Road to Utopia - NCT

41 - New Friends

Mark and Jaemin were still in their confined room together. Since they were unable to fight back against their enemies whilst undergoing their 'treatment'. They were unaware of their surroundings as they convulsed on the floor and writhed in pain they couldn't ever imagine.

After hour fifteen, they had stopped moving and lay motionless on the cold, wooden floor. Another hour later, they woke up, disorientated and still unable to move. They couldn't speak and their thoughts were sluggish.

Moments later. Eunhee walked in with her signature smirk and her arms crossed against her chest. "Welcome back. It seems like you have finally realised that we were right all along and came crawling back to us. I would punish traitors like you by killing you, but seeing you beg for us to take you back, I guess we could give your old jobs back."

Their facial muscles contorted to confusion. Did they beg for their jobs back?

"Of course you don't remember! Our guards were still on orders to detain you if you ever came back and so they had to knock you out. Luckily, I stepped in and told them that you were here on my orders to return to your previous jobs." Eunhee explained after seeing their faces. "Unfortunately, I still don't trust traitors who run away from their jobs so I had to administer a drug to reduce some cognitive functions that may aid any future escapes, such as speaking. And I also made it easier for you to both follow my instructions."

She leaned down and carefully caressed the side of Mark's face. "You'll go back to handling and administering drugs to our test subjects, won't you?"

She then turned to Jaemin, who looked at her in fear. "And you'll be our pliant subject like you were in the past, won't you?" She patted his head and stood back up to leave. Before she stepped out, she turned back to them. "It's a shame we had to meet in such circumstances. The serum should slowly dissipate your past memories, but I thought I should introduce myself properly."

She smiled warmly, tilting her head slightly. "Hi. I'm Lee Eunhee, Jaehyun's ex-girlfriend."

~~

"All those in favour of making Ten our leader, say 'aye'."

"Aye!"

"Motion carried. Court dismissed." Sungchan clapped his hands and stood up.

"Sungchan, I know you were planning on working in the legal system, but no one made you the one leading this judgement," Chenle whined. "Why couldn't I do it?"

"Well, I'm in charge now. One day, you can, I'm sure of it." Ten patted his shoulder. "For now, we need to decide where to go from here, let me relay Kun's last words." Everyone sat up a little straighter at the mention of their ex-leader. "He said to find EXO and that he loves us all. So, does anyone know who and where EXO is?"

Winwin raised his hand. "They were Sooman's previous group that he funded. They had the same goal we did until one of the members won the lotto a few too many times and they went off the grid. Their base should be about thirty minutes away, somewhere underground."

"And you know this how?" Jeno asked. "I would have thought that I would have come across them during the times I've been hacking."

"They were wiped from the databases as soon as they went missing. And being Taeyong's little maid, clearing his desk, really helps you gain a lot of info. Like, I didn't need to know the number of times Lucas interrupted his shower time."

"We didn't need to know that either," Yangyang muttered under his breath.

"So, you wanna head over there? There's a van and some fuel in the back, though someone will have to sit in someone's lap." Ten said. "Do you know where their base is, Winwin?"

"The rough area, yes."

"Let's go then!" Renjun yelled at them, shooing the others to the back.

~~

"It should be right around...here."

"Winwin, you've said that for the past twenty minutes. I don't think this is the way." Yuta chided him.

"Really? Then who's that?" Winwin pointed at the man that stood defensively about ten metres away. He rushed out of the car to greet him.

"Wait, Winwin! I don't think you should run to a guy-" Ten rushed to follow him. The unknown man raised a gun at them. "-who probably thinks we're his enemies."

"Who are you and what have you come for?" He asked, switching his stance to aim at all of them.

"We're looking for EXO. Our base got infiltrated and we lost a lot of our core members." Ten raised his arms, signalling that he meant no harm.

"Suho, who's this?" A taller man came out from the ground and squinted at them. "Wait, NCT? Suho, put your gun down."

The man named Suho dropped his gun to his side. "Sorry, we've been on high alert since we heard about Sooman's new group getting captured. We thought we'd be next. How did you know to find us?"

"Kun told us to find you and Winwin knows a few things about you through Taeyong." Ten said.

"I still remember those two when they were younger." Suho sighed as he reminisced about the past. "They would always sneak into our meetings and take our snacks. How are they both?"

"Dead," Chenle said bitterly.

The two EXO members gasped.

"That's why we need your help," Yuta added.

Suho sighed. "It's always the good ones that die early. Come in, we can help you."

"Oh, and I think we have something that belongs to you anyway." The other man said.

END

What does EXO have?

And yes, Jaehyun did have a girlfriend in the past, what else would we expect? It won't be brought up again in the story so see the end notes for more information.