A/N: Super long chapter, 6.3k but I was assured it's fun just the way it is so here you go

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Jongin wakes to the tranquil ringtone of Yiruma’s Love Me on his phone at 4:00pm. He rolls out of bed and into his robe and slippers, shuffling to the kitchen for his breakfast. Hmmm, he’s running low on convenience store kimbap and grapefruit juice. He asks Siri to add a trip to the grocery store to his errands list for the day while getting changed.

He’s ten minutes into his run on the treadmill in his building’s tiny gym before he stops sideways glancing at his phone’s blinking light. He pauses the music flowing through his earbuds and listens to his mom’s voicemail from yesterday. “Hi dear. Just checking that you’ll be here for dinner tomorrow. It’s been awhile since you’ve swung by.” Jongin snorts: only his mom would classify one week as ‘awhile.’ At least she’s self-aware, stating it with a hint of sarcasm in her voice. “I swear you’re taller each time I see you these days. Are you taking the ginseng I gave you last time? Do you need more? Text me if you need anything from the store.”

He’s been living on his own since he went to university, but Jongin’s only recently tried to put a little more distance between his own adult life and his parents’, slowly scaling back from dinner three nights a week to once a week. It’s not even because he has better things to do, but more that… he’s realized he needs to get some better things to do, and that isn’t likely to happen without some sort of effort on his part. God, he needs a hobby. Maybe he should look into learning magic, or bonsai pruning, or competitive ferret racing. Just… something.

He washes away the lonely thoughts in the shower and gets dressed in his black slacks, crisp white dress shirt, and glasses. Work satchel repacked and slung over his shoulder, Jongin steps out of his apartment and blends into the rush hour crowd of normal office workers all heading home. He weaves through several local stores to complete his errands and circles back to drop off the goods at his place before taking the subway to his parents’ for dinner.

It’s a comfortable meal in the cozy Kim home. Conversation flows easily as always, the only mild hiccups occurring when they inquire about work.

“Oh you know, the usual. It’s fine, like any office job,” he says, sharing the standard half-truth. Jongin has never been one to lie to his parents. He tried a few times in middle school to fake like he was going to a hagwon instead of the pool hall and always ended up admitting the truth one breath later. He justifies it to himself that keeping to Prudence Inc’s rules about secrecy isn’t lying, but it still feels wrong. He quickly changes the subject to ask about the eccentric Mrs. Lee that lives next door and her perpetual battle with the pigeons trying to roost in her eaves.

While he’s washing the dishes and helping tidy up the kitchen after the meal, his mom sidles up to him. “Speaking of neighbors, do you know who I saw just the other day?” she asks with a terrible attempt at nonchalance.

“Who’s that mom?” Jongin says, avoiding eye contact and anticipating what’s to come.

“Hani. She’s working at Samsung now. Isn’t that nice?”

“Yes, that’s lovely. I’ll be sure to ask her about it if I run into her. Oh look, it’s already 9,” he says with a forced yawn and deep stretch of his arms. He squints through one eye to check if she’s buying his tired routine, and gets a thwap of damp dishtowel across his exposed sides.

“Okay, hermit. If not Hani, that’s fine, but please tell me your eyes are open to possibilities with someone, Jongin-ah.” He gives her a noncommittal hum while trying to block out the smooth, deep “darling” that’s bouncing around in his head (where the did that come from). He starts stacking the plates in the tall cabinet while his mom dries them and hands them to him one by one. “...so how’s Taemin doing?”

His grip slips on the plate and he juggles it awkwardly, just barely preventing it from shattering on the countertop. “He’s fine, he’s still in Busan, and we’re still just friends, ma.” His ears are turning red, he can feel them, as the most awkward moment of his high school life continues to haunt him at every turn. He’d agreed to let Tae practice his kissing technique on him so his best friend could feel more confident making the move on his crush, and of course that was the perfect time for his mom to bust into his bedroom with snacks. She never brings it up directly, but always finds ways to remind him she knows (and accepts) he’s not as straight as the rulers in his satchel.

After his mom’s matchmaking inquiries are finished along with the dishes, Jongin stops by his father’s office to say goodnight and then heads out. He’s still got half an hour to kill before his shift, so he walks along the Han river and grabs some street food to reheat later for his midnight lunch.

It’s 9:45pm when he slips into the lobby bathroom to get ready for work. Jongin slides his suit jacket and tie on, tucks away the glasses, and styles his hair up with a touch of gel. He’s first to arrive on the navigation floor, as usual, and heads to the break room to scrub out the coffee pot. When he opens the cabinet door, it looks like a tea bomb went off. He has to dig through the mess of half-sorted tea bags to find the regular coffee tin and get the first batch brewing. Oh Baekhyun, why start something if you can’t finish it.

Wendy strolls in a few minutes later and gives him a kind greeting on her way to her desk. She’s back less than 60 seconds later.

“Guess what I found on my desk?” she gushes out.

“Well, I’m betting it’s not 10,000 packing peanuts like on your work anniversary because you seem awfully happy about whatever it is you found.”

Wendy makes a face, remembering the prank Chen pulled that took her an hour and ten trash bags to clean up. “No. It was… a green envelope!”

“Green envelopes?” echos Baekhyun, walking in from the elevators. “Oh I LOVE green envelope days!” He claps his hands excitedly and holds one up in front of Kai’s face, begging for a high five like a geared up puppy and Kai is the one holding doggie treats. Kai rolls his eyes and slaps Baek’s cheek instead of his hand, eliciting a high pitched giggle. “Oh oh, even Kai’s excited in his own sourpuss way!” he chirrups, grabbing him by the shoulders and shaking him back and forth.

“You’re early today, for you,” Kai comments.

“Yeah, had a 9pm meeting. Chen, too. He’ll be here any second.”

Chen joins the break room hubbub moments later, and the mood is so lively, even Kai is admittedly feeling uncharacteristically happy about the work day.

Green envelopes indicate coordinated missions. They’re essentially in-house training exercises, whether to keep them all sharp or to try out new gadgets, it’s not clear. They are fun, but in Kai’s mind, it also implies business must be slow enough to allow for them to have everyone focus on a fake mission for the first part of the shift. It’s been awhile since their last one, though, so probably no need to worry. In any case, the green envelopes are essentially some version of an intrasquad spy competition. Which means…

“What are the stakes this time?” Chen asks, rapping his knuckles on the table. “We have to decide before we open the missions and all that.”

Because they don’t know what the teams are, or if they’re all ‘competing’ individually, each navigator gets to make a request that will get fulfilled if they or their team ‘wins.’

“I want each of you to buy a flowering plant for the break room in a pretty pot AND to water it,” Wendy wagers.

“Pfff, that’s kind of a wasted bet, don’t you think? What’s stopping you from just buying three plants yourself?” Baek asks.

“But then I’d have to take care of them.”

“Touché.”

“What kind of flowers do you like?” Chen asks pretending to carefully evaluate his mug of tea. Kai tries to hide his snort. Chen, king of subtlety.

“Orchids,” she replies with an appreciative smile, putting her lunch into the fridge. “And preferably the redder-- oh what the hell, Baekhyun!” Inside what should be the vegetable drawer is a small rack, with 2 pairs of socks hanging on it.

“Refrigerated sock drawer stays if I win,” he says simply. “And I’ll have you know, only one pair of those is mine.”

Wendy gives an incredulous look at Kai, like he’s a traitor to all common sense. He shoots her a flat please, like I’d do that look back, and she shifts her horrified eyes toward Chen, who quickly asks, “Kai! What do you want to wager?”

“50,000 won from each of you.”

This is met with a chorus of groans. “Oh come on, man. That’s so boring. Why cash - you know what? No more cash wagers. All in favor, say aye.”

“Aye.”

“Aye.”

Kai sighs and racks his brain for a different bet. “Um, okay fine. A rotating schedule for who cleans the coffee pot then.”

His co-workers shrug. Chen acknowledges it with a half-grimace. “Well… I guess that’s technically better than cash. Time limit, though: it can’t be an indefinite punishment.”

Kai scoffs. Punishment, he does it every ing da-- “Ok until the next green envelope appears,” he says defiantly. They reluctantly agree.

Checking the time, Kai notices it’s 10:05 already and tries to speed things along. “Okay, and what do you want Chen?” Besides Wendy.

“One break room back massage per person, to be cashed in at the time of my choosing.”

Not a bad choice. Those damn desk chairs: they could all use a massage after what they put up with in an 8 hour shift.

Bets all placed, they start to stand up from the table when Baekhyun exclaims, “Wait! Green envelopes had me distracted. Kai - how did your mission with Dyo go yesterday?”

Wendy and Chen immediately sit back down and lean in. “Oooo, yes, this I gotta hear.”

“Do tell - I’ll probably get him for this exercise. I need to go in prepared to win that massage-- those massages,” Chen corrects.

Kai hesitates, uncomfortable with all eyes on him. “It was… fine. He, uh, he has a nice voice, I guess.”

“Oh come off it. ‘He has a nice voice’,” Baek imitates. “That’s all you have to say?”

Kai blushes, the flood of all of Dyo’s honeyed flirt talk hitting him at once. “Yeah. I mean, you could’ve warned me about all the nicknames, though. That was a little…” incredible, thrilling, wonderful, “...weird.”

“What nicknames?” Wendy asks. “I didn’t get a nickname, just a y, ‘You can call me Peter Pan if you want,’” she informs with a shiver.

“Me neither! I mean, he called me Baek a few times, but everyone does that. Ooooo, he likes you, Kai.” Baekhyun pokes him repeatedly in the shoulder with his index fingers. Kai smacks them away.

“Stop it. I don’t know, he used a few different ones. It’s no big deal. It was probably just to annoy me because I made it clear it was gross when I told him I wasn’t a--” he pulls up short, not wanting to actually share the labels. “Anyway, he’s capable and follows directions well, Chen. Though he might ask for a rationale, he’ll follow through with your navigation plan. Now come on, it’s 10:10, we need to get started. They’re probably waiting on us.” He stands and turns to leave before the interrogation can go any further.

He settles into his desk and spies the green envelope waiting for him in the tray.

Exercise 0031

Gingerly, he holds it in his hands and gnaws his bottom lip. There’s an odd bubble of hope. Maybe he’ll be paired with him. Their mission was short, they didn’t really get a lot of time to test the waters on their compatibility. As operative and navigator, of course. He slowly opens the flap and checks the briefing sheet.

Tao. Okay. Good. This is good. His chances of winning the bet probably just increased, since they work together seamlessly. This is fine. Dyo probably got paired with Chen, after all. It makes perfect sense.

So why’s he so disappointed?

Kai shakes it off and gets his computer up and running. , it looks like this training mission doesn’t have them partnered with anyone: They’re supposed to protect a room and prevent any infiltration. Damn it, three on one? If he wins, he’s making sure the coffee-pot-cleaning-rotation skips him every other cycle.

Cracking his knuckles, he loads up the blueprints and studies the facility they’ll be in. Tao will need to get to the 4th floor faster than the other operatives, but maybe he’ll have a head start? At least the room he’s guarding isn’t the centrally located one. It’s only got one entrance, and it’s not an exterior room either, with a large conference room separating it from the building’s outer wall. No windows, but one ceiling vent inside, so there’s a chance someone may try to use the HVAC system. Three stairwells and one elevator bank. Kai will need to be vigilant at five different access points to this floor.

It’s a nice challenge for once. They can do this.

He turns on his headset. “Good evening. Kai here, ready to lead. Let me know when we’re a go.”

“You see this bull?” whines Tao on the other end of the line.

Kai laughs. “Yeah, man, I do. But we’ve got this. Did they give you anything new?”

“No! The best news I have for you is that they’ve boosted the thermal viewer, so we should be able to detect bodies in a 50% wider radius than usual. But I don’t know if that’s just for me, or if all the operatives are gonna have that tech.” Tao is murmuring something to himself in Mandarin and huffing indignantly.

Time to hype him up. “Hey, no one in the company’s on par with your combat skills. We can do this. It’s only a half hour drill. And maybe they’ll be dealing with handicaps or something. Where are you starting from?”

“Oh right,” Tao turns on his locator, and the green flashing light comes to life on Kai’s main screen. He’s stationed just outside the front door already.

“Is thermal on already, too?” Kai asks.

“Yep. I’m not getting any blips. You see anything?”

“Nope. Though the range can’t cover the whole building, it doesn’t seem like they’re inside yet nor stationed just outside this door or the west side one.” The east side entrance is unfortunately beyond the thermal detector’s reach.

“Well, I suppose that’s something. You have the fastest route picked out?”

“Almost.” Kai manipulates the blueprints on his secondary screen to evaluate each floor in turn, keeping a running total of estimated distance for three different pathways to the room. Balancing out the risk of traps that might be set along one sketchy hallway, he makes a final decision and describes the most direct path to Tao. “We ready?” he confirms before committing to the official mission Prepared button.

“Ready.”

The others must have already gameplanned and locked in because when Kai clicks the button, the timer starts immediately. “Ok, go!”

Tao races through the doors and starts scaling the stairs. When he comes out on the 4th floor, he reports back, “, laser sensors in both directions from this stairwell door. Want me to du