Spotting the familiar letters on the object hanging around the neck of the human in a white lab coat, Lee Shin couldn’t help but tilt his head in puzzlement.
“That’s my name. I told you the first day.”
“…….”
“This here is “Seo.” And this is “Su… ho.” Seo Suho.”
The human held Lee Shin’s hand and traced over the name on the researcher ID as he explained. The cool touch of the skin made Lee Shin flinch slightly.
He knew what a name meant. Realizing that the researcher’s name was Seo Suho, Lee Shin’s eyes widened.
The being the monster had longed for. That being was standing right in front of him.
Seo Suho was kind. He treated his wounds, brought him delicious food, and even trimmed the long, shaggy hair that had blocked his vision and covered his back. With that gone, he felt refreshed and light.
“A friend is… someone who stays with you.”
“Stays with you?”
“Yeah. Someone who stays by your side. Someone whose company makes you feel happy and secure.”
Lee Shin thought of the monster he had lived with. That monster had been his reliable protector, shielding him from attacks by other creatures. If someone asked whether it was a joyful relationship, he would say there had been comfort in that life.
A friend, huh.
Defining the relationship between himself and the monster, Lee Shin then turned his gaze to Seo Suho.
Seo Suho was his friend too. He liked Seo Suho. At first, it was merely out of curiosity and intrigue upon realizing that Seo Suho was the one the monster yearned for. But now, he simply liked him.
So much so that just watching him talk to the soldier who had brought him here made him feel anxious.
Whether Seo Suho and the soldier knew each other beforehand didn’t matter to Lee Shin. What mattered was the fact that Seo Suho—so delicate and fragile he seemed like he could shatter like candy—and that strong, aggressive soldier were together at all. That was threatening.
“Colonel…?”
Even just the gaze from beyond the barrier, laced with a murderous glint, was enough to make him recoil. He didn’t want to send Seo Suho into the hands of someone so dangerous.
Seo Suho may not have noticed the soldier’s presence right away, but Lee Shin had observed every shift in his expression from beginning to end.
At first, the soldier frowned in confusion, seemingly disturbed by the sight of Lee Shin and Seo Suho together. But gradually, that look turned to a cold, seething anger, as if he would burst in at any moment, attack Lee Shin, and snatch Seo Suho away. That change made Lee Shin instinctively shrink back in tension.
“It’s okay, calm down. It’s fine.”
Seo Suho had soothed him gently, using such words as he stopped Lee Shin from crossing the barrier. But the reason Lee Shin ultimately let him go wasn’t just because of his calming tone—it was because the soldier’s gaze, which had shifted from him to Seo Suho, no longer held hostility.
Since being confined in this wide yet sealed space, Lee Shin had never wondered about what kind of life Seo Suho lived outside. But watching Seo Suho interact with the soldier made him realize something—maybe there were others out there who liked Seo Suho as much as he did.
“Suho, you come late and leave early. You’re so irresponsible.”
When people other than Seo Suho began entering the observation room during that time, Lee Shin was gripped by anxiety.
Startled by Lee Shin’s whining, Seo Suho had gently comforted him as always with that expressionless face. And that was when Lee Shin knew—
He wanted to stay with this human, always.
But that didn’t mean he wanted to live on the ship like Seo Suho had suggested. He had to return to his friend, the monster, who was still on the surface.
Of course, the monster would survive just fine without him. He was overwhelmingly strong, even among other monsters. Even if he met a stronger one and died, that was just the natural order of things.
Still, Lee Shin felt the need to go back—to deliver Seo Suho’s story and ease the monster’s longing, even if just a little. That was how he could repay the one who had shielded him during the harsh life on the surface.
And besides, life here—while luxurious—was suffocating. Even if he escaped this room, he’d still be trapped within the vast machine that was the ship. For Lee Shin, who had lived freely on the surface, the ship felt no different from a cage.
“……”
Lee Shin quietly stared at Seo Suho. He couldn’t think of any clever way to return to the surface and still stay with Seo Suho.
His mind conjured up a fantasy of catching Seo Suho off guard and fleeing with him to the surface. But Lee Shin wasn’t one to make detailed plans—he avoided complicated thoughts. And more than anything, the idea didn’t appeal to him.
The ship was Seo Suho’s home. Lee Shin understood that living on the monster-infested surface would be unbearably miserable for someone like him.
“Grr…”
“Lee Shin?”
Frustration bubbled up in his already muddled mind. Lee Shin hunched his large body and rubbed his face into Seo Suho’s chest. That unique scent, the one that always put him at ease, filled his nose. Maybe he’d just grown accustomed to Seo Suho’s natural scent over time.
But he was already so used to the gentle pat on the back that followed, he didn’t want to imagine losing it.
In the days when Seo Suho hadn’t appeared, Lee Shin had felt extreme anxiety and doubt. Seo Suho’s colleagues told him that he would be back soon and that they were waiting too, but never shared any details.
He had feared that Seo Suho might never return.
So when he finally did, Lee Shin almost rubbed his eyes in disbelief, thinking it was a dream. Then he saw the bruises on Seo Suho’s face and realized—the ship wasn’t such a peaceful place after all.
Lee Shin tilted his head up slightly and looked at Seo Suho’s face.
Maybe… Seo Suho’s life here wasn’t all that happy either.
***
Sun Woosung remembered the day he had searched the collapsed building. To say he had found something felt embarrassing—it was barely a fragment of a body, and even that had taken ages to uncover at the time.
…Could they really have died because of Min Sanghan’s scheme? Then that accident…
“……”
Stopping in his tracks, Sun Woosung stared at Seo Suho, who was talking with his team members in the research facility’s lobby. He looked no different than usual, so composed that it was hard to imagine he had gone through anything traumatic recently.
As Sun Woosung stood there, absent-mindedly watching Seo Suho’s calm face, their eyes naturally met.
“You’re here.”
Seo Suho greeted him without emotion and approached. His teammates followed and also offered greetings, but all that echoed in Sun Woosung’s mind was the story he had recently heard from Yeo Wonjin.
Min Sanghan had been close to Seo Suho. If what Yeo Wonjin said was true, could Seo Suho even begin to accept the truth behind his parents’ death?
At first, he’d almost certainly deny it—insist there was no way Min Sanghan could’ve done such a thing. Anyone in Seo Suho’s position would.
And then, once he finally accepted the truth… he might crumble even worse than what Sun Woosung had seen that day in the past.
He never wanted to see him fall apart like that again.
“Colonel?”
As Sun Woosung remained silent, eyes fixed solely on Seo Suho, Lee Seo-rim and Seol Young-jun exchanged puzzled glances, feeling as if they were being ignored. In the end, Seo Suho looked at Sun Woosung’s face and quietly called out to him.
Snapping back to himself, Sun Woosung turned to face everyone.
“Ah… yes.”
“…Are you alright?”
It was the first time Seo Suho had seen Sun Woosung so completely absorbed in thought. A trace of concern lingered on his elegant face—barely noticeable unless one looked closely.
If that almost irresponsibly gentle personality of his hadn’t been hidden behind such a cool and sharp-looking exterior, Seo Suho would have long been surrounded by people drawn to the sweet scent he seemed to exude.
And in truth, it seemed there already were a few.
Sun Woosung swallowed a sigh. He recalled the look in Yeo Wonjin’s eyes—that gaze which seemed to recognize a fellow traveler, the kind who saw Seo Suho the same way he did. The way Yeo Wonjin had looked at him as he spoke about Seo Suho made the implication impossible to miss.
“Yes. I just had something on my mind.”
“Is that so?”
Sun Woosung belatedly greeted Seo Suho’s teammates. After parting ways with them as they headed to Building A for their schedules, only the two of them remained and walked together toward Seo Suho’s lab.
“Would you like a glass of water?”
Thinking back, Seo Suho offered water more often than tea. For someone feeling parched like their throat had tightened shut, nothing could be more helpful. Sun Woosung nodded silently and took a seat.
Seo Suho placed a glass of cold water in front of him.
“I think I said a bit too much last time.”
He began speaking as he sat down across from him—referring to the conversation they’d had the day they ran into each other at the hospital.
“It wasn’t something I should’ve gone into that deeply. It was an unpleasant topic, and I’d rather you forgot about it.”
“……”
Sun Woosung drained the glass in one go and frowned. He had been the one to pressure Seo Suho into talking, even though the man clearly hadn’t wanted to. There was no need for Seo Suho to be apologizing like this.
But more than that…
“That’s not something you can brush off that easily.”
His voice came out sharp before he realized it.
How could he describe something like that as merely an “unpleasant topic”?
Even if it was in the past, it had been a life-threatening situation for him. And yet Seo Suho remained unaffected.
The day he’d found out that Seo Suho had been spending time in the same space as a survivor—Sun Woosung had barely been able to suppress the rage surging inside him.
Seo Suho flinched slightly at the hint of anger in Sun Woosung’s tone, then met his gaze.
