Progress

[surgicalfocus]

Title: Progress

Length: Oneshot

Genre: AU, angst, drama

Rating: PG-13

Pairing(s): Sehun, Kai

Warnings: Language

Summary: Sehun has no complaints about life in North Korea. Then he meets the mysterious Kai, who opens his eyes to a world of things he can’t unsee. Written for aideshou challenge 08.

Disclaimer: Any song lyrics used belong to their respective owners. Characters don't belong to me.

Word Count: ~10,000







A/N: There used to be a man who would anonymously write the word ‘eternity’ in various locations all over Sydney, and he later became something of a cultural icon for doing so. I guess my idea came from that. I didn’t originally set out to write a fic about North Korea, but my train of thought derailed itself, and well… here we are.

For the sake of clarification, the story is set a few years ago while Kim Jong-il was still in power. Given that it is set in the country’s capital, the two boys’ personal situations do not represent those of the general population; they would be considered privileged compared to most North Koreans. These days Pyongyang appears to be advancing itself in comparison to the way it is depicted in this story, but conditions elsewhere in the country are apparently not much better.

While I did rely on my imagination for many things, I tried to do a fair amount of research as well. A lot of the things that happen are based on things I read about, so if parts of it seem absurd, that’s because NK is a genuinely strange place. Then again, it can be so easy to dismiss its people as crazy, brainwashed America-haters from a comfortable distance, even though they’re really nothing more than victims of their circumstances.




PROGRESS



progress, it's a pleasant myth



Oh Sehun likes to think he’s pretty lucky. As far as he’s concerned, he comes from the best place on earth. Of the 25 million people in North Korea, he’s one of the 3 million who are fortunate enough to live in the great city of Pyongyang, the country’s celebrated capital.


Sehun has grown to love his city even more at night. He’s never been able to understand why he seems to be one of the few who feel that way. After all, many of the world’s great cities become even more spectacular after dark - entire streets and buildings glow with a dazzling array of bright lights, and skyscrapers soar impossibly high into the night sky. Trains rush past each other at top speed, traffic is in a perpetual state of gridlock, and the sounds of people living their lives can be heard until well into the later hours.

Then again, the nighttime situation in Pyongyang is decidedly different. It’s virtually a black hole by night, plunged into an all-consuming darkness as a result of the power shortages that plague the entire country. Electricity is only available for a few hours per day, leaving little to do once the sun goes down. There are only so many books one can read by candlelight, so most people go to bed early, and Sehun’s family are no exception. For Sehun himself, however, doing so would be a complete waste of his favourite part of the day. He likes to go for long walks instead, exploring areas of Pyongyang he's never seen, and pretending he’s a lone traveller in a city relatively untouched by tourism.


Sehun is rarely afforded much time to himself elsewhere, so his nighttime strolls are the only opportunity he has to clear his head and relieve some of the boredom and antsiness that occasionally come with being sixteen-years-old. It’s unseemly for young people to go roaming around at night alone, though, so he does what any teenager would do. He waits until everyone else is sound asleep and, when the coast is clear, he silently sneaks out.

There are no streetlights to be found anywhere, so his mobile phone is his only source of light. But while many other people lament the darkness, Sehun takes great delight in it. In a place with such tight control over its citizens, the darkness brings with it a feeling of freedom that he can’t compare to anything else; plus it’s only after dark that Sehun gets to see the billions of stars peppered across the night sky – a rare sight in any other major city, but ever visible in Pyongyang due to the lack of light pollution.



It’s a warm, clear night, and Sehun is walking alongside the railway line, as he occasionally does during his unplanned wanderings. With only a few services entering and leaving the city each day, the trains have long since stopped running. Travelling between cities is not only difficult, but also discouraged, and requires travellers to obtain a permit beforehand. The streets are deserted, but this isn’t a sight that’s unique to the later hours - even if they were able to afford them, people generally aren’t allowed to privately own cars, leaving Pyongyang’s roads disconcertingly empty at any given time of day.


It is largely for these reasons that Sehun, like so many other North Koreans, has left his hometown only a handful of times in his life. The thought doesn’t really bother him, though. Pyongyang is all he knows. The city is his entire world, and his wanderlust, however keen, is mostly confined to its borders.



On his way back home, Sehun takes his usual shortcut, which leads him through a long underground walkway that he refers to as ‘the tunnel’. It’s a good several hundred metres long and ends a few streets away from his apartment, where he lives with his parents and younger brother. The tunnel is always pitch black at night, and Sehun often tries to navigate his way through it without the aid of his phone; he likes to think of it as an experiment to see how he would cope with getting around if he was blind.

This time, though, he’s surprised to notice a dim, flickering light about halfway through the tunnel, which only seems to get brighter as he gets closer. He’s not sure whether he should turn around and go back the way he came, but curiosity gets the better of him, and he decides to stick it out and see where the mysterious light source is coming from.


To his surprise, he stumbles upon another person in the tunnel, which has never happened before - If Pyongyang’s a bit of a ghost town by day, it most certainly is one by night. He’s kneeling on the ground with his back to Sehun, surrounded by several burning candles scattered randomly about the place. As Sehun silently draws nearer, he notices some white chalk outlines drawn on the grey brickwork of the tunnel wall, which the strange individual appears to have been filling in with lurid green paint. Although only half of the outlines are filled in, Sehun can just make out that they form the characters of a single word.


“‘Progress’..?” he reads aloud before he can think to check himself, and the mysterious figure spins his head around with a start, dropping something on the ground in surprise, which Sehun realises is actually a paintbrush. He’s young and good-looking, and Sehun estimates that he’s around the same age - perhaps a year or two older.


The boy quickly scrambles to his feet. He’s wearing a blue knitted hat, which is unusual in and of itself, because it’s nearly summer. He quickly pulls it all the way down to completely cover his face, and Sehun realises there are eyeholes cut into it, like some sort of crappy makeshift balaclava. It would make for a much more menacing sight if there wasn’t a multicoloured pompom still attached to the top.


Before he has time to respond, the masked boy grabs him by the shoulders and slams him roughly against the wall.


“I’m sorry, but now that you’ve seen me, I’m going to have to end you. I can’t risk being reported.”


The voice is deep and mellifluous despite being somewhat muffled by the layer of wool covering his mouth. There’s something hypnotic about it that almost makes Sehun lose the urge to attempt to wriggle himself free.

There’s also the fact that any intimidating aura the guy might have possessed is killed off slightly by his stupid DIY pompom mask.


Sehun looks up at him in bewilderment.

“But why? I’m not going to report you; I don’t even know who you are..”


“It doesn’t matter,” the boy snaps, “you can’t be too careful with so many informants around - everyone reports everyone else for almost anything these days. All I need is for you to blab to someone about my activities, and I’m a goner. I’ll be packed off to some labour camp, and we all know what those places are like. I’ll never make it out alive.”


The boy sounds more threatened than threatening, so Sehun tries to remain calm. Surely they can come to a resolution with some simple reasoning.


“You have no reason to kill me,” he assures the boy, “I have no intention of ratting you out to anyone. If it’s money you’re after, I don’t have any on me right now, but you can take my phone if you want. Anyway, if you get caught for murder, you’ll only be executed.”

“Not if I hide the body properly,” the boy shoots back – there’s something wild about his eyes, and Sehun doesn’t like the look of them at all. “People mysteriously disappear all the time. Eventually your family will stop looking for you and will probably just assume you defected or something.”


He then shoves Sehun against the wall again, this time with his hands firmly around his throat. Sehun briefly squirms, but his captor is stronger than him, as well as slightly taller, and with his own slight frame he just can’t muster the strength to fight him off.


Sehun screws his eyes shut as the hands tighten around his neck, almost as if to accept the untimely end he’s about to meet. But then the vice-like grip loosens and he hears a defeated sigh.


Sehun slowly opens his eyes one at a time.


“You don’t do this sort of thing very often, do you..?” he ventures cautiously after a moment of silence.

“No,” the boy sighs, allowing his hands to rest by his sides, “and the fact that you barely struggled somehow made it even more off-putting..”


Stepping away from Sehun, he bends down to retrieve the paintbrush lying on the ground.


“Alright, I guess I’m not going to kill you after all,” he declares, picking bits of gravel off the end of the brush. “So you can run along, then.”


Even though he’s free to leave with his life, Sehun is somehow so intrigued by the strange boy that he almost forgets he was at risk of strangulation only moments before.


“Actually… do you mind if I watch you for a while?” he asks.


The boy looks at him oddly, his dark eyes narrowing in suspicion.

“Why..?”


“I dunno,” Sehun admits, “I’m just interested, that’s all.”


The boy continues to look at him with narrowed eyes for a moment, but then he shrugs.


“Well, alright,” he says finally, “I guess if you want to watch, I won’t stop you. You can make yourself useful and keep an eye out for danger. While you’re at it, hold one of these candles up for me; it’s hard enough to see in here..”


Sehun feels strangely compelled to obey, so he picks up one of the candles and holds it up near the wall. He watches the boy paint for a while in silence before finally daring to speak.


“What are you even doing, anyway..?”


“I’m defacing public property with revolutionary sentiments,” the boy deadpans, “what does it look like I’m doing?”


“I’m pretty sure that isn’t allowed…” Sehun says slowly, and the boy only snorts at the obviousness of the remark.

“Who said anything about it being allowed..?”


“But what if someone catches you?” Sehun points out, “this is the sort of thing that could land you in serious shit. You could get yourself arrested or killed.”

“I’ll kill you if you don’t shut up and hold that candle still..”


Although he doesn’t have much faith in the boy’s murderous intent, Sehun promptly shuts up anyway.


“Look…” the boy sighs, “if you insist on being here, just keep quiet and watch what I do. Maybe that way you’ll learn to understand why I do it.”


For the time being, at least, Sehun complies.


The boy doesn’t say anything while he works; he only squints his eyes in concentration, trying to make the most of the limited light source available to him. The only sound that can be heard is the sound of his breathing, slightly muffled by the weird hat-mask, but nonetheless audible in the eerie stillness of the tunnel.


Holding the candle steady so that it doesn’t drip wax on his clothes, Sehun decides to break the deafening silence with another valiant attempt at conversation.


“So.. what’s your name? I’m Sehun, by the way.”


The masked boy takes a few moments to respond.

“You can call me Kai.”


Sehun can barely suppress a smirk over the unusual moniker. “That doesn’t sound Korean… did you just make that up?”


“It’s not my real name, obviously,” the boy replies wearily, “it’s just an alias.”


“What’s your real name, then?”


“Wouldn’t you like to know..”


“Yeah. That’s kind of why I asked.”


Sehun has always been a little too plucky for his own good.


“Well, I’m not gonna tell you,” Kai snaps somewhat irritably, “so drop it.”



Given that he’s already survived one murder attempt, however unsuccessful, Sehun decides not to press the issue any further. Instead, he channels all of his inquisitive energy into a host of other questions, much to his companion’s dismay.



“So why the green? Do you like green?”


“I don’t always use green, but it is one of my preferred colours,” Kai says with a shrug, “on a basic colour wheel, green is the opposing colour to red. Red is the colour of Socialism. I’ll let you work that one out on your own.”


“Fair enough,” Sehun nods, “what’s the deal with the weird hat-mask thingy, then?”


“It’s just to cover my face in case I ever get caught in the act,” Kai sighs, “I should probably learn not to take it off while I’m working, but sometimes I just really need some air..”


The ever-nosey Sehun has a million more questions where those came from, so he fires round after round of them at Kai.


“Why don’t you just use a torch instead of candles?”


“Because candles are cheaper and easier to get than replacement batteries.”


“Why don’t you just use your phone?”


“The backlight isn’t bright enough to illuminate an entire wall.”


“Forgive me for prying, but how do you supply the materials for these ‘projects’ of yours?”

As a result of the country’s suffering economy, certain consumer goods are hard to obtain, and Sehun knows all too well that art supplies can be prohibitively expensive.

“I don’t buy them, if that's what you mean,” Kai replies casually, “I nick them from school.”


Sehun stares at him blankly. “But… that’s stealing…”


Kai gives him a withering look in response.

“Surely relieving the school's supply cupboard of a few tubes of acrylic is the least of my crimes..”


Sehun raises an eyebrow but doesn’t say anything more about it.


“Why do you do this stuff anyway?” he asks eventually, “I mean, why put yourself at risk like that?”


Kai chuckles a little. It’s the first time he’s done so, and it’s a pleasant sound that prompts Sehun to crack a smile of his own.


“Hey.. we have to make sacrifices for the good of the collective, right? Isn’t that the belief our great nation was founded upon?”


“Yeah but I mean, don’t you ever fear for your safety at all?”


Kai narrows his eyes in concentration once more as he squeezes more paint onto his brush – white, this time, for highlights – and shrugs.

“Sometimes…” he says thoughtfully, “but in a way, I enjoy the adrenaline rush and the feeling of freedom that it gives me. Anyway, the one thing I fear more than the possibility of my own arrest is this country and its people never seeing an improvement in their situation. I’m just giving passersby something nice to look at. Something to give them a bit of hope that things might get better someday.”


Sehun frowns. “I don’t see what’s so bad about the way things are right now..”


"Then you're walking around with your eyes closed, Sehun."


Although he can’t quite decipher the meaning behind Kai’s remark, Sehun is somehow reluctant to ask him to elaborate. Anyway, it’s a school night, and he thinks he’d better start heading back home.


“Well, I should probably go.. school tomorrow and all,” he pipes up, placing the candle on the ground next to Kai’s feet, “thanks for not murdering me, by the way..”


There’s a moment of silence before Kai responds.


“You’re welcome.”


But Sehun makes no immediate attempt to leave, instead choosing to observe Kai intently for a moment longer while he paints. The outlines are entirely filled in now, and even in the dim light, the shapes of the lettering are quite beautiful against the drab grey wall.


There’s no doubt that Kai is artistically gifted, although Sehun thinks he could perhaps find a less risky outlet for his talents.


“Kai…” he says eventually, and the other boy jumps a little.

“Oh. You’re still here. What do you want?”


“I think…” Sehun says hesitantly, “that I’d like to watch you paint again sometime. If you’d be okay with it, that is.”


The words come out of Sehun’s mouth before he even has time to think it over. He’s not entirely sure of his motives for wanting to join Kai on one of his strange expeditions. Perhaps it’s simply a dangerous combination of curiosity and boredom.


Kai just looks at him with those penetrating eyes for a moment, so dark and endless in the dim candlelight. But then they crinkle a little and Sehun swears there’s a hint of a smile forming somewhere beneath that crudely constructed disguise.


“I’ll text you as soon as I scope out a location for my next piece,” he says, reaching out to take Sehun’s phone. He saves his number into it and hands it back. Sehun accepts it with a nod and turns to leave.


“One more thing, before you go,” Kai calls out to him.


Sehun turns back around to look at the other boy on his way out of the tunnel.

“What’s that?”


“If you can, bring a candle or two.”



* * *



As he begins to regularly accompany his new friend on his adventures, Sehun soon discovers that there is indeed some method in Kai’s madness.

Apart from the weird eyehole hat, of course. That’s just pure madness. It's a good thing Kai neglects to wear it half the time, because Sehun finds it hard not to laugh at him when he does.


Before they set out to paint, they always meet at an old abandoned warehouse that Kai uses as his base. Once Sehun arrives, Kai briefs him on the location he’s chosen, and if it’s nearby, they walk. If it’s on the other side of town, they ride their bikes.

No matter where he chooses to paint, Kai always paints the same thing; the only variation is the colour, which depends on what he’s managed to swipe from the supply cabinet at his school that week. Whenever Sehun asks him why he has such a fascination with that one word, Kai always tells him that the notion of progress defines his existence; he believes in only moving forward, and he wants the same for North Korea, even though the country is still so backward in many ways.


It doesn’t take Sehun long to realise just how much he values his new friendship with Kai - not only because he gets to fulfill his thrill-seeking needs through their nocturnal escapades, but also because the other boy fills the role of the big-brother figure he’s always wanted but never had. They’re also able to have discussions about topics that are a little more cerebral. Intelligent conversation is something that Sehun is sorely lacking with his school-friends; all they seem to want to talk about are their grades, and whatever illegally-smuggled South Korean drama they might have watched over the weekend. With Kai, he’s able to talk about any number of things, and he finds that he’s learning just as much.


A lot of the time, they end up talking about politics. Or, to put it more accurately, they end up arguing about politics, and Sehun soon learns that engaging in a heated debate while trying to keep your voice down is a difficult skill to master.

“I still don’t understand why you claim to hate the General when he and his father have done so much for the development of this country..” he says one night while he’s watching Kai paint – this time on the outside wall of a dilapidated factory building on the outskirts of town.


“Because Kim Jong-il puts the ‘dick’ in ‘dictator’, that’s why," Kai says drily, "and his father wasn’t much better.”


Sehun is scandalised by the remark.

“You can’t say that..!”


Kai shrugs. “Why not? Everything he says and does is a pile of crap. America or Japan or whoever the scapegoat of the week is… they aren’t to blame for our misfortunes, Sehun. Bad things happen to us because we have an incapable leader who doesn’t give a shit about his people. There you have it - all of our problems summed up in a single sentence.”


“How you have the nerve to say all this stuff, I will never know,” Sehun says, shaking his head.


“I’m only speaking out on behalf of the many out there who are too shit-scared to voice these things themselves,” Kai replies frankly, “and I think you’ll find that probably includes you.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t share your views at all.”

“So you’re just going to sit there and honestly tell me that you don’t think the whole Juche ideology thing is bullshit?”

“Well, to be honest I think it’s a perfectly fine philosophy,” Sehun shrugs, “it’s a very good thing to be self-sufficient.”


Sehun soon ends up wishing he hadn’t started the conversation in the first place, because without warning Kai opens up the floodgates and releases a wave of long-repressed dissent.


“It’s not so much the idea itself that’s the problem,” he says, “it’s that it isn’t being implemented. We’re taught to value self-sufficiency above all else, yet we have no choice but to depend on the state to feed and clothe us, even though it fails to deliver time after time. If independence is so important, tell me why so many people here have to rely on foreign aid, or else they’ll be left to starve. I refuse to believe that I’m the only person who thinks there’s something very wrong with that.”


“You can hardly blame the food shortage on the General,” Sehun points out, “much of the country isn’t arable, and most of what does grow gets ruined by the floods. It’s just a sad fact of life. We should be thankful that the state provides us with all we need in the first place..”


Even as he speaks, Sehun can’t help feeling like he’s merely quoting verbatim from the state radio broadcasts he listens to every morning. He doesn’t even know if he actually believes the things he’s saying… but for now, that’s hardly important. All that matters is that he has an opinion, even if it’s not his own.


“That’s exactly what they want you to think,” Kai retorts, “and that sense of obligation to be grateful is just one of many things they take advantage of in order to control us. But I see no reason to feel any gratitude towards the state at all. We’re made to think that we’re indebted to these people for their so-called generosity, but we’re only getting things that it is our basic right and need to have. Not only that, but we’re receiving them in pitiful amounts that belie our dignity as human beings.”


Sehun sighs in defeat. When it comes to politics, talking to Kai is like talking to a brick wall. A brick wall that talks back and refuses to shut the hell up.


“The way you talk, I’m surprised you’re still alive..” he says wearily.


“I wasn’t always like this, you know,” Kai muses, “I was once just as enamoured with your precious Leader as everyone else. Probably even more so.”


Sehun raises a skeptical eyebrow.

“Really? You?”


“Uh-huh,” Kai murmurs absently as he swirls his brush in a jar of water, “I never questioned anything at all back then. In short, I was just as naïve as you are..”


“Hey!”

“Sorry. It’s true, though.”


Sehun pouts, but then chews his lip thoughtfully for a few moments. For the life of him, he just can’t picture Kai ever being a devotee of either the Dear Leader or his father.


“What happened to change all of that?” he asks.


Kai continues to work in silence for a few minutes, apparently not interested in providing an answer to the question. Sehun has just about made up his mind to let it go when the other boy finally opens his mouth to speak.


“When I was younger, I was a very keen gymnast,” he says quietly, “gymnastics were my life. I trained for hours and hours a day - pretty much every spare second I had was spent doing round-offs and backflips. I hate to toot my own horn, but I was so good that I was chosen to participate in the Mass Games three times in a row. I received numerous gifts from the state as rewards for my performance and dedication. But for me, the best part of being selected for the Mass Games was neither the perks nor the praise; it was the opportunity to perform in front of the General, whom I had always loved and admired very much.”


Sehun just stares at his friend in dumbstruck disbelief. In his entire life, he’s never met anyone as ardently and shamelessly critical of the regime as Kai. To think that he ever willingly participated in an event as propaganda-driven as the Mass Games is nothing short of inconceivable.


“You were in the Mass Games?” he snorts incredulously, “you’re joking, right..?”


Kai only shakes his head.

“I wish I was joking. Anyway, my involvement in the Games was naturally an honour for my family, so my mother and grandparents were always very proud of me. For some reason, though, my father never seemed to be quite as enthused by my achievements as they were. I could never quite work out why. I began to assume it was because I was lacking in some way, and it only made me work harder and harder to earn his respect. But no matter how perfect my moves were, or how many awards I received, it just wasn’t enough to shift that grim expression he always wore in my presence. It seriously bothered me for years.”


“Didn’t you ever confront him about it?”

“I didn’t have to,” Kai says with a despondent sigh, “when I was fifteen he sat me down and apologised for never being supportive of the Games, but he said that there was a reason for it, and he thought I was old enough to know. So he went on to tell me that everything we read in newspapers and hear on the news is a concoction of concealed facts and blatant lies, and that journalists like him are paid to tidy it all up for public consumption. He said it was his job to keep up Kim Jong-il’s appearance as some kind of godly, benevolent figure, when in reality he’s just an incompetent, despotic arsehole who seems hell-bent on driving our country into the ground. And then he just broke down on me, saying that he felt so guilty about contributing to the ignorance of the masses, and that he at least wanted me to know how things really were.”


“Wow…” Sehun murmurs, because he doesn’t really know what else to say. “How did you react to that..?”


“Well, my first reaction was to call my father a liar and a traitor and all manner of terrible things…” Kai says thoughtfully, “but then the more I thought about it, the more plausible it seemed. And then suddenly, all the propaganda I was constantly surrounded by but had been oblivious to before began to jump out at me from literally everywhere – from the radio, from the television, from the mouths of my teachers and classmates, from every book I read, from every newspaper article and every billboard poster… I couldn’t stop hearing and seeing it everywhere I went. It was like something inside me just snapped.”


Kai trails off into silence and goes back to painting for a while.


“So… what happened to the Mass Games, then?” Sehun ventures cautiously. He can tell that it’s a sensitive topic, but he wants to hear the rest of the story.


“I didn’t want to have anything to do with the Mass Games after that,” Kai replies, in a tone that isn’t so much bitter as it is sad. “During the selection process for last year’s Games, I faked an injury and purposely slacked off so I wouldn’t make the cut, and in the end I didn’t even qualify as a stand-by. I hated disappointing my family, but as far as I was concerned, years of literally bending over backwards for the General’s benefit had amounted to nothing. But the worst part about it wasn’t the exhaustion and the physical injuries, or the constant fear of screwing up and letting everyone else down. The most painful thing by far was losing faith in the one person I really looked up to, and for whom I had endured all of those things. It completely destroyed me at the time… but I’m still glad it happened, because otherwise I would never have learned to think for myself.”


Kai falls into silence once more and Sehun watches his friend as he wipes his paint-covered fingers on an old rag sitting beside him.


“I want to help you achieve the same, Sehun,” he says eventually, “but that means you’ll have to trust me, and agree to let me do that. I can’t help you unless you want to be helped.”


Sehun remains quiet for some time. He doesn’t know what allowing Kai to help him will involve, or if he even wants to be helped at all, for that matter. But Kai has one of those extremely persuasive personalities, and Sehun is quickly learning that it makes him almost impossible to refuse.


“Okay. I’ll let you help me.”

Despite his uncertainty, Sehun thinks he means it.


Kai nods and puts the rag down before turning to face him.


“Kim Jong-il might have a whole army,” he says quietly, “but the most dangerous thing of all isn’t any kind of weapon. It’s this.”


He reaches over and lightly taps his knuckles on Sehun’s head, making the younger boy flinch a little.


“Possession of the minds of the people is what the state ultimately thrives on, Sehun. I think it’s time you took yours back.”



* * *



The next time Sehun meets with Kai at the warehouse, he expects to go out and watch him paint on a wall somewhere as per usual, but his friend has something else planned entirely.


“We’re staying here tonight,” he announces, standing up to greet the younger boy, “there’s something else I want to do instead.”


He picks up a newspaper and hands it to Sehun. There's a large photograph of Kim Jong-il splashed across the front page.


“What’s this for?” Sehun asks as he takes the paper from Kai.


“The Rodong Sinmun is the newspaper my father works for,” Kai says quietly, “for security reasons I won’t tell you which journalist he is. Ordinarily I wouldn’t even tell you the name of the publication, but I trust you enough now to do so.”


“I didn’t realise he wrote for such a high-profile newspaper…” Sehun replies absently as he flicks through the pages.


“I’m going to get you to do something for me, using that paper,” Kai begins hesitantly, “and I have a feeling you’ll be reluctant to do it, but I wouldn’t suggest it if I didn’t think it would help you.”


Sehun slowly lowers the paper to look at Kai.

“I don’t quite follow you. What exactly am I supposed to do with it?”


“I don’t know,” Kai shrugs, “whatever you want. Burn it. Tear it up. Step on it. Spit on it. You could take a piss on it, for all I care.”


Sehun freezes. He stands there idly for some time, looking at the paper in his hands. Incorrectly folding a newspaper is enough to land you in serious trouble if it means potentially creasing an image of the Dear Leader. Even dropping one facedown on the ground is considered an offence.

Going as far as destroying a picture of him intentionally doesn’t even bear thinking about.


“Oh come on, Kai, I can’t do that…” he laughs nervously, but then Kai picks up the box of matches that he’s brought to light the candles scattered around the place. He strikes a match and hands it to Sehun, and the latter realises with a sinking heart that he isn’t joking.


“Go on,” Kai whispers urgently, “for once in your life, live dangerously.”


Deep down, Sehun has no explanation for why he’s so hesitant to do Kai’s bidding. It’s not really the General he holds in his hand, after all – it’s just a few ink blots on a flimsy piece of paper, arranged into a mere representation of the man he holds in such high regard.

Or at least, he thinks he does. After all the time he’s spent with Kai, he’s not sure how he feels anymore.


He’s been holding the match so long by now that the flame travels down the thin piece of wood and starts to burn his fingers. With a yelp he flicks it away reflexively, and it extinguishes itself on the cold, damp concrete.


“For fuck’s sake..” Kai mutters impatiently, and without warning he reaches over and smacks the newspaper out of Sehun’s hand, prompting a gasp from the younger boy. They both watch in silence as it flutters to the ground and lands in a crumpled heap – with the image of the General facing upwards, much to Sehun’s relief.


“There - the hardest part’s been done for you,” Kai says, handing Sehun the entire box of matches this time, “now burn it.”


But Sehun simply hasn’t got it in him to destroy the lowly pile of paper lying on the concrete near his feet.

It’s almost like asking a priest to burn the Bible.


“What are you so afraid of?” Kai asks, somewhat exasperatedly, “it’s just a picture of the bastard, Sehun. And on a newspaper, of all things. You’re acting like I’m asking you to sneak up behind him in the flesh, pull his pants down and run..”

“I’m sorry,” Sehun says quietly, “I know how silly it sounds, but I’m not sure I can do this.”


Kai lets out a long-suffering sigh and takes a step closer to Sehun. He relieves him of the matchbox and places it on the ground, then takes both of the younger boy’s hands in his own and pulls him to the side.


“Listen to me, Sehun. And after everything I say, I want you to respond with a simple yes or no. Do you think you can do that?”

He’s standing so close and staring so intently that it makes Sehun nervous.


“I guess so..” he replies, shifting his feet uncomfortably.


“You had to endure the great famine just like me,” Kai begins in a low voice, “just like every other North Korean that lived through the nineties… right?”


Sehun sighs. “Yes, I did.”


“So you remember how you felt back then,” Kai continues, his gaze only increasing in its intensity, “you know what it’s like to be hungry. And we’re not talking just a little bit hungry, but so hungry that it fucking hurts.”


“Yes,” Sehun replies in a wavering voice.


“You’ve seen people around you wasting away to nothing. Neighbours, friends… probably even members of your own family.”


“Yes,” Sehun says, and by now his voice is barely a whisper.


“It was like this for us, Sehun, but we’re still the lucky ones,” Kai continues. For some reason he squeezes Sehun’s hands in time with each word, possibly for emphasis, and it’s starting to hurt. “What about all those in less advantaged areas of the country? You know that thousands of them literally starved to death, don’t you? And you know that for the people living in more remote areas, this is still happening now. You know that some of them are so desperate for food that they resort to picking bits of half-digested corn out of animal shit..”


By now, Sehun is so upset that he can barely bring himself to speak.

“Yes, I know..”


“And you know what it’s like to live in fear, knowing that your entire family can be carted away at any time, simply because one of you might have been overheard uttering a few poorly-timed, misconstrued words.”


Sehun inhales deeply, his breath rattling a little in his chest.

“Yes.”


“You’ve no doubt witnessed a public execution..”


Sehun merely nods in silence this time.


“How many?” Kai asks quietly.


“A few.”


“How old were you when you saw one for the first time?”


Sehun has to fight the urge to vomit as he begins to revisit long-buried memories of being forced to sit in a stadium along with thousands of other spectators, where they would watch the perpetrators of some crime or another being shot in the back of the head at point-blank range. Even from a distance, he remembers being able to hear the chilling, desperate pleas, the deafening crack of gunfire, and the dull thud of lifeless bodies falling to the ground.

He remembers being unable to eat for days afterwards.

Not that there was anything much to eat back then, anyway.


“I don’t remember… probably five or six.”


“And I’m guessing it scarred you for life..?”


“Yes,” Sehun sobs, “please, Kai, I don’t want to talk about this anymore..”


“Alright,” Kai relents as he releases Sehun’s hands, “I think I’ve heard enough anyway.”



Sehun nods in silence and dries his eyes with the end of his sleeve. He knows Kai would never judge him for crying but he feels embarrassed nonetheless.


“This man has failed you,” Kai says, gesturing towards the photograph on the front page of the newspaper, “he’s failed every single person in this country. But if you won’t do this for yourself, then do it for all those who’ve had it even rougher than you. You’ve got nothing to lose, Sehun. No one’s going to arrest you, because there’s no one else here. It’s just me and you.”


Sehun doesn’t respond, nor does he move, and Kai bends down slowly to retrieve the box of matches from the ground. He strikes a fresh one and holds it out towards the younger boy once more.


“Please, Sehun,” he says, more gently this time, “you said you wanted me to help you learn to think for yourself. This is the first step.”


Kai is silent now, but his eyes are pleading with Sehun, and they’re pleading so loud that he can almost hear them screaming in his ears.


Without much further contemplation, Sehun takes the match from Kai and drops it on the newspaper still lying on the ground. It lands right on top of the General’s photo, and they both watch in silence as it slowly burns a hole in the page. Once the image is suitably destroyed, Kai stamps the flame out with his boot, leaving a pile of ash and blackened paper.


“Good job, Sehun. I know that was really hard, and I’m proud of you.”


Sehun looks down at the half-burned remains of the newspaper in silence.

“I don’t even know why it was so hard..” he says eventually.


“It was hard because you’ve been brainwashed from birth into worshipping Kim Jong-il and Kim Il-sung like they’re gods, when they’re not even worthy of being called human,” Kai replies matter-of-factly, “but the road to freedom of thought starts with a few baby steps, Sehun. You might think this is nothing, but it’s not. This is the very definition of progress."


“I’m starting to question if there’s even such a thing as progress,” Sehun wonders aloud as he stares absently at the burned newspaper, “maybe it’s just another empty hope to cling to. It’s nice to think about, though, I suppose..”


Sehun is almost surprised by the bitterness of the words that come out of his mouth. While access to a world of concealed information has made Kai hungry for change, he realises it has only made him feel strangely detached and world-weary. He knows he hasn’t got the guts to chase after dreams of a better life, regardless of the desperate thirst for it that Kai’s passionate rhetoric has inspired in him over the past couple of months.


“Well, I think just the possibility of progress makes life worth living,” Kai says thoughtfully, and Sehun wishes he had even an ounce of his friend’s positivity.

“Yeah,” he sighs, “I guess so..”


But as hard as he tries, Sehun just can’t shake the thought that maybe this is as good as it gets.


* * *


Later that night, Sehun sneaks into his bedroom quietly so as not to wake anyone up, and silently begins to undress himself. As he does so, he looks up at the framed photograph of Kim Jong-il’s unsmiling face above his bed.

We’re your people, Sehun finds himself pleading at the photograph, so why do you treat us like animals?


He knows it’s a stupid question to ask, because it’s not like he’ll ever get a response from a picture. Ultimately, that’s all the General now represents to Sehun. The Dear Leader he’s been taught to blindly worship all his life has turned out to be just as two-dimensional, inaccessible and unfeeling as his likeness that hangs well out of reach on the bedroom wall.


* * *


These days, Sehun thinks that maybe he’s not quite as lucky as he once thought.

Suddenly, all the negatives in his situation seem to be vying for his attention, while all the long-forgotten positives get trampled underfoot. While he used to think he had everything, now he realises he actually owns nothing. He barely even owns his own thoughts.

His home is the same standard-issue two-bedroom apartment that most families squeeze themselves into, doled out to them by the state along with their precisely-measured food rations that only seem to grow more meagre with time. In order to give their sons a room each to study in, his parents willingly sleep on the living-room floor. They’re fortunate enough to own a few luxuries, such as a television - but there is only one channel. Because of the power cuts, broadcasts only last a few hours per day. Most of it is propaganda.

Sehun rarely gets anything out of his solitary nighttime strolls anymore. He tries to fool himself into thinking he still enjoys it, but what was once exciting now just feels like taking a walk in the dark. He finds himself enveloped in a cloud of jaded distraction as he goes about his day, especially while he’s at school. He keeps answering questions incorrectly and the teacher barks at him to pay attention each time, to which he always responds with a ninety-degree bow of apology.

He acknowledges that he’s still much better off than people elsewhere in the country, many of whom are surviving on grass soup and wouldn’t know a television if they tripped over one, but sometimes these things are hard to keep in mind.


For the most part, Sehun no longer feels like he’s living, but rather going through an agonisingly slow process of decomposition, and he’s arrived at a point in his life where the only times he actually feels alive are when he’s with Kai. He literally lives to see those texts light up his phone screen, telling him to meet the other boy at the warehouse that night.


At a time when happiness seems hard to come by, Sehun is desperate to cling to the one source of joy he has left - still blissfully unaware that, just like everything else, it’s about to slip right through his fingers.



* * *



Whenever he arrives at the warehouse to meet Kai, Sehun is typically buzzing with excitement in anticipation of the night’s activities. This time, though, he’s apprehensive, because the text he’d received earlier that day was worded very differently to what he was expecting.


Come to the warehouse as soon as you can tonight. I need to see you.


Kai never says anything more than is necessary – usually a text from him will consist of little more than the time they’re supposed to meet. Although he doesn’t want to think about it, Sehun knows there’s definitely something not quite right about that text.


When he arrives that night, Kai is slumped on the floor against the wall. As usual, there are a few candles scattered around for lighting, and even though it’s dim, Sehun can see that his friend has been crying.

Taken aback, he drops to his knees on the concrete floor next to Kai and places a hand on his shoulder.


“Kai, what’s wrong..?”


Kai doesn’t look at Sehun; he merely stares at the floor, drawing ragged, sporadic breaths. His normally smooth, plump lips are chapped and dry, and his eyes are red and puffy. He looks a right mess.


“Last night while I was out, I received a text from my father,” he says quietly, “and it read ‘do not come home.’ Of course, I was baffled. Why was he telling me not to come home? Was he kicking me out? I just didn’t understand. I tried calling, but he didn’t answer. Finally, I worked up the courage to go back to the apartment and see what was going on.. and I found it completely deserted. Everything was in its usual place – there was just no one there.”


Sehun’s face falls.

“Kai, what are you talking about..?”


Fresh tears begin to trail down Kai’s cheeks.


“They took my family, Sehun. I’m completely in the dark as to why, but as soon as I realised they were gone, I knew I had to get out of the apartment. So I quickly packed some stuff and pissbolted out of there. I’m surprised there was no one waiting for me to return; my father must have made up some story to explain my absence when he realised I wasn’t at home, in order to buy me some time.”


Sehun has heard more than a few stories about entire families suddenly going missing overnight, but he never pictured it happening to someone so close to him.


“Oh Kai, I’m so sorry… I just don’t understand how this could happen…”


“I don’t know… but I think it must have something to do with my father. Journalism in this country is a dangerous vocation. He used to tell me that the editors could be punished simply for leaving typographic errors in the text, so if he wrote something that was mistaken to be critical of the regime in any way, then repercussions would be much more severe. That’s the only possible explanation I have right now.”


Kai draws a deep, shaky breath and wets his cracked lips before he continues to speak.

“Either way, it doesn’t matter why they were taken, Sehun. My family is gone. They’re probably on their way to a labour camp as we speak, where they’ll be tortured and starved and worked to their deaths, and there’s not a thing I can do to help them. I have no idea where they are. I have no way of finding out..”


“Well… what are you going to do?” Sehun asks nervously.


“Isn’t it obvious? I have to defect..”



At the mere mention of the D-word, Sehun’s heart sinks into the pit of his stomach.


“But… you can’t..”


“I have no choice. I can’t go back home. I have nowhere else to go..”


Sehun desperately tries to think of ways to convince his friend not to leave, but his options are limited.


“You can come stay with me,” he offers, but Kai only sighs in response.


“That’s very generous of you, but we both know that would never work. I can’t just intrude on your family like that - I’m a stranger. And in case they are looking for me, I can’t put you all in danger as well. I would never be able to forgive myself if something happened to you and your family because of me.”


“But you can’t leave,” Sehun says again, this time with growing insistence and what sounds like a hint of panic.

“What else can I do? I have to get out of here.”

“With what? You can’t leave Pyongyang without a permit.”


“Who said anything about getting permission? There’s no way I can get out of here by public transport, Sehun. I’m going to have to make the journey by more covert means. If I can make it as far as the border I can cross the Tumen river into China. Parts of it are so narrow that you can wade right through it.”


“Well… what about border guards?”

Sehun’s not about to give up yet.


“I’ll worry about that when I get there. I found some money in the apartment, so if I need to, maybe I can bribe someone. If hundreds of others have done it, so can I.”


“Okay, fine..” Sehun splutters exasperatedly, “but once you’re in China, what’ll you do then? You don’t even speak Chinese. If they realise you’re Korean you’ll get arrested and deported back here.”


Sehun knows he’s running out of arguments, but this is one debate he really needs to win.


“I don’t know,” Kai whispers, “I haven’t thought that far ahead. I just know that I have to try, or at least die trying..”


“That’s it - I’m coming with you,” Sehun declares, “you shouldn’t do this alone.”


Kai shakes his head vigorously in response.

“No way. You’re too young.”


Sehun huffs in indignation.

“I’m only one year younger than you!”


“I don’t care. It’s not safe.”


“But you’re always telling me what a shithole this country has become. Now you’re telling me not to leave it..?”


Sehun knows as well as anyone how unsafe it really is to leave the country. Any attempts to escape are treated as a grave offence, and repatriation would mean almost certain death.


But somehow none of these things scare him as much as the thought of losing Kai forever.


“Yes, I did say that..” Kai admits wearily, “but making the decision to defect is something that must occur on your own terms, Sehun. Doing so puts not only you at risk, but it also endangers the family you leave behind if anyone finds out you escaped. It’s not something to just do on a whim..”


Sehun has run out of things to say, so he merely sits there in a silent daze.


“Your situation is so different to mine, Sehun,” Kai says gently, “you still have a life here, and a family. In the end, you have two choices: to come to terms with the hand you’ve been dealt, or to risk it all in the pursuit of something better. But I only have one, and that’s to leave.”


Sehun doesn’t answer.


“I’m sorry, Sehun. I really am, so please believe me.”


There’s still no response from the younger boy, so Kai keeps prodding away until Sehun feels like he’s about to snap.

“Sehun, are you angry? Please just say something..”


And then he snaps.


“What do you mean, ‘am I angry’? Of course I’m fucking angry. All you’ve done is ruin everything; my life, my home, my entire understanding of the world around me… and now that you’ve successfully managed that, you’re just going to get up and piss off? How do you expect me to get on with my life as I did before, knowing what I know now - that there’s absolutely nothing left for me here?”


Sehun leans forward and rests his head on his knees so that Kai can’t see the hot, angry tears forming in his eyes. Somehow the ground beneath him doesn’t feel as solid as it used to. He doesn’t know what’s real and what’s not, and he’s terrified, but no matter where he runs to in this godforsaken place, it’s a feeling he’ll never be able to escape. Not unless he runs for his life.


“Please, don’t leave me,” he begs, and his voice is barely a choked-out whisper.


He knows he’s being selfish and unreasonable to even make such an impossible request, but desperate pleas are all Sehun has left. Above all else, he feels guilty for crying. Although he’s about to lose Kai, he knows that his friend has lost so much more.


“My intention was never to ruin everything for you,” Kai whispers, his hand resting gently but firmly on Sehun’s back, “instead I hoped that by opening your eyes to what’s going on around you, I could maybe help you save yourself one day. But it has to be at the right time, because this isn’t something you can take lightly, Sehun. It’s a matter of life or death.”


Sehun doesn’t answer. The only thing on his mind is how his family and everyone around him are still so oblivious to their situation, happily accepting their misfortunes as just an inevitable part of life; something they have to endure for a greater good that doesn’t exist. For some reason, he can’t help desperately wishing he could go back to a time when he was just as compliant and clueless.


He finds himself thinking of that old saying, ‘ignorance is bliss’, and how devastatingly true it is. Now, more than ever, those words hurt.


They hurt so fucking bad.


“Sehun.”


At the mention of his name, Sehun raises his tear-stained face to look up at Kai.


“The night’s already half gone, so I’m going to camp out here tonight, and then I’ll leave tomorrow as soon as it’s properly dark.”


Sehun nods and wipes his eyes. He doesn’t have any tears left to cry, and he’s glad of it because he doesn’t want to make this any harder for Kai than it already is.


“Okay.”


All of a sudden, Kai looks a little shy.


“So… do you think maybe you could stay with me a bit longer?”


Although he’s plagued by the conflicting desires to hug his friend to death and also punch him in the nuts, Sehun nods again in agreement.


“Yeah. Of course.”




It’s cold in the warehouse, so Kai builds a fire in a rusty tin barrel using old newspapers, and they sit around it, rubbing their hands together and trying to keep warm.


“The good old General always makes the best fires,” Kai chuckles, and Sehun thinks he’d probably laugh too, if the whole situation wasn’t so far from being funny.


“I’m sorry for getting angry at you before,” he says apologetically, “I didn’t mean those things I said. I was just in shock.”

“That’s alright,” Kai replies, waving off the apology, “I realised you were only saying them because you were upset.”


“I’ve actually been thinking a lot lately about how things have changed since I met you..” Sehun muses, shivering a little in the cold.


“Is that a good or a bad thing?”


“I don’t know,” Sehun sighs, “but now I look at all the people around me and I feel like I’ve drifted miles away from them, simply because I’m so much more aware of things than they are. You’re the realest person I’ve ever known, and it’s going to be very lonely without you here to make sense of all these things with.”


“I know, and I’m sorry,” Kai says quietly, “but I have no choice.”


Sehun shakes his head insistently.

“Don’t apologise, Kai. I know why you have to go; I just really wish it hadn’t come to this. I can’t stand the fact that you’ve lost everything that matters to you.”


Kai reaches across to hold Sehun’s hand.



“I haven’t lost everything that matters to me, Sehun.”




Sehun can’t find any words worthy of a response. He wants to tell Kai so many things - things he finds difficult to even think to himself - but he doesn’t even know where to start.


He looks over at Kai, and he can see in the other boy’s eyes that he really wants to say something too, but neither of them seem willing or able to be the first to speak. Instead, they’re both rooted to the spot, stuck fast in their silence. They’ve reached what is arguably the most crucial moment in the history of their friendship, and it breaks Sehun’s heart that neither of them can manage a single word.


After what feels like an eternity, Kai suddenly takes a deep breath and opens his mouth to speak.


“Sehun.”

“Yep.”

“Thanks for convincing me not to murder you. It would have been a shame. And now that I think of it, I have no fucking clue where I would have put the body.”


Sehun has to laugh in spite of himself.


“You’re welcome. Kai.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Thanks for helping me get my mind back.”

“That’s alright. Make sure you look after it. And don’t feed it any shit it doesn’t need.”

“I won’t. I promise.”


“Okay. Sehun.”

“Yes, Kai.”

“My real name is Jongin.”


Sehun smiles and squeezes Jongin’s hand.


“It’s nice to finally meet you, Jongin.”



Jongin squeezes his hand in return, and Sehun tries to distract himself with how surprisingly warm his friend’s hand is in spite of the cold, banishing any and all thoughts of how little time they have left.



* * *



On the day of his friend’s departure, it suddenly becomes apparent to Sehun just how drab Pyongyang really is. He had never noticed it when Jongin was around, or even before they met… but now it’s glaringly obvious.


Everything seems so joyless and monochromatic – grey by day and black by night. The multitude of propaganda posters littered around the city seem to be the only source of colour, apart from the few reminders of himself that Jongin has left behind.

Although Sehun knows where to find them all, it dawns on him that these will only fade away or be removed with time, and then he'll be left with nothing but black, grey and all the colours of the propaganda rainbow, just like before.


All the real colours in his life are about to disappear along with Jongin, and Sehun desperately needs to get them back.



* * *



That night, Sehun waits in his room, anxiously biting his nails to the quick. He tries to telepathically urge his family to go to bed as soon as possible, in the desperate hope that he might be able to catch Jongin before he leaves the warehouse. He’s packed his things and all that’s left to do is wait until he can sneak out, but in a way, the waiting game is even more excruciatingly unbearable than the thought of leaving his home for good.

Eventually the power cuts out and everyone shuffles off to bed as they normally would. As soon as Sehun can hear the faint sounds of snoring, he softly opens his bedroom door and tiptoes out of his room.


On his way out, he briefly steps into the living-room and looks down at his parents’ sleeping faces in the darkness, and Jongin’s words from the night they met repeat themselves over and over in his head.


We have to make sacrifices for the good of the collective.


Despite his newfound disdain for the regime that spawned the phrase, Sehun still thinks it’s a sound philosophy, and it’s one that he really does want to live by. It pains him to think of how he’s about to shit all over that principle by choosing to leave his family behind.


But Sehun knows he’s all Jongin has left, and in his mind, at least, his friend needs him more.



* * *



Sehun rides his bike to the warehouse, pedaling at breakneck speed. It’s already very dark outside, and although his eyes are accustomed to badly-lit environments, he’s still worried he’ll plough right into something (or someone) he shouldn’t. For the first time in his life, Sehun finds himself cursing the darkness, but somehow he manages to arrive in one piece.

He wheels his bike through the entrance and his heart instantly deflates when he finds that the place is pitch black and entirely empty. Feeling like he’s taken a kick to the guts, he quickly dials Jongin’s number, praying to God or Buddha or whatever’s up there that his friend will pick up and say he’s not too far away.


Sehun counts the dial tones, but there’s no answer.


With a defeated sigh, he uses the light from the phone to inspect the place.

The rusted barrel that Jongin had built the campfire in the night before is still there. There are a few bits of burned paper and ash scattered on the concrete floor, and a couple of half-spent candles. Sehun bends down and dips his fingers into one of them. The wax is cold and completely solid.


He’s just about made up his mind to leave when he spies a pile of newspapers lying on the floor next to the wall. The front page appears to have something scrawled all over it.

Sehun picks it up and his eyes widen when he realises it’s a message from Jongin, as though his friend was expecting him to show up.



I had a feeling you might come back here. I wish I could have waited for you, but there’s one last thing I have to do before I blow this joint for good.

Please don’t worry about me; I swear I’ll be fine. I’m a sneaky bastard, after all - I managed to graffiti many different structures across Pyongyang in my time, and the only person who ever caught me was you. But I’m really fucking glad you did.

Although there are little pieces of me scattered all over this city, I’m perfectly aware that they’ll one day be scrubbed off or painted over, so I’ve left you something else to remember me by instead. Please don’t wear it, though, because you’ll look like a massive dickhead. Much like someone else we both know.

Maybe I’ll see you again someday.

Jongin



Confused, Sehun lowers the piece of newspaper and notices that there’s another scrunched-up bundle of paper lying near his feet. He squats down next to it and opens it up.


Inside is Jongin’s stupid hat with the eyeholes cut into it.



Hugging the hat to his chest, Sehun sinks down to the ground and cries harder than he’s ever cried in his life.



* * *



Sehun is standing on the edge of a river. He’s not quite sure why he’s there. It’s a narrow river, only about several metres wide.

Something compels him to step into the water, so he does. He puts one foot in and feels it disturb something on the riverbed. The object bobs up to the surface.


Sehun stares at it. It’s a body, floating face down.

It’s wearing clothes that look just like Jongin’s.



Even as the line between dream and reality unblurs and he's restored to semi-consciousness, Sehun continues his anguished tossing and turning, crying out into the darkness until his little brother comes into his room and silences him with a pillow thrown at his face.



* * *



The next day, Sehun wakes up at 7 AM to the cheerful sound of the Worker’s Siren – which sounds more like an air raid warning than anything else – and gets ready for school to the dulcet tones of the state news broadcast, just like he does every morning. On his way to class, he reluctantly drags his feet along as though he’s wearing bricks for shoes, and counts propaganda posters to pass the time.


He’s standing across the road from his school, about to cross over, when he notices a group of workmen hastily attempting to remove the large poster featuring portraits of the two Leaders that sits on the front wall of the building.

Sehun stops in his tracks and watches curiously from where he’s standing. On closer observation, he realises why the men are in such a hurry to remove the poster. Some gutsy individual has painted devil horns on the General and his father, as well as arrows going through both of their foreheads. Obscuring the original propagandist text are some characters sloppily painted in a garish green to stand out against the red. He squints from afar, trying to make them out, and his eyes widen as he recognises the word.


Progress.


As Sehun walks past them through the front gates, he has to try hard to hide his smile.


Somehow his feet feel strangely lighter than they did before.



~


Isn’t it great how far we’ve come since then?



____________________________________________________________