little boy blue

jisung only needed enough small cash to buy a couple of pots of instant ramen. his paycheck from work didn’t come in until the end of the month and he had already spent everything else on feeding himself and jinah (mostly jinah). which meant that once again he found himself out on the streets, hood up over his head and looking for his next lift. though he was hoping he would only need one for the day and then he could go and buy dinner and head back home. just needed to find someone who looked like they would have a lot of cash in their wallet. 

didn’t take him long to find one, making sure to keep his distance as he watched for just a moment. and then, when he was sure the guy and no one else was looking, he started to close in to make him move. and that is when someone else stepped right in his way. “hey!” jisung hissed, narrowing his eyes somewhat, “you could have knocked me over.”

though his complaints did pause when it sounded as though this guy knew what he was about to do. “no idea what you’re talking about,” he muttered a quick lie, moving to step around this stranger and get back to what he needed to be doing. 

now he was standing in front of this kid, he looked even more down and pathetic than he looked from a distance. there was hardly any meat on his bones, a clear sign that he wasn’t eating properly if ever there was one. it was almost patheticif it wasn’t so sad how some people ended up int his situation in the first place. jihun could almost see himself in this boy’s position if his life had turned out a little different.

“if knocking you over would have stopped you as well, then it would have worked just fine,” anything to get the hitman this kid was planning on robbing out of sight before anything else happened. and of course this scrap of a kid was denying everything, but jihun didn’t care. he didn’t need him to tell the truth. he could lie about it all he wanted, just so long as he didn’t end up losing a hand. or worse, which was very likely given the man he was planning on pickpocketing.

he’s ready for every face but his. well, sanghun would’ve been worse, probably, but his little brother isn’t any better, right? this isn’t good at all, what if he finds something and has to take him with him? sanghun picking him up at the police station wouldn’t be fun, either. he decides that if he sees something, he’ll just ignore it. or at least he will try to, being loyal to the mpd is more important than everything else. small exceptions are okay, though. maybe he’ll make this encounter one of them. it’s not that he doesn’t consider him to be clever enough to not keep anything suspicious in his apartment, but he’ll never know.. well, soon he will.

“this is kind of surprising, i didn’t know that you live here. how have you been..?” remembering what he’s actually here for, he fakes a cough. “sorry, i forgot. detective kim, homicide. there’s been a murder around this block and i’d like to ask you some questions regarding what happened, may i come in for a few seconds? we might even get some time to catch up on how we’ve been..uh..and stuff.” and how sanghun has been. they’ve split their ways years ago, when seokjin left for the academy to become a cop.

he puts the badge back into his jacket, not even flashing it to prove who he is and what he’s here for. the other has to know that he’s working for the mpd, sanghun probably told him at least once. he has no idea how much he knows about what happened and their relationship, but he’ll probably find out just now.

jihun supposed that it was better he actually regocgnized the officer on the other side of the door. it would just be awkward for everyone involved if he had to sit there and talk to someone he didn’t even know and try and pretend he knew nothing about the shooting. which he didn’t, really besides what he had heard. but if it were gang business he supposed he would end up finding out about it eventually through the grapevine. but jihun didn’t see why some random, what he could assume to be, mugging gone wrong on the university campus, would have anything to do with hydrus or one of their rivals. it was probably just some random criminal who had nothing to do with anything.

“i go to the university, so yeah...” he had thought that would make sense he lived on campus in the dorms, “but i have been fine, thank you.” that was nothing but a lie, he had been a little more less than fine for a very long time. but he couldn’t exactly say that without more questiosn and, to be frank, it was better that a cop didn’t know about his problems. not unless he wanted to get carted off to the station. “i had a feeling that is why you are here, yes,” it was not likely this was going to be some random meet and greet.

— @mijihun​ | tw: mention of drugs, mention of murder, slight gore

“mpd. please open the door.” the detective pulled out his badge of office, ready to show as soon as the residents opened the door. the door belonged to an apartment that was relatively close to the one his newest victim was found - lee namgi, 20 years old, cause of death: one shot through the chest, one through the stomach. some of the residents must’ve heard something - but if they were clever enough, they stayed at home. if one was so stupid and left their house after hearing a shot - especially at myeongcho - they would’ve soon learned not to make that mistake again, if that was even possible.

he would be doing a citizen check and ask if the residents heard anything - a gunshot, screaming, blood splattering, an argument, loud noises - and if they saw anything - someone running, a gun, blood anywhere, a car driving away, a license plate. any information could be useful, honestly, since he currently groped in the dark. seokjin patiently waited for the residents to open up, tapping his foot against the ground. he didn’t expect much information, honestly, most people kept quiet about things they heard, fearing the gangs and everyone else. the door opened, he was ready to show his mark - and then-

“jihun?”

there had been a shooting just around the corner from his university building. jihun had heard the shot, but was quite happy to pretend that he hadn’t. it wasn’t any of his business and he didn’t want to get involved in something like that. but he knew what was going to happen next, no doubt the mpd would be knocking on his door asking questions. thankfully he wasn’t that worried about it because he didnt have anything comprimising in his dorm room. jihun refused to leave anything lying around, this was his safe space, to get away from his gang life. so even if someone did show up and he had to invite them in, he had nothing to hide.

as soon as he heard the knock of his door he was standing up. hoepfully this would be over and done with as soon as possible. giving one last look around his room, jihun moved to the door, pushing his hair out of his face as he grabbed the handle and pulled the door open. he was fully expecting to have a badge thrust in his face, but what he was not expecting was a familiar face saying his name.

--- he couldn’t help but laugh again, though it would’ve been more convenient if he didn’t. seungwoo had his own secrets he wasn’t so keen on letting out, including how little he really feared death. still: “i’m so scared,” he says, sarcastic. “you’re right, i chose this and i’m going to die an early death. i’m here for a good time, not a long time.” it wasn’t a lie, at least. seungwoo was good at that: half truths, talking much and saying little, secrets without lies. 

taking pictures? surely the puzzlement showed on his face. “is that a hydrus thing? or just…a you thing?” not that it mattered. seungwoo shrugged. “i’m supposed to be killing a guy. i should probably figure out how to get back on that, or…report my critical mission failure or whatever.”

jihun just tilted his head slightly as seungwoo laughed. he was going to question him, but in the end he simply decided that he didn’t actually care all that much. “well, you never know,” he did have to offer, though his words were no more than a mutter and he wouldn’t be surprised if the other male didn’t even hear them. and jihun supposed that it didn’t matter whether he head the words or not in the end. maybe handing him in wouldn’t bring that much respect after all. jihun supposed that most of hydrus assume that he was useless and telling them about the fact he missed shots on purpose would only confirm that. what kind of useless solider was he if he was purposfully missing and messing everything up? though deserving it. he raised a brow as he turned his head briefly back towards seungwoo, “and out of curisoity, what would i have to do to deserve it?”

“sort of did,” he just argued. he hadn’t denied the fact that he was a good shot which was more or less the same thing as saying it out loud. “but fine, if you want to get technical with me: i miss my shots on purpose because i don’t want to kill people.” now he couldn’t say that he hadn’t actually told him this. though when seungwoo suggested he could have died, jihun did have to let out a short and sharp laugh, “yeah, that’ll be the day.” one of these days there would be a bullet coming right at him and he wouldn’t even bother to try and dodge it. what was even the point of all of this anymore anyway?

seungwoo didn’t seem the least bit affected by jihun’s words, though he didn’t know why he had expected him to care. “well, nice to know you’re aware of this fact,” no one in a gang ended up growing gray and old. they all died, either in a massive shootout or some small job which ended up going wrong. and jihun fully expected to go the same way eventually. or maybe he would be the special case and his own family would end up murdering him before anyone else would.

Tagged: @mijihun

Ryuu had gotten used to being some sort of bodyguard or insurance ever since he got into Hydrus. Though he’s not sure if he would count that in his very first mission when another gang member was somewhat acting as his handler. Kind of. This time, for certain, he’s acting as both of the aforementioned as he’s with another gang member, donning his red dragon mask and his sword sheathed at his side.

The thing about being in a gang was that they often used gangs or brass knuckles and a pocket knife to fight. Both had their advantages and disadvantages, though Ryuu knows his number one disadvantage is having to be in close range for his sword to actually make a mark. The weapon being long is probably the only advantage, he supposes. But he’s quiet tonight as he accompanies Cobra on this mission. It had been a long time since he ever found himself in the world of smuggling, since the last time would’ve had to have been when his father was alive and had gotten Ryuu to start doing some work.

Back then, though, he didn’t wear a mask. No one really knew who he was, since the retainers often addressed him as “Milord” without uttering his name. It added to one of the many factors why no one knew who the son of Saito Ryusuke ever was.

His gaze turns to his companion, bluntly stating, “They’re late.”

for a change, he was the one being babysitted. jihun was used to having to be the one acting as bodyguard,  a simple soldier he was usually told to walk around and protect those in higher standing and far more important than him, but apparently hydrus didn’t even think he could do this one simple drop by himself and ryuu was currently sitting beside him in that ridiculous mask of his. what was wrong with a simple mask over your mouth, jihun just thought the drag drew too much attention. and it looked a bit stupid as well, though he had never actually said this out loud.

“i noticed, thanks,” jihun muttered in response as he shifted a foot, one hand pulling the plain black neck gaiter up a little further over his nose. he never really liked wearing it, but he knew he needed to keep his identiy hidden and couldn’t really afford to have people know his face. so he was always found with it over his mouth and nose while out on offical gang business and this was no different from any other time.

he could help but glance to his watch, just checking how late they actually were. quite a bit, and that was making him feel a little anxious about this whole thing. it was never a good sign when the other party showed up late. either they were preparing some kind of ambus or planning how to kill the both of them and take the goods without paying a dime.

He watches Jihun trying to curb his anger and for a moment he hopes Jihun will pucker up and bite the bullet. His hopes are short-lived. Sanghun sighs and props himself on the desk in clear and obvious disregard of “get the fuck out” command, hands crossed on his chest, he is getting a little bit defensive in addition to being half-exasperated half-worried, it’s always that way with Jihun. He lifts his eyebrows giving him his ‘are you kidding me” look.  “I ain’t gonna tell that to the old bastard. Do I look like I have a death wish? You can tell it to him yourself. Just do it while running because if he catches up he’ll rip you a new one.” Why Jihun is always making things so hard for himself?

Looking at his brother’s righteous indignation Sanghun feels baffled and jaded (and an asshole, but that’s a given). Baffled because they both know rebellion is useless. Jaded because the fact that Jihun is still fighting makes him a better man than Sanghun will ever be. He already is sorry he let himself be riled up and wish he did not say that. It hits too close to home. He breaks the eye contact, looking for a brief second through the window at the bustling campus - a life neither of them can afford. Speaking of which - “Can you afford to piss him off even more than he is already? Because you did not gain any favours lately.”  He looks back at JIhun and wishes he could tell him it will be ok, but they both intimately know that the good endings do not exist in real life. Whatever the dinner plans are, it will hurt.

“Not gonna tell you what to do or not to do bro.” In the end, Jihun is old enough to make his own choices but Sanghun is not sure he would survive them. “Just don’t be an idiot, please.” There is a fear hidden beneath his words. Because Sanghun does not want to see Jihun hurt. 

sanghun was still sitting there and jihun couldn’t help but scowl at him. purosfully ignoring the command to get out of his room was not going to suddenly make jihun change his mind about anything. and when sanghun simply told him that he was not going to be the one to inform their father that jihun had no intentions of showing, jihun just scoffed slightly. “well shit, guess he’s not going to find out until i don’t show up,” because there was no chance he was actually going to tell his father he didn’t have any intentions of going to this dinner. reason one was because simply didn’t want to have to look at his father again, reason two was because this was a sign that he was going to get shouted at and that was just something he wasn’t in the mood for in the slightest.

“he’s just always pissed off,” jihun simply muttered, perching on the edge of his bed as he sighed, “the fucking disappointment, me.” jihun had learned long ago that there was simply nothing he could do anymore to actually ain any favour with his father. the man had long since decided that jihun was just a waste of space and everything he did was going to be riddled with mistakes. sure, not showing up to this dinner would probably push him one step closer to just getting himself murdered, but jihun found that he didn’t even have the energy to worry about that anymore. if he was going to die then so be it, it was not like living was doing much for him at the moment.

Hyuna wondered how he was able to manage a double life as eventful as his. Being a college student seemed stressful enough, and then add being a Hydrus soldier on top of that? What was more important, a major essay’s due date or a high-paying job if they happened to fall on the same day? She could barely find a way to work her real job in between her department store hours sometimes. It just seemed overwhelming to her, why even subject yourself to all of that? Her thoughts were interrupted as she felt the phone buzz again.

Her face screwed up as she read the messages. It looked like she had a wise guy on her hands. She couldn’t say she expected him to get nervous immediately once he realized she knew his involvement in that night. Getting sarcastic with her wasn’t the right response either though. There had to be something that would make him start to crack underneath the pressure. Otherwise, all of this worrying about a potential visit from Hydrus would be for nothing. She began looking through all of her notes and random bits of info. After a while, it became obvious that the answer was under her nose the entire time.

{blocked number} drugs are dangerous, very much so. so are drug dealers as well, especially those offering a lot of money for information about who stole from them {blocked number} i don’t think mommy and daddy would be too happy if they found out you messed up their plan would they?

Now, she didn’t know all the logistics behind that last job. For all she knew, neither of his parents had any involvement in that plan. But, she figured just the sheer mention of them would let him know that she meant business. Her higher-ups would be mad if she screwed something up, so it only made sense to assume the same of them. Would it be worse because they were family? She couldn’t even imagine working with her mother, especially with gang-related jobs. That was a family dynamic she’d pay to watch just out of sheer curiosity.

the longer jihun sat there staring at his phone, the less and less he thought about contacting one of the hydrus nerds to look into this. it was clear whoever was trying to extort him on the other end of the line knew quite a bit, that much was completely obvious. and over time they were staring to reval how much they happened to know. and while jihun knew it could be incredibly dangerous and this extortionist could end up runing his day, he didn’t really want to get anyone else involved. not when he was sure he would get some talking to about ‘being more careful’ or ‘being better at covering his tracks’ or even being told ‘stop being a fuck up’.

yeah, that was one he was used to hearing a lot.

hearing another ping as a message arrived, jihun was quick to open it up and scan the contents. though he very nearly laughed out loud. his parents. really. clearly they didn’t know him that well if they thought they could use his parents against him. sure, he might be batshit scared of them deep down, and sure, he hated them and everything they stood for and sure he was constantly worried about the day they’d get tired of him and just kill him and be done with it. but threatening him through the phone by bringing up his parents was really not the way to go about things. and was really not going to start making him spill the beans anytime soon.

[ message to unknown number ]

- you clearly don’t know me very well. my parents are never happy with me. the family disappointment, me. i don’t think they ever expect me to actually do anything right anymore.

he didn’t really know why he was telling some stranger all of this, but he supposed whoever they were might want to update their records. but, for all jihun knew, he could just be fueling them with more dirty intel they could use to try and bring him down. now that was not a very nice thought, so he promptly pushed it from his head as he looked back down at his phone to send something else before he got a response to the first message.

[ message to unknown number ]

yejun hated to show that he was scared. he thought it would make him seem weak and vulnerable. his father always made fun of him for it. “be a man” he said, “stop crying like a little girl, you’re a man.” 

oh just thinking about his father made him clench his fists but he calmed down with one breath, unclenching his fists. 

he looked up at the man, “its just some random dude from the bar…” he didn’t want to explain his whole story as it would take too long. yejun could still hear the man’s footsteps coming closer and closer to their location. 

quickly, he said, “i apparently talked to ‘his’ girl and i accidentally took his phone but i gave it back to him i promise! h-he got mad and started chasing!” 

“and look where i am now..” yejun thought to himself. 

“no police are involved i swear-“ he quickly said just in case that was the thing holding this man back from helping him. 

yejun’s hands started sweat as he heard the man shouting out, “where’s that wimp?!” and “he wont get away from me!” 

the footsteps getting faster and faster and closer to them. 

“i swear on my life, there will be no cops involved and you won’t have to worry about anything! i’ll repay you if you want me to!” 

as if his day couldn’t get any worse, this guy was now talking to himself. jihun just sighed, dragging his hands back through his hair as he looked at the sorry state of the human being in front of him. a small part of this guy reminded jihun of himself, and it certainly wasn’t something he was proud of in the slightest. it was just sorry. and while he didn’t really want to help this guy out, he still had no idea what sort of situation he could end up etting dragged into, he knew that he couldn’t just ignore it. not even if he really wanted to.

“this is why i don’t go to bars,” he muttered, rolling his eyes slightly as he heard the reason behind this guy’s obvious distress. if you wanted a drink, it was far safer to do it inside the comfort of your own home. “but how do you accidentally take someone’s phone?” unless it was just sitting on the table and you thought it was yours, but no one just left their phones sitting around by themselves.

at least the mpd weren’t involved... yet. but if he just left this guy to the man currently chasing him, then he couldn’t really say it would stay that way. so, jihun sighed out loud, glancing behind the guy just once more to check how much time he had before he nodded. “alright, but you owe me, dude,” because he was not doing this shit for free. “come on,” he reached out, grabbing the guy by the wrist as he pulled him along, across the street and to the other side. the campus was not far and while he wasn’t a fan of the idea, bringing the guy and hiding him in his dorm room could work.

----

{blocked number} i figured you would, he’s a very prominent drug dealer. i heard he sells high-quality goods, though i’ve never had any personally. {blocked number} you know he had a huge part of his warehouse stolen from him? a lot of socialities are missing their nose candy right now because of you little cobra

If he wanted to act dumb, she’d bring him back to reality. He had to know that a heist of that caliber was not going to go unnoticed by everyone regardless of where they were aligned. A lot of money was on the table to find even one of the accomplices, and luckily for her, part of her good friend’s face was caught on one of the cameras. It wasn’t the clearest footage, but she could tell it was him based off of the hundreds of other photos she had. She hadn’t sold him out yet, only because she wanted to see if he could give her a better offer.

the longer he was sat there just staring at the meesages on his phone, the less and less he was starting to worry about the whole thing. the inital panic had been warrented, but now he wasn’t going to really worry until he was sure it was something serious. and if it was, he supposed there was nothing stopping him from handing his phone into the ‘techie’ members of hydrus and seeing what they could come up with about the person on the other end. and sure, that would probably get him a punch or two for getting caught in the first place, but he supposed that was a darn sight better than being somoenes personal puppet.

hearing the ping of another message, jihun let his eyes drift downward, pressing his lips together as he read the next couple of messages which had just popped up in his inbox. so, it seemed as though he couldn’t play cimpletely ignorant about the whole thing. though he was also getting a bit more of a taste of what sort of information whoever this was happened to have on him. and the more he knew about that, the better he would be as he knew how much leeway he could have with the situation. if all they had was the simple information that he had been a part of the raid and was a member of hydrus, then that wasn’t much at all. not where there was so much more information they could have on him.

humming slightly under his breath, jihun’s fingers hovered over the keypad, thinking carefully about what he wanted to type down next. he didn’t really want to just openly admit he had been a part of the whole thing, even if it did seem they had information that he was. no, he needed to be clever about all of this, think properly and try and be coy and as secretive as he could be. there was no need to lay all his cards on the table, not until the person sending these messages did the same thing.

[ message to unknown number ]