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"Agent… I didn't think you'd be so uncooperative in the midst of a darkness..." He moaned petulantly, yet his voice was a snide, taunting thing.
Choi stared down at the man beneath him, eyes narrowing, brows furrowing with contempt and irritation.
For a man caged by his arms, trapped between his knees, and underneath his torso, the Director was being quite bold. Even more so bolder when he'd reached out and curled his mangy claws around Choi's neck, tightening and loosening as he wished.
See, their current predicament was that of a low-level disaster.
This disaster required just a semblance of cooperation and amiability to escape, and Choi had heard about instances of coworkers getting trapped with each other in passing.
It was said to activate randomly when a pair was near a body of water, but other than that, there was no particular trigger criteria—although it was joked to be somewhat of a matchmaking darkness, having created couples from all the close proximity it shoved the two into….
It was just his luck that he'd found himself in here with this bastard.
Regardless, this compact space and spherical arrangement made any seriousness to this situation impossible.
Talking it out? Please. This self-centered, self-justifying cult director would always find a way to have the last word—a trait that set off Choi over and over again, reacting to his provocations with startling, predictable ferocity.
He'd lunge forward, hoping to catch him in his maw, only to get himself trapped between those large paws…
Ugh. Instances of all the times he'd been caught off guard sent him reeling with anger...
Even now, he was just aching to draw blood across that smug smile.
“Really—” He laughed, unmistakably beautiful, yet so full of derision. It bounced off the walls and reverberated till the sound had cemented itself in Choi’s brain, refusing his every adamant attempt to overwrite it with thoughts of malice and the like.
“Is the bureau so understaffed they hire just about… anyone?" he continued, teeth bared viciously, eyes sparkling with an excited voracity. He pressed his thumb against Choi’s Adam’s apple, enjoying how the agent turned all shades of blue.
"Hah." Choi scoffed—a raspy, pitiful thing—his eyebrows furrowing further as his vitriol grew, trembling lips curling with a smile that seemed to challenge.
As if pitying him—as if—he relaxed his grip enough that Choi could manage a few words.
He coughed furiously, chest heaving, tears decorating the corners of his eyes in relief. The illusion of freedom had him grabbing further at the large hands around his neck, hoping to claw it off completely, but to no avail.
“Honestly—” He started, fingernails still scraping at his neck. “It's a bit rich coming from the cult company that uses disasters to filter out new recruits, don't you think, Director?” he managed, voice hoarse, his throat already aching from the effort.
The director smiled, all crescent moon crinkles and sharp, upturned lips.
Cheery as it may have looked, it voiced a silent threat too clear to miss. His grip tightened where it had bunched up Ho’s expensive suit jacket, and once again, his fancy cologne hit his face like a truck.
He wanted to throw up. This place, this position—him. Everything made him sick, or maybe it was just his presence that made it so unbearable. It didnt help that he felt strangely conscious of the sphere’s transparency.
Right now, with how their arms were positioned, the closeness with which Choi hovered, and Ho lay against the rubbery apex—the compact arrangement leaving no space for leg room, forcing him into a fetal position—any onlookers could get the wrong idea.
But it was unavoidable.
Choi had noticed a slight change in the overall volume of the space throughout the time they'd been stuck here—and hour and seventeen minutes—and thus concluded that the darkness begins to shrink every so often. They could tousle about for another half an hour, or more, and they’d still have space to move about.
Unexpectedly, Choi came to bite his earlier words. The space they were in shrank inwards, the walls pushing in on them. They squeaked as Ho’s knees pressed against them, shifting in surprise, and Choi could feel the pressure of the tight rubber squeezing against his ass.
Fuck…. It's unpredictable.
Now, all earlier knowledge of the disaster had to be thrown out the window. Shrinks painfully slowly over a set time? Toss. Shrinks with increasing hostility towards one another…? Possible—he was no stranger to anomalies after all.
If Choi could change his position and free his arms from where they’d kabedoned the cult director, he'd be pinching the roof of his nose the way Jaekwan does, but any shift in position would only tumble them further and further into uncertain positions and put one of the two into positions of advantage—Choi couldn't let that happen. He wasn't going to take a gamble and let physics push him underneath the perverted claws of that cunning bastard.
Sensing a bit of an opening, Choi attempted to yank at the director's hair—and the director, as if expecting it, tightened his grip around Choi's neck.
His long, slender fingers brushed gingerly against the grooves of his scar, an intimate move too unfit for their current situation. He took his time admiring it, like this compromising position they were in didn't leave him vulnerable enough for Choi to beat him up.
Which he should. Once he managed to find a position that didn't keep them so aggravatingly close.
“Don't be so upset, dear agent.” He cooed, enunciating each word with slow breaths—flitting his eyes over him with an intensity that made his whole body shiver.
Fuck, it's like he's undressing me with his eyes…!
“I'm just merely admiring the trophy of your battles.”
Ugh…
Choi would throw up if he let the director caress him any longer. Even more so if he had to hear his voice in that tone—that sickly sweet, yet dauntingly husky timbre that upturned his insides and ignited a heat in his stomach.
Fuck…..
Choi would have to shut him up before his body betrayed him.
He grabbed hold of the director's shirt, bunching it up with his nails and digging deep till he elicited a pained whine. The surprise in his eyes was gratifying, and an opening at that, so he took this chance to kick the director in his crotch with the knee wedged between his legs.
The director let go of his neck, clutching at himself as he wheezed in pain, and Choi felt a burst of satisfaction.
More. He wanted more.
Eyes dilating, the adrenaline overtook his brain, leaving him crazed and excited, and he grabbed hold of the director yet again.
To nobody's surprise, the director smiled ravenously, like this was just what he wanted.
Hah. This masochistic bastard…
He threw another heavy punch against his face, the oomph! like music to his ears, and he was pleased with the blood that splattered the walls as he fell over.
However, this movement had pushed Ho to the side, the weight pushing over the ball they were trapped within. Flailing attempts were made to balance it out with his body, but Ho remained slumped over on the opposing side, and Choi suddenly found himself crashing forwards instead, his face meeting Director Ho’s. And onto his mouth.
Soleum didn't think his day could get any more eventful. He wasn't sure what sins he'd committed in his past life for him to crash land into three darknesses back to back.
Like a box inside of another box, and another one inside the other…
But at least it was peaceful when they’d made it out. The atmosphere was fresh, the scent of sea salt weighing in the air, and the skies boasted a perfect blue. Fluffy clouds overhead drifted by, splitting apart like cotton candy, and the silhouettes of seagulls whooshed past.
And in the distant horizon, two specks of blue and orange could be made out, moving about violently within what seemed like a clear ball. The ball tumbled precariously on the surface of the river and almost always just barely escaped rolling over.
Earlier, upon his arrival, he’d been briefed by his former senior.
“Don't worry, agent, we're already out of the darkness.” Eun Haje affirmed, putting his mind at ease in that familiar carefree manner that sparked nostalgia inside him.
“Unfortunately…” She sighed. “Those two may have triggered another one… so we'll have to wait till they manage to talk it out and free themselves.”
Inching closer, Soleum had taken a better look and realised that this was a darkness he recognised. It was one of those smaller entries that gained fame due to the versatility of its nature, paving the way for many romance-based exploration records that were more fanfiction than serious entries. Soleum had immensely enjoyed them, although he'd tell you otherwise to save face, so he was admittedly a little jilted when they had never made it to canon.
But anyway, nothing out of the ordinary ever happened in the darkness, even with all the unprecedented anomalies. It was just an enter-and-leave darkness, with the escape method being… simply unzipping the water ball.
All it required was cooperation from both parties and an amicable atmosphere.
Sigh….
Soleum could immediately understand why it was such a difficult darkness for the two of them…
He looked to his right, hoping for some assuring words from his senior, but he met with a grim and overwhelming miasma instead.
“They'll settle around eventually…” Ryu Jaekwan added, ever so true to his nature, but even Soleum could tell by his tone that he himself didn't believe that at all…
They could only pray that the two would turn desperate enough that they would play along for just a moment.
…!
Hm?
“It stopped?” Eun Haje commented, a palm over her eyes as she craned her neck for any further signs of movement. There was a slight impatience in the way her feet rocked on her heels—which made sense; this job of hers was unpredictable in its essence: one day terribly dull, another day, far too strenuous.
Soleum fixed his eyes back onto the ball in the distance, following her example. For a few tense moments, all three of them were transfixed on that unmoving contraption, anticipation eating them whole.
And suddenly. It popped.
The three watched with bated breaths, awaiting any sign that the two were alive. The silence stretched thin amongst them yet again, but was quickly broken by the sound of splashing water. Emerging from the surface was a familiar brown mop of hair, stuck slack to his forehead, wet hair glistening under the sunlight.
In his arms was the body of another man, its status yet to be determined.
With a careless chuck, he threw the director across the sand, flopping over to his back with a tired wheeze.
They gathered around the director, observing him like as if he were a never-before-seen fish that Choi had caught for them.
“Ahh…agent.” Choi’s junior spoke up, eyes still fixed on a man undeserving of his gaze.
“Hm?” Choi hummed inquisitively in response, chest still heaving from his grand rescue.
“He's not breathing…” He pointed out, his words trembling.
“We might have to do CPR…”
Fuck.