vicious

She's no healthier than him, living week-to-week hiding in her room and taking whatever drugs she can get delivered to the door - she went from vigilantly monitoring her feeding to forgetting, to forcing herself to ignore the growl of the creature in her gut. Willow's done ignoring it today. Her eyes burn and Hawk is bleeding, weak, and distracted. The survivor in her takes the wheel.

Willow says nothing, not really Willow any more.

In the chaos, the back of his head cracks against the floor. His vision goes dark and he sees sparks, like the wiring in his head is failing. Then he’s somewhere else. Coughing on the floor of the bathroom, holding up his arms to defend his head as fists and boots come at him. Hand in his hair, knocking his skull against the sink. Listen here you little shit, you fucking worthless pig—keep squealin’, keep fuckin’ squealin’ and see what happens—

626 is an outlier - it is comforted by the progress reported in hyuntae's studies, happy here. the aches and pains of the experiments are worth it for learning more about itself and others. too see how much it is growing.

it smiles at him through the bars. then squints.

She dozes off again, chewing her sleeve and drooling out onto her wrist. It’s calm in this car and nothing is going to break through and ruin it. This isn’t Hell, despite what she’s been thinking every second since she got back - this might even be heaven.

Hours later, she finally finishes processing that thought. The sun has disappeared behind the surrounding trees.

He doesn’t answer; instead he slowly, laboriously shifts closer, throwing an arm around her shoulders and pulling her against him. The movement, slight as it is, makes the world spin. He laughs, feeling like a little kid who has just stumbled off the roundabout at the playground. Shit, he used to love going on the roundabout. He and his friends called it ‘the widowmaker’ on account of all the broken arms it bred.

'Heroin User' 1972 - Edward Melcarth (1914–1972)

it’s  all  so  messy  —  minsu  is  being  much,  much  more  messy  than  he  normally  would  be.  something  has  him  hanging  on  by  a  thread,  dangling  over  a  precipice.  why  he  thinks  hawk  is  a  safe  place  to  land  is  anyone’s  guess,  but  here  he  is,  drunkenly  hanging  on  his  every  word,  eyes  uncharacteristically  soft  and  submissive.   

he  would  have  been  getting  something  good  out  of  this  regardless.  the  recorder  in  his  pocket  has  been  running  for  a  while,  picking  up  conversations,  names,  dirt  —  things  that  he  can  use  in  his  favor  later.  when  the  hangover  inevitably  comes  and  goes.

“  so  what  if  i  was?  ”        minsu  is  nursing  on  the  beer  he  had  ordered  specifically  for  hawk  and  then  promptly  forgot  to  give  him.  his  head  feels  heavy  and  light  at  the  same  time.  his  skin  prickles  at  the  very  idea  of  hawk’s  calloused  fingers  grazing  his  own  soft  skin.  minsu  shifts  in  his  chair  to  bring  his  knees  together.       “  so  what  if  i  wanted  to  see  you?  besides,  we  have  some  business  to  discuss.  ”

which  is  true.  but  how  much  of  that  is  an  excuse  to  get  hawk  alone?

Maybe that’s the best time to talk business. For the best possible results in his favor, he can exploit both Minsu’s impaired decision making and the blatant crush he has on him. He can’t help but feel a little guilty about potentially doing that, though—the guy is just so fucking earnest. Weirdly so, given his rank in criminality. He seems in over his head all the time, and despite all logic it doesn’t read as an act. Clearly he isn’t acting right now; the scent of liquor and naïveté radiates off him like oversprayed cologne.

          “Never mind—whatever, man. You wanna talk, let’s talk. But let’s do it in the back, right? Privacy.”          Hawk heaves himself off the bar stool and snatches up his drink. Throwing an arm around Minsu’s shoulder, he steers him toward a desolate corner booth.

The pair passes a balding redneck leaning against a pool table. Fags, he mumble-sneers into his beer bottle. Hawk stops in his tracks.

She flinches when he reaches for her, not fast enough to quite evade him. Cool ceramic against her palm, fingers pinched between him and the mug. The smell of the concoction makes her want to gag, all chemical and thick.

The mug clunks against her cheekbone as Willow turns her face away, its contents sloshes from one side of the rim to the other and threatens to spill over.

          “Go back where you fucking belong,”          he hisses, vicious, frustrated, struggling to wrangle her. She won’t open her mouth, she won’t stay still. His eyes lose their blue, their whites, as the monster shows its face. Lips part to reveal his canines, a wolf baring its teeth.

God, she's fucked up.

She giggles, leans over and kisses him on the inside of the wrist.

"What noise do hawks make?" Because this is easier to think about than soulmates, a next life or whether or not she's going to be this happy in a few hours. "Is it like a caw-caw! or... a scree! sorta noise?"

Somehow, her head ends up sideways. Leaning over this far, she must have gotten stuck in her daydream. She's chewing on her sleeve, grinding it between her molars.

Like he’s never heard that one before. Jenny’s prayer from Forrest Gump is another oft-quoted joke at his expense: Dear God, make me a bird, so I can fly far-far-far away from here… Or, during games with friends, the gargoyles from Disney’s Hunchback of Notre Dame might be invoked: I’m losing to a bird! The list goes on and on. 

He’s laughing, though—because she’s laughing, and because her impression of him is on par with Tallah’s for the goofiest shit he’s ever heard. And because he’s high, of course. Mostly because he’s high.

and of course, the ethics are always a footnote in these reports to 626. the ends justify the means, and in the end, if everybody is so concerned with being good and humane and kind, they wouldn't be anywhere near where they are now with their understanding of the world.

hawk tells it doctor namkung is a bad man. it is too concentrated on its handwriting to reply, but the thought does cross its mind: are you not also a very bad man? it glances up from its little book after punctuating.

          “You’re right. I’m not very comfortable in here. And I don’t like what he’s doing to me. I didn’t say it was okay. He’s hurting me. From your drawings, it looks like he hurts you too. He shouldn’t be doing that to either of us. It’s wrong.”          There’s an urgency to Hawk’s voice now. He catches himself, wincing as he leans his forehead against the bars.          “I’m sorry. This all must sound pretty weird, huh?”

A strained smile. He shuts his eyes. His head is killing him. The doctor keeps shooting him up with heroin but won’t give him any goddamn Excedrin. 

i don't wanna lose you.

minsu  has  never  been  much  of  a  drinker,  so  he  hasn’t  had  a  chance  to  learn  how  to  handle  his  liquor  well.  or  his  chemfae,  for  that  matter.  he’s  known  to  be  messy  but  it’s  very  unlike  him  to  be  this  far  gone  —  eyes  glassy,  cheeks  painting  pink,  bedroom  eyes  and  parted  lips  at  anyone  who  passes  by.

a  man  in  his  position  shouldn’t  be  this  stupid  —  it’s  only  by  the  grace  of  his  waning  anonymity  that  he  hasn’t  been  jumped  yet.  at  this  rate,  the  underground  drug  market  will  soon  know  who  he  is,  like  it  does  back  home  —  soon,  there  will  be  people  waiting  for  him  to  slip  up,  to  be  vulnerable  like  this.  or  maybe,  somewhere  in  the  back  of  his  mind,  he  hopes  someone  finds  him,  someone  who  knows  him,  someone  who  wants  to  do  him  hard.  his  family,  or  those  who  are  left  to  care,  can’t  be  mad  at  him  if  he  wasn’t  the  one  to  kill  himself.

@skullfck  appears  right  on  schedule.  he  once  made  a  joke  that  minsu  was  stalking  him;  is  it  really  a  joke  anymore?  he  has  been  sitting  at  the  corner  of  this  bar,  waiting  for  him  for  at  least  two  hours  at  this  point.  woefully  out  of  place,  but  none  of  that  mattered  now  that  he  was  here.

he  slinks  through  the  crowd,  surprisingly  coordinated  despite  his  inebriation.  a  beer  is  ordered  —  not  for  himself  —  as  he  slides  up  beside  hawk  at  the  bar,  giving  the  best  performance  of  fuck-me  eyes  he  can  muster.  the  most  forward  he’s  ever  been  with  hawk  to  date  without  the  barrier  of  two  phone  screens.  he  resists  the  urge  to  pet  the  front  of  hawk’s  jeans,  instead  placing  his  wandering  hand  on  his  knee.  minsu  is  leaned  so  close  that  there’s  no  doubt  hawk  can  smell  the  liquor  on  his  breath.

“  i  was  starting  to  think  you  weren’t  coming,  ”        minsu  purrs,  his  eyes  trail  down  to  rest  comfortably  on  the  contours  of  hawk’s  lips.       let’s  hide  away  in  the  back  somewhere.  i  want  to  taste  you.        this  is  all  so  out  of  character  for  him.       “  drinks  are  on  me  tonight.  ”

Twinks in crisis sure seem drawn to him. He wonders what signals he’s unconsciously giving out that make him such a beacon for this type of guy—not that he minds much, at least in this instance. Minsu has yet to cause him any problems. He’s healthily cautious, as anyone in his position would be, he doesn’t feel the need to be on high alert. To him it seems pretty clear that, despite the luxury apartment and supposed kingpin status, Minsu has deferred all the power in this relationship to him. 

Messy. 

Hawk glances around the room. Already there are a few bigoted glares in their direction. Minsu, all prim and buttoned up at the biker bar, was probably getting looks like these long before Hawk even arrived. How many drinks has he had? He’s lucky he’s still in one piece. Pretty fucking careless for a professional criminal, especially one still trying to get his footing in a new, less-than-welcoming country.