NAAWWW I THOUGHT I SAW A CHAPTER UPDATE...BUT IT WAS A MIRAAAGE

bahngarang

1 week ago

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bahngarang

1 month ago

chapter 4.0 ☆ death of achilles

ss: 9

wc: 1,143 ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

cw: mentions of food, swearing, apple slander (deserved)

these types of days were some of yn's favourite days. the slow days, when they were finishing up a paper, when they could just sit at a cafe with their noise cancelling headphones and do the final editing. the days when they could rationalise buying a few too many sweet treats because didn't they deserve a reward?

it was a little less enjoyable this time, as yn had woken up at stupid o'clock in the morning and had been unable to get back to sleep, so they were at the cafe far earlier than usual, but... it was still better than having to supervise second year students fucking around in the lab.

they had learned their lesson, and yn didn't order any caffeinated drinks, otherwise their shaky hands would have been no use with their temperamental laptop. it was, admittedly, on its last legs, but after eight years it was like their child and yn was unwilling to part with it until it was really, truly, unfixable. but that day was not today.

yn fiddled with their pochacco usb absentmindedly as they read through their paper, fixing spelling errors from the words that were evidently too scientific for autocorrect to handle, no matter how many times they put it into their personal dictionary. at this point, they'd just accepted it, and were resigned to going through the entire thing. it wasn't like it was terrible, anyway, but after seeing it almost every day for the last six months it was getting a little old.

luckily, in the midst of the slow, calm morning, fate had decided to make the day more exciting. because apparently, a calm morning was not in the cards.

it all happened so fast – someone bumped into someone else, a muffled curse, and the next second, three drinks had their contents emptied onto yn's laptop.

thankfully, yn had the presence of mind to pull the usb containing their paper out of their laptop, wiping it on their sleeve, hopefully before any damage could be done. after almost deleting their entire thesis during their bachelors degree… they weren't taking any chances. so while it would suck losing the editing, they had backups, so it wouldn't be the end of the world. but their laptop?

oh, it was not having a good time.

the screen flickered a few times, before shutting down, unprompted. and yn had a feeling that this time, it wasn't powering up again, especially with all the liquid currently seeping into the hardware through the gaps in the keyboard, and dripping off the table onto the floor as well as into yn's lap.

but, of course, that wasn't the end of it, because when yn looked up at the masked face of the person who spilled all that coffee over their laptop? seo changbin.

seo fucking changbin. of all the people in south korea, it had to be one of the eight people yn was trying so hard to avoid.

they just sat there in shock for a few seconds, staring down at their soaked laptop, before he started apologizing.

"i am so sorry-" changbin started before yn cut him off.

"it's fine," they said quickly. it wasn't fine, not really, but those words came out of their mouth on reflex.

finally, yn stood up, cringing at the feeling of their damp trousers clinging to their skin, knowing it would probably stain, and also knowing that it definitely looked like they pissed themselves now.

"oh, let me," changbin said, pulling off his jacket and tying it around their waist, covering up the worst of the spill.

both of them seemed to kick back into gear at that point, grabbing handfuls of napkins to try and mop up the liquid, to marginal degree of success. in the end they were ushered out of the cafe, leaving them standing awkwardly on the pavement outside, while yn tried to not make eye contact with the billboard showing a close up of changbin's face. it was like the universe was taunting them.

"sorry," changbin apologised again. "i could pay for the repairs, if you want…"

"you don't have to," yn replied, turning their gaze down at their shoes, and shifting their weight over to their new cane – which didn't start creaking immediately, a definite improvement from the last one. "it's pretty old. i'm not sure it can be revived another time."

"i'll buy you a new one, then."

"no, you don't have to do that," yn protested, but they got the idea that it would need a lot more to convince him not to.

"why is your laptop called achilles?" changbin asked, bemusement evident on his face.

yn shrugged. "when i was setting it up, you could name it... for, like, bluetooth or something. one of my old friends named it."

"right..." he replied, clearly not understanding.

yn laughed quietly to themselves, the conversation going quiet again as the pair walked into the electronics store. at least they had an idea of what they wanted – yn had become quite aware over the last few months that their laptop was... close to death, and had been preemptively window shopping for a new one, so they just made a beeline for the one they'd been looking at.

"not going to milk this for something more expensive? like a macbook?"

yn shot changbin a withering look. "macbooks suck. they lose battery in, like, 20 minutes, then they overheat when you charge them. the layout is awful and completely different from almost every other laptop for literally no reason and they're so expensive for what? to be unusable without a software update that makes everything worse? spare me."

changbin muffled his laugh behind his hand. "all my friends are weird about iphones, too. they're so much worse, i don't get it."

"right? i just want a good device, and apple is worse than everything else, as well as being way more expensive. the hype is completely undeserved."

"so... this one, then?" he asked, pointing at the model they were standing in front of.

yn nodded. it wasn't the best, or most expensive, but it had all the things they needed, and it weighed less than seven bricks, as minji had so aptly put it.

it didn't take long for the new laptop to be purchased, and changbin handed it over with a new litany of apologies. yn accepted it with an embarrassed smile, unable to stop the hitch in their breath as their hands brushed his.

"i, um... thank you," yn muttered out, averting their gaze. they felt the tips of their ears heat up, in a way that had nothing to do with the weather, accompanied by a sinking feeling in their gut. somehow they knew that it was going to become a lot harder to hide from their soulmates from now on.

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a/n: is this a weird plot point? maybe. but I have free will and I can write what I want

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