Kyungsoo was standing outside the elevator, tapping his fingers against his thighs. He was starting to wonder if maybe he should take the stairs instead, as it seemed like the doors would never open. But since he was on the fifth floor and also because of how many people were standing around him he decided that he could wait at least some more minutes. It was worth the wait opposed dying of fatigue by taking the stairs. He could feel himself getting more irritated by the minute and the fact that the young man standing beside him didn’t seem irritated at all only made the matter worse. What kind of master patience was that even? At least he wasn’t the only one bothered with the malfunctioning elevator as almost everybody else had the same expression as himself, if not looking even more irritated (like the fat blonde lady wearing an extreme amount of perfume) but to tell the truth that didn’t improve his mood at all.

Kyungsoo was just about to give up and take the stairs when an important looking woman stepped up to the elevator and held some sort of card in front of the camera and immediately the doors opened and a bunch of scared people stumbled out of the elevator. He had no idea how that card worked and he was too tired to understand that maybe you shouldn’t walk into something that was malfunctioning just a second ago. Then again, it seemed like he wasn’t the only one that decided to trust the elevator because it was soon packed with people (and of course the perfume lady had to stand extremely close to him). The young, undisturbed looking man pressed the button for the ground floor and Kyungsoo was glad that it was the same floor he was going to because, of course, he had forgotten to press any button when he entered the elevator. The doors closed and the elevator started moving downwards when it suddenly stopped with a loud bang. Heart in his throat, Kyungsoo could feel the panic rising in him. Judging from the amount of time spent in the elevator they must be stuck somewhere between the fifth and fourth floor. He knew he should’ve taken the stairs. Hopefully this would be sorted out quickly so he could get home. Then, there was another bang and the elevator started falling towards the ground. Not moving in the slow pace it usually did, but falling uncontrollably. Kyungsoo clutched the bar on the wall and tried not to throw up. This couldn’t be happening.

Kyungsoo had always been deathly afraid of heights, pulse speeding up just by looking out his office window, and it was only a year ago that he realized that it actually wasn’t the height that was the thing that scared him the most, but the possibility of falling. The fall felt excruciatingly long and Kyungsoo caught himself wishing that it would just hit the ground so it would all be over.

Then the elevator suddenly started to slow down to in just a second come to a stop. The stop was far too fast to be comfortable but still much better than to crash into the ground and most certainly die. The doors opened and everyone stumbled out of the elevator into the parking lot that was in the company’s basement. With his legs feeling like spaghetti and shaking like no tomorrow it was by willpower only that Kyungsoo made it outside the elevator. Two steps out and he fell to his knees and hands.

“Is everyone out?” Someone shouted and Kyungsoo looked up to see the young, undisturbed man from before. Kyungsoo was slightly pleased to see that he wasn’t as untroubled anymore but now looked all worn out. . He got a faint yes as an answer and suddenly the elevator doors closed. Kyungsoo could hear the loud crash from when the elevator supposedly hit the bottom of the shaft. It was only lucky they’d all gotten out on time.

“Hey, are you alright?” The man was suddenly kneeling in front of him. No, he was not. He felt some sickening sort of déjà vu when he looked into the man’s eyes that he couldn’t understand. He had never fallen from a great height before, not even in amusement parks. And he could swear that he’d never met this man before. He felt sick to his stomach. It felt like his lungs were too small to take in any air and his heart felt like it had jumped up to find a permanent spot at the base of his throat. He doubted that he’d ever be able to ride an elevator again, no matter how many stairs he would need to walk in its stead. Kyungsoo was about to try to convey this but before he was able to the man gasped and started talking.

“We should probably leave now.” He lifted Kyungsoo to his feet. Kyungsoo stumbled a bit, still feeling incredibly dizzy.

“Why?” He said while trying to keep standing straight and not throw up.

“Because that man over there –“ He pointed at a man talking into a phone “- is probably calling some sort of authorities right now and that’s our cue to leave.” Kyungsoo did by no mean understand why that was so.

“Why? Aren’t we supposed to stay and answer questions about the whole thing?” The man had started dragging him towards the exit and Kyungsoo didn’t have the strength to refuse him.

“If the circumstances were normal, yes. But now they aren’t and you’re panicking so we can’t have them see you right now. We don’t want you dead now, do we?”

“What does me panicking have anything to do with this? And why would I be dead if they saw me? It’s not like it was them that made the elevator do that just now.” The man only gave him a look as an answer which effectively halted Kyungsoo’s train of thought. “Wait? Was that elevator thing deliberate?” The two of them just reached the entrance and left the building when five men in suits ran down the stairs towards the parking lot.

“Yes, it was deliberate. Hopefully they didn’t know your were there and that it was me that they tried to kill. I’m sorry for endangering your life but I didn’t know they knew where I was nor that they were ready to offer so many innocent lives just for me.” The man put his hands on Kyungsoo’s shoulders and looked him in the eyes.

“I need you to calm down. Take deep breaths.” Kyungsoo tried to do what he was told but it was harder than it seemed. With some help of the man’s rhythmic breathing they managed to get Kyungsoo’s pulse and breathing to a more normal level. The pair was getting some weird glances by all the people passing by but too much had happened for Kyungsoo to care. “It won’t take them long to realize that I’m not there any longer and you can’t be seen with me so we need to separate now. Can you get home by yourself or do you need to call someone?” Kyungsoo nodded but soon realized that it’d been an “or-question”.

“I can get home by myself.” He said, still in a daze. The man smiled at him then turned around to walk away.

“Wait!” Kyungsoo shouted and he turned to watch Kyungsoo. “Who are you?”

“You may not know me now, but I’ve known you since forever.” The man turned around and waved to Kyungsoo over his back. Kyungsoo stood dumbfounded for a minute. That answer had only managed to make him more confused than before.  The man had quite a distinctive appearance and he felt that he would’ve remembered him if he’d ever met him. After having stayed still for a minute just trying to rack his brain for any memory of the man he remembered that the other had told him that he needed to move so he started his journey home.

~ * ~

When Kyungsoo closed the door to the apartment after him all the suppressed stress from before washed over him. His legs gave up as he fell to his knees. Once again it felt like his lungs constricted and he desperately tried to remember what the stranger had told him before to get him to breathe normally again, but the only thing he could focus on was how it felt like the world was spinning around him and how the floor beneath him was falling away. Curling in on himself he tried to make it all go away.

It was in that position that his boyfriend found him when he got home fifteen minutes later, curled up on the floor with his forehead against the floor tiles. To say that Jongin was scared was an understatement. He immediately dropped his bag on the floor and kneeled in front of Kyungsoo. He put his hands on Kyungsoo’s shoulders and pushed him to an upright position. When seeing the tears that had started to gather in Kyungsoo’s eyes he changed his position so that he had his hands on either side of Kyungsoo’s face, trying to dry away the tears with his thumbs.

“It’s okay, Soo, I’m here. We’re both here. Take deep breaths… In… and out…” He did what he said himself and Kyungsoo’s breath evened out a bit. Jongin felt at a loss. He did not know what to do. To see Kyungsoo in the state that he was in was extremely rare as Kyungsoo always tried to stay strong and almost never cried in front of other people (it occasionally happened when they were watching an incredibly sad movie, but Kyungsoo hated to bare his feelings to other people and therefore next to never cried).

When Kyungsoo’s tears had dried and his breath was almost completely evened out Jongin helped him up from the floor so they could walk to the couch in the living room. Kyungsoo curled up against Jongin who gladly embraced him. He still didn’t know what had happened to get Kyungsoo in this state, but instead of asking he waited until Kyungsoo was ready to talk about it himself. Kyungsoo drew a shaky breath and looked up at Jongin.

“I think I was supposed to die today.” It came out as a whisper, voice raspy from lack of speech but still relatively even. He took Jongin’s hand and started playing with it while Jongin froze beside him.

“Why do you say that?” He whispered too as he pulled Kyungsoo a bit closer.

“The elevator at work broke and the emergency functions didn’t work and I think we were supposed to crash. I have no idea why it suddenly stopped so we could get off before it started falling again.” It almost didn’t sound like it was Kyungsoo speaking. It didn’t look like it was him speaking either. He was just staring straight ahead while playing with Jongin’s fingers, not showing any kind of emotion. Jongin wanted to say something, anything, but he couldn’t come up with anything but there’s nothing logical to say about a mass murder. He leaned his head against Kyungsoo’s and hugged him closer, feeling both relieved that he was there and alive.

“And then this man comes up to me and tells me that I have to go because if I get found I’ll get killed. Why does anyone want to kill me?” Kyungsoo voice cracked as it got a bit higher, emotion seeping back into his voice.

Jongin sighed. “I don’t know. But you’re home now and no one is going to touch you here.” If what the mysterious man had said was true Jongin definitely had to thank him. Then again Jongin could not even imagine a reason for someone to want murder Kyungsoo. It was so absurd and he prayed that it wasn’t true. If it was they would probably try to find Kyungsoo again and he couldn’t allow that to happen.

Kyungsoo let out a shaky breath and buried his face in Jongin’s chest. They stayed like that, quiet and cuddled up until Jongin’s stomach decided to make it known that it had waited more than enough for dinner. Jongin glanced at the clock above the small TV and noticed that it was close to half past 9 by now.

“Soo… I’ll go and fix us something to eat, okay?” He carefully stood up and was about to go to the kitchen when he noticed that Kyungsoo still held onto his hand.

“I’ll need both of my hands to do that, you know.” Jongin said, trying to lift the mood a bit. A small smile appeared on his boyfriend’s face and slowly he stood up beside Jongin.

“I’ll help you.” Jongin wanted to protest but Kyungsoo shut him up with a peck on his lips. “It wouldn’t be right for you to do all the work. And I also don’t want to be alone right now, even if it’s just in another room.” Kyungsoo sounded so small when he admitted that and Jongin couldn’t deny him what he wanted.

“Okay, come on then.” 

AN:

Okay, so not much happened in this chapter but I introduced you to some of the characters and I promise more stuff will happen in the next chapter ;)

Hope you liked it and feel free to comment whether you did like it or if you hated it or if you're just like "meh" I appreciate anything~