“I don’t know you,” Moonbyul stated as she climbed down from the machine, inwardly fighting to keep herself calm. It would have sounded silly a few weeks ago, but she swore she could feel pure hostility radiating off the black-haired woman.

Solar stepped forward. “I do. You’re the woman who knows where Diana is.”

The woman glanced at Solar with impassive eyes. Not a single flicker of recognition or reaction at Diana’s name. “And who is that supposed to be?” She waved Solar away. “Doesn’t matter. I don’t know who you are anyway, nor do I care. I’m here for you.” She pointed and grinned at Moonbyul.

“Like I said, lady, I don’t know you.” Moonbyul reached for Solar’s arm, bracing herself and preparing to run away at the first possible opportunity.

Unfortunately for her, their adversary was more vigilant than anticipated. The woman quickly lashed out with her whip, catching Moonbyul on the back of her hand. “You really think you’re going to run away from us again?” she asked, lips curled into a sneer. “You got lucky the first time. There will not be a second.”

“I swear on Galileo’s balls, lady, I have no idea who you are and what you’re talking about!” Moonbyul shouted, confused and frustrated.

The dark-haired woman stared at Moonbyul. She cocked her head to the side, deep in thought. Then she grinned. “Will this jog your memory, then?” She lashed out again, the whip cutting through the air and slicing the gauze patch on Moonbyul’s forehead in half. She jabbed her finger at the exposed scar. “That is clear evidence that you are property of the Juris. And since I’m part of the Juris… It means you’re my property.”

Moonbyul gritted her teeth. “I’m no one’s property.”

“Oh, really? Does the name Hwasa mean nothing to you anymore?” The dark-haired woman stepped forward and kicked Moonbyul to the ground, pushing Solar aside as she did so.

Pinned under her boot, Moonbyul struggled to move, but every single movement seemed to grow more sluggish until she was lay limp. “What… did you do… to me?”

Hwasa coolly coiled her whip back and fastened it to her belt. “This was a little invention of yours, don’t you remember? A weapon that you made for me to keep people under control.”

“...I made a weapon?” As her world slowly turned dark, Moonbyul stared up at her attacker, fighting to remember, to understand. A single thought came to her with a jolt from the dark depths of her brain, a memory that was long lost of a smirking woman proudly receiving her newly made whip embedded with microscopic needles. “Hwasa. I remember you,” she breathed before passing out.

Hwasa smiled. “There we go. Time to go home.” She picked Moonbyul up by the suit and hauled the limp woman over her shoulder before turning around and walking away.

Sitting on the ground, Solar shook her head, regaining her senses. She rubbed at her eyes, wincing as the heat from the volcanic ash stung her exposed skin. Then, remembering where she was and what she was doing, quickly looked around for Moonbyul. She spied a retreating figure in the distance and scrambled to her feet. “Moonbyul!” she shouted, immediately breaking into a run. She grabbed the back of Hwasa’s suit and yanked back as hard as she could, but the woman did not move a muscle.

Hwasa glanced back and rolled her eyes. “What made you think that I’d even budge at a weak attempt like that?”

Growling, Solar lunged at Hwasa. Hwasa simply turned to one side, causing Solar to narrowly miss her target. “Look, you’re never going to be any match for me,” Hwasa stated. “Just give up. Leave. I don’t have any business with you.”

“No! You cannot take her away!” Solar grabbed Hwasa’s leg and desperately clung on.

Exasperated with the woman’s weak antics, Hwasa fished around in a pocket and came up with two small metal balls. She dropped them onto the ground face-down and stamped on them. Immediately the balls grew ten times in size, and from the sides shot out metal limbs resembling those of a spider, with claws that extended at the ends. Two circular eye-like discs appeared at one end of the body and flashed red, lasers shooting out from them, searching for their target.

Hwasa pointed at Solar. “Attack.”

The spider robots sprung into action, leaping at Solar and taking her down in one fell swoop. She lashed out, catching the robots on their hard body, but only succeeded in bruising her knuckles. As she struggled, pinned under the robots, she could see Hwasa walking away with Moonbyul over her shoulder past the horizon.

“No! Moonbyul!” Solar cried, shoving at the robots. She would not have someone she loved taken away from her.

Not again.

Solar began to feel something bubbling within her, very much like the magma that had once again started to seep out of the cracks. It burned like the sensation of touching the sun with bare hands, swelled like the crest of the sea over the shore, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.

A deep growl emerged from . Her skin began to quickly rise in temperature, intense heat emanating off her entire body and turning the metallic robots bright blue. Liquid steel fell in drops as she gripped the robots’ legs with her red-hot hands. Her eyes glowed bright gold, and with a terrifying roar she she blew the robots up to bits. She slowly got to her feet, body still burning bright as she walked away, leaving only charred circuitry and melted metal in her wake.

“Wait for me, Moonbyul. I’m coming.”

Stirring, Moonbyul found herself lying in the dark. Upon trying to reach out and get her bearings, she realised she did not have full control of her limbs. Her first attempt at lifting her arms failed; they remained as limp as wet spaghetti. Taking a deep breath, she tried again, stretching out as far as she could with whatever little energy she had in her… until her fingers met smooth, cold metal. She ran her hands along it, finding that the metal ran around and over her, as if she was contained in some box.

Okay, Byul, don’t panic, she told herself, trying to calm her rapidly beating heart. If you’re locked in somewhere, there’s gotta be a way to unlock it and get out. Right?

With that in mind, she began to feel around, pressing into every nook and cranny she could find. After a while, almost at the brink of giving up, her sensitive fingers found a small, nearly negligible latch just overhead. Years of figuring out the exact mechanics of dozens of machines finally came into fruition when she skilfully wiggled the miniature latch about until it quietly clicked into place.

“Yes!” Moonbyul allowed herself one tiny fist pump before her arms went limp again. She blinked wearily and sighed from exhaustion. Whatever Hwasa had done to her was taking effect, fast. Her eyes began to droop, and she had to shake her head to keep herself awake.

You gotta get out of here, Byul, you’re almost there. Nodding to herself, she steeled herself and tried pushing at the latch. A small stream of light poured through the crack where the lid separated from the rest of the box she was trapped in. Encouraged, her spirits lifted, she gathered all the energy in her body and pushed! Until the lid of the box swung open to reveal more darkness.

Dammit. Edging herself out of the box, she stumbled onto her hands and knees and, deciding to stay how she was, started to crawl around the room blind. It took her a long while of arduous, exhausting crawling until the crown of her head hit a wall. Wincing, she rubbed at her head and cursed silently. She pressed her hands against the wall and with careful movements pulled herself up until she was propped against the wall. Once again she slid her hands over its smooth surface, searching for a door, or even better, a light switch.

To her utter surprise -- not really, she admitted to herself once her excitement wore off, it was to be expected -- she did in fact find a light switch only a few steps away. She pressed it and watched the lights overhead flicker to life.

When her eyes adjusted to the obscene brightness of the fluorescent lights, Moonbyul found herself in a storage room of sorts. There were some unlabelled cardboard boxes in a corner, a few built-in shelves full of unknown items and/or weapons, and two long metal containers.

The lid of one of the containers was open. That, Moonbyul thought to herself with derision, is neither a comfortable nor a decent-looking box to lock people captive in at all. She tottered over to one of the transparent display shelves to further examine the items contained within.

The shelves were built tall so that they could hold as many weapons and gadgets as possible. And there were many, many gadgets. She slid aside one of the glass doors left unlocked and, reaching in, took out a small metal ball decorated with grooves and circular indentations.

“What are you supposed to be?” she asked the ball. It did not reply. Staring at the ball, she rotated it, trying to figure out its use, or even how to activate whatever it was supposed to be.

“Well, whatever.” She tucked it into the pocket of her space-suit and continued to rummage around. Over the course of minutes she managed to discover a plethora of gadgets that she did not know how to activate… and a penknife.

“Huh.” She folded the knife and slid it into her sleeve, just in case. “Right, let’s get outta here then.”

Turning away from the cache of unknown contraptions, she managed two steps before a crushing pain bloomed in her head, causing her to groan and collapse where she stood. She clutched her head, willing the pain to just go away. It seared like lightning into the scar above her left eye and burned like a thousand fires. Crying from the unbearable pain, the only thing Moonbyul could do was curl up into a ball and press a shaky hand to her scar.

“Someone,” she whispered hoarsely, curling up in the fetal position, “please help me. Please.”

The little ball she had pilfered rolled out of her pocket, and she watched as it rolled, unhindered, until it lightly tapped against a wall. The ball shivered and unfurled itself into the form of a robotic hedgehog.

Still in pain, Moonbyul gaped at it. “What the actual .”

Wobbling on its tiny legs, the hedgehog sniffed -- if a robot could sniff -- and scurried towards her. It butted its head against her forehead as if trying to console her. Odd as it may be, it did give her a sense of comfort and made her feel a little bit better. Propping herself up on her elbows, she ran her fingers over its spines, feeling out its casted shape and cold smoothness, forcing herself to think about mining for the materials and manufacturing the miniature hedgehog.

Anything to distract her from the pain.

As she petted the hedgehog, she felt one of the spines shift under her touch and prick her hand. Startled, she quickly withdrew her hand and stared in surprise at the needle sticking out of her palm.

She glared at the hedgehog still nuzzling its nose against her other hand. “Dude, really?” Shifting, she yanked the needle out of her palm and chucked it aside. A drop of blood dripped from the puncture wound onto the floor, and the hedgehog rushed at it. Leaning down, it touched its nose to the blood droplet. Its eyes flashed red, and with a shudder, curled up into a spiky ball and shot itself towards Moonbyul, embedding its spines into her hands.

Moonbyul yelped and flailed in pain. Pushing herself into a sitting position -- not easy with a spiky metal animal stuck on one’s hand -- she growled at the hedgehog that by now had unfurled itself and was lying on her hand. “Not cool, little dude.”

Just as she was about to throw the hedgehog as far away from her as she could, she felt the pain in her hand receding, like a soothing balm being applied on a burn. And like the sea as it washes away from the shore, she could feel -- actually feel -- her body gaining strength. Her headache slowly subsided, and the feverish heat within her was no more.

She gaped at the hedgehog nestled in her palm. “D-did you do this?”

The hedgehog blinked at her, and with the grace of a toddler, tumbled out of her hand and landed on the floor. It scurried off, headed towards an seemingly normal wall… then squeezed its metal body through a nearly invisible gap at the joint where wall met floor.

Intrigued, in pursuit of the hedgehog, Moonbyul got on all fours and crawled towards the space where the hedgehog had disappeared. Flattening herself, she squinted in search of the small sliver of light coming from the gap. She poked at the gap and felt, just very slightly, the wall give way under her touch.

She grinned. Very, very clever.

Taking this as encouragement, she hurriedly jumped to her feet and leaned her weight on the door. Digging her heels into the floor, she pushed with whatever strength the hedgehog had given her.

The door opened under the force, swinging aside so she toppled through the doorway. Fortunately, she was quick enough to regain her balance, grabbing the nearest object available to steady herself.

She found herself standing in a long corridor -- plain, unadorned except for a large insignia painted on the wall. On one side of the corridor were doors; on the other, exactly four window panels. She pressed her face against one of the glass panels and peered out. Judging by the cracks formed by lava eruption and the rocks that formed upon cooling, she guessed that she was still on Io. Definitely a good sign, she knew. Better to be kidnapped in a familiar enough place than stranded in space alone.

And maybe, she thought to herself, maybe Solar would find her. Or if she managed to get out of here, wherever she was, she would find Solar instead.

The woman on Moonbyul’s mind was currently tracking Hwasa’s footsteps, her keen eyes noticing every fine detail needed to hunt down her quarry. This exercise proved itself extremely difficult, as lava may erupt where a dusty footprint would be, covering the track with bubbling magma and breaking her focus. She knew that every second wasted having to look for Hwasa’s tracks again was a second closer to possibly losing Moonbyul forever. And who knew where Hwasa would take her?

It would be basically impossible for her to chase after Hwasa, too, if she really decided to fly away from Io with Moonbyul. How would she conduct an inter-planetary chase if she didn’t know how to operate a space shuttle?

Huffing and puffing and her head a whirlpool of worries, Solar almost missed the rather large spaceship standing just a few paces away. And it was, she realised, really quite ginormous, with all its windows glittering and its ellipsoid body standing on bent leg-like appendages.

This had to be it.

She did a quick jog around the spaceship, trying to find a way into it without alerting anyone in the ship and keeping a lookout for Hwasa at the same time. She ducked and weaved under the window panes lest someone peeked out of one of them and spotted her. Try as she may, she just could not find a single way into the spaceship.

How did people enter without a single door to be found? Crawling on her hands and knees, she burrowed under the spaceship, her fingers digging into the underside to look for kinks, but to no avail. The ship was as sturdy and impenetrable as the damn Labyrinth of Crete.

Grunting in frustration, Solar punched the belly of the ship, rapping her knuckles against the hard steel frame. Unsurprisingly, her knuckles immediately turned a blistering red colour, and she yelped in pain. “Oh my father, that hurts!” she snapped at the ship… Then punched the ship in the exact same spot again, even harder. “Just open, will you?”

Above her, the ship shuddered to life. Jolting in shock, Solar immediately started backing away from the ship, wiggling out from under it as it swayed on its spindly legs. She gaped in amazement as the spaceship rose to its full height, standing at a height at least twice of hers. The part of the ship’s belly where she had foolishly punched it let out a frothy hissing sound. A rectangular seam slowly became visible as light began to shine through the growing gap. The seam grew and grew until the rectangle became a platform that descended rather majestically before her.

Standing there with agape, Solar nearly failed to notice the pair of boots standing on the platform. She quickly scurried away, hiding behind one of the legs of the spaceship, and watched as a figure clad in a plain white spacesuit nimbly hopped off the platform. The figure -- gender unidentifiable due to the looseness of the spacesuit and the helmet over their head -- placed a hand on the side of their helmet and spoke in a garbled voice. They waited a few moments, presumably for a reply, then dashed off.

This was the opportunity she was waiting for. Solar took her chance and leaped onto the platform. As it began to ascend, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. If Moonbyul wasn’t here, she would have made a huge mistake. But her instincts were telling her that Moonbyul was definitely on this spaceship.

She had to be.

Moonbyul sat bewildered in a corner of a brightly lit bathroom. Just moments ago she was wandering the quiet corridors of the spaceship, searching for the hedgehog that had somehow vanished from sight. Opening all the doors didn’t do her any good; all she found was an assortment of bedrooms, lounge rooms, an excessively large gym, and one cleaning closet. The last door she found led to another corridor, and seeing no other direction to go but forward, she had continued on.

The next door she opened led to a bathroom, equipped with a toilet, a luxurious bathtub, a large sink, and a very abstract aesthetic. A plain, undecorated mirror was propped on the wall above the sink, holding its own amongst abstract paintings that graced the walls of the room. Moonbyul looked behind her, back into the dark and narrow corridor with its many doors, and then back at the brilliant washroom. “Huh. Weird.”

Just as she stepped into the bathroom, the floor beneath her feet began to rumble and tilt, Moonbyul swaying with it. The rapidly rising ground caused her to topple over, and she tucked herself away in a corner just in case things began to fall.

She waited until the movement of the spaceship, rising and falling like the chest of a sleeping giant, came to a halt. “What was that?” she wondered, getting to her feet.

Bewildered, she left the artistic bathroom. Just outside was the little metal hedgehog from before, curled up into a ball and rolling around. When it spotted her, it quickly unfurled itself and sniffed at her boots.

“There you are. Where did you go? I couldn’t find you at all,” Moonbyul reprimanded it as she crouched down to pick it up. The hedgehog whined and scuttled away from her touch.

“Hey, what was that about?” Moonbyul complained, following the hedgehog as it made its way down the corridor. She turned the corner, keeping her eyes on the robotic animal. It turned into a ball and rolled until it bumped into a pair of boots. The hedgehog, squealing, scampered in circles around the boots.

Moonbyul glanced up, her eyes tracking up from the oddly familiar looking boots up to their owner’s face. That long pink hair was unmistakable, and when she turned to look at Moonbyul, the fire in blazing gold eyes instantly fizzled out, settling back to their original, friendly brown.

Both women stood there, dumbstruck, both unable to make the first move. Moonbyul realised she had been unconsciously holding her breath, and she exhaled, relieved. She attempted a lopsided grin and raised an awkward hand in greeting. “Hey.”

“Hello,” Solar whispered, not believing her luck. She took a shaky step forward, then sprinted towards Moonbyul, wrapping her in a tight embrace. “I found you. I actually found you,” she mumbled into Moonbyul’s shoulder.

Moonbyul hesitated -- but only for a few seconds -- before she returned the hug. Solar was so warm and her touch so tender Moonbyul could almost sink into a deep, comfortable sleep. Then she remembered where they were and jerked back. “What are you doing here? We’re on Hwasa’s shuttle! It’s not safe.”

Solar frowned. “I know. But I had to find you.”

“Well… Wait. But how did you get in here?”

Solar pointed behind her. “There was an opening under the shuttle. I saw someone leave the shuttle and came in here before it closed.”

“So you know where the exit is?” Moonbyul grabbed her hand excitedly. “What are we waiting for, then? Let’s get out of here.”

As Moonbyul followed Solar to the exit, a thought crossed her mind. “But how did you know where I was? This spaceship’s pretty big, you know.”

Solar pointed to the hedgehog running alongside them in answer. Moonbyul laughed in disbelief and winked at the hedgehog. “You seem to really be saving our asses today, aren’t ya?”

Solar pointed at a door before them. “This one! I came in from this room.”

As she reached for the door, the hedgehog started to shiver, and it uttered a terrified squeak. Its eyes flashed red and it scratched at Moonbyul’s leg. Moonbyul scooped its trembling body up.

“Is there something wrong?” Solar asked.

Moonbyul glanced at the hedgehog in her hands, then at Solar. “I think it’s telling us to not go in there.”

Solar cocked her head. “Why?”

Moonbyul narrowed her eyes and hushed Solar. Leaning forward, she pressed her ear against the door. Her eyes widened when she heard the sound of muted conversation from the other side.

“Do you hear something?” Solar asked.

Moonbyul nodded and pressed a finger to her lips. “Voices,” she whispered. “We can’t go in. We’ll get caught. Gotta go somewhere else.”

“But this is the only exit,” Solar argued.

“Then we gotta stay here,” Moonbyul hissed back. “Don’t worry. If Hwasa really does know where Diana is, then she’ll basically lead us to her. Ain’t that great?”

“Well, yes, but…” How could Solar tell her that it still didn’t make it right, that Moonbyul’s safety was more important than her finding Diana? After meeting Callisto, Solar started to have her doubts regarding Diana. She didn’t even remember why she was so desperate to find her. Was Diana really her lover, or just someone pretending to be one for her own amusement?

Why did relationships have to be so frustratingly confusing?

“Hey, you okay?” Moonbyul gently touched her shoulder. “Look, I hear them coming. We gotta go hide somewhere.”

Taking Solar’s hand again, Moonbyul led her back to the storage room where she had woken up in and sat her down. “This room should be pretty safe. It doesn’t look like anyone really comes in here, and if they do, the hedgehog will alert us.” She peered at Solar’s face again. “You ain’t looking so well. You okay?”

“I’m… just nervous, I think. And I’m not very sure what happens after I find Diana. What will happen to us?”

“I guess you’ll both kinda run away or something. Escape? I mean, you could try to assimilate into society and work and stuff, right?” Moonbyul laughed at the idea of Solar attempting to work at a mine.

“Not Diana and me,” Solar said quietly. “I meant you and me.”

“Oh. Well.” Moonbyul scratched her head in thought. “We’ll still be friends, right? So I guess I’d just be sticking around after everything.”

Solar smiled at her and stuck out her little finger. “Promise?”

Moonbyul nodded and intertwined their little fingers together. “Promise.”

author notes about this chapter: i wrote the latter half of this chapter while listening non-stop to Sam Kim's Sun and Moon. it's just kind of really the vibe i was going for at the end when they met again. that's all. pls listen to it his latest album's beautiful.

warning: me talking about things. 

heyo dear readers. it me. sorry for taking ages to update, i'd move faster if i could. except, yknow, brain. and after writing reports for a whole sem, you kinda don't wanna write anymore. you feel? heck, at one point i didn't even wanna open a word doc. anyway. finals are gonna start in less than a week so i sat myself down and was like "ash you gotta write bc there's stuff buzzing in your system and if you don't do it now you'll never do it until the end of your internship in feb" so i smashed out half the chapter today. and guess what? it all flowed without me having to force the words outta me. so that's great. :D

but thank you so much to all of you readers who take the time to open this story and read it and leave comments and upvotes and that kind of stuff. it really means a lot to me, and by that i mean i actually screenshot some of your comments so i can look at them again when i'm tired and it gives me lots of energy so i hope reading this does the same to you too. every comment, whether it's about how something made you feel or a speculation of what's going to happen in the story or even just a keyboard smash, they mean a lot to me. heck, they mean a lot to every writer/artist/etc out there. we're really grateful to you all. i'm having a lot of feels writing this, can you tell?

anw. thanks so much for your support, and i'll try to start writing the next chapter as soon as i can (which is after finals ofc guys i take my studies very seriously unlike some of my lecturers hmph) but thank you!!! <3