feeling a little giddy as he skates through town, remi hopes no one tries to jack his backpack today of all days, considering he's fresh off a delivery from lock, heading back from the massage parlour. nothing earth-shattering: some computer parts, a new video game, another deadly class comic to add to his collection - almost completed! this latest one makes for 49 out of 56 - but, tucked amongst these innocuous things, the pièce de résistance.
-
"it's... a picture of a man?" lock furrows his brow, looking over the card that had gotten remi so excited.
"it's not- byun baekhyun is not a man. he's like, a modern day god. you wouldn't understand, they don't make photocards for whatever weird goth music you listen to." is lock a cure guy? he seems like a cure guy.
"a modern day god using a frog hat filter." lock doesn't seem impressed. "what's all this other stuff, then?"
"those are the other inserts. there's another photocard in there, i think. you can have it if you want it. consider it the start of your collection." he doesn't care about the little ids the album comes with, really, and besides, he has all the green ones already.
lock fishes the photocard out from the pile remi had abandoned - he normally treats his albums better than this, but this is like his fourth time trying to pull froggy baekhyun, so he's got more than enough copies of the album by now - and turns it over, looking at it for a moment. "this guy kinda looks like you." that attracts his attention. which member could lock possibly be talking about? "see?"
he glances at the card.
"dude. i'm flattered, but mark lee does not look like me."
-
honestly, he could blow the person who'd introduced him to lock, his lifeline of sanity in this pleasantville-ass place, but his time might be better spent sucking up to lock instead. the siren had politely but firmly turned remi down, whenever he'd tried to blow him, but that doesn't mean remi can't try to get on his good side in other ways.
lost in some half-baked fantasy about how best to go about that - lock likes spooky stuff, right? bats and spiders and shit? maybe he can... - a flurry of movement attracts his attention, pausing in the entry of the alley he'd been passing as he sees someone brought down that way, draped over another man's shoulder.
that's... weird, right? like, even for hanjeong.
nobody around him seems to be inclined to act on it, so he guesses it'll have to be him. sorry, froggy baekhyun. don't get ruined. kicking his board up easily, remi tucks it under his arm before darting into the alley without much more than a quick prayer that this doesn't blow up in his face.
neither man seems to have noticed him, even though the one on the ground is obstructed from his view by the other. whatever, suits him just fine. gives him a second to come up with a game plan, anyway. he shoulders off his backpack, setting it and his skateboard aside, spying some construction debris nearby. he doesn't really wanna use his skateboard for this: he really likes this one, and whenever he'd broken a truck on it some months ago, it had taken ages to get a replacement, so he's not exactly keen on destroying it just yet. a quick once-over is all he needs, before fishing a piece of wood that'll work out of the pile. he might only be 5'4, but his attitude's definitely 6'2, deciding to make his presence known.
"hey, fuckhead!"
as fuckhead turns towards him, remi doesn't hesitate, swinging his makeshift bat as hard as he can.
the puddle doesnāt afford ren with much context, he can only āseeā a couple feet around it; even the belted-man standing above him is a shaky figure at best. he hates moments like this, moments that make him feel so weak and fragile, like heās not the same shi renyu that can control the flow of water⦠like heās powerless.
the auditory cues arenāt much help either. human clothes are so weird, the donning and removing of pants sounds about the same. its the shapes that give him more clues, the bunching of a fabric-y shape around what ren would guess is the knees? itās interrupted though, footsteps approaching with a relative haste, more shouting.Ā
heās not sure what āfuckheadā means. heās heard it before, sure, but hasnāt gotten the opportunity to ask. it definitely gets the now-unbelted-manās attention, though. the shape turns toward the approaching footsteps, but thatās all it does before it crumples to the ground, the resounding crack loud enough to give ren a reason.
instincts are a weird thing. renās never really been sure his developed quite properly, but its harder to tell without moments like this. instinctually speaking, a blind person might duck or back away, something to get further from the person whoād levelled the ,,, horrible man. one might even call that a logical choice. renās instincts, however, are tied to the waterā and his puddleās just about dried up.Ā
ādo you have any water?ā the radius of his sight decreases practically in real time, most of his energy focused on maintaining his glamour with his inner water. heās not even entirely sure the new person is still in the alleyway with him, āpleaseā¦ā
















