Frozen in his spot, the sound of thunder quieted down as Jongdae saw the body in the distance. His father was unmoving. The rain was growing worse as the moments passed, and he only moved when another bolt of lightning flashed through the sky and another boom burst his ears.

He dashed forward, wasting no time to grab his father’s shirt, and began to tug. He grunted, pulling as hard as he could. Once the two of them got back home, his mother would know what to do. She always did! It certainly wasn’t strange for a drunkard to collapse without a word! Then, everything would go back to normal and the nightmare would end. 

Right?

Jongdae was beginning to doubt that thought. A strange smell mixed with rainwater entered his nostrils – was that the smell of burnt meat? He gagged.

His father’s body twitched as he tugged once more. “Daddy?” he called out. There were no insults cast his way. No curses, no demeaning comments. Nothing.

“Daddy, wake up.”

Still nothing.

He felt himself begin to panic. The hands gripping the drenched shirt started to tremble, along with his knees. Something was wrong – something was very wrong.

He collapsed to his knees, shakily grabbing his father’s arm. The man’s body was facing away from him, and there was a part of him that knew what he was going to see was not at all pleasant. Uncertainty and fear were the only things he felt, as he took a deep breath, using whatever strength he had left to turn the body towards him.

There was complete, utter silence. Then, Jongdae heard a scream, and was even more shocked to find that it was his voice that had done it. His lip began to quiver, and he stumbled back, sliding in some mud and fell on his bum. His breathing was frantic, limbs went numb as he took one final glance at his father’s corpse, before blacking out.

**

“You alright there?”

Jongdae looked up from the grass. “Yeah,” he uttered without thinking. Slipping his mask off, he glanced at one of the snacks Kris had grabbed from the store. He bit into it - a muffin, they called it - savoring the sweet taste of blueberries. “Just… thinking.”

Jiyoung replied, “I could tell. I was calling your name for a bit. You didn’t reply.”

His gaze fell back to the ground. The hand not holding his food wrapped itself around his shorts. “Sorry.” He sighed through his nose, feeling a strange emptiness bubbling up from inside as he took another bite of his food.

Jongin, who was sitting next to him, was gnawing on a piece of beef jerky, trying to pull it from his gritted teeth and almost fell back as he was able to rip a piece off. Luhan erupted into guffaws.

“Ya almost ripped ya damn teeth out!” he laughed, beating his fist against the ground.

A confused and jumpy Kris glanced up from the sleeping dragon. His bug-eyed stare landed on the blushing Jongin, hysterical Luhan and completely lost Jongdae.

“Did I miss something…” he asked, fingers the skin of Ace’s scaly back. His wings were folded and stuck to the sides of his body as he continued on with his slumber.

Jongdae glanced at the two. “Not quite sure, to be honest.”

The youngest rubbed his neck, chewing intensely on the jerky. “I be having some problems, is all.”

“Jongin was battling a tough piece of beef jerky,” Jiyoung explained, amused. “Luhan thought it was absolutely hilarious.”

“’Cause it was!” the man shouted, curling over in cackles again.

Kris looked at the rock on the ground. “Are you watching everything? Like, can you see everything above from the sky? Like God? Do you happen to be god?”

She snorted. “It’s hard to explain, but yes, I am god,” she joked, sniggering at Jongin and Kris’s eyes, which widened at the jest. “I have this sort of omniscient view where I’m like a tiny pair of eyes watching everything overhead. I tend to notice somethings but I mean, I’m not always paying attention. Plus, my vision is limited to whether or not I’m in my rock form, so if I’m in my rock then I can only see things in that certain area from the point of view of my rock.” The aura peeked out of the stone. ‘’It's different if I slip out like this. It’s just- it’s really confusing to explain.”

Slowly nodding his head, Kris’s eyes darted around in confusion. “I guess that makes sense? Should I refer to you as god now?”

“Whatever floats your boat, kid.”

 Jongdae’s finger brushed over his shirt. “Should we start moving again?” The sky was bright, a couple of clouds were surrounded by blue, but overall the weather was fine. Not to mention there was a cool breeze that tussled his hair each time it passed. The North definitely had it easy compared to the West, that’s for sure.

He took out the map, to which Kris beckoned his hand with a piece of lettuce hanging out of his mouth. He flinched a bit, however, when Jongdae narrowed his eyes at him. Taking the map without a word as it was held out to him, Kris rolled it open, scrutinizing it. He dug his fork into his salad, taking another bite, not minding the lettuce that unattractively fell out of his mouth and on the floor.

“I still can’t believe of all things you bought a salad,” Jiyoung remarked, snorting. “Here I thought the women back from my day were bad.”

“I have an image to uphold,” the conman replied. He sat back, gesturing to his suit and slightly unkempt, slicked back grey hair. “Once this whole war thing is over, I’m going back to my business, and I’m sure afterwards I’m going to have an even bigger crowd than before. Oh, the money I’ll receive.” A grin appeared on his face as he began to daydream. Jongdae raised a brow.

Kris cleared his throat, seeing the other's gaze. “Sorry, I got a bit carried away there.” He pointed at the map. “We are right here. We will arrive at sector two next.”

Luhan burped, patting his stomach. “How long’s it gonna take?”

“I’d say we’ll get there late tomorrow if we walk.”

Clapping his hands, Jongin exclaimed, “Yes!”

Jongdae nodded quietly, standing up. “Should we start moving then?” He his lips, gulping down the remnants of his snack.

The three men on the floor were gazing at him, but for some reason their stares seemed to be set on him for quite a long time. He began to feel uneasy. His palms began to sweat, eyes blinking rapidly when they started to feel abnormally dry.

Then, it was over. Jongin jumped up, pencil in hand, and shouted, “Teach me more stuff, Jongdae! I wanna be smart just like you.” He forcefully, but gently, placed the item in the older’s hand, urging him to talk as the other two followed.

Talking about vocabulary and grammar seemed to shake away the uneasiness in Jongdae’s gut, but it surely didn’t shake away the fear and hopelessness he felt. That’s when he heard it – laughter.

His laughter.

That’s when he realized he was being toyed with. Again. He had to get ahold of himself.

**

The gates to sector two were similar to that of three, but these gates weren’t as guarded. There was a small booth for people to check in, but it seemed the guard who was at the post was dead asleep. Jongdae rolled his eyes at the snoring, overweight male behind the glass.

The people going into the gates seemed almost hesitant to move, knocking on the glass a few times before heading through the doors once they realized the man was got going to be waking up anytime soon. This certainly made things simpler for Jongdae and the group, since they just had to follow those people.

“Up top,” Jiyoung said. “Don’t look.”

The four glanced up anyways, whipping their heads to the floor when she yelled at them. “I said not to look up!”

“I wanted to see what was up there,” Jongdae defended. “You weren’t very specific.”

“If ya gonna warn us, then tell us what ya warnin’ us about,” Luhan said, hands on his hips.

Jongin grumbled under his breath, a bit shaken over the fact that he was yelled at. “You wasn't real specifics like Jongdae said.”

Ace’s head was tucked into Kris’s neck. The male was cooing at the animal. “Those are cameras set up at the top of the booth. Those record us being here, but hopefully our masks won’t give away our – yes, Ace, that’s a good boy – give away our identities.”

Jongin snapped his fingers. “Ya mean this thing?” He took out the strange invention with a screen on it.

Jongdae recognized it from when the younger had used it back when he first met him. “You still have this?” He looked at the bulged pockets. “What is in there?”

Jongin shrugged. “Dunno. I just be putting stuff in there and forgetting ‘bout it. I got pencils though!” He took out a few more pencils.

“Ya got the damn world in ya pocket,” Luhan laughed.

“Can I see the camera?” Jongdae asked, his hand out. Jongin complied, placing it in his hand, and he stared at the screen. “Whoa.”

“What?” Jongin asked, rushing to his side. Luhan and Kris followed, until the three were huddled around him.

On the screen was officers walking down hallways or talking with each other. It was strange to see them moving on the strange box.

“Here! You can press this button,” Jongin told him, pressing one of the four small arrows beside the screen.

“Jesus, this a model double-oh-four,” Kris said, sounding disgusted. “This came out decades ago! It was one of the first cameras on the market. The West needs to catch up because this is just disgusting and humiliating. God, it's not even an MP3 player.”

Jongdae, Luhan and Jongin stared at him. “Huh?”

“Music player, basically. Those were all of the rage when they came out.” He Ace, a grin on his face. “I sold over one hundred of those in one year. Those were the times.”

Jongdae and Jongin stared at each other, the latter shrugging, while Luhan glanced at them, snickering. “Alright, then,” Jongdae drawled.

“See what you can find,” Jiyoung said. “Switch through.”

Jongdae pressed the arrow some more. None of the cameras had anything worth watching, and he just about gave up switching until Jongin stopped him.

“Look.”

On the screen was a large table surrounded by wealthy looking people. Some of them seemed familiar, but not familiar enough to where Jongdae could place a name to a face, while the others were complete strangers.

“Holy , it’s sugar ,” Luhan remarked, giving a nasty leer, which caused Jongdae to sneer.

Jiyoung snorted. “Sugar ?”

“Yep. Sugar , sweet , tasty badonkie - she's got a bunch o' names.” He shrugged. “But sugar is the best since she’s got them perky brea-“

“Alright, alright! Enough!” Jongdae screamed, covering Jongin’s ears. “Filter, Luhan. Make one and use it!”

Luhan’s lips formed a creepy, long grin. His eyes squinting as he did so. “But where’s the fun in that, Jongdae?”

Jongdae blinked, slowly turning his head back to the camera. He squinted his eyes, moving his head closer as he saw someone extremely familiar. “No way, is that the witch?”

“Yep, that’s sugar ,” Luhan repeated in a ‘duh’ tone. “I ’member that time she came to sector one. Ooh, she was moanin’ and groanin’ like crazy. I made her c-“

Jongdae shoved his fingers in his ears. “I can’t hear you I’m singing the ABCs now – A, B, C, D-!”

Luhan guffawed, elbowing his side. “Ya gotta find out sometime.”

Huffing, Jongdae quit with his tantrum, trying to ignore the heat on his cheeks and ears. He looked back at the camera.

“What’s happening?” Jiyoung asked.

Jongdae explained, “They’re talking about something. Judging by their facial expressions, it's important.”

“Whaddya think they be talking about?” Jongin asked, knocking his head against Jongdae’s as he moved closer. “Sorry.”

“Perhaps they’re talking about important matters regarding the West?” Kris asked, brows furrowing as he tried to focus. “Damn this poor quality – I can barely make out the people!”

Luhan glanced at it. “I think ya eyes are blind. I can see this perfectly.”

“But there are pixels! The pixels are so big and – and so huge – I can barely see that guy’s eyes and the damn camera is right in front of his face!"

Jiyoung snorted, sighing happily afterwards. “Oh man, back in my day we would refer to this as first world problems. Hilarious.”

Jongdae muttered, “First world problems.” He needed to write that down somewhere.

“Watch out.” Kris took a strange white device from inside of his jacket.

Jongdae gave him the camera, following Kris’s movements with his gaze. “What’s that?”

“This a device which will allow me to put multiple headphones in, so we can all listen to what’s going on in the cameras. It is a bit disappointing that there is a headphone jack, but no library for music. Or BlueTube. What a shame. I really wanted to listen to So Hyang’s new single,” Kris grumbled, taking neatly folded headphones out of his jacket. “Put this in your ear. You’ll be able to hear then.”

Hesitantly, Jongdae placed it in his ear, jumping as voices sounded through his ear drums. A car suddenly zoomed past, causing him to back away from the road and move closer to the others. He was relieved to find that they were all bunched together below a tall tree.

“-the West has all of the materials needed in order to survive. Those darn civilians don’t need any more than they’ve got. The wealthy have enough to buy them half of a sector – adding cars into the picture will do nothing but spoil them even more.”

Jongdae recognized the pudgy male as the West’s leader – Raijin Fujiyoshi. His greyed beard and shaded sunglasses were what caused him to stand out, as well as the top hat on his bald head. “Televisions have just come in. If the people receive more now, then they’ll rage for more and more until eventually we’ll have to wipe everything off of the market again. I’m feeling quite generous, you see, and it takes too long for the officers to go into every house and clear them out.”

A woman with angular, sharp blue eyes threw her head back, letting out a laugh. Her black hair was pulled into a sophisticated, tight bun, and trimmed, pink nails drummed along the table. “Oh, really? Generous, you say? I say you’re just afraid of your people! You’re like a cat – you’re devious and sneaky, but you’ve got your tail between your legs. Too afraid to face the inevitable, Raijin.” She let out a sinister chuckle, smirking. “Too afraid to move forward so you take away as much as you can. C’mon, big boy, the North will happily donate to your lowly people.”

The witch was the one to fight back. “Trixie, now is not the time to be fighting. We have come here for important business – the most important we've dealt with in a long time, in fact! So shut that trap of yours.”

Trixie cackled. “Got your fighting for you again, I see!”

Another man with dark skin and dreads laying on his shoulders groaned. “Every damn time we have a meeting this occurs. Enough with the relationship drama and back to the meeting, please. I am supposed to check up on some new military weapons after this.”

Trixie rolled her eyes. Raijin seemed to wince at that statement, saying, “Your South