Adjustment (taejoon & yoonmin/jikook)

Chapter 1

It was getting harder and harder for Taehyung to keep track of how many days had passed since they'd ended up at this deserted place. Even though they'd managed to climb down the mountain, the valley seemed more than infinite; no matter how far they went, there was yet another valley- and then another, and another.

It was almost ironic how something they'd planned for months could possibly end up this bad — all of them had been training for almost a year, so they'd be able to withstand the enormous challenges that automatically followed hiking.

Perhaps the south-eastern part of Siberia wasn't the best choice now that he looked back at it; after all, the closest village was at least one hundred kilometres away. Just thinking about it, their current situation, made Taehyung tear up. Although they tried talking about it as little as possible, they were all aware of their chance of surviving – it was little to nothing. The loss of Miyeon had been yet another confirmation of that unchangeable fact.

Poor girl; her death had been terribly brutal and truthfully, she deserved to leave this world with dignity, certainly not at the age of twenty-two.

The accident had happened only a few days after the powerful snowstorm had set in. Rather quickly, they'd decided to head down to the valley to seek shelter from the ruthless storm. Although Mother Nature granted the world the most enchanting and beautiful moments in life, she's also the wrecker of the same beauty she created. While travelling in her world, one must be careful and focused at all times, and Miyeon's death was the outcome of this inattentiveness. Everything happened in a blink of an eye, but from what Taehyung witnessed, she didn't watch the ground for just a short moment and thus slipped on a rock, which was covered with a thin layer of ice, hidden beneath a thick layer of the purest snow.

Unfortunately, from there, it was impossible for any of them to reach out and grab her to keep her from falling. She fell down from the edge of the slim invisible track, her body hitting numerous of crags painfully. The feisty wind drowned out every other sound, though Taehyung wasn't sure if Miyeon even had had time to scream – perhaps he simply couldn't hear it. At least they didn't hear the bones in her body crack painfully each time her weak body came into contact with the hard stones. The sight, however, had been terrifying; the way gravity and the crags had played with her body, tossing her around like a rag doll, was a sight that'd never leave their retinas.

At that exact moment, all of them knew that it was just a matter of time before it was their turn to be taken by eternal sleep. The storm hadn't only weakened them mentally but also physically; they were running out of food and clean water. Soon, they'd have to use the snow to fulfil their need for H2O and Taehyung was pretty sure the snow was full of hazardous bacteria.

One night before they'd reached the foot of the mountain, a bough had been taken by the wind and had made a huge tear in the tent. The equipment to fix a possible hole in the tent was in Miyeon's backpack, which lay somewhere unknown, probably alongside a deep-frozen body – to put it simply, they were fucked and optimism was not a word in their vocabulary at that very moment.

Without Miyeon, they only made it four down the mountain. The plain, covered under a duvet of snow, didn't offer as much shelter from the fierce storm as they'd hoped. Plus, without their tent, they were even more exposed and vulnerable to possible attacks.

In Taehyung's eyes, they had to choose between cholera and the plague; they could've stayed in the mountains, fairly protected against potential attacks, though they'd be without any possible source of food and an even stronger wind that could take yet another one of them. Or they could stay on the plain, very exposed and vulnerable but able to move towards help.