Hotline.1
Title: Hotline
Pairing: Junhyung/OC
POV: Eunseo (OC), possible occasional Junhyung
Genre: Romance, Friendship, Action
Rating: PG-15, for strong language, sexual references, and crude humor.
Summary: Separated by a sea, joined by a phone call. Sometimes, friendship can be found in the strangest of places.
A/N: Hello; this is my first fic on livejournal, I've written a few on my own before, but I don't typically share my fics, so this would be one of my first. The inspiration for this fic grew from an innocent "Boy falls in love with phone operator", into this. Enjoy.
- - - - -
“Welcome to Hotlines Enterprise. What do we do, you ask?
Well, we talk to people.
What kinds of people? Troubled people. People who need some advice, who need some help. People who want some help.
We’re here to help them find their way back.
But once you pledge into our Hotline world,
There’s no backing out.”
- -
“How was the briefing with the newbies?” Hana yawned, thumping herself in her office chair.
“Eh, nothing much. Just scaring the shit outta ‘em, as per usual.” I groaned, hooking on my earpiece.
“Better than babying them, this place is no funhouse.” She laughed, before picking up a call. “Hello, this is the Suicide Hotline. My name is Hana, and I’m here to help you. What can I do for you today?”
“Ready?” Chris asked, about to open my line.
“As I’ll ever be. Bring it on, fuckers.” I pointed a handgun at my intercom, and waited patiently for my first transfer.
Hello.
My name is Eunseo. Pretty, huh? Jang Eunseo.
What am I? A teleprompter? Tch.
I’m a therapist.
You can reach me by calling the suicide hotline and having a story serious enough to scare the intestines out of my workers, or you could speak Korean, since I’m the only person in my team who speaks it fluently. Either reason should work out well for you.
Let me get things straight.
I’m the best of the best.
I work at Hotlines Enterprise, the largest hotline networking center on the globe. People would think that people like me get paid minimum wage and have an IQ of negative sixty nine. Wrong.
Here, every one of our workers can speak at least ten languages fluently, and get paid at least sixty grand a year. How’s that for minimum wage?
We’re split into teams. There’s a department for every problem. We have a family department, a love department, a school department, even a diet department. We even have an entire department for the suckers to transfer calls to the right department, aka the dungeon of boredom. It’s pretty much the worst of the worst.
We have a strict social triangle of hierarchy here, and it’s based on what department you’re in. Each department only has two positions, the head, and the others. At the bottom, we have the dungeon of boredom (more formally regarded as the “Transfer Center”, but no one really gives a shit). At the top, we have the suicide department (where my team dwells), and in the middle you have everyone else. Of course there’s a higher power that controls all of us, kind of like what outsiders call a “president”, but it’s a bit different in its own way. He’s kind of like a father; a god. We refer to him as “Chief”. No one’s ever seen him in real life, though.
Despite our obvious segregation, we’re all called one thing: pioneers. Why? Because in the lives of our clients, we’re the first to give them real help. We’re just that good.
Everyone here starts at the bottom, but we’re all pioneers here. We don’t pull strings, You can only climb your way up this bloodstained hierarchy one way: doin’ a helluva good job.
You don’t do well in your department? We put you in a new one. You don’t do well there? You’re sent to the dungeon.
No matter how shitty of a worker you are, the second you pledge into our world, there’s no way out. You live in our headquarters, you eat at our cafeteria (which is rated seven stars, just by the way), you attend our schools, live on our land, drink our coffee, and breathe our air.
My suicide hotline team and I are at the top of the pyramid. Why? Simple.
‘Cause we save lives.
I’m the head of the suicide department, putting me at the top. The only person higher than me is Chief.
We’re isolated onto our own island, Teleia, somewhere in the so called “Sea of Japan”. You can come here by choice (god knows how you found us), or you can be like the heat of us, born into our world.
It sounds terrible, but it really isn’t.
You’re given great food, a place to sleep, and a well paying job. The only difference is that you’re living on one island (which is quite large, may I add) for the rest of your life.
Me? I love this place. I love my job. It seems crazy, since most people would hate having to talk to depressed people all day, but I love it.
Did I mention that I’m also hella good at it?
- -
“Transferring a stabber, Eunseo.” Hana chimed lightly, before punching in a few buttons on her intercom and accepting a new call. “Hello, my name is Hana…”
I calmly rolled my head back cyclically, my muscles relaxing at the cracking of my bones. I accepted the transfer and adjusted my earpiece, waiting to hear the light buzzing of conversation.
“Hey, the name’s Eunseo. You’re calling cause you want help, right? Well that’s what you’ll get. What can I do for ya?” I smiled in my speech, accepting a new chat window on our online rooms. I proceeded to consult with the person online while waiting for the person on the line to respond; multitasking has never been a problem for me.
“Hi.” a timid voice squeaked out of the receiver, and I leaned onto my palm for support. “I…need some help." She proceeded to drone on the usual, things revolving a crappy family life and her break up being her breaking point. I nodded to myself understandably, finishing off my online conversation with a smile.
“Things would be better if I just stabbed myself.” she said weakly, and I sighed.
“Would they?” I asked casually, taking a slight sip of my coffee.
“W-what?”
“Would things be better if you killed yourself?”
“Y-yes.”
“Why?”
“B-because nobod-dy cares about me.”
“No one will care for someone who doesn’t care for themselves. Tell me, Kate. Do you feel that you have a purpose in life?”
“…what?”
“What’s your role in this world?”
“…I have none.”
“Well,” I chuckled, and I heard Hana scoff a bit. I smirked in her direction, and she shot me a pair of rolled eyes. "I think you've got yourself a problem, then."
“Um..”
“Should you kill yourself? What is your reason for killing yourself?”
“I already said, don’t belong here… ” Her voice was slowly becoming tainted with frustration as a slight curve began to form onto my lips. "Are you not..listening? Who are you?"
“A therapist.” I sighed, chuckling lightly. “Your therapist. But will killing yourself do anything? Why don’t you just go make yourself belong here instead?”
“…”
I finished off the online chat, and logged myself off as silent buzzing played through the receiver. "Um, hello?" It was rare for me to instigate the conversation in any way, but the girl wasn't responding, and I sure as hell couldn't count the number of people on hold with my fingers alone.
“You're..." she began warily, her voice
“A bitch?” I finished.
“N-no, just..."
I smiled. "I think this conversation is over, Kate."
A light laugh escaped my lips at the sound of the line cutting off as I picked a dart and swiveled my chair around to face the bulletin.
“And Eunseo scores again, with her methods that seem to strike gold for Eunseo, and Eunseo only.” Chris groaned, standing up from his chair to watch me shoot the dart.
“You know it.” I narrowed my right eye, before releasing the needle with a quick, speedy gesture. It landed comfortably on the cork, joining the flock.
“How many of darts have you shot by now? You started when you became head, right?” Genevieve hung up her call, resting her chin on her palm and shaking her head.
“Thousands, I keep buying more. It’s a waste of money to track my achievements like this.” I sighed, revolving myself to face them.
“Not like we anything to waste our money on.” Hana mumbled, and hypothetically scoffed before accepting a new chat window.
Hana’s a dreamer.
Always talking about wanting to see the outside, when outside was just outside the door. I always respond with that; 'Hana, outside is right there.' But she always would then correct me on how she meant the outside world, not just outside, but either way, I don’t really care. I don’t see the point in knowing what’s outside of our cubicles when we’re living a luxurious, comfortable life in Teleia. My family has stayed here for four generations, and I have no intentions of sacrificing my family's legacy for idiocy.
I finished off another day at the office, had dinner with Hana, and retreated into my headquarters.
I opened my notebook quickly mixed a new tune out of pure boredom. At the office, we didn’t really get to customize much with our calls and such, but we did get to set up our own dial tone, which is just what I did. I was mixing a new tone, rocking my head to the beat with my eyes closed, allowing the music to absorb me.
Yeah, this’ll do.
I quickly saved it into my life drive. In Teleia, our life drives were exactly what they were called; our lifeline. We save everything in them, personal information, files, money (that mind you, was taken globally), even memories. Had we the ability to store time in them, we would in a heartbeat.
I yawned, getting ready for my three hour nighttime nap before the twilight shift. Since we're a global company, we work for six hours, sleep for three, and so on. We're split into groups so that there's always someone working during every second of the day. Every person works three shifts a day: the morning, evening, and the twilight shift. For most people, twilight's the worst and most exhausting shift, but I, being the wacky ass oddball I am, love it.
The feeling of the eerie, scarlet sunrise pouring onto your skin as you listen to people who want to kill themselves; breathtakingly priceless.
- - - - -
oof.
I haven't decided how long this fic should be yet, but I know it's going to be chaptered, so for now I'll leave it at I/TBA.