“Is something wrong with your food?”

Taeyeon broke from her daze, “W-what?”

Jessica pointed at Taeyeon’s food that was untouched, “You are not eating.”

Taeyeon gave Jessica a sad smile, “Sorry I was thinking of something.”

“Did you want to talk about it?”

Taeyeon shook her head, “Not right now. Maybe later. I need to clear my head first.”

Jessica reached forward to take Taeyeon’s hand, “Whatever it is, you can tell me. I will be here to help you anyway I can.”

Taeyeon smiled, “I know. It is just…there are so many things that might happen.”

“The 30^th is going to come Taeyeon and we all know something is going to happen, but if we sit here worrying about it without any intel, then we are wasting our days. If you ask anyone here, we are all anxious for what is to come, but I won’t let the Party win. I won’t sit here thinking of what if when I have something certain in front of me. You.”

Taeyeon could feel her heart flutter with Jessica’s reassuring words, “Yea…you are right. I am glad in this moment, I can have a meal with you.”

Jessica pulled Taeyeon’s hands up to her lips, “Of course I want you to be safe and we both make it out of this Revolution together, but in the end I know you will do something dangerous and reckless. These little things like today, they mean the world to me so I hope you can get out of your head for a few minutes and enjoy this time.”

Taeyeon got up out of her seat to sit next to Jessica and hold her, “I am glad you are here to remind me what matters.” Kissing Jessica on the forehead, Taeyeon held her girlfriend for a little longer, “You are right…I am going to do something reckless, but I won’t do it alone. When the time comes, I want you to come with me, no questions asked.”

Jessica released the hug, “You know I will.”

“Good.” Taeyeon patted Jessica’s hand for a second before reaching for her food to slide to her side of the table and eat, “We should finish eating. I have to go meet some people and you have to get back to work.”

Jessica smiled back, “Work has been kind of easy these days.”

“Why is that?”

“Seohyun has been in and out of the office a lot these days. I don’t know what she is doing but Kangta has been helping with editing.”

“That isn’t like her.”

Jessica shrugged, “I noticed a lot of the supervisors from other Levels are also getting busier. It might be because we are on high alert.”

Taeyeon thought for a second, “I haven’t heard anything from Level 1 about new duties for the supervisors…”

Jessica patted Taeyeon’s leg, “I told you, don’t think about it too much. Eat first and think later.”

Taeyeon giggled as she scooped up another spoonful, “So demanding. One day you will make a great supervisor.”

Jessica rolled her eyes, “you want to be dating a Seohyun?”

“Oh god no! Don’t ruin my fantasies with those kind of thoughts.”

Jessica giggled as she continued to be Taeyeon’s serotonin boost for the remainder of the meal.

After bidding Jessica goodbye, Taeyeon was thinking about talking to Mr. Ok, but Taeyeon was caught off guard seeing Sunny run down the hallway, “Taeyeon! There you are. I was looking all over for you.”

“Did you need something?”

Sunny nodded her head frantically, “Yea I was going through some data…and…” Sunny stopped to look around, “Follow me.”

Taeyeon saw Sunny being suspicious and wondered if she was being followed at that very moment, “okay.”

Sunny rushed Taeyeon back into her lab and sat her down, “Okay so I was looking at that transmission device and I was wondering, where could that thing be transmitting from. I noticed that this thing is periodically giving out small pulses so I cross referenced with this here to see where those pulses were coming from.”

Taeyeon was a little lost on all this technology, “Uh okay. So where is it coming from?”

“Inside the Party. Not just anywhere though, close to that main frame, you know the one with all the security that holds the database for the whole Party.”

“Wait…so is this thing a tracker? They will know where to find us.”

Sunny shook her head, no it is sending out pulses so that means the Party is sending something to these trackers, not the other way around.”

“What is it sending then?”

Sunny shrugged, “Not sure, but if we wanted to find out, we would have to go to that central location, which as you know is impossible right now.”

Taeyeon slumped in defeat, “I thought you had some huge breakthrough.”

“Not about that…I just that it was pretty cool and wanted to tell you.” Sunny got up and rummaged through some items, “I wanted to give you this.”

Taeyeon looked at the unusual brace, “What is that?”

“I may have read through your medical reports on your leg. Something about brittle bones…anyway I can’t heal your bones, but I can reinforce them. Try this on.”

Taeyeon looked at the contraption, “I put this on my leg?”

“Of course. Just put this on here and strap it to make it secure.”

Taeyeon did as she was told and put the brace on with Sunny’s help, “I don’t feel any different.”

“So you see here, this is a lightweight metal and I made it so that it mimics your normal movements, but it is like a brace and it should strengthen your leg. Try it out for a day and see if you can walk around without getting tired or get ambitious and try kicking something.”

Taeyeon tried hopping on the bad leg and to her surprise, it didn’t hurt coming back down, “Cool.”

Sunny smiled triumphantly, “Your leg feels good right?”

“I am not sure.” Taeyeon tried hopping again, doing a few kicks in the air, “I wonder what it will be like to spar with it.”

“Don’t look at me. I am a tech geek and that is about it. Go find a victim in your team.”

Taeyeon giggled, “Thanks Sunny.”

“What are friends for. Now go have fun and tell me how it works out.”

Taeyeon quickly hugged her friend before running out the door to find a victim, “Yunho…”

Yunho stopped right in front of Taeyeon, “Woah. Are you running through the halls?”

Taeyeon couldn’t stop smiling, “I know right?”

Yunho looked at the thing on Taeyeon’s leg, “What is that?”

“Something Sunny gave me to help with my leg. Do you have 10 minutes?”

Yunho looked up to the ceiling and thought for a second, “Maybe. What do you need help with?”

“Fight me.”

“What?”

“A friendly fight. I was told to try this new leg out.”

Yunho frowned, “I don’t want to hurt you Taeyeon.”

“It will be fine. Just fight me.”

Yunho sighed, “Okay but I am going easy on you.”

“You know I won’t take it easy on you though.”

Yunho rolled his eyes, “If you break your leg again, the higher ups will kill me.”

Taeyeon waved off the empty threat, “Don’t worry about it.”

Going to the nearest training room, Taeyeon took off her jacket as did Yunho, “first to tap out.”

Yunho got into a fighting stance, “Got it.”

Taeyeon, who was a little excited about the fight, decided to make the first move. She rushed forward and tried to land a few hits on Yunho but he was faster and dodged all the attacks. For a while, Taeyeon was trying to attack and Yunho evade, but then Yunho saw his move and kicked Taeyeon’s bad leg, hoping to end the fight quick. However, to both their surprise, Taeyeon didn’t feel a thing and so she went in to counter his move with an under kick to throw Yunho off his feet. Falling to the ground, Yunho didn’t have much time before Taeyeon hopped on him to make the final move. With her fist above his face, Yunho knew he was finished and tapped out.

For a second, Taeyeon remained hovering over Yunho as her eye caught onto something shiny right behind his ear. She stared at it long enough that Yunho had to interject, “Taeyeon I quit you win.”

Taeyeon shook her head before getting off the guy, “Sorry.”

Yunho smiled back, “That as…something.”

Taeyeon got up and rubbed her leg, “Yea…that was awesome.”

Yunho carefully inspected the brace, “Sunny is brilliant.”

“I know right. She can do almost anything.”

Yunho wiped the sweat from his head, “Anyway that was fun. It is nice to see the old Taeyeon back. I must be out of shape for you to beat me that quick though.”

“You let your guard down.”

Yunho laughed, “Well I won’t be doing that again.”

Taeyeon patted the man on the back, “thanks for the spar.”

Yunho waved Taeyeon off, “Anytime.”

Taeyeon immediately dropped her smile after Yunho left, “Did I see it wrong?”

---------------------

Jessica felt Taeyeon toss again in the bed, it was clear the other girl wasn’t sleeping. They spent the night together because Taeyeon was anxious about the next morning. A few days have passed and Jessica was trying to make every day seem as normal as possible but she knew Taeyeon was counting down the days to the 30^th. It was usual that the Party were silent with the days leading up to the big event other than announcing a parade and some big speech after.

Of course she knew Taeyeon’s mind was running wild with what could happen, but with radio silence from the Party, Taeyeon didn’t have any updates from Level 1 either. She understood what Taeyeon was going through and knew everyone in the Resistance felt like sitting ducks waiting for the Party to do something but it seemed agreed upon by Level 1 that they shouldn’t do any action unless provoked. This angered several people in Level 1, but others held onto hope that they could save civilians in the Party if they could prove they were not the bad guys in this war. Jessica could see both sides of this argument, but she didn’t know how to save more people, to act before the Party kills or to kill before the Party kills more? Is there really a right answer in this long battle of wits?

“Taeyeon did you want to talk?”

Taeyeon flipped over to her back, “I can’t sleep.”

“I know.”

Turning her head towards Jessica, “Why are you awake?”

“The same as you. I am expecting a nuclear bomb to drop right on us as soon as the sun rises.”

Taeyeon flipped one more time to face Jessica and brush her hair back, “If that does happen, I am glad I get to spend my last minutes with you.”

Jessica smiled, “Me too.”

Taeyeon gathered Jessica in her arms, “Maybe we should stay together tomorrow. I don’t want to lose you if something does happen.”

“What about our schedules? I have work, you have meetings and there is some training.”

“I don’t think tomorrow will be a normal day.”

Jessica buried her head into Taeyeon’s chest, “I want to hold onto some hope that it will be.”