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There’s nothing forgiving about the desert. You stand amongst the dunes for long enough, roads and crumbling buildings out of sight, you start to forget that there’s anything out there except sand and dirt and tufts of spinifex grass, not that there’s all that much else worth noticing anyway. If you wait around for even longer, features of the landscape begin to fade away under the unforgiving heat; horizons begin to shimmer, stray rocks and plants melt into the ceaseless sand and the scorching wind morphs the sunset coloured dust into strange, twisted creatures whose remnants can be found hiding in the pockets of your clothes and crushed in the soles of your boots long after the shapes have settled.
Hoseok knows just as well as anyone that more is lost in the desert than is found; shoes swallowed up by unexpected sinkholes, a limb if you happen to run into a bored gang, maybe your mind if you stay out in the sun long enough (Hoseok’s seen enough loonies stumbling around, rummaging through rubbish and muttering nonsense to know it doesn’t take much to end up with scrambled eggs for brains out here).
Saying that, Hoseok’s always had an affinity for the apocalyptic desert lifestyle. He doesn’t cower from the sun or the sand, the thought of travelling over endless expanses of road with no sure idea of where he’ll end up doesn’t make him shudder, and the possibility of running into a less than friendly gang doesn’t send shivers down his spine; although that may be because he’s fully aware that they fear him far more than he fears them.
Maybe it comes down to how he thrives on independence. At the end of the day, it’s just Hoseok, his motorbike and the desert, and that’s exactly how he likes it. No relationships mean no ties you might have to cut, no one you might have to leave behind, no one who can be used against you, no one you might lose.
Hoseok had never meant for his lone wolf status to shape him into an enigma, a sort of urban legend shared between colonies and vagrants, but he’s not complaining. What had simply started as a survival tactic had shaped into bonfire stories full of respect and admiration, fear and mystery.
Hoseok deals with people when he needs to, gruff but polite enough if he seeks something from them, ruthless and vengeful if they try to mess with him, but he’s inconspicuously dropped into enough colonies for a meal and made small talk with enough nomads on the road to hear how they speak of the elusive Hoseok, some reverently, others almost fearing to do so.
One night, when Hoseok had been sitting around a bonfire, sharing dinner with a small, ragged looking group, a particularly weather-beaten man had stood up and shared a story he had heard about the mysterious Hoseok. The man had barely whispered Hoseok’s name, looking over his shoulder into the darkness as he had done so as if he was afraid that Hoseok had heard him and by some apocalyptic magic would appear and end his sorry life right at that moment. Hoseok, from his position slightly in the shadows, had chuckled at that, shaken his head at how elaborate the stories of him had become, but the man had heard him and became aggravated, yelling at Hoseok that he better watch out, or he’d be the next to fall victim to Hoseok’s brutality. Hoseok had just rolled his eyes, dumped his empty plate into the dishes tub and headed back over the sand dune to where he’d left his motorbike. He’d grinned at the hoarse shouts of fear, he’d suspected from the old man, when he’d revved the engine and rode off into the night.
At the end of the day, when he hops off his bike and pulls off the mask that conceals the lower half of his face, he’s just Hoseok, trying to get by in this shitty world as well as the next person.
*****
Hoseok pulls into the mechanic on his bike, entrance marked by nothing more than a taupe tied to the side. He knocks the kickstand out and settles back on the seat, pulling his mask down and gloves off.
“Namjoon-ah!” he calls out as he slides off, small clouds of dust rising where his feet hit the ground.
“He’s out the back.” Seokjin answers, the bamboo curtain separating the living area tinkling softly as he slides past.
“I don’t understand why you bother keeping that curtain around, it’s probably more string then bamboo at this point.” Hoseok grunts.
Seokjin just smiles saccharinely, “You gotta take what touches of home you can get in this world.”
“Sure.” Hoseok mutters. He’d be lying if he said that the idea of home had never appealed to him, but the concept just wasn’t practical. Home creates a target, a sanctuary that can come under fire if someone’s got a bone to pick. And homes can collect people, can create “families”, and that’s not something Hoseok is willing to sacrifice his freedom to protect.
“What’s the damage this time?” Seokjin asks, sauntering over to investigate Hoseok’s bike. He crouches down to check out the state of the wheels.
“I’m thinking it’s just a flooded engine or dirty spark plug. Nothing major, but she sometimes takes a couple of tries to start.”
“Mm,” Seokjin hums, raising an eyebrow, “you couldn’t have had a look at that yourself?”
“Sure,” Hoseok shrugs, “but she’s due for some general maintenance anyway. You and Joonie have more tools and shit than I do.”
Seokjin stands up and sighs dramatically.
“I was hoping you’d say you were missing me terribly and were willing to use any excuse to see me again.” Seokjin pouts and sidles over to Hoseok who rolls his eyes at the shameless flirting. “Don’t you miss me, Hoseokie?” Seokjin runs a hand down Hoseok’s leather covered bicep, but to little effect, “I miss you.”
Seokjin is attractive, Hoseok won’t deny that, but he’s not Hoseok’s type. His dried out, dusty pink hair and long lashes juxtapose his broad shoulders and strong arms, and the glittering piercings decorating his ears seem so dainty compared to the muscle evident through his tight black jeans. Despite his brazen nature, Seokjin is really too clean for Hoseok, too easily ruined. Seokjin knows Hoseok would never go for him too, which only gives him further excuse to get away with flirting like a teenager despite already being in possession of a significant other.
“Christ, you’re a hopeless flirt.” Right on cue, Namjoon slides into the room, barely sparing Seokjin a second glance as he makes his way to one of the numerous workbenches with a spanner in his hand. Seokjin winks at Hoseok before heading over to Namjoon, wrapping his arms around his waist from behind and turning his head gently to face him.
“Mm, I won’t deny it, but you know you’re the only one I really want.” Seokjin says, rubbing his nose against Namjoon’s. Namjoon laughs and turns to take Seokjin in his arms, kissing him slowly, sweetly.
Hoseok shoves the envy spreading through his chest down, back to the murky depths from which it emerged. Despite his scepticism at attachments, romantic or platonic, Hoseok can’t help the small cry of longing for some kind of closeness. He’s had it before, just once, but at the memory of that his stomach twists uncomfortably, so he represses the thought before it has time to fully emerge.
“As much as I would love to stand here and watch you two eat each other’s faces.” Hoseok interrupts dryly.
Namjoon laughs and pulls Seokjin into a warm hug instead, kissing him on the cheek before releasing him and walking over to Hoseok and his bike.
“Alright, what’s the problem?”
“He thinks it’s a flooded engine or dirty spark plug,” Seokjin offers before Hoseok can reply, sitting back on the workbench and crossing his legs, “having trouble starting.”
Namjoon hums in acknowledgement and looks to Hoseok, “Anything else you want me to take a look at?”
“If you could just give her a full check over that would be great. It’s been a while.”
“It has been a while,” Namjoon nods, “you been avoiding us, Hoseokie?”
Hoseok scoffs, “You two are being awfully mushy today.”
“I think you mistook my flirting for mushy affection.” Seokjin smirks from the bench.
“Trust me, you’re flirting is as hard to miss as a kick to the guts.” Hoseok fires back, Seokjin just throws his head back and laughs.
“You can hang around while I check out your bike, Hoseok. I can grab some grog and some booze for us too, if you like.” Namjoon says, forever well meaning.
Hoseok shakes his head, “No thanks, I was thinking I’d just wander around for a bit.”
“Come on, Hoseokie,” Seokjin pouts, “tell us what you’ve been up to!”
“No, really, thank you, but I can’t.” Hoseok tries to be firm, voice unwavering.
“Why?” Namjoon asks, his voice soft, “Come on, Hoseok, just take the night off from being a lone wolf. Let us take care of you for an evening, yeah?”
Hoseok goes to shut the offer down one last time, but Namjoon and Seokjin both look so sincere, his heart wavers in its resolve. Hoseok sighs.
“Fine, whatever.”
The smiles on the couples' faces warm Hoseok’s chest, but he keeps his expression indifferent.
Small indulgences won’t give the game away.
*****
Hoseok wakes the next morning to gentle snoring, Namjoon’s he’s sure. For a moment, he allows himself to just lie still, one more little indulgence before he gets back to life on the road. He closes his eyes and breaths in deeply, enjoying the faint, musty smell of the incense lingering from the night before, then he rises from the cluster of pillows he’s submerged in.
Scratching at his bare chest, Hoseok looks over to the dilapidated old mattress that Namjoon and Seokjin sleep on. Seokjin is curled up against Namjoon’s side, hand rising and falling on the younger’s chest with each peaceful breath.
That pang of loneliness hits Hoseok again, and he feels a very appealing urge to stay for a while longer. He shakes that feeling off.
Silently as he can, Hoseok pulls off the ragged blanket he’d slept with and stands. He grabs his shirt off the chair in the corner and pulls the thin cotton over his head. Then he takes his leather jacket and slides silently through the patchwork curtains thrown up haphazardly to separate the kitchen from the bedroom.
Making his way back through to the garage, Hoseok heads straight to his bike and grabs a small pouch of copper coins from one of the makeshift carry bags on either side of the vehicle. He carries the pouch back into the kitchen and digs out a large handful of coins, more than enough to cover Namjoon’s maintenance work (and the hospitality, which the two would insist requires no payment whatsoever), and places it carefully on the counter between unwashed metal cups and plates.
Hoseok knows that Namjoon and Seokjin would vehemently refuse such a large payment, but by the time they wake up to find it, Hoseok will be long gone.
A rustling from behind the curtains startles Hoseok; time to go. He hurries back to his bike and unpacks his mask and gloves, pulling them on before swinging his leg over the bike and backing out of the garage, shoving the unbound taupe out of the way.
The air is still crisp in the early morning, but the sun is steadily burning through the chill. As he fires up the engine (successfully on the first try, bless Namjoon’s soul) and tears away through the other tents and crumbling structures of the small colony that Namjoon and Seokjin reside in, part of Hoseok wants to turn back and stay a little longer, live peacefully for just a while more. Hoseok grunts and fixes his stare on the long stretch of road ahead. The road is his home, the open desert is where he belongs; attachments are the last thing he needs. But Namjoon and Seokjin’s smiles refuse to fade away into the back of his mind. Maybe he won’t come back for a while.
*****
A week or so later, Hoseok is staring up at the stars from his camp; if a hessian tent that’s barely big enough to squeeze in two bodies, a fire that lasted long enough to heat a can of beans and a stationary motorbike can count as a camp.
He’s virtually forgotten about his stay with Namjoon and Seokjin, the tugging at his heart to stay with them shoved to the back of his mind. When it’s just Hoseok, the sky and the sand, nothing else really matters. It’s the best kind of freedom, unparalleled with any other, and that’s all Hoseok needs.
Hoseok’s nearly dosed off, the last tendrils of smoke curling skywards from the ashes of the fire when he hears the scream. It’s not close enough to jolt him awake, more like a muffled screech in the distance, but it’s enough to catch Hoseok’s attention.
More screams follow, but they’re more like screeches, like bizarre imitations of bird calls. Then a steady chanting starts up, words imperceptible, tone low and ominous. Hoseok should know by now that anything even vaguely cult like is best left alone, he’s not really interested in getting caught up with shit involving people’s heads getting cut off and blood sacrifices, but curiosity itches at his skin.
With a low groan and the knowledge that he’ll probably regret this, Hoseok stretches his arms out behind his head and arches his back, bones popping satisfactorily, and clambers up. He grabs his semi-automatic from where he left it in the tent, a spare round from one of the bags on his bike, and stalks off after the noise.
It’s amazing how sound is muffled between sand dunes, and Hoseok is surprised when he only has to climb three dunes from his camp before he finds the group causing the commotion. Hoseok lies flat so his head is only just peaking over the crest of the sand, pulls up his mask, and takes in the scene taking place in the valley between the dunes below him.
There’s a makeshift table, planks of wood bound roughly together, sitting atop sand piled about waist high, and a number of torches surrounding it. A small group of people, maybe ten or so, writhe and shake as they throw their heads back, repeatedly calling nonsense to the heavens as they move around the table. The people are dressed in what looks like dirty, white cloth, tied around their bodies haphazardly and fastened with thin rope. Their feet are bare in the sand and their cries are mismatched; some low and animalistic, others high and wailing. They look harmless enough, Hoseok’s seen this kind of post-apocalyptic worship bullshit before, but he wonders what the twist is.
A bellow startles Hoseok and the dancers, the group freezing both their song and movement and turning to look up the top of the dune opposite Hoseok. A middle-aged woman stands atop of the sand, dark hair matted or braided, Hoseok can’t tell from this distance, down to her waist and her body clad in the same dirty sheet attire as those down below. To her right stands a boy, shorter than her and younger, head down and hands bound by a rope that extends into the woman’s tight grip. In her other hand, the woman holds a torch.
She bellows again and the people around the table shriek back at her, clapping and howling as they resume their dance. The woman makes her way down the dune, dragging the boy behind her and from his insistent tugging against his restraints, Hoseok thinks he knows his fate.
“Shit.” He mutters. Hoseok’s rationale is telling him to back the heck away and pretend he never saw anything; pack up camp and get out of there. He doesn’t know how large this cult is. It could be as small as the people he sees gathered here, or it could extend across colonies, he has no clue, but the thought of interrupting and making some more enemies is incredibly unappealing.
Hoseok’s morality, however, is urging him to stop this madness. Enough people die out here as it is, why should this poor kid suffer the same fate for a crime as innocent as stumbling across a bunch of raving lunatics?
He doesn’t have much time to formulate a plan as the woman exchanges her torch for a long knife from one of the others and pulls the kid up with her onto the table. No, not a table, an altar. She forces the kid onto his knees in the centre of the platform and stands behind him as the chanting and shrieking gets faster and higher in pitch.
“Always gotta be the fucking martyr, don’t you?” Hoseok grumbles to himself as he stands atop of the sand dune and raises his pistol in the air.
Just as the woman raises the knife high above her head, chanting frenzied, Hoseok fires.
The effect is immediate. All heads turn to Hoseok, including the boy on the altar, and Hoseok puts on his meanest glare as he lowers the gun to point at the woman with the knife and walks down the sand dune.
Even though Hoseok is outnumbered, the group most certainly look afraid. Close up, Hoseok can see that their faces are painted with red dots and lines, but no two have the same patterns. They’re not uniform in their appearance or their worship; they probably haven’t been doing this for long.
Amateurs, Hoseok thinks, quietly grateful that he’s not picking a fight with one of those bigger mobs he’s heard about.
“Put down the knife.” Hoseok demands as he approaches, pistol pointed at the woman’s chest. She’s the only one who doesn’t seem to fear Hoseok, but she still slowly lowers the knife and places it by the kid on the altar.
The kid at her feet is pulling at the rope binding his wrists, eyes darting around like he’s looking for an escape. Hoseok hopes he’s smart enough to just stay put and let him take care of this.
“Good, now let the kid go.” No one moves, Hoseok sighs internally. He really, really, doesn’t want to shoot anyone today.
Thinking fast, Hoseok grabs the person closest to him, a young girl, maybe eighteen, and holds her to his chest, arm around her front and gun to her temple. This provokes a reaction from the group, some of them calling out fearful protests, others taking a tentative step towards him. Even the woman, who he’s assuming is some kind of leader of the group, finally seems unsettled.
Good, a bargaining chip, Hoseok thinks; this can be used to his advantage. The girl whimpers, and he hopes that these idiots are at least smart enough to just let this end here.
“Let. The kid. Go.” Hoseok growls. The group eyes him warily, some sending pleading glances at the woman on the altar, some at him. For a moment, Hoseok thinks she won’t relent, that maybe he’s bitten off more than he can chew, but eventually she lowers her gaze to the kid and scowls.
Hoseok doesn’t expect her to kick the kid square in the back so he goes tumbling face first into the sand, but they kid doesn’t waste a moment in getting himself up, spitting sand out of his mouth and staggering over to stand behind Hoseok.
“Start heading up that dune, kid, I’ll be right behind you.” Hoseok says lowly. The boy doesn’t need to be told twice as he disappears from Hoseok’s periphery and he can hear the squeaking of his sneakers on the sand.
“I won’t hesitate to kill anyone who follows us.” Hoseok warns. In this moment, he is every inch the ruthless killer the desert rumours make him out to be. It’s times like these that he’s grateful for the rumours. He slowly removes his arm from its hold around the girl, pushing her gently away from him as he starts backing up the dune.
He doesn’t think any of the people will pursue him, but Hoseok still takes his time, keeping the pistol steady. When he reaches the top of the dune, he doesn’t run over the hill with his tail between his legs, he’s got a status to maintain after all, so he aims one last glare at the group below him before turning his back in a show of confidence and stalking down the other side.
Hoseok waits until he’s halfway down the dune before he breaks into a run and high tails it after the kid who’s just making his way over the top of the next dune. By the time Hoseok’s over the last hill, the boy is standing by his bike, eyeing it like he’s trying to decide whether he could figure out how to make it work.
“Don’t even think about it, kid.” Hoseok pants as he pulls down his mask. He heads straight to his tent and starts pulling it down. The kid doesn’t move, seemingly not intimidated. His bangs have fallen into his eyes, but Hoseok sees him staring at him through the curtain of hair, sizing him up.
“We’re getting out of here, now. That lot back there didn’t seem all that dangerous, but then again,” Hoseok reasons, “they did try to kill you.”
The boy doesn’t respond, just shoots Hoseok a glare. Ungrateful little…
“What’s your name, kid?” Hoseok asks, trying his best to stay patient. Now that he’s able to really look at him, Hoseok realises the guy’s probably not that much younger than him. He’s got a soft baby face, but his eyes are sharp and alert, and beneath his torn t-shirt and baggy jeans (the fact that he’s not naked further confirms the cults immaturity), Hoseok can tell there’s lean muscle.
“Jimin.” The kid eventually says, scrutinising Hoseok as he rolls up the tent. Hoseok is intrigued by Jimin’s accent. His name settles deep in his throat before it rolls out, a little slurred, sounding like it should be accompanied by a smirk.
“Hoseok. ’S a pleasure,” Hoseok grunts, standing up. Jimin wordlessly moves as Hoseok approaches the bike and ties the bound tent across the back.
“You gonna untie me or what?” Jimin asks dryly. Hoseok doesn’t even spare him a glance as he quickly checks the fastenings on the various bags attached to his bike.
“I’m the one who saved your ass, kid. I don’t think you’re in any position to be making demands right now.”
Despite his words, Hoseok ignores Jimin’s sour expression as he grabs a small knife from under the seat of the bike and roughly jostles Jimin closer so he can cut through the rope binding his wrists. Jimin rubs at the reddened skin as the rope falls away, muttering his thanks. Hoseok just nods and packs the knife away, pulls out his riding gloves, then swings a leg over the bike.
“You getting on?” Hoseok asks as he pulls on the gloves.
“Where you going?” Jimin asks, unmoving, sceptical. Hoseok shrugs vaguely.
“Away from here.” Jimin doesn’t look assured. “Look, kid,” Hoseok sighs, “if I meant you any harm, I would have left you tied up. Hell, I wouldn’t have bothered saving you from those cult freaks in the first place. You’re more than welcome to hang around here, it’s not going to make a difference to me, it’s your life to live and whatever.”
Hoseok turns on the bike and knocks the kickstand back. He looks at Jimin, the kid still frowning as he gnaws at his lip in anxious contemplation.
“Last chance, Jimin.”
Jimin huffs and runs his hands through his hair, glancing back at the dunes they’d run over, and decides against another run in for the evening.
“Yeah, whatever.’ Jimin grumbles, barely audible over the rumble of the engine. He hurries onto the bike, looping his arms around Hoseok’s waist loosely. Hoseok pulls up his mask and sets off, cool night air whipping his skin as he speeds through the desert.