Jimin stirred awake, blindly pushing aside several objects around him as he worked to sit up. He then rubbed his eyes and opened them to see that he was in the back of a stationary military vehicle. The front seats were empty, and he could see that the rear opening of the jeep was facing a large roller shutter. Voices were coming from right outside, reminding him that he had run into uninfected people before blacking out.

He crawled to the opening and climbed out with some difficulty, still exhausted from the ordeal of running and hiding he had gone through since leaving his friends. He could only hope that they were safe. He embraced the cooler air outside the vehicle and looked around, deducing that this was the loading area of the warehouse his had run into, before going around to the front of the jeep to see two males sitting on the ledge of the loading dock.

“Look who’s awake,” commented one, who was in military attire. He grabbed a bottle of water from a crate next to him and tossed it to Jimin. “Here, take this.”

Jimin caught the bottle, cracked it open to quench his thirst, and then propped himself up onto the hood of the jeep to face the two. “Thanks, and uh… thank you also for saving me.”

“Jimin, was it?” The other asked. “I should be thanking you too. I’m Hoseok, a friend of the Kims as well, and they told me what you did. Which reminds me, I had that conversation with them using your phone.”

Hoseok pulled Jimin’s phone out of his pocket and handed it back to him. “Fortunately, Tae decided to call you, or I wouldn’t have known.”

Jimin felt his pocket as he took his phone back, realizing that he had not noticed it had been gone. “You mean they’re alright? That’s a relief. So, you’re who they’ve been mentioning the whole time, but they said you were at Black Swan Resort. We were on the way there when we got into an accident. Why are you here?”

Hoseok exchanged grave looks with his soldier companion, and the latter spoke up. “You going to tell him?”

“Black Swan Resort was breached just after I heard you guys crash. I managed to escape the safe zone with Yoongi here, but we don’t know how many others made it out,” Hoseok explained.

Jimin’s eyes widened in horror at the news. “Oh no! To think that we were heading there. Do Tae and the rest know, hyung?”

“Don’t worry, I’ve informed them,” Hoseok assured him. “They told me that they’re hiding out at a standalone store. Hopefully it’ll hold up until we go to get them when the Sun sets. That was amazing, what you did for them.”

Jimin nodded and smiled reflectively. “You see, I’m not from this city. I’ve been away from my family and home for a very long time, but all of them who were in that car, they’ve been my family here, they’re the ones who made me feel at home. When you feel this way, you don’t think before doing what I did.”

As Yoongi listened, he could not help but think about those he felt similarly for, the other members of his unit. They did the best they could to help one another out in the face of this new and unknown threat, but it had left them scattered and each one of them fending for themselves, if they were still alive, and he doubted that many were.

“Well, I’m glad things have worked out on your end so far. Let’s hope they continue to do so,” he eventually responded flatly.

His pain was obvious to Jimin, however, who turned to him in concern. “What’s wrong, hyung?”

Yoongi snorted. “I’m not your hyung, kid.”

“Why not?”

“Let’s not get that close yet. I don’t want to feel too bad if you somehow end up dying in all this,” he paused and chuckled at the younger’s mortified look before he continued. “It’s the other way round too, you know? Maybe I’ll be the one dying instead.”

Jimin pouted. “Don’t say that. We’ll get through this!”

Yoongi snickered bitterly. “That’s the kind of optimism my unit had before a good number of them ended up goners.”

Jimin gave Yoongi a look of sympathy, now understanding the reason for his sentiment. The former left his position on the jeep’s hood to sit beside the other before pulling him into a hug. A warm smile formed on Hoseok’s face as he watched the scene.

Yoongi scoffed and shifted uncomfortably. “What are you doing?”

“It’ll make you feel better, I promise,” Jimin replied.

Yoongi pulled away before sliding off the ledge and going around to the back of the vehicle. “I’ll let you know if and when that starts to take effect. If neither of you are going to get some rest, I’m taking a nap. Wake me up if we’re in trouble.”

The other two watched him disappear behind the jeep, and Hoseok then turned to Jimin. “So, why did Tae call you ‘mochi’ over the phone?”

“Oh my goodness, that little-”

Jungkook and Taehyung scanned the visible area of the supply room from their positions at the door to find no threats. They crept slowly into the room to check between the tall shelves, ready to beat the daylights out of any infected they were to encounter, but there were none so far. Just before they were about to look behind the last shelf, they heard another indication of movement. They shot each other nervous glances, knowing that there was definitely something there. Taehyung took a deep breath and darted around the shelf, about to swing his bat at whatever it was. However, he stopped himself just in time when he saw what had been making the sounds.

In front of him was a black and tan Pomeranian. He slowly lowered his weapon as he stared at it, surprised but relieved at the same time. It had a collar on, and he figured that it must have been separated from its owner in all the recent chaos and had found its way into the store.

At the silence, Jungkook peered around the shelf. “What is it, hyung?”

“It’s just a dog,” Taehyung replied, taking a step closer to it. It scurried back with a whimper, and his expression softened. “Oh no, it must be afraid. It’s okay, I won’t hurt you…”

Jungkook watched in concern as Taehyung continued to approach the dog. “Are you sure it’s not infected?”

“It would have probably attacked me if it was,” answered the latter, crouching down and reaching over to pet it. “Can animals even get infected anyway?”

The younger shrugged wearily. “How would I know? This whole thing popped up like, last night. I wouldn’t be surprised if nobody knows.”

Taehyung ran his thumb over the tag attached to the dog’s collar, and read the name on it out loud. “'Yeontan'. Oh, you’re so adorable, Tannie!”

Jungkook playfully rolled his eyes. “Whatever, Bam is still cuter.”

“Yeah, sure. We both know why you said that,” Taehyung dryly remarked, knowing that Bam was the name of the dog Jungkook had back home.

“It’s nothing like that, he just is,” Jungkook protested, and the two shared a laugh.

Suddenly, a voice came from the entrance to the supply room. “Hey! What’s going in there? Are the both of you still alive?”

The boys turned to the entrance to see Jin leaning against the doorframe, and Taehyung picked Yeontan up to show him to the older. “Yes hyung, this is what was making that noise.”

Jin let out a groan at the discovery, annoyed that they had been worried for nothing, and the three returned to Namjoon with Yeontan still in Taehyung’s arms. Namjoon was fiddling with a portable radio he had found lying around the store, and it crackled to life as soon as the others sat down by him. From it came news of the city’s current situation, and things did not seem too good. There were still many civilians who had not made it to a safe zone, and they were, of course, part of that statistic.

Namjoon looked from the radio to the others, and eyed Yeontan curiously. “So, it was just a dog?”

“Yeah. His name is Yeontan,” Taehyung responded, cuddling the mentioned animal. “Are you and Jin hyung feeling better?”

“The flesh wounds are still hurting like crazy, but we haven’t broken any bones. At least I don’t think so. We should be able to get around fine if anything comes up,” Namjoon answered, and then turned to Jin, who nodded in agreement.

“That’s good. I guess despite everything that has happened, we’ve been really fortunate up till now,” Taehyung commented, slipping into a contemplative mood. “We’re all still alive and have one another. I actually saw a huge chance of us losing Jimin after what he did, but not only did he survive, he also ran into Hoseok hyung.”

“He’d better survive,” Jungkook muttered in a somber tone. “I don’t think I can take losing anyone else to this outbreak, especially Jimin hyung.”

Like Jimin, Jungkook was alone without family in the city. His peers at the university were all he had for company, but as traumatic as it had been to see so many members of his cohort die, he thought it unlikely that any of them would have done what his roommate had done for them. No other kind of friendship he currently had came close to the one he and Taehyung had with Jimin. The Kim brothers echoed his sentiment and nodded at what he said, glad that they had one another, especially at a time like this.

After a short moment of silence, Jin looked to the younger two and spoke up. “Joon and I were out for a while, the both of you should get some rest. We’ll keep watch.”

At Jin’s words, Jungkook and Taehyung realized that they had been up the whole night, and the tiredness was starting to kick in for them. It was not as if they had not pulled all-nighters completing projects or playing video games before, but they should take the opportunity to recharge in such a situation. They readily agreed, grabbing a couple of memory foam pillows from one of the shelves and settling down on the floor before allowing the droning voice from the radio to lull them to sleep.