The first step into the third part of Wooyoung's open-ended research already promised a lot of trouble. Wooyoung stepped from the safety of the cosy time travel institute right into a body of cold water. Abruptly, it seized his body to limit his disorganised movements. With no time to waste to figure out whether that would leave a puddle back at home, he instantly kicked out harshly. The sea was icy cold, and he felt it chill his bones within seconds. The time it took him to gather his bearings already had him shivering and lethargic with shock.

Wooyoung had landed outside the trapdoor of a sunken ship. Its wooden boards were covered in barnacles and squishy with how much the water took them apart. When Wooyoung's boots found purchase on the surface of the closed hatch to push off, the rotten surface carved in underneath him. Desperate, he fought to get upwards. The weight of his outfit dragged him down, but the added struggle brought some heat back into his over-working limbs.

For a few panic-stricken moments, he just tried to live. With hands and feet, he clawed his way up from the bottom of the shallow waters and towards the glimmering water surface above him. What took only seconds felt like an eternity. His lungs burned up and his body froze from the inside out. He didn't feel his toes anymore after seconds.

When Wooyoung's head broke through the water's surface, his loud gasp rang through the frosty air. A white landscape shrouded in thick, grey clouds greeted him far on the horizon. He must have landed in the ocean near a corner of Norway. The temperatures were freezing and snow tumbled from the skies to land on his wet hair.

He basically felt a fever getting cosy in his insides.

Shivering, Wooyoung willed his body forward. He had to reach land as fast as possible and warm up. As long as he swam, he should be fine for a few minutes.

Wooyoung channelled all of his energy into the workout. His blond hair stuck to his nape and spread the chilliness of the air on his skin. The heavy grey woollen clothes that Seungyoun had given him were soggy and dragged him down.

Struggling for his life, Wooyoung swam and swam. He was far slower than he would have liked and the ocean seemed to yank him back a meter for every two meters he swam. It would take him hours to get to land and he barely had minutes before his shivering body would give out on him. As he choked on the chilly air that froze his lungs and made it hard to breathe, his movements gradually dulled.

Wooyoung cursed himself in his mind. He needed to go on, needed to push himself harder. But every desperate advance seemed like the last. Every raise of his arm got heavier. Soon, he could do nothing more but float in the water while his entire body turned blue and white.

Horrified by the imagination, Wooyoung sobbed around yet another lethargic arm stroke. The limb splashed into the water with no grace. The spray hit him in the face and had him splutter and gasp.

In all the scenarios that Yongguk and he had feared happening once he arrived here, this had not been one. Dying out in the wintry ocean with no way back was nothing Wooyoung had anticipated.

Ridiculed by the unnecessary means of his own death, Wooyoung felt his last strength drain out. He floated like a dead animal in the water. Icy stabs of coldness penetrated his skin like knives, but he couldn't care. After the pricks came blissful numbness.

Wooyoung was about to close his eyes and call his life a day so he could pretend it was all just a bad dream and he would wake up in the present time, when a current picked him up. A shove of water came from behind him and launched him forward. Limp, he paddled through the boost, but it only aided in distancing him from the land.

Bewildered and half dead, Wooyoung put up a fight once more. And as he kicked and gasped to stay afloat, he heard the creaking for the first time. Looming and elongated, like a hundred old doors opening at once. It seemed to resonate in the water and his body, impossible to tell from the shivers that wracked his form.

Before Wooyoung could muster the energy to even look around, a call cut through the chilly air like a knife.

"Man over board!"

The booming voice carried the rough syllables of the Old Norse language over the sea. The water rippled and vibrated around Wooyoung as if shaken by its might. He matched its rousing when he finally glanced over his shoulder and spotted the mighty ship that had been closing in on him. Its main body was sleek and humble, not offering any entrance points. A dozen of oars were on top of it, the one mast loomed in the middle, and the steering rudder took over the bow. An entire crew of people hurried around. Wooyoung spotted a woman leaning over the railing on his side with her long hair fluttering in the breeze. His sight was blurry, but he also picked up on the figurehead carved in the shape of a dragon's head.

Even if the furs and metal helmets the crew wore hadn't given them away and he had ignored their language, their wild and savage faces at least informed Wooyoung of who they were.

The Vikings he had been searching for.

And even half unconscious and frozen numb, hot dread settled in Wooyoung's limbs as he gazed upon them. At their neatly trimmed hair and beards. At their broad bodies packed with muscles and heavy weapons. They were a sight to behold, and an uncomfortable amount of them were staring at Wooyoung.

His first instinct would have been to throw his body around and swim as far away as he could with newfound speed. But no matter the reflex, he pushed it down. To explain his presence, he couldn't treat them as a threat. He had to pretend he was on their side.

"Help," he thus croaked around his chilled throat. His hand waved around numbly. "Please help!"

His Old Norse was fine, if not as good as other languages he spoke. Sometimes the sounds didn't roll off his tongue right, but he would excuse that with having grown up further from their main villages. If it was enough for them to understand, it was fine.

"Sharp right to collect the castaway!" The woman who monitored Wooyoung yelled. Thunderous like a bolt of lightning in the hazy winter air, she set the crew into motion. Soon, the ship turned in his direction and once more its mass pushed him further off from them.

Another man appeared at the railing. His locks were a deep ginger red that was ten timed more vibrant than Seungyoun could ever colour his hair in. It was braided artfully and his beard grew together in one long braid as well that had pearls and metal rings woven into it. In his hands, he held a rope fastened to a hook that Wooyoung would associate to medieval wall climbing in movies.

The moment his brain caught up with what the man planned to do with that hook, he lifted his hands to protect his face. The hook splashed in the water in front of him, just shy of digging into his chest. It caught onto his sleeve and Wooyoung scrambled to hold on to the metal before it could slip off. Senseless fingers curled around it only with effort.

Before Wooyoung had adjusted to his new position, he was already jerked forward. His entire weight got dragged by his shoulders when three Vikings worked hard to haul him in. Wooyoung coughed around the water that hit his face and resisted breathing any of it in until he arrived.

"Heave ho!" The merry call of the woman didn't match Wooyoung's weakness. He nearly lost his grip on the hook once he was lugged out of the water and slapped against the side of their boat like a dead fish. For a few agonising moments, his body drew along rough edges and nails. Then he finally blissfully lost his balance. His breath got squeezed from his lungs when he landed on the wooden boards in a twisted ball.

After spitting out a few pitiful gulps of water, Wooyoung rolled to his side to wheeze. His frozen lips didn't obey him when he willed them to speak.

"Thank- Thank-"

Before he could finish, a rough hand fisting into his hair interrupted him. He gritted back a pitiful whine and allowed the tug. His hair was at shoulder-length with the magic of extensions and the perfect length to wrench him around. The strain on his neck was a welcome exchange to the water weighing him down.

"You. Where did you come from?" The brusque voice of the man was like the bark of a wolfhound. Intimidated, Wooyoung hung lax in his grip.

Wooyoung tried to speak; he really did, but his body cooled down even further under the winter air. Ice formed on his clothes and lashes as he blinked to clear his sight.

"Leave him, he's frozen solid," the woman called out again. "Get back to work and if he makes it, we can ask him later."

The man above Wooyoung grunted in displeasure. Once more, he shook Wooyoung as if he were a doll for him to throw around.

"You won't reply, eh? Show some gratitude, brat."

When Wooyoung just dangled in his grip like a sad kitten, the man gave it up. He dropped Wooyoung carelessly to step over him and return to the rudder he had been working on. In his puddle, Wooyoung tried to centre his heat and preserve as much of it as possible. Not even his shock warmed him enough.

"He doesn't belong to our village," one of the nearby Vikings hissed. They barely concealed their voices or wary glances at Wooyoung's weak figure. Their scarred faces with the long manes framing them looked scary to him. These men had seen hell and returned. He was no match for their suspicions.

"If anything happened back there and no robbers can be traced, we know where he came from," the other one replied. Their hushed whispers got interrupted once more when the woman stepped in. Wooyoung could just see the fur of her boots that were held together by a tightly woven leather string.

"He won't be here to get punished by you if he freezes. Get moving." With those words, something soft and heavy landed on Wooyoung. A blanket. The wool scratched on his chin, but he wrapped it tighter around himself with trembling fingers. The temporary relief it brought was heaven to his chilled limbs.

The female voice above him sighed.

"There's no helping you, huh? You need to get out of those wet clothes first. Don't tell me you've never been to the sea before."

Without waiting for him to respond with his frozen tongue, she stepped away. The creaking of wood and the splashing of oars in the water as powerful muscles rowed them closer to the land filled Wooyoung's ears instead. He picked up on her voice once more after she had left.

"Sǫndúlfr, take care of him. I don't want him frozen before we arrive."

From further back on the ship, someone replied to her order. The boots that neared Wooyoung were so soft that they left no noise on the creaking ship. Rabbit fur, maybe. He blinked up at them where he had cosied up. He didn't really care who took care of him and in what way. It couldn't be worse than dying of hypothermia, anyway.

When hands pulled his blanket from him and drove under his shirt, he flinched back on instinct. But the hands were not colder than his drenched skin. Despite being out in the cold air, they were like burning irons on Wooyoung's body. He squirmed when his tunic and his woollen gauntlets were taken from him. All the fabric landed in a heap next to him until Wooyoung was left naked and shivering in front of the Viking crew. His pitiful body must look weak and malnourished to them. He picked up on several whispers that acknowledged it as a child's body.

Before too many comments could spread, his caretaker wrapped Wooyoung back up into his blanket. Left like a burrito on the side of the ship, he leaned Wooyoung against the protective mould the rounded ship formed. Finally getting warmer, Wooyoung dropped his head back. He was exhausted.

Sǫndúlfr already stood to leave when Wooyoung raised his eyes to thank him.

Once more, not a single word came over his lips. This time, not because the cold had taken his ability to speak from him. But as he peered into the retreating features of the man, just one thought crossed his mind.

No fucking way.