"Sooo" I said when it was just the two of us. The tension was somewhat strange.
"How's your ankle?" He asked.
"Since I didn't go with them you can probably guess" I said with a sigh.
He just nodded. "This is a weird game, I still don't really understand it" he said.
"It's not that hard to understand when you think about it though" I said. "Actually the creator of the game was really wise and really had a great plan and a whole concept with a fun storyline, he just made it a bit too dangerous, and a bit too real"
Felix hadn't seen it that way until now, but now he seemed like he was realizing it too.
"I also though a bit about what you said about the moons, and now I have a theory about them" I said.
"Let me hear" he said and looekd genuinely interested.
I thought about all the times I'd seen myself, but it wasn't really me. "The moons are ourselves. We in ourselves are split apart, not knowing who to be. The society wants us to be one way but we feel another way. The closer we get to finding our true self and letting go of everything else to be free, the closer the two moons we'll get, and once we're not split apart anymore, the moons will collide and make one bright and beautiful moon" I explained my theory.
Felix nodded. "Interesting" he said.
"It kind of fits with the message of this level, and the whole game and its storyline, so I thought that would make sense" I explained to him.
"So what is the storyline in the game?" He asked me.
"You really want me to give you a run though of the whole game?" I asked since that was what I needed to do to explain it all to him.
"We've got time, don't we?" He asked with a shrug.
I looked at him a second before beginning. "Okay so the first serie was the i am series. Starting out with level 1; district 9. Here we're rejecting a perfect society. We need to realize there's no such thing as a perfect template in which everyone can fit. We're like glitches in the system because we don't fit, we're all different but everyone should be allowed to be themselves. I am NOT.
Moving on to level 2 we have my pace. We realize we don't know who we actually are and now we need to figure that out. We first need to dare admit we don't know who we are and question who we actually are. To realize which path we should chose in life we must follow ourselves only. The path that others chose is not necessarily the path you should chose. Follow yourself to see where your heart takes you, that's where you should go. I am WHO.
Third and last from I am series is I am YOU, we have it already in the title. We need to follow ourselves to find which path to go, but helping us on our path and forming us into unique individuals are the people around us. We need to find ourselves in others around us. Events and people from our surroundings will form and influence our personalities and our interests. We need to realize who the important people around us are and let them help us find ourselves. I am YOU" I ended the first part of the explanation.
Felix looked at me with furrowed eyebrows. "So in the first triology we first reject a perfect society, then we question who we are and which path we should chose, and then we need to figure out ourselves with the help of others in our surroundings" he summarized what is said.
I nodded. "After the I am series, we have first get cool, this one is actually part of the I am series, but not really relevant to the story. It's a fun level, like a stop on the way to let us have some fun and kill a principal" I heard how Felix chuckled because of my words. "It's kind of the opposite to all other levels, instead of deep and hidden messages it's literally get cool by drinking a cool drink, which we need to be lucky to find a coin to get"
I saw the way Felix looked at me as if he was still bitter I'd been right and he'd been wrong about that one.
I continued explaining. "The second serie is the clé series. Clé meaning key in French, as you said, tells us this serie is all about finding the keys, but also navigating through the maze of life. First level was miroh. So literally the maze, it can either take you to success, or back down to hell. A civil war between the regime and the rebels is taking place. A war between what you're expected to do and what you actually want to do, you're split up inside, not knowing what to do. You need to fight for your will and therefore what we've learned about ourselves and everything in the previous levels will be put at test. It's important you know yourself inside and out. Finding the material key isn't too hard, it's finding the key to peace and success, the solution, that is hard.
Second level of the clé series is maze of memories, this is like get cool a stop on the way. It's not one of the major levels. Another maze, but this maze will take you back in time. Whereas the last maze was focusing on the future, now you need to remember where you're from and how you got to where you are now. Even if it's important to remember your past, you still have to put the past behind you and move on. You need to acknowledge what you've been through, but realize it's in the past and can't be controlled.
Next level is side effects, the second part of clé. Every decision you make will have side effects. Some are good, some are bad. You need to realize that and be aware of how to handle them. Bad things we've done might come back to haunt us while as good things we've done might reward us later. That's part of life and something we must deal with. We also need to realize the easiest way might not be the best. Sometimes the hard way will give us less side effects. To find the key we chose the road not taken, we needed to make our own way to take, which certainly isn't easy, but the best option we had that will result in the least amount of side effects.
Then we have the fourth level, a level in between, double knot. Maze of memories had been like a second part of miroh, but this isn't the second part of side effects, more like the opposite, it's more of a preparation for the next level to come. Here we just need to brace ourselves for whats coming. We need to be ready, even if we don't know what lies ahead of us. We always need to be ready, we always need to have our shoelaces tied up in a double knot to be prepared for unexpected events in life. This level basically just lets us prepare mentally while taking us to the next level, the last level, levanter.
Levanter is the last level before the finish line. In order to step out of clé we must find the third and last key. Levanter is complicated and not really like the other levels. It's the last step, but it's also all steps. The purpose of Levanter is to let go of the past and embrace your true self. Get rid of everything that's restrained you and be you. This is what all the levels come down to, but it's also a recap of at the levels we've gone through. We must realize we're not glitches in a perfect system and we must decide which version of ourselves we want to be. Then we have all of that related to the book Chan has read, the alchemist, but since he still doesn't quite remember it all I'm having some struggles to see how it intertwined with the rest of the story. All we've figured out is that we're supposed to go back where we came from and take the hellevator, the elevator that have taken us all the way from hell and up here, back to the normal world and step out of clé"
Felix looked stunned, unable to speak. I chuckled at his reaction.
"Why are you not speaking?" I asked him.
"How did you figure all that out?" He asked slowly, still stunned.
"Just analyzing the levels" I said and shrugged.
"Have you been pretending to be stupid all this time?" he then asked and looked very confused.
I gave him a glare. "Yah, that's mean" I said.
"But really, you just sounded like some Einstein that majored in philosophy" he said.
"I am a philosophy student" I said with a shrug.
"Yeah but you haven't graduated yet, you only have a few years left" he said with some sarcasm.
I continued glaring at him. "My brain just tends to remember and analyze weird stuff that nobody else would even bother to remember" I said. I may look stupid, and I usually was, but not always. "You may have better grades in school, but I'm better than you at understanding things like this game" I then said.
I thought I'd insulted Felix and that he would glare at me, but his face just softened as he nodded slightly.
"Whats with your reaction? Are you not mad at me?" I asked him because I really couldn't read him. It was like I made him realize something, but that shouldn't be it, because this dude always says I'm stupid, he would never even listen to me on such things.
"Why would I be mad, everything you said is true, and sounds really smart to me" he said and looked at me.
I was getting worried for real now. "Whats wrong with my Felix?" I asked.
He chuckled. "Am I your Felix?" He said as if what I'd said amused him.
"Huh?"
"You really want me to be your Felix" he said, and suddenly I realized why he'd reacted like that to it.
My face heated up. "Wait no, I didn't mean... ehm... just forget what I said" I rambled in panic.
Felix laughed again at my reaction. "Rambling again, you're cute when you get nervous" he said, knowing me too well.
My cheeks heated up even more and I couldn't tell if it was because he knew I was embarrassed because of what I'd said or because he called me cute. Maybe both.
I looked down at my lap to avoid his gaze.
"So what do I need to do to be your Felix?" He asked and lied down with his head on my lap so he was looking straight up at me.
I found myself staring at his heart shaped lips and the memories from earlier came floating back. My heart was beating faster than before thinking back at it. I swallowed
"My Felix?" I said questioning.
"Mm" He pouted his lips and focused his eyes on my. The corner of his lips curved slightly into a smirk. "I know you're staring at my lips" he then said.
My eyes opened up wide open and I adverted my gaze away from his mouth. "I'm not" I lied.
"Thinking of that kiss?" He asked, still smirking as he looked up at my face.
"I'm not" I repeated again, feeling attacked, even though he was right.
"You know, if you said you like me too right now, I would kiss you again" he said, which caught me off guard. I didn't think he would be so bold and confident, he really had grown since we met the first time.
Part of me was tempted to kiss him, like most of me, but I didn't dare say anything, so I just sat there, staring at him, probably looking like a fish or a potato or something.
"You already know how I feel" he then said casually. How could he even be so casual?
"Yeah you're not very discreet" I muttered with low voice so even Felix could just barely hear it.
He let out a chuckle before sitting up straight again. He was looking intensely into my eyes as. He put his hand on the ground behind my back to lean on and leaned closer to me.
I stared back into his eyes, not moving a muscle. At last he stopped when there was only a few centimeters between our faces.
"So what do you feel?" He asked.
I gulped. Not saying anything. My brain was seriously malfunctioning right now. Felix's lips were so close I could feel the air he exhaled against my lips. I was about to say they were too close, but god, they weren't actually...
"Guys you wouldn't believe..." Jeongin stopped to let his mouth hang open when he saw us. We both quickly threw ourselves away from eachother. "In front of my chicken" he then said. I glared at him and he was well aware of it. "Sorry, we must've ruined the moment" Jeongin said, not even bothering to give a fuck about how embarrassing this was for us two.
We both got back to sitting up normal with a good distance between us.
"Nono, you guys continue, don't mind us, we can take another stroll, just to let you guys have your moment"
I couldn't decide whether he was being serious or not. I opened my mouth but no words came out because I didn't know what to say.
That didn't matter very much though because Jeongin continued talking. "I'm joking, we won't take another walk because I'm hungry now. But don't mind us, just don't think about continuing what you were doing, I want to eat and I don't want you to scare my food away with your r-rated stuff... he's a minor" he said and patted his burger with deep fried chicken from McDonald's as he looked at it with a pout.
Everyone looked at the maknae.
"What?" He said and took a seat between me and Felix, starting to unwrap his dinner; a happy meal with toys and all.
Nobody said anything, except Changbin. "Sometimes I wonder what is going on inside your head" he said, looking quite impressed.
"You're a minor" Felix then said and looked at Jeongin.
"Exactly and there are still more people here, so don't think about doing anything tonight because I, as a minor, will be uncomfortable" he said. "And my happy meal" he added. This kid is hella hilarious, but also hella annoying, and wayyyy too bold.
My cheeks suddenly heated up from his comment and I saw Felix was feeling uneasy as well. Everyone had stopped what they were doing because of Jeongin's comment.
"Can we please just eat now?" Seungmin came in and said, obviously not wanting this conversation to continue.
"Yeah we should"
"I totally agree"
"Absolutely, I'm really hungry now"
They were all mumbling and started eating.
I took up the burger they'd ordered for me. "Finally some food, I'm really hungry" I said and looked at the food. Nothing fancy, but definitely edible. I wondered if the boys had put together the burgers themselves since here were no humans. It also looked messy and with oddly combined ingredients. A pro sure hadn't assembled this burger so either the person was new on work or it was like... Jeongin.
Speaking of the devil.
"What are you most hungry for? The food or Felix?" Jeongin commented, just throwing it out there without hesitation.
I choked on the piece of burger I'd just put in my mouth.
All eyes were on Jeongin and the others were struggling with keeping their laughters. I felt my face heat up, both because of embarrassment, and because I was chocking to death here.
I wasn't the only one blushing though. I looked to the side and saw Felix was just as red as me, even though he wasn't choking on food. He picked up a bottle of water and chugged the whole thing.
"Yah! The food! Of course!" I said.
Who taught this baby such phrases? He needs some holy water, now immediately.
"You sure? Because to me it looks the other way" he said.
"Jeongin it's time for you to shut up now" Hyunjin said and looked at the younger boy.
Well this was hella awkward.