“What do you want to know?” Kyungsoo asked. He was sitting across from Jongin in the living room, both holding a mug filled with tea.

“Who is after me? And why are they after me?” Jongin needed to know the reason he was being targeted. He deserved to know, his apartment was a mess, and so was his life now.

“Because you’re one of us, and they are on the opposite team,” Kyungsoo sighed. “Remember the story Junmyeon told you?” Jongin nodded in response. “Well, we are the ones hiding on earth, they are the ones trying to hunt us down and exterminate us… you’re an easy target because you don’t remember much about this life.”

“I don’t remember anything,” Jongin snorted, and being honest he wasn’t sure he wanted to, this life meant a lot of complications he didn’t sign up for. However, at the same time, he felt unprotected by not knowing anything. It didn’t matter if Sehun, Baekhyun, or Kyungsoo tried to protect him, which led him to his next question. “Why does it feel like it’s kind of personal for you?”

“Personal?” Kyungsoo took a sip of his mug.

“Yeah, I know I can’t remember the type of relationship I had with anybody but…” Jongin frowned.

“Exactly, you can’t remember,” Kyungsoo sighed, placing his mug on the coffee table. “Everyone here knows you well, we’ve all had different experiences with you since our creation. To you, it feels like we’ve just met, but to us, there’s hundreds and hundreds of years of… friendship.”

Jongin tries to process this information for a moment, his brain trying to understand the idea of this strange group of people having memories about him that he didn’t have, caring about him in general. In a way, it’s so weird but at the same time, it made Jongin feel warm inside. He guessed that would explain why Kyungsoo was watching over him so closely, although it seemed a little too much.

“Were we best friends?” he then asks, Kyungsoo responded with a chuckle.

“I guess you could say that.”

Suddenly the door swung open, Yixing walked in with another one of them, Jongin identified the lip chain and the bun on his head. They looked over at them and made their way over, sitting next to Kyungsoo. The lip chain guy glanced over at Jongin.

“I heard you had an encounter today,” he dragged his words and Jongin wasn’t sure if this was his way of speaking or if he was drunk already. It was barely nine o'clock at night.

“Jongdae, can we not talk about this?” Kyungsoo sighed, looked like he felt the same way Jongin did about the matter.

“I’m just trying to make conversation,” Jongdae shrugged, putting an arm around Yixing, and pulling him towards him. Yixing smiled sweetly in response.

“Do you guys have sins assigned too? Or virtues I don’t know,” Jongin questioned. It was hard for him to know which one was which.

“We do,” Jongdae smirked. “Yixing’s sin is deception and my virtue is truth.”

 Kyungsoo laughed and Yixing punched his arm playfully. Jongin frowned.

“What he meant is… my virtue is truth and his sin is deception. Trust about half of what he says, he just lies for fun,” Yixing shook his head but still smiled when Jongdae leaned in to kiss his cheek.

“How would I know when he’s telling the truth?” If his sin was deception, then there was no way Jongin would be able to tell the difference.

“You can ask me, I can always tell,” Yixing intertwined his fingers with Jongdae’s. “That’s why he can never lie to me.”

“Just so you’re not confused, every virtue has blond hair after the awakening, and every sin has black hair,” Kyungsoo explained, reaching out for his mug again.

“Unless they change it,” Yixing added. “Like Junmyeon.”

Oh.

So, as far as he knew, Baekhyun and Yixing were virtues. Jongdae, Sehun, Junmyeon, and Kyungsoo were sins.

“What’s your sin again?” Jongin asked Kyungsoo who just smirked, his eyes turning darker. Suddenly the air in the room felt heavy and Jongin felt hot in all kinds of places, he shifted slightly on the couch watching Jongdae and Yixing also sit closer to each other.

“Stop, Kyungsoo,” Yixing protested, his voice sounded a little out of breath.

“Please don’t… I like this,” Jongdae smiled, standing up and pulling Yixing with him. “See you guys later.”

Once they disappeared down the hall, Kyungsoo turned to Jongin again. “Lust is my sin.”

Lust.

Oh well...

“Is that why I feel…?” Jongin couldn’t even put his thoughts into words.

“? Yeah, that’s me,” Kyungsoo raised an eyebrow.

“Why didn’t I feel like this before?”

“Because I didn’t want you to,” Kyungsoo shrugged. “I control it however I want.”

Jongin didn’t say anything for a moment, making people just feel… , that was as sinful as it could get. He sat back on the couch his brain all over the place with all the information and the way he was feeling and… why was it still so hot in there?

“Can you like… stop doing that? Please,” Jongin’s voice started to sound raspy as well and he cleared his throat to gather himself. Kyungsoo chuckled, just looking at him for a moment before relaxing against the couch, his eyes not as dark as before and Jongin started to feel better instantly. “Thanks.”

Kyungsoo shrugged, standing up then. “You’re safe here so I’ll head upstairs for a while, you should go to sleep for now.”

That was probably the best idea for him now, it had been a long day and to be quite honest Jongin was exhausted. He was drained mentally, emotionally, and physically. There was too much to think about, too much to consider, and things just seemed to be moving so fast for him. Kyungsoo led him into a room, he didn’t know if it belonged to any of them, but it didn’t look like they slept a lot.

Kyungsoo turned around to leave, however, Jongin suddenly stopped him, holding on to his arm. “So, tomorrow… you guys will go back with me to the apartment. Right?” The idea of doing that on his own was terrifying.

“We will,” Kyungsoo placed a hand over Jongin’s, and even when he didn’t have Baekhyun’s powers Jongin still felt safe and calm. “I will be there with you.”

They shared a look for a moment before Jongin nodded.

He sighed as he sat on the bed. “Can you stay with me for a while? I don’t want to be alone.”

Kyungsoo hesitated but then he nodded, sitting next to him, and patting his shoulder softly. “I’ll be here until you fall asleep.”

The bed was comfortable, so he couldn’t complain of anything, however, the weight of that day’s events was starting to fall on him. Someone had tried to kill him, and he had been terrified, the time it lasted Jongin didn’t know if he would make it out alive or not.

And in all honesty, he didn’t have much hope then.

Jongin’s eyes started to burn with the tears he hadn’t allowed to come out after being rescued, maybe due to shock, maybe because he wanted to be strong for himself, but in the darkness of a stranger’s room, Jongin cried and cried until there wasn’t a tear left. Kyungsoo was silent the entire time, rubbing Jongin’s arm to comfort him. Jongin couldn’t make much of his expression in the dark but he was glad he at least had him there.

He was glad he had Kyungsoo.

Only when his eyes were finally dry, he allowed himself to drift off.

…

“The area is safe; they’re not hiding around,” Sehun said as he approached them. Jongin, Kyungsoo, and Baekhyun were standing in the hallway of Jongin’s apartment building, waiting to go inside. “They won’t try anything anytime soon; they know we’re protecting him.”

“We don’t know that,” Kyungsoo said. He glanced at Jongin. “Open the door, I’ll go inside and check.”

Jongin nodded, opening the code pad for his apartment, and putting in the code not caring if the others saw or not. The red light turned into a green light and the door opened smoothly. Kyungsoo was the first to go in, followed by Sehun. Baekhyun sighed as he waited outside with Jongin.

“Don’t worry, Jun hyung is investigating and Minseok Hyung is also searching the city… we’ll find them,” he rubbed Jongin’s arm, trying to provide some comfort. Jongin didn’t know if it had to be with Baekhyun’s powers or his comforting smile but he felt better.

A few minutes later Kyungsoo and Sehun came out.

“The apartment is clear,” Kyungsoo pulled Jongin inside and the rest followed. “You said you have class.”

Jongin nodded, his eyes can’t help to look around at the mess. Proof that what happened the day before was real and that someone that wanted to kill him was still out there.

“We’ll help cleaning up everything,” Baekhyun pushed him in direction to his bedroom. “You go get ready for school and we’ll take care of it.”

Jongin was a bit hesitant about this but Kyungsoo nodded.

“Just go, if you want to be on time you can’t sit here to clean up,” Kyungsoo reached out for a broken piece of porcelain of the vase Jongin broke on his intruder’s head. Jongin sighed, turning around, and heading for his room. He had to check in with his brother, so he didn’t suspect anything, he also had to take a shower and brush his teeth since he didn’t do so back in the basement.

He felt gross.

The first thing he did was text his brother, a simple good morning text that he hoped his brother didn’t turn into a call because he wasn’t sure he could talk to him without breaking down. He dropped his phone on top of the bed, getting his towel and other necessities and heading to the bathroom.

A warm shower sounded and felt like heaven. It almost felt like a whole-body transplant for Jongin, all his worries slipping away with the warm water and it was a plus that he didn’t feel like something that came straight out of a trash bag anymore. He finally stepped out of the shower, allowing himself to look at his reflection in the mirror for the first time. Of course, since Yixing healed him there weren’t any kind of bruises or marks or anything but he could still feel the intruder’s hands around his neck.

Jongin shook his head, this wasn’t the time to go there.

He got changed and grabbed his things before heading out into the living room. Everything was sort of back into place, except for the things that were broken, but other than that they did a great job cleaning around. Kyungsoo was in the kitchen, making sandwiches, and Baekhyun and Sehun were sitting on the stools just observing.

“I’m ready,” Jongin said, sitting next to Sehun. “Also, thanks for cleaning up guys… it was really quick.”

Baekhyun smiled. “We have our ways.”

Kyungsoo sighed, putting a plate in front of him. “First, breakfast.”

Jongin chuckled, nodding as he took a bite of his sandwich. “Yes, mom.”

Sehun and Baekhyun laughed and quickly gathered themselves when Kyungsoo glared at them.

Kyungsoo did one for everyone and he sat down to eat as well. They sat there in comfortable silence for a while, when suddenly Jongin’s phone beeped inside his pocket. He put his sandwich down, thinking it was probably his brother texting him back, which he was very thankful for.

He could be a little too intense for Jongin, and if he sensed that there was something wrong, he would start asking questions, Jongin would start crying and he would take the first flight there. Jongin didn’t need his brother to get involved in a mess he didn’t even know how to handle himself.

Pulling out the phone, he noticed it wasn’t his brother, but his project partner who he completely had forgotten about and was supposed to text. Jongin almost smashed his head on the marble counter. A lot was going on, but he still had to focus on school or else his brother would kill him. Jongin sent a quick message letting him know they could get together that same day at the library to keep working.

Jongin sighed before putting his phone away and going back to his breakfast. Getting his together seemed to be harder than he thought.

“So, what’s the plan for today?” Jongin asked. “Who’s going to follow me?”

Baekhyun was the one to speak first. “Kyungsoo will be with you during classes, Sehun will join during breaks and I will hide here in case whoever tried to make Jongin juice attempts to do it again.”

“Jongin juice?” Kyungsoo raised an eyebrow.

“Well… do you have a better way to put it? At least without the k-word?” Baekhyun finished his breakfast in no time, putting the plate on the sink.

Kyungsoo sighed. “Never mind.”

Jongin imitated Baekhyun and grabbed his stuff. He could only hope the day would go smoother. “Okay, let’s go then.”

He could only hope.