“I thought you said this thing ran on air!”

“Yeah, it’s fueled by oxygen which is why I originally insisted you use this ship instead of one that runs on gas, battery, or water!”

“So you are saying we’re actually running low on fuel?”

“Yeah, because we had to trust this stupid dino for our way of transport!”

“You think I expected something like this to happen?!”

Sungyeol groaned at the three loud bickering voices and sat up, his head feeling fuzzy. His eyes scanned around before focusing on Woohyun who was across the room from him; he had sat up and was watching the verbal fight with sleepy eyes. Sungyeol followed his gaze to the three men up front; each of which seemed very tense and confused.

“So what exactly happened?” Woohyun grumbled as he rolled off the loveseat. “Full story, please.” He commanded. Everyone else seemed just as interested and, instead of complaining, they looked towards Dongwoo for an explanation. His eyes darted to each person before sighing once and beginning to talk.

“It was the weirdest thing. I was steering like normal when suddenly I saw a weather change in the distance. But it was.. less like a weather change and more like a.. complete climate change.

“A climate change?” Woohyun asked incredulously, but Sunggyu quickly held a hand up as if to say ‘shut-up for a second’.

“I crossed through it easily, but it all changed in one instant.. like crossing through an invisible wall or going through a bubble.”

“What do you mean?” Hoya asked.

“I mean this area is completely different from what we were in just before. It’s.. strange.” Everyone stayed silent and Dongwoo turned around to press a few buttons on the ship’s console to explain further. “I did some quick scans for the area after I realized the fuel dropping quickly; because you can’t contain and re-use oxygen as well as you can with other fuels once the source is taken away.  The scans brought up.. nothing. Literally. No life signs or even oxygen. All zeros.”

“And you didn’t tell us any of this until just now?” Sunggyu yelled.

“It was only just now that I got the caution alarm!”

“You think waiting for that matters when you could have easily told us what you already know?”

“I didn’t want to bother any of you with something that could have been a simple malfunction!”

“A complete change in climate patterns is considered a simple malfunction? Are you kidding me right now?”

As the distraught Dongwoo was bantering with the angry and stressed mission leader, Hoya just watched on, looking unsure. The two Tane friends decided to sit back and watch as the chaos unfolded, knowing they wouldn’t be any help by butting in. Both of them turned heads and made eye contact for the first time in a while but Sungyeol looked away just as quickly, making Woohyun feel worry yet again. The banter continued, now at a yelling level and seeming to be more focused on insulting each other.

“Maybe I should steer the damn ship instead of you since you have already proven to not be reliable whatsoever!”

“You couldn’t steer this ship if you had all the airship training in the world which you would never be able to do anyways! I built it, so I get to steer it; airship code!”

“I don’t care about some code, I want to get to where we are going in one piece, you idiot!”

“You’re the idiot if you really think I’m going to let you steer my ship!”

“Shut up!!”

The two bickering males immediately went quiet and let go of each other’s shirt fronts. Each head turned towards where the sudden yell came from, and everyone was surprised to see L standing there with a long rope in hand. “There’s no point in fighting when there’s no way we’re getting out of this smoothly.” He grunted, walking towards one of the support poles in the middle of the room. “Now, I will be tying myself to this pole, and if anyone wants to join me, they are welcome to.” He said leisurely, sitting on the ground in front of it.

The faces of confusion and utter disbelief would have been amusing if everyone wasn’t slightly on edge. A few gazes were met, but no one said a thing. Sungyeol, still remaining silent, shrugged once before walking up to L and sitting next to him and he continued to expertly tie around them. Woohyun raised an eyebrow and gave Sungyeol a look of ‘What on Aarde are you doing?’ but Sungyeol didn’t return any sort of expression. Sunggyu just rubbed the bridge of his nose in frustration and continued to talk, as if ignoring what had just happened. 

“So what exactly does this mean is going to happen?” he quietly asked not looking to anyone in particular. Suddenly, an alarm began to blare, making everyone jump in surprise. Dongwoo grimaced.

“That.”

The ship began to drop rapidly from the sky, creating that terrible empty feeling of your stomach flying into your chest. Working only on adrenaline, everyone grabbed the nearest thing to them as the ship dropped hundreds of feet down per-second. Knowing there was nearly no way of saving the ship now, Dongwoo fled the console and steering area, making his way to a hand hold near the left wall. What seemed only seconds later, they impacted the ground hard and the whole ship jumped high then shook from it as many of them lost their hold. A pained scream was heard but no one knew exactly who it was from yet.

It was at this chaotic moment that Sungyeol realized this trip may be far worse than he originally imagined; the seriousness of it had only just sunk in. The whole airship leaned forward as it came to a violent stop, skidding across the ground, and creating a cloud of fine dirt around them. Sungyeol’s vision slowly returned to normal and he took in the situation. The whole ship was leaning to the right and a few of the furniture pieces had come undone, then slid down to the right side. He looked to his left to see L who was leaning on him slightly but was still tied down safely. He had a large gash in his forehead, a trickle of blood dripping down the side of his face. “Ah, .” Sungyeol whispered with a grimace, lifting an arm to touch it lightly. He took a breath as L stirred and opened his eyes. “Are you alright?” he asked. L just nodded slightly, enough that Sungyeol could see at this close proximity. “Where’s everyone else?” he mumbled to himself, looking around. ”Can you un-tie us?” L nodded again and began to work at the two large knots in front of them. Once loose enough that he could slip out, Sungyeol took hold of the thick pole behind them. “Hold onto yourself, I’ll be back.” On his hands and knees, Sungyeol made his way across the now angled floor. A soft groan could be heard from nearby, but it was hard to tell from exactly where.

“Yah! Woohyun!” Sungyeol called out, sliding his way down to the pile of furniture pieces at the bottom right. He spotted a hand from underneath one of the arm chairs and rushed down quickly. “Stay still, I’m coming!” He called out. Pushing hard on the side of the chair, he eventually toppled it over to reveal Hoya with a bleeding leg. “Ah- Are you okay?” He asked, looking concerned.

Hoya, with a pained grimace on his face as he held onto his leg, replied “Yes, I am now. Go help someone else.” With one nod Sungyeol climbed his way back up the somewhat steep and slick surface and spotted L helping Dongwoo get his foot untangled from a mess of wires. He heard a cough to his left and saw Sunggyu climbing his way out of a supply closet, brooms and mops sliding out as he opened the door. Sungyeol scanned the large trashed room for his best friend but had no luck yet. Worry began to fill him as he wondered the worst of what could have happened to him. Only a second later and Woohyun emerged from a dark corner of the far front, sliding himself around with a large air tank in hand.

 “Guys! I found a breathing apparatus hooked to the wall over here!” He called. Sungyeol quickly made his way over and punched him, hard, in the arm. “Ow! What the heck man?” Woohyun whined.

“You could have at least answered when I called you!” Was all he said before heading towards L again. Woohyun couldn’t help but smile as he realized Sungyeol still cared despite how he’d been acting; then he frowned as he realized he was probably just angry at him now.

Everyone had gathered by the wall where L was wrapping up Hoya’s leg with gauze from Sunggyu’s pack. Sunggyu was the first to speak up. “Is everyone here?” He asked, everyone nodding in reply. “There’s another one of those in the supply closet up there.” He said pointing at the air tank in Woohyun’s arms. “Seeing as there’s no oxygen outside and we’ll run out eventually in here, we will have to share the two tanks and walk our way across.” Again, everyone nodded, not really focusing since they were all still shaken up. Sunggyu moved closer to Hoya and they began to formulate a plan together for the use of the tanks. Just as Hoya’s leg was finished being wrapped up, he said “I estimate a total of 10 minutes tops before we run out of air, so we should head out as soon as possible.”

~

This place is literally barren. Not quite a wasteland as much as there’s simply no life within it. No trees, no birds… no water, no grass…no clouds, no air. It was just as Dongwoo described it: a bubble; like walking into a bubble that contained no life whatsoever, containing only the hard ground with scattered dust-like dirt across it. There was the occasional large branch that may have previously been a tree, but was unrecognizable as such now.  Even the two normally warm suns were nearly nonexistent; giving the whole area a more dim light. The close stars were still in the sky above them but, like a blur, barely there. The normal blueness to the sky had taken on a gray color, matching everything else around them. The temperature contained no warmth, nor did it even have a chill.

You quickly come to appreciate the real beauty of the places you live, even a rusted wasteland such as Tane, after being surrounded by absolute nothingness.

You also become very quickly used to sharing mouthpieces with other people when you desperately need to breath. Three people to one tank of air was very difficult getting used to in the beginning, but after nearly an hour of walking, they had gotten it down to an art.

No one talked, no one looked at each other, there wasn’t much thinking going on either. It was as if they all had taken on a state of mind as ‘dead’ as the area around them.

Now, imagine being locked in a blank room for hours; the walls brown and the temperature and humidity non-existent.  You have no food, no water, and you can’t breathe properly. You have no hope to even reply on your own imagination for entertainment and no way of escaping. Then, after what seems like nearly an eternity, the door opens. You see green’s and blues and life everywhere, welcoming you back to reality. You see birds flying and the air is so wonderfully breathable.

It takes you a while to become used to it yet again. It all seems so unreal that you just have to lay there and breathe for a few minutes.

That’s exactly what the group of the six boys did as they crossed through the other side of the dead bubble into life once again. Thankfully, they had flown through the majority of the barren environment. If not, they would have run out of air for sure. All unsure of how to converse over what they just went through, they decided to talk over other small things (like how Dongwoo is ‘..going to be killed when I get home because that ship cost a lot of money to make!’) as they got up, dropped the empty air tanks, and continued to walk on.

~

A few more hours had passed and darkness had set in. They were all finally used to breathing properly yet again. The distant moon barely lit up the night sky and so they relied on any lighting devices brought with them –which turned out to be one lantern and two small flashlights. Like the Earth moon, there was only one. But unlike the Earth moon, despite the two suns, the moon did not reflect as well, and so did not light up the night as well.

Sunggyu was ahead of the group, leading them in the right direction; his pack and sword sheath jingling as he walked. Hoya was just behind with Dongwoo next to him as they conversed quietly- or as quietly as Dongwoo could. Woohyun, Sungyeol and L all brought up the rear, though L stayed silent and would fall behind them occasionally. Woohyun felt the need to ask, again, if Sungyeol was alright or if he was mad at him for some reason. However, he decided against it in the end. It only made sense that Sungyeol would be a little down since he had been for a very long time now anyways and a trip like this wasn’t going to help anything. As the nearly continuous thoughts of worry ran through Woohyun’s mind, Sungyeol was pondering over his dream from before. Normally, he wasn’t one to think through those type of things, believing they were random and unimportant; but this had seemed so real. A lot of it had become fuzzy and forgotten, but he figured he wouldn’t have been able to make much sense of it even despite that. For now he just gazed down at the ring, touching it lightly with his fingers.

They traveled like that for nearly three hours, just talking quietly amongst themselves, when Sunggyu stopped suddenly. “Finally.” Dongwoo grumbled, resting by placing his hands on his knees and leaning down. “I was about to ask if we were ever going to stop.”

“Shut up.” Sunggyu interrupted, holding his right hand up yet again. Sungyeol was beginning to wonder if it was a habit of his. “I hear something.”

“You’re going to hear things, Mr. Leader. We are outside.” Woohyun replied as they gathered, a chuckle apparent in his voice.

“No. It sounds like running water..”

“Perhaps we are near a river?” Hoya spoke up, looking at Sunggyu with knitted eyebrows.

“I don’t see a river, though.”

“Well, it is quite dark.” Sunggyu took a few steps forward and the others followed along.

“Still, I don’t see how-AH!” Sunggyu’s legs slid out from underneath him as the ground he stood on broke off from what seemed to be the edge of a deep cavern. The ground cracked a few feet from behind and fell apart into the cavern as well, bringing the rest of them down. They all yelled out in surprise and fear. Then, two seconds later, one splash was heard followed by four more.

A few people coughed and spluttered as they came to the surface of the water they had landed in. L was kicking frantically as he had trouble holding himself up. Sungyeol gasped as he felt a hand grab his arm. “It.. it’s me. Sorry, I can’t swim well..” L gasped out and Sungyeol nodded before remembering they couldn’t see each other well in the darkness. “That’s okay. You can hold onto me, just keep kicking.”

“Is everyone alright?” Sunggyu called out and five replies sounded out.

“I’m good, but a little wet.” Dongwoo chuckled after his reply, but the chuckled formed into a girlish shriek. “Something just touched my leg!”

“Maybe it was a fish?” Hoya replied a few feet away, laughing at the other. Dongwoo just swam a few feet from where he was.  The group was sandwiched between two stone walls in a thin cavern, the bottom acting like a deep river with no flow. They followed each other’s voices to gather closer -L hanging onto Sungyeol- then began to formulate a plan.

“So, should we just swim down and hope we can make our way out?”

“There’s no way we can climb back up this cavern.”

A splash was heard in the distance and everyone went silent out of fear.

“What was that?” Woohyun asked quietly.

“A splash.” L replied.

“Thanks, captain obvious.”

“Shut up!” Sunggyu called out before yelling suddenly. “Something just touched my leg too.”

“Ah! Me too!” Hoya screamed and pushed back in the water, splashing Dongwoo who sputtered and yelled out in protest. It went silence again as they all listened closely. The tension began to grow as nervousness sat in.

An unfamiliar and feminine voice sounded out from the silence. “How many are you?”

The six boys screamed in surprise.

“Yah! I’m not gonna’ eat you! Answer my question!”

“There is six of us here.. why?” Sunggyu answered, seeing a shadow of another person in the water with them and facing towards it.

“Six? Jeez, alright. Stay here, but stay completely still. If you don’t move, the rays will think you’re dead and you’ll have more time to get away.”

“Those things touching our legs are rays?”

“Yeah, sort of. That’s what I call ‘em at least.”

“Wait, why do you say get away? Are they dangerous?”

“I’ll be right back.” Was the only reply before there was a small splash as the person apparently went under the water again.

“Where on earth could she be going?” Sunggyu asked rhetorically.

“Is it a girl?” Dongwoo spoke up. “I thought it was a guy.”

“Maybe you’re right.”

“Wait, I’m right and you’re not?”

“That’s hardly important right now. Stay still.”

A good 15 more seconds passed and the boy came back up and handed Sunggyu something.

“Hold this.” Was all they said before diving back down. Sunggyu just looked at is as well as he could, trying to figure out what it was. The person gave no room to ask questions as they came up with two more. He continued this until each person had their own mystery object with an opening that was hollow inside. The whole thing was also both wet and slimy.

“Just place the object around your mouth and don’t breath in through your nose.”

“Wait, what are these? How do we know we can trust you?” The rest all listened closely as Sunggyu asked the questions.

“These are basically natures own breathing devices. I think they have some sort of oxygen producing plant inside. They grow in between the rocks of the cliff side underneath the water; I found them a while ago and use them often.” A few seconds of silence passed. “And you can trust me because.. at least I’m trying to help you. I’m showing you a shortcut to avoid the rays.”

“These aquatic creatures have done nothing so far but touch our legs.” Sunggyu debated.

“Sure, but when they get their little group together, they’ll work together to sting you to death, smack your head against rock, and eat your brain since it’s the only meat they can digest. You won’t want to be here. Trust me.” Sunggyu went silent.

“I’m with girly voice!” Dongwoo yelled, holding a hand up.

“Good, ’cause here they come..” He said, pointing backward to the sounds of many small splashes. He placed his own breathing apparatus on his mouth then dove straight down into the dark waters.

The six boys did the same and followed behind as the rays were getting closer to their original spot. L held onto Woohyun and Sungyeol for stability but still kicked as they swam down. Light came from some device the unknown person held and it lit the way down the deep waters. As they swam further down, it became colder. The seven of them eventually reached the bottom to find something quite strange; a river. Sungyeol looked on in a disbelieving way. It was a flowing river at the bottom of a body of water; something that seemed to defy all reason. It must have been some sort of different substance; like how water and oil don’t mix. Following the rest, Sungyeol landed in the flowing river and let the strong current push him along the bottom of the cold still waters. The breathing pieces were strange, the slimy part of it sticking to their faces well, and the fresh air coming from it smelling algae like, but still providing good air. As they breathed out, a line of bubbles would escape from a vent-like hole on the top.

L was holding tightly onto Sungyeol’s shoulder, his fingers digging in. Sungyeol looked over to find his eyes closed tightly and realized they probably had been the whole time. It’s not salt water.. is he in pain? Or is he afraid? It was strange to think that might be the case. Sure, he didn’t know the guy, but he had always seemed so straightforward and confident to Sungyeol. Still, he held tighter onto L as a way to comfort him while still attempting to keep with the current. He also did so after noticing that Woohyun had been swept away by the current.

A few minutes later and the person up front began to signal them to swim up. They all kicked their way out of the current and into the still waters, going up as the water began to warm up once again. Sungyeol held tightly onto L who still had his eyes tightly closed and an expression of utter discomfort. As they broke the surface, everyone took off the mouthpieces and took a deep breath. L blinked and rubbed his eyes furiously. “Aish… I hate swimming.”  He grumbled quietly and Sungyeol chuckled, somehow feeling glad he was alright.

“Did everyone make it?” The voice spoke up, shining his light onto the faces. “I count six, good. Follow me.” Without another word, they all followed him as they paddled their way across the much more shallow waters eventually making it to a bank and up onto land.

“Um… I would thank you properly for all of your help but I do not know your name.” Sunggyu spoke up, looking at the young blonde headed boy.

“My name’s Sungjong.”