Early the next morning, Yui was woken up by the speaker system announcing their imminent arrival in fifteen minutes. She leaned over from the top bunk to look at her sister, whose wide awake eyes indicated that she also heard the message.

For a moment, they merely stared at each other in silence. Yui sighed and then began rearranging her covers distractedly. “I couldn’t sleep very well.”

Below her, Kouichi shifted uneasily, too, and didn’t respond. Though she had initially sounded so assured and confident last night, Kouichi had been uncharacteristically acquiescent as they carried out their latest grand theft, and didn’t even press Yui to steal half the amount Yui would have expected her to ask for.

Upon thinking about it again, Yui’s stomach churned. She had been the one who stole his money. Almost unwillingly, she glanced across the narrow compartment to the third party, who, as expected, was still sleeping soundly.

Kouichi got out of her bed. “I’m going to dispose of this,” she said, holding up a plastic bag. In it, Yui knew, were the remnants of a needle and a sedative drug.

She nodded. “Let’s remove the band-aid from his arm first. I’m sure the bleeding would’ve stopped by now.”

“I’ll do it,” Kouichi said instantly, already walking to his side. Almost seemingly gently, she took his arm and turned it, revealing a band-aid marking the location where she had administered the substance last night. She pulled it off quickly and dropped it into the bag, and as she turned around, Yui noted her bitter expression. Not the face one would see on a thief who just successfully stole the equivalent of almost $100,000USD in one night. 

“I’ll be back,” Kouichi said, averting her eyes.

Yui nodded, and then realizing that Kouichi couldn’t see that, responded out loud. “U-un, yeah. Take your time…”

As Kouichi closed the compartment door and headed for the bathroom, Yui sighed again and got down from the bed. She walked over to the tourist, whose name she now knew to be Kim Ryeowook.

With an urge bordering on OCD, she suddenly her hand into his jacket pocket and withdrew his wallet, checking and then double-checking again to make sure all his cards and currency were still in place. They hadn’t stolen anything directly from his wallet. No, they had hacked his accounts. Or more specifically, she had hacked his bank accounts.

She shook her head. What was wrong with her? It wasn’t like she had never stolen before. Heck, she’s done worse. Thinking about their most recent kidnapping, her heart sunk again and for a moment, she allowed herself to be unprofessionally immersed in guilt. Her attitude when stealing versus after the job was done always seemed to conflict with a bipolar nature; during the task, she would act coolly and with composition, but the moment it was over, she felt nothing but extreme remorse and doubt.

And besides, why did she feel so bad about stealing from this stranger? If anything, she should’ve been feeling a sense of self-justification—after all, he was a Korean and—

She groaned again, willing her thoughts not to go down that path. The last thing she and her sister needed to be reminded of was his ethnicity. Especially Kouichi…

Now that she thought about it, Kouichi hadn’t seemed very happy last night, either. Yui recalled their theft a few hours ago, with both of them huddled on the top bunk in front of her mini laptop. Kouichi had injected a small dosage of anesthetics into his arm to insure he would stay asleep for the remainder of the ride, and then spent a few moments rifling through his pockets to locate his wallet. After finding it, she had passed the important cards over to Yui, and then sat silently by her side while Yui hacked his online accounts and transferred the money over. They hadn’t talked much, but as always, Yui’s retrospective guilt caused her to remember everything they said verbatim:

“His name is Kim Ryeowook,” Kouichi had whispered, glancing at the wallet cards as she climbed on top of the bed. “He’s twenty-four.”

Yui had grunted with concentration. “Well, that only makes him five years older than us, then.”

“Yeah…” Kouichi had said reflectively. And then her eyes had opened. “Wow,” she had gasped, as Yui successfully broke in, “He really is rich…”

“Wonder what he does for a job?”

“Must be a doctor or something.”

“With dyed red hair? And at twenty-four?”

Kouichi hadn’t responded then, mesmerized by the screen. But it had been Yui who brought it up—

“You know… if we took everything, we could go back home in less than a year,” she said quietly. She had then looked up to see how Kouichi would react—and was surprised to see conflict on her sister’s face. “But let’s not,” she had quickly added, already ashamed by her thoughts.

But Kouichi had merely nodded in assent. “Let’s just take the equivalent of about $100,000,” she had suggested in a murmur. “He won’t miss that.”

The door creak suddenly jolted Yui from her thoughts, and she looked up from the floor to see Kouichi reenter the compartment. Their eyes briefly met again and then broke apart; though from the corner of her eyes Yui noticed that Kouichi also glanced at Ryeowook, too, before stepping into the room. She picked herself off the floor.

The announcement speakers crackled. “Five minutes until we arrive at St. Petersburg. Passengers are requested to please assemble their luggage and pick up any trash…”

The two sisters exchanged another glance. Being closer to him, Yui took a breath and began prodding the sleeping passenger. “Excuse me, sir,” she said, unwittingly being reminded of their first encounter. “Sir… it’s time to wake up.” The man didn’t stir. “Sir?” she asked, prodding him harder.

Seeing her having difficulty, Kouichi walked over and started shaking him. “Wake up. Wake up!”

He still wasn’t responding. Yui paled. “Kouichi, what did we do? We didn’t poison him, ri—”

“No,” Kouichi said steadily. “Yui, calm down. You’re not thinking straight right now.” Though judging from the distracted look on her face, Yui took it that Kouichi wasn’t psychologically faring much better, either. “But I think I miscalculated the dosage… I might’ve given him slightly too much.”

“How did that happen? You never make mistakes!”

Kouichi bit her lip. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me right now,” she said, almost emotionally, and for a split second Yui saw confusion in her sister’s normally assertive gaze. But wait—? Before her brain had time to complete the thought, the engines whistled and both jolted as the train started slowing down.

“We have no choice. We’ll have to take him with us for now,” Yui said, gritting her teeth. She grabbed his arms and prepared to hoist him on her shoulders, but Kouichi intercepted her.

“I got it. You go ahead and grab your luggage from the top bunk.” Yui paused and looked at her for another second, but then relinquished his arms as she asked.

The trio made for a weird sight at the St. Petersburg train station that early morning. Kouichi quickly walked while hunched over, head bowed down under the weight of the person she was piggybacking; next to her, Yui simultaneously pushed and pulled and carried their excessive luggage over to the first bench she saw while awkwardly hoping no one would think too much of their situation.

Uncomfortable with the attention they were getting and deciding that Ryeowook didn’t need his sunglasses (why did he even have sunglasses in the first place? Yui couldn’t help wondering suspiciously) at the moment, Yui took them from his shirt pocket and placed them on her own face instead. Kouichi was understandably refusing to look up, so Yui figured that she didn’t need them too much, either. Through this method she deflected questioning stares and offers for help, though why she refused latter she wasn’t completely sure.

As they finally reached the benches, more than one moan escaped from their lips. Yui relieved herself of their entire luggage collection and turned to help Kouichi with hers, until she realized that the second moan had come from him. Ryeowook was finally waking up.

“Wh—what? Where am I?” he murmured sleepily, shifting his weight and rubbing his eyes. Then his eyes opened wide as he noticed his surroundings—“Oh! I’m so sorry!” he blurted out. Yui helped him off Kouichi’s back, and both sat on opposite sides of him as he tried to readjust himself on the bench. “Wh—what’s going on?” he asked wildly, evidently disturbed. “How did this”—he gestured indiscriminately, at a complete loss for words—“happen?”

Even though Yui foresaw this scene, she hadn’t planned a coherent explanation yet; she shot Kouichi a quick look and at once knew that she hadn’t prepared anything, either. Her sister’s face was beet-red and wore an expression that Yui couldn’t quite place. But there was no time to ponder that now.

“Um—” she said, thinking fast, “You slept really well on the train and wouldn’t wake up—we tried and everything and…” Well, that’s not exactly far from the truth, some cheeky part of her brain said sarcastically.

He frowned quizzically, giving her insufficient logic the skepticism it deserved. “I fell asleep…?” Yui nodded vigorously, inwardly willing her mind to work a bit faster. She was never good with lies; that was generally Kouichi’s department.

“It was very weird. We tried waking you when the conductor announced the fifteen minute mark, and then the five minute mark, and then…” she was rambling incoherently, and she knew it. “But you wouldn’t wake up,” she finished rather lamely.

Ryeowook subconsciously rubbed his arm, not realizing—Yui hoped—that he was touching the spot where Kouichi had sedated him hours ago. “But it’s so strange,” he mumbled. “How could I have slept that deeply…? Could it have been something I drank?” Yui’s blood ran cold.

“Um—yeah!” she blurted out, improvising frantically. “After you drank that vodka, you completely out! I mean fell asleep,” she corrected herself, not wanting to agitate him any more than she already had. Though she realized her crazy explanations weren’t helping.

“I drank vod—? No no, I didn’t drink anything alcoholic last night!” he exclaimed. “I’m sure of it!”

It was too late to back out of the lie. “Yes, you did. That’s why you don’t remember it now!”

“Then why don’t I have a hangover?”

Yui groaned. Having absolutely no experience with alcoholic beverages, she had no idea what the correct bodily responses were supposed to be. “Um… because it’s vodka?”

Ryeowook still didn’t look convinced. “I remember going to bed right away…” he said slowly. “When would I have time to drink vodka?” Yui inwardly face-palmed. Clearly, Kouichi had misjudged him when she called him clueless.

Kouichi finally spoke up. “It’s true,” she said, with an unusual awkwardness. She was looking at everywhere but him. “You just don’t remember.” He opened his mouth to protest when they were approached by some girls. If Yui hadn’t been so distracted, she would have noticed that they had been eyeing the group for some time.

“Excuse me,” one of them now said in accented Korean—the twins both raised their eyebrows—“Could you be… Super Junior’s Ryeowook?” There was a pause.

“Super who’s Ryeowook?” Kouichi blurted out.

After the Russian girls had collected their autographs and left, the three were finally left alone again. Both Yui and Kouichi were staring at Ryeowook with fresh eyes while he smiled weakly at them.

“Who are you?” Yui asked in awe.

“I’m Super Junior’s Kim Ryeowook,” he said, finally formally introducing himself. “The Hallyu band, Super Junior,” he clarified, seeing their still mystified facial expressions. When they still didn’t say anything, he tried one last time. “You know Super Junior?”

“My name is Yui,” Yui said, tactfully avoiding answering his question.

The next moment, she was mentally kicking herself for giving out her real name when Kouichi added, “And my name is Kouichi.”

Both girls bowed. “Nice to meet you.” Officially. He returned their bow.

“Thank you for helping me again,” he said politely, having evidently decided to drop the confusing situation from earlier.

“Please don’t worry about it,” Yui said, meaning her words literally. Then, perhaps to make it up to him somehow, she ventured her help one last time—“Is there a particular place you want to go to? We can help guide you there.”

“Ah… nowhere in particular. Maybe just a place to eat?” he suggested. At the mention of food, Yui suddenly heard her stomach growl treacherously, and without thinking, she clutched it, embarrassed. He laughed. “Shall we all eat together, then?”

They glanced at Kouichi, who was being strangely silent.

“Kouichi-chan?” Yui asked.

The rare usage of the feminine suffix attached to her sister’s name seemed to catch her attention, and she looked up, distracted. “Um, yeah, food sounds good,” she said without resistance.

Twenty minutes later, the three had sat down to a local Russian restaurant and were browsing the menus. Or more precisely, Yui was examining the dish selection, Kouichi was staring the cover with an unfocused facial expression, and Ryeowook was looking at the pretty pictures under the children’s menu.

A waitress approached them. “May I take your order?” Her eyes stayed on Ryeowook’s face just a bit longer. He smiled innocently at her and then turned to Yui for a translation.

“She’s asking what you want to eat,” Yui said automatically. Her tired brain suddenly shot into overdrive as she realized that she had no currency on hand. After everything that already conspired today, she couldn’t ask Ryeowook to pay. Chances were Kouichi didn’t stock up on rubles either.

Why, oh why, did she have to give in to her hunger pangs?  Just like always, she was being weak, the one dragging her sister down, the one with double standards as a pathetic excuse for morals...  Yui closed her eyes, trying to clear her head.

As if struck realizing the same monetary problem, across the table Kouichi appeared to have woken up from her phase and was swiftly rifling through her pockets; after a few moments, she audibly groaned with the same frustration Yui felt.

Ryeowook, who hadn’t noticed the twins’ sudden change in mood, had finally moved on past the children’s menu and located the alcoholic selection. “I would’ve wanted to order some vodka,” he mused out loud. “I’ve always wanted to try it. But after this morning… it’s so unfortunate that I cannot remember the experience,” he said regretfully.

“Um,” was Yui could manage to say.

Kouichi put down her menu. “We’re not hungry,” she said, lying through her teeth; as if on cue, Yui’s stomach let out another groan of complaint and she slammed her head onto the table out of embarrassment and frustration.

Ryeowook genuinely laughed, a feat which caused more than one female face to blush. “Your sister seems to be,” he kidded gently.

“My sister is also broke,” Kouichi said bluntly, and then flushed. From the table, Yui raised her head. Apparently Ryeowook’s laugh, probably also mixed with their empty stomachs and tired brains, had sufficiently disarmed her sister’s social discretion.

Meanwhile, the waitress, after listening to the Korean conversation for a good few minutes without leaving, finally seemed to sense that they weren’t ready to order. “Maybe I should come back another time?” she asked reluctantly, evidently not wanting to leave.

Kouichi dismissed her with a wave while Yui tried to explain in more socially acceptable terms to Ryeowook why they couldn’t eat with him.

He wasn’t having it. “If it is just money, don’t worry about it!” he reassured them generously. “I can treat you!” At that, Yui’s stomach churned again, and this time, it wasn’t due to hunger.

“We—we can’t,” she stammered. Beside her, Kouichi nodded, too, though with less assertion.

“Why not?”

“Be—because…it wouldn’t be right,” Yui continued to splutter gracelessly, feeling and sounding like a hypocrite. “We couldn’t…” Inwardly, she wondered why, of all the people she could have robbed, she had to steal from one who already had such a big heart.

“It’s quite alright,” he said blithely. “I can’t order without you two, anyway.”

Her hunger pangs getting worse, Yui could feel herself giving in. “That’s true,” she said weakly. Kouichi shifted uncomfortably. “Well—if you insist…”

He had already gone back to reviewing the menu. “What do you think of this one?” he asked, smiling, as he pointed to a picture of Borshch. Yui leaned over and began explaining the ingredients to him as Kouichi, now wearing a tiny smile of her own, flipped through the menu to choose the next dish.