[title songs: faded - alan walker]
[~12k]

chapter 28;

Though Sohee’s eyes are nothing like Minseok’s, she still has that same piercing gaze Minseok has. It’s disconcerting really, when her eyes drift over to meet Hyemi’s, when she can feel the way Sohee is assessing her from head to toe, sizing her up carefully.

Hyemi meets Sohee’s eyes, when Sohee’s eyes travel back up, and Hyemi raises a brow, pursing her lips while she does it. Hyemi doesn’t know what Sohee’s expecting from her and her appearance, but if Sohee’s the type to judge her from the way she looks then Hyemi’s not going to sit back and let it happen without some kind of retaliation. Sohee raises a delicate brow right back and Hyemi is momentarily taken aback by how Sohee looks like a carbon copy of Minseok, eyebrow raise and all. They hold each other’s gaze for a long, long moment and something tells Hyemi she shouldn’t break eye contact first. It feels like submission or something, like she’s admitting to being intimidated and Hyemi isn’t about to let that happen. It’s a long, long moment before Sohee finally blinks. It doesn’t seem like admittance when Sohee looks away and Hyemi’s in awe with the amount of power that radiates out of her small frame. Hyemi almost misses the smile, small but there, that inches onto Sohee’s face. It all happens in the span of a couple minutes, while Baekhyun, Jongdae, Yixing, Jongin, and Sehun are busy swarming Chanyeol with are you okay and what the happened and why is it so hot and Chanyeol what the and we thought you were dead, .

No one notices their exchange. No one even really acknowledges neither Sohee nor Hyemi until Sohee tears her intense gaze off of Hyemi and pivots on her heels, her hands folded over her chest as she looks at the five boys practically piling on top of a laughing Chanyeol, all of them attaching themselves to Chanyeol as they nuzzle against him, practically suffocating him with the way they cling to him. The scene is adorable, Hyemi has to admit, and it makes her heart swell in her chest a bit.

(It also scares her, makes her hyperaware of the fact that she’s responsible for the lives of these boys—boys who are just that: boys. And friends, too. Best friends. Better friends than she ever was with Baekhyun, no matter what anyone says, because her friendship with Baekhyun was based on lies, no matter how emotionally attached they were to each other—are to each other. Besides, Baekhyun and her friendship is different from the one she’s seeing right now. This one feels like late living room movies with Minah and dishes and roaring, earth-shattering fights and gentle, hesitant make-ups and waking up the other with a bag of fries thrown in each other’s faces because it’s their favorite and—it feels like family, like how she and Minah are. How she and Baekhyun used to be, once upon a time, for a brief, suspended moment in history before everything went haywire, before she started catching feelings and he started distancing himself, before eventually he disappeared. That was a long time ago, what feels like lifetimes ago.

They are a family and she’s afraid she’s going to destroy them because that is what she’s made to do.)

“Get off him. You’re going to ruin all my progress.” Sohee’s sharp voice cuts through the loud inquiries and Chanyeol’s deep laughter.

Hyemi thinks it’s kind of funny how fast they all spring off of Chanyeol just because of her tone.

Chanyeol pouts and it should look funny or out of place, what with the strands of hair falling out of his loose ponytail and how he’s shirtless, but strangely it doesn’t. “I’m fine, Sohee.”

“Yeah?” Sohee raises a brow. Chanyeol nods and then Sohee proceeds to gesture all around them, wildly pointing at her face and the way her hair sticks to her cheeks because of the sweat, “Then explain why you’re still acting like a walking space heater.”

Before Hyemi can wonder if space heaters exist here, and whether that means they’ve been invented in Earth first or Exo Planet first, like some kind of modern chicken-and-the-egg question, Chanyeol speaks, rubbing the back of his neck a little nervously. “Okay, maybe I’m not fine.”

“Dude, what happened?” Sehun’s hair is still billowing all around him, which earns him a look from everyone else in the room because he isn’t bothering to use his powers to air condition the rest of them.

Chanyeol opens his mouth.

And Hyemi sees it as he speaks it. Everything that’s happened to him. Her knees wobble but she remains standing, her vision fading as Chanyeol’s words echo in her ears, in her head, only for it to slowly fade out into—

Chanyeol’s there, tall, lanky frame set stiff as he stares off over the wall—the wall she realizes is the same one she was at, run by Jessica, where Heechul and Donghae keep watch. Chanyeol’s wearing a coat with a familiar insignia on it, the same one on the door in the castle, and though he looks put together, his shoulder-length hair is loose and messy. He looks so incredibly serious and it seems strange on his face, especially because of how friendly he had been throughout the time Hyemi was with him in the castle. She thinks that he looks like he’s aged years since the last time she saw him, the lines of exhaustion on his face more prominent than ever, especially when he isn’t smiling.

“Sir.” Chanyeol turns around and for a second, she thinks he can see her because he looks directly at her, but then she hears a voice behind her and Hyemi quickly spins on her heels, blinking rapidly at Jessica standing behind her, looking through Hyemi as well. Hyemi steps to the side because she thinks it’s awkward, standing in the middle of their conversation, even if they can’t see her.

Jessica is handing Chanyeol a telescope before she nods out over the wall. The breeze blows all around them, tangling Jessica’s hair in the process and making Chanyeol’s hair get into his mouth. It would have been a funny sight, hair blowing in their faces while they look incredibly serious, but it isn’t because Hyemi can see the line of dark bodies along the edge of the forest, can see them swaying, all of them seemingly watching Jessica and Chanyeol’s interaction closely.

Chanyeol’s grip tightens around the golden telescope and Jessica points off in the distance, way past the tree line.

The forest is silent, the faint hissing and the sounds of guards preparing within the wall fading into nonexistence, until all that’s left is the soft sounds of Jessica and Chanyeol’s breathing and the wind blowing heavily along the wall. Chanyeol’s knuckles whiten as his grip tightens around the telescope.

Jessica’s breathing hitches.

Hyemi turns her head slowly, following both their gazes.

Her blood runs cold just as Chanyeol drops the telescope, the sound of it hitting the stone floor of the wall echoing all around them.

It’s—

“Luhan.” Chanyeol chokes over the two syllables and the sound is utterly devastated, it breaks Hyemi’s heart even more than ever.

Luhan’s there, above the trees a few hundred yards away from the front lines, floating, hovering, above an army of dark figures with red, red eyes. She can’t see him very well, can’t make out his appearance, his condition, but she can see the way his limbs hang limp as he floats above the tree-line, the bare branches of the trees creating eerie, jagged lines beneath him, adding to the darkness she can feel radiating out of him, even from all the way over here. There are dark balls floating around him, spinning, spinning, spinning, and she thinks the tension, the foreboding feeling of him just floating there, casts over Chanyeol and Jessica, over Hyemi, over the entire wall, is nerve-wracking.

Then Luhan lifts his head, seems to look directly at them, and goose bumps prickle up and down Hyemi’s arms.

His eyes are pure black; Hyemi can see it even from this distance.

Chanyeol’s hands are shaking.

“Wh—what should we do?” Jessica asks and her voice is surprisingly calm, collected, despite the dread and horror twisting up her pretty features.

Chanyeol opens his mouth and nothing comes out.

After a beat of silence, a voice echoes throughout the wall, sends clawing shivers up and down Hyemi’s spine.

It sounds like a twisted caricature of Luhan’s soft, calming voice. There are other voices mixed up within his, making his voice sound like it’s an echo, and it makes Hyemi’s heart sink to her stomach, her breathing caught in . It’s Yeonma’s voice, she knows this instantly, mixed up with Luhan’s, and, for a brief second, Hyemi wonders if this is him, if Luhan was Yeonma’s master all along. Or if Luhan couldn’t protect his mind, his field of blooming flowers, from the darkness. She wonders if Yeonma had finally managed to consume Luhan whole. She wonders why Luhan had gotten where he is, hovering over Yeonma’s army the way he is.

“Open the gates, Chanyeol.” Luhan’s voice booms in the silence. “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll open the gates for Yeonma and me. For our valiant followers.”

Chanyeol looks like he’s on the verge of tears, his expression crumpling, full of emotion, but he doesn’t cry. Hyemi thinks Chanyeol is good at that, at twisting his emotions into determination. After seeing all those visions about him, Hyemi’s noticed that’s what Chanyeol is, an emotional whirlwind who feels so, so much, has his heart on his sleeves, but he’s also strong, determined, the general of the King’s Royal army, a hard pillar for his men, the community, to rely on. Emotion and strength is not mutually exclusive and Chanyeol is the epitome of that. Chanyeol is gripping the edge of the wall, heat emanating from his hands, turning the stone into molten rock beneath his fingers, dark smoke snaking upwards, making the sky hazy. His expression is filled with anger, determination, and the molten rock beneath his hands glows a soft reddish orange. His eyes are glassy with tears as he speaks, his voice steady, commanding, and her heart hurts at the way his voice remains steady, but his eyes are filled with so much sadness, “No, Luhan. You, of all people, should know I won’t allow Yeonma—you that.”

There’s a long, long pause, before Luhan laughs, his familiar soft, calming laugh, and it sounds so much like him that Hyemi’s chest tightens. Chanyeol closes his eyes and Jessica shakes her head, though she doesn’t close her eyes, her gaze on Luhan’s distant hovering figure as if she can’t look away. “Then die, Chanyeol. Die.”

The last word echoes in her head, as if it’s bouncing off the walls of a giant, high ceilinged room, and she hates it, hates how prominent that word is. Luhan screams it at them, his voice clawing at the inside of her head, piercing and so so loud.

“Luhan, please.” Chanyeol says, wincing at the sound, his deep voice filled with heavy, heavy emotion. “Snap out of it.”

It doesn’t do any good.

Hyemi tries to tell herself it isn’t Luhan speaking, kind, awkward Luhan who felt awful for reading her thoughts, because he couldn’t help it. It’s Yeonma. But it sounds so much like him. It is Luhan, even if he’s being controlled.

(A voice in her head tells her that, maybe, just maybe, he’s not being controlled and Luhan’s the one doing the controlling. She shakes that thought away because no.

No.)

Then Luhan lifts his arms, a slow ascent that brings about terror like Hyemi’s never seen before. He lifts his arms and every single head in the sea of black before the wall lift their heads at the same time, jagged teeth and shadowy, red eyes turning simultaneously to gaze up at Chanyeol and Jessica. It’s a sea of terrifying red eyes against bottomless, pitch black.

“Die.” Luhan’s voice is mixed in with a million other voices, of men and women and children, of people speaking different languages, and it’s jarring, the way it sounds like it’s being screamed into their ears, echoing in their heads.

The sea of black surges forward without warning, a lot of them hurling into the wall simultaneously, causing the wall itself to tremble with the force. Some of them keep doing it; they keep hurling themselves into the wall as if that’s all they know how to do. Hyemi looks over the edge, the same time as Chanyeol, and she sees some of the monsters clawing at the metal gates, the screeching echoing in her ears. And some of them—some of them are using their claws to hook onto the walls down far below. They’re clawing their way up the wall, the sound of stone being scratched up grating to her ears. The sounds emanating from the creatures make the hairs at the back of her neck stand on end, the growls creeping under her skin, low and heavy, echoing all around them.

She looks at Chanyeol, sees the momentary panic, the fear, before he seems to pull himself together, swirling his hands before he shoots downwards, palms flat, and a stream of fire blasts down the wall, burning some of the monsters (brainwashed people, Hyemi remembers, paling at the thought that these people are civilians, habitants of this planet) and making them scream, the sound so human-like that it has Hyemi covering her ears, closing her eyes, in a terrible attempt to block out the heart-rending noise. It doesn’t help because this is a vision and Hyemi hears everything Chanyeol does. She hears everything.

She even hears him spin in the chaos, placing a hand on Jessica’s shoulder and shaking her out of her frozen stupor. Jessica blinks, rapidly, her pretty face white with fear and her lips set into a thin, grim line as she waits for Chanyeol to speak. Chanyeol voice is quiet, calm, and commanding, “Bring in reinforcements. We need to stop them from going over the wall.”

Jessica blinks again, before she nods, her expression suddenly stoic, rigid, battle-ready, and she bows her head ever so slightly in acknowledgement of his command, “Heechul and Donghae have been working on bombs. I’ll go find them.”

“Hurry.” Chanyeol says before he swivels on his heels, flexing his arms as balls of fire form at his fingertips. He takes a deep, deep breath, his gaze flickering upwards, to where Luhan is floating forwards, his eyes pure black and his arms outstretched and raised upwards, while he raises Yeonma’s army from the depths of the forest. Luhan reminds her of a God and that thought—it’s horrifying. Chanyeol’s eyes lock with Luhan’s and his jaw ticks.

No, Hyemi thinks, shaking her head, despite this being a vision, despite her knowing Chanyeol’s going to make it out of this alive.

“Don’t.” Jessica voices for her, quickly, pausing in her steps as her voice cuts through the silence, her eyes wide as she looks between Chanyeol and Luhan. “You can’t beat him, Chanyeol. You know you can’t.”

(Hyemi briefly wonders how Jessica knows that, why Chanyeol seemingly closes his eyes in resignation.)

“I have to try, Jessica, I have to help him snap out of it. Now, go. They’re coming up fast.” Chanyeol’s eyes are glassy as he bends his knees, his eyes remaining pinned on Luhan’s floating form, and he pushes himself off the edge of the wall, jumping forward, his arms outstretched and his hair suspended in midair. He falls for a second before blasting hot fire downwards, the human-like screams of some of the monsters below being burned alive by the fire shooting out from his hands ringing through the growls and shouting from below the wall, where the metal gates have been torn apart. The fire pours out of his hands as he projects himself up and out into the air, straight towards Luhan. Chanyeol’s clothes burn into blackened tatters around him as fire spouts from his palm and fingertips, red hot and tinged with an electric blue. He veers headfirst towards Luhan and Luhan raises his limp hands higher, as if he’s preparing to embrace Chanyeol midair. Chanyeol’s expression twists into a pained one and Hyemi can see the way Chanyeol starts to slow down, as if he’s being pushed back by an invisible force. Chanyeol shoots more fire from his palms, stronger, faster, and hotter.

Hyemi flinches at the heat wave, stumbling back, mostly surprised because the heat a hairsbreadth away from her skin feels so, so real. The vision itself fades away, Luhan’s laughter loud in her ears and she stares, in horror, when the first creature, with twisted fingers that look like they’ve broken from clawing its way up the wall, splayed out in different directions, jagged white teeth, and blood red eyes that are uneven, almost as if they’re slipping off its face, crawls over the edge of the wall, landing in front of her. It bares its teeth at her as if it can see her. At the same time, there’s a loud boom from up above, a wave of sweltering heat, and fire everywhere, catching on the treetops down below as well as burning some of the creatures, who scream in agony. The last thing she sees, aside from the creature seemingly advancing on her, snarling loudly, is the horizon beyond the wall catching fire, red blazing right before her vision fades to pitch black.

~.~.~.~.~

“Sohee found me in the rubble while she was passing through.” Chanyeol finishes weakly and Hyemi feels strange at the sudden switch back to reality, her head spinning at the feeling.

She glances around the room, frowning because no one’s noticed, not even Baekhyun. At least she thinks that’s the case until she glances at Sohee, who is looking directly at her, her brows knitted together as if she’s confused. Hyemi blinks at Sohee’s expression.

“Passing through?” Jongdae lifts his head up from where he’s practically wrapped around the uninjured parts of Chanyeol’s body, his chin still nestled in the crook of Chanyeol’s neck as he blinks at Sohee, curly lips still turned upwards ever so slightly. Hyemi thinks it’s funny that Jongdae’s the only one doing so, aside from Yixing pressing a glowing hand to Chanyeol’s injuries, healing him without being asked, and Baekhyun clutching Chanyeol’s fingers tightly, his thumb drawing comforting circles that Hyemi knows firsthand is incredibly soothing. Clearly, Jongdae isn’t as afraid of Sohee’s threats as the rest of them are.

“I was heading to the market with the other merchants and then we saw the fighting. We decided to wait it out. Avoid the crossfire, you know. Then we went in to check for survivors. And—” Sohee’s expression crumples for a moment before her expression straightens out, the same, almost stoic, Minseok-like blank slate it was before. Hyemi can’t get over how similar she looks in comparison to Minseok, especially at that moment. “We didn’t find very many. The ones that could walk said they had to return to the castle to protect it or something, but it was a wasteland. The trees were gone, everything was smoke and ashes, or rubble regarding to the broken wall. There were so many dead bodies, Jongdae.”

Sohee is looking Jongdae right in the eyes, her jaw clenched as if she wants to ask him something else entirely. Her voice wavers the tiniest bit and it’s a strange sound, even to Hyemi who has known her for less than twenty minutes. Her shoulders are tensed up.

Jongdae sits up and Hyemi watches as Yixing stares between him, his eyes moving back and forth from Jongdae to Sohee and back again before it remains there, on Jongdae.

“Chanyeol said Luhan was there.” She’s not speaking to just any of them anymore; she’s specifically speaking to Jongdae.

Jongdae stands up, pushing himself off Chanyeol’s bed as he straightens up. Jongdae’s pretty, curly lips turn down into a tight frown, “Sohee.” Jongdae sighs.

(Hyemi thinks Jongdae’s tone is anxiety-inducing, too careful, clearly hiding something.)

Baekhyun looks between them, blinking, “What’s wrong?” Baekhyun turns to Sohee, his eyes flickering downwards, where Sohee’s fingers are curling into tight fists, “Sohee, what’s wrong?” Baekhyun repeats himself, his voice louder.

Sohee raises a hand in Baekhyun’s direction, waving off his concern, while her eyes still on Jongdae. Her tone is rigid, pained almost, “Where’s Minseok?”

“We don’t know.” Jongdae says, softly, shaking his head. “Jongin said he left a while ago and Junmyeon thinks he went looking for Luhan.”

Her voice is quiet, settling over the room like dust. They’re afraid to move, to respond, in case everything explodes right there, in that very moment. “Minseok wouldn’t—he’s not going to join Luhan, is he?”

Hyemi never considered that and, apparently, the other boys hadn’t considered that either. She thinks, in any other circumstance, she would have thought it surprising just how much she’s come to trust Minseok, despite knowing him to be a criminal with a terrifying aura about him and a murderous streak. They all glance at each other, eyes widening in surprise. Jongdae’s forehead scrunches up with little creases that make him look so utterly distressed that Sohee ends up staring at Jongdae with a dismay written all over her expression.

“He wouldn’t.” Jongdae shakes his head, his voice so sure. “What kind of question is that?”

Sohee eyes Jongdae for a long, long time.

Jongdae frowns.

“He may not know what love is, but he cares deeply for Luhan.” Sohee murmurs, “It’s an entirely valid question.”

“Sohee.” This time it’s Yixing that says her name, a sudden wave of tranquility washing over them, the feeling hitting them so hard that it makes Hyemi’s heart slow down and the corners of her lips pull up into a soft, barely there smile, her head hazing up a little.

“Stop that.” Sohee snaps, her eyes trained on Yixing and the tranquility is extinguished immediately, leaving Hyemi feeling more exhausted and in pain then before, as if the brief moment of reprieve had been masking all the pain and exhaustion she had just gotten used to. “We all know Minseok would do anything for Luhan. And if Luhan is—if he’s with Yeonma—”

“It’s possible.” Chanyeol stares, unblinking at Sohee, before he looks down at Jongdae, “It’s possible. Minseok’s…he’s never been known to make good choices, especially when it comes to Luhan’s safety.”

Hyemi watches them all exchange looks, as if they know exactly what Chanyeol’s talking about. Sohee rolls her eyes when Jongdae blinks rapidly, sitting up, and whispers, “Oh, my God. . You’re right.”

Sohee makes a face, but Sehun’s the one to grimace and say, “You were defending him a minute ago.”

“I mean, like, I was there when he killed all those people fo—”

Sehun looks queasy, “Yeah, don’t remind me. I was there, too.”

“Killed?” Hyemi blinks rapidly, “His bad decision for Luhan’s safety was murder?”

Baekhyun nods, “That’s why he was in the dungeons.”

“He’s been in the dungeons longer than he’s been outside of it.” Sohee sounds a tad bitter, then, like Hyemi used to when she’d mention Baekhyun offhandedly to Mina, years after Baekhyun had left.

Hyemi blinks at Sohee, watching the way her eyes narrow a bit, the way her shoulders stiffen. Her expression is still cold, guarded. Hyemi thinks it’s quite the façade Sohee’s got.

“We should go.” Yixing finally speaks up, glancing between Jongdae and Sohee, “You should come with us.”

“As much as I’d love to beat my brother’s , I have a business to run.” Sohee shrugs.

Baekhyun frowns, “If Yeonma wins, you won’t have a place to do business. You won’t have customers. You won’t even have a damn business.”

“I’ll risk it. I’ve survived worse.” Sohee says and she stands there, arms crossed, chin jutting out, completely adamant on her decision.

Baekhyun looks sad almost, “It’s not about tha—”

“I’ll be fine.” Sohee says, shaking her head. Hyemi sees a scar running down the side of her neck, visible when she turns her head at a certain angle. It’s white against her skin. That plus the stoic lines on her face, from worry and exhaustion, should make her look older, but she still looks so young. Hyemi thinks wisdom is all in her eyes, her exhaustion and pain and worry fills her eyes, makes them look absolutely ancient and—

She vaguely catches Jongin mutter, “Here we go again.”

(Hyemi sees it in the callouses along Sohee’s palms, the burn marks littering her fingers, sees that her eyes aren’t just filled with exhaustion and pain and worry, her stoicism didn’t come from just that, it also came from working, constantly trying to make a living for herself. An image crosses her mind, of Sohee laughing, beautiful and so much younger, at Jongdae. Hyemi remembers how carefree she looked.

It juxtaposes terribly with the images she sees after that. First, Sohee bent over a burning fire, forging pots and pans and other necessities in the fire, molding hot metal carefully, fumbling with the pieces. She sees Sohee, hair tangled, face red from being so close to a fire for so long, keeling over a cold pot of water with her hand inside of it, and Hyemi can see the pain in Sohee’s eyes, the frustration. The burn leaves three of her fingertips smooth, ridge-less, insensitive to cold and heat and Hyemi watches Sohee stare at her fingers, brows knitted. Second, Hyemi sees Sohee running her business, her table of necessities every town needs—she only sells necessities because the demand for those are always steady, reliable—and she hears a jumble of words from the other street vendors, hears scattered words about freaks and second moon children and Hyemi can see the bitterness, resentment, bubbling up out of Sohee, like a monster clawing its way up out of Sohee’s chest, eventually clawing open just to spill out in front of Hyemi in the form of another vision.

Sohee’s younger again, around the age she was when she was so carefree, in that vision of her flicking Jongdae’s forehead. She looked so happy there, Hyemi thinks, and the image before Hyemi is the exact opposite of that. Sohee looks sad, so so sad, and Hyemi thinks it does not suit her one bit. Sohee watches a coffin drift by her, floating on by, a surreal sight really, and then Minseok is standing in front of her, dressed in all black.

Dead, he says, voice wobbling, his fists icing over, his face filming over with a thin sheet of ice. Sohee watches the coffin go and Hyemi sees tears forming, ready to spill, until Sohee closes her eyes, turning the world around Sohee black, imageless. Sohee opens her eyes to another vision for Hyemi, this time where Sohee is even younger, equivalent to a four or five year old back on Earth, though Hyemi knows her mental intelligence is anything but (Hyemi still doesn’t understand aging in Exo Planet; she may never understand it, really).

This time Sohee is holding Minseok’s hand while they watch another coffin float by, and another one, and another one, and Hyemi notices that Minseok isn’t filming over with thin ice. “Mother’s dead.” Minseok tells her, unfeeling, uncaring.

Sohee feels a tinge of pain, sadness, because no matter what their mother did to them, no matter the fact that their mother purposely left them nothing to live off of, no matter how many times she made Minseok fight her to the brink of death for training purposes, no matter how many times she’d ignore Sohee because Sohee was never born with a power, she was born normal and therefore useless, Sohee still felt pain for her mother. She still felt the loss of her mother deep in her chest. Sohee still cried that day, crumpling into Minseok’s arms when those words fully processed. Minseok had just pressed her head against his stomach; he let her ruin his nice funeral clothes, while he her hair gently, his fingers freezing. She remembers that he never cried, not once, at least not in front of her.

And lastly, there’s a vision of Sohee, less carefree, more tired and cheeks thinner, clothes looser, but still smiling, eyeing Minseok carefully in his new robes. Hyemi can feel the hunger clawing at her stomach, can feel what Sohee is feeling, hear what Sohee is thinking, and it’s strange, jarring.

“The Brotherhood, huh?” She had asked but Hyemi could tell Sohee really didn’t care for his answer, her stomach tight with hunger, growling over and over and again. All she could think of was how she would get her next meal.

(That robe wouldn’t be getting her a meal, just Minseok. It left a bitter taste in .)

“Mother would have killed you for this.” She says, a tad amused, despite her distracted thoughts. Their mother wanted Minseok to be in the King’s Guard. A part of her resents that he didn’t follow their mother’s footsteps because the King’s Guard guarantees her food, too, at least she’s pretty sure it does. She’s sure the King would never allow his Guard’s family to starve.

“That fact alone makes this an even better occasion.” Minseok grins, small ice shards spilling from the apples of his cheeks, glinting in the sunlight.

She watches the tiny shards of ice crack and spill for a long, long moment. Minseok squirms for a second and it’s a funny sight, because Minseok never really squirms under anyone else’s gaze. The ice keeps cracking along his cheeks and she knows it means he has something to say. She’s guesses it right away, because she’s heard rumors, long ago, “The Brotherhood have rules, don’t they?”

“Yeah. But they’re better rules than the King’s Guard.”

The disbelief must show on her face because Minseok shakes his head, jaw clenched as his eyes frost over, like it does when he remembers something from the past he doesn’t particularly like.

“Trust me, Sohee. They are.” Minseok grimaces and Sohee knows she’ll never know what rules he’s talking about. She can’t seem to care, not when hunger is the only thing on her mind.

“What are they?”

She has an idea, but she wants him to say it. Or maybe deny it. Minseok just looks at her, gaze as icy as it’s always been, “Luhan knows a merchant beyond the wall. He’ll take you as an apprentice and—”

“I can’t stay with you, can I?” Her voice sounds small to her own ears. She hates it. She hates—

“I’m not allowed—I mean, I can see you sometimes. There are rules, Sohee. We’re supposed to break all ties outside of the Brotherhood and the Tree. Relationships, family, they’re distractions. Even baby sisters.” Minseok pauses, swallowing, his Adam’s apple bobbing while more ice splinters off his face. They glitter on the way down and she figures that’s what the snowfall Zhang Yixing described to her once, while she was waiting for Minseok outside of the academy, is supposed to look like up North. She’s almost reminded of tears, but knows they’re not, because Minseok never cries. “We get a break once a month and I can see you then. I mean—I also get a small monthly allowance though and…and I can send you that, Sohee. It’s just—it’s not going to be enough to live in the city. So you have to go. You have to go with that merchant. Luhan says he’s an honest man and he can be trusted. Then—then you can make a name for yourself out there. You can finally be useful like how you always wanted to be.”

She hates him, she thinks.

Her fists curl and Minseok stares at them, but doesn’t say anything, even when she says, “I don’t want your allowance.”

She also wants to say that she doesn’t need Luhan’s connections or that damn merchant, but she knows she does. Her mother didn’t raise a fool, even if she treated her like one.

Minseok still sent his allowances. He still visited once a month for about a year until she got a letter and he stopped coming, just around the time after she fully finished her training in the forges and on the pottery wheel with the merchant. His allowances stopped coming, too, after that.

A couple months after that, instead of Minseok coming to explain himself in person rather than through a letter, Luhan stands in front of her, no doubt digging into her head. He looks out of place, so pretty and frail, especially in her dark and grimy workshop. She wipes at the soot across her forehead, but judging from the way Luhan smiles, she must have just made it worse. She, momentarily, wishes today was a pottery wheel day instead of a forge day. Then she shoves that thought far, far away, because who cares.

Luhan’s smile falls away. She doesn’t even have to ask out loud. Luhan just looks infinitely sad as he says, “He’s been sentenced to the dungeon.”

“I know. I got the letter.”

Luhan nods, slowly. Then he opens his mouth, seemingly wanting to add more information, “It’s—he’s allowed out sometimes. Just not beyond the wall. Maybe—maybe that’ll change when Kris is crowned, though, since they’re friends.”

She stares and stares and there’s a brief tightening in her chest, a moment of choking, constricting hatred. Then it disappears, as fast as it came, and she thinks she’s gotten good at not caring. “Okay, thanks.”

She turns back to her forge. She can sense Luhan’s eyes on her, but she’s already slipping her gloves on, focused on the task at hand. Luhan’s voice drifts over the roaring fire of the forge. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?” She looks over her shoulder, frowning at him.

“I took your brother.” Luhan says and she can see the guilt all over his face, wonders how long he’s been feeling it, wallowing in it. “You could only see him once a month and now that’s gone, too, because of me.”

“It was his choice.” Sohee says, her gaze steady as she meets Luhan’s eyes, “Everything he’s done is because of his own damn decisions. None of it is your fault.”

Luhan’s eyes widen, most likely at the thoughts buzzing through her head, before he shakes his head, gives her a meaningful, doe-eyed look, “He loves you, Sohee. He really does.”

“He sure has a way of showing it.” Sohee says, laughing. It doesn’t sound bitter or angry or anything. Just icy, cold.

Hyemi watches the visions fade away to Sohee, here and now, in this little dimly lit room.)

Sohee eyes her coldly, but Hyemi is the one to speak first. She thinks maybe she should say something understanding, but she can’t find it in herself to do so, not when they’re on a ticking time bomb of a deadline and Sohee seems too stubborn to argue with. A lifetime ago, she would have argued back, would have tried to convince Sohee to join them or at least not hate Minseok so much, because despite everything she just saw, she also knew that Minseok wasn’t a terrible person, just oblivious to the needs of others—perhaps because of how Minseok and Sohee’s mother raised them; how she neglected Sohee and weaponized Minseok.

Hyemi says, “I’m sorry it ended up like this.”

Hyemi wonders why the hell she sounds so unaffected, so unlike her, so rushed.

Sohee raises a brow, “You’re not going to ask for my help?”

Hyemi smiles a little, “We do need an air ship or air boat or something to get back to the castle. That’s all the help I’ll ask from you. I think,” Hyemi pauses, pursing her lips, and she momentarily wonders when exactly reason started trumping emotion in her head. Perhaps, it happened when she felt everything and anything from Yixing’s outburst. Perhaps, Sohee’s visions, the emotion she felt bubbling up in her chest, hardening there, had been the last straw for Hyemi’s own heart, her own emotions? “I think it isn’t fair to ask more.”

Sohee eyes her funnily.

Hyemi can feel eyes on her, Jongdae’s irritated gaze, Baekhyun’s frown, Sehun just watching, Jongin’s unfaltering eyes boring into her skull, Yixing glancing between Sohee and Hyemi, mouth twisting, and Chanyeol sighing as he gazes at them.

“I’ll show you the ships.” Sohee says, her tone carefully light, her expression carefully neutral, but her eyes different, unreadable but different from neutrality. Hyemi thinks it’s almost disappointment.

(Hyemi can’t find it in herself to care. She can’t find it in herself to dwell on that revelation either.)

~.~.~.~.~

She steps back, blinking up at the air ship, which is exactly what she thought it’d be—a giant steel ship that’s awfully tall, hidden away in some underground tunnel Sohee had brought them to, through a series of other underground tunnels. The air ship has rolled up cloth at the mast and fan-like contraptions at the bottom of the ship, a huge set of retractable stairs leading up to the deck. It glints silver in the dim underground lights and she can see some soldiers, controlled by the king no doubt, eyeing them warily, though they had bowed instantly the minute they saw Jongin (and then nearly fell over themselves in haste to bow repeatedly when they caught sight of Chanyeol, leaning heavily against Baekhyun and Hyemi, his long limbs nearly burrowing the two of them out of sight). Hyemi wonders, for a moment, how Sohee had managed to get into this military sanctioned zone without much hassle.

Instead, she watches them all say their goodbyes. Chanyeol hobbles, ruffles Sohee’s hair, murmurs, thanks, to which Sohee replies with a succinct, ruin my work and I’ll castrate you, Fire Boy. Chanyeol just laughed out loud, absolutely delighted. The other military officers in the room shifted uncomfortable. Hyemi thinks maybe it’s because Chanyeol’s a known Child of The Second Moon and these officers are clearly not, shoulders entirely too tense. Chanyeol hobbles back, allows everyone space, and Hyemi offers him an arm, allowing him to lean against her, despite his large form practically swathing her, the heat, though more subdued than earlier, radiating from him making sweat beads form all over.

Sehun grins and gives Sohee a one-armed hug, Sohee squeezing him back lightly, the exchange seemingly awkward but somehow so familiar, the corners of Sohee’s lips pulling up slightly. Jongin just eyes Sohee for a full minute before punching her arm lightly. Sohee punches Jongin’s arm hard in retaliation, making him wince and rub at his arm, muttering ow what the . Sohee says, don’t punch me, you er. Jongin smiles. Sohee smiles, too, and Hyemi thinks Sohee looks like the old her, just a tiny bit, happier. She’s not carefree though, Hyemi can see it in her tense posture, the guarded look always hidden in her eyes. Baekhyun just ruffles Sohee’s hair. Hyemi notices a moment, a brief minuscule moment, where Sohee looks at Baekhyun normally, before it switches into widened eyes, horror. Sohee looks horrified, her eyes so, so wide, and form words Hyemi can’t understand, can’t even lip-read. It’s like her brain is seeing the formation of words, hearing the sounds, but it can’t process anything at all, and a horrible feeling of dread drips down her spine, creeps up the back of her neck, like a set of thin, cold fingers.

And then it switches back, fast as it came, Sohee trying in vain to fix her hair while she kicks at Baekhyun’s shin without much force, Baekhyun laughing that sweet, sweet laugh of his, a laugh that makes Hyemi instantly relax beneath the swatch of Chanyeol’s limbs leaning heavily on her. Hyemi figures it was just a trick of the light, a moment where her paranoia, her mind, got away from itself. She’s been noticing it a lot lately. She’s probably just imagining things now, thanks to her visions, which she thinks is just perfect.

She watches Jongdae throw his arms around Sohee the minute Baekhyun pulls away, yanking her into a tight hug, seemingly warm and all-encompassing.

Chanyeol chuckles softly from above her.

Hyemi watches the scene with her heart so, so full because the love she feels radiating from them is just—it’s painful, overwhelming. She is momentarily jealous of it, but then that quickly passes because she has no right to feel jealous of this. She watches Jongdae press a kiss to the side of Sohee’s head, dramatic and loud, and Sohee looking cross, glaring over his shoulder, though her body softens, melts really, in his arms. After a moment of hesitation, Sohee allows her limp arms to return the hug.

She finds herself saying, “Did they ever—”

“Maybe?” Chanyeol sounds unsure. “I think it was a possibility a long, long time ago. And then Jongdae developed a big, gay, love-at-first-sight crush on Yixing and here we are.”

Hyemi smiles, fondly. Jongdae says something like, Be careful. I know—ugh don’t look at me like that, I know you can take care of yourself, just—be careful. And Sohee says, softly, softer than Hyemi’s ever heard her and it reminds Hyemi of Sohee crying in Minseok’s arms in her visions, You, too. Don’t electrocute yourself or something. And then Jongdae nods, smiling softly, fondly, and Yixing just takes a step up from where he was standing a little ways away, watching this all happen with what Hyemi can only describe as heart eyes, and Sohee glances at Yixing, looks slightly nervous, worried, anxious, somehow. Her fingers curl at her sides as she takes great care to maintain her icy expression. Yixing just places a gentle, reassuring hand on Sohee’s shoulder, mutters, I’ll make sure he doesn’t. It wouldn’t be the first time. Sohee’s shoulders relax at the touch and Hyemi knows Yixing’s not using his powers, it’s all Sohee.

Sohee’s laugh stays with her for a long, long time, years and years to come really. Hyemi’s heart is full to the brim with feelings, things she can’t quite sort through, and it hurts, she thinks. Her chest hurts.

(It hurts like she’s looking at memories—distant, once forgotten—like those times she’d go through her pictures of Baekhyun and remember moments she can’t have back.)

It hurts, it hurts, her chest feels like it’s splitting in two, it hurts, it—

(She gets that feeling again, that same feeling she’d get after looking at millions of pictures of Baekhyun, millions of memories long forgotten, and then she’d want to delete everything, tear everything apart and scream and scream and scream.)

She gasps.

Chanyeol’s deep voice is filled with so much worry, “Hyemi, Hyemi—”

Hyemi.

Hyemi.

~.~.~.~.~

Hyemi.

Hyemi.

She opens her eyes to a hooded figure perched in front of her, cold hand resting on her cheek, a mocking version of a gentle gesture that makes her skin crawl. She jerks away from the hooded figure’s touch, the chains tying her back, against the stone wall behind her, all around her, digging into her already raw wrists. Her chest heaves. It still hurts. It hurts so, so bad.

Her cheeks are wet.

“How much more pain will you take?” The voice coming from under the hood is electric. She feels it deep inside her head. She recoils, wants to melt into the walls, away from here, “How much more pain can you take?”

“It doesn’t hurt.” moves on its own accord, but it is her voice. She’s within herself, but she doesn’t know whether this is a vision of what’s to come or if it’s something else entirely. It feels different, more real than any other vision she’s ever had, like that high definition television her father bought for Christmas so many years ago. Her heart hurts at that thought.

The hooded figure chuckles, cold and benevolent. “It will soon. It’ll hurt so much you’ll want to destroy everything.”

“I won’t.”

This time she thinks it’s her, not Vision Her, but Hyemi within the vision, who says that. It’s a quieter, more distant sound compared to the other voice.

The hooded figure tilts their head and she wishes she could catch a glimpse of the face beneath, confirm whether it truly is Luhan controlling Yeonma. Hyemi may not be sure of many things, but she knows one important fact: this hooded figure is the real enemy, the enemy behind the enemy, Yeonma’s master.

“Oh, darling, but you will. You see,” His voice sounds closer, right against her ear, and she—the Hyemi she’s occupying—trembles, “It was written in the stars as such. Either Yeonma destroys everything, or you destroy everything.”

“Why—why are you doing this? You don’t have to do this.” This time Vision Hyemi speaks, her voice weak, tired.

“I was born in destruction, much like you, darling. I was reborn in deals made in the dark. I thrive in darkness and destruction. That is what we both are. Both of us.” The grip on her face tightens, becomes vice like. Yet her chest still hurts, not her face, “What a pair we make.”

“You’re wrong.” Vision Hyemi snarls and she sounds angry, so ing angry. She yells, cries out, sobs, “But you are not darkness. I know you. I ing know you’re in there. You are not darkness, you are l—”

Hyemi’s chest bursts and Hyemi screams and screams and the pain skitters through her, has her seeing black spots and white spots.

~.~.~.~.~

She screams awake and she’s shaking and someone wraps their arms around her and she shakes like a leaf in wind, bites back her tears, her vision focusing on an the expanse of blue t-shirt in front of her as one of her hands trails up to her chest, between their bodies, just to make sure that there is no gaping hole in her chest. Her heart rate slows, her fingers wrap around his black shirt, curling and uncurling. She heaves for air.

He whispers, gently, softly, like she’s the most fragile piece of porcelain in the world, and says, “Shhh, baby. You’re okay. You’re okay.”

She nods, whispers, “I know, I know.”

(She doesn’t feel like she does. It’s the problem she’s had this whole time—not knowing.)

He her spine, runs a finger up and down the curve of it, and she can feel her limbs relaxing, her fingers uncurling for the last time, until she’s a pliant pile of bones on top of him, blinking away tears.

She looks up, when she’s ready to face the world, face whatever she out on; she lifts her head from his chest and takes in their surroundings. She’s sitting on his lap, his arms wrapped around her. He is sitting on the deck of the ship and she sees clouds whiz by around them. Sehun is at the helm of the ship, Jongin leaning back beside the steering wheel, arms crossed. Sehun has his back to them, his eyes past the deck, clearly busy steering, or at least pretending to be busy. Jongin, on the other hand, has his dark eyes on her. For a moment, she thinks she sees pity. It makes her angry to see it. But then he raises a single eyebrow in a mocking sort of way. He says, “Got any more instructions for us, Dear Chosen One?”

“Shut up.” Her voice is hoarse and pathetic to her own ears. She scowls at him for good measure. He smiles.

Her eyes drop to Chanyeol, sitting on a mass of blankets while Yixing’s practiced hands heal him. Jongdae sits cross-legged, chewing on some food Sohee probably supplied them with. He makes such a point of watching Yixing intently do his work that Hyemi knows he’s highly aware of her vision-nightmare. Chanyeol’s eyes are closed but she has a feeling he wasn’t sleeping. They all were aware—are aware.

Baekhyun just lightly brushes at her cheeks, like he’s brushing away the tears she forced herself not to shed, his finger cool against her hot skin. She leans into his touch and he leans forward and carefully, gently, places a soft soft kiss at her forehead, right along her hairline. She closes her eyes, revels in the feeling, allows the feeling of his lips against her hot skin sear the memory of Yeonma’s master’s cold, cold fingers against her cheeks, her jaw.

Sehun’s voice carries in the wind, a work of his doing no doubt, “We’re almost there. Get ready. We’re about to hurl headfirst into some deep .”

~.~.~.~.~

They do end up hurling, not into deep in the literal sense, but definitely the metaphorical sense. If deep happened to be the castle ground or possibly even the castle itself. Sehun can’t land the ship.

“I never learned that part.” Sehun exclaims, eyeing the ground franticly as it comes whirring up at them at speeds Hyemi does not want to consider at the moment. Hyemi’s hair whips at her cheeks as Sehun desperately tries to lessen the impact and slow the landing.

“You never learned any part.” Jongin shouts, scowling at Sehun as he grips the edge of the deck.

Sehun looks sheepish. “Well…you’re not wrong.”

“I hate you.” Jongin says before yanks at Sehun’s elbow, the two of them seemingly shrinking, before they disappear. Then Jongin and Sehun reappear beside Chanyeol, Yixing, and Jongdae. They instantly grab onto him and the same thing happens, only for everyone to reappear next to Hyemi and Baekhyun. Jongin has sweat beading his forehead. Hyemi locks eyes with him and they both know Jongin won’t be able to teleport them off this ship. Not all of them.

Baekhyun’s the one to speak, even as he’s thrown against the deck sides, nearly thrown off if Jongdae hadn’t grabbed for him with both hands. “Sehun, forget the boat.”

Sehun blinks, then grins, and then gracefully moves his fingers, hands dancing to a wonderful rhythm Hyemi wishes she could hear. She thinks it’s something gentle, relaxing. Wind whips all around them until they’re surrounded by a giant wind bubble, floating as the ship goes down, the sensation of nothing necessarily holding them up except for Sehun’s wind making Hyemi entirely too nervous. She trusts Sehun but also she’s not used to being so far off the ground. Sehun, she knows, is tired and they can’t afford for him to use too much of his power too soon, especially when they saw the army headed this way already, a shroud of black converging on the walled city, like darkness was slowly seeping through the planet, clawing its way towards them.

Chanyeol takes a deep breath and blasts fire beneath them, a little to the side, and then their ball of wind hurtles through the air, so fast Hyemi shrieks and she’s sure Baekhyun and Jongdae shriek too. They blast through the air like some strange pinball and crash right through a window, Hyemi gasping, losing her breath and probably gaining a concussion as she hits the ground, sliding and rolling across soft carpet.

“A warning would be nice.” Baekhyun groans, a few feet away from her as he lies on his back and heaves for air.

“What the .” Another voice joins the fray, familiar and absolutely not the voice Hyemi wants to hear right now. Kris stands over them, watching them groan in annoyance and pain, cursing at Chanyeol for ing hurling them through the air without a single bit of warning or heads up. He looks regal, his hair pinned up elaborately and his shiny deep blue robes draped around him beautifully. He sneers at them, ruining the regality instantly. “I have a door. Like hundreds of them, as well as hundreds of people to open those damn doors for you, you ing heathens.”

Zitao laughs, nearly falls over himself, tears in his eyes.

~.~.~.~.~

Junmyeon pulls them each into fierce hugs, grasping and rough and filled with so much emotion. He even hugs Hyemi, engulfs her in his arms, and her chest hurts again.

(It scares her, makes her worry she’ll see the hooded figure again, with his awful words and cold fingers, his comparisons between the two of them, and she finds herself closing off her emotions, shutting down. She can’t afford to deal with that again because she doesn’t want to feel the hurt. She doesn’t want to wake up nearly in tears. She doesn’t want any of them to see her like that, so utterly vulnerable. Especially not now, not when Kris is here, not when Yeonma’s army is nearly at their doorstep.)

She shuts down and Yixing instantly turns a sharp gaze on her, his mouth twisting with concern. She avoids his questioning eyes.

“Thank you.” Junmyeon says to Hyemi, like she’s solely responsible for keeping Sehun safe and bringing Jongdae and Yixing and Chanyeol back. She wasn’t—she isn’t. Her boys did it on their own. Junmyeon still smiles that kind, kind smile. Her chest wants to hurt and she tells it to shut the up.

(She thinks the thank you is pointless especially when she gets around to telling him they all have to go to war with her. A small part of her wonders if maybe Junmyeon is already aware of that, has been since she first touched that dying tree and whispered, twelve.)

She looks around the room, at ten faces, and she wonders if this is enough, if it’s okay that she couldn’t gather all twelve at her side. Her stomach churns and she wonders how much more worrying she can take until she gets an ulcer. Her chest hurts less. It’s numbed out, just like her worry and guilt and all those ing emotions and she is so glad she could cry. She revels in the numbness, in her emotionless state. She knows, deep down, that it’s probably unhealthy beyond belief but she can’t find it in herself to care.

Especially when she watches Junmyeon’s face fall and fall hard, when Chanyeol mentions Luhan offhandedly, too casually.

Even Kris looks floored, his eyes unblinking, his sneer falling away into to surprise, horror, and fear.

“I need to see the Oracle.” She says after a beat, quick and to the point. She knows she should let the news sink in first, let them have a moment to grieve, bargain, deny, before she jumps into the task at hand. She can’t find it in herself to allow that time. She doesn’t want to see it, doesn’t want to risk the pain in her chest again.

For a moment, Kris looks as exhausted as Junmyeon, “Okay.”

~.~.~.~.~

They’re walking down the hall side-by-side, Zitao trailing behind them with purposeful steps. There’s a moment where Hyemi’s vision warps and she sees a much younger Kris beside her, with his princely robes that are much too big for him and a deep set look of fear on his face. Then she blinks, rapidly, and her vision returns to normal. In the present moment, Kris just looks mildly inconvenienced, not afraid like his younger self.

Kris speaks and it surprises her because he sounds so sad and almost resigned. “I loved your mother, you know?”

Hyemi blinks, “I know.”

“I know you do.” Kris sighs, grimacing slightly, reminding her of her threats way back when about how she knew his secrets. Kris stares at his fingernails for a long moment before he glances sideways at her, a glance she thinks he wanted to be subtle, though it doesn’t work because there’s really nothing subtle about Kris, the Crown Prince of Exo Planet. Kris says, “She was the only mother I ever really knew.”

Hyemi takes a moment to think about that fact. Here she is, walking beside a man who grew up with her mother. Jealousy fires through her for a moment, because she was her mother’s daughter, she was here because of her mother, yet she never had a single memory of her late mother. But Kris—awful, sneering, angry, mean Kris—he did. He loved her mother. Her mother definitely loved him.

(She figures he loved her so much that when her mother ran at the first chance she got, Kris hated her more than Hyemi ever learned to hate Baekhyun when he had left. Hyemi can’t imagine what that’d be like, to be left in the hands of someone like King Sungyeol. Hyemi thinks maybe she should feel sympathetic, and for a moment she does feel a twinge of sympathy for Kris, but it mixes quickly with jealousy, resentment, because at least he got to feel her mother’s love (any mother’s love), even for a brief period of time. That concoction of jealousy and resentment swirls in her chest, brings about a twinge of pain that instantly has her scrambling to end it before it starts. The pain is dull and the jealousy and resentment, mixed with sympathy, dulls as well. Deep at the back of her mind, she wishes it were gone completely.)

Hyemi stares straight ahead and says, her voice tiresome to her own ears, “So, in a messed up sort of way, would this make us siblings?”

Kris’s steps falter beside her. She glances sideways at him, too, and his large, expressive eyebrows are furrowed tight. He gives her a strange look.

Then Zitao starts laughing.

Kris shoots him an annoyed look.

Zitao laughs harder.

Hyemi’s mouth twitches when Kris eyes her in a begrudging sort of way, “I guess it does.” Kris sighs, like he’s majorly inconvenienced now rather than the minor inconvenience of walking her to Amber and Soojung’s Oracle Room, “Do not expect me to start calling you little sister.”

“Yeah, no. It’s weird enough already.” Hyemi responds, wrinkling her nose.

Zitao can’t stop giggling and Kris promptly tells him to shut up which earns Kris another giggle from Zitao.

Another silence passes before Hyemi speaks, unable to hold her next words in, unable to let the slight bitterness, the resentment, stay buried far far within her, “Besides, you knew her more as a mother then I ever did.”

Kris’s eyes flash and it’s strangely guilty for a moment. She never thought she’d see the day where he’d look upon her with any semblance of guilt in his eyes. “You’re a lot like her.” Kris says.

She frowns, “I’ve been told.”

“Not in a bad way.” Kris shakes his head, “Not everything, at least.”

“But some things.” Hyemi reads between the lines.

Kris smiles, an introspective wispy thing, “Sometimes your parents live on in you. Sometimes you embody them. It can’t be helped.”

“It can,” Hyemi murmurs, as the two of the come to a stop in front of the Oracle’s Room, the familiar tall doors of shimmery gold making her stomach churn. She eyes it anxiously as she says, “You have a choice to become your parents or break the cycle. I’ve always believed that, even back on Earth.” Hyemi turns to Kris, eyeing his robes and his crown, how similar he looks to his horrible father.

Her vision flips to younger Kris, in too big robes, vying for his father’s attention, losing out only to stomp away, towards the room her mother used to occupy. Younger Kris smiling tentatively at a much younger Junmyeon. She’s hit with the vision of Junmyeon dousing Kris in cold water, laughing so brightly while Kris scowls. Then she’s hit with the images of a fight, Junmyeon with a water whip flowing out from his fingers, glinting so so bright in the light of the sun and Kris with a giant, fiery dragon sitting at his back, curling around him like smoke curls around a person’s fake as they take a hit of their cigarettes, tendrils of fire and darkness flitting up above them, it’s long bird tail curling around Kris’s body in a protective way. Kris’s eyes are a deep, blood red, aglow with anger. Junmyeon doesn’t look terrified at all. He is the calm of the sea, the silent anger the sea conjures up before a huge storm. His eyes are the murky darkness of the sea in a raging storm, angry and whirring, screaming as it destroys everything in its path. Words, thoughts, sound, everything melts together in her ears and she can’t quite make out anything. She picks up tidbits here and there, Junmyeon shouting, Kris growling. She feels sadness, intense and heavy, a burden on her shoulders that she cannot function properly under. She thinks that burden belongs to Kris, but perhaps it belongs to Junmyeon as well. She thinks they’re fighting because that heavy, heavy burden is weighing them both down and neither of them want to face it. She catches Junmyeon’s angry words, breaking painfully halfway, You are not your father. Kris replies, I am. I have to be.

Blackness entraps the vision, swallows it whole, and suddenly she’s back to reality, back to Kris eyeing her like she’s speaking absolute nonsense, though there’s a hint of consideration in his eyes. He says, “We cannot escape destiny. It’s the reason why you are here, wrapped up in our world’s affairs.”

Hyemi shakes her head, “Destiny is bull.” She says. Once upon a time, she used to whole-heartedly believe this, but after everything, sometimes she wonders if it isn’t as ridiculous as she’s always thought. “Life is not a fixed timeline of events.” She tells him (and reminds herself).

“Maybe so.” Kris says. Kris doesn’t look like he believes her, but there’s tension in his shoulders and she wonders if maybe he’s at least contemplating her words. Unlike the last time, the doors slam open before Kris can knock, the watery curtains drawn away, spilling over the fingers like water spills over Hyemi’s hands when she has her hands under running water.

She stands there, eye to eye, with a frazzled, clearly annoyed Amber. Her eyes, rimmed black with kohl, narrow in extreme annoyance, “Why the hell did it take you so long?”

Hyemi frowns, “What—”

Amber grabs Hyemi’s forearm and drags her through the rippling curtains. Amber takes a moment of pause to look at Kris. She says, voice high strung, “Man the castle, Kris. They’re—” She lets out a steady breath and the tension in her voice disappears, returns to a poor version of the usual amusement in her voice, “They’ll be here soon.”

Then Amber slams the golden doors in Kris’s face, cutting off Kris’s equally as annoyed questions.

Hyemi takes a moment to observe the room and she’s stricken by the stark differences from last time. That hazy, otherworldly feeling is still there, but there’s an edge to the atmosphere that brings about a prickly feeling that crawls up her back, down her legs, along the nape of her neck. Hyemi shivers as she studies the upturned leather couch, the dirty rugs covering the white pavilion floor. The pavilion itself is the same, tiled floors that stretch on and on in the distance, dropping off like a cliff against a red backdrop. However, the soft red backdrop is darker, a deep, dark, blood red that leaves a bad taste in Hyemi’s mouth. A few of the pillars surrounding the once cozy room are broken, cracks forming dark webs that seem to creep and crawl towards the white ceiling. A couple glass tables are shattered, strewn past the pillars and along the huge expanse of white tile that creeps past the pillars. It is paired with shredded, colorful rugs. The cauldron in the center of the room is producing white smoke that curls and disappears into the high ceiling. Cushions are torn apart, some looking as if they’ve been thrown across the room, some piled high, as if they’re being used as a poor excuse for defense. There’s something still so incredibly enticing about the atmosphere, though there’s also something so incredibly harrowing too, and the more she observes the place, the more details she notices. The floating crystal balls that emitted so much warmth do not dance overhead. Some are broken on the floor, shattered curled up balls that remind her of death and destruction, herself. Some are hanging so, so still, just at the edges of the room, along the line of pillars separating the room from the pavilion beyond. Some are whizzing dangerously along, knocking against each other, against the ceiling with loud, disconcerting thuds that echo out, out, out and then drop away at the cliffs. Her chest hurts so, so bad. She looks at the room and all she feels is destruction and she thinks that, maybe, just maybe, this is her fault. Destruction is her jurisdiction.

Fingers curl through hers, holding tight, and she looks away from the once beautiful, cozy Oracle Room to the nervous Oracle herself. Amber lifts their intertwined hands in the direction beyond the pillars, towards the empty white expanse spreading out beyond this room. Amber says, voice soft, a remnant of the warmth that was once so full in this room, “Look closer.”

Hyemi does.

And standing there, beyond the white tiles, just at the edge where white meets blood red, stands Soojung, her eye patch gone and her terrifying eye so, so visible, even from all the way over here. She is dressed in a white shift dress that flows over her pale skin, her blonde hair tangled, covering the half of her face that doesn’t hold that glassy blue eye, so big it nearly overtakes Soojung’s pretty face.

Soojung’s voice rings like she’s standing right in front of them. “Come.”

Then, as if someone’s grabbed Hyemi and Amber and just dragged them across the room on an accelerated platform, they are shoved forward, so fast Hyemi curls back into Amber. Soojung’s pretty face, her terrifying blue eye comes at them fast and Hyemi’s hair whips against her face, her eyes become dry.

Hyemi screams when they don’t stop. She screams when they keep going and Soojung holds out hand, when that hand delves into Hyemi’s chest, pushes right through, making her gasp as all the air leaves her lungs. Hyemi cries out in pain, her chest burning, and recoils into Amber, who holds her steady, mutters, it’s okay it’s okay, and she thrashes until she stills, frightened beyond belief because—

Soojung’s fingers are curled around Hyemi’s heart. She knows it. Hyemi looks down, tears slipping down her cheeks, dripping and dotting Soojung’s pale wrist, the rest of her hand buried within the confines of her chest.

Hyemi looks up, a slow deliberate movement. The blue eye stares at her.

Amber speaks beside her, “You are losing your humanity.” She sounds disappointed.

Hyemi gasps, feels it in every single ing nerve, when Soojung’s grip tightens once more on her heart. Hyemi says, voice scathing, “Are you going to tear my heart out then?”

A slow, sharp smile spreads across Soojung’s beautiful face. It claws up the corners of and moves well past where a normal smile should end, slicing up her cheeks, towards her ears. Hyemi’s heart races in Soojung’s grip.

Amber simply says, “Yes. You don’t need it anymore.”

Hyemi wants to call bull because she needs her heart, everyone needs a damn heart. But it’s too late. She screams and screams and the pain is excruciating, like she’s being stabbed over and over again in the chest. She watches Soojung’s pale hand slip out from her chest, watches deep blood red seep along the curves and cracks between her fingers. She yanks, tugs, and Hyemi heaves, until her heart is pulled clean out.

And then Soojung puts Hyemi’s heart, blood red and still beating, boom boom boom, blue and red veins lining the organ, right to her pretty lips, her stretched out smile still so pretty despite tearing her face apart at the seams. She swallows it whole.

The last thing she hears is Amber mutter, “Wow. Puts a whole meaning to the saying I'll eat your heart out, doesn’t it?”

a/n: funfact this fic has hit over 170k which means it is now a little bit longer than harry potter and the half blood prince.......i'm shook lol

like I couldn't NOT update this after exo's released power it's like they're trying to remind me to finish my mama powers!au fic sjdknjkxzn can they please stop making mvs that remind me of my unfinished work lmao

but anyways thank you thank you thank you to everyone that's stuck by me and this fic for so long, we're getting into the of the fic everyone please hold onto your seats.

xoxo as always, comments are super appreciated and very loved and make my day, I love you guys! <3