Chapter 5: Change my mind

[Dinner is served]

Lunch, Jungmo assured, was only a preview of what's to come. And so, against all reason, the abductors manage to convince Sunny to stay for dinner. 

Which turns out to be his favourite combination of foods! Homemade jokbal in a serving bowl the size of a washbasin, fragrant with spices and glistening with thick brown marinade, served with heaping helpings of gamjajeon and japchae. Long ribbons of napa cabbage kimchi seasoned so hot that the spices dissipate into the air, stinging the nose and thrilling the eye. There is even miyeok-guk, and ample greenery with which to make wraps, including a stack of steamed pumpkin leaves with all traces of veins and bristles meticulously removed. At the sight of this last uncommon treat, Sunny puts his chopsticks down. 

"How long have you guys been watching me?" He asks Jungmo, all alarm. 

"Well, less watching than inquiring and best guessing, I should think," Jungmo says innocently. 

"Miyeok-guk, though. You've been on me since at least January."

"Yeah, and it paid off, didn't it," Jacob shoots at him from the other side of the table, topping the steamed lettuce wrap in his hand with a generous spoonful of meat. Does this dude ever let up? "If you hate it so much, then why don't you walk away from the table, tough guy?"

"Dare me to do it! I can't be bought!" Sunny retorts, and some miyeok-guk mysteriously flies out. 

"Well," Jungmo says lightly, handing a boiled egg to Soeun before placing a half-dozen on the table, "let's not disrespect food by waging a fight over dinner. I propose that the best way to respect it, and indeed to receive respect, is to eat well. Jacob?"

Jacob says nothing in reply, but continues to glower at Sunny as he shoves the massive lettuce dumpling into his mouth. Sunny could feel a knot of tension inside of himself about to explode - possibly his spleen! This is going to be a very long night.

[Negotiation, good cop style]

"Would you still like us to take you back to school?" Jungmo asks after dinner, before Sunny has had a chance to pass out on the couch. Soeun is well ahead of him: already in dreamland, with her face tucked snugly between the backrest and a heavily embroidered cushion.

Sunny opens one groggy eye. "Whuh - wha?"

"Would you prefer making the journey tonight, or would waiting until next morning be best?" The ageless and inquisitive face leans over him, the ever-present smile almost teasing. 

Of course, Sunny wouldn't leave now. Why would he? After an aerial tour of Busan, exploring a house full of rare baubles, and gorging on some of the best food he's ever eaten? Sure, maybe it's humiliating to want to stay a captive, and he can still dimly recall the indignity of being hoisted like a pig on a spit and carried out of his own school. But could any life be more free than the one that his captors are offering him?

"Jacob is a morning lark," Jungmo continues, "and will be taking Fassy for dawn patrol around 5:30am. If you intercept him before then, he'll be sure to take you home - willingly, if not gladly."

"...Let's consider it over dishes," Jungmo says a few seconds later, after Sunny fails to produce any kind of dignified answer. He gently taps him on the knee and walks off, and Sunny realizes that this is his cue to follow along and help with the chores. 

He does. "Willingly, if not gladly." (And there's the other kicker: living alone all this time, he is strangely happy to have someone tell him what to do and where to be. How messed up is that?)

[Dishes with Jungmo]

In the cupboard adjacent to the sink, Sunny locates an extra pair of rubber gloves, a scouring pad, and a large bamboo whisk for cleaning the insides of pots. He turns around, whisk in hand, just in time for Jungmo to slide a plastic apron over his head depicting - he peers curiously at the upside-down image - a cartoon dolphin gleefully turning cartwheels in the air. 

The apron continues to trouble him for the next 15 minutes. 

"Jungmo, is this really yours?" He asks at last, unclogging the used sink gingerly with the handle of his whisk before scrubbing it clean once more. "I mean...a happy dolphin?"

He can see the smile to his left waver. "Hmm, let's see. It's part of a set that we purchased at Gamcheon Culture Village."

"..."

"Yours is the pink one."

"So the answer is no!!" Sunny exclaims, throwing down his whisk, and it spins violently before settling in the sink. "You bought this for me too! What the hell!"

He stares incredulously out of the tiny kitchen window covered with patterned vinyl, at the barest hints of a sky which has now fallen dark. "You guys were serious about wanting me to live here. Forever. Like, you've already gathered all the stuff."

"Yes," Jungmo says after a pause. His voice is gentle, unhurried, but each word and sentence is undergirded by an immovable framework. "It would be our wish."

"But why? Why me?"

Another weighty pause. Sunny feels uneasy and honestly, a little disappointed. Seriously...were neither of these guys prepared to explain their reasoning whatsoever? Everybody just thought that finger sandwiches and jokbal would be enough to smooth things over? 

At last, Jungmo speaks. "How much did Jacob explain to you earlier, about who we are and what we stand for?" 

"Uh, define 'explain''."

"I suppose that's quite fair," Jungmo says, pursing his lips thoughtfully. "Please, allow me to try again.

[The reason why]

"You can see all around you, Sunny, evidence of the fact that we are not entirely normal. I don't mean that we have delightfully eccentric personalities."

"No, I get that."

"Jacob and I have extraordinary powers. But we were not born with them. You see, many years ago, I lost my family to a great fire. It took the lives of my parents and my sister, and the entirety of our ancestral home. I alone was able to throw myself out of a second-storey window, and from where I landed, my body broken and cut to pieces, I saw them calling to me...I'll never forget the image."

Sunny isn't sure what he expected, but he definitely wasn't prepared for the conversation to take such a brutal turn. "...I'm sorry."

Jungmo turns to Sunny, not entirely fixing his gaze upon him, but rather trying to conjure up something that feels very far away. They are very close now, and for the first time, Sunny notices Jungmo's eyes. The eyes that are neither young nor old, deep-set and deeply lined...touched with the faintest brush of green. 

"The tragedy was unexpected enough, but something even more unexpected happened. As the house succumbed to that all-consuming fire, I saw in it the figure of a young man. It was such a shock to me, Sunny, that I wasn't sure if I had already died."

"So...that was...Apollo?" 

Jungmo nods, and there is nothing that Sunny can say. This is a serious conversation about ancient Greek gods! But how can he question it, when Jungmo is so solemn, so convinced of what took place? 

"I do not know why he decided to appear to me in that moment. Whether it was out of mercy, or pity..." He pauses. "But I knew that, even though my heart was entirely too full - of grief and longing and all of the worldly things that cross one's mind in the depths of despair - I knew I loved him right away. And as I thought this, all pain vacated my body. We were joined, like two flames merging into one. 

"It's difficult to describe. Shall I try anyway? It was as if something had entirely taken hold of me. I could not command my body. And yet I felt no pain, no perturbance. I was not troubled by it. It was as if I was looking at myself through Apollo's eyes, and that all the world was a distant object. Human life, and human grief...suddenly, though I know not how, none of it meant anything.

"And then, we separated, and I was only myself once more. Only the didactic memory of that sensation remained. But I could not access the feeling of it anymore. 

"I knew that he had wanted to show me this. This, his tremendous power, and what would become my power."

"Wait a second. Your power?" Sunny shakes his head in disbelief. "So your power is...you can kind of..."

"I could see the truth of the world," Jungmo replies. He is calm and smiling. And completely serious. "I became the first acolyte of Apollo, whose power would be necessary to guide all others towards him. To guide you towards him, Sunny - I saw you in something resembling a dream, and with no further assurances and no promise of success, we came here to find you. To meet you, after many months of investigation and ascertaining your exact whereabouts. And so to answer your question, I am the reason why."

[Enter Jacob]

Sunny puts down the pot in his hands, his duties completely forgotten. Well, it wasn't terribly surprising that these bandits thought he was...what did they call it? An acolyte? But the real insight to be gleaned from Jungmo's incredible story was quite another detail...

"So like...you can see what I'm thinking? Right now?" He says haltingly. "You know, Jungmo, in some universes, that'd make you a high-level mutant..."

"As much as that prospect would excite and delight me, I am afraid the power is nothing like a gift." Jungmo's smile widens. "And I promise that I cannot see what you are thinking. Indeed, though this may seem dull and uninspired, I only ever exercise my power in one way."

"To find other acolytes," Sunny finishes, not missing a beat. Obviously. Jungmo is lawful good! "And, that's how you found Jacob."

"Precisely. You are very astute."

"I've read a lot of comics." But that's not really what Sunny wants to know about. Suppose all this is correct, and not a wild collective hallucination... "So then, what's Jacob's power? Is it just being able to balance on a giant surfboard? Oh, no, wait..." 

Before he can correct himself, Jungmo already provides the answer. "All of our powers are extended to us by Apollo. They resemble his functions and follow the mythology. And so..."

"Flying!... Flying, on a giant chariot! Flying like a giant swan."

"...His is the gift of light," Jungmo supplies.

"Ohhh..."

"Jacob was one of the first acolytes I located, owing to the brightness of his light. It continues to burn brightly still. With the power of light, he can manifest any number of powers. He can dazzle and confuse, and can manipulate what others see simply by redirecting the light around himself. Though this house is not rooted to any power source, he provides light and heat to it whenever he enters."

"Wait, what? That's so sick!! And economical!"

"Indeed. It is not an exaggeration to say that Jacob manifests new uses of his powers every few days. However, his control over most of these abilities is weak. And...by his own admission, he is sometimes guilty of using the powers in ways that fall short of advancing Apollo's goals."

That's not surprising. "Let me guess, impressing women?"

"I should think it is rather you who is reading my mind," Jungmo replies, winking at him.