The wind was roaring loudly in Chanyeol’s ear. His hair was dancing wildly in the wind. He had his usual pair of goggles on to keep the wind from blinding his vision.

The strong constant gust of wind was blowing in the opposite direction in the direction they were traveling.

Chanyeol couldn’t use his power of fire here too either. A small fire would be extinguished by the wind and a large fire would get too dangerous aided by the wind.

Because of that, Chanyeol was thankful for laser and plasma guns because, in this wind, a standard metal bullet would be hitting him in the face instead if he were to fire opposing the wind.

Chanyeol had a plasma gun with him this time, pointed towards the enemies that came at Kyungsoo, as was his job to back Kyungsoo up and take down the targets from a distance.

In front of him, Kyungsoo was doing well fighting the enemies with just his sword and sometimes even using the scabbard at his own disposal.

Like the wind that blew around them, Kyungsoo was swift and graceful, while Chanyeol would find himself in near grave danger.  

Chanyeol and Kyungsoo were on the top open deck of an old gas-powered airship, flying at an altitude where the low clouds formed in the sky above the planet Rasaoir.

The geography of the planet Rasaoir was mostly rocky mountain ranges with barely any flatlands except near the coast. The people of Rasaoir lived in cities carved into the side of these mountains, high up above sea level.

The Rasaoir’s population main source of an economy was trading and they would operate large gas-powered airships to travel between cities to transport their goods to and fro.

However, as of late, a group of pirates had been causing trouble by hijacking these trading ships to steal the goods and hold the crew hostage in order to extort money from the Rasaoir government.

Sehun was called in by the Rasaoir’s president to eliminate this pirate group. Sehun accepted the job and Chanyeol and Kyungsoo went along as part of the new trio they formed with each other.

A special decoy ship was sent out under the guise of traveling the normal shipping route to attract the pirate group’s attention.

The pirates bought the decoy, only to discover that Sehun was piloting the airship and that not goods, but Kyungsoo and Chanyeol waiting for them in the payload area.

Sehun was now trying to juggle between piloting the airship, not wanting it to crash while fending off some pirates who had stormed the flight deck.

In the meantime, Kyungsoo and Chanyeol had brought the fight up to the open flight deck, where the pirates had their own ship anchored mid-flight to the decoy airship.

Like they had discussed, Kyungsoo would be the usual attention grabber and fight off the pirates while Chanyeol would work on boarding the pirate ship to take it down.

Chanyeol was trying to make a clear shot at one of the pirates who was much larger than Kyungsoo and had him in an almost chokehold.

Chanyeol was supposed to be boarding the pirate ship now but he found himself not feeling at ease enough to just leave Kyungsoo there against maybe tens other.

In the middle of his hesitation, the door to the flight deck shattered open into pieces as Sehun was heard laughing and hurling a pirate through the door and off the ship.

Chanyeol it up and reminded himself that they would be alright and that he needed to do his job. Chanyeol just couldn’t help but be concerned about them, when he was supposed to be worrying about himself more.

Chanyeol left Kyungsoo to deal with the pirates as he snuck onto the pirate ship that was anchored onto the decoy ship.

Chanyeol had to run on a plank of wood that was the only thing bridging the two ships together mid-air, hundreds of meters above the ground with a nasty fall to the treacherous ridged mountains below should he fall.

Aboard the pirate ship, Chanyeol fought and successfully shot down the few remaining pirates left there. Then, Chanyeol made his way to the pirate ship’s flight deck and struggled a few minutes before finally taking down their pilot and taking over the flight system.

“I’m in. I have control of their ship,” Chanyeol announced over their personal in-ear communication system.

“Okay, good. Take it down when you can,” Sehun replied while wrestling with one pirate and keeping in control of the decoy ship at the same time. The pirate was heard choking and spattering as Sehun was taking them down.

Kyungsoo didn’t reply over the communication system although he was aware of what was being talked about. He just continued what he was doing, swinging swords and cutting down pirates. Kyungsoo was never one to talk much while he was working.

Like Chanyeol was briefed to do, he disengaged the autopilot on the airship and set it on a descending course to crash into the side of a mountain that was far from any civilization.

Once Chanyeol had that done, he had less than a minute to run out the flight deck and back onto the decoy ship before he would be crashing down together with the pirate ship.

When Chanyeol arrived again at the bridge between the two ships to jump back onto the decoy ship, Chanyeol was met with a pirate who had come aboard to stop him from leaving.

Chanyeol managed to defeat and shoot down the pirate. But he had wasted precious time in doing so and by then, the pirate ship was decreasing in altitude and was no longer anchored to the decoy ship.

Chanyeol rushed to the bridge, only to see that the bridge of the decoy ship was now several meters above him as the pirate ship began to lose altitude.

“Chanyeol!” Kyungsoo yelled over the wind roaring around them, seeing that Chanyeol had not boarded their ship yet. “Uncle Sehun! Decrease altitude! Chanyeol is still on the pirate ship!” Kyungsoo addressed Sehun over the communication system.

“Fine! Be quick though! We’ll be crashing ourselves if I descend too fast, the ship can’t keep it up for long!” Sehun yelled back into the communication system.

Kyungsoo ran to the bridge of the decoy ship, dangling his upper half over the railings as he held out an arm to Chanyeol, who was now several meters beneath him on the soon-to-be crashing pirate ship.

“Jump! I got you!” Kyungsoo yelled over the roaring wind, lowering himself as far as possible so Chanyeol could reach his hand.

Chanyeol hesitated, looking up at the hand Kyungsoo was holding out for him. He could probably make the jump now that Sehun was trying to match their ship’s altitude with the sinking pirate ship. But he was afraid of slipping off the railings that he was already struggling to balance himself on.

“Chanyeol, you better hurry!” Sehun warned over the communication system.

“Chanyeol, quick!” Kyungsoo called out, looking over his shoulder to see one last pirate still alive and charging towards his direction at the same time.

Chanyeol took his chances and leaped off the railings, jumping up as high as he could to catch Kyungsoo’s hand, ignoring the fact that he would most likely die if he fell.

Kyungsoo caught Chanyeol’s hand, leaving Chanyeol dangling mid-air at the side of the airship, held up only by Kyungsoo’s right arm.

Chanyeol was about to begin climbing the side of the airship while holding onto Kyungsoo when he felt himself being lifted and hoisted onto the ship.

The moment Chanyeol found himself being pulled over the railings and onto the top deck; he was swung around by the arms and used as a club for Kyungsoo to knock out the last remaining pirate aboard their ship.

Kyungsoo later pushed the pirate off the ship as Chanyeol was panting, breathing heavily and lying on the wooden floor deck where the wind didn’t blow as much.

It didn’t hurt but Chanyeol could feel as if his back had just been slapped harshly into a wall, which left it feeling stinging and slightly sore.

“Why’d you do that?” Chanyeol heaved, trying to catch his breath as he looked up at Kyungsoo who was standing where his head lied at.

“You’re sturdy,” Kyungsoo answered, “-besides, I had to let go of my sword to catch you, so you were the only thing I had in hand at the time.”

Chanyeol lifted a forefinger, pointing it upwards at Kyungsoo as he gasped between breaths, “You…Sehun did that to me once. He threw me into a wall.”

“You regret working with us now?” Sehun joked over the communication system as he was still on the flight deck.

“-absolutely not because Gaueans like Kyungsoo have a good grip. Otherwise, I’d have died. That grip saved me. It was my ‘Grip of Life’,” Chanyeol laughed, rolling onto his side near Kyungsoo’s feet.

Kyungsoo found it comical and he too laughed, as he stood hovering above beside Chanyeol.

~~★★★★★~~

Chanyeol, Kyungsoo, and Sehun returned from the mission unharmed and in one piece, although Chanyeol didn’t really want to ride another airship with an open top deck for a while to come.

The pirate group was taken down and the Rasaoir’s president rewarded Sehun handsomely for their services. The reward was later split three ways as usual, although most of the costs usually went to replenish their supplies and maintaining, Umi, Sehun’s starship. It wasn’t cheap to maintain a starship at all.

They remained on Rasaoir for a few more days to rest and resupply after the mission before returning to Anam. The journey to Rasaoir from Anam took a little over nine Anam days, each way.

Umi was able to travel non-stop throughout the galaxy for a standard Anam month before they required stopping for a refuel.

While it wasn’t the fastest starship or had the furthest range around, it was stealthy and convenient enough for Sehun to operate even when he was working alone, with some impressive cannons and defense systems to boot.

Unlike their apartment on Anam, it was actually several times more spacious and there were actually enough bunks for three people aboard Umi. There was actually even space for a fourth bunk should they add another person to their team.

While traveling aboard Umi in space, the crew operated based on Anam standard time. It was around the early Anam hours when Chanyeol woke up from his sleep, on his bunk and still aboard Umi.

They were only two Anam days into their journey back to Anam from Rasaoir. There was still at least seven days more of travel before they arrived.  

Chanyeol slept on a lower bunk and woke up to see Sehun’s arm dangling off the top bunk above him. Sehun was still very much asleep from the looks of it.

Chanyeol turned his head to the side to look at the bunk across from him, where Kyungsoo slept. Chanyeol found it empty and saw that the blankets and pillows had even been folded and put away.

Kyungsoo was alluring in a sort of mysterious way, Chanyeol learned. One of the reasons why Chanyeol felt that way was because Kyungsoo would always wake up in the middle of the night to apparently do something.

A few times, Chanyeol found Kyungsoo gazing up the sky even if there was really nothing to see on Anam.

Seeing that it was still very early, Chanyeol quietly crept out of the bunk to avoid waking up Sehun. Chanyeol was curious to see what Kyungsoo was doing or up to, having woken up at such a time.

Chanyeol left their sleeping area which was below the flight deck on Umi. Chanyeol climbed up the ladder to get up to the main flight deck, where he thought Kyungsoo would be.

When Chanyeol arrived on the flight deck, only the essential lighting was left as was the usual procedure when they were asleep and Umi was on autopilot.

Chanyeol found Kyungsoo on the pilot’s seat, which Sehun was usually at while Chanyeol would assume the co-pilot’s position.

Kyungsoo still had his back turned to Chanyeol and hadn’t noticed Chanyeol’s presence there yet either.

Chanyeol could see through the glass view that they were actually flying through an asteroid belt.

A warning alarm would usually go off when approaching a dense asteroid belt, so as to alert the crew that the starship needed to be manually flown, slowed down and not be on autopilot to avoid a collision.

Chanyeol didn’t recall hearing the warning alarm and even if he had missed it while asleep, Sehun would have caught it. But apparently, both he and Sehun had slept through it. Or the alarm had never gone off in the first place because there was no threat of collision as detected by Umi’s sensors.

Chanyeol rushed to the pilot’s seat beside Kyungsoo and quickly strapped himself in, attempting to fly the starship through the asteroid belt.

“It’s fine,” Kyungsoo said, looking at Chanyeol. Kyungsoo pointed to the screen to show that Umi was still on autopilot and that Kyungsoo had not taken over the ship’s controls when they entered the asteroid belt.  

“-but we-,” Chanyeol tried to protest when Kyungsoo pointed him to look outside the glass view.

Chanyeol saw the asteroids floating around literally disperse and moved out of the way while Umi flew through it. The smaller asteroids weren’t obvious but Chanyeol was surprised to see an asteroid several times larger than Umi, simply fly out far off Umi’s flight path.

Nothing hit the starship, as they were seemingly moved from place to create an obstruction-free path while passing through the asteroid belt.

Chanyeol looked towards K