The song was still ringing in Mizi's ears, a phantom echo in the hollow space behind her eyes. It wasn't one of their songs, not one of the saccharine, weaponized pop anthems they were forced to perform on the main stage. This was the other music: the low, thrumming dirge of the transport ship, the sound of their gilded cage moving through the silent, uncaring void. It was the soundtrack to their abduction, a constant reminder that the planet they were born on was now just another distant, muted star in the viewport.
Another round was over. Another girl was gone, her face pixelated on the recap monitors, her existence scrubbed from the official roster as if she had never been. A ghost in the machine. Tonight, the performance had been particularly brutal. The choreography, a series of sharp, desperate movements designed to look like a dying star, had left Mizi's body a canvas of screaming aches. But it was her mind that felt the most bruised. On stage, under the glare of a thousand alien suns they called spotlights, she had caught her own reflection in the polished black floor. For a terrifying second, she hadn't recognized the girl staring back a doll with wide, vacant eyes and a smile stapled on.
Now, in the sterile quiet of their shared quarters, that doll was threatening to crack.
She sat on the edge of her designated sleep pod, her hands trembling in her lap. The crisp, recycled air of the ship did nothing to calm the frantic hummingbird of her heart. Every surface in the room the metallic walls, the cool laminate floor, the smooth plasti steel of the furniture was designed for easy sterilization. It was a room meant to be wiped clean of any evidence of life, or of death.
"Mizi."
The voice was soft, cutting through the oppressive hum. Hyuna was there, kneeling in front of her, her own stage makeup smudged beneath her worried eyes. She gently took one of Mizi's trembling hands, her touch a small, warm anchor in the cold, humming emptiness.
"Don't," Mizi whispered, the word a fragile, broken thing. "Don't look at me." She didn't want to see her own fear reflected in Hyuna's gaze.
"Hey." A second voice, sharper and more grounded, came from the doorway. Sua leaned against the frame, arms crossed. Her expression was a carefully constructed mask of indifference, but her eyes, dark and perceptive, missed nothing. They saw the way Mizi's shoulders were hunched, the way her knuckles were white. "The cameras are in sleep mode for the next cycle. They're not watching."
It was a lie, of course. They were always watching. Their alien captors, the silent, unseen audience for whom this entire bloody spectacle was arranged, were always watching. But in the brief, scheduled downtimes between broadcasts, the overt, glowing red lights of the internal surveillance units would dim. It was the illusion of privacy, and it was the only thing they had.
"That doesn't matter," Mizi choked out. "I can still feel them. In my skin."
Sua pushed off the doorframe and walked over, her movements deliberate. She didn't kneel like Hyuna. She sat beside Mizi on the pod, her presence solid, unyielding. "Then we need to give them something else to feel."
Hyuna looked from Sua to Mizi, a silent question passing between them. It was a conversation they'd had a hundred times with their eyes, a language forged in the shared trauma of their abduction and imprisonment. How do we survive another night? How do we make the next broadcast mean something other than our slow execution?
Sua's gaze was fixed on Mizi. "You're floating, Mizi. Drifting out of the airlock. You need to be grounded."
She reached out and, with a surprising gentleness, cupped Mizi's jaw, tilting her face up. Mizi's eyes were wide, swimming with a terror that was vast and deep. She looked like a girl on the edge of a cliff.
"We're going to overwrite the signal," Sua said, her voice low and steady. "Tonight, there is no stage. No audience. No votes. There is only this room. Only us."
Hyuna understood. She squeezed Mizi's hand, her other hand coming up to gently brush the pink hair from Mizi's damp forehead. "Only us," she echoed softly.
They moved her from the edge of the pod to the center, creating a small island of their own making. The abduction had stolen their homes, their families, their futures. All they had left were their own bodies, these vessels that their captors demanded they adorn and perfect and push to the breaking point for entertainment. Tonight, they would reclaim them.
Sua's hands were methodical, unfastening the complicated clasps of Mizi's stage costume. The fabric, stiff with synthetic glitter and smelling of ozone from the stage effects, fell away. Beneath it, Mizi was pale and shivering, not from cold, but from a profound, soul deep vulnerability. Hyuna's touch was the counterpoint to Sua's efficiency soft and reassuring, her fingers tracing soothing patterns on Mizi's arms and back, warming her skin, chasing away the ghosts.
"Breathe," Sua commanded, her voice a low anchor. "Feel this. Not the memory of the lights, not the fear of the next round. Just this."
Her hands moved to Mizi's chest, her palms pressing flat against her ribs. Mizi's breath hitched, a sob catching in her throat as Sua's fingers brushed against the sensitive peak of her breast. The touch was electric, a jolt of pure sensation that was completely separate from the choreographed, performative touches of the stage. This was real.
"Good," Sua murmured. She leaned over to a small, unmarked metal box she kept under her pod a container of personal contraband, of small rebellions. She retrieved two objects that glinted in the dim light: nipple clamps.
Mizi flinched. The devices looked like a part of their prison.
"Shh," Hyuna whispered, her voice close to Mizi's ear. "It's okay. It's just another feeling. A strong one. To hold you here with us."
Sua showed Mizi the clamp. "This isn't for them," she said, her voice firm. "This is for you. A point of focus. A signal you can control." She brought one of the clamps to Mizi's breast, the metal a shocking cold against her heated skin. Then, with a slow, deliberate twist of the screw, she secured it.
It wasn't pain. It was a blossom of intense, overwhelming sensation. A sharp, bright ache that pulled every frayed nerve in Mizi's body to a single, sharp point. It was grounding. Real. Sua attached the second one, and Mizi cried out, a sound that was half pain, half pleasure.
With her senses now tethered to those two aching points, the rest of the world began to feel different. Hyuna's touch, which had been soothing, now became reverent. She leaned in, her lips replacing her fingers, pressing a soft, chaste kiss to Mizi's forehead. Then another to her temple. It wasn't a kiss of passion, but of worship. Of care.
Sua watched for a moment, then leaned in from the other side, her own lips brushing against Mizi's collarbone. Their breaths ghosted over Mizi's skin, a warm, living presence in the sterile room. They began to rotate, a slow, deliberate dance of reclamation. Hyuna's lips found Mizi's, a soft, questioning pressure that deepened when Mizi didn't pull away. It was a kiss of shared breath, a silent promise of I am here, you are here, we are real.
As Hyuna kissed her, her hand came up to gently cup Mizi's breast, her thumb stroking the tender skin just beside the metal clamp. Then, they shifted. Sua moved in, her kiss different firmer, more demanding, a claiming. Her tongue traced the seam of Mizi's lips, and when Mizi opened for her, it was an surrender. While Sua kissed her, Hyuna's mouth traveled down Mizi's neck, her teeth grazing the delicate skin before her lips closed over the other clamped nipple, not to remove it, but to warm it, her tongue laving the stiff, metal pinched peak.
The rotation continued, a dizzying carousel of sensation. A kiss from Hyuna, soft and deep, while Sua's mouth worshipped at her breasts. Then a kiss from Sua, fierce and consuming, while Hyuna's hands mapped the plains of her stomach and the curve of her hips. They were overwriting her, touch by touch, kiss by kiss. The phantom music was gone, replaced by the wet, soft sounds of their mouths, their ragged breathing, and the low, constant thrum of the ship.
The dynamic shifted again, becoming more intentional. Hyuna settled behind Mizi, pulling her back against her chest, becoming a warm, living chair. She nuzzled into Mizi's pink hair while her hands came around to Mizi's front, her fingers finding the clamps. She didn't remove them, but played with them, twisting the screws minutely, sending fresh, sharp waves of sensation through Mizi's core. At the same time, she captured Mizi's mouth in another deep kiss, swallowing the gasps and moans that were now falling freely from Mizi's lips.
This was Sua's cue. She slid down the length of the sleep pod, settling between Mizi's splayed legs. Her hands, strong from countless hours of dance practice, gripped Mizi's thighs, holding her open. Mizi tensed for a moment, a final vestige of vulnerability, but Hyuna held her tighter, her kiss more insistent.
"Let her," Hyuna breathed against her lips. "Let us have all of you."
Sua's gaze was dark and unwavering as she looked up the length of Mizi's body. Then she lowered her head.
The first touch of her tongue was a lightning strike. A soft, wet, deliberate stroke through Mizi's folds that made her jolt against Hyuna's hold. Sua didn't relent. She established a slow, maddening rhythm, her tongue circling Mizi's clit before flicking against it with pinpoint accuracy. Mizi cried out, her head falling back against Hyuna's shoulder, her back arching. The dual assault was unraveling her the sharp, possessive ache in her breasts under Hyuna's ministrations, and the building, coiling heat between her legs where Sua was now feasting.
Hyuna alternated between kissing Mizi's neck and whispering into her ear. "That's it… feel her… she's bringing you back to us…"
Sua's technique was as precise as her dance. She licked and nibbled at Mizi's clit, her movements knowing exactly how to build the pressure without pushing her over the edge too soon. Then, Mizi felt a new sensation the slow, deliberate press of one, then two of Sua's fingers at her entrance. Sua's mouth never stilled, her tongue a constant, swirling pressure on her clit as her fingers pushed inside, filling her, stretching her.
Mizi gasped, her eyes flying open. The feeling of being so completely occupied, so utterly claimed, was overwhelming. Hyuna's hands on her breasts, her mouth on her neck; Sua's mouth and fingers working in a perfect, devastating syncopation deep within her most intimate space. It was too much. It was everything.
"Tell us," Sua murmured, her voice a husky vibration against Mizi's core that made her shudder violently. "What do you feel?"
"I... I can't..." Mizi's voice was a shredded whisper. "It's... too much."
"No, it's not," Hyuna countered, her voice thick with her own arousal. "It's exactly enough. Stop thinking. There is nothing but this. Feel my hands on you. Feel Sua's mouth. Feel the pull of the metal on your skin. That's all that's real right now."
Sua doubled her efforts, her fingers curling inside Mizi, finding a spot that made her see stars. Her tongue lashed Mizi's clit, relentless and perfect.
And Mizi did. She let go. She let the artifice of the performer fall away, let the fear of the contestant dissolve. She was no longer Mizi, the idol ranked number seven, fighting for her life. She was just Mizi, a body being worshipped, a spirit being called back from the void by the two most important people in her universe.
The signals converged. The dull ache of the clamps sharpened into a brilliant fire that seemed connected by a live wire to the deep, swirling pressure Sua was building between her legs. Hyuna's whispered praises, Sua's hungry moans, the slick, wet sounds of their joining it all fused into a single, rising frequency. It was a broadcast of pure, animal sensation, a signal so powerful it drowned out everything else.
Her body arched, a silent scream building in her chest. This was it a signal overload. A moment of pure, unadulterated being that was not for the cameras, not for the judges, not for the unseen audience. It was a broadcast entirely for herself, a burst of static and light that wiped everything else away. The climax tore through her, a convulsive, shattering wave that left her trembling and boneless, a raw, sobbing mess held together only by their arms.
In the shuddering, quiet aftermath, they didn't speak. Sua gently withdrew, crawling up to curl against Mizi's side, laying her head on her stomach. Hyuna gently removed the clamps, the release of pressure a final, profound sensation. They curled together in the center of the pod, three bodies tangled together, seeking warmth in the sterile cold. Limbs intertwined, skin slick with sweat, the scent of their sex a human rebellion against the sanitized air.
Nothing had changed. The low hum of the ship was still there. The threat of the next round still hung over them like a guillotine. Their abduction was still their reality.
But as Mizi drifted into an exhausted sleep, tucked between the warm bodies of the only two people in the universe who understood, she knew they had won. They hadn't won the game. They had won the night. And for now, in the endless, star dusted void of their captivity, that was a victory profound enough to build a future on.