“Lift lobby 2, door A, 30th floor.”

The elevator door whooshes open, and Jinyoung swings- landing on the floor after a perfect arc. Damn, these skirts make for such increased flexibility.

“Thanks Jae. Bam, how much longer?”

“On my way. Met a couple of those fur-brains on my way up,” Bambam sounds breathless, probably from scaling ten floors in five minutes. “They kinda remind me of Jaebum on his bad days.”

“That’s not funny, and actually kinda gross,” Youngjae comes in, and Bambam scoffs.

“I’m almost at the labs,” Jinyoung doesn’t waste his breath nagging at either of them- he’ll have plenty of time to do it later, anyway. “Jae, I don’t see a special room, or anything- there’s just a regular door up ahead.”

“It’s definitely at the end of this corridor- it’s shorter than all the others,” Youngjae says. “Maybe there’s a concealed entrance inside the room, or something?”

Jinyoung huffs as he reaches the end of the corridor, bracing himself in his stylish leather boots, hoping Youngjae meant what he said when he told him these weren’t just made for walking.

The door goes down in one kick.

“Whoa, you were right, Jae,” he walks into the hotel-style furnished room, turning back to admire the shoes. “Hey, after the mission, I get to keep these, right? I mean they’re my size and everything, anyway, and-…”

“Baby,” a man in nothing but a dress shirt and socks springs like a bat out of hell onto Jinyoung, clearly drunk and mistaking him for an actual hooker. “I was waiting for you to show up-…”

Jinyoung would’ve instinctively er-punched the guy and sent him straight back to sleep, if not for the short electric pulse that bursts from his outfit, sending the guy flying about two feet away, hitting a wall and tumbling down in a messy heap.

He blinks.

Jinyoung gingerly pokes his skirt. “Jae, did you just-…did you install some sort of remote-controlled electric defence system on my sailor-fuku?”

“I figured-…” Youngjae sounds a little defensive. “I figured you wouldn’t be meeting very nice people here, okay?”

“Why don’t I get an electric field on my clothes?” Bambam steps in, looking very grumpy with yellow goo squelching under his boots.

“Guys,” Jaebum half-shouts. “Fifteen minutes.”

Jinyoung gets back into it immediately. “Bam, sweep the place with me, look for a secret door, a control panel, something.”

“Got it, hyung,” Bambam looks him up and down as he walks in. “Nice stockings.”

“Head in the game,” Jinyoung snaps his fingers.

“There’s a weird heat signature coming from the far corner of the room, opposite the door,” Youngjae informs. “Is there a bookshelf there, or something?”

“Bookshelf? This isn’t a fricking library, Jae, it’s a brothel,” Bambam scowls. “There’s a decorative iron maiden there.”

“Ew,” Yugyeom offers.

Jinyoung steps right up to it, fingers travelling along the grooves, frowning as he stands, testing the floor inside, and it moves, like a pressure plate. He closes the doors, surprisingly well-oiled for a decorative piece.

“There,” he says sharply, after a few moments. “You hear that?”

“Hear what?” Bambam says uncomfortably- the next room has started making noises.

“Some sort of mechanism was moving in there, it was pretty well insulated,” Jinyoung opens it again, looking inside.

“Hyung, you’re not planning on going in there, right?”

“Sentry duty,” Jinyoung orders, and Bambam grumbles, standing near the maiden to watch the door as the other man steps in cautiously. “Follow only if I give the green light.”

Bambam watches in that signature way he does when he’s anxious but telling everyone, including himself, that he’s not, as Jinyoung steps into the maiden, grabbing surprisingly conveniently placed handles to close it.

The spikes adorning the inside of the iron maiden come closer, closer- then retract into the metal walls smoothly, small stubs in their place. Jinyoung reaches out to touch them, but can’t, because the floor’s turning, and he’s whirled around into a bright white light, coughing at the strange smell from the room.

Immediately, he’s got his gun out, eyes sweeping the room for any sign of movement as he steps out of the tall cylinder-like cubicle, taking in the long, metal tables, microscopes and whirring centrifuges, x-ray films tacked up neatly onto the walls, accompanied by scribbled notes and photos, and feels a little sick, seeing some of the pictures.

“Bam? You can come in now.”

The cylinder whirs and clicks immediately, and in a moment Bambam’s stepping into the room as well.

“Jae? Can you see this?” Jinyoung’s studying a series of petri dishes closely.

“Permission to log into your body-cam, Bambam.”

“Permission given,” Bambam’s a little awed, looking around the room, rifle held slack in one hand. “This place is weird.”

“Sweep for items with seals. Test tubes with organic evidence,” Jinyoung’s grabbed a briefcase, tossing a pair of rubber gloves to Bambam, before snapping on a pair of his own. “Keep it clean. We don’t want them to know we were here for as long as possible.”

“Stop jostling,” Youngjae grumbles over the radio, as Bambam strolls around the lab after that, riffling through folders of notes. “I feel like I’m on a roller coaster, Bam. Can you get a close up on some of the notes they’ve tacked up?”

“Aww, I’m so sorry for you,” Bambam tells the mini camera attached to his utility belt, before deliberately knocking it into a shelf. “Oops. Petri dishes are just over here.”

“Bambam,” Jinyoung says warningly, grabbing some x-ray pieces off the light board and giving him a look before he crosses into the next room.

“Alright, alright,” Bambam grumbles, lifting the camera to let Youngjae get a look at one of the folders, tagged and left on the table. “What do you think?”

“Huh,” it’s not a good huh. This huh once got his favourite pair of hot pink Stefano Bemer loafers dirty. Also, Yugyeom nearly died. But priorities. “Is there something you can plug me into? Some sort of computer?”

“On it,” Bambam spins once, scrutinising the room, before pulling the extendable USB cable from his belt, walking over and plugging it into what he supposes might be the oversized CPU of the computer built into the ceiling and wall. “Did I get it?”

“It’ll do. Now this might be hard, but I’m going to need you not to move for a couple of minutes.”

“Har har,” Bambam grumbles, looking over at the various bell jars filled with amber liquid and round, squirmy things, in an experimental glass case a safe distance away, while Youngjae tries to hack in and download the data.

They’re alive things, he realises after a few moments, alive slimy things with odd appendages that look like they could be legs or wings, and translucent skin that he can see their various hearts beating through.

He blinks at it. One of the things blinks back at him.

“Jinyoung-hyung,” Bambam says, in a perfectly non-trembling voice, because his knees are not knocking together right now. “Can we get out of here soon?”

The echoes of his voice peter out in the cramped room, and all of a sudden Bambam feels very alone.

“Hyung?” Bambam turns around, voice just a slight bit imploring. “Can we please-…”

The communications specialist pauses. Because there is a very giant, very quiet thing behind him, and a glob of the thing’s secretions drips onto him in the most spectacularly horror clichéd way ever.

He brings his arms up to brace himself just in time for what feels like a tentacle to whip out and slam him against the mainframe, and Bambam gasps out in pain at the impact, the air having been punched out of his body.

“Holy ,” Youngjae says over the radio, like it’s necessary, considering the situation.

“Ow,” Bambam says, offended and a little terrified, gun out, firing a neat spread across the thing’s gelatinous face (???), before arcing off the ground in an axle to sink his foot in its body, just like Jaebum had taught him to.

He does not account for the way his foot sinks for a beat too long in the hybrid’s sticky, jelly-like body, and just keeps right on sinking. Above him, the hybrid makes smacking noises.

“It’s eating me!” Bambam cries out, wriggling his foot. This is not how he intends to go. If anything, he’s going to go walking from an explosion coolly in the background, and there’s going to be a great picture framed up on the wall, and he’s going to be a legacy.

A tentacle shoots out, one grabbing his arm and forcing the gun out of it, and when Bambam tries to catch it with his other hand, it grabs that too, pushing him back against the supercomputer, jostling him such that his earpiece falls out.

“Rude,” Bambam says, mouth running the way it does when he’s freaking out and can’t do anything about it, before another one of its many tentacles wrap around his neck.

He’s trying to wiggle his hand down near his belt, to grab a couple of smoke pellets and hope the thing’s dumb enough to those in too, tears springing up in his eyes as the tentacle tightens threateningly hard around his neck, when the hybrid makes a particularly loud smacking sound, and turns- Bambam can’t really tell, since he can’t exactly make out where its eyes are anyway.

Jinyoung’s eyes are blazing, breathing hard from behind the hybrid- he’s bleeding from an abrasion on his arm, and Bambam realises he must’ve been in a fight somewhere else too.

He’s got something in his hands- some sort of modified blowtorch they keep around the lab. Jinyoung expertly avoids a tentacle, leaping in a spinning kick over a lab bench to get to where Bambam is, and firing the torch where Bambam’s connected to the hybrid.

It shrieks, spitting Bambam out violently against the computer, and the younger boy’s grumbling out a thanks, I guess, when a tentacle successfully wraps around Jinyoung’s midriff, curling dangerously tight.

“Hyung!” Bambam’s fighting through the goo to get up, but Jinyoung shouts out a “Jae, now!”, just as the hybrid’s about to crush his lungs.

The hybrid spasms from the electric current, letting out a mournful smacking sound when it stops, just before it crashes to the ground, oozing yellow goo.

“Situation’s been contained- we’re getting out of here now.”

Jinyoung’s panting, outfit rumpled and boots covered in the ooze, as he goes over to lift Bambam up, fingers nimble as he checks his vitals, and the younger boy is wholeheartedly embarrassed.

“Hyung, I’m fine,” he mumbles, sitting morosely, almost in a puddle of the yellow stuff. “Sorry, I messed up.”

“Don’t be sorry, learn,” Jinyoung’s stern as he checks his foot. “Can you stand?”

“Yeah,” Bambam wobbles dangerously when he puts his foot to the ground. He takes a step, and almost falls, clinging onto Jinyoung for support. His foot feels completely numb- probably some chemical from the hybrid’s saliva for easy digestion of prey (he did not just think that). “Okay, no.”

“Come on,” Jinyoung says, throwing Bambam’s arm over his shoulder, and handing him the briefcase. “Hold onto that,” he takes out a gun. “And put your earpiece back in.”

Bambam obeys, and comes back to an explosion of Jaebum yelling at Yugyeom about how I mean it this time, Gyeom, if you leave your post, I’m taking away all your chocolate shake privileges for a year, you hear me, a year.

“Thanks, hyung,” he mutters, limping along with Jinyoung towards the door, feeling very much like a useless piece of baggage as they hobble along.

They’re stopped in their tracks just then, however, by a very prominent growl from the door adjacent to the way out, and Jinyoung groans.

“If one of those things comes out of the door over there, I’m going to quit this job,” he mumbles, pulling Bambam forward regardless.

To be fair, it isn’t even a hybrid that crawls in through the doorway, blocking them off.

It’s three of them, all smacking and clicking hungrily as they fan out.

Jinyoung curses under his breath, hefting Bambam along with him with a harsh whispered warning of if you come back to help, I’ll feed you to them, understand?, gun out, like it’ll be of much help.

Wait.

“Hyung?” Bambam says, panicking slightly as Jinyoung takes his arm off his shoulder, wrapping it firmly around the briefcase. “Wait what are you-…”

He doesn’t get to finish, because Jinyoung’s lurched forward, dragging Bambam bodily with him, ducking a jet of putrid smelling liquid, and Bambam’s shoved into the cylindrical exit with the briefcase.

The last thing he sees is Jinyoung being slammed into the wall by a tentacle, before the iron maiden spits him out on the other side.

*

Jinyoung has been slammed into many walls before. He’s pretty much grown up being slammed with different things, like floors, glass bottles, unreasonable parental expectations. Not by tentacles, though- those make a difference, they really do.

A hybrid jettisons yellow goo at the spot where Bambam was barely a spllit second ago, and Jinyoung hears the mechanism in the concealed exit fizzle and die with a pathetic sputter- damn it, there goes that way out.

There was another door in the other room behind, though- all he has to do is distract them long enough for him to get around to it. Yeah. Easy peasy.

Jinyoung’s on the counter in three seconds, tipping the glass case over onto one hybrid with a resounding crash, and it flattens under the broken glass, smacking in pain.

The hybrids seem to have learnt- none of them are trying to python-wrap him now. Instead, the other two send a barrage of goo projectiles, and one of the tentacles that follow after get him in the middle.

Jinyoung braces as he hits the counter on the other side- the sharp edge gets him in the abdomen, and the pain momentarily has him reeling, unable to move.

He pushes himself away with a foot as the other two converge on him, inching away, broken glass digging into his skin, and for a moment he thanks the heavens for his modified stockings. They probably wouldn’t do much to stop a bullet, but they’re holding out pretty well against the glass.

“Retrieval team,” he gasps for the second time into the mic, still backing away- there’s a buzz of noise coming from the earpiece, and he has a sinking feeling Jaebum and the others have their hands full downstairs. “Radioing for help. Jaebum-hyung-…”

The door the hybrids had originally come in through opens again, and for a moment Jinyoung’s heart leaps, grateful for any sort of distraction at all, one that might just buy him enough time to get out of the way.

Then someone steps in, and Jinyoung’s eyes widen.

“Jae?”

Youngjae’s panting, clearly just having run over, sweat glistening on his forehead, holding something in each hand.

“Jae, no, look out!"

Youngjae throws the makeshift chemical explosive in his right hand before the goo projectile can get him, hitting home- it burns holes in the hybrids, causing a right ruckus, buying more than enough time for Jinyoung to scoot away and out of their range.

The other thing seems to notice, prowling closer to Jinyoung, and he swears under his breath, his mind on Youngjae and how to get them both out of here safely.

That's when the tech specialist slams the other thing in his hand- it’s a wrench, Jinyoung realises, against the metal sink, built into the counter. The resounding clang sound seems to make them angry, because the smacking and clicking noises increase in volume and frequency, and they start converging on him, tentacles extending threateningly.

The younger boy seems to read Jinyoung’s mind. “Hyung, no, don’t move,” he half shouts, gaze burning holes into the two approaching hybrids, his voice holding an authority it typically only has when they’re in his lab.

“Choi Youngjae, that is a wrench. This isn’t Bioshock, Jae, you cannot come out of this alive with a wrench,” Jinyoung bellows, struggling up, regardless- the pain in his side is already receding, and he bites down the rest of it as he tries to get up, mind grasping at straws for some semblance of a plan.

One of the hybrids shoots out a tentacle at the younger boy once it gets close enough, and Jinyoung’s ready to jump straight into the throng it need be, but Youngjae swings the wrench down into the sink- against the tap, this time, and water bursts from the pipes, drenching them.

Jinyoung watches, stunned, as the hybrids start clicking frantically, scrambling over each other in the cramped space to get out. Youngjae, in turn, twists open the cupboard under the sink, disappearing in there for a moment, before he retreats quickly, and water starts spraying out from there too.

The hybrids seem to be shrinking, melting, for some reason, dissolving into globs of foamy mush, and Jinyoung has the sense to back away before any of it can touch him. Soon, they’re reduced to little mountains of yellowish jelly on the floor, tentacles flopping pathetically, and Youngjae crosses over the other side to get to Jinyoung.

“Hyung, you okay?” his eyes are wide and worried, hand still clutching onto the wrench, and Jinyoung shoves him.

“Don’t ever do that again, I was so scared,” he says, furious. “What if the stunt with the water didn’t work? You would’ve been dead.”

“I processed the data I managed to download while Bam was plugged in, I figured the consistency of their body substance would make them susceptible to solvent-based attacks,” Youngjae protests, helping him up. “Granted, I didn’t know what kind of solvent, but polar solvents-…”

“Don’t change the subject," Jinyoung says sourly, bruised in both the metaphorical and literal aspects. Then something clicks. "How much did you manage to process? Anything that'll help the rest downstairs?"

"They released some sort of pulse to block transmissions in the building- probably to make sure vids and pictures of tonight don't get out. Our comlinks weren't spared," Youngjae tugs on Jinyoung's arm, as one of the mush mountains starts to twitch. "Hyung, we'd better get out of here soon, I'm not exactly sure what happens after they dissolve and I'm not all that hot about finding out first-hand."

"Right, okay," Jinyoung nods towards the door near the back. "I spotted what could be an exit over there, come on. And Jae," Youngjae looks over questioningly, still holding onto the wrench. Jinyoung rests a hand on his back, squeezing his shoulder. "Nice work."

Youngjae puffs up a little in pride, eyes crinkling in a smile. "No problem, hyung."

*

Mark is not in the best of moods.

He hasn't eaten a proper hot meal since this morning. He currently smells like hybrid excretion. And he missed a rerun marathon of Keeping up with the Kardashians last night because they were brainstorming escape routes for this mission. All in all, it's been a pretty ty couple of days.

"I want dumpling noodles," Jackson announces as he socks a hybrid with a potted plant at the corner of the 25th floor. Mark's stomach growls accordingly.

"Shut up, Jackson," Jaebum says, possibly in a worse mood than Mark's in, because it seems their communications have been knocked out, and the last thing all of them heard was Jinyoung’s distress call from the laboratory level, and the maknaes have been uncontactable, so he’s in a pretty bad mood, that goes without saying.

They're well aware that the team's deputy leader is very much capable of taking care of himself (Jackson can testify to this- technically, it was his fault for thinking it was socially appropriate to squeeze Jinyoung's one of the first few times they met, but he still gets nightmares that Jinyoung actually did snap his head off with his thighs after that), but then again, Jackson wasn't a bunch of ugly hybrids.

"Up," Jaebum says, ruthlessly clearing a hybrid from the stairwell. "Don't stop till we hit the top level."

Mark's panting- climbing twenty-five floors is typically no issue for him, except they've been stopping to knock out increasingly persistent hybrids every few levels, and that would take a toll on even the best.

"Jaebum, chill for a second," he huffs, glances over with mild concern to where Jackson's engaged in a WWE style wrestling match with a bear-bird thing. "He's going to be fine, okay? He's gotten himself out of tier situations."

"Either way, we're behind schedule," Jaebum gestures stiffly for Jackson to finish up and join them, before taking to the stairs. "Without comms, the timing's the only thing Yugyeom has to rely on. Come on."

Mark watches Jaebum race to the next level, entirely unamused, as Jackson joins him, shaking feathers out of his hair.

"You wanna bet he's going to start freaking out once we get to the labs and Jinyoung's gone, probably because he already beat the hell out of whatever was attacking him?" Jackson quips, as he starts jogging up the stairs, and Mark mutters an impressive string of swear words under his breath.

"I don't get it, I sure as hell wouldn't be this strung up if I were him," he grumbles, following Jackson, who snorts.

"Dude, I've known you since we were kids. I'm pretty sure you're capable of your own murderous rampage."

Mark gives this notion some considerable thought.

Then: "Nah. Too much effort."

Jackson cackles, already on the next landing. "That's my Markie-pooh."

*

Jackson wins the bet. Sort of. Jaebum freaks out about a minute after they've left the lab, finding it in a mess and no trace of Jinyoung- but also because they discover the remains of a chemical bomb on the flooding floor that Jaebum somehow knows intuitively was made by Youngjae, and it's Youngjae and Jinyoung and they were here and everything to hell, they're probably injured and helpless and being eaten somewhere.

It's all very entertaining for Jackson. Mark, on the other hand, is hungry, and by default grumpy.

They manage to persuade the leader to recoup at the rendezvous point on the roof because if Jackson knows Jinyoung, he's probably kicked every hybrid's back into the test tubes they came from, with or without Youngjae, and is currently waiting impatiently for them to catch up.

Jackson pops his head out of the emergency roof access hatch they'd found, scanning the periphery. As predicted, Jinyoung's there, wrapping some sort of bandage around Youngjae's arm, and he scoffs.

"All clear."

He receives a tremendous shove in the from the ladder rung below him, courtesy of Mark, and tumbles out onto the roof ungraciously.

"Hey," he barks, trying to roll over into a sitting position. "If I were you, I'd be appreciating the view."

"Ugh, no thanks," Mark clambers out, before toppling flat onto the roof, exhaling noisily in the cool air. ", that’s good. Now we just need food."

Jaebum's the last to surface, and predictably, goes straight over to Jinyoung and Youngjae once he gets out to pelt them with a thousand questions, probably asking if they’re alive and who needs him to go beat up who. It's extremely demeaning for Jackson, who's risked his life for this mission just as much as they have, thank you very much.

"I don’t mind your existence," Mark says, eyes closed, like he's read Jackson's mind.

"Thanks man," Jackson jackknifes into a sitting position, looking around, before frowning. "I need someone else to call me amazing and wonderful. Where's Bambam?"

Jinyoung looks over, alarmed. "I thought he was with you guys?"

"I thought he was with you," Mark says, starting to sit up.

"You think-..." Youngjae looks over anxiously. "You think he made it up?"

"Well he'd better have!" Jackson says loudly, going over to look down into the emergency access. "Who's going to clap for me when I do triple backflips in the training room if he doesn’t?"

Mark's this close to rolling his eyes, when he hears a rumble from below, and stills immediately, straining to listen.

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Jackson squint. "What the hell is th-..."

In a split second decision, Mark leaps forward, dragging Jackson out of the way a moment before some thing blasts out from the access, splattering gelatinous yellow stuff everywhere.

"Holy ," Jackson is yelling, hands up to cover his face, and Mark looks up to see a giant tentacle thing the size of a small house, secretions dribbling down its overgrown sides, bulbous white eyes staring down at each of them. If tall dark and handsome was one end of the spectrum, this would sure as heck be all the way at the other end.

Jackson twists them both out of the way in time to miss a giant tentacle that slaps down on the roof, splashing yellow goo everywhere.

"Gross," Jackson makes a face, as he stands, looking over to where Jinyoung, Jaebum and Youngjae are.

Jinyoung's got his gun out, and clips the thing neatly where its five eyes are, and the giant ugly hybrid howls, tentacles waving wildly.

One of them catches Youngjae in the chest, sending him sprawling backwards, and Jackson exclaims, but not before Jaebum sends a zipline shooting out from his cable gun, getting the lamppost at the corner of the building and springing the younger boy back before he flies over the edge of the building.

"Watch out!"

Jackson ducks just in time to miss a tentacle- the hybrid's swinging them everywhere now, forcing the two of them back against a greenhouse in order to avoid them. Jackson glares, drawing his serrated-edge knife from behind him with a smooth snikt sound as Mark gets his out.

“You thinking what I’m thinking?"

Mark cracks his neck and shoulders. "Go in and I'll cover you."

Jackson narrowly misses another tentacle, before diving in for the kill, slicing that one off. The smacking noises from the hybrid intensify, as well as a low humming from within it that’s freaking him out just a little. Jackson springboards off another tentacle, bringing his knife down on two of them, while Mark takes out the one he’d just bounced off of.

"We're having sushi tonight, es!" Jackson yells, attacking another one.

"Ugh, you need to work on your infight dialogue," Mark mutters from behind, stunning one tentacle long enough for Jackson to take it out.

"Bro, that hurt," Jackson says, sincerely offended, reaching to cut another one off, only to shriek as one wraps around him from behind, lifting him up off the roof.

"EWWW," he screams as he's slammed footfirst into the hybrid- and his foot sinks in like quicksand.

"THIS WAS THE THING THAT ALMOST ATE BAMBAM," Jackson bellows, struggling. "HELP ME."

"I figured it out!" Youngjae’s shouting, having ducked a tentacle to get to them- if he crossed the Red Sea just to tell them that, Jackson swears, he's going to feed that kid to this thing. "The water- it dissolved them, but without a containment device, they all just merged into one entity!"

"THAT'S NOT HELPFUL, JAE," Jackson wriggles a hand free- he grabs a smoke pellet from his belt, tossing those in. It explodes, causing a sizable dent in the thing, but it's a net loss, because the thing starts smacking angrily, pushing him in harder.

"There’s something else I got from the notes!" Youngjae shouts from below.

“ANYTIME NOW,” Jackson's in up to his knees, now, and already losing all feeling in his legs.

There’s a forceful, muffled explosion, then, that shakes Jackson violently, and he cranes his neck, offended, to see Jinyoung aim another grenade into the hybrid’s gelatinous folds.

“Explosives!” Youngjae cups two hands around his mouth and yells. “Hit it with explosives!”

Mark starts socking it with grenades, and Jinyoung and Jaebum continue, the hybrid smacking and clicking furiously, trying to catch another one of them as it turns.

The explosives work, sure, but one has to remember that this is a regenerative hybrid the size of several cars stacked on top of one another, and that the loss in body mass seems to make it just want to eat Jackson faster.

"I LOVE YOU MOMMY," Jackson's got his eyes squeezed shut, yelling out. "I'M SORRY I LEFT YOU AND GEGE. I LOVE YOU MARK, STAY IDIOTIC EMOTIONALLY. I WOULD LOVE YOU JB IF YOU WEREN'T SUCH A PRICK-..."

"I'm going to regret saving your ," Jaebum snarls from opposite, sending a series of flares into the hybrid’s greenish folds.

Jackson’s heavenward laments are interrupted (how rude) by a strange whip whip whip noise, then, and he feels a strong gust of wind that is not coming from his life flashing too fast before his eyes. He looks up, panting, and hears Jinyoung shout from somewhere distantly below.

That is not a helicopter descending from the skies straight at where they are, and it is not coming straight for Jackson’s head and by extension, his hair.

It is.

Jackson lets out a scream that is, admittedly, not very wild or y (give him a break, he’s being eaten by a monster and about to be julienned by helicopter blades), until one of the blades slices barely half a metre away from where he is, cutting cleanly through the tentacle holding him.

The hybrid shrieks, and Jackson tumbles to the ground in a pile of goo and immobile legs, and immediately feels someone heave him up- it’s Jinyoung and Mark, pulling him away.

The helicopter rears back, barely missing one of the hybrid’s tentacles, and gains altitude, towering over all of them.

Then, in an unmistakeable voice, over a loudspeaker of some sort: “Will all idiot hyungs please take cover.”

Jackson gapes as he’s dragged away. “Hey, is that-…”

The hybrid smacks angrily, tentacles shooting out, but not before the helicopter plummets towards it. It draws the copter in with its tentacles, clicking angrily as it devours it, and there’s a lapse of inactivity, before something rings shrilly from the copter.

Within a split second, there’s a blossom of fire, a roar of an explosion and a roll of heat where Jackson, Mark and Jinyoung are hidden at the side of the building under a ledge, and one last panicked squeal, before little charred bits of goo start flopping down onto the rooftop.

It’s all very gross and relieving.

Jackson emerges cautiously, dragging himself over the edge and onto the roof with his arms, and he feels Jinyoung follow behind him with Mark.

“Everyone alright?” Jaebum’s shouting from behind the rooftop store, Youngjae curiously popping his head around the store to look at the magnificent blackened radius where the hybrid once was. “What the hell was that?”

“If anyone needs a summary, I’m pretty sure a remotely triggered bomb-rigged stealth helicopter just crashed into the hybrid,” Jackson announces, still on the floor with his legs spread at odd angles in front of him. “Also there was a voice coming down from the heavens that sounded almost as nasal as Bambam on his good days.”

He jumps, then, rudely interrupted yet again (this is becoming a very unfortunate pattern that needs to be looked into at once) as the roof access door bursts open, and guards start to flood out. Guns are very notably charged and pointed at the five people on the roof who pretty much just saved the world from cephalopod digestion. s.

“Freeze!” Someone yells. Jackson sees Mark roll his eyes.

He would honestly rather not have to do this, though- legs aside, he’s run out of badass quips (sushi notwithstanding) and to have to repeat one in a single night would ruin his reputation as witty and intelligent (on top of being y as heck) forever. Not ideal.

A distant blare distracts a couple of them, then, just the sound of someone leaning on the horn coming at them with a steady crescendo, but it’s the bright glare of white headlights that’s enough to have most of the heads turning. An engine roars into the vicinity, and somewhere in that mess, someone exclaims, sparking a mass retreat back down the roof access.

The massive, gleaming black armoured truck, floodlights blinding, soars through the air to reach the roof, before smashing into and out of a rooftop greenhouse, mowing down whatever had remained after the hybrid attack.

The huge off-road wheels lock into position, drifting across the concrete before screeching to a halt, bowling over the few unfortunate souls who hadn’t made it down and neatly slamming the roof access door shut.

Five pairs of eyes are fixed on the van apprehensively, though Jackson pretty much knows (and is resigned to) what he’ll see inside.

The side door to the back seat slides open, then, and the passenger side bullet-proof, out window rolls down to reveal Bambam and Yugyeom, both donning sunglasses and the same unimpressed look.

There’s a moment of silence for all their age-related bruised egos. Then-…

“Get in, losers,” the maknae says, drumming his fingers once against the matte steering wheel.

*

(Jaebum’s threats about the age line aside, they get to the final pick-up point at a deserted dock safely, thanks to the van. A bunch of scientists had been trying to make a getaway in the helicopter and van, Yugyeom explained, and he and Bambam had just very considerately relieved them of that burden. Also, they helped kill about a million's worth in budget by remotely piloting the empty helicopter into the hybrid. That's also a thing.

Mark looks furtively into the back of the van, where a pile of unconscious, tied-up guys are rolling around, and shudders.

By some means unspeakable on the roof, too, Jackson terrorises one of the bouncers that had made it up and claims the spoils of war, a giant purple -shaped club capable of causing concussions, as his new ultimate weapon of choice.

Jaebum has to physically wrestle it from him on the van ride, because Jackson, I don’t even trust you with regular s. Jackson’s puppy-eyed promises that he won’t stick it up anywhere inappropriate fall on deaf ears, too.

Jinyoung changes like lightning out of the outfit, grumbling about how stockings are a bane to humanity, and Bambam later whispers something to Yugyeom involving the words Jaebum and once they’re on the evac helicopter.

The only reason he doesn’t get thrown out of the chopper after that is because they’re all strapped in, and because Jinyoung attempts to gag him with a stocking, anyway.)

a/n: ayyy guess who finally finished this \o/

yes do hope everyone enjoyed this!! ;A; i tried to make it as fun and happy as possible to make up for all fall down so yes. if things got a bit stupid just now, please understand my heart.

major thanks once again to the bao of beis desole for proofreading and shouting at me, please rail at her to finish her shifter au too ^.^

so hence commencing explanations for a possible future spy au instalment!! watched the got7 escape room vid and tj was like SPY AU and i was like NO but tj doesn't listen to me so here we are, and there will possibly be an escape room inspired fic in the future (amazing!!) i am...kind of tempted to branch out a little to shake things up?? plus i rewatched indie horror rpg playthroughs so you can kind of tell what's coming T_T

so there is poll! please share what you think? comments are very much appreciated and treasured, as per normal! >.< they correlate to how much strength an author has to write, honest, especially if things are not in their least y state irl (yay!)

p.s. tiny irrelevant thing but ayy the image in the foreword is a hint to the next instalment! \o/ love you guys