Chapter Text
Kim Dokja hated mornings.
Not because of the sun; he could ignore that with curtains and spite, not because of Han Sooyoung’s phone alarm, which screamed like a kettle and then kept screaming while she stared at it, daring it to keep going. No—mornings were hateful because they came with forms, lines, rules, and damp envelopes that smelled like a filing cabinet.
He sat cross-legged on the tatami mat he insisted on keeping despite Sooyoung’s protests that it “clashed with their brand.” A chipped mug steamed against his palm. On the TV, the morning news flashed repeatedly, emergency red: MANDATORY REGISTRATION FOR UNASSIGNED GUIDES. NATIONAL SAFETY PRIORITY.
Yoo Sangah’s polite voice tried to soften the words. “They’re starting immediate enforcement. It says… ‘voluntary compliance encouraged for the next two weeks. After that, detainment and forced evaluation.’”
Han Sooyoung slid down the couch like a contented lizard. “Detainment. Such a strong word for ‘Welcome to your government spa day.’”
Dokja sipped, deadpan. “I hear the mud masks are just recycled paperwork.”
Sooyoung tossed a throw pillow at him without looking. “You’re allergic to signatures.”
“I’m allergic to being categorized.”
“That’s a longer word for the same disease,” she chirped.
Sangah muted the TV. “They’ve doubled the overload incidents this quarter. There was an explosion in Mapo. The Bureau’s panicking.”
“I’m sympathetic to explosions,” Dokja said. “They’re very relatable.”
Sooyoung perked up. “See, that’s why you’d be great in detainment. You can coach the exploding espers. ‘Tell me when your trauma started on a scale from one to bureaucracy.’”
Sangah aimed a soft look at him—the kind she used right before shepherding him into a terrible decision. “We should go today. If we wait, it will be crowded, and the officers get… less flexible.”
He stared at the frozen news anchor’s smile, at the bold red crawl, at the poise of institutions that expected compliance like gravity. “If we go,” he said, “I’m not writing anything true on any line that says ‘optional.’”
“Of course not,” Sooyoung said. “You’ll lie on the mandatory ones, too.”
Sangah pressed a hand to her chest, scandalized. “We’ll… keep it accurate where it matters.”
“So, Lies,” Sooyoung concluded.
Biyoo—a small, round, white menace with glass-marble eyes—popped its head out of a grocery bag and made a questioning chirp.
Dokja rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Fine. We’ll go. But if they ask me for a spirit animal, I’m writing ‘tax audit.’”
~✾~~⋇⋆✦⋆⋇~~✾~
It took thirty minutes to wrangle Sooyoung out of pajamas (“Society is an outfit,” she declared, tying her hair with a USB cable), and ten more for Sangah to assemble what she called a “pleasantly compliant” folder: old contracts, a forged receipt, two letters of recommendation, and a peppermint candy to calm frazzled clerks. She gave the candy to Dokja. “For you.”
“For bribery?”
“For kindness,” she said. “Which is its own kind of bribe.”
The Bureau sat in a steel-and-glass block that tried to look friendly by curving one corner. It still looked like a courthouse that had eaten a hospital. Inside, the line curled through retractable belts like a domesticated serpent. A poster read Espers & Guides: Better Together over a stock photo of two grinning people who had never once screamed at each other during sync.
Sooyoung swept her phone camera across the lobby. “Today I’ll be documenting the rare migration of the Free-Range Guide as he’s herded into captivity.”
“Phones away,” a security officer said.
Sooyoung clicked the screen off without shame. “Of course. I’ll just remember everything and write a scathing essay later.”
They reached the registration desk. The clerk had hair that moved as a single unit and eyes that begged for mercy. He adjusted his tie like it was a choke collar. “Name?”
“Kim Dokja.”
The clerk typed. Paused. Typed slower. “You… aren’t in the system.”
“That’s a feature,” said Dokja.
Sangah leaned in, all warmth and competence. “He’s here to fix that. We’d love to begin the preliminary evaluation as soon as possible.”
The clerk brightened in the way of a man who had found a script to hide inside. “Wonderful. We’ll need baseline metrics. Height?”
“Average,” said Dokja.
The clerk blinked at him. “In centimeters.”
“Socially average,” Dokja clarified.
Sooyoung clapped. “He’s a comedy guide. You’ll need a special form.”
Sangah sighed and produced a tape measure from her bag like a magician producing doves. “One seventy-eight.”
The clerk typed, relieved. “Any notable medical conditions?”
“Bureaucria,” said Dokja.
The clerk looked up. “Is that… a blood disorder?”
“It’s terminal in democracies,” Sooyoung stage-whispered.
Sangah pinched both their sleeves at once and smiled at the clerk. “No conditions. Healthy as a complaint letter.”
“Excellent,” the clerk said, and then his eyes slid toward the monitor’s following prompt. His voice picked up with dread. “By current regulation, all unassigned Guides must complete a compatibility trial. You’ll be paired with an Esper currently flagged for priority.”
Dokja felt his stomach do a quiet, traitorous drop. “Define ‘priority.’”
The clerk’s screen flashed a list. His lips moved until they caught on a particular line. He swallowed. “Ah. You’ve been… selected. Congratulations.”
“That sounded like a condolence,” Sooyoung observed.
The clerk pasted on a smile. “Esper Yoo Joonghyuk.”
There was a moment where everything in Dokja went very still. Quiet recognition, like hearing a storm name you. He kept his face blank. “He’s famous.”
“Infamous,” the clerk corrected before catching himself. “I mean—renowned.”
“For chewing through guides,” Sooyoung said gleefully. “He’s like a paper shredder with legs.”
Sangah touched Dokja’s sleeve. “We can ask for a different match.”
The clerk winced. “I’m afraid the algorithm has already—”
“—chosen your soulmate,” Sooyoung finished, wiggling her eyebrows. “Say ‘thank you,’ Dokja.”
“Thank you,” he said gravely, “for your crimes.”
The clerk pressed a button, as if it might end his shift early. “Testing chamber four.”
~✾~~⋇⋆✦⋆⋇~~✾~
Chamber four was white, much like teeth in toothpaste ads. Hidden machinery hummed like an anxious chorus. Behind safety glass, two observers waited: a tech and a woman in a neat blazer with eyes that took notes without moving. Her badge read Senior Evaluator Lee Seolhwa.
Sooyoung pressed her palms to the glass. “Hello, surveillance state, it’s me, your problem.”
Seolhwa glanced up, gave a professional smile, and then looked at Dokja with a brief, searching interest—as if she were measuring the air around him, not just the man. He filed it away: she noticed too much.
The door hissed open.
The room grew smaller by temperament alone. Yoo Joonghyuk stepped in like a walking verdict: tall, straight-backed, shoulders squared under a black training jacket, the kind of face sculpted by stubbornness. He didn’t look at the glass. He didn’t look at the ceiling. He looked at Dokja last, and it felt like a sword choosing where to hang.
“You,” Joonghyuk said, as if the pronoun were an insult.
“Me,” Dokja agreed. “Regretfully.”
The intercom crackled with the tech’s best attempt at cheer. “Welcome! Baseline compatibility will begin with a trust exercise.”
Sooyoung cupped her mouth against the glass. “Kiss!”
Sangah dragged her back by the collar.
Joonghyuk didn’t look away from Dokja. “If you slow me down, I’ll walk out.”
“Perfect,” said Dokja. “I love short relationships.”
Seolhwa’s voice, crisp and calm, replaced the tech’s. “Mr. Yoo, Mr. Kim, the trust exercise is standardized. The guide falls backward. Esper catches. Ready?”
“Never,” said Dokja, stepping into position.
“Always,” said Joonghyuk, not moving his arms.
Seolhwa’s gaze flicked between them. “On three. One… two—”
Dokja leaned into gravity on two just to make a point. He met the ground with a thud that vibrated up his bones. The silence after was ceremonial.
“Fascinating,” Sooyoung said. “A duet.”
Sangah covered her face. “Oh no.”
Joonghyuk looked down with cool disdain. “If you require me to catch you, you are not a guide, you are luggage.”
Dokja sat up, dusted his palms, and arched an eyebrow. “If you require me to pamper your ego, you are not an esper, you are a blog.”
“Again,” Seolhwa said, unruffled. “Properly.”
“Must we?” Dokja asked the ceiling.
“Yes,” said Seolhwa and Joonghyuk together.
The second attempt was a choreographed disaster. Joonghyuk stepped a fraction too far back; Dokja stepped a fraction too far forward; physics took it personally. He hit the mat again. The tech made a high keening sound, reminiscent of a kettle. Biyoo, smuggled under Sooyoung’s jacket, let out an indignant peep that fogged the glass.
Seolhwa marked something on a tablet. “Noted. Moving on. Resonance.”
If the first test measured the body, the second measured everything else. They stood a half-pace apart, palms hovering, energy fields unwinding into the air like two temperatures meeting. Most espers’ fields felt like weather: some sunny, some windy, some with a chance of thunder.
Joonghyuk’s felt like a fault line.
The moment Dokja brushed the edge of it, pressure snapped around his wrist, invisible teeth testing the bone. He kept his face neutral and softened his own field—quieting the burr, thinning noise, making open water where there had been chop.
Joonghyuk’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t touch.”
“Then stop throwing knives at the air,” Dokja murmured. “I’m shaving them down so you don’t cut yourself.”
“I don’t cut myself.”
“Congratulations,” said Dokja. “You cut everyone else.”
Their fields clashed—sparks skittered along the space between their fingers like static that had found religion. The tech yelped, “Containment at ninety percent!” and smacked a switch. A soft barrier shimmered up around them.
Seolhwa’s voice stayed even. “Mr. Yoo, if you resist, the Guide can’t regulate your outflow.”
Joonghyuk didn’t look away from Dokja. “If he were a real guide, I’d feel calmer, not… provoked.”
There was a small, traitorous beat—because Dokja was provoked, too. Not only by the arrogance but by the honesty cloaked inside it, the way a stubborn truth sometimes wore the costume of insult.
He smiled, thin as a knife. “If you were a real leader, you wouldn’t be afraid of being helped.”
“I am not afraid.”
“Then prove it.” Dokja nudged the field again, this time letting a sliver of his own strange current show through—a thinner, quieter hum that didn’t buzz like most Guides’ discipline. It shaped itself, almost Esper-like, around the edges of Joonghyuk’s outflow, not smothering it but bracing it like scaffolding.
Seolhwa’s head tilted, eyes narrowing a degree, attention sharpening on Dokja’s hands. He didn’t have to see her note to know what she wrote: anomalous modulation.
Joonghyuk felt it. His rigidity shifted from outright refusal to… wariness. “What are you doing?”
“Letting you keep your shape,” Dokja said softly. “Not the one the Bureau likes. Yours.”
For a breath, the pressure evened out—like a door cracked in a sealed room.
Then Joonghyuk jerked back, the field snapping shut. “Don’t.”
The barrier lights went from orange to red. The tech swore. “Resonance destabilizing!”
The hum rose into a shriek—machines complaining, air prickling like a storm’s palm. A hairline crack spread along the far wall, because of course Chamber Four had a dramatic streak. Seolhwa hit another switch. The hum died to a tolerable ache.
“You two,” Sooyoung announced, fogging the glass with laughter, “are going to be terrible together. I can’t wait.”
Sangah knocked on the glass with her knuckle, brow furrowed. “Are you okay?”
Dokja flexed his hand to hide the tremor. “Never better.”
Joonghyuk glared at the barrier like he could intimidate physics. “We’re done.”
Seolhwa’s voice had a note in it now—something like interest layered with intention. “That was only baseline. The Bureau has authorized a thirty-day compatibility study for this pairing.”
“Forced dating,” Sooyoung sang.
Joonghyuk’s mouth flattened. “I decline.”
“You can’t,” Seolhwa said mildly. “You’re flagged as a national asset. You are obligated to pursue stabilization options. Mr. Kim, as an unregistered Guide, you’re obligated to participate in the evaluation. Failure to comply will result in detainment.”
Dokja stared at the glass, at his reflection layered over theirs, at how neat Sangah’s hands looked folded over her file, at how bright Sooyoung’s grin glinted like cutlery. He found the camera and smiled like a man at his own gallows.
“Thirty days,” he repeated. “And then what?”
Seolhwa’s eyes didn’t leave him. “Then the Bureau makes a recommendation regarding registration and assignment. It’s not binding.”
He wondered how many ways “not binding” could be made to bind. “Of course.”
Joonghyuk stood very still. “I don’t need a guide.”
“Great,” Dokja said. “You won’t notice me.”
“Impossible,” Joonghyuk said, as if stating a weather report.
Sooyoung clutched her heart. “Chemistry! Negative chemistry, but it counts.”
Biyoo head-butted the glass, left a tiny smudge, and chirped something like: feed me the state.
~✾~~⋇⋆✦⋆⋇~~✾~
They gave him a bracelet on the way out—temporary clearance, printed barcodes blinking like an anklet for the wrist. The lobby looked the same except for the way it felt heavier, like time had decided to camp on his shoulders.
Sangah walked beside him, quiet. “You didn’t have to provoke him.”
“I didn’t,” Dokja said. “He arrived pre-provoked.”
Sooyoung skipped a step to keep up. “But you did something. The little static? The weird not-guide guide thing? The evaluator noticed.”
“I breathed,” Dokja said.
“Liar.” She grinned, delighted. “You breathed in italics.”
Sangah touched his sleeve. “They’ll push registration harder now. Be careful.”
He made a show of inspecting the bracelet. “I am cautious.”
Sooyoung looked at the bracelet like a prophecy. “Thirty days. What’s the over/under on you eloping with the landmine?”
“We’ll split custody of the crater,” he said.
Outside, the city exhaled. Buses wheezed. Somewhere, a street vendor banged a lid. People flowed around them with the incoherence of a school of fish that had agreed to pretend it was a river. The sky did its best impression of a good mood.
They walked in companionable argument to the subway. Sooyoung talked with her hands, narrating a future documentary: “He hates you because he hates needing anyone, which is the funniest way to be alive. You hate him because he’s a mirror with arms. And Sangah will gently force you both to hydrate.”
Sangah nodded solemnly. “Have you considered lemon water?”
“I have considered death,” Dokja said.
~✾~~⋇⋆✦⋆⋇~~✾~
Back at the apartment, Biyoo sprint-waddled from the grocery bag to the couch and belly-flopped onto a cushion, victorious. Sooyoung collapsed next to it and started posting. “Uploading our enemies-to-co-workers origin story.”
“Please don’t,” Sangah said, which Sooyoung interpreted as ‘please do, with flair.’
Dokja retreated to the kitchen, ran water over his wrists until the tremble cooled into ordinary fatigue. He had pushed a little too hard in the chamber, just enough to taste the edge of something he didn’t use in public. He stared at the flow from the tap like it might rearrange into an answer.
From the living room, Sooyoung’s voice: “Comment section is vibing. Top reply: ‘Yoo Joonghyuk’s love language is property damage.’”
Sangah cleared her throat. “Let’s not antagonize a national asset.”
Biyoo rolled over and exposed its belly. Dokja dried his hands and obliged, rubbing tiny circles until it purred with a sound halfway between an aquarium pump and a cat with opinions.=
“You did stabilize him,” Sangah said quietly from the doorway.
He didn’t turn. “He stabilized himself to spite me.”
“You did something,” she insisted. “It was gentler than you pretend.”
Sooyoung leaned over the back of the couch, smirking. “It was also hot.”
Sangah blushed, then rallied. “It was effective.”
“Those are cousins,” Sooyoung said wisely.
Dokja opened the fridge. It contained a dignified bottle of water, a less dignified jar of pickles, and a bowl labeled DO NOT EAT (HAN SOOYOUNG), which, based on history, contained something inedible that Sooyoung would later blame him for stealing. He closed the fridge and leaned his head against the door.
“What if I don’t register?” he asked the magnets shaped like discount coupons.
Sangah’s voice softened. “Then they detain you. And they will not be kind.”
“On the bright side,” Sooyoung said, “prison uniforms are slimming.”
He pictured the bracelet as a dotted line across his skin. He pictured thirty days measured by checklists and clipboards. He pictured Joonghyuk’s field, the way it had cracked like a door, the way refusal had slammed it shut again. He pictured the look in Seolhwa’s eyes: curiosity without malice, but also the hunger of a system that fed on solved problems.
He turned, found Sooyoung’s grin and Sangah’s worry looking back like two halves of a coin he carried everywhere. “Fine,” he said. “I will participate. With grace.”
“So never,” Sooyoung translated.
Sangah exhaled. “We’ll help.”
“Obviously,” said Sooyoung. “I’m going to buy a whistle. For drills. And a spray bottle, for when he postures.”
“Which he?” Sangah asked.
“Yes,” said Sooyoung.
The apartment door knocked politely, then less politely. Sangah glanced at the peephole. “Oh. It’s… a courier?”
Sooyoung opened the door because she liked the plot. A Bureau courier stood there holding a tablet like a shield.
“Delivery for Mr. Kim. Orientation packet. Daily schedule for the first week. And…” He produced a second, more menacing envelope. “A non-binding consent form.”
“Those are the most binding,” Dokja said, signing the tablet with a flourish that was neither his name nor his handwriting.
The courier fled, yearning for quieter recipients.
They spread the schedule on the coffee table. It read like a sitcom pitch written by an authoritarian: 0800 Meditation; 0900 Physical Synchronization; 1100 Sparring; 1300 Debrief; 1400 Civil Conduct Module; 1600 Guided Meal.
Sooyoung pointed. “Guided meal. Are they going to put two forks in your hands and make you eat in sync?”
“Probably,” said Dokja. “We will achieve chewing resonance.”
Sangah traced the line with her finger. “Civil Conduct Module. I can help you practice being civil.”
“I can help him practice conduct,” Sooyoung said. “By making him commit mischief.”
Biyoo crawled onto the paper and sat on “Sparring,” as if volunteering its body as a shield for violence.
The knock sounded again. Louder. This time, it was the kind of knock that came from someone for whom doors were suggestions.
Sooyoung peered through the peephole and hissed. “Oh, this is even better. Captain Grudge is here.”
Yoo Joonghyuk stood in the hallway like a doorframe had annoyed him. He wore the same black jacket, a different scowl, and the patient fury of a man who didn’t like being told “later.”
Sooyoung opened the door and leaned on it like a talk show host. “Welcome! We were just defaming you.”
“Mr. Yoo,” Sangah said, already bowing, already exemplary.
Joonghyuk’s eyes flicked over each of them and landed on Dokja. “Tomorrow. 0800. Do not be late.”
“I’m not registered for punctuality,” Dokja said.
“You’re registered for nothing,” Joonghyuk replied.
“Poetry,” Sooyoung breathed.
Joonghyuk’s gaze cut to her. “No filming.”
Sooyoung smiled with all her teeth. “No promises.”
“Make one,” he said.
“Fine,” she said sweetly. “I promise to film with discretion.”
“That isn’t a promise,” he said.
“It’s the most honest kind,” she said.
Sangah stepped between them, palms up. “We’re all on the same side.”
“Which side is that?” Dokja asked.
“The side that doesn’t explode,” she said.
Joonghyuk held out an envelope. “Your clearance badge for Bureau facilities. Don’t lose it.”
Biyoo reached out from the coffee table, delicately took the envelope in its mouth, and scuttled under the couch. Joonghyuk stared at the disappearing envelope as if considering whether to flip the couch.
“Biyoo,” Dokja said, “return stolen federal property.”
Biyoo stuck its head out with the corner of the envelope, chirped contrition, and dropped it at Joonghyuk’s boot.
Something microscopic in Joonghyuk’s expression shifted. Not softening, exactly. More like confusion being forced to stand politely in the foyer.
He looked back at Dokja. “You pushed my field.”
“You shoved first,” Dokja said.
“Don’t do it again without warning.”
“Consider this your warning.”
A pause stretched. The hallway light hummed. Someone down the corridor laughed at a joke that didn’t belong to them.
Joonghyuk said, “If you waste my time, I will request reassignment.”
“So will I,” said Dokja. “I’m very desirable.”
“By whom?” Joonghyuk asked, genuinely curious, like taking tallies for an audit.
Sooyoung raised her hand. “Me. For science.”
“Me,” Sangah said quickly, “for… scheduling.”
Biyoo chirped. “Beeyoo.”
Joonghyuk looked at the creature like it had signed a contract. “Be punctual,” he said again, and turned to go.
“Wait,” Dokja said before he could find out what the back of that jacket looked like in indignation. Joonghyuk paused. “Why us?”
Joonghyuk didn’t turn. “They said you were the best kind of problem.”
The door clicked shut behind him.
Sooyoung flopped backward onto the couch, cackling into a cushion. “He complimented you. In his dialect.”
Sangah pressed the schedule smooth again with careful hands. “We start at eight.”
Dokja stared at the door, at the dent the conversation had left in the air. “Tomorrow,” he said, because he liked to say a thing once as if that made it less inevitable. He breathed out. “Okay.”
Sooyoung tossed him the peppermint candy from the morning. “For bravery.”
He unwrapped it. It cracked between his teeth, sweet and sharp, the kind of sugar that made the tongue ache.
“Thirty days,” he said.
Sangah smiled gently. “One at a time.”
Biyoo clawed its way into his lap, turned in a circle, and anchored itself like a paperweight on a stack of unfiled feelings.
He scratched its head. “We’re going to be very civilized,” he told it.
Biyoo chirped solemnly.
On the TV, the news anchor smiled with the relentless optimism of a person who always believes in solutions. The crawl moved on to weather. The city prepared for a warm front. Somewhere, a schedule printer coughed out another plan for someone else’s day.
“Tomorrow,” Dokja repeated more quietly, to the peppermint, to the room, to the version of himself who kept signing up for situations he would later mock.
Sooyoung wagged her phone. “Sleep early. We report at dawn.”
“I don’t sleep,” Dokja said, and then, because the day had been long and the peppermint had melted, he did.