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atinytokki · 1 year

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H O R I Z O N: S U N R I S E

Chapter 3: Source Unknown

It’s a hot afternoon in July 2110 according to the date and time listed on the corner of the screen, and a clip from the CCTV camera of the KQ-196 class rocket awaiting launch transitions into another shot of the control room. The feed has been carefully curated by the owner of the file– presumably Jongho’s grandmother.

Mingi and Youngseok have replayed the video three times now to catch every detail being given to them.

First it shows a good minute or so of the viewing room on the 215th floor, allowing them to get as detailed a look as possible at the people conferencing there. Board members, presumably.

Then, the interior of the shuttle, as Kim Woomin and his team march out and take up their stations, save for the one empty seat seen in the middle of the screen from the camera’s point of view. For thirty seconds afterwards, the missing crew member is shown performing final checks on the engine before she takes her seat in the cockpit with the rest. The main hatch, one which leads to the hallway separating the cockpit and the rest of the shuttle, remains open.

Again, the clip switches to show the camera in the viewing room. A man with glasses and a striped tie catches everyone’s attention and announces something before leaving the room. There’s no audio over the clip, but by now Mingi and Youngseok know what he’s saying. The man has informed the others that he’s getting the champagne.

The video follows him into the elevator, where he stands stock-still after swiping his wristband and sending the elevator down a single floor. A man with a leather jacket gets on.

In what could likely be the most important image of the upload, the two have a conversation. It’s silent, thanks to the CCTV settings, but nevertheless the video lingers on it. While the men discuss business, the elevator travels to the ground floor and opens into the lobby, where both exit. The man with glasses re-enters a moment later with a bottle of champagne.

By the time the man returns to the viewing room to start the festivities, it is much fuller than when he left. Families are standing by the window and admiring the rocket. Mingi even thinks he recognises a young Hongjoong.

The video switches over to the shuttle’s feed again, where the man in the leather jacket swipes his wristband to pass through the surrounding security enclosure, enters the ship through the open hatch and disappears into the engine room. For two and a half minutes, the clip of the cockpit’s view plays out. There is no camera in the engine room, so the scene is left to the imagination.

When it switches again, the mysterious man is exiting the shuttle and it’s the last time he’s seen. Inside the ship, procedures continue as normal and eventually the hatch is closed.

For the final moments of the video— likely out of respect for the dead— the only camera angle shown is that of the official broadcast, one both Mingi and Youngseok had seen before many times. The ship takes flight, explodes, and crashes to earth.

The screen goes black.

“So these two men conspired to assassinate Kim Woomin,” Youngseok states the obvious. “And his flight crew took the blame for it, essentially being scapegoated by the media because they perished in the crash and had no one to speak to their innocence. I still think we should call Hongjoong hyung.”

“That appears to be the case,” Mingi sighs. “The system should have a record of every wristband swipe, I’m positive they would’ve checked that during the investigations.” He doesn’t answer the final statement, it’s not his choice to make.

Youngseok hums before turning to face him, concerned. “So the glasses man who sent him must be high ranking, in order to wipe it from the record?”

Shifting uncomfortably in his chair, Mingi can only nod and begin to consider the far-reaching implications of this.

“Switch back to that document uploaded,” he requests. “Maybe there’s some explanation there.”

Youngseok supplies, even while he shakes his head, already knowing the result. “There’s nothing on it. A few names and— what are these, drugs?”

Mingi groans and drags his hands down his face, coming up empty on what any of it could mean. “That tells us basically nothing.”

And then there is also the problem of what to tell the other members.

The video footage needs to be shared and dealt with, that much is certain. But they’ll inevitably ask questions about where it came from, and it’s up to Jongho whether that information should be shared, not Mingi or Youngseok.

Youngseok even finding out at all was not a planned situation, and though there’s no reversing it, Mingi is already nervous about what Jongho will think.

It doesn’t take long for the dreaded confrontation to take place, with Jongho entering the room and sliding the door shut the moment he arrives.

“Where are the others?” Youngseok asks, just as Jongho’s opening his mouth to ask a question of them.

“Debriefing the Lexiwi,” Jongho reports succinctly. “I slipped away. What did you find?”

Knowing he would cut straight to the point, Mingi pulls up the file and slides his chair back to give the gunner access.

A sharp but quiet intake of breath follows soon after.

“I recognise this file name. Utopia–”

“The Utopia Project?” Mingi perks up, peeking over Jongho’s shoulder even as he tries to swat him away. He hadn’t noticed the file name himself, but remembers the significance of the phrase.

“No,” Jongho corrects with a note of panic in his voice. “The Utopia Scheme.”

“That’s what your grandmother renamed it?” Mingi whispers, knowing it’s pointless when Youngseok is sitting there listening but lowering his voice nonetheless.

“This must be it,” Jongho agrees, excited. “This was what she was working on after she went missing.”

Not bothering with anyone else, he skims through the information listed on the document and watches the video through twice before sitting back.

“It doesn’t make sense,” he sighs before pulling up the holographic timeline he created on his wristband. “She disappeared before this incident ever happened, why is she giving us evidence about it? How did she even know about it?”

“If nothing else, it’s proof she could be alive, right? I mean, it did happen years ago but if she managed to compile footage of it…” Mingi tries to encourage him, and Jongho hums gratefully but continues to stare at the screen, brow furrowed. He’s still convinced all they’ve unearthed is bad news.

“Maybe it’s connected to the reason she went missing somehow,” Youngseok suggests quietly, faltering. “Clearly she wanted you— or whoever found it— to know, given the fact that the password was found in your gift.”

Jongho stares at the younger boy for a moment before nodding. He already knows now, there’s no going back. At least Jongho is fairly sure he has his allegiance. “That’s true. I’ll have to find out the history of this conspiracy. If she uncovered it before she went missing…” He shudders at the thought. “Well, it could’ve given the IPF incentive to make her disappear.”

Mingi purses his lips but nods in agreement, fear growing in the pit of his stomach that the ideal he’s clung to for his entire life is threatening to dissipate as soon as he’s gained it.

“You’re right, though,” Jongho clears his throat and gets to his feet, eyes on the door that he sealed shut. “The others need to know. I think the cat is out of the bag.”

___

Until he can soak his hands in a bioregeneration tank, Yunho can think of nothing else.

The pain is somewhat lessened with the cooling effects of the ointment Yeosang applied, but still the phantom of the burning sensation pulsates through his fingers and up his arms, and his wrists are locked in place from the tension in them.

He looks on miserably at the celebrations on board the DES-1024 from his little cot in the medical area.

Hongjoong dodges a sloppy cheek kiss from Wooyoung and nearly throws the ship off course during the landing. San and Yeosang are arm in arm and chattering together until the time comes to help Yunho up from the bed. Junyoung sits in San’s lap, messing around on his wristband while his hair is played with. Jongho gives Seonghwa a resounding hi-five before running off down the hall, presumably to find Mingi and Youngseok.

And Yunho can’t even think about hi-fiving any of them without the pain spiking again, fist almost clenching in frustration until he forces himself to relax.

Yunho knew someone would be injured eventually— it’s why they have a medic, after all. He didn’t think he would be the first.

Yeosang helps him off the ship despite his protests and the two of them make their way into the hallways, leaving Wooyoung and San to unload the weapons with the help of the mechanical android brought on in the caves.

A bioregeneration tank is already waiting for him in the medical facilities, and when Yeosang unwraps his bandages and instructs him to call as soon as he’s finished, Yunho takes the opportunity to shed his clothes and have a full body soak— even though only his hands are injured.

He’s hoping the debriefing will last long enough to give him privacy while he mulls things over in the tank. The breathing apparatus he uses lets out small bubbles when he exhales, and they drift leisurely to the top of the tank while he watches them. Sighing out more bubbles, he lets himself sink to the bottom of the tank.

Alone with his thoughts, he tries to find the positives. There’s a multitude once he slows down and considers it. They landed a tracker, confiscated weapons, found a new helper android, killed a leader, and hacked the wristband transactions. The only real downside is that he had gotten injured, so it makes sense that everyone’s celebrating.

Perhaps his annoyance is over the fact that he was the one injured. Even as he watches the skin knit itself back together on his hands, aided by the chemicals in the tank water, he begrudges his own stupidity for attacking the junker atop a moving spaceship. He’d felt brave, even heroic, in the moment, but it all faded away to be replaced with the smell of burning flesh and pain shooting through his fingers.

Hongjoong had been forced to risk his own life to rescue Yunho, and when he leans forward to glance at the door, wondering if the pilot is also in need of some medical assistance, the reminder hits him that at least Hongjoong had the foresight to wear gloves.

There’s no real reason to be jealous of that fact. After all, it was Yunho who first adapted the metal siding into an acid rain-proof umbrella on the spot, but he knows the underlying reason already.

He just doesn’t like appearing vulnerable.

A few moments later when Yeosang and Hongjoong appear to ask if he’s ready to come out, he sighs out a stream of bubbles but nods anyway.

Wrapped up in a soft robe while the medic re-bandages his hands, he finally focuses his attention on the future. “How soon can I be in combat again?”

“That’ll depend on how regularly and consistently you do the exercises,” Yeosang responds cryptically as he fastens the last bandage and pulls up a guide on his wristband. “The tank only patches up the injuries you sustained on the outside. To regain full muscle control, you’ll need a bit of physical therapy.”

He sends the file to Yunho for his own reference and pulls Hongjoong’s jacket off, leaving him in a thin undershirt, to apply some ointment to his back.

“So… within the next few months, if I’m diligent?” he asks the medic, an unspoken plea behind his words. Yeosang turns and smiles sheepishly, unable to resist the pouting and puppylike charm.

“Yes, you should be able to fire your blaster properly by then, assuming no long-term damage emerges.”

A wristband notification from Jongho interrupts Yunho’s impassioned thanksgiving and prompts him to throw some clothes on before checking it. “Hey guys?” he calls back when he’s read the message. “Jongho has something to show us in the surveillance room.” Secretly, he’s hoping it isn’t anything that would prompt action so soon after his injury. It’s inevitable, but he won’t enjoy being benched.

“All of us?” Hongjoong asks for confirmation when Yunho returns to the medical area from the changing stalls.

“Can it wait?” Yeosang huffs, still meticulously cleaning the faint scratches on Hongjoong’s back. “I’m still a little busy at the moment. Plus, I’m pretty sure the others are still unloading weapons.”

“Yeosang, it’s fine,” Hongjoong protests, sitting back and reaching for his jacket. “It doesn’t even hurt.”

“You want to take your chances on an alien planet with who knows what diseases?” Yeosang scoffs, mildly perturbed despite packing up his supplies obediently. “You’ll be thanking me for keeping it clean later. In fact, everyone who was outside should be reporting for a checkup— I’m supposed to monitor all of our health.”

“And you will, after we see what this is about,” their leader assures them, heading for the door as soon as he knows they’re following. “It’s Jongho, after all, he wouldn’t call a meeting over a false alarm.”

And he’s right.

The moment the three of them join the others in the somewhat cramped surveillance room, made for a small number of short-statured Lexiwi and not humans, the atmosphere is already tense. Mingi shoots Yunho a pained smile, as if in preemptive apology.

“As you may or may not know,” Jongho begins when he has their attention. “My grandmother was Choi Jieun, a famous member of the Horizon Project years ago. For all my life, I’d been told she went missing, but her disappearance was never treated with any concern by the IPF. I joined the Horizon Project to find out more and, if possible, to track her down. Thanks to Mingi and Youngseok here, we managed to find a trace of her, despite her being practically erased from the logs.”

He turns on the screen behind him, a sparse file already pulled up with a short document listing names and some long Latin words Yunho doesn’t recognise, plus a single video file.

“She must have landed here at some point on a space highway trip to Biso. The only clue we have is this folder she left on the supercomputer, uploaded externally from her own device and password protected so that only I could get in. I believe she’s trying to tell us something, something she couldn’t say when she was a Project member for fear of retaliation from the Citadel. It may even be part of the reason she went missing.”

Yunho’s eyebrows rise higher the more he explains. Now things are getting interesting.

“The video she made is…” he trails off with a sigh, unsure how to proceed. “It doesn’t explain much. But I think all of you ought to watch it. It may change some things for us.”

Mild amusement and curiosity becomes horror as Yunho watches. It’s a historical event he’s seen dozens of times, but a few new camera angles of what went on behind the scenes make all the difference. In just a few minutes, he’s learned something irreversible; that CEO Kim Woomin was deliberately killed. Worse, that it appears to have been plotted by his own board member.

When the footage switches to the news broadcast, Yunho glances around to see everyone just as shocked as he is, excluding the three who have seen it before. His eyes land on Hongjoong, standing behind Mingi and clutching the back of his chair with a death grip. The more he watches, the angrier he gets, jaw clenched and a neck vein gradually popping out.

“Turn it off,” he suddenly snaps, making Mingi jump in his seat at the sternness in his voice. He continues, a little more desperately, “I don’t need to see this part again.”

Jongho quickly complies and pauses the video, tapping back so that it rewinds from the beginning. There is dread in his eyes.

“I’ve been playing it back to see if I can catch any details,” Jongho recounts after clearing his throat uncomfortably. “If you want, Youngseok said he can slow it down and—”

“No,” Hongjoong bursts out with that distinct shakiness in his voice that means he’s going to cry. Yunho is one of only a few who can recognise it. “Please, don’t. I’m sor— I just can’t. I can’t.”

He flees the room and if not for the door being left open behind him, it would feel suffocatingly hot.

Jongho bites his lip and sighs softly, but Seonghwa comes to his rescue without a word needing to be said.

“It’s not your fault.”

“Let’s get to the bottom of this so Hongjoong doesn’t have to,” Yeosang suggests in his gentle but firm tone.

Though silent up until this point, Wooyoung already has a question to pose.

“Does anyone know who is actually on the Board?”

Yunho’s lips are moving before he even realises it. “Seonghwa was there the night before we left, he would recognise them.” The look of surprise on Seonghwa’s face doesn’t register until Wooyoung has already targeted his interrogation to him.

“Are either of these men in the IPF’s current leadership?”

Seonghwa doesn’t even glance at the screen, where Jongho has paused it on an image of the two conversing.

“N-No, I don’t know them.”

“Are you sure?” Mingi presses earnestly, and Seonghwa takes a long hard look at the video before nodding.

“There has to be some way we can track them down,” Junyoung mutters, fingers flying as he freezes the frame and zooms in on the striped tie man.

“What would we even do if we could?” The groan comes from San, who rubs his hands down his face and collapses back into Wooyoung’s lap. “Hunt them down and exact revenge?”

“Hey, don’t joke,” Wooyoung tuts at him, finger flicking his forehead, but San dodges and argues back, “I’m not! It’s a serious question. We have hardly any standing in the IPF, we’d have to be crazy to bring a case against them!”

Yunho lets them argue back and forth and excuses himself to seek out Hongjoong.

He probably shouldn’t be alone right now.

The pilot is by himself in an adjacent hallway, pacing and tugging on his hair as he attempts to get his breathing under control. Upon seeing Yunho, he drops onto a bench built into the earthy wall, too exhausted to keep his composure any longer.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, scrubbing at his face and hiding from Yunho’s concerned gaze.

Yunho comes back with a response immediately. “Don’t be.”

Hongjoong shakes his head and a beat of silence passes. “Watching that video again is just—” he cuts himself off with a frustrated groan and tries to explain. “Every time I see it, I’m back there. I remember it all like it’s happening right in front of me again. The way the windows shook. The dust cloud that went up.”

He struggles through the words, teeth clenched against impending tears, breath coming in with quick gasps. The claylike hall echoes with restrained half-cries.

Hesitantly, Yunho reaches out and rubs his back, letting him continue on his own time. He’s slow and careful so as not to further injure his bandaged hands, but pushes through the discomfort.

“I imagine what it might’ve been like in that cockpit sometimes; a sudden, consuming fire, that feeling of weightlessness before falling back to earth. Before I switched schools, my classmates looked into the report and debated it in front of me. Some of them thought everyone died in the initial explosion, others claimed they must’ve been alive until the impact with the launch pad, probably in pain and completely aware they were in their last moments.”

As terrible as the event already was in Yunho’s imagination, hearing it from Hongjoong’s perspective invites new horror into a moment he’d become desensitised to, and he finds his eyes watering even as Hongjoong finally lets go and allows tears to roll down his own cheeks.

“Their sick fascination with those deaths— my father’s death— just infuriated me. And they thought they were ‘doing me a favour’ reading about autopsies so I didn’t have to. I never even saw his body, Yunho,” his voice breaks and he crumples into the taller boy. “We used to make fun of him for being old fashioned and wanting to be buried on the Citadel, in those meadows they planted of real grass. He never got the chance. They sent home an urn and that was it.”

Yunho’s blood boils for Hongjoong’s sake, even as he works through his betrayal aloud, struggling to keep his emotions under control when the hurt bleeds into anger.

“And now… now I find out this was intentional? Someone turned him into a casualty and then he was blamed for it? I don’t care what I have to do, I’m bringing him justice. Him and Jongho’s grandmother both, whose only crime was knowing too much.”

Letting out a cynical laugh, he wipes the tears away, resolved to move on.

“If it means anything to you,” Yunho speaks up quietly. “I think everyone agrees. We all need time to process the implications of this, but we’ll back you up. At least… I will.”

Yunho can’t speak for everyone, and the questions about the future still sit uncomfortably in his stomach, but he knows where he stands.

Hongjoong is about to answer when an alert sounds from their wristbands in unison.

“The tracker!” He gasps, shooting to his feet and beelining for the surveillance room, explaining hurriedly. “We just lost the signal.”

Inside, the room is still in full chaos with all eight of the members arguing about how to proceed, given their new information.

“Maybe we go back to the Citadel and ask, then,” Jongho is insisting when the pair enters. “If Soojin doesn’t know, then move up the chain of command until—”

“Let’s table this for now,” Hongjoong interrupts, any trace of panic replaced with cool, collected leadership. “We’ve got bigger problems to deal with.”

Called to attention, everyone checks their wristband to see what Hongjoong is going on about.

“The tracker has been deactivated,” he explains. “Youngseok, do you have their latest position? If we leave now, we may catch them.”

The tech expert has already pulled up the coordinates by the time Hongjoong is finished speaking.

“Alright, if we’re raiding their main base, I need all hands on deck,” the captain continues. “Except for you, Yunho, sorry.”

Disappointed despite expecting it, Yunho drops into the chair Mingi has just vacated and slides up to the supercomputer. At least he can keep an eye on things from here.

Wanting to be sure he’s leaving him safely, Yeosang comes over and inspects his patient’s hands again.

“It’s not going to be the cakewalk we had this morning,” their pilot warns them, sighing and fixing his hair. It was still mussed from earlier. “The junkers knew we were coming, they were waiting for a chance to steal our metal; that fact alone still makes me nervous. And if they found the tracker, they’ll be expecting us.”

“We’ll be ready for them,” San hypes everyone up confidently, leaving no room for doubt. “We have their weapons now, too. We just have to be careful and use our brains.”

Hongjoong shoots him a weak smile and glances around the room. “Any objections?”

“None from me,” Yeosang pipes up. “I checked Yunho’s hands again and they should heal fine. He’ll be alright here on his own while we’re gone.”

And it’s true, as much as Yunho wishes it wasn’t, so that he didn’t have to sit by himself and watch his friends charge into an alien battle.

“Good luck,” he tells them, yearningly, when they file out to prepare.

He knows they’re going to need it.

___

After years of directing his anger into his studies, it’s not difficult for Hongjoong to hyperfocus on the mission ahead. He avoids his teammates’ concerned eyes, dodges Jongho’s apologies, and manages to squirm out of a hug being sandwiched between Wooyoung and San, claiming he needs to ready the ship.

Nothing they say or do can make this right.

Ultimately, nothing he does can make it right either.

Walking out to the hangar as soon as he’s dressed and ready, he spies the setting suns. Despite one being farther away, the heat still lands on his skin. It’s calming in a way, despite twice as many shadows following him, to be blazed into with the light of a pair of dying sunsets.

He enters the cockpit alone and allows himself a moment to feel the hum of the ship waking underneath him, breathing in the hint of fuel disguised by the scent of a minty air freshener Seonghwa had sprayed earlier.

“Hey,” a voice interrupts his thoughts softly, and Hongjoong startles and turns in his seat to see Seonghwa himself standing there, clad in all white gear as Hongjoong had directed. He shuffles his feet awkwardly but glances up at his captain with innocence and regret shining in his eyes. “Um… I just wanted to say that I-I’m here.”

He sinks into his chair suddenly, still clutching his backpack in front of him. It’s no surprise— usually he’s ready to take off first, unless Jongho beats him to the cockpit— but Hongjoong knows that’s not what he means.

“Right,” he responds finally, clearing his throat and casting his eyes away. “I…” he wants to say he’s fine, he doesn’t want to talk about it now, he’ll deal with everything later. “I’d rather focus on the mission right now,” he settles on, not looking to see Seonghwa’s reaction.

A hand lands on his thigh and he jumps in surprise. “If you need anything, don’t hesitate to ask,” Seonghwa says firmly before shifting in his chair and turning on the navigation system, conversation ended.

He seems to have found his footing, so Hongjoong sets aside his emotions and joins him in looking at the satellite footage, now displayed on the front console. As thankful as he is for Yunho’s presence earlier, an embarrassing breakdown right before a mission can only harm how the others perceive his leadership.

“At first I was sceptical about wearing white,” Seonghwa admits, zooming in on the area they’re headed for. “If the suns set while we’re out there, the colour will make us stand out. But the cliffs surrounding the caves are also completely white. I suppose it’s a solid inference that the inside will be white as well.”

“Mingi pointed the topography out to me earlier,” Hongjoong explains, leaning forward to get a better view of the terrain. “The wardrobe was my idea, though, so you can blame me if it goes wrong.”

Seonghwa is chuckling and shaking his head, and goes quiet with no further comment, inputting the best route to reach the coordinates quickly. Jongho enters the ship and takes his seat silently, lost in his own head as he considers the mission looming over them. One by one the others trickle in, as prepared as they can be, and buckle up for what they can only hope will be a smooth operation.

Hongjoong doesn’t have much time to plan either, setting the DES-1024 to hover mode when it’s time to lift out of the hangars and letting autopilot take over while he gathers the rest of the team.

“Satellite imaging doesn’t show anyone down there, but there are heat signatures,” Seonghwa informs them. “And I mean a lot of heat signatures.”

Looking at all the tiny red blips on the holoscreen makes Hongjoong nauseous so he turns to his team for ideas. “I don’t like going in there blind,” he admits, and upon hearing this, Yeosang sits up suddenly and runs to his seat to fetch something stored inside it.

“Would this help?” He asks shyly, dropping his newly made drone model on the table in front of them.

Hongjoong’s eyes blow wide and he glances up at the medic in wonder. “You made this yourself? And it’s operational?”

“Started back when we were first accepted into the project,” Yeosang recounts with a shrug, falling back into his seat. “Wooyoung and San helped me from time to time. It doesn’t maintain a good connection over very wide of a range but it’s fast moving and silent.”

The captain nods as a plan begins to formulate. “Alright, if you send it in when we arrive, we’ll have an idea who to gun for. It would be much more efficient and much less dangerous if we could identify their leaders and negotiate a surrender.”

“I’ve analysed the information you downloaded from the junker Yunho killed,” Mingi reports, pulling up his screen and letting everyone take a good look. “These colour patterns seem to designate clan leaders.”

“If we’re going for a mass arrest, it would be best to set our blasters to the stun setting,” Jongho adds, reminding them how to adjust the strength of their weapon blasts.

“Mass arrest?” San asks for clarification carefully, pulling up the transcription of the IPF’s debrief again before reading it aloud. “‘Bring those responsible to justice by any means necessary’ is what it says. Are we sure keeping them alive will suffice to complete our mission?”

“I interpreted ‘justice’ as the Lexiwi’s judicial system,” Youngseok contributes. “And they have trials just like we do. IPF may be involved in the protection of the planet but I don’t think the courts are under our jurisdiction.”

“I agree,” Hongjoong says simply, giving the young technician a nod. “I don’t feel comfortable being the IPF’s executioners. At least not without the say of the locals.”

“While we’re on the topic of weapons…” Jongho clears his throat and gets to his feet, opening the door to the cargo hold and taking a silvery set of turbines in hand. “When we unloaded the weapons we confiscated, the Lexiwi Police told us they have no use for a jetpack and said we could keep it. It’s a bit small due to their size but… it could come in handy tonight. None of you would happen to know how to use one, would you?”

Hongjoong thinks back to distant summers at his cousin’s house by the sea, playing with their jetpacks in the backyard. Father catching him when he messed up the landing so he wouldn’t skin his knee again.

“As a matter of fact, I do,” he smiles, taking the pack in his hands and trying it on.

“It fits?” Wooyoung asks, pressing his hands to his mouth to hold in a squeaking laugh when Hongjoong admits, a bit embarrassed, that it does.

“Their torsos are human sized!” He protests weakly in his own defence. The others are laughing along and he doesn’t truly mind if it’s at his expense. “It's just their legs that are so short.”

Hongjoong allows them a moment to chuckle at his height— regardless of the fact that Wooyoung is barely any taller— before giving Yeosang the go ahead to operate his drone.

It’s an opportune stroke of genius that he’s brought it along with him, because it only takes two minutes after the small device has entered the jungle of white clay-like rock formations for it to find an exhaust vent and enter it.

Just as Yeosang had warned, it doesn’t take long for the feed to grow staticky and unstable the farther underground it travels, but before the camera fails entirely, Hongjoong sees what he needs to; a single central area burrowed down all the way to the bedrock, with metal bridges crisscrossing the span of open space one on top of another in various floors, and outlying tunnels converging from every direction around it.

“I hate to leave the ship, but I think this is going to take all of us,” Hongjoong admits quietly when they’ve all been staring at a black screen for a few moments.

He’s got a clearer plan now, one that will need to adapt regardless, but he’s ready to divulge. Pulling his favourite goggles from his Dome days out of his pocket, he slaps them on and adjusts them to rest above his eyes.

“We’ll drive them out like insects.”

Ten minutes later he’s in the air, hovering behind a tall hoodoo and checking in with the others via wristband radio.

“San, Wooyoung, and Jongho, you should enter your vent first,” Yeosang informs them all, already inside and crawling through the tunnel he entered behind his drone as soon as the coast was clear.

The medic inches forward, pushing the headband higher up on his forehead to move the hair out of his eyes. There’s a streak of white dirt from the tunnel on his cheek, but it looks more like chalk due to its colour and consistency.

He’s streaming the feed of his drone’s camera to the others via holoscreen, and can only hope the light reflecting on his face doesn’t give him away, should any junkers happen to glance up into the tunnel. Youngseok follows down the tunnel on his belly, several feet behind, and turns to cover Yeosang’s six. He’s ready to stun any junker that turns the corner the moment they’re seen. If their medic is injured, they’re all in deep trouble.

Seonghwa crouches inside an opposite tunnel, watching the central activity with an eye on Yeosang’s hiding place, defending him at long range. It’s his job to check in with both Hongjoong and Yunho back at the Lexiwi base via wristband radio the moment anything goes awry.

“Entering now,” Wooyoung’s voice crackles over the connection as his three-person team moves quickly through the rear air vents in the direction of the junker’s hangar.

Hongjoong can see three blips inching inwards as he watches their sensors on the screen. “Give us a count as soon as you’re in,” he reminds them. It’s vital that they know how many junkers are in the hangar vicinity before proceeding with phase 2.

“You got it, Captain,” San quips and Hongjoong finds himself rolling his eyes despite the fact that none of them can see him where he hovers behind the hoodoo.

Two large shadows stretch out ahead of it, casting the exit doors in preliminary darkness.

“We are in position,” Jongho reports a moment later. “There are six— no, five— targets in the hangar area. Repeat; there are five targets present.”

Hongjoong digests the information before making a call. Jongho, San, and Wooyoung are outnumbered but could likely take the targets down with the element of surprise on their side.

“Yeosang, I need visual on the hangar,” the leader finally sighs, hoping he can be more helpful with a fuller picture of the surroundings.

There’s a tense moment after Yeosang confirms the order before the footage begins to change, the drone silently swooping down another tunnel and navigating through the darkness. When nothing appears on screen for a few seconds too long, Hongjoong opens his mouth to ask what’s happening.

“It got stuck on something,” Yeosang grunts out before anyone can question it. He sounds as if he’s on his stomach still, fiddling with the joystick of his controls. None of the members can see his face anymore now that the drone’s camera is directed elsewhere. “I think it’s a light fixture hanging from the tunnel wall. If I can just… wiggle it out… and pull back.”

His concentration is audible through the radio feed, and Hongjoong bites his lip in worry. The entire mission will be caught off track if a junker happens upon the stuck drone.

“Got it!” Yeosang breathes out a sigh of relief and, seconds later, a cluster of light grows into a shape; the hangar doors. The drone easily bypasses them by shooting through a vent and out the other end in no time, and soon Hongjoong can see Jongho, Wooyoung, and San on camera.

“San and Wooyoung, find a chance to sneak underneath and pop open the nearest aircraft’s control panel. Jongho, you should change position to the adjoining area between the tunnel and the aircraft to keep watch,” he decides after surveying the room for a moment. It’s his first time seeing the junkers’ own aircraft but it’s not difficult to surmise that the loading point is through the bottom hatch and that the engine control panel is just ahead of it from a first glance. “Go slow, make sure you aren’t seen.”

“If the drone isn’t needed here anymore, I should find the communication hub,” Yeosang breaks in, and with confirmation, he directs the drone out of the area. The camera approaches a small room in the uppermost level and hovers for a moment so Mingi can read the writing on the door.

“That’s it,” he confirms quickly. “Junyoung and I are just above, in the ventilation shafts.”

“Yeosang, is that thing armed?” Seonghwa suddenly asks.

“No,” the medic answers, realising it’s the drone that he’s referring to. “Only with a hi-res camera and a geotracker. It can do infrared scans, x-Ray, sonar, and night vision, too—”

“But it doesn’t have a laser or a stunning function, right?” Seonghwa interrupts as the list of drone features goes on.

“No,” Yeosang sighs over the comm link, clearly wishing he had installed such a device. “That’s kind of illegal as an IPF trainee.”

“Then maybe Mingi and Junyoung should drop in first and take out the security guards before the drone goes in,” Seonghwa suggests.

“But we don’t know what we’re up against yet!” Mingi protests. “There could be ten guys in that room!”

“Seonghwa’s right,” Hongjoong pitches in. The navigator had taken the words right out of his mouth. “In all likelihood, there’s only one, and we can’t afford to lose the drone.”

“You can afford to lose us ?” Mingi whispers into the comm link, panicked, before Hongjoong quickly reassures him.

“No, Mingi, but you have a stun blaster and you know how to use it. The drone can’t defend itself. You and Junyoung can do this, I know you can.”

There’s distant whispering for a moment before Mingi’s voice returns in a sighed, “Okay. Standby.”

“Be careful,” another voice crackles through the system from a much longer distance— Yunho’s— and it’s the encouragement the team needs to get the job done.

Just three minutes later, the door of the security hub slides open and Mingi’s face appears on screen, beckoning the drone inside where the camera settles on the pair of junkers knocked out on the floor.

“For your information, you were off by one,” Mingi snorts, clearly in Hongjoong’s direction, while Junyoung chuckles in the corner and makes his way to the security cameras.

Hongjoong elects not to answer the quip, and watches closely as Junyoung hacks his way into the mainframe and loops the security camera footage just to be safe.

“This is amazing!” Wooyoung’s voice comes online with an awed gasp, and the entire group is confused until realising he’s simply chattering aloud while he works on the enemy ships as usual. “San, are you seeing this? Look at the heat shield material! And yet they don’t have anything for the acid rain, isn’t that unbelievable?”

“Let’s focus, please.” Seonghwa does the scolding so Hongjoong doesn’t have to, and the pair of engineers audibly blow raspberries at him but comply nonetheless.

It’s their way of lightening the mood of such a tense mission, and while it can be distracting, Hongjoong is at least thankful it provided him an unintended update on their progress.

“Alright, Mingi, we’re ready for you to work your magic,” Junyoung proclaims, visibly handing Mingi a microphone on camera, though he keeps it disconnected from the PA system for now while the xenologist does a few practice runs of his speech.

It’s an evacuation message in the Lexiwi language, with the lower class junker dialects taken into account, and as the linchpin of the entire operation, is vital to send out at the correct time.

“Just waiting on you now, San and Wooyoung,” Yeosang points out. “How many ships are left?”

“Can’t talk, please hold,” San hisses into the comm link before he, Wooyoung, and Jongho all go on mute.

Sweat rolls down Hongjoong’s neck at the prospect that they might’ve been seen. Ten seconds go by, then twenty, then thirty, and with his eyes glued to the motion sensor display, Hongjoong counts forty-eight seconds before Jongho unmutes himself and explains what’s happening.

“There was a junker adjusting the loading ramp of the ship next to the one San was working on,” he whispers, barely a tremble in his voice despite the close call. “I didn’t stun him because I didn't want to alert the others, and he moved on without seeing any of us.”

“There are four left, to answer your question,” San jumps in, breath sounding laboured. Hongjoong imagines he must be hanging upside down from the undercarriage to access the control panel without being seen, but doesn’t trouble Yeosang to get the drone in there to see for himself again. Not after such a narrow escape.

“Captain, we’ve recorded the evacuation message,” Mingi reports, voice just as quiet as the hangar team’s voices despite being in a much more secure location. “It’s ready to be broadcast as soon as you say the word.”

“Hangar team, time remaining?” Hongjoong sighs, trying to be patient. If even one of those ships is able to take off in the final stages of the mission, it could come back to haunt them.

“Give us five,” Wooyoung estimates. “And then another three to take up defensive positions just inside the doorway.”

“10-4,” Mingi shoots back, evidently antsy to complete his part of the operation.

Hongjoong takes six of the eight minutes to land on the hoodoo and save some fuel, cleaning his goggles but keeping his eyes peeled on the hangar exit doors.

“Potential problem in the communication hub,” Junyoung informs them, as calm and collected as ever, waving to the drone camera to attract the entire team’s attention to the screen. “According to the schedule posted in this room, the guard change will occur in five minutes. It’s going to raise suspicion when these two security room junkers don’t report to their new station, and we’ll have some company in here. At least two more.”

It’s another problem to solve, and it has a fast-approaching deadline.

“I’m sorry I didn’t notice earlier,” Junyoung tacks on professionally.

“Don’t be,” Seonghwa reassures him quickly before attempting to solve the problem. “Yeosang, is there any way you can get up there with your med kit?”

“Not through the central walking area,” Yeosang answers quickly, and Youngseok speaks up from a few feet behind him, his voice catching in the background of Yeosang’s own call, “If we move fast, we can go out through the back and in the way Mingi and Junyoung did. The coast is clear at the moment.” Yeosang hums in agreement to the idea and the sounds of shifting follow before he asks of Seonghwa in another grunt, “Why do you ask, hyung?”

“You have the anaesthetic reversal agent with you,” the navigator explains with growing momentum. “You can wake the junkers before the guard change and before the stun blast naturally wears off, you’ll just need a large dose since it’s the entire body rather than a single limb.”

“Are you suggesting we let them go?” Hongjoong asks with a quirked eyebrow, regardless of the fact that none of them can see him. “They’ll just alert the rest of the station, even more quickly than the guard change would.”

“Let them go, yes,” Seonghwa confirms, quickly adding on, “But not without a dose of MMM.”

“MMM?” Junyoung repeats, confused. “What’s that? Molar mass... something?”

“Memory modifying material,” Yeosang answers him grimly. “In small doses, it essentially erases or replaces the past few minutes to hours of a subject’s memory. Technically, I do have it, but it’s very clearly labelled for dire emergencies only. There are some ethical debates in the medical community about usage–”

“It’s either hide the bodies and take our chances getting Mingi and Junyoung to fit into a pair of junker security guard outfits in the next three minutes or inject the enemy with a tiny bit of triple M and send them on their way,” Seonghwa points out with a scoff. “I think this qualifies as an emergency and IPF wouldn’t have given it to you if you weren’t cleared to use it.”

Yeosang only hums in answer, and while it’s clear he doesn’t like the idea of going through with it, he and Youngseok are already approaching the communication hub and they can’t afford a wasted trip.

“Nearly out of time,” Hongjoong reminds the entire group, glancing at the setting suns for a moment and subjecting himself to the light’s blinding reflection off the white cliffs. “Status update, all teams?”

“We’ve completed our first objective and are taking ground positions,” Wooyoung explains first. It’s a relief that the alien ships have been successfully sabotaged.

“Position unchanged,” Seonghwa follows next, likely watching the junkers move around below him with a close eye and a steady gun.

“Approaching the hub,” Youngseok reports last, and the camera footage shows him and Yeosang dropping into the room from the ceiling vent, quickly administering the drugs while they confer with Mingi and Junyoung.

“Get them outside before they fully come to and they’ll think they’re simply on the way to their next station,” Seonghwa suggests, and the four of them comply immediately, two to a body, after checking that the coast is clear. The drone continues to hover there with no one at the joystick.

“Alright, send out the evacuation message and get out of there,” Hongjoong eagerly instructs next, ready for all the planning and manoeuvring to come to a head. “Seonghwa, cover them.”

Yeosang’s hands find the joystick to his drone again and it follows the progress of the four of them up and out into the air vent labyrinth once again, zooming on ahead to make sure the coast is clear. They meet up with Jongho, San and Wooyoung’s group, staggering themselves down the hallway, and wait for the inevitable.

“Ready?” Junyoung breathes, a hint of nerves in his voice as his hand hesitates above the button on his wristband.

“Let’s do this,” Mingi nods him on encouragingly, and a moment later his announcement echoes through the entire station.

Hongjoong can hear it over their comm link, but only picks up a word or two from Mingi’s incredibly detailed pronunciation and intonation. After a few seconds of confusion on the part of the junkers, they begin pouring in numbers from their various activities in the station to the hangar as instructed.

Mingi is Team ATZ’s best kept secret. Because whether the enemy was waiting for them or not, they never expected one to perfectly replicate their dialect.

“Well done,” Hongjoong whispers to him through the comm link, careful not to disrupt anyone’s focus, and he can see Mingi’s small smile on the drone cam footage. It’s enough.

“Hold positions,” Jongho takes charge, unwavering where he kneels with his weapon drawn. “We need as many of them in the ships as possible before we enter combat to lessen their numbers.”

Yet again, it’s about patience, and Hongjoong’s is wearing thin but he alternates gazing between the screen and the surrounding area to make sure not a single junker escapes his notice.

“There are a few outlying heat signatures but the pilot junkers will start to become suspicious over why their engines aren’t working right about now,” Yeosang informs them, and Hongjoong bites his lip in worry. “I say we give it twenty more seconds and close up each ship’s loading dock.”

“We’re ready,” San assures them all confidently, focused intently on the enemy as they swarm their aircraft like bees to a hive. “Just give us the word.”

“Are all the clan leaders accounted for?” Hongjoong asks before offering his judgement, dropping his shoulders in relief when Seonghwa responds with an affirmative, “Yes, I counted all twenty-three from the evacuation route vantage point.”

“It’s up to you, then, Yeosang,” Hongjoong puts the decision in his hands as the most informed thanks to the drone sensors, and the medic counts down in a whisper before signalling to the pair of engineers.

“Go.”

They run in perfect sync through the blind spots of each alien ship, closing the back hatches with a simple touch and barring them from the outside. All five team members in the room with them watch their backs, firing off the occasional stun blast when a junker is quick enough to try to escape.

The wide hangar doors begin opening, probably via remote command from one of the ships, and Hongjoong can see it from where he stands atop the hoodoo, fingers hovering above the on switch for his jetpack. “What’s happening down there?” he asks into the comm link. The drone’s camera is still directed at Mingi and Jongho’s respective pairs, safely sequestered behind some storage containers as they pick off stragglers one by one.

“The targets are panicking,” Mingi reports to the camera as he recharges his blaster briefly, wiping wispy hairs out of his face. “Nothing to worry about.”

“Hangar team, you’ve got junkers incoming from the station,” Seonghwa reports over the link, although the sound of bodies hitting the dirt floor in the hallway he presides over reassures Hongjoong that it’s nothing the navigator can’t handle. “I’m catching as many as I can by the entrance but you’ll still have one or two on your six.”

Clearly, his warning is meant for the team fighting inside the hangar, but Hongjoong makes sure his blaster is charged and ready anyway in case any of them make it past the open hangar doors.

Suddenly the sound of engine turbines gearing up takes over the link audio, followed by a soft curse from Wooyoung.

“Hyung— I mean, Captain— there’s an aircraft headed your way,” Junyoung reports. “I’ll close the doors remotely in case any others were missed.”

Hongjoong tightens his jaw and takes flight in preparation. It’s why he’s out there, after all.

It was bound to happen that Wooyoung and San would miss one. The drone couldn’t scan everything in so short a time.

The ship that makes it, however narrowly, out of the closing hangar doors is a rather small one, and may have simply escaped the engineers’ notice. It’s likely manned by only one pilot, and Hongjoong locks his blaster on the cockpit and fires as soon as he’s clear. To his disappointment, the stun ray bounces clean off the heat-proofed windshield and Hongjoong is left with one option.

Boarding.

As safely as he can with two miniature jet turbines strapped to his back, Hongjoong positions his goggles, flies directly at the oncoming ship, and slows down right before it passes under him, pivoting to catch the edge of the extended right wing and clinging on for dear life. The shocked pilot turns to look at him through the side window, almost crashing directly into the nearest hoodoo, and the ship veers left, causing Hongjoong to slide towards the body of the plane. It’s a stroke of good luck for him that the craft is the type of alien ship with the engines built under the wings rather than above.

Making signals with one hand and clutching the wing edge in a vicelike grip with the other, Hongjoong quickly realises the pilot doesn’t have the slightest intention of listening to him as he slows down abruptly in the hopes of shaking the human off.

Pulling his body weight forward and getting to his feet in that perfect window of time, Hongjoong stays low and crosses to the top of the ship, digging his fingers into the gap between the smooth surface of the jet and the emergency ejection hatch at the top. He breathes out evenly through his nose in an attempt to quell his nerves and then pulls hard.

The door doesn’t budge.

Groaning as another sharp upward yaw causes him to faceplant into the emergency hatch, Hongjoong fumbles for his blaster and switches the setting to laser beam.

“Hey, I’m looking at the live satellite footage right now,” Yunho’s distant voice crackles through the comm link. “Am I seeing things? Is that you on top of the junker ship, Captain?”

Several other statements of confusion from the team members in the middle of their respective tasks are voiced through their shared call, and Hongjoong mumbles back through gritted teeth, “That’s correct, now if you don’t mind, I’m a little busy here!”

The laser is halfway through successfully burning an opening in the top of the aircraft when it again yaws upwards sharply, this time to avoid colliding with another hoodoo.

The manoeuvre is unsuccessful on the part of the junker pilot, and the landing gear which he still has not retracted since takeoff is promptly ripped off the belly of the aircraft as it brushes with the top of the rock face and stutters on, wounded. “Easy there!” Hongjoong scoffs, finishing with the laser and kicking the hatch in. He quickly places the blaster against the side of the junker’s masked head. “Hands off the controls.”

Appearing to get the point regardless of the fact that he doesn’t understand the language, the pilot shakily lets go of the joystick. Hongjoong quickly recovers it and nudges the alien out of his seat, still directing the blaster at him but splitting his attention now to avoid a head-on crash and turn them back towards the base.

“Okay, I’m calling in for advice,” he says through the comm link, ready now for his teammates’ voices in his ear. “I can’t land this thing, the wheels are gone.”

“Then I guess you’ll have to crash it,” San informs him grimly. Not what Hongjoong wanted to hear.

As far as he knows, there’s no parachute built into his jetpack.

“Thank you for your contribution, San,” he sighs with a wry smile. “I guess I’ll figure it out.”

Even as the words leave his lips, an idea hits him with the G-force of a DES class interplanetary vessel.

The hoodoo from before is ahead of them again now, having turned the ship around in the direction they came from, and while it’s no landing pad, it has space enough for him and his alien captive if the jetpack can get them there. He sat on it for a good fifteen minutes at least earlier in the mission.

“Hold on,” he mimes to the clueless junker, who nods slowly and hugs his waist a bit too tightly for comfort. Knowing he has a total of five seconds maximum to pull it off, Hongjoong wastes no time in setting the ship’s trajectory downward, lighting his jetpack engines again, and soaring up through the hole he burned into the roof earlier with the alien pilot clutching him the entire time. Below them, the ship crashes to the ground with a minor explosion.

The extra weight of the junker combats the strength of the turbines, only meant for a single person, and it isn’t quite enough to get them up to the flat top of the hoodoo, resulting in Hongjoong’s second faceplant of the day– directly into the side of the rock.

This one hurts enough that he sees stars for a moment before reeling back and peeling off the side of the hoodoo like the spaceship stickers he used to slap onto his bedroom window, alien pilot in tow.

It’s a good forty five feet at least to the bottom, and it’s as if Hongjoong’s brain is operating at double the speed to find a solution to break their fall. His first instinct is to throw out his arms and legs to slow his momentum, but he accidentally succeeds in grabbing hold of a very fortunate cranny in the side of the rock as he does so, stopping their fall and positioning the junker directly beneath him.

“Hey, team?” He grunts into the comm link, strained from the extra weight hanging on him while trying to keep his gloved hands anchored on the rock. “I’m a bit stuck and could use help.”

The drone zooms out of the hangar and hovers in front of the pair for a moment, filming their predicament.

“Be right there,” Yeosang answers promptly, and Hongjoong turns his head shakily to see him and Youngseok sprinting out from the alien base. “Don’t do anything stupid. I can put you back together but only if you stay alive.”

“Okay,” Hongjoong whispers, just barely audible, too focused on hanging on. He can feel blood in his mouth, but ignores it and looks down at the junker still swinging below him, clutching his waist with an impressive grip. “You ought to climb down!”

The pilot looks up at him through those beady eyes on the mask and says nothing, evidently confused, so Hongjoong repeats. “Go on! Let go and climb down so I can follow!”

After staring at him a moment longer, the junker seems to figure it out and reaches out one of his hands to test the wall. Deeming it feasible to climb on, he finally releases Hongjoong and begins working his way down, testing each landing with his foot before putting pressure on it, and conveniently marking out a good path for Hongjoong to follow.

The hoodoo is strangely shaped, probably due to wind erosion, and so the climb down is less like the elementary rock walls with their flat surfaces in school and more like the unnatural ones the Horizon team practised with in their training. In that respect, at least, the feeling is familiar, although Hongjoong aches by the time he nears the bottom and sees Youngseok restraining the junker pilot before he thinks to run into the desert.

Yeosang stands with a hand out to help Hongjoong off the hoodoo and shakes his head at him with a smile. “All that for one guy?”

“It was an important guy,” Seonghwa’s voice quips back in both their ears as he inspects the crest the pilot dons via drone camera footage. “And all the leaders are now officially accounted for. Is it safe to say we’ve completed our objective?”

“Yes,” Hongjoong sighs, ripping the goggles off his face and accepting the oxygen mask the medic pushes at him. It’s been long enough outside in Mu Ryool’s atmosphere to justify using it. “Let’s call Hybin here and let his men handle the arrests.”

Team ATZ has essentially offered up the entire population of the base, alive, on a platter, trapped in their very own aircraft and stunned into frozen shock at the humans’ cleverness.

On his way inside, Hongjoong’s thoughts are already turning towards the decision they’ll have to make about what to do next when they reach the Lexiwi base, but Wooyoung appearing in front of him with a black eye successfully pulls his attention away.

“You mean to tell me I had to watch you clip wires for fifteen minutes and the moment you get punched in the face by an alien who is smaller than you, I’m busy doing something else and miss it?” He pouts in mock disappointment.

“Hey!” Wooyoung screeches in return. “The idiot snuck up on me!”

“We were a bit busy by the front door,” Jongho shrugs, offering explanation but taking no sides as usual. “And San was talking to you so he didn’t notice either.”

Electing to be merciful on account of his distracting San, Hongjoong taps his own face and draws Wooyoung’s attention to his cheek, which is forming a bruise itself as a result of being pancaked into a rock formation. “Well, at least we’ll match, huh?”

The engineer beams at him and returns to the DES-1024 with the others, buckling himself up in the seat across from Yeosang so he can have the first pick of cute bandages for the scratch across his nose.

“Would you like the jetpack back?” Hongjoong asks Jongho, dangling it between his fingers. “Sorry, it’s probably low on fuel.”

“Keep it,” the gunner snorts, shaking his head in amusement. “It doesn’t fit anyone else.”

Smiling at the proven efficiency of such a childish device, Hongjoong turns to walk inside the ship, making eye contact with San when he pokes his head out to see who’s coming, and finally allowing the calm of success to wash over him.

Suddenly, San’s face changes, crescent-shaped mirthful eyes widening and growing dark. His smile falls and he opens his mouth to scream, “Behind you!”

Everything happens in slow motion. Hongjoong is turning around to see a flash of light, the discharge of a weapon in the hands of a rogue assassin junker, one who was able to sneak up on them from behind. But it’s not aimed at him.

It’s pointed at Jongho.

He’s opening his mouth to yell at the younger boy, “Get down!” knowing he won’t reach the assassin fast enough.

But San does.

Sprinting full speed and tackling the junker around the midsection, he forces the shot up so that it misses Jongho entirely, though Hongjoong is by his side in an instant to check that he’s unharmed.

“Jongho, are you hurt–”

“Fine, I’m fine,” Jongho answers quickly, practically pushing his captain off in order to look past him and see his attacker.

San has the junker restrained after a brief struggle, the ballistic blaster he used laying uselessly on the floor, so Hongjoong picks it up and inspects it. “Shrapnel,” he gasps after checking the ammunition. “Made from our stolen metal, no doubt.”

It’s a particularly dangerous weapon, and he shudders to think what it might’ve done had a projectile from it pierced Jongho as intended.

“Who hired you?” He growls at the kneeling assassin, helmeted head hung so that the spikes surrounding the bug-eyed goggles he wears are firmly pointed down. “Well? Out with it, why are you targeting this man?”

Hongjoong points to Jongho, seated on the loading ramp now as the other members flock around him anxiously.

The junker doesn’t answer. Running his hands through his hair in frustration, Hongjoong turns back to the crowd. “Mingi, I need Mingi. Where is he?”

“Here!” The xenologist steps forward from the huddle and obligingly translates the angrily posed questions, hopefully into something with equally strong wording in the Lexiwi language.

“Search him,” Hongjoong sighs while Mingi tries and fails to get the assassin to talk. No more than a huff escapes the screen-like grating over the alien’s mouth. San roughly pulls off the worn cape thrown over the junker’s shoulder, half covering the rusty ridged armour he wears, and is careful of the spiky disc-like details on his right arm. It’s clear just from looking at him that he’s no average soldier. This is a highly trained and specifically selected junker assassin.

“Hybin is touching down in the next forty-five seconds,” Junyoung offers helpfully from behind and Hongjoong nods, exhaling sharply through his nose in frustration at how useless he is to do anything at all about the incredibly close call they just suffered.

And right when he thought everything had finally worked out.

“The moment he does, we’re loading up and heading back,” Hongjoong decides firmly. “I’m giving no one else the chance to take a shot at one of us.”

All around are silent nods and grave faces. They file back into the ship one by one, more than a few pairs of hands patting Jongho, squeezing his shoulder, or petting his hair to offer their sympathy. He shrugs them all off.

San releases the assassin with a kick to the face and lets one of Hybin’s officers drag him away for proper interrogation. On his way up the ramp, Hongjoong stops him and pulls him close with an arm around his neck.

“Never do that again,” he warns in a low voice right by the engineer’s ear, and San nearly pulls away in confusion.

“I saved his life–”

“You could’ve been killed,” Hongjoong overrules immediately. “I appreciate the result, but it was brash and thoughtless. I won’t have one member of this team sacrifice himself for another, not like that.”

“You and I both know there was no negotiating with that assassin,” San snorts, still fiery despite both of them knowing he’ll ultimately accept the captain’s word. “Sometimes you have to act without thinking, let instinct take over.”

“Trust me, I know, I’m the pilot,” Hongjoong reminds him. “But you’re the engineer. I need you taking apart alien ships, not tackling assassins and putting yourself in harm’s way. We handle things as a team, and maybe today you were lucky, but that might not be the case when you tackle another alien tomorrow.”

“Understood,” San sighs like a reprimanded child before buckling himself up. Hongjoong watches very closely to see if he did, in fact, hurt himself.

They all know he wouldn’t tell them if he had.

Even after taking off, turning toward home base, and switching on auto-pilot, his heart rate hasn’t returned to normal.

“We need to discuss some things,” Hongjoong breaks the exhausted silence which has settled over the crew. “We won’t hear it out of his own lips, but that junker had orders from someone else to shoot Jongho. I’m sure of it.”

“But…” Seonghwa’s brow furrows as he shifts in his chair to glance at Hongjoong. “Surely he was aiming at you? I mean, you’re clearly the leader, you have an armband with a symbol on it and everything, and junkers understand symbols– their own clan leaders wear them, too.”

“My back was to that assassin, he could’ve easily killed me,” Hongjoong explains, swallowing dryly as his own words sink in. “But he didn’t. He was targeting Jongho. And I think I’m starting to realise why.”

“Why?” Wooyoung repeats, lips parted as he glances back and forth between the members to be sure he doesn’t miss anything important.

“Because he has access to the secret files,” Mingi states grimly when it dawns on him as well, turning and nodding at Jongho as he explains further, “Your grandmother left the information to you, anyone following the trail would naturally go after the recipient of the file. You know something you shouldn’t know, and that junker was hired to make sure it doesn’t get out.”

“That’s absurd,” San splutters. “Who would contract an assassin to keep things quiet; IPF? They’re the ones who sent us here to fight the junkers to begin with, surely they’re not allied with one?”

Hongjoong is busy landing the ship, but the arguments bounce back and forth and reverberate in his head. There’s too much about IPF that isn’t adding up, and he’s reached his breaking point.

Only when they’re reunited with a relieved Yunho and locked away in the surveillance room from any curious Lexiwi who might happen upon them does he open the discussion in earnest.

“I know we said we’d table it for now but I think it’s time to discuss this again,” Hongjoong finally says, glancing around to get an idea of each member’s position on the matter. “I think we need to go back to the Citadel.”

“Absolutely not,” Seonghwa responds immediately, so quick in his delivery that half of them startle and turn to look at him. “I-I think that’s a bad idea. Not to mention, against the law.”

“Against the law?” Mingi scoffs. “I think we’ll have to do more than break the law if we mean to confront the Board about this.”

“But leaving Mu Ryool after we’ve only just landed here?” Seonghwa fires back, more confident now in his opposition. “It’ll just increase their ammunition against us.”

“We did the job we were sent out here to do. Why should we stay here when we have important questions that need answering?” Yunho asks him, confused.

Hongjoong is confused, too. None of Seonghwa’s weak excuses have any precedent, and despite being at each others’ throats before, he had expected support from the navigator who had supported him more than a few times since then.

“Aren’t you at all concerned about the greater implications of this?” He asks quietly, giving Seonghwa a chance before he’s outvoted.

The navigator can only shake his head.

After all the time they spent repairing their relationship, Hongjoong can’t believe what he’s seeing.

Again, Seonghwa has an objection, and this time it’s not even supported with evidence.

He sounds more like he’s pleading with Hongjoong than arguing with him.

“We shouldn’t be doing this.”

Seonghwa has always been a closed book about his personal life and past experiences. But still Hongjoong fails to understand how the navigator can be so cold, so unfeeling in the wake of unfolding disaster and compounding trauma.

There is not a shred of guilt in his eyes as he insists, “You’re not thinking straight. We ought to revisit this later—”

Hongjoong can’t sit quiet anymore.

“It’s not your grandmother who was erased from the records!” He shoots back, getting to his feet. “It’s not your father who was slandered after dying a hero’s death.”

The navigator presses his lips together to keep from saying something insensitive rashly, but it’s ultimately Jongho speaking up that prevents him from uttering it.

“Hyung, I know we all worked hard to get here and it’s frustrating to discover all this might put our careers in jeopardy, but this is a lot bigger than us,” he says gently.

The murmurs of agreement sweeping the room reassure Hongjoong that he’s not alone in his disillusionment.

They need to act now, and Seonghwa has been outvoted.

Still, Hongjoong takes it upon himself to invite the older boy to his room that night, not to be reprimanded, but to give him an opportunity to share whatever he thinks needs to be kept private.

He has a feeling Seonghwa is hiding something.

___

Everything is falling apart again and Seonghwa’s options are fewer and fewer by the second.

After everything, after all the sacrifices he made, here he stands outside of Hongjoong’s door knowing the clock is ticking and his entire story is slowly unwinding while it does.

When he ended his correspondence with Source Unknown, he knew there was a possibility of being discovered as a fraud, he had just hoped and prayed the discovery wouldn’t come from within. That his team members would be spared the embarrassment and the utter betrayal guaranteed to take place when the moment comes.

But alas, it turns out he’s not the only person with incriminating evidence. Jongho’s grandmother has files of her own that she didn’t delete after being blackmailed like Seonghwa did. She’s stronger than he was, no question about it.

And yet the image of his family is still burned into his head every time he closes his eyes. He never received credible confirmation that they would be protected, and he knows that if he were to lose this battle and discover they were every bit in danger as they had been when he first cut his dangerous deal, all this lying and manipulating would be for naught.

And then he could never forgive himself.

There’s a soft “come in” when he knocks, and he enters with his head bowed, already working his angle.

“My apologies if I–”

“No, please don’t. You’re not in trouble or anything. I wouldn’t,” Hongjoong chuckles and shakes his head. “I wouldn’t punish you for having a different opinion. Or for any reason really. I just want to understand.”

He’s sitting back from the desk the Lexiwi provided for him, combing through some type of digital files on his own. Seonghwa doesn’t get a good look before they’re minimised out of view and Hongjoong hops on his bed, patting the place next to him.

Seonghwa resists the urge to sigh. It’s going to be that kind of conversation, then.

“These junkers knew we were coming,” Hongjoong says quietly after they’ve sat down comfortably. “They already had a deal in place with an unknown source. Jongho was exactly where they wanted him and almost got killed. I don’t know what that looks like to you but it seems awfully apparent to me; we were set up.”

Seonghwa protests quickly, despite knowing his words are false. “Now you’re just seeing conspiracies where there are none!”

He’s practically exhausted this particular argument and knows he needs to try something else to throw the rest of his team off the scent, but denial is his default, and discomfort swirls in his stomach when it’s met with a scoff and shake of the head.

“You can’t actually believe that, Seonghwa. I know you can’t. You’ve seen all the evidence that I have.” There is concern in Hongjoong’s eyes, despite the heaviness of his words. “The Board of the most powerful organisation in the known universe is corrupt. Isn’t that the least bit concerning?”

He breaks out into a sweat. Hongjoong can see through him too well. Trying to convince him he’s imagining things isn’t going to work anymore.

“Don’t you understand? I’m trying to protect this team. Of course it’s concerning! There, I said it, alright? That doesn’t mean charging in there with accusations we can’t prove will accomplish anything at all!” Seonghwa pleads again, hands fisting in the thin blanket atop the bed they’re sitting on, and it’s real panic that bleeds through his words. “I’m telling you, I know it’s hard and it hurts now but you’ll regret it in the end if you don’t let this go.”

He realises a moment too late that he sounds like he’s speaking from experience.

Hongjoong’s frown deepens and he stares a moment, just like he did back on the Citadel when he caught Seonghwa struggling his way out of the web of his own anxiety.

“Is everything okay?” He asks gently, carefully, and tilts his head with the intent to listen. “You know you can talk to me— or anyone— and we’ll do what we can to help.”

“No, it’s not like that,” Seonghwa answers quickly, sighing through his nose and glancing away. “I just don’t think we should turn our backs on IPF so hastily.”

He tries what he tried on the Citadel– fishing for pity– knowing it’ll work on Hongjoong without question, and feels just as sick to his stomach as he had that day.

“My family… is depending on me. This is my chance to make sure they’re safe, for good. There’s only one way to ensure that, and you and I both know what that is,” he interrupts himself with a helpless sigh. It’s the truth again, just bent slightly to suit the situation. “You said so yourself, it’s the most powerful organisation in the known universe.”

Hongjoong chews on his lip, a shadow falling on his face.

“I understand the pressure. Really, I feel the same way. But this… I can’t let this go,” his voice drops to a wrathful whisper. “There’s a murderer somewhere on the Citadel and a Board member ordered him to do it.”

“We don’t know that,” Seonghwa reminds him softly. He does know– or at least, he’s quickly finding out. “The men in that video may have been accused and removed from IPF standing privately.” He’s grasping at straws in the hopes that Hongjoong will accept one of them, and abandon this revenge quest. As justified as he may be, he’s not ready for what he’ll find, and Seonghwa can think of no other way to protect him from it than to keep him from looking.

Hongjoong’s eyes are wet, and he fiddles with his hands as he responds with trembling words, “As much as I hope we find out that’s the case when we confront them, that’s not good enough. Not… not just because of my father, but think what else he might’ve done. What other lives he’s taken, families he’s ripped apart.”

His voice breaks and Seonghwa pulls him in for a hug, every thought in his brain screaming at him to get the situation under control by whatever means necessary.

“Shh, it’s alright,” he consoles, his mind wandering back to that day at the Citadel again, where roles were reversed. “It’ll be alright.”

“I-I know I can’t bring him back, but I will bring him justice.”

Despite his sadness, Hongjoong still sounds more angry than anything, and it dashes Seonghwa’s hopes that he might be cycling through the stages of grief quickly enough to reconsider the return journey.

“And I wish you could by doing this but, Hongjoong, the rules of our contracts are binding. A single misstep can land us in the same trouble Jongho’s grandmother landed in.”

Again, it’s the truth, and Seonghwa delivers it sweetly with a hand rubbing up and down his captain’s spine, but the real consequences are so far beyond what Hongjoong can imagine and Seonghwa still can’t tell him the full implications of that reality without sacrificing everything he’s done to get here and the safety of his family back on Earth.

Hongjoong senses that something is off about his mellow response, and pulls away to look at him again, lips pressed together tightly.

“That’s no reason to keep quiet about it. Sometimes the rules need to be broken. If this isn’t worth that to you, then… I don’t know what to say.” He scans his face and the red beneath his eyes seems to intensify. “I can’t help but think you know more than you’re telling me.”

Seonghwa’s heart pounds loudly in his ears, and he shifts his body to face forward in an attempt to hide his panic.

He does know more than he’s saying; much more. And the problem is that he can’t tell anyone yet. Not here. Not now. Maybe not ever, if they go through with this.

“I’m just as shocked and upset as anyone, I promise you,” he retorts without making eye contact, jaw tightening. Perhaps it sounds a little shallow and insincere, but he can’t risk losing his edge over this conversation. He goes for pity again. “I just… I can’t break down and lose my resolve at a time like this, it’s too important.”

Hongjoong is quiet for a moment, and Seonghwa thinks perhaps he’s turned the tide.

“You said back there that I wasn’t thinking straight,” he finally repeats, voice empty and tired. He isn’t looking at Seonghwa anymore now either. “Am I… Am I a burden on this team? Is my leadership putting us in a dangerous situation— one that isn’t worth the risk? It’s not me trying to put my needs first, it’s the far-reaching implications if this does turn out to be a conspiracy and I—”

That was not the intended effect of Seonghwa’s words, and he rushes to repair the damage.

“Hongjoong, no, please don’t think that. It’s true, I hope you’ll reconsider returning to the Citadel but everyone makes mistakes and if you go through with this one, it’s my hope they’ll let you off easily for it.”

Seonghwa leans forward to catch Hongjoong’s gaze and succeeds. There’s still self-doubt in his captain’s eyes, but the perfect combination of his tone and word choice have assuaged the worst of it. Seonghwa is relieved that revealing his true thoughts has turned the discussion around favourably, though there’s still a ball in his throat.

Hongjoong smiles weakly and shifts to fully face his guest again. “If it makes you feel any better about breaching the contract, I do think the Board will listen to us if we make a good case. At the very least, I’m sure Soojin will.”

That’s wishful thinking, almost laughably naïve, although given the information Hongjoong currently has, Seonghwa can’t blame him. He was the one who put the thought of mercy in his head after all.

But he also can’t set him straight. His enemies’ hold over him is too strong, even casting a shadow over the two of them in a private room on a distant alien planet.

Hongjoong is fiddling with his hands again, and Seonghwa realises he’s been quiet for too long and sparked concern.

“Are we going to be alright?” Hongjoong asks, not for the first time. “I can’t help if you won’t talk to me.”

Seonghwa’s eyes well up involuntarily.

If only. If only it was that simple.

“I hope one day we will be.”

Clearly, his answer is somewhat mystifying, and Hongjoong can only shake his head with a sigh and beg quietly, “Come with us, please.”

Seonghwa clenches his teeth in irritation and tries not to let it show. “Is that an order?”

He’s the only one not on board with this crazy plan, and if neither of them budge from their side of this fight, the hierarchy will determine the result. Maybe he shouldn’t have asked for the title to pass from him after all.

Hongjoong drops his head into his hands, more frustrated at this perhaps than any of Seonghwa’s earlier objections.

“Don’t make me do that. I need you on my side.”

“I am on your side. It just doesn’t always look like it to you,” Seonghwa insists, delivering the half-truth with all the sincerity he can muster before muttering mostly to himself, “I’ve broken more rules than you know.”

That’s what got him into this mess. That’s what turned him into such an orderly rule-follower even though he knows this road can lead him to only two places, neither of them good.

With tired eyes, Hongjoong stands and motions to the door. It looks like their conversation is at an end. He finishes it drained of all emotion, “Then I’ll see you in the hangar at 0800.”

Seonghwa has lost this battle. And now he needs to call in the cavalry, or he may just find himself losing the war.

“Yessir.”

---

Taglist: (Let me know if you would like to be added) @mooneylooney1 @1998psh @delphinium3000 @kpop-choco

Recommended listening: Mixed Up by Enhypen

A/N: Hiiii! I know it’s been forever but I was really busy last summer teaching abroad and then GRADUATING FROM COLLEGE YAY as well lol. I hope the wait was worth it and that this 13.8k chapter is acceptable reparations! Let me know what you thought and what you think is on the horizon~

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