The cult hit fanfic takes on its most daunting narrative challenge yet in Group D.

GuMiho

“Everything looks fine, sir,” GuMiho stated crisply. Seated before a glowing monitor, he blinked and wiped the sweat from his brow as he waited for a response.

“Sounds good. Let me know if you see anything,” his supervisor answered in a rather disinterested tone.

It always rankled GuMiho if he were to be honest. The skies around Incheon airport may have been clear at the moment, but without constant vigilance and thorough upkeep, a disaster could strike at any moment.

It wasn’t that he needed to be in control as people frequently told him, he just craved order and felt at home when everything fit in its right place. He liked it when things went as they were supposed to and the unpredictable was kept at bay. Maybe there was merit to chaos in the way it influenced a sporting event or that team building exercise where you stand on one leg and bash into each other, but this was real life and there wasn’t room for craziness.

GuMiho became an air traffic controller for precisely that reason and, after a few years of hard work, he was starting to rack up benefits and secure his future. Security was paramount when it came to things working out as intended. He’d do anything to guarantee things went as they were supposed to.

Was risking a bit of chaos to get the security he so desired worth it then? Entering the ring to take on Maru, and what was sure to be a gallery of rogues, was absurdly dangerous, but imagine what he could do with all that power. He’d put money where it belonged, in public transportation and infrastructure. Korea would run like never before and he’d be at the helm leading it all.

A less responsible man would have simply stood up and marched out the door, but GuMiho knew better. He’d stick around for the rest of the work day and file the proper paperwork to take a few days off. Sure he was risking a bit of chaos, but that wasn’t a reason to be truly reckless.

MMA

Man, he sure loved the scent of sterile medical equipment in the morning.

MMA took a deep breath before the freshly opened container of capped syringes before placing them in bins to be carried off to the various rooms in Seoul Veteran’s Hospital. He moved quickly, efficiently, the paragon of excellence born from hundreds of hours of training. One had to be diligent in the hospital, diligent, wary and prepared, but also caring, empathic and joyful.

MMA had become an orderly to save lives and cure people’s illnesses. To make their situation a more comfortable one and find ways to spare patients and their loved ones grief and heartache. He wasn’t a surgeon or a doctor, but he was a proud member of a machine that bettered people’s lives.

MMA went so far as to volunteer at various jobs in his free time. That’s how committed he was to making the world a brighter place. He always kept his ears open and his eyes peeled. You never knew from where a cry of help would come.

Like the other day, one of his patients, a polite old woman who was recovering from a bout of severe arthritis kept talking about her son and how he’d left home to join some sort of contest. It was a worrisome story, especially given the news floating around that Maru’s gladiatorial games were kicking off again. Could her son really have gotten involved in something that serious?

It was none of his business, but MMA was going to find out. The second his shift ended he was heading downtown to see if anyone had any news. It was going to be dangerous, but sometimes one needed to take risks if they were going to make the world a better place. For now he was going to enjoy that sterile scent and the echo of footsteps against the tiled floor. His time would come soon enough, he wasn’t trying to rush into it.

herO

“You ever been to an amusement park and seen the sign that says ‘You Must Be At Least This Tall to Ride This Ride’?” The woman seated next to him at the bar nodded faintly as she took a sip from her neon green drink. “How do you think they make those?” There was a pause as she cast a longing glance towards the teeming dance floor.

“A ruler?” She responded with a shrug. “I don’t know. Why don’t you tell me.” herO slid a little closer and winked.

“They use me, baby.” She had already gotten up and sauntered off in her five inches heels, but herO was too absorbed in his speech to notice. “You see, the Korean government realized that I’m the perfect height when it comes to safety regulations. Without me there would be people falling off of roller coasters left and right. The whole fabric of our society would fall apart.” He took a long, loooooong sip of his beer with the type of self satisfied aahhhhh at the end you’d see in a Sprite commercial.

Now, one might have thought herO would be discouraged after being turned down so disdainfully, but he merely turned to his right.

“You ever been to an amusement park and seen the sign that says ‘You Must Be At Least This Tall to Ride This Ride’?” This woman merely stared at him incredulously. Hey, it was his last night in Busan, could you really blame him? Tomorrow he’d be heading north to Seoul to become the next king of the world. Sure, Maru’s whole competition was a tad overblown, but it was a solid opportunity to reaffirm his fame as a man of the perfect height for amusement park safety regulations.

“What are you talking about?” She inquired. It wasn’t the correct response, but tonight, he wasn’t slowing down.

“They use me, baby. You see, the Korean government has realized that I’m the perfect height...”

Solar

On the long list of sh!@#y jobs this had to be the sh!@iest.

It was 2018 for !@#$ sake. There had to be a better way to do this. Shouldn’t the world’s elite scientists have invented some new-fangled machine with fancy sensors that could detect a freshness enzyme or something like that.

Freshness enzyme!?! How sh!@#y of a spot did you have to be in to even think about something like. It must have been the mercury getting to his brain…

Lung flukes? No. Those were from crabs. Yellowtail couldn’t do that to you, even when you ate 30 kilograms a day.

Solar took another bite, nearly choking as the scales grated against his throat. He’d been at this job for three years, but he knew within a week that being a freshness taster for supposedly sushi grade fish had to be the sh!@iest job out there.

Sure, most of the fish was the type of stuff you paid 100,000 per meal for in Seoul, but there were some wild cards mixed in that made the whole operation a real hazard. Cramps, vomiting, nausea and diarrhea so bad ten gallons of Pepto Bismol couldn’t save him were a regular occurance. Of course he still had to report to work the next day and scarf down more of the poisonous garbage.

He needed a way out, but it was hard enough to go grocery shopping with the absurd security escorts. It seemed like he wasn’t the only one who realized how terrible his job was and how difficult it would be to replace him.

Tonight was the night, though, the night Solar put it all on the line and ran. He needed to get to the big city because that’s where his salvation would lie. He’d enter the gladiatorial contest and turn his life around. Solar smiled. He’d have all the money in the world and he’d never need to even look at another fish again.