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The sound of Jisung's door banging open violently startles him from sleep.
"Wha—but I didn't do anything," he blabbers nonsensically, unable to comprehend whether he's conscious or still dreaming, heart pounding against his rib cage. As his eyes adjust to the light spilling into his room, he registers the unmistakeable silhouette of Minho looming eerily in his open doorway like a horror antagonist that just found its next victim.
"Jisung-ah," the shape announces, deadly serious. "Pack your things. We're moving."
Jisung blearily reaches for his phone on the nightstand. Two o'clock in the morning rudely beams back, too bright and far too early. "Right now? Hyung, what—"
"Hurry up. We don't have much time."
Even as his cotton-filled brain continues its struggle to find a reason for this sudden emergency, Jisung starts clambering out of bed regardless. His body is tuned to respond to whatever Minho dictates, and if Minho says something's wrong—something's wrong. "What's happening? Is it a fire?"
"I wish," says Minho, absurdly. "Fire would cleanse." He appears to think for a moment, then adds, "Do we have a flamethrower?"
Body still moving without a smidgen of critical thought, Jisung absently, hastily starts grabbing whatever possessions are within reach—yesterday's shirt, his favourite ball cap, a manhwa on loan from Hyunjin—and stuffing them into his messenger bag. A few seconds later, his brain finally comes online. He pauses. What the hell is he doing? What is happening right now? "A flamethro… what?"
"Cockroaches," Minho says with finality, as if he's been waiting for Jisung to figure it out. "Quickly, jagiya!"
Jisung sets his bag back down on the bed, urgency to evacuate fading—but not entirely. There's still time to turn this around, he thinks, before they have to flee. "How many?"
"At least two." Minho's voice wavers, just slightly. Enough for Jisung to understand the gravity of the situation. "But they've joined forces."
Every hair on Jisung's body stands on end. "Where are they now?"
"Still in the bathroom. I was ambushed."
Now that he's fully aware of his surroundings, Jisung can see that Minho is wearing nothing but his underwear, two sets of gloves on each hand, and the battle-weary face of a man defeated. It's not the first time they've had to deal with bugs in their apartment; usually Minho and his legendary catlike reflexes dispatch them quickly enough for Jisung to not have to worry about the odd mosquito or spider. But cockroaches are an entirely different beast, one whose size and bulk are unfortunately too great for Minho's sensibilities. If there are indeed two of them, this is definitely going to take a united front.
"We could call—"
"I already called them," Minho cuts him off. "Jeongin laughed and wished me luck and said he was going back to sleep."
"Shit." Jisung deflates, out of ideas. Moving out it is, then.
Then he sees Minho's eyes drift from his own and land on something over his shoulder. And then Minho smiles with something that looks like hope.
"Richard," he says decisively, like she's the answer to all their problems.
Jisung catches on immediately. He turns to the gecko's vivarium and sees that she's stirring, roused by the disruption in the usual lighting schedule. His heart swells at the sight of her.
"We can try," he says, "but she just ate yesterday so she might not be hungry. And cockroaches are really big…"
Minho bristles at the reminder. "I know how big they are, I almost just died!"
Jisung looks at him pleadingly, instantly protective. "I don't want her to get hurt!"
"She'll be fine," Minho says, a little more softly. "She'll be a hero. It's her time to shine."
Jisung looks back at Richard as she slowly crawls up her favourite branch. He chews his lip in apprehension. She's not ready for battle.
"She has to pay her rent somehow," Minho adds.
"Hyung," Jisung admonishes him, eyebrows knit together. "She's our baby. She pays with her love."
Richard stares vacantly into the middle distance, oblivious.
"She's our only hope, jagiya."
Jisung looks up at the quiver in Minho's voice. It's a rare thing, seeing him so desperate, so vulnerable; it makes Jisung's soft heart tug. It makes him feel like this is worth a shot. Best case scenario: Richard gets an extra meal. Worst case scenario… they start over somewhere new and have to explain to the company that it was a life or death situation. He gives a single, solemn nod, and then opens the door of Richard's enclosure.
Minho had turned on all the lights in the apartment when he fled the bathroom, insisting he needed a clear escape path. Once they reach the closed door, he nods wordlessly at the handle. Jisung looks at him incredulously.
"I'm holding her," he says, gesturing with Richard cradled gently in both hands.
Minho exhales slowly through his nose. "Okay. Get ready." He places one hand on the handle and points the other at Richard's snout. "I believe in you, little one." And then, taking another deep breath, he opens the door.
Nobody moves.
For a while.
"You first," squeaks Jisung, eventually.
"I was fighting them while you were sleeping," Minho reminds him, voice coming out several octaves higher than normal. "It's your turn! You've got the secret weapon!"
"She's not a weapon, she's—"
"The baby, yes, ugh. It's a good job you're both cute."
The compliment gives Jisung the courage to step over the threshold into the bathroom. Tentatively, he peers along each wall, checks each of the upper corners. "Did you hear that, Richard? He says you're cute," he preens. She's a warm and comfortable weight in his hands.
Minho sighs, hovering behind them at a safe distance. "Don't let your guard down. That's when they get you."
Jisung casts him a pointed look over his shoulder. "What makes you think I can handle this any better than you can? I'm just as—waugh!"
He shrieks at the same time Minho does, both of them jumping back and colliding with each other in the doorway. The roaches are real, and they're big, and they're scurrying with alarming speed up the wall next to the shower.
"I told you! I told you!" Minho screeches, vindicated, clinging to Jisung's shoulders.
"I believed you!" Jisung yelps back. "When have I ever not believed you!"
Minho ignores the retort, pointing past him at the roaches with a small, trembling hand. "Deploy her, quick!"
Jisung's stomach drops at the realization that in order to put their plan in motion, he has to get Richard within striking distance of the target. Both roaches have paused on the tile, antennae twitching but otherwise deceptively still. Oh my god, they're so gross. This is a nightmare.
"This is a nightmare," he says, and takes a brave step forward.
"Richard and Jisungie, fighting," Minho cheers quietly from behind him.
As Jisung inches further into the bathroom, eyes locked on the roaches, every cell in his body screams at him to run. The few times in his life when he's been presented with the choice between fight or flight—being caught stealing Changbin's food, trying to pour water on Changbin onstage (huh, there's a pattern there)—he always chooses the latter. But here he is now, their lives and their home on the line, and all hope rests on him successfully deploying the little creature in his hands. No one can ever say he isn't brave ever again. He feels like Samwise Gamgee wielding the Light of Eärendil, the movie fresh in his mind from a recent long-haul flight, bravely confronting Shelob.
Except there are two Shelobs. And in his hold isn't a legendary crystal vessel but a crested gecko currently licking her own eyeballs.
"Richard, fighting," he echoes in a whisper so as not to startle any of them, and raises her towards her target. He squeezes his eyes shut, expecting—hoping—to hear the telltale pap of a little tongue striking its victim(s).
But nothing happens.
Behind him, Minho squeaks. Jisung risks opening his eyes.
The roaches haven't moved—thank god honestly, if they'd vanished they'd have to locate them all over again—but neither has Richard. She's looking down at Jisung's fingers as if she's just realized she's being held six feet in the air.
"Maybe she can't see them," offers Minho from the doorway. "Like a t. rex. Maybe they need to move—"
"I don't want them to move!" Jisung wails immediately. "Not when I'm right here!"
Either disturbed by the sudden outburst or spurned on by devastatingly comic timing, both roaches suddenly launch themselves along the wall. Jisung all but flings himself backwards in horror, maintaining a secure grip on Richard, and stumbles into Minho's open arms as he's pulled back to the safety of the hallway. Minho reaches past him to slam the door shut.
"I can't do this I can't do this I can't do this," Jisung chants, turning in Minho's hold to bury his face in his shoulder with Richard held protectively against his chest.
Minho rubs a reassuring hand across Jisung's back. The rubber of the dishwashing gloves he's still wearing catches in the fabric of his sleep shirt. "You can, Jisung-ah," he soothes, pressing his cheek against Jisung's head. "What if… what if we shut her in there with them?"
Jisung reels back in dismay. "I'm not leaving her to face them alone, you monster!"
"Okay, okay," Minho relents.
"I told you she wouldn't be hungry," Jisung whines, looking down at Richard's pointed little head. Gently, he brushes the pad of his thumb across the space between her eyes. "And they're way too big for her anyway, like I said." As though reliving the horror, he hides his face back against Minho's body. "They're so big, hyung, and too fast."
"I know," Minho says with genuine sympathy and a little hopelessness.
The three of them remain huddled together in silence for a few moments longer. Richard squirms. Jisung loosens his grip and lets her climb onto his shoulder.
"Is this how we die?" he asks, despondent, words muffled against Minho's neck.
Minho holds him a little closer. "We had a good run, didn't we?"
Jisung turns his head to the side and sighs deeply, his breath ghosting across Minho's bare chest. He loops his arms around Minho's waist, accepting their fate. They did have a good run. It's a shame for it to end this way, for their members to have to carry on without them…
A fresh idea strikes him. The members! He draws back, eyes bright. "We could seal off the bathroom until Iyennie can get here in the morning!"
Minho shakes his head. "Absolutely not," he says. "It was bad enough that I called him. He'd never let us live it down if we both hid and waited all night for rescue."
"Ugh, right," Jisung agrees. He feels Richard's padded feet crawling towards the neckline of his shirt and plucks her off, placing her in his open palm. She settles there, unblinking and unaware of their dire situation. Lucky, Jisung thinks.
"I could shoot them," says Minho suddenly.
"With what?"
"Get me something you don't mind getting broken."
"Hyung," Jisung says, but he's already thinking the plan through. Minho's historically not great at sports except shooting, which he's actually unsettlingly good at. It could work. It could save them. "So you're just going to… throw something at them?"
"Yes," Minho confirms. "I'm going to throw something at them."
Jisung instinctively draws Richard close against his chest, shielding her with his other hand.
"Not her," Minho adds, rolling his eyes. "My god, jagi."
"Right, of course." Jisung nods, feeling silly.
Quickly running through potential projectiles in his mind, he dismisses all the things he doesn't want to see shattered on the bathroom floor. Not the remote, not a phone… If only there was a heavy, plastic, maybe disposable… Wait, that's it!
"Just use one of the bottles in the shower," he suggests. "They should be heavy enough to crush them without anything getting actually broken. I've dropped them in there enough times."
Minho blinks at him. Then leans in to press a kiss to his forehead. "You're so smart."
"That's why you're in love with meee," Jisung sing-songs, wiggling his shoulders.
"No, no aegyo in the house," Minho scolds, holding him by the arms and moving him out of the way. "I'm in love with you because of your ass, you know this."
"Okay, hyung," Jisung says easily, because he knows that isn’t the whole truth. "Go shoot the roaches."
He watches as Minho steels himself with a deep breath and opens the bathroom door once more. The show of bravery is somewhat diminished by the way he instantly leaps backwards, as though the cockroaches were waiting just inside, ready to fight. Minho freezes with his eyes squeezed tightly shut.
"I can't look," he admits, voice catching.
Jisung peers around him, keeping himself outside in the safety of the hallway. He scans what he can see of the bathroom and spots the two roaches beside the mirror, not moving.
"I have eyes on them," he confirms, like he's in the command center of an elusive spy network and Minho's his agent in the field. "I'll direct you."
"Okay," says Minho, immediately committed to the bit. "Tell me where to go."
It would probably be disturbing to anyone else, how easily they can work together like they exist in one body. If they were competing for some kind of variety show glory right now Seungmin would be calling it an unfair advantage; that allowing them to be on the same team is basically cheating. But right now, here in their bathroom, in their home, their ability to work as one is quite literally saving their lives. Or at least what's left of their dignity. It's the highest stakes they've ever had.
Minho successfully retrieves two shampoo bottles and one conditioner from the shower under Jisung's guidance, insisting he can do it in three attempts. With Richard settled calmly on his hand and feeling more confident in their success by the second, Jisung believes him.
Then one of the roaches scuttles further along the wall and Jisung almost jumps out of his skin.
"Wah!" he yelps, careful not to deposit a startled gecko onto the floor.
Minho bristles too, back curved and arms stiff like a frightened cat. "What? What?!"
"No no, it's fine, it's okay," Jisung hurries out. "One just moved. It's okay. It's not any closer to you."
Minho draws himself back up, eyes still closed, and holds up a bottle. "Can I throw? I hate this so much."
"You're doing great, baby," Jisung says encouragingly. "Okay, turn slightly to your right. Lower your arm." Minho follows his directions exactly, and Jisung feels a sudden wave of panic at the weight of his responsibility. "Oh my god, I'm so bad at these games. I shouldn't be doing this."
"Too late now!" Minho spits, but there's no venom there. "Tell me when!"
"Argh! Throw!"
With a solid bang, the first bottle collides with the wall—and the roach. Both fall to the tiled floor: the bottle in one piece, the insect crushed.
"Yeah, yeah!" Jisung cries in delight, bouncing on the balls of his feet. "You got one, hyung!"
"Yesss," Minho says, trusting him completely. "Where's the other one?"
Unfortunately, the impact from the first shot had disturbed the other cockroach and sent it scurrying further up the wall, closer to the ceiling. Jisung shivers with disgust as he looks at it.
"Okay, this one might be tougher," he warns. "It's higher. Move to your left a little. Hold your arm higher—that's it!"
Minho does as he's told, frozen in position. Ready to strike.
"He's so good," Jisung says admiringly to Richard.
"Jisung-ah."
"Sorry, you're just so—" Jisung sees Minho's entire body tense with impatience and stops himself from waxing poetic about how hot he is, his half-naked hero with the aim of an assassin, fighting to keep them safe in the early hours of the morning. "Whatever. Throw!"
This shot misses, sending both the roach and a sizeable squirt from the loosely-capped conditioner dashing down the wall.
"Did I get it?" asks Minho, so full of hope.
"Nooo," Jisung wails, recoiling in horror. "I'm so sorry, it's—ah, throw to your right, quickly!"
Minho does so and this time, thank fuck, this time it's a clean shot. The roach tumbles lifelessly to the floor to join its sibling, or lover, or whatever the hell was the deal between those two, Jisung isn't an expert.
"Tell me I got it!" Minho wails right back.
"You got it! Hyung, you got it!"
Minho's eyes fly open to confirm his victory. "Wow, we're so powerful," he says, peeling off his gloves before whirling around to catch Jisung as he crashes (carefully, with Richard onboard) into his arms.
"We really are the best team," Jisung agrees, pressing a chaste kiss to his lips.
"You're cleaning up the corpses tomorrow. And I'm sleeping in your bed," Minho declares, already beginning to walk them both there. "For safety. If there are more, we'll have to team up again."
Jisung nods, because that makes perfect sense. "Obviously."
"You're the only bug I want to deal with for the foreseeable future."
"Obviously."
"I'm putting this on Bubble, by the way," Minho says, then immediately senses Jisung's apprehension. "Not the details. Just enough for the comedy."
"Ah, okay," Jisung says with relief, recognizing the opportunity for entertaining content. "As long as we still look good. No one needs to know we tried to call in Jeongin."
Minho hums in agreement. "No one."
Back in his bedroom, Jisung gently returns Richard to her vivarium as Minho flops down onto his bed and makes himself comfortable. She clings to his hand a moment longer, then mouths at the tip of his finger in protest.
"Hey," Minho says to her, sternly. "Don't get bratty with him. You were no help."
"She was moral support!" Jisung retorts, easing her off his hand and closing the little door. "Don't listen to him, baby," he tells her soothingly. She bobs her head a few times before scrambling under a rock. "You did a great job."
When he climbs into bed, he finds Minho pouting at him with the sheets drawn up around his shoulders so only his head is visible. The sight is devastatingly cute.
"What?"
"You used to call me baby," Minho says, frowning.
Jisung lets out a long noise of complaint that catches in the back of his throat. "Big baby," he chides fondly, slinging an arm and a leg across Minho's body. "No aegyo in the house."