(no subject)
Title: Acts of Insurrection (9/20)
Authors: butterflyweb and nemesis_cry
Rating: NC-17
Pairing: OT5
Warning(s): violence, graphic sex, language
Summary: It's been six months since Changmin crashed on the remote planet known as Elysia. Five months since Yunho and Junsu found him. Four months since Jaejoong was shot by a man he and Yoochun both trusted. Now training as the Empress' men, former soldiers and former rebels have shed past allegiances in service of a common goal. But the tide is turning--and not in their favor.
Banner credit: luvmeanddespair
A/N: Thank you for all your wonderful feedback for the first part. We hope you enjoy this one!
Prequel: Acts of Contrition;
Acts of Insurrection: One; Two; Three; Four; Five; Six; Seven; Eight
Chapter Nine
The world moves in slow motion.
Jaejoong hears his lover's call on the comsys and runs to it like a sailor to some pretty, murderous siren. Instead of finding his own death, however, he finds something much worse.
Small and curved like a bow, the front of a ship becomes gradually greater as it slips through the trees, moving towards him, moving away from him all at once. Out of sheer horror, he finds himself reducing speed, looking around as if he'll see Yoochun in pursuit of it. What he does see is the other man's abandoned hovercraft, his sidearm on the ground.
Cold, liquid fury steels him.
Yoochun is gone.
His lover's gone.
***
The rendezvous point is the Cerberus. Yunho is there first, organizing the search, trying to do everything himself under Jiexi's watchful eye. When Changmin arrives, he feels panic tighten in his belly.
"He's not been found?" he asks, cutting the engine and jumping by his Captain's side.
Yunho shakes his head. "Nothing yet, not a word." It's not exactly true, but it'll do. False alarms help no one and there's too many of those. "I ran out of fuel," he adds, sounding almost apologetic over the static pouring into his ear as he changes frequency from one search party to the next.
Changmin nods, glancing around helplessly. "Same."
There are perks in being Her Majesty's men. They live and breathe respect, even though it's wholly undeserved. And when something like this happens, they merely have to wait for the Empress to snap her fingers and they have a fleet at their disposal.
The odds are in their favor, but Changmin has a feeling. It's inexplicable, but it's growing, covering him in doubt and unease. It takes Yunho's hand on his shoulder to shake him.
"Jaejoong's coming in," the older man tells him, staring into his eyes. "He's not answering his comlink," he adds, staving off any inquiry about Junsu.
The landspeeder negotiates the distance to the Cerberus quicker than most, but the engines die just as abruptly, Jaejoong's face indiscernible behind dark bangs hanging over his face like a veil. Changmin is first to intercept him.
"No luck?" he asks, strangely hopeful despite it all. He half expects Jaejoong to put his arms around him as he so often does. 'Don't worry, he's supposed to say, 'everything will be alright, Min-ah.' What he gets instead is Jaejoong sidestepping him with ease, shouldering past Yunho and out of their reach.
Changmin looks nervously to their leader. Yunho glances after their lover's retreating shape for a short second before taking off after him.
"Jae! Hold up, what's the rush?" And then, just because there's rarely one around without the other, he adds: "Where's Yoochun?"
There's no response from the shorter man, Jaejoong's strides long and purposeful and Yunho has to jog to catch up with him. He grabs the corner of his sleeve, forcing the other to stop and talk to him, goddammit.
"Jaejoong, what happened? Where's Yoochun?"
The other man turns on him and Yunho expects reassurance, expects rage or sadness, but there is not a trace of it. What's there is far worse. Jaejoong's features are like porcelain, smooth and blank, eyes dark and cold as obsidian.
Something twists in Yunho's chest. No.
"They took him," comes the answer, tones clipped and short and full of more quiet rage than Yunho has ever seen in his lover. "Fucking let go of me."
Changmin blanches. "Took him?" he repeats, voice as hollow as his chest. "Who?" How, is what he wants to know, how can this be happening? First Junsu, now Yoochun and he's losing them one by one. Panic sits in his throat like a stone, dragging him down.
He's a soldier, he won't give in.
Yunho's arm tightens instead of releasing. "Who took Yoochun?" he grits out, and Changmin knows, can see the calculating stare. They've got the land covered. They just need to know if he's airborne or at sea.
Jaejoong wrenches free of his grasp, turning on his heel and continuing the way he'd been headed, speaking over his shoulder. "Airborne. Skiff. You fucking well tell me."
He goes straight to the gun cabinet, bringing the butt of his gun down hard on the rusted lock, snapping it in two. Wrenching open the doors, he starts taking down the plasma rifles.
Changmin watches disbelievingly. Yunho turns sharply on his heel, climbing through the gates of the Cerberus in three short strides.
"Yoochun's gone?" he repeats, swallowing thickly. Yoochun's gone and Junsu's gone and Jaejoong doesn't even look at him. He takes out guns he's never touched before and starts assembling them with the silent, methodical patience of a hitman. Cold sweat runs down Changmin's back at the sight. "Jaejoong..."
He doesn't have time to finish. All frequencies crackle with the same alert message from the Cerberus: "Unidentified spy craft trying to break atmo. All ships are ordered to pursue but not engage."
The words break over Jaejoong with all the patience of water against a rock, the snap of the gun cocking as he stands.
Changmin looks at him helplessly. Years of military training and he feels utterly helpless in the face of Jaejoong's silent, cold fury. Feels like he's never so much as met the other man. "Jaejoong," he tries again, reaching out a hand to lay on his elbow. "Did you see what happened? How could they..."
Dead eyes stare right through him. "They took Yoochun. They probably took Junsu." A plasma rifle leans against his shoulder. He looks deadly. "What more do you want me to say?"
His mouth opens but nothing comes out, and so he shuts it again, listening to the near audible clack of his teeth. He moves to take Jaejoong's face between his hands, to will the man he knows to come back from wherever this hollow, dark-eyed impostor has hidden him.
"We'll find them," he tries, voice cracked and not at all convincing.
Jaejoong just looks at him. "Grow up, Changmin."
Yunho calls their names loudly, fisting the side of the hatch in a strong grip. "We're going after them. Come on."
The Cerberus is revving its engines, broken down as it is but fierce and large like a predator. Most importantly, it's got fighters aboard. Changmin swallows his pride, his retort. "We can get them back," he adds to an incredulous Jaejoong.
There isn't any other option. They will get them back.
***
Yunho presses his lips between his teeth until he can taste blood, ignoring the glare shooting holes into his back. Jiexi straddles the space separating him from Jaejoong, at once giving him pause and a reprieve. He doesn't dwell on it. There are more important things at stake.
"We've got a clear signal," a crew member whose name he can't remember tells the room at large, barely looking up from his electronics. "Unmarked skiff, not answering hails."
"Keep in pursuit," the words come out of his mouth unbidden, echoed by Jiexi's voice. She shifts forward, pushing him aside as if to remind him who the Captain of this ship is, hands docked firmly on his hips. "Raise forward guns and hold for fire on command." She turns, eyes seeking Jaejoong. The younger man looks away.
"You can't shoot them out of the sky," Yunho hisses, low enough that only she should hear it. "Our people are on that ship." Amending the horror he feels with mock repentance, he bows his head. "If you take out their engines, they'll be blown to pieces on impact, Your Highness. We have to think of another way."
Her mouth twists in a grim, mocking smile. "If you have a suggestion, Captain, please, out with it. Our ship is operating at fifty percent--any tractor is sketchy at best. We wait till he breaks atmo and take out his starboard engine and we have a chance of boarding the little shit."
"Use the fighters. Use the other ships." He refrains from raising his voice, no matter how much he wants to. "If he breaks atmo, we risk losing them completely." He can't say what he means. The Cerberus is old and wounded. It can crawl reasonably well through the launch, but it will lose out in a race in open space.
She grabs him by the collar, pulling him close to hiss in his face. "This isn't the Guard. We don't have the resources on call to withdraw all sources. We have more people to think of than your bedfellows. A greater cause. Think of something else or shut up and let me run my ship."
He backs off, but not because she tells him to. A pale hand on his arm is the most Jaejoong has moved in the past minutes. Yunho was ready to label him catatonic.
"Leave her to it," he hears. "She knows best." That's defeatist behavior and he wants to punch the other man for it, hesitating only because he knows it's a pointless impulse. Jaejoong doesn't need a wakeup call.
The Cerberus pursues a small craft. Sensors reveal it to be a transport vessel, modified like the Cerberus is. Mercenary, no doubt, and carrying few lifesigns. Three, maybe four. Reports vary in the atmospheric interference. Two of them are Yunho's bedfellows, as Jiexi calls them so sneeringly. They're alone in the black and helpless. Yunho feels the ship shudder around him, alarm signs blaring the moment they're away from the gravitational pull.
She knows best. Right.
Rear cannons spew fire right into their engines, slowing them down even more. Jiexi gives out a cry of frustration. He tunes her out, tunes everything out.
They can flex their muscles all they want, there's no denying what the electronics show. And what they're showing is the smaller craft gaining speed, pursuit impossible for long before they've lost its trace.
Junsu is gone. Yoochun is gone.
Authors: butterflyweb and nemesis_cry
Rating: NC-17
Pairing: OT5
Warning(s): violence, graphic sex, language
Summary: It's been six months since Changmin crashed on the remote planet known as Elysia. Five months since Yunho and Junsu found him. Four months since Jaejoong was shot by a man he and Yoochun both trusted. Now training as the Empress' men, former soldiers and former rebels have shed past allegiances in service of a common goal. But the tide is turning--and not in their favor.
Banner credit: luvmeanddespair
A/N: Thank you for all your wonderful feedback for the first part. We hope you enjoy this one!
Prequel: Acts of Contrition;
Acts of Insurrection: One; Two; Three; Four; Five; Six; Seven; Eight
Chapter Nine
The world moves in slow motion.
Jaejoong hears his lover's call on the comsys and runs to it like a sailor to some pretty, murderous siren. Instead of finding his own death, however, he finds something much worse.
Small and curved like a bow, the front of a ship becomes gradually greater as it slips through the trees, moving towards him, moving away from him all at once. Out of sheer horror, he finds himself reducing speed, looking around as if he'll see Yoochun in pursuit of it. What he does see is the other man's abandoned hovercraft, his sidearm on the ground.
Cold, liquid fury steels him.
Yoochun is gone.
His lover's gone.
***
The rendezvous point is the Cerberus. Yunho is there first, organizing the search, trying to do everything himself under Jiexi's watchful eye. When Changmin arrives, he feels panic tighten in his belly.
"He's not been found?" he asks, cutting the engine and jumping by his Captain's side.
Yunho shakes his head. "Nothing yet, not a word." It's not exactly true, but it'll do. False alarms help no one and there's too many of those. "I ran out of fuel," he adds, sounding almost apologetic over the static pouring into his ear as he changes frequency from one search party to the next.
Changmin nods, glancing around helplessly. "Same."
There are perks in being Her Majesty's men. They live and breathe respect, even though it's wholly undeserved. And when something like this happens, they merely have to wait for the Empress to snap her fingers and they have a fleet at their disposal.
The odds are in their favor, but Changmin has a feeling. It's inexplicable, but it's growing, covering him in doubt and unease. It takes Yunho's hand on his shoulder to shake him.
"Jaejoong's coming in," the older man tells him, staring into his eyes. "He's not answering his comlink," he adds, staving off any inquiry about Junsu.
The landspeeder negotiates the distance to the Cerberus quicker than most, but the engines die just as abruptly, Jaejoong's face indiscernible behind dark bangs hanging over his face like a veil. Changmin is first to intercept him.
"No luck?" he asks, strangely hopeful despite it all. He half expects Jaejoong to put his arms around him as he so often does. 'Don't worry, he's supposed to say, 'everything will be alright, Min-ah.' What he gets instead is Jaejoong sidestepping him with ease, shouldering past Yunho and out of their reach.
Changmin looks nervously to their leader. Yunho glances after their lover's retreating shape for a short second before taking off after him.
"Jae! Hold up, what's the rush?" And then, just because there's rarely one around without the other, he adds: "Where's Yoochun?"
There's no response from the shorter man, Jaejoong's strides long and purposeful and Yunho has to jog to catch up with him. He grabs the corner of his sleeve, forcing the other to stop and talk to him, goddammit.
"Jaejoong, what happened? Where's Yoochun?"
The other man turns on him and Yunho expects reassurance, expects rage or sadness, but there is not a trace of it. What's there is far worse. Jaejoong's features are like porcelain, smooth and blank, eyes dark and cold as obsidian.
Something twists in Yunho's chest. No.
"They took him," comes the answer, tones clipped and short and full of more quiet rage than Yunho has ever seen in his lover. "Fucking let go of me."
Changmin blanches. "Took him?" he repeats, voice as hollow as his chest. "Who?" How, is what he wants to know, how can this be happening? First Junsu, now Yoochun and he's losing them one by one. Panic sits in his throat like a stone, dragging him down.
He's a soldier, he won't give in.
Yunho's arm tightens instead of releasing. "Who took Yoochun?" he grits out, and Changmin knows, can see the calculating stare. They've got the land covered. They just need to know if he's airborne or at sea.
Jaejoong wrenches free of his grasp, turning on his heel and continuing the way he'd been headed, speaking over his shoulder. "Airborne. Skiff. You fucking well tell me."
He goes straight to the gun cabinet, bringing the butt of his gun down hard on the rusted lock, snapping it in two. Wrenching open the doors, he starts taking down the plasma rifles.
Changmin watches disbelievingly. Yunho turns sharply on his heel, climbing through the gates of the Cerberus in three short strides.
"Yoochun's gone?" he repeats, swallowing thickly. Yoochun's gone and Junsu's gone and Jaejoong doesn't even look at him. He takes out guns he's never touched before and starts assembling them with the silent, methodical patience of a hitman. Cold sweat runs down Changmin's back at the sight. "Jaejoong..."
He doesn't have time to finish. All frequencies crackle with the same alert message from the Cerberus: "Unidentified spy craft trying to break atmo. All ships are ordered to pursue but not engage."
The words break over Jaejoong with all the patience of water against a rock, the snap of the gun cocking as he stands.
Changmin looks at him helplessly. Years of military training and he feels utterly helpless in the face of Jaejoong's silent, cold fury. Feels like he's never so much as met the other man. "Jaejoong," he tries again, reaching out a hand to lay on his elbow. "Did you see what happened? How could they..."
Dead eyes stare right through him. "They took Yoochun. They probably took Junsu." A plasma rifle leans against his shoulder. He looks deadly. "What more do you want me to say?"
His mouth opens but nothing comes out, and so he shuts it again, listening to the near audible clack of his teeth. He moves to take Jaejoong's face between his hands, to will the man he knows to come back from wherever this hollow, dark-eyed impostor has hidden him.
"We'll find them," he tries, voice cracked and not at all convincing.
Jaejoong just looks at him. "Grow up, Changmin."
Yunho calls their names loudly, fisting the side of the hatch in a strong grip. "We're going after them. Come on."
The Cerberus is revving its engines, broken down as it is but fierce and large like a predator. Most importantly, it's got fighters aboard. Changmin swallows his pride, his retort. "We can get them back," he adds to an incredulous Jaejoong.
There isn't any other option. They will get them back.
***
Yunho presses his lips between his teeth until he can taste blood, ignoring the glare shooting holes into his back. Jiexi straddles the space separating him from Jaejoong, at once giving him pause and a reprieve. He doesn't dwell on it. There are more important things at stake.
"We've got a clear signal," a crew member whose name he can't remember tells the room at large, barely looking up from his electronics. "Unmarked skiff, not answering hails."
"Keep in pursuit," the words come out of his mouth unbidden, echoed by Jiexi's voice. She shifts forward, pushing him aside as if to remind him who the Captain of this ship is, hands docked firmly on his hips. "Raise forward guns and hold for fire on command." She turns, eyes seeking Jaejoong. The younger man looks away.
"You can't shoot them out of the sky," Yunho hisses, low enough that only she should hear it. "Our people are on that ship." Amending the horror he feels with mock repentance, he bows his head. "If you take out their engines, they'll be blown to pieces on impact, Your Highness. We have to think of another way."
Her mouth twists in a grim, mocking smile. "If you have a suggestion, Captain, please, out with it. Our ship is operating at fifty percent--any tractor is sketchy at best. We wait till he breaks atmo and take out his starboard engine and we have a chance of boarding the little shit."
"Use the fighters. Use the other ships." He refrains from raising his voice, no matter how much he wants to. "If he breaks atmo, we risk losing them completely." He can't say what he means. The Cerberus is old and wounded. It can crawl reasonably well through the launch, but it will lose out in a race in open space.
She grabs him by the collar, pulling him close to hiss in his face. "This isn't the Guard. We don't have the resources on call to withdraw all sources. We have more people to think of than your bedfellows. A greater cause. Think of something else or shut up and let me run my ship."
He backs off, but not because she tells him to. A pale hand on his arm is the most Jaejoong has moved in the past minutes. Yunho was ready to label him catatonic.
"Leave her to it," he hears. "She knows best." That's defeatist behavior and he wants to punch the other man for it, hesitating only because he knows it's a pointless impulse. Jaejoong doesn't need a wakeup call.
The Cerberus pursues a small craft. Sensors reveal it to be a transport vessel, modified like the Cerberus is. Mercenary, no doubt, and carrying few lifesigns. Three, maybe four. Reports vary in the atmospheric interference. Two of them are Yunho's bedfellows, as Jiexi calls them so sneeringly. They're alone in the black and helpless. Yunho feels the ship shudder around him, alarm signs blaring the moment they're away from the gravitational pull.
She knows best. Right.
Rear cannons spew fire right into their engines, slowing them down even more. Jiexi gives out a cry of frustration. He tunes her out, tunes everything out.
They can flex their muscles all they want, there's no denying what the electronics show. And what they're showing is the smaller craft gaining speed, pursuit impossible for long before they've lost its trace.
Junsu is gone. Yoochun is gone.