Work Text:
Death is no respecter of persons
Back in first grade – you know, when the teachers ask the little kids about their dreams – Taehyun had already known what he wanted to be.
A detective.
Why? Because he always used to watch murder mystery series on crime Tuesday with his mom and for some odd reason, she never forbade him to stay and watch as well – no matter how brutal or morbid the scenes showed on screen after 8pm were. The only thing she had always told him was, that if he would refuse to leave and continue watching, he better not come running into her bed at midnight because of a nightmare.
He never had nightmares – no, if anything, the crime Tuesday became his favorite day of the week and soon, he knew which character was who and what a serial killer was.
His mother had received several worried calls from teachers in his first few years at his school about how Taehyun told other students about the shows they watched; he had agreed to not talk about it anymore in school and no one questioned it anymore after his mother had promised Taehyun must’ve accidentally watched things unauthorized that weren’t meant for his kid-eyes.
A lie but at the very least, teachers didn’t think of his parents as serial killers anymore.
The infatuation with crime shows went on and on – so much so that at one point in his life, Taehyun didn’t have to lie about his knowledge regarding serial killers, crime scenes and murders anymore. In high school, people more or less knew and did a lot of different things and Taehyun’s interest in murder cases was by far not the weirdest thing at his school.
Although his best friend Soobin was never really fond of the topic, he always ended up listening to whatever Taehyun got to say about the latest murder case he had read about or documentary he had finished watching.
When teachers asked him in his senior year what he wanted to become in the future, his answer hadn’t changed from when they had asked him back in first grade; a detective.
He wanted to track and find murderers, wanted to analyze their minds and make sure they got what they deserved.
His teacher (and Soobin but that was beside the point) had argued a lot that he was smart enough to enroll in any university and get a psychology degree – especially considering he was very interested and well-invested into that topic as well. It made sense after all; finding murderers meant understanding their minds. And understanding a criminal’s mind was in dire need of very thorough psychological knowledge.
Psychology interested him – but not because he wanted to become Dr. Kang Taehyun, psychiatrist at whatever the hell he would be working at. He didn’t want to sit around and listen to a depressed college student about why he had to eat in order to get his studies done. There was no appeal in the possibility of writing recipes for strong anti-depressants to him. No, Taehyun’s interest in psychology was very limited to criminals and murderers. It had less to do with depression and more to do with the complex way PTSD could show itself in a person’s mind.
And so, no matter his exceptionally good grades (and Soobin’s whines), he enrolled in the police academy.
Taehyun was fit – he liked to go to the gym, he was disciplined enough to wake up early, feed his cat and snake, go on a quick jog down the road, do some practical sit-ups and whatnot in his apartment and then run off to work. But even with his muscles and fit body, he had brains and knew when to use it rather than knocking out idiotic criminals.
After two years of working in the general police department, he was finally promoted to the murder department – and that is where he was working now for the past almost five years. He was 26 years old now and good at his job – so good that more often than not, he would just love to go back in time and tell his 7 years old self about what kind of awesome detective they had become!
Especially in moments like these, when he walks into his department with a round of applause and Huening Kai dutifully adding a point to his side of the board with an approving nod.
“Eat this, Yeonjun!”, he said and let himself fall into his (cheap) office chair, high-fiving Hyuka as the secretary walked past him with a smirk, “I’m leading, 10:8. Are you losing your mojo?”
Sergeant Choi Yeonjun, the leader of their section and currently 29 (old hag is what they liked to call him but he absolutely did not like that). If one doesn’t call him out for his nearing 30s, Yeonjun is actually a rather chill Sergeant – he rarely gets mad and usually keeps his cool. Which is why Taehyun and him had a bet running – who would solve the most cases in one month.
Taehyun prided himself in not only calling himself a friend of Yeonjun’s, but also that he managed to keep up with him (although that was usually due to Yeonjun’s very much needed paperwork but there’s no need to get into that in detail).
“I wouldn’t jump around in joy just yet”, the elder said and hit the enter-key on his computer’s keyboard, a grin on his face as he eyed the pile of paperwork and files on Taehyun’s desk right in front of his, “Because once you’ve started doing these – and you will because Namjoon will not let you live until these are gone by the end of the week – I will be done with my paperwork and destroying you again.”
Damnit, he was right.
Luckily, Taehyun was a fast writer.
He huffed and dumped the solved case’s file onto the pile carelessly, not even really realizing that Huening Kai held it off from tipping over on his way back to his desk, “I will win this bet – we got two days left and there’s no way in hell I will be the new addition on the clown-list for Case 136111.”
Case 136111 – the most infamous murder case of their department. So infamous that there was a clown-list filled with detectives who were cocky enough to talk about their abilities and how good they were; just for them to end up in dead-ends again and again, unable to solve the case and handing it back to the archives only a few days afterwards.
Taehyun may be confident in his abilities but he wasn’t stupid enough to attempt solving a case that has been unsolved and a mystery for almost 20 years.
Nope, he’d rather not.
The bet him and Yeonjun had going on was centered around it – the loser would have to attempt solving the case and therefore be eternally engraved on the board of clowns (which was in the archives, hidden from their chief – but Namjoon knew about it and even if he liked to pretend he had no interest in it, Taehyun knew from Hyuka that the chief laughed at the list every now and then, especially when there was a new name on it).
So, no; Taehyun would most likely continue to work here for another 20 years or so (if life was kind enough to him) and he would not ruin that by being on that clown-list this early into his career. No way in hell will he touch Case 136111.
Yeonjun clicked his tongue and got up, throwing his jacket over his shoulder while doing so. At first glance, he looked more like a model than a detective – blonde-dyed hair, the plumpest lips one could imagine, long legs that went on for miles (Soobin’s words, not his) and porcelain skin; really, he was eye-candy. Not only did he have the natural beauty, but he also knew how to dress and style himself. The leather-jacket was new, Taehyun knew as much because Yeonjun had boasted all about his newest YSL-clothing (he had wanted that one for months).
No one but Huening Kai had been allowed to try it on, let alone touch it for longer than two seconds (and Hyuka was allowed to do so because he was Yeonjun’s baby and the only person who hadn’t realized yet that Huening Kai shamelessly used that for his own advantage was Yeonjun).
“Well, I’m off to the forensics – my next case is lying on their table and I’m ready to kick your ass onto the clown-board”, he said and ruffled Taehyun’s hair as he walked past him with an annoying snicker.
Pfft.
There was no way Yeonjun could solve three cases in just two days – even if he was busy working on his paperwork to make sure Namjoon wouldn’t kick his ass.
He had won this bet fair and square already.
-
Taehyun absolutely did not win this bet fair and square.
Well, maybe it would’ve been fair but most definitely not square. Although his predictions hadn’t been all that off; when they had both speed-walked into the office on the 1st of October to check their cases, they had both been on 10.
Eventually – after a very long discussion – Namjoon had told them to, quote, “Fucking end it with rock-paper-scissors and get to work”. And Taehyun had lost there, very dramatically so.
Huening Kai was still laughing at him although he at least tried to hide it as he handed over the file for Case 136111.
“…I hate this world”, Taehyun said and slammed the stupid file onto his desk – there were very obvious stains on it which indicated that not only did many people touch this file before; it was also old enough to have seen his grandmother’s first time on a bicycle (it wasn’t but he was dramatic okay), “What have I done to deserve this?”
Kai seemed to swallow the laugh (and joke) on his tongue and said: “…Cheer up, Hyung! Who knows, maybe you’ll actually figure something out? You are one of our smartest detectives after all.”
He sighed and placed the file in one of his drawers while getting his keys, jingling them around in his hand, “Well, Namjoon told me to prioritize the new cases so that’s where I’m off to now.”
He called Jungwon and Heeseung over to follow him and headed out to the crime scene with his car (an old Subaru his father had oh so graciously given to him after buying himself a brand-new Kia – thanks for that, dad).
It was definitely too early for him to have to deal with this kind of thing and he really didn’t know what to say when they walked into the open apartment, where the police officers had already handled things.
He ducked under the tapes and eyed his surroundings, notebook in hand as he waltzed over to where the body was located – neatly placed on the carpet, right in front of the couch with the TV softly rustling in the background.
“…Good morning”, he said and yawned, silently cursing himself for not bringing along a coffee, “What happened here?”
The police officer in charge nodded his head politely at him before answering: “Kim Hwayoung, 23 years old woman, student at SNU. She was found by her neighbors after her best friend got worried about her absence from classes.”
Taehyun nodded along and pulled on his gloves carefully inching closer to the body – yeah, that did not look fresh at all. She must’ve been lying here like that for at least three days. What an ungodly scent indeed. He eyed Jungwon – one of their younger detectives – as he subtly tried to not be bothered by the smell, professionally moving into the kitchen of the small apartment to distract himself. Taehyun knew that he was listening to their conversation anyways, “…There were no signs of burglary I assume. She’s also not native, is she?”
“No, she’s an exchange student from the US, only half-Korean. According to her friend, she was supposed to leave in a month”, the police officer said. He had a kind of lost look in his eyes, almost like he had no clue what the hell was going on here, “There are no CCTV in this building – too old and cheap for it. Someone could’ve easily killed her without needing to break any locks. The neighbor also said that she often had men and women over so no one really suspected anything.”
Taehyun quietly nodded along, eyes trying to identify some sort of wound – but there was nothing. Her eyes were wide open but other than that, she didn’t have any wounds or blood on her for that matter. There were no signs of a fight either – the apartment was clean and organized except for some random books and notebooks scattered across the room, probably courtesy of her messy student life. He also spotted a few halfway filled boxes of personal belongings; she must’ve started packing already, seeing as she was apparently supposed to leave for the US in a month.
He eyed the kitchen from his position in front of the victim and watched as Jungwon seemed to look through the drawers. There was an opened bottle of painkillers on the table near the kitchen – Taehyun walked over to check them out, identified them as normal dosage painkillers any idiot could get at any pharmacy though. Then again, the possibility of it being a suicide-case was not too far off; even non-prescription-requirement medication could kill you if you took enough of them. Seeing as this wasn’t bought with prescription, he didn’t know when Kim Hwayoung bought these though. He decided to take them along in a small plastic bag and told Jungwon to check for the nearest pharmacies to ask about it.
So far, this seemed less like a murder and more like an unfortunate accident and/or event. He didn’t know anything about Kim Hwayoung but it wasn’t uncommon for students to suffer from severe depression and stress. After checking her bedroom and the bathroom for any medication indicating psychological issues, Taehyun was left even more confused – because there weren’t any.
He assumed that her journey back home to the US had less to do with her unpretty situation in Korea and more to do with her exchange year ending. Besides; someone who’d want to die wouldn’t bother packing a month ahead of their flight back home, let alone having unfinished university projects lying around or keeping their apartment more or less tidy.
A lot of things didn’t fit here. He walked back over to the police officer.
“…Why is this a murder case?”, he wondered, analyzing his surroundings – he walked over to the TV and frowned at the ugly static sound coming from it, turning it off wordlessly, “I don’t see any penetrative wounds. There are no signs of burglary and she doesn’t seem to be hurt in any way.”
When he turned around to look at the police officer, he raised an eyebrow at him – the man looked absolutely dumbfounded for a moment, “…I’m…not sure. Well, I mean, I am. Kind of? I would’ve declared it natural death but, I mean, her friend was screaming about it and we just didn’t know what to do so we-…”
“What did the friend say?”, he interrupted and rubbed his temples – definitely too early for this. Especially after losing a bet.
The officer swallowed, “…She kept saying that something was off with her. And that she didn’t die a natural way. She said that something killed her and it was not an accident.”
Great. A freaked-out, probably traumatized bestie from university.
He sighed and took out his pen and notebook, “Who’s the friend and where can I find her?”
-
The next day, Taehyun started his investigation at SNU.
He hated universities – not necessarily because of the universities themselves. More because the people walking around there were just another kind of stupid. He had always thought of students as extremely smart and disciplined, ready to start their lives and motivated to get things done, step into adulthood.
But if he had learned one thing from Soobin during his time in university, it was that it fucking sucked at best and people there were stupid – probably even more than high school students. Because high school students pretended to be adults but they all knew they weren’t. University students actually thought they were adults and that was what made them stupid.
He exhaled a pissed-off groan as he finally found the dorm-number of Lee Yujin. It took a couple seconds for someone to open the door when he had knocked, pulling out his detective-ID and police batch to introduce himself, “Hello, Miss Lee. My name’s Kang Taehyun, I’m the leading detective in your friend’s case. I’m sorry to interrupt.”
Lee Yujin was a small young woman with round eyes, long, braided, naturally red hair and soft freckles dotting her Korean face. She was very obviously also not fully native but seemed fluent enough in Korean. There was a layer of fear in her eyes as she eyed him, body hidden behind the door slightly. She cleared her voice, eyes darting around the area in a weirdly panicky manner as she replied: “…A-Are you alone…?”
Taehyun looked around himself, “…My partner Heeseung is on campus but I’m alone. The corridor is empty, if that’s what you’d like to know.”
“…N-No”, she was whispering now, “I meant; are you alone?”
What the-…?
“Miss, I’m the only one here right now”, he answered with a barely held-back sigh.
Yujin stared at him for a very long moment before her eyes widened and she promptly answered: “I’m sorry but I’m busy right now, come back another time!”
And just like that, the door was slammed closed in front of him.
He technically couldn’t force her to talk if she really didn’t want to but then again, she was the best friend, the one who had persistently talked about how this was not a natural death and also the one who had been worried enough about Kim Hwayoung to call her neighbors and find her dead in her apartment. She may be an important witness but also a very possible prime suspect.
But as much as he didn’t feel like doing his job today, he was at work; and therefore had to act a certain way.
Which is why he took a deep breath and made sure to slide one of his business cards through the crack on the floor as he said: “…I can imagine that the events were very traumatizing for you and it’s not easy to talk about this. But you are an important witness and we need your testimony on this for further investigation. This is my card – if you feel comfortable enough, call me.”
No answer.
But he assumed Yujin had heard him just well enough.
With another exhale, he stood back up and went to find Heeseung – who would hopefully provide a very big cup of iced americano for him.
Case 136111 was already enough – he just wanted this case here out of his way as fast as possible.
-
Taehyun didn’t like coffee.
It was bitter, tasted bland at best and he never grew fond of it despite his nightly cup of americano or the quick shots of espresso he downed after pulling an all-nighter. Sometimes, working in the murder department was harsh. He didn’t drink coffee because he enjoyed it and quite frankly didn’t know anyone who did for that reason (luckily because people who generally liked bitter things like coffee for the taste were insane in his opinion).
But he had to admit that coffee did have its purpose on earth and for his line of work, it fulfilled its purpose; he felt a lot better after his first three sips of iced americano (overpriced from the campus’ cafeteria, as Heeseung had told him with a grumble). They decided to listen in on the campus; they were pretty sure that word had already spread and people were indeed whispering about the incident, about Kim Hwayoung and these two detectives are here to investigate, right?
The first thing they had done after reuniting by the campus’ front gate was getting their hands on Kim Hwayoung’s personal data and information. Jungwon had made sure to send them the needed information while also updating Taehyun on his pharmacy mission (he hadn’t found out anything yet but still had to ask about six different pharmacies). Even with the personal records they had (which weren’t many considering she wasn’t native), they decided to ask the university for a file about her.
And that one was a lot more interesting than the boring entry documents they had of her from almost pretty much a year ago. Which also meant though that she had been a calm citizen and hadn’t ever gotten into any sort of trouble. It ruled out any possible outsiders who were mad at her for some reason.
According to her file, she had studied veterinary medicine and had been active in a club about gardening and stuff like that.
Hence why they eventually ended up in that exact club’s room, knocking on the door and waiting for someone to open up patiently.
A young man eventually slid the door open, eyes surprised for all but two seconds before apparently catching up to the situation by merely seeing the batch on Heeseung’s belt.
He had red-dyed hair and wore a green apron – their club room was in a small greenhouse behind the university, surrounded by a beautiful garden with all kinds of flowers and plants. Seeing as it was October, there were leaves already collecting on the floor and they had seen a few forgotten gardening tools lying around near them. Taehyun assumed they were on break right now.
“…Hello. My name’s Kang Taehyun, this is my partner Lee Heeseung. Would you mind answering a few of our questions?”
The boy stepped aside, opening the door fully for them and nodding softly, “Ah, yes! Uhm…my name’s Cho Junseo. I’m not a student here but helping out in the gardens as an apprentice.”
They stood around in the greenhouse, not really capable of sitting down to talk since there was only one metal chair. Heeseung had assured Junseo to take a seat, seeing as it was him who would have to answer a few very unpretty questions about someone he probably considered a friend for a long time.
Someone who wasn’t here anymore and he was very much aware of that.
Taehyun hated these kind of questionings because he never really knew how to approach people like that, in situations like this. They had found the body today and yet; the whole campus already knew about Kim Hwayoung’s death. The wound was still fresh but they didn’t have a lot of time and if this really had been a murder, they needed to find that someone sooner than later. “I’m sorry for your loss”, he started the questioning and made sure to have a solemn look in his eyes. Junseo either didn’t care too much about it or simply didn’t feel comfortable enough around them to express his emotions properly, as he merely nodded awkwardly, “What was your relationship with Kim Hwayoung?”
The apprentice bit his lip and pondered about it for a long moment before eventually answering: “…We weren’t exactly…friends. I mean, she was good with plants? And uhm…she was very popular among the students. I barely talked to her though.”
Huh? Taehyun noted how Junseo didn’t seem to have much of an opinion about her – which was neither really good, nor was it bad. You’d assume people who were in the same club for probably around a year to be closer than that though. “You didn’t like her that much, did you?”
Out of a detective’s mouth, these words always sounded like an indirect accusations, even when they didn’t mean it like that. Especially to people who tried to hide something and felt called-out on it. Taehyun had purposely worded himself that way to see Junseo’s reaction. Similar to before, he didn’t really express any emotional outburst though; he only shrugged awkwardly, teeth tugging on his lower lip, “That may make me seem a little suspicious but no, I didn’t. Hwayoung wasn’t really…a pleasant person to be around. She was very hotheaded. And loud about what she wanted. She never backed down from any challenge and kind of had a reputation across campus for being easy.”
Being easy?
Taehyun remembered the neighbors telling him she often had men and women over – which is why no one ever questioned anyone. Junseo must be talking about her sexual preferences then.
“Was she easy?”, Heeseung wondered.
“…I doubt it”, Junseo said after a moment of thinking, “Hwayoung is…was, a pretty woman. She knew that; everyone knew that. Someone who’s aware of their beauty wouldn’t offer themselves to just anyone like this. She may have had many partners but I think she was picky either way.”
Taehyun made sure to not stare at Junseo when he worded himself, “Had your experiences with it?”
“No. I don’t exactly swing that way, if you understand what I mean”, Junseo admitted and it caught Taehyun off-guard – people usually weren’t as open about their sexuality in South Korea and especially not in that kind of age-range. Hwayoung may have been rather open about her apparent openness regarding sexual partners but Taehyun had merely connected that to her American roots and education; she had probably been used to it that way and didn’t make it a secret because it wasn’t one for her.
But Junseo was native Korean and he probably grew up being told and taught that same-sex relationship or desires weren’t tolerated and looked-down-upon by most people around him.
Junseo either expected the confused glances from them or he was a lot sharper than Taehyun gave him credit for as he explained without being asked: “Hwayoung tried flirting with me. I guess I don’t look too bad – I’m just too shy most of the time. When I refused her, she had already seen right through me and the next day, the whole campus knew about my preferences.”
Oh. Okay, so Kim Hwayoung wasn’t only dead – but also a little bit of a petty bitch.
Taehyun didn’t like university and this was one of the reasons. His detective side was unbiased of course but the tiny voice in his head that wasn’t in work-mode scoffed at the admission; Hwayoung may have died an unfortunate death but exposing someone else’s sexually isn’t exactly something to be liked for either.
“I see”, he said and eyed Junseo neutrally, “You do know that this makes you seem a certain way in this investigation?”
He still tried to get Junseo to have some sort of emotional outburst.
But just like before, Junseo merely shrugged, “Take it or leave it I guess. The last time I saw Hwayoung was on Thursday – we always have club activities then. I’m usually always here, seeing as I don’t study but help out in the garden” – he walked over to a cramped metal desk and pulled out two sheets; one was a printed plan of the greenhouse’s activities and schedule, the other one an additional list of everyone in the club, when they came in, what they did and for how long – “Every time I came in, my boss signed my time off at the end. The ones he didn’t check yet are from yesterday because he hadn’t come in yet. If you’d like, I can give you his number and tell him about your visit to ask him as well. Hwayoung was helping in the preparations for autumn and winter on Thursday alongside me and Lee Yujin, her friend. I didn’t talk much to either of them that day but they had acted very strange.”
While Heeseung took pictures of the lists and schedules, Taehyun thought back to Yujin and he had to admit that he also didn’t really have a normal impression of her – the police officer had also said something along those lines. It was Tuesday now – which meant that whatever happened to her must’ve happened after Thursday and at least before Sunday. Hwayoung’s body had looked like it had lied there for longer than just a few hours.
“…Did Hwayoung have classes on the weekends?”, he asked, thinking back to how the police officer talked about Yujin noticing Hwayoung’s absence in class.
Junseo nodded, “I’m not entirely sure but if I remember correctly, veterinary medicine majors have classes on Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning due to some changes in their schedule. It’s not common but someone messed up the organization and some classrooms were booked for two majors at the same time, which is why they had to move certain classes to the weekends. Yujin and Hwayoung started hanging out together around three months ago.”
“…Three months ago?”, Heeseung wondered, handing back the papers to Junseo with a slight smile, overshadowed by confused frowns, “But we were told that Yujin and her were best friends.”
The dry laugh morphing into an amused scoff Junseo let out had Taehyun and Heeseung look at each other in confusion, “Best friends? These two? No. No one really knows why exactly but around three to four months ago, Hwayoung and Yujin went from not knowing about each other’s existence to being adjusted to the hip. They were always sticking together, talking quietly, whispering among themselves, disappearing into corners. Yujin is usually quite nice and calm, very quiet – everything Hwayoung was not. I don’t know why they suddenly started hanging out. I also didn’t care to ask though. Maybe someone from their class could give you more insight on that?”
Weird.
Very weird.
They thanked Junseo for his time and told him to call if he had anything else to say. He promised to tell his boss and they left the greenhouse, on their way towards what Junseo told them to be the medical major’s building.
Teachers probably wouldn’t have too much insight on their students since this wasn’t high school anymore. But the classmates potentially did. Junseo had said that Hwayoung’s classmates usually met up in the building’s common room to do some homework together on quiet afternoons like these.
“Do you think he knows more?”, Heeseung asked as they rounded the corner.
Taehyun thought for a moment before he shook his head softly, “No. I think Junseo was pretty open about his opinion about her but I don’t think he did it. We’ll check on the schedule and list and ask his boss as well but I believe him. What bugs me a lot more than Junseo though is Lee Yujin. She’s acting strange and if what Junseo told us was true, her classmates will agree on it.”
-
“The pharmacy said that she had bought those painkillers over six months ago”, Jungwon said, exaggeratedly letting himself fall over the just now freed space previously occupied by a pile of files. Taehyun had gone back to the office to get these done and finished while waiting for any updates, seeing as their talk with the classmates didn’t really do anything for them – other than confirming that Lee Yujin was weird.
One thing they had collectively agreed on was that Kim Hwayoung had apparently started acting off after dealing with her more and more. That may give them more insight but didn’t really help otherwise. Taehyun decided to wait and see who’d call him first; the forensics or Yujin. He had a feeling that the forensics would win this one.
For once.
“…Well, that rules out a suicide for now”, Taehyun said and lazily drew an ugly bunny above the word suicide in his notebook, “Anything else?”
Jungwon sighed and straightened up again, eyes now a little more awake, “Yes, actually! You wouldn’t believe what I saw! After pretty much running around the area to locate every pharmacy Kim Hwayoung could’ve frequented, I decided to check out her apartment again…you know, with the body gone and all? I still have the get used to that. Anyways, I searched her bedroom and opened a few drawers – and that’s what I found!”
He pulled out his phone and scrolled through his gallery, softly cooing at the dozens of pictures of his dog (really an adorable pet), before apparently finally finding what he had been looking for. With shaky fingers and a skeptical frown on his youthful face, he turned the phone over to show the pictures.
Taehyun raised an unimpressed eyebrow at it, “…Is that a Ouija-board?”
Jungwon nodded along enthusiastically, “I swear I had chills going down my back when I found it in one of her drawers! And look!” – he zoomed in onto the open board, where there was an obvious scratch in the otherwise clean wood – “It broke! She must’ve used it at some point!”
A loud gasp was heard right behind Taehyun and he snorted at Heeseung when he jumped at the sudden sound, all of them turned their heads to look at Huening Kai. Their secretary had a rather frightful expression on his face, eyes glued to Jungwon’s phone, “Idiotic. This is why you don’t play with ghosts! Who invented this stupid board and thought it’d be a cool idea to just sell it off to broke college students?!”
“You believe in ghosts?”, Taehyun questioned with a deadpanned stare.
Hyuka rolled his eyes, “I believe in the afterlife. And I believe that when humans are capable of evil things, so are ghosts. You should as well and do not ever play around with these boards!”
“…Well, Ouija-board or not; Kim Hwayoung probably died of a natural death so I don’t think it really matters”, he responded and therefore considered the topic over.
Huening Kai though seemed to think otherwise as he turned to stare at him with intense eyes and drawn-together eyebrows, “Really? This woman was young – still studying. Healthy, apparently popular in college. Very few natural deaths would be reasonable for your average studying young adult unless it ran in her family and the documents her doctors sent from the US and Korea confirmed that there was no such thing in her genes.”
“It is not uncommon for young people to die of a sudden heart attack for unknown reasons. It happens a lot more than people would like to think about”, Taehyun shrugged it off, reaching over to grab his telephone and dialing the number of the forensics – they should be done with it any time soon, seeing as Kim Hwayoung’s body had already been rather old and they usually had to work on those first to find valuable traces, “Life is unfair.”
But Kai merely huffed, “…I think that you’re over-seeing something. The world isn’t just black and white.”
“I know”, he said and waited for someone to pick up the phone at the forensics, sending a pointed glare towards Huening Kai, “I’m a detective, I have to think out of the norm every now and then. But that still doesn’t prove the existence of ghosts, much less can I write down that the cause of death was an angry spirit.”
He tuned Kai’s answer out in favor of talking to the forensic doctor – only for his bored posture to immediately straighten up at the answer he had received to his questions about Kim Hwayoung.
“I’m sorry, what?”, he said and ignored Kai’s smirk and Heeseung’s and Jungwon’s anticipating stares, “Could you repeat that please?”
The phone was now set on speaker as the forensic doctor repeated: “We couldn’t find any exterior penetration on her skin. But we figured that the cause of death was suffocating. When we searched for something in her lungs or airways, we couldn’t find anything though. Her neck was broken but her cause of death was suffocation.”
He thanked the doctor after writing a few other things down and ended the call with a quiet huff, rubbing his temples eagerly – this whole day had been nothing but a pain in the ass.
“…It’s weird, I’ll admit that”, he said and turned off his computer, deciding to follow Yeonjun’s example and go home for today, like he should’ve done an hour ago, “But still, it Is possible that the victim was someone who wasn’t seen breaking in or didn’t have to do so in the first place. There are many people who could’ve done it. Just because her neck was broken, doesn’t mean the suffocation wasn’t caused through that.”
Kai shrugged and waltzed back over to his desk, “If you say so…”
Taehyun scoffed, “If it really were something paranormal, don’t you think there would be a lot more deaths like that happening all at once than just these few every now and then?”
The secretary didn’t answer and Taehyun went home with his jaw clenched and his head filled with questions.
He didn’t sleep well that night.
---
Ghosts never speak ‘til spoken to
Taehyun had always hated the concept of the irony of the universe because it always seemed to bite you in the ass when you could least need it. And, seeing as it was all about irony, always in just the perfect moment.
Or, well not at all the perfect moment.
He was cramped over his desk with a new pile of cases he had successfully uncovered and dealt with; while there were two files he had no fucking clue about on the other side of his desk. And, really, if he could, he would bury himself beneath the files and hopefully drown in self-pity and suffocate due to paper stuffing his airways. But both options were unrealistic and therefore, he had to deal with Yeonjun’s worried stares until the elder finally had had enough and asked: “Dude, you’re mojo is dead.”
“It’s not!”, Taehyun hissed but remained seated in his exact position, forehead resting against the surface of his desk and unbothered by the people he knew sent him weird stares as they walked past his desk. Detectives were weird and as such, they often believed in stupid folklore. One of which was the infamous luck-losing-period that the best of all the detectives eventually got; a time in which things just didn’t work out.
Taehyun had that right now. More or less.
Well, not really because he could solve his regular cases just fine.
But apart from the infamous Case 136111 lying around on his right side, there was a new addition to a case he couldn’t solve just yet; Kim Hwayoung’s mysterious death. He hadn’t really expected Lee Yujin to text him or even call him for that matter and she not-so-shockingly never did. Although he could’ve asked Namjoon for an official form to search her dorm and bring her in for an investigation, they were only allowed to keep her for 24 hours until they legally had to allow her to leave. Seeing as she didn’t even allow Taehyun to step inside her dorm, he doubted she would be much more willing to talk if they’d attempt forcing answers out of her.
Apart from the fact that one of the prime witnesses refused to talk, all Taehyun and Heeseung were capable of gathering were a bunch of rumors and gossip from university students. The only real testimony they had was Junseo’s, which had turned out to be confirmed by his boss as he had told them about the exact same thing. The gardener had admitted that he barely knew anything about the students helping out because he was usually busy keeping an eye on the apprentices and his job in general. He had been a dead-end as well.
There were absolutely no signs of anyone getting in and out of Kim Hwayoung’s apartment forcefully. Although Taehyun had tried talking to various people about who could’ve possibly been over at the victim’s place around the time she must’ve died, none of the people who had admitted to it had a real reason to kill her. The weirdest thing about it all was that although her neck apparently was broken and she had died due to suffocation, Taehyun had been told various times that Kim Hwayoung had not been strangled.
Which didn’t make any sense. Not at all.
He had even asked Soobin to check again, who (ridiculously so) worked as a forensic doctor for their department as well (he usually took the night shifts though). Soobin had also confirmed after a last check on her body that Kim Hwayoung definitely died due to suffocation on Friday, her neck broke during her suffocation but it had not been the cause of death. And she had no signs of anyone strangling her – which meant that her broken neck and the suffocation had nothing to do with anyone because if someone would’ve choked her to death, there would’ve had to be some sort of marks on her skin.
In other words; Taehyun tried to distract himself from a case he couldn’t solve by solving other cases. A tactic he knew wouldn’t work for long, if only because of the fact that Kim Hwayoung had been native American and if there was one thing worse than Case 136111, it was a native American who died due to unknown circumstances one month prior to her flight back home. Namjoon had already been up his ass about it and he knew he should do something – but he really didn’t know what.
“Taehyun”, Yeonjun interrupted his quiet moment of self-pity, pulling him out of his thoughts and making him hear the distant sound of a ringing telephone.
He groaned, “Could anyone please answer that phone?”
“It’s you’re telephone so I guess you’ll have to do it”, Yeonjun said with a deadpanned undertone.
Taehyun groaned again, straightening up in his seat and answering the call with a way too bored voice – he knew he was unprofessional but life really seemed to try him right now, “Yes, this is Detective Kang Taehyun?”
“…I-…I need hel…help…”, a voice said on the other side of the line and Taehyun immediately found himself perking up, recognizing the high-pitched shyness.
He blinked, now more awake, “Miss Lee? Yujin? Is that you?”
“She’s here…she found me and she’ll…she’ll kill me. P-Please, please help me. Please-…”, Yujin sounded off on the other side of the line – like someone held her up against a wall by her neck or cut off her airways. Which was weird because why would anyone allow someone to call the police if they were about to strangle them to death? Also, she was clearly already suffering from something and yet talked like whoever tried hurting her hadn’t actually reached her yet.
“Yujin-ssi. I need you to calm down and tell me where you are. Are you at your dorm?”, he said and listened intently.
There was a weird rustling on the other end of the line and her approving answer drowned in a way too loud, static sound. It reminded him of something he had heard before but he couldn’t pin-point what exactly that had been. With a frown, he focused on any more sounds – but when he called for Yujin again, there was no response. Instead, he heard a low thud and suddenly, the line cut-off after his ears pretty much exploded with the probably loudest beep he had ever had to endure in his entire life. It had been loud enough for him to jump slightly and let the telephone’s receiver fall from his hands. He could still hear the low, consistent beep of an ended call.
He got up in a frenzy and called Heeseung over, Yeonjun apparently also interested (and bored) enough to join along. Jungwon followed them as he seemed just on his way back towards his desk, probably from his break. Taehyun’s Subaru was cramped but they all fit inside as he drove as fast as he could, glaring at Yeonjun when he turned on the siren. They technically weren’t allowed to do that without any real, actual reason – but he’d snitch him out to Namjoon if he had to.
For now, they just had to arrive in time.
To his absolute misery, when they arrived at the Seoul National University’s general dorms, there were already a bunch of people standing around in the corridor Taehyun remembered Lee Yujin’s room to be located.
They had to push through the students and show their ID’s and batches to a teacher when he had stood in their way to ask who the hell they were. Taehyun couldn’t fucking believe what he saw seeing as Yujin had been talking to him a mere twenty minutes ago, if even.
The dorm-room was filled with colorful pastels and cute decorations. Yujin sat leaning against her bed as if she fell asleep – except for her tilted-back head, the staring eyes and the wide open mouth, opened to a never-ending, silent scream. There was no blood, Taehyun couldn’t see any exterior wounds.
With careful steps, he approached her body, making sure to pull on gloves – it didn’t seem like anyone had tried to touch her yet but he had to make sure. She wasn’t moving so he assumed Yujin to be dead.
Just when he was about to touch her though, someone suddenly shouted from behind him and within an instant, a warm hand had wrapped itself around his wrist, holding him off from touching her pulse-point.
He turned around with a glare in his eyes and a nasty series of profanities on the tip of his tongue; but he abruptly zipped his mouth shut when his eyes connected with deep, dark-brown irises. There was a man in front of him – smooth, light skin that seemed to glow in the artificial light of Yujin’s dormitory, round eyes framed by long lashes that casted shadows on his rounded cheeks, plump lips, a soft nose and slightly longer, wolfcut-styled black hair with just a few very random white strands in it. His touch felt electrifying and for some odd reason, Taehyun found himself disappointed when the stranger pulled away as soon as he had dragged him away from Yujin’s body.
The man’s voice sounded soft and velvety when he said: “Don’t touch her. Don’t get close to her or you’ll be next.”
Taehyun was too stunned by this man’s beauty to yet really comprehend what he was saying. But when it finally caught up to him, he found himself uttering out a dumbfounded: “…What?”
But the man walked around him and towards Yujin, ignoring Taehyun’s profanities about how he had nothing to look for on a crime-scene and he was the one who most definitely shouldn’t touch Yujin’s body.
All of his anger about this random ass dude holding him off from examining Lee Yujin evaporated into thin air when the man touched her and Yujin let out a shrill scream, high enough for him to wince at the noise. It went on for at least ten seconds – and when she stopped her head whipped up, staring back at him through motionless eyes.
The man nodded and carefully tugged a few of her red strands out of her freckled face before placing his hand on her forehead, “…I’m sorry…”, he mumbled and just like that, Yujin’s body fell forward as if she suddenly lost all of that tight strain in her muscles.
What. The. Hell.
Taehyun needed a few moments to blink himself out of his stupor before he eventually, finally, managed to get a grip on himself, move past this stranger’s outstanding visuals and get back into his detective-mode: “What-…you-…who are you?!”
That was…not his detective-mode. And also not what he had wanted to say.
The stranger turned his head to look at him after gently placing Yujin’s apparently dead body on the floor, round eyes seemingly sparkling as their gazes connected and for some odd reason, Taehyun felt his wrist tingle and prickle where he had earlier felt that warm touch. Their eyes remained connected for a moment and then, the stranger let his gaze drop, instantly displaying a mix of surprise and regret. He smiled sheepishly before slowly getting up and walking over towards Taehyun. He stopped right in front of him and was taller by just an inch (which managed to piss him off a little bit, not gonna lie).
He had a weird sense of push and pull as he stared back into those deep eyes and found himself unsure of whether he wanted to back off or get closer. Which then again had him frown internally at his own thoughts because first of all, Kang Taehyun never backed-off and more importantly; why the fuck would he want to get closer to some random stranger?!
“You…have an outstanding aura”, the guy said lowly – so low that Taehyun was pretty sure Yeonjun and the others behind him (what the hell happened to them, why were they so quiet, were they even still there?) had no idea this guy was even talking to him in the first place, “Like your energy is…really light. I could bask in it. It’s seldom for people like you to have this kind of energy…I like it.”
What…? Energy?
What.
Taehyun found himself unable to say anything, too transfixed on his eyes and the sudden smile he received. It wasn’t until he registered the words, “Right so I gotta go now, bye”, and felt utterly cold from one second to the next that he realized this man had touched his wrist again! And not only that; but he also managed to pull him into the weirdest trance he had ever been in well enough to almost slip right past him and disappear into thin air!
But Taehyun was fast and he was strong and so, even with how unreasonably distracted he had been (regretfully so), he quickly reacted and ran after the guy just in time to catch him as he had attempted turning the corner at the end of the corridor. Taehyun had no recollection of anyone telling any of the people hogging Yujin’s dorm to fucking leave but the corridor was empty aside from them, one teacher, a security from the campus and Taehyun’s coworkers.
He could feel the warmth of the stranger’s body through his medical gloves but like this, it was a whole lot less distracting for sure. His voice was back to sounding like he was used to and this time, he said what he actually wanted to say: “Bold of you to assume I’m stupid enough to not notice this. Who are you, what were you doing in that dorm, how do you know Lee Yujin and what in the name of god have you done in there?”
Those were a lot of questions at once but the stranger didn’t seem all too worried about that right now. Instead, his eyes kept darting back and forth and Taehyun felt the way he suddenly shuddered beneath his grip. All of a sudden, the other’s skin felt a little colder and maybe it was the change of lightning but did his skin look paler in comparison?
“…H-How about this?”, the velvety sound from earlier got replaced by a scratch in his voice; Kai sounded like that when he overslept because he was obviously gaming the whole night instead of sleeping like a normal adult person should, “You’ll let me go and I’ll find you tomorrow at noon. I promise.”
Taehyun knew he shouldn’t agree on this because, really, no matter what the fuck had happened in there, this dude had done something and even if the explanation would turn out to be utterly ridiculous (Taehyun had an odd feeling that he would not like the explanation one bit), he trespassed into a crime scene and had obviously known something about Lee Yujin – why else would he just stumble into her dorm like that? Especially considering Yujin didn’t strike Taehyun as someone who had met and known a lot of people.
But something about the cold skin under his gloved hand and the sudden tired glimmer in the stranger’s eyes had him weak in his knees and he knew his resolve was crumbling as he felt his grip loosen up slowly, “…At least tell me your name. So I know who to look for in case you don’t show up.”
He didn’t know why he worded himself like that because, really, this guy was in no position to propose any sort of deals. Taehyun was the authority and that stranger was a suspect at best. But he felt like everything else was wrong and for some odd reason found himself staring back at him in a way too soft and carefree manner.
The stranger hesitated for a moment before eventually nodding. He could’ve easily broke free from Taehyun’s grip now to make a run for it but he didn’t move as he responded: “Beomgyu. Choi Beomgyu. That’s my name. Remember it, Taehyun-ah.”
Taehyun let go of his hand and as he blinked, Beomgyu was already out of his sight; gone just as fast as he had appeared.
It didn’t occur to him until much later that he had never told him his name and also didn’t wear anything on him that revealed it. He shrugged it off; he must’ve told him at some point.
-
Lee Yujin died due to suffocation; her neck was broken but it was not the cause of death.
Taehyun knew as much.
That was what he knew and that was what Soobin had told him that night, when he had called to ask about Lee Yujin’s forensic report because he couldn’t sleep.
Which was weird because he felt drained – drained mentally and physically, as if someone sucked all of his energy out. And yet, even with how tired and heavy his body felt, he couldn’t bring himself to fall asleep. The few times he had fallen asleep, he had startled out of very random and bizarre dreams.
He was no stranger to nightmares, had been diagnosed of insomnia during his teenager years even; but he hadn’t had any dreams like that in almost ten years and therefore didn’t have any medication for it other than valerian to calm his mind a little bit. Not like it seemed to help much.
Yeonjun’s look when he let himself fall into his office chair a whole two hours late for work was enough to let him know he wasn’t only fucked but also looked horrible as well.
Namjoon had then appeared like the robotic chief he was to reprimand him about duties and all of that, only to falter in his probably well-prepared dad/chief-speech as soon as he saw how absolutely done Taehyun looked. He had even asked him if he wanted to go home because apparently, he looked that horrible.
But Taehyun needed to work. He couldn’t go back home and attempt to get some sort of sleep; it would mess up his sleep schedule. He’ll get through this day, work a little slower than usual (or maybe not at all, who knows), get his medicine for insomnia from his pharmacy on his way home and hopefully get back the lost hours of sleep afterwards.
“She was alive…”, Taehyun mumbled to himself, intensely staring at the forensic report Kai had very graciously printed out for him, for once not complaining about it (looking like absolute shit sure had its perks). He compared Lee Yujin’s report to Kim Hwayoung’s and hated how similar they were except for the body’s state as the forensic doctors had worked on them. Soobin’s work also tended to be cleaner and more thorough than that other dude’s – Taehyun didn’t remember his name but he knew that he hated him and his reports. Which is why he often called Soobin again to check on whatever the hell the other one was talking about.
But not right now.
He couldn’t ask Soobin again if he were sure this was right because the elder would most definitely chop his head off if he asked one more time.
It just didn’t make sense.
Not at all.
No one at the dormitory had seen anyone entering or leaving Yujin’s room. Neither before she had apparently suddenly screamed in historical panic, neither afterwards. There had been a bunch of people in front of the door, Taehyun knew and remembered as much; enough for them to stare and someone to even get a teacher and the security of the campus.
Although CCTV could very much be fabricated, there were also no signs of anyone leaving or entering the room around the time Yujin must’ve called Taehyun. No one but her entered the room. Not an hour earlier, not two hours earlier. Her room was on the third floor and had one window – there was no way anyone would’ve been capable of sneaking their way in there through that without the security seeing or noticing.
Yujin had been alone.
And yet, she died due to suffocation.
Soobin had regretfully admitted that they’d have to call it a natural death because there were no reasons for them to assume she or Kim Hwayoung had been murdered by anyone. You’d see that – and Taehyun knew because he had seen Yujin alive. When Beomgyu had walked in and touched her to do whatever the fuck he did she had been alive. Alive enough to scream at the top of her lungs, stare back at Beomgyu for a long moment before finally dying, just like that.
No one had strangled her.
But to Taehyun, none of what had happened had looked like a natural death either.
Yeonjun seemed unconvinced as well but he had refused to elaborate on his thoughts and merely remained silent as Heeseung and Jungwon kept telling each other that this could happen to someone who suffocated for no real reason other than the universe hating you and having you die just like that. They had obviously tried to convince themselves and it had worked on them. But not on Taehyun and most certainly not on Yeonjun.
The problem was that no other explanation made sense – even when the natural caused death also didn’t make a lot of sense.
Juridically, no one killed Yujin.
Juridically, Kim Hwayoung had not been strangled to death.
Their necks broke for unknown reasons while they suffocated to death due to natural causes. Sudden death, caused by stress and overworking – that was what was noted in the reports. It made sense if you wouldn’t have seen what Taehyun and Yeonjun saw and it made sense if you didn’t think about it twice because students tend to overwork and they do die because of that.
But not in a span of two weeks. Not two people who were reportedly weird for months. Not just like that with the same cause of death. These were just too many coincidences at once and Taehyun knew that he knew it – but he couldn’t explain himself what else would make it make more sense.
Or maybe, he was just too rational to admit that something was fucking off.
His eyes drifted over to Case 136111 – he had not yet been added to the clown-board because he hadn’t opened it yet and also didn’t give it back. Which meant he had kept it for the longest time since forever; although he hadn’t worked on solving it and merely ignored it while trying to ignore the other case he couldn’t solve by working on cases he could solve.
Like grandmas being robbed on the busy streets of Seoul or teenagers spraying penises on school walls.
With a sigh, and in hopes to seem less like a lunatic and more like a detective, he reached over to open the (awfully) thin file.
His eyes quickly skipped through the report written around 23 years ago and he wasn’t particularly interested until he recognized something he had heard before.
“[…] found dead in her apartment only two minutes away from the university at around noon. No witnesses, no suspects, no clues. No hints at burglary or forceful entering of the apartment. Case dismissed as of 14.02 due to lack of evidence.”
With quick fingers and focused gaze, Taehyun flipped the page over and stared at the autopsy report on the next paper, eyes widening. He flipped over again, reading the second case belonging to that file and compared this victim’s autopsy report to the one prior. He did that with all five victims and stood up so abruptly that he had Yeonjun flinch in shock, Kai drop down from his sleeping position on his chair a good three meters away from him and Jungwon dropping his seemingly just prepared cup of tea.
“Oh my god”, he whispered and stared at the pages spread across his desk. This had to be a joke. The universe was playing tricks on him – there was no fucking way. No way this happened right now. No. This was just…too much of a coincidence to be real.
“…I think he might’ve finally lost it…”, he could hear Kai whisper to Yeonjun and he knew he saw the Sergeant nod along quietly in his peripheral.
But he didn’t exactly care as he abruptly looked up, ready to explain himself – when suddenly, he heard someone say behind him: “I found you, Taehyun-ah.”
His head whipped around fast enough to have his muscles crack loudly. He winced at the feeling (and the sound in his own ears), staring back at Beomgyu.
Just like yesterday, he had that effortless beauty to himself, a weird kind of grace even though he didn’t seem to hold himself in any special, elegant way. His smile was gentle and although there was that soft spark in his eyes again, the smile didn’t really reach all of his face and Taehyun just knew that he was tired, exhausted and drained.
Kind of like he himself felt, only that Beomgyu still managed to look good while he himself looked like a gremlin.
Once again, he needed a moment to catch himself and even longer to realize that Beomgyu just finding him and knowing his name was not something he should be this chill about. If anything, seeing as he was a detective, he should be very much worried about it. Or at least suspicious of him.
Instead, he malfunctioned again: “…You wear glasses.”
Beomgyu blinked at that and then giggled quietly before nodding, the round, rimmed glassed slightly sliding down the bridge of his nose with the movement of his head, “I usually wear contacts but I had a horribly bad night and was too lazy to care about it today. How have you been, Taehyun-ah?”
All of a sudden, he was way too close once more. Taehyun instinctively found himself inhaling the scent of freshly shampooed hair and something that must just be Beomgyu.
He rated the scent as something he’d like to wake up with and the thought startled him.
At least enough to stop the malfunctions in his brain and slowly have his usual, normal, work-mode to start back up, “…How…do you know my name? And where I work?”
It was hard to focus with Beomgyu so close and Taehyun really didn’t know why he allowed this man to even be so close in the first place. But he couldn’t find it in himself to push him away or even step back on his own accord – his feet stayed rooted, as if something held him from moving away and he wasn’t all that mad at it either.
“…It’s not hard to find you once you know where to look. Detective Kang Taehyun – one of the most promising detectives of Seoul’s main murder department”, Beomgyu responded. His voice was softer than when he had disappeared yesterday but there was still a slight hint of tiredness in it along with dark circles under the round, dark eyes.
Taehyun noticed how Beomgyu still didn’t answer how he knew his name in the first place because he was pretty sure that not many people would just recognize his face for that one quote about him Namjoon had proudly stated to the press around two years ago. But once again, he found himself doing things he shouldn’t and usually wouldn’t do and decided to not note it in his brain or even take a lot of notice on the fact that Beomgyu avoided his question skillfully.
“You promised to explain. I hope your explanation is good because you’re a main-suspect as of right now”, he said.
Okay, his detective-mode was back and running.
For now.
Beomgyu hummed and stepped around Taehyun towards the interrogation room and he wasn’t sure if the stranger just knew where it was or merely guessed where he had to go. It wasn’t until then that Taehyun realized pretty much the whole office was staring at them. He sent them quick glares and everyone sheepishly pretended to go back to work (except for Huening Kai and Yeonjun, who both shamelessly continued to watch their exchange as if it were the most interesting drama they had seen in a while).
“I guess that pretends on whether your energy is as promising as I expect it to be.”
Even in a shitty lightened interrogation room, Beomgyu managed to look a little bit like a fairy. He sat down at the metal desk with his fingers fiddling on the surface and even with the nervous habit, he seemed rather calm. Taehyun considered playing the bad cop but for some odd reason he couldn’t find it in himself when Beomgyu looked up at him from his seat through round, expecting eyes. He cleared his voice and sat down in front of him with his laptop, prepared to type down the answers to his usual questions.
“…This isn’t an official interrogation but I’ll still let you know; you have the right to remain silent. Everything you say can and will be used against you in court if needed”, he pressed out and cursed himself for suddenly feeling like his throat was drier than a desert.
Beomgyu silently nodded and answered when Taehyun asked him to introduce himself fully, “Choi Beomgyu, born in Daegu on 13th March, 27 years old, working as a producer.”
Taehyun finished writing along and made sure to sound as neutral as possible when he asked his next question. “How do you know Lee Yujin?”
“…I’ve met her for the first time around one and a half weeks ago. She called me for advice regarding something she was worried about and I tried to help her as good as I can”, when Taehyun looked up with a raised eyebrow, Beomgyu had a guilty expression on his face, “…I was too later though.”
“…Why would you have your number if you didn’t know her before? And what exactly did you help her out with?”
Beomgyu looked up at him, the guilt now gone and instead replaced by a weird void in his eyes. Taehyun decided that he didn’t like that look in his eyes at all, “I don’t think I can tell you that, Detective Kang.”
He didn’t press on it and merely typed in N/A, seeing as Beomgyu didn’t have to answer the questions; he had the right to remain silent after all, as mentioned. He still made sure to remember it though.
“Do you know a person called Kim Hwayoung?”, he wondered.
The void look in Beomgyu’s eyes seemed to get even worse and Taehyun had to bite his tongue to prevent himself from dismissing this question again. “Yujin-ah told me about her. There was nothing I could’ve done to help Hwayoung-ssi when I learned about her though.”
Why would he have to help anyway?
Taehyun stared back at Beomgyu silently for a few moments before saying: “In Yujin’s dorm, you held me off from touching her. Why did you do that?”
To his surprise, Beomgyu remained silent. He didn’t avoid his stare but he also didn’t say anything.
Taehyun tried it with a different question, “What have you done when you touched her? Why was she still alive and what was the reason for her sudden death?”
He knew that Beomgyu possibly didn’t have a reasonable answer for that last question but he also didn’t ask it to know about it – he wanted to see what the elder would do if he was cornered like that.
Beomgyu though wasn’t bothered by the pushy demeanor and instead merely stared back into his eyes as he responded: “You tell me. You had an autopsy done on both, Lee Yujin and Kim Hwayoung. You got the reports today and compared them. What was it that killed them both?”
Taehyun found himself getting irritated because how in the name of god did he know that? How did he know his name, how did he know where to look for his workplace? How did he know about the autopsy reports?
There was no way he could’ve known any of this just like that, not even if it were a mere hunch. But their office was highly guarded and not any idiot could just waltz right in and listen to them talking about murder cases.
In any other situation, probably with any other person, he would’ve lost his cool by now. But as agitated as he was, Taehyun realized that it had less to do with Beomgyu’s behavior and more with the simple fact that he didn’t seem to want to tell him. It bothered him that Beomgyu didn’t open up to him for the wrong reasons and once again, Taehyun couldn’t quite pin-point why exactly that was.
He huffed out a breath and let his hands leave his laptop’s keyboard to instead cross his arms in front of his chest. Beomgyu had let his eyes trail the movement of his limbs but he chose to not dwell on it and instead said: “Why did you apologize to Yujin-ssi when she died?”
There was no reason for him to ask this.
It wouldn’t really help his work neither did it really influence anything. He should’ve asked Beomgyu what he had done the last two weeks. Or where he had been around the time Hwayoung died. He should’ve asked about a liable alibi that would support Beomgyu’s answers and proof he had nothing to do with the deaths of these two. But for some odd reason, Taehyun didn’t feel like he needed to ask any of this because he didn’t suspect him. Which was ridiculous; Beomgyu was the most suspicious person they’ve found to interrogate in these cases. He appeared out of nowhere, did some weird stuff with Yujin and then proceeded to disappear again like he had never been there to begin with. He knew stuff about Taehyun that he couldn’t just know and all of this seemed too much of a coincidence to mean absolutely nothing and he should be more than just a little suspicious of him. And yet, even with all of that, Beomgyu had promised him to come and find him the next day and he did. He had answered his questions truthfully (seeing as there was data about him in their archives when he earlier typed it in). He wasn’t uncooperative, just…a little secretive.
That wasn’t exactly something Taehyun could blame him for though and out of a legal view, he didn’t even have any real reason to interrogate him. Yujin may have died yesterday but the autopsy report had already revealed that she had apparently died of a natural death. There was no interrogation needed and Namjoon would probably soon tell him to close the case.
It would become another mysterious death-series, just like Case 136111, a case that had never been truly solved but called off for a lack of evidence and suspects. Taehyun hated it when he couldn’t solve cases because it always left him feeling like there was something he missed, something he didn’t see, something he could’ve done better. He did become a detective after all to catch these nasty bastards and not being able to do so left a bitter taste in his mouth. He knew now that he couldn’t catch them all and failing was part of his job. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t be disappointed about it.
Beomgyu hesitated for a long time to respond and Taehyun found himself not particularly being bothered by it. He had time. This was not a race against time and besides, he admittedly liked to take in the elder’s soft facial features.
Maybe a little bit too much.
When Beomgyu finally opened his mouth to answer, he sounded shy and a little bit scared, “…You wouldn’t believe me, even if I told you.”
“…Try it then. If I don’t believe you that’s a me-problem, isn’t it?”, he said with a shrug.
But Beomgyu nibbled on his lip and shook his head slowly. He suddenly looked so small in that chair; like the dull light above the table wasn’t strong enough to hold off the shadows around him, like the pressure of this world was resting on his shoulders and he was about to get crushed by it. “You’ll think I’m crazy. And then you’ll call the authorities, lock me up in some mental health ward and declare me mentally ill.”
What kind of person did he think Taehyun was?
“…I thought you liked my aura?”, he said and that had Beomgyu perk up a little bit, round eyes staring back at him with a glossy layer over them – he looked close to crying and Taehyun decided yet again that he absolutely did not like that look on his face, “I may not agree with everything people say or believe in but that doesn’t give me the right to judge anyone. I won’t call you crazy. And I won’t call authorities to have you locked up in a mental health clinic.”
Beomgyu was very visibly still not sure what to do. But eventually, he took a deep breath and then, after licking his dry lips and swallowing heavily, finally said: “…Ghosts. I can see and communicate with ghosts. And I apologized to Yujin because she had asked me to help her with a demonic power and I was too late. She died because I underestimated the kind of entity she dealt with and-…you think I’m absolutely mental.”
Okay.
Taehyun knew for a fact that his face very clearly displayed how utterly ridiculous he thought that sounded. And, yeah, okay, he had promised he wouldn’t judge him but could he really be blamed for staring at Beomgyu the way he did after hearing all of that?
But he had promised it and the hurt expression on Beomgyu’s face made him feel even worse than the possibility of this case being ended and closed with the way it was. And so, he sighed, gave himself a mental slap and said: “…Okay. I-…well, I admit, I did not expect that. But I am willing to…listen. And maybe you can convince me…”
Beomgyu’s glossy eyes had a sudden layer of confidence in them as he nodded, stood up and walked around the desk towards Taehyun, who was startled enough to lean back against his chair as soon as the elder was all up in his space – again!
He gulped and stared back into Beomgyu’s eyes as the elder said: “…I can prove it to you. But…it’ll feel weird. Just…don’t freak out…?”
That was not something you told a skeptic man when someone who was absolutely enchanting for no reason other than just looking beautiful stood right in front of said man. He wanted to back out again because he thought about it and figured he really didn’t want to know more but Beomgyu already leaned closer, one hand coming up to touch his wrist again and this time, there was no glove in-between.
The touch sent a shiver down his spine, electrifying his body in the weirdest way and he felt hot all over; just like before, Beomgyu’s touch was soothing and yet exciting at the same time. He was way too close for someone Taehyun didn’t know and yet, like before, he couldn’t be bothered to move or push him away – he was rooted to the chair as if something rendered him motionless, held his muscles in place and stopped him from moving a single inch.
“Close your eyes”, Beomgyu said in a soft timbre, the earlier hearable tiredness to his voice completely gone.
He really didn’t know why because Taehyun didn’t believe in stupid hocus-pocus – but he found himself closing his eyes and as soon as he did, he suddenly heard a weird noise in his head; like a whisper, somehow loud and yet not loud enough at all. It had him shivering once again and he now felt Beomgyu’s whole hand wrapping around his wrist in a soft grip.
The voice he heard as a whisper earlier now sounded a lot clearer and he startled slightly when he finally understood what it said: “Taehyun-ie, are you going to help me collect some strawberries in the garden?”
It took a couple seconds for him to really recognize the voice but as soon as he did, he felt the strong need to open his eyes again. Beomgyu’s grip around his wrist tightened just the tiniest bit and he found himself unable to open his eyes, especially when the elder said: “…Don’t open your eyes abruptly; you’ll scare her away otherwise. Do it slowly, like stroking a flower’s petal.”
Taehyun found himself following the words and slowly blinked his eyes open. The room was the same as before and yet it looked completely different. When he turned his head to the source of the voice, he was indeed met with the silhouette of his grandmother – whom he had last seen when she had died around twelve years ago. He always used to visit his grandparent’s cottage over summer and helped them in the garden. His grandmother used to have these rows of strawberry-bushes, from which he often picked and ate some.
His grandmother had her lips suddenly forming an O-shape as she seemed to realize Taehyun could see her and he couldn’t help but mirror her expression.
She frowned softly, “Omo – this young man must’ve helped you. But you shouldn’t trespass these thin lines for too long, dearest.”
Beomgyu’s touch tightened again and when Taehyun blinked again, his grandmother was gone – with her, the elder softly pulled away from him and suddenly, the room looked like he was used to; dull and with the shitty lights dangling above the metal desk illuminating it just enough to make it seem scary.
“She’s around you a lot”, Beomgyu said, a little bit out of breath, “What a kind soul indeed.”
Taehyun didn’t know what to say and he really would’ve prepared to not have seen his dead grandma because it spooked him out more than he’d like to admit. But at the same time, seeing her had left him with a kind of warm feeling.
He willed himself to calm down and not freak out like Beomgyu had asked him to.
“…Okay. Yeah that was...interesting. Really interesting, not spooky at all.”
“…I usually don’t show people their ancestors like this but she was here right now and I figured you wouldn’t believe me otherwise”, Beomgyu said sheepishly and despite his own sudden paleness, he filled a glass of water with the jar for him, handing it over to Taehyun with a soft smile.
He took a couple sips and stared at Beomgyu warily before placing the glass down on the table and standing up to step closer for once. The elder leaned back against the table in an attempt to lean out of his way but he clearly couldn’t step back any more than this.
“So you see ghosts, you talk to them and you try to tell me Kim Hwayoung and Lee Yujin died because of a fucking demon?”, he repeated, just to make sure he wasn’t high on something.
Beomgyu swallowed and at this point, he was almost sitting on the desk, “…I-…yes? Could you please not…get so close? Your energy is really…uhm…tempting.”
Taehyun narrowed his eyes at him, “Okay I believe you for now. But you’ll follow me in this investigation and explain the things you see and know.”
Despite Beomgyu’s attempts to look everywhere but Taehyun’s way, he nodded sheepishly, a healthy redness sneaking onto his otherwise pale skin. He finally backed off and held the glass of water up for Beomgyu to drink from it, “Is it possible that dealing with these kinds of things is tiring for you?”
The elder took a quiet sip and smiled softly, “…Yes. I usually really don’t touch people that often because I tend to dry them of their energy or show them things they shouldn’t see. I guess you probably had a very rough night as well, I apologize for that. I didn’t mean to but for some reason, your energy really messes with mine…”
Taehyun found himself having to admit that he believed the whole ghost thing even more now, if only because Beomgyu knew about his sleepless night and he knew that he didn’t look as horrible as Yeonjun and Namjoon said he did; they just liked to overreact.
“If it’s worth anything, I find myself doing things for you without even realizing so we’re both a little confused”, he said and immediately blinked when he realized that these words had actually just left his mouth. Beomgyu stared at him in amusement and he rolled his eyes, “…Like I did just now.”
They both startled out of the comfortable staring they had going on when Yeonjun’s voice echoed through the corners of the interrogation room through the speakers attached to their wall, “Yeah so, this was cute while it lasted but I don’t feel like watching you both fuck on the table so don’t do this and count me and Kai in on the ghost hunt!”
Fuck.
Taehyun groaned.
He had completely forgotten about the camouflage window behind him, where Yeonjun and Kai probably watched them and listened to the whole interrogation – therefore also saw what kind of ridiculous shit Taehyun allowed himself to do and say. He would never hear the end of it.
---
When we all fall asleep, where do we go?
Right from the start Taehyun knew that Yeonjun and Beomgyu would rob him of his last nerve.
While they had collectively decided to like each other for the sole reason that their surnames were Choi, they also started fighting over the smallest, stupidest things – all while Huening Kai managed to establish a sense of brotherly friendship that wasn’t deadly with the elder.
Kai unfortunately had to stay at the office because he was Namjoon’s secretary first and foremost; but he’ll also cover for Taehyun’s and Yeonjun’s unreasonable absence. When Taehyun had attempted telling Namjoon about their new developments in the case, Yeonjun had held him off by simply shrugging and say they’d just do whatever.
He knew this would bite them in the ass later unless they would really end up solving this thing because without an official yes from their chief they technically weren’t allowed to investigate people, their apartments or lives.
On their way to their first destination – Kim Hwayoung’s apartment, which was still filled with her belongings since her family hadn’t yet managed to deal with it – he complained about Yeonjun’s behavior, “You’re our Sergeant! How can you dismiss Namjoon’s authority like this! I don’t know how you worked your way up to this position!”
“…Chillax, Hyun. He’ll reward us as soon as we solved this case and especially Case 136111! Who would’ve thought that your bad luck in rock-paper-scissors would lead us to understand the clown-case!”, Yeonjun said and explained the situation to Beomgyu when he asked about it in confusion.
Something they technically also shouldn’t do because Beomgyu had no business with detailed police work whatsoever but why not break some more rules while at it, right?
“We don’t even know if we can and will solve these cases”, he said and parked his car a good block down the street from where Hwayoung’s apartment was located.
As they walked up the stairs, Yeonjun waved it off yet again, petting Beomgyu’s shoulder a little bit too hard without even noticing, a broad smile on his lips, “No worries, we got our psychic Beomgyu who’ll talk to the dead and solve it for us!”
Beomgyu frowned as they stepped inside the apartment with a spare key (the one they should’ve returned by now but didn’t because Heeseung forgot about it), “That’s not really how it works though…I can’t like…just ask stuff and they tell me, I feel their presence and try to communicate with them. It works a lot less than you might think.”
Yeonjun probably ended up as their Sergeant because he was an optimistic idiot at best.
They searched the apartment for something they hadn’t seen before although the only reason they even went back to Hwayoung’s place was that Beomgyu said he could maybe find something beneficial in here regarding her and Yujin. So the two detectives really only had to wait for the psychic to feel something or see something or whatever.
“So…did you suddenly wake up one morning and saw a ghost or how did you end up with this kind of special superpower?”, Yeonjun asked, genuinely interested as it seemed.
Taehyun was also not uninterested but had refrained from asking for his own well-being – he was still convinced he’d be happier if he would’ve had no idea about any of this.
“I was born with it”, Beomgyu said and smiled sheepishly, hands tracing an emptied shelf and frowning at the dust that had already collected there, “My family has it running in their blood. I’m not entirely sure for how long but my mother told me that we’re the descendants of witches. Our abilities are very limited now though…”
Witches.
A mere 24 hours ago, Taehyun would’ve fucking laughed at everyone who told him he had the bloodline of ancient witches. But now, he found himself merely nodding along, interested in what Beomgyu was talking about and listening intently as he continued speaking: “It’s not the same for all of us; my siblings can do different things than me, my mother was capable of stronger things – our abilities get weaker with every new generation.”
Yeonjun stared in awe: “Woah, that’s so cool! All my parents gave me was a headache and my grandpa’s old apartment. What are your abilities?”
“Well my elder sister can actively see and talk to ghosts. She often drags them along and get’s too attached to them – she’s also very earth-bound with her abilities. A lot of…centering yourself, focusing on your roots and the connection to nature. My elder brother has a lot of dreams and foreseeing through that – I sometimes accidentally see him astral-projecting at the most random moments…he loses control a lot depending on his emotions and physical health”, Beomgyu closed one of the cupboards in the kitchen with a pout before turning around and pointing at himself with a sheepish smile, “I work a lot with energy. Through it, I usually recognize emotions and connect to the afterlife. If I focus well enough, I can also heal people or calm them down. It’s very tiring because I don’t really know how to control it sometimes. When I enter certain places or touch specific items, I get impressions of the energy in form of physical signs; like a headache or a shiver or a sudden thought in my head. My ability is usually more attuned to the underworld and the dark though.”
This whole topic would’ve really thrilled Kai and Taehyun was suddenly reminded of the talk they had had about the Ouija-board Jungwon had found in the apartment – the universe really did like to make fun of him in the worst ways.
He stopped in his movement and turned 180 degrees to instead look at the bedroom door, “The board”, he said and Yeonjun also had an aha-moment, both of them dragging a startled Beomgyu along.
As soon as they stepped into the room though, Beomgyu’s feet skidded to an abrupt stop and his hand had shot out to stop him from following them inside by holding him off by the doorframe. He stared ahead, his head slowly turning towards the closet, all color draining from his face as he shakily said: “Something…evil is in there. I feel…sick. It’s the same energy. The same one Yujin had attached to her when I attempted helping her, although it had already been weaker then.”
Taehyun didn’t know if it was because Beomgyu’s free hand had shot out to latch onto his wrist or because he somehow started being more attuned to things but he also didn’t like this room one bit. His head was throbbing softly with a headache, not yet enough to be bothersome but enough to make itself known.
He attempted stepping more into the room to retrieve the board but Beomgyu’s grip tightened and he looked like he was scared to death.
Yeonjun wordlessly walked over as Taehyun remained standing close to the elder, softly pushing him back from the room a little and staying in his proximity to calm him down. His own heartbeat was going at it way too fast and he didn’t even realize until he saw how heavy Beomgyu was breathing.
The gasp Beomgyu let out when Yeonjun stepped around with the board in his hand had them both jump a little bit.
Beomgyu stared at the board and seemed ready to make a run for it. Just when Taehyun wanted to suggest that they should leave, the apartment’s door slammed shut, the shutters fell down and it was completely dark in the room after the sound of curtains also zipping closed. By now, Beomgyu had gripped onto Taehyun’s shirt as well and he was shaking.
It was eerily quiet for a moment, nothing but their own sharp breathing being heard.
“…They didn’t end the session”, Beomgyu shakily whispered and when Taehyun turned to look at him (although he could barely make out his silhouette), he realized that the elder was still staring at the board Yeonjun held in his hands, “They called for someone and they didn’t end the session; now the Ouija-board is its door to our world-…”
He was interrupted by the sudden loud static rustling of the TV, suddenly turned on with a video playing a moment later. It illuminated the room just enough for them to make out the edges of the couch and the small coffee-table in front of it.
Taehyun would’ve focused on the video playing if it weren’t for the silhouette sitting in front of the couch – the exact place Hwayoung’s body had been in when they found it. Only that Hwayoung’s body had long since been picked up and examined by forensic doctors. He tried to will himself to calm down because there was no fucking way the silhouette suddenly stood up and turned around. The grip Beomgyu had on his shirt intensified and Taehyun knew for a fact that the fabric ripped. Not like he cared much when the silhouette started moving closer and Beomgyu started trembling so much, his knees were knocking against each other.
“Beomgyu”, Taehyun tried getting his attention but the elder was not responding. He didn’t know what this thing was, who it was or what it wanted but he didn’t need more evidence to know that in here, something he couldn’t understand had killed Kim Hwayoung. He therefore concluded that this thing, whatever it was, would probably be very much capable of hurting them if it wanted to. With a little bit more eagerness in his voice, he attempted shaking Beomgyu out of it again; but to no avail.
Finally having enough because there was no way in hell he’d watch this silhouette any longer when a loud crack resounded through the room and he saw the thing’s head unnaturally bent, he turned Beomgyu around and grabbed his hands in his – he had no clue about this shit but if he knew one thing, it was that Beomgyu worked with energy. Maybe, his oh so bright energy would help him?
He didn’t think it would work until Beomgyu’s void eyes seemed to get some sort of emotion back and he blinked himself out of it, staring back at Taehyun after inhaling a sharp breath.
With a determination in his eyes, he turned back around to face the thing and Taehyun really almost fucking jumped out of his skin when he realized it stood right in front of them.
But Beomgyu stared back, unafraid, his voice a low timbre when he spat out: “I don’t want you here. You do not belong here and I will not allow you to hurt me. Leave. Now.”
It took a couple more seconds but the static of the TV stopped a moment later and the silhouette disappeared with a last loud slam as the door was ripped open, curtains abruptly opening again and letting a little bit of the daylight filter in through the cracks in the shutters.
“Holy fucking shit”, Yeonjun said after a long minute of silence in which they all kind of tried to calm down from this whole thing, “What in the name of god was that?!”
Beomgyu stomped over to the shutters with Taehyun duckling after him (seeing as their hand was still intertwined), starting to let the natural light back in by opening the shutters again (with one hand).
Only when the apartment was filled with light again did Beomgyu allow himself to slowly untangle his fingers from Taehyun’s, resting his body against the edge of the small dining table.
He looked exhausted. And terrified.
“…You don’t even believe in god”, Taehyun said with a shaky sigh.
Yeonjun choked out a joyless laugh, “Well, I might convert then after this because that was some unholy shit”, he held up the board with a disgusted frown on his face, “Eww, I really don’t want to touch this. Can we burn it or something?”
Beomgyu shook his head tiredly, running a stressed hand through his hair, “We can’t just burn it. This board is the only open thing connecting the demon we just saw to the other side. We need to ban it again and close the séance properly.”
“Ha, yeah, sure. We. No. Not in my Christian household”, Yeonjun said but Taehyun knew he was joking around to defuse his own panic, “I am traumatized for the rest of my life. Is this what you have to deal with all the time? Because if yes, I’d rather not have your superpowers.”
The psychic frowned softly at that but although there was no real bite in it, he didn’t look all that happy at all, “…If I could, I would get rid of it. Not all ghosts are like this. Ghosts are humans – or at least, they once were. If humans are capable of doing evil things, so are ghosts…obviously. They have emotions and feelings and are much more fragile than one would think. It’s not like I never encountered rotten souls but this one…is bad. It was filled with…hatred and negative emotions and energy. It could’ve hurt us all, killed us all…but it left because we’re not its next victim. It’s already bound to someone else.”
Taehyun blinked and stared at Beomgyu, “…Is that why you didn’t want me to touch Yujin?”
Beomgyu nodded, a soft blush on his cheeks as he avoided his gaze, “I mean, maybe your energy would’ve been light enough to hold this thing off. But I wasn’t certain if Yujin could maybe still be saved and in that case, it would’ve just gone over to you. So I…held you off. But it seems like the demon already had a new human to latch onto.”
“Why does it do that though? Like I’m sorry bitch but you’re dead? Stay in your lane?”, Yeonjun hissed and he was now entering his petty anger-mode with which he tried acting like this was not a big deal at all when he probably almost passed out earlier.
Either way, it managed to tickle out a snort from Beomgyu as he replied to him a lot more serious though: “Because, like you just said; ghosts are dead. They do not belong in our world anymore. If they decide to roam around it’s usually only for a few moments. If they want to remain on this side of the afterlife, they need to stick to someone. More often than not, that is harmless; just some bored ghost sticking to someone, maybe messing a little bit with their stuff, being an annoying poltergeist. Most leave after a few days. But the thing Yujin and Hwayoung had summoned with the Ouija-board was not just some bored ghost or a friendly poltergeist; this is a hateful soul. A vengeful spirit, driven by its wish to get revenge. It has to stick to humans just like any normal ghost would but their negative souls drain the energy of people and eventually kills them.”
He pushed himself away from the table and walked over to the TV on still slightly shaky legs. Taehyun and Yeonjun followed (although probably for different reasons because Taehyun found himself mainly walking along because he wanted to be prepared in case Beomgyu’s knees would give up beneath his weight).
“Demons usually pick easy targets, by the way”, he said and sent them a meaningful side-glance, “Taehyun’s aura is naturally dominating and his energy his very light; it’s why it probably backed off when I regained my consciousness through your energy. Thanks for that by the way” – he smiled shortly at Taehyun and then turned his gaze onto Yeonjun – “Your energy is…well. It’s also very light. Not easy to get through. Kai would’ve probably passed out.”
Touché.
Beomgyu leaned down to a CD-recorder and pressed the button to open up, revealing a blank CD; there was nothing on it, not even a scribbled-down name.
He took it out and hesitated for a moment before finally straightening up again, narrowing his eyes at the CD, “…I think this is the video that was playing earlier. We should watch it.”
-
The video turned out to be nothing but a recording of a hospital of some sorts. Taehyun had never seen it before, neither had Yeonjun and they were both convinced this place either didn’t exist anymore or was too far away for any of them to have been there. The recording seemed old, even for a CD, and he was almost certain that it was converted from a VHS to a DVD-data.
For about three weeks, they tried finding hints and whatnot to somehow get the hang out of their situation but they didn’t really know where to start or what to do – which is why these three weeks mainly consisted of going to work, getting to know each other and paying for Yeonjun’s meals (that was mainly Taehyun but okay).
It was evening now and although Taehyun didn’t know why, everyone had agreed to come over to his apartment to talk about this – that included Soobin, who had whined about being excluded of the ghost-stuff because of course Kai had told him all about it.
Snitch.
Not like Yeonjun’s whipped ass didn’t immediately call the forensic doctor to tell him all about how he, quote, “Almost fucking died because of a stupid demon”.
These three really destroyed Taehyun’s braincells.
Just as expected, Namjoon had questioned Yeonjun’s absence (not Taehyun’s though because Kai had told the chief he had gone home to get rest). As a punishment, Yeonjun was told to work over-time and so, Beomgyu was currently the only one at Taehyun’s apartment. Taehyun had started preparing a mind-map for his thoughts, pinning down people’s printed out pictures to the location they had been found, connecting them with strings of different colors, writing down stuff on paper to attach it if needed.
“I’ve only ever seen such things in movies”, Beomgyu said, suddenly standing right next to Taehyun. He didn’t even flinch anymore, somehow completely at ease with the proximity and used to the warmth it provided, even if they didn’t touch. It should confuse him because he usually wasn’t that much into close proximity and touching – for some reason, it didn’t bother him with the psychic though. It felt natural; almost as if they had known each other for years, “Does this really help or are you trying to impress me?”
Taehyun snorted softly – was he flirting?
But he answered anyway, while attaching the word, ‘Ouija’, to Kim Hwayoung’s picture, preparing a green string to connect it with Yujin located at the SNU, “It’s not just to look fancy. The map helps visualizing a serial killers steps. In this case, seeing as we assume this is a paranormal murder, I’m trying to see a pattern; why Yujin and Hwayoung? Why the Ouija-board? Why this CD? Why a recording of a clinic? I’m trying to connect the dots in a visual way, you could say.”
To underline his statement, he finished wrapping the green string around Yujin’s pin, successfully creating a connection with it.
Beomgyu stared in wonder and then turned his gaze to the table, eyeing the file for Case 136111. He carefully opened it up, studying the reports of the five victims, “…Is this the infamous clown-case, as Yeonjun-hyung had called it?”
He nodded and joined Beomgyu at the table, finding himself standing closer than necessary as well – he didn’t back away though, “I noticed that the autopsy reports were similar to Yujin’s and Hwayoung’s. No one could solve this case in over twenty years – but maybe it was because no one considered the possibility of the serial killer not being alive anymore? Why would anyone think of that in the first place…right?”
Beomgyu turned his head to look at him and it was now that Taehyun really noticed how near they were. He felt the elder’s breath hit his cheek, that’s how close they were. He suddenly found himself wondering if Beomgyu also stepped this close all the time before even realizing that he did.
“…You’re a lot more accepting of all of this than I would’ve thought”, Beomgyu said and his voice was low – maybe because he was partially distracted by something on Taehyun’s face he refused to acknowledge, maybe because they were close enough to just hear each other.
Taehyun shrugged softly, “Well…you showed me my dead grandmother, had me almost getting killed by a demon and were the cause of my sleepless night, all in less than 24 hours. I guess even my rational detective-brain can’t deny all of that. Besides, I had a couple weeks to get used to all of this by now.”
They stared at each other for a few more moments in comfortable silence, until Beomgyu’s cheeks turned a rosy shade again and he looked away, seemingly distracting himself with the files by reading through them.
He suddenly frowned at something he read and tugged on Taehyun’s shirt softly, finger pointing to a particular part of the report, “Is this…a mental health clinic?”
Taehyun followed his finger and read the line: ‘Institution for Psychological Healing’. He mirrored Beomgyu’s frown and checked the other pages, but there was no such thing mentioned in the reports of any of the other victims.
He quickly sent Kai a message to check these victim’s records and data about this institution, also reading through the things they had gathered from Hwayoung and Yujin.
“I found it”, Beomgyu said, his phone in hand – he must’ve googled it and read out loud, “’The Institution for Psychological Healing’, founded in 1893, used to be one of the biggest Mental Asylums in South Korea. Up until 1957, it had been called the ‘Seoul Mental Asylum’, later changed its name due to public opinions though. In 1998, the Institution had to close its doors due to forbidden lobotomy and various questionable, inhuman practices on patients.”
Inhuman practices on patients?
Taehyun already didn’t like the sounds of that.
He eyed Beomgyu’s phone for the institution’s former location and searched it on his map, pinning a small paper onto it when he found it.
It was in that moment that his apartment’s door opened and a bunch of noise entered; that being said, Yeonjun, Soobin and Hyuka walked in.
Kai was busy doing something on his laptop as best as he could while walking, probably what Taehyun had asked him for (no comment on how he managed to do that on his own laptop because they most certainly weren’t allowed to check citizen’s records and personal data like this but as mentioned before; why not break some more rules while at it?).
“…The video recording”, he said and stared at the pin he had just made, playing around with a black string in his hands, “Do you think it’s taking place at this asylum?”
Taehyun’s apartment was decent considering he lived here alone; a bedroom, a spacious living room, enough space for a dining area with a larger table and a very modern kitchen. It was minimalistic in this new, modern way but as Beomgyu had commented when he stepped in, it apparently suited Taehyun’s general vibe. He liked his apartment.
His friends did as well, seeing as they just waltzed in like they were the ones who paid for it monthly.
Unsurprisingly, Soobin and Beomgyu also hit it off quite fast, although rather awkwardly – but that didn’t really shock anyone.
“Your energy is full of a lot of things that aren’t yours”, Beomgyu had said and eyed Soobin from a distance, a wary expression on his face as he had probably unconsciously moved closer to Taehyun.
Soobin had merely smiled his dimpled smile, which had already been enough to have Beomgyu’s walls crumble slightly, even more so when the elder had answered: “It’s probably because I work as a forensic doctor – don’t worry, I am not attached to anyone I examine.”
That conversation had been odd but sadly enough by far not the weirdest thing Taehyun had heard or seen that day.
“So seeing as I now know why you were suddenly so interested in every victim’s possible relations to mental health clinics, I can finally tell you what I’ve found”, Kai said from his spot on Taehyun’s couch, long legs draped over the end of it and eating a lollipop. He popped it out of his mouth loudly, sitting up so everyone could hear him better, “Every single one of them, from the earliest victim of Case 136111 up to Lee Yujin used to be in a mental health institution before. Not only that; but the five victims from 136111 were all in that weird Mental Asylum you told us about.”
Taehyun scoffed and untangled the black string from his fingers, instead making a connection from the asylum to all of the victims of case 136111. He took a white string now, didn’t use it yet though as he asked Beomgyu: “…What happened to the old asylum? You said they closed business but is the building still standing or used?”
The psychic scrolled through his phone, “Uhm…yes and no. A year after the institution had to close business, they put in another mental health clinic. But it was closed again a few years ago for similar reasons, although these were accusations no one could prove; still, the business went downhill and they went bankrupt.”
He nodded to himself, using the white string to connect Yujin and Hwayoung to the institution as well while he talked, “This is what I think: Yujin and Hwayoung were two students of SNU, both studying veterinary medicine in the same year” – he pointed at Junseo’s picture, not connected to anyone specifically but the university – “up until, according to Junseo and several of their classmates and other students, four months ago. Suddenly, they went from being total opposites and strangers to secretive best friends. It is impossible for them to have attended the same mental health clinic, seeing as Hwayoung reportedly used to live in the US and attended SNU as an exchange student. But something connected them, enough to talk and become friends, enough to buy a Ouija-board and summon a demon that eventually ended up killing them both.”
“Okay then let’s say this is true”, Yeonjun said and stepped closer, obviously in his detective-mode and studying the pins and tags and pictures, “Let’s say that all of that is true and we disregard the unknown connection Yujin and Hwayoung had; why these people? What would this demon want? And can we really agree that the victims of Case 136111 died because of a ghost as well?”
They all turned to look at Beomgyu when he said: “…We could check the institution out? The building is still there, it’s just empty and unoccupied. Maybe I can find out something about the demon because, clearly, it has a connection to this mental health institution. Ghosts are often bound to places, regardless of how it changes. Besides…Hwayoung’s role in all of this is a little bit blurry to me. She is from the US – so she was either really unlucky or actually has a connection to Yujin and this demon.”
Taehyun pushed himself off of his table with a nod, “Alright then, we’ll split up; Beomgyu and me will check out the asylum. Yeonjun, I’d be very happy if you would pay another visit to the university. Beomgyu said that someone must’ve already been chosen as the next victim for this demon; which means someone touched Yujin before we arrived. We need to find this person so maybe, Beomgyu can help them before they die. We already lost a lot of time so get some help; I’m sure Heeseung and Jungwon will keep their mouths shut and help you with it.”
Yeonjun nodded along in agreement and wrote everything down in his notebook.
“Kai, it’d be nice if you could cover for me and Yeonjun some more and stay at the office to do research when we have something. Maybe even about the institution in general; who worked there, what exactly was the problem, the patients, the overall public’s opinion…anything you can find, everyone of interest”, he continued and let his gaze drag across the city map with a distracted frown. Huening Kai sent him an enthusiastic thumbs-up, “I’ll tell Namjoon you fell sick; he’ll believe that easily with how shitty you looked lately. And regarding Yeonjun…I’ll think of something, he’s used to him breaking rules anyway.”
They collectively ignored Yeonjun’s offended scoff.
Taehyun now addressed Soobin, “Hyung, it’d be really great if you could get your hands on the original autopsy reports of the five victims regarding Case 136111. I was supposedly working on it anyways and it’s not weird for people to ask about it from time to time so I don’t think your co-workers or the people at your archives will care that much or ask questions for that matter. Try to find anything that could hint at something that wasn’t paranormal; it has been over 20 years after all and things did change in medicine. Maybe you’ll see something that makes more sense than just a mysterious natural death.”
Soobin smiled and nodded softly.
With that, everyone finally left his apartment to go home and get some rest. It wasn’t even that late yet but with October now almost over, the days were shorter and the nights longer; Taehyun felt like he had been awake for weeks.
Beomgyu stopped at his door and turned around again, the other three already out of reach while discussing something ridiculous. He had a hesitant look on his face and Taehyun knew he had something to say.
“I’ll text you the details about when and where to meet tomorrow, okay?”, Beomgyu said and Taehyun nodded softly.
He lingered around for a little longer, obviously not sure if he should say what he wanted to say or not. Eventually, he reached into his bag and handed Taehyun a small stone – it was black, shiny and round, had a flat surface and looked quite fancy. “It’s an obsidian. I know that my touch lingers with you and my energy is messing with yours so you probably had a few sleepless nights ever since we met. I brought it along because obsidians have the energetic power to protect you from strange energies and energies you don’t want to come near you. It’s like a shield…”
Taehyun smiled softly and reached to take the obsidian from Beomgyu. Their fingers dragged against each other and their warmth lingered. “Thank you. I’ll keep it close at night.”
“…Sleep well, Tyun”, Beomgyu said softly and for a moment, he twitched as if he wanted to move forward or do something else. But then, his cheeks turned red again and he left the apartment.
“Good night, Gyu”, Taehyun replied.
He fell asleep easily that night with the lingering feeling of a shield around him and the warm safety of the knowledge that his energy was safe from any neck-cracking demons.
---
Good and evil is cloudy
The loud, constant dinging of his phone eventually woke Taehyun up. He groggily reached over to get the device, cursing himself for never turning it off at night. His eyes squinted at the brightness of his display; it was half past midnight.
A groan left his lips as he unlocked it and tabbed onto his messaging-app, yawning softly when he opened what seemed to be a bunch of messages from Beomgyu.
He needed a few moments to really comprehend what they said.
-Tyun…
-I think something’s in my room
-No, I know something’s in my room
-You’re probably asleep but it just really calms me down to text someone
-Oh god my light switch doesn’t work
-Something just slammed closed and I’m sure it was my bedroom door
-Could you check for the obsidian because there’s one under my pillow and I’m sure it's the one I gave you
-I-…
Taehyun stared at the messages and was suddenly wide-awake. His hands reached under his pillow, where he had placed the obsidian before falling asleep – but there was nothing there. Scrambling to get out of his bed, he attempted turning on his night-lamp; to no avail.
It was then that he realized something was off. Not just with Beomgyu, obviously so, but in general. His room was cold; colder than it should be with his heaters on and especially considering he was wrapped in his sheets like a fucking burrito.
He glanced at his phone again and saw that Beomgyu’s last message had been sent a mere two minutes ago. Which meant – even if it had been cut-off while texting him – he would probably still be active. Maybe.
Taehyun didn’t know if his trembling fingers came from the icy coldness in his bedroom or because of the slight movement he was pretty sure he could make out in his peripheral.
Although his message was delivered and apparently read by Beomgyu as well, he didn’t receive an answer.
The curse on the tip of his tongue died down when he heard a weird rustling and he couldn’t quite pinpoint if it sounded more like a death rattle or a heavy, way too deep exhale. Maybe he just had one too many conversations about ghosts and demons and now he had lucid dreams about it? Or he imagined sounds that weren’t there? Maybe, the rustling was nothing but his closed window letting in wind and playing with his curtains?
He almost wanted to laugh at himself because a mere month ago he would’ve just gone back to sleep, not even hearing things or waking up in the middle of the night for that matter. And here he was now, creating stupid imaginations and links to every possible horror movie he had ever seen.
It was cold enough in his room now to have small clouds of breath be visible in the air with every exhale he did and he really started to wonder why because there was no window open and it should not be this cold, not even if the heaters were broken. His apartment wasn’t luxurious but it was definitely modern enough to not let in more of the outside cold than it should.
Taehyun decided that he had had enough when he knew for a fact the thing in his peripheral was the source of the loud crack and it started walking towards his bed.
He had never before in his entire life stood up so fast to get out of his bedroom. Not like that really did anything for him because obviously, ghosts were a lot faster than humans and before he could even touch his closed door, something grabbed his shoulder, pushed him back and basically into his bedframe, causing him to stumble back onto his mattress with a huff.
Yeah, no. He most definitely did not expect that and he knew for a fact that the burning sensation on his shoulder was definitely a scratch of some sorts.
When he tried getting up to make a run for it again, his body couldn’t move though and the silhouette from earlier suddenly stood so close to him that he could feel its coldness at his legs – even through the woolen fabric of his favorite sweatpants.
“Pain…”, he heard the ugly rattling again, but this time, he actually understood what the demon was saying. It sounded like a woman’s voice, raspy and deep but…definitely a woman. Maybe he would’ve found it in himself to feel pity for her with the way she whimpered and rattled out the word ‘pain’ again and again. But fright now, he just really wanted her to go. Again, he had no idea about this whole ghost shit, but if he learned something from Beomgyu, it was that his energy was light and that ghosts were fragile.
He figured that screaming at the demon would only make it worse.
And so, he hesitantly swallowed the lump in his throat to ask: “…Who hurt you?”
The whimpers stopped and for a moment he regretted it and really, he thought he’d seen the end of his life. But then, the demon’s rattling voice whimpered out: “Seo Yoona.”
A loud thumb was heard somewhere in his apartment and just like that, the coldness at his legs disappeared, the stuffy sound of rattling was gone and the lights he had previously tried turning on suddenly flickered to life. He still couldn’t move his legs but he didn’t have to when his bedroom door slammed open and chaos ran inside.
“Oh my god, oh my god”, Beomgyu’s voice sounded frantic and he rolled his eyes endearingly when the elder’s face appeared above his, eyebrows knitted together in worry and obvious guilt written all over his features, “I’m so sorry, oh my god. Can you move? Are you hurt? Wait, do you know who I am?!” – he held up three fingers in front of Taehyun’s face causing him to go cross eyed for a moment – “How many fingers are there?!”
“I’m fine”, Taehyun said and huffed out a breath, “Just…immobilized? I can’t move.”
“Why is it so cold in here?”, Yeonjun asked while he pulled Taehyun into a seated position. Beomgyu wordlessly grabbed his hand and started murmuring stuff; he felt warmth seep into his body and slowly started feeling his muscles again.
As soon as he felt back in control of his body, he shrugged his shoulders with a sigh, “I don’t know? But the demon was here.”
“Oh my god, it scratched you. Oh my god”, Beomgyu was definitely rambling now, nimble fingers examining the cut and frantically ordering someone to get a first-aid-kit (Soobin, apparently, seeing as he came back with it in his hands after a few moments), “It shouldn’t be this strong already. I’m so sorry. This shouldn’t have happened. Ghosts can very rarely touch or hurt humans; I should’ve stayed with you when I felt that something was off…”
Taehyun wordlessly pulled his shirt off so that Beomgyu could reach the scratch better – now that it was light in his room and he could move again, he actually managed to turn his head and check it out; the wound was a lot deeper than he would’ve expected and it looked like a tiger or a bear attempted eating him for breakfast.
“I knew something was off when you kept lingering around to give me a stone”, Taehyun said and watched Beomgyu’s cheeks slightly warm up again, “Does the obsidian really protect me?”
The psychic sighed, “Yes. I mean, it should. But not against souls like this. I thought that this demon would go after me, if anything. And I felt that something was wrong in your apartment but I couldn’t quite pinpoint what or if it really was the apartment. I was tired and I often miscalculate then. So I shrugged it off. But then I woke up and that thing was in my room. And then I realized that it disappeared and all it left behind was the obsidian I gave to you. So I knew that it would try something and I woke up everyone because I didn’t know your door’s code. I’m sorry.”
Yeonjun scoffed, “You should apologize to me! Do you know how scared I was when you cried about Taehyun being in danger?!”
“…Ah…I’m sorry for that as well, Yeonjun-hyung”, Beomgyu said sheepishly.
It took a lot of effort for Taehyun to finally convince everyone to leave and go back home because he was fine. The only one he couldn’t push out of his apartment was Beomgyu. Which didn’t really surprise him at all, to be honest.
Something he had realized quite fast about Beomgyu was that the elder was stubborn when he really wanted things to go his way. It didn’t need much knowing-each-other for Taehyun to figure as much out. Seeing as he was scratched by a demon and it was midnight, he therefore didn’t fight Beomgyu for very long when the psychic refused to go back to his own home.
What he didn’t understand though is why Beomgyu was snuggling himself into his side now and especially; why he wasn’t bothered by it.
They knew each other for all but one month and yet, being this close to him wasn’t awkward or weird at all. It felt natural, if anything. It shouldn’t feel this natural but it did.
“Do vampires exist as well? Tell me now because I don’t think I could handle any more supernatural things thrown into my life unprepared”, he said, focusing on not reaching over and playing with Beomgyu’s black hair.
The psychic giggled, “No, vampires don’t exist. Witches don’t really exist anymore either. Like I said; our abilities get weaker and weaker with each generation. I can’t heal physical wounds or jinx people. I can communicate with the dead, work with energy and calm people down. I can create barriers for them and share my pure energy. It’s really not that amazing.”
Taehyun liked to disagree.
But he was too tired to ask more about it and fell asleep with the skeptic feeling that maybe, Sunghoon – a lawyer they sometimes encountered – was a vampire after all.
-
The next day, Beomgyu and him had a very heated argument about whether they should go to the Asylum together or not. Taehyun had told everyone (through a voice-call) about the name ‘Seo Yoona’ he had heard from the demon right before it disappeared, to which Kai had promised to search for her in every possible database he could use.
Beomgyu had refused to take Taehyun along because, apparently, this demon seemed to target him for some reason and he didn’t want to risk anything happening to him.
Eventually, Taehyun had managed to convince Beomgyu by saying that the demon could very much appear in his apartment just as well. The real reason for his consistent discussing was completely different though; he didn’t want Beomgyu to go alone.
Last time, in Kim Hwayoung’s apartment, Beomgyu had stared and been completely out of it until Taehyun apparently gave him the energy he had needed. Even if the elder would be smarter now and handle himself better, that was a risk Taehyun refused to take (for whatever reason).
Just for the record, none of them elaborated on the cuddling at night.
Finding the Asylum wasn’t hard – it was somewhere in a rather unknown region of Seoul, rather far off of anything close to civilization. There were a bunch of scattered houses but most of them looked empty and abandoned. Taehyun hadn’t liked the looks of that one bit and he knew for a fact that he had seen more than just one junkie hiding away in the empty houses.
Lucky for the junkies, he wasn’t here to arrest any of them.
One of them even walked out of his hiding spot to ask if they were headed for the abandoned clinic at the top of the hill. When they had nodded skeptically, the junkie’s eyebrows had furrowed and he had said with a low whisper: “I wouldn’t advice that. This place is pretty fucked up.”
Although Taehyun hadn’t really thought much about that advice, he couldn’t help but agree. From the outside, it looked like what you’d expect a building that old to look; a closed, rusty fence surrounding the area, dead leaves, uncared for garden and plants, a dry fountain in the middle of the yard and a big exterior with several, broken windows and signs of once by authorities locked-up doors that were obviously trespassed a bunch of times.
Taehyun couldn’t help but compare it to that one horror-game Kai, Yeonjun and Soobin had forced him to play and he had very shitty flashbacks of stupid jumpscares. Although he knew that nothing of Outlast would happen in here, it still sent a shiver down his spine. At the very least, he didn’t have a recording-camera and it was daytime.
“How do we get inside?”, Beomgyu asked with a frown on his face.
Seeing as this place was as abandoned and uncared for as a place in Seoul could be, he doubted that people frequented it a lot or even checked on it anymore for that matter. There were no CCTV installed and the ones he had seen were so old that he knew for a fact they weren’t running anymore, merely there to scare of unsuspicious idiots.
He sighed and walked over to the fence, which was closed by an old, rusty lock. Yeah, no, no one really cared about this place anymore or whether someone would get inside or not.
Which is why he merely grabbed a big stone from the side, drilled it into the lock a couple times and watched unimpressed as it cracked open and fell to the floor.
“…You’re rather bold considering this is trespassing and you lock away people who do this”, Beomgyu commented with a blank stare. He was obviously still pissed-off Taehyun decided to follow him here anyway.
If he wanted to, he could be petty. And for some odd reason, he felt like being petty right now, which is why he said: “Well, if it weren’t for me, you’d still stand here and think about how you’d get inside.”
They glared at each other for a moment longer before Beomgyu huffed and walked ahead. Taehyun made sure to not only place the stone in-between the fence’s doors but also leave it open. He didn’t trust humans, much less ghosts and if they had to make a run for it, he’d rather have some sort of safety. Although he had a feeling a stupid stone wouldn’t help him much.
The obsidian didn’t really protect him either. His trust in stones was pretty much inexistent by now.
There was more than just one way into the building but Taehyun found something to dislike about all of them for very reasonable reasons. They could climb in through one of the three broken windows on the ground floor – but there was broken glass everywhere and Taehyun didn’t want to know for how long these glass shards were exposed to the weather or what kinds of people stained them with whatever substances. Obviously, they could just break a window as well, although his moral-compass didn’t really root for that option (neither did Beomgyu’s, apparently). The third option was that one side-door on the left of the building, which was very poorly closed with wood. Taehyun could easily snap the bottom planks off so that they could crawl through the door.
Unsurprisingly, they ended up doing that.
As Taehyun snapped off the last wooden plank and threw it to the side of the wall with a huff, he heard Beomgyu inhale sharply from behind him.
“What’s wrong?”, he wondered and stood up to check on the elder.
Beomgyu was staring up at one of the windows with wide eyes and answered slowly, “…Someone was standing at the window and watched you opening our way into the building. When you were done, they walked away.”
Eww.
Hell no.
Taehyun closed his eyes and took a deep breath before offering his hand to Beomgyu, who stared at it in confusion. He elaborated quickly, “You and I both know that this probably won’t be a nice adventure. So take my hand and don’t ever let it go because I swear to this shitty god I don’t believe in that if I lose you in there, I’ll pass out.”
A slight smile appeared on Beomgyu’s lips and he blushed softly, other than that didn’t say anything though. Their fingers – just like before – fit together like puzzle pieces and it felt normal to hold Beomgyu’s hand like this.
One after another and never letting go of each other’s hand, they slipped through the opened way and into the asylum. It seemed like this used to be some sort of delivery-door or storage-room to store stuff in. There even still were a bunch of cans and tins and whatnot. Taehyun had made sure to bring along a flashlight, illuminating their surroundings just enough. It wasn’t particularly dark in here seeing as it was daytime but most windows had been covered from the inside by wooden planks or were just so dirty that the light from outside barely made it through. Maybe it’d be a little brighter in here if there was actually sunlight hitting the building; but the weather was dull and cloudy.
He gently tugged Beomgyu along to the shelves, examining their surroundings. There was a paper hanging on the wall, the letters on it almost completely washed away with time – it seemed to be a schedule for the cleaners, dated for the week of April 2009.
“If you feel or see anything, let me know”, Taehyun said and watched Beomgyu nod along stiffly. The anger and pettiness from earlier was gone, instead replaced with a worried frown; he looked like he was already feeling a bunch of things and they didn’t seem to be good.
Beomgyu swallowed as Taehyun carefully directed them out of the storage-room into a narrow hallway with two closed doors on the opposite wall, “I feel…different things. I have a headache. It’s not strong but a constant pounding. Horrible things happened here. I can feel it.”
Taehyun was suddenly very grateful that he himself never had to endure these kinds of things. Although he assumed his constant physical contact with Beomgyu gave him some sort of stronger affinity, he didn’t suffer of any headaches or pounding heads. The only thing he could agree on was that he felt extremely uncomfortable in here.
He figured that it didn’t need witch-blood to conclude that this place was filled with horrible secrets and memories.
They decided to follow the hallway out into what Taehyun assumed must be something similar to a dining room. He could imagine that it probably looked quite presentable once – but what used to be a decorative dining area to share your taste with friends and clinic-mates now was nothing but a bunch of dusty furniture, broken and in obvious disarray.
Beomgyu flinched as they walked further into the room, head snapping towards the other door that they were heading towards to, “I saw a boy. I only very rarely see ghosts like this. This place is filled with energy, so concentrated that I can actually see their silhouettes.”
“…Do we want to follow him?”, Taehyun said and Beomgyu seemed hesitant for a moment.
He tightened his grip around the detective’s hand and nodded eventually, “I suggested we’ll try to look for answers here. And the boy seemed quite alright. I’ll lead the way, okay?”
Taehyun nodded and let Beomgyu walk ahead, their hands still joined. The next room was probably the entry-hall, seeing as there was a massive stairway leading upstairs. It was completely dark here, the whole front of the building obviously locked-up the most secure seeing as people would probably try to get in here a lot more than from any of the other possibilities. The floor was cracked at several edges but Taehyun could see that it had once been beautiful marble in black and white. Beomgyu lead them towards the stairway and stopped in front of the first step, staring up at the top of it with a very mixed frown.
He turned to look at Taehyun, “The boy. He…told me to leave because we seem like nice people.”
Ha. Sounded like something out of a horror movie script-…
“I wouldn’t want you to get hurt. I can’t help you”, he heard and an ice-cold shiver ran down his spine when he could hear the pitter-patter of tiny shoes against marble-floor and saw the fleeting disappearing silhouette of a boy.
He decided to leave the choice to Beomgyu. “You’re the expert. If you think we should move further inside and that we can handle it, we’ll walk upstairs. And by the way, I am not a fan of these sudden ghostly voices.”
Beomgyu frowned again, apparently confused as to what exactly he was talking about, before seemingly catching up, his mouth shaping an O, “…That’s got nothing to do with me or our hands touching” – he gently tugged on his hand and they started walking up the marble stairs slowly – “Seeing, hearing or feeling things from the other side is kind of like…setting a radio-frequency. In theory, every human is capable of communicating with the dead. More often than not, most people probably encountered ghosts at night or in their flats but merely shrugged it off as a trick of light or the result of too little sleep. Your energy is very strong – you always had the affinity to communicate. Your frequency has just been set wrong. Now that you are aware of the other side and know where to focus and look, you notice the things your brain ignored before.”
They arrived on the first floor and the feeling Taehyun had was like he had just swallowed a bag full of clay. Up here, the overall atmosphere and air felt heavier, like stepping into a stuffy attic. Obviously, there were more than just a few blocked and closed windows. But still, it felt utterly uncomfortable. He shivered softly at the changes in temperature as he answered Beomgyu, “…So you’re saying I’m aware now and that’s why I hear the voices, I see the silhouettes and I can feel the energies?”
Beomgyu nodded mutely and seemed unsure of where to go for a moment – left or right? He eventually moved towards the left with a very sudden determination. From up here, they could glance down into the entry-hall – Taehyun could make out the silhouette of a boy hiding behind the handrail of the stairway with a frightened expression on his pale face.
He chose to ignore him for his own good and silently thanked his soul for the worry he had for them. The hallway Beomgyu lead them into was cut-off by an open door. It creaked way too loudly for their liking as they pushed it open and slid through it. The state of this hallway was utterly horrible; there were wheelchairs and beds scattered across it, random bits of wall that had crumbled off with time, wires hanging down from the ceiling. Taehyun knew that they probably wouldn’t be electrified anymore but he made sure to remind Beomgyu of them anyway.
Better be safe than sorry.
They walked a couple steps through the corridor when Beomgyu’s steps faltered and Taehyun saw him swaying softly, gently supporting him by his shoulders to stabilize him. “…We should turn around. You look very pale.”
“It’s there”, Beomgyu said and Taehyun frowned softly at that, following his line-of-sight – at the end of the hallway was a closed metal door, “I need to go in there.”
Taehyun heard the slight shift in his voice – he sounded off. Void, as if someone robbed him of his natural hyper voice. He tugged on Beomgyu’s hand and turned him around so that they were looking at each other, but then his phone rang and they both jumped at the sound.
Yeah, he should really set it on vibrate from now on.
With a hiss, Taehyun answered Kai’s incoming call, “What? I almost had a heart-attack.”
“Hyun? Are you in the asylum?”
Taehyun frowned, “Yeah? Where else would I be? Me and Beomgyu told you guys that we’ll take a look today.”
“Get out of there”, Kai answered and he sounded stressed, “Get out, right now, I mean it. You really don’t want to be there, especially not on the first floor. Get the fuck out as fast as you can.”
He was about to answer in confusion but also turn around and leave with Beomgyu – but he heard it. The sound of a metal door scraping against marble floor as it opened up heavily, slowly. He looked up and saw the door at the other end of the hallway was now wide open and not only that; but there was a woman in it’s frame, stepping aside to invite them in wordlessly.
Before he could even say anything, Beomgyu had abruptly tugged his hand out of Taehyun’s grip and ran towards the door.
“Wha-…Beomgyu! No!”, he ran after him in a frenzy.
Taehyun was fast, he managed to sprint after idiotic thieves for minutes without getting tired. But Beomgyu had just been two seconds faster and in a situation like this, that was all he needed to slip through the door just in time for it to slam closed right before Taehyun could follow him inside.
He skidded to a stop with a huff, just so not slamming into the metal door. Through the foggy window of it, he could make out Beomgyu – he looked dazed, almost as if something tugged on strings and had him move around like a puppet. A shadow moved away from the window and followed after him around the corner and further to the left – he couldn’t see Beomgyu anymore from here.
“Kai, Beomgyu is stuck in a room because he ran off. I can’t get out yet”, he said and heard the younger inhale on the other end of the line. His attempts at merely pulling the door open or even pushing himself against it with all his weight were fruitless – it was locked-up tight, “Tell me what you know while I try to find a way in.”
The whole left side of the hallway’s wall was closed with no doors or windows – he assumed that was the other side of the room Beomgyu had walked towards. He tried eyeing the right side of the room he could see to maybe make out another connection on that side, some door or window he could go through if he approached from a different side – but there was nothing.
God damnit, he needed something to break the door!
Kai started talking with a shaky voice, “I did what you asked me to do and started off with simply researching about the asylum itself and that really got me a lot of reports from all kinds of sources. The institution used to be a very popular destination up until the late 1950s, in which year rather old-fashioned, psychological treatments were already considered inhuman and barbaric. Although the clinic claimed to not use these treatments on their patients anymore, there were anonymous reports of people who claimed otherwise. For years, police tried investigating but couldn’t arrest or blame anyone because lobotomy and Metrazol therapy have not been illegal, just looked-down upon a lot. When the Metrazol therapy was withdrawn from use in 1982 was when the asylum started getting more and more negative attention. It turned out that even up until they were officially closed by the authorities, they used isolation, ice baths, insulin coma therapy and countless other inhuman, old treatments to deal with the mental health patients. And that is where things start to get very ugly.”
Taehyun swallowed the lump in his throat and hissed in annoyance when the stone he used to attempt breaking the glass of the door to at least be able to shout after Beomgyu merely bounced off – of course this was a plexiglass, why would it be anything else, right?! He had to tone it down with the insistent attempts to break the doorhandle when he could barely hear Kai anymore. Maybe he’d be better if he could use both hands but, alias, he needed to hold his phone.
He really started to hate stones.
“The name Seo Yoona appeared in my search without me having to look for it in the first place. She used to be a patient at the Institution, right before they had to close due to the governments orders. Her file is filled with all kinds of things; born with schizophrenia, borderline-personality-disorder and eventually developing a heavy depression, her parents mistreated her a lot. At 14 years old, she was forcefully put into the institution after she tried attacking one of her classmates with scissors and afterwards attempted cutting herself. She spent several years in there until she turned 26 and the clinic was closed. A few days afterwards, she managed to escape from her new clinic and disappeared for almost eight months. Then, she was found dead in her old family-home’s garden in Ansan – it says the gardener of the neighbors had seen her hanging from the tree”, Kai’s voice sounded rough, Taehyun could hear a bunch of clicking-sounds in the background, before the secretary continued, “Here’s the thing; that happened in the same year the victims of Case 136111 were found dead one after another and exactly during the time-frame she was missing. The murders stopped when she was found dead.”
Oh god.
Taehyun felt dizzy with the amount of information and he swallowed the nauseous feeling crawling up his throat. The demon in his room hadn’t talked about who had hurt her – she had told him her name.
He was about to ask Kai something when suddenly, he heard the familiar sound of pitter-patter behind him. When he turned around, he could make out the boy behind the door they had come in through as they had entered this hallway. He waved at him quietly and insistently.
“…Kai. Keep looking, I have to go”, he said and ended the call as he speed-walked towards the boy and leaned down a good meter away from him, “…Hey…what’s your name?”
The boy bit his lip and pointed outside before making a circular movement around himself with his skinny arms. Taehyun tilted his head, “Taeyang?”
Taeyang nodded and stepped back, waving his hand again to have him follow him.
He walked after Taeyang, who lead him to the other side of the first floor and towards a small room that looked like an office. Taehyun prayed to a god he started to hate for real that it wasn’t locked and exhaled a breath of relief when it opened easily.
Taeyang stood in front of a dusty, messy desk and pointed at a drawer with tiny fingers.
When Taehyun opened it, he was met with an old bundle of keys in all kinds of sizes and colors. The small boy’s ghostly hand gently pointed at a smaller one with rusty handle, “That’s the key for the metal door? Thank you, Taeyang-ah.”
He felt the need to ruffle the boy’s hair but seeing as his fingers had earlier glided through the key, he probably wouldn’t be able to touch him. Instead he smiled his kindest smile to really make sure Taeyang knew how thankful he was.
The boy nodded shyly and then ran off again, the sound of his shoes echoing until it completely faded out.
Taehyun exhaled and ran back towards where he had come from, fingers shaking as he slid the key into the lock and managed to finally open it. Never before had he ran around a corner faster than right now, only to skid to an abrupt stop at the sight he was met with; Beomgyu was lying on an adjustable, black leather-chair, head tilted to the side with his eyes open; but he was obviously not conscious, a void layer in the round orbs as he stared at nothing in particular. This room was cold as ice; so cold that Taehyun felt the icy coldness crawl up his neck and through the layers of his jacket and jeans.
But more than that, he saw the silhouette hovering over Beomgyu with a needle just mere centimeters away from his eyes and nuh-uh, the fucking hell no.
“Stop!”, he said and the demon stopped moving, its head abruptly moving to look at him with a resounding, ugly crack. Taehyun forced himself to not be bothered by the ugly pounding in his head and the way his airways felt like someone had tied a knot around his throat, instead, he stared back at the thing with narrowed eyes, “Step away from him, Yoona.”
The mention of her name seemed to trigger her in some way because suddenly the demon hissed and backed off from Beomgyu, shadowy, boney figure pressed against the corner of the room. It almost seemed like she was scared of Taehyun.
He eyed her for a moment longer before finally reaching Beomgyu, gently and carefully shimmying his arms under the psychic before lifting him off of the chair and walking out of the room slowly, never losing his focus on Yoona. He closed the door behind him with many struggles when he was out of it and speed-walked out of the building the same way they had managed to get in.
As he was about to duck under the wooden planks, he could hear the door to the storage room slam closed and, yeah, he was out of here, fuck everything.
He didn’t stop his fast pace until he was a good 300 meters away from the asylum, stopping at a crossway to finally sit down at a deserted bus-stop, Beomgyu placed in his lap.
Fucking hell, he was done.
This whole demon-ghost shit was really stressing him out and he was only in this shit for two days yet.
His focus shifted from calming down his racing heart to the slight stirring movement in his lap and he looked down to see Beomgyu slowly blinking back to reality, his eyes looking up at him tiredly. Before he even really said anything, tears started gathering in the corners of his eyes and Taehyun found himself hugging his waist and pulling him closer before he could even really think about it.
Beomgyu cried for a long time, drenching Taehyun’s shirt and literally clinging to him. He hadn’t even heard how Taehyun had called Yeonjun to please pick them up, sending him his location.
Yeonjun found them about twenty minutes later, parking the car in front of the bus stop to get out and walk towards them with fast steps and a very worried look on his face. Beomgyu was still crying and sniffling.
“Oh my god, what happened to you?”, Yeonjun said and flinched at the glare Taehyun sent his way when the psychic’s sobbing got even worse.
They wordlessly got into the car, with Taehyun in the front and a lapful of Beomgyu, who refused to let go of him. Yeonjun and him both knew that this was against more than just one traffic law but none of them gave it a second thought and they merely drove off towards Taehyun’s apartment.
Beomgyu stopped crying by the time they arrived, his sobbing reduced to sniffles and harsh, choked-up inhales as he still clung onto Taehyun as if he were his lifeline. He had tried getting him to talk or at the very least eat and drink something small – but the elder refused and merely buried his face more into the crook of Taehyun’s neck.
By now, Soobin and Kai had also successfully managed to escape work (seeing as it was noon by now anyway) and joined them in Taehyun’s living room with worried frowns on their faces and not really knowing what to do.
Eventually, Beomgyu murmured, “I-…couldn’t control myself. A-And I kept trying to scream o-or move but I just couldn’t. And if you wouldn’t h-have gotten into the room t-that thing would’ve-…”, he was cut off by another sob and Taehyun softly petted his hair.
“…Told you to not fucking let go of my hand”, he tried to joke and it actually managed to squeeze a tiny, wet chuckle out of Beomgyu. He groggily accepted the tissue Kai offered to him and emptied his nose with an embarrassed red tinting his cheeks.
With tiny sniffles, he climbed off of Taehyun’s lap and sat down next to him on the couch, although still keeping close to him. “I’m sorry. Your energy is so light it really centers me…”
“At this point, a fucking dinosaur could perform Ringa-Linga in front of me and I’d not even blink anymore”, he said with a deadpanned stare and shrug, causing Beomgyu to snort again, “Are you ready to talk about this whole thing?”
Beomgyu nodded enthusiastically and grabbed the crackers on the table to sheepishly munch on them while Kai recited what he had found out about the asylum and Seo Yoona.
When he was done, Soobin had his eyes widened in an alarming way and he said: “Oh my god! Of course!”
They all frowned at him and he elaborated with frantically moving hands – just the way Choi Soobin does explain things when he doesn’t know where the start, “Okay, okay so – you told me to look through the files again, right? And, well, there wasn’t really anything that I could go back to except for this one note that had been added to every autopsy report of the 136111-victims; it seemed insignificant but the forensic doctors back then managed to find small traces of Metrazol and I was like well, the usage of Metrazol isn’t forbidden. Metrazol generally stimulates the center of breathing in our brain, which means the part that is subconsciously making sure we breath in and out without having to actively think about it. Back then, when the autopsy reports had been made, no one would’ve looked at that twice because no detective understood what they had to look for. But with what Kai just told us, everything makes so much more sense!”
They collectively looked at each other and then back at Soobin with confused frowns, causing him to groan exaggerated and continue, “Don’t you see you idiots?! Metrazol causes seizures if used excessively! Seeing as it stimulates the part of our brain that tells us to just breathe like we normally would, that usually leads to-…”
“…Suffocating”, Taehyun concluded and he had an aha-moment, “The victims of Case 136111 were drugged with an excessive dosage of Metrazol and therefore suffocated to death. And since no one suspected that because no one had a fucking clue how they died, no one asked about it. They had no clues, no suspects and no hints. No witnesses and no one with motives. All of the victims seemed as random as can be – but the one thing they all had in common was that they had been treated at the Institution for Mental Health before it was closed by the government. And no one cared to look at that because all of them had been discharged and lived a relatively normal life again.”
Soobin nodded along, “And Metrazol is a medicine you can get from a doctor for various reasons. It’s not necessarily something to be alarmed of.”
“That explains the deaths of Case 136111 and we can guess who did it then. But what about Hwayoung and Yujin? Even if they had Metrazol in their system; what about the broken neck?”
The forensic doctor shook his head, “It is very seldom but not impossible to break your own neck while experiencing a seizure. We call that a Bilateral Simultaneous Neck Femur Fracture in medicine. There are really only very few cases in literature but it has happened before.”
Taehyun shuddered at the thought, pretty sure he had a dissatisfied expression on his face – he couldn’t imagine having seizures and then breaking your own neck because of it. He wondered if that was a quick death.
He frowned and stared at the glass surface of his coffee table – that explained what happened to them in general. It made sense because he had seen Yujin’s seizures before she had collapsed and died. But they still didn’t know what kind of connection Yujin and Hwayoung had had. Why they got the Ouija-board and why they suddenly started being friends.
“…Me and Yeonjun should go back to working normally for a few days again or Namjoon will kick us out for real”, he said, to which the elder nodded along with a panicked look in his eyes, “I’d really appreciate it if Beomgyu or Soobin could ask around at SNU again what Yujin was like. I don’t know why but I have a strong feeling that Hwayoung ended up where she ended up because Yujin dragged her into this whole mess. We know some of Hwayoung’s favorite activities; I think it’s time to dig a little bit more into innocent wallflower Lee Yujin.”
Soobin, Kai and Yeonjun eventually decided to leave again, seeing as they had to get back to work (and they all over-extended their lunch-break fifteen minutes ago), petting Beomgyu’s head and telling him to rest a lot.
“…Don’t you have to work as well?”, Beomgyu said and Taehyun was about to answer that he really should because he technically only took off half of the day. But the elder looked so small on the couch, face puffy and eyes red-rimmed from all the crying. There was really nothing on this world that could’ve dragged Taehyun out of his apartment right now.
And so, he found himself answering, “I think I’ll just stay here for the rest of the day. I’m quite worried about you.”
Beomgyu avoided his gaze, “…I’m sorry. To think that we fought about you staying here while I’d go to that place on my own. I’d probably be dead if it weren’t for you” – when he tilted his head back up to look at Taehyun, he also moved a lot closer as well. He twitched like he had done last evening, as if he wanted to do something; only this time, he actually closed the distance and pressed a tender kiss to Taehyun’s cheek – “…and thank you, Tyun-ah. I know you were so persistent because you wanted to protect me…and you did.”
Fuck.
This much cuteness should be added to the list of illegal stuff because Beomgyu did things to Taehyun’s heart that felt extremely unhealthy.
Apparently also to his brain when he said: “You said Vampires are a myth, then what about soulmates? Because you keep making me feel this way and it’s really distracting and confusing.”
Yeah, he really didn’t mean to say that out loud but it was a question lingering on the tip of his tongue for a very long time already.
Beomgyu’s eyes widened for a few seconds before his whole face turned pink and he giggled softly, leaning his forehead against Taehyun’s shoulder to probably hide his embarrassed (and endearing) red cheeks, “…There are several myths about soulmates, although the concept of it is mere fiction. What I can tell you though is that souls from past lives tend to meet again if their connection was strong enough; again and again throughout time and space, never really knowing of their past connections, but feeling that there’s something more between them. Kind of like…remembering something without consciously remembering it? It’s a feeling, a touch…a moment or a mere stare.”
He looked up again with a dazzling, very shy smile, “But if it calms you down a little bit; I know what you mean. I feel it as well. Your presence is very…warm. I feel safe with you. I know that no matter what, you’ll protect me. Maybe, you were my shining armor in a past life?”
Taehyun snorted at the thought and grabbed a fluffy blanket from the end of his couch, draping it over them both as he more or less tackled Beomgyu into the soft cushions. It was bold but he felt like wrapping himself all around Beomgyu and so, he did. The elder went along with it even though a surprised squeak left his lips, “Your shining armor thinks we should get some sleep because I don’t know about you, but this whole ordeal earlier sucked out all of my energy.”
Beomgyu turned around in his embrace and snuggled closer to Taehyun with a shaky exhale, hands fisting his shirt as he mumbled a quiet: “…Yeah that sounds like…a very good plan.”
They fell asleep on the couch and slept all through the whole afternoon and night. It was the best sleep Taehyun had had in a while.
---
It was only a simple ‘Goodbye’
Taehyun knew that Yeonjun had something to say, if only because the elder kept staring at him with that infuriating, smug smirk on his face. He really wasn’t subtle but then again, he probably didn’t want to be anyway.
A whole morning of forgotten paperwork went by without Taehyun acknowledging the stupid smirks and lingering stares because he somehow had the impression that it wouldn’t matter if he ignored Yeonjun or not; the Sergeant would just blurt it out due to his own impatience eventually. And that point was apparently reached when Taehyun enjoyed his quick-cup-ramen-noodles (more or less) while answering E-Mails from various people.
Yeonjun slammed his Caesar-salad onto the surface of Taehyun’s left side of the desk with an over-dramatic huff, causing the few people who hadn’t left the office to eat something (because they weren’t on active duty like Taehyun and Yeonjun) to turn their heads in confusion; only to shrug it off when they realized it was yet again one of their Sergeants ridiculous outbursts about something. Only that this time, it had nothing to do with that order he hadn’t gotten yet or how handsome Soobin looked with his hands in a dead body (absolutely no comment on that one, Taehyun had considered asking for a friendship-refund more than once).
This time, Yeonjun blurted out in his usual volume: “So when will you confess to Beomgyu and finally fuck him?”
Taehyun usually ignored the elder and his tantrums because he had gone to police academy with Yeonjun for about two years and then somehow always ended up at the same division. Their whole career went side-by-side and he was somehow like an elder brother for Taehyun.
But there were very obvious things he refused to talk about at work, much less during his lunchtime and for sure not something regard Beomgyu, possible feelings or having sexual intercourse with him. Not like it was any of Yeonjun’s concern, of course. But like, alias, it was because; nothing Taehyun did wasn’t Yeonjun’s problem as well. According to the elder, of course.
He halted in his movement to feed himself a fork of ramen and slowly turned his head to glare at Yeonjun, “…Hyung. I’m eating.”
“And I’m done watching you eye-fuck each other and then be the sweetest not-yet-couple ever. I’m honestly not sure half of the time if I want to barf or open a Fanclub for you two”, the elder said and took a big bite of chicken and salad, “You know, Kai calls you both Taegyu and I think that’s really fucking cute.”
Taehyun considered playing nice today but he felt like turning the tables and therefore stared back at Yeonjun with a smirk, “He also calls you and Soobin Yeonbin – speaking of which, what was that about your obsession with Soobin’s hands? You know, when you went on and on for half an hour about how-…”
“Shut up!”, Yeonjun stuffed his mouth with a piece of chicken (surprisingly so, the elder barely shared his food, much less chicken and even less if it was from a salad of all things), “We agreed to not talk about this again!”
“And we also agreed to not bother me when I’m trying to enjoy the 60 minutes of cold cup-noodles-time I can get”, he replied and swallowed the chicken; it was kind of dry but he wouldn’t comment on it.
They went back to eating in silence after that, with Yeonjun obviously too scared of Taehyun exposing him more. Their quiet was interrupted when Taehyun’s telephone rang and he really wanted to ignore it; but on most occasions, it was an important call. And he was on duty. So he kind of didn’t really have a choice.
“Detective Kang Taehyun, what can I do for you?”
“You sound so different at work”, he heard Beomgyu’s familiar voice and a dumbfounded expression set itself onto his face, “It’s not a bad different. Sounds attractive. Have you ever dressed up as an officer for Halloween? That’d be kind of funny, not gonna lie-…”
“Beomgyu-hyung. Is there a particular reason for your call because if not, I’ll hang up”, he interrupted slowly, “I treasure my 60 minute lunchbreak a lot.”
“Actually, there is”, he answered, “I asked around on campus about Yujin and you wouldn’t believe what I found out. But you’ll have to come here. I’m at her dorm.”
Needless to say, Taehyun sacrificed the remaining 45 minutes of his lunchbreak to have an excuse (and he left behind Yeonjun because one of them had to stay at the office or Namjoon would really get mad).
Just as promised, Beomgyu waited in front of Yujin’s dorm with his hands behind his back and seemingly balancing on an imaginary railing as he walked up and down the hallway. When he seemed to hear or maybe feel Taehyun approach, he turned around with a wide smile – but his mood seemed a little over the top, almost as if he wanted to purposely look as happy as he could.
Taehyun decided to not mention it for now.
“I’m just making you aware of the fact that if we enter now, it’s trespassing”, Taehyun said and then they stepped inside with a key. Apparently, Beomgyu got it from a teacher when he lied about being one of Yujin’s cousins.
The room was filled with halfway organized boxes – apparently, the family had a similarly hard time to get rid of her stuff as Kim Hwayoung’s. Most of Yujin’s belongings still stood exactly where Taehyun remembered them to be from the day he had found her dead almost a month ago. He couldn’t imagine how difficult it must be to get rid of your own daughters belongings from a place she had lived in for so long.
“What is it you found out?”, he wondered and watched as Beomgyu closed the door behind himself.
The elder looked a little pale again but he spoke up before Taehyun could ask about it, “So I had to ask many students about her because most really didn’t talk to her. They all more or less said the same though; that Yujin was very shy, very introverted, barely talked with anyone and seemed kind of weird. Many said that she used to be rather popular on campus because of her cute looks; but apparently, every time someone approached her to initiate a friendship or any relationship for that matter, she reacting very cagey and extremely off. Someone told me she stared at them and asked if they liked the taste of blood? So you see, Yujin definitely was more than just your ordinary, shy college student.”
Taehyun frowned at that – if she said such things to students, why didn’t anyone ever talk about it? Usually, if people were that weird, word spread and students avoided her. Kim Hwayoung had been a popular girl; someone like her would’ve probably heard about the weird rumors surrounding Yujin and kept her distance.
“You probably wonder; why did no one bully her for that?”, Beomgyu said and Taehyun tilted his head softly, “I asked myself the same thing. Apparently, people here were scared of Yujin. In her first year at SNU, a guy tried drawing on her face as a joke while she was sleeping in the classroom. She later told him he’d regret that and would wish he could stop himself from doing it. A day later, the guy dropped out of SNU and moved back to Busan. The students were keeping their distance, people assumed and whispered she cursed people and could manipulate them.”
“…Is that possible though?”, Taehyun asked, generally interested.
Beomgyu shook his head, “…No. Not just like that. I don’t know what Yujin did to have that boy flee SNU – what I do know though is that she definitely had a very dark hobby. After a lot of asking around, a boy called Jinwoo approached me. He told me that in his first year of SNU, Yujin had been assigned to take care of him on campus – you know, introduce him to everything, instruct him into the rules and what not. He had first thought of her as very kind and actually fun to be around; but with every day he spent being her friend, she started acting more and more off. One day, she had invited him over to her dorm and pulled out a book from a hidden spot in her closet…”
Taehyun watched as Beomgyu opened the floor-plate of the closet after opening it, pulling out an old-looking, thick book with a black leather cover and several very out-of-place, yellowish pages. It looked like it had seen many centuries pass. He noticed how Beomgyu didn’t directly touch it but held it with his sleeves pulled over his hands, “This is the book. Jinwoo had said she had then proceeded to talk about revenge of a ghost, about unban her spirit and let justice rule. He had fled the room after that and they never talked again. Yujin left him alone and I assume it was because she was generally scared he’d tell on her otherwise.”
He stepped closer and examined the book. When he reached to touch it, Beomgyu glared at him and held it out of his reach. Taehyun rolled his eyes but put on his trusty leather gloves (it has gotten quite cold outside and he usually brought them along because he often drove to work with his motorcycle). “…What is this book?”
“A fanfiction about salvation, unholy spirits and rituals”, Beomgyu shrugged but he had a disgusted frown on his face as he eyed the book, “Even if it’s filled with nonsense, its energy is still extremely tainting. Blood rituals are unholy and often done in very barbaric, wrong ways. Their original purpose of producing energies useful as sexual, healing or mental stimulus has completely disappeared from most cultures and nowadays, the weirdest and most morbid cults make use of it to justify their stupid rituals and wrong intentions. Witches like me refrain from practicing such rites. It’s forbidden.”
Even with his disgusted look, Beomgyu seemed to feel a lot of respect for this thing either way. Taehyun hummed and opened the book with his gloved hands, frowning at the red stains on the pages and the artistically written letters and whatnot.
“…Okay so Yujin practiced forbidden blood-rituals. I guess that’s her connection to Seo Yoona and the demon haunting her. But what’s Kim Hwayoung’s role in all of this? I doubt she was a fan of satanic cults”, he said and watched Beomgyu snort softly at the mention of satanic cults.
The elder stopped Taehyun’s hands from turning another page and pointed at the exposed one with a nudge of his chin, “Salvation of the unjustified. I asked around a little bit because I was curious – Yujin never went home. She never had anyone from her family visiting her. She was extremely closed off but at the same time had moments in which she freaked out or got unreasonably aggressive or scary. Sounds familiar?”
“Sounds like she had a psychosis”, Taehyun halted and stared at the page for a few moments, “…Where was she from?”
Beomgyu closed the book and carefully let it slide into his bag, “Ansan. I also found this when I snooped around without you earlier” – he pulled out a small piece of paper from his pant’s pocket and handed it over to Taehyun, who unfolded it carefully. His eyes widened – “A recipe for Metrazol. She apparently got it regularly for four months.”
But what about Hwayoung…?
How did she fit into this whole mess?
Everything they thought about Yujin now was halfway based on speculations and Taehyun texted Kai to check on it and do some research. But what about Hwayoung? Why her? Why not anyone else, why not Junseo, who was in the same club for years? Or Jinwoo, who would’ve been an easy target? Why Kim Hwayoung and not one of the easier manipulated ones? What was it that finally managed to have them become friends?
They drove back to the office and Taehyun just allowed Beomgyu to waltz right in along with him, seeing as Namjoon was currently out of the house anyway and none of the other detectives cared at all.
Kai looked frustrated when they walked back in and Yeonjun for once wasn’t amused at the younger’s tantrum.
“What’s going on?”, Taehyun wondered, to which Kai huffed out an annoyed scoff.
He pointed at his computer as if it had done something outrageous, “There’s almost fucking nothing about Lee Yujin! I mean we never cared to look more into her before but when I tried searching, all I can find is her stay at the mental health clinic four years ago and that’s that! There are no records from her life before that, not even a birth-certificate! How is that possible! I swear these stupid computers are getting on my last fucking nerves!”
“…Try Seo Yujin”, Beomgyu suddenly said and it earned him a lot of very confused stares. But he remained serious and nodded at the younger secretary, who rolled his eyes and indulged him with a sigh.
“I don’t think we’ll really get far with a wild guess-…”, Kai stopped talking, focused on the screen and blinking uncontrollably as he stared at the screen with wide eyes, “…This…is her. Right?”
Taehyun glanced at the screen and nodded at the picture on the database’s file, frowning at it. This woman looked exactly like Lee Yujin but her name was different, she was 26 and she most definitely didn’t study veterinary medicine at SNU. According to this file, she died at a mental health clinic in Ansan four years ago-…
He memorized the name of the clinic, grabbed Beomgyu’s wrist and dragged him out of the office.
They had somewhere to be and if his assumptions were correct, this whole thing was a lot more messed up than he thought.
-
“…Why are we driving towards Ansan now?”, Beomgyu wondered and then snorted softly at the ruckus in the backseat, with Kai squeezed in-between Yeonjun and Soobin. Don’t ask why, Soobin had called them about something important and then demanded to come join them on their very important investigation.
Taehyun set the blinker to drive onto the expressway – he could use the normal streets but it was a lot faster like that. “Don’t you think it’s weird that after Yujin died, nothing else happened? You said that demon would have to latch onto someone else when their recent victim died. We tried to find someone at SNU but you and Soobin and Yeonjun all said that there was no one who acted off, no one who had touched Yujin – which makes total sense seeing as apparently, people were wary of her behavior and preferred to not interact with her. The people we saw lingering around in front of her dorm were nothing but coincidentally present students who wanted to see what was going on; like with every crime scene. But the demon was very obviously still here; it attempted hurting me, it attempted hurting you and we have no idea why exactly that is. Why me? Why the lobotomy? Why Kim Hwayoung?”
“…It is weird”, Yeonjun said and sent Kai a quick glare when the younger attempted tickling his side again, “Namjoon asked me if there were any new victims in the Kim Hwayoung case a few days ago and when I said that there wasn’t any other incident, he had looked at me very weirdly. We assumed this to be a serial killer on the run. Targeting students at SNU. After you saw the connection to Case 136111, I kind of assumed that as well – they died the same way; no suspects, no hints, no witnesses, no one with motives. You’d expect more to happen after two murders like that. But a month passed and nothing happened.”
He pressed the gas and speeded past a white van (still within the speed limit okay, he’s still a working detective on duty and technically, none of them except Beomgyu should even be in this car o their way towards Ansan). “But what if there is a motive? What if there is a suspect and there were hints?”, he sent Soobin a glance through the rearview, “You said you found something after I asked you to check on Yujin and Hwayoung one last time. You found the tiniest hints of Metrazol, didn’t you?”
Soobin blinked and nodded in absolute confusion, “…You already expected that then. How?”
“There was something that bothered me about Lee Yujin, from the very beginning on”, he said and blinked right to get off of the expressway, slowing the car down – okay, maybe he went a little faster than 120 km/h but no one needs to know, “First of all; they shared every single class and apparently were friends – close enough for people to know, regardless of their previous relationship or how weird everyone thought it was. You’d expect best friends like that to text each other on a daily basis, right? And yet, Yujin didn’t get worried about Hwayoung for three days? Not only that but according to her phone, she never messaged her again after Friday evening – a very simply, ‘Good Night’, that had been left on seen by Hwayoung. They went from texting day and night, almost constantly, to all of a sudden not all and Yujin claimed to have worried because she didn’t appear in class? Then why didn’t she text her? Why didn’t she call or try to get a hold of her – unless she already knew that Hwayoung wouldn’t answer.”
Taehyun never liked driving through Ansan – for several reasons, really, but mainly because he very rarely had to be here, seeing as him and Yeonjun were stationed in the center of Seoul and barely had to leave their radius for anything.
“But that was a hunch you had”, Yeonjun said, “I remember you asking me about the text messages and I answered you that we also don’t constantly text each other.”
“Exactly”, Taehyun nodded along softly, his GPS directing him through the city, “I agreed that sometimes, people get busy. The next day, I went to talk to Yujin and then gave her my number. She was the best friend. She was the person who found her. But she didn’t refuse me for those reasons – she merely slammed her door shut and never called me again; until two weeks later, when apparently, someone tried to kill her. Conveniently, Beomgyu was also there and helped her dying in peace. Conveniently, she was dead and unresponsive by the time we arrived. Why call the police this late when you apparently know that someone’s after you? If she were that scared, she would’ve asked for help from the police. She was the one who insisted Hwayoung had been killed – it just didn’t make sense. Yujin was the last person who texted Hwayoung. The last person who talked to her, the only person who should’ve been generally worried about Hwayoung not answering or texting, not appearing to classes and not calling. She was her best friend. So why didn’t she ask?”
His GPS told him he had arrived at his destination and Taehyun therefore turned it off, neatly parking his car in the designated parking lot.
They all got out of the car as Taehyun locked the old Subaru and continued talking, “What finally irked me was what Beomgyu told me earlier and that was when I realized it and connected the dots. The only thing missing now is Hwayoung and her connection. And if I’m right, this is where we’ll find the answers.”
They walked past a tall, silver sign with modern letters engraved in it – the whole building looked quite new and not anything like the asylum Beomgyu and him had been to; ‘Ansan Mental Health Clinic’.
As they stepped inside the tall building, the receptionist smiled at them warmly, “Hello. Are you here to check-in or visit someone?”
Taehyun opened up his wallet and showed his ID, “Detective Kang Taehyun. I’m here to ask a couple questions regarding a patient I believe used to be here. Her name was Lee Yujin.”
The receptionist nodded along obediently, still smiling as she started typing in the name. She flicked her brownish her out of her face with a practiced movement before saying: “Ah, yes. She was a patient of Doctor Kim. Unfortunately, he’s not working for us anymore…”
“May I ask why?”, he said and watched as the receptionist’s smile faltered.
She didn’t have to answer but it wasn’t like Taehyun didn’t already suspect anything either way. With a few glances sent to her sides, she leaned forward and whispered, “We don’t talk about this too much here but Doctor Kim was kicked out of the institution for very…inhuman practices. He lost his doctor certificate. I’m not entirely sure what exactly he did but Lee Yujin was one of the very poor ones. And his daughter, apparently, as well. He was put in prison four years ago for the things he had done.”
Taehyun knew she was lying but it didn’t matter much. He smiled and nodded before saying: “…One last question. His daughter – what was her name?”
The woman blinked in confusion and started typing around on her computer again before answering him with a low voice: “Kim Hwayoung. I heard she’s doing fine by now and studying…but that’s all I know. My apologies.”
“Oh no”, he said and shook his head gently, “You’ve helped me enough. Have a nice day.”
-
With a huff, Taehyun connected a red string to the asylum, dragging it further to Yujin and then over to Hwayoung before letting it hang loosely, obviously not yet done with connecting as he grabbed a pen and prepared a new paper to add onto the board.
“Everything started with Seo Yoona, 23 years ago”, he said, pointing at the picture of the poor diseased at the Mental Asylum in Seoul, “She was diagnosed with Schizophrenia and Borderline-Personality-Disorder in her very early childhood years. Her parents mistreated her and she was passed back and forth between various schools until she attempted attacking a classmate and hurting herself. After that, she was forcefully entered into the Institution for Psychological Healing. Only that things got worse and worse there…”
As everyone stared at the new pin and picture he created, Taehyun explained some more, “Professor Doctor Kim Seungjun. He worked in the field for several years already and was known for his rather…questionable approaches among the psychiatrists back then. With many of the old treatments banned or at the very least looked-down upon in the early 80s already, he kept a rather low profile for a very long time; up until 1990, when the Institution for Psychological Healing started getting more and more bad reviews for treating their patients badly. The police tried finding evidence but there was nothing to hold against the clinic or Doctor Kim – so the clinic kept doing business. One of his patients used to be Seo Yoona and he did not treat her nice at all.”
He connected a pink string from Dr. Kim to Yoona, “Yoona’s illness was very difficult and very harsh. Even today, it’d be hard to keep her in check and help her healing. Doctor Kim was a believer in the old ways and so, he had the philosophy of more is more. One of his favorite techniques to handle her Borderline-Disorder was the Metrazol shock-therapy. It has been officially banned in 1982 but he continued to practice it on her, believing that she would experience changes in behavior through it – only that it never worked and instead made her symptoms worse and worse due to her Schizophrenia. It went on and on for eight years; until the clinic was closed after the horrible secrets of the clinic were exposed. Even though it reopened again a few years later, Seo Yoona was transferred to another clinic – the new one went bankrupt after only four years.”
He grabbed a neon-green string and wrapped it around a second pin at Seo Yoona’s picture, continuing to explain with a serious look, “1998, the year of the clinic’s closure. Seo Yoona was moved to another clinic, where she managed to escape three days later though. She disappeared and although the police tried to find her, she remained hidden. April 1998…” – he dragged the green string down towards one of the victims of Case 136111 – “Hwang Daejoon was found dead at the public laundry at 6:30pm. Cause of death; suffocation. Additionally, they found out his neck was broken. No witnesses, no suspects, no evidence. Three weeks later…” – he started connecting the string to the next victim of Case 136111 – “…the next body was found. A month later, another one. And so on, until January 1999. Five people died within eight months and the police had nothing. The case was closed and remained unsolved for the following 23 years.”
Taehyun pointed back at Seo Yoona, “January 1999, Ansan. A gardener found the body of Seo Yoona hanging from the neighbor’s tree – an unoccupied house that hasn’t been bought or used by anyone for years.”
He took a new color – this time light blue – and wrapped it around Hwayoung’s pin, “1st October this year. Lee Hwayoung was found dead after her best friend Lee Yujin voiced her concern due to her absence in class for three days. Cause of death; suffocation. She also had an additional broken neck. Two weeks later, Lee Yujin was found dead in her dormitory at Seoul National University. Lee Yujin was a patient at Ansan Mental Health Clinic four years ago and was discharged afterwards. She started studying veterinary medicine at SNU.”
He grabbed the pink string again and dragged it from Yujin to Doctor Kim, “After the closure of the Institution of Psychological Healing in 1998, Doctor Kim changed his location and started working in Ansan. He continued practicing his barbaric methods on patients for many years without anyone knowing – one of these patients was Lee Yujin, a patient with Schizophrenia and Borderline-Personality-Disorder. He used the Metrazol shock-therapy on her unbeknownst to anyone and actually managed to get good results from it. Yujin’s behavior got better and she seemed to heal, having her discharged not long after. In the same months of her discharge, the police got an anonymous hint and his ugly treatments were once again exposed, to which the clinic fired him and the government took away his doctor’s license. He was sentenced to 25 years in prison. They found out that not only did he use his treatments on patients in the clinic, but also secretly at home on his step-daughter Kim Hwayoung.”
With a sigh, he pointed at the girl and connected another pink string to the doctor, “Kim Hwayoung, half-American, half-Korean. Her mother got a divorce and moved to America when she was still very young. A few years later, she met Kim Seungjun during their holidays in Korea. Due to her mother’s job in America, Hwayoung often travelled back and forth between America and Seoul to visit her stepfather, especially during summer break. In these times, Doctor Kim would use all kinds of old psychological treatments on her to test her psych. She eventually developed a heavy depression from it until she refused to go see him anymore in the same year he was fired from the clinic in Ansan. Her mother divorced him and sued him, which lead to his imprisonment. Hwayoung went to therapy for three months in America and then came back to Seoul to study veterinary medicine at SNU with a healthy mindset.”
He pointed at Seo Yoona again with a sigh and made a new post-it with a year on it, pinning it to it and connect Yoona to the number with a pink string, “1995. Seo Yoona has been at the clinic for several years now. At that point in her treatment, she was allowed to go home for 24 hours on weekends. She never went home though and instead met friends of hers and went partying. In 1995, she secretly gave birth to a child and asked the father to take care of the girl. The father, Lee Hyunwoo, never told anyone, but had the girl grow up with her mother’s surname; Seo Yujin.”
The pink string was dragged over to Yujin’s picture, Taehyun added the surname Seo underneath the name Lee, “Seo Yujin grew up as a normal child, lovingly raised by Lee Hyunwoo. When she was 10 years old, Hyunwoo noticed her changes in behavior and took her to the doctor, where she was diagnosed with Schizophrenia and Borderline, just like her mother. Although they tried medication and several therapies, Hyunwoo eventually had her stay at a mental health clinic in Busan to hopefully heal. She stayed there for four years and was one day found dead in her room. Seo Yujin died and was reborn as Lee Yujin, a patient of Ansan Mental Health Clinic, assigned to Doctor Kim, who treated her as his patient and she endured the barbaric treatments for four years. Her symptoms got seemingly better and she enrolled as Lee Yujin at SNU to start her revenge plan.”
He finally connected Hwayoung to Yujin with a red string and sighed, “Yujin was obsessed with her mother’s death, the things she had had to endure and the thought of her never coming back. She found an old book about blood rituals and started practicing the rites, believing that by doing so, she could help her mother’s salvation and get revenge for her. She faked her own death, enrolled in university to make sure she’d be around Kim Hwayoung and carefully pulled her into her world. Hwayoung was popular on campus but she also didn’t really have many real friends. Yujin offered her something she hadn’t had before; someone to genuinely talk to, someone who listened and cared. For four months, Yujin planned her murder on Hwayoung, had her take Metrazol and eventually killed her on the 28th of September. She pretended to not know about it, called her neighbors three days later and that was when we got the call about Hwayoung’s body found dead in her apartment. Yujin’s mistake in all of that was the Ouija-board.”
He stared at Beomgyu, who had caught up by now, “…Yujin was so obsessed with her dead mother that her wishes materialized themselves into a soul of bad energy. When she did a Ouija-séance with Hwayoung, her wish obsession with Yoona called her broken soul from the other side. Their broken necks were a result of Yoona’s death and the way she had killed the five victims of Case 136111. When Yujin killed herself with the Metrazol, Yoona couldn’t leave this world anymore since the board was broken. So she started haunting you and me, trying to find a way back to where she belonged…”
“Conclusion”, Taehyun said and finally tied the red string off, stepping away from his board, “Kim Hwayoung died due to a Metrazol-overdose, induced by Seo Yujin, who killed herself after finally fulfilling her carefully planned revenge on Doctor Kim and his family, believing she could perform the salvation of her mother.”
It was silent for a few moments until Yeonjun leaned back with a groan, “I can’t believe you fucking solved not only Case 136111, but also the newest case no one managed to get a fucking hang of! Why am I Sergeant?!”
“Good question, Hyung”, Kai said and petted Yeonjun’s back in fake sympathy, “Namjoon had asked the same thing before and we both didn’t have an answer. You suck.”
“Yah! I’m not that bad! You suck! And what kind of Chief gossips about his Sergeant with his stupid secretary anyways?!”
Soobin smiled sheepishly, “Now, now, Jjunie-hyung. Don’t throw a tantrum. You’re Sergeant because of your incredible skills and very sharp senses.”
“Barf”, Kai said and turned to look at Taehyun, “I’m glad you managed to solve these. And I understand why you first explained everything to us – but that leaves the question; how are you planning to explain the whole demon part to Namjoon? No one will believe that and I doubt Beomgyu wants to prove his witchy-thing to a bunch of police officers and detectives.”
Taehyun shrugged, “I don’t. Because really, Yoona didn’t do much. Her demon…was an unfortunate addition, something Yujin didn’t plan. It’s why she had called me that day and why she died the way she did. But Namjoon doesn’t need to know that and it also doesn’t make much of a difference; Soobin already said that broke necks during a seizure are seldom, but very much possible. They both had overdoses of Metrazol and seizures, me, Yeonjun, Heeseung and Jungwon saw it on Yujin before she died. The cause of death was an overdose. The broken neck happened as a result. It’s as easy as that.”
He sighed and threw the reel of red string onto his dining table, letting himself fall onto the chair next to it with a tired groan, “And now, I’ll leave the ghostly-shit to Beomgyu-hyung. I’ve done enough and also have to report all of that to Namjoon again. And then the committee, probably.”
“And most likely the press, seeing as Hwayoung’s case went pretty viral”, Kai said with a smile, causing Taehyun to let out another groan.
“Well…I’ll need your help though”, Beomgyu said sheepishly, “Yoona listened to you. I don’t know why but she did. I believe that if anyone should send her off, it should be you. You were the one who solved the case. You were the one who found out about the horrible things that have happened to her. I can’t deal with her without you.”
Great.
He sighed, “…But not today. And I’ll tell her that the scratch on my shoulder was not nice.”
Beomgyu giggled.
Taehyun found that the sound was enough for him to not dread the ghost-stuff as much as he once thought he would.
---
And suddenly, I’m floating
It wasn’t as weird of a sight to see Beomgyu wearing one of his old police academy t-shirts and sitting on his big bed with his legs crossed, munching on some Pringles. It should be weird; but it wasn’t.
Taehyun found that the sight was calming and normal – when he had walked in it had felt like Beomgyu has been doing that for the past ten years. They knew each other for two months now.
He’d say they had become something similar to friends. Even though it was clear that there was more between them than that (or in Yeonjun’s words, ‘They definitely wanted to fuck’). But none of them changed much about their flirty interactions, the domestic behavior or nightly cuddles. Maybe Taehyun should question how long it had been since Beomgyu had actually slept at his own apartment.
Then again, he found himself not caring all that much.
Especially not when the elder looked up to see him standing in the doorframe, pouty lips forming a wide smile at his sight, “Ah! Tyun-ah! I saw your press-conference today! Namjoon-hyung looked close to crying when you received the badge! I was too scared to approach you though when everyone started lifting you up and you glared at them for twenty minutes…”
He chuckled and tugged on his uniform to loosen it up a little – he’d been wearing it the whole day already and as fancy as he felt in his police uniform, there was a reason detectives like him and Yeonjun preferred to not wear it; they used to have to wear it for years when they still had had to prove their skills and worth to the upper-people. Now, as detectives of the murder department, they rarely had to wear uniforms; the only exception was when they attended formal events or had to speak in court or whatever.
Taehyun had held his press-conference regarding Case 136111 today and therefore had also explained the official solved-case of Kim Hwayoung to everyone (Yeonjun’s loudly whispered, “The clown-case has been solved!”, was heard by everyone in the audience and also by the people who had recorded it live on several TV-stations).
Afterwards, he had received a badge of honor from the National Police Agency for determination and helping to solve a horrible case no one managed to close in 23 years. He didn’t really think he deserved that much of a reward but he had to admit that his heart had felt warm when family-members of the diseased had come to hug him and cried their thanks and gratefulness about how they could finally live their life in peace.
He was tired from today’s events and had had to go out to eat and drink with his team afterwards. Before Yeonjun or Kai could hog him though, he had petted Soobin’s back, wished him good luck and vented as fast as he could – if there was one thing he definitely didn’t feel like doing it was babysitting drunk Yeonjun and Hyuka. Soobin would probably hate him for a week straight for that stunt but he’ll just buy him a few chicken for dinner as an apology.
Works every single time.
Beomgyu was suddenly up in his space again and Taehyun didn’t even notice that the elder had stood up to stand right in front of him. He traced the embroidery on the badge Taehyun had received, proudly sticking to his uniform with the Korean word ‘명예’ engraved on it; Honor.
“…You don’t understand what you’ve done, right?”, he said and Taehyun couldn’t help but chuckle lowly.
“…I see that I solved a difficult case. But it’s hard to wrap my hand around the fact that people praise me so much for it – especially because I would’ve given up after Yujin’s death if it wouldn’t have been for you.”
Beomgyu shook his head, “You connected the dots. You saw the hints and the small things. You solved the case because you’re that good. And not only did you do that with your genius head; you helped many families finally getting the closure they needed. And tomorrow, you’ll help Yoona as well. Not because of me; but because you’re a kind man.”
With nimble fingers, the elder unpinned the badge and the other general pins attached to Taehyun’s uniform to neatly place them back into the box he kept them in.
When he walked back to stand in front of Taehyun, he let his fingers glide under the fabric of the uniform’s jacket and gently pushed it off, “Let me do this. You look like you had a hard day.”
Taehyun silently agreed with that even though he had done much more tiring things than standing around and talking to an audience. Then again, explaining the extremely complicated story of Seo Yoona and Seo Yujin had been difficult and he had had to answer many questions, show many pictures and references – it had indeed been a very long, hard day.
“Have you been here the whole day?”, he asked and watched as Beomgyu pouted softly, neatly placing the uniform on the chair to later pack it up with the rest of Taehyun’s clothes – he’ll have it professionally washed sometime this week.
The elder stood back in his place in front of Taehyun, flicking his long hair out of his face to smooth out the expensive white fabric of Taehyun’s dress-shirt, hands gently gliding across his torso to stop at the top button and slowly pop it open, “…You have Netflix. And Soobin told me about this drama he found so I used your account. It’s not like you mind anyway…”
Taehyun chuckled at the petty behavior and noted how Beomgyu continued to unbutton the shirt, let him continue though, “I didn’t complain. I was just wondering, that’s all. You know that if you want to, you can stay here for however long you want.”
Beomgyu’s hands finished unbuttoning his shirt and he looked up again to connect their eyes. He was taller than Taehyun by a mere inch or so but even then, he seemed so delicate, so small. Taehyun caught himself almost not hearing what Beomgyu said, too focused on the feeling of his warm hands against his exposed neck and the movement of his plump lips, “So if I wanted to stay forever, you’d let me…?”
There weren’t many things Taehyun denied Beomgyu – from the very beginning on. Everything he knew was right and wrong was completely irrelevant in front of him. Like when he should’ve arrested him instead of merely grabbing his wrist or allowing Beomgyu to touch the victim on their very first meeting in Yujin’s dorm.
And how he should’ve most definitely not just allowed him to make a deal and blindly trust in Beomgyu’s promise to explain everything on the next day.
He doubted though that Beomgyu was consciously aware of the effect he had on him or that Taehyun did a lot of things he definitely shouldn’t just because the elder asked or blinked for that matter.
It also wasn’t like he cared much though because it really didn’t matter at all. Taehyun found that if Beomgyu asked or merely breathed a certain way, he would hold him up on a golden tray and carry him through a field of diamonds.
Why?
Because it just felt right.
Beomgyu did this thing again where his body twitched and he seemed to stop himself from doing something.
The first time, he had merely turned around and wished Taehyun a good night.
The second time, he had gathered all of his courage and leaned forward to gently press his lips against Taehyun’s cheek.
This time, the third time, Taehyun decided to make it easier for him.
He wrapped his arm around Beomgyu’s waist and pulled him closer, tilting his face into the position he needed him in to do what he wanted to. But ultimately, like always, he’d follow what Beomgyu wanted – which is why he whispered: “…Whatever you want, Gyu. Lead the way and I follow you over every line.”
Beomgyu took a shuddering breath before he finally erased the space between them, connecting their lips in a kiss.
Much like every time they touched, Beomgyu felt warm – so did the kiss. It was a warmth unlike anything Taehyun had felt before though; it spread within him and left him longing for more even though he was already feeling hot all over.
Although Beomgyu had said that soulmates were a romantic fairy tale, he liked to disagree; because nothing had ever felt as good as kissing him, nothing had ever felt as right as holding him close, feeling him against him as they eventually found himself on his bed.
Taehyun broke the kiss with a frown when Beomgyu carelessly pushed the half-full chips-bag off of the bed, having it land on the floor, “Hyung”, he chastised, “I literally vacuumed my place yesterday!”
But the elder merely giggled and pulled Taehyun closer by his neck, kissing the irritated pout away from his lips with a tender peck before cheekily pushing the open shirt off of his shoulders, “…You can vacuum the floor or you can finally have all of me…I won’t help you with the cleaning though, I’m a guest here.”
He scoffed playfully, rolling his eyes while indulging the elder to get rid of his shirt and lean back over Beomgyu, who already started greedily mapping out the structure of Taehyun’s muscles with warm, careful fingers, “You’re hardly a guest. And demanding. How rude, really…”
“Shut up and take of these stupid pants already, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity in which Yeonbin and Hyuka don’t stumble into your apartment uninvited!”, Beomgyu whined, causing Taehyun to let out an actual laugh at it – if only because of the hypocrisy, seeing as the elder was also here uninvited.
But he also wasn’t wrong so he decided to not mention it.
They kissed again as their clothes disappeared on after another. For some odd reason, Taehyun had had the impression on Beomgyu’s body being completely pure and bare of anything – to his surprise though, he had a beautiful poppy tattooed onto his collarbone and it was now that Taehyun noticed the elder usually walked around it pretty closed-off clothes. Then again, they met in October and he had also taken notice of how Beomgyu got cold easy.
He traced the lines of the flower-tattoo with his fingers at first, lips following the map of his skin to the collarbone as he gently let his free hand wander down, grabbing Beomgyu’s thigh just because he had wanted to touch them for way too long.
Beomgyu let out a shaky sigh at the sensations.
“Why a poppy?”, he whispered against the tattoo, kissing the skin next to it until it bloomed the same red as the watercolor-styled art of the poppy’s petals.
The elder needed a moment before he answered shakily: “…W-We all get a flower and an animal when we’re born; kind of like a family tradition. M-Mine are poppies and butterflies. We all got them tattooed onto our body. I-I chose the collarbone because it’s close to my heart.”
Taehyun smiled against his skin – it suited him. The place, the flower, the art.
It was so Beomgyu that he was overflown by a weird sense of pride.
He followed the lines of the poppy towards his beating heart, lingering there for a moment before moving further down until he reached his hipbone, kissing around it for a moment, “What would you give to me then? In your most witchy-opinion?”
Beomgyu chuckled, cutting himself off by a sharp inhale of breath as Taehyun let his hand push at his knee trailing kisses from the inside of it down to his thighs and further, further down.
He tried to focus on his answer and Taehyun purposely made it hard for him as he got nearer and nearer to his hardness, “D-Daffodils. Because they can last d-decades if you nourish them correctly. A-And they stand for spring, for h-hope, for light and n-new beginnings; it reminds me of y-your energy. Warm, tender, s-so bright” – he stopped talking to let go of a moan as Taehyun finally wrapped his hand around his member, tilting his head at him to keep talking. Beomgyu inhaled sharply a few times before continuing with a pout – “…And a-as an animal…Caique Parrots.”
He couldn’t help but snort at that, “That’s oddly specific.”
“They’re v-very kind birds but people are wary of them because their beaks look sharp. B-But they are extremely l-loyal and j-joyful around those they l-love”, he whimpered out, back arching as Taehyun hummed in interest again, parting his lips to lick along Beomgyu’s member.
He loved the sounds Beomgyu made, the small reactions his body made, the way his toes curled and his fingers gripped the sheets as he squeezed his eyes shut.
Like this, the air seemed to vibrate and Taehyun wasn’t sure if it was merely his imagination or the excitement.
He took his time prepping Beomgyu, distracting him from the feeling by kissing along his hip and member, adding more fingers until they were up to three. By the time Taehyun thrusted his fingers into him in a steady rhythm, Beomgyu was already a panting mess, fingers tugging on his black hair in fruitless and uncoordinated attempts to either pull Taehyun closer or away from him – neither of them really knew.
“I-I’m ready. Please, Taehyun, I even came up with a stupid animal, stop teasing me!”, Beomgyu whined, causing him to chuckle lowly.
But Taehyun complied, pulling his fingers out of Beomgyu to move up again. He connected their lips in a kiss as he grabbed a condom from his nightstand, putting on with an additional layer of lube.
As he positioned himself at his entrance, he leaned away slightly to say: “And where is your butterfly tattoo? I’m generally interested.”
“…If you plan to get on with it before the end of this century, you’ll find out some time tonight”, Beomgyu huffed pettily.
He laughed, amused at the elder’s impatient behavior and kissed him again as he finally pushed into him.
Beomgyu was warm everywhere so it really shouldn’t shock Taehyun as much as it did – but with him, everything felt like more anyways; even hotter, even better, even…just even more. He kept still when their hips were flush against one another, kissing along Beomgyu’s throat and collarbone, patiently waiting for him to give him the sign to start moving.
Eventually, he felt Beomgyu’s tight hold loosen up a little and he started clenching around Taehyun, to which he pulled out, slowly, at first, pushing back in carefully.
With Taehyun’s pace increasing, Beomgyu’s soft whimpers turned into pleasured moans and Taehyun wanted to see.
Much like everything about the elder, it overwhelmed him – the sight of Beomgyu’s scrunched up face, his parted lips, the flush spread all across his cheeks, his long hair sprawled out across the mattress as he gripped the sheets with his right hand, the other one reaching up to wrap around Taehyun’s neck when he noticed his stare and got embarrassed.
“Now you’re being shy?”, he teased and focused his movements into one direction when Beomgyu moaned out louder before, tensing up slightly when he must’ve hit his prostate, “How cute…”
Beomgyu kept moaning out unintelligible words that got swallowed by his own pleasure and the only thing he somehow seemed capable of murmuring out was Taehyun’s name and murmurs about, “Feels good”, and; “Don’t stop”.
At some point, Beomgyu grabbed Taehyun’s shoulder and said, “M-My neck…”
Taehyun stopped moving instantly with a worried frown, “Did I hurt you? What about your neck-…”
“The butterfly”, Beomgyu interrupted and glanced away from him with bright-red cheeks, “It’s on my neck…”
Oh.
Now that wasn’t what he expected to hear but Taehyun most certainly didn’t complain.
Pulling out of Beomgyu, he used his strength as an advantage to turn him around and push him back into the mattress with his knees propped up. The elder whined but he didn’t resist when Taehyun leaned down, mesmerized at the sight of Beomgyu’s beautiful butterfly – tattooed directly onto his spine and spreading wide, beautifully detailed wings up until the top of his shoulders; Taehyun had probably seen it before but thought it had been some of Beomgyu’s black hair. He traced the lines with his fingers, letting his hands wander down to wrap around his waist and kissing the top of the tattoo as he pushed back into him slowly.
Beomgyu stuttered out a long moan at the feeling; like this, he had more control of his movements and reached deeper, pulling out almost all the way in a slow drag to push back in harshly.
“Y-You like the t-tattoos, huh?”, Beomgyu whimpered and scrambled to get a hold of one of Taehyun’s hands, gripping tight onto it and lacing their fingers together was he held the hand next to his head.
“There’s nothing I don’t like about you…”, Taehyun whispered against the shell of Beomgyu’s ear, relishing in the high-pitched moan he managed to push out of him, “You’re so gorgeous. So amazing and so strong. When you smile, the whole room lights up and when you look at me, all of my worries are meaningless and inexistent.”
Taehyun sped up his pace, using his free hand to wrap it around Beomgyu’s member as he felt him getting closer. The elder moaned out something that sounded like a desperate sob.
He kept his pace going, his hand’s movements matching it, whispering soft praises to Beomgyu until he felt him tensing up and clenching harshly around him, keeping his pace up and riding out Beomgyu’s high as he released against the sheets beneath him, fingers tightening their grip on Taehyun’s hand. It didn’t take long for Taehyun to follow, thrusting a few more times until he emptied himself into the condom, resting his forehead against Beomgyu’s shoulder with heavy exhales.
Beomgyu’s legs seemed to have lost their strength as he fell to the side, no longer capable of holding himself up. Taehyun followed, still inside of him as he carefully let his free hand glide through the elder’s soft hair, damp from the sweat and sticking to his forehead.
“…I like you a lot”, Beomgyu whispered out and blinked his eyes open to turn his head slightly, looking back at Taehyun with a loving glimmer in them.
Taehyun leaned forward to peck his lip, “I like you a lot too. And maybe I should take you out on an actual date after this.”
He watched as Beomgyu giggled softly, eyes forming crescents, “You wouldn’t consider our trip to Ansan our first date?”
“The hell no. You’re lucky I agreed to follow you to that godforsaken place again for your little cleaning ritual tomorrow”, he deadpanned with a stare.
Beomgyu laughed and moved, causing Taehyun to carefully pull out, tying the condom off and precisely throwing it into his bin. He was tired but they had to change the sheets.
He should also pick up his uniform because it was expensive and Namjoon would probably question it if he needed a new one.
“Well then, take me on a real date and then I can tell you how much I really like you”, Beomgyu said with a smile, scrambling to get up and walking towards Taehyun’s adjusting bathroom, “Or…we could set a date for in five minutes…in which I fill your bathtub while you change the sheets, and later, you lean back while I ride you?”
That could very much be arranged indeed.
-
Taehyun wouldn’t say that he felt much better stepping inside the clinic this time – because last time he had thought it wasn’t as bad by day, Beomgyu had almost had a free lobotomy with an ice pickle and he had vented out of there as fast as possible.
But at the same time, as they ducked into the storage-room and walked the same path towards the first floor, it felt…better. Somehow, less scary. Maybe because they knew now that Yoona was less of a vengeful demon and more of a desperate, scared soul that lost its way.
“I don’t see why I have to hold this board”, Yeonjun hissed and hit Kai when the younger attempted scaring him with a cheap Boo, “There’s no way Taehyun fucks that good!”
“Hands in bodies, Hyung”, Taehyun said and watched the elder’s cheeks turn red instantly, zipping his mouth shut and hugging the Ouija-board against his chest with a petty pout.
Soobin smirked at the sight and Taehyun snorted when he realized that the forensic doctor was very much aware of the implication – how could he not be, when Yeonjun had literally stared at Soobin working on a victim as they had walked in to meet him for a report for the first time. While Taehyun had obviously known him from school already, Yeonjun had had a K-Drama moment of ‘Love at first sight’.
It never really went beyond hopeless pining and embarrassing rambling and drunken cuddles but Soobin indulged him out of amusement (and probably, a little more than that).
When they arrived in the hallway to the room Beomgyu had been trapped in, Taeyang stood there with his head tilted to the side softly. He scanned them all one by one, running up to Taehyun with excited little steps and holding up a ghostly teddy-bear when he skidded to a stop.
“Ah, hello Taeyang-ah”, he said and leaned down, eyeing the bear, “Is that your friend? What’s his name?”
The ghost-boy pouted and looked around before setting on Beomgyu, pointing at him with an obviously questioning look on his face. Taehyun nodded in agreement, “Yeah, they do look similar. How about Gyu? I also call him that from time to time – so our friends have the same name.”
Taeyang grinned and nodded, cuddling the bear to his chest and turning around to skip ahead.
“I will never get used to suddenly seeing dead people”, Kai murmured, “But I’ll admit, that boy is cute.”
They followed Taehyun and entered the room at the end of the hall. Just like before, the room was utterly cold.
Taeyang lingered behind a curtain, his head peaking out to stare at what he recognized was Yoona sobbing as she sat in the same corner she had sat in when Taehyun had told her to leave Beomgyu alone.
Beomgyu walked in and ordered Yeonjun to place the board on the examination-chair he had laid on last time.
Yoona stopped sobbing, looking up with a fearful expression on her pale face. She looked ready to attack them but Beomgyu merely made himself smaller by leaning down softly, a smile on his lips, “Hello, Yoona-ssi. My name is Beomgyu. This is Taehyun, Yeonjun, Soobin and Huening Kai. We’re here to help you.”
The ghost glanced at them, her gaze stopping at Taehyun for a moment before flicking back to the psychic with a suspicious glare. Beomgyu pointed at the Ouija-board on the chair, “Do you remember that? You broke it out of anger, right? Yujin-ah accidentally kept you in this world. But you don’t belong here and you deserve to rest in peace. So we came to help you pass over.”
Taehyun grabbed the small package of crayons from his pocket, holding them up to Yoona as he stepped next to Beomgyu and stopped in the same distance from her, “Choose a color, Yoona.”
She hesitated, thin arms wrapped around her knees before she reached one hand to point at the green crayon with a shaky finger.
He nodded and pulled the crayon out, drawing a line between them before rolling it over to her softly. Yoona stared at it for a moment before tilting her head at him in confusion.
“Draw something. Anything. It’s your favorite color after all.”
They watched with smiles as her ghostly hands grabbed the crayon and the dark-grey complexion of her skin started turning lighter, the darkness in her eyes made room for normal, brown irises and she started looking less like a shadowy demon and more like a normal, young woman with a slight transparence to herself. She started drawing circles on the ground with the crayon, reaching for different colors as Taehyun had left the package open for her.
Beomgyu had explained to them that Yoona couldn’t leave because she was stuck in a cycle of despair; probably why she ended up spooking around in the place she had spent some of her most traumatizing years of her lifetime. He told Taehyun to buy a package of crayons to draw a visual line, somehow kind of like a way to make it easier for her to visualize what it’d be like to pass over to the other side and finally leave this world.
Letting her do something as innocent as drawing with crayons on the floor was to make the negativity flow out of her – which is why her whole appearance changed and she looked like the person she had been, and not the demon she had become for the wrong reasons.
She had killed people – but Taehyun found it hard to really hate her for that, although he could understand the families who mourned their beloved deaths. Now looking at Yoona though, with her long, black hair reaching her shoulders in a clean cut, a cute, blue dress with small, green leaves on it, brown sandals on her feet; this was what Yoona would’ve looked like if the world wouldn’t have been such a horrible place to her. If life would’ve treated her kinder. With the right doctors and the right people, she could’ve grown old, could’ve been on Yujin’s side and have a normal, fulfilling life.
But the universe was cruel to her and she had not had it easy. Taehyun couldn’t help but feel sympathy for her as he watched her drawing a butterfly onto the floor with a pink crayon. For some reason, he found himself tearing up and crouched down in front of her, unable to stop the sob from escaping him.
He heard Beomgyu ask him what’s wrong and Yoona stopped drawing, looking up at him with wide eyes, pink crayon still in her hand. She tilted her head to the side with a very tender frown on her doll-like face; she was very pretty.
“I-…I’m sorry”, he murmured in-between held back sobs, “I am so sorry for what happened to you. I wish I could help you more than this. I wish I could give you a chance to live again, live a better, fairer life. This isn’t…the world can be such a beautiful place but it’s always ugly to the most innocent of souls. I’m sorry that this world offered nothing for you to stay in.”
A cold sensation went through him when he suddenly felt a hand on his cheek and as he looked up, he saw Yoona in front of him. She wiped away a tear and smiled a pained smile – but it reached her eyes and for the first time since he had started seeing her, she looked…at peace. It was a real smile and it caused him to cry even more.
Beomgyu, who had watched in silence, stood up and grabbed a lighter, burning a small sachet of what he had said was white sage on top of the Ouija-board.
Yoona gently tabbed Taehyun’s nose and turned around to draw with the crayons again before pushing them back towards him with a nod.
She was ready to go.
Taehyun stood up and stepped aside, standing back next to Yeonjun, who pretended to not cry as well. Beomgyu grabbed his hand and tugged on his hand, causing everyone to grab each other’s hand as well as they bowed to Yoona.
She looked at the line Taehyun had drawn and then back up at him one more time, sending him a smile so bright, it seemed to illuminate the whole room. He heard a familiar pitter-patter and looked down to see Taeyang in front of him. The boy smiled a toothy grin and this time, when he stepped forward to hug Taehyun’s legs, he could feel him and the boy didn’t glide right through him. The sun casted orange light in through the windows on their right and drowned the whole room in a dreamy light.
Taehyun petted the boy’s hair and ruffled it softly with a smile as Taeyang stepped back, holding his teddy-bear up to him. “…You give him to me?”
Taeyang nodded enthusiastically and Taehyun took the bear into his left hand, smiling at the boy. Beomgyu linked their arms together, “Farewell, Taeyang-ah. And thank you.”
They watched as Yoona reached out her hand, holding Taeyang’s smaller one as he waved to them with the right one. Yoona bowed a last time, a smile on her face and a tear sliding down her cheek as she said: “Goodbye.”
As they stepped across the line, their silhouettes started disappearing, almost like glitter that slowly disappeared along with the setting sun until nothing was left of them and the last ray of sunlight disappeared behind the horizon, leaving them with nothing but the slowly burning out sage.
The silence was interrupted by Yeonjun’s sudden loud sob and they startled at it before Soobin smiled and tried calming him down, “Now, now, earlier you said you were scared…”
“But-…but!”, Yeonjun sobbed all the way out of the clinic while Kai recorded it with a mean grin and Soobin tried to keep a wailing Yeonjun from strangling the secretary to death.
Taehyun stayed at the room for a little longer, staring at the line he had drawn, somehow not able to go yet. He sighed and walked over to the crayons he had left on the floor to get out of Yoona’s way, his steps faltering when he saw what was written on the floor.
He felt Beomgyu stepping next to him, wrapping his arms around his torso from the side as Taehyun couldn’t help but let a tear escape. But he smiled when they turned back around as well to follow their friends.
He knew that the message would forever be there, even if the building would disappear one day or people would wash it away. Because Yoona’s soul was bright at the end and her thoughts and feelings would forever nourish the floor she had left them behind at.
“Shall we order some Tteokbokki?”, Beomgyu asked as they found the others outside and started walking towards where Yeonjun had left his car.
Soobin interrupted, “Hell no! Taehyun owes me a lot of chicken for leaving me behind with these two drunk idiots to go fuck his boyfriend!”
“I hate to agree but he’s right”, Taehyun deflated, mourning his Tteokbokki.
Beomgyu laughed and intertwined their fingers, pressing a kiss to his cheek to make him feel better and it worked (way too easily), “I’ll make you Tteokbokki sometime then!”
“You’re good at many things honey but no way in hell will I let you use my brand-new kitchen”, Taehyun deadpanned.
“Yah!”
---
“당신이 신경썼기 때문에 세상이 내게 줄 수 있는 모든 아름다운 것들을 경험할 수 있었어요. 감사합니다.”
-서윤아 <3
“I got to experience every beautiful thing the world can offer to me because you cared. Thank you.”
-Seo Yoona <3