Tense (14) Backfire
Click to view-continues from Tense (13) Showtime -
Heechul cursed silently under his breath as he crouched down low against the wall. He never did like getting his hands dirty; yes, he could point a gun and shoot just as well as any of them but it didn't mean he liked it. He found that most of the strongest-looking of people flailed when a gun's mouth was pointed at their most important areas after all.
He peeked around the side of the wall, where the hotel's entrance was. If Yunho was smart, they would escape through the front - risky but less likelihood of fire. Choi might be an idiot but he was not one to start a gang war in public. He flicked the safety off and waited.
Fuck you, Hojun. 5 minutes and I'm going in.
---
"All clear." muttered Hojun as he looked over the railing, glancing quickly downwards and then above. Yunho was behind him, still carrying a dazed Changmin. He groaned.
"Yunho..? Are you alright?" whispered Changmin as he looked worriedly at the older man. Yunho coughed again and then answered, "I guess I'm still a bit winded. The bullet didn't hit me but it was too close a distance."
"Let me down, I'll run." Changmin said, moving to get off.
"No, you're in pain." objected Yunho, tightening his grasp.
"It's nothing I can't handle. I'll worry about it when we get out of here." Changmin hopped off gingerly and leaned against the wall, feeling the ache severely in between his legs. He thought briefly of having to undress and then.. face the extent of the damage of whatever was there. That amount of pain. He could feel himself quaver.
Strong arms enveloped him again.
"Hey, I've got you."
Changmin looked back into Yunho's warm eyes, eyes that were alit with fight.
He came back for me.
He attempted a smile and answered, "Let's go."
---
"Fuck these Korean bastards. No sense of principles at all!" cursed Kei-san as he rubbed the back of his head.
"Kei-san we have to tread carefully. This isn't Japa.."
"Yes, I know that, Ryu-san." spat out Kei-san as he kicked the nearest chair into a corner of the room. "First that two-faced Choi dared to mark my Changmin, and now my Changmin's gone off with Jung fucking Yunho of all people. How the fuck did he get involved with the two biggest mafia heads in Korea?!"
"And one more thing..."
"What?!"
"There's another problem with Choi."
---
Siwon closed his eyes and counted to 3 slowly. His regular masseuse had told him he needed to learn how to relax even in emergency situations. Well, she had mentioned something like that - he could not really remember, after all she had mentioned it when he was busy fucking her during one of their sessions. But her words had stuck.
"Where the hell is Shim and Jung now?" he asked, voice shaking with the effort of keeping it even.
"We're not sure, Mr Choi. Our men were led to another location so it was just the couple of us here and no one keeping track of the surroundings. We only realised the trap when we got there."
"1...2..." counted Siwon again.
He growled and jabbed the mouth of his revolver into the temple of the squeaking man that was on his knees in front of him.
"Mr Choi?" came another voice from behind him.
"Kei-san is looking for you."
---
39th floor
"Take the stairs!"
"Down! They are there"
25th floor
"Goddamnit! They are here!"
Pressed against the wall, the three held their breaths as gunfire sounded from above their heads, the sound echoing off the stairwell's walls.
"Hojun, stat rep now."
"Heechul's outside waiting for us."
"Our men?"
"Surrounding the building. We're holding off on any confrontation until you're out."
"Let's try to avoid that. There are members of public here, and I don't plan on Jungnam Inc. getting implicated."
"What do we do now?"
"Get out of here before the police comes."
Changmin was staring wide-eyed at Yunho and Hojun as they spoke but at Yunho's final word, they both turned to him and in unison,
"Police?!!"
Yunho looked at the both of them and winked.
"You didn't think I came here without a plan of my own, did you?"
He leaned in and tugged Changmin's chin up towards him,
"We'll talk about this mark of yours later."
Changmin exhaled.
Fuck.
---
"Yunho's got the coppers coming." muttered Hojun into the receiver.
"What the hell? Is he crazy?" Heechul burst out before he remembered where he was and clamped a hand over his mouth.
"He says he has a plan."
"Fuck. And our men have to be out of here before they arrive, how. the. fuck. will. we. do. that?"
In the distance, police sirens sounded.
"Just get the fuck out of there now, Son. All of you!"
---
15th floor.
"Here."
The sound of gunfire from the floors above had stopped but they were not about to question why.
"Yunho, I don't know if you have noticed but we're still not at ground level yet." said Hojun.
"Just follow me."
They slid the door open after Yunho made sure the coast was clear and sneaked out. He led them down the carpeted corridor. This floor was the hotel's club floor; Changmin could hear the sound of television from an occupied room as they hurried down the hallway. He hoped this would end well and quickly.
1522.
Yunho took out a card and let them in.
"Baby, you need to go and shower and dress up."
"What?"
"Trust me. As of now, we're a couple now, and we've just checked in."
"What's going on?" asked Hojun.
Yunho sighed and turned to his right-hand man.
"When I found out that Kei-san was in Seoul, I had my contacts do some research. He was staying at the Peninsula, which is where -" Yunho paused to indicate Changmin with a flick of his head "-Changmin has a room. But he would definitely not seek him out there so the second most obvious location would be this hotel. It's part-owned by a Kenta-gun affiliate," Yunho finally let himself smirk "and part-owned by Jungnam Inc. I found this out by chance when a source informed me that some Japanese yakuza had checked in here."
"As expected, the penthouse was booked by a Ryuka Tamoroshi. Japanese connection. I got a booking here on the club floor and set about preparing the next part of my plan. I was going to try and keep Jumon Syndicate and Jungnam Inc. out of this as much as possible. I'm not interested in a cross-country turf war. So I called in a favour. As you know, we have operated quite peacefully all these years despite the nature of our activities. This did not come cheap but it's paid off. We have some men in the police force and I hinted that gang activities were taking place here."
"Heechul had a plan too. He slipped Choi's men information about a different location and they went there instead. We were supposed to come here, get Shim and leave. We didn't know about any police!"
"Calm down, it's not a crime to be at a place. This is within Jumon Syndicate's turf. The police is aware of that unofficially. Plus I'm here with my lover, fucking. Naturally, my men will be outside."
Changmin was speechless as he listened to Yunho. It was a risky plan but was brilliant. Yunho's alibi for being here was iron-clad. Jungnam Inc. owned half the hotel, and he was here with Yunho. Even if the police suspected anything, their hands were clean.
Yunho got up and went over to Changmin, holding him in a loose embrace.
"I know you're hurting, my love. But I'm going to have to ask you to be strong for me, and just do your best one more time. Then after this, we'll take care of you and we can talk about what happened."
"Yunho.. I'm sorry." Changmin's eyes welled up again, misery on his face as he recalled the hurt on Yunho's face when Choi's gang mark was revealed.
"I had no choice, I didn't know if Heechul would come in time, I didn't know if you would come. I knew if Kei-san saw this, there was a chance he would turn on Siwon and that would buy me more time."
Yunho chuckled, then he leaned over to press kisses along the side of Changmin's face.
"You did well, my love. Nothing enrages an old gang boss more than seeing a young pipsqueak mark his women.. or in this case, his man."
"Now, I need you to shower so we can look like a couple who are going for a date before coming back to fuck."
---
20th floor.
The door flew open and the men rushed in, having come down from the upper floor when they realised it was empty.
"Kei-san is coming!" reported one of them.
Siwon turned around and faced the door. His men gathered behind him, guns pointed, ready for a fight.
The man appeared soon after, flanked by his own guards.
He took one look at the manpower in the room and shook his head. "Siwon-san. I'm surprised you still dare to act like you did nothing wrong."
"I don't know what you mean."
"All that gun display. When I should be the one pointing this at you!" Kei-san scowled, lifting up a gun of his own and pointing at Siwon.
Immediately, six men on each side lifted their own weapons, all aimed at the other side.
The tension grew.
"I don't know what the fuck you're talking about." repeated Siwon.
"Fucking Changmin, I can live with. It's what men like us do. Fine. I hope you fucked him well and good. But to mark him, when he is still mine. It is technically theft and you owe me both an apology and compensation."
"What the.. I didn't mark him!"
Kei-san chortled, the sound of his laughter ringing around the room.
"I saw it with my own eyes, Siwon-san And it is enough to tell me that as of now, clearly rules are meant to be broken."
---
-continues to Tense (15) Showdown -