I.

A small, fragile teenage boy, looking no older than seventeen, struggled wildly as two very buff men tied his hands and legs together, tightly, with rope and forced him to kneel down before their boss; Seo In Guk.

“Well, well, well,” Mister Seo In Guk, a forty-eight year old drug dealer, let out a sinister laugh as he watched the poor human writhe helplessly. “Kid, did you really think that I wouldn’t find out that you were smoking my , when your ing job is to sell it and bring me my money? ing with my is like ing with my emotions, did you know?”

“P-Please, I will do better,” the helpless boy shook with fear. “Give m-me another chance, please!”

“Oh no, no, no,” In Guk wagged his finger. “No can do, my friend. I don’t play that second chances . You ed me over once, what makes you think that I’ll believe you won’t do it again?”
In Guk glanced to his right, where Choi Minho, his right-hand man, his favorite, his son, stood. Though, he wasn’t exactly Minho’s biological father, but he raised the little so he better get the title as his father. “Minho-ah, you know what to do.” He stood from his chair. “Please clean up afterwards, I don’t want this place smelling like dead, okay?” In Guk and his two henchmen, that dragged the teenage boy in, took their leave.

“P-Please!” the boy pleaded to Minho. “I’m sorry! I’m really sorry! I was wrong! I was really, really wrong! Have mercy! Oh, please, I’m too young to die!” His pleads had no effect on the cold-hearted man that stood before him.

Minho had a deadly look on his face as he cocked his revolver.
The boy tried to inch away, but his restraints just made him fall on his behind. Minho watched, amused by his attempts. He took one step forward and finally the teenage boy could at least see what he looked like.

“M-Mr. Ch-?” Before he could finish his sentence Minho put a bullet in between his eyes.

He put his revolver back in the holster as he knelt down next to the still corpse, finally noticing the clothes he had on. It was a school uniform. Genie High’s school uniform.

“Rest in peace,” he smirked, reading the boy’s name tag. “Lee Taemin.”

He showed no remorse or even a little hint of guilt as he walked out of the crack house.

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

“Oh, you’re here?” Kim Jonghyun, Minho’s roommate, looked up from the pot of ramen that he was cooking. “How was work today?”

“Eh, it was the usual,” Minho came behind and peaked over his head, which was an easy task considering that Jonghyun was barely five feet tall. “Ramen? Smells good.” He rested his chin atop of Jonghyun’s head.

Jonghyun and Minho have been living together for half a year now. They first met each other at the super market, both trying to tell the difference between a red and a green bell pepper.
After that, a couple of weeks later they bumped into each other at a bar and there they became real friends and exchanged phone numbers and .

Jonghyun had been living with his boyfriend, but they had broken up. His lover claimed that he didn’t get enough space with Jonghyun always being there.
That’s when Minho suggested that he come stay with him in his condo.

“Y-You want some?” Jonghyun stuttered, feeling his face redden.

He has had a crush on Minho for the past three months now. He is certain that what he is feeling is no longer just a simple crush, but love. He was in love with Minho, for sure. He just didn’t have the balls to tell him how he felt, since he was certain that Minho saw him as a hyung.

“Yeah, I’m pretty hungry.” He said, sniffing Jonghyun’s hair playfully. Jonghyun elbowed him in the rib, laughing. “I’m gunna go grade some papers; call me when the food’s ready.”

“Neh, songsaengnim,” Jonghyun hid his blush.

“A hundred, hundred, ninety-eight, ninety-eight, eighty-nine, hundred,” Minho diligently graded the papers with a big smile on his face. I’m such a great teacher. My students are so smart. He said to himself as he continued shuffling through the papers. “Hundred, ninety-eight, ninety, twenty-four…?” He paused and looked at the owner of the paper’s name. “Aish! How do you get a twenty-four on such simple work, Kim Kibum?!”

☆═━┈┈━═☆☆═━┈┈━═☆

“Kim Kibum!” Eighteen year old Lee Jinki yelled, running to catch up with his best friend, Kibum, the very next morning.

“What? What is it?” Kibum asked. “And hyung, what did I tell you about running? You know your body likes to sweat, and to be honest it doesn’t smell very nice.”

Jinki fanned himself; “Never mind that! Did you see the news this morning?”

“Psh, no. You know I don’t watch that.” They began to walk towards the gates of Genie High. “News is boring. Unless it’s about celebrity gossip – that is when I’ll pay attention to it.”

Jinki rolled his eyes. Oh brother. “You know that sophomore, Lee Taemin?”

“You mean High-In-The-Sky Lee Taemin?” Kibum questioned. “That crazy kid wanted me to smoke some weed with him.”

Jinki nodded. “Yeah, well, they found him dead outside of a crack house.”

Kibum gasped, loudly. “Shut up!”

“I wish it wasn’t true, but it is.”

Kibum felt tears coming to his eyes. He wasn’t all that close with the kid, but it’s still sad to hear the news of someone dying. Nevertheless, murdered…

“D-Don’t cry, Kibum!” Jinki said.

“B-But! He’s just a kid, why would someone do such a thing?”

“People in this world are crazy, Kibum,” Jinki squeezed his shoulder. “Now, please stop crying before all the--”

It was too late, fan girls started stampeding towards them from north, south, east and west.

“Why is Kibum oppa crying?!”

“Noona will give you a tissue!”

“Noona’ll give you a hug!”

“I’ll buy you clothes to make you feel better!”

Kibum was about to take up on that last offer before Jinki dragged him away.

Jinki let out some air when they were clear of the fan girls and safe in a classroom; Mr. Choi’s health classroom to be precise.

“Yah, what are you kids’ doing?” Mr. Choi hissed. “Class doesn’t start for another fifteen minutes!”

Kibum and Jinki flinched in shock; they had thought they were the only ones inside.

“Oh, perfect. Is that Kim Kibum?” he took his feet off the desk. “Come here kid, I need to have a word with you.”

Kibum coughed, looking at Jinki. He already had an idea on what this was about.

His grades.

“Jinki, if you could step out for a moment?”

“S-Sure thing,” Jinki stepped out.

“Have a seat,” Mr. Choi gestured towards the desk in front of him. He planted his elbows on the desk, intertwined his fingers together and leaned his chin down on top of those. “Surely you must know what I am about to say.”

Kibum fidgeted in his seat, making it squeak awkwardly.

“Why aren’t you speaking? Do you have a fever?” Mr. Choi questioned. “You look like you’ve been crying.”

Good, now I can change the topic.

“Oh, yeah, a student that went here got murdered.” Kibum said. “It’s sad isn’t it? He was so young…”

Mr. Choi moved around some papers on his desk and cleared his throat. “I see,” he said. “Anyways, Kibum… your grade in my class is really bringing down your GPA average. Hearing from your other teachers, I know that you are a very smart kid – so I am not understanding… is the work too hard?”

Kibum shook his head.

“I think tutoring every day after school, minus Fridays, will be appropriate right?”

“W-What?” Kibum demanded. He liked going shopping after school, even if he wasn’t going to buy anything, and hanging out with his peers.

“I’ll let you go once you have a ninety-five average in my class,” Mr. Choi leaned back and smirked.

The smirk sent chills down Kibum’s spine, and he didn’t know why.

That smirk…

That smirk was not normal.