Hoseok could feel the jostle of the blade on his back, the blood pounding through his temples and the rush of adrenaline in his veins. His ears were sharp, his muscles in a push-and-pull as he raced through tight rows of tents towards the mess hall. Without a second thought, he peeled the shortsword from his back in his right hand and peeled the flap of the tent back with his left as he ran inside.

A too-sweet smell. That's not dessert.

Jung Hoseok crouched low and crept hurriedly along the side of the tent, his eyes searching through the darkness inside. His feet padded hurriedly, the smell getting stronger until he braced to a stop--still standing in a low crouch.

One body. The head chef.

Hoseok held in a sigh, taking in the sight of the plump woman that lay dead between picnic tables. Then his eyes caught a second form on the floor, this one on the far side of the room. He gripped tighter at the blade and ran. But as he got closer to the form, he saw the dark pool next to it of more blood.

Two bodies. A cafeteria aide.

Their big gaping eyes were glassy. Hoseok jumped up onto a table and scanned the room. There was no one else.

There should be three more main attendants. Where are they?

Hoseok jumped down from the table and raced towards the smaller adjacent tent to the cafeteria, where the team bunked. Through one flap, then another.

This tent was smaller, and the light was on inside it as Hoseok crept through the wide open flap. Inside, a chair was on its side and a broken mirror was scattered like jagged snow across the messy room crowded with clothes and bunk beds.

"GHA!"

A young woman came running straight for Hoseok with a frying pan in her hands and a wild look in her eyes.

Hoseok dodged out of the way. Realizing the terror in her eyes, Hoseok sheathed the shortsword in his hand onto his back. "Hey! Hold on there!"

"AHHHH!" The girl turned and ran for him a second time.

Hoseok dodged easily and, with little effort, twisted that frying pan out of the girl's hands. After he did so, she cowered towards the back of the room like a frightened, angry dog, her little chest heaving in panic. Hoseok carefully set the frying pan down on a cot next to him.

"Hey," he spoke softly. "It's ok. My name's Jung Hoseok. You know me. Commander Hoseok."

Recognition settled into her, but that didn't stop her from heaving panicked breaths.

"Hey, it's ok. I'm not gonna hurt you. I came to find out what happened to you and your friends." He crouched low like he was going to sit down on the floor in a show of vulnerability. "I came to help."

She let out in an angry screech, "Where are my friends?!"

"What do your friends look like? Let me help you find them."

She rambled off names and faces in a blur of terror. Hoseok knew at least two of them were dead in the tent next door. A third lay dead outside, having tried to murder Shae and come out worse for wear.

But that left two more people heading up the cafeteria unit unaccounted for.

And despite the show of panic, he wasn't sure whether this girl fell into the category of victim or villain just yet.

--

Jeon Jungkook recognized the make of the gun on the dead body that had been lying outside of the storage unit after Minghao had finished his work.

He knew he'd seen it somewhere before.

He also recognized the emerald green color around the young kid's fingers and the residue on his nose.

This is why we shouldn't fucking keep leaf weapons at camp.

With that in mind, Jungkook raced for the weapons and ammo heavy armor facility that lay on the outskirts of camp. He was relieved to see that as he neared the facility, it still looked tightly secure.

But there was a patter of feet. Not walking, but running--and it wasn't his own.

Jungkook slid his longsword Geji blade from its sheath and continued his silent run, sneaking forward to cut off the running feat he could hear. He pushed himself harder, to run faster.

He turned.

He rammed the hilt of his sword into the side of someone's face, and watched as they toppled over sideways into the sandy terrain with an OOF.

The tip of Jungkook's longsword rested low to the ground and he shifted expertly around the grounded figure, taking in the blank face of the man lying in front of him who was looking up at the sky.

Jungkook's grip tightened around his sword.

"What are you doing?" he asked sharply. "Where are you going?"

The man gave no answer. Instead, he sprang from his back onto his feet in a flash. He started to square up with Jungkook, the two of them silently dancing around each other. Jungkook swept his eyes over the man but there were no blades or blasters in sight.

"You're outmatched, man. Give up and give it to me straight. What are you doing? Who sent you?"

The figure charged forward, growling with rage. It barely took a shift of his feet for Jungkook to pivot and slice. He felt the tear of flesh and tendon, heard the groan of the reckless man as he ran past him.

As he fell.

Jungkook winced but he had to do it. He pivoted, pointing his blade at the man's gasping throat.

"Who sent you?"

The man stayed on his knees, but he was holding his left shoulder in his right-hand vice-grip-tight. "Does it really matter who?"

"Tell me." He pressed his blade just-so against that skin, and a trickle of red seeped down the man's neck.

The man swallowed, and it only caused his neck to press deeper into the blade. "Why should I? You'll only kill me faster."

Jungkook growled. He pulled his sword away from the man's neck. His body did a quick twist, and he kicked the man hard in the back of his head--causing the man to fall face-forward in the sandy earth.

This man is no real fighter. This is sickening.

"Tell me... who sent you."

"...No."

Jungkook's hands tightened on the hilt of his blade.

"GHAAA!"

The metal came down hard and swift, and the man's head severed from his body in a clean, fast break. The blood spattered onto Jungkook's face and hands, but it camouflaged with his armor in the dark.

He lifted his thin longsword and flicked it through the air to send some of the thick blood flying.

Then he fell deep into his senses again, and started running towards the munitions storage facility like a bolt of black lightning in the dark.

--

"I DON'T KNOW WHERE THEY CAME FROM. We never talked about it, I never talk about it. That's MY business, that's not YOUR business!"

Hoseok sighed. He was getting nowhere with this girl. "Are you sure you can't recall a name? Not even one name?"

He was sitting rather casually with his legs crossed in the middle of the floor, while she still cowered on a bunk across the room, hugging her arms around her legs.

"You know where I'm from. Everybody knows. Noon Mool. But my home... it's gone now. No longer exists. Some of my people are here in this camp. Most of them are scattered in other camps. Less militant camps. They're just normal kinds of people, they're not fighters. Are you a fighter?"

The girl spoke through shaking teeth, "Yes. I am. I'm a fighter."

"Is that so?" Hoseok shifted his hands beneath his butt, as if sitting on them might further make his point of being non-threatening.

"Yes. My older brother, he's... he's a better fighter. But I am! I am one."

The girl sniffed and rubbed her nose with the back of her hand. A gesture Hoseok noticed she'd been repeating over and over while he sat and watched her, trying to get something out of her.

He squinted.

"Hey, are you sick?"

"N-no. I never get sick."

"Then what's that?" Hoseok gave a bob of his head, his eyes fixed on the girls' small, runny nose.

She whiped at her nose with the back of her hand again, then looked down at the back of her hand... to see deep green powder spreading across her skin.

Her eyes flickered up again.

But now, instead of sitting on the floor, Jung Hoseok was standing over her and dangling the tip of a shortsword right in front of her leaf-touched nose.

"I like to assume the best, prepare for the worst. The weather. People. Weird smelling foods."

Like the flip of a switch, the girl changed right before his eyes. She stopped breathing heavily. Her eyes narrowed. Her body relaxed.

She replied in a dull voice, "Burn in hell, Jung Hoseok. You and all your Noon Moolites can burn... in... hell."

"Guess this means you don't wanna answer my questions right now, eh?" His eyes zoned in to focus on a small mark beneath her left eye. It wasn't a freckle. It wasn't a scar. But it was in the shape of a teardrop, and it had a soft magical glow to it.

He looked her properly in the eyes, shock showing on his face. "You're one of Umber's. Aren't you?"

She smiled at him, and it was a nauseating sight. "Well done, Hoseokie."

He reared back his hand, aiming the blade in his hand with care. "I thought Umber would have better people fighting for him. This assault is a halfhearted joke."

She laughed, and it was chilling. "Hoseok, we're not really fighters at all. We just came to stir things up... and deliver a message. And here you are to receive it."

"Oh yeah? And what is it you have to share that's so important?"

She leaned a little closer to Hoseok, as if taunting him to strike. "He sees you. He sees all of you. Your Satoor Ai and all her little pets in a row. And he can come for you at any time." She shifted forward, her nose shoving into Hoseok's face. "And when he does, either you're dead... or your his."

Hoseok snapped his wrist. The butt of his sword fell hard on the girl's head and then she slumped over completely unconscious.

"Some people just loooove to hear themselves talk the crazy talk, don't they." Hoseok shifted the girl's hands around so that he successfully handcuffed her wrists and ankles together.

"You'll make a good little prisoner, since you like to talk so much. Just get yah a lil' tipsy with some alcohol and POOF. You might have all kiiiiinds of morbid and helpful things to say."