o35

Robber

Darkness greeted Jinqiong when she opened her eyes. Darkness and warmth, and then she realized just why it was so dark and the warmth seemed to disappear.

She sat up abruptly, shoving the blankets off her and reached for the wall on her left to support herself. Her hand hit the surface harder than she expected, apparently having overestimated the distance, and Jinqiong swore loudly.

“You’re awake,” Jongdae said as she cradled her hand to her chest. She tried to look in his direction, but it was impossible when all she could see was darkness. Jinqiong bit down the frustration, then the fright. She had showed enough vulnerability in front of him, and if she tried, she could get used to the darkness given that it wasn’t permanent. If she focussed on something else, ignored the fact that she felt absolutely helpless—

“Bad news and good news.” Jongdae’s dry tone seemed to have gotten closer. Jinqiong turned to where he seemed to be, and sure enough, the bed dipped next to her. She moved away slightly from Jongdae. “Which one do you want to hear first?”

Jinqiong couldn’t even glare at him. “Whatever,” she ground out.

“Whatever,” Jongdae parroted. “Well, bad news, you’re still blind. I’m guessing that by the fact that you punched the wall.”

“Thank you,” she snapped, “for informing me.”

“You’re welcome. The good news is that I also appear to be blind, so now we know it’s the sector and not some strange disease that has suddenly befallen you.”

Jinqiong choked on her next breath. “What?”

She could almost hear his stupid smirk. “What?” he echoed. “Are you surprised?”

Jinqiong reached around her until she could feel him. Her hand connected with Jongdae’s shoulders, tightening her grip on the shirt he was wearing, and she gave him a slight shake. “You’re blind. You can’t see me right now? You can’t see anything?”

“I can’t lie.”

Temporarily relief that the fact that his vision was gone meant that hers wasn’t permanent, but then she realized that if his were too, then maybe everyone in the crew couldn’t see. And if they couldn’t see, there would be no such thing as sailing to the central island and fighting monsters, because they would all be hopelessly lost in the dark.

As if he could read her worries (Jinqiong wouldn’t put it past him to be able to), Jongdae reassured, “Not everyone’s gone blind. I already went and checked. Baekhyun called a meeting in the mess hall in ten minutes.”

“Is everyone else fine, then?”

“Woah. You don’t need to sound so bitter.”

Jinqiong scowled at him before realizing that he wouldn’t even be able to see. “I’m not bitter,” she snapped. “I’d like to know what the situation even is.”

“The sector is messing with our senses,” Jongdae replied, thankfully not saying anything about her comment before. “From what I know, Hei can’t balance right now. My brother… has really bad seasickness. He’s been hurling his guts out since this morning. I think it’s something about motion-sickness, but the seas aren’t even bad right now.”

Jinqiong fought the urge to laugh. She had spent the first week on sea struggling to adjust to the waves and the fact that under her feet, the sea was always moving. Jongdae had been used to it, but he’d still grumbled about Junmyeon, who couldn’t get seasick because of his affinity with water. Now, it was ridiculously funny that whatever the sector was had decided to throw that on Junmyeon.

“Everyone else?”

“Don’t know yet. I suppose we’re about to find out who’s still capable of steering. Baekhyun wouldn’t tell me what was wrong with himself.”

“Maybe there’s nothing wrong, other than his ego.”

Jongdae snorted. “His ego’s still as big as ever, I’m afraid, but no, something’s wrong. I can sense it. I just don’t know what it is.”

“You could sense it?”

“Yeah, my power still works. It’s a bit harder to move around and I don’t really know how to explain this, but I have a general sense of where things are and what’s going on even though I can’t see. I just… know.”

She didn’t bother hiding the bitterness that time, although it wasn’t completely directed at Jongdae. “That’s nice. Have fun going to the meeting, then.”
 

“You’re also going.”

“I can’t see where I’m going. Byun Baekhyun wouldn’t really care if I didn’t show up.”

“I’ll walk you there,” he replied simply. “And he wants everyone there because we also need to figure out what we’re going to do on the central island, and that involves Taeyong and the gem. So you’re going, and that’s final.”

Jinqiong pressed her lips together. Apart from Baekhyun, Junmyeon and Hei, they didn’t know who else had been affected. Perhaps they all had. But sight—she couldn’t help but wish it were something else. Anything else. She would’ve taken whatever Junmyeon was going through to the darkness, the new sort of uncertainty that came when she tried to move, and the feeling of being so, so helpless. The fact that she couldn’t even walk up to the mess hall without Jongdae’s help felt awfully humiliating.

“You might drop both of us into the ocean,” she told him drily, although Jinqiong still felt tense all over.

A laugh. “It’s not that hard. Even if I didn’t have my power, just keep your hand along the wall, and you’d be able to get to the mess hall. It’s just easier to navigate since I have a sense of where things are still.”

Jinqiong remained silent. There was nothing else for her to do or to say, and the blindness dampened everything into half-heartedness. She couldn’t find the heart to snap at Jongdae (for whatever reason; she always managed to find one), but neither did she particularly want to talk. She wanted her sight back, to leave the sector that had stolen it from her, to wake up and see, but it was obviously all impossible at the moment.

“You’re still worried,” Jongdae said.

“Thank you for pointing out the unnecessary.”

“Not unnecessary,” he replied. “We can go up to the mess hall now. You haven’t eaten anything in a while either.”

Jinqiong told herself that she certainly did not care about the fact that he noticed. Instead, she replied, “Fine.”

Jongdae seemed to stand up. She moved from where she was sitting, found herself slightly sad to get out of the comfortable bed, before swinging her legs over the side. She could hear Jongdae’s breathing, somewhere close, as she stood up from the bed.

Balance turned out to be slightly harder without her sight, but Jinqiong managed to stay on her feet, telling herself that she wouldn’t accept Jongdae’s help unless she really needed it. Which she wouldn’t, given that all she had to do was keep a hand on the wall and walk.

She tried to take a step forward and crashed right into Jongdae.

Jinqiong could feel him shaking from laughter as he steadied her, both hands on her shoulders. He seemed to have moved so easily, as if the blindness barely affected him while she was stumbling around like… well, like she was blind. She was more graceful when she was drunk.

“Stop laughing,” she hissed at Jongdae.

“Were you considering not accepting my help?”

“I don’t need—”

“I bet you can’t even walk to the door right now,” Jongdae said, and Jinqiong was too proud to admit it was true, but in her head, she agreed. She couldn’t even be certain where the door was.

Stupidly unfair that Kim Jongdae, while blind, still managed to navigate easily. Him and his stupid power.

Jongdae slung an arm around her shoulders, either not noticing or not caring (knowing him, it was the latter) that she stiffened. “Three small steps forward,” he told her. “See, the problem with you is that you rely too much on your sight. Try to use your other senses. You’re panicking since it’s gone, but once you let go of that, it shouldn’t be as hard. Listen. And when you can touch everything, that’s a sight in itself. Focus on those two especially.”

Three small steps forward. Jinqiong followed that, and sure enough, when she stretched her hand forward, she touched the door. Then downwards and slightly to the right—the knob.

Jinqiong pulled the door back, and it swung open a bit too hard. She swore as it hit her toe, and Jongdae laughed again.

She turned towards him. “Stop laughing,” she told him pointedly. “You’ll look just as stupid trying to use a blade.”

“You technically don’t look stupid,” Jongdae replied, “because I can’t see right now either.”

“Right,” Jinqiong replied sourly, “I sound stupid. I feel stupid. You sense that I’m doing something stupid.”

Jinqiong was pretty sure he shrugged, but she couldn’t be sure as she stepped outside. She reached forward, d at empty air, before Jongdae grabbed her hand. “If I could see right now,” he said, “you would definitely look blind.”

“Shut up,” she hissed again, but it was more as an attempt to distract herself from how he was holding her hand.

Jongdae guided her a step forward before placing her hand on something. She met the smooth surface of the wall.

“Small steps. Slide your feet, so it’ll be easier if you hit any obstacle. I won’t tell you where the stairs are.”

“You’re supposed to be helping me!”

“I am,” he shot back.

She grit her teeth but didn’t respond, focussing on moving like Jongdae had instructed. He didn’t remove his arm from her shoulders, and Jinqiong figured that if she happened to trip, she might as well drag him down with her. One step at a time, fingers pressed against the wall, she moved forward slowly, Jongdae calmly following her speed beside her.

“You know,” he started, “when I woke up blind, I panicked too.”

Her foot hit something. The stairs.

It was hard to tell how high it was, but there was the railing, so Jinqiong gripped it tightly as she raised her foot. She stepped down a bit too hard, but it was better than nothing. Jongdae moved up too.

“You seemed pretty calm,” she replied after a while.

“Oh, I had an hour or so before you woke up. I had time to deal with the shock. Besides, it wasn’t as surprising."

“You should’ve been affected first.”

“Careful, Jinqiong. Wouldn’t want me let go.”

She was about to say try it when she misjudged the distance and hit her foot against the side of the stairs. She stumbled, nearly lost her balance, and cursed Jongdae.

“Did any of your tutors ever wash your mouth out for your language?” he marvelled.

Jinqiong snorted at that. “Many.”

“Where did you even learn it?”

“It comes naturally to me.”

He laughed again, and they headed up the rest of the stairs. 

***

Hei woke up feeling just as bad as she had when she had fallen asleep—it was a miracle she had, but being confined in bed all day had gradually turned into exhaustion, and despite the discomfort, she passed out.

Baekhyun was standing over her, arms folded over his chest. One of the lanterns had been set on the bedside table, as if they were still taking precautions after the fourth sector.

“Hey,” she croaked. “I don’t feel any better, so I don’t suppose we’re out.”

Baekhyun shook his head grimly, and Hei glanced at his hands. They were curled, holding the fabric of his clothing, knuckles clenched white. Touch. He’d lost his sense of touch, and out of all the senses it could’ve been, it seemed exceptionally cruelly chosen, as if the sector had known. It wasn’t the same as his father’s control, but Hei could tell that it reminded him a little too much of not being in control. He had, after all, gripped her too hard that first time because he couldn’t feel.

“Can you not feel anything?” she finally asked him, eyeing him and wondering just how bad it was.

To Hei’s relief, Baekhyun sat down on the edge of the bed. “No,” he admitted. “I can still feel heat and cold, but it doesn’t feel the same as before. It’s…” He pressed his lips together. “I cut my hand with my cutlass on my shift, and I didn’t even know it until I saw it was bleeding.”

Hei winced. “It’s not the same,” she told him.

Baekhyun closed his eyes. “I know,” he said, then took a shaky breath. “But still. To not be able to feel already seems like half my control is gone. Jongdae’s currently blind right now, but I would’ve rather had that than this.”

“Jongdae’s blind?” Hei echoed. She tried to sit up, but the room spun so painfully and the nausea, initially slight, rose suddenly.

Baekhyun steadied her, even though she was pretty sure he winced when he touched her. He set her gently—too gently, she knew he was trying to control himself to the best of his ability—on the backboard.

Please Subscribe to read the full chapter