Cradle-Snatcher [Chapter]
Title: Cradle-Snatcher
Author: .flavored
Rating: PG-15 (for disturbing implications)
Genre: Dark
Pairing: Leeteuk-centric
Summary: It starts in a dark room, grows and festers and earns for release. Then it gets tired, and knows its time has come... curling up and surrendering... before it starts again.
Part 1
“And next up! We will have Leeteuk from Super Junior!”
Leeteuk looked into the eyes of the large and scary-looking German shepherd. Most people in his position would have contemplated whether they had done anything useful for the world; or perhaps, have their entire life flash before their eyes; or even just shit in their pants. Or all three.
But he wasn’t most people. He wasn't exactly scared... well, truthfully, he wasn't scared at all, though he should have been. No one should come face to face with a hostile police dog and not feel any sort of fear. But then, those kind of real feelings had packed up and abandoned him for the hills a long time ago. All that remained was an empty shell and a penchant for realistic acting.
So he did just that - he acted.
He heard the loud laughter that roared from the audience as he played his part of timid little boy-idol that was terrified of large and biting dogs. Running around in a panic while his mind was perfectly calm was easier than he thought. He didn’t even need to conjure up perfectly scared expressions on his face - audiences were easily fooled.
And fooled this one was.
And unaware, they laughed.
Well, there was one party who wasn’t fooled at all by his performance - the dog.
The dog had known what he was the moment she had sniffed his scent. Animal’s instincts, Leeteuk marveled, were certainly not things to be underestimated and trifled with.
That night, as he and his fellow members replayed the footage shot from their blood and tears, and more specifically, the footage of that particular scene of the police dog chasing him like it was her duty, he laughed genuinely along with them for the first time and the last time.
“Seems like you have a criminal face, Leeteuk-hyung!” his members teased him, citing reference from the witty caption emblazoned across their television screen.
He had smiled back at them then. They had no idea how close their joke was to reality.
No idea at all.
~*~
The moon was full that night. And it watched over the world with a world-weary gaze, waxing and waning as it yawned from boredom in its work.
It watched as the young girl of twelve snuck cautiously into the alleyway, her brown eyes wide and her pale skin reflecting off the moonlight with the natural oil that came with acne and puberty.
And it was because of puberty that she doing such a foolish thing (for if sneaking into the middle of a suspicious alleyway was not a foolish thing, then no sane man would know what was). But one could not blame the girl, for there was something in that alleyway more enticing for the girl than candy, chocolate or even diamonds.
Standing right there, barely ten meters away from her was her fulfillment of all possible wishes, her dream come true, her one and only ‘Oppa’.
“Leeteuk-oppa!” The girl’s loud whisper would have, at most times, gone unheard amidst the everyday noises was now a reverberating scream in the context of the silent night. The one whose name had been called paused, and began to turn around in pregnant curiousity.
The girl’s smile widened in anticipation as she ran towards her idolic goal. She admired the slim profile in the simple white clothes, the silky light brown hair floating as he turned, and anticipated the puzzled but still winning smile he would give her, complete with that mischievous twinkle in his eye…
The girl stopped short. Everything in her dream had been fulfilled, except for one crucial factor -
- There was no smile on his face.
In fact, it was far from it. Instead, a slight scowl was donned loosely on his lips like a badly placed piercing. And his eyes were void of any twinkle. In fact, they were void of anything except a cold, appraising look as they traveled up and down the being of the girl like two empty cameras connected to a dispassionate and apathetic computer.
She took an involuntary step back as her idol took a voluntary step front. She winced when he suddenly placed his slim fingers on her chin, forcing them upwards to look straight into his soulless eyes. His hands were cold.
“Hmm…” the soulless brown eyes blinked, then moved away. “Good enough. Take her away, Chaeseol-sshi.”
“Very good, boy.” The girl jumped when a hand fell firmly onto her shoulder and stayed there. It was a disgusting hand - one with wrinkled, rough skin and enough scars and dirt to tell a lifetime of forensic stories. “We’ll take it from h’er.”
The girl turned slowly around to face the owner of the hand who kept her in place. And her innocent eyes met diseased teeth, thin, grimacing lips, and skin black from the sun, hard labour and dirt engrained into the thick, pig-hide folds.
Her composure broke like a hard glass gently rapped against at its weakest point of pressure. And in that same way, the girl’s way of lashing out was extremely painful to the one who received it.
It’s enough to say that Chaeseol-sshi was going to spend the rest of the week squawking like a jelly-fish stung sparrow and rubbing special ointment on bruised family jewels.
The girl ran as hard and as fast as she could from something she could only place in her head as a nightmare. She ran so hard and fast that she didn’t realize when someone came silently up from behind her.
When she fell, she fell like a ton of unassuming bricks in a large gurney-sack. Hard and loud.
Leeteuk rubbed his hand where he had used it to hit the specific area in the girl’s neck where a particular pressure point was located which had an explicit use of putting someone instantly to sleep.
“Ah… boy… good.” The grimy Chaeseol-sshi limped to where the idol and the unconscious girl were. His voice was high and squeaky, but he was too much in pain to care if the idol would make fun of him. Not that he need have worried - the idol didn’t care much for making fun of people. He had to pretend that he liked it too much when he was acting, so much so that he found himself adverse to it when he was not. “Carry her… to… van.”
Without so much as a sweat or broken finger-nail. The idol lifted up the girl and carted her to the nondescript black van waiting for them at the end and side of the alleyway which they were in. Seeing the idol, the bunch of thugs lounging lazily at the side of the van suddenly became alert and respectful.
Leeteuk didn’t care that when he dumped the girl in the van, the thugs were scrambling to help him do so. He didn’t care much that the thugs were whispering out him either. He knew why they were doing so, and what they were saying without needing to wonder.
“That’s the boss’ pet poacher.”
“They say he’s next in line to inherit this child-smuggling business.”
“He’s good. Wish I were in his shoes.”
“Name’s Leeteuk.”
“Says that he qualifies in getting young girls. Really young and profitable ones.”
“Leeteuk? Ah… you mean the ‘Cradle-Snatcher’.”
“Cradle-Snatcher…”
“…Cradle-Snatcher.”
He still heard.
Ditching the group as fast as he could with a few well mumbled excuses, the idol made his way back to his group’s dorm. He got in with no trouble. No one was up so late, or rather early (in the morning). Even Kyuhyun, with his gaming habits, slept at 2 a.m. in the morning after a night of rigorous filming.
Only him. With his complicated thoughts swirling in his head, and with the darkness coming down and trying to shroud them all away.
‘Cradle-Snatcher…’
~*~
“You’re doing well, my precious one.”
He met the complement with silence and a stony glare directed at a brick just behind the man who was talking to him. Or rather whispering into his ear.
The breath was hot against his skin. And smelt faintly of fresh peppermint sweets. But it stank. It stank of calculation, coldness and beady-eyed greed.
There were three elaborate silver spoons hanging on the wall, put up for decoration, and for the purpose of pride. He focused on them now instead. Counting them again and again.
‘One, two, three.’
“I even heard that you have acquired quite a reputation as a cradle-snatcher. I assume it’s because you capitalized on your good looks.”
‘One, two, three.’
“Keep this up, and I will reward you well. In fact, I’m giving you a small reward tonight.’
Leeteuk stared into the faces of one of the spoons. And saw his own, distorted in the curved reflection.
Twisted.
Tainted.
He saw his true face.
“Yes, sir.”
‘One, two, three.’
~*~
“Hey, Hyung.”
Leeteuk paused, and blinked at the concerned face suddenly barely an inch away from his own. Sweet, brown eyes stared intensely into his own, which though similarly brown, were not similarly sweet. “Sungmin?”
“Where did you go?” Though sweet, the eyes which stared into had the tendency to scare when they wanted. “Kyu and me wanted to go buy some snacks, but Manager-hyung told us you were holding the company credit card and you weren’t anywhere to be found! Now we’re both very hungry and it’s all your fault.”
Leeteuk sighed. Such troublesome members he had - at least, that’s what he should be feeling. Instead, he felt nothing but a blankness and a slight tinge of worry that he wasn’t up to fill in with falseness today.
He had to try. “Firstly, I went to meet Lee Soo Man-nim, so that's definitely more important than snacks. And secondly, it should be ‘Kyu and I’ not ‘Kyu and me’. And thirdly, Kangin has the card now. Not me. Something about buying stuff to prank Yesung.”
Sungmin growled. “Why didn’t you say so in the first place?!”
“You didn’t ask.” Leeteuk shrugged and made a quick escape while the pumpkin vented. He needed his calming darkness, unsure how long he could keep up his facade of irritation.
He didn’t notice the pair of sharp eyes upon his back. With an astuteness that belayed assumptions of his awkward demeanor, one Cho Kyuhyun watched as his Hyung stalked back to his room the way a predator tended to stalk back to its cave.
‘There’s something strange today about Leeteuk-hyung…’ Kyuhyun thought, ‘He's more… depressed? No, that’s as per usual… Tense…? No… that’s not it...’
“Kyu! I got the card! Get your lazy butt here and we'll go get some snacks!”
“Coming, coming,” Kyuhyun sighed and got up slowly and reluctantly. ‘... Never mind. I’ll get it sooner of later. I always do.’
But, he never did.
The door to Leeteuk’s room slammed shut. And the key turned in the lock three times.
'One, two, three.'
~*~
Part 2
Another day of filming, and he couldn’t even said he was tired.
There were worst things than being put onto a rollercoaster and pretending that you were scared as heck. Or running from irate fans crowding around you the minute you were off being terrified from the said ride.
He didn’t feel anything - just emptiness.
All in a day’s work.
~*~
Leeteuk stared at the card in his hand - white, pristine and crisp.
It might as well have been yellowed and dark with sin.
Looking at it once again, he sighed and pulled out a tin box from under his bed. The lid was pried open to reveal black ashes mixed with grey. With the help of a lighter and its flame, the card soon joined the rest of its brother in a flaky rest.
Leeteuk took stock of the level of ashes in the box. It was getting full again. He needed to empty it soon again.
Empty it so that it could be filled all over again.
He left the room, hopeful that no one would smell the smoke that was only slowly dragged away by the breeze, whispering of secret meetings and a surprise.
~*~
The grin on his superior’s face was full of pride and slightly sickening. The greed in this room was so thick that one could take a spoon and actually part it like the jello it resembled -
Scented with lemons and artificially sweet.
Leeteuk took it all in and frowned. Something was different tonight. Not only was his superior in the room, but also some other goons.
A certain cockroach skittered up and began groveling to his superior. Leeteuk couldn’t help realize that the superior seemed to disregard and even sneer at the grimy man the same way Leeteuk did.
He didn’t know whether to be satisfied or horrified.
“Come, my boy.” The commanding finger beckoned towards the secret room. Something cold entered the idol’s stomach as he followed automatically, his limbs pulled forward by strings and electrical signals not implicitly his own.
The button was pressed and the shelf slid open smoothly, being well used and greased. Leeteuk saw the darkness and found it familiar.
He had started from it after all.
“Here.” His superior handed him something - something long, black and fit with barbs at the end. “You might need this.”
Leeteuk stared at the whip, his face frozen into something that resembled blankness. He turned from it and stared into the darkness of the room. A whimper had caught his attention.
It was girl - of perhaps 14 or 15 years of age. She was stunned, she was scared, she was lost.
She was crying.
Leeteuk now knew what this was all about. What the superior was giving him.
It was a promotion.
He refused the whip, saying that he knew something that would work better.
And he strode into the darkness without so much as a look back.
~*~
The big man in black stood at the door which had closed in his face with a look of satisfaction on his face.
“He’s turned out very well, don’t you think, Chaeseol-sshi?”
“Yes, very well.” The cockroach rubbed his hand together, trying to emulate the greed in the room. “Turned out very well. I laid a good foundation after all.”
“Hmm…” the blank eyes turned and made Chaeseol uncomfortable. He squirmed and shut up.
There was a knock at the door.
“Lee Soo Man-sshi?” it was the secretary. “Would you like to check the reports?”
One look from the blank eyes and the cockroach scuttled, running into the emergency exit installed for more than just an escape from fires.
With a nod, he quickly the dismissed the rest as well.
He was a little rude to the secretary when she came in - after all, he would have liked to monitor his star tool as it worked its wonders.
Still, he knew he didn’t need to worry.
The screams inside, blocked from the outside world by sound-proof walls, had already started.
~*~
Leeteuk returned to his room and fell asleep straightaway.
He was tired.
~*~
Part 3
His eyes were shrewd and bright with cold logic. They reviewed everything shown to him, taking everything in, missing nothing out.
It did nothing to calm the young man standing in front of him, face kept blank, brown eyes dull.
“Hmm…” the cold brown eyes finally lifted, satisfied. “Continue.”
The other nodded before entering the room, his eyes sliding but a bit before they snapped straight, staring into the darkness.
The cold brown eyes watched calmly, analyzing, as the door closed on the darkness and its secrets within.
He smiled. He knew what was happening.
His eyes never missed anything after all.
Turning to the video, re-watching it again, his satisfaction was apparent. And Lee Soo Man laughed.
Everything was going according to plan.
~*~
She screamed as he beat her.
She screamed as he bruised her.
She screamed as he abused her.
But she saw in his eyes apology.
She saw in his eyes pain.
And she forgave him.
~*~
Leeteuk collapsed on the bed, his hands shaking, a purple and black mark formed where he had clutched the riding crop too tight.
Outside, the usual mayhem occurred. Ryeowook cooking the kitchen while Eunhyuk nagged and cleaned behind him, Yesung hovering around and generally causing more accidents than should happen. Kyuhyun playing Starcraft while Heechul criticized and Kibum challenged - Sungmin obviously was beside trying to drag them away from it all and Hangeng just stared, confused. Donghae was just running around like a headless chicken… actually he was waving a box of one and Shindong was actually running around trying to case him. Kangin just snored somewhere in the corner, dozing off.
It was all so noisy.
So, so noisy.
He just wanted everything to end.
~*~
The blank brown eyes stared at the screen, barely looking at the greedily shivering cockroach who wanted to please.
“E-everythin’ as planned, s-sir?”
And the blank brown eyes smiled, looking at the many papers in front of him.
The fat fingers pulled out that ink black phone and dialed a number.
“Leeteuk. Come.”
It was going to end.
~*~
He had arrived to a scene of mayhem. People with official auras were crowding around everywhere, and confused Leeteuk just stood there like a deer caught in the headlights.
And that description might as well been an actual description rather than just a metaphorical one.
“Hey! He’s also part of it!” a shout by Leeteuk’s side startled him, and before he could react, there were people all over him, pinning him to a wall, roughly pulling his hands behind his back. There was a loud jingle, and Leeteuk found that he couldn’t separate his hands anymore, the flesh of his wrists touched by the coldness and captivity of the handcuffs they put around him.
He should have known that this was coming. The police had been tightening their inspections on illegal smuggling, and everyone in the business had known it. It was why only Lee Soo Man and him were the only ones being arrested. Everyone else had run away.
And the police wouldn’t care about them - after all, they had gotten their main prize. Leeteuk himself was just small fry as well, and he’d probably get out with a lighter sentence, although the scandal that would follow would be an entirely different thing altogether.
Leeteuk knew all this… but the restraints on his arm chaffed more painfully on his soul than they did on his hands.
“Wait!”
The sudden cry that rang out startled everyone in the room, even as the girl that had been held captive rushed out of the medic’s caring hands to Leeteuk’s side, pulling away the hands that pinned him against the wall. “Not him! He’s as much a victim of all this as I am! Please! Don’t lock him away!”
It was strange how even though there were arms encircling him the way the handcuffs encircled his wrists, that the hug that the girl gave him felt sweet with a relief that could only be called as freedom.
Leeteuk was finally free.
~*~
The cell they finally put him in wasn’t too bad. Sure, it was three walls and a row of still bars where you would never get privacy. But there was a soft mattress on the cot, a condoned off area that was a private toilet, and a small window that when he climbed onto the stool, he could peer at the outside wall, watching it pass by without him.
In all, it could have been worse.
And so, Lee Soo Man sat on his mattressed bed in his cell meant for him alone, getting the envy of all the other prisoners there, counting the bars that would prevent him from escaping through the window.
There were three bars.
“One. Two. Three.”
~*~
Epilogue