ILJIN

34 | BOSS

He stared at her pointedly and her brows furrowed.

"What?" she groaned out. "What do you want me to say?"

To talk to me. Because I have so much to tell you about that, he wanted so badly to say, but he didn't.

"I want you to promise me you'll talk to someone when you're upset. Don't keep it bottled. It's not good for you," he licked his lips. "Even if it's not me, promise me you'll talk to someone."

Her eyes had turned glassy, as if remembering something someone else had said, or just someone generally. "That's a lot you ask for, Choi."

"But it's not impossible," he retaliated. "I've been there and done it. Whatever you're going through now, I had already too."

Her expression morphed into one of silent inquisition and a corner of San's lips quirked.

"What? Where do you think the Choi of my name came from? My personal creativity?"

..

Hansol's fingers fumbled as the man drew near. His fingers felt like they were smeared with butter and his throat went dry.

One of his fingers jabbed something on the remote and-

Beep...

Both parties froze in step.

Beep...

Beep...

He heard his Uncle take in a sharp breath, clearly recognizing the familiar sound, and that seemed to pull him out of any sort of shell-shock trance he fell into.

"Another step," he tried to bring up his inner Dong Sicheng, surprising himself by how steady and legitimate he sounded. "And you go right down with me, Uncle dearest."

Faint amusement danced in the other man's eyes, clearly not buying his words, so Hansol jammed his finger into another random button, hoping it didn't blow him up.

Well, luckily for him, God was on his side this time. The left of the building went up in fucking flames. Real blue fire flames he never thought he'd see anywhere outside the laboratory. How the fuck Liu Yangyang managed to do this he had no idea and he was not about to find out. Taking this pristine chance his Uncle was distracted, everyone was screaming and there was chaos everywhere, he ran.

He ran as quickly as his legs could carry him, as far as he could go. He didn't even know where he was running to but he knew he had to fucking run.

So adrenaline pumping through his veins, breath like glass shards poking through his lungs, he ran.

..

"What are you doing?"

Alarmed and clearly uninformed, Guanlin held out a hand, confused. "Where are you going?" he rephrased his question when he saw the large leather bag on the table top.

The masked man shoved him and Guanlin stumbled back, nearly losing his footing. "You didn't see it on the way in?" the older man jabbed a finger in the window's direction.

The Chinese boy followed his finger, biting down on his lower lip. The blotchy single word on the clear window was crusted and a little brownish, seemingly written in blood. Blood that dried over time, likely. The edges of every letter were drippy and some overlapped each other, but the word itself still seemed relatively clear.