Chapter Text
Sixteen hours before Kim Dokja dies, Han Sooyoung tips the first domino over.
“Joonghyuk, I want him to go at the hands of someone he trusts.” The lie scrapes at Han Sooyoung’s teeth.
It’s a cop-out, and she knows it. Sooyoung sees the way Dokja looks at Joonghyuk, like a flower reaching for the sun after a long, difficult winter.
This would destroy the kid, Sooyoung thinks. This is worse than betrayal, to die at the hands of someone you love.
It’s a cruel, selfish thing, what she’s doing, but Han Sooyoung has never been a creature built for gentleness. Maybe she’s hoping Joonghyuk will be braver than she is. Maybe she’s hoping that if Joonghyuk goes through with it, she can feign ignorance with clean hands.
Besides, Sooyoung reasons, it’d be worse if she did it. With her, Dokja would be alone and afraid.
A harsh sound slices through the air. It’s sharp and brittle. It’s Yoo Joonghyuk’s voice.
“I can’t do it.”
Sooyoung’s never seen that expression on Joonghyuk’s face.
“You don’t have to do it now,” Sooyoung tries, but the damage has been done. “Just don’t delay it for too long.” Sooyoung swallows. “We all want Dokja back.”
The implicit message ripples between them. This isn’t our Dokja.
Joonghyuk storms out of the room. Sooyoung stands in the dust, a lump in her throat.
That evening, Dokja disappears.
—
When the sun dips below the horizon and Yoo Joonghyuk still hasn’t returned, Han Sooyoung begins to worry.
Sooyoung bites the inside of her cheek. I shouldn’t have pressured Joonghyuk like that.
It’s easy to think that Joonghyuk is no stranger to blood and death, but Han Sooyoung should know better. The endless slaughter doesn’t get any easier from regression to regression—he’s just become more efficient.
More numb.
Sooyoung paces the tent. Maybe Joonghyuk was right. Hasn’t she learned anything from Dokja by now? There has to be another way.
Kim Dokja, that stupid idiot, she fumes, sweeping the door aside. Even as a kid, he’s always getting himself into trouble.
Sooyoung runs.
And now I have to clean up the mess.
—
Han Sooyoung can’t find them.
How far can one scrawny little kid run? Sooyoung seethes. Where the hell did they go?
It’s another thing that Sooyoung doesn’t want to think about. Dokja was so thin—concerningly thin. He doesn’t stand a chance out there.
Sooyoung kicks down another fence, agitated.
When she finally spots Joonghyuk in the distance, carrying that little rat bastard he loves beyond saving, the worry falls away and crystallizes into a safer emotion—anger.
“Christ, Joonghyuk,” Sooyoung swears, relief ballooning in her chest. “Do you know how worried I was–”
She stops.
Joonghyuk’s jacket is soaked in blood—Dokja’s blood.
—
Sooyoung hardly gets any information out of Joonghyuk on the way back. Dokja—adult Dokja—sleeps on Joonghyuk’s back, unaware.
“Did you kill him?”
Joonghyuk’s eyes are empty.
“Joonghyuk, did you kill him?”
Joonghyuk only speeds ahead, her question ignored. Sooyoung runs after him, grabbing Joonghyuk’s shoulder, forcing him around to look at her. No, it feels as though he’s looking right through her.
A bleak misery is painted across his handsome face, an expression more devastating than the catastrophes that ruled TWSA.
This is a man that has known too much grief, and Kim Dokja might be the one to destroy him, Sooyoung realizes.
Sooyoung’s hand goes slack.
And I did this to him.
When they reach the tents, it’s like Joonghyuk is running on autopilot. He unceremoniously dumps Dokja onto their makeshift couch, twisting away to find first aid.
Sooyoung follows him in half a daze. Maybe she’s running on autopilot too. “Joonghyuk.”
Joonghyuk nearly empties the whole cabinet searching for gauze and medical tape.
A wound like that can’t be fixed with those.
“You’re covered in blood,” Sooyoung says, strangely calm as she trails after Joonghyuk. Maybe she has to be, or they’ll both splinter apart. “Go wash yourself. I’ll clean him up.”
Then it slips out, the words oddly comfortable on her tongue. “You’re gonna scare the kid when he wakes up.”
Joonghyuk’s head snaps up from where he’s kneeling by the couch, holding a roll of gauze.
Sooyoung realizes her mistake—the kid. The kid is gone. Of course the kid is gone, Joonghyuk killed him, and Yoo Joonghyuk never leaves a job unfinished.
Sooyoung doesn’t know what to expect. Will Joonghyuk yell at her? Stalk off in a rage?
Will he try to kill her?
Even now, Sooyoung can’t fully let her guard down around Joonghyuk. Unconsciously, she reaches for her dagger.
Joonghyuk catches the movement, eyes flickering down to her hands. But contrary to her expectations, he doesn’t pull out his sword. He doesn’t even glare at her.
Joonghyuk just turns back to the couch, unbuttoning the bloodied fabric of Dokja’s shirt. Then, he says something unexpected.
“I didn’t kill him.”
When Sooyoung looks at Dokja’s exposed chest, where the stab wound should be—
There’s nothing.