Me and my bad fluff-writing skills. I don't know. If you have any critiques, please tell me.

I learned from him that often contradiction is the clearest way to truth.

-Patti Smith

Chanyeol woke up at five fifty-four to the severe weather alert on his phone beeping incessantly. He knocked his phone off the bedside drawer trying to turn it off, and the clattering noise it made was almost worse. With a groan, he tried to roll over to pick it back up, stopping when he felt something tighten around his midsection.

Baekhyun had his face pressed into the button-down Chanyeol had fallen asleep in, arms wrapped in a vice around his waist. As Chanyeol watched (with an amused horror), Baekhyun threw a leg over Chanyeol's and mumbled something quiet.

How easy it would be to just kill him now. There was an air syringe in the drawer, the leftovers of the ricin from the Hatchman mission right next to it in a tiny brown bag. How easy it would be to just finish the mission and get back to the mysterious commissioner who promised a bountiful reward. To just be done with it.

In theory.

Baekhyun smacked his lips and smiled, hopefully dreaming about something nice. Chanyeol watched the smaller man's eyelids flicker, his nose wrinkle, his soft-looking lips twitch. A foreign warmth bloomed in Chanyeol's chest.

There was snow falling heavily outside, from what Chanyeol could see through the crack in the curtains. He would have to turn the heat up if it kept going.

Baekhyun made a whimpering noise, and Chanyeol put an arm around him almost instinctively. "I'm here," he said quietly, as if that would do anything.

Which it seemed to. Baekhyun huffed and stilled, and Chanyeol found a lullaby in his breaths.

Baekhyun, on the other hand, woke up when he heard someone swearing loudly.

There was a loud sizzling noise, and Baekhyun shot to his feet, an unfamiliar bedroom teetering around him for a moment.

"G-d fing dammit!" Chanyeol (at least, he hoped it was Chanyeol) growled.

Baekhyun tiptoed to the open door of the bedroom and peeked out. The taller man was in the kitchen with a flaming pan, looking around desperately for something. Finally, he dropped the pan into the sink and threw the faucet on. As the flames died out, Chanyeol leaned on the counter and sighed heavily.

"What happened?"

At the sound of his guest's voice, Chanyeol whirled around, nearly decapitating himself on an open cabinet door. "Ah, s . Did I wake you up?"

The pan crackled, as if in laughter.

Baekhyun smothered a grin. "Uh, yeah. But that's fine."

Chanyeol simply stared for a moment, taking in Baekhyun's bedhead and his oversized makeshift pajamas. "Um, okay. Sorry. I mean, uh--" He felt his façade crumble around him.

Baekhyun didn't seem to notice Chanyeol's discomfort, or at least didn't acknowledge it. "What time is it?"

"Just before eight."

"Oh. Is it snowing?"

"Yeah. A lot, too."

"Good thing I cancelled school today."

"Yeah." 

Baekhyun padded into the kitchenette and peered into the sink at the charred remains of an egg in the pan. "What were you going for?"

Chanyeol groaned and covered his face with his hands. "I thought I knew how to make scrambled eggs."

"Good job." Baekhyun hauled out the steaming mess and inspected it. "Do you have another pan?"

Yixing was furious when Baekhyun showed up at the house in the middle of the snowstorm. 

"I swear to tap-dancing Chr-st, if you had gotten into an accident..." the man said, voice shaking dangerously.

Jongdae and Sehun, for once, were silent, shivering on the ratty old couch, having evidently bore the brunt of Yixing's wrath.

"You were the one who called me to come home," Baekhyun said quietly. He glanced quickly over his shoulder at the silver car making a u-turn outside.

Yixing's fingers drummed on the folding dining table. "That was before the wind started. You could've...ah, f . Whatever. You're home now." He sighed and leaned back in the chair. "Sorry. I was really scared for you. Is your friend going to be okay, driving home like this? Why didn't you invite him in?"

"I did...he said he had to get home fast. I don't know why."

Meanwhile, Chanyeol was driving way too fast on the snowy roads.

Just as he had reached Baekhyun's house, the mysterious commissioner called his cell phone. Chanyeol hadn't picked up with Baekhyun in the car, but as soon as Baekhyun left, he turned to drive home, playing the voicemail as he swerved between parked cars.

"Park Chanyeol. I have decided to rescind my request for Baekhyun's...ah, termination. However, if you do complete the task, I will pay you. It is of utmost importance. At the moment, though, it seems that you do not intend to carry through. And so, I have sought the services of someone else."

Chanyeol slammed on the brakes, nearly throwing himself through the windshield. "What?" he demanded, as if anyone could hear him.

"His name...nickname, more accurately, is Kris. I have told him everything I told you, but the mission is of low priority for him. You have time to claim your reward before he does. Remember: it is your life at stake if you do not complete the task, and the danger does not come from me." The voicemail ended there, and Chanyeol stayed there, staring at his smartphone lying in the cupholder, car stopped in the middle of a snowstorm on an empty street.

For the first time in nearly a year, Chanyeol met up with his father.

His father had requested a dinner at some fancy French place Chanyeol couldn't pronounce, and so he waited in a private dining room, fidgeting in a stiff suit jacket. The one his father had bought for Yoora's funeral...

Not the time to think about that.

Mr. Park was dressed sharply in a suit and obnoxious tie (his favorite one from the collection he kept), and he swept into the dining room with classic Park bravado.

"I can't believe my son wanted to see me," he said, clapping Chanyeol on the shoulder before sitting across from him. "Brought a nice cabernet sauvignon, too."

Chanyeol winced at the way his father butchered the word sauvignon, but he knew correcting him wouldn't fix anything. "I, uh, have some questions. And I know you think that--"

"--talking over the phone is dangerous. Exactly." Mr. Park nodded approvingly. "So I raised you right."

If by raising a cold murderer who ended up not being able to carry out a simple mission, then yes, you did.

Chanyeol tried for a smile. "You never did teach me how to make eggs, though."

Mr. Park chuckled and popped open the wine bottle with practiced ease. "No, I didn't." He tilted his head. "But I thought you hated eggs."

"Right, but...I had a guest over and I tried making eggs." As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Chanyeol realized the effect they would have.

"A guest?" Mr. Park poured the wine into their glasses, studying his son the whole time. "You never have...I thought we talked about this."

"Yeah. I, uh, he was caught in the snowstorm and needed clothes, and I figured I would make him something, um, something to eat."

Mr. Park set the wine bottle down gently, lips tight in a familiar frightening way. "Did he go to where your files are?"

The bedroom. "No, he didn't." Chanyeol looked down at the shiny forks and knives on the table before him, pretending to rub at a blemish on one of them.

"Good." Mr. Park looked up at the waitress coming in with the menus. "Oh, thank you."

Chanyeol barely read anything, settling instead on something friendly-sounding. "The, uh, onion soup and the piperade. With eggs."

"Good choice." Mr. Park raised his winelgass to his lips. For a moment, Chanyeol could swear he was looking into a mirror at himself. Growing up, everyone had always remarked on the father-son similarity, especially their eyes. Most of them didn't even know half the story.

They made small talk until the food arrived ("Beautiful," said Mr. Park. "Send a glass of wine to the chef."), during which Chanyeol glanced down at the notes he had taken the night before on how to broach the topic.

"I, uh, have a few things I need to ask." Chanyeol put his utensils down, and Mr. Park looked up at his son, surprised by his seriousness.

"And here I thought we would have a nice bonding experience," he said, smiling slightly. Mr. Park looked over at the door to the dining room, then nodded at Chanyeol. "Go ahead."

"Have you ever heard of an...a man named Kris?"

Mr. Park's eyes narrowed. "Where did you hear the name?" he said slowly.

"I have a project right now, but the, er, client, he decided to put Kris in charge."

Mr. Park dabbed at his lips with his napkin. "Kris is an exceptionally gifted man, amazing at what he does," he said. "He does, however, have a competitive streak, to put it one way, and he doesn't like having people in his way." He raised an eyebrow. "I would say you were pretty unlucky here. Be careful around him."

Chanyeol chewed on his bottom lip, and Mr. Park tsked. "You still haven't changed that habit." Immediately, Chanyeol stopped. 

"If I were to hypothetically get in his way," he said carefully. "What would happen?"

Mr. Park studied his son's face. "He would kill you," he said. "Hypothetically, of course."

Chanyeol opened his mouth to ask another question, but his father leaned forward. 

"Kris is the kind of man who makes me look like a civilian," he said quietly. "The things he is capable of are beyond your reach. Back away now, and put as much distance between yourself and this project. Move back into my house, if you need to. Because if Kris feels that you are a threat, even I would be afraid."

Mr. Park sat back up straight in his chair and smiled. "But let us enjoy our meal, hm?"