Gi-hun swore that he wouldn't get attached to anybody. Not again. He had already been through enough, he had already felt like he'd lost everything, and he didn't want to lose more. But surely this was different. Maybe, this time would be different. Maybe this time he could actually do it.

It was different. It was fair, at the start. It was you. You worked with Jun-ho to help him track down the games. You were there everytime Gi-hun started something new. Everytime he started a new search for that recruiter, each and every time it failed. You were there by his side when he had no one, and believe him, that was often. Very, very often. Well, not anymore. Not anymore because he had you. He supposed it was different. He hadn't met you in those games, he met you after. When he was already the broken and damaged man he was, and yet you stuck around. You stuck around like he meant something. Like you needed him as much as he needed you. He liked to think that you did. Even if he tried to convince himself that he wouldn't get attached to anybody again. That he wouldn't care as deeply as he now did for you. It was too late now. It had always been too late, for him.

He knew it was over the second you said that you would go with him to join the games again. Gi-hun only wanted to enter again to try and stop them, to prove to the Frontman that just because he had won, it didn't mean that he hadn't lost. And he had lost. He lost everything. And he wasn't going to let it happen again. He tried to convince you to stay, but you said that you wouldn't, that you would go to help, to be on the inside with him, while Jun-ho tried to find the island himself. You were right. Hell, you always were. And he planned on getting everybody out alive. Maybe, the second time round, he would.

He couldn't.

The first game was useless. He tried to tell them what was happening, and they did listen for the most part. Until someone died. Then they all ran. He expected it. It still hurt to see. He formed his own group, with you of course. They believed that he had played the games before, like he said. They thought that maybe he knew what games were next. He thought so too. But he didn't. The second game was different, it was like some cruel trick. He saw the way the other players looked at him, he knew how he must've looked. Like a liar. He knew he wasn't, so why did he feel like he was? You all survived that game as well. Then the next. The number of players dropped. The votes were never to leave. They never listened.

The rebellion came and ended quicker than he expected. He thought that you all could've done it, and taken over, killed all the guards. You couldn't. Again. There were too many. Only a few of you that went survived. He wished he hadn't. But then, he thought, he still had you, after all. You were the only thing holding him together. The only thing stopping him from what he had wanted to do for four goddamn years. You were his saviour, in a way. Intertwined with him. You were everything he wanted and everything he wished he was. You were everything. And he couldn't let you go. He knew that if he ever did, he would be letting himself go as well. And maybe that was about time.

The next round came and ended quicker than he wanted it to. Or maybe it was longer, he couldn't tell. It was hide and seek. Keys and knives. You were on the keys team, and he was on the knives, so obviously he spent his time going to find you the keys off the dead players so you could get out safely. He did. You both managed to survive.

That couldn't be said for so many others. So many others you had laughed with. So many you had joked with, talked with. All gone. It was like the reality of the situation dawned on you then. You weren't going to make it out alive either. There was only one winner. Only one.

Lights out started not long after the second game. Gi-hun sat up against the bedframe, and you sat beside him. You were all he had. He was all you had. In that moment, in that silence, Gi-hun had never been more aware of how much he cared for you.