I felt awkward, sitting on their couch, in their living room, while they carried on with their own business. Rome had gone down the hall that led to different rooms for some reason and Kris was busy digging around in the kitchen for something to eat or whatever.

                I just sat there and examined my nails, not saying a word.

                “Rome!” Kris’s booming voice made me jump out of surprise as he stormed out of the kitchen and into the living room, facing the hallway.

                “What?” Rome yelled from one of the rooms.

                “We need to buy food if we’re going to feed the princess.” Kris called. “And that means we need money.”

                It got silent for half a beat, but then Rome was suddenly in the living room. He sighed heavily as he sat down in the arm chair across from me. “Kris, we can’t—“

                “Then what are we supposed to do? Go get a job? We need records for that. We burned ours, remember? We don’t exist anymore.” Kris crossed his arms and gave Rome an expectant look. “Got any other ideas?”

                Rome ran a hand through his hair and frowned. “I don’t like this, but fine.”

                Kris jerked his chin towards me. “We can’t leave princess here alone without protection, and we’ll be too busy to come and rescue her if something happens.”

                Rome shut his eyes out of frustration. “You’re trying to cause trouble, aren’t you?” Kris only smirked in response. “Fine. Anya, come with me.”

                Deciding that I didn’t want to be anywhere near Kris for much longer, I quickly followed Rome down the hall and into the closest room. He pulled a black hoodie from the closet and tossed it to me. “Put this on. Don’t ask questions.” I pulled it on and sighed.

                “But—“

                “It’s just better if you don’t ask, trust me.” Rome gestured for me to follow him and we both went back into the living room. “Brief her, Kris.” And then he disappeared again through the hallway.

                Kris smirked and crossed his arms and he looked at me. I took notice that he was wearing a similar hoodie as me. It made me instantly suspicious.

                “What are we about to do?” I asked despite Rome’s clear instructions.

                “Rob a bank.” Kris replied nonchalantly. I blinked, not knowing how to respond to that. I turned at the sound of footsteps and looked at Rome hopefully. Maybe this was just one of those times that I was supposed to ignore Kris. Except, Rome didn’t meet my gaze and only stepped around me, and that made me much more nervous all of a sudden.

                “We’re what?” I asked in a hushed tone.

                “You heard me.”

                “Kris.” Rome sounded exasperated. I was beginning to think that was a normal tone for him when it came to anything that had to do with Kris. No offense to the guy, but I could tell how he could get stressful to be around after a while.

                “What?” Kris turned and studied my panicked expression, then chuckled. “Don’t worry, princess, we do this all the time.”

                “Kris.”

                “What?”

                We went down to the garage once Rome had spent some time calming me down and whatnot. I still was very hesitant about the ordeal, but after seeing the small amount of food in the kitchen that wouldn’t even last us for tomorrow, and no other option, I basically had no other choice but to agree.

                It helped when Kris explained that I was just going to be a lookout for them and wouldn’t actually be a part of the robbing.

                There were some expensive cars in the garage that we passed by. They were nice, but even I could tell that they were just for show and wouldn’t last a day actually out in the open. We passed by them without a second glance.

                Towards the back of the garage, however, were close to six cars that outshone any of the others. They were clearly made for speed rather than looks, not that they lacked in that apartment either.

                Rome went straight to a red car towards the corner, pulling out a set of keys. I watched in amazement as the engine roared to life once he’d slid into the driver’s seat and started the ignition.

                “Whoa.” was literally all I could say.

                A pair of keys was suddenly tossed into my hands.

                I looked up at Kris in surprise. My eyes only widened when I realized that he was glaring at me.

                “I’m trusting you, Princess. Don’t make me regret that decision.” Then he turned and climbed into a silver car, ignoring me as I still stood there dumbfounded.

                They expected me to drive? I mean, I wasn’t a terrible driver. In fact, Sam took me out racing quite often; it was just that I didn’t know the streets of Seoul that well.

                I didn’t even know them that well.

                So why were they letting me drive one of their cars? I glanced over at said car and my eyes only grew wider. Why were they letting me drive such a nice car?

                “Anytime now, Princess.” Kris called from his seat in the car. I turned back to look at him.

                “Why are you—but—I don’t—“

                “You’re one of us now. Just get in and follow us.” Rome said, giving me a nod of assurance. “Go ahead, don’t worry about it.”

                I nodded mutely, slipping into the driver’s seat and shakily starting the ignition. The engine came to life instantly, and I couldn’t help but smile just slightly at the sound. It reminded me of home a little bit.

                Rome led the way out of the garage and down to the bank we were going to be—um—visiting. We parked a small distance from each other, ready for a quick but unnoticed get away. Lucky for us, every car around us looked just as expensive as the ones we were driving, so there was nothing suspicious of us driving up.

                “Why didn’t we just come here?” I muttered curiously, as I pulled out a pamphlet mindlessly, standing close to Rome. I was speaking about our abilities but by the way Rome didn’t answer at first, I thought I would have to elaborate more.

                “Too suspicious. Driving makes it less. It makes us look normal.” He murmured, leaning over my shoulder and pretending to look at the pamphlet in my hand. “I’m going to go talk to that woman over there. You stay here and lay low.”

                “Hmm.” I hummed in response as he turned and walked away. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Kris sitting in the sitting room, flipping through a magazine with a bored expression on his face. He must have felt me staring though, because he looked up and directly at me, raising an eyebrow.

                I sighed and turned back to the pamphlet. I don’t know why, but Kris made me uneasy. Not in the way that Rome had earlier. Kris just seemed like the cocky trouble-maker type of guy and I had always tried to steer clear of those.

                Aside from Sam, of course.

                With a reluctant sigh, I pushed thoughts of Sam and Emi and everything else away. I needed to focus. Any second now, Kris would give me the signal and I was supposed to move towards the back of the bank where Rome was currently being led by that woman he’d been sweet-talking.

                I glanced around at the people around me; taking in the surroundings in an air of what I hoped was nonchalance. There were many business men waiting in line, a woman with her little boy, a guy in a hoodie looking at his phone with the bill of his hat pulled down over his face, and a woman in sweats. Not that many people, lucky for us.

                I turned back to the pamphlet and read the same sentence that I’d been reading since I had picked it up and chewed on my lower lip. I glanced over at Kris and saw him ripping a picture out of the magazine and discretely sticking it in his hoodie pocket. I couldn’t help but roll my eyes.

                Peeking from behind my bangs, I looked over at Rome and saw him still chatting up the woman. She was smiling and brushing her hand on his arm as if they were good friends or something. It made me want to gag, because it was obvious that the woman was more than twice his age and was shamelessly flirting with him.

                I was in mid-turn back to the pamphlet when a round of gunshots rang through the room. Screams spread through the surprised people as everyone simultaneously dropped to the ground. I looked around in bewilderment, trying to find the culprit.

                But, honestly, it wasn’t that hard to spot him.

                I should have known.

                The guy in the hoodie, standing in line behind the woman with her child, stood there among the fearful people, with a gun in one hand.

                The room grew quiet after the people began to realize the situation. All eyes were on the guy as he dropped his arm and swung the gun nonchalantly back and forth.

                He sighed and took a step forward, towards the woman and her child. She whimpered and protectively clung onto her little boy, keeping her fearful eyes on the guy. He knelt down slowly, focusing his attention on the little boy.

                “Ssh, it’s alright, I’m not going to hurt you or your mom, okay?” he said in a surprisingly gentle—yet extremely deep—voice. The little boy only looked up at him with wide eyes, trembling in his mother’s arms.

                “But you have a gun.” He said finally, pointing at said weapon.

                The guy glanced down at the gun in his hand before placing it on the ground and sliding it away. “Not anymore, see? It’s over there. I’m here to stop some bad guys from doing something really bad.” He propped his elbows on his knees and rested his chin in his hands as he continued to talk solely to the little boy. “So you don’t have to be scared of me, okay? I’m a good guy, I promise.”

                “Then who are the bad guys?”

                The guy let out a small chuckle at the boy’s question and pulled his hat off. He set on the little boy’s head, discretely covering his eyes so that he couldn’t see anything else. He gave a quick nod to the boy’s mother before getting up and retrieving his gun. He turned and his eyes locked with mine.

                My heart started racing as he came closer and closer to where I was kneeling on the ground. He squatted down in front of me, keeping the intense glare in his eyes.

                He knew. I don’t know how, I just knew that he knew. Probably everything.

                “What year were you born?” The question blurted out of my mouth before I could even fully think of what I was saying.

                “1990.” He responded, keeping his tone even. “Same as you, Anya.” It didn’t surprise me that he knew my name. “You three need to get out of here right now. Leave the cars here, I’ll have someone come and get them later. You just need to go. They’re coming.” I didn’t need to ask who he meant by ‘they’. I took his hand that he’d outstretched towards me and allowed him to pull me to my feet.

                “You know my name.” I whispered, glancing towards Kris and Rome who were already walking towards us. “Let me know yours, at least.”

                He gave me a small smile. “Yongguk.”

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whoop whoop!! four day weekend :D and barely any homework!

hooray, all the main characters have officially been introduced XD

so a little intro:

Rome is the careful, protective one who likes to keep it 'need-to-know' at all times

Kris is the loudmouth, annoying one (comic relief, hopefully) who likes to get under everyone's skin

Yongguk is the one with all of the connections and knowledge, but other than that nothing is really known about him

(i usually make my A/N's a different color, but my computer is so screwey that it's not working, so sorry bout that)

thanks for reading~