“Focus,” Yunho all but ordered as they swiftly pulled off their clothing and swapped in the standard blue uniform of the hired security force. Yunho was nearly overwhelmed himself, however he thought it was nothing compared to the way Zhou Mi looked.

Maybe it would have been better to bring Leeteuk.

Zhou Mi had a unique set of skills that were absolutely essential to the job, and if they were backed into a corner he was a power house who could have Yunho’s back and not panic. But having him here with Kyuhyun?

Yunho understood. He wasn’t as callous as Zhou Mi must have thought him. Kyuhyun was precious to Yunho too. But Kyuhyun wasn’t a distraction to Yunho, not like he obviously was to Zhou Mi.

“I am,” Zhou Mi said, doing up the buttons on the front of his uniform.

“You don’t look it,” Yunho said.

He could practically taste victory. It was so close it was tangible, and no one, not even Zhou Mi, was going to ruin it for him.

“I am,” Zhou Mi said once more, and his fingers stalled. “I’m worried about him, Yunho, but that worry won’t stop me from doing this. Don’t doubt me. Okay?”

Yunho nodded in return. He’d never doubted Zhou Mi before, and now wasn’t the time to start.

It was just … this was the Eye they were talking about. And this was by far the closest Yunho had ever been to it. It was honestly the closest he’d ever dreamed of getting.

And the Eye meant everything to him.

It was his hope, and his greatest desire, that obtaining the Eye would put him one step closer to unlocking his past. With the Eye there was a chance, a real chance, that he’d be able to find out where he’d come from, and who his parents had been. He might even be able to find them, if they were still alive, and ask them why they’d given him up, why they’d tattooed him, and what it all meant.

The rumor about the Eye, or maybe just the story that drunk men told each other in bars, was that the Eye was one part of a compass. And the compass, when complete, was supposed to lead to the Vault, where countless treasures of Earth that was were stored. There’d be enough there to set a man for life, Yunho had been interested in the Eye for that reason.

He also had a sinking suspicion, one that he was hedging everything on, that the circular disk he wore around his neck, hidden beneath layers of clothing, that had been with him since before he could recall his name, was the second piece of the compass. The Eye, with any luck, would fit in perfectly, and it would point the way.

In moments of optimism, Yunho could see himself in a year’s time having all the answers to his questions and his crew having all the credits they could ever want. It was a win-win.

“You’re the one who looks nervous,” Zhou Mi said, reaching over to flick a button.

Yunho looked down and realized he’d slotted the wrong button in the wrong hol3. “I’m human, aren’t I?”

Zhou Mi’s eyebrows lifted. “Sometimes I wonder. Yunho, you have to know, you’ve always seemed larger than life to all of us. It’s why we follow you from one crazy scheme to the next. “

“I thought it was because of my winning smile,” Yunho teased.

“It’s your sparkling personality,” Zhou Mi corrected. He cleared his throat just after that and said, “Timing is going to be everything here. We need five minutes to get back to the room and get our gear, and another five to reach the observation area. If we’re ahead of Kyuhyun or behind him in any severe way, things are going to go badly for us.”

“We told him fifteen to twenty minutes,” Yunho said. “He’ll know that’s his window.”

“Okay,” Zhou Mi said, squaring his shoulders. “Let’s do this.”

They were able to hide their guns fairly easily under their uniforms, though the canisters of gas were slightly more difficult and required a lot of finagling on their part to remain hidden.

By the time they reached the observation room, the uniforms working like a charm, it was nearly packed to the brim with party goers. And there, at the center of it all, was the red gem that haunted Yunho year after year. It was sitting exactly where they’d hoped it would be from the start.

“He did it,” Yunho said, in absolutely awe of Kyuhyun. “He really got Choi to part with it.”

“Of course he did,” Zhou Mi said a bit boastfully.

Kyuhyun had come a long way.

When Yunho had first met him, he’d absolutely known that Kyuhyun was the pilot for him. There was no arguing with the kind of intuition a pilot had to have, and Kyuhyun could hear the ship talking to him as if there were actually works spoken. That was something Yunho couldn’t bear to pass up, even if the necessary pilot had come with a bad attitude.

Though in Kyuhyun’s defense, Yunho did think it was important to note that Kyuhyun had only been a child. He’d been fifteen. At fifteen, it had almost been expected that he’d be a little who talked too much, ate too much, caused trouble no matter where he went and annoyed Yunho to death.

There’d always been something a little endearing about Kyuhyun, a diamond in the rough feeling, but it had been hard to imagine back then, when they’d first flown together, that Kyuhyun would be the person he was now.

Yunho almost felt like a proud parent.

“What’s the status of the security system?” Yunho asked under his breath.

In a trick that was almost a slight of hand, Zhou Mi produced a slim, nearly invisible data pad from his pocket in which code was flying across at an alarming rate. It was gibberish to Yunho, but it must had made absolute sense to Zhou Mi who stared at it intensely.

“We’re still on a feedback loop,” Zhou Mi said, squinting a little. “But the security system’s AI seems suspicious. It won’t be long before it goes looking for my tampering. We probably have around ten minutes to get this done, then we’re going to be visible to anyone who’s watching a monitor.”

Yunho tapped the gas canister in his pocket. It was time to move. If they didn’t succeed in extracting the Eye before the cameras reverted, there’d be no point in doing anything.

“Ready?”

Zhou Mi leveled up the black box the Eye was expected to fit into. “Ready. Toss the canister.”

Feeling a bit too much jubilation for something that could potentially get them killed, Yunho flipped the pin on the first canister and tossed it directly into the room. He and Zhou Mi ducked away as it exploded, showing the room with sleeping gas which leaked quickly out into the hallway and took out any of the remaining security force members.

“Thirty more seconds,” Yunho said, eyes on the wristwatch he wore. “Just to be safe.”

With the security task force down, and the camera overlooking them thanks to Zhou Mi’s tampering, it was essentially a smash and grab job. At least for the other jewels on display. As Yunho worked on delicately extracting the Eye from its wired case, the fake ready and waiting to be swapped in, Zhou Mi did his best to make it look like they were inexperienced thieves, grabbing at anything shinny or potentially worth credits.

The watch that Yunho wore beeped at him just as the real Eye was sliding into the box, and the fake Eye was sliding back into the display case.

“That’s it,” Zhou Mi said, giving Yunho a firm nudge to the shoulder. “We have to get to the garbage shoot. If we miss our window we can’t drop the Eye safely.”

Because of the size of the estate, and increased garbage from the event, Yunho and Zhou Mi had worked out that trash was rotated every twenty minutes. And depending on which rotation cycle they were in, it made all the difference as to where the Eye would end up. Some of the garbage shoots were more accessible than others, and some rotation drops went straight to the incinerator.

“Then let’s go,” Yunho said, and they were tearing off to the garbage shoot they’d specifically chosen for a later retrieval

Though Yunho did his best not to show it, it was a hard thing to head directly to the garbage shoot and drop the Eye, along with the rest of the jewels, down it. Yunho still remembered so clearly being a young boy, dreaming about the day he’d have his hands on the Eye, and exactly what he’d do with it. Well, now he had the Eye, but there wasn’t even time to stop and admire it. There wasn’t time to even process the fact that it was his. He had to let it go before he could relish in the victory. He had to be patient.

“You’ll see it again soon,” Zhou Mi laughed out as they made the drop, almost as if he were reading Yunho’s mind.

“I know,” Yunho said a bit snappishly then added more kindly, “It’s just hard. I’ve dreamed about it for so long. To just drop it like garbage? It hurts.”

“Well, I’m sure all the credits we’re going to make off it will sooth that pain,” Zhou Mi said, and Yunho decided in that very moment that the next chance he got, when the crew were all safe and sound, back on the ship, he was going to tell them everything. They were more than just a crew he flew with. They were family, and they deserved to know why the Eye meant so much to him. It wasn’t fair and only Changmin got to carry the burden of knowledge.

The very next thing they had to do was swap out their uniforms for the clothing they’d been wearing before. Very shortly Siwon would be getting the kiss of his life from Kyuhyun, and the both the party goers and security guards in the viewing area would wake. There’d be mass confusion, panic, and surely anger on Choi’s part. Yunho and Zhou Mi had to look as if they’d never left the ballroom.

“I can’t,” Zhou Mi said, the second they were sliding into place at the back of the ballroom, the gala carrying on as if nothing had happened, “believe that went as flawlessly as it did.”

“You have to have faith,” Yunho teased. His heart was still beating frantically in his chest, and he was too caught up in thinking about Kyuhyun and Choi, the Eye, and if they’d really be able to get back to the ship without a hiccup of any kind.

“Faith I have,” Zhou Mi said, and it was true that he was likely the most devout of the crew. Changmin hardly counted, especially since he’d been raised by the Companion Guild to be heavily steeped in the traditions of the old gods. Zhou Mi seemed pious and spiritual of his own desire. Yunho kind of respected him for it, but also thought it was a mystery how someone could have faith in the world they lived in. “It’s the luck that usually eludes us.”

It was minutes more before Yunho began to feel as if something was wrong. The worst kind of something.

“He should be done by now,” Zhou Mi said, voicing the fear that Yunho had luring around in his mind at the moment. “It’s been over twenty minutes.”

It had been exactly twenty-two minutes, and this wasn’t something Kyuhyun would have misjudged. This wasn’t something he would have gotten distracted during.

“Something is wrong,” Yunho said, foot tapping nervously.

Zhou Mi turned to Yunho and said, “I’m going to get him.”

“Mi!” Yunho hissed, but Zhou Mi had a good deal of a head start on him, darting and weaving through the crowd, heading directly towards the double doors that Choi and Kyuhyun had disappeared through.

“Don’t try and stop me,” Zhou Mi said when Yunho caught up with him.

“Then don’t act rashly,” Yunho huffed out. He was certainly feeling just as unsettled as Zhou Mi was, but they’d already pulled off the most difficult portion of the plan. Yunho wasn’t about to let Zhou Mi ruin everything at the very end.

They had minutes, precious minutes, until the bodies they’d left sleeping were discovered, and then all hell would break loose.

“We have to be smart about this,” Yunho said, wrenching Zhou Mi around hard when they were in the hallway, something that afforded them just the tiniest bit more privacy. “This can’t be a mountain we try to storm stupidly.”

Looking flushed in the fact, Zhou Mi demanded, “Then what do we do? If anything, he should have beaten us here. The fact that we’re still waiting for him …”

Yunho slicked a hand through his hair and said, “You still have the estate blueprints?”

Zhou Mi quickly pulled the small data screen from his pocket and drew up the blueprints. “Of course. I was worried that I might get turned around down here.”

Yunho swiped the device from him and said, “Okay, I think it’s safe to say that if Kyuhyun can’t come to us, we have to go to him.”

Zhou Mi tapped his thigh where Yunho knew his pistol was concealed.

“Now,” Yunho said, doing his best to ignore the fact that if Zhou Mi got within shooting distance of Choi, they were very likely to have an incident on their hands. “Changmin used to tell me that on average a Companion will provide services to their client in a comfortable location of their choice. But considering Kyuhyun likely didn’t have that option, our best guess should be that he allowed Choi to take him towards the residential area of this estate. I think we need to find Choi’s personal rooms. That’s where we have the best chance of finding Kyuhyun. Agreed?”

Zhou Mi’s head bowed next to Yunho as they scrolled through the estate blueprints.

“Here,” Zhou Mi said, finger stopping on a page of the schematics Changmin had provided them from. “And getting there from here shouldn’t be too difficult.”

They ran.

Because Yunho was trying his best to keep calm, but if anything happened to Kyuhyun after Yunho let him take Changmin’s place, it was going to be a blow neither of them could recover from. Hell, Yunho didn’t think any of the crew would be. They’d barely survived losing Joon. Losing Kyuhyun too, would break them.

If Zhou Mi didn’t break Yunho first.

The residential part of the estate, where the private quarters were kept, was a twist of turns and hallways all looking the same. More than once they had to stop and consult the blue prints, and Yunho’s heart was absolutely aching in his chest with how hard it was beating by the time they were sure they were on the right track.

“Hey!” a voice called out, startling them. “You can’t be back here.”

Zhou Mi ground out, “This is not a problem we need, Captain,” as a young security officer jogged towards them.

“This is a restricted area,” the man told them, and he looked young. Very young. Yunho imagined he wasn’t much older than Kyuhyun was.

“You know, we don’t plan on staying long,” Yunho said, throwing an elbow up at him.

The man collapsed to the ground out cold in a matter of seconds and Yunho watched Zhou Mi’s fingers curl away from the pistol at his side.

Never again, he decided. Never again would he let significant others on jobs together.

“Come on,” Zhou Mi said, not phased. “We’re almost there.”

They paused just outside Choi’s door, and Yunho’s pulled his own pistol free finally. The hammer was cocked back and he met Zhou Mi’s gaze. “Do not get trigger happy,” Yunho warned him, more afraid that a firefight of any kind could get Kyuhyun shot on accident than anything else. “Or I will leave your on this planet and let you deal with the consequences.”

It was an empty threat … mostly … but it was enough to earn a deep, understanding nod from Zhou Mi.

From the other side of the doors they could hear Choi’s voice harsh in tone, severe in words, “You must think I’m an absolute fool. But I’m not as stupid as you seemed to hope I was.”

Yunho pushed through the doors immediately at the words. There was no doubt in his mind that Kyuhyun’s cover had been blown.

Pistol up and at the ready, Yunho tensed at the situation that awaited them.

“Come to join our little party?” Choi demanded, his fingers twisted up in anger and something even more dangerous.

He had Kyuhyun’s back pressed to his chest, a heavy arm around his neck in a way that was cutting off air if the way Kyuhyun was struggling meant anything. And to Kyuhyun’s side a short, inconspicuous knife was pressed. The kind that was usually concealed in a boot or up a sleeve.

“Let him go,” Yunho barked out. Kyuhyun’s eyes were wide with fear as he strained in Choi’s hold, face red as he gasped for air.

“Go?” Choi demanded, head cocking as if they hadn’t been speaking the same language. “You come into my home, try to pull a fast one on me, and you think I’m just going to let the little mouse I’ve got caught go?”

“If you don’t,” Zhou Mi said evenly from next to Yunho, his own pistol up, “I’ll blow your head off. And trust me, I’m a very good shot. I won’t hit Kyuhyun.”

On the floor Yunho could just make out the small container of gloss that Kyuhyun had been given by Changmin for the kiss with Choi. It was open and clearly looked used, but then why was Choi on his feet and not in the bathroom? Had Kyuhyun not used enough? What had happened?

Choi caught his eye and said, “You can’t honestly believe that a man of my position and wealth wouldn’t be the target of thieves of all kind. You’re not the first to try a Goodnight Kiss on me, in an attempt to rob me. But you’re going to be the last.” He tightened his grip, Kyuhyun gave a cry of pain, and Yunho honestly wasn’t sure how Zhou Mi hadn’t started firing right away.

“Let him go,” Yunho said again. “No one has to get shot.”

“On the contrary,” Choi shrugged.

Yunho knew how the whole situation would play out if something didn’t change immediately. Zhou Mi would shoot Choi, and their victory would be short lived because the nearby security forces prowling the hallways would be drawn in by the sound. They’d see Choi’s body, and there’d be three more joining his in cooling.

“Where did you find this one?” Choi asked, his nose pressing into Kyuhyun’s hairline. He remarked, “It’s obvious that he’s not a Companion, but he played the role spectacularly. And isn’t he uniquely and sublimely attractive? Did you pick him up at a brothel? One where they keep the pretty boys?”

Zhou Mi let out a low growl.

“Oh!” Choi looked absolutely delighted. “Is this one yours?”

“He’s none of your business,” Zhou Mi ground out.

Choi delighted in pressing Kyuhyun even more fully against himself. “He was my business the moment you attempted to pass him off as a Companion.”

Yunho wanted to tell Zhou Mi to calm himself. He wanted to shake Zhou Mi to his senses and remind him that Choi was only trying to get a rise out of them. The threat was very real to Kyuhyun’s life, but at the moment, Choi was only playing with them.

Once more Yunho’s eyes flickered to the gloss on the floor. “How’d you know?”

“That your boy here was trying to pull a fast one?” Choi laughed. “I don’t know what kind of backwater Rim trash you are, but here in the Core, the latest protection against Goodnight Kisses is available for a select clientele.”

Changmin couldn’t have known. There’s no way he wouldn’t have told them that there was a chance Choi had a counter measure to the kiss. No, Changmin was surely in the dark as much as they were.

“And,” Choi continued, not at all bothered by how Kyuhyun was coughing between his gasps for air, “that’s really the only thing that gave him away--the attempt to put me down. He absolutely looks the part in every way. He said all the right things, and up until just now, I wasn’t suspicious in the least bit. Actually,” Choi laughed, “I was smitten. Imagine me having to stand here and tell you that I was making all these plans to offer Kyuhyun a long term contract of service, if only to keep him by my side.”

“So we’re at a stalemate,” Yunho said.

“Maybe,” Choi replied.

Zhou Mi said, “It doesn’t have to be. But if you hurt him …”

Eyes narrowing, Choi demanded, “I want to know what the hell you’re doing here. Why did you come to my gala? Why did you try to pass this boy off as a Companion?”

Yunho couldn’t stop his eyes from widening, or from the shocked, almost disbelieving look h sent Zhou Mi. There was no way. There was absolutely no way.

Choi ….

The look that Zhou Mi returned to Yunho said everything.

They were both extremely baffled, because it seemed as if Choi knew nothing of why they were there, or what they’d done. It didn’t seem possible, but for all intents and purposes, Choi seemed confused as to what their plan was.

“We …” Yunho said, and honestly wasn’t sure how to respond. They couldn’t come outright and say that they’d stolen from Choi, but neither was it something that could be hidden now. Choi would suspect them immediately when the first report came in of theft, and it was looking like a shootout was their only way off the planet--if that was even possible.

They’d be ID’d, too. It was Yunho’s one regret. There was no way Choi wouldn’t eventually identify them and alert the Alliance. That would mean they’d have to run to the Rim and lay low for a while, maybe even a long time. Changmin would be disgraced, but Yunho had seen the real love on Minho’s face at their parting. The wedding would still happen---Yunho just wouldn’t be there to see it. If fact, it might be years and years before he even got to consider seeing Changmin again.

“I want to propose a deal,” Zhou Mi said, gun lowering as he moved closer. “And this is something you’re going to want to hear.”

Yunho tried not to look at how Kyuhyun’s face was starting to go slack, his eyes closing as he lost the fight for air.

“Deal?” Choi asked, and he was caught off guard just enough that Kyuhyun was able to sneak in a bit more air. He wheezed loudly and Yunho couldn’t begin to understand where Zhou Mi was going.

Zhou Mi holstered his weapon and said, with absolute clarity, “I’ve been poking around in your security system. And you wouldn’t believe the things I’ve found, stored away on seemingly protected servers. I’ve even found things that you thought were gone for good.”

Choi didn’t seem phased. “Is that supposed to be threatening?”

“I know about Noore,” Zhou Mi said, and Yunho could have sworn that he was the one being choked.

Noore. The Companion that Changmin swore Siwon had been directly responsible for the events leading up to her death. Changmin had sworn Choi had roughed her up, and in response she’d been planning to report him. But a shuttle accident had taken that out of the equation, and Choi had been allowed to continue to use the Companion’s Guild.

Even Choi looked a little hesitant now. “Noore.”

“Security footage, even when you delete the recording, scramble the data and try to cover it up as if it was never there in the first place,” Zhou Mi said, “leaves a trail. It’s like a phantom footprint. And if you know where to look, someone who’s skilled enough can recover the data. And I saw you. I saw what you did to her.”

Choi released his grip on Kyuhyun even more. “You’re lying.”

“Am I?” Zhou Mi asked. “Let me tell you, you’re a real piece of work. What you did to that girl … and what you thought you could get away with.”

Yunho found his voice again and added, “The Companion’s Guild couldn’t touch you, no matter how responsible they suspected you were. You are a very powerful man, Choi. It would take actual proof to do any kind of damage to you. But if we leaked a certain video to not only the Alliance, but also the net itself, there’d be no hiding behind your money. Even you couldn’t dodge a bullet like that.”

“So,” Zhou Mi posed, “my deal is looking better and better, isn’t it?”

“Deal,” Choi spat the word out. “The data for the boy?”

Zhou Mi nodded. “I think the Companion’s Guide would pay a pretty hefty amount of credits for proof concerning what happened to Noore. And as you so eloquently pointed out, we’re just some backwater Rim trash. We’d do it in a heartbeat to make a few credits. But we’re not without compromise. You give us Kyuhyun, and safe passage off your planet, along with the guarantee that you won’t so much as breathe a word of our existence to anyone else, and in return the data disappears. No one ever has to know that it was retrievable in the first place.”

Yunho wondered if this was something akin to making a deal with the devil.

If they were better men they wouldn’t even be considering such a deal. Noore had been Changmin’s friend. Getting justice for her was important to him, but they were about to sell away that chance for Kyuhyun. For themselves. For the Eye.

Zhou Mi didn’t look for a second as if he regretted suggesting something of the nature, and Yunho supposed that was what love did a to person. Love compromised morals, if a person had any to begin with. And the whole situation made Yunho wonder if he’d be making the same proposition if Changmin had been in Kyuhyun’s place. Would Zhou Mi had still played the same trump card? Would it have been Yunho instead?

“And I just have your word that you won’t attempt to blackmail me in the future?” Choi asked.

Zhou mi clarified, “I’ve already erased the original data from where I found it ghosting. I have the only copy of it at the moment. As long as we leave quietly, and you never open your mouth about us being here, and footage will never surface. I’d say that’s a fairly even playing field in terms of having things on each other.”

Before anything else could be said, there was the clattering of boots in the hallway and Choi’s communication’s device across the room was going crazy.

Yunho thought it was safe to say that the observation room had been discovered, and the missing jewels.

“Make your decision,” Zhou Mi said, a hand out for Kyuhyun. “Give me Kyuhyun and keep your freedom, or end up in a penal colony along side us, where I promise you one of us will make you pay for touching him.”

The doors to Choi’s room slammed open and just as the first of the security came through, Choi released Kyuhyun.

Crashing down to his knees Kyuhyun braced both hands on the ground and hacked loudly, drawing in huge lungful of air, shoulders shaking.

Zhou Mi knelt by him in half a second, wrapping a comforting arm around him, and Yunho could hear him whisper, “You’re okay. I’ve got you.”

“Sir,” one of the men called out, all of them skidding to a stop to take in the scene before them. It must have looked completely confusing to anyone who hadn’t just been a part of the conversation. “There’s been a … is there a problem here?”

In irritation Choi tossed the knife to the side and demanded, “What’s happening?”

Yunho carefully holstered his pistol as the security officer said, “There’s been a robbery--in the observation area. Several pieces of the Tossi-Theroux collection are gone, and almost the entirety of the Minister’s diamonds.”

Choi’s eyes cut to them and Yunho arched an eyebrow. Choi thought it was them. Choi was also clearly weighing his options still.

“The Eye?” Choi asked, and Yunho had no doubt that was a deal breaker.

“Safe,” the man relayed. “It was safe in its case. Whoever stole the other gems, didn’t want to risk taking that.”

There was only the tiniest twitch on Choi’s face, something that barely gave him away, but it was enough to reassure Yunho.

They were in the clear.

“Set up a perimeter and lock down the area,” Choi said, almost so lazily that he was probably doing it just for show. “I’m on my way.”

The majority of the security force turned to follow his orders, but the man leading the charge was eying them again, and he pressed, “Are you certain you’re okay here?”

Zhou Mi helped Kyuhyun up to his feet as Choi said, “My guests have been called away unexpectedly. They’ll need to leave immediately. See to it personally that they don’t dawdle.”

Choi strode past them with thundering footsteps and Yunho watched him go.

“Come on,” Zhou Mi said, his arm still around Kyuhyun. “We should go now.”

Yunho gave a silent nod. They needed to get back to the shuttle and pick up the Eye.

And frankly, the Choi Estate was starting to give Yunho the creeps. It was an impossible thing that they had managed to salvage a situation gone bad, and the Eye was within their grasp again, Choi none the wiser.

If Yunho were a betting man, he’d be wagering everything he had on his luck of the moment.

In the twenty minutes it took to get to the shuttle, no one said a word. Kyuhyun breathed in loud gasps, his throat already promising to bruise, but other than the sound of the transport taking them to the shuttle, there was nothing else.

Once on board Kyuhyun all but collapsed into a seat and Yunho squatted next to him. “You doing okay, Kyuhyun?”

In the pilot’s chair Zhou Mi fired their engines up right away, flipping switches and readying them to break atmo.

“Fine,” Kyuhyun whispered, voice rough. “Sorry … I …”

“That wasn’t your fault,” Yunho said firmly, then slid into the chair next to him. “You did exactly what you were supposed to. None of us had any way of knowing Choi would be prepared for any sort of trick. You did good, Kyuhyunnie. You did good.”

“Captain,” Zhou Mi called over his shoulder, pulling back on the controls to lift them off the ground and into the air. “I’m getting a strong reading from the box. We’ll be on it in five minutes. Maybe less.”

Yunho leaned forward, keeping his voice low. “Do you want me to fly? You can come sit back here with Kyuhyun.”

“No,” Zhou Mi said quickly, his voice tight and tense. “I need to … concentrate on something else.”

Yunho sat back in his seat as the shuttle angled towards where the Eye was waiting for them. “It’s not your fault either,” Yunho said, though he wasn’t sure Zhou Mi heard him. He desperately hoped Zhou Mi didn’t try to blame himself for anything that had happened to Kyuhyun. Or cling to tightly to the fact that he’d had to let Choi walk free.

It was a simple thing to extract the Eye from where it had been resting amidst garbage, and with it came the other jewels they’d swiped to cover their theft of the Eye.

Yunho held up a dangling sapphire on a white gold chain and asked, “I was thinking of giving this to Changmin as a wedding present. What to you guys think?”

With the shuttle shaking as they cleared atmo, Kyuhyun reached over deliberately and put the chain around his neck. From the front of the shuttle Zhou Mi let out of the first easy laugh Yunho had heard from him in days, if not more.

“Okay,” Yunho said, shaking his head. “It’s yoursm Kyuhyun. You win.” He really deserved it.

“Leeteuk?” Zhou Mi called over the radio as the stars came into view. “It’s Mi. We’re on our way. The package is secure and everyone is present and accounted for.”

In his lap Yunho looked down at the black box. He, oddly enough, couldn’t bring himself to open it just yet. It was overwhelming knowing what was in it, and what it meant for not only himself, but for the whole crew.

The Eye. He had the Eye.

“Leeteuk?”

Yunho’s fingers shook as he ghosted over the top of the box.

“Captain,” Zhou Mi said sharply. “I think we have a problem.”

The shaking of clearing the atmosphere was gone in another few seconds and Yunho undid his restraints to stand. He set the box on the seat he’d just vacated and made his way to Zhou Mi’s side.

“What kind of problem. Mi, we just had the problem of all problems. I don’t want to hear you say there are more.’

Yunho startled at the look in Zhou Mi’s eyes.

“I can’t get Leeteuk on the radio,” Zhou Mi said.

“Bring us up on the ship,” Yunho said. From the angle they were at it was impossible to see the Tohoshinki. She was in too high an orbit, but they were minutes away from docking. “Looks like there’s another thing to add to the fix-it list.”

Yunho leaned himself on the back of Zhou Mi’s chair and sighed. He was so tired. He just wanted to crawl into his bunk and sleep for several days. And maybe, if he played his cards extremely well, he could convince Jaejoong to crawl in next to him.

Yunho wasn’t much a cuddler, probably a remnant of so many year spent with Changmin who was very much not affectionate by nature. But Jaejoong sort of made Yunho want to be one. And there was nothing better he could think of than pulling his heavy duvet over his head with Jaejoong’s warm body next to his and simply laying there.

“Bring us up on her,” Yunho said again.

He was seconds away from returning to his seat when Zhou Mi said in a shaky voice, “We’re right in front of where she’s supposed to be.”

Air caught in Yunho’s lungs. “What?”

Zhou Mi let out a deep exhale. “We’re right in front of where we left the ship. She’s … not here.”

Yunho leaned over to check their coordinates. Zhou Mi was right. They were in the right place. It was the Tohoshinki that was missing.

“Captain?” Kyuhyun asked, pale in a way that made Yunho want to tell him to lay down.

“Maybe Leeteuk had to move her for whatever reason,” Yunho said, trying to rationalize the lack of ship. Yunho absolutely trusted Leeteuk with the ship.

“There’s something else,” Zhou Mi said.

“What?” Yunho said dismissively, checking over the readings on the display in front of him.

Zhou Mi swung towards Yunho, looking as if the world had ended. It was such an odd look, and one that was absurdly unnatural on Zhou Mi.

“Captain,” Zhou Mi said. “The ship is gone. But there’s …”

“There’s what?”

Zhou Mi’s eyes turned to the window of the shuttle and pointed. “Wreckage.”

The world fell out from under Yunho in that moment as he stared out into the black void, huge chunks of charred metal staring back.