warning: brief mentions of guns, but no one dies lol
word count: 4.4k
a/n: surprise!! or late christmas present or whatever...
i wrote this on 12th july 2023 JSNJHDFK but we kept it in our docs for a year and a half because we had this whole (admittedly stupid) idea of sticking to a timeline
we are now older and wiser and have realised that the timeline is just taking a toll on our motivation to write, so hopefully this random posting will pave the way for more ideas that have laid dormant for months
@sanccharine and i have so much fun every time we read this (and we've read it like 50 times already)
masterlist
Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.
Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.
You rolled over in your cot and slammed your hand over your incessantly loud alarm, shutting it for good. You stretched. Although you longed to stay in your warm bed, you were actually excited to begin your day for once.
Today was your unit’s turn to have a training course, an internal competition between trainee agents wherein you had to get past multiple obstacles, as well as opponents, before making your way out of the three-floor contraption your supervisors had specially designed to torture you.
Today was the day you would finally get to put months of training to use.
Still groggy from sleep, you took a quick shower and grabbed some toast from the toaster before you left your small one-bedroom house.
As you made your way through the security clearance and entered the training center of your organization, you looked around in awe. You’d heard of the training course from your seniors, of course, you had; they loved showing off and telling grand tales about how quickly they had escaped. Rookie you had dreamed of this ever since you had passed your initial acceptance stage into the organization. And finally, you were here.
You slowly spun around, taking in the bustling lobby filled with your fellow comrades impatient to start the course as well, when you were suddenly knocked into the wall by a force that had mysteriously appeared.
Brushing yourself off with a frown, you looked up to see your attacker standing above you, a grin stretched across her face. “You should be more alert, Y/N,” she proclaimed with a laugh.
“It’s too early for this,” you grumbled, but you took her hand nevertheless and pulled yourself up.
She swung her arm over your shoulders and dragged you off towards a queue that had begun to form, where your supervisor would soon give you the orders regarding the course. You stood in the growing queue, lightly warming up for whatever physical challenges you would face later in the day.
“Y/L/N and Minatozaki,” you heard as you approached the front of your queue. “These are your trackers.” Your respective anklets were handed to you, a way for your supervisors to track your progress from the outside. You obediently put them on and awaited your next set of orders.
“Since you two got the highest score at the range last week, you have been awarded the task of distributing the weaponry.” You were barely able to stop the groan that left your mouth. “Make sure everyone is equipped with a standard revolver and a set of bullets.”
As you walked away from the queue, lamenting the fact that you now had extra work, you heard your friend chuckle next to you.
“Sweet naive Y/N,” she began, “think of this as an opportunity!”
You stared blankly at her. Perhaps you really should’ve taken an extra five minutes to make yourself some coffee in the morning because your brain was lagging at the speed of a slug.
She shook your shoulders. “We have unrestricted access to the weaponry stock for the next thirty minutes. We have free reign over which guns we distribute.”
As the pieces began to click, you slowly matched her grin.
Oh, this would be good.
“Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
“That we switch out someone’s bullets?” she smirked.
“Perfect!” Suddenly filled with energy after this devious scheme, you raced each other to the stockroom.
You were lucky that the minx squealing in your ears as she ran past you was your friend. Even though you had only known Sana for a few months, it had taken surprisingly no time for you to warm up to each other. Well, surprising for you, you mused. Sana was as extroverted as they come, talking a mile a minute and even managing to get into the good books of some of the most stoic trainers at the organization. Though you could do without her dramatic tendencies and terrible pick-up lines, Sana had grown to be a steadfast and dependable friend.
The two of you had found unexpected chemistry in doing your assigned tasks as trainee agents. Hence, even for this course, you had decided to pair up, confident that you would match each other perfectly, and make up for the other’s weaknesses.
Taking a minute to catch your breath once inside the stockroom, you pondered over whose bullets you would switch.
“Well, it has to be someone who would be tough to beat, right,” said Sana as she walked over with a box of rubber pellets.
Your unit contained a mix of trainees. Some of them, like you and Sana, had only just begun training. Some were older and had more experience than you did. Even so, one team immediately came to mind.
“It has to be Kim and Min, then.”
They were only a year above you, but already well on their way to being promoted to agents. Although not super popular, they were known for being kind to their juniors; Kim was always ready with a witty joke to relieve some of the day’s brunt.
The two of you grinned like Chesire cats again. Working quickly to sort out the rest of the weaponry, you reserved the last gun and emptied it of its bullets, hurriedly shoving the rubber ones inside.
“Okay, so this one,” you turned over the revolver. “The one with code number 617 is the gun we’ll give to Kim.”
Sana looked up from the pile of revolvers she was sorting. “Wait, we’re giving the fake bullets to Kim? Wouldn’t Min be a better choice?”
“They’re both equally good marksmen, except Kim would be less likely to get mad at us,” you shrugged.
Her eyes widened. “You’re kidding, right?”
When you showed no further attempts to change your target, she explained, “I’ve never seen Min get angry, but I once stole some cheese off Kim’s tray in the cafeteria and he glared at me until I ran away from there.”
You burst out laughing. “So this is why you don’t hang out with us in the cafeteria anymore, is that it?”
Sana should’ve known not to come between Kim and his food. There were very few things he was sensitive about, but food was territorial to him. Understandably so too, after a day filled with grueling physical and mental exercises, who wouldn’t want to lounge around and nibble on cheese?
She bristled. “No, I just have other friends. I’m not a nerd like you Y/N,” she suddenly got defensive when you made no inclination to stop laughing.
“Anyways,” she said loudly to shut you up, “let’s get a move on with these.”
Grabbing the boxes you had arranged the guns into, the two of you left the stockroom.
As you approached the corner of the lobby where the seniors were standing, Sana hastily said, “Let’s split up,” grabbed one of the boxes, and ran in the other direction before you could even say a word.
She really must not have wanted to face Kim again, you chuckled.
Min nodded as you approached closer, a small smile on his face. Beside him, Kim was crouched on the floor, struggling to tie his shoelaces into an elaborate knot.
“Gun duty, I see,” he said in lieu of a greeting. You nodded, reaching into the box you carried with you and pulling out two guns.
“That was us last year,” Kim grunted from where he was finally done with one shoe, pulling his other leg in front to start re-tying his laces.
“I’ll take both of these for now,” Min said, stretching out a hand for both the guns, one just a regular standard issue, and one gun 617, which you were specifically reserving for Kim.
As he weighed both guns in his large palm, you froze for a second. Awkwardly pointing to the one below, you said, “Umm, that one’s for Kim.”
Yoongi scratched the back of his neck with his free hand. “Aren’t they both standard issues?”
Shit. You had to stop talking before you gave it all away. You shrugged in what you hoped was a nonchalant manner as Kim jumped up, finally having tied both his shoes, and grabbed the top gun from Min’s hand.
Guess Sana got her wish after all.
Before either of them could say anything else, you threw out a weak ‘Good luck!’ and dragged your box away to where some other trainees were standing. After distributing all the guns, you grabbed the last one for yourself before making your way to where Sana stood.
“How’d it go?” she whispered. You only had time to nod before a sharp siren rang through the air, your first call to attention.
As the air thrummed with the combined energy of all the trainees, ready to prove themselves and get promoted, you squeezed Sana’s hand, hoping to share your combined excitement and nerves through the brief contact.
Upon the second siren, you rushed toward the entrance of the course, Sana right at your heels. From hereon, it was every team to themselves, and the competition was fierce. Although all the trainees were competent enough to not directly shoot at each other, everyone was still in full combat gear. The bullets were less to maim and more to disorient opponents and break through locked doors.
Even as your eyes quickly flitted around to make out what space you were now in, and identify possible hiding spots, you couldn’t help the smile that spread on your face; this was what you had been dreaming of.
Sweat streaked down your face, matting your hair to your forehead. Your muscles ached, demanding sympathy as you wiggled around, trying to move to a more comfortable position than the crouch you had put your body in for the last twenty minutes. Sana had gone ahead to scout for opponents while you stayed back to guard her and prevent anyone else from entering this section of the room.
As your ears picked up on footsteps, you stayed completely still, readying your gun in front of you. A low whistle sounded, one that allowed you to relax and finally stand. A safety code you and Sana had agreed upon. She must have deemed it safe to move forward without getting caught, so you made haste to join her.
“Okay, so there seems to be some sort of barrier on the door that’s too heavy to push. And the wall is too thick to break,” she whispered, bringing her head closer to yours. “So we either climb over or—”
“Burrow our way under the wall,” you finished for her.
“Exactly,” she nodded. “We’re almost there.”
As you made your way into the clearing she had scouted, you let out a relieved sigh at finding it empty. The absence of trainees was good, as it meant they were still far behind you. Or, you realized with a sinking sensation, they had already gone ahead.
No, you shook yourself. You refused to let doubt creep in. You and Sana had put in too much work to lose now, at the last juncture, when you were so close you could practically feel the cool air conditioning of the trainee rec room on your flushed skin.
You went towards the aforementioned wall and felt it carefully. “There don’t seem to be any gaps in the brick we could use as footholds,” you mumbled.
Sana was kneeling a few feet away from you, rummaging through jute sacks that looked as though they were made in the eighteenth century. “There’s only crumpled up newspaper and hay in these,” she said, “no rope we can affix to something to pull ourselves up.”
That meant underground was the way to go.
Coming to the conclusion at the same time, you both started crawling around the floor, dusting it off and feeling for any crevices or embellishments in the smooth concrete where a trapdoor could be hidden.
After a good few minutes of scouring the entire floor, your nails hit something hard near a corner of the clearing, a small niche created by the walls that would have gone unnoticed by an ordinary human being.
“Here!” you gestured quickly for Sana to come to where you were.
Sitting back on your haunches, the pair of you stared at the concrete between you, pulling and prodding at the crevice to make it give way. Finally, after multiple scratches on your fingers, and a couple of dents on your gun as you had uselessly tried bouncing it off, the crevice deepened.
Although it wasn’t the trapdoor you had been expecting, you pushed back the slab of concrete to reveal a muddy hole.
Great, so now you had to further traipse your way through the mud to reach freedom.
Hesitating only for a second, you decided to go first this time, jumping into the hole, and waited for Sana to follow after. However, minutes passed and Sana had still not joined you. Although you hadn’t heard any loud alarming sounds, you knew just as well that all trainees had practiced stealthy ways to knock someone out. Just what had happened to her?
Your boots squelched in the mud below you as you tried walking back towards the opening. “Minatozaki!” you whispered frantically. “Where are you?”
Suddenly, Sana’s head popped over the hole. “I’m scattering some of the hay from the bags all around the room so that whoever comes in here next has to waste time finding the opening.” And just like that, her head disappeared again.
Clever, you thought, waiting patiently this time and allowing your eyes to get accustomed to the dark. The complete lack of light in this tunnel meant that you would have to rely on your hearing. Luckily for you, years of blasting music at full volume had not destroyed your ears yet, and they were sharp as ever.
Making quick work of her decoy, Sana jumped down next to you, splattering mud everywhere. Gross, but you didn’t have time to dwell on it as you helped her pull the slab over the opening, drenching you both in darkness.
“All okay there, Sana?” you asked, knowing she had once let slip that she was afraid of the dark.
“It’s all good,” she murmured, although she pressed herself closer to you as you began walking. You didn’t mind, finding her presence comforting.
Regardless of the darkness, the tunnel was still eerie, with a chilling breeze wafting through. You trudged on, feeling the walls in front with your left hand, all the while clutching your gun in the right. At some point, the tunnel stooped so low, you both were forced to crawl. Your bodies were protesting with each movement, and you could no longer tell which arm you were putting first, but you had to carry on.
Just when you thought the tunnel would further narrow to dangerous proportions, your ears pricked up. That was the sound of dripping, which meant pipelines were close by.
Sana had heard it too. “We’re almost there,” she repeated from behind you.
The brief moment of panic vanished and was replaced with a renewed resolve to get to the finishing point. You had to win this.
Your hand clunked against something that echoed with a sharp twang throughout the constricted space.
“Is that a sewer cover?” Sana’s voice had regained some of her usual cheerfulness as you neared the end.
“It has to be,” you reached behind your back to hand her your gun and began prying open the metallic disk with both hands. After many frustrating minutes of your muddy hands slipping all over, you finally managed to crack it open.
Victory was close. You smiled to yourself. Another bright spot was the absence of any other sounds in the tunnel, which meant the other teams were still far behind.
With Sana urging you on, you pushed the disk with all your might, hearing it clang onto the floor in front with a satisfying cacophony. You pulled yourself out of the tunnel, not forgetting to turn around and pull Sana out, but she smacked away your helping hand and got out on her own, with a much neater landing than you had, you noted.
Upon first glance, you didn’t see anyone in the room apart from your supervisors holed up in a board room behind glass walls, and turned to Sana, smiling widely.
“We won!”
However, she didn’t match your excitement. Before you could turn around once again to look for what you had initially missed, a resounding crack sounded through the room.
That was the sound your revolver made when a bullet was fired. Your eyes only had time to widen before you felt something strike your side. Pain bloomed, and you bent yourself in half, collapsing against Sana who struggled to hold your sudden weight.
Your eyes screwed shut.
Why wasn’t she screaming for help? Why couldn’t you feel anything warm and wet flowing down your side? Already the pain was subsiding. Were you dead?
A chuckle brought you to reality. You slowly opened one eye after the other, offended that someone would laugh at your misery, only to see Min pointing his gun at you, while his partner slouched against the wall beside him. The pair of them, similar to you, were muddied and scratched up, but unlike you, wore identical smirks.
Your brain finally caught up. You realized what had happened. Despite Min having fake bullets, they had managed to outsmart everyone and win. You looked down and found a rubber pellet, the same one that had struck you. Having had enough of holding your weight, Sana shoved you to your own two feet.
“Wha—how?” you could only manage single-syllable words.
“Of course we caught on to what you did, you punk.”
You sighed. It had been a good attempt, but you should’ve known you would never be able to outsmart the winning duo who stood in front of you.
Hang on. It wasn’t even your idea in the first place, it was Sana’s!
You raised your eyes to stare at her accusingly, only to find she’d already made her way to the water dispenser and was now sipping from a paper cup without a care in the world.
She shrugged, acting as though she didn’t know what was going on.
Kim pushed himself off the wall, making his way toward you. “Little tip for next time. Bullets have different weights.” You could only gape at him. He continued, with an air of ease about him, as if he was filling in for a trainer who had been absent, “It’s minute, sure, but any skilled agent will notice the difference upon holding the gun.”
You turned towards Min. “So you knew from the instant I handed them over?”
“Yep,” he said, with a satisfied smirk.
“Then why did you… so you just entered the course without a weapon?”
He shrugged, taking a seat on the many couches spread around the room. “Just wanted to test myself I guess.”
By now Sana had let her curiosity get the better of her, scooting over to be a part of the conversation. “How long did it take you to finish?” she asked.
“We waited for around twenty minutes before you two came out,” Kim replied, grabbing a glass of water for himself as he plopped down beside Min. “Still, you two did pretty well. Yoongi and I took way longer last year, didn’t we?” he nudged his partner, who merely grunted assent.
The realization that you were the only one left standing finally uprooted you from your spot near the metal disk. Picking up the rubber pellet, you walked over to the seniors.
“We’re sorry,” you began, “it was just meant to be a harmless prank.”
Yoongi waved away your apology. The knowledge that they had managed to win with just a singular weapon between them was enough. Plus, the fact that they would now be awarded by getting to go on an actual mission with an agent overlooked any annoyance they would’ve had.
“Just plan better next time,” he said, casually stealing Kim’s cup of water and taking a sip.
“Hey, give me that!” Kim made a wild grab for his cup, managing to retrieve it without sloshing any water. “And just be glad you didn’t attempt this during the final tests,” he added, glancing in your direction. “Also, why are you involving Tozaki in this?”
You stared at him, uncomprehending.
“Why did you say ‘we’ before? Weren’t you the one distributing the guns?” he explained.
Tch. You swung around towards her for the second time in the last ten minutes, only to find her hiding a smile as she innocently peered up at you over the rim of her paper cup.
Leave it to Sana to mastermind the whole thing and then not even get caught for it.
Okay fine, you reasoned with yourself, since you weren’t getting into actual trouble for this, and because Sana so desperately wanted to get back into Kim’s good books, you would let it slide this one time.
Before you could make any move to defend yourself, Yoongi stated, “As much as it pains me to say this, Seokjin’s right, you know.” You heard Kim smother a laugh. “Having a prank backfire is one thing Y/N, but you should take full accountability for it at the very least.”
Now hold on. You glanced again at Sana, but she turned away, failing to hide her smirk this time.
You could not believe this.
How had Sana gotten you into this mess? Plus, you were pretty sure Seokjin wasn’t even that mad at her. He’d just called her Tozaki, and he only reserved nicknames for people he was close with.
Looking down at your feet once more, you mumbled, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to say ‘we’. You’re right, it was just me, my bad.” She had better buy you ice cream after this or else she was going to be the one to get shot with a rubber pellet next.
Having cleared the air, the seniors made space for you on the couch and you joined them, glad to get back into your regular dynamic. You were still surprised at how they’d managed to finish the course as quickly as they had, and you remarked as such.
“With my devilishly good looks, Yoongi’s brain, and my brain! We’re ready to be amazing agents,” Seokjin said with a smug smile. You didn’t doubt him for one second although he joked around. He was such a smooth talker, he could charm almost anyone into doing what he wanted, an essential quality for agents engaging in non-stealth missions.
“Have you thought of your codenames yet?” Sana perked up once again, ever curious.
Codenames were chosen by trainees upon promotion. They acted as a means of recognition but were also used for security purposes. Although all employees of the organization had designated codenames, agents in the field were further given numbers as an added layer of anonymity.
As you could begin to hear the sounds of other teams approaching, Yoongi hummed, “I’ll probably go with Shooting Guard.”
Shooting Guard, you mused, leaning back towards Sana on the couch and trying to ignore the drying mud on your body, that was interesting.
“It was the position I used to play back when I was on the basketball team in high school,” he continued, knowing he had the rapt attention of juniors in front of him, eating up every word he was saying.
“And what about you, Seokjin?” Sana prompted, albeit hesitantly.
With the blankest face you had ever seen on the usually expressive man, he replied, “I think I’m going with Scombridae.”
Silence settled over the room as you and Sana stared blankly at each other. Was that even a real word?
Clearly having dealt with his friend’s bullshit many times, Yoongi merely smacked his shoulder, leading to Seokjin’s face finally showing the twitches of the smile he was so desperately trying to hold in.
“It’s the family that tuna comes under, “ he finally guffawed. “Jeez, do kids these days not learn science?”
You rolled your eyes. This was classic Seokjin. Of course he would choose an unnecessarily complicated name. The tuna made sense. After all, you had seen how he practically inhaled his lunch when the cafeteria served tuna sandwiches.
Sana however, was still confused. After the cheese incident from many months ago, she had not sat with you three for lunch, and thus was unaware of Seokjin’s obsession with tuna, or as he liked to call it, super tuna (“It’s the best fish after all!” he had loudly and proudly proclaimed to the entire unit, on multiple occasions).
“Why a tuna though?” she asked.
He threw her a wink, another one of his classics. “Come sit with us for lunch again, and you’ll find out.”
She ducked her head, hiding the embarrassment spreading across her face, and merely nodded. She was saved from further teasing as your supervisors chose that moment to finally leave their glass shelter.
You looked around from your little corner of the room and saw that many of your peers had emerged from the tunnel in the midst of your very important tuna conversation. Many of them had also not. They would be rescued by the trainers once the time limit was up and would be assigned additional exercises to make up for their lack of ability.
Although victory had not been yours, the initial disappointment was quickly wearing off. You were glad you were friends with such cool seniors, and you hadn’t even gotten in trouble for your prank. Most of all, you were proud you had managed to come second place, beating the multitudes of other trainees around you.
All you wanted now was a hot shower, which you would get priority access to thanks to being one of the first teams to escape, and then you would go raid Sana’s wallet for all the ice cream you could stuff yourself with. You grabbed her hand and stood up, ignoring your groaning muscles to go over to the front of the room where your timings would be announced, determined to beat them next year.
a/n: sana, jin, and yoongi?? and where's momo??
*gasp* where is this story heading??
