey!”

“Hey you! You shouldn’t run into the street without looking! It’s dangerous.”

“Let me go!”

“Are you afraid of humans? I’m sorry, here I’ll put you down.”

As Sowon moved to put the odd eyed nuko down, someone shoved into her back sending the nuko flying out of her hands.

“No!”

She ran out to catch it, noticing the car racing towards it. As she caught the nuko, Sowon tucked her into her arms, crossing them to protect the nuko as the car slammed into her side. Anything that might have happened after, she couldn’t remember.

```````````````

Sowon lifted her head a bit to look at herself, groaning at the dull throbbing in her head.

“Aw, are those my arms in these casts?”

Looking past the arm casts that were in slings hanging from the ceiling, was Sowon’s right leg in a cast.

“I broke my leg too? Curse my terrible luck.”

She tilted her head to the right when she heard a small sound. On the right bedside table, was a little nuko curled up next to the box of tissues.

“Oh?”

It was the odd eyed nuko that she tried to save, seeing no bandages on the nuko, she let out a relieved sigh. She held her breath as it woke up, letting out a yawn, Sowon nearly cooed at her tiny canines.

Then as if struck by lightning, the nuko turned and looked straight at her.

They stared at each other for a long time.

“You! You’re awake!”

Sowon nodded dumbly.

“Oh my goshies!”

Sowon smiled.

“Are you okay?”

“Yea I’m fine but you broke your arms and leg you know why are you asking me?”

Sowon lay back down in her bed properly.

“Because I would be upset if I didn’t save you.”

“Why?”

“I dunno, because you don’t deserve to be hunted or hurt?”

The nuko stared incredulously at the human who was smiling despite the pain she was probably in.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Umji patiently waited in the lap of Sowon’s mother, holding hands with Eunha, waiting for the taxi to arrive at the hospital.

“Are we there yet?”

“No honey, almost.”

Sowon’s mom had brought a basket to carry all the nukos at once but during the car ride, Umji had gotten car sick and Eunha wanted to hold her hand.

“How close is almost?”

“A few more minutes.”

“Okay.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Say, why were you being chased?”

“What, you can’t guess?”

“No, why?”

“Because the people chasing me are the people that try to mass produce rare breeds, it turns out I’m special because I got on blue eye.”

Sowon stared at the nuko who had gotten closer to her, she had started from the tissue box and now was sitting next to her on the bed.

“Well, that’s terrible.”

“Mm.”

“So, are you afraid of humans?”

“I’m not particularly afraid of humans in general, I just don’t want to go back. Why do you ask that question? You asked me that when you first grabbed me off the street.”

“Well, I have another nuko who is afraid of humans.”

“Then how do you keep her if she’s afraid of you?”

“She’s warming up to me. Yerinnie ran away from her abusive home and I picked her up off the streets.”

Sowon hummed.

“Wait, why’d you pick her up off the streets? You could’ve just left her there.”

“Hm? I could have but even if I didn’t bring her home I still would have brought her to a nuko care place.”

“Eh?”

“That was my plan after all, after taking care of her immediate needs, I was going to take her to a rescue center, but then Umji wanted a playmate and I really liked her. She’s a nice kid.”

“So, you spontaneously decided to keep her?”

Sowon chuckled, wanting to ruffle the nuko’s hair but was unable to move.

“Yea, pretty much.”

They sat in comfortable silence until Sowon’s stomach growled.

“Did you know that your stomach growled for a very long time when you were asleep?”

“Oh? It did?”

“Yea.”

“So, after all this talk about me, my name is Sojung, call me Sowon. What’s yours?”

“I don’t have a name.”

“Oh?”

“Make one for me please.”

Sowon noticed that it had snuggled closer and into her side, thankfully she didn’t have anything broken there.

“Well, you seem to be a very unique individual. How about SinB?”

“SinB, mysterious. I like it.”

“Well, I’m glad you do.”

They both jumped as the door swung open to the room.

“UNNIE!”

==============

I've been working on my writing, did my angst work? It seems like it did....  :)

Fluff train will be arriving soon OT6~