for our sweet minbongie... Happy Birthday...!

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Vulgar profanities sailed past him through the air as he ran. Although Minwoo paid that little attention, as the intensity and the volume of the swearing increased as did his speed.

He stumbled a couple of times and almost broke his neck in his mad dash for freedom. He only relaxed a bit when he saw the daylight streaming through the staircase. With a final burst of energy he catapulted out onto the deck.

Cold wind greeted him as he finally came out into the broad daylight. And…

           oh no oh no oh no… he was not prepared for this…

   …and the dark blue water that covered every corner of his line of sight.

Wherever he looked, deep blue waves stared back at him.

How the hell could he forget this.

This- the most important fact of the entire stupid thing…

That he was in the middle of the sea.

Minwoo felt like banging his head on the nearest metal railing that ran around the boat.

Trust him to make something big out of nothing. The man was only wearing his friend’s cloths and he had snapped… and he attacked… forgetting about the situation he was in- in the middle of the sea, with no knowledge what so ever about boats or how to control them. Too bad he couldn’t remember where he was before he kicked the living daylights out of his captor.

‘’ok ok… just calm down… calm down…’’ he dragged a sweaty palm over his equally sweaty face, trying to calm his erratically beating heart.

His eyes swept across the deck trying to find something… something to help himself… someway of escape… or at least some place to hide from the undoubtedly angry man that would be out for his blood the moment he recovers enough to come after him.  

His eyes came to a halt on the small control room and a light bulb went off in his head.

That’s it.

Don’t boats have some sort of communicating systems in those control rooms?

Minwoo could vaguely remember some walkie-talkie kind of thing hanging from the roof from when his friend had offered to show him around the boat. He hadn’t paid much attention because he didn’t have any interest at the time but now he was. And in any case the room would serve as a hiding place as well. He dashed over into the room and closed the door, jamming a chair against it for good measures.

His heart swelled with happiness when he saw the black radio system that was indeed hanging from the roof.

Help was only a phone call away…

He took the receiver.

‘’hh.. hello…’’ his voice shook with nervousness and anticipation.

Minwoo hadn’t had any experiences with those kinds of equipment, given that they never came across his line of work, but he was quite sure that they were not meant to be that quiet. They should be making some noise- static noises at least. But there was nothing but dead silence at the other end.

He poked and prodded at it, pressing the buttons, trying to make the thing come alive. But nothing happened. It lay limply in his grasp just like before. 

Minwoo never swore. Even when he was angry enough to wrangle someone’s neck he rarely let that indecent side get the better of him.

But today…today is definitely an exception.

When things keep failing him in a row… when his plans for escaping are thwarted one after the other… waking up in the middle of the god-forsaken sea… to be threatened at by a six foot tall giant… it took a lot out of him and there’s only so much he could endure.

He shook the small radio again and again in his frustration until the wire attaching it to the roof broke and Minwoo was left to stare at the detached pieces of the code and plastics.

Now it is really broken…

He threw the pieces onto the floor where they broke into even more parts with the impact and scattered in different directions.

No wonder Junjin never took the stupid boat to sea. The thing was like a fossil, deteriorating right in front of his eyes. It would be only a matter of time till it sank with him trapped in it.

But in the meantime… what the hell was he supposed to do???

Due to his distracted mind Minwoo failed to notice something before. But with no thought what-so-ever crossing his mind, now he noticed it.

There were no more swear words directed at him. There were no angry growling or shouting or whatever noises an angry man would be making. There was no indication that the other man was coming after him.

It should be enough time to recuperate and come after him right?

And for a second he wondered had he really done some serious damage?

He didn’t have time to worry about the injured man though. As ridiculous as it may seem he needed to plan his plans.

The last option left for him was Eric- the man himself.

Absurd it may be, and a huge blow to his pride but Minwoo had to admit that fighting with the man was not going to help him in anyway. When it came to physical build and strength he definitely got the shorter end of the stick. Even dealing out that kick before- he knew it was only a fluke that he had even managed to hit him that hard.

He was tempting his luck. And his luck is going to run off sooner or later. He would surely end up dead if he tried anything more.

No. He needed a different approach.

His mind configured a new plan immediately. And Eric was smack dab in the middle of it.

Eric was his trump card - his way out. It was with a smirk that he opened the door and went out into the broad daylight- his fears disappearing with his new plan. He had the upper hand now.

It was with that new found strength that he descended into the quietness of the boat.

What do they say… Keep your friends close and your enemies closer…?