[super junior] the high cost of dying (7/7)
The High Cost of Dying
super junior // kyuhyun/zhou mi (+ minor mimin, kyumin) // r // 50,000+ words (total)
[inception!AU] In which Cho Kyuhyun, international corporate spy and part-time assassin, is sent to China on a bizarre mission involving famous popstar Victoria Song with the assistance of Chinese MC slash fashionista Zhou Mi, whom he had never met before. Along the way they discover shocking secrets, unexpected attraction, and how to make edible pancakes.
1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7
The High Cost of Dying.
-
“This is not the real world. We are dreaming.”
“Congratulations, you’ve finally caught on. And thanks to that, I can access all the information you have taken from Kim Minyoung here.” Kyuhyun watched in horror as Sungmin pulled out a USB key and plugged it into the computer. “The best part is the file isn’t even password protected. Your head really has been on the good drugs.”
It had been a dream. Everything had been a dream. Kyuhyun panicked - he didn’t even know from when and where the dream had begun. How much of what he had been experiencing was reality and how much wasn’t?
“What day is it in the real world?” His heart was thumping loudly in his chest. Sungmin had mentioned drugs. Did it mean it hadn’t even been that long after the day of the mission if he was still on medication?
“You can worry about it after you wake up,” Sungmin stared at the screen for a while as if waiting for something to load, and then he clicked something and pulled the USB key out. Sungmin finally stood up and turned to look at Kyuhyun with a small smile.
“Everything about you up until now has been a lie? The bar, your job, everything? For years? You have been using me all this time? Was it even a coincidence that we met?” Kyuhyun hissed in anger. Sungmin sat down on the bed next to him, looking pensive.
“It wasn’t like that, Kyuhyun. I never knew you worked for SM until February this year after you worked on a job related to my company. Even then, I never did anything about it. There was no reason to. Your job didn’t interfere with mine and vice versa. The knowledge changed nothing between us. Our professional paths just never crossed… until now. This was an unfortunate affair.”
“There isn’t anything unfortunate about this. You were there at the gala that night. It was you, wasn’t it? The one who shot at us. It was you who shot me. It couldn’t have been the bodyguard - he was supposed to pass out for the next five hours.” His mind was rapidly putting together all the pieces now. The realization numbed him.
Sungmin shook his head, looking almost regretful. “I was there with the purpose of catching up with Kim Minyoung, yes, but it wasn’t me who shot you guys. It was my partner on the job. I only knew about it later. I was furious. He let Kim Minyoung be taken away, reacting recklessly without informing me immediately in the first place.”
“There is no reason for me to trust you.”
“You are right. There isn’t.” Sungmin nodded with a small smile. “I have always genuinely liked you, Kyuhyun. It’s unfortunate that our paths have to cross like this. You might not believe it, but you have to understand that there is nothing personal about this. This is just purely a professional matter. I have to do this because the job requires it.”
“Even if I take it personally or not, it doesn’t matter. You can’t expect me to ignore what we are like you said you did. Nothing is going back to what it was. You are going to have to kill me. Otherwise, I will have to tell my management, and you will have to disappear since this is a direct act of theft against SM.” Kyuhyun frowned.
“Not really though. Everything is going back to what it was when we wake up… if you don’t remember the dream. I have no intention to kill you, it doesn’t serve any purpose. And we are not supposed to remember our dreams anyway.” Sungmin tilted his head.
“That’s not easy, Sungmin. You know I’m a lucid dreamer. I will remember my dreams.”
“Not if I injected you with a special made dose of somnacin with altered formula. My company doesn’t have the biggest specialist chemistry lab in Japan for nothing, Kyuhyun.” Sungmin smiled, a touch of mischief on his lips.
“…You are saying I will forget everything that happened here.” Kyuhyun stilled as cold realization slowly set in.
“Supposedly, yes.”
“And I will go back to being vaguely attracted to you and believing you are a harmless innocent bartender and dropping by your place every half a month? You are saying I would just go straight back to trusting your lies?”
Sungmin was silent for a beat. “You know, you could go work for us. For AVEX, I mean.”
Kyuhyun looked at him incredulously. “You lied to me, invaded my dream, stole information from me, and now expect me to just go and work for you?”
“Just a suggestion.” Sungmin’s smile was bright, the same as it always had been. “I know you are good, I like you, and I don’t really want us as enemies. I know SM is notoriously crap in treating their employees, and anyone who has eyes could see that you are way overworked. I know your schedule, Kyuhyun, and I know you have had at least three consecutive high-profile jobs without break. You are burned out. You drink to the point you pass out because you can’t have normal sleep anymore. And you are too busy to actually care about the research you had set out when you first got into the company.”
Kyuhyun stiffened. “You know too much of these things.”
“SM doesn’t have the best security for their data system, but the system itself is impressively intensive.” Sungmin smiled, almost hesitant and regretful.
“Well fuck.” Kyuhyun sighed, dropping himself back on the bed. “Is there anyone who hasn’t read my file? Except me, I mean.”
Sungmin leaned closer, cupping Kyuhyun’s cheek lightly. He didn’t move away from the touch. Sungmin really looked the same as ever - bright-eyed and genuine.
“I can’t trust you anymore.” Kyuhyun murmured, resigned.
“Of course not,” Sungmin nodded in agreement.
“But I would when I wake up.”
Sungmin simply smiled at him.
“How much of this was not real?”
“From my second visit onwards. I wasn’t there all the time though. The rest was your subconscious and projections.”
Even his several conversations with Zhou Mi, Kyuhyun noted. He didn’t want to know what that said about his subconscious. Now that he remembered, the only two persons he had actually had conversations with in the last few… weeks were Sungmin and Zhou Mi. Sungmin because he was sharing the dream with him, but Zhou Mi was obviously his projection. Sungmin’s second visit, it also meant the day after he had woken up in the hospital, after Leeteuk had gotten the information from him, and after… Zhou Mi’s confession. Somehow the knowledge that at least that one conversation was real was comforting to him, knowing it was not his desperate subconscious that invented everything Zhou Mi had said to him. That would have been pathetic. Suddenly something struck him.
“Zhou Mi. Does he know about you? Does he know that you were also in the business? Does he… have anything to do with this?” Kyuhyun swallowed hard as all the possibilities assaulted him. However, it was impossible to just sweep them under the rug. He never knew what kind of history Sungmin and Zhou Mi had had together, and it was hard to imagine Zhou Mi not knowing what his ex-boyfriend did for a living. His hands clenched into fists. He was suddenly not entirely willing to know the answer, because it would just be horrible if Zhou Mi was actually someone he wasn’t and Kyuhyun would wake up not remembering anything but their attraction, and the lies would just continue.
“Zhou Mi, he… doesn’t know about this.” Sungmin’s eyes lowered, his expression turning regretful.
“Are you sure though?”
“I’m pretty sure. We met a few years back through mutual friends, it had nothing to do with the business. He never knew what I did for a living, and I had no intention to tell him. I never let him come over to my place. It was only for that one year when he stayed in Korea for a university exchange program anyway. When he came back to China, we decided to put it on hold. When he told me he applied to the training program in SM China branch, that was when I decided to break it off entirely. It was clear that it wasn’t going to work out. I didn’t want to face him in a situation like this after building an attachment to each other.”
Kyuhyun wasn’t even aware he had just let out an audible sigh of relief. His fists slowly unclenched.
“I know you think you can’t trust anything I say anymore, but I think you deserve that truth. Zhou Mi deserves a lot, please take care of him.” Sungmin’s fingers brushed his cheek, and Kyuhyun closed his eyes.
“I can’t.”
“You mean a lot to him.”
“I can’t.”
“You didn’t see how frantic and worried he was that morning after your ‘accident’ when I came to see him. I’d never seen him like that. And the way he touches you… you must know it best, Kyuhyun.”
“Your martyr act isn’t going to gain you any point at this moment, Sungmin.” Kyuhyun turned his face away, breaking off contact.
“Of course I know that.”
“But I guess it doesn’t matter in the end.” Since he would just forget everything, all the lies and cruel mind games.
“Of course not.”
“You are good,” Kyuhyun reluctantly said. He actually felt amazed that someone could have led him on for this long, after so many years of training and experience. This was obviously no second-rate work. “I just wish I would remember this.” He didn’t feel too offended, surprisingly. There was just a hollow feeling in his chest that everything had not been real.
“I’m sorry,” Sungmin leaned down and pressed a chaste kiss on his lips. “Please don’t take this personally.”
There was suddenly a loud crashing noise outside. Kyuhyun jerked in his restraint, turning his head towards the source of disturbance.
“Ah, that would be your subconscious’ projections barging in to protect you and remove the threat, which would be me. It seems our time is up.” Sungmin also raised his head, looking at the door with an expectant smile. Finally, the door crashed open, and Kyuhyun sucked in a sharp breath as he recognized the looming shadow.
“Step away from him.”
Zhou Mi’s face was hard and expressionless, the hand holding the gun didn’t waver just once. It was pointed straight at Sungmin’s head, and Kyuhyun knew one shot would instantly kill. He knew how precise it would be, because this Zhou Mi was his own projection. This was a product of his own mind.
“Wow, your subconscious’ idea of protection is Zhou Mi?” Sungmin looked both amused and surprised, but he slowly stood up from the bed anyway. There was no point in dragging it out, he was done with the job anyway. “He’s not ripping me into shreds yet though. Are you really that fond of me, Kyuhyun-“
The gunshot was somehow deafening loud. Sungmin crashed to his feet, blood splattering the side of his bed. The shot had been absolutely precise. Kyuhyun closed his eyes and swallowed hard. When he opened his eyes again, Zhou Mi’s face was still a mask of cold blankness. He was staring at the dead body with nothing but a slight hint of distaste. That expression chilled Kyuhyun to the bone because of how far it would be from real life. If anything, it only served to convince him that this had been a horrible dream. Zhou Mi had killed the way Kyuhyun killed, because he had never seen Zhou Mi shoot at anyone before. He didn’t want to see it ever again.
The room was starting to crumble down, the ground rumbling beneath them. The dream was falling apart since it was Sungmin’s dream, and now that he was dead in the dream, he was waking up in the real world. Kyuhyun swallowed.
“Zhou Mi…” He called out, feeling somehow disconnected and numb. “Come here.”
It didn’t matter if this Zhou Mi was just a product of his own subconscious. It didn’t matter if everything had just been a dream. He would forget everything when he woke up anyway. For now, he could allow himself this moment.
Zhou Mi leaned over him, the gun still clutched in his hand, and Kyuhyun tilted his head up. He breathed in the familiar scent of Zhou Mi’s jawline, taking in the familiar angles of his cheekbones and the soft curves of his lips. It didn’t matter, Kyuhyun told himself as Zhou Mi’s soft lips brushed his, and the world fell apart beneath their feet. His eyes fluttered close.
-
The next time Cho Kyuhyun opened his eyes, he was met with a familiar white wall and the bumpy feeling of the mattress beneath his back. Kyuhyun blinked, feeling somehow disoriented but not exactly sure why. His hands twitched. His eyes fell upon the empty seat beside his bed, half expecting someone. His head felt heavy and fogged, the effects of the painkiller still in full. Kyuhyun concentrated in breathing in, breathing out. He kept expecting something, but he wasn’t sure what. The silence was almost unsettling.
The click of the door startled him.
“Oh, you are already awake?” Zhou Mi and his gangly limbs shuffled in, the smile soft on his lips. “That was probably the longest time I have ever seen you sleep. The industrial-strength painkiller really knocked you out, didn’t it?”
Kyuhyun moved the muscles around his mouth. “What day is it?” His voice came out barely as a low croak. Kyuhyun winced inwardly.
“It’s Tuesday, twenty-third of November. You didn’t miss anything exciting, don’t worry.” It was only then that he noticed Zhou Mi was carrying several bags. He carefully set them down on the bedside table and even the floor.
“What are those?” Kyuhyun squinted at the bags suspiciously.
“Your recipes for good living while being bed-ridden in a hospital.” Zhou Mi grinned, poking some open. “Magazines, books, games, your handheld touch pad with 3G. Hide that one though, I don’t want the nurses to kill me.”
Kyuhyun made grabby hands, and Zhou Mi laughed.
“This is such an improvement from my last hospital room, seriously. I guess there are some benefits to being a long-time employee for the company after all.”
Zhou Mi made a low humming noise. Kyuhyun’s eyes swept over the room, really assessing it for the first time. It was typically white, bright, and boring, but it was pretty spacious, and there were even a desk and chairs. The curtains didn’t look that horrendous either. There was also a small LCD TV in the top corner of the room.
Zhou Mi shuffled around the table next to his desk, getting out and arranging everything he had brought. “Hm…?” He paused, leaning down to stare at something. “What’s this?”
Kyuhyun turned to see Zhou Mi poking at a plastic container inside a small brown bag on the table. He hadn’t noticed that before. Zhou Mi opened the container cautiously and leaned closer to sniff at it.
“Oh! Did Sungmin come to visit you earlier? He brought you his infamous pumpkin soup.” Zhou Mi’s expression brightened. Kyuhyun tried to lean over to see, though he was not really succeeding at it.
“Really? I must have been asleep. Say thanks to him for me the next time you see him.”
Tuesday noon, the twenty-third of November. The mission had been on Saturday evening. It had barely been three days, and yet somehow it felt so much longer.
-
He would have loved to say that the weeks he spent in the hospital passed by in a blur, but the truth was that they dragged on and on to infinity in his mind. He could barely moved around the first few days, and when they started to lower the dose for his painkiller, the pain was a thorn on his side. He managed to get something prescribed for his sleeping schedule though, so there was that at least.
Zhou Mi came by often, as if he felt was personally responsible for Kyuhyun’s health condition. He tried his best to transfer the entire content of Kyuhyun’s room to his hospital room. The visits dropped off a little in frequency by the end of his stay though. He had been doing some field work for the company again, Zhou Mi told him.
Sungmin didn’t really come again, but he regularly sent food through Zhou Mi’s delivery service. Kyuhyun was touched, especially as he nibbled on some delicious fluffy mochi with banana and white chocolate paste.
When he finally got out of the hospital though, life unfortunately didn’t get much more interesting. He was not bed-ridden anymore, but he was practically home-ridden. He needed time to fully recover from the injury, and Leeteuk had unceremoniously thrown a two-month holiday in his face, so there was absolutely zero work to do. Kyuhyun knew he was supposed to jump with joy as the prospect of free vacation time and he should fly off to some tropical paradise like Phuket or Bali or the Maldives to rest his achy body and enjoy what little piece of life he suddenly had, but Kyuhyun was inherently lazy, especially now that he was injured. And so he stayed home. With Zhou Mi.
Zhou Mi seemed to have become a full-time Korean agent in place of Kyuhyun’s absence, Kyuhyun suspected. The jobs slowly piled up, he slowly got more and more work to bring home every day, but Zhou Mi never stopped. Kyuhyun on the other hand sat on his ass playing games and staring at Zhou Mi’s pile of work sullenly.
At the very least, he had started to learn to make simple food in his vast amount of free time. From simple but delicious stir-fried instant noodle with spicy beef to pancakes with maple syrup. He was becoming a housewife, Kyuhyun grumbled one morning as he found himself preparing something for Zhou Mi to eat before he rushed to an early morning briefing.
Life was peaceful enough, he supposed, though it was definitely jarring since he had been so busy before. Now he suddenly had so much time to actually think. Kyuhyun pulled out his old research plan and pored over them again. He called up his old research partners back in university - Ryeowook and Yesung - and was surprised to learn that they were actually living together. His life was pretty good, he thought, what with actually having a social life and going out for drinks or a snack with real life friends once in a while. He didn’t even feel offended that Ryeowook had taken to tortoise-farming with Yesung as well. Yesung had the decency to laugh at him when he said he was working for SM though.
He was glad Zhou Mi never did actually move out though. His sunshine smiles and noisy fussing were still there to make his jobless life less dull. Somehow Zhou Mi had become a comforting presence in his home. Sometimes Zhou Mi also brought people from work back to his place to work on their projects, and Kyuhyun could live vicariously through them. He would hover over their shoulders, giving advice about this and that, and sometimes he even designed the maze himself. Kyuhyun spent a bit of personal time with the PASIV machine, researching and building a few constructions he had never had the chance to try out before. It was kind of fun, he realized, to be so relaxed about what he did again. This was what he was good at, this was what he had always enjoyed.
One day Zhou Mi brought home Victoria Song.
Kyuhyun was just getting a glass of water when he heard the door open and there were voices outside the doorway. The conversation was in… Chinese, and it sounded like a girl’s voice, and Kyuhyun raised an eyebrow, peaking his head out to see if one of Zhou Mi’s family relatives had just come or something.
And he promptly dropped the glass, spilling water everywhere on the kitchen table with a loud thumping noise. He was lucky it didn’t break since the table was wooden.
“What.” Kyuhyun made a strangled noise, unable to continue the sentiment.
Zhou Mi shuffled in with a young girl in tow, tall and beautiful, and none other than Chinese pop idol Victoria Song, They were both bundled up in colourful winter knit scarves, looking flush and giddy. Before Zhou Mi could even open his mouth, Victoria had bowed at him ninety degrees, her face brightened even more with a wide smile.
“Hello, I am Victoria, nice to meet you!”
Her hair whipped in the air as she bowed, and then Victoria proceeded to stare at him with huge hopeful eyes that resembled an overgrown evil kitten. Kyuhyun rubbed at his temple slightly.
“Uh. I know who you are.”
“And this is Kyuhyun!” Zhou Mi finally spoke up, the level of sunshine in hard competition with the girl. Zhou Mi turned to look at him. “Victoria came to Korea on a job, and I was assigned to help her with the planning of the operation. I hope you don’t mind if we borrow the living room for a bit.”
“Of course not.” Kyuhyun automatically said. Of course he didn’t mind. Zhou Mi practically lived there, it had pretty much become their apartment already. Zhou Mi borrowed his living room for work all the time anyway. It was just that his partner had never been a psychopathic young girl with abnormally bubblegum and cheerful disposition that moved like a well-trained sniper. Which she most likely was. He didn’t hold grudges, not really. Work was work, but it was easy to be apprehensive about someone who used to shoot him in the head without exactly good intention.
He retreated into his room after wiping up the kitchen table while Zhou Mi and Victoria got on with their work. Their conversations were all in Chinese, and while he could understand bits and snatches of it, he still wasn’t fluent enough, so he didn’t interfere. Zhou Mi sounded strangled excited, maybe because he could finally speak Chinese with someone after a long time. Or maybe it was just because Victoria was a really pretty girl. Kyuhyun peaked out from behind his bedroom door, feeling all kinds of ridiculous.
Zhou Mi and Victoria looked good together though. Tall, exceptionally good-looking, very stylish, nice and cheerful.
He crawled out of his room after a few hours of gaming, wandering into the kitchen looking for food. The other two beautiful people were still engrossed in their laptops and paperwork. Kyuhyun ignored them, poking through his fridge, trying to see what simple food he could make by himself. Maybe instant ramen was a quick, convenient, and delicious idea.
He was just setting the pan on the stove to boil hot water when a high voice piqued up, startling him into nearly dropping the pan.
“Oh, are you making dinner? You want any help?”
Before he knew it, Victoria had already wandered into the kitchen with Zhou Mi in tow like a puppy. Kyuhyun was determined not to flush as their eyes swept over his excellent nutritious choice for a meal.
“Let’s go for a break,” Victoria peered up at Zhou Mi with a hopeful smile, “I will make dinner for us.”
Zhou Mi looked a bit hesitant but finally nodded. “Okay, but only if we can help.”
And so dinner turned out to be an extravagant affair with stir-fried egg noodle, sweet and sour pork, salted cabbage, and iced fruit salad. Victoria was a surprisingly excellent cook, Kyuhyun had to grudgingly admit. It was still nonetheless jarring to see a girl cooking in his tiny kitchen. His mother would have cried with joy at the scene. As it was, Kyuhyun was more concerned with the lanky young man hovering over her shoulders.
He insisted on washing the dishes after dinner so they could get on with the work, and retreated to his room after he finished. There was this heavy feeling in his stomach, and it wasn’t really the food.
-
To his surprise and annoyance, the first thing Zhou Mi did after he came back from the job was to invade Kyuhyun’s room in the middle of his StarCraft mission. Kyuhyun blatantly ignored him, choosing to concentrate on the screen instead. And then Zhou Mi poked his cheek.
“What do you want.” Kyuhyun swatted at the offending hand after the fourth poke.
“Kyuhyun, are you sulking?”
What. “What are you talking about. I’m trying to concentrate here. That’s code for ‘please get the hell out of my room’, in case you didn’t catch it the last two months we have been together.” And he wasn’t really thinking about it when the words blurted out from his mouth, but saying that startled him. Had they really been living together for two months already? He had refused to hear it when Zhou Mi tentatively suggested he found a place of his own in order not to bother Kyuhyun when it became clear that he was going to stay in Korea for a while. Since when did he become so comfortable with another person in his personal space? Since when did he stop moving all around the continent?
Deep in his thoughts, he didn’t even notice that Zhou Mi was silent for a while. All of sudden, Zhou Mi tugged on his arm again, shaking him slightly.
“Let’s go out for dinner today, my treat?”
Kyuhyun glanced at the other man out of the corner of his eyes. The prospect of free food was tempting though. Zhou Mi knew his food, and Kyuhyun didn’t know how but the other man was apparently familiar with a lot of good restaurants in Seoul. It however was no surprise that Zhou Mi knew the shopping district by heart.
In the end, Kyuhyun finally tore himself away from his laptop, though only after several minutes of needling from Zhou Mi. He kicked the other man out and started changing, grabbing a random blue shirt from a furthest corner of his wardrobe and black pants, mostly because Zhou Mi had insisted on him wearing something nice. He guessed the place they were going to were kind of semi-formal. Kyuhyun made an attempt to smooth down his bed hair, but finally decided to give up. It was just Zhou Mi, he reasoned to himself.
To his utter non-surprise, when he came out Zhou Mi was dressed in a navy double-breasted blazer with golden buttons and tight dark pants, a grey cashmere scarf slung artistically across his shoulders. His hair was obviously perfect. Kyuhyun rolled his eyes as Zhou Mi grabbed his beloved Yves Saint Laurent clutch, and off they went.
The place did turn out to be semi-formal, a small classy French restaurant nestled away in Gangnam that looked both luxurious and cozy. It wasn’t like he was unfamiliar with this type of place, he had to deal with such often enough on the job, but to have a meal in such a place with lit candles and sparkling silverware with Zhou Mi… it was rather strange. The other guests around them were mostly couples.
He ordered some grilled salmon with mustard sauce for main course while Zhou Mi settled on something whose pronunciation was completely lost on him. French and complicated, no doubt. Zhou Mi ordered a bottle of red wine for them as well, a Merlot that was rich with hints of wild dark berries. Kyuhyun made a mental note to himself to drop by Sapphire Blue sometime in the near future. He hadn’t seen Sungmin for a while, and Zhou Mi had been too busy with work to visit either. The last time he had been to Blue Sapphire, the girl at the bar had said that Sungmin would be on holiday for a few weeks. At least he wanted to thank the man for the food he had sent when Kyuhyun had been in the hospital.
As they munched on their food happily, the conversation flowed on light and easy. Zhou Mi told him about his recent jobs, his hand movements and face animated. Apparently Leeteuk had been pairing him up with a lot of people on a lot of bizarre missions.
“Oh my god, that last job with Victoria was the most epic job ever.” Zhou Mi gushed, stabbing his cherry tomatoes in excitement. “We were in Hong Kong 1962, can you imagine? In the sixties! In Hong Kong! Apparently the mark - this filthy rich Hong Kong businessman - grew up there and had an affinity for the place back in the sixties when his family had just moved there from mainland China. That was a stroke of genius from Victoria, really. We had so much fun playing dress up in preparation for it.”
That part Kyuhyun knew. He had opened the door of his bedroom one day to the sight of Victoria in a traditional red qipao and Zhou Mi in a double-breasted three-piece grey suit with a pocket watch and a rather fetching fedora. It had definitely been a bizarre sight. He wondered why they felt the need to dress up even in the real world, but didn’t question them on it. They had both looked so excited.
“It was hard, looking for traditional Chinese stuff in the sixties in Seoul, but somehow we managed. We went to see this awesome Chinese lady who used to be an opera singer in Hong Kong in the old years. Her dresses and accessories were brilliant.” Zhou Mi practically said this with sparkles in his eyes. He had probably been even more excited than Victoria, Kyuhyun mused.
“It was really cool, you know? I love doing historical stuff like that. It is hard, but extremely interesting. I had to spend so much time studying old photos of Hong Kong, the bay, the Kowloon, the old markets. I used to go to Hong Kong all the time, but it was definitely fascinating to see how it was in the old days fifty years ago. Ah, did you know I used to go to school in Guangzhou? That’s why I can speak some Cantonese, thank god. That really helped in this job. Victoria can’t really speak much Cantonese.”
Kyuhyun nodded absently as Zhou Mi rambled on about Hong Kong in the sixties. It was interesting and all, but he was rather focused on dismantling his gratinée mussels on top of toasted garlic bread instead. Zhou Mi really did talk a lot about Victoria, but he had learned over the course of the past few days that she already had a boyfriend. (“But who would actually want to be the boyfriend of a bubblegum psychopath?” Kyuhyun had exclaimed this when Zhou Mi told him, and it earned him a nudge on the ribs that had him bowling over from the residual pain. Zhou Mi had apologised profusely, but still.)
To tell the truth, even Kyuhyun could see that Victoria was actually acting more like a partner in crime to Zhou Mi - someone he could go shopping and gush over pretty hats with and teach him how to make delicious chai pancakes with apricot sauce. That last part, Kyuhyun was particularly grateful for. Despite their busy schedule, Victoria’s visits to their apartment in the last few days meant that he had been fattened up at an alarming rate. He felt a bit guilty about it, but his stomach definitely had not been complaining. He was more than overjoyed about the sudden influx of the people in his life who were obsessed with making good food.
“I hope we can do more stuff like that in our future jobs together. I think you would have a lot of fun building those places in the past, Kyuhyun.”
Kyuhyun caught Zhou Mi’s smile out of the corner of his eyes and flushed slightly. “We would be mostly stuck with metal vaults and boring golf courses, sad to say. The minds of most of those business people are usually not that imaginative.” Kyuhyun cleared his throat, sipping from the wine glass. Would Zhou Mi and he even have a lot of chances to work together in the future, he wondered.
As he savoured the richness of the salmon, Kyuhyun had to wonder about this sudden treat he was having though. Did Zhou Mi somehow feel bad about neglecting him for work still? Zhou Mi had once told him this, and Kyuhyun had been so dumbfounded that he had laughed until his ribs hurt.
The answer came soon enough, as the main course was cleared away, leaving them with the two wine glasses while waiting for dessert.
“So…” Zhou Mi began, and Kyuhyun knew this was going to be it. “It has been over two months.”
Kyuhyun nodded. “Yeah, it has. Time flies, huh?”
“Two months since your… since the Kim Minyoung job. I’m really glad you are okay, Kyuhyun.”
Kyuhyun himself was glad too, that was for sure. He fiddled with the wine glass, waiting patiently for Zhou Mi to continue.
“I think it has been enough time for it not to be… as you called it, ‘rebound’, or a spur of the moment thing because I was upset. About what happened.”
Kyuhyun stilled as the meaning of the words slowly sank in. He had almost forgotten about it, assuming the conversation to be a by-product of the drugs he had been knocked full of at the time. He had assumed Zhou Mi had forgotten everything as well, but apparently Zhou Mi had not. It was almost too late to brace himself for what was coming.
“I love you, Cho Kyuhyun.”
And then Zhou Mi fell silent, waiting for him to slowly sort out his brain and formulate a reply. Except it was not that easy. Kyuhyun stared at his wine glass, at the table cloth, the small china plate. Everything about him felt stilted, out of focus, as if he was floating on a piece of wood plank on the Pacific Ocean. This was not how it was supposed to be, he thought to himself. Yet he didn’t even know how it was supposed to be then.
“You.” Kyuhyun started, and stopped himself. “You brought me to a fancy French restaurants with lit candles and sliver tableware to… say that you… love me.” The ridiculous nature of the situation struck him then stronger than ever. It was as if he was some girl Zhou Mi wanted to woo, all sweet and romantic. He had cared more about the salmon than the candles. But he supposed it was just typical Zhou Mi, the part that was absolutely ridiculous and charming about him. Yet, Kyuhyun was not a girl, beautiful or sweet.
Zhou Mi laughed then, the sound giddy and nervous, and Kyuhyun briefly closed his eyes. A hand tentatively touched his, the long fingers prying his own away from the wine glass. His fingers tangled with Zhou Mi’s, the other man’s skin soft and warm and familiar.
“What is stopping you, Kyuhyun?”
“…Your ex? Whom you still apparently like a lot?” His voice came out scratchy in his throat, the answer sounded more like a dubious question even in his own ears.
“You know there isn’t anything like that between Sungmin and me anymore.” Zhou Mi’s voice was soft, and Kyuhyun could feel his cheeks burn. The waiter came out of nowhere with their desserts, and Zhou Mi resolutely refused to let go of his hand the entire time. He was suddenly self-conscious of all the other people around them in the small restaurant. He settled for staring at their desserts instead - white chocolate mouse with apricot and Earl Grey tea for Zhou Mi, and a small piece of apple pie for him. They both looked sickeningly sweet.
Zhou Mi tugged at his fingers.
“You can’t run away forever, Kyuhyun.”
“Why are you so insistent even after what I said?” Kyuhyun asked, feeling oddly bewildered.
Zhou Mi averted his eyes, looking a little abashed. “So I texted your sister after that time, and she replied that you were a painfully socially awkward turtle, and that I should just kick your ass into it, quote unquote.” Zhou Mi laughed, embarrassed as Kyuhyun stared at him in indignation. “But I waited for two months, like you wanted to.” Zhou Mi looked up, beaming at him.
His eyes flickered to the long line of Zhou Mi’s forefinger. What exactly was it that he had been running from? What was it that was stopping him from going ahead with this?
His fingers curled around Zhou Mi’s, pressing to the touch.
-
They were both quiet on the way home, but there was this underlying thrum of nervous energy running through every single touch. Kyuhyun fumbled with his key card, and Zhou Mi let out a small laugh, high and abrupt. He was halfway into the living room when Zhou Mi’s hands landed on his hips from behind. Kyuhyun stilled as long fingers rested warm and solid on his hips, stroking slowly, almost as an afterthought.
Zhou Mi’s presence was warm behind his back, and shivers ran down his spine as that warmth shifted closer, pressing against his back. Zhou Mi’s lips brushed his ears, hot breath damp against the nape of his neck. Kyuhyun automatically leaned back, stretching his neck to let the taller man run his lips across the expanse, sucking on his neck. His eyes fluttered close, and before he knew it, they were kissing, tongues hot against each other’s and the slight bits of teeth nibbling on swollen lips. It was the first time they kissed when he was completely awake and sober, and it was everything he remembered and then some. The taste of Zhou Mi’s lips, his scent, and rub of Zhou Mi’s jaw against his skin. Kyuhyun’s head was dizzy with the heat.
When they finally broke apart for air, Zhou Mi was panting softly against his ear and his hard-on was pressed warm against his thigh. Kyuhyun deliberately dragged his leg against the hardness just to feel Zhou Mi’s entire body twitch deliciously. He smirked against the corner of Zhou Mi’s lips. Zhou Mi leaned close, deliberately breathing into Kyuhyun’s ear.
“Are you saying yes now?”
Kyuhyun answered with a roll of his hips, and Zhou Mi gasped, fingers clutching tight around his hips. “Let’s go.” Kyuhyun tugged at his hands as Zhou Mi showed no sign of moving from their spot in the living room. He was too busy trying to get Kyuhyun’s pants open.
“Zhou Mi. Bedroom.” Kyuhyun tugged at his hand again, trying to push his human koala towards the other direction.
“Why? Here is just fine.” Zhou Mi whined against the back of his ear, and Kyuhyun had to restrain himself from shuddering as Zhou Mi’s long fingers finally worked his pants open and slipped inside.
“Mi… no. Condom’s in the bedroom.” Kyuhyun swatted at the other’s hand in annoyance, but Zhou Mi had already stilled.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” Kyuhyun smirked and then immediately tripped over himself as Zhou Mi practically dragged him by the neck towards the direction of the bedroom.
---
---
---
Kyuhyun was on level eight of the stupid game on his phone when Leeteuk slammed the door open and rushed into the meeting room, looking harried and frantic as usual. He didn’t even bother to get his feet off the chair.
“Hey, what’s up, Leeteuk-hyung.” Kyuhyun said in monotone, and got a nudge on his back for his trouble.
“Good morning, Leeteuk-hyung!”
Kyuhyun rolled his eyes, putting his phone down on the table.
“Oh hey, Kyuhyun, Zhou Mi, sorry for the… uh… lateness.” Leeteuk tried to smooth down his shirt, adjusting his glasses and running a hand through his hair.
“No problem, it’s only nearly time for lunch now.” A sharp elbow nudged his back again, and Kyuhyun turned, glaring at Zhou Mi. He straightened up and adjusted himself back to his own seat. His human pillar was being pretty annoying that morning.
“Sorry, I had a few meetings before this. Things to settle, people to see, paperwork to sign, and all that jazz.” Leeteuk set his bag down on the glass table, pulling out several files. “Did you have fun in your last job?”
“It was… entertaining, yes.” Zhou Mi smiled beside him, his mirth barely controlled as he remembered what had happened, and Kyuhyun didn’t even bother to hide his snicker. It had involved some rather bizarre cross-dressing action.
“This new job isn’t that much entertaining, I’m afraid to say. Still, I’m sure you two would find a way to enjoy yourselves.” The corner of Leeteuk’s lips twitched up, and Zhou Mi flushed a little while a smirk graced Kyuhyun’s lips.
It had been six months since he had finally gotten over his misgivings and said yes to Zhou Mi’s insistence. When Kyuhyun came back to work after two months of obligatory vacation time, Leeteuk was apprehensive at first about him going into the field again so soon, but Zhou Mi had volunteered to be his partner in all projects to ‘keep an eye on him’. After a while, when it became apparent that Kyuhyun was more than fine, it was also more than apparent that Zhou Mi would stick together with him on the job from then on. And so they became a team, the same way Donghae and Eunhyuk did. Kyuhyun supposed it worked out, since he was supposed to cover the China region from then on anyway, so it actually made sense that they would fly back and forth between China and Korea together.
“Okay, so, new development.” Leeteuk pushed up the glasses on his nose, straightening up. “Our company has decided to solidify a deal, working with a partner company in Japan. This is our first ever partner contract with another company on the same level of business, not to mention a foreign one. This company specializes in subconscious reading and sharing technology, and they own one of the biggest labs in Japan, in Okinawa.”
“So it is a Japan-related job?” Zhou Mi asked, curious.
“Kind of. But actually, it is more China-related, which is why you have been called in. They have some deals to settle in a Chinese region, but their China network really isn’t so extensive as ours, so that is why they want to work with us on this job. Of course it provides a very good opportunity for us to draw up a partner deal for future cooperation.”
“Ah, I see.” Zhou Mi nodded in understanding. “How is the format of the job supposed to change if we are supposed to be working with them though?”
“They are sending one person from their Korean branch to us. You are going to work with this person for the job.” Leeteuk smiled.
Kyuhyun raised an eyebrow. That was significant. Japan had been the first Asian country to embrace and develop subconscious sharing technology, to work with one of the big giants would have tremendous meaning for the company. He mentally counted the big ones he knew in Japan in his head and wondered who this one could be.
Before he could finish his thought though, there was a knock on the door.
“Oh, that would be whom we have been waiting for.” Leeteuk perked up, walking towards the door and opening it. “Oh hey, I see you have made it. Please come in.”
Kyuhyun craned his neck to see who was at the door. Zhou Mi was too tall and blocking his view. Kyuhyun blinked as he touched the other’s arm - Zhou Mi had suddenly stiffened. He peered up at Zhou Mi’s face. His eyes were staring straight ahead towards the doorway and he looked… stricken by something?
“Guys, please welcome, our new partner from AVEX Corporation.” Leeteuk stepped back, allowing the other person to come in and shutting the door behind. Kyuhyun’s eyes flickered over.
“Hello, I am Lee Sungmin. It’s a pleasure to meet you. I hope we can have a great time working together.” The young man bowed, looking straight at Kyuhyun with a small smile on his lips.
The phone he had been holding in his hand dropped to the glass table with a loud clanking noise.
-
End.
Long-Winded Author's Note:
1. Yes, it really is the end.
2. It's been a long journey. 54,000+ words, one November for writing, and one January for editing and posting. Once again I would like to extend my thanks to: Ddangkoma, Sungmin's pumpkin soup, Victoria Song's fabulous qipao, Zhou Mi's cooking lessons in Korean Impression, Kyuhyun's alcohol appreciation, my flist for putting up with all my rambling and hand-wringing throughout November, and of course my awesome readers who have been following this silly little piece throughout January. Also, thank you to chrysa who were an enabler that enabled.
3. During November, I also made 2 book/fic covers which were entirely unrelated to the storyline but they made me lol and cheered me up a lot.
the high cost of dying
heartquake
(note: #2 was made in celebration of lulzy badfic graphics that cried tears of cheesiness. sry qmi.)
4. Yes, it really is the end. No moar trolling I swear!! There isn't even an epilogue. It should have been QMiMin but it isn't, my apologies. ;_;
5. brb passing out now.