A/N, this chapter was 30 pages T_T

I wanted to introduce the concept in the best way possible. Since I wrote some parts first, please keep in mind the flow might seem "off". Here's to Jeno being my fav character - you'll know what I mean. Keep out for hints, comment (Please don't be a silent reader!), subscribe, and thank you soooooo much for reading! 

Matthew’s Apartment

“We should give him a Xanax,” Luhan drawled, watching as Jeno sat in front of Matthew’s washing machine, staring at it as if lost in a trance. They had shifted from the clinic to Matthew’s apartment when the sun had risen, Kyungsoo stating that ARA would be looking for their missing student soon.

“Absolutely not,” Matthew snapped at Luhan, watching as Jeno did not move. “He will relapse.”

“I think we should let the poor boy relapse,” Kyungsoo added, Luhan snickering.

Bora could not blame Jeno. She was also surprised as to what she heard, Bora bringing herself back to the conversation that took place an hour ago.

“It’s not like there are two Matthew’s out there!” Jeno had yelled out. “Right?”

It was at that moment, Luhan looked straight at the teen and clapped his hands ever so slowly. More like he was mocking the teen for being able to figure it out after a very long time.

“Impressive,” Luhan paused, thinking to himself for a moment. He shrugged. “Not really, though. I expected someone to get it sooner.”

“What are you talking about?” Bora asked. She was confused, not being able to grasp whatever they were trying to say.

Kyungsoo cleared his throat. He had waited for this moment his whole life. He was very much prepared to explain the situation (or so he thought). However, he was not prepared to keep it under control. Inside his bag was a rolled-up piece of paper that he began putting together a month ago when he first got his suspicions.

The paper had a photo of Siwon, Haechan, Dr. Eldridge, Teacher Donghae, and a couple of other people Bora did not recognize. There were “X’s” on their faces as if they were now dead, but Bora was sure they weren’t and were very much alive and breathing.

“Oh, here’s the fun part,” Luhan mused. “Explaining it.”

“Bunny should be on there too,” Matthew said.

“I don’t have all of them,” Kyungsoo began, Bora blinking.

“All of them? All of them what?”

“These people.” Kyungsoo waved a hand over their faces, turning to look straight at Bora in the eyes. “These people are replaced.”

A moment had passed, Baekhyun looking deep in thought. The journalist had decided to not say anything all this while, but if it was one person who’d believe Kyungsoo, it would be him.

“Replaced?” Baekhyun repeated. “By who?”

Kyungsoo took a deep breath, his gaze focusing back onto the paper. “By themselves.”

“What are you saying?” Jeno snapped, Luhan letting out a laugh in amusement.

“Apologies, Kyungsoo. You’ll have to try harder than that.” Luhan winked at his friend who scowled.

“I’m happy you’re finding amusement in the situation, Luhan.”

“I expected a better explanation from someone who is seemingly prepared. Was this what you were going to tell the rest of the town, Kyungsoo? That they’re simply replaced?”

“Take it easy on him, Luhan,” Matthew snapped. “He’s trying.”

Kyungsoo narrowed his eyes on Matthew. “I don’t need you to defend my efforts, Matthew, thank you very much.”

“I wasn’t—”

“Boys.” Bora’s voice had snapped them back into reality, Kyungsoo’s annoyance quickly dissipating when he caught sight of her expression. “Not the time.”

“Dopplegangers?” Baekhyun asked suddenly, thinking to a comment from reddit that he once read. “They’re being replaced by their dopplegangers?”

“If you mean by someone who looks exactly like them, then yes.” Luhan clicked his tongue.

“You can’t expect me to believe that!” Jeno voiced impatiently. “You’re saying that the Bunny I saw is not Bunny but someone who looks like her?”

“Yes, child. I’m saying exactly that.”

“Where’d they come from?” Baekhyun pushed, Bora noticing that his phone was placed in his pocket. Every time he put it there it meant that he was recording. He was probably ecstatic that he got a lead for his next article. “A hole from the ground? Did they fall from the sky?”

Luhan ran a tongue over his teeth. “Fall for the sky? Like angels? It’s a cabinet that has been around since our founder migrated to Ashgate with her followers.” Luhan scoffed. “Gloria Ashgate found a way to create something that had access to a shadow world when she lost her son and her husband. Back then, ARA was called Aether Castle.”

“The cabinet we saw in the room!” Baekhyun said out loud, Matthew nodding.

“Aether in Latin means upper, pure, bright air. Where we are, are what people call ‘Aether’. The heavens,” Matthew spoke. “We… to them, are from the heavens. Right now, we are in heaven. Those people who are replacing the ones here—” He motioned to the paper. “They come from Umbra.”

“That’s Latin for ‘shadow’,” Baekhyun breathed.

“It’s always dark in Umbra,” Luhan said, his eyes darkening for a moment as he slipped deeper into his own mind. “No time dividing day and night. It’s cold and people there are built different. Most are with a sinister mind and evil heart. Like animals, feasting on each other when famine spread across the land. Cats and dogs and bunnies being the source of food.”

“Twenty-two years ago, the gateway to Umbra was opened by a husband and wife who had lost their child in a drowning accident,” Matthew continued, Bora noticing as he wrung his hands together nervously. “They missed their child so much they went into Umbra to bring him out so they can raise the shadow child as their real one.”

Luhan nodded. “But little is known about the mechanics of the pathway between Aether and Umbra. Time in Umbra works different, for one. They live in a time where it’s centuries before us. The husband and wife also did not know the full scope of what was to happen when you enter Umbra.”

“Anyone can enter Umbra, but not everyone can leave.” Kyungsoo stood up, the male staring at the board. “Two versions can exist in the same place, but only one is allowed through the gateway for Aether, leaving the other behind.”

“I think that is what Siwon, Dr. Eldridge, and Haechan have been doing. They’ve been getting people from Aether under the pretense of a school or a drug reform program and switching them out. It is to give those from Umbra a taste of “heaven”, to live life here as normal person even if they did not originate from this place.”

“This is ing insane,” Jeno hissed.

“Trust me, I know.” Luhan smiled.

“Explain the scars on the people,” Baekhyun demanded. “Explain why they were laughing hysterically like mad men.”

“Try to come from a world where there is no happiness,” Luhan said to him. “People from Umbra do not know how to laugh. It is not normal for them to know how to express happiness. They do not understand jokes. The scars? They fight against each other. They are attacked left and right by their own people. Sometimes rabid animals that haunt the land. It’s a dark, dark, place.”

“They were laughing because they were learning how to laugh?”

“Siwon must have realized that it would be hard to integrate them into Aether society if they do not think, speak, or act like us,” Luhan said, leaning back.

“How do they prepare for a switch?” Bora asked. She didn’t know if she believed them. It was too far-fetched a concept for her to wrap her head around. She, unlike her brother, did not have an open mind to such things.

“One of them enters Umbra and informs the rest who’ll be next. They then find the shadow version and prepare them to switch out into Aether.”

That was when it clicked to Jeno. That’s why he heard Siwon say “Tell Dahyun to be prepared”. Siwon meant the other Dahyun since they’d switch her with Bunny.

“Donghyuck,” Baekhyun blurted out, remembering the conversation he heard when he was inside the academy. “Siwon said a Donghyuck is informing them on the “inside”. It means he’s the one going in and out of Umbra and letting them know who is next.”

“What do they usually do to the people that enter Umbra from Aether? What’s going to happen to my Bunny, my Haechan, and the people who were switched out?” Jeno demanded.

Luhan pressed his lips together. “I’d not hold onto hope that they’re still alive.”

With what he said, Jeno cried. “How do we even know if we can trust you?”

Matthew knew this was a defense mechanism. He knew that it would be hard for anyone to accept the fact that there might be a possibility that their loved ones might be dead. He watched as Jeno refused to believe Luhan, the male glaring at the older man defiantly.

“How do you even know all these things?” Jeno asked, Luhan standing up.

“Because,” Luhan murmured. “Twenty-two years ago, I came here.”

Luhan undid his coat to remove it. His arms were filled with scars, Bora gasping at the sight.

“I am from Umbra.”

Jeno fainted.

Umbra – Ashgate, Umbra Castle - Dungeons

Kim Bunny had lost track of time.

The last thing she clearly remembered was Nurse Bora holding her hand beside her bed before she fell asleep. She had awoken in the middle of the night to head off to the bathroom. When she woke up, she was already in a dingy cell.

Was she still at the academy? The air smelled sour, and it was incredibly cold. She had to hug herself to keep from shivering. The ground and the walls were covered in mold and her pajamas were soaked from the leaking water in the cell.

Kim Bunny thought that this was a dream she was stuck in. That she finally went off the deep end. She had cried so much her nose was blocked; hurt from screaming. Very little food was given to her by people who had their face covered cloth masks, and burned every time she tried to drink the water in the little wooden cup they gave her.

Bunny scrambled up when she heard a “Let go of Wilbur!”. The door opened, people descending the stairs before they threw him towards her, Bunny crying out when she recognized the town drunk.

Wilbur grunted. He was just as groggy as Bunny was when she was first thrown into isolation. “Hurts.”

Bunny glanced at his arm. There were deep bite marks indented into his skin, Wilbur struggling to sit up.

“W-Wilbur,” Bunny sputtered, trying to help him. “Where are we?”

It was a question that went unanswered because the older man had knocked out cold, red blood running down his arm. Bunny gulped, a hand going to the leg of her pajamas before she ripped off a piece to tie it around Wilbur’s arm.

She was glad she wasn’t alone, but that also meant it was both of them in danger now. Bunny stationed herself beside Wilbur, wrapping her tiny arms around his body to keep him warm as she tried to drift off to sleep.

She woke up with a sound. Someone was there with her and Wilbur, Bunny squinting under the dim light when she saw someone open the jail door. He was tall and had his hair pulled back, the male closing the door behind him when—

“Jeno?” Bunny whispered, her vision adjusting and he crouched down in front of her. “Jeno!”

With that, Bunny came forward to hug him thinking to herself that she was finally saved by her one and only. The hug lasted two seconds because the male pushed her away silently, Bunny confused as to what was going on.

“Jeno, where are—”

“I’m not Jeno,” the man said, running a hand through his hair. He paused, flickering his eyes over her coldly. “I’m not your Jeno.”

“Wha—What does that mean?” Bunny whispered. No, this was her worst nightmare. She was now convinced that she was dreaming. Jeno not loving her? She had bad dreams about this.

“I brought water,” the man said, bringing out a jug. He lifted it up to tip it into . “Drink it.”

Bunny refused. “It… The water tastes weird. Jeno, I’m so scared. Please bring me out of here.”

Bunny was trembling, but Jeno… This Jeno, whoever he was, was not fazed. He tipped the jug over, water splashing all over her face. Bunny gasped in shock, sputtering as she wiped her face.

“Are you trying to drown me?” Bunny’s voice raised an octave.

“I’m not your Jeno,” the man hissed, the tone of his voice making Bunny cower in fear. “Any feelings that apply to the one beyond this world has nothing to do with me.”

This world? What world? Her world? The world in her head? This Jeno had only a lock of hair hanging down his forehead. He seemed calmer than the Jeno she knew. Less patient. Not as forgiving. Her Jeno would do anything for her, he’d put her to sleep and tell her he loved her but this….

“Snap out of it, Dahyun,” the man said, Bunny placing a hand on her heart. He was not Jeno. Jeno would never call her by her real name.

“Are you his long-lost twin?” Bunny asked, trying to wrap her head around the situation. “Are you—"

“We leave when the fog rises,” the man ignoring her question, shifting his attention to the sleeping Wilbur and looking at the bite wound. He didn’t say anything about it. “His arm is infected. If he doesn’t die of hunger, he’ll die of fever.”

“I don’t know, I… He just came,” Bunny replied, tears spilling from her eyes. “What’s going on?”

“We don't have the luxury of time for me to provide you an explanation. I need to bring you to Na Jaemin.”

Lee Jeno thought to himself that this Dahyun was different from the one he knew. This Dahyun had emotions in her eyes. He felt like he could read her if he tried. He wondered if the other Jeno was similar to him.

“Nana?” Bunny asked, another flicker of hope before it switched to sadness. “Is Nana kidnapped too?”

“Na Jaemin,” Jeno corrected. He had no idea what kind of names they called each other in heaven, but in hell they stuck to the ones given to them at birth. He knew that they would have to explain it to her, but Jeno also knew that it’d take time.

It did for the rest.

“Up. I’ll bring him when he’s able to run,” he said referring to Wilbur, standing up. “There is risk with two disappearing at the same time.”

Bunny went with Jeno, trying to stay close to him, but every time her shoulder bumped against his he would give her a death glare that would make her hang her head.

“Where are we?” Bunny asked, seeing how dark the hallways were. “We’re at the basement of the academy, aren’t we?”

“At the Umbra Castle,” Jeno corrected her. “We’re in Ashgate, but not the Ashgate you are used to. Here, we do not have night and day. The sun never rises, and our goodbyes are spoken in lines such as ‘I hope you live to see another day’.”

Bunny sniffed the air, Jeno leading her down deeper through small narrow hallways.

“Do not speak to anyone. If you see anyone who bears striking resemblance to anyone you know, or anyone at all, either hide or run.” Jeno took a deep breath. “Only Na Jaemin can be trusted.”

Bunny gulped. “Oh…”

Jeno stopped when they reached a dead-end, the male going to a bookcase and pushing against it. The sound of wood scraping against the floor echoed through the hollow hallways, Bunny nervously looking around.

A trap door was on the ground, Jeno lifting it up.

“No,” Bunny said, her voice quivering. “It’s darrrrrk in there.”

A flash of annoyance could be seen on Jeno’s face, Bunny shaking her head rapidly. “You have to come with me—”

“Either you go or you die.”

Jeno’s words made Bunny gulp down all the fear she was feeling, the female stepping down the stairs that led to nothing but pitch-black darkness.

“Put both your hands on the walls. They are narrow enough for you to feel. Do not stop until you reach a dead end.”

Jeno did not wait for her response, closing the trap door and proceeding to wish that she was one to follow instructions. He quickly made his way to the castle to keep up appearances.

If the rest knew he was bringing those from the other side and leading them to Na Jaemin who was providing them sanctuary, he’d be hung from a cross and be ridiculed for seven days before they’d eat his flesh for feast.

“Jeno,” a voice called out, Jeno turning just in time to see the all mighty leader walking down the hallway. Candles flickered, Jeno reminding himself that composure was all he needed.

Matthew Lee. The one everyone feared. The one who made every single decision. The one who made the rules and made everyone follow them without remorse even if death was a consequence.

“Doing rounds, I see?”

Jeno tried to keep calm, the male giving a low bow. “Not at all, sir. I was heading over to the hospice… Been feeling under the weather.”

“Oh?” Matthew asked, cocking his head to the side with his eyes narrowing on the younger male. “The shadows under your eyes are alarming, Jeno.”

“I have been working down the list errands you’ve penned.”

Matthew smiled, his straight and non-sharp canines were what made him different from the rest.

“I am impressed with your loyalty, Jeno. You, Donghyuck, and Dahyun have never let me down.” Matthew placed a hand on Jeno’s shoulder, Jeno stiffening for a moment. “I was thinking that maybe you should be next. You deserve to be in heaven, afterall.”

Jeno’s mind drifted to his friend, Na Jaemin. The male nodded slowly.

“If you say so, sir. I would be honored to be chosen.”

“Say,” Matthew began, Jeno feeling his heart race once more. “The people who have come from the other side have been disappearing. I have searched the castle, Jeno. I believe Na Jaemin has found a way in and out. We have yet to be able to locate him.”

“Ah,” Jeno whispered under his breath. “My heart hurts when we speak of him, sir. For him to betray us this way hurts more than the loss of a friend. He has turned into a traitor. I know nothing of his whereabouts.”

“He has a heart of heaven,” Matthew said, his eyes distant. “But we are in hell.”

Jeno cleared his throat. “You’ll be the first to know, sir. If ever.”

Matthew gave him two pats on the shoulder, whistling a melody he learned when he arrived more than two decades ago.

“I’m counting on you, Jeno.” He said, not bothering to turn around to look at the younger male. “Do right by me and you will be rewarded.”

Jeno pressed his lips together before taking a deep breath.

He made his decision a long time ago. He meant to stick to it till the very end.

Umbra - Ashgate - Underneath Na Estate

Bunny was running out of breath. She kept her hands against the side of the walls to make sure she was still stable. She had to keep going or she’d feel claustrophobic. The first few minutes in the tunnels she was afraid to walk.

By the next hour, she was running.

‘Please, please, please,’ Bunny thought, pushing forward. When her thoughts started to scare her, she began to say it out loud. “Please! Please! I just want to—”

And then there was light, Bunny seeing a doorway open in front of her, the female falling into the arms of a familiar face.

“You’re safe now,” the man said, Bunny tightening her grip around him and wailing. “You’re safe now, Dahyun.”

Na Jaemin… Definitely not her Na Jaemin. He didn’t have pink hair like Nana. His chocolate brown hair flopped over his forehead, and he had an apron tied around his waist. No, this Na Jaemin was far gentler than the Nana she knew.

He carried her, picking her up and placing her on top of a wooden barrel. Around the room were huge barrels just lined up one after another. There were two rooms in a distance that had a table in it.

“You must be famished,” he said to her, Bunny blinking at him as he leaned closer to inspect her face. A hand lifted her arms to see if she was injured. “You’re in better condition than the rest, Dahyun.”

“Bunny,” Bunny blurted out, hating the way her name sounded. “My name is Bunny.”

Na Jaemin blinked. He knew that people had other names from wherever they came from. They called it “nicknames”. Even if he didn’t understand it, he wanted to respect whatever they wanted to be called.

“Bunny,” he repeated, noticing she relaxed more when he said her preferred name. “Nice to meet you. My name is…”

“Na Jaemin,” she blurted out, looking at him with her big eyes. “We’re best friends.”

Jaemin smiled when he heard that. He was once best friends with Dahyun, too. Dahyun, Donghyuck, Minhyung, and Jeno. If it was one person who changed the most, it was Dahyun.

“Are we?” He asked, amused. He tilted his head to the side.

“Yes,” Bunny answered, her hands clasped together tightly.

“We used to watch Jeno climb trees while you would throw apples at him from the ground. You’d tell me that I wasn’t crazy whenever I cried. We’re best friends,” she repeated.

“Mhm,” Jaemin hummed, intrigued at her stories. “Sounds like me, alright. What did you call me?”

“Nana,” she said, her eyes fixed on his face. “We all called you Nana. Haechan… Haechan was the one who gave you that name when we were in primary school. You were standing up to him. He was a bully and he’d say “Nanananana” until… Until it stuck.”

Jaemin nodded, seeing Bunny nod repeatedly. She was talker, he was sure. He knew that maybe it was a way for her to calm herself down, so he encouraged her to do so.

“Then,” Bunny continued. “Then both of you became best friends, too.”

Jaemin smiled. He saw a tear slide down her cheek, Bunny quickly wiping it away. He raised a hand to brush it away when the door to one of the rooms opened. A girl stood by the doorway. She was eavesdropping and had heard everything.

“Ahyoung!” Bunny cried out, noticing the female whose footsteps quickened. “Ahyoung—”

Ahyoung was reformed more than a month ago, Bunny recalled. She was the one who ripped Renjun’s tongue out when he came back from the train station. Before she knew it, she was being pulled into the embrace of the girl who was never her friend, but only classmate.

Ahyoung tightened her grip around Bunny, her body shaking with sadness.

“Ahyoung,” Bunny whispered, feeling the desperation from the hug. “Are you the Ahyoung I know?”

A muffled cry from Ahyoung who had her face pressed against Bunny’s shoulder. It was bittersweet to see a familiar face. Bunny patted Ahyoung’s shoulder softly.

“Haechan,” Ahyoung said suddenly, pulling away. Her eyes were filled with tears. “Haechan is dead.”

Bunny blinked at the information. “What?”

“He…” Ahyoung sputtered. “He was already here when I came. I think he was one of the first ones. Haechan was a fighter, he fought against them when he passed through so his arm was ripped out. That was when Jaemin decided he’d save everyone who came from our world. He… he tried to survive, Bunny.”

Bunny felt close, Ahyoung gripping her shoulder tightly.

“He’s dead?” She whispered.

“Jaemin has only so much,” Ahyoung told her. “Haechan survived around only a month. He died ten days after I was brought into this place.”

“The last time I saw you, you ripped Renjun’s his tongue out,” Bunny mumbled.

“That wasn’t me, Bunny.”

And slowly, Bunny noticed that people were beginning to come out of the room behind them. Her eyes widened seeing her small-framed peer wave at her.

“Renjun!” Bunny exclaimed, pushing herself off the barrel. “Renjun—”

Renjun smiled, a hand going to scribble something on a piece of paper on his notebook before he brought it up to show it to her. Bunny braked herself, squinting to read it.

“Hi. Bunny,” she read, her eyes going to Renjun’s face who gave her a sad smile. “Why… Why are you writing?”

“The other Ahyoung ripped his tongue out,” Jaemin said from the side. “In your world. You witnessed it.”

Bunny was in shock. Jaemin knew it these things took time to register so in no time, he had her sitting down with a mug of boiled hot cocoa beans. That was the best he could do. She warmed her hands, seeing a bunch of people who she knew sit down in front of her as Jaemin placed a huge coat on her shoulders.

“We’re underneath the Na Estate,” Jaemin told her. “There are tunnels from the Umbra Castle that lead to where we are. We have to stay hushed, my parents are oblivious to my whereabouts. They, too, do not know I am using their storage space as sanctuary.”

ARA would be the Umbra Castle, they told Bunny. The Na Estate was where they were at, and the mansion above them was an orphanage run by Jaemin’s parents. They were raising the orphans and passing them off to the castle to work.

“What’s happening?” Bunny asked softly, Jaemin sighing.

“People are getting replaced in our world by people who live here,” Jungwoo said. He was leaning against the doorway. He was a senior to all of them, but he was recently switched out. “The people who live here are different from us, Bunny.”

“What do we call this place?” Bunny asked, Jaemin shrugging.

“We call it Ashgate like you do,” he told her. “The world your people are currently inhabit is often regarded as 'heaven'. We refer to this place as "Umbra", which translates to "shadow" in Latin tongue. It emphasizes on the stark contrast between this world and yours.”

Bunny shivered, Jaemin noticing it. “I know the temperature isn’t as what you’re used to.”

“So my Ahyoung is here?” She asked, Ahyoung reaching out to hold her hand. She squeezed it tightly. “And my Jeno is there?”

“Everyone here is who you know,” Lalisa said softly, smiling at her. “We’ve been kept safe by Jaemin. Everyone who is reformed in the Ashgate we know has replaced us in the real world. I don’t know what my fake has done.”

Jaemin didn’t like to be called a ‘fake’. He noticed that the people who he had saved would often call them that, but in Jaemin’s head, they were just as real as them. They were just shadows, born in a world that had nothing but darkness and hardship.

“Your fake growled at me when I said I didn’t want to play hide and seek,” Bunny told her. “She wasn’t very nice to me.”

“Mhm, sounds like one,” Jungwoo said, chuckling.

“But the bad Jeno…” Bunny began, Jungwoo nodding as if he knew what she was going to say. “Jeno helped me.”

“Not all of us are bad,” Jaemin murmured from the side.

That was a lie. Everyone in Umbra was just taught to survive. Jaemin couldn’t imagine his life without having to worry about water, the air, whether they’d eat the next day… They had evolved for years, baring their teeth to those who showed weakness and making them their next meal.

This was the only way to live.

“You’re not bad, Jaemin,” a girl said from the side, Jaemin turning to smile at her. “You’re the nicest of the bunch.”

Bunny nodded in agreeance to Jaemin. The affectionate girl she was, she leaned against Jaemin, feeling how he suddenly tensed up. She smiled, her arms going to hug him tightly.

“Yes, Jaemin.” She winked at him twice. “I love you in Ashgate, and I love you here.”

Jaemin had never heard the word ‘love’ before, especially if it was for him. Was it that easy to say from where she came from? To get it from a stranger from heaven made Jaemin wonder if it was a word widely used. It definitely was not widely used in Umbra. 

There was a knock, all of them turning to look at the  that was hidden behind one of the many barrels that Jaemin had stacked up. They waited, everyone closing their eyes to listen carefully.

Knock, knock, knock, knock.

A rhythmic knock. Everyone relaxed when they heard it.

“Jeno,” Jungwoo said, Jaemin quickly rushing to push away the wall of barrels away from the door that was closed. “He’s here.”

Jeno had a hard time trying to lose the rest of the guards at the castle, finding a way to enter the trap door without being noticed. He grunted, his arm cramping up from the weight of the old man who refused to wake up.

“Wilbur!” Lalisa exclaimed along with the rest of them who noticed who it was. “Wilbur got switched?”

Wilbur almost collapsed to the ground, one of the younger students that Bunny didn’t recognize rushing over to him to steady him. Jeno massaged his shoulder.

“Are you injured?” Jaemin asked his friend, the male giving him a nod. “Ahyoung, bring the man to the bed—Jeno, were you followed?”

“No,” Jeno replied stilly, his eyes settling on Bunny who quickly looked away. “Not at all. I made sure.”

Bunny noticed how they worked as a system. Ahyoung grabbed the water, Jungwoo stationed himself by the door with a knife (supposedly to make sure he’d kill anyone who tried to follow Jeno), and Lalisa began barking to the younger students who followed her orders.

“Oh, Jaemin,” Jeno said, relaxing and leaning against one of the walls. “Who is going to do your bidding when I’m switched out?”

The room fell silent, Jaemin freezing as he glanced at the male. He didn’t want to show the others that he wa