#I think I fucked up the chronology but whatever it’s been a million years since I watched s1

[sentientsky]

“Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude,” Ross Gay

hey gaymers, back again with a poem that kicked me in the teeth :)

#I think I fucked up the chronology but whatever it’s been a million years since I watched s1 #last one of these I’ll probably do for awhile cause I’m getting tired of mashing the same photos together #ineffable husbands #crowley #good omens 2 #aziraphale #aziracrow #good omens #go2 #ineffable lovers #ineffable wives #good omens season 2 #good omens edit #gomens 2 #David tennant #Michael sheen #gomens

[herobrinna]

Well, considering im still mildly pissed about the toh finale, wanting a distraction from it, and considering todays date, I think its the perfect time to infodump my toh x homestuck au.

I hope whoever reads this suffers <3

Ok, starting chronologically (or attempting to at least) with the collectors' backstory, or as I've so creatively renamed them to "star people", to not confuse the species with The Collector (the character).

So, the star people's species originated very early since the universe's creation, some might even argue that they are the first sapient species to ever exist, although verifying that would be impossible, for the universe was a very chaotic place back then, with all the destruction happening let and right, pockets for life to emerge were very small and far between. But the star people got initially lucky, and got a very quiet space in the newborn universe.

Of course, relatively speaking, that quiet didn't last long (it lasted quite a few million years but like). The star people were just about discovering technology that would let them expand into the stars as tragedy struck, and for one reason or another their home world was destroyed.

With there being so few viable planets at that time they could settle on, they decided to adapt their bodies to survive in space. With a mixture of mechanical and genetic engineering the species redefined themselves. And with rapid improvements in technology they became almost immortal beings, who could change their bodies however they wanted to suit them.

And thus, they started expanding into space. First, only on the outskirts of galaxies, where things have already mostly calmed down, but with their pseudo-immortality they "soon" saw the rest of the universe reach an equilibrium.

And so began their empire. Though the star people didn't need planets to survive, and they could very much acquire materials from inhospitable worlds; they quickly gained a sort of obsession with discovering and cataloguing any new life form they found. And most of all using the lifeforms' genetics to change their appearances, a sort of fashion statement.

But there was a problem, see despite all their progress they never managed to figure out how to travel faster than light. This isn't that much of a problem for an immortal species of course, they are used to waiting, but the longer they lived the greedier they became, wanting to catalogue everything there ever was, and change their looks to be based of what they considered the coolest creatures.

But oh sweet luck came to them! As they discovered a species they called the titans.

The titans come from a highly oxygenated but also high gravity world, that ended up giving birth to buff ass giants lol. The titans might not have been the largest or strongest species that planet had, but they had 2 things unique about them, 1) they were sapient, and this was the first time the star people encountered another sapient species, and 2) their blood had magical properties.

Soon the star people discovered, that whatever magic, for a lack of better explanation, the titans had in their blood, it was a major ingredient in creating wormholes.

With that, the star people driven with greed, decided to attempt enslaving the titans to harvest their blood.

The titans of course didn't like that, and although they were a tribal species, it turned out their magic is really fucking good at fucking with technology. Thus a war broke out. Blah blah blah, too many details later that'll take me ages to write, the star people lost.

One of the main contributors to their demise was due to editing themselves so much they could only be "born" through artificial means, and due to their semi-immortal lifespans, children took thousands of years to mature to adulthood. So during their prime this species ended up having a very small population (relatively speaking) that was spread all over the place, then during the war they just weren't able to replenish their species in time.

Tho this war has rendered them technically extinct, as the few that remained weren't able to upkeep all the technology required to "birth" new members of their species, and thus the few remnants left decided to live the last of their life exploring the stars.

Overtime, even though their technology was literally designed to last millions of years, it, like them isn't truly immortal, and so with no one to upkeep it, they were slowly dying out one by one.

Some star people, in their final moments of existence decided to make a name for themselves, these are:

Caliborn and Calliope were the last of the species to ever be born. Due to an error they ended up sharing a body and the lab they were born in was long abandoned anyways, so they fended for themselves in their shared body, until they managed to figure out how to make separate bodies for each other. At which point they separated, both absolutely despising each other, with each having different outlooks on what they should do with their newfound freedom.

Caliborn hated everything and went out to destroy as much as possible. Calliope treasured all life and went out to protect as much as possible.

Both of them died way before either humanity or trollanity came into existence, yet they each had an affect on the respective species planets that ended up being factors in their developments.

Calliope found earth when the tragedy that extincted the dinosaurs happened, she used her last bits of life to help restore the planet. Caliborn, when he found Beforus¹, he used his last bits of powers to make the sun as harsh and hostile as possible, he did so to any nearby solar system as well, no longer able to completely destroy shit.

The Sufferer/Jesus were the same person, just a funky ass star person that decided to go around finding sapient species, disguising themselves as one of their own and fucking around.

Most other star people kept to themselves until they died, although 2 still remain:

Hooty was actually the star people's last resort, an attempt at making a weapon that will be effective against the titans. Sadly, he couldnt care less about the war and ended up just vibing on the titan's planet.

The Collector was a kid that was put in stasis, in hopes that he could be raised after the war was over, but forgotten cuz, well everyone died, and Belos found him later, so yh.

Now skipping a bunch of time forward.

Of course everyone know the Alternians manage to find a cheatcode to faster than light travel through the use of the slave labour of their own kind. Thus, with the rapidly expanding into space it wasn't long until they found the Titans as well.

And sadly there wasn't much the titans could do to protect themselves this time. Not only did their magic not do much against the trolls' biotech, but also the trolls greatly outnumbered the titans and could just throw a bunch of lowbloods to be canon fodder.

Thus with the titans enslaved the Alternians now had the much more efficient travel tech of wormholes.

This actually had one nice thing to it tho; giving lowbloods more rights²

With, as close to straight up teleportation as you can get, Alternians set out to conquer the galaxy now faster than ever.

This brings us to humanity.

The year is 2648³ and humanity has started its own space exploration age, having discovered their own way of efficiently traveling the galaxy, that I can't be bothered to make up.

Two brothers-

Actually this is way too long already, I'll do the Wittebrothers' backstory later.

--------------------

1 - So basically this au is actually an au of au, which is just a generic no-sgrub au were i re-did troll history. To summarise, trolls originated on Beforus but due to the industrial revolution and its consequences they had to relocate to what is now known as Alternia. Later all history on their origins and Beforus itself was erased.

2 - The Empress at the time⁴ didnt care much for anything other than conquering new planets, and Alternian owned space was already split into regions with sort of their own local governments, kinda like American states, quite a few of which had ...nicer treatment of lowbloods. But with wormholes goldbloods weren't needed as batteries anymore so they managed to protest for more rights.

3 - Yh, I'm just being lazy and setting their story a 1000 years from canon. "Oh but shouldn't it be in 2613 then?" you might ask, and I'm going to tell you that the show is wrong.

4 - The Alternian Empire had many leaders in the past, but the Condesce was the best at erasing history.

------------------

Wow did anyone actually read all that?

Well if someone did, heres a shitty sketch of Belos' "redesign" as an apology for not actually getting to his backstory:

Uhhh, I need to really rework the colours, but it is what it is for the time being.

#Owlstuck au #philip wittebane #emperor belos #(<- just for the sketch at the end) #homestuck #the owl house #toh #the collector #toh hooty #(<- briefly mentioned)

[homieswithhades]

why steve rogers returning to the past was wrong

disclaimer: im clearly a stucky enthusiast, but please, do not be thrown off by that. i admit, there may be undertones of bias because of that in the following, but i did my best with trying to lay out the facts and draw logical conclusions, so do please give me a chance. also, i may have accidentaly omitted some moments and some quotes may not be 100% word for word, as my memory lowkey sucks. ALSO this is NOT a peggy hate post!! i think shes a dope and underrated character and quite frankly she was done dirty. but i also definitely h8 the trope of badass woman falls for the hero.

first and foremost, every sane person knows endgame was complete and utter bullshit when dealing with steves character, so this post will be more for you to maybe show (and hopefully convince) some stubborn friend or family member. nice, concise (not) and including proof from the movies (+a few tweets and stucky undertones, if u dont fw that i respect it but bucky is an integral part to steves character regardless of how u interpret their relationship) here is why steves character development was thrown away at the end of endgame.

let us begin at looking at the cap trilogy.

in ca:tfa it should be noted that steve had no one to return to in the 40s, except bucky. i believe steves relationship with peggy was no where near as developed as it should have been to elicit him returning exclusively for her. as we are aware, steves driving force has absolutely always been bucky. bucky was there for steve after his parents died, when he was sick, and always protected him from whatever trouble he got himself into. "until the end of the line" right? steves relationship with peggy was forced and short lived, literally, we're talking a matter of months here. i need to keep emphasising the important disparity between bucky and peggy, as it is absolutely key in this whole argument. steve dropped everything and went against every order just to even attempt to save bucky. even the slightest chance of him surviving being captured was enough for steve to break into a hydra camp and free the 107th division. steve even had the chance to capture zola, one of the main villains and masterminds of the war, but again, steve prioritised bucky. when theyre trying to escape the exploding hydra camp, the exchange between steve and bucky is critical. steve says "go! get out of here!" as all he wanted was bucky escaping safely. he put bucky's life over his own (this wasnt the first time he did this, nor the last) but bucky rooted himself to the spot, and yelled back "no, not without you!". they both escaped safely as we know, and then steve gathers the howling commandos to take down the red skull. bucky then falls off the train, nd steve blames himself for his death, even visibly crying over it twice. steves morals went from "i dont wanna kill anyone. i dont like bullies, i dont care where theyre from" before buckys death, to "i wont stop until all of hydra are dead or captured" after. stuff happens and steve defeats the red skull and is now in control of the flying ship with the bombs. he connects the comms with peggy and she tries to convince him theres another way to disarm the ship. steve was so dedicated at that point he didnt even want to hear it. he didnt even attempt to do anything to ensure his survival. this alone proves, peggy was not important enough to him to return to.

next is ca:tws. The stevebucky movie. in the museum, peggy confirms that steve saved the man from the 107th division who eventually became her husband (steve was never in the 107th, just to clarify) i believe her husbands name was daniel sousa (as revealed in the marvels agents of shield show) steve then finds out peggy is alive and talks to her. she, in short, tells him she's lived her life, and it was his turn to live his in the time hes in. the "my best girl" line was unnecessary and out of place; again, steve barely knew her. again, shit goes down, and steve finds out the winter soldier is bucky and immediately drops everything, and becomes dead set on saving him. not killing, not imprisoning, but saving him. no matter the cost. "he saw me, and he didnt even know me" "hes not the kind you save, hes the kind you stop. he won't recognise you" "he will." god, steve KNEW bucky would recognise him. regardless of the brainwashing, steve managed to break through the barrier hydra fought so hard to drill into buckys mind. nothing ever broke him out of that state exept for steve. "im not gonna fight you, youre my friend." "youre my mission" "then finish it. cos im with you till the end of the line." [[good fucking lord let me break out of my essay-esque semi professional format here and just say how fucking heartbreaking those lines are. oh my god. read them, over and over until it hits you.]] steve shows us again, that he is willing to not only die for bucky, but literally die by his hand. he would let bucky kill him. he'd dropped his shield. he didnt fight back. steve always, always, ALWAYS got up and fought back. always. exept that time. the time bucky could have killed him. that scene is the essence of "im with you till the end of the line" because then, it was true. it was true because steve was okay with dying at buckys mercy. theres a difference between sacrificing yourself for the greater good (steve going into the ice), willing to die for someone (steve risking his life multiple times in attempts to save bucky) and finally, being willing to let someone kill you, because you love and trust them so much (hellicarier scene). the difference between peggy and bucky's relationship to steve is that steve may be willing to die for either, but only willing to be killed by one. not to mention, bucky pulled steve from the river. he recognised him. steve broke through 70 years of brainwashing with such impact it literally drove bucky away from hydra out of his own free will.

in between ca:tws and ca:cw its confirmed (im p sure sam says it) that him and steve looked for bucky for two. years. even off screen, bucky was steves priority.

im going to squeeze in 2 points from from age of ultron here, for chronology's sake:

steves worst nightmare, as portayed in the movie, is LITERALLY going back to the 40s and being stuck there (with peggy too??lmfao) and also the quote "family, stability, the man who wanted all that went in the ice 75 years ago. i think another one came out." objectively confirms that steve isn't the man he used to be, and doesnt want to return to the past. aou may have sucked, but that doesn't mean the character development should be thrown away.

ca:cw. hoo boy. steve went against 117 countries and half of his closest friends and colleagues because he believed bucky was innocent of the bombing of the un conference. god, steve quite literally, did everything to defend and protect bucky. though i shall acknowledge that steve did attend peggy's funeral, however, there was no real connotations there other than the fact he was mourning her death (understabdibly so). steve then proceeds to protect bucky for 2 hours 27 mins and 41 seconds to the point where they escape together to siberia after the airport fight. "i dont know if im worth all this steve" "what you did all those years... it wasnt you. you didnt have a choice." "i know. but i did it" again, absolutely heartbreaking quotes if you read it a couple of times and truly understand the meaning of them. steve somewhat indirectly tells bucky yes, yes he is worth all of this. otherwise, he wouldn't be doing it. a quote to support that would be "for the longest time, i always did what i thought was right." (disclaimer this is not a direct quote i deadass couldnt find it to save my life, i belive steve said it at some point during civil war or tws, but the point is, bucky is the only thing that could have shaken steves morals so intensely.) and finally, the most important part of cw, the fight at the end with tony. bucky and steve constantly protected each other. steve kept fighting because he was fighting for bucky. to keep him safe from tony and the world. he got up, time and time again. "i can do this all day." the fact that he said that to tony, some people consider them the closest of friends, proves again, a million times over, bucky is more important to steve than literally anything else, INCLUDING his shield. his mantle. he dropped it and left it like it was nothing, because his priority was bucky. as always.

theres not much to discuss for infinity war other than their hug whicg was honestly just adorable.

mmmmm endgame. i will not go into how much i hate that movie because it would be a rant quintuple the length of this one. in the support group, steve dead ass fucking says "you gotta move on. you gotta move on" and that sentiment was literally forgotten at the end. my main point for endgame is this. people tend to tell me, the reason steve abandoned bucky and went back to be with peggy is because he knew that he was finally safe. :/. if you had half a braincell youd know that's not true. the steve we know, never would have left bucky for good, ESPECIALLY after the "dont do anything stupid until i get back" exchange [[god i want to beat the shit out of the r*ssos]] mostly because, bucky had fucking no one in the time he was living in!!! no family, no friends and most heartbreakingly, no one he could trust. (yes sam was there but were just seeing their friendship develop now in tfatws, all that wasnt there in endgame) and secondly, what made steve think bucky was entirely safe??? half of the worlds population just suddenly reappeared, which as we see now, there were massive consequences for that. i simply believe steve is not that stupid. steve going back was disrespectful not only to his character, but to bucky AND peggy. most importantly, the steve we've been watching since 2011 would NEVER abandon bucky, no matter how safe he thought he was (he visited him frequently in wakanda, the safest place on the planet arguably ffs) especially for such a dumbass and quite frankly, nonsensical reason as going back to be with peggy, who clearly stated to him she moved on, and so should he (which he did. idk endgame writers prolly didnt watch the previous movies :/) its not even debatable. bucky is more important to steve than peggy. even in terms of screentime.

now allow some tweets to speak for me, this one being the absolute most important one:

ladies and gentlefolk, all of the stuff ive said can be summarised in that last line. "it would be contrary to who he is."

heres some more:

and now finally, id like to briefly mention steve and tfatws, so beware of spoilers (writing this as of ep 4 coming out; praying it doesn't age badly)

bucky mentions steve, unprompted, fucking constantly. he clearly isnt over steve leaving, and im hoping that gets acknowledged and talked out in the show.

in conclusion, tl:dr, steve shouldn't have returned to the past and stayed there, it is contrary to who he is, as shown to us through his trilogy and other appearances in the mcu. not to mention the timeline bullshit in endgame makes zero sense in the first place.

#long post #stucky #captain america #steve rogers #mcu #marvel #tfatws #bucky barnes #peggy carter #hwh's marvel thoughts #please dont bullshit me in the comments also i dont have the strength #imma hide this in the tags praying no 1 will b bothered to look but steve and bucky gay #everytime some1 calls their relationship brotherly it takes 10 years off my life nd makes me wanna impale myself ❤ #also no beta we die like men #my meta

[popculturebuffet]

One Year Anniversary: Top 12 Ducktales Episodes!

Happy anniversary all you happy people! Yes it was one year ago today I started reviewing animation and it’s been a ride to be sure. I’d always WANTED to be a reviewer: I love going on and on about stuff I love, really digging into it and picking it apart... but I could never get started. I tried youtube but I didn’t have the money for the equipment nor a proper shooting space to record, so my efforts.. were not great. And while I TRIED text reviews, my own looming pile of self hatred meant every attempt I made was shot down when it got hard as me not being good enough. 

But one year ago I finally got past that. I’d already been reviewing a bit, doing invididual issues of comics... but got way in over my head trying to do the current line of X-Men comics as it came out, and wisely bowed out of that. But that left a gap: I had nothing to cover week to week and with a demanding new job, I drifted into just doing in charcter chats, little fan fictions script styles. Not bad work, I should do some more at some point and I even got a comissoin once in a while, but nothing I could really live on and not what I wanted to do with my life. 

Enter Ducktales. I’d always WANTED to review the show.. and when the double premire happened, I decided fuck it, and put up my thoughts. And then decided.. hey maybe I can do this every week.. and slowly.. my work evolved, getting better and better, getting more and more likes. I picked up Amphibia when that came by week to week.

And eventually.. this went from a hobby, if one I was passionate about to a career. Not a largely paying one, as only one person was really intrested in paying me for it, friend of the blog and our fincial backer @weirdkev27, but .. it’s money and i’m now making about 30 dollars a month due to a comination of comissions and patreon. Other contributers are always welcome mind you, my patreon is here if your curious and comissions are 5 dollars an episode, but i’ts just nice to have money coming in. To have gone from simply WANTING to review things and make a living off it.. to simply doing it. 

And it’s been one hell of a year.. and not just because 2020 felt like hell or 2021 began with a full on insurrection. I feel like i’ve acomplished a lot in the year i’ve been doing this: I finished what I started with Ducktales season 3, getting better and better as I went. And I didn’t stop there with ducks: I started covering what brought me to Ducks in the first place, the Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck, and while that retrospective has slid a bit on the schedule, I intend to get it back on track this month. I reviewed a bunch of Darkwing Duck episodes leading up to the Just Us Justice Ducks.. chronologically anyway. The actual airing order reads like someone took 50 issues of a comic, made it rain with them, then just started reading whatever ones they picked up randomly. I also covered some of Duck Master Carl Barks work with the classics Night on Bear Mountain, A Christmas for Shacktown and Back to the Klondike, with more to come. 

And the Duck didn’t stop at just reviews I did on my own: Kev comissioned two MASSIVE retrospectives from me: My first for him was Ride of the Three Caballleros where in just a few short months I covered the boys entire televisied careers together from the movie, to house of mouse, to mickey and the roadster racers, to ducktales (again) and finishing with the wonderful Legend of the Three Caballeros. It has probably the worst Daisy imaginable, but otherwise is really excellent and i’m glad I finally watched it. I also covered Don Rosa’s two stories with the boys as part of it. It was a fun ride and I enjoyed every minute of it... okay most of them again Three Cabs Daisy is the worst. And once that finished Kev started up another idea: Shadow Into Light: a look at Lena’s character arc from start to finish that has gone on to be my most popular series on this blog, and that finishes next week. And there’s more to come as after that there’s a short breather with a look at Lilo and Stitch’s crossover episodes.. folllowed by me looking at all three of season 2′s ducktales arcs. And I fully intend to have covered every episode of the series by this time next year, so stay tuned. 

Outside of ducks though I didn’t slow down. I restarted my Tom Lucitor retrospective, covering what i feel to be one of Star Vs’ two best characters, tied with eclipsa, and my personal faviorite as he redeemeed himself, found love and I bitched a lot about the horrible directions the series took and probabably will more as that’s still not done yet. I did what I always wanted to do and started looks at some of my faviorite comics ever, starting with Life and Times and adding in New X-Men and Scott PIlgrim. I also threw in the awesome comic Blacksad. I did pride month for the first time and not only came out publicly, but also did two whole arcs i’m proud of with The Saluna episodes of Loud house and the rednid episodes of OK KO, and generally just had myself a good old fashioned time as an out bi man reviewing childrens cartoons. 

I started Season 2 of amphibia with it’s lows of an endlesss road trip and highs of adding Marcy to the cast and giving us more of the silky voiced keith david. And finally Patreon wise Kev’s taken me on a hell o fa journey: In addition to the restrospectives i’ve covered some additional darkwing duck, and a simpsons homage to the duck comics... but also got a bit weird and obscure with detours like the lost animnaics sucessor Histeria, the apocalyptic comedy where Santa dosen’t know how doors work Whoops! and the adventures of Santa’s bratty teen daughter jingle belle. In short.. it’s been a long year but damn has it been fun and there’s more to come. I’d like to thank all of you for reading, thank my Patreons Kev and Emma for supporting me, and thank my family for doing the same.  So with that out of the way, I figured the best way to celebrate was to do something i’ve been wanting to do for a long time, something honoring the show that gave me this calling in the first place. And with Season 3 sadly being the last, and enough weeks having passed for me to digest it between the finale and today, I could think of nothing better than my top 12 episodes of Ducktales.

Ducktales is one of the best cartoons of the 2010′s. Brilliantly taking EVERYTHING that had come before, the comics, the original cartoon and every bit of duck media period to craft a masterful, unique and wonderful reboot. It was funny, it was insane, and it had damn good character arcs. By the end every member of the main cast along with major supporting cast members like Fenton, Drake and especially Lena, had changed and signifigantly at that. The show was everything I could’ve dreamed of and more and I miss it terribly, hoping DIsney will do a revivial movie at some point. For now though, Frank and Matt’s run on ducktales, as they called it and I do too since i’m a massive comic book nerd, it’s time to look back on my favorite tales of ducks. So grab your sharks, your number one dimes and your friendship cakes with clear gay undertones and join me under the cut as I celebrate one of my faviorite shows and my anniversary in the best way possible. 

12. House of the Lucky Gander! 

 So as i’ve gone on about before and no doubt will again, Donald kinda got the short end of the stick in season 1. While Frank and Matt had good story intentions, keeping Donald away from adventure since he had no interest in it, in practice it meant a beloved Disney Icon who they and disney HEAVILY promoted as part of the series and whose being here this go round was a big draw for fans of the comics.... was only in a quarter of the season and only got TWO plots centered around him in 23 episodes, with only one being the main plot of the episode. The PIlot and Finale both centered around the family more as a whole if your curious how I counted those so while he got plenty of focus in both, it’s still not a day in the limelight sort of thing. 

But unusually for Donald, he lucked out as his one big starring role for Season 1 was both one of my faviorites and one of Season 1′s most inventive outings.  A lot of the episodes enegy comes from a one two punch of a great guest star and one of the series best settings. The guest star is of course everyone’s faviorite overly lucky himbo Gladstone Gander. The show adapted the prick perfectly: The original Gladstone from the comics.. was the worst asshole imaginable, utterly insufferable. And for a villian, and Donald’s rival, that’s all well and good.. but his super luck meant he RARELY , if ever, suffered any consequences for being just...

The 87 series simply made him nicer, while Going Quackers simply removed his luck. No adaptation really got how to make this fucker work.. until this one. Here Frank split the diffrence: Gladstone is still smug.. but he’s no longer actively malicious. While he is an insensitive prick to Donald in this one, unlike the comics he’s not constantly bragging about his luck or how great he is or actively BAITING Donald to fight with him or trying to ruin his relationship or a million other reasons he sucks and I hate him.

This version by contrast... is generous. He’s not the most empathetic, because he doesn’t get how life works, but he does share the riches of the casnio with everyone and in a cameo appearance in “Treasure of the Found Lamp” gladly offers his nephews some diamonds. He’s got a nice surface level charm to him that makes you understand why people like him.. but it’s also clear ther’es nothing UNDER that of value, making you equally understand why Scrooge and Donald hate him. Gladstone in this reboot is a perfect example of why we need reboots or new adaptations in the first place: Because sometimes the original got something wrong or something can be done much better by the new writers. 

He’s perfectly paired with the setting: The House of Lucky Fortune, a mystical casino with an East Asian astatic based in the country of Macaw and provides two great plots. Donald’s really highlights his character: His understandable jealousy at gladstone earning the boys love through nothing while he struggles to make a living for them, and how he feels like a looser and like Gladstone is simply showing that off instead of just not knowing what empathy is. Having Louie be the one to bond with Gladstone was also just pitch pefefct, as is showing some depth for the boy by having himr ealize his hero is an asshole and be the one to help donald in the end. 

The other plot is just pure joy though and is where the setting REALLY shines: Scrooge and the rest of the kids try to leave.. but can’t find the exit. This is where the creative part comes in: The Casino simply morphs to keep people trapped, and caters to them, giving them whatever they want to keep them trapped. In the cases of the kids it’s all hilarious and adorably in character: Huey becomes entranced by a fancy water show, in one of his best bits of the season, Dewey gets a pet tiger who sadly did not come home with him and Webby gets to live the dream we’ve all had of stuffing her face directly in a choclate fountain. Scrooge’s escape is likewise clever: He simply prepares to get a room.. then books it as the check in desk is ALWAYS near the front. 

We then find out Gladston’es trapped get the whole mystical contest with absolutely gorgeous animation, i’ll talk about it in full some time but this episode is just a treat to watch, has a great arc for donald and had some memorable gags. I can’t help but smile when I watch it. 

11. The Dangerous Chemistry of Gandra Dee!  As I mentioned before i’m a superhero nerd so naturally Fenton was one of my faviorite parts of the show. Frank and Matt were just damn good at crafting superhero stories, and like gladstone improved fenton turning him from an awkward donald stand in to an awkward peter parker-esque science nerd who just wants to be a good person and the best hero he can be. He got into science not just because he thinks it’s neat, but because he honestly wants to help people and you can’t help but foot for him whenever he pops up. Lin Manuel Miranda is a large reason for that, bringing his incomparable a-game to the character. While we sadly didn’t get a ton of gizmoduck focused episodes, the fatct we got AS MANY as we did and that Lin didn’t drop out for a minute even with his busy schedule was a miracle and I’m acknowledging that. 

As for why this one, I feel it builds brilliantly on the previous Fentoncentric episode Who Is Gizmoduck?! which just BARELY didn’t make this list and uses the fact we haven’t seen fenton in a while as both a plot point and to move some things forward without having to spend screentime they clearly didn’t have. By having Fenton be just burnt out on superheroics it finds a way to both explain where he’s been, he’s been busy with his new job, and give us an interesting angle to the old “superhero is tired of the life” thing. He never once complains about saving people or stuff... it’s just like any job it gets tiring after a while. As someone who has his dream job but has struggled with it from time to time, I vastly relate. 

Though while I love my boy and Lin is game as always, the episodes real MVP is my other boy Huey. The episode has moved Huey up from being simply Fenton’s fanboy to being his best friend, and adorable as hell relationship. The two clearly respect and appricate each other and Huey is looking out for his buddy the whole episode. His love of love is also just really cute. Added in the mix is Webby, who in one of my faviorite gags of the series, finds out Fenton is  Gizmoduck because Huey is incredibly and insanely blatant with his unecessary coverup. But she of course is game to help while Fenton is trying to play it casual. We also just get a waterfall of great gags as everyone overdoes it wingmanning for fenton: Huey sets up an itallian bistro and tries to purposfully create a lady and the tramp situation, and sings opera (With Manny on acordian), the wonderfully 80′s suit from Fenton’s dad his mom gives him to wear, and Launchpad, who gives us a tremendous list of his exes, and plays my favorite song of the series: It’s a Date, a micheal mcdonnel riff. 

This episode also wisely ups Mark’s Beaks game as Fenton’s arch enemy, still keeping him hilaroius, with the guy acting like a bored teenager and guzzling so much nanite jucie he turns into a hulk, as well as said hulk mode leading to a ton of great gags from kidnapping the children (”I got your kids.. are they your kids? I don’t know how this family works), to “take that coach dad” to eating a pie with tins and all and wondering about said tins. But he’s an actual threat now, taking on fenton in one hell of a fight, and having an utterly transcendent scene where he hacks his way past gyro’s security while dancing.. and dabbing because of course he does. It’s a fun, well done character piece that’s mostly here for i’ts laugh but Fenton’s struggle with Gizmo overtaking his life, and finding out someone he truly hit it off iwth only wanted him for that.. it’s really good stuff and Lin’s delivery after Fenton finds out, the pure pain and betryal in his voice, is just excellent. Also that opera scene is poetry. 

10. Quack Pack!

One of the episodes that started my career naturally landed here. Not for that reason though: Quack Pack is a fun riff on sitcoms, specifically the tgif ones of the 90′s that Disney Afternoon Kids no doubt also watched, the kinds Disney Channel still makes today, and most importanly the kind the Disney Afternoon itself made like Goof Troop and well... Quack Pack. 

Riffs on sitcoms are nothing new and the last year has been FULL of them. 2020 gave us this episode, Beef House and the wonderful “The Perfect House” episode of Close Enough, and this year gave us WandaVision, my second favorite MCU project so far, right behind Black Panther, which used the sitcom deconstruction to create one hell of a character study. 

So you’d think with a year having passed and this concept happening as an entire mini series would dull this one.. but no. it’s still damn funny, having fun at the cliches while, again like WandaVision, having one of the main cast be responsible by accident but go along with it. The episode pivots from glorious affectionate parody of cheesy sitcoms, to that plus horrifying “Humans”, and a character piece for Donald. This brings Donald’s hatred and fed up ness with adventure to a head revealing his fondest wish is just to have a normal life and not loose anyone again. 

It takes one of his best friends to snap him out of it. Look Goofy is my second faviorite of the sensational seven, an episode with him was already an easy sell for me.. but the episode uses him really well. First for laughs as he’s gentically dispositioned to be a perfect sitcom neighbor.. but also for heart. With his family preoccupied and a bit hurt, i’ts Goofy who cuts to the heart of the issue, pointing out NO ONE is normal and even his normal domestic life raising Max, who we see go to prom with roxanne eeeeee, has all sorts of chaos. Normal is what you make of it and pining for some ideal that will never happen was just tearing donald apart piece by piece and by letting go of that.. he finally begins to grow as a person throughout the season. It’s also a great thematic tie in to the season’s overall plot with Bradford and what Makes donald, despite also disliking the chaos his family gets into, different. Donald accepted it and grew as a person.. Bradford clung to his hate and it ate him alive. Or turned him into a non-sapient kind of vulture. Before I close this part out Jaleel White is also excellent and I wish eh’d get back into voice acting. He’s so freaking good at it. Seriously man i’d love to see him and ben in a sonic property together as a mythology gag. Same with Jims cummings and carey. Just think about it whoever owns the sonic movies.. think about it. 

9. The Last Adventure!

Look I knew this was coming, you knew this was coming. But it had to be on here. The Last Adventure is not perfect: The lack of a build up episode like the previous two finales had really hurt this one: even at about 70 minutes, it still feels rushed in places and Huey, one of hte main characters of the season, dosen’t feel like he has a full payoff to his character like Dewey and Louie got. 

But despite those flaws.. this episode is just a damn good ending. Almost everyone gets a big moment paying off their character arc, everyone in the party that comes to rescue webby and huey, along with the two themselves, gets a moment to show off, and everything comes together to give us one last epic sendoff. There’s just moment stacked on moment stacked on moment from Launchpads heroic second wind and donning of the gizmoduck armor, to Webby’s tearful confrontation with Beakley, to Huey using the greatest adventure of all line to foil bradford in one of the most deligfhully nuts moments of the series, I could go on for days with just how triumphant this finale felt. While it left a lot of doors open.. that feels like part of the design. It’s the end of the fight with FOWL.. but our heroes will never stop adventuring, never stop going and never stop being in our hearts and the curtain call at the end is now my faviorite bit of end credits ever, perfectly giving the main cast and friends one last chance to take a bow in their own unique ways. I will always miss this show but I will never be disapointed by the note it went out on. 

8. The 87 Cent Solution!

Look some episodes are show stoppers, some are heartfelt tearjerkers, some are all this and more.. and some episodes are just clever and hilarious. The 87 Solution is the second funniest episode of Ducktales with me and my go to episode when watching the show. It’s just pure fun and with a clever premise: Scrooge notices 87 cents have gone missing, and already coming down with a cold, goes mad with paranoia as the kids slowly don face masks, something that has become even eeerier given everything, one by one realizing he needs to stop. 

While David Tennant is an EXCELLENT dramatic actor, his comedy timing is really something that shoudln’t be ignored and i’ts on full display here as his performance gets more and more deranged, to thep oint he thinks an 8th dimensional imp is repsonsible. He nicely balances the disturbing side of Scrooge’s paranoia, his distancing from his family, with plenty of great gags about it too, the standout being when he offers 2 million dollars to whoever took the money like he’s publicly appeasing kidnappers. It’s fucking brilliant. 

But while David is awesome as ever what really, truly makes the episode is my boy, one of my faviorite characters on the show if not my single faviriote FLINTHEART GLOMGOLD. Keith Ferguson is ALWAYS a dream as the character but this is his best performance by far. Part of this is the addition of Zan Owlson, Kev who I mentioned earlier’s faviorite Ducktales character. She’s not only throughly likeable in her own right, but provides the one thing Flinty was missing; a straight man.. or woman in this case. Scrooge wasn’t TERRIBLE in the roll, but can easily step away from his shit or foil it. Owlson has to put up with Glomgold’s nonsense while desperatly trying to stop him from undoing all her hard work with sheer force of jackass. The two jut play off each other brilliantly, Glomgold not getting sh’es not his employee but his equal and Owlson constnatly snarking at him. 

And of course both things hit their peak in the climax with the family staging a fake funeral (Though no one told donald it was fake), and we get the funniest scene in the entire fucking show as Glomgold burts in in a white suit, money shades and full dance number to “All I Do Is Win’, which when first watching this I was convinced the song was somehow accidnetly on in the background but nope. They got it after using it in the test phase and the scene is better for it. Glomgold twerking on Scrooge’s casket, trying to get on it to dance, and having to be placated like ac hild is the icing on this very rich cake

And the reveal scene is also gold as Glomgold gets into a YEARLONG staring contest with a baby, fails to steal more than the 87 cents and, in my faviorite touch, put on an imp costume just to make scrooge seem crazier... then keeps the damn thing on the rest of the time for no explicable reason. The episode is the show at it’s comedic peak while giving Glomgold a chance to be a genuine threat and that’s Glomgood. 

7. Let’s Get Dangerous!

Frank’s Rebooted Version of Darkwing Duck is probably his greatest achivment with the show. While this show is a team effort, something I slowly realized as I reviewed the show, it’s very clear from the way he talks, how well he knows the show and how much effort was put into porting Darkwing into the reboot that this was his baby. While redefining ducktales for the 2010′s was clearly a huge dream of his... doing the same for the master of suprise was an even bigger goal. And as a huge fan of superheroes i’ve seen my fair share of half assed takes on laired and complex characters. The XCU alone is one giant grab bag of missed opportunities for me. 

So i’ts no exageration when I tell you Frank.. nailed it. In one of the most brilliant moves i’ve seen for a superhero work Frank worked his love of the show into the reboot.. by having Darkwing have been a show, one Launchpad loved.. and so did Drake, who was inspried by the show to become an inspriation himself and while his attempt to do that through a zack snydery reboot failed, Launchpad encouraged him to do it for real. Drake was still himself, but the meta aspect and the toning down of some of darkwing’s more obnoxious traits that didn’t work in a universe that, while patently rediciulous still took it’s characters seriously, he made a BETTER version of the character.

This is where all that comes to it’s peak, and hoppefully convinced Disney to let Frank , and possibly matt, run the reboot. And no, even if Point Grey is producing that dosen’t stop that: Thanks to Invincible i’ve now realized that Seth and his friend Evan producing the show dosen’t mean it’ll be RAN by them, nor unrelated to this. It just means their helping make it and if anything given how lush and gorgeous invincible’s animation is, it’s a VERY good sign their helping out with it if it’s true. 

But wether this versoin continues or not, Frank gave it his best shot. Part of his diffrent angle is having Drake as a rookie here and as such here we see him truly struggle: he’s had his origin, he ahs the cape, he has the gadgets (in a brilliant turn thanks to fenton, who he actually likes... but is so far the ONLY person to not get he’s Gizmoduck), and the city.. but no crime to fight and no real idea how to go about his lifelong dream. The events of the episode slowly shape him: WHile he already had the spirit for darkwing, never giving up, looking good in a cape etc, this episode gives him the heart the same way it gave his original it: With Gosalyn. Dimantopolis and Beatriz just play off each other perfectly, as the two go from neimies to slowly bonding as Drake realizes this kid needs him and that he needs to fight for more than just filing the ohle inside, and goes to hell and back to help her get her grandpa back, with one of the best moments of the episode to me being when Launchpad helps her realize how hard he’s been working at it, an exausted drake refusing to acccept that he can’t get her grandpa back because he promised. He grows from simply trying to live the dream.. to surpassing the original. We also see more from Launchpad, who grows into his new family and helps push his boyfriend and newa dopted daughter in the right directions. The episode really evolves these characters from the simple disney afternoon versions, who while awesome were made into fully fleshed out characters. Gosalyn still has her edge but now has a hard lesson to learn about doing the right thing, forced to give up someone she loves for the greater good but finding a new family in the process. 

Part of what makes the episode work though as while it is funcitonally one big darkwing duck reboot pilot that’s awesome, heartrending and a joy to watch... it’s still a ducktales episode in parts without either part hurting each other. Huey plays a vital role, figuring the ramrod is too good to be true.. and discovering just how it is, then when captured, slowly unravling why Bradford’s there and being at least in part responsible for outing him as a FOWL agent. While this is largely Drakes story the rest of the cast is still vital to it: Scrooge trusting in huey, Louie serving as his logical counter and Dewey meanwhile bonding with team darkwing and helping Gosalyn, knowing exactly where she’s been and providing a nice foil. The episode is just one long and impressive love letter to the original show while creating it’s own thing and that’s really this reboot in a nutshell. It also has some of the best fights of the series, with the first fight between darkwing and bulba, where our hero, unlike his original counterpart, easily troucnes bulba using his speed and skill, is the standout. 

6. Woo-Ooo!

I covered this one recently so I won’t go on for too long.. but I will say I hold this one up as the gold standard for first episodes. In one hour, hell even in jus the first half we get a sense of the whole cast, the tone of the show, and the world we’ve been thrust into. It gets all the table setting out of the way by weaving it into a compelling story of Scrooge getting back in the game, finding a reason to get back to what he does best in those he loves most and setting up the season long arc effortlessly in the process. The worst I can say about the episode is it sets the bar a bit high for Season 1 and a lot of the first half really struggled to reach these heights. This episode is a masterwork and the perfect showcase for what the series would be at it’s height. 

5. Moonvasion!

Speaking of Golden Standards, Moonvasion is one of the best season finale’s i’ve seen. it’s not THE best.. but that’s a really high bar to clear and that spots currently taken in my heart by “The Crossroads of Destiny” from Avatar the Last Airbender. But while not the best of it’s kind, it’s sitll the best the series put out and is an utterly satisfying epic that ties up season 2. 

While I love the Last Adventure, it had a LOT to tie up and was really hampered by having to do all of that with no direct lead in. Moonvasion by contrast hits the ground running with the Moonlanders arriving on earth and all hell breaking loose, and the episode itself breaking into two stellar plots. Scrooge leading an army of every ally he has against the invaders, and Della seemingly going for reinforcements.. but really just trying to keep the kids safe from it, to their anger once they find out. 

Both sides end up going badly: Scrooge looses most of his army as Lunaris was one step ahead of him and is left iwth Beakly and Launchpad, while Della ends up marooned.. and finds Donald. The reunion between the two is the highlight of the special, as the two argue as you’d expect (And Dewey cutting in seemingly to stop it.. only to rant at Donald for costing him “ten years of turbo” is the best gag of the episode), before embracing. 

Our heroes naturally find ways to bounce back though. Louie, capping off his growth for the season, convinces his mom they can’t just hide.. and in the second best scene of the episode sings the lullabye she wrote.. one Donald sung them every night

And no sooner than Della gets her step back and realizes that dangerous or not she and her newly reunited family have to get back in there, do the cousins show up on Fethry’s giant shrimp/girlfriend Mitzi, and our heroes head back. 

Scrooge’s plot hits i’ts peak though as he’s forced to accept the help of an unlikely and unwelcome ally: Glomgold, who turns out to be exactly what they need: While his plan is as stupid, short sighted and insane as you’d expect, complete with forcing Scrooge to dress up as santa just to piss him off and dressing his sharks in parkas (”I call them sharkas”), the sheer lonacy throws Lunaris off as he dosen’t know how to deal with this and Glomgold not only gets the better of him but gets his company back as part of his scheme.  “You were prepared for our best but not our dumbest!” “And i’m the dumbest theirs ever been! Muahahahaha! Wait...”

And of course our other heroes arrive just in time to save things.. and the episode still manages to pull off what many works struggle to, something tha’ts very hard to: a SECOND climax. Lunaris decides to just say fuck it and blow up the earth and i’ts up to our core family to kick his ass in space. Epic space battles, Della’s girlfriend meeting the family and more insues and an emotoinal, action packed and fully satisfying finale is had by all... and it’s all topped with one of the best sequel hooks i’ve ever seen as FOWL makes themselves known to us.. and prepares to strike. 

4. How Santa Stole Christmas! This one will also be short as i’ve talked about this one.. a lottttt. The initial review, my best christmas specials list and my best of 2020 list. I stand by all of that: this is a unique and wonderful christmas special, i’ll be watching it every year, and i’ts full of charm, humor and gay subtext. In short it’s this series but on christmas footing. 

3. Last Crash of the Sunchaser! 

Another one I covered very recently, this episode is a master piece of suspense, slowly building tension as our heroes get closer and closer to the truth about Della.. and to death, the simple but deadly stakes making this an absolute nailbiter from start to finish. This is some of the series best pacing bar none... but what seals it is the ending: the masterful flashback finally explaning whatever happened to Della duck, our heroes lashing out at each other.. all cumilating in the best Scene of the show. I said it might be in the review but no I can confirm: Scrooge bitterly ruminating over things while we find out just how much he’s lost... ending with him tearfully and angrily sitting once again alone in one hell of a powerful shot echoing Scrooge’s first apperance. Damn fine stuff. 

2. Escape from The Impossbin Only one episode not only matches Last Crash in mounting tension and atmosphere but suprasses it. With FOWL and Bradford’s true nature now out in the wind, this episode uses that to create tension and rattles it’s two most unshakable characters: SCrooge’s normal boundless confidence is shot, not sure he can win this time against an opponent who knows him as well as he knows himself while Beakly slowly unravels, pitting Webby against the boys.. and pitting herself against Webby when Webby sees her terroizing them is only dividing them. Both plots start out funny enough but slowly escalate in tension and stakes until by the end your on the edge of your seat. The Beakly plot is the standout of the two, giving Bentina the starring role she badly needed, having gotten even better in light of the finale. Everyone is at the top of their game and everything builds up to one hell of a twist ending and one hell of a badass boast from our heroes: Their down.. but their far from out and this is far from over. 

1. Nightmare On Kimotor Hill!

I”ll be reviewing this episode in full later this week as part of my Lena retrospective, but I stand by putting it up top. This episode is ducktales in it’s purest form and focuses on it’s best original character as Lena grapples with her self hatred and her past. That core helps anchor an amazing concept: going into the Kid’s dreams and finding out their greatest desires. The results.. are all gloriously rediclous and are easily the best gags of hte series as a whole: Dewey’s high school musical santa claus is going ot high school nonsense from getting a’s in Dewology to running away from the abstract concept of a love intrest, to not getting the sybolism of himself crying a moon made of his own tears. Louie quite literally becoming garfield, and my faviorite scene of the show: Huey, wanting to be the tall older brother..g iving himself horrifcly long leg. While everyone else is just understandably baffled, what makes the scene is the banter between Dewey and Huey, with Schwartz and Pudi at their best as Dewey first freaks out and then asks what the hell man, while Huey defends his weird decision (”I”m not good at imagination stuff okay!”), and then tries to get a jar of pickles. Each dream is just so oddly and wonderfully specific to each kid and each one of the triplests dreams, as well as violets being color coded down tot he backgrounds is a very nice touch. The visuals here are just peak ducktales, using the setting for all it’s worth and the climax is utterly emotoinal and heartbreaking... and Lena’s break from her abuser, finally realizing she has the power now is not only a wonderful metaphor... but also just so damn cathartic. And that’s why this one’s the best to me personally: it just packs so much into 20 minutes: some of the series best and most creative jokes, a gripping emtoinal arc, and so much more. It’s just that damn good and tha’ts why it’s the best... that and starting Huelet for me. Seriously that LIbrary scene is so fucking cute. 

Thank you all for reading. If you liked this artcle, join my patreon and help me get to my stretch goal for monthly darkwing duck reviews, a review of super ducktales and more after! Until the next rainbow... it’s been a pleasure. 

#ducktales #huey duck #dewey duck #louie duck #webby vanderquack #scrooge mcduck #bentina beakly #lena sabrewing #santa claus #della duck #donald duck #gladstone gander #gizmoduck #fenton crackshell cabrera #gandra dee #mark beaks #flintheart glomgold #zan owlson #goofy goof #launchpad mcquack #darkwing duck

[attilarrific]

Attila I hope you're having a really great time! I haven't had an opportunity to tell you yet but I had SO MUCH FUN with the last two parts of Hidden Track, particularly the joint interview. BUT MY HEART IS ALSO BREAKING, because LWJ is like "I'm gonna Tell The World I love Wei Ying" and WWX is only hearing "he can't even find a moment where he sorta likes me, he's saying he always liked me but we all know that's not true!" Attila... you can be sorta evil sometimes.

@moonbelowsea​, as we discussed, it wasn’t true when I wrote it, but it SURE IS NOW! And Anon, I have been meaning to write Jiang Yanli into this verse for, uh, ages, so thanks! (And sorry that it’s apparently been an entire month since you sent that.)

The Hidden Track tag, and again in chronological order. (And since it’s been a million years and this follows the last part directly, here’s that one.)

.

Lan Wangji doesn’t look at him as they walk into the hotel and get into the elevator, which Wei Wuxian thinks is a little bit unfair. Sure, this whole shitshow fake relationship is a mess, and sure, Wei Wuxian did just make Lan Wangji profess his undying love on live television, which is probably is probably giving Lan Wangji’s entire family ulcers right at this moment, but---but--- But even he can’t figure out how that extremely public kiss against the car is something he made Lan Wangji do. And he spent ten years living in the same house as Jiang Cheng’s mother, which means he’s finely attuned to the myriad ways in which things can be his fault.

Wei Wuxian’s hands shake a little when he slides the key card into their room, and he almost drops it onto the ugly hallway carpet. He feels wired, like he’s on the right edge of an all-nighter, so awake it hurts a little, everything too bright and too fast, almost-nausea clenching its fist in his stomach. “Um,” he says, flinching when the door slams behind them. “Um, you---you do whatever. I won’t bother you. I’m just going to---I’m going to call Li-jie.”

He realizes as soon as he says it that he hasn’t called Jiang Yanli, not in ages, and certainly not since Lan Wangji grabbed him and kissed him in front of a hundred cell phone cameras and at least one news crew. He didn’t call her or text or email or anything at all. He just let her---oh, god, he’s the worst brother alive.

“Fuck. I’m going to call Li-jie,” he repeats faintly, and then he glances again at Lan Wangji, who’s finally looking at him, a tense frown on his face, and Wei Wuxian runs to shut himself in the bathroom.

His sister’s phone rings twice while he huddles in the shower, the fancy tile cold underneath him and his legs drawn up against his chest, and then she picks up. “A-Xian,” she says, and her voice is as sweet and lovely and welcoming as it always is, as if he didn’t start fake dating someone and leave her to find out from Instagram. “I was getting worried about you.”

“Jiejie,” he says, and his voice breaks a little. He only ever calls her ‘jiejie’ when it’s just them and their brother, ever since he realized how furious her mother got whenever anything suggested, even very slightly, that he might be blood-related to her children. After that, he’d said ‘Yanli-jie’ for weeks until she and Jiang Cheng started appending everything they said to him out of their mother’s hearing with ‘didi’ and ‘gege.’ Even then, it’d only worked because he’d realized how completely nuts it was driving Jiang Cheng to keep reminding the both of them who was older, and he’d thrown himself at his little brother and hugged him relentlessly for an hour while Jiang Cheng squawked about it. Now Jiang Yanli is ‘Li-jie’ when other people might hear them and only ‘jiejie’ when he’s alone and desperately in need of a big sister.

“Xianxian,” she says immediately, her voice going from happy to concerned in an instant. “Xianxian, is everything okay?”

And now he’s gone and made her worry. “It’s fine,” he says, pressing his forehead against his knees. “I’m always fine.”

She half sighs, half laughs, and he presses the phone closer against his cheek like it can bring them closer together.

“I just miss my jiejie,” he whines, pretending she’s there and he can lay his head on her lap. “Xianxian needs someone to take care of him.”

“Well, I knew that,” she says, sounding amused. “But according to the magazines I read this morning, that’s Lan Wangji’s job now.”

“Jiejie,” he says in agony. “Jiejie---that’s---that’s not---I should’ve called you earlier, but---jiejie, I’m not actually dating him. I’m---I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have let you think---I should’ve called you---”

“A-Xian,” she says quickly. “A-Xian, I know. Of course I know.”

He stops. “You know?”

“A-Xian, you spend all your time with our little brother, and your manager was my husband’s best man at our wedding. I like it when you tell me things yourself, but how could you think I didn’t know? You’re my didi. Of course I knew.”

“Oh.” He laughs, helplessly relieved. “I’m so glad. I meant to call, but it’s been---um. A lot. Just. With stuff. Happening.”

He hears rustling on the other end of the line, and he imagines she’s getting comfortable, maybe on the huge, overstuffed couch he and Jiang Cheng got her as a housewarming present when she first moved out of their childhood home, right after they did. She’s always kept it, no matter how many times she’s moved, even though Jin Zixuan’s offered like ten times to buy a new, better one.

“Xianxian,” she says, “not calling me wasn’t what was bothering you, was it?” He groans into his knees, and she makes a concerned noise. “Lan Wangji isn’t being mean to you again, is he? Is he nearby? Can you give him the phone?”

“Jiejie.” He curls up into a tighter ball in the shower. “That was years ago, and he wasn’t even that mean. He’s not---no. Lan Zhan’s perfect. Please don’t scold him because he didn’t like me in school.”

“He was very rude to you,” she says, in a tone of voice she usually reserves for particularly malicious tabloid reporters and her father-in-law. “And you wanted to be friends with him so badly.”

“Yeah, but I was me, so I wanted to be friends in a really annoying way,” Wei Wuxian points out. “Anyway, Lan Zhan’s---Lan Zhan’s always nice to me now.” So nice. Too nice. Horribly, cruelly nice, so Jiang Yanli is right, and he is getting bullied, because for some reason, every time Lan Wangji is nice to him, he wants to hide. “That’s not it,” he says anyway.

She waits patiently, and he presses his big toe against the edge of a tile that’s sticking up just a little, feeling the point dig into his skin. “I don’t think I like pretending to date him,” he admits. “I mean, I’m glad he’s doing it, since at least now no one thinks I’m trying to steal my brother’s girlfriend. I just---I don’t think he likes it either. He’s trying really hard, but...” He trails off, finding that the words to describe the weird anxiety plaguing him are missing from his vocabulary.

“Why don’t you like it?” his sister says, very gently.

He hooks his chin over a knee. “I don’t know. It---he---he couldn’t think of any reason he’d ever want to date me,” he blurts out. “We were trying to figure out who asked who out, and he couldn’t imagine ever wanting to for real. You should’ve seen the look on his face, jiejie, like---like---anyway. And we were just on a talk show, and he said, uh, because the host was asking how he felt about me, so he just said he’d liked me forever, and... Jiejie, he really can’t think of any time he might’ve fallen for me, even as pretend. I can think of tons of times---” He cuts that thought off ruthlessly. “It’s not hard, making things up, I mean. But when it’s me, he just--- Why can’t he even come up with something fake? Is it really that hard to imagine wanting to date me? And I...”

And I still liked hearing him say it, his traitorous mind thinks. I knew it just meant he couldn’t come up with anything else, but I still liked hearing him say he’d liked me always. He tells his brain firmly to shut its stupid face, anyone would like hearing that they were beautiful and clever and perfect when they were fifteen and actually a horribly awkward brat.

“Oh, Xianxian,” Jiang Yanli murmurs. She hesitates for a long moment, like she’s thinking of what to say. “That bothers you?”

He makes a noncommittal noise that she must correctly interpret as yes, a lot, because she says, “Oh. I see.” She lets out a long breath. “A-Xian, you know Lan Wangji doesn’t like to lie. He’s probably panicking right now, and it’s throwing him off. It’s not that he doesn’t like you, it’s only that he’s in a very odd situation, and he’s having trouble adjusting.” Her voice takes on a teasing note. “Imagine if you had to be silent in interviews all the time.” He laughs a little, and she adds, “He must be uncomfortable with all the talking he has to do now. That’s all.”

“You think?”

“I’m sure,” she says firmly. “And if he’s mean to you, you have to call me, okay? I’m your big sister, so you have to do what I say. If you don’t, I’ll tell A-Cheng to.”

“Don’t,” Wei Wuxian says with feeling. “Jiang Cheng always thinks Lan Zhan’s being mean to me. I’ll call.” He almost reassures her that Lan Wangji would never be mean to him, but then he runs his tongue over his lower lip, sensitive where Lan Wangji bit it, and shivers. He opens his mouth to try and explain that, to tell her that every time Lan Wangji looks at him, he almost vibrates out of his skin, and every time Lan Wangji doesn’t, he wants to drown himself in the shower. His throat closes on the words. It’s probably nothing. Not something he wants to worry her about.

Definitely nothing.

“Tell me about your day,” he says.

“What about it?”

“Anything.”

“All right,” she says slowly, and he presses his forehead against his knees and lets her cool voice wash over him.

#

He hangs up and opens the bathroom door half an hour later, leaning against the doorjamb. Lan Wangji is sitting on the bed with his back straight, frowning at something on his laptop, but he looks up when Wei Wuxian doesn’t say anything.

“Wei Ying?”

Why did you kiss me like that, Wei Wuxian categorically does not say. He bites his lower lip and then remembers whose teeth had last been there and flushes embarrassingly, looking away. He’s still antsy, his hands jumping from loose threads to a broken nail to his hair, trying to find something to fiddle with. “Hey,” he says, and then all of a sudden, he knows what he wants. “Hey, do you want to do a Round Robin with me?”

Round Robin songwriting is something he’d come up with at nineteen, fresh out of the Jiangs’ house and drunk on the band having just enough success to afford renting a tiny, terrible house near the university Lan Wangji and Jiang Cheng and Wen Qing were going to, just big enough for the five of them. He’d dragged Lan Wangji away from his schoolwork at all hours of the day and night so they could write together, desperate to prove he deserved this, that he was good enough for the music, for the loyal fans they were starting to get. He’d spent the whole month of December blocked, drunk five shots of cheap vodka, and declared they were doing a Round Robin. One of them writes one phrase, and the other has to come up with the next one, and they keep going until both of their perfectionist brains are either satisfied or prepared to declare defeat. Their finished products rarely include whatever the first notes were and even more rarely end up being anything worth recording, but Lan Wangji is still the best musician he’s ever worked with, even if he knows better than to say that to Jiang Cheng now. Writing music together is as close as Wei Wuxian can get to sharing a brain.

“Yes,” Lan Wangji says without hesitation, setting his laptop aside immediately. “You pick the instruments.”

Wei Wuxian perks up. “Really? Aren’t you afraid that’s giving me too much power?”

“No.”

Wei Wuxian grins at him, even as his heart turns over inside his ribs. “You asked for it, then.” After rummaging through both of their things for a while, he comes back with a harmonica for him and Lan Wangji’s cello, which he carries around to every city but almost never plays. Lan Wangji raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t otherwise comment beyond grabbing the ottoman and piling a few large books onto it to make it high enough to sit on.

“You set the key,” he says, nodding at the harmonica in Wei Wuxian’s hands.

“Right.” Wei Wuxian flops onto the couch and checks to see what he’s holding. “B flat, so we’re playing in F, okay?”

Lan Wangji nods, tuning his cello seriously and tightening the bow. “You start.”

Wei Wuxian shrugs, lifts the harmonica to his lips, and plays something short, like a question, a lingering chord on the end. And without hesitating, without needing to check that he’s done, without even thinking about it, Lan Wangji plays him an answer.

And Wei Wuxian hides his smile in his instrument as he responds again, feeling his way through their awkward not-music-yet. The tension bleeds out of his shoulders slowly but surely every time Lan Wangji finds something new and brilliant to do with whatever Wei Wuxian gives him.

It is nothing, then, the thing he didn’t tell his sister. It’s nothing, not worth thinking about, as long as he has this: the music, the tantalizing glimpse of a melodic line they keep almost finding, and Lan Wangji matching him gracefully, phrase for phrase.

.

hidden track masterpost

#hidden track #modao zushi #the utnamed #mdzs #wangxian #A WILD UPDATE APPEARS #haHA told you I'd write more soon #things i write #moonbelowsea #attila replies to things #hidden track update

[i-am-parsec]

                                                                                                              11/02/2020

Hey, so...I had a bit of a crisis a couple days ago and now I’m here, writing again. I think I can still picture your smug look whenever I’d admit I was “wrong”, even if my memory is very unreliable these days, I can still see it and I know for a fact that’s the look you’re giving me right now. You little shit.

Um, they are probably not gonna like reading that. They don’t like it when I “pretend I can actually communicate with my missing, most likely already dead ex husband”. Weird, right? Like I don’t see how that would disturb them, ha.

I suppose I now should explain to you who “they” are. I’m talking about my doctors, Dr. Richard Willson and Dr. Alexandra Freias, who, little fun fact, my sister hired solely on the basis of her being 1. A woman and 2. Latina. I guess she thought I’d “bond” better with someone who looked more like, but the funny bit is that Dr. Freias’ mother is Russian and she looks like a photocopy of her mother. What I’m trying is that, not only was my sister’s idea dumb, she also did a terrible job at executing it because my doctor looks white as hell. She is nice, though, and I’m grateful about that. And no, Dr. Freias, I am not writing that just so you’ll forgive me for destroying your brand new phone yesterday but yes, I am very sorry about that, or at least as sorry as I can be these days and I promise my dumb sister will replace it as soon as possible.

I’m gonna have to get used to the idea of these letters having a bigger audience than before. In the sake of my little agreement with my lovely health professionals, I’ll be open and honest and admit...I don’t like it, it makes me uncomfortable to share this, my only safe space, with people who are basically strangers to me, but I am aware this decision was taken for the sake of everyone's peace of mind. When I’m writing, I’m focused, more relaxed, less prone to spiral down after Dr. Willson gives me a mocking look and sighs at the mention of your name, Chase, so this is a good thing: I get to talk to you and my doctors get a bit of insight on what’s going on inside my mind without me losing my shit and breaking everything around me, something they claim to desperately need.

I am a woman of my word, so I will continue this little daily exercise if that is what everyone thinks is best for me, even if I can’t help but laugh at the idea that this might give them any kind of extra data about me or you or anything related to this mess our lives have been for the past couple of years. I’ve already told them everything, from the very beginning. They refuse to listen, I refuse to give in and spew the nonsense they are trying to feed me instead of the truth I already know, then we all get frustrated and eventually...we start the cycle again. Circles, we are just going on and on in these fucking circles and it does annoy me, but I guess I have accepted it to a certain degree - I’m stuck. This is my life now, an eternal retelling of the hell I’m trapped into, while being trapped within said hell. 

I am lost here, Chase, lost and blind. But I keep moving, even if I know how it is all going to end, I still walk. I walk towards you, mi amor. You are my North, my compass in a world without poles, paths or direction. Ever since we were kids I’ve been doing that. You gave me purpose in a pointless world, a home in a deserted land, a glimmer of Hope among absolute darkness...so I’ll do my part, I’ll take my medicine, I’ll go to my appointments, I’ll write my letters. I’ll be good, I swear, for you, for the kids, for my sister - who bends over and backwards for me, even if I can’t seem to forgive her-, hell, even for my doctors, who refuse to actually listen to me but also refuse to give up.

Oh, before I go, in case you were wondering why I had the mental breakdown: I was telling the doctors about our wedding and it hit me that it was the 31st. I got quiet for a second, a bit teary and informed them that that day would have been our ten year anniversary. I laughed when Dr. Freias pointed out that we got married on Halloween and told her it was on purpose, that you love this holiday so much that you begged me for months to let you proclaim your undying love for me in front of our few friends, both of us being in full costume in our tiny backyard.

That’s when it all went sideways. “Undying love”. Dr. Willson just had to remind me with a smirk that we are divorced. I would like to explain in more detail what happened after that but truth be told, I don’t know. Last thing I remember was staring at him, my whole body shaking and then, dropping under water. It's a familiar sensation by now, but it never gets less disturbing or less violating. When I was back in control of my body, the room was a mess, I had three men holding me down and Dr. Willson’s forehead was bleeding.

I do not forgive him for the unnecessary remark about my civil status but I do regret, greatly, ever hurting him and I appreciate him not quitting. I don’t know why he wouldn't, I’m just glad I don’t have to deal with a new smug asshole who thinks they have the right pill and therapy combination to fix my unfixable brain. At this point in my life, I will always rather stick with the devil I know than the devil I don’t, and besides, Richard is no devil. I should know.

It’s late now, almost 8, so I’ll send this to Dr. Freias and be on my way to bed. See you there, my love.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Link to all the chapters in chronological order, here. Link to the last chapter, if you can even call it that, here.

Well. Here’s the thing. I am too broke for therapy and too uninspired to write anything original that could probably be more nurturing to my soul than a fanfic that I started 2 years ago...so I’m here, back to my bullshit. And also, Sean is finally dropping some new crispy fresh ego content so I guess...I’m doing this. I’ll be posting daily, the quality will be shit, there might be no actual progress to the plot and it is going to be mainly me just using Stacy to vent. I have little to nothing going on in my life right now, and I vaguely remember I used to get joy from writing so in order to get even the slightest bit of serotonin, I set myself the goal of writing everyday, no word minimum or special prompt in mind, I’m just going to write, and if it’s good, great and if nobody reads, fine. I’m just trying to get back whatever pieces of myself I can find, which I think is a feeling this character can very much relate to. That might be why I’m returning to her.

Or maybe it’s the fact that I was very invested in her before I fell in love and then I was so engrossed in my relationship that I completely forgot about her and then I had my heart broken in a million tiny pieces, losing any kind of sense of self or purpose in life and now, almost six months after my first real breakup, I’m trying to rebuild myself and I secretly hope that going back to Stacy, a character that was very dear to me, I can find whatever it is that I’m looking for. Maybe, but who’s to say?

Anyway, if you read all of that bullshit (and I mean the whole post, not just my after-chapter ranting), I feel like I owe you some kind of reimbursement for emotional damages. Sadly, I’m poor, so all I can offer you are memes. You can slide on my DMs for your payment of memes. Do not feel the need to ask me how I’m doing, I am doing Fine...in the sense of I will not be yeeting myself from a rooftop any time soon, no matter how sad I might sound, I’m just a whiny bitch using writing as a coping mechanism. I’m okay, like not really, super mega hyper ok but I’m ok. If you’re concerned, I appreciate you but don’t be. I’m writing to deal with my feelings, that’s like, healthy, right? So yeah, we good. 

see u tomorrow

❤️Tag list❤️: @amyxmiaplay @beckofthewoods @closedworldofmathiel @darktrash-drash @fanfictionrecommendations-com @flyingfishflopsthings @fruitycasket @hiimizzyxoxo @hishex @scarlet-mangata @mcomegalletas @mijako98 @mysterious-cupcake-ninja @mysticalanimallover @novasingalaxies @plutoandpolaris @probablyghosting @randomartdudette @saltyweirdbi @scarlet--raven @septicuniverse @skyewardlight @thevampireauthoress @youllnevertaketheskyfromme @rats-this-username-is-taken

#Stacy Brody #Chase Brody #Jacksepticeye #Antisepticeye #Unaddressed Letters

[goodlesson]

peyt’s big bad bastille fic rec post

have i read literally everything in the bastille ao3 tag at least three times over? unfortunately yes. and now i’m here to share my wisdom with you all!!

bella (@dansmlth) asked for fic recs so i figured i’d just....compile everything into one post for easy access. this list has p much every pairing under the sun, so hopefully there’s something for everyone. happy reading y’all!!

please make sure you heed any warnings on ao3 before reading; some of these are certainly more heavy and triggering than others.

p.s. if you need more recs, ej (@mirandabeach) has a great list here. you can also check out my ao3 bookmarks.

dan/kyle:

i’ve never felt my heart like this by unfinishedidea (explicit, 5k)

“‘My quiff makes them panties drop,’ or, Kyle finally accepts that fans aren’t the only ones obsessed with Dan’s hair,” by Kyle Simmons, age twenty-four and a half.

lights by trash (teen, 4k)

Kyle gets a flat, with bonus flatmate.

through the years by trailsofpaper (explicit, 13k)

Five times Dan and Kyle have sex, and the one time they finally kiss again.

you are enough by trash (teen, 2k)

Kyle is in a shit house share, three miles from campus, with less money to spend on getting rat arsed than he had initially envisioned. In fact, university is turning out to be an all round utter shit show. But then there's Dan.

and in the morning you’ll be stranded in love (it goes around and around) by brujay (teen, 15k)

“Have you seen Groundhog Day?”

Kyle took a moment before replying. “I have… what exactly are you trying to say, here?”

Dan sighed again. “I think I’m living it.” Dan gets trapped in a time loop, and he is not having a good time.

help me piece it all together, darling by trailsofpaper (explicit, 16k)

Dan Smith, sometime after he turns fourteen, travels in time. What follows, if not chronologically, is a life of existential dread and an inability to follow his dreams. Dan thinks there is no purpose to it, and is resigned to this existence of inconvenience, until he goes to a party where he meets a dark-eyed man with a bright smile, who is sure they've met before.

exorcise my mind by brujay (explicit, 12k)

BBC Radio 1 @BBCR1 • 12h

BREAKING: @bastilledan just came out live on air! Listen back here -> bbc.in/2jREPsm #WildWorld

days that bind us series by lady_icarus (teen to explicit, 47k total)

When Kyle meets Dan at a party, he's not sure what he's expecting to come of utilizing the messy number scrawled on his arm. Near-daily texts of "join my band" wasn't even in his top five expectations. And yet getting pulled in by dazzling eyes and a mesmerizing smile wasn't as much of a surprise as it should have been.

nothing except my aching heart by trailsofpaper (explicit, 9k)

Dan is an exotic dancer, and Kyle is just the lights and sound guy. He didn't ever stand a chance, did he?

who the fuck is keith by cornflakes_canvas (teen, WIP, 125k so far)

"So, you want me to fake-date Kyle, whom you owe a favour, so he can convince his crazy ex that he's gay, which he's not, so she'll stop stalking him, and you can't do it yourself cause he'd never date you if he was gay. Which. He's not."

Ralph considered his words for a moment, then broke into a small grin. "Sounds about right?"

i’ll see you in the future when we’re older by trailsofpaper (explicit, 9k)

Glastonbury, 2016. Dan would look forward to it if Brexit hadn't just happened, and if he could remember the last time they performed at the festival. Whatever happened on that night in 2013, Kyle won't tell him, and Dan never thought to ask.

keep chasing echoes of my mind by orphan_account (teen, 9k)

“I’ll be okay, you know,” Dan mumbles, slowly, rubbing nervous circles against Kyle’s wrist with his thumb. “There’ll be other people coming along, we have everything planned out ahead, and if they ever start being suspicious of us we’ll be right out of there before they can even touch us.” Kyle nods, quietly. Dan tightens the grip he has on his hand a little. “It’s just a few months! I’ll be reporting back every once in awhile, too, and I’ll be fully back before you even know it.”

“It’s just…” Dan’s head perks up as Kyle finally turns around to face him. “I’d like it a lot better if you didn’t have to go at all.”

give me something to remember by thoseseconds (explicit, 11k)

They’ve cuddled like this before, just… never during the day. The cuddling is a night thing that they do when everyone else is asleep and not there to judge them, but Dan has been strangely touchy ever since the train ride here.

argonautica orpheus by trailsofpaper (mature, 17k)

Kyle, like Jason on the Argos, sets out on a journey to retrieve something important but, more importantly, he finds love along the way. Dan, unlike Orpheus, doesn’t look back.

(Dan and Kyle are flatmates in Leeds, but when Kyle wrecks his keyboard a week before he and Dan are about to enter a competition, they need to go to London to get another keyboard. Complications and even shenanigans ensue.)

don’t paint wonderful lies on me by atrophicgalaxy (explicit, WIP, 7k so far)

That was one of the reasons why Dan hated these types of conversations. He didn’t understand, couldn’t relate. It made him feel like an alien, this strange out of place being observing the real people who experienced normal things. Dan didn’t have the same urges.

Dan is asexual and he's been burnt before. Trying to navigate that, and his own head, in such close proximity to the rest of the band takes its toll. And then there's Kyle.

drown all sorrow by trailsofpaper (explicit, 4k)

Dan would rather chat with a dark-eyed and nimble bartender than watch a burlesque show. He is also propositioned via drink - twice.

turning saints into the sea by thoseseconds (explicit, 3k)

“Oh my god.” Dan suddenly says, cutting Kyle out of his thoughts. “You’re jealous.”

a million pieces by trash (g, 1k)

Dan should have never kissed Kyle.

kiss? by trash (mature, 1k)

Dan is drunk again.

you won’t remember this (a kiss is just a kiss) by trailsofpaper (mature, 21k)

1930, Los Angeles. The weather is unchanging and so is Kyle Simmons, but when he meets fellow British expat Dan Smith, the singer with the bright blue eyes, Kyle thinks he might have found something to strive for. Dan wants more from life than playing the piano in smoky Hollywood jazz clubs, but Kyle isn't sure he's able to follow him even if he wanted to. His past threatens to drag him down, and Kyle doesn't want to drag Dan down with him.

charlie/dan:

like the world is watching series by heartbreakordeath (g to teen, 14k total)

Everyone is here except for me And I can feel the world is watching - the world is watching, two door cinema club

invisible string by williever (mature, WIP, 8k so far)

That's the only thing he hates about parties - people tend to turn up to them.

i wanna pour my feelings down the drain (fall headfirst like paper planes) by dansmlth, williever (teen, 11k)

Charlie often wondered what a relationship would entail for him.

Was he just supposed to put his heart on the line before either of them got invested? “Hi, nice to meet you, you’re cute, also I don’t want to fuck you ever? Please don’t take that the wrong way?” Jesus. He’d like to not ever put himself in such an awkward position.

dan/will:

i’m afraid the ground will swallow me whole by theonline (mature, 8k)

They had barely aged. A couple of wrinkles had collected around Will’s eyes, but that was it. He noted that Will had dropped the American accent and he sounded like home. Dan felt himself break.

“I just don’t want to be alone anymore.”

kyle/will:

place your head on my own by theonline (explicit, 6k)

Sounds began to flood his ears: the sizzling of something cooking in a pan, Will lightly humming, and the TV in the background:

We will be with Great Britain in these final hours, right up to the very end.

dan/ralph:

sinking for something by parachutiste (mature, 3k)

Dan thinks it's worth a try, liking how it feels a little bit weird at first, and not weird at all pretty soon after. Ralph always seems to forget the next morning. Dan doesn't.

#fic rec #peyton speaks #i'm not putting this in the tag for obvious reasons #happy reading kiddos!

[mappingthemoon]

01. Wood panel + tile bathroom in a rest stop off 441 (wHiCh I dRoVe To), Athens GA, 7/9/17

02. “No one will give it so just take some”: photographing Kasabian at Terminal 5 NYC, 9/14/17

03. documenting the experience / experiencing the document, or, a portrait of the photographer getting her shit wrecked: Gogol Bordello at the Georgia Theatre, 10/19/17 (R photo by Simone Cifuentes)

04. neighborhood kitty on Whitehead Road, Athens GA, 11/4/17

05. actually already cannot believe I spent much of last year looking so shitty and exhausted! wow. I remember thinking at the time that this was an A+ selfie, now i am like y i k e s. UGA Libraries secret bathroom, Athens GA, 12/4/17

06. last-minute anniversary cupcake + photo by Pete, 12/11/17

07. oh hi, photo by Pete, 12/13/17

08. reflection with the inside of a music machine at the Morris Museum in NJ, 12/17/17

“cleaning out my selfies for the end of the world”

some other stuff I did in 2017 besides (complain and freak out about) grad school. this feels like a million years ago now and not just bc even stuff that happened last week feels like a million years ago on the internet. I had a lot of Big Organizational Projects I thought I was gonna complete this summer in a whirlwind of “becoming a person again,” but mostly I was fixated on the project of finally getting caught up on editing/organizing/posting my photo backlog in some semblance of chronological order, however belated. it’s kind of a weird temporal feeling bc I remember, even at the times these pictures were taken, I was already starting to get behind on “life”, i.e., if I do not have enough time to write in my journal and/or process photos, I tend to not really process experiences/feelings -- I remember kind of spending the past year always being like "I'll have to deal with this later", and dumping pics into my /1edit folder; collecting little scraps of paper with notes on things to journal about at some later date, provided I could then remember what was so poignant about whatever barely-legible phrase I'd written; letting the mail pile up, overdrafting the bank, late fees, etc.; leaving the house, forgetting phone or keys or coffee, running late, insisting "this isn't me," wondering if this disorganized, distracted mess IS, in fact, who I am, who I have become, a person who doesn't know what the fuck is going on anymore! ultimately realizing that the nearly 10 consecutive years I have spent in school has been, in part, academic accomplishments notwithstanding!, an excuse, a valid procrastination, a way to avoid acknowledging problems and having feelings; realizing that 10 years have passed and suddenly I don't know "who I am" at the exact age in which I am supposed to be developing out of late adolescence and settling into a stable adult identity but holy shit sometimes I feel so goddamn moody and rapid-cycling in a way I haven't felt since I was like 18, which is kind of fucking annoying. this is also probably still cigarette withdrawal (psychologically) in part... anyway I spent two hours crying in the bathroom the other day which might be more than I have cried in the past five years so I guess that's a start.

#GPOY #driving #kasabian #terminal 5 #new york #concerts #gogol bordello #georgia theatre #athens ga #cats #Iberry skool #iberry jaerb #food #morris museum #new jersey #automata #personal

[sparklyjojos]

Let’s Read & Suffer: Tsukumojuku by Maijō Ōtarō [part 18]

Today`s recap: We shift back in time to the beginning of the Fourth Story, or THE PART I KINDA HATE, in a “what the fuck are you writing Maijo and why are you suddenly so hell-bent on making me hate your protagonist” way.

[tw: csa, incest, dubious consent, gore, body horror, lots of nsfw, Just Plain Fucked Up]

STORY 4 PART 1

Tsukumojuku looked at the clock: 16:00. It’d still be a while before Umi (有海) came back from walking Moppy. [note: Umi’s name is written the same way as Moppy’s owner’s name from the Fifth Story.]

Earlier, he and Umi had decided they should solve a serial killer case targeting young women in Chofu. One of Umi's close friends was killed in that case two days earlier, and besides, the grieving families would pay ten million yen for whoever could help catch the culprit. Tsukumojuku didn't have a daily job, and since their baby triplets were born last autumn, they dreamed of having enough money to get their own place to live in. [He’s like 16 in this Story, btw. Which automatically makes me despise Umi and her mom for thinking this relationship is ok. As per usual in this book.]

So way before Umi with Moppy came back, Tsukumojuku decided to go out, telling the mother-in-law he’s only taking a walk. She asked him to swing by the bookstore when coming back, and buy some magazines for her [not sure if this will be important or not, but the titles are 群像 and 新潮 and すばる and 文學界].

Most of the cherry blossoms had already scattered, covering the street like a carpet. The people locked in the Castle didn't get to enjoy it this year, Tsukumojuku thought. There was but a single window there, in the highest of its seven towers, too far away to enjoy the last cherry blossoms in their life.

Tsukumojuku felt sorry for them. He liked cherry blossoms. And sakura mochi, just like Umi. It was comforting to know that even if they didn’t get ten million yen, sakura mochi would still be there to buy on the way back.

- - -

Let’s solve (”solve”) the case at hand: the serial killing of young women. Who could be the criminal -- who could he make the criminal?

Maybe Seshiru – he was missing, and did bad things already. Let’s say that after killing Junko and hiding her head, he and Serika also killed other women. It may be addictive or something to collect the body parts, right? So, Seshiru would do as “the culprit”.

Tsukumojuku entered Chofu’s Green Park. Behind the Inari shrine, there was a public toilet, and in a big underground room hidden beneath it, Seshiru and Serika had been living for three years now. They were in hiding, but surprisingly also took care of the place: the park got cleaner, all the weeds were pulled out, the shrine repainted, new cherry trees planted. Amusingly enough, there was also an urban legend circulating that there were people-eating monsters hiding in the public toilet, waiting for their hapless victims to enter, which probably had something to do with their unexpected presence.

Anyway. Tsukumojuku opened the secret entrance in the floor, and gracefully avoided Seshiru trying to swipe at his legs before realizing who he was. “What do you want, Tsukumo?” [He calls him Tsukumo for short, just like Mr Kato did in the First Story, and I may have a little feeling now -- after all, this Story comes chronologically (if this term is even applicable to this book) after the Third Story’s finale.]

“Brought you some vitamins and stuff.” Tsukumojuku passed a plastic bag to Seshiru, who thanked him and vanished back inside, Tsukumojuku following him down the ladder. The room was quite big, with repainted walls and a carpet, and comfortable furniture. (And also, Tsukumojuku noted looking around, a quite suspicious syringe, but right now he didn’t care for that.) Serika’s also around, doing her own stuff.

Tsukumojuku sat in the reclining chair, and announced that Seshiru shouldn't go out for some time.

“Ah, so I'm the criminal again?” Seshiru asked, unsurprised.

Tsukumojuku nodded, and said that this time the prize was 10 million yen, and they’d split it half and half like usual [oh wow, they actually had this system going on for a while, huh]. Seshiru bemoaned that it's hard to stay put, but Tsukumojuku said that it's safer this way – and besides, with too much movement Seshiru’s health could get worse.

Seshiru had been extremely lucky before - back when Tsukumojuku had stabbed him with the katana, it went in in such a way that Seshiru's heart still worked without any problems. They were afraid that taking the sword out would kill him, so they just cut off most of the tip and the handle and left the remaining piece of the blade in his body. There was stil a risk of injury and death if something caused that piece to move too much, though.

After sealing the deal, Tsukumojuku and Serika went out of the hidden room to “solve the case”. [...and then they have sex out of nowhere and then he finds a porno magazine out of nowhere, wtf, I’m NOT recapping this and have I already mentioned that I hate this book sometimes.]

–

ANYWAY, Tsukumojuku then explained what was going on in the case at hand. 12 beautiful women had been killed so far. All had their heads cut off and taken away somewhere, and three of them also had one or both hands cut off and taken away.

Soon after starting their investigation, Serika discovered that the seventh victim had been to Nishi Akatsuki's ski resort in high school. [I guess they’re happy about that because they can link it to Seshiru being from Nishi Akatsuki?] She went to talk with the victim’s friends and do some other stuff for the investigation [we’ll be back to it later], while Tsukumojuku headed to the house of another grieving family.

He was greeted at the door by Kusanagi Yayoi (草薙弥生), the older sister of the second victim, Kusanagi Ryouko  (涼子) [no pronounciation is given, so I’m just assuming it’s read “Ryouko”] . Tsukumojuku asked her if she had seen the dead body; she had. The funeral service hadn’t been held yet, though. It felt weird to see that body without the head, she said -- it was looking pitiful, and kinda... weird, even. Like not herself.

It's that phenomenon again, Tsukumojuku thought. If Ryouko’s face wasn’t there, then it “wasn't really” Ryouko. Without her head, the place holding her memories and wishes, it’s as if it wasn't her. Even if a person's soul wasn't the same as their brain – the brain was just a tool to make that soul, in a way -- the bereaved family still wanted that head back, and could even think that its absence wouldn’t allow Ryouko to go to heaven/whatever other afterlife. Surely they'd be ready to go through the funeral ceremony again if the head was found. So the problem was that there was a lost “soul” they had to look for.

Tsukumojuku understood that a little. Ryouko's soul has been lost, as if it fell behind the bookshelf in a child's bedroom and was left there in darkness and silence.

“I will now explain what’s going on,” he said.

- - - 

[He’s explaining all of the following to Yayoi]

If a person loses their head, they lose their social signal of “being themselves”. That's the criminal's reason: he didn't want the victims to “be themselves”, so he removed the heads.

However, a headless human body is still not just a piece of meat; souls exist. God made the world in six days and told humans to multiply, since “My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal; their days will be a hundred and twenty years.” [Genesis 6]

Let’s say it’s true, and that humans are meant to live for 120 years -- but there's no known human who would reach that age before dying, so maybe the rest of these 120 years would be then spent as spirits? Eg. if you die at 80, you'll still “live” for 40 years more in this world, but as a soul. That’d mean 21-year-old Ryouko would “live” for the next 99 years... lost in the darkness behind the bookshelf, in her childhood bedroom on the second floor.

Bodies also have another thing about them: blood. Let’s think that way: a headless corpse is like a decanter for wine (blood). Let’s think colors now. Wine: pink, white, red. Body: red blood, yellow lymph, transparent or white/silver cerebrospinal fluid.

What other connections are there here? These colors, red, yellow and white, are the colors of the flags of North Ireland [The Ulster Banner], Gibraltar, and Jersey. If you count silver, also Vatican. Those four flags all have similar features, too. North Ireland and Jersey – a red cross and a yellow crown. Vatican also had a crown, the Triple Tiara (Papal Tiara), that could indicate the authority of the priest, shepherd and teacher [ie. the authority of Jesus Christ; there's a lot of alternate meanings connected to the Triple Tiara, though]. Under the Tiara there are crossed keys, one silver and one golden. A key is also in the Gibraltar flag, under a castle with three towers. Okay, so we have a cross, a crown, and castle, all of which imply a “king”. We also have “keys”.

...Let’s go back to blood for a while. Blood flowing from corpses... maybe “blood” = “flood”. Like the Flood brought on by God after he saw the evil in people's hearts, that killed everything on Earth.

“But are we dead, right now?” he asked Yayoi.

Yayoi answered that of course they weren’t.

(But Tsukumojuku, for some reason, had a split-second though that this was a lie, that they were already dead, and just didn't notice it.)

“We aren't dead,” he told Yayoi, “because of Noah. The Flood rages on, but we're on a safe ship. The Flood will continue for 150 days, and everything around us will die. We're Noah's family, I'm the husband, you're the wife--”

He got closer to Yayoi, trying to seduce her or something [I’d consider throwing the book against the wall if it wasn’t an ebook because woah there, narrator, you’re being kinda an asshole right now]. And then she, uh, exploded with desire and pulled him down on the carpet and they did the do [and I’m just sitting there reading this like... really, Maijo? They were just talking about her dead sister? That’s not how women (or just people period) work??? Also he’s sixteen and she’s implied to be an adult, like when can we finally stop with this?!] Tsukumojuku noted that she was strong as hell and really rough, but it was alright, “she could hurt him as much as she wanted”. [...no witty commentary is left within me]

She then said she didn't understand why she was doing this and cried [which for every decent partner would be a sign to, y’know, stop and talk about it even if she claims she’s alright with continuing, but they don’t stop and Tsukumojuku says something like “well, maybe you just had an urge to have children with me” and I’m just sitting there like, uh, I sure hope Maijo meant for this Story’s narrator to be super unlikable, although of course she’s the one who started getting physical with a minor in the first place so it’s also bad and can I just stop at saying that this entire situation is extremely fucked up?] 

And then he, uh, puts a hand into her and what’d you know, there's something like a fucking plastic bag up there and he pulls it out and sure enough it's a book titled the Third Story and WHAT THE FUCK AM I READING RIGHT NOW, MAIJO?! DID YOU REALLY JUST WRITE THIS

Yayoi is understandably freaked out [yeah no shit, even if it apparently somehow didn't hurt I’m wincing in sympathy just at the thought]. Tsukumojuku considered making her faint and reading the Story right there and then [wow you really are an asshole, huh], but there was no time: Umi and Moppy would be back home soon, so he had to go return too. So he just told Yayoi to “Calm down, this was just a magic trick.” (She still tried to hit him, but finally calmed down a little.)

- - -

Just outside the house he met with Serika, who then introduced herself as Kirika Mai to the still freaked out Yayoi. The case would be explained soon, but first, a little question -- Yayoi wanted the head of her sister back, and to catch the criminal, right? Whatever it took?

Yayoi thought over that question for a long moment, and Tsukumojuku noted that hmm, even after the sex she still had enough boldness to consider refusing, huh? [Aaaaand here goes my leftover sympathy for the narrator. Fuck OFF.] But in the end, Yayoi agreed.

“Well, then let's pour the wine back into the decanter, so to speak.” Tsukumojuku said and opened the giant sports bag that Serika had brought, revealing Ryouko's corpse, still without a head.

...or bones, or internal organs, or blood. Just skin and meat.

[Good thing it's not just the skin, because knowing Maijo I'd expect it to fly its way out of there a’la Antonio Torres.]

Yayoi screamed seeing it. At the same time, from the second floor, there came a sound of someone stomping around. It seemed that Ryouko’s soul had noticed the presence of her body, and came out from behind the bookshelf.

Then, because that’s a good decision apparently, Tsukumojuku stripped and went inside the corpse, wearing it like a suit. Serika had earlier removed the bones and organs, and even put in a convenient zipper in the back.

[fuck I was just joking with the Antonio thing, Maijo please]

Ryouko’s spirit slowly walked down the stairs, saw him, and had quite a puzzled expression (“the fuck are you doing to my body”). She didn't seem to be aggressive towards him, but looked as if she wanted to attack Serika for some reason.

Tsukumojuku turned to her and said in a firm but gentle tone he’d usually use with Moppy: “No, Kusanagi Ryouko. No. No.”

And Ryouko quietly returned to her place behind the bookshelf.

There was still something left to do while he had the skin on: he closed his eyes and concentrated on the feelings around him.

STORY 4 PART 2

Human memory is not always left in the brain. The entire body holds it. There are stories circulating about people with new corneas who can see what the donors saw, or people with new hearts who can feel the emotions the donors did. Wearing Ryouko's corpse, Tsukumojuku could feel the memories contained in her skin as if they were happening to him.

Everything touching her. Every stimulus she had felt in her life. [And of course Maijo has to include sexual stimulation in this and it’s disturbing and I’m not recapping this in details, ugh.] And after that tsunami of feelings, there came skin memories from just before Ryouko’s death.

Somebody was touching her roughly with big hands, a man? She shook it off and ran away, but tripped -- the sensation of her hands hitting earth, small stones of the road digging into her knees. Then, the man turning her over, sitting on her chest, pinning her arms to the ground with his legs. But her ankles were also held down by someone (so there were two criminals!). Then a needle was inserted into her chest, and the memories faded to black.

Tsukumojuku gathered the facts together. The first person's hands were big and rough, the second person's – much thinner, with long nails that left ten clawmarks on the body. The first person seemed to only have four fingers on their right hand, with the ring finger missing.

Next thing: judging by the memory and the condition of the body, the victim had been killed by injecting some kind of detergent. The culprit used a syringe as their killing tool, so maybe it was someone relatively physically weak, maybe a woman--

That syringe he had spotted in the hidden room. Of course. Serika. That’s why Ryouko’s soul seemed angry at her.

Maybe that’s why the heads were removed: she knew that Tsukumojuku could access the bodies’ “memories”, and the presence of eyes/ears/nose would give him enough sensory input information to figure out she was the killer. And those hands of a man -- did she just cut them off of some guy and wore them like gloves to confuse the shit out of him?

As for the motive... aside from the Green Park, there was another park near his house, Ikoinohiroba, where he and Umi sometimes took the kids to play. And where he also secretly banged many women, apparently, which could lead to Serika being jealous [why would-- why-- God, I’m already tired of this part.].

When Tsukumojuku confronted Serika, she admitted that she did kill those women. At first she just dumped the bodies into the river, but then a certain person paid her for the last 12 murders.

That person would take the head and hands of the victim for themselves. They claimed to have come from the Castle through the old waterway running beneath it. No doubt that suspicious person was the culprit in the Castle case, as well, and used the waterway to bring new victims in. They introduced themselves as “Seiryoin Ryusui”, but their real identity seemed to be the “Great Detective Tsukumojuku”.

And they looked uncannily like our narrator.

--

IMPRESSIONS:

I. I don’t even know anymore, my dudes. I give up. I don’t even have the energy to rant.

Seriously, Maijo, what the fuck? You wrote the gut-punching finale of the Third Story where Seshiru finally recognizes Tsukumojuku as his kid brother and defends him with his life, you wrote the Fifth Story where Serika sincerely apologizes for all the abuse she inflicted and it’s implied she’d move on from the fucked up relations of her childhood towards a better life (even if the world is ending)... and then you make Tsukumojuku and Serika fuck? WHAT?! I know this is chronologically before the Fifth Story but come the fuck on. Somehow you made the already bad out-of-nowhere scene even worse by putting it here.

Since nobody actually knows who Maijo Otaro is or what they look like, with even that pen name being an artistic pseudonym, there are quite a lot of people who entertain the rumor that Maijo is a woman. I want these people to read this book, with all its female victim exploitation / having every female character want to throw themselves at the male protagonist / constant “that’s not how women (or people period) work” feel, then look me in the eye and try to repeat that claim.

While I love how mitate works in this universe and the thought processes involved, that fragment with flags was ridiculous even for me. Tsukumojuku sure can bullshit his way through anything.

BOOKS SHOULD NOT BE UP THERE. NO

If there’s something to defend in these parts, it’s the first “lost behind the bookshelf” comparison.

Also, I’m amused by the notion that the entire mess with Antonio Torres in Jorge Joestar could have been avoided if somebody wore his corpse long enough for his confused spirit to appear, and told him “no” in the exact tone of voice that an owner of a well-meaning but easily excitable cairn terrier would use.

>>>NEXT PART>>>

#sparkly reads tsukumojuku #long post #maijo and jdc stuff #not gonna lie if I had the physical version of the book I'd probably throw it againt the wall somewhere around this point #csa tw #incest tw #...to be fair I did compare this book to punpun and punpun did grow up to be a massive asshole later so.

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Well it’s about damn time estimate two half years ago I made this marble synthetic universe in chronological order video ever since then the question is in the most is wins election coming out so with avengersand Cindy working out in about a weekand that is a big sign is a need to do one last one of theseand yes this will most likely be the last of theseand seek analogies because after this this university to be weighted a trick out this video is high enough to make already just be the moviesand TV shows in the short filmsand even the tying comics as this video is ridiculously hilariously long but considering everything a document here in total is about 256 hours long condensing ends in two hours I think is not bad but maybe to watch this on one setting or do be impressive to just put a few disclaimers upfront if you must get themand find the video you can click to this time go had I will be too offended 170 states are to be 100 accurate that you might be assumptions recipe name hereand there because there are a lot of weird names of artifactsand planets also considering the stuff I need to cram into this I will be painting with a pretty broad brush for some of these especially TV shows I can go into every tiny subplot of agents of shield as much as I’m I went to’s that wasn’t super obvious spoilers ahead for everything like having everything I know I said sit back relaxand let’s get this thing started before we had to get into the eventsand everything are few things you should know about this universe is elite think of this universe is having two main sections there is the normal universe first which has earth that branches off to the rest of space goes to the galaxiesand planetsand guardians even further to planets like Asgardand the restaurants now in other card realms not planets but for my researchand understanding that realms are just planets deep out in spaceand is not specifically are connected to each other by Qaeda system called Yggdrasil basically just think nine important different planets connected to each otherand it got names from Norse mythology for the sake of not starting massive argument in the comments plan arounds from the out the nameplate around his Asgard with aliens living there have technology so advanced that they appear to be godsand also yeah have some magic powers that make them pretty godly then be on this regular universe in this other section there are hundreds thousands infinite number of parallel dimensions to this world all this is called the multi verse we mainly say our dimensions at this but in the story to be a lot of references to other dimensions basically universes that existed Dr strange portal with Myers so there planets switched rounds find twoand then there are the dimensions which will point out along the way okay I don’t Arity lots of people not set up but now it actually it started before the universe existed several billion years ago there were six singularities that eventually morphed into tiny gems with the powers of the universeand the powers of time power reality space the souland the mind in this pre universe darling on us to call it is a race of aliens called the dark elves who rule this place cousins are comprised of darknessand the love that I can’t get enough of darkness then the universe starts the dark elves don’t like this is no more infinite darkness so they would return the universe to how was before without of these planetsand speciesand whatnot so the albino leader of the dark elves Malikand gets his hands on the reality stoneand turns it into a substance called the ether basically turns a stone into a substance he can use as a weapon then as the universe evolves these giant spaceguard type things called celestial startup where we don’t really know the power to manipulate huge massand energyand so they are able to use the most powerful objects in the universe the infinity stones these into planetsand civilizations wherever they want is there just got pics like that of the celestial’s called egoand he finds being spaceguard disk kind of lonely he discovers he can manipulate the matter around himand create shells ponchos himself until he is an actual planet being a planet boring though so creates a smaller avatar from self to explore the universe over the next millions of years he finds tons of planets around the universeand decides he must conquer all of them he does this with a well thought out plan we start supplanting little seasonal planets that can turn this planets into extended versions of himself but to activate them the power of another celestial so how do you get another celestial you bang anything that moves in the entire universe apparently ego gets busy across the universeand since people church or the kids he makes for him one of these retrievers is eventually undo but were getting out of ourselves as pre pesto because none these kids inherit his celestial powersand so their useless 10 so he kills them all in stores the corpses in the lower part of the planet just technically inside of himself ill I at this point earth has finally formed kind of an immediate right filled with a superstrong element called by brainyand crash landsand what will become Africa because it’s awesome the rebellion gives the pilot around it special powersand extra strength had a few million yearsand now humans have evolved on earth in Africa five tribes of humans discovered the vibratingand decide to build a home around itand call it Wakonda that drives us fighting until one day one of the tribes warriors gets a message from the panther goddess passed to consume this plant affected by the librarian called the heart shaped herb okay pods yes there is apparently a panther goddess maybe this was just a hallucination as guy had a something because there’s really no expiration plan is universe whatever maybe does exist in part but anyway is he consumes the vibrating power plant superstrength speedand enhancing sinks from losses like yeah right as prequel he should be arcaneand so the tribes are united under his ruleand live in peace in Wakonda except for Jabari tribe who decide to live in the mountains instead a guy who eats the heart shaped herb also becomes the Black Panther the warrior protector of a condo over the centuries the natural kingand Black Panthers passed down with the help of the heart shaped herb also because they have a boatload by brainy him over the centuries work on it develops into an incredibly technologically advanced country far more advanced than anywhere else in the world however they decide to hide themselves so they don’t assure the techand wealth with the otherwise pretty sucky world of timeand so discuss themselves as a poor Third World country meanwhile this being somewhere else in the world who might be human might not it’s not really clear called out tomorrow discovers the Mystic arts basically realizes magic Israel Mr guards essentially allows you to manipulate those alternate dimensions I mentioned beforeand also do other cool stuff like make magic shields because this secretes a little club called the Masters of the mystic arts with a bunch of humansand start training in this art of energy manipulation magic really at some point he uses his magic powers to get his hands on the time infinity stone which he uses to make the Iraq Amato so he can control it as their fancy necklace he puts of three symptoms around the world to protect the world from threats from other dimensions these are symptoms in Hong Kong Londonand New York or what will eventually be displaces threats from other dimensions you ask my ass like for example this big amorphous that called her mother who is the Lord of the dark dimension that our dimension is one as many dimensions that exist out there in the multi verse time does not exist there that’s important detail the mother wants to conquer every dimension in the multi verse is he’s a giant superpower for bad guyand so he just wants to consume worlds it’s also possible to draw power from the dark dimension that old let’s say let you live for superlong time by is generally not a good idea to do so because the memo can influence youand come throughand destroy literally everything it’s not recommended now over to I called Oden who is the heir to the throne of that plan around the mentioned before Asgard currently the king is this guy called bore Asgard is a tale told of ragged rock this event that will destroy Asgardand sci fi demon called starters can do that using the eternal flame which basically gives them loads of powerand can resurrect that people like the sound of any of that so he fights orderand locks up on another plan around called Miss Lewis behind Danny Locke’s eternal flame is big screen textile vault back homeand Asgard will be stubborn rock from ever happening please take note as does the first of countless times Oden sucks at hiding stuff fast forward of itand the convergence is happening physically this means that all the nine plant rounds align with each otherand so they’re much easier to get to like literal portals open up between themand the fabric of reality starts getting weird so that race of aliens from before the universe called dark elves who are credentialing on the planet realm of content it take this opportunity to try destroy the universe again using the ether reality stone their stop by these guardians led by King Borer who also take ether from corpus either way were known find it kind of delicateand some of his troops managed to escapeand put themselves in hibernation until the next chance comes now back outthere’s a space of aliens called the Cree what you need to know about them is that they’re just the worst like pretty much all the time there also were with some other aliens at this particular time their suffering huge casualties in the war anyway to get the upper hand so they’re trying to search for that eventually they come across Earth set aside humans aren’t exactly good weapons but if the modified they can become good weaponsand so they decide to make in humans is not because the next part of this is slightly gatedand very important to the rest the story Cree experiment humansand give some of them powers that only manifest exposed to a missed called carriageand missed this mist is released by Turgeon crystals this process is called terror Genesis when she becoming human usually does get some sort superpowerand maybe deformity does the Cree put these Turgeon crystals in these weird shipping is called diviners while they were there the Cree decided also to go to Puerto Rico where they built a giant underground city where you can easily release the Turgeon list to activate your dormantand human powers if human with the inhuman Jean touches this divider Turgeon crystal carrier they had visions of a big that cities so they go thereand get their powers confused or just going started the Cree are happily making superpowered humans but after a while they like a these kind of suck let’s get out here when the first humans are made from this mine Hunter turns out to be a super powerfuland dangerousand human called hive who has a tentacle face is so powerful that the Cree want to get rid of them so they find a planet called Navistar Mavis found the universe call Mammothand build a portal called the monolith to easily transfer the human there to get rid of him they do soand he destroys the entire planet turning it into a barren wasteland however this hive has some followers back on earth that they believe that eventually can be brought back to rule the world so they started trying to get them backand built a whole society around the idea this secret organization became known as Hydra yes Hydra wasn’t always crazy Nazis they were originally crazy tentacle monster worshipers one point Hydra gets its hands on the monolithand transitionsand people to get hive but they never come back anyway the Creekand hallway from Earth but one poor Cree died while thereand so’s corpses just left behind at some point years well something humans that are left on earth find a way to get to the moon or a portal maybe anyway they get to the moon build a city thereand set up their own monarchyand society where the people who get good powers get to be royalty in divorceand lives while the people who get less can powers have to work in the mindsand remember you’re supposed to root for the rich people here for some reason back Asgard has become the King he has a daughter called hello who is now the heir to the throne decides he wants to expand as God’s powerand brings kingdom more glory does run the nine plant rounds of helloand conquers them sometimes that means that aren’t necessarily very sanitary eventually though multi lung style house a mission goes too bigand she gets a little too let’s say crazy with murdering so I banishes her to the plan around of hell is only capable realized yet is kind of a bad dude I was getting ashamed of all the terrible stuffand held it together so we just covered a lot then act like it never existed like the hero hits out finally were in the 80s metal multi verse thing where there are bunch of different dimensionsand another one of these dimensions theirs is awesome mystical city called Conlon which appears on earth somewhere in China about every 15 years or so in the city this group of monks called the order of the Crane mother teach the art of G this mystical life energy in every living thing is we can help you heal people superfast or can be used for fighting purposes also did I mention that dragons live in the city because they do that without style dragons over the years often die out except for one college shall allow is also always one special trainee in the order of the Crane mother who if there super amazing at punchingand kicking testified the Dragon shall allowand when the powers of the immortal iron fist the damage eventually achieve one fist to make it really strong busing heal peopleand you’re really good at fighting the orifice job is to defeat the enemies of the order of the Crane motherand got a secret passageway to come onand the metals passed down from generation to generation think of it as the city’s Black Panther minus the cloth it but things are all sunshine shall beatings and their five students one immortality using the Chi door of the grandmothers likeand so these five get banished to earth those five are called because no madam gal Alexandra Murakamiand so one day they been together to form an evil organization called the hand very sinister name figure out around the world their opponents while those dragons died scattered undergroundand through these bones they can get an elixir that lets you bring that people from the dead take elusive on time which is what they want has to strive to conquer Asia getting their own little army of ninjas together so the group called the chaste who don’t like that stand up against themand they battled for centuries to come the chased a big believer’s income line in the iron fistand they’d really like iron fist to help them out they had to go around being able to one point destroy the city of Pompeii is still a twin helland she hates it so she tries to escape ownsand his army of super bass worriers called the Valkyries to stopper they do it but all the Dina process except for one of them called Brunhild make a medical doctor for the rest of this she’s pretty shaken after seeing literally all of her friends get murdered so she goes off of the universe as her faith in Asgardand all that is shaken Jens Obama’s junk planet on space called cigar more or less all the garbage in the universe goes where she slowly turns in a Han Solo mixed with archer also has another kid with his lovely as guardian wife Freda called Thor Thor is now the heir to the throne of Asgard as hell it totally doesn’t count later on in another plan around cardio nine there’s a species called the frost giants who want to conquer earth they came that guard which again guest yes Earth is another planet realm so they start invasion in the heart of the earth Scandinavia in Norway these guardians meet themand paddle them all the way back to your nine where they defeat them also licking the frost giant has a baby but he just is not to die outand find that baby is like God’s cute so he keeps in the namesand Lokiand he raises him with his actual son Thor never telling him that he’s actually frost giant nice of negotiate a peace treaty with frost giantsand take their source of power at the casket of ancient winters he also present on his vault Loki grew up togetherand they love each other even though they don’t always get along snake transformed into himselfand make Loki’s generally just kind of envious of Dorcas secretly gets more attentionand Thor also gets kind of writing area as he grows up as a is a prince those blue aliens called the Cree welder still hated by actually everyoneand so the end of starting a war with this huge Empire space called the no vampire this empire spends a lot of planets that were last for a long long time don’t worry we’ll get back to it Asgard also has his army of special soldiers a bit super enragedand store everything called the berserker Army one member of this army after a battle on earth decides to stay thereand he ends up living in a quaint little monastery in Ireland is berserker staff makes a person superstrong so he split it up into three piecesand distributed around the world is still a pretty busy kingand so he gets his hands on another infinity stone the space stone which is also called the Tesseract is IK the subject of insane power the most secure place in the universe Norwayand so he does also this as guardian woman whose voice ensnares men called Laura lie goes around nine plant around collecting an army of slave men she stoppedand imprisoned by as guardian where your name sift though still in Asgard yes a bunch of as good stuff happens this time there’s this blacksmith called how dear which if I was using my Danish voice would probably be had to buy this videos in Danish so hold dear anyway this guy finds artifact called the cup of glory but Loki seizes him because he’s Loki things a plan to steal it insults hold yearand gets chased by Holger sunblock Thor stuff the Chaseand Loki says it should have a contest of skill intelligenceand virtue to settle the matter in teams together this challenge enters tricksand schemes Loki steals a cup of in the process however through circumstances that really unimportant here Thor is arrogantand tries to take the cup they are realized the companies at the worst of them looking at what he did how do those crazy with power because the cupand trust sealed until Thorand then Thor was the fightand that’s the end of that Burger King time comic I’m not getting nothing really important happened for about 300 years by the 1800s hydra still sitting people through portals to the novice to get their tentacle leader back I on the other side keeps killing themand taking on the bodily forms to stop himself from dying some pieces also cut off from the monolithand given to the biggest fatcatsand Hydra now over the next 100 years hydra sort of moves away from the Holton Gloucester thing becomes more focused on just world domination as you do still doesn’t the above there are still big passing also the hand still rock about just being eviland stuff just don’t forget in the 1930s this kid called Howard Stark make some pretty crazy inventions because he’s a genius uses these at his other brilliant ideas to become a multimillionaire at a relatively young age there’s this sickly skinny sad kid called Steve Rogers in Brooklyn who has a heart of gold this other guy called Bucky Barnes helps them with some bulliesand so they become testes for decades to come like a lot of decades 1934 one of the biggest members of hydra is a guy called Johann Schmidt now that the Nazisand taking over Germany you want to join up with them Schmidt meets with Hitler is IK unable your evil let’s do thisand it was like sounds good to also needs the scientist called Arden Zola yes Arden not Armen starts working closely with him Hydra is now the Nazi deep science divisionand Schmidt has quite a few things on his to do list was a turn itself into a super soldier weapon for hydra he wants to adopt special weapons for the Nazis to use is looking defining the mythical Tesseract since it’ll probably be pretty useful in the whole taking over the world thing Howard Stark in his billionaire ring also meets Dr Abraham or Scott a German scientist was working on a serum that enhances a person’s physical abilities to the max super soldier serum if you will that is like KS it was a serum convenientand so Schmidt capturesand forces her skyand make the serum threatening to kill as a family Hydra continues to develop high tech next suits weapons but don’t have the extra to make them super laser heand cinematic yet the rafters Steve Rogers’s mom Sarah Rogers dies of tuberculosis is not often but Bucky helps to get through the tough times is with them to the end of the line over in Soviet Russia the red room program is started by the Soviet government is designed to brainwashand train young women to be super deadly assassin’s physical tank of shooting forceful sterilizationand ballet a little girl who would later be called Dottie Underwood is draining this program to become a superspy out Stark has all this moneyand all this tackling around so he starts of the company for all his awesome inventions called Stark industries which start stealing scienceand eventually weapons with the help of his own resources Stark also comes across in that I bring him that still left over in Africa takes the tiny man he finds back USA to work on now there’s this woman called Peggy Carter she’s a code breaker in England working for the British she doesn’t get married to this guy called Fred her brotherand BFF Michael recommends her to be a field agent because she such a badass the pays like I can fight this guy you hate Michael but then Michael diesand this pushes Peggy to become field agentand call for wedding needs to start working with Chester Phillips in the US Army. And see you want to show in and on our supposed to possibly kill the enemy and and not the no feverish and will will in this and that’s not the problem is not going all five and you sold me know you are and that they go to the oh so real about is moving company off the money I will be in this will not only the cost know about me goal so don’t go now and that I was in this is that some smart is not okay what portion they know what they will about 1 See Other Shirt: There Was A Girl Who Really Loved Baking And Dogs It Was Me T Shirt

#Trending #There #Was #A #Girl #Who #Really #Loved #Baking #And #Dogs

[recentanimenews]

Anime in America Podcast: Full Episode 8 Transcript

  It's time to bid farewell to Crunchyroll's Anime in America podcast, but not before it goes out with a banger of a final episode. Join host Yedoye Travis and special guest Kun Gao as they tackle the streaming wars, and read on for the full episode 8 transcript. 

  The Anime in America series is available on crunchyroll.com, animeinamerica.com, and wherever you listen to podcasts. 

  EPISODE 8: THE STREAMING WARS

Guest: Kun Gao

  Disclaimer: The following program contains language not suitable for all ages. Discretion advised.

  [Lofi music]

  Last we checked in, the anime industry was struggling. Rising competition matched with the economic crisis of ‘07 and ’08 caused half the industry to shutter its doors within the next five years. And even without economic obstacles, the physical media and broadcast focused industry was still facing the looming threat of piracy.

  I’m Yedoye Travis and this is the final episode of Anime in America. 

  [Lofi music]

  By this point anime was already available to stream legally, and had been as early as 2002 with Valkyrie Media Partner’s video on demand service Anime Network. It had been a mainstay on Netflix since back when the company was still mailing out DVDs, which it technically still is, but if you already knew that, chances are your internet connection isn’t strong enough to listen to this podcast. Funimation and VIZ had already made the jump to digital with major streaming services Hulu and...uh… Joost?

  Do you remember Joost? Cause I do not. What the fuck is “Joost?”

  Both inked deals along with the now defunct U.K. anime distributor Gong in 2008 to stream select anime series from their catalogs. More on that in Anime in the U.K.! Ha ha, just kidding… unless… maybe?

  Video hosting websites were presenting a major problem to anime distributors, however. The internet had entered the age of YouTube and new sites and services where literally anyone could upload a video without any kind of quality control were rising and falling daily and with them fell the final remaining barrier between consumers and pirates, technological literacy [Pirate “Arr!”]. The online ecology was primed for pirates to step out of IRC and torrenting sites and start putting their work on streaming video pages that literally anyone could use.

  Unburdened by approvals and quality assurance, piracy had been beating official releases in terms of speed for decades and now suddenly was standing shoulder to shoulder with official services in availability. 

  But already the seed of a new era had been planted. And among the thousands of video hosting sites was an anime-focused page run by a group of young Bay Area techies.

  Gao: We started to just tinker around on nights and weekends. We were watching Starcraft replays, we were watching anime content, and every week it was like “well, let’s load up this torrent and let’s wait for the Naruto to come out, and now we have to seed to a bunch of people before we can watch and let’s hope we don’t get a virus, or whatever.” And it was like, you know it was like a lot of work. And then we’re like “well, why don’t we just make a website that people can just click, just like YouTube, and just start watching?” And coincidentally, YouTube took off in… I’ll say ‘05-’06, when it was really starting to hockey stick, so we kinda said “well, that’s kinda the model.” YouTube, there was many other sites, at the time, now it’s just YouTube, but Veoh, MetaCafe, like Stage6, like all these sites we were like, what if we just did one where people would upload content they normally just can’t watch? And anime just made a lot of sense to us because we couldn’t find how to watch it… anywhere. Except for torrent sites. That’s kinda the chronology up until we founded the company in the middle of ‘06. 

  That is Kun Gao, founder and former CEO of Crunchyroll. It wasn’t always the biggest catalog of anime in the world, back then it was a small website he and his friend designed to host anime and Starcraft videos which quickly turned from a passion project into an ever-increasing logistical and financial struggle as site traffic began to balloon.

  Gao: We ran out of bandwidth [dialup sounds] though pretty quickly, because bandwidth was really expensive. Especially back then [dialup sounds end] it was like 20 times more  expensive than it is now. And I remember we were just maxing all our credit cards, because we didn’t, we weren’t really making money, there wasn’t a way to monetize with video ads, there wasn’t video ads to begin with. So yeah, that was the situation in early ‘07. So we, first it was raising with some angels. We said, we approached some angels, they were angels for our first company, my first company, and they had gotten a return from that investment. And I asked them if they wanted to invest into the new company, and they were very supportive and they were right behind us. And then within about a month or two after the angels invested, the site just continued to grow. And it was showing up on Alexa, which was not the Amazon speaking thingamajig, it was a website where you could look at other peoples’ traffic, and how they were trending over time. And I think that’s when VCs started knocking on our doors, they saw that the website was just hockey sticking and blowing up and they approached us and said they wanted to invest. And so from about… August-September through December of 2017, we started talking to a lot of VCs and then we found the right VC to invest into our business, and then we raised about $4 million bucks into the company, and that was when we started paying off all our credit card bills, and then we started to you know, get more servers, starting to hire full time employees, because we weren’t paying anyone or ourselves at that time, so that everyone could work on this full time. 

  That’s Angel Investors, of course, not actual… angels, which, uh… in some circles, you might believe are fake. Depends. We’ll leave that up to God. Who is real! [angelic choir].

  Gao: In 2008, after we raised VC funding, we said “well, we need to figure out how to, like, license this content. We need to figure out how to compensate creators, and then we need to figure out how to make money for this content.” And so at that time, I think the company was like six, maybe seven, people? And everyone was an engineer, and so I drew the lucky or unlucky straw of having to figure out how to like, figure out Japan. The first thing I had to do was, you know, was like figure out “who do I talk to?” And I didn’t know who to talk to. And so fortunately, one of our advisors was a guy who was, at the time, the CEO of a company called BitTorrent, and he, along with Bram, who created the BitTorrent protocol, had setup a office in Tokyo where BitTorrent was a thing you can license to put on to like, a NAS drive, or a router, where you could do BitTorrenting on your NAS or your router so you don’t have to turn on your computer to do that. And so they had a business out there, and so I talked to him about who to talk to. And he said “well, you should talk to this guy called Vince Totino, he works for the BitTorrent in Japan.” And so in March of 2008, I went to Japan, met up with Vince, and then the more we talked, the more it was like “well, this guy’s awesome. Like, he knows everything about Japan, because he’s been there for 20 years. He speaks fluent Japanese. Maybe he can help us to navigate Japan.” And so he joined full time, and then we then set about going to all the major Japanese anime companies. And he didn’t have all the connections, either, so it was just we found someone who knew someone who knew someone, and then we contacted him and just kept going down the chain until we were able to get to, we were able to get to the key folks at all the major companies. And then, as relates to subtitling, outputting content, once we figured out the business side and we were able to get a deal with TV Tokyo, we had to figure out how to legitimately subtitle the content. Because we were getting the files before TV broadcast, we can’t just put it out there for fansub groups to fansub, because we wouldn’t know or be able to trust that. And so we started to hire people to help us to subtitle. And it ended up being that a lot of the people who used to participate in the fansub community were the best people to subtitle. And so they were able to receive some compensation and credit for their work doing it officially, legitimately, through the Crunchyroll business.

  So, Kun just went to Tokyo, linked up with Vince and got all the major anime publishers on board. Pretty simple, right? Wrong! Absolutely wrong. You’re stupid for thinking otherwise. Turns out it was pretty difficult not only to sell them the whole idea of streaming media, but also to convince those publishers to license out their valuable IP to a pirate site.

  Gao: Interesting side story is, if you remember when we previously talked about VHS that was pirated and distributed by fans, for fans, very analogous to what we were doing, that started a company called AD Vision, by John Ledford, who I would say is probably the pioneer of anime home video distribution. And today the company’s called Sentai. But he helped us to introduce us to TV Tokyo, in like the Fall of 2008. And then, when we got to TV Tokyo, they were, you know, they were very pragmatic about the situation. I would say not everyone was pragmatic. We would have conversations, a lot of conversations, were something to the tune of “Hey! We’ve got a website, there’s a lot of fansubbed content on there, we know it’s not legal, we want to get the license to legally do it.” And then they would just… not try to make eye contact, they would like act visibly angry, they would be shaking and they would say “you’re stealing from us, you’re pirating our content.” And we said “well, we want to make it legitimate. And if you want us to take all of your content down, today, we will. But that’s going to send all the fans to dark corners, to get access to your content, because they really want to watch it. And we want to make a bright lit place for you and your content to be distributed worldwide.” And so I think TV Tokyo really got that, and so we were able to work with them to figure out how to license Naruto legitimately. And at the end of ‘08, we announced together with TV Tokyo that they would be, we would be simulcasting Naruto, for the first time [Naruto opening 2 “Haruka Kanata” plays], within like an hour of TV broadcast starting Jan…. uh, Jan 7th, or something, 2009. So that’s kinda how that arc started.

  [Lofi music]

  On New Year’s Eve 2008, Crunchyroll deleted all of its illegal videos and fan contributed content, converting to an official streaming service that began simulcasting Naruto Shippuden in January 2009. On the Japan side it would remain an uphill battle over the years as Crunchyroll continued to shop itself out and prove itself to other publishers, but in America it was a deal that shook the entire industry. Streaming anime was just beginning to creep onto platforms like Netflix and Hulu in 2008 but NO ONE was simulcasting. At the time, Naruto was the single most popular anime in the world and suddenly it was on a brand new service that was putting it up to stream within an hour of its Japanese broadcast.

  For anyone who doesn’t know, simulcasting is a portmanteau of the words “simultaneous” and “broadcasting,” and I think based on those two words you can guess that it means “simultaneous broadcasting.” 

  This was a foundational shift both for the established industry and for pirates. Where before pirates had speed on their side, they couldn’t hope to turn around episodes of Naruto within an hour. Crunchyroll’s agreement with TV Tokyo got them all the materials in advance of the broadcast to allow them to do the legwork pre-release, which would eventually shrink down the window to be near simultaneous with the Japanese TV broadcast. Suddenly the fastest and easiest way to watch new anime was once again an official source.

  Along with their new offering, Crunchyroll also established a new framework for the streaming business. Although Crunchyroll’s original catalogue was small, many fans considered it a win-win.Crunchyroll had a large pre-existing community that trusted the brand and now it was beating the pirates in speed and had a clear financial throughline from your wallet to the people making the product. 

  So Crunchyroll started to grow. And it started to grow FAST.

  Suddenly industry titans like Funimation, VIZ, and the recently established Aniplex of America found themselves having to play catch-up. This started the Simulcast Wars, a nearly 10 year long race for each of these companies to launch its own branded streaming services and get their products out alongside the official Japanese broadcast, and of course, everyone tried to get in.

  And I mean everyone. Every single person. 

  But quick aside before I get into that… This pivot to simulcasting is a huge moment for anime itself, but that moment had another lasting effect on licensing that’s definitely worth mentioning. Anime itself got more opportunities. Licensing companies always have to be strategic to make money, but the shift toward streaming as the primary vehicle changed the economics of anime. You might say it… disrupted… the industry.

  Gao: I think when you start off as… when you start off and become so successful like Funimation in home video, sometimes it’s tough to switch gears and disrupt your own business. And so we were disruptors. We were definitely way smaller, but we had to be nimble. And there were a lot of content that Funimation just doesn’t license, because for them it doesn’t make sense to go get Haikyu!! [Haikyu!! opening “Imagination” plays]. It wouldn’t ever sell on home video, and that was the only way they made money. So that wasn’t interesting for them. But it was interesting for us. Through the internet, there’s a lot of sports anime fans who love that genre, who love the fact that sports is just a vehicle for telling stories, and they’re willing to subscribe, they’re willing to watch online. And so we had an advantage in that regard. 

  Before our modern era where there’s just about 100 percent licensing rate every season, tons of titles would get skipped over because anime distributors in the U.S. had to judge new titles through the lens of a physical release and decide if a production looked like it would sell enough units to make up for their investment. A streaming model meant it was not only easier for each anime to find its audience online, but a lower price tag since you didn’t necessarily have to add the costs of designing, manufacturing, and distributing DVDs and a title’s performance online could act as a testing ground to inform your later decisions regarding a physical release.

  You could make the argument that this also hurts anime’s longevity since physical releases are often all that is left of a title if the license enters limbo and that’s certainly legitimate but, as a counterpoint... We might notta gotten Haikyu!!... so there’s that. That’s enough of an argument, right?

  Okay! Back to the thing that I was talking about.

  EVERYBODY. In all caps.

  Funimation was the quickest to follow, streaming a near simulcast of Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood the very next season, four days behind the Japanese broadcast, which was fast by industry standards, but still gave pirates plenty of wiggle room for one of the biggest shonen releases of the 2010s [Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood opening “Again” plays]. 

  VIZ followed next with Inuyasha: The Final Act in the Fall season which they simulcast on Hulu.

  This was the pattern for about two years as other companies experimented with simulcasts of top priority titles and Crunchyroll continued to grow not only in subscribers but their number of their simulcast titles each season.

  Then Anime News Network tried to get in on the action.

  Y’know, the news site. The one with “News” in its name? One of the most trafficked anime sites in the world at the time, Anime News Network wanted in on the game, and after picking up some catalog titles from the likes of Aniplex, Bandai, and Sentai, they made their simulcasting debut starting with Oreimo in Fall 2010 [Oreimo opening plays]. Oreimo is… uh… I will say the definitive title in a genre of anime known as “Siscon,” upon which I refuse to elaborate but you can google at your own risk.

  Unfortunately ANN pulled a Funimation, and someone took advantage of an exploit in their system and managed to get ahold of the second episode of Oreimo pre-release, and ANN was also forced to suspend its simulcasts because siscon dudes mean business. At this point though they were probably already on their way out of the streaming business. Despite the large amount of traffic ANN commanded on its editorial side, it was unable to leverage that into streaming views and it quietly wound down its catalog over the years to once again focus exclusively on news. Because they’re a news site. They do news.

  The Fall 2010 season also saw the launch of Toonzaki, a creation of none other than the now-failing 4Kids’. It started with a catalogue of 72 mostly non-exclusive titles, and honestly the streaming site may have been one of the best things 4Kids’ ever created, a community focused platform that attracted even longtime critics of the anime licensor. Unfortunately the site couldn’t survive 4Kids’s financial woes and it was ultimately killed, likely as a result of the 2012 lawsuit we mentioned in the previous episode. In 2012 Toonzaki suffered the 1-2 punch of losing its entire Yu-Gi-Oh! catalog and having its site mysteriously going down for three whole months. I dunno about you but I would cancel my subscription after uh, probably a couple of hours, actually. Ultimately the site’s ownership was passed to Konami and it was later shut down in 2013.

  In 2012 VIZ announced its own online streaming channel called Neon Alley which was kinda like a TV channel but VIZ anime and on the internet. That uh, ya know the whole concept of streaming? That’s what we’re talking about this episode. Unfortunately it didn’t fly and by early 2014, VIZ cut a deal with Hulu that added Neon Alley as a content channel to the larger streaming service’s menu. Within just a few months the Neon Alley name was dropped altogether as VIZ’s content was fully incorporated into Hulu’s service.

  2013 saw the introduction of a brand new face in American anime streaming which, if I were a company like Crunchyroll or Funimation at the time, I probably would have greeted with hostility. Daisuki was founded by a Japanese consortium led by Asatsu-DK whose investors included major studios like Toei Animation, Aniplex, Sunrise, and TMS with the intention of streaming their anime globally. If that wasn’t scary enough, they were later joined by another $3 million in investments from a who’s who of Japanese publishers like Kodansha, Shueisha, Shogakukan, and Kadokawa.

  Included in their starting catalog were Aniplex hits like Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Sword Art Online as well as a large number of Sunrise mecha anime. And I can not emphasize enough the vibe at the time was that this was the apocalypse for international licensing. Japan’s gonna hold onto all their titles, choke everybody else out, and run their own one-stop shop for anime.

  But obviously that didn’t happen, so… what went wrong?

  Well nobody’s entirely sure but probably a number of things. By 2013 America’s short romance with mecha anime like Gundam Wing, Escaflowne, and Evangelion had long since come to an end and it was Gundam titles courtesy of Sunrise that made up most of Daisuki’s initial offering of exclusives. Look, Gundam fans, I see you. I’m one of you. I don’t know why kids these days can’t appreciate giant robots, either, but that’s just how it is. The rest of Daiksuki’s starting catalog was pretty sparse since they’d already shopped out the licenses to many of their major titles in the largest international markets. By now, I’m sure this episode feels like a thinly veiled Crunchyroll ad, but the fact is, Crunchyroll had the good fortune of launching with Naruto the single most popular anime of its era, while Daisuki had two major Aniplex hits that were already showing their age. That, along with some endemic technical issues on their platform, seem to have made an environment not even One Punch Man and Dragon Ball Super could save. Also, it seems, splitting up anime streaming rights by region and selling them piecemeal to major streaming services may have been more profitable for some of Daisuki’s investors.

  In March of 2017 Bandai Namco purchased Daisuki’s owner Anime Consortium in Japan and by October of the same year the service shut down completely.

  Anime was already a popular subsection of Netflix’s sprawling catalog in 2014, but that year the company started to make public moves to invest in the medium and secure their own exclusives, teaming up with Polygon Pictures to secure many of their future seinen releases such as Knights of Sidonia and Ajin: Demi-human [Ajin trailer clip], likely establishing the relationship that would later lead to a number of 3D anime produced by Netflix itself like the upcoming Pacific Rim and recently released Altered Carbon and Ghost in the Shell.

  Early 2016 saw Funimation launch their own streaming platform dubbed FunimationNow. But that wasn’t the only major announcement they planned that year. 2016 was also the beginning of what was probably the biggest news for Anime in America since the start of simulcasting: the big Crunchyroll/Funimation alliance.

  Under the tagline “better together” Crunchyroll and Funimation, now two of the biggest names in anime not only in the U.S., but worldwide, announced a strategic partnership in which they’d be sharing their libraries with one another.

      [Lofi music]

  As it turned out, 2017 was the year that two media juggernauts would turn their eyes on anime and I just gotta discuss the most unfortunate one first. I’m talking, of course, about Amazon’s Anime Strike. And I say “of course,” but you might not’ve known about it until I just said it, so... Amazon announced its entry into the anime industry January 17th with a great deal of fanfare. 

  [IGN News: Amazon has just launched its own anime focused streaming channel, called Anime Strike]

  Anime Strike was the first of what would be several branded add-on channels for Amazon Prime Video, which were essentially ways of compartmentalizing content that they could charge extra money for. So, in addition to your Prime subscription, you’d have to shell out an additional $4.99 to watch the exclusive anime Amazon was planning to load on the service.

  Amazon wasn’t fuckin’ around, either. Among their first exclusives was the seinen sex drama Scum’s Wish, which would be the first of Amazon’s new exclusive streaming deal with the lauded Noitamina animation block on Fuji TV which, down the line, would land them Inuyashiki, After the Rain, and Banana Fish. They also entered a strategic deal with Sentai Filmworks that would give Anime Strike an exclusivity window for certain new Sentai titles. After about four months they even rolled out the ability to download episodes for offline viewing. So even up against Netflix and the new alliance between Crunchyroll and Funimation, Anime Strike was shaping up to be the next major competitor in anime streaming.

  Or… it seemed that way.

  Let’s just say anime fans didn’t like Anime Strike very much. You could forgive them for charging another $60 a year for a very limited library of anime ($160 if you didn’t already have Prime). But also, Anime Strike just didn’t seem to “get” anime fans and didn’t seem very intent on trying to figure us out.

  And despite Amazon’s massive and sophisticated streaming video infrastructure, they just couldn’t seem to get anime episodes up on time. They would show up days late, often without subtitles. And discoverability was a problem, with many complaining they were unable to find Anime Strike anime on Amazon even after searching for its exact title. Amazon publicly blamed late deliverables from Sentai for the frequent episode delays which Sentai very publicly stated was an outright lie.

  It was a bad look that just got worse with their PR. Anime Strike “no commented” several journalists looking for interviews and the ones they did get like ANN���s interview with VP of Digital Video Michael Paul were… uh, awkward? Forbes and IGN each released articles panning Anime Strike, citing its prohibitive cost and that it just didn’t seem to understand anime fans. Despite acquiring many major titles in 2017 including the Anime Award Winning Made in Abyss, Anime Strike was circling the drain.

  Just seven days shy of its first year, the channel was finished. Amazon announced they were canning Anime Strike and putting their content back in general population on the rest of Prime Video. Their deal with Sentai ended with Sentai slowly retrieving their titles off Amazon and eventually losing their exclusive deal with Noitamina as of 2019, which you can probably thank for The Promised Neverland, Given, and Sarazanmai showing up on Crunchyroll. But Amazon hasn’t gotten out of the anime game entirely. Their acquisitions have been more low key and selective but they’ve kept things going with dark fantasy and science fiction anime over the past year such as Dororo, Blade of the Immortal, Psycho-Pass 3, and PET. So some good shows to check out if you still have your mom’s login or your college forgot to delete your .edu email. Otherwise, you know, I don’t know what to tell you. 

  Later in July, Sentai would announce its own streaming service HIDIVE to stream Sentai and Section23 anime which at first looked like any of the services I’ve already talked about that had good catalogs but not much new anime because of Anime Strike’s exclusivity window, but in hindsight this may have been some next level maneuvering from Sentai to prepare for Anime Strike’s fallout. However you look at it, Strike is dead and HIDIVE lives, having picked up many of Strike’s most acclaimed titles like Made in Abyss and Land of the Lustrous since their exclusivity window ended on Amazon. So thanks for the signal boost, Bezos. And congrats on your… unnecessary amount of money.

  [Bezos clip: Thanks, it’s great to be here.]

  In October of still 2017, a year that felt never-ending until 2020 came along, Netflix announced a big $8 billion dollar spend on original content, a considerable portion of which was earmarked to produce 30 anime titles in the coming years. On the heels of the Neo Yokio announcement some fans with zero taste thought this was pretty terrible news, considering Netflix had also rubbed those same fans the wrong way earlier in the year by purchasing TRIGGER’s much-anticipated Little Witch Academia set to premiere in January then just not releasing it. So, until its eventual release six months later, no one knew why it wasn’t already out or when they could expect it to be released. 

  It turns out this would become Netflix’s strategy in the coming years, eschewing simulcast schedules for batch releases often months after their conclusion to compete with international dubs… unless you’re in Japan where they broadcast on time. This supports the binge culture that has only become more important as we all stew in our own smells at home. It’s hard to tell if that system is working out for them or not because Netflix only recently hinted at maybe releasing viewership numbers and because they’re so big they could honestly just buy all that anime and set it on fire and still not hurt their bottom line.

  Anyway, Little Witch Academia was the first of a sudden Netflix shopping spree. In addition to streaming titles from other anime distributors, Netflix has been pretty reliably picking up exclusive rights to about two to three anime per season, even securing a big (although temporary you’ll soon discover) exclusive streaming deal for the Fate franchise with Aniplex, and slapping a “Netflix Original” sticker on it, driving anime aggregator websites crazy every quarter when they try to build seasonal launch lists.

  Regardless, Netflix’s interest in anime is undeniable. They would follow up their 2017 announcement with another in early 2018 claiming they had partnered with Production IG and Bones to produce new anime and ANOTHER announcement including Anima, Sublimation, and David Production in 2019. And context should tell you those are VERY BIG anime studios. But If it doesn’t, I will tell you. They are VERY BIG anime studios.

  Meanwhile their list of air quotes “original” exclusive seasonal anime is growing and Netflix has begun announcing a number of new original anime now based on successful live action Netflix series such as Altered Carbon, and also licensing all the live action anime from Japan that nobody has ever seen, unless you live in Japan. Basically what I’m trying to say here is Netflix is very into anime.

  Another smaller announcement in 2017 was that Funimation had been acquired by Sony, which was notable but not unusual, since the company had changed hands multiple times.

  And that’s where I’m ending my history. That’s it.

  [Lofi music]

  Now, in case you’ve been trapped under a rock for the past 10 years, you should know that media companies in the U.S. have been slowly consolidating, with Disney leading the charge on their mission to own all 100 of the Top 100 blockbuster Hollywood movies every year. And if you didn’t know before, I’m sure you’ve learned in quarantine, that Disney has started its own streaming service.

  2020 was the starting line for what’s already been a free for all between Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Video, Disney+, and HBO Max for the eyeballs of every human being on planet Earth and, of course, anime is a big part of that. If Amazon and Netflix suddenly investing in the medium doesn’t convince you then here are some numbers.

  A report estimated the total revenue generated by the anime industry at about $19 billion USD in 2017. Another report estimated the total revenue generated by the U.S. film industry as a whole at about $43 billion USD, with anime on average being considerably cheaper than inflated Hollywood and premiere TV budgets like Avengers Endgame’s $356 million purse or Game of Thrones’s $90 million final season budget, which covered a mere 6 episodes.

  It’s also worth noting that under quarantine a lot of anime is on hold, but overall animation is the easiest television production to produce, with Netflix going back into production on shows like Big Mouth and things of that sort. 

  Ironically, despite technical advances we’ve just about come full circle with the largest media conglomerates in the U.S. once again being in charge of anime localization. We’ve also seen the reappearance of anime as a relatively cheap addition to content portfolios, the major differences being the dramatically shrinking distance between Japan and America, an almost 100 percent rate of title acquisition by Western companies, and anime having transformed from something to fill time or disguise as American cartoons into its own mainstream force in the media alongside the MCU and whatever HBO is doing since Game of Thrones ended.

  There are definite concerns with the way the industry is headed but the benefits are undeniable. Save for maybe China, Americans are the most privileged group of anime fans, even more so than those in Japan itself. A perfect storm of being one of the largest anime markets in the world paired with this decades long consolidation of media is that all the anime gets licensed but spread across less platforms than even in Japan. So, even if it seems like you’re forking over subscription fees to an unreasonable number of services to catch all the big shows, realize you’ve got it better than international fans whose countries don’t even get every seasonal title.

  When you think about it, anime is even easier to keep up with than American TV. Amazon Prime, Netflix, Crunchyroll, Funimation, and HIDIVE gets you well over 99 percent of everything out there. Meanwhile in the sprawling American media landscape you’ll also need a subscription to Disney+, HBOMax, Peacock, and not only Hulu but make sure to grab Starz, Cinemax, and Entertainment add-ons… maybe even Hallmark if you, if you’re into stuff your grandma watches. And this is to say nothing of specialty and classic services like Shudder and Criterion. And of course Quibi. How could we possibly forget Quibi? Point is, each of these services probably has a few titles that were formative to your childhood and has some upcoming release that you’re interested in. And compared to that, anime has been cordoned off into what appears to be a reasonably small number of subscriptions.

  Now the face of competition has changed entirely. Co-productions are nothing new in anime, dating back to the beginnings of anime in America in the 60s and definitely providing a deep enough topic to warrant its own episode if Crunchyroll greenlights a season two…?

  But co-productions had previously been a way to get a particular project created, one of the most famous examples being the 1995 Ghost in the Shell film, a joint production between Kodansha, Bandai Visual, and the U.K.-based Manga Entertainment. Once again, Anime in the U.K.?

  Maybe? 

  As previously discussed in our manga episode, up until that film Ghost in the Shell, along with many Masamune Shirow works, had a considerable following in the West, greater even than in Japan. Investing in the film made sense and the deal gave Manga Entertainment exclusive rights to a cult classic that’s still being both emulated and outright ripped off by American directors to this day. At the time it was what you’d call a smart investment in a specific title with crossover appeal to Western audiences.

  And… yeah that’s still what co-productions are, but also they’re a way of getting your foot in the door early on titles you wanna license by investing in them years in advance rather than bidding on rights in the lead-up to the release. It also goes a long way in developing good relationships with studios and production committees. 

  And Netflix has been loudest on the co-production front, proudly announcing their strategic partnerships since as early as 2014, licensing content from studios directly to dodge the committee system, and just slapping “Netflix Original” on titles after they purchase exclusive rights whether they were actually involved in production or not, partly because that’s just how TV works in America.  

  Looking back you can find at least one example of a co-production from most of the major American anime companies that rose and fell in the 90s and 2000s. Crunchyroll itself has been quietly producing anime since early in its existence, counting over 60 co-pros before announcing their Originals Slate in 2020. Funimation first dipped their toes in back in 2016 with Dimension W and have slowly started to accrue their own roster of co-productions since late last year. If you’re a proper anime fan that never skips the OP, you may have noticed a growing number of American names and companies in the production credits since 2010.

  [Lofi music]

  Which brings me to my final point. What even is anime anymore?

  Japan has been outsourcing work to Korea for about 20 years now even as foreign animators have been traveling to Japan to work in Japanese studios. International entities are becoming increasingly involved in production and now foreign creators and source material are more prominently featured in new titles. As the number of foreign names increases in anime credits that inevitably means the number of Japanese names proportionally decreases.

  Korean webcomics are getting anime, Daft Punk and Porter Robinson had music videos made by anime studios, Studio 4C produced an anime film adaptation of the manga Tekkonkinkreet directed by an American animator. A manga by a french Canadian has been adapted into an anime. Marvel comics have gotten anime. Batman is a ninja now. Well, he has been for a while but this time animated by the studio that does the JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure openings. 

  At what point does a production lose the essential Japanese-ness that the term anime implies?

  Scratch that, what does “anime” even mean?

  The very definition of anime is now being tested, used as a marketing term to evoke a popular conceit about the medium rather than an identifier of its point of origin. Nowadays if you ask Netflix what an anime is, they’ll tell you it’s a cartoon written by the lyricist of Vampire Weekend starring Jaden Smith or an animated series made by a studio in Texas based on a 1983 American kids show, and written by the director of MallRats.

  So where are we headed with all this? Can anime survive its exposure to the American media ecosystem keeping its identity intact, or will anime soon just mean “cartoons but with blood in them?”

  I can’t answer these questions, I don’t know. Gonna have to get back to you in a sequel podcast in 2030. Anime in Space. Or in The Parallel Dimension That Apparently Exists. All I can do for now is provide you with the wise words of the individual who has provided me with the answers to most of life’s questions up until now. My mom…

  Grace: I don’t- I tried to do research, and I have no clue what this thing is.

  Yedoye: Yeah? Like, nothing at all? You didn’t find anything?

  Grace: They’re just cartoons! That’s all I know, you trying to test me?

  Yedoye: [laugh] A little bit, yeah.

  Grace: Why?

  Yedoye: Because- 

  Grace: I never watched cartoons. 

  Yedoye: But WE watched cartoons!

  Grace: It was never my thing.

  Yedoye: It was our thing, though.

  Grace: Pinky and the Brain, that’s it. 

  Yedoye: I mean, yeah, but that’s what we did on Sundays. But there was other stuff, after that. 

  Grace: [skeptical] Okay. I have no clue. I wish I did the research, I was too busy.

  Yedoye: You didn’t listen to any of the podcast? 

  Grace: I listened to one, it’s all about Japanese something, right? 

  Yedoye: Yeah,

  Grace: I know ??? used to draw them. He loved Japanese cartoons. 

  Yedoye: Yeah.

  Grace: But I can not make out- I may have been sitting there, but I never paid attention. 

  Yedoye: No? There’s, I mean, there’s like… Pokemon is anime. That counts. 

  Grace: Oh, really? Pokemon is anime?

  Yedoye: Yeah!

  Grace: Oh my God! I thought the name of the cartoon is “anime.” 

  Yedoye: Oh, no, no. 

  Grace: [realization] Ahhh, Pokemon is anime, which means... There’s several versions, right?

  Yedoye: Yeah, there’s a lot. There’s like, there’s Pokemon, there’s Dragon Ball Z, umm-

  Grace: Dragon Ball Z! I just recently [Notification sound] heard that.

  Yedoye: Yeah. And there’s um… did you ever watch Speed Racer?

  Grace: In the car? 

  Yedoye: Yeah.

  Grace: They like to drive?

  Yedoye: Yeah.

  Grace: Yeah, I’ve seen that.

  Yedoye: Yeah. That’s anime, too.

  Grace: I watched you guys ?? , but I just- you know, all that stuff was for you guys, babysitting activities. 

  [Both laugh]

  Yedoye: There’s shows-

  Grace: It was for babysitting, it was all for babysitting.

  Yedoye: They're not even-

  Grace: Did you know that?

  Yedoye: They’re not even for kids, though! 

  Grace: Eh?

  Yedoye: Those shows are not for kids though!

  Grace: Yeah, that’s why I’m trying to tell ??. Yeah, so the general name is “anime.”

  Yedoye: Yeah. 

  Grace: Then under anime is like, you have all these different versions of cartoons.

  Yedoye: Yeah, yeah.

  Grace: Okay.

  Yedoye: You thought it was one show?

  Grace: I thought it was just one.

  Yedoye: Oh G- Okay. 

  Grace: And I just heard of them.

  Yedoye: I definitely could’ve uh…

  Grace: And the name is anime.

  Yedoye: I definitely could’ve clarified that a few weeks ago. 

  Grace: Yep, I didn’t even know. 

  Yedoye: Okay, maybe that’s my fault. 

  Grace: So Pinky and the Brain, Pinky wasn’t one of them?

  Yedoye: Uh, no, no, he was not.

  Grace: Oh, okay. You guys confuse me. What else you wanna know?

  Yedoye: Umm, I think maybe that’s it? I don’t know-

  Grace: What do you mean “that’s it?!”

  Yedoye: There’s not that much, I just wanted to know if you knew what anime was. 

  Grace: I wasted all this time just to tell you in five seconds that anime, something is under anime is just a broad name for all the cartoons.

  Yedoye: Yeah!

  Grace: Jeeze.

  Yedoye: [laugh]

  Grace: And I be here, all excited, thinking that something else is coming up.

  Yedoye: Oh, no, no, I just was gonna- I just wanted to ask if you knew...

  [Lofi music]

  Thanks for listening to Anime in America presented by Crunchyroll. If you enjoyed this, please go to Crunchyroll.com/AnimeInAmerica to see the site I’ve talked non-stop about for most of this episode. 

  Special Thanks to Kun Gao. 

  This episode is hosted by me, Yedoye Travis and you can find me on Instagram at ProfessorDoye, or Twitter @YedoyeOT. This episode is researched and written by Peter Fobian, edited by Chris Lightbody, and produced by me, Braith Miller, Peter Fobian, and Jesse Gouldsbury. 

  [Lofi music]

[Beep]

  Yedoye: But you can just- you can like, you can start watching them now, if you want.

  Grace: [skeptical] Seriously?

  Yedoye: Yeah, anime’s not just for kids, you know. There’s like, there’s adult stuff.

  Grace: [continued skepticism] Really? Like, one example.

  Yedoye: There’s… Cowboy Bebop is a good one, it’s like a… it’s like a drama sort of like...

  Grace: Okay, tell me what do they do?

  Yedoye: They’re uh… so the main characters are like they’re bounty hunters, and so they fly through space just like, tracking down criminals. It’s kinda like a, it’s like a crime thing. 

  Grace: You know I don’t like Star Wars. 

  Yedoye: [sigh] I know you don’t like Star Wars. [Chuckle] But I know you like crime stuff. 

  Grace: So now you think I’ll gonna like-

  Yedoye: But I know you like crime stuff, though!

  Grace: Ah-ha! Now you’re talking!

  Yedoye: Yeah! It’s like a crime show. 

  Grace: Which one? I have to watch it! Which one?

  Yedoye: It’s called “Cowboy Bebop,” they like, track down criminals and they take them in for a bounty. 

  Grace: They like, all those stick people do, right? It’s all cartoon folks, it’s not real? It’s not realistic? 

  Yedoye: I mean, it’s not real, it IS realistic, it’s drawn really well. 

  Grace: Yeah… see that’s still fake to me, I like more realistic stuff. 

  Yedoye: I think you would like it. 

  Grace: Name it again?

  Yedoye: Cowboy Bebop.

  Grace: Cowboy what?

  Yedoye: Bebop.

  Grace: Bebop? Cowboy Bebop, okay. 

  Yedoye: Yeah.

  Grace: Cowboy Bebop. 

  Yedoye: I’ll send you a link.

  [Lofi music]

  Thanks! Bye.

  By: [email protected]

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

[differentworlds-fiction]

30

HILL

A pair of slender lips greeted me, followed by a meek ‘good morning’.

Amid a plethora of pointless decorative pillows propped up against the cream tufted headboard, Tarin sat upright with her legs crossed, wiping the sleep from her eyes. Barefaced and all, her beauty never radiated more than it did at this very present moment. Much to her chagrin, she apologized for her current appearance. She reached upwards and pulled off the colorful paisley headscarf, allowing those loose ringlets of hers to fall past the nape of her neck. Amusement flickered in her eyes reminiscent of the hue of rum.

Her nose scrunched up at its narrow bridge.

“Did I wake you?”

“Mhm, but I needed to get up anyway.” she yawned and stretched. The strap to her thin camisole grooved down her skin, no hint of a bra in sight.

She fixed her mouth to speak, but sucked her teeth instead and grabbed a hold of the loose strap. “Hill, it’s way too early for you to be a fuckin’ perv.”

“It’s,” I pulled away from the phone, “Seven minutes to eight over here, which means that it’s almost eleven in New York.  I thought you’d be leaving the office for lunch at this time. Yesterday must’ve been awful.”

“You don’t even know the half. Yesterday was a day from Hell. Truly.”

“Did that nail polish launch thing go over well?” I queried.

“It went over well -- so well that the guests didn’t want to leave. Randoms started poppin’ in from off the street wanting to see what the hype was about, which conflicted with the schedule. The launch was initially scheduled from one to four o’clock p.m. That time was specifically stated in the mass email sent to all the social media influencers invited. Could you believe the party didn’t end until eight o’clock? I wouldn’t have cared about her having to pay for the allotted time if I wasn’t expected to stay there longer than I should’ve. My grandmother ended up having to pick my kid up from day camp and keep her overnight, all because that washed up reality star with bad injectables wanted me to stay there and ‘man down the entire operation’.”

“And where was Cara when all this was happening?”

“Getting her nails done. She might’ve helped put out the supply of polishes for the nail technicians, but that was it.” She huffed. “On top of that, she left halfway through the event. Like, who does that? Mind you, putting together this event was joint. We were splitting the commission percentage right down the middle!” Her anger could easily be detected through the video chat application. Her eyebrows knitted together; deep ridges emerging across her forehead. “I had to check the inventory and I had to make sure there was more than enough wine for everyone coming in, on top of that.” An aggravated sigh escaped her. “I know it doesn’t sound all that hard to handle, but when you have to deal with middle-aged trophy wives who’re under the notion that they’re always right and you’re in the wrong, then it becomes pretty difficult. Something like this wouldn’t have such a negative effect on me. I would’ve let this shit roll off my shoulders under any other circumstance. I think my lack of sleep had something to do with it. I, uh, I had this weird dream that kept me up most of the night before. I had a dream, about my daughter’s father.”

My back relaxed against the car’s plush interior after turning off the car’s engine. Beads of sweat still coated my body; my heart still racing after the routinely morning run.

“I had a feeling he was coming to see me. Most times -- whenever I dream of him, it’s never expected. But this time was different. It felt different. It was weird. I just knew he was coming.  But, it wasn’t like my other dreams. In my other dreams, we meet on Fulton street. For some odd reason, I dreamt about the night he was killed.” She murmured, her voice deadpan; Tarin’s eyes, though wearisome, harbored an ample amount of emotion that I couldn’t seem to distinguish. “It was still summer. He was wearing these baggy jean shorts. He walked me home that night wearing the same shorts. It was so hot out that night,” she reminisced, “like, unbearably hot, Hill. Blackout hot. Still sweatin’ in the shade hot --”

“I get it, Tarin.”

“ We’d spent most of the day together so it was definitely time to part ways. I wasn’t feeling all too well that day, to begin with. I’d been nauseous on and off for over a week.”

“You were pregnant by then, weren’t you?” I asked in an attempt to piece these significant occurrences in chronological order.

“Sure was. I thought my poor eating choices were to blame. You should’ve seen me that summer. I ate a bunch of shit I had no business eating. Greasy Chinese food, chopped cheeses from the deli -- you name it, I ate it, and then some!” Tarin laughed. “Um. Where were we before I got sidetracked? I forgot.”

“Your dream, baby. Your dream.” I laughed myself at her recent spell of absent-mindedness. Often she mentioned she fell victim to losing her train of thought whenever she was dwelling on something greatly significant.

She let out a timid giggle and quickly reined it in with a low ‘oh’. “It was as if it were any other night and I was sneaking back out the house. My grandmother was sleeping and my mother was probably working back to back shifts. So, I left out the back door to my grandmother’s house, hopped the fence and met Richie up the block. Our meetup spot was always in front of this beige paneled house with a rusted iron gate. He was there waiting for me. I saw him from far away and I was expecting him to get on my case about him having to wait for me, but he didn’t. He didn’t suck his teeth or groan, or anything like that.” She placed the phone on the bed; the camera capturing her bedroom ceiling. “His t-shirt was white, but there was this small dark spot that kept getting bigger the closer I go to him.” Tarin rushed out. “By the time we were face to face the spot had spread across the whole lower half.” There was a pause, followed by her taking a deep breath in an attempt to control the sudden shakiness in her voice. “He told me he loved me. In my other dreams, all his ‘love you T’s’ were rushed. He took his time, this time. And I appreciated that.”

“And?”

“And, what?”

“What happened afterward?”

“He left me standing in front of that beige house. I kept calling his name, over and over again. But he wouldn’t stop. He wouldn’t turn around. He just kept on walking up the street towards this bodega we frequented...without me…”

We hadn’t resumed our usual forms of communication since she cut the video call short Tuesday morning.

Whether accidentally or purposefully my calls during the dismal forty-minute plane ride were ignored and sent directly to voicemail, causing me to dread heading to Vegas altogether.

Bria, my parents, and two of my cornermen were either bracing themselves for all that awaited us in a matter of hours or busying themselves with their phones through the uneventful travel. Craig, on the other hand, decided to peruse the swank loaner the chairman of the Showtime network had given us access to so we could ‘ride in style’.

Whatever the fuck that meant.

“Impressive jet,” Craig murmured, adjusting his seat, “Do you have any idea how much this bad boy runs for? Just guess.”

“I don’t know, maybe forty mill’.”

“Close, but no cigar.” He retained an inward laugh. “Sixty-five, and that doesn’t include maintenance, kid. That Kyser fella at the network told me that yesterday. Could you believe that? Spending almost a hundred millions dollars on a goddamn private plane? These people are bat-shit crazy, I tell ya.” Craig let out a deep, raspy chuckle; the whites of his eyes disappearing when his eyes narrowed into thin slits. “So where ya flying to after this? Victoria wants me to go with her on her family vacation this year. He sounded as shocked to say it as I was to hear it. Though they’d grown closer over the years for the sake of Madison’s upbringing, Vickie and Craig were a bit estranged. There were no or ill feelings or bad blood between them, as far I knew, but unless it was a birthday or around the time of the holidays, they hardly kept in touch. “You ever been to Aruba?”

“Not yet.”

“Me neither. Apparently, that’s where her, the hubby, and little Maddie are going -- where they want me to go. That little prick she’s married to --”

“Language, Craig!” My mother blurted out, lifting the satin mask up from around her eyes.

With a push of a button, Craig sat upright in the plush leather recliner; his elbows grazing the small table between us. “That little prick she’s married to rented out this villa in the northern area of the island.”

“You going?”

“Damn right I’m going. There’s a casino not too far from there.” He guffawed. His boisterous burst of laughter settled within seconds. “What about you? Where do you plan on going once this thing is finished and over with?”

I had no intention of fleeing out of the country for a week-long vacation this time around. My sole intent was to meet back up with Tarin.

That is if she ever answered my calls.

After arriving at McCarran International Airport, the seven of us dispersed into two separate vehicles. Bria, our parents, and I packed into an SUV parked closest to the hangar while Craig and two of the cornermen rode with security personnel to locate the other service car. Once nestled inside the silent black Chevy Suburban, my mother and Bria ensued with aimless conversation as my father listened on, adding in his two cents to let them both know he was paying attention. They attempted to include me in the comical banter by questioning whether or not I was still plagued by the same pre-match jitters I had as an amateur, but I refrained from answering due to the fact that my mind was on other things.

Without putting forth much effort, my hand patted along the seat, searching for the cobalt blue encased smartphone and idly checked Tarin’s social media activity.

She may not have been acquainted with social media prior to becoming Cara Santos’ apprentice but her online following increased in the matter of a few weeks. Part of it having to do with her association to Cara Santos, but most of it having to do with her professionalism and execution. On Monday she revealed the alias of her newest client; a child actor turned crossover crooner by the name of Haneef Parker. The masses, women generally, were enthralled by him and his singing abilities for as long as I could remember. Since childhood Smith had been in the spotlight, gaining moderate success from the various TV-sitcoms he starred in. He managed to strike gold in the music industry after signing a lucrative recording contract with a major label.

He was like a teen idol a decade go, Tarin brought up during her instance of fangirling. With high regard, she mentioned the copies of his albums she had in her possession, the J-14 posters taped onto her bedroom walls and the college-ruled notebooks marked up with the playful moniker ‘Mrs. Smith’ on them. I had it bad back then. He used to perform on 106 & Park all the time but Marjani’s parents would never let her go to Harlem without any supervision. We came pretty close to sneaking off one time, but we were never successful.

Of all the women Smith was linked to -- talented songstresses with whom he collaborated with, ditzy socialites the media often linked him to, and the frequently exposed video models who threatened to expose him on Twitter -- he ended up settling down with a registered nurse from his hometown.

Him and his girl are expecting, Tarin spoke lowly into the phone as if she weren’t within the confines of her own apartment. She mentioned how fortunate the opportunity was on account of him finding out about her through Instagram’s Discover tab.

Realizing Tarin hadn’t been active on social media since our last interaction, I proceeded to stuff my phone back into my pocket.

“Trouble in paradise?” Bria queried, lifting up her massive sunglasses for dramatic effect.

“What?”

“I watched you call the same number three times while we were on the tarmac.” She mentioned, reaching inside her knapsack’s unzipped compartment, retrieving a handheld mirror. The sight of her using holding the regal-esque mirror just to slab another layer of lipstick. “And now you’re scrolling down Tarin’s Twitter page like a stalker.”

“I’m not stalking her,” I made clear, “I’m worried. There’s a difference.”

“Worried my fucking ass.”

“Bria!”

All eyes darted towards the front of the truck. Seated beside my father who happened to be entirely engrossed with finishing the final pages of Nigger: An Autobiography of Dick Gregory, my mother mussed with her bangs angrily.

“What ma?” Bria peered over at her.

Raising an eyebrow, mother raised her hand, wagging her finger as she did. “Don’t be cussin’ in front of me! You know better than that.”

“Your mother’s right. Show some respect, Bria.” My father chimed in, pushing the e-reader aside.

“Sorry,” Bria said apologetically before turning to me. “You’re still a creep.”

“How exactly does this translate into me being a creep? By all means, let me know.”

“What you should be focused on is tonight’s final weigh-in. You have a lot riding on tomorrow’s fight, son.”

“And I’m aware of that, pops”

“Act like it, then.”

For the remainder of the commute to MGM Grand located right on the Las Vegas Strip.

As if it were her very first time experiencing the wacky Elvis Presley impersonators donning differentiating versions of the infamous studded jumpsuit or the old folks peddling off the shuttle buses and hurrying for the casinos.

“Act like you’ve been somewhere, please.”

She waited until my parents were mere feet away before advising me to ‘pull the stick out of my ass’.

Courtesy of the networks close relationship with the hotel, the family, Craig, the cornermen, and I were provided complimentary rooms of our choosing for the duration of our stay. Staying throughout the entire weekend wasn’t in the cads for Bria and my parents, being that they were heading back to their home in Florida Monday morning. With the assistance of a hotel staff member, the three of them were led through the main entrance. Craig and the cornermen followed close behind as bellhops unloaded every bag from the service trucks.

By the main entrance, a lone woman stood nearby equipped with a clipboard, extending her hand to acknowledge me. “Mr. Dawson, it is a pleasure to meet you. My name is Valerie,” She pushed her glasses upward by the bridge as they grooved down, “and I will be making sure your stay here at MGM Grand Las Vegas will be a remarkable one. I’m aware that you frequent the hotel quite often but it’s been brought to my attention that you’ve never visited our diversions.”

“I can’t say that I have, Valerie,” I answered truthfully. Aside from the matches being based out in Nevada and a few last minute meetings held inside of a restaurant or two, sticking around in the city of sin just wasn’t my thing. After matches, I allowed my body time to decompress and checked out at dawn.

“Well, If you’d like to reserve the best table at any of our ten restaurants or acquire tickets to any show of your choosing, please do not hesitate to call the skylofts’ private lobby and ask for me personally.” She said, pressing her hand against my back. “Now, if you don’t mind, the head of hotel security would like to escort you through the VIP lounge. There, the three of us will take a private elevator to your loft where we can check you in.”

I figured the extraordinary service I was currently experiencing was due to executives at the network pulling out all the stops to make sure the networks and I were all on the same page.

I’d be a fool to believe there wasn’t a proposal of a potential partnership in some capacity impending.

In the skyloft, at the elaborate dining room table complemented by chairs draped in yellow fabric, Valerie walked me through the hotel’s preliminaries and procedures; a document that I’d signed many times before. “If you’ll just sign right here and here, Mr. Dawson.” Valerie pointed to the bottom of the document. She leaned over the table’s edge. The deep V-neckline shifted, unintentionally granting me unwarranted peaks of her lacy bra.  “Alrighty then. Here is your keycard.”

“I was never good at keeping up with keycards.”

She rested her hand on my shoulder but slowly pulled it away. “In case you happen to misplace your room’s keycard, a staff member will be happy to help you recover another one.” I nodded, indicated that I had heard her. We sat in a prolonged silence until Valerie the concierge took the hint that I wanted to be alone. Grabbing her clipboard along with the preliminary and procedures document she made a beeline for the door, muttering ‘good luck tomorrow night’ prior to closing the loft’s door.

My mind ran rampant.

Not with thoughts of tomorrow night or what I intended to do once I headed back to California.

At the forefront of my mind remained thoughts of Tarin and the longing for her to alright with whatever she was up to.

TARIN

Roberta Flack’s “Feel Like Makin’ Love” poured in through the recording studio’s powered speakers connected to a white oak turntable.

Records suited in tethered jackets remained scattered across the state of the art soundboard; audio from the likes of Teddy Pendergrass and Donny Hathaway were two of the few I’d been able to identify from their covers alone.

My time was limited, I reminded Haneef once obliging to meet at the last minute.

Considering that evening was steadily approaching and my hunger was getting the best of me, I still found time to schedule a last-minute meeting with Haneef Parker to come to a general agreement about the event, its budget, and the non-negotiable commission percentage I expected for my services.

“Could you tell me a little about -- I’m sorry. What’s the mother of your child’s name again?” I queried. The fact that she wasn’t famous was making it all the more difficult to remember her name.

“Marissa,” He answered quickly as he sorted through a crate containing hordes of records. D’Angelo’s Voodoo album had been pulled out and placed over Bilal’s 1st Born Second and Erykah Badu’s Mama’s Gun.

A boyish grin tugged at the corner of his mouth; one that instantly put me in the mind of the one he sported on the cover of Essence’s annual Men’s Issue.

He scooted back in the swivel chair, lifting the turntable’s needle carefully before swapping the Roberta Flack record for D’Angelo’s.

The opening track was slow and taking its time to build up with a succession of hand claps and layered vocals, luring me to sway along to the song infused with jazz and funk.

“You like that?” He inquired, his voice low.

“It’s easy on the ears.” A moderate screech hollowed out the song Haneef referred to as “Playa Playa”. “Drawing inspiration, by any chance?”

He twiddled his thumbs. “Every now and again I always seem to hit a dead end. It never fails.That’s when I take a breather and dig in the crates. Creatively I’m burned out. My mind’s on other things.”

“You’re about to be a father. It’s be expected that music isn’t your main focus.”

His mouth hung slightly ajar in an attempt to form some sort of rebuttal, but he paused, looking to be in deep thought as he bopped his head to the beat of “Devil’s Pie”. Rather than giving forth an audible answer, Haneef nodded his head in agreeance.

“I’ve always wondered whether men freak out over parenthood as much as women do.”

“I can’t speak for all men, but I’m a lil’ nervous. I ain’t gonna front.” Haneef admitted, running his hand down the length of the fitted, distressed jeans he donned.

“The fear will go away. Trust me.”

“How you know? You’re speakin’ like you know. Like --”

“-- I’ve been where you are. Well, not exactly where you are. You’re a multi-millionaire having his first child in his late twenties. I’m not saying I was when I had my kid, but I didn’t have a ton of cash at my disposal, either..”

“Wait. You have a kid?”

I nodded.

“You lyin’!”

“No, I’m not. I’m serious!”

“Bullshit,” His laughter came out a low, gruff roar, “you can’t be no older than --”

“-- I had her young.” I retorted without thinking much of the revelation. I turned forward, taking in the isolated room ahead equipped with bass drums, a microphone, and an electric guitar. “I wouldn’t have had it any other way. She’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me. The same way your child will be the best thing that’s ever happened to you. And despite the fame, the money, and all your accolades, they will be your greatest accomplishment ever. Enough of all that, though. By any chance, do you have a theme in mind?”

“Nah.”

“What about a color scheme?”

“Nah.” He repeated.

“Do you know what you’re having?”

“Nah Rissa,” He called her for short, “wanted the baby’s gender to be a surprise.”

“Haneef,” I huffed, “Haneef. You’ve got to give me something to work with here. Something.” I stressed, easing my back against the chair. “Now, since the baby’s gender is unknown, it’d be best if we stick to a gender neutral color scheme. This leads me to ask you whether you’d be content with the use of yellow.”

““I’m not put off to it being used’.”

“Alright. Yellow is a possibility.” I nodded. “How about I look into some potential venues and follow up with you sometime next week? If you’re available we could schedule another meeting Monday morning.”

“Tomorrow’s my only free day.” He mentioned.

“Eh, tomorrow’s no good for me.” I spoke sheepishly, “I’m gonna be outta town.”

“After tomorrow I will be, too.” Haneef expressed with a head nod. “I’ma be in Miami until next week doing a few intimate shows. From an artist’s standpoint, I haven’t garnered enough attention leading up to the release of this album --”

“Which is why you’ve considered doing these performances.”

“See, you get it.” Haneef scooted in the chair up to the soundboard, carelessly fiddling with the buttons and knobs. “My management said those bastards at the label want me to put forth a bit more effort this go around. I’m booked all month for radio interviews and segments for morning talk shows. They even got me doing those interactive Q&A’s with the fans so I could seem more attainable.”

“You have to put in more of an effort now than you’ve probably had to before. I’m no music industry guru that knows all the ins and outs of the biz but album sales are definitely not as high as they used to be. You had it pretty easy back in the day, Haneef. You were the sangin’ pretty boy with the big hazel eyes --”

“'Was the sangin’ pretty boy’?" He scoffed. "I still am!”

I pursed my lips together, fighting the urge to tell him he’d handed over the title of reigning supreme the moment he decided to chase musical fads and cross over. A former label A&R and longtime mentor of Haneef introduced him to a duo of producers responsible for the reemergence of EDM in mainstream music. Working with two of the hottest producers of the moment earned Haneef concurrent chart-topping hits and favorable co-signs from the mediocre pop stars who conquered radio airplay day in and day out.

No longer was he the Haneef Parker record executives pitted against other rivaling act, nor was he the same Haneef Parker who critics regarded in the same class as the talented luminaries who had come before him. On the heels of his crossover success music aficionados referred to the R&B golden child as nothing more than a sellout who sacrificed true artistry for mass-notoriety; a man who disregarded his core audience.

I took a moment to ponder how I could break the silence that loomed over us, witnessing him looking at me with intent the moment my stare drifted to the True Believer tattoo cascading down his right forearm.

Either the bold marking was a new addition to the throng already coating his arms, torso, and legs or I was officially disinterested with all minor things Haneef Parker; the latter rang true the longer the singer and I occupied the same space.

“Um. So...conference call it is, then. And if I can’t get a hold you that way, I will send photos of venues within the budget directly to your email.”

“Damn. You on it, ain’t you?”

“It’s pretty much essential to be.”

Reaching for the slouchy tote bag that had been grazing my exposed ankles, I rose from the swivel chair, stopping per Haneef’s request; his rendition of the Roberta Flack record he played previously.

“Couldn’t let you leave without hearing his version.” His hand fell to the knobs again, feathery croons matching the tone of D’Angelo’s tone fluttered into the air as Haneef sung along, merging with the track’s infectious bass.

“I like this one, too.” I murmured as the studio’s door opened. I assessed the group of people; a collective of both men and women, passing through the entryway, dispersed into groups and occupied the two leather couches. A man holding a guitar case ambled towards Haneef and proceeded to give him dap before inquiring about the audio engineer scheduled to be present for the session. As they engaged in conversation, and the trio of women behind me began belting out rehearsed verses they’d read off sheets of papers, I bid my farewell to Haneef and slipped out the studio.

It was nearing six when I finally arrived home.

Silence greeted me on the way inside the darkened apartment.

Traces of Ayla were present throughout the furnished space complemented by teal or orange decorative accents. Small shoes idled the cubby space by the door. In the living room, toys that she failed to put away as well as a box of misplaced crayons and a coloring book rested atop the coffee table. Releasing a huff, I tossed my bag and keys on the bare kitchen island in passing and proceeded to gather her belongings and return them to their rightful spots.

Before peeling off the frayed denim dress and slipping out of the mahogany rose Vans I hurried to hook my phone up to the charger port plugged in beside my nightstand, dreading to reply back to the inquisitive text messages from Marjani that I’d already skimmed over or hearing the voicemails Mama Sarah had left prior to my phone dying while on the way to meet with Haneef. With the dress puddled at my feet, I shrugged out my bra and shimmied out of the matching hip-riding panties, making a beeline for the master bathroom soon after. A backpack containing a change of clothes, travel size toiletries, and an alternate satin scarf hung above a change of comfortable shoes that were lined neatly against the bathroom’s wall.

I doubled back into the bedroom simultaneous to a resounding blare emitting from my cell phone. I figured it would be Mama Sarah calling to coax me out of leaving tomorrow afternoon, but I was wrong.

For what seemed like an eternity I watched my cellphone continuously dance from left to right and back again on the nightstand, a zoomed-in picture I’d screenshot one night during a facetime call appeared before a notification stating that Hill had left a voicemail, popped up. I contemplated on calling back but decided against doing so.

As soon as the voice on the other end greeted me the plan itself would be botched.

I had to remain focus and act accordingly.

Bria and Vickie would have my ass if I didn’t.

****

I was in over my head.

I’d come to that realization thirty-thousand feet in the air.

The flight scheduled for two remained stagnant on the runway due to the pilot being a no-show.

My mind instantly resorted to the worst.

Perhaps he was at someone’s bar getting sloshed prior to risking the lives of all the passengers or cooped up in a private bathroom somewhere snorting bumps of coke off a bathroom counter. As if harping on that horrific possibility wasn’t troubling enough, I grew frantic from feeling every erratic motion the alternate pilot who’d been assigned to fly the plane at the last minute determined was turbulence.

In a matter of minutes, I’d lost feeling in my limbs. The violent churning in my stomach commenced when the short-haired Asian woman sitting beside me commanded my attention. Since accidentally bumping into each other during my frequent trips to the bathroom, she’d been itching to start up a conversation. On more than occasion, I’d caught staring at me out the corner of my eye. I couldn’t even browse through Twitter in peace without spotting her take unwarranted peeks at my phone’s screen.

Heaving a heavy sigh I shifted against the window, closing the application after retweeting photos Cheyenne had uploaded from the recent nail polish launch onto CS Event Planning & Productions’ user account.

*Nervous?” The woman sitting beside me spoke up. With the hand that wasn’t cradling the latest issue of The New Yorker, she brought it upward to toy with her blunt ends. In contrast to her pale skin, her hair was dyed blue-black which complemented the reddish brown matte color staining her round lips.

She didn’t bother waiting for an answer.

It was as if she’d picked up on my timidness.

I mean, we were sitting directly next to each other.

“Relax. Sit back, and breath. Ditching the caffeine always helps too.” She nodded in the direction of the venti ice coffee cup that was now empty.

“This is my first time flying.”

“Shocking,” the woman muttered, laughing a little.

****

Often I wondered how it would be to see him again. To share his presence. To succumb to that familiar embrace and settle against his chest as his arms enclosed around me. He’d left an impression on me long before this moment. Long before our dinner at Buddakan. Long before our heated kiss at the bar. I wanted him more than I’d led on. More than I had ever predicted if I was being honest with myself. The wracking emptiness that lingered within me due to our purposeful strain in communication, attested to my developing sentiments. That, and the fact that I’d left my obligations in New York behind to simply be alone with this man for a few hours.

With the help of Bria snagging Hill’s keycard out of his pants’ pocket when he changed into his match attire, I entered the swank loft suite moments after the third round began. A series of alarming text messages and corresponding voice notes from Victoria stating that the fight had come to an end when Hill’s gloved fist connected with his opponent’s jaw, idled my notifications.

By unanimous decision, Hill had defeated his opponent by way of knockout.

Sports journalists wasted no time rushing to various social media platforms to discuss the bout that lasted four rounds.

In an attempt to allay the nerves afflicting me throughout the excruciating wait, I passed through the beautifully decorated suite more than once, finding myself in awe of the art bedecking the walls of the sitting area. Atop a checkerboard carpet positioned by the floor to ceiling windows was low-lying furniture paired with intricate additions of red and oranges. Hues of creams and browns were used avidly throughout the bedroom and master bathroom. Per Bria’s rather rigid request, every touchscreen tablet control panels were left untouched being that Hill hadn’t yet altered the settings himself.

When perusing every inch of the suite began to bore me I retreated to the ottoman positioned against the bed’s footboard. With my phone as my sole source of entertainment, I scrolled through my Twitter feed and stumbled upon a link to the post-match press conference. Both Hill and his opponent stood at adjacent podiums with their respected trainers behind them. It took an hour and a half for them to get through every question members of the press had asked, most of which were recycled inquiries concerning their training regimens, their diets, and each side’s honest opinion of the other. Much to my disappointment, the distorted live-stream was cut short just as Hill uttered a heartfelt expression of gratitude to Craig.

With haste, I sent a series of text messages to Jani with whom I failed to respond to earlier on account of being escorted to a black Chevrolet by a driver Victoria arranged to meet me at the airport. Our conversation that consisted of her urging me to let loose while in the city of sin placated momentarily until the commotion filled the air, followed by the opening and closing of the door downstairs. Instinctively, I shot to my feet; a voice belonging to Bria Dawson approached and grew closer as footsteps padded up the stairs.

“You have your own room for a reason, Bria.”

“I’m aware of that,” she scoffed, “I wanted to use the bathroom.”

“There’s a bathroom downstairs. It’s right by the door.”

“Why do I have to use that bathroom? Am I not good enough to use the one up here?”

“Look, I’m not about to argue with you about no stupid shit. I’d appreciate it if you’d go back to your room --”

With a slight push, the bedroom door swung open, unveiling a stoic Hill standing in its entryway. His eyes drifting from me to Bria; doubt present in his expression.

Grinning, I muttered a low ‘surprise’, receiving a boyish grin I’ve had the longing to witness face to face since his previous stay in New York.

Standing before both Hill and me in a satin top and matching wide-legged pants the color of champagne, Bria’s tongue ran across her top row of teeth; a triumphant look spread across her face.

I didn’t know whether to acknowledge her efforts with a comforting embrace or with an acknowledging head nod.

Coolly she strutted to me, her oversized blazer draped over her shoulder, adding to the awe of her tantalizing gait. She oozed every bit of confidence. Everything I wished I was at nineteen. “Well, Tarin, I have to hand it to you,” her breaths jagged, “I’ll be the first to admit that when Victoria ran the plan by me I wasn’t too sure you’d be able to pull off ignoring my idiot brother until the weekend. I figured you were just as sprung over him as he is over you. But, you stuck with the plan. Good job, girl!  Mission a-damn-complished!”

“It was the easiest task.” I confessed, my eyes meeting Hill’s once again. He pressed his lips into a fine line, dropping a large Under Armour duffle on the swing-back armchair. He moseyed in more, skirting by Bria who stood just mere inches from me.

Her glossed lips parted into a goofy grin. Unrestrained laughter escaped her, settling once she took our non-verbal communication through fixed stare. “I’ll think I’ll be headin’ to the bathroom now.”

“And leaving afterward, I hope.”

“Do you see this Tarin? This the thanks I get for helping bring this plan to fruition. You’re an unappreciative ass, Hill. Where’s the gratitude? Where’s the appreciation? I’ve yet to hear a thank you!”

“Jesus Christ --”

“Thank you, Bria.” I butted in an attempt to keep the peace.

She shifted in her stance, elongating her right leg which showcased the nude strapless ankle-wrap sandals.

“I know you’re thankful,” forcefully, she nudged Hill right on his shoulder, “but I wanna hear this jackass say he is. He doesn’t seem to be!”

“Knowing you, a ‘thank you’ isn’t all you’re looking for.”

She snickered, “It it ever?” A series of pats were landed on Hill’s cheek prior to Bria making her way towards the bedroom’s door. “You owe me big for this one. We’ll talk later. Okay? Until then, have fun.”

Just as she was about to make her departure, Hill’s hand found its way to her shoulder, restricting her from moving any further. Without expressing words, he enveloped her in a hug from the side. At first, she tried shooing him away, but settled into the embrace, smiling although the moment was short-lived. Per Bria’s request, they separated, following up the endearing moment with an elaborate handshake consisting of two turns, three consecutive hi-fives, and a knuckle pound. Slips of laughter escaped me as I stood nearby witnessing the two siblings carry on lovingly as if they weren’t acting like a pair of bickering children moments ago. After she used the bathroom and Hill phoned hotel security to escort Bria to her room, he returned into the bedroom, discovering that I took a seat on the bed. He joined me; a hand rested on my thigh, putting me at ease.

“I’m usually not one for surprises.” He admitted lowly.

“I’m usually not good at keeping surprises. Anyone who knows me knows that I couldn’t keep a secret of this caliber. In the past, I tended to talk a secret right outta me.” I spoke faintly, reaching for his hand. His long, narrow fingers intertwined with mine. “I couldn’t ruin this one. I just couldn’t.”

His lips found their way to my neck, peppering my skin with kisses. I relaxed against his touch yet I desired nothing more than for his arms to surround me and for his lips to be on mine.

Fortunately for me, my earnest desire was met.

In seconds, his mouth collided with mine. His tongue slid inside, eliciting a stifled moan from me. Rather than gently running my hand up the side of his face, my left hand found its way to a spot just above his brow bone. The pads of my fingers traced over the thin, white bandage concealing a minor cut.

“How was the fight?” I asked in between fervent pecks.

“I won.” He retorted blankly, seeming somewhat disinterested in the topic.

“I know that.” I mentioned. “It doesn’t seem like you were hurt too bad.”

“You should see the other guy.” He responded, removing his lips from mine.

Impassioned kisses were left on my collarbone; the scent of sandalwood combined with another subtle manly scent wafted into my nose. My back came in contact with the sheets that felt expensive to the touch. He paused, assessing the ribbed hunter green mini dress that fit snug against my frame. At hem gathered at my thighs, Hill pushed the ribbed material up; a devilish smirk settled on his face upon realizing that I was pantiless, his grimace wholly manifesting into a look of mischief.

My dress was carelessly thrown to the floor.

The plunging triangle bra I donned was the next to be discarded after Hill’s struggled effort in unclasping the final row of hooks. Succeeding, he tossed the bra onto the armchair, basking in my naked frame and all its supposed glory. He regained footing when arising from the bed, unbuttoning each button stitched onto the mosaic-printed button-up he wore. He went on to remove his dark-wash jeans, but, I quickly shot up, wobbling on the heels I loathed wearing altogether.

“Let me.”

Somewhere in between Hill stepping out of his loafers and his belt producing an audible when his pants hit the floor, a ball of nerves flourished right in the pit of my stomach.

We stood before one another exposed. Face to face, chest to chest. “Hey. Hey,” he called out, halting me from any sudden movement, “we don’t have to --”

“But..I..want to.”

My hands aimlessly ran down his torso, patting over the deep-set grooves and contours of his abdominal muscles

We retreated to the bed, then.

I anticipated the moment our lips reunited.

For a moment I watched on with intent as he roughly parted my thighs. To his knees he sank and buried his head between my thighs, coaxing me to moan out his name. Nipping at my flesh as my thighs quivered -- tickling the smoothness of my thighs with his the minimal stubble coating his cheeks. Solace was found the moment I planted hand atop his head, raking my nails through the low heap of coarse locks he’d yet to trim off and down towards the scalp. A drawn out guttural mewl sputtered from my lips, prompting me to undulate my hips against his face.

I pushed further -- relentlessly, nearing the brink of my peak.

Goosebumps coated my fervent skin.

Shivers cascaded down my spine.

Warm tears settled at the lower rims of my eyes from the thought alone, thickening while they trickled down the sides of my face. Subsequent to removing his head that was recently situated between my legs, Hill rose from the bed and made a beeline for the slate grey sports duffle, leaving me aching for him; He searched through the two smaller compartments located on either side, retrieving a black leather wallet.

A condom or two -- perhaps maybe three rested inside the slip compartments.

“C’mere.”

Despite the sudden hoarseness detected in my voice, he happily obliged.

In quick movements he labored over me, gently caressing my cheek. With erratic haste, we eased down his boxer briefs together, only for him to rear back to rip one of the condom’s wrapping open. Our eyes locked shortly afterward. My expression was assessed for the slightest hint of hesitancy -- any inkling of uncertainty. Beats of silence pervaded the air thick of unspoken lust that became almost dire to be acted on.

“I want you.” His head lowered, granting me the opportunity to run my tongue over the fullness of his lips. “Do you want me?”

“Of course I want you.” Hill asserted firmly; the throbbing between my legs became unbearable the longer I continued to ache for him. “Of course I want you.”

The words reverberated into my skin. Within seconds, he was inside me, producing slow, marginal strokes that quickly progressed into deep thrusts. I panted his name until words were no longer comprehensible. My worrisome thoughts -- tasks that I knew had to be handled as soon as I landed back in New York, were subdued by warm breath cooing onto my skin. Repeated remarks of my beauty were made amidst struggled groans. Beneath him, I cursed and met his urgent movement with an eagerness of my own. My hips rose, prompting my thighs to anchor around his waist entirely. He reared back, supporting my trembling thigh as it started to ease down his torso; lust evident in the eyes of the man shuddering above me.

Curses bellowed from his parted lips, the very same succulent pair I latched onto and kissed tenderly, reaching the ascent to another climax. He plunged harder then, releasing a harsh, throaty groan onto my lips simultaneous to his body tensing up atop my quaking frame. I fastened my arms around him, asserting that I was unwilling to let him go.

In my grasp he stilled, his head resting on my breasts.

Still, plunged deep into my depths, his manhood pulsated.

“Don’t move. Stay right here.” I begged.

His large, taut hand ran over the tops of my breasts, kneading them softly until Hill decided to get off the bed and amble into the bathroom.

I rolled over, feeling the freest I’d felt in years.

#Different Worlds #Different Worlds Fiction #fiction

[onghwcng]

not in blood but in bond

RATING: Explicit

PAIRING: Hwang Minhyun/Ong Seongwoo

SUMMARY: Stolen jewels, a wealthy detective, and a retired thief.

WORD COUNT: 54,816

WARNINGS: Depiction of violence, anything else you’d expect from an explicit rated fic.

Also posted on AO3.

[ i. ]

 Never, not even once in his life, had Seongwoo ever imagined one of the lowest points of his life would be holding a collapsed ex-criminal to his chest; even as the sound of world crashing echoes around them, even as the walls begin to collapse in on them.

“Stay with me,” The three words are the ones he repeats. A mantra, a lifeline, something to clutch him into reality.

A pool of blood never stops expanding underneath Hwang Minhyun’s collapsed form. Warmth seeps into the fabric of Seongwoo’s bottoms, the smell of blood a stark contrast with the damp, nearly moist air.

Minhyun is ghostly, already white skin growing paler by the minute, the redness of his blood accentuating the near fantasy-like portrait his crumpled, broken body makes. His breathing comes out in ragged, short breaths; eyes glossed over, as if they could close forever in any moment.

“You bastard, you’re not going to die on me—I’m not allowing you to die on me so hold on, no don’t close your eyes—Minhyun!”

    There’s a steady thrum to Seongwoo’s veins as he’s faced with the front page of this morning’s newspaper. July 3rd, the date is written on the bottom right of the page, and he finds his eyes drawn towards the article on the utmost page of the newspaper.

Yesterday, the article was about the latest top star couple exposed to the public. He remembers watching their movies, remembers the way the both of them lingered too long around each other during the snippets of the press conferences that’d been shown on the television. There was always something different that separated them from other onscreen couples, so when he’d read the article yesterday, there was no surprise. Seongwoo glimpsed the title of the article with a smile, almost knowing. Then he’d flipped the page, finding his attention held by the article in the crime corner about a missing woman in Jeju-do. (He sent in an anonymous tip to the police after he finished the article, and his tea. Try to look into the neighbor. The one with a basement. He has yet to check on another update of the case, but Seongwoo would bet his Benz they’d have found the woman in the basement. Alive, but maybe worse for wear.)

That was July 2nd. The day Naver’s search engine ranking would only show anything related to the top star couple, because that is the type of front page worthy scandal that never fails to make noise.

July 3rd’s front page is not about the couple. It’s not even about a new celebrity couple, although the past few days, the newspapers have been publishing articles left and right about the ‘hottest blind items’, and other things that would entice the average reader, but never holds Seongwoo’s attention for longer than a few minutes.

Instead, it boasts a picture of a jewelry display box, the glass gone and in the place where a jewel should be, a note is placed. The bolded headline reads, Jewelry Exhibition Cancelled After Jewel Theft! and there are passing mentions of no fingerprints left behind (as any decent thief would), and almost no leads to go by. The latter is written in a manner that mocks the capability of the country’s police while bringing up South Korea’s own justice system. That’s when Seongwoo flips the page of the newspaper. It’s barely shy of eight AM, and he deals with articles that hold undertones of political agendas after lunch—and only after lunch.

Any time before that, he would analyze the piece written regarding the downfall of Nokia’s stock prices instead. No matter how much the amount of statistics and numbers and generally just data involved are enough to invoke pain that isn’t unlike a bad hangover. 

He’s in the middle of the Nokia article, brows furrowed in his trademark look of concentration, looking over each sentence multiple times in a struggle to comprehend them to the best of his ability, when his phone plays the theme of Mission Impossible. He knows who it's from immediately; it's the only ringtone he has on his phone that's different from the others', so without even checking the caller ID, the identity of the one on the other line is already clear as day.

Seongwoo picks up the phone, and presses it close to his ear.

“I’m going to need you to come in.”

“What, do I not get a ‘hello’? You hurt me, Jaehwan. More than anything else, you wound me, irrevocably, irreversibly—”

“Has anyone ever mentioned how big of a pain in the ass you are, Ong?"

He bites down his grin. “You do. Every morning, and yet, you keep coming back for more,” he purrs.

On the other line, Jaehwan makes a gagging noise. “You’re a vile human being and you disgust me. Asshat.” He hangs up after that, and Seongwoo looks back on all the times he’s done that. Every time Jaehwan calls, now that he thinks about it. Knowing Jaehwan, it’s either something about a need to always get the last word in, or wanting to get Seongwoo to shut his big, smart mouth.

Maybe it’s a mixture of both.

    Here’s the 411 on Ong Seongwoo:

In the year of 2014, he’d made it at the top of Forbes’ list of the richest men in the world under the age of thirty. There’d been a media outrage at the time the article was published, a sudden onslaught of articles questioning the validity of Forbes magazine. Is This Really the World We Live In? is the article with the most clicks, posted on the site of a retired Wall Street author. The article points out Ong Seongwoo’s accomplishments, making sure the readers know that when compared to the others on the list, this kid, this little trust fund baby who the world has never heard of until now (does he even have Instagram?) has never worked a day in his life. He doesn’t have a company under his belt. He isn’t the inventor of a site like Facebook (fuck you, Zuckerberg!), and he sure as hell isn’t an actor who can make a million a day and blow most of it on cocaine.

Who’s Ong Seongwoo? A nobody who’s only there because of mommy and daddy’s death, that’s who, the article points out, vicious in its approach. 

Had it been any other person, maybe they would’ve gotten upset. Cried over it and eaten pints of ice cream while watching and reciting all the lines of Titanic, or jump off a building, whatever it is that people do when they’re depressed and have their worlds crashing around them with nobody present to be a beacon ray of positivity and all things nice. Then again, Ong Seongwoo’s not just anybody, so he’d used the article as an excuse to (in the simplest words possible) get off his ass and do something with his life and all the money he has that he doesn’t blow on drugs (anymore). Or any other illegal activity (once again, anymore), because he’s a trust fund baby who had some pretty rough times in his life, but now, likes to think of himself as clean enough to function. If the media thinks he’s going to let them walk over him like that, then they can suck their collective, metaphorical dicks, because Ong Seongwoo’s hobby is proving people wrong by succeeding and pissing them off in the process. 

(It’s a perfectly dignified hobby, okay?)

This is Seongwoo’s Revenge (the capitalization is a must) in chronological order: 

 Send an email to the author if Is This Really The World We Live In?and point out the errors that litter said article. Nothing linguistics-wise, but the inaccuracy of his personal details had been a pain to read through. Dissing him is one thing, but dissing him with false facts is a one-way ticket to a lawsuit that he’s not bothered enough to give. (Lawsuits, lawsuits, lawsuits. If he has one for every negative article he’d gotten because of that damned list, his reputation would rival Taylor Swift’s.)

Use his deduction skills for anything further than sending in anonymous tips for the police whenever they prove themselves to be lazy and/or wrong. He set up a website, boasting his credentials (a BA in political science he doesn’t know what to do with but displays anyway) and skills of observation. He also makes sure to write down, in bold and underline, that his fees are flexible. Depending on the complexity of the case, and (this he adds with a smiley face emoji), if he’s in a good mood, might even do it for free. Everyone likes freebies, right?

Subsequently prove to the world that he’s more than his parents’ money by becoming one of the best detectives of his time, as well as proving himself to be the police force’s biggest pain in the ass for stealing their cases. How is it his fault if they’re incompetent and the public trusts him more with their mysteries? It’s not, that’s how.

 He’d been working independent, choosing his own cases and keeping all the money for himself (and taxes), up until the fateful day when he’d received an Email from a friend who, frankly, he assumed to have gone missing. That thought was not because of ill will, but because this is the same friend nobody caught any word of since graduation.       

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Subject: Coffee?

 It’s been a while. I’m in town, and we should—no, we have to—catch up. There’s something I have to talk to you about.

Your old friend, 

Kim Jaehwan. 

This is where something happens—the turning point, if you must call it—because the something that Jaehwan wanted to talk to Seongwoo about is in regards to project funding, and it’s a project the both of them have talked about in the past, although years have passed. “So,” Seongwoo drawls. “You want me to help you fund an independent crime-fighting agency? And then you’re going to be my boss?”

To his credit, Jaehwan stays undaunted, even if there’s a taunt in Seongwoo’s words. That’s something Seongwoo’s always admired in Jaehwan, the obvious confidence that Jaehwan carries himself with and how he never lets anyone bring down his mojo. “It’s going to be big, and I’m going to need all the help I can get.” 

“Okay.” Seongwoo puts down the file, having made up his mind. “I’m in.”

So, here are the words to describe Ong Seongwoo: rich, brilliant, modern day non-fictitious Sherlock Holmes without the Watson, a crucial member slash funder of Jaehwan’s Angels. (That’s not the real name, but that’s what Seongwoo wishes was the real name. Kim Jaehwan’s Crimebusters Incorporated is nowhere as cool as Jaehwan’s Angels.) 

Ah, and here's one thing a person must never forget, when they're tasked to describe Ong Seongwoo: he's handsome. Never forget the handsome.

    Because Kim Jaehwan has horrible taste (not only in building but also in clothes, and Seongwoo would say men if it wasn't for the fact he hasn't seen Jaehwan date anyone in what feels like years and are probably years), the 'super secret hideout' for Kim Jaehwan's Crimebusters Incorporated is located smack-dab in the middle of Seoul. It's something about hiding in plain sight and learning to be subtle around the locals, though Seongwoo wouldn't say having a flower shop that offers the most limited assortment he's ever seen to be necessarily subtle. The only redeeming thing about their hideout is the fact that it makes him feel like he's a part of a spy movie, what with the whole secret headquarters thing going on, but the novelty's worn off after spending a couple of years going to the same place and doing nearly the same thing every other week.

"Hello, Seongwoo," the reception lady chirps, and Seongwoo has to look at the name tag to remember her name. They seem to change every two weeks, though Seongwoo would blame that on Jaehwan and his prone to temper outbursts kind of personality that never fails to drive people away.

"Morning"—he squints to read the nametag—"Irene!”

"That's Irene noona to you," the reception lady chides.

"You don't look a day older than eighteen, though," Seongwoo says in return, laying on the charm.

To her credit, Irene doesn't even blink. "I'm five years older than you.”

"Whoops!" Seongwoo's lips curl into a sheepish grin. "Sorry, but I did say you don't look a day older than eighteen. I mean it!" He finger guns, because he can and he's insufferable like that, and waltzes away into the cleaning room that functions as the gateway between the flower shop (that has an entire office in the back, it's really miraculous how nobody's noticed? Like, wow much?).

There's an elevator hidden behind the stack of room cleaning appliances, and Seongwoo presses on the arrow that points downwards. There's actually only one button, everything else being underground, because Jaehwan thinks it'd be cooler. (Don't tell Jaehwan, but Seongwoo thinks the same way, too.)

Inside the elevator, the most recent Twice song is blasted, and Seongwoo taps his feet to the rhythmic beat. Jaehwan collects girlgroup memorabilia in his bedroom, Seongwoo would know, as he's paid visit to said place multiple times before. (Nothing in that way, mostly in a 'where have you been for the past few days, the fuck?' kind of way, and somehow he always finds Jaehwan in his bedroom whenever that happens, looking more catatonic than anything. They don't talk about those days.)

When the elevator doors open, he's greeted by the sight that is his workplace, workers (both agents and non-agent operatives) dressed in their everyday attires. The best thing about having Jaehwan as a boss is his hatred for uniforms, so he allows them to wear whatever they want, as long as they're office appropriate. His excuse is, "Just in case anyone needs to go undercover all of a sudden!" but anyone who's had a conversation with Kim Jaehwan would know that he just really, really dislikes stuffy business suits that regular jobs would dub as appropriate work attire.

Jaehwan's office is located right next to the bathroom (boss privileges), and Seongwoo finds Jaehwan waiting for him there, feet rested on the top of his table. No shame, as per usual.

"So, what do I have?" Seongwoo prompts, taking the empty seat on the other side of the table. The seat is wooden and unstuffed, and in contrast, Jaehwan's seat (or what he likes to call "The Boss Seat") has wheels, is made of faux leather that still feels comfortable, and is padded. No wonder Jaehwan has a tendency to fall asleep on the clock.

"The jewel heists," Jaehwan gets straight to the point, passing a file to Seongwoo. "I didn't think we needed to step in, but a friend called me. Apparently the case is most likely connected—and don't give me that look, I know you've come to the same conclusion, you smartass—but it's going to be difficult to apprehend the criminal if each country's laws have their limitations regarding areas and... all that. That's where we come in.”

"'And all that.' You could be a writer with that vocabulary, have you ever considered a career change?”

"Shut up, Ong.”

Joking aside, Seongwoo moves to open the folder, and Jaehwan doesn't say anything nor does he move to stop him. Jaehwan only watches, quiet and observing.

"This started two months ago?" The first thing he sees is the date of the first heist, and it was on May 4th, 2017. The picture is of a green jewel, the shade similar to that of an emerald’s.

"Yeah. That one—The Emerald Dragon, and why do people give fancy names to jewelries anyway? —was stolen in Shanghai. From a museum, so you'd think they'd have better security, but apparently all the security cameras were hacked. Our thief's good, managed to get in without setting any alarms, though that might be the job of his hacker." Jaehwan's mouth twists into a grimace. "They checked the system after they lost the jewel. Anything security-related was turned off, and there was no trace of it at all.”

"Wow. Clean job, huh?" Seongwoo whistles.

"Yeah," Jaehwan murmurs. The clean jobs are always the headache-inducing jobs, because the people involved are meticulous in those. Meticulous not to leave any evidence, meticulous to not get caught. At some point though, anyone is bound to slip up; and that's the opening Seongwoo would use to swoop in, figure out the case, and save the day.

(The day is metaphorical, because sometimes, it's not even a day he saves. It could be a week, or in other occasions, a life. Those are always the best kind of saving.)

Something in the report catches his eye. "There was a note left?”

Jaehwan's head dips into a nod. "Yeah. There's no picture of the note, because apparently it's too hard to get my orders right when the only thing I'm asking for is a picture of all the fucking evidence, but it's a good thing I've got some eyes there. Apparently, there was nothing written. Just a picture of a moon.”

"A moon?" How peculiar. "Why would someone leave behind a moon?”

"I don't know, that's why you're the detective instead of me, Ong.”

Seongwoo waves him off. "Right, right. You can tell me if you're jealous, you know. I wouldn't mind letting you snoop into my, uh, mystery busting process."

The look on Jaehwan's face is priceless. If it were any other person, Seongwoo might've felt offended by how horrified one looks upon being flirted with, but this is Jaehwan, so really, Seongwoo would feel the same way if he were in Jaehwan's place. He's only doing the whole flirting thing to see Jaehwan’s reactions. It’s a pastime. "Stop flirting and start working on the case, we don't know if the thief's going to strike again."

Because he's a Professional™ Seongwoo is quick to sober up, catching up with the details of Jaehwan's words. "You said thief. So, you're sure this isn't some kind of Ocean's 11 thing going on?"

"I’m sure. Call it a gut feeling."

"Gut feelings are useless when there's no proof to back it up. See, this is why I'm the detective, and you're the boss. You fire and hire people with your gut."

“That doesn’t even—“ Jaehwan pinches the bridge of his nose. “Why do I even bother. Get out of my office and get to work.”

Seongwoo does a lazy salute, a cheeky smile painting the lower half of his face. "Roger that!"

    This is the way Seongwoo works:

He finds a nice place to sit down. Nice is relative, so while in one occasion it might be the eatery down the street (completely adjacent to a white collar bank, it makes a nice place for part-time people watching as well), while in other times—read: most of the time—said "nice" place is the little meeting room in the office, where no one comes in because no meetings are actually held and Jaehwan only added one in as a formality. The office barely does any kind of official, work-like things, with Jaehwan preferring to inform them of their jobs personally, and their group chat using an application Jaehwan had hired someone to make (with near state of the art security and high-profile encryption) as their primary form of communication. One for technology, zero for healthy work environment communication skills. (Ding!—If you haven't realized, that's Seongwoo's attempt at a buzzer from a game show.)

So—meeting room. There's a clinical cleanliness aspect to it, considering the janitor still comes by to clean the room every day (and night) despite its rare usage; the room, square-based and as big as Seongwoo's guest room back at the manor, smells like a wet mop and floor-cleaning formulas. The cheap ones that you can find at a convenience store, not the ones you'll only find at high-end supermarkets. A single plant decorates the room, a potted silk areca palm tree imported from the States, and how it hasn't died is a mystery that even Ong Seongwoo can't solve. The janitor hates greenery, for some reason, and everyone else could care less. If he were superstitious, maybe he'd say this is all the work of a Casper-like ghost who'd most likely been a botanist in their life. But he isn't superstitious and the meeting room's CCTV is faulty at best, so he's accepted not knowing the mystery behind the potted plant of Kim Jaehwan's Crimebusters Incorporated's meeting room.

A taxi has crashed in front of the white-collar bank, and though there are no casualties, the driver has taken it upon himself to conduct what is essentially an interview from nearby bloggers waiting for a scoop at the eatery that is the alternative to the meeting room. There's a crowd of the driver, the bloggers, and the regular eaters (as it is morning after all, and the eatery's pancakes are famous not just in this district, but in Seoul in general), and Seongwoo can't be bothered to wait in a line that could last as long as half an hour. 

The meeting room it is.

"You're the only person around here who uses this!" A lady who breezes by, carrying a stack of papers that seem too heavy for her wispy arms, makes sure to say.

"Better than it being a waste of space. And money," he retorts, and his brows knit. "My money."

(There's the reason why he uses the meeting room. It'd be a waste of the money, and to be more specific, the money from his inheritance he'd blown on an idea that most would consider as 'fucking crazy.' Because there's a reason why spy movie plots are movies instead of reality. Jaehwan was probably crazy when he thought of this idea, and what does that make of Seongwoo who must've been out of his mind to fund it? A product of boredom gone bad mixed with an entanglement of capitalism, that's what.)

The meeting room is empty and Seongwoo's seat (technically Jaehwan's but does Jaehwan ever use it? Nope!) is, by extension, empty as well. The seat is right next to the window that overlooks one of Seoul's busiest working districts, skyscrapers adjacent to each other, paved roads leading to traffic lights and the bustling pedestrians at any time of the day. Seongwoo's heart soars at the sight of the city, his city (and is he sounding like some Batman towards Gotham right now or what?), in the current state it is at now; jostling with life, and maybe not the safest when you've still got your pickpockets every once in a while, but in all accounts, for a metropolitan city it's safe and this is why Seongwoo does what he does. He wants to keep them safe, keep them busy and make sure their worries are only about what to eat for dinner or where to bring their dates for tomorrow.

Leave the big bad criminals to him, leave him to weed out whoever does the dirty crime little by little, and let the people worry only about the little things. That's why, when someone tells him that he could be doing so much more with the money he has—could build something like a weapons company or even a tech one because that's where the money's at—Seongwoo never feels an ounce of regret towards his chosen career path. Unconventional and not necessarily always high-paying (as if the murder of a grocer pays the same as a government official, though that isn't necessarily what Seongwoo agrees with because at the end of the day all humans are the same, but that's the way the world works) but it makes him feel like he's doing something to make his city a better place.

(God, he sounds like a protagonist, and for all the bravado he puts on for being cocky and essentially feeding every trust fund baby trope there is, behind the money and the publicity, that's who Seongwoo really is.)

The stolen jewelries might not be based in Seoul, and Seongwoo would be lying if he said he had the same attachment to these places instead of here, but that's the thing about working with a global crimefighting company: you don't always get to choose where your cases are at, and sometimes, even if you dislike a certain place, you still have to do something to restore a semblance of peace there. Do it for the people, and all that, because even if Seongwoo's mostly in it for Seoul, everyone deserves a shot at having a life that isn't made abnormal by murders and robberies. 

He places the files down on the table, and picks up a pen and an empty piece of paper to jot down his notes. He's the type of person to write as he goes, to note down every single piece of information he deems relevant, to draw graphs or underline the details one could consider as "fishy." This case isn't any different, and as Seongwoo proceeds to read through the report, all short and factual sentences, the notetaking and pen scrawling is exactly what he does.

It isn't until he's reached the documentation on the stolen jewel from London that the moon, along with the dates, spark an idea into his head. "Let's see," he says under his breath, using his phone's search engine to look up a specific occasion that happens on the dates of the previous heists: May 4th, June 3rd, and the latest, July 2nd.

He holds his breath, and once the results show (thank you, fast internet that he may or may not occasionally use for Netflix whenever Jaehwan's not watching!) a grin that isn't unlike the Cheshire Cat's from Alice in Wonderland surfaces onto his lips, completely overtaking the straight, focused line it had been. 

Bingo.

    "So, what you're trying to say is that our thief only strikes on the dates of full moons from 2004?" Jaehwan asks flatly, his eyes trained onto Seongwoo’s notes that were thrown together in haphazard. 

“Exactly. It all matches up, see?” Seongwoo gestures at the little notes he’d scribbled in blue ink. Jaehwan tilts his head, and tilts the paper as well, and yet, he still has a difficult time making it out. The smartest people always seem to have the worst handwriting—or maybe that’s not the case, but that’s what Seongwoo uses as an excuse for his shitty excuse of one.

“It’s not really what you’d call a strong lead.” His face contorts into a frown.

“Hey, it’s our only lead.”

“God, I hate it when you’re right.”

“You must hate every passing moment of your life, then.” Seongwoo snickers, barely avoiding a thwart over the head with his own piece of paper. Good thing he’d avoided it, because being attacked by your own sheet of paper is, in Seongwoo’s not humble opinion, a new low.  

“If your guess about his next target is correct—”

“Which, you know, it probably is.” 

“—as I was saying before you interrupted me, if you’re right, then that means you’re going to have to work fast to make sure it doesn’t happen. I’m assigning you with a partner.” Jaehwan puts away the file into the storage underneath his table.

“Yeah! Wait, what? A partner?” Seongwoo’s euphoria is short-lived, the tonality of his words going from an upbeat trill to one of an outburst, mixed with a healthy tinge of confusion, in a matter of seconds. There’s a reason why he’s one of the only ones here who hasn’t been assigned a partner. Seongwoo works terrible with others; whenever Jaehwan would send someone to work with him, back when the both of them had been new to this thing, Seongwoo had the ability to scare them away within 72 hours, or less. Less, a majority of the time. Interns going in fresh-faced and then submitting the resignation form after facing his ego and his general lack of nicety for others, and Jaehwan ended up getting fed up with having to recruit new people nearly everyday—so in the end, they reached to a compromise, where Jaehwan would stop finding new people to work with Seongwoo as long as he proved himself capable of working solo.

It hasn’t been a problem for the past few years. So when Jaehwan announces, more sudden than the forced loveline in that new drama airing every Monday night, that Seongwoo would have a partner on a mission that doesn’t present itself at anything special—it becomes a problem.

“Jaehwan, you know I don’t play well with others,” Seongwoo says all of this with a gaping mouth. If Jaehwan, the fucker, had a camera, Seongwoo’s sure he would capture this moment right now as a memorabilia of the time he’d managed to drive Ong Seongwoo into shock.

“You’re not going to solve this one alone,” Jaehwan says, conviction lacing his every word.

And, sure, the words sting. Seongwoo’s never failed Jaehwan before; his cases are a clean track record, and he’s never failed to apprehend the criminal, never failed to uncover the truth of some deeply shrouded web of government-level secrets. Knowing Jaehwan doesn’t trust him enough to let him do this one case on his own—and really, how could this case compare to the time he’d discovered a drug ring in a country’s government? That’s Seongwoo’s biggest case, the one that got him on the map, and that’s bound to be more difficult than finding a jewel thief, right? —knowing that, it sucks. Seongwoo thought he’d gotten rid of disappointment now that he never has his hopes up, because that’s a surefire way to get yourself sad a lot (the world constantly proves itself that it hates Seongwoo and never fails to let him down, but at least there’s consistency there). He thought he’d gotten rid of that kind of despondency, but Jaehwan must be a miracle worker, because there’s some real bitterness that Seongwoo finds in the burrow of emotions he calls his heart.

“What, you don’t think I can solve this on my own?”

“No,” Jaehwan is blunt with his response, and Seongwoo’s bitterness fades, anger growing in its stead. “To catch a jewel thief—one that’s as good as our guy because you can’t say he’s bad when there’s barely any clue as to who it is—you have to think like one.”

“I can think like one just fine. I watched a documentary on a jewel thief so I’m pretty sure I can get into character, or maybe—”

“Shut up and let me talk!”

Seongwoo shrinks into his seat. A pout that resembles that of a pungent child wobbles on his lower lip. “Fine." 

“Trust me on this one. It’s not about me doubting your abilities.” So, maybe Jaehwan’s a mind-reader, or maybe (and this is a case that’s like hood of happening is higher than the mind-reader possibility) he’s known Seongwoo long enough to read him like an open book. “I don’t want to take any chances, and one of my contacts recently gave me the whereabouts of someone who might be able to help.”

“Any chance the person’s already here? Maybe waiting behind your curtain or something?” The curtain, beige and washed out by the sun’s blinding rays, is hiding no one. It’s also not even drawn. “Guess not?”

“Convincing him to do the job will be your responsibility.” Jaehwan gives a conniving smirk, leaving Seongwoo to groan, because why him? He’s terrible at having people stick around him, much less convincing them to help him. “I’ve got his address already, so you’ve got your work cut out for you.”

“Yeah, because tracking’s always the hard part,” Seongwoo grumbles, the sarcasm evident like the blinding ray of a flashlight in a pitch-dark closet. 

Jaehwan checks his watch, one of Seongwoo’s birthday gifts, a Rolex Antimagnetique model that looks as complicated as a Rolex can be. “Stop whining, you’ve got a plane to catch in—oh, an hour. The boarding gate closes in forty minutes, so I think you should run. Take a cab and then run, no need to pack.”

“No need to pack? What, am I supposed to wear this the whole time?” Had he known, he wouldn’t have chosen to wear the combo of the white shirt and the ripped denim jeans. He wouldn’t believe himself if he tried convincing said “himself” that he was a world class detective with a global case to crack.

“I never said anything about you staying there for multiple days. Just recruit the dude, and go back here with him so I can have a word and all that official jargon you know I can barely stand. Thirty-nine minutes until the gate closes!”

    The plane (that he'd been lucky enough not to miss, though his name was called in one of those "the boarding gate will shortly be closed" calls, no thanks to Jaehwan) takes him to New York. Amongst the thrall of suits and business skirts sitting in first class, Seongwoo sticks out like a sore thumb with his casual, near effortless attire. This is, once again, no thanks to Jaehwan. 

"You can get a cab there or something," Jaehwan had said, as if saying that would take the burden off his shoulders. Which, technically, it does. "Here's your address." His boss slash friend slash the person who maybe secretly hates him or loves him hands over a business card, scented with perfume Seongwoo is unable to recognize. Maybe it's Hermes. Seongwoo doesn't have one of those. 

The Art House is written on the card with Times New Roman, likely 12pts, italicized and bolded, the words dipped in gold. A silver border surrounds the three words. Seongwoo flips the card, and finds an address along with a single name, romanicized. Hwang Minhyun.

Minhyun, Hwang—the name sparks a warning bell in his head, but for what exactly, Seongwoo cannot remember. 

"Are you going to get me to work with a—what's this—an art curator?" He purses his lips at Jaehwan, who looks like he's short of bursting into the maniacal cackles he calls laughter in a matter of seconds.

Jaehwan, that fucker, folds his arms on the top of the hardwood. "Don't tell me you don't recognize the name."

The warning bells transitions into sirens. "I don't." Seongwoo narrows his eyes in suspicion, first at the card, then at his employer. 

"One of my top men doesn't recognize Hwang Minhyun? Have you not been reading all those super secret archives? I'm shocked. Really, I am." The hand that'd been folded primly on the table crosses over his heart. Jaehwan's face contorts from one of mock surprise, removing any trace of the neutrality that was just there. 

Seongwoo raises both of his hands, waving the palms as if to say, 'just spit it out.'

"He's a retired jewel thief." Jokes aside, Jaehwan goes straight to the point, putting his arms down and folding them on his lap, under the table. "Used to be one of the best, but his leg got shot—never could get back to the hang of things. Remember the Pink Panther case?"

The Pink Panther case. Three years ago, that was all the news talked about, as if the world had stopped revolving since the thievery of one of the most well-protected jewels in the whole world. Something straight out of a movie, the case seemed, what with the manner it'd been taken (in the dead of the night, all the guards taken out with a blow dart and the security systems bypassed and shut down just like that) and how no suspect was ever apprehended despite the media coverage that the team, composed of some of the best detectives and profilers in the world, received. It's a cold case, now, although there are websites dedicated to the solving of it; a fruitless effort when the thief proved himself (or herself) to be meticulous in covering their steps. 

"What do you take me for, a hermit? 'Course I remember." Seongwoo scoffs, reclining on his seat. "Wasn't that case everywhere? The media was going crazy about that. Even Won Bin's dating rumours were nothing in comparison—and that's Won Bin."

"Grow out the hair and you could pass as a hermit," Jaehwan mocks. Seongwoo resists the urge to throw a tissue at his head, because that'd be a waste of the tissue, and by extension, the environment. "Hwang Minhyun was the culprit. At least, that's what we caught on three years late, and there was no sufficient evidence to put him behind bars." His lips twist into a grimace. "Doesn't matter now, though. He's retired, as I've mentioned before. Isn't really a thief anymore, just an art curator in New York."

"Then how'd you figure out it was him?"

"Someone fessed up. A little bit of snooping done in the criminal underworld added more anecdotes to the original statement." Jaehwan unfolds his hands, and lays them out on the table. Like he's laying out cards. 

"Alright, then," Seongwoo drawls. "But how am I supposed to get him to help me? I mean, I know my good looks are devastating, but maybe not to the extent they'll break some kind of jewel thieves’ bro code. If that exists. Probably does, anything's possible nowadays," he mutters the last thing to himself, dark brows furrowed in thought.

"You're smart," Jaehwan says, sounding almost begrudging. "Figure that part out yourself."

The detective crosses his arms in front of his chest, although the image of authority is ruined with that of petulance as lips jut out into a pout. "You're a terrible boss, you know that?"

So, that's why he's in New York City; the sun is gone by now, swallowed by the night, but this isn't the city that never sleeps for nothing. Even in the night, when no stars shine anymore and the moon is obstructed by dark, polluted clouds, the city's radiant, bursting with the colours from the lights from all around the city.

Seongwoo finds a cab with no problem. They're everywhere, he figures, and as he hops into one, he's stuck with his hands metaphorically crossing his heart, hoping the driver won't recognize him. It leads to questions, and questions lead to unnecessary conversations. All Seongwoo wants to do is rest, maybe sleep for a day or two, but he can't, obviously; he's a man on a mission and he's not going to start failing his missions now.

(And yes, the questions; one should find it curious how one of the richest men under 30 in the world goes around New York without a limousine or whatever it is the top percentile use, but he can't say "Kim Jaehwan is the reason behind all this and also world hunger, probably!" could he?

Wait—he could. Why hasn't he done that?)

"Where are we headed, Sir?" The cabbie asks once Seongwoo has gotten in the car, closing the door with an audible thud. He settles into his seat, and like any good passenger would, puts on his seatbelt. 

"Madison Avenue, please." He can find the location on his own from there, and a little room to stretch his legs after a long flight is something that his near numb feet are in desperate need of. (That's the reason why Seongwoo loathes long plane rides; as the type to be quick on his feet, figuratively and literally, that kind of discomfort is—pardon his french—the fucking worst.) 

The cabbie drives as if they're fugitives on the run from the police, that is to say, he drives fast. Maybe it's the New York traffic (and wanting to avoid it whenever they're not stuck in a long, long line or stopped by the spread out traffic lights) or maybe the cabbie's a thrill seeker who ended up scraping the bottom barrel in terms of thrill seeking by using a cab to do that, who knows? Not Seongwoo, nor is he someone who makes small talk with strangers, so he settles for accepting and hanging on tightly to the arm grip underneath the car window. Whenever the car takes a sudden sharp turn, or when the thrall of cars zoom by in what can be described most accurately as a blur, the only thing he can do is hold on tighter and pray the mission won't end (tragically) before it even started. 

He’ll never admit this, especially not to the people who won’t ever let him live it down, but the moment the cab comes to a stop, he thanks every deity there is out there that he knows of in his head. Thank you Jesus, thank you Buddha, thank you Zeus, and thank you Beyoncé.

“We’re here,” the driver announces, and Seongwoo takes some money out of his wallet, adding a little extra as a tip—common courtesy more than anything. The driver accepts it with a smile, bidding him, “Have a nice day!” as Seongwoo gets out of the car, closes the door, and never looks back. There goes the wildest cab drive of his life, not just in New York, but also all the places he’d travelled using a taxi.

Maybe he’ll take the bus next time.

In accordance to the business card Jaehwan gave him, Hwang Minhyun’s art gallery should be located right across James & Co; though not the most helpful indicator, considering the similarity of the architecture of the buildings around Madison Avenue (and Manhattan in particular now that he thinks about it), it’s better than nothing. Seongwoo walks along the borough, Google Maps guiding the way on his phone—the battery reads 38%, so he makes do with what he has, and turns off the notifications for this texts. Even if that leads to the consequence of at least 500 missed texts from Jaehwan and his best friend (because surprisingly, Jaehwan isn’t his only friend. A true shocker.)

The coloured lights cast reflections on the path he takes, puddles from the rare onslaught of rain turning (predominantly) red and yellow, following the neon signs and city lights that hang around the streets. Seongwoo has never been much for sightseeing or picture-taking, a majority of his overseas trips being one of work-related activities instead of a leisurely kind of visit (this time not being an exception), but if his battery wasn’t dying, he’d take a picture—or two—of the scenery. Maybe pose underneath a street lamp, if he ever found a stranger who doesn’t look as if they might run off with his phone. But, that doesn’t happen, and all the strangers that walk by never give him a second look, each of them busy living their own lives. So, there goes that plan; botched and foiled.

“You have arrived at your destination,” a robotic female says, as soon as Seongwoo finishes following the directions left by the application. He looks up from his phone, and finds that he has to look up even more to read the sign on top of the building—two stories high, painted jet black as if to fit in with the night. The Art House, the plaque reads, the golden writing standing out over the porcelain canvas. Behind the door, the open sign has been turned around to a ‘Sorry, we’re closed!’, but Seongwoo still sees that the light is still on, and when he tugs on the door, he finds that it’s unlocked. 

An unlocked door is practically an open invitation for him to enter, regardless of the business hours, so Seongwoo comes in, right foot before the other. 

“We’re closed,” someone calls out immediately, and Seongwoo closes the door slowly, confusion growing in his head. There’d been no door bell or any other noise to signify he’d come in, so how’d the person heard him? 

Then again, if said person is Hwang Minhyun, supposedly a legendary jewel thief (before he retired, but what are semantics anyway? —alright maybe he shouldn’t be saying this as a detective who’s supposed to look at semantics), then that was a question with an automatic answer. 

"I'm here to see a Hwang Minhyun?" Seongwoo calls out, as he inspects the interior of the gallery. Considering the nature of his job as well as his interest in art (that is to say, none), the creme-themed design—a stark contrast from the darker shades that make the exterior—make the place seem… posh? Is that the right term? Seongwoo imagines, if classical music started playing all of a sudden, it wouldn't feel out of place at all. Paintings, all of them displaying different art styles and having nothing except beauty in common, are hung all around the room, with little details plaqued underneath them.

He's in the middle of inspecting a painting from France (the detail put into the paintings are nowhere short of impeccable, reminding Seongwoo of his own eye for detail when working on a case) when he hears a tap of a foot on ceramic floor from behind him. He flinches, because Seongwoo doesn't do jumping in fright, because if that had been a life and death situation whereas he hadn't noticed someone sneak up on him—he could've died. And Seongwoo doesn't need to die before the age of thirty, as only the good die young, and Seongwoo falls away from that category almost terribly.

Dark brown eyes meet lighter ones as Seongwoo turns around, finding himself adjacent from a man—slightly taller, this he notes with no lack of envy—wearing slacks and a loose, white shirt, a glint of amusement shining within his orbs. "Come back tomorrow if you're interested in the art."

"I'm not," Seongwoo denies, as if he hadn't been observing the artwork a few seconds ago. "Like I've said, I'm here to talk to Hwang Minhyun." He squints at the taller. "Are you Hwang Minhyun?" That's a trick question, because Seongwoo has taken the time and liberty to look through Hwang Minhyun's file from Jaehwan's archives, and the man standing before him fits the physical description (and picture!) of Hwang Minhyun to a T.

(By that, Seongwoo means the man is handsome, not in a way like Seongwoo’s where his face looks like a literal Greek God, but Minhyun’s beauty reminds him of the edge of a very sharp knife.) 

“Yes,” Minhyun admits, although his lower lips twist, and he looks at Seongwoo with no small amount of suspicion. “Why were you looking for me?” 

“Wow, you’re not going to offer me tea, or anything else to drink?” 

“No.” 

“I’m—” The look Minhyun sends is his way is that of someone who just wants to go home, and Seongwoo returns it with a look of petulance. “I was just joking,” he whispers under his breath, and if it were possibly to say something ‘poutily’, that would’ve been said like that—poutily. 

“So?” Minhyun prompts, patience wearing thin by the minute. Or second. (Most likely the latter, judging by how he doesn’t bother to hide the annoyance shining through his well-sculpted facial features.) 

“I’m Ong Seongwoo. Maybe you’ve heard of me?” The resounding look does nothing to answer that, because Minhyun has a hell of a poker face that even Seongwoo finds difficulty in deciphering. “Anyway, I’m working on a case right now. You might’ve heard of it, if you still like the shiny things in particular—” He particularly enjoys the way Minhyun’s eyes widen a fraction, the first sign of discomposure he’s shown during the entire conversation, “—but a bunch of jewels have been stolen. Me? I don’t know anything about stealing jewels. Murders are usually my specialty, and I won’t lie; I’m one of the best in that field. But give me a case about stolen gems? Even I need… help.” 

Help that his boss forced him to undertake, but, help is help. That counts, right? It should.

“How did you find out?” Minhyun asks, his voice soft and nothing short of gentle, yet there’s something undeniably dangerous underneath the saccharine layers. It makes Seongwoo feel uneasy, knowing he’s in the company of someone who’d been a criminal, and on top of that, the kind of criminal who’d gotten away with his crimes.

“I’m working with an independent crime agency, if you will.” Seongwoo makes a gesture with his hand, turning his palm upwards, and Minhyun’s face remains stoic. “I was going to say something about me figuring it out because of my intellectual prowess—”

 “—well, it’s a good thing you didn’t,” Minhyun cuts him short. A ghost of a smirk shapes his lips, and Seongwoo’s not sure whether he likes this, or the straight line it’d been better.

Both looks have something in common, however: they’re both intimidating, and that’s saying something, considering Ong Seongwoo rarely ever gets intimidated by anyone or anything that isn’t his own reflection in the mirror when he’s wearing his best Sunday clothes.

“Rude,” Seongwoo says, aghast. Minhyun doesn’t bat an eye. “Long story short, I know about your past as some kind of master thief or whatever you claimed yourself as—”

Minhyun frowns. “I didn’t label myself as anything.”

 “—and, let me finish, I need your help on a case,” Seongwoo finishes, in spite of the interruption from his single audience. “We’ll split the reward and everything, the money’s pretty good, but somehow, I don’t think that’s the deal-breaking reward for you, is it?”

A cat ate the canary grin forms on Seongwoo’s lips as Minhyun tenses, a small movement that the untrained eye wouldn’t have seen, but this is Ong Seongwoo. He practically lives and breathes details—it’s how he stays on the top of his game.

Not seeing a response coming any time soon, Seongwoo carries on, mindful of the other’s reaction to his every word. “I’m sure you’d find it up to your liking if your… past colleague’s current work stayed out of the press.” This isn’t blackmailing, or at least, that’s what Seongwoo’s telling himself; it isn’t as if he’d go and out the information he withheld now to the nearest TMZ office (or Dispatch, whatever) if Minhyun refused his offer, but—judging by the widening of Minhyun’s eyes, and the way he seems to harden his resolve, the likehood of that happening grows smaller with every passing moment.

“I don’t know what you mean.” It’s a valiant attempt, but still, Seongwoo’s got Minhyun all figured out now; trying to go against that is futile.

“Kim Jonghyun,” Seongwoo says, and the two words have the effect he’d just so expected. Minhyun clenches his fist, sharply trimmed nails digging into his skin. “You don’t want to play that game with me. I know when you’re lying, and when you’re not,” he almost coos, but the icy glare Minhyun directs as him makes him fall short of that. In retrospect, that might’ve saved him from being strangled to death by the same person he was trying to recruit, but it’s not like Seongwoo knew Kim Jonghyun would’ve been that touchy of a subject.

“What are you going to do with him?” Minhyun prompts, and there’s something so inherently cold about his manner; this isn’t to say it hadn’t been cold before, but if Seongwoo puts it into words, it’s as if he’d gone from plus to minus degrees in temperature.

“Nothing,” and this, what Seongwoo’s saying, is truthful. The earnest, he makes sure, shows in his face. “But it’s the nothing that should concern you. The government has some files on him—it’s only a matter of time before they use his name as a distraction for a scandal and drag him to jail.”

“They wouldn’t do that; they’ve got dating news.”

“Sorry to say but they’ve released all the dating news in the arsenal.” That shuts Minhyun up, leaving him gaping like a fish out of water. “So, they’re going to turn to crime next. If you choose to help me, you’ll have my word that I’m going to do everything I can to ensure all of those files are deleted.”

“And I’m supposed to trust you, just like that?” Minhyun scoffs, sneering down at him.

“Well…” Seongwoo knows this might not be the most professional move, but he can’t exactly help it, so he rubs the back of his head, ignoring the judging kind of bafflement that comes from Minhyun at the action. “Yeah. My face’s enough guarantee, isn’t it?” He adds cheekily.

Minhyun doesn’t even look moved. “No, it’s not. How am I even supposed to know that the government even has files on him? You could be lying.”

A groan is what comes out from Seongwoo’s mouth as he hears Minhyun’s reply, and he unlocks his phone, opens a video, and hands it over to Minhyun who snatches it out of Seongwoo’s grasp, albeit not without a look of genuine curiosity. “You ask a lot of questions. How paranoid,” he mumbles, as if he isn’t paranoid himself. “Just look at the video I’ve got there. It’s what the government has too.” Seongwoo yawns, covering his mouth with his sleeve. Or, his arm, considering he’s not wearing a sleeved (long-sleeved, to be more precise) shirt—eh, whatever.

The video is barely a minute long, but it has incriminating evidence; Kim Jonghyun caught by a camera as he steals a pretty gem, taking it and sneaking away within a small timeframe. It would’ve seemed like the perfect crime had it not been caught on camera—alas, it was, and Minhyun watches all of this with a blank face, although Seongwoo can see the traces of his hardening resolve.

Hook, line, and sinker.

“How’d you get this,” Minhyun hisses, demeanor turned hostile as soon as the video ends. Seongwoo wonders if he’d give his phone back, if Seongwoo asked.

“We have our ways,” Seongwoo says airily, knowing that mentioning Jonghyun had been set up—for the sole purpose of catching him in the act to lure Minhyun, apparently Jaehwan can think things through and had decided to do this sometime after the second robbery—would serve to jeopardize his mission.

Silence follows Seongwoo’s statement. It leaves Seongwoo to wonder if Minhyun would take the offer, or if he’d think of all of this as a fluke, but he finds himself spared from the thoughts as Minhyun sags his shoulders, a wary, but accepting look already flashing in his eyes.

“Fine,” Minhyun mutters begrudgingly, and hands Seongwoo back his phone with no little amount of reluctance.

Seongwoo is no psychologist, but it doesn’t take one to realize that he and Minhyun are far from getting off on the right foot; for one, the only reason why Minhyun decided to help him was because of a threat on behalf of someone evidently important to Minhyun—and Seongwoo, though you could call him a self-centered, egoistic bastard all you want, can understand where Minhyun’s coming from. But there’s a line between personal feelings and a job, and Seongwoo would rather not cross that line. He needs to remind himself that he’s dealing with an ex-criminal here, one who could sneak away with Seongwoo’s phone and maybe even trace the video if he wanted, no matter how mundane Hwang Minhyun’s dressed like at the present moment.

“We have a deal.” Seongwoo beams. The glumness of Minhyun’s face is a stark contrast from the blinding ray of Seongwoo’s wide-toothed smile. “I hope you've got a passport with you, because we’re leaving as soon as I book a ticket for the next available flight.” There’s no sign of Seongwoo joking from his words, and Minhyun’s left gaping, the tightly bound composure, for once, broken full-blown. Maybe Seongwoo should be proud of that.

“…You’re shitting me, right.”

“Nope! I didn’t even bring my luggage with me when my boss pulled the same shit so consider this as misplaced revenge.” Seongwoo grins toothily, much to the obvious dismay from Minhyun’s part. “Come on, I’ve got to brief you on the mission. Speaking of which, I can’t believe you decided to help out without even hearing the complete details; like, what if I was going to ask you to help me kill a president?”

The retired gem thief shrugs. “If you’re asking me to help impeach the president of this country, I suppose that wouldn’t be too bad.”

    This time of the year, the full-booked plane tickets are to the places where the sun shines best; places where coastal residences are of abundance, places where the sea is glittering green and groups of families are scattered all around the beach, children building sandcastles and adults tanning under the sun’s rays.

(Seongwoo’s talking about places like Hawaii, Bali, or even Florida—though that’s a stretch, because don’t people go there for the amusement parks?)

Unsurprisingly, it proves to be easy for him to find two tickets to Seoul, expensive as it is for being first class seats. He and Minhyun depart the following morning, taking the first flight that leaves at the crack of dawn. It leaves little time for packing (in Minhyun’s case, though Seongwoo had been interested in seeing how light the curator traveled, and this he credited to past experience of being on the run from authorities), although there’s enough time for them to loiter around the airport, eating meals in the dead of the night and going window shopping (for Seongwoo; surprisingly, the detective is the one with an eye for the pricey things, as opposed to the thief.)

Time passes as fast as it possibly can when a stranger’s in company of another, and when the both of them board the plane, they’ve both known each other for a total of less than 12 hours.

In a mixture of curiousity and amusement, Seongwoo tries to conjure how his sixteen-year-old self would react had he been told that, in less than ten years, he’d be going on a plane with a stranger he barely knew. Knowing his past self, Seongwoo reckons he’d wave it off—after all, he’d always had an adventurous streak that bordered on lunacy. 

“I take it this isn’t your first time flying first class?” Seongwoo attempts to start a conversation after seeing how Minhyun seemed to be familiar with all the perks that came with flying first class; from the way the chair reclined to the little button to call upon the flight attendants.

Minhyun doesn’t look at him as he responds, too busy adjusting his seat’s reclining options until he was comfortable. “No.” The response is curt and to-the-point, though Seongwoo doesn’t know what he’d expected. It’s not as if Minhyun seemed the type to open up to strangers right after meeting them, especially if said stranger had practically blackmailed them into coercing to an offer.

“That’s… nice?”

“You don’t seem very sure of yourself.” A wry quirk settles on the edges of Minhyun’s lips. It’s the most emotion Seongwoo has seen from the retired thief.

Something Seongwoo dislikes in a conversation is when he’s resorted to having the lower hand. It’s a dislike that stems from how used he is to controlling the conversation; he’s the one questioning instead of being questioned, and his first instinct when someone tries to turn the topic on him is to pout. Far from the professional front Jaehwan can only wish Seongwoo had, but disappointing Jaehwan isn’t what one could consider a new development. 

“Whatever,” Seongwoo mutters sulkily, opting to asking the flight attendant for a glass of wine instead. Unhealthy since he hasn’t eaten anything that could be considered as ‘proper breakfast’, unless chocolate ice cream constutes as that (but he doubts it—though that’d be welcomed, he’s not going to lie), but he’s going to die one day anyway. A glass of wine isn’t going to change that, unless one of his enemies managed to slip some poison into it, which he doubts; he’s just being ridiculous. (Or is he? —but then again, after taking a sip of the drink and containing his grimace because since when was wine supposed to be that strong, he’s just being dramatic. Really.)

    A chauffeur is waiting for them when the both of them have disembarked from the plane. Seongwoo’s worked with this chauffeur before on several cases, and gladly goes down a brief trip down memory lane on their occasional liaisons; not necessarily appropriate workplace behavior, but the both of them keep things under wraps and unattached. Last time Seongwoo’s heard, the chauffeur has even began seeing someone (seriously, not the ‘we’re screwing around but there’s no labels so no pressure’ thing he had going with Seongwoo), and Seongwoo’s only complain to that is, why haven’t I been introduced?

“Daniel!” There’s a thrall to Seongwoo’s words, the words complimented by a grin so wide it hurts his cheeks.

Kang Daniel, nowhere short of awkward at the presence of his ex… something, makes a show of tugging at the buttons of his jet black uniform. The uniform looks like something a spy would wear more than what an actual spy wears (as proven by the casual attire that runs rampant amongst the intelligence department of the organization). 

No matter how visible Daniel’s nervous habits are, however, a smile that makes his eyes disappear into crescents is still present on his face. That’s the thing about Daniel—he’s almost always smiling, even when there’s no reason for him to be. Seongwoo’s watched Titanic once with Daniel, on a whim, and while Seongwoo didn’t burst into tears, Daniel still grinned from ear to ear from the beginning of the movie until the moment Jack died; it was at that moment that Seongwoo figured he could put on The Shining and still have Daniel smile like an idiot even at the goriest moments.

“Hello, Mr. Ong,” Daniel greets, tone still guarded even as the smile he wears says otherwise.

“Come on, there’s no need for formalities with me.” Seongwoo rolls his eyes, and he opens his arms, readying himself for a hug that never comes. It leaves him to pout as he pointedly ignores Minhyun’s wry smirk. “Wow, okay. I guess I’m not even deserving of a hug anymore,” he complains, and even then, Daniel refuses to relent. “Suit yourself.” With awkward movements, Seongwoo returns his arms to their former position, a metaphorical dark cloud looming above him.

“Do you have any bags for me to carry?” Daniel prompts, completely disregarding Seongwoo’s previous fuss. Seongwoo splutters, resembling a fish taken straight out of the water, while Minhyun shakes his head even as his fingers are curled on the handle of his suitcase. Daniel’s eyes are drawn towards the suitcase, and as he moves to take it out of Minhyun’s grasp, the man waves him off.

“No need for that, please.” Minhyun flashes Daniel a disarming smile.

The crowd continues to walk (or run, in some cases) all around them, the people consisting of large groups of families to businessmen traveling light and in solitude. Though the chatter and announcements make for noise, between the three of them, nobody speaks—at least, until Daniel breaks the silence, still wearing that ever-present smile.

“Well, let’s not loiter, shall we?”

    Unsurprisingly, Daniel drives them to headquarters, not complying to any of Seongwoo’s (whined) requests to stop by a McDonalds drive through, or even to go to a gas station because he really, really needs to pee. (“You flew first class. You’re trying to tell me you didn’t bother to take a piss there?” Daniel had asked, much to Seongwoo’s chagrin and Minhyun’s mirth.)

Jaehwan awaits them at his office, a pensive look drawn across his features. He has files stacked on his desk, not a single paper out of sight. The look is uncharacteristically serious of him, and that coupled with the heavy silence does nothing to alleviate any of Seongwoo’s worries.

“Did the thief strike again while I was away?” Seongwoo tries, and Jaehwan shakes his head to deny the guess. “Someone spit on your coffee?”

Not so subtly, Minhyun jabs Seongwoo’s ribs with his elbow. It isn’t too harsh, but there’s enough force behind it to remind Seongwoo to behave. (Which, by the way, is totally uncool—Minhyun has the guts to defend Jaehwan, a stranger, instead of letting Seongwoo live? Ugh.)

“Don’t worry,” Jaehwan says after a silence long enough to cover the intro of a song. “I just had a thought. If it turns out to be relevant, I’ll share later—”

“To hell with that!” Seongwoo’s surprised by his own outburst. Judging by the way Minhyun stiffens, he is, too. “That’s never stopped you before. Don’t think I can’t remember the time you gave out intel that turned out to be false, even when the source hadn’t been confirmed when you’d told me that.” He huffs.

“Maybe I’ve learnt from that,” Jaehwan mutters underneath his breath, and Seongwoo doesn’t quite catch onto his words, leaving him to peer at his boss in confusion. “Learn to control that temper of yours.” He waves his hands airily and sobers up, mustering a very Jaehwan-like smirk and looking more like the Jaehwan that Seongwoo knows than he had less than ten seconds ago. 

As glaringly obvious as it is, Seongwoo’s not convinced, but he lets the matter drop. Instead of pursuing the topic, he gestures Minhyun’s way. “Whatever. This is the guy, by the way.” 

Minhyun sniffs, unpleased at being referred to as ‘the guy’, but having known Seongwoo for several hours now, understands it’s more or less futile to argue with the eccentric billionaire.

“I assume you’re the one who asked him to fetch me,” Minhyun speaks up, the strange mixture of boredom and acceptance on his pretty face. “I’ll have you know I don’t appreciate being threatened.”

“You say that as your words convey a threat of your own.” Jaehwan intertwines his hands, and locks them underneath his chin, elbows propped onto the table. “If the two of you can work well enough, you won’t have to worry about the... threat, at any rate. I give you my word, Hwang Minhyun.” 

The retired criminal narrows his eyes. “We’ll see about that.” 

Seongwoo gapes at the exchange, although mostly, the gape is directed at Jaehwan. “Wow, who knew you had it in you to be so serious. And official. I thought that side of you was an urban legend.” 

Just like that, it’s as if Jaehwan’s previous composure is shattered, and in its place is the Jaehwan that Seongwoo knows so well; the Jaehwan that’s completely done with his (Seongwoo’s) shit. 

“Go solve the damned case, Ong!”

    As much as Seongwoo hates to admit it, Minhyun isn’t as terrible as he’d expected the infamous man himself to be. 

Maybe it’s the stigma he has against criminals (even retired ones who now sell art—hopefully legally) in general, or maybe it’s because they hadn’t got off on the right foot; at any rate, he’d expected Minhyun to be rusty in the ‘thinking’ department, because what do art curators do? Seongwoo’s not sure on that, but something he’s sure of is they don’t require the intellect behind planning heists or solving crimes. Memorize the names of the art and their creators, maybe, but there’s a fine line between memorizing and solving something. 

Against his initial expectations, Minhyun isn’t rusty; not at all. He doesn’t fall behind Seongwoo, and Seongwoo is self-aware, to say the least. He knows his thinking is fast-paced, and often jumps from an idea to another, sometimes without figuring out the whole variables in a certain thought. It’s a confusing process that works for him and not for (nearly) anyone else, but while he’s received odd looks from Minhyun, Minhyun never complains. Hell, he never even asks about what Seongwoo means by a certain scrawl, or asks Seongwoo to explain his theories—and it’s not a matter of pride, because Minhyun contributes, and even points out some gaps in his theories when found. 

So, yeah. The guy’s good.

“What happened when you checked the CCTVs?” Minhyun asks, but he isn’t looking at Seongwoo. He’s observing a picture of one of the stolen jewels, something not unlike interest glowing fervently in his eyes.

“There was nothing. Zilch, nada,” Seongwoo complains, even as he turns a photograph he’d been holding in his hand 180 degrees for no particular reason. Still, he squints at the rotated picture.

“Do you reckon he’s got someone working with him?” At Seongwoo’s blank look, Minhyun frowns. “Come on, don’t tell me you didn’t take in the possibility of him having a hacker on his side?”

Seongwoo rakes his hand through his hair. “Fuck, I knew I was missing something,” he says, mostly to himself. “We’re possibly not looking for one person to apprehend, then, but two? A guy in the chair?”

This time, it’s Minhyun’s turn to look bewildered. “A guy in the chair? Do you use that term?”

“Well, yeah. Why not? Sounds cool, doesn’t it?”

To his credit, Minhyun doesn’t say anything degrading; in fact, he doesn’t say anything at all, and their half-assed conversation burns out in a slow, painful death.

Minhyun takes the laptop from the chair, and begins to type, almost as if in a trance, in a near-immediate sequence. Seongwoo looks on, half-tempted between walking over to see what Minhyun was doing, and in the end, curiosity takes the crown; so he walks behind Minhyun’s chair and leans over Minhyun’s slightly hunched back, peering curiously at the screen now littered with words and symbols Seongwoo can’t recognize for the life of him.

“…What are you doing?” Seongwoo whispers, just because this seems like the perfect time for whispering.

“Figuring out who’s our hacker,” Minhyun responds, straight to the point. “Be quiet, I need to focus.”

In a rare display of obedience, Seongwoo pipes down, leaving Minhyun to his keyboard smashing (because that can’t be typing, right?) and computer tricks. And, unless it was a trick of the light, Minhyun even smiled—gratefully—for a slight second before it’s wiped away in an instant by the stoic, straight line of his lips.

(He really wants to say something about it, maybe something about how surprised he is over the fact that Minhyun can even smile, but after seeing the concentrated furrow of Minhyun’s brows, Seongwoo decides that’s a comment best saved for later.)

“Found him,” Minhyun says, accompanied by no small sense of pride only a few minutes later. Seongwoo nearly jolts out of his seat because of how quick Minhyun is, but keeps himself in check just in time as the man himself turns to give Seongwoo a look. “I’ve tracked down their address. What’s our next move?”

Seongwoo reads the mapped out location on the monitor. His mind’s already calculating the gas fares they’ll need to get there, but money is far from being a problem to him. “We pay them a visit, of course.”

    Their hacker resides in an apartment building that’s nowhere short of being called ‘shady’, with its location in the outskirts of a red light district and the barbed, wired fences that make it look more like a detention center than a residence. 

“Sure you got the right place?” Seongwoo has a hand shielding his eyes from the sun, the side of his index finger flushed against his brow. “I was expecting something flashier.”

“Something more like you, I’m guessing,” Minhyun says. Seongwoo is shameless with his admittance; a boisterous round of laughter, unbefitting for their current situation, but nobody’s watching. (The CCTV cameras in this area don’t work anymore, and are more accessories meant to scare away those who aren’t aware of their real state more than a proper security measure.)

“Very funny,” Seongwoo deadpans, sounding anything but entertained. “Think we should knock on the door of every apartment?”—at Minhyun’s eye roll, Seongwoo quickly interjects his own statement—“Have I told you about this one time I did that when I was trying to find a serial killer? I bet you can’t imagine the look this old lady had when she heard there was a serial killer in the building, but that look’s nowhere as priceless as the cop with me when he found out that she was the killer all along!”

“The grandma’s the serial killer?” Minhyun double checks Seongwoo’s words.

Seongwoo’s eyes shine with excitement. “Yeah! One of my most popular cases, for obvious reasons. I have a whole file on it back in the office if you want to take a look.”

What Seongwoo expects: Minhyun to flat out refuse the offer, maybe add a blithering comment of ‘ha, would you really think I’d do that, idiot?’ for his own satisfaction.

What Minhyun does: a pensive look of contemplation merges underneath the shadows of his features, and he nods. Actually nods. “I’ll be sure to take you up on that offer sometimes. It sounds interesting.”

“…You’re letting me live,” Seongwoo chokes out, and the effect is immediate. Minhyun actually flushes in embarrassment, and gives Seongwoo a nasty glare that says it all: “I regret being nice to you.” Seongwoo is paraphrasing.

 “Forget anything I’ve said,” Minhyun is quick to comment. He looks at his phone—an iPhone 7 model, and the case is a soft, jet black, no imperfections seen unlike Seongwoo’s phone with the cracked monitor after he’d dropped it during a chase—for a few seconds, and pockets it when he’s finished. “I know their apartment number. 10A.”

 Seongwoo whistles. “I hope they’ve got working elevators.” He eyes the building, and with the run down, barely held together state it is in, Seongwoo has doubts in his own statement.

    The elevators are out of order.

When opening the door to the emergency staircase, Seongwoo grunts with effort. “I can’t believe this is the first exercise I’m getting in months.”

Ahead of him, Minhyun’s already on the third floor. He peeks down, and Seongwoo can only see Minhyun’s head. “Stop complaining, we haven’t got all day.” His voice sounds distant from that height. 

“Easy for you to say.” Seongwoo trudges through the stairs. Horror claws at his chest upon the realization that he’s got nine (and a half, considering he’s only halfway through the first floor) more floors to go. “How are you fit? Don’t art curators just… sit around or show people art all day? How the fuck are you in better shape than I am?” 

Minhyun, gesturing at his lithe, but obviously well-toned body: “I work out.” 

Seongwoo, not blushing and definitely not trying to leer at Minhyun: “Oh.”

    A little boy greets them at the door, looking around ten years old and completely unassuming. If it weren’t for his face, still holding a childlike innocence to it despite the distrustful set of his mouth, Seongwoo would’ve mistaken him as older; what with that height, limbs lanky and awkward. 

“Can I help you?” The boy chirps, though guarded suspicion that’s bereft of a child leaves traces in his eyes. To some extent, Seongwoo figures his pleasantry is contrived. 

“Yes, you can,” Minhyun answers, and he doesn’t even need to bend his knees too much to meet eye to eye with the boy. “My friend and I”—Seongwoo gives a little wave that goes unanswered—“are your dad’s college friends.” A flat-out lie, and a risk they’ll have to take. For all they know, the boy’s father might’ve been estranged. “Is he here right now?” 

The boy wearing the red shirt two sizes too big for him shakes his head. “No, he’s at work. He only goes home after dinner,” he says, matter-of-factly. Interestingly enough, there’s a hint of an accent to his voice, and his pronunciation is slurred together. 

Him and Minhyun share a look. Seongwoo shrugs. 

“We’ll return later, then—” 

“Guanlin, what’s taking you so long—oh, who are you?” 

In Seongwoo’s years of experience, he figures he has seen all the peculiarities the world (or at least, South Korea) has to offer. Upon being confronted by the sudden appearance of the boy with the bubblegum lips and a sweater in the brightest shade of orange that reeks of fashion terrorist and the bad, overtly hipster kind of fashion sense, Seongwoo has his belief stomped on, crushed, shattered into little pieces, and kicked to a fictitious curb. 

“Guanlin, were these guys bothering you?” He frowns. Seongwoo has seen puppies looking more intimidating. 

“No!” Guanlin, the boy, denies. He looks at the other male with a look in his eyes that can’t be anything but starstruck admiration. “They were just asking me about dad!” 

Seemingly satisfied by Guanlin’s answer, Jihoon isn’t outright hostile with Seongwoo and Minhyun, but his shoulders are tense, as if he’s anticipating a moment to come when he’ll have to block a blow from either of them. Flashes of the neighbourhood’s surroundings return full force to Seongwoo’s mind, assaulting him with the grim realization that in a shoddy location like this, these kids are raised to expect the worst. When Seongwoo was Jihoon’s age, the only reason he hadn’t been totally naïve was because of his uncle’s habit of taking him to work—his uncle was (and still is) a commissioner general—and showing Seongwoo just how terrible humans could be.

It helped shape him to be the person he is now. The Ong Seongwoo who makes it a personal mission to help those around him who aren’t as well off as he is (and that category contains an overwhelming amount of ordinary citizens. Not everyone is lucky enough to be born into a wealthy and well-reputable family. Seongwoo is one of the lucky ones. 

“If it’s important, you can leave your message now,” Jihoon informs them, an arm curled around Guanlin’s shoulders, tugging him closer to him and away from the two strange men. If the situation hadn’t been serious, Seongwoo would’ve laughed, because Guanlin is almost as tall as Jihoon. Give or take a year, he would engulf Jihoon’s height with his. After all, Guanlin has to be growing, still. “I’ll relay it.” 

“Actually,” Minhyun starts, a funny looking glint mirrored by the light. “I think we might benefit from a conversation, if you wouldn’t mind—Jihoon, was it?”

Jihoon draws Guanlin closer to him. Without being told, the younger of them moves to hide between Jihoon, although that does little good, considering the ever-closing gap between their heights. 

“Alright,” Jihoon says, warily. He eyes the two figures standing outside his door with distrust. 

“It won’t take too long,” Seongwoo interjects. When Jihoon focuses on him, Seongwoo draws the most genuine fake smile he can muster. From the way Jihoon sneers, it’s not working.

The boy with the odd fashion sense steps aside, and Guanlin nearly trips behind him, only able to regain his footing by gripping onto the hem of Jihoon’s sweater. “Come inside. My neighbours will start wondering what’s up.” The little tidbit, at the end of Jihoon’s mini-tirade, is directed to Jihoon himself; at least, that’s what Seongwoo figures, judging by the way the last few words are muttered instead of said, and Jihoon had peered his head at the surrounding corridors, just to see that none of the other occupants of the floor have gone out of their way to ask about the ruckus. 

Which Seongwoo has his doubts on, because it’s not as if him and Minhyun were kicking up a fuss. They were just being… persuasive, that’s the term.

Inside Jihoon’s apartment (“Mind your heads, the doorframe’s low!”), Seongwoo finds it just as he’d expected. Filled with little trinkets that serve to characterize the living space, even if the wall paint is cracked and the television looks like something out of 2005. There are family pictures on the wall, and in some, those present in the picture are Jihoon, an older male with kind, trusting eyes that Seongwoo assumes is Jihoon’s father, and a woman with striking resemblance to Jihoon. Guanlin is barely in any of the pictures, except for ones that look more recent than the others; he seems to have only started being a part of family pictures by the time Jihoon is around Guanlin’s current age, give or take a year or so.

Though Seongwoo is smart, it doesn’t take someone of genius intellect to form a conclusion that Jihoon and Guanlin are not biologically related. Their facial features are distinct, and with Guanlin’s speaking mannerisms, the likehood of him being foreign is greater than the chance of him and Jihoon being biological brothers.

Adopted or not, Jihoon is protective of Guanlin; some things just can’t be faked, and the concern that Jihoon shows for the younger, whether it’s his worry over two strange men visiting their household or Guanlin wanting to stick around to overhear a conversation that Minhyun has pushed to becoming ‘private’ (the attempts Jihoon is making to ensure Guanlin stays in his room is hilarious, or maybe that’s  just Seongwoo, because for some reason he enjoys seeing Guanlin being baited by the prospect of having movie nights with his Jihoon hyung if he’d only stay in his room for ten minutes). It isn’t hard to miss how Jihoon’s eyes grow tender when he looks at Guanlin, and how they harden just as quickly when faced with Seongwoo and Minhyun. On the same wavelength, it’s just as easy to see the kiss that Jihoon leaves on Guanlin’s forehead before the younger sprints off to his room isn’t a show of fake love; Seongwoo’s seen his fair share of love, and knows enough to know when someone is lying or not about affections.

What he just saw? Seongwoo would eat his own fist if that’d been faked.

“So, what did you want to talk about?” Jihoon asks as soon as Guanlin is out of ear range. His eyes linger on the door to Guanlin’s bedroom for a few moments too long, giving Seongwoo the impression of an overly worried mother hen. 

Minhyun drives his hand inside the pocket on his undercoat. A few moments later, he finds what he’s looking for, and presents a picture of a glittering emerald jewel to Jihoon. “Is this familiar to you?”

The moment of hesitation before Jihoon responds is enough for Seongwoo to find his answer.

“No.” Jihoon looks away from the picture a beat too fast. “It’s a glittering diamond, I guess? But in green? What does that have to do with me?” He scowls at the men seated across him.

“Let’s cut to the chase,” Seongwoo says, presenting Jihoon a thin smile, completely unlike the look of friendliness he’d gone for earlier. “We know your involvement in this, Park Jihoon.”

The mask Jihoon had been wearing chips. His fists clench on his lap, and Seongwoo feels the momentary surge of pity, before giving himself a strict reminder he’s working; there’ll be a time for pity later, but right now, he needs to set the feelings aside and focus.

“I wasn’t involved,” Jihoon says through clenched teeth.

If anything, Seongwoo admires Jihoon’s effort.

“Ranked first place in your school. Your IT teacher made sure to put in good words for you. Exceptionally talented, and has a lot of potential—that’s what he wrote, yes?” Seongwoo is simply lining down the facts, but Jihoon grows pasty, already pale skin going sheet white.

The fuming boy lifts his head, and gives a defiant nod. “Yes. But I had no part in, well, whatever you guys are investigating right now. And how could you even make sure it was me? Not saying it was me!” His cherub cheeks turn piping red, and he bows his head, drawing his gaze to his lap. He probably wants to curse, or at least, that’s the general vibe Seongwoo’s getting.

“Just tell us the truth, Jihoon,” Minhyun murmurs, although there’s no trace of pity in him at all. Only a clinical, cold kind of observation, and it’s enough to tickle goosebumps on Seongwoo’s forearms. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way.” Suddenly, it’s not so difficult for Seongwoo to imagine Minhyun during his prime; encountering those who dared to defy him and giving them a tantalizing smirk, and saying the same things he’s saying now. Minhyun is dangerous, and if Seongwoo had his doubts, all of them are scattered in the wind.

“I’d rather not do it at all, thanks.” Jihoon gives them a pinched, sour look. “Whatever it is you think I did—I didn’t do it.”

For a fleeting moment, Minhyun says nothing. Only stares at Jihoon impassively, not even making eye contact with Seongwoo who tries, desperate and futile, to catch Minhyun’s attention without drawing alert to Jihoon.

“Hard way it is,” Minhyun says at last, sounding neither happy nor unhappy about the prospect of doing things in the more troubling way. “What’s in it for you?”

“…Sorry?”

“What’s in it for you,” Minhyun repeats, rolling his eyes. “Are you helping a thief out of the goodness of your own heart? Is that it?”

Abruptly, Jihoon rises from his seat, and splutters indignantly. “I told you I wasn’t involved!”

“It can’t be your father,” and there Minhyun continues saying, completely ignoring Jihoon’s prior outburst. “His records state he works on construction sites—leaving virtually no time to do some of these heists that are done before he even gets home.”

“Leave my father out of this!”

“Can’t be your brother either. He’s too young,” Minhyun dismisses, and Seongwoo’s not sure whether he’s oblivious enough not to notice the venomous look from Jihoon, or if he’s ignoring it; either way, at this point of time, Minhyun is a dead man walking more than anything. 

That was the last straw for Park Jihoon. He grabs Minhyun by his collar, honorifics thrown and forgotten, emotions taken over by the heat of the moment. It makes for a comical sight, what with Minhyun being a head taller than Jihoon, but Jihoon’s glare is ferocious as he glowers up at the older male. “Leave my family out of this,” Jihoon hisses.

Minhyun barely blinks. “Touchy subject, I see. My apologies.” He doesn’t even sound remotely apologetic. “Let go of me.”

Just like that, as if a switch has been flipped, Jihoon’s fingers tremble as he hastily releases draws his hand from Minhyun’s collar, as if the fabric burns through his nimble skin. He gnaws on his lower lip, and his fingers twitch at his side. “I’m sorry,” he whispers, sounding disbelieved that he’d dared to do that in the first place. With stiff, near lifeless movements, he sinks back into his seat.

“I’m the one who should be sorry, Jihoon,” Minhyun says softly, and after a moment of contemplation, offers a hand to Jihoon. Though confused, Jihoon grasps Minhyun’s hand with his, eyes desperately searching for any sign of peculiarities in Minhyun’s expression. “That was insensitive of me.”

(Minhyun, you manipulative little bastard, is all Seongwoo is able to think as Jihoon hangs onto Minhyun’s every word as if they were the gospel truth.)

“I was just taken aback,” Jihoon utters, defending himself. He seems to realize he has been holding Minhyun’s hand for longer than five seconds now, and hastily retreats his right hand, clenching and unclenching it into a fist. “I—I’ll admit it. I helped the thief, but it wasn’t because of what you might think.”

“And what do you suggest we might be thinking right now?” Seongwoo leans forward, head tilted in curiousity.

“W-Well,” Jihoon stutters out. It’s really not helping his case at all, but Jihoon looks so much like a deer caught in the headlights, nerves ready to scatter like petals at any time, that Seongwoo doesn’t think pointing it out would make for a good idea. “That I was up to no good. That I was helping out someone for what looks like barely any reason at all.”

“What was your reason, then?” Minhyun’s tone has shifted into something gentle. Gone is the cold interrogator, in his stead a man filled with concern for someone—most likely half his age—who’s in a bad place right now.

From his experience, though, Seongwoo knows there must be a reason. A good one, at that, because every villain has their motive. (But having to call Park Jihoon a villain, even if he isn’t up to any good like a law abiding citizen would, doesn’t make him feel like he’s any better.)

Sometimes, a petty thief steals to supply food for their family. Sometimes, a murderer strikes because they’d been betrayed by someone they thought they could rely their trust in. Sometimes, the man behind the bars has a story that shines a light on him, a light that makes one think, what is the line separating between a criminal and a product of the wrongs of the system?

Park Jihoon, with his ratty apartment where the floorboards groan with almost every step, with his secondhand, worn-out clothes, has a reason for doing what it is he’s doing. Seongwoo can spell it out, the words aching to be poured from the tip of his tongue, but it won’t come to that.

“I needed the money,” and just like that, the truth is said, and Jihoon’s shoulders relax as if the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders. “My dad can’t support the family on his own. His job, it doesn’t- doesn’t pay well.” As he confesses, he makes sure to look at Seongwoo and Minhyun, and while his expression is earnest, there’s an undertone of malice to his words; but with malice, comes fear.

Fear of what is to come. Fear of being taken away from his family. Fear of his future, now that he’s caught.

“My family, we…” Jihoon trails off, tongue poking out of the slit of his mouth. “We have more on our plate than we can handle,” he admits, ruefully. “With the money dad makes, he should only be able to support himself and—”

Jihoon never quite finishes his sentence, but the unspoken words hang in the air like miasma. Amidst his inner turmoil, Minhyun and Seongwoo look at each other—the latter at loss on how to proceed, knowing the fragile psyche of a teenager is in their hands right now (and to be honest, they aren’t very capable hands). Minhyun purses his lips, and shakes his head. Let him finish, his eyes speak.

“Someone had to help.” A conviction that hadn’t been prevalent before shows itself. Jihoon’s will grows stronger, visibly, what with the hardening of his eyes. “So, I started getting money for my family.”

“Where does your dad think the money comes from?” Seongwoo barely notices he’s said the words until Jihoon looks as if he’s on the verge of closing in on himself.

To his surprise, Jihoon is stronger than he looks. (It isn’t a very difficult thing to achieve, because Jihoon is the textbook definition of a flower boy; cherub cheeks with a faint pink glow, pouty lips, pretty eyes.)

“He thinks I’ve been taking an internship,” Jihoon says, although his voice wavers. His adam’s apple bobs, and his face twists like he’s forced a spoonful of salt to his mouth, and deeper into his system. “What are you going to do to me?” He looks at the both of them, lingering his eyes on each of them for a moment before looking at the other. His hands have begun to rub together at the face of his knees.

“Nothing, if you cooperate,” Seongwoo says. “Just answer the rest of the questions honestly and stop hacking. It’s illegal.”

“Where am I supposed to get the money now?!” Jihoon splutters indignantly. His cheeks are turning red with fury.

“Get a proper job?” Minhyun offers, dryly. “That’s what the rest of us do.”

Yeah, like how you were a thief, as if that’s a legal profession, Seongwoo laments in his head, though the impassive mask of his face shows no signs of such thought.

“I can’t do that!” Jihoon panics, and rises to his feet. “Someone has to take care of Guanlin, and that person is me.” He points a finger at himself, accentuating each word with a finely timed jab. 

“We understand that you have to support your family, but the law—” 

“Fuck the law,” Jihoon grits out, and he lets his arms drop to his sides. “I know you.” He looks at Seongwoo as he says this, and Seongwoo can’t say he’s surprised. His infamy tends to do that. “You’re Ong Seongwoo. You’re rich—you were born rich—and you’ve never had to struggle with money your entire life.” The bitterness of Jihoon’s words pierce Seongwoo like little pinpricks, and Seongwoo desperately wants to say something, anything to defend himself, but how can he when Jihoon is only saying the truth?

“I don’t struggle with money, you’re right,” he says, after too many beats of silence. Both Minhyun and Jihoon’s eyes are on him, scrutinizing his every move, and he feels as if he’s been thrown underneath a microscope. “But I have my own fair share of problems. They might not be like yours, but I’ve got my own shit to deal with. The world doesn’t stop turning just because you’re struggling, Jihoon.”

“That’s rich, coming from the man who acts like the world revolves around him—”

“You know nothing about me,” Seongwoo growls, and breathes in deeply to remind himself that he’s here on a job, not a social visit, and letting his emotions get the better of him is ideally the number one thing to do in situations like these. “If your problem is that you don’t think you can get a job because someone needs to take care of Guanlin, have I got news for you: daycares exist. You could even leave him with a friend, or take him to your workplace, if you’re so worried. People will help you. Have some more faith in the people around you, Jihoon. You don’t have to carry the weight of everything on your shoulders,” Seongwoo whispers, and gets up on his feet. His hands meet Jihoon’s, and when the younger does nothing, even when Seongwoo grips Jihoon’s palms tightly with his own.

“Help me,” Jihoon chokes out, and his eyes brim with unshed tears. He stubbornly blinks them away, keeping the waterworks at bay. “If you think I need to have faith in the people around me—help me.”

Uneasiness settles like a package of rocks on Seongwoo’s chest. Not because he’s uncomfortable at the prospect of helping Jihoon, because his job entails helping everyone, even strangers, but because of the circumstances that revolves around Jihoon’s life; his lack of trust in his environment, lacking enough that he’ll trust a stranger to help him instead of someone he actually knows, but at the same time, Seongwoo can’t blame Jihoon for feeling this way. His neighbourhood screams, kill or be killed. Maybe the words aren’t meant literally—he’s never seen at the mortality reports around this borough—but in a place like this, it’s every man for themselves. It’s a wonder how Jihoon turned out to be so loyal to his younger brother, adopted or not, and the knowledge of that is enough to convince Seongwoo that underneath it all, Jihoon is good.

“I promise.” The words feel light, although the lightness isn’t there because it’s empty. It’s light because Seongwoo is in his element, saving others, and even though he has a connection with the person he’s looking for, Jihoon is someone who needs help. Someone Seongwoo can save, because Seongwoo has seen enough of people’s sufferings in his lifetime that to know he could be able to save someone from further experience of it (there is no doubt Jihoon has suffered, there’s no way he hasn’t, with everything he’s been through), maybe even safe an entire family—he’d take the chance in a heartbeat.

Finally, Jihoon smiles. It’s small and restrained, as if he’s still doubting his very decision, but it’s more genuine than every other smile Seongwoo has shown him. “I’ll hold you to it.”

 Jihoon takes a few minutes to calm down, and both Seongwoo and Minhyun wait, the latter more patient than the former. Seongwoo has probably used up all the ‘mushy and nice’ emotions he has festered for the day (or maybe a lifetime), but Minhyun is steady, like he always is; even made tea for Jihoon, who was baffled after taking a cautionary sip from the china. 

(“This is the best tea I’ve ever tasted. Are you sure you’re using the tea in the kitchen?” He looks like he’s on the verge of asking Minhyun to reveal the contents of his bag, as if Minhyun would’ve brought a packet of tea along with him.

Though Minhyun has a hefty collection of tea back home—Seongwoo saw them for himself, and is still amazed by the man’s passion for tea, of all things—he hadn’t been able to bring any with him. “I would’ve used something different if I could’ve,” Minhyun sniffs.

He isn’t very pleased with the tea in Jihoon’s kitchen, not at all.)

“Who have you been working with?” Seongwoo questions, phone recording every second of their conversation.

“I don’t know,” Jihoon confesses, and Minhyun frowns.

“How don’t you know?”

“He’s never shown me his identity.” Jihoon shrugs, and takes another sip from his tea.

The usage of the pronoun draws Seongwoo’s interest. “You’re calling the thief with ‘he’, so you at least know we’re after a male?”

Jihoon finishes his tea before answering Seongwoo’s inquiry. “Well, yeah. He distorts his face and covers up whenever he needs to talk to me, but it’s a male, obviously. His figure says so.”

(Then again—Jaehwan had used he while talking about the thief, Seongwoo now remembers. The memory comes up so suddenly in his brain, and he’s wondering if he’d projected his newfound information into his own head, but Seongwoo is confident enough in his memory to give a firm no to that assumption. Jaehwan had said ‘he’, and all of Seongwoo’s detective senses are tingling. He needs to ask Jaehwan about this when he meets him.)

“Huh.”

Afterwards, Jihoon shows them to the door, Guanlin following behind him like a duckling after Jihoon had told him he was allowed to go outside his room. (Guanlin had practically sprinted outside, yelling about how much he’d missed his Jihoon hyung in the thirty minute span they were away, and proceeded to throw himself on the older like an oversized pet.) Jihoon hasn’t anything further to tell them, though Seongwoo can’t figure if it’s because doing so would’ve meant Jihoon needed to do more research on certain things, or if Jihoon is holding something back. For all the trust he’s placing in Jihoon, Seongwoo can only hope it isn’t the latter.

    “Is this where I’ll be staying?”

Minhyun needs to look up to eye the extravagant building with impressible height in front of him, all black painted, high walls, and glass windows. A modern castle, Ong Seongwoo’s abode.

Seongwoo drove them to his home immediately after their visit to Park Jihoon, saying something about how they could talk to Jaehwan again tomorrow; night had befallen upon them, though an empty circle shape remains, surrounded by the stars, where the moon is not. The moon is supposed to be there, Seongwoo supposes, had it not been for pollution and other kinds of global crisis’s. 

The sky, a murky black littered with little white spots, is reflected onto Seongwoo’s swimming pool. Swimming now would feel like swimming amongst the stars, but Seongwoo would prefer not getting hypothermia.

“Yeah,” Seongwoo says, the upper corner of his lip twitching wryly. “I’m sure you’ve seen better.”

“Yeah,” Minhyun mirrors him, smirking at Seongwoo’s gape at the unexpected response. “I was a thief, remember? Luxury isn’t a stranger.”

Seongwoo pouts. “This has got to be the first time someone wasn’t impressed by my mansion.”

“Haven’t you ever had a gala here? I’d have thought your fellow socialites would’ve had the same experience as mine with wealth.”

“I wouldn’t know. I’ve never held a gala,” Seongwoo says. “If I ever had one, I don’t think I’d invite my fellow socialites. Most of them were my parents’ friends. I might invite you, though,” he surmises, rubbing his chin with the pad of his thumb.

“Me?”

“Yeah, you.” Seongwoo leans his head back, and tilts it to look at Minhyun. When he gets a look at the other, Minhyun’s already staring back at him, an unreadable look in his eyes. “You’re not bad company, you know.”

“Thanks,” Minhyun says, dryly. “You’re not so bad yourself… you know, blackmailing aside.”

Seongwoo rolls his eyes, but he breaks out into a ghost of a smile.

“I’m going to ignore that last bit.”

“You can’t. It comes with the first.”

    Life hates him, because why else would he be hearing ‘Toxic’ by Britney Spears first thing in the morning?

(Okay, so Seongwoo was the one who had chosen his own ringtone, but that doesn’t mean he wants his wakeup call to be Britney Spears. God bless her and her old music, though; those were good times.)

“What the fuck,” he says, his first words in the day being crass and vulgar. Bleary-eyed, his fingers feel around his bedside table for his alarm clock, plucking it and placing it in front of his face to read the time. 04:38AM.

With a groan, he uses his elbows to prop himself into a sitting position, and slams his alarm clock back on the bedside table. His phone continues to play Toxic, having repeated the same few lines over and over again the way ringtones do, until it finally stops when an angry thumb presses itself onto the ‘answer call’ button.

He hasn’t even checked the caller ID, but whoever it is, is bound to get a half-assed lecture from him. Half-assed because he’s in the odd state between sleeping and being awake and he can’t bother to force himself to be more productive, a lecture because all of his friends—and the list isn’t a party list, considering Seongwoo’s occupation and Seongwoo himself—should be informed about his strict ‘don’t wake me up before 6AM, fuckers’ rule.

“What?” He speaks into his phone’s in-built microphone, voice thick with sleep.

“Sir, Seongwoo Sir!”

The person on the other end of the line is unfamiliar, and Seongwoo takes a moment to place who it is—slurred words, high-pitched voice of a child—but when he does realize who it is, he jolts, fully awake and alert.

Guanlin is on the phone with him, and whatever it is he’s calling about, it can’t be good. Before he and Minhyun left, yesterday, Seongwoo made sure to leave behind his phone number—after giving a pointed stare at each of them, forcing them to repeat the words, “Emergencies only.”

Though Jihoon looked more bored than anything when reciting, Guanlin was terrified, and probably took Seongwoo’s words to heart.

“It’s Jihoon hyung,” Guanlin says, and Seongwoo finally notices something else about Guanlin’s voice he hadn’t been able to hear earlier; a jagged quality, like a poorly sharpened dagger.

“Calm down,” Seongwoo instructs sternly, the grip he has on his phone making his knuckles bleed white. “Take a deep breath”—when he hears the sharp sound of inhale on the other line, he figures Guanlin must’ve taken his advice—“and let it out. Tell me what happened.”

When Guanlin speaks, after the tense smoke of silence, Seongwoo barely stops himself from breaking into a state of distress.

“Jihoon hyung is missing!”

    There are no signs of struggle in Jihoon’s bedroom. The bedsheets are unruffled, no wrinkles needing to be smoothed down. None of the books stand out of place. Even his coffee mug looks untouched, and after conducting a scan, there was no trace of poison or drug in the drink that could’ve made Jihoon docile.

Even a note is left, saying something about how Jihoon can’t live like this anymore, how he’s going to stay with a friend for a few days. Seongwoo doesn’t believe it, and wouldn’t have believed it even if Guanlin had shown him a post-it left on the fridge by Jihoon about the groceries, how the slope of the handwriting is at the wrong places, further convincing evidence of the forgery of the note. But, even if the note left behind had been written by Jihoon himself, Seongwoo would’ve thought something was wrong, still; he might not have known Jihoon for years, or even months, but there is one thing about Park Jihoon that anyone can see: how he cares so much, maybe too much, about his family. How he would hold up the world like Atlas did if it would help his family in any way.

“Have you alerted the police?” Minhyun asks to a pale Guanlin, whose red, bloodshot eyes stand out in contrast to his pasty skin.

“I thought you guys are the police.” Guanlin looks between them oddly. “Aren’t you?”

Though Seongwoo and Minhyun originally introduced themselves as Guanlin’s father’s friend, at the end of their conversation with Jihoon just yesterday, the partial truth was out of the bag; now Guanlin knows neither of them have anything to do with his father, but knows that Seongwoo is rich, Minhyun is Minhyun, and the both of them are law-abiding citizens who stand up for the law. That’s as close as it’s ever going to get to the truth.

Saving Minhyun from answering, Seongwoo interjects, “Yeah. Totally. Is your dad here, by the way?” The change of subject isn’t smooth by any means, but Guanlin takes the bait, and completely forgets the previous topic of Seongwoo and Minhyun as policemen.

“He’s in his room, he’s not coming to work today.” They all know the reason. “Do you… I mean, would it help you find him, if you talked to him?”

“Yes,” Seongwoo says. “Could you go get him for us, Guanlin?”

Wordlessly, Guanlin nods, and takes brisk steps towards his father’s bedroom. While Guanlin is gone, out to fetch the only adult in the household (and Jihoon’s legal guardian), Seongwoo takes a moment to look at Minhyun; wearing his usual mask of impassiveness, and Seongwoo would reckon Minhyun isn’t worried at all if it isn’t for the tell—the hand he keeps on his damaged leg, as if it’s a clutch to reality.

“God,” Minhyun whispers, and Seongwoo knows the words are directed to him, even as Minhyun presses his gaze to the cracks on the walls. “He even took Jihoon. Jihoon’s just—he’s just a kid.”

“Well, he was a teenager. Kind of a difference there.”

Minhyun stares at him in horror. “This isn’t the time to joke. Someone went missing and you’re joking about it?”

Unable to say anything further that wouldn’t be not insensitive, and realizing the truth in Minhyun’s words, Seongwoo’s face burns from shame. “Sorry.”

The door to the father’s room is pushed open, and outside its confines is a middle-aged man, older than both Minhyun and Seongwoo by another fifteen years or so. He must’ve seen better days, what with his untrimmed mane that stick up in all directions, and cracks rampant on his ashen lips. “Who the hell are you?” He asks the strangers in his apartment with just enough suspicion, and moves to pull Guanlin behind him. (Seongwoo can’t blame him; he’s just lost a son, and must be deathly scared of losing another.)

“We’re trying to help you find your missing son, sir,” Minhyun addresses, polite as ever even in the frazzled emotional state he’s in. That they’re all in.

“I don’t need any coppers investigating for me,” bites out Jihoon’s father, livid. “Load of good you coppers have done for my family, so stay out of my business!”

“Please, we’re just trying to help—”

“I don’t need your help. Give it to someone who does.”

With a tone of finality, he returns to his room, slamming the door behind him with a force that makes the clock that hangs on the wall shake. Guanlin is still there, frozen as if he’s rooted to his spot, and he looks at the men in his living room with something not unlike helplessness.

“I’m sorry dad is—wait.” In the middle of his sentence, Guanlin’s words dry, and leaves behind a mute child. “Before you guys go, there’s something you need to see. Can’t believe I almost forgot about this!”

Guanlin takes off to his room, yelling something about ‘how could I’ve been so stupid?’ and then saying some words in Mandarin that Seongwoo recognizes as curse words. Suddenly, the worries in his head aren’t simply about one kid, but two, because who’s been teaching Guanlin such colourful (and undeniably crass) language at his age? Jihoon would—

Hold that thought right now, Ong Seongwoo.

The little boy with the interesting language returns just before Seongwoo can start beating himself up over his own thoughts (and isn’t that a surprise, because does he seem like the type? No, not really), holding a flashdisk shaped like a minion’s head in his pudgy hands.

“Jihoon hyung gave it to me yesterday—said something like he knew he could trust me with this, but I thought he was joking because he does that a lot and I didn’t think—”

Minhyun rests a hand on Guanlin’s shoulder just before his voice crescendos into a frantic yell, and the effect is immediate. Though not entirely appeased, Guanlin relaxes, just a bit, and takes deep, shaky breaths. “Take it easy, Guanlin.”

“Sorry,” Guanlin apologizes, although he has no reason to. “I haven’t checked what’s in it… I mean, I did.” He blushes at the admittance. “But I didn’t get it—but, I think you guys can crack it. You can, right?” The little boy’s eyes go doe wide, layers and layers of hope shining beneath them.

“We can,” Minhyun says, firmly, and takes the item out of Guanlin’s hands and into his bag, sealing the zipper shut with a satisfied smile. “We’ll do everything we can to find him, Guanlin.”

“I trust you.” Three words, but they’re heavy, and Seongwoo feels the pressure accumulate on his body. “If anyone can bring him home… you can. Please,” his voice breaks into a crack.

His shoulders are shaking, and his eyes redden, like it’s taking every muscle in his too tall body not to cry. “I just want my brother back.”

    Less than an hour later, they check Jihoon’s message, and it only has one file, but it’s the one file that contains the biggest clue they now have in the palm of their hands.

A location. A tracer, back to the thief’s location, and Minhyun is able to activate it with a certain ease that comes only from experience.

“He’s in Italy.” Seongwoo recognizes the shape of the map immediately, and how could he not? Italy is easy to find and memorize on a map, though for Seongwoo, this is because it’s shaped like a boot. “I’ve heard it’s nice this time of the year.”

“Is it?” The left corner of Minhyun’s mouth quirks. “Then I suppose it’s time for a visit.”

    [ ii. ]

 “Mom, I’m home.”

The only response he garners is the sound that comes from the television, a re-run of an old soap opera playing in full volume. Hwang Minhyun doesn’t expect anything less.

He takes off his shoes, and puts on his slippers. In the kitchen, he washes his lunch container, as well as the other dishes left in the sink. Empty wine glasses, plates with scraps of this morning’s breakfast. He didn’t have the time to clean those up this morning; he woke up late, and used up most of his time before his ride came to cook breakfast for him and his mother.

(Not that it meant anything, if his mother barely ate any of hers.)

“Did you rest a lot today?” He asks, after he’s finished the last of cleaning and heads to the living room; his mother doesn’t answer, having fallen asleep in the middle of her television intake. This is the third day in a row his mother hasn’t spoken a single word to him, and Minhyun feels something in his clawing in his chest, something that makes it suddenly hard for him to breathe.

What else were you expecting, you fool? It’s been like this for months—and it will continue to be like this, the spiteful voice inside his head spits at him, and Minhyun tries to ignore it, tries to tune it out with the memories of the days when his mother wasn’t a shell of herself, when she still had her spark of life; before the divorce, before his father left the house and carried the happiness of the house along with him, before she fell into the routine of waking up, drinking until she fell asleep, and repeat.

Minhyun takes a quilt from her bedroom, red and handmade by his aunt who’d stopped contacting them after the divorce. (Then again, she never seemed to like his mother that much; even the gift was made for his father, who’d decided to leave it behind when he turned his back on them, a little less than six months ago.) He spreads the blanket over his mother’s curled body, turns off the television because their electricity bill is more than what they can cover, and goes to his room; locks the door, and turns on the radio until it’s loud enough to drown out his demons.

In the middle of the night, when Minhyun finds his stomach growl in hunger, he unlocks his room, and goes to get whatever leftovers he’d stored in the fridge. (He hasn’t had his dinner, and doesn’t make it a habit to cook dinner when his mother won’t even touch her plate; breakfast, it seems, is enough sustenance for her.) When he passes by the living room, he sees her gone, though she leaves the quilt behind.

Jazz music plays loudly from his mother’s bedroom. Minhyun recognizes the voice as Ella Fitzgerald’s. He doesn’t bother to try to open the door, to give her back the quilt, to bid her good night; leaving the quilt where it is, and pads back into his room, his hunger forgotten. In its stead, grows a certain weariness too much for someone who is only sixteen.

Like mother, like son.

(He runs away the next day, backpack stuffed to the brim with his favourite clothes, his radio, and a worn copy of ‘War and Peace’. Minhyun doesn’t bother to make an attempt to be quiet; he doesn’t try to sneak his way outside, doesn’t smother a single noise, whether from his footsteps, or the telltale creak of the doors.

His mother never comes out of her room through it all.)

    They are here on a very serious job, with very dire consequences; and so, it makes sense that right after they’ve checked into their hotel room (clean enough to the point Seongwoo finds a little rusted spot in the bathtub, as if it’s been scrubbed too hard), Seongwoo proposes that they orientate themselves with the bustling city of Turin, Italy.

“A child is missing, jewels are missing, and you’re asking me to go sightseeing with you in Turin?”

When Minhyun spells it out, Seongwoo winces, realizing how wrong he’s sounding; after all, the stakes are high, and loitering isn’t doing them any favours—but neither is working too hard, and if there’s something him and Minhyun have been doing non-stop for the past two days, it’s thinking. Using their combined wits to solve the cases, trying to get any hint as to how Jihoon might’ve gone missing in the dead of the night, to find the missing variables to the equation.

“We can’t work ourselves to death,” Seongwoo retorts, meeting Minhyun’s judging gaze steadily. “I know you want to find Jihoon—and I want to find him too, because even I’m not that heartless—but you need to think about yourself, too.” He nearly grins when he sees Minhyun’s resolve crumbling, the other man obviously taking Seongwoo’s words into account. “We’ll get back to work after we sightsee, you workaholic.”

“You, calling me workaholic?” Minhyun scoffs. “Rich, coming from the one who doesn’t sleep sometimes just to solve cases.”

“Hey, how do you even know that?” Seongwoo hasn’t told the story to Minhyun. He’d know if he had, or maybe it might’ve spilled had Seongwoo been drunk, but considering he hasn’t gone beyond tipsy through alcohol since meeting Minhyun, he can’t have said anything while intoxicated. “I’ve never told you,” he says, accusingly.

“That, you’re right.” Minhyun nods, and his response leaves Seongwoo with more questions than answers. “I drew an assumption—and I was right, though I can’t say I’m surprised.”

Seongwoo does what he thinks is an impersonation of Minhyun; a haughty sigh, tilting his head until it’s a 90-degree angle. “Because I’m never wrong,” he simpers.

The effect is immediate, because Minhyun looks as if he’s torn on getting angry, or being amused. “I don’t speak like that,” he decides to say in the end. The detective barks out his short laughter, eyes dancing with bemusement.

“Of course you don’t,” he agrees, adding a nod to accentuate his response, though the both of them know he doesn’t mean it at all. “Come on, now. We’ve got places to visit, food to eat, people to flirt with—”

“Seongwoo.”

“Right, sorry! Forgot you were a, uh, celibate nun in disguise.”

“One of these days,” Minhyun starts, and he makes a motion of slitting his own throat with his thumb. “I might kill you in your sleep before we even find our guy.”

Thoroughly threatened, Seongwo ‘eeps.’

(If anyone asks, though, it wasn’t him. It was their hotel room neighbor, a woman in her fifties who was visiting with her Chihuahua—so, they didn’t know if the noise was from her, or her pet. Definitely not Seongwoo, that’s for sure.)

    According to one of the travel journals that Seongwoo has read before (reading is a pastime he’s grown to enjoy, no matter how much he used to grumble about it as a child, because when you barely have anyone who would tolerate you, books were as reliable as friendships came), the restaurant he and Minhyun are seated in now is one of the best ones in Turin. Their wait outside hadn’t been long at all despite the crowd, although Seongwoo owes that to his name; apparently, the restaurant wasn’t above getting the big names in before the small ones, and as soon as a table had been emptied, the both of them were ushered inside, completely passing the others who’d lined up even before them. Seongwoo caught dark glares here and there, and Minhyun must’ve seen them as well, although neither of them make conversation out of it.

(The closest thing to a conversation about it goes like this:

“You get that treatment a lot?”

“Depends on where I’m at, or if the people recognize me. In Texas, I was treated like shit.”)

Everything on the menu is expensive, though money has never been a problem for Seongwoo, so he doesn’t look at the price tag for too long and chooses whatever sounds the best (and not foreign) to him; on the chair opposite him, Minhyun is still searching through the menu, much to the annoyance of their waitress, who has begun shifting from foot to foot.

“Minhyun, in case you’re looking, they don’t have kimchi here,” Seongwoo says in his native tongue, knowing how Minhyun, though prone to eating whatever there was (there must be a story behind it, for why else would he have been content with eating a leaf-y thing on the plane? Or eat any airplane food, really?), he always seemed to prefer it when there was kimchi. Seongwoo attributes it to how he mustn’t have been back in South Korea for some time, and maybe it’d been difficult for him to have his fill of a food he’d eaten from his childhood until the day he moved out in a place like New York.

“Trust me, I know.” Minhyun finally stops ruffling through the pages, and the waiter visibly calms down, although she has begun frowning whenever she thinks neither Seongwoo or Minhyun look at her. (And, she’s right; technically, they aren’t staring her in the face, but the reflection of a book makes for a good spying tool.)

“I’ll have a Neapolitan pizza, please.” The smile he gives to the waitress is sweet, as if he’s trying to charm away her anger, and judging by how all of the annoyance disappears in an instant and is instead replaced with a love struck look, Seongwoo would say Minhyun’s manipulating is, once again, a success.

“Would you like any wine, sirs?”

Seongwoo scans through the options, inwardly beaming at all the choices they had; all of them good, and worth their price. Minhyun doesn’t seem to be as familiar with the winery, much to Seongwoo’s surprise, because he’d always come across as a wine guy; then again, he doesn’t know Minhyun all that well (although the slope of his nose, the curve of his neck, and the width of his shoulders have somehow ingrained themselves into his head, making it easy for him to find Hwang Minhyun even in Seoul’s morning crowd), so maybe it isn’t his place to guess—

Ha. Yeah, right. Minhyun himself guessed about Seongwoo’s characteristics earlier, so Seongwoo’s entitled to his own guessing; it’s just that he’s not as successful as Minhyun when it comes to making correct statements about the other.

“Give us your oldest,” Seongwoo instructs, and their waitress turns to smile at him. It’s a fake smile, and obviously, she isn’t as taken with him as she is with Minhyun. He doesn’t really understand why, because Seongwoo thinks of himself as a whole fine buffet while Minhyun’s more of a full course meal (but a buffet is multiple full course meals and you can choose, so?), but some people are into the smaller things. That’s what he reckons.

“Very good, sir.” As she leaves, she smiles shyly at Minhyun, who notices and returns it with a cordial nod.

It’s only once she’s gone that Seongwoo lets the laughter burst from his lips like water from a dam, gripping his hand onto the table as support. “Holy fuck. You’re a real heartbreaker, aren’t you?” He wriggles his brows suggestively, causing Minhyun to groan, dropping his head onto the palm of his hands.

“Please, screw yourself.” The way Minhyun adds a ‘please’, as if to be more respectful, before cursing at him is a little endearing; but Seongwoo thinks of it simply as a fleeting thought, even when his eyes linger a beat too long at Minhyun’s flat, reddish pink ears. He lifts his head after another few seconds, and pointedly looks at the velvety red table dresser. Anywhere but Seongwoo, it seems, whose laughter has diminished into soft chuckles. “What was I even thinking?”

“Maybe it’s a sign that your love life’s been as dry as the middle of a desert,” Seongwoo comments. “I mean, look at your lifestyle: a full-time art curator and part time recluse. I’d be surprised if you’ve been seeing someone for the past few months. No offense,” he adds the last part quickly, just because he notices the way Minhyun’s expression turns pinched. “You’re handsome. Not as handsome as me, but you make do.” Minhyun rolls his eyes. “Just, you know. Your lifestyle.”

Minhyun takes a little too long to respond to Seongwoo. His eyes seem to glaze over for a millisecond before he snaps himself out of it, regaining the cool façade, and serving Seongwoo a little smirk that hadn’t been there just a second ago. “As if you’d know the first thing about my love life.”

“World class detective here?” Seongwoo waves his hands in front of Minhyun’s eyes. “Obviously, I used my world class detective skills to figure out.”

Pale hands push a tanner pair away, and Minhyun’s hands stays on his for a few seconds before he pulls away, though he doesn’t rush. Even after Minhyun’s hands are no longer on his, Seongwoo can still feel the tingles where they’d been, like cool flames waltzing across his skin.

“There’s no appeasing your ego, is there?”

Just as Seongwoo is about to open his mouth to answer (a big, fat no, just as what the both of them expect), the trio of musicians that serve as the restaurant’s entertainment walk to their table, the one on the guitar strumming some chords, not enough to construct an entire song, but just enough to fill the silence.

“Good day, sirs,” The one in the center, presumably the vocalist, says. “Care for a song?”

“Oh no, that won’t be—”

“Absolutely!” Seongwoo cuts off Minhyun’s rejection, and when Minhyun looks at him in blasphemy, Seongwoo’s grin grows wider. It stretches his face, and it hurts, but what he’ll get in return from this should be enough payment for all the pain felt in his cheeks. “Any song?”

The vocalist smiles, all teeth, showcasing his pearly whites. ���If we know it.”

“What kind of music do you think he”—Seongwoo jabs a thumb at Minhyun who grows paler upon realizing Seongwoo’s plan—“would like? Whatever you think it is, play it for us.”

Minhyun kicks his shin under the table. “What do you think you’re doing?”

Biting back a wince, because for someone with a limping leg, Minhyun has one hell of a kick. “I’m figuring you out. With the help of these lovely gentlemen.” Seongwoo waves his hands at the trio in grandiose fashion, making sure to memorize every line of Minhyun’s face right then, the way the lines of his mouth loosen with shock. “So, just sit back, and enjoy.”

“…Is this how you woo people?”

“Who says I’d want to woo you?” Seongwoo tries to ignore the heat that creeps on to his cheeks. He hopes Minhyun deems it as a trick of the light. He doesn’t like Minhyun in that way—he barely even knows the man other than the fact he has a limp and he can keep up with Seongwoo, sometimes even assist him in filling the gaps his thoughts can’t fill out—but it’s not as if Minhyun is detestable. As much as Seongwoo is grudging to admit, Minhyun is, like him, a textbook example of ‘handsome’, albeit in a different style from Seongwoo’s almost godlike kind of beauty; it’s a more royal kind of handsome, the kind that makes you think of princes or emperors from the times that have long passed. What he’s trying to say is, amidst all that ‘praising Minhyun’s face’ jargon (but trust him, he’s gone on longer about his own face in the past), it’s not as if it’d be revolting of him if he tried to garner Minhyun’s affections. Because Minhyun’s not bad, not at all.

But, he’s not trying to woo him, though. Seongwoo’s just trying o be a tolerable travel companion, because they’ve been stuck in each other’s presence (at first unwilling, later growing lukewarm, currently being pleasant against all odds), and he has no doubts that they might be stuck together for a longer time, considering the state things are going.

“Enjoy our performance,” the vocalist says, and cues the other two to start with a snap of his fingers.

The music grows more and more familiar as the trio progress from the instrumental opening, of which Seongwoo had looked on, lost, while the beginning of realization dawned on Minhyun’s scandalized face. Seongwoo doesn’t understand why until he hears the lyrics, and in that moment, Seongwoo tries his best not to choke out his laughter in the middle of a performance.

“We’re no strangers to love, you know the rules, and so do I.”

There are a few things Seongwoo expected would’ve happened the day he travelled to Italy. Some items on the list include posing in front of the Pisa like your typical tourist (where camerawork would make it look like he was bigger than tower), and eating pizza until his stomach bloated with the added weight.

None of those things include being rick rolled in a five-star restaurant he’d visited on a whim, with Hwang Minhyun, who looks as if he’s trying to count down the seconds until he can wrap his arms around Seongwoo’s neck and most likely kill him before they even find their culprit, as his only company.

    The food served in the restaurant was great, and certainly a breath of fresh air from the airplane food they’d eaten nearly two days in a row, but it didn’t make up for Minhyun’s sour mood; still grumbling about mischievous musicians and Seongwoo feeding them to keep going. (After ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’, Seongwoo tried his luck and paid them for one more song; they played ‘Hit Me Baby One More Time’, which Seongwoo tried his hardest not to show his delight at, because it was a good song. He just didn’t want to get eviscerated on the spot by Minhyun.)

“Where are we going?” Seongwoo whines, after the both of them have left the restaurant. The sky is dark now, with only a few stars casting light, and no moon left behind. Most of the light on the streets come from the establishments that scatter around the roads, as well as the few street lamps that stand tall, maybe has stood tall for longer than both Seongwoo and Minhyun’s lifetimes combined.

A step ahead of him, Minhyun continues to walk in a brisk pace, phone’s built-in navigation in hand. “A bookstore. I thought it was my turn to choose a place to visit.”

“I didn’t say it worked like that,” Seongwoo mutters under his breath, as he’d been expecting to carry both him and Minhyun around Turin, acting like their tour guide (who, in reality, had never set foot in this place before. But the Internet was powerful that way.)

They walk through the cobblestoned path, take a few turns, and even get stopped by the traffic lights. Seongwoo keeps track of all this in his head.

(10: Minutes they walked.

4: Turns they took.

3: Traffic lights.

1: Book store.

0: Energy he had left after they arrived, and Seongwoo’s left panting for breath. Having a full-course dinner before walking tends to do that, maybe because what he’s eaten hasn’t quite settled in his system. It’s not because he needs exercise… desperately. The only exercise he needs is the moderate kind, thank you very much.)

“What book are you looking for, anyway?” He asks Minhyun as the both of them enter the establishment, the situation inside the store—old, it seems, what with the ‘established since 1858’ sign hanging outside—a 180 from the loud streets. The only sound is the rustling of pages, and the smell, instead of asphalt and secondhand exhaust fumes, is of old books and the faintest linger of tobacco.

“Nothing in particular. I just wanted to look around—don’t tell me you’ve never done that before,” Minhyun says, rather wryly.

“’Course I have.” Seongwoo huffs indignantly. “I just… don’t really get the point of doing it. I don’t know.”

“Hm,” is all Minhyun says in response, and goes to ignore Seongwoo as he explores the store, taking in the sight of the plethora of books in the room; books that date back to hundreds of years ago, books written in languages foreign to both of them (or maybe simply foreign to Minhyun, as Seongwoo has a fair grasp on most languages—a job precaution more than anything), books with worn, leather covers.

Rather than standing at the entrance alone, Seongwoo heads towards one of the aisles, containing the classic books. He hasn’t read in a while. Hasn’t had the time, hasn’t had the motivation; even if he has a vast library in his own home (that Minhyun had taken a liking to, considering he’d spent the first night in Seongwoo’s home shut inside the library, barely spending any time inside his guest room. This, Seongwoo knows because he’d been the one to find Minhyun curled up in one of the armchairs near the fireplace when he needed to inform the other about Jihoon’s abduction.)

Not that he hates books or anything, because he doesn’t, but Seongwoo finds himself bored only ten minutes into the bookstore. Maybe it’s because a majority of these books can be found inside his library, and he’s read more than a few of them. Or maybe it’s because his Italian isn’t good enough for 800 pages of literature. Either way, he goes to find Minhyun, and finds him only two shelves away, clutching a copy of a book close to his chest; like a lifeline, and he stands, still as a statue. A far-away look in his eyes, a wistful cross of his mouth.

“Minhyun?” Seongwoo calls, softly, breaking Minhyun out of his trance. As Minhyun jolts in surprise, Seongwoo gets a good look at the title on the cover. Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s ‘War and Peace’, one of the older editions. “Are you done yet?” He asks, not entirely impatient.

“Yeah.” A foreign element is present in Minhyun’s voice. Bittersweet nostalgia. “Let’s get back.”

If Minhyun walks faster than he had before, Seongwoo comments nothing on it; lets the other have his secrets, no matter how much Seongwoo yearns to ask Minhyun about the story behind the book that’d shaken him so.

    Pinpointing the thief’s exact location isn’t difficult when you have Hwang Minhyun, a hacker with above average skills, on your side. Over breakfast, they make an attempt to track down the thief, and Minhyun emerges, victorious, just as Seongwoo finishes eating his baked beans.

“We might need to take a cab there,” Minhyun announces, looking like he’d been forced to take a pinch of salt to his mouth. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out Minhyun would prefer walking over taking cabs (or driving their own car), and Seongwoo deduces this must be due to his habits while he was a thief; always afraid of having conversations overheard by a stranger who’d gain more than they would lose by reporting whatever it is he’d hear to the nearest police station.

“Hey, it’s okay,” Seongwoo assures him, and spoons a mouthful of marinated beans into his mouth, eager and opened wide. He munches loudly, much to Minhyun’s disgust. “I’ll be there to protect you.” He throws in a wink, laughing when Minhyun fakes a gag.

“Protect yourself first.” Minhyun’s nose scrunches up.

“Cute,” Seongwoo says, off-hand, and has to stoop to dodge when Minhyun aims a tissue at his face.

     Villains are typical. Predictable, he’d go so far to say.

Seongwoo expected something more from their elusive thief, as he hadn’t disappointed them so far, but having a hide out in the middle of nowhere, the place disguised as a barnyard? There’s nothing new about that, and Seongwoo feels like he’s come across at least dozens of these in his few years of experience. He’d wanted to see something more grandiose, something with more flair, something more… drawing; for a jewel thief, at least.

“He’s very… unflashy,” Seongwoo says, trying not to pout. Ahead of him, Minhyun is at the process of getting the doors to open, but that proves to be a more difficult task than what they’d expected; instead of using an old fashioned key, to enter the barn, facial recognition is needed. “Can you do something about this?”

“Yeah. Just give me a moment.” Soon after, Minhyun begins to ‘work his magic’ (as Seongwoo likes to call it) on the machine, and Seongwoo watches him as he does, never failing to look at Minhyun’s work in a mixture of wonder and admiration. Though Seongwoo isn’t averse to hacking, he’s not as good at Minhyun, who needed to do this on a daily basis back when he was in commission. The skill set is different from Seongwoo who only hacks into government records to dig through old files, and he doesn’t know how he’d have fared on this case if Minhyun hadn’t been there with him—but Minhyun is here with him, that’s the reality, and that’s precisely why the case has been smooth sailing.

(So, maybe Jaehwan isn’t wrong sometimes.)

The sky is a gradient of pink and orange, the sun disappearing in the horizon; being devoured by nightfall. In the sky, the first of the stars have popped out, and it makes for a pretty picture, if Seongwoo wasn’t in the middle of breaking into someone’s hiding place. Hopefully, the light is adequate for Minhyun’s purposes, because with the rate the horizon is going, they don’t have much time until the sun is completely gone.

“Think I’m done,” Minhyun says, a hint of triumph lingering in his timbre. True to his words, the barnyard’s doors slide open, and Seongwoo has to admit, he’s slightly impressed. At least the thief didn’t make the place as plain as it had seemed, at first. “After you.”

Inside, the place is deceptively simple; though, having seen what the entrance could do, Seongwoo knows better. Though the inside is small, two-thirds of Seongwoo’s bedroom, bookshelves align themselves across the red brick walls, most of them empty, save for a few books. (Old copies, Seongwoo finds out, as he retracts his hand from one of them and finds enough dust to make him sneeze.)

“Do you think it’s the bookshelf trick?” Minhyun asks, as he inspects the room. Taking note of the couch in the center of it all, and right across it the coffee table with the hardwood legs and newspaper dating back to a month before, untouched, laying innocently across the glass surface. “If you pull one of the books, it’ll lead you to the hideout.”

“Probably is.” Like a magic trick, as Seongwoo says the words and pulls on a random book, the bookshelves shift, sliding and creating a distance between the other to form a gap meant as an entrance. “This is so cliché.”

“After all the trouble we’ve went through travelling around just to find him, this is a nice break,” Minhyun argues, and pushes past Seongwoo to venture inside the hidden passage. The both of them need to duck their heads when entering, being at least a head taller than the height between the roof and the empty gap.

What greets them are computers, each of them interconnected into a monitor that looks as big as an LCD monitor, and a single chair in the middle of it all. Though the only sound present is Minhyun and Seongwoo’s breathing, the room glows, alive with the silent, thrumming machineries of the engines; Seongwoo tries not to shiver, even when he feels like someone’s eyes are on his back, but that can’t be—he’d looked behind him several times, and the sight of the now shut entrance, an innocent seeming bookshelf, is all he can find.

“This place is giving me the creeps,” he gripes, and rushes forward towards what he guesses to be the mainframe computer. “Let’s hurry so we can get out of here.”

“What, you’re scared of a little dark?” Though Seongwoo is unable to gain a clear view of Minhyun’s face amidst the near pitch black darkness inside the room (he supposes it’ll be brighter once the computer is turned on, though could the thief really hadn’t had the thought to invest in a few light bulbs?), he would bet on his kidney that Minhyun’s giving him that look, the one that says, ‘what a loser’ and is almost exclusively reserved for Seongwoo himself.

“Of course not,” Seongwoo denies, and scoffs. “I know I’m as handsome like a vampire, but that doesn’t mean I have to like the dark.”

“Do vampires like the dark?”

“What are you saying—of course they do, they can’t step out in sunlight!”

“I think that depends on what myth you’re going by. If you were a Twilight vampire, I’d say you’d have no problem with the sun, especially if you’re not shy about glitter.”

Completely against his will, Seongwoo laughs, but makes sure to keep the volume down, just in case. “What the fuck, why are we even having this conversation here? Let’s just get it over with.”

Minhyun says something like, “You’re the one who started it.” Seongwoo ignores him, and for once, keeps his mouth locked shut.

Swiftly, Minhyun presses a few keys, and turns on the monitor, causing the other screens to light up and casting light around the room; the kind of light that’s manmade and makes the back of Seongwoo’s eyes hurt. Minhyun begins to type in a language that Seongwoo only half-understands, and though he knows what some of the commands are for, Minhyun’s pacing is too fast for Seongwoo to keep up, so he resigns himself to waiting, and watching Minhyun work.

“Time to find out who you are,” Minhyun says, and leans forward in his seat in anticipation.

(You’d figure this is where things start to make sense, when the puzzles fit together, when their long journey would wrap up and Minhyun can return to his regular life; away from Seongwoo, away from the dangers of this job, away from the remainders of his past.

Alas, this is when the opposite happens; when the foundations crumble, the Fates pull their hands, and things start to go very,��very wrong.)

“It isn’t loading,” Minhyun says, confused. Instead of the thief’s personal files being found, only a picture of a jewel pops up; it’s a picture of one of the already stolen jewels, too, so it isn’t as if this is new information. “Why isn’t it loading? I could’ve sworn…” He swivels the chair to look at Seongwoo, and Seongwoo gets the feeling that Minhyun is looking past him rather than at him, most likely deep in thought. (Seongwoo is at loss as Minhyun is; whenever Minhyun does things, it just works, and this is the first time his attempt has failed.)

“Maybe you could try again?”

“I could change the algo—Seongwoo, look out!”

Minhyun sees it coming before Seongwoo does, and with a strength Seongwoo didn’t know the other possessed, gets up from his seat and lurches towards Seongwoo, giving him a hard, forceful push to the side. Seongwoo barely registers the pain on his tailbone as he falls to the cold hard ground, stilled in shock. This happens in the matter of seconds, so quick that Seongwoo never catches the wince in Minhyun’s face at the uncomfortable sensation on his limped leg from the strain, never has the chance to move and pull Minhyun down with him—he’s like a statue, and for him, the world has frozen; he barely moves until he realizes what Minhyun has just done, and when he realizes just what the other had done for him, Seongwoo’s breath catches in his throat.

“NO!”

Knives shoot from the wall that’d just been behind Seongwoo moments ago, three knives forming a triangle aiming for the upper body, the other two aimed for the legs; Seongwoo’s lips fall into a helpless cry as it happens too fast for him to get up and pull Minhyun out of the fray, and his chest burns with the realization that he cannot stop this. He can’t stop the knives from embedding themselves into Minhyun’s body, can’t stop the blood that oozes out of his wounds, can’t stop Minhyun from falling backwards to the stone floor, his head taking most of the fall.

Seongwoo has never felt so useless before in his life.

His hands shake, and Seongwoo trembles as he crawls towards Minhyun’s fallen body, shaky breaths drawing out of his wide, opened mouth. “No, no, no, this can’t be happening!” Seongwoo’s vision goes red with bloodBloodBLOOD and the only thing he can see is Minhyun, still as a broken doll, laying in a puddle of his own blood.

Minhyun’s body is light, and Seongwoo is able to gently lift the other into a half-sitting position, placing Minhyun’s head on his chest. The only reason Seongwoo hasn’t lost the slipping remainder of his self control is because Minhyun’s still breathing, beat up and worse for wear, but he’s still alive; Seongwoo can still save him.

“Get out of h-here, Seongwoo,” Minhyun rasps out, and he coughs, spluttering blood on his chin. Seongwoo tries to focus on Minhyun’s eyes instead, half-lidded, but still opened. “Leave me behind.”

“What the fuck are you saying?” Seongwoo half-yells, hysterical. “I can’t just—”

“If my guess is right and I’ve trig”—Another cough, although much weaker than the last—“Triggered the alarms, this place, it’ll collapse soon. You have to get out of here. I’ll be dead weight, just leave—” Minhyun is unable to finish his sentence, and Seongwoo can see his eyes go out of focus; though they’re still open, they’re dull, as if Minhyun’s not even there anymore.

Trembling, Seongwoo’s thumb reaches for Minhyun’s neck, checking his pulse. His hand nearly flinches away when it’s startlingly cold to the touch, in contrast to the warm, red blood that continues to ooze out of Minhyun’s wounds.

Something in Seongwoo’s throat breaks.

    The only reason why Seongwoo hasn’t collapsed is through sheer willpower.

With Minhyun leaning heavily against his side—by now, his shirt has been stained with Minhyun’s blood, but he doesn’t even care about that—Seongwoo carries the both of them outside the barn, barely saving both himself and Minhyun just before (true to Minhyun’s words) an explosion sets off, leaving the barn in flames. Seongwoo tries not to think about what would’ve happened had he been inside for just a few seconds longer.

Their trudge towards civilization is slow-paced, but Seongwoo can’t go any faster, with the added weight of Minhyun (he wouldn’t leave Minhyun behind, no matter what the other would say about it) and the own burden of Seongwoo’s exhaustion; both physical and mental. Still, he carries on, even when his lungs are on the verge of giving up, even when his legs are on the verge of collapsing, and leaving both him and Minhyun sprawled somewhere on the road of a foreign country, where barely anyone would notice their absence until it’d be too late to save them.

“Come on, Seongwoo.” He barely has any strength in him left, and Seongwoo’s voice is a flicker of what it used to be; perhaps he’d agonized too loudly earlier, and now, all that comes out of his mouth is a hoarse whisper, even when he means to say it louder.

“Come on, Seongwoo.” The words are a spell, and Seongwoo chants them, over and over. Even when his larynx burns at the saliva that slithers to the bottom of his throat.

“Come on, Seongwoo.” Civilization grows closer with every step. Though every step forward feels like a million, Seongwoo still has some fight in him left. If he’d been useless to Minhyun earlier, he’d rather be dragged through hell and back first before giving up now.

“What the hell—is that a person?” Someone shouts in the distance.

Seongwoo lets himself smile. They’ve been found. “Come on, Seongwoo.” His vision is invaded by black spots, and the next thing he knows, his knees buckle, and the last thing he can force himself to do is to tug at Minhyun so that when they fall, Seongwoo will take the burnt; leave his chest as Minhyun’s cushion, and barely registers the pain the asphalt causes to his head.

Come on, Seongwoo.

    [ iii. ]

 On the evening Minhyun runs away, Kim Jonghyun waits for him outside, wearing a backpack much lighter than what Minhyun carries with him.

“How did you carry so… light?” Minhyun wonders, fingers tracing the outline of Jonghyun’s orange backpack. Not the most subtle, considering they might have to run away from the authorities just in case anyone bothers to look for them (Minhyun doubts his mother will even notice he’s gone, and Jonghyun doesn’t have any parents, only an orphanage that plans to kick him away as soon as he turns seventeen—so, Jonghyun had figured, why not do them a favor and go away now?), but Minhyun finds comfort in it; somehow, even when he knows wearing an orange backpack is practically raising a red flag for others to come and snatch it away.

“I don’t have a lot with me,” Jonghyun answers, simply, and Minhyun realizes the meaning that could’ve been inferred by his previous words.

“Jonghyun, I didn’t mean it that way.”

“Never thought you did.”

Minhyun struggles to will away the pink tint that creeps onto his cheeks. “Are we all set?”

His company pauses, seemingly reviewing a mental checklist. The way Jonghyun’s head tilts and his mouth falls open, ever so slightly, when he’s deep in thought never fails to paint a picture in Minhyun’s head.

“I think we are. We should leave now, before anyone finds us.”

The both of them know, of course, the last few words are more of a joke than a real possibility.

“Okay. What do you say about heading north?”

“North, no certain direction? I don’t know about this, maybe we could think this through—”

“You trust me, don’t you?”

Jonghyun stops his line of argument at those words. “What are you—I do, of course I do. It’s you and me against the world, Minhyun.”

(Many years later, Minhyun thinks about that night, over and over again; had Jonghyun meant it, when he’d said it was him and Minhyun against the world? At the time, it seemed like it was real, and Minhyun would gladly return the words to Jonghyun, too. But now, when Jonghyun is hundreds of miles away and Minhyun stands against the world alone—he can’t help but wonder.)

    Seongwoo wakes up to whitewashed walls and the odor of alcohol (the medical, or rubbing kind, not the consumable kind) and antiseptics. Even without asking, he knows he’s in a hospital, and the first thing he says when he regains full consciousness is, “Minhyun—where is he? Is he okay? Where’s Minhyun—”

As soon as the words come out, Seongwoo winces at the sound of his own voice. Hoarse and throaty, and his throat is parched, like sand is clinging to every corner inside it, and then some on the roof of his mouth. Just how long was he out?

“Take it easy,” the nurse says, presenting a cup of water and placing it just in front of his lips. Seongwoo attempts to take it to his own hands, but they’re shaking and weak, and the cup nearly falls from his grip as soon as he takes hold of it. Thankfully, the nurse catches it before it does, and persistently pushes it back to his lips. “Drink.”

Unable to do much else, Seongwoo pushes his lips open, and takes the rim to the entrance of his mouth. He leans his head back, and the nurse tilts the cup, letting the water fall to his throat; the water is warmer than it is hot, but it still stings his tongue—yet, in the end it brings relief to his throat, and Seongwoo’s experienced worse pain before. He downs the water in one go, and when he pulls back from the cup, some droplets of water have spilled onto his chin.

Without a word, the nurse takes a tissue from his bedside table, and gently dabs away the wet spots on his chin. Seongwoo lets her, though more questions teeter dangerously on the tip his tongue; unfortunately, his self control isn’t known to be particularly strong, so when the nurse throws away the tissue, he lets the questions fall.

“What happened to Minhyun? Is he alright? What day is it?” His voice is still rough, and unpleasant to the ears, but it’s not as scratchy as before. This, Seongwoo takes as a small step towards recovery.

“Slow down with your questions,” the nurse says, amused. Seongwoo reads his nametag. Yoon Jisung. Only after reading the nametag does he realize he has been speaking in Korean all this time, despite the fact he’s sure that he’s still in Italy; the biggest clue to that is the view outside his hospital room window.

“You’re Korean?”

“Yes,” Jisung confirms, and his smile makes Seongwoo want to cry. Not because the man is particularly striking, nor is his smile anything he’d spout poetry for, but finding Jisung is Seongwoo finding a strand of home in a place where all he wants to do is go home and eat his chef’s seaweed soup and rice for breakfast, no matter how good the food here is, no matter how many world class chefs head the hotel’s restaurant. Seongwoo misses home, and being able to speak Korean with someone who’s not Minhyun for the first time in what feels like forever, even though he hasn’t been in Italy for any longer than three days. (At least, that’s if his sense of time isn’t fucked up, and more time has passed since he collapsed in the middle of the road—he doubts that’s the case, though.)

“Sorry,” Seongwoo says, hating how thick his voice sounds, hating how his eyes are starting to burn. “I’m not crying, by the way. These aren’t tears, you’ve just got a lot of dust in your hospital room—”

“Of course,” Jisung returns, though judging by the press of Jisung’s lips, Seongwoo doubts he believes him at all. “If you’re wondering about the person who was with you, he’s still here, but last time I checked, he was still unconscious.”

“You’re allowed to tell me this?”

“Of course. Aren’t you married?” Jisung looks at him oddly. “That’s what your records said.”

As per usual, this move practically screams Jaehwan’s doing.

Fuck you, Jaehwan.

In his head, Seongwoo can hear Jaehwan’s squawking laughter from hundreds of miles away.

    The few things Seongwoo learns from Jisung (the nurse is chatty and boasts about his ability to talk ‘a hundred miles per minute’, according to his fellow nurses and the doctors he has worked with) include:

He was out for a total of three days, which is three days out of commission more than he can afford. Now, Seongwoo doubts he’ll be able to get any ‘proper rest’ as the case is above his own well being, much to Jisung’s loud, insistent nagging and threatening; that he wouldn’t let Seongwoo out except if he got some proper rest at the hospital, in which Seongwoo scoffed at. The cheek was not appreciated, and he was reprimanded with something along the lines of, “These stubborn men are all the same. Why can’t I ever have a docile patient for once? You know, this one time, when I was just starting out as a nurse, I had a patient who would listen and rested—” (Seongwoo has learnt how to tune him out.)

Last week, he’d married Minhyun, according to his files that was forged, rather obviously (to Seongwoo, Jisung remains oblivious as he never forgets to mention his congratulations every few words), by Jaehwan. Who must be back in Seoul and enjoying the thought of Seongwoo’s minted newlywed status and, if busy with anything, would be occupied with making sure the news of his ‘marriage’ doesn’t reach the media. It’d be suspicious to wipe the record so suddenly, and Seongwoo can only cross his fingers that nothing will happen. The last thing he needs is to have reports swarming him and Minhyun when they return to Seoul, and having their ‘secret gay wedding’ announced to the world—if that happened, that’d mean he and Minhyun would be Dispatch’s couple of the week, never mind the fact that people barely know about Minhyun, and would only recognize Seongwoo. It’d be media hell for the both of them, though the only upside to the news, to Seongwoo, is that they’d most likely be recognized as gay icons. (Technically speaking, though, Seongwoo is bi.)

Speaking of Minhyun, according to Jisung, Minhyun is in a coma and is placed in the extensive care unit. He’d offered to let Seongwoo see him, but the only thing that comes in Seongwoo’s head when he thinks about Minhyun is Minhyun, with knives embedded in his body, with blood spurting on his chin, the red tainting his pallid skin. Seongwoo isn’t ready to see Minhyun, not yet; he’s not sure if he can gather his wits to do that, now, if he can visit Minhyun without seeing that Minhyun instead.

Oh, and the jewel thief has struck. Again.

“Jisung, I’ve got to get out of here,” Seongwoo pleads, having shoved entire an entire spoonful of chicken soup just moments before, in an attempt to show Jisung that he’s all better now—so much better to the point he can devour his food in nearly one go. “See? I’m healthy now!” Not the best thing to say when you can barely throw your fist up in the air without wondering why your fistbumps are so weak (the muscles are out of exercise, not that Seongwoo’s ever going to admit it), and, judging by the judging curl of Jisung’s mouth, he doesn’t buy it. Just like any rational person would, admittedly.

“I’ve been a nurse for five years. I know when a patient’s lying,” Jisung deadpans. “Get some rest.” He turns to leave Seongwoo’s room, carrying Seongwoo’s tray of eaten food in his svelte arms.

The door closes softly, and the artificial tranquility is ruined when Seongwoo curses: “Shit.”

He has to get out of here.

An idea sparks in his head when he rummages through his drawers and finds a notepad, and a standardized hospital pen. With a wince, he takes the IVs out of his arms, trying not to pay too much notice into the crudeness of it all. As long as he doesn’t bleed out before he can get out, it’s okay if he gets a little bruised; and judging how he hasn’t stained the white carpet with red, he’s all good.

Sorry, gotta go. Contact me if Minhyun wakes up. Thanks, you’re a real one! Seongwoo makes sure to jot down his number underneath the words, and tries not to scowl as he gets a good look at his own handwriting. On regular occasions, his handwriting is neat enough, but now it reminds him of the atrocity he’d called handwriting when he was young enough to stuff two full candy canes in his mouth during Christmas and actually had someone to reprimand him; but the muscles in his wrist aren’t used to writing after the few days it had of disuse.

He kicks away the blanket, and lives to regret it when the cold air rushes inside his hospital gown, sending goosebumps down his exposed skin; which is a lot of skin, considering he’s naked underneath the hospital gown, and that makes it all even worse because if he sets off into a run inside a hospital gown, Seongwoo figures people could see the crack of his bum. And that is not for public viewing. The thought of that gives him enough terror to make him think twice about this entire plan, because it’s not like he can just stroll out of the hospital wearing a feather light hospital gown that would open with the slightest rustling of the wind, and having nothing underneath. Seongwoo is a great deal of many things, but the thought of voyeurism makes his toes curl, and not in the good way.

“Clothes, I need clothes,” he chants to himself as he pushes himself off the bed, the coldness of the floor biting his plantar, and he sprints towards the wardrobe, eager to get some footwear as soon as possible.

In normal occasions, Seongwoo would throw away the clothes that are stacked inside the wardrobe, but he’d rather look ridiculous than go running around Italy in a hospital gown and get cursed at by his own country’s netizens for being indecent—so, with as much reluctance as a child being dragged off to school, Seongwoo slides the large pink shirt on, groaning when he realizes how long it is, and ends up looking more like a dress. “I’m fucking ruined.” Goodbye, Ong Seongwoo’s chic image; it was nice knowing you.

He can’t decide if the pants are worse or better, and Seongwoo doesn’t find a belt that’d help the loose, silver material from pooling down to his knees, rather than gripping firmly on his hips. (The pants are silver. Of all colours—why. The only scenario this’d be worse is if the pants were Naruto orange.) On the floor of the wardrobe, hotel-styled hospital slippers are offered, and they fit snugly on his feet.

Deciding this is as good as it’s ever going to get, Seongwoo takes one last sip of his drink, and goes straight to the window; thankfully, easy to open (actually—shouldn’t that be worrying instead?) and after a battle with the crème curtains, he sticks one foot out, and diverges on the other side with his other foot moments later, hands gripped on the windowpane to help keep himself steady.

Don’t look down, Seongwoo tries to tell himself, except he has no choice but to look down, if he wants to escape before anyone takes a picture of him and uploads it on the Internet, something about a madman escaping his hospital room. Taking a deep breath, he looks over his shoulder, and lets his eyes sweep over the distance between his room and the ground—from what it looks like, the hospital’s garden, void of even a single soul at the moment—unconsciously gripping the white-painted pane tighter as his stomach lurches at the gap between him and the grass. A fall from this height would put him right back into his hospital room, and he tries not to think about how that’s probably the best case scenario, in this situation.

If he wants to get down, his only choice is to jump. A leap of faith, a test of his courage, and if he’s lucky, he’ll make it down safely.

“You can do this,” Seongwoo whispers to himself, and turns around to face the front of his body towards the open sky, rather than the window of his hospital room. (He forces away the thoughts of his weak, shaking fingers. He’s stronger than this. He knows he is.)

He glues his fingers from the things he’d been holding onto. Steadies his breath. Clears his head from doubts, instead filling it with self encouragement, and all the courage he has left. Plays a Queen song in his head, to fill him with reckless determination, to desecrate any vestige of uncertainty that continues to linger like a permanent resident of his essence.

Deep breaths. In, out, in, out.

(A chronicle of his final thoughts: Guanlin who has a missing brother and needs him to find Jihoon and bring him back; Jaehwan who has always believed in him, even when Seongwoo doesn’t know if his heart is in the right place, the same Jaehwan who had given him a chance at redemption for all the sins he has committed in his lifestyle; Minhyun, who is in a coma because of Seongwoo’s own incompetence, the same Minhyun who has grown to consider as something closer than a forced colleague; and the faces of all the people he has saved, the people whose lives he has helped—and the thought of how he could help many more if he makes the jump, if he believes in himself that he can make it, and he will.)

Seongwoo kicks his feet off from the surface.

He leaps.  

    "I'm glad to have you back in commission," Jaehwan says, looking more casual and at the same time, wearier than Seongwoo has ever seen him in weeks; though he wears a striped t-shirt and the shorts Seongwoo knows to be his favourite, he has bags underneath his eyes, unconcealed and a stark contrast against his pallid face. It's not the computer, or the camera, either; because the signal is perfectly fine (full Wi-fi bars, and he'd actually paid for the service), and the both of them have cameras that are more expensive than they should be, but with features that make it worth it—including the quality of the pictures, or in this case, motion.

Questions linger on the tip of his tongue, ranging from Why do you look so tired? to How did you know the thief was male before I did? but in a show of self control, Seongwoo bites his tongue (quite literally, he's afraid to say, what with the metallic taste that now roams in the roofs of his mouth) and saves the questions for a better time.

"Yeah. Thanks for the marriage thing, by the way," he speaks, and finds the slightest hint of relief when Jaehwan laughs. At least Jaehwan's laugh is the same, high-pitched and nearly crescendoing into a scream, and Seongwoo has one less thing to fret over. "You didn't even give me a wedding gift. Here I thought you were my best friend."

"I'll sing for you as a late wedding present," Jaehwan assures him, causing Seongwoo flashbacks to the time he and Jaehwan had gone to karaoke, soused after drinking more than they could handle, and the only thing Seongwoo clearly remembers from that night is Jaehwan wearing a wig on his head and singing his lungs out to Defying Gravity. "How is he, by the way?"

The tell-tale sign of Jaehwan's guilt is present; the crease on his forehead, and the way his voice dips into a lower register, even if only for the last few words of his sentence.

"In a coma," Seongwoo exhales, and doesn't miss the frown marring Jaehwan's lips. "I left my number behind, just in case he wakes up, so someone can contact me."

"Don't remind me about your stunt," Jaehwan says, flatly. "Do you have any idea how much paperwork I had to deal with?"

"It's not like you do that on your own, anyway," Seongwoo says, indistinctly, with a conspicuous pout.

"...Do you have any idea how much paperwork Sungwoon had to deal with?"

Sungwoon is Jaehwan's secretary, and one of the most reliable people Seongwoo has ever known. (He even brings a toaster to the office, for reasons Seongwoo can't fathom, but Sungwoon makes a mean toast bread, so it's not like Seongwoo is at any place to complain.) Graduated from Seoul University, and everyone expected him to be a surgeon, so he ended up working for his high school friend; the most medical thing he's done since his graduation being fixing up Jaehwan's agents' wounds. Nice guy, though. Seongwoo likes him enough to feel a shred of guilt over the stress Sungwoon must've endured due to Seongwoo's own antics, but it was a necessary evil.

"Tell him I'm sorry," Seongwoo offers. "About Minhyun, though—Jaehwan, I messed up. He wouldn't be in a coma if I was more capable," he confesses, and through the urge to bow his head, Seongwoo forces himself to stay upright, to meet Jaehwan's eyes; he expects Jaehwan to show him disdain, or at the least, confusion.

Instead, Jaehwan's expression opens, and instead of something scathing, all Seongwoo sees is understanding.

"It wasn't your fault," Jaehwan says, readjusting himself in his seat before leaning forward, curling his fingers together and resting them on his lap. "You did your best, Seongwoo."

"No, I didn't. You don't understand, if I was faster—"

"What would've changed? You would've gotten out faster?" This is the first time Jaehwan has raised his voice in the entirety of their conversation, and it's enough to drive Seongwoo into silence. "Seongwoo, you froze up. That's not just something you can beat out of yourself. I think, sometimes, you forget that you're human too."

Sometimes, you forget that you're human too.

The words imprint themselves on Seongwoo's head, leaving behind a noticeable mark. Jaehwan is seldom ever somber with Seongwoo; this side of Jaehwan is one that he has only seen very few times, and only during the most dire of situations. But, the things Jaehwan said, must have some truth in them; even if Seongwoo attempts to bisect them, to see if he can twist them around, if he can find some kind of negative hidden meaning behind them.

All Seongwoo wants to do is to save the people around him. But how can he do that when he's as human as they are? He's not invincible, not by a long shot—Seongwoo bleeds, too, red and dark and not a speck of gold, unlike ichor. That should be enough proof of him being human, but not rarely, Seongwoo considers himself above; not because he deems himself morally superior, because Seongwoo has done so many wrongs in his life that the good very barely weighs it out, but because he's so used to helping and saving the world that he forgets, sometimes, he needs to be saved, too.

"I could've... I could've moved."

Jaehwan looks at him with pity, and Seongwoo's nails dig into his skin. "You care about him a whole lot, don't you think?"

"I—what are you saying? Of course I do," he conveys, lips drawn in flummox. "It's hard not to. I hate to say it and inflate your ego, but; Minhyun... he's not bad."

There's a funny expression on Jaehwan's face. Not funny, meaning Jaehwan's 'I really want to laugh' face, but funny as in, he knows something Seongwoo doesn't; by all means, this is odd, because in more cases than not, it's the other way around. "What do you mean, 'not bad'?"

"For someone I've been stuck with for a while, he isn't bad company," Seongwoo admits. "He can keep up with me. He's not intimidated by me. It helps he doesn't... push me away, too. If I were him, I'd hate me, you know? Not because of my personality, that's not the problem here, but it's because I threatened him. I'd probably plot to kill me in my sleep."

"Who's to say he didn't?" At Seongwoo's disbelief, Jaehwan is quick to add, "I was just saying!"

"You know what? I'm not surprised. Why am I even shocked at this point? You're so... you."

"At loss for words now, Ong?"

Seongwoo rolls his eyes. "Yeah, yeah." He isn't entirely in the mood to fight Jaehwan, which is a first, but maybe it's because he's been too busy worrying over Minhyun to have a bone to pick with his best friend. "I'm going to investigate the latest heist tomorrow," he finally says, completely changing the topic; Jaehwan straightens in his seat, and thoroughly adjusts his look to something more like the Jaehwan that Seongwoo sees during mission briefings.

"Take Sungwoon with you," he instructs. "I know you're used to working with Minhyun by now—"

"I still work solo the best, what are you even saying?"

"—but," Jaehwan says, completely ignoring Seongwoo's nimble protests, "I think a little help won't be bad. You like Sungwoon, don't you?"

The man has a point. Besides, Seongwoo could use for one of Sungwoon’s baked toasts right about now; maybe he’ll leave a text to the older man later, to bring his toaster with him when he leaves for Italy. Knowing Sungwoon, however, he most likely already has the toaster packed, along with a few other things that he’d deem as a necessity, such as (but not limited to): an exfoliator (which makes perfect sense once you’ve seen the man’s face, he has a skin as soft as a baby’s butt, Seongwoo swears this on his kidney), other facial masks that Seongwoo needs more than Sungwoon but is too lazy to use, dietary sugar, and just enough food and materials for him to cook something out of it—like baked toast.

"Yeah." Seongwoo deflates at the look of victory Jaehwan wears like a cape. "I'm the superior friend though, right?" He makes sure, because he's petty, and likes to hear it when Jaehwan is forced to admit that, no matter how much he acts like he hates Seongwoo's guts, Seongwoo is as much of his best friend as Jaehwan is Seongwoo's.

"Where'd that come from?" And then, he snorts; "save some of the sap for Minhyun when he wakes up."

Then, it all clicks. The funny look on Jaehwan's face. The bait Jaehwan set up and Seongwoo took, like the idiot (in everything besides crime) he is. "When I told you I cared about Minhyun, I didn't mean it in that way, what the fuck."

Before Jaehwan disconnects from their call, he sings out in a well trained vibrato, "Suit yourself!"

    Truth be told, Seongwoo’s experience of working with Sungwoon is limited to them attempting to create something in the kitchen, meaning Seongwoo’s attempt to cook and Sungwoon being his supervisor slash babysitter slash a mentor who’s like the nice version of Gordon Ramsey, and that one case when Sungwoon just started working for Jaehwan, and Seongwoo was assigned to keep an eye on him until they got stuck into a murder case and had to solve their way out (an interesting story for another time)—a majority of their interactions are of them just socializing without the burden of a mystery, or whenever Seongwoo needs someone to annoy and Jaehwan’s not there, but conveniently, Sungwoon is—and Sungwoon is too nice; even when he gets his feathers ruffled, he’ll try to pass it off as a joke, and so, whenever Seongwoo stops bothering Sungwoon, he finds himself left with a sense of guilt.

They’re not bad together though, and while Sungwoon isn’t Minhyun, who acts like Seongwoo’s guy in the chair, Sungwoon is effective and reliable; they finish up their initial investigation in the bank in a matter of minutes (thirty minutes, to be exact), leaving them with enough time to conduct a questioning with the manager of the bank. Sungwoon keeps track of everything with his recorder, and Seongwoo is the one with the ‘asking duty’; he makes sure to school his face into something intimidating. Because that’s how you get the bad guys to fess up, though he doubts the manager is capable of stealing all those diamonds—the man is round and balding, and looks like he’s about to faint whenever Seongwoo so much as glances at the man’s black shoes.

“We’re just here to ask you a few questions,” Seongwoo begins, and in return, receives hurried nods from the manager. “Your name is…?”

“Giovanni Romano.”

“Right, Mr. Romano. Do you have any clues as to who might have done this?”

For a moment, Giovanni Romano forgets his irrational fear of Ong Seongwoo, and goes into deep thought; he emerges moments later, and so does his fear, because he looks at Seongwoo’s velvet red tie as he speaks. “I do. And I don’t have a clue—I know it is him!”

Sungwoon gives Seongwoo a look of perplexity. Just go with it, Seongwoo mouths at Sungwoon, making sure to tilt his head in an angle where Giovanni will find it difficult to read what he’s said. Not that he could make much sense of it, unless Giovanni has learnt Korean.

“Who is it, then?”

“But, first.” The balding man shifts his eyes onto the floor, and when he lifts his gaze once more, he says, in a conspiratorial whisper; “I implore you not to look at the bank unfavorably after this—I’ll admit it was foolish of me, to have trusted him like that”—A look of disdain crosses his feeble profile—“but I assure you, it was a mistake.”

Seongwoo doesn’t understand a single thing, but he follows his own advice, and goes with it. “Of course, Mr. Romano.”

“A year ago, there was a man, who created an account here—a man named Kwon Hyunbin.” Seongwoo tries not to cringe at the mispronunciation, and gestures for the man to continue with his story. “He was a trusted customer, he traded diamonds with us quite regularly; me, Sir, me and the bank—never thought anything was wrong. He even gave us gifts whenever he returned from overseas! How could we have figured something was wrong? We gave him a VIP pass, and it allowed him to come and go as he pleased, even after hours—we were fools.”

Yeah, you guys really were, is what Seongwoo wants to say, because who would trust someone that easily over the basis the man would give them gifts? But, he spares the man, and nods noticeably, signaling the man to speak the rest of his story.

“The day after the robbery, he was gone! Vanished like the wind. That’s when I knew it was him—I’ve known it since that day!”

“Of course you have,” Seongwoo says, and after Sungwoon gives him a thumbs up, meaning he now had the conversation on record, Seongwoo gives the balding man one last look. The man visibly pales. “Thank you for your cooperation.”

On the limousine, on their way back to the hotel (because Jaehwan is only generous, going so far as to provide Seongwoo with a limo as a method of transportation around Italy, five or six days too late), Sungwoon cross checks the result of the interview with what he and Seongwoo and theorized prior to asking Giovanni Romano. For the most part, their initial theories were spot on; it’d been a trusted customer, it’d happened because of the carelessness on the bank’s part. But now, they had a name to go with their suspicions, and Seongwoo can whiff the smell of a resolved cast in a distance not too far off.

“I’ll have to ask the people back at headquarters to search for a Kwon Hyunbin.” Sungwoon categorizes their findings together, and Seongwoo doesn’t help, only pours himself another drink from the vending machine inside the limo.

“You go do that.” Seongwoo tips his head back and downs the soda as if it’s a shot. “I’m staying here.”

“Hwang Minhyun?” Sungwoon guesses, and Seongwoo smiles, grimly.

“Yeah. We’ll follow your lead later,” Seongwoo plans on the spot, and goes to refill his cup.

“Okay.” Sungwoon pauses; “I don’t mean to sound rude or anything, but… what will you do if it takes more time for him to wake up?” In the subject of comas, Seongwoo knows the like hood of Minhyun making it out within a number of only a few days is startlingly low; he’d suffered major blows, practically nearly died, and Seongwoo knows of coma cases where it has been years and yet, the patient hasn’t woken up. And some of those cases happen from reasons that are lesser than being stabbed all over your body with throwing knives. He can’t stay in Italy forever, but the thought of leaving Minhyun behind is too much.

If Minhyun wakes up from his coma, all alone, then Seongwoo would’ve failed him again. He can’t do that—once is already once too much.

“I don’t know,” Seongwoo admits, honest as he is unsure. “I’ll get to that when that happens. I’ve always been good at thinking on the spot. Or just thinking in general.” He waves his hands at the end, though Sungwoon only throws him a sad smile, as if he knows that Seongwoo’s trying his hardest to act like nothing’s wrong. “Make me baked toast before you leave.” He changes the topic, and he’s grateful when Sungwoon says nothing of it.

“I’m not your maid,” Sungwoon complains. In the end, though, back in their shared bedroom (and Seongwoo tries not to think of how Sungwoon sleeps on the bed that Minhyun used—will use when he wakes up too, because he can’t not wake up) he still makes four baked toasts; two for Seongwoo, and two for himself.

They eat in comfortable silence. Neither of them daring to disturb it, much less they drive the other away from their thoughts.

    It’s a regular day, until it isn’t.

Seongwoo has taken it upon himself to explore Turin during the time Minhyun remains in his coma, and Sungwoon is still researching their findings with the team back in Seoul. He stays away from the places he and Minhyun visited together, in fear he might find himself lost, not in the physical attributes of the streets, but inside his own head; he fears he might find himself trapped in a memory, so he walks the roads he has not walked, and when he catches the first sight of a place he’d been to with Minhyun, he firmly turns the other way.

The day starts out as one of those days, until it isn’t.

At lunch, Seongwoo receives a phone call from an unknown number. He puts down his fork and knife—previously cutting down his steak into small, juicy slices—instead lifting his phone with his now free hand. Though wary, he picks it up, and presses the phone close to his ear. “Hello?”

“This is Yoon Jisung. You know, the nurse you ditched after I explicitly told you not to leave the hospital yet.” The voice is familiar, and Seongwoo remembers the nurse who can talk a hundred miles per hour, the nurse who’d taken care of him during the shortest, conscious hospital visit of his life. Jisung’s own reminder of Seongwoo’s doing helps. “You asked to be notified about any updates on your husband, right?”

“Yes.” Seongwoo feels his heartbeat in his ears, dull until it crescendos into the sound of distant drums.

“He’s awake.”

And then: “Are you still there? Oi, Ong Seongwoo. Yoohoo? Did I break you?”

“I’m here,” Seongwoo somehow manages to say, despite his heart that’s beating too fast in his ribcage, and a mind that courses with the thought, he’s awake, he’s awake, he’s awake. “I’ll be there soon. Tell him to—tell him to not go anywhere.”

“You should take your own advice,” Jisung snuffles; “Do you know how much trouble you got me into after you left? I think I’ve never seen the boss look so angry.”

“I can imagine.” He shakes his head, even if Jisung can’t see it. “Sorry. I’ll give you some cash later as compensation—”

“Do you think I can be bought?” Jisung shrills, and Seongwoo hears a clatter on the other line. He’d bet that Jisung just bumped into a wall, or something along those lines, and is likely getting some dirty looks from the people around him, if the few moments of silence and mumbled apologies is anything to go by. “This isn’t about the money. I know I won’t make even a quarter of your life savings in my lifetime, but I’m not doing this because I want your money. I’m doing this because I want to help, you fool.”

Seongwoo’s mouth dries up, like a well in the summer. When he lets his tongue lie flat on the roof of his mouth, it makes a soft clicking sound.

“You might be a stubborn, difficult patient,” Jisung continues, heedless to Seongwoo’s stunned condition, “but I know about what you do. If anyone deserves help, it’s you—or are you so used to being a martyr and helping others that you forget you need help, too? These stubborn billionaires, I swear.”

When Seongwoo doesn’t come up with a response, Jisung speaks again, though this time, he speaks with a trace of worry. “Seongwoo, are you still there?”

“Sorry, I just needed to find the car keys.” A lie, because Seongwoo doesn’t even have a car rented, and the limo that Jaehwan gave him disappeared around the same time as Sungwoon. But, he needed that silence, needed it to control the prick in his lungs, needed it to control his throat from closing up when he needed to talk. “Jisung.”

“What is it this time?”

“Thank you.”

    They’ve moved Minhyun into a hospital room not unlike Seongwoo’s instead of keeping him in the intensive care unit, and when Seongwoo barges into the room, he finds Minhyun already awake, a novel in his hands. Most of his wounds seem to have subsided, and all Minhyun looks now is worse for wear, wan with rims on the bags of his eyes.

The moment Seongwoo shuts the door closed, Minhyun looks up from his book, placing it onto his lap. “Seongwoo,” he greets, and he doesn’t sound as if he’d been unconscious for the past few days—nearly a week now. “Come sit.”

Seongwoo takes a chair from the small coffee table, and slides it across the floor towards the empty spot next to Minhyun’s bed. He sits, crosses and uncrosses his legs together, and finds himself confused where to start; he’d been waiting for the day for Minhyun to wake up, but he’d been so focused on wondering when it was for him to think about what he’d say when the day arrived.

“Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” Seongwoo says, at last, right hand gesturing at Minhyun’s weak, but still breathing, figure. Minhyun tugs his blanket closer to him, and Seongwoo helps, lifting the edge of the soft, greyish blue material with the slits of his fingers.

“Thanks, but I feel like shit,” Minhyun answers, frankly; “I guess that’s what a coma would do to you.”

“I guess,” Seongwoo echoes. “Should I be concerned you’re already making jokes about your own suffering?”

The other stifles a laugh, but in a few seconds, he coughs instead; Seongwoo shakes his head when he sees blood on Minhyun’s chin, and pinches his thigh to snap himself back into reality from the firm grip of his fears.

“The best thing I can do right now is move on from that,” he admits, and frankly, Seongwoo agrees. “You could’ve left me behind back there—but you didn’t.” Minhyun looks at him with something that Seongwoo can’t place; is it suspicion? Is it thankfulness? Or maybe, is it loathing, for Seongwoo having disobeyed Minhyun’s orders?

“Did you really think I’d leave you behind?” The sad smile Minhyun wears says it all. “What the fuck. What kind of person do you think I am? I’m kind of offended.”

Minhyun doesn’t hesitate when he says, “You know I didn’t mean it that way.”

Seongwoo knows. He doesn’t need Minhyun to spell it out for him. Though he might be oblivious, he isn’t daft enough to miss Minhyun’s martyrdom and confuse it for a mistake of judgment on his character.

“Just… It was dumb, okay?” He lets himself be honest, even when Minhyun rests his eyes on him with befuddlement. “We haven’t gone to the level of giving each other friendship bracelets or anything, hell, you don’t even know what my favourite colour is (it’s black, by the way), but you’re still my friend. That’s as emotional of a confession as you’re ever going to get from me—and you know, what?” A pause; “I wish I could get mad at you for asking me to leave you behind. I wish I could be furious at you for asking me to leave you there to die, I really do, because at least then I wouldn’t still feel the guilt on my conscience, even after saving you. I was useless, Minhyun, and you might not even be in a coma if I’d done something, or didn’t stand in front of the trap like an amateur, and if I was angry at you, I wouldn’t feel jack shit about your situation at all.” Seongwoo’s smile grows wistful, and he looks at Minhyun for answers that he knows he’ll never get. “I wish I could hate you—God, I want to—but that’s not enough.”

When he looks at Minhyun, he’s hoping he can find something, anything, that’ll leave Seongwoo with more answers than questions; instead, he finds Minhyun sitting there, face pinched together like the very act of breathing hurt him. “That was fucking weird, wasn’t it? Forget what I—”

But, Minhyun cuts his words short, and his voice is distorted, like he’s having a struggle with himself that he’s trying not to show. “Why is that?”

“Hell if I knew.”

“Seongwoo.” In the stretch that lies between the bed and Seongwoo’s chair, Minhyun extends his arm, and finds Seongwoo’s palm, kissing it with his. Seongwoo opens his palms, previously fisted in itself, and lets Minhyun interlock their hands together, the iciness of Minhyun’s flesh melting against the warmth of Seongwoo’s. During that moment, Seongwoo waits for Minhyun to push him away, to say something like, ‘ha! This is some gay shit, isn’t it?’, but Minhyun doesn’t; he simply stares at their hands, intertwined, with a funny look, as if it is the most peculiar he has ever seen.

    Inertia is what keeps Seongwoo from leaving Minhyun’s bedside, even when he has a whole hotel room with the amenities that a hospital can only dream of waiting for him a taxi ride away, and it’s the same inertia that leaves him waiting for Minhyun’s full recovery in the sofa placed in Minhyun’s hospital room, where he spends most of his days and nights in Italy.

“There are still a lot of sights to see,” Minhyun says, although he doesn’t look up from his book. Seongwoo doesn’t know how the book even got here, but knows better than to ask.

“What’s the point of travelling by myself?” He makes a face. “Besides, I know you’ll be better in no time if you’re blessed with my presence, so really, I’m doing you a favor.”

Minhyun turns the page, and sighs wearily, as if he’d been expecting Seongwoo to say that—and knowing Minhyun, he probably saw it coming from miles away. “Whatever helps you sleep at night. Could you turn down the TV?”

Though Seongwoo has been keeping himself busy by watching the latest episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians, at Minhyun’s request, he takes the remote from the table and lowers the volume by double digits. “Thanks,” Minhyun mumbles, and resumes to read his book, leaving Seongwoo alone with the low rumble of chatter from the TV.

His phone rings a few minutes later, playing the telltale ringtone of Britney Spears. He takes it outside, having taken into account the annoyed crease of Minhyun’s brows at the first note of Seongwoo’s ringtone. A few nurses pass by, pushing carts filled with hospital food, IV bags, and other medicine he can’t name.

“Hello?”

“Seongwoo.” That’s Sungwoon’s voice on the other line, and Seongwoo pulls his free hand from his pocket. “I managed to track down that Kwon Hyunbin guy, and I had a few others to go to Japan to ask him a few questions.” Usually, that duty would go to Seongwoo, but Jaehwan hasn’t bothered him ever since he’d called in the middle of the night and found out Seongwoo was staying with Minhyun by the way Seongwoo’s voice had, apparently, hushed; in his defense, Minhyun was sleeping and he’d rather not disturb the other from whatever fitful rest he was able to get. “He hasn’t been out of Japan in the past month—we double checked with whatever possible records, checked out his alibis too, and everything matches up.”

“But didn’t the identity say it was him?”

“The passport said it was him, yeah.” A rustling noise is heard in the other line, and Seongwoo imagines Sungwoon is tidying some files as he speaks, the phone probably trapped in the crook of his neck with his chin. “But he lost his passport last year—shortly before our thief started operating in Italy.”

“Well, that’s a bummer. When did the bank robbery happen again, by the way?"

“July 7th, why do you ask?”

But the next full moon is supposed to be on July 31st—to have the thief suddenly strike on July 7th is out of the usual pattern, and leaves Seongwoo with a cloud of doubt. “But that’s the… warning gibbous, I think. Why’d he strike then?”

“I’ve been wondering that too, actually,” Sungwoon admits, sheepishly. “Jaehwan sounded really sure when he told me it was the work of the thief, though. So I just went with it.”

Jaehwan. This isn’t the first time Jaehwan’s known something that even Seongwoo doesn’t, and although Seongwoo would jump in front of a bullet for him, something is terribly wrong about all this. How does Jaehwan fit in the puzzle? There’s no way Jaehwan doesn’t know something, because while once could be a coincidence, twice is too many times too much; the next time Seongwoo sees Jaehwan, it will be with questions that he’ll ask with no remorse.

It’s not as if he considers Jaehwan to be working with the enemy. Jaehwan is a great deal of many things. He is a friend, a boss, a good singer who can’t hold a proper tune when drunk, and someone Seongwoo would, on normal circumstances, trust with his life. But there’s no way Jaehwan has no part in this, even if Seongwoo knows Jaehwan isn’t shallow enough to steal some jewels; just because Jaehwan wouldn’t be the thief, however, doesn’t mean he’s free from Seongwoo’s inner doubts and accusations. Though having to accuse his own best friend of something makes Seongwoo’s breakfast climbs its way back from his stomach, separating personal feelings from the job is one of the lessons Seongwoo’s learned the hard way.

“I’ll have to call you back,” Seongwoo says, finally, when he realizes he’s spent too much time staying silent on his part. “Thanks, Sungwoon.”

“Any time. Good luck, Seongwoo.”

Sungwoon hangs up, and Seongwoo returns to Minhyun’s room, where the other has just finished his plate of pasta for dinner. There’s a little bit of sauce smudged on his cheek, and before Seongwoo even knows it, his legs have moved against his own will, and he’s suddenly offering Minhyun a tissue, though it would’ve been faster to let Minhyun know and let him take his own tissue from his bedside table.

“Oh.” Awkwardly, Minhyun takes Seongwoo’s offering, and pats it onto the dirtied corners of his mouth. “All good?”

“Nice and clean,” Seongwoo assures, hating how his voice comes out as a nervous squeak.

Minhyun purses his lips, and stares at Seongwoo oddly. “You sound… different.”

“Your mom thinks I sound different.”

“Seongwoo, those jokes were never funny; and even if they were, they stopped being funny back in 2012.”

“…You know what, you’re really making me regret keeping you company with my presence—just go to sleep, Minhyun, so we can get out of here quick.”

“Okay. Good night, Seongwoo.”

Having walked across the room, Seongwoo flicks the light switch, leaving only the dull yellow glow of the night light shining amidst the darkness of the room. “Good night, Minhyun.”

    On the day of Minhyun’s discharge, the sky is a pallid gray, little white washed clouds streaming in and out of sight, leaving the world in peaked blue hue. The nurses coddle over him, one last time, murmuring things about how they wish him the best, how they’d just wish he and his husband would stop trying to be so adventurous during their honeymoon, just in case something like this tragedy would occur once more; Minhyun listens to the ordeal, clueless to the words, and Seongwoo, the one who understands every last bit of Italian they speak, wishes he could melt against the wall he leans on—for it’d be better than standing there, looking as red as the nose of a Christmas reindeer.

“Don’t be a stranger!” Jisung sees them off, either ignoring or remaining unawares of the dirty glares sent by the doctor he’s supposed to be working with; when Seongwoo breached the topic of Jisung’s own duties as a nurse above him seeing away Seongwoo like the good friend he is, Jisung said something about there being at least a dozen nurses that could substitute for him, and seeing away the most difficult and the most interesting patient he’s ever nursed would be more interesting than doing his usual routine of helping a doctor shoot some drugs into a patient’s bloodstream to help them with their pain.

“I won’t! Visit Seoul sometimes—maybe for Chuseok! If you don’t have plans, you could stay at my place,” Seongwoo offers, after he’s finished stuffing the last of his bags into the car. Two days after his initial stay at the hospital, he’d decided to check out from the hotel, and moved his belongings to Minhyun’s hospital room instead; he wouldn’t have gone back anyway, and though the bill wouldn’t make so much as a dent on his savings, he sleeps better knowing he’s made a decision that financially makes sense. Sungwoon would be proud of him for having broken through his bourgeois lifestyle, even if it’s just this once.

Jisung pretends to think about it for a moment, though the shit eating grin completely ruins the effect of it. “Fine!” As if Seongwoo didn’t know that already; “Minhyun, your husband just offered me to stay at his place—”

“Not in that way!” Seongwoo covers his ears, and hurriedly gets inside the car, flipping Jisung off before rolling up the car windows. He can hear Jisung’s laughter being carried by the wind, and lets it distract him from the disturbing realization that he doesn’t even freeze at comments about him and Minhyun’s ‘marriage’ anymore.

“Where are we going?” Speak of the devil and he shall appear; Minhyun, seated on the passenger seat next to Seongwoo’s, asks. Their driver awaits their instructions, though judging by the lost look on his face, Seongwoo figures he doesn’t understand a word of what Minhyun said.

“The airport, please,” Seongwoo says in Italian, and their driver nods, before setting course towards their desired destination. “Airport,” Seongwoo then translates to Minhyun, who nods and leans back in his seat.

Figuring Minhyun wouldn’t be in the mood to talk, judging by the way his head lolls back and his eyes are beginning to drift to a close, Seongwoo takes out his phone, plugs in his earbuds, and puts his playlist on shuffle. The last time he’d listened to music properly—not his ringtone, and not through the speakers that blare through the streets or even the performances from the trio at the restaurant—was weeks ago, and he misses his favourite songs, for they always make him feel like he’s more than what he is; music can wash over his soul, make him forget of his condition, even if it’s only for a fleeting moment.

A song begins to play, and Seongwoo lets himself drown into the beat, sinking deeper, and still, sinking.

    There are times when Seongwoo wishes he had a camera. When he’s faced with a view so breathtaking there’s no way he is able to ingrate it only in his memory, when he meets a celebrity in the middle of the streets and, as a public figure himself, feels like asking for an autograph on his forehead is two steps too extra than what he’s allowed, and lastly, when he catches glimpse of Minhyun after realizing their next stop isn’t Seoul, or even Japan—it’s New York, where Minhyun’s home is, where Seongwoo only knows he’s going because the best way  to solve a case when they’re faced with a dead end, is to take some time off with a breath of fresh air.

(It’s true the sands of their hourglass continue to fall, but Minhyun has literally just recovered from a coma caused by throwing knives, and Seongwoo reckons eating pizza with pineapples would hurt less than forcing him to go back into the action immediately, despite Minhyun’s protests of, ‘My condition isn’t even that bad!’)

“Treat me some food later. I want something that’s… New York-ish. What are New York’s signature dishes, anyway?” Seongwoo follows behind Minhyun like a puppy, finally taking the time to observe the sights the city has to offer in broad daylight, now that the both of them are making their way to Minhyun’s apartment with little thought but food; for they didn’t eat on the plane, too busy napping to make up for whatever it is they felt the need to compensate for.

“I’ll take you to a pizza place later,” Minhyun promises, much to Seongwoo’s excitement. They come to a stop in front of the familiar sight of Minhyun’s apartment building, a skyscraper amidst the heart of the city, with sleek glasses and figures with formal work attire coming in and out. The doorman greets Minhyun when he sees him, though he blinks at the sight of Seongwoo; Seongwoo reckons, from this interaction, Minhyun seldom invites men back to his apartment. (When taken out of context, that must sound very wrong, but at the same time, the thought of that makes Seongwoo feel a burst of relief; the reason he can’t fathom.)

Unlike Jihoon’s apartment (the first thing they’re going to have to do when they’ve gotten enough rest is to find Jihoon, honestly, because Seongwoo sometimes finds himself waking up in the middle of the night when Jihoon visits his nightmares, pretty face beaten and bloodied—sometimes Guanlin is there too, crying in the distance, throwing accusations to Seongwoo, “you didn’t even try to save him!”), Minhyun’s apartment has working elevators, and the both of them are spared from walking ten flights of stairs.

“Do you have your keys with you?”

“I do.” Minhyun takes the card out of his pocket, lets it hover in front of the sensor that stands underneath the number plate hung outside his apartment. The sensor flashes green, and with a beep, the door clicks open.

Inside, the apartment is clean, everything kept immaculately in place. The white wallpapers and the narrow hallway of entrance leaves space for him and Minhyun to take off their footwear, and the marble floor is ice cold. Paintings are hung all around the hallway, and Seongwoo pointedly looks away from a particularly gruesome one of a man in battle, stripped of his armor and bleeding his guts out; why Minhyun has it, he has no idea at all, though he assumes it’s the same reasons why a person would paint it in the first place: art itself.

“I’ll have to go see if I have to throw anything out from my fridge,” Minhyun says to himself, padding through the floor in order to make his way to the open space kitchen that practically blends as one with the living room. Seongwoo takes his time before he follows Minhyun, eyes roaming over the sleek interior that adorns his living space; whether the money comes from his job of being an art curator or if he’d kept some money behind from his life as a thief, Seongwoo can’t help but question. “Hold on—Seongwoo, is this yours? How’d it get in here, though?”

“What?” Seongwoo says in confusion. Minhyun holds a golden envelope in his hand, and Seongwoo takes it from his grasp, turning and tossing the envelope just to see if there’s anything interesting; but it’s a plain envelope, no matter how many times he turns it in his hand. “I didn’t leave this behind, though?”

Minhyun watches the envelope with keen eyes. “Open it.”

He follows Minhyun’s instruction and tears the envelope open, finding a single piece of paper inside. When opened, the letter is written not in handwriting, but in print; at Minhyun’s nod, Seongwoo resumes to read the letter out loud.

“To: Ong Seongwoo and Hwang Minhyun,

“By the time this letter arrives, you’d have been too late to stop me from taking away my latest jewels—diamonds, and they’re very lovely, if you want to know—but you might have a chance of stopping me yet.” Seongwoo pauses, the blood draining from his face upon realizing just exactly whom the letter is from.

“How do I know you’re on my trail? You’re wondering that now, right? I’ll spare you the excitement of figuring it out—a little birdie told me; a little birdie with fallen wings, a little birdie I’ve taken from the sky, and into one of my nests.”

“Did Jihoon mole us out?” Minhyun rattles, not quite in disbelief; he looks knowing, as if he’d expected it to happen, even before Seongwoo has revealed the thief’s source of information.

“Who else could it be?” It could be Jaehwan, sounds a traitorous whisper in Seongwoo’s head, but he desperately wills it away; Jaehwan knows something, but he can’t have ratted them out. Seongwoo knows Jaehwan too well to know that he wouldn’t so far as associate himself with a criminal—wouldn’t he? Nevertheless, he continues to read; “I’m a little disappointed. I’d expected more from the world’s so-called greatest detective and the thief who’d stolen the pink panther, but maybe I’d expected too much.

“At any rate, I’ll give you a hint, just to make it interesting! A siren, and its jewels. I’ll see you when I see you.”

The message goes unsigned, but it’s clear as day, even without a signature (though a signature certainly would’ve made things easier in figuring out their elusive thief’s identity.) When Seongwoo puts down the letter, he finds the corners wrinkled, and realizes he must’ve gripped it too harshly; hopefully, it wouldn’t have ruined the evidence by too much, though Seongwoo doubts the thief would’ve left his fingerprints on the letter.

“… At least we have an idea where Jihoon is?” Seongwoo tries, and grimaces when he only sees Minhyun’s tightlipped frown. “What do you think he means by a siren and its jewels?”

Minhyun says, slowly, “I think I know someone who could help.”

Call it a premonition, or maybe divine intervention, but Seongwoo feels a lurch in his gut that makes him think, he does not like where this is going—not in the slightest.

   [ iv. ] 

 Not for the first time, Minhyun returns to a pamphlet of physical therapy on the couch; not for the first time, either, he picks up the pamphlet, and throws it into the trash, never bothering to read the contents instead of only skimming through the cover. They tend to have the silliest slogans, things that, Minhyun supposes, should make him believe he’ll get better. With a little help, you’ll be good as day! is one of the many things he’s seen written on those things, and yet, instead of acknowledging the attempt at positivity, Minhyun can see through the lies.

The world is a vast terrain, and the humans that populate it are either liars, or they’re the ones being lied to. Minhyun would rather be the former than force himself into a state of daydreaming where his limp is treatable, and he can go back to the life he’d once led before a reckless decision took everything away from him.

“Minhyun, is that you?”

… Almost everything.

Jonghyun is the only good thing in his life now, the only thing that keeps him from slipping away his complete control over his being, that now exists in a state that feels like restless limbo. Jonghyun is beautiful, even when he leans against the doorframe of their bedroom, hair tousled and sticking up in a few directions; he wears sleep like a cape, and Minhyun knows this is around the time he has his afternoon naps.

“Did I wake you up?” The words are supposed to invoke warmth, but they’re cold, and clipped, as if Minhyun is forcing them out of the shell of his mouth just because it’s their routine. Jonghyun’s eyes flash with hurt, and Minhyun gnashes his teeth together, just to keep himself from apologizing. If he started, he’d never stop; the last thing he needs is for Jonghyun to think Minhyun is doing anything but worse.

“I was going to wake up in a few minutes, anyway.” Jonghyun detaches himself from the frame, and stretches his arms above his head, movements as languid as a cat’s. “I wanted to cook you something for dinner.”

“Cook something for yourself. I’m not hungry.”

“Minhyun, you haven’t eaten anything since yesterday,” Jonghyun points out, a frown marring his pretty lips.

“Who’s to say I don’t eat outside?” Minhyun talks back. “Who’s to say I just don’t want to eat with you?”

Genuine hurt springs in Jonghyun’s expression. Minhyun feels his heart sink onto the floor of his stomach, but forces himself to keep the venom in his eyes; the more Jonghyun realizes he can’t give Minhyun back what he’s lost, the easier it will be for Jonghyun to abandon him.

Painting himself as the villain in this situation will be better for the both of them in the long term, even if Minhyun hates himself all the more for it; but, he can’t be the person Jonghyun wants him to be, and to make Jonghyun unhappy (in the long run) is the furthest thing from whatever it is that Minhyun aspires to do in his lifetime.

“Okay,” Jonghyun says, and his smile is sad, but resigned; as if he knows exactly what’s going on Minhyun’s head, yet, continues to accept it for what it is. Minhyun wishes he knew what to do to make Jonghyun hate him, because no matter how many times he’s hurt Jonghyun by now, Jonghyun looks at him with the same, tender eyes as he had years ago; he still loves Minhyun, even when Minhyun himself desperately wants him to act otherwise. “I’ll just make something, just in case you get hungry later, okay?”

Why are you still so kind to me? Minhyun wants to shout; he wants the world to know of his sorrow, just as it had caused him the despair he experiences, now. I don’t deserve this—I’ve been trying to push you away, so why haven’t you left me?

The words burn his tongue, and he fits his feet back into his sandals, barely registering the twinge of pain in his leg, too busy averting his eyes from Jonghyun’s imploring stare. “Do whatever you want. I’m going out again.”

“Alright—be careful, and don’t stay out too late.”

Minhyun shuts the door behind him with a slam.

    Vermont is five hours—nearly six—from New York, and they leave shortly after getting their fill of food. Considering the letter they’d gotten and the clue that needs solving, they haven’t got any time to waste; the both of them can agree with that enough, and Minhyun stuffs the both of them enough snacks to last them during the trip in a paper bag, along with toothbrushes, vitamins, and packs of instant tea. (Seongwoo wanted coffee instead, but Minhyun thought it was an atrocity that he would’ve preferred that over tea; for some reason, Seongwoo relented, even if drinking tea makes him sleepy—it shouldn’t, by the way, considering tea itself is caffeine.)

“Who are we visiting anyway?” Seongwoo drives Minhyun’s car, keenly listening to the directions voiced by the robotic female voice of their navigator.

“I’ll tell you when we get there,” answers Minhyun, cryptically, and he stuffs another grape into his mouth. “Want some?” Seongwoo nods, and Minhyun places a piece in front of his shut lips. “Open up.”

He tries not to get distracted when Minhyun brushes his finger against the skin of his lips, how if he’d closed his mouth just one second too early he would’ve caught said finger in his mouth, instead of just the grape. The fruit bursts with flavor on his tongue after a single bite, and Seongwoo lets the sour sweetness distract him. (But not too much, considering he’s driving.)

“Don’t you want to turn on the music or something?” The detective asks after hours of driving with only accompaniment from the rustling of paper bags and their labored breathing. “Turn something on. Anything. I can already imagine your music taste, by the way—do you listen to modern songs, or are you stuck in the 40s? Or maybe you’re a Mozart type of guy?”

“I listen to anything that fits my taste,” Minhyun responds, flatly. He plugs in the AUX cord into his phone, and within moments, has Sufjan Stevens playing through the car speakers. The first few notes of Blue Bucket of Gold begin to play.

Seongwoo makes a face. “Indie folk. Why am I not surprised—the song makes me sleepy, by the way.”

“Don’t fall asleep just yet.” Minhyun shoots him a stern glare. “Fine, I’ll change it to something more upbeat so you won’t get sleepy,” and then, he adds under his breath, “weak.”

A popular trot song begins to play, next, and it reminds Seongwoo of what his mother would listen to while she was alive; during Sunday mornings, to be more specific, whenever she’d invite her old friends and they’d gaggle as if they were school girls in their lawn, listening to old songs and dancing like the middle aged women they were. “…This song? Really.”

“Stop complaining.” Minhyun punches Seongwoo’s shoulder, just lightly enough for him to feel it, but not hard enough to contain legitimate force behind it. Seongwoo exaggerates a moan (of pain), to Minhyun’s confusion. “What are you even doing.”

“Making things exciting, duh,” Seongwoo says, matter-of-factly. “I hope we’re almost there. I need to take a piss.”

Suddenly, Minhyun looks like he’d been forced to swallow something particularly sour. “I did not need to know that.”

“Now you do, anyway.” Seongwoo laughs; “Okay, sorry. That was gross, wasn’t it?”

“… Nothing new, now that I think about it.” For a brief moment, Seongwoo contemplates if he should stop the car just to give Minhyun a pout. “We’re almost there, though.”

The car is starting to smell like stale chips and fruit (an unpleasant combination), so Seongwoo does a little cheer, evidently pleased. “Okay! To Vermont we go.”

Four songs later (all of them still in the spectrum of trot), the robotic female voice announces, “we have arrived at your destination.” Their ‘destination’ is a suburban neighbourhood, where the houses’ exterior look as if they’re the same; white picket fences, spacious, clear lawns littered with gnomes and the occasional pool, the smell of barbeque wafting through the air. Seongwoo drives slowly, listening to Minhyun’s instruction as they pass, house by house, until they finally come to a stop in front of the house at the very edge of the neighbourhood, nearly obscured by a collection of forests and greenery. The difference between this house and the others is that it’s bigger, the lawn wide enough to have a manmade lake instead of a swimming pool; unlike the others, too, the house is a single story, but sights can be deceptive. For all you’d know, the house might extend, almost worryingly, to the back.

“Sweet place.” Seongwoo whistles. “A friend of yours, I’m guessing?”

For some reason, Minhyun’s face twists into a grimace. “Something like that.”

Outside, the weather is warm, and Seongwoo can hear crickets and cicadas from a distance; a clear summer’s night, where the sky has stars coming out of their recluse, the moon a pale grey, hued by a darker shade of yellow. Their steps make a crunching noise, a few dried leaves that’d fallen from the trees littering their path.

The both of them remain in front of the door, still, until Minhyun rings the doorbell.

“Just a second!” Someone shouts from inside, and a few moments later, the door’s lock clicks; it’s pulled open, and the light from inside the house bleeds out to the dark shadows outside.

As the door is pulled open completely, Seongwoo is able to gain a complete view of the man who’d opened the door for them—and it feels like a sort of déjà vu, because he has seen this face before, hasn’t he? He wouldn’t forget eyes like those, though—explicably sad, with a light that makes it look like someone plucked the stars, one by one from the night sky, shrunk them, and glued them inside the man’s eyes. The child that rests on his hip is unfamiliar, though (although it—for Seongwoo isn’t sure if it’s a boy or a girl—bears a striking resemblance to the adult carrying him, with the same thin lips of the same shape, and a similar facial structure), and young enough to be carried around, it seems; the man is using both of his hands to carry the child, fingers interlocked underneath the black-haired child’s bottom. “Can I help—Minhyun?”

Like the domino effect, when if one falls the others would soon follow, the pieces begin to make sense in Seongwoo’s mind; one after another, until they create a startling realization. This is the man he’d used to coerce Minhyun into helping him. The same Minhyun who stands behind him, eerily still, as if he’s a delicately crafted figure, beautiful and humanlike, but manmade enough to be made of stone; unmoving, silent even when prompted. Once Minhyun regains his wits, however, he moves stiffly, as if the body he’s using right now isn’t even his own.

“Hello, Jonghyun. It’s been a while,” his voice is carried by the wind, fleeting as a hushed whisper. If Seongwoo hadn’t been standing next to him, he would’ve thought he’d imagined the words, if at all; “I… This isn’t a social visit. There are a few things I need your help with.”

Jonghyun looks at Minhyun with a certain reverence that has Seongwoo feeling as if he’s intruding on a moment, and for some reason, the realization of it makes Seongwoo’s fists clench. “Okay. Come on, but, Minhyun? There are things I’d like to ask you, too,” he pleads (fucking pleads, of all things), and the grape Seongwoo ate threatens to rise up from his stomach, and into a pile of bile.

By a considerable degree, the inside of Jonghyun’s house is colder than the outside, thanks to the functioning air conditioners inside. The man of the house leads them from the foyer, to the dining room, and lastly, to his study; decorated with pictures of him and his family (the man himself, his child—his daughter, Seongwoo hastily corrects himself upon seeing a picture of her in a pretty white dress—and a woman with a radiant smile, who Seongwoo assumes is his wife) as well as little trinkets, like the postcards from Paris, or Rome, signifying wherever he’d visited before.

“Daddy has to talk to his friends. Could you wait outside, please?” Jonghyun’s going down on one knee to match his daughter’s height, who can stand alone on her own, though seems to be attached to her father’s leg, seeing how she keeps poking and prodding his knees. “It won’t be too long, and mom’s coming home soon.”

“Okay,” she mumbles, reluctant as she slips from her father’s grasp and outside. Jonghyun closes the door for her, and takes a moment to breathe, before he returns to face them; standing tall, although (and this, Seongwoo thinks pettily) still not as tall as neither him nor Minhyun, even at full height.

“Have a seat.” He gestures at the leather couch, and Seongwoo doesn’t need to be told twice. Minhyun apparently does, though, because Jonghyun repeats (softer this time, for a reason Seongwoo can’t fathom), “Minhyun, sit down, please.” Minhyun sits, next to Seongwoo, with dazed movements that don’t seem like Minhyun’s at all.

Struck with an unfamiliar tug in his gut, Seongwoo does what he thinks would be the best remedy for this situation, which, according to his brain, is apparently placing a comforting hand on Minhyun’s knee. Jonghyun seems to notice, eyeing it for a moment, but shakes his head, and plasters on a smile. It doesn’t reach his sad eyes. Minhyun, on the other hand, doesn’t move nor does he push away Seongwoo’s hand; this makes Seongwoo feel glad, yet for another reason he doesn’t understand.

“What did you need help with?”

A flick seems to have been switched, because Minhyun jolts back in existence, and regains the steel in his eyes. He still hasn’t pushed away Seongwoo, though Seongwoo wonders if Minhyun had been caught too unawares he hasn’t had the thought to do something about the hand occupying his knee. “Do you still steal?”

“… Yes,” Jonghyun answers, wary. “Why?”

“Has anyone been talking about the jewel thieveries? Or, perhaps the one that occurred in Italy, just a few days ago?”

“Ah!” Jonghyun snaps his fingers in recognition. “I know something about it, maybe. Why do you ask?”

“Do you know who it is?” Seongwoo asks, bluntly, much to Jonghyun’s evident amusement; the wry quirk of his mouth, the way his eyes crinkle as he smiles.

“No, unfortunately, I do not.” He actually sounds apologetic, and that makes Seongwoo feel more awkward than anything.

“Then, do you know any jewels that fit the description a siren, and its jewels?” Seongwoo prompts, once more, too stubborn to return from Vermont empty handed.

Recognition sparks in Jonghyun’s eyes. “I think I know what jewel you’re talking about—it’s the Wailing Ruby, if I’m not mistaken. You’ve heard of it, haven’t you, Minhyun?” There’s familiarity with the way Jonghyun says Minhyun’s name, a familiarity that Seongwoo dislikes; which is odd, because Jonghyun hasn’t done anything to ire him, yet Seongwoo has been disliking him anyway, feeling almost uneasy.

Minhyun’s jaw clenches, and unclenches, before he answers (as soft as a murmur), “I do.”

“’I do.’ It’s been a while since I heard the words coming out of your mouth,” although the words are light, Jonghyun’s voice sounds pained as he says this; the rueful smile Minhyun has clinging to the skin of his mouth doesn’t help, either.

“Whoa, whoa. What?” Seongwoo splutters, and looks between the both of them with suspicion. “Did I hear something wrong, or were you guys married!?”

“Seongwoo… please don’t tell me you didn’t know,” Minhyun says, giving a look to Seongwoo that shouts, I can’t believe you’re this stupid. When Seongwoo doesn’t say anything, instead going slack jawed, and gaping at the both of them like a fish, he says again, “I thought you would’ve at least done some research.”

“I didn’t!” Seongwoo yelps, and rests both of his hands on the top of his head, like he’s just had the most startling revelation (and he really had); “God, I can’t believe—the both of you? Married?”

“Is it so hard to believe?” Jonghyun asks, looking between him and Minhyun oddly.

“Well… It explains why you didn’t hesitate to help us.” Now that Seongwoo’s forced to think about it (though he tries not to think about it too hard, lest he starts conjuring images of Hwang Minhyun is full wedding attire, his figure on the top of a wedding cake that’s probably nauseating to eat), he and Minhyun don’t look too shabby together; but even that realization is clipped and reluctant, and he won’t let the words escape from his mouth, for even the taste of them on his tongue makes the foreign feeling return. “But you have a kid now! And who’s she?” Seongwoo points accusingly at the family picture that hangs over the study’s fireplace.

“We got a divorce,” Minhyun bites out.

“I’ve remarried,” Jonghyun finishes, holding up his hand, and Seongwoo can see the band of the wedding ring on his finger.

Like the tactless man he is, Seongwoo asks, “I—but, why?”

“Do you want me to tell him?” Jonghyun asks, to Minhyun, looking at him like the two of them are the only ones in the room.

“He’d just pester me if you didn’t,” Minhyun responds, “and I’m sure he’d be able to pester me until the day we both died.”

Jonghyun laughs, the sound rough, yet at the same time, soft; a paradox, really. “Minhyun and I met when we were sixteen. I came from an orphanage, but he wasn’t too far off; so we ran away together, and we stuck together ever since. That’s how the both of us came to stealing—but you were always better at it than I was.” Tough load of luck it did Minhyun, though. “We got married eventually; you know, how you spend so much time with someone, you start figuring you’re going to end up with them your whole life too? That’s what we a—were. I was stuck with you for so long I started to wonder if I might as well be stuck with you forever,” he says, nostalgia creeping into his words. “But… life happened. And we divorced.”

“Yeah, like you could say that in a court. ‘Why are you getting a divorce?’, ‘Well, your honor, life happened so I’m breaking off this sacred ritual… thing called marriage.’” Seongwoo snorts.

To his credit, Jonghyun laughs, because he has a sense of humor, it seems. “I don’t think that part of the story is my place to tell.”

“It’s as much as your place to tell as it is mine,” Minhyun finally speaks up, sounding frustrated enough that Seongwoo, against his own thoughts, begins to circle his thumb on Minhyun’s knees in what he deems as a calming gesture. “Considering you were the one who gave me the divorce papers over breakfast.”

“I did that because of you. You weren’t happy with me anymore, and you kept pushing me away—do you think I didn’t see all the pamphlets you threw out? I took out the trash, you know, during that time.”

“I know.” Minhyun smiles, but it isn’t a nice smile; he smiles as if he’s swallowing the sharp edge of broken glass. “You explained it well in your letters.”

Jonghyun’s breath catches in his throat. “You read them?”

“… Surprised?”

“You never wrote back, so I thought—I thought you threw them away. Or that I got the address wrong, but I always figured it was the former, rather than the latter,” admits Jonghyun.

“No, the only thing from you I threw away was the wedding invitation.” Minhyun waves him off, ignoring the look of hurt from Jonghyun. “Don’t look at me like that. You don’t know—you would never know how that feels. Not until it happens to you, but congratulations, I don’t think that’ll ever happen.”

“Really? I’m not so sure about that.” Jonghyun looks at Seongwoo’s hand on Minhyun’s knee, and it might be the trick of the light, but there could’ve been a brief spark of detest there; whatever it was, though, he looks regretful that he’d even thought of that, considering the apologetic smile he gives to Seongwoo, who returns it with a confused, shaky one of his own.

“What do you even mean?” Minhyun asks.

“… Don’t tell me neither of you have figured it out,” Jonghyun mutters, almost scandalized, at the way neither Minhyun nor Seongwoo say a word; the only thing the both of them are sure of is of their matching sense of confusion. “I won’t say it. It’ll be more fun that way, though I have to say, this is surprising, coming from you, Minhyun.”

“Just say it,” Minhyun snaps, and Jonghyun chuckles.

“I stand by my words—I won’t. You’ll figure it out soon, anyway.” He winks at Seongwoo with a good-natured smile, further deepening Seongwoo into the pool of his own puzzlement. Then, Jonghyun looks at the time, and considerably pales. “I have to cook dinner for my daughter now—her mom’s away on a business trip, but the both of you are welcomed to stay for dinner, if you’d like.”

Although Seongwoo is desperate to eat something rather than grapes, something in him tells him to not say anything, because this should be Minhyun’s choice to make.

“It��s okay. We’ll eat on the road instead,” Minhyun figures. “It’s a long way from Vermont to New York.”

Jonghyun hums. “If you say so—but, Minhyun?”

“Yes?”

“Don’t be a stranger,” Jonghyun says, “and come over for a Christmas dinner with my family. Please. Invite him, too, if you’d like.” He gives a pointed look at Seongwoo, who still hasn’t taken away his hand from Minhyun’s thigh; he’d forgotten to do so sometime along the way, and besides, this feels comfortable, somehow—even familiar.

In the naked eye, Minhyun would sound normal, even cold while answering; but Seongwoo can tell the slightest shake of Minhyun’s shoulder that comes, not from the cold, but from the swirl of his own emotions. “I’ll think about it.”

    As the wave of fatigue of a flight from Italy to New York, almost immediately followed by a drive from New York to Vermont, sweep over Seongwoo and Minhyun not unlike the rough tides of the sea, Seongwoo pulls up at a five-star hotel shortly after their visit to Jonghyun's that wasn't purely social, but purely professional either, and books the last available room for the night; a presidential suite is their last available unit, but Seongwoo can easily afford it, so he snatches the room keys out of the air—even if the bellman looks at them oddly for their choice of clothing, standing out almost completely against the backdrop of suits and dresses paired with very high heels. (This, Seongwoo figures, is the effect of the hotel rarely getting visitors of the trust fund babies' caliber.)

"I'm going to take a nice, long bath," Seongwoo says to Minhyun in the elevator, just as the other swipes their card over the detector and presses the button to the top floor. "And then sleep until oblivion. I don't know. Fuck, I'm just exhausted."

"You and me both," empathizes Minhyun, leaning against the wall of the elevator with a sigh. "We don't even have any fresh clothes, though. What are we supposed to wear?"

"Each other's clothes?" Seongwoo's attempt at humor does not go appreciated. "Geez, sorry. I don't know, I think I'll sleep in my underwear. That should be fine, right? None of us have raging hormones anymore or whatever, although I know it'll be hard to control yourself, especially considering my specimen—"

"You could sleep butt naked, for all I care," Minhyun cuts the middle of Seongwoo's sentence, ignoring Seongwoo's exaggerated gasp. "Do whatever you want. It's just me, isn't it?"

It's just me. The words don't feel... right, like there's something missing, but Seongwoo doesn't know what to protest with; 'don't say that because it doesn't feel right, even if I don't know why it doesn't feel right?' Not very likely.

The elevator dings as it comes to a stop on their floor, and the hallways smell of scented candles, with the aroma meant to help someone relax. They walk through the carpeted floor, no luggage in tow, and stop their walk in front of the entrance of their room. Minhyun lets the car key to sit on the sensor, and the door slides open; when they enter, the both of them are too tired to inspect the room, yet, the both of them are so used to luxury that when they look down and see that the tiles are made of fine marble, neither take their time to gawk.

"I call dibs on the master bathroom!" Seongwoo shouts, already running across the living room to open the door to the biggest bedroom. The interior is startlingly modern, the bed a king size that could fit even three grown men, and the bathroom has a tub big enough to fit two people comfortably. Hell, even the shower has buttons that Seongwoo isn't familiar with, and that's saying something. "I'm gonna take a shower," he informs Minhyun, though whether the other can hear it or not, he's not completely sure. Locking the bathroom door, he strips away his clothes, letting them pool to the floor before hanging them; wouldn't be any good for them to get wet, considering he has to wear these clothes tomorrow, too.

The water, warm enough to relax his muscles but not warm enough to turn his skin raw red, fills the tub within a matter of minutes. Once Seongwoo deems it enough, he turns off the tap, and sticks his feet inside the tub, testing the temperature; satisfied, he submerges inside the bathtub, and lies down until most of his body is inside the water, even the upper parts of his neck. He hasn’t had a relaxing bath in a while, too busy with the case, and Minhyun’s en suite bathroom in the hospital offers a shower cubicle that’s barely big enough to move around in.

He doesn’t bathe for too long, however, because his stomach begins to rumble half an hour into his soak. So, Seongwoo steps out of the tub, and drains the water—by the time he slides on a towel around himself, some of the water has already dripped to the floor, but it’ll dry fairly quickly, that he does know. The hotel provides peppermint toothpaste, and while it’s not as good as the brand he usually uses, Seongwoo brushes his teeth, still, and puts on his boxers—thankfully black, because would Minhyun let him live it down if he went to bed with heart-patterned boxes? (No. That’s the answer.) Thankfully, the hotel has a bathrobe hanging in the bathroom, so he slides it around his form, tying it around the curve of his waist; revealing his broad chest, but then again, it's not like he's committing public indecency.

As soon as he steps out of the bathroom, he can hear the sound of the television from the living room, playing a re-run of a popular, old school soap opera. Minhyun, the type to watch soap operas, apparently.

"Are you hungry?" Seongwoo says as soon as he comes in the living room, and sees Minhyun splayed down on the couch, still wearing the same clothes he'd been wearing earlier. He hasn't taken a bath, apparently. "I'm going to order room service."

"Choose something for me," Minhyun calls after him, as Seongwoo heads towards the telephone in the room. His eyes are transfixed by the drama unveiling on the television, and instead of finding it funny, Seongwoo finds it endearing; in his defense, who would've thought a whole grown man would enjoy a soap opera so whole heartedly?

After taking a look at the menu, Seongwoo orders the both of them burgers (a double cheeseburger for him and a beef burger for Minhyun) and drinks; the food isn't arriving any time soon, though, so Seongwoo shoves Minhyun's legs from the spot he could use to sit on the couch successfully.

"What's the story?" He asks Minhyun, who still hasn't tore his eyes away from the television.

"I think she found out her boyfriend was her long lost brother," Minhyun mutters, although his voice has a bite to it, like he wants to tell Seongwoo to shut up and watch it for himself.

"Damn." Seongwoo whistles. "Hey, are you going to shower any time soon?"

"I don't know, why?"

"Nothing! I just think it'll be more comfortable for you if you shower before you eat, you know," Seongwoo says, shrugging at the end of his words. Minhyun looks away from the television, resting his eyes on Seongwoo—for some reason, the tips of his ears suddenly turn bright red, and Seongwoo wonders why until he finally realizes exactly where it is that Minhyun’s looking at; Seongwoo’s revealed chest, and in any other occasions, Seongwoo would cross his arms together, or maybe tug the bathrobe closer to him. But, if it’s Minhyun watching him, oddly, Seongwoo is content letting the other just… look at him like this.

Minhyun shakes his head suddenly, like he’s trying to shake away his own thoughts. “I think I could really use that shower,” he mutters, suddenly, and walks away from the living room to the other bedroom—that also has an en suite bathroom—like he has something hot on his trails. A few minutes later, Seongwoo can hear the sound of the water turning, and he suddenly realizes he’s still staring at the empty spot Minhyun had been earlier; thinking little of it, he takes the remote, and changes it to the news.

The report is, as per usual, something about the president, having done some stupid shit that Seongwoo doesn’t even keep track of anymore. Detaching himself from the state of reality, the sound of people talking from the television becomes a small hum in his ears, and Seongwoo begins to think; not about the thief, not about Park Jihoon, not about Jaehwan’s possible involvement—instead, he thinks about Minhyun, how he hadn’t pushed him away when Seongwoo had a hand on his knee, how he’d blushed when he looked at Seongwoo’s exposed chest, how Seongwoo found it impossible to hate Minhyun, no matter how much he ached to, just to spare himself from the guilt that haunts him even in his nightmares, sometimes. There’s something there, something big, that the world can see, but not Seongwoo; Jonghyun’s seen it, and thinking back to his video call with Jaehwan, he reckons Jaehwan must’ve sniffed it, too—but what is it? What is he missing, the lost variable he’s overlooked in the equation that is him and Minhyun?

Is it attachment? (Of course it is, for there’s no way he would’ve bothered to stay by Minhyun’s side during his period of recovery if he didn’t give a damn about him.)

Is it guilt? (If that was the case, he would’ve seen it coming from a mile away—not that this is the only thing he feels when he looks at Minhyun, but the most obvious thing, Seongwoo figures, wbat he must be feeling to some degree, is the guilt.)

Or maybe—and isn’t this a wild thought—is it love?

He’s admitted, from the very beginning, it feels, that Minhyun is attractive. It’s not as if admitting that is detestable, because just like water is wet, the grass is green, and Seongwoo is handsome, Minhyun is that—attractive. Handsome. Whatever else adjectives you’d might use to describe him. So, maybe Seongwoo likes the way Minhyun’s eyes slants up whenever he’s smiling, just as he still finds it attractive whenever Minhyun frowns—it makes him look even more appealing, for some reason?—even if his laughter is more beautiful than his scowl. Superficiality aside, however, Seongwoo can easily find himself being more relaxed in Minhyun’s company, something he hasn’t found in many souls, except maybe Jaehwan, but thinking about Jaehwan in a romantic way feels all sorts of wrong and gross—he doesn’t get that same feeling of nausea when he considers this about Minhyun. Now that he thinks about it, the only time he’s ever felt sick, in an odd, tug pulling kind of way, with Minhyun around was whenever Jonghyun was there, and when he’d realized that the both of them used to be lovers (even the thought of that word, coupled with images of Minhyun and Jonghyun together makes him feel sick), and he could never place that feeling before, but if he thinks on it—thinks really, really hard on it—maybe it could be jealousy?

All of Seongwoo’s past experiences with love, or lust, or anything along those lines, have been limited to intoxicated one night stands and short, summer flings. Or friends with benefits, something along the lines of what Daniel was to him. Like a flame, every experience Seongwoo’s ever had with love, was fleeting; it burned quickly, passionately, yet just as quickly as it was ignited, it’d burn out. He would mess something up, or maybe he’d just lose interest, and let it rot; but with Minhyun, is it this way, too? Whenever Seongwoo would find himself realizing his enamor with someone, there wouldn’t be a flicker of doubt as to what to do next—he’d go for it, emerge with a new love story that’d close almost as soon as it’d opened. But, when faced with the realization regarding Minhyun, all he feels is that he’s scared.

Scared, because he doesn’t want to do something that might ruin whatever remnants of friendship he has with Minhyun. Scared, because he doesn’t want Minhyun to end up like one of his exes; never contacting him after their end, always looking upon him with resentment. If anything ever happens between him and Minhyun, Seongwoo wouldn’t want Minhyun to be like one of his old flames—he’d want Minhyun to be something more, someone who he’d be able to open up to, completely, to show even the skeletons that remain in his closet; all the bad things he’d done before his redemption, all the wrongs that still, even until now, outweigh the good he has done.

It hits him, like a douse of ice cold water to the head, that he isn’t infatuated with Minhyun, or the idea of Minhyun—and nor is he simply attracted to Minhyun, although he would admit that maybe, from the beginning, he has been attracted to him. It runs deeper than that, courses through more rivers than the simple state that leaves him besotted.

He is in love with Hwang Minhyun, and there’s nothing he can do to stop it.

    Once the food arrives, the both of them eat it together, in silence and in matching hotel bathrobes. Seongwoo, too stunned with his realization, doesn’t strike conversation; Minhyun, who notices the oddity in Seongwoo’s demeanor (judging by the worried looks he continues to send Seongwoo, that’s a telling fact that he’s aware of the uncharacteristic tense silence on his part), continues to eat, pausing to look up from his food just to stare—longer than what Seongwoo is comfortable with—at Seongwoo, who eats like he’s picking on his food; on regular occasions, he’d scarf it down.

“Is everything alright?” Minhyun asks, eventually, when he can’t stand the thick, almost choking, silence that makes even dinner seem like a worrying activity. “Don’t bullshit me, by the way. I can see through your bullshit.”

“It’s…” What Seongwoo really wants to say is ‘nothing’, but he believes Minhyun when he said he could see through Seongwoo’s veiled lies, so instead, he opts for the truth. The half-truth, at least. “Something I’ll get over soon. The food’s pretty good, isn’t it?”

“You’re terrible at changing the subject,” Minhyun says, bluntly. “Seongwoo. What’s wrong? Did I do something to make you feel uncomfortable?”

Technically, Minhyun did everything to make Seongwoo feel discomfort, but if he admitted it now, then he’d have to tell Minhyun the whole truth—and is he ready for that? No, not at all. Maybe he needs a drink or two before he’d gather the courage to do something about his newly realized feelings.

“You really don’t need to concern yourself with it,” Seongwoo says, running his thumb over the top bun of his burger. “I’ll be fine in no time.”

“You’re right, I don’t need to concern myself with it.” Minhyun puts his half-eaten food back into his plate. “But I want to concern myself, so, tell me what’s wrong.”

“Like I’ve said before, you don’t need to worry about it—”

“It has something to do with me, doesn’t it?” Minhyun interrupts him, hard brown eyes narrowing. “Was it something Jonghyun said? Wait, no, that wouldn’t make sense. You were fine until earlier, even when we were in the car—did I shower too long? Do you want the bedroom I’m using instead?”

Admittedly, Seongwoo would rather share Minhyun’s bedroom with him, but that’s really not what he’s supposed to say now, is it? “Forget it, okay? Just… stop and forget it,” Seongwoo says, at last, and focuses himself on the task of finishing his burger instead of meeting Minhyun’s prodding gaze. He can feel Minhyun’s eyes are on him, still, like pinpricks needling through the shell of his skin.

    Going into Minhyun’s room to ask for a charger in the middle of the night was a bad idea, and if Seongwoo had known what would’ve been waiting for him the moment he stepped inside the room, he’d rather have his phone die rather than be faced with the sight of Hwang Minhyun in nothing but his Calvin Klein boxers. Give him a phone that will die in the middle of his ride home, or basically anything else, but that; because he can’t hide the way his throat goes dry, and how the heat creeps into the flesh of his neck, climbing steadily until it reaches his cheeks.

“Uh,” he says, remaining to stand still by the entrance.

Minhyun’s eyes widen, realizing his clothing (or lack thereof), and promptly throws a blanket on top of him. Seongwoo appreciates the effort, but it doesn’t really help, knowing that he’s seen almost every inch of Minhyun’s skin. “Sorry, I didn’t hear you come in.”

“It’s okay,” Seongwoo squeaks, and nearly stumbles on his own words. “Can I borrow your charger?”

“Yeah, wait.” Minhyun bends his back to retrieve the charger from the inside of his bag, the blanket falling down to his lap, and Seongwoo tries not to look at his stomach, or his arms, littered with scars and yet, none of it matters—thankfully, before his thoughts advance, Minhyun has taken his charger from his back and throws it Seongwoo’s way.

Seongwoo retrieves it mid-air. “Thanks.” He runs out of the room, across the hall, and with shaking hands, closes the door to his bedroom, trying so that it won’t close with a slam, no matter how much he wants to slam it and lean against the door, maybe slide down on it like he’s the star of some sappy Disney movie.

He doesn’t waste any time in climbing on the top of his vast bed, laying on his back, eyes staring up at the roof with barely any amount of focus. No matter how many times he tries to channel his thoughts into something like Jaehwan’s psychotic laughter or his mother’s trot parties, in the end, he keeps conjuring the image of shirtless Minhyun, leaning against his bed, and it’s distracting enough that whenever he tries to close his eyes and go to sleep, he tosses and turns, unable to find any remnant of peace.

Eventually, he gets up and pads to the bathroom, and attempts to take a shower with the coldest setting of water he can turn the water to, but it barely helps—only leaves him shivering from the cold, so he dries himself up, throws the towel away to the floor (he could always get that later), and flops onto the bed, long arms falling limp at his sides. “Am I really going to do this,” Seongwoo says to himself, bottom lip caught with his teeth; and apparently, seeing as he isn’t able to get Minhyun out of his head and tossing and turning in a useless attempt to sleep isn’t helping, he is.

It doesn’t take much to get himself hard. It’s been a while since he last did this (months, maybe?), too often being swamped with his own work and other people’s company that Seongwoo hasn’t had the time to focus on himself fully. He’s sensitive, too, and every stroke on his hand makes him feel like his nerves are set ablaze. (The image of Minhyun is really helping too, but, you didn’t hear that from him.)

Soft, hushed pants puff out of his lips, and Seongwoo bites down on his tongue to stop himself from being loud. He doesn’t know how thick, or thin, the walls are, and he’d rather play it safe; the last thing he needs right now is for Minhyun to barge in and see Seongwoo touching himself, eyes screwed shut, parted lips mouthing Minhyun’s name.

God, he’s a terrible person.

Seongwoo doesn’t go too fast, instead going slow enough to draw it out; he focuses on every sensation, grazing his hand up and down his cock, using his thumb to circle the head. His heels press into the cold comforter, and his hips jerk with every inch of his movements.

He isn’t thinking much now, finding that he would rather focus on the thought of how good he’s feeling, and how much better it’ll feel when he comes undone. Seongwoo is bound to have less restless energy after this, too, and maybe, he’ll finally be able to get some momentary peace in his head, just enough for him to rest.

(The door creaks open. But Seongwoo, too busy hearing the blood pound in his ears, doesn’t notice.)

“Seongwoo, I think I have to get my char— charger.”

It’s as if this was a movie (or maybe just a really, really badly shot amateur porn video), and someone hit the pause button; Seongwoo sees, from the haze that clouds his vision, Minhyun stopping shortly before the entrance to Seongwoo’s room, already pushed open without his notice. How the other has covered up with the same bathrobe he’d used to eat dinner with Seongwoo earlier, how his grip on the doorknob is white, how much red taints Minhyun’s pale, handsome face.

“Sorry,” Minhyun says, his voice coming out like something is strangling his vocal chords. “Fuck, I’m really sorry—I should’ve knocked,” the apologies stammer out of him, and Minhyun turns his back around, sharply, forgetting about his charger even when it rests on the table right next to the door. “I’ll just… just—”

“You can stay, if you want,” Seongwoo says, boldly. Maybe it’s the arousal that’s causing him to think with his dick instead of his brain. After all, his rational thought is currently shouting obscenities at him, but Seongwoo can’t bring himself to care just yet; he’ll regret this, undoubtedly, in the morning.

Judging by how the red that seems to seep out of Minhyun’s neck darkens, he understands the connotations hidden behind it. Seongwoo expects a scathing remark, something mean enough to either kill his boner completely or do the opposite; what he doesn’t expect is for Minhyun to turn on his feet, and, looking at Seongwoo dead in the eye, says, “Fine.”

Minhyun closes the door behind him, letting it fall shut with a click. With every step he takes, getting closer towards Seongwoo’s naked form on the bed, Seongwoo feels his heartbeat quicken, to the point he’s resorted to pinching himself in the arm just to see if this is a twisted wet dream. Even as he adds pressure onto his pinches, however, the scenery doesn’t change, and he never finds himself waking up with sweat trailing down his face. This must be the real deal, then, and somehow, that’s even more daunting than a dream. His thoughts go to a pause when Minhyun sits down on the bed, face pinched as if he’s not sure on how to proceed in this situation he’d dug for the both of them.

Seongwoo props himself on his elbows, and, after receiving a small, barely noticeable nod from Minhyun, leans his hand forward to undo the tie of Minhyun’s bathrobe, leaving the other to take it off, and put the discarded piece of clothing down to the floor, joining Seongwoo’s towel from earlier. Seongwoo memorizes every piece of Minhyun’s skin, every freckle, every scar of it; he lets the image sink into his head, knowing that this might very well be the first and only time this might happen—and Seongwoo knows he should be fighting, or doing something, to make sure this won’t end up as a mistake for the both of them; but at the end of the day, Minhyun strikes him where he’s the weakest, and he’s rendered at a loss for action, unable to even put up a fight. (And, to be honest? He doesn’t want to.)

“Are you going to regret this?” He’s moved closer to Minhyun now, and breathe the word against Minhyun’s shut lips, pink and plump. His hands have found their way to Minhyun’s chin, cupping it, thumb tracing the outline of Minhyun’s jaw.

“No,” Minhyun murmurs, breath tickling Seongwoo’s skin. He buries his head on the crook of Seongwoo’s neck and trails slow, lazy kisses, down to Seongwoo’s collarbone.

“What are we?” Seongwoo finds himself asking, trying to at least attempt that—because he doesn’t know if Minhyun feels for him the same way he feels for Minhyun, or if he’s just an outlet for Minhyun’s pent up stress release—before he lets himself melt into Minhyun’s cold, steady hold.

“We’ll figure it out in the morning,” Minhyun says, actually sounding slightly annoyed by Seongwoo’s continued questioning. “Just be quiet and let me kiss you, okay?”

“Okay.”

    As the sun soaks through the pale yellow curtain, Seongwoo finds his vision doused with light, red spots popping up amidst the black vision that curtains his eyes when he closes them. With a soft groan, he blinks his eyes open, blinking once more the get the gunk out of his eyes. There’s a weight on his left arm, and when he glances down, he finds Minhyun asleep, head snugly placed on Seongwoo’s bicep.

And, yeah, Seongwoo feels the ache on his arm now, but at the same time he’s sure removing his hand would wake Minhyun up; there’s something so peaceful on Minhyun’s face as he sleeps, however, that keeps Seongwoo from thinking about his own comfort over the other’s.

He inspects the way Minhyun’s eyelids flutter against his cheeks, chest rising and falling as he takes short, quick breaths. Seongwoo doesn’t know if he’s ever going to see this again in his life, so he takes his time to look at Minhyun, to paint the picture that paints the differences between the almost childlike tranquility of his features when in sleep, to the cold stoicism he wears like a mask when he’s awake. Minhyun isn’t just pretty, like how Seongwoo had described him in his head before; Minhyun is beautiful, maybe the most beautiful person Seongwoo has ever seen (including his own reflection in the mirror), and Seongwoo doesn’t know why it’d taken him so long to figure it out.

“Seongwoo?” Minhyun mumbles, suddenly, voice rough and slightly gravelly; the after-effect of deep sleep. He opens his eyes, blinks to adjust himself to the light, and finds Seongwoo giving him a small, sleepy grin. “What”—he yawns—“What time is it?”

“Half past eight, I think.” Seongwoo reads off the digital clock, squinting to make out the blue digits. “Do you want to get breakfast?”

“Yeah. That’d be nice. I’m going to shower first, though.” Minhyun whiffs Seongwoo’s arm, and his nose crinkles. “You should, too.”

“We could save water and shower together,” Seongwoo says solemnly.

Minhyun chuckles softly, and detaches himself from Seongwoo’s grasp, sitting up on the mattress. “Don’t push your luck.” He pats Seongwoo’s chest twice before he leaves for the bathroom in his own room, for that’s where his clothes are, and Seongwoo watches him go, still feeling the warmth from Minhyun’s fleeting touch.

He could get used to this.

    Breakfast happens at a diner near the hotel, when the both of them have washed up, wearing the exact same clothes they’d used yesterday. (Not like they have any other choice, though by the time the both of them get back to New York, Seongwoo’s going change into something more comfortable—the jeans he’d chosen to wear yesterday were more uncomfortable than he’d imagined, though this might be the effect of having worn it for a while.)

Minhyun orders pancakes for himself, and English breakfast for Seongwoo. Music dating back to the 1960s play through the jukebox, the waitresses darting back and forth between the customers wearing checkered sunflower yellow dresses.

“Where are we going after this?” Minhyun asks, his hands flat on the table.

“Go back to New York. After that we could check for leads on the Wailing Ruby, maybe try to track down Jihoon again,” Seongwoo says, playing with the red napkin covering the fork. “You know about the Wailing Ruby, don’t you?” He remembers what Jonghyun had said, and Minhyun nods, humming lightly.

“Yeah. I know the general story of it, but you could search it on the Internet and it’ll have the same story as I do.” Minhyun begins to pick on the straw of his drink. “I could still tell you, though, if you want.”

So, maybe Seongwoo just wants to hear Minhyun say it because he likes Minhyun’s voice or whatever, but he ends up saying, “I want to hear it from you.”

“The jewel’s cursed. At least, that’s what superstitious people tend to say, but I don’t really believe in that.” Seongwoo knows this, because for as long as he’s known Minhyun, he understands that the other doesn’t believe in curses. “That’s the reason why it’s called ‘wailing’—the jewel is beautiful, but it brings misery to the owners.  Its first owner had her husband die, and when she passed it on to her daughter, her daughter got separated from her husband. When the daughter gave it to her friend, her friend’s husband cheated on her; in a nutshell, they believe the jewel ruins relationships, and it’s named ‘wailing’ because people believe it causes the people who own the jewel to wail over the loss of their loved ones.”

Seongwoo whistles. “That’s… kind of sad, actually.”

“You’d figure people would stop giving it away, maybe would just keep it in a museum or anything, but a billionaire bought it back in 2005; he gave it to his wife, and they divorced last year. I forgot what they divorced over, but…” Minhyun trails off, but Seongwoo understands what he’s trying to say.

“If I were him, I would’ve gotten a jewel that didn’t have a tendency to ruin relationships for my wife,” Seongwoo comments, and Minhyun chuckles. “Why would the thief want to steal that, though? I know it could just be because he thinks it’s pretty, or whatever—but I don’t think that’s it.”

“Oh?”

“I just think there’s something deeper to it than that. Call it a premonition.”

Minhyun doesn’t comment on it, instead nodding thoughtfully. Their food arrives soon, sizzling hot on their plates, and Seongwoo gobbles it down with an enthusiasm he didn’t have during yesterday’s dinner; Minhyun eats, too, but his manners are more refined than Seongwoo’s, at any rate, despite the fact Seongwoo was the one groomed in an aristrocatic household.

Though Seongwoo finishes his food in less than five minutes, all the hunger from yesterday’s lack of appetite coming back to bite him in the bum, Minhyun takes longer, meticulously slicing his pancakes into neat little pieces. Seongwoo watches him work in silence, and doesn’t even realize he’s smiling until his cheeks begin to hurt.

“Why do you keep looking at me?” Minhyun questions, and looks up from his plate. He tilts his head curiously, and Seongwoo blushes, realizing he’d been caught.

“Who’s to say I was looking at you? Do you want my attention that badly?”

Minhyun shakes his head. “You can drop the bravado, you know. For the tough act you’re putting on now, you weren’t like that last night.” He smirks at the scandalous look on Seongwoo’s expression. “What? I’m just stating facts.”

“If you want to talk about last night, then what happened to the person who said ‘we’ll figure it out in the morning’? It’s nearly 12PM now,” Seongwoo retorts, and hides his face in his hands, practically feeling the heat emanating from his skin. The words come out muffled because of it, though he can hear Minhyun’s amused snort from the seat across him.

“I was waiting for you to bring it up. But if you want to talk about it now…” Minhyun offers, and Seongwoo peeks from the space between his middle and ring finger.

“Let’s talk about it now, then,” he mumbles through the expanse of his skin.

“I’ll go first, then,” Minhyun volunteers, and pauses, lips pressed together and the tiny spot between his brows creased in thought. “First of all, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t think of this as a one time thing.”

Seongwoo’s heart leaps in his throat. “W-What?”

“You heard me,” Minhyun mumbles, and his ears flush pink. “I don’t know what kinds of relationships you’re used to, but I don’t jump into anything that doesn’t have commitment—don’t give me that look—and I’d prefer if we could build something… lasting, I suppose.”

Considering this is someone who has married before, Seongwoo can get why Minhyun would prefer something that screams fidelity. In normal occasions, this would be the part where Seongwoo scrambles out of his seat and runs away, being as prone to commitment as he is, but for some reason, he wants to stay; wants to see what he can do with Minhyun, wants to see how they could make this work, considering the both of them are practically trainwrecks. (Though Minhyun is, admittedly, an otherworldly kind of trainwreck.)

“You’re usually not my type,” Minhyun points out, “but I wouldn’t mind going out of my comfort zone, I guess. But—only as long as you’re willing to try. If you’re just seeing me as some kind of play thing, then I’d rather—”

“I don’t,” Seongwoo suddenly says, and receives a look of bewilderment. “I don’t see you as that. Minhyun, I swear, I don’t.”

“… That’s good, then,” Minhyun says, stiff and awkward. Seongwoo tries not to show too much of his nerves, but then again, this is difficult because they’re having feelings talk and that usually makes his toes curl. Evidently, Minhyun is not a case of one of Seongwoo’s ‘usually’s. “Your turn.”

Where is Seongwoo supposed to start? Should he start from the time he looked at Minhyun and thought of him as a cold, intimidating beauty? Should he start from yesterday’s realization over Trump news, his realization that he was actually in love with him? Or maybe, should he start from the overwhelming jealousy that’d overtaken him when they’d visited Jonghyun?

“I just don’t want to lose you,” Seongwoo blurts out, and that’s not too far from the truth, even if it’s not the whole version of it. “And—fuck, I’m really bad at this—I figured, if I can’t bring myself to hate you, no matter how many times I’ve attempted, maybe I should just accept my feelings for you.” That isn’t a good confession at all, but if Minhyun expects Seongwoo to be someone who would get on his knees and start spouting Shakespearan styled confessions, then he’s about to get the let down of his life.

“Okay,” Minhyun accepts, and stuffs a piece of pancake into his mouth. He finishes chewing and swallowing the piece before he continues talking. “I accept your confession.”

“I—well—okay,” Seongwoo stutters, unsure where he’s supposed to lead this conversation to. “What are we now, then? Boyfriends?”

Minhyun looks up, and his eyes flutter for a moment, lost in thought. “I suppose we could be whatever you want us to be. Do you want us to be boyfriends?”

“That’d be nice,” Seongwoo says, almost shyly. “I think we have to introduce ourselves as husbands, though. Considering that’s… how we’re listed now,” he mumbles, and Minhyun’s soft chortle echoes in his ears.

“I think you can ask your friend to remove that,” Minhyun chides. “I may like you, but I’m not ready to be remarried just yet. We can just… take it slow, I guess.”

“Take it slow. Yeah, I can do that.”

The both of them share a smile, and for a while, everything feels alright.

    [ v. ]

 “Look at the sky! I told you it was going to be pretty, and when am I ever wrong, huh? I think I can find some constellations—is that Othello? Wait, was its name Othello? It’s really pretty though, right?” Jaehwan gushes, spread out against the grass, transfixed by the night sky.

“Yeah.” But it’s not the sky the man is looking at, with the basking light of the full moon and the little stars that scatter like white dots, only interwoven through the constellations, just as stars make. “It is.”

“Aren’t you glad you snuck out with me?” If Jaehwan realizes boy’s searing stare, he never shows it. Instead, on his face is tranquility, guard let down at utter ease, with a childlike sort of excitement bursting through its cracks.

Sewoon smiles softly. “I am. I’m happy I’m here with you, Jaehwan.”

     D-DAY.

 The com Seongwoo wears buzzes into commission.

“We’re in position,” Sungwoon says on the other line, his voice coming out through the crackles.

“Okay. This is One and Only, over,” Seongwoo returns, and in the corner of his eyes, he sees Minhyun shaking his head. “What?” He says, frowning at his boyfriend.

“I can’t believe you’re using that as a codename.”

“How do you even put up with him?” Sungwoon makes sure to interrupt their conversation, before hastily adding, “over.”

“I’d told you if I knew,” Minhyun says over the com, tugging on his tie uncomfortably.

The only thing Seongwoo notices is, “Minhyun, you forgot to say over.”

“… Over.”

July 31st, and both Seongwoo and Minhyun are in the middle of a gala, blending in with the crowd as much as they could with their tailored suits and neatly styled hair; Minhyun practically fits in with the socialites of Seoul, charming everyone his way, and Seongwoo is the one who isn’t doing any favours for himself despite the fact he’s the one who’s supposed to play with the rich kids. Maybe it’s the sarcasm, or his open confidence that had driven people away from him after a single conversation, muttering something underneath their breaths along the lines of, “He’s totally what I’d expected from the media. He’s gotten so boring now.” If Seongwoo actually cared about his reputation, he’d be sad, but then again, he’d never been in the good graces of these people—after all, he’s everything a socialite isn’t meant to be, especially after his reform from the clutches of the dirty lives of the wealthy shortly before he began his career as an investigator.

(That’s a story for another time, for it is long and filled with many, many of Seongwoo’s fuck-ups, including but not excluded to: too much drinking, too much partying, and too much manipulating.)

“Seen our lady?” Seongwoo murmurs, scanning his eyes over the crowd of similarly dressed middle aged men and women. Minhyun, sipping daintily on his drink, shakes his head; they were here to catch the thief, and to do that, they have to be on alert. Though Seongwoo has little clue as to where the thief is, exactly, he knows who they have to keep an eye on—the ex-wife of the man who last had possession of the Wailing Ruby.

“Three o’clock,” his com crackles, and true to Sungwoon’s word, there the lady stands at their three o’clock; a woman wearing a golden dress that accentuated her every curve, golden hair glowing through meticulous hair products and maintaining. Jessica Jung; known fashion designer and model, gorgeous (there was, after all, a reason why the media took a liking to calling her GorJess), and wearing the jewel on her neck.

“I’ll keep an eye on her,” he says, and disappears into the thrall of people chatting, generally building their connections. Though it has been less than a month, Seongwoo feels as if the case has taken him years, and he’d be damned if he let the thief slip through his fingers like a slippery eel.

“And I’ll keep track of the entrances,” Minhyun adds, and goes up to the second stair of the ballroom, finding himself a bird’s eye view.

“Good luck.”

“I don’t need luck—I only need certainty—but, you too.”

Many dances and announcements later, Jessica eases her way through the crowd, and Seongwoo follows behind her, maintaining enough distance just to avoid looking like a stalker; although, once he sees that she’s disappearing into the lady’s bathroom, there’s not much he can do but to grumble at his own luck, and lean against one of the marbled pillars in the ballroom. The waiting game is his least favourite game, but he’s gotten too close to just give up.

Fifteen minutes later, she still hasn’t left the bathroom, and suspicion begins to lurk in the surface of Seongwoo’s senses; he knows socialites, has breathed and lived their lives, and knows enough that ladies of Jessica’s caliber don’t view things such as (mind his language) taking a shit during public events, kindly; the most they go to the bathroom for, in his experience, is to touch up their makeup, spray on their millions’ worth perfume, or, if they’re anything like the women he used to hang out with, shoot heroin into their veins.

Once deeming the coast as clear, Seongwoo, as inconspicuously as he could, tiptoes across the little hall between him and the entrance of the ladies’ room.

Ducking into the bathroom, Seongwoo is relieved when he sees nobody loitering inside, not knowing at all what he would've done had someone really been inside. The stalls are closed, save for one, and taking a deep breath, he bends his knees, and sees the sprawled feet of Jessica Jung; the tell being the pink pumps she has been wearing all night. "Alright, time to save the girl." He jumps in his spot, wringing his hands together at the same time, before he raises his right feet and with all the strength he can muster, kicks the door of the stall. 

It opens.

He scans the cubicle, barely noting how big it is (but then again, these people holding the gala are loaded, so this is nothing to be surprised about), until he finally sets his eyes on Jessica's unconscious form splayed on the floor. The jewel, previously locked tightly around her neck, is gone; and Seongwoo knows just who's taken it.

"He's taken the jewel," he says into the com, bent down over Jessica's fallen body to get her into an upright seating position. Though she was unharmed, he'd deduced after running a quick scan over her body for injuries, her hair is tousled, the previous neat, not a hair out of place glamorous hairdo ruined. "Man, the thief's going to suffer for this."

"Sorry, what?" Sungwoon sounds confused. 

"He ruined her hair," Seongwoo tuts. "I can tell she's one of those ladies who put a hundred percent effort into her appearance—if we don't get him, I'm convinced she will."

"Err, okay," Sungwoon hesitates, not completely understanding Seongwoo's jargon and pysche analisis. "Minhyun has a visual on the thief—and I think I spot two ladies making it for the bathroom—"

"You couldn't have warned me earlier?" Seongwoo whines, standing up in a hurry and sprinting towards the exit. "At this rate, the media's going to start calling me a peeping tom!"

"I'm sorry!" Sungwoon apologizes, a quiver telling he might be genuinely terrified. "But you're out of there now, right?"

As the two ladies get in his line of sight, Seongwoo hightails it back to the ballroom, rubbing his hands on his pants. "Well, yeah, but still! Where's Minhyun?" He pauses, not seeing Minhyun on the 2nd floor where he'd been just earlier, keeping track of the movements inside the ballroom—giving Sungwoon a real life visual of the happenings in the gala. Like how the prime minister of some country starting with the letter S spilled his champagne all over his wife's dress.

“Minhyun is—wait, I’m getting a visual—he’s out in the courtyard on your floor, Seongwoo, go after him now!”

“You don’t need to tell me twice.” Seongwoo bulldozes his way through the crowd, receiving dirty glares and turned shoulders. “Excuse me, coming through!” He yells, and after hearing the first few murmurs of panic that’d crescendo into high-pitched shrieks (because when is a good thing ever happening when Ong Seongwoo is running around at a gala like a madman), tries to say, as reassuringly as he can, “There’s nothing wrong going on here, folks!”

Chaos ensues, then, after his clear voice breaks through the reverie of their chatter. The guests start to push after one another, each of them desperate to go outside the exit, and the music accompaniment stops in the middle of the bridge of the song; the orchestra are all gathering their instruments, packing them stuffily, before escaping through the emergency exit, and the ‘refined’ guests aren’t much better; in short, the gala has turned into a full scale mess, and Seongwoo can only imagine how much worse it’s going to get once someone discovers Jessica’s slumped figure in the body.

“Oh my God, is she dead!” A woman screeches from the bathroom, and now the room goes into uproar, with shouts of, “Murder! Murder in the gala!” and the occasional additions of, “This is all Ong Seongwoo’s fault! Who even invited that blathering idiot?” Well, random lady in the tight pink dress, it’s always nice to know when someone’s honest about their perception of him.

Fully aware of the adrenaline coursing through his veins, Seongwoo runs with all his might and the speed he’d never known he had, far away from the ballroom and the panicking guests and into the open night, where the door had been thrown open, its hinges even frayed. What the hell went on there?

The moon shines brightly above them, almost taunting, and Seongwoo looks around the empty courtyard; nothing particularly interesting here, but hearing the indistinct sound of chatter, he must be getting closer. Taking a left, Seongwoo passes through the well-maintained shrubbery and a few Grecian styled statues, even one Cupid fountain; at the very end of his road, he finds a figure he isn’t accustomed to, wearing a suit like the rest of them, backed up against the brick wall that marks the end of the line. Minhyun is standing in front of him, blocking with exit, a gun held threateningly in hand.

“I hope I’m not late to the party!” Seongwoo jumps into the fray, feeling like his lungs might collapse from all the running he just did. Minhyun jolts, and swivels to point the gun at him before he realizes it’s only Seongwoo, and he releases a shudder of breath he’d been holding. “Don’t get trigger happy just yet.”

“It’s your fault for sneaking up on me like that,” Minhyun says, evidently tense; he warily turns back to the man, who has been standing there, silent, watching Seongwoo and Minhyun’s interaction with amusement gleaming in the fires of his dark eyes. (This is the first time Seongwoo’s ever used that expression, fire in someone’s eyes, because he’d always assumed it was impossible—at least, until he found himself face to face with this man with the expensive suit, even more expensive watch, and embers—fire, or whatever—lit in his eyes.)

“Who are you?” Seongwoo asks, bluntly. “Don’t even try escaping; unless you’re Spiderman, you won’t be able to climb through that wall.”

“… I’ll bite,” the man says, after three beats of contemplation. He lifts his head into the light, where Seongwoo can see the clear features of his face, instead of having the structure shadowed by the places where the moon doesn’t shine. “Hello, Seongwoo. Hello, Minhyun. A pleasure to finally meet you in person; my name is Jung Sewoon, and I’m the thief you’ve been searching for.”

     D-3.

 As soon as they step foot into South Korean soil, Seongwoo requests a private meeting with Jaehwan; a request that’d been taken with no small amount of suspicion from said man he needed to have a private meeting with, but the request was accepted, nonetheless, and as Seongwoo leaves for his workplace, Minhyun informs Seongwoo of his intentions to roam around the neighbourhood.

(“It’s been a while since I’ve been here—truly been here, by the way, I don’t mean the running around I did with you,” Minhyun says, almost complaining, but not quite.

“Okay. Do you want to take the car?”

“Which car?”

“You can choose.” Seongwoo shows him the drawer where he keeps all the keys of his cars (or, as he likes to call them, his babies) in one place. “I’ll be taking this one, though.” He takes the car key to his favourite, a mustard yellow Ferrari, and twirls them in his hands.

“…” Minhyun inspects the car keys in silence. “Do you have a car that I’ll be able to actually drive?”)

Now, Seongwoo is sitting across Jaehwan, and even after his entrance (dramatic, bursting through the door and immediately pestering Jaehwan with questions of ‘did’cha miss me? I bet you did!’), he hasn’t said a further word to the other, instead inspecting him—every strand of hair, the wobbly smile he wears without its usual swagger, the way the bags under his eyes have gotten even more prominent (prominent enough to make Seongwoo want to offer his sleeping pills to him)—keenly with his eyes, and in-built detective senses.

“You’re starting to creep me out,” Jaehwan mutters, and hunches in on himself, like he doesn’t like being put underneath Seongwoo’s microscope. “Dude, seriously. What’s up, and why are you looking at me like I’ve just killed your dog.”

“Okay. Well, first off, I'm going to just... throw this piece of information out here; the thief is going to strike again on the 31st, in accordance to the gala that the person wearing the jewel he's after is going to visit."

"We can plan something in advance, just forward me the details of the gala later. And then...?"

"I’ll be honest with you,” Seongwoo says, “I thought it was a coincidence at first.”

“What was? You’re not making any sense.”

“How you knew the thief was male.” Jaehwan pales, and that’s enough ground for Seongwoo to go on. “How you knew the thief was going to break its usual pattern of the full moon strikes.” He leans closer in his seat, peering at Jaehwan, who has backed away from Seongwoo. “What are you hiding, Jaehwan?”

“Those were all just coincidences,” Jaehwan lies through his teeth. It’d be less evident if Seongwoo wasn’t aware of Jaehwan’s lying habits (saying the last word a little off beat), but Seongwoo knows Jaehwan like the palm of his hand, and sees through the white lie immediately.

“You know there’s no such thing as a real coincidence, in this line of work,” Seongwoo says. “I don’t believe you’re working with the thief. You don’t… you’re not cool enough for that, I guess.” He ignores the nearly offended look Jaehwan shoots him. “But. I do think you know something—something that you’re hiding from me, and I’m here to say, spill. If you don’t, I’ll figure everything out myself, and I’m not shitting you when I say I would actually go through your high school files.”

Jaehwan waves him away, and his hand nearly hits Seongwoo’s nose, so Seongwoo retracts the distance between them by a bit. “Had those removed.”

“Had what removed?”

“High school files. Trust me, you really wouldn’t want to look at my high school pictures.”

“I’ll be able to find them, I have my ways,” Seongwoo says, airily. By ‘my ways’, he really means pestering Minhyun until the other would hack for him, but Jaehwan doesn’t need to know that. “Now. Answer me.”

Their staring match lasts a whole two minutes until Jaehwan blinks, and his eyes brim red with tears, not from sadness, but because keeping your eyes open for more than a minute stings. Seongwoo, already fanning his eyes, knows the feeling.

“Come on, Jaehwan,” he urges, and has a tissue in his hand now, patting away the droplets of tears that have streaked across his cheeks. “Just tell me. You know I’d tell you, if you asked me something like this; we’re best friends.” There’s actually the smallest trace of hurt in Seongwoo’s voice, because he’s never really verbally admitted to Jaehwan they’re best friends—the love/hate dynamic they have going on would only have Jaehwan laughing at his face for the ‘sappy admittance’—and he feels like he’s presenting some butt naked part of him to Jaehwan, who’s looking at him with sadness in his eyes, like he can’t believe this is what he’s driven Seongwoo to do. “Say something. Anything. You’re starting to deflate my ego.”

At last, after minutes that feel more like forever, Jaehwan resigns.

“Fine. I’ve been neglecting my duty too, I think, from withholding information from you—but this is personal, and I needed… I don’t know why, but I needed to hold on to it, but I’ll tell you now. It all started when I was eight…”

     I used to sneak out of my house just before dinner. Where I grew up, it was a pretty lonely household; only my parents, and my maids, and me. I didn’t have anyone to play with, so sometimes, when nobody was guarding the gates, I’d climb out through the backyard and I’d run to the playground near my house.

The playground was a vast expanse of an outdoor sandbox, decorated with painted swings, slides, even a single see-saw that stood in the middle of the terrain. On the mornings and the late afternoons, parents would bring their children here, to let them socialize with the others from their neighborhood; Jaehwan knew nobody here, not the kids pushing each other in the swings, not the gaggle of girls building sandcastles on the ground, not the pair of twins taking turns to slide down the red playground slide. He was alone, even when the whole reason he’d snuck outside was to find his own friends, but there was something about the others that intimidated him; so for a while, he would stand on his own alone, only able to look through his bangs (he needed to have them cut soon or else the principal would have his head) as the others had fun on their own.

At least, until the day a boy, alone just like Jaehwan, started coming to the playground; what Jaehwan noticed was how he always wore the same shirt, even when the light blue dirtied into a murky shade of gray. He switched his pants sometimes, though, from a black pair to a brown one, but Jaehwan wasn’t sure how it made a difference when both were equally ratty.

“Hi,” he said one day, sticking out his hand expectantly to the silent boy with the dirty clothes. He smelled like the earth. “I’m Kim Jaehwan.”

The boy with the dirty clothes looked at Jaehwan’s outstretched hand, before slowly raising his own hand in front of his face, as if he was looking at it for the first time. “You’re supposed to shake my hand, silly.”

“Oh,” the stranger said, a blush forming on his cheeks. Hesitantly, he caught Jaehwan’s grip, and Jaehwan tried not to grimace at the dirt that clung to his skin. “I’m… J-Jung Sewoon. I think that’s my name.”

“How do you think that’s your name?” Jaehwan asked incredulously. “You’re supposed to know your name, you know!”

“Sorry.” Sewoon shrunk back, retracting his hand immediately. As fast as Sewoon’s action of taking away his hand, so did Jaehwan’s guilt form.

“… I’m sorry, that was mean, wasn’t it,” Jaehwan mumbled, a pout forming on his lips. “Hey, Sewoon, don’t you have any friends around here?” Jaehwan knew Sewoon didn’t, of course, but his father always said it was polite to ask, even when you were already sure of something. (You don’t seem to do that now, Seongwoo comments, receiving a dirty glare from his friend who’d been in the middle of telling his story. Alright, shutting up now.)

Sewoon hesitated, as if he was torn between making a lie or telling the truth. “No,” he whispered, deciding that the truth would be revealed in the end, anyway.

Instead of walking away, like everyone had done to him before, Jaehwan instead smiled; bright as the summer sun that shone upon them, resulting the sweat that poured down his forehead, and made Sewoon’s neck feel sticky, and gave it an unpleasant smell. “I don’t have any friends either!” Jaehwan proclaimed this so loudly a few of the other children paused their activities to give the duo judging looks. “Hey, what do you say about being my friend?”

“Be your friend?” Sewoon repeated. “Be your friend…” The words sunk into realization now, and he looked at Jaehwan with the most hopeful eyes Jaehwan had ever seen; for some reason, it flooded warmth in Jaehwan’s chest, and Jaehwan didn’t find it difficult to return the smile, unlike whenever he was forced to smile at his parents’ stuffy friends. “I’d like to be your friend, Jaehwan.”

That was the beginning of the end.

I started to play with him a lot. I used to come back later from the playground, until my parents got suspicious, and one day, they followed me; found me playing with Sewoon, rolling on the sand until my new clothes got dirty. When I got home, they made me sit down to have a talk with them, and I was so scared—I remembered thinking that they might actually force me to stop being friends with Sewoon, just because he wasn’t as privileged as I was, but instead of doing that, they… they even asked me if I wanted Sewoon to be my brother. Of course I said yes to that—at the time, Sewoon was my only real friend; I had a lot of people who wanted to talk to me at elementary school, but none of them fit with me the way Sewoon did. He felt the same way about me, too, though he didn’t have anyone to play with him at school. He didn’t go to school at all, actually. Before my parents took him in, Sewoon—he was homeless.

“Sewoon, these are my parents!” On one fated day, Jaehwan doesn’t sneak out to the playground, instead being driven there by his chauffeur, his parents following behind him and smiling at the excitement their son had been showing all day. “Say hi,” he stage whispered to the shell shocked Sewoon.

“Hello, Jaehwan’s parents,” Sewoon squeaked out, and gave so many bows Jaehwan wondered if Sewoon’s back was going to break. “D—Did I do something wrong?” And this time, to Jaehwan: “Do they want me to stop being friends with you?”

Jaehwan shook his head with so much force, if he’d given it a little more strength, he might’ve broken his neck. “No! Mom, mom, tell him the good news!” He tugs on his mother’s dress, admiring the way she smiled at Sewoon with so much kindness, it was almost like the way she smiled at Jaehwan. His mom was so awesome.

“Sewoon.” His mother stooped to Sewoon’s level, never even seeming to care that the bottom of her dress now had some of the playground’s sand stuck on it. “Do you want to be a part of our family?”

“You mean, like, be Kim Sewoon?” Sewood gapes with all the magical splendor a child his age can muster.

“If you’d like,” confirmed Jaehwan’s mother; “or, you could still be Jung Sewoon—you could be our ward.”

“W-Ward?” The word tasted foreign on Sewoon’s tongue; this was the first time he’d heard a term so complex! Then again, the competition for that wasn’t very tough, for he spent most of his days either with Jaehwan, who had the same grasp of the vocabulary as he did, or the other kids in the street, who tended to use more colourful language that wasn’t age appropriate for Sewoon himself.

“We’ll be your guardians,” said Jaehwan’s father, speaking up for the first time during their conversation. Though he didn’t look as friendly as his mother, the wrinkles surrounding his eyes were enough to show that he was one who smiled plenty of times throughout his life. “We won’t be replacing your real parents, but we’ll provide you with a roof over your head, plenty of food on the table, and Jaehwan’s company—he likes you a lot, you know.”

“Dad! You’re embarrassing me!” Jaehwan hid his face with his hands, much to the amusement of his own parents. Traitors, the both of them. He took back everything he said about his mom. She wasn’t awesome, she was mean.

“So, Sewoon? What do you say?”

“Okay. I’ll be your ward.” Jaehwan let his hands that were hiding his face to fall to his sides, instead using both of his arms to give a big hug around Sewoon’s waist.

“We’re going to be like brothers! Sewoon, you could share your room with me! We could buy a bunk bed—and I told you about our garden, right? It’s huge, and then there’s a pool too, if you’re into swimming; do you know how to swim though? It’s okay if you don’t, it’s really easy to get the hang off…”

Throughout the years, we were inseparable. People used to think we were two peas in a pod; Kim Jaehwan and Jung Sewoon, the two people who’d been together since they were kids, and would probably end up either marrying the same girl or even marry each other. I thought Sewoon and I—this is childish but I will not allow you to laugh in the middle of my sentimental story, don’t give me that look!—we’d move into matching apartments in the middle of the city, and we could sneak away from our families’ when were grown up, in the middle of the night, to watch the stars like we used to when we were teenagers. I would’ve given him the world if he asked me to, Seongwoo; that’s how attached I was to him.

(“But, what happened?”

“What happened?” Jaehwan repeats Seongwoo’s words. Suddenly, he seems so distant, as if his body might be standing with Seongwoo, but his spirit is somewhere else. “We grew up.”)

Sewoon returned to his shared dormitory with Jaehwan two hours later than he usually would, not for the first time that week; when he returned, Jaehwan was waiting for him on the couch, watching re-runs of an old cartoon, though his eyes kept staring (more often than not) into the empty space next to the wall.

“Jaehwan?” He called out reluctantly, completely aware of the verbal lashing he might be the receiving end of in just a few moments. Jaehwan whirled around in his seat, eyes growing wide when he saw the person he was waiting for, even though he was tired, and every bone in his body was yelling at him to sleep. He had an assembly to worry about tomorrow, but that didn’t matter, because assemblies were a one-time thing and Sewoon was a constant in his life.

A constant that’d been drifting away from him, distancing himself enough that Jaehwan had begun to view his other friends more often than he would see Sewoon. But a constant, nonetheless, though the reason he thought this might lie with the age-old rule of, where there is Jaehwan, there must be Sewoon.

“Where the hell have you been?” Jaehwan asked, not bothering with the formalities. “You’ve been coming home late, and you never tell me where you are—what if you’re in gang wars? Sewoon, I’m seriously worried about you; none of your other friends know what you’ve been doing, and that fact alone worries me. See these?” He jabbed his finger viciously at the dark circles underneath his eyes. “Thanks a lot, man.”

“Jaehwan, I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you.” Sewoon placed his messenger bag (a sixteenth birthday gift from Jaehwan he’d been using ever since) on their kitchen table, and began to pour himself a cup of warm water.

“You have to tell me, Sewoon,” Jaehwan pleaded, and he hated how thick his voice sounded, like he was on the verge of tears; he was rarely ever this dramatic, but this was Sewoon. If he was ever dramatic over someone, it would be Sewoon—and it would always be Sewoon, that was the way things were supposed to be. “Have you been doing drugs?” He speculated, gasping from his own guess. “Oh my God. That’s it, isn’t it? Who’s dealing you drugs? I swear, when I get my hands on—”

“I’m not doing drugs!” Sewoon laughed, leaning against the counter with a familiar smile. “Jaehwan, where did you even get that idea?”

“From my head, because it makes perfect sense!”

“No, it doesn’t,” Sewoon denied, the laughter fading away, and the smile on his lips was replaced by a deeply set frown. “You’re being ridiculous. Get some rest, I promise I’ll get home early tomorrow.”

“… You promise?” Jaehwan asked warily. “How am I supposed to hold you to that when you can’t even tell me the truth?”

“Jaehwan, I’m sorry, but—”

“Sorry doesn’t cut it.”

Sewoon, properly chastised, looked at the cup of water in his hands. “You’re right,” he muttered. “It doesn’t. But I still can’t tell you.”

You know how people break their promises, even when they don’t explicitly state it as a promise, but you expect it to be a promise anyway? That’s what Sewoon did. He didn’t even go home the next day, so, on the day he got back, I told him I was going to have late night practice; he believed me, but when he left, I followed him. Don’t look at me like that, I didn’t put a tracker on him or anything, I was just hiding out in the  café near my dorm so I could see when he left—and it was pretty late when he did, but I followed him anyway, though I was shit scared he was going to go to a gang and if I got revealed I’d end up getting shot to death by mobsters. Anyway, though.

I didn’t find him with mobsters. But sometimes, I wonder if that would’ve been better.

Sewoon stopped walking upon coming across an empty public garden. At this hour, the only source of light came from the lamps that scattered all around the garden, considering the trees were big enough to overshadow the moon, and the stars; in broad daylight, the shading was nice, and blocked away the sun from being too bright—at night, however, the shadows of the trees just seemed sinister, and Jaehwan found himself wanting to go home, even before he saw anything begin to happen.

The night was unbelievably cold, too, and Jaehwan rubbed his hands together, blowing soft, white clouds into them to keep himself warm enough not to shiver. If his teeth chattered, Sewoon might hear the noise, and he didn’t want to risk it. Seeing Sewoon angry wasn’t something common, but if Sewoon were aware of Jaehwan following him, then Jaehwan had no doubt that was exactly what the other was bound to do. Sewoon was many things, but he was far from a pushover—something both of them had in common, among an abundance of things they held in common, though Jaehwan wasn’t sure if some of the points still stood; what if Sewoon, during the time he’d begun to distance himself from Jaehwan and the world around him, decided that he preferred to pour milk first before the cereal? (The thought itself left Jaehwan with a cold sensation of dread and horror.)

“Hello, Sewoon. I hope I didn’t keep you waiting.” Jaehwan froze. He didn’t know who that was, and somehow, that made the situation much direr than it’d been. Peeking through the shrubbery, he made out the figure of a middle aged man, wearing all black; if he didn’t look carefully, he would think the man was part of the night. “I had business to take care of in Japan.”

“The Tokyo robbery?” Sewoon didn’t sound fazed at all, even if Jaehwan’s gut began to churn at the slow realization; was Sewoon becoming a criminal? A legitimate, Michael Jackson’s Smooth Crminal kind of criminal?  “It was on the morning paper; I think you did well. There’s so many things I could learn from you.”

This was an apprenticeship. Sewoon was the apprentice of a thief. The same Jung Sewoon he befriended on a playground so many years ago, the same Jung Sewoon who wouldn’t stop fidgeting the first time he got on a plane with Jaehwan and his family. That Jung Sewoon was on his way to becoming a criminal, of all things.

“See to it that you do. Have you packed? I’m departing soon—I don’t wish to extend my stay here for much longer; I’ve got many enemies, and if I stay longer than a month, I fear I’ll have people trailing me at all times.” He paused. “But then again, I know what I’d signed up for when I became the greatest thief in the world.” He laughed throatily, and Jaehwan always thought the term ‘evil laughter’ was an exaggeration until he found out that even the sound of a stranger’s laugh could douse ice into his veins.

“I have,” Sewoon assured, and Jaehwan thought back to the stacked clothing he found when he checked Sewoon’s bedroom earlier. “I just need a little time to say goodbye.”

“Don’t be so sentimental, boy.” The man sneered. “It’s going to be your downfall.”

Sewoon smiled; and Jaehwan, who knew him better than anyone else, knew it was his smile that said, I know. “I’m sorry, sir, but I won’t be able to leave without taking my time to say goodbye. My friend, he… he deserves better than that.”

When the man went mute, Jaehwan was starting to fear he would do something drastic, like smack Sewoon across the face for being, as he said so himself, sentimental. “Fine,” he relented eventually. “But I don’t want to hear any word of your friend when you’ve left with me, do you understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

The man readjusted his coat. “I’ll come by the same time tomorrow. We’ll leave immediately. I have to leave now, but I’ll see you tomorrow.” He walked away without saying a proper goodbye, and Sewoon stood there, still, as if time had stopped for him.

Once Jaehwan was sure the mysterious man was out of sight, and most certainly out of hearing range, he jumped out from the bushes, some leaves sticking out of his head. “Jung Sewoon, what the hell!” He exclaimed in a hushed tone, and when Sewoon practically jumped, higher than Jaehwan had ever seen him jump, he didn’t even feel a speck of sympathy. He deserved it for training to be a criminal, or whatever it was that Sewoon was doing with the man that Jaehwan received nothing but bad omen from.

“Jaehwan, were you here the entire time? Do you know how just how dangerous and reckless that was? You could’ve been seriously hurt!”

“Don’t talk about me, I was only here because I was worried about you! I thought you were in serious trouble—I thought there were mobsters involved, and I wasn’t too far off, was I?” Jaehwan raised his chin triumphantly. The ego boost went as soon as it arrived, though, because the revalation of what exactly Sewoon had been doing during all the times he’d disappeared was too horrifying for Jaehwan to let the moment absorb him. “You’re training to be a criminal? Sewoon, why? Do you not get enough monthly allowance from my parents, is that it? I could always ask them if you need more, or if you want a new guitar, I could always buy you something! Why are you even resorting to this?” Jaehwan made a wild gesture at the empty spot where the mysterious man stood there, just minutes ago.

“Because it’s my legacy!” Sewoon yelled, his voice echoing in the night. Jaehwan took a step back, heart hammering against his chest. “Jaehwan—this is who my parents were. They were criminals. Scumbags. The lowest of the low. The trash of society; and that man? He helped them. He was their friend, and now, he’s going to help me too.”

“Sewoon, you don’t have to do this. You don’t have to follow the path set by your parents, you can form your own destiny—”

“Can’t you see it?” Sewoon said, almost hysteric. “All my life, I’ve always wanted to know the truth about my parents, why one day they just stopped coming until I was kicked out of my own home with an empty stomach and no relatives who wanted to take me in. That’s all I wanted to know. I wanted to know where they were, or if they died, how they did. And he”—Sewoon pointed his index finger at the empty spot—“told me all those things, and more. He told me how they were legends, how amazing they were at their jobs, how I could be amazing, too. This is my chance to prove myself to my parents, Jaehwan. They could be watching me, right now, and I’ve been left without answers for too long, only left with shifty memories of a kid who never knew better, to just waste away the opportunity.” Sewoon’s voice cracked at the end of his sentence, and the whites of his eyes turned into a pale red.

“Don’t do this,” Jaehwan whispered, and despaired when Sewoon shook his head, a smile of acceptance gracing his lips.

“I have to.”

“No, you don’t.”

“You wouldn’t understand.” Sewoon turned his back on Jaehwan, and stared off into the distance. The bridge between them began to burn. “I’m leaving, Jaehwan, whether you like it or not.”

Sewoon never returned to his classes; eventually, his professors began pestering Jaehwan about his whereabouts, but the last Jaehwan saw of Sewoon was on the night everything they’d built for the past decade (and more) went to waste. “He dropped out,” Jaehwan said, flatly. “He’s not coming back.”

Whenever the television would start playing news of a robbery, Jaehwan, against his own will, thought of Sewoon and his mentor; was it them? Or was it another group, perhaps one that knew Sewoon? Though they stopped talking, stopped meeting, even, Sewoon never left Jaehwan’s mind; in the end, he was the reason why Jaehwan invested all his lifesavings into a company that seemed to come straight out of a movie, much to his parents’ scorn, something about him needing to use his agree instead of letting it rot. But Jaehwan never listened, enlisted the help of his friend Ong Seongwoo (who’d stepped into his life months after Sewoon left and never came back), and built the agency dedicated to helping the people around them, dedicated to helping the people that those like Sewoon and his mentor wronged.

Him and Sewoon were once like brothers, but the rift between them grew, until their bond was severed and they found themselves standing on opposite sides of a chess board; Sewoon defending his king, the mentor, and Jaehwan the king of his own army, dedicated to stopping Sewoon against all costs.

I knew the both of us would meet each other again one day, but I didn’t expect the day to come soon. To be honest, I thought we were going to be like Professor X and Magneto, but it didn’t turn out that way; I don’t understand why he’s being so blatant all of the sudden, but the moon, and his identity, is all that I can offer.

    “Man, the both of you are depressing,” Seongwoo comments at the end of Jaehwan’s story, when Jaehwan has reached over for a capped bottle of water. “Don’t… I’m bad at comforting people, which you probably know already, but don’t beat yourself up too much. He isn’t your responsibility anymore.”

“I tried to stop him and I couldn’t. If he isn’t my responsibility, I don’t know what is.” Jaehwan struggles to unwrangle the cap, and Seongwoo nearly offers his help, until he manages to get it open with a sigh of success.

“Your responsibility is to be my overgrown caretaker,” Seongwoo says, frankly. “That, and you’re supposed to run Kim Jaehwan’s Crimebusters, and as far as I’m concerned, we handle all kinds of criminals; not just the old childhood friend gone rogue type, and so, even if he becomes our responsibility by proxy, he’s the entire organization’s responsibility. Besides, he said it himself. He’s the one who made his choice. I don’t think you could’ve done anything to stop it. He chose his path, and you chose yours.”

The way Jaehwan looks at him is unsettling. “Who are you and what have you done to my best friend Ong Seongwoo?”

“Come on, I can be wise too,” Seongwoo whines, thrashing about like an oversized puppy in his seat.

“I bet this is all Minhyun’s fault,” Jaehwan mutters to himself and takes a sip from the bottle, and when he catches Seongwoo’s blush, he chokes on his water. Seongwoo reaches over to pat his back until Jaehwan gets all the water out of his system and onto the floor. “I can’t believe—I was just joking but I was right—holy shit. You better treat him right.”

“Why aren’t you saying this to Minhyun? Who knows if he’s supposed to be the one treating me right?”

“Well, the both of you need to treat each other right,” Jaehwan says thoughtfully, “but I just like to make you suffer. That’s my job as your best friend.”

Then, they laugh, and it’s genuine and open and Seongwoo feels like they’ve regained a spark of trust that’d been clouded in Seongwoo’s head as doubt; but now that the truth is out, there is nothing but a sense of relief, and this is the way that things should be.

     D-DAY.

 Even held at gunpoint, Sewoon continues to smile, in a way that lets it show he knows something neither of them do; in a way, this is unsettling, for a sane man would feel threatened, maybe even quiver when someone is clutching a gun and pointing it at their face. Then again, Sewoon was trained by someone who must’ve been good enough at his job to evade any public suspicion until the day he stopped and threw the mantle to his successor, so maybe emotions training was included into the regime.

“I’ve heard a lot about you,” Seongwoo says conversationally, resulting in an arched brow from the tricky thief. “But, this is something I don’t get; the motive. I don’t understand why you’re doing this.”

“We’ve never met before. For all you know, I might just be a very greedy man with an eye for precious gems.” Sewoon claps his hands together, a smile so serene it’s unsettling growing on the corners of his lips.

“I call bullshit!” The detective snaps, pointing a finger accusingly at the jewel held in Sewoon’s gloved hands. “This is the first time you’ve been so open about stealing jewels, leaving behind sentimental”—he doesn’t miss the way Sewoon’s eyes narrow at his choice of word—“clues like the time you watched the stars with Jaehwan.” At the mention of his childhood friend, Sewoon’s resolve seems to crumble, little by little, the previously calm demeanor he held melting into something more desparate. “What, didn’t think I’d have pieced the puzzle together? You’re not being very slick. Wait, no, I need a cooler way to say that—you ain’t slick,” he finishes, harrumphing proudly.

(Minhyun’s looking at him like he kind of wants to melt to the ground from the embarrassment of dealing with someone of Seongwoo’s caliber.)

“I have to admit,” Sewoon begins, articulating the words slowly, “I was… surprised at your sudden mention of him.”

“Him? You can say his name. Repeat after me: Jaehwan. Jae Hwan.”

“Doesn’t he ever shut up?” Sewoon directs this question at Minhyun, whose muscles must’ve begun to hurt, considering he looks like he’s about to drop the gun back into the holster if Sewoon isn’t going to try anything to escape.

“I’m afraid he doesn’t,” Minhyun empathizes with the outlaw, throwing him a pitying look for being at the receiving end of Seongwoo’s blabbering. “You can learn to tune him out eventually, though.”

“Good to know,” Sewoon says, never missing a beat. “This conversation has been enlightening, but I’m afraid I must take my leave.”

Before either of them have time to react, Sewoon’s thrown something out of his pocket, and moments later, a hissing noise and dark clouds of smoke emerge at the same time, blocking Seongwoo’s vision with dark gray he can’t see through.

“Smoke bombs!” Minhyun recognizes the attempt of distraction, and attempts to wave away the smoke to clear his vision. He pulls on Seongwoo’s hand, and the both of them come out from the field of the smoke bomb, and back into clear sight; Sewoon is right there, ten steps or so in front of them, running his way back into the ballroom.

“Oh no you don’t!” Seongwoo sprints off after him, and Minhyun follows behind him in a slower pace, looking for the shortcuts to wherever it is Sewoon would emerge from.

“Go straight, and take a left,” Sungwoon instructs, reminding Seongwoo of his existence, because he’d been so silent the past few minutes that Seongwoo even forgot he was a part of the operation. “That was for Minhyun, by the way.”

Inside the mansion where the gala is held, the guests have all evacuated themselves out of the room, leaving a comfortable space for Sewoon to run, and an easy spot for Seongwoo to trail after him without having to worry about bumping into someone’s nose. Sewoon abruptly halts when rounds of bullet are shot in warning in front of him; Seongwoo uses the moment of distraction to jump and tackle Sewoon from behind, sending him face-first to the floor.

A struggle resumes, with Sewoon attempting to wriggle his way out of Seongwoo’s grip, but Seongwoo leans onto Sewoon’s back with all his weight; eventually, Sewoon just stops moving, and remains still, a frown marring his lips directed at the marbled floor. Seongwoo kind of figures the frown would be for him if Sewoon could actually raise his head, but, eh.

“Jung Sewoon, you are under arrest for thievery.” Seongwoo fits the cuffs into Sewoon’s hands, and when the familiar lock of the cuffs sound, he beams in triumph. “Now, tell us where you’re keeping Park Jihoon.”

“B-Busan,” Sewoon wheezes out, completely out of breath from the pressure of Seongwoo’s body against his back. “He’s in Busan—fuck, can’t breathe, get off me I can’t get myself out of these cuffs anyway they’re electronic, aren’t they?—he’s in Busan, in the inn that Jaehwan used to love to visit; you can ask him where that is exactly.” He takes in greedy gulps of air as soon as Seongwoo slides off his back and onto the floor. Seongwoo feels a little guilty, but only a little; now, they’ve got to give Sewoon back, and catch the latest flight to Busan.

Only one more thing to do before they can officially close the case.

“Good job,” he calls to Minhyun, who watches them keenly from the second floor. For good measure, he throws in a thumbs up, one that Minhyun responds with the most carefree smile Seongwoo has ever seen his boyfriend wear. (Calling Minhyun his boyfriend still feels like a dream, but then again, even finally solving this case is like a goddamn daydream.)

“You too.”

“Hey, are you up for a victory round tonight?” Seongwoo suggests, and Sewoon begins to gag from his sprawl the floor.

“That is disgusting, why can’t you save that for the bedroom? Christ.”

“… Uh, I don’t know what victory round you were thinking about, but I was talking about playing Overwatch with Minhyun. See, I’m still introducing him to the game, but I think he’s liking it! You like it, right? You don’t complain about it a lot. Last time I checked, he really liked playing as—”

“You near the stairs—sorry, Minhyun, come down here and get your boyfriend to shut up.”

    [ vi. ]

 Many mornings later, Seongwoo will find himself waking up to the front page news being something so boggling, something so different from what the news is used to reporting. It’s news of jewelries, but instead of theft, the article reports (in a tone that screams confusion that Seongwoo can easily relate to) on how, overnight, there’d been a mass restoration of jewels all around the world. The most notable of them all being—

“Pink Panther,” Seongwoo breathes, and has to read the article twice to make sure he hadn’t come up with something in his state of half-consciousness.

But, how was it possible? Minhyun was here with him last night, and is still with him now, currently in a state of sleep in their bedroom; it’s not possible for him to be in two places at once.

“You have that look on your face,” the devil says himself, Minhyun suddenly striding into the room, still rubbing away the sleep from his pillow tracked face. “The one where you’re thinking really hard. What’s going on now? Did Jaehwan call you in?”

Wordlessly, Seongwoo pushes the newspaper to Minhyun, who skims through the article a few seconds quicker than it had taken Seongwoo to finish reading.

“Oh, Jonghyun finally put them back. I sent him the address of my safe last week, good to know he hasn’t lost his touch,” is all Minhyun says, before he pushes the newspaper back to Seongwoo’s chest.

Except this time, Seongwoo no longer has that thinking look in his face; he’s staring at Minhyun like he’s seeing something there for the first time, and Minhyun needs to flick his fingers in front of Seongwoo’s eyes to snap him out of whatever state he’s in this time.

“You… you put back your stolen jewels?”

“It wasn’t like I was going to hold onto them forever.” At Seongwoo’s disbelieving look, Minhyun sighs. “Okay, so maybe I was, but I don’t have to anymore. I’ve got a new life now, don’t I?  I just figured it was time for me to put those things back where they belong. I need to make a new story for myself, I can’t do that if I still have the skeletons in my closet hanging around somewhere.”

Seongwoo gawks at Minhyun.

“… Did I break you?”

“No,” Seongwoo says, and promptly gulps. “I just… you’re amazing.”

“I know.”

“You’re brave.”

“I know.”

“I love you.”

“You sap,” Minhyun says, accusingly. Still, he kisses the corner of Seongwoo's mouth, smiling as he does. “I love you, too.”

    The moment Guanlin throws the door open and sees Jihoon standing on the other side, he runs, slamming his head face first into Jihoon’s chest. He wraps his arms around Jihoon’s form tightly, not even realizing the older’s struggle to stay upright at the sudden force that collides him in the force of his younger brother. Still, once he manages to regain his standing and he’s sure enough he won’t keel over, he lets his arms curl around Guanlin’s head, burying his face into Guanlin’s hair. A sniff. “Guanlin, I’ve missed you so much, but… have you been washing your hair properly?”

Guanlin’s reply is muffled against Jihoon’s shirt, but Guanlin does shake his head with all the honesty of a child. From the sidelines, Seongwoo guffaws, and Minhyun’s sent a jab to Seongwoo’s side to keep it down. (“Let the kids have their moment, Seongwoo, maybe Guanlin finds it hard to focus on washing his hair when Jihoon’s not there—stop, that wasn’t even remotely funny, be quiet do you want to sleep on the couch tonight—”)

When Guanlin reluctantly lifts his head from Jihoon’s embrace, tear tracks have stained Jihoon’s shirt, but Jihoon doesn’t mind them at all; in fact, he even smiles down at it, but only for a moment, for he takes the rest of his time to pepper his little brother’s face with kisses, leaving the longest one on his forehead. Guanlin giggles, eyes shut tightly, and smiles like Christmas has come early this year.

Knowing Guanlin, if Jihoon hadn’t come home for Christmas, he would’ve asked Santa to bring his older brother back for the holiday; but he doesn’t have to do that now, because Jihoon’s here, safe and sound, albeit a little worse for wear; but he doesn’t have any visible bruises left, and Sewoon, apparently, is humane enough not to torture kids. Maybe keep them around to avoid further leak of information, but he doesn’t harm them, and the only thing Jihoon comes out of that with is an unwated experience at an abandoned inn, that he would swear upon his grave, is haunted.

“Dad thought you weren’t going to come back,” Guanlin says through his faint, little sobs, “but I knew you’d come back! I believed in you, hyung! I know you didn’t run away like dad said—you wouldn’t do that, right, hyung?”

“I would never,” Jihoon says, and the words ring like a promise. “Guanlin, I’d never leave you behind. Not as long as you need me.”

“But I’ll need you forever.” Guanlin pouts.

Jihoon laughs softly, and boops the tip of Guanlin’s nose. “I don’t know, will you still be saying that when you’re old?”

“If I won’t need you when I’m old, then I’m never going to grow old! I’m going to stay young forever, like Peter Pan!”

Unwilling to find the flaw in Guanlin’s reasoning, Jihoon once again pulls Guanlin back into his hug, a move that the younger follows along enthusiastically. The both of them stay like this for the length of two entire songs, only breaking apart once Jihoon explains, rather sadly, that he has to spend some time to talk to the adults who’d helped saved him; Guanlin, though reluctant, detachs himself from Jihoon. But, when he turns to the faces of Seongwoo and Minhyun, he flashes them a wide smile, so wide that his eyes crinkle along like curved half-moons.

“You really brought him back! Thank you so much.” Without a warning, he drives into Seongwoo and Minhyun, and hugs the both of them; leaving Seongwoo at shock, but Minhyun takes the hug like a fish to water, immediately stroking the top of Guanlin’s head. “I don’t know what I’d do without him. Thank you so, so much,” he continues to thank them, and nearly doesn’t let go until Jihoon gives a pointed cough. “Oh, right. My room. Don’t stay out too long though, hyung, I need to show you everything I’ve done at school while you were away! Don’t forget, okay?”

“I won’t,” Jihoon calls after Guanlin’s running form, a watery smile on his face. Though he might not be as enthusiastic as Guanlin upon being reunited with his family, Seongwoo will never forget the way all Jihoon asked about upon being found was of Guanlin; is Guanlin okay? Does he think I’m dead? Does he think I’ve abandoned him?

With Guanlin gone, the three of them are left alone in the sunny afternoon; just like their first meeting, only weeks ago but feeling like years, they sit on opposite sides. Minhyun with Seongwoo, and Jihoon alone.

“I wish I could say I’m sorry for unveiling your intentions to Sewoon,” Jihoon begins their discussion, “but I can’t. It was for my family—and for them, I can’t regret it. I’m sorry I can’t regret it, but that’s as far as an apology that I can offer.”

Seongwoo’s not surprised. He’d seen this coming from a mile away, to be honest, but he can’t find himself resenting Jihoon; all of them have something to fight for, and in Jihoon’s case, it is (very obviously) his family.

“Guanlin isn’t even my biological brother,” he continues, “but I’ve grown to love him like he shares the same blood I do. Do you know how he came into my household?” At the silence, he divulges the information that’d been bothering Seongwoo from the moment he’d seen Guanlin, but had been able to keep his mouth shut (a notable accomplishment) to refrain from asking the question. “When he came in here, he was left behind by his aunt; she is… was a friend of my dad’s. His parents died in a car crash, and they left him with her, but she didn’t want to keep him. So, she gave him to my dad, knowing he wouldn’t be able to refuse Guanlin, even if at the time, my family were already struggling financially. He was so quiet at first. I thought it was the language barrier, and to some extent, it was—but for the most part, he was just scared. You have to understand that he was thrown away by his own family, and that’s bound to leave an emotional scar on anyone.” Jihoon chuckles, though there’s no amusement behind it. Only woeful sorrow for Guanlin, who now shines so brightly Seongwoo has a tough time believing he’d gone through everything Jihoon is describing.

“When he opened up to me for the first time… I think that became the highlight of my life.” He smiles at the memory, and seems to shake away the nostalgia, before he coughs, and looks at the two adults with a face that says business. “So, what are you going to do with me now? Are you going to arrest me? If you are—I’ll go with you, just… please do something to help my family.”

“Well, Jihoon, I’ve come here to break the news to you,” Seongwoo begins, making sure to sound solemn enough that Jihoon’s even screwing his eyes shut, like he’s expecting his notice of prison to come any minute now. “Starting from today, you are now an official member of Kim Jaehwan’s Crimebusters. Congratulations, and come in after school tomorrow to get your official membership card.”

Jihoon’s eyes open, and his jaw slacks. “M-Member? What?”

“I pulled some strings.” Seongwoo waves away the dust in the air. “Made sure to put in a good word for you, added a thing or two about community service and putting your skills into good use. You’ve got a lot of potential, you know. You could use it for good. Besides, we’re going to pay you, too; it’ll be just like working, but your times are flexible, and you’re not going to work for the entire company—to be more exact, you’ll be working under Jaehwan and me.”

“This means—we—”

“That’s right! We’re a team, now.” Seongwoo beams. “You, me, and this guy over here.” He slings an arm over Minhyun’s shoulder, who doesn’t even put up a fight at the public display of affection. “The headquarters is pretty far from here, though, so if you want, I could have you and your family living in my mansion. I’ve got plenty of room left, and I’ll enroll you in a new school near the neighbourhood, just a few blocks away; unless you’d rather stay here. Ultimately, it’s your choice.”

Jihoon regains his wits, though when he speaks, he sounds dazed, as if he can’t believe this is his reality. “I don’t know what to say,” he says, honestly. “My family and I… we’d love to live with you, and I don’t mind about school at all, but are you sure it won’t be a bother? Guanlin can get loud sometimes, and my dad isn’t the easiest person in the world.”

“We’ll just have to learn how to tolerate each other, won’t we?” Seongwoo shrugs. “So, are you in?” He outstretches his hand.

A beat later, Jihoon takes the offered arm with his own, his smaller hand being completely engulfed by Seongwoo’s. “Yeah. I’m in.”

This is a new beginning. For Jihoon, for Seongwoo, for Minhyun—for all of them.

    [ epilogue. ]

 It takes a great deal of things to get Kim Jaehwan to make a personal visit down to the cells of all the criminals caught by his company, and even as his steps grow closer towards the cell at the far end of the floor, even as he tries to convince himself that no, this isn’t a social visit, and he just wants to take a look—it doesn’t change the fact he’s taking some time out of his schedule to visit the facility he so rarely takes his time to see, even though he knows how many glares he’s gotten on his time here, how many threats he’s received from the criminals he’s put behind bars.

“Are you sure you’d like to come in?” The guard standing by the door asks, fiddling with the key.

“I’m sure,” Jaehwan asserts, and the gate to the cell goes unlocked; Jaehwan steps inside, noting how all the lights are turned off except for the night light. On the bed, laying on his back with a book trapped between his hands, is the phantom who’d haunted his every decision; the person behind the existence of the organization to begin with, the person he’d tried all his life to get in his grasp, after having him disappear from his life like the wind, leaving no trace, as if he wasn’t there during the majority of Jaehwan’s days.

Sewoon places the book on the nightstand, and slowly stands up from the mattress. Jaehwan tries not to notice how orange the jail uniform looks, tries not to think about the boy with the dirty clothes back in the playground he’d met so many years ago.

“You’ve graced me with a visit,” Sewoon says, and makes a grandiose gesture at the sparse cell that surrounds them. “Welcome to my humble abode.”

“Hello, Sewoon,” Jaehwan responds, stiffly; for a moment there, he forgot how to speak, having spent too long comparing the matured features of Sewoon’s face to the youth he’d last seen during their disastrous night at the park. “I’ve come to ask you a question.”

The corner of Sewoon’s mouth quirks. “Alright. Ask away, old friend.”

“Why did you do it? I don’t mean why you became a thief in the first place—I know that reason well enough, don’t you think?—what I mean is, why’d you begin to steal all those jewels? You’re… subtler than this. You’re not materialistic,” Jaehwan says, head cocked in confusion.

“That’s the same question Seongwoo asked me,” Sewoon murmurs, seeming to find the floor particularly amusing. “But, if you have to know, I did it for you.”

“… For me? I didn’t ask you jack shit.”

Sewoon tsks. “Language. I don’t think your mother would be very pleased by that, you know?”

“You were the one who taught me curse words in the first place,” Jaehwan sulks. Sewoon’s resulting smile is almost sharplike in quality. “Anyway, tell me. I didn’t ask you to steal so many jewels, so if there’s another reason behind it, just say it,” he finishes, and he sounds weary, though he tries to cover it up with a neutral press of the lips.

“I’m not lying,” Sewoon insists. “I did it for you. I had to catch your attention, Jaehwan, and what better way to do it than to get on your radar? I know it wouldn’t get to you unless I did something grand,” Sewoon says, bitterly, “so I made a purposeful trail, though I’d never meant to get myself caught; the most, I think, would’ve been to get recognized by you. When I found out Seongwoo and Minhyun were on my trail (I left Jihoon’s place bugged, I know how to take proper precautions at that, at least), I knew I’d done just that. I should’ve stopped then. Who knows, if I had, then maybe I wouldn’t be in this cell.”

“But you didn’t stop,” Jaehwan says, resolving to think about Sewoon’s reasons for later. Preferably when he’s had more to drink. “And now you’re in my cell.”

“Considering I’ve taken residence of it, this is our cell, don’t you think?”

Jaehwan turns around, and heads for the door. “I’m leaving. Thank you for your time, Sewoon.”

“Any time. Come drop by sometimes; I’ve missed the sound of your voice, I wouldn’t mind if you sang something for me, sometimes.”

“… Shut the fuck up.” Does Sewoon think he deserves to tease Jaehwan like that, as if he hadn’t walked out of their bond like it was nothing? Jaehwan’s not here for that, not at all, and he begins to regret even the thought of visiting him. He never should’ve come here.

Just as Jaehwan steps out of the room, Sewoon says, softly, “I’m sorry.”

As Jaehwan turns on his heel and meets Sewoon’s tender eyes, for the first time in their first conversation in more years than the combined fingers of his hands, he chuckles.

“Sorry doesn’t cut it.”

    fin.

#ong seongwoo #hwang minhyun #wanna one fanfiction #produce 101 fanfiction #onghwang

[artificialqueens]

pygmalion (katlaska) -- svetlana

summary: Justin had a habit of drowning in people with beautiful dreams and strange chins. Slow-burn in non-chronological order.

a/n: thank you so much for the response to astronaut! i was very nervous submitting a fic for the first time, but you guys have encouraged me so much. i tried to give back to the community – i wanted to answer the prompt i saw earlier for katlaska slow-burn on the topic of addiction. but somehow it ended up becoming something a little different (or a lot different from anything ive ever written – ft. the least graphic sex scenes ive ever attempted). hopefully, its good! 

The first time they fuck is just that: two men with mascara still clinging to their lashes, the last vestiges of Alaska and Katya hanging thin between them. They mark it by putting another stain on Alaska’s couch and knocking over that shitty bottle of cinnamon vodka they shouldn’t have tried. 

It goes like this.

“Oh,” Katya says, gesturing at the general region of Alaska’s crotch. “You know, I could take care of that for you.”

Somehow, that makes it worse. Suddenly, she can hear where this night will veer. Maybe it’ll be one bawdy joke and maybe it will be two, then they’ll go at it until Katya sucks something out of her dick, and then they’ll watch Golden Girls and she’ll stare at Katya’s toes curling in time with her laughs. It is a circle, Alaska decides, a bit that reruns even after it’s dead. It’s a sketch that she decidedly never wanted to be a part of. The entire thing seems exhausting.

This is the part where you remind yourself that you can never say no to her, Alaska’s mind supplies, but it isn’t technically true. It’s more like Katya makes it easy to say no; there are fifty million things that Katya wants at any given moment, and as much as she likes sucking dick, she’d be fine if they spent the rest of the night exploring conspiracy theories. But Alaska doesn’t want to say no. 

“This is a bad porno,” Alaska decides. “Go for it. Shoot for the fucking moon.”

At least Katya seems to know the script. At some point during the night, she’d started switching in and out of that disgusting Maureen voice and hasn’t stopped since. “Spread your legs for me, baby.”

“Okay, okay. Stop.”

“I’m like a dementor,” Katya says conversationally, “I haven’t actually left anyone a lifeless husk or anything, but –“ 

“No, like seriously, stop.”

It’s strange how no one talks about Brian’s jaw and how it connects the alien texture of his cheekbones to the sandpaper feeling of his chin. Alaska has never understood either and she presses her thumb against his chin, where his lipstick has smudged. He’s cold, she realizes. He’s cold and his jaw is clenched so tight he’s shaking. When he speaks, it’s clear that the lozenges from earlier have worn off.

Katya or maybe Brian says, “Are we going to do it the bi-curious college girls experimenting way? I can be Mary-Anne the dean’s daughter who’s rebelling against daddy and pursuing a women’s studies major, if you know what I mean.”

“Why are you trying to fuck me in character?” 

Fuck, she’s made it awkward. Brian’s eyes are wide enough that she can see the tiny dilated vessels, leftover from the vodka. She thinks it might be hurt, or shock, but they’ve both been in the industry enough to know better. Put enough of yourself into the woman you paint on and you’re Miss. Charisma Uniqueness Nerve and Talent. Too much and you risk confusing fantasy and reality. It’s a dangerous line that Alaska has learned to toe. Addicts, former or otherwise, must take caution not to lose themselves. 

How many seconds has it been? Brian is staring at the carpet. One of his lashes has fallen to cover his eye. His wig is gone with his corset and most of his clothes, and only the lashes and communist-red lipstick remain. He makes no move to speak, nor to remove Alaska’s hand.

Justin sighs and drops his hand to Brian’s shoulder, intertwining his other hand through his fingers. “I’ll do it if you’re sure you want to. But I don’t think we should.” 

A pause.

“Brian? You know I mean this in a I’m horny, but I’m also worried about you way.”

“No, no,” Brian rushes, “no, you’re right, I’m sorry, it’s just, it’s just that my thoughts are really fucking loud and also, did you know that I find you very attractive?”

“I’m Justin right now.” 

Brian blinks like the thought hadn’t even occurred to him, trailing his fingers up Justin’s forearm. “Aren’t you always? Wait, is this philosophy? I don’t think I can have sex and think about philosophy at the same time.” 

And it’s simple after that. Whatever’s wrong, it’s none of Justin’s business, and he’s never been one to turn down an invitation to keep things easy. There are better things to drown in, he tells himself, and his mind goes blank as they kiss with just a little too much tongue and Brian wraps his hand around Justin’s dick.

—

—

Justin wasn’t always so careful. Justin had a habit of drowning in people with beautiful dreams and strange chins. He remembers them in pieces. Phillip, Wesley, Sharon-Aaron, Sharon, Sharon, Sharon. He’d wanted to be deconstructed, unwritten, assimilated into something better than a boy who would never be brave enough to be normal. Sometimes he still wants to drown until he forgets Justin and Alaska and everything in-between. But that’s not what Sharon wants to hear.

“Good,” he says. 

Sharon stares back, unimpressed. “Why are you trying to lie to me?” 

“I’m not,” Justin says, and it’s true. He’s not really lying so much as he is making a policy of not telling his ex every single thing that runs through his head. Sharon should know that. Or maybe Sharon suspects something. He looks at his nails on the table. That’s probably it. Stripped of Alaska’s razor-sharp plastic manicure, they are pale and ragged. He frowns. They didn’t look so ugly this morning, but that’s the Sharon effect. Somehow talking to her has always made Justin feel like an idiot teen – all at once becoming too much and not enough. “I’m fine. You’re not responsible for my bad decisions.” 

Sharon snorts. It suits her more than concern, and a part of him thinks that this should worry him, that he thinks Sharon is at her most beautiful with scorn lining her lips. “That’s what I get for being one of your bad decisions.” 

“If you want to put it that way,” Justin starts. 

“I have four years of rage I haven’t used on you. I get very creative when I’m angry.”

This part is easy. Sharon smirks, still looking like the crazy punk dreamer who never entirely left the 90’s. Justin bares his teeth back – his horse-face, they called it. “What are you suggesting?”

“That I could read you for being a bitch, but I won’t.”

“It takes one to know one,” Justin drawls.

The teasing is new. Before, it had never really been so verbal – it had been cold fingers up Sharon’s sweater in February, nightmares and fantasies they’d whisper to each other in the mornings. They’d been serious. Sharon had wanted to build something and she could never find the words to explain how; only that she needed to destroy the world to make room. All Justin had known was that he trusted her vision more than his own, even when he was sober.

Thirty-two is too old for learning to create instead of destroy, to invent instead of borrow, but he has to try. But sitting across from Sharon, drinking coffee and not alcohol, he tells himself the world is ten shades brighter. 

“How are you really, then?” Sharon asks.

“Just tired,” Justin answers.

—

—

It starts with Trixie. “Have you seen Katya?”

“No,” Justin says. “Did something happen?”

“No,” Trixie answers. “Nothing. Just wondering. I’m not sure. I haven’t seen her in a while, and she mentioned that you’d been hanging out lately. Sorry if I woke you up. Anyway, I’ll see you later.”

The line goes dead. Across him, Brian snores softly, yesterday’s makeup smeared across his chin and the cushions. Justin will have to get a new couch soon, he tells himself as he shoves his phone across the floor. “You can stop pretending to be asleep now,” he tells Brian.

Morning in Los Angeles is jarringly pale and it has washed Brian of all color. Where the light hits his stubble, he seems brittle like he’s lost weight. He doesn’t open his eyes. “Five more minutes, Mom.” 

Justin pushes himself to his feet. He thinks he should expect something, or maybe feel something, but there’s only his stomach twisting itself into a post-clubbing knot. He lingers for a moment anyway, watching the way shadows settle into Brian’s cheekbones. Then, he heads into the kitchen and sets out the blueberries and pancake mix before he can change his mind. The problem is, he knows that he shouldn’t have lied. If anyone speaks Katya, or Brian, it’s Trixie with her strange ability to comprehend half Russian psychopath, half batshit American.

It’s not my problem. 

But is it?

Justin is good at reading people. He’s good at cataloguing sidelong glances and knowing when to joke, when to comfort. Sharon had told him her theory once, that all queer kids learn how to be invisible at the right times to avoid dangerous attention, how to do what people expect. Justin stirs the rest of his milk into the pancake mix. He turns on the stove, puts out a pan with a slab of melting butter. 

Something is wrong with Brian. It’s not the first time Brian’s annexed Justin’s living room after a show. The amount of tiny plastic hands lurking in wait between the couch cushions is atrocious. But bruises bloom beneath Brian’s eyes. Even after stealing all the blankets, he’d shivered all night. They’d talked yesterday at manic speeds, as if Brian had forgotten that Justin is barely proficient in his brand of logic.

Justin starts scooping the batter onto the pan. No, he decides. It’s not his place. Crazy as he can be, Brian is a private person. It strikes Justin that despite the fact that that he’s heard about every sexual encounter that Brian has had this year, he knows next to nothing about Brian’s life or his mind, that it sounds familiar.

(Once upon a time, there had been a boy who played so many roles that he lost himself.)

Then there’s Brian himself, standing in the kitchen doorway. He shifts from foot to foot, eyes downcast. For once, his awkwardness isn’t funny. Never one to miss an opportunity to get out of cooking, Justin places the spatula in Brian’s hand and pushes him to the stove. There’s a flash of something that tries to be a smile, then, nothing. Only Brian methodically stacking pancakes ceiling high on Justin’s Betty Boop plates.

Just as the silence threatens to swallow them both, Brian mutters, “Sorry.”

Neither of them are looking at each other. “But you didn’t want me to tell Trixie where you were.” 

There’s too much whipped cream on the pancakes, which is fine. Justin has an incurable sweet tooth. “I think I might’ve asked you not to yesterday.”

“I don’t remember,” Justin admits. “It was more like I saw the look on your face.”

Brian looks at the ceiling, contemplates the stains there. It’s the last five years mapped out in shadows that never really fade. He turns off the stove and drops the spatula into the sink. “Sorry.”

“Does it make you feel better to say you’re sorry?”  

“Not really,” Brian says, and for all that his eyes are oceans, it is nothing like a flood.

“I’m not sure what the problem is,” Justin says instead. “But you can keep coming here if you need a place. You don’t have anything to be sorry for if you just do the dishes or something.” 

Because there is a tightness in his lungs that feels like fire when Brian smiles, or maybe a breathless summer in Erie. Because there’s a quality about Brian that seems swing toward happiness no matter what, and Justin can’t help but want to make him laugh. And somewhere along the road, he’d realized that he could say no to the strange three a.m. conversations and crazy childhood stories, but that he didn’t want to. 

Because Brian says, “You’re a furry little gnome, and we feed you too much,” holds a straight face for one second, before collapsing into cackles. 

“You can’t ruin that show for me,” Justin cuts in, “whatever you do, that’s like the one thing, you can’t ruin Golden Girls.” 

But Brian is doing that scream-laugh that’s uniquely his, and Justin can’t help but join in.

—

—

The second time they fuck, it’s to Prometheus playing in the background. Brian’s dick is heavy against his tongue, and it’s spring and Justin is half-crazy from the moans and the way the couch cushions dig into his erection. And they climax like teens, all shuddering curses and sad, sad stamina. He tells Brian on the way to the trashcan, two used condoms swinging from his hand. 

“But okay, did you know, did you know that it’s been a few months? And it’s the craziest thing too, because I think it’s because a month ago, I was going through an occult research phase, and this like, orgy cult got my email and now I’m invited to their moonlit trysts every fortnight.”

Justin laughs. “Are you going to go?”

“I’m thinking about it,” Brian says. He crosses his legs, then his arms, and then makes a truly disgusting face. “I feel like it would be like, like, too soon? I think there’s a level of comfort with myself that I have yet to achieve.”

“So, not the fact that you don’t know if these strangers have STDs.”

Justin sinks into the couch, and Brian pulls him into his arms. Their height difference is such that Justin’s feet dangle off the armrest.

“Well,” Brian says reasonably, “you never know if strangers have STDs. Eating ass is an adventure.”

“So, when you offered to help Violet with her show, that wasn’t community service.” 

The arm around him shifts, shaking with laughter. “No, I got finished doing that months ago after they realized that yes, I did leave the stove on. And it wasn’t community service, I was exploring as of yet… ah, unmapped mysteries.”

“Don’t flatter the whore,” Justin says. 

Brian wheezes, slamming a hand onto the spot where Justin’s heart beats, his entire body curling inward from laughter. “Mama, are you worried about indirect kisses?”

“I wouldn’t call you indirect. I can smell you from my kitchen before you even knock.” 

The briefest touch of lips against his neck, and, “What do I smell like?”

Justin doesn’t remember the last time he felt this light, or even the last time he wanted to feel. Justin is new to wanting things for himself, caught halfway between mania and hesitation, where he can’t help but be too much because that’s better than not enough. But this is soap-bubble-thin and it’s so much easier to deadpan, “Desperation.”

It’s a cheap joke, but Brian laughs, soft and warm. “Did I ever tell you that you’re absolutely shit at reading me?”

“Don’t worry, I know.”

Brian goes still. “You know I’m fine, right? I don’t want to –“

“You’re not,” Justin says, and he has the feeling that Brian doesn’t know which question he’s answering either. He doesn’t want to have this conversation now. It’s too much trying to adjust and his mind’s still stuck on the joke he didn’t tell. “I don’t mind it. I –“

“It’s not fair to you, I know,” Brian interrupts. The hand on Justin’s back has stilled, and god he can hear every car coming down the street through these shitty walls. “You have enough to deal with right now, and I promised I’d tell you soon, it’s just spiraling out of control and I feel like I’m back to who I was ten years ago, and I really don’t want you to meet that person.” 

It should worry him, that the moment the emotion reel begins it all feels fake. Suddenly he is transported to grade school where he’s auditioning for a part, making all the exaggerated motions to the back row. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he’s still hanging onto Ms. Zhu telling him that he got the part, and he can’t stop thinking about the things he should do and say. The correct response is to turn around and look Brian in the eye, grip his hands and tell him that it’s more than two fools grasping at permanence. It’s more than two fuck ups in mourning, that you can make something beautiful out of everything ugly. But his thoughts are a storm and he has no real reason to be unhappy.

He wants Brian, or maybe he wants move back to Erie. He wants to shoot up. Justin has never been good at wanting anything.

—

—

“What do you think?”

“I think that we never watch Contact together and it’s a sign. Also, I’m so fucking scared, Detox, I like, am seriously considering going for someone who regularly admits to being a crazy bitch.” 

Detox gives him an unimpressed look. “Bitch, you’re not considering it. Stop trying to pull the shy act. I saw those drunk texts.”

Justin has to smirk at that. “Yeah, but sober is different.”

“Boo-hoo, you have to be responsible for your actions when you don’t have mind-bending shit in you, boo-fucking-hoo, grow up. How hard can it be? You’ve already –“

“Wow, I came here looking for sympathy,” Justin drawls. But it’s what he already knew, and he’s aware that he’s in danger of being slaughtered by Detox for being melodramatic. It’s simple, but –

(Brian turns his phone off and the car plunges into darkness. They are floating over mountains and clouds in a ski lift in Colorado and it sounds more poetic than it is. Later, he hears that Katya and Trixie are taking a break because Katya isn’t good at lines; she’s all the weirdness Brian was afraid to let out and Brian is half-in-love-drowning-mad. Later he hears that Brian hasn’t been on his phone in days, has deleted the half of his friends who are using. But now, there is only Brian and Justin huddling closer for warmth, then closer yet. Their lips meet, and, and, and…)

—

—

It’s the last thing he thought he’d hear himself say, “Let’s go back to testing it out then. Let’s just hang out, have a good time, let’s talk about shit. I’m probably going to fail at talking about shit right now, because I’m not having a good few months, and you’re not either, but I’ll try if you do.”

Brian blinks before he makes that gross noise again. “I never thought that you’re Trixie’s replacement,” he blurts out. His voice is scratchy like the words have clawed scars into his throat. “You were there at the time, but you’re not, I swear.”

He does turn over then, to find that Brian is looking at him with wide eyes. Up close, he can see that there are fine lines in the corners of those eyes. “Well, obviously. I can pass for a woman in the dark, and she can pass for a woman if you’re blind.”

There’s a quiet snort, and the eyes and nose crinkle together. “Oh my god, we were having a moment.”

Justin considers it, and decides to reenter the moment. “I hope you’re talking to her again.”

Brian frowns. “It’s the good thing about being a whore. Inevitably, something happens like lusting after your best friend and it’s somewhat socially acceptable?”

Justin raises an eyebrow.

“Yes, Mom, I’m talking to her and we’re halfway back to where we were, like good adults. Stop trying to reenact Thanksgiving Dinner.” Then, he tries again, leaning into Justin’s shoulder. “But it’s a little different. I guess we’re more, we’re more learning to laugh about it. That’s what we do.” 

“What do we do?” Justin asks. Outside of the tiny plastic hands in the couch, the apartment is clean for the first time in years. Justin’s books are ordered on the shelves, and the refrigerator is stocked with something other than takeout. It seems they’re both better at taking care of others than they are of themselves, and he can work with it. “Can we promise to tell each other when something is wrong? Like we’re joking about it now, but at the end of the jokes, I want to know about you.”

A stray bit of sunlight lands on Brian’s cheek. It’s warm to the touch. “I’ll try,” he agrees. 

Beautiful people with strange chins, Justin thinks. Drowning in them felt like justice. But he knows better now than to trade his ideas and for theirs, to lose himself in their visions. Beautiful people with strange chins who are different people, at the end of the day – just as he has changed. He thinks he’s learned how to be ambitious. 

He hopes he knows how to dream.

#alaska thunderfuck #katya zamolodchikova #sharon needles #detox icunt #trixie mattel #katlaska #past shalaska #one-sided trixya #slow burn #slight smut #canon compliant #svetlana #rpdr fanfiction #pygmalion #tw mention of substance abuse #submission #tw substance abuse #tw depression

[uniformbravo]

ok so. my day today

basically i spent a long fucking time today trying to Finally get off my ass and scan my traditional drawings so i can post them to my art blog, because like i have been drawing but these days the vast majority of my art is traditional sketches that im too lazy to scan so my art blog never gets updated and i rly want to work on that (i stg some of this shit is literally so old it’s from 2016 but whateverrrrr)

mostly the reason im finally doing this is that i don’t wanna wait too long to post my mp100 shit bc i’ve been drawing a Fucking Lot of that so i have enough to make a few posts now and i wanna get them uploaded while they’re still fresh, u know. the thing is since i was gonna scan those pages i decided it’d be a fun neat idea to scan the entire rest of the sketchbook bc Why Not

well i’ll tell u Why Not, there are several reasons Why Not:

it takes 12 yrs to scan everything because not only are there a shitload of pages but also the sketchbook is too big for the scanner so i have to do some pages 4 times to get all the edges and it’s horrible and bad, legitimately i was standing there for over an hour scanning this book, i put on an hr long video in the bg and got all the way through it and i Still wasn’t done

On Top Of That the scanner is kind of fucking garbage, as scanners are, so i have to take each image into photoshop to edit so they dont look entirely like trash (they still look kind of trashy anyway)

then for the multiple scan pages i have to patch them together so the images are complete / not blurry

then i have to collage all the drawings i want together because a lot of pages are either incomplete or only have like 1 thing i want to show on them so i spend like 100 years trying to arrange everything semi-nicely so that it’s, like, even slightly presentable, Maybe (idk i think the compilations tend to feel really cluttered tbh but Whatever it’s my STYLE), and also i have to take into account tumblr’s formatting so i usually have to make everything fit on a canvas either 540px or 1080px wide (this is even worse for pixel art bc it needs to be exactly 540px to look nice but i digress, we are talking about traditional art here)

so uh yeah that’s my process and Boy is it a Fucking Process

i think im complaining more rn because i have like a year’s worth of sketches im trying to deal with here, like. good god. i spent maybe two and a half hours working on this today (after the first hour of scanning things, just the scanning) and i did not get even halfway through the scans, and that’s just for the photo-editing stage, i haven’t even started putting together the compilations yet

god and like the Other Fucking Piece Of Shit Thing My Scanner Does is it tries to do this Smart Technology Bullshit and decide for itself where the paper ends instead of looking at, like, the actual paper’s boundaries, so even if i line everything up perfectly, a small part of the image fucking always gets cut off and if i were a stronger person i would engage in the full process of scanning the images, taking the flash drive back to my laptop, opening each image one by one to figure out which ones got cut off, going back to the scanner and re-scanning the pages and just repeating the process over and over until everything is in order but as it stands i do not have eighty-five thousand fucking years on my hands nor even a fraction of the mental capacity required to pull that off so we are just going 2 sit down & deal with some cropped images like mature adults

(tbh with all the cons of scanning the art, and there are a Lot of cons, i feel like it would probably make more sense to just take pictures using a camera instead, but on the other hand do not get me started on lighting, focus, unsteady hands, sifting through millions of copies of the same photo trying to determine which one came out the clearest, retaking photos that didn’t work out, back aching from being hunched over the paper for so long trying to get the perfect straight-down angle w/o casting any shadow, etc etc etc)

im just??? honestly, typing all of this out is making me sit back and think why?? why am i even doing this. this is so much goddamn effort for shit that probably won’t get very much attention, which is fine and all but god. jesus christ. im really putting myself through some shit for this

in any case i think i’ll probably be posting some of the more recent stuff first, like all the mp100 shit because like i said i want to post it while it’s still fresh and if i work on this whole project in chronological order u probably won’t see the things i drew this week until like next year hgkdslkdgn

#retag later #talkin bout life

[larryfanfiction]

Ao3?   hattalove

Tumblr?     hattalove

Name?   kris

Age?   21

How long have you been a fan of One Direction?   i think it’s going to be four years this march….jesus

Who is your favorite fic author?   tashie togetherwecouldbealright, and i’m also very partial to 100percentsassy and gloriaandrews’ fics.

What is your favorite fic?   THIS IS TOO HARD i don’t know if it’s even possible to just have one favorite, but the first thing that popped into my head was be my little good luck charm.

When did you start writing?   long enough ago that i can’t really remember, i learned how to write at 5/6 so probably not long after that. i think i wrote a very lengthy poem about spring when i was 7, so definitely by then.

What was your favorite fic to write and why?   in all honesty, the general process of writing is extremely painful for me..but probably run away home, partly because it was about horses and i really love horses, and partly because i’d like to think i improve a little with every fic i write and i ended up really liking the character dynamics i created there, especially lilo and h/l.

How and where do you find inspiration?   all sorts of media, usually. i’m very, very bad at coming up with original ideas (working on it, though!), but when i’m watching a movie or tv show, i immediately start thinking of what harry and louis would be like with that kind of dynamic or how they would fit into that environment. it’s been movies, tv shows, a gif…the one i’m writing now was also inspired by a movie, and the one i want to write next is set in a tv show environment.

Are any of your stories influenced by personal experience?     i guess it depends. i’d like to think i’m a decent baker, so i drew on that experience when writing leave it to the breeze, and i’ve been a huge horse nerd since age four, which came in useful when writing run away home. i was also in a long-distance relationship, and i’m asexual, which were both key elements of wait up i’m coming home (i just almost forgot that i wrote that one, lol). so i actually guess i do, even though i was ready to say not really.

How do you get over writer’s block?   i don’t think i really get writer’s block, i just get lazy. usually it’s because i’ve come to the end of what i initially had planned for the plot, so the only way i move myself forward when that happens is sitting down and forcing myself to plan. if i’m just feeling like i don’t want to write, i try to use time management techniques (like pomodoro, i.e. 25 minutes of focused writing and 5 minutes of pointlessly browsing the internet to reward mysel) or, if it’s an ongoing thing, i try to leave off in a place i know i’ll want to continue the next day.

On average, how long does it take to write a fic?   all of my longer 1d fics were started/written as part of nanowrimo, which really helps move things along. for the monster fics i always seem to end up doing i’d say maybe two to three months of consistent writing. the issue, and the reason i literally post one fic a year, is that i’m not consistent, lol.

How often do you sit down to write? What does your ideal work setting look like?   if i’m in the ‘groove’, ideally i like to write every day. it just helps keep everything fresh in my memory so i know where i’m picking up, and also helps get everything done faster. the only thing i really need is complete silence/white noise. i used to be really particular about where i wrote, but i’ve learned to be more flexible as my life got busier, so now i don’t really mind - i’ve written at work, at school, at coffee shops, bus stops, in the library, all over the place. if i am at home, though, i like to have a cup of tea while i write.

Pick 3 things that are absolutely necessary to make a good story!  

characters!! nothing works for me if the characters aren’t good or, in the case of fic, if they’re ooc.

character growth/development

things like grammar, syntax, punctuation, capitalisation, paragraph breaks. i’m unfortunately a very picky reader, so what a story looks like plays a big role for me.

What do you like most about the writing process?   i really love how stories change from what you intend them to be. when i start i’ll usually have a basic outline of the plot and characters, but the story kind of takes on a life of its own and new scenes/plot points/character motivations come into my head as i’m writing and often take the story in a different direction, so i end up with something totally new! i also love the rush of excitement after i post the fic. i usually go to sleep right after so i can wake up to reactions, whatever they might be, haha.

What is your favorite genre/tag to write? in my early fanfic days i used to really enjoy writing angst, but 9 times out of 10 it doesn’t work with h/l. when i’m writing about them i just like all sorts of romance-y stuff, especially them getting together, so in terms of tags i guess i’d say friends to lovers.

What kind of scene do you find hardest to write? Easiest?   hardest is probably action/scenes where a lot of things happen in quick succession, i struggle with pacing those properly. smut is really hard, too. easiest are dialogue-heavy scenes, both friendly and romantic fond banter, and specifically lilo friendship scenes, haha.

Do you write chronologically?   yes. if there’s a scene i’m really looking forward to writing, i plot it out in detail and use it as motivation to write faster so i can get to it.

What’s one thing that not a lot of people know about you, and you feel comfortable sharing?   i feel like i put everything really personal on the internet to be honest, haha. but i feel like the most interesting thing about me is the fact that i work at an escape room, so i literally lock people in rooms and then spy on them through a camera for a living.

Are you currently working on something? Can we have a little preview?   i am! i’ve talked about this a little on my blog, it’s an au based on the movie sweet home alabama. it’s a huge mess right now, but here’s a bit i like:

“I’m not sure I believe you,” says Louis, half-grinning. “I’ve moved on, Harry, the best that I could. I’d love it if you disappeared tomorrow, sure, but you being here isn’t—I don’t know. It’s not breaking my heart in two, or whatever Liam would have you believe.”

He avoids Harry’s eyes as he says it.

“But—actually. Since you are here, I wanna show you something.”

Harry blinks at the sudden change in demeanour, and has to scramble to get up and follow Louis out of the door. He’s walking up the stairs briskly, brushing his hand over the picture frames as he goes in what looks like an unconscious habit.

Harry catches up with him on the landing upstairs. He’s standing right in front of the white door that Harry tries to pretend isn’t there, looking at it with his arms wrapped around himself.

“What…” Harry starts, looking him over. He looks small, but determined, standing firm, with his chin tipped up.

“You know what,” he says, quiet.

Harry shakes his head. He, too, hugs himself, needing something to keep him together just in case.

“You don’t have to do this,” he says.

“I want to,” Louis replies. “It’s been too long. I just—I didn’t want to get rid of it without you. That’s just stupid, isn’t it.”

“No,” Harry says immediately, reaching out to touch Louis’s shoulder before he realises who they are, where they are, and pulls back. “It’s not stupid, Louis.”

“Don’t start indulging me now,” he half-laughs, rubbing his arms like he’s cold even though it’s June. “It felt like the right thing to do, I don’t know. It’s just that—regardless of the fucked up things you did,” and Harry flinches there, can’t help himself, “this hurt you, too.”

It’s not a question, of course it’s not. They’d cried about it together, enough times for Louis to know exactly how heartbroken Harry had been.

They share a look, there in the dark corridor, that’s heavy with understanding, perhaps for the first time.

Anything you would like to say to your readers? thank you!! thank you all a million times over. i never, ever imagined my writing would get the kind of response it has gotten from everyone in this fandom. i get really overwhelmed when people say nice things and don’t always reply, but know that i see and appreciate all of it ♥  also, sorry for being shit and only posting once a year, lol.

Thank you so much, Kris! The Sweet Home Alabama fic sounds amazing! 

#as #feb17