"But, see, I'm not the main person here. I'm the killer. I'm the tool, in the end. We all are. But he isn't. He is the one you want to fear, Jonghyun. Not me. Not Xuimin. Not even the young one, even though he's not much to fear. 

"But if you fear us, than you may want me to kill you now, Jonghyun."

"No."

"Well, I warned you." 

And then he left me alone.

~~~

I remember these gates. I remember this fence, surrounding the new generation of killers. Some of us are killers. Some of us weren't so lucky. 

I know they always abandon the training center after the course is finished, so I break the lock easily and slip inside, closing it behind me with a clang. The noises echoed hollowly, and I was left standing, alone, staring at the place that, for two months, made my life hell. 

The single brick building stands silently, low and sprawling, across the land. The windows were long cracked, vines crawling their way up the walls. Weeds had sprouted wherever possible, and began reaching to the sky with bony fingers and dead fingernails, a sea where there used to be a desert. The dust cloying the pebbled path leading to the main doors was unmoved, silent for a long time.

One of the main doors was wide open, showing the shadows inside. Water, wind, fire haven't been here for three years. It looked, at a glance, like no one had been here since the building was built.

Everything was still. Everything was silent.

Three years can be a long time. But three years cannot fully envelope the memories, for me. 

i can remember.

I start down the path, not daring to tramp through the weeds instead. The crunch of gravel is much quieter than the snap of stems, anyway. As I get closer, to the memories and to where I believe the king is held, I ignore the coldness, the crawling fear that will always appear with this place, this haunted place. 

This place, who has seen many of blood and skin and snarls. This place, who has heard many screams, many tears. 

Why am I doing this? Why am I doing this for a king who hasn't shown anything but idiocy and disdain for me? Why? 

But there's no turning back now.

As I get closer to the door, I notice the faint outlines of boots in the dust and dirt. Good. I nudge the door open a bit more, and it creaks, loudly, a gunshot in the silence.

too loudly. 

The thought is only registering when I hear a deadly whistle, and throw myself flat on the wooden boards inside. Something carves a line in the air where my head was, and I flip onto my back, still flat in case of the weapon swinging back. Above me, I see nothing but beams held together by spiderwebs, the silver threads spun and shivering. Shivering. 

I swear and move to the side before standing, searching the ceiling's supports even as I reached for a knife, and, in the other hand, a loaded sling. There! A flash of color, vanishing behind a vertical beam. I run, across the large, empty room. My boots thump over the oldened wood, signaling squeaks and groans and creaks, but I don't care. I stop a yard from the beam, circling it, always moving as the figure above moved as well, trying desperately to stay out of my vision. I must know them, for them to try like that. 

I stop suddenly, and the figure above stumbles. I immediately take the chance, and aim for a pale hand reaching around the wide beam to get a grip. A sharp, flat rock strikes exactly where I aimed, on the thin wrist. The figure yelps, and the hand faulters. That's enough to loose his grip, and the figure falls, a shot bird, to the ground with a muffled thud. 

I take another rock and load my sling, pointing it at the eye of the guy as he lies, stunned, as I stand above him. The clinging, dusty shadows doesn't let me see the face of the guy, but one choked moan of pain gives me the answer. 

"Zelo?" I haul the guy up by his shirtfront, and sure enough, it's him. He cracks open his eyes, and immediately cowers, eyes too wide. 

"H-hyung?" He mumbles, weakly, as he tries to shrink himself, as if I couldn't see him if he got small enough.

no such luck.

"Care to explain?" I drag him, half struggling, to corner him against the beam, and with my other hand, I draw a knife, and let the blade brush Zelo's side ever so slightly, an unspoken threat. What I'm counting on, with him, is that he knows what I can do. He knows that I will do what I have to do. And I will hurt this traitor if I have to.

When he only stutters and mumbles and avoids my eyes, I let the knife pierce his side. When he squirms and tried to hiss at me and spit in my face, I just turn my head aside and move my hand on his shirt so my nails dig into his chest. 

he doesn't talk.

When, finally, the last thread of my patience vanishes, I've just began to split his skin when a voice rings out. 

"Stop, hyung." I know that voice. It's been three years, but I would recongize at voice anywhere. That tone. But it doesn't sound like him. It's too sharp. Something's wrong. Something happened. 

I turn slowly, dreading what I'll see. And there he was. Standing in a shaft of light, eyes that used to be so soft, but now drill into me like a knife. He's taller now, muscle filling out where there used to be skinny bones and nothing. He's more of a presense now. He demands attention from even those who don't know him, and I can't tear my eyes away. Zelo's forgotten now, as I face this very solid being, who I was sure was dead. 

dead, gone.

For the good of him, because for him it was a brutal world. But he was still innocent then. He still hesitated harm. But now, he wouldn't. I can see it, even as I move, circling, as he stands there, calm, a smirk on his face, because he knows how much of a shock this is to me. So what had they done to him? 

I try to speak, but my throat is too tight. 

He smiles, no, smirks. "I've never seen you speechless, hyung. Glad I could be here to see it. Instead of being dead." 

I my lips, still moving. "You are dead." 

"No, I'm clearly not," he says, almost offended. "Would you rather me dead?" 

"I did, because you were too young to handle it." 

"Too young to handle what?" A gleam, a dangerous gleam, glitters in his soft eyes, and I'm unsettled, because I've never seen it like that. 

"Life, Mir. Life was cruel to you, and you were too young."

He flexes his fingers, head turning to face me, as his feet made no move to shift. "You are wrong." 

"Now, I would be. But not then."

not then, but now.

*claps* First update ever in the New Year! Happy 2014, everybody! 

Okay, this might be confusing but don't worry it's like the soon. So this fic, is, sadly:(, almost done. Kind of.

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