[Day 5] [Night]

“Your brother and father are doing well; I’ve made sure they are living comfortably.” Youngjae snaps his head up at that; surprised that he wasn’t threatening to kill them off. “Yeah right, as if I would believe you.” Youngjae grumbles and looks out the window, dying to get out of this place but having failed a bazillion times. Daehyun sighs again, as if it was tiring just talking to the younger male. “I don’t see what I would gain by lying to you.”

 “You’re ing confusing you know?! Keeping me here and letting me do nothing, then treating me this well? What the hell do you want from me?” Youngjae swivels round and glares at the impassive man. “I’m pretty sure you don’t need any money from me and I’m most definitely not a woman. Which obviously proves you don’t need me here, let me go back!”

God knows how many times Youngjae had flared up at the older male.

Daehyun seemed reluctant to answer his question, so he turns around to leave. “Answer me! Just what do you want?!” Youngjae bellows once more at him.

“You.” A loud gasp could be heard from the younger male, who obviously wasn’t expecting such an answer. “Now that you know, what would you do?” The forsaken look in Daehyun’s eyes shot a twinge of guilt through Youngjae; he had no idea the older male felt this way. “It doesn’t matter. Just forget it.” Daehyun turns to leave once more, leaving Youngjae stunned and slightly speechless.

“I didn’t know…” Youngjae stares down at his feet still reeling from surprise at the sudden confession. It definitely explained a lot though. From the overly concerned gestures to just the way Daehyun would look at him sometimes, it was oh so clear now.

But, he’s a Lynx; they deserve no sympathy, even if they were suffering.

~~~

A resounding blast jerks Youngjae awake; he glances around the room for signs of what had happened.

He swings his legs over the edge of the bed, flinching slightly as his feet make contact with the cold floor. A few more blasts could be heard not too far away from his room, but they don’t perturb Youngjae.

Suddenly, the door to his room gets thrown open and a fully armed man swings his rifle around the rather vacant room, checking for enemies, till his sights fall on Youngjae. He puts the gun down and removes his mask.

“Doyen, it’s good to see you well and unharmed.” The man was young and had a great build from years of relentless training, he didn’t look terribly threatening, but looks are always deceiving.

“Equilibrium has started.” The man tosses a spare rifle to Youngjae, as though it was nothing but a mere handgun.

“I know.”

“I can’t believe they really bought my ‘starving’ act, like c’mon I can go for weeks just surviving on morsels.” Youngjae mutters and rolls his eyes at just how terribly ignorant the Lynx appeared to be.

He straightens his shoulders and schools his features. Gone were the weak and infuriatingly ‘useless’ demeanor he had feigned.  

“Asher, did Yongguk send you here to fetch me?” Asher, who was leaning against the door frame waiting for him, nods and makes a silent gesture for him to hurry up.

“Damn him for thinking I can’t take care of myself.” Despite his sour tone, a small smile creeps onto his lips as he swings his rifle, ready for combat.

His pretense of throwing a tantrum had completely erased any suspicion against him. Obviously the act of not eating and seeming so whiny also threw them off the fact that he was really monitoring their conversations. Most of which had proved to be a little helpful in successfully getting the teams in. Of course, when he had asked to explore, it was in fact to observe the guards patrolling and their changes in shift. Not that they had to be wary of a simple farmer. It was even humiliating to consider the fact that anyone could infiltrate their ‘fortress’.

Their arrogance and ego was really going to be their very downfall.

~~~

“Doyen, Team Walker here, the West wing is down, moving on to Team Bookman in South Wing.”

Youngjae mutters back an affirmative, barely registering the message coming in through the device in his ear, as he dodges an array of bullets. He ducks behind a wall as gunshots ring out clearly, followed by the familiar thump of a body hitting the concrete. Adrenaline was pumping through his veins, fuelling his every movement. His skinny frame was doing wonders for him at the moment, not only did it make his opponents extenuate him, it definitely made dodging easier.

Youngjae swiftly moves on to his next location – the heart of the Ruby fortress, where the Lynx were supposedly being held.

Suddenly, a massive guard rams his entire body into Youngjae’s blind side, toppling both of them over. The guard clumsily reaches for Youngjae’s neck, in a desperate attempt to suffocate him. Youngjae resists the urge to smile at the poor guy’s pathetic struggle to cut his air supply; he clearly lacked the proper training. Another glaring mistake that the Lynx had made – erroneous training of their so called ‘guards’.

Youngjae’s rifle had slid off somewhere from their scuffle, so he opts for hand to hand combat instead. Reaching for the guard’s arms, Youngjae tugs them down and knees him in the abdomen. Not sparing a second at all, he throws the guard off to the side and twists his arm till he hears a satisfying crack of bones. The guard howls in blatant agony while frantically swinging his good arm around, trying to land a blow on Youngjae.

“Blind them with pain, Youngjae! Don’t give them time to recover!”

Youngjae uses his body weight to immobilize the guard’s thrashing legs, while reaching for his head. In a quick motion, he lifts his head and slams it back onto the hard and unforgiving floor. The impact to the guard’s head immediately knocks him out as scarlet red blood starts pooling around it.

Youngjae lunges for his rifle and promptly embeds a bullet in the guard’s heart and one in his head for good measure.

“You don’t have to feel guilty over taking your enemy’s life, because, they would have done the same to you.”

Not wasting any more time, Youngjae sprints to his next location, eager to meet up with the rest of his team. 

They were always trained to kill, never just to harm.

~~~

“Youngjae, good to see you finally made it.” A sinewy young man with a crew cut ambled towards Youngjae. The amiable look he had on right now definitely didn’t fit with the current situation where everyone else literally looked like they were attending a funeral.

“Hey Yongguk, of course I wouldn’t be missing out on so much fun.” Youngjae pats him lightly on the shoulder, glad to see his long-time companion well. Yongguk gives him a rueful grin as he leads Youngjae over to the Lynx they had managed to gather.

After years of monitoring the Lynx, they knew the precise number of them and even their daily habits. Youngjae basically had to confirm it once more as they undoubtedly had no room for failure.

“Daehyun over there refused to shut up until he saw you,” Yongguk gestured over to the familiar brunette. “What did you do to charm that poor soul into such devotion?” Yongguk chuckled at Youngjae’s perplexed expression. Even as they were talking, the ‘poor soul’ kept turning around to search for Youngjae. He was unknowingly pushing the buttons of Youngjae’s team member, who held him at gunpoint and basically looked about ready to wallop him unconscious.

“Hold on alright, I think Cam over there is ready to manhandle Daehyun into submission.” Youngjae mutters to a smirking Yongguk and takes long strides over to his team member who had a murderous glare trained on Daehyun. “Dude, stop moving before I bash your ing nose in.” Cam sneers at Daehyun who defiantly glares back at him. “Like I’ve said, I want to see Youngjae.” Even with his hands bound to his back, Daehyun still looked as though he was in charge, which certainly pissed Cam off to no end.

“Hey hey hey, relax Cam.” Youngjae hurriedly calms him down before Cam has the chance to smash his rifle into Daehyun’s skull. “You take over this .” Cam growls back at him while shooting Daehyun one last dirty look. A wave of relief washes over Daehyun as he sees Youngjae unharmed, but confusion mars his features when he notices Youngjae carrying a rifle and appearing to know the man threatening him.

“Youngjae, what’s going on? And how did you even get all these weapons?” wariness seeps into his tone as he eyes the rather familiar looking rifle. “We were stealing them from your warehouse.” Youngjae’s blatant tone and the hostile look in his eyes were nothing like the Youngjae from the past few days. “If you looked carefully enough you would have noticed missing items but I know you’re much too confident of your ‘guards’ to bother.” Daehyun finally registers what he had just said and gasps in dismay. Feeling extremely betrayed, he resists the urge to spew vulgarities at him, which really wouldn’t help at all. But it would make him feel better.

“So the past few days were an act?” The disappointment in Daehyun’s eyes sent a reluctant wave of guilt through Youngjae but he ignores it and continues staring back down at him.

“I’m sure you would have seen this coming.” Youngjae curses mentally at his surprisingly gentle tone. “I knew a rebellion was inevitable, but I never expected you to be a part of it. Not you, Youngjae.” The despondency in his tone stunned Youngjae; he didn’t know it would affect Daehyun this much. It would definitely be best if he didn’t know Youngjae came up with half of the plan.

“You should stop underestimating me or the other Pearyns for that matter.”

“I’ve never underestimated you. I just thought…you were different from the rest.” Unwelcomed displeasure soars through Youngjae’s body as he bites down on his tongue to refrain from lashing out unnecessarily.