Work Text:
When he first sees you, you are an unfamiliar name in a familiar place.
At first, Luciel thinks that you are a glitch, a fragment of imagination created by his too-tired mind. Too many nights awake. Too much Ph. D Pepper. It sits badly in his stomach. He can’t help but wonder when was the last time he ate something other than junk food.
He’s quick to dismiss the notion; he can always eat tomorrow.
Right now…
His finger traces the list of names at the top of the chatroom.
Hey.
Think someone entered the chatroom.
The first time he sees your face, it is in a grainy photo on someone else’s social media profile. You are partially-turned away from the camera, but it’s all he needs to see your features.
Luciel smiles and taps out a quick response on the messenger.
Shescutelol.
He feels a flicker of amusement at the response; Zen is already demanding a photo of you. He sends one of Jaehee instead.
He can find out more than just a photo, of course, much, much more.
Medical records. Bank accounts. Insurance information. He’s used to looking up these things, for both the agency and V. His fingertips itch, and he rubs them idly against the rough material of his shirt. He really should look into those files, save himself the time and effort, for when V inevitably asks him to dig them back up.
And yet, his cursor lies still on the screen.
He isn’t quite sure what to make of you yet.
If you are telling the truth, then you’re simply an innocent bystander, willing to go to great lengths to return someone’s lost phone. It’s sweet, in a way. Luciel thinks of Saeran and can’t help but wonder if his brother would do the same thing in your place.
Eventually, he decides that he would. Even as kids, Saeran had been the more trusting of the two of them. He had always been quick to believe whatever their mother said, nevermind if she was drunk or sober.
Wherever Saeran is, right now, Luciel hopes that he’s with someone he trusts. Someone who would only say nice things to him, like their mother never did. Like Luciel can’t.
In the end, he decides to leave the information alone for now. He can give you that much, at least.
Privacy. For a hacker (cockroach) like him, the term was almost laughable.
But still, he tries.
It is hours later when V calls and asks him to dig the information back up.
This time, Luciel doesn’t have a choice.
He closes his eyes when he sends V the files.
Ever since he joined the agency, all his days had been the same.
Too much work. Too much time lost. Vanderwood and the agency breathing down his neck. Empty cans of Ph.D Pepper beginning to litter his desk.
Missions. Digging up information that can ruin lives, sending them to people whose faces he can’t see.
Someone smiling at him. Him smiling back and introducing himself with a fake name that tastes like ash in his mouth. The edge of a gun digging into his back.
Work, RFA, V.
When he has the time, Luciel finds himself staring at Saeran’s pictures.
(Once, he tried to create a program that could predict what Saeran would look like at twenty-one. The face that it came up with looked nothing like Luciel’s).
His days and nights were beginning to melt together. He slept poorly at his desk, waking up at odd hours with a crick in his neck.
Work, RFA, V.
He sneaks in time on the messenger, during those rare and shining moments when his handler steps out for a smoke or when the agency decides that their poor, put-upon slave can use a break. It feels like the only time he is allowed to smile.
“Have you heard what happened with Zero-One-Six?”
Vanderwood brings it up one day, out of the blue, his tone so casual that it immediately makes Luciel suspicious.
Policy dictated that he didn’t interact much with the other agents, in case one of them was captured. Vanderwood knows this, knows that there’s no point in asking if Luciel knows who Zero One Six is or what happened to them. So Luciel pretends not to hear, focusing instead on the messages scrolling across on the RFA app.
An image of a cat sitting on a table flashes on his screen. An orange tabby with wide, green eyes, glaring at the camera.
Meow! Try not to work too hard today! Meow!
He doesn’t even need to look at the name on the top of the screen to know who it was from; you had mentioned wanting to visit a cat cafe that was near Rika’s apartment. His mouth goes dry.
(When was the last time someone worried about his health like that? Vanderwood, anxious that he might miss a deadline? Jaehee lecturing him about eating too much Honey Buddha Chips? Somehow, they don’t feel the same.)
But Vanderwood is still speaking, and his words are grating against Luciel’s ears, “They found out he had a daughter.”
He pauses.
The words hang in the air, heavy with implications.
“Shit,” Luciel said.
“Yeah,” Vanderwood sighed. “Shit.”
He should have stopped there, he should have made some witty remark that would make Vanderwood threaten to taze him again, he should have just let it go.
He can’t.
“What happened to them?”
Vanderwood snorts.
“What do you think? They were dead by morning.”
Luciel’s mouth twists; he can taste stale soda on his tongue. He wonders how old the girl was. How old Zero One Six was. But he knows better than to ask. This is his life. Has been for years, now. People like him aren’t allowed friends or families or lovers.
(The last thought comes unbidden, and the realization sends a chill down his spine).
He deletes your message without replying.
And he finds himself wishing (stupidly, blindly, selfishly) that he could have gone to that cafe with you.
Luciel can’t sleep.
His brain (heart, Jaehee would correct him) is racing, a hundred thoughts per minute, and none of them are good. He constructs scenarios and deconstructs them just as quickly, he makes plans about what he should do when this hacker fiasco is over and then makes a list of reasons why they can’t come true.
He thinks of bodyguard robots and robots that breathe fire and robots that can make you happy if you ever feel sad.
He thinks of his agency, and what they can do to you. He thinks of Zero One Six and his dead daughter. He thinks of Saeran (dear God, at least keep Saeran safe and happy), he thinks of his father. He thinks of you, alone in an apartment you don’t even own, trusting him to keep you safe.
He thinks about how he doesn’t deserve that trust.
Luciel can’t sleep. His mind is too full. His chest is too heavy.
Vanderwood, if he was here, would tell him to just continue working if he can’t sleep. He would threaten Luciel with his taser again. He would offer sleeping pills, just in case they could help.
(You asked him not to strain himself. You asked him to try and get some sleep).
He shifts underneath the sheets; too restless to sleep, too tired to work.
He reaches for his phone. Normally, on nights like these, he’d message Yoosung, just to pester him into going to bed or play LOLOL or manage his Tripter bot.
(But somehow, it feels wrong to do any of these things while your life is in danger.)
In the end, Luciel calls you, listening to the sound of your phone ringing. Your voice has been running through his mind all day.
You pick up almost immediately.
“Seven, hey.”
Your voice isn’t soft with sleep, your words don’t slur when you speak; Luciel wasn’t the only one staying awake.
He opens his mouth, and finds that he isn’t sure about what to say. He only wanted to hear your voice.
“Good morniiiiing.” Luciel draws out the last syllable in an attempt to sound playful, the way 707 in the chatroom would say it. “It is morning, right? Well, close enough, anyway. This is your regular check-in from Agent Seven Zero Seven. Nothing out of the ordinary?”
Even in the solitude of his own house, the words fall flat. He sounds tired, more than that, he sounds worried.
(In short, he doesn’t sound like 707 at all, and he wonders if that is enough to put you off.)
“I’m fine. Are you still working? It’s late.”
You are worrying about him. You are the one who’s in the most danger, the only one without bodyguards to protect you, and you are worrying about him. The irony of it is enough to make him laugh, and he hopes that you don’t hear the bitterness in it.
“No need to think about me. I’m used to working late.” Worry surges through him. “Have you checked the windows? Did you see anyone suspicious outside the apartment?”
Luciel is already out of bed before he even realizes what he’s doing. He had decided to keep the CCTV feed on, in case something happens during the middle of the night. He can’t help it, but he keeps staring at the feed, even when it’s not his turn to keep you safe.
He likes the way you wave at the camera whenever you went outside.
“I’m fine, Luciel.”
The name is enough to jolt him awake; you rarely call him that.
“Is something…” His voice sounds too raw, bits of Luciel and Saeyoung peeking through. He can feel himself splintering.
He swallows and tries again. “Is something wrong?”
You pause for several long moments. He can hear your breath on the other end of the line and there is something startlingly intimate in that, the serenity and the silence. His chest aches with something he can’t quite name.
(He doesn’t dare to.)
“Are you watching the CCTV feed again?” you ask.
He can’t lie. Doesn’t want to. He’s lied enough for a lifetime, maybe several, but he finds that he doesn’t want to lie to you.
“I don’t like that you’re tiring yourself out for me.”
(His agency, in its early days, would give him job after job after job, until he fell unconscious in front of his screen. He had gone through physical training exhausted, in pain, barely out of recovery. He had run miles with bullet holes in his back, blood seeping through tightly-clenched fingers.)
(No one has ever said anything like that to him.)
Luciel can’t speak. His throat feels too tight.
“Luciel?”
(Saeyoung, he wants to say. My name is Saeyoung.)
“Yeah?”
“Are you still watching the feed?”
He swallows. “Yes.”
“Okay.”
He can hear the whisper of cloth being moved, your muted sigh, hopes that maybe you’ll finally decide to sleep. But then, he hears the creak of wooden floors, the shuffle of soft slippers.
“What are you doing?” he asks.
You don’t answer.
It is only when he hears the squeak of a door, sees the sudden stream of light pouring through the dark hallway in the feed, does he realize what you’re doing. Panic floods through him.
“H-hey, hey! What are you doing? You can’t be out this late, it’s dangerous! You shouldn’t be going out anyway, the hacker could be waiting outside! He could--”
He stops. You’re still dressed in your pajamas: a loose shirt and cotton shorts. Your hair isn’t brushed; it sticks out from all angles.
Luciel finds that he actually likes it that way. (And, perhaps, he likes that no one else in the RFA has ever seen you this way.)
“I’m not going anywhere. I just thought you’d like the company,” you say.
He does.
He doesn’t.
“You should be sleeping,” he says dumbly.
“So should you.”
Whatever witty answer he has dies in his throat as you shuffle closer to the camera; you have to stand on the tips of your toes to just barely reach it. The camera was old when he installed it under Rika’s instructions, its footage grainy and colorless. He finds himself wanting to see the color of your eyes.
This is all he’s ever seen of you: photos he’s managed to steal from someone else’s account, poor quality footage from a camera feed.
“Hi, Seven,” you say, and there is a hint of amusement in your voice.
His mouth goes dry.
“Hi,” he replies.
He can’t help it, he reaches out and touches the screen, exactly where your cheek is. The glass is cold where your skin would have been warm.
(Luciel feels pathetic doing this, but something about the gesture felt right. As if feeling his touch, you smile at the camera.)
“Are you looking at me?” you ask.
“Yes.”
(Always.)
“Good.” You move in, as close as you could to the camera.
He can see you straining with the effort of keeping yourself upright, and when you nearly fall over, his fingertips ache with the desire to help you keep your balance.
“Luciel,” you say, and your voice is so delightfully breathy, like a puff of wind on a warm day.
He shivers and presses his phone closer to his ear.
Your lips look so pretty when you say his name.
(He wonders how they would form around his real name. Saeyoung. Would you say it the same way you say Luciel? The same warmth, the same odd tenderness?)
(He is putting you in danger.)
“Go. To. Sleep.”
He can’t help it, he laughs.
“I don’t think you’re really one to tell me that,” he teases.
You mull his words over before speaking.
“But you’ve been working so hard, lately.”
(Not enough.)
(There is a moment, the span of a single second, between one breath and the next, where he thinks he goes insane. He wants to tell you all of it. About Luciel and Saeyoung and Saeran. About the agency and Vanderwood and 707 and everything that he did. He wants to confess to you. He wants you to see him and still manage to smile. He wants to rip out every foul thing he’s ever done and hand it to you, raw and bleeding, just to see if you will hold it as tenderly as you say his name. He wants to keep you safe. He wants you to keep him safe.)
(He wants to kiss you.)
Right then, he can’t quite speak as 707, can’t be anyone else but Saeyoung, here, in the darkness of his own house, miles and miles away from you.
But Saeyoung is dangerous, knife-edge, needle-sharp, all the bad things that Zen will ever warn you about, that Vanderwood will always remind him about. There is no room in your life for someone like Saeyoung, and there is no room in Saeyoung’s life for someone like you.
So he doesn’t speak, and he watches and watches until you eventually tire of your position and take several steps back. But you don’t go back inside Rika’s apartment.
Instead, you sit down there, on the hallway floor and stare at the camera.
“If you can’t sleep, Luciel,” you say. “Then I can keep you company.”
(It is the last thing he wants.)
(It is exactly what he wants.)
He opens his mouth, and the words feel like they were dragged out of him, from some deep place he keeps hidden from the RFA, from Vanderwood, from himself.
“Thank you,” he says.
If he says anything else, he fears that he will break. If he says anything else, he fears that he will say everything.
Your lips twitch, and Luciel somehow sees a small smile through the bad CCTV feed.
(He wants to kiss you, right there at the edge of your mouth, just where your lips start to curve.)
“It’s just company, Luciel. It’s the least I can do.”
It’s enough, he thinks. It’s enough.
(It has to be.)
It is the first time he’s ever seen you and everything has fallen apart.
He feels sick, feverish with guilt.
“Luciel?” Your voice sounds so much sweeter in person, and yet he can’t force himself to look at you.
He pretends not to hear, focusing instead on the numbers scrolling across his screen.
(He has thought about it. He has rehearsed what he was going to say, what he was going to do. A hundred different scenarios, a thousand different lines, all filed away in his head.)
(And now he can’t even look at you.)
You are so close that he can feel your body heat. His fingers tremble against the keyboard, and he prays that you won’t notice.
“Luciel,” you say again. “Are you ignoring me?”
There is hurt in your voice, and confusion, and he wanted nothing more than to turn around and wrap his arms around you. Reassure you.
(He still wants to kiss you.)
(Luciel wants a lot of things. And he can have none of them.)
Instead, he lets his grief sharpen his tone, he lets his exhaustion and his pain and his fear turn him into something ugly.
“I’m working. You’re bothering me.” His tone is sharp; it is meant to cut.
You flinch at that, the creak of the wooden floor telling him that you have taken several steps back.
(Good.)
It takes a few moments before you speak to him again, and this time your voice is softer, more hesitant. He hates that he has done that to you.
“Okay. I’ll keep quiet. Is there anything I can get--”
Luciel interrupts before you can finish speaking, “No.”
(He doesn’t want to hear this. He doesn’t want to hear you being kind to him or asking him if he needs anything or telling him to take breaks. He doesn’t want to hear you.)
“You don’t need to worry about me,” he says. “I’m fine. Just let me work. The sooner I finish this, the sooner I can leave.”
Silence again and the slow, steady sound of your breathing. Unlike the night when you had called to stay awake with him, there is no intimacy in this, no soothing quality. Instead, he can hear the deep, stuttering breath of someone fighting tears.
“Okay,” you say again.
You move so quietly that he doesn’t realize what you are doing until he feels your hand on his shoulder. Even through the thick material of his jacket, he can feel the heat of your skin. He stills, though he can feel his heart hammering painfully against his chest, loud enough that he is scared that you will hear it.
“Thank you, Luciel,” you say. “For saving me. I’ll stay quiet now.”
When you remove your hand, his entire body feels cold. Freezing.
Some small, treacherous part of him wants to turn around. Say the right words to make you laugh, to make you smile. It is what the 707 in the chatroom would do. The 707 who loved cats, and talked about space and whose only problem was the occasional mishap from work. The 707 who was always bright. Always laughing.
The 707 that you had confessed to, when Saeran held you hostage.
(And that is what makes him stay in his corner, what makes him go back to typing. Because Luciel isn’t bright or uncomplicated or happy. He isn’t the 707 in the chatroom. In fact, Luciel thinks with a sudden, bright viciousness, he hates him.)
----
Luciel jolts awake.
He doesn’t know how long he’s been asleep.
(Too long, too long. He shouldn’t be sleeping.)
The first thing he does is check in on you. It has become a habit now, a stolen glance out of the corner of his eye, the slightest tilt of his head to hear your footsteps as you paced across the small apartment.
(He isn’t stupid, he knows that he doesn’t deserve this, but knowing that you are safe is one of his few comforts right now.)
But the apartment is dead silent.
He shifts uncomfortably, rolling his neck to get rid of the stiffness there. Did you fall asleep? This time, Luciel doesn’t bother to hide the fact that he is looking for you. He glances at the bed, which doesn’t look like it had been slept-in, and the kitchen table, where he’d sometimes catch glimpses of you quietly reading.
He doesn’t see you.
A trail of goosebumps burst along the skin of his arms; the apartment is small, there are few places for you to hide in. Luciel stands up, grimacing at the burn in his muscles from sitting too long. He tentatively calls your name, and his own words seem to echo back at him.
The hairs on the back of his neck bristle at the silence.
He makes himself wait for a few seconds before he begins to panic.
And it is impossible, impossible, to be calm and collected where you were concerned. Not after the bomb and the agency and Saeran. Cold sweat snakes its way down his back.
(The bomb-his-agency-Saeran.)
(So many things have gone wrong already, you can’t be another person he breaks.)
He blinks away images of you being held hostage in Saeran’s arms, shakes his head as if he was getting rid of cobwebs.
The first thing he does is check the CCTV.
Luciel isn’t quite sure why he does it, why it’s the first thing he does.Perhaps over the past few days, the habit is so deeply ingrained in him that is becomes second nature.” His chest constricts when he sees you exiting Rika’s apartment; he can just barely see himself beyond the door, hunched over in one corner, typing away on his computer.
(He doesn’t even turn, he doesn’t even see you leaving.)
And he watches as you pause just before you close the door and put your hand over your eyes.
You look so tired.
His shoulders slump at the realization.
(He has been pushing you away all day, he knew. The only time he ever spoke to you, he had made his tone sharp, biting. He said words he didn’t mean. He had looked at the way your face twisted with hurt and told himself that it was exactly what he wanted.)
(It wasn’t.)
(But he has to believe that it was worth it.)
He reaches for his phone and calls you.
(Will you even bother to pick up?)
The timestamp on the feed says that you had been gone for seven minutes.
Seven minutes.
Really, not a lot of time at all, he knows. But he also knows that a lot can happen in seven minutes. A kidnapping, an infiltration, a murder.
(He has done quick in-and-out missions that lasted for five minutes, slipping between defenses and uploading a virus that crippled an entire system. He has untied Saeran and carried him to the bathroom in six. He has seen a man bleed out from a gunshot wound in three.)
Right then, seven minutes feels like a lifetime.
You pick up on the first ring.
“Hello?” You sound calm, unhurt.
Luciel relaxes, doesn’t even realize that he had been tense until he feels the ache in his shoulders. But relief quickly morphs into anger.
“Where the hell are you?” he snaps.
“I--” He hears the hesitation in your tone, the sudden, sharp intake of breath, like someone bracing for a blow.
(He thinks of Saeran. He thinks of their mother and her moods.)
He wants to apologize.
He doesn’t.
“I went out.”
“That’s obvious.” His tone is too sharp, too cutting, even for him.
Luciel runs a hand over his face, and the word sorry feels like cotton balls in his mouth. He finds that he can’t speak for several minutes, exhaustion dragging at him like lead weights.
He hates this, he realizes. He hates what his life has become.
A brother who hates him. A mentor he can no longer trust. A father (and an entire agency) that wants him dead.
And a girl he can’t let get close to him.
No matter how much he tries, it seems that Luciel could never really leave that small, dark room their mother kept them in. In the back of his mind, he can still hear his name, (Saeyoung), the way their mother has always said it: spat out, like something that tasted foul. Pain lances across his head, and he massages the area with his fingers.
“I just went to the convenience store,” you say. “You weren’t eating anything, so I tried to get some Honey Buddha Chips for you.”
You pause, a moment of silence that lasts just long enough for his heart to twist painfully in his chest.
“...You didn’t have to do that for me,” he says quietly.
His head won’t stop throbbing and he finds himself leaning against the wall, relishing the coolness of the concrete against his skin.
“They were out, anyway, so I didn’t really do anything,” you say.
Luciel can hear the apology in your tone.
“And I needed some air.”
You say it so quietly that he wonders if you had meant for him to hear it.
He glances around the room; two hundred and fifty square feet of space. He remembers their mother in one of her moods, the heavy sound of her footsteps as she stalked around the house and the way her eyes seemed to slide over them. He remembers the way her raw, impotent rage seemed to fill in all the tiny spaces, until even breathing becomes an effort.
(Saeran cowering at his back, trying to make himself as small as possible. The heat of his skin the only thing keeping Luciel warm.)
“I’m sorry,” he says.
(He’s not even sure what he’s apologizing for anymore. The words feel too small to encompass everything he’s done.)
“Maybe when this is over…” He stops.
When this is over, he’ll delete his name from the messenger, he’ll disappear from your life. Every single trace of him will be erased. It will be like he never existed.
He finds the thought almost impossible to bear.
“When this is over…?” You drag the last word out, waiting for him.
(You have always been good at that, poking and prodding at the little chinks in his armor where he is raw and vulnerable and bruised and he cannot be anyone but himself.)
“I don’t know,” he says, and his voice is thick with grief.
(In his head, he is already saying goodbye.)
“Luciel…”
“Just...come back safe,” he says. “I can’t focus on work while you might be in danger. I’ll wait for you at the door, okay?”
Luciel terminates the call with shaking fingers, not even bothering to wait for a reply.
He’s too afraid that he’ll start crying if he hears your voice one more time.
Luciel sits on the floor, and he isn’t quite sure where he’s supposed to begin.
A long crack runs down the length of the cat robot’s face, where it had taken the brunt of the impact. One of its glass eyes lay in pieces just beside its head. When he picks it up, he can hear bits and pieces of metal rattling around in its chassis.
Shame burns hot in his gut.
He has never lost his temper like that before.
“I’m sorry,” he says to it.
Of course, it doesn’t answer.
His fingers pick idly at the stray bits of wire sticking out from its neck. The head snaps off completely, hitting the wooden floor with a thud that makes him wince.
(It will be infinitely easier, he thinks, to trash the thing and start over again. A fresh start. New materials.)
(But he is so, so tired of fresh starts. Blank slates. Something to be erased and written over and forgotten all over again.)
He wants to keep this, he decides.
He is not quite sure he knows how he’ll be able to fix this, but still he tries. And it’s unlike the first time when he had first put it together, bits and pieces coming together as he neglected his work in favor of staring at the CCTV feed.
It’s hard. Some pieces he has to throw away, some he has to seal over with duct tape, some parts replaced with a few odds and ends he finds in Rika’s apartment.
Every now and again, he glances at you.
You are sitting on the sofa, quietly typing something on your phone. You haven’t spoken to him since you had promised to give him time. You haven’t even glanced at him.
(And he appreciates that, he does. His thoughts are still a mess; bits and pieces of his brain scattered across the ground like confetti. But still, a part of him still wishes--)
As if hearing his thoughts, you look up from your phone and smile tentatively at him.
(Luciel wonders how you do that, to be exactly what he needs at the exact time he needs it.)
(He wonders how you can still smile at him after all the horrible things he’s said to you.)
“Need a break?” you ask.
He looks down at his hands; they’re covered in oil and broken shards of plastic.
He smiles wryly and replies, “This is my break.”
Your brows furrow together as you try and make out what he’s building.
(Cute.)
“Is that the cat?” you ask.
Heat crawls up his neck, the tips of his ears. He’s red in the face, he’s sure of it. But if you noticed, you don’t mention it.
“Y-yeah. I’m fixing what I broke earlier.” He stumbles over his words, his tongue thick and clumsy. He’s never done that before either.
Luciel pauses; he is not quite sure how to say the next part. As an agent, everything he has said always came out of a script, meant for a specific purpose. Extracting information, lowering defenses. As 707 of the RFA, everything he typed was supposed to be funny. Meant to tease or irritate or make someone laugh.
He is not quite sure what he wants to happen when he speaks to you, not quite sure who he’s speaking as.
(Saeyoung, his name is Saeyoung.)
He only knows that he has to get the words out. Again.
“I’m sorry,” he says.
It is the second time he has said that to you in less than two days, and yet he has to stop himself from repeating it over and over, like a prayer.
(No matter how many times he says it, it feels like it will never be enough.)
“For...for…” he stutters, stumbles.
The words flutter in his chest and lay there, pulsing against his lungs.
(For Saeran. For the bomb. For the lies. For putting you in danger. For every foul thing he’s ever said to you these past few days.)
He stares at you, raw panic rising in him. He wanted--no, needed--to make you understand.
(If he disappeared, he doesn’t you this to be your last memory of him. Cruel and spiteful and cold. He doesn’t want you to want to forget him.)
You stay quiet, waiting for him to finish.
(Patient. You were always so patient with him.)
“...everything. For everything,” Luciel finishes lamely.
Even that doesn’t seem enough.
His eyes burn and he looks down at the cat again. Its cracked eye stares up at him, almost mockingly.
He doesn’t know how to fix that.
“It’s all right, Seven,” you say. “I forgive you.”
You say it so quickly, so freely that his head snaps back up. You haven’t even moved from your spot on the couch, and yet it feels like his world has spun free of its axis.
(Forgiveness was not something that came painlessly, in Luciel’s experience. With his mother, a whispered word could mean days without food or water. Saeran’s hollowed cheeks, eyes begging him to make it better. With the agency, a single mistake could mean his life. Vanderwood dropping the names of dead agents like bombs.)
(It hasn’t occurred to him that absolution is something that can come as easily as breathing.)
The air feels too thick, too sharp; there are needles in his throat.
Luciel doesn’t speak, doesn’t want to say anything that might make you change your mind. He does not want you to take this back.
He goes back to the cat, though he has already forgotten what part he is supposed to be fixing. He does not raise his eyes when he hears the creak of old leather, hears your footsteps as you move across the apartment; it’s enough that he knows you’re safe.
Perhaps that’s why he doesn’t notice until you are right behind him. He jumps a little when you speak.
“Can you fix it while talking? I want to talk to you.”
He pauses, his fingers skittering across the cat’s plastic surface.
“Seven?” you prompt.
“If you want,” he says slowly. “What do you want to talk about?”
The wooden floor creaks, and he realizes that you must have sat down behind him.
(His skin crawls, having you so near. Everything he has ever learned in training is telling him to face you.)
(Every sensation seems magnified by a hundredfold. His skin feels electric. He imagines that he can feel your breath on the back of his neck.)
“Can you tell me about the hacker? You called him…”
Your voice trails off, and once again he recognizes the doubt, the hesitation, as if you’re afraid that he might start shouting at any moment. He finishes for you, “Saeran. I called him Saeran.”
He breathes in, deep. Lets it out. His fingers are shaking.
Even just the mention of his twin’s name seems to darken the air around the two of you. When Luciel blinks, all he can see is the hate in Saeran’s eyes.
“You don’t have to talk about him,” you say. “Not if you don’t want to.”
“N-no. No, it’s fine.” He blinks when he realizes he means it.
And he says it again, if only to taste the truth in those words. “It’s fine.”
He places the cat robot gently on the floor before he stands.
When he speaks again, his tongue feels heavy, clumsy, as if the past is a physical thing that can weigh him down.
“Do you remember that floppy disc from before?”
Your face twists when he asks, and he remembers how he had yelled at you for touching it. Shame flashes in his gut, searing hot.
But then your expression smooths, clears.
“Yes.”
“I can show what’s in there. If you want.”
(He feels it now, the sudden, freezing bite of fear. He knows how you must have seen Saeran: he had broken into your apartment. He had tried to kidnap you.)
You’re still sitting on the floor, looking up at him.
(He has to look away. There is so much trust in your eyes.)
Luciel holds out his hand for you to take.
(He will not blame you, he thinks, if you do not take it.)
But you do, you do, and his heart thuds uncomfortably against his chest at the unexpected warmth. His fingers twitch; he can feel his pulse in them.
(It has been a lifetime since he has told someone the truth. It is this realization that scares him. He’s terrified in a way he hasn’t been in years. He has been shot, stabbed, tazed, tortured. He has spent three days in a sweltering boiler room, waiting for rescue or waiting to die, so delirious from the heat that he wasn’t quite sure which one he wanted. But he has never felt like this: cracked open, clean down the middle, all the raw and blackened and ugly parts of him dragged out into the light.)
(He’s terrified you’ll turn away, disgusted by what you see.)
“Luciel?”
You squeeze his hand and something inside him jumps.
“Are you okay?” you ask.
(He’s not.)
Luciel tries for a laugh, something to defuse the tension between the two of you; it comes out flat and lifeless.
“Luciel…”
He tries to swallow past the dryness in his throat
“Before I tell you about all of this...C-can I do something first?” he whispers. “If you don’t mind, that is.”
Heat crawls up his neck when you smile at him.
“Of course.”
“Can I hold you?” he asks, voice soft. “I just need…”
Luciel stops, not sure what to say next. What did he need? Warmth? Comfort?
(A lifering, he thinks, something to keep him afloat when he feels like drowning.)
Whatever he was about to say next is lost when you shake your head and wrap your arms around him.
He melts, resting his head against the crook of your neck, where he feels your pulse beating against his cheek. Your hands are warm, drawing circles against his back.
And Luciel breathes and tries to sear this moment in his memory; a brand, a mark, something that can’t be wiped away or erased. He wants to remember this, he wants to know that whatever happens today or tomorrow or in the distant future, he wants to remember that he has been held like this once.
His lips move soundlessly against your skin.
(I love you, I love you, I love you--he can’t bring himself to say it out loud. Not yet).
“I’ll tell you.” He speaks through dry lips. “About Saeran. My agency. Anything. Anything you ask.”
“Okay.”
He feels more than hears you say the word, feels it reverberate through his chest.
You don’t let go.
And he knows, even without looking, that you are smiling.
It’s thrilling, he realizes, the feeling of being so entwined with someone.
“I just…” Your voice is small and soft. “I just need a few more seconds, okay?”
Luciels wants to give you more than a few seconds, he wants to give you hours, days, a lifetime, if you wanted it. But even now, he can feel Saeran slipping away from him, the shadow of his agency creeping closer to him.
(And in the back of his head, there is a new, desperate need to find out why V has lied to him.)
“When this is over,” he says. “When I’m sure you’re safe. I’ll have to go. I have to find Saeran, keep him safe.”
He inhales.
(He feels like he’s putting his heart in your hands, ripped out of his chest and still beating.)
“But it’ll probably be safer if you come with me,” he continues. “If you don’t want to, I’ll understand. I...I could make a better program for the security system, I can tell Jumin this place’s address and he can-- ”
You move away from him before he can finish, and Luciel flinches at the way cold air rushes in the empty space between you two.
“Seven,” you say. “I want to come with you, even if it’s dangerous. I want to help you, if you’ll let me.”
(His heart will explode, he thinks, when he sees the raw trust in your eyes. He has been alone for so long.)
Luciel holds your face in his hands, thumbs brushing over your cheekbones.
(You feel like water, collected in his cupped palms, slipping through his clumsy fingers. He’s terrified you’ll disappear.)
(And yet he knows that you want to stay. You want to be with him, not Zen or Yoosung or Jaehee or even Jumin. You wanted him. You chose him.)
“Thank you,” he whispers, and he says it in that same, reverent breath that he uses when he prays. “For saying that. Thank you for trusting me.”
There is so much more he wants to say, so much more he wants to thank you for. But words are difficult. They never came easily for him, and he is scared that he won’t be able to make you understand all the things he wants to say.
So he doesn’t speak, doesn’t give himself the chance to mess this up.
Instead, he lowers his head, close enough that he can feel your breath ghost across his lips.
And he kisses you.
(Right there, at the corner of your mouth, just where your lips start to curve. Just like he wanted to from the very start.)
The sky outside the apartment is dark.
It’s past midnight and Luciel can’t sleep.
He has torn apart Rika’s apartment, disabled the security system that he created, broken open every locked drawer he can find. He has found files and sketches and building plans, more than enough evidence to damn Rika for several lifetimes.
He doesn’t even bother organizing them, he scans them for information and lets them flutter to the floor like refuse.
(Touching them made him feel dirty, somehow. He imagines the ink leaving smears on his fingers like stains.)
Mint Eye’s logo stares up at him from every angle; he can feel their gaze burning into his skin.
(In the back of his mind, he wonders if he has somehow done something to deserve this, for the sheer amount of blind faith he has put in them.)
Luciel shivers, wipes his hands on the back of his jeans and kneels down to pry loose one of the floorboards.
(He’s serious about what he said. He is going to learn everything about Mint Eye before he leaves this place behind. He’s going to find out what they did to his brother.)
(Those cold eyes. Like bits of broken glass.)
“Luciel?”
Your voice cuts clean through his thoughts, and he looks up. He feels a jolt of surprise when he realizes that you’re dressed like it’s already morning: pants, running shoes, a comfortable shirt. Clothes that won’t hinder your movement in case the two of you needed to run.
“You should be sleeping,” he says.
“So should you.”
Without asking, you kneel down and help him pry loose the floorboard, not saying anything when the two of you see only empty space underneath.
Luciel grunts in disappointment.
“Feels like we’ve had this conversation before,” he says.
(Over the phone. In the hallway. Several feet from his exact position now, and what feels like a lifetime ago.)
You smile at that.
(He has to look away. You’re too bright, sometimes. It’s like staring into the sun.)
“Yeah. Seems familiar.” You lean your head against his shoulder. “Luciel, you’ve barely slept for days now.”
“I’m fine.” The answer is almost automatic now. “I’m used to this.”
Normally, he would have been content to leave it at that, but for the first time in days, Luciel feels inclined to be playful.
“I may not look it, but I’m pretty used to physical exertion. I’m the Defender of Justice. I can do this for days.”
“You mean tearing apart my apartment?”
He looks down at the splintered wood in his hand and feels his cheeks grow hot.
You’ve been living here for more than a week now, but he still thinks of it as Rika’s apartment. He hadn’t even bothered to ask what you would think of him tearing it apart.
“I’m just kidding, Luciel,” you say, gently. “It didn’t really feel like home to me, to be honest.”
His chest eases at that.
“T-that’s good. Considering that I’ve, uh...destroyed it.”
Luciel feels a sudden burst of embarrassment when you survey the mess he’s made. Crumpled up bits of paper, half-scribbled notes, and torn folders.
“Find anything interesting?”
“A lot. Too much. None of them make sense. Rika would never--” He cuts himself off.
If there is anything he has found today, it’s that he knows nothing about Rika or V.
He tries again, “Blueprints, mostly. Names. Some kind of drug...I couldn’t really make out what it was for.”
“Think you’ve got everything?” you ask.
That makes him pause.
“Not everything,” he says slowly. “There’s so much I still don’t understand. But I know enough that we’re not going in blind tomorrow. I know where their headquarters is, I know the building’s weak spots. I know...”
Luciel’s voice trails off.
(He wonders if you’re having second thoughts. He wonders what he has to say to make you say.)
“Okay.” Your voice is steady, he feels your fingers touch his arm, warm even through the fabric of his jacket.
“Do you think you can sleep now?” you continue. “You haven’t stopped working since this morning.”
He blinks. He didn’t expect that turn in the conversation.
(He expected you to be afraid. He expected you to say that you wanted to leave.)
“Were you just trying to get me to sleep?” He lets his tone turn teasing, lets himself lean into you, soaking up your presence.
“It’s a little past one, Seven,” you say gently. “You need your strength tomorrow.”
He feels your fingers run through his hair, and he hides his smile against your shoulder. It feels good, soothing.
(He wonders if this is what it will be like, after everything is over. Everything soft and silent. Your presence and your fingers in his hair, and your steady breathing. It is such a hopeful thought that it is hard to believe that they’re from him. Seven. Luciel. Saeyoung. Nothing in his life has ever worked out the way he’d hoped.)
(And yet it’s hard not to look at you and think that everything will be alright.)
“I can sleep,” he says. “For a few hours. Then I have to get up and--”
“You’ll sleep for as long as you need to,” you interrupt.
It’s the first time you’ve ever sounded stern.
It feels good to laugh, even when you scowl at him for it.
“Okay then,” he says. “No work for me until tomorrow.”
(It surprises him, how easy he finds it to agree with you. With their mother, Luciel had relished whatever small victories he had been able to get. An hour outside with Saeran. Sneaking him food after their mother had fallen in a drunken stupor. With Vanderwood and the agency, he had fought at every turn. Passing files with seconds to spare. Disobeying his handler when he thought he could get away with it.)
(But with you, it’s almost frighteningly easy.)
“If I’m going to sleep, you should be, too,” Luciel says.
He brushes his thumb underneath your eyes; he knows that you didn’t have those dark circles before he came to into Rika’s apartment.
You make a small noise of approval, kissing his fingers when he trails them over your lips. It feels like static, rippling through his veins.
“Luciel,” you whisper.
“Yeah?”
“Everything’s going to be okay, you know. Tomorrow. The day after that. And the day after that. However long it takes to find Saeran.”
(Why do you make it sound so easy? You could tell him that the sky was green instead of blue, that the sun circled the earth and he would believe you.)
“Thank you.” His voice is hoarse when he speaks. “For saying that.”
You shrug, as if to say that it’s nothing, as if it is such a small thing to hold his world together.
“Are you ready to go to sleep now?” you ask.
He looks around at the tiny apartment, the documents that he had left scattered across the floor, the bundle of bags that you had finished packing.
(He realizes, with a start, that this might be the last time he’ll ever see this place.)
(Or maybe not. Maybe you’ll stay here after the three of you come back, hiding out until the storm passes. Maybe he can convert it into an office. Rebuilding the RFA in the same place that nearly destroyed it.)
“Luciel,” you scold.
He blinks, realizes that he’s been staring off into space.
“Sorry,” he says. “I’ll go to sleep. I’ll take the sofa. And don’t try to argue, I’ll be too worried about you if you don’t take the bed.”
He ignores your scowl and lets you lead him to the sofa.
Luciel sits there, runs his fingers across the fabric. Even without lying down on it, he can tell that it will be uncomfortable. Rika had decorated this place without ever considering it as a home or a place to stay.
“Can I ask you for a favor first?” he asks impulsively.
You look down at him warily , and he remembers all the pranks he’s pulled in the RFA chatroom. It feels good to think that, someday, he’ll be able to do it again.
“Say it again.” He can’t help the way it sounds, like a plead, like a prayer. “Tell me everything’s going to be okay.”
He watches as your face goes soft with emotion; there is a tenderness there that nearly breaks him in half.
“Luciel, everything’s going to be okay.”
He lets you pull him in your arms, lets you rub small circles into his back, whisper words he can’t quite hear.
(He can fall asleep like this, he realizes. Right here, in the shelter of your arms. He has fallen asleep with his back pressed against Saeran’s, guarding him as best as he can. He has collapsed in front of his computer, the numbers on his screen seeming to swim in front of his eyes. He had fallen asleep in the back of a car, drifting in and out of reality, as Vanderwood races him to the nearest safehouse. He had even fallen asleep in that boiler room, his dreams muddled and feverish. He had been terrified then, convinced that he’d disappear so completely that they won’t even find a body to bury.)
(But he has never fallen asleep like this. At peace and hopeful and...safe. You make him feel safe.)
He is already drifting when he feels you pull away, feels the pressure of your lips against his forehead.
“Good night, Luciel.” He can just barely make out your words.
His last thought before he falls asleep is that, tomorrow, he’s going to tell you his real name.
He wakes in complete darkness, gasping.
He fumbles around blindly, reaching for your shoulder, your hand, anything.
Saeyoung finds nothing but rotten wood and the hard edge of a flashlight.
(How many times has he woken up like this? He remembers the first few weeks after he joined the agency. Waking up without feeling Saeran’s heat at his back. His voice. The way he’d hold onto Saeyoung’s hand whenever he felt scared. He had even missed their mother, once or twice. Anything to stave off the crushing loneliness.)
He tries to call out for you, but his throat feels too dry.
Did you leave? Did you go outside?
He reaches for his phone next, still inside his pocket, and dials your number..
You pick up almost immediately.
“Hello?”
You sound calm, safe, the tightness in his chest eases.
“I woke up and you were gone. Where are you?”
You giggle, and he finds himself feeling grateful that you can still laugh.
“I guess it’s too dark for you to see. I’m literally right in front of you.”
He pauses and lets his eyes adjust to the dark; if he squinted, he can just barely make out your silhouette.
“So there you are.” It’s hard to keep the relief out of his tone.
Saeyoung reaches out a hand for you, and you move to catch his fingers in your palm.
(He doesn’t think he can ever tell you how grateful he is for that tiny bit of contact. All he can think of is the way you had gripped his hand when the two of you had found Saeran. Trembling. You had been trembling. But you still managed to step in front of him to shield him from his brother.)
“What were you doing just now?” he asks.
“Just having a look around.”
He glances behind you, and he can see the dots of city lights somewhere in the distance.
The floorboards creak underneath your feet as you move and he feels a flash of hot guilt.
(He wants to give you something better than this. You deserve expensive hotels, a day on the beach in some private island, a night out watching movies. Certainly, you deserve better than a creaky old cabin in the middle of nowhere.)
“I’m sorry,” he says quietly. “I know this cabin isn’t...well, it doesn’t suit someone like you. But it’s quiet and people rarely come here.”
“It’s fine, Saeyoung.”
(His mouth goes dry at way you say his name. He wonders how he had ever been able to live without it.)
“I was thinking that I felt like I was in a spy movie--” You interrupt yourself with a laugh. “I’m sorry. I know it’s awful. I know we’re in danger.”
Relief washes through him. You had been so quiet on the car ride on the way to the cabin that he had begun to worry.
“I’m glad, actually,” he says. “After we saw V...you were so quiet.”
“Yeah. What he said about your agency taking Saeran made it...made it seem real, you know?”
He hears you take a shaky breath, sees your head dip, as if you’re ashamed.
“I’m sorry,” you continue. “I know it’s real to you. You have experience with this sort of thing. But after the bomb, everything felt so surreal. It felt like I was watching someone else’s life.”
Saeyoung sucks in his breath.
(He knows exactly what you are talking about. He remembers his first hazy weeks at the agency, where he walked around as if in a daze. He would go to bed and wake up, half-expecting to see Saeran huddled against his side for warmth.)
(He hates that he’s the one who’s caused you to feel like this.)
He curls his fingers around your palm, a silent plea to move closer. You comply and crouch down in front of him, so close that Saeyoung can smell your perfume.
“I wish...I wish I could take care of you better,” he confesses.
(And that’s what it feels like: a confession. The darkness of the cabin feels like the darkness of a confessional, where he’d sometimes go and reveal his sins in hoarse, broken whispers. The darkness of that boiler room, where he spent three days, pleading for relief, his fingers so tightly clenched in prayer that they felt numb.)
He lets his fingers travel across the landscape of your face. It’s so familiar to him now that he feels like he can see it clearly, even without a light.
You lean your cheek into his palm, like you crave his touch as much as he craves yours.
“I don’t regret coming with you, Saeyoung,” you say. “I don’t regret you.”
The words are enough to leave him speechless, as if all the air has rushed out of his lungs.
It is a long time before he can get himself to speak.
“That’s what I find so hard to believe,” he says. “I’ve put you through so much already.”
“I don’t understand what’s so hard to believe about that.”
Even without seeing your face, Saeyoung knows that you’re pouting.
(It makes him want to kiss you, just to feel your smile against his lips.)
“I love you, Saeyoung. Of course I want to come with you.”
And you say it so softly, so hesitantly, that he knows that you aren’t expecting him to say it back. Your heart freely given, held in his clumsy hands, as if you hadn’t stolen his from the very start.
(He doesn’t know how to say it back to you. It is like trying to count the number of stars scattered across the milky way or the ever expanding number of galaxies in the universe; there are no words to describe what he feels.)
(He would die for you, if you let him. He would give up everything if it meant that you and Saeran are safe.)
“I was thinking of that and you said it first,” he says with a smile.
(It never ceases to amaze him, how easy it is to smile--actually smile--when he is with you.)
“I love you.”
Saeyoung slides his hands down your face, feels you shiver when his fingers trail along your neck. He lets his hands rest there, at the juncture of neck and shoulder, where he can feel your pulse against your fingertips, an ever-present reminder that you are here and you are alive and you chose him.
(It’s not enough. He can say it a thousand, a million times and it will still feel like it’s not enough.)
“Today.”
Downwards, towards your chest, where he teases the skin just above your collar of your shirt, feels the drumming of your heart when he presses his palm against the swell of your breast. He leans forward and presses an open-mouthed kiss there, and he hears the sharp intake of your breath. A strangled whisper of his name.
“Tomorrow.”
And he is pulling you towards him until you are sitting in his lap, your hands braced against his chest for support. He wonders if you can feel his heartbeat, the way he can feel yours.
“Forever and ever.”
He kisses your cheeks, your forehead, your lips, and you chase him; he can feel your lips moving against his skin when you make contact. The line of his jaw, a spot on his neck that makes him jump when you mouth at it.
(“I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.”. You say them so quietly that he wonders if he’s imagined it.)
“I wish…” He stops, feels himself grow hot at what he was on the verge of saying.
Even so, you laugh, and he wonders if the same thing is on your mind.
“After.”
You say it so sweetly, with such conviction that it makes his chest hurt.
“I want--” Again he stops himself.
(It’s not embarrassment that makes him stop now. He isn’t quite sure what makes him stop. Superstition, perhaps. The fear that if he says everything that’s on his mind, he’ll somehow jinx them, make it so they will never be real.)
“Saeyoung?” you ask. “What do you want?”
(He wants what he’s always wanted as a child: a home to feel safe in. Saeran, happy and healthy. He has always told himself that if he had that, it would be enough. But now he wants...so much more.)
(He wants you, he wants long drives with you in one of his cars, he wants you to look at Saeran and smile, he wants to dance with you at an RFA party, he wants to make you programs that will make hearts fall from your phone screen if he ever texts you, he wants to make you robots and toys and things that will make you laugh, he wants a time when he can sleep next to you without thinking about Mint Eye or his agency or his father.)
He wants it all so badly it hurts.
“I can’t tell you,” he says finally. “If I tell you and it doesn’t happen…”
(No, no. He can’t think like that. You’ve taught him better than to think like that.)
“When this is over,” he says. “I’ll tell you. I’ll make an entire list and we can make it all come true.”
Even in the darkness, he knows you’re smiling.
“Okay. I’ll ask when this is over.”
“Thank you,” he says. “When this is over, I’ll tell you...everything. But right now, you need to rest.”
(He can’t think about the future right now. It hurts too much to think about it--what he stands to lose if he failed tomorrow.)
He doesn’t give you a chance to answer, instead taking your hand in both of his, frowning at how cold your fingers felt. The cabin has a massive fireplace, but too much light would draw attention so he decided not to use it.
“You’re so cold,” he says.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not.” He shifts, fumbling to take his jacket off in the dark.
He feels you struggle when he wraps it around you.
“Saeyoung--”
“Please,” he whispers. “Let me do this, at least. Let me take care of you.”
That gives you pause, long enough that he is able to zip it up all the way to your neck.
(He wishes that he can see you in it.)
“Now you’re the one who’ll get cold. Wait, let me…” You rise from his lap, and he immediately misses your weight against his.
He hears the zipper being pulled down.
“Hey--”
And you sit down next to him, throwing the jacket over the both of you.
It isn’t a perfect fit, a portion of his shoulder and torso remain uncovered, but as long as you remained warm, then it’s enough for him.
“Better?” you ask.
He reaches for your hand in the dark, feeling your fingers tangle against his own.
“Better,” he says.
You lean your head against his shoulder.
“I’m going to sleep now. You rest, too, Saeyoung.”
He listens to the sound of your breathing, growing steadier and more shallow as you drifted off to sleep.
Saeyoung closes his eyes.
(He’s afraid. Perhaps more afraid than he’s ever been. He’s scared for Saeran. He’s scared for you. Scared that he won’t be able to protect either of you. Scared that he won’t be able to make that list with you.)
In the darkness of a cabin, miles and miles away from home, hunted by his father, hunting for his agency, Saeyoung prays.
(He has prayed when he was lonely, and he has prayed when he was sad. He has prayed for Saeran’s safety, and he has prayed for your happiness. And he’s prayed for more selfish things as well: a new car, a cat like Elly, a fancier computer, a better phone. But right now, all he can pray for is one thing.)
(Dear God, Saeyoung thinks. Please let me keep this.)