THE SUN IS not that high up in the sky when Chan leaves the house. It's still chilly, but the clear skies give him hope that he won't have to rush home, chased off by a sudden shower.

He couldn't sleep. At some point during the night, the covers got a little too warm and the air a little too thick, his eyes a little too teary. So he simply grabbed the first blanket he could pull off the bed and left the house to go and sit in the backyard. The swing couldn't lull him back to sleep, not after what he saw in his dreams. Instead, he made the decision to visit the fields earlier and that's exactly what he's doing.

There are still a few more hours until he needs to open the shop, so after a quick shower, he finally decides to put on some proper clothes, opting for a pair of faded blue jean shorts and an equally pale blue shirt. The top three buttons stay unbuttoned because he knows that if he here to button it all the way up, the shirt would be impossible to breathe in.

Bella watches him close the glass door, eyes round and pleading as he straddles his bike and prepares to leave.

She's an old lady now, almost twelve, but there are still moments when she acts like a puppy, curious about the world around her, digging and chewing and biting out of pure wanderlust. Chan is proud to say that wanderlust is what they have in common.

So hesitantly, he returns to the door. The hesitation dissipates with each step as Bella's tail grows more restless, up to the point where she's jumping at the door to greet him. Grinning, he lets her outside.

"No running away, okay?"

Unsurprisingly, she sits down right next to his bike, waiting for him to move, head tilted in curiosity.

He passes the neighbouring houses on his way. It's still early and their beautiful little world is waking up. An elderly couple are drinking tea on their front porch. A child is playing in the garden. There are two teenagers making out behind a house and Chan shouts an "Already?" in their direction, but keeps up his pace despite their red faces.

The store won't open for another hour or so. Yet, just in case, he rests the bicycle against a lamppost before stepping towards the door. Now the closed sign is accompanied by another one, saying he'll be there shortly, just in case he doesn't get there in time to open the store.

"Such a responsible little boy, aren't you?"

Minho is wearing something different today. It's a simple pastel yellow t-shirt with words printed on it, already chapped to the point of being illegible. The denim of his straight jeans is a pale blue shade, ripped all over to show the golden skin of his thighs and knees. His hair is as frizzy as always, the purple fading in some places. He looks almost normal. Almost ordinary. Chan connects the jolt in his chest to the surprise of being interrupted on one of his rides, not to Minho. Certainly not to Minho.

Bella, cautious and slow, waddles over to him, sniffing his ankles with a curiosity she shows to everyone new. Minho frowns at her.

"I'm busy." Chan turns away and heads over to the bike, ready to leave. Footsteps behind him are barely audible, but he knows they're there by the soft chuckle that follows them.

"I can see that. Still, I'm kinda bored, so I think you won't mind some company."

What the fuck? "Company? Not interested. What were you doing here anyway? We're you following me?"

"What? No, I was in the neighbourhood." He looks back and Chan follows his eyes to the ground, to a small, skinny feline curled up by the wall Minho was leaning against. He eyes Bella warily, but she pays the cat no mind, busy examining Minho. "Come on, Channie!" The whine in Minho's voice is back. Chan glances over at him to see his lips pouted. "You can't just leave me here."

"I can and I will." He gives Minho one final grin and ignores his pout. "Let's go, Bella!"

Yet, he barely moves a few yards before he realises she isn't following him. He turns back around and the sight makes his eyes widen.

Bella has propped herself up on her back legs, her paws pressed to Minho's thighs, leaving dirty little prints on his clothes as she scratches him curiously. Before Chan can say a thing to her, she jumps, forcing Minho to the ground with fond licks and sniffs all over his face. Chan can't believe the sight before him.

Minho's expression is one of surprise, of horror. He scrunches his face up in disgust. "You menace! Channie, get your lady friend off of me, please!"

Chan holds back a laugh. "Nah, you seem to be getting along just fine."

Looking at Bella, he realises that bringing Minho along will be a bigger issue to Minho than it will be to him himself, so he complies.

Unsurprisingly, Minho turns out to be quite the bother.

As Chan cycles down the dirty roads and past barely functional homes, Minho clutches to the fabric of his shirt, no doubt throwing nasty glares at Bella. Chan can feel his hot breath against his back and it doesn't help him feel any better when the weather is so merciless. Minho's humming an unfamiliar melody the entire time he's not cursing at Bella underneath his breath, stopping occasionally just to point out something, a memory he's made at places they pass.

Chan almost flinches when Minho's voice rises and he greets an old lady standing in one of the gardens. He looks over and notices her wrinkled skin and patched up clothes. Her smile is still warm as she waves at Minho.

"I fixed that lady's fence. Thinking about taking care of that roof one of these days," Minho mutters as they round the corner and cycle away from her cottage. Chan glances back at it to see the house all broken down, vines climbing up its walls to claim it as their own now that there is no one who can defend it, for the old lady is too weak to take care of it. There is a well by the window, overgrown grass making it barely visible. The fence, however, looks brand new, the lock completely in place, the planks freshly painted a bright blue. "She has no one."

What is a proper response to that?

He has to admit, it's nice of Minho. Helping the elders live out the rest of their lives decently by doing favours. He seems very skilled, too. Being a mechanic might be only a part of who Minho really is.

"Uh, good job?" Chan settles on that.

"You're so cute!" Minho gushes and Chan scoffs. "Even your ears are red, Channie."

"Don't call me that."

When he tells Minho something, he should really consider the fact that Minho absolutely loves doing exactly the opposite. So yes, 'Channie' is now a regular thing, apparently. Thanks a lot, Jisung.

Soon enough, the houses are all gone and they're surrounded by forest all around. The air smells like grass and raspberries and it's one of those memories one could never trade for anything else in the world, it seems. Even with Minho clinging to him, with every struggle weighing him down and all the pain in his heart, the memory is special.

"This all yours?" Minho questions at some point. Enthusiastically, he flails his arms around, attempting to wave at the workers, yet he loses balance, clutching onto Chan tighter.

Chan examines the infinite green around them, the golden corn glistening in the early sun. "Not really. This is where most people work around here." He doesn't know why he explains it the way he'd explain it to someone who's never stepped foot onto the island. "Mrs Kim's bakery gets all the stuff from here, though."

"I don't know why I never bothered to come here."

The confession is strange. Chan feels like an intruder somehow, like every word that gets past Minho's lips isn't for him to hear, like he shouldn't even listen, yet he can't help it.

"It's beautiful here," he replies. "It's a lot of work, yeah, but the feeling is... I don't know. You'd have to try it in order to get what I'm saying."

"I'm considering coming here with you often."

"You can go by yourself."

"And have only half as much fun?" Minho scoffs. "That would suck."

Chan can't help but roll his eyes at how insistent Minho is. Yet, it doesn't really surprise him. Nothing about Minho does.

"You'd have to walk Bella with me, then. I won't go without her."

Minho hums to himself, no doubt eyeing the dog warily. "Yeah, that could be an issue. I suppose that's what our grandparents would call a red flag."

Chan chuckles. "My mum used to say that. Everything was a red flag to her. As a joke, of course."

"That's why you're a red flag, Channie."

"For having a dog? That's something a red flag would say. I'm the greenest of green flags," Chan complains, relieved to finally see the spot he usually leaves the bicycle at. He's grinning wide, so he bites the insides of his cheeks to hide it before stopping the bike. "We're walking from here."

He waits until Minho gets off the bike, tripping in the process as Bella throws herself on the ground before him, ready for belly rubs that never come. Before Minho can ask him for help, Chan casually rests the bike against the nearby tree.

Yet, as he turns back around, a helpless Minho isn't what he sees. Instead, Minho's ignoring Bella altogether, eyes fixated on the tree, head tilted.

"What is it?" Chan asks, feeling his heart sink.

"That's a cute treehouse up there," he muses, a few purple strands falling into his eyes, but he blinks them away without a complaint. "Yours?"

Throat running dry, Chan is quick to shake his head. He glances up, sees the broken-down roof hidden by the leaves and looks away immediately, the sight almost physically scorching.

It's too much. It takes him back to the people he once knew, to the time that once was, to the obliviousness of childhood and the peace of happiness he'll never go back to.

"Not mine, no."

"Huh..." Minho chuckles. "I used to make these when I was little. I'd make them and break them, rebuild them until I got bored of doing it over and over. I kinda miss it." There's a softness to his gone and Chan can't help but think that perhaps he's not the only one missing the peaceful days of being young. It's gone quickly as Minho clears his throat. "This one looks pretty old, though. It could use some work."

Chan clears his throat. "Well, doubt that the owners would like that very much."

He turns around and starts walking, not bothering to tell Minho to follow. He hears Bella all but gallop, and knows Minho's behind her. Soon enough, both of them are by his side once more. "I would like to help out. Like, to trade. A favour for a favour. Do you know them?"

"Kind of," he lies and clears his throat. "We should probably hurry up. No use fixing something like that. That thing's been broken for too long."

"What's the rush?" He ignores Minho's question and hopes Minho forgets about it. With the way he's scowling at Bella and talking about how cats are superior to dogs, Minho does forget.

The sun sits warm on Chan's shoulders as he walks, eyes on the dirt of the road ahead. Minho hums from beside him, could be an actual song, could be something he's come up with himself. Chan doesn't know.

"You didn't bring any water with you?" Minho mumbles at some point and Chan shakes his head. "Ridiculous."

Chan only chuckles, choosing not to respond, but offers an arch of his eyebrows when Minho's eyes land on the well hidden among the gentle, swaying trees. "You were saying?"

Minho's hair looks even paler under direct sunlight, but he runs a wet hand through it and it's a cold, damp purple now. The light hits his eyes just right and, although he shields from it with a small scoff, Chan can swear the dark brown at the green melt into each other with a sort of golden yellow tone to them. His lips are wet, spread into a grimace of barely concealed amusement when Bella laps at the water he sprays for her, and Chan concludes, with a swooping feeling in his belly, not unlike the waves he wishes to be carried away on, that Minho is sort of pretty.

"Why do those in the back not have sticks?"

"Because these," Chan says, gesturing to the rows of raspberry bushes right in front of him, "are summer raspberries. They need canes for support. Those don't."

Minho nods, eyes crinkled at the corners, narrowed in the sunlight, and crouches down. The denim hugging his thighs strains with the movement and Chan busies himself with fixing up a cane that seems to have tilted at some point.

They mostly sit in silence after that. Bella lies down in the grass, belly up, tail brushing against Minho's hip whenever she moves, and Minho grimaces, pokes at her belly, as payback. She doesn't seem to mind it and expects belly rubs, it seems, because she scoots over even closer to him. He almost jumps. Chan pretends he doesn't notice, busy picking a handful of raspberries.

"Oh, Channie. You're a gentleman." Minho takes a raspberry from Chan's palm when offered. "I'm flattered."

"Don't get used to it."

"Oh, you bet I won't."

Chan takes one, as well, and feels his entire face scrunch at how sour it is. Minho doesn't seem bothered by the taste whatsoever, blindly reaching for more. It results in accidentally grabbing Chan's finger, but Chan ignores it promptly.

"It really is beautiful." Chan looks up at Minho and dreadfully realises he's looking over the corn fields, at the tree house. "It makes me nostalgic."

"Me, too," Chan utters before he can think better of it.

"You know how they say the virus causes all sorts of discolourations on the body?" Chan nods, unsure of where he's going with this. "Hair, eyes, skin, all that stuff. Also affects the attention span, concentration – good thing I'm immune to mind control now, right? Don't get me started on the legends about the Taken losing their fucking minds and becoming cannibals and—"

"Woah, let's just... Okay." Chan snorts, but he's not entirely sure it's supposed to be funny. Not entirely sure it's a joke.

"Well, they also say it causes memory loss." Chan swallows, but Minho keeps speaking, oblivious to his reaction. "Not literally, but, like, gaps in memory, forgetting things that happened and inventing new memories that never actually—"

"I know, Minho. What about it?"

"Well, my point is, I have this vivid memory of my mother trying to build one for me. A tree house." He sighs. "I don't know if it's real or not."

The sinking feeling in Chan's chest won't cease. There's an image of Helene sitting beside him, telling him about things that never happened, about people who never existed, until she couldn't remember him or her wife.

He imagines Minho like that. It leads him to wonder, once more, which symptoms apply to him and which don't. Will he die like his mother did? Or will it drag out, painful and slow? Will he get to grow old?

"Can't you just ask her?"

"I will. When I find her."

Oh. "Sorry."

"Don't be. Fuck her. She's the one that's missing out." Minho smiles. "I have a family of my own. There's no room for her in it."

"Tell me about them."

Minho raises an eyebrow, probably in surprise. "My family? There's not much to tell. They come and go. I grew up kind of all over the place. Met all sorts of people. Some of them stuck and some... well. It's a dangerous place, isn't it? All sorts of things happen." His lips stretch into a smile. "Animals are way safer than humans, I realised. My cats don't get infected, they don't abandon me, they don't get kidnapped by the government."

"Have you ever lost someone?" It's an odd thing to ask, Chan knows. But they've already gotten past the awkward questions when he asked Minho if he was going to die the first time they met. He doubts Minho minds it.

Oddly enough, Minho's smile remains intact. "A few people, yeah. I lost my teacher. She was the one who took care of me the most. She'd always bring me stuff, books to read, music to listen to. She'd say she wanted to take me home with her, to be my mother." He purses his lips. "She just stopped showing up a couple of years ago. I heard she died. I couldn't even pay my respects, didn't know where to go. She never even told me her name. She just told me to call her Sugar."

Chan's breath hitches in his throat. "Sugar, that's... that's Eve, that's my mother."

Minho's looking at him now, eyes big and shiny, smile still there, and Chan remembers Eve going around the house, collecting the books and clothes he'd outgrown, making meals and taking them to the kids. The orphans... the homeless.

"She talked about you all the time," Minho whispers. His voice is fragile, the gentlest Chan's ever heard it, and he's not sure he likes witnessing this vulnerability. "Never by name, but she always talked about her little boy back home. She loved you more than anything. How'd she—?"

"She wasn't. Not like you. Not like my— like her wife."

Natural causes. That's what he always says. The truth is something far more terrifying, more terrifying than the virus that's been killing them all for decades.

Eve died of a broken heart. She loved and lost and it killed her, the suffering that came with taking care of her dying lover for years, losing hope, being forgotten at the end. She was tired.

"I'm sorry," Minho says and Chan shakes his head.

"It was an easy death. She didn't suffer."

He almost laughs at how he says it. Like it's something rare. Something desired. To go easy, to die with no torturous pain or false, disrupted memories or unable to see or remember the world around you, everything that made that miserable life worth living. All that suffering that's awaiting Minho, perhaps, that's awaiting the strange boy locked in the mansion on the other side of the island.

What'd this world become? Was it ever any different?

"I also lost my best friend," Minho says. His voice is not as soft now.

"How'd he die?"

Minho laughs. The look in his eyes is nowhere near that gentle one from before. There's determination in their depths now, something chilling about that fierce grin in one of them. His jaw is tight, and the smile he carries is false.

"Oh, he didn't. They took him."

Chan freezes, dread filling his gut in a way that's so familiar, has been ever since he met Minho. Minho always tells him what he never wants to hear. "They? As in—?"

"Channie, I know I'm the most breathtaking person you've ever laid eyes on, but have you been listening to anything I've told you from the moment we met or do you just gaze at me lovingly with white noise going through your head?" Chan doesn't even have an opportunity to scoff properly, heat creeping up his neck, because Minho's tone lowers and he's serious again. "Commander Hwang. The chancellor. They took him and they did something to him. I know it." He clears his throat, picks up another raspberry. "That's why I wanna watch them burn. They're all gonna burn."

"Tell me about him."

Minho sighs. "Seo Changbin. A fucking dumbass. I absolutely hated him, until I didn't. We used to beat each other up, for the hell of it. I practically cracked his skull open once, gave him this nasty fucking scar. He liked it, thought it made him look terrifying." He snorts. "That boy was not terrifying."

"He sounds fun," Chan confesses. He watches Minho's lost eyes, imagines him as a child, as a teen, with other kids, playing, and is not even remotely surprised that he pictures them all just... fighting for fun. He eyes Minho's hands; not that big, but lean, with thin, soft fingers and dry, split knuckles. He looks like he fights. He's muscular, too. He must be good at it, they all must. He can imagine Changbin, someone just as pompous, just as rough around the edges. "And you think they took him?"

"Oh, I know they did. He used to live with me. He wanted something better, a better life. So he started working for them, until he... Hwang came to us directly one day. His first real task, I think. Changbin left with him and just... never came back. He found something he wasn't supposed to find, if my guess is correct. They needed him under control."

"And your solution is... to start 'working for them until you find something you're not supposed to find?'" Chan shakes his head. "Isn't it dangerous? You could get hurt. They could recognise—"

"They won't recognise me, any of them. I looked pretty different back then. And, frankly, darling, I don't care."

"But he could be anywhere! How do you know he's still alive?"

"He has to be." Minho leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees, and focuses his eyes on Bella, who's busy munching on a tuft of grass. The ground beneath them rumbles and Chan wonders if there's a storm coming. "They have those dungeons full of people, and they're very well guarded. You don't put a guard in front of an empty cell."

On cue, the trembling of the earth becomes more prominent. Chan can feel it in his palms, which are buried in the grass. There's that noise again, the one that makes his skin crawl with unease and uncertainty.

Minho, on the other hand, just falls silent. He looks over the fields, stares into nothing, and states, "They're here for you."

"It could be—"

"It's the same car from before. It sounds the same." Minho's jaw is tense. "Might be the kid. You should go."

Chan nods and stands up, offering a hand to Minho. Minho doesn't take it and stays where he is on the ground. "You sure you're okay on your own?"

"Yup." Minho smiles and looks up at the sky. "I wanna take a walk around before it starts raining. Might steal some more raspberries."

Chan chuckles, but says nothing about it, reaching for the bike. "I guess I'll see you around, then. Kinda wish you could come with me, but it might be better if they don't see us together. You could... come by the shop tomorrow?"

"Is this a date?" Minho is smirking, but he's avoiding Chan's eyes again. He watches Bella, who's alert now, since Chan's taken his bike, and is trying to say goodbye. She's sniffing Minho's leg, nudging and poking at his side.

Chan watches as Minho hesitantly traces two fingers down one of her floppy ears, before he flinches away when she tries to lick them. "Some other time."

He cycles back with Bella right behind him. The wind is stronger now, and the absence of Minho behind him is evident, but he doesn't get to ride all the way back to his house. The car is in front of the shop, and it's Commander Hwang awaiting him once more.

He's wearing his usual suit and Chan wonders how he's not melting underneath all those layers, but he offers a mild smile without commenting on it. "Commander."

"Christopher," Hwang says and bows. Chan almost speaks up. "We know you were going to come by soon and see the Taken anyway, but we could risk and await your next visit. I'm afraid there have been... complications."

Chan's throat feels tight. "What kind of complications?"

Hyunjin looks away with an expression that's nothing short of worried and Chan wonders what it could be that causes that much concern. "He's misbehaving. He's been... irritable, aggressive. He hid a plastic fork underneath his pillow and attacked an armed guard with it this morning. He tried to hurt himself, as well."

Chan's ears are ringing. He can't hear anything anymore, except for a faint voice in his head, resembling Minho's, telling him about the Taken running wild. If that's what's happening to Felix, they'll put him down. That's never happened, despite the stories, so what if he's brought another, more aggressive type of the same virus from wherever the fuck—?

"Are you alright, Christopher?" There's a ghost of a touch on his arm and he's distantly aware of Hwang Hyunjin watching him, eyes dark and sharp. "We need you to stay focused. He will listen to you."

Chan spends the entire ride wishing he'd been there. Whatever it is Felix is going through, perhaps having someone beside him would have prevented it. Having Chan beside him.

Fuck, Chan made a promise to him. He made a promise he couldn't fucking keep. He should have been there.

_______

IT'S ALMOST MIDNIGHT. The room smells of freshly brewed coffee and dried fruit. It's better than whiskey, is what he tells himself to excuse the half empty coffee pot sitting next to his mug and his paintbrushes. His father's whiskey is difficult to obtain and he's in no mood to go search for it now.

Kim Seungmin knows he won't be able to sleep tonight. It's that odd itch in his fingertips that won't let him rest, whenever there's something happening in the house. So he paints and drinks and reads until dawn, because who'll reap the benefits of his father's hard work for their people, if not him?

The sun's almost out when a knock on his door breaks the silence. Finally. "Come in. Were you followed?"

"No, sir."

"Take a seat."

The soldier shifts on his feet. "I'd rather not, sir, I can't be long."

"Sit down." He obeys hesitantly. "Good. Now, tell me about Hwang. What did he have you and the others to do?"

"I'm afraid there's nothing to tell, sir."

Seungmin sighs. He can picture dropping his brush, throwing it across the room. The paint would spatter over the perfectly polished wood, over the pristine white walls, staining them red. He clutches it tighter in his hand instead, shutting his eyes for a moment. "Must we go through this every time? Need I remind you that I know you're way more than the number on your chest?"

"Sir, I shouldn't---"

"I could tell my father," Seungmin muses. He continues the glide of his brush over the canvas, mimicking the red of the sky at dawn. The soldier freezes. "I'm sure he'll be very surprised to hear that a Chaser isn't really... a Chaser, Mr... 0325. Speak."

"Commander Hwang sent out fifty men. He instructed us to check the surroundings, to see where the Taken could have come from." He pauses. It's refreshing to hear Chasers speak so animatedly. "My team had five men and we sailed out east, in the same direction the boy must've come from."

"And?"

The soldier squirms in his seat. His head lowers and Seungmin can imagine a generic face, staring at the marble floor in hesitation --- something that real soldiers shouldn't have. "I really shouldn't---"

"You know what's happening. You know I need to hear this. Tell me the truth."

A beat passes, silent and empty. Then, "There was... something, sir."

Seungmin frowns. "As in?"

"I'm afraid I'm not sure how to explain it---"

"Well, try, how about that?"

"It was maybe around a few hundred miles, I'm not sure. We just couldn't go any further, because it just couldn't--- it was too powerful." The man shakes his head. "The water."

Seungmin blinks. "The water."

"Yes, sir. It's almost as if there was something in it, pushing. It was pushing us back. The boat couldn't go any farther, no matter how much we tried. I even jumped in myself, I only ended up swimming backwards."

Rubbing his temples with the heels of his palms, Seungmin huffs out a breath of air. "I'm afraid my father doesn't tell me things."

That old fucking bastard. Of course he would hide this. This, whatever this is. A force in the water, what the hell?

The Chaser remains quiet as Seungmin glances out the window, the window facing east. He pictures the Taken in the water, the way he lay there days ago, remembers his blood in the sand.

How on earth did he get here?

"Anything else?"

"No, sir."

"You may go." The soldier nods and stands up. As he nears the door, Seungmin clears his throat. "One more thing."

"Sir?"

"The next time I summon you here, skip the part where you try to get out of talking to me. It won't end well for you." He offers a smile. "My father's a cruel man. He may not look the part, but you know what he's done. You also know what he'd do if he were to find out about you. To find out that his... training methods don't always work. Seo, was it?"

The soldier clutches the door handle, and confirms it with a bite to his voice, the bite of someone holding onto the final bits of their sanity. "Seo Changbin, sir."

"Seo Changbin," Seungmin repeats. "You're dismissed, Mr Seo."

He turns away and steps towards the window, the deep violet and soft orange bruising the horizon. The door clicks shut and he's wrapped in silence, a silence that has every nerve in his body buzzing with this... restless sort of feeling.

The water stopped them from going further. He wonders how far they went, exactly. How far people usually go, if they surf or swim.

Poor people bury their own at sea. If the water's the same in the west, the dead have been trapped in it, floating around the island for decades. He grimaces, glancing down at his blood red paintbrush.

A flicker of something catches his eye and he looks back up, but it's gone, whatever it is. Yet, he stays there, eyes fixated on the horizon, on the burning sun and the dark water, and waits.

What he's waiting for, he doesn't know.

He thinks back to the time he wanted to learn to swim when he was six, but his father didn't let him. Something in the distance flickers again.

He thinks back to sneaking out on a Chaser's boat when he was seven, but his father sent out more men to find him. The shadow in the distance blinks into existence once more, then disappears.

He thinks back to his mother always looking at the horizon, to her screaming at his father and rushing to her son's room one night when he was eight, tears and blood all over her face, when two Chasers came for her, when his father told him she got sick. It's a building.

The paintbrush drops. The wooden floor is stained red. Seungmin sees it, clear as day, a tall, narrow building. It's in the water. It's on the other side of it.

He parts his mouth, to call out, to scream, to cry. But it's gone.

Perhaps, he's sick, too. Like his mother was, when she clawed at the guards to let her go, when her screams echoed through the house like a ghost's, when she saw something in the water her husband couldn't explain.

Perhaps, she'd think the same thing, too.

This isn't an ocean.

A/N:

omg y'all?? i actually updated this??? like damn...

anyway i've been changing things up so you might wanna give the previous chapters a quick re-read, just so you're not lost

we have changbin, finally!! if it's confusing, trust me, it'll be cleared up once the action comes, which is within a chapter or two. but it's getting serious!! drama! chaos! secrets! i'm so excited for the next chapter, it's gonna be a rollercoaster

btw back when i started the fic, i made this map of the island. it's not exactly realistic or proportionate but you get the point. the main use of it is for you guys to get the sense of where everything is, not the size or the distance

anyway i hope you enjoyed!!