han aehra.

  'oh shit.' was what she first thought. she could hear the people below's hairs rustle as they looked up, obviously alarmed. taeyong looked sheepishly at aehra's outline in the darkness. aehra and yuta took of across the woods, trying to move as far and fast away from the Umbra, leaving kun and taeyong to fend for themselves.

  she had only jumped across three trees in the rough span of a minute when she heard gunshots. many, many gunshots. they sounded like they were fired from an automatic machine gun. trepidation and fear rose in her chest. kun... taeyong...

  "psst!" roughly seven to ten trees away, yuta whispered to her. they were already out of the Umbra's earshot.

  aehra hissed back, "yeah?"

  "let's just go. they'll be fine," yuta whispered. aehra crumpled the leaf in anxiety.

  "come on. we have to go," he coaxed.

 "where? where must we go?" aehra muttered, just loud enough so yuta could hear. yuta really did not understand why  she cared about taeyong. not that he particularly cared...

 "back," he muttered, referring to their base.

 "leave no man behind," she said in her normal voice before springing from the tree back towards the gunshots, gracefully hopping across branches. yuta sighed before trailing her.

lee taeyong.

  he gulped as kun grabbed him, trying to quickly move himself and taeyong across the forest, but without yuta's help, it was not an easy task. he only managed to get taeyong across a single tree before the gunfire began.

  the rapid gunfire tore through the ataraxy night, hitting the trees that they were once on.

  "can't we just fight?" taeyong whispered, brusque.

  "no!" kun hissed, helping taeyong across another tree. in order to hear each other, they uncomfortably had to bring their lips extremely close to the other's ear before whispering. it was terribly uncomfortable, but with guns blazing behind them, they couldn't really care.

  "those insolent labourers," taeyong seethed. kun coughed at his insult.

  suddenly, the gunfire stopped. kun and taeyong froze on the branches, looking around nervously.

  silence.

  nothing.

  taeyong and kun both relaxed, but they were still alert.

  still, nothing.

  kun poked his head out of the bunch of branches, glancing around the dark forest.

  "what are you even trying to look at?" taeyong squinted around. "you can't see anything in this darkness."

  "look, I always do night missions. I can see well in the dark," kun breathed.

  they waited in silence for a few more minutes, before slowly beginning to climb to another tree.

  then the gunshots started again. this time, much, much closer to them. a bullet ricocheted off a tree and ripped through taeyong's right arm, fortunately not hitting any major arteries. taeyong clenched his teeth, outraged.

  "those destitute serfs!" he yelled, ever so conveniently revealing him and kun's hiding spot. kun's eyes widened and he slapped a hand over his mouth, a little too late.

  "us? destitute serfs?" a low voice grumbled from the ground.

  "can serfs do this?" the voice said again, as a gunshot sounded. kun heard a bullet bounce off a tree to his left. pushing taeyong back slightly in the nick of time, the bullet sped in front of taeyong's face, whistling as it passed. kun sighed in relief, although taeyong was still slightly dazed.

  "get down from there. it's four against fifty!" the voice yelled. this man didn't know that yuta and aehra had already left. that's good.

  taeyong grasped his hand over his gun wound, slowly yet painfully pulling out his gun.

  "put it away," the person said. taeyong's eyes widened. how could they see him in this darkness?

  "what do you want?" kun asked.

  "we want taeyong and aehra." the person replied, sounding impatient.

  "and why?"

  "taeil promised us them."