dainuhsoar | Waking Up (Reply)

title: Waking Up
rating: g
pairing: junhyung x hyunseung
wordcount: 2,208

summary: junhyung and hyunseung are two field agents on the run from enemies.

we should get going again, junhyung sighs as he crawls back into bed, carefully lifting the thin sheet and slipping in behind hyunseung. they should actually grab their little belongings and leave like now but junhyung can't get himself to shake hyunseung from his sleep. it's also partly because junhyung is so damn exhausted he can't feel his legs. he can feel hyunseung's body, though, warm and fitting in his arms.

hyunseung leans back into junhyung's chest instinctively but continues snoring lightly. junhyung smiles and kisses his cheek softly. he closes his eyes and he tries to sleep but he hasn't been able to sleep for days now. he has only caught 10 to 15 minutes winks to get him through these days. he can't sleep because how can he when he knows there are hundreds of people out there trying to kill him and when they kill him, the next natural target can only be hyunseung? his arms tighten protectively around hyunseung's waist, prompting hyunseung to mumble something and wriggle. junhyung instantly loosens his hold.

this place isn't safe anymore. they'll have to leave in the morning. junhyung can already feel people – really fucking dangerous people with guns and rifles and knives – creeping in closer and closer to their location. junhyung's eyes fly open and shoot nervously around the room. paranoia is also one of the reasons he hasn't been able to sleep. junhyung has this niggling feeling that they're being watched constantly. maybe they should go now.

junhyung puts a hand on hyunseung's shoulder to shake him awake. but then hyunseung mumbles something and he turns over, wraps arms around junhyung's waist and tangles legs around junhyung's own pair and buries his head in the corner between junhyung's head and shoulder. junhyung can feel hyunseung's little puffs of breaths and he sighs, hand lowering to the base of hyunseung's spine and brushing a thumb gently against the strip of skin below the hem of hyunseung's tshirt, making the older man purr and arch closer to junhyung.

they'll leave in the morning.

they're in a car that's not theirs. it probably belongs to an old person, squeezy and smelling of wet cabbage. it has a light scent of flowers as well and hyunseung feels bad because whoever owns this car probably won't be able to fetch flowers for his or her dead spouse's tombstone today.

hyunseung is driving and junhyung is sitting in the shot gun seat, feet up on the seat with him. hyunseung asks him if he wants to recline the chair so it'd be more comfortable. junhyung shakes his head. he doesn't give a reason why but hyunseung knows anyway. junhyung turns to hyunseung and smiles at him once more before leaning his forehead on his knees and hugging his legs to his chest.

they pause at a red light. hyunseung reaches over to junhyung and cards fingers through junhyung's dry hair. junhyung hums in appreciation at the affectionate touch. hyunseung's hand lingers at junhyung's nape before massaging softly. the stoplight turns green and hyunseung retracts his hand.

junhyung falls asleep for 20 minutes before jerking awake. he smiles at hyunseung sheepishly.

their next motel (hiding place) is nicer than the last, which is strange because their lives are getting worse. this motel actually provides a proper bed. the last one had just a mattress dumped on the floor. the lighting is good – bright and yellow, soft on the eyes. the last one was dim orange and made them squint a lot.

junhyung drops himself on the bed once they've unlocked the door.

in the day, junhyung tries to sleep and hyunseung keeps watch. their enemies don't tend to attack in the day. maybe that's why junhyung insists hyunseung keep watch in the day and takes night-watch himself. it's not that he doesn't trust hyunseung. hyunseung tends to be distracted easily and his shooting hand isn't as accurate as junhyung's- so maybe junhyung doesn't trust hyunseung a little. but mostly because hyunseung deserves the normal sleeping hours (the normal life).

hyunseung doesn't deserve to run from state to state. he doesn't deserve to switch from bed to bed. he doesn't deserve to be dragged off by junhyung. but he does it anyway without a word of complaint, with a simple genuine smile and twinkling eyes like their lives are not in danger and they're just going for an eternal roadtrip. it's junhyung's fault, he blames himself for their lives, he blames himself for hyunseung's plight.

junhyung loves hyunseung and unfortunately hyunseung loves junhyung as much, maybe more. because junhyung is selfish and he doesn't want to let go of hyunseung, he needs hyunseung. hyunseung is the only source of strength he has, hyunseung is the only reason he doesn't give in to sleep, hasn't given in to exhaustion. he has thought of leaving hyunseung so hyunseung could live a better life – he'll still be riddled with random attacks but at least lesser than their current situation – but never gotten round to actually doing it because- well because he's damn fucking selfish, that's why.

junhyung isn't afraid of death. he's afraid of what comes after it. what does come after death? blackness? if it's blackness, he'll never be able to see hyunseung again and never see that smile, never taste hyunseung's tongue on his, never smell hyunseung's eternally sweet scent... junhyung doesn't want to risk that. he still has a reason to live and he's going to keep that reason next to him. he only hopes hyunseung's reason to live doesn't dissipate. (he only hopes hyunseung doesn't dissipate.)

hyunseung sits in front of the bed, Indian-style, taking apart his gun and organizing the parts in front of him. there's another gun beside him. there's one more strapped to junhyung's belt and junhyung feels the hard edges of his handgun dig into his flesh through his tshirt. he rolls onto his stomach and watches hyunseung assemble the gun back together in silence.

hyunseung puts the gun back together wrongly and junhyung knows where he went wrong but he doesn't say anything, jaw tired and eyes droopy. he falls asleep eventually but wakes up 25 minutes later with a start, neck a little cold and sweaty. hyunseung is looking at him. he has an assembled gun in his lap. he smiles sweetly at junhyung, strokes junhyung's cheek and kisses him softly. junhyung's breaths are still short and quick from his nightmare but he manages a grateful smile – grateful for hyunseung's touch, grateful for hyunseung's smile, grateful for hyunseung just fucking being there.

it takes about two days for junhyung's enemies to find them again. the last time it took four days. at night, junhyung sits next to the window with thin white curtains. he peers out through the crack in the curtains and watches cars drive into the carpark and out. he watches other motel guests – all of them look unwashed and tired like junhyung – groan and stretch their limbs as they close doors behind them and head out to work. most of them work at night, men in their stained wifebeaters and leather jackets and women in their skin tight dresses and mile-high heels – go figure why.

and then he sees a man in a nice black suit coming out from one of the rooms opposite from junhyung's, straightening his jacket. stupid, junhyung thinks. the man looks so fucking different from all of them. but maybe he's not even trying to hide. junhyung's the one who has to hide after all.

junhyung doesn't kill that man. he watches him look around with shifty eyes. the man's eyes pass over the curtains covering junhyung's face. and then he turns and walks away.

when day breaks, hyunseung greets junhyung with a warm smile and a deep kiss and massages his shoulders for him. they go out and have sandwiches from the convenience store for breakfast and then sits on a bench at a park that smells like dog poop and have spiderwebs hanging from the trees. they watch hobos wake up and drunkards stir.

junhyung leans against hyunseung, wraps an arm around hyunseung's waist and listens to hyunseung tell him about the dream he had where both of them were in a car and driving away from everything- and he falls asleep. he wakes up 30 minutes later with his head in hyunseung's lap and hyunseung's warm hand on his forehead.

i fucked it up again, junhyung thinks as he bursts into the motel room, arm bleeding from a bullet graze. he shakes hyunseung awake hurriedly.

"i'm so sorry," he says. "we have to go right now."

hyunseung's prepared for emergencies. they take nothing but themselves and their handguns. there are more than 6 men, some wearing suits, others wearing wifebeaters and jeans and bandanas, but all shooting maniacally at them. hyunseung fires twice and kills one of them. more of them are coming by cars. they've nowhere to go.

so they dodge back in, smash the back window and climb out of it, running away as their shoes crush broken glass. they manage to get about 15 meters away before men are shooting at them again. junhyung turns, aims at one man behind them and shoots- the man falls back in a spurt of blood from his head, just like a video game but slower.

"that car, hyung!" junhyung shouts, pointing at a black car parked outside a closed grocery store.

hyunseung cracks the glass window with a harsh punch and shards litter both the sidewalk and the seat inside. the interior is neat and smells of pine. there's a teddy bear in the back seat and hyunseung realizes with a sort of guilt and horror that they're stealing a family car, a car where nice memories were spent probably on road trips or to dinners out in the city. he can almost hear gurgling laughter from a baby or shrieking giggles from a toddler as his mother dangles his teddy bear in front of him playfully. hyunseung unlocks the door from inside and clambers in.

junhyung shoots just one more man and climbs into the shotgun seat.

hyunseung hotwires the car and jams the pedal. they speed off, both panting heavily and wide-eyed and fucking terrified. they're used to running away and stealing cars and shooting people but the i don't want to fucking do this i'm so fucking scared has never worn off.

there are still men chasing after them in cars. junhyung slumps down in his seat and then sticks a hand out of the window, eyes on the reflections in the sideview mirror and shoots. his first shot misses but the second shot takes a hit.

it's too dark. it's too late. the town should be quiet. hyunseung wants to cry because they're ruining everything. he wants to cry because some unsuspecting citizen who wandered out of her or his house to check out what the hell is going on could have been undeservedly killed. orange lights stripe the streets and the car flashes in and out of these stripes as it speeds past.

hyunseung suddenly realizes that both his life and junhyung's life are right in his hands, gripped tight around the steering wheel. he gulps. he looks to junhyung who has turned back around and staring at him as if he knows what hyunseung just realized.

junhyung takes a deep breath and covers hyunseung's white knuckles on the steering wheel with his own palm, sticky and warm. he smiles and says, "hyung?" as in "what's the matter?" as in "i trust you." as in "i love you, do you know that?"

hyunseung has never been afraid of death. he's only been afraid of losing his reason to live. he sighs and his heart leaps to his throat. bullets smash through the back glass. he glances at the back and sees the limp teddy bear bouncing against the car seat. he feels the life and happiness seeping out through the cracked windows. he remembers how he's so afraid junhyung will fall asleep and never wake up again, hyunseung remembers the fear in his veins whenever junhyung falls asleep next to him. hyunseung had watched junhyung sleep all the fucking time, as creepy as that sounds. he had watched with wide eyes and a thumping heart.

hyunseung tears his eyes from the road, grips the steering wheel tighter, leans over and kisses junhyung harshly.

a car crashes and another one drives out of the city.

---

two weeks later, son dongwoon receives an email on his phone. it beeps and continues to beep – an emergency. he groans as he stretches a hand to grope at the small bedside table for his phone. he squints at the bright screen, eyes used to the pitch black and not the white lights. and then he frowns as his stomach twists into a knot.

dongwoon looks over to kikwang, still sleeping soundly with a small contented smile on his lips. so he sets his phone aside and lies next to kikwang, wondering how he should break the news in the morning, the sharp black of the words "yong junhyung – dead." and "jang hyunseung – dead." printed on the back of his eyelids.

---

a/n: or did they...

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Waking Up

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