Chapter 7: Half Lies

Soojung follows Kahi inside the room. The older woman points to one of the plush chairs, silently urging Soojung to sit on it, to which the girl complies. Kahi sits down in front of Soojung, she folds her hands in her lap and stares at Soojung with curiosity.

“Will you really tell me about her?” Soojung starts. “Will you tell me everything?”

“Why are you so eager to learn about the woman?” Kahi ignores Soojung’s questions and throws back her own instead. “What started this?”

“Nothing.” Soojung says. “I just want to learn about her.”

Kahi smiles. “Well first off I must say that the first time I saw you I thought it was Yoona standing there before me. You look so much like her.”

“Figures.” Soojung snorts. “I’ve never really looked anything like the woman who raised me, nor do I look like Yunho. I got teased a lot by the other kids because of that.”

“I’m sorry about that.” Kahi says it so gently but there’s something lacking in her voice that Soojung cannot place. “If only Yoona didn’t go away then we could have done something to let the two of you live together in secret.  I’m sure she would have been a great mother to you.”

“Yoona was a gentle young woman, a newly Transitioned nurse in Cirena, and a friendly person. She knew immediately the danger that would happen to you if Hannan found out about her illegal pregnancy so she sought us out.” Kahi continues and Soojung listens to her every word intently. “I don’t know how she found out about us to be honest. She just appeared here in Kaptan unannounced with a seven months child growing inside her womb. Yoona insisted that she’d rather choose a complicated life for you than to not let you experience life at all. And of course we saw that as a great opportunity for us since it has already been months since the failure we had with the first child and we almost already gave up.”

The last sentence of the doctor annoys Soojung for a bit and she raises an eyebrow at the doctor. She wonders if Kahi realizes that she just offhandedly called Sehun, her own son, a failure.

“What is it?” Kahi asks.

Soojung shakes her head. “Nothing. I have a question though.”

“Go ahead.” Kahi says. “Isn’t that what you’re here for? To ask questions, right?”

“Yes.” Soojung says, clasping her hands together. “Do you have any idea why she left? Did you notice anything odd about her before she suddenly disappeared?”

Kahi sighs and shakes her head. “I’m sorry but no. She seemed normal before and after she gave birth to you. She acted like a real mother towards you. Yoona saw to it that all of your needs will be provided. It is still a mystery to us why she left only a month after your birth.”

Soojung nods in defeat, another fact remains as a mystery about her biological mother. “And then after that Yunho decided to take me.”

“That’s right. He felt that you were his responsibility.”  Kahi says. “It was a good thing that his wife is connected to members of the council in Sinukwan, so it was easy to sneak you in as one of their daughters.”

A sudden beeping sound coming out of Kahi’s kitchen startles them. Kahi murmurs apologies as she stands up and leaves Soojung in the living room while she attends to it. Soojung watches the older woman’s hurried pacing inside the kitchen through the open door. The beeping must be from a kitchen device that Kahi forgot to turn off.

She learned about a few facts about the woman, Yoona, today. But they aren’t enough to create an image of what kind of mother she was to Soojung. No one knows why she left or where she went.

Is she still alive?

Soojung sighs and rubs her eyes with the back of her hand. She didn’t get enough sleep last night, too anxious to let her mind rest. Their physical training later would definitely for her today.

A table on one side of the living room catches Soojung’s attention. It is full of framed photographs, showing Kahi’s life outside Kaptan. Soojung walks towards the table and picks up one, a photo of Kahi with a number of people inside what seems like a laboratory. Every one of them is wearing lab coats but the photograph seems informal despite the uniform they have, even Kahi herself is sporting a wide smile on this photo. Soojung notices a young man on the photo, one of his arms draped comfortably on Kahi’s shoulders.

“My colleagues are all fun people. Working with all of them had been a pleasure.”

Kahi appears beside Soojung with a mug of steaming coffee on one hand. Soojung blushes, embarrassed to be caught looking at something so private.

“If you’re curious all you have to do is ask, Soojung.” Kahi says.

“I…. Well ….” Soojung stutters. “The man..” She points at the person standing beside Kahi on the picture. “Is he Sehun’s father?”

The question catches Kahi off guard, and it takes her a moment to process Soojung’s question but when she did, the older woman surprises Soojung by laughing loudly.

Kahi wipes a tear on the corner of her eye as she looks at Soojung with amusement. “That boy is not Sehun’s father. He could not be the father because he was only a year old when Sehun was born.”

Soojung blinks at her. “Oh. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” Kahi says, handing Soojung the mug on her hand before sitting down on a chair. “That’s my assistant. He arrived one day in front of my laboratory looking like a starved stray dog. I took him in, fed him, gave him clothes, and such. In exchange he promised to help in doing errands for my team, ofcourse prior to that we had to make sure that he has no connections to Hannan.”

“He grew a strong interest in our research and after a few years, when he was old enough, the team decided to let him be part of us. I was very fond of that child.” Kahi sighs. “I guess in a way I treated him the same way I would’ve treated Sehun if we were together.”

Soojung looks at the wistful expression on the older woman’s face and feels a pang of pity towards her. There will be no excuse for what she had done to both Soojung and Sehun, but it cannot be denied how this also affected Kahi.

“Is it alright for me to ask what you and Sehun talked about the other day?”

Kahi smiles sadly. “I asked for his forgiveness.”

“Did he?” Soojung asks.

Kahi carefully takes the photo from Soojung’s hand and places it gently back on the table. She turns her back on Soojung and slowly walks towards the window of her room.

“I’ll see you in training later Soojung.”

Soojung frowns at Sehun as the boy prattles on and on about the Old World journal he had found in one of his adventures inside the library. She remembers the sad look on Kahi’s face and the unanswered question that she left hanging in the air that morning.

“Are you listening to me?” Sehun throws a crumpled piece of paper at Soojung’s face.

“No.” Soojung grumbles. “I was remembering something.”

“Nonsense!” Sehun declares. “What could be more important than this discovery of mine?”

“Why are you so hyper today?” Soojung glares at him as she steals the old journal from Sehun’s hands.

The tattered pages of the journal have turned yellow through the years and most of it is missing. But Soojung admits that something written back in the formation of their country certainly raised her interest, specially the short part describing something that they only know as the war that destroyed the The Old World.

“That is the most detailed explanation of the war I that I have ever read.” Sehun states. “Don’t you wonder why they didn’t teach everything in school? They always told us that the details have been lost because of time, but look at that! The true story was only rotting inside an old library here in Kaptan.”

“Maybe they thought we only needed to know the important parts.” Soojung says. “The Old World leaders messed up. They fought and killed a lot of people while destroying the world. Don’t repeat that kids.”

“But how sure are they that it won’t be repeated if we barely understand how it happened?” Sehun presses on. “Look around you Soojung, war is going to happen again and the two of us are in the center of it.”

Soojung freezes in the middle of turning a page before looking up at Sehun. She quickly closes the journal and pushes it back towards Sehun. The boy smirks at her, Soojung decides that she doesn’t like that arrogant smirk.

Soojung leans back on her chair and crosses her arms in front of her chest. “I really don’t want to be reminded of that fact outside of our trainings.”

“Well what else can we do, Soojung?” Sehun says. “We can’t run away from it forever.”

“I don’t want this.” Soojung murmurs. “I wanted things to change but not like this.”

“It’ll be better to just accept it and move on.” Sehun says, he uses a pen to carve shapes on the wooden table, Soojung recognizes them as the ones Kahi drew before to explain to them the code.

“I went to see Kahi earlier.” Soojung says.

Sehun looks up at her. “Yeah?”

“I asked her about my mother.” Soojung clears . “She explained a lot of things.”

“Sehun,” Soojung starts. “Why won’t you forgive her?”

Sehun drops the pen on the table and it rolls to the side and falls on the floor. “I just can’t.”

“You know, you’re lucky you still have a mother.” Soojung stares at Sehun, and at that moment she realizes how jealous she is of the boy. “You’re lucky you know that the woman who gave birth to you is still alive and despite of her being away you know that she still cares about you. Not everyone has the opportunity to have that.”

Soojung hates how bitter she sounds. She hates the tears that are threatening to spill out from her eyes.

“Do you honestly believe that woman cares about my safety?” The anger on Sehun’s eyes makes Soojung turn away from the young man. “A mother who cares about her child wouldn’t do the same thing she has done. If she cares about me then she wouldn’t put me through all of this. She wouldn’t put a code inside my head and leave me in a situation where Hannan can easily have me Delivered.”

Sehun angrily kicks the foot of the table. “For a second back then I was actually happy to see her. All my life I thought I was an orphan, you know? That’s what my grandparents told me. And I believed it. But then I found out I have a mother, that she’s alive, and I will be able to meet her.” Sehun wipes a hand over his face. Soojung looks back at him and the frustration on her friend’s face makes Soojung want to be swallowed by the floor. “But then she started talking about how important this mission is, how the moment she found out that she was pregnant she knew that my existence will be vital for the success of it. And you know what? She even had the decency to say that she was slightly disappointed when my brain failed to be able to handle all of the code. Soojung she was disappointed that I wasn’t the perfect storage she thought I was. Do you still think she cares about me?”

Soojung is taken aback by this. She opens to apologize to Sehun but the young man has already stood up and is already starting to walk away from her. Sehun leaves her alone but Soojung can still feel his anger in the air. She releases a shaky breath and picks up one of the papers that Sehun accidentally left on the table. It was the list of books that the doctor gave them. The title of the books ranges from books about history, psychology, and even warfare.

A scoff escapes from Soojung’s mouth when she realizes what Kahi is trying to do.

The doctor was trying to make a perfect soldier out of them.

--click--

“Have you finished the preparations Jinah?”

…

“Yes. I looked for information regarding the mother of the girl. Apparently she’s already dead.”

…

“Just make sure it will be me who will face the boy. You’re free to eliminate everyone else.”

…

“Ha ha ha. I understand.”

…

“Yes coming back to that appalling region would definitely be nostalgic. I can’t wait to see the look on their faces when they see me. Imagining it alone already excites me.”

…

“That woman could rot in hell for all I care. The only thing important for me is the success of this mission.”

…

“Well that would be interesting. I’m sure Kyuhyun would be delighted to hear your idea.”

…

“Alright. I will see you in three days.”

--click--

A/N: I finished early so here you go~