Chapter Text
Seonghwa woke up slowly, his curtains dancing since he fell asleep with his windows wide open. The sound of waves replaced his alarm, he learned long ago that the sea kept better time than any clock.
He started his morning routine on autopilot, salty air giving him comfort.
The coffee was too strong on his tongue, but he needed it to get his mind working again. He showered and got dressed in record time, hurrying his steps to soothe the pull he felt on his chest to get to the beach.
The moment he stepped barefoot on the white sand his heart finally stopped beating frantically, a deep breath made him completely relax and he started walking to his usual spot. His equipment was on his left hand and his shoes were on his right one, the morning sun was hitting his face in a way that made him feel as if he was being hugged by the gods, it was warm and soft. He could see wild horses walking in the distance, big and imposing, never meant to be owned by humanity nor to be caged as prisoners.
Yonaguni moved slowly in the mornings, as if the island itself was still half asleep. Seonghwa had moved there for work, he had been summoned by a governmental organization that wanted to study a newly found species of jellyfish and apparently he was respected enough to be a necessity on another country.
He was assigned the task to learn how these creatures were any different from the others and every single feature that they had, from their reproductive rituals to what they ate. The jellyfish gathered in a specific part of the island, they had bright colors and gentle pulses.
Seonghwas had always loved jellyfish the most, they did not swim, they breathed. They were creatures that just let the current do as it wanted and only attacked when disturbed.
As he approached his working station he heard a sound that disrupted his morning, something so foreign to the environment that even someone like him, who had the habit to daydream, was snapped out of his thoughts.
He heard metal equipment being moved, he looked up from the sand and couldn’t pinpoint if it was him or the sea that held it’s breath.
In front of him, he saw multiple botes and crates with a group of people standing where the shore should have been empty, they moved like they already owned the place. Some of them were unloading equipment right next to his working place near the dock.
He walked faster and passed in front of the new people, looking at their gadgets that made his stomach turn. Underwater drones, sonars and other things that he didn’t recognize, but that made him upset nonetheless.
When he arrived to his team’s designated cottage, he was met with startled eyes, his friends. All of them were japanese, but he had no problem learning the language before his trip.
“What the fuck is going on?” He asked in their language, anger palpable on his voice.
“Hwa, it’s so bad. Haru went to ask and he was told that apparently there are underwater ruins here, but what’s bad is that they are right by where our jellyfish live.” Yuna was the first to answer him, his friend was very small and cute, but her face was utterly terrifying in that moment.
“That is very bad, if they’re planning on using some vibration based equipment to map the ruins.” Seonghwa did not like at all what could possibly happen.
“I saw some of their stuff when I went over to asked them and it was clearly not jellyfish friendly. I tried to tell them that their investigation could be harmful to the environment, but they just laughed.” Seonghwa got even more angry, how could anyone laugh at sweet and cute Haru, he was so endearing that just seeing the boy could make someone coo at him as if he were a puppy.
He took his phone out of his pocket after leaving his diving equipment on a table that was on the terrace of their small cottage and pressed the called button.
“Hello? Seonghwa, what can I do for you?” The voice of Tanaka, the Governor, came through his phone.
“Sir, I’m so sorry to disturb you this early, but it came to my attention that some ruins were discovered on the island and the danger they could put the jellyfish under from their machines makes me uneasy.”
“Yes, I was just made aware of the discovery, I’m also not a fan of what is happening, but sadly the investigation is under a private company and not the government, they have international permits,” Tanaka said, voice filled with emotion. “The situation is completely out of my hands, all I can do is hope they don’t disturb our own investigation.”
Dread surrounded his body from those words, he couldn’t do anything to stop them, it made him hopeless.
“I understand, sorry again for bothering you at this hour. I’ll call again for our debriefing later this month.”
After he hung up, he sat on one of the chairs. All his energy seemed to have been taken from him.
“What did he say?” Yuna asked.
“They can’t do a single thing.”
“Fuck, this is so unfair!” Haru was clearly upset and Seonghwa’s heart hurt from being unable to do anything to make him feel better.
“I know. All we can do is keep our investigation going and hope that we can do so before they kill every living thing on this island.”
As Yuna handed him a strawberry juice to calm his nerves with the sweetness, he saw a group of men approach them.
“Hey! We were wondering if you guys had any electricity? We need to charge some things.” A western man spoke happily as if they were acquaintances in a broken style of japanese.
“We do, but I don’t feel like sharing.” Seonghwas answered bitterly and an asian man stepped in front of the group.
“C’mon man, don’t be like that. We’re just trying to do our job.” That one spoke perfect japanese. He was a somewhat short guy with brown hair, but his eyes made Seonghwa feel smaller than him for a second. He carried himself in a way that could make someone shrink into themselves and lower their gazes, but for Seonghwa, that feeling only lasted for a moment.
“What job? Disturb marine life? I wouldn’t quite call that something other than cruelty.” He said it as he stood up to start putting on his diving gear, ignoring the glares that came his way. The whole group was clearly not happy at his snarky remark, all making faces that showed discomfort, only one of them seemed to be actually ashamed, but the others just shrugged their shoulders and gave Seonghwa angry stares. “Tell your boss that if he wants electricity to kill animals, to come install it himself.”
“Well, I'm not the actual boss, but I’m in charge of this site and we’re operating within our permit. So don’t go all sassy on me, we aren’t doing anything that is illegal.” The man stood right in front of Seonghwa’s face, as if daring him to go against him and Seonghwa does.
“I can’t make you leave this place alone, but what I can do is stand in every way possible to make your fucking job a living hell and you bet I will do everything in my power to make you and your little friends leave this island alone.”
He walked even closer. If this man thought he could intimidate Seonghwa, he was very wrong. He is normally a very calm guy, but when he sees his dear creatures being threatened he could easily forget his normally soft demeanor to protect the ones that couldn’t protect themselves.
One of the guys grabbed the man’s arm to pull him away, but he before he could the man threw one last comment.
“We didn’t come here to destroy anything. For fuck’s sake we’re archeologists, we want to preserve nature not destroy it.” He almost yelled while being pulled away from the cottage.
“You have a funny way of preserving nature then.”
As they left, Seonghwa pulled the last of his gear on and walked to the dock. He got to the very edge and jumped before he actually exploded from anger.
The sea took him in as kindly as ever. The water hugging him like a kind mother and the lower he got the better he felt, it always made him feel like that.
Ever since he was child the sea calmed him like no other thing. Being born on a tiny island made it natural for him to learn how to swim before he learned how to write, always surrounded by fish and other animals. His feet always on water or sand, grounding him as he floated around without worrying about anything. He opened his eyes and the sight was as mesmerizing as if it was the very first time he was seeing the bright colored fishes and the beautiful jellyfish he was supposed to be studying instead of swimming around.
He turned to the left and there he saw something he had never paid attention to before, the ruins. Stone pillars in square shapes that he didn’t notice before he was made aware of their existence, hidden under accumulated sand.
Those things were worth disturbing sea life over?
They were just stones to him, not even beautiful ones, only big grey and boring stones.
Seonghwa dived toward the stones and there he saw his subjects of investigation. The jellyfish were moving around the stones, going under some of them as if they were being pulled there by some kind of force. If the stupid men wanted to investigate the place they would absolutely have to damage at least a dozen of those beautiful creatures.
His oxygen tank helped him stay underwater for long periods of time, giving him an advantage that made it easier to actually investigate. He saw how they moved slowly, how they floated around without the knowledge that their environment could be destroyed because some annoying stones were more important than them.
Seonghwa and his team didn’t even know what species they were, what if they were the only ones in the world and they get wiped out.
Before he realized he was running out of oxygen and had to swim upwards, not knowing how long he had been down there until he saw the sun had moved quite a bit when he emerged from the water.
With the help of Haru and Yuna, he got on the dock. He took off his gear there and got bombarded with questions.
“Did you see the ruins?”
“Are they close to our babies?”
“Please, tell me they aren’t that close.”
Seonghwa closed his eyes, having to get used to being outside the sea after staying too long underwater. “I can’t answer if you keep on asking more questions.”
“Sorry, we’re just worried.” Haru pouted and it made Seonghwa unable to actually get upset.
“They are close, too fucking close and for some reason, our babies are attracted to that place. Maybe they’re using it as some kind of breeding place.” He leaned his head back in a surrendered way, tired from diving and thinking.
“Could we get some type of animal protection certificates?” Yuna closed her hands worriedly.
“It would be hard to get one, it’s not like anyone other than us would actually care.” Seonghwa answered sadly.
He stood up and walked to the cottage, as he walked he saw the other team was still on the beach. They had set some blue tents and under them were wide tables with machines on them. He looked around as he kept on walking and his eyes crossed paths with the annoying man’s ones.
Seonghwa gave him a nasty look before he looked away as he arrived and sat on the same chair he had used before, juice left untouched.
Even after what went down, he felt better from the dive. The ocean always asked him to slow down and he listened. He stayed there while watching his friends dive in and disappearing before his eyes.
His muscles were tired, the anger that had left his body was creeping back. The sun dipped closer to the horizon and Seonghwa stayed where he was, unresolved. Salt dried on his skin, his hair was still wet and his shoulders ached. Now his anger felt more contained, but it wasn’t gone. He wouldn't understand that some people thought the sea belonged to whoever arrived with paperwork, but he swallowed the urge to interfere, he couldn’t be reckless, he had to plan everything slowly.
Seonghwa’s stomach complained loudly at being ignored for so many hours, making him get up to get food. He entered their place, a small cottage that had only the bare necessities, a kitchen, a couch and a bathroom, nothing else. On the kitchen he opened the fridge and got some strawberries to snack on as he had forgotten to bring his usual tupperware with lunch.
He went back outside and as he started eating he saw a silhouette next to him, the same annoying guy.
“Ew, go away.” He threw the comment at the man, happy from seeing the face he made because of it.
“Is that how you greet everyone, or am I special?” He exhaled through his nose in an annoyed manner.
Seonghwa paused for a second, admiring the man's beauty without being able to stop himself until he realized where his train of thought was going. There was something hypnotazing about the man's angry face that made him giddy.
“You're a bad person,” he answered. “Just admit it.”
“No need to be so hostile, we aren't going to touch your dear animals.”
His face was a clear sign of anger, but his voice stayed calm and collected. It made Seonghwa even more upset, the fact that he sounded so serene as if destroying an ecosystem was just a task he had to follow through.
“Oh, but you will, I know you will.”
“I care about what's underwater too,” he said as he pointed a finger at his own chest. “Just not in the same way you do.”
“I believe you care about the wrong things then.” They stared at each other the way they did earlier.
The waves started to hit harder, as if the sea was getting upset alongside them. The salt was stronger on Seonghwa’s nose, in an almost irritating way.
“You don't own the sea.”
“No,” Seonghwa snapped. “But neither do you.”
And that last comment was what finally made Hongjoong walk away.
The animal guy was extremely irritating to him.
As he approached his team on the tents, every step he took made his feet sink into the sand.
Who the fuck did that guy think he was?
He had the permits and if they were granted to the company it must mean something. He didn't even know what kind of animals those guys were talking about.
All that anger over some uninteresting fish. They didn't understand what the ruins meant, the history they could uncover, how old civilizations worker and everything that came with it.
He had been summoned by a big archeology company as soon as the discovery was made, to arrive to japan and work as hard as he could. His love for archeology was what kept him moving, understanding how past generations lived made him incredibly fulfilled and those naive guys were being unreasonable.
The ruins deserve a voice and he would be the one to give help them.
He saw the maps spread out on the tables, the hills visible in the backround and screens showing codes he couldn't quite pay attention to.
“How did it go?” James, an australian guy, was the firat to acknowledge him.
“Like shit,” he murmured. “The black haired one is completely out of his mind, he is the most annoying person I have ever met.”
“So no electricity then.” Another one of his teammates said.
“Tomorrow we buy a generator and then dive the second we get the underwater drones ready.”
They get ready to pack their things hurriedly, eager to finally get some rest.
Hongjoong got two backpacks, one on each shoulder, the straps biting into his collarbones as he stepped away from the tents.
He walked the narrow sand path to his designated rental places, being a leader had its perks, not sharing a house was one of them. A whole cottage for himself.
The rentals looked identical, wide windows facing the sea as if it were a painting.
When he finally had the light blue door in front of him, he shrugged one backpack off his shoulders and got his keys out of his back pocket he had recieved that morning. As he started opening it, a door opening right next to him made him look up and there he was.
The annoying guy.
Hongjoong froze.
Not the wetsuit version that he met the man in, he had apparently changed already and stepped out of the cottage that shared a wall with his. He must have arrived honey in the time he took to gather all of his gear.
This new version threw him off, casual clothes made him look almost normal. He hadn't paid any attention to how long the man's hair was, almost touching his shoulders, how his broad shoulders made his waist look even smaller than how it actually was.
He looked nothing like the man from the beach, no tension in his shoulders or sharpness in his eyes.
They locked eyes, but neither spoke. Realization hitting both men at the same time. Neighbors.
Hongjoong entered his house before either of them spoke. The sea murmured behind the windows as both doors closed shut, thin walls feeling far too close.
He left his unopened bacpacks on the floor and walked around the new place. His luggage had been sent there before he arrived.
Suddenly, he needed air. He opened the back door and to his misfortune, they had a shared deck on the backyard with chairs, couches, lights and plants.
Hongjoong’s stomach clenched up at the knowledge of how much he will have to see and share with the other man. Walking to his room was an automatic move.
The bed swallowed him easily, not even covering himself with the bedding.
He closed his eyes and morning came without asking permission. Hongjoong only blinked and the night had passed like a single deep breath.
There were footsteps resounding close by, but not close enough to be inside his house making him notice that the walls were far too thin. With that in mind he went on with his morning, locking the door without looking back, shoulders heavy with equipment.
The sand was cold even with shoes on, damp from the morning mist.
His team was already on the site under the tents, generator freshly bought resting on the side, loud and big. The beach was busy and the ruins were waiting.
“Hongjoong! We were wondering when you would be arriving.” James was the first to speak. “We need help with the mapping, the sonar’s misreading depth.”
“Lower it slower,” Hongjoong said immediately. “You’re fighting the current instead of following it.”
His team went to the boats again while Hongjoong stayed on land to monitor the machine and they communicated by walkie talkies. “Slower you said?”
“That’s it,” he answered, eyes fixed on his tablet. “Let it just fall for now, then we move it.”
Movement on the edge of the beach caught his attention.
His new neighbor had arrived sometime during the morning. He stood near their cottage, a bag slung over one shoulder with his gaze already lifted toward the water.
Hongjoong looked up just as the man turned and their eyes met. The moment stretched.
The man’s expression gave nothing away and he should’ve been happy, but an irrational flare of irritation bloom in his chest. He looked back down at the screen, breaking eye contact first. “Proceed,” he said, with his voice even.
He saw as the drone slipped deeper and the water closed over it without a sound, still feeling a glare directed to him from far away.
Seonghwa kept on watching the man. Hoping that whatever it was that they were using, it wouldn’t hurt his babies.
That day he wouldn’t go in the water, it was a writing and reading day. He needed to review what they had and make a plan on what they needed to study next.
Until that moment, they knew the bright colored jellyfish were an anomaly to that part of Japan, they knew what they ate and how they behaved. What they didn’t know was how they got there and why. As he sat in their cottage, facing the sea while reading his investigation documents, something made him look at the man under the tents.
The boats had retrieved and he was loading something that made Seonghwa’s heart stop for more than a second.
A small multibeam sonar.
A machine that literally emitted repeated acoustic pulses that mapped the seafloor, but it produced the kind of vibration that could make his jellyfish drift or become stressed.
He had researched the night before if there was a possiblity the investigation stop, but he wasn’t successful. He couldn’t intervene.
As he took in deep breaths, he felt it. It was subtle, if he had been doing anything else he wouldn’t have even noticed, but he did. Under his feet was a very minimal vibration and he couldn’t do a single thing about it.
Seonghwa was angry, furious even, but it made his skin crawl seeing injustice right in front of him and not being allowed to stop it.
He walked to the man, wanting to at least talk him out of using that single machine, but as his body moved he saw it.
His feet were planted on the very edge of the sea and before he could keep walking, right in front of him was a bright blue jellyfish, laying there unmoving.
The beach was suddenly too quiet or maybe his ears were ringing. He had to manually breathe as to not explode and he knelt down to have a closer look.
The poor thing had sand stuck all around it, color dulled from being taken from it’s home and the tide didn’t touch it, as if it refused to take the jellyfish back. That wasn’t natural, nature didn’t vibrate. It was equipment and power, it was a choice. He had warned the man and he assured Seonghwa he didn’t intend on harming the animals, but there it was. He had killed an innocent jellyfish that had done nothing wrong.
Seonghwa gently pushed sand over the edges of the bell, he wasn’t sure if they could sting, but it deserved something better than being in the open air.
He stood and brushed the sand from his hands, already thinking on how to get back at the man from doing something so cruel. Marine life was beautiful and at many times, harmless. If humans didn’t feel the need to go and invade their homes, they wouldn’t have to attack and defend themselves, but that right there was essentially savage. The poor animal probably didn’t even noticed it was being moved to it’s death by the vibrations.
The marine biologist went back to his chair, holding his files again.
His eyes moved through the words, but his mind kept on drifting back to the jellyfish.
He read the words he wrote about population stability and low risk disturbance, but his mind didn’t leave the image of the body on the sand. Seonghwa looked back at the tents and the man there didn’t even notice what he had provoked. If he truly cared, he would’ve noticed, but it seemed to him that the screen hiding the man’s face was clearly the most important thing to the archeologist.
Seonghwa read the same paragraph repeatedly and realized he was no longer able to maintain focus. He closed the file without finishing it.
He walked home to rest after a long day and to prepare for a repeat the next morning. Days went by with morning walks, shoreline checks, diving and counting bodies. By the third morning, he stopped being surprised. One or two each day, grief settling on his chest.
Every day he heard doors closing and showers running, but he never intended to start an argument, too angry to even want to direct his attention to the man.
One day, he got the beach before the man and his team. Seonghwa walked passed their tents as any other day and without missing a beat, he went over to the sonar that had been a murderous machine all those days and turned a knob ever so slightly that it wouldn't be obvious at first sight.
He went on with his day, diving upon arrival, seeing the jellyfish keep on living not noticing how many of them were missing. The sea received him kindly, as if it knew he was defending it’s livelihood.
When he swam back up, he saw Haru waiting for him at the dock, an amused smile on his face.
“What did you do, Hwa?” He asked mischievously.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, dear,” he answered, also amused. “I was just checking on our babies.”
Haru laughed, hands reaching down to help Seonghwa up. “They were on their boats for a second and had to get back. Their whole team is bickering about something and I know damn well you had something to do with it.”
“I may have messed with their sonar,” he laughed loudly and as he got on the dock with Haru’s help, he refused to look at the tents, avoiding eye contact as to not get caught.
Days passed and Seonghwa kept messing with the men. He moved knobs, hid cables, stole one paper from every binder, he even replaced batteries with ones that didn’t work anymore he had kept for some reason.
Every time he got there just a little earlier, he messed with them in small ways that were not meant to enrage them, but just mildly inconvenience them. He loved to watch them from afar, checking their gear again and again, tired faces being rubbed with both hands, some of them with bags under their eyes that were getting darker by each day that went on.
Seonghwa felt good, seeing them that way. Everytime he had a spark of guilt arrive, his mind went back to the jellyfish laying on the sand and the guilt went away as fast as it came.
One warm afternoon, he was seating on the edge of the dock, his feet kicking around on the water while he ate strawberries. He heard footsteps approaching and thinking it was Yuna or Haru, he stayed looking at the sun setting. Until he saw a pair of legs settling beside him and realized it wasn’t any of them.
“You’re subtle,” said the man, while grabbing a handful of his strawberries that were between them.
“You know those aren’t yours, right?”
“Funny, you don’t seem to mind messing with things that aren’t yours,” he shot back at him, eyebrow jerking up.
Seonghwa glared a the man’s face for more than a second, taking in his features. His eyes looked like precious gems from the sun hitting them directly and he had to look at the sea before his thoughts went on a direction he didn’t feel comfortable indulging in.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Well, sensors don’t just change by themselves, batteries don't work for only three days and I’m certain that paper can’t disappear,” he heard the man’s voice become more irritated by every sentence. “What's funny though, is that every time something went wrong, you just happened to be here before us.”
He stayed silent for a moment, taking in his mistake.
“I work here, if you didn’t notice.”
“You’re interfering with an important investigation!” The man suddenly raised his voice, clearly worked up from days of being messed with.
“And you’re interfering with life, but you don’t see me getting in your face to scream at you for it,” he finally looked at the man beside him and saw how upset he looked, eyebrows scrunched up together and lips forming a straight line.
“Do you have any idea what you’ve compromised?” He asked harshly. “You don’t fucking understand. This discovery is one of the most important ones that have happened in the last decade.”
“You study what’s already dead, I fight for what’s still breathing,” Seonghwa tried to steady his breath as to not show how upset the whole situation made him. “You’re harming the jellyfish over some rocks.”
“Jellyfish?” He sounded exasperated. “You did all of that because of jellyfish? You have to be fucking kidding me, they don’t even have brains!”
“So what? Because the don’t have brains, they don't have a right to live?” He couldn’t handle listening to the other man’s stupidity anymore, he stood up and after grabbing his strawberries he walked to the cottage. “If you believe they aren’t as important as other animals because of that, then the one that’s missing a brain might be you.”
After that last comment, he kept on walking, but the other man didn’t want to end the conversation there. Both of them walking the dock.
“You think passion excuses damage.”
“The same goes to you,” he stopped at the table, set down his bowl and turned to look at the man again. “I really dislike you.”
“Good, same goes to you,” he looked more upset than when he had arrived at the dock. “Don’t mess with my shit anymore, you won’t like the repercussions.”
And with that he went away, leaving Seonghwa furious and aware that he couldn’t continue what he had been doing before.
Hongjoong walked back to the tents, the dock stayed behind, but his jaw stayed tight. He thought about all the trouble he went through and how it was all because of jellyfish, he didn’t even see them when they got the drones down to the ruins, he wasn’t disturbing the dumb animals to begin with.
His team was already putting away their things for the day as he arrived, tired from the fight, his energy had left him the moment he had left the dock.
Rage had settle in and it remained even as the days passed, after two days of fixing everything the other man had messed with, they were able to get back on track.
The mapping was done and they could finally dive to start the excavation.
They prepared everything early, final checks on tanks, regulators and comms. They had to assign the excavation zones first and how to do it safely. It wasn’t treasure hunting, they only had to reveal and not take.
Hongjoong descended underwater, along with two teammates, mesmerized by the beauty of what was still uncovered. Just one or two pillars showing, but they knew that it was an entire infrastructure they had to gently brush over to reveal.
The ruins were partially buried, sand setting over centuries and algae growing through architecture. He was holding a soft bristle brush to start the excavation, it would take time to do it that way, but a stronger tool could risk breakage.
He worked millimeter by millimeter, letting the sea do half the work too, current helping the sand move. As he uncovered some part of the structure, he saw traces of carvings making his heart thump hard.
Someone stood there once and Hongjoong was the first in many years to see it again.
He was concentrated on the uncovering, brushing away sand with the brush and something drifted by him. A bright blue being floated by where the ruins breathed, they didn’t interrupt the structure, they completed them and for just a moment, the ruins stopped being the most beautiful thing in there.
Hongjoong stayed there, floating close by and watching the creatures just be. He was stunned by their colors and their beauty. As he kept on watching, his eyes drifted to his teammates, who were also hypnotized by the wonderful sight, dozens of jellyfish going around.
He saw James was too close to one of the jellyfish and he lifted a hand to touch the beautiful creature in front of him. Before Hongjoong could swim fast enough to stop him, James was already touching the tentacles.
Bubbles exploded from James’ regulator, his body jerking harshly away from the animal. Hongjoong hurried himself to the man, grabbed his wrist forcing more distance between them and the jellyfish. Then , he signaled to start the emergency ascent protocol.
As they went up, Hongjoong looked at the jellyfish, seeing how danger could be layered under beauty.
They got to the sand with the help of the boats and the rest of his team, James screaming from the pain and his hand with a red mark that made Hongjoong grimace.
“Lay him on the sand, I'll call the local emergency number, we don't know what kind of jellyfish it was,” Hongjoong got his phone out as he spoke. “It could be deadly.”
Hongjoong didn’t know a thing about jellyfish, making him feel helpless from not knowing how to help further. The only thing he could do was try to stay calm.
As he crouched down to have a better look of the man’s hand, he heard someone running toward them.
He saw the annoying man from the cottage kneeling next to James, wetsuit half on and barefoot, breathing hard from the running.
“How long ago?” He asked fast as he looked over the injured hand.
“About five minutes ago,” Hongjoong hesitated before answering, surprised by the man making an appearance and wanting to help them.
As the man moved the red hand around, Hongjoong lowered his phone without meaning to.
“It’s not lethal if we act fast,” he said as he looked at Hongjoong directly. “I need a card or anything similar.” He got his hand up, palm waiting for someone to fulfill his request.
A young man from his team got his wallet out and gave him a card in record time.
“What's that for?” Hongjoong asked, voice the lowest it had ever been when directed at the irritating man.
“We need to scrape the nematocyst out, they have poison in them,” he looked up when he answered and saw that everyone around him had puzzled faces,clearly not understanding. “Just hold his other hand, it’s going to hurt.”
The boy that gave him the card was the same one that went to hold James’ hand. As the man worked with the card to get the things out, James didn’t even scream anymore, too out of it to barely stay conscious. Hongjoong saw the man work, his face concentrated on his task, he was biting his lip to stay focused and if it was any other situation, Hongjoong would’ve found it utterly seductive.
He moved as if he had done that before, making Hongjoong quietly respect him from afar.
“Done, take him to the hospital and tell them he was stung by a blue jellyfish. They’ll know what to do.” He sat back on the sand as two of Hongjoong’s guys got James onto their truck and the archeologist stayed on the beach after giving them instructions to notify him of everything.
After James was on his way to the hospital, Hongjoong paid more attention to the man on the sand, realizing his hands were shaking and wondering if they were shaking before. He hadn’t looked or sounded nervous at all, but now he could see the way he was trying to steady his breathing with his eyes closed.
Hongjoong was waiting for the man to gloat or look at him as if he was stupid, but he didn’t and it somehow made it worse. He finally looked up at Hongjoong and they made eye contact.
“Next time, you guys won’t be so lucky,” he said softly. “Please refrain from touching them.”
“It was a stupid move, but James will be okay,” his anger came back after a moment of silence.
His team started moving around, packing their things. Some of them looked at the man on the sand with faces that told Hongjoong they wanted to thank him, but they stopped themselves when they saw the expression on Hongjoong’s face.
The man got up to leave, but Hongjoong stopped him before he could do so.
“Hey, let me get your name. James will like to know so he can thank you later.” Hongjoong said reluctantly. He didn't really want to approach the man on a more personal level, but James was too good and he knew he would like to know the man’s name.
The man looked back at Hongjoong with an annoyed face and turned back to keep walking, as he was about to insist angrily, the man answered.
“Seonghwa,” he said simply and left.
“Wait,” Hongjoong’s face scrunched up. “You’re korean?” He asked on his native language, sounding foreign after weeks of only speaking japanese.
Seonghwa didn’t hear him as he kept on walking, leaving Hongjoong to only wonder if they were actually more similar than what he wanted to admit.
They both loved the sea and wanted to protect something within it. Apparently they were even from the same country, but their difference was far too clear.
They wanted to protect different things.
Their similarities made Seonghwa less of a problem, but it didn’t make him any less annoying.