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It started with a 'play date' with another human who had been picked up by an Unfathomable a long time ago.
Jingeon was apparently an 89 year old grandfather pretending to be a little kid with an Unfathomable who pretended to be his mother. With Unfathomable technology, Jingeon was even reverted back to his young childhood self.
Jo Euishin couldn't really tell the difference as he played with Jingeon at the motherly Unfathomable's home. Jo Euishin could almost hear his Unfathomable's friend Hwangho laughing and saying that Jo Euishin always lost his intelligence in front of animals and kids, but Jo Euishin never knew what Hwangho was talking about. His intelligence was fine. The 'dog' of the family of Unfathomables that he was staying with, Snare, was a genius, and Jingeon looked like an adorable little kid genius too.
"You're really nice, hyung, so let me just say something." Jingeon said after scrutinizing him. They were currently drinking orange juice after playing games all day. "Something bad happened when you were on Earth, right?"
Jo Euishin was going to listen to the cute gray-haired kid, but he faltered upon hearing his words, even that serious, more knowing 'old man' tone coming out of the kid.
"You lost a lot. Went through a lot. You're tired." Jingeon continued while looking at him with knowing but also solemn eyes. "You should try what I'm doing. The Unfathomables have the technology to revert anyone back to any physical age you want. And you know how they're nice enough to go along with almost anything that we want here in this Paradise. You can rest in Paradise. I'm also always looking for new friends to play with."
Jo Euishin softened a little at hearing a child, even if it was someone with the appearance of a child, say that.
"A lot happened to me too." Jingeon confessed before looking up at him. "I sincerely think it'd be good for you." Jingeon reached out to touch Jo Euishin's hand. "Just try it. When we have all the time in the world now, what's stopping you from trying it? You don't have to truly forget. Just rest and play with me. If you want me to be the hyung, then I can take care of you too."
It was a little odd but touching to hear a child want to be his hyung.
At the adorable declaration, even puff of his chest as Jingeon made it, Jo Euishin couldn't help but promise. "I'll think about it."
"What are you two talking about?" Hwangho asked, having apparently come to pick him up with Baekho. "Hm. It seems like you're losing your intelligence, Jo Euishin."
"Hwangho-nim should be nicer to his ward." Jingeon's Unfathomable said and Jingeon pouted like a real child.
"Yeah! Hwangho hyung is such a big meanie! Euishin hyung is always intelligent!"
"Hahahaha, is that so!"
Baekho snorted at his friend, but the white tiger-looking Unfathomable looked at him contemplatively, having probably heard the entire conversation. After all, Hwangho didn't need to pick him up when his 'official' Unfathomable Baekho almost always followed him around, never interfering but always looking out for him somewhere in the vicinity.
Baekho was like a worried guardian - almost as much as Jingeon's Unfathomable was - and Jo Euishin couldn't help but think on Jingeon's words again.
'Just try it... What's stopping you from trying it?'
It wasn't like it was that much different from how things were like nowadays. Jo Euishin was already like a pet cat fostered by aliens.
He couldn't get the word 'rest' out of his ears either.
Jo Euishin never wanted to forget his family, but it would be nice to try fully putting himself in the hands of aliens who already wanted to take care of him and didn't seem to need anything, having everything in the world in this Paradise already.
Jo Euishin considered it.
And the word 'rest', the thought of not being the oldest, the responsible, the anything echoed in him.
If anything, it can be like acting... Jo Euishin was always good at acting and this can just be one extended long act as he thought of what to do from now on as he was staying here.
-
The Tigers were only surprised for a moment before they smiled and offered to schedule the operation as soon as tomorrow.
Enough time to back out, but quick enough to give him his request, Jo Euishin thought as he agreed to the schedule.
As Jingeon said, none of them had judged him or anything, just eager as always to help. Jo Euishin wondered if there was something in the water or if he had always been crazy since coming into Paradise or if he had died and lost some brain cells in the process, but he rather liked that. Felt like he really was allowed this and could put everything in their hands. Let someone take care of him who didn't deserve it and who didn't think that they could be put together no matter what.
And Jo Euishin became physically a year younger than Jingeon, making Jingeon a hyung.
Jingeon happily took on the role, easily switching to calling him dongsaeng the next time they met.
Jo Euishin was glad. He didn't think that he could be a good hyung.
-
Although Jo Euishin's body was much younger, Jo Euishin's memory wasn't ever tampered and he could remember clearly how he used to read books with his dongsaengs back when they were alive.
They would go to the library to pick them out.
His dongsaengs liked picking out the picture books to ask him all sorts of questions on the pictures to test his knowledge. He used to think that it was to annoy him, but now, he wondered if it was to feel proud or awe whenever he knew an answer, if it was to feel safe and happy whenever he sighed but nevertheless answered all of their questions. Just like when his dongsaengs used to try to bother him for his attention when he was trying to focus on chess. Just like when they would always squeeze with him instead of giving him space and room to breathe.
They only wanted his attention. To feel positive things about him. To be with him.
"But why don't the red fish like the black fish?" Jo Euishin asked childishly, reliving a memory of his dongsaeng asking him that for a book about a black fish that got ostracized by his school of red fish.
Like most memories of his family, Jo Euishin's mind stuttered, darkening as he wondered for a moment of what he did, how did he treat them, did he ignore them, get mad-
"Shoal discrimination happens when..."
Jo Euishin's mind cleared when he heard Baekho answer the question while drawing him even closer in a hug. Jo Euishin was already between two tiger-like Unfathomables. He would say that it was his first time experiencing 'cuddling', but actually, not only had it happened a lot with the Unfathomables and Jingeon since his physical de-aging, but Jo Euishin could now remember through the scattering haze of his memory that he had cuddled with his dongsaengs like this before.
And Baekho's answer was actually his answer. Although Jo Euishin sometimes forgot how he treated his family in panic and guilt of whether he had treated them right before they had died, Baekho had always been watching him with Unfathomable technology when Jo Euishin had been living on the Earth and apparently Baekho remembered.
Jo Euishin felt himself able to breathe again at the cautious thought that he had answered the question instead of pushing his dongsaengs away or getting too annoyed and angry at them. He wasn't that awful of a hyung.
"That's cool, hyung. How did you know?" Jo Euishin felt himself reciting his dongsaengs' words as he finally recalled their excited smiles and awe with a choked feeling in his chest.
"I just do." Baekho said smugly, and the other Unfathomables, his found family of friends, looked at him with scowls and disbelief that he could just plagiarize someone's words right to their face and shamelessly say that as if it were all his own words.
Jo Euishin should be more concerned by more evidence of Baekho essentially stalking him before he had died on Earth, or sympathetic to the other Unfathomables for having such an arrogant and shameless friend, but he could only feel lighter at yet another memory of his family safely reviewed as 'not so bad'.
"Does Jo Euishin want orange juice while we continue reading?" Hwangho asked, seemingly always needing to compete with Baekho at the title of 'best hyung'. The tiger Unfathomables were weird like that. Or maybe Baekho had just drawn too much aggro from them even before Jo Euishin entered Paradise that they felt the need to humble Baekho whenever possible.
At the question spoken to him like a parent to a child, Jo Euishin thought about it before smiling like he imagined his dongsaengs would, like how he if he was a real child would.
"Yeah!" Jo Euishin smiled, reaching up with his hands and wiggling them impatiently as if he expected the offered juice to already be ready for him now.
Hwangho breathed sharply, his eyes widening, before he smiled and got up immediately from the warm cuddle pile of tiger Unfathomables around Jo Euishin.
"I'll prepare it right away. Just wait a moment."
Was his acting too much? Was it too burdensome? Jo Euishin wondered for a moment, examining his memory of Hwangho's sharp inhale but then mentally shaking his head by how Hwangho had smiled brightly afterwards.
"Euishin-ah is such a good child. Our Euishin-ah can wait so patiently." Eunho, the tiger Unfathomable on his other side, praised him while patting Jo Euishin's head and also moving to cuddle and hug him closer like Baekho.
Jo Euishin giggled - and for some reason, many things didn't feel as bad as they once had.
Maybe Jingeon did have a point about acting like a child with the Unfathomables.
Eunho breathed sharply at the sound before rubbing Jo Euishin's head with both hands and then giving up and hugging Jo Euishin into his arms, completely ignoring Baekho. "So so good. Our Euishin-ah is the cutest!"
"Eunho hyung is silly. Jingeon hyung is cuter." Jo Euishin said while reddening.
"Nonsense." Eunho said while Hwangho seemed to have returned just a moment earlier because he asked urgently.
"Can I be hyung too? Call me Hwangho hyung."
"Hwangho hyung."
Hwangho surprisingly lost composure and rubbed his head with more head pats while giving him his orange juice.
"Eunho is right. Our Euishin-ah truly is the cutest!"
Were they really so happy about him acting like a child? Normally, people would be annoyed if a grown adult acted like a child, but then again they were Unfathomables - real aliens - and not humans.
But seeing how it wasn't so bad, especially because they were aliens and because he felt himself slowly letting go of other things, Jo Euishin decided that it wouldn't be so bad to continue to try.
"Should we continue reading about Swimmy? Or does Euishin-ah want to read another book or do something else?"
"I want to keep reading." Jo Euishin said. Although his heart was pounding with a hint of fright, Jo Euishin wanted to keep remembering how he spent his time with his dongsaengs and finish reading the book with the Unfathomables.
Although Jo Euishin had already graduated from college as a literature major, it didn't feel bad to read picture books with them either. He felt warm and safe within their arms as they cuddled together on the bed again and Jo Euishin drank from his glass of perfectly chilled orange juice.
"Then I'll go next. I want to read next." Eunho fought for the right to read the next sentence of the book.
Unfathomables were truly weird, fighting over things like this, but Jo Euishin felt alright as he watched them. A life like this truly didn't feel that bad.