When I woke up this morning, my mind was groggy and my body was sore from last night’s late night training session with Kai.

We had stayed up until 4 in the morning working on our shooting and agility skills, with not much improvement. Although Kai had assured me tons of times that I was doing exceptionally well, I couldn’t help but feel that he was only saying that because he had felt bad that I was overworking myself. I could sense that in him by the way he took care of me and I hated it sometimes. I didn’t want to be taken care of, even if it was from my own best friend.

Out of everyone at the training camp, Kai and I were the closest to each other both in age and relationship wise. He was, I guess as proper terms go, my best friend. Whenever we were going through hard times during the training, we would find each other and vent our problems to one another. Although he would never truly admit how much he cared for me, deep down, I could see through his actions and the way he looked after me, how much he really cared for me.

He was only a year older than me, but he looked beyond his age. Unlike the rest of us who have a milky white complexion, Kai had more of a darker tint to his features which was usually the joke amongst all of us. Sometimes, Chanyeol would tease that Kai was from Earth, one of the few planets that was once closest to the Sun, which was the reason as to why he was so dark. But the topic of Earth was sensitive to us, because it had perished thousands of years ago by an impact of many asteroids that boiled all of the oceans and caused life there to cease.

Our ancestor from the Galaxy weren’t quick enough to prevent it from happening, nor was Earth able to recover after that. Thousands of years later, no one really talked about Earth because we considered it taboo to talk ill of it, except for Chanyeol who almost always received a punch from Kai afterwards. He never learned his lesson though, bringing it up occasionally to piss Kai off. Chanyeol was really great at doing things like that, which is why I kept my distance from him. Unlike Kai, I wasn’t very good at tolerating Chanyeol. If he pissed me off, I was sure to make it clear that he did while Kai would say nothing and ignored him until he cooled it off.

That was one of the few qualities I admired most about Kai. I have to admit, from our friendship, I learned not only the qualities of how to be a good Hunter, but how to be a good person. At first, I wanted to be a Hunter to protect only Haewon and me, but after his passing, and getting close with rest of the Hunters and Kai, I learned that our sole purpose was not to just protect ourselves, but to defend EXODUS. I watched how Kai took care of his friends, and I saw how many lives he had saved in the city, and realized that his purpose of becoming a Hunter wasn’t just to vanquish the Nightcrawlers, but to protect humanity.

Despite his skinny frame, Kai was quite strong and well-built underneath under all the layers he usually wore. He was about a head taller than me, with chestnut brown hair that covered his eyes often when he slept and pouty small lips. He wasn’t one to smile often, but that was only because he trained so hard that he was always tired the next morning. Aside from Kris, I didn’t know anyone who trained as hard as Kai did. It wasn’t until recently that I began to train side by side with Kai, every night we would stay up until the wee mornings to train. I would study his movements and observe his way of hunting and I’d try to do the same thing.

One of our most memorable training session happened about a week ago. After everyone had fallen asleep, Kai and I snuck out past our bedtime.

After 11pm, if we weren’t on a mission with the camp leaders, we were forbidden to leave the center for health and safety reasons. Kai, of course being one of the senior hunters, was able to talk his way out. He spoke with one of the guards at the front, by the name of Taemin, apparently they were old friends, and the guard allowed us to leave. We both wore the same article of clothing, a light jacket with a thick vest on and our gun holsters strapped securely onto us. The only difference between Kai and me that night, was that he had his bow and arrow slung over his shoulders. My outfit was heavy enough; I couldn’t imagine how heavy the bow was on Kai.

“They’re weightless, I can’t even feel a thing,” he told me. He was bending down tying his shoelace, so he didn’t catch the look of apprehension I gave him.  

“You’re crazy. What if we encounter one of them, and something happens to you?”

“Hey,” he said softly. He straightened up and gave me a serious face. “Nothing’s going to happen to me. But since you said something, go knock on wood. I don’t want your words to jinx me out tonight.”

I looked around the vast darkness and sighed. “I’m just nervous,” I admitted.

The moment we had stepped out of the thick electrical fences, realization settled in and I knew that we were no longer under the protection of the guards or any of the other experienced Hunters. It was just Kai, me, and the darkness of the night. We didn’t know what or who we were going to encounter, and that’s what scared me the most. I had never been outside of the camp without a car or a leader. Although Kai and I were well trained hunters, we didn’t know what we were going to expect. We had no walkie talkies, so if anything were to happen to us, there will be no way of sending feed back to the center.

“Mia,” he said my name so quietly that I couldn’t hear him. He had to say it a second time, and when he did, I stopped walking and looked at him.

Kai looked at me with a soft expression, and he touched my shoulder gently with one hand. “There’s nothing to be nervous about. I saw the way you fought, Mia. You are an incredible Hunter. Just think of this as one of the tests that Kris is putting you through, prove to him that you are more than just what you’re outer appearance is—you are a Hunter.”

His words provoked something inside of me to burn up. He held my gaze strongly for a moment before turning his face forward. “We got three hours, Mia. Let’s show them what you’re made of.”

This was probably why he was my best friend.

There was nothing more inspiring to me than perseverance and determination, and Kai had that in him.

The light bulbs on the streets were dim and mostly broken, the older one’s flickered wildly as it threatened to burn out; the only thing I could hear was the sound of my heartbeat and our footsteps against the rocky gravel. Earlier in the afternoon today, there was a sandstorm raging outside which explained all the dust and sand on the street. Even the air was inexplicably chalky and dry, causing my nose to fill up with dust. I pulled up my face mask and hid the lower half of my face to prevent my nose from getting any more congested than it already was.

It was ra