Did Donghyuck know where he came from?

Mark thought this to himself as the latter was too busy screwing back a lamp that had stopped working (Xiaojun was going to fix it, but Donghyuck insisted on doing it himself - Johnny didn’t train him for nothing.) 

The two were seated at the kitchen table, the only two people in the house, not knowing the others’ whereabouts; even Johnny just stated that he was “going to take care of something”. Xiaojun and Kun probably went on a walk again. 

“These stupid wires are so tiny,” Donghyuck complained, setting down the screwdriver gently before grabbing the tweezers. “I can’t see-”

“Do you need assistance?” Mark asked for the fifth time that hour.

Donghyuck shook his head. “No,” he said sharply, leaning closer to the lamp. “I must do it.” 

And he continued fixing the object in silence, not paying any attention closer to Mark. 

Donghyuck must be used to doing it alone, Mark realized; usually he would be much chattier, always filling up the silence with his words. The quietness at the moment was not something Mark had been expecting. 

Leaving him alone with his thoughts. Well… if you could call it that. He was still getting the hang out of it; after all, he had only been in existence for a couple of weeks. Conscious wise, that is. 

Mark knew where he came from. He knew where model L, R, K, and TY came from. They had been created, in a lab by the Royal Scientist Jung Jaehyun, for good for the people in the Kingdom of Korea. He knew how Jaehyun had slaved over scripts and scripts of the human genome, how they basically speedrun through the first 20 or 25 years of human life, how they recently have developed consciousness when for the first time. 

But Donghyuck… Mark knew that Donghyuck and Johnny biologically weren’t siblings. He knew that Donghyuck was first cousins with the Prince of Korea, Highness Park Jisung. But everyone knew the last time someone in the royal family passed away was when the young prince, his wife and their newborn son had been murdered. 

It was painfully obvious what had happened. 

Now the question remained though: how did Donghyuck survive? Did they take him away when he was still breathing, thinking he had passed? Were babies switched at birth? Was there a decoy? Who was involved? Who helped him escape? Who still knew? 

Did Johnny know? 

“You’re so quiet all the time,” Donghyuck muttered under his breath. “Do you forget the human part of superhuman?” 

“The origins of that word began with you,” Mark. “I am still trying to grasp the definition.” 

“Grasp the-” Donghyuck set down his screwdriver so that he could clap his arms together. “Humans make their own definition, idiot. You know what I mean when I call you that.”

Mark merely blinked in response, trying to process Donghyuck’s words. For someone who is still biologically human, he doesn’t really know how to act like one. 

“Do you find a lot of differences between you and your brother?” Mark asked randomly. 

Donghyuck raised an eye. “Are you still scared of him?” 

“Why would I- should I?”

“Mark, he’s been out to get you since day one,” Donghyuck explained, tapping the screwdriver on Mark’s head softly. “Idiot. Though now that I think about it, you may have started that fight with you trying to kill me first.”

I have been assigned to kill the royal family. 

Johnny definitely knew. And Mark was going to have to confront him before the situation got worse.

***

The two were lying on the grass, staring at the sky above. 

“We rarely got the chance to do this in the city,” Yangyang said, sighing before closing his eyes. “The grass is so soft.”

Chen Le didn’t say anything in response, but he also agreed. The city was so full, so populated, and it was already bad enough for them to find a place to sleep for the night. 

“The city must be in full chaos right now,” Chen Le muttered. “I wonder what’s going on over there, we haven’t exactly gotten news.”

“Good thing they are four hours away,” Yangyang added. “They’ll never find me here-”

“I’m sure you’re the least of their concerns,” Chen Le said, “considering the royal family almost got murdered.” 

Yangyang scoffed, crossing his arms. “Don’t remind me.”

Chen Le rolled his eyes. He hadn’t forgotten about Yangyang’s obsession with the royal families. Didn’t help that they had met them either; if Chen Le had to hear him call Prince Hendery handsome one more time Chen Le was going to explode. 

He sat up, fixing his hair which now had tiny strands of grass in it. “Just glad we were never caught for trespassing. Which was a stupid idea.”

“And yet you still followed me,” Yangyang said, grinning. “You know you love me~”

“I’m going to kill you- OW!” Chen Le yelled, as Yangyang was now shaking his arm vigorously. “What the hell are you doing??”

Yangyang wasn’t even looking at him, pointing behind Chen Le with his free arm as he abruptly sat up. “It’s- it’s it’s-”

Chen Le looked to where Yangyang was pointing; beyond in the distance, there was Prince Jisung, staring back at them, wringing his hands nervously. 

“What could he possibly want now,” Chen Le muttered now, grabbing Yangyang’s hand off him. “You’re going to bruise me-”

“He’s looking at us,” Yangyang exclaimed excitedly. “I think he wants to talk to you!” 

“I doubt that.” Chen Le looked towards where Jisung was standing again. “I’m going to go see what he wants.”

Yangyang’s eyes almost bulged out of their sockets. “I really wonder why he’s here in this town-”

Chen Le got up from the ground, picking some more grass strands off his shirt. “I’ll go see what he wants-”

“It’s so cool that we’ve been able to talk to them,” Yangyang said, talking to himself at that point. “Especially Prince Hendery. He’s so cool…”

To be fair, Yangyang had a point; they’ve definitely have had their fair share of talking to royalty from both kingdoms, but at this point Chen Le just accepted it as part of reality. 

In all honestly, he was quite happy here right now. He and Yangyang had food to eat, a place to sleep, and no one was out to arrest them for stealing some apples here or some bread loaves there. No more shivering in the rain, sweating in the heat, freezing in the snow. 

And of course, all the worms for Yangyang till his heart’s content. 

Chen Le stuffed his hands in his pockets, heading towards Jisung. Considering the latter had been watching them (albeit a bit creepy in Chen Le’s perspective), he figured Jisung wanted something to do with them. As long as they weren’t getting arrested for trespassing the palace, Chen Le could care less. 

Once he reached a reasonable distance, Chen Le gave a small wave, making eye contact with Jisung. “Morning,” he said. “Is something wrong?”

Jisung’s face turned slightly red, the latter rubbing the back of his neck. “It’s… a pleasure seeing you right now,” Jisung said, struggling to get the words out. “I didn’t mean to stare, I just… was wondering if I could ask you a favor.”

Chen Le shrugged. “Go ahead.”

Jisung looked around them, despite no one being around as far as Chen Le knew. He couldn’t help but notice how Jisung instinctively had a hand over what Chen Le assumed was a sword sheathed on his side, and he wondered how many times Jisung had to fight for his life. “Actually, let’s… walk to the main square, if you don’t mind that is.” 

That was… certainly not what Chen Le expected. “... sure,” he agreed, turning around and raising his hands to his mouth. “YANGYANG! I’LL BE BACK!”

Yangyang, who had been sitting on the grass eyeing the whole conversation, waved his hand in the air. “OK!” 

“Okay, well, that takes care of that.” He turned his attention to Jisung. “Any particular reason why we are heading there?” 

He would probably get in trouble if he ever talked to another royal like that, but either Jisung didn’t mind or he was in his own little world, as he gave a nervous laugh. “Um, sort of, but no, but, um- yeah, let’s just… walk there.” 

***

“What’s up with all these computers in here?” Ten asked, staring at all the monitors. 

“Hold up, I’m trying to pull up all the logs and data I have saved,” Jaehyun muttered, furiously typing away on his laptop. 

Being in this room felt very… foreign to Ten. There was technology in here that he had never even seen before, much less know how to use. 

He knew that as the royal scientist, it was in Jaehyun’s interests to make developments in science to improve the lives of all the citizens in the Kingdom, so it made sense that Jaehyun had created all of this to further aid his research. Jaehyun himself had helped create a whole assortment of items to help patients that Ten keeps in the clinic, plus developing certain types of medicine. 

“Okay, I have here a list of all the dates,” Jaehyun mumbled to himself. “Some time ago, I was giving an assignment by the Royal Advisor-”

“Oh, don’t remind me of that piece of ,” Ten said. “He gave you an assignment to help others? Really? You expect me to believe that it came from the goodness of his heart?”

Jaehyun frowned. “You know, I should have seen that coming, but…” he sighed. “A little part of me was curious to see if I could replicate human life.”

Ten nodded along until the very end, when Jaehyun said replicate human life. “Um- excuse me?”

Jaehyun turned around in his chair, making eye contact with Ten. “Did you see Renjun and Taeyong out there?” 

Yeah, he saw them perfectly well. Taeyong and Jaehyun had been a little too close to one another, and Renjun looked like he had committed multiple war crimes. “Yes, I saw both of them, along with Jaemin who stapled his own fingers-” 

“Jaemin’s a normal human,” Jaehyun said, turning back around. “He’s not the problem-”

“I’m sorry, what exactly do you mean a normal human?” Ten interrupted him. “First of all, he’s insane-”

He stopped himself, though, once Jaehyun pulled up an image on the screen that made Ten pause. 

Because that image, that specific image on the computer, was of a young male, from the waist up, a serious expression plastered on his face, and he looked a little too familiar for Ten’s comfort. 

“That’s Model M,” Jaehyun explained. “Or, as he was named last minute before chaos, Minhyung.” 

“That’s Mark,” Ten said, remembering his conversation with Johnny. “Why do you have Mark on your computer?”

“Wait, you guys called him Mark?” 

Ten raised his hands up in self defense. “Hey, I didn’t name him, that was Donghyuck, Johnny’s brother. Speaking of which, Mark had tried to kill him-”

“Oh, right, the override mode,” Jaehyun muttered. “Wait a second, they were only ordered to kill royalty or anyone in their way, why was Minhyung attacking this young kid?”

“I-” Ten paused, eyes widening at Jaehyun’s statement. “Jaehyun… what’s going on?”

Jaehyun remained silent, opening up another tab on the computer. 

“Jaehyun-”

“The plan was to create humans from scratch,” he explained. “But with advanced capabilities designed to aid us for good.”

Ten raised an eye. “So killing people is supposed to help.”

“That was not my fault!” Jaehyun pointed at the screen, where now there were five men on the screen- wait a ing minute… “These are the five prototypes that have been created.” 

Ten leaned toward the screen, trying to get a closer look, not believing his eyes. Not close enough, he pushed Jaehyun away, the latter rolling away and collapsing on the ground. “OW-”

“Are you ing with me right now?!” Ten yelled at Jaehyun who was now on the floor, rubbing his head. “This is fake. This has to be fake.”

“It clearly isn’t and I can show you the footage whenever,” Jaehyun said. “Also, did you have to push me?? Seriously??” 

Ten pointed at one of the males on the screen, a small L underneath him. “Okay, this guy, I don’t know who the he is.” Then, to the one with an M. “This one is Mark, and these TWO- wait, isn’t TY your boyfriend out there-”

That was a very good question, and Jaehyun… did not know the answer. You would think two people who have kissed twice would have already made that clear. “I have no idea,” Jaehyun admitted. “Plus, then there’s the ethics involved-”

“THIS one is Xiaojun’s friend, Kun!” Ten exclaimed, pointing at male with the letter K below it. “You’re telling me he’s just like Mark?” 

Jaehyun saw who Ten was pointing at and shoved Ten out of the way, staring at Model K’s picture. “You- that’s impossible, he escaped the lab months ago before consciousness!” 

“Hey, don’t push me- wait, what are you even talking about?” Ten pointed at Kun again. “That’s Kun, he’s Xiaojun’s friend, there is no way he is the same… thing as Mark or M or whatever the you call him.”

Jaehyun stared at Ten, a worried look on his face. “You need to bring those two back-”

“No, first of all, you’re going to explain to me why Mark tried to kill Johnny’s brother,” Ten demanded. “If he truly is innocent and has no memories of the whole incident, then there is still someone responsible.”

“Okay, first of all, why doesn’t he have any memories? Was his control panel in the back damaged?”

Ten blinked. “Oh , you mean-” he took out something from his pocket covered in cloth, unwrapping it to show Jaehyun the piece of metal. “This?”

Jaehyun looked at what Ten was carrying in his hands, sighing. “I’m going to get arrested for treason, aren’t I?”

“Well, it certainly looks like it,” Ten said, setting it down on the computer desk. “Cause it’s not looking great.”

“Okay, LOOK. They have an override function for emergencies where you gain control but Lee-eun ordered them to kill the royal family and anyone who stood in his way.” Jaehyun got on his knees on the floor. “Ten, you have to believe me, I would never order for anyone to be killed.”

Ten shook his head. “It- it still doesn’t make sense, why would Mark try to kill Donghyuck? He was alone in the hallway.”

Jaehyun raised an eye. “That’s impossible, either they went to those with royal blood or Donghyuck must have been trying to stop him.” 

“Well, he was just minding his own business in the hallway, so…” Ten shrugged. “Maybe they malfunctioned-”

“Or maybe…” Jaehyun ran away from the desk to where there was a whiteboard on the wall halfway across the room. “Ten, how old is he?"

“..16?”

“Does he have any allergies?”

“I don’t see how this is relevant but yes, silver,” Ten said, rolling his eyes. “Are you finally going insane-”

Jaehyun started scribbling unintelligible lines on the whiteboard with a marker. “Now, are he and Johnny biologically related?"

…. Now Ten was worried. “No. Donghyuck is adopted, but he does not know-”

“I KNEW IT!” Jaehyun started yelling. “I knew it, he survived!!”