Concern flares through him as she wheezes. How quickly did she run to the sick bay? “Elevator,” he grits out, knuckles white on his cane as they burst onto Deck 4 and practically sprint to the nearest elevator, pushing past throngs of guests who mill about the restaurants and shops with glazed, dreamy expressions. For them, this cruise must be a dream, but for him, it’s a fucking nightmare. Seokga pounds on the little white Up button, and when the elevator door finally opens, he hurls himself into it and closes the door before anyone other than Kisa can enter. The elevator might stop at every floor, and taking the stairs would be faster—but Seokga isn’t sure his leg can handle running up the stairs from Deck 3 to Deck 9. That had been the original plan, but one flight up, he’d acknowledged defeat to the monstrous stairways. And Kisa looks as if she’ll pass out if she’s made to run any more anyway.

Seokga would very much like to rip out the sound system as cheerful Muzak begins to play. In the mirrored ceiling of the elevator, he and Kisa are so incredibly frazzled and sweaty that the vain trickster god does something he normally would never dream of, and looks away from the mirror.

He’s relieved to hear that Kisa’s breathing has begun to steady. The elevator stops on Deck 5, and Seokga impatiently jabs his cane against the Close Door button before any of the other guests can board.

“Hey!” one of them shouts, a sunburnt man wearing the tie-dyed shirt he’d found so horrendous. The door closes on his outraged face.

“You’re going to break the elevator if you keep doing that,” Kisa warns, but Seokga ignores her, pounding the button again as they reach the sixth floor while simultaneously hitting Deck 9 with a growing determination. “Seokga, really, stop pressing the buttons! It’s not going to get us there quicker, and besides, Hwanung might not even be who we’re—”

“Even technology bends to my will,” he informs her smugly, moments before he accidentally pounds in the Emergency Stop button about a dozen times rather than the Deck 9 one. Kisa stumbles into his back as the elevator, caught somewhere between Decks 6 and 7, abruptly jolts to a stop.

There’s a moment of terrible silence.

—he is—so smart—yet so—exhaustingly dumb—

“Perhaps I spoke too soon,” admits Seokga. Kisa makes a sound that reminds him of a growling kitten who is trying very hard to be ferocious, and shoves past him—presumably to remedy his mistake.

“You—”

Her voice is abruptly drowned out by the sudden screeching over the cruise ship’s intercom. Seokga’s ears fucking shriek in pain and he grimaces as his head pounds. Kisa jumps about a foot in the air—which would be comical if the noises now being broadcast all over the SRC Flatliner weren’t so…alarming.