SLAM! SLAM! SLAM!

In bursts three huge men, cloaked in too much leather and sporting identical sunglasses even in the dark of the room. The one standing closest to the door flips on the switch and light illuminates the very spacious and very pink room.

The shorter of the three men (and donning quite the atrocious blonde Mohawk) scowls at the décor of the room, mumbling how “the pink hurts his eyes” and that “a 5 year old female toddler practically puked all over the walls”.

His friend – very blonde, very tanned – shushes him and starts gesturing at the other two to start inspecting the room.

They move silently and quickly as they spread across the room which is identical in size to that of a small house.

One of the men spies a blot of white on the lavish makeup table, it seeming out of place in the abundance of hand lotion and perfume and other things of the like. He approaches the table and realizes that it’s a piece of paper. Cursive, loopy handwriting is stamped with the unmistakable kiss of a pair of red lips.

It takes him one, two, three seconds to properly digest the short letter. “Hyungs, over here,” the man’s voice calls out and the other two immediately appear by his side. “Look.”

The three of them crowd around the small sheet of paper.

“Well, , Taehyun’s going to have a fit.”

The middle one sighs and shakes his head grimly. “This is bad, really, really bad.”

The last of them sighs and plucks the paper out of the other’s hand, tucking it into his front pocket. “Better go tell the Royal Adviser the princess’s fled.”

Outside the castle’s gates, in the more seedy areas of town wherein laid a dirty little restaurant wedged in between other little restaurants, sat a young effeminate man around his 20s in the office of his boss.

Or if I can call it that, really, he thinks as he sweeps his eyes across the room. The room is small, too small, about the size of a closet in fact. The old worn desk – which by the looks of it, his boss probably nicked it somewhere by the dump – is already taking up most of the limited space, the ugly paint is peeling, and there’s this funny smell in the air that’s a cross between a dead rat and some very, very rotten food.

Jinwoo thinks it’s the former.

His foot jitters nervously from side to side and his eyes keep glancing at the door, just waiting for the moment that his boss would burst in.

Jinwoo had ed up another delivery. He had gotten confused with the street signs and the house address and Jinwoo wonders why he even took this job in the first place since he’s so bad with directions.

Oh right. It’s the only job that I have the basic requirements to; he thinks bitterly, a pair of functional legs and a working heart.

Jinwoo must not – cannot lose this job.  He bites his lips and drums his fingers on the grimy surface of the desk anxiously. This is his fourth job in six months and his options are thinning. Plus, his rent is due tomorrow so he needs this week’s pay.

The ‘office’ door clicks open and Jinwoo’s head snaps upwards. His boss’s face is blank and his lips are poised in a thin line. Jinwoo gulps.

“H–hey boss,” he croaks, “is the business doing great?” He knows it’s a stupid thing to say since he works at the place and he knows business isn’t doing well ever since that cockroach some random customer found in her soup and decided to spread the news to the whole Lariotte. He personally thinks the front of the shop is just warning enough that it has a rats’ nest or two lying under the floorboards.

His boss ignores Jinwoo’s sad attempts of lightening the mood, and takes a seat in his chair. Jinwoo’s mildly surprised that the chair doesn’t just collapse altogether. His boss is very ‘well-rounded’ in more places than necessary.

“Is this about a raise?” he tries again, forcing out a convincing-enough laugh.

Still, his boss’s face remains sombre and Jinwoo falls silent as he mentally prays to god to spare his job.

“No, Jinwoo,” his boss finally decides to speak, propping his elbows on the desk and leaning his chin onto the palm of his hands, “we’re here to talk about how, lately, you’re butchering a simple delivery boy’s job.”

Jinwoo turns pale, the unmistakeable feeling of dread pooling in his lower stomach.