“!” Heechul cursed, hanging up the phone in his apartment. “That bastard Ren isn’t answering!”

Hongki looked nervously from the two unconscious gang members on the carpet to his friend helplessly trying to get in contact with someone who could direct them to Donghae. Since Jaejoong had left with Heechul’s cell phone, neither he nor Hongki actually had Donghae’s number, or any idea where to contact him.

“He’s not answering!” Heechul said. “It’s been forty five minutes! Ren is the only person who knows Donghae’s new number, apart from my cell phone!”

Heechul rammed his digits into the keypad, furiously dialling on the base of the phone which sat on his kitchen counter.

The dial tone sounded in his ear again, but after almost twelve rings, nobody answered.

“Why the won’t he answer?!” Heechul barked, slamming the phone down and running his fingers though his hair. “If we can’t get through to Donghae, he won’t know Jaejoong and Yunho are on their way to blow them to smithereens!”

Hongki continued to pace nervously, tapping the barrel of his gun against the edge of the couch.

“Well, at least Donghae’s with Hyukjae, right?” Hongki reassured him. “Even if it takes a while to get through, Donghae is a lot more capable of standing up to those two. Not to mention, the safe house is loaded with firearms. Donghae is all set.”

Heechul bit his fingertip. He had faith in Donghae to protect Hyukjae, but he knew that if he didn’t get a warning through to Donghae, that things would be bad. And of course, it was all Heechul’s fault.

He tried Ren again, desperately hoping  he would pick up in a time of such emergency.

I pulled the car up onto the side of the road, turning off the engine and sinking down into my seat. Now of all times I couldn’t risk being spotted by anyone. I sat, waiting for Kyuhyun to show up at our arranged location. Not only was I happy to be seeing my closest friend after over four months, I was relatively curious as to how he managed to escape captivity in a building full of armed police officers. I had plenty to ask, and yet we had so much to do.

I had waited almost twenty minutes until finally, Kyuhyun showed up, not in a car as expected, but on a motorcycle. Even though he was wearing a helmet, I could tell it was Kyuhyun, simply because there was nobody else around for miles. Normally, a busy location would have been more ideal, because we had a chance to blend in with people, but for Kyuhyun who was in immediate danger of being caught, we had to settle for the outskirts of the city.

I watched as Kyuhyun left his helmet on, stepping off the bike and coming towards the car. I unlocked the door and he settled himself in the seat beside me.

Then after he pulled the door shut, sealing us both completely within the darkened windows of the car, did he take of his headgear, revealing a familiar, unchanged face.

“Hey.” He said, ping his jacket to give himself room to breathe.

“I’m so glad you’re okay.” I replied. “I heard you were arrested. Hyukjae and I came all the way from America to get the files from SM. I heard they’re running background check regarding myself.”
Kyuhyun sighed, a long, exhausted sigh.

“I managed to get myself the out of there,” Kyuhyun said. “But I would have never been able to get back into SM y’know.”

“Well, Heechul bailed on us at the last second,” I explained, still meaning to find out what that was all about.

“How did you get yourself in?” Kyuhyun asked, prompting me to explain the entire operation, starting from the airport, then to Ren and to how I had sent Hyukjae in as my little secret agent.

The cutest secret agent there ever was.

“Not bad Donghae.” Kyuhyun said, nodding in approval. “You never fail to impress me.”

“Yeah, well, we make a good team.” I smiled, happy to hear the monotonous voice of my friend.

Kyuhyun turned in his seat, eyeing me up and down.

“You look very tan.” Kyuhyun pointed out. “And your hair looks stupid, you need a haircut.”

I laughed at Kyuhyun’s blunt nature, automatically bringing my hands to run through my hair.

“We’ve been living in Miami.” I told him. “Hyukjae and I.”

“And where is Hyukjae?” Kyuhyun asked, looking over his shoulder to check the backseat.

My mind flickered to Hyukjae, who was probably done with shutting down the system by now, and who was most likely awaiting my return. I smiled at the very thought.

“He’s at the safe house.” I sighed. “I gave him the codes and told him to erase the last of our systems.”

Kyuhyun and I fell silent for a moment, realising what that meant.

“So I guess the last four years of hard work is all coming to an end.” Kyuhyun said, probably sounding a lot more unconcerned than he really was. I knew that Kyuhyun put the most work out of anyone into the entire operation. It was our whole lives up until the point I had met Hyukjae. Part of me thought that maybe we wouldn’t have been discovered in the first place if I hadn’t been distracted by falling in love, and I would have caught onto the fact that Seunghyun had followed me to Mokpo. Not that I regretted meeting Hyukjae in the slightest bit; he was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. I just felt bad for Kyuhyun. Partially for destroying a lifetimes worth of his hard work and dedication, and also for the fact that after this had all blown over, I got to spend the rest of my life with the man I loved, and Kyuhyun didn’t really have anyone. And he certainly wasn’t the social type.

“I guess it is.” I said in response to his earlier statement.

When discussing the arrangements to clean up the rest of the stuff at Kyuhyun’s apartment, as it turned out, the police had already taken all of his equipment in as evidence.

“I was only able to sneak back there this morning,” He said. “All I took was what I could fit in my bag, and Choco of course, who I left back at Hongki’s place until I’m all set to go.”

“Where are you going to go Kyu?” I asked, turning to my friend. “After here, where are you planning to relocate to?”

“I think I’m going to stay here.” Kyuhyun said, much to my surprise. “I like Korea. And you know I’ve never been much the type to travel the world.”

I laughed at this. It was so Kyuhyun-like to say something like that.

“I figured I’d just move to a different city.” Kyuhyun continued. “Stay off the charts, all that stuff. I’m sure I can manage.”

“I never doubted that Kyu.” I chuckled, knowing that Kyuhyun was even more capable of keeping himself out of danger than myself.

“You need to watch yourself though.” Kyuhyun warned. “You and Hyukjae. They lost me, and of course, they will never be able to find me. They have a description, but I have my ways of keeping out of the way. But you know that Seunghyun won’t give up his search on you. It’s more to him than just a case now. You have been the only thing on his mind for the past three years. Finding you is possibly his way of life by now. Even if the agency calls off the search, Seunghyun will never stop, even if it kills him. He doesn’t care about me, or Hyukjae or even finding out who else is behind this whole operation. He wants only one thing, and that is to see you locked up for the rest of your life.”

I felt the smallest inkling of fear, not for me, but for Hyukjae. My entire life, I had never been afraid of being caught. I had never even been concerned with dying. It just never phased me. But now that I had Hyukjae, I needed to re-think my priorities. Now the only thing I cared about was keeping Hyukjae safe, and sticking around to live my entire life with him. I knew Seunghyun would never give up. He would stop at nothing to find me, and take Hyukjae out of my life forever.

“There you go with your psychological analysis again.” I said sarcastically. “You know, you really could have made something of yourself. Like, you could have been the world’s best criminal psychologist, like L from Death Note or something. And yet, the both of us found our way to the dark side.”

“Who says I wanted to make something of myself?” Kyuhyun retorted. “And who said I didn’t? The both of us pulled in over a billion dollars with this scam over a period of three years, and I’m not even twenty one yet. We are criminal masterminds, Donghae. And better still, we actually got away with it. We outsmarted police on several occasions. Who says that isn’t an accomplishment? Plus, you are with the love of your life. You and Hyukjae have something that some people spend their entire life searching for. The way I see it, we did make something of ourselves, Donghae. We really did.”

Kyuhyun’s words began to sink in. He was right. I had Hyukjae. Nothing else mattered. As long as I kept him safe, everything else was history.

“I guess you’re right.” I said, smiling at my expressionless friend.

I dug the files out of my bag, handing over the pink folder to Kyuhyun, who stuffed the whole set of documents into his jacket.

“That’s the last of everything.” I said. “The raw coding for everything. You know what to do with it.”

Kyuhyun nodded, and I had only just realised I had been away from Hyukjae for almost an hour, and I really should be getting back soon. Besides, we couldn’t afford to risk the fact that at any moment, someone could go past and realise something was up.

“Well, I guess I should get back to Hyukjae.” I sighed, knowing that this was probably the last time I would ever see my friend of almost nine years. “But good luck with everything.”

“Send me a postcard from Miami.” Kyuhyun joked, “I’ll take care of everything else, you just take Hyukjae and get the out of here. See you in another life, yeah?”

I laughed, about to say my final goodbyes to my best fr