A/N: I’m sure there are plenty of things I did wrong. I really did try! Also, warning for a scene that is kinda hot and heavy. They don’t have or anything, but they do make out.

The first thing he saw was the bright light.

As he blinked his eyes open, he began to see faces materialize around him. His eyes darted back and forth as he fought to think through the grogginess in his head.

He gasped when a boot landed next to his head.

“Hey, Minho, this one’s kind cute.” He heard a soft chuckle from right above him. Who he presumed to be Minho, a tall handsome man with slim and defined muscles, walked forward and hopped into the elevator holding him.

“Taemin, don’t start preying on him just yet. Let him breathe for a second.”

Taemin, the pretty doe-eyed boy standing over top him, sighed and stepped back.

Minho chuckled again and looked toward him. “So, what’s you’re name? I’m Minho and that kid over there-”

“Hey!”

“-is Taemin.”

He had to think a moment. What was his name? Fighting through the smoke clouding his head, he rasped out a soft, “J-Jonghyun. It’s Jonghyun.”

Jonghyun sat there, thinking that as the smoke subsided, he would remember more. But nothing was coming to mind. The only thing in his head was his name, chanted over and over like a new mantra. My name is Jonghyun, my name is Jonghyun, my name is Jonghyun.

He looked up at Minho confused.

“You don’t remember anything else, do you?” Minho had this sad look in his eyes when Jonghyun nodded. “Yeah, no one else does, either.”

Sensing something was wrong, Taemin took a break from sulking to hop up and drag Jonghyun out of the elevator. “Well, we’re going to introduce you to the rest of the guys! I’m sure you’ll like them!”

Jonghyun nodded and moved along, secretly praying that the guys would have at least a drop of water.

Stepping into the Glade, Jonghyun is at first amazed by its efficiency then alarmed that this is likely where he will be spending the rest of his days.

Not two seconds before he can finish admiring the area, a man with shoulder length black hair comes hopping up to him.

“I’m Jinki! Please don’t let this menace,” He starts, pointing at an innocent looking Taemin, “Corrupt you.” He offers his hand with a smile that shines brighter than the sun. Jonghyun, slightly concerned that Taemin didn’t even try to fight the title of ‘menace’, takes it, and is shocked by how firm his handshake is compared to how gentle his smile is.

Jonghyun can’t help but smile back. “I’m Jonghyun. It’s nice to meet you, Jinki.”

“Alright, alright. Enough of that. C’mon, he has to go meet Kibum,” Taemin says from somewhere behind them.

Jinki nods and drags Jonghyun further inside the living quarters, where there is another man – maybe even a boy, his age is ambiguous – sitting on the floor with his head down.

Jonghyun takes the step forward. “Hi, I’m Jonghyun.”

His picks his head up and Jonghyun’s stomach drops.

His eyes are feline, lips bowed, and nose sloped. All of that is contrasted by a sharp jawline and thick eyebrows. His tongue darts out to his lips and Jonghyun’s eyes follow the movement.

“Kibum.” Is all he offers. But it’s all Jonghyun needs for his heart to start fluttering inside his chest and damn, as far as he knows he’s only been alive for a few hours and he’s already got a crush.

Jonghyun just kind of stares at Kibum and his eyebrows furrow. Jonghyun doesn’t know much, but he can tell he’s freaking him out. He can’t stop staring though because he’s just. So. Pretty.

Jinki laughs awkwardly and steps in between them to break the tension. “Alright, enough of that, right? It’s about time to go to bed, anyway.” Jonghyun looks up and notices that the sky is dark. When did that happen? “Jonghyun, go with Minho. He’ll get your sleeping arrangements in order.”

Jonghyun does as follows, eyes falling back one last time to look at Kibum’s sullen posture.

“So, how does everything work around here?” Jonghyun tries to casually ask Kibum a few days later. “I mean, I’ve got the gist of it. But how did this all start?”

Kibum looks up from the shirt he’s washing. “I don’t know. Minho and Jinki have just always been here to take care of us. I appreciate them for that, but I’ve never asked for more information than they’ve given.”

Kibum punctuates what he says with a meaningful look to Jonghyun. “Yeah, yeah. Okay, I get it. I won’t pry. But I just don’t understand. Why haven’t we tried to escape?”

“It’s impossible.” Kibum deadpans. “The only reason we’re alive is because of Minho and Jinki being so strict and careful with us.”

Jonghyun looks at Kibum’s face for a minute. “Do you want to escape? To get out of here?”

Kibum’s eyes lock onto Jonghyun’s for a second, before he turns them back to the shirt he’s washing. “Like I said, it’s impossible. Don’t you have potatoes to harvest?”

Jonghyun sighs and walks away.

Later that night, he hears Kibum quietly crying to himself. He can’t help but wonder if it’s because of what he said.

Despite the somewhat bad foot that they got off on, Jonghyun and Kibum continue to talk and eventually become very close friends.

Meanwhile, Jonghyun’s crush only grows. At first, he could control himself. His eyes would wander to Kibum’s lips sometimes when he talked, but he could bring them back up within milliseconds. Now, all he could do was stare at Kibum’s lips. And his eyes. And his legs, especially when he was bending over to pick up the crops.

It made him feel like a creep, especially since he knew Kibum saw the friendship as being innocent. If only Kibum could see the things that Jonghyun thought. The mere idea made him shudder in shame.

“-hyun? Jonghyun? Hello, earth to Jonghyun?” Jonghyun tilted his head back to see Kibum leaning over him, his figure illuminated by the sun. “Are you okay?”

Jonghyun sat up and wiped the dirt off the back of his legs. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

Kibum looked skeptical, but sighed and let it go. “Okay, because Jinki says he needs you.” Jonghyun nodded and began to walk get up, longing for just a few more moments with Kibum.

“Jonghyun.” Jinki’s face was uncharacteristically somber, his voice hard and cold.

Jonghyun never thought he could be afraid of Jinki, but boy in this moment were his knees shaking. “Yes, Jinki?” He would be ashamed of the way his voice shook later. Right now he was too focused on not pissing himself.

“This maze… I’m sure you’ve figured out by now that this is a death trap. One way in, one way out.” Jonghyun nods and gulps.

“When you have a situation like this, it’s fairly common for people to seek comfort with one another. Sometimes, though, that doesn’t quite work out. It’s unfortunate, but it happens.” Jonghyun nodded again.

“You know, more than five people have been in this maze and stayed in the Glade. But there are only five here now. And there is only one way out. I think you get what I’m implying.”

Oh yeah did Jonghyun know what he was implying. He just didn’t understand why he was implying it, as his crush was unrequited. Not voicing this, he just nodded again.

“Good. Just know, when it comes to you and Kibum, I will pick Kibum every time. Do you understand?”

Jonghyun nodded again.

“Good boy. Now go finish washing those clothes.”

Jonghyun has never run so fast in his entire life.

Three nights later, Kibum wakes Jonghyun up in the middle of the night and grabs his hands. He drags him outside of their sleeping quarters, and presses a soft kiss to his lips underneath the moonlight.

They both have morning breath and Kibum is sobbing into the kiss but it’s perfect. It’s exactly what Jonghyun wanted and he can’t help stealing more. Going from soft pecks to lip biting moans until eventually he knows he has to stop or else he won’t be able to anymore.

When Kibum sleeps in the next day, Minho doesn’t fight him. Taemin doesn’t complain, and Jinki slides into his chores like he does it every day. Jonghyun wonders if he’s the only one who didn’t see this coming.

Every night, Kibum sneaks into Jonghyun’s bed to press kisses all over his face. He kisses his cheeks, his forehead, his nose, his chin, and eventually his mouth. Kibum’s lips are always so gentle, such a harsh contrast to his biting personality.

It’s only when Jonghyun slips his tongue into Kibum’s mouth that Kibum reciprocates, needy and heady. Kissing Kibum in that way, in such a filthy way, is as natural to him as breathing air. Rolling on top of Kibum and wanting to hear him moan, wanting to feel him squirm underneath him is beautiful to Jonghyun in ways he can’t quite understand.

What Jonghyun does understand though is that he needs Kibum, and that now that he’s had a taste, he will never be satisfied.

Eventually, they start to talk.

Jonghyun and Kibum have always talked to each other. They’ve always been friends. But it was never like this. Kibum never talked to Jonghyun about his fears, about what he imagines his old life to be.

But something changed and Kibum confesses everything to Jonghyun. While getting out has always been in the peripheral of Jonghyun’s brain, it’s on the forefront of Kibum’s.

I want to get out.

Every single night, Kibum says the same thing over and over. I want to get out. I want to find my family, I want to introduce you guys, my makeshift family, to them. I want to start another family with you. I love you so much. I want better for us.

Jonghyun didn’t even realize how sad Kibum was. It breaks his heart to realize that all Kibum wants is the one thing that Jonghyun is sure he can’t give him. Freedom.

“Kibum isn’t happy.”

Jonghyun sighs when he hears these words come out of Minho’s mouth.

“I know,” is all he plans on saying in return, but he can’t help it and pours his heart out to Minho. “I know and it tear me apart. All I want is for him to be happy. All I want is for us to all be happy, together. Kibum isn’t the only one who feels trapped. I want to find a way out, not just for him but for us. I want to get out. We need to get out. We can’t survive like this forever.”

Minho sighs. “I know.”

Jonghyun collapses next to him.

“I just don’t know what to do.”

Minho sighs again and wraps his arms around Jonghyun’s shoulders.

“Me either.”

Weeks go by of Kibum falling asleep into Jonghyun’s chest, listening to him murmur sweet nothings of freedom and a life beyond the maze. Petting Kibum’s soft hair, he tells him about how they’ll adopt a kid, how they’ll move next door to Jinki and act like they don’t like it but secretly love having him so close. They talk about how Jinki’s wife will be filled with just as much sunshine.

They talk about how Minho will be a professional athlete or model, or about how Taemin will be the one who never gets married or has kids and instead just has a bunch of dogs that he spends all day spoiling.

They talk about love and life and happiness. They talk about the future that they want, ignoring the future they they’re going to have.

Until one day Jonghyun gets sick of it. He get sick of hoping for something better for Kibum.

So Jonghyun decides to go to the only person he knows that is mischievous enough to actually try to help him and go against and order from Jinki and Minho.

Stepping up to Taemin, with his hair falling into his face, Jonghyun sighs and declares, “I want to get out of here. We need to figure a way out of here.”

Taemin looks up, and leers at Jonghyun. “What’s wrong, lover boy? You aren’t happy here anymore?”

Jonghyun growls. “You know that’s not why.”

Taemin cackles. “Luckily, I like getting into a little bit of trouble. C’mon, I already have a few theories brainstormed that I’d like you to check out.”

Jonghyun, wondering just what trouble he’s gotten himself into, signs his own fate, following Taemin and praying that they can figure this out together.

A/N: I really wish I could have developed the world more, and made the relationship a little less spontaneous, but that would have taken A LOT of words and probably a chaptered fic which I, unfortunately, did not have time for. I hope you enjoy this, anyway!