Chapter Text
The evening had been perfect. The diamond on Felix’s finger felt heavy, a beautiful weight that anchored him to the happiest moment of his life. They had returned to the penthouse, shared a bottle of expensive champagne, and Felix had finally fallen into a deep, exhausted sleep.
It was 2:00 AM when Felix realized it.
The velvet ring box. It wasn't on the nightstand. It wasn't in his bag. It was the box Chan had held while he was on one knee - the box that held the certificate of authenticity and, more importantly, a small, handwritten note Chan had tucked inside that Felix hadn't had a chance to read yet.
"I must have left it in the car," Felix whispered to himself, sliding out of the bed with the grace of a dancer.
He threw on a hoodie and grabbed his keys. But the SUV wasn't in the driveway. He remembered Chan mentioning before Felix went to bed that he quicky had to go to the main office for a quick post-celebration diagnostic check.
"I'll just take a taxi," Felix decided, his heart full of late-night romantic whimsy. "It'll be a surprise. I'll get to the office, get the box out of the car and then wait in Channie's office so we can drive home together."
It was the kind of plan that only works in a world where logistics actually means shipping and handling.
The headquarters of Bang Global Logistics was a towering monolith of glass and steel that loomed over the city like a silent guardian. At night, it looked majestic, its peak lost in the low-hanging clouds.
Felix let himself in through the side entrance. The regular security guard - a man who usually saluted Felix with a smile - wasn't at his post.
"That’s odd," Felix murmured, walking through the darkened lobby.
He took the elevator. But instead of pressing penthouse, his thumb hovered over the B4 button. He remembered Chan saying the vehicle bay and specialized storage were in the sub-basements.
The elevator descended. The lights flickered. The usual smooth, elevator-jazz music was silent. When the doors opened on B4, the air was different. It didn't smell like the expensive vanilla candles of the upper floors. It smelled like wet concrete, ozone, and something sharp - like the tang of a penny on your tongue.
"Channie?" Felix called out, his voice echoing down the long, industrial corridor. "Binnie-hyung? Is anyone here?"
He walked past a door that was slightly ajar. Usually, every door in this building required a biometric scan, but the security celebration must have left the staff lax.
He pushed the door open, expecting to see the SUV.
He didn't find the car.
Felix stepped into a room that looked like the brain of a nightmare.
The walls were covered in monitors, but they weren't showing shipping routes. They were showing live feeds of police precincts, rival gang hangouts, and the docks. Red lines connected names - names Felix recognised from the news - to black-and-white photos of crime scenes.
On a central table, there were no lego sets. There were disassembled rifles, rows of black tactical earpieces, and stacks of cash that were bound not with 'logistics' bands, but with the seal of the National Bank’s confiscated vault.
Felix’s breath hitched. He felt a cold shiver crawl up his spine. "It’s... it’s just a very intense security room," he whispered, his voice trembling. "For... protecting the trucks."
Then, he heard a sound from the room further back. A muffled, wet sound. And a voice.
A voice that was cold, jagged, and devoid of the softness Felix loved.
"I asked you once," the voice said. It was Chan. But it wasn't his Chan. "I’m not asking again. Where is the ledger for the Iron Fangs?"
Felix moved toward the sound, drawn by a horrifying curiosity. He peered through the heavy plastic stripping that divided the rooms.
The scene inside was a visceral explosion of reality.
Minho was standing in the corner, his tuxedo jacket tossed over a chair, his white sleeves rolled up and stained with dark, crimson splatters. He was cleaning a blade with the same methodical precision he used to perform magic tricks for Felix.
Changbin was there, too. He wasn't doing a ribbon dance. He was holding a man by the throat against the wall, his muscles bulging with a terrifying, lethal strength.
And in the center of it all was Chan.
He was sitting in the metal chair - the one Felix had said needed lumbar support. He looked like a king on a throne of bone. He was holding a silenced pistol, idly tapping it against his chin as he looked at a man tied to a wooden chair. The man was broken, his face a map of bruises, sobbing for mercy.
"Channie doesn't like it when people touch his things," Minho said, his voice a sharp blade. "And you touched a shipment meant for his family. That’s a 'logistics' error you won't recover from."
Chan leaned forward, the light catching the cold, murderous vacuum in his eyes. "You have ten seconds before I stop being 'sweet.' Ten. Nine..."
Felix stepped back, his foot catching on a metal casing.
Clang.
The sound was like a gunshot in the silent basement.
In a heartbeat, the room shifted. Changbin dropped the man. Minho’s knife was in his hand before the sound had even finished echoing. Chan spun, his pistol levelled at the door, his finger a hair-width away from the trigger.
"WHO’S THERE?!" Chan roared, his voice a guttural snarl that shook the very foundation of the building.
Felix stumbled through the plastic stripping, his hands raised, his face white as a ghost. His engagement ring caught the harsh fluorescent light, glinting mockingly.
The silence that followed was deafening.
Chan’s arm didn't drop immediately. It took three agonising seconds for his brain to bridge the gap between threat and Felix. When it finally did, the pistol clattered to the floor with a heavy, metallic sound.
"Lix?" Chan’s voice broke. The Wolf didn't just vanish; it collapsed. "Felix, what... what are you doing here?"
Felix didn't answer. His eyes moved from the blood on Minho’s hands, to the man tied to the chair, to the weapon on the floor. He looked at Chan - the man who had just proposed to him under a sky of lights and festive fireworks.
"The 'safety audit'..." Felix whispered, his voice small and fragile. "The red ink on the floor. It wasn't... it wasn't from a pen, was it?"
Chan stepped toward him, his hands reaching out, but he stopped when he saw the blood on his own knuckles. He tucked his hands behind his back, looking like a shamed child and a monster all at once.
"Felix, listen to me..."
"The logistics company," Felix interrupted, his voice gaining a hard, sharp edge of clarity. "The discount on the lease of my dance studio. The stolen car that came back with muffins. The 'interactive theatre' in the boardroom. The 'stuntmen' at the Opera House."
Felix looked up, his eyes swimming with tears that didn't fall. "It was all you. All of it. You’re not a CEO. You’re... you’re him. The one the news talks about. The Wolf of the South. You're a mob boss."
Minho and Changbin exchanged a look of pure, unadulterated dread. They backed away into the shadows, leaving the two of them in the center of the wreckage.
"I did it for you!" Chan shouted, the desperation leaking out of him like a wound. "I wanted to keep you safe! I wanted your world to be bright and perfect! I didn't want the dirt of my life to touch your shoes, Lix!"
"But it’s not my world!" Felix yelled back, the first sob finally breaking through. "It’s a lie! I’ve been living in a dollhouse you built out of... out of this!" He gestured wildly at the room. "How can I trust a single thing you’ve ever said to me? Is our engagement a 'logistics' maneuver, too? Did you hire the fireworks? Did you threaten the jeweller?"
"No!" Chan stepped forward, ignoring the blood, ignoring the monster he was. He grabbed Felix’s shoulders, his grip tight and shaking. "The ring is real. The love is real. Everything I feel for you is the only honest thing I have left in this world!"
Felix looked down at Chan’s hands on his shoulders. He looked at the man he had promised to marry four hours ago.
"You killed people, Chan," Felix whispered. "Didn't you?"
Chan didn't lie. He couldn't. Not anymore. The porcelain was gone. "Yes."
"And you’re going to keep doing it?"
Chan looked at the informant in the corner. He looked at his empire. He looked at the life he had built to protect the boy in front of him.
"I have to," Chan said, his voice a low, mournful ghost of a sound. "To keep you safe... I have to be the monster."
Felix slowly reached up and unlatched Chan’s hands from his shoulders. He stepped back, the space between them feeling like an ocean.
"I came back for the box," Felix said, his voice flat. "But I think I found everything I needed."
Felix turned and walked toward the elevator.
"Felix! Wait!" Chan started to follow, but he stopped at the threshold of the room. He looked at his bloody hands, then at the bright, clean hoodie of the boy walking away.
He didn't follow. He couldn't. The Wolf knew that some things, once broken, can't be fixed with a smiley-face sticker.
The elevator doors closed.
Chan stood in the middle of the Red Zone, the silence pressing in on him like a physical weight.
Minho stepped out of the shadows, placing a hand on Chan’s shoulder. "Boss... what do we do?"
Chan didn't look at him. He picked up the silenced pistol from the floor and set it on the table.
"Double the security on our home," Chan said, his voice turning back into cold, dead steel. "If a single person so much as looks at him the wrong way, end them."
"And the wedding?"
Chan looked at the door Felix had disappeared through.
"The wedding," Chan whispered, "is the only problem I don't know how to solve."