Chapter Text
Lightheaded and disoriented, I stumbled out of Looky Mart with the white lizard plushie in my arms. Just as I collapsed onto the sidewalk, in the corner of my eye, I saw the notepad floating in the air with a slight glow.
What the hell? What is with this thing's timing? I could have used its help while inside Looky Mart, not the moment we escaped. But before I could cuss out the notepad any further, my vision faded to black.
---
I jolted awake. A blanket was wrapped around me, tucking me into the hospital bed. My eyes still bleary, I could make out an armchair and a bedside table next to me. The table had various fruits, snacks, and drinks stacked in the middle.
The notepad was still floating in front of my face. I swiped at it weakly and clicked my tongue. If I had the energy I would have punched it. A soft, hand-sized object fell out of the air.
“...”
That object…
I recognised it immediately.
Ugh, I didn’t want to think about it now.
I shoved it underneath the pillow behind me and then focused on my immediate situation.
I had belatedly realized I was starving. The nostalgia candy would have worn off a while ago, and the familiar heaviness returned to my limbs. I hurriedly reached out to a water bottle close to me. Um. My reach was a lot shorter than I remembered. Using my left hand instead, I grabbed the water and crumpled back onto the bed.
"Ghk-"
Everything was sore and my head was pounding. I rested there for a moment, gathering the strength to open the water bottle...Uh, how would I open the water bottle..? Should I hold the bottle still with my feet and then use my left arm..?
A click of the door interrupted my meandering thoughts.
"Ah, you're awake."
"...?!"
Craning my neck with difficulty, I met a Bureau agent's relieved gaze. I squinted and nearly did a double take - a cold shock ran through me. A Bureau Agent. Visiting a Dispatch Rescue team member. And most importantly, that unmistakable scar on his neck that brought back warm memories of late night wiki reading.
Holy.
My eyes shook for a moment but I quickly looked away and around the room, as if I was still disoriented. The man's relaxed demeanor at seeing me awake quickly changed to concern. His eyes flicked to the water bottle, then to my arm.
"Did you sleep well? It looked like you were having a nightmare before," He said lightheartedly, opening the bottle for me as he spoke.
Oh my god. The man I had read numerous wiki logs about was at my hospital bed, nonchalantly taking a seat. Was it really him? Dear god, am I still dreaming? Did I die in Looky Mart?
"Nice to meet you, hoobae! Thanks to you, I got to experience entering Looky Mart..and leaving in just three minutes. The students are safe and have returned home, and Agent Mint is recovering well too. Everyone's doing fine, agent, you've successfully completed your first rescue mission!"
Agent Choi picked up an apple from the table and began peeling it with a knife as he debriefed me.
"Ah. Let me introduce myself. Hmm, I don't really like using my agent codename, but..."
That line...
"Just call me Agent Choi."
"..."
Holy shit. It's really him. It's a good thing I was too tired to move, otherwise my jaw would have been hanging open.
The accumulating apple slices on the plate were cut with rabbit shaped ears. He picked one up and shoved it into my mouth.
"Agent Mint told me about your arm, by the way." Agent Choi's tone dropped a little. "The doctors patched you up and gave you some special painkillers," he sighed, "but you..to lose a limb on your first mission.." He trailed off and sighed again.
Now that I had been eating and drinking for a bit, my head had truly cleared. Rather, I should say, to my despair, my head had truly cleared. I could no longer ignore the object that fell out of the notepad earlier. Especially when the individual it was based on was sitting next to me, chatting in a soothing voice while feeding me peeled apple slices.
---
Being an adult with adult money, I had bought DER merch before. However, official merch tended to be limited to small items like acrylic keychains, button badges, or pins. Items that teenagers could buy with their limited allowance. However, I had greater ambitions.
After careful consideration and multiple pages of design notes and mockups, I had commissioned a doll maker to craft for me a 15cm tall plush doll. Yes. Of Agent Choi.
How could I not be a fan of Agent Choi? He was someone with a bright personality, who looked after his colleagues and juniors, and prioritized rescuing citizens as an upstanding Disaster Management Bureau agent. My thoughts started wandering as I catalogued through all the wiki logs I had read about him. The moment I sent the money to the dollmaker on Tweetser I knew I was too far gone to say I was just a casual fan.
It was embarrassing to admit, but I was a bit of an otaku.
I even commissioned the dollmaker for only the base plush body. I wanted to hand make his Bureau uniform myself, to make sure the fabric was comfortable and the details were correct. His miniature Jakdu had taken me the whole weekend to make, but seeing Agent Choi with his signature weapon sitting on the table every morning made even Mondays feel bearable.
---
This led me to my current situation.
I was lying in a hospital bed in the Disaster Management Bureau. The morning sun was peeking through the curtains and there was a light breeze. The mission had been concluded cleanly. And I was stiffly nodding along to Agent Choi's cheerful chatter while trying to ignore the sweat coating my back and the knowledge that there was a miniature Agent Choi plush hidden beneath my pillow that he absolutely must not know about.
Fuck. He must have seen the recognition in my eyes when he walked in, but he still introduced himself to me anyway. Kim Soleum is a fresh rookie at the Disaster Management Bureau. He shouldn't have been here long enough to know many other agents.
'...'
Why didn't I just look down and pretend to be a shy rookie..!? Why couldn't I have recognized him just a bit later..!? Then I wouldn't have been caught with that expression..!! I wanted to dig myself into a hole.
But surely I can say I've seen him around the building and just happened to remember him? That won't be so suspicious. Even though my expression of recognition he saw was beyond that of a casual acquaintance...and it was more like complete shock with my emotions all over the place...he only saw it for a moment! If I insist I just saw him around, I can make him conclude he was mistaken.
Even better, if Agent Choi doesn't bring it up, maybe he didn't even notice! Yes, it might have been a shock that I made it back alive, and I was finally out of the darkness - there are many things that could be interpreted from my momentary expression!
Speaking of making it out of the darkness, I needed to convince Agent Bronze to let me switch teams and escape the horrors of darknesses. But now that I remember that Agent Choi was also in Hyunmoo 1, it kind of makes me want to stay in this team...
To choose between a life of administrative peace without Agent Choi or a life of terrifying ghost stories, but with Agent Choi. I was using my brain too much for someone who had woken up just 10 minutes ago.
It wasn't long before he had finished shoving all the apple slices in my mouth. Agent Choi made sure I had drunk the full bottle of water, then he stood up suddenly and opened the hospital room door, dragging in a person.
Agent Bronze.
The three of us discussed my team placement, and I used my sympathy card to its fullest, finally getting Agent Choi and Bronze to let me try out other teams first.
With that concluded, they stood up to leave. Agent Choi grinned right before Bronze shoved him towards the door.
"Ah! Jaekwan's trying to kill me!"
"For now, just rest. Don't worry about anything else."
I bowed my head towards Agent Bronze.
"Thank you for being so considerate."
Then, my stupid mouth betrayed me.
"Um! And thank you..Agent Choi."
I immediately cringed. Every word sounded foreign and overpronounced, like it was someone else's voice and I was watching myself in third-person act like a clown. I felt my face heat up and cursed inwardly again. Maybe this is the legendary, devastating awkwardness people talk about when they meet their idols.
Agent Choi paused, smiling warmly, "You can call me Choi-sunbae, you know." Ruffling my hair, he left with Bronze and closed the door quietly.
I laid there with my head in my hand (just one) for the next hour, staring at the ceiling.
---
The predicament of plushie Agent Choi existing within 1m vicinity of the real Agent Choi had concluded. My next mission was sneaking him out of the building without anyone seeing him. There was no way I was going to keep a plush of an existing agent inside the Disaster Management Bureau building.
A while later, I recovered and was finally discharged. I managed to slip him under my jacket and smuggle him back to my motel without any agents seeing.
[Friend.. you seem to have brought home another "friend".]
Braun sounded displeased, but there was nothing I could do about this. I couldn't leave plushie Agent Choi at work, or in some dusty locker, and I definitely could not dispose of him. This was something the notebook had given me. Based on its track record, all the items had some kind of function or a good degree of usefulness. Yeah. It wasn’t because plushie Agent Choi looked so cute that it brought a sense of fullness to my heart whenever I looked at it. Yeah. At least Braun approved of my handicraft in the Bureau uniform I had spent sleepless nights on. It was a small comfort, but it was good that he wasn't too upset.
I returned to my usual routine without knowing it. I gave plushie Agent Choi a pat on the head every night before I went to sleep, when I woke up in the morning, and when I left or came back from work. I felt my sleep quality improve and my energy increase just by seeing the cute embroidered face.
Although seeing the real Agent Choi was a shock, I think I managed it alright. My heart rate did spike violently, but it was from a mix of excitement and fear. Seeing the object of your fanboying in front of you is very different from taking photos from afar. My emotions flipped between wanting time to stop so that I could take HD photos of him, but also wishing I could evaporate from the room. Nevertheless, I survived.
---
'...'
The person grabbing my shoulder and chatting. I recognized that voice and that lighthearted tone.
I'm screwed. What is he doing in the Faceless Market...and how did he recognize me?
I didn't realise I had spoken that part out loud, when he replied, beaming, "The veins on wrists. Turns out those are unique to each person."
Goosebumps spread across my skin, my mind spinning. If his observation skills were this good, then there's no way he missed it when I recognized him in the hospital room.
"The veins are almost like fingerprints, you can track people down with them, and they're a lot harder to remove than fingerprints."
Ah. Yep, that was the sound of everything falling apart. With his overly friendly grip on my shoulder, he was clearly suspicious of me. And it's definite. He knows that I know him from somewhere I shouldn't.
Why doesn't Daydream sell equipment that can erase memories in the employee points shop?
Actually, should I just hit him on the head and run?
Whatever, I don't even have a weapon with me right now...I cried internally.
But why didn't he say anything? And why isn't he doing anything now?
Agent Choi even believed all the nonsense coming out of my mouth about the "distress signal note". Even if it's in his characterisation to want to save just one more person, the stuff I'm making up right now is just ridiculous. Agent Choi..aren't you being too lenient with me..? TT
"As I thought..."
As you thought?
"You should really join Hyunmoo 1."
Wow. It's like an unstoppable force. I really needed to channel the energy of an 'unmovable wall to counter him', but I'm already using up the majority of my brain trying to control myself from fanboying out, even in this situation. Let's control my heart rate first…
---
Eventually I joined Hyunmoo 1 and we cleared Disasters as a team. At home I freely appreciated the cuteness of plushie Agent Choi, and at work I freely stared at the back of his head or his side profile as he wrote reports. Compared to Daydream, life now felt like I was in a fictional story written by someone who wanted me to be happy. Of course, entering darknesses never got easier, but picturing myself squishing plushie Agent Choi was an excellent way to distract myself from the ghosts and gore in front of me.
Just as we were finishing up for the day, Agent Bronze tapped on my shoulder. "Grapes, I think it's about time you took a day off."
Agent Choi popped up from behind his desk partition. "Agreed! We cant have our hoobae work himself to the bone all the time. We just packed up a large case and Bronze and I only have errands to do on Monday, so it's the perfect day to be unproductive!" He gave me a thumbs up that peeked above the partition panel.
"After this weekend, take Monday off as well." Bronze concluded.
And so I found myself with time and liberty that was unexpected in my life as a wage slave.
When Monday rolled around, I tried to recall what I usually did on my days off. The last time I had a day off, I went to the DER pop-up shop...well. What do normal people do with their free time? Go to arcades? I'd feel like an old man surrounded by teenagers and elementary schoolers. Go to a restaurant? ...Looking at the peeling motel wall, I can't afford that. Go to a cafe?
Plushie Agent Choi made eye contact with me at the perfect moment, and memories of fans taking their Nui plushies to coffee shops and posting cute photos flooded my head.
I stood up quickly, feeling a rush of exhilaration imagining plushie Agent Choi sitting next to a cup of iced coffee and a slice of crepe cake. I could even use the Jakdu as a prop as if he had cut the cake with it..!! No– I could even take pictures of little Agent Choi posing with the Jakdu and cake and then draw dialogue bubbles and sfx over the photo..!!!
Right. I should buy some cute ribbon and a bell for props on the way to the cafe.
---
ring~
In the early afternoon, the door of the coffee shop opened and two people walked in.
"Ah~ I'm glad everything wrapped up quickly!"
Huh?
"Agent Haegeum recommended the apple tart here. Let's get that and some coffee - I feel like a sugar boost, so maybe something sweet."
Wait a moment.
"Jaekwan-ie, what are you going to get?
Please wait a moment.
“Hm? Jaekwan?”
“Uh.”
"..."
"..."
Agent Choi stared at me, his mouth still open and finger still pointing at the menu on the wall.
More accurately, I feel, he stared at the setup in front of me.
Plushie Agent Choi was sandwiched between an iced latte and a slice of tiramisu crepe cake, with his Jakdu leaning against his side and miniature bells near his feet, complementing the bells on the Jakdu. A red and blue ribbon trailed around the set, completing the scene perfectly in the afternoon light.
Fuck. There’s no way out of this. My phone was in my hands and the screen was on the photo editing app, with tiger ears and a tail drawn on the plushie Agent Choi, and yellow sparkles around him.
Hello? God? If you exist, strike me down now. My heartbeat was so loud I felt like my whole body was shaking with each beat, and my ears were burning. If I keep getting caught in situations like this with Agent Choi I might die of heart failure before a darkness gets to me.
"Woah..Hoobae… Uh, wait.." Even the normally chatty Agent Choi couldn’t gather his words. To make it even worse, Bronze was watching this all go down..
"..."
"Uh, is that..me?"
"..."
Wish potion? Fuck. Forget about returning home.
If I got my hands on a wish potion I would immediately erase his memory of this.
The silence was getting too long. Huh. Maybe I should just die today.
I eventually gathered the vestiges of my sanity and tried to form a coherent explanation.
"Choi-sunbae, um, I’m actually a fan.."
Wait.
"No! Um. You see, I knew about you before joining the Disaster Management Bureau!"
Kim Soleum, what are you doing...you aren’t making any sense… Ah, I wanted to drive my head into a brick wall.
"I’ve always admired you and so I, uh, I had this plush made.. And, uh, taking photos of cute things is just something I like!"
I kept babbling, hoping that the order of my words were correct even when my thoughts were like soup.
"Ah, you know the cute pink rabbit keychain I always carry around?"
"..Braun..?" Agent Choi finally responded.
"Yes– Yes! It's just like that!" I nodded vigorously.
Agent Choi was still standing with his mouth hanging slightly open.
Damn. If before I wanted to dig myself into a hole, now I wanted a darkness to suddenly trigger and drag all of us away from this situation.
Please just say something..please…
"So..Grapes-ie, when you recognised me at the hospital, it was because you, uh, were a fan of me..?" Agent Choi spoke stiltedly.
I nodded again.
"And here I was, thinking it was because you were a spy or something.."
Woah. Cold sweat flooded down my back and I almost made eye contact with Bronze. Um. That’s something else..I’m sorry agents..
Okay, aside from that, this wasn’t going too badly.
Time to double down.
"Although I was hesitant at first because of my terrible luck, I heard of an experienced agent that prioritises helping civilians and still makes it out safely from Disasters, which ultimately convinced me to apply for the Disaster Management Bureau."
I was surprised at how smoothly the lies flowed out of my mouth. I intentionally made a show of being shy of my admiration for Agent Choi, which wasn’t difficult because I wasn’t really acting. My face still felt like it was on fire.
"I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier, Choi-sunbae..! Ah..and the doll, I should have asked you if it was alright before making it.."
Perfect. I’m just an enthusiastic fan of a particular Disaster Management Bureau agent who is very shy about his passions. Summarised quickly without too much detail.
Not someone suspicious, or a freak otaku. This should dissuade them from asking more now that I’ve come clean and seem so apologetic, but...
"..."
Why is Agent Choi’s expression so smug...
‘Please just grab your coffee and food and go along with your day!’
But have you heard the quote from German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, "God is dead"? Using the same words, but with a slightly different meaning, I wanted to cry out that statement. God is dead – God has abandoned me, because no matter how hard I prayed for Agent Choi and Agent Bronze to ignore me...
The sound of two chairs being dragged over from a nearby table.
Agent Bronze picked up a menu and went to order for him and Agent Choi.
Agent Choi plopped down in front of me while grinning. His previously awkward movements smoothly shifted to his usual teasing tone as he picked up the plushie Choi to examine it.
"Wow, Grapes-ie, this is really well made..you’re actually a fan of mine?"
Oh fuck. Why does he look so happy while saying that? ...He could at least be a little weirded out. Haha, I kinda wanna cry.
"Oh, did you make the Bureau uniform yourself!?
Seriously, Agent Choi? Don’t look so happy at having a freak fanboy junior.
“Wow, this is so cute, Jaekwan-ie, come and take a look at this!"
...Don’t call Bronze over either please.
"Grapes-ie, can you tell me more?" Agent Choi rested his chin on his hand, looking at me expectantly.
Tell you more? What should I say? You’re actually a character from a horror wiki, and I have a shrine of your merch at home? Or should I tell you that I pat the plushie good morning and good night every day? Or that I was going to print a photocard of the edited photo I just took of plushie Choi and hide it inside my phone case..? Agent Choi. I’ll be honest. There’s too much I can't tell you.
...Maybe it would have been better to be suspected as a spy.