o39

Enemy Lines

Jongdae found Jinqiong in her own cabin, for the first time in what was days.

It was odd being back in the room. It was also empty. But sitting there alone was better and more tolerable than being with the rest of the crew, where Jinqiong was reminded over and over again of what had gone wrong and what could possibly go wrong. The list was too huge, and their own number of solutions were finite, if not nonexistent.

She couldn’t think of any brilliant plan on her own either. She couldn’t think of a plan, period. Given that both Baekhyun and Jongdae had been unable to (and to the point where they had started fighting), she couldn’t think that anyone else in the crew would have any luck.

Jongdae didn’t even knock on the door before he came inside. He handed her a cup without another word, and Jinqiong raised an eyebrow. “Is it alcohol?” she asked.

He gave her a look. “Now you’re capable of joking? Drink it. It’s water.”

Jinqiong set it aside. “I’m not thirsty.”

“Yeah, well, Junsu doesn’t have to worry after all, given that we’ll all be dead of either dehydration of starvation or exhaustion. Drink it.”

She opted for scowling at him, but accepted the cup nonetheless. Water sloshed onto her arm, but Jinqiong couldn’t bring herself to care as she downed the cup in one go. Alcohol would’ve been better, she thought, but she could settle with water. It eased the parched throat she hadn’t even known existed until she drank.

Jongdae didn’t say anything until she finished the cup of water and set it down quietly. He only watched, arms folded over his chest, exhaustion obvious on his features. Jinqiong wished she didn’t feel as bad as she did about the whole situation. It wasn’t as if she claimed responsibility for anything when she had found them for help.

“So,” he said finally. “Do you have any ideas?”

Jinqiong gave him an incredulous look. “Why would I have ideas?” she demanded. “You and Baekhyun couldn’t even think of anything. What am I supposed to do?”

“Do you want to say something, then?” he asked.

“Like what?” Jinqiong snapped.

Jongdae shrugged. “Look,” he said. “It happened. It’s over. We need another idea. Stop telling yourself that you got us caught up in this, and—”

“And you’re all going to die because of me?” Jinqiong stood up. She wanted to throw something, and the cup looked like it would shatter quite nicely. “It happened. It’s happening. I got every single person who’s on this ship right now caught up in this, and because of that, Junsu will kill all of you. Perhaps not Baekhyun and Hei, but they’re going to suffer a lot worse, and there’s nothing anyone of us can do about it.” She tried to force herself to unclench her fists. Her nails had dug in enough to scratch. “So right now, every one of you are going to be dying because of me. I might’ve outsmarted him a couple of times, but ultimately…”

Jongdae listened in silence. Jinqiong wondered if that meant that what she said was right. It was awfully unlike him, after all, to remain silent after she said all of that, and—

“Technically,” Jongdae replied, “we’re all here because of me too.”

Jinqiong lifted her eyes, incredulous. “Are you serious?” she demanded.

“I can’t lie.”

It didn’t matter if he was trying to make her feel better. Jinqiong shook her head. “Not you,” she snapped. “It wasn’t you. I stole the gem. I forced Baekhyun and Hei—”

“I brought you to them,” Jongdae interrupted. “I went along because I wanted to find Lee Taeyong also, and I thought that it was my best bet to do so. This has as much to do with me as it does with you. Baekhyun might act like it’s all your doing, but I’m sure he’s well aware that it’s partially my fault too.”

Guilt, that’s what it was. Guilt so horrible that Jinqiong wanted it gone more than anything. “It was my life,” she said. “That was Junsu’s one demand before. My life, and then the gem. But now that’s not even enough.” 

“So you’re saying it wasn’t worth it.”

“No, it wasn’t,” she snapped. “No, it wasn’t worth getting everyone involved. It wasn’t worth coming all this way and dooming people who actually had a life.”

“And right now, you think that everything’s your fault?”

Frustrated, angry, and very much annoyed that his words actually bothered her much more than they should, Jinqiong scowled at him. “What do you want me to say?” she demanded. “What am I supposed to do? Why are you even here?”

Jongdae met her gaze squarely. “I want you to know that you need to stop making yourself take the blame for everything. Maybe you made a mistake. But whatever mistake you made—and you’re not the only one, no matter what you say—we need to fix it now, and blaming yourself for what you did and the things you haven’t done either isn’t going to make anything better.”

“There is nothing we can do.”

“There is always something.”

“No,” she replied, a sinking feeling in her gut. Jinqiong couldn’t understand how Jongdae could remain so certain after everything that had happened and everything Junsu had threatened, but she couldn’t share the optimism. “No, there isn’t this time.”

“So you’re going to sit there and blame yourself?”

“Maybe it’s time you understand that there are fights you can’t win.”

“Maybe it’s time you stop running away from the fights,” Jongdae snapped back. Jinqiong hoped he didn’t see her flinch.

“Stand up,” he said.

She glared at him. “If you’re so keen on thinking up a plan, why don’t you do that yourself?”

“We’re going upstairs,” he replied. “Then we’re going to practice with your power again. There has to be something.”

Jinqiong opened to protest. Invisibility was no use, they had already established, given that Jongdae himself had said that the ice wasn’t regular and could probably sense if she tried something. To practice, as if nothing were wrong—

“Jinqiong,” Jongdae said in a low voice. “We have three days to figure something out, and I’m sure as hell not going to let you sit there and mope for all three days. Get up.”

Useless, everything they could try against Junsu.

“Jinqiong,” Jongdae repeated. “You may be thinking of the if onlys right now, but if you continue doing this, you’ll have the exact same thoughts three days later. Let’s go.”

She glanced up at him, tired, ragged features set into grim determination that was so Jongdae. The strangest part was that he couldn’t even fake it.

He offered her a hand. Jinqiong eyed him, wanting to shove it away and turn away also, but Jongdae didn’t budge. Half against her own will, she took his hand and let him pull her up.

A slight smile touched his lips. “There,” Jongdae said. “Now let’s see what we can do.” 

***

Hei practiced summoning her power for at least an hour.

It was hard work. Baekhyun made it look effortless when he showed her with his water, pulling orbs of liquid from thin air before letting it go back, disappearing into nothing, but Hei was nowhere near close. Given that she had never truly called her power in such a way and that it was hundreds of times more muted than usual, it was even more difficult. A couple of times she summoned that small wisp of her power to her through Jungwoo’s block, but it wasn’t nearly enough to anything sufficient. She managed to direct a small patch of stopped time around herself, but it unravelled less than ten seconds after she had managed it. The drastic drop in power was as frustrating as it was different.

By the time she seemed to hit the limit of what she could summon with Jungwoo’s block, her head pounded erratically and she could barely breathe properly. Baekhyun told her to take a break, and, a bit grudgingly, Hei opened her eyes and leaned back on the bed.

“I don’t think I can summon more,” she admitted.

Baekhyun nodded, even though his expression was tight. “It’s a lot better than nothing,” he replied.

Hei could tell he was expecting more. She was pretty certain that this was all she could do, and unless they took Jungwoo out somehow to completely break his hold over her power, then there was nothing else she could do.

“You should rest,” Baekhyun decided.

Hei shot him a look. “No one else is.”

“No one else is pregnant,” he pointed out.

“There will be no point sleeping if Junsu kills us all,” she pointed out. “I need to do what I can. And—”

“And you’re exhausted, and you won’t be able to summon up even a bit of your power if you go on like this.” His eyes flickered over her. “I’ll stay.”

“I still shouldn’t—”

“Five hours,” Baekhyun bargained. “I’ll stay the whole five. And who knows. Maybe I’ll think of something.”

“You’ll probably fall asleep too.”

He pinched her cheek lightly