Work Text:
“Nakyoung-ah, clean your room more often, I'm begging you,” Yooyeon nags, pinching the bridge of her own nose. It's probably the fifth time she's had to ask this month. She's peeking over the open door to stare at Nakyoung's room.
It's not unusual for Yooyeon to see her having such a dirty and messy room. Her room is mostly filled with disorganized anime and manga merchandise collections that would've been so adorable to look at if they were kept spot clean and not collecting dust. The only thing noticeably clean are her bed, a dozen of her My Melody stuffed toys, and the two photo strips they took in a cheap photobooth stall in their campus taped on her wall. Yooyeon can't imagine stepping inside her room for more than 10 minutes without going into a coughing fit – if she is even able to walk inside properly given the amount of spread out pile of takeout containers on the floor.
Nakyoung is scrolling mindlessly on her phone while sprawled on her bed like some sort of overgrown cat. “Sorry, unnie. I've been busy lately,” she answers nonchalantly.
Yooyeon has heard this excuse before, too many times to count. She was just hitting a wall over and over again, but she forces herself to take a deep breath instead.
“So your part-time job is keeping you so busy, you can’t manage to pick up a single trash bag? Or, even a broom? A vacuum? You don't even go to college anymore,” Yooyeon says, her voice edged with exasperation. There's no sign of ‘busy’ anywhere in what the younger girl is doing. Just the glow of the screen reflecting against Nakyoung’s face, and the occasional sound of a TikTok audio playing for barely three seconds before being swiped past. “And yet you're always bothering me about our TikTok streak, whining about how I’m ruining our streak if I don’t reply.”
“Our streak is at 203 days. That's commitment now, unnie. And I'm busy hustling,” she replies, fingers still scrolling through her phone. “You know. The grind.”
“What grind? Do you define grind as watching anime?” Yooyeon snaps, leaning against the doorframe. “Watching your twelfth episode of…what is this? Magical Bunny Kitty Angel 5000?”
“It’s called Magical Bunny Princess Angel 8: Return of the Epic Black Kitty Under the Moonlight,” Nakyoung corrects cheerfully, like she deserves a gold star for remembering the full title of the animated glitter-coated fever show dream she was watching. “It's very nuanced. You wouldn't get it, unnie.”
Yooyeon stares at her. Just stares. Yooyeon gives up. She tells herself not to care, because caring meant frustration, and frustration meant wasted energy. She shouldn't use too much energy on reprimanding her lazy roommate when her finals are just around the corner. But watching Nakyoung shrug off responsibilities as easily as flicking lint off her sleeve grates on her.
“Just… clean up, okay? There's bound to be a hazard within your room eventually.” she says finally, voice flat, empty of energy. “You don't get how exhausting it is when you drag me into your mess every time you can’t find something. Nine times out of ten, it’s because it’s buried underneath some pile of junk in here.”
“Oh, come on, unnie,” Nakyoung whines with an exaggerated pout. She spreads her arms out like a starfish, phone still dangling from one hand. “That only happens… uh…” She squints at the ceiling in thought. “Like… once a week.”
“It happened yesterday, Nakyoung-ah.”
“…Oh.”
“Yeah, oh.”
She could still remember it vividly. Nakyoung was barging into her room in a panic, flailing around and wailing about how she’d lost her wallet and couldn’t make it to her part-time job without it. Yooyeon had spent nearly an hour digging through Nakyoung’s clutter only to find the stupid strawberry wallet wedged under an empty instant ramen container.
Nakyoung blinks up at Yooyeon with big brown eyes, her lips tugging down just enough to look pitiful, hoping to get whatever shred of sympathy was left in Yooyeon’s soul.
Yooyeon almost felt bad.
Then her eyes drifted around the disaster zone of a room again, and “hazard” was putting it lightly. It looked like some kind of post-apocalyptic war zone where the My Melody plushies had declared victory over humanity.
She straightens her posture, crossing her arms tighter over her chest. Her face was set, her jaw tight. “Yah, don’t give me that look.”
“Fiiiiine,” Nakyoung drawls out, making a show of stretching dramatically, as if cleaning would be some impossible task.
The thing about living in Seoul is that it's an extremely bustling city and everything happens in it for some reason. It goes from seeing a cat walking on the frozen Han River (Yooyeon still has that meme in her head from how Nakyoung had sent almost every existing variation of it to her) to having a front-view of superheroes in colorful spandex suits defeating monsters. It didn’t matter how ordinary her day started – by the end of it, Yooyeon knew she'd witnessed something insane.
Yooyeon had barely stepped out of the building, and there it was already in broad daylight. Another infamous masked monster with a humanoid body clad of black that showed up in Seoul every week. All of them were individual monsters that had different heads, with their head being part of their powers. The Seoul monster of the week was… Super Glue?
There’s gross, gloppy glue everywhere in front of her along with the sharp, chemical smell of pure liquid adhesive in her nose, and it was continuing to wreak havoc. People were stuck to anything and everything with the adhesive the blobs of glue monster shoots out. She surveys the scene around her, trying to process the chaos unfolding in front of her. A man was flailing against a streetlamp, his tie glued to the pole like some cruel joke. A woman was stuck in an awkward squat position, clearly regretting bending down to tie her shoe at the worst possible moment. And then there was a kid who’d somehow gotten both hands glued to his ice cream cone.
She wasn’t even surprised anymore. Disgusted? Yes. Mildly inconvenienced? Definitely. But surprised? No.
It was just how things went in Seoul. You could wake up, brush your teeth, and head out for a day of errands only to find yourself dodging yet another incident involving monsters with random objects as their heads. Yooyeon knew this stuff happened. It was practically a weekly occurrence in Seoul. A monster shows up, the spandex superhero squad rolls in to save the day, and then everyone shrugs it off and goes right back to their overpriced coffee.
But this wasn't just a replayable video clip. There was no pause button. No mute button. Just reality crashing into her at full force. The monster is just 30 meters away from her, and Yooyeon was paralyzed by the gravity of it all.
The monster lets out a growl and shoots another string of glue from its nozzle head, targeting an unlucky food delivery driver attempting to swerve past on his motorbike. It aims directly at the guy's butt in his seat, forcing his rear to stick there. Yooyeon can faintly hear his cry of agony from afar.
It was going to be fine, most likely. Any second now, someone in colorful spandex wearing a helmet would come flipping in from the rooftops to save the day, shouting out their famous lines with a dramatic attack name while striking a pose.
“Social Squad Sonyoger, here to protect the people of Seoul!” A chorus of voices unison from somewhere above her.
Yooyeon tilts her head and squints up at the rooftop where the spandex-clad heroes stood in all their glory, silhouetted against the cloudy gray sky. The leader, Sonyoger Red, was at the front, posing dramatically and showing herself off to everyone.
“Hey, what are you doing?!” Sonyoger Green exclaims, surveying the mess before her.
“Me? I'm simply doing a favor for the world! Mwahahaha!” Glue monster cackles, proceeding to shoot more spurts of glue towards the superhero team. They barely dodge it.
“What favor? You're hurting people!” Sonyoger Orange shouts.
“I’m simply bringing the best matches together! Isn't it romantic? I'm doing my part as the cupid of love!” Glue monster proclaims gleefully.
“How is a guy and a street lamp exactly the best match?” Sonyoger Blue deadpans.
The Sonyogers were so close to defeating the monster. Then it quickly fled from the scene with an evil cackle. And now Yooyeon finds herself stuck in a sticky situation.
Yooyeon stares down at her hand – their hands – and feels every last shred of her sanity drain out of her body like a deflating balloon. They're in the middle of the sticky streets with her left hand now glued to Sonyoger Black’s right. The slimy texture against her palm felt all sorts of weird, her fingers twitching uselessly against the warm, fabric-covered hand they were now glued to. It felt some sort of sick prank where someone had dumped a bucket of epoxy where their hands intertwined.
Sonyoger Black was only trying to deflect an incoming garbage bin being thrown at Yooyeon earlier. She was successful at protecting her, but in the moment where their hands held, the monster quickly glued their hands together, resulting in this.
“Just take your gloves off already,” Yooyeon manages as calmly as she could try. She tugs as much as she can at their hands, wincing as the glue didn’t budge at all.
Sonyoger Black tilts her helmeted head towards Yooyeon. “It’s part of my uniform,” she responds.
“Huh?”
“It’s part of my uniform,” Sonyoger Black repeats, slower this time, like Yooyeon hadn’t understood the first time. Her voice has a soft and lazy drawl to it. Something feels familiar and it's odd. But there are more important matters for Yooyeon to worry about, and it’s their conjoined hands. She was never good at memorizing details of people to begin with.
“Then take your clothes off,” Yooyeon simply says as if talking about the weather. “I'll find a stall for us.”
Sonyoger Black's helmet snaps toward her in surprise. “I- I can't, sorry. Secret identity protocol.”
“You’re not taking your helmet off,” Yooyeon insists, tight and clipped. “You’re just taking your uniform off.”
There was a pause. The kind that stretched a second too long. Yooyeon knew she wasn’t going to like what came next.
“It's part of the uniform too. The helmet, gloves, and suit are all in one piece,” Sonyoger Black snaps back.
What kind of uniform even was this?
Yooyeon stares at Sonyoger Black for the umpteenth time through the visor hiding Sonyoger Black’s eyes.
“I’ll tear it off with scissors then,” she mutters.
“This uniform is made of specialized material.” Sonyoger Black continues, voice steady as a metronome, “It’s designed for combat integrity and environmental resistance. Removing any part compromises my identity as well as operational integrity.”
“What about acetone? There's a hardware store down the street.”
“It's industrial-grade adhesive enhanced by alien technology. It doesn’t come off that easily,” Sonyoger Black huffs, leaving no space for argument.
“Then how does it get off?” Yooyeon asks, feeling grim.
“We wait until they defeat the Glue masked monster,” Sonyoger Black explains coolly.
“But it ran away.” Yooyeon sighs.
“It’ll eventually come back, trust me.” From the tone of her voice, Yooyeon could hear the black ranger smile through it. “No monster gets away from us.”
“Are we just going to spend the entire day like this until your team defeats them?”
“Yes.”
Yooyeon dragged her feet along the sidewalk, her arm stretched awkwardly to the side where Sonyoger Black was attached to her hand. Every step felt like they were participating in a three-legged-race, with neither of them managing to sync up their pace properly. Her shoulder was starting to ache from the strain.
“Have you never walked with someone before?” Yooyeon asks, trying to manage her composure.
“Not with someone I'm glued to,” Sonyoger Black retorts.
They’ve been walking for what felt like miles. It felt long enough for Yooyeon’s calves to burn and her patience starting to wear thin. She wasn’t used to walking this much. Her normal commute to her campus involved a taxi ride that lasted an hour. The idea of trying to explain this whole mess to a taxi driver was enough to make her ditch the idea entirely. People can stare while they're walking, but at least Yooyeon won't have to talk to them.
Besides, the roads were blocked anyway. Everywhere she looked around, it looked as if some god got bored and scattered all the vehicles in the road like they were toys. Cars were stuck like someone had pressed pause on the city mid-crash sequence. Buses, mopeds, even the occasional delivery bikes were all frozen in place. Almost every driver abandoned their own vehicle except for the ones that had passengers in it.
Yooyeon could feel sweat gathering beneath her collar, sticking her shirt to her back. She tugs at the strap of her bag with her free hand, shifting it higher on her shoulder as if that might somehow make this situation more bearable.
“You’re walking too fast,” Sonyoger Black says suddenly, breaking the silence.
Yooyeon shoots her a look, or tries to. It was hard to glare properly when you were glued like this. “I’m walking at a normal speed.”
“Not for me,” Sonyoger Black quips.
“Well I have an exam,” Yooyeon's voice cuts sharply through the air. She presses her lips into a tight line, and she turns her gaze firmly back to the sidewalk ahead of them.
“An exam,” Sonyoger Black echoes the word like it was some foreign concept. “It’s not life or death, right?”
“My life does depend on it,” Yooyeon says through the awkward shuffle of their mismatched footsteps.
“You could just reschedule,” the ranger hums. “You're going to be fine.”
“Do you even understand how bad this is?” Yooyeon asks incredulously, having to stop dead in her tracks. “Did you flunk out of school?”
“Kind of,” Sonyoger Black admits. “I dropped out after my first year.”
“That explains things,” Yooyeon blurts out without thinking.
“Yah!”
Obviously the guard didn't let them in. He didn't even blink nor budge. He stood there like a brick wall in his navy uniform, thumb perched under his chin like he was pretending to think about it. Yooyeon could tell that he wasn't.
The security guard’s voice echoes in her head:
“Sorry, miss, you can't go in with your superhero friend. No outside visitors allowed during exams.”
Yooyeon tried everything. From showing her lanyard, her student ID, her profile in the student portal, and even receipts proving she’d paid her tuition. She even bothered to spend five minutes explaining her entire situation and how she got stuck glued to Sonyoger Black. He just stood there, arms crossed and wholly unimpressed. As if it was perfectly normal for someone’s academic career to be derailed because… they were glued to a superhero.
She stabs at another sticky rice cake with her skewer, chewing as if it could somehow vent her frustration. The sauce drips onto the flimsy paper plate, bright red and accusing, like it was mocking her for how this day had gone straight to hell. Sitting at a plastic table under a squeaky tarp wasn’t exactly how she envisioned spending her afternoon. She should be in her exam hall right now, flipping through questions about all the topics she'd bothered to stay up all night to study for.
So much for her future.
Across from her, Black sits awkwardly on the plastic stool, helmet still firmly on her head.
“You’re not even eating anything,” Yooyeon mutters after swallowing.
“I can't really eat anything with my helmet.” Sonyoger Black laughs weakly to herself. But then her voice lowers, losing that light, playful lift. Quietly, she says: “...I’m sorry about everything.”
Yooyeon blinks at her, momentarily startled. The words were so sudden that it caught her off guard. Yooyeon finally looks up, her gaze flicking across Black’s face – or what little of it she could see past the visor. Yooyeon wonders what expression she was making beneath the helmet. And slowly, she feels herself softening towards the hero.
“It’s not your fault,” Yooyeon murmurs, the words slipping out by itself from her mouth. The skewer in her hand suddenly felt too fragile. She sets it down and flexes her fingers against the tabletop before continuing, “You were just trying to protect a civilian like you were supposed to.”
There was a heavy, stretching long enough to settle into something almost comfortable silence setting into them. Then, Sonyoger Black breaks the silence with such a simple question:
“Do you like superheroes?”
Yooyeon couldn’t see her face, but she could hear the smile. It was in the tiny lilt of her voice in her tone and in the way her head tilted, just like a kid.
Yooyeon lets out a tiny chuckle, feeling suddenly flustered. “What? No,” she answers.
“Everyone likes superheroes,” Sonyoger Black insists. “Who’s your favorite superhero?”
“I’m indifferent to all of them. They're not really my thing. No offense but…” Yooyeon trails off, gesturing vaguely at Sonyoger Black’s outfit with her skewer like it explained everything.
It kind of did.
She's always been impartial to them and it doesn't seem like anything will change her mind about it anytime soon. If you asked about her favorite superhero show, she'd answer ‘The Boys’ with no hesitation, but that felt too mean, considering Sonyoger Black was sitting next to her looking like she might actually care about Yooyeon’s answer.
“No offense taken. I mean,” Sonyoger Black starts hesitantly, “at least you're not glued to someone you wouldn't want to be glued with.”
“...Right. I could be glued to my roommate. That would be a total nightmare compared to this.”
Sonyoger Black lets out a strangled cough. It was almost comical. The sharp, sputtering sound she made was too awkward to be funny and too loud to ignore.
“What’s wrong?”
“I-I’m fine,” Sonyoger Black stammers, her voice strained and muffled through a cough. “Completely finr, don't worry. Anyway, why wouldn't you want to be glued to your roommate?”
Sonyoger Black’s shoulders jerks slightly and Yooyeon squints at her suspiciously. Something about her reaction felt off.
Her roommate…
Kim Nakyoung.
Kim Nakyoung.
“To start with,” Yooyeon begins, “she’s messy. Like, disaster zone messy. Her room looks like it’s been hit by a typhoon and somehow survived, only worse.” She waves her skewer vaguely in the air for emphasis. “I can barely walk in there without stepping on something – instant ramen cups, stuffed animals, socks that aren’t even hers.”
Yooyeon takes a deep breath and picks at her sticky rice with the tip of her skewer, stabbing one of the rice cakes until it splits in half. “And don’t get me started on her habits,” she adds, voice rising slightly. “She loses everything. Wallet? Lost. Keys? Lost. Phone charger? She borrowed mine without telling me, and lost it too.”
Yooyeon pauses, frowning as a fresh memory surfaced uninvited.
“Last week,” she starts again, her tone sharper now, “she made me search for her stupid wallet for half an hour. Guess where I found it?” She doesn’t wait for an answer – not that she cares if Sonyoger Black was going to give one. “Under a pile of instant ramen containers. You don't even wanna know how many there are in her room.”
Sonyoger Black shifts slightly in her seat, as if she wanted to say something. But she doesn't. She instead lets out a short laugh at that, nervous and stilted, like she wasn’t sure if she was allowed to laugh.
Yooyeon narrows her eyes at her again.
“But at least she’s…” Yooyeon trails off for a second, staring down at her plate as the words stumbled into a softer tone before she could stop them. “At least she’s kind.” A pause. Then softer: “With her own weird way.”
She jabs at the rice cake and swallows it.
“In the end…” she starts, her voice quieter now, softer, as if the words were meant more for herself than anyone else. “She’s my friend.”
The words feel strange in her mouth. Not because they weren’t true, but because she hadn’t said them in so long that they felt foreign. Like something borrowed from another time. Another version of herself. She lets out a small sigh, the kind that barely made it past her lips but still felt like it carried something heavy.
“We stopped being close after she dropped out,” she admits, feeling suddenly sentimental. “I mean, we still live together, obviously. But it’s not the same. Sometimes I wonder how our friendship would look if she didn’t. She has her own life now that I don't have a place in.”
Her throat burns suddenly, tasting faintly acidic, and she half-heartedly stabs at the final rice cake before shoving it into her mouth. Anything to push down whatever was bubbling up inside her.
“I still wouldn’t want to be glued to her though,” Yooyeon finishes in a mutter.
It was stupid how she just dumped every last shred of her frustration – her messy, tangled thoughts about Nakyoung – onto a masked superhero she didn’t even know. A literal stranger in spandex. Someone she didn’t care about. Someone who probably wouldn’t even remember this conversation by tomorrow. The fact that she still hadn't given her name to Sonyoger Black too tops the cake.
Maybe that was why it had felt so easy. Yooyeon hadn't talked this much before outside of speeches for her school.
She couldn’t imagine trying to say any of this to Nakyoung’s face without choking on her own words. Without retreating behind some snarky comment beginning another session of their bickering or a conveniently-timed argument about how Nakyoung needed to clean her damn room. For someone who's received multiple awards for best speech before, every atom linking her body falls apart in front of Nakyoung.
Sonyoger Black hadn’t said anything for a while now. She was just sitting there, her free gloved hand resting awkwardly against the table like she didn’t know what to do with them. She was just listening in a way that felt both comforting and uncomfortable all at once.
This whole day felt surreal in the worst way, like a fever dream she hadn’t woken up from. The glue on her hand was still sticky and uncomfortable, pulling at her skin whenever she moved even slightly. Her legs were sore from walking god knows how far. She missed major exams for her subjects that were 30% of her final grade. And now her chest felt tight for reasons she wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to unpack.
Yooyeon clears her throat. “Thanks for the food,” she says quietly. “Sorry I dumped everything at you.”
“Don’t apologize,” Sonyoger Black replies, her tone steady. “Sometimes you just need to let some things out.”
There it was. That faint itch in the back of her head again.
"It’s funny,” Yooyeon says suddenly, tilting her head slightly as she focuses on Sonyoger Black. “Your voice sounds familiar.”
The ranger freezes for a split second. Her free hand stopped fidgeting, hovering just above the table like she was bracing herself for something.
“…Does it?” Sonyoger Black asks, feigning innocent so poorly.
They were now getting better at this, walking side by side. The awkward steps from earlier had smoothed out into something that almost resembled coordination. They're less like two strangers glued together and more like a slightly less dysfunctional pair of idiots figuring it out. Yooyeon slowed her steps a little, Sonyoger Black matched her stride, and suddenly they weren’t tripping over each other all over the sidewalk. Though Yooyeon’s shoulders still ached from the awkward positioning.
They’re halfway down the block when Yooyeon hears the sharp, excited squeal of a little kid cutting through the ambient noise.
“Sonyoger Black!”
A high-pitched squeal pierces through the air, and Yooyeon flinched at the noise. She turns her head just in time to see a small girl – eight, maybe nine years old – rushing towards them. Her pigtails bounces with every step, and her tiny pink backpack looked like it weighed more than she did.
The girl skids to a halt right in front of them, her wide eyes sparkling. “Oh my gosh!” the girl exclaims, practically vibrating with excitement. “You’re Sonyoger Black! The Sonyoger Black! I watch all your battles on YouTube! You’re so cool!”
Sonyoger Black freezes for a second, clearly caught off-guard, before carefully bending down just enough to meet the girl at eye level.
“Hi there,” she says gently, her voice warm in a way Yooyeon hadn’t heard anyone before. “What’s your name?”
“My name is Rin! You’re my favorite! My hero!” the girl gushes, trembling with awe. “I wanna be just like you when I grow up!
It was honestly endearing to watch. Yooyeon couldn’t help her lips twitching, almost forming into a smile.
“T-Thank you, Rin,” she stammers, clearly floundering under the weight of all that adoration.
The girl gasps so loudly at the response Yooyeon thought she might pass out. Then she notices their hands. Her wide eyes darted down to where Yooyeon and Black were still glued together – and widened even further, if that was possible. Her little mouth popped open into an ‘O’ shape.
“Oh my god!” she shrieks, pointing at their hands with all the dramatic flair of someone who’d just uncovered a national secret. “You’re Sonyoger Black’s girlfriend!”
Yooyeon’s jaw actually drops. Her brain short-circuited, sputtered for a second, and finally manages to form a single coherent thought:
What.
“That’s not it–” Yooyeon tries to drop Sonyoger Black’s hand, only to remember that they were glued together. Her attempted escape yanks the ranger slightly off balance, making her stumble closer.
The girl ignores her completely. She was already bouncing in place again. “My mom always says superheroes fall in love with regular people!” she announces proudly, grinning from ear to ear. “You’re soooo lucky!”
“Oh no, no,” Black says quickly, waving her free hand in front of her like she could physically swat away the misunderstanding. “It’s not like that at all. We’re just– uh…” She trails off, not sure how to explain their situation.
“Our hands are just glued together from an evil monster. We're not like that,” Yooyeon blurts out, finally finding her voice.
“Ohhhh…” Rin says, nodding sagely. “Like soulmates! You’re stuck together because it’s destiny!”
Yooyeon feels her face heat up instantly – hotter than it had any right to be considering how chilly it was outside. Her cheeks burns with a flush spreading all the way to the tips of her ears.
Neither of them didn't know what to say at all. The girl gave Yooyeon a knowing look. The kind that little kids always seemed to have when they didn’t believe you as if they knew everything the world had to offer already.
“It’s fine! I can keep a secret. I hope you two get married in the future,” Rin continues with an overly formal bow like she's handing them out their blessing, “with children.”
Yooyeon stares at her, slack-jawed.
“T-Thank you!” Sonyoger Black replies sheepishly. Yooyeon’s head had never snapped forward towards anyone before.
“Yah, what are you doing?” Yooyeon hisses, yanking their glued hands enough to make the other woman off-balance.
“She’s a kid! What am I supposed to say?” Sonyoger Black whispers, leaning close so the little girl wouldn't hear.
Yooyeon turns to face Rin again and before she could form anything resembling a coherent sentence to clear everything up, the girl beams at them one last time and scampers off down the street, giggling to herself as if she’d just set something magical into motion.
Yooyeon slumps back against the bench, chest heaving as she tries to catch her breath. She tilts her head up to stare at the sky like it had personally wronged her. The park was quiet, thankfully. Her legs felt like jelly and her lungs were desperate for air. Sonyoger Black sits beside her, equally heaving for her life.
“Well,” Sonyoger Black says after a long moment, her voice still slightly breathless, “at least we got away.”
“Barely,” Yooyeon shoots, turning her head to look at her. “I thought I was going to die.”
“You did fine,” Sonyoger Black replies lightly, waving her free hand as if to dismiss Yooyeon’s complaints entirely. “For someone who doesn’t run.”
Their running had been a chaotic mess of mismatched steps and constant tripping over each other. Being glued together didn’t exactly lend itself to coordination. Her cheeks were still burning faintly from all the flashing cameras and pestering questions from the swarm of reporters chasing them as if they were a Z-list celebrity couple.
“Sonyoger Black! What is it like being one of Seoul’s top heroes?”
“Who is the mystery woman with you, Sonyoger Black?”
“How does it feel to be Sonyoger Black's partner?”
The reporters had come out of nowhere while they were walking. They were crawling out from the cracks like ants as soon as one of them caught sight of their glued hand. The questions and cameras made her head spin just thinking about it. Yooyeon didn't have energy anymore to deal with even a single one of them. So she ran. And naturally, Sonyoger Black had no choice but to stumble along beside her as they tried to sprint.
“Why are reporters even so obsessed with you guys?” Yooyeon asks suddenly, almost without thinking. “I get the children, but reporters?”
She wasn’t sure why she even cared enough to ask. Maybe it was the exhaustion talking. Or maybe she just wants to fill the silence before it swallows her whole.
“It’s the exposure,” Sonyoger Black says after a beat, her tone slightly distant. “The public loves a spectacle, and we,” she trails off, “we’re easy content.”
Yooyeon frowns at that. “Content?” she echoes, eyebrows knitting together.
The word felt too clinical and detached, as if Sonyoger Black wasn’t talking about people saving lives but a reality show or a trending topic on social media.
Sonyoger Black hums softly in agreement. “It’s all about headlines,” she continues, her voice quieter now. “Sonyogers Save Downtown From Catastrophe.” Her tone turns dry as she adds: “Sonyoger Black Spotted Holding Hands With Mystery Girl.”
Yooyeon’s face went hot instantly.
Black laughs softly, quiet and almost shy, like she didn’t want to fully commit to it. “You get what I mean. The cameras love us. And people love what the cameras give them.”
Yooyeon lets out a sharp exhale, not quite a laugh but close enough. “That sounds exhausting,” she mutters under her breath.
“It is,” Black admits simply.
“Do you like it? The whole superhero thing?””
For a moment, Yooyeon thought she wasn’t going to answer.
Then Sonyoger Black let out a long and slow breath, like she was exhaling something heavy. Her shoulders shifted slightly, the tension easing just a fraction before settling back in again.
“Sometimes,” she answers finally.
“Sometimes?” Yooyeon repeats, watching Black closely than ever before.
“It’s kind of complicated.”
Yooyeon blinks at her. A faint breeze sweeps through the park. She didn’t say anything, waiting for Black to continue.
“It’s not all bad,” Black adds eventually, her tone softer now. Like she was trying to convince both Yooyeon and herself at the same time. “There are moments where it feels worth it. But it’s not always.”
Yooyeon frowns.
It was weird, hearing someone who’d dedicate their life to saving people sound so uncertain about it. She'd expected a big speech with unwavering conviction about justice and hope, but this definitely didn't sound like that. Beneath the layers of spandex, there was a vulnerability that felt achingly human.
“Why do you do it, then?” Yooyeon asks after a long pause. “If you’re not sure you even like it?”
“They chose me. And I…” She hesitates, sucking in a shallow breath before continuing. “I told you I was a dropout.” Her free hand clenched tighter now against her knee, her knuckles pressing against the black fabric. “I was sick of feeling useless. Like I had no future. I wanted to do something good in my life for once.”
Yooyeon swallows hard. She didn’t know what to say or if she should say anything at all. Her mind was too loud, buzzing with fragments of things she didn’t want to think about. Nakyoung’s room, messy and chaotic but warm in its own way. Nakyoung dropping out without so much as an explanation, just a shrug and that grin like it didn’t matter. Nakyoung’s wallet being buried under ramen containers. Funny how Nakyoung, bane of her existence, lives rent-free in her own head.
She shouldn't hear Nakyoung in every word Sonyoger Black said. In every faint tremor of uncertainty and every tiny pause where it sounded like she was doubting herself as she spoke.
Something twists in Yooyeon’s chest, sharp and sudden. Not pity but something adjacent. Something hotter and messier. She shook her head quickly to herself, trying to push the thought away before it could sink its claws in further. This wasn’t about Nakyoung. This was about Sonyoger Black. The girl in full black spandex who saved civilians, even when she didn’t seem entirely sure about whether she liked being a hero.
She glances down at their hands again, glued together under the dim park lights. Somehow, the connection felt different now.
Yooyeon's voice came out softer than she meant it to when she finally speaks: “Do you think you've done something good?”
“I just hope I did every day.”
Yooyeon bit her lip, hesitating for a split second before blurting out: “I think you’re doing a great job at it.”
Yooyeon barely had time to process the fact that she was being dragged by Sonyoger Black before she found herself standing in the middle of their base, glued hand still stuck to Sonyoger Black’s, and her legs so close to giving out she swore she could feel her knees trembling.
The room was sleek and futuristic, all polished steel walls and glowing tech consoles that wouldn’t look out of place in some big-budget sci-fi movie. There were monitors everywhere, flashing maps and graphs and stuff that looked important but meant absolutely nothing to Yooyeon.
But it didn't really matter, because Yooyeon was busier gawking at the unmasked rangers before her. Her eyes widened as recognition slammed into her chest like a freight train.
Sonyoger Red and Blue were both models, Zhou Xinyu and Yoon Seoyeon respectively. She'd seen their faces splashed across multiple products, glossy magazine covers and sometimes even billboards. You could practically see their faces plastered everywhere you walked in Seoul.
Sonyoger Pink was Koma Mayu, a particularly big name in the acting industry. Yooyeon had seen her in that one hit drama everyone was obsessed with last winter – the one Nakyoung made her binge-watch over a weekend while eating way too much jjajangmyeon. Her face looked just as flawless in person as it did on screen.
Sonyoger Orange was Hsu Nientzu, the Olympic runner. She recognized her instantly from that viral video of her breaking some insane sprinting record at the last Olympics. People had been obsessed with her for months, and it was impossible to not see her on your feed on social media during the Olympic Season.
Meanwhile, Sonyoger Black – still fully masked and glued to Yooyeon – stood beside her, stiff and awkward like a kid caught skipping class. The only one who hadn’t revealed their face.
Nien notices them first, looking up from her spot on the couch with a wide grin.
“Hey!” she says brightly, standing up. “Finally, you're here! And you brought…” Her gaze shifts to Yooyeon, lingering long enough to make her feel like she was under a microscope. Then her eyes widened, as if she recognized Yooyeon herself.
“Do you know me?” Yooyeon asks before she could stop herself.
Nien blinks at her, startled, but didn’t answer right away. Instead, her gaze flicked toward their glued hands for a brief second, then to Sonyoger Black, and then finally, Yooyeon's face. She opens her mouth as if to say something, then closes it again, her lips pressing into a tight line.
“N-No,” Nien answers, shaking her head, though there was a hint of hesitation in her voice.
Yooyeon's brain was filled with suspicion.
“Why are you two holding hands?” Seoyeon asks bluntly, cutting through the awkward tension like a knife.
“It’s not like that,” Yooyeon starts her voice, hitching embarrassingly. “We’re not–”
“We’re glued,” Sonyoger Black blurts out, like she was trying to end the conversation before it could begin.
Seoyeon raises an eyebrow. “Glued?”
“Yes,” Sonyoger Black says firmly, holding up their joined hands for emphasis. “Literally. You know, from the monster attack earlier today.”
“We trust that you won't leak our identity, will you?” Xinyu proclaims from her chair.
“I won't. I'm too busy with college for that,” Yooyeon replies.
Xinyu hums softly, nodding once like that’s good enough for her. But her gaze lingers on her for just a second longer than necessary, like she's assessing her.
“Thank you. She wouldn't bring anyone here that she didn't trust in the first place,” Mayu adds.
Who was she?
“Why is Sonyoger Black the only one unmasked?”
The room stills for a moment. The atmosphere shifted slightly. Not enough to be tense, but enough that Yooyeon noticed the way everyone exchanged glances. Like they were silently debating who should answer.
Then Nien exclaims, “They say that innocent civilians who see her face bear the curse!” The words spills out in a frantic rush, like she was trying to outrun Yooyeon’s question entirely.
Before Yooyeon could even process that nonsense, Mayu tries to chime in smoothly, “R-Right! She doesn't have a face, and if you look into it, she sucks your soul completely, like a black hole!”
“She’s just looking after you, don't worry,” Xinyu adds, barely holding in her laughter at all.
“And that’s not even the worst part,” Seoyeon continues with a deadpan. “We’ve seen too many people sucked into her black hole and–”
“Oh my god,” Sonyoger Green – Kim Chaeyeon, probably the most famous idol in Korea – squeals as she bursts into the room. Her voice was high-pitched and sing-songy, practically vibrating with excitement. “Nakyoung unnie! You finally brought your roommate here that you keep talking about!”
Yooyeon’s heart almost stopped. Her throat burned, and her chest tightened all at once like she’d just been sucker-punched from the inside. Her eyes were fixed on Chaeyeon, who was still bouncing on her heels like some energetic puppy unaware it had just peed on the carpet.
Sonyoger Black presses the gray button on her waist with her free hand and in the blink of an eye, her helmet was removed, and her clothes were reverted back to normal.
“Hi, Yooyeon unnie,” Nakyoung says weakly with a wince.
Everyone had left in a rush, talking something about the glue monster returning, their voices overlapping as they scrambled out of the base. Or maybe they just didn’t want to stick around and deal with the mess brewing between her and Nakyoung. Yooyeon wouldn’t blame them for that.
Yooyeon sits stiffly on the couch, her glued hand still awkwardly stuck to Nakyoung’s, the faint pressure of the glove straight up unbearable now. She doesn't know how long the silence had stretched between them, but it felt like years. There's too many words tangled in her throat she can't make sense of. Too many feelings crashing into each other at once – shock, confusion, anger, and something else she didn’t want to name. It made her chest feel tight, like her ribs were pressing in too hard.
Yooyeon felt stupid, frankly. How did she not realize it sooner? All the clues were right there, practically screaming at her and she missed every single one of it.
“So you’re…” Yooyeon starts, her voice cracking slightly. “You’re Sonyoger Black?”
Nakyoungs let out a weak laugh – small and breathy and guilty as hell.
“Uh…” She scratches the back of her neck with her free hand again, still unable to face Yooyeon. “Surprise?”
“Nakyoung-ah. Look at me. You…” Yooyeon speaks, though her voice came out strained and tight. “You never told me.”
Nakyoung flinches at that, just barely, but enough for Yooyeon to notice. Then she finally looks at Yooyeon in the eye.
“I couldn’t,” Nakyoung murmurs after a beat. Her gaze drops to their glued hands, and her next words came out softer. “I thought you’d laugh.”
“What?” Yooyeon's voice pitched higher with disbelief. “Why would I laugh?”
Nakyoung hesitates, biting at the corner of her lip in that way she always did when she was nervous. “Because,” she mutters, not looking up, “it’s… me.”
Yooyeon swallows hard, her throat tight and itchy like it was filled with sandpaper. Her fingers trembled faintly where they were still stuck to Nakyoung’s glove, and she curls them tighter, pressing into the fabric like it might steady her.
“You’re a hero, Nakyoung-ah.” The words tumbled out before Yooyeon could stop them, her voice trembling despite her best efforts to keep it steady. “Look me in the eyes, please.”
Nakyoung hesitates. Then, slowly, like she was bracing for something painful, she turns her head toward Yooyeon. Yooyeon could see the set of her jaw. The way her shoulders curl inward, like she wanted to fold herself into nothingness.
It hurt to see her like this.
“I’d always support you,” Yooyeon says firmly, like an oath. “Sure, you're the bane of my existence because of how messy you are–” (She forces a weak laugh here, more for herself than anything; it sounded hollow.) “But if you told me it was because of your superhero activities then…”
She trails off, shaking her head slightly as frustration bubbles up in her chest.
“Then I would’ve understood, Nakyoung-ah!” The words burst out of her raw and sharp and full of everything she’d been holding in since the moment Chaeyeon had dropped that bombshell. “Do you know how much time I spent wondering if I did something wrong? If I pushed you away?” Her voice cracks again, and she it, but the words kept tumbling out whether she wanted them to or not. “I thought I failed you as a friend.”
Nakyoung flinches like the words physically hit her. Her mouth opens like she wanted to respond but nothing came out. Just a faint, shaky exhale that made Yooyeon’s stomach twist into tighter knots.
“I thought you didn’t want to be friends with me anymore,” Nakyoung finally replies, “so I didn't bother.”
Yooyeon stares at her, her throat burning with the acidic sting of something. Anger? Guilt? Sadness? All of it, probably. A horrible mixture of emotions that made her stomach churn and her fingers twitch uselessly against Nakyoung’s glove.
Her mouth felt dry, like every word she wanted to say had been sucked out of her lungs and scattered into the air
Yooyeon had thought about it – about whether Nakyoung still wanted to be her friend after dropping out. Whether the distance between them was intentional or just… what happened when people’s lives spiraled in different directions. There were times she figured Nakyoung had moved on – had better things, bigger things to focus on. Like it wasn’t worth trying to force a closeness that had already started slipping through their fingers.
But hearing Nakyoung say it aloud hurt more than she wanted to admit.
“You’re such an idiot,” Yooyeon mutters, shaking her head. “Like, literally the dumbest person I know.”
“I’m sorry…”
“Look,” Yooyeon says quietly now, softer but no less firm. “I’m still here, aren’t I?”
Nakyoung blinks at her again, hesitant and unsure.
“I'm still here, still maintaining our dumb TikTok streak, so stop acting like you don't matter to me.”
Yooyeon hadn't really expected falling asleep inside a superhero base. But exhaustion doesn’t care about plans, and at some point – maybe when Nakyoung shifted closer to her on the couch – her eyelids grew heavy. The kind of heavy you couldn’t fight even if you wanted to. She wasn't sure what woke her up. Probably the ache in her neck from sleeping in the world’s most uncomfortable position.
The first thing she noticed was her hand.
It wasn't sticky and glued to Nakyoung's hand anymore. It was bare and weightless, resting on the edge of the seat.
Then she looks at Nakyoung. She was slumped against the opposite end of the couch, head tilted back and mouth slightly open in the most unflattering position imaginable, still asleep. Yooyeon blinks at her for a moment, letting herself stare just a little too long.
As if moving on instinct, Yooyeon reaches for Nakyoung's hand and intertwined their fingers again, as if it belonged there. Like they’d done it a hundred times before. Like it was the most natural thing in the world.
And it felt natural. As if their hands had been made to fit like this all along, like they were made just for this. Her pulse thuds faintly in her chest as she glances down at their joined hands. Just skin against skin, warm and solid that made her chest ache all over again.
She could feel every faint ridge of her knuckles, the soft pad of her thumb brushing against hers without meaning to. It sends a quiet shiver up her spine.
Yooyeon only squeezes her hand tighter with no intention of letting go anytime soon.