Sehun and Jongin decides to stay out and have a much needed conversation so Kyungsoo and Baekhyun leave them alone. The ride home is mostly silent, both boys lost in their own thoughts. While Baekhyun is genuinely happy for his best friend, his heart aches for his unidentified soulmate and their undetermined fate. He has so many unanswered questions swirling around in his mind, all of them confusing and stressing him out further.

Kyungsoo looks over at Baekhyun who has his brows knitted together in frustration. He reaches out and lightly taps the area of Baekhyun’s forehead between his eyebrows, the creased lines unfurrowing from surprise.

“Stop worry for a bit,” Kyungsoo says, “It’s a long ride home. You look exhausted Baek, get some sleep.”

Baekhyun manages a nod before closing his eyes and allowing his body to rest. As if Kyungsoo’s words had magic laced in them, Baekhyun falls into a light sleep, his head lolling sideways onto Kyungsoo’s shoulder.

Unfazed by the close proximity, Kyungsoo’s lips curve up slightly as he fondly pats Baekhyun’s slightly overgrown locks.

--

Baekhyun wakes up to the sound of knocking below him. He peers at his clock, squinting because of the neon digital light. It is 5:34 AM. Groaning, he half-heartedly swings his legs over his bed and walks down the narrow flight of stairs. He relies more on muscle memory than his sense of sight as his eyes refuse to fully open.

“Who is it?” he calls out grumpily.

“Baekhyun, it’s me!” the muffled voice replies from the other side of the door.

Confusion washes over him as he opens the door to a slightly sheepish looking Kyungsoo.

“Kyungsoo?”

“Hey, I know it’s kinda early but I was up late last night trying to find something about violet tattoos. I-“ Kyungsoo turns to look at the deserted staircase behind him.

“May I come in? I don’t want to talk about it out in the open like this.”

Baekhyun flushes. “Oh of course! Sorry, it was rude of me not to invite you in.”

Kyungsoo gives him a full heart-shaped smile as his gratefully walks into the warmth of Baekhyun’s loft. As he takes off his shoes, Baekhyun asks, “How did you find my place anyways?”

Kyungsoo grins. “Bribed Sehun with free cupcakes for a week. Didn’t mention that they’ll be the leftover stale ones at the end of the day but I doubt he’d notice anyways.”

“Amen to that.”

Baekhyun makes a beeline for the couch and plops down on it, gesturing for Kyungsoo to sit beside him.

Once both boys were relatively comfortable in their seats, Kyungsoo sets down the backpack he was carrying and brings out a laptop. Opening it, he quickly types in the password and hits enter. An internet page pops up with what seems to be a crappy scan of a news article open in the tab.

“I was looking up cases of violet tattoos in Toronto,” Kyungsoo starts, “And for the longest time I was almost convinced that there were no violet tattoos here until now. However, I found a site that keeps an account of all violet tattoos around the world since 1851 so I thought I’d give it a shot. Toronto was an available link so I clicked it. I was redirected to several links until I can across this one.”

Kyungsoo angles his laptop towards Baekhyun so the latter could properly see the screen.

“His name is Lee Hyoseop. He has a list of people written down in this notebook of his and he started killing them one by one. Eventually the police caught him and he was sentence to the death penalty but apparently the government swept the story under the rug in hopes that future generations wouldn’t even know what a violet tattoo is.”

Baekhyun is quiet as he reads the article through once. It happened in the early 1900s, long before Baekhyun, his parents or even his grandparents were born.

“I know this isn’t that much,” Kyungsoo says, “But at least we’re getting somewhere right? Look at the end of the article.” Both boys gaze at the screen.

“It says that the police kept the notebook in their custody. What if that notebook is still there? It would be a very good place to start if we could get our hands on it,” Kyungsoo insinuates.

Baekhyun stares at Kyungsoo.

“No way.”

“oh YES way.”

--

By the end of Baekhyun’s shift, the notebook is within his reach.

“HOW did you manage that?” Baekhyun asks with wide eyes.

Sehun shrugs as he locks the door.

“Do you remember Jongin’s cousin? Jonghyun? Well, Jonghyun’s younger brother Taemin is a police officer. He said that he’d look in the archives for the notebook,” Sehun explains as they double-check the exterior of the store.

Baekhyun walks beside Sehun as they head towards the café.

“Wow.”

“Your supposed high level of vocabulary is disppointingly sparse today,” Sehun comments, earning a punch from his best friend.

When they walk through the café’s doors, they saw a small group of people, namely Jongin, Minseok, Yifan and Yixing crowding around the counter.

“What’s Yifan and Xing doing here?” Baekhyun asks with a raised brow.

As the two get closer to the group, they see that the four were crowding around one specific person. Jongin notices them first and he gives them the most radiant smile. Wrapping his arm around Sehun’s waist, his gives him a peck on the cheek before gesturing for Baekhyun to come closer.

“I think you want to see this,” Jongin says as the smaller boy leans in to see what everyone was looking at.

He sees Kyungsoo and their gazes lock. He looks a little flustered and Baekhyun is immediately concerned.

“Are you ok?” Baekhyun asks, nibbling on his lower lip out of nervous habit.

“Yeah, I’m fine. I…I just got my first tattoo?” Kyungsoo tries.

“…WHAT?”

Sehun rolls his eyes. “Baekhyun’s ever impressive vocabulary range.”

a/n guess what? I UPDATED WHOO /shot. Sorry about the long wait! Thank you so much for 100+ subscribers!! That's more than I could ever ask for :)) I hope you enjoyed the chapter!