Monsta X: The Clan Pt. 2

14: I'm a Fighter

"Cause I'm a fighter"

"Fighter"

Changkyun:

I angrily slammed my thumbs on the buttons on the device before me as lights flashed in my eyes.

The blinking lights came like a rainbow; they could easily blind anyone else attempting to the game, but I was used to it. After all, playing this game was all that I had been doing for weeks, never leaving my spot on the concrete ground, however uncomfortable it was.

Lowering my head I snuggled my chin into the teddy bear in my lap, which acted like a pillow for these past few days. In fact, the ground surrounding me was covered in more teddy bears just like the one with me. Some tan colored, some brown, some in bad condition, some good. Some were even wearing cute clothes.

Why the teddy bears? As cheesy as it sounds soft things help me feel safer. With them surrounding me I felt as if I was in a protective bubble that nobody could break through. The soft feeling of the fur against my cheek felt so much better than all of the harsh things around me. Since I started playing my game, I've been obsessed with teddy bears.

Meanwhile, I was guiding my game character through the digital pipes and obstacles in the game. The character, a pixeled brown teddy bear, followed my every move as I tapped the right arrow and advanced further into the visually displeasing level.

I had been trying to distract myself with this game for the past few hours but nothing it clearly wasn't helping. In fact, every mistake I made, as the timer in the corner of the game ran out, stressed me out even more.

I couldn't afford to make mistakes like these when the time came.

And that's what was stressing me out the most.

Sighing deeply I relaxed my hands onto my lap and pulled the teddy bear closer to my chest, feeling the slightest bit of comfort in the action.

Wonho had been contacting me for the past few hours.

Childishly I refused to respond to any of them, refused to give any of his texts more than a glance. But from what little I saw, I knew what he wanted from me.

He needed me, and the game before me.

An "activation system" he called it, whatever that meant. The teddy bear game was the one that would be able to start the program of his time machine. It was one of the most essential pieces.

I knew for the past few days that he needed something to activate the system at the moment the flower's maximum power was harnessed. There was no way to do that without missing the timing or completely ruining the capability of the machine. It was too exact of a thing that needed to be done.

Not only that but a series of other phases before that needed to be executed at the same time before that. The activation system needed several layers, several levels of activation. And we needed it fast.

The connection was all too clear.

The game I was playing itself was a programming Wonho had actually designed himself long ago, back when we were still friends and back before the rebellion had started. Way before any of the disaster happened a few months ago.

He was simply experimenting and had made it for me, as a gift, that I could play when I was bored. He was thoughtful back then, really.

He only made one version of it because it was so meaningless and useless for anything but fun. He had experimented with the game to maybe make it useful somehow but he never told me what for.