When Yongguk's eyes opened, he wasn't sure where he was. The roof was white, the walls white the floor white below the red, orange, green and yellow rag rug spread across it. His neck was stiff and his back ached, and at thirty-one years, he didn't think he'd ever felt this old. One turn of his head to the right had him looking through a glass wall towards the Unit's empty morgue, and finally he remembered the night before, when he'd come down into the lab below their HQ in the hopes of convincing Junhong to go home and get some rest like a normal person. It didn't exactly go how he'd planned, but then again neither did anything when one Canadian Doctor was involved.

He still remembered the day they'd met, like he could ever forget that. He'd been convinced to attend an international Policing and Security conference in Tokyo alongside the police commissioner and a handful of representatives in black coats he assumed were NIS, and he'd never felt so in over his head in his life. The Unit was still new, and it had been made clear to him early on that he had been chosen as a prospective leader, and that had been his first taste of bureaucracy. The whole thing was endless. There were talks, stalls selling products to assist in espionage like it was some kind of kids gaming convention, but in place of trading cards and fan paraphernalia it was tiny weapons concealed in pens, and cameras the size of needle points. The whole thing felt more wrong than he could have possibly imagined, and while the commissioner and some of her men in black went outside to inspect the newest models of covert weaponry, he wandered the halls and waded through the crowds on his own, hoping to find a familiar face.

He'd been half-heartedly admiring a selection of surveillance tools when someone said, “Ah, Bang. Just the man I was looking for.”

When Yongguk looked up, one of the Commissioner's people, Jin Shinyoung, was approaching with three men at her side. Two of them were older, one bald the other desperately clinging on to what hair remained, and both dressed impeccably in grey suits. Yongguk first guessed they were American, but there was something about the way they stood with straight spines, and frown lines around their mouths that really made them look uniquely British. It was the third man who caught his attention, though. He was much younger, not any older than nineteen or twenty, and he stood between the other two, towering over them all, and while he seemed to be dressed in a similarly stitched up suit, he looked relaxed without a tie, and the first few buttons of his shirt undone. Black hair was falling into his dark eyes, and while the two elder men held their hands out for Yongguk to shake, he looked disinterestedly around the room like he didn't want to be there at all. Yongguk could relate.

Shinyoung gestured to the men she stood with, and announced in perfect English, “May I introduce you to Doctor John Stephenson and Doctor William Cooper of MI6.”

“It's a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Bang. We have heard a lot about you from the Commissioner.” The bald man said, Yongguk wasn't sure if he was Stephenson or Cooper, but nor did he really care that much.

“The pleasure is mine.” He replied, hoping his accent wasn't too strong.

Almost-bald shook Yongguk's hand a moment later, then gestured behind him at the third man, “Can we introduce you to our student, Doctor Jamie Wilson-Choi.”

The younger finally turned and looked at Yongguk again, his lips pressing together before they spread wide into a smile over straight teeth, and two deep dimples dented into his cheeks, “It's nice to meet you.” He greeted, his accent was thick and Canadian, and his hand was warm and firm in Yongguk's own.

“It's nice to meet you, too.”

They'd met again at the event dinner that evening. The room was ablaze with conversation as people from agencies all across the globe carried on meaningless stories about nothing as though this was a friendly work function, not a smörgåsbord of spies. Yongguk hated networking, and he was deep in thought about how it should have been Himchan there instead of him when someone dropped down into the empty seat to his right and commented in perfect Korean, “You make them nervous.”

He lowered his chopsticks and turned his head to see Jamie Wilson-Choi curiously looking down at the food on his plate, then glancing up to gesture with his eyes towards Stephenson and Cooper deep in conversation opposite them. Their brows were furrowed and heads bowed as they murmured between themselves, clearly not wanting to be heard.

“Why?” Yongguk asked.

The doctor tipped his head and hummed, then took a moment to eat a mouthful of the food as he considered his response.

“MI6 is a powerful agency. They're used to having their fingers in every pie, and knowing everything that's going on, but there have been whispers all around this place that South Korea is planning another agency. Then there's you: obviously not NIS from the way you dress, but not one of Madame Commissioner's helpers, either, or else you'd be hovering around her like the rest of them.” He glanced down the table to where the Commissioner sat mid discussion with a Russian representative, NIS agents in their black suits stationed around her and Jin Shinyoung at her right hand. Dr. Wilson-Choi shrugged and sent Yongguk a grin, “So if you're not NIS, nor one of the Commissioner's cronies, you're representing something else, and not knowing what makes them nervous.”

Yongguk nodded and took a hold of his drink to take a long sip so he could consider this before replying. When he glanced across the table, Cooper (or maybe Stephenson- who knows) was looking at him, but averted his gaze as soon as they met eyes.

His lips quirked into a half smile, “And how about you?” He asked with a sidelong glance towards the Canadian, “How do you feel, Doctor Wilson-Choi?”

Wilson-Choi met his challenge with a boyish grin, “Interested.” He replied, then offered out his hand to reintroduce himself, “I prefer Junhong over Jamie these days.”

“Junhong.” Yongguk smiled back and shook his hand again, “So tell me... How would you feel about visiting Korea?”

Yongguk rubbed a hand down his face and pushed himself up from the couch, then stretched his arms up and over his head with a low groan. The labs were cold, they always were, and the goosebumps rising across his chest and back were enough to send him searching for where he'd left his shirt the night before. He spied it laying across Junhong's chair and pulled it on over the sweatpants he kept in his locker for nights just like that, then turned again towards the door that separated the office from the lab beyond. Usually, Junhong kept the door between them open, but that morning it was closed and Yongguk gazed for a long moment through the glass panel to where their Doctor sat leaning over a tub of burnt out car bits with his broken right arm held tight against his chest in its sling, and his clumsy left trying to make up for it. He'd come a long way from the cheeky boy Yongguk had met in Tokyo too many years before, and when he looked at their Junnie now, he wondered if MI6's Dr. Jamie Wilson-Choi still existed.

Yongguk didn't bother finishing getting dressed beyond tugging on his shoes before he was pulling open the door and moving to lean against its frame, “How do you sleep on that couch?” He asked while rubbing at the back of his neck.

Junhong didn't look up as he sorted between the tubs, searching for something, “It wasn't made for two people.”

“It wasn't made for one.” Yongguk could hear the almost-chastising tone in his voice.

Finally, Junhong turned his head and glanced up at him with a faint smile on his lips and the softness of his expression had Yongguk lurching forward and coming closer. He looked freshly showered, he was wearing different clothes from what he'd slept in, and his hair was still damp and fluffy from being washed and rubbed dry and once Yongguk was standing behind him, he could smell the faint aroma of fruit and sugar.

“You smell like my shampoo.” He said softly as he leant down and nudged the crown of his head with the tip of his nose.

“I ran outta mine.” The Doctor replied absently, his eyes were still focused on the tubs in front of him as his left hand sorted through until in a force of movement, he pushed them away and growled out his frustration.

Yongguk pulled back slightly, though didn't pull his hand from Junhong's shoulder. It was because he wanted it to be a comfort to Junhong, and he didn't pause to think about how it was a comfort to him.

“Something is bothering you.” He simply prompted.

“Of course something is bothering me!” Junhong bit, “My ing arm is useless and I have tub after tub of nothing! What the hell am I supposed to find from loose bits of burnt plastic, I need to go through the car, I need to look over every inch but getting this bit by bit is pointless!”

The director looked down over Junhong's shoulder. It had been less than two days since his arm had been broken, and it had to be causing a great lot of pain, but he'd refused any medication for it. It disrupts my concentration he'd said. Yongguk had tried to argue that so would monumental amounts of pain but the doctor always knew best. He sighed and gently started to rub his thumb along the spot right where Junhong's neck and shoulders met, feeling the tension in the muscle there.

“I wish you'd let me take you home so you could rest.” He tried, but any progress he'd made in relaxing Junhong was reversed when he felt him seize up all over again under his hands.

“I can't do this, Hyung.” He paused, and Yongguk waited. There'd been a time when such a sentence would make his chest tighten and his throat hurt, but he'd learnt a lot since then. About himself, and about Junhong, and about the chasm between them neither was willing to cross, “This lab, this place, it's brilliant, but this kind of evidence... A whole car. I need a bigger space, I need people to help me look. There was something in there or else they wouldn't have blown it up, and I need to find what it was they were so desperate to destroy.”

He knew their headquarters, in all of its brilliance, could never be perfect and he paused to allow his thoughts to take the road they needed. He knew what he had to do, the thing was, he wasn't entirely sure he could do it. Instead of saying that out loud, however, he dipped his head to press his lips to the top of Junhong's head, “I'll see what I can do.”

*

The third day in Busan was spent examining more files and extra documents. They'd come through from Youngjae long past midnight, when he was still working, and Himchan and Jongup were fast asleep, and when none of the agents based in the Unit's Seoul headquarters had heard from them before midday, they called. Jongup slept through the first three, but the fourth disturbed him enough that he pressed his face down deeper into his pillow with a low groan. An arm was wrapped loosely around his middle, and one of Himchan's legs had slipped between his during the night, and when Jongup shifted to reach out for his phone, he held on tighter.

“No...” Himchan groaned, trying to pull him in closer to his chest and stop him from moving. Jongup couldn't help but smile, and he resisted the sound for a moment.

“They'll panic if we don't answer.” He reminded Himchan, whose nose was pressing into his back just below his shoulder blade while his palm pressed flat against his chest to keep him in place.

“Warm.” Was Himchan's entire argument.

Unfortunately, it wasn't quite enough, and through his persistent protests, Jongup managed to slip free from his hold and rise from bed. The carpet felt scratchy under his feet, and Jongup itched along the expanse of his chest as he assured Daehyun they'd just overslept. They'd been working late into the night, he lied, and they'd needed their rest. He figured there were some revelations they could keep to themselves.

The call ended with a promise to look at the files, and then Jongup tossed the phone aside so he could peek through the curtains down at the street, and pretend he didn't know Himchan was watching him.

“Overslept.” He said, amused, and Jongup glanced over his shoulder.

“Well we did, didn't we?” He grabbed his boxers from where he'd left them on the lid of his laptop, and pulled them on.

“Among other things.” Himchan grinned and pushed himself up to sit, though winced at the stretch to his side. It was tender, and the bruising ached when he moved, “Why did you let me exert myself?”

“You didn't seem to mind last night” Jongup quirked a brow.

“Well I was distracted.” Himchan replied.

They both got up and showered, and while Jongup started sorting through the documents Youngjae had sent, Himchan stepped out of the room for a cigarette and a search through the building's vending machines in the hopes there would be something that resembled a meal. He discovered another one in the hall downstairs and triumphantly returned with a variety of dried ramen they ate together on the bed using the room's ancient kettle and water from the shower head. It wasn't exactly the most conventional morning after Jongup had experienced, but he had to admit, it was one of the better ones.

Most of the documents were about members of Lee Taejin's notorious Golden Lotus that Youngjae had found in prison records from the nineties, the rest covered murders, monkshood and cyanide. Jongup was midway through a graphic post-mortem report from 1997 when Himchan set aside the laptop he'd been reading on and leant back against the headboard. He'd been seated on the bed since that morning, while Jongup went from sitting beside him, to standing by the window, then eventually ended up where he was now laying half across the foot of the bed with his feet firmly planted on the floor.

“You never told me about your brothers.” Himchan said.

Jongup lowered his laptop and turned towards him, “What about them?” He asked.

“I saw the photo of the three of you in your book case. You look alike.” Himchan yawned and covered his mouth with one hand, while the other closed his computer lid. Jongup realised then they'd been working without a break for more than seven hours, between the curtains he could see that it was starting to get dark.

“People say that, I can't see it much. Jongho is the eldest, he's thirty in June, and Jonghwan is almost twenty-eight. Jongho-hyung started working at a high school last September, near where we grew up, Jonghwan is in a restaurant. He started as just an assistant, but he's probably getting close to being a chef now.” He hated that he didn't know, but it had been a long time since he convinced himself it was too late to ask.

“They're a lot older than you.”

“Mm.” Jongup laughed and tucked a hand under his head, “My parents used to say I was their happy surprise.”

“Happy surprise. I like that.” Himchan laughed and closed his eyes. He guessed he didn't see Jongup as much different from that himself.

A thought occurred to Jongup and he pushed himself up to sit. For a beat, he just looked at Himchan, then he said “I never asked you your sister's name.”

The guilt in his voice made Himchan smile. It was small, just a tug at the corner of his lips, but it was there, “Kim Yejin.”

“Yejin.” Jongup repeated with a smile, knowing he would remember that. He could hear the way Himchan's voice brightened when he said her name, and he figured he'd be encouraging him to do that more often.

Himchan folded his hands over his lap and blinked open his eyes, Jongup asked, “Is she why you joined the Unit?”

“No.” He replied immediately, then hesitated and corrected, “Kind of. I refused to join, Yongguk talked me around. I guess it was for both of them.”

“It must have been difficult to watch the police let the culprit get away.” Jongup noted. He was staring up at the roof, at where cracks were forming in the white paint and small bits were starting to flake away. If he squinted, it looked like sheets of ice spread out over water, showing their fragility in the early spring sun and fragmenting into floating platforms waiting to be washed out to sea.

Himchan didn't reply. Instead, he shifted over the mattress to lay down on his back beside Jongup with their shoulders touching and looked up. Yellow stains were spreading along the skirting board where the walls and roof met, probably from some rain that managed to seep its way through cracks and crevices sometime during the autumn.

“She'd have liked you.” He said eventually.

“Why's that?” Jongup asked and turned his head. Himchan blinked slowly, his eyes unwavering as he stared up at the roof and Jongup started to count his eyelashes as they fluttered open and closed, open and closed.

“I don't know.” Himchan admitted, then turned his head to look back at Jongup, “I just think she would've.”

It was the first time Jongup had the chance to see Himchan properly close up, and he found himself taking in the sight of him bit by bit and he liked the opportunity to just look. The first day he'd met Himchan, he remembered seeing him smile and noting how natural it looked on his face, but now he could see the way lines were forming around his mouth from years of frowning, and how three little creases fit between his brows that deepened when he furrowed them together. Jongup lifted a hand and gently pressed the pad of his thumb between his eyebrows to smooth the creases out.

“They'll stick.” He said, in not much more than a whisper.

“I think they already have,” Himchan replied. He was smiling, and Jongup agreed with himself again because it was true, there wasn't anyone else who suited a smile quite like Kim Himchan.

He ran his thumb from Himchan's forehead over one of his eyebrows and smoothed down the hairs, then pulled back altogether but then instead it was Himchan's turn. Once Jongup's hand had returned to his side, Himchan's own lifted and his palm brushed slowly over the angle of Jongup's cheekbone, then down along his jaw until he was gently drawing him in closer. Their noses touched once, then twice, then a third time, until Himchan tipped his head and their lips brushed. Jongup closed his eyes and just let the warmth wash over him, waiting patiently for lips to touch his as Himchan took his time.

Instead, he got a ringtone and both of them jolted from the intimacy of their moment. Himchan hesitated, and Jongup thought for a second he was going to let it ring out, but he pulled back to sit and grabbed the phone from beside his laptop to answer.

“What is it?” He said and rubbed a hand down over his face.

“Hey it's Dae.” Daehyun's cheerful voice filled the receiver, “You been going over the documents Youngjae found?”

“Yeah.” Himchan replied. He poked half heartedly through the file Sun's people had given them two days before, “You? How are you going?”

“We're all doing well. Actually, we think we've found something.”

Himchan looked up, and Jongup met his eyes, “Go on.”

It was a warehouse, in a shipping yard not far at all from where Himchan and Jongup were holed up in their hotel room. Youngjae had been the one to find it, of course. Someone had off handedly mentioned it in a Police interview two decades before, and with a brief search through property indexes, he discovered it hadn't been sold since it was bought in the eighties by Golden Lotus.

The phone call ended with Himchan agreeing that they would go and check it out, and reluctantly both stood to dress for the cold winds coming down from the mountains north of Busan, and hoped that the snow and rain wouldn't be back just yet.

While Himchan was winding his scarf around his neck, Jongup picked up a torch he'd left on the floor the night before while he'd been searching through his bag for a . He'd pulled out his first aid kit, then the torch and set them both aside, next he grabbed a sweater and a knife and Himchan chuckled from where he'd been laying back on the bed, propped up on his elbows.

“What don't you have in that bag?” He asked, amused.

Jongup had rolled his eyes with the square foil package in hand and didn't bother answering. Instead, he slipped from his boxers and Himchan caught him in his arms, and then they didn't have any need to do much talking.

“Ready?” Himchan asked from by the door and Jongup pocketed the torch.

“Ready.” He confirmed.

They exited through the hotel's back door and turned left, then right, then left again to wind their way through the tangle of streets between them and the water. At every corner, Himchan would peer around it, just to make sure the route was clear, while Jongup searched through the darkness behind them for surety that they weren't being followed until they slipped through a hole cut into the four metre tall chain link fence that marked the perimeter of the yard.

“What are we going to do if this place is full of Golden Lotus thugs?” Jongup asked as they strode across vacant lots between a graveyard of empty containers to the dark mass of the warehouse.

“We sneak.” Himchan replied with a lopsided grin.

Surprisingly, getting in was the easy part. The first door they tried was locked, but after fiddling with three of the nearby windows, one jolted out and Jongup managed to pry it open just enough for them both to climb through. He went in first, then Himchan followed, and soon they were standing side by side in the almost-black of the dark warehouse.

“It doesn't sound like anyone's here.” Himchan noted softly, as they came up to their fourth doorway but he still pressed his back to the frame and peered around the corner to confirm he was right. The first few rooms were small, probably offices, some with furniture stacked up and decaying in the corner, others entirely empty, but each one brought them further and further into the building.

“It doesn't look like anyone's been here for a while.” Jongup agreed and followed him through to the next room. The floor was dusty, and when Jongup tried a light switch on the wall, the bulbs flickered and flashed, then died again. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the torch, but even with the stream of yellow light, not much could be said about the building. White paint was peeling off the old walls and crumbling onto the ground below, and the windows built high up near the ceiling were so caked with dust and grime it was impossible to see through them.

A pile of broken chairs was stacked in the middle of the room, and Himchan approached to nudge at them with his foot while Jongup moved to peer through the next doorway. He flashed his torch around, then quirked an eyebrow as it illuminated a neatly stacked pile of wooden boxes, much like the ones they'd seen being carried off the boat near The Rook two nights before.

“Hyung, over here.” He called and Himchan looked up.

“Hyung, huh?” He asked as he came closer and Jongup rolled his eyes.

“Unless you'd rather I call you Agent.” He said.

Himchan chuckled low, and brushed his hands along Jongup's hips as he stepped past him and into the next room, “Hyung is fine, baby.”

Something pulled at Jongup's lips as he followed as Himchan started trying the lids. The first three boxes were empty, and the rest were sealed with heavy screws, and Himchan sailed a hard kick into the side of one to vent out his frustration.

“Hyung, look.” Jongup said, while swiping a hand over the top, "There's no dust on these. They've been placed here recently.”

“Help me find something to pry the lids off.” Himchan replied. Jongup put the torch down on top of the boxes to illuminate the room in dim light as they moved to the perimeters to search through the piles of broken furniture left there to rot. Himchan picked up the old leg of a table, but when he tested its strength between his hands, the wood snapped and crumbled from the damp that had seeped deep into its grain and so he tossed it aside. On the other side of the room, Jongup was sifting through an array of metal bars constructed to cover up glass windows, trying to find one loose enough to be implemented as a crow bar when the light of their torch flickered then went out and they were both plunged into darkness.

Jongup groaned. “You okay?” Himchan asked.

“Yeah, but I can't see .” Jongup's eyes searched blindly in the hopes of catching movement.

“Neither but-” Himchan paused, there was a shuffling sound coming from not far away and both men went completely still, “Did you hear that?”

Jongup swallowed, but just as he was about to reply, he felt the nozzle of a gun press into the small of his back, and a voice said low right in his ear, “Hands where I can see them.”

Calmly, Jongup lifted his arms into the air either side of his head, “Himchan.” He warned sharply until he heard another voice from across the room grunt.

“Don't move.”

“Ah.” Himchan said, in a voice way too calm for the gravity of their current situation, “Looks like this is a trap.”

____

A/N: Thanks so much for reading, I hope you enjoyed it!  Any feedback/comment is always appreciated. I may not continue posting this here and just stick to posting on Ao3 but I'm not sure. xo