She's still wearing the same clothes as she was the last time, except now she has an umbrella. Bomi doesn't have the same luxury. "Why do you get an umbrella and I don't?" Bomi whines. Dressed in a light tan trench coat over a white v-neck and some dark blue jeans, Bomi blends in with the city but not the rain that is now drenching her clothes. She holds the suitcase containing the PASIV with her right hand and tugs her purple bowler hat lower onto her head with her left.

          "I came prepared," Chorong smirks. Bomi gives another high-pitched whine as a dark van with tinted windows rolled up to them. 

          "Get in, losers," Hyeri shouted from the back seat as the windows rolled down. "We're going shopping." Bomi lets out an obnoxious laugh as she joins Hyeri and Ilhoon in the back. Dongwoo moves over to the passenger seat to let Chorong drive. All the passengers in the car are slammed into their seats as Chorong floors it without hesitation. Cars honk after them.

          "There," Chorong gestures to the impending skyscraper with the ominous spires. "that's Naeun's Port. It's literally everything she hates all rolled up into one." She makes a sharp left and Ilhoon lets out a grunt as he slams into the car door and the two girls in the back slam into him.

         "No, it's not." Bomi says seriously, making a complete personality 180 as compared to only moments before. "It's too easy. Too obvious." She bites her lip and rubs at her eyebrow. "It's a red herring," she murmurs softly and as much as it frustrates Chorong, Bomi is right. It is way too obvious. Not to mention that Naeun looped the maze around this area and not the area surrounding that building. "It's raining," Bomi mumbles, looking out the window. Before Chorong can make a snarky remark about how obvious that is, Bomi makes eye contact with her through the rear-view mirror. "Unni," the younger girl says, watching Chorong intensely, "has Naeun mentioned anything to you about cities in rain?"

          Chorong furrows her eyebrows. "Yeah," she finally croaks out, "she has."

*

         "Don't you think it's beautiful?" Naeun breathes against the hazy glass, watching droplets of rain hit the window with a delicate beat. Chorong looks up from her work- mapping a new dreamscape for some client whose name and face she can't seem to recall- and smiles at her. She stands up from the couch and stretches before heading over to Naeun, bare feet mutely padding against the cold, wooden floor. Chorong wraps her arms around the younger girl and places her chin on Naeun's shoulder, following her gaze out the window. 

          Chorong looks back at Naeun. "I think you're beautiful," she says cheekily, trailing light kisses down the column of Naeun's neck. The younger girl giggles and swats at her arm before pushing her away.

         "You're cheesy," Naeun laughs, but the twinkle in her eyes says differently. The warm kiss Naeun gives her afterwards says a lot differently. "But seriously," Naeun says, grabbing the older girl's arms and wrapping them around her slim waist again. She sighs, content in Chorong's embrace, and nuzzles her face against the older girl's neck. "Don't you think the rain is just so beautiful? It's like the sky is washing away all the sins in the world." Her fingers press gently against the glass and trails downward, leaving behind only foggy imprints.

          Chorong raises her eyebrows curiously but looks back out the window. "I don't like the rain," she declares delicately. "It clings to you and makes your clothes weigh heavier. It tugs and pulls you down. Under the rain, people melt; they just pretend that they don't." Naeun is looking at her with wide eyes and Chorong only smiles in response, pressing a tender kiss on her forehead.

          "Maybe we melt under the rain because sin is all we're made of now," Naeun mumbles out, gaze returning to the rain trickling down the window pane. 

          Chorong shoots her a confused look. "You're weird," she states bluntly, but says something different as she kisses Naeun's frown away, tilting the corner of the girl's mouth upwards, and laces their fingers together. She says something completely different as she loosens the first buttons of Naeun's shirt.

*

         "BRAKE!" Hyeri yells as they almost ram into the sixteen-wheeler in front of them. Everyone in the car jolts forward; Ilhoon and Bomi lets out twin groans of pain after their faces slam into the car seats in front of them. "Jesus Christ, unni, watch the road," Hyeri mumbles. Bomi whispers back that she used to be a lot worse back when she first started driving, making Ilhoon widen his eyes comically. Dongwoo laughs and Chorong snarls at the three of them before retorting that pain is all in the mind and that they should all it up.

          "She thinks the rain washes away all your sins," Chorong says stiffly once silence resettles in the car. Bomi sits up, her face lighting up as if something had just dawned on her.

         "The Port is her biggest sin," Bomi declares, "and what she thinks her biggest sin is her first mistake- our third mission together." Chorong tightens her grip on the steering wheel- she remembers wild hands grabbing at her, clawing at her skin, muscles ripping, tendons tearing, bones cracking, a tortured scream in the air (LET ME DIE!)- her knuckles turn white. "The mission where she screwed up the architecture," Bomi finishes solemnly. Chorong hears what she doesn't add on: The mission where you were torn apart into pieces by the projections.

         Chorong slows the van down to a stop. She rigidly looks forward because she can't look to the side. She can't; she's not ready yet. (In the back of her mind, she wonders if she ever will be fully ready.) "We're here," she says quietly.

          "Arsenal's in the back," Dongwoo grins. "Don't worry, I packed a lot." They all pile out of the van before opening the trunk to grab their weapons. Chorong eyes Hyeri judgingly as the girl brandishes a rocket launcher with a grin on her face. Noticing Chorong's look, Hyeri only shrugs and remarks that she shouldn't be afraid to dream bigger. Chorong judges her even harder. 

          "!" Ilhoon curses as projections started shooting at them. He ducks under some bullets and his gun before shooting. The noise rings in Chorong's ears as projections soundlessly fall to the ground. 

          Hyeri lifts the rocket launcher onto her shoulder and aims it where a cluster of projections have gathered onto the roof of a nearby building. "Dream big, unni," she winks cheekily at Chorong before shooting. Her words are reinforced by a giant explosion that knocks the group (sans Hyeri) onto the ground. Chorong has to admit, as trigger-happy as Hyeri is, she gets done.

          "Everyone, into the building!" Chorong shouts and they all retreat inside. The group stops dead in their tracks and Chorong slams into Dongwoo's back. Before she's able to scold the man, something catches her eye. It's a looming figure standing in the shadows. Suddenly, the lights of the warehouse turn on, drowning the place in fluorescent light. Through her fingers, Chorong sees a mess of short brown hair. It's the person who killed her the first time she tried to get Naeun back. She steps forward and in front of her is a girl- young- dressed simply in a knitted grey sweater and blue skinny jeans, standing over a mess of blood splattered violently on the concrete. Chorong pales when she realizes it's her blood. (She feels fingernails, desperate and wild, gouging at her veins, feels arteries spill open and tendons snap. She can't see; she can't tell if she has been blinded by pain or cruelty. She's not sure if she wants to know.) 

          Chorong trembles and gasps desperately for air until Bomi appears next to her, grasping at her shoulders and holding her firm until the tremors stop. "Unni," Bomi calls out softly. Through shaky vision, Chorong can see the worry in the younger girl's eyes. "Are you okay?"

          Chorong shakes her head. "No," she rasps out, gulping in air. "But that doesn't matter right now." Bomi looks apprehensive, but ultimately lets it slide and Chorong is grateful. She takes a moment to prepare herself before standing up and squaring her shoulders. "That's my blood, isn't it?" she calls out to the young girl who she assumes is the Sentinel.

          The girl simply nods. "You died here before," she replies, pulling a gun out from behind her back, "and you're going to die here again." The girl points the gun at her and Chorong knows she's going to shoot, knows she has no reason not to, yet she's frozen in place until Bomi tackles her out of the way. The bullet lodges itself in the wall. Bomi pushes Chorong behind a forklift, using it as cover and starts shooting back at the girl. On her right, Chorong can see the other three hiding behind some cement bags, waiting for the right time to attack.

         Chorong bites her lip and looks down before making her decision. She stands up and walks determinedly to the middle of the room. Bomi calls out desperately at her. The girl aims her gun at her and before she can shoot, Chorong yells out "I didn't forgive her!" The girl's finger stills on the trigger. Chorong pauses and slowly, the Sentinel lowers her gun. "I told Naeun that I forgave her, but I lied." She her lips. "How can you forgive someone who-" (She feels her clothes being ripped off, feels the cloth embedding into her flesh.) "How can you forgive someone who-" (Fingernails dig into her eyebrow and she screams as they drag lower and deeper.) Chorong's arms fall to her side and she gives up on trying to finish her sentence. "We had been dating for about a year and a half, but if you add in dream time, it was about five years. I knew I loved her, but that wasn't enough." Chorong looks away. "I didn't love her enough to forgive her. At least, not at that point," she finishes softly.

          "I'm Namjoo," the girl says finally.

          Chorong finally raises her gun and points it at the Sentinel- at Namjoo. "That doesn't mean anything to me." She shoots, but Namjoo just casually sidesteps it. Chorong's eyes widen. 

         From the corner of her eye, she sees Hyeri stand up, rocket launcher perched on her shoulder. "Oh yeah," Hyeri yells out, "try pulling that Matrix bull on this puppy!" 

         "No, you idiot!" Bomi yells from across the room. "That's going to blow up the entire place along with the Port and us in it! Put that stupid thing down!" Hyeri grumbles, but ultimately obeys. If it weren't for the situation she's in, Chorong would have laughed at Bomi calling someone other than herself an idiot.

          "Noona," Ilhoon calls out. Chorong turns around to see the boy heading towards her. He places a hand on her shoulder while eyeing Namjoo closely. "I'll handle her. You guys go set everything up." Chorong nods and the other three leave their hiding spots. They head towards the area where the blood splatter is, but Chorong stops them and gestures for them to head up to the second level instead.

*

         "Why did you lead us to the second level?" Dongwoo asks over the ringing of gunshots. Bomi and Hyeri both stop to look at her curiously as well.

         "Because the place where I got killed is too obvious," Chorong says. "And there was nowhere near enough blood," she adds on under her breath. She stops in front of a door labelled 'SECURITY' in rusty yellow letters. She jiggles the doorknob only to find it locked, and shoots the damn thing off. "Because in here," Chorong says, looking at all of the security camera monitors- all still working, "was where she saw everything that happened. Her biggest sin wasn't the screw-up that caused me to get ripped apart. Her biggest sin was not doing anything while she watched the projections rip me apart," she states quietly. Bomi hands her the suitcase containing the PASIV and they quietly set everything up.

         The gunshots stop, leaving behind only an eerie silence. The group waits in anticipation. "Noona!" Ilhoon calls out and they all sigh in relief. Bomi heads down to help Ilhoon carry Namjoo up the stairs. 

         "Is she still alive?" Chorong asks when she sees Ilhoon. The boy nods, limping into the room as Bomi carries Namjoo. "You know that once the Sentinel is down, the projections are going to become even more agressive, right?"

         Ilhoon grins and nods. "Don't worry, noona," he says as brightly as he can as Dongwoo unlodges a bullet from his shoulder. "I can handle it. After all, I am the best of the best." Hyeri snorts and Ilhoon glares at her. They all insert the IV lines into their arms and Bomi inserts one into the unconscious Namjoo.

         "We're all counting on you," Bomi mumbles out and the boy nods dutifully. He presses the trigger.

*

         Chorong wakes up. It's quiet.