Midnight and Dawn (8/13)
Title: Midnight and Dawn
Authors: e and hopeandmemory
Rating: NC-17 (for sex and violence)
Overall Word Count: 36283
Warnings: Whatever you'd reasonably expect to see on western television in a crime drama will be found in this fic. If you are easily triggered by material referenced (but rarely explicitly shown) in these kinds of programs, you might want to tread carefully.
Summary: In 2006, Kim Heechul put Kim Youngwoon behind bars. He became a legend almost immediately--the guy who watched Star King instead of doing work, drank more than his fair share of the shitty office coffee, and managed to drive off every partner he'd ever been assigned. And then in 2009, Kim Jungmo joins the force, a new case leaves Special Ops Department 1315 grasping helplessly at straws, and everything changes. Heechul/Jungmo
VIII.
The couple they’ve displaced from the mansion next to Youngwoon’s compound was safely settled in police-sponsored housing on Sunday evening, so Jungmo and Siwon return after dark on Monday to set up their base camp. They’ve been given copies of the front and back door keys, as well as the key to open the padlock on the outside entrance to the cellar, where they’d agreed it would be best to store all of the equipment they’d be unloading in the next few days.
“Turn off your lights,” Jungmo hisses as they near the house, gesturing frantically at the console of Siwon’s car. “They’re going to realize we’re in the house at some point, but I don’t want it to be before we even get into the driveway.”
“I’ve done stealth missions before,” Siwon retorts, but he obliges. Jungmo feels the knot in his stomach tighten.
“Sorry. I’m tense.”
“We all are. You can’t let it get to you, though.”
Jungmo fidgets in his seat and thinks of ribbons and pink nail polish. Easier said than done.
But Siwon’s right. They can’t rush this. They unload the computers first, trudging down dark stairs into the well-lit damp of the cellar. It’s unfinished, but the couple had kindly laid a few carpets and provided them with some folding tables and chairs before leaving.
“We should leave set-up to Kyuhyun, really.” The boxes were labelled with sharp rebukes in permanent marker: I will not work if you turn me upside down! I cost more money than you can imagine! My LED screens are delicate. DELICATE. Jungmo nods.
“Seriously, you need to relax. This case won’t close in a matter of days--it took years the first time around. ‘Anxiety in a man's heart weighs him down, but a good word makes him glad.’ Proverbs, chapter twelve, verse twenty-five.” It almost sounds like a joke when Siwon says it, so Jungmo attempts a smile.
“You have a quote for everything, don’t you?”
Siwon sighs. “You have to have something. Otherwise every day just gets to be too hard. For me, it’s faith. For Hyukjae, it’s the promise he made to Donghae. For Donghae, it’s revenge. We all have something.”
“And it makes you happy?”
“It does. ‘I love the LORD, because he hath heard my voice and my supplications. Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live.’ Psalm one hundred and sixteen, verses one and two.”
Jungmo thinks the quote fits Siwon perfectly. “It suits you.”
“Faith?”
“Love.”
--
It’s well after three in the morning when Siwon and Jungmo pull away from their new base. Siwon drops Jungmo off at his house with a wave and a sleepy smile, and it feels like he’s only slept for ten minutes by the time his cell phone alarm wakes him at eight. He walks into 1315 half an hour later with bleary eyes, messy hair, and a slightly wrinkled shirt to find Heechul already sitting at his desk, flipping through a binder full of reports and nursing half a cup of coffee.
Jungmo grabs Heechul’s mug and refills it wordlessly.
“Did you go home?” Sungmin asks them both when he walks in at nine, clothes unnaturally neat.
“For a bit?”
Heechul grimaces. “No. No point. Too much work to do.”
“I took a look at some of your analyses.”
“I saw.”
“You’re not hopeful, are you?”
Heechul sighs. “We’re racing against time. Youngwoon’s best bet is to escape Korea--he’s honestly not important enough to chase around the world, and we’d never catch him if he went into hiding anyway. We’re barely keeping up with him as it is.”
“But you didn’t like the raids we planned.”
“I told you--you’re thinking too simply. We won’t outnumber him. We need to get into his head. Wiretapping, hacking--all of that is a must. We’re working off of too little information.”
Sungmin sinks into his chair. “That’ll take weeks.”
“I know,” and Heechul’s voice is raw. “And every second we lose is dangerous.”
Jungmo bites his lip. Why don’t we just let him go? Leave? Never bother you again? He can’t bring himself to ask. Instead he clears his throat. “We set up some of the materials over at Alpha Camp yesterday, and Kyuhyun said he’d be by this evening to help assemble the monitors.”
“Right.” Heechul grabs a pen and scribbles a few notes at the bottom of one of the pages.
“In the meantime, Heechul, Jongwoon wanted to go over smokescreens with you. He had a few breakthroughs last night.”
“I hope he’s worked out the timing. I am so fucking sick of dealing with his inability to realize that a smokescreen is not cover if everyone sees it going the fuck off.”
Sungmin smiles tightly. “He’s downstairs with Amber.”
“And Donghae?”
“There too. He’s running a check on equipment with her.”
“I still have to run through his location list. Fuck. Thanks for the message, though.”
Sungmin waves him off, and Heechul disappears after flinging a few folders into his rucksack.
“You holding up, Jungmo?”
Jungmo frowns and thinks of the bags under Heechul’s eyes. I have nothing to complain about, really.
--
Jungmo rides over to Alpha Camp after work on Tuesday with Kyuhyun. They spend two hours outside in the freezing cold, Kyuhyun clinging to a power pole while he fits the wiretap onto the phone line leading to Youngwoon’s estate, Jungmo standing guard with his rifle over his shoulder. When Kyuhyun begins to climb down, Jungmo feels the tightness in his chest abate somewhat, but he doesn’t let his guard down until they’re safely in the basement.
“I see you read my notes,” Kyuhyun drawls, inspecting the contents of his boxes.
“Pretty hard to miss, really.”
Kyuhyun narrows his eyes. “Go plug this extension cord in, I need to get this network set up as quickly as possible.”
“Not like I want you to stop working or anything, but what’s your rush? You never seem nearly this interested when we have other jobs for you.”
“Like debugging all of the computers Heechul has touched? More like, that shit takes place during the day,” Kyuhyun says, looking away from the tangle of wires in his hands. “Look. I’m all for getting this guy back in prison and all, but all of this nighttime secret mission crap is really cutting into my Starcraft time.”
“Wow, that sounds really important.” Jungmo continues plugging monitors into CPUs, shaking his head. “Really glad I stood guard over you there. You might have even missed a tournament.”
“Whatever stick is lodged in your ass right now, you’d better up and remove it before I do you the favor. I’m not actually part of your department, you know.”
“Yeah well this is everyone’s problem right now.”
“No, actually,” and Kyuhyun stands up, wiping his hands on his trousers. “You’re sort of missing a key point. You and all of those fuckers in 1315 have your panties in a twist because Youngwoon broke out of prison. But he’s not doing anyone else any harm--he’s sitting in his fucking mansion doing nothing. You lot just have some kind of post-traumatic stress disorder about the entire thing and need him behind bars again, which is great and all, but is not actually my job. So forgive me for not giving the tiniest shit.”
Jungmo clenches his fists. He’s right, sort of. Jungmo wants Youngwoon behind bars so that Heechul, his Heechul, will go back to watching Strong Heart and Inkigayo and take him on a second date. Curl up against him in bed, give him another blowjob, fuck him. He wants to erase the image of pink nails and fluffy hair and ribbons and frills.
And yet. He remembers the curve of Heehee’s collarbone, the delicacy of her wrists, and the knowledge that her cock was pinned carefully between her legs, and swallows. Fuck, he thinks helplessly.
Kyuhyun rolls his eyes. “Now hand me those ethernet cables, I need to get the wireless up and working.”
--
By Wednesday, Heechul looks like a wreck. While he’s wearing a fresh pair of red skinny jeans and a black pullover, Jungmo suspects that he went home late only to change and shower. Without a word, Jungmo snags the mug off of Heechul’s desk and makes him a fresh cup.
They’re the only ones in the office--Hyukjae has taken to spending his mornings with Geng up in The Basement, fielding inquiries, taking calls, and promising results. Sungmin, Jongwoon, Donghae, and Siwon have yet to make an appearance. Jungmo slides a hand down Heechul’s neck. Heechul flinches violently.
“You okay?”
“Stop,” Heechul gasps. “I can’t--don’t touch me.”
Jungmo frowns. “You can’t--It’s just me, Heechul. It’s been over a week. I really miss you.” He can’t help but let desperation seep into his voice--the mere memory of Heechul’s mouth on his has been enough to get him half-hard in the morning.
“Not today. I really need to focus. We’re planning fly-overs, and I need to coordinate them with regular commercial airplane routes.”
Jungmo remembers Sungmin’s advice. Solve the case. Everything will work itself out if you work as hard as you can--it’ll all be over once Youngwoon is gone. “You think Youngwoon will notice a few extra planes in the sky? Aren’t you overestimating him?”
Heechul fixes him with a glare that’s unnerving in its insistence. “Youngwoon is more dangerous than you think. He knows everything. He’s not some fucking stupid civilian--he has trained personnel whose lives are concerned with ensuring that Youngwoon is totally, one hundred and ten percent secure.”
“But you can’t work when you clearly haven’t been sleeping.”
Heechul sniffs. “Don’t compare me to mere mortals like yourself. I’m not the most highly paid agent in this office for nothing, you know.”
Jungmo has to admit--Heechul is a force to be reckoned with when he’s serious. He holds miniature briefing sessions every few hours, sitting on his desk and throwing wads of paper at anyone devoting him less than their full attention. Geng types up some of his notes and distributes them periodically.
“Han Geng,” Heechul spits after the third time. “None of us read Chinese. I really don’t understand why you bother.”
“You realize this is actually Korean, right,” Changmin says, walking in and grabbing a flyer. “I never understood this particular office meme. But! I am here to inform you that I am quitting.”
“That’s really fascinating and all but if you keep interrupting my briefing I will hurt you.” Heechul clears his throat. “I’ve gone over Alpha Camp’s set-up--I’ll be there tonight, by the way, so if you need shit installed, clear it with me first--and we’re still lacking basic equipment. I’ll need a few of you stationed semi-permanently in the house so there’s not as much movement, and we really should be simulating daily activity there anyway. Youngwoon’s people think there’s still a couple living there.”
“I am an intern. I do not get paid. And somehow I am working two jobs.”
“Take it up with Sooyoung,” Hyukjae says tiredly. “I’m already cringing about the damage this mission is doing to my Preservation Of The Budget.”
“But she’s busy and--”
“So are we.” Heechul whirls around, furious. “So go whine to someone else.”
“JYJ have offered me a salary.”
Heechul ignores him. “Who is on patrol tonight?”
Siwon raises his hand. “I’m with Donghae. Tonight’s probably the last night we’ll have to move material in--as of Friday night, we’ll start taking semi-permanent shifts.”
“We really just need a skeleton staff there. Alpha Base is fully wired, right?”
“Yeah,” Jungmo says. “Kyuhyun and I finished that last night, and I confirmed it this morning.”
“Good. So we’ll start phasing people in Friday night. In the meantime, you all have gotten proposals back from me. They’re not good enough. Do them again.” He pauses. “Did I mention equipment yet? And schedules?”
Jungmo stares. Like. Three seconds ago, Heechul.
“You should sleep, Heechul,” Sungmin offers. “We’re good here. Take a nap in the break room. We’ll wake you if we need you.”
“I’m fine,” Heechul snaps. “Worry about yourselves.”
--
When the Lieutenant sees Jungmo slumped over his desk at 3 p.m. on Wednesday, papers scattered over his keyboard and a collection of paper coffee cups in disarray beside a stack of folders, he hands him a bottle of ibuprofen and tells him to call it a day.
“You’re not getting anything done,” Lieutenant Lee says, and Jungmo knows it’s true. He’s pored over printouts of data transfers and read through coded e-mails for hours, but hasn’t progressed much in breaking the code Youngwoon’s agents are using. “Look. Get some sleep. You’re staying at Alpha tomorrow through Friday evening, and I need you to be sharp. We can’t do anything if you’re not in good enough shape to give us intel.”
Jungmo slides a hand down his face and pushes his chair back from his desk, popping the pills in his mouth and downing them with a swig of cold coffee. “I’m sorry, Lieutenant.”
“You won’t crack all of this in a day,” the Lieutenant says kindly, clapping Jungmo on his shoulder. “Go. Sleep on it.”
Jungmo nods, standing up and cracking his back before grabbing his jacket from the back of his chair. Heechul is still bent over files, shifting documents around in a binder and furiously scribbling notes in the margins. “Thanks,” he says quietly, almost guiltily. “I’ll report straight to Alpha in the morning, then.”
--
After stumbling through the doorway and kicking off his shoes, Jungmo collapses into bed fully clothed. He hadn’t realized how exhausted he’d been--he’d been seeing through tunnel vision all day; between the overwhelming amount of work on his shoulders and how worried he was about Heechul, it became all too easy to forget his own physical and mental limits. The guilt and hurt settling in the pit of his stomach didn’t help; he missed Heechul.
He feels slightly sick for wanting him--for knowing how much this mission means to Heechul and still wanting to hold Heechul’s arms over his head again, to leave a line of purple bruises blooming along his collarbone, to hear his name on Heechul’s lips when Jungmo fucks him, agonizingly slow and then fast, fast, faster, until they’re both spent and sticky with come and sweat, falling asleep in a tangle of sheets and limbs. But he also wants to wake up to Heechul bitching about his television programs and Sunday morning reruns and begging for coffee.
Despite not remembering having dozed off, Jungmo wakes up sometime in the middle of the night to the sound of his phone bleeping. He frantically searches for it in his pockets, hoping it isn’t an emergency call.
It isn’t. He grins at the flashing name above the message alert. Kim Heechul.
Warmth floods the pit of his stomach. He was just tired before, Jungmo thinks giddily, keying in his pass-code and opening the text.
[11:02 PM] Kim Heechul
Come over tomorrow night. I want to see you.
Jungmo bites his lip.
[11:04 PM] Kim Jungmo
I have stakeout duty. Don’t you remember?
[11:05 PM] Kim Heechul
This isn’t him. I wouldn’t know.
Jungmo almost drops his phone. Of course it’s her, he thinks angrily. Heechul hasn’t had the time of day for me since--
“Listen. In case you--don’t tell her anything. Not about the case, not about Youngwoon, not about your job. She doesn’t know as much as she says she does, and you can’t trust her.”
[11:17 PM] Kim Heechul
Friday night? You can’t possibly be working then.
She doesn’t know. Relief floods through him. She’ll think I’m just doing some ordinary surveillance work, if she even knows what Heechul and I do.
[11:20 PM] Kim Jungmo
Friday night sounds great.
Jungmo turns over and finds that he’s thinking of meeting Heehee, of kissing her and slipping a hand under her dress and tugging at her cock and seeing if she makes the same breathy noises that Heechul does.
His right hand slides under his duvet and sheets and teases at the elastic band of his underwear. He’s completely hard.
→ IX
Authors: e and hopeandmemory
Rating: NC-17 (for sex and violence)
Overall Word Count: 36283
Warnings: Whatever you'd reasonably expect to see on western television in a crime drama will be found in this fic. If you are easily triggered by material referenced (but rarely explicitly shown) in these kinds of programs, you might want to tread carefully.
Summary: In 2006, Kim Heechul put Kim Youngwoon behind bars. He became a legend almost immediately--the guy who watched Star King instead of doing work, drank more than his fair share of the shitty office coffee, and managed to drive off every partner he'd ever been assigned. And then in 2009, Kim Jungmo joins the force, a new case leaves Special Ops Department 1315 grasping helplessly at straws, and everything changes. Heechul/Jungmo
VIII.
The couple they’ve displaced from the mansion next to Youngwoon’s compound was safely settled in police-sponsored housing on Sunday evening, so Jungmo and Siwon return after dark on Monday to set up their base camp. They’ve been given copies of the front and back door keys, as well as the key to open the padlock on the outside entrance to the cellar, where they’d agreed it would be best to store all of the equipment they’d be unloading in the next few days.
“Turn off your lights,” Jungmo hisses as they near the house, gesturing frantically at the console of Siwon’s car. “They’re going to realize we’re in the house at some point, but I don’t want it to be before we even get into the driveway.”
“I’ve done stealth missions before,” Siwon retorts, but he obliges. Jungmo feels the knot in his stomach tighten.
“Sorry. I’m tense.”
“We all are. You can’t let it get to you, though.”
Jungmo fidgets in his seat and thinks of ribbons and pink nail polish. Easier said than done.
But Siwon’s right. They can’t rush this. They unload the computers first, trudging down dark stairs into the well-lit damp of the cellar. It’s unfinished, but the couple had kindly laid a few carpets and provided them with some folding tables and chairs before leaving.
“We should leave set-up to Kyuhyun, really.” The boxes were labelled with sharp rebukes in permanent marker: I will not work if you turn me upside down! I cost more money than you can imagine! My LED screens are delicate. DELICATE. Jungmo nods.
“Seriously, you need to relax. This case won’t close in a matter of days--it took years the first time around. ‘Anxiety in a man's heart weighs him down, but a good word makes him glad.’ Proverbs, chapter twelve, verse twenty-five.” It almost sounds like a joke when Siwon says it, so Jungmo attempts a smile.
“You have a quote for everything, don’t you?”
Siwon sighs. “You have to have something. Otherwise every day just gets to be too hard. For me, it’s faith. For Hyukjae, it’s the promise he made to Donghae. For Donghae, it’s revenge. We all have something.”
“And it makes you happy?”
“It does. ‘I love the LORD, because he hath heard my voice and my supplications. Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live.’ Psalm one hundred and sixteen, verses one and two.”
Jungmo thinks the quote fits Siwon perfectly. “It suits you.”
“Faith?”
“Love.”
--
It’s well after three in the morning when Siwon and Jungmo pull away from their new base. Siwon drops Jungmo off at his house with a wave and a sleepy smile, and it feels like he’s only slept for ten minutes by the time his cell phone alarm wakes him at eight. He walks into 1315 half an hour later with bleary eyes, messy hair, and a slightly wrinkled shirt to find Heechul already sitting at his desk, flipping through a binder full of reports and nursing half a cup of coffee.
Jungmo grabs Heechul’s mug and refills it wordlessly.
“Did you go home?” Sungmin asks them both when he walks in at nine, clothes unnaturally neat.
“For a bit?”
Heechul grimaces. “No. No point. Too much work to do.”
“I took a look at some of your analyses.”
“I saw.”
“You’re not hopeful, are you?”
Heechul sighs. “We’re racing against time. Youngwoon’s best bet is to escape Korea--he’s honestly not important enough to chase around the world, and we’d never catch him if he went into hiding anyway. We’re barely keeping up with him as it is.”
“But you didn’t like the raids we planned.”
“I told you--you’re thinking too simply. We won’t outnumber him. We need to get into his head. Wiretapping, hacking--all of that is a must. We’re working off of too little information.”
Sungmin sinks into his chair. “That’ll take weeks.”
“I know,” and Heechul’s voice is raw. “And every second we lose is dangerous.”
Jungmo bites his lip. Why don’t we just let him go? Leave? Never bother you again? He can’t bring himself to ask. Instead he clears his throat. “We set up some of the materials over at Alpha Camp yesterday, and Kyuhyun said he’d be by this evening to help assemble the monitors.”
“Right.” Heechul grabs a pen and scribbles a few notes at the bottom of one of the pages.
“In the meantime, Heechul, Jongwoon wanted to go over smokescreens with you. He had a few breakthroughs last night.”
“I hope he’s worked out the timing. I am so fucking sick of dealing with his inability to realize that a smokescreen is not cover if everyone sees it going the fuck off.”
Sungmin smiles tightly. “He’s downstairs with Amber.”
“And Donghae?”
“There too. He’s running a check on equipment with her.”
“I still have to run through his location list. Fuck. Thanks for the message, though.”
Sungmin waves him off, and Heechul disappears after flinging a few folders into his rucksack.
“You holding up, Jungmo?”
Jungmo frowns and thinks of the bags under Heechul’s eyes. I have nothing to complain about, really.
--
Jungmo rides over to Alpha Camp after work on Tuesday with Kyuhyun. They spend two hours outside in the freezing cold, Kyuhyun clinging to a power pole while he fits the wiretap onto the phone line leading to Youngwoon’s estate, Jungmo standing guard with his rifle over his shoulder. When Kyuhyun begins to climb down, Jungmo feels the tightness in his chest abate somewhat, but he doesn’t let his guard down until they’re safely in the basement.
“I see you read my notes,” Kyuhyun drawls, inspecting the contents of his boxes.
“Pretty hard to miss, really.”
Kyuhyun narrows his eyes. “Go plug this extension cord in, I need to get this network set up as quickly as possible.”
“Not like I want you to stop working or anything, but what’s your rush? You never seem nearly this interested when we have other jobs for you.”
“Like debugging all of the computers Heechul has touched? More like, that shit takes place during the day,” Kyuhyun says, looking away from the tangle of wires in his hands. “Look. I’m all for getting this guy back in prison and all, but all of this nighttime secret mission crap is really cutting into my Starcraft time.”
“Wow, that sounds really important.” Jungmo continues plugging monitors into CPUs, shaking his head. “Really glad I stood guard over you there. You might have even missed a tournament.”
“Whatever stick is lodged in your ass right now, you’d better up and remove it before I do you the favor. I’m not actually part of your department, you know.”
“Yeah well this is everyone’s problem right now.”
“No, actually,” and Kyuhyun stands up, wiping his hands on his trousers. “You’re sort of missing a key point. You and all of those fuckers in 1315 have your panties in a twist because Youngwoon broke out of prison. But he’s not doing anyone else any harm--he’s sitting in his fucking mansion doing nothing. You lot just have some kind of post-traumatic stress disorder about the entire thing and need him behind bars again, which is great and all, but is not actually my job. So forgive me for not giving the tiniest shit.”
Jungmo clenches his fists. He’s right, sort of. Jungmo wants Youngwoon behind bars so that Heechul, his Heechul, will go back to watching Strong Heart and Inkigayo and take him on a second date. Curl up against him in bed, give him another blowjob, fuck him. He wants to erase the image of pink nails and fluffy hair and ribbons and frills.
And yet. He remembers the curve of Heehee’s collarbone, the delicacy of her wrists, and the knowledge that her cock was pinned carefully between her legs, and swallows. Fuck, he thinks helplessly.
Kyuhyun rolls his eyes. “Now hand me those ethernet cables, I need to get the wireless up and working.”
--
By Wednesday, Heechul looks like a wreck. While he’s wearing a fresh pair of red skinny jeans and a black pullover, Jungmo suspects that he went home late only to change and shower. Without a word, Jungmo snags the mug off of Heechul’s desk and makes him a fresh cup.
They’re the only ones in the office--Hyukjae has taken to spending his mornings with Geng up in The Basement, fielding inquiries, taking calls, and promising results. Sungmin, Jongwoon, Donghae, and Siwon have yet to make an appearance. Jungmo slides a hand down Heechul’s neck. Heechul flinches violently.
“You okay?”
“Stop,” Heechul gasps. “I can’t--don’t touch me.”
Jungmo frowns. “You can’t--It’s just me, Heechul. It’s been over a week. I really miss you.” He can’t help but let desperation seep into his voice--the mere memory of Heechul’s mouth on his has been enough to get him half-hard in the morning.
“Not today. I really need to focus. We’re planning fly-overs, and I need to coordinate them with regular commercial airplane routes.”
Jungmo remembers Sungmin’s advice. Solve the case. Everything will work itself out if you work as hard as you can--it’ll all be over once Youngwoon is gone. “You think Youngwoon will notice a few extra planes in the sky? Aren’t you overestimating him?”
Heechul fixes him with a glare that’s unnerving in its insistence. “Youngwoon is more dangerous than you think. He knows everything. He’s not some fucking stupid civilian--he has trained personnel whose lives are concerned with ensuring that Youngwoon is totally, one hundred and ten percent secure.”
“But you can’t work when you clearly haven’t been sleeping.”
Heechul sniffs. “Don’t compare me to mere mortals like yourself. I’m not the most highly paid agent in this office for nothing, you know.”
Jungmo has to admit--Heechul is a force to be reckoned with when he’s serious. He holds miniature briefing sessions every few hours, sitting on his desk and throwing wads of paper at anyone devoting him less than their full attention. Geng types up some of his notes and distributes them periodically.
“Han Geng,” Heechul spits after the third time. “None of us read Chinese. I really don’t understand why you bother.”
“You realize this is actually Korean, right,” Changmin says, walking in and grabbing a flyer. “I never understood this particular office meme. But! I am here to inform you that I am quitting.”
“That’s really fascinating and all but if you keep interrupting my briefing I will hurt you.” Heechul clears his throat. “I’ve gone over Alpha Camp’s set-up--I’ll be there tonight, by the way, so if you need shit installed, clear it with me first--and we’re still lacking basic equipment. I’ll need a few of you stationed semi-permanently in the house so there’s not as much movement, and we really should be simulating daily activity there anyway. Youngwoon’s people think there’s still a couple living there.”
“I am an intern. I do not get paid. And somehow I am working two jobs.”
“Take it up with Sooyoung,” Hyukjae says tiredly. “I’m already cringing about the damage this mission is doing to my Preservation Of The Budget.”
“But she’s busy and--”
“So are we.” Heechul whirls around, furious. “So go whine to someone else.”
“JYJ have offered me a salary.”
Heechul ignores him. “Who is on patrol tonight?”
Siwon raises his hand. “I’m with Donghae. Tonight’s probably the last night we’ll have to move material in--as of Friday night, we’ll start taking semi-permanent shifts.”
“We really just need a skeleton staff there. Alpha Base is fully wired, right?”
“Yeah,” Jungmo says. “Kyuhyun and I finished that last night, and I confirmed it this morning.”
“Good. So we’ll start phasing people in Friday night. In the meantime, you all have gotten proposals back from me. They’re not good enough. Do them again.” He pauses. “Did I mention equipment yet? And schedules?”
Jungmo stares. Like. Three seconds ago, Heechul.
“You should sleep, Heechul,” Sungmin offers. “We’re good here. Take a nap in the break room. We’ll wake you if we need you.”
“I’m fine,” Heechul snaps. “Worry about yourselves.”
--
When the Lieutenant sees Jungmo slumped over his desk at 3 p.m. on Wednesday, papers scattered over his keyboard and a collection of paper coffee cups in disarray beside a stack of folders, he hands him a bottle of ibuprofen and tells him to call it a day.
“You’re not getting anything done,” Lieutenant Lee says, and Jungmo knows it’s true. He’s pored over printouts of data transfers and read through coded e-mails for hours, but hasn’t progressed much in breaking the code Youngwoon’s agents are using. “Look. Get some sleep. You’re staying at Alpha tomorrow through Friday evening, and I need you to be sharp. We can’t do anything if you’re not in good enough shape to give us intel.”
Jungmo slides a hand down his face and pushes his chair back from his desk, popping the pills in his mouth and downing them with a swig of cold coffee. “I’m sorry, Lieutenant.”
“You won’t crack all of this in a day,” the Lieutenant says kindly, clapping Jungmo on his shoulder. “Go. Sleep on it.”
Jungmo nods, standing up and cracking his back before grabbing his jacket from the back of his chair. Heechul is still bent over files, shifting documents around in a binder and furiously scribbling notes in the margins. “Thanks,” he says quietly, almost guiltily. “I’ll report straight to Alpha in the morning, then.”
--
After stumbling through the doorway and kicking off his shoes, Jungmo collapses into bed fully clothed. He hadn’t realized how exhausted he’d been--he’d been seeing through tunnel vision all day; between the overwhelming amount of work on his shoulders and how worried he was about Heechul, it became all too easy to forget his own physical and mental limits. The guilt and hurt settling in the pit of his stomach didn’t help; he missed Heechul.
He feels slightly sick for wanting him--for knowing how much this mission means to Heechul and still wanting to hold Heechul’s arms over his head again, to leave a line of purple bruises blooming along his collarbone, to hear his name on Heechul’s lips when Jungmo fucks him, agonizingly slow and then fast, fast, faster, until they’re both spent and sticky with come and sweat, falling asleep in a tangle of sheets and limbs. But he also wants to wake up to Heechul bitching about his television programs and Sunday morning reruns and begging for coffee.
Despite not remembering having dozed off, Jungmo wakes up sometime in the middle of the night to the sound of his phone bleeping. He frantically searches for it in his pockets, hoping it isn’t an emergency call.
It isn’t. He grins at the flashing name above the message alert. Kim Heechul.
Warmth floods the pit of his stomach. He was just tired before, Jungmo thinks giddily, keying in his pass-code and opening the text.
[11:02 PM] Kim Heechul
Come over tomorrow night. I want to see you.
Jungmo bites his lip.
[11:04 PM] Kim Jungmo
I have stakeout duty. Don’t you remember?
[11:05 PM] Kim Heechul
This isn’t him. I wouldn’t know.
Jungmo almost drops his phone. Of course it’s her, he thinks angrily. Heechul hasn’t had the time of day for me since--
“Listen. In case you--don’t tell her anything. Not about the case, not about Youngwoon, not about your job. She doesn’t know as much as she says she does, and you can’t trust her.”
[11:17 PM] Kim Heechul
Friday night? You can’t possibly be working then.
She doesn’t know. Relief floods through him. She’ll think I’m just doing some ordinary surveillance work, if she even knows what Heechul and I do.
[11:20 PM] Kim Jungmo
Friday night sounds great.
Jungmo turns over and finds that he’s thinking of meeting Heehee, of kissing her and slipping a hand under her dress and tugging at her cock and seeing if she makes the same breathy noises that Heechul does.
His right hand slides under his duvet and sheets and teases at the elastic band of his underwear. He’s completely hard.
→ IX