"This was the last thing I expected when you asked me to come over," Junhui huffs. A streak of neon purple hair flying up at the sudden puff of air. He doesn't let it settle into place before pushing his glasses to rest atop his head, the bright green light dimming down and shutting off its functions. He thought he could get a productive day going, fixing one of the robotic functions in his house that powered the living area with a quick-change. Junhui wasn't always too keen on having people over at his home, but it served its purpose for preparation. After all, having such a large group of acquaintances led to one or two drinking parties a week for various reasons. The last one being his success in building the main screen on his latest invention after much trial and error. If it were up to him, he wouldn't label himself as the best to handle cyberware in his group, but if he had to choose one, it would be the blue haired boy in front of him. 

Maybe he's not exactly in front of him, but he is at the sound of a bolt dropping and a groan. The man slides out from under the massive robot. With his back on the hovering board, he folds his arms across his chest and looks up at Junhui with a sneer. "I'm no genius. If I want this finished in the next two weeks, I can't work completely by myself," Wonwoo mutters out. It's flaunting, the way he sits up without using his arms and taps twice on the corner of his own glasses, turning any magnification down, Junhui assumes, as the man proceeds to toss him a wrench. "We're a team, remember?" And Junhui sure as hell remembers, but it wasn't worth reminding Wonwoo that just yesterday he insisted on working the software element by himself. 

"You're so stuck up, you know," He says instead, watching a smirk spread across the man's face that he so wishes he could just slap right off. Maybe even program to never do such a thing again. Junhui scowls. "We might have a chance at beating the VividZ team this year," Wonwoo starts. And Junhui already hates where this is going. "You know? The ones that built that totally awesome man-controlled cyborg with the technical malware that totally fried our own creation we worked so hard on," he laughs. "And what makes you think I want to be reminded?" Junhui snips back, dusting off his reflective sleeve with a hand, as if the comment had actually left a dirtied imprint on something more than his ego. 

"Oh, come on," Wonwoo pushes. As he stand up, Junhui catches the way his overworked muscles flex purposefully. Under the sleeveless crop top, there was no hiding how well the younger man was built after years of weight-lifting. 'What's the fun in that?' Junhui thinks. Though he supposes he can kind of see the appeal, seeing as it is one of the only things left in the world that high-tech could not replace. So maybe Wonwoo's hard work did pay off. But it still doesn't excuse his cocky attitude, and Wonwoo seems to know that. He lets out a loud laugh at the disgruntled look on Junhui's face, running a veiny hand through his hair. The lighting in the clunky garage highlights the bright colour of his overgrown mullet. An electric blue, contrasting to the rest of his hair that covers it. Wonwoo bites a hair tie off of his wrist and collects the charcoal coloured upper layer to swiftly tie into a ponytail. 

"They're our friends too, Wen Junhui," The man remarks, strutting over to clap a heavy hand down onto Junhui's shoulder, making the oldest of the two stumble to keep standing. "Isn't Seungcheol your idol or something?" 

"Just because he's my idol, doesn't mean he can't be my rival too," Junhui remarks, feeling Wonwoo's hand slide off of him as he walks away to grab a seat. Unlike his that move to accommodate people at his command, Wonwoo still keeps and uses wooden bar stools to his liking and comfortability. It's almost cliche, knowing that they have way more advanced versions, but Wonwoo has always been like that. And apparently, they're more comfortable than sitting on textured metal. 

"You don't act like an ass in front of him. Maybe it's about time I tell him how you really feel," Wonwoo argues as he moves to the opposite side of the creation they are working on, letting Junhui's complaining and grumbling fall on deaf ears. Instead, he puts his full attention onto the digitized blueprint he pulls up on his lenses using nothing else but his own eye movement. It leaves both go his hands free to gently hold a screw in place, while the other maneuvers the tool to screw it into place perfectly. 

Despite Junhui's complaints, he knows he has to work just as hard. With a tap of his finger, he pulls up a projected image from a device around his wrist. In its full 3D outline, is the mech they are working on. Team  No.Va's mech. With only a few parts highlighted in green on his screen, he knows they still have a lot to work on. He supposes he can let this sudden call slide, just this once. 

V.ega-17 is the name of their mechatronic creation. 

They started working on her about a month ago. Wanting to get the motherboard,  software, controlled commands, and coding done sooner rather than later, they somehow managed to work together to get that out of the way quite quickly. Though Junhui would argue that he did most of the work on that part. Going as far as staying up into late hours of the night just to re-read every single line of coding to make sure they wouldn't run into any problems once they started programming. V.ega-17's functions were pretty much set to work. All they needed now was the shell. That, was arguably more of a Wonwoo strong-suit. 

Junhui's eyes quickly scanned over the diagram in front of him, using the motion of his fingers to scroll through their building plans before finding just the one he was looking for. In no time, he has a document open with his proceeding steps. 

'Wire the capacitor to the charge amplifier, making sure to tie the correct wires together. Image sensors and integrated transceivers should be wired accordingly using the given Complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor found near the CPU socket.'

Of course, only Jeon Wonwoo would leave all the technical stuff to him. 

Rolling his eyes, Junhui finds it quick to pull up his instructions for the servo motors instead. Their mech needs the ability to move before being given the commands to move, after all. Just like before, a tap of his finger allows him to see the images in his lenses instead. He watches how the entire frame lights into a neon green as he slides them back over his eyes. 

With careful hands, he inspects V.ega's right arm. The wiring at the base was done already. All he needs is to extend its circuits to the elbow, making sure the shafts and adaptors are precisely in place to provide free movement. This isn't his field of strength, but he's learned a lot from both his friends and the internet. Starting in high school, Junhui self-taught himself the works of mechatronics engineering and coding. His mother had a point, always brining up how curious of a boy Junhui was. Starting at a young age, he wanted to know how things worked and why the world around them was the way it was. He wondered what could still be changed and what he could make better.

It wasn't easy. God Junhui would laugh in your face if you ever had a single thought that it would be easy. Moving from China to the even further advanced country of Korea is an experience he has everything to thank for. Getting comfortable and around in a place surrounded by some of the most useful technology used in every day life was anything but easy. He was used to the pleasure of meeting people, but having to meet power operated personalities was.. strange. 

Nonetheless, it was a world he found himself adapting to. Over the years, it only added more sparks to the already burning fire of infinite possibilities his imagination conjured up. He knew that not everything had to be mechanized, but that didn't take away the idea of just how cool it was anyways. His first robot, made for the school's end of the year science fair, could only pick things up and sort them into respective categories. Impressive, yes, but that only made him want to go further until he touches the limit of what he can really do. Robotics was his passion, and still is. If it weren't for that, he doesn't think he would have ever met Wonwoo. 

That day, he was tinkering with the gears on a new invention while waiting for the bullet train, when all of a sudden someone bumped into him, sending one of the gears flying off of its axel and rolling towards the tracks. Junhui thought for sure that the component was a goner. Already doing the math to figure out how much of his allowance that singular gear was worth. 

He had already bid it a farewell in his mind when he caught sight of a boot landing itself on top of the gear and stopping it from continuing to roll on its side. When Junhui followed up the person's body, he was met with the back if a messy head of hair. The man carefully bent down and picked up the silver object, inspecting it between his fingers. He carefully slides his headphones off of his ears to rest around his neck, before turning to meet Junhui's eyes with his own blue ones. A smile slowly crept onto his sharp features as he strides in Junhui's direction. Stopping only a mere foot away from him. "This yours?" He asks casually, holding the precious gear out in his palm for Junhui to take. And take he does, mumbling a curt thank you, fully expecting this mysterious boy to go on about his day right after.

Boy was he wrong, because the searing gaze was on his hands for a whole minute. Watching as Junhui precariously put the gear into its place once more and tested the rotary function. 

"Are you building that?" The boy suddenly speaks up. Making Junhui look up at him with an incredulous expression. 

"It's in my hands, of course I'm the one building it," Is what he wants to say, but he swallows down the remark to replace it with a simple "Yes."

"So you're a mechatronics major too, I'm assuming," The man adds. And Junhui has to wonder what's so interesting about him all of a sudden that this guy won't just hand him the stupid gear and walk away. 

Junhui nods. 

"I think I've seen you around the lab before. Wen Junhui, is it?" 

Junhui blinks. 

And this guy has the nerve to laugh, extending a hand out. 

"Wonwoo. We go to the same university. I think I have a different class period than you do, though. I've only ever seen you after school working on assigned projects," The Wonwoo guy smiles. Still waiting for Junhui to shake his hand. And maybe Junhui isn't a complete ass because he places his own hand into Wonwoo's, giving a firm shake.

"We should be friends," Wonwoo pipes in, already pulling his phone out from his pocket, and Junhui doesn't even get a second's time to say no.

After so much time, Junhui has been able to tame his pride enough to admit that he doesn't regret declining the offer of friendship. Not even when Wonwoo is at his most narcissistic, clingy, and annoying phases. He found someone with a shared interest. And before long, it was someone he worked with. A lab partner for the second time since they met. 

They worked well together. Always knowing what the other was thinking with only a single glance. It was a rare thing, to find a balanced chemistry between two differentiating personalities. But Wonwoo and Junhui made it work. Wonwoo was like to soju to Junhui's hot pot. Complimentary, and honestly, necessary on some occasions. 

As their friendship reached two years, the sudden rise of robotics competitions started. And who was Junhui to deny a challenge? He made sure to take a picture of the bright screen atop that building that day, and send it to Wonwoo, of course. This was their chance to show what they were truly made of. Junhui pocketed his phone as all he got in terms of a response was a spam of shocked cat stickers and ran home that day to start brainstorming. Every single one of his ideas got a spot on his digital vision board. He made elaborate sketches on his tablet and summarized his invention's uses. 

For a whole week, he video called Wonwoo so they could plan, prototype, and build. Things flowed so naturally between them. It was almost like they had their own secret language only the other could understand. With a two week time limit, they managed to construct a home device that could set an invisible barrier to only alert any breakage of unrecognized faces, as well as register ones to be recognized. 

It didn't get them first place, but second place felt just as great after the nights they spent awake past midnight to conspire. And it set the ground floor for everything else they could do. 

So, naturally, combat robots was what they set off to build next.