Even though Jeonghan was sick of being called a scaredy-cat, he insisted on Joshua staying overnight. If someone had found a way to break into his personal four walls he, admittedly, felt a little bit nervous, even with a gun in his night stand.

After he had shown Joshua the situation in the bathroom, Jeonghan went into the kitchen which was directly connected to the living room; only a counter made of black marble separating them. A lot of the things that were decorating his apartment he had inherited from his father. Though, a few he had to sell or store at his friend's houses since his apartment was simply too small for all the stuff that had originally belonged in a villa.

Jeonghan remembered the place well that he had spent his childhood in. A house so big, every one of your footsteps would create an audible echo. He remembered using the hallways as a little skatepark when he was a teenager to the great displeasure of his father. It was a fulfilled childhood until that one day changed everything. From there on, Jeonghan had to take his life into his own hands. He had to manage everything on his own; no one at his side who would scold or encourage him. It was just Jeonghan standing in front of a wall that he thought he would never be able to climb.
But here he was now, standing in his apartment with one of his best friends who at the same time was his colleague from his work.

While Jeonghan was standing in the kitchen making dinner, Joshua sat down on the couch again after tossing his shoes and jacket aside which, in all the hurry, he had forgotten before. Technically he should have used the night to write a report that their boss wanted to have on his desk by the end of the week, but on the other hand he didn't want to leave his best friend alone. Especially not when a serial killer was on the loose and keen on meeting him.

He knew Jeonghan was scared to death even though he tried to cover it up by being his usual sarcastic self. A pretty good coping mechanism if you think about it. Joshua had noticed this behavior of Jeonghan's a lot of times before. Every time they were working on a case together and had to arrest the criminals by surprising them in their not-so-hidden hideout, Jeonghan was doing it. If you didn't know him you would probably call him crazy for cracking jokes and being sarcastic in such serious situations. But whoever worked with him seemed to get used to this kind of behavior pretty fast. Even a lot of criminals knew him as the pretty guy who challenged whoever got in his way and took nothing seriously, but still eventually put everyone of them into prison. A lot of them held a grudge against him because he had hurt their ego. It was just a matter of time for a situation like this to happen.

Joshua wasn't exactly sure what to think of this S.Coups guy yet. He seemed to be pretty smart, considering that he managed to break out of a prison and leave messages without anyone noticing him. Joshua and the rest of the office had worked on the S.Coups case in their past but this didn't mean that they had much knowledge about him. S.Coups was like a shadow, not leaving any traces to his past or current life. Everything that the police had found out about him was information that S.Coups wanted them to find, Joshua was certain of that. If it was up to him, Joshua would've spent his time in the office trying to find out more about this guy instead of sitting around in an apartment wasting his time. But, like almost everyone, Joshua could not resist Jeonghan's infamous puppy eyes.

It was quite late already so Joshua thought it would be better to finally continue his nap from before since Jeonghan's call had basically jolted him out of his dreams. But for Jeonghan it was impossible to think of closing his eyes at this moment. After all the stress he had gone through earlier he was wide awake and full of energy. At other times he probably would have spent that energy on thinking about a case. But given the current situation, being involved in cases was the last thing Jeonghan wanted to do.
While walking back to Joshua, the shelf with the DVDs caught his eye. In times of apps like Netflix, DVDs had lost all their popularity. However, Jeonghan liked to pick one of his DVDs and watch some old, classy movies sometimes. And when Jeonghan wanted something, he the charm and after having eaten dinner, both of them ended up on the couch with a big bowl of popcorn between them. At least he was gracious enough to let Joshua choose the movie which turned out to be one out of his giant disney-collection. They spent the entire evening in front of the TV laughing together, crying together and horribly attempting to sing Circle of Life, until both of them fell asleep.

The next morning they woke up with corresponding back pain in front of a still switched on TV, just in time to not miss an incoming call on Jeonghan’s cell phone.

After Mingyu was done scolding him why he and Joshua hadn't shown up to work yet, he informed him about a new case that they should work on. He gave Jeonghan the address of the alledged crime scene to which Joshua and him should move their lazy asses immediately.

After Jeonghan had woken up Joshua in a very ungentle way and having stopped by Joshua's apartment to get him a few decent clothes, they arrived at the crime scene more or less on time. Jeonghan parked his car at the side of the street right in front of the apartment building. However, before he could get out of the car Joshua grabbed his arm and pointed to the driving mirror with a serious expression. Jeonghan followed his eyes and saw a black vehicle in the mirror that was parking at the end of the street.

"He followed us for the whole ride. When you stopped for me to get into my apartment he stopped as well, and when we drove off he followed us again," Joshua said.

But Jeonghan only shrugged Joshua's doubts off and opened the car door with his unoccupied arm.
"He probably just had the same route we did."

Joshua tightened his grip around Jeonghan's other arm.
"And what about the scene? I mean, do you see any police cars around? Forensics?"

Jeonghan hesitated and looked around. It was true, there were only a few cars parked at the side of the street, not a single one of them belonged to the police. This area in general seemed pretty abandoned - not a single soul to be seen on the street.
"That's truly a bit weird," Jeonghan admitted, seemed to contemplate for a few seconds but then got out of the car anyway. "I'll make sure to keep my hands on the gun then," he called out to Joshua. Said officer remained in the car, staring after Jeonghan, who was on his way to supposed crime scene by now, in disbelief.

After he had overcome the initial confusion, Joshua got out of his car as well, but not without throwing a glance over to the shady looking van again. If it were up to him, he would have called his boss to verify the address first. But his idiot of a partner obviously had to storm into the building without thinking twice. Now Joshua didn't want to waste any time leaving Jeonghan alone in there, so he quickened his pace until he caught up with Jeonghan in the staircase.

To keep it simple, the building was a mess. The white paint on the walls was covered by a thick layer of dirt, spiderwebs and a couple of graffiti, spelling out various curses. Plaster was crumbling from the walls and the stairs didn't look any better. As soon as they had taken a few steps, they noticed how at least every second one sounded like a dying cat. Jeonghan could even have sworn that he had seen a rat disappear into a crack in the wall.

The more stairs they climbed, the more nervous Jeonghan got. It was the same feeling as yesterday when he had seen the message on the mirror, that was floating back into his veins. Not one police officer had crossed their way yet. No forensics in their funny overalls, no witnesses being questioned, nothing. No one seemed to live in this house either, so it was only the two detectives and the squeaking wooden stairs. 

As they arrived on the targeted third floor, they spotted only one apartment door. It was torn off its hinges and therefore more or less open. 
"Something's wrong", Jeonghan whispered, more to himself than to Joshua, "did this idiot Mingyu mix up two addresses again, or what?" 
His colleague shrugged and while approaching the door carefully, they shot each other a short, knowing glance, causing them both to take their guns out of the holsters.

Joshua was the first to enter the apartment at gunpoint. Just as Jeonghan wanted to follow him through the door, his phone vibrated in his pocket. Silently cursing and preparing to scold whoever dared to call him now, he took it out of his pocket, not moving his gun by an inch. Something about the fact that the caller had his number surpressed made him curious and he picked up. His eyes kept moving around swiftly, trying to secure the area.
"Who is this?"

"I'll give you three guesses," murmured an all too familiar voice on the other end of the line. You could literally hear his arrogant grin in only those few words. Jeonghan froze. 

"Who the hell gave you my number?", he spat out, not knowing what to think or feel.

"Why so grumpy this morning? Oh, I forgot, you didn't get much sleep because of me, did you?", he was smiling again, Jeonghan could feel it,"I heard you called that jesus-freak to protect you. Pathetic."
Jeonghan let out an angry snort. He didn't fail to notice with how much hatred and venom S.Coups had pronounced the phrase 'jesus-freak'. It instantly sent Jeonghan back to the day of the trial. Back then, the amount of hatred and venom in his eyes had been equivalent to his voice now. 

"Are you stalking me?!", Jeonghan blurted out. That was a question Jeonghan cold answer himself: Of course he was. That's literally what he did for a living. Amongst other things. Yet Jeonghan was a bit horrified by how much S.Coups actually knew.

"Oh honey, I managed to hack myself into your cell phone and break into your house. Believe me, there isn't much I'm not capable of."

Jeonghan tightened his grip around his gun, his knuckles tensed, clearly not amused by his dialog partner's sassy tone.
"What do you want from me," Jeonghan asked, ignoring S.Coups' previous words.
"Oh, focusing right on the serious stuff, are we?" S.Coups said disappointedly, "Say, haven't you learned - in your police training thingy - that you should never go into an abandoned house alone? Bad things can happen at such places. Maybe an evil vampire wants to bite you. Actually, you don't necessarily have to be a vampire to want to bite people..."
His voice had become noticeably softer and less like bullets hitting Jeonghan’s ear the longer he spoke, but you could still clearly hear a pinch of spite in every word he said.

Jeonghan brought his phone as far away from his ear as he could and hung up, shivering with disgust. He hadn't been prepared to hear his voice again after such a long time. Just now he had been reminded of how much he hated what it did to him. Now that he thought about it, he could have just hung up as soon as he knew who was speaking. But hearing the sound of S.Coups' voice, Jeonghan didn’t even dare to interrupt him. He couldn't. It felt as if he was put under some kind of spell that made him hang onto S.Coups's every word.

But now that his voice was gone, Jeonghan's mind was crystal clear again and the only thing he thought about was Joshua. Not only did S.Coups know where he was and with whom, no, he had also warned Jeonghan. Though, Jeonghan was sure, S.Coups didn't give warnings for nothing. He must have had some evil intentions, he always does. But spending more time thinking about this wouldn't help anyone. Jeonghan had to do something. Now.

He warily peaked trough the tattered door into the apartment and listened carefully but the corridor was completely empty and silent. The wind, making the wooden planks squeak, was the only thing he could hear. Slowly, Jeonghan entered the flat just like Joshua did before, with his gun pointing at anything that seemed suspicious. He passed through the corridor checking every room. But they were all empty. They barely had any furniture, and everything had fallen into a state of disrepair a long time ago.

Finally, he was going to go through the door of the last room as he suddenly lost grip on his gun. A strong pain shot through Jeonghan's hands and he reflexively brought them close to his body. He heard the gun hitting the floor a few meters away from him and felt something cold touching his forehead. As he raised his head again he looked directly into a pair of brown eyes. They seemed completely emotionless and Jeonghan felt like they were directly staring into his soul.

Those eyes belonged to a pale, black haired guy who was now pointing at Jeonghan with a gun that looked quite similar to the ones that the police used. His own was lying on the floor, out of reach, so it must be a different one. Joshua. Jeonghan's eyes darted around the room. Eventually, he spotted his colleague sitting in the corner with his hands tied up and a dirty cloth stuffed into his mouth. He obviously seemed immensely unamused, as he tried to get rid of the handcuffs.

S.Coups had been right. He always was. That was the thing that Jeonghan hated the most about this situation. Having to admit that S.Coups had outsmarted him. Again.

Jeonghan averted his eyes from a struggling Joshua and turned back to the guy standing in front of who still looked like he had better things to do than threatening two detectives in an abandoned building. Without saying anything he took Jeonghan's handcuffs from his belt and started to tie Jeonghan's wrists together behind his back. He was way stronger than Jeonghan, plus, he was still pointing that gun at his head. So unless the detective wanted a hole in his skull, he had no chance but to let all of this happen.

"We are going to go on vacation now. There is someone desperately waiting to see you," the guy said in a deep voice and roughly pulled Jeonghan up from his kneeling position. Without throwing Joshua even one glance he kept pushing Jeonghan towards the door and followed right behind him. Jeonghan could only hear a muffled grumble out of Joshua's direction but with all due respect, he had more important things to do right now than thinking of his friend.

He was being kidnapped at gunpoint and his probable destination was S.Coups' hideout. Panic rose up in Jeonghan and all those suppressed memories and pictures of S.Coups started to appear in front of his mind's eye again, along with it a lot of questions. But the most important one was:

Why was Mingyu working hand in hand with Jeonghan's archenemy?