[VIXXO] the heart is just a bloody motor (never meant to drive) [5/5]

[gollumpanties]

<-- part 4

The second thing he notices is the water landing on his face, pouring out of the overhead sprinklers. All around him, the others are sitting up as quickly as they can, staggering upright using the tables and counters as supports.

"Oh my god!" Baekhyun exclaims in anguished tones. "Who am I now?"

Minseok's heart nearly stops. He looks around to see identical looks of horror around him.

"You're not Baekhyun?" Junmyeon says, his face going white.

"Nah, I'm just shitting you. I'm Baekhyun. Ow!" He rubs his head where Kyungsoo slammed an elbow into it.

"What's that awful noise?" Zitao asks. Both his hands are over his ears.

"I think these rooms must have a detection system for gases and various other chemicals in the air," says... Hongbin. That's Hongbin. Minseok has gotten used to thinking of that face as Sanghyuk, but no, that's Sanghyuk next to him. "Then the burner was left unattended too long and set off the fire alert. I didn't expect the chemical to incapacitate us for so long." He looks frustrated and remorseful.

"It's not your fault," Sanghyuk is quick to assure him. "It's hard to say how long we were out, right? And at least we're back to being ourselves again."

"That's true." Hongbin smiles over at him, the dimple at the corner of his mouth just peeking out.

"Listen, not to hustle you guys too much," Yixing says, "but I'm pretty sure we've got cops and guards on the way now. We might want to book it."

"Hang on just a second," says Baekhyun. He fumbles with his belt buckle. "I've got to check for tattoos."

"You can do that when we're not about to get thrown in jail for the rest of our lives!" Yifan shoves him forward. "We're leaving now."

They're all fully armed thanks to Kyungsoo, so they look something like a walking armory when they round the corner out of the lab. Just outside they run into the first security guard, clearly one of the ones already on patrol in the building when the alarms started going off. Before he can even shout, Wonshik drops him with a bullet to the head.

"We have to keep going!" Junmyeon shoves them forward until they're in an all-out sprint down the hall.

It's at the stairs up into the office levels that they encounter the first squad of police, all in helmets and riot shields. They're going so fast that they nearly run into the cops, scattering at the last minute to avoid the guns pointed right at them. Minseok's forward momentum nearly pitches him out into the open anyway, but then someone's hand closes around his arm and yanks him to the side. He finds himself flat against someone's chest, half crushed against the wall, and when he looks up it's Taekwoon he sees there. The real Taekwoon, back in his right body.

"Are you alright?" he asks and his voice is higher than Minseok is used to hearing it, but it's every bit as quiet and controlled.

"You're very tall," is all Minseok can think to say.

Taekwoon's mouth twitches. It's a very familiar look. "I hadn't noticed," he says.

A volley of bullets from behind the wall makes Minseok forget whatever he'd been about to say. Whatever it was, it could wait until they got out of here. It's quite clear they're not going to make it up that staircase, so they double back around to find another way up onto the main floor. All of the elevators have been shut down and after two seconds looking at the controls Chanyeol says he could figure it out enough to get them moving, but only with the right tools and about fifteen minutes to do it in.

"So basically, you can't do it," Sehun shoots over his shoulder while he shoots at movement ahead. "Stop getting our hopes up with no point."

"We're not going to get up any of these elevators, and they'll have blocked off all the staircases too while they send down more goons," Hakyeon says, fitting a new cartridge into his pistol with a snap. "Are we out of ideas yet?"

"Who here can kick open a door?" Lu Han asks suddenly. Wonshik, Taekwoon, Chanyeol, and Zitao raise their hands. Lu Han nods. "Follow me."

He leads them back down one of the hallways, counting doors as he goes, until they arrive at a blank gray door that looks something like an electrical closet. It takes several tries, but they manage to break the door off its hinges. Behind it is a long, dark staircase descending down.

"This is great," says Junmyeon, "but we need to go up."

"Oh, ye of little faith," Lu Han crosses his arms. "You put me in the mail room for a reason. There are service stairways like this all over that connect to the basement sorting floor down here, and if we're lucky one of them can get us up to the mail control room where there is a big garage door and trucks to break it down with."

"It'll mean leaving our vans behind," Jongdae points out. "And all the evidence in them that could lead them back to us."

"What evidence?" Lu Han retorts. "We cleared out everything in those vans before we set out because we're not idiots. There are no plates, no registration papers, no serial numbers anywhere, they've been wiped down... those vans are as clean as they're gonna get without the judicial application of fire."

"We don't have time to argue it," Yifan says. "Better to leave evidence behind than bodies, which is what will happen if we don't get moving."

The stairs take them down into a wide open area, largely unfurnished apart from huge tables arranged in rows, but with doors spaced periodically along it like the one they came down out of. Lu Han takes them all the way to one end where the mail chute comes out, emptying into a huge shallow bin, something like a dumpster cut in half. Next to it is another staircase leading up to a door marked "MAIL".

"This is it," says Lu Han. "If we can get in here, we have a good shot at getting out."

"I can't kick this door down," Wonshik says, eying it. "The hinges are on the wrong side and i can't get any leverage from these stairs."

"Well, that's it," Lu Han flings up his hands. "We're just dead then. I'm out of ideas."

An idea occurs to Minseok. "What about the mail chute?" he asks. They all turn to look at him. "Someone could climb up the mail chute and try to kick open the door from up there, where it's easier."

"That could work," Chanyeol nods. "But only if one of us can actually get up there."

They take turns trying to scale the chute with varying degrees of failure. Changyeol can barely get a grip on the smooth metal surface at all and Wonshik only gets slightly further before he too slips back down. Zitao can get to the halfway point, but that's where he gets stuck. He can stay wedged up there comfortably but he can't pull himself up any further. Minseok ponders how to get him up the rest of the way for a while, but it's Sanghyuk who speaks up first.

"What if you climb up there, then?" He looks at Taekwoon. "He's got a really good grip where he is, right? If you can get up to that point, maybe he can boost you up the rest of the way."

Taekwoon looks over at Minseok before nodding once. Zitao had found that even their sneakers don't work as well as bare feet, so Taekwoon unlaces his and slides them off his feet, stuffing his socks inside before handing them to Minseok. Minseok tries to give his hand an encouraging squeeze, but his hands are a little too full of shoes to be able to do much. He hangs at the end of the chute to watch until Taekwoon disappears into the gloom. Even then, he listens for each dull metallic thump that means he's another foothold higher. He bites his lip every time it sounds like Taekwoon is slipping, but finally he can hear Zitao's voice calling down.

"You're almost here!" Zitao is saying. "Reach up a little further and I'll be able to grab you."

The sounds of struggling filter down the chute along with more thuds and bangs, but finally Minseok hears Zitao's triumphant exclamation.

"Got it!" he says. "Here, try to get your foot up- augh, no, not there! A little- yeah, you got it. Brace up against the wall here... okay, now you're past. Go on ahead. It gets a little steeper but not too much. Yell if you start to slip."

The sounds drop off then, no matter how closely Minseok listens. There's vague shuffles and thumps but he has no idea what's going on. Then even those sounds fade away and there's only a faint metallic ringing in the silence. Then he hears gunshots. Hakyeon gasps somewhere close behind him, but Minseok is already dropping down to rip off his own shoes as fast as he can.

"What are you doing?" Lu Han demands.

"I'm going to help him," Minseok says fiercely. "And don't even fucking think of trying to stop me."

Lu Han studies his face for less than a second before nodding. "You might want a boost," he says. "Come on."

Zitao is surprised to see him up there, but hoists him further up the mail chute anyway. "I don't know what's going on up there," he frets. "He disappeared out the other end and I didn't hear anything until someone started shooting."

"I'm going to find out what's going on," says Minseok darkly. "And probably do some more shooting."

He scrambles up the rest of the way on pure adrenaline, hauling himself over the lip with one hand while pulling out his gun with the other. The moment his head clears the top he sees Taekwoon crouched behind a half countertop and window. Next to him, an open doorway leads out into a loading dock where there are several police gunmen all aiming into the mail room. At the sound of Minseok's first shot, Taekwoon whirls around in surprise but the first gunman drops to the ground and Minseok is stalking forward emptying round after round into the garage. He doesn't even wince when several answering bullets whiz past his face. He barely even notices them except to fire into the space between two trucks until he hears a pained, cut off gurgle. When the first gun runs out of ammo, he flings it to the side while he pulls out a spare without missing a beat. Taekwoon has emerged from the mail room to help him, and with the two of them working together they soon empty out the room of opposition.

Minseok's arm drops and he turns to rip into Taekwoon about what on earth he thought he was doing opening that garage door without backup, but before he can do more than open his mouth he sees a figure stumble to its feet right behind Taekwoon. One of the men Minseok had shot first had only been wounded, and while he's lost his gun, his hand comes up and in it Minseok sees the glint of metal. His feet move without conscious input from his brain, closing the distance in a split second. He slides in close to the man, knocking his hand away smoothly like it's nothing more deadly than a punch being thrown at him in training. Was that close enough? he thinks, and then the muzzle of his gun pushes up under the man's chin and he pulls the trigger.

This time when he turns around, he's too tired to say anything. Taekwoon is staring at him like he's seen a ghost. His mouth is slightly open in surprise and there are probably better things for Minseok to be thinking about right now but fuck that was close and all Minseok wants to do now is seal it with his own because the high buzz of a gunfight is still singing in his veins and they're both alive and they're both them again.

When Taekwoon kisses him, Minseok tastes blood. It's all over his face and it's not his own but Taekwoon doesn't seem to mind so Minseok doesn't mind either. As always Taekwoon is trying to make himself appear smaller, curling in on himself and around Minseok. When Minseok wraps a hand around the back of his neck, Taekwoon's hands twitch on his back just a little, and when Minseok tugs his lower lip between his teeth, Taekwoon's fingers grip at Minseok's shirt and if it could be more perfect Minseok doesn't know how.

"Just had to be a fucking hero, didn't you?" Minseok gumbles into his mouth.

"Not the one who climbed out of a mail chute already firing," gasps Taekwoon. "Wouldn't call me the hero."

"Don't argue when I'm kissing you," says Minseok, though his heart stutters at the implication that he's a hero to this man. He proceeds to effectively shut him up for another few seconds. "Crap," he pulls away suddenly. Taekwoon makes a noise, moving forward as if trying to catch Minseok's lips again, but Minseok holds him still. "The door," he says emphatically. "The other guys are still down there."

Taekwoon's eyes instantly snap back into focus and he straightens, composure returning so quickly that Minseok could have thought he'd imagined the whole thing. Only Taekwoon's lips are still red and shining and Minseok's own mouth is tingling as they hurry back to the door leading down to the sorting floor. Taekwoon sizes it up and lunges forward, foot hitting the wood right next to the door knob. Minseok has to grab his arms to keep him from tumbling down the stairs after the door, but then the others are looking up at them in various states of panic, surprise, and fear. They're standing with their backs to the stairs, and the reason becomes apparent when Minseok sees the tables moved and piled in front of all the doors along the walls. A loud banging is coming from most of them, several actually shaking on their hinges.

"About damn time," Kyungsoo snarls. "Glad you decided to join us. Can we leave now?"

He pushes past Minseok and Taekwoon, and the others file up the stairs as quickly as possible. Lu Han is the last to come through the door, and he stops to put a hand on Minseok's shoulder.

"Glad you finally figured out your relationship issues," he says, "but there are way better times to swap spit. I'm just saying, we're kind of on a deadline."

Then he's gone, following the rest of the gang to pile into whatever vehicles they can get Kyungsoo to hotwire. Taekwoon's ears are red, but he looks largely unapologetic as he shrugs at Minseok. At that point, there's nothing for Minseok to do then but drag him off to find a spot in one of the trucks and pray desperately that Lu Han doesn't catcall too loudly. It's a testament to Kyungsoo's hotwiring skills that they have two trucks up and running before the greater assembled police force have time to figure out that that's where they're making a break from. As a result, they smash through the chain link face before more than one or two officers have time to fire a shot off at them. It's also a testament to Jongdae and Jaehwan's driving skills that they manage to lose whatever tails they pick up within half an hour of crazed circling and weaving. They rattle back up the dirt and gravel paths to the lake house at something approaching fifty miles an hour and the air is full of their whoops and cheers, tossed back and forth between the cars like bouncing balls before echoing off the trees around them. With all the windows down, the cool wind whips through Minseok's hair. He's sweaty, sore, battered, covered in blood, and yet... happier than he's been in months. This could be because the strange nightmare that his life had become, something straight from the sci-fi channel, is finally over. Or it could be because Wonshik is laughing loudly, clapping Kyungsoo on the shoulder in congratulations while Hakyeon and Junmyeon look on with near-identical grins. It could be because Jongdae is yelling loudly from the front seat something about running Jaehwan off the road if he tries to pass him again and getting hysterical laughter and engine revving from the truck on their tail. Minseok thinks it has a great deal to do with the shoulder he's resting his head on and the hands working to rub out some of the knots already forming in his shoulders, something to do with the lips that brush the corner of his eye when Taekwoon bends to murmur in his ear.

When they pull into the driveway, tumbling through the door in an excited, shouting crowd, it takes the leaders some time to make themselves heard. When some order has been restored, Junmyeon speaks quickly and urgently.

"We did what we set out to do tonight," he says, "and we did it without anyone getting hurt, which is nothing short of a miracle." Taekwoon's hand tightens around Minseok's and he has to bite back a giddy smile. Junmyeon is still speaking. "Unfortunately, the police were alerted to our presence, so you know they won't be giving up the search that easily. This was a very high-profile company we infiltrated, so there will be a lot of pressure to bag some arrests in the next few weeks. As long as there is any chance this break-in can be definitively traced back to us, this city is not a safe place for us to be."

A ripple of tension runs through the room.

"So, you're telling us to skip town," says Jaehwan.

"We can't stay here," Junmyeon repeats. "And we can't leave as a group either. Eighteen people leaving at once will be too obvious. We need to split up as much as we can, scatter as far as we can, and wait until everything dies down."

"He's right," Hakyeon nods. "It'll be hard to stay in touch at first, but I know how to contact you if I really need to. When the time is right, we'll come back together. In the meantime, we'll need to disappear as thoroughly as possible, taking all those crates downstairs with us."

This is it. This is the moment of truth, Minseok thinks. This is where it will become clear whether or not the two groups will turn on each other, dissolve into the factions from before fighting over this prize.

"I've been thinking about that," says Yifan. "We'll all be coming back to the city when the time is right. With the amount of time we'll be gone, we may find that others have tried to take our places. Since we've already proved that we can accomplish more together, it would be in our best interests to work together against what will certainly be a common enemy in the future."

"In the meantime, we can divide up the materials downstairs, so that no one can say they're being cheated," Junmyeon says. "They won't be safe to sell for a good long while yet, but we're more than ready to give you... say, a third? In the interests of a future partnership."

Hakyeon thinks about it for a moment. "A third sounds fair," he says slowly. "And I wouldn't be against working together more in the future." His face breaks into a smile. "Like I said when we first ran into you that night, we got to where we were by following your lead. Think of how much father we can go if you're not trying to shoot us at the same time."

"Does this mean we have to come up with a new name?" Chanyeol wonders.

"VIXXO," says Baekhyun promptly, only to be kicked in the shin by Kyungsoo.

"That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard," Kyungsoo grouses. "No one asked you. And don't you have a tattoo to find anyway?"

Before Baekhyun beats a hasty retreat to the bathroom, they drag him over along with everyone else to the electric safe where they each enter the individual digits they programed in when their residence here began. It seems so long ago that Minseok is surprised to actually find a charge still on his phone. Everyone goes about sorting through their belongings, pocketing wallets and holding up phones to check a month's worth of back messages. There's an anguished cry from the bathroom and Kyungsoo looks actually pleased for the first time since this began.

"Ah, I see he found it," he says. "I'll just hold onto his things until he finishes crying in the bathtub, shall I?"

While all the crates are being reloaded into the two trucks -- one for Hakyeon to drive away and the other for Junmyeon -- Minseok follows Taekwoon upstairs into the hall to gather up what few things they've left scattered between their two rooms. When they walk into the bedroom though, the first thing Taekwoon does is to look around for any sign of the rabbit. There's no sound of paws on the wooden floor, no bundle of fur curled up in any of its usual napping places. The door swings open into what would appear to be a completely empty room. While this was his plan to give the rabbit a new beginning, Minseok thinks that Taekwoon is disappointed to see it  actually gone, as if his care and attention would be enough to win over the wild animal and keep it here waiting for his return. He doesn't say anything, but he doesn't have to for Minseok to know that that's what he's feeling. There's nothing Minseok can really say to that. He walks over to the armchair near the window. The last book Taekwoon had started reading is still sitting there facedown over the arm. "The Outward Bound," he can just make out on the spine. When he flips through it, it's a book of first aid. He sets it down and taps the cover thoughtfully.

"So we have to leave town as soon as we can," says Minseok. He gets only a nod from Taekwoon, who is taciturn again now that they're up here. "Were you planning to leave by yourself?" A shrug this time. Minseok tries again. "Would you mind if I came with you?"

Taekwoon doesn't look up from the pile of sheets on the floor, but at least his shoulders relax a little. "I wouldn't mind," he says quietly.

"Do you know where to go?"

Taekwoon shakes his head at that and Minseok thinks he understands some of the reluctant confusion he sees there. The exhilaration from their successful mission has faded a little, dimmed by the sudden need to form practical plans. They solve one problem only to be sent running from another that promises to chase them for months, if not years, of their lives to come. In terms of intimidation level, it ranks above being hunted by Lu Han's death owl and somewhere below realizing for the first time he'd like to kiss Taekwoon breathless and drink up every sound he makes like sweet wine until they're both drunk on it. The thought only makes him smile now, but it doesn't bring them any closer to knowing where they ought to go.

Minseok looks out the window. There, in the grass of the yard, he sees a rabbit with notched ears. He watches it cross the clearing cautiously but quickly. It limps a little as it moves, as if favoring a mostly-healed injury. It sits up at the edge of the treeline, head raised and looking around, chewing a bit of leaf; it sniffs the air; it looks back at the house for the briefest of moments. Then, with a flash of white tail and kicking legs, it vanishes into the trees for good. Minseok turns away, back into the room. Taekwoon still stands next to the abandoned nest, turning over a piece of hay in his fingers, like it holds the answers. Minseok thinks maybe it does.

He crosses the few steps between them, covering the hand holding the hay with his own, and tugs Taekwoon down by the back of the neck to press a kiss to his lips.

"Hey," he says, "do you want to go live in the forest?"

Taekwoon looks confused for a moment, then his eyes follow Minseok's to the bookshelf and he laughs, a small puff of air against Minseok's mouth.

"If you like," he says.

"It'll be like a vacation," says Minseok. "We'll have lots of work to do when we get back. You know some upstart gang of kids will try to move in on our turf. We'll have some fighting to do when we get back."

"I look forward to it," Taekwoon smiles.

They watch the others split off in ones or twos or threes, each heading off to their own corner of the world to disappears and wait until the heat dies down, until it's safe to come back and take their place again as the ruling crime lords of the city.

And, Minseok thinks as he follows Taekwoon, riding the bus into the sunset for parts unknown, when that day finally comes, we'll do it together.


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- I looked at the example prompts on the sign-up post and went "oH NO NOT CROSSOVERS" and madina was quick to assure me "nooo malay i won't give you a taekwoon prompt haha it's okay don't worry"
then the email came and it was nothing but her cackling "HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA I LIED" B|
- i cannot believe i wrote 43k of vixxo fic oh my god
- the mad push to finish means that i broke a personal record by writing over 5k in a single day after work and then i broke it again by writing over 10k in a day. that was I N S A N E
- there are a lot of things i didn't get a chance to put in the actual fic just because i didn't have room or they didn't fit with the pacing of the main plot... i wanted to write a hyukbin side story to post at the same time i reposted but i don't have it done whoops. I'LL PROBABLY DO THAT SOONISH BECAUSE THERE ARE STILL GAGS I WANT TO WORK INTO THIS UNIVERSE THAT MAKE ME LAUGH WAY TOO MUCH. so yeah
- we actually wrote out a full bodyswap chart on elpis_chan's blackboard while i was rolling around on the floor trying to nail down this plot so uh... here it is.
- i was originally going to do just a straight mafia au plot but it was giving me the hugest block ever until i realized that the way to make myself write it was to make it more ridiculous. hence the bodyswapping.
i had an actual outline and scraps of scenes already written to get me past the first check-in, so i ended up cannibalizing the first scene and scrapping the rest to get what you all finally got.
the original outline and scrapped scenes are posted here.
- okay so i already caught and corrected two typos for this repost but PLEASE let me know when you spot more, because i know they're there. i'd like to keep eliminating them as they get caught.
- as always, feel free to ask me anything about the fic!
(((that being said, the tattoo is a Noodle Incident. it will never be explained or clarified further. i don't know what it is or where it is because i feel like that would actually make it less funny. XD sorry y'all~)))