Chapter Text
The air was still, unnervingly so.
The lake stretched out before them like a great gray mouth, silent and glistening with the faint shimmer of oil-slick residue. Something had once burned here. The smell lingered—ash and rot, layered beneath the cold bite of wind coming down off the surrounding cliffs.
Across the water sat a fishing boat. Medium-sized. Unfamiliar. It floated too still on the lake’s surface, not bobbing, not even listing. It looked… fine. Not new, not ruined. Just there. Like it had been waiting.
Hyunsu stared at it with a heavy chest and a heavier belly.
The weight of many months sat low in his pelvis, pulling at every joint in his body. His back ached with each breath, and his legs—already thin from too many skipped meals—quivered under the added pressure. Still, he stood. One hand resting against the gentle swell of his stomach, the other holding Yisoo’s.
She toddled unsteadily on the uneven ground beside him, babbling softly to herself in a garbled trail of sounds. Most of it was nonsense, but occasionally, Hyunsu swore he heard a shape to her sounds—his name, maybe, or “baby.” She wasn’t talking yet, not really. But her gaze… it was always locked onto him. Studying. Tracking. Her dark eyes watched him the way animals did when they were figuring out whether you were food or family.
She giggled suddenly and pointed at his belly. Her small hand pressed to it like she was trying to feel the baby through the skin. Then she leaned in and nuzzled him there, humming something that wasn’t quite a tune. Just comfort. Just instinct.
Hyunsu blinked hard. His throat was suddenly tight.
Behind them, Eunhyuk paced slowly, blade tucked to his side, eyes flickering across the water like he was tracking something no one else could see. His face betrayed nothing. Not fatigue. Not worry. Not even interest. Just the same unreadable blank he always wore now. Monster eyes behind human lashes.
He hadn't said much since that night. Since Hyunsu told him the truth. Since the secret became the burden they both carried—though Eunhyuk bore it with silence, and Hyunsu bore it with guilt.
Yisoo sat down with a soft thump, patting her hands against the cold ground. She babbled again, some slurred version of “up” and “ba-ba,” her eyes locked on Hyunsu like she expected him to translate the world for her.
“She’s too smart,” he murmured, brushing her hair back. “Too quiet for a baby.”
The parasite inside him shifted. It didn’t whisper anymore—not since the merging—but it always stirred when Yisoo was near. Curious. Like it didn’t know what to make of her either.
Eunhyuk’s voice cut through the cold. “We should keep moving.”
Hyunsu looked up at him, studied his profile—the sharp lines, the way he wouldn’t quite meet his eyes anymore. He wondered if Eunhyuk remembered their time together before this all became unbearable. If he remembered the way they used to talk. Laugh. Fuck. Hold each other like that meant something.
But of course, Eunhyuk remembered. He just didn’t feel it anymore.
Hyunsu stood, wobbling slightly. The baby inside him kicked hard, and he let out a low exhale, hand returning to his belly.
Yisoo toddled to his side and raised her arms. He scooped her up with effort. She pressed her warm cheek to his chest, murmuring nonsense. Her fingers found the hem of his shirt and tugged at it—just like she always did when she needed to be soothed. It grounded him.
And even so, something felt wrong.
“Something’s off,” he whispered.
Eunhyuk turned. “You say that every day.” Because it was true. Every day something was wrong. Just never the same wrong. Hyunsu stared at the boat again. “It’s just sitting there.”
“It’s shelter,” Eunhyuk said. “If it floats, it’s good enough.” Shelter. Sure. But shelter didn’t usually come without strings.
The wind picked up slightly, pulling at Hyunsu’s clothes and making Yisoo whine. The girl buried her face into his collar, her tiny body warm against the chill. He looked at the boat again. Something about the stillness of it felt rehearsed. As if it were waiting for the right moment to open its jaw.
Eunhyuk stepped ahead. “Let’s go.”
Hyunsu followed, tucking Yisoo closer. He didn’t ask how they’d cross. He didn’t care. The only thing that mattered was that he keep the children safe. The one in his arms. The one inside him. His back ached. His legs throbbed. But he kept walking. The lake loomed wider with each step. And the boat never moved.
The boat creaked when Eunhyuk stepped aboard. Hyunsu followed slowly, cradling Yisoo close as her little hands gripped his collar. She didn’t cry, but her body was tense—small legs locked tightly around his waist, her cheek mashed to his shoulder. Even she seemed to sense that this wasn’t their place.
The boat was still. Not swaying. Not welcoming. Just… still.
It was a fishing boat, mid-sized, with a small enclosed cabin and an open deck at the back. No signs of active power, but the air inside wasn’t stale. There were worn blankets folded in a corner. An overturned mug with a tea stain at the bottom. Someone had once lived here. Recently. Long enough to leave their scent in the metal and wood.
Eunhyuk swept the space in silence, his movements automatic. He opened cabinets, checked under seats, lifted floor panels like he’d done it a hundred times. He said nothing about what he found—but Hyunsu caught the edge of an old bloodstain on one of the walls. Dried. Cracked. Long forgotten.
Whoever had been here before… they weren’t coming back. That should’ve been comforting.
It wasn’t.
Hyunsu sat down heavily on the floor, knees cracking, ribs tight. Yisoo wriggled in his arms until she could sit in his lap, legs splayed, babbling quietly as she tugged at the hem of his shirt. She’d grown again.
It wasn’t even subtle now—just two months ago, she was barely crawling. Now she walked. Climbed. Understood simple instructions. Her babble had shifted into vocal patterns—mimicking tone, rhythm. Sometimes she’d “talk” back in long strings of nonsense, like she was trying to speak a language she hadn’t learned yet.
She could point to herself in a mirror. Stack blocks. She’d started showing signs of dominant hand preference. Sometimes she tilted her head while watching Eunhyuk like she was studying him.
Hyunsu combed his fingers through her hair. “You’re getting old,” he murmured. “You’re not supposed to be doing half of what you’re doing.”
Yisoo looked up at him with wide, dark eyes. She giggled and shoved her hand into his mouth.
He snorted. “Gross.”
He pulled her hand away and kissed it. Her skin was warm—almost too warm. Not feverish, but unnatural. Never cried in the night unless he did. Like they were connected somehow. She always knew when he was upset. When the parasite stirred inside him, she’d whimper. Sometimes even press her ear to his belly, like she was listening to it instead of the baby.
She babbled again and leaned forward, resting her forehead against his chest. “I know,” he whispered. “You’re trying.” The parasite twitched gently in his ribs, like it was listening too.
It had never reacted violently to her. Never even shown discomfort. If anything, it liked her. Responded to her with a strange... hum. A kind of internal vibration Hyunsu couldn’t explain. He didn’t talk to it anymore. There wasn’t a need. But every now and then, he could feel it shift toward her like a sunflower leaning into the light.
He wondered if it saw her as a sibling. A descendant. Or something else entirely. Eunhyuk returned, tossing a folded tarp to the side. “Cabin’s clear. No food. Water’s fine.”
Hyunsu nodded without looking up. “Someone lived here.”
“They’re gone.”
“Obviously.” He looked at the wall again. “But they were here.”
Eunhyuk didn’t reply. He sat near the cabin door, unsheathing a knife and inspecting the blade like it could answer for the silence. Yisoo started trying to crawl off his lap. Hyunsu let her, watching her toddle across the floor on unsteady feet. She clutched a piece of frayed rope and babbled triumphantly. Her motor skills were advanced. Too advanced. And her eyes—sharp, focused, never dreamy like most kids. They locked on details.
She made her way to Eunhyuk and plopped into his lap without hesitation. He didn’t react at first. Not until she smacked his thigh with the rope and let out a warbling squeal. His hand lifted instinctively. Not to stop her—but to catch her, if she fell.
That was enough for Hyunsu.
He leaned back against the cabin wall, one hand on his stomach, the other loosely resting where Yisoo had been. “We’re okay,” he said aloud, softly. “It’s okay.” He wasn’t sure if he meant it. But the boat was quiet. Yisoo was safe. And for now, that was all he needed.
The days didn’t change anymore. They hadn't changed for a long time.
The sky stayed the same muted gray, sometimes darker, sometimes washed with a soft yellow like old paper. The water never calmed, but it never churned either. Just rocked—slow, rhythmic, enough to remind them they were still floating. Still untethered. Still here.
Hyunsu stopped counting days. He didn’t know when exactly he gave up trying. Maybe when the last tally mark he’d etched into the metal rusted over. Maybe when he stopped waking up expecting something different.
The boat didn’t smell like blood anymore. Just salt. And bodies. And the faint, ever-present mildew that no amount of wiping could erase.
He leaned against the cabin wall, breathing through the ache that had become normal. His belly had grown again—rounder, lower, heavier. His hips ached constantly. His ankles had disappeared somewhere between the last storm and now. His skin was warm to the touch, sometimes sweaty even when the wind was biting. He hadn’t said anything about the pressure in his ribs or the fluttering that sometimes felt too far apart to be one baby moving.
He didn’t want to say anything.
Yisoo toddled across the deck, her feet slap-thudding against the floor in that clumsy rhythm that always made him smile. She’d grown, too. That was harder to ignore.
She was tall for her age—tall for what he assumed her age was. Fifteen months maybe? Or older? Her limbs were still chubby but stronger now, more coordinated. She could climb onto the bench without help, pull open low drawers, even open the cabin door if he forgot to latch it.
She still didn’t speak—not clearly. But she babbled in long strings of sound, sometimes mimicking tone and rhythm like she thought she was saying something. She’d point at things, tap her fingers in repetition, tilt her head in ways that made her seem like she was waiting for someone else to answer a question.
She hadn’t cried in weeks. She didn’t tantrum, didn’t scream, didn’t demand. Sometimes, Hyunsu missed the noise.
She crawled into his lap now, curling into the space between his thighs and belly. He rested his hand on her back. She was warm—always a little too warm, like her blood ran hotter than his. She mumbled something, cheek pressed to his chest, hand clutching the hem of his shirt. “You want to nap here?” he asked softly, voice low and cracked.
She didn’t answer, of course. Just sighed and shifted closer, one foot still twitching like she hadn’t fully powered down yet.
Hyunsu looked down at her, brushing her hair away from her forehead. It stuck up in soft little curls now, uncut and messy, a halo of wildness around her sleepy face.
She was beautiful. Unnervingly quiet. And sometimes when she looked at him, he swore she was listening to something else. Like she heard things he didn’t. Sometimes, her little hands would find his stomach, and she’d press both palms there. Not like other kids—no kicks, no giggles. Just... stillness. Like she was waiting.
She did it again now.
“Do you know something?” Hyunsu murmured. Her eyes flicked up. Not quite understanding. But not entirely clueless either.
He let his head fall back against the wall and shut his eyes. The weight inside him shifted, a dull ache stretching through his sides like something pressing in both directions at once. He winced.
“Too much movement today,” he whispered to himself.
He didn’t think about it too hard. Didn’t let himself wonder why the weight felt off-center. Or why sometimes, it kicked in two places at once. It didn’t matter . The baby—babies? no — the baby was alive. That’s what counted.
Eunhyuk sat at the edge of the deck, facing the endless water. He hadn’t moved in hours. Maybe longer. His legs hung over the side of the boat, hands resting on his thighs, blade untouched. He never looked tired. Never looked alert. Just... present . Like a fixture. Like a ghost haunting a place he hadn’t died in yet.
Hyunsu watched him from behind, lips parting like he might say something. But he didn’t. There was nothing new to say.
If a creature drifted too close—one of those bone-pale leech things, or a bloated floater—the child would cry first. That was the only warning. Eunhyuk never reacted unless it touched the boat. Only then would he rise, moving like breath, and remove it. Not violently. Just... efficiently.
Hyunsu had learned not to ask how.
The child stirred against his belly, making Yisoo twitch in her sleep.
He swallowed hard. He didn’t know how far along he was. Didn’t know when the baby would come. Just that it would . And that it would hurt.
Yisoo shifted, mumbling nonsense again—“Da. Ba. Mm”—and tightened her fingers in his shirt. Her cheek was flushed against his skin. She pressed her hand back to his belly again, one soft pat after another.
It wasn’t rhythmic. It wasn’t playful. It felt like a message.
The pain didn’t start with a scream. It started with silence.
Hyunsu sat upright in the middle of the boat’s small cabin, one hand pressed to the floor for balance, the other locked over his swollen belly. His breath hitched. Just once. A tiny, involuntary gasp that made the hair on the back of Eunhyuk’s neck rise.
Then the blood came. It soaked through the front of Hyunsu’s pants like ink spreading across paper. Thick. Dark. It pooled beneath him before either of them could say anything. He didn’t scream. He froze. “I—” Hyunsu’s voice cracked. “I think—”
His body folded in on itself before the sentence finished. Eunhyuk moved before he even thought about it. Crossed the space in two steps, catching Hyunsu under the arms before he crumpled completely. Blood smeared between them—slick and hot and too much. There was no way to count time anymore, but something about the volume— this much bleeding, this quickly—felt wrong.
Yisoo was screaming. Wordless. Raw. She clung to the cabin doorframe, face red, tiny fists slamming the wood with her full weight. Hyunsu convulsed. “It hurts,” he rasped. “They’re trying to—inside, they’re— fuck— ” Eunhyuk lowered him onto the floor with practiced, hollow gentleness. He grabbed a tarp. Laid it out. Positioned Hyunsu on his back. No hesitation. No questions. Just action.
Blood pooled under his thighs. His belly was stretched tight, too tight. Like it was being pulled in two directions at once. The skin was bruised. Veins blackened. Something beneath the surface moved —not a kick. A grind. “Something’s wrong,” Hyunsu choked, fingers clawing at Eunhyuk’s wrist. “It’s not working, I can’t push— I can’t— ”
“You’re not going to push,” Eunhyuk said, flat. His voice sounded like static. Like a news broadcast on mute. Hyunsu didn’t respond. His head lolled to the side. Mouth open. Sweat slicked his hair to his face. His legs kicked once, twice, then stilled. Eunhyuk unbuttoned his shirt. Pulled it open.
Saw the belly rise and fall like it was breathing without Hyunsu. The first cut was clean. A blade honed to unnatural sharpness. Flesh opened like fruit. Blood welled instantly, flooding his hands, coating the steel. Muscle quivered, skin twitched. The parasite didn’t stop him. Didn’t fight. Didn’t even react. But the body did. Hyunsu arched. Seized. His mouth opened, but no sound came. Just a wet gasp and the click of his teeth slamming together.
Eunhyuk worked fast. Precise. Inhumanly calm. He reached inside.
There were too many limbs. Too much heat. Slippery tissue and pulsing cords and something with a tiny, beating heart. The first baby came out blue. Eunhyuk cleared its throat with two fingers and slapped its back. It wailed. Yisoo’s screaming stopped.
The second was stuck. Too far to reach. Hyunsu’s abdomen convulsed, nearly trapping his arm. The tissue contracted around him like it wanted to keep the child. Or hide it. He didn’t stop. He forced his arm deeper, slicing what needed to be sliced . Nerves. Muscle. Placenta. He found the second baby tangled in something too slick to be umbilical. Something alive inside Hyunsu that moved away from his fingers. The parasite. It let go.
He pulled the second child free. It didn’t cry immediately. Just opened its eyes—milky, unfocused—and stared at him. Then it wailed.
Hyunsu didn’t. His chest had stopped rising. His eyes were half-open, blank. A smear of blood clung to his lips. The color had drained from his skin. His hands twitched, once, then went still.
Eunhyuk looked down at the mess of flesh and blood and open cavity in front of him. He didn't speak. The babies cried. Yisoo watched from the floor, her hands red with prints she didn’t understand.
The boat creaked. And Hyunsu didn’t move.
There was no exact moment when breath returned. It wasn’t cinematic. No gasp, no jolt. Just… movement. A twitch of the fingers. Then the ribs shifted, expanded. Like lungs filling for the first time. Hyunsu opened his eyes. Everything was quiet. His body didn’t hurt. The air tasted clean. He looked down at his stomach—bare, bloodied, but sealed. No pain. No scarring. Nothing but the vague memory of something tearing. Then cold. Then nothing.
The parasite whispered softly, like a sigh in his head. ' You didn’t need to be opened.' Hyunsu blinked. The babies slept beside him in a nest of fabric. Yisoo curled nearby, eyes watching—not asleep. Just… watching.
He exhaled slowly.
“Okay,” he whispered. Because what else was there to say?
He didn’t hear Hyunsu wake up. He didn’t need to. Something shifted behind him—soft, small. Not a noise, not a movement. Just presence. That quiet weight of someone alive returning to a space that had been holding its breath.
But Eunhyuk didn’t turn around. He sat on the floor, knees bent, arms folded loosely over them, staring at the two newborns wrapped in stained towels. Their cries had faded hours ago. Now they just breathed—tiny, shallow puffs. The smaller one twitched in sleep, fingers curling. The other stretched, a long, uncoordinated flail that made the fabric shift from its shoulder. Skin like bruised silk. Veins still showing through.
There had been two. When he’d reached inside Hyunsu’s body, he thought the second child was a mistake. A shadow. Something dying. But it wasn’t. It was real. Whole. Alive. They both were. He hadn’t meant to feel anything. Hadn’t expected to. That part of him—whatever housed affection or awe or grief—had been silent for months. Just gone. Not buried, not locked. Absent. But now—
He didn’t know how to name it. It wasn’t relief. Not pride. It wasn’t even love. Not yet. It was...
Warm.
It sat behind his sternum like heat spreading from the inside out. Not burning. Just present. A pressure that didn’t hurt. He stared at the babies like they might disappear. Or change. Or reveal teeth. But they didn’t. They just were. Soft. Breathing. Quiet. He looked at the bigger one—the firstborn. Rounder, louder, fists clenched even in sleep. Then the second. Smaller. Paler. Eyes had opened once, eerily calm. No crying. Just observation. Like she knew .
He’d never seen anything like them. They smelled like blood and salt and something new. Behind him, he heard Hyunsu shift. A soft intake of breath. Alive. He didn’t turn. Couldn’t. If he looked at Hyunsu now—after everything, after that stillness, that moment where the body had gone slack and stopped —he wasn’t sure what would break. Something would. So he stared at the babies. And let his chest warm. For the first time in memory, his heart didn’t feel like a stone.
Hyunsu didn’t realize he was crying until one of the babies latched.
He stared down at the small, wrinkled face pressed against his chest, mouth working, eyelids fluttering like a newborn animal. The other lay nestled against his side, wrapped in a damp towel, snuffling quietly. There were two. Two.
He didn’t know how long he’d been out. His body felt… stitched. Like something had been taken apart and clumsily put back together. But the pain was gone. The wound was gone. And still—two.
His mind fumbled with the math. The logic. The months. He didn’t know how far along he’d been, or how they’d even fit inside him, or why he hadn’t felt them moving in different rhythms. He thought it had just been one heartbeat. One weight. One kick. But now there were two tiny bodies, soft and real and his.
The one suckling was hungrier than he expected. Each pull was sharp, rhythmic, and so instinctive that it startled him. Again. He watched it happen like it wasn’t even his chest, like the skin wasn’t his own. He trembled—not from fear, but from disbelief. A miracle, smeared in blood and sweat and human failure.
The baby whimpered softly and pressed closer, hand gripping the fabric of his shirt with impossible determination. Something stirred inside him.
The parasite, usually so quiet since their merging, purred. It didn’t speak. It didn’t send thoughts. But it radiated approval—deep and humming, like satisfaction vibrating through bone marrow. It liked the babies. It loved them.
Hyunsu let out a shaky laugh. “I didn’t even know there were two of you,” he whispered, brushing his fingers over the other’s tiny forehead. “I didn’t know…” His voice cracked.
The cabin floor creaked behind him. He looked up. Eunhyuk stood there, arms loose at his sides. He didn’t speak, didn’t blink. Just looked down at them—the mess, the miracle, the aftermath. Then, without a word, he crouched beside the older child. She stood beside the wall, watching everything, lips parted slightly like she’d been holding her breath since yesterday. She didn’t cry. Didn’t make a sound. Just… stared. When Eunhyuk reached for her, she stepped forward.
He picked her up. It was awkward, a little stiff. Her limbs wrapped around him fast, used to it, unafraid. One small hand fisted in the collar of his shirt. She looked over his shoulder at Hyunsu, at the babies in his arms, and then pointed. “Two,” she said, clear as day. Her voice was high, soft, but sure. “Two baby.” Hyunsu blinked.
He laughed again, wetter this time. “Yeah,” he said. “There’s two.” Eunhyuk turned so she could see better. She leaned forward slightly, staring hard at the newborns like she was inspecting them. She didn’t reach. Didn’t babble. Just observed.
Then, quietly: “Mine.” Hyunsu choked on his breath.
Eunhyuk didn’t correct her. He just shifted his hold, tucking her against his chest like he’d done it every day of her life, and stepped closer to the nest of blankets and sweat-stained rags where Hyunsu lay. He crouched again. Silent. Let the girl watch.
The babies twitched in their sleep. Hyunsu looked up at Eunhyuk, eyes rimmed red. “You delivered them.”
“You died,” Eunhyuk replied flatly.
“I got better,” Hyunsu said, managing a smile. Eunhyuk didn’t smile back.
But he didn’t look away.
The child in his arms pointed again. “Both mine.”
“No,” Hyunsu murmured, voice soft. “They’re ours.” Eunhyuk didn’t argue.
Five months passed in a blur of warmth, noise, and too many small hands.
The babies had grown like they were supposed to—slow, sweet, clumsy. One had learned to pull themselves upright against the boat’s railing. The other laughed so hard at the sound of their own fart that Hyunsu thought he might cry.
They were loud, sticky, teething disasters. And Hyunsu loved them with a bone-deep ferocity that made every exhausted breath worth it.
But Yisoo—
She was different.
Not in a dangerous way. Just… faster. By now, she could speak in full, short sentences. She asked questions. Made jokes. Knew which twin was which without ever being told. She helped. She played. She understood.
And she had started calling Hyunsu 'oppa' .
She tried to call him 'eomma'. He made sure that didn't stick.
The boat didn’t feel like a prison anymore . Not really. It was cramped, yes, and it still creaked like something ancient—but there was life in it now. Noise. Motion. Chaos. And then came the shore. They didn’t plan to dock. The decision just… happened. Something about the clouds thinning, the water quieting. Eunhyuk had spotted a signal fire in the distance—a small one, weak, cautious.
The boat pulled in slow . Hyunsu held both babies, wrapped to his chest and side like an overworked marsupial. Yisoo stood beside him, her little hand in his, her eyes narrowed with that strange calmness that always unnerved him. She didn’t say anything. Just stared at the shape of the woman waiting on the beach.
Yikyung.
She stood alone. Hair short and wild around her ears. Clothes torn in places. Eyes hollow and sharp, scanning the deck before the boat even touched land. When her gaze landed on Yisoo—
She stopped breathing. Hyunsu didn’t move. Eunhyuk stepped forward first, always the buffer. He didn’t speak. Just offered Yikyung a nod. A warning. An allowance.
She ignored him. Her eyes didn’t leave her daughter.
Yisoo tilted her head. “You look tired,” she said softly. Yikyung flinched. Then she was moving— down the dock, across the short sand. She reached them in seconds and dropped to her knees in front of Yisoo. Not crying. Not trembling. Just staring.
Yisoo looked back at her like she was trying to remember something from a dream. “Hi,” she whispered. “I know you.”
Yikyung nodded. “I know you too.”
She reached out, brushing the girl’s cheek with the back of her hand. It was tentative. Her touch shook slightly.
Yisoo leaned into it.
Then: “Are you mad?” That shattered something.
“No,” Yikyung said quickly, too quickly. “No, baby, I—”
She pulled Yisoo forward, arms around her, hugging her too tightly. Her eyes were clenched shut. Her jaw locked. She wasn’t crying. She wouldn’t let herself. Hyunsu said nothing.
He just stood there, swaying slightly with the weight of his babies, watching something reattach and unravel at the same time. After a long moment, Yikyung pulled back. Her hands lingered on her daughter’s arms like she was making sure she was real. “You’re so big,” she murmured.
“I’m almost three,” Yisoo said proudly, even though she wasn’t. “I can run fast now.”
Yikyung smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “I bet you can.” She looked at Hyunsu then. Really looked.
Her gaze landed on the babies, then his face. She didn't ask questions. Maybe she didn’t want answers. “They’re mine,” Hyunsu said, because he thought she might need to hear it. “The twins. They’re 'normal'.”
She nodded, slow. “And her?” she asked, voice tight. Hyunsu hesitated.
“She’s… good. ”
Yikyung didn’t argue. She didn’t ask what else Yisoo might be. Just reached for her daughter’s hand again and held it like it might float away. “I’m not scared of you,” Yisoo said, watching her. “Even if you are.”
That silenced everyone. Hyunsu’s chest ached. Yikyung looked away. Not ashamed. Not angry. Just… hollow. “I want to be better at this,” she said quietly.
“You can try,” Yisoo offered, completely unbothered. And somehow, that didn't seem like enough.
A month passed.
Yikyung had taken up the far side of the boat. Not by force—no one made her—but by quiet design. She rolled out her blanket in the corner near the emergency raft, stacked her supplies in neat, solitary piles, and kept to herself unless someone spoke to her first.
Except for Yisoo. Yisoo approached her daily, like clockwork. Sometimes with a toy. Sometimes a question. Once with a dead moth she’d found and decided was “interesting.”
Yikyung tried. She answered. She nodded. She even read to her once, voice shaking with every word. But she was… strict.
“No, sit up straight.”
“No, don’t touch that.”
“Use your words.”
Her voice wasn’t angry. Just tense. Clipped. Too sharp around the edges for someone speaking to a toddler. Hyunsu watched it all in quiet disappointment. Yisoo didn’t seem hurt—not really. But she noticed. Of course she did. The girl had started choosing her moments. She’d wait until Hyunsu was close. Until Eunhyuk was in the room. Until there was safety around the edges.
Yikyung hadn’t said it out loud, but her fear lived in every glance, every flinch when Yisoo stood too still. She never touched her daughter without hesitating first. Never looked her in the eye for too long. The others noticed. They just didn’t talk about it.
That morning, Hyunsu was trying to spoon watery rice into Minjae’s mouth while Areum chewed on a spoon she’d already claimed as hers. Minjae drooled half the meal back onto Hyunsu’s arm. Eunhyuk sat nearby, holding a damp cloth, absolutely no urgency in his posture. “You could help,” Hyunsu muttered, brushing rice from his sleeve.
“I am,” Eunhyuk replied, deadpan, and wiped Minjae’s face with mechanical precision.
Areum looked up, delighted, and threw the spoon across the boat. “Of course she did,” Hyunsu sighed.
Eunhyuk got up without a word to retrieve it. Yisoo sat cross-legged nearby, humming to herself. She was holding a small rock she’d adopted three days ago and named “Dog.”
Hyunsu leaned back against a crate, hair tied up messily, shirt stained from breakfast, and smiled. “You know, this is almost domestic.”
Yisoo looked up. “Means normal?”
“Kind of.”
Yikyung stood across the boat, arms crossed, pretending not to stare.
She hadn’t spoken since the babies were born. Not really. Just short things—logistics, basic needs. She hadn’t commented on the twins' eyes being slightly too wide, or the way they never cried in unison. She didn’t ask why Minjae never blinked when people spoke to him, or why Areum giggled when there was no sound at all. But she looked.
And the longer she watched, the tighter her jaw became.
Yisoo stood and toddled over to where Yikyung sat. She held the rock out. “Dog wants to say hi.”
Yikyung stared at it. Then at her. “Why do you always bring me things like that?”
Yisoo shrugged. “Dog likes you.”
Yikyung sighed, rubbed her temples. “Yisoo—” She stopped. Yisoo was staring up at her, blinking. Waiting.
“Just… listen when I tell you things.” Yikyung said finally .
“I do,” Yisoo replied.
“I mean it.”
“I know. ”
That look. That calm, eerie certainty. Like Yisoo knew something she shouldn’t. Yikyung flinched, just barely. Across the boat, Hyunsu shifted. He saw it. So did Eunhyuk. Areum made a squawking noise and bit Minjae’s arm. Minjae retaliated by licking her face.
Yikyung watched the mess unfold—the twins shrieking with laughter, Hyunsu juggling baby limbs, Eunhyuk stepping in just fast enough to keep the rice bowl from becoming a projectile. They weren’t perfect. They were chaos . But they were a 'family'.
And they weren’t afraid of each other.
Not like she was.
She didn’t realize she’d taken a step back from Yisoo until the girl frowned.
“I don’t hurt people,” Yisoo whispered.
“I didn’t say—”
“I don’t want to hurt people.”
Yikyung’s stomach twisted. “I know,” she managed. But it was too late. The girl had already stepped away, walking back toward Hyunsu like nothing had happened. Like it didn’t matter. But it did. Everyone felt it. Yikyung stayed in her corner the rest of the day, holding herself together with both hands.
Yikyung hadn’t meant to leave the shore. They’d only gone for water—her and Yisoo, a quick refill run while the others wandered inland with the twins. It was supposed to be quiet. Normal. Uneventful. But then the men came.
Two of them. Filthy, reeking, sunburnt. Teeth like gravel and eyes like hunger. They saw Yisoo and paused . Not because she was small—but because she wasn’t. Not really. Something in her face. Her stillness. The way she looked at them . Yikyung had frozen. She didn’t have a weapon. Didn’t know what to say. They asked questions. Got too close. One of them touched Yisoo’s arm and said something crude.
Then everything went wrong. She couldn’t remember the sound Yisoo made—but she remembered the way the man collapsed , clutching his chest. The way the other screamed, shriveled, gasping, clawing at his own throat like the air was being pulled from his lungs.
She remembered the smell. And the stillness after. Yisoo stood in the center of it, eyes glazed, lips slightly parted, a thin trickle of blood down one nostril. Her clothes were torn. Her hands… trembling. Then she dropped. Dragging her back to the boat felt like moving a stranger.
Yikyung cried the entire way. Not loud. Just silent, seething sobs that rattled her teeth. She carried Yisoo in her arms, heart racing, breath ragged.
The girl’s body was longer. Limbs stretched. Face sharper. She wasn’t a toddler anymore. She looked like a ten-year-old. Like a stranger. Like something else. Hyunsu and Eunhyuk returned laughing. Hyunsu had a twig in his hair. The babies were pressed to his chest in the wrap, both asleep, cheeks sun-pinked. Eunhyuk was holding a fruit of some kind, making some dry remark about its toxicity.
Then they saw Yikyung. Her clothes soaked in blood.
And the child curled in the corner, eyes closed. Yikyung looked resentful. Hyunsu dropped the basket he was holding. “What happened?”
“She killed them,” Yikyung snapped.
“Who?”
“Two men. Scavengers. They touched her and she—she drained them. Like she sucked the life out of them! Like a parasite. Like—”
“ She’s alive, ” Hyunsu said, stepping forward. “Right?”
Yikyung didn’t answer. Yisoo groaned, barely. The boat creaked.
Hyunsu rushed to her, reaching out—only to see the knife in Yikyung’s hand. The small blade, trembling in her grip. Yisoo whimpered. Blood ran down her arm.
“You hurt her?” Hyunsu’s voice dropped. Quiet. Like a predator.
“She killed people! ” Yikyung shrieked. “She didn’t even hesitate! She’s not—she’s not—”
Crack.
Hyunsu’s hand met her cheek. Yikyung staggered back, mouth open in shock, blade clattering to the floor. “She is a child, ” Hyunsu hissed. “She was attacked. She defended herself. And you— you —cut her. Your own daughter.”
“I was scared—”
“I don’t care. ” He knelt beside Yisoo, gathered her into his arms like she weighed nothing. She didn’t flinch. She just leaned into him, trembling. Blood smeared her sleeve. Her face was too mature, too knowing. “You don’t get to hurt her just because she frightens you.”
Yikyung didn’t speak.
Eunhyuk stood behind them all, watching silently. His hands were still. His face unreadable . But something in the room had shifted. Yikyung backed away slowly. Then she turned. And locked herself in the cabin. The door slammed shut. Hyunsu cradled Yisoo, brushing the hair from her face. “You’re okay,” he whispered. “You did nothing wrong.”
Her lip trembled. “I’m not a monster,” she breathed.
“No. You’re mine.” And that was all that mattered.
Yikyung didn’t look at Yisoo much anymore. When she did, it was with tight eyes and pressed lips. Her hands always clenched something—fabric, rope, the edge of a blanket—as if she were trying to keep herself tethered to the moment. As if, left unchecked, she might spiral. After Yisoo returned from the beach bloodstained and older, things had shifted. Not immediately. Not publicly. But enough.
Yikyung started insisting on things. Don’t let her go alone. Don’t let her near the edge. Don’t let her touch things. She tried covering Yisoo’s hands with socks, with gloves—whatever she could find, muttering about safety, about other survivors, about “what they might think.”
Yisoo didn’t fight. She just looked confused. Hurt. Quiet in a way that wasn’t like her. She stopped talking as much. Stopped singing to her rock collection or asking Hyunsu weird questions about clouds. Sometimes, when she thought no one was watching, she’d just stare at her own palms like she didn’t understand what she was supposed to do with them.
Hyunsu had had enough. He took the gloves. Threw them overboard.
“She’s not dangerous,” he told Yikyung, voice flat.
“You don’t know that,” she snapped. “You didn’t see what she did. You weren’t there when she looked me in the eye after it. You didn’t see what it did to her—how calm she was—”
“She’s calm because she has to be,” Hyunsu bit out. “Because if she cries, you flinch like she’s going to explode.”
“She killed people, Hyunsu!”
“They would’ve killed her. ” Silence fell between them. Yikyung’s jaw trembled, but no words came out. Her anger wasn’t fury—it was fear, shaking behind her ribs. She didn’t want to talk about it. She didn’t want to be understood. Not really. What she wanted was for time to rewind, for Yisoo to be a soft, innocent thing again. Something she could understand.
But that version of Yisoo had died on that beach.
So Hyunsu watched her. Not to punish. Just to contain. Because fear, if left alone long enough, always finds something to destroy. And then, one morning, Yisoo was gone. It wasn’t dramatic. There wasn’t blood, or screaming, or a trail of broken things. Just an empty bedroll, her favorite rock placed gently on Hyunsu’s pillow, and a drawing scrawled in charcoal on the hull wall: a crooked smiling face, holding hands with two tall figures. Hyunsu’s heart dropped the second he saw it. He didn’t even have to ask where she’d gone.
He knew. “She followed something,” he muttered.
Eunhyuk nodded once. “Or someone.”
It took them three days to find her. Yisoo had disappeared like a ghost—no trail, no footprints, not even the sound of movement. Only silence, broken occasionally by distant roars that made Hyunsu’s stomach knot. The kind of sounds that didn’t belong to anything human. He didn’t sleep. Not really. Neither did Eunhyuk. The babies clung to their chests in wraps, unnaturally quiet for infants. As if they understood the dread in the air. The boat was left behind, guarded by the scavenged remnants of Hyunsu’s grief. Only Yikyung remained there, quiet and haunted.
And then they found it. A broken stretch of road. A collapsed median. A sinkhole in the middle of the highway that looked like the Earth had simply yawned and swallowed part of the world. At the bottom of it: two people. A woman with scraped knees, shouting curses. And a man in tattered military fatigues, holding a gun he clearly didn’t believe would help. Above them—on the edge of the ruined concrete—stood a girl.
Not a toddler.
Not a child.
A girl with short, bushy black hair, legs spattered with dried mud, expression unreadable. Her hands were bare. Pale. Unmarked. But what stood beside her was what made Hyunsu go cold. A monster . Towering, pulsing, grotesque. All sinew and cartilage and eyes that didn’t blink. Its limbs twitched in anticipation, claws tapping the asphalt like it was waiting for permission.
Yisoo said nothing. She simply raised her hand. The monster below surged forward. “STOP!”
The word cracked through the air like a whip. Hyunsu, breathless, stumbled over broken road as Eunhyuk followed behind. The babies cried out for the first time in days. The monster froze. Yisoo turned her head. Slowly. Almost dreamlike. When she saw Hyunsu, her brows knit. “Why are you here?”
Her voice was calm. Even. Not cruel—just… distant. Like she was somewhere far away. “Baby,” he gasped. “What are you doing?”
“They tried to shoot me,” she said. “He raised his weapon. She screamed.”
Eunyu’s voice echoed from the pit: “She summoned it first! We were walking—we didn’t see her—she just appeared —!”
The army guy shouted something unintelligible, gun shaking in his grip.
“They were scared,” Hyunsu said gently. “People are scared of what they don’t know. That doesn’t mean you kill them.”
Yisoo looked away. “I didn’t touch them. I didn’t even go down there.”
“That doesn’t make it better.” The monster beside her huffed.
“You’re not mean,” he said. “You’re not. And this—this makes you no better than the ones who hurt you.”
That landed. Her lips parted. Her hand lowered. The monster whimpered and backed away. “I didn’t want to be alone,” she said.
“You’re not.” She looked at him fully now. Really looked. And then she raised her arms. They carried her back to camp that night. Chanyoung, as he introduced himself, and Eunyu followed. Eunyu kept her hand on the hilt of her knife the entire time. She didn’t speak much—just stared at Hyunsu like he was the last star in a collapsed sky. She asked questions only when necessary, made jokes with too much edge, and refused to cry.
Until she saw Eunhyuk.
He hadn’t spoken since the sinkhole. He didn’t flinch when he saw her. Just blinked once. Like seeing her was a passing thought. Eunyu choked. “Oppa,” she whispered. “It’s me.” He tilted his head. No warmth. No grief. Just a nod.
That broke her. She turned, hands over her mouth, shoulders shaking.
Eunhyuk didn’t move. Hyunsu pulled her into a hug from behind. Neither said anything for a long, long time.
The camp they set up was temporary—half tarp, half crumbling overpass. It wasn’t meant for comfort, just survival. But somehow, with everyone breathing the same stale air again, it felt… full. Noisy. Heavy in the way only reunion could be.
Eunyu sat near the edge of the concrete, picking at a half-burned ration bar. Her eyes hadn’t left Yisoo, who was curled up beside Hyunsu, asleep with one hand resting on one of the twins. She didn’t ask which was which. That came a little later.
Hyunsu scooted beside her with a grunt, adjusting the baby on his back—Areum, he’d said. The little girl never cried, just stared, her eyes far too knowing. “You forgot,” he said softly.
Eunyu blinked. “Forgot what?”
He gestured to the babies. “That I was pregnant.”
She gave him a look. “I didn’t forget,” she lied. “I just… figured it wouldn’t stick. You know. Infection and all.”
“Well. It stuck.” He smiled a little. “Twice.”
“God.” She laughed, a small, breathless thing. “Twins?”
“Yeah. Areum and Minjae.”
Eunyu glanced down at them. “They look like you.”
“Kind of.”
“They blink like Eunhyuk, though.”
That earned a quiet snort. “I should’ve known you’d notice something like that.”
A beat of silence. Then—
“I missed you,” Eunyu said, still not looking at him.
“I missed you, too.”
Her lip trembled. “He didn’t.”
Hyunsu followed her gaze. Eunhyuk sat on the far edge of the camp, staring into the treeline. He hadn’t said much since they stopped. Just held Minjae and stroked his head absentmindedly, like it was muscle memory. “He’s changed,” Hyunsu admitted. “But you knew that.”
Eunyu wiped her face quickly. “I still thought—I don’t know. That something would spark. That he’d see me and remember how we were. That he’d feel something.”
“He probably does. He just doesn’t know what to do with it.”
She shook her head. “He doesn’t even try. ”
Hyunsu sighed. “He will. He just needs a push.” Later that night, as the fire died down to a warm flicker, Hyunsu sat beside Eunhyuk while Areum slept across his lap.
“She missed you,” he said softly.
Eunhyuk blinked. “She said that.”
“Yeah. And she meant it.”
Eunhyuk didn’t respond. Hyunsu leaned forward, elbows on knees. “You don’t have to be a robot, you know.”
“I’m not.”
“You sure? Because I think even our kids blink more than you do.” That earned a glance. Hyunsu smirked. “She’s your sister.”
“I don’t remember how to care for her.”
“You don’t have to remember everything to care.”
“She’s a stranger.”
“She cried when she saw you.” That landed. Not deeply, but enough to flicker behind Eunhyuk’s eyes. A few minutes passed. Then Eunyu approached. Hesitant. Her arms wrapped around something—something folded and faded.
She crouched in front of him. “This was in my bag,” she said, voice rough. “I’ve had it since the beginning. I don’t even know why I kept it.” She handed it to him.
A photo. Two kids. Laughing. Arms around each other. Eunyu missing a front tooth, Eunhyuk beaming like the sun hadn’t exploded yet. Eunhyuk stared at it. That smile— his smile—looked alien. Like it belonged to someone else. But he studied it, something twitching in his cheek.
And then—
He tried. He lifted his lips. Curved them just slightly. Pulled the corners of his mouth into something almost like the boy in the photo. Hyunsu, sitting nearby, nearly choked on his own spit.
“Oh my god,” he whispered. “Are you smiling ?”
“Trying,” Eunhyuk said flatly.
“It’s terrifying.”
Eunhyuk nodded. “Accurate.”
Even Eunyu cracked a laugh. Chanyoung—who had watched this whole scene from behind a pack of supplies—finally couldn’t hold it anymore.
“Okay, sorry, I gotta ask.” He stood, gesturing wildly. “You’re telling me you got pregnant?” he pointed to Hyunsu. “And you’re a monster,” he gestured again. “And he’s what? A—what did you call it?”
“Neo-human,” Hyunsu supplied helpfully.
“And the girl?” He pointed to Yisoo, still asleep near the fire, a faint hum of monster energy coiling around her like a blanket.
“A neo-human,” Eunhyuk said, voice low.
Chanyoung just dropped his arms. “Okay. Awesome. Love that for me.”
The city didn’t feel like a grave anymore. It was still scorched in places—broken glass in gutters, faded blood smeared into concrete. But there were signs of life now. Crude gardens planted in old medians. Solar panels mounted on the sides of abandoned buses. Children laughing from the rooftops of department stores turned dormitories.
And above it all, rising like a stubborn weed through the cracks, a new kind of home. The survivors had done it. Humans. Monsters. Neo-humans. All of them. The ones who had once tried to kill each other were now stacking bricks side by side. Not out of forgiveness, necessarily, but because nothing else made sense anymore.
Hyunsu stood on the edge of a rooftop, wind tugging at his worn coat. His face was different now—older, wiser, scarred in ways that didn’t show on skin. The twins were asleep behind him in a crate-turned-cradle. Minjae snored. Areum kicked in her sleep, dreaming of something she couldn’t yet describe.
A few feet away, Eunhyuk leaned against a rusted pipe, staring into the distance. Not quite watching. Just existing. He hadn’t fully come back emotionally, but he was there . Present. Grounded. And that was enough for now. Eunyu stood between them, arms crossed, her stance casual, but her eyes scanning the sky like it might drop something unpleasant at any moment. Her infection had taken hold weeks after the Yisoo incident. It crept up slow —subtle headaches, a flicker of clarity that felt too sharp. And then one morning, she woke up and didn’t flinch at the sound of monster howls echoing through the street.
She didn’t cry when it happened.
She just breathed easier.
They were a strange trio—monster, neo-human, and newly-changed—but they fit. Not perfectly. Not comfortably. But honestly. Behind them, the new community thrived. Sangwook—what was left of him—was gone. A sacrifice. He took Sangwon with him. That final battle had ended in blood and ash and a roar that hadn’t echoed since. Hyunsu still heard it sometimes when he closed his eyes . Not out of fear, but in respect. Chanyoung, ever the human observer, had helped lay the groundwork for alliances. A man who once couldn’t believe a man could get pregnant was now co-parenting a gaggle of monster toddlers with the patience of a saint.
And Yisoo?
Gone, for now. Not dead. Not forgotten. She’d wandered again. After the final naming. After her mother’s final breath. After whispering her name— Yisoo —to the people who had raised her. She had things to do. People to find. Pieces of herself to put back together. Hyunsu believed she’d return. When she was ready. Maybe she’d be a monster. Maybe she’d be more.
“Music,” Eunyu said suddenly, tilting her head. “Do you hear that?” A beat. Then, softly, from a lower floor, the hum of a record player. Fuzzy, warped. A woman’s voice singing in an old language no one remembered how to speak.
Eunhyuk blinked. “I do.”
Hyunsu smiled. “Someone found the generator again.”
They stood there, letting it wash over them. Below, the city stirred. A group of kids ran past, one of them with a tail that flicked when he laughed. A man with one glowing eye helped hang laundry. A woman with scaled skin poured water into a planter. No one flinched. No one screamed. This was normal now.
This was home.
Eunyu nudged Hyunsu with her elbow. “You know this is insane, right?”
“I know.”
“We should be dead.”
“We were,” Hyunsu said, amused. “A few times.”
She shook her head, half-laughing, half-exhausted. “You realize the world’s still totally screwed, right?”
He looked at her, eyes warm, body still. “Yeah,” he said. “But we’re still here.”
Eunhyuk said nothing. But he reached into his pocket. And without a word, he held up the photo Eunyu had given him. The two of them. Kids. Smiling. He didn’t say anything. But he smiled. And this time, it wasn’t terrifying. Just… real.
The three of them stood together as the sky shifted above. Clouds parting. Not bright. Not perfect. But light nonetheless. Somewhere below, a child screamed. Another laughed. A monster purred from the shadows. And far beyond the city, a girl named Yisoo walked through the ruins, her shadow stretching longer than her years, her hands still free.