Accompanying the sound of a shovel piercing mud cracks is a frustrated Doyoung who wished he could go back a few weeks when he celebrated his 24th birthday and got his hair recolored from cerulean blue to pitch black. Those were comfortable and fun times. But now he finds himself annoyingly covered in his sweat and hard at work. 

“I just don’t get it. Why is our team responsible for transporting and burying the dead? Isn’t Team Captain the stepdaughter of the president? Can’t she request a private meeting with him and get us out of this?” He asked, behind the breathing black mask that is preventing him from suffocating to death as the atmosphere is rather thin. 

Wendy, a petite woman with rosy cheeks and long wavy blonde hair who’s been sitting on the top of their dark blue spacecraft keeping watch over the two men below, scoffed. 

“And I don’t get why you ask the same questions over and over again. We’ve told you before. Our Team Captain specifically asked for this task. Now, if you have a problem with this line of work then you should resign.” 

Before Doyoung could match energy with Wendy and respond, the last man presented quickly intercepted to set the quarrel straight. “That’s enough! It’s nearly noon and we don’t have all day.  Doyoung put your back into it. Wendy, prepare to lower the bodies. It’s about time Aera and Minyoung receive the proper burials they deserved.” Taeil, the second man, said. Though the last line was more to himself than his two teammates. 

Upon hearing his orders, Doyoung gave Wendy the stink eye then proceeded to do as he was told. Although he had no more respect for Taeil as he does Wendy, the second-in-command was right about one thing. They don’t have all day and he surely doesn’t want to spend any more time in the dull and dry cemetery. 

Inside the spacecraft that’s shaped like the head of a predatory bird, Wendy put on a headset, a few switches, then wrapped her slim fingers around the control wheel. Through the round and wide glass windows, she bobbed her head at Doyoung. A gesture that she was ready whenever they were. 

Taeil is older but a man of shorter stature compared to Doyoung. He’s always seen with lengthier staves or steel tridents. His choices led some to believe he’s insecure about his height and the weapons’ purpose was to intimidate on his behalf. 

Others assumed they were to enrich his appearance, to give him a wiser look. And although no one doubted his intelligence, being a living legend wasn’t enough. He may have been the youngest to graduate from PlanZ Academy at the mere age of 15 when the normal age is 20 but Taeil was regularly picked on by his adversaries. Albeit his unmatched abilities to coordinate, react, and think quickly on his feet, and strategize in the middle of mayhem, his talent did very little in instilling fear and respect in his peers. 

Wendy concluded he carried such things as a means to help guide her; when and where she should lower the caskets, when and where she should land the craft, or when she should stop towing ginormous, ochreous rocks to make way. Doyoung, who’s only known Taeil for ten months, presumed the older man likes stomping the ground with them whenever someone disobeys him. He thought Taeil thought Taeil was cool. But only Taeil had the answer to his behavior. 

An answer he wasn’t ready to share. 

A cloaked, gangly woman, can be seen squatting alone on the edge of a cliff beside a line of white stones that drew out an arrow and the word ‘SEOL’ pointing in the opposite direction of the cliff. Under the cloak, her shoulder-length ebony hair fell over the leaden knit cowl-neck sweater she had on and the leather pants that hugged and brought out her powerful and spindly legs. The woman like tools and is handy so around her thin waist is a utility belt that holds a flathead screwdriver, scalpel, short blade, wrenches, and rolls of strings and wires. 

By her inky boots, she added a rock to the shorter line in the letter ‘L’. Then she studied the message longer, unenthusisastically, with her sharp brown eyes before dusting her hands of dirt and standing. 

She was 161 cm and quite lean, charismatic even. But her mood was sour and far from charming. She sighed, disappointment dry as the land. Her interest was nicked short and she quietly rejoined the others when her view offered her nothing out of the ordinary. 

Back at the site with piles of dirt and sticks marking countless graves, Doyoung was shoveling dirt into the last of the two holes that had Aera’s coffin. He groaned and grumbled over and over again, not understanding why he put up with his team’s lack of support.

Meanwhile, inside the aircraft, Taeil checked on Wendy sitting behind the yoke still. 

“I can hear him complaining without really hearing him,” Wendy said, glaring at the back of Doyoung’s head. 

Taeil cracked a small smile as he understood why Wendy complains about Doyoung. The latter’s forthright, hardheaded, and mannerless—on purpose. Since he couldn’t get into his and almost everybody’s dream team, he acts up intentionally hoping he’ll force the team to petition him out. His plan could have worked if Wendy was the leader of the team but as she’s not, Doyoung’s strategy fell apart the moment they all met and he referred to Taeil as the ‘loser of losers’. 

Moments later, Wendy broke the ice, “Team Captain refused to transfer him because it’s supposedly his punishment but why does it feel like we’re the ones paying for it? Him calling you names, disrespecting what we do, and being negative when he’s asked to do his job. Why’d he become a Zinner if he didn’t want to work?” 

“Give him more time,” Taeil said empathetically, “Soon he’ll come to accept our assignments and our team.”

“I doubt it. Who doesn’t want to be in Lee Taeyong’s team? He’s handsome, kind, popular, and talented. He has no weaknesses and his second in command is Kim Jungwoo, a literal prince. Friendly and sweet in nature. Their team is superior anyway because their leader isn’t stuck in the past. Their whole team has no broken souls. Team Captain is set on finding a missing-possibly-long-dead sister. I’m on the verge of getting my second divorce and you—” Wendy stopped herself when their eyes met and are immediately choked with guilt. “I’m-I’m sorry Taeil...I didn’t mean to—”

Taeil waved her apology off with a forced smile, “It’s fine. I’m fine. It’s not like no one knows,” Taeil made small circles with his thumbs as he tried to hold back the tears welling up in his eyes. Maintaining his smile, he clapped Wendy on the arm and said, “Come. Let’s check on Doyoung and see where Team Captain ran off to.” 

The woman said nothing and quietly followed him after they put their masks back on. 

At the exit and from the corner of his eyes, Taeil stopped when he noticed a figure striding by. It was Seulgi, their team captain, who’d wandered off to check on the messages she’d sprawled all around the area. 

“Are we done here?” Seulgi asked, her voice slow and weary. 

“Just about done,” Taeil answered, slightly influenced by her dampened mood and the fact that Wendy brought up a past he wanted to forget. He quickly changed the topic and asked, “Anything?” referring to news of Seol. 

Seulgi shook her head then spared him a soft smile for asking. Then gently added, “Let’s go home, Taeil.” 

Once everyone but Seulgi was in the craft, Seulgi took out two popsicle sticks and a marker from her belt and wrote the names ‘Lee Aera’ and ‘Shin Minyoung’ on them. Next, she respectively pierced them into the piles where the bodies rest. 

On their way back home, Seulgi was buckled down on one of the benches across from Taeil. Seulgi noticed he had his back to the wall and was looking down at his shoes. There was nothing particularly interesting to see but Taeil does it to pass time and Seulgi wished he wouldn’t. She’d rather he rest his eyes whenever she can as she was aware of his sleeping habits. Sleep paralysis and nightmares have been keeping him up night and day. His lack of sleep makes him slower and easily tired. And Seulgi can’t afford to slow down and take breaks in between her searches.

The longer Seol was out there, the more Seulgi had to believe she was dead. 

After a while, his usual depressed and stoic expression reminded her of the last time she saw a genuine smile on his face. It was three years ago when he and his older wife were expecting their first child. Taeil lost the ability to smile that same year. 

While Wendy steered them home, Doyoung unwantedly became her second pair of eyes. Much as he loathed her, he’d rather sit with her then in the back with their bosses. 

“Hey Wendless, can I ask you something?” 

Wendy nearly missed what he said as he was whispering behind his mask. 

“Depends on what it’s about, Dodo.” 

Doyoung rolled his eyes a millisecond before becoming serious again, “What is it that Captain keeps looking for when we leave the dome?” 

“What do you mean?” Wendy played dumb, hoping it’d stall the direction of their discussion long enough until Seulgi or Taeil routinely check up on them. 

Doyoung shrugged, clueless of Wendy’s intention, “You know, earlier for example. She’d leave without a word then come back whenever she wants. And every time Taeil would ask her ‘anything?’ or ‘find anything?’ but she doesn’t answer him. What did Captain lose out here and when? Because ever since I joined this team, I’d see her take off randomly.” 

The woman sighed, silently wishing someone would stop her before she said anything she’ll regret. The last time she spilled Seulgi’s secret, Seulgi didn’t speak to her for well over a month. And it was during that long, atrocious time that Wendy learned the extent of Seulgi’s immense stubbornness. 

“If you want to know, ask her yourself. I'm not your answering machine, Dodo.” Wendy stated, recalling that not answering him was also an option. 

Doyoung sighed, annoyed that she wasted his time and any chance of them reconciling. So he crossed his arms, faced forward, and skidded down in his seat until he was barely sitting on it. 

Seulgi gazed out the window and saw their city in the distance. 

The city of Rurakin existed under four domes; two on land and two on water. The larger domes are in actuality a sphere within a sphere with both halves of it over and under the water’s surface. The inner dome consisted of pyramid-shaped houseboats and establishments immobilized by connected cedar walkways and bridges. The structures are made out of polymer white walls and blue rooftops with panels installed. 

Rurakin was a paradise under the sky, not only for its beautiful and peaceful sighting but the city-sized pool. 

Since the city technically floated on a vast body of sky blue water under the inner dome, the government made sure every part of it was safe and swimmable. Sealife was kept out and in between the inner and outer dome, and outside the outer dome.

For as long as the city existed, it had managed to keep the water crystal clear and at room temperature all year long. The eye could peek over the fences and inspect its depth until all that could be seen are nothing but large underwater pipes. Pipes that prevent ocean life from entering the inner-sphere. And whether it rained or snowed, outside the dome, the weather hardly affected the interiors; except for sea level rising and lowering.

Finally, the outer dome had a thicker glass and consisted of the inner dome and a water lap for fishing and providing seafood. With their city being a water city, the dead had to be buried on land outside the domes. 

The closer they got to the domes, the less flying they did over land. And soon they traveled over water until Wendy determined it was safe to fully submerge. 

While Wendy navigated them toward the bottom of the sphere to find the tunnel that would bring them up to the city, Seulgi was studying an ancient accessory that belonged to her family. It was a green hairpin that their great grandmother received as a gift and had passed down to their grandmother who then passed it down to their mother and finally it was given to Seol on her 16th birthday. 

Seulgi buried the hairpin in her hand and glanced up slowly. The moment she locked gazes with Taeil, she felt a burning urge to ask, “If you were me, would you believe she’s dead?” 

By the look of her eyes, he knew she wanted him to assure her that there was hope; a slight chance of possibility. But everyone knew the truth. 

“It has been six years since she stepped outside the dome without proper gears, Seulgi. There’s no believing that she’s alive because she’s dead.”