(27) COUP D'ETAT

‘I have a bad feeling about this...’

Kris sighed for the nth time that day. Xiumin seemed fine, interacting with the other officers as if they weren’t about to find out about the faction’s biggest military secrets.

“Don’t think, Kris. That head of yours just gets you into trouble.”

Xiumin had appeared out of what seemed to be nowhere, blowing air into Kris’ ear as he squealed from the coldness.

He growled and pushed the latter away with a small smile while Xiumin pulled him in for a noogie, slapping the back of his head playfully before letting him go. It was obvious that something was wrong with Kris, and Xiumin could see it so much that he needed to pull him into the next room over to talk to him in case he decided to freak out in front of the entire cafeteria.

“You need to calm down.” Xiumin huffed.

Kris groaned and ran his fingers through his hair, slightly tugging on the roots in order to get ahold of his anxiety. His heart wouldn’t calm down and no matter what Xiumin was saying didn’t process properly since he was so agitated. Body slightly off balance, he tried keeping his feet firmly planted on the floor until he was thrown back onto a nearby chair, collapsing and feeling his legs turn to jelly at the sudden movement.

Pressing a palm to Kris’ forehead, he felt a little warm under his touch. “Out of all the times to get sick, you choose now? Really?”

“I’m fine.” Kris mumbled, silently enjoying the subtle chill on his face. “I’m just, a little anxious.”

“More like a lot.”

Xiumin peered outside the room and was glad to see nobody roaming the halls, motioning for Kris to follow behind him as he stepped out. He walked normally, though he couldn’t say the same for Kris. His long legs wobbled unnecessarily and Xiumin had to pretend that he didn’t see anything.

“Kris! Xiumin!”

The loud voice made them both stop in their tracks, turning 180 degrees around before giving a firm salute. Two males dressed in identical uniforms as their own walked up to them, and Kris already felt himself going weak in the knees at their presence.

“Get your partner a bed to rest. A weak soldier would be of no use to us if his legs won’t move at top shape.” His eyes flashed red for a second, deep scarlet hue reflecting off of a small portion of his high cheek bones.

The other nodded his head and turned about face, shoulders slightly bumping as the sound of metal hitting metal rang through the air. They both turned away from Xiumin and Kris before leaving the premises.

“Right away, sir!” Xiumin proceeded to hook his arm around Kris’ waist and pull him in the opposite direction, giving another short bow and salute to the two men.

It had taken Xiumin a while to lug Kris back to his room, and by the time he had made it, his uniform was starting to collect a bit of sweat at the collar and armpit area. “You could’ve at least tried to walk and help me out!”

“S-Sorry... “ Kris muttered, sitting down on Xiumin’s bed.

Those two men were the only types of people Kris refused to be near. He hated the way their eyes flickered from brown to red, then back to brown again. It was unnatural. He had told Xiumin about it as the latter aired out his sweaty uniform, the boy giving him a stupid look before turning back around to get another uniform out from the closet.

“Our eyes change color too, if you didn’t realize.”

Kris shook his head and watched as Xiumin demonstrated, pupils brightening into a sky blue color before dissipating back to its natural warm brown. “No, for them it’s different… It’s too weird…”

Taking a seat next to Kris, Xiumin shoved him aside before laying down completely across the mattress. “They’re androids, what do you expect?”

Kris has no immediate reply. Instead, he leans back into the wall and stare around at the room he once found familiar. After the memories had come back, this room that once seemed to fit suddenly felt different. It felt wrong and out of place, bright white furniture puzzled into the fairly large room meant for two. Kris’ bed is on the further side of the room, elevated by two steps and a stage that rises above the lower floor. It’s complete with red, white, and silver chairs, identity locked wall compartments, and a fitted desk that occupies the corner snugly. Xiumin’s side looks entirely identical to it as well, despite the change in tidiness and the different curves in the walls.

Those two men they had run into earlier were no normal pair of robots. In fact, they were once too human. Taken under the wing of the best engineers and scientists in the country, their bodies were reconstructed into super beings. Their skin turned from its rubber like stretchiness to a material that still felt like skin, but had the strength of a thousand heavy tanks. They were made into the faction’s greatest weapons, and the three of them made up some of the highest ranking officers in the military, which was why Kris and Xiumin couldn’t as so much as touch their rank.

Kris didn’t understand why it made such a loud clanking noise if it was like skin, or even the real reason behind becoming a human experiment for something so life changing.

Everything about them were changed. It was if they were turned into dolls, their red beady eyes watching him in the halls whenever he passed by as if it were completely normal for eyes to flash red.

He and his brothers were just a special case.

“When you think about it, we’re even weirder than them. Since robots make sense, but kids with super powers? And why do our eyes have to change colors anyways?” Xiumin huffed, voicing his opinion while Kris wondered the same thing except the part about the cyborgs being more normal than they were. At least they had emotions, and souls.

Xiumin slapped him hard on his back before sitting back up and opening the door back outside, glaring at Kris to hurry up before he had held up the entire mission. They both walked down the halls and traveled up a couple of elevators on the way. Once reaching the far west end of the facility, Xiumin began to walk quicker on his feet, picking up the pace as the amount of people dwindled down to zero.

They both jogged up to the last room at the end of the hall, Xiumin fishing out a small keycard from his pocket before letting it scan over the lock. The card wasn’t his of course and he had to ‘borrow’ it from their section leader for a little while. It clicked open and the door slid to the side, allowing them both to step into the room painted all white. There in the center of the room was a single projector pointed at the wall.

It took a while to start up to Kris’ dismay, but once they had gotten it going, the array of windows had popped up right in front of them. Holographic screens weren’t something they were used to, especially since they didn’t have regular computers back when they were kids. Luckily Xiumin had been forced to take a course under technological programming for the faction’s power plants, giving him the upper hand when it came to working the screens.

He swiped a hand across the air and hoped that he wouldn’t overdo anything too much, startling himself by the amount of information that had collected in front of them. There were blueprints for atomic weapons and even some designs for new buildings they were planning on creating, a hexagonal prison catching Xiumin’s eye though he didn’t know what it would be used for.

There was a small tab open under all of the junk mail and flyers for the events, and Xiumin dug through each and every bit of wasted money plans to find a whole window open about Chanyeol. The two of them watched as he blew up the antique shop with Baekhyun still in it, the sight of the explosion tearing their hearts apart. Both of them knew how much that kind of thing would affect them, especially because of what happened in the past.

“This is Chanyeol, Kai, Sehun," he let out, a bit startled by the death rate, "and… Lay?”

Xiumin checked the files once, then twice, looking everything over until he was sure that the Chinese male was being shone on the screen. With the flick of his wrist, more profiles came out and he was able to see Suho, Chen and Luhan with little notes written about them. Each had pictures that looked like someone had professionally checked them but they knew they wouldn't have consented to this since none of them had chips, not even Kris and Xiumin.

"Oh ..." Kris seemed to have gotten ahold of his self control and stepped forward to pull out two more profiles, showing their pictures and things written about them that they didn't even know themselves. Bad habits, sleep schedules, but no powers thank god.

In fact, none of the undiscovered members had their powers written down.

"There!"

Kris pointed towards the very top corner of the screen and sure enough, a picture of Tao was there, but this picture was very old. It had to be taken around the time when they were kids, sometime after Tao had sent them away. He was almost unrecognizable. The rings going around his eyes covered the entire area up until his brow bone, dark circle looking like someone had punched him in the eyes.

There was a small code required in order to look through the file and Xiumin practically threw the keycard towards the scanner, growing desperate since they've finally found some sort of clue. Under his profile were little snippets of tests that were done on him, the countless amounts of blood being taken and strange names of chemicals that were injected into him.

“Tao, he.... Where is he?” Kris breathed out, unaware that Xiumin was still reading through the file.

Xiumin scoffed and took a step back from the screens, completely baffled by what they saw.

“He’s been under our noses this entire time, I can’t believe this.”

Not understanding what he meant, Kris grabbed his shoulder and pulled him aside to get a better look at the map. “He’s… In faction F?”

Closing all of the files and shutting down the projector, Xiumin dragged Kris back as alarms began to sound.

“Not in it. Under it.”

--

“What’s taking them so long?” Sehun muttered. They had relocated back to faction F and were relaxing in their “jail cell” while the others waited at the house. It would’ve gotten suspicious if they had been gone for too long so they parted ways for now.

Kai teleported in and Sehun looked at him anticipatedly, shoulders slumping down when he shook his head. “They said they’d tell me when and I can’t keep going back every two minutes. I almost gave hyung a heart attack…”

Sehun rolled his eyes, making his way to the next corner where Chanyeol sulked on his bed. He hung his head down, much less hyper and a lot more quiet.

Footsteps approached with light taps and scrapes, and Chanyeol immediately shrunk down on the farther end of the bed. Sehun puts his hand on his shoulder and leans in a bit, giving a calming squeeze.

“Everything will be fine,” he says softly. “...Chanyeol, please don’t worry so much. We can get out of here again, soon.”

In actuality, Chanyeol had been questioned and doused again the moment they stepped foot back into their cells. The guards and the main warden were especially infuriated. In fact, they bickered on and on about nearly losing their jobs because faction A had to deal with the three who escaped, though it was not enough. They were scolded because they weren’t even supposed to be outside their cells, more so outside of the faction in general.

Kai doesn’t give as calm looks as Sehun does, though. If anything, he looks troubled as well. He places his pointer finger on his lower lip, nudging it a bit anxiously.

“I wouldn’t put my guard down, though.” He says, leaning against one fold-up desk that connects to the wall. Sehun looks up as Kai leans forward, giving a small whisper.

“Did you hear?” He asks.

Sehun shows interest with the arch of his eyebrow. “Hear what?”

Kai looks around, specifically gazing towards the bars of the cell to check for any guards. The one present doesn’t seem much interested luckily, as his hat tips from the droop of his head. Kai nods. “...They’re growing suspicious,” He says, a bit louder now. “They’re planning to separate us three because they know we’re in on something. And…”

His next words are hushed. “... There’s going to be a mass screening today. One huge gathering per faction, though I think faction D will have two. They’re checking for chips.”

Chanyeol gulps. “But, what happens if they find out we don’t have any?”

Unfortunately, Kai shakes his head. “I don’t know. But I think there can be three options: One, they will punish the others and send them here; Two, they will be questioned and experimented on, where they will find out how to fuse the chips into our nerves without failing our brain system; Three…”

All of them know the last option, and it isn’t one that is ideal, but then again, none of them were. Chanyeol pictured some of the others locked in the dousing room as jets of water knocked them unconscious, the mere thought throwing him off the bed and over to Sehun.

“How do they pull off a mass screening if it involves all of the factions? Wouldn’t people get suspicious too?”

It didn’t seem possible to the other two boys, but they didn’t know what to expect with the government.

A few hours later they were all pulled out from their cells and taken through a long tunnel, rest of the prisoners in shackles and handcuffs as they muttered about how unfair it was that the three boys didn’t require any sort of restraint.

Sehun rolled his eyes, whipping out a bit of air in the tunnel before they had finally realized how pointless it would be. He made sure to stick close to Kai and Chanyeol in case something happened and they needed to teleport out of there as quickly as possible. By the time they had reached the end of the tunnel, they had come out of a hole somewhere inside a facility. The walls were painted all white and the uniforms sported the same dreary color, supporting the idea that they were in faction A.

“Who would’ve known that there was a tunnel connecting the place.” Sehun whistled, momentarily allowing himself to become distracted to take a look around the facility.

The white on white everything hurt Chanyeol’s eyes. He refused to open his eyes and went wherever Kai led him, the latter observing every nook and cranny in case he needed to teleport around if a fight broke out.

“Ninety four, eighty eight and sixty one! Pull into this room and follow orders. Wait until further instruction thereafter.” The man giving them instructions was none other than the same man that almost threw an electric rod at Sehun’s head back when Chanyeol had first arrived.

The boys all looked at one another and went into the room as ordered, running into a few familiar faces and a few not so familiar ones. Xiumin and Kris were among the recognizable bunch and Chanyeol had to resist breaking down and crying at the sight of someone less intimidating in such a place.

Xiumin moved to the side and was assigned to Chanyeol to his individual cell while likewise, Kris had been chosen to watch Sehun. Kai was to be placed under another man’s guard, but after seeing the red lights flashing in his eyes, Kai gave a quick apology and teleported out of there, leaving the android still and confused by his sudden disappearance.

“Damn it!” The lanky supervisor screamed, looking back at Sehun who just shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly. “It’s always one or the other with you two insolent brats!”  

“Sorry you do such a poor job at watching over us sir.”

Kris had to stifle a laugh at that and by almost blowing his cover, did he get upset at Sehun, shoving him a little too roughly into the cell. As he began to shut the door, he made sure that nobody was listening before whispering through the crack.

“We found Tao and we’re going to meet up later tonight. Don’t make a scene and keep yourself in check.”

His body language had stayed hunched over, but judging by the way his hands curled into fists, Kris figured he was more or less pumped now that they had a clue about Tao’s whereabouts. In the next cell over, Xiumin was standing inside with Chanyeol as he placed handcuffs around the boy’s wrists. There was no need since Sehun and Kai both didn’t have any, but he had to make it look at least somewhat realistic that he was taking his job seriously. Plus, this gave him a long enough time to calm the boy down.

“We know where Tao is, so just sit tight and breath, okay? In and out, just like this.” Xiumin demonstrated by taking a deep breath through his nose and exhaling out from his mou