They had been fighting the North Koreans for only a few minutes now, and Kyuhyun had no idea how many men he had shot already. He tried not to think about it as he ran past soldiers caught in struggles, keeping his head low, trying not to get hit. It was impossible to tell which soldiers were his comrades and which were the enemy. He pushed past hundreds of people as he searched for a place to take cover.

Much to his dismay, they had ended up far closer to the town than they had wanted. Kyuhyun assumed the townspeople were hidden safely in their homes, safe from harm, but the thought of killing innocent people still haunted him. Sure, he wasn’t too happy with taking the lives of North Korean soldiers, but they were the enemy, and he knew they must be stopped.

Finally, Kyuhyun ducked into a secluded alleyway, hiding behind a wall, and peeking his head around the corner to try to get a good angle. Once again, he began shooting, his eyes set on enemy soldiers.

Suddenly, he heard movement in the alley behind him and spun around quickly, ready with his gun pointed directly at the source of the noise.

________________________________________________________________________________

Sungmin knew something was wrong right away. The noises of shooting that he was hearing were coming from the west side of town, while they had been positioned on the east side of town – the side they expected the South Koreans to go past.

At first, he wasn’t sure what to do. It seemed that either way he would be disobeying orders. He was told to stay where he was, but he was also told to attack the enemy. In order to attack the enemy, he would have to leave his position and head to the other side of town.

For several minutes Sungmin remained frozen, unsure of what action to take. Then, he heard footsteps coming his way. Through the dark, he realized it was a herd of fellow North Korean soldiers running towards the direction of town.

“Come on! Let’s go!” They shouted as they passed. Without another thought, Sungmin rose from his spot and joined his comrades as they headed off to do their job.

As they neared the town, they could see and hear the sounds of battle. Sungmin would have been nervous and scared, but he didn’t have the time seeing as they were already entering the struggle and an oncoming opponent distracted him.

The South Korean man pointed his gun straight at Sungmin, but he quickly dropped to the ground and dodged the bullet. As Sungmin ducked he simultaneously turned and pointed his gun at the enemy, pulling the trigger. Sungmin heard a scream and thought he had hit his target, but couldn’t tell for sure because at that moment a body fell on top of him, crushing him to the ground.

Sungmin yelled and struggled to push the dead body off of him. Not stopping to check which side the corpse was from, Sungmin hurried to his feet and began to run through the chaos. He figured his best bet would be to find some cover and assess how to best assist his comrades in the battle.

Soon, Sungmin had found temporary refuge from the battle behind a house that was half torn apart and slightly on fire. He took a moment to catch his breath and make sure his body was okay. Then, just as he was about to observe his surroundings to see what he could do, he heard a soft sob from a small shed behind the house. Slowly and quietly, he inched towards the shed and took a peek inside.

There on the floor, in the corner, sat a small girl, maybe 10 years old. She was crying and holding onto a small doll. Sungmin’s heart melted at the sight of it, and he was instantly reminded of his young cousin who lived with him back home and had been like a sister to him.

Almost forgetting about the battle going on outside, Sungmin pushed the door of the shed open further and stepped inside. When the girl saw him, she immediately let out a small cry and tried to back further away from him.

Sungmin stopped and closed the door so they would be hidden. Putting up his hands, he said softly, “It’s okay, I’m not going to hurt you.”

However the girl still looked frightened, so Sungmin continued to talk as he inched slowly forwards. “How did you end up in here?” He said gently. “Don’t worry, everything’s going to be alright. I won’t let anything hurt you.”

The young girl, seeing the warm look in Sungmin’s eyes, began to relax a bit, but the tears continued to run down her cheeks and she remained silent.

Finally gaining the little girl’s trust, Sungmin, kneeled next to her, placing one hand on her shoulder to comfort her. He felt that she was trembling.

“It’s okay, I’m going to help you,” Sungmin told her, temporarily forgetting about his comrades outside fighting. For some reason, saving this child seemed like the most important thing right now. “My name is Sungmin, what’s yours?”

At first, the girl didn’t answer, just staring at Sungmin. Then he gave her a reassuring smile, and she seemed to gather some courage. “M-M-Mi Sun.”

“Mi Sun. What a pretty name,” Sungmin replied, surprised at the cheerful tone of his own voice, considering their current situation. “Well, Mi Sun, I’m going to get you out of here, alright? It’s not safe right now. I’m going to take you somewhere safe.”

Sungmin held Mi Sun’s hand and stood, but still she didn’t move. “You have to trust me, okay?” Sungmin pleaded, looking into the small girl’s intelligent but scared eyes. After a few seconds, she nodded, and stood, and the two carefully left the shed.

Sungmin began to lead Mi Sun around houses and slowly away from the village, steering clear of the fight going on in the center of town. Suddenly, they reached the end of this row of houses, and Sungmin thought they were trapped.

He paused and panicked for a moment, afraid that he would not be able to save this little girl after all. That was when he noticed that someone was tugging on his hand. He looked down at Mi Sun and saw that she was pointing towards a narrow staircase next to the building closest to them.

Sungmin didn’t know why, but his instinct was to trust the girl, and he followed her up the stairs. He soon realized that they led to the roof of the building. Once they were on the roof, they had to crouch to stay hidden from any soldiers below that might be looking up. But Sungmin soon realized that from up there, they could navigate across the roofs of all the houses in town.

Mi Sun led the way as they carefully made their way to safety. Sungmin was impressed at the clever little girl, and it hit him how lucky he was to have a native of the town with him.

Eventually, they neared the town borders, and Mi Sun led the way to a ladder leading down from the roof. Then they turned into a very narrow alley. They were almost to safety, and started moving faster.

Finally, they turned into another alley that would lead them out of town. However, they saw something that made Sungmin stop dead in his tracks.