3 chapters in 1. Please don't expect anything epic, I don't want to disappoint you. This is the peak of Youngjae x Jongup's friendship, so yeah. I'm not the best writer, but I'm trying. I know it could have been better; my skills are fuzzy. 

“Uh, why is Jongup with the Block B folks?” Yongguk was saying, turning to look at Himchan who was busy trying to figure out the clue on the paper that had been given to him.

Himchan’s paper said: Twin Role.

Half the bus seemed to be busy with their clues. They were on the bus, and now they have to figure out who their team members were.

“I dunno, maybe those are his team?” Himchan said, “Since some people left, like Youngjae on his business thing doing whatever, T-ara going for some concert oversea… some of us are sorted into new teams.”

“Yeah, but,” Yongguk frowned, looking behind his seat, grumbling, “They are all Block B members, Himchan. Jongup is the only odd one out.”

Himchan sighed, looking up from his clue, and twisting around to eye Jongup.

“Why do you care? He looks fine to me,” Himchan said, as he eyed how the three Block B members were trying to talk to Jongup all at the same time. The drummer just looked bewildered and lost at being the centre of attention. “Not like he’s being excluded or anything,” Himchan said, shrugging.

“GOTCHA!” a shriek and a head popped out from the other side of Yongguk’s seat.

Yongguk yelped, falling out of his place.

Jimin was grinning, head perched up on the back of the seat, cheeks flushed, looking like a five year-old kid. “We’re in the same team, my friend!” she said, spreading her arms wide.

“Oh gawd, Jimin,” Yongguk groaned, trying to get back up from the floor. “You scared the hell out of me.”

“Well, that’s good isn’t it? You ain’t got no more hell in you!”

Himchan snorted, before saying, “What does your clue say?”

Jimin shoved her paper in Himchan’s face. “DRAGON TWIN.”

“Dragon twin? How is that…” he trailed off, thinking.

Jimin rolled her eyes. “It’s obvious isn’t it? It’s Yongguk. Dragon in Korean is Yong, you replace that, and it’s Yong Twin!” She blew her hair out of her face. “Yongguk is the only one with a twin. Besides, nobody else on the bus has anything to do with dragons.”

Himchan looked surprise and Yongguk could only just stare.

“Well, all right then, Miss Logic, what’s the answer to mine?” Himchan asked, shoving his own clue in Jimin’s face.

Jimin gave it a stare and then one eye roll. “Ugh. You’re so bad at this. It’s Yuna, Himchan. The answer is Yuna.”

Himchan frowned, “Wait how–”

“TWIN ROLE. Who else plays the keyboard, you mush?” the girl snorted, before popping out of her seat, reaching for Yongguk’s arm and started to drag him off. “C’mon, Yongguk. I’ve gathered up everybody, let’s go.”

“Uh–” Yongguk started to say, glancing at Himchan helplessly.

“Be a good boy Himchan and go find Yuna,” Jimin said kindly, “She’s at the front with the rest of your team.”

“Uh, right,” Himchan said, dazed, as he watched Yongguk get manhandled by none other than little wife-to-be.

::

Zelo stared at his clue. And stared. And stared.

“I don’t get it,” Juniel said from beside him. She was busy staring at her own clue. “How can one word tell us anything?”

“My thought exactly,” Zelo sighed, scrutinising his paper. “What does yours say?”

“Nothing,” she said, flipping the note over. “Just the first syllable of my name.”

“Well, that’s just stupid,” Zelo answered, snorting. He rubbed his eyes, continued to stare at his clue.

“What does yours say?” Juniel asked, elbowing him. Zelo grunted, shoving his note to her.

“Whatever, I give up,” he said.

“Hey, I think I know what yours mean,” Juniel said. “Zelo. We got the same team.”

Before anything could be said any further, Niel and Naeun popped out of nowhere.

“Noona! You’re mine,” Niel said grinning.

Zelo groaned but nobody seemed to pay him any attention.

Niel showed his clue to them. “See? It says 2NIEL! We’ve got a couple name!”

“Oh, wow! That’s so cool,” Juniel grinned. “So we’re on the same team!”

“Hello, Juniel,” Naeun greeted smiling.

“Hullo. What does your clue say?”

Naeun shrugged, “I’d rather not say. Niel finds it offending. But here you go.” She handed Juniel the clue instead.

Zelo strained his neck to read the clue as Juniel unwrapped the paper.

HUMAN FISH.

The bassist snorted, earning a glare from Niel. Zelo quirked his eyebrows challengingly.

“Oh, well. That’s interesting,” Juniel mumbled, handing the paper back to Naeun. “So that means, Zelo’s probably got Naeun, then? The clue says MY HAND.”

“That’s me,” Naeun said, chuckling.

“How’s that…” Zelo started.

“Son for HAND. Na for MY,” Niel answered without needing to think. “Son Naeun. Anyway, yours, noona?”

“I guess it’s Zelo, then,” Juniel said, turning her paper around. The clue said: JUN. “I thought it was supposed to be a part of my name.”

::

Autoimmune Disorder.

This was starting to get on Youngjae’s nerves. “Just get on with it,” he snapped, because his head was throbbing and he wanted to know what was going on already. “You’re not gonna break my heart.”

Kris nodded, looking up from the test results. “You’re still dying Youngjae. Nothing’s changed.” No sense of sympathy nor sadness.

Youngjae smiled despite it all. He appreciated the apathy. It reminded him so much of himself, so much of what he didn’t need, didn’t deserve. Youngjae had been expecting it—why wouldn’t he?—and so he would not react.

He would not cry, nor crumble, because he was above that. He was. But his heart was falling over, shaking, staring at the ground, and it was enough to make something in Youngjae snap. Words caught in his throat and a few moments passed before he found his voice, and when he did there was a clipped tone to it that he didn’t like.

“How long?” he asked, hands shaking. He hid them behind him, wrists aching from all the blood tests and medical equipments probing into his skin.

Then Youngjae swore he saw a shadow move, on the other side of the examination room.

“Who’s that?” he snapped, as the reflection of a man suddenly disappeared again.

“Oh god,” Kris said, and that was all Youngjae needed to hear to confirm his dread. He sprang up from his place, and out of the examination room, after the man.

“Youngjae, no!” Tao yelled but he wasn’t listening, he needed to catch up with that man fast.

Footsteps followed footsteps, and Youngjae was losing his breath. The world was spinning around him, but ahead, he saw the man reaching the elevator.

No!

The moment Youngjae made it to the elevator, the man had already slipped inside, forced to turn around to stab the closed button. And Youngjae saw his face.

The look of horror. The panic. The fear.

Youngjae, about to pry his way into the elevator, stumbled back, watching as the man inside stared at him, in shock, in anguish… No.

The man’s eyes were haunted, as though he’d seen the truest of his nightmare.

No. Youngjae’s vision blurred, his eyes burned and then, everything went dark.

::

“If you want to remember all that will happen, you must be very careful.” Kyung was saying with this look of wariness on his face and it was directed at Jongup.

They were in a cab now, in Seoul, heading to the hospital. Jiho sat in the passenger seat beside the cab driver. Taeil was at Kyung’s other side.

“What?”

Kyung sighed. “You know how people forget, right?” He didn’t wait for Jongup to reply. “Well. It’s a sad thing. Nobody remembers. Ever. They forget. They always do, but it’s important that you remember this time around.”

“What are you on about?” Jongup said, perplexed.

“Magic. Sorcery,” Taeil quipped up. Kyung shot him a glare.

He turned back to the drummer. “It’s a double-edged sword, you see. There is a, uh, smudged point in the universe, and anything that happens around that smudged point is to be forgotten.” He waved his hand dismissively. “That’s why we were so insistent you sit with us on the bus, and that you don’t leave our side.”

Jongup stayed silent. He wasn’t going to say anything when he wasn’t even sure if he knew what they were saying.

“It’s both sad and funny, because what are done remain in effect, remain in people’s conscience, resulting in changes in their lives, but they almost always don’t remember how those things happened.” Kyung had a forlorn look on his face.

They knew Jiho was there, but had been quiet ever since they boarded the bus, leaving it to Taeil and Kyung to do the talking. Jongup wondered why he was suddenly so dark, but the other two seemed to allow him the space and peace, not questioning when he muttered under his breath, looking grave and staring at nothing.

The look really reminded Jongup of Youngjae when he was masterminding. It unsettled Jongup to see the same old look on Jiho. He tried to push the images of his nightmares away, recalling how they had known each other since young was not helping in the least.

He focused on what Kyung was trying to tell him.

“Jongup, listen to me,” he said. “The universe is vast, and scary and, most often, unpredictable. There are times when things happen and they are so absurd and unfathomable that humans cannot find rationality in them.” He gave Jongup a hard look. Jongup’s heart was beating as though he was going to uncover some big secret. “But sometimes, wonderful things happen. Magical even, and people don’t know how, but their darkest moments turn into the best moments of their lives. What I need you to understand is,” Kyung in a breath, “those things you people call ‘Miracles’? They aren’t real. We are.”

The blood in Jongup drained. “What?”

“There aren’t such things as Miracles,” Kyung said. “Miracle is just a man, Jongup. He makes things happen. He works to make things happen. He is a man, but so much more.”

“I, I don’t understand.”

Jongup turned to Jiho for some help, but the guy still didn’t budge from his seat, like he was still lost in a trance or something. He turned to Taeil then, but the man averted his gaze, taking interest at his fingernails.

There was a pause as Kyung stared calculatingly at Jongup, as if assessing how much of an idiot the drummer was. The look on his face was so grave that it contrasted with all his childish and whiny behaviour he had broadcasted all the other times Jongup had seen him.

Suddenly, Kyung was so much more than just a young man, he looked to be almost as intimidating as Jiho, but there was a slight normalcy in his gaze that anchored Jongup to the belief that whatever Kyung was, he was the closest to a regular human as Jongup was.

Then Kyung said, the words bittersweet in his mouth, “I was just like you, once.” His eyes lost their intensity the moment he leaned back into the seat, sighing. He turned towards the front, eyes landing on the contemplating Jiho. “There is one big difference between Jiho and Youngjae, the only difference that matters to me.”

“What’s that?” Jongup found himself asking.

Kyung smiled, meeting his eyes, “Youngjae is to be remembered. Jiho on the other hand…” he trailed off, smile slipping off his face, “is the smudge in time. The Miracle everybody forgets.”

::

Ischemic Heart.

There was a boy, Youngjae remembered that much. A decade older than him. His eyes were wide, like they’d been every time something bad happened. That boy and that smile, and the hurt in his eyes. It hurt.

“Calm down?” The boy sounded incredulous. “Father just said he’s transacting all the medical support, what are you—“

“I’m not worried about the medical support, Youngwon,” Youngjae said, but, gawd, was he worried. Worried about himself, about Youngwon, about what would happen. He forced his lips into a smile he hoped was reassuring, because he didn’t want to see Youngwon like that, couldn’t stand to. “I never thought I’d still be alive at this point— and living hasn’t exactly been so great anyway.”

Youngwon smiled, but it was probably just as empty as Youngjae’s.

::

Jongup was saying now, “So what’s the difference that doesn’t matter to you?”

Kyung flashed a lopsided grin, not looking at Jongup.

“Why should I talk about something that doesn’t matter to me?” he asked, eyes landing on Jiho at the front.

Jongup shrugged. “Because it might matter to me.”

The other chuckled, eyes sad. “Of course it does matter to you.”

“So? What is it then?”

Kyung sighed.

“It’s Youngjae. He doesn’t forget Jiho; like me, like Taeil… he doesn’t forget.” Kyung shrugged. “But Youngjae doesn’t remember either.”

“What does that mean?”

“Youngjae only remembers his life now, this sad life of his. He doesn’t recall what he was before. In this life, anything that happens between Jiho and him, he remembers. Every conversation, every word of it.” Kyung said, “You, on the other hand, don’t. Your friends didn’t. In a few hours, you won’t even remember we had this conversation. You won’t remember the things Jiho said to you, what he did for you, what all of us are doing for you. But Youngjae will. Youngjae always will. That’s part of the big secret, Jongup.” Kyung turned around to stare at the drummer. “We’ve met before. We’ve talked before. You and me and Jiho.” Kyung smiled bitterly, “Out of all the small miracles in your life… Youn