Road to Utopia - NCT

31 - Magic

(A/N - Time skip of about 2 months brought to you by Johnny, Jaehyun and the rest. At this point, I have no clue what day/month/year it is, so just assume it's a Monday. Also, a lot more third person POV since I can't follow through with first-person with the direction this will take).

After Jisung's rescue mission and recovery, the mansion quietened down a little. Of course, it was never going to be fully quiet, not with 23 grown adults that acted like zoo animals living together.

Jisung had now fully recovered, even his left ankle that he never let heal previously (mainly due to being ordered to be on bed rest for three weeks). Kun had finally slept and no longer had eyebags, but maybe they had moved to Taeyong since he looked a little sleep deprived. Being the leader did come with many burdens, but there was nothing mission-worthy to worry about recently.

~~

"You know, they didn't even report my great fireworks display on the news!" Jaehyun whined on the couch, flicking through the channels on TV. "They just said the building burnt due to a 'mysterious fire'." He air-quoted.

"Probably because they didn't want the public to panic. After all, they portray themselves to be perfect and flawless." Yuta shrugged.

"Why have they not said anything? Or tried to find us!"

"You want to be caught?" Renjun asked incredulously.

"Nah, it's just the thrill of being a rebel. That, and I have constant anxiety of knowing our door could be busted down any second."

"So, it's the latter." The younger muttered, walking away with a bagel.

"Hey, has anyone seen Taeyong?" Mark asked as he walked in.

"Probably in his office working, he really needs to sleep," Yuta answered.

True to his suggestion, Taeyong really was in his office, working. As Mark opened the door slightly, the leader hissed like a vampire. It wasn't even dark in the room, but he hissed.

"Hyung, what are you doing?"

"Hurry up and shut the door. I have a theory." He gestured for him to enter.

"Hyung, I haven't seen you leave this room for three days. You really need to shower." The younger winced.

He got shushed. "Listen, OK? What if we've not heard anything from the government because they're using Jisung to get information?"

Mark sighed. "You literally look like that guy in the corkboard meme who makes conspiracy theories."

"They said they can track him, but we never found anything? What if they can still do that and they're waiting for us to be vulnerable?"

"Hyung, I'm leaving, get some sleep. You've gone crazy. We found something on Jisung and destroyed it, we're safe." He made his way back to the door, inching away slowly in fear of crazed Taeyong.

"What if they're still using Jaemin?" He called after him.

~~

Jisung seemed fine. He was very talkative once he was allowed to leave the infirmary. He also got babied a lot more now since he was probably traumatised from kidnapping. He insisted he was fine, but the doctors believed it was just a front, and his trauma was hiding behind his inability to recall information properly.

Currently, he was lying on the sofa, head on Yuta's lap as he softly stroked his hair. Johnny came and gave him a bowl of ice cream (since ice cream was the solution to half their problems, the other half was divided between rock, paper, scissors and shooting people).

Shotaro also gave him a plushie almost every day since he was able to walk around the base. No one knew where these plushies were magically appearing from since Shotaro only had two otter plushies and he rarely left the base. Jisung now had over thirty and he wasn't sure his bed could hold him and the plushies too, something would have to be sacrificed.

"Jisung?" Jungwoo's head popped around the doorframe. The youngest raised his head. "Do you mind coming down to the lab?"

Confusedly, he followed him down where he was met with an empty lab and Jungwoo shutting the door after him, locking it. Not scary at all.

"Take a seat, I just have a few questions." He turned his back and rummaged around a drawer for a clipboard. He turned to face him after a few minutes. "OK, I just have two things to address but I didn't want anyone else to enter so I locked the door."

"OK?" He tilted his head slightly. "Please make it quick, my ice cream's gonna melt."

Jungwoo chuckled. "I'll try, just give me enough information to work with and I'll let you go." He flipped the page on his clipboard. "Firstly, I'm not sure if you remember, but a few days before you got kidnapped, you came in here when I was attempting to make a ricin antidote. Do you remember that?"

Jisung scrunched his face in concentration for a few minutes before shaking his head slightly. "No, but did the antidote work?"

"Not in the slightest. Lucas tried testing it on some cell and it basically killed itself." The youngest stared in shock. "Don't worry, it wasn't an embryonic or stem cell, so we're good. Anyway, you came in and left quickly, but the next day, Yangyang came to do stock intake and there were four vials unaccounted for. Naturally, I expected the others to have used them and not crossed it off the list, but they hadn't."

"So, you're accusing me?"

"I'm just asking if you had seen them since you were the only non-alchemist who entered the lab between the last stock update and this one."

"I mean, I don't think I did, but please do search my room or anything you need to do." He denied the accusations.

The older member sighed. "I really didn't want to leave it to this but look here." He brandished a tablet out of his pocket and showed him a video. More specifically, surveillance footage of him explicitly pocketing four vials after looking around suspiciously.

"I seriously don't remember that happening though."

"You should really get that checked out, that's not normal, even for amnesia patients. Anyway, I will have to search your room to find them, but you took them, right?"

He shrugged. "I guess so, the evidence is there. I'm sorry about that, I'm not even sure what I'd use those for; I don't even know what half the things you have do."

"The second thing I wanted to address was the pink and orange pills you've been taking."

"I've been taking pills? I stopped having anything except the odd paracetamol!"

"Except you haven't. Multiple members have seen you discreetly have orange ones, which we found could lead to death, and the pink ones aren't any better. In fact, they're just something that makes you more likely to follow the government's orders."

"Well, I can't remember taking any orange pills, ever. So, am I still taking them?" Jisung asked.

The alchemist shook his head. "Thankfully, no. We did search your room whilst you were gone to remove them and destroy them. The pink ones you were given at the facility have also been destroyed."

"So, what do I need to know about all of this?"

"Well, I hate to break it to you, but I don't think we can let you leave the mansion again for a good while, even after you've recovered."

END

I had Taeyong's part written for almost two weeks and never looked back here until today, so it may seem rushed, but I tried. IDK where to end it so here we are.

I have such a good scene planned but I need the fluff and build-up first so enjoy the snippets of their daily lives before I dive into the missions of the last arc.