“What the hell am I doing?”

Jongdae asks to the heavy blow of the wind whipping him hard in the face as he scales one inch at a time, a ledge of a cliff, where the ground 700 ft below is clouded by white mist. His back is glued to the solidity of the cliff behind him, but he can’t stop his heart when it plummets to his stomach when he breaks the very first rule of survival by looking down to the endless white abyss below, and he also can’t stop the swallow of his saliva when he imagines himself reduced to mere Jongdae pudding if he were to slip and fall to die a gruesome death, a death in which no one would even know where or how he died, a death silenced by the howling wind.

This was not part of the plan.

This was supposed to be Jongdae’s adventurous expenditure to find ruins and ancient artifacts of Yamatai. He was supposed to make his mark in books dusty from scrawls of history; he was supposed to uncover the truths to myths once told, and bring whatever found back to a national museum for to others to believe. But this is way beyond the scope of what Jongdae had in mind. An unnatural storm came out of nowhere and cracked the Endurance like it was a biscuit, and now he’s stranded on an island, the lost kingdom of Yamatai, and where Jongdae’s friggin’ stoked to have found what others spent their lives to find only to fail, he’s also exhausted to the point of collapse. He’s definitely uncovering artifacts, but he’s also digging up truths that are entailed with an ominous mystery that’s more than what he originally hoped to find. Jongdae is a ing archaeologist, and the last time he checked, archaeologists don’t wield an arsenal of semi-automatic weapons, jump from ledge to building, climbing one rocky wall to the next in a mission to save his fellow crew members from a psychotic shaman who was once a shipwrecked survivor like himself. All the while channeling his inner Rambo by killing the blood-thirsty inhabitants of the island -- who just can’t take the hint to get the out of his way-- and of course, figure out what the hell is up with this island, and why no one can leave. Jongdae’s been stripped of his title as ‘Archaeologist’, to be slapped with ‘Cold-Blooded Killer’ who’s not only fighting for his own life, but the lives of his friends as well.

An open window of a decaying temple catches Jongdae’s eye, and Jongdae determines that it’s a pretty wide leap from his position from the ledge. But it’s the only option he has to get out of the wind, now growing angrier, and one leap is all he’s got. No practice runs, no second tries. It’s either he curls his fingers over the bottom of that window, or here ends Kim Jongdae, the archaeologist with nothing to his name.

“Breathe Jongdae, you can ing do this. You have to ing do this,” He bends his legs, breathes in a jagged breath, and then he propels his body forwards, blistered fingers clinging on for dear life of the wooden bottom of the window. Jongdae heaves himself up with a muffled grunt, and then he drops into a small room lit with candles that breathe life and an eerie awe to the white symbols of the great Sun Queen decorating the walls, and the myriad of skulls and bones lying all over the floor.

Through a crack in a wall, Jongdae squeezes through, yet his heart automatically quickens at the sight of a Solarii wielding a semi-automatic rifle in a large clearing illuminated by the sun’s light from a gaping hole in the high-ceiling. Back turned to Jongdae, he seems to be completely clueless of Jongdae’s presence, and another man, talking to his comrade from the roof above can’t see him either from his angle either. Pick axe in hand, Jongdae slowly approaches the Solarii in a low crouch, wary of the movement above of him. Easy Jongdae, don’t make a sound--

“-- Jongdae -- Jongdae, are you there--”

Jongdae’s radio goes off abruptly, and goddamnit Jongdae, he forgot to turn it off once he landed inside. The Solarii whips around, rifle pointed with a ‘What the--’ escaping from his mouth, and then everything goes to chaos. A cacophony of bullets hitting the wooden floor rings in Jongdae’s ears as he draws his shotgun, giving the Solarii a good shot in the stomach, where pieces of his armour flies in all directions, along with his blood and his life splattering all over. Alarmed cries are hollered from the roof; ropes swing down, and back up rains from the sky. Jongdae rolls around for cover, switching his shotgun for the rifle -- fully loaded-- and he starts blasting it at the Solarii on the ropes, too busy shooting another to watch them as they plummet to the ground, necks and ankles breaking on contact. Fire arrows and molotovs fly in his direction from archers and explosive-fanatics perched on the roof above. Jongdae fights fire with fire, drawing the string of his bow, and shooting fire- arrows at his enemies, until they come raining down in strangled cries.

The last archer falls, and then the ensuing wave of calm washes Jongdae, cleansing him of the adrenaline, but leaving him with a hardened heart and resolve as he loots the bodies for ammunition. He switches the radio back on to be met with silence. Jongdae straps it back onto his belt. He scales the walls, calloused hands gripping wood until he’s back outside in the wind, now died downed enough to hear the sounds of gunshots and explosives being volleyed not too far from him. Out of the frying pan and into the goddamn fire. Past wooden huts, Jongdae starts running towards the commotion, hoping for some chance that the Solarii are having a rebellious uprising amongst themselves, but he quickly doubts it before the thought even extrapolates. If the guns aren’t pointed at Jongdae, that means that his crew members are being bombarded with malice intent, and it just so happens, as Jongdae runs into a battleground of another abandoned pagoda, Minseok and Zitao are crouched behind barrels, bullets flying from their pistols. Luhan has his hands full dancing with death, somersaulting left and right, and then blasting his shotgun at his shielded perpetrator, until their head flies off.

Jongdae stealthily enters the scene, but not he isn’t as discreet as he thought as a gun is pointed to the back of his head, stopping him in mid step, and this is it, this is the ing end, but it unexpectedly recedes. Jongdae whips around to meet the sheepish grin of Yixing, and he heaves a sigh of relief that doesn’t even have time to leave his mouth until a Solarii with a machete comes barrelling towards Yixing from behind. Jongdae pulls the trigger on his pistol just in time, bullet between the eyes and out the back of his head. However, another bullet is shot past Jongdae’s ear to hit another Solarii dead in the head behind him, credited to Yixing. A look from the both of them is all the thanks required before the boys both unanimously dive for cover. Jongdae lands beside an occupied Luhan who greets him with a, “THAT EXPLOSIVE BARREL TO THE LEFT-- SHOOT IT!” Jongdae willingly complies, aiming his rifle to the red barrel. With a BOOM! The remaining enemies fly out from their cover in a bone cracking symphony, the only sounds left being the pieces of metal landing shortly after.

Jongdae rises from his spot and pats himself of the dust. He flashes a white smile that he didn’t even know he could even muster in a place and time like this, but it’s been far too long since he’s made contact with his friends, not since the crash, and although they’re as fatigued as he is, they’re ecstatic to see him alive too. They all embrace in a circle of exultant laughter that echoes in the ancient structure. With his chin rested on Minseok’s shoulder, Jongdae scans the environment in front of him. Bodies lie everywhere: hanging from balconies, strewn on the floor in distorted positions. He looks to his friends, all still very alive and intact, but soaked in blood that aren’t theirs; all the cruel aspects of survival that he’s grown accustomed to. So they’re not the reasons why Jongdae furrows his brows, as there’s something else that just doesn’t feel right with this situation.

“Where’s Wufan?”

Tao lands it right on the mark, and how could Wufan, six foot plus of noticeable demeanor have been overlooked for so long?

Yixing cranes his neck from one inch of the building to the next, but with such an obvious clearing, it isn’t hard to spot a blonde giant, or to verify that he clearly isn’t present. “He was here when we got ambushed, I don’t -- What happened to him?”

Right on cue, Yixing’s radio goes off with Wufan on the other end, and he doesn’t sound like he’s in the midst of unforetold danger, in fact he just sounds outright embarrassed and ashamed when he grudgingly states his current predicament in an almost inaudible mumble, “I’ve been kidnapped.”