Chaewon finally understood where she was. It was clear that she was in some sketchy testing facility from how the girl with the ears and tail called out to a researcher and all the guards. She had received a tray of food after she was practically thrown into her cell, which looked mostly edible with an apple, a small bottle of water, and a poorly put together sandwich with a small slice of meat and unknown vegetables wedged between two dry slabs of bread. She ate the apple and drank the water, but put the sandwich aside; deciding sleep sounded better than choking that thing down. 

Cautiously walking towards the bed in her cell, Chaewon roughly laid down, Falling asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow. She dreamt of that odd girl in the cell; the dream suddenly turning into a nightmare, abruptly waking Chaewon up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat. She tried to force herself back to sleep, settling for staring at the ceiling for hours after failing several times. Soon enough, morning rolled around and a guard ordered Chaewon out of her cell.

“Lucky day for you, no tests, no nothing,” the guard in front of the cell door sneered, “Let’s get going, don’t wanna use no excessive force on you.” 

Silently, Chaewon held her hands out after the cell door swung open, handcuffs slapped onto her wrists. Following behind the chill guard, Chaewon noticed that this facility was rather small and had quite a gloomy atmosphere. There were little to no prisoners and the hallways were awfully short. It didn’t take long to get back to Hyejoo’s cell. Standing at the entryway was the researcher from yesterday, Dr. Ha.

“Hello, Chaewon. Hope you had a decent rest yesterday.” The researcher slightly smiled a bit, Chaewon gently nodding in reply, “Today, you’ll be acquainted with our wolf hybrid here. Go on and step inside the cell so we can get going quickly.” 

A guard unlocked Chaewon’s handcuffs and threw them aside, the blonde walking into the cell to see a tired Hyejoo leaning against the wall with messy hair. Door slamming shut, Dr. Ha waved at them through the observation window before leaving the vicinity.

“Well, welcome back, doll.” Hyejoo chuckled, gaze following Dr. Ha’s disappearing figure before directly looking at the blonde, “I was told they want us to become.. acquainted?” 

“Yeah.. that’s what I was told.” Chaewon muttered, feeling vulnerable in the girl’s piercing gaze, hanging her head and looking down at her shoes.

“I’ll go first,” Hyejoo yawned, looking away and studying a suddenly interesting crack in the wall, “I’m Hyejoo, wolf hybrid and I’ve been here since forever. You?”

“I’m Chaewon.. I was kidnapped off the streets while I was going to the convenience store.” 

“Tough.”

“So..?” Chaewon finally looked up, almost blushing at the gaze Hyejoo was giving the girl. The wolf hybrid was somehow unbelievably attractive, wolf ears looking adorable on her head.

“Well, you could talk about your backstory, assuming you won’t live very long here.” Hyejoo shrugged, slyly smirking when she realized the shorter girl was blushing.

“I’m an orphan, and homeless. That’s really it.” Chaewon sat on Hyejoo’s bed, staring at her feet, wired frame whining at the weight.

“Sounds tragic. I was separated from my two sisters and one Android friend when I was younger - not very fun.” The wolf hybrid shrugged once more, little pain showing through her eyes, sitting next to Chaewon on the small mattress and blankly looking at the grey concrete wall.

Speechless, Chaewon just gave Hyejoo a hug, the wolf hybrid unresponsive. The blonde couldn’t imagine how hard it must be going through that at such a young age. 

While Chaewon’s mind was going on and on about how sad that is, Hyejoo’s mind was a mess. She wanted to reject the hug and act disgusted and all, but it felt nice and comforting; a feeling she’s been missing since forever. 

Thinking why the hell not, Hyejoo relaxed and let out a content sigh, enjoying the hug. 

-

Months later, the two have unusually gotten quite close. They’ve done several tests together as well as comforted each other when things got tough, which was often. The researchers hadn’t prepared for this to happen, so they were inwardly panicking. They tried pitting the two against each other to ‘test’ Hyejoo’s physical strength, ending with the wolf hybrid outright refusing to move.

“Come on, mutt, just go at the prisoner. They’re useless and easily replaceable.” Dr. Ahn, the cruel research party head frustratingly growled over the intercom. 

“No way, hag. I’m gonna sit here and stay here.” Hyejoo rolled her eyes, promptly taking a seat on the floor.

“What did you ing call me?” 

“Hag.”

“Guards, drag the mutt out and put her in the box.”

Right on cue, the gate to the cell flung open and two guards stormed inside. Roughly dragging Hyejoo, who didn’t have a reaction and allowed it to happen without struggle, out of the door and to the direction of a place Chaewon had no idea what was. The prisoner blankly stood there, quietly waiting for orders. Her heart ached to see her little wolf get dragged away so carelessly. 

If she had a chance of surviving, she would foolishly run after them, willing to test if she would get shot on the spot or not.

—-

Standing at the sink and cleaning up the remnants left behind at dinner, Yeojin ‘accidentally’ dropped a ‘drop proof’ plate to see if it would break.

It broke, and scared Yerim’s cockroaches out from the kitchen, flood of insects running to the comfort of the underside of Yerim’s bed.

“Yeo! Where are my cockroaches going!?” Yerim shrieked, watching her lovely pets scurry around the kitchen floor and out into the living room, “What did you do!?”

“Hey, relax. I was testing if this drop proof plate was actually drop proof,” Yeojin reasoned, eyes darting to the plate fragments scattered on the floor, “What I learned was they are not drop proof.”

Yerim stood in the doorway of the kitchen in shock, blinking twice.

“I’m telling Jungeun!” The fruit bat hybrid exclaimed, quickly transforming into her respective animal and flying around the mansion, searching for said person and leaving Yeojin alone in the kitchen once more.