Irene woke up long before Yerim did, and crept her way out of the younger girl’s arms as carefully as she could. The black-haired girl found herself brushing her fingers against the crystal multiple times as she made her way to the washroom. She was deep in her thoughts when she entered the room, unaware that someone else was emerging from one of the shower stalls. Irene had already began brushing her teeth when she noticed Seulgi toweling off behind her, absentmindedly humming as if she didn’t have a care in the world.

“Hey, Seul,” Irene said without turning.

“Hi, Irene. I feel like we haven’t talked in forever.”

Irene finished brushing her teeth and spit into the sink before turning around to face the monolidded girl.

“Me too,” Irene said, sighing, “How have you been?”

Seulgi laughed, eliciting a confused look from Irene.

“Sorry, that’s just such a casual question. I’m just not used to that kind of stuff… Jisoo is really amazing, and we managed to make it here alive, so it’s gotta be at least somewhat good, right? What about you?”

“Besides the fact that the fate of an entire world rests in my hands, it’s been alright.” Irene said, trying to muster up a smile. Seulgi’s expression immediately shifted from lighthearted to concerned.

“I’m worried about it, too. It’s a lot. But we made the right choice. It’s not our decision-”

“I’ve already heard this enough from Yeri,” Irene interrupted, raising her hand to stop Seulgi before she could continue her monologue, “I’m going to do it, you don’t need to convince me.”

Seulgi gave Irene a worried look and opened to say something. Before she could, the ground began to shake. Unlike the previous tremors, which had started slowly and evolved into full earthquakes, this event was immediately powerful; more powerful than any of the ones before it.

Irene grabbed onto the sink beside her to prevent herself from falling, and Seulgi, who had nothing to grab onto, dropped to the tiled floor and covered her head. The mirrors were beginning to rattle dangerously, so Irene pulled herself under the sink, jamming her body up against the piping. As she did so, several of the mirrors began to drop, and shattered glass littered the floor.

“Jesus Christ!” Seulgi yelled.

As Seulgi finished her sentence, Irene felt a deep reverberating in her stomach that had nothing to do with the tremor. It was as if her very soul was being shaken, and it was the most painful thing she had ever experienced. The feeling traveled throughout her entire body, and she felt herself losing complete control. Her hands moved of their own accord, down to her belt, onto the loop that secured the crystal in place; it was then that she knew what was happening. The Living Mountain was trying to get her to use the crystal.

Irene fought as hard as she could, but found that the only things she had control over were involuntary functions of her body. She was able to slow the movements of her hand, but ceasing them and regaining control was impossible.

“Seulgi!” she called, speaking as fast as she could, lest the Mountain take control of her speech as well, “You need to stab me in the hand!”

“What?” Seulgi began crawling over the floor to get to Irene, moving painfully slow as the earthquake continued, “Are you ing insane? What-”

Seulgi paused when saw Irene’s hand clutching the necklace. The older girl’s terrified eyes were leaking tears now.

“Please Seulgi! The mountain’s trying to make me put it on!”

Seulgi snatched up the nearest large shard of glass, the shaking of the ground causing it to move around and lacerate the inside of her palm. She ignored the pain and took a moment to mentally curse herself as she the jagged end into the back of Irene’s hand.

The older girl let out a cry and was able to regain her capacities. She dropped the crystal and fell to the floor, holding her injured hand. Just as she did so, the quake ended.

Seulgi rushed over to take Irene in her arms, holding the damaged girl as she sobbed uncontrollably.

***

Jennie awoke before any of the other girls did. She was in her usual spot, her head resting on Rosé’s chest and her face covered by a curtain of her lover’s hair. Rosé had often asked her how she managed to sleep in such an uncomfortable position, but Jennie had always waved off the younger girl. In truth, Jennie just enjoyed hearing Rosé’s heartbeat and smelling her sweet fragrance. It was more difficult for the black-haired girl to sleep when she wasn’t in that exact position, and in Rosé’s absence, Jennie rarely was able to rest for more than a few hours at a time.

Jennie wrapped her arms tighter around Rosé and buried her face deeper into the girl’s s, inadvertently waking her.

“Not so tight, Jennie,” the violet-haired girl whined sleepily, “You’re gonna break my ribs.”

“Oh, sorry,” Jennie whispered, relenting, “I just wanted to be as close to you as possible.”

Rosé laughed softly and kissed Jennie on the forehead. They lay there for awhile, enjoying the simple act of being in physical contact with one another.

“Did you hear them last night?” Jennie asked, breaking the comfortable silence, “I was trying so hard not to laugh. All she did was get and she was practically crying.”

“Oh hush,” Rosé replied, playfully smacking her partner on the arm, “They just like to be gentle, is all. Not everyone wants to be spanked like you do.”

Jennie turned her face up to kiss Rosé on the cheek.

“They’d probably want it just same if they’d ever slept with you,” the black-haired girl shuddered and resisted the urge to touch herself as she reminisced, “God, I want you to my brains out so badly right now.”

“Not here. Maybe in the shower. We’d be way too loud here.”

“Whatever...” Jennie said, pouting, “Do you think BP has any strap-on toys lying around?”

Before Rosé could tell Jennie how ridiculous that idea was, the ground began to shake violently. Both girls were thrown from the bed onto the floor. The quake was powerful enough to knock Joy and Wendy down from their bed as well, causing them to hit the ground with loud yelps of surprise and pain.

“What the ?” Joy yelled, wrapping an arm around a disoriented Wendy to keep her grounded. Jennie would have done the same to Rosé had the violet-haired girl not already been clinging to one of the bolted-down feet of the bed for support.

“The mountain!” Rosé yelled, “What’s up with Wendy?”

Jennie looked over at the blonde girl. She wasn’t trying to anchor herself properly, leading Joy to have to completely pin her to the ground with her free arm. She didn’t even look conscious.

“Did the fall knock her out?” Jennie asked.

“I don’t think so, she was just bracing herself a second ago!”

There was the sound of shattering glass followed by a scream, causing Jennie to look towards the door.

“Glad to see everyone else is enjoying this.” she said through gritted teeth.

The quake went on for about a minute more before ceasing completely. The three conscious girls looked around at one another, all equally confused as to how such a large seismic event had stopped so soon. Wendy was moving now, curled up into a ball and crying. Her eyes were shut tightly and moved as if she were having a nightmare.

“Wendy! Wendy come on, snap out of it!” Joy said desperately, shaking the small blonde, but to no avail, “This must be one of those visions she was talking about.”

Just as Jennie and Rosé regained their footing and moved over to where Wendy lay, the seizing girl stopped her movements and relaxed. She gradually uncurled her body and opened her eyes.

“Wendy, what did you see?” Joy asked, concern filling her voice.

“We’re all in terrible danger,” Wendy said, looking around frantically, “We have to go now. The world is ending, right ing now.”

“Don’t be all vague for dramatic effect,” Jennie said, earning a punch on the arm from Rosé and a death glare from Joy, “Just tell us exactly what you saw.”

“Right… sorry,” Wendy said, sitting up and collecting herself, “First, I saw that same black mist as before. It was rushing our way, through the jungle and the snowy area and the city. And in front of the mist was an army of zombies. There had to be hundreds of thousands of them, probably more. Literally from all sides. And in front of the zombies was this army of these weird, cat-like things made out of the black mist. They were moving the fastest. And I don’t know why, but they’re all coming this way.”

Jennie felt go dry.

“Then we have to go...” Rosé said, grabbing Jennie by the arm, “We’ll go get the others together. You guys get BP and start gearing up. I guess it’s time.”

***

Yerim sprinted out of her room and down the hallway, blood trickling from the fresh gash on her forehead. Of course there was an earthquake while she was asleep, of course she would hit her head right on the side of the bed that was sharpest, of course Irene wasn’t there when she woke up, and of course she would hear a distressed scream from the washroom that sounded suspiciously like her absent bedmate.

The redhead stopped at Lisa’s door for a brief moment, listening to the cacophony of barks that were coming from inside. She contemplated going in to check on Lisa first. Before she could decide, she heard the sound of another door opening behind her. She turned around to see Joy and Wendy running down the hall in the opposite direction, towards the elevator. A second later, Rosé and Jennie ran out of the room, heading straight for Yerim this time. When they reached her, they both spoke at once.

“We have to go!”

“What happened to your head?”

“The earthquake. Where’s Irene?” Yerim asked seriously.

“Was she not with you?” Jennie asked.

“If she ing used that crystal I’ll ing kill her!” Yerim lost complete control, shocking both of the younger girls into silence.

“Damn Yeri, you’re kinda hot when you’re mad.” Lisa said, stumbling out of her room with a goofy smile plastered on her face, “Sorry about the smell, that earthquake didn’t agree with my stomach. What’s up?”

Just then, Seulgi came barreling out of the washroom, accompanied by a crying Irene. The older girl was cradling her hand, which was wrapped in a blood-soaked towel. Yerim felt relief wash over her when she noticed the crystal still on Irene’s belt, followed by guilt-ridden concern at the older girl’s wound.

“Unnie!” Yerim yelled, running forward to inspect Irene, “Unnie what happened to you?!”

“Piece of glass.” Seulgi said shortly, “Let’s take her to BP.”

“Yeri, your head!” Irene said, reaching out to touch the younger girl. Yerim took Irene’s outstretched, uninjured hand and kissed it.

“It’s just a scratch. You’re much worse.”

“Guys, we have to hurry up,” Rosé said, “We’ll explain later if we have the time but the world is ending and we need to go stop it.”

“So soon?” Lisa said, her previously jocular expression switching to one of horror.

“Wendy saw it in a vision. We have to go get ready. Stop wasting ing time and let’s go to BP!” Jennie said, taking off.

“Wait!” Yerim said, “Where’s Jisoo?”

“She should already be there! She woke up early and decided to go check out the weapons room. Come on!” Seulgi said.

Rosé called the six dogs over, and together, the group began sprinting down the hall.

Yerim couldn’t help but feel that they were marching to their deaths.

***

Jisoo walked from shelf to shelf of the weapons cache, inspecting the foreign armaments with the eye of a woman who had dealt with such things many times before. Although she was unfamiliar with most of the gadgets, she could glean what their basic functions were; most of them were laser guns and swords, while others were combat pieces that were clearly meant to enhance the user’s physical abilities. She was especially interested in the latter, for she knew the she was most useful in all out, close-quarters brawl.

Dalgom followed her around wherever she went, constantly nuzzling her or her hand when he felt hasn’t receiving enough attention. Jisoo had been overjoyed when she’d been reunited with her long-lost best friend, although the circumstances of their meeting were not very jovial. Still, she tried to spend as much time as possible with him before the end.

BP was somewhere else in the massive room, tending to any of the tools he deemed as “in unacceptable condition”. Jisoo had offered to help him out, but he’d declined, stating that the level of expertise required for the repairs he made was out of her scope of abilities. The robot was stereotypically straightforward.

As Jisoo was trying on a form-fitting glove that, according to the label below it, was purported to increase the user’s strength by fifty fold, the earthquake struck.

Dalgom fell into a frenzy of barks and whimpers as weapons began tumbling off the shelves and onto the ground. Several sirens began to whirr, and Jisoo fell to the ground. The disoriented girl started an army crawl across the ground, moving as quickly as possible, dodging the falling weapons as she went. The wolf seemed to be having a much easier time in keeping his footing when compared to Jisoo, and was already far ahead of her. Jisoo’s crawl was effective, but the falling projectiles were coming in such large numbers that it was inevitable that one of them would land on her at some point. Still, she braced herself and continued on.

Dalgom was already at the end of the aisle when he turned to look for his master. When he saw the predicament she was in (the falling weapons were landing closer and closer to her, and she was starting to tire from dodging them constantly), the dog bolted forward, bounding over the shaking ground with large leaps. His method of movement prevented the earthquake from affecting him too much, and in seconds he was able to clamp his jaws around the back of Jisoo’s shirt and drag her to safety. The girl then spent the remainder of the quake lying on the ground with her hands covering her head, just like her father had taught her. Dalgom stood over her, growling low and covering her body with his own. Although they were out of immediate danger for now, the dog still felt that it was necessary to protect her. It warmed Jisoo’s heart.

An abrupt ending to the event caused her stomach to lurch, and she sat up slowly to avoid vomiting.

The weapons room was a mess. Many of the objects had fallen onto the ground and gotten damaged; chunks of metal and other structural materials littered the floor. The sirens in the room were still blaring, their red lights flashing on and off.

BP seemed to pop up out of nowhere in front of Jisoo, his green light flickering, several cracks having appeared in his metallic skeleton.

“BP, you’re hurt!” Jisoo was forced to project her voice more than usual due to the severely increased sound-level.

“The damage I have sustained is superficial. You appear to be unharmed as well, apart from some minor bruising and mild hemorrhage in your l area, the latter of which can be attributed to your menstrual cycle.” the robot said matter-of-factly.

“You sure are observant…” Jisoo said, holding back a grin, “What was that anyway? The mountain again?”

“Yes,” BP’s voice becoming significantly more melancholy, “It appears that our time is short. Much shorter than I initially anticipated. We must alert the others that immediate action is necessary.”

Jisoo nodded gravely.

“I’ll go get them.”

As she was about to depart, the large double doors of the exit burst open, causing Dalgom to break into a fit of barks as two girls stumbled into the room. When the dog realized that it was Wendy and Joy, he relaxed and returned to sitting by Jisoo’s feet.

Both girls were out of breath, but Joy was more capable of speaking.

“Wendy had another vision,” the tall girl said, “Literally everything is coming to kill us, right now.”

Jisoo took a deep breath and took Joy by her shoulders, steadying her.

“Slow down. What’s going on exactly?”

Jisoo’s calmness helped Joy to clear her own head, and she was able to fully explain the vision that Wendy had. The blonde girl nodded here and there throughout Joy’s explanation, holding her side and standing doubled over as she recovered from the mad dash they’d just undergone.

“I will check the scanners to confirm this.” BP said, running off to the opposite end of the weapons room.

“Jennie and Rosie are rounding up the other girls now,” Wendy said, “I think we should start preparing to scale the mountain.”

The other two girls agreed and they began to look through the scattered weapons. Thankfully, most of the equipment was still intact; whatever the items were made out of, they were certainly durable.

Jisoo returned to the shelf she had previously been at and procured a full set of the enhancement gear. It was bulkier than the bodysuits that the other girls wore, but it covered her entire body with an alloy that had the same look and feel of BP’s skeleton. As she moved around in the armor, she could feel the added strength; if she wasn’t careful, she could literally crack the floor with this. She took some time to get used to the enhancements as she looked around for weapons that Lisa, Rosé, and Jennie would use. As she did so, the rest of the girls entered the room in much the same way that Joy and Wendy had. They were followed by the remainder of Dalgom’s pack.

“Where’s that stuff you guys used for Joy’s cut yesterday?” Seulgi asked, guiding Irene into the room. Jisoo felt a pang of jealousy at how tenderly Seulgi caressed the wounded girl.

“Give me a sec, I think I remember where it is!” Wendy said, running off down one of the aisles. She returned hastily, carrying three tubes of the miracle cream.

Seulgi began applying the ointment to Irene’s hand (another pang of jealousy struck Jisoo’s stomach) and Lisa began applying the ointment to Yerim’s head wound.

BP returned from checking the scanners, and when he spoke, his voice was grave and almost panicked.

“The scanners indicate an innumerable amount of undead approaching our location. Additionally, the seismic activity within the volcano indicates that an eruption is imminent.”

“All we already know, BP,” Jennie said, rushing to Jisoo’s side, “Let’s get armed and get out there!”

“We can’t just run in there without a plan, Jennie,” Jisoo said, pointing at Irene, “The whole point of our efforts are to get that crystal to the top of the mountain.”

“About that…” Jennie muttered, “I say one of us holds the crystal and does it instead.

We’re far more capable of defending it than her.”

“Hey,” Seulgi said, looking up from tending to Irene’s hand, “Back off. It’s not like she chose to be given the crystal.”

“Don’t start this now.” Jisoo interrupted Jennie before the fiery girl could retort, “Jennie, you know it was never our job to take that crystal up there. The most we can do is them.”

“ them, of course,” Jennie said, turning to walk away, “Because apparently in this whole big thing, we’re just the ing side characters.”

Rosé gave Jisoo a worried look before following after Jennie, disappearing down one of the empty aisles.

“Anyway,” Jisoo said, trying to contain her frustration, “I think it’s best if we let BP lead us up the mountain, and surround Irene with Jennie, Lisa, and Seulgi. Joy and Wendy should take point with me, Yerim, and Rosie, and the dogs can guard our sides. Sound good to everyone?”

“I’m sure Jennie will be absolutely thrilled about you splitting her and Rosie up...” Joy said, taking Wendy by the arm and guiding her to find supplies.

“But we’re in.” Wendy added.

“I’m not too thrilled about you splitting us up, Jisoo,” Seulgi said, giving the younger girl a sad look, “But I’m gonna trust your instincts.”

Jisoo smiled reassuringly.

“If Seulgi’s okay with it, so am I.” Irene said, giving the monolidded girl a look of adoration. The older girl sure did know how to push people’s buttons, didn’t she?

“You know that I’m down for any of your plans, Jisoo.” Lisa never failed to make Jisoo feel relaxed, even in a situation as dire as this one, “What about you, Yeri?”

Yerim nodded, seemingly lost in her own thoughts.

Jisoo finally turned to BP, who had been relatively quiet up until that point.

“And you, BP?” Jisoo asked, walking over to the robot, “You’re pretty much the most integral part of the plan here.”

“Why would I refuse? It’s not like I have anything better to do.”

There was a few seconds of silence before Yerim snorted, causing the entire group of girls to fall into fits of laughter.

***

When Irene and Yerim's wounds had been taken care of, the group went about gearing themselves up as best as possible for the coming events. Rosé, Lisa, Jisoo, Jennie and Seulgi knew their strengths the best. Rosé equipped herself with two laser swords and a shotgun that fired plasma pellets rather than shot. Jennie chose an automatic laser rifle and a belt full of grenades that, according to BP, would tear apart the molecules of any organic matter within a twenty-five foot blast radius. Jisoo chose only the power suit that she had already been wearing (at BP’s insistence, however, she did clip a single laser pistol to her belt). Lisa took a backpack full of the medical ointments, a laser sniper rifle, and one of the laser swords. Seulgi insisted on using her revolver, so BP resigned to providing her with plasma-tipped bullets for the weapon.

The other girls required more test runs. Yerim and Wendy were perfectly content with taking another pair of laser pistols each. Joy enjoyed the feel of the automatic laser rifle, and while she was resigned to the fact that her shooting skills would never be on par with Jennie’s, she could still hold her own. Irene had at first requested the same, but upon feeling the heft of the gun in her arms, she chose to follow the same path as Yerim and Wendy.

Unfortunately for the wolves, none of the weapons were designed for their use; however, Rosé, Irene and Joy assured the other girls that Dalgom’s pack could more than fend for themselves, and that there was no need to worry about leaving the dogs unarmed.

BP outfitted himself with twin laser pistols, a laser sniper rifle, and a laser sword. Additionally, he replaced some sections of his normally slender body with thicker, more reinforced versions.

As Wendy and Joy waited for everyone else to prepare, they sat in the back corner of the room, Joy’s arm draped over Wendy’s shoulders. The blonde girl tried to get in as much time with her significant other as possible before they dove into the unknown.

“Hey, Joy? Can I tell you something?”

“Yeah, what’s up?” Joy said, lifting her head from the top of Wendy’s and turning to look at the shorter girl.

“I know you’re probably sick of hearing this kind of , but I have a really bad feeling about going out there. Like a feeling that some of us might not make it out.”

“Why do you say that? Did you see something in your visions?” Joy asked, her brow furrowing in concern.

“Kind of,” Wendy said, sighing in nervousness, “There’s this one vision I have where there’s this monster, at the very top of the volcano. I can’t see what it looks like exactly, but it shoots projectiles out. And after that, there’s a scream. And then nothing.”

Joy was quiet for a moment, running her fingers through Wendy’s locks, curling and uncurling them as she thought of a response.

“I’ll be frank, Wen. I don’t know what that means at all. And it does sound bad. But we’re here, and we’re doing this. For better or for worse, we’re all in. I’m sorry that I don’t have a better answer to that.”

“It’s okay, Joy,” Wendy said, pressing her forehead to the younger girl’s, “No matter what happens out there, I…”

The blonde paused, searching for the correct way to word her feelings for the girl who had gone to such lengths to take care of her. The girl who was responsible for her survival, who helped her feel comforted when she was alone, who could make Wendy’s heart swell with emotion through little more than a glance.

“I love you, Wendy.” Joy whispered, stealing the words from her partner’s lips. Wendy smiled and felt tears of sadness and mirth welling up in her eyes.

“I love you too.”

They sat together and cried silently, mourning for all the lost time they could have had ahead of them. They were like that until Jisoo came to tell them it was time to go.

------------------------

So I decided to split this chapter up into two parts because I didn't think that you guys would enjoy reading a 20-35 page chapter. This is definitely entirely a setup chapter... SORRY ): But I hope it gets you hyped for the next part. Thanks for reading<3

Also, yes, I'm gonna tease you with some RoJennie kinkiness and not follow up on it yet (:<