Virus ~ A Stray Kids ff

3

"What was the outside world like, Jeongin-ah?" Jisung's suddenly asked with a curious grin as he jumped off his bed and bounded across the room to Jeongin and Seungmin's bunk.

It was 11 at night and they were all supposed to be asleep by 10. If Jisung carried on, they were going to get found out.

"Shut up, Jisung, you're going to alert them. Do you even know what time it is?" Seungmin hissed.

"No,"he shrugged. "But I can't sleep."

"Who gave him the drugs?"Changbin groaned, who was the only one asleep but woke up due to Jisung's loud voice.

"The scientists gave us the drugs,"Jisung pointed out, which made the others stop in realisation.

"For once, Han Jisung,"Minho said suddenly, "you've actually said something intelligent."

"I know, right,"he grinned with obliviousness.

"Nevermind,"Minho muttered quietly to himself.

"Jisung,"Jeongin started slowly as if talking to a little child, "I've already told you this story."

"Well, tell me it again,"he persisted. "I'm bored and I haven't seen the outside world for 8 yearssss."

"I just want to SLEEP,"Woojin complained but he was shushed by Hyunjin, who apparently was on Jisung's side.

"You weren't sleeping anyway, Hyung, so you might as well listen,"he said smartly.

"Hey, hey, mind the tone,"Chan warned, though he was already leaning forward to listen in.

"For God's sake, guys, I'm pretty sure the world as I saw it 3 years ago is exactly as Chan remembers it 13 years ago."

"Jeongin, just tell him the stupid 'story' before someone gets thrown off the top bunk,"Woojin grumbled, leaning over the top of his bunk shared with Minho. "That boy is on more than the pills we're actually given."

"Oh my God, ok,"Jeongin sighed with a roll of his eyes. "Well, it was pretty normal. I mean, apart from my parents, but none of us seem to have had a normal family. After all, if we did have normal families, they wouldn't have given us up to these crazy people or abandoned us and all. I went to school, but I didn't really have friends. I had one, but he moved away when I was young, seven maybe. I didn't like him much anyways, to be honest. He was always a bit boring. I liked to eat kimchi fried rice and I rode bus 4419 to school. I had this one teacher who got fired for throwing glitter in some kid's eye. Yeah, some said that he lost his eye...I feel kinda bad now. I had a cousin who had a sixth finger. Moving on, it used to be quite busy, but towards the end of the time I spent in the outside world, Busan became quite empty. People were probably moving because of climate change, you know. Such a tragedy, such a tragedy."

"This is boring,"Jisung scoffed. "It's obvious that you're doing it on purpose too."

"Well, YOU'RE the one who asked me to tell you about my completely normal life."

"Come on, where are the serial killers and murderous pigs?"Jisung whined.

"Jisung, how is that relevant to my life at all? I mean, there were a lot of news reports about the world ending, probably from climate change."

"YES, I knew it!"Jisung almost screamed. "You secretly have powers but you're evil and you're gonna kill us all!"

"Jisung, I said nothing even relatively close to that,"Jeongin scoffed with his eyebrows scrunched together.

"Oh, come on, Jeongin," Seungmin sighed ." The world isn't ending and besides, they said that back into 2012 and we're still alive. Unless we live in an alternate universe and that's the point of District 9."

"You think we live in an alternate universe?"Jeongin frowned. "I'm just gonna stick with my 'the world is ending' conspiracy."

"Really?!"said Felix. "Oh my God, it's just like this video game I used to play and-"

"Don't encourage him,"Woojin groaned. "And Jeongin, making up something like that is only going to make it worse. You know what Felix and Jisung are like. They'll be going around into other people's dorms and yelling that the world is ending middle of the night now. "

"I'm not making it up!"he protested.

"Jeongin, if this is actually true, how the hell could you forget to mention something so major?" Chan frowned, though there was some sort of hope in his eyes that he was getting answers after so long. Woojin shot him a sharp look, annoyed that he wasn't agreeing that it was just their imagination.

"I don't know, it seemed like some made up ish when I saw it on TV so I thought it was stupid."

"And it IS! Jisung is the one who brought it up, of course it's stupid!"Woojin exclaimed, trying to stop them, but no one paid attention as they were all too engrossed in what Jeongin was saying.

"I mean, I don't know, don't ask me!"Jeongin spluttered, obviously flustered. "I just saw it on TV, ok? Just some crazy scientists wanting to stir up trouble. And besides, like Seungmin said, everyone's been predicting the end of the world for years and years now. It's not believable anyways." He rolled his eyes, although there was a gleam in them.

"It's not believable because it isn't true,"Woojin sighed. "I know that we all promised to get out of here but this is getting ridiculous and conspiring about rubbish like this is not our ticket out. It's just a coincidence that Jisung brought it up and Jeongin remembered some fake news reports on TV. Stop convincing yourselves of the impossible. We're just here because we're unlucky."

He turned back around to face the wall his bunk was up against, closing his eyes with a creased forehead, trying hard to ignore everyone.

"Woojin hyung-"

"Just go to sleep, Hyunjin. All of you. I'm not mad. I'm just being reasonable. Now get to bed before someone comes in to check."

The flick of the light and rustling of sheets was the only thing heard as they were submerged into a darkness, enclosed in white walls and white lies. But a lie was a lie.