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Minho crept through the dark room, his mask hiding the glow of his face, gun held up and at the ready. His bulletproof vest was getting in his way, but he was grateful that it protected him from the enemy.
Speaking of the enemy, there was someone shifting around ahead of him. They looked like they were trying their best to blend into the darkness, but Minho could still detect movement. He crouched behind a wall and steeled his nerve, resting his finger on the trigger of his gun. He took a couple of deep, silent breaths. And three, two, one—
Minho stood and rounded the corner, raising his gun to fire, only to be met with the tip of another gun to his chest.
“Checkmate.”
An alarm went off in his vest, a sad little pew pew pew like Pac-Man dying emanating from inside it, and the lights came back on. Minho stood still, in a state of shock, as he looked at his attacker.
“You—“ he started, before looking more closely at his murderer. He was ethereal. Never minding his carrot coloured hair, which was covered by a black baseball cap, and his smug expression which was driving Minho crazy, the boy could be an angel. Or, with those eyes paired with that smirk, possibly a demon.
“You fucker! I was going to win!” Minho finally managed, tearing his eyes away from the boy’s plush lips.
“And I won, instead.” He shrugged, and stuck out his hand, the one that wasn’t holding his gun. “Han Jisung. I thought you’d like to know who had the pleasure of beating your fine ass at a game of laser tag.”
Minho shook the boy’s hand, still in a mild state of shock, and was about to respond with his own name when they were cut off by a voice over the PA system.
“Everyone clear the floor, please, the next game will be starting in two minutes.”
Minho shot Jisung a glare before heading out of the room and going to stand in the line again. Much to his chagrin, Jisung stood behind him and waited for another game as well.
Jisung kept trying to talk to Minho, but Minho was not paying any attention. What did he owe the little shit behind him except a rematch?
Finally, finally, the floor was open again. However, there were only enough openings left for two people to squeeze in alongside the large group that had gone in front of them. Minho tried to push a couple ahead of him, but they wanted to be on the same team, while the remaining guns were of separate teams.
So, Minho stepped forward, his gaze coming to rest on the red gun. As he picked the thing up, he saw another hand that looked like it might belong to the carrot head curl around the breech of the other gun. Glancing out of the corner of his eye, he confirmed, it was that Jisung kid.
They entered the arena, Minho’s heart pounding loudly in his chest, and had thirty seconds to hide. Minho positioned himself in a turret sort of place, higher ground where he could snipe off the other team while hardly being seen.
It was a perfect plan, until about two minutes in, when his vest made a sad pew pew pew, signifying his death. Again.
“Okay, no, what the actual fuck?” Minho said, confused. He was literally on top of a turret, his vest protected, and nobody had even looked up at him the entire time. He had worked so hard, scaling a turret and everything, and now his kills were all for naught, because he had died as well. How the fuck had he died?
A pair of shoes dropped onto the surface next to him. “Checkmate,” a cheery voice came.
Minho looked up, and sure enough, fucking Jisung was standing over him, offering a hand to help him up. Minho’s mouth opened in shock, and his brow furrowed further.
“Heya,” the boy grinned.
“How the fucking hell did you get me?”
“The next round begins in two minutes, please exit through the door on the right side of the arena.”
Minho smacked Jisung’s hand away and hopped off of the turret, turning to stalk through the open door. He heard Jisung follow in his movements. Once they were outside the arena, Minho turned.
“How the fucking hell did you get me?” he repeated.
“Well, y’see,” Jisung started, bringing a hand up to ruffle the back of his hair and adjust his hat. The movement pulled his loose shirt up a little bit, and Minho struggled to keep his eyes on the boy’s face. “I knew you would want to get somewhere high, to start sniping, right? And so I strapped my gun around me and climbed the walls to hang from the ceiling. The ceiling is nice and made of bars going across in a lattice pattern, right, and so, I uh, swung from those along the wall until I found you, and then I went around behind you and stuck my legs through the ceiling and hung by my knees, and pulled my gun around, and shot you.”
Minho stood there, agape. “I—“
Jisung tugged on his hand and pulled him into the back of the line again. “At least one more try to get me, yeah? I feel kinda bad about that last one.”
Jesus Christ, there was something you didn’t see every day. An angel at a laser tag arena, promising instant death and a shot at redemption. Only to encounter instant death again.
So they waited in line for another pass at the game. Once they were finally at the front, there were only blue guns left.
“We’re gonna be on the same team this time. No friendly fire, right?” Jisung said. “We’ll just have to wait for another round for you to get me.”
Minho shrugged and tossed the other boy a gun. “Arm thyself.” Minho made sure his face mask was secured up over his nose, before picking up a gun for himself. “And let the game begin.”
The doors swung open, and each team was given a minute to get themselves ready. Jisung latched onto Minho’s hand, making his heart flutter, for some reason, and pulled both of them behind a pillar.
“Do we need a game plan?” Jisung whispered.
“I already have one.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. Don’t get shot.” Minho stood and rounded the corner, shooting the two people in front of him in the chest.
Minho heard Jisung snort behind him, and then felt something press up against his back. “What if I used you as my human shield?”
“I wouldn’t play the next round,” he murmured in return, proceeding to take aim and fire an accurate hit to the centre of someone else’s vest.
The girl threw her arms in the air and stalked away. “For fuck’s sake, why can’t I last longer than two minutes in this infernal game?”
Minho tried not to laugh. It would give away his position too easily. He turned to face Jisung, shooting someone over the other boy’s shoulder in the process. “You left your six unprotected.”
“Yeah well, you—look out!” Jisung pushed Minho down and landed on top of him, trying to protect him from an oncoming array of lasers.
Jisung’s vest flashed a couple of times before sounding off that he had died.
“Damn,” Minho muttered. “I was planning on tag-teaming the shit out of this.”
“Well,” Jisung shrugged. “You have fifteen opponents left, and two teammates, me not included. Good luck. Prove your worth.” With those final words, he managed to push himself off from on top of Minho, and walked out the door.
“Fuck,” was all Minho could come up with. Having the boy’s face so close to his own was an experience, one that left his heart racing. He was ethereal, his flawless skin leading into warm dark eyes. His smile was the brightest thing he had ever seen and oh, fuck, did he have a tongue piercing?
Minho shook his head in a futile attempt to clear it of the unholy god that was Han Jisung. He had a game to win. Returning to his first strategy, he scaled the turret in the back corner and began sniping off members of the other team, unable to erase any thought of Jisung from his mind. After less than five minutes had passed, all fifteen were eliminated. Minho walked out of the room, pretending to blow smoke from the barrel of his gun, giving Jisung a smirk.
“That was hot,” Minho thought he heard Jisung mutter.
Minho choked on his spit as returned his gun to the table. “What?”
“Hm?”
“What did you say?”
Jisung flicked his tongue out over his bottom lip. “Nothing.”
Yeah. That really looked like a tongue piercing.
Lee Minho was going to die at the hands of Han Jisung.
The next rounds only served to prove how accurate that statement was.
They got to go through the arena multiple times, since the line only got shorter as time passed. On the rare occasion that Jisung and Minho were on the same team, Jisung would push Minho down and lay on top of him to protect him from the lasers. If they were on separate teams, which was more often than not, Jisung would end up shooting Minho in some way within the first five minutes.
“How the hell are you so good at this game?” Minho asked, throwing his gun onto the table after a round where he had died within the first thirty seconds. He mussed up his hair and pulled his face mask down so he could breathe easier.
“Well, I practice a....” Jisung started. His eyes widened more the longer he looked at Minho. “Hi,” he breathed.
Minho furrowed his brow and stripped his vest off. “Uh, hi? You good?”
Jisung blinked a couple of times before shaking his head. “Yeah, uh, I was gonna say I practice a lot.”
“Uh... huh.”
“Well, and then you took your face mask off and I’m actually seeing you and it’s weird because all I could see of you before was your eyes and the way they crinkled up when you smiled and now I can also see your smile and you’re actually currently smiling and oh god I think I might die.”
Minho was, in fact, beginning to smile. “Huh. I really don’t want you to die, so I’ll just pull this back up, yeah? I enjoy our battle. Even if it is frustrating.”
He began to reach for the top to move it back up over his face, but Jisung’s hand shot out to grab his and gently push it back down. “No, uh, that’s fine. I won’t really die.”
“Probably.”
“Yeah. Probably.”
“Next round begins in thirty seconds.”
Another two rounds of Minho quickly being shot down came and went, albeit in a blaze of glory, and the frustration became exceptionally present. It would have been fine losing that many times, too, but the problem was that it was Han Motherfucking Jisung who killed him each time. Minho sat down sharply and massaged his temples.
Jisung sat next to him. “Hey. One more try?”
“You fucking—“
“Next round begins in one minute.”
There was nobody in line. The place was about to close, actually; it was late in the evening, and honestly everyone wanted to go home. This low key included Minho.
“It’s just the two of us. What’re you playing at?”
“Huh? Nothing. I just, well, I don’t know your name, still, and I’d kinda at least like to get that before you try to beat me.”
“Oh. Uh, Minho. Lee Minho. Honestly, after all of this? Hyung’s fine.” Minho stuck out his hand to properly shake Jisung’s. “I’m the guy that’s about to beat you.”
Jisung smirked. “That’s the kind of attitude I like to see. Last round?”
Minho nodded. “Last round.”
Jisung tossed a blue gun over to Minho, who caught it deftly, and picked up a red one for himself. “Ready?”
“No time like the present,” Minho nodded again.
The doors in front of them opened, and they went to their respective sides.
The beauty of being in a laser tag arena late at night was that there was literally nobody else there. Nobody to dodge, nobody to shoot; he could focus primarily on his carrot-headed opponent.
Minho crept around barrier after barrier, his gun at the ready. In his haste, he had forgotten to tug his face mask back up, so he tried to keep his face hidden and his breathing as even and quiet as possible.
He sat down in a corner, trying to collect his thoughts. He closed his eyes and let the darkness allow him to focus on every little sound.
There was faint hardcore metal playing in the background, but it was low enough that it didn’t matter. There were a couple of fans whirring softly, and a general white noise ambience. He tried to focus in on anything irregular—
A slight sound of panting came from around the corner. It sounded like it was getting closer, too. Yeah, that was definitely Jisung, he decided as the barrel of a gun came around the crate in between them.
Minho leapt up and smacked the gun in Jisung’s hand away, pushing the boy against the wall. As the gun clattered to the floor, Jisung’s eyes widened, and his breathing became more erratic. “Hi,” he whispered so quietly that Minho barely heard it, but could feel the gush of air brush across his collar bone.
God, Minho’s senses were overloading. He wasn’t sure what to do with everything that was going on, not sure of what to pay attention to. The sweat racing down his back, or the beads of perspiration peppering Jisung’s hairline? His own heavy breathing or the way their breath mingled in the small space between them? How his hair probably looked like he had just rolled out of bed or the way Jisung’s pupils were dilating? How he could feel his pulse in his fingertips or the way he could see Jisung’s beat beneath his Adam’s apple?
Their current position?
Or their current thought process?
Minho surged forward and caught Jisung’s lips with his own. His eyes fluttered shut. What was he doing?
Did it matter?
Everything was lost in the soft touch of Jisung’s lips. Kissing Jisung was like manoeuvring his hand through a cloud. There was the faintest of contact, and it was like a cool breeze, refreshing and satisfying.
Minho pulled back a little bit to allow oxygen to flow back into his lungs. His eyes reopened, and his vision felt enhanced, his nerves buzzing.
Jisung’s eyes were still closed, his eyebrows raised in a look of surprise. He blinked a couple of times, and Minho was blessed with dark pools that he could lose himself in looking back at him.
In shock.
Minho cleared his throat. “I, um. I’m sorry. I don’t know what—“
“Shut up,” Jisung murmured, and reversed their position. He pushed Minho up against the wall, his arms caging him in, a hand on either side of his head, and his lips crashed against the older’s. His tongue swept across the seam of Minho’s lips, and Minho more than willingly parted them with only the faintest of squeaks, allowing Jisung to lick in with ease.
And oh, fuck, that was definitely a tongue piercing.
The space between them, already small, decreased as Jisung brought his fingers to curl into Minho’s hair. Minho keened, his breath coming in short gasps. His right hand came up to fist in Jisung’s shirt, around the vest, before realising that he was still wearing the vest, and they were in a very public space with very exhausted staff and they were kissing in a dark corner.
In his left hand, Minho was still holding the gun.
The goddamn gun, that had brought them together in the first place.
He pressed the gun to Jisung’s vest, and pulled the trigger.
Pew, pew, pew.
Minho’s eyes fluttered open in time to see the look of utter surprise in Jisung’s.
He smirked.
“Checkmate.”