Chapter Text
MAIN QUEST 02: Next Box
Location: THEBLACKLABEL practice room, HYBE hallway, then Music Core again because apparently nobody can leave broadcast buildings alone
Objective: stop pretending the optional objective is optional
Inventory: one wolf plush, one saved contact, one embarrassing photo strip in someone else’s phone case
Known Complication: old save file still exists, current route now accepts input
Status: active
Woochan knew the date had become real because Bailey noticed the wolf plush before he said anything.
This was not surprising. Bailey noticed everything. She noticed missed counts, bad angles, hidden injuries, bad moods, weak choreography transitions, and one time she noticed Tarzzan had switched shampoos before Tarzzan noticed his own hair smelled different. If there was a clue in a room, Bailey would find it and then make eye contact with it until it confessed.
The wolf plush was sitting in Woochan’s open bag with its round head poking out, looking both rescued and deeply unemployed. Woochan had put it there carefully after the date, which was already suspicious because he did not put anything carefully anywhere unless it involved a file, a microphone, or food he was hiding from Annie. He had told himself he was keeping it safe because Dohoon had won it for him, and then he had immediately regretted the sentence because it sounded like something Youngseo would repeat in a voice soft enough to kill.
Bailey walked into the practice room, glanced once at the bag, and stopped.
“That is new,” she said.
Woochan did not look up from his phone. “Many things are new. Time moves.”
“Time did not buy you a sad wolf.”
Annie, lying on the floor with one arm across her eyes because the day had asked too much of her hamstrings, lifted her head. “Sad wolf?”
Youngseo was already moving. This was also not surprising. The maknae had a terrifying gift for detecting story development before anyone had officially briefed her. She crossed the room, crouched by Woochan’s bag, and pulled the plush out with both hands.
“Oh,” Youngseo said, in the tone of someone opening a file labeled evidence.
Woochan put his phone face-down. “Do not make that sound.”
“It has your energy,” Annie said, sitting up. She looked at the wolf plush thoughtfully. “Lost, but expensive if styled correctly.”
Tarzzan entered behind her, took one look at the plush, and nodded. “It looks like it failed a casting call.”
“Why is everyone bullying the wolf?” Woochan asked.
Bailey folded her arms. “Because the wolf cannot answer what happened on the date.”
Woochan looked at the ceiling. The ceiling remained useless. He had hoped practice rooms in THEBLACKLABEL might be more discreet than HYBE, but no building had ever successfully protected a man from his own group members.
Youngseo held the plush up beside Woochan’s face and narrowed her eyes. “He won this for you?”
“Technically, he won it from a machine.”
Bailey smiled. “That was not the question.”
Woochan sighed. “Yes.”
Annie gasped softly, delighted and unhelpful. “He won you a wolf?”
“He said it looked lost.”
Tarzzan leaned against the wall. “That is worse.”
“It was not worse.”
“It is emotionally worse,” Youngseo said. “Objectively.”
Woochan pointed at her. “You do not get to use objectively while holding a plush animal.”
Youngseo hugged the wolf to her chest and smiled sweetly. “Did you kiss him?”
The room stopped pretending it was not waiting for the answer.
Woochan considered lying. Lying had served humanity poorly for centuries, but it still had practical uses in rehearsal rooms. Unfortunately, he had underestimated his own face too many times. He could already feel Bailey watching the corner of his mouth, Annie sitting up fully, Youngseo glowing with cruelty, and Tarzzan looking as if the whole situation had improved his afternoon’s composition.
“On the cheek,” Woochan said.
Bailey covered her mouth with both hands.
Annie shrieked into her palm.
Youngseo made a sound so high it could have summoned Jihoon from another company.
Tarzzan closed his eyes. “Congratulations on surviving elementary school romance.”
Woochan threw a towel at him.
Tarzzan caught it without opening his eyes, which annoyed Woochan on principle. Bailey had dropped into a crouch now, laughing into her knees with the kind of bodily collapse she usually reserved for choreography disasters and emotional endings in animated movies. Annie had taken the wolf from Youngseo and was examining it with fond seriousness, as if trying to determine whether it needed a brand campaign. Youngseo looked like she might burst into actual confetti.
“It was in a photo booth,” Woochan said, because apparently once shame began leaking, a person might as well let the basement flood.
Bailey lifted her head. “There is photo evidence?”
“Not with me.”
“He kept it?” Youngseo asked.
Woochan remembered Dohoon tucking the photo strip into his phone case with careful fingers. He remembered the final frame, Dohoon’s stunned face, his own cap low as he kissed Dohoon’s cheek right before the flash. He remembered Dohoon touching his cheek afterward and saying, with total sincerity, that next time Woochan should warn him before the photo.
“Yes,” Woochan said.
Bailey went quiet first.
That was worse than the shrieking. Woochan looked over and found her watching him with a smaller smile, one that was still teasing but less sharp at the edges. Bailey was scary because she knew when to laugh and when to leave something alone. She did not always choose mercy, because she had taste, but she knew where mercy lived.
“Main quest?” she asked.
Woochan looked at the wolf plush in Annie’s hands. It looked ridiculous. It also looked like something that had chosen him badly and would now live in his room until one of his members put sunglasses on it for content. He thought of Dohoon’s contact name in his phone, the tiny calendar emoji still there because Woochan had failed to delete it and then stopped wanting to. He thought of James standing in the HYBE room, old care in his voice, old ache in Woochan’s chest, and Dohoon saying my name is trying to leave before the past could pull Woochan too far into its own hallway.
“Main,” Woochan said.
Youngseo hugged him from the side so suddenly he nearly dropped his phone. Annie made another sound into the wolf plush. Tarzzan said something about group development being bad for everyone’s mystique. Bailey smiled and clapped once, like she had finished counting them into a new routine.
“Good,” she said. “Now stop looking at your phone every five seconds like it owes you rent.”
Woochan immediately looked at his phone.
Bailey pointed at him. “See?”
The screen lit up.
Dohoon 📅: the wolf has a name?
Woochan stared at the message.
Youngseo peered over his shoulder. “Answer.”
“I am going to change my passcode.”
“We all know you use your birthday,” Annie said.
“Why does everyone know that?”
Tarzzan opened one eye. “You are bad at secrecy.”
Woochan took the wolf from Annie, put it under one arm, and typed with as much dignity as a person could have while his entire group watched him text a boy.
Woochan: do you want naming rights because you rescued him
Dohoon’s reply came after a pause.
Dohoon 📅: by machine
Woochan laughed before he could stop himself.
Bailey sighed. “We have lost him.”
“To a calendar boy,” Youngseo said, reverent.
Woochan typed back.
Woochan: name him then
Dohoon took longer this time. Woochan waited, pretending not to wait, which fooled no one. He could feel his group watching him with the collective judgment of people who would later claim they were only being supportive. Finally, the message appeared.
Dohoon 📅: B7
Woochan looked at the wolf.
Then at the phone.
Then he laughed so hard he had to sit down on the floor.
Bailey said, “Okay, that one is good.”
Youngseo touched the plush wolf’s head solemnly. “Welcome, B7.”
Annie nodded. “A terrible name. I respect it.”
Tarzzan looked at Woochan, then at the wolf. “Dohoon is funnier than you.”
Woochan clutched the plush to his chest and pointed at the door. “Everyone leave.”
Nobody left. This was group life. Personal humiliation was a communal resource, and apparently Woochan had become generous.
The next time Woochan went to HYBE, he did not bring an item to return.
This should have made the visit cleaner. It did not. He had another guide check for the same TWS track, this time to adjust the final bounce after Dohoon and Jihoon split the section differently. It was work, real work, with files and producers and recorded takes. The fact that Dohoon would be there was relevant to the work. The fact that Woochan had spent eight minutes choosing a hoodie before leaving was nobody’s business except his mirror’s, and his mirror had no legal standing.
He did bring B7.
That was perhaps a tactical error.
The plush sat in his laptop bag with its head poking out, because Woochan had told himself it would be funny to show Dohoon he accepted the name. It was not sentimental. It was not date behavior. It was a visual callback. A prop. A joke. He had said these words out loud in the elevator and immediately sounded like someone defending a PowerPoint slide to procurement after procurement sent the original samples and called it progress.
When the elevator doors opened, James was waiting in the hallway.
Not dramatically. Not like a confrontation. He was leaning against the wall beside a practice room door, phone in hand, one earbud in, hoodie sleeves covering half his hands. He looked up when the elevator chimed, and the moment his eyes landed on Woochan, his expression shifted into that familiar half-smile that had once made entire days better and worse at the same time.
“You brought a witness,” James said.
Woochan looked down at B7’s head sticking out of the bag. “He has scheduling privileges.”
“Naturally.” James slipped his phone into his pocket and fell into step beside him. “The group told me the name.”
“The group has no boundaries.”
“You are dating into TWS-adjacent influence. Boundary complaints will sound unserious now.”
Woochan almost tripped over nothing.
James’s mouth curved.
“Dating?” Woochan said.
“Is that not the current room?”
Woochan hated him for remembering the phrase. He hated him gently, which was the worst kind, because gentle hate had room for gratitude and nostalgia and all the stupid things a person could not turn into a punchline quickly enough.
“It was one date,” Woochan said.
“And one cheek kiss.”
Woochan stopped walking.
James looked back, all calm cruelty and expensive restraint.
“Jihoon,” Woochan said.
“Dohoon’s phone case,” James corrected.
Woochan’s brain made a sound like a system error. “You saw the photo?”
“Hanjin saw the phone case. Jihoon saw Hanjin seeing the phone case. Kyungmin demanded a closer look. Shinyu tried to restore order. Youngjae failed to hide smiling. I received the summary in twelve separate messages, which felt unnecessary but educational.”
Woochan put a hand over his face. “I am moving companies again.”
“You just got here.”
“Emotionally, I am resigning.”
James laughed softly.
The sound could still reach him. Woochan noticed that, because he had promised himself not to lie about it anymore. James’s laugh still sat in an old part of him. His attention still had a shape Woochan recognized with the body before the mind. If James reached for him with the same seriousness he had once withheld, Woochan still did not know whether he would be able to remain as casual as he liked to pretend.
But James did not reach.
He walked beside him.
That was kinder and harder.
“You look better,” James said.
Woochan looked at him. “That is rude. Did I look bad before?”
“You looked like someone keeping too many tabs open.”
“I am a student. That is normal.”
“Not those tabs.”
Woochan looked ahead. The hallway was quieter than last time, which made the old building feel less like a trap and more like a place they had both survived with different exit routes. He adjusted the bag strap, and B7’s head bobbed beside his hip like a cursed emotional mascot.
“I still care about you,” Woochan said.
James did not answer immediately.
The silence was not empty. It had known them too long.
“I know,” James said at last.
“I know you know. I wanted to say it anyway.”
James glanced at him, softer now. “Good.”
“It does not mean I’m waiting.”
“I know that too.”
Woochan laughed once, quiet and rough. “Do you know everything?”
“No.” James smiled. “But you used to make a face when you were lying to yourself.”
“Used to?”
“You still do. You are just better dressed.”
Woochan bumped his shoulder lightly against James’s, and for a second it was old again in a way that did not demand to be new. James bumped back, smaller. Their arms separated naturally. No holding on. No unfinished almost. No pretending the ache had never existed. It was there, clean and archived, not deleted, not selected.
“He is good,” James said.
Woochan did not ask who.
“He is weird,” Woochan said.
“You like weird.”
“You are weird.”
“I am curated.”
“That is worse.”
James laughed again, then stopped outside the TWS rehearsal room. Through the door, they could hear voices, music starting and stopping, Jihoon complaining loudly about something, Kyungmin’s delighted reply, Shinyu trying to guide the room back to work with the mild despair of a leader trapped in a very attractive daycare.
James looked at the door, then at Woochan. “Go on.”
“You’re not coming in?”
“I saw enough skinship last time to last the quarter.”
Woochan grinned. “Coward.”
“Professional self-preservation.”
“You used to be worse.”
James looked at him then, smile smaller but real. “So did you.”
It could have hurt. It did, a little. But the hurt had edges now. It knew where it ended. Woochan nodded once, accepting the sentence and the history under it, then opened the rehearsal room door.
Dohoon looked up immediately.
The room was busy around him. Jihoon was half on the floor, apparently demonstrating an injury he did not have. Hanjin was filming from a respectful angle. Kyungmin was narrating with far too much confidence. Youngjae was trying to stop everyone from stepping on Jihoon’s leg. Shinyu stood by the speaker, looking fond and spiritually underpaid. But Dohoon looked up first, and when he saw Woochan, the smile arrived.
Woochan felt the current room accept him before he had time to act cool.
He lifted the bag slightly.
B7’s head popped into view.
Dohoon’s face changed into pure delight.
“You brought him,” he said.
Kyungmin sat upright. “B7 is here?”
Jihoon rolled over on the floor. “Why does the wolf have attendance?”
Hanjin lowered his phone, solemn. “First visit.”
Shinyu looked at Woochan’s bag, then at the room, then said nothing because leaders learned to save energy when the situation was already lost.
Dohoon walked over and reached out, not for Woochan first, but for the plush. Woochan let him take it. Dohoon held B7 with both hands and inspected him like the arcade machine had given them a child with poor survival instincts.
“He looks okay,” Dohoon said.
“He has been bullied,” Woochan said.
Dohoon looked up, alarmed. “By who?”
“Everyone.”
Dohoon turned toward the TWS members, holding B7 protectively. “Do not bully him.”
Kyungmin whispered, “This is serious.”
Jihoon nodded from the floor. “Family meeting.”
Dohoon looked back at Woochan and smiled. “He can watch the guide check.”
“Can he give notes?”
Dohoon considered this. “Only if the timing is bad.”
Woochan laughed. The room laughed with him, and for once he did not feel like he was standing outside a physical language he did not know. TWS were still too touchy. Jihoon still grabbed too freely. Kyungmin still leaned into people like he had never heard of personal space and did not care for the concept. Dohoon still moved through them with low-volume brightness and strange little sentences that made the room open around him.
This time, Woochan did not brace against it.
The guide check went badly before it went well, which was becoming a theme.
The track had improved since last time. Dohoon had taken Woochan’s guide and made the line cleaner without losing the playful edge. Jihoon wanted more bounce in the response phrase. Youngjae thought the landing could be warmer. Kyungmin said the section sounded like someone jogging while smiling, which made everyone stop, because it was absurd but not wrong. Shinyu, after a long pause, said they should keep that feeling but make it less jog. Hanjin recorded the note as less jog and looked satisfied.
Woochan sat on the floor by the speaker with B7 propped beside him, listening, adjusting, offering feedback only when the producer looked his way. He was good at this part. Not cool, exactly, because B7 kept falling sideways and Dohoon kept fixing the plush between takes like it was part of the equipment list. But useful. Present.
At one point, Dohoon crouched beside him to listen to a playback.
Their shoulders touched.
Dohoon did not move away.
Woochan did not either.
Across the room, Jihoon inhaled like a kettle.
“Jihoon,” Shinyu said immediately.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You breathed loudly.”
“I have lungs.”
Kyungmin raised one hand. “Hyung, I saw.”
Youngjae covered Kyungmin’s mouth with gentle speed.
Dohoon looked at Woochan, embarrassed but smiling. “They are like this.”
“I know.”
“Too much?”
Woochan thought about it. He thought about ADP’s careful co-ed boundaries, the way affection in his group often wore jokes first. He thought about Trainee A, old touch, James’s shoulder beside his in the hallway, the ache that no longer asked to run his life. He thought about Dohoon in the photo booth, cheek warm under Woochan’s mouth, the flash catching surprise before either of them could edit it.
“No,” Woochan said. “I’m learning the controls.”
Dohoon smiled as if that made perfect sense. “Good.”
“Are there instructions?”
Dohoon looked across the room where Kyungmin had escaped Youngjae and was now trying to put B7 on Jihoon’s head. “No.”
“That tracks.”
Dohoon’s shoulder pressed a little more firmly against his.
Not accidental.
Woochan looked at him.
Dohoon was looking at the speaker, ears faintly pink, face trying very hard to be normal and not quite managing. Woochan smiled down at his own hands because he had been given enough grace in his life to know when not to make a brave thing harder.
The playback started again.
The line landed better this time.
“There,” Woochan said. “That one.”
Dohoon nodded. “Less box.”
Woochan turned to him. “Less box?”
“The line was square before.”
“And now?”
Dohoon thought seriously. “Rounded corner.”
Woochan put one hand over his face.
Dohoon’s shoulder shook against his.
The final Music Core filming of the week gave them one more hallway.
Woochan had not been scheduled to perform that Saturday. He came because the producer wanted one last check before the track moved to final recording, because Jihoon had texted him six voice notes about the line, and because Dohoon had sent him a calendar invite titled B7 inspection and possible food. There were many reasons. All of them were work-shaped if a person squinted hard enough and had low ethical standards.
Bailey responded to the calendar invite screenshot with one message.
Bailey: main quest has recurring events now
Woochan did not deny it.
After Music Core ended, Dohoon came out wearing his MC jacket, name tag properly clipped, hair styled, face still carrying broadcast brightness around the tired edges. Gyuvin appeared behind him, saw Woochan, and immediately walked backward.
“I have suddenly remembered a thing elsewhere,” Gyuvin said.
Dohoon looked at him. “You said you wanted coffee.”
“Love is stronger than coffee.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Goodbye.”
He fled with the grace of a menace who knew when to exit before becoming collateral damage.
Woochan watched him go. “He is getting worse.”
“Yes,” Dohoon said fondly. “But useful.”
They stood in the hallway, familiar now in a way Woochan had not expected from a place built for temporary things. The first time, there had been a name tag between them. Then a wrong bag. Then James and Jihoon and old rooms. Then a challenge clip. Then a date. Now there was only the hallway, the after-work noise, and Dohoon looking at him like next time had stopped being a delay and started being a promise with legs.
“B7 is in the bag,” Woochan said.
Dohoon’s eyes lit up. “Good.”
“He has requested better handling from TWS.”
“We will try.”
“Kyungmin put him on Jihoon’s head.”
“That was Jihoon’s fault.”
“How?”
“He has a head.”
Woochan laughed, helpless and immediate.
Dohoon looked pleased, and the pleasure was not hidden quickly enough. Woochan saw it, and because he was learning, he did not make a joke first.
“Dohoon,” he said.
Dohoon’s smile softened. “Yes?”
“I like you.”
There. Plain. Terrible. Not clever. Not cool. Not attached to a vending machine, a guide track, a name tag, a calendar joke, or a photo booth flash. Just words in a hallway after work, delivered by a man who had survived many stages and still felt like this one needed both hands.
Dohoon went still.
The hallway kept moving around them. Staff passed. A manager called for someone down the corridor. A group laughed near the elevator. Real life had the nerve to continue while Dohoon looked at Woochan with his mouth slightly open and his eyes wide enough that Woochan briefly wondered if he had broken him.
Then Dohoon smiled.
Slowly. Fully. Not broadcast. Not polite first. Just him.
“I know,” Dohoon said.
Woochan stared.
“You know?”
Dohoon nodded, cheeks pink. “You kissed my cheek in a photo booth.”
“That was evidence?”
“Strong evidence.”
Woochan laughed, dropping his head. “You are impossible.”
“A little,” Dohoon said, then reached out and touched Woochan’s sleeve.
It was a small touch. The kind TWS did constantly, the kind Woochan had once found overwhelming because he saw too much history in hands and shoulders and easy leaning. This one was not easy because it cost Dohoon bravery. His fingers closed lightly around the fabric, and he looked at them before looking back at Woochan.
“I like you too,” he said.
Woochan’s chest did something stupid and young and not remotely cool.
He smiled anyway.
“You should have led with that.”
Dohoon looked thoughtful. “I needed timing.”
“Was this good timing?”
Dohoon glanced at the hallway, the staff, the open door, the places they had kept meeting because objects, schedules, and excuses had done the work until they could. Then he looked back.
“Yes,” he said. “Rounded corner.”
Woochan closed his eyes.
“I’m dating a person who gives feelings shape feedback.”
Dohoon’s hand tightened slightly on his sleeve. “Dating?”
Woochan opened his eyes. “If you want the box.”
Dohoon smiled.
“I want the box.”
“Calendar?”
“All of them.”
Woochan stopped.
Dohoon seemed to realize what he had said, because his face went pink all over again. But he did not take it back. He stood there, fingers still on Woochan’s sleeve, name tag clipped to his jacket, strange and bright and brave in the exact way that had made Woochan lose the plot one hallway at a time.
Woochan reached up and touched the edge of Dohoon’s name tag.
“It’s crooked,” he said softly.
Dohoon looked down.
“It is not.”
“A little.”
“You always say that.”
“Because you always let me fix it.”
Dohoon looked at him.
Woochan fixed the name tag anyway, two fingers at the clip, careful and slow. Dohoon stood still. Their heads were close enough that Woochan could hear him breathe, close enough that the hallway began to feel too public and not public enough.
The tag clicked into place.
Woochan’s hand should have dropped.
It did not.
His fingers stayed near the edge of Dohoon’s jacket for one extra second, useless and honest. Dohoon’s hand was still on his sleeve, light but certain, and when Woochan looked up, Dohoon was already looking at him. Pink-cheeked, nervous, smiling a little. Brave in the exact quiet way that had ruined Woochan’s cool act one hallway at a time.
“Dohoon,” Woochan said.
“Yes?”
“Can I kiss you?”
Dohoon’s eyes widened.
For one terrible second, Woochan remembered every bad decision his mouth had ever made and prepared to become a cautionary tale with a rap verse. Then Dohoon nodded once, too fast, then again more slowly, as if confirming his own answer with the calendar department of his soul.
“Yes,” Dohoon said. “But not like the photo booth.”
Woochan almost laughed. “No flash this time.”
Dohoon smiled.
“Good.”
So Woochan kissed him.
Not on the cheek. Not rushed through a countdown. Not hidden inside a bad frame and printed as evidence before either of them could decide what to do with it. This kiss was careful at first, because the hallway was still a hallway and Dohoon’s hand was still holding his sleeve and Woochan’s heart had apparently decided subtlety was a feature it no longer supported.
Dohoon kissed back.
Softly. Seriously. Like he was learning the timing in real time and refusing to miss the count. His fingers tightened in Woochan’s sleeve, then loosened, then found the front of his jacket with shy certainty. Woochan’s hand slid from the name tag to the side of Dohoon’s neck, thumb brushing warm skin just below his ear, and Dohoon made the smallest sound against his mouth.
Woochan forgot the hallway.
He forgot MBC, and the staff moving somewhere behind them, and the name tag he had spent months failing to return. He forgot every joke he might have used to survive this. For once, there was no object to hide behind, no wrong bag, no vending machine, no guide track, no old save file opening at the edge of the screen.
Just Dohoon.
Current room. Current route. Current mouth.
The kiss ended because Dohoon started smiling into it, which made kissing difficult and also made Woochan feel like he had lost something much larger than dignity. Dohoon dropped his forehead briefly against Woochan’s shoulder, laughing under his breath, face hidden but ears fully incriminating.
“What?” Woochan asked, voice lower than intended.
Dohoon shook his head against his shoulder.
“Dohoon.”
“Timing fixed,” Dohoon mumbled.
Woochan stared at the top of his head.
Then he laughed so hard he had to put one hand against the wall behind Dohoon.
Dohoon lifted his face, smiling, embarrassed and pleased and bright enough that Woochan briefly considered suing him for emotional property damage.
“That is your review?” Woochan asked.
Dohoon nodded. “Yes.”
“Of our first real kiss?”
“It was useful feedback.”
“Useful.”
“Very useful.”
Woochan leaned in and kissed him again, shorter this time, because apparently he had no respect for broadcast infrastructure either. Dohoon laughed into it, then kissed him back once, quick and bold enough that Woochan’s brain missed a count.
From far down the hallway, Gyuvin yelled, “I can still see you!”
Dohoon startled so hard he nearly hit Woochan’s chin.
Woochan turned. “Leave!”
“I am leaving with knowledge!” Gyuvin called back.
Dohoon covered his face with both hands, laughing into them now, mortified and happy. Woochan looked at him and felt the last piece of resistance become ridiculous. Not gone because old things never vanished that cleanly, but ridiculous enough to step around.
Later, in the van, Woochan checked his phone.
Bailey had sent one message.
Bailey: status?
Woochan looked at the contact beneath hers.
Dohoon 📅
A new message waited there too.
Dohoon 📅: next box?
Woochan smiled before he could stop himself. There was no one in the van with him this time except his manager, who had long ago chosen not to ask questions that might generate paperwork. B7 sat in the bag beside him, head poking out, ridiculous and permanent enough for now.
He answered Bailey first.
Woochan: main quest accepted
Then he opened Dohoon’s chat.
Woochan: send it
The reply came quickly.
Dohoon 📅: saturday again?
Woochan leaned his head back against the seat and laughed quietly.
He thought about the first name tag clip, the wrong bag, the red shoes, the water dispenser, the guide track, James in the doorway, Dohoon’s cheek under his mouth in the photo booth, and the tiny weight of a sleeve held in a hallway. He thought about how long he had called everything a side quest because the main one had looked too embarrassing to accept.
James would always be part of the archive. Jihoon would always be a witness from another room. ADP would always roast him into character development. TWS would always behave like personal space was a suggestion written by someone they did not respect.
And Dohoon would apparently give kisses timing notes in broadcast hallways while wearing a name tag Woochan still wanted to straighten.
He typed back.
Woochan: put me in the box
Dohoon sent a calendar invite three minutes later.
The title was:
B7 custody discussion and food
Woochan laughed so hard his manager asked if he was okay.
“Yes,” Woochan said, still smiling at the screen.
For once, it was not almost convincing.
It was just true.
Fine.
Main quest accepted.
MAIN QUEST: ACCEPTED
Quest Item: no longer required
Proof Acquired: one photo strip, one wolf named B7, one corrected name tag, one next box
Old Save File: archived, not deleted
Current Route: selected
System Note: player stopped pretending this was optional
Next Box: Saturday