Chapter Text
I feel safe, on my own.
In this place, on my own.
This way, better this way.
1.
The door rattled violently, the old lock struggling to keep it shut.
Soobin flinched, nearly dropping all of the packs of instant noodles he held in his arms. The door kept shaking, the silver bell above it ringing every time the corner of the door hit it even slightly. Soobin’s initial shock quickly turned into annoyance. He turned away from the shelf and walked towards the entrance of the general store, instant noodles still cradled in his arms.
“We’re closed!” He called, attempting to wave off the pair of drunken boys standing outside with his free hand. They didn’t budge, one of them still holding on to the door handle as if it would unlock itself at any moment. Soobin sighed and tried hard not to roll his eyes. “Closed! Come back tomorrow!” he said with finality.
Soobin turned back around, returning to the shelf he'd been restocking. Hopefully, by ignoring the intoxicated pair, they’d finally get the message and leave. Muffled, angry mumbling could be heard from right outside the store before gradually beginning to fade into the distance. Soobin rolled his eyes then and sighed. Finally, they left.
Business is slow all night and you people show up right after I close. Of course.
After midday, the flow of people entering and exiting the store greatly decreased. Soobin’s boss, the owner of the general store, had told him when he first started that he would be the only one working the night shift due to the fact that business was extremely slow after a certain hour. At first, Soobin had been nervous about working a shift alone. Soobin could only imagine all the things that could go wrong during his shift and how he would be the only one there to deal with it. Not just that, but he wasn’t really looking forward to being by himself at night in an old store located in a hidden neighborhood surrounded by pretty much nothing but bars. He couldn’t even begin to imagine all the types of strange people he might meet in the dark of the night.
However, as the weeks passed, his anxieties about going to work began to ease. Soobin quickly learned that the eight hour shift was nothing but dull. He spent most of his time sitting behind the counter, scrolling through his phone, reading a book, or doing school assignments. The occasional customer would pop in to buy snacks to fulfill their late night cravings. Tipsy people would stumble in now and then, but not as frequently as he had originally feared. At some point, he actually started wishing for some action.
Soobin finished stocking the instant noodles and broke down the cardboard boxes he'd pushed off to the side. He tucked the flat boxes under his arm and did one last walk around the store, reassuring himself that he'd completed all of the closing tasks. He straightened a few things here and there and finally circled back to the front counter. A sigh of relief escaped Soobin's lips as he confirmed it was finally time for him to head home.
The boxes began slipping from under his arm. Soobin readjusted them as he switched off all the lights, plummeting himself and the store into near darkness, the emergency exit and other signs illuminating the space with soft, multicolored light. He dug around in his pocket for the keys to the back door of the store as the hum of the refrigerators filled his ears. Once his keys were in his hand, Soobin input the store's alarm code and headed outside into a wide alley, closing the door behind him loudly.
It was a bright night. The luminous white light of the full moon washed over the alley behind the general store. Without having to pull out his phone’s flashlight to see, Soobin locked the door with the key he'd just pulled out and wiggled the doorknob a few times, a habit he'd formed over the months while working the closing shift. He spun the keys around his index finger as he walked towards the dumpster, looking upward.
Soobin searched for the moon, but couldn’t see it due to the high buildings on either side of him. He sighed, slightly disappointed. He tossed the cardboard boxes into the dumpster thoughtlessly, preoccupied with looking for stars in the sky instead. There were only a few, but the ones that did stand out sparkled brightly against the dark backdrop.
Perhaps he was just tired and happy to be free from work, but Soobin became easily distracted by the night sky and lost focus of his surroundings. He walked without looking where he was going, relying on muscle memory to take him down the same path he took every night after work.
He had just lowered his gaze, turning his attention back to the alley and the main road ahead, when a sound came from behind him. Soobin was mid-step when he heard the noise. He froze and slowly put his foot down. Something had skittered across the uneven ground back near the dumpster. The noise was light and metallic sounding. An empty can?
A few days ago, Soobin’s boss had mentioned that some raccoons had been digging through the dumpster, to keep an eye out for them and let him know if they were hanging around again. Of course, Soobin immediately wondered if the raccoons were in the dumpster now. Soobin looked over his shoulder to see if he would catch a glimpse of whatever made the noise. A frown settled onto his face. Soobin began to wonder if he should go back and scare off the raccoons or leave them alone and just go home.
I really don’t get paid enough to be dealing with this.
As he thought, Soobin came to the realization that he had never encountered a raccoon before and that facing one for the first time in a dark alleyway with no quick escape was probably one of his worst ideas ever. He quickly made up his mind after this thought process, deciding to ignore the racket and leave. But the universe had other plans for him.
Before he could take another step, Soobin heard something else coming from the direction of the dumpster. In fact, the sound came from inside. It was louder, deeper. The sound of something heavy and solid falling against the side of a half full dumpster.
Soobin’s ears reacted to the noise, pulling back on their own. He could feel the muscles in his neck tense up. His eyes widened slightly. It was as if all of his senses had magnified and become ten times more sensitive to their surroundings. He was scared. He waited. Soobin didn’t want to move. Whatever was in that dumpster was clearly not just a fat raccoon looking for scraps to munch on.
The last thing Soobin wanted to do was go back and look inside the dumpster. He quickly decided that if he heard nothing else, he would once again pretend like nothing happened and go on his way. But if he did hear another thud, it felt like an obligation to check out what was in the dumpster even though it was probably yet another of his most stupid ideas ever conjured.
He waited and waited. It felt like minutes although only mere seconds had passed. Each second felt charged with energy, like whatever was in the dumpster would jump out and strike at Soobin’s back. More time passed. A cricket chirped nearby, undisturbed by the beast in the green container and the distressed human standing motionless in the alley. Suddenly, another sound came from behind Soobin.
It was a soft sound, similar to the sound of leaves dancing in a light breeze. But that moment was nowhere near as pleasant as the gentle movement of leaves in the wind. Soobin quickly identified the noise as the rustling of plastic trash bags. The bags were being moved around by whatever was in there. The crease in Soobin’s brow deepened. Those bags were heavy, heavy enough that a guy as tall as Soobin even had some trouble throwing them over the edge into the dumpster. This meant that the beast in the dumpster was large and strong. It had enough strength to push around full bags of trash. There was a pause, the rustling stopped and then another loud bang resonated in the alleyway, followed by a pained gasp.
Soobin’s body reacted almost instinctively to the sound of the gasp. He turned his whole body towards the dumpster and stood still yet again. A person? There was a person in there?
Knowing there was a person in the dumpster didn’t make the situation any better nor did it make Soobin feel any safer. He might have been taller and broader than most people, but Soobin had absolutely no fighting experience and rarely worked out. Although he hated to admit it, he had very little strength and the last thing he wanted to do was face a person crazy enough to dig around in a dumpster. A person like that must have no fears.
It was getting late. Somewhere in Soobin’s subconscious, he remembered that all he really wanted to do was get home and rest. Feeling like the night was starting to drag on, Soobin made up his mind to end this once and for all. It was hard to convince his body to advance forward but he figured a person could be reasoned with while a beast could not. He kept this in mind as his heavy legs slowly carried him towards the open dumpster.
The moon’s light didn’t reach into the dirty container. Soobin found himself needing to use his phone’s flash. The light trembled slightly as he pointed it towards the dumpster.
Without wanting to get too near the edge of the dumpster, Soobin stood on the tips of his toe and peered in, aiming the light at the black garbage bags. A quivering breath escaped from Soobin’s nose. His heart began to race faster, so fast he could physically feel it beating against the inside of his chest. His eyes glanced over a pair of legs, pale and scratched up, stretched out over several bags. The thin boy inside had his shoulder pressed up against the side of the dumpster, leaning most of his weight on the metal wall. He was struggling to regain his balance. Soobin did nothing but stare wide-eyed, speechless at the scene in front of him.
The boy noticed the light from Soobin’s phone immediately. He became frantic, kicking at the bags, ripping them up in the process. It was clear he wanted to push the trash away from him in order to get better footing and escape from the inside of the dumpster. But trash spilled out of the bags as he tore them, making it even more difficult for him to stand. The boy started scratching at the sides of the dumpster. Soobin promptly backed away once he saw that the boy managed to wrap his fingers over the edge and was pulling himself upwards.
As the boy stood, a million thoughts flashed through Soobin’s mind.
Anyone would immediately recognize that this boy had been living on the streets for a while. The boy was filthy. His skin was covered in dirt and scratches, especially his hands and arms. The boy’s hair was matted in some places, dark and very long, covering his eyes. He wasn’t dressed for the weather. He had on a pair of loose, dark colored shorts and an oversized, what once had been white short sleeve shirt. The boy’s body shook. It could have been due to the cool night weather, the fear of a stranger having cornered him in a dumpster, or both.
Unkempt. Terrified. Injured. Digging through trash presumably looking for something to eat.
These were shocking observations. But what Soobin found even more difficult to comprehend was why a hybrid would suffer through all of this.
The boy’s nonhuman features had immediately stood out to Soobin when he first saw him. From under his dirty hair, two floppy, black dog ears flattened against the boy’s skull, the positioning of the ears signifying fear and stress. The hybrid boy’s features were scrunched, his nose wrinkled and teeth bared, exposing sharp canines among his other teeth. Soobin wasn’t able to see it now since the boy had stood up and faced him, but earlier he had caught sight of a short, thick tail protruding from the boy’s lower back.
The scared boy in the dumpster was a dog hybrid.
Hybrids were regarded with respect in society. Most lived comfortable lives. In fact, many indulged in luxury and prestige. Being described as a pet was inappropriate and offensive. Instead, hybrids were referred to as guests of the household they lived in and if the term guest seemed too detached to them, hybrids were considered family.
Having children was especially difficult for hybrids. Therefore, hybrid children were even more special and well taken care of. The hybrid boy that stood in the dumpster was no child, but he was young. Soobin guessed he might be a few years younger than him, in his late teens and on the cusp of adulthood. This was the age when hybrid parents and their human family would throw parties and overindulge the teens in a celebration of their life before sending them off to college, their new household, or whatever next big step they were taking.
Abandoned hybrids, mistreated hybrids, feral hybrids, runaway hybrids—Soobin had only ever heard stories like these on the news. Stories that took place in foreign places far, far away from Soobin’s old and boring neighborhood.
Something must have happened to this hybrid. Soobin wanted to know the boy’s story, but seeing how he was doing everything possible to try and scare Soobin away, calming the boy down enough to have a conversation didn’t seem likely.
It finally dawned on Soobin that he had been pointing his phone’s flash right at the boy’s face. He struggled to turn it off, his finger sliding over the screen and pressing everything but the flashlight icon. Once Soobin had finally managed to turn the light off, his arm fell to his side, firmly grasping his phone in his fist. He looked up at the boy and met his intense gaze.
The moon’s light washed over their features. Although the boy’s hair messily covered a large part of his face, Soobin could make out a sharp nose and pink lips that trembled with agitation. It was almost imperceptible, but the boy seemed to calm down after Soobin turned off the light. His knuckles, which had been white as he tightly held onto the edge of the dumpster, became a normal skin tone again.
Soobin’s mouth was dry. He licked his lips a few times, trying to get words out into the air.
“A-are you okay? I heard you fall against the dumpster,” Soobin had kept moving backwards and was pressed up against the building on the opposite side of the dumpster. It would only take Soobin a few steps to close the distance between them, but at the moment he sort of wished the brick wall behind would absorb him.
The hybrid boy said absolutely nothing. If anything, his gaze sharpened and he became more guarded.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” Soobin swallowed cold air. “To be honest, I think I’m just as scared as you are,” an involuntary, nervous laugh left his mouth.
He was met by silence once more. The hybrid shifted his weight and stumbled, nearly falling back onto the trash bags. Without thinking, Soobin took a few steps forward, reaching out towards the boy. He stopped himself, however. Soobin had nothing but good intentions, but he knew the boy may not know or understand that. He froze where he stood and waited as the hybrid regained his balance, returning his piercing glare onto the human boy that stood in front of him.
Soobin could only imagine what the boy was thinking. He was standing in a metal container. His only form of escape was to jump out and run to either end of the alley, out onto the main road. But the dumpster was tall and he might trip once he jumped out. If he tripped, the human boy might grab him, keep him from running, and possibly hurt him. He needed an opening, but he wasn’t seeing any. The hybrid obviously didn’t care for any of the words that left Soobin’s mouth, he just wanted to leave.
Soobin was at a loss as well. Was it right to just let the hybrid boy run away again? To let him suffer alone? The hybrid was obviously hungry, injured, and would soon fall ill if he didn’t find something warmer to wear. At the same time, he feared that the hybrid would hurt him. The situation was becoming tense and Soobin couldn’t think of a way to defuse it.
A single thought suddenly emerged amongst the multitude of others that ran through Soobin’s mind.
“Wait,” Soobin’s head tilted to the left as he thought out loud, “were you in there when I threw the trash out earlier?”
His voice came out softly, mostly just talking to himself rather than asking the question directly to the hybrid. Earlier, before closing the store, he had gone out to throw trash, belting his favorite song at the top of his lungs. Remembering this, Soobin felt heat rise to his face. He knew that if it were brighter outside, the boy opposite him would easily be able to see the tips of his ears flare hot red.
Both of the boys looked away from each other, one embarrassed that someone might have caught him singing loudly and terribly and the other feeling slightly amused.
“Yes,” the hybrid boy whispered the single word.
Soobin almost didn’t hear it. He whipped his head back around to face the boy, delighted that he had actually responded. As Soobin opened his mouth in an attempt to keep the conversation going, an abrupt crash came from one end of the alley. The hybrid boy jolted, panic appearing on his face once more. Something large and solid was thrust across the ground towards them, but before it came to a full stop, the boy jumped over the edge of the dumpster and landed on the ground unsteadily.
Noise filled Soobin’s ears and his eyes had a hard time keeping up with everything going on around him. He caught sight of the hybrid boy regaining his balance, stumbling as he ran further away from him into the darkness of the alleyway. At the end closest to Soobin, a group of drunk men stumbled around, laughing and yelling at each other over the crates they had just knocked down. The thing that had moved towards Soobin and the boy had just been a black crate, but it had been enough to bring fear back into the hybrid’s body and compel him to run.
Soobin wasn’t able to stop him. He had been so flustered and confused that he hadn’t even made a move to keep him from running. Disappointment flooded his entire body at the realization that he would probably never see the boy again.
The drunken group was still hanging around the alley. Soobin suddenly kicked the crate nearest to him and started yelling.
“Hey! You gonna help me pick these up? No? Then go away! Making a mess for what? You bunch of drunk idiots! Go away before I call the police on your asses! Fucking go!” Soobin kept kicking the crate in front of him until it slammed against a pile of crates that was still standing and sent them all crashing to the ground.
The men caught one look of Soobin’s towering figure and quickly retreated. Once they were gone, the unexpected anger Soobin felt was gone in an instant, leaving him feeling empty and drained of energy.
His eyes skimmed over the crates littering the ground, but he wasn’t really seeing them. All he saw was the boy’s face. The hybrid boy and his fearful eyes and his cautious stance. All Soobin could hear was his gentle whisper, his quiet reply—“Yes.”
Soobin turned and scanned the area in the direction in which the boy had run but it was empty. He was long gone.
Are you okay all on your own?