A guy with broad shoulders and curly hair was above me after having protected me from the big cement block falling from the wall.
"Th... thanks" I stuttered.
He smiled as he stretched his hand out to help me stand up properly again. "You're welcome" he said as I took it and stood up so we were standing face to face.
"Hyung! You're so cool, even saving our Nora" Jeongin said who came back after having hid inside the building.
"Really?" He asked.
"Yeah really" Jeongin reassured him before turning to me to speak again. "We found the last one while you were gone, this is Chan, or Christopher, but you can also call him Chris, or oppa, or daddy" he said casually while introducing the muscular man to me.
He did not just...
Chan looked a bit flustered himself. "I do not respond to that" he said with quite low voice, definitely feeling uneasy talking about it.
"Sure you do" Jeongin said and shrugged.
"He's just playing with you, call me Chan" he said.
"Hey daddy" Jeongin was heard say from beside me.
"What?" Chan wondered as he looked at the boy with a hint of annoyance.
"See, you do respond to it" he said to prove his point.
Chan looked done with the boy, but also flustered.
I chuckled slightly. "Don't worry, I'll call you Chan" I said and gave him a smile to make him feel more at ease.
"You better" Felix suddenly showed up behind me to say, putting a hand on my shoulder. He'd also fled the huge chunk of cement by taking a few steps backwards.
I turned around to give him a very faked and exaggerated smile. "Mmm, no need to worry" I said, but I saw on Felix's face that he was looking so softly at Chan with big and vulnerable eyes, as if he was touched to see him.
"Hyung" he said with a soft voice.
"Oi Felix, long time no see" Chan said in English with an Australian accent and looked at the freckled boy with a big smile before embracing him in a hug.
Felix smiled as he looked over Chan's shoulder. "Man I've missed you" he replied in an even broader accent.
Then it hit me, this was the dude from the third level who'd come as Felix's +1. He must really care about Chan.
"You're Australian?" I asked and looked at Felix with big eyes of surprise as they broke their hug.
He looked back at me with disbelief. "Where did you think I was from? America?" He asked.
"No I thought you were Korean" I answered with a shrug.
"My name is Felix" he pointed out.
"Mm" I said.
He tilted his head to the side to inspect me as if I was an idiot.
"What?" I said and felt a bit flustered over his reaction.
"How many in Korea are named Felix? Of course I'm a foreigner" he said.
"My name is Nora, I'm born and raised in Korea" I said and shrugged to defend myself.
"Didn't you say your parents misspelled Nari?" He asked. So he even remembered me mentioning that name.
"No I said that could be the reason, I'm not sure why they named me Nora" I said.
"But Felix's Korean is not as good as yours" Seungmin butted in as he came outside and happened to hear our conversation.
Felix gave him a glare.
"What, I'm just stating facts" he said and then left us to go back in again, probably feeling too threatened by Felix's glare to stay out here.
"He is more or less Korean though, both his parents are born and raised in Korea, he even has a Korean name" Chan said to expose his friend.
"Really? Whats your Korean name?" I asked and looked at him with big eyes full of wonder.
He glared back, "no need to bring that up now" he said.
"What? Don't you like your Korean name? Is it embarrassing to tell?" I asked him.
"No I just don't trust you with such personal information" he said as an excuse.
"You don't trust me to know your Korean name, but you trust me with your real name" I said and frowned.
"I never told you my name because I didn't trust you with the information, it was that traitor Jisung who told you" he said to remind me.
"Okay will you stop being mean now and continue your reunion with Chan oppa?" I said with a pout.
"Chan oppa really?" Felix said and looked at me with disbelief. "I thought you just assured me you'd call him Chan only"
"He's older than me, I'm just paying respect to the older who saved me from a falling chunk of wall when someone else who stood next to me only felt the need to save their own skin" I said and shrugged.
Felix looked a bit guilty now. "Okay but how do you even know he's older than you?" He asked, because god forbid him to admit I'm right.
"Because you're the same age as me" I said and looked at him with disbelief.
"And what does that even have to do with it?" He asked with a frown.
"Compared to you, he's a man, so if guys our age are boys like you, men like him should definitely be older" I explained, trying to roast him in the process.
He gave me a glare. "Your brain is malfunctioning" he muttered.
"She was correct though, I am older than both of you if you're the same age" Chan said.
I gave him a smile to thank him for backing me up.
"Yeah but even though she got the correct answer, she used the wrong formula" Felix said.
Now I couldn't quite keep up with their conversation anymore. What language are they even talking in? Feels like I'm back in maths class. "Talk so people can understand" I said and looked at Felix.
"See she's stupid" Felix said and looked at Chan.
"I know, stop telling me what I already know" I said and looked at Felix with a glare.
Chan looked at him with disapproval. "Why are you teasing her? She's sure not that stupid" he said.
Felix just looked at me for a few seconds.
"Whatever, what have you been doing all this time?" Chan asked.
"Nothing, he was too scared to leave the lobby" I said and rolled my eyes.
"Pussy" Jeongin suddenly said from nowhere after having stood and listened to us silently.
"Why is he not pure?" Chan asked and looked at Jeongin.
"Something went terribly wrong with that one" I said as if I was declaring he had an incurable decease and would die soon and looked into Chan's eyes.
"I'm standing right here you know" Jeongin said and looked a bit hurt.
"Mm, I don't care" I said and glanced over at him a short second.
"Rude" he muttered.
"Anyway in what way were you any better? You stayed in a refrigerator for almost as long" Felix asked and looked offended as well after being called pussy.
"At least I had a threat I was hiding from, you were just hiding from reality" Jeongin defended himself.
"Maknae's got a point" I said and nodded slowly as I listened to their arguments as if it was a real debate.
"He was hiding from his brother" Felix argued.
"Yah! Brother's can be dangerous" Jeongin defended his statement.
I couldn't hold in the laughter and let out a grunt. I'd been keeping a straight face to seem like the referee, until now, because I knew the hologram of his brother had been super nice, more mature than him for sure.
"So your name is Nora" Chan said to make the boys stop their argument about who's a pussy and who's not, and looked at me.
I nodded. "Moon Nora"
He chuckled "That's quite ironic"
"What is?" I asked him with wonder, not understanding what was ironic.
"Your name means stray in Japanese" he said and gave me a smile.
(A/N Fun fact, I didn't know that when I wrote the original story, then a reader pointed it out and I searched it up and it really does mean stray and that's the only reason I kept that name in this story too, I'm dying, thank you the reader who commented that!!)
"It does? But this game's named adventure of the strays right?" I asked to have it confirmed.
"That's what's ironic" he said.
I looked at him with big eyes. "So you know Japanese?" I asked in awe, finding it more interesting that this dude who was from Australia was fluent in both English and Korean, but not only that, he also knew Japanese, and the fact that my name means stray.
"Just a little bit" he said and smiled charmingly so his dimples showed.
"But you know the Japanese word for stray" I said.
"Guess I just kind of liked that word" he said.
"What's so fascinating about the word stray?" Felix asked and rolled his eyes.
"I don't know, maybe I just kind of relate to the definition of what a stray is" Chan said. "Besides, Nora is just a pretty word, and name" he added.
Something in what Chan said made Felix look a bit uneasy.
"Pretty name, as if" he muttered, but he was hiding both some nervousness and bitterness in his words. "Fun being named stray, your parents already knew you would be completely lost" he continued mocking my name.
"At least I'm not named Felix, your name is just boring, it has no cool meaning" I mocked him back.
"Oh yeah, but my Korean name is Yongbok which means scent of the dragon" he said.
"Your Korean name is Yongbok?" I asked. "I thought you said you wouldn't tell me"
He looked flustered now. "Forget I told you that" he said.
"No it's a cool name, I admit, being named scent of the dragon is cooler than stray" I said and shrugged.
He glared at me as if he didn't believe me.
"Yah don't take the compliment then if you don't believe me" I muttered.
"I never said I didn't believe you" he said and looked at me.
"I could see it on your face, veeerry clearly" I said back.
"You could?" He wondered and looked at me with a frown.
"You're basically an open book, your feelings are so easy to read" I admitted. He was easy to read, he had complex expressions and was not good at hiding anything.
He froze for a second. "You clearly can't see everything" he then muttered with low voice.
"What is it I don't see?" I asked and tilted my head to the side in wonder.
He looked almost frustrated at me. "I won't tell you" he said. "If you're so good at reading me then figure it out yourself" he muttered before leaving me with Chan and Jeongin.
"Whats his problem?" Jeongin wondered.
Chan chuckled. "I think I know" he said before walking after Felix into the store.
Me and Jeongin looked at each other before I shrugged and we headed in for the rest of the boys.
The reunion inside was also lively. All the 8 boys were back together after having been split apart for so long.
"Whaa, all eight of us are finally reunited" Jeongin said as they were all hugging each other.
I saw Felix looking my way. He sighed and showed me a slight smile. "All nine of us, come here Nora, you're also part of our team now" he said.
I felt touched by his words. He was finally welcoming me to the group. I couldn't stop a wide smile from spreading over my face because of the happiness. I went to them and let them embrace me into their hug. For the first time since I got here I felt true and pure happiness. All those boys I really liked and being a part of them was all I could ask for. I somehow felt like I belonged with them. We hadn't just had the bad luck to end up at the same hellhole. With those guys I felt comfortable and true to myself, well, as comfortable I could be when constantly fleeing death.
"Thank you" I mumbled with low voice. I don't think anyone heard me, but I had to let out how grateful I was.
Suddenly a rumbling noice was heard and I noticed the walls shaking slightly.
"We should get out, this building isn't stable" I said, interrupting the moment before we all hurried out.
Another big chunk of cement from the wall fell down behind us right after we'd left the building, blocking what otherwise would have been our way out.
"Well that was close" Jeongin said when he realized we would have been stuck in there now if we had been only a few seconds later.
"We should move so we don't get crushed" Chan suggested and a second later we were all in movement.