Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

The dissertation committee may as well have laughed in Kim Dokja’s face, and god he could tell they wanted to. Five years—nine if you count all the work he did in undergrad—all down the drain. He knows he failed miserably; the committee doesn’t have to tell him that. His mentor had given him a pitying look as he packed his laptop and left the room with what little dignity he dares to keep.

The worst part is the weather. With winter warming into spring, he feels wrong moping like this. He wants the numbing pain of below freezing temperatures biting at his cheeks, not petals from flowers on blooming trees scattering onto the ground as he makes his way home.

“Han Sooyoung?” He pushes open the door to their shared apartment, though considering she regularly helps him pay his part of the rent, it is more hers than his. One more thing he epically fails at. He feels the wall for the light switch, expecting everything to be as he left it a few hours ago: his roommate sprawled on the couch with her laptop and take-out boxes littering the floor.

To his surprise, everything is all cleaned up.

Han Sooyoung walks out of the kitchen wearing a party hat and holding a cake that says ‘CONGRATS! IT’S A DISSERTATION!’ complete with elegant flowers lining the sides. She grins wide and yells, “Congratulations, Dr. Kim!”

His eyes go misty. He’s definitely not about to cry.

She aggressively jerks her head in the direction of the kitchen, eyes wide in panic. Not a moment later, Yoo Sangah walks out with a small, box mix cake that has a giant ‘L’ written shakily in red icing.

A single tear rolls down his face.

“I told you he wouldn't like this one,” Yoo Sangah whispers loudly.

In a matter of seconds, the women place their respective cakes on the sorry excuse for a dining table and engulf him in a hug. Neither asks what happened and he’s endlessly grateful for that. He doesn’t think he can form the words they’d want. For now, they’re able to read between the rivulets of tears.

It’s Yoo Sangah who speaks first, one hand wiping at his wet face. “Would you like to eat at least one of the cakes right now? I promise it’s delicious. I can take the… writing… off, if that makes it better.”

Kim Dokja nods and takes in a deep breath that nearly has him choking on silent sobs. Together, they help him to the table and one of them pushes a fork into his hand. He grasps the handle of it like a toddler holding a marker, gripping with his whole fist, and takes a chunk out of the box mix cake.

He chews the cake, face slowly morphing into disgust as he realizes how revolting its taste and texture is. Han Sooyoung reads his disgust quickly, but isn’t fast enough to shove a trash can into his arms.

Silence fills the room as the three of them try to make sense of the fact that Kim Dokja spat half digested cake into Han Sooyoung’s open hands.

“You know what?” she says, a strained smile taking over her face as she tries to keep her composure. “It’s fine. I’m good. These things happen.” She suppresses a full body shudder, which Kim Dokja appreciates, and excuses herself to the bathroom.

When she comes back, Yoo Sangah and Kim Dokja have disposed of the smaller cake, deeming it a health hazard. The message on the store bought cake is wiped off, presumably by Yoo Sangah who is eating a plate of only frosting. Kim Dokja half heartedly nibbles away at a large slice.

“I think I’m done,” he says, setting his plate down. “Thanks for trying to make me feel better.”

“Well, do you? Feel better, I mean?” Han Sooyoung asks.

No, he doesn’t. He feels like complete and utter shit. He’s not being dramatic when he thinks that his life’s work has been deemed worthless. So many hours spent in a stuffy lab for nearly a decade and it means nothing.

He grimaces and avoids their eager gazes. “I think I’m going to quit.”

Yoo Sangah’s jaw drops, which he considers a better response than Han Sooyoung yelling, “Are you fucking kidding me?!” loud enough that the neighbors can hear.

Kim Dokja rubs the back of his neck. “Yeah. I mean, clearly I’m not meant for it.”

“Dumbass. You failed once. Big fucking deal. Everyone fails.” She reaches over the table and gently taps Yoo Sangah’s chin, prompting her to close her mouth. “No one decides to go into academia because they think it’s an easy pass. Academia means researching and failing and trying and failing again until you either die or make something of yourself.”

He frowns, preferring to make eye contact with the cake. “But I want it to be easy.”

“Tough.” Han Sooyoung flicks his forehead. “It was one failure. Get the fuck up and do it again in a year. Ask Dr. Rodgraim for advice, listen to your dissertation committee when they criticize you, and pull yourself up.” She sighs, tilting her head. “You’re a really ugly crier, so don’t fail again, okay?”

He nods reluctantly.

“I said, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Good.” Han Sooyoung straightens up. “Now, I wanted to go out to Mike’s to celebrate, but I have a report to finish in—” she checks her phone, squinting at the time “—fuck, okay I have to go finish now, or it’s never getting done. Sangah?”

Yoo Sangah smiles gracefully and places a hand on Kim Dokja’s shoulder. “I’ll go to Mike’s with him if he’s interested.”

“Don’t have too much fun without me.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

They look at each other for a second too long, only breaking apart when Kim Dokja impolitely clears his throat, reminding the two of them that he’s still there. Four years they’ve known each other and they still haven’t done anything about the obvious tension.

At this rate, he’s more likely to get his PhD.

Ow, okay, the failing-his-defense thing still hurts. Not enough time has passed for him to be comfortable joking about it without his eyes getting wet.

“Alright! Let’s go, then, shall we?” Yoo Sangah grabs her purse as Han Sooyoung retreats to her room.

—

Mike’s is a bar far enough from campus that it isn’t teeming with undergraduates drinking their friends under the table, but also close enough that it’s easy to get there.

Yoo Sangah orders drinks that don’t retain the taste of the copious amount of alcohol used to make them. They get progressively more colorful, until she’s carefully nursing a cocktail that’s somehow every single color of the rainbow.

Truthfully, Kim Dokja is kind of scared of her.

He has his fourth beer in front of him, untouched. He draws a frowny face on the condensation that forms on the exterior of the glass.

“I brought you here to have fun,” says Yoo Sangah, “not to doodle sadly.”

“Bars on Wednesday nights aren’t exactly fun.” His argument is half baked. The bar is nowhere near as packed as it gets during the weekend, though there are a handful of people dispersed through the establishment.

Yoo Sangah shakes her head and he can feel the disappointment in her level gaze. She finishes her drink, making sure to take obnoxiously loud sips from her straw near the end. “I’m going to the bathroom. Don’t leave.”

How did she know he was planning on making a run for it?

“Damn it.” He sighs, placing his palms on the strangely damp surface of the bar.

“Are you okay?” someone asks from his right. The first thing he notices is that the stranger is terribly handsome, with defined angles and a strong jaw. Dark, wavy locks fall over his forehead and he wears a charmingly awkward smile that takes his breath away. He has the sleeves of his black turtleneck rolled up, revealing his forearms.

Kim Dokja says something that he hopes is intelligent, but from the perfectly shaped eyebrow that the stranger raises, he’s sure it was completely incoherent. “Is it okay if I sit here?”

The stool he gestures towards was only recently vacated by Yoo Sangah. A good friend would say no, that’s taken.

Kim Dokja isn’t that type of person. Not trusting himself to speak, he just nods a little too enthusiastically.

The man’s smile doesn’t waver as he sits down beside him. The bartender brings the man a drink, and it can’t be his first of the night, because he sways ever so slightly and certain consonants he says are slurred.

Oh god, he’s been staring at the guy’s eyes for way too long. His cheeks heat up in an obvious way. It’s definitely the alcohol. He takes a large gulp of his beer.

Liquid courage.

“So…” You come here often? he nearly asks. He manages to stop himself in time, literally biting the tip of his tongue.

He doesn’t seem to mind the faltering and taking a sip of his drink. “Are you celebrating tonight?”

Something about the man makes Kim Dokja want to tell the truth, to lay his head against the bar top and tell him each and every problem, because surely this man can solve all of them. Unfortunately, old habits are hard to break. “Celebrating,” he lies. “I did well on my dissertation defense.”

Both of his eyebrows rise, his eyes widening. “You too? I had mine this morning. Congrats.”

Shit. He was hot and smart. This isn’t good for his small, weak heart. “Congrats to you too,” he says, surprised to find that he’s sincere, a distinct lack of jealousy in his tone.

He wants to be jealous so badly. At least it would bring him some catharsis, projecting his problems with himself onto others.

“What’s your research on?” Kim Dokja asks, placing his elbow on the bar top and holding his chin in his hand.

“Well,” begins the man, dark eyes shining as he shifts closer and lowers his voice. “If you’re interested, you can come to my place and I’ll show you my research.”

Kim Dokja’s breath catches in his throat. He can’t be serious. He considers it for a few seconds, but as he’s about to say yes, he sees Yoo Sangah in the distance, staggering out of the bathroom.

He’s not a good friend. He’s also not a bad friend.

“I wish I could,” he says, lacing as much regret into his voice as possible, which isn’t a very difficult task when everything below his brain is telling him to go home with this man. “But I have a friend to take care of.”

The man glances behind his shoulder and nods. “Ah.” Kim Dokja feels like he got stabbed in the stomach by the way he sighs. “Can I kiss you, then? Just once?”

He nearly suggests exchanging phone numbers, but something tells him that the man isn’t one to do this sober.

Plus, there’s a thrill to a drunken kiss that he can’t deny.

In response, Kim Dokja leans closer, and the stranger meets him in the middle.

He wishes he could say the kiss was magical, that it was something that changed his life, but relative to all two other times he’s been kissed, it ranks last. His soft lips and gentle movements and the firm hand at the back of his neck make up for it.

“Kim Dokja,” says a faint voice to his side. He unwillingly pulls away, one hand still lingering on the collar of the stranger’s leather jacket. His lips tingle pleasantly, tasting like the liquor the man was drinking earlier. Yoo Sangah looks pale, sweat shining above her brow. “I don’t feel well.”

He lets go with a sigh. “Bye.”

The man nods, holding his gaze. “Good luck with your continuing research.”

If Yoo Sangah hears the exchange, she doesn’t mention it, practically dragging him away. It’s only when he’s hit by the chill of the night that he realizes that he never got the man’s name.

Oh well. Some drunken encounters are meant to be only that.

—

The next few months to summer aren’t far from hell. Dr. Rodgraim, despite being a heaven sent advisor and mentor, has only managed to break bad news to Kim Dokja.

At this point, he has a running list of things that have gone wrong.

Ranking number three is that he’s been assigned to show the ropes to two undergraduate students that have joined Dr. Rodgraim’s research team.

Number two is being told to redo a third of his research for his dissertation to provide better results to help his defense.

Coming up in first place is that the lab he and Dr. Rodgraim use has been ruined so badly by the undergrads that it’s literally unusable.

Kim Dokja thinks about dropping out several times every day. The only thing keeping him going is a daily text from either Han Sooyoung or Yoo Sangah, reminding him that they can and will kick his ass if need be.

Han Sooyoung is the one that volunteers to drive him to the medical school, where a new floor of labs has opened up. Until their lab gets renovated, Dr. Rodgraim said they’d be using that space for their research. Kim Dokja doesn’t mind the commute if it means he gets the type of sanctuary that only the clean workspace of a lab can offer.

Besides, what kind of researcher would say no to a brand new lab? He’s heard that they have access to expensive equipment, and with this being practically untouched, he gets to be one of the first people to get his hands on the transmission electron microscope.

Kim Dokja feels giddy just thinking about it. In the passenger seat of Han Sooyoung’s gaudy sports car, he’s already reworking his experiments to make optimal use of his new resources.

“Stop thinking so loud,” she complains. “You’re giving me a headache.”

He grumbles, sinking into his seat. “No one asked you to drive me.”

“I was gonna visit Lee Seolhwa, actually. You’re just carpooling with me. It’s better for the Earth that way.”

“I could’ve biked here.” He rolls his eyes. He knows that she doesn’t mean any harsh words she throws at him. There’s an underlying kindness, a tough sort of love that’s rough around the edges.

“Yeah, whatever.” Han Sooyoung turns up the radio, and he tunes it out, lost in his thoughts once more.

He doesn’t realize that he dozed off until he’s shoved awake.

“We’re here,” she says without preamble. “I’ll walk you to your lab. Meet me at the coffee shop across the street when you’re done.”

Kim Dokja grabs his bag as he steps out.

The building is large and imposing, and he feels like an imposter just walking through it, despite the small voice in his head demanding that he belongs.

If there’s one thing that he’s good at, it’s faking it until he makes it. He has yet to ‘make it’, but he’ll fake it anyway. He squares his shoulder, straightening his slouch so he stands to his full height. His fingers twitch, a plea to take out his phone to double check which room he’s supposed to be in. Doing that will only mean submitting to defeat, making him stick out like a sore thumb. He’s already surrounded by medical students that think they’re a million times smarter than him.

“Where are we going?” asks Han Sooyoung.

“Fifth floor,” he says and steps into the elevator, clicking the appropriate button on the panel.

She squints at him, lips downturned like she doesn’t quite believe him. She doesn’t have much of a choice.

The elevator opens to a pristine hallway. Doors leading to offices line the right side, while on the left, the labs are visible through walls made of floor to ceiling windows. It’s quiet enough that he can hear his own breathing. This is everything that he could have ever wanted. Maybe the ruined lab and months of research going to waste isn’t so bad, if it means he gets this.

“Which one is yours?”

He shrugs and makes no move to check his email for the information. He’s quite content just looking.

Kim Dokja turns to the offices, curious if any of the names written below the room numbers are familiar.

Out of the seven in this hallway, he recognizes only two, one of which sparks immense irritation.

Han Sooyoung follows his burning gaze and reads, “Yoo Joonghyuk, PhD? Do I know him?”

He clenches his jaw. “No.” But he knows him. His department has made it impossible not to know him. Dr. Namgung’s prodigal student, a genius intent on perfecting the use of stem cells for neurological disorders.

As far as research goes, he has to admit that Yoo Joonghyuk’s is incredible. He’s made a breakthrough that others working in the same field have been trying to achieve for decades.

On the other hand, he is also the worst person Kim Dokja has ever had the pleasure of knowing. “Yoo Joonghyuk is a fucking asshole.” They’ve only met briefly, that too a month ago at an interdisciplinary event, but that was enough for him to come to the conclusion that the man has a trash personality. “Remember that roommate you had before you met me that you still complain about even though it’s been years? Take that and multiply it by ten. That’s Yoo Joonghyuk.”

Han Sooyoung goes stiff. He waves his hand in front of her face, trying to get her attention again. “Hellooooo, Earth to Han Sooyoung.”

Her eyes remain locked beyond him.

His stomach sinks. “Oh, fuck,” he whispers. “He’s right behind me, isn’t he?”

She doesn’t get the chance to nod, because Kim Dokja turns around to face the very man who’s name he was dragging through the mud. “How much did you hear?”

“It’s doctor,” Yoo Joonghyuk says, instead of answering.

“What?”

“Next time you talk about me behind my back,” he clarifies condescendingly, “make sure you call me Dr. Yoo Joonghyuk.”

Kim Dokja’s eye twitches in annoyance. Three months with a PhD and he talks like he’s had it his whole life. “You’re a Doctor of Philosophy. Don’t act like you studied medicine.”

“And you aren’t a doctor in any sense of the word, Mr. Kim.” The corner of his mouth pulls up mockingly and he steps closer, seemingly towering over him despite being only a few inches taller. “Your lab is in room 514. Do try to not destroy this one.”

His fist clenches by his side, nails digging into the flesh of his palm to remind him that this wasn’t the place to try and start a physical fight.

For the record, Kim Dokja would win a fight with Yoo Joonghyuk any day.

“I’ll try my best,” he responds through a tight smile. Uninterested in continuing the conversation, he turns to Han Sooyoung.

Or at least to where she should be. She vanished, leaving him here to suffer alone.

“Your friend scurried off,” Yoo Joonghyuk points out, a deliberate smugness pouring into his words.

“I can see that.”

He makes a noncommittal hum and extends his arm uncomfortably close beside Kim Dokja. “Move,” explains Yoo Joonghyuk when Kim Dokja stares at him in confusion. “I’d like to get to my office and you’re standing in front of it.”

Kim Dokja makes a show of rolling his eyes and steps aside, gesturing dramatically to the door as it opens. “Please, Your Majesty Dr. Yoo Joonghyuk.”

Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t retaliate, but he makes sure the door slams behind him.

Kim Dokja stands in front of his office for another minute, mumbling curses under his breath. It makes him feel marginally better.

In the lab as he organizes his equipment, he accidently shatters an Erlenmeyer flask when it falls from the shelf he’s trying to place it upon. He imagines that it’s Yoo Joonghyuk’s face that’s broken. Kim Dokja leaves the lab smirking, pleased with how he handled himself.

—

Yoo Joonghyuk is a professional. More importantly, he’s a grown man. He doesn’t engage in petty arguments with people who don’t respect him and his work, especially not those who have yet to reach his level.

That doesn’t mean he doesn’t get curious. He is a researcher, at the end of the day. In between burning his retinas skimming through subpar scientific journals and writing a grant proposal, he finds himself navigating to a new tab.

Stem cells?

The grant proposal is shoved into the back of his mind as he clicks onto an article that has Kim Dokja as a credited author.

Know thy enemy, and whatnot.