Monsta X: The Clan Pt. 2

4: I Won't Rest

"This place is heating up"

"I won't rest"

Wonho:

Flames burst before me as I hammered endlessly on the piece of metal before me.

The thick, silver gloves on my hands that prevented my hands from being burned from the fire were making me hot. I already was wearing no shirt except my large, black work apron.

It was dangerous for sure, but I was used to working like this. Several hours for several days made the stuffy and empty warehouse I was working in almost insufferable.

Still, I managed, ignoring the burning heat and hammering on and on, with a heavy pair of glasses around my neck, thunking against my chest as I worked.

I was reshaping the metal before me, because the first time I had made it, it didn't fit into my structure. This was how I worked, on a constant base of trial and error, mostly errors, and hasty fixes. I hardly knew what I was doing, yet I did it anyway because I had to.

I was tired, almost exhausted to death, but on I worked. Despite my hand cramping so badly it couldn't move, despite the sweat soaking me, despite my body begging to sit down and take a break, on I worked.

But I knew if I burned myself out, then this project would never be finished. I shouldn't overwork myself.

It had to be finished.

Whining in frustration I set the metal cross that I was hammering against the metal table and turned off the fire. I glanced around the warehouse for a suitable seat where I could rest, but in a place like this, there was hardly any such place.

Besides my long work table, there were rows upon rows of shelves, each filled with boxes that held tools and bits of metal that I needed to use. In the middle of the warehouse stood the giant project that I had been working on, and alongside that was a messy set of tools strewn over the floor. Faint light drew from the windows on one side of the room, revealing the amount of dust in the room.

My giant project was covered by a dusty cloth, but I could still see the metal protruding out one side. It was massive, a few feet taller than I was, and bulky, which was understandable for such a complicated structure like this. Several bundles of wires, snaking through the warehouse and piling on top of each other, were connected to the machine. It needed a lot of power to run, that is, if I could even get it running.

In the end, I decided to simply sit on the floor, deciding that there was no other place. The cold, concrete ground almost instantaneously cooled me down compared to the flames I stood with before. Stretching my legs and wiggling my fingers I made sure that I was comfortable, for this kind of comfort wouldn't last long.

Soon, I would have to go back to work, as unfavorable as that sounds.

I had to keep working because my project would set them free.

Such a hope seemed impossible before. How could I get Minhyuk and Hyungwon out when they were trapped in the Capitol, surrounded by the very people that hated us? We were just barely on good terms with the government, considering they let us out.

If they found out what I was doing, what we were doing, they'd immediately take us back into captivity, and wouldn't let us go like last time.

Still, I wasn't going to abandon Minhyuk and Hyungwon, I refused to do it. I had to get them out.

And I'm sure this is the only way to do it.

Or at least that's what Jooheon said.

He had been leading my operation and guiding me on my project. While I was skeptical of him at first, I know to trust him completely.

It felt nice to have some faith in someone in a world like this.

In the past few months, the world around us has been slowly falling, piece by piece. The rebellion had started, and it was stirring quite a fire in the people's hearts.

Now, every day in the news, you couldn't go to a single channel without hearing some news report on some new attack. Casualties were listed every day since both sides were growing tenser and tenser by the day.

It wouldn't be long before we had a full-scale war, as we had a few years ago.

It was bound to happen anyways. Messy compromises and meaningless promises were made after the first one. The government neglected the people and hastily rebuilt the city around them. Too many things were left untouched, unfixed.

Everyone was expecting this. It was just a matter of when.

And now, it was too late to fix any of it. The time, the chance for that, was long long ago, maybe even before the first war. The government and the aristocrats knew it. The people know it. Everyone's just too afraid to admit it. Everyone's going to die for nothing.

Unless I build this machine of mines.

The big project that I had been working on for the longest time.

Then we could fix it all, only then will everything be right again.

I remembered the good days, when we were young and carefree, walking outside each day and stopping silly crimes and protecting people. Was that all useless?

I would say it was.

Instead, we could've been using those days to address the problem instead of running away from it. We did exactly what the government did, and turned away, leaving stinging wounds unfixed.

It was how Minhyuk turned insane, how Hyungwon had gotten so ruined that he decided to take his own life, how Kihyun felt so desperate to help the hopeless situation that he ran away, how Changkyun and I were so confused between right and wrong that we blindly followed Minhyuk's bad ways, how Shownu robbed the bank instead of looking for another way, and how Jooheon failed in leading us.

All we did was run away, just like we ran away from the guards the night they captured us, too weak and ignorant to bother to fight back.

Well know, we learned our mistake.

We'll get a second chance to make it right again.

It'll be alright again.

A/N

Which side is Jooheon on? What's Wonho building? You'll find out 👀

Time-stamp is 0:52-1:01.

Next update will be this Thursday, 7/12!

Thanks for the read and don't forget to vote!