Archive of Our Own

≫=====><=====≪

Only ten minutes in and it’s already hell.

The job had been relatively simple. Kill everyone. Not just some, not just the ones that fight back. Not specifically the people in suits and formal wear, holed up in back rooms and talking in low voices. No, the order had been everyone.

And it isn’t going well.

For all Chan’s planning- and for once he’d been given time to work a plan out- they’re still cursed with a shitty hand. Everything is going wrong. Their opponents had been better armed than expected, there had been more of them than they’d thought, and they weren’t going down without a fight.

Admittedly, he’d anticipated the last one. This was the last vestiges of opposition. There had been no chance in hell it wouldn’t be difficult, and he’d been ready for that, but this?

Cursing internally, Chan ducks down a hallway, doing his best to keep his footsteps light. Tries to lose them in the clamor and commotion.

They’d taken care of most of the untrained bodies who’d attempted to get in their way, but like an idiot, Chan had gotten separated from his backup. Junseong was god-knew-where, and talking might give away both of their positions. Jeongin was hopefully still blocking off the main exit, but that assumed a lot. Dongjun and Minho might still be up and kicking, but Chan isn’t exactly in a good place to assume.

Throughout the house, the sounds of gunfire ring out. Their weapons might have been silenced, but the people here were not armed as such. It made it disgustingly easy to tell friend from foe, just by listening to each shot. Two from his guys, five from the other side. This isn’t the time to be hyper-fixating on something he doesn’t have the power to change, but Chan does it anyway. Like the fool that he is.

It’s going to get him killed.

His job is the difficult part. The glorious part too, arguably, but glory seems a far off concept when you’re already several bodies in with no end in sight. Chan doesn’t care about the prestige of taking out a rival boss. This man isn’t his rival, after all, it’s his organization’s rival. He’s just the muscle.

The gun.

His boss is the finger pulling the trigger. And he’s fine with that.

More gunfire from below. Chan’s looked at the blueprints they’d managed to get their hands on, but he’s starting to wonder if they’re incorrect. Somewhere there’s a staircase that’ll lead him where he needs to go, up to the panic room, but he’s starting to feel lost. And if not lost then unforgivably distracted by the mess this job has become. This isn’t the time to be distracted.

Gritting his teeth, he tries to visualize where he’s going. No, no, if there are three doors here on the left, then he took a wrong turn at the T. Backtracking when there are probably people on his tail at that very moment seems dangerous, but so does everything else about the situation. It’s a little late to be worrying.

Taking a moment to listen for footsteps among the gunfire from below, Chan bites out a quiet, “Fuck,” under his breath and heads back. He’s going to be fine, and if not fine, then he’s at least going to succeed.

They’ve already got two people waiting in the van with the kerosene. When they’re done, this whole building is going to be reduced to ash. He just has to survive until then. He’s got to make sure the people dying tonight actually do die. Because no one is interested in dealing with someone else’s revenge quest. Better to make it quick, dirty and thorough.

A lull in the firefight below makes him aware of the footfalls somewhere on his floor. Instantly, he’s taking stock of his surroundings and diving away from the noise, trying to get a better vantage on what he knows he’s going to have to make a fight whether he wants to or not. Everyone meant everyone, and he doesn’t really have an option.

Doing a quick mental check of what ammunition he still has left, Chan decides he’s as well equipped as he can be. As long as he shoots first, he’ll be fine.

That confidence is quickly broken as the faint whine of his ear-piece steals away his attention.

It’s Jeongin, and the man is frantic, voice quiet and quick like he only has a handful of seconds to speak. “They got Dongjun. I don’t know about Minho but Dongjun- he’s- shit, I heard it on the comms and we don’t know where he is. I-“

No, that’s not good. How do they not know where Dongjun is? He was supposed to be on the back door with Minho. And speaking of, why don’t they know about Minho? Did he abandon his post and leave a man behind? It sounds wildly out of character for him.

But that means the only other option is-

His chest goes cold. “Shit,” Chan hisses.

Jeongin’s voice is hoarse. “I think he’s dead.”

Junseong’s voice filters in through the communication, getting jumbled with Jeongin’s for a moment before becoming clear. “We need to retrieve his body.” Of course he’d say that, they’d worked together for years, Junseong wasn’t going to leave the man, even in the middle of a fire-fight. He’s too stubbornly loyal, too tenacious. Unfortunately, they don’t have that luxury, not with hostiles still swarming around them.

Chan’s grip on his gun tightens. “You will not move from your location until we’re clear, do you understand me.” He’s having to hiss under his breath, trying to keep his position unclear for as long as possible. “Keep your focus, both of you.”

“Minho won’t answer, someone has to hold the back door!” Junseong sounds rabid, and theoretically it’s a good argument, but if Chan’s just lost two men, he’s not going to throw another one into what’s probably suicide.

“Taeseung and Kangsung are watching the building, they’ll catch anyone who gets out.” It’s the backup plan of a backup plan, and both of his remaining men know it. He can hear it in Jeongin’s sharp breath, and Junseong’s frustrated growl.

“With all due respect, Chan-“ Junseong begins, in the clear tone of someone who is not about to say something respectful. “I’m not going to-“

But he doesn’t get to find out what the man won’t do, because a burst of gun-fire below cuts him off. Chan doesn’t wince at the sound but he does tighten his jaw. He hates that he can tell who is who, he hates that he can follow it back and forth like some awful game of ping-pong. 

It’s a silenced pistol that fires last. Fighting to keep himself controlled and calm, Chan hisses into his ear-piece, “Junseong? Jeongin?”

“Shit shit shit-“ It’s Jeongin’s voice, and the burst of feedback in Chan’s ear almost drowns him out entirely. “There’s so much, why is there- Why is there so much blood?”

It’s all just going so wrong, isn’t it? “Report, Jeongin!” His voice is harsh, but it’s only to keep the other man from spiraling. “What’s happening?”

“Junseong, he- he’s bleeding a lot.” Chan hears Jeongin curse again, hears the notes of panic laced into his voice. He’s trying to hide it, but it’s not working, not well enough. “I don’t know if he’s still- I can’t stop the blood.”

Gritting his teeth, Chan ducks behind a doorway, weighing his options as he listens to the sounds of footsteps thundering through the building. “Get him out of here.”

“What, no!” Jeongin’s voice drops to a growl. “I’m not leaving you behind.”

“That is an order,” Chan snaps into his ear-piece. “Take Junseong and get out.” If Jeongin is panicking, he’ll be no use to Chan, and Junseong is already down. Better to get them both out and save at least one than to lose them both at once. It’s not his ideal scenario, not by a long shot, but adapting and overcoming is part of the job. “Bar the doors when you go, make sure the front isn’t an escape point.” Pausing, he adds, “Even for me.”

From the other side of the connection, Jeongin lets out a breath. “You can’t just die here.”

“You know I won’t die.” Chan knows it too, as certainly as if he’s seen his own future. “If you want to help, get Junseong somewhere safe and try to find word on Minho. Get me his status.”

“Forget the job.” Jeongin’s begging, and it’s the first time Chan’s heard him sound so small. So hilariously young and out of his depth and not meant to be here at all. “Come back with us. Please.”

“I can’t.” Pursing his lips together, Chan leans back against the door for a second. Sees one face flash before his eyes, and feels his own resolve solidify into steel. “Someone has to finish this.”

“But alone you can’t-”

“I’ll be back.” His free hand jumps up and he switches off the ear-piece, before stuffing it into his pocket. He’ll have hell to pay for it later, but right now he needs complete focus, he doesn’t need Jeongin doubting his capabilities.

It might get me killed, Chan muses, as his grip returns to his silenced pistol and he focuses once more on the sounds of running feet. But then, it’s not time for me to die, is it.

Not when the Boss has given him a job.

Maybe it seems skewed, a mere job over his own life. An order placed above everything else. But in Chan’s mind, it makes perfect sense. In fact, it’s so simplistic it’s almost laughable.

It’s not just an order, it was a command given by his boss. The Boss. The same person he’s been following for several decades. 

You don’t disobey the Boss. You don’t let him down. And Chan has never let the man down. Not since they were children, and he won’t do it as an adult. This isn’t just a job for him, this is his life. This is everything.

He is everything.

As two pairs of footsteps round the corner, Chan quickly makes a decision. He’s outnumbered, but he’s been outnumbered all night. This is the time to start taking bodies. He’s got a mission, and he’ll be damned if he lies down and fails.

Shifting his stance, Chan ducks around the corner and fires twice. 

<=====≪

Chan remembers the first time he met Seungmin clearly, even though at eight he shouldn’t have been able to keep more than snapshots of memory. But he has this one locked away. 

Where he can stare at it sometimes, and wonder if this was all inevitable.

The hand on his back had been his father’s. Large, stern, purposeful, pushing him to shuffle and scuff his feet over to the stone steps that lead up to the Big House. He didn’t feel shy exactly, but the Big House wasn’t somewhere he went unless something important was happening, and the nice shirt he’d been forced into was stiff across his shoulders and down his back.

Chan remembers looking up at the Boss, as his father always called him. With his slicked back hair and his narrowed eyes and immaculate suit. He remembers the hand on his back shifting up to rest on his head as his father straightened to address the Boss.

But mostly, he remembers the boy beside the Boss.

That’s what he’d been at the time, a boy. Not the man Chan eventually came to know. No, this had been a kid, with chubby hands and eyes almost too big to fit on his face and a baseball cap shoved over unruly hair. Someone had put him in a suit, so he matched all the other men and women standing around the yard, but it had been too big on him. Just enough that he was drowning in it. Just enough that it slid over his hands and almost hid his tennis shoes.

“This is Kim Seungmin,” the Boss had stated. “My son.”

Seungmin. A five year old who looked so out of place among all the other officials gathered around them. A kid who had turned those huge eyes on Chan and had looked him over like he was fifty and not five. Maybe it was something about how his face naturally settled into a calculating look, albeit a childish one. Maybe it was the situation, being introduced like this was something unbelievably official and not two children meeting for the first time. But Chan would always remember Seungmin being intimidating, even then.

“You’re going to protect this boy with your life,” Chan’s father had told him, like this was something he should already be able to comprehend.

Except as far as he knew, his father worked a stuffy office job, and the Boss was just his work boss, and Seungmin was going to be his new friend. Protecting him with his life? Chan hardly knew how to look after himself. So it must have been a joke.

But his father’s voice was serious, and the Boss was serious. And Seungmin had just blinked at him expectantly, like this was some sort of test. For all Chan had known at the time, it was, and he didn’t want to fail it.

“Okay.”

Around them, the conversation had continued as the two of them were ushered away and shooed off to the yard of the Big House. Seungmin’s suit jacket had gotten lost in a tree, and under the baseball cap had been fluffy straight brown hair that almost fell over his eyes.

He laughed more back then.

“Your name is Chan, right?” Seungmin had asked, standing above him, wedged into the crook of two low branches. “That’s what Dad said.”

“Bang Chan,” Chan had quickly offered, with a little nod. No one had told him in advance about Seungmin.

“Chan,” Seungmin had repeated, and he’d flashed a wide child’s grin. “You’re going to protect me forever.”

And that had been that. If you’d asked him to point to a moment where everything had changed, this would have been what he gave you, every single time. It didn’t matter that they had been children, it didn’t even matter that he didn’t know what it meant.

He’d still tipped his head to the side and offered Seungmin an answering grin.

“I guess so.”

If nothing else, in that moment Chan had decided to be this kid’s friend, because it had been expected, and because he seemed like fun. But when he thought back to those instructions, of protecting Seungmin with his life, all Chan could do was wonder.

Because how was he supposed to do that past making sure the boy didn’t fall off his bike?

≫=====>

He remembers the first time he held a gun.

He’d been twelve, standing at a private indoor range, hardly tall enough to see over the arm-rest, and one of his fathers men had pressed something cold, heavy and metallic into his hands.

Of course Chan had seen these before, on the TV screen, playing video games with Seungmin. He’d even seen his father with them. But he’d never held one. Never had one this close to his person.

It hadn’t scared him exactly. Part of him had found it deeply cool to be holding a weapon. The small childish twelve-year-old who couldn’t even imagine using the thing to hurt someone. The most he’d ever seen his father do with it was point it calmly downrange and unload bullet after bullet into paper targets that jerkily moved around on little motorized rails.

What had scared him was the first rule of gun safety he’d been taught.

“Never point your gun at someone you’re not prepared to shoot.”

Chan had blinked up at his father, who stood behind them all watching this scene play out. “I’m not trying to shoot anyone,” he’d responded dumbly. Foolishly.

At this point, he wasn’t as uninformed as he had been. He knew that his father worked for the mob, he knew that past his mother’s soft voice, she could kill someone. He knew that the Boss was a lot scarier than just an older adult.

He knew that was going to be his life someday.

But it hadn’t hit him until that moment, with a gun in his hand. With a grip that was starting to get sweaty as he held it pointed at the floor.

Suddenly, he hadn’t found the gun so cool anymore.

He wasn’t supposed to say no to his father, though, so he kept ahold of the gun, even though he desperately wanted to put it down and back away.

For a long moment, his father had regarded him coolly. Granted, those eyes had never been particularly full of warmth in the first place. Chan’s father showed kindness in other ways. Through physical action and rarely through words. Rarely by his expression.

Still, at that moment, he’d looked cold. Chan remembers that expression, and wonders if that alone had been enough to shift his entire paradigm.

“Eventually, you’re going to have to shoot someone.” His father’s voice had been firm. Chilled but gentle. Which was good because if it had been any harsher, Chan probably would have dropped the weapon. “Whether you want to or not is irrelevant.”

It didn’t feel irrelevant. It had felt like the most important factor at the time. But then, he’d been twelve. He hadn’t understood exactly what he was facing. Hadn’t understood that what felt like an option or a suggestion would become a way of life too quickly for him to escape it.

Looking back down range, his father had continued listing the rules of gun safety. It wasn’t until Chan was much older that he’d discover these weren’t the traditional gun safety laws.

“Always treat the gun like it’s loaded.” One of his father’s men set out a box of ammunition. It clanked ominously against the small table. “If you do, they will too.”

The magazine already in the pistol suddenly seemed monumentally heavy. Like it was going to drag the weapon out of Chan’s fingers. But he didn’t dare set it down. Because that had felt like the wrong thing to do.

“Putting your finger on the trigger is a threat. If you’re not prepared to follow through on that threat then don’t.”

His finger hadn’t been on the trigger but Chan was very aware of where his index finger was now. Along the barrel, sweaty and useless. Glancing down the range at the paper targets, he wondered why he couldn’t have had this lesson without the knowledge of what this practice would be used for.

If I don’t plan on threatening anyone, why am I even holding the gun?

His stomach had knotted up, until he felt sick.

“Be aware of your target, but always be aware of the collateral in the area with them.”

Target. Like a person.

And it’s not exactly a mystery what collateral means.

“Now hold that gun like you mean it.”

One of the other men steps up then and starts showing Chan how to hold the gun. It’s complicated. There’s bracing your elbow and locking your hands together over the grip and where not to keep your pinky finger to keep it from getting hurt. It doesn’t help that the gun is too big for his hands. Even this smaller pistol feels ungainly and awkward and no matter how many times he’s shown how to steady himself and how to position his feet, it still feels wrong.

And then they start talking about recoil and keeping relaxed before pulling the trigger and when to breathe. Chan’s head spins and his stomach knots up. He’s a kid. Learning to shoot would be cool, but learning to kill sounds terrifying.

“Why?” he finally manages, after they’ve shown him how to drop the magazine and how to put a new one in.

The men around him had fallen silent, deferring to Chan’s father.

“Why?” His expression stays flat, but Chan still takes a step back. “I already told you why.”

No, that’s not what he meant, he wants to know why this is going to be his life. Why he can’t just grow up and be boring. Why he can’t be the office worker he used to think his father was.

Even though he’s risking his father’s anger, Chan still speaks up, because staying silent is worse. “Why do I have to kill people?”

He’d expected a lot of things, ire chief among them. He hadn’t expected the man to point towards the window of the range. Turning, Chan had found a familiar face watching them.

Seungmin had stood there, arms on the windowsill, watching Chan with quiet interest. He seems unfazed by the weapons. Entirely unbothered by the fact that Chan was being taught how to use a gun. He just stands there, staring, eyes locked on the twelve-year-old.

“That’s why you have to kill people,” his father had said clearly, as Chan’s heart thudded weakly in his chest. “Because you have to protect him. Because he’s going to be your responsibility just like the Boss is mine.”

Chan doesn’t like it. He wants to go back to chasing after Seungmin’s bike and catching his hand when he almost slips into the creek. He wants to run around and have fun and he wants out of this concrete room with its little paper targets on motorized rails that shift around. He doesn’t want to shoot anything.

“Can’t someone else protect him?”

His father’s gaze is ice. “Responsibilities aren’t that easy to push onto someone else.”

But it doesn’t have to be my responsibility. It could be someone else’s. There are another seven men in the room at that moment, all of whom have guns at their waists. All of whom are trained to do this. To kill people probably, or at least be willing to do so if the need arose. It doesn’t have to be Chan.

His eyes dart to Seungmin again. To the way he leans his forehead against the glass intently, waiting for Chan to do something with the gun still sitting uselessly in his hands.

“No,” he says quietly. “I won’t.”

Sighing shortly, his father glances towards one of his men.

The next handful of seconds happen very fast. One of the men goes for his gun. He has it out and the safety off before Chan can blink, before he can really register what’s happening. And in the next second he has that gun pointed at the window. At Seungmin.

Chan doesn’t think. He isn’t anywhere close to as fast, but he’s still swinging his own gun up and at the other man. The safety on his pistol is off, the gun is loaded, and his finger is on the trigger before he realizes what he’s doing. Before he stops because he thinks his heart is going to hammer itself out of his chest.

Seungmin’s still standing in the window, unmoving. Entirely uncaring about the weapon currently pointed at his head.

Chan’s father snaps his fingers.

At once, the man is clicking the safety back on and is holstering his pistol. It occurs to Chan years later, after he actually understands weapons, after he knows what he’d been looking at, that the man had never put his finger on the trigger. He’d pointed the gun, but he hadn’t been prepared to shoot. And the glass he’d pointed it at had been reinforced plexiglass anyway. Bulletproof, even at point-blank range.

Seungmin had never been in any danger, but Chan had been ready to pull that trigger anyway. He’d been ready to kill someone else in order to protect him. And it had taken him all of five seconds to be pushed to that point.

Stepping over to him, Chan’s father had put his hand on the barrel of the pistol and pointed it downrange. “That’s why it’s your responsibility.”

It hadn’t even taken several years for it to sink in. In that moment, Chan had understood.

“Yes sir.”

“Good.” Chan’s father had nodded. “Now, back to the lesson.”

≫=====>

Seungmin had always been intimidating.

Perhaps not traditionally so. Growing up he’d been small. Lanky but slight. Like all it would take was a good gust of wind to knock him over. He’d also been uncommonly pretty. With full lips and a perfect smile and huge dark eyes that sparkled. Always so neatly groomed, even when they were teenagers, even when everyone else was a disaster of ripped jeans and dirty tee-shirts and bed-head from days ago.

Seungmin always looked flawless. And oh so delicate.

It was the way he moved, the way he acted like even the dust on the pavement couldn’t touch him. And by all accounts it couldn’t. Where he went, people paid attention. When he walked into a room, heads turned. The moment they moved from elementary school to middle school, and then onto high school it was over. No one could resist Seungmin’s charms.

But that grace and refinement didn’t mean he wasn’t terrifying.

Perhaps it had helped that Chan knew who he was. Knew his background and who his family was and the hell that anyone who hurt him would have to pay. But in Chan’s opinion, even at a young age, Seungmin hadn’t needed all of that to be scary.

There was something about his soft, precise voice that commanded respect. That demanded he be listened to.

Chan could remember a few times when he hadn’t been afraid, or rather, when that healthy level of deference you had for something more powerful than you had left him. He also remembers how quickly he’d been corrected of that misapprehension. How unequivocally.

He’d hit puberty before Seungmin. When the boy had still been small and willowy, Chan had gotten bigger. His voice had dropped, the training he got from his father and others in the organization started bulking him up. He’d gone from a kid to something in that awkward in-between phase a lot quicker than he’d expected.

Because of that, and maybe also because of his background, the same one that was training him to kill things, Chan had moments where he didn’t fear much of anything. Even Seungmin. He had moments where he’d look at the boy and think that he looked weak instead of just younger.

A foolish assumption to make. One that had nearly gotten him killed on a particularly notable occasion.

The power struggle had formed somewhere around his nineteenth birthday, when Seungmin had still been fifteen; well spoken but tiny. Puberty was just setting in for him, but all it had done so far was make him grow like a weed. The height without anything to accompany it had made him look more twiggy than usual, easy to be pushed around, easy to ignore.

Chan hadn’t ‘pushed him around’ physically. He’d known better than to do that. And he hadn’t let anyone else push Seungmin around either. But there were times when Seungmin gave him an order thinly veiled as a suggestion, and Chan ignored him. Or he’d throw around dangerously mocking words about Seungmin. Words that would have gotten him in trouble if his father or the Boss had heard him.

Seungmin had tolerated this insubordination to a point. If something was important, he explicitly made it an order. When Chan’s teasing went too far, Seungmin pushed back, with a razor tongue that would have put almost anyone else to shame.

As an outsider, their relationship probably looked healthy. Like something boys of their age should have. Even if Seungmin had never used honorifics for Chan in his life, and probably wasn’t going to start. They were still fine.

But anyone with a trained eye could have seen the power struggle from a mile away.

And then came the incident. The moment that Chan remembers with perfect clarity even years later as the day he finally fell into line.

Seungmin had just turned sixteen a handful of days previously, he had new responsibilities because of it, and they’d been arguing. That was the first sign that something was terribly wrong. For all his rebelliousness, Chan usually didn’t go so far as to argue, at least not with any sincerity. And yet there he’d been, locked in a heated debate with Seungmin that showed no signs of petering out.

It had been over something, retrospectively, quite stupid.

Chan had wanted to spend time with his friend Changbin. Seungmin had very clearly stated that he had somewhere to be and Chan needed to come with him as protection. And knee deep in his rebellious phase as he was, Chan had said no.

It had been a concurrence of bad choices on his part.

They’d been at the Big House. Chan spent more of his time there than he wanted to, more than any teenager should have to. What had once been a place of mystery and excitement and Seungmin had gradually become another classroom. Another chore. A cage. And it had only made his frustration worse, had only fueled his poor choices because he’d wanted out.

Seungmin had been unimpressed with him from the very outset.

The boy had been in the middle of a patch of sunlight streaming in through the wide window, standing despite the armchairs scattered around the sitting room. He’d had his arms folded across his chest, his full lips had been pursed, and his eyes, which usually sparkled and danced, had been dark. Irritated. His tone had only reinforced this mood.

“Chan, we’ve known about this meeting for two weeks now. It isn’t a surprise.”

Chan still remembers the wave of frustration that had passed over him at those words.

“No, you knew about this for two weeks. You never told me anything.”

Sticking his chin further in the air, Seungmin had simply said, “I tell you things when you need to know them.”

“I needed to know them before I made plans.” And Chan had fully believed that was a good argument, even if it had been one made based off of the foolish idea that he was a normal kid. That he could do normal kid things. “I have a life, Seungmin. I have friends outside of you. I need to know if I’m going to be busy before the day of.”

Lifting his shoulders in a shrug, Seungmin had just said, “I told you last night. That was the time to cancel, but you’ll just have to cancel now.”

That had hit a nerve. That look on Seungmin’s face, like he had complete control over Chan and knew it, had pissed him off. He’d been sick to death of people ordering his life for him and of all of them, Seungmin wasn’t an adult. Seungmin was a kid three years younger than him who had never acted like it once in his life and Chan had been angry.

His second mistake.

But he hadn’t known it was a mistake at the time. No, at the time, he’d just taken those two steps forward until he was in Seungmin’s personal space and had stared him down. They had still been the same height at that time, with Chan having the advantage on a good day. He was bigger, he was taller, he was theoretically more intimidating, and he was tired of being told what to do.

“I’m not canceling, I’m hanging out with my friends. Find someone else to babysit you.” That’s the word he’d used, babysit. It still made him wince, even a decade later.

Seungmin’s eyes had narrowed ever so slightly. Despite Chan’s ill advised show of physical presence, he hadn’t backed down, hadn’t so much as budged, he’d just stared at the other boy and said, “It’s your job Chan, it’s not someone else’s job.”

“I don’t want the job! I don’t give a fuck about these responsibilities.” Clenching his hands into fists, Chan had snapped, “You can take care of yourself, stop making this my problem.”

And that had been his last mistake. Not the words, though those had been bad enough, but instead it had been the moment he’d raised his voice. Because until then they’d been matching inflections, had just been arguing, but now Chan was shouting, and you didn’t shout at Seungmin.

Just like you didn’t shout at the Boss.

The shift in the room had been instantaneous. The drop in temperature, the change in air pressure, the sudden ringing in his ears as he realized too late what he’d done. Even pissed off and hyped up like he had been, Chan had noticed it. Had known he’d made a mistake the moment it happened.

Had instantly taken a step back as Seungmin advanced on him.

“What was that?”

The shift in Seungmin’s expression had been minute. The slight narrowing of his eyes, the press of his lips, the tilt of his chin. But the difference had been startling. Abruptly he had gone from entirely non-threatening to terrifying, in less time than it took Chan to blink. And his voice. Gone was the irritation, gone was the testiness, all that had been left behind was ice.

Suddenly Chan was looking at something far more frightening than he would ever be.

“I- I’m sorry,” he’d quickly said, as his throat went dry and his palms started to sweat. “I didn’t mean-“

“Didn’t mean what exactly?” When Seungmin took another step forward, Chan had matched it with his own retreat. The lessons his father had given him informed Chan that Seungmin wasn’t armed, but that hadn’t mattered. It hadn’t mattered that it was just the two of them in the room, that any backup Seungmin might have had was several closed doors away.

He’d still felt the cold hand of death gripping his throat.

“Go on Chan, tell me what you didn’t mean.” Seungmin had been goading him, but Chan didn’t dare answer. Didn’t dare give excuses and make this worse. “Didn’t mean to insult me? Didn’t mean to raise your voice? Didn’t mean to argue?”

When Seungmin took another step forward, Chan hadn’t moved. He’d just stood there, frozen, as the other boy bore down on him. “Tell me Chan,” Seungmin had demanded, venom dripping from his words. “Tell me what you meant.”

That was an order. One that he couldn’t disobey. Dragging in a rattling breath, Chan quietly insisted, “I didn’t mean to disrespect you.”

“So why have you been doing it for the past year?”

As Seungmin took that last step forward, bringing them nose to nose, Chan had heard rather than felt his knees give way. Heard the sound they made when they hit the floor, even though his body had been too numb for the discomfort to register.

“I’m sorry,” he’d whispered, as quite a few of his poor life choices caught up to him in that moment.

“You know if you don’t want this job, there is an alternative.” Seungmin’s words had been silk. Cold and devoid of discernible emotions but oh so soft, slipping past Chan’s ears like fingers caressing his cheek. “If protecting me really is so terrible, there is a way out. You wouldn’t have to worry about it ever again, you wouldn’t have to worry about anything.”

If someone had told Chan he was trembling, he’d have believed them. As it was, he couldn’t feel his body, couldn’t think. All he had been able to do was stare up at Seungmin and listen to the words dripping from his mouth.

Reaching down with one of those delicate, picturesque hands, Seungmin had hooked a finger under Chan’s chin, bringing it up so he couldn’t have looked away if he wanted to.

“We could kill you.”

And then he smiled, and Chan had known that if anyone killed him it would be Seungmin, and he wouldn’t hesitate for a second.

“If you don’t want to be here, I can make it so you aren’t. But the only way out is in a casket. If that’s what you want, I can make it happen, but I think we both know that isn’t what you want, because you wouldn’t just leave me like that.” 

He wouldn’t. It’s more than the threat to his own life, it had been the realization that Seungmin was in charge. Wholly and completely. In all those ways Chan had been resisting so strongly.

“You can’t just walk out of those doors, Chan. This is your life.”

It was the same thing he’d been told for years, but for the first time Chan believed it. He understood with every fiber of his being that this is where he belonged and trying to be something else was pointless. Was only going to make him more unhappy later on.

“I am your life.”

The breath that Chan had heaved in had shook his whole body. “Yes sir.”

Batting those long, lovely lashes, Seungmin’s smile had blossomed into a beautiful and terrifying grin. “That’s not my name, Chan. Come on, you’ve known it for years.”

Uttering that name had felt like the most dangerous thing he’d ever done, and yet he had, because who was he to tell Seungmin no.

“Yes, Seungmin.”

Smile gentling, eyes curving up into little delicate crescents, the boy had reached out his hand, had beckoned for Chan to take it, and had made a show about dusting him off as he stood up. “We need to get changed for that meeting,” he’d hummed, as he straightened Chan’s shirt and brushed those slender fingers through his curly hair. “Got to look presentable.”

And all he’d been able to do was nod, because what words were there left to say?

≫=====><=====≪

The second body slumps to the floor, dead.

Chest heaving, Chan pulls him out from behind his door-frame entirely and stares at the mess of the hallway. The two hadn’t given up without a fight, there are pot-marks in the walls and blood splattered over the floor. He hopes it isn’t a sign he’s getting sloppy but maybe he is. This hasn’t exactly been easy on him.

Fighting to get his breathing back under control, Chan gathers his bearings. Hopefully, Jeongin is in the process of obeying him, getting Junseong to safety, making sure that no one else got out. He still hasn’t processed the news that Dongjun is gone, but that will come later. I should find and grab him on the way out. If he’s lucky, if he has time. If he isn’t forced to search for Minho’s body too, then he will.

He knows it’s the height of sentimentality, but he doesn’t want to leave someone behind.

Briefly, his eyes skate back over the bodies on the floor. He’s been doing this so long, it doesn’t register anymore. When was the last time a kill actually gave him pause? He doesn’t remember. At this point, they’re just targets. Just bowling pins to knock over at Seungmin’s whim.

Chan’s father had been right. Eventually, the line between paper targets at the range and people became the Boss’ word and nothing else. Chan hadn’t believed he’d get to that point, but maybe it had been inevitable. Considering how loyal he is, he’s only surprised it didn’t happen sooner.

He thinks to Seungmin then, to the kill order several days before. He’d been so calm as he’d given it, as if the elimination of a rival family was a drop in the bucket, hardly something to bat his eyes at. And for him, it wasn’t, because he could simply give the word and know it’d be carried out with precision.

Chan hadn’t batted an eye either. He’d been expecting the order for a while, had heard the rumblings and felt the change of the wind. If Seungmin made this move, their own organization would be able to slide in to fill the power vacuum left behind. Their own influence would be nearly doubled, and the things it’d do for their reputation would be invaluable. He doesn’t know every intricacy of the politics, but he knows enough to recognize this as the right decision.

Closing his eyes for a second, under the vague pretense of listening for movement within the house, Chan sees Seungmin before him, just as he’d been that night.

The steepled fingers, the press of his lips, the cool gaze he’d turned towards the window. Looking like sex and sin in that familiar pinstriped suit. Chan remembers the soft breath that had left him before he’d spoken, like he was accepting there was no other way. Like a single sigh was the only prayer he needed for the souls he chose to condemn.

All of them, he’d said, with a glance to the side that bore no argument. And then burn what’s left.

Scorched earth was a rarely used method; Chan could count on one hand the number of times he’d been asked to carry out a similar mission. And never this big. Never something that promised to overturn the balance of power so completely.

But Seungmin’s eyes had been so dark, and Chan had felt his heart thump heavily at the sight. Following through on this would please him, so Chan would. He wouldn’t ask questions, he wouldn’t raise concerns, he’d just do. That’s how he operates. That’s the kind of attitude Seungmin expects, the expertise he demands.

Of course, he’d answered, without a moment’s hesitation.

He’d been given papers and details, names and faces. The number of exits and what date it needed to happen. It had all been business as usual, like it was one of his hits that would be done in an evening. Chan had treated it as such, right up until Seungmin’s hand had brushed over his own and lingered there.

It’s dangerous. It’s rare Seungmin shows anything that could be categorized as concern. When it comes to his people, he often says he doesn’t worry because he only has the best, so the flicker of something else in his voice had stopped Chan in his tracks.

Quickly, his eyes had met Seungmin’s.

I know.

Seungmin’s lips had thinned. Do you? Such a strange question at the time because it couldn’t be doubt and it didn’t sound like mockery. There was a different bite to the tone, one that had rested somewhere between his shoulder blades and sunk below his skin. In retrospect, Chan wonders if somehow, the man had known just how bad it’d be.

All he’d said in response was the same thing he always did. The simple I’ll come back to you that he used in place of a confession. Words that were safe and almost professional and so much less heart wrenching than what could come out of his mouth.

For a moment, Seungmin’s eyes had lingered on his face, and though the emotions within them were unreadable, Chan had felt a weight fall over them both. As so often happened, he’d been frozen to the spot, unable to so much as blink.

Carefully, Seungmin had reached forward, always the one to initiate, always the one to draw him in. Without question, Chan had leaned into the touch, pressed his jaw against Seungmin’s delicate fingers and suppressed the shudder the contact pulled from him. Despite the talk of murder, just this was enough to subdue him, to put him under the other man’s thumb as literally as it did figuratively.

Seungmin had been a hair’s breadth away, his breath on Chan’s face, his lashes fluttering over those dark dark eyes, and even before soft lips pressed against his own, he had been lost.

Just like every time before.

And then he’d drawn away completely, and the loss of contact had threatened to make Chan get down on his knees and beg.

He hadn’t then, but it was moments like these, with viscera splattered up one pant leg and a new magazine in the gun, that he knew why sometimes he did.

If Chan was going to commit to this for the rest of his life, there had to be someone greater than himself to turn to. There had to be an answer after the question, a reason beyond the why. If all his hands brought him was death, there had to be an altar to pour that blood upon.

At this point, he wishes it were as easy as love, because at least love wouldn’t have made him sound crazy.

Remembering himself, steadying his breath, Chan opens his eyes and brings his mind back to the present. Yes, he’s outnumbered and quite likely alone, yes he’s teetering on a razor’s edge, but he’s still got his weapons, and resolve in his nerves. And somewhere in the back of his mind is the knowledge that he isn’t permitted to fail. Whatever Jeongin said about leaving, about not letting this kill him, Chan would rather die than return to Seungmin empty handed.

It’s not just the knowledge that Seungmin will kill him quicker than anyone here. It’s the unwavering devotion to the man that drives him forward. As his senses sharpen and his grip strengthens, Chan turns back in the direction of the stairs.

He still has work left to do. Until it’s done, he won’t stop.

And they can try to stop him, but the only one who’s going to be his death is Seungmin. This is child’s play by comparison.

<=====≪

Chan still remembers the day he fell in love.

It’s probably something a lot of people remember. Their first love. With all the associated ups and downs and shining memories that bring with them a host of emotions. It can’t be uncommon to hold that moment forever. That moment you looked at another person and went oh.

The fact that his first love has also been his only love is probably not worth mentioning.

Certainly it wasn’t his first relationship. Hell, it never became a relationship. Even years later, Chan wouldn’t be so bold as to claim it’s anything with concrete labels. Or at least, not ones related to romance in any way. That would be assuming a lot of things he didn’t have the right to assume.

But it was his first love.

His previous relationships had been fun. Flings. A few girls, a guy or two. His friend Jisung on one notable, drunk occasion. But it had never been love. And that had been fine. Chan had a lot of things to think about and love just wasn’t one of them. It was easier to have fun and forget all the serious stuff that had slowly filled his everyday life. Maybe, if he could have had a choice in the matter, he would have asked to never fall in love at all.

He’d been in his early twenties when it happened. Twenty-four, to be exact, and he can almost remember the day. Years later, when that time of the year and that time of the month comes around, it’ll hit him like the first time, and it’s the closest thing to an anniversary he’ll ever have.

If you’d asked him, Chan would have told you he stopped fooling around with people close to that time because that had been when he’d been given his first hit.

But if he’s honest with himself, he knows it’s something a lot more sentimental.

Of course it doesn’t just begin with the hit. Things had started getting serious for him the year previous. He’d finished up college and started working full time. Not in an office, not in a grocery store or little restaurant, but for the mob. His cover story was a boring desk job, just like his father before him, but Chan’s life was far from boring and he’d given up trying to pretend otherwise.

He still had a life outside of it. He kept his friends, Changbin and Jisung, and sometimes he got to be an ordinary guy with them, but the instances of normalcy were steadily decreasing. Canceling plans had become more common, and with every year, the reluctance to do so had faded away.

Responsibilities were exactly that. Responsibilities. Things you couldn’t just put off and avoid in perpetuity. Eventually you had to tackle them. And he’d started to become proactive rather than reactive.

Still, at that point, the severity of life had only come to a certain point. Chan did business with the mob, but there were some things not yet expected of him. He’d been security detail for years, he’d played guard dog and bad cop and had kidnapped a few people. He’d caused grievous bodily harm to a number of individuals he was slowly losing track of.

But he’d never killed anyone.

Hits were still something handed to his father, even though the man was starting to get on in years. Or they were things handed to the people under his father. But Chan was one of those people now, and it was only a matter of time until the Boss gave him that order.

He thought he was ready for it.

Retrospectively, he should have known that it wouldn’t be the Boss at all who gave him that command.

Because while Chan had been slowly sliding into his role of bodyguard, the man he was guarding had been growing up.

Adulthood had hit Seungmin like a truck. Gone was the tiny little waif that flirted with his future but never fully embraced it. Somewhere along the line, that boy had been replaced with a man. His jaw had sharpened, the baby fat on his cheeks had lessened. His waist stayed tiny but there was lean muscle under the clothing now, and power in his movements. He carried himself like he knew what he was doing, with the same confidence and strength as the Boss.

His eyes were still big and beautiful, but the sparkle in their depths was a calculated sparkle. A gleam that existed only to disarm.

Seungmin had evolved from the menace of his childhood into a full blown threat, and even though Chan had also changed, he couldn’t hold a candle to the man he protected.

He didn’t mind that. Everyone knew that Seungmin was going to be the boss, probably within the next five years. Already he was the Boss’s right hand, already he took care of business that many would have considered him too young to handle. At the tender age of twenty-one, Seungmin was the second most powerful person within the organization, and the fear that position commanded had been earned.

Chan was honored to follow him.

It had been why he hadn’t asked questions when Seungmin asked him to meet him at the Big House that night. He’d gotten the text and had looked between Jisung and Changbin with a shrug. Duty calls, he’d said, and they had both laughed and Changbin had punched his arm, telling him that he worked too hard. But they’d let him go without question.

Them not prying into his business was the biggest reason their friendship was so solid.

An hour later, he’d arrived. Freshly showered and dressed for business, his handgun tucked away with the rest of the arms and armaments that he carried with him when working. He still had almost half an hour before the time Seungmin had specified, but he wanted to be on time. When it came to Seungmin, he always wanted to be on time.

It had been a night like any other, the nods from the other men and women, the trip down to the familiar office at the end of the long hall, and letting himself in with the spare key. Admittedly, Chan had been looking forward to seeing Seungmin but he hadn’t thought anything of it. Certainly hadn’t been thinking about how his interactions with the man had changed over the past two years because in his eyes, it was so gradual as to still feel normal.

This had been simply business.

The office had been dark when he’d arrived. Absently, he’d turned on the desk lamp and stood there, waiting.

A few minutes in, the waiting had turned into checking his pistol. The quick disassembly and reassembly was something he found soothing. He knew this weapon, even if most of its use had been at a range, and, on a few memorable occasions, someone’s foot, knee, or thigh. At this point, you could see the shine on the dull metal where his hand usually fit.

The repetitive motions were like a little prayer. Something like meditation, something that put him in the right mindset to work.

By the time he’d checked every piece of his weapon, down to the two spare magazines he had tucked away, he was ready.

To say he hadn’t heard the door open would have been a lie. Seungmin could be quiet, but Chan’s job was hearing. Knowing exactly what was going on around him at all times no matter what. But it would have been fair to say he hadn’t been expecting what walked through the door.

The suit had been new.

Familiar in years to follow, becoming almost like a little switch in Chan’s brain that did the worst things to him at the worst times. A certified Pavlovian response. But that was the first time he’d seen Seungmin in it. All dark with faint pinstripes that made his legs look even longer, a loose jacket and a tucked in button down that made his waist look even slimmer. Silver cuff links and tie pin that had glittered dangerously in the low light.

The suit was fine, yes, but Chan’s eyes had been all for the man wearing it.

Seungmin had looked deadly that night. Not just dangerous as usual, a thinly veiled threat behind a glass of liquor. No, he’d looked like the edge of a knife, the finger on the trigger of a gun. His hair had been swept back, partially falling out of the hair gel, tumbling over half his forehead in a glossy wave. His jaw had been set, just barely containing the thoughts that bubbled under the surface.

And his eyes-

If Chan hadn’t had the desk at his back, he would have retreated.

As it was, he watched silently as Seungmin locked the door behind him before stepping forward, all long legs and eyes as deep as the abyss. Even if he’d wanted to move or look away, he couldn’t have.

Chan had grown up with Seungmin. He’d spent a lot of time seeing the man as small and in need of protection, or delicate and pretty and ever so dangerous. More recently, he’d learned to see the man as someone to be respected, to be feared and fought for in equal measure. But there was always that lingering thread of their shared childhood that colored everything.

Seungmin might as well have been his younger brother when they were small.

It had been that precise moment that Chan realized that somewhere along the line, everything had changed.

As Seungmin’s eyes met his, Chan’s throat had gone dry. “Thank you for meeting me,” he had hummed, and there had been something wild behind the tight note of professionalism. “Especially on such short notice.”

Like Chan wouldn’t drop everything for him. Like even then he wouldn’t cross entire oceans just because Seungmin asked him to.

Clearing his throat, Chan gave a short nod before letting his eyes travel over Seungmin. Though he knew there was business to be done, he allowed himself a brief moment of light conversation.

“New suit?” A small gesture, a shallow swallow. “It looks good on you.”

Good hadn’t been the word on his mind. Even though Chan was trying to valiantly ignore that fact, the word on his tongue had been attractive. Sexy. 

Hot.

Things you didn’t think about your boss. Even if your boss was someone you’d known your whole life.

It wasn’t the first time it had crossed his mind. Seungmin had been gorgeous for a few years now, but it had been the first time it had been so personal. It was one thing to objectively look at someone and know they were pretty. It was quite another for it to affect you.

Right then, Chan had been affected.

As though the words meant very little, Seungmin had skated over his comment with a wave of his hand. “I have a meeting later.”

“Is that why you needed me?”

“No.” Pausing, Seungmin had drawn closer and tipped his head to the side. “Well, yes, actually. I guess I do need you to be there, which is going to give you a bit of a time limit.” A small, soft smile that might as well have stopped Chan’s heart. “But I’m sure you can manage.”

He could. Whatever it was, if Seungmin needed it done and done fast, done right, then Chan would figure it out. That’s why this was his job and not someone else’s.

“Of course.”

Stopping in front of Chan, Seungmin had put a hand on the desk behind them and looked him over. Slow and calculating it may have been, but it had set the man on fire. Every single one of his nerves sang as Seungmin’s eyes had lingered on his belt before wandering up to the two buttons of his shirt that Chan had left undone. What he was thinking was anyone’s guess, but Chan knew exactly where his mind went and oh, when had his attraction to Seungmin gotten this bad?

Eventually, that gaze had found his face, and before he could put two thoughts together, Seungmin had leaned in. Just a gentle sway forward, his body never touching Chan’s, as his weight shifted and his lips ghosted past his ear.

“I need you to kill someone for me.”

So simple, like it was the easiest thing in the world.

Chan had been able to feel the man’s breath on his neck.

For a moment, his mind had gone blank. He’d already been struggling under the weight of acting professional, in spite of his own traitorous thoughts. This was enough to short circuit him.

Dumbly, he’d glanced to the side, to where Seungmin’s face had been inches away. Flawless as always, his expression directly stating just how serious he was.

“I’ve never killed anyone before.”

Chan hadn’t known if he was trying to apologize or warn Seungmin. Maybe it had been hesitation, just the last vestiges of childhood still clinging to him like the dimples on the backs of his knuckles. Maybe it was something else entirely, like asking Seungmin permission to finally let him off of his leash.

Whatever it had been, it had died on his lips as one of Seungmin’s hands lifted and traced the line of his jaw. Feather soft, leaving flames in his wake.

“For me, you’ll do it.”

And that’s when he’d known with complete and utter certainty that this went beyond loyalty, beyond even attraction. No, Chan had realized in that second he was in love with Kim Seungmin, and there was nothing that could change that.

“Yes, Seungmin.”

Instantly, Seungmin’s face had lifted into a bright, glittering smile, one meant all for him, and something in Chan’s chest had taken flight. “Good.”

And against all logic, it had been.

≫=====>

Chan doesn’t actually remember the day Seungmin took over as the Boss.

Admittedly, the event had been met with minimal fanfare. There had been a dinner, a classy celebration, alcohol, and a lot of paperwork changing hands. But that had been it. Seungmin had been given one night to look and act like a king before he’d been trapped within his office, buried under a mountain of business that all required straightening out. Now that he was in charge, these were his decisions to make, and everyone wanted to see what the new leader was made of.

The day that stands out to Chan isn’t that celebration or the immediate aftermath, but instead a date two months later.

It hadn’t started with Seungmin, strangely enough, it had started instead with the fresh new recruit that had been dumped into his lap. 

Chan’s first recruit he’d been expected to train, actually. Not exactly a momentous occasion in the grand scheme of things, but certainly a big deal for him. It had marked the shift of power on his side of the fence, when his father had ‘retired’ to keep an eye on the old Boss, and Chan had taken over as head of security for Seungmin. He’d been expecting the shift for a while, may have even been chomping at the bit for it, but it had still surprised him when it actually came.

Until then, Chan had been the right hand, directly beneath his father. He’d had authority, sure, but his word hadn’t been anything close to law. For too much of the organization, it had been a suggestion. No matter how much the other hit men had respected him, there were still any number of people who could dismiss his orders with a wave of their hand. After a while, it got tiring.

But with Seungmin’s ascension to power, Chan had arguably become the second most powerful person in the organization. Technically, there were a few others under Seungmin that held more power, but in name only. When it came to decision making, people turned to Chan. They expected him to have answers, and if he didn’t have them, he was allowed to make them up.

The recruit had been simply been the first tangible example of his new position.

Jeongin had been young. Sharp eyed and sharp faced, but entirely naive. His mother worked under Seungmin, so this had become an option for him instead of college. Of course he’d taken it. The mob sounded cool, didn’t it? Organized crime and fancy suits and guns with silencers on the end. All very shiny and interesting and different from a boring desk job.

Chan couldn’t remember ever feeling that same excitement that he’d seen in Jeongin’s eyes, but he supposed that enthusiasm was better than his own unfortunate reluctance. With time, that look would fade. For better or for worse.

At the very least, it made it easy to train him. He wasn’t as impressionable as Chan had been, but then he was much older. Already twenty-two with only the most basic of exercise habits to his name. But he was willing to work hard and willing to learn, and with a little help from some of the older members, he would probably shape up to be something quite swiftly.

His biggest weakness had been how inquisitive he was. Always nosing into business that might have been his mother’s, but certainly wasn’t his. Chan did his best to correct it with a gentle hand and a stern eye, but Jeongin had decided this was where he’d be stubborn.

It didn’t really bother Chan, not personally. The only reason he’d cared is because it wasn’t done. You didn’t poke into things that weren’t yours, you kept your tongue in your head unless it pertained to a job. Despite how closely he himself worked with Seungmin, Chan only knew a fraction of what went on in the organization. His job was to deal with problems, the physical ones that Seungmin was too good to handle. He didn’t ask questions.

He’d learned better, Jeongin hadn’t yet.

It only irritated Chan when the questions were about Seungmin.

Typically, Jeongin had known where the line was. He’d ask questions about everyone and everything else. All the other hit men, the rest of the security detail. He’d asked questions about his mother, obviously, but also her team and what they did, and who they worked with. He’d asked questions about rival organizations, not just the details of what kind of security they had and how they were trained, but questions about the politics and the inner workings of those closed door deals that no one was supposed to know about.

His questions had even taken him nearly to the top, to Somin and Junhyung. And they’d taken him back in time, to the retired Boss who was now living out his remaining years in the countryside, happy and unbothered. But the one person Jeongin never asked about was Seungmin.

Roughly two months after Seungmin took over, Jeongin had crossed that line.

Chan still remembers it, right after a work out with he and Minho, the kid had made the mistake of asking a question about Seungmin that had hit a little too close to home.

He doesn’t remember the exact details of the question. Something about them being closer than a simple business relationship should suggest. Something about the way Chan looked at Seungmin, like he’d die for him in a heartbeat.

“You’re definitely more than just friends,” Jeongin had said, with that sharp gleam in his eyes that was just a little too insightful. “I won’t say what, but you’re shit at hiding it.”

Maybe the reason it got under his skin had been because it hit so close to the truth. Because sometimes, Chan didn’t know where he stood with Seungmin either. One minute, he was just a hit man, and Seungmin hardly said a word to him at all. Other nights, he watched the man stride so purposefully about his office as he grumbled about day to day issues and affairs.

Sometimes, Chan would find Seungmin an inch away, whispering such terrible orders like they were the softest of pillow talk.

But it had been one thing for him to be plagued by that uncertainty privately and quite another for it to be dragged out into the open.

Though he hadn’t lain a hand on Jeongin, he’d definitely scared the kid within an inch of his life. It had only been Minho’s quick intervention that had spared the man a further dressing down.

“I think he gets the message, hyung,” Minho had stated quietly, his own narrowed eyes catching Chan’s blazing stare and holding it. “He’s new, and to be fair, I’m not sure anyone understands what’s going on between you and the Boss.”

Associates, had been exactly what Chan told himself as he’d left the gym, Minho and a significantly quieter Jeongin in tow. That’s what he’d always been to Seungmin, even when they’d been young, even when he’d believed they were friends. There’d always been an impassible barrier between them that limited things to only professionalism. To Chan’s loyalty, and how well Seungmin could direct him. It could never be anything more.

Admittedly, that’s probably where the problem had been, because for Chan, it had long since become something so much deeper.

The only people he’d been able to tell about it were Changbin and Jisung, and they didn’t even know Seungmin’s name. It was always this vague my boss and the two of them simply assumed it was some complicated office situation and commiserated accordingly. They didn’t know that the attraction was woven in with the knowledge that this same man would probably kill him one day. They didn’t know that love translated into the unquestioning ability to kill for him.

Minho was probably the person closest to being able to understand how complicated it was, but even he seemed to have a healthier relationship with his work. A certain detachment that reminded Chan of his father. For Minho, this really was just a job. Though he’d never say as much out loud, Chan knew that if it came down to it, the other man could turn and walk away.

Chan couldn’t. Wouldn’t. Hadn’t even been able to consider it in years.

It had still been on his mind after getting back to the Big House. Despite the meeting he needed to call about the shuffling of the security details and assigning who was going overseas with Somin and who wasn’t, his head hadn’t been in it. All he’d been able to think about was Seungmin, and his own potentially poor life choices.

Even at that point, there had been a lot of them. Worse, he had trouble regretting any of them.

Dongjun had called him distracted, and Minho had kept a very deliberate eye on him, but Chan had suffered through. He’d gotten through the meeting and acted professional and had fully intended to just go home afterward. Usually, on a night spent in the Big House, he’d at least make the attempt to find Seungmin, but tonight, he’d thought better of it. Chan had been too in his own head, too close to the emotions bubbling about in his chest.

Naturally, things like this could never be easy.

He’d thought slipping out would be a breeze. After all, since the promotion, Seungmin had been startlingly absent. Chan had seen him a few times, but compared to before, Seungmin had basically dropped off the face of the earth. His office door had remained closed, and official meetings became the only contact Chan had with him. Responsibilities, Seungmin had called them, with a bitter curl to his smile. My favorite part of being in charge.

Chan had just assumed that this night would be like the rest of them. Even if he went to seek out Seungmin, he’d be dismissed. And right now, he had too many feelings to be put in front of the man. Not when a single look from those dark eyes could leave him dissected and lain out on a tray for Seungmin to examine.

So he hadn’t looked, but that hadn’t stopped Seungmin from looking for him.

Because of the events following Seungmin taking over, this was the moment he remembered.

Typically, when Seungmin wanted to see him, someone came to find Chan. Felix was the most common choice; he’d been Seungmin’s personal assistant for years. Chan was used to the man’s mellow voice calling out to him from around corners, relaying times and places with a little cupid’s bow smile and a twinkle in his eyes. Even in the days where he might have taken offense to being summoned, it was hard to be offended by Felix.

But tonight, it hadn’t been Felix who had found him.

“Leaving without saying goodbye?”

Even in the low lights of Chan’s tiny ‘office’, Seungmin had looked exhausted. All dark circles and slouched shoulders and a small frown that creased the corners of his mouth. His skin had been just on the edge of sallow, his cheekbones had been a little too sharp. Chan had frozen at the sight, still half-way between shrugging into his leather jacket and grabbing his bag, intent on going home and sleeping. Of course, faced with the man before him, all other thoughts had fled him.

You never gave him your report. ‘Goodbye’ was colloquial, Seungmin wanted information. Quickly remembering himself, Chan had tugged the jacket on the rest of the way and started recounting the decisions they’d made during the meeting. “Minho is going to be going with Jeon-ssi, along with Junseong. I think the two of them will be able to do a fine job, though if she has any of her personal detail she’d like to bring, they’ll be more than happy to cooperate.”

Business was safe. Chan didn’t have to think too deeply about it, didn’t have to pay attention to the way his heart was thumping in his chest.

This little room had never felt so personal. So close.

Because even tired and bedraggled and hardly holding together, Seungmin had looked beautiful. He’d forgone his usual crisp suit for a lavender button up, one tucked messily into a pair of dress slacks. His hair was everywhere, but that just made Chan want to run his fingers through it. His mouth was drawn down into a pout, but that just made Chan want to kiss it. Neither of those things were appropriate, and he’d shoved his hands into his pockets firmly.

“I apologize for not bringing this news to you tonight. I planned on presenting it tomorrow.” Resolutely, he’d fixed his eyes on a point just past Seungmin’s shoulder. “You’ve been busy. I didn’t want-“

The door of Chan’s office had clicked closed, and the words had died in his throat.

“I have been busy, haven’t I,” Seungmin had muttered ruefully. And for just a moment, Chan had seen something other than the terrifyingly powerful man he’d come to know. Instead he’d seen the friend he’d made when they were just kids, the Seungmin who didn’t have to worry about anything past not getting his nice clothes dirty, and he’d seen the pressure of the present crush him in a second.

It hadn’t been conscious thought, it had been something a lot more instinctive that had made Chan step forward. Just a subtle shift that had creaked the floorboards under his feet, something he could retract if it was denied. But he’d still taken that risk, he’d still bridged that gap, knowing full well doing so could get him killed.

Staring at him silently, Seungmin’s lips had twisted and he’d slowly, oh so slowly stepped forward as well.

Chan had waited for something to happen, for the tension to break. Half of him had expected Seungmin was here to order a hit, or give him another command. But he’d just swayed lightly across the floor, woven around the desk with such grace, he might as well have been floating. With footfalls that hardly made a sound, he’d drawn into Chan’s personal space, taller than him, but somehow in that moment so very small.

For a long moment, he’d just stared, and Chan had lost himself in those dark eyes, that inky void that encompassed so much, and had already lived so much life. In the light of his tiny desk lamp, the shadows had settled into Seungmin’s skin, and the sigh he’d let out had shaken Chan to his very core.

His lips formed around a word, but before Chan could decipher it, he’d turned away.

Settling his back against the desk, an inch away from Chan, Seungmin had softly admitted, “I’m tired.” 

It didn’t hit him then, but it would hit him later. The fact that until that moment, Seungmin had never admitted to any sort of weakness around him. Later, Chan would file this away as a pivotal moment, but all he’d been able to do then was stare and struggle to keep himself in check.

“It’s been a long couple months.” Dipping his head, Seungmin had pursed his lips. “I thought I was ready. I still do, but when does ready become… Handling it?”

Chan hadn’t known. Maybe because his own responsibilities were smaller. Maybe because he was older and had people he could trust, not just associates that might usurp him if he showed weakness. He didn’t know so he didn’t answer, he just shifted slightly; pulling his hand out of his pocket and settling his hip against the desk beside Seungmin.

They were so close, hardly a hair’s breadth apart.

It had been Seungmin who crossed the invisible boundary. First pressing his side against Chan’s chest, then leaning back into him fully, relaxing bit by bit. For a moment, Chan hadn’t known what to do. He considered pulling away, he considered protesting, but he didn’t consider those options very hard. Seungmin had been cool to the touch, and for a moment, he’d seemed so unmentionably frail. Like he was two bad seconds from falling apart completely.

Chan had hesitated to touch back, to lift his hands and put them anywhere, but when Seungmin reached down and laced their fingers together, he’d allowed himself to be guided. To be told without words what he was and wasn’t allowed to do.

As their joined hands had rested on Seungmin’s waist, before sliding around his stomach, Chan had been distinctly glad he couldn’t see the man’s face. This was already nearly too much, any more would have stopped his heart.

Curling into the hold, the half hug Chan was giving him, Seungmin had let a deep, shivering sound build up in the back of his throat. “Don’t talk,” he’d whispered, the line between ordering and begging so very fine. “Just-“

If they had been anyone else, Seungmin might have said Just hold me.

But Chan had known him long enough to hear those unspoken words. Gently, like he might break the man if he moved too quick, he’d wrapped his other arm around Seungmin and settled his face into the crook of the man’s neck. Where his shoulder and throat met, right at his pulse, right where his muscles were the most tense. And little by little, he’d felt them relax, unknotting and becoming pliant under him.

There had been no illusions as to who was in charge, even then, but for a brief moment, Chan had been given everything he could possibly want. Seungmin in his arms, the feeling of his breath under his palms, and his hair tickling the side of his face.

In that moment, he’d remembered the questions from earlier about what they were, and he’d realized the line was blurring. What they should be and what they were was slowly deviating, branching off and leaving Chan in uncharted territory. Perhaps not alone, but so hilariously out of his depth.

And… He hadn’t cared.

If this was what Seungmin needed, Chan vowed to be it. Just like he had vowed to be everything else. He would be the bloody hands that protected Seungmin, but he would also be the one there for him when he faltered. The solid presence behind him, if he ever needed a moment to be weak. Because Chan knew just how strong Seungmin could be, and moments like these only made that knowledge stand out more starkly.

Tightening his arms around Seungmin minutely, Chan had made that silent promise into the back of the man’s neck, and hoped that somehow, he understood.

Chan had been here since before he knew what that meant. He wasn’t going anywhere.

They’d both turned to each other at the same time, Seungmin craning his neck and Chan leaning around. For a moment, they’d stayed like that, just staring. Chan had tried to find the words, searched fruitlessly for what he should say and what he was allowed to say and how far he could push before he was doing something wrong.

But maybe all of this was wrong to begin with, so did it matter?

Opening his mouth, he had started to say, “Seungmin, I-“

“No.” There had been no finger pressed to his lips, but Seungmin had shifted in his hold until they were facing each other and that had been plenty to silence him. “Don’t say it.” It. Everything. Anything. Chan wouldn’t have been able to speak even if he wanted to.

Not with Seungmin’s mouth on his.

They never would talk about it, that would go down as the extent of them working things out, but to Chan, that had been fine. Because in that dark room, amidst the exhaustion and confusion, he’d been given Seungmin. 

Nothing else really mattered.

≫=====>

To say Chan remembers the first time they fucked would be true, and yet at the same time woefully inaccurate.

He remembers that entire night actually. Every single horribly eventful moment, down to the second, down to every instance he hesitated. In fact, it would be most accurate to say that has nightmares about that day, terrible memories that haunt him at the worst times. Arguably the worst part is how seamlessly the nightmares shift to dreams, to reminders of bliss. To being on his knees. To Seungmin.

But Chan can never recall one part without the other.

For once the memory doesn’t begin at the Big House. Chan forgets how much of his life is inextricably tied to the place until he’s not there. It occupies a permanent place in his mind, a metaphysical presence as well as a literal one. Though it doesn’t bring comfort, it brings a certain sense of grounding. He can remember the things that have taken place within its walls, can trust those recollections to be accurate. Outside? Things get a little dicey.

If it weren’t for the vividness of this particular memory, Chan might be tempted to believe it never happened at all.

Recalling it always starts with the clinking of glasses, the soft din of unintelligible chatter, and the ache of an old wound in his right leg. Chan had been standing there in the same spot for going on two hours at that point, and while he can dredge up the conversation of earlier, he usually doesn’t. After all, why focus on what didn’t involve him?

He does however have a clear picture of what did concern him. The security detail standing on the opposite side of the room, watching him with the same placid yet prepared expression that he himself worse. Though it had hardly mattered, the man was easily several times his mass, tall and hulking, an intimidating presence by most metrics that counted. Of course, Chan wasn’t one to be intimidated.

Chan hadn’t even paid attention then to the man’s name, and time has long since erased what might have been there. He remembers vaguely being introduced. Something like Park or Lee or maybe Yang, but his attention had been on the man’s weapons and his stance and of course his eyes. Something had been lurking there, and he’d been intent on drawing it out and deciphering it.

Seungmin’s proximity had only heightened that awareness.

He’d been speaking that evening to a member of another Family. Cha-ssi, with his black eyes and artfully groomed black hair that fell neatly on either side of his face. He’d been older than both of them, but Seungmin had spoken to him as an equal, with twinkling eyes and a deadly smile.

Something about business, something that involved folders being passed across their table, something that involved calculating glances from over little glass cups. Chan had paid exactly as much attention as he had to. It wasn’t his job to know what Seungmin was doing, it was his business to guard, to help keep this little meeting peaceable. Admittedly, he’d been plenty satisfied with this job description.

The night had already been tense, long before this meeting began. This man Seungmin sat before was a known enemy back in the days of the previous Boss. Chan had spent all day tracking down everything he could about the kind of people who would accompany Cha-ssi, in the interest of being prepared. Names, faces, known criminal records, unknown criminal records. Unfortunately, upon arriving he’d been met with an entirely new roster of security, forcing them to go in blind. On top of that, he’d been separated from his men, sequestered in this tiny room with Seungmin as his charge, and Cha-ssi and his guard as their opponents.

Potential allies, Seungmin had hummed to him, as they entered the room. Loosen up, Chan.

As if he could. Not in such close quarters. Not with Seungmin so close.

Logically, Chan knew that Minho and Dongjun were nearby, along with the rest of the entourage Seungmin had brought with him to this little restaurant. They had been a room away, keeping company with Cha-ssi’s people. This was probably the best way to split it, but he didn’t like it. He wanted Minho at his back so he didn’t have to try to keep two people in his sights at once.

Admittedly he’d mostly wanted to be able to hover over Seungmin and stare down anyone who so much as looked at him wrong.

Cha-ssi had said something, and let out a sharp laugh that showed too many teeth. Seungmin had matched it, with one of his lowered-lash smirks, and Chan had wanted out. He’d wanted to pick the man up and just leave. Fuck business, something was crawling at the corners of his senses, and he was tired of swallowing that discomfort back down.

Looking back on it, he probably should have done just that. But Chan also knows that when he looks back on that day, there’s very little he could conceivably change and be guaranteed the same result.

“This was very productive, Cha-ssi,” Seungmin had hummed, as he arranged his utensils to the side of his plate and smiled across the table. “You do yourself credit.”

“Thank you, Kim-ssi, I think this will prove profitable for us both.” Those had been the words Cha-ssi uttered, with thin lips pulled back from gleaming white teeth. “I’m glad that you’re more amenable to making a deal than your predecessor ever was.”

Pleasantries. The words had been entirely innocuous, but there was something about his tone. Something about the twitch of his hand, almost like a hand signal, and that had been Chan’s only warning that everything was about to go horribly wrong.

Cha-ssi’s bodyguard had moved far more quickly than someone of his mass should have been able to, but in the same moment, Chan lunged forward as well. Because he’d seen the gun being drawn and his body had acted before his brain had. There had been only one thought, and it had been to protect. To disarm, before that pistol ended up pointed at Seungmin.

In that moment, Chan’s life had flashed before his eyes.

He’d slammed into the man’s shoulder just in time to knock that first shot off-target. Gritting his teeth against the ringing in his ears, Chan had gone into auto-pilot. Get the gun away from this man, get a weapon of his own up into his hands. Eliminate the threat. Protect Seungmin.

That last thought had been running through him like blood, pumping through his veins and forcing him to act just a little bit quicker than the other guy.

Cha-ssi’s bodyguard had been just as strong as he’d looked. He’d been able to knock Chan aside at first, but he hadn’t been able to shake off the sharp blow to the ribs. Swiftly, they circled each other, before Chan jumped forward. Another shot went off, somewhere above his shoulder. He felt pain lance through his arm, but he could still move so he kept going, darting in and drawing a weapon of his own as he did.

A knife was the first thing he had gotten his hands on, but that was fine. That was all he needed. Knocking the gun aside, doing his best to pin that arm against the wall, Chan had slashed out, going for the eyes. Because as anyone who’d been in a couple knife fights knew, stabbing wasn’t always the most effective course of action. The goal was to slash, to use the knife like an extension of a punch and do the most possible damage.

The bodyguard had jerked backwards, avoiding the strike, but that momentary retreat had given Chan exactly the opportunity he needed. Using the combat knife to its fullest, he’d carved into the man’s right arm, forcing him to release the gun. The moment it hit the floor, Chan had kicked it away. Far from the table and Seungmin and Cha-ssi and shit, he’d gotten distracted.

Where was Seungmin? Was he okay?

But see, the real distraction had been that moment. Because as he’d gone to look for Seungmin, to get a read on his position, the bodyguard had slammed Chan into the wall, forcing the breath from his lungs in a rush.

As he’d fought to throw the guy off of him, to keep the knife in his hand from becoming a liability, Chan had watched stars pop before his eyes. He was being crushed, there was an arm around his neck, restricting his breath, slowly squeezing the life from him. Already his limbs were getting sluggish, his movements powerless. But there hadn’t been time to die, because somewhere behind him had been Seungmin, stuck in the room with another hostile individual, and that thought was what propelled him.

Nothing else, just Seungmin. Always Seungmin.

Blindly, he’d lashed out.

He’d caught the other man in the thigh with the first strike of his blade. The torso, his second time. Chan’s movements hadn’t had nearly enough power behind them, but the moment he felt that blade sink into flesh, he’d twisted, and been rewarded with a growl of pain and a brief moment of respite. Instead of simply trying to throw the man off, Chan had spun in the bodyguard’s hold. He’d felt a meaty fist connect with his ribs, once, then again, and he’d seen from the corner of his eyes the gleam of another weapon as the man reached for a knife of his own.

Gritting his teeth, fighting the urge to curl in on himself and cough up a lung, Chan had gotten a knee up between them and used the leverage to shove the bodyguard away. The other man’s weapon had come for him, and in that moment, time had slowed nearly to a crawl.

Usually, Chan would have said he didn’t have an opinion one way or another on his job. But moments like that, where it was kill or be killed, he found he had very clear thoughts on the matter.

Chan’s combat knife bit into the other man’s neck.

As time jolted back into motion, he’d been sprayed with blood. It was the messiest possible way to kill someone, but as the bodyguard’s arm dropped limply and his weapon clattered to the floor, Chan had been reminded yet again that messy didn’t mean ineffective. With a grunt, he’d kicked the body away and watched it slump backwards over what remained of the table setting.

That had been his only second of reprieve, of course, because in the next second, Chan was zeroing in on what was happening on the other side of the room. And for just a moment, he’d felt his heart stop.

He’d probably have nightmares about this moment for the rest of his life. The sight of Seungmin, pinned against the wall by Cha-ssi’s body. The sight of the gun in the man’s hand. The realization that he was too far away with Seungmin alone and unprotected and actively in danger. In his dreams, he’d watch Seungmin crumple to the ground. He’d see blood splattering the wall. He’d hear the crack of a gun.

But in that moment, all he’d seen was the red of rage.

Lunging forward, he’d grabbed for both Cha-ssi’s collar and the hand holding the gun, breaking the latter and using the former to toss the man away from Seungmin. He’d half expected to get a cry of pain from the man, but all Chan had heard was the slump of a body. Spinning sharply, well and truly prepared to destroy this man for daring to even think about laying a finger on Seungmin, Chan had come to a halt in his tracks.

There had been a steak knife protruding from the man’s white button-up shirt.

As blood began to seep up and around the entry wound, Chan had realized how the man had been stabbed. Just between the third and fourth ribs, it looked like, and angled up, just like he’d been taught as a kid. Except this kill hadn’t been his.

Eyes darting back to Seungmin, Chan had seen several things flash behind the man’s dark eyes.

But there hadn’t been time to deal with that. Because his next thought had been for the sounds of fighting in the other room, and getting Seungmin out of this restaurant before anyone came looking for them. He didn’t know how his other men were faring, but his first responsibility was the man still standing against the wall, his lips slightly parted and his chest heaving.

“Are you hurt?” he’d asked as clearly as he could manage, even though he was already giving Seungmin a swift once over. When the man hadn’t answered, Chan had taken matters into his own hands. As professionally as he could, he’d grabbed Seungmin and hustled him towards the doors, keeping them positioned so any unexpected attacks would hit Chan first. His body still hurt, and he was going to have to deal with his shoulder eventually, but adrenaline would carry him through until they were somewhere safe.

Blessedly, instead of more hostiles it had been Minho who met him in the hallway. He’d been leaning on Dongjun’s shoulder and trying to wipe the blood out of his eyes, but he’d been alive.

“It’s a mess in there,” he’d spat out through gritted teeth, before his eyes had dropped to Seungmin. “Is the Boss-“

“Get his car outside for us, we need to go. Back door.” Chan had kept his arm clamped around Seungmin, unwilling to let him go even for a second. “I need you guys to get this place cleaned out. Call Kangsung. Make sure Son-ssi knows what’s happening.” Giving the man a once over, Chan’s eyes fall to the blood seeping through one of Minho’s pant legs. “Are you good to keep moving?”

Grimacing, trying to flip it into a smile, Minho had nodded. “We got lucky. Some of the other people in there, not so much.” Pursing his lips together, the man had looked like he wanted to say something else, but he’d forfeited the opportunity for reaching for his phone. “I’ll get the driver to meet you outside. Keep the Boss safe.”

He would. He almost hadn’t, but Chan had decided to process that later, when he didn’t need to be at the top of his game.

Instead, he’d simply said, “I trust you,” to Minho and Dongjun before pulling away, dragging Seungmin with him

It wasn’t that Seungmin couldn’t move, he was managing to shuffle along behind Chan, but the man’s breathing was ragged, and he still hadn’t said anything. Chan wasn’t sure what he expected, but this wasn’t good. He almost died. How many times has he actually been put in that situation? Unlike the rest of his thoughts, he allowed these to surface to the forefront of his mind. After all, Seungmin’s wellbeing was his only concern right now.

If he goes into shock- well, he’d handle that when it came.

The driver had met them out back, pulling up in the sleek black luxury car just as Chan had pushed through the back doors. Quickly, the driver had started to get out of the car to help, but Chan had waved him back. They needed to leave, right now. Every second counted.

Usually, they’d have a couple cars with them, just in case. On their way there, they’d had an entourage, but right now, it was just the two of them that peeled out of the parking lot and into the night traffic.

Shutting the privacy window between the front of the car and the back, Chan had slipped to the floorboard in front of the car bench Seungmin sat on and finally, he’d been given a chance to look himself and the man over.

Chan hadn’t looked great. He’d been covered in blood; mostly someone else’s, yes, but also some of his own. Checking his shoulder he was pleased to see it was a shallow wound, more torn clothing than anything serious. He’d still need to get it cleaned out, but it wasn’t going to kill him. Taking a moment more, Chan had taken stock of the rest of his body. His throat was fine and his bruised ribs would heal. Right then, he’d had something more important to take care of.

Seungmin hadn’t moved from where Chan had put him. His immaculate outfit was now spattered with blood, his hair was falling into his face, and his pupils were blown wide. All he’d been doing was staring at Chan, lips parted, like he was struggling to find words. For once, Chan hadn’t been thinking about how gorgeous the man was, all he’d thought was how Seungmin looked so hilariously, horribly out of his depth.

Seungmin had seen plenty of people killed, Chan knew that, but at that second it registered that this might be the first life the man had taken with his own hands. Usually, Chan was there to do the dirty work, to keep Seungmin’s hands clean of anything unmentionable, but he hadn’t been fast enough this time, had he? He’d almost allowed the man to die on his watch. 

His own failure had forced Seungmin’s hands.

And what beautiful hands they were, decorated with blood and clenched like claws into the leather of the car’s interior. Chan had almost caught one in his own hand. In a fit of weakness disguised as concern, he’d almost reached for Seungmin first instead of the other way around. Instead, he’d gently placed his hands on the man’s thighs, hopefully steadying them both.

Seungmin’s eyes had focused, and his adam’s apple had jumped.

Finally, Chan had found his voice. “I’m sorry,” he’d choked out, the only words he could think to say. I almost let you die. He’d wanted to go back and try again, to somehow avoid all of this, but all he had were words and in that moment they’d felt useless.

He’s not sure what he expected, but the way Seungmin had continued to stare at him with those wide eyes had done something to Chan. He’d been perfectly prepared to beg for forgiveness, but… Oh hell, he just needed the man to speak to him, before the tension killed him entirely. Why was Seungmin leaning forward, why was his chest still heaving so heavily even though they were sitting? It occurred to Chan, perhaps a little too late, that the light in the man’s eyes wasn’t fear. It was something else. Something… Dark. Deadly.

Hungry.

“You weren’t quick enough,” Seungmin had breathed, and his voice had been far too stable for what he’d just been through. “You almost let me die.”

The words were a condemnation that fell on Chan like a lead weight. Breaking eye-contact with Seungmin, bending his head, he had struggled to hold himself together. “I- I did.” Any excuses he could have made were meaningless. He’d been too slow, he’d failed Seungmin when he’d needed Chan most. The fact that he was still alive wasn’t the issue, it only mattered that he hadn’t been good enough.

Chan had expected to be killed. Maybe in the same way Seungmin had dispatched Cha-ssi, with a knife through the ribs. Maybe something worse, something much more painful. What he hadn’t expected was for one of Seungmin’s hands to thread through his messy hair and drag his head back. The sudden contact had been like an electric shock to the system, and Chan had shivered as he was forced to make eye-contact once more.

“But you won’t do it again, will you?” Seungmin’s voice had been only just loud enough to be heard over the rumble of the car, and oh hell now wasn’t the time to be reacting like this. He was clearly in trouble, but apparently Chan’s body didn’t care in the slightest. Not when Seungmin’s blunt nails were scraping his scalp and his hair was being pulled just hard enough to sting. “You’ve learned your lesson, haven’t you?”

“Yes.” And then, because he’d known how the man felt about Chan using his name, he’d added, “Yes, Seungmin.”

“Good.” And oh it had been good because those fingers had started carding through his hair and that had definitely been hunger in Seungmin’s eyes. Chan probably should have taken a step back and considered that this was how the man was reacting to having taken someone’s life, but he didn’t. All he could focus on was the feeling of his heart in his throat, and the tent in the front of Seungmin’s dress slacks.

Oh- Oh god. The line between fear and desire apparently hadn’t been as thick as it should be. Chan’s mouth shouldn’t have been watering, but it was.

He’d wanted to lean forward, wanted to shift his hands off of Seungmin’s thighs and touch. He’d wanted to press his nose against that bulge and ask permission to go further. He’d wanted to beg for it. But this had been uncharted territory, and Chan didn’t know how far he was allowed to push.

He’d also been cripplingly aware of how quickly he’d filled out his own pants.

Like he’d sensed the shift in the air, Seungmin’s parted lips had finally twitched upward into a smile. Not quite the same innocent expression he usually wore, this one was wild, just the hint of teeth past his lips, his eyes still so wide and dark. “You look like you want something, Chan.”

Chan had been all too aware of the groan that had escaped his chest at the question. Because he did, so badly, and he didn’t even entirely know why. Hadn’t they just been in a life or death situation? Hadn’t he just made mistakes that had nearly cost Seungmin his life? But it hadn’t mattered. All that had mattered was the way Seungmin shifted on the bench, and bit his lip slightly as he stared down at Chan.

“Don’t just stare at me, Chan,” Seungmin had ordered, his voice soft, slipping between his shoulders, pooling somewhere in his groin. “Tell me.”

Trying to think of something a little more eloquent than ‘I want your dick in my mouth’, Chan had finally settled on shifting more firmly between Seungmin’s knees and murmuring, “I want to suck you off. Please.”

The hand in Chan’s hair had tightened for a moment, and though it must be his imagination, he swore he saw Seungmin’s dick twitch.

Considering the furthest they had gone up until then had been quick clandestine kisses, this was definitely making a leap. But fuck it, they’d both been hard and Chan had desperately wanted to know what Seungmin tasted like. He wanted to ride that adrenaline high as long as he could, buried between the man’s thighs. And he’d been absolutely willing to beg if that’s what it took.

Carefully, Seungmin had dragged him closer. Following where he was led, Chan had fought the urge to tighten the hands on the man’s thighs as their lips had met. It had been quick and ravenous, just mouths desperately moving against each other and the overwhelming taste of blood before Seungmin had pulled him away. Chan had wanted to whimper at the loss, but the sound had died on his tongue as the man shifted again, giving him better access to his pants.

Dragging his fingers through Chan’s hair, Seungmin had let out a breath, one that shivered in the air between them. “Touch me, Chan.” Even if he’d wanted to, Chan couldn’t have resisted that tone. All he could do was surge forward, cupping Seungmin through his pants and reveling in the hissing sigh it earned him before attempting to fight with the man’s belt.

It hadn’t taken much fumbling to get it undone. The buttons hadn’t been much harder. Reverently, Chan had peeled back the layers hiding Seungmin, until he could get a finger hooked around the waistband of the man’s underwear. Part of him had been tempted to ask if this was okay, but he’d also known how far gone he’d already been. Just the sight of the man’s dick straining against the thin gray fabric had been enough to short circuit his brain entirely.

Carefully, he’d dragged a thumb up the shape of Seungmin’s erection, and the hiss that escaped the man over him had been imprinted into his mind. Just like the rest of the evening. Right along with the death and the blood still splattered across his face. And in that moment, he hadn’t cared about the rest of it, because he would have done it a thousand times over for just one second like this.

“Don’t tease.” God, Seungmin’s voice alone had been enough to make his dick ache in the confines of his trousers. From anyone else, Chan would have ignored the words, but from Seungmin’s mouth, he knew better. This was an order. His job was to follow orders, no matter what form they took.

Swiftly, he’d pulled the man’s underwear down, yanking it further over his thighs to give him a bit of room to work. Using the saliva pooling in his mouth to his advantage, Chan had let some dribble into his hand before reaching forward.

Seungmin’s dick had fit perfectly in his hand, and he’d felt the man shudder over him at the contact. Emboldened, he’d twisted his wrist in a quick stroke, slicking the man up and paying attention to what made Seungmin feel good. With only spit as a lubricant, it couldn’t have felt fantastic, but the way the man above him twitched and huffed suggested it was just fine.

Passing his thumb over the head of Seungmin’s erection, dragging it through the pre-cum beading there, Chan had been forced to snap his mouth shut to keep from drooling. God it had looked perfect. Pink and flushed and pretty, just begging for more than the light strokes from Chan’s hand. Still, he’d gone slowly, bracing himself against the jostling of the car and gradually picking up the pace of his hand.

Inevitably perhaps, he’d hit the limits of the other man’s patience. Chan hadn’t known exactly where the lines were, but he discovered that this was one a moment later as Seungmin tightened the grip in his hair and pulled his head back so they could make eye-contact.

“You said you wanted to suck me off,” Seungmin stated directly, the words dripping off his tongue as his eyes bored into Chan. “Didn’t you?”

“Yes,” Chan had panted, the hand in his hair making it difficult to do anything but stare up at Seungmin. Not that he’d cared, the sting from the man’s fingers distracted him from his other various injuries, helped him focus on only this moment.

“So do it.”

That voice ordering him around, telling him exactly what to do, was going to be his death. Unable to stop the helpless sound that left him, Chan had returned his grip to Seungmin’s thigh and instead leaned forward, following instructions.

Licking a stripe from the base of Seungmin’s dick to the tip, Chan had drawn in a sharp breath and allowed the man’s scent to consume him. Everything had been stifled by the heavy tang of copper, the smell of death clinging to them both, but Chan had chased what lay underneath it. Found Seungmin and honed in on it.

Here, on the floor of Seungmin’s fancy car, wedged in between the man’s legs, Chan had been hit with the undeniable knowledge that he was in love. And like every other time it hit him, it had been such a horrible time to remember.

So he hadn’t, he’d just taken the tip of Seungmin’s erection into his mouth and memorized the gasp that fell from the man’s lips.

Chan could taste the sweat that had sprung up from the conflict on Seungmin’s skin. Just a little tang on his tongue, the musk of exertion and adrenaline. And as he’d sunk down further, loosening his throat as he did, he’d felt Seungmin jerk over him. The man’s hand had tightened in his hair, and Chan’s name dropped from his lips. Softly and just a little brokenly. Never like begging, but something akin to it.

Demanding, Chan had decided, as Seungmin’s dick hit the back of his throat and his nose brushed up against neatly trimmed pubes. He liked that.

No, he’d loved it.

All thoughts had left him but Seungmin bent over him, and the self appointed task of getting the man off. He’d gone slowly at first, hollowing out his cheeks and pressing his tongue over the vein on the underside of the man’s dick, but the hand in his hair had forced him to pick up the pace. Moaning at the insistent tugging on his hair, Chan had done as he was told, moving his lips over Seungmin and reveling at the sensation.

There had been something so good about it, Seungmin breathing heavily over him, his eyes going unfocused, the muscles in the man’s thighs tensing under Chan’s hands, that had been addicting. Had turned him on so badly that it hurt. But Chan hadn’t cared that he hadn’t been able to touch himself, all he’d been able to think about was making Seungmin feel good, dragging those little sounds from between his lips.

“You look so good, Chan,” Seungmin had murmured, the words sounding so right coming from his mouth. “With your mouth around my dick. Looking so desperate. Is this getting you off too?” It had been, every little shift of his own hips had Chan moaning around Seungmin’s erection desperately. Even just the scrape of fabric over his dick was enough to drive him crazy. I’m going to come like this. Right here. Untouched.

The thought had only dragged more wanton sounds from his throat.

Shivering, Seungmin had jerked upwards unexpectedly, cursing under his breath as he did. Choking as the man’s dick hit the back of his throat, Chan almost pulled back, but the hand on his head kept him from moving. As tears pricked at his eyes, Chan had looked up to the other man and met Seungmin’s gaze and oh.

There had been a silent question there to go further. Even though his gag reflex was promising to get in the way, Chan didn’t care, he just urged Seungmin to thrust up into his mouth, relaxing his throat in an attempt to make it easier. The man had gone slow at first, just little twitches, but soon he was actually moving, jerking up into Chan’s mouth and letting obscene sounds spill from his chest.

As Seungmin’s dick started to hit the back of his throat, Chan had been lost. At that point he’d been absolutely desperate to touch himself, just to find some form of relief, but he’d hardly had enough thought to cling onto the man’s thighs. Everything was the feeling of Seungmin slipping in and out of his lips, the hand still in his hair, the sight of the man arching above him, clearly drawing closer to a climax with every thrust.

The car they’d been in had whipped around a corner, and they’re both reminded of where they were. Letting out a breathless laugh that sounded so good on him, Seungmin had murmured, “You like this, don’t you? You like when I face-fuck you.” He’d wanted to answer, but with Seungmin’s dick in his mouth, all he’d managed was a loud, messy groan. “Your mouth feels so good, Chan, you’re doing so well.”

The praise had gone straight to his dick. Yes, he was doing well. For Seungmin, he would do anything. Anything at all, and he’d do it perfectly, because that’s what the man wanted. He wanted perfection, and right now, Chan had wanted everything Seungmin was giving him. Every sound, ever twitch of his hips, every gasp that filled the car and echoed just over the sound of the road.

Cursing again, Seungmin’s movements had started becoming erratic. Without thinking, Chan had dragged his hands over the man’s thighs soothingly, trying without words to encourage him, to bring him closer to his orgasm. The fingers in his hair had tightened, and Seungmin had just barely managed to get out Chan’s name as a warning before he was cumming. As the man’s hips stopped jerking up, Chan started moving again, swallowing around Seungmin and taking everything he’d been given.

Only pulling off of the man once he was sure he wasn’t going to make a mess, Chan had drawn in a shuddering breath and stared up at Seungmin. The only thing on his face had been bliss. For a moment, nothing else had mattered, and Chan had reveled in the completely carefree expression on the other man, knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that he had been the one to put that look there.

Vaguely, Chan had been aware of the car slowing down over the crunch of gravel, but he’d been instantly distracted as Seungmin’s eyes slid open and he glanced down. The fire still in those dark eyes had floored him, and threatened to drag a whimper from his abused throat.

Leaning forward, Seungmin carefully brushed his fingers through Chan’s hair, unknotting the snarls he’d left behind. Eyes flickering down between Chan’s legs, his lips quirked up into a breathless smile. “Was that not enough to get you off?”

Before Chan could process the words, Seungmin had shifted and pressed the sole of his shoe against the tent in his pants. Unable to even begin to hide the groan that left him, Chan had fallen forward, just barely able to brace himself against the seat as he jerked up into the pressure on his dick. It probably should have been demeaning but it felt too good for him to care.

“I could make you cum just like this,” Seungmin had mused, like he found the idea tempting. “You seem like you want it.”

Almost sobbing at the feeling of finally getting some friction on his aching cock, Chan had panted, “Yes- yes Seungmin, please-“

“Or-“ the man’s voice had interrupted Chan, instantly shutting him up, reducing him to small, admittedly pathetic noises. “You could take me inside, we get that shoulder properly treated, and then you can fuck me.”

Oh.

His entire world had ground to a stop. It had been a miracle that he hadn’t come in his pants at those words.

“Would you like that, Chan?” Leaning forward, pressing down just a little harder on his dick, Seungmin had brushed his lips past Chan’s ear. “Because I’d like it very much.”

“Yes.” Chan had struggled to make the words coherent. “Yes, I want that.”

“Good.” Pulling his foot back, Seungmin had spent a moment tucking himself back into his pants before slowly getting to his feet. Then, his lips twitching teasingly, he’d added, “You can do your reports later.”

That night, Chan had been given permission to fuck Seungmin, and even though there had been no going back before, in those stolen moments with an aching shoulder and sore ribs, he’d fallen so much further. Love had long since become too shallow a word to describe it. All he’d had was the feeling of Seungmin’s fluttering breaths against his throat as he panted for more, and a life placed so unconditionally into his hands.

Love?

Maybe, but Chan would have always called it devotion. Every single time.

≫=====><=====≪

It’s a lot easier to focus without the faint crackle of static in his ear.

Honestly, Chan doesn’t know how many people are left in the house. There are still footsteps, but not many, and they’re all ahead of him. Exactly where he wants them to be. But he still doesn’t know if it’ll be enough. It’s just him after all, he was supposed to have backup. He definitely doesn’t have that any more.

Still, his breathing is level as he kicks yet another body out of the way. According to the layout, he’s got several directions left to cover, several rooms left to sweep. The safe room, where he’ll probably find the leaders of this whole operation, is somewhere in the center. The blueprints he’d been given hadn’t been that exact, but he knew where he’d put it. And he knew that his intuition was all he had left.

If he’d had a little less self control, he would have let his thoughts scatter to Dongjun, probably dead, Minho missing in action, and Junseong, shot and probably dying as well. If he’d had just an ounce less resolve, this situation would be enough to bring him to his knees.

As it is, he just stalks down another hallway, every movement purposeful.

Those are his men, and he owes them a lot, but he owes Seungmin more. He owes that man enough to keep going, to trust that Jeongin followed his orders, and trust to fate Dongjun and Minho. Chan is bad at giving up control over his situation, but right now he’s doing just that. Everything that isn’t immediately before him, he lets slip out of his mind and from his grasp. Instead he hones in on the present.

This is where he is now. This is his mission. He’s still standing, and as long as he is, he will continue.

The sound of footsteps catches on the periphery of his attention, and Chan makes a couple very quick decisions. There’s nowhere to hide, so it’s an easy choice to make. Better to take them by surprise. It sounds like three people running, and getting closer quickly. Before he has a chance to second guess himself, Chan steps to the corner and smoothly pops out from behind it.

One of them is hardly more than a child. The thought hits him as his first shot strikes one of them in the chest and the other in the shoulder. Obviously, he knows how young these organizations start training people. He was probably younger when he started himself, but as one of the men screams and the other goes down, Chan watches the fear shoot through the kid’s eyes, and it feels familiar.

He doesn’t have time to think about it however, because he’s flattening himself against the wall and trying to get another shot. Another man goes down as a bullet whizzes past Chan’s head. Ignoring that, he focuses on the kid, on the gun he’s managed to get into his hands. They’re shaking, badly enough that he probably can’t shoot. But that just makes this easier. Perhaps even too easy.

There’s so much he could say, so much he could opine on, but it strikes Chan as he raises his own weapon that he’s long since moved past the point of needing to. Sometimes, it really is just as simple as who lives and who dies. When he’s here in the thick of it, he’s able to make it black and white, us and them. He’s able to remember why he’s doing this, and stop caring about the form the actions take.

When his finger twitches over the trigger, he’s had just enough time to confirm that his aim is true. Just a single shot between the eyes, before the kid was even able to properly aim his pistol.

And then Chan is moving again. With purpose and intent. Deeper into the house, deeper into this maze, his footsteps almost entirely muffled by the carpet under his feet and the sound of his heartbeat in his ears. He doesn’t really feel like a person right now, instead he’s just an extension of someone else’s body. Right now he very literally is the weapon, and his own thoughts and feelings and fears don’t matter. They’re nothing but extraneous details and he treats them precisely like that.

Waste to be discarded.

Reality feels like it’s blurring and bending around him. Everything is another hallway. It’s another series of doors. It’s the blueprints in his head, and it’s the sounds of footsteps around him. He only hears one last cluster of them, and then it’s to the safe room, where he’s to kill everyone. No matter what he finds.

It’d be difficult to say he’s prepared for it, Chan reflects, as someone appears in his periphery and his gun is up and firing before he’s fully registered that he’s facing another threat. If he hadn’t been doing this since he was a child, he probably wouldn’t be. Right now, however, there isn’t any room for doubt. There’s just watching another body hit the ground, and ducking out of the way of the hail of gunfire that forces him back.

Doubt was a human emotion, and right now, Chan doesn’t feel human. He’s not sure he feels like anything. He just knows that every shot he lets off hits true, he just knows that this is him in his peak form, and that if there was ever a time to push the limits, it’s now.

Another magazine in his pistol, another face in his line of sight. While he registers features, he doesn’t register anything more. A disconnect is forming between his mind and body, and that’s alright. It makes this so much smoother. Simply instincts, and the simple direction of how he must move. The precise way to dart through a door, forcing the hostile presence through a choke point, and then using their own numbers against them.

Chan isn’t sure he knows where he is anymore, but his feet are carrying him forward anyways, double tapping each body and heading towards his goal.

His hands are steady. His head is clear. If his footsteps aren’t completely silent, then they’re almost silent. Not like a predator or a force of evil. That ascribes malicious intent to his actions, and Chan would argue there is none. Without the grounding crackle of his ear-piece in his ear, there’s nothing forcing him to justify what he’s doing. Like this, everything is so simple.

And there’s the heavy door, and both of the door guards aren’t ready for him. Because right now, no one is.

One goes down. Chan brings his pistol around to the second one in a fluid motion, and thoughtlessly, he pulls the trigger.

From behind, pain lances through his right arm. He feels it radiate out, starting from just above the elbow, until it’s lancing down his arm and up into his shoulder. And it’s only then that he hears the shot, like a belated reaction, as his brain catches up with the stimuli assaulting him.

Just like that, he’s snapped back into his own head. He’s in front of the door, there are two dead men before him, and the second shot is ringing out before he has a chance to turn. A bullet buries itself in his shoulder. There’s no exit wound, but he’s certain that something shatters. Maybe it’s bone, maybe it’s his focus. All he knows is that it’s a lot of pain all at once, and if it weren’t for his left hand still clasped around his gun, he would have dropped it.

He’s not sure if it’s instinct that drops him to his knees, but he knows his arm is covered in blood. That everything is happening in slow motion, at a pace that he can register even with the agony firing off in his head. There’s so much blood, he can feel it soaking down his back, pooling on the carpet below, and it’s as much the shock of getting shot as it is the shock of being forced out of his own head that leaves him momentarily stunned.

He can’t move his right arm. It refuses to answer even the most basic commands. As his fingers go limp, he swears he can count every single one of his heartbeats, as it forces more blood out of his body.

There’s someone behind him. He needs to move. He needs to move now.

Unbidden, a single face flashes through his head. Soft brown hair, softer lips, and those eyes, always so dark and powerful and perfect . As he kneels there, just a handful of seconds away from a third bullet being lodged in the back of his skull, all he has are those gorgeous eyes boring into his soul, and it hurts in an entirely different way than he was prepared to handle.

Seungmin.

Somewhere, he’s sitting at his desk, staring at his paperwork, and glancing absently out the window. Somewhere, he’s waiting for Chan to get back, to tell him that he’s done his job, that he’s carried out those orders given and he’s succeeded. And Chan knows with the sort of unshakable certainty that only comes from years and years of consistent proof that Seungmin believes he will come back. Because Chan has never given him a reason to even consider otherwise.

He’s about to die, but the only thing that matters is Seungmin.

And in that second, time stops-

<=====≪

“You realize what this means?”

Seungmin always looks beautiful. Unreachable and untouchable. But ironically, Chan had been most aware of that fact at that moment, lying next to the man naked in bed. Because it had been then that he was his most beautiful. All unfocused eyes and heaving chest and a voice that was rough and scratchy with overuse. His hair had been sticking to his forehead and he hadn’t been hardly able to move an inch, but he had been gorgeous in that second. So much more than Chan had ever been able to imagine before.

Both of them had still been sweaty, still breathing unsteadily, and yet the second Seungmin spoke and he glanced in the man’s direction, he’d realized just how great the distance was between them.

Though his voice was a croak, Chan had still found his own voice. “What?”

Slowly, Seungmin’s eyes had slid in his direction, and for a moment, he’d been taken aback by how much was in them. Chan had suddenly been faced with his future and for a moment, just the briefest second, he’d allowed himself to hope there was a confession coming. A promise of commitment that they’d share that would be mutual. That would, for once, put them on equal terms. Because he’d known beyond a shadow of a doubt where he stood, and even though the gap between them was impossibly wide, he believed that Seungmin was capable of reaching across it.

Of course Chan knew better, but the brief delusion was a beautiful one.

Seungmin’s lips had twitched.

“It means you aren’t permitted to die.”

From anyone else, it would have sounded like a hollow and desperate wish. The kind of flimsy thing that was uttered with the knowledge that no one could ever truly promise something like that. It wasn’t something you could control. From anyone else, it would have sounded childish.

Yet from Seungmin’s mouth, it sounded like an order, and Chan knew he was supposed to take it as such.

“You’re my right hand, and that’s forever. No matter what.” His voice had still sounded faint, but Seungmin had spoken with such conviction that Chan couldn’t have missed a word if he tried. “Unless I tell you otherwise, you will always come back.”

The do you understand had been unspoken, but Chan had understood. Had already made that promise, at first as a child, but since then in so many other, deeper ways than a simple verbal agreement. 

“Of course, Seungmin.”

Humming low in his throat, the man had just responded, “Good,” and that had been it. There had been no further need for reassurances, because Seungmin didn’t doubt Chan. And Chan wouldn’t have been able to describe just how deeply devoted he was, even if he’d been directly asked.

Letting out a breath, Seungmin had shifted closer and nestled himself into the hollow of Chan’s side. Rolling to face the wall, he’d gone limp once more, and in that moment, Chan remembers how his heart stopped. How everything stopped. How the world stopped turning and how gravity stopped working. How nothing had mattered anymore, except that second. Where he was permitted to be close to Seungmin, where he’d been given the kind of trust that you only came across once in a lifetime.

He remembers how small the man had seemed, and how endlessly far away.

And above all, he remembers thinking that this was better than a confession of love ever could have been.

Until the day Seungmin said he could die, Chan had promised himself that he would come back. He would always return to this man’s side. No matter the circumstances, no matter how difficult the task. He would wade through seas of blood and graveyards of bones to be beside Seungmin. He would kill whoever he needed to, if only to hold this man again. And it hadn’t felt like an unreasonable promise to make, because given the circumstances, it was all he could do. All he ever wanted.

Beyond that, nothing else needed to matter.

≫=====>

- and time restarts.

Chan’s not sure where the strength comes from, but in a second, the will to continue fills him and he spins. Almost in the same motion of falling to his knees, he’s bringing up his gun with his left hand and aiming it behind him at the person who just shot his shoulder. 

It feels like a shot in a million, but he still pulls the trigger, still accepts the recoil as it shudders through his body and rattles him to the core.

The person’s third shot goes wide, ricocheting off the wall and getting lost to the space behind Chan. But his bullet? It strikes true. For once, he doesn’t think it’s practice that did it. Not skill, not anything that can be learned or taught. But not luck either, because no one gets lucky like this. If he were asked, Chan would have simply said that his shot hit because it didn’t have another choice.

For a long moment, everything is silent.

Drawing in a breath, one that makes his shoulder and neck throb, Chan heaves himself to his feet. There’s really no time to bandage himself up, no time to see how severe the injury is, but he can feel it, and his first thought is it’ll be a miracle if he’s ever able to move it in the same way again. Eventually, he’ll give it more thought. Until then, he just searches the corpses for the key to the heavy doors and tries to keep his breathing stable.

If he’s being honest, he doesn’t remember what happens next. He remembers pain, he remembers how frustratingly unfaithful his aim is with only his left hand to hold the gun. Chan remembers blood, enough to drench him completely, and he remembers the screams. The voices of people begging for their very lives, and he remembers not giving them a second thought.

It’s rare he blocks things out completely, but he thinks he does it in this moment to keep himself sane. Because he’s lost touch with that cold distance he’s so good at putting between himself and his job. The pain has ravaged his mind and left it a mess, and what it’s revealed in its wake are things he can’t quite handle at the moment. So he doesn’t force himself to focus, he just does, and takes what his brain gives him in terms of evidence that he is still, in fact, functioning at all.

Vaguely, he remembers standing in the safe-room when the deed is done, and looking over the corpses. Double-tapping each of them with the kind of cold precision that he’s still trying to cling to, even though he’s on the verge of disassociating completely.

It’s only once he’s fully carried out Seungmin’s orders that Chan locks the safe-room once more and stumbles back into reality. Like the past five minutes had been nothing but a dream.

Standing there for a long moment, he lets it wash over him. The pain, the knowledge that he’s still alive, the certainty of who he is and why he’s here. He finds the internal strength he keeps tightly knotted around his core and sinks himself into it. As he forces starch back into his spine, and straightens despite the agony.

Ripping apart the shirt on one of the corpses around him, Chan swiftly ties off the bullet wound just above his elbow, and briefly tries to figure out what to do about the shoulder one. He can still feel it dribbling blood down his back, soaking his shirt and sticking to his skin. Unfortunately, there isn’t much he can do, not with the supplies he has on hand.

So he just turns himself back the way he came, and starts making his way through the maze the house has become.

Honestly, Chan doesn’t know how long he walks, he’s not even sure where he goes. The blueprints have fled his mind, he’s struggling to hold onto consciousness. He’s done his best to tie something around his arm like a sling, to hopefully stop some of the blood, if only for a moment. Already, the fragment of fabric around his elbow is stained heavily, and it’s only a matter of time before it becomes useless. He’s pretty sure something important got hit, but he doesn’t know, and he hasn’t slowed down for long enough to check.

All he can do is keep stumbling, and hope that he makes it to the back door before the house is set ablaze.

Remembering himself eventually, somewhere mired in the second floor of the house, Chan fumbles his ear-piece out of his pocket and sticks it back into his ear with fingers that don’t quite work right. No, this isn’t the time to go into shock, just keep moving. Forcing another deep breath into his lungs, he turns it on, and lets the familiar crackle of white noise ground him.

“This is Chan.” Another breath. “It’s over.”

He’s not sure who he expects to hear back from. Hopefully Jeongin, letting him know that he’s made it out in one piece. Or maybe someone from the cars, letting him know that they copy, that they’re sending in the cleanup team, and that his job is done. He thinks he expected something, because when he doesn't get anything, his insides jolt. In that second, the empty static feels so much more awful and vast that he was prepared for.

And yet he keeps going. One foot in front of the other, feeling like he really is the only one left alive. Just him, in a house of the dead. Like standing in a graveyard. Like wandering through a crypt. If he weren’t already so up in his own head, it might have been enough to drive Chan insane.

Suddenly, there’s a buzzing in his ear, and finally a voice reaches out to him.

“I’m here Chan, I’m holding the back door. Let’s get out of here.”

Minho.

There’s a lot he could have said, about why the man had vanished for so long, and if he’s okay. If Dongjun is actually dead, and if he knows the fate of the rest of Chan’s men, but in that moment, there aren’t enough thoughts in his head to ask. Instead, Chan just dips his head and murmurs, “Alright.” Hopefully, if he survives, there will be plenty of time to ask those questions later.

When he reaches the back door, Minho is waiting for him. He looks worse for wear. There’s as much blood on him as there is on Chan, and he’s got a body slung over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. The fact that it takes Chan a full ten seconds to recognize the limp form as Dongjun shows just how out of it he really is. But Minho is alive, the details can’t be that important.

“Shit,” Minho inelegantly mutters.

Struggling to find words, Chan just croaks out, “Yeah,” before stumbling two more steps forward and almost dropping to his knees. Instead, Minho catches him, and grunts softly as he struggles to support the weight of two people.

“Come on, we need to leave.” Coaxing Chan back to his feet, Minho jerks his head at the door behind him. “Everyone down here is dead. I’ve checked. They’re going to start burning the place soon.”

Nodding, too weary to do more, Chan forces the last bit of strength he has back into his legs. It’s like that he follows the man out of the house and out into the relative chill of the night. To the vehicles that are waiting for them, and hopefully to safety.

And there’s so much he should be doing right now, but all Chan can do is focus on one face, and repeat that name to himself again and again.

Seungmin.

Seungmin…

Seung-

≫=====>

The funeral is a somber affair.

Chan looks a little out of place, arm in a sling, suit jacket awkwardly thrown over it in a vain attempt to conceal it. He stands apart from the crowd, on the very edges of the periphery, almost not a part of the procession at all, and yet watching with the same careful regard the other quietly gathered individuals possess. If he stands closer, he’ll feel like an impostor, but here? Here he’s allowed to exist.

Admittedly, he doesn’t come to these things often. He hears about them, through the grapevine, by word of mouth from sources of all sorts, but it’s rare he attends. Usually, he doesn’t feel the need to, usually, it’s all just work and news of what comes after is simply- to borrow an apt turn of phrase- the final nail in the coffin. But today, he’s made an exception.

He doesn’t know who’s being buried right now. Actually, he’s pretty sure the coffin is empty. If there’s anything in there at all, it’s ashes. It’s not like there were bodies left behind. Bones, yes. Charred corpses perhaps, but not enough to justify more than one, singular coffin, and the only name on the gravestone is the old boss, but Chan isn’t there for him. He doesn’t know the man, past getting close enough to put a bullet through his brain.

No, Chan is here for the man who almost killed him. In his mind, that coffin is that man, and him being here is paying tribute to a corpse that should have been Chan’s.

It’s a little surreal, as he fiddles with his cuff-links and stares at that box, suspended above the empty grave, to think that he could have been the one being buried today. Despite the past two weeks and change, he hasn’t really thought much about it. There’s been too much else going on. He’s been unconscious for a good week of it, after the emergency surgery on his arm. The next week had been reports and paperwork and recovery.

Actually, this is his first time outside of the Big House in far too long.

And yet he’d chosen to come here. Not to mourn the dead, not really, but perhaps to mourn the man he had once been, so many years ago. The child who had been too scared to hold a gun. The teenager who had thought he could have a normal life. The adult for whom this had just been a job, and not a horribly complex web of things he can’t hope to untangle, even if he were given the rest of his life.

Dipping his chin, Chan purses his lips and draws in a heavy breath.

His arm aches. Thanks to the bullet that had shattered his shoulder, he’d needed a certain amount of reconstructive surgery. Despite not being bedridden anymore, the doctors had told him it would take at least a month before he’d be able to even begin physical therapy. And even if all goes well, he might never have the mobility or strength he used to. It’s a grim prospect, but he’s coming to terms with it. Not that he’ll fully accept that fate until he’s exhausted every ounce of effort within himself to change it.

Thankfully, today is one of his better days. Slowly, he’s being weaned off of the prescribed pain-killers, and back onto something a little weaker. It’s not the constant agony of before, thank god, but it still makes it just a little difficult to breathe or think clearly. This is his first day that he doesn’t feel as though he’s viewing the world through a bubble of reinforced plexiglass. 

Personal injuries aside, the job had actually gone well. Kangsung had handled the cleanup brilliantly. Somin had easily taken care of everything else. Thanks to Minho, Dongjun was currently recovering instead of dead, and even Junseong had made it out with only a few new scars. Jeongin was still a little shaken up, but he’d be back to form soon enough. Miraculously, everyone had survived.

But Chan thinks something in him changed that night. It’s the closest he’s come to death in a long time, and he feels like he’s seeing the world through fresh eyes. Though perhaps calling them fresh is the wrong word.

Older eyes might be more accurate. Jaded and tired. Just a little closer to the man his father had been before him. Just a little closer to a machine and not a human. The only thing that reminds him he isn’t are moments like these, where he stands with a funeral procession, and remembers the few breaths that kept that from being him.  

Beside him, there’s the soft sound of crunching gravel, and Chan turns his head, until he catches sight of his new companion.

“You know, it’s been threatening rain all week, and now there’s not a cloud in the sky. Funny how that is.”

Seungmin looks as gorgeous as ever. He’s dressed in his favorite suit, pinstriped, sharp and freshly dry-cleaned, looking like he’s stepped straight out of a dream. For a moment, Chan can’t even look at him straight on, like if he does, he’ll be blinded by him. Eventually however, by increments, he turns and finally faces the man.

The boss.

Chan’s everything.

At once, the breath leaves him. Seungmin is staring straight ahead at the coffin, the look in his eyes simply too deep to fathom. Briefly, Chan tries, he tries to read what the man is thinking from his face alone, but he comes up empty every time. There’s too much in the line of his mouth, the softness of his face. If anything, Chan would have called his expression gentle, but how often does that word really apply to the man beside him?

After a moment’s hesitation, Chan turns back to look at the funeral.

“Don’t you think it’s a little passé, showing up here?” As if he has the right to pass judgment.

Though he can’t see it, Chan can hear the devastatingly beautiful smile Seungmin turns on him as he insists, “I think it’d be disrespectful not to.”

Maybe. Tempted to ask if Seungmin usually shows up to the funerals of the people he’s had killed, Chan forces himself to think twice and bites his tongue. It isn’t his business, and he doesn’t want it to be. He’d rather stand here and let this moment be sacred. He’d rather believe that Seungmin is here for him, even though he hadn’t told anyone where he was going. It’s been a rough two weeks, and Chan would rather believe a fantasy.

“I’m surprised to see you here.” Seungmin’s voice is light, easily lost to the voices ahead of them, all speaking over the grave. “I thought you’d still be in bed, with that shoulder of yours. Junhyung informed me your recovery would take weeks.”

Chan pokes at his bottom lip with his tongue. “It will. But I was going stir crazy.”

“Understandable.” 

Fleetingly, he wonders if this is when he’s supposed to give his report. Because he hasn’t yet, and eventually, he’s going to have to. But Seungmin doesn’t ask and he doesn’t try. Half of it, he’s not entirely sure he could recount, the rest of it is still sitting badly in his gut. There were too many close calls, it makes him feel wildly unprofessional to speak of them. Even if they succeeded, by rights they shouldn’t have. He doesn’t want to face Seungmin with that knowledge.

But he doesn’t have to, because it seems the man is here for other things entirely.

“You know I knew that man once, the boss.” Seungmin’s voice is ever so soft, like he’s recounting a bedtime story. Lulling Chan into a sense of calm that he’s not sure he deserves. “He was a friend of my father’s. I remember him bringing me candy, every time the two of them did business. I think for a while I called him uncle.” Chan searches Seungmin’s voice for grief, and he’s unsurprised when he finds none. “There was talk of me marrying his daughter, years ago.”

“Oh.” 

“She left the country,” Seungmin dismisses, with an airy wave of his hand. “And things changed.”

If it’s an invitation to ask what changed, Chan doesn’t take it. But then, he rarely does. Some things aren’t for him to ask about, and he’d rather keep it that way. Seungmin is made of secrets already, what’s one more? If this mission Chan had just carried out had been more personal than the rest, then that’s for his Boss to know, and not for him to worry over.

Still, he glances to the side, and offers Seungmin a look of sympathy that he hopes is enough.

Gradually, Seungmin shifts closer, until they’re pressed shoulder to shoulder. Usually, Chan would have stiffened, but that kind of tensing of his muscles hurts right now. Instead, he stands there helplessly as the man pushes into his personal space and exists, like this is normal for them. It isn’t, but considering this is the first time he’s seen Seungmin since that night, Chan accepts it, and clamps his mouth shut so he doesn’t beg for more.

This is why he’s still here. Maybe he hadn’t been sure before, but he is now. This is what let him make that last shot. This is why he’s not in the coffin right now, instead of someone else.

He wants to voice it, but Chan doesn’t think it’d make any sense if he did.

Instead, he watches in silence as the coffin is finally lowered into the hole, and one by one, the gathered mourners begin to disperse. Just like that, the spell is broken, and he feels like his breath comes a bit easier.

“I almost died.”

Chan isn’t sure where the words come from, but he doesn’t stop them. His usual hold over his tongue is loosened, and whether it’s the pain or the pain killers, he doesn’t know. But he’s not sure that it matters. Even though he’d usually rather die than speak freely to Seungmin, some things need to be said. Some forces are more powerful than his self-control.

Seungmin dips his head, lips twitching as he does. “I wasn’t worried.”

He wants to ask then what does worry you. Chan wants to fall to his knees and sob that he had been worried, that somewhere during that job he’d seen his life flash before his eyes, and it had all narrowed down to Seungmin. That everything had led back to him. He wants to explain in detail those seconds after he’d finished the deed, where everything had been silent, and he hadn’t entirely been sure if he was dead or alive. There’s so much he needs to say, but he only manages two words, like that could ever be enough.

“Why not?”

Shifting slightly, until he stands before Chan, Seungmin meets his eyes. There’s something steadying there, something so incredibly certain. It’s earth shattering and it’s terrible and it takes everything out of Chan. Things he didn’t know he had, emotions he’d forgotten he possessed. Right now, there’s not an ounce of doubt in Seungmin’s eyes, and in that strength, he finally finds the peace that’s eluded him for days.

For a brief moment, Chan feels okay again.

“Because I told you to come back.” When Chan can only stare at Seungmin, the man lowers his lashes and reaches forward. All he does is flatten the collar of his shirt, but Chan feels the touch like it was on bare skin, and it burns like fire. “You wouldn’t disobey an order, Chan.”

His name on Seungmin’s lips makes Chan want to cry.

But he doesn’t, all he does is draw in a shaky breath and whisper, “Then give me one.”

Eyes curving up into half moons, Seungmin smiles, bright and perfect. So very very gentle. And Chan doesn’t care if this is going to be the death of him, because that’s exactly how he wants to go.

“Who’s gone is gone.” Seungmin’s lips brush past Chan’s ear. “Don’t mourn what you can’t change. It’s time to leave.”

Willingly, Chan goes.

≫=====>

It had never occurred to Chan that Seungmin would know how to change bandages.

He’s used to the man’s hands being pure and clean. Seungmin doesn’t handle dirty things, he has people to do that. People like Chan, whose hands are already so caked in filth that a little more won’t be a bother. His job is to keep Seungmin from having to do things like this, having to handle all the consequences of the life he leads.

And yet when Seungmin tends to his shoulder, he couldn’t possibly be more careful and precise.

The stitches are ugly. They don’t hurt like they did, but the whole scar stands out like a sore thumb. Chan’s only able to see it in a mirror, and even then he’s only been able to look at it with help because his neck hasn’t been moving quite right. But it’s awful. Jagged and thick, coming up over the peak of the joint and dipping three inches down his back.

He doesn’t want to know what it looked like when they first brought him in.

The past week has seen everyone from a nurse to Minho to Jeongin helping him with these bandages, and every time they do it hurts. Not just physically but mentally, as he faces the damage this life has done to him. Every time someone unwraps it and hisses through their teeth or tuts quietly under their breath, and Chan remembers just how bad it really is.

But when Seungmin touches him, it’s not as painful. These hands touch him with such delicate purpose, he can’t help but wonder if the man is trying to carve his touch into Chan’s bones. Like Seungmin’s long, dexterous fingers can leave scars far more permanent than any bullet wound, or any surgery. 

If you had asked him, he would have said that these marks are much deeper. He thinks he can feel them on his soul.

They’re in the make-shift bedroom Chan’s commandeered while he recovers. He’s used to being invited to Seungmin’s quarters when they’re together, he’s used to everything being on the man’s terms, on his turf, under his control in every single way. This is as close to Chan’s ever been to Seungmin coming to him, and he doesn’t know how to handle it.

It probably shouldn’t make him feel this vulnerable.

Thankfully, Seungmin has been gentle so far, and not just in his touch. It’s in his words too, just murmuring nonsense to Chan, like he’s a wounded animal and not a person at all. Perhaps it should feel demeaning, but he finds comfort in it. He hasn’t felt like a person in a while, maybe handling him like he isn’t one is helping soothe whatever’s been wreaking havoc with his head.

He’s vaguely aware of how expertly Seungmin cleans the site of his stitches before pulling out fresh gauze and putting it over the wound. It hurts, but the pain keeps Chan grounded. Otherwise, he fears he’d drift away entirely, so quick to bend and break under Seungmin’s hands.

When he starts bandaging Chan back up, Seungmin doesn’t ask the questions that Chan has been getting from everyone else. He doesn’t ask when it’ll get better, he doesn’t ask for how much longer Chan is going to be useless. He doesn’t ask about physical therapy or if this is it. He doesn’t even ask if it hurts. He just murmurs quiet reassurances, and keeps up his methodical, steady actions.

And when he’s done, Seungmin slides around to Chan’s front and settles in his lap as he starts the process all over again on the bullet wound above his elbow.

While the man moves, single-minded in his focus, Chan watches him. Seungmin isn’t quite as dressed up as he was for the funeral. His suit jacket and tie are forgotten on the chair behind him. His shoes are by the door, and several buttons of his dress shirt have been undone. Just a hint of his collarbone peaks out through the gap, and if Chan had possessed a little more presence of mind, he would have asked to undo more of those buttons.

As it is, his movements are a little restricted. By pain, and by how thoroughly Seungmin has subdued him. So he just fixates, and falls into the careful way the man handles him.

Because it’s not just his arm. When Seungmin finishes wrapping the second bullet-wound, his fingers just shift elsewhere, smoothing down Chan’s chest, over his stomach, before skating back up his ribs. Always so careful, more tender than he thinks Seungmin has ever been before. And yet it doesn’t feel out of place. If anything, it’s all he thinks he can bear right now.

If he had to put a word to it, he would have said the man is caressing him, but he’s not sure that fits. Seungmin touches Chan like he’s precious, but he also touches him like he’s examining damaged property. Effortlessly, the man snatches away any thoughts Chan might have had, and replaces them with something else, something that starts to cut through the buzzing tension at the base of his skull.

Leaning forward, pressing himself closer, Seungmin brushes his lips over Chan’s throat. With a soft sound already building up in his chest, he tips his head back. Willing, entirely prepared to just do exactly what he’s told, and never ask a single question.

As those lips become teeth, gently scraping over the shell of his ear, a groan escapes Chan. “Seungmin, I’m not-”

Not able to move? Not deserving of this? Not human enough anymore?

“It’s alright,” Seungmin assures him without hesitation, shifting his position in Chan’s lap as he does. Easily, slender thighs trap him in place. “I’ve got it.” When Chan still hesitates, Seungmin patiently reaches down and finds his one good hand. “Just touch me, Chan.” He accents the point by placing Chan’s hand on his hip, in the sort of way that’s a gentle command. 

That’s something he knows what to do with.

Thoughtlessly, he holds on to Seungmin, dragging his thumb over the man’s hip before sliding it into the divot of the bone. It’s a familiar place for his hand, and Chan swears he can feel the man’s body heat radiating up into his palm, even through the layers of clothing. Letting out a soft sigh, Seungmin leans closer once again, and his lips return to Chan’s neck.

He thinks they burn wherever they touch. Past the aching of his body, past the fog in his mind, Chan is able to feel every place Seungmin’s lips touch. First under his jaw, before dipping down along his throat, then shifting to his shoulder. He’s careful to avoid Chan’s injury, but he gets close to it, always careful not to hurt him worse. And as he kisses, he keeps touching, flattening his palms over Chan’s chest and skating nails over his spine.

As Seungmin moves, he starts talking, his voice soft against Chan’s skin. “I should have come to see you sooner.” His tone isn’t regretful, at least not traditionally, but Chan knows he wouldn’t have said it if he didn’t mean it. Still, he’s having trouble handling this now, he doesn’t know if he would have been able to accept Seungmin’s presence sooner.

“I wasn’t fit for company.” The words are a huff as Seungmin’s lips become teeth once again, scraping over the knotted muscles of his good shoulder. I’m still not.

But if Seungmin cares then he certainly doesn’t speak up. He just finds the crook of Chan’s neck and bites down, easily stripping any other thoughts from his mind. As his breath shivers and a low sound threatens to break free of him, Chan’s grip on the man’s hip tightens and thoughtlessly, he drags Seungmin closer. Like he is somehow protection from everything else.

Just when it starts to actually hurt, Seungmin lets him go and mouths over the mark he left behind. Exhaling shakily, Chan just strokes his hand down over the man’s thigh and lets himself be entirely distracted.

Breath ghosting by Chan’s ear, getting lost in his hair, Seungmin reminds him, “I get to decide if you’re fit for company, Chan.” Soft though the words might be, they’re as controlled as always, and when they’re accompanied by one of those small, dazzling smiles, all Chan can do is nod.

Seemingly satisfied with that, Seungmin leans down.

His lips are as soft as always, just as devastatingly wonderful. For a moment, the world around Chan fades out as Seungmin kisses him, just so heartachingly slow, like he’s trying to make this moment last for a lifetime. And perhaps it does, because in those seconds, Chan thinks he could be forgiven for forgetting everything that’s come before. It’s not fast, it’s not fiery, it’s not rough and bruising. It’s just Seungmin.

It’s all he’s ever wanted.

Maybe that’s why it’s so dangerous.

Fingers tangle in Chan’s hair, Seungmin’s tongue slips between his lips. It’s so natural, so instinctive, and he can hardly breathe for how much it is all at once. If this killed him, he thinks under normal circumstances he’d be forgiven. As it is, he just tips his head slightly and tries to deepen the contact between them.

When Seungmin pulls back, his face is flushed and his chest is heaving. Chan doesn’t want to know what he looks like, but he knows it’s a mess. Every breath feels unsteady, and he can’t quite keep his eyes focused, but he still wants more. He wants Seungmin, in whatever way he’s allowed to have him. Even if it’s just soft kisses in the darkness of Chan’s room.

Shifting forward once more, Seungmin fits their mouths together again, nipping at Chan’s bottom lip as he does. These kisses are shorter, messier. Pointed where the one before had been gentle. He can taste coffee and sleepless nights on the man’s breath, and he fights back the memory of blood that rises up in the back of his throat. He just falls deeper, and stops trying to cling to self control.

Somehow, he’s managed to get Seungmin’s shirt untucked. His skin is warm under Chan’s hand, soft and flawless and like sin. Far too decadent to be real, far too forbidden to be here in his arms. And god, Seungmin just melts against Chan, moaning softly into his mouth and dragging him closer.

Vaguely, he’s aware of how quiet the room is around them, how loudly their sounds echo in his ears. That awareness is quickly stripped away from him however, as Seungmin adjusts his position and swivels his hips down against Chan’s lap. It’s slow, but it’s purposeful, and it sends a heavy chill shooting through his spine. As his whole body tenses, his shoulder throbs with pain, and he’s not sure if the groan he lets out is a good one.

But that doesn’t stop him from trying to help, trying to set some sort of rhythm with Seungmin. Because heaven knows he can’t pull away.

It only lasts for a handful of seconds before Seungmin is pushing him back further on the bed, sitting back just enough to give him a dark-eyed look. “You shouldn’t be moving.” Concern from anyone else, but from him, an order. So he goes still, just clinging to Seungmin as the man grinds down on him again and catches his lips in another messy kiss.

Of course, Seungmin doesn’t need help for this. He’s perfectly capable of moving Chan how he needs, of taking exactly what he wants without ever hesitating or thinking twice. Because Seungmin never doubts himself, and when he does, this is where he comes. That has to mean something, right?

Chan tells himself the answer is yes because he’s not sure what he’ll do if it’s anything else.

Like he can sense that Chan is getting lost in his own head again, Seungmin effortlessly distracts him, just reaching between them and palming the front of his slacks. He hadn’t even realized he was hard until that moment but the second he does it snaps him back into the present. Huffing out a heavy breath, Chan’s head falls back as he struggles to keep himself stationary.

“Do you need to hold on to me?” He doesn’t know if Seungmin’s question is genuine or teasing, honestly Chan doesn’t care. Instead he takes the invitation and returns his hand to that slender waist, like that’ll be enough to ground him.

It isn’t. The pressure of Seungmin’s hand on his dick coupled with the way the man’s hips are still rolling against his has him slowly losing his mind. Chan probably shouldn’t be this easily affected, but he’s not sure he could have helped it if he tried. Everything is heat and friction and the beautiful sounds that start slipping from Seungmin’s mouth. And what sounds they are. Breathy and almost melodious and just a taste of how loud this man can be.

Chan drinks them down like a dying man, leaning forward to eat them off of Seungmin’s willing lips. And all the while Seungmin continues to stroke him through his clothing, until he’s fully hard and desperate for more than just this.

“Seungmin.” He groans the man’s name, his voice already so unsteady. “Please-”

But Seungmin hushes him with small, comforting sounds, his lips finding Chan’s once more. For a moment he wants to beg, but that idea is pulled out of him as Seungmin takes his hand away and bucks against him, harder than before. He knows he groans at the feeling of the man’s erection through too many layers of clothes, but he doesn’t care. Because who is going to hear him but Seungmin?

Even as he keeps up a steady pace with his hips, Seungmin lips trace Chan’s jaw. “Can you be patient for me, Chan?” Hot breath brushes past his ear, and it yanks him further into the present, into right here and not wandering in his own head. “Are you going to wait?”

Nodding shallowly, Chan swallows the saliva pooling in his mouth and tries to find the words to answer Seungmin. Justifiably, it takes him a moment. And even when he does, he knows his voice sounds weak. “Yes. I- I’ll wait.” I’ll be good, he manages not to whisper.

He says it, but it’s almost impossible not to lurch forward when Seungmin backs off of him. The only thing that holds Chan back is the man’s orders, and the pain that lightnings through his right side when his body tenses abruptly. It’s as good as an electric shock would have been, reminding him to stay where he is, to not plead with Seungmin to come back and just touch him because that’s all he wants.

Instead, Chan sits back on the bed as Seungmin slides to his feet.

Slowly, so achingly slow, Seungmin reaches for the buttons of his shirt and begins to undo them, one by one. With every inch of skin that’s revealed, Chan thinks he falls a little deeper. It’s nothing that he hasn’t seen before, but he’s already in such a state that it makes his head spin. The man is gorgeous, long lines accompanied a willowy build, perfect shoulders that taper down to a waist so small it shouldn’t be possible. And he gets to watch as the man strips before him, just graceful enough to make it feel like a show put on exclusively for his benefit.

As the shirt drops to the floor, Chan feels the breath in his lungs shiver. If he weren’t already fully aroused, then this would have been enough. Just the sight of Seungmin standing half-naked before him. And then his hands go for his belt, and Chan doesn’t bother to hold back the sound that builds in his throat.

Smirking at the sound ever so slightly, Seungmin takes his time with it, slender fingers toying with the buckle for a moment before clicking it free. Following the way of the shirt, the leather hits the floor with a much more audible snap. Dragging his eyes down to the obvious tent in the man’s dress slacks, Chan sucks in a sharp breath. At least I’m not the only one in this state.

Sometimes, he feels like he is. When he and Seungmin come together like this, sometimes Chan thinks he’s the only one falling apart. He could be fucking the man into the mattress, reducing him to incoherent words and helpless cries, and yet it still seems like Seungmin is internally composed, always with the upper hand. But right now, somehow it feels like they’re on the same page.

Seungmin’s lashes are fluttering a little too quickly for it to be otherwise, there’s too much in his eyes for him to actually be detached. His hands tremble slightly as he undoes his buttons, and Chan shivers right along with him.

At least for a second, there isn’t a line between them at all.

Fingers fluttering over his zipper, Seungmin catches Chan’s eyes and parts his lips in a soft sound. Without an ounce of shame, he works both pants and underwear down over his hips, leaving himself entirely bared. Slowly, Chan’s eyes follow the man’s ribs, down the gentle curve of his waist. There he spends a moment admiring those hips, before his gaze dips lower, to the man’s dick, flushed and bobbing slightly in the empty air. Usually, he would have found more crass words leaping to his tongue, but tonight all he can do is marvel.

Seungmin’s just as beautiful and flawless as always.

Smiling, no doubt knowing exactly what he’s done to Chan, Seungmin slinks forward and crawls back onto the bed. Then with the same methodical care he’d put into undressing himself, the man reaches for Chan’s pants and begins working his belt free.

Even though he’s supposed to be staying still, Chan still does his best to help Seungmin, wiggling his hips and awkwardly lifting himself to allow the dress slacks to be pulled free. Cool air hits his erection, and he sucks in a sharp breath at the sensation. The involuntary action quickly becomes a gasp as Seungmin reaches a hand around the back of his neck and drags him in for a sloppy kiss that’s more teeth at Chan’s bottom lip than anything else.

God, it’s everything.

Backing up again, Seungmin goes for Chan’s makeshift side table and grabs for the bottle of lube he’d stuck there earlier. “I know you can’t move,” he hums almost indulgently, as he crouches over Chan once more. “But that’s alright, I’ll handle it tonight.” Before there’s a chance to ask what that means, Seungmin is snapping open the little bottle and dribbling some of it liberally over his fingers.

Oh. Chan is hardly even able to begin to process what’s happening as the man slings an arm around his neck before leaning forward. Reaching behind himself, his eyes twitching closed as he does, Seungmin nibbles on his bottom lip for a moment before shuddering and letting out a quiet moan.

Admittedly, he can’t see much from this angle, but even this is a lot. Just Seungmin rocking back on his own hand and shivering as he starts opening himself up. His face is pinched up in concentration as he does, the kind of expression that makes it impossible not to want to kiss him. And he’s up in Chan’s face as he does it, almost resting their foreheads together as he tries to control his breathing and fails completely.

Chan’s instinct is to help, but the moment he tries to bring his good arm up, Seungmin is pinning his hand down with his knee. Putting just enough pressure on it to keep him rooted to the bed, the man shoves his face into Chan’s shoulder. “Be good for me, Chan.” Another order, but it comes out in a gasp, one that he can feel spilling out over his skin. Like Seungmin is starting to fall apart too.

Chan wants to be good, but it’s so hard when Seungmin’s spine arches in his view and his whole body shivers. He can feel everything, can feel the rhythm Seungmin is setting with his own hand. There’s nothing he wants more than to just touch the man, but all he gets is the way they’re pressed chest to chest, and the way the lips at his throat become teeth.

When Seungmin bites down on Chan’s neck again, he knows it’s the man’s name that escapes his mouth. Because that’s the only thought left in his head, past the sharp pain of Seungmin’s jaw tightening, and the burning heat that’s finally chasing away the chill of his limbs. It’s electric and it hurts but it’s so much better than the pain of his shoulder, so much sweeter. If he’d had words, he would have begged for more.

As it is, he groans as Seungmin sucks at the mark with bruising force, like he’s demanding Chan stay with him.

I’m here, he thinks hazily, as he watches Seungmin add another finger and try to speed up the motions of his hand. I’m right here, I’ve always been here. At this point, he doesn’t know if he’s referring to this moment, or everything. He’s not sure it matters.

Pulling back for a second, Seungmin catches Chan in a stare that yanks him back to the present better than anything else ever could. “Focus,” he breathes, before leaning down and crashing their mouths together.

And oh does he, like Seungmin telling him to do so is all it takes. Chan focuses on how hot their bodies are pressed together, on the sounds that spill from Seungmin’s lips and past his own. On how much he wants this man and how every muscle is starting to tense up with the effort of sitting still. God he wants to move, whether it be to touch Seungmin or to touch himself, but he can’t so he just pours that desperation into what he can do. Devouring the other man’s mouth and letting it consume him as well.

Breaking the kiss so he can curse loudly, Seungmin’s head drops to Chan’s shoulder again. His hips are shaking. Actually, his entire body is trembling. Clearly so on edge already, with that flush traveling down the jut of his spine, and sweat standing out on his tanned skin. Chan can feel his dick throb at the sight, and he wonders if he was subjected to this long enough if he could cum just from this alone. Probably. His self-control always falls apart in the face of Seungmin.

But maybe that’s okay, because when Seungmin moans next, it’s Chan’s name on his lips. Demanding and yet needy, like he’s letting his hold of the situation slip by increments. Like he’s trying to show Chan the things that he can’t say aloud.

In that moment, Chan thinks he gets it.

Hissing into Chan’s throat, possibly with impatience, Seungmin pulls his fingers out of himself with an audible sound. Shifting his position, he grabs swiftly for the forgotten bottle of lube before dribbling some more into his hands. Obviously he knows what’s coming, but the feeling of Seungmin’s hands on him is still enough to shake a groan from his chest, one that’s so deep it could have been a sob.

“You’re doing well, Chan,” Seungmin hums to him, as he slicks up Chan’s erection. “You’re doing so well for me.” He’s trying but god, it’s almost too much to bear. And any answer is lost to his heaving breaths and his spinning head. If Seungmin keeps touching him like this, he’s convinced he’s going to fall apart.

Thankfully, or perhaps inevitably, Seungmin has other plans. Letting go of Chan’s dick, the man crawls forward, his eyes dark and spiraling. Until they’re pressed so close together that Chan thinks he can feel Seungmin’s heartbeat, somewhere past his own thundering pulse. Then Seungmin is guiding his erection into place and without any more warning than that, he’s slowly sinking down.

As always, it’s at the worst possible moment that Chan realizes just how in love he is. 

Blessedly, the only thing that leaves his mouth is a moan as Seungmin takes him in, inch by inch. Clearly, the man had been too impatient to stretch himself entirely, it’s evident in the way Seungmin grits his teeth, and the way his thighs shake as he moves. Still, he keeps going, using the hand he buries in Chan’s hair as a hold to cling to. His grip is almost painful, but it makes so much more sense than a caress ever would.

It’s only once Seungmin has fully seated himself that Chan realizes his good hand has been freed. Despite his orders not to move, he still settles his palm on that waist, and watches captivated as Seungmin drags in slow, steady breaths and forces himself to adjust.

“You’re okay,” Seungmin murmurs as his eyes flutter open, and it takes Chan a moment to realize those words are being directed at him. As the fingers in his hair loosen, the man drags them both together and repeats the words against his cheek, like he’s trying to imprint them into both of their brains.

You’re okay.

Then he’s moving, and just about everything else ceases to matter.

When Seungmin told Chan that he’d handle this tonight, he meant everything. He doesn’t seem to require a bit of help as he picks his hips up only to sink back down on Chan’s dick again. Shuddering heavily, he sucks in a heaving breath before repeating the action and letting out a delighted moan. And like a fool, Chan keeps falling, for every single part of this glorious man.

Seungmin starts slow, but he certainly doesn’t stay that way. He gives them both a minute to grow accustomed to the sensations, but then he’s picking up the pace, rolling his hips down with the kind of single-minded intensity of a man possessed. And all Chan can do is hold on with his good hand and push his face into Seungmin’s shoulder. Like that’ll be enough to hide how far gone he really is.

It’s not, but at least like this, he can put his lips to Seungmin’s skin and taste the man’s own desperation there. So sweet and perfect, and all the more precious for how solid this moment is after days of nothing feeling real. Because he’s well and truly in the present again, with the pain of his shoulder and the tension in his spine and Seungmin’s body flexing over him. It’s here and he knows it's not going away, and coming out of that fog feels like finally waking up, for the first time in too long.

Every inch of his body feels like it’s on fire. Where their bodies slide together, where Seungmin’s hands brace themselves. One on Chan’s good shoulder and the other digging nails into his back. The man’s whole body is heaving with the effort, and yet he keeps going, fucking himself on Chan and moaning obscenities woven with one name. Together, it’s better than any song, any prayer.

It replaces the cloud in Chan’s head with something else. Something like ecstasy or maybe just love. Pure and utter devotion.

“Touch me, Chan,” Seungmin says, for the second time that night, but this time his voice is laced with need. Towing that fine line between begging and demanding, with only the history between them to determine which side of that distinction it falls on. And this time Chan is more than eager to comply, dragging his hand down Seungmin’s trembling, tensed thighs, before slipping it up the lovely path of the man’s spine.

He can feel himself breaking apart beneath Seungmin. It’s more than just the intense pleasure coursing through him, and the electricity buzzing in his nerves. It’s something deep in his chest that’s being shaken loose. Thoughts and feelings that he usually keeps so tightly locked down, only to be acknowledged, but never experienced. In that moment, he thinks he could be forgiven for breaking down and sobbing, for how all encompassing it is.

Briefly, Chan is given the chance to hold his world in his hands, and he realizes that for all the times he’s said he’d die for this man, he’s also willing to live for this man. He’s willing to defy the laws of what should be possible, just for the chance to return to Seungmin’s side, and he’ll never give it a second thought, because there’s never been another option.

He can’t say it aloud, so he says it with his actions. With his mouth pressed against the side of Seungmin’s throat and his fingers digging into the man’s hip. With every frantic kiss and every fiery touch. Every time Seungmin’s hair brushes his cheek and every time he groans the man’s name. Chan says I love you and even then he knows it’s not enough. He doesn’t think it ever will be.

Adjusting his own movements briefly, furrowing his brows as he does, Seungmin changes the angle of his hips and lets out a near-silent cry as he manages to find his own sweet spot. Chan can feel the man start to shake himself to pieces as he repeats the motion, just a tangle of long limbs and hair that has long since fallen out of the gel he’d swept it back with. There’s nothing but delirious desperation on those features, and yet all Chan can think is he’s perfect, and how could he want anything else.

He can feel the tension building up in his own gut every time Seungmin sinks down over him. Every time the man gasps out his name. It starts radiating through his body, locking up his limbs and winding his tendons taut like piano wires. He’s so tense that it’s starting to hurt, starting to radiate down his bad arm insistently, but he’s too far gone to pay attention to something like that. 

The only thing that matters is Seungmin’s lips finding his once more, missing more than they connect, and the sob that works its way out of his chest.

All things considered, it doesn’t take them long. Everything about this has been entirely too much to last forever, not with the way they’re both shaking, losing control in tandem. Chan’s vaguely aware that Seungmin shifts one of his hands and starts fisting his own forgotten erection, his whole body curling in on itself as he does. He also knows that despite every order he’s been given to the contrary, he’s moving his own hips, trying desperately to chase that release.

Just a moment of bliss. Of thoughtlessness.

He thinks he loses his grip first. Seungmin is so tight and hot around him that he can’t help it. All he thinks to do is mouth the man’s name against his throat before he’s coming, pulsing inside Seungmin and clinging to him as he rides out that high. It’s enough to make sparks dance before his eyes and it’s enough to briefly stave off the pain of his shoulder, if only through distraction.

For a moment, the only thing he can hear is his own heartbeat. For a moment, he’s permitted to just exist.

As the tension drops from his body and he drags Seungmin closer, he can feel the man clenching around him tightly as he finds his own orgasm. Seungmin’s voice is too far gone for the cry to be loud, but maybe it’s all the more precious for how fragile it is. Just him hoarsely calling Chan’s name as the man presses his face into Chan’s good shoulder and trembles.

Honestly, he doesn’t know how long they stay like that. Just Seungmin curled up in his lap, and Chan struggling to catch his breath. He knows that there are tears on his cheeks when he comes to, but he also knows he doesn’t have the strength to wipe them away. Abruptly, he’s been brought back into reality, and he thinks he needs to process that before being able to do anything else.

Drawing in a heavy lungful of air, Seungmin pulls off of Chan and shudders as he situates himself back where he was before. Comfortably straddling him, arms just thrown tiredly around his neck. Hazily, Chan waits for the man to pull away, but he never bothers. He just presses himself closer and stays, like this is alright.

Maybe, if Seungmin says so, then it is.

Already, Chan can feel the line between them reforming, just like it always does, but he thinks he can handle that. Some boundaries are immutable, but this one can be crossed when they need to, and he dares not ask for more. As long as he can hold Seungmin like this, he’ll be alright.

If it takes almost dying to be given this, then it’s a fair price.

Eventually, Seungmin finds enough strength to move himself. He does so carefully, with limbs that don’t quite work right. Still, he’s got the wherewithal to push Chan back to the mattress before relaxing down beside him. They’re not tangled like they were before, but Chan can still reach out and touch the man. Usually, he would resist, but tonight he doesn’t. Tonight he uses his good arm to pull Seungmin closer, and pushes his nose into the man’s back.

“Seungmin, you’re the reason I wasn’t the one in that coffin.”

He’s not entirely sure where the words come from, Chan certainly doesn’t have the energy for conversation. Maybe he’s just so far gone that he’s lost control of his tongue entirely. Wherever they come from, he whispers the words into the fine hairs at the nape of Seungmin’s neck, like bottling them up a second longer would kill him.

“I came back for you.”

Turning in his hold, Seungmin looks at him. Stares at Chan with big brown eyes, those long lashes, and that flawless mouth. Stares, and then smiles, tired but soft. Almost tender. Maybe even something more, if there was ever a chance for it to be so. 

“And you’ll keep coming back for me,” he hums, lifting up a hand and gently brushing it over one of Chan’s cheeks. “Until I give you permission to do otherwise.”

He’s right, Chan knows, as his eyes slip closed and he settles himself into Seungmin’s warmth. As always, he’s right.

It’s not an ‘I love you’, and he knows it never will be. Not even death could drag those words from them.

But it’s as close as they can get. 

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