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Chapter Text

Sae-byeok still wasn't sure when the screaming stopped.
She remembered crossing the river and tugging Cheol along as she sobbed and begged, their father drifting away, down the river.
"Take care of Cheol, live well and long. I love you. All of you."
When they'd reached Central South Korea, she'd been numb.
Her mental absence had been picked up on by the barista of a cafe that her and Cheol had stopped in to think.
Alongside her absence, the barista supposedly noticed the dried spray of blood on her thigh and the tear of her skirt. Or maybe it was the dripping wound in her neck.
When they'd been escaping - a soldier had torn the flesh with a knife, two soldiers.
Anyways, Cheol was taken away from her and placed in an orphanage not too long after that.
The barista had called CPS, but Sae-Byeok at only seventeen was turned away. Too old. She can take care of herself.
And she tried. Shortly after that, she'd met Deok-su.
A cowardly gangster who cares for nothing more than sex and money.
Who pounced on the seventeen year old foreigner like a god to his sacrifice.
Sae-Byeok had to admit, she hadn't t tried very hard prior to this to work for herself.
Her hope at simply died like her father in the river, like her brother and grandparents to the plague.
But, unfortunately enough, prostitution got her the most money. Deok-Su was happy. The men who came for her services were happy. Cheol was doing alright in the Orphanage.
If she kept working like this, she might get her eomma home.
Until she snapped.
One particularly night, Deok-Su had her services sold to a rich, American business man.
The man offered her temporary stay at a fancy hotel, while he used her out every hour of the night. Alongside a good €500 payment.
She allowed it. Until it came for him to pay up.
He gave the money over to Deok-Su, who pocketed it and promised her a tenth of it.
That was not what she sold her body for.
So she pickpocket him. Took his money, took his knife.
And she earned a right old slice in the neck for it.
But she lived. Well, if you could say that surviving is synonymous with living.

She visited Cheol every single day.
He was getting bullied by the other children. He blamed her for it. Now, while if technically it was not her fault, she is still a homeless seventeen year old with crippling depression and PTSD.
So she understood. But she held him close and promised him a month. In a month, theyll all be together. A family again.
She knew it would take far longer. So she stopped buying necessities that would take longer to toll on her life.
Food. New clothes. Toothpaste and stuff like that.
She cut her beautiful long hair and sold it.
She got quite a good bit for that.
She saved all the money away, to bring her eomma to her. To get Cheol out of the orphanage.
She became concerningly thin, hiding it behind the oversized, on-sale clothing she wore.
Rarely did her clothes fit her. She had exactly one jacket. Two t-shirts. And one pair of trousers.
She washed her clothes in closed laundromats, in the night. She was caught once. The security guard took pity on her, and never said a word.
Cheol never noticed how she never changed her clothes beyond those things.
And while she used the bagginess of her clothes to hide her malnourished state from Cheol, it was also to conceal the bites and bruises and scars littering her lithe body.
Cheol was so young. So innocent. He doesn't deserve to know such cruel things.
The poor boy should not pity a theif, a trickster, a conwoman. Hell, a prostitute.
And she knew he would. For Cheol was a sweet boy, he saw her wounded neck and cried for her.
She had never felt so useless and guilty before.
But that feeling has become her bones and so she carries on feeling it.
The month she'd promised is closing in and she has but three days left and knows she'd been wrong.
So when the man with the strange smile gives her a chance - she takes it without hesitation.
Her poor brother, how distraught he would be when the month was up and his sister was wrong.
Though the title of sister felt wrong now - had she not cradled him in her arms, wiped the grease from his chin, sung him to sleep, told him stories and great imaginations of peace and love and family, clothed him, fed him, taught him manners and table etiquette and all.
Was that not a mother?
Sister or mother, didn't matter. She was his Sae-Byeok. His only hope.
And she could not let him down so when she woke in the rooms full of pink soldiers and people. All dressed in the same green-blur tracksuits, numbered.
A piggyback of the money she needs dangling nearby. She is almost glad.
She can do it. Surely.
But then she meets Deok-Su once more, who screams and fights, furious about that time months or weeks (Had it been a year yet?) ago when she'd stolen from him. He beats her. Taunts of her origins in the North declared before everyone. She argued back.
101
Then, a man she'd pickpocketed while scouting for an honest job recognises her by the scar.
456
Sae-Byeok only really defends herself to the second man. He shakes her and screams. His saliva spraying on her face.
They are forced apart by Deok-Su, who hasn't finished his own beating yet, but a load of the Pink Soldiers interrupted - came to explain the game to them.
That's when she notices her own number.
067
She decides she likes it. Her real name doesn't really fit her.
Dawn, it means, but Sae-Byeok was quite sure she wasn't Dawn. She was murder in the moonlight, slaughtered animals in the dark.
She isn't sure she likes that. But 067? It's meaningless. It fits much better, to her.
After the pink soldiers have finished their explanation, the first game begins.
They're led to a big field, a large doll standing tall at the other end.
Red light. Green light.
She has never played this before. Or much other games, really.
She'd only had two friends back in the North, and they were two quiet girls with the same boring interests as her.
To be entirely honest, Sae-Byeok was a little worried. Not because of the game itself, but by how many people were stupid enough to keep moving at red light, and the shovers.
At some point, she catches up with Deok-Su. To her delight, she can hide behind him easy enough.
He's big and bulky, and she's small and malnourished. Well, she's rather tall. But Deok-Su is taller.
So she manages it.
Her slender fingers curl through his hair as a gleeful smirk crosses her face.
She hadn't even known she was capable of such a devious expression prior.
She only knew by catching the reflection in the grease of Deok-Su's hair.
She wonders if there's a shower here.
(Not now, Sae-Byeok!)
She snaps herself into the moment, just as Deok-Su hisses out a question of who's there.
"The bitch who betrayed you."
Her mischievous grin widens. She can't help herself.
"You little shit head."
She cringes a little at the grease visibly tinging her fingers.
But she tightens her grip and responds - some cunning comment she barely thinks about.
But he pleads with her, and she can barely keep the giddiness inside.
She can do this.
When the lights turn green, she sprints, but pulls Deok-Su back by the hair, causing him to topple over.
Oh, she's ablaze now.
She finishes the game with a triumphant stumble.
She doesn't smile now. Or show any emotion.
It's been made clear already how any show of weakness could end up exploited and the 'weak' dead.
She makes her decision. She can't think about Cheol unless to motivate herself, thinking of winning and how she'd bring her family together again.
If she did that. Would her eomma forgive her? For the thievery? For selling her body? For selling her hair? For not fighting hard enough to keep Cheol in her custody.
She would have to. Wouldn't she?
She has to.
But if she lost...that wouldn't happen. No home. No eomma. No forgiveness.
If she lost, she'd be dead.
Cheol left forever wondering where his Noona went. Why she abandoned him. Pleading for an answer as he grew.
Her heart is caught in her throat, beating so hard it echoes in her mind and her veins.
She has to live. For Cheol. For her eomma. And to fulfill her promise to her appa.
She catches herself before the tears fall, and she wipes them away with her sleeve.
No one has noticed.
She takes that as a good sign, as they're led back to the dorms.
However, once the soldiers have read out how many deaths had occurred, one of the other players - 212, runs out.
She begs and pleads, on her knees. Desperate to go home.
Sae-Byeok can't help the sinking feeling in her gut as the majority agrees.
She needs this. Even more desperately than the others want to go home. Everyone votes.
To her frustration and disappointment, the guards let them go.
Strip them down, tied them up, and discarded them to the alleyways.
Sae-Byeok certainly bites her tongue as the panic sinks in.
She's tied up next to a 40 year old man. In her undergarments. In an alleyway. At nighttime. Alone.
After her time as a prostitute, this was a fucking nightmare made real.
She cuts herself out with her pocket knife and rummages through the duffle back to retrieve her clothes.
It's a relief as the thin fabric covers her freckled and scarred body.
When he comes around, he screams at her a bit. It's the same man who she'd stolen money from when he'd ran into her rather rudely during her job scouting.
He wants his money back.
She doesn't tell him it's currently hidden in her bra. Eventually, he calms down and promises he won't hound her for the money if she untied him.
They argue some more.
She finally unties him. Partially.
He sticks to his promise - mostly.
As she walks back to the alleyway she sleeps in - which wasn't a far walk away - she finds the phone number of the games again, in her jacket pocket.
A smile tugs at her lips.
( I'm going back. I'm getting my eomma home.)

Chapter Text

Cheol isn't speaking to her.
She brought him ice cream.
There's silence between them, well, apart from Sae-Byeok's desperate attempts to get him to tell her what's wrong.
"Did you fight with your friends?"
She asks, plump red lips parted slightly.
He shakes his head.
But after a moment, tears we'll in his eyes and her heart slows.
"You promised it would only be a month."
Oh.
Oh no.
"We're almost there, little man, almost there. Give it a year. We'll all be together in the same house. "
They've been here for three. Homeless or in orphanages. One more won't make a difference.
"The others keep saying you're lying. That you'll abandon me."
She's quite positive she died during the games and she's in Hell, facing punishment for her sins - seeing Cheol's tearful eyes, his voice full of dreaded, cruel belief.
"I'm your big sister. I always keep my word, don't I? I haven't abandoned you, little man. I'll never abandon you.*
She hugs him tight.
He hugs her back.
The ice cream melts in her hand.
He eventually takes it, and she only licks it from her fingers when he asks her why she hasn't.
She doesn't mention the strange feeling of something to consume on her tongue after starving for so long.
Other than the coffee she'd had about... about a week ago.
Cheol asks why her wrists are so tiny. She doesn't answer.

As she'd hoped, she's back in the games.
Sometime last night, she'd been taken from the streets on her way home from another day of pickpocketing.
She dreamed last night too.
Of a home. Of her eomma and Cheol. Of peace.
Right now, she leans against her bed, waiting.
For what?
She's not entirely sure. Just keeping up her guard as she eyes Deok-Su and his little companions approaching her.
When he finally stands by her, he tries to be friendly - and what a frantically shit attempt he did - the moment she speaks he's pounced on her with claws of steel.
He starts on her like he did during the first game, trying to intimate her with his size, and big words he doesn't understand.
She doesn't either - but she has an excuse. He doesn't. Stupid, filthy man.
"Do you know what they would call you in my village? A revolutionary asshole."
He sneers and his eyes darken.
He mocks her and taunts her for her Northern heritage.
Her jaw stays tense - a nervous habit her eldest brother used to tease her endlessly for.
But now her big brother was dead and with him went her fear of what others thought of her.
Her heart pangs a little.
Her brother had been an arsehole - but he was also the person she'd held closest to her, told everything. He used to put salve on her blisters and cuts, kiss her forehead before bed, held her close even when was sick. But then he'd died and left her alone. But so did her father and her eomma was far, far away so far it seems she might as well have died with them.
She swallows and straightens up a little.
Had she zoned out?
Thankfully, no one had noticed.
Deok-Su eventually leaves her alone after a bit of back and forth.
She just sits there now, waiting.
Expecting attack, or at least some insults thrown her way. She can hear the player in the bed above her murmuring to another about her
She hears the words - "Psycho northern bitch"- and stops listening.
She doesn't care what they think of her.
If she did, she wouldn't be thinking as how proud her older brother would be now.
She's not afraid. Not anymore.
Fear is for those who have much to lose.
And she only has her life to lose.

The second game is easy enough for her.
Cut the shape out without breaking it, simple enough for her.
As the gunshots ring out loud and clear all around, Sae-Byeok is suddenly grateful for all the sibling competitions of who could carve their names in cursive the fastest.
They were strange competitions, but it was fun.
Her eomma kept the wood cravings in her bedside locker.
Every single one of them.
Sae-Byeok is very grateful of the Pocket knife she'd stolen from Deok-Su, which she always kept nestled in her bra.
She's able to cut it quick and neat and she's the first finished.
She shuffles last the guards and out of the room, letting out a small satisfied sigh when the gunshots lessen and fade into the distance.
She finds herself sitting by her bed, quietly inspecting the room for any idea of what to do.
After a while, a man, the same who she left half-bound in the streets and stolen from approaches her.
Gentler, this time, calmer, this time.
He asks her to team up with him and his brother.
She declines.
When he asks why, she is not honest.
"I don't trust people."
It's herself she doesn't trust. She cannot come to love another without them dropping dead. She will not order that fate as theirs.
I don't trust people.
What a blatant lie.
However, the man, 456, leaves her alone. And she's almost glad.

When night falls, she curls up in the bed and at first tries to sleep.
But the moment darkness cloaks them, the fights begin.
Screaming, blood and yells fill the room.
Sae-Byeok falls from her bed and lands with a dull thud.
Dizziness rings through her head.
She doesn't have much time to process it, as a stubby hand grabs ahold of her hair and slams her into the ground.
She wriggles free, but Deok-Su only grins, thinking he's got her cornered.
And he has, mostly.
But he hasn't thought about the little cracks under the beds that her emaciated body can fit through that his muscular one can't.
She wriggles under there. He grabs her ankle.
He pulls, and clings to the bed.
Something hard and cold beats against her leg.
That'll surely bruise.
But she kicks him, just in time. As his companions distract him by pointing out the uselessness of focusing on her right now.
And thankfully, he leaves.
For now. She squirms back out, grabs the rusty metal pole he'd apparently been bashing her leg with, and runs to 456.
He questions her sudden enthusiasm to join him.
She points out how he had asked her first.
He doesn't argue with that.
After a few more minutes of anarchy, the old man - 001 - stands upon a bed and begs for peace.
The lights turn back on, guards flood the room.
Sae-Byeok instinctively stays by 456, hands up in surrender.
Shortly, everyone goes to their beds.
But no one sleeps.

Chapter Text

The third game requires teams.
Tug of war, they're apparently playing.
Sae-Byeok wanders around soundlessly.
She keeps wandering.
Her dark eyes falling over the other players, watching them team up.
She notices how the women are pushed aside mostly.
Speaking of women to the side, her gaze lands on a small, paperly looking girl.
And she does what she wants - and invites her to join herself and 456's team.

100 feet.
A fucking hundred feet drop below them.
She's starting to sweat, feels it soaking her t-shirt.
They haven't even begun it.
Her strengths lie in agility, quick-thinking and sneaking about - not brute force.
But she pulls.
Her fingers burn against the thin frays of the rope, straining muscles.
Her scalp feels almost sticky with sweat.
She rarely has time to feel so disgusted at her own body functions, but it's too strong to overcome right now.
And she hasn't showered in two years.
Some damn priorities she has.
She keeps pulling.
Rope burns come up in angry red sores across her palm and the pads of her fingers. Her knuckles straining.
The others are yelling to each other.
She doesn't listen - she'd get distracted, and the icky sweat would let her grip slide. She knows that. So she doesn't listen until player 218 yells something *useful* to them.
And like that, she takes a step forward, biting her lip as she feels the sweat dripping down her nose.
The other team falls, and Sae-Byeok's team gets an upper hand.
She can only think of Cheol.
Her sweet, sweet brother. If she was weak enough to lose this game - lost in thoughts of sweat and dread - then he would forever lose his noona. Forever questioning, forever pleading. Had she abandoned him? Left him all alone in this dark, cruel world?
Her heart physically burns.
She's with the worst possible team; A handful of weak middle aged men, a women who should probably be admitted to a psych ward, an elderly man who never stops grinning, a small girl with weak little hands, and herself. And she alone is a curse on them all.
Oh fuck.
Despite it, she listens when they yell instructions. She could be misjudging them. Underestimating them.
She could be rather unassuming herself.
And somehow, they manage it, collapsing to the ground when they do.
Her skin is slick with sweat, it makes her head spin.
Her muscles ache.
She wants to lie here forever.
But eventually, she has to get up.
When they enter their dorms, she eyes Deok-Su. He's jeering with his buddies, but when he eyes 212 - the pyscho lady - the two start off.
She can't tell if they're arguing or flirting, and to be frank, she doesn't care.
Instead, she waddles on over to her bed. She wants desperately to peel her sweat soaked clothes from her body and wipe herself down. But she can't. Won't.
She sits on the steps, and plays with her sleeves.
Her pocketknife is hidden up there somewhere.
She feels the pretty metal against her fingertips. And sighs in relief.
She hadn't lost it.
It comes to her attention that they've gone down at least another half of players.
It makes her queasy.
She could be next.
She hopes she isn't. If she was then she'd die humiliated. If Deok-Su lived longer.
Well, Deok-Su is what…61? And she...turns seventeen next week.
She'd been hoping to get eomma home in time. Not that it really matters. But it would've been so special to her for her eomma to be there.
It's true.
She'd lied about her age.
You have to be 18 to be eligible for the games, according to the form she'd signed.
She'd written her age as being 22. To be safe.
To be honest, she was quite sure the soldiers knew. Just didn't care.

They're served lunch, and she sits alone.
However, about five minutes later. The doors swing open, and five soldiers enter. A group of players in a different shade of blue right behind them.
The soldiers introduce them as the North Korean players, who'd been transported over the border.
Deok-Su makes a joke about how Sae-Byeok belongs with them.
She doesn't say anything.
That is, until, she unintentionally let's her gaze meet that of a middle aged woman who looks all too familiar.
Eomma.
The word falls from her lips, barely audible. Her eyes wide. Face pale.
But she can tell her expression is caught by the other players, by the comments Deok-Su throws her way, and the strange way some of them eye her.
But her Eomma meets her eyes too and holy shit.
"Sae-Byeok?" Her Eomma's voice is clearer, much more audible than her own.
The room is silent.
Even the soldiers share questioning looks.
Player 212 murmurs something to player 456, and he gasps.

The soldiers file out again, and her Eomma rushes to her.
Sae-Byeok lets herself melt into the warm hug she's given, hardly processing the world around her.
She catches the eyes of the small girl she'd recruited for Tug of War; 244, she smiles.
But then they break eye contact, and Sae-Byeok buries her face in her Eomma's jacket.
After a few minutes, they finally part.
Mrs Kang helps her sit down, as if afraid letting her go would make her vanish again.
She asks her about Cheol, about her life, does she have a boyfriend? Friends?
Only one of those questions does she answer.
When her Eomma asks her where she lives - she goes quiet. She doesn't have an answer.
Thankfully, before she can be questioned further about that, player 456 approaches.
"Hello!"
Sae-Byeok stares at him. Her mother chuckles.
"Behave, Sae. And hello to you too, sir."
456 smiles.
"Thank you... I uh, I was wondering if you two would like to team up with Ali, Sangwoo and I? Seeing as there's no doubt that player 101 is after you." He says the last part to Sae-Byeok, who nods faintly in agreement.
"We'd be honoured!"
Player 456 smiles a little wider.
"What are your names?"
"Oh, yes. My name is Kang Ji-Eun, and... apologies, sir, my daughter is very shy. This is Kang Sae-Byeok."
Sae-Byeok raises a brow.
"Pretty name, Sae-Byeok. Dawn."
Unfitting.
She wasn't gold, and gentle rises and fading clouds.
She was barely human.
But she only stares at him. Her words dying on her tongue.
"There's something off." She says instead.
"What is it?" Her mother frowns.
"They brought you all in from the North for a reason. I want to know why."
The two adults share a look, and back at her.
"What about it?" 456 frowns.
She doesn't answer, concocting a plan in her mind as night nears.
Her chance comes when the crazy lady - 212 - threatens the soldiers, yells about how she plans to piss on the floor.
Eventually, they open the door to let her out. And Sae-Byeok pops up beside her.
She keeps eye contact with the soldiers as she leaves with her.
Once in the bathroom, she lets the crazy lady go into a stall, while she wanders around.
Her eyes fall on the vent, right above crazy lady's stall.
Whatever, she decides.
And pushes the door open.
As expected, 212 wasn't there for the bathroom at all. Judging by the cigarette she's holding.
Sae-Byeok holds up her knife in a almost comical manner, and the woman panics.
She mutters a few words to the woman, ties her short hair up, and climbs up into the vents.
It's freezing up here.
She just about fits, with little room for movement.
That lets her know that the vents wouldn't fit any healthy adult.
She squirms and crawls through the closed in passage.
Her hips ache from dragging across the metal.
But she manages it.
She sees another vent, this one looking down into a strange looking room.
The soldiers are sorting marbles into little bags - she has a very bad feeling about this one.
She catches a few words from one of the soldiers.
Death. Pairs. Marble throwing.
She scoots backwards down the vent.
She kicks the one she came through and falls onto the toilet, the water splashes onto her wrist.
The crazy lady stares at her. Shes standing by the door, pressed up against it, likely having heard her coming back.
Sae-Byeok stands, the woman jerks up at the sound of a soldier entering the bathrooms.
She pulls down her trousers and promptly plants herself down on the seat.
Sae-Byeok pinches her nose as the door opens.
The soldier immediately closes the door again when player 212 screeches, and Sae-Byeok hardly contains a giggle.
They make it out of the bathroom and back to the dorm without any more interference from the soldiers.
She tells her mother what she saw - and her mother insists on telling 456, who's name she finds out is Gi-hun.
Her mother and Sangwoo plan to team up. Sae-Byeok decides she'll see about the girl from Tug of War.
She approaches her and mumbles something about being on watch together.
The girl smirks, and nods.
She says something about Sae-Byeok being obsessive.
She gives her a signature glare and that conversation is over.

Chapter Text

"I had nothing to lose. I was gonna die anyway."
Sae-Byeok's nose twitches when the girl - Ji-yeong, she'd found out - speaks.
Her interest is piqued.
"Why did you come here then?" She tilts her head ever so slightly.
The fading sunlight illuminates them both.
"I came because I wanted to play. I wanted to have fun for once. Before I die, I wanted to experience what it's like to be happy."
Ji-yeong's soft voice is toned with a slight edge of acceptance.
Sae-Byeok's heart aches a little.
"Then why didn't you just go home?" Her bangs lift a little in the wind.
"Because I don’t have a home. My family is gone. I have nothing left."
(Nor do I.)
Sae-Byeok thinks about it. Neither does she. She's homeless. Is this girl too?
"Then, what’s the point of playing this game?"
Curiosity bounces around in her ribs.
"I don’t know. Maybe just... to feel alive for a little while longer."
She can understand that.
"What about you? What's your story, miss misery?" Ji-yeong smiles.
"I-" She thinks about it, "-to give my brother a better life. A life he deserves. To bring him home. To have a home. "
She goes quiet.
"What's his name?"
Sae-Byeok is quiet this time.
"What's your name?"
Still nothing from the Northern defector.
"C'mon, 67, not telling?"
"..."
"Fine."
Ji-yeong huffs, and rests her head on Sae-Byeok's bony shoulder.
Sae-Byeok lets her.

She'd forever deny cuddling her while they slept in the same bed that night.

The next game is only a while later.
The soldiers explain it to them. Throw a marble. Whoever lands closer to the wall wins. Simple.
Sae-Byeok is teamed with Ji-Yeong. Her mother with Sangwoo. Gi-hun with the old man. Ali with someone random.
The two enter the little area of the game, Sae-Byeok's heart racing.
In so little time, she'd gained an attachment to the girl.
A crush, some might say.
She tries to put that to the back of her mind.
It was stupid, really.
She takes her go.
Her heart falls a little as her marble lands roughly halfway. A shit throw.
Her hands shake ever so slightly, and she see's Ji-Yeong glance at them, as she steps up for her own go.
That's when it happens, the world stops spinning.
The marble slips from her fingers, and stops. That wasn't even a throw.
Ji-Yeong's eyes are closed, a delicate smile gracing her soft features.
Sae-Byeok thinks quick.
If her eomma is here, alive, then Cheol doesn't need her. Then she can make the sacrifice.
She grabs Ji-Yeong and twists them around, falling to her knees.
Ji-Yeong stares at her, beyond confused.
"You stupid girl." Sae-Byeok's voice wavers.
Ji-Yeong starts to piece together what she's doing.
Her heart positively drops.
"No." Ji-yeong's voice is steady, firm. "You aren't fucking taking a bullet for me, Kang Sae-Byeok."
The guard enters, gun in hand.
Ji-yeong stands against the wall with a smile.
"No. No. No. We can do it. Have another throw! You THINK I'll be grateful??"
Sae-Byeok stumbles to her feet, yelling. Throwing a tantrum like a toddler, almost.
To Ji-yeong, it's....sweet. Knowing she's causing a scene because she cares. About her.
Quiet, stonecold Sae-Byeok. Causing a scene. Over her.
Somehow that wasn't enough indication for Ji-yeong to realise what was happening.
The guard raises his gun.
Ji-yeong closes her eyes, smiling.
Sae-Byeok doesn't think.
The trigger is pulled.
But it never hits Ji-yeong. She never feels the blow.
But she hears a scream and feels the splatter of blood on her shirt.
Her eyes flutter open.
Sae-Byeok is curled over her in a protective stance, her eyes brimming with tears, bottom lip trembling.
"It burns."

Chapter Text

Ji-yeong screams.
It rings around her head. Sae-Byeok coughs up blood, feels it dribbling out of her nose, ears and mouth.
Her eyes feel like they're spasming, the world flickering like static at the edges.
She can't focus on anything.
The ground is rough on her elbows - when had she collapsed?
The back of her neck is a horrible, horrible wreck of blood and flesh and matted hair.
She tries to speak, a gurgling sound is all that comes out.
She's dizzy.
So, so dizzy.
Ji-yeong is pulling her to her feet.
"Kang Sae-Byeok!! Sae-Byeok!!"
Her knees are weak and shaky, as the smaller girl drags her to the door.
The soldier just stares in shock.
He clearly hadn't expected Sae-Byeok to take the bullet either.
He lets the two stumble into the dorm.
"You dumb bitch..." Ji-yeong sobs out, as she lays the wounded girl to the bed.
The other players watch them, just as shocked and confused as everyone.
With the angle Sae-Byeok had thrown herself, the bullet had landed between her shoulder blades.
It hadn't gone too deep.
Player 212 approaches, looking awfully concerned.
"Help. Please." Ji-yeong's voice wavers.
Surprisingly, 212 doesn't argue.
She helps remove Sae-Byeok's windbreaker shirt and bra, leaving her in just the tracksuit bottoms.
The wound is a nasty thing, all torn flesh and purple bruise.
212 rips apart of the girls shirt, as Ji-yeong tries to remove the bullet as carefully as she can.
Steady hands are hard when you have a dying girl's stomach heaving beneath you. They flip her over to access the wound.
Sae-Byeok feels like she's floating.
The world feels peaceful. Calm. But there's a searing pain in the core. Burning her, flaying her.
She's never felt so desperately worthy of death. She has a reason. Cheol will be okay. He has four - five? - people to take care of him.
Ji-yeong. Their eomma. Gi-hun. Ali. And possibly 212.
Her lashes flutter.
Ji-yeong's hands shake uncontrollably. But she got the bullet out.
She steps away as player 212 manages to bandage her with a lot more tightness then Ji-yeong would manage.
The room is utterly silent. Even Deok-Su doesn't say anything. He's too busy gaping at player 212's betrayal.
The door opens again, Ali and Mrs. Kang.
Mrs. Kang almost faints at the sight.
Ali has a hand over his mouth.
Sae-Byeok smiles.
It's quite positively the most tragic thing anyone in that room has seen.
"She'll live." Player 212 says with certainty.
Ji-yeong smiles wide, sniffling as she cups Sae-Byeok's pale, sweaty face.
"You're so dumb." Her voice breaks.
The taller gril's nose twitches, and her eyes glance down.
Ji-yeong grins.
"I see, you wanna kiss me?"
A light dusting of red coats Sae-Byeok's chest and cheeks.
"She almost died, Ji-yeong. Lay off on the teasing." Gi-hun speaks suddenly.
Sae-Byeok takes in how red and puffy Ji-yeong's face is from crying.
She wants to touch it.
And she does.
Gentle fingertips press into the bit between her neck and jaw.
Ji-yeong watches her face with curiosity.
Their eyes meet.
She smiles.
"Can I...?" The smaller girl asks before she acts.
Sae-Byeok pauses for a second, then nods.
Ji-yeong smiles, and presses her lips to hers.
And maybe Ji-yeong has dated many people, kissed and loved and fucked. Maybe Sae-Byeok is mean and cold, and cruel.
And maybe that's true. But maybe they're just as human as everyone else, but their flaws made their picture and their fear their voice.
That melts away. Everything does. The people around them no longer exist when Sae-Byeok's lips are so soft and cold against her own.
When her father used to rave of destiny and Fate, Ji-yeong had listened. She didn't believe in it back then, oh no. But now? Maybe he wasn't always wrong.
".... Ji-yeong?"
That's it. That's what she wants. To hear her name roll off Sae-Byeok's tongue, forever and ever and ever.
"Yeah?"
"That was..."
"Fucking fantastic. Eh?"
Sae-Byeok laughs softly, but agrees never less.
She forces herself to sit upright, groaning slightly at the strain of her muscles.
"Well, what now?" Gi-hun says after a few minutes of silence.
"Uh...we sleep?" Ji-yeong lifts Sae-Byeok properly, one arm under her knees, the other around her waist.
Sae-Byeok cringes as she realises her only coverings are the too-big tracksuit bottoms and the bandages around her chest.
The others are about to go back tj their own business when Mrs. Kang makes a realisation.
"Umm.... How do we get go about finishing this? I mean, it's to the death, is it not? And who says the final two games aren't going to be like the last one?"
"Where's Sangwoo?" Gi-hun suddenly speaks.
Mrs. Kang allows herself a smug little smirk - akin to the one Sae-Byeok had worn in the first game, when she'd got ahold of Deok-Su.
"He tried to set me up during the last game. So I took the guards gun and shot him myself. Serves the bastard right. Turns out he planned to kill Sae."
"Sae?" Ji-yeong grins.
Sae-Byeok's face glows red.
"Shush."
"He planned to what?!" Gi-hun stares.
"Kill me, apparently." Sae-Byeok is glad to distract Ji-yeong from the somehow embarrassing nickname.
"Which he can't do anymore." Ali points out.
"Oh, joy." Player 212 grumbles.
Ali only raises a brow at her.

Chapter Text

Sae-Byeok leans on the bathroom sink, groaning softly.
Her skin glistens in the cool, dimmed lighting as she pulls off her clothes layer by layer.
She had Ji-yeong on guard for her at the entrance, letting her do what she needed to do.
There were no showers here, apparently, so Sae-Byeok had to be resourceful.
So stripping naked in a public bathroom and using her shirt as a wash cloth was definitely the best she could come up with.
None of the other players had thought to wash themselves - but Sae-Byeok couldn't risk it, due to the threat of bacterial infection of her bullet wound.
And she also hated the feeling of sweat all over her body constantly, alongside the build up of dirt and blood.
The water is cold at first, and she gasps away from it as the soaked fabric is dragged across her pale stomach.
She had washed her face, and combed her hair back with wet hands.
So she got used to the cold quick, it's almost refreshing.
The cleanliness she hasn't received in so long finally given to her.
Yes, she hasn't showered since she came from the North. But she can't really be blamed for that.
This is how she did it before the games too, usually in public changing rooms and all.
But this, it was calm.
When she finally finished washing herself, she can't help a little smile.
It felt nice, having scrubbed her skin raw.
She pulled on her underwear, and then calls Ji-yeong in to help bandage her wound again.
"Took you long enough." Ji-yeong says teasingly.
Sae-Byeok rolls her eyes slightly, avoiding eye contact as she crosses her arms across her still bare chest.
Ji-yeong stands behind her, her small hands gentle between her shoulder blades as she puts cleans the wound first.
After a moment, she speaks.
"Why did you do it?"
Sae-Byeok pauses. She knows exactly what she's talking about, yeah. But what is she supposed to stay?
That her only reason for staying alive no longer applied and she was free to die? That she felt she owed the girl for bring so kind to her?
"Because I wanted to." She decides on.
"That's not a real reason, byeokie."
"Well how do know my name? I don't recall telling you. In fact I remember doing the exact opposite." She tries to deflect it.
"Stop dodging it, spy from the North - and also, Gi-hun told me." Ji-yeong points out.
Sae-Byeok cringes.
"I... I don't know. Sort of...impulse. I don't like people dying for me."
Ji-yeong rolls her eyes and keeps wrapping the thin, white fabric around the taller girls chest.
"Arms up, I can't get it around."
She does as told.
There's a strange silence between them.
"How badly does it hurt?" She asks after a minute.
Sae-Byeok is quiet.
That's answer enough.
She leans back against her, unexpectedly.
Ji-yeong breathes low and steady as Sae-Byeok leans her weight back.
"What is it?" Ji-yeong manages to squeeze out, as her eyes land on the white expanse of silky skin between her shoulder blades.
"Sorry..." Sae-Byeok mumbles, fixing her hair.
Ji-yeong pauses.
"It looks nice like that."
They're both quiet.
Sae-Byeok thinks about Cheol. He's going to be okay - whether or not she survives no longer matters.
He has their eomma. He has Gi-hun, and Ali and Ji-yeong. She might even say Han Minyeo.
She thinks about death. Would it be painless? When she's gone?
She doesn't think she'll survive the games. She's almost certain she'll die.
Because that's what happens when you love.
You become vulnerable, susceptible to sacrifice.
And maybe she likes that.
Maybe Sae-Byeok would like to love someone so much she would die for them.
Maybe she already does.

Chapter Text

She slept well that night.
Curled in under the sheets, Ji-yeong's chin settled on her head as she spooned the taller girl.
It was comfortable, despite the height difference.
The whole room is quiet - save for the soft sound of Gi-hun and Ali conversing at the foot of the bed.
Sae-byeok lets out a soft sound as she buries herself in the pillow.
Gi-hun glances over.
The man had been extremely worried and coddling toward her since her injury. It was almost laughable.
He taps her leg, to see if she'd asleep.
He doesn't know she would wake to that if she were asleep.
But she fakes sleeping on.
A slight smile crosses Gi-hun's face as he looks over the two.
He wonders what would happen if the Kang family were caught.
Mrs Kang, Sae-Byeok and Cheol. He knows a bit too well.
North defectors faced horrible, hard punishments for defection. Deemed traitors and beaten and starved.
Gi-hun's smile drops as images of Sae-Byeok going through such torment flood his head.
He can't stand the mere thought.
He looks over to her mother - who is standing nearby, in deep conversation with the man who's wife had died during the marble games.
Gi-hun takes in Mrs. Kang's appearance.
She's a good height, but not as tall as her daughter. The same wavy dark hair and pointed chin, the same wide nose and bangs curled around.
He could easily use her to imagine Sae-Byeok around that age.
He decides he likes the idea of her growing older.
He decides he wants her to win this. If not escape this.
She rolls over in her sleep. Ji-yeong's head sleepily lolls down, her nose pressed under the taller girls ear. Sae-Byeok makes a soft little sigh of a sound.
He smiles and nudges Ali, who looks over and grins.
Mrs. Kang notices the exchange and glances at the two girls, then her face warms.
"Isn't that a rare sight?" Her voice is gentle, run thick with her accent.
Sae-Byeok sounds little like her, rougher, raspier.
"Hmm?" Gi-hun tilts his head.
Mrs. Kang turns to him.
"Sae-Byeok has never really been one to accept affection. Not because shes uncomfortable with it - but out of fear. It's rare, but very sweet, to know she trusts the girl, and trusts you too, to witness her vulnerability."
Gi-hun and Ali soften immediately.
"She trusts us?" Ali's eyes fall on the sleeping form.
"She does." Mrs. Kang's gaze follows his. "Don't lose that trust."
Gi-hun allows the corner of his lip to prick up.
"We wouldn't dream of it, Mrs."

Chapter Text

"Let me find a way. I'll get a job. I'll come back for you when...when it's possible."
Those had been the last words her elder sister has spoken to her, whilst the newly parentless Sae-Byeok had screamed and cried and clung to her skirt.
"Please unnie! Stay! You have to stay, you have to! Please stay..." She'd broken off into ragged, raw sobs.
She'd been what 14, 15 at the time? Cheol was eight or nine, and her elder sister?
.... was a fully grown adult, we'll say.
Her sister practically beat her off, hitting her hard across her face, hard enough to immediately come up in red.
Sae-Byeok sobbed harder, as her sister grabbed s her arm.
One of her hands on her elbow, the other on her forearm.
For a moment, her eyes soften.
But they hardened just as quickly and her arm snaped with a sickening crunch.
Sae-Byeok had torn her vocal cords with the scream she'd let out.
Her sister had dropped her to the ground, and stepped away. Her own hands shaky.

And she'd left her and Cheol.
They'd been in China, at the time. They'd made a run across the border a few days later, once Sae-Byeok had gained the strength and Cheol stopped crying.
The more upset they appeared the more suspicious they'd be.

She wakes in cold sweats, a faint weight around her hips.
She pushed her hair out of her face, and takes a moment to calm herself.
She looks down, to find Ji-yeong's arms had slid loosely from her waist to catch on her hips.
Sae-Byeok sighs, and swallow.
"Are you alright?" Gi-hun watches her soundly.
She takes a moment to register everything, reorient herself.
"I'm fine." She ties her hair back, sweaty bangs falling over her brow when her hands move away.
"Ugh...." Ji-yeong groans and starts to wake, Gi-hun steps away to give them some privacy.
"Did I wake you?" Sae-Byeok speaks softly - her voice surprising herself.
"Nah, not really..." Ji-yeong is a terrible liar.
She sits upright and rests her chin in her knees.
"That's hot."
Sae-Byeok frowns.
"The bed?"
Ji-yeong stares at her blankly, before a snort escapes her.
"No, sunshine. I meant the ponytail. Suits you."
Sae-Byeok nods, and subconsciously touches the base of her hair.
Ji-yeong rolls her eyes fondly and moves her hand to the taller girls knee.
"How old are you? When's your birthday?" She blurts out both questions.
She knew there was an age limit for the games, she'd lied about her own age. She just hoped her suspicions about Sae-Byeok being younger than she'd claimed was true.
"Honestly? I'm turning seventeen tomorrow."
Ji-yeong lights up.
"I'm seventeen! Hah, you're still a baby. "
Sae-Byeok glowers at her - but there's no real heat behind it.
Ji-yeong feels the taller girl's legs shaking beneath her hand, and a smirk pulls at her lips.
"Nervous, Kang?"
Sae-Byeok's face breaks into a rather... comical look of offence.
"What!? No!"
Ji-yeong laughs aloud, falling on her side, letting her hand move to the taller girl's jaw to make her look at her.
She's quite sure plain dark brown eyes have never looked so gorgeous in her life.
"I like your eyes." She grins before she can think about it, her thumb tracing the sharp line of her jaw.
Sae-Byeok leans into her touch, eyes fluttering half lidded.
Her finger traces over the scar, and she pauses.
"Where did you get this?" The skin is rough and dark and a strip of mangled red.
For a moment, she doesn't expect an answer.
"When I was escaping the North. They had... a knife with them for if the bullets missed." Her voice is distant, as if thinking about something.
"Stay with me. Come back the the moment, sunshine." Ji-yeong says quietly.
She meets her eyes, and smiles.
And the whole world is at peace.
To Ji-yeong at least.
She kisses the taller girl's knee, and watches her face.
162.
162 freckles. Excluding the beauty spot above her lip.
On her face alone.
"What?" Sae-Byeok's lips hardly move, a little smile pull at them however.
Her voice is faint, inaudible nearly.
But Ji-yeong hears her. She always does.
"Your freckles," She really hopes she doesn't sound like an obsessive creep, "You have exactly 162 freckles on your face."
Sae-Byeok pauses, her own fingers ghosting over her cheeks, her nose.
Her face pinks a little, and Ji-yeong smirks.
"Flustered yet?"
Sae-Byeok just turns her gaze to Gi-hun, who is standing with his back to the girls, a good bit away from the bed.
Ji-yeong catches the red that practically makes her glow.
The shorter girl sits up, and kisses her shoulder.
Sae-Byeok shudders, her eyes fluttering shut.
"You okay?" Ji-yeong whispers into her ear.
Sae-Byeok pauses.
"What are we?"
Ji-yeong smiles against her skin.
"What do you want us to be?"
"I..." Her cheeks redden. "You do it."
Ji-yeong grins, a teasing lilt appearing.
"Aww, nervous, Kang?"
Sae-byeok just stares at her with those voidlike eyes. Full of everything and nothing all at once.
"Well, I love you, if you haven't noticed." Ji-yeong smiles. "And I'd like a relationship with you, if you want it too. So, will you be my girlfriend, Kang Sae-Byeok?"
Sae-Byeok's eyes widen and soften at once.
"If...if you want me to be. I..." She bites her lip, face pinking. "I love you."
"Yes or no, Kang? Are you my girlfriend? I want to hear you say it." Oh, she's enjoying this now. Despite her heart pounding.
"I want to be your girlfriend."
"Then it's settled. That's what we are. Girlfriends."
Ji-yeong feels like she's floating, her heart banging in her head.
Sae-Byeok looks quite positively faint, she leans against her now girlfriend. And an uncontrollable smile breaks out.
She turns to Ji-yeong, and they both.... laugh.
She catches Gi-hun's eye over her shoulder and finally returns a smile to him.
Maybe there is hope.
Maybe there is reason.
And maybe, the tragic lesbians can kick tragedy in the arse.

Chapter Text

The next game requires vests.
Sae-Byeok and Ji-yeong stay close, with Mrs. Kang by Gi-hun. Minyeo and Ali reluctantly stay together.
Deok-Su, the priest and a glassworker are the only other players they know now.
"What numbers should we pick?" Ji-yeong snaps Sae-Byeok out of her analizing.
"Maybe 15 and 16. Close to the end. But not last."
"I'll take 17." Gi-hun states.
'"I'll go for 11." Mrs. Kang says.
"12, I guess." Ali decides.
"Thirteen HAS to be my lucky number." Minyeo grumbles.
They don't care much for what everyone else says.
Until, that is, Deok-Su snatches 14.
All while eyeing up Sae-Byeok with a glint of vengeance in his eyes.
Ji-yeong tightens her grip on her arm.
The first guy shakes and trembles when he has to start - he chose wrong and falls to his death.
The second guy has a bit of better luck, he gets the first one right. And the second. But that's it, he dies.
The third is much the same, and the fourth, right up to the priest. He falls to his knees praying, and everyone else groans.
They're running out of time.
The glassworker tells them how to survive, and Mrs. Kang lets him go ahead.
But Deok-Su yells and distracts him after three steps - he stumbles and falls off the platform.
Ali punches him. A guard pulls them apart before it can break into a real fight, and whispers something in Ali's ear.
Ali grins when he meets his group's eyes again, but he only tells Mrs. Kang what he'd been told.
"Everyone..." She says quietly, so only they can hear. Only three people, Ji-yeong, Minyeo and Gi-hun. "Take your jackets off, keep them on hand."
"It's freezing." Minyeo grumbles.
Everyone ignores her.
Mrs. Kang is next.
She follows the glassworker earlier instructions and makes it across.
She guides Ali, and next is Minyeo. She makes it halfway across and Deok-Su is at her heels, followed closely by Sae-Byeok.
He stops. Right in the centre. And he fucking grins.
"What are you doing?!" Gi-hun yells, he's right behind Ji-yeong, who is eyeing him darkly.
"Do you know the date, 067?" He says lowly.
Sae-Byeok's throat tightens. Her jaw clenches
"Yeah, I do."
He smirks.
"This, would be exactly one year from when you stabbed me in the back." He starts.
Sae-Byeok freezes. Her eyes darting around them.
She feels like prey. Trapped, vulnerable, desperate.
"It's time I returned the favour."
And he elbows her hard in the chest, her feet slide.
She falls. But only for a second.
Ji-yeong is grasping her wrist.
And they're startled by a scream. Deok-Su is falling too - Because Minyeo pushed him back.
She steps back onto his platform, and pulls Sae-Byeok up.
"Teach me your ways, skinny woman." Minyeo declares.
"Malnutrition." Sae-Byeok offers,"Periods of starvation."
"Nevermind."
They make it across. So does Ji-yeong. So does Gi-hun.
They're all heaving out relieved sighs and groans when they hear it.
Cracking.
"Now!" Mrs. Kang and Ali both scream.
Ji-yeong pulls her jacket over herself and Sae-Byeok, Ali has his over himself and Gi-hun, Minyeo's over herself and Mrs. Kang.
The glass pounds against the fabric of their jackets, pattering softly.
Sae-Byeok jumps in a panic.
For a fleeting second, her skin is exposed. And a fleeting second is all it takes for the horror to persist.
A thick shard of glass embeds itself in her stomach. And she screams.
A genuine, raw scream.
Ji-yeong pulls her in tighter as the glass stops showering.
Silence falls.
After a moment, the jackets fall to the floor.
Everyone looks to Sae-Byeok, who's hunched over slightly, hands to her stomach.
"Oh fuck." Minyeo decides.
"Oh fuck indeed." Ali agrees.

Chapter Text

Sae-Byeok groans and heaves as Ji-yeong supports her weight.
She lets her lie on the cool ground of the bathroom while she helps her undress.
"Fuck....that's bad, cupcake."
Sae-Byeok just lets out a little gasp of pain.
"It's gonna hurt, okay? When I take this out?"
Sae-Byeok nods. And prepares herself.
When the glass exits her body, she let's put a low, shuddering moan of pain.
"Shit....that stings."
"Told you." Ji-yeong points out as she runs a ripped part of her own shirt under the tap.
She wraps it around the wound tight.
"Damn, sunshine. You've certainly earned some scars in the past few days."
Bullet wound. Glass wound.
She sighs.
"This is going to sound mad...."
"Oh?"
"...but I'm really starting to get quite attached to Minyeo. She's like a feral fucking monkey but.... I don't know." Sae-Byeok swallow and stares at the ceiling.
"Ah, I get it. Not going to lie, she's cool as all hell." Ji-yeong says as she applies pressure to the wound.
Sae-Byeok lets out a little sound.
"They gave us fancy boxes. New clothes."
"You peeked."
"Possibly."
"Definitely."
"Yeah - Anyways, I want to do your hair. New outfit. New style. Y'know, that type of shit."
Sae-Byeok pauses.
"Nothing childish."
"Mhmm."
She finishes bandaging her wound and swallow.
"That should be it. All tight." Ji-yeong declares.
Sae-Byeok sighs, and relaxes against the floor.
They're quiet for a moment, just relaxing.
"We should get dressed."
"Yeah... We should."

They're mostly dressed ten minutes later, well, Ji-yeong has finished. Her tux all perfect and buttoned up.
When she turns around, Sae-Byeok has the trousers on, but unbuttoned. The shirt unbuttoned, and the bowtie lose around her neck. The blazer still in the box.
"That's hot." She observes.
"What?"
Sae-Byeok raises a brow as Ji-yeong gets closer.
"You, Kang Sae-Byeok, need to realise that you are drop, dead, gorgeous."
Her hands rest on her hips.
Sae-Byeok's breath hitches.
Ji-yeong slides the bauble from her wrist, and ties the taller girls hair into two loose braids. One bauble of her own, one of the girls.
She completes the braid with a kiss to her neck.
Then her throat, until it transforms into sucking and kissing and biting.
Sae-Byeok makes low noises, one slender hand curling into her hair.
Ji-yeong's hands land gently to cup her jaw and hold her bicep.
"Can I?"
Sae-Byeok meets her eyes.
"Go ahead."
Ji-yeong slides the taller girls thin bra of bandages up, and lets out a shuddering breath.
"What is it?" Sae-Byeok near whispers, her freckled cheeks warmed with a soft blush.
"You're perfect."
She kisses her properly, tenderly. Her hands cupping her breasts.
Sae-Byeok arches her back.
"Do you want this?" Ji-yeong says again.
"Yes. I do."
"Are you comfortable with this?"
Sae-Byeok nods.
"That's good."
She presses into her nipple.
Her head falls back.
Ji-yeong runs her hands down the taller girls sweat soaked abs, kissing her neck as she does.
Sae-Byeok makes an approving sound when she reaches her bellybutton.
She murmurs incoherently, as Ji-yeong slides her trousers down to her mid thighs.
"Aren't you such a good girl?" Ji-yeong smiles.
Sae-Byeok whines and bucks her hips.
"I see. Do you want me to.. .?"
Ji-yeong is certainly enjoying this.
Sae-Byeok pushes her own underwear down to give her girlfriend access without words.
Ji-yeong hums in delight, and lifts Sae-Byeok's legs into the air, and nestles her head between her slender thighs.
She looks up at her.
"I'll be so gentle."
Sae-Byeok takes a deep breath as Ji-yeong dives in, licking and sucking and kissing.
She writhes, and squirms and moans, and Ji-yeong strokes her hips and murmurs praises to her.
When she finally finishes, Ji-yeong kisses each thigh before moving out.
"Was that good?"
"So good..." Sae-Byeok mumbles, still dazed.
After a few minutes of blissful peace, Ji-yeong pulls her to her feet and helps her finish getting ready.
"Your face." Sae-Byeok points out.
"Hm?" She looks in the mirror.
Her mouth and chin are glistening from their...activities.
She dabs her chin clean, and takes Sae-Byeok's hand in hers.
"Are you still in pain?"
"A little. Not bad."
She smiles, and they make their way to join the others.

Chapter Text

A large, rectangular, candlelit dining table.
Ali, Gi-hun and Minyeo at one side. Mrs. Kang, Sae-Byeok and Ji-yeong at the other.
Four guards. One at each wall.
Sae-Byeok swears one of them is looking between her and her eomma.
But that guard ups and leaves, and she notices the seemingly confused atmosphere the other guards are in watching them.
A moment later, they snap back, serving meat with a side of vegetables. However, a piece of card is placed in the centre.
Minyeo snatches it and reads whatever is on it, when she does, her face drops.
"What is it?" Ali gets out through a mouthful of carrot.
Minyeo lets Ji-yeong harp it out of his hand and read it.
She goes pale.
"Holy fucking shit balls." She gulps, "Gi-hun..."
He looks up, his mouth closed as he chews the meat.
"They fucking served us...slices of a human heart."
Ali chokes.
Sae-Byeok spits out her champagne.
Mrs. Kang drops her fork.
Minyeo gags.
Gi-hun puts a hand over his mouth, and slowly, sickeningly, swallows the meat.
There is silence.
A voice comes over the speakers, encouraging them to eat. They can only leave the room when they try it.
So Ji-yeong eats. And Ali does his best. So does Minyeo. And Mrs. Kang. And Gi-hun.
But Sae-Byeok feels physically ill. Raising her food to her lips and closing her eyes. But not opening her mouth.
She sets it down and tries again and again.
Ji-yeong puts a hand over hers
"Sae-Byeok, don't push yourself."
"I need to."
And so she eats it all.
However, stupid actions have stupid consequences.
She instantly throws it all back up. All over the table. All over herself.
Minyeo groans - and it sets something off.
The guards are screeching in disgust as four out of six people are gagging and vomiting everywhere.
Mrs. Kang and Gi-hun stand in the corner, avoiding the sick.
"This is disgusting." Minyeo whines. And then immediately joins the sick pile again.
An alarm rings out.
The guards are back on track immediately, flooding the halls.
"What the hell is going on?!" One of the guards barks.
A man in all black - the Front man, he calls himself - enters, and he is shaking. With fury or fear, they haven't a clue.
"Sir...?" One of the guards frowns.
"011. Kang No-eul is missing. And she took the money with her."
"Kang No-eul?!" Mrs. Kang leaps up.
Sae-Byeok stops vomiting for a moment to look up, wide-eyed.
"Wha...?" Ali manages.
"That's my elder daughter."
Gi-hun promptly faints.

Somewhere in the vents, Kang No-eul's heart is pounding.
She has the card that all winners receive in her pocket, and she's trying to find them.
She'd begun to recognise her baby sister during tug of war.
Her little face of concentration hadn't changed once in the past two years.
Then she'd really dug into her profile.
The Front man liked to keep files of all his most interesting players.
Of course Sae-Byeok was there. She was so special.
- or, as their older brother used to say, empty-headed but sharp as a bullet.
He was kind of right. No-eul remembers how Sae-Byeok liked to sit in silence with a blank mind, just staring, glowering.
But she was so smart and quick-witted when it came to it. She won every game they used to play.
Her smart, sweet sister.
She'd turned out so much like their appa.
Just as hard-working, as loyal, as loving as him.
And now appa was dead.
And Sae-Byeok had dodged that curve time and time again, but she was starting to slip.
No-eul finds herself looking down at....quite the sight.
456 laying face-flat on the ground, a pool of vomit with four other players adding to it - her sister included - guards arguing amongst themselves, and half a human heart on the table.
Chaos at its finest.
No-eul considers her options.
They aren't looking good.

Chapter Text

Despite them, she presses her head against the side of the vent and uses her keys to unscrew the border below her.
Once it's gone, she knows there isn't any going back.
She holds her gun tight in one hand, takes a deep breath. And jumps.
She crashes into the table, sending the human heart remains flying.
Screams and yells get louder as she rolls off and pulls down her hood.
The Frontman is here.
Her heart pounds.
She pulls a player to her feet - 212 - and shoves her in the direction of the kitchen.
199 and her both get the memo and run toward it.
She hears the doors open as she wacks another guard in the head with her gun.

Amongst the fighting and vomit, Sae-Byeok slides under the table with Ji-Yeong.
"This is insane." Ji-yeong whispers, but she's grinning.
"I know." Sae-Byeok swallows.
They watch Gi-hun's legs as he runs past.
A hand clasped into both of their collars - and No-eul and the Frontman pull them out on either side.
Ji-yeong feels the coolness of No-eul's hands on her neck - while Sae-Byeok goes still under the leathery grip of the Frontman.
"011." The Frontman sneers.
"Sir." No-eul swallows.
Ji-yeong mouths to Sae-Byeok - (Sounds like awkward exes.)
Sae-Byeok smiles, despite herself.
"How tragic..." The Front man interrupts.
Kang No-eul refuses to meet Sae-Byeok's eyes.
"Do you recall, 011, how you treated your baby sister the last time you spoke?"
Ji-yeong feels like she's intruding. The Frontman shouldn't know this. Shouldn't speak of this.
"My family is none of your concern." No-eul says through clenched teeth.
Sae-Byeok falls limp entirely.
This is too much.
"I would order the whole Kang family execution here, yes. A nice reunion. However - the Minister wants to talk."
No-eul stills. She drops Ji-yeong with a resounding thud.
"Put my sister down. This is between you and I, do not bring my family into this. I stole the money, I purposely caused a ruckus to distract the guards. That was me. Not her. Do not punish her for my crimes."
Her voice is low, eyes dark.
"Oh no, I didn't come here about the ruckus or the money. I came to find every Kang we had. My little north defecting collectibles. He wanted you all before that."
The guards, as if on cue, snatch Sae-Byeok, No-eul and Mrs. Kang
"Take 240 for good measure." The Frontman pauses. "She seems like she's important to 067."
They're dragged out of the room and down the hall, kicking and screaming.
Gi-hun bangs on the doors of the dining room when they're locked behind the guard.
The kitchen doors open, Minyeo and Ali enter - with steak knives.
"....we're late to the party." Ali observes.
"Yeah....the guards took Sae-Byeok and Ji-yeong, and Mrs. Kang. The Minister - whoever he is - wants them."
Ali goes quiet.
"I have a funny feeling," Minyeo declares.
The other two state at her.
"I mean, they dragged off everyone in the one family and their little future in law. I think Minister guy might have something to do with them. I mean, has Mrs. Kang ever mentioned a Mr. Kang?"
"Sae-Byeok has. He drowned in a river when they were escaping the North." Gi-hun points out.
"Did he drown though?" Minyeo goes on.
"Don't be ridiculous, who could survive that? Sae-Byeok and Cheol almost drowned themselves. Cheol would've if she didn't drag him out with her. Thats what Sae-Byeok said." Gi-hun groans.
"Actually - he could've just been unconscious." Ali suggests
"Oh. My. God. He's DEAD okay!?"
"But-"
"Maybe-"
"NO. Kang Rae-jin is DEAD. He DROWNED. That is it. End of story."

Chapter Text

Sae-Byeok's knees ache from kneeling on the cold hard ground for so long.
She can hear Ji-yeong struggling with her own binds beside her - but she doesn't do the same. Struggling would strain the rope and burn her wrists and ankles.
And, she's curious. She shouldn't be, but she is.
She feels a mouth on her wrist. She shudders.
"It's just me."
Oh. Ji-yeong.
Her wrists are freed as the smaller girl pulls the rope loose with her teeth.
Once free, Sae-Byeok removes her blindfold and the binds around her ankles.
It's eerily similar to after the first game - when she and Gi-hun were tied side by side.
This time, however, they're wearing clothes.
Sae-Byeok undoes Ji-yeong's own binds and they stand together.
She hits her head off of the low ceiling and groans.
"You good?" Ji-yeong pats her on the head.
"Eh...yeah."
"Must suck being built like a screw."
Ji-yeong can sense Sae-Byeok's frown even in the darkness of the small room.
"Nail me then."
She chokes.
Of all things, she didn't expect that.
"You serious?"
"If you're up for it."
Suddenly the room felt very, very hot.
Ji-yeong decides to find her girlfriend in the darkness, by slowly sticking her hand out.
She feels something warm and wet.
"What is...."
"That's my stomach."
"Why is it...wet?"
"I sweat."
"Ah."
She pokes at the soft plane of her stomach, and slides a hand over the jagged curve of her hip bones.
"Where are the other two? Your mum and..."
"And No-eul. In a different room, likely."
Sae-Byeok tilts her head back.
There is a crack in the ceiling, a sliver of thin gray moonlight falls across her neck, illuminating the pulse of her throat.
Ji-yeong smiles, and licks a long strip up the taller girl's neck, up to her jaw, and kisses right back down to her stomach.
Sae-Byeok hums softly and cups the back of her head with one hand, slender fingers twisting gently though her highlights.
Ji-yeong's hand slides under the band of Sae-Byeok's dress pants, under the band of her underwear.
The next few minutes are of blissful peace.
Sae-Byeok tightens her grip on her own shirt subconsciously, her head turned to the side, brows furrowed, lips in a soft pout, hips rolling ever so slightly.
Her dark, whispy hair framing her face.
"My pretty girl..." Ji-yeong murmurs, kissing her cheek and forehead between finger thrusts.
Sae-Byeok's sweet whimpers heighten a few octaves - her jaw clenching.
Ji-yeong feels her spasming around her hand.
"Mhmm…." She licks it from her fingers when she's done.
Sae-Byeok's cheeks redden.
For a moment, there is calm. And then there is footsteps. And keys jangling.
She wipes her hands on her shirt, and grasps her girlfriend's tightly in her own.
Just in time for the doors to clang open, and a well dressed man with a golden mask enters.
He eyes both of them up and smirks to himself.
"How much for the commie whore?" He calls over his shoulder.
Ji-yeong tightens her grip on Sae-Byeok - who just swallows and keeps up her poker face, despite the sweat sneaking down her neck.
After her time as a prostitute over a year ago - she'd come to know exactly what the man in the golden mask wanted.
And by the laughter and guesses of the others behind the door, she fears he may get it.
"I'd say a good buck, I mean, look at her." Another steps into the room. This one slides one calloused hand under her chin and forces her to look up at him. "An exotic thing. Don't get many Northern beauties in here."
"More men then women, eh? And rare of the women we do get to be youth." The first man smirks.
More men crowd the room.
Ji-yeong wants to look at Sae-Byeok terribly - but she can't. They have to stay pokerfaced. They can't let them know that they're attached to one another. No weaknesses to be exploited.
But she can feel how clammy Sae-Byeok's hand is in hers, and how the girl's nose twitched with fear - like a little bunny - every few moments.
"Is she worth the price?" One of the men asks.
"Check then, does she even have a good voice?" Another says gruffly.
Ji-yeong has to avoid flinching as one of the men slaps Sae-Byeok hard enough to turn her head. It resounds.
"Speak, woman." He demands.
"Yes?" She speaks low.
The men share delighted looks.
"And body? Can't see with all that fabric in the way. A man's suit?" One sneers.
One of the other men approaches, and to Ji-yeong's absolute horror, just…starts undressing Sae-Byeok.
And what may be worse, is that she just takes it.
She doesn't fight.
She doesn't argue.
Just…let's it happen.
She doesn't fight when she's bare and cold and shivering, not when the men eagerly try to outpay the others to have her as if she's a prized calf at an auction, not when one finally wins and snatches her up.
Not when the men shuffle out and the door is locked and Ji-yeong is all alone.

Safe to say, things are going a little better for No-eul.
She needs to speak to her sister. But she needs to get out of this tiny, dark room first.
She's on her knees, using her arms to figure out where exactly she is on the ground.
Mrs. Kang had taken to sleeping in the corner. Hadn't been too bothered with escaping.
But No-eul? No-eul couldn't afford that. Couldn't afford never getting to explain the truth to Sae-Byeok, never getting to hold her tight and tell her stories and tease her relentlessly again.
She couldn't afford to let her baby sister slip through her fingers once more.
She finds a crevice and pushes.
A buzzing, orange light flickers on.
It's dim and a little shit - but it works.
She can see now.
The door is opposite her, tall and wooden, the keyhole stuffed with wet tissue.
She does what she does best.
She gets up and bangs.
Her mother sleeps through it, but a guard approaches.
She thinks so, she hears footsteps.
The door opens.
She was right.
A guard stands there, looking quite positively nervous.
His mask and hood are down, revealing a pale face, with sharply carved features and soft dark hair.
"What?" He speaks low and soft.
"Where is player 067? What have they done with her?" She knows he might have an idea. This guy in particular had always been a little more trusted than most other guards due to his desperation to care for his family.
He goes quiet.
"You don't want to know."
"Yes, I fucking do. Tell me."
He stills.
"Sold."
"….what?"
"VIP's thought she was an exotic thing so they….sort of auctioned her. The VIP who won gets her for the whole 24 hours. A personal whore."
No-eul's heart drops.
"To do what to her?"
She knows. She knows but it's too horrible and she's begging that she's wrong.
"Deflower her. Beat her. Whatever they like. Usually both."
She falls against the wall, whispering the word 'no' to herself again and again as if it would make it not real.
But it is. It is so awfully real.
And she hates herself for making it so.

Chapter Text

When Sae-Byeok was nine years old, her father took her to work with him.
She sat inside the little farmhouse while her father worked out and hard with the other men.
She'd been a mere child, sitting atop a tall stool, in her perfect clean clothes a shade of periwinkle, her hair in pigtails. Drinking from her juicebox and on her best behaviour like she promised her father.
And she'd been quiet. Only spoke to the milkmaid who offered her the juice and spoke with as many pleases and thank yous as a nine year could squeeze into a sentence.
She'd been a happy child. A sweet, content and quiet child.
But then the farmhouse door opened and one of her father's fellow field men enters.
Her father told her four years later that the man had been drunk in this moment - when he told her the truth of this story.
He'd eyed her little self with a thoughtful, clouded eye.
"You do know, girl. You'd be good with the whores with a body like that."
She'd been so young. So innocent she hadn't questioned it. Just blinked up at him with big eyes.
"I'd pay a good load for you." The man had continued, "Look at you. You're delicate, subservient, weak. You're a rare beauty."
Her father had entered then. And he had heard the man's words.
He'd ushered her into the field with the kinder men.
She didn't ever tell her father she'd heard the man's pleads for mercy as he was beaten for his tongue.

She thinks of that moment now, as she lays staring blankly at the ceiling while the VIP takes what he came for.
Now, her father isn't here to protect her.
He hadn't been been able to protect her when she was a prostitute, and he cannot protect her now.
He is dead.
Is this what death felt like to him?
She feels like she's drowning like he did.
Only difference is that he refused to succumb, but she? She had broken immediately, gave in and forced herself to become submissive. Obedient.
She'd moulded to the role of a commie whore like she had done with the role of a mother, like the role of a selfish silent player, like the role of a sweet lover.
For Cheol.
For Ji-yeong.
And she had ended up here, beneath a rich man probably older than her father had lived to be.
Multiplied by three.
The man stands with a grunt.
She keeps her legs open. She'd learnt after the first time that they may not be finished with her yet.
This time, she's wrong.
The man tightens his robe around himself and slaps her thigh.
She closes her legs.
"Look at you, a pretty flower. Let's hope you die as young as one too. So you don't grow out of that flawless face."
Her skin crawls.
The door opens and closes.
He's gone.
Her eyes fall on the shoebox on the desk opposite the bed. She knows stacks of cash fill it.
She hears a metalic clang - for a second she thinks she's imagining it.
But the vent above the bed swings open, and No-eul drops down beside her.
Without pausing, No-eul passes her a fluffy robe from the floor and lets her cover herself.
"Decent?"
"Yeah."
There is an awkward moment.
Sae-Byeok stands, and retrieves the shoebox of cash.
"Ready to go?" No-eul speaks low - in choppy sentences, to restrain from crying.
"Yeah."
They climb up into the vent.
They come out onto a beachy area.
Alone, just sand, the sea, and the further inland the grassier.
They stay on the sand.
"How did you find me?" Sae-Byeok asks after a moment.
"One of the other guards told me. And released me."
No-eul swallows, and decides she needs to ask her own question.
"Why did you give in to him? I know surviving is by whatever it takes - but you were alone, armed, and you didn't fight at all. Didn't speak back. Subservient. Why?"
Sae-Byeok just ties her hair up and swallows, hands resting around her neck.
"After you left Cheol and I...I needed work to keep us afloat. I sold myself. I think it just…brought back bad memories. I couldn't find the strength."
Whatever she was expecting, it wasn't the tight hug she was suddenly embraced in.
It's so familiar, yet so foreign.
It had been so long.
She buries her face in No-eul's shoulder.
"Sae, I'm so sorry." She takes a deep breath, "It's my fault. If I hadn't...if I hadn't of left you - this never would've happened. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."
"I chose to do it."
"It wouldn't have even been an option if I stayed. You were basically a baby still when we arrived."
"I was fifteen, No-eul."
"A child. A sweet, innocent child. And I ruined you."
No-eul pulls away slightly to cup her face.
Her thumbs trace the indents of her cheekbones, eyes following the tilt and crease of her brows.
"You never ruined me. I did what I needed to survive. I'd rather it me than you."
"Be selfish for once." No-eul's voice cracks, "Be selfish, byeokie."
Sae-Byeok leans into her touch.
"I'm a horrible person."
"No, you're not."
"I've changed, No-eul. I've changed so much. I've stolen, I've done illegal things, I've hurt people. I've hurt so many people."
No-eul presses her forehead to hers.
"Survival. Survival is not sin, you hear me, byeokie?"
Sae-Byeok's brows furrow, her eyes water.
"I'm awful."
No-eul keeps caressing her face.
"Tell me what you've done for Cheol."
"I…I put every cent toward giving him the house and family he deserves. I didn't eat for him. Not a crumb. Only what kept me moving. I did so many bad things for money. I let myself be beat by the man allowing me to see him. I worked for Deok-Su to ensure his protection. I pickpocketed for him. I tried to give him a childhood."
"Would a bad person have done all that?"
Sae-Byeok stills at No-eul's rhetorical question.
"Exactly," No-eul continues, "You don't need to apologize for anything. I do."
A small silence.
"I abandoned you." She carries on, "I beat you off and left you alone in a foreign country hours after appa died. Minutes after Eomma was taken. I can still see the permanent mark on your arm from me snapping it. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Your crying, your begging, it still echoes in my mind. Always. In the back of my head, I hear you every moment of the day. Every time I close my eyes I see you. Every time I look in the mirror I'm reminded of the pure fear and agony in your eyes. I abandoned you."
This time, it's Sae-Byeok's turn to surprise her with a hug.
No-eul pretends not to notice how small she is compared to her. Her byeokie was tall enough, but still so small and fragile.
At least to her.

Chapter Text

Whatever Ji-yeong was expecting when she'd been thrown into the backseat of a limousine with Mrs. Kang, it certainly wasn't this.
In the seats opposite them, a man is sitting with his legs crossed, dressed in an elegant suit cinched at the waist.
Rather twinkish, in Ji-yeong's very valid opinion.
The minister, according to the guard and frontman who were driving.
There's a strange window between them and the front seats - probably there to keep the conversation confidential.
The minister is clearly thinking. He hasn't looked up at their faces yet.
"So, what'd you want us for? Where are we going?" She blurts out.
He looks up, and Ji-yeong nearly jumps out of her skin.
Those freckles. That tanned hue. Those same brows. Those eyes-
"Ji-yeong. 240. What a way to greet the richest man in the world."
He has a low, raspy voice. But it has a soft edge to it.
"The richest man in the world?" Mrs. Kang frowns. She too must be analyzing the features.
"Indeed, I am."
The car slows. The door opens. In is thrown three people - Gi-hin, Minyeo, and Ali.
They slowly clamber into the seats as the other three wait a little impatiently.
"What the actual fuck is going on?" Minyeo spits.
"Language, Han Minyeo." The Minister says in a rather paternal manner.
She gives him a weird look.
"Where are we going, sir?" Ali asks.
"Jeju island. There's two people we need to collect."
"Sae-Byeok. And No-eul." Mrs. Kang names.
The Minister goes still.
"….Sae-Byeok? No-eul?" He sits upright in his seat.
The car screeches to a halt.
A guard opens the door.
"Get the file." The Minister orders, clearly starting to panic.
The guard nods and goes to find it.
"What the hell..." Ji-yeong trails off.
"You - you wouldn't happen to be talking about North refugees Kang Sae-Byeok and No-eul by any chance? Hopefully not?"
"Actually - that's precisely who we're talking about." Mrs. Kang squints her eyes.
He goes pale.
Not shock pale - like deathly pale. Sickly.
After a moment, he yells out the door to the paused drivers.
The limousine is up and running again - in an entirely different direction.
He closes the door and slumps in his seat, thinking hard.
"Okay. So this is happening." Ji-yeong observes.
"Yeah, it is." Ali agrees.
The limousine finally pulls in. And guards open the doors for them.
They all step out into the driveway of a massive hotel-like building.
"The whole sixth floor is yours for the night." The Minister says to them, "We will speak at noon tomorrow. After the other two have been collected."
And with that, he walks on past and vanishes into the bathrooms.

Luxurious is an understatement for the hotel room Gi-hun finds himself in.
A big, fluffy bed with loads of pillows and piled with plankets and the softest duvet he's ever felt. Two snack trolleys and a mini fridge full of drinks. A balcony, a hot tub, a massive unsuite bathroom, a massuve window of a wall with a beautiful view of the sea. Everything. That's not even including the actual room space.
He takes a warm shower and collapses into the bed, eating from one of the trolleys as he ponders how Sae-Byeok is getting on. He truly hopes she's okay. He's practically already lost one daughter - he can't bear to lose another.

No-eul has never felt such simultaneous guilt and relief in her life.
Sae-Byeok is lain on the sand, head in her older sister's lap. Trying to get some sleep despite the cool night air. Her hair is mussed, and her body shivers, but No-eul tries her best to warm her.
She can't even fathom how she could have let this poor child alone in a foreign country not that long ago. How she could have chosen to abandon her, so scared and small and alone with a child who was even more scared, and smaller, just as alone.
She tries singing to her.
A soft lullaby their father had made for Sae-Byeok when she was born - because he'd loved his little dawn-born angel so much he'd had to sing her praises in sweet words and poetic lyrics as he cradled her to sleep.
And that's what No-eul sings now, in this chilly, empty beach.
She's ripped her guard uniform from the waist up to wrap it around Sae-Byeok.
She doesn't feel the cold anymore - and even if she could, nothing could compare to the guilt of her relief that her baby sister forgave her.

Minyeo stares at the ceiling.
She hasn't felt like this for a while.
She'd known deep down, from the start, that Deok-Su would betray her. She'd felt it.
And yet she kept trusting him.
And then she'd betrayed him.
It had been satisfying, until she realized that without him there was no one there to protect her.
Or so she'd thought.
Until that disastrous dinner where Ali had grabbed her hand and the two had ran to safety together. Until Ji-yeong had hugged and thanked her for saving her sad-looking lesbian. Until that sad-looking lesbian in question had grinned at her in appreciation after she'd betrayed Deok-Su and saved her life.
It was an odd feeling.
But it was a pleasant one.
It had been so, so long since she'd felt that people could accept her without her needing to give her body in exchange, like she had with Deok-Su.
So for the first time in a long time, Han Minyeo is not alone.

Chapter Text

Sae-Byeok and No-eul find themselves back in the vents the following morning.
They're searching for anything useful, information or people, within the place.
Sae-Byeok's ear is still slightly over sensitive from earlier - when her sister had managed to remove the tracker from her ear.
But she pushes through, and they end up over an airvent, overviewing a hushed discussion between three guards.
No-eul signals to her to stay put and listen - she'll keep searching, so Sae-Byeok listens.
"-and the commies?"
Her heart leaps.
"What about 'em?"
"What do you with them? In the incinerator chambers, there is absolutely no one from the north. Ever. But we do have north players. Why is that?"
Oh, she's intrigued now.
She could hear the laugh in the sickening words one of the guards responds with.
"Oh, they never do die. If they lose, the men are enslaved for labour and the women? We get to beat them, drug them, use them. Seriously, we get far more northern women than men in here due to them being so lowly employed. There's a whole dungeon of 'em to chose from. Some as young as fifteen."
"Aren't they still people…?" One of the other guards says meekly.
"People? They're savages. Barely even human."
She stops listening at that point.
Her heart is pounding in her ears.
That's pretty much confirmation - if No-eul hadn't found her before the VIP came back yesterday, than she would have likely joined them.
She scampers over the air vent and catches up with No-eul.
"You okay?" The older girl frowns when she says the sick look on Sae-Byeok's face.
She just mouths something about telling her later and swallows.
They keep moving.

Eventually, they pop out the other side. Then get back in and go straight through back to where they began.
"So, kiddo."
"I'm seventeen."
"Kiddo. What happened back there? You looked proper sick." No-eul says anyway.
"I, uh…found out what they probably would've done to me if you hadn't showed up when you did."
Sae-Byeok rests her head on her sister's shoulder.
"What was it?" Though she likely already knows.
"According to those guards, they like to enslave North refugees. The men for labour, the women for…everything, really. They have a dungeon where they keep the women and girls."
No-eul doesn't even look surprised. Just holds her sister a little tighter.
"Damn…"
"They don't even know us. And yet…they want to hurt us."
Sae-Byeok's voice breaks.
"That's some tough shit, kid. If we find the dungeon at any point, we'll make sure to free them, okay?"
"Swear on it…?"
"I swear on appa's grave."
They sit quietly in the sand for a few minutes. Until a distant sound rings out.
They both look up.
A speedboat is shooting toward them at breakneck speed, a suited man at the wheel.
It's an almost comical sight.
But the two girls are so startled they just stare with wide eyes.
The boat stops suddenly, the man leaps off and approaches.
"Good afternoon, ladies. I am the Minister. Come with me, I'll take you to Seong Gi-hun, Ali Abdul, Han Minyeo and Ji-yeong."
Slowly, and awkwardly, they get to their feet.
And they do it.
They get onto the boat with him.
No-eul keeps one arm protectively around her sister, despite knowing she could easily defend herself against the man.
Just by looking at him, she could tell he couldn't fight.
When they boat starts speeding again, they both yelp at first.
The man purses his lips to avoid smiling.

Sae-Byeok nearly faints when they arrive at a gigantic, expensive-looking hotel.
"Sixth floor. That's where your friends are." The man points out.
The elevator is a fascinating thing.
Rarely has she ever gotten to ride in one - she hated malls. She could never ever afford a single thing so there was no point.
But this elevator has a whole ass fridge attached.
No-eul finds it rather amusing.
When the doors open and they step out into the hallway, No-eul barely blinks before Sae-Byeok has shot down the hall on her knees at the sight of Ji-yeong.
She watches how Ji-yeong laughs and kisses her forehead before introducing her to her new and improved comedy hour.
It's been a long time since No-eul has witnessed love so pure and untainted.
"-so uh, why exactly are you wearing a robe…and nothing else?" Ji-yeong breaks the calm as she runs a finger down the exposed clavicle of her girlfriend.
"…yeah, uh. You know what the VIP's did...so uh we didn't have a lot of time to get clothes when we were escaping."
Ji-yeong's eyes soften, but twitch at the mention of what the VIP's did.
"Damn it, sunshine."
She pulls her in tight for a hug.
Another door opens at the commotion. Gi-hun.
When he sees Sae-Byeok, he practically teleports beside her. And hugs both of them tight.
More doors open - Minyeo, Mrs. Kang and Ali.
The hug piles up. Until No-eul is just picking at her nails and watching.
But of course - Ali and Gi-hun pull her into it.
And it is the most loved she's felt in a very, very long time.

Ji-yeong and Sae-Byeok end up sharing a room.
The night is quiet, calm and peaceful.
Sae-Byeok is sleeping with her head on her girlfriend's chest, as said girlfriend cards her fingers through her freshly washed hair, lulling her into a deeper sleep.
Ji-yeong's heart falls every time her brain reminds her how cruelly the world has treated this poor girl in her arms. Each time her heart cracks a little.
And so she vows to herself, that she will never ever be the one to cause her such pain. Not if she can help it.
Because she cannot bear to ever put her own beloved through anything other than heaven - because she is not her father and she never will be.
She refuses to be.

Chapter Text

The following morning, Gi-hun is woken by the sound of gentle footsteps.
Whoever is there, he has his back to them.
"Ahjussi."
He calms.
"Sae-byeok."
He sits upright.
She's standing at the foot of his bed, her slight form clothed in a loose white shirt, her dark hair falling around her worn face.
He's never wanted to hug someone so much.
"How are you faring?"
"Alright."
She avoids eye contact. Her lips are shiny, tinted a familiar pinky-orange.
She's wearing Ji-yeong's lipgloss. Whether intentionally or just shared by kiss.
"Sae-Byeok.…what happened, if you don't mind me asking, after the VIP 'bought' you?" He almost immediately regrets asking by the way she stiffens.
But she relaxes slightly, swallows and tilts her head back.
"He did exactly what he bought me for. My body and nothing else."
That's all she needs to say for his eyes to widen and jaw to tense in guilt.
"I should've stepped in. I could've. I should've."
She finally looks at him - her abysmal eyes a cosmic wonder of sadness long boned.
"You didn't know any better. None of us did. Minyeo and Ali could've stepped in to. But they didn't. And we can't blame them for that. Even No-eul. She watched him, from the vents. But she didn't. Because it would've cost both our lives."
"But I've already lost my blood daughter. And if I were to lose another - I wouldn't know what to do, how to keep living." He reaches for her hand. A bold gesture to make to someone who isolated themselves so much.
But she takes it.
And her hand is so small and bony in his it makes his heart ache.
He can feel every bone, tendon and vein.
He squeezes it.
She squeezes back, thought with little strength. She was agile, and she was highly intelligent, but she was not very strong.
"Another. Your blood daughter, and another. Do you see me as a daughter, Ahjussi?"
He pauses, for a second fearing her response, but then he recalls how little he has to lose and his relaxation floods back in.
"I do, yeah."
She pauses, her face unreadable.
"My blood father died on my fifteenth birthday," She looks straight ahead, "I think…I think it's nice to have someone I can see as a father again."
He allows himself to steal a small smile as he realises something.
She's shy.
She isn't just being introverted or cold - she's being shy, towards him. Because she sees him as her father.
He runs his thumb over her jagged knuckles, permanently pinked by her time on the streets.
She gingerly sits on the edge of the bed at last, and after a moment, almost nervously, she rests her head on his shoulder.
She's so tense at first, he's worrrid she'll pop a nerve.
But when he just rests his hand gently around her shoulder, she calms, relaxes.
And it is the closest he's ever felt to a father in a very long time.

No-eul has come to a conclusion.
These are the sweetest, juiciest strawberries she has ever tasted.
She and Ji-yeong had been the first down in the breakfast buffet. A glorious thing, full of all sorts of foods. All top quality.
Minyeo and Ali had been close behind.
The four had been enjoying themselves, when Sae-Byeok and Gi-hun had entered.
Ji-yeong waves at her girlfriend - who waves back with a soft blush.
No-eul nods at her sister in acknowledgment, still ridden with shame.
But her sister has no grudge - a slight weakness, her easy forgiveness of any she's ever loved - and nods back at her.
As they all eat, she spots Gi-hun whispering something to Ji-yeong, who nods.
No-eul has the sinking feeling it's something about Sae-Byeok. and it isn't something good.
They're clearly concerned about something. And she'll be damned if these people who've known her sister for a week pick up on odd behaviours quicker than her.
And so she observes.

"Jeju island, someday soon. Mojitos, and strawberries and bikini's."
Ji-yeong keeps on, listing everything about Jeju island she can think of.
While Sae-Byeok dresses properly, listening intently to her girlfirend's voice.
A bikini.
"What's that?"
"What's what?"
"That thing. A bikini."
Ji-yeong's jaw drops.
"Oh. My. God. What is the North teaching you over there?! It's like - a two-piece swimsuit, waterproof undies!"
"Not the North. Just my Eomma."
"Your Eomma is so nice!"
"I know - but she raised us to be modest. Waterproof undergarments feels...erotic."
"Holy shit. Where has your inner slut gone? Just two days ago we fucked in a cell! Now you're calling a bikini 'erotic?' Ah!"
Ji-yeong dramatically falls back onto the bed, pretending to faint.
Sae-Byeok rolls her eyes, smiles and pulls her shirt on.
"You're overreacting."
"Oh? Fine then. I'll go check with the Minister dude about the nearest shopping centre. Then we're going shopping."
"...I'm going to regret this."
"Oh yes, you are "

Chapter Text

The Minister has lunch with them.
The silence is thick, uncomfortable, and the ex-players are wary of their food.
The meal is obviously much better than anything they had before. But still.
"So..." Gi-hun attempts, but it lands flat.
"Uh..." The Minister sits upright, clearing his throat, "Sae-Byeok, No-eul. Tell me a bit more about yourselves."
The two share a hesitant look.
"Go on, I won't bite." The Minister smiles primly.
Still, they're wary.
"Ah, I see - Mrs Kang, why are your daughters so secretive? So mysterious..."
Mrs. Kang pauses.
"With all due respect, they have just been witness to over 450 deaths, they were captured, tormented, and then brought to a mysterious hotel all in the span of a few days. After the lives they've led added, it makes sense that they'd be cautious."
The Minister just raises his brows and smiles.
Sae-Byeok siddles closer to Gi-hun.
"Eat up. I can assure you that you will need your strength."
The Minister stands, bows. And is gone.
"So uh - what the fuck?" Minyeo breaks the silence following his departure.
"That was...something." Gi-hun leans back.
"Why was he so interested in them?" She points at Sae-Byeok and No-eul who are both sitting soundlessly, staring at the plates in front of them.
Mrs. Kang swallows.
"I have a slight suspicious as to why."
"....same." Ji-yeong agrees.
Sae-Byeok snaps up.
"Which is?"
They both pause.
"For your sake.... until we get confirmation, it's best to ignore it."
At this, Sae-Byeok sits upright.
"No - tell us."
"Yeah, eomma. If it concerns us - which it does - you have to tell us!"
Mrs. Kang just shakes her head and returns to her meal.
The two protest further, standing.
Gi-hun stands.
"Sae-Byeok," He speaks carefully.
He gets both sides of this.
Sae-Byeok wants to know why a mysterious, masked man is so interested in her life - and her eomma just wants to protect her.
She sits down quietly, and finally picks up her fork.
No-eul looks between them, surprised at how quickly the man had calmed her.
Hadn't he also shaken and beat her for pickpocketing him mere days ago?
He was acting like her father - to No-eul, he could never replace their father.
Never. No one could.
But she follows suite, taking her seat again with a questioning glance to her sister.
Sae-Byeok avoids eye contact.

"This is a horrible idea."
"Yeah, that's exactly why we're doing it."
Gi-hun, Minyeo, Ali, Sae-Byeok and Ji-yeong are all inching along inside the vents - a plan concocted by Sae-Byeok to figure this out herself.
Of course, the others tagged along.
That's how she ended up here - with Ali right behind her.
The vents are small, claustrophobic. They're all pushed close together. She can feel him breathing on the backs of her knees.
She's so grateful when she spots a light ahead - an exit.
"There."
She whispers.
She crawls closer.
But when she reaches the exit, it opens straight out onto the sea.
The nausea is instant.
Memories of overflowing lungs, a frantic Cheol, come rushing back. A father drowning. If it hadn't been for Cheol and No-eul reaching the surface first, she would have joined him in the dead family club, with her elder brother and grandparents.
"....who can swim? Because I can't."
"We should back up, prepare a bit better, than come back, okay?" Gi-hun suggests.
"Yeah, that's a better idea...now how do we get out?" Ali's voice resounds in the claustrophobic space.
"We just have to back up." Ji-yeong points out.
"Easy for you to say," Minyeo grumbles, "If we back up too fast, we'd be smacking someone in the face with our arses. There's no one behind you so you can go as fast as you like."
"Fine, we'll go one at a time with a minute between everyone so we're spaced out." Gi-hun sighs.
"I can't count." Minyeo points out.
"I'll do the counting." Sae-Byeok mutters.
And it sort of works.
That is, until, Sae-Byeok's turn comes around.
She is desperate to get away from the sea and the misery in it's depths.
However, she wasn't expecting to bang into Ali.
His nose hits her calf and her head hits the vent roof.
They both groan.
"Why are your legs so bony..." Ali puts a hand to his sore nose.
Before any more can be said about the situation, Minyeo yelps.
"Ah! Who bit me?!"
"I - ouch! Don't scratch me! I didn't do it!" Gi-hun hisses.
"I didn't scratch you!"
Ali shudders.
"Gi-hun did you back up or some-"
Sae-Byeok stills. Staring behind Ali.
She recognises those evil little eyes anywhere.
The fucking vent rat from the games.
It runs at her.
She screams, despite herself.
Ali screams too and starts backing up fast.
He bangs into Gi-hun, who in turn bangs into Minyeo.
To Ali, it sort of looks like Sae-Byeok is having a seizure, as she struggles to get her pocket knife out as the rat climbs her legs.
He screams gain and it startles her. She starts to kick her legs to try and throw the evil rat off.
It digs its teeth in.
She hisses in pain.
"You're gonna get rabies!" Ali pretty much sobs to her.
"I'm gonna get what?!"
Minyeo and Gi-hun start to panic - still oblivious to what exactly the creature was.
They start pushing each other down the vent to escape.
Ali scrambles behind them, abandoning Sae-Byeok to the rat.
"In another life!" He calls to her apologetically.

Two hours later, Mrs. Kang is not impressed. Neither is the Minister.
No-eul however, and Ji-yeong (who'd made it out quickly enough to miss out on the shenanigans), found the situation quite amusing.
Decidedly, being bitten by a rat does not make you a ninja turtle.

Chapter Text

By the time they've prepared themselves for the escape (yes, rat repellent included), night has fallen.
This time, No-eul leads them through the vents to the exit.
When the scent of the sea pollutes the air, Ji-yeong tightens her grip on Sae-Byeok to comfort her.
"Okay... Ali, you're strong right?" No-eul addresses.
"I suppose I am, yeah..." His face reddens a little.
"Mind helping Sae-Byeok? She can't swim... and she's afraid of the water."
"Way to expose me, unnie." Sae-Byeok grumbles.
"Sure! Maybe it will make up for abandoning her to the villainous rat's hands..." Ali shudders.
Ji-yeong snorts.
"Right so....we do have to swim quite a bit, so uh...stay calm, stay in pairs. Gi-hun and I will go first."
And like that, the two let themselves crash into the sea, popping up moments later, safe.
The two start to swim off, Minyeo and Mrs. Kang follow their lead. Then the final three go together.
Ali keeps one arm around Sae-Byeok, just under her own arms.
He can tell by her sickly pale face that she is trying her best not to panic or throw up.
Oh.
He hadn't noticed that before.
She really is comfortable with them. Enough so that she would be openly fearful with them. Openly have emotions.
He keeps his smile to herself and keeps coaching her on how to swim.
Ji-yeong is alongside them, humming to herself as the water splashes slightly around her.
It is peaceful, the sea is calm.
Eventually, they reach the island, crawl up the beach through heaving and sighing, strip down and re-clothe themselves in what they've stolen from the hotel.
Gi-hun sits next to Sae-Byeok when they're all done, away from everyone else.
"Ahjussi." She greets.
"Hey, Saebyeok-ah." He smiles.
They sit quietly for a moment, watching the waves lap up.
"You know…." He begins, then pauses.
She makes a noise of confusion.
He glances at her.
In the dawning light, her whole face was illuminated in a pink-gold glow, her eyes shiny, her hair in a disheveled ponytail, her lips red and plump. But her undereyes were a deep purple, and her skin devoid of colour. And her body shakes despite the windless warmth. Her shirt hangs from her shoulders, delicate prominent collarbones on display.
He swallows - how long had it been since she'd had the rest to cure those eyebags - since her skin had been a lovely hue of moonlight and her body steady and sure. Since her bones coveted by flesh.
He wants to cry for her. For the innocent girl she could've been - and the scared women she'd become.
"What?" Her voice is low and soft. Mature.
He's been staring, with his brows furrowed and his lips downturned, looking utterly pained.
"You're so young," His own voice is shaky, ridden with sadness, "And yet so hurt."
Her eyes shift, from curiously to something unreadable.
"I'm fine."
"Don't lie to me, please."
He doesn't mean to sound so pleading - but he does and he cannot say it isn't how he truly feels.
Whatever he was expecting, it isn't for her to rest her head against him, eyes shadowed by her overgrown, uneven bangs.
"Only some people are born be happy and glorious," Her voice is gentle, tender, intercepted by sharp inhales, "Only some born to be lucky and live well, and those who don't?"
His hand rests on her waist, encouraging her to continue.
"The people who are nobody and nothing, unimportant and barely surviving - they learn to take and take what they need for a happy ending - no matter how bad it makes them. No matter how bad."
She goes quiet then, her breathing a slight sound.
He cards his free hand through her hair, feels sea salt and smells it.
But with it he smells something else, something sweet and bitter and horribly fresh.
"….Saebyeok-ah? Can you smell that too?"
She pauses.
"Smell what, Ahjussi?"
Her voice is hardly audible, nearly lost in the wind.
She shifts slightly, her shirt rising and his pinkie skimming the sliver of skin exposed. She's…cold. So cold.
He removes his own jacket and wraps it around her.
"You're freezing..."
He moves around, and her head just slides down his chest.
"….Seoja?"
He frowns moves his hand to cup her face.
She just makes a little sound.
A sound of pain - he realises.
He tilts her chin up to meet her eyes as he asks her what's wrong - only to be met with blue lips and a sickeningly pale face.
Her bangs are sweaty and sticking to her forehead, and her eyes are half-lidded.
"Saebyeok - what is it?!"
He starts to check her all over, and he finds the source quick.
But not quick enough.
Her side - sort of front - is soaked, hot and sticky.
He stills.
"Saebyeok-ah…."
He has made a horrible mistake.
He lays her down as the panic flares, tugging his jacket and her shirt off to reveal her little body, the bandages around her abdomen stained red, red, red.
He sweaes as he tries to undo them, to see the wound, for access.
But she's seizing up beneath him and his blood is running cold.
She's so small and scared and if he'd remembered sooner she wouldn't be in this situation.
The others are all asleep and he is terrified and his throat is closing up.
"Ahjussi…." She breathes, her voice a gentle breeze, lost the second she's opened her mouth. "…appa, I think I'd like to go home now, if you don't mind."

Chapter Text

Everyone knows that your father is the man who sired you and your mother is the woman who gave birth to you. Your brother and sister are the boy and girl who were born by the same blood. Your lover should be a good wealthy man, handsome of course.
Sae-Byeok knows this, obviously.
Then why, when she thinks of a father, does she think of Gi-hun, and the way he cradles her and trusts her.
Then why when she thinks of sisters and brothers does she think of more than just Cheol and No-eul and the brother she'd lost to a plague. Why does she think of Minyeo, and Ali, and maybe even Gi-hun's daughter?
Then why, when she thinks of her perfect lover, is it imperfect and yet so lovely Ji-yeong?
And it hits her.
Somewhere along this horrible, cruel path, they'd become a family.
They weren't good, and hardly were they kind, they were people wrenched from badness and desperation into a death game.
And yet somewhere, they'd become a twisted, messed up family.
But a family still.
She recalls being eleven years old, sitting in the garden of her old home in North Korea.
She wasn't really supposed to be out, the plague had been at its worst.
She recalls watching her freshly deceased brother being carried out the door and down the street a little, to the pyre.
She wondered then and she wonders now - (When I die will my body burn too?)
She watched her big brother, with his gently tanned skin sucked pale from the sickness, his colourless lips and freckled cheeks.
She'd never feel the warmth of his hands cupping her face or braiding her hair, never bicker over breakfast while No-eul ran around looking for her school shoes, never crawl in bed with him after a nightmare or sneak into the kitchen with him late at night. Never again.
She didn't cry then, hardly fathoming the word dead yet.
Her big brother, dead. But it had weighed on her heart, though she ever spoke of it.
Then she recalls when she was fifteen, watching her mother be dragged away by the catcher men, No-eul had grabbed her up and ran, Cheol in her other hand.
They'd gone stumbling into a barn, running on adrenaline.
Then No-eul had left.
And then she remembers one little detail.
Eomma never would have been captured if she'd just listened, No-eul had left because of her, he'd never said it but she can tell Cheol resents her still for his scarce memories of their family.
Maybe she's the problem.
"I know you're stupid, but seriously?"
She opens her eyes.
She's lying in a white room - is it a room? She feels like she's inside a cloud.
Sangwoo sits opposite her, Deok-Su pacing nearby, her big brother right beside her.
"Am I dead?" She blurts out.
"Not yet." Sangwoo informs, "You're right in between. You can wake up now."
"Why should I?" She feels weightless as she speaks.
"Give yourself some decency." Her brother shoves her lightly.
"Give yourself a reason, you shithead." Deok-Su mutters.
She sits upright.
"I have one - how did you feel when I died?" Her brother wraps his arme around her shoulders.
"Empty, mostly. Scared. Alone." She mumbles.
"Yeah well if you don't wake up, you'd be doing that to Cheol. And remember that Eomma and No-eul don't know where he is....so you'd be abandoning him." He points out.
"Good point - and Ji-yeong I guess."
She lies back. "So uh, do we know how to wake up?"
"Close your eyes, kid." Her brother murmurs.
She does.
The next moment, she feels their hands on her arms.
Her brothers gentle and comforting, Sangwoo's limp ad almost bored, Deok-Su's cold and calloused.
She feels an airy feeling rush through her.
She's falling, falling, falling.
She heaves up and her eyes snap open.
They're on the beach again, her side dripping with blood while a frantic Gi-hun tries to tend to it.
"....ahjussi?"
Her own voice is hoarse, and raspy but she can breath now. She's living.
He gasps and smiles through tears.
"You're okay!"
He hugs her tight, cradling the back of her head in his hand.
"...appa?"
Gi-hun pauses, then allows himself a small grin.
"Yeah?"
"Are we...are we a family?"
He looks over her head at the rest of them, sleeping in the sand.
"I think....I think we are."
She smiles against him.
"That's good."

Chapter Text

When No-eul awakes, it's to the off tune hollering of Minyeo and Gi-hun.
She sits up, disoriented.
Sae-Byeok and Ali are sitting side by side, watching the two with equal pain and amusement.
Mrs. Kang is watching them with a sort of exasperation only a mother could manage.
"Okay - I have many feelings , and none of them are good." No-eul observes.
"She's awake so we can scheme now!" Ji-yeong grins.
Sae-Byeok stands with tired legs.
It's hard for her to move - due to the sheer volume of fabric wrapped tight around her abdomen, fighting the wound.
Gi-hun raises a hand as if to help her if she needed it, but she doesn't and he lowers his hand again.
"I think I should be the leader." Minyeo grumbles.
"Minyeo, we love you and all - but no." Ali shudders.
Gi-hun nods, Ji-yeong smirks.
"I'm in charge." Sae-Byeok settles.
"Youre the youngest." No-eul raises a brow.
"-And evidently more intelligent and responsible than the rest of you. Your faults raise my perfections, so. When No-eul and I were still at the game arena place, I overheard something."
Ji-yeong rests her chin on her knees.
"Do tell, great storyteller."
Sae-Byeok gives her a faux look of annoyance.
"Anyways, it turns out that...." Her voice falls soft and solemn, "That they have a basement full of Northern women and girls."
They're all silent.
Ali speaks up, innocence and anxiety laced together.
"For what? Do they deport them or..."
Sae-Byeok meets his eyes, and he knows.
Gi-hun swallows uncomfortably.
"We're freeing them?"
No-eul nods, hesitantly.
"And how do you want us to do that?" Minyeo raises a brow.
"We can pick the lock. I have my knife." Sae-Byeok ties her hair back as she speaks.
Ji-yeong watches her closely, at the ripple of her tight stomach muscles.
"Are you sure you're fit to do that?" Gi-hun speaks up.
He doesn't say it to be rude - just worried.
She stills.
"I'll be careful. I'll stay in the vents. I won't get caught."
"Byeokie..." Ji-yeong stands,coldce calm.
She knows what they're all thinking.
"I'm not weak." She states, a tad defensive.
"We're not saying you are! You're just….more susceptible to harm in your current state." No-eul tries, but judging by the way her younger sister's face hardens and jaw clenches, her words fall flat.
"I'm perfectly capable!" She spits out in response, her arms coming down in a sudden swing from her hair to fists by her thighs.
"Seoja…" Gi-hun reaches a hand out to her, "…maybe you should take a little break this time, let us do it."
She stumbles back, as if she'd been struck.
"You too?" She's clearly hurt by his agreement, if her tense form had any indication.
He goes to stand, to comfort, to elaborate.
But before he can, she just turns and strides away, hugging her arms to her chest.
"Should somene go after her?" Ali frowns.
"Nah…give her space. She needs it." Ji-yeong murmurs, staring in the direction her girlfriend had vanished.

The sea is cold and unforgiving - it might have been a good metaphor for the hardened young woman she'd been before she'd stepped foot near Ji-yeong, or Gi-hun or these games at all.
It doesn't fit her quite as well now, softened by safety, but she still thinks about it as she wades through the shallow water.
Her legs sting from the temperature - she tries to remember how cold the river her father drowned in had been. Very cold, she recalls, cold enough to turn her lips blue and her skin ghoulishly pale, cold enough for her to be shivering even hours later.
She still misses her father.
He used to make promises to her, promises that he never, ever broke.
Until he did break one.
("I promise you I'll live long enough for you to get married, so I can walk my babygirl down that aisle, you hear me?")
He died only hours after saying that, funnily enough.
She always keeps her promises too, doesn't she?
She never forgets her promises.
"-yo, Sae-byeok."
At Minyeo's voice, her knees almost buckle.
She turns to look at her.
"Sheesh, you look dead." The woman continues, making a face when she meets her eyes.
Sae-byeok restrains from smiling. She doesn't need to make herself any more vulnerable - that's what got her here in the first place.
"As if you look any better." She scoffs instead
"Nah, kid, I mean it. You're pale as my cocaine was. You're all hollow-cheeked and shit. Your eyebags looks like they have eyebags that have eyebags."
Minyeo points vaguely as she explains.
Sae-byeok touches her face in self-awarness, and concludes that her skin may really be a bit unnaturally icy cold.
So she swallows and redirects the conversation.
"Come to convince I'm weak too?'
Minyeo groans.
"Fuck's sake, I'm on your side of this, kid."
Sae-byeok raises a brow.
"You don't think I'm gonna scoot to my death?"
"Don't really care as long as I get my cigarettes."
"Woah, Minyeo. You make me feel ever so loved."
Sae-Byeok finally smiles.
"Anyways, they gave in. You getta' do the thing."
Minyeo admits, smiling herself as she lights a new cigarette.
"Good. But you didn't really have a say in that - I was gonna do it no matter what they said."
"I know, kid," She smirks, "Want a cigarette?"

Chapter Text

Minyeo later realises giving her a cigarette mightn't have been her greatest idea, judging by the coughing fit she'd collapsed into almost immediately.
"Hmm." She squats down by the heaving teen, who just lets out a deeper, more growl of a sound.
"Oh-" Another gasping breath, "-my-" another, "-God."
"I know you had a deep voice but holy fuck...you sound like Sangwoo like that. Look like 'em too with that shirt and trousers."
That shocks Sae-Byeok out of her coughing fit.
"...how dare you."
Minyeo cackles and breaths out a small plume of smoke.
If either woman was truly honest, they'd admit they had never expected a friendship to web between them - a strange sort of sisterhood.
But they were not honest women - and so as long as the others are concerned, no bond had struck between them.
"Y'know, Deok-Su couldn't handle his cigarettes either." Minyeo follows up with, her eyes moving to watch the calm sea ripple. "Not well, only tried 'em to look tough."
Sae-byeok lets out a slight laugh - a sort of snort.
"That bastard did so much shit for show "
Minyeo grins.
"Oh he did. Even his history with you."
"Oh?" Sae-byeok raises a brow, sensing a truth she doesn't know just yet.
The corner of Minyeo's lip quirks.
"He was genuinely really hurt when you betrayed him. Like insanely so."
"Minyeo…he sold me as a prostitute - to be fair, there, I technically did it of my own accord and just had him get the connections for me - but he refused to pay me for it, so I betrayed him." She gives her a quizzical look.
Minyeo just shakes her head with a sort of faint smile.
"And he may have, but awful doesn't always equate to heartless."
Sae-byeok tilts her head. Like a cat.
"And..?'
"He thought of you as an annoying little sister."
She looks...surprised.
Minyeo finishes her cigarette and turns to her again.
"He hated you sure, and he tried to kill you. But that's because he was practically an oversized toddler who can't handle 'big feelings.' You and I know that better than anyone."
Sae-byeok snorts again.
"Well then," Minyeo puts her hands on her hips, "Now that you're done whinging let's get back to the others before the search parties start."

Ji-yeong's touch is tender, but cautious.
The wound is a gaping thing, and Sae-byeok's breath seizes every time she presses a little too hard.
A few hours have passed since her talk with Minyeo, and her wound from the glass was acting up again. Like it had last night.
So now she's laid out with her dress shirt hitched up to her ribs.
"There…all bandaged again." Ji-yeong sits back.
Sae-byeok stays on the sand, staring up at the starry sky.
The two of them are away from the rest of the group, behind a boulder and a few trees. Neither of them really wanted to socialise much at the moment.
The group had been understanding.
Ji-yeong just traces shapes on her girlfriend's abdominal muscles, circling her navel, stroking her hip.
"Ji?"
She looks up at her face.
"Yeah, byeokie?"
"If we do get out of here and back to Seoul...will you stay with me?"
Ji-yeong gives her a disbelieving look, then smiles.
"Obviously, you think you can escape me that easily? Not a chance in hell, baby."
Sae-byeok smiles - and even if it is twilight above, it is still blindingly beautiful to Ji-yeong.
Ji-yeong decides to try something.
She wraps an arm around her girlfriend and and pulls her up, so she's straddling her lap.
"Tell me mundane things about you." She murmurs, burying her face in the thin fabric of her girlfriend's shirt.
Sae-byeok's face flushes, but she rests her chin on Ji-yeong's head and begins.
"Well uh…I'm not allowed energy drinks, if that counts."
Ji-yeong laughs softly, as the shirt wrinkles around her face. She's immersing herself in the feeling of Sae-byeok's warm skin beneath her hands. Her almost fluid waist hidden behind flimsy cotton.
"What else?"
"I…I can't sing."
"Sure you can!"
"Seriously, I can't!"
"Sing for me then! Prove it!"
"No! I'm off tune!"
"Please, it'll be cute!"
"I-"
"For me?"
Sae-byeok gives in.
A few minutes later - and Ji-yeong is so glad she'd gotten a phone at the weird hotel place, her first video ever being her girlfriend's off tune singing.
"This is so adorable…" She grins, playing the video back.
Sae-byeok just groans into her neck.

The two finally get to sleep a few minutes later, entangled in each other.

Chapter Text

The vents are cold, but their close body heat makes up for it.
Sae-byeok leads them through, Ji-yeong right behind her.
The others are finding it hard to get through - seeing as half the group is made of either tall, lean women or pudgy men in their forties, but Sae-byeok is lithe, and Ji-yeong is tiny, so it is much easier for them.
"Found it." Ji-yeong whispers back when she realises her girlfriend has stopped, and is currently unscrewing the vent with her knife.
"Everyone armed?" Gi-hun enquires.
They all nod.
They're just armed with rocks and a crab Minyeo found, but it's enough.
Sae-byeok drops down into the little room, scanning around her until she spots the camera.
A tear of her shirt and the camera is covered.
"Smart, byeokie. Way to offer distraction." Ji-yeong grins sarcastically, running a hand over her waist.
Sae-Byeok snorts and goes to unlock the door.
Immediately, they're face to face with a guard.
Minyeo hits him in the crotch with her rock, Ali snatches the gun from it.
Sae-Byeok and Ji-yeong set off down the hall, the group all split up.
The two girls make their way through the corridors, hitting the guards wherever they meet, until they arrive at the lowest floor they can find.
"It seems to be a basement."
"There is three doors." Sae-Byeok points out.
Ji-yeong peaks in one.
"Damn, this seems to be the guards quarters. There's rows and rows of doors, like apartments."
Sae-Byeok looks in another, and her heart tightens.
"Incinerator room. This is where they burn the bodies."
"Last door is the basement then."
Ji-yeong helps her pick the lock, and the two freeze the moment the rusty old door swings open.
It's a massive, damp and dark room. Full, of young northern women in various states of undress.
Ji-yeong grabs her hand, mouth agape.
Sae-byeok takes a deep, shaky breath as her eyes fall over each girl, as they raise their bowed heads to look at the two.
Sae-Byeok swallow, then speaks.
"Run. Get out of here. Run. Survive. Set the fucking place on fire. Go now."
She jumps down into the crowd to start helping the girls out.
Some whisper thanks, some cry with joy, some are so tormented they cannot speak at all. But they listen.
The basement clears in short time, and Ji-yeong pulls Sae-Byeok back up as the last girl runs out.
At that, Ali and Gi-hun run around the corner.
Guards at their heels.
Ali has the gun still, but he tosses it to Gi-hun and grabs Sae-Byeok's hand.
Ji-yeong and Gi-hun pair up as well, and they run in opposite directions.
Ali and Sae-Byeok go stumbling into the incinerator room.
"Listen to me, Abdul. We need to get in the fucking incinerator." She hisses.
"They'll burn us alive!" Ali points us.
"Just listen to me!" She climbs in anyway.
Ali follows, despite himself.
The heat is near unbearable, sweat forming in milliseconds.
Sae-Byeok starts climbing the side, hands in the cracks and feet in the crevices.
Ali copies her on the other side.
Outside, the guards turn up the heat.

Ji-yeong hits the sand with a groan.
She, Minyeo and Gi-hun had found a way out through an emergency door and met back up with No-eul and Mrs. Kang. But there has been no sign of either Ali or her girlfriend, and as the smoke thickens above, fear cradles her.

Chapter Text

Sae-byeok's skin is blisteringly hot.
Sweat drips down at a rather maddening pace, her body sliding against the wall.
She almost falls off a handful of times, Ali catching her every single one.
It's harder to get a grip now, as the flames below them lick up.
The guards have sealed them inside, and the incinerator generates a suffocating amount of smoke, polluting their lungs and blocking the light above.
Abrupt little shocks of white hot pain burst through their ribs as they cough and scramble to escape.
Sae-Byeok can hardly see. Ash gathers in her lashes, sparks on her lips and cheeks, her hands keep slipping.
And she keeps going.
Ali has gotten ahead now, with his strength. He'd pulled himself up more and more and caught her when need be.
Once he finds a steady ledge, he reaches a hand out to her. She takes it with shaky, sweaty hands.
His fingers are long and hence he winds them around her little wrist for a better grip, and tugs her up to his level.
A sliver of light finally appears overhead.
They no longer have the energy to be hopeful.
And just when they think this couldn't go wrong, the incinerator door opens. Three guards poke their heads in, armed.
And start shooting upwards.
A bullet deflects off the wall next to them, Ali jumps.
The ledge beneath them crumbles away at the sudden weight return.
Sae-Byeok grabs ahold of a crack in the wall, Ali drops down, but manages to catch his fingers in a slit they'd climbed moments prior.
The bullets keep coming and the two are scrambling up the wall.
A bullet ones within inches of Ali's head, passing on to hit Sae-Byeok in the leg.
The adrenaline however, blocks out the pain, and she pulls herself up onto the jutting roof rim of the incinerator.
Ali just about makes it, as the incinerator explodes.
They impact sends them flying off the roof, through the air.
The kaboom echoes and resounds - but you feel it more than you hear it, with the guards screaming, yelling, a cacophony of sweet deserving agony as they're torn apart, as the roof comes tumbling down.
Sae-Byeok's head is full of white noise, her ears ringing, if she was on the ground perhaps she would be shaking.
But she isn't on the ground.
Instead, so she and Ali are shooting through the air at a hundred miles per hour toward the sea.
When she crashes into the waves, she can only wonder if her father felt the water pooling into his lungs like she does now, if his shot wound had stung as much as hers do now, she wonders, would he be proud if she died the same way?
Oh of course not, everything would mean nothing if she gave up now. But since when has she meant everything?

Since Gi-hun was young, all he'd wanted in his future was a family of his own.
A family, where he'd have kids to love and to teach, where he'd have a home where his friends could visit and sleepover and spend all times of day at, and of all the places to have his wish come true - it was here.
It was here that he'd found his own strange, eccentric teammates-turned-family that he'd always seen in books and shows and amongst the people he knew.
And the heart, the cause, was the good-hearted pickpocket who'd stolen 100 won from him upon their first encounter.
And so when the building that had housed the Squid games explodes, likely taking his pickpocket and newfound brother with it, his heart burns.
He's thrown back with the impact, despite his distance.
But he would not care if it had killed him.
His daughter was missing in there.

Chapter Text

The water is cold.
Cold, in a way that is warm.
Like two friends huddling together, skin afrosted, lashes glittering with snowflakes in the winter.
Cold, in a way that makes you feel all fuzzy and numb inside.
Bullet wounds are the opposing similarity, Sae-byeok decides.
A burn, then cold. Sweet, nostalgic stinging. Like when your brother throws a pebble at your shaky little knees and it cuts, but much more intense. It is numb.
Numb, like your childhood head rested in your mother's lap as she cradles you to sleep. Her voice a humming lullaby lulling you to the gentle darkness.
The darkness, be the practice death. A feeling she has not yet felt and yet caresses her, holds her, wipes her tears and promises eventual permanent.
Death, that she is so close to, as she floats down, down, down.
Ali struggles above her.
She, oh she, she succumbs.
She lets the water fill her weak lungs, lets her hair rise like a dark cloud, lets her eyes close.
And yet, the darkness never tightens it's hold, instead, a new grip clutches her collar and tugs her up, up, up.
She's pulled, dragged, heaving onto the shore.
When her blue lips are parted, little rivers of seawater rush out. Desperate.
Her hair is pushed - soaking wet - from her face, and hands press down on her chest to make her cough up whatever she has swallowed.
She rolls onto her side, clutching her heart over her shirt as she chokes up a rough gallon, a hand on her back.
Finally she turns to see her saviour - and is not in the least surprised to see Ali, watching her with worry in his kind eyes.
"Are you alright?" He says slowly.
She nods, then winces.
The shot wound in her leg is worse looking now - the filth of the water, full now of hot ash and little particles of cement seems to have quickly infected the fresh wound.
"Can you walk?" He cringes.
"Yes."

As it turns out, she can't.
Instead, Ali hooks one of her arms around his shoulder, and he supports her as she limps.
They wind through the trees, friendly bickering, until they arrive at another beachy area.
Almost instantly, Sae-byeok is tackled to the ground.
Ali at first yelps, then laughs.
When she finally registers that it is Minyeo who is now mounting her as she both scolds and praises her. A scolding, for her disappearance - which, absolutely did NOT affect Minyeo at all no matter what the others say yup definitely - and praises, for causing chaos.
"Fucking hell, byeokie.…what happened your leg?!" Ji-yeong kneels beside them.
Minyeo looks at her leg for the first time, and makes a disgusted sound. l
"Got shot while in the incinerator." Ali explains.
"That explains why it's fucking burnt. Look, it's blistering all around the edges." Ji-yeong leans back.
"No-eul, please tell me you know what to do." Gi-hun turns to the Kang woman.
"Yes, I do. Disinfect and cauterize, then bandage it and wait it out." She makes her way over to her younger sister as Ji-yeong quickly wipes the wound clean with her shirt, and Minyeo hands her a lighter.
"What the hell are you-" Sae-byeok begins.
"Sorry kid, this is gonna burn."
And it does, white hot searing pain fills her whole body for a matter of seconds. Then it just flushes out, leaving her heaving on the ground.
"What…" She gasp, "…the hell…" She tries to sit up, "…was that."
"Cauterization without medical equipment. Dangerous, but I have some experience. Now, anything you need?" No-eul moves on quick.
"A gun." Minyeo suggests.
"A break from life-threatening and crippling wounds." Gi-hun points out.
"That's like, your third this week." Ji-yeong sighs.
"And the second once since my birthday." Sae-byeok sighs.
They all fall silent. Even Minyeo.
"Shit." Ji-yeong turns back to her. "Byeokie, I'm so sorry. We completely forgot."
She shrugs, and gives her a blank stare.
"Me too."

The next morning, they pay a visit to the arena of the games again.
A good third of the building is destroyed, still crumbling dust and corpses hung over walls. Some near trees aflame.
"So uh," Gi-hun swallows, "What now?"
"We end the games." No-eul swallos, "But first, let's go home for a while."
"I was evicted." Minyeo grumbles.
"Homeless." Ji-yeong cringes.
"I live with my mother." Gi-hun swallows.
"Also technically homeless, sent my family to a safer place and didn't ask where." Ali sighs.
"Homeless as well." Sae-byeok mumbles.
"…" Mrs. Kang looks away.
"Well…No-eul, if you got the money, then…what if we all bought an apartment to share?" Gi-hun suggests.
They all pause.
"So…less rent to pay?" Minyeo raises a brow in a rather agreeing manner.
Sae-byeok, No-eul and Mrs. Kang all look to each other.
"As long as Cheol is there too."
"Of course he'll be there - oh, and me too." Ji-yeong grins.
"Then it's settled." Ali smiles. "We're staying together."
"And how do we get off this island?" Gi-hun looks around.
"Helicopter. They were all scattered, but undamaged during the explosion. There's literally one over there." No-eul points out.
And so they do.

Chapter Text

The shopping mall is mildly busy.
The group sit around a table in the lunch quarter, steaming mugs in their hands.
"So uh...where did Gi-hun and Sae-byeok go?" Ali looks over the railing.
"They're fine. Gi-hun had a eureka moment and ran off, she went with him to supervise." No-eul sighs.
Minyeo snorts.
"There he is!" Ji-yeong points.
Gi-hun practically dances over.
"You dyed your hair," Ali muses, taking in the vibrant red.
"Indeed. It gave Sae-byeok the idea, so she's off getting hers done now." He grins and takes his seat.
"What colour is she getting?" No-eul takes a sip of her coffee.
"No idea. She doesn't know what I got either. She left with the card so I paid beforehand." He looks up.
Minyeo smirks and leans back, eyes searching over the quarter, then she laughs out aloud.
"What?" Everyone tries to see what she's looking at, when they do, Gi-hun chokes.
Sae-byeok gives Minyeo the finger for spoiling the surprise as she sits between her and Ji-yeong.
Her hair, is a cherry red. And she looks rather grumpy at having picked the same as Gi-hun - despite the shade difference.
Ji-yeong kisses her temple and smiles.
"It looks good, byeokie. Ignore them."
She grumbles something incoherent in response.
"What can we say?" Ali grins, "Like father like daughter."
Gi-hun's heart lifts when Sae-byeok doesn't correct him.
"So," She continues, "Cheol is getting packed up currently. We'll go pick him up while you guys get the bare minimum furniture moved into the new apartment, yeah?"
They all agree.

A few hours later, Kang Cheol sits alone in a dark corner of the orphanage playroom.
His brooding is interrupted when the door bursts open, and his big sisters stand in the doorway - both of them.
And despite the absurdity of the situation, and the curious eyes of the other children, he returns to them. Right into Sae-byeok's open arms.
He near enough tackles her. She just holds him tight and presses kisses to his temple and forehead.
"We're going home, little man," She whispers, "Eomma's home. No-eul's home. We've got a home. And friends. We'll be okay. We'll be okay again."
He buries his face in her neck, inhaling the fresh scent of passionfruit she now bares.
"You changed your hair." He gets out.
"I did." She smile sweetly, "Now, let's go home."
She stands up, and holds his hand tight.
No-eul takes his other hand, and they walk out into the parking lot.
The apartment is a twenty minute walk. Plenty of time to talk and prepare him for the people inside.
"We should warn you," No-eul begins, "That while we have money now, we live in a spacious apartment with a few very good friends. Together."
He nods.
He's still wary around her, No-eul realises with a pang to her heart, and she can't even blame him. The last time he'd seen her, she'd snapped Sae-byeok's arm in two and screamed at her, then abandoned the two.
He doesn't trust her with the sister who stayed.
When they arrive at the apartment, Gi-hun greets them at the door.
He gives Sae-byeok a tight hug and Cheol a high five, then lets the three inside the apartment.
Minyeo and Ali are playing just dance, while Mrs. Kang prepares dinner with the help of Ji-yeong.
When her children enter, she looks up.
Ali looks over his shoulder when he spots her holding all three of her living children.
Cheol is crying, Mrs. Kang is apologising, and both sisters are trying to stay composed. Ji-yeong and Gi-hun are both pulled into the hug.
It's a strange sort of peace - and it would've stayed that way if Katy Perry wasn't blaring from the TV.

Dinner is a familial event.
A large, buffet type meal is set out on the table.
Everyone is messing around, and telling stories, and being human.
Gi-hun tells everyone about his daughter, Ga-yeong. And Ali tells them about his wife and son. Minyeo spills some of Deok-su's embarassing secrets and Ji-yeong tells tales of her time in prison.
Thankfully, there is no Katy Perry to interrupt them.
However, thid time, there is a knock on the door.
The whole table goes quiet, and Sae-byeok takes her pocketknife with her as she goes to answer it.
Whatever she was expecting, it wasn't the Minister, standing shirtless, soaked, in the door frame.
"I needed to go somewhere," He heaves out, "You were the first people I thought of."
And promptly faints.

Chapter Text

Early the following morning, Kang Cheol enters the apartment kitchen in his spiderman pyjamas.
The kitchen is empty, and a note is stuck on the refrigerator.
Gi-hun left it, and it is him, Ali and Minyeo who are gone. Cheol already knows that his eomma has already gone job hunting, and No-eul and the Minister are out front.
So he pours himself a glass of orange juice, alongside a bowl of cereal, and watches the shadowy silhouettes through the blurry window next to the front door.
When he finishes, he decides to go find Sae-byeok.
His noona was always up at this time. Always up hours before now.
He doesn't consider knocking, just opens the door slowky and quietly.
However, the regret is immediate.
The girl with the highlights - Ji-yeong, he remembers - falls off the bed with a surprised yelp, the opposite side, thankfully.
His sister just covers herself with the blanket and stares at him with wide eyes.
"Good morning to you too, little man." She says, in a tone that he knows means a lecture is coming.
He groans, and tries to focus on erasing the unholy image he'd walked in on from his head.
Ji-yeong stands. She's pulled on a dressing gown and clears her throat.
"Heya, Cheol." She avoids eye contact.
"I know, I know! I'll knock next time! Just eugh!!!" He covers his eyes and fake gags.
Sae-byeok swallows and rolls her eyes fondly.
"Don't tell eomma."
"Fine. And also…" He looks at Ji-yeong, "Can I talk to you? Without noona here?"
Sae-byeok gives him a suspicious look, and Ji-yeong just nods with a curious look.
His sister pulls on her shirt and underwear and leaves into the kitchen to get breakfast.
"So, Cheol. You wanted to talk?" Ji-yeong smiles brightly - still a little confused, and trying to give the boy a good impression of her.
"You're my big sister's girlfriend." He states, big eyes looking up at her.
"I suppose I am, yeah." She tilts her head.
"Hurt her," He bangs on his chest like an ape, "I'll spiderman you."
She nods quickly, a faux-serious look crossing her face.
"Understood, Commander Cheol."
He gives her a toothy grin, proud of himself.
She ruffles his hair and smiles.
"But make sure to tell me all the embarassing stories about her." She whispers.
"I wrote them all down in a notebook! I started it when I was eight because No-eul said it would be funny." He giggles.
"Wrote what down?" Sae-byeok calls from the kitchen - her voice muffled by whatever food is in her mouth, "Wrote what down, you little squirt?"
The two just snicker to themselves.

"Who the fuck ordered over two hundred Won worth of clothing?"
No-eul enters the kitchen with a box under her arm.
"Oh that was me," Ji-yeong grins shyly, "But it's two people worth so it's okay."
The Minister sits at the opposite end of the table, head in his hands. His migraine had come on a rough hour ago.
"Here, I've got you the painkillers." Sae-byeok murmurs as she hands him the little tube.
He thanks her and turns his attention to the tube.
"Hey, byeokie. The clothes I ordered arrived already!" Ji-yeong informs her delightedly.
"Oh, cool." She smiles.
"-which means we're having a fashion show later. Cheol can be our audience."
"Can I be in the audience too?" Gi-hun enquires as he enters the room.
"Only if you put a shirt on." Sae-byeok pokes him in the chest.
He sighs dramatically.
"If I must."
The front door swings open, and Ali enters with the takeaway in hand.
Ji-yeong moves the box of clothes onto the counter as he and Mrs. Kang set it out on the table.
They sit in silence at first, just sorting the food until Cheol breaks the silence.
"Who are you!" He asks the Minister.
He smiles and sets his fork down.
"You sure you really want to know? Because I've fitted the pieces together and - I know you might just kill me."
Sae-byeok tightens her hold on her dinner knife.
"Who are you, Mystery man." Ji-yeong points her fork at him.
He looks around.
"Absolutely sure you want me to answer that?"
They all glower at him.
"Fine, fine..."
He takes a deep breath.
"My name is Kang Rae-jin, and I did not drown in that river."

Chapter Text

"I cannot believe you locked him out in the rain."
Ali muses, as he watches the man give them a comically large frown within face pressed up against the window.
"Fucking deserves it." Sae-Byeok hisses as she sips at the hot chocolate her mother had made in an effort to calm her.
Cheol had been sent to his room due to the pure horror of the situation - and everyone else stayed to watch Sae-Byeok throw the man into the storm outside.
Ji-yeong snickers and kicks her feet up on her girlfriend's lap.
"It's pretty funny though."
"Nothing about this is funny! Well, accept maybe Sae-Byeok's reaction - but our FATHER, is the richest man in the world, is part of a mass organisation that kills thousands of people worldwide per year - or even week?!" No-eul exclaims.
He just taps the window and presses his face against the glass.
Mrs. Kang looks away.
"I can't believe I married that fool."
Gi-hun stares at the window.
"Maybe we should let him back in." Minyeo suggests, putting her feet up on the windowsill.
"Now why the hell would we do that?" Ji-yeong raises a brow.
"He looks very polite if you ignore the manipulation, mass murder, kidnapping and family abandonment." Ali offers.
Minyeo cackles.
"Well, I saw Gi-hun checking out the Frontman guy, so...." Ji-yeong grins.
Gi-hun splutters.
"I was not!"
"You absolutely were!" Minyeo snorts.
"Byeokie...are you crying?" Ji-yeong's smile drops immediately as her hands go to her girlfriend's shoulders and she sits upright.
Sae-byeok's eyes are glimmering with unshed tears, her bottom lip trembling and her pallor ghoulish.
"I thought he was dead." She cracks out.
The room has fallen silent, all humor snapped out in milliseconds.
"He made me think he was dead. I thought - I thought he was gone." Her voice breaks a little further.
She buries her face in Ji-yeong's neck.
"Shhh..." The shorter girl in question whispers, lacing her hand through the silky cherry strands of her dyed hair.
She just sobs into her neck.
"Noona?"
Cheol stands in the doorway - likely having heard the laughter from moments ago.
If she hears him, she doesn't respond.
But being the boy he is, a boy who's never seen his big sister cry, goes to her side, and hugs her tight.
His little face is pressed between her sharp shoulder blades.
Gi-hun sits beside him, and holds her as well.
No-eul decides it's best to join from Ji-yeong's side.
Minyeo and Ali sit by her legs, and rests their hands on her knee to ground her.
Outside, the Minister sits down, back to the building.
Of all the crimes he's committed, of course it is this that holds him consequently.

Chapter Text

"Sae?"
Ji-yeong peeks into her bedroom quietly.
Her girlfriend is curled up on her carpeted floor, head buried in her arms and her legs all folded up.
She steps inside and closes the door behind her.
"Aein," She says softly, as she kneels by her.
Sae-byeok buries her head further in her arms. As if she's trying to block out the world.
"Mind if I hold you?" Ji-yeong asks, to ensure she doesn't overstep her boundaries.
She's quiet for a moment still, but then she nods.
She sits up a little to let Ji-yeong slide into a better position, and the shorter girl's heart nearly breaks
Her eyes are swollen and red, her whole face pinked, and tear streaks evident down her face. Some glittering tears are still sliding down. Her eyes are shadowed dark, and her hair disheveled around her face.
Ji-yeong hugs her tight, allowing her to bury her face in her chest.
She rests her chin on her hesd and cradles her as she shakes and cries, almost inaudible.
"Oh love…" She whispers, kissing her head.
If she could do anything, anything at all, to numb the feelings that her girlfriend is drowning in, she would. But she can't.
There is nothing that can be done about one's blood.
Ji-yeong looks around the room, to see if there is anything she can use to distract her from the turmoil of emotions.
There is little to no decorations.
A bed, a desk, LEDs, a wardrobe and some shelves.
Hard to think only this morning she'd been pounding her into the mattress with her strap before Cheol interrupted.
Ji-yeong mentally curses herself. She should not be recalling that while her sweet Sae is breaking down in her arms.
She should just ask to do something for her.
"Do you want a drink? I have fanta in my bag. I think it's still in here."
Sae-byeok wipes her nose on her sleeve - and Ji-yeong doesn't care to berate her for it, or feel any kind of disgust - and she nods slowly.
Ji-yeong reaches over to grab her bag, and rummages through it.
"Here we go…here I'll open it for you…"
She struggles with it for a moment, but manages.
She helps her get the can to her lips and take a sip.
She strokes her hair as she drinks, slowly and carefully.
"Once you finish that, you should get to sleep." She whispers to her.
Sae-byeok nods, and keeps drinking.
Ji-yeong comes to the realization - that when Cheol cried about his father, he'd been loud, desperate for someone to hear him. But Sae-byeok? She tried her very best to refrain from crying, and when she broke, she broke quietly. Like a shattering vase on a muted TV show. She did not want to be heard. She feared the consequences.
Ji-yeong kisses her temple, her forehead.
"Sweet girl…drink up. Do you want me to stay with you tonight?"
She nods, quickly and surely.
Ji-yeong just smiles.

Gi-hun is ready to throw hands.
How fucking dare he - the Minister - show up after faking his death and abandoning his children in a foreign country and expect a warm welcome - especially after what he'd out them through in the games too, working alongside the Frontman.
How dare he harm Gi-hun's daughter like that.
Ali and No-eul have to physically restrain him, despite both of them being ready to crash if need be. Even Cheol is prepared to give Kang Raejin some serious injuries.
His poor girl, had sprinted out of the room mere moments after her tears had been spotted, to avoid breaking down before them all.
He wants nothing more than to cradle her and promise her everything would be okay.
But who she needs right now is her girlfriend - who is in with her now. And he doesn't want to overwhelm her. An easy thing to do with someone like her, who doesn't like social situations and more than a single person at once.

Minyeo, on the other hand, is lighting various candles to throw at the Minister from the window.
He screeches and leaps about to about being set on fire.
No-eul walks right past with nothing more than a smirk at the sight.

Chapter Text

Ji-yeong wakes first.
She stares at the ceiling, contemplating getting up or not, before realising she doesn't have much a choice.
Sae-Byeok is pretty much holding her down. Face buried in her neck, her arms around her.
So she decides on just caring her fingers through her hair.
She's gotten used to the cherry red colour her girlfriend now has quicker than she'd expected.
"Sae?"
No response.
She looks at the clock.
It's almost eleven.
She looks down at the young woman in her arms, then back at the clock, then back at her.
"Sae-Byeok?...if you don't wake up, I'm gonna start being loud and embarrassing..."
Still, nothing.
Nothing except for the little bit of drool that wets Ji-yeong's neck.
She sighs and moves her head to whisper in her ear.
"One more chance..."
Nothing.
"Your choice, then." She smiles, "

"
She sleeps on.
Ji-yeong sits up, and rolls off the bed.
Sae-Byeok lays spread Eagle, shirt ridden up to her ribs.
"Sorry for this in advance, sweet girl." She smirks.
She opens the door and peeks into the hallway.
Everyone else is already down in the main room.
She clears her throat.
"Wakey, wake, sweetheart." She says it nice and loud, so it resounds. The kitchen falls quiet, "Good morning, princess. Sleep well?"
At that, Sae-Byeok shoots up and near enough launches herself out of bed.
"

" She hisses, face pink.
"Yes, my love?" She grins.
"...really?"
She kisses her cheek.
"Yup."
There's a knock on the doorframe.
"You two definitely decent...?" Gi-hun asks.
"Yes." Sae-Byeok grumbles.
The door opens wider and he steps inside.
"Well, uh...good morning." He smiles, as Sae-Byeok tied her hair back.
Ji-yeong wiggles her eyebrows suggestively.
"Shush, Jiji." Sae-byeok presses a finger to the shorter girl's lips.
Gi-hun clears his throat.
"So, uh. How are you, after last night?" He says to Sae-Byeok, kneeling by the bed.
"A little better." She presses her pinkie to the end of her eye, checking for any tear residue.
A thin pink line is visible now.
He frowns.
"He's still outside. He fell asleep under the windowsill. He's half naked though. Minyeo set him on fire."
Ji-yeong snorts.
"Minyeo is a blessing."
"Or a curse." Sae-Byeok corrects.
"Or maybe a secret third option." Gi-hun suggests.
"Either way, she's great." And with that, Ji-yeong marches out to go thank her in person.
Gi-hun turns to Sae-Byeok, and pats her on the head.
"Why don't you just come down and get breakfast and we'll sort the bastard by the window later?"
She pauses.
"That's probably best."
And the two follow Ji-yeong.

Chapter Text

"He's so pathetic. I wanna fuck him."
Sae-Byeok chokes on her tea.
"Minyeo! That's my father!"
Minyeo shrugs and leans further to look out the window at the sleeping man.
"And? Who doesn't want a soggy looking dilf."
"...dilf?" Cheol frowns
"-Nothing, Cheol." No-eul clears her throat.
Sae-Byeok rubs her temples.
Ji-yeong snorts.
"You alright, cupcake?"
She faceplants the table.
"I'm taking that as a no." She rubs her shoulder to comfort her.
Minyeo points an accusing finger atg them. "Gay."
"Damn right we are." Ji-yeong snorts.
The front door opens and Gi-hun enters, face tinted pink.
"Where have you been?" No-eul raises a brow, rim of her cup pressed to her bottom lip.
"Nowhere important." He mutters as he speedwalks down the hall.
They all faintly hear the click of his bedroom door as he locks himself inside.
"Weirdo...." No-eul mutters.
Ji-yeong sits back in her chair as Sae-Byeok finally raises her head again.
"Right," She finishes her tea, "I'm gonna go take a shower."
Ji-yeong kisses her hand.
"Mind if I wait in your room for you to done?"
Sae-Byeok smiles.
"You're always allowed. But no one else is."
Ji-yeong smirks smugly and follows her out of the room.
When they enter her bedroom, Sae-Byeok immediately puts her record player on.
"Adrianne Lenker? Sounds about right." Ji-yeong grins as she plops down onto the bed.
Sae-Byeok rolls her eyes as she strips down and vanishes into the unsuited bathroom.
"I'll only take a few minutes."

And she does.
But while she is doing that, Ji-yeong is armouring herself with her strap on.
It's a strange struggle trying to not make it obvious under her tracksuit bottoms. But once she's got it under control, it's fine. Just in time, it seems, as Sae-Byeok enters the moment she manages it.
"What should we do know, then?" She says as she nestles up next to her.
Ji-yeong twirls one of her highlighted strands around her finger.
"Oh I don't know...."
She whistles and looks away, then winks at her, then repeats it.
Sae-Byeok snorts.
"You're such an idiot."
Ji-yeong kisses her softly, smiling against her lips.
She hums approvingly, and tilts her head back to expose her slender neck.
"You're so pretty…" Ji-yeong murmurs, as her lips trail downward and her hands grasp her waist.
Sae-byeok's cheeks pink, as she lays back in the bed.
"So…this definitely a 'yes?' I didn't pressure you, did I…?" She looks up, making sure.
"Ji-yeong, this is definitely a yes."
She exhales in relief, then kisses her deeply.
As the kiss gets more and more passionate, Ji-yeong reaches down and wriggles her trousers down to her knees, freeing the strap.
Sae-byeok lets her remove the towel, as she kisses down her body.
"Tell me something," Ji-yeong whispers, "I need to hear your voice. I need to hear you speak."
"I love you."
Sae-byeok gasps a little, when she runs the head of the strap over her slit, in circles around her clit.
"Keep going." Ji-yeong blinks slowly.
"I don't regret taking that bullet for you. I never will. I know you still think about it. And I know you blame yourself. But I love you. I took that bullet because I love you."
Sae-byeok clasps her hand in hers as the strap slowly sinks inside, gently.
"You're an actual angel, you know that? You're too…too good for this world." Ji-yeong whispers.
And those words flush over Sae-byeok with more power than the strap bottoming out.
These words mean much more coming from someone with such a deep hatred for all things religious.
Someone with a past like Ji-yeong.
Soft, tender thrusts rock their hips against each other.
Little whimpers, little gasps, escape between deep kisses. Minutes pass in bliss.
"Gonjunim.." Sae-byeok whispers, eyes fluttering shut as she meets her peak.
"I'm right here, nae sarang...always."
She kisses her forehead as she trembles and whimpers.
Such lovely sounds....such tender vulnerability.
Ji-yeong pulls out when the shaking calms and her breaths have evened out once more.
She takes off the strap, and sets it on the bedside locker, turning back to Sae-byeok.
"Was that good?"
"That was perfect, Jiji."
The two lay next to each other, in a sort of peace they hadn't allowed themselves in so long.
But oh, they should've known better.

Chapter Text

The moment Gi-hun steps inside, he knows there's something wrong.
"Sae-Byeok?" He calls out.
When he gets no response, he sets the grocery bags down on the kitchen table and heads to the young woman's bedroom.
"Sae-Byeok?" He tries again, just to be sure.
Silence.
He knocks once on the bedroom door for good measure, and when there is still to reply, he enters.
The room is a wreck.
The mattress is hanging from the bed. The bathroom unsuite door is wide open. Clothes and trinkets litter the floor, the window is shattered.
His heart is in his throat as he runs into the bathroom.
The shower floor is still soaked. The detachable shower head lies nearby.
They couldn't have gone too far.
He runs back into the bedroom, and looks out the window.
A black car is just now leaving the street, way out of reach.
A shiny black car - clearly expensive.
The number plate makes his heart drop.
Only three numbers.
Zero. Six. Seven.
That's all he needs to know.
And he knows damn well where they're heading. But he can't go alone.

When Minyeo and No-eul get home, bickering as they come in the door, Gi-hun is pacing the living room.
"Where's Sae-byeok?" No-eul asks immediately upon noticing the girl hadn’t shown.
"Get your coat. Tonight we kill a man."
Minyeo holds up her lighter.
"Can I burn him?"
"Sure. I'll explain everything in the car. Come on. No-eul, can you text your mother? Ji-yeong's waiting in the car already."
No-eul nods, and pulls the zipper on her coat straight back up.

It isn't long before they're driving through the rain, music blaring.
Ji-yeong plays with her girlfriend's blade - which had been left behind during the kidnapping.
"I can't be the only one who finds it a bit spicy that they kidnapped her in the shower. I mean, perfect plot for a sexy enemies to lovers book...how'd they out clothed on her?" Minyeo asks.
"Likely held her at gunpoint while she dressed herself - but anyways, this is a serious situation. My sister is in trouble." No-eul mutters, playing with the sleeve of her coat.
"Oh my god." Gi-hun groans, face planting the steering wheel.
"What?" Ji-yeong looks over her shoulder in the passenger seat.
"If things keep going as they are, I might decide to be the man we murder tonight."
Minyeo cackles.
"And take away the rage muffin's father again?"
He pauses.
"Nevermind."
No-eul raises a brow.
"Rage muffin?"
"Don't ask."
"Okay...where are we going again?" Ji-yeong turns back to Gi-hun.
"You remember when we were all thrown into the street in pairs after the Old man voted for the games to stop?"
She pauses, thinks about it, then nods.
"Well, Sae-Byeok and I were both thrown off together. In the middle of nowhere. Or so we thought. But that's where we're going now, because I have a feeling about it."
Ji-yeong smiles.
"Ah. If that stupid fucking Frontman has put a hand anywhere near my girlfriend, he won't be worrying about his taxes anymore to say the least."
Gi-hun hums in agreement.
"Even if he hasn't. He already violated her privacy and kidnapped her. I'm not gonna hold back."
Minyeo simply holds up her lighter with a manic glint in her eye, and No-eul nods approvingly.

Chapter Text

Dim orange streetlamps illuminate the empty street softly.
The puddles look like pools of amber, and they ripple soundlessly when No-eul dips her foot into one as they pass.
"This is where they threw you two off?" She enquires, slowing down with a furrowed brow.
"Uh, yeah, why?" Gi-hun looks over at her.
"Funny. I was the one who threw you out then." Her lip tilts.
"The one who thew me out was hot." Minyeo adds, "I made him cry."
No-eul pauses.
"I want to ask why but I'm not sure I want to know."
"I called him sexy pants and told him about everything I've shoved up my cooch."
Gi-hun grimaces.
"Minyeo, I don't think that was an invitation to tell us."
She shrugs.
"Never said it was."

On the other hand, in the sewers below, Sae-Byeok's blindfold and gag are finally removed.
She gasps for breath as she assesses her surroundings.
Dank lighting, rusty barred off areas and wet concrete.
Her wrists and ankles are tightly bound to the chair she is seated on. And her clothing is little.
A drab white shirt that hits about mid-thigh on her skinny frame.
Her hair is still soaking wet, what was slicked back of her bangs is now in small curls plastered to her hairline and around her ears. Sticking to her shoulders and neck.
The sewers are cold and she shivers involuntarily. Her lip is bleeding from the punch she'd been greated with a few hours prior.
Across from her, Cheol stands completely straight. Head back, shaking with terror and a gun to his throat.
She tries to sit upright, but her binds keep her stuck.
"Cheol-ah," She says softly instead, "Are you hurt?"
She can't afford to make him any more afraid. That includes showing any fear herself.
"N-no..." He whispers.
The man with the gun to his throat is dressed in black from head to toe. With a matching mask. The Frontman.
"Kang Sae-Byeok," He states, voice distorted, "Player 067."
Her face hardens.
"Don't bring my brother into this. He did nothing wrong. He did nothing to you."
"But he means everything to you. In the same manner in which you mean everything to your mother, to Gi-hun, to No-eul, to Sangwoo."
"Cho Sangwoo is dead." She tilts her chin back. "And even if he isn't, he hates me."
"I wouldn't be so sure about that."
She stills.
From the shadows, a figure is thrown, onto his stomach in the wide space between Cheol and Sae-Byeok.
"Sangwoo?" Sae-Byeok sits up so quickly her wrists burn.
"You." He breathes out, as a guard steps on his back and lowers a gun to the back of his head. Head at the joint of spine and skull.
She sits there, bound in shock.
She must look pathetic.
A seventeen year old girl, a white shirt and spindly limbs and wet hair. Thinly veiled terror in her bottomless eyes.
"I spared him," The Front man continues, finally stepping away from Cheol as a guard steps forth to restrain the boy, "After your mother kept strong in the Marble Game."
He cups her face in his gloved hands.
"And I paid the price. He escaped, while you disgusting pigs were throwing up the dinner we'd made you. He isn't the only one we kept alive."
"What, like they're pets? Like they're prey?" She hisses through her teeth.
"Watch your tongue, woman. One wrong move and the boy's brains will blow."
She stills.
Never, has such sickeningly raw fear coursed through her veins.
"Don't touch him." She practically mouths, but her lips hardly part and her voice is almost inaudible.
"You want to know who else is alive?" The Front man offers.
She stills.
"Player 101. Player 111. Player 218. That is all. "
Her heart almost stops.
Just her luck.
Deok-su, his limited edition evil Sangwoo boyfriend and Sangwoo.
"Your friends will come for you." He admits, "However, we are prepared. Seong Ga-yeong is also hostage, alongside the wife of Ali Abdul. You will be enough for your mother and No-eul, and Minyeo will be separated and forced to deal with Deok-su. Alone. With no way out."
She stares at the ground.
"So, Kang Sae-Byeok, do you believe in God?"

Chapter Text

Gi-hun unscrews the final screw holding the sewer ventilation down with No-eul's knife, and sighs on relief.
"Are we sure this is the right way?" Ji-yeong raises a brow.
"Has to be." No-eul shoves the metal aside and starts clambering down.
They all follow suite, and Minyeo pauses.
"Do you smell that?" She says suddenly.
"Smell what?" Gi-hun frowns.
She purses her lips, and approaches one of the two massive sewerage pipes.
"It's coming from there."
"Let's go...I'll go with you." Ji-yeong takes place next to her.
Gi-hun pauses.
"Are you two sure you'll be okay?"
"We're fine. I've got a lighter, she's got her psycho girlfriend's knife." Minyeo grumbles.
And so Gi-hun and No-eul make their own way into the shadows of the opposing pipe, and Ji-yeong can't help but pick up on the spilt blood by the entrance.

Three guns.
One to Cheol's throat, one by the tender brains of Sangwoo, and one in her hand.
The Frontman stands behind her, protected if by any chance she tries to shoot him.
She can't, she's bound in one direction.
"Bring out the little girl." He barks.
Seong Ga-yeong is restrained, on her knees next to Cheol with a gun to her head.
Her eyes wide with terror, clutching at her coat.
"So, Kang Sae-Byeok."
Sae-Byeok looks up at him. Her hands run over the trigger of the gun.
"The rules are simple." His cold, gloved hands stroke her cheek.
She swallows back bile.
"All you have to do, is pick one of them to shoot. One of them has to die tonight. And it will be you who pulls the trigger."
She raises her chin, the first tear breaking through the damn and dribbling over her lip, down the bump of her adams apple and glistening in the low light.
" I can't."
Her voice breaks; Splintering wood, shattering glass, burning ashes.
"You can. All you have to do is shoot." He hisses in her ear.
"I can't."
"Fine then." His hand glides over her arm; Fingers curling around her wrist, "I'll do it by myself."
He pulls the trigger.
Her knee comes up hard and fast, and she cries out when the bullet does more than just skim her knee.
Cheol screams when he catches sight of bone and blood and ragged flesh.
"You stupid woman!" The Frontman's fingers tug on the flesh of her wound as the gun drops from her hand.
She stares at her knee, at the bubbling blood and purpling edges.
Cheol goes silent. Ga-yeong keeps staring.
"You'd rather harm yourself over them?" The Frontman speaks steadily.
"Always." She hisses through clenched teeth.
"Then so be it."
He lets go of her arm roughly, and storms toward Sangwoo.
He kneels, as he takes the man's glasses.
And breaks them on the cold, concrete floor.
She breathes heavily as he picks the thickest piece of glass from the floor, and returns to her side.
"I told you all would matter in the end by your own decision. And you chose yourself."
The glass drags slowly across her cheek, little red ribbons of blood soaking the soft flesh.
She bites her tongue to avoid making a sound.
She makes the mistake of meeting Cheol's eyes over the shard.
He stares, wide eyed and horrified. His little hands grasp at his coat - she'd bought it for him after she'd been paid for the first time - and her heart drops.
She swallows and closes her eyes.
Her knee still stings, the bullet oozing out.
It slides out of the wound very, very slowly.
Every little movement it makes ripples through her leg.
"You asked for this."
The Front man whispers, as he drops the glass on her lap.
He pauses at the sight of blood staining her shirt.
Her wound, from the Glass Bridge not too long ago.
She hadn't been able to bandage it again seeing as he stole her right out of the shower.
He glances at her.
She swallows.
He picks up the glass once more, and uses it to rip the fabric of her shirt enough to create a gap over the wound.
And then, his hand lowers inside. His gloved fingers sink into the grasp of her wound.
The sound, sounds, she makes is indescribable. Gutteral, animalistic. Twisted. Like a broken, distorted horror movie on an old TV.
Her hands twitch against their binds, itching to pry his fingers out of her skin.
She bites down on her tongue hard. Anything to keep Cheol from seeing her cry. Anything to keep the girl safe.
The Frontman's free hand slides under her shirt too, only to clutch at the soft give of her stomach to hold him in place as his other hand basks in the slip of her organs.
It isn't long before her consciousness mostly slips from her fingers.
But the Frontman doesn't stop.
A single, glittering tear escapes her closed eyes.
He removes his hand from her stomach to remove his mask, and press his lips to her jaw, catching the tears on his tongue and gracing himself with the taste of her misery.
The children are in silent horror, watching, staring, at the sight before their eyes.
She trembles and seizes, again and again. Like some grotesque beauty, a canvas ripped to pieces in a way that is possibly more artistic then anything that could ever have been on it.
Finally, his hand retracts from the depths of her stomach, dripping with blood.
He peels his glove off, and tosses it aside.
"What the actual fuck."
He slides his mask back on before turning to Gi-hun and No-eul.
No-eul is pale, looking rather queasy.
Gi-hun is frozen, lips parted ever so slightly.
The Frontman stands straight.
"Seong Gi-hun," He can still taste Sae-Byeok's tears on his tongue, "Kang No-eul."
Cheol vomits.

Chapter Text

For a girl named after the dawn, Kang Sae-Byeok is cold.
She is nothing like the soft hazy gold of the rising sun. Nothing like sweetness, nothing like a gentle fawn.
She is sharp like glass - like the glass that had pierced her skin and let her blood run red, red, red down her face. Cold like the arctic - a cold so sharp it strikes everyone she cares about dead.
She sees her reflection in Gi-hun's eyes - and she looks pathetic.
Hair slicked out of her sweaty face, lips trembling as she does everything in her power not to break, eyes wide and shining with unshed tears.
It is still her.
Because Kang Sae-byeok from North Hamgyong Province, the older sister of Kang Cheol and the baby sister of Kang No-eul and Kang Chan-yeol, daughter of Kang Raejin and Kang Ji-Eun, is nothing more than a weak, cowardly child.
She wants to pull the gun to her head and pull the trigger to keep her family safe from her. She wants to rip her skin from her bones and sew it into a blanket to keep her loved ones warm. She wants to rip her brain out of her eye sockets to offer them every gently loving thought she'd ever concealed.
She wasn't strong. She was hardly even existing.
Teetering back and forth across a tightrope of life - trying to fall but finding her feet are nailed down and she can only dangle forever in the space between end and all.
No-eul and the Frontman banter back and forth but she sees nothing.
Something hot and salty hits her tongue and for a second she wonders if she's been shot in the head - only to realise her tears are falling, trickling down her face and into her mouth.
She is a child, a small frantic little girl.
She feels like she is back in that river, sobbing in her sister's arms as she is dragged.
She never did learn to swim.
And she knows that if her elder brother knew her now, his kindness would outweigh the tangled mess of calamity she's become.
To him, she'd always been the apple of his eye.
They'd lain in bed side by side, staring out of the window at the stars and he would tell her and Cheol far-fetched fairytales of gods and unicorns and leprechauns.
When the news displayed executions, punishments and otherwise, he would hold her a little tighter and promise her that she would always be safe.
But Chan-yeol is dead now, and he cannot protect her in death.

Minyeo and Ji-yeong stumble out into a dimly lit stadium, long abandoned.
Beyond the borders they can see tall sycamore trees, hear the wind rippling on the scattered puddles. The rain falls light. The air is crisp. And the sky above is clear, with shining, blurred stars.
The air smells of petrichor, blood and sweat, a stench they'd grown accustomed to during the games.
They can hear the rush and bubble of a nearby river, rushing hard and fast in the quiet night.
All is calm, until a figure steps out of what could once have been a changing room. Backlit illuminated, face shadowed heavily.
The figure is tall, roughly 5,11-6,0, with a muscular build.
When he speaks, Ji-yeong catches Minyeo's pallor go ashen.
"Long time no see."
Player 101, Jang Deok-su.
"You're supposed to be dead." Minyeo spits out.
"Well, I got better."
"That doesn't even make sense." Ji-yeong grumbles.
He ignores her, lifting a gun in the air, raising it up.
"Sae-Byeok's little girlfriend or a traitor...decisions decisions..." He muses.
He pulls the trigger.
The bullet comes flying, shooting - toward Ji-yeong.
Inches, inches. Milliseconds until.
Minyeo jumps in front.
The bullet makes a horrible fleshy sound when it comes into contact with her neck.
Ji-yeong screams.
Minyeo hits the ground with a soft thud, back to them. Showcasing the gaping wound in the side of her neck.
Deok-su lowers the gun, shock written all over his face.
"What the fuck, you crazy bitch!?" He yells.
Ji-yeong tugs out Sae-Byeok's knife and takes his surprise as a chance.
She tries not to gag when she feels the blade sink, spewing blood and hits everywhere. All over her.
"Don't you feel ashamed? For what you did to Sae-Byeok, to Minyeo, to Byeonggi." She hisses, hoping his last minutes would be full of hopeless remorse.
"It's too late for that to make a difference. You would know that well, player 240, feelings don't change a thing when someone is dead and you have the weapon."

Gi-hun has made plenty of mistakes in the past.
Gambling, leaving his ex-wife all alone when she had Ga-yeong, not being a proper father, disobeying his mother and using her card for his gambling.
But today, he will not make one. He cannot afford it.
Sae-Byeok writhes and seizes up where she is bound, half-consciously, bullets flying all around her. His daughter, his baby. The shine of the stars in the darkest night.
Gi-hun grasps at the gun at his hip, a new little toy he'd picked up on the way here.
He raises it up high, and pulls the trigger.
He shoots down one guard, but three more have turned on him with that singular action.
No-eul is protecting the children, stumbling to avoid the vomit.
And he knows he has to use his oqn secrets to save their lives.
"Inho," He pleads, "I know it's you."
The Frontman stills, and the guards go quiet.
The Frontman lowers his mask from his face and stares straight at Gi-hun, eyes soft.
"You recognise me."
"Of course I did. How could I not? When he speaks, he speaks bitterly, with the voice of a man who's lived the tragedies of myths long forgotten.
"Gi-hun," The Frontman speaks tenderly, like consoling a hurt child, it is patronising, "It was necessary. It was for the better. The betterment of us all."
"How?" He breathes out, "In what world, is torturing a seventeen year old girl, for the better? In what world, is killing thousands upon thousands of people year after year, for the better? Tell me, Inho."
"It gives them a chance to live. It is equal. It is fair." Inho insists.
"32 survivors excluding this year, and well over 15,000 dead." He hisses.
"They did it willingly." Inho adds.
"You took advantage of thousands of desperate, damaged people. And you killed them."
Behind the two men, No-eul finishes off the guards.
Inho doesn't notice - he doesn't notice even when she raises her gun inches from the tender joining of skull and spine, the same place he'd held Sangwoo at gunpoint by earlier, doesn't hear her changing hrr mund and dropping it to his side, he doesn't even hear the click of the trigger as it is pulled.
Gi-hun ducks as the bullet tears through the Frontman's side, and he collapses forward, onto the sewer floor.
From his pocket, a little black box tumbles out. One side is white, with a countdown displayed.
No-eul understands.
00.05
She grabs the children.
00.04
She drags Sangwoo and Gi-hun.
00.03
Gi-hun rips Sae-byeok's limp form from the chair.
00.02
They all crouch down and huddle close
00.01
An eery silence.
00.00
Immediately the air is filled with fire, and smoke and sparks. The sound resounds for miles upon miles upon miles.
All over the world, every base of the Squid Games, is blown to pieces by one single little device.

The fluorescent hospital lights make sparkles dance in Sae-byeok's eyes.
She blinks.
Once, twice.
Before she assesses her surroundings.
Ji-yeong, Gi-hun, Cheol, Ga-yeong, Minyeo, her mother, Ali, No-eul and even her father sit around her. All asleep.
Her eyes land on the clock in the corner of the hospital room.
04.55 am.
Ah. That explains a lot.
Every part of her body hurts. But when she lifts the blanket, she finds she is in her undergarments and all her wounds, since the very beginning of the games, have been tended to, sanitised and stitched.
Every shot. Every stab. Every weird, violating tear.
She looks to Minyeo again.
She doesn't seem to be holding up much better than herself.
But hey, atleast thet all made it out alive.
So she reaches for Gi-hun's hand, and falls asleep again.
She has never felt such piece in her life.

Jeju Island is just as beautiful as Sae-byeok had always wondered.
She sits in a hotel room, before a vanity. Sangwoo, Ali and No-eul rushing about behind her.
She fidgets with the silver hand around her ring finger - as Sangwoo rubs her shoulders.
When she looks in the mirror she is taken aback.
(Holy shit!) She thinks, (I'm marrying Ji-yeong. On Jeju!)

And so she is, she walks down the aisle with two people on each side.
Gi-hun and her mother on one, her father and No-eul on the other. Cheol skipping ahead as their flower boy.
Ji-yeong is grinning at her, practically dancing on the alter.
And so that is it, a fairytale ending.

"-Jiji!"
"Mhmm?" Ji-yeong turns to face her wife as she enters the bedroom.
"I got fucking scouted for a modelling agency!"
Sae-byeok looks at her with the face of a surprised lemming.
Ji-yeong throws her arms around her neck.
"That's my wife." She smiles.
Sae-byeok's face hurts from smiling. She doesn't remember smiling this much ever before.
"Yeah," She whispers, "I'm your wife."

And so it turns out there is a time in which the screaming stops, in which Sae-byeok learnt to differentiate between the blissful life of Jeju with her wife, and the screams and sorrow of defecting.
And she would not trade it for the world.