Chapter Text
Hyuna didn't quite know anything other than the studies Heperu forced upon her.
She vaguely remembered the one who birthed her and someone who looked just like her. She doesn't remember their faces clearly or what they sounded like, but she sees them in her dreams. In her dreams, their faces are oh so clear and bright as day, but when she wakes, she never remembers what happened in the dream or their faces. It's a perpetual cycle of seeing, remembering, and not remembering again and again, on and on. She wants to see them — she truly does — but it never happens, so she resigns herself to her fate.
Her fate with her endless studying, singing, dancing, and performing. Her fate with seeing the faces she only knows in her dreams and never remembering them as she tries to cling onto the memory of their warmth and their smiles and their voices.
So Hyuna keeps studying, singing, dancing, and performing her whole life while she's dream, dream, dreaming of faces and people she doesn't know but can't help but know. She continues in this cyclic routine for her days to come until a change is brought up to her.
Heperu takes her to Anakt Garden's lobby, fills out and signs paperwork, tells her to go with the alien on the other side of the counter, unclips her leash, and leaves her in the lobby for the alien worker to take inside to the play area of the school.
Within her first week at Anakt, she has done nothing except for the routine the aliens have put her in and complying with Heperu's ever insistent and everlasting demands that she does this modelling photoshoot and star in that commercial.
In all honesty, she was getting tired of the routine and wanted to escape it, so she won't have to deal with the photoshoots and the commercials and the creepy and disgusting and weird way some of those aliens who aren't Heperu stare at her.
With all that going, Hyuna didn't think she would find anyone to become friends with because of all the photoshoots and commercials and the strict routine she was put on.
However, she was quickly proven wrong when two new pet-humans arrived at Anakt.
She was counting on her fingers, a new game she made to play by herself since she didn't have anyone to play with during the recess time they got at the school between classes. Each time she counted, she would attribute the number to someone or something in the play area. This way, she would remember the names of each thing and person there even if she never interacted with the people there.
One. The tree pressed up against her back.
Two. The red flowers in the garden. She thinks they're called "Clematis"?
Three. The vibrant grass colored verdant but too bright to be natural.
Four, let's start with naming people now. Let's see... The girl with dark indigo hair... What was her name? Oh, that's right, Hari.
Five... Um... Hyuna thinks that person's name is... Kim?
Six... How about that blonde boy who's in front of her and counting with her? What's his name?
Wait.
The blonde boy in front of her?
Hyuna looks up as he bends her fingers towards him as he counts aloud.
"One, two, three..."
His eyes are hyper-focused on counting and he's not looking at her.
His hair is light but golden, perfect curls albeit unkept, and his eyes are a similar shade to his eyelashes. He seems smiley and sunshiny just from the way he's interacting with her; so unbothered, so carefree. It's unlike the other kids in Anakt who would keep their distance from her because they thought her too intimidating with her neutral expression of frowning, as opposed to smiling.
She didn't remember how long she was staring at him for, but she knew she stared at him until he paused in his counting, looked up at her face, and beamed at her. Nobody smiled at her, especially not as brightly as he is right now. It took her off-guard at how freely he was acting with her right now. She didn't even know what to say.
Blessedly, she didn't even need to say anything because he spoke up, in a calm voice, soothing to the ears, "I'm Luka. What's your name?"
"Hyuna."
"'Hyuna.'" He repeated, the word flowing out of his mouth seamlessly, like it belonged there, like Hyuna's name was meant to be said by him, in his voice. "That's a nice name! Say, do you want to play with me and my friend? I saw you were here by yourself and thought that you'd appreciate the company! He's right over here."
The blonde motioned to a brunette who looked just like her, just with shorter hair, standing with a ball in his hands. He was remarkably familiar and his eyes seemed to flash with recognition when his gaze landed upon her. There was a word on the tip of her tongue, the familiar taste of it and its syllables in her mouth, but she couldn't remember it and its consonants and vowels, even when she knew it instinctually. Just like how she knew the one who birthed her and another who looked like her.
"Alright... What's his name?" She asked, desperate to know the brunette's name, to know the word on the tip of her tongue, to feel the instinctual pull and lull of warmth, to feel the consonants and vowels of each and every letter of his name until it's ingrained into her brain and her tongue, until she can feel it brand itself on her heart and her very soul.
"Hyun-Woo," The blonde responded. "His name is Hyun-Woo."
"Hyun-Woo." She enunciated. It was familiar and so similar to her own, even when they've undoubtedly been born from the same human and separated to be purchased by different aliens, it's familiar in that she remembers him and he remembers her. And in her heart and her very soul, they're both screaming the familiar word of 'brother' out into the world.