#oneus fic

When your boyfriend proposed this idea to you, you weren’t quite sure if you would enjoy it. But, once both of your clothes were off, you were glad you agreed to this. 

You moaned as Seoho teased your thighs, inching closer and closer to where you ached for him. His hands slowly crept up your legs, making you grow impatient with each passing second. “Seoho, please,” you whined. Your own hand went down his bare chest, making his breath hitch as you went lower and lower. 

He chuckled. “You’ll get what you want,” he teased before his finger was now on your slit, moving it slowly. You moaned loudly, enjoying his slow movements a little too much. Seoho liked to tease you, and either you went along with it or he would stop. And you definitely did not want him to stop. 

Your own hand was now wrapped around Seoho’s cock, stroking him just as slowly. The look on his face was something that you wanted to keep in your mind forever. He looked so good when you’d please him; he was gorgeous. You loved that he was all yours. 

Seoho’s thumb was now on your clit, applying pressure as he slowly slid his fingers inside you. You were soaking, so it was easy for his fingers to be deep inside you. Your hips bucked into his hand, instantly showing him how much you were enjoying this. When he had offered for you two to do this, you definitely weren’t sure what to expect. But now that you were doing it, you were so glad that he brought up this little idea. 

His fingers were moving a bit faster, and you had moved your hips so that they could go as far in as they could. He was making you feel so good that you almost forgot you were pleasing him too. Your thumb was on his slit, tracing his sensitive head. “Just like that,” He moaned, his eyebrows were scrunched together. You leaned closer to him and began to pepper his neck with kisses. He groaned as you quickened your pace on his cock. 

You wanted to desperately to give him what he deserved, but when the tip of his fingers hit that spongy spot inside you, you stopped your movements on him. “Seoho-” you choked out and he chuckled breathlessly. His touch was something else - he always knew how to have you crumbling in his hands. Tonight was no exception. His other hand was on your breast, kneading it and teasing your nipple with his thumb. 

The extra stimulation went straight to your core, and you could feel that you were getting close to your orgasm. Seoho kissed you, it was sloppy and needy. Fitting for how you were both feeling in this moment. Both yours and Seoho’s breaths were ragged and you were both getting closer to your orgasms. 

You were enjoying his way too much and Seoho could tell based on how you were responding to his movements. He enjoyed knowing that this was giving you as much pleasure as it gave him. He admired your body as you moved with his hands. His thumb was now moving faster on your clit, matching the pace he had set with his fingers. He curled them inside you and that’s when you felt it. That familiar knot in your stomach was making itself known. “I’m so close,” you whined. 

Seoho smirked, “Go ahead,” He said before attaching his lips back to yours. He kissed you as you rode out your ogasm. The waves of pleasure hitting you full force and Seoho drank in your moans. Your hand was still on his cock, losing its rhythm, but he didn’t care. He was getting off because of you and how beautiful you looked to him when you came. 

He slowly removed his fingers from inside you and you hissed at the loss of contact. But that was okay, you knew what you needed to do now. You collected yourself and concentrated on pleasing your beautiful man. You moved your other hand so that you could massage his balls as you quickened your pace. You wanted to please him as much as possible, so you went back to kissing on his neck. His neck was very sensitive and you knew it would help make him come. Any extra stimulation you could give him, he happily took. 

Seoho let out a few moans, and you felt proud of yourself. His moans were music to your ears as you kept up your movements. His breathing was becoming even more labored and you could tell he was close by the way that his hips bucked into your hand. Your thumb went back to his slit that was dripping with precum now, spreading it around his head, paying attention to his that spot under where he was the most sensitive. “Y/N,” he said, warning you that he was close. 

You pulled away from his neck and looked up at his face. Seeing his features be contorted in pleasure was enough to make you want to stop what you were doing and have him fuck you. But, he was so close and you wanted to watch him come undone in your hands. 

And he did just that. 

You turn off the timer and go back into the kitchen, taking the teabag out of your mug. You’ve been branching out to new teas since the first evening you’d tried it in the safehouse, sampling them little by little. You now own a small village’s worth of tea boxes, after watching in horror as your best friend swiped her arm along the shelf of teas at the store and into your cart, insisting it was her treat. You’ve found you don’t care for straight green tea or matcha (green bean water, more like), but you like jasmine just fine, peppermint too. English Breakfast is okay, just not as malty, and chai is good if you add more cream than usual.

Tonight, though, you’re allowing yourself to Admit and Mope Over having feelings for a made man. Which, naturally, means your tea is his favorite, Irish Breakfast. You set the teabag in your spoon and wrap the string around it, wringing extra tea into the mug. You’ve gotten rather good at it with practice.

You turn to throw out the teabag when you hear a muted thump from somewhere in your apartment.

You stare, unmoving, at the teabag dangling in your hand over the garbage bin. It swings gently back and forth, and you try a deep breath. One, two, three four. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.

By the end of the deep breath, no more noises have come. You drop the teabag in the bin and turn back to your mug, only partly aware of reaching for the sugar. Pal, chill out. Someone came home across the hall and dropped their groceries. The box of Christmas decorations finally teetered off the shelf in the closet. Kids down below jumped too high on their bed and whacked into the ceiling.

Your phone vibrates sharply against the counter, and you drop your spoon with a clatter. You crane your head aside to glance at the screen.

LEEDO: u can say no but do u mind if I stop by?

You snatch your phone clumsily and fumble to the app with live feeds of your security camera. A raven-haired man in office slacks and dress shirt is leaning heavily against your front door. As you watch, his knees buckle under him, and you hear another thump as he crumples against your doorframe.

“Shit,” you hiss. You drop your phone on the counter and hurry to the front door.

Geonhak catches himself heavily on the doorjamb as you ease the door open, a final defense against collapsing entirely.

“Hi,” he murmurs, sounding for all the world like he’s fine and not a man who can’t stay upright.

You drop to your knees, trying to figure out where it’s safe to touch him. His entire left side, from head to toe, looks to be spattered in blood.

“Jesus Christ,” you mutter, guiding his right arm over your shoulders. You brace your hand against his back, heaving upward.

You manage to stay balanced, most of his weight on you, and stumble back inside. You’re careful to keep your hand at the center of his back, away from the side that’s drenched in red.

He sags back against the door as you shut it again, relieving you of crutch duty. Flipping on the front hall light, you try to get a better look at him. His side is littered with bloody hand- and fingerprints—probably from staunching the blood flow, you take a guess. There’s so much blood, it looks like so much. The blood on his face has trickled down from a matted spot in his hair.

“What can I do?” You ask, surprised at how calm you sound. “What do you need?”

A corner of his mouth quirks slightly. “Just towels.”

His voice is cottony, so un-Geonhak-like. A sliver of ice sinks into the pit of your stomach.

“Just….” You take a tentative step back from him to see if he’ll stay upright. He leans more heavily against your front door, and your hands hover there in front of him. “Just….don’t move.”

You fly into the kitchen, feet barely touching the ground, and yank open the drawer of tea towels. You grab the entire stack and flip on the sink, running a few under cool water. Your eyes catch on your mug on the counter, and after a second you grab it and bring it all with you.

Geonhak’s face is tilted towards the ceiling when you return, eyes closed. A thin line of blood is slowly trickling down the side of his neck. In the light of the entryway, positioned as he is, he looks like a hero straight out of a classical painting. Lordy. No man has any business looking this good bleeding out.

You set the mug gently on the hall table next to him and close the distance with the towels.

His head drops back down, eyes opening at your approach, and you offer him a wet towel. He murmurs his thanks, taking it and mopping his neck and face roughly while you unfold a dry one.

You rake your gaze over him carefully, heart pounding. His hair has grown out a bit since you saw him last. You note in the part of your mind that isn’t panicking that it suits him, although everything suits Geonhak. Gingerly, you scrape your fingertips along his hairline, combing his hair off his face and checking for more injuries. His jaw works and his throat bobs once, and you replace his thoroughly bloodied hand towel with another damp one.

“‘Woong’s in Chinatown tonight, won’t be able to get here for a half hour,” Geonhak says as he works, and you realize he’s apologizing. “He’ll take me to the safehouse and out of your h—”

“Like hell he will,” you say, swapping him for another fresh towel. “Finish mopping up and we’ll take my car.”

“Hwanwoong will come get me,” Geonhak mumbles, eyes closing as he prods at the spot on his head.

“And I said like hell,” you reply, your free hand going to the buttons on his shirt. “This needs to…move…so you can get to the spot on—oh, don’t look at me like that, you’re bleeding.”

“Interesting way to ask me to take my shirt off,” he murmurs with a shrug, smile as dangerous to your pulse as ever as his free hand starts unbuttoning.

Once he’s undone the first four, you shove another damp towel inside and grip at the injured place on his side firmly, making him hiss. Serve him right, flirting while bleeding out on my doorstep.

“Hold this there, tightly. Be right back,” you say, taking another bloody towel from him and scooping up the others.

You pause for a second, then gesture at the mug of tea. “For you.”

Within moments, you’ve thrown the bloodied towels in the drum of the washer to deal with later and grabbed several other things on the way back.

Geonhak’s finishing a long sip of Irish Breakfast when you return. Wordlessly, you hand him a few ibuprofen. A smile plays at his lips as he accepts them and downs them with tea.

“Off,” you say as he sets the mug down, waving vaguely at his blood-sodden shirt. “I’ve got something clean.”

“It’ll just get dirty, too,” he says, already undoing the final few buttons and shrugging it away.

Any other time you would admire him shirtless, but your focus now lasers in on the injury. After all the blood he was wearing, it’s surprisingly smaller than you feared. “I don’t care if it gets dirty, too. I have my first aid kit—”

“Just—” he winces when he presses against his side wound too hard, then sighs softly, “just…if you’ll drive me to a safehouse, I’ll get Keonhee to patch me up.”

Ah yes. Keonhee. A trained medical professional. Someone of actual use to him. “Let me get my shoes.”

You watch from the corner of your eye as he takes the oversized hoodie you offer him and finagles it on gingerly. You’ve grown so accustomed to Geonhak in office attire that anything else looks unfamiliar on him. You’re right, though; anything suits him. Your heart doesn’t seem to notice the oddness, twisting at the knowledge that the hoodie is yours.

Your staring doesn’t escape Geonhak’s notice.

“Don’t usually wear this kind of thing,” he says as you exit the apartment together. He leans into you for security as you lock your door.

“And why not?” You ask, heading for the stairs at a stilted pace.

Your face bumps into his neck as he stumbles, and he swears and apologizes under his breath. Despite the clear excitement he’s had tonight, you notice he still smells like the pine and eucalyptus soap you’d seen in the safehouse shower. You immediately try to ignore this.

He shakes his head as you both begin slowly down the stairwell. “Not taken seriously in street clothes. Look too young.”

You can feel him wincing with each descending step, and you slow your pace, keep the hand at his back soothing.

“Well, who wouldn’t take you seriously right now?” You ask as you reach the exit. You pause to heave your free shoulder against the door when it sticks. “Now? When you’re bleeding a concerning amount?”

“I’ve had worse,” Geonhak says mildly, misstepping and staggering against you as you exit into the night. You catch him, free hand landing against the front of his torso, and you mumble an apology as he winces and straightens again.

“Surprised you survived with these reflexes,” you mutter, hobbling with him through the parking lot in the warm summer night air.

You lay a towel along the back of the passenger seat before Geonhak sits; blood sounds horrible to get out of a car. He wordlessly plugs an address into your GPS once you start the car, and then you’re on the road.

The car is quiet as you follow the first few directions, save for the occasional GPS voice. Geonhak extracts his phone from his back pocket, wincing all the while. He taps away at the screen, likely notifying the safehouse and Keonhee, as you follow the directions onto a street that sounds vaguely familiar.

“Should I, um. Worry about being followed?” You ask, glancing at the passing headlights in your rear view mirror.

“Mm-mm,” Geonhak says, shaking his head slightly and pocketing the phone again. “Our guys got him.”

You refuse to consider what “got him” means in this context.

“I’m sure it’s pointless to ask, but what happened?”

Geonhak sighs, leaning back in his seat with a wince. The silence carries for a few minutes, and you begin to assume he won’t answer when he finally speaks.

“He didn’t like what happened at your shop this week.”

You stiffen as you stop for a red light. A blue-eyed smirk you’ve come to hate flickers to mind. The man who was the reason you’d met Geonhak in the first place; the man who was the reason you’d had to hide for a week in a safehouse meant for organized crime members. “Him?”

Geonhak leans his head back against the headrest, eyes shutting as he adjusts the towel against his head. He gives no indication to confirm or deny.

That isn’t allowed to be the end of it. “But nothing really even happened. He just…came in, to intimidate me again. And then he got spooked by your uncle and left.”

A corner of Geonhak’s mouth curls. “Technically, he was humiliated by a crime boss over muffins. To a lot of these guys, that’s something.”

Over muffins. The space in your chest for breathing begins to shrink. It was your fault. That man, the one who’d tried to convince you to let his boss run dirty money through your store, who kept showing up at your new storefront to intimidate you, had hurt Geonhak. He’d been so mortified by Geonhak’s uncle, who was there to defend you, that he’d taken it out on the man’s nephew for good measure. Not on you, who actually owned the store; him. Geonhak was hurt because of you.

“Breathe,” Geonhak says, voice firm.

You gasp in a breath and blow it out shakily, easing on the gas as the light turns green.

“Slower than that. There’s enough air,” Geonhak soothes.

You shake your head, each breath coming heavier and quicker. I did this to him.

He starts counting, and you take a deep breath and hold it like he taught you, blowing it out unsteadily. It does little to settle your jittery pulse, your whirling thoughts.

“Promise it’ll be over soon,” he says, glancing at the GPS. “In six minutes. Just drop me off at the front door and—”

“I—you’re kidding, I’m not just, just—leaving you somewhere,” you protest, grip tightening on the wheel. “You’re covered in…Geonhak, I did this to y—”

“Don’t. Don’t you dare.”

His voice is so suddenly sharp that your mouth snaps shut without another thought. His mouth is set in an even line, blue flame behind his eyes as he stares out at the road.

“You are good, and you are innocent, and you did not do this to me,” he says, voice dangerously even. “I won’t have you taking blame for that shithead. I won’t.”

You swallow, trying another slow breath in, out. You nod.

“Sorry,” you whisper.

He blinks, still watching the road, but the hardness in his eyes dissipates.

“Me too,” he admits. “Shouldn’t have dragged you into this.”

“No, it…I mean, I don’t mi…it’s—” You stammer, trying to figure out how to say you missed him without saying it outright.

Eventually you snap your mouth shut, face burning. You see him glance at you out of the corner of your eye, then lean further back into his seat.

“You, um.” A smile is playing on his lips. “The tea, earlier....I didn’t think you drank tea.”

Your face feels even hotter. You swallow. “…I do now.”

He doesn’t say anything the rest of the drive, but that smile stays in the corners of his mouth.

The address, an old brick bungalow, is different from the last safehouse—probably closer to where you live, you assume. The porch light is on, and you see movement in a window as you park along the curb.

“Stop, just—would you hang on a minute?” You huff as Geonhak opens his door, unbuckling.

You hurry out of your seat and around the front of your car as Geonhak tries to ease out by himself. He grunts in pain and stumbles over into you, and you sway as you attempt to keep balance for two people.

“I got it,” he says, trying to straighten, face twisting in pain.

“You really don’t,” you say firmly, locking your car and helping him up the walkway. “Cut the heroics.”

It’s Keonhee who opens the door as you reach the five little stairs up to the porch. You’re surprised to see him in pajamas and glasses.

“Up you get, come on,” he says, coming to Geonhak’s injured side and gingerly lifting his other arm over his shoulders. Keonhee glances over Geonhak’s shoulder and smiles at you, somewhat of a grimace. “I’d say it’s nice to see you again, but…”

Your smile is also half grimace, remembering the first time you met him, when he treated your black eye. “Agreed.”

Keonhee’s taller than you, so when he straightens, Geonhak’s arm stretches up higher, and he hisses.

“Son of a bitch, Keonhee, ow,” Geonhak grits through his teeth.

“Yeah, yeah, get inside, you big baby,” Keonhee mutters. “I know for a fact you’ve had worse knife wounds before.”

Ice drops into your stomach; a knife. That man had gotten close enough to hurt Geonhak with a knife.

With Keonhee in the lead, the three of you shuffle sideways up the porch stairs and through the front door. To the left of the entryway is a little kitchen. To the right you see a small sitting room, with a couch covered in a few sheets. The coffee table has a spread of little tools that remind you of emergency room procedurals on TV.

“In there, if you don’t mind,” Keonhee says. “I made coffee before I remembered you drink tea, Geonhak, so there’s coffee if you want it.”

“Water for them,” Geonhak manages, panting as you help ease him to lie down across the couch.

You stick your tongue out at him but don’t argue. Your mind and body are starting to catch up with the shock of an injured Geonhak, and you don’t want to make yourself even more jittery.

Keonhee disappears briefly into the kitchen, emerging with a glass and a mug. You take the water gratefully, hiding yourself in the glass as you swallow back half of it.

When you lower it again, Keonhee is seated beside the couch and inspecting Geonhak’s head wound. He swabs at it with alcohol wipes and clucks his tongue.

“Stupid, but not awful,” Keonhee says, fighting a smile as Geonhak swears violently under his breath at a firmer prod. “Probably won’t even need stitches. Just bled a lot.”

“You’ll bleed a lot if you don’t cut that out,” Geonhak grumbles. Keonhee snorts and scoots back, lifting the hoodie to get a better look at his side.

“Need a few stitches here, though,” Keonhee says, pausing when Geonhak jolts from the rubbing alcohol sting. “Ribs hurt at all?”

“Not as much as yours will if y—shit,” Geonhak hisses at another pass of the alcohol wipe.

“Look at you, king of the streets, brought to your knees by antiseptic,” Keonhee says, grinning.

Geonhak glares at him, breathing heavily. “I say king of the streets one time, back in high school, and you won’t let it die.”

“Nope.” Keonhee pops the “p” and reaches for a few things on the coffee table.

You take a deep breath, setting down your glass with shaky hands. “Uhm, if I needed the bathroom, where…?”

Keonhee’s eyes are understanding. “Down that way, on the right. I’ll be quick. He’s seen worse.”

You hear Geonhak’s “fucking hell” from the living room before you close the bathroom door behind you.

You lean heavily on your hands against the sink and rest your forehead against the mirror, allowing yourself a moment in the whirlwind of thoughts. Knife wound. They got him. He’s been hurt worse before.

He came to me. When he got hurt, he came to find me. I got to see him again.

That’s what feels the most shocking, that he’s here, you’re here, back in his world, when you didn’t think you’d ever see him again. You know he’d told you it was for your own good that he keep a distance, and you didn’t think his reasons were bad. It still hurt, though, to make such a connection with him and then watch him disappear from your life like he’d never been there.

Well, now you’ve seen him again—covered in blood, admittedly, but nonetheless. He hadn’t been a figment of your imagination, after all. He’ll be on the mend soon, and then…

You gulp. That’s what’s scariest. How fleeting being here, being back in his circle, feels. You wish for selfish things for a brief moment—for a few more nights of Irish Breakfast, a few more conversations, even one more exchange of banter, for wounds that need time to heal, time you can spend with him. The thought that he’ll slip away again forever after this is…

A soft knock on the door startles you a little too much. “Hm?”

“He’s all patched up now, all fine,” Keonhee says. “Just needs a couple days of low activity and he’ll be back to normal.”

You sniff, leaning back off of your hands. “Good. I…good.”

There’s a pause. “I’d like to take a look at you when you come out. Customary check.”

“Oh, uh, sure, yeah, coming out.”

You reach up to itch a spot on your cheek and blink when your hand comes back wet. You wipe under both eyes, hands coming away damp. When you glance at your reflection, you grimace at how blotchy you look. There’s no way to hide it, so you sigh and brace for the inevitable, opening the door.

Keonhee studies you for a moment, then says, “let’s see if I’ve got tea somewhere after all, hm?”

It feels a bit wrong to dig through his cupboards and pantry like this, but Keonhee encourages it, clapping your shoulder when you find an old box of orange pekoe.

“You’ll be staying tonight, of course,” he says after he cleans out the coffee pot and begins brewing plain hot water. “At least until the shock wears off.”

You purse your lips as you retrieve two mugs. “I don’t want to overstay my welcome…”

Keonhee scoffs, putting a tea bag in each one. “Please. You’re more tolerable than he is, swearing at me over a little scratch.”

“Is it really that minor?” You ask, watching yourself run a thumb over the lip of a mug.

“He’s just fine,” Keonhee says, firm and reassuring. “He’ll be back to intimidating us all at full capacity far too quickly.”

The nobler side of you relaxes at this. Your less noble side wishes for a few more days of bed rest. You try to ignore the less noble side.

“Perhaps I should worry more about you,” Keonhee says, studying you. “You’ve been well?”

You laugh once. “Oh, yes. I’m just fine. I’ve seen neither hide nor hair of a single made man until this week, much less tangled with any of them.”

You wince inwardly at how bitter you sound. Ridiculous.

Keonhee hums, taking the now-filled pot of hot water and pouring it into the mugs. “I see an awful lot of made men, but that doesn’t necessarily add or detract from any tangles. Surprising, how much you can see of them without being involved.”

You don’t know what to say to that. You realize with a pang that you’re almost jealous of him, of his ability to be involved but not involved.

He frowns at one of the mugs as it steeps. “I should go check how he takes it, I can never remember—”

“That’s alright, I’ve got it,” you say, waving that away and preparing both mugs.

Keonhee’s quiet as you labor over the tea. When he speaks, you can hear a slight smile.

“Good. I’ll go make up the air mattress, then, if you’ve got this under control.”

You make your way back into the sitting room slowly, trying not to spill either mug. Geonhak has every pillow propped up behind his back, an arm slung over his eyes. You frown when you see one of his ankles in a brace.

“You didn’t tell me your ankle was hurt.”

A corner of Geonhak’s mouth twitches. “Only twisted a little. It’s why I couldn’t keep better balance.”

He lowers his arm from his eyes and looks up at you. You lift his mug, nodding at it, and he inches his way further upright, grimacing.

“Let’s see how badly Keonhee did on this cup,” Geonhak says as he takes the mug.

“He didn’t make it. I did,” you say, sitting gingerly by his knees and blowing on your mug. “Two sugars, no cream. Strong. Brought the spoon when you want the bag out.”

You set your mug on the coffee table, now cleared of surgical instruments, and lift your teabag into said spoon, twisting the string round and draining the excess. You feel Geonhak’s silent, studying gaze and try not to let it fluster you as you find a wastebasket at the end of the couch to toss the teabag.

You take a sip of the tea, then blink. “You know, I always thought orange pekoe would be…well, orange flavored. But this is just another black tea.” Hmm. Suppose it can’t hurt to have around for guests, so the nicer teas can be for you.

“Damn it,” Geonhak sighs softly.

You glance over at him as you blow on your tea, raising an eyebrow. He’s cradling his tea placidly against his stomach, eyes shut.

“You make it so difficult.”

You blink. “So difficult to what?”

He opens his eyes and meets your gaze. “To stay away from you.”

Your lungs feel suddenly empty. Oh. Some warm and electric feeling zings up your spine.

You look down into your mug, pulse skipping. “…I see. My hopelessness when it comes to tea, back at it again.”

When he speaks, you can hear his smile. “Might play a part, maybe.”

You take another swig of tea, bracing yourself. “I wish…I wish you wouldn’t stay away, but I, you know, I get it. Promise.”

You shrug a shoulder, grimacing.

He purses his lips, then sets the mug down. “Mind getting the bag for me?”

You set your tea down and grab the spoon, finagling with the tea bag in his cup.

His fingers brush against your knee, backs of his knuckles rubbing gently back and forth. You swallow, throat surprisingly dry for how much tea you’ve drank, tossing his teabag and setting the spoon aside again.

“Don’t like when you’re in danger,” he murmurs.

You nod, picking your mug up again with shakier hands than you’d like.

“Don’t want to be the reason you’re in danger,” he says quietly.

You nod again, tilting your head thoughtfully and taking a sip of tea. “Keonhee’s got a lot of your guys in his life and he’s not in danger.”

“He’s under my uncle’s protection,” Geonhak says, not unkindly.

You shrug a shoulder. “Well…think I might be now, too. He intimidated that man into leaving and then left a hundred dollar tip for his muffins.”

Geonhak laughs once, and his hand opens on your knee, resting warm and firm.

“Touché.”

You take another sip of tea, gathering courage, then drop your hand to your knee and curl your fingers around his hand.

His gaze makes you feel shy, but you don’t look away, drinking in the way it feels to be looked at like this.

He shakes his head at himself, smiling wryly. “Knew exactly what I was doing tonight. Might’ve been easier to go to a few different places, but I went out of my way.”

His fingers squeeze yours.

“I just missed you,” he whispers.

It’s a good thing you hear Keonhee clattering back down the hall. You’re not sure you have the power of speech anymore.

Keonhee forces Geonhak to give up two pillows (“you have all the other pillows in my house, fiend, surrender one to me and to the guest”) and pushes aside the coffee table to make up your bed. It’s a good thing you were already in pajamas, you think as you sit at the edge of the air mattress. No need to sleep in clothes, unlike Geonhak, despite your hoodie.

When the lights go out and Keonhee goes back to bed, you spend a while staring up at the ceiling. You realize, too late, that there was caffeine in both of those teas. Late night caffeine intake versus shock exhaustion, fight.

“There’s, um.”

You glance over at Geonhak on the couch. He’s looking up at the ceiling, too. “There’s this place on the other side of town, a bar? But it’s got cats, like a cat cafe. Hwanwoong tells me you’d really like it.”

You purse your lips, fighting the massive grin threatening to take over your whole face. “I’ve heard of it. It’s got some cat pun name, yeah?”

“Yeah, I can’t think of it, either,” he says, laughing softly.

His hand reaches out and finds yours in the darkness. “Wanna try it with me, maybe? Like, in a week or two, obviously, or Keonhee will put my head on a stake.”

You laugh quietly, squeezing his hand. “I’d like that.”

His thumb brushes over the back of your hand, gentle. “Okay.”

When you finally fall asleep, your hand is still in his.

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prologue.

Over fifty missing bodies. People had been issued missing, one after another over months at a time, and yet not a single sign of them had come up in the search parties. Not a fingerprint, not a discarded piece of fabric, and much less common but still possible, not even a note.

How do so many people fall off the face of the earth without a single sign, you might ask? Well, for one, they don't.

The chief had clicked your office door shut, the blank walls only condescending as you sat with an equally blank mind. Staring down at the array of files on your desk, glaring over at the cork board covered in photographs of all the victims; from an insider's perspective, you could tell there was no common link. Each person stood different. Identical victims were more common in serial cases. Some type of link, string, figure of similarity that could be caught by the naked eye, or at least a professional's.

Yet there was nothing. Their lives were different, some rich, some poor, some old, some young. Every arrow pointed in a different direction, which rendered you clueless to a motive. But it assured one thing: this was a serial killer—one on a rampage through the city, and that was most dangerous.

Fingers pressed to your temple, you were truly out of your element. Not new to the world of crime or kills, this case brought your knowledge to a dead end. No start, no evidence, no clues, no task, and zero directions. What were you to do here?

Palms brushing against the vanilla folders opened thrice in one session with the chief of the department, you were on your last limb. You had nothing to tell the families struggling with pain and loss, no words for those locking their doors with added bolts at night from the fear that they were next. It was human nature to be scared, but what could bring someone to cause such chaos?

The white letter hidden beneath the piles of folders held all the answers seering your mind. Plastic gloves pulled over the skin of your hands in order to not tamper with evidence, the printed name on the back of the envelope stumped you.

Ravn, the name written in black ink dried to the enclosed letter as you ripped open the lid and pulled out the single, folded printer paper. You could see the same ink littering the inside, could make out single letters within the words, but nothing could have prepared you for what was written inside.

"The bodies have been in my safe keeping. They drop like flies in a window, their cuts and bruises fresh. But there are too many, too fast. I cannot keep up with them under these conditions. Something must be done, someone must be stopped. Come alone." Written in calligraphy, the alias named Ravn cut their words sharp until the letter read straight to the point.

Here was what you had been wishing for. Bodies of the victims, lacerations that can be transcribed as signatures, links that could bring the killer forth in a matter of time. All from one donor, the strange one called Ravn.

An abandoned mill's address read at the bottom of the page, one long shut down. Possibly a place harboring the so-called Ravn holding onto the bodies. Nothing like this had ever been registered in a case before. With everything on the line, you couldn't hold back the weightlessness of your body rising from the desk to escape to the destination.

So much death, and not a single red flag in your mind. Anyone would have seen what was ahead of them long before they stepped into that old, wooden building. Black ink written from a feather, harbored bodies held onto for a reason, words written in such a way. He was right before your face: death, but you were too far gone to realize.

one.

The moonlight emitted shadows as you walked. You couldn't ignore the matching frame to your motions, limbs swing in tandem with your own. But it was fluttering, almost translucent, and encased in small flame-like patterns. Fetched and followed, it was what brought you within the abandoned building.

Creaky metal beams, decaying wood, and shattered windows. Had you been with a partner, they would be advising you to leave right this moment. But the clatter in the distance, one room brighter than the rest: it kept your feet from moving in the opposite direction.

His back was to you, huddled over the cold body of a victim. Almost stiff, the lace on the trims of his shirt were your last concern as you noticed the sharp knife in his hand poking around a gash from a blunt object.

He didn't need to see you, it was clear he sensed you coming into the building from long before you made an appearance behind him. "I don't usually ask for help from the authorities." He claimed as if he was embarrassed, but his hands didn't shake like that of a nervous person.

It was only when your eyes met your full surroundings that a gasp left between your lips and the man spun on his heels. The deceased were all around, displayed on operating tables and rolling carts in the same way a morgue is set up. It was obvious they had been here for a long while, the smell slipping up your nostrils nearly making you faint.

"Sorry!" He moved fast on his feet, running his index finger through an open jar of vapor rub. In an instant, his gentle hand was cupping your cheek as the opposite swiped the gel at the edge of your nose. The smell subsided, your eyes watering from the minty scent now stronger to your senses. "Takes a while to get used to."

"You're used to the scent of death?"

His eyes shifted from your face, smile fading as his sight caught the floor. A gentle brush of a towel to his finger, and he was headed back towards the victim that originally had his attention.

"Please excuse this. All of it, in fact." His voice was shallow, hidden in the howls of the city floating through the cracks in the windows. "Usually I work alone."

"Are you Ravn?" The question seemed stupid slipping off your tongue now. The man had accompinated you as if you were non-threatening, even made physical contact with you, and now you questioned that he was the right person.

"In your line of work—" his sentence sounded condescending. "—don't you usually ask questions right off the bat?"

"I was a little more concerned with the scent of the multiple bodies around us right now." Admittedly, you were already in over your head.

His head tilted, eyesight watching your frame move around from where he stood to the other side of the victim. They were cold, pale, and lifeless: and yet you wished they would speak of what truly happened. Ravn was knee deep in the wrong side of the situation, and appeared as the blank space in a detailed painting.

"I am Ravn," he nodded, but kept his sight on the body before him. "And this looks bad." Aside from his lips forming a short-timed pout, his face stood still. "These people—" he sighed within his words, but even he couldn't explain this much." "—I found them like this."

His position got darker by the second.

"Every laceration, the death sites, and these victims: they're all at random." His cold, black eyes found yours, your nod making his lips run thin.

"This is what I've been working with this whole time now." You sighed. "It's all out of rage. Wrong place, wrong time. Makes me ill just thinking about it, and more standing in the middle."

The man nodded, eyes filling with remorse. Ravn, riddled with insight on the case and set dead in the middle without your recognition, seemed to understand your position on a personal level.

"You and I both." Another short smile, and the silver tools left the body of the victim.

They were recent, name floating into the precinct not long before the letter sat on your desk. It was odd timing, and even worse seeing the poor person in reality other than their name alone.

"My job requires me to work fast, you see?" Head aimed equally with your face as his arms opened straight, palms on the cold counter below the body, he spoke slowly. "Snapping fingers, fast."

Again, you knew this all too well. Lives depend on time, and your entire job revolves around working on a timer.

"This serial killer, it's backed me up so much I can no longer keep up. It's costing me my position." His job, something you should have questioned the moment he mentioned it, appeared far more important than yours by the mention of it.

"Then, what are you doing with these bodies?" Peering around the room, a shiver snuck up your spine. It was fuller than a hospital at its busiest hour, and still had room for more. "Why are you holding onto them? And why are you the one taking them?"

For the duration of the case, no bodies had been stored in your own morgue at the police station. Night by night, people would vanish from the city only to never be seen again. Almost like the killer was right under your nose the entire time, and could go invisible.

"They're here where the killer would last check." Ravn's voice wavered more now than ever, the vibrations seeping into your own nerves. "They're safe with me."

An explanation, why they went missing twice in a row: once alive and another dead, was finally given.

"And who are you, exactly?"

The man pressed his hands down so hard on the metal table that his knuckles turned white from loss of proper circulation, his eyes scanning your serious face. He seemed to not believe in your question, and was answering only to entertain himself over your response.

"A colleague." He said plainly, hands regaining blood flow as he rose them in the air and rubbed at his wrists. "A necessity."

"Then why do you work alone?"

Your question made him still, brows creasing. "You and I are the same, remember?"

"I had the choice of joining a team, or turning over the case." Your mouth moved smoothly, but he was straightforward.

"My occupation is purely solo." His eyes gleamed in the moonlight, allowing you to see the small, brown specks fluttering within his irises. "As I said, we're on the same case. Only we're in separate jurisdictions. I've had run of my side, but you seem to have stuttered."

It was a dig, but you stood your ground.

"I am a last resort to your operation?"

"Plan, more so."

Your fists balled tightly, recreating the whites of his knuckles on your own. Sensing your anger, his throat cleared and his eyes grew soft. "I am letting you in now. Trust me, this is far past my rules and regulations. My job is truly on the line now, as I assume yours is too considering I am your first lead in so long."

Your growl was so under your breath that even you hardly caught it, but he still smiled lightly. His hands stretched, index finger pointing down at the victim below. It was there, and you had missed it. Something unseen by eyes before being claimed by Ravn, an "X" was marked on the wrist of the victim.

Your eyes blinked out of fear and recollection, fingers fiddling the notebook out of your bag's pocket to re-read your own notes. Something new, and a second break to the case in one night with the help of your eclectic partner.

"A link—" you whispered, bewildered.

"They're on all of them. It's only when I touched them that I noticed it. Is it in your notes?" A single shake of your head was all the response he needed. "Write it down." He quietly advised, the watch on his wrist moving from his peripheral to the front of his face.

"I must take my leave." He sighed, looking at you through the long, deep locks of his hair.

"L-Leave?"

"It's my work shift. I still have common-day work." He nodded with his own words, taking short steps backwards towards the door. "Please, stay as long as you need to. Don't turn them in or else all will be lost."

"I-I, uhm." Your stuttering was cut short, the frame of the tall man exiting the room with a small smirk on his lips.

"Take your time." His voice echoed longer in your mind as he left, hands pulling the bag from your back and setting the case files on the desk opposite his.

The room was cold, your coat doing nothing to calm the neverending shivers quaking through your form. How could Ravn stand this for so long? You didn't understand.

"Found bodies. Matching X's on wrists. Common links coming abroad. Ravn?" Your notes seemed slimmer than what you had before. So out of context, and painful to read such short descriptions of such a deep case. "A forensics team would be delightful right now." You chimed to yourself.

The man was more eccentric than anyone you had ever met. Usually, people within the case were there all along. They wouldn't show up a quarter of the way in, and they most definitely wouldn't be so vague about their positions or knowledge.

Ravn, the man made you shiver again. His desk sat empty-seated, and way too easy. Closing in on it with the wheels of the chair under you guiding you, your fingers caught the first handle of the top drawer. Breathing unsteady, hands shaking, it was just what you hoped for.

A letter titled "Notice of Grim Corporations." followed by a list of reasonings and ending with a final sentence explaining his soon-to-be resignation. "Failed to show up on time. Inserted self into cases higher than his position. Went against words of superiors. Involved in an altercation with a representative."

Ravn had racked up more indications of worry for you, and he wasn't even in the room.

The page slipped back where you found it, not an inch off, and your brows didn't unfurrow on the short ride back over to your desk. The wheels of the chair squeaked, but your mind raced a thousand miles an hour.

Ravn, the victims, talk of the serial killer, a corporation, a resignation from a list of reasons, and a representative. It was all too much to take in at once. Thoughts speeding to a stand-still, it was one mere image going through your frontal cortex that halted your world.

Your feet slid across the floor with dread, the name scribbled onto the tag at the end of the empty cart being lifted by your fingertips. It was new. Certification, the name not on your missing victim list, and a sudden realization of where all the arrows had been pointing this entire time.

The man, the being more-like-it, was farther than you could comprehend. And he knows who's going to die next.

two.

Notes jumbled, mind scrambled, and cold tiles beneath your shoes: his voice brought your back to straighten out. Ravn, almost a shadow in your peripheral vision, walked into the room with blood dripping from his fingertips.

“Ravn?” Almost tossed up from your seat by your own strength, your shivering form before the man didn’t make a single difference to him. Once aligned, like he had everything in his mind to figure about this case—he walked with a hunch until his back pressed into the torn leather chair of his desk with a huff.

A deep purple bruise formed on his cheek, appearing painful but ignored by him as you moved in closer. His dark hair fell over his forehead, covering his eyes and making him seem more of a cloud than he already was.

“What in the hell is any of this?” Your voice was shattered, anxiety in your lungs as your bones shook. Almost over the edge, your mind. “Blood. Why is there blood?” Questioning his appearance seemed to overlap the racing accusations in the front of your mind before they slipped out of your mouth. “Am I working with the killer?”

His smile was forbidden, seen only for a glance, and his eyes held as colder than before.

“What a backwards question.” His mouth shuttered at the sight of his own hands, palms to the ceiling and a stricken expression worn on his face. “Don’t get the wrong idea so early into our partnership.”

A scoff at the back of your throat meshed into your speech. “Am I meant to ignore the fact that you know who is next to go? To die, their name meaningless and just another on the list?”

“You finally looked around.” The tone in his voice was bored, but his eyes glistened in light of the sky turning dawn outside.

“How do you know these things?”

“Take a look for yourself.” His voice was gritty, making you spin slowly on your heels. Pivoted, shivering, and more afraid of him than ever.

The new victim’s body laid just as still as the others. Drained of color already, cold and filled with seams of the evil doings towards them. Your hand couldn’t muffle the scream leaving you, Ravn’s sudden appearance behind you and his hand at your lower back making you shift away from the scene and out into the dark hallway.

“Disheveled clothing ripped and bloodied, just as always. It’s like a continuum, this horrid work.”

Zoned out, your legs carried you back inside, but the dreadful scene was no easier to deal with. Ravn was so calm, his notebook now in his large hands being written into with the similar tactics done to the poor victim.

An ‘X’ on the wrist, another body, the strange man scribbling the forensics into his notebook, and the sun rising above. Clueless, once more, wasn’t the correct word to pinpoint where your mind was at. This was a three-ring-circus, and you were just the audience.

“The killer always wears so many clothes. I’ve never seen their face, only watching them do the last of their work and make an escape. Strength is an understatement, but they don’t seem so threatening as they leave. How is that?” Pen against his bottom lip, he thought aloud.

Ravn now letting you into his head was almost as confusing as your notes. Messy, baffling, and insane-sounding.

Pacing back to your seat and falling down like a heavy rock descending a mountain, you wanted it all to pause. A recap of what you know and don’t know would be helpful, but with a rushed case like this—impossibility was the top lead.

Head in your hands and sight trying to block out the dim lamp on the desk, you felt the puff of air before you smelled his deep cologne. Ravn, positioned on the peak of your desk with his feet still solely on the ground, spoke from his gut. “Been a while since you got a good night’s rest, huh?” He watched you with dark eyes as you tried to not leer out from exhaustion, the adrenaline abating in your veins from the chain of events.

“How can I sleep when more people die in one week than I can count on both hands? What do I even do?”

Sorrowful, his eyes beady and attentive on your form. It was almost like a mirage you awaited to see, his speckling sight staring into your own eyes. It almost meshed the sound of your phone ringing in your pocket, the green button sliding to answer only to be blared with the shrieking sound of your chief’s voice. Your location was asked for, but you didn’t even know how to form a single word in response before he clicked the call away. “Stat”, his voice claimed.

Ravn’s arm caught you by surprise, the tight hold on your wobbling form giving you the idea that you rose to leave too quickly. His face so odd, strange and gloating, broken at the sound of your voice. “What is it?”

“I can take you to the killer.” Tongue twisted, voice caught and silenced in your throat, and a scarred expression on your face made him continue. “But this is going to be difficult.”

“What part hasn’t been difficult so far?” You huffed, his head slightly nodding in agreement.

“You’re going to have to watch and not make a move. Can you do that?”

Sheer perplexity, he was asking you to not do your job. Like the matter at hand was smaller if you just played nice, and things would all work out in the end. His choice of words was sickening, but made sense in hindsight.

“You have to let me work. You have to let them work.”

“You want me to watch this serial killer take someone’s life?” Your voice was pained, his calming face making it narrow out into disbelief. “You want me to w-watch someone die? I can’t.”

“I-I’m sorry.” His stutter caught you off guard more than the tears appearing to fill his eyes. “But they’ll already be dead.”

three.

The cork board was filled with the same faces you had seen lying on rolling cards and operation tables, relentless and restless in your bones. White board filled with new bullet-points, all too confusing to consider but too important to erase and rewrite. Red string connected so few things taken notice of. The alluring man’s name written in calligraphy—larger than others, the Grim Corporation in a smaller font beneath, and the serial killer framed in a boxed further down. It was like a roadmap to a place you had never, and would never, travel to. So many confusing trails, dead-end cul de sacs, and places not often gone.

The aggressive turn of the door handle startled you, the black dry-erase marker in your hand flying forward and leaving a thick line through Ravn’s name on the board. He cleared his throat, your chief at your back stunned into stillness and a quick silence.

“Chief?” Your voice was small, but enough to get into his ears. The grimace on his face was so horrid like he was seeing the face of an old enemy and didn’t know how to truly react. His hand rose upwards, flat-palm in your sight as a tell to give him a second. His eyes shifted over the board in high speed, pupils dilating directly at the visual of Ravn’s name written and added into the case.

“This is—” he begins, voice so groggy. “—is y-you are in way over your head, dear. So far. Like home-run ball fleeting from the field into oncoming traffic, far over.”

You were unable to mention your confusion at his reaction before he spoke again, cutting away at your voice as he always does.

“This is so much larger than just you. Please—and I beg you for this, give the case over to a team. Before you lose your head, or more importantly—your life.”

“Trust me, I am neck deep now, sir.”

His head turned at your calm response, brows furrowed and eyes blood-shot. The man that had overseen the entire case since the first body hit the cement and lost its soul; he, too, had been in too deep throughout this entire process.

“I am on the right track now. So close, I can feel them breathing on the back of my neck.” Your off-putting metaphor was too on point, the chief shaking his head in worry but not able to speak his reasonings. “I have a chance. To put these people and their families to rest, that's all I am working for now.”

“In over your head.” Was his last words, your body returning to your desk only for sleep to finally pull you in.

In nightmares, your control is so little. Even lucid dreaming has no real hold on the horrors of the mind when the body rests. That is how being the authority when a killer is on the loose feels. Watching, waiting, finding every little puzzle piece to get the big picture. You were originally working from such a small bit of the image until Ravn leapt in and gave you all four corners. Each piece was something new, riveting and keeping you on the edge of your seat; but still you had such large middle parts to configure. Only this time, the pieces alongside the picture look nothing like the image being made.

Eyes peeling open to be met with darkness, it was your basic survival skills to stand up straight and feel the brick wall at your back. An alleyway cascaded with nothing but moonlight just as the abandoned building had been the night before, you shivered from the cold air of midnight. The office you fell asleep in had faded away and left you standing in a new place: a new puzzle piece.

Ravn stood, dark and tall, in a way that was so ominous. Like seeing a ghost for the first time after years of non-belief, a shadow crept in on him. Moving slower one second and faster the next, your heart thumped in your ears and mouth couldn’t form the words fast enough.

“Ravn!”

Faint, diminishing with the same wind that carried it, he heard you. A solid, seamless voice in his ears he had grown fond of brought him to duck and miss the assailant. But it wasn’t enough to protect him, the otherworldly bits seeping inside of your own surroundings. A solid fist to his gut, and Ravn was breathless. Small sounds, grunts of pain and eyes narrowing in on the figure before him; this was where things turned.

“Working with the cops now, are you?” Only in horror movies could you hear something so disturbing, yet intriguing enough to continue and absorb it all no matter how scared you were. “Have you sunk that low, dead one?”

“I’m not dead yet.” Response tired but there, Ravn shook in his shoes and stood up straight.

“Oh—but you will be. Your magic is nothing compared to the world I have creat—” A sudden halt in the killer’s voice made you blink rapidly, a single touch of Ravn’s hand to their shoulder silencing them. Your body felt faint watching them sink to their knees, an ill appearance in the visual alone.

His form turned, Ravn’s eyes finding you behind them. No matter how shallow you felt within the case, what little you brought to the table: Ravn gave you something to work with. His palm floated over the killer, their body visibly heavier until the final sight of them was too obvious. Face like stone, eyes open and staring at the sky, and chest still: death was finally upon the bringer of chaos, but at a cost.

Ravn’s long legs bent at the knee, his lips just outside the shell of the killer’s ears as he whispered something to them. Eyes so sad, world so still, the fluttering black specks and dark cloud surrounding them took him away in an instant and left you standing alone with the one you had been searching for.

Finally able to feel your limbs, you maneuvered to the carcass in a fast motion. Cuffs on your belt pulled and latched onto them out of precaution, it was too eerie of a surrounding to not believe in their death. Even the call over your radio didn’t sound real until others showed up at the scene and witnessed the serial killer at your feet.

Still in time, black marks covered their every vein and a painful expression lied on their face. So ill-looking, everyone hesitated to lift them onto a backboard and begin to take them in. A mattress was no comfort, no words leaving their lips in the duration of their holding for questioning. And no matter how much you pried, requested for any sign of remorse, the only true sight of what they were was when a smirk rose on their lips and their eyes went dead.

Unknown causes. That was the label on their page of the case. You wanted to walk outside into the dead of the night, pull at your hair and scream your lungs out, but even you couldn’t wrap your head around the situation. Drained, overseen and underseen all at once, your attempts to bring them back went unheard. No adrenaline shot could revive someone so evil, and no words spoken by them could erase what had been done.

The lonesome feeling of the world growing colder made the sight of the smoke enwrapping your form seem normal now. Same as Ravn had gone, you found your vision clouded until he sat before you. Good as new, fine and ripe; but you, sick and distorted.

Eyes closing and peeling back open to find him smiling, the first thing you saw was the name tag clipped into his black shirt. It read “Youngjo.” as if he had a name within a name, your startled response seemingly rehearsed in his head.

“No one ever gets used to this.” He claimed, the sound of his voice calming you at once.

You felt your body grow sore the more you sat up in the chair, Ravn staring at you in concern before pulling at your hand to help you sit all the way up.

“That was a nasty fall. I’m glad you didn’t hit your head.” Your brows furrowing made him nod, recollection of the sudden exhaustion making you pass out just as the cloud took over now refilling your mind. You were so cold before, now wrapped with his blazer and warming up by the minute. “I’m only used to taking out bad humans, so please excuse my physicality.”

“B-Bad humans?” Your palm felt the knot growing on your head. The displeased look in Ravn’s eyes clearly was for himself as he went on, but you couldn’t help but notice how his hands ran along his legs like he was holding back from reaching for you.

Your sense of reasoning had been dismissed for the case, overtaken by the need to find one person and end all the terror around you. It didn’t hit you until now, how much you had learned but ignored.

There are limits to humanity. Those who trespass on the edge of insanity are considered lunatics, but they play a part within the circle of life. Someone loses their meaning of the world, goes out on a limb to create madness, and sanctifies all that matters. They make people hold their children closer, marry the one they love, and turn the volume up higher on the TV when watching the news.

The ones who bring fear into the hearts of the innocent, and leave everyone wondering what would drive someone so mad: where exactly do they come from?

"If I told you I don't fear those I work for, I would be lying." Youngjo began, his teeth almost chattering with every word. "Corruption, chaos, and limitless communications have always been a part of your world, but they're too outlandish to understand—aren't they?"

What he was saying confused you, nonetheless.

"That's because their doing is otherworldly—our world." His teeth clenched together and hit tone got deeper as he went on, but you could see the worry in his eyes. "This is their doing. The killer on the street. The representative of their business."

Representative. It has come up a few times now.

"Their hire is to bring in numbers. But this killer, more serial now than most, has gone way out of the league meant for jurisdiction." You wanted him to bite into the true fuel that had him running, but the truth itself scared you to your core.

"So I was brought in. Severe backup, I guess." He seemed almost disappointed in himself. "And for once, I couldn't do my job alone."

And now, you.

"It was our job to stop this serial killer. But it was my job to make sure they got their penance. That is our only difference."

“Y-you mean to tell me, I really was in over my head.”

“And out of your element. As you are here, now.” He chuckled at your disposition, but kept his eyes warm as they looked over you.

“And where am I, exactly?”

His office had sucked you in, looking almost more alive than the man himself. It took all your might to understand that you were both just two people in the position of work, doing the job you’re meant to do, but getting caught in the crossfire. His world inhabited the same as yours, and fate of the worst brought your paths to cross.

“Welcome to Grim Corporations.”

four.

“What are you?”

“Do I really need to explain?” Ravn, now Youngjo, had been sat on the edge of his desk staring at your disturbed looking form for a matter of minutes now. Processing, worrying, feeling betrayed and used, all of it was in your eyes now.

“You’re It, aren’t you?” You asked in a slow tone, his brow rising in an obvious way and paired with the same smirk he flashed before. “The grim reaper.”

“There are many of us, actually. This entire corporation was created to give life to the dead.”

Perspective, it makes up everything. You were simply a pawn, a small speck in the large image of the puzzle. For once you understood: you had never been the one putting it together.

“I was a ‘rushed death’, as they call it.” He began, mouth moving like he was ready to pull back his own curtains and reveal his real world. “As a service for my good deeds, I was gifted a position here.”

“Life after death exists.” Hushed and meant to be in your own head, he nodded.

“My downside was that I was never truly good in life, either. I stole to survive, worked my way up the food chain of my corrupt job to make ends meet, and never thought of what was outside of my own eyes. But I never harmed anyone, and that seemed to open the door for me in the afterlife.”

You listened like this was a novel, the personal diary of the man you had come to know but not understand. Ravn, a mirage, became a full blown figure as he showed you Youngjo.

“Even though I never brought anyone any dismay, it truly felt like I did when I took this job. It was a second chance I believed didn’t exist, and I was stupid to take it.”

“Why is that?”

“Because the cost was more than moving on. I didn’t know how I obtained the job, let alone the truth behind it. Death was around me all the time, it was all I grew to know.” Youngjo, tortured by life even after death, found solace in seeing you exist. “You were the first real soul I had come across in so long. I was so grateful to find you and make you a partner for my last case.”

“But you gave me everything.” You halted him in place, confusion sending you back into the seat in wonder. “The bodies, the forensics, the locations—even the killer.”

“Truth be told—you gave me them. I saw them all while working through you. The human range of emotions are a powerful thing. Every gut feeling, worry, sense of losing humanity while human: it guided me to finding the killer long before he got the true kill. But sadly, my job doesn’t allow me to get between a representative and the dead.”

There was that word again. His anthology pulled at your brain and made you think: just what were they to this operation? Crazy people given a task to go along with? Create the chaos necessary to cause death and hysterics?

And then it hit you. His specifics on getting “between” had been there before. The resignation letter wrote it in a proper way, you just didn’t have the correct example to connect the dots.

“You have gotten between them before. The killer, they were sent out by the corporation?”

“Do you really think an innocent human is capable of going so mad so easily? You said it yourself, you couldn’t believe someone would cause such chaos.” His point was made more than once, and he even reclaimed your own to help you understand. They were the cracks between the pieces, the ones overlooked but needed to fit the puzzle together.

“But t-this is so messed up.”

“It’s the way of the universe. People have died since the beginning of time, we’ve just been there to collect their souls and guide them into the next life.”

“They don’t always make it to that new life.”

“The mind of a detective.” He chuckled, crossing his legs and holding up his chin with his palm in focus. “No, some are forced to join the corporation as reapers. Simple transaction. Some just can’t go through, can they? If they all did, how full would the other side truly be?”

He didn’t have to say it, but it was on the tip of his tongue. That forcefulness was immorally done, Youngjo’s quick death a symbol from one of the released serial killers sent out by the same business that recruited him. They needed new reapers to fill in old positions, so they used death at their expense. A horrible cycle, and one ever-turning.

It was only when the familiar scent of coffee in your nostrils startled you back into your reality later that day that you really grasped it all. Your chief busting inside your office and barking an explanation of the bodies being found at the old mill meshed into your deep breath of reality. The case was in closing, and all those lost were moving in the circle to move along or gain a new position.

Relief rushed through you despite how terrible things are in reality. Out of your control, your world returns to a small circle, and your body leaning back against your chair to cradle your head and bring you rest.

And rest finally came. Weeks of sleeping so hard you woke with energy, worked at a good pace, and found tranquility in reminding yourself that the outside world remains just as fucked up as your own.

The dip in the mattress made your heart skip, his scent floating back into your nose with a deep breath. Happiness in your mind, his frown swallowed your excitement. His term finished, he was finally out, but not all stories have happy endings.

“When a reaper is resigned, they are free to rest peacefully.” He spoke lowly, taking his time to explain.

“That’s a good thing, right?”

For the first time, real tears dripped down. Warm against your thumb as you held his face, his voice was so small that it almost didn’t sound like his own. “That means I can’t see you again until you die.”

epilogue.

The eyes staring back at you were so beady and filled with love. Youngjo had seen the ins and outs of life time and time again, yet he was so stunned by you. Someone so brave in a cruel universe only catering to pain and chaos. He could only smile as he cried from his attachment to you.

His own hand rose to your face, thumb now mimicking the circles you made on his cheek. He could touch you without any real harm, not send you to sleep or make you worry. He can’t kill you just by thinking about it, and that to him was most freeing. Lips closing in on your own in a deep kiss, feeling him pull away from you was most dreadful.

But again, the world works in a circle. You watched his eyes grow estranged, a scroll appearing from thin air as he skimmed over the words written. “Something was written smaller than anything else in my contract.” He begins. “I was tailored in so fast I didn’t think it was important, so I just signed so I wouldn’t leave yet.”

“What was written?” You whispered, watching him contort into pure bliss as he reread the small font.

In the smallest letters drawn in calligraphy just as he writes, he read: “In addition to the option of rest, another life will be stored for the soul’s use after their term if another good deed has been met.” His words stopped, a sob breaking through his voice. “A good deed?”

He sighed, well knowing that his first life was nothing but mundane and spite of survival. The tasks done were resourceful to him now, but they were never defined as a good deed. It was clear, so clear, that he sees himself as evil.

“You brought people to rest, souls in the afterlife and families living alike.” Your eyes watered in tandem with his, faces mere inches from one another. “And you saved my job. This case was all I had, my last chance. That’s why I was so adamant to solve it. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have the chance to help anyone again. And you helped me.”

The scroll turned golden right before your two sets of eyes, the man before you shining bright. The thick lace of darkness that had been above him for so long lifted, healed right under your sight. Life was replenished to him as if he had never gone in the first place. “I’m not evil?”

“You never were to begin with, Ravn.”

Dongju had been busy for quite some time, but you two had planned to spend the evening together. Last minute, he ended up cancelling on you. You understood, but were still frustrated. So, you let your mind wander and thought about the possibilities of what you could have been doing.

Which led you to masturbating, and sending Dongju a short clip of you orgasming with the comment, “wish you were here 🥰.”

A few days later, he was able to make up for cancelling on you, and promised to have a movie night. Dongju clearly had other ideas, as you ended up naked on your bed, patiently waiting for your punishment.

“I thought you understood why I couldn’t be with you Friday,” he says, disappointment clear in his voice.

“I did,” you say.

“And you knew that I would be free today regardless. Are you that needy that you can’t ask for permission? Or did you want to be punished, hmm?”

“I…”

“Go on,” Dongju insists, patiently waiting.

“I was horny and thought you would be too busy to respond,” you admit, looking down.

“I would have answered you eventually.”

“I know…”

“So you were too needy to think? You let your hormones take over?” he says, his words embarrassing you but also turning you on. “Are you still a horny little bitch?”

You look up at Dongju, surprised by his words.

“Was that too much?” he immediately asks, and you shake your head no.

“Good. Now lay down and let me use you as a toy. Don’t you think I should have fun with a toy too?” he asks, smirking.

His words surprise you, but you move back on the bed, spreading your legs. His eyes slowly work down your body, his lips turning into a smirk as he notices your arousal. Dongju opens the bedside table’s drawer, putting lube on his fingers.

“I shouldn’t even have to prep a toy, but here I am,” Dongju says, letting his forefinger go into your hole. He moves it slowly, easily hitting that spot. He notices your body relaxing, and as a soft moan escapes you, he adds another finger.

“Do you like that?” he hums, continuing to stretch you out.

“Yes, it feels so good,” you softly moan, holding onto your sheets.

Dongju lets out a soft chuckle, watching for your tell tale signs of your orgasm growing. As soon as he notices, he pulls out his fingers.

“I was getting close~” you whine pitifully.

“If you had behaved, maybe I would have let you cum,” Dongju tells you simply, undressing without haste, then getting a condom and rolling it onto his length.

You whine softly, pouting.

“Now, behave and I might let you cum tonight,” he adds, kissing your lips as his tip intrudes your hole.

“Are you okay?” he asks, slowly sinking his length all the way inside.

“Yeah, give me a second,” you say, nodding.

Dongju’s fingers ghost over your nipples, lightly pinching them and eliciting a moan from you.

“Okay, you can move,” you tell him softly.

He nods and begins thrusting at a brutal pace, clearly chasing his own high. “You feel so good, clenching around me,” Dongju huffs underneath his breath, lacing your fingers together.

You move your hips up in time with his thrusts, unashamedly moaning into his ear.

His rough pace quickly brought back your impending orgasm, and he could tell by the way you gasp his name. Dongju smirks, going back to playing with your nipples as he begins to cum inside the condom.

“Please?” you softly ask, your thighs shaking as you do your best to hold back your own orgasm. “Please can I cum?” you ask as his hips start slowing down.