𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐔𝐌𝐍 𝐊𝐈𝐋𝐋𝐄𝐃 || 𝐧𝐜𝐭 𝐦𝐚𝐟𝐢𝐚 𝐚𝐮

06 TO INFINITY AND BEYOND

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C H A P T E R S I X
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»they went separate ways,
that doesn't mean their paths won't ever cross again.«
– anonymous

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The day had passed by in a flash. Of course, I had to calm down after my mental breakdown this morning; I had thrown up a few times in the bathroom, not a nice thing, but at the end of the day, I had survived it. So it was best to ignore it and keep doing what I was doing.

After we – Jungwoo, Mark and I – had spent some more time and eaten lunch together, I had decided to start with the work. Since the whole building was icy cold, I had taken the files Mark had given me to my new room, which actually belonged to that Lucas guy. It took me ages to work through the documents, but luckily by nighttime, I was halfway through them all. It was interesting to see what Nakamoto had accomplished in his early years. But it was creepy as hell that Mark's men had actually been able to take so detailed photos of him; be it in his office, on the street, in his car. It was surprising that they had taken the risk of getting caught. Good thing nothing happened.

I could only imagine the newspaper headlines and evening breaking news if they had been caught photographing him.

Young, rich, successful and charming entrepreneur Nakamoto Yuta was attacked by an organization of stalkers who accuse him of working on biochemical weapons in order to destroy the world.

I shuddered at the thought.

Slowly I realized I was getting bored and was desperately in need of a break. I never thought that reading so much could make your eyes burn. That's why I decided to leave the room and walk around the building a bit.

Actually, I didn't go around aimlessly but knew exactly where I headed to. I thought it would be a good idea to go on the roof and get some fresh air. So that's what I did.

~∙~∙~

I took a deep breath, inhaling the cold night air and felt a lot calmer. It was exactly twenty-four hours that Mark had appeared in my apartment; my body felt exhausted.

The sky was cloudless. The world drowned in ink blue and the sky was littered with sparkling stars. As if someone had lovingly and carefully dabbed each one into the sky with a painting brush.

Perfection. The definition of perfection.

"Did you know, when you're looking at the stars you're actually looking into the past?" I turned around to where the voice came from, but there was no one behind me. I knew no one would be standing there, but still, I was hoping to see someone, anyone. Someone but the person I was thinking of.

"What? Really?" I remembered my own voice asking. Back then, the sky was as beautiful as tonight. And stargazing at the rooftop was kind of our thing. After all these memories within the last hours, I wasn't really surprised that I had to think of the midsummer night from that time.

"Yes, really." In the light of the milky moon, this beautiful man next to me looked almost surreal, bright as a sparkling star in the sky, yet he was surrounded by a mysterious dark aura that robbed him of this incredible glow. The night was loving him. And freedom was worshipping him. "We're seeing our present at this location, and the star's past at that location. And when we look at stars, we're actually looking at the light from the stars that has traveled a long way to reach our eyes. When you're looking at the moon, for instance, you're actually seeing how the moon looked 1.3 seconds ago. Similarly, when you're looking at the sun, you're looking at the sun from 8 minutes and 20 seconds ago. The farther you're looking at, the more into the past you are looking at."