Seungri wasn't sure how he didn’t panic, considering the fact that he had a psychological breakdown watching a flashlight turning on and off by itself before, and that was nothing, absolutely ing nothing, compared to this. 

To Jiyong being possessed by a ing demon. 

Seungri backed away, stumbling until his back reached the opposing wall, putting even farther distance between himself and the demon, who has since retreated to the far corner of the kitchen, his back on the counter with his one hand massaging his forehead. 

This must be a dream. This can’t be happening. This can’t be true. Jiyong can’t be a d—

“I’m the only demon here.” Jiyong’s joke from what it felt like years ago flashed inside his mind. 

Seungri’s knees turned jelly and he trailed his fingertips against the drywall to guide himself down until he’s sitting. Blood rushed past his ears so fast, so hard and so loud that for a moment it’s all that he could hear. 

After a long, painful moment focusing on his breathing, he finally could bring himself to speak. His voice wavered still as he did. “Is Jiyong still in there somewhere?”

“I am Jiyong,” the demon responded, voice tired-sounding and muffled by his palm, but eerily familiar to his ears.

That’s Jiyong’s voice. Seungri’s teeth clattered when he force-closed his mouth. “How long have you been inside him?”

The demon wearing Jiyong’s skin turned to look at him, bracing his hands on either side of him, fingers curled around the edge of the countertop. “Since he was an infant.”

“I don’t believe you,” Seungri rasped, his eyes growing damp. “You’re lying! You’re ing lying. When did you take him!?”

“Christ,” the demon muttered, pinching the bridge of his nose like Seungri was exhausting him or something. “The baby died in the hospital and I took the body. He was gone by the time I claimed it.”

The bottom dropped out of Seungri’s stomach and he felt like he’s gonna throw up soon. He swallowed the flood of saliva in his mouth, tipping his head back against the wall with a muted thump.

“This can’t be happening.” 

“Ri.”

“This is a ing nightmare.” Seungri drew his knees up and pressed his forehead to one, closing his eyes. The dampness in his eyes starts to leech out into the dark material of his jeans. “This isn’t real.”

There’s a frustrated noise coming from the kitchen and a sound like someone sat down with a huff. “I am real, Ri. Everything that’s happened since we met has been real because this is me. I am Jiyong.”

Seungri sat up again, wiping hastily at his eyes with the heels of his hands while the demon looked pained as he watched, eyebrows drawn together and forehead wrinkled.

“No, it’s all been ing lies because I never knew what you were,” Seungri snapped. “I can’t believe anything you tell me. I can’t believe anything you’ve ever told me at any point since I met you!”

“I have never lied to you!”

“Except everything is a ing lie because you’ve been a demon possessing a dead body the entire time I’ve known you!”

It felt so ludicrous for Seungri to be saying all this, to be screaming at the top of his lung in his own house about this, but he couldn’t help it. The anger, the disbelief, the betrayal, the confusion, the fear— they were all mixing together and exploding out of him.

“This body is mine,” the demon told him heatedly, jabbing at his chest with his forefinger. “You think I possessed him at some random places we went to? ing no! I had to take it through infancy, pissing and ting itself, and through puberty, and ing high school, for ’s sake.”

“You expect me to believe that you have the power to bring a body back from the dead to live inside of it but you don’t have the power to get around acne and awkward boners?!”

“No, the awkward boners were surprisingly a treat for myself.” 

The demon’s tone was casual when he said that and the laugh that bursted out of Seungri felt horrible the second it left him. The demon seemed encouraged, though. He pulled himself to his feet only to pace forward a few steps and lowered himself to his knees near the salt line.

“Ri, please. Search for it. Search for it inside you— have I ever changed since the first day you met me?”

It’s like his own brain was acting on the demon’s command, not his, that it started rummaging his memory, searching deep for any crucial pieces and found nothing against the demon.

“You’ve known me all this time and I’ve never hurt you. I’ve never let anything hurt you.” 

That set off an alarming noise in his head but Seungri had to ignore it for he could only deal with one earth-shattering revelation at a time. 

“You know me.”

“Stop saying that!” 

“It’s ing true!” The demon shouted back. “Stop being so ing scared for two ing seconds and think about it!”

Seungri shoved himself to his feet even though he wasn’t sure that his legs would hold him until he’s already upright. 

The demon, however, stayed on his knees.

“Maybe you don’t consider it lying to keep the fact that you’re the thing I’m more afraid of than literally anything in the world a secret from me but I ing do.” Seungri had to wipe at his running nose with the back of his hand as... as Jiyong looked up at him.

Jesus, this is Jiyong.

His best friend, his co-host, his investigative partner, the guy who kept him from losing his in every haunted location they’ve ever been in, the guy that makes him laugh so hard he could piss himself. The guy he’s slept beside and ing kissed. The guy he wants ing more with.

Wanted more with. 

, he doesn’t know anymore. 

It’s Jiyong. Jiyong’s a demon and has always been a demon.

Seungri couldn’t take it anymore. He felt so sick to his stomach so quickly, that he nearly didn’t make it to the bathroom in time. His knees hurt from how hard they hit the ground, and he’s throwing up before he’s even braced himself over the toilet. 

His stomach lurched until it ached and he’s left with nothing but painful dry heaves and damp eyes. Seungri didn’t know how long he stayed kneeling on the floor, shaking and sweating so much that his shirt sticks to his back, but one thing for sure was that he didn’t feel any better when he hauled himself to an unsteady feet. 

Reaching for the switch with trembling hands, Seungri flipped on the light, flushed the toilet, and rinsed out his mouth without making eye contact with his reflection.

When he’s done cleaning himself up and splashing his face with cold water, he stumbled out into the hallway. There’s no sign of movement in the kitchen but he heard Jiyong’s or the demon’s —whatever, he didn’t ing care anymore— voice call out to him.

“Ri.”

The final piece of his self-preservation must have fled along with the inside of his stomach he projected out and flushed down the toilet earlier because Seungri followed the call of Jiyong’s voice without consideration. He heard the refrigerator door opened and shut and then Jiyong appeared again, tossing him a water bottle. 

Seungri fumbled it to the floor, but Jiyong didn’t mock him like he would have before. Instead he just stood there, looking tired and concerned as Seungri used the bottom of his shirt to twist the top off.

“I don’t know what to do,” Seungri finally spoke, his voice low and hoarse, even after chugging down half the bottle. He cleared his throat but it just made it hurt worse.

Jiyong seemed to consider him for a moment. His shoulders lift in a half-hearted shrug, his hands held out for a moment. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“Neither do I.”

Jiyong made a sound bordered between frustrated and hurt, raking his fingers through his hair, setting it on end in several places. “If I had ever wanted to hurt you, don’t you think I would have done it by now?”

Seungri dropped his gaze. He couldn’t see that look on Jiyong’s face. He’s never seen anything resembling the pleading that Jiyong did just now nor heard that sort of desperation in that voice.

“That’s not really comforting,” Seungri told the floor.

“It should be! We’ve been alone in all of your little nightmare places, and I’ve never hurt you. Or let you get hurt.”

The renewed twisting in his stomach was entirely unwelcome. Seungri might puke again. “Stop,” he practically whispered.

“I would never hurt you, Ri.”

“Shut up.”

“I love you.”

“.” Seungri covered his face with his free hand. “ you. Stop talking. I don’t—you don’t even—how could you possibly even feel that way?!” Seungri dropped his hand and met Jiyong’s eyes again but he couldn’t hold his gaze for long. “This is a ing—this is bull. I’m so ing stupid.”

The silence dragged on between them until it’s so far past uncomfortable that Seungri couldn’t stand it but he let it lingered still, because he had no ing idea what he’s supposed to say or do now, let alone to response to that ridiculous confession. 

“If you want me to leave you, I will,” Jiyong said at great length, his voice flat.

Seungri looked up again and fixed his gaze somewhere around Jiyong’s shoulder. 

“I’ll go and I won’t come back to you or work or anything.” 

Seungri’s eyes stung with tears and he had to avert his eyes away again.

“But absolutely no one can know about this. You have to let me out of here.”

That thought did crossed Seungri’s mind. The thought of reaching out to someone else, someone in power, a priest maybe, about this information but he knew that seeking anyone else out, with this crazy revelation, would mean the end of Jiyong. 

And, if he’s really, truly honest with himself, he didn’t want that.

“I’ll leave this body, if I have to.”

Seungri’s heart pounded hard against his ribs. “What?”

“If you won’t let me out of here, I’ll leave this body and go. I can’t take it across the line but I myself can go out any other way.”

. Seungri hadn’t considered that. Jiyong’s body was trapped in his kitchen but the... spirit or soul or whatever the that the actual demon Jiyong was made out of wasn’t confined to its physical form. It could dispel itself from the body and then leave it behind, lying on Seungri’s kitchen floor.

His skin crawled at the thought. It would be like Jiyong just collapsed and died in his kitchen, and that made the sour twist in his stomach even worse.

Jiyong watched Seungri in silence as he had the biggest internal debate of his life. Seungri tossed his water bottle onto the couch and paced a few steps away, hands pulling through his hair before settling them on shakily his hips. 

Seungri was trying to approach this logically but his brain had finally, officially melted and all he had left was the voice at the back of his head and the sharp ache in his chest.

Demon’s always on the top of his things-that-top-tier-terrifying list, and finding out Jiyong’s one was just beyond anything he could ever fathom. Seungri could feel every ing cell in his body was throwing warning to him, flashing red emergency light to signal his brain that there’s a danger near him. There’s a predator very close in proximity to him and he needed to ing run and save himself.

Yet, it honestly felt like he’s both terrified and not at all afraid of Jiyong now. Because Jiyong’s right. If Jiyong had ever wanted to hurt him or drag his soul to hell or whatever the was that demons do, Jiyong could’ve done it an innumerable amount of times before now. 

Or, maybe Seungri’s rationalising it to himself because they’ve been friends for so long. Or because Jiyong made him weak in the knees and felt safer than he’s ever felt in his life. Or maybe Jiyong just had him in his thrall and Seungri only felt brave now because he’s being compelled to want to let Jiyong free.

Maybe, maybe, maybe. All of the maybes were ing exhausting and Seungri was suddenly so tired. He’s so done with everything that he didn’t care anymore. 

The only thing Seungri could think of now was that he wanted Jiyong to go but he didn’t want it to be forever. He wanted the chance to think about this when he wasn’t nauseated and on the verge of a frankly embarrassing amount of tears and especially not in front of Jiyong’s ing face. 

With a deep breath, he summoned more courage than he thinks he’s ever had in his life, and approached the salt line. 

Jiyong straightened, shoulders pulling back and their eyes met. Jiyong looked so ing sad, Seungri almost couldn’t stand it.

“Back up,” he said quietly.

Jiyong retreated several steps. 

Seungri fisted his shaking hands tight and drew his foot through the salt. Jiyong didn’t move as Seungri dragged his feet to the front door, unlocked it and pulled it open. 

Their eyes met again and Jiyong pushed himself off from the counter. Weariness beat out any lingering fear as Jiyong drew up close. Jiyong paused when they’re close enough to touch and stuck his feet into his shoes. Jiyong looked at him when he’s done.

Seungri swallowed the ache lingering at the back of his throat. “Don’t—don’t go away for good.” When he heard the relieved exhale Jiyong let out, Seungri closed his eyes and pressed his forehead to the side of the door, his sweaty palm shook around the doorknob.

“Okay,” Jiyong said, stepping out the door when Seungri said nothing else, but paused before Seungri shut it. “Thank you.”

“Just go,” Seungri told him, shaking his head against the edge of the door, couldn’t bring himself to even throw Jiyong one last look, afraid he’ll change his fragile mind. “Please.”

When Seungri had shut and locked himself up inside his bedroom, he didn’t feel anything but numb. And when he finally slept that night, he dreamed of Daegu over and over again.

*****

Seungri’s glad he didn’t work for anyone but himself. He’s glad he could follow his own flexible schedule, and not bound to some companies, so he didn’t have to apply any sort of leaves if he didn’t feel like working because he’s sure would abuse the out of it now, as he couldn’t bring hims