“Killers, that's what we were."

— Kim Jongdae

Saturday, Four Weeks Ago 

One buzz from that phone and I knew something was wrong. And not the need tech assistance wrong or you might have to come to work tomorrow wrong like Jieun might think, but the this phone only rings if I need a trained killer and people five feet below kind of wrong. 

Though what I read wasn’t anything of the sort. 

In study, first bookshelf on the left. Bottom drawer.  9:43 PM Saturday, Unknown

Code: 147692 9:43 PM Saturday, Unknown 

Mr. Byun’s dead. 10:20 PM Saturday, Unknown 

I was up on my feet before I could register what was happening, or that I had received two messages before the last one. Rather, I heard that familiar rumble of a particular motorcycle shutting off and the accompanying whistle of a man I’d rather kill than see right now. And so, I let all thoughts run from my head as he waltzed through the entrance of the park. 

What was going on? 

“Chen—” Yixing seemed to mock me, his breath catching in his chest as a rough laugh came tumbling out. That gleam was there, right in his eyes, the one that made me stand a little straighter and the hairs on the back of my neck to stand up. “—something’s happened and you. weren’t. there. again.” He drugged out the “something” in a manner only I knew really meant I would have enjoyed having you there, see you squirm at the sight. By the look of his bloodied up lip and the brass knuckles he only wore when he intended to draw it out, that something must have been big.

Mr. Byun is dead. 

In a split second, I had the thought of panicking. What if Mr. Byun was dead? What if he was here to kill me? 

I suppressed the sweat that threatened to break out over my forehead and instead let myself focus on something I never thought would happen. Yixing. Jieun. Me. Poor innocent Jieun caught in this. I felt his eyes fall behind me, onto the one thing I decided I couldn’t, I wouldn't,  let him see. I squared myself fully in front of her, but it seemed not to matter. 

“Who’s the ?” He spit out in a warning I was too familiar with. 

Condition One: No ties, no relationships, no family. 

Condition Two: All those who may expose us are enemies. Enemies die. 

Her grip began to slip from the back of my shirt and all I could imagine was Jieun sitting calmly beside me, her soft, too trusting eyes looking up towards mine as she suddenly is replaced with her splayed out bloodied figure— eyes cold, silently condemning me for what I let him do to her. I forcefully grabbed her wrist before she could use that mouth of hers to start something only I could stop. I was lucky she gave up, a simple tremoring Dae what the is going on?! falling from her lips that I only knew how to ignore. 

I had the thought that in another life, I would be consoling her, I would be terrified of the man in front of me, and I definitely wouldn’t be just as bad as him. But none of that mattered now, I had made my decision a long time ago, and I had made a second decision I couldn’t risk ing up. 

If I wanted out, I couldn’t let her get in the way. 

I steeled my voice in the way I had been taught to, the one that pushed me down and let Chen speak. “None of your concern,” was what he (I) settled on and I felt the light tensing of her presence behind me as Yixing decided it wasn’t worth a fight over and drew his curious eyes away from my side. 

I watched as he nodded slowly at me, the gun in my back pocket that I knew would scare Jieun just as much as the one on Yixing did starting to feel like a heavy weight pulling me down. He clucked his tongue and easily twisted around, a signal that read as we have work to do coming from the quick jerk of his hand as he spoke over his shoulder, “this ones’ gonna shock you.”

Then we were alone and I knew she wanted answers. Answers I couldn’t bear to give her. Answers that filled me with rage and a flesh ripping grief at the realization that I was losing yet another thing I wished I could have kept. 

And so when I turned around, I let her see what I knew would drive her away. I just didn’t know that it would hurt so much. Her brows furrowed in dripping confusion as she took in my words and her small hands fell from mine before turning to tight little fists. I watched as she fled from my side as quickly as she had come, things I wish I could have said sitting restlessly on my tongue. 

I’m so sorry, Jieun. I would have had to say goodbye soon anyways. I just wish it didn’t have to be this way. You were the only thing close to a friend I’ve ever had. Please, though, forget me, forget this.

I swallowed them all down, and once I was sure she was far away, I swallowed Jongdae down too. 

A Few Hours Later, Sunday

The guards were dead. Knocked unconscious. Beat bloody. Lifeless now. 

Mr. Byun was dead. Killed. Stabbed. Stabbed seven times. 

Blood everywhere. The floor. His bed. Down the side of his bed. On my hands. On Baekhyun. Why was there so much blood on Baekhyun? 

And for once, I thought, we wore the same gleam in our eyes. Killers, that’s what we were. 

Dead eyes looking at dead people.

There was a safe, in the bottom left drawer of the bookshelf. 

I went to it once they left. The code had to be entered three times. 

It was empty. Empty all except for bloodied prints on an empty file case. 

Baekhyun wouldn’t stop looking over there. 

I wouldn’t be convinced of his story. 

“What ing happened?” I hated him. I hated that he was able to look scared, look traumatized by blood, look like this was the first person he had seen dead. , it probably was. 

“I—” he was shaking. “He called me to come over, said he had somethin’ important to say.” He couldn’t look me in the eyes. Always so arrogant and demeaning Baekhyun couldn’t look me in the eyes. “When I got here, I found this. I don’t know what happened.” 

I should be shaking, I should be distressed. He wasn’t my father, but he was the closest thing I had and we all know he never loved Baekhyun like a son. But all I felt was numbness. A numbness that left my toes icy and my sweat sticky and my mind blank to it. All blood looked the same. All blood spills eventually. 

It didn’t make sense. “Who would do this?” 

“Another gang?” Yixing offered. I had almost forgotten he was there, unlucky me. 

“No gang would dare.” I only said the obvious, but both of their faces soured like I had poured alcohol on a lit flame. “Only someone on the inside would do this.” 

Baekhyun had been staring at his red stained Gucci loafers like he regretted wearing them more than he regretted seeing his dead father splayed out on the foot of his bed, but at those words of mine, his eyes went shooting up like a revelation came over him. That was when I saw that so familiar gleam. That was when I knew he was hiding something. 

“Oh Sehun…” He slowly remarked as if it was easier to believe if he said it slower. 

Yixing smirked, cracking his knuckles. There was crusted blood under his nails. “We knew that bastard would come back sooner or later. Get his revenge. Seems likely.” 

“Where did you fight?” I directed at Yixing, who looked like he didn’t understand my question, tilting his head. I knew him better than anyone, though, he never just doesn’t understand. “The gun, the brass knuckles, your bloodied lip. Were you here?” 

Baekhyun looked at the corner of the room anxiously. It wasn’t his first time. I was beginning to wonder what was so damn urgent about a ing bookcase. 

“Nah, pretty boy” Yixing smiled. The one that reminded me of the sleek shine of his knife. The one where he was daring me to keep questioning him. “I was having fun before I got here.” 

Baekhyun gulped and looked back down at his feet. 

“Sehun wouldn’t.” I moved on after a second, deciding it best not to continue if I wanted to keep a low profile. “Sehun wants nothing to do with this place anymore. He wouldn’t risk coming back to get caught.” 

“And how would you know that?” Baekhyun spit out, his voice raising an octave despite the small tremor in his hands— always insistent