Faith, in the End

by alatariel_gildaen

Summary:

“Young-il! I know you’re there! Face me, you coward! FACE ME!”

 

His voice bounced off the walls, ragged with fury and heartbreak. In-ho couldn’t bring himself to look away. Gi-hun stood alone, Jun-hee’s baby cradled against his chest, swaying slightly as if the weight might drag him down.

The VIPs beside him stirred. He could hear the rustle of fur, the clink of ice in crystal glasses, the irritation of people unaccustomed to dealing with real human emotion.

“What’s he doing?” Eagle asked lazily. “He won, why is he so angry?”

“You’re asking why the maniac who came back willingly is angry?” Panther replied, already bored again.

But In-ho knew. He was daring In-ho to talk to him again. Because they both knew that he had just lost. When Player 333—one who had proven himself to be nothing but selfish and self-serving—had said, “Look after her,” then started the game, and thrown himself off the platform before Gi-hun could even blink, Gi-hun had proven that his faith in humanity wasn’t misplaced.

Notes:

Here we go. Another fix-it.

I'm still very much in the 'denial' phase of grief. I absolutely cannot believe what was done to the show, and to Gi-hun in particular. I hope this will go some way to rectifying it <3

Chapter 1: "You saw it, didn't you?"

From behind the one-way glass, In-ho stood still as a statue. His mask—expressionless, black, and absolute—hid the tight line of his jaw.

Below, on the platform drenched in harsh white light, Gi-hun was screaming.

“Young-il!”

That name pierced him somehow, but he took a twisted comfort in it. He could still pretend it wasn’t actually him Gi-hun’s rage was directed towards.

“Young-il! I know you’re there! Face me, you coward! FACE ME!”

His voice bounced off the walls, ragged with fury and heartbreak. In-ho couldn’t bring himself to look away. Gi-hun stood alone, Jun-hee’s baby cradled against his chest, swaying slightly as if the weight might drag him down.

The VIPs beside him stirred. He could hear the rustle of fur, the clink of ice in crystal glasses, the irritation of people unaccustomed to dealing with real human emotion.

“What’s he doing?” Eagle asked lazily. “He won, why is he so angry?”

“You’re asking why the maniac who came back willingly is angry?” Panther replied, already bored again.

But In-ho knew. He was daring In-ho to talk to him again. Because they both knew that he had just lost. When Player 333—one who had proven himself to be nothing but selfish and self-serving—had said, “Look after her,” then started the game, and thrown himself off the platform before Gi-hun could even blink, Gi-hun had proven that his faith in humanity wasn’t misplaced.

In-ho stood frozen for a long moment as he watched Gi-hun looking up toward the glass, daring him to show his face again. “Excuse me,” he said at last. “I have to go and greet this year’s winners. I trust you found the games to be entertaining?”

“As always, Front Man,” said Lion. “Maybe you could get 456 back again next year?”

In-ho bowed his head in a gesture of respect, but internally his stomach dropped. It was exactly the kind of thing Gi-hun would attempt. But no. This was one game he was done playing.

 

***

Gi-hun held the baby close. Her breath was warm against his neck, her tiny chest rising and falling like the beat of a sparrow’s wing. She weighed almost nothing, but in his arms, she felt like the sum total of everything that was left—grief, survival, a single fragile chance.

She let out a soft hiccup of a cry, and he bounced her gently, murmuring into her hair, words just for her.

“It’s ok, sweetheart,” he whispered. “It’s going to be ok.”

The phrase came out instinctively, cracked and raw at the edges. It wasn’t something he fully believed—but for the first time in what felt like years, there was the faintest echo of truth beneath it. A glimmer.

He hadn’t done what he set out to do. He hadn’t burned it all down, or stopped the machine. But at least someone—333—had seen what he saw, felt what he felt, and had chosen to protect instead of destroy.

Gi-hun hadn’t saved the world. But he had proven to someone that it could still be worth saving.

And he had proven to him that his faith in people wasn’t misplaced. A tiny, flickering, bittersweet victory—but one he clung to with everything he had.

The platform beneath him juddered and began to descend. The gears groaned around him, echoing through the stone chamber like thunder. The baby shifted in his arms. He held her tighter.

The game wasn’t quite over. Not yet. There was still one player left he had to deal with.

The platform struck the floor with a hard, echoing clang. The sound rang out like a bell tolling the end of something vast and unseen.

He stepped off, slow and deliberate, his body tight with tension, his senses sharp. Every part of him was ready—for a fight, for betrayal, for anything.

And there he was. Young-il. No mask this time. No cold façade of leadership or ritual. Just a man. A man wearing a face Gi-hun had thought he knew. His expression was unreadable, but Gi-hun didn’t need to read it. He could feel the hollowness rolling off of him like smoke.

Gi-hun’s grip around the baby shifted instinctively, pulling her closer to his chest. His breath came short, his heart pacing behind his ribs. Something rose up in him—a scream, or a sob, or a howl—some animal thing born of rage and memory. He took a step forward, body coiled to strike.

Young-il raised his pistol.

But death wasn’t something that frightened Gi-hun anymore.

Young-il saw it too. The absence. The void where fear used to live. Gi-hun’s soul had been sanded down to something simple and brutal. He wasn’t bluffing..

Young-il tilted the gun slightly downward, toward the baby. And that—that still mattered.

Gi-hun felt the chill bloom in his chest. Not shock. Not even fear. Just a grim, cold confirmation of what he already suspected. This man would do anything. He had drawn a line years ago and then walked past it without ever looking back.

Even on the platform, in the final moments, the Players—wounded, starving, broken—had hesitated. No one wanted to be the one willing to kill a newborn baby.

Young-il on the other hand… Gi-hun could see straight away that he would pull the trigger in a heartbeat.

“Congratulations on your victory, Players 222 and 456,” he said, his voice detached, almost robotic. “Follow me.”

The baby cried, her voice thin and sharp in the vastness. It pierced Gi-hun more cleanly than the threat ever could. So small. So human. And yet, she had survived where so many hadn’t.

“She’s hungry,” Gi-hun said, his voice low and tight, like he had to fight to get it out without it turning into something dangerous.

“I’ll have a bottle prepared and sent to my quarters,” Young-il replied. “We need to talk.”

Gi-hun didn’t bother to hide the hate in his voice. “I have nothing more to say to you.”

His arms shifted protectively around the child, angling his body like a shield. He couldn’t stop thinking about everyone this place had taken. Jung-bae and Jun-hee and Sang-woo and Sae-byeok and Ali and Hyun-ju and Geum-ja and Yong-sik and Dae-ho… He shuddered as he thought about the boy, about what he had done to him. To a scared young man who had made a mistake, and whose return wouldn’t have got them any further anyway.

And everyone else. He thought about all the lives lost here that had led to this moment, compressed into the weight of this crying child.

Young-il didn’t even blink. “And yet,” he said, “you will follow—and you will listen to what I have to say.”

The pistol lifted slightly. Not a threat. A promise.

Gi-hun’s eyes burned. He hated him. Hated him for hiding behind the mask. Hated him even more for taking it off.

He adjusted the baby in his arms, rocked her gently, then took a step forward.

The walk back to the Front Man’s quarters seemed to take forever. With each step his heart pummelled against his chest, and his pulse beat harder and harder in his throat.

“It seems to me,” Young-il said, “that you could have saved yourself a lot of time and stress by just doing as I had suggested. The end result would have been exactly the same.” Young-il glanced sideways towards him, and Gi-hun felt the rage flare in his chest again.

“Not exactly the same,” said Gi-hun.

“The same players would have lived and died. And the dead would have passed far more peacefully. It’s what I would have done.”

“I’m not you,” he said.

“No,” Young-il replied, smirking very slightly. “You’ve made that very clear.”

It was meant as an insult. But Gi-hun refused to take it that way. “Thank you,” he said, with over-exaggerated gratitude.

Young-il said nothing, but the amusement in his eyes flickered—just for a moment. Maybe he didn’t expect Gi-hun to still be capable of fire. Or maybe he thought the game had bled all that out of him. He was wrong.

Finally, they reached the lift.

The doors slid open with a low hiss, and immediately, Gi-hun’s stomach dropped.

Blood.

It was smeared across the floor, drying in dark patches. Shell casings littered the ground like discarded teeth. The metallic scent of violence lingered, unmistakable even beneath the sterile air.

Gi-hun instinctively stepped back, his arm pulling the baby protectively against his chest. His heart stilled for a beat.

Young-il froze. Something passed across his face, something Gi-hun hadn’t expected to see. Not anger. Not calculation. But surprise, followed by something that almost looked like worry.

This wasn’t part of the plan. Not his plan, anyway.

Good, Gi-hun thought, his fingers tightening around the baby. Let him feel what it’s like when the rules stop making sense. Let him taste that helplessness, even for a second.

Beneath his fear, a small, fierce satisfaction bloomed, like fire catching dry wood.

Young-il raised a hand, sharp and sudden. “Stay back,” he said, already slipping his mask from his pocket and pulling it over his face. The pistol stayed drawn as Young-il reached for his radio. “I need an armed team to my quarters,” he said flatly, but there was strain beneath the even tone. “Immediately.”

Gi-hun didn’t move. “It looks like you’re losing control,” he said quietly.

Young-il didn’t respond, didn’t turn. But Gi-hun saw the stillness tighten around his shoulders.

“You can’t pin this on me,” Gi-hun continued. “So what’s happened, Young-il? Trouble in paradise? Are your own people turning against you now?”

The black mask turned toward him, just enough for Gi-hun to see his own reflection faintly in its polished edges. Then, without a word, Young-il turned and strode away from the lift.

Gi-hun took one last glance at the bloodstained elevator. The baby stirred again, and he followed, stomach sinking as the corridor ahead started to feel uncomfortably familiar.

He knew this path. It felt like walking backward through a nightmare.

“Is this the way you went when you betrayed me?” Gi-hun asked, his voice cold.

Silence.

“Were you already planning to kill Jung-bae by then?” he pressed. “Or did you flip a coin to decide which of us you'd get rid of first?”

Still nothing—until Young-il slowed just enough for the mask to catch the light. “I have already apologised for Jung-bae.”

Gi-hun laughed, bitter and dry. “Oh, I’m sure his wife and child are incredibly grateful.”

Young-il fell silent again as they climbed the narrow stairwell. The baby’s small, hiccupping cries echoed against the walls, a soft reminder of what Gi-hun was protecting—and what Young-il was still willing to endanger.

Gi-hun could hear the radio crackle faintly. A voice confirmed the team had reached Young-il’s quarters. Still no relief in Young-il’s posture. If anything, the tension grew.

They stopped before a scanner. A mechanical click, a line of red light, and the door hissed open.

Young-il’s gun was already drawn again. He entered like a man storming a breach—clearing corners, moving like someone who didn’t trust his own house anymore. Gi-hun stayed just inside the threshold, watching him with calm detachment.

From the far side of the room came the sound of boots—pink-suited guards entering, sweeping the space with military precision.

Young-il dropped into a crouch beside a body on the floor. Blood had pooled beneath it, drying to a sticky brown. He spoke urgently with one of the soldiers, head bowed slightly, posture taut with frustration. It looked like the careful machinery of his world was slipping, gear by gear, and no one knew how to stop it.

Gi-hun watched with a kind of detached amusement. So, he thought, this is what it looks like when the system starts to crack.

Young-il straightened. He barked an order. A pair of guards picked the body up and removed it. Others marched away, clearly looking for whoever had killed one of their own, and others began posting up at each entrance.

Then he turned to Gi-hun, and once again removed his mask.

“Take a seat,” he said, as if they were about to have a civil conversation. As if any of this could still pass for normal.

Gi-hun didn’t move immediately. He just stood there, holding the baby. Her small eyes blinked open, unfocused, and for a second, Gi-hun saw a sliver of future in her face. Something untouched.

Then he stepped forward and sat. Before Young-il could start talking, Gi-hun spoke. “You lost,” he said.

Young-il raised an eyebrow. The only movement in a face that was otherwise carved from stone. “The Game’s benefactors disagree,” he said. “By all accounts, they were exceptionally pleased with this year’s entertainment.”

Entertainment.

The word echoed in Gi-hun’s mind like gunfire.

That cold detachment—the way Young-il spoke of slaughter like it was a television show—sank claws into Gi-hun’s chest.

It was chilling and terrifying hearing these words come from the man he thought he knew, seeing his face so expressionless, his eyes so cold. How could this be the same man who only days before had cried to him as he confessed his wife and child were dying? The same man with whom he had laughed, and shared jokes and triumphs?

The same man he had thought of in the cold of the nights, to keep him company through the lonely hell of existence?

“And besides,” Young-il went on, his voice casual, “I thought you were playing to put a stop to them. To save everyone. From where I was watching, four hundred and fifty-four people still lost their lives on your watch. If I lost, it hardly feels like you won.”

Gi-hun’s fingers curled instinctively around the baby. His jaw tightened, the words crawling up his throat like fire. “But you saw it, didn’t you? Humanity. In the last round. You saw it.”

“I saw seven men arguing over which one would kill an infant, because they were all too greedy to accept even 6 billion won.”

Gi- hun didn’t back down. “They all hesitated.”

Young-il scoffed softly. “So they could live with themselves. That’s all. They still made the decision. They just didn’t want to be the piece of trash getting their hands dirty.”

“Player 333. What was his name?” Gi-hun asked.

“I don’t know off the top of my head.”

“I need to know. Because in the end he cared. He gave up his life to save her.”

The silence stretched between them like wire pulled tight. “Most men would to save their own child,” Young-il said at last.

“What would you know?” Gi-hun spat, holding the baby a little closer.

For just a moment—a flicker, a crack—something shifted in his face. A pause in the breath. A flash in the eyes. It was gone as quickly as it came, but it was there. A reminder that under all the layers, there was still a person. Still something human, however buried.

“Who are you?” Gi-hun asked, his voice low and worn.

The question hung in the air, suffocating and unavoidable. He wasn’t sure what answer he expected. A confession? An explanation? Maybe nothing at all. Just the sound of the man across from him cracking, even a little.

But no answer came.

Instead, a quiet buzz broke the tension as the door slid open with a mechanical groan. A Circle-masked guard entered, their arms full. They wordlessly deposited the bundle onto the table between the two men without a word, then turned and left, the door hissing shut behind them.

Gi-hun’s eyes dropped to the items.

A bottle, prepped and warm. Soft, pale cotton squares. A blanket folded with sterile precision. Cotton wool. A basin of warm water that let off a faint curl of steam.

It was so ordinary, so domestic, it felt like a hallucination—something plucked from a memory rather than reality. But it was real. Right now, this was what mattered.

The baby whimpered, her cry thin and mewling.

Gi-hun moved instinctively. He leaned over, hands already reaching, his body remembering things his mind had long buried. He washed his hands, gently dampened the cotton wool, and began the ritual of cleaning her. The motions felt impossibly delicate after the violence he’d endured. But he did it. He remembered how to do it.

How many nights had he done this for Ga-yeong? Half-asleep, singing nonsense lullabies, fumbling in the dark. He remembered her tiny fists, her gummy smile, the smell of her skin like powder and milk. The ache in his chest deepened, not just grief but awe. Because somehow, in all of this horror, he’d been given another fragile, blinking little soul to protect.

He would protect her. He would keep his promise to Jun-hee for as long as he lived.

Gi-hun lifted her carefully into the crook of his arm, tucking her against his body as if trying to shield her from the very walls. Then he took the bottle. For a moment, panic nipped at the edges of his thoughts—what if he tilted it wrong? What if she choked? Ga-yeong had been breastfed; this was foreign terrain.

But then she latched, greedy and fierce, her tiny mouth sucking with surprising strength.

Relief crashed over him, so sudden it almost staggered him. She was okay. She was hungry, but okay. And he was doing it, he was keeping her alive. In a world built to break people, she was still here, and he was still here, and that had to count for something.

From the corner of his eye, he noticed movement.

Young-il was watching him. Something in the angle of his head, in the stillness of his posture, betrayed him. A quiet grief maybe, or envy, or simply exhaustion that no longer knew where to sit.

And then he spoke.

“Everything I told you… about my wife and child… it was true.”

Gi-hun didn’t look up right away. He kept his eyes on the baby, on the slow rhythm of her feeding. But the voice struck a nerve, not because it sounded false—but because it didn’t.

“I was a player,” Young-il continued. “And I came here to save them. You asked me what I know about sacrificing yourself for a child? I already did. I lost everything I was to save them.” His voice faltered slightly, just enough to notice. “And I still failed,” he said. “Hope in people is futility.”

Gi-hun looked down at the baby again, her eyelids fluttering closed, content and safe—for now.

“You’re wrong,” he said quietly. “And I think you know it.”

Young-il smiled, a cold, insincere thing, as if he had one more ace up his sleeve. But the smile faltered the moment his radio crackled to life and he raised it to his ear. Not a theatrical falter. Not a deliberate pause for effect. It was the kind of misstep that came from something unexpected—something he hadn’t accounted for.

Gi-hun heard it too. Barely. A blur of static… a voice… and then one word broke through like a lighthouse beam in fog.

“Coastguard.”

His breath caught in his throat.

Jun-ho.

Across the room, Young-il’s face turned to stone. His posture tightened, a subtle shift in his shoulders that betrayed the effort it took to keep from reacting further. He turned his back, walking quickly to the far corner, muttering into the radio now in rapid bursts, too low for Gi-hun to hear. But the urgency in his tone was unmistakable. Gone was the polished calm of the Front Man.

He was improvising.

Gi-hun watched him in silence, the baby stirring faintly in his arms, her small body rising and falling against his chest like a ticking clock. She whimpered softly, and he adjusted the blanket around her, whispering low to soothe her. He could feel her heartbeat against his own, fragile but insistent. She was still here. Still alive.

So was he.

Young-il turned back after a moment, but something in him had changed. Not just the clipped way he moved, or the anger that simmered just behind his mask of control—but something deeper. There was tension, yes. But behind it… there was a flicker of something else. A kind of desperation that Gi-hun didn’t expect to see.

“Well, 456,” he said, his voice quieter now. Not quite weary, not quite mocking. “It looks like you truly won after all.”

Gi-hun stared back, not responding. He didn’t trust it. Not the tone, not the words, not the man.

“This place,” Young-il continued, glancing toward the wall—toward something unseen, “will be reduced to rubble. Soon.”

Gi-hun narrowed his eyes.

Young-il met his gaze. There was no mocking, just cold certainty. And something in his posture had shifted again—as if he were no longer the executioner playing god, but a man whose options were vanishing by the second.

“If you want the girl to live,” he said carefully, “you have to come with me.”

There was still menace in the words. But it felt… off. Gi-hun could feel something unraveling behind them. A kind of urgency, not for dominance, but for survival. And as much as he wanted to ignore it—to fight, to resist—he found himself hesitating.

Not out of fear. But because something in Young-il’s eyes, behind all the hardened layers, suddenly reminded him of the man he had teamed up with during the games. He didn’t look like a man cornering prey. He looked like a man who was trying to save something. Someone.

Gi-hun looked down at the baby in his arms. Her lips moved softly in her sleep, opening and closing as if she were still latched to the bottle. He brushed a finger gently along her cheek.

He didn’t trust Young-il, but he did want to live. And more importantly—she deserved to.

Gi-hun met his eyes. “Then lead the way.”

Notes:

Thank you so much for reading

I'm hoping for this to be a slow burn - after all, Gi-hun *still* doesn't know In-ho's real name yet - but also I know what I'm like, so if they end up together faster than anticipated I apologise!

Chapter 2: Hope & Benevolence

In-ho never thought he would actually have to carry out this emergency protocol. It had been rehearsed, of course. He had made his staff practise the drills until they could do them in their sleep, and his feet carried him automatically. But being prepared for the end, and meeting it head-on, were two very different things.

He supposed that the man accompanying him would understand that better than anyone. Gi-hun’s footsteps echoed behind him. Watching. Judging. Not trusting. In-ho didn’t blame him.

He didn’t know what expression was on his own face—whether it was the mask of the Front Man or the fractured remnants of Hwang In-ho. Either way, it didn’t matter. The end had come, and this place—the Games, the system, the grotesque empire they’d kept breathing for years—was about to disappear into smoke and sea foam.

He tried to compartmentalise his feelings as he strode through the compound, making his way towards the computer that required his final authorisation, and then all of this would be over.

There was relief that Gi-hun was alive. But there was conflict too. He had wanted to bring Gi-hun over to his side, but without future Games to show him the depths to which humanity could sink, how could he? And yet… there was that tiny spark in complete opposition. That he had hoped Gi-hun could bring him back, and now… why would he? Once they were gone from this place, he was certain he would never hear from Seong Gi-hun again

The biometric scanner greeted him with a soft mechanical chime. His fingers raced over the keypad with practised precision. Passcode. Confirmation. He hesitated—just for a breath—then pressed ENTER.

He caught his own reflection in the screen as it blinked its final green light. He barely recognized the man staring back.

Thirty minutes and it would all be over. In-ho turned from the screen, voice steady as ever. “Come on.”

Behind them, a quiet ripple of urgency moved through the corridors. Staff and soldiers filed out in well-rehearsed order, heading to the main dock to where they would be transported back to the mainland.

But In-ho didn’t lead Gi-hun to where the others were headed. Instead, he veered toward a different corridor, one that was unmarked and quiet. A restricted route only a handful of people even knew existed.

Gi-hun followed in silence, but In-ho could feel the tension in his stride. Could imagine every possible suspicion behind his eyes. Was he wondering if this was another manipulation? Another mask?

They emerged onto the open-air causeway above the secondary dock. Below them, the grey sea churned restlessly.

Moored at the far dock was the VIP yacht—a grotesque leviathan of wealth and indulgence, its towering decks gleaming with lacquered black and polished gold. Even from this distance, In-ho could make out the movement of figures boarding it: cloaked, masked, shepherded by silent attendants with umbrellas held against the thin mist. They moved unhurriedly, as though the island beneath them wasn’t minutes from obliteration. As though the world still bent to their will. That ship didn’t just look like it belonged to another world—it did. A world where nothing had ever happened. Where consequences never came.

But In-ho’s path didn’t lead there.

He turned instead toward the end of the dock, where a smaller, faster vessel waited. His personal escape craft. Matte black, stripped of ornament, built for speed and silence.

He didn’t look at Gi-hun, nor did he offer any kind of explanation. Not of the ostentatious display of wealth that was fleeing this place of death and cruelty, nor of his own separate transportation.

There was nothing left to justify.

He stopped at the base of the gangway, the wind catching the edge of his coat. The baby whimpered softly in Gi-hun’s arms behind him.

“Quickly,” he said, as he stood to one side to allow Gi-hun entry first.

Maintaining his silence, Gi-hun walked up the gangway and onto the boat, but before In-ho could follow, he spied movement. A single figure, wearing breathing apparatus, coming out of the sea. In-ho watched for a moment as the figure shrugged off the breathing mask and oxygen tank.

“Jun-ho,” he whispered, quiet enough that Gi-hun couldn’t hear.

In-ho withdrew his pistol, and at the top of the gangway, he saw Gi-hun’s eyes widen in panic, as he shielded the child with his body. The sight sent a cheap thrill through his body, that even now he could still exert that level of power.

“Stay here,” he said. “If I don’t return in fifteen minutes, go.”

“I don’t know how to operate a boat,” Gi-hun said.

“Then you have fifteen minutes to figure it out,” he said, before moving swiftly after his brother.

The distant figure was already climbing the gangway into the yacht, his own pistol drawn. The kid was going to get himself killed, and again In-ho felt that pull in two different directions. It wasn’t long ago he had forced his emotions to shut down and ordered Captain Park to kill his own brother in order to protect the secrecy of the island, but now it was over anyway, he couldn’t let that happen. And definitely not at the hands of the bloated fatcats in charge.

Ahead, he heard a crackle of gunfire, and he picked up the pace. It snapped through the sea air in short, controlled bursts. In-ho’s boots lightly hit the deck and he moved as quietly as possible as he ascended the gangway, every sense sharpened. Somewhere up ahead, Jun-ho was already inside. The kid moved fast. Brave? Maybe. Reckless? Definitely.

As he crossed the threshold of the lower deck, the scent hit him—blood and cordite, faint but fresh. The lighting aboard the yacht was all soft golds and luxury marble, the kind of place where murder had no right to exist. And yet, it was already soaked into the floors.

The first body was slumped in the corridor: a Triangle-masked guard, neck bent at a grotesque angle, limbs sprawled in the limp configuration of sudden death. His rifle was gone. In-ho didn’t need to guess who had taken it.

He stepped over the corpse, pistol drawn, every inch of him locked into survival mode. A memory surfaced uninvited—Jun-ho as a child, crouched behind their old apartment’s ratty couch, pretending his squirt gun was a revolver. He used to make that same determined face that In-ho was certain he was sporting now.

More gunfire ahead. Muffled, then a pause. He moved faster, skimming along the wall, checking corners. Another triangle lay collapsed in the hallway, this one shot clean through the chest, his rifle fallen uselessly beside him. A close-range kill. Jun-ho was getting bolder.

In-ho kept moving, his breath quick but even. The hallway narrowed toward the VIP quarters, and the atmosphere thickened with tension. When he turned the corner, he saw the Eagle Mask—or at least, what was left of him. The man lay crumpled against the velvet sofa, red blooming across his designer suit like some twisted imitation of a cravat. One hand still clutched a drink glass, shattered at the rim.

Two more dead guards in the next hall, attempting to protect the Lion VIP. In-ho stepped over the corpses and pressed forward.

Then, he felt it.

The cool, unmistakable pressure of a gun barrel nudging against his shoulder blade, followed by the distinct click of a revolver being cocked.

He stopped perfectly still.

“Hello, Jun-ho,” he said calmly, not turning around.

Behind him, the gun didn’t waver.

“Are you here to kill me, hyung?” Jun-ho asked, his voice low and cold.

There was a silence—a pause charged with too many unsaid things. Their last meeting, where both had shot each other. The threats In-ho had given him to stay away. In-ho didn’t move. His voice dropped a half tone, almost gentle. “Are you here to kill me?”

He waited. For a word. A breath. A bullet. Anything.

A flash of movement ahead, and the barrel against his shoulder was gone, firing towards the guard that appeared at the end of the corridor. The Triangle mask dropped to the ground instantly.

In-ho reeled from the gunfire in his ear, but his brother gave him no chance to recover, and he immediately felt the barrel press against him again.

“Jun-ho,” he said, his voice low. “We have to go. There’s no time to finish this.”

“Bullshit.”

“Jun-ho, please,” he said, as he felt the yacht’s engines come to life beneath them, and something in his tone caused his brother to waiver. “I have a boat waiting. There’s a baby on board. If I don’t make it back, she won’t survive. We have to go.”

For a moment, In-ho thought Jun-ho might pull the trigger anyway.

The pressure of the revolver didn’t ease. His brother stood behind him like a storm barely leashed, his silence louder than the gunfire that had just torn through the corridor. But something in In-ho’s voice—maybe the way it cracked on please, maybe the rare absence of command—landed somewhere deeper.

The pressure slowly eased, then it was gone entirely, and Jun-ho was moving. “Lead the way,” he snapped. “But if you’re lying—”

“I know,” In-ho muttered, already sprinting. Now he had secured his brother, his thoughts drifted back to the man he had left in his escape boat, and the strange need he had to see him survive.

They retraced their steps through the lavish corridors of the yacht, now littered with bodies and the thick, coppery stink of death. In-ho moved quickly, ducking past the last of the fallen guards. There wasn’t time to dwell. He just focused on moving forward, while behind him Jun-ho followed with light, precise steps, his gun raised and alert.

They burst out onto the deck just as the yacht’s rumbling engines kicked to full throttle. In-ho’s stomach twisted. The VIPs must have scrambled for control, desperate to flee the island before the countdown reached zero. That yacht wouldn't wait for anyone. Let it go.

He could see that their boat was still moored. Gi-hun was still waiting for him. Of course he was. Kind, hopeful, forgiving Gi-hun still hadn’t left him here to die, even after everything.

They pounded down the gangway, boots slamming against the metal with every step. The overcast sky seemed lower now, thunder brewing in the distance, wind beginning to pick up—nature itself impatient to erase this place.

In the boat’s cabin, In-ho could see Gi-hun on his feet, one arm clutching the baby to his chest, the other reaching for the boat’s control panel with open confusion and rising panic. He looked up as they approached, eyes narrowing the moment he saw Jun-ho behind In-ho.

In-ho could see the confusion mixed with relief across his face. This wasn’t how he had imagined his trump card playing out.

“Jun-ho?” Gi-hun asked, as the two of them came into the cabin.

Before he could say anything else, the island behind them gave a deep, guttural rumble, and a cloud of dust rose into the air like an omen.

“We need to move,” In-ho said tightly, and he took over at the controls.

The engine revved as they sped away from shore, the roar of water and the death of a nightmare swallowing everything else.

***

Gi-hun’s eyes darted between Young-il and Jun-ho.

“Gi-hun-ssi? You’re alive!” Jun-ho gasped.

Gi-hun nodded numbly as he looked between the two of them. Aside from the miracle of Junn-ho making it here, why would Young-il bring a cop aboard like this? It made no sense, none at all. And they seemed to already know each other…

Young-il smiled. That same cold, insincere smile he had given Gi-hun in his quarters, just before his radio had crackled to life and set off this evacuation. The sight of it made Gi-hun’s stomach plummet.

“I forgot for a moment, Gi-hun,” said Young-il. “You already know my brother, don’t you.”

“Brother?” Gi-hun replied, his voice cracking.

Young-il gave a small, theatrical shrug. “Maybe I should introduce myself properly. My name is Hwang In-ho.”

Everything inside Gi-hun fractured.

The world tilted sideways. The air seemed to vanish. He swayed and dropped down hard onto the nearest bench, clutching the edge of it as if he might be pulled overboard by the weight of it all.

It all made sense. The discovery of the tracker in his tooth; someone had to have tipped Young-il—no, Inho—off about it. Who else but his brother?

He looked at Jun-ho.

“Did you know?” he whispered. “Did you know it was him?”

Jun-ho’s eyes flinched away before he could answer. That was enough.

Gi-hun’s heart plummeted. His whole body vibrated with disbelief.

“You were working against me this whole time,” he said. His voice was barely audible.

Jun-ho stepped forward, expression stricken. “No. It’s not like that—”

But Gi-hun had already placed the baby down on the bench with slow, measured care. She stirred slightly, letting out a little hum, still curled up in her blanket, whole and untouched.

He smiled at her tenderly.

Then heexploded.

He lunged at the brothers with a roar, fists flying. He didn’t care who he hit—he just needed the impact, the burn of knuckles on skin, the sudden crack of fury released. They had used him. They had lied. Played god. Watched him suffer. Watched all those people die.

He landed a punch, sharp and brutal. Someone stumbled back. There was shouting. A hand yanked at his shirt. He twisted, ready to throw another, snarling like a cornered animal—

He heard a loud click and was immediately aware of the gun barrel in his face.

Jun-ho’s voice cut through him like steel: “Stop. Gi-hun—STOP.”

The rage still thundered in his ears, his vision shot through with red. But then he saw the gun was shaking. Jun-ho’s hands weren’t steady. He didn’t want to fire on him.

“I—” Gi-hun’s chest heaved. “I trusted you—”

Jun-ho didn’t speak. He looked almost mournful as he reached into his vest and pulled something out.

A pair of handcuffs.

Gi-hun flinched, but they weren’t for him.

Without a word, Jun-ho stepped toward In-ho, grabbed one arm, and cuffed him. He pulled the arm behind his back then other. The sound of the metal snapping shut was final, and gave Gi-hun space to breathe once again.

In-ho didn't resist. He didn’t even take his eyes off Gi-hun, his mouth still twisted in that cruel smirk.

Gi-hun stood frozen, fists still clenched, shoulders still trembling. He looked at the man in chains—the one who had watched people die like it was a sport, and he wanted to scream.

He wanted to demand answers, wanted to hit him again, to make him feel something—but what was the point? The man was already ash inside. Or maybe he always had been.

Instead, Gi-hun stood there, fists still shaking at his sides, his knuckles raw, and his chest heaving. He couldn’t even look at Jun-ho—not yet. Not until he figured out whether the fury inside him would eat them both alive.

A low rumble passed underfoot.

At first, he thought it was just the engine shifting. But then the entire boat shuddered—just slightly—and a second later, a sound like the earth itself being torn open cracked through the air.

Gi-hun staggered toward the window of the cabin, drawn by instinct more than thought.

The island was lit from within. Flames surged into the sky as if some buried god had finally stirred and torn its way free. Explosions bloomed like flowers of fire, the mountainside rupturing, structures collapsing in flashes of orange and black. Smoke coiled upward in thick, hellish waves.

The Games were dead.

He watched, motionless, as the place that had devoured thousands of lives—the place that had so very nearly destroyed him—was swallowed by fire and sea. And he cried. Fat, silent tears slipped down his cheeks, as he realised he was finally free of this place. He thought of Jung-bae. Jun-hee. Sang-woo. Sae-byeok. Ali. Dae-ho. Hyun-ju. Geum-ja. Yong-sik. All lost to this place.

And there were so many names he never learned. Faces that had blurred together in blood and hunger and desperation, now lost forever beneath the smoke.

The cabin was quiet behind him. Just the gentle hum of the motor, and the occasional creak of the boat rocking beneath their feet.

He closed his eyes and exhaled slowly, as he realised that for him, it would never truly be over. He would forever be haunted by the thought of what if? What if he could have done more? What if he had done things differently? Would he have been able to save more people? To bring it to a close sooner.

Gi-hun opened his eyes again, the fire from the island still flickering in them like an afterimage burned onto his soul. He blinked, but the tears didn’t stop. They carved hot tracks down his cheeks, and he let them.

His hand drifted instinctively to the small bundle beside him—the baby, still sleeping soundly, wrapped tight and warm. She hadn’t even flinched. Hadn’t stirred once during the chaos. Oblivious to the island dying behind them. Oblivious to what it had taken to bring her this far.

Gi-hun sat beside her, curling his body just slightly to shield her from the window’s red glare, though there was no danger now. Only ash, and the sound of the sea as it carried them farther from hell.

He stared down at her. At her tiny nose. The way her fists stayed clenched even in sleep. Her breath, soft and steady. A piece of innocence, untouched by the horror.

He shouldn’t have been the one to name her. He had no right to name her, not really. He had no claim, no authority, no blood in her veins. Just guilt. Just a promise to Jun-hee.

But someone had to do it.

“Kim,” he whispered, picturing her young mother. “Your surname is Kim.”

He looked out once more, past the dark horizon, past the wreckage glowing in the distance.

And then, turning back to her, he added gently, “Hae-in.”

Hope and benevolence.

The name settled around her like a blessing.

Kim Hae-in.

Gi-hun leaned back in the seat and drew her closer to his chest, breathing in her warmth, her weight, her quiet presence.

A new life. A new chance.

Notes:

Thank you so much for reading and for your kudos and comments - every one feeds my muse, and I love you all <3

I hope you all like the name I chose for Jun-hee's daughter. Looking through name meanings, 'hope and benevolence' seemed absolutely perfect.

In the next chapter we'll *finally* get the full conversation we should have had in season 3!

Chapter 3: No Absolution

The cabin was heavy with silence. The hum of the boat's engine underscored everything, low and constant, but even that seemed muted, as though the air itself was afraid to intrude.

Gi-hun sat across from him like a coiled spring. There was a stillness to him that wasn’t calm—it was barely contained restraint. His shoulders were tight, jaw locked, and his fingers twitching ever so slightly where they rested on the baby’s blanket. The rage was still there, smoldering under the surface like the dying embers of a fire.

“How much longer?” Gi-hun asked suddenly, his voice cutting through the quiet like glass breaking, cold and sharp.

“Another hour, at least,” said Jun-ho. The words were cautious and measured. In-ho caught the faint edge of apology in them, though he didn’t think Gi-hun noticed. Or cared.

“Then what?” Gi-hun’s eyes finally lifted—narrowed and unreadable—and landed on him. His tone didn’t change, but something flickered behind it: challenge, accusation, maybe even dread.

In-ho raised his brow and shifted his gaze toward Jun-ho instead. “Yes, Jun-ho. Then what?”

Jun-ho exhaled slowly, the sound weighted. “I don’t know yet.”

And then there was silence again. Not the companionable kind, but the heavy, waiting kind—the kind that stretched and strained, filling the space with all the things none of them were saying.

In-ho let his eyes drift back to Gi-hun. The baby was resting against his chest now, wrapped tightly in the blanket In-ho had provided. She stirred slightly, making a soft noise, and immediately his hand moved, rubbing slow smooth small circles on her back. His mouth moved too, forming quiet murmurs, syllables meant only for her. Nonsense words. Calming sounds.

It was unbearable to watch. And yet In-ho couldn’t look away.

He studied those hands—hands that had killed, that days ago had choked the life out of a frightened young man—as they gently caressed the girl’s cheek, and he marvelled at the dichotomy. They moved naturally now with such tender gentleness it was almost obscene. Like this was the life Gi-hun had always been meant for.

He let his eyes flick briefly to Jun-ho’s cheek. The bruise had darkened since the strike, blooming across the skin. Gi-hun hadn’t even been aiming. He’d just needed someone to hurt.

And yet now those same hands were stroking the baby’s hair with reverence.

A strange surge of jealousy rose in In-ho’s throat before he could stop it. He wanted… what, exactly? To be the object of that gentleness? That fury? Both, maybe. He wasn’t sure. Violence was a form of intimacy too—and for so long Gi-hun had poured all his hatred, confusion, and desperation into In-ho, even if he only had a name and a face in the last couple of days.

Now, Gi-hun’s world had shrunk down to the child in his arms. And In-ho… In-ho was nothing but a shadow in the corner of it.

He felt the loss like a phantom limb.

He shifted, the leather of the bench creaking beneath him, and watched Gi-hun rock the baby once more. His expression had softened, but only for her. His back was still stiff with tension. In-ho wondered if he would ever get a piece of that tenderness. Even a sliver of forgiveness. Or if he had burned that chance with the rest of the island.

His throat felt dry when he finally spoke.

“Is there anything you want to ask me?”

“Do you think you can offer me a few words,” Gi-hun said, voice sharp and low, “and it’ll erase everything you’ve done?”

In-ho didn’t flinch. There was no room left for lies. “Nothing will erase it,” he said. “But I hope you might at least understand.”

Gi-hun laughed, short and joyless. “I just want to know why. Why did you lie to me? Both of you?”

At the helm, Jun-ho bristled. In-ho felt it more than saw it—the subtle hitch in his shoulders, the tension in his fingers on the wheel.

He turned his head slightly, deliberately. “Well, brother?” he said. “Do you want to go first?”

Jun-ho shifted, the guilt practically vibrating off him. “Gi-hun-ssi,” he started, voice hesitant. “I’m… sorry. I—”

“If I’d known,” Gi-hun cut him off, fury breaking through, “so many people might still be alive. Their deaths are on you as well as him.”

In-ho smiled. He couldn’t help it, though it wasn’t amusement. It was the smile of a man trying not to bleed out. “A burden shared, little brother,” he said dryly.

The effect was immediate. Gi-hun’s expression twisted with revulsion, and Jun-ho shot him a look that landed somewhere between warning and disappointment. But he didn’t care. Not really.

Why was he doing this? Why did he keep pushing, prodding, picking at old wounds until they bled?

Because he knew what came next.

The mainland. A dock. Sirens. Papers. Cold walls and iron bars. He would be processed, paraded, and buried—first by the law, then by time.

And Gi-hun… Gi-hun would walk away. With the baby in his arms and a new life ahead. There would be no room left for In-ho in that world. So maybe—maybe—it was easier to spend what little time remained driving a wedge so deep it would make the goodbye hurt less.

Jun-ho spoke again, quieter this time. “Gi-hun, I really am sorry. In spite of everything, he’s still my brother. And I was afraid that if you reached him before I did… you’d kill him.”

Gi-hun’s eyes narrowed. “So you gave me up?” His voice rose in disbelief. “You told him about the tracker?”

“No!” Jun-ho’s voice cracked. “No, Gi-hun, that was never supposed to happen. I swear to you, that wasn’t me. I should’ve told you everything—I know that. But I had to find him. You were my best bet. And if I had told you, would you have trusted me? Or would you have thought I was leading you into a trap?”

In-ho didn’t need to see Gi-hun’s face to know it had landed wrong. There it was again—that flash of betrayal, raw and open like a torn stitch. “So you used me,” Gi-hun said, voice low.

“It wasn’t like that,” Jun-ho whispered, but it was too late. The words had already done their damage.

Gi-hun clenched his jaw so tightly In-ho could almost hear it grind. He looked like he wanted to scream, to strike something, to let his grief find an outlet—but the baby stirred softly in his arms, shifting at the sound of raised voices. He looked down. His hand went instinctively to her head, soothing her back to stillness. His anger retreated behind the walls of his restraint.

Then, slowly, Gi-hun raised his eyes and turned that gaze—sharp, quiet and oh-so damning—on In-ho.

“Why?” he said.

In-ho hesitated. “Il-nam said it was more fun to participate than to watch and—”

“Bullshit,” Gi-hun snapped. “Why?”

In-ho closed his eyes. The lie had sat ready on his tongue—easier, cleaner, one more brick in the wall between them. But he was tired. Of lying. Of pretending the Games had ever made him anything more than hollow.

So he told the truth.

“To get close to you,” he said, eyes opening slowly. “To push you. To hurt you. To make you choose, and suffer, and see. To be there when you finally admitted that humanity is beyond saving.”

“You’re wrong,” Gi-hun said instantly.

“When I was first a player, the games were even crueler,” he said. “A blind eye was turned to a lot more than the occasional fight in the dormitory. You think you’ve witnessed hell and depravity, Gi-hun? You’ve seen nothing. I survived that and for what? To come back to nothing. And when Chairman Oh approached me to become the head of the games, I found out just how unfair the games were. Favourites were given special privileges, extra food, clues as to what the next game would be. With me in charge, at least everyone was given a fighting, fair chance.”

“Is that what you called it,” Gi-hun said, “when you gave me that knife?”

“Yes, Gi-hun. That’s exactly what I called it. I gave you a fair chance. They wanted to tear you both apart. They would have done. Yes, I wanted you to end it sooner, but what I gave you made that final game fair on you.”

In-ho watched the muscle twitch in Gi-hun’s jaw, before he fell once again into terse silence.

“Well, Jun-ho?” he said, tearing his eyes away from Gi-hun at last. “Is there anything you want to ask me, while I’m still a free man?”

The pause that followed was heavy and loaded.

“Convince me,” he said at last. “Convince me to let you stay a free man.”

In-ho let the silence stretch, the low groan of the boat’s hull beneath them like a distant warning bell. The child stirred again—just a soft sound, a little shift—and Gi-hun’s arm moved instinctively. In-ho’s eyes followed the motion, drinking it in like a man dying of thirst.

Jun-ho’s words echoed again in his mind: “Convince me.” Convince him to let him remain a free man.

The absurdity of it struck him. A bitter laugh, dry and joyless, almost made it past his lips. Convince him? He wasn’t sure he could even convince himself.

His wrists shifted in the restraints, steel brushing against bone.“I don’t deserve to be free,” he said, finally. The words dropped into the quiet like stones. “You know that. You both do.”

Neither of them spoke, and so he kept going. If he stopped, he wouldn’t start again.

“I ran those Games for nine years. I’ve watched thousands of people die.I’ve made choices that can’t be undone. But every scream… they’re still in my head. Some nights, I hear them in the silence. Other nights, I hear nothing at all—and that’s worse.” His gaze lowered, heavy with the weight of it. “They all became numbers. Horses. I stopped seeing people.”

He felt a shift behind him—Jun-ho, no doubt, reacting to the sudden rawness of his voice, while across from him Gi-hun looked up sharply. He hadn’t meant to let emotion bleed through. Hadn’t meant to sound so… human.

“But the worst part?” In-ho continued, eyes fixed now on the floor, the grain of the wood beneath their feet. “The worst part is, I wasn’t coerced. Not really. Il-nam didn’t threaten me. He gave me a choice. And I made it.”

His voice cracked then, just slightly, just enough that he turned his head away. Even now, shame felt foreign on his tongue. He’d buried it for too long.

“I took his offer because I was tired of being broken. Because I had lost everything and I wanted control. Because I had suffered and at first I thought I could make something better. And that’s the trap, Jun-ho. That’s how they keep you. Not with chains. With purpose. With the illusion of it.”

He turned to look at his brother then. Really look at him. The younger face, still hardened by their years apart. The boy he’d protected, then left behind. The man who’d followed him into hell.

“You asked me to convince you,” he said softly. “I can’t offer innocence. I can’t undo anything I’ve done. And I soon stopped caring. But I can tell you this—I was never the top. Never the one with real power. The Hosts, the VIPs, the investors… they sit so high above us, Jun-ho. You have no idea. I answered to them like everyone else. I was just the face on the front of the machine. The janitor in a suit.”

Jun-ho’s mouth tightened. The wheel creaked beneath his hands.

“They funded the violence. They demanded it. If I had refused a game, they would have simply replaced me. If I questioned them, they reminded me that my life—and that of anyone they thought I cared about—could be taken away just as easily. And I believed them. God help me, I believed them.”

In-ho let the words settle. The sea outside lapped softly against the hull. The night had darkened fully now, and the lights on the console painted everything in pale blue and steel gray. He looked back to Gi-hun, still holding the baby. That tiny, precious weight—born from death and cruelty, and still somehow a promise of something better.

“I don’t deserve a future,” he said, voice low, almost reverent. “But I do know how the Games work. I know where the money goes, who gets it, who launders it. I can name every one of those bastards in gold masks. Let me give you that, if nothing else. Let me make that right.”

Jun-ho still didn’t respond, but his jaw clenched, the faintest tremor running through his hands on the wheel. In-ho recognized it—conflict. Anger. Fear. Confusion. Sadness. The same cocktail of emotion he had seen in his brother’s face the night he fell from the cliff.

The night he shot him, he corrected himself.

He took a deep breath. He had put Jun-ho through so much pain, and for what? He wasn’t sure if Jun-ho believed a word he had said. If it was enough to keep his brother from turning him over. But he had one more card to play.

“The VIPs, the ones that got away, they won’t let this rest,” he said. “They’ll figure out who killed the others.”

He saw Jun-ho’s knuckles whiten.

“They’ll come for you,” In-ho said. “Not today. Not tomorrow. But they will. They’ll find out your name—if they haven’t already. You can’t hide from people like that. You think I stayed in that tower because I liked the view?” A bitter chuckle slipped out. “I stayed because stepping outside that structure, that protection, was a death sentence. I built a cage around myself and called it power.”

It was only based in truth. In-ho had no idea whether the VIPs would come for him. But he let the prospect of it linger. Let his brother sit with the weight of it.

“I know how to keep them off your back. I know their signals, their channels, the ports they use, the accounts they keep off the books. I know how they find people, and how they make them disappear. You have me, and you have a fighting chance. Without me…”

He shrugged, slow and tired.

“You can drag me to the authorities. You’d be right to. But that won’t keep you alive. They’ll get to me, and try to use me to find you. If you want to stay alive, you need me by your side.”

For a moment, the only sound was the sea again—its slow, methodical breath rising and falling against the boat.

In-ho closed his eyes for just a second. The thought of losing Gi-hun too burned into his chest, stealing his breath away. If the half-truth could keep Jun-ho from leaving him, perhaps it could for Gi-hun too?
“The same goes for you, Gi-hun,” he added. It had to be worth trying, at least. “They’ll figure out we all left together. I’m not asking you to forgive me,” he said. “And I’m not asking for absolution. But if you want to stay alive, if you want that child to stay alive, you can’t do it without me.”

Notes:

Thank you so much for all your comments and kudos, every single one brings such a smile to my face <3

In-ho still has to be a bit of a sneaky, self-serving bastard, but he's been lost so long, he won't be redeemed over night ;)

Anyway, thank you once again for reading, I hope this helps soothe everyone's soul after season 3.

Chapter 4: No One's Daughter

The boat came into port with such a sense of mundanity that Gi-hun wondered if any of this was real.

Was it really only a week earlier that he had gone to Club HDH in search of the Frontman? Was it really only days earlier that he had lost Jung-bae? Was it really only hours earlier he had stood on top of that pillar, protecting this new life from men who wanted to kill her?

The pier creaked beneath his feet as he looked around. Neon signs blinked lazily above convenience stores. A couple strolled by with coffees. A man argued with someone on his phone in the distance. Life went on. As if the island hadn’t burned. As if the screams hadn’t echoed across the sea. As if over the years thousands hadn’t died just a short boat ride away.

The contrast was nauseating.

Behind him he heard the faint click of handcuffs being unlocked and footsteps alighting on the dock. Jun-ho was letting him walk free. The thought made him feel ill.

Behind him, there was a soft metallic click or handcuffs being unfastened. Jun-ho was allowing In-ho to walk free. The sound crawled across Gi-hun’s spine like ice. He didn’t turn around. He didn’t want to see it.

Let the devil unshackle the devil.

But Hae-in stirred softly in the homemade sling against his chest, and the moment sobered. Her breath was beginning to hitch, her nose beginning to wrinkle in discomfort. So fragile, human, and immediate. He had other concerns now. She needed food. A clean nappy. A warm bed. And he needed cash to make that happen. One of those two men behind him—brothers or monsters or both—would pay.

He pointed toward the closest glow of fluorescent light—a convenience store just off the dock, its windows cluttered with sale signs and faded posters.

“I’m going in there,” he said flatly. “I’m getting formula, nappies, wipes, cream. Then I’m getting a taxi home. You’re paying. Every damn won. After that, I never want to see either of you again. And god help you if I do.”

He saw the two brothers exchange a look with each other, and the sight piqued his anger once again. His jaw clenched tight, Gi-hun turned and walked, his uncomfortable dress shoes scuffing against the pavement. His body ached with every step, bruises blooming beneath his skin like rot. He could feel the sticky dryness of blood on his neck and the dull sting of reopened wounds beneath his clothes.

As he moved down the aisles, people parted around him as if he carried the plague. He tried to picture how he must look; a man covered in filth, blood, and bruises, carrying a newborn in a makeshift sling. Little wonder they gave him a wide birth.

His hands shook as he lifted a can of dried formula off the shelf, and he nearly sobbed in relief as he found a pack of ready-to-drink formula, complete with pre-sterilised teats.

What else?

Nappies. Wipes. Rash cream. Powder. Pacifier. Infant suitable body wash. A small pack of muslin squares. He picked up a bottle of infant paracetamol, and studied the label. Not suitable for babies under two months. He was about to put it back on the shelf, then thought fuck it. She might not be able to use it yet, but that didn’t mean the Hwang brothers couldn’t pay for it.

He’d need to go elsewhere for clothes, for a cot, a changing mat, a proper sling. But for now, at least, this would be enough to get them through the next few days.

Hae-in was starting to fuss badly now, and Gi-hun could feel the wetness soaking through the blankets. He couldn’t think about anything else right now. This would have to do.

Behind him he became aware of a presence, watching his every move closely.

In-ho had caught up, and was wisely staying just out of reach, as the feel of him nearby buzzed like static in his skull. He tried to ignore him, but it was like trying not to taste bile at the back of his throat. That sense of betrayal was marrow-deep. He could still feel the way the man had looked at him days ago, the soft smiles and closeness, the heat of his voice in the dark.

And it curdled inside him like poison. All that closeness, all that shared pain, every unspoken bond forged through suffering—it had been a lie. And yet he could feel the echo of it still, just behind his shoulder.

He kept his eyes fixed forward. Refused to give In-ho the dignity of a glance.

Gi-hun strode toward the checkout, every step purposeful, every tendon in his jaw tight enough to splinter. He dumped the contents unceremoniously onto the counter—cans, packets, wipes, one after the other in an almost violent rhythm.

The cashier flinched slightly but said nothing, just started scanning with cautious efficiency. Her eyes flicked up as she scanned the last can of formula. Her gaze hovered, sharp and uncertain, on the baby writhing in the makeshift sling against Gi-hun’s chest. Hae-in’s soft whines had escalated, her face flushing red as her tiny limbs pushed outward in jerky distress.

The cashier's brow creased.

“Is… is the baby yours?” she asked, clearly trying to keep her tone neutral, but suspicion laced every word.

Gi-hun stiffened. Hae-in let out a high-pitched, frustrated cry, and he instinctively bounced on the balls of his feet, trying to soothe her. It didn’t help. Her cries only sharpened, shrill and raw, the sound like a blade sawing at his nerves.

“Yes,” he said hoarsely, rocking her more urgently. “She’s mine.”

The cashier didn’t look convinced. Her eyes darted from his bruised face to the blood on his clothes to the distressed child in his arms.

“Where’s the mother?”

Gi-hun froze. The question cut straight through him. His hand faltered on the baby’s back. Jun-hee’s face flashed in his mind—the single tear cutting a path down her face, as she made him promise to look after her, just before she stepped over the edge.

He blinked hard, but it was too late. Tears welled fast and hot in his eyes.

The baby screamed.

The cashier shifted, her frown deepening. “Sir, I’m sorry, but I’m going to call the police—”

Gi-hun opened his mouth to speak, but his throat was thick with panic, his mind blank with grief.

Jun-ho moved in before he could even find the words. Calm, steady, the practiced flick of a badge catching the fluorescent light.

“It’s alright,” he said firmly. “Everything’s under control. He’s with me.”

The cashier hesitated, glancing between them as the baby’s cries bounced off the aisles. Her eyes narrowed, but she finally gave a tense nod. “Alright. Just… she looked really upset, and—never mind. Okay.”

And then In-ho appeared beside them, expression unreadable. He reached into his coat, pulled out a thick roll of cash, and laid it across the counter without a single word. The bills hit the counter with a soft slap.

The cashier didn’t say a word. She swept the notes away, fingers twitching slightly, eyes flickering between the three men, and bagged the purchases in rigid silence.

“She needs changing,” Gi-hun said as Hae-in let out a particularly shrill cry. “Is there somewhere here I can use? Please.”

The cashier—still clearly unconvinced—gave a wary nod and gestured behind her, through a beaded curtain that led to a cramped storeroom cluttered with cardboard boxes and half-unpacked stock.

It was nowhere near sanitary, but he had no other choice.

Gi-hun didn’t wait. He moved past the counter like a man in a trance, the baby’s cries still tapering into snuffles against his chest. The storeroom smelled of dust and plastic wrap, lit by a flickering fluorescent bulb that buzzed like an insect trapped in glass. There was barely enough floor space, but he dropped to his knees with urgency, laying out a clean muslin square as gently as he could.

“Alright, little one,” he murmured, his fingers already moving. “We’ll fix you up. I promise.”

He peeled back the blankets he had wrapped her in back in In-ho’s quarters, and what he found beneath made his stomach twist with guilt. Her skin was red and angry, irritated by the damp and the mess—thick meconium streaked across her tiny body, the first evidence of her system waking up to the world. She let out a pitiful, scratchy cry.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, his throat tightening. “I should’ve done this sooner. I’m sorry.”

He fumbled with the wipes, hands not quite steady, but his movements were tender as he murmured apologies between each swipe, wincing every time she flinched at the touch.

The rash cream came next, cool against her skin, his fingers coated in it as he worked it gently into the worst of the redness. Her cries softened, the tension in her limbs easing just a little.

“There we go,” he breathed. “Almost done, sweetheart. Just hang on.”

The clean nappy fastened with a quiet rustle of the tabs, and then he swaddled her in the remaining muslins. She blinked up at him, her cries sounding weaker from exhaustion.

Cross-legged now, Gi-hun reached for a bottle of the pre-made formula, pulled off the cap, and screwed on one of the sterile teats with shaky hands. The seal broke with a soft pop.

He offered it to her, and her mouth found it instantly as she latched and drank deeply, with the primal instinct to survive.

The bottle emptied with a soft, hollow gasp of air. Gi-hun lifted her carefully, cradling her against his shoulder, and patted her back in slow, rhythmic motions. She gave a weak little cough, then a quiet burp—barely audible, but it brought an enormous swell of pride to his chest, despite everything else.

Through the dangling beads of the curtain, he could just make out the silhouettes of In-ho and Jun-ho waiting near the counter, reminders of everything that had been taken from him. His fingers tightened slightly on the baby’s back.

He wanted to scream. To hurl the nearest object at them. To curse until his throat bled and the truth of his fury was etched into their bones. But he couldn’t—not yet. Not while his hands were full of something far more fragile than vengeance.

He took a long, measured breath, like he was trying to trap the rage in the pit of his lungs and hold it there until it passed.

With careful hands, he gathered the bags, slung them over his shoulder, adjusted the swaddled baby against his chest, and stepped back through the curtain. He didn’t meet the cashier’s eyes, just offered a tight, strained “Thanks,” before heading straight for the door.

He didn’t spare either of the brothers a second glance.

Outside, he scanned the dark street, eyes landing on the faint glow of a taxi sign parked just down the block. He was halfway there when the voice chased him.

“Gi-hun, wait!”

It was In-ho.

Gi-hun paused, jaw clenching hard enough that it ached. He didn’t turn. Didn’t trust himself to look at him without shattering.

“What are you going to do?” In-ho called again, footsteps crunching lightly on the pavement behind him. “How are you going to explain a child just appearing in your life? When you try to register her, what are you going to say? That the mother was a woman you barely knew? Half your age? That she died in a secret facility that no longer even exists?”

Every word struck like a cold blade to his heart. Gi-hun closed his eyes for a moment, the weight of it all—truth, lies, the impossible future—settling like lead on his shoulders.

But he didn’t answer. He started walking again.

“You really think they’ll let you keep her?” In-ho pressed, voice lower now, more urgent. “They’ll take one look at you and she’ll be gone. I can help you, Gi-hun. I can get you the right documents—papers, certificates, medical records. Proof.”

That was what made him stop.

“She’s not your daughter,” Gi-hun growled over his shoulder, spinning halfway to face him, the words spit out like venom.

“She’s not yours either,” In-ho shot back, without hesitation.

It felt like being punched straight through the sternum. And yet he wasn’t wrong. Not in the eyes of the law. Not in the eyes of the people who would come asking questions. All he had was the truth, and the truth had no power here. No name, no documents, no mother. He could already see the headlines: Man found with abducted infant. No evidence of legal custody. Child taken into state care.

The thought of her being pulled from his arms—processed, labelled, and handed off to strangers who didn’t know the sound of her cries—made something collapse inside him. He couldn’t let that happen.

“Fine,” he said, his voice flat, and emotionless. “Get me the papers. And then you’re out of my life. Forever.”

There was a flicker across In-ho’s face—an almost imperceptible twitch at the corner of his mouth. A ghost of something smug and self-satisfied. Gi-hun saw it. Felt it like a crack of heat behind his eyes. But just as quickly, it vanished. In-ho nodded solemnly, as though nothing had slipped.

He and Jun-ho fell into step behind Gi-hun, but Gi-hun didn’t acknowledge them.

He just kept walking, clutching Hae-in tighter to his chest like she was the only real thing left in the world.

Notes:

Thank you all so much for reading, for your comments, and for your kudos. They all mean the world to me :)

Chapter 5: Splinters

In-ho kept his distance, watching as Gi-hun stalked towards the taxis, struggling to carry all his supplies in one hand, with the child nestled in the crook of his other arm.

“We should help him,” Jun-ho said quietly.

“Be my guest and attempt to offer,” In-ho replied. “I’m more than willing to bet he’ll tell you to get lost.”

Jun-ho gave a soft huff of breath. “Yeah, maybe. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try.”

In-ho’s eyes remained on Gi-hun, the tension in his shoulders, the sharpness in every step, like his body was clenched into armor. “You think so? While he’s acting like we’re a bomb about to go off?”

“You kind of are.”

In-ho shot him a sidelong glance. “And what about you?”

“Don’t put any of this on me, hyung. I just want to help someone survive the fallout you created.”

“Spare me the sermon,” In-ho muttered, shifting his gaze again. Gi-hun was managing—barely—but it was obvious he was running on sheer adrenaline now, held together by raw instinct and bitterness. “He’ll make it to the car. That’s all that matters right now.”

Jun-ho’s voice was quieter when he spoke next. “That baby… she’s so small. Are either of you even going to tell me where she came from?”

In-ho took a deep breath, exhaling slowly. Jun-hee’s death was unfortunate. But inescapable. “Later,” In-ho said.

A taxi pulled forward at last. Gi-hun opened the door with his foot and awkwardly began trying to maneuver both bags and child inside.

Jun-ho took a step forward. “He can’t do this alone.”

In-ho reached out and stopped him with a hand on his arm. “Let it be,” he said. The more Gi-hun struggled, the sooner he’d come to realise Jun-ho’s words were true; he absolutely couldn’t do this by himself.

Jun-ho turned, frowning. “What are you doing, In-ho?”

“I’m prioritizing.”

“No, you’re not.” Jun-ho snapped, not raising his voice, but with enough heat to press the words like embers into skin. “Because right now, the priority is that baby, and you’re letting him struggle with it. I don’t understand, In-ho. Something cracks through your mask, and then you lock it all down again.” He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice was no longer fiery, but as cold as ice. “Like with us. You shot me, hyung. You go missing, and—”

“Later,” In-ho interrupted.

“Don’t give me that.”

“We make sure they get home first,” In-ho said, his tone final. “Then… I’ll talk. I’ll tell you what you want to know.”

He gave a reluctant nod. “Fine. But don’t think I’m letting you dodge it forever.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” In-ho murmured, voice unreadable. “One thing at a time.”

The taxi door remained open, engine idling. Inside, Gi-hun sat stiffly, angled away from them, one hand protectively cupping the baby’s tiny head where she lay against his shoulder.

The driver leaned out the window, and shouted towards the brothers. “You riding or not? I’m not waiting all night.”

In-ho smiled internally. Gi-hun still needed him. For now, at least.

Without waiting for Jun-ho, he opened the rear door and slid in beside Gi-hun, who visibly tensed but said nothing. The space between them might as well have been a mile, the air dense with fury and betrayal.

Jun-ho got into the front passenger seat with a quiet grunt. “Let’s go,” he said.

No one said a word as the city rolled by in flickering shapes and streaks of neon. Gi-hun sat like a loaded spring, his eyes forward, jaw locked tight. In-ho sat beside him, watching the man who’d once called him a friend, and who now wouldn’t so much as glance his way.

In-ho forced his gaze back to the window, watching the world speed past outside; narrow alleys, shuttered shops, the occasional couple stumbling out of a bar. All of it looked normal. But to In-ho, it felt unreal. Paper-thin.

The streets grew narrower still as they climbed into the northern districts of Seoul, toward Dobong-gu. The alleys here were threadbare and cracked, hemmed in by outdated buildings whose best years were decades gone. Laundry lines crisscrossed second-story windows. Neon signs buzzed intermittently, casting uneven glows over shuttered shops and broken fences.

The taxi finally pulled up outside a building that looked like it had been forgotten by time. The word PINK flickered in vertical neon, casting sickly light across cracked stucco and weathered paint. Windows were barred or bricked in, the walls streaked with rain grime and old graffiti. The entire structure slouched like it had given up trying to stand straight.

In-ho leaned forward slightly, frowning as he took in the place. He knew this had been Gi-hun’s base of operations for some time, but this was the first time he had actually seen it in the flesh.

“This is it?” he asked, voice quiet but heavy.

Gi-hun didn’t answer. He was already shifting to get out, arms full of sleeping child and plastic bags, as though the sooner he got inside, the sooner the whole nightmare might end.

But In-ho wasn’t convinced. He handed the driver a wad of cash and muttered, “Keep the change,” in a low voice.

The cab pulled away almost too fast.

Gi-hun stooped to gather his plastic bags from the pavement. In-ho took a step forward, then hesitated.

In-ho gestured subtly toward the building. “You think this place is safe? For her?”

Gi-hun froze, just for a moment. And when Gi-hun finally turned to look at him, In-ho almost wished he hadn’t. His face was pale under the streetlight, smeared with exhaustion and old blood, but his eyes were sharp enough to cut bone.

“Don’t act like you care now,” Gi-hun said, voice tight. “You already killed her mother.”

The words landed with brutal precision. And for a second, In-ho had nothing.

Gi-hun paused on the threshold of the motel, fury tightening every inch of his body. “The keys were in my jacket,” he bit out. “Which is now ash. So unless one of you brought a goddamn miracle key, you’re going to have to break it down.”

In-ho didn’t move. Jun-ho stepped up beside him, raising an eyebrow.

Gi-hun’s voice dropped, low and dangerous. “Don’t just stand there. I’ve got a baby who needs warmth and sleep. And I’m running out of patience.”

That was all the prompting they needed.

Jun-ho moved first, stepping up to assess the door with a trained eye, tapping near the lock to test the wood. In-ho joined him, crouching to examine the frame. It was old, warped from years of heat and neglect.

“This won’t take much,” Jun-ho muttered.

“Good,” In-ho said. “I’m not in the mood for finesse.”

Together, they positioned themselves shoulder to shoulder. One coordinated nod. Then they drove forward, slamming into the door with the force of two trained bodies. The wood groaned under the first impact, splinters blooming at the latch.

The second hit sent it swinging open with a splintering crack, the deadbolt half-torn from the frame.

Gi-hun stepped past them without a word, brushing against In-ho’s shoulder as if he were nothing but furniture. The baby let out a startled squeak but didn’t fully wake.

In-ho straightened, wincing faintly as his shoulder throbbed. Jun-ho gave the broken latch a brief look, then glanced toward his brother.

“You planning to help him fix that? Because if this place wasn’t safe enough before, it definitely isn’t now”

In-ho watched as Gi-hun stalked straight for the stairs, hitting a couple of light switches as he went. He paused briefly, glancing over his shoulder for just a moment. “Someone needs to do the same for my room. You can both go after that.”

“Wait here,” In-ho said in a low voice, before he followed Gi-hun up the stairs.

The stairs groaned under their weight, each step lit by the occasional buzzing ceiling light. In-ho followed at a distance, letting Gi-hun lead the way with the stubbornness of a man determined not to need anyone. The plastic bags dug into Gi-hun’s wrist, rustling with each movement, the baby now beginning to stir again with faint, uneven snuffles.

When they reached the fourth floor landing, Gi-hun turned sharply down the corridor, stopping in front of Room 410. The numbers were tarnished, barely hanging onto the door, the zero hanging askew. He shifted Hae-in in his arms, bracing her against his chest, and glared at the door as if sheer will alone might open it.

In-ho exhaled, and gave it a strong kick next to the latch. The door swung open onto a small, stale room that smelled faintly of mildew and old cigarette smoke.

Gi-hun didn’t wait. He shouldered past In-ho, stepped into the room, and kicked the door the rest of the way open. He dropped the bags on the floor with a thud and moved straight toward the bed.

“Leave,” he said, without turning around.

“Gi-hun—”

“I said leave.”

In-ho opened his mouth to say something else—but the door slammed shut in his face with a sharp crack, the echo shuddering down the dim hallway.

For a second, there was only silence.

Then a small, trembling wail rose up from behind the thin wood, one that was both startled and frightened. Hae-in’s cry was high and urgent, a jagged noise that sliced through the stillness and made In-ho’s chest tighten instinctively.

Inside, he could hear Gi-hun’s voice trying to soothe her.

“Shh… shh, baby, it’s okay. I’m here. Appa’s here. I didn’t mean to scare you. I’m sorry. I’ve got you, sweetheart…”

But the crying didn’t stop. It only grew louder, more panicked, the wails pushing out in uneven gasps. There was the soft shuffle of movement, the rustle of muslin, the unmistakable edge of desperation creeping into Gi-hun’s voice.

In-ho listened for a moment longer, head tilted slightly. He could picture the scene clearly—Gi-hun holding her awkwardly, heart thundering in his chest, unsure what she needed, too sleep-deprived to think clearly and unable to calm her.

In-ho had known this was coming.

The silence in the hallway thickened as Hae-in’s cries bounced off the walls. In-ho didn’t smirk. Didn’t gloat. But in his mind, he quietly marked it: he can’t do this alone. Not like this. Not on no sleep and with no help. He turned and walked back down the stairs, one slow step at a time.

Jun-ho was waiting at the bottom, leaning against the busted doorframe with his arms crossed, watching him approach.

“Well?” he asked.

In-ho gave a quiet sigh. “She’s crying. He’s trying. He’ll keep trying until she either calms down or he breaks.”

Jun-ho leaned against the chipped doorframe, arms crossed. His voice was quiet, but it carried. “So now what?”

In-ho exhaled slowly, gaze drifting toward the broken latch. “Now we wait. We can’t leave him here, not like this. Not in a place with no lock, no protection, and a baby to protect.”

Jun-ho nodded, his jaw shifting. And In-ho knew that look—knew the rhythm of his brother’s mind when a question was winding its way to the surface.

“So, hyung,” Jun-ho said softly, “I guess it’s just us now.”

In-ho didn’t answer right away. He just nodded once, slow and heavy, like the movement itself cost him.

“So tell me,” Jun-ho continued. “Why?”

The word dropped like a stone between them.

In-ho swallowed andturned, bracing a hand against the motel’s reception desk as if steadying himself—then let his body slide down until he was sitting on the cold linoleum floor, knees bent, back against the desk.

He looked up at Jun-ho, still standing there, watching him. Expecting something.

In-ho drew in a breath. Then another. Words came slower than he thought they would.

“When I married Yoo-na,” he said, voice low, “I made a vow to her. That I’d protect her. Keep her safe, no matter what. And when she got sick… that vow turned into a war.”

Jun-ho moved slowly, sinking down to the floor beside him. He didn’t interrupt. He just waited.

“I never told you how bad it got,” In-ho went on. “We sold everything. Every account was drained. I borrowed. I begged. From colleagues, from friends, and finally from men I shouldn't have touched with a ten-foot pole.And when my superiors found out…” He shook his head. “I was dismissed from the force. Just like that. No pension. No options. Yoo-na was dying, and the system I’d served for fifteen years wouldn’t lift a finger.”

His voice cracked at the edges, not with tears—just exhaustion. Regret.

“I was desperate, Jun-ho. I was approached by a man who—”

“Who offered money if you played a game? Yeah, I’ve heard this part. That doesn’t explain how you became their head.”

In-ho laughed bitterly. “I signed up,” In-ho said.”I played. And I won.” He swallowed heavily, his eyes fixed on nothing but memory. “And in the process, I watched people tear each other apart. I lost pieces of myself I know I’ll ever get back. But I won.” He closed his eyes. “And when I came home… she was gone. She died that morning. Alone.”

Silence again. Thick and immovable.

Jun-ho’s voice cut through it, sharp and raw. “So you lost your wife… and your solution was to become them? To put a mask on and kill hundreds of desperate people every year? You’re actually saying that out loud, hyung.”

In-ho’s head dropped back against the desk with a dull thud. He didn’t flinch. “It wasn’t like that,” he murmured.

Jun-ho scoffed. “Then what was it like?”

In-ho looked at him, something heavy and hollow in his gaze. “It was survival. I had nothing to live for. I was ready to end it all, when they came back.” He paused. “It was… purpose, after the grief. Structure. Order. Somewhere I didn’t have to feel anything but control.”

Jun-ho stared at him, his expression one of utter disbelief. “You traded grief for power. And now you’re surprised that no one’s thanking you for it.”

In-ho didn’t answer for a long time. He didn’t have one that wouldn’t make it worse.

“I’m sorry,” he said at last, aware of how hollow the word sounded. “If I could change everything, of course I would. In a heartbeat.”

Jun-ho didn’t respond right away. He just sat there across from him, arms loosely draped over his knees, staring at the opposite wall like he didn’t quite trust himself to look directly at In-ho, while the silence stretched on and on.

Jun-ho turned his head slowly, meeting his eyes now. “You disappeared. I thought you were most likely dead. And when I finally found you—when I finally had you—what did you do?”

In-ho’s throat closed up.

“You shot me, hyung.”

The words sat like stone between them.

“I know.” In-ho’s voice cracked. “God, Jun-ho, I know. I see it every time I close my eyes.”

Jun-ho’s jaw twitched. He was holding it in, holding everything in. But his eyes gave him away—glass-bright and unblinking. “You think I don’t? You think I don’t see you pull that trigger when I close my eyes? You think I don’t feel that goddamn bullet tear through me?”

“It was the only way I knew how to save you,” In-ho said, his voice barely above a whisper now. “They would’ve killed you. If they thought for one second I wasn’t loyal, if they’d known I had a brother infiltrating the island—”

“Don’t,” Jun-ho said sharply. “Don’t you put that on me.”

“I’m not.” In-ho swallowed hard. “I’m not. But if I’d hesitated—if I’d let you get any closer—the people in charge, they would’ve known who you were to me. That bullet was the only thing that kept them from asking more questions.”

Jun-ho exhaled hard, a bitter laugh escaping his lips. “You’re seriously asking me to believe you shot me to protect me?”

“I’m begging you to,” In-ho said, the words cutting out of him before he could swallow them back. “I didn’t know if you’d survive the fall, but I had to take the chance. It was the only path where you might live.”

Jun-ho rubbed his hands over his face, then dragged them through his hair, as if trying to pull the weight of the explanation off of him. “You don’t get to make that kind of choice for me.”

“I know,” In-ho whispered. “But I did.”

The motel’s silence closed back around them, filled only by the occasional creak of old plumbing and the hum of a flickering sign just outside the window.

“I lost you either way,” Jun-ho said finally, not even looking at him.

That broke something inside In-ho. Not the anger. Not the accusation. But the quiet, resigned truth of it.

“I’m still here,” he said, his voice rough. “Whatever else I’ve done, I’m still your brother.”

Jun-ho didn’t answer, but he didn’t walk away either.

Notes:

I can't believe this has hit 500 kudos! Thank you so much everyone, you all bring such a smile to my face <3

I hope you enjoyed this moment between the brothers. It's going to take a LOT for there to be forgiveness between the three of them - definitely more than a shouted 'In-ho!' from across the room, and then a baby dropped off without warning 6 months later

My apologies if I don't respond to comments - I always try to, but do get overwhelmed sometimes. If I don't respond, I just want you to know that every single comment has brought an enormous smile to my face, and really mean the world to me <3

Chapter 6: No Rest for the Living

The moment he’d slammed the door in In-ho’s face, she’d startled awake. The bang had ripped through her tiny body like thunder. She’d begun to wail—piercing, inconsolable, the sound of a child in a world far too loud and strange. And Gi-hun, caught in the raw aftershocks of everything, had just stood there, frozen with guilt, as her cries rattled the thin walls.

It had taken forever to calm her. Rocking her. Shushing her. Whispering apologies through cracked lips. She’d fought the blankets, her fists clenched in tiny fury, her cries high and broken. He’d tried everything—milk, changing her, holding her, swaying her, singing—but nothing worked. What she truly needed—her mother—was the one thing he couldn’t provide, and he was too exhausted to be a worthy substitute.

When she’d finally settled—her breaths hitching in the dark like the tail end of a storm—he’d laid her gently on her back in the centre of his bed, swaddled in clean muslin, her tiny fists still twitching with leftover distress. He positioned himself facing her, close enough to watch every rise and fall of her chest, but careful not to touch her. No blanket near her, nothing loose around her small, fragile body.

He tried to stay awake, to watch her, to make sure she was safe, to be ready just in case she needed him, in case anything went wrong. But the moment he blinked, the darkness pulled at him, and straight away the nightmare came in jagged pieces.

Jun-hee appeared first—drenched in rain, eyes rimmed in red, her hand pressed flat against his chest.

“Please,” she whispered, voice trembling. “You have to look after her. You promised me.”

“I will,” he breathed, almost choking on it. “I swear I will.”

But when he blinked, she was gone, and in her place stood Sae-byeok, too calm, too silent. She wore Jun-hee’s player 222 tracksuit, blood blooming across her collar like bruised petals.

“You won’t. You’re not that kind of person,” she said, her voice accusatory and colder than he had ever heard it in life. And then she turned and walked off the edge of the jump rope platform.

An unseen crowd burst into rapturous applause.

The dormitory snapped into place around him. Beds stretched to the ceiling, casting warped shadows across the concrete floor.

Sang-woo stood in the centre, sleeves rolled up, hands and face streaked with blood. One by one, he drove a knife into the remaining players. Their faces blurred, anonymous, screaming soundlessly.

When the last one was stilled, Sang-woo straightened and turned towards him. “Give me the baby,” he said kindly, an exhausted smile on his lips. “You can’t take care of her. You can’t even take care of yourself.”

“No,” Gi-hun whispered, backing away. “She’s not yours. She’s not—”

But Sang-woo didn’t wait. He plunged the knife into his own neck, slow and deliberate, watching Gi-hun as he did.

The room fell away again.

A wet, black surface stretched out in all directions, glistening under a flickering spotlight. No rules. No explanation.

Across from him stood himself. Hollow-eyed. Holding Hae-in like a bargaining chip.

“If she stays with you, she dies,” the figure said. “We both know that.”

Gi-hun dropped to his knees. “Let her go. Take me instead.”

The other him didn’t respond; he looked down at the baby in his arms as Hae-in began to cry, then slowly walked backwards, the darkness consuming them both, until they were invisible.

But Hae-in’s cries continued. A single note of distress. Then another. Then a full-throated scream, rising and falling, cutting through the dream like a razor.

But the scene didn’t dissolve.

He was still in the arena. Still paralysed and alone, and the cries kept coming.

He pressed his palms to his ears, curled in on himself, begging for it to stop—but her voice only got louder.

It folded into itself, became the only sound in the world, until it was not a dream anymore, but something closer. Something real.

His eyes snapped open as if yanked from the abyss, lungs seizing on a breath that caught halfway to his throat. The motel ceiling twisted above him in a dizzying whirl, the dim overhead light smearing into spirals. He gasped, chest heaving like he’d surfaced from deep water. For a long, suspended beat, he couldn’t move—couldn’t think—his body locked in a paralysis of confusion and dread.

Then reality slammed into him like a blunt force.

Hae-in was gone.

He bolted upright, limbs heavy and clumsy with sleep, a cold sweat slicking his skin. His hands flew to the mattress, searching blindly. His heart thundered so hard it drowned out thought. His gaze darted to the space where Hae-in should have been—where she had been—wrapped in muslin, safe and still and breathing.

The blood drained from his face. For a moment, the room spun. He clawed at the sheets like they might still be hiding her somehow. “No, no—” he rasped aloud, voice cracking.

His eyes swept the room in a blur, wild and disbelieving. There was no door ajar. No window open. But she was gone.

A baby’s cry pierced the fog of panic. Distant, but close enough to cut. Muffled. Mournful.

“Hae-in,” he whispered.

His heart lurched so violently it made him stagger. The sound had weight—it pressed against his skull, too real to be imagined.

Before the thought even formed, his legs were already moving. He shoved himself off the bed, feet slapping against the cold floor, joints trembling with the aftershock of adrenaline. He nearly fell, catching himself on the edge of the dresser with a curse. His breathing came in short, frantic bursts, the air too thin to satisfy.

Someone took her while I was asleep.

The thought screamed through him, raw and accusing. He’d failed her. He’d promised to keep her safe, and he’d foolishly, selfishly slept.

He reached the door, fingers fumbling on the handle, blood pounding so loud in his ears it drowned out everything else. His hand hesitated for half a second—just long enough for the horror to double down.

He threw the door open and ran down the corridor, following the screaming cries, stopping outside a room a few doors down from his own. Relief crashed into him first—so fierce it made his knees weak. Hae-in was alive. She was safe. The tension in his chest loosened just enough to let breath through.

But then he heard a voice talking to her.

In-ho.

He had taken her. He was talking to her, trying to calm her, trying to soothe her. Singing the lullabies that Gi-hun had sung to her. As if he had any right to do so.

The fury built slowly, like heat in a sealed room. In-ho had come into his space. Held her while Gi-hun had slept like a dead man. And yes, he hadn’t meant to fall asleep, but it didn’t matter. It had happened. He’d left her vulnerable. Dependent on him instead.

He stood in the doorframe, catching his breath, and for a moment couldn’t even trust he was really awake. Hae-in’s cries began to calm. In-ho’s voice, low and sweet as syrup, filtered out from within. Gi-hun’s stomach curdled with shame even as the rage gained force: she had been taken from him, and he hadn’t even noticed.

He stepped into the room and found the man sitting on the edge of the bed, back straight, the baby in the crook of his arm with a kind of assurance that made Gi-hun want to throw him through the window. There was a bottle on the nightstand, half-drained. Hae-in’s fists flailed at the air, but the force she'd put into crying was already fading. In-ho rocked her gently, not even looking up.

He clenched his fists. “Give her to me,” he said.

“Gi-hun, you need to rest,” In-ho said, still not looking up. “She’d been crying for nearly fifteen minutes when I came in. You’re exhausted, and in no fit state to—”

“Don’t tell me what I can’t do,” Gi-hun interrupted. “Give her to me.”

“No,” In-ho said. “Not until you’ve slept.”

Gi-hun’s chest rose and fell in sharp, jagged bursts. His fingernails dug into his palms as he took a step further into the room, the cracked vinyl flooring creaking under his weight.

“I said, give her to me.”

In-ho finally lifted his gaze. Calm. Composed. And that made Gi-hun’s fury spike even further: the unbearable steadiness of him, as if he hadn’t trespassed on the most sacred thing left in Gi-hun’s ruined world.

“She’s safe,” In-ho said, voice steady, infuriatingly gentle. “I changed her. Fed her. She’s calm now. You’re not.”

Gi-hun’s voice broke as he snapped, “She’s mine. Not yours. You don’t get to— You don’t get to take over just because you think you know better.”

“I don’t think,” In-ho said quietly. “I know better. You passed out, Gi-hun. I knocked three times and you didn’t even stir. What if she’d been choking? What if she’d rolled off the bed? Don’t gamble with her life just because you’re trying to prove a point.”

Gi-hun surged forward, trembling with the effort it took not to shove him aside. His eyes burned. “You think I don’t know I failed her already? You think I need you to remind me?”

Hae-in gave a hiccuping little sound in In-ho’s arms—half-cry, half-breath—and Gi-hun froze. Just for a second. Long enough to see her little chest rising and falling again, soft and steady.

His arms dropped slightly. Shame crept in, hot and acidic.

In-ho stood slowly, his eyes still on the sleeping baby cradled in his arms. “You can’t protect her if you’re falling apart. And whether you like it or not, she needs more than what you’ve got left right now.”

Gi-hun stared down at the floor, throat closing. Every word was a blow. Worse, every word was true.

“Don’t take her from me,” he whispered.

“I’m not,” In-ho said. “I’m just making sure that she’s still alive to give back to you, when you are ready. Get some rest, Gi-hun. I’m not going anywhere yet.” He took a step closer. “Let’s get you back to bed.”

Gi-hun felt his legs betray him, moving without conscious thought as In-ho guided him back to his room. He lay down stiffly, eyes fixed on the low ceiling, heart still aching with the phantom echo of Hae-in’s cries. He hated that he was forced to trust anyone else to care for her. Hated even more that she’d quieted for In-ho and not him.

But the exhaustion clawed at him again, dragging him back under.

***

The nightmare came quickly with no warning.

He was in an unknown arena, one that was opulent, cold, and endless. The ceiling arched high above like a cathedral, but there was no sound, not even footsteps. He wandered the corridors barefoot, feeling the weight of a thousand eyes watching him. Each door he passed had no handle, no markings—only numbers flashing and disappearing too quickly to read.

He turned a corner, and the light changed. Harsh fluorescents now, flickering. The dormitory—yes, he recognised the narrow beds—but something was wrong. Every bunk was empty. No bodies, no players. Just silence and the smell of old blood.

Then he heard a sound: the soft shuffle of slippers behind him. He turned, but there was nothing.

That sound again. Behind him.

He whirled and saw Hae-in, swaddled in a blanket far too large for her, lying alone on one of the bunks. He started toward her, but the floor shifted beneath his feet. Tiles cracking. The bed she sat on fell away like a trapdoor, swallowed by shadow. He dove, fingers outstretched, but she was gone again. Only the echo of her fading cries remained.

Now he was running down endless corridors. The walls turned red. He could hear the click-clack of marbles being played. The sound of a glass bridge shattering. A noose pulling tightly as a body dropped from a great height. Behind him, a chorus of children chanted something he couldn’t quite understand.

Then Sang-woo’s voice, sudden and sharp in his ear: "She's not yours to save."

He spun, and Sang-woo was there again, tears in eyes, blood pouring from an open wound.. Hae-in was in his arms, limp and silent.

“No—give her back—”

“Play the game, hyung,” Sang-woo choked out through his tears. “You can’t leave until you win.”

***

He was thrashing by the time his eyes snapped open again.

He gasped like he was surfacing from deep water. The room spun. His hand reached for the space beside him instinctively—but of course, she wasn’t there.

Gi-hun buried his face in his hands and tried not to scream.

Notes:

Thank you so much again for all the kudos and comments, they are literally a fan writer's life blood, so thank you for giving me life!

I just want to say sorry for such a short chapter, but hope you enjoyed it nonetheless.

I've seen so many parallels recently between Squid Game and Hunger Games, and a few Everlark/Inhun crossover posts, and it basically gave me the idea for this particular chapter - sewing the seed for a way to stop the nightmares in a future chapter ;) Yay for letting your fandoms and OTPs all merge into one!

Chapter 7: Latch

In-ho sat slouched on the motel room’s sagging two-seater couch, one foot propped on a mismatched plastic stool, the other leg curled beneath him. Hae-in lay nestled in the crook of his arm, her weight so slight he barely felt it until she stirred. Her head lolled slightly against his chest, mouth parted, breath soft and damp against the inside of his shirt.

With his free hand, In-ho scrolled through his phone, the screen casting a faint glow in the half-dark room. The sun wasn’t up yet, but the world outside was beginning to shift—slate grey light at the corners of the window, birds testing the air with the occasional thread of song.

He placed orders for necessary things, adding items to cart and checking out with the kind of mechanical efficiency he used to use to sign off on security budgets and transport manifests. Now, it was nappies and knitted hats with ears like teddy bears. Sleep suits and onesies. Tiny socks and booties. A cardigan with wooden buttons. He added things to his basket in bulk, selecting overnight or same-day delivery whenever it was available.

A crib. A mattress. A travel pram with adjustable seating. A car seat. Swaddling blankets. A baby bath shaped like a whale, and a thermometer shaped like a duck.

Steriliser. Bottle warmer. Digital monitor. White noise machine. Night light shaped like a cloud. Plush toys. A mobile that spun slowly and played a soft lullaby.

He ordered a body wash that promised no tears and smelled faintly of rice milk and pears. A bundle of soft hooded towels. A set of muslin cloths.

Then he paused—glancing down at the rumpled dark overcoat he was still wearing. His shirt was stiff at the collar, damp where Hae-in had drooled earlier. His trousers were stiffened by sea salt. He looked like exactly what he was: a man who’d walked out of a nightmare and hadn’t figured out where to go next.

With a sigh, he opened a new tab and added shirts, plain black and charcoal grey. A pair of tailored trousers, as well as comfortable sweat pants and sleep wear. A warm sweater. A belt. Underwear. Socks. He hesitated, then added a pair of trainers in his size. His shoes had dried blood along the heel. He hadn’t even noticed.

The phone buzzed quietly as confirmation emails came in one after another. He ignored them

Then, pausing for only a second, he tapped open a new tab and typed in: rural property for sale.

He wasn’t sure why, at first. The idea came as a murmur rather than a plan, but it took hold quickly. Stronger than instinct. More like need.

Farmhouses. Old pensions on the edge of disused farmland. Cottages drowned in shade, or surrounded by quiet rice fields with their paddies long since gone dry. He skimmed listings with a detective’s precision. Places with land but not too much traffic. Places close enough to a hospital, but far enough to be forgotten.

A modernised hanok near Hongcheon caught his eye—a wide courtyard, forest on three sides, a long stretch of fence and an automatic gate. It had a private well, an outbuilding that could easily convert to a studio or greenhouse, and wide eaves that would flood the interior with light.

He bookmarked it.

Others followed—a villa tucked along the coast of Namhae, half-buried in pine. A converted temple near Gyeongju. A slate-roofed cabin outside of Pyeongchang that had once been a guesthouse but looked abandoned now.

He added each one to a growing shortlist of somewhere someone could raise a child and disappear at the same time. Somewhere a man could stop being the Front Man, or the Winner, or the killer—and just become quiet. Invisible.

For a moment he wondered what he was doing, but the answer was already there.

Hae-in stirred slightly in the crook of his arm, her small fingers flexing. She exhaled a sound between a sigh and a whimper, settling deeper against him. Her breath was slow, a small metronome against his ribs.

She needed more than this. More than a rotting motel with a broken door and a father too broken to keep his eyes open for more than a few hours at a time.

She needed safety. Air. Sunlight. Space to cry and laugh and crawl and grow.

She needed a future that didn’t smell like blood.

Gi-hun wouldn’t be easily swayed. He was one of the most stubborn people In-ho had ever met, and these days he wore his guilt like a second skin, every inch of him sharp-edged and hollow-eyed, as if suffering were some kind of penance he had to keep earning. But this wasn’t about Gi-hun anymore.

It was about the small, sleeping bundle curled into the crook of In-ho’s arm.

Getting Gi-hun to listen to him, even if it were the most reasonable request in the world, would be like coaxing a half-wild dog into a cage. The trick wouldn’t be dragging him out. The trick would be making him believe he’d walked out on his own.

It would have to feel like his idea. Or, at the very least, not like an intervention, and definitely not like charity. Gi-hun was still drowning, but was too proud to reach for the rope. So In-ho would have to leave it floating close enough to grasp. Close enough for him to think he’d pulled himself up.

An offhand comment about black mold. The bullet holes in the wall and the casings on the floor.

The blood spatter left behind by Ki-yong blasting his own brains out.

In-ho leaned back with a sigh. The old motel couch creaked beneath him like it resented the weight. Hae-in stirred faintly but didn’t wake, her breath still slow and soft, one tiny hand twitching against the fabric of his shirt.

She deserved more than this. More than the mildew-stained walls and peeling linoleum. More than a door that didn’t lock and the constant hum of traffic just outside the window. She needed light. Stability. A future measured in soft mornings and safe spaces—not shadows and survival.

He wasn’t her father. That title didn’t belong to him. But he had knowledge. He had resources. And right now, most importantly, he had time. Enough to build something. Enough to lay a foundation for the life she should have had from the beginning.

If Gi-hun would let him.

In-ho shifted carefully and rose to his feet, adjusting his hold so Hae-in wouldn’t stir. She moved only a little, her body still tucked in close, and he stepped over to the window.

She had no idea. No idea where she was, or what kind of world she’d been born into. No idea about the weight of the past tethered to the men now orbiting her like fractured moons.

No idea how close she'd come to being no one at all.

In-ho’s throat tightened. He smoothed a fold in her blanket, fingers light over the tiny curve of her ear.

When Yoo-na died, the whole idea of fatherhood had died with her. The mornings like this one. The weight of a child held just because. The quiet joy of care not bound to consequence.

And yet.

Here he stood. Not a father. Not even a surrogate. But somehow folded into the shape of a life that needed him. However briefly. However imperfectly.

“I’m not your father,” he whispered, so soft the words nearly disappeared into her blanket. “And I’m not sure I deserve to be near you. But I promise you this.”

He paused. The words ached on the way out.

“I’ll do everything I can to give you a life better than the one that made me. Better than the one that broke him. I don’t know what that looks like yet. But I’ll find it. Even if he fights me the whole way.”

A breath shuddered out of him. The sting behind his eyes didn’t ask permission. He blinked it away.

“I’ll try,” he added, barely a whisper now. “I swear to you—I’ll try.”

Her only reply was the warmth of her weight against him, and the soft, steady rhythm of her breath.

There was a quiet rustle of movement behind him. A shift in the air. In-ho turned.

Gi-hun stood in the doorway, barefoot and silent. The light from the window painted his face in faint blue-grey, sharpening the shadows under his eyes. He looked more stable than he had—less frantic. But the weight he carried was still there, carved deep.

They stared at each other for a long moment.

No barbed words. No anger. Just the pressure of everything unspoken stretching the space between them.

In-ho didn’t move at first. He adjusted Hae-in slightly, her cheek still resting on his chest, the turn of her mouth soft and slack with sleep.

“You get enough rest?” he asked, quiet as the room.

Gi-hun gave the barest nod. “For now.”

In-ho took a slow step forward, and then another, careful not to jostle her. When he reached him, he didn’t hesitate. Just extended the baby forward, offering her with both hands. A gesture without accusation or strings attached.

Gi-hun paused. Only for a heartbeat. Then reached out and took her.

The exchange was smooth and instinctive, as if they’d done this a hundred times before. Gi-hun shifted her gently against his shoulder, one hand finding the back of her head without needing to look. He glanced down at her, checking she was ok, and then went still.

In-ho let his arms drop to his sides.

There were no jabs this time. No caution. No power struggle. Just a man holding his daughter. And another man watching in fragile silence.

Gi-hun glanced down again. “Has she been ok?”

In-ho gave a faint nod. “She stayed asleep the whole time.“ In-ho looked up towards Gi-hun, and for a moment he remembered the rounded cheeks and optimistic doe-eyes of Gi-hun during his first games. He needed to look after himself; there was no way he could pour from an empty cup. “You should both eat something,” he said. “I’ll send Jun-ho out.”

Gi-hun said nothing. He nodded once, sharply, then returned to his room.

***

The smell of coffee hit first. Sharp, dark, and comforting.

Gi-hun blinked and looked up.

Jun-ho had come back. He hadn’t heard the door. Hadn’t heard much of anything, really—just the dull throb of his own thoughts, and the constant background hum of Hae-in’s tiny breaths. But now the younger man was setting down two large paper bags on the chipped table near the window, peeling them open and pulling out their contents.

Fruit. Packaged gimbap. A small stack of pastries. A bottle of orange juice. And three steaming cups of coffee

Gi-hun watched him while still holding Hae-in, who had just started to stir. She gave a soft grunt of protest, then settled again, cheek pressed into the curve of his shoulder.

In-ho moved to help without speaking, clearing space with a wet wipe, unpacking one of the cups and placing it close enough to Gi-hun to be a suggestion, not an order.

Gi-hun’s eyes narrowed slightly as he watched the brothers trying to act like any of this was normal. He hesitated, then reached for the cup, the bitter smell already clearing a corner of the fog in his skull.

He took a sip. Then two more.

By the fourth, the heat was spreading down his chest, unfolding something tight in his ribs. It didn’t fix anything, but it definitely helped. His fingers stopped trembling. The ache in his jaw—he hadn’t even noticed how hard he’d been clenching it—eased by degrees.

He wasn’t about to say anything. Not out loud. Not with both of them standing there, pretending not to watch, but damn. He’d needed that.

And now, with that same old familiar pull in the back of his throat, came the second craving: a cigarette. Just one. Ten minutes outside. A hit of nicotine, some cold air, silence.

Hae-in stirred again, lips puckering softly in sleep. He adjusted her carefully, watching her eyelids flutter, then settle.

The cigarette would have to wait. It’d been a week since his last one, after all. What was a few more hours?

He let out a breath through his nose, shifted his weight, and moved toward the side counter where the powdered formula and bottles were lined up like supplies in a field hospital. He re-read the instructions carefully—there was nothing especially complex about it—but it still felt like threading a needle blindfolded. A single mistake felt enormous.

Behind him, he could feel them watching. Still not speaking. Just standing there with that silent, fraternal patience that somehow managed to feel both steadying and suffocating. Like if he faltered even a little, they'd both reach out—and he wasn't sure which would be worse: them watching him fail, or them trying to stop him from it.

He set the cup of coffee down, reached for the boiled water flask, and began to prep the bottle. Every movement was deliberate and methodical. Scoop, level, pour. Shake gently. Check the temperature. Shake again. Cap it.

The coffee had worked just enough to cut through the worst of the brain-fog, but he was still slow—still moving like a man underwater, his limbs five seconds behind his thoughts.

Still, neither of them stepped in. That, at least, he appreciated. Whether they sensed he needed the space, or just knew better by now, he didn’t care. He could feel the barrier he was projecting like static in the air: Don’t. Just don’t.

As if right on cue, his stomach growled then—loudly enough for both brothers to hear. He scowled at the sound, and grit his teeth, willing neither of them to say anything.

Jun-ho arched an eyebrow. “You’re going to have to start eating something before you collapse.”

Gi-hun shot him a look, but it didn’t quite have teeth. Not this time.

His gaze dropped to the baby still tucked into his arm. She was blinking now, slow and owlish, her mouth twitching toward hunger.

He finished prepping the bottle, and tested it again against the inside of his wrist.

In his arms, Hae-in gave a soft whimper—a breathy little protest that didn’t quite become a cry. Gi-hun instinctively rocked her, a gentle sway from the hips, more motion than thought. She quieted, but only briefly. Her head shifted, mouth rooting blindly against his shirt.

He looked down at her, the bottle in one hand, the other cradling her close.

“All right,” he murmured, barely above a whisper. “I’ve got you.”

He guided the bottle to her mouth, and she latched on with sudden, hungry urgency—no hesitation, no pause. Just the soft, eager sound of her suckling, tiny fingers curling reflexively against the fabric of his shirt.

The moment cracked something open in him.

There was nothing dramatic about it—no soaring music, no cinematic reveal. Just this: the warmth of her nestled against him, her need met by his hands, her trust given without question. It hit him low in the chest, with fragile, impossible tenderness.

Love.

He held the bottle steady as she drank, her eyes still closed. Every breath she took tugged at something wordless inside him. The kind of feeling that asked for no reward—only that she stay fed, stay warm, stay safe.

Gi-hun swallowed hard, blinking down at her.

“I’ve got you,” he whispered again.

He glanced briefly towards the brothers. In-ho had gone back to the couch, nursing his own coffee with a neutral expression. Jun-ho stood leaning against the kitchenette wall, arms folded, gaze lowered like he was giving Gi-hun some illusion of privacy.

Another level of tension fell away. That was how he wanted it.

A rattling buzz echoed around the room, and Gi-hun looked up sharply. Without a second word, he raced towards the bank of monitors he had installed. “Help me,” he said to Jun-ho, indicating them. The younger brother walked over and switched them on. Gi-hun’s eyes roved over the stranger that stood on his doorstep, his heart beginning to race painfully.

“Don’t worry,” In-ho said as he calmly stood up. “I’ve got it.”

Several minutes later, In-ho returned, a large box in his arms. “There’s another downstairs,” In-ho said to Jun-ho, who nodded and pushed away from the wall.

“What is all this?” Gi-hun asked, a well of suspicion bubbling up inside him.

“Essentials,” In-ho answered.

Gi-hun clenched his jaw, and said nothing. The gesture, however well meaning, stung. That he’d had to rely on In-ho to get all of this was just more proof that he was a second rate parent.

In-ho opened the box. Folded inside were several soft cotton onesies in neutral tones, sleep suits, tiny knitted hats, mittens, and cardigans. The tags looked expensive without trying to be.

Jun-ho returned carrying a folded bassinet—sleek, well-made, the kind of thing you’d expect in a magazine ad for modern parenthood. “This should help you find the time to actually have breakfast, Gi-hun,” he said, as he put the bassinet down. “You still haven’t eaten.” Gi-hun ignored the dig.

Hae-in made a soft coo and pulled off the bottle’s teat, her mouth slack with drowsy satisfaction. Gi-hun patted her back gently and narrowed his eyes at the bassinet as In-ho began setting things up quietly. No dramatic flourish. No smug satisfaction. Just calm efficiency—pulling the bassinet frame into shape, laying down the mattress, arranging the smallest of the sleep suits along the edge so they could breathe.

It was infuriating.

It was also—God help him—exactly what he needed.

“There’s more to come,” In-ho said. “Some today, some tomorrow. Anything else you need, we’ll deal with as and when.”

Gi-hun grunted. He shifted on the spot and reached for a muslin. His arms ached and his head buzzed. But Hae-in let out a soft burp and slumped into his shoulder with a breathy sigh. Milk drunk and warm and alive.

Gi-hun didn’t thank In-ho. He couldn’t. Not yet.

But he didn’t tell them to take the stuff back, either.

Notes:

650 kudos? I'm honestly blown away, you guys are amazing <3

This chapter pretty much burst out of my chest like a xenomorph, but if I can just get Gi-hun to agree one of those properties In-ho found, then can slowly start growing together ;)

Thank you forr all the comments and love, they're what keep us going <3

Chapter 8: Foundations

Gi-hun had accepted the gifts. That was something. But any offers of help—real, direct help—were still either gritted through under duress or waved off with clipped words and a glower sharp enough to cut bone.

Still… there were signs. Small ones. Quiet ones.

It had started small, with the absence of venom. He’d stopped barking at them to get out of his sight every time one of them so much as looked in his direction. That had been the first crack in the armour. He still made offhand remarks—low, sardonic mutters about how he couldn’t wait to get his space back once Hae-in’s paperwork came through, but they became less and less frequent.

Then, a few days in, Gi-hun had passed Hae-in to Jun-ho with barely a word so he could go downstairs and smoke. Just a brief look, and a quiet, “Can you hold her?”

In-ho hadn’t missed the shift. The moment the wall didn’t just crack, but gave a little under pressure.

Another few days later, Gi-hun had muttered something while allowing In-ho to watch over her in her bassinet while he went outside again: “It’ll be a pain in the ass finding time to smoke when you two are gone.” No eye contact. No admission. But In-ho had caught the edge of something softer in the words.

He didn’t press. Not yet.

Instead, he let the silence stretch when it needed to. Stepped in only when Gi-hun’s exhaustion started to blur the edges of his patience or coordination. Held back when the stubbornness kicked in. It was like coaxing a stray dog in from the rain—no sudden moves, no raised voices. Just consistency. Just presence.

He hadn’t mentioned the property yet.

The modernised hanok near Hongcheon was still sitting on his shortlist, but it wasn’t a fantasy anymore. The viewing was booked for the end of the week. If Gi-hun came with him, good. Ideal, even.

But if he didn’t?

Well. There were some decisions In-ho might have to make on his own. For Hae-in’s sake, if nothing else.

Time to start laying the foundations.

The door creaked open behind him. Gi-hun returned, along with the unmistakable smell of stale smoke.

In-ho didn’t look up immediately. He was at the counter, pouring water into the kettle, his back half-turned to the door. Beside him, Hae-in lay nestled in her bassinet, one tiny hand fanned against the edge of a blanket. She’d been drifting in and out of sleep all morning, quiet and content.

He gave the kettle a moment to click on, then gave a small, deliberate cough into his sleeve. Not loud. Just enough to be heard. A subtle rasp.

Right on cue, Gi-hun snapped, his voice defensive and annoyed. “I smoked outside.”

In-ho turned just enough to glance at him. “Mm,” he said noncommittally, setting two mugs down on the counter. He coughed again. Slightly louder this time.

Gi-hun kicked off his shoes with more force than necessary. “I wasn’t even near the door. You’re not choking on anything.”

In-ho gave the tiniest shrug, then finally looked up. “I know,” he said, as if reluctantly conceding the point. “Could be something else.”

That caught Gi-hun’s attention. “Like what?”

He nodded toward the corner by the bathroom door. “Mold. You can smell it in the plasterwork. It’s not visible yet, but it’s there. In the bathroom, in the corridors, in most of the bedrooms.”

Gi-hun followed his gaze. “And?”

“And,” In-ho said mildly, “if it’s bothering me, it’s probably bothering her.”

That landed. Even from across the room, In-ho could see the flicker in Gi-hun’s expression. Not panic—but the seed of concern. He gazed down at her sleeping form.

“She hasn’t been coughing.”

“Yet,” In-ho murmured. He reached for the coffee canister, measured out a spoonful, then another. “But this place isn’t built for long stays. You know that. The damp, the peeling walls, the air. It's fine for grown men who should know better. It’s not fine for an infant who doesn’t.”

He didn’t look directly at Gi-hun when he said it, instead continuing to busy himself making coffee.

He stole a glance over his shoulder. Gi-hun stood there still, bristling but not biting. He looked tired, and worry was already beginning to knit his eyebrows together, as his gaze roamed over his daughter’s sleeping face, then back towards the crumbling plaster.

In-ho didn’t press. He didn’t need to. He handed over the mug of coffee with no commentary, and allowed Gi-hun to sit with the thought.

Time would do the rest.

***

In-ho hadn’t said anything else for the past couple of days. No more pointed suggestions. No direct mentions of mold or ventilation. Just the occasional dry cough, carefully timed. Soft, unobtrusive. Enough to keep the idea simmering in Gi-hun’s mind, whether he liked it or not.

He let the motel settle into its small rhythm—bottle feeds, naps, formula prep, murmured arguments about taking breaks or accepting help. Slowly, the sharpest edges of Gi-hun’s anger were beginning to blunt. Sleep helped. So did coffee. Hae-in helped most of all.

This morning, Gi-hun was in the bathroom. The sound of running water was a positive that Gi-hun was taking one more step towards self-care. In-ho was standing near the counter, rinsing out a bottle, when he heard the door open and soft footsteps on the stairs outside. Jun-ho. Back from one of his supply runs, armed with shopping bags and whatever fresh complaints he’d picked up along the way.

Perfect timing.

If In-ho angled it right, this could be the next nudge. A casual conversation just loud enough to carry through the thin bathroom walls. Another seed dropped exactly where it needed to be.

But before he could open his mouth, Jun-ho beat him to it.

“Hyung,” he said, dumping a bag onto the small kitchen table. “I need you to be honest with me. For once in your life.”

In-ho didn’t rise to the bait. Not this time. He simply turned, expression unreadable, and gave a short nod.

Jun-ho didn’t waste a second.

“You said they’d come after us. After me. Did you mean it?”

That pulled In-ho up short. Not the words, exactly. But the tone. There was something sharp beneath the surface—something real. Not just curiosity or paranoia, but something edged with the slightest hint of fear.

He straightened slightly. “Why?” he asked. “Did something happen?”

Jun-ho didn’t answer the question. He just looked at him, jaw tight. “Did you mean it?”

In-ho hesitated. He could feel the steady rhythm of the water behind the bathroom door. Gi-hun would be listening. Even if he pretended not to be.

And the truth was—it hadn’t been entirely a lie. Maybe he had said it in part to keep Jun-ho close, to keep Gi-hun too entangled to run. But that didn’t mean the threat wasn’t real.

He let the silence hang a moment longer, then exhaled slowly. “It’s possible,” he said at last. His voice stayed low, like this was a conversation meant just for the two of them. And maybe, in part, it was. “Did something happen?” he added.

Jun-ho didn’t answer immediately. He pulled out a bundle of groceries, setting them down on the table without ceremony. He gave a slight shake of his head, but his posture betrayed more than the words.

“I don’t know,” he muttered. “Just a feeling more than anything. Maybe I’m being paranoid. But it felt like… someone was watching me. Not just once. The whole time. But that every time I looked up, they turned away.”

In-ho’s eyes narrowed slightly.

“Did you see anyone follow you back here?” he asked.

“No,” Jun-ho said. “And I didn’t take a straight route. Doubled back twice, crossed the river... But still—” He broke off, then gave a small, tight shrug. “I can’t shake the feeling, you know?”

In-ho nodded slowly. His expression didn’t change, but a quiet current of thought ran beneath it. This wasn’t just paranoia. Jun-ho was too grounded for that. And if there was even a chance they’d been tagged—

“Hmm,” he murmured, moving toward the counter, reaching for the notepad tucked beside the microwave. “It’s good to be aware,” he said aloud as he grabbed a pen. “But you’re probably just overtired. Try and get some rest. Keep your guard up. Don’t let it eat you.”

But on the notepad, his hand moved quickly. He kept his body angled slightly, blocking the writing from view of the rest of the room.

Help me sweep for bugs.

He tore the note cleanly and passed it to Jun-ho, who met his gaze—steady and sharp—and gave the smallest of nods.

“Yeah,” he said aloud, voice light but with a thread of grim humour. “You’re right. Being woken up five times a night by a screaming baby really doesn’t help your mindset.”

In-ho allowed himself a flicker of a smile, then gestured to Jun-ho to take one side of the room.

They moved without a word.

Jun-ho picked up a knife which he used to crack open the baseplate of the wall clock. In-ho ducked under the table, his hand running along the underside of the wood, checking for irregularities, wires, anything magnetic.

In-ho gestured toward the smoke detector, and Jun-ho grabbed a chair. After that, they checked the back of the television, behind the radiator, inside the lamp. Even the bottom of Hae-in’s bassinet.

Nothing.

Still, the ritual brought something like relief. Control, however brief. They were doing something.

Jun-ho looked over at him as he climbed down from the chair. “Clear,” he said, just loud enough to be heard. His expression softened a fraction.

In-ho gave a faint nod. “Same here.”

At that moment, the bathroom door creaked open.

Gi-hun emerged in a fog of residual steam, towel slung around his shoulders, face newly shaved and hair damp. The change in him was almost shocking—less like a corpse, more like a man again. Not fully recovered, but there was at least a flicker of life returning to him .

He rubbed at his jaw with the heel of his hand, quickly checked on Hae-in, who was gurglinng softly in the bassinet, then squinted at them. “What the hell are you two doing?”

Jun-ho froze for half a beat, then casually moved to finish putting the clock back together. “Weekly bonding ritual,” he said with a sly grin.

Gi-hun’s eyes narrowed. “The hell does that mean?”

In-ho stepped in, smoothing his tone. “Just double-checking the room. Jun-ho thought he saw something earlier. Probably nothing.”

“Probably?” Gi-hun echoed, brow creasing. He glanced around the room, suddenly alert. “Was someone here?”

“No,” In-ho said. “It’s fine. Nothing was out of place. It’s just… precaution.”

Gi-hun shifted the towel off his shoulders and walked toward them, looking unconvinced. “You’re not saying this for no reason. What did you think you saw?”

Jun-ho met his gaze. “I didn’t see anything. Just a weird feeling on the street. Someone watching. Could’ve been my imagination.”

Gi-hun didn’t answer immediately. He reached for the towel again, drying the back of his neck in long, thoughtful strokes. His jaw clenched, but he didn’t argue.

Finally, he said, “If someone comes here—”

“They won’t,” In-ho cut in gently. “We’re just staying ahead of it. That’s all.”

Gi-hun looked at him hard, but didn’t press.

In-ho could see it—the wheels turning. Suspicion curled behind his eyes, but it wasn’t directed at them. Not this time. Just a creeping awareness of how fragile the illusion of safety really was.

Gi-hun sighed and reached for the coffee, and In-ho could practically see the cogs turning in his mind. He smiled internally, then turned towards Jun-ho. “That being said, Jun-ho, we should start looking for a new place of our own. To get out of Gi-hun’s hair. He’s shown he doesn’t need us hanging around forever.”

He let his eyes linger on Gi-hun for a beat longer—watching the slow tightening of his grip around the coffee cup, the way his jaw shifted as if working through a thought he wasn’t sure he wanted. The silent battle between pride, anger, and fear.

Good, In-ho thought. Let it sink in. Let the idea settle in his bones before he even knows it’s growing roots. Let him believe it’s his decision when the time comes

***

In-ho and Jun-ho had left Gi-hun in his own room with Hae-in, a moment of much needed peace and quiet.

If only his mind would slow down just for a little while.

He shifted her gently, the soft weight of her small body settling into the crook of his arm. One hand moved instinctively, brushing her fine hair off her forehead. Her eyes—wide and dark—blinked slowly as they drifted across the room, not focusing on any one thing for long. Just… watching. Taking in the light, the shadow, the shape of his face.

She made a soft sound, somewhere between a grunt and a sigh, then another—tiny, breathy, aimless noises that felt like the start of something bigger.

Her fingers flexed around the soft rubber giraffe he’d tucked into her blanket. It gave a quiet, gentle squeak, and she stilled, startled and curious. Her brow furrowed faintly as her lips parted, and she repeated the motion with something akin to joy.

It cut straight through him—half awe, half ache, as the idea that she could still be in danger, both from people on the outside, and her environment within, began to nag further at him.

Gi-hun’s eyes drifted upward, toward the corner of the ceiling and he saw them. Tiny black specks that he hadn’t noticed before. Or maybe he had and just hadn’t cared enough to look. But they were there. Spreading slowly in an uneven bloom across the plaster. The telltale signs of moisture, rot, and time.

He exhaled through his nose, low and steady, and looked back down. Hae-in was chewing on the giraffe’s ear now, legs kicking in steady rhythm against his ribs. Her eyes sparkled with mischief and curiosity. And for one strange, stinging moment, he was back in a cramped apartment as a new father, Ga-yeong giggling in her high chair as he tried—badly—to impersonate different animals to entertain her.

His throat caught, just for a second. He wasn’t going to lose another daughter. And he was going to do everything he could to bring the first one back into his life.

A low, unmistakable rumble vibrated against his forearm, and Hae-in gave a contented little squirm. A second later, he felt warmth blooming through the fabric of her onesie.

He blinked, stared down—and let out a disbelieving exhale as a pale brown stain began to spread with alarming speed across her pristine white clothes.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Hae-in let out a sleepy sigh, completely unbothered, like she’d just dropped a masterpiece and was waiting for applause. He held her at arm’s length, as far as he dared without losing his grip, assessing the damage.

“Alright,” he muttered. “So that’s what a level ten looks like.”

He stood carefully, shifting her so he could peel off the now-doomed onesie with minimal collateral damage. No such luck. The mess had somehow defied gravity and containment. His hand came away damp. He winced.

“This feels targeted.”

In the hallway, the floor creaked—probably one of the brothers moving around—but he wasn’t about to call for backup.

“Don’t look so pleased with yourself,” he said as he carried her toward the changing mat, cradling her like a tiny, smug war criminal. “You’re not even sorry, are you?”

Hae-in blinked up at him, blank and serene as a monk. Another soft grunt bubbled up from her throat.

“God help me,” Gi-hun muttered, as he continued peeling clothes away.

Hae-in made a face, scrunching her nose, but didn’t cry. She just squirmed a little, her legs kicking the air with random bursts of energy while Gi-hun worked quickly, carefully, stripping away the last of the ruined onesie and wiping down her skin with a gentle tenderness..

“You’re taking this really well,” he said softly, balling up the mess in a plastic bag and knotting it shut. “But let’s not make a habit of it, hey.”

He wiped his hands, then gave her belly one last swipe just to be sure. The new nappy went on snug, and he adjusted the tabs with a care that had already become second nature. Hae-in lay there watching him the whole time, her chest rising and falling in slow, even breaths, her eyes wide and impossibly focused—like she was trying to study his face and commit it to memory.

“You deserve more than this,” he said quietly, not even really thinking about the words until they were out. “More than me. More than...this.”

He swallowed the ache as it rose, clenching his jaw until it passed. No use getting sentimental. Not now. He shook his head, blinked a few times, and reached for the clean clothes.

A pale pink vest. A sleep suit patterned with rainbow unicorns. The sleeves were too long, but he rolled them neatly at the wrists. He tugged scratch mittens over her tiny fists, then pulled on a soft yellow cardigan—clearly hand-knitted, with little flower buttons and scalloped edging.

It didn’t match. Not really. Eun-ji had always been good at that sort of thing with Ga-yeong—matching colours, patterns, hair clips and socks that all somehow made sense together. Gi-hun looked down at Hae-in and felt the weight of that memory press against his chest.

Still. She was warm. She was clean. That was what mattered.

Her mittened fist batted lightly against her mouth—a familiar cue now—and he didn’t waste time. He moved to the side table, set up the bottle, and loaded the Perfect Prep machine In-ho had ordered. The water poured at just the right temperature, formula scooped and shaken, and within minutes he was easing the bottle into her waiting mouth.

She latched on with no hesitation, sucking eagerly. Her eyes, dark and unfocused but locked on him all the same, didn’t stray from his face.

He watched her in return, cradling her close.

She was warm. She was clean. She was fed. And even if he didn’t know how to say it right now, she was loved. Fiercely. Without condition.

He shifted her gently, resting her against his shoulder. She let out a soft burp, milk-drunk and drowsy now, and he began to sing—low and rough—a lullaby he used to sing to Ga-yeong:

A baby more beautiful than the moon
A baby more beautiful than the stars
Hush hush my baby
My baby sleeps so well
A baby more beautiful than flowers
A baby more precious than gold
Hush hush my baby
My baby sleeps so well

Her lashes fluttered. Then closed.

He stood there for a long minute, not moving, listening to the quiet breath against his collarbone. When her head lolled slightly, he carefully transferred her to the bassinet and adjusted the blanket around her. She didn’t stir.

He watched her for another moment—just to be sure—then backed away, step by slow step, before slipping from the room. He left the door open behind him.

In the corridor, the silence felt thinner, stretched taut. He padded barefoot to the makeshift dining space, flicked the kettle on, and glanced around for signs of the brothers. Nowhere to be seen. A twinge of irritation itched at him. He needed a smoke. Badly. Just a few minutes outside. But someone had to be close by in case Hae-in stirred.

He sighed and settled for caffeine instead.

While he waited, his eyes fell on a stack of papers left on the table. Printouts. Photos. Listings.

Properties. Dozens of them. All over the country.

His stomach turned. He picked one up. Then another.

Modern hanoks. Family homes with space. Yards. Light.

In-ho had mentioned it in passing, something about giving Gi-hun his space again. But this wasn’t casual browsing. This was a search in progress. A plan forming without him.

Gi-hun stared at the pages in his hands, the edges crinkling under his fingers. It was such a strange dichotomy; the anger, the distrust, the fury at both of them continued to simmer under the surface, but it was already growing muted and distant in the face of having a brand new life to look after. And now that the possibility of having to do that entirely alone was rearing its head, Gi-hun already began to wonder if this was something he could do.

He had no one else. No parents. No siblings. No friends left in this world.

The reality hit like cold water down his spine. His grip on the paper tightened, but he immediately put the pile back where he found it when he heard the sound of the brothers returning—a low murmur of voices, the thud of a door closing too hard. Gi-hun dropped into the nearest chair, trying to look casual. The kettle clicked off behind him, steam fogging the window a little.

In-ho came in first, carrying a small bag of snacks. He nodded once in Gi-hun’s direction. Jun-ho followed, hands shoved deep in his hoodie pockets. Neither of them said much. Gi-hun didn’t either.

He set about making coffee for everyone. The silence sat thick between them, not quite tense, but far from relaxed.

“You eat yet?” In-ho asked after a while, his voice forced into the neutral tone Gi-hun had gotten used to from him.

“Not really.” Gi-hun poured the coffee into three separate mugs, and added a little milk and sugar to his own. He took a sip, staring into the cup. “Thinking about it.”

Jun-ho opened a packet of crackers and offered one toward him. Gi-hun took it without a word. They sat like that—mug, crackers, slow sips—for a few minutes. The air eased just a little.

Then Gi-hun set the mug down and gestured vaguely at the stack of property listings. “Those yours?” he asked, as though it had just occurred to him.

In-ho nodded. “Yeah.”

Gi-hun gave a small grunt of acknowledgment. “Maybe I should start looking too,” he said, keeping his tone flat, offhand. “Can’t stay in this dump forever.”

He didn’t look up, but he could feel both brothers glance at him.

“I’ve got a viewing booked,” In-ho said after a moment. “End of the week. Out by Hongcheon. It’s quiet out there. Clean. Plenty of space, two bedrooms. Room enough for—you know.”

Hae-in and you to join us. And not get under each other’s feet. He didn’t say it, but they all heard it in the pause.

Gi-hun took another drink, letting the words sink in. He tilted his head slightly, like he was thinking it over. “You want me to come with you?”

“If you want,” In-ho said, carefully and casually. “No pressure.”

Gi-hun nodded slowly. “I’ll think about it.”

That was all he said. He didn’t look at either of them. Just picked up another cracker and chewed slowly, eyes fixed somewhere beyond the wall.

But inside, the decision had already been made.

He was going.

Notes:

As always thank you to everyone reading, commenting, and enjoying. You're all amazing!

Chapter 9: New Beginnings

The road climbed slowly, winding through the trees. In-ho kept half an eye on his brother, who was handling the wheel with quiet focus, lips pressed together in a way that meant he was either concentrating or biting back commentary, and half on the man in the backseat.

Gi-hun sat with Hae-in’s car seat nestled beside him. The baby had fallen asleep not long after they left Seoul, her little head tilted slightly in her padded carrier, arms limp in sleep. Gi-hun hadn’t taken his eyes off her for more than a few seconds at a time.

It gave In-hun the opportunity to watch him unseen in the mirror.

Fatherhood suited him. Not in the picturesque, social media kind of way. Not like those men who played the part in matching clothes and posed smiles. But in the way he moved, instinctively, around Hae-in. The way he kept a hand near her without even realizing he was doing it.

It surprised him. And at the same time, it didn’t.

He remembered watching Gi-hun on the monitors back on the island. Just before the jump rope game, he overheard him speaking to Jun-hee on the stairwell cameras, how watching his daughter grow up had been the happiest time of his life, but that how he had never been a good father.

At the time, In-ho had believed him. Now, he wasn’t so sure.

Maybe Gi-hun hadn’t been perfect. Maybe he’d made mistakes. But watching him now, the thought crept in uninvited: Maybe he was too hard on himself. Maybe he didn’t fail the way he thought he did. Maybe the world just gave him nothing and blamed him for not turning it into something.

He hadn’t put up as much resistance to the house viewing as In-ho had anticipated. There’d been some token grumbling, the usual prickly reluctance, but it was more out of habit than conviction. Gi-hun still liked to act as though he was being dragged along, forced into decisions—but In-ho had seen the flicker of something else in his expression when the idea was first raised. Not just resignation. Relief. Exhaustion, too. Like a man on a sinking ship who didn’t want to be rescued, but couldn’t afford to drown either. He needed out. He needed safety. And he didn’t have enough left in him to get there alone.

Finally, the hanok came into view at the crest of the hill—a stretch of clean lines and warm timber tucked back from the gravel drive. The trees gave way to a gentle slope, sun spilling down across the porch and the pale stone steps. It was modernised, yes, but not cold. Not gutted. The original bones had been preserved—dark wood, open eaves, the quiet elegance of traditional craftsmanship—and every modern addition had been made to complement, not erase.

It was a place that understood history could live beside new beginnings.

He glanced back, just enough to catch Gi-hun watching the house.

His eyes had softened slightly, as if he were already imagining Hae-in living here safely, taking her first steps, her first words…

After a long beat, Gi-hun exhaled through his nose. “You said this was near Hongcheon?”

“Twenty minutes outside,” In-ho said.

Jun-ho shut off the engine and opened the driver’s door. “Come on,” he said, stretching. “Before the baby wakes up and reminds us who’s really in charge.”

Gi-hun climbed out and opened the boot, lifting out the buggy frame and setting it up in silence. When he returned to the car door and leaned in to unbuckle the seat, his hands were steady and gentle. He lifted the carrier out with a care that kept Hae-in sleeping, her little head tucked to one side, completely undisturbed.

In-ho watched it all unfold from his place at the edge of the gravel, and something inside him shifted. A tightness that rose unexpectedly in his chest. A twinge of something like jealousy, sharper than he wanted to admit. Not of Gi-hun, exactly—but of the quiet, undeniable bond forming between him and the girl. Of the chance to show up for someone that small, and be enough.

He swallowed heavily, as a flash of memory struck him without warning—Yoo-na, still glowing and round with the promise of their future, hands folded over her belly in bed beside him. They had spoken in murmurs about names, laughed about which features the baby might inherit. All of it was gone now, cut off before it ever began. A hollow ache opened behind his ribs and lingered.

But then Gi-hun brushed a thumb softly over the baby’s blanket, and smiled with a warmth In-ho hadn’t seen on his face since…

Since the start of the marbles game, when Gi-hun had still believed Il-nam to be an ally, when he thought they would pass and get out together.

In-ho exhaled slowly. The grief didn’t vanish, but something else curled up alongside it. A kind of warmth. A cautious hope that perhaps this could be the start of Gi-hun returning to himself.

The estate agent met them at the gate—a polished young man in a slate-coloured suit and pristine sneakers, bowing with crisp efficiency before launching into his practiced pitch. In-ho only half-listened. The floor plan, the square footage, the details about drainage and property lines—he already knew all of that. He hadn’t come to be sold the house. He’d come to watch someone else be sold on the idea of a life.

He kept his focus on Gi-hun.

As they approached the front steps, Hae-in began to stir. Her tiny mouth opened in a soft, squirming yawn, fingers twitching against the edge of her blanket. Without hesitation, Gi-hun unbuckled her from the seat and lifted her into his arms, her head coming to rest naturally against his shoulder. The buggy was left beside the porch.

Good, In-ho thought. That was better. Pushing a child through a space created emotional distance. But carrying her? Cradling her against his chest, her breath warm and steady on his collarbone? That would change things. He wouldn’t just be walking through a building. He’d be imagining routines. Mornings in the kitchen. Naps in the sun-drenched sitting room. She wasn’t just along for the ride now; she was part of the picture.

The agent led them up the stone steps and through the front door. Inside, the hanok was cool and hushed, the filtered light soft against polished wood. Their socks slid gently over smooth floors as they moved deeper into the space. Sliding doors folded back with a papery whisper, revealing rooms laid out with clean, graceful symmetry—modern in execution, but timeless in feeling. The kitchen was open and warm, the appliances sleek without feeling cold. A dining nook overlooked the slope of the hill, and the living area opened out onto a wraparound porch that bathed in late morning light.

In the bathroom, a deep copper tub sat beneath a window that framed the forest beyond. Gi-hun paused there, holding Hae-in close, and something in his expression shifted—just a flicker, but it was enough.

In-ho saw it.

He was no longer simply assessing. He was picturing. Not whether it would work, but how. “She’d sleep well here,” Gi-hun said quietly. He didn’t look at anyone when he said it. Just out at the trees.

When the tour ended, they all stepped back into the main room. The agent smiled politely, letting them take it in for a moment longer.

“As I mentioned on the phone, the property is chain-free,” he said, smoothing a folder of papers between his hands. “The paperwork on our end is ready to go. The sellers are looking for a cash buyer to ensure a quicker turnaround.”

Gi-hun’s brow furrowed slightly. “How much are they asking?”

“Eight hundred and fifty million won,” the agent replied. “It’s very competitively priced for a property of this type, in this condition, and this location. Particularly given the restoration quality.”

In-ho nodded, unphased. “That wouldn’t be a problem.”

The agent gave a short, approving bow. “We’ve already had interest from a few parties, but the sellers will prioritise a clean, fast sale.”

Gi-hun didn’t say anything. His gaze swept the room again. The soft wood. The angled beams. The patch of sky through the lattice window.

In-ho could almost see it in him: the quiet calculation about possibility. About safety. About permanence.

In-ho turned to the agent, nodding once, polite but noncommittal. “We’ll think about it,” he said. “There are a couple of other viewings lined up later this week, so we’ll need to compare options.”

He barely finished the sentence before Gi-hun spoke.

“Why?” Gi-hun said, sharp but quiet, like the thought had surprised even him. “This is perfect.”

The agent blinked in pleased surprise, but In-ho didn’t look at him—his eyes were already on Gi-hun.

He raised his eyebrows, tilting his head just slightly, as if to say, Oh?

Gi-hun didn’t elaborate. Just kept his eyes forward, as though he hadn’t meant to speak out loud.

In-ho held back the smile threatening to tug at the corners of his mouth. He schooled his expression into something neutral—mild curiosity, maybe a hint of doubt—but inside?

Inside, he was grinning.

He turned back to the agent and gave a polite nod. “We’ll be in touch soon.”

The agent offered a business card, bowed, and stepped away to take a call, leaving them to linger at the edge of the drive. Gi-hun stood in silence beside the buggy, watching the breeze stir the branches overhead, and In-ho could practically see the gears still turning in his head.

”Perfect,” he’d said.

Not “good enough.”

Not “better than the motel.”

Perfect.

***

Two and a half weeks later, they were back at the gates, but this time, it was different.

This time, the keys were in Gi-hun’s pocket.

The gravel crunched under the tyres as the car pulled up to a gentle stop, and for a moment, no one said anything. In the back seat, Gi-hun blinked at the familiar slope ahead of them—the curve of trees, the golden wash of early afternoon sun on warm wood. It looked exactly the same as it had on the day of the viewing.

Except now, it belonged to them.

To him.

Gi-hun stepped out of the car and into a different kind of quiet. Not the muffled stillness of a cramped motel room or the buzzing tension of being confined in close quarters with two men he barely trusted—but real quiet. The kind that came with space, distance, and safety.

The wind was clean here, sharp with pine and the mountain chill. He closed his eyes for a second and let it fill his lungs.

Hae-in stirred in her carrier as he lifted her out, blinking against the sudden light, her tiny fingers curling reflexively into the folds of his shirt.

"Yeah," he murmured, pressing a kiss to her soft head. "Big day, huh?"

He barely acknowledged the others. A curt nod to Jun-ho and a sidelong glance at In-ho. The silence between them wasn’t new, but it felt different now—like something was slowly being buried under layers of practical necessity. Still sharp, still jagged, but not bleeding. Not today.

He didn’t wait for them to unload. Instead, he set off walking slowly around the edge of the property, down a narrow gravel path that skirted the house and led into a short loop around the side garden. Wild grasses bowed gently under the breeze. A single swing creaked on its frame beneath the shade of a ginkgo tree.

Hae-in blinked up at the canopy, wide-eyed. The light filtered green and gold through the leaves and painted soft patterns across her cheeks.

“Your mum would’ve liked this,” Gi-hun said quietly, adjusting her against his chest. “I’m sure of it.”

He paused at the edge of the garden where a low stone wall bordered the property. It was cracked in places but sturdy, and he could imagine her—Jun-hee—sitting there with Hae-in in her lap, watching the wind move through the valley below.

“She was… kind,” he said after a moment. “Strong too.”

The ache came quietly. A familiar dull weight that settled somewhere behind his ribs. He shifted Hae-in slightly, and her head lolled peacefully against his shoulder. He wished he knew more to be able to tell her, but the truth was, all he had was a name and little more than first impressions.

“She was brave. Not stupid-brave. The real kind. The kind that means you keep going, even when everything tells you to give up.”

His throat felt tight. The words felt heavy saying them aloud. Maybe he needed to. Maybe Hae-in did too.

“She did everything she could to protect you. Right to the end.” He drew in a shaky breath. “And I think… wherever she is now, I hope she sees this. I hope she sees you. I hope she sees me and thinks… ‘okay. You’re doing alright.’”

He brushed his hand over Hae-in’s head again, grounding himself. “I’m not perfect. But I’ll do my best.”

A rustle of motion in the distance caught his eye.

Across the far side of the property, near the treeline, he spotted In-ho and Jun-ho mid-conversation—or at least what started as one. Their gestures were tight. Clipped. Jun-ho’s voice was raised, though the wind stole most of the words. In-ho stood still, arms crossed but shoulders tense.

Then Jun-ho turned abruptly and walked away, head down, fists balled at his sides.

In-ho didn’t follow.

He just stood there for a moment, utterly still. Something about the set of his face—the raw, unguarded slump of his shoulders—caught Gi-hun off guard.

It wasn’t the same face he’d come to rely on in the Games. Or the one sitting across a table from him, offering him a knife and an easy way out. Not the one issuing threats behind a mask, or even the slightly distant strategist from the motel.

This was someone hurting. Someone who’d just been left behind.

Gi-hun shifted Hae-in again, more to shake the strange feeling than out of necessity. He should’ve felt vindicated. Triumphant, even. Some dark part of him did.

But under that there was a flicker of something else. It wasn’t forgiveness—it wasn’t as big and all encompassing as that. But the slightest little glimmer of empathy. However small, however unwanted, it was real.

He turned away before In-ho could look up and see him watching. The wind had picked up, tugging gently at the hem of his coat, and he looked down at his daughter.

“Come on, baby girl,” he said softly. “Let’s go see your new room.”

***

The house was still, save for the low hum of the baby monitor on the table between them. Gi-hun’s eyes flicked to it every few minutes, watching the green line pulse gently with sound—Hae-in’s soft breathing, the occasional sleepy shift.

She was safe. Asleep in her new cot in his new bedroom. For now, that was enough.

The kitchen had filled earlier with the subtle scent of sesame oil, ginger, and soy. In-ho had made braised tofu with scallions, garlic, and red pepper flakes, served alongside sticky rice and lightly pickled radish. The food was better than it had any right to be. The tofu was seared golden at the edges, tender in the middle, soaked through with flavour. It was the first real meal Gi-hun had eaten in… he couldn’t remember how long.

Still, he didn’t say anything about it. Neither of them had spoken since sitting down. They ate in silence, save for the quiet clicks of chopsticks against porcelain.

Finally, Gi-hun reached for the soup bowl and asked, without looking up, “Jun-ho not coming back tonight?”

In-ho’s chopsticks paused mid-air.

For a long beat, he didn’t answer. Then, slowly, he set them down and folded his hands on the edge of the table.

“No,” he said. Not sharply, not coldly. Just final.

Gi-hun nodded once, a small, tired motion. “He didn’t seem happy.”

Another silence stretched between them, heavier this time. Gi-hun glanced at him—just briefly—and caught the way In-ho’s jaw had tightened, the flicker of something raw behind his eyes. Not anger. Not even frustration. Just pain.

And guilt.

He looked like someone who had already had this conversation with himself a hundred times, and lost it every time.

Gi-hun didn’t press. He just turned his attention back to the food, chewing slowly. But something about the stillness of In-ho’s posture made it clear that whatever had passed between him and his brother earlier, it had cut deep.

Gi-hun reached for the baby monitor again, thumb brushing over the edge as Hae-in stirred softly in her sleep, then settled.

“I didn’t know you could cook,” he muttered after a moment, as he turned his attention back to the food..

In-ho blinked, just slightly thrown by the change in subject. “There’s a lot you don’t know about me.”

Gi-hun paused and looked up, his eyes narrowed. “Likewise.”

A faint twitch of a smile touched In-ho’s lips, but it didn’t quite hold. The silence stretched again, but this time it felt different. Not as sharp. Just... uncertain.

Then, completely out of nowhere, In-ho said, “Did you ever read The Hunger Games?”

Gi-hun blinked at him. “What?”

“Did you ever read it? Or watch the films?”

“No,” Gi-hun answered.

In-ho gave a small, almost shy smile, as if embarrassed by his own question. “There are these two characters, and at first they’re forced to be around each other. They… have to present a united front, in order to keep themselves safe from an all powerful regime. But they don’t really know each other, so they start simply. Asking basic questions. Like…what’s your favourite colour?”

Gi-hun stared at him, brow furrowed, caught somewhere between suspicion and disbelief. “Are you… asking me that? Or just quoting the book?”

In-ho met his gaze calmly, not flinching. “Both,” he said simply, like it was the most reasonable thing in the world.

Gi-hun huffed a quiet breath, the kind that wasn’t quite a laugh. It seemed like such an innocuous question—childish, almost. But the more he sat with it, the more he realised he had no idea how to answer. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had the luxury of thinking about something so simple. So harmless. His mind had been a battlefield of survival, shame, grief, and exhaustion for so long that it had little space left for preferences.

But then, uninvited, an image rose: Ga-yeong running through a field of sunflowers, haebaragi taller than she was, the golden blooms nodding gently in the breeze. She’d been laughing, her hair tied in messy little bunches, arms outstretched as if she could hug the whole summer sky. She had called them her favourites—said they were like the sun had come down to visit her.

And just like that, they’d become his favourites too.

“Yellow,” he murmured, almost surprised to hear the word out loud. “Sunflower yellow.”

A flicker of something softened In-ho’s expression—surprise, maybe, or something gentler. He nodded once. “That suits you,” he said, almost to himself.

Gi-hun blinked at him, unsure how to take that. “You?”

There was a brief silence, not tense—just thoughtful. In-ho’s gaze drifted toward the window, though there was nothing to see now except the inky wash of night against the glass.

“Green,” he said, voice quieter now. “Pine green.”

Gi-hun followed his gaze, thinking of the woods surrounding the hanok. Miles of trees out there, swaying unseen in the dark. He could almost smell the pine, the loamy earth after rain. He wasn’t sure if it was In-ho’s words or just the fact that he could finally breathe a little easier, but the weight on his chest didn’t feel quite so crushing.

“Green, huh,” he said quietly. “Guess that fits too.”

He didn’t say why—about the steadiness, the way In-ho seemed to hold himself like a tree in a storm, unmoved even when he was breaking—but he thought it all the same.

Neither of them spoke after that for a while. But the silence didn’t feel quite so unfamiliar anymore.

Notes:

Let the slow burn commence!

I know I mentioned Everlark before, but this was too perfect a moment to not include. I can just picture In-ho, imagining them as Everlark. Little nerd that he is <3

Anyway, I just have to say thank you once again for all your kudos and comments, every single one makes me smile <3

Chapter 10: Moon and Stars

In-ho watched Gi-hun’s face in the low light, the shadows stretching across his features. The anger, grief, and exhaustion that had etched itself so deeply into his expression had been slowly easing since first coming to view this place, and now—with the simple and neutral question he’d asked—Gi-hun seemed to relax even further. The lines of suspicion hadn’t vanished, but they were no longer drawn quite so tightly. A glimmer of something else was beginning to show through—faint, reluctant, but real. Something like warmth.

And In-ho ached for it. He had spent so very long in the cold and the shadows, and couldn’t bear to any more.

For just a few days, during the games, that warmth had been his, freely given, and he’d squandered it like a fool. Now, the smallest sign of it felt like sunlight through frostbitten skin—something beautiful, and painful, reminding him of those stolen, surreal days when proximity and deception had blurred into something dangerously close to connection. Gi-hun’s trust had come quickly, naturally, and In-ho—like always—had turned it into a weapon.

He didn’t deserve another chance, but he wanted one all the same. Not to fix the past. That was impossible. But maybe to build something in spite of it. Something quiet and careful and real. He didn’t know what shape it might take—friendship, forgiveness, or something still unnamed—but the desire rooted deeper each time Gi-hun let his guard slip, even for a moment.

So he paid attention. He though about Gi-hun’s answer to his favourite colour. Sunflower yellow. Such a perfect choice for a man who once upon a time shone like the sun itself. He wanted to know why. What was it about that colour that spoke to him? Was there a memory attached to it? He wanted to know everything about this man. One step at a time though.

So he tried another.

“Favourite food?”

Gi-hun blinked, as if the question had caught him off guard. He tilted his head a little, eyes narrowing in thought. “Tteokbokki,” he said eventually. “Spicy. With too much gochujang and the cheap rice cakes from street carts. The messier the better.”

In-ho grinned faintly.

“She hated it,” Gi-hun added a beat later, a flicker of amusement tugging at his mouth. “My ex-wife. Said it was junk food. ‘A grown man shouldn’t be eating like a schoolboy,’ she used to say.” His smile widened with the memory, though it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “But she always let me have it on my birthday. Bought it for me from the stand by the subway, even though she’d wrinkle her nose the whole way home.”

The smile faded a little, and Gi-hun looked down at his hands, as if surprised the words had left his mouth. The air shifted—quiet and heavy, like something private had slipped out before he’d decided it was safe.

In-ho didn’t press. He recognised the signal for what it was: a closed door. So he changed the subject, gently.

“Cats or dogs?” he asked, voice light.

Gi-hun looked up, grateful for the redirection. “Cats,” he said without hesitation. “Obviously. What about you?” he asked after a moment.

“I prefer goldfish,” In-ho replied. “I have—had—two.”

Gi-hun raised an eyebrow. “Goldfish?”

“They’re calming,” In-ho said defensively. “And smarter than you’d think.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

A quiet beat passed between them. Gi-hun adjusted in his seat, glancing toward the monitor again.

“What were their names?” he asked, his voice quieter.

In-ho looked faintly surprised. “The goldfish?”

“Yeah.”

In-ho paused for a moment. “I don’t know,” he said. “They never told me.”

Gi-hun paused for a moment, then let out a soft breath that was almost a chuckle, the warmth in it catching In-ho off guard. It wasn’t much. But it was real.

“First pet?” In-ho continued.

“Stray kitten,” Gi-hun said. “I was maybe ten? Found it under a market stall in winter. Tried to hide it in my room but eomma found out, of course.”

“What happened?”

“She let me keep it. It wasn’t long after my appa passed. She said it was the first time she’d seen me smile in weeks.”

In-ho’s throat tightened a little. “What was its name?”

“Jubu. Because he was ginger and fluffy enough to look like a ball.”

In-ho laughed softly. Gi-hun smiled, too, just for a moment, looking down at the tabletop.

Then, from the monitor, a sharp cry rang out—thin and high and unmistakable.

Gi-hun was on his feet in an instant, chair scraping softly against the floor. He crossed the room in moments, and vanished into his bedroom.

In-ho stayed behind, his chest tightening slightly. He hoped that one day Gi-hun would trust him enough to answer these calls. He listened to Gi-hun’s soft murmurs over the monitor—“It’s ok, sweetheart, I’m here, I’m here”—and something in his chest twisted. It was a quiet moment, ordinary in its tenderness, but it cut deep. Not because of what it was, but because of what it wasn’t—for him. He wondered what it would feel like, to be needed that instinctively. To be trusted in the dark.

He drew in a slow breath, letting the silence settle around him again. But it wasn’t peace that followed—it was absence.

His gaze drifted to the darkened window again, the trees outside swaying gently in the night breeze. But his thoughts were somewhere else—chasing the echo of a door that hadn’t reopened. A fresh pang hit, sharp and familiar. Jun-ho hadn’t come back.

The argument unspooled in his mind on a loop, every word sharpened by the silence that followed it. Jun-ho’s voice—usually so measured—had cracked with something raw. Not just anger, but hurt. Frustration. Fear.

“You can’t keep me in this box, hyung,” Jun-ho had snapped, eyes glassy with the effort to hold everything in. “I’m not like you. I don’t have the luxury of disappearing.”

“You think I have a luxury?” In-ho had thrown back. “This isn’t about luxury, it’s survival—”

“No. It’s about control. You want to run the whole damn world like it’s another game board.”

That had stunned him, not because it was untrue, but because it came from the one person who he thought would never say that out loud.

Then Jun-ho’s voice had softened—not to calm, but to something far more dangerous: sorrow. “Are you forgetting something, hyung? I need access to a hospital, regular check-ups, bloodwork, prescriptions. I can’t just vanish into the woods with you and pretend I don’t exist.”

And In-ho had fallen silent, not because he didn’t care, but because he cared too much—and didn’t have an answer. Not a good one.

Jun-ho had kept going, his voice trembling now. “And I left everything. My badge. My life. I didn’t ask to be pulled into this—again. I did it because you asked. Because you needed me. And I didn’t say no, because...”

His jaw clenched. “Because I’m stupid. Because I love you. But I left someone behind. Someone I was starting to—” He’d cut himself off. “And now you want me to lie to our mother too?”

In-ho had looked away then. “She’s not my mother,” he’d said quietly. “She’s yours.”

Jun-ho’s face had darkened at that. “Don’t do that. She never treated you as anything but her own.”

And it was true. She never had. She’d made him his favourite lunches to take to school, and held his hand when he was feverish. She’d wept with pride for him when he enlisted, and wept harder when the world chewed him up and spat him out. But he had never let himself need her the way Jun-ho did. Had never let her see him the way Jun-ho had. He’d kept his distance, even then. The obedient son. The protector. The one who made himself useful so no one could see the hollow inside.

“It’s not safe to be near her,” In-ho had murmured, his last card to play.

“She’s my mother,” Jun-ho had returned, breath unsteady. “And she’s sick with worry because I disappeared off the face of the earth. I won’t cut her off. I won’t.”

In-ho hadn’t argued after that. He watched his brother walk away, and the pain in his eyes had been worse than shouting. It had been final.

In-ho swallowed hard and turned his gaze away from the window. Fix one ruined relationship at a time. That was all he could manage.

From the other room, a sharp cry cut through the quiet—louder, more distressed than before. Gi-hun needed help, and In-ho was fast on his feet. He turned toward the kitchen and began preparing Hae-in’s formula moving with quiet urgency.

In-ho entered Gi-hun’s room to find him kneeling beside the changing mat on the floor, bent over Hae-in with a soothing cadence in his voice. His words were low and rhythmic, almost like a lullaby, as he gently wiped her down, murmuring reassurances. The tenderness in his tone landed like a blow—gentle but sharp. In-ho swallowed hard.

Without a word, he knelt beside him and held out the warm bottle the moment Gi-hun finished dressing her in a fresh sleepsuit. Their eyes met briefly in the soft light—Gi-hun’s gaze tired but grateful—and he accepted the bottle with a small, silent nod.

He settled onto the floor, pulling Hae-in close to his chest with a motion that was second nature now. She latched almost immediately, her tiny fingers curling against the fabric of his shirt, her cries softening with each suckle. In-ho sat back on his heels, watching the scene unfold with quiet reverence. There was something about the way Gi-hun held her—like she was the most fragile and important thing in the world—that made it hard to breathe.

When Hae-in finally drifted off again, her breathing deep and even, Gi-hun eased to his feet with care. He placed her gently into the cot at the foot of his bed, pausing for a moment to softly brush a thumb across her cheek. In-ho caught the flicker of a smile that crossed his face—small, fleeting, but real.

Gi-hun turned, eyebrows raised in a silent signal, and together they tiptoed toward the door. The floorboards groaned under Gi-hun’s weight and he froze mid-step, glancing back like someone afraid to wake a sleeping tiger. Hae-in stirred but didn’t cry, and after a long beat, they slipped into the hallway.

Gi-hun pulled the sliding door closed with an exaggerated slowness, then he turned. “Thank you, In-ho-ssi,” he said, voice low but clear.

In-ho stilled. It was the first time Gi-hun had used the honorific since everything had come out—since trust had cracked and fallen away like glass underfoot. Before, it had always been “Young-il-ssi,” polite and measured. After, just “In-ho.” Sharp. Flat. A quiet punishment. A mark of severed respect.

Hearing it now felt like something loosening in his chest—small, cautious warmth sparking beneath the rubble. He didn’t dare acknowledge it out loud.

“You want a drink?” he offered instead, nodding back toward the kitchen. “Soju?”

Gi-hun’s mouth twitched, almost a smile. The corner lifted, then faded again. “I can’t,” he said softly. “Not yet.”

In-ho inclined his head. “Of course,” trying to hide his disappointment.

A pause followed, but the silence between them wasn’t uncomfortable. Something shifted—tentative and fragile, but real.

“Maybe just one,” Gi-hun added, after In-ho had turned away.

He looked back over his shoulder and offered the smallest of smiles. “Just one,” he repeated. “Go and sit, relax. I’ll bring it through. You’ve earned it.”

That vague hint at a smile returned, and a gentle nod, Gi-hun went to the living room. In-ho watched him for a few seconds, feeling a heavy weight start to lift from his shoulders.

 

***

Gi-hun had lost track of time. If he had to guess how long they’d been at the hanok, he’d have said two weeks—but even then, he wouldn’t have placed a bet on it. Time moved differently here. Not in hours or days, but in quiet stretches and sudden cries, in bottle feeds and warm skin, in naps stolen in the glow of the paper lanterns and the soft rhythm of baby breaths against his chest.

Life had settled into something like a routine—loose and frayed at the edges, but steady enough to keep him upright. Mornings began with the rustling sound of Hae-in shifting in her cot, or the more insistent wail when her patience wore thin. There were feedings and changes, slow walks down the gravel path just beyond the porch, the baby snug in the carrier as he whispered old lullabies and nonsense stories into her hair.

He cooked when he could. Simple things that didn’t ask too much of his attention—rice, kimchi jjigae, roasted sweet potatoes, boiled eggs drizzled with a little sesame oil. On the days when exhaustion pressed down too hard, In-ho would quietly take over the kitchen, and Gi-hun would doze against the sofa, Hae-in curled into the crook of his arm, both of them warmed by the scent of broth and toasted seaweed wafting from the stove.

And In-ho—against all odds, and Gi-hun’s every prior expectation—had been steady. Helpful. Unfailingly patient with Hae-in, and careful not to press too hard or speak too much when Gi-hun's weariness overtook him. He often quickly fixed the formula for overnight feeds while Gi-hun was busy offering Hae-in comfort without being asked. He washed dishes in silence, left tea by the bedside when Gi-hun was too exhausted to lift his head. He gave space without vanishing, and offered help without hovering. That balance… Gi-hun hadn’t known how much he needed it until it was already there..

But even with his quiet steadiness, a shadow lingered behind In-ho’s eyes.

Jun-ho hadn’t returned.

Gi-hun had overheard enough to piece it together—short, low phone calls behind closed doors, sharp-edged words exchanged in hushed tones. In-ho trying to coax him back. Jun-ho refusing. Each call left In-ho a little quieter, a little further away, as if the very act of trying had scraped something raw inside him. Gi-hun could see it even when he pretended not to. The way In-ho would stare too long at the darkened tree line outside. The way his hands shook, just slightly, when he thought no one was looking.

Gi-hun didn’t know what to say. Didn’t know how to help. It wasn’t his place. Still, he noticed.

So the days blurred. Softly. Silently. Wrapped in the rhythm of Hae-in’s needs and the unspoken griefs of grown men who’d already lost too much.

Then, one morning, as the pale winter sun filtered through the paper screen and the scent of warm rice porridge filled the air, In-ho reached down beside him, into a simple canvas bag at his feet, and pulled out an envelope. He slid it across the low table without a word.

Gi-hun blinked at it, disoriented. “What’s this?”

In-ho didn’t answer right away. He picked up his spoon and helped himself to a mouthful of porridge before replying, almost offhandedly, “Happy Christmas.”

Gi-hun stared at him.

Christmas?

He glanced toward the frosted window. Snow had fallen in the night, a thin layer dusting the stone steps and tree branches outside, glowing faintly in the early light. But he hadn’t even noticed. The calendar had meant nothing lately. He’d been counting time in nappies and half-drunk bottles and the softness of Hae-in’s breath against his collarbone.

“I didn’t realise,” he murmured.

“I figured,” In-ho said. Then, more gently, “That’s okay.”

Gi-hun picked up the envelope. It was plain—no name, no decoration, just a clean fold and the subtle weight of official paper. He didn’t know what he expected. A card, maybe. A few bank notes. Something practical, something impersonal.

Instead, when he slipped the flap open and pulled out the contents, he found a neatly stacked set of documents. Cream-coloured paper, crisp and perfectly aligned, stamped and signed in all the right places.

At the top of the pile: a birth certificate.

Hae-in’s name stared back at him in black ink. Her date of birth. Her mother—Kim Jun-hee—listed clearly. And beneath that, in the line for the father’s name, was his. And next to his name, in small but official lettering, was a note in brackets: (non-biological, declared paternal guardian).

His chest pulled tight.

Beneath the birth certificate was a marriage registration. Jun-hee’s name again. His own, printed in hangul and romanised letters, beside hers. The date stated that they had been married for seven months. There were stamps. Official seals. He looked down at the certificate, a frown creasing his brow.

And then the final page: a death certificate. Jun-hee’s.

A hollow ache opened in his chest as he scanned the text. The clinical language couldn’t soften the blow: Postpartum complications. Deceased

He closed his eyes for a moment, and watched Jun-hee as she stepped over that ledge, tears streaming down her face. He blinked away the tears and looked at the documents once again.

He ran his fingers over the embossed seal in the corner of the birth certificate, half-expecting the texture to give it away—but it didn’t. The paper felt right. The weight, the typography, even the signature ink looked aged. If he hadn’t known better, he would have believed them himself.

His voice, when it finally came, was hoarse. “You made all of this?”

“I had it made,” In-ho replied softly, keeping his eyes on his bowl. “From someone I trust.”

Gi-hun laid the papers down, one by one, and stared at the name—his name—beneath Hae-in’s. The knot in his chest pulled tighter, pulled deeper. This was more than a gift. It was protection. It was permanence.

It was the story they would tell if anyone came asking.

And in that story, she was officially his.

Gi-hun swallowed hard. His hands were trembling slightly as he folded the papers back into the envelope, careful not to crumple the edges.

“You thought of everything,” he said at last, looking between the birth certificate and the marriage certificate. An explanation of how the baby belonged to him, even though blood tests would show they weren’t related. People would think it was a marriage of convenience on her part. A young, pregnant, single woman marrying an older man with money. The story wrote itself.

There was a long silence between them, quiet but not empty. Outside, snow drifted gently past the windows.

“Thank you,” Gi-hun said, his voice low, rough around the edges. “This… means more than you know.”

“I think I do,” In-ho replied. “And I—”

He caught the rest before it left his mouth, and then placed a small, neatly wrapped box on the table. Wrapped in delicate silver paper and tied with red and gold thread. A paper tag hung from the thread, the single word Hae-in written in In-ho’s compact handwriting.

Gi-hun swallowed, caught off guard by the tightness in his throat.

He’d forgotten the date entirely, forgotten what it meant—what it once meant to him, to Ga-yeong, when there had still been presents under the tree and sugar-dusted tteok from the market.

“I didn’t—” he started, then stopped.

In-ho shook his head, not unkindly. “You don’t have to. That’s not why I gave it.”

Gi-hun looked down at the wrapped box again, fingers brushing the paper. “Still.”

“She’s too young to remember,” In-ho said, softly. “But you won’t be. And… I thought maybe one day, it’d matter. That you remembered her first Christmas wasn’t just another day you survived.”

Gi-hun’s mouth twitched, something like a smile trying to form. “Thank you,” he said finally. “Really.”

In-ho only nodded, his eyes on the snow beyond the glass, as if the weight of those two words was more than enough.

Gi-hun turned the small, neatly wrapped box over in his hands. He peeled the paper away slowly, carefully — as if something inside might break. Beneath was a small wooden music box, pale and smooth in the palm, its lid carved with a scattering of stars and a crescent moon.

He felt his breath hitch, just a little, at the simplicity of it. The kind of thing you didn’t realise was missing until someone gave it to you.

There was a tiny key tucked into the base. Gi-hun turned it once, then opened the lid.

A soft click sounded — then music, sweet and muted, filled the quiet kitchen. The first bars of Fly Me to the Moon tinkled out, transformed into the high, lullaby-bright notes of a music box. It was slower, gentler than the original, but unmistakable. Gi-hun stared at the box, unmoving, as the music played.

It caught him off guard — not just the tune, but what it meant. The thought behind it. Something about it settled under his ribs, and he could feel his throat tighten.

“She’ll love this,” Gi-hun said, finally, voice hushed. “She really will.”

He looked up, and for a moment, something unspoken passed between them — too deep to name, too fragile to touch. In-ho didn’t speak. He only nodded once, his expression unreadable but full of something quiet and steady.

The song played on, soft as breath between them. Gi-hun let it fill the silence.

And for the first time in weeks, he didn’t feel so tired.

Notes:

I'm blown away - 800 kudos? Thank you so unbelievably much! I'm so touched, I've never had this many kudos on a work in progress before - and onlly reached that on one other fic after it was completed, so this is a massive milestone for me <3

Please let me know what you think, I absolutely love hearing your comments, that's what's keeping me going :)

Chapter 11: Watchers and Watched

Notes:

This is my first ever time writing from Jun-ho's point of view, and I really hope its ok. I tend to find one or two characters in every fandom and only ever write from their pov, so this is quite a departure for me!

I named the Mercenary Kim as Min-hyeok which means "Brave and radiant," which I thought fit him pretty nicely!

The heater in the car ticked softly, while the tires rumbled gently over the asphalt, the only sounds cutting through the early morning stillness. Outside, the Pink motel sat quiet and abandoned, its windows clouded with creeping frost.

Jun-ho watched the figure on the other side of the road. “Still there,” he muttered.

He’d been there for at least twenty minutes—Jun-ho had clocked him on their first pass. Standing motionless, leaning against the concrete post of a power line, face obscured by a hood. He wasn’t smoking anymore, but he hadn’t moved on either. His hands were tucked in his pockets. He wasn’t scrolling a phone, or pacing like someone waiting for a ride. He was just... watching.

Min–hyeok was in the driver’s seat, hands loose on the wheel. His eyes hadn’t left the figure either.

“Well,” he said eventually. “Guy’s not sightseeing.”

“No,” Jun-ho agreed. “And he’s definitely not here by accident.”

Min-hyeok glanced over. “Think he’s waiting for you? Or your brother? Or Mr Seong?”

“Could be any of us,” Jun-ho said in a low voice. He shifted slightly in his seat, eyes narrowing. He thought about how he had managed to get his mother into a safe house by calling in a couple of favours with people at his old department that he still trusted. He shook his head to himself, and spoke in a low voice. “I just couldn’t shake the feeling that we were being watched, and now we’ve got a guy standing across the street, doing nothing but staring.”

They lapsed into silence again. Outside, the world was muffled in early winter stillness. Their breath fogged the windshield. Jun-ho reached forward to wipe it with his sleeve, but Min-hyeok had already hit the defroster.

It was the third time they’d driven by, taking long loops through the surrounding streets. Each time, the man was still there. Jun-ho hated how his body remembered this feeling: the gut-tightening weight of surveillance, the way time seemed to thicken, heavy with possibility. He wasn’t scared, exactly. But he was keyed up in a way that never boded well.

Then Min-hyeok spoke, calm as ever. “I’ll go,” he said.

Jun-ho blinked. “What?”

“I’ll go across. Knock on the door. Make a bit of noise. Shout out that Mr Seong owes me money—for rent, for a job, doesn’t matter. If that guy’s watching for anything, it’ll get a reaction.”

“No.”

Min-hyeok gave him a sidelong glance. “No?”

“It’s too risky.”

Min-hyeok huffed, something that might’ve been amusement or annoyance. “Jun-ho. I’ve taken a bullet for you. I think I can handle walking up to an abandoned motel.”

“That’s not—” Jun-ho bit the inside of his cheek. “That’s not the point. You’re not expendable.”

Min-hyeok’s expression shifted at that. Just for a moment. “I know that. But I’m not the one they’re looking for. Let me do my part.”

Jun-ho looked away, jaw tight.

“Besides,” Min-hyeok added, softer now, “if something goes sideways, I’ve got a knife and a .45. You’ve got... that little glare thing you do.”

Jun-ho stared at him, his eyes narrowed.

“That’s the one,” Min-hyeok grinned.

“You can be really infuriating," Jun-ho muttered.

“And you’re adorable when you’re stressed,” Min-hyeokk said with a smirk, then reached behind his seat to grab his coat. “Back in five. Ten if I feel like being theatrical.”

Jun-ho’s hand caught his wrist before he could open the door.

“Be careful,” he said quietly.

Min-hyeok paused. Then, more serious than before: “Of course. Stay here. Stay hidden.”

He pulled his hood up and stepped out into the cold.

Jun-ho watched him cross the street, his posture straight and his pace determined, the very image of a man on a mission. He headed straight for the motel’s front door and rapped three times on the cracked glass.

Jun-ho’s gaze flicked to the figure by the pole. They continued to watch, unmoving, Then, as Min-hyeok called out—”Seong Gi-hun! I know you’re hiding in there!”—the figure shifted just slightly. A tilt of the head followed by a slow, deliberate step forward.

Jun-ho’s pulse spiked, and his fingers crept toward the grip of his sidearm, hidden under his coat.

The man stopped a few paces away. Jun-ho strained to read the stranger’s face, but he was too far away, and the low brim of his cap and the hood obscured everything but the lower half of his jaw. They exchanged a few words—Min-hyeok gesturing back toward the motel with a half-laugh, still playing the role—and for a moment, Jun-ho allowed himself to breathe. The man wasn’t armed, at least not visibly. He wasn’t shouting. No sudden movements.

Then, without a word or warning, the man drove one boot into the motel door, then disappeared inside. Min-hyeok looked towards the parked car, where Jun-ho was still hidden. A moment later, Jun-ho’s phone beeped once. The text simply read Stay back.

Jun-ho obeyed, jaw tight. He didn’t like it—every instinct screamed to follow, to intercept—but Min-hyeok was right. He wouldn’t do himself any favours by revealing himself right now, and he watched from a distance as Min-hyeok disappeared inside.

Still, every second that ticked by left Jun-ho twisting with unease. His eyes darted between his phone, waiting for another message, and the entrance to the motel, waiting for the pair of them to emerge, while his mind raced with every possible scenario.

Minutes passed.

And finally, there was movement.

The stranger stepped out from the motel’s shattered doorframe with the same casual ease he'd walked in. No sign of alarm, no sign of haste—just quiet confidence in every step. He paused beside Min-hyeok and said a few words. Jun-ho had no idea what was said, but he could read body language. The stranger was relaxed—too relaxed.

Min-hyeok laughed in reply, easy and unbothered, still playing the part. He gestured vaguely behind him, and the stranger’s mouth tugged into a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.

They spoke a few moments longer before the man gave a small nod and turned, walking off like he had all the time in the world. Min-hyeok watched him disappear down the street and around the corner before turning on his heel and striding straight back to the car.

Jun-ho was already leaning forward when Min-hyeok climbed in. “Well?”

Min-hyeok didn’t waste time. “You need to call your brother. Now.”

Jun-ho’s fingers were already curling toward his phone. “What happened?”

“There was a business card. For the estate agency that handled the hanok.” He was speaking quickly now, quiet but intense. “Tucked in some old mail. The guy spotted it in seconds. He took it with him.”

Jun-ho’s chest tightened.

“He didn’t act like it was a big deal—he played it smooth—but he knew what he was looking at. And he asked about all three of you. Gi-hun. In-ho. You.”

Jun-ho’s heart stuttered. “What did you say?”

“I told him I didn’t know you or your brother,” Min-hyeok replied. “Said I was just here looking for Gi-hun. That he owed me money. Didn’t even blink—just smiled and said that he had good news for me.”

“Good news?”

Min-hyeok nodded, jaw clenched. “Said they’ve been trying to get in touch with Seong Gi-hun. Something about unclaimed prize money, interest, a payout he never accessed. That part sounded legit, or at least... technically true.”

“That part is true. Everything went to hell before he could be given anything.”

“Exactly. They want to return his fortune, tie it up nice and neat.” Min-hyeok’s voice dropped. “But he made it very clear that’s not the only reason they’re looking.”

Jun-ho’s hands stilled.

Min-hyeok glanced sideways. “When he said your name? In-ho’s? His tone changed. Cold and quiet.”

Jun-ho’s pulse was thundering now.

“I don’t think they care what they have to give Gi-hun, as long as it gets them close enough to grab you and your brother.” Min-hyeok leaned forward, bracing his forearms against the wheel. “He knows where the trail picks up again. And once he starts asking the right questions, someone’s going to talk.”

Jun-ho’s voice came out tight. “Then we have to move first.”

Min-hyeok nodded. “Call him. Tell them to disappear. Now.”

Jun-ho’s stomach dropped. He pulled his phone out and dialed In-ho’s number. It rang and rang with no answer, before it clicked off. “Come on,” he hissed, as he hit redial.

Still no answer. He nearly threw the phone at the pavement.

Min-hyeok caught the edge of his expression and leaned closer. “Hey. Look at me.”

Jun-ho ignored him, hitting redial once again.

“Jun-ho.”

He turned, reluctantly.

“I’ll drive,” Min-hyeok said, steady and certain. “You call again. And again. You don’t stop until he picks up. You’re not losing him again, alright? And I’m not losing you.”

Jun-ho nodded, jaw clenched so tight it ached. He sat back in the passenger seat without another word, already redialing.

Come on, hyung. Pick up the phone.

***

The bathwater had long gone tepid, but In-ho couldn’t bring himself to move.

He lay half-submerged in the oversized copper tub, arms resting along the warm, slick rim, head tilted back against the cool tile. The house was quiet—just the soft creak of the old pipes and the occasional hiss of wind against the windows. Somewhere down the hall, Gi-hun and Hae-in were still sleeping, the monitor sitting silent beside the folded towel on the counter. In-ho had checked it three times before finally letting himself sink into the water.

It was the first real moment of quiet he’d had since Christmas.

Christmas, he thought with a faint smile. Gi-hun hadn’t even realised the day until he’d handed him the envelope. Not that it mattered—there’d been no tree, no gifts exchanged, save for the music box now sitting pride of place near Hae-in’s cot. And yet, somehow, it had still felt... full. That strange, imperfectly perfect little day had meant more than any celebration he could remember.

The steam had long since faded from the air, and condensation hung in soft beads on the mirror above the sink. He closed his eyes again, listening to the hush, the weightless quiet.

Then—faint, muffled—he thought he heard a buzz.

In-ho frowned, eyes cracking open.

It buzzed again. Sharper now. Not the monitor. His phone.

He swore under his breath and pushed himself up, water sloshing against the sides as he stood. The chill of the air hit his skin instantly, a rude contrast to the bath’s fading warmth, but he ignored it, reaching for the towel and swiping it roughly over his shoulders as he padded across the floor and out of the bathroom.

His phone was sitting on the coffee table, its screen still lit up.

He had eight missed calls, all from Jun-ho.

A bolt of cold shot down his spine that had nothing to do with the air, and he grabbed his phone with wet fingers and called back instantly. The line barely rang once.

“In-ho?” Jun-ho’s voice hit like a crack of thunder—too loud, too fast, breathless. “Why the hell didn’t you answer? Are you at the house?”

“I was in the bath. What’s wrong?” He was already moving to his bedroom, grabbing clean clothes as he talked.

“Someone’s been sniffing around the motel.”

In-ho froze mid-motion. “Who?”

“We don’t know yet. A man. Calm, careful. Dangerous. My…friend… baited him—pretended to be someone Gi-hun owed money to. The stranger broke the door down and went inside the property.”

“Shit,” In-ho whispered, already moving into the hall, eyes darting toward the closed bedroom door.

Jun-ho kept going, rapid-fire. “He found a business card. For the estate agent that sold the hanok. He’s on his way there.”

In-ho’s heart dropped.

“It’s us they’re after, In-ho. You and me. My friend said they had Gi-hun’s prize money, and want to pass it on, but they’re using him to come for us.”

“This friend, Jun-ho. You trust him?”

Jun-ho paused before answering. “Yes, hyung, I trust him. And Min-hyeok’s been involved in enough interrogations to know when he’s being lied to. The man—he asked about you. And me. By name. He was careful, but it was obvious. They know Gi-hun left with us. Once he found the business card, he didn’t look triumphant, he looked calculated. He knows that finding Gi-hun is the first step to finding us.”

There was a beat of heavy silence.

In-ho’s jaw tightened. “We need to lead them elsewhere. Plant false trails. Make them think we left the country.”

“The Estate Agents will be open in less than an hour. It won’t take him long to get information from them, and they’ll be on their way. Hyung, they could be on your doorstep in less than four hours.”

“Then I have to make sure they don’t find me here.”

“Good luck, hyung,” Jun-ho said.

A pang struck In-ho in the chest. For all of their terse words and exchanges, they still cared for each other deeply.

“You too,” he replied, before hanging up. He checked his watch. He had work to do.

***

Gi-hun was trying to force himself into calm but his mind was in sheer, utter turmoil.

A part of him wanted to scream and shout at In-ho for putting him in danger again, for making the home he had started to build feel unsafe. Another part thought this was the perfect opportunity for him to go for good. And a part of him, one he didn’t want to acknowledge, was terrified of the thought that In-ho was in danger, and as he watched him disappear outside and into the woods, he wondered if he would ever see him again. It stung more than he wanted it to.

In-ho had woken him up by moving all his clothes and personal effects into Gi-hun’s room, in the guise of making it look like it was only Gi-hun and Hae-in living there. He had a pair of burner phones, and left one in Gi-hun’s possession with the instruction to use it to call the other once it was safe.

And now, all he could do was wait. Try to act like nothing was wrong. Be surprised when they turn up. Give nothing away.

He bounced Hae-in on his knees, her delighted giggles warming his heart, but not doing quite enough to dispel the fear that had settled.

The hours dragged. He began to wonder if anyone was coming at all. Outside, the afternoon sun had burned low behind the hills, casting the hanok in long winter shadows. Inside, every creak of the floorboards, every shift of the wind against the eaves, made Gi-hun flinch.

He tried to keep busy. He washed the bottles, then rewashed them. Folded a basket of baby clothes that didn’t need folding. Boiled water for tea that he never drank. At one point he stood staring out the window for so long that when Hae-in started fussing, he realised he hadn’t moved in nearly ten minutes.

He held her close after that. She was the only thing keeping him from spiralling completely.

Because the truth was, Gi-hun didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know when they were coming. He didn’t know exactly who was coming. Only that they were related to the games and that made them dangerous.

The worst part was the waiting.

Every so often he thought about checking the burner phone, currently hidden under the mattress in his room, but In-ho had said to leave it until it was all clear.

The sun dipped lower. Shadows stretched longer. The fear gnawed deeper. Then, finally, just as he was considering getting Hae-in ready for bed, he heard a knock. Three times. Deliberate, not too loud, and unhurried.

Gi-hun froze as he turned towards the door, the hairs on the back of his neck rising like static. Hae-in, half-dozing against his chest, stirred very gently, and he leaned down to place a kiss against the top of her head, the movement reassuring himm as much it was for her.

Another knock.

He stood, heart in his throat, and moved toward the front door. Not too fast. Not too slow. He tried to swallow the fear, and forced his features into neutral.

He hesitated with his fingers on the door handle, then very slowly he cracked it open—just wide enough to see who was on the other side.

A man stood there in a dark, sharply cut suit, coat buttoned tight against the cold. Neat hair. Clean-shaven. Unremarkable, if not for the unmistakable weight he carried—not in size, but in presence. Like a man who was never out of place, because he never allowed himself to be.

“Mr. Seong Gi-hun?” he asked, voice polite, expression unreadable.

Gi-hun’s throat worked around a dry swallow. “Who’s asking?”

The man reached with deliberate slowness into his coat pocket, and produced a small pale brown card. He held it out between two gloved fingers.

Gi-hun didn’t take it, but he saw it clearly enough. A circle. A triangle. A square. The pit in his stomach hardened to stone.

“I’ve been sent to deliver what’s yours,” the man said, gesturing subtly to the card. “Your winnings. From the game.”

“I don’t want it,” Gi-hun said, voice low and even. “I don’t need it. Give it to the families of everyone who died.”

“I understand your feelings, Mr Seong,” the man said. “But I’m afraid I have an obligation to complete the transaction. To hand over what belongs to you. And to the child.”

Gi-hun tightened his hold on Hae-in. She let out a small noise, not quite a cry, but restless. He gently bounced her, trying to soothe her back down.

“If it’s just a bank card,” he said, “slip it through the door. I presume the PIN is the same as before?”

“I’d prefer to come in, if you don’t mind.” The man’s tone was mild, but firm. “There are… a few formalities that I need to complete.”

Gi-hun let the silence stretch between them. Allowed the performance to continue a little further. “You didn’t need to before. A bank card shoved down my throat before being kicked out on the pavement, I recall. Now there are formalities?”

The man didn’t flinch. He gave a faint, too-polite smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “I don’t want trouble, Mr. Seong. Please don’t create any.”

Gi-hun’s jaw clenched. The man’s civility was more invasive than shouting would’ve been. “Fine,” he said finally, stepping back with deliberate slowness. “You have ten minutes. I have to put my daughter to bed.”

“Feel free to do it now,” the man said. “I’m happy to wait.”

Gi-hun took a deep calming breath. No way he was leaving the man on his own. Hae-in gave a tiny sigh, her breath warm against his collarbone. Gi-hun didn’t answer. He turned and led the man into the living room, his steps measured, careful, every inch of him fighting not to let the panic boil over.

“Tea?” he asked, out of reflex more than courtesy.

The man raised a hand in polite refusal. “I’ll cut straight to the point, Mr. Seong. As you’re no doubt aware, just after you won your final game, our organisation was compromised. The island had to be destroyed, in accordance with protocol. We’re currently searching for someone you were previously acquainted with. Hwang Jun-ho.”

Gi-hun didn’t flinch. He gently shifted Hae-in in his arms as though she were the only thing on his mind. “I haven’t seen him,” he replied, smoothly.

The man offered a small, knowing nod. “And his brother?”

Gi-hun allowed the lie to form without hesitation. “His brother died,” he said. “In my first game.”

A flicker of interest crossed the man’s face—small, but unmistakable. “That’s strange,” he said calmly. “Because Hwang In-ho was very much alive at the end of the last game. You left the island with him.”

There was a beat. Gi-hun forced a puzzled expression across his face, tilting his head slightly like he was genuinely trying to recall. “I left with the Front Man,” he said. “Oh Young-il.”

“No,” the man said, his voice still frustratingly calm. “You left with the former Front Man, Hwang In-ho. And his brother, Hwang Jun-ho.

“I never knew him as that,” Gi-hun said.

“Be that as it may,” the man continued, “We are currently seeking Hwang Jun-ho for the murder of four people, and the attempted murder of a fifth, and Hwang In-ho for aiding and abetting in said murders.”

“Are you police?” Gi-hun asked.

The man smirked. “No. The people I represent are far too important to leave their murders to the police.”

Gi-hun couldn’t help but laugh at that. “That’s rich. No one is more important than anyone else,” he said. “Plenty of your employees should be wanted for murder too, including Oh Young-il, or whatever other name he wants to go by.” Dae-ho’s face, youthful and exuberant and hopeful flashed before his eyes, and he let out a shudder. “You’re looking for murderers?” he said quietly, “ You can start with me too. I don’t know where either of them are, but you find the Front Man again, you can put a bullet between his eyes from me.” He stepped back and nodded toward the door. “Now get the fuck out of my house.”

The man paused a moment longer, gaze unreadable. He placed two golden bank cards down on the table. Then he gave a single, precise nod and turned toward the door. He paused with his hand on the doorknob.

“One more thing,” he said, without turning. “I’d like to take a look around. Just to be sure.”

Gi-hun stiffened. “What the hell for?” he asked, his voice low and sharp.

The man turned back slowly. “You live out here alone, Mr. Seong. No neighbours for miles. No oversight. Forgive me for wanting to ensure you’re not harbouring wanted fugitives. It’s for your safety too.

“I already told you I haven’t seen them.”

“You also told me Hwang In-ho was dead. I’d like to verify for myself.”

Gi-hun looked down at Hae-in, now dozing fully against his shoulder, the soft rise and fall of her breath pressing against his collarbone like a ticking clock. Every instinct screamed to slam the door shut, to bar the house, to shout him down. But that would only draw suspicion—he knew that. He knew this game. Knew how to lose by trying to win too fast.

So instead, he sighed—deep, weary, believable. “Fine,” he muttered. “But quietly. She’s sleeping.”

The man nodded, lips pursed in polite gratitude. “Of course.”

Gi-hun led him through the house, his arms aching from holding Hae-in, though he dared not put her down. Her presence was both shield and shackle now—keeping him steady, but tying him to every ticking moment.

They passed through the kitchen, the hallway, then into the guest room—neatly made, stripped of personal details. In-ho had done a good job.

The man’s eyes scanned every surface with mechanical precision. The bathroom. Every storage cupboard. Under the beds.

Nothing.

At last, they returned to the front door.

“You’ve seen everything,” Gi-hun said, voice clipped. “Satisfied?”

The man looked around once more, then back at Gi-hun, his gaze lingering for a moment on Hae-in’s sleeping face.

Finally, he nodded. “For now.”

Gi-hun opened the door without waiting. The cold rushed in like a gasp.

“Enjoy your evening,” the man said, stepping outside. “We’ll be in touch if anything else comes to light.”

Gi-hun didn’t answer. He waited until the man reached the bottom of the path, then shut the door and locked it—bolt, chain, and deadlock. He watched from the window as the man got into a dark car and slowly pulled away.

His legs nearly buckled beneath him. He held Hae-in tighter and pressed his lips to her soft hair, letting his eyes close. She was fast asleep. Without a second thought, he hurried to the bedroom, and laid her down in her cot, tucking a soft blanket around her. Then he pulled the burner phone out from its hiding place and typed out The storm passed. Blue skies again — the coded message In-ho had told him to send once everything was clear.

He watched Hae-in sleep for a while before retreating back to the living room. In-ho hadn't yet replied, and he found his heart racing faster in anticipation.

He paced for a few minutes, unable to sit. The silence of the house, which had once felt peaceful, now rang with tension — every creak in the walls, every shifting branch outside made him glance toward the door. He checked the burner phone again. Still nothing.

His eyes fell to the empty peg by the door that usually held In-ho’s coat, and something in Gi-hun twisted at the sight. The place didn’t just feel quieter, or emptier without him. It felt deeper than that. Like he wouldn’t know how to cope if In-ho didn’t return. He fell onto the sofa and sat cross legged, staring at the burner like he could will it to buzz.

At long last, it gave a single vibration, and Gi-hun snatched it up immmediately.

Clear skies on my end too. Thank you for the weather warning. Hold the fort one more night — I’ll catch the sunset with you soon.

Gi-hun let out a shaky breath. He ran a hand down his face, slow and exhausted, and let himself sink fully onto the sofa. He re-read the message several times, and the last line made his chest ache in a way he didn’t want to name, and warmed him more than he wanted to admit.

He leaned his head back and looked toward the ceiling, letting the quiet settle back around him. For the first time in hours, the silence wasn’t heavy.

Notes:

Thank you to everyone reading, and again, I hope I did Jun-ho justice!

I won't be able to update for about a week now, as I'm off on holiday. I'll take a notepad and write the old fashioned way while I'm abroad (I wrote my first ever Caryl fic sitting on a beach in France with a pen and paper!) so hopefully I'll be able to type it up and update as soon as I get back, but in the mean time, i'd love to hear what you're thinking, I love hearing every one of your commments :)

Chapter 12: No More Shadows

The house was quiet, save for the soft, rhythmic rustling of fabric as Hae-in wriggled on her belly across the play mat. She was so small still—barely nine weeks old—but determined. Her head lifted shakily, her arms pushing, her mouth forming tiny frustrated o-shapes as she strained against gravity.

Gi-hun lay beside her, mirroring her posture, propped up on his elbows, murmuring encouragement with every wobble and kick. His voice was soft, his smile real. It struck In-ho, not for the first time, how different Gi-hun looked like this—free of his past, if only briefly. More like his old self.

In-ho sat in the armchair with a mug of coffee between his palms, taking a small sip every now and then. He wasn’t just watching them—he was memorising them. The sight of them. The sound of Hae-in’s breathy little coos. The way Gi-hun’s eyes crinkled with every smile.

A week ago, he’d been crouched beneath the shelter of a pine outcrop, deep in the woods, mud caked on his boots and cold seeping into his bones. He hadn’t been camping in years—not since he took Jun-ho out when they were kids. And even then, he had never found it especially fun, but it was something Jun-ho insisted on doing.

This time, however, it had felt like punishment. Exile. He’d had nothing but the ache in his shoulders, and the gnawing weight of worry to keep him company. Even lighting a campfire had felt too risky.

There hadn’t been enough time to come up with a cleaner plan. It had all happened too fast. And every hour he'd spent away had been an exercise in restraint—not rushing back too soon, not calling to check in, not letting his worry cloud the logic that had kept him alive this long.

The text he’d received confirming Gi-hun was safe had almost moved him to tears, but he forced himself to hold back, to wait to respond, and to wait even longer to return. Just in case.

Now, watching Gi-hun and Hae-in on the floor, he felt the tight knot in his chest loosen slightly. They were safe. For now. And he was more grateful than he could ever say.

Gi-hun leaned in and pressed a gentle, lingering kiss to the top of Hae-in’s head, before turning to In-ho.

“Can you watch her for a bit? I’m going out for a smoke.”

In-ho gave a short nod and lowered himself to the floor beside her, folding his legs as he reached for one of her toys — a soft plush kitten with embroidered eyes and a pink ribbon around its neck. He held it just above her, just far enough that she had to stretch her tiny hands to reach it, and a quiet smile pulled at his lips as she gurgled in determination.

Gi-hun lingered a second longer, watching the two of them with a careful, searching gaze. Then, seemingly satisfied, he turned and slipped outside, the door closing gently behind him.

The soft thud of the door closing was followed by quiet, and then just the gentle rustle of Hae-in’s little hands as she stretched for the kitten toy. In-ho stayed there beside her, watching the determined movements of her limbs, the way her brow furrowed in concentration as she made another swipe.

He hadn’t expected this—any of it. The quiet moments. The domestic stillness. The warm familiarity of a lived-in home that didn’t feel like a prison. For so long, his world had been structured around secrecy, orders, isolation, and death. And now here he was, sitting cross-legged on a rug with a baby wriggling beside him, while the man who once hunted him trusted him enough to leave them alone together.

It could be so easy to forget, in the softness of these hours, that they themselves were still being hunted.

He glanced toward the window, where bare trees swayed gently under the grey sky. A week of quiet. A week since the stranger had come and gone. But the silence unsettled him just as much as the noise might have.

Since then, he'd been careful. Methodically laying false trails across Seoul, leaving traces of fabricated travel documents for both himself and Jun-ho, planting hints online suggesting they’d fled to Taiwan, then onwards to Europe. But it wasn’t enough. Not when their enemies had the kind of resources they did. Not when In-ho knew, better than anyone, how patient and relentless they could be.

A small, sudden cry pulled him out of the spiral.

Hae-in’s face scrunched up, mouth wobbling before another louder wail followed. In-ho reacted instinctively, scooping her up into his arms. He adjusted his hold, one arm underneath as she rested against his shoulder, his other hand gently stroking her back.

“It’s alright,” he murmured, his voice soft. “You’re alright.”

She settled slightly, her cry tapering off into hiccuping gasps as she tucked her face into his neck. He rocked her gently, feeling the rhythm of her breathing start to even out again, and let his chin rest lightly on the crown of her head.

He hadn’t realised how badly he needed this kind of stillness—or how terrified he was of losing it.

In-ho stayed there with Hae-in nestled against his chest, her breathing slow and steady now, her little fingers curled into the fabric of his shirt. Her warmth seeped into him, grounding him, holding him fast against the pull of darker thoughts. The fire crackled softly in the hearth, casting a lazy orange glow across the rug and the scattered toys. For the first time in a long time, he didn’t feel like a shell of himself. Just a man, holding a child, trying to remember what it was to be human.

The door clicked open behind him.

In-ho turned, just slightly, enough to see Gi-hun step back inside. He was rubbing his hands together against the cold, the smell of smoke clinging faintly to his clothes. Their eyes met, and Gi-hun’s expression softened when he saw them.

“She okay?” Gi-hun asked, voice low.

In-ho nodded. “Just needed some reassurance, I think. She seems happy again.”

Gi-hun stepped over quietly and crouched down beside them, brushing a hand gently over Hae-in’s back. In-ho passed her back to Gi-hun, who greeted her with warm smiles and kisses, and he felt a pang in his chest, an undeniable guilt that he was putting them in danger with his presence.

He had no real reason or excuse to stay. He had manipulated and persuaded Gi-hun to keep him around; at first it was simply access to cash to get him home that first night, then the insidious suggestion that it wasn’t safe to be alone, the promise of bringing him the documents that would make Hae-in his without any questions being asked…

But now?

Now there was no denying it.

Gi-hun and Hae-in would be far safer without him.

“Do you want me to go?” he asked suddenly, unable to look Gi-hun in the eye.

“Go where?” Gi-hun asked innocently, then the implication of the question hit him. His face dropped, his brows knitted together. “Oh,” he said quietly.

In-ho watched as a myriad of expressions crossed his face.

Surprise, first. Then confusion. A flicker of pain. Something defensive, tightening his jaw—but it softened before it could become anger. His gaze dropped to Hae-in, blinking slowly up at her father as she curled her little fingers into his shirt.

“Where would you even go?” Gi-hun asked, voice quiet. “If you left.”

In-ho let out a slow breath. “I don’t know,” he said truthfully. “And even if I did, it’d be safer if you didn’t know.”

That pulled something taut in Gi-hun’s expression. He looked away, toward the fire, his hand moving gently across Hae-in’s back, soothing her without thinking. In-ho could feel the tension radiating from him—like he was caught between old wounds and new fears, between self-preservation and the stubborn, reckless thing that had always defined him.

“I don’t want to make things harder for you,” In-ho said softly. “Or for her.”

Gi-hun let out a low breath. “You already did.”

It wasn’t cruel. Just the truth.

In-ho nodded once. “I know.”

A pause stretched. Hae-in shifted, making a soft sound, and Gi-hun held her a little closer. He didn’t ask In-ho to go. He didn’t turn away.

“If you hadn’t followed me after…everything,” Gi-hun said, eyes on the fire now, “maybe things would’ve been simpler.”

In-ho’s stomach twisted, but he said nothing.

Gi-hun looked down at Hae-in, gently brushing a thumb along her temple. “But I don’t know if I’d still be alive. I don’t know if she would.”

He looked up again, and this time, there was something raw in his expression. Tired, still. Hurt, definitely. But open.

“I used to think you were nothing but poison,” he said, “but you’re the reason we made it this far. Whatever happens, I think I want you here.”

In-ho’s throat was tight. He stared, struggling to find words that wouldn’t unravel everything all over again. Gi-hun had the good grace to look away briefly, giving In-ho the chance to surreptitiously dry his eyes on the back of his hand.

It had been a long, long time since he had felt so accepted.

—

The colours were too bright, an assault on the senses that left him with a feeling of unreal dread.

Those ridiculous stairwells—pink and turquoise and lemon yellow—twisted up and around like an Escher painting come to life. There was no end to them, only more steps, more turns, more candy-coloured madness.

Gi-hun ran.

He didn’t know where he was running, or why, only that he had to keep going. The slap of his footsteps echoed hollowly on the steps, bouncing off the high, warped walls. The sound of his own breath rasped loud in his ears. His legs burned with every stride, but the panic pushed him forward.

Suddenly he stumbled, the sight before him making something in his gut twist in grief and terror.

There—hanging in midair, suspended by thick ropes—were the people he couldn’t save.

Sang-woo and Sae-byeok swayed silently in their finalist suits, the knife wounds in their necks reopened and bloody. Dae-ho’ eyes still wide in betrayal. Jun-hee dangled from a ledge above, her face tear-streaked. Jung-bae’s eyes open and unseeing, blood dripping silently from the bullet wound in his chest. Ali, Geum-ja, Yong-sik, Hyun-ju—all of them, motionless, strung up like marionettes. Their faces were frozen in their final moments, twisted in fear, grief, or pain.

And at the centre of them all, In-ho.

He wore the Front Man’s mask, but it had slipped sideways on his face, revealing a slack jaw, black eyes, and bloodied nose. His body turned slowly in the still air, and as Gi-hun looked up, the mask clicked into place with a sickening precision.

No.

He turned and ran again, faster now, taking the stairs two at a time. He had to get to the top. Had to stop this. The bodies blurred as he passed, but they were always there—again and again. The same friends. The same dead faces. The same suffocating guilt.

He looked up.

At the top of the endless stairs, Oh Il-nam stood waiting.

The old man smiled with that maddening serenity, tilting his head as if to ask what took you so long? Then, with slow ceremony, he reached out—took the black mask from In-ho’s limp face—and slipped it over his own.

“No—” Gi-hun shouted. “You’re dead. I watched you die.”

But the old man didn’t respond. He turned and began to pace past the bodies, fingers trailing along them, like they were a beloved collection of precious artefacts.

Gi-hun ran harder.

The stairs stretched, warped, pulled further away. No matter how fast he moved, the old man stayed out of reach. And the bodies kept swinging. He couldn’t escape them.

Il-nam paused in his perusal of the bodies, stopping in front of In-ho..

“In-ho!” he shouted. “No—In-ho—!”

Il-nam reached out, a blade in his hand. He cut the rope holding In-ho in place, and Gi-hun could only watch in frozen horror as In-ho began to fall into the abyss below. He turned, and tried to run after him, but the stairs were blocked, full of nameless, faceless players marching coldly and emotionlessly toward their fate.

He pushed past as best as he could, when a familiar voice said, “Gi-hun-ssi.”

He span around, and there, right behind him was In-ho, his eyes open but already dead and unseeing.

“I’m sorry,” he said, and he plunged a knife deep into his own throat.

Gi-hun’s eyes flew open.

Just a dream, he told himself. It was just a dream.

But something was wrong.

The room was steeped in shadows, the kind that swallowed corners and blurred edges. The walls stretched just a little too tall. The window let in light that wasn’t moonlight—it was just a little too blue, a little too clinical. And the air felt thick, as though the room itself was holding its breath.

Outside his door, a floorboard creaked.

His heart jolted at the sound.

He rose from the bed, though he didn’t remember deciding to move. His limbs felt weightless, as though he were drifting in a current. The floor didn’t press back beneath his feet. He moved toward the door, not walking, exactly, but drawn. Pulled inexorably.

Some part of him already knew what was waiting.

His hand touched the ice cold doorknob, and the door swung open with a sound like breath being sucked from the world.

In-ho was there, fully dressed, shoulders squared like he was preparing for a storm. His back was to Gi-hun, stiff and unreadable, framed by the dull silver of the front door, now cracked open, letting in a wind that carried no sound and yet screamed with finality.

“In-ho-ssi,” Gi-hun tried to say, but no sound came.

In-ho didn’t turn around. “I’m sorry, Gi-hun-ssi,” he said too softly, as if he was already far away. Like the words were from another room. Another lifetime, even.

He stepped out through the door, and vanished.

Gi-hun tried to follow, tried to scream, tried to run—but he couldn’t move. His legs wouldn’t obey. His arms stayed slack. He was trapped in a body made of stone.

The door yawned wider on its own, and beyond it was darkness. Not night. Not shadow. But nothingness. An empty void where In-ho should have been.

He gasped awake for real this time, air tearing into his lungs. His skin was damp with sweat, heart hammering in his chest like it was trying to break free. His shirt clung damply to his back, and the echo of the nightmare still clawed at his mind—swinging bodies, painted stairs, Il-nam’s smiling face. And then the false awakening, with In-ho leaving in the middle of the night.

He blinked, his chest heaving.

In-ho.

He had to see him. Had to confirm with his own two eyes that it really had been just a dream.

Gi-hun flung back the covers and stumbled into the hallway. His bare feet slapped against the floorboards as he moved. He didn’t bother to knock—just shoved In-ho’s door open hard enough for it to bang against the wall.

“In-ho-ssi—!”

A sharp inhale from the bed. The shape beneath the covers stirred, then pushed upright, blinking groggily in the moonlight. “Gi-hun-ssi?” In-ho’s voice was rough with sleep. “What’s wrong—?”

Gi-hun couldn’t speak. The relief hit him so hard it left him dizzy. He reached for the doorframe like he might fall over without it, and the tears came without warning and without resistance. Hot, silent, and humiliating.

In-ho was already out of bed, crossing to him, alarmed now. “Hey, hey—come here.” His hands found Gi-hun’s shoulders and gently guided him inside, out of the hall, down onto the edge of the bed. “What happened?”

Gi-hun couldn’t answer. He tried. His lips moved, but all that came out was a broken sound in the back of his throat.

“Nightmare?” In-ho asked quietly.

Gi-hun nodded numbly. His head dipped low, hands pressed over his face, shoulders shaking.

In-ho didn’t push. He just sat beside him, one steady hand rubbing slow circles between his shoulder blades. His voice was low, calm. “It wasn’t real. Whatever you saw, it wasn’t real.”

Gi-hun let out a raw breath, half-laugh, half-sob. His palms were still pressed hard against his face, as if he could rub away the lingering images from the dream. It was real. So much of it. Those stairs, the hanging bodies, the loss and death…

And In-ho was the cause of it. Or at least, he facilitated it.

And yet it was the idea that In-ho might leave that had finally woken him from that hell. The dichotomy was almost too much to bear.

He felt the mattress dip as In-ho shifted beside him, felt the slow, steady circles being rubbed between his shoulder blades. The contact grounded him, but it wasn’t enough to shake the cold, damp panic from his skin.

“Sleep here the rest of the night,” In-ho said, voice low and sure. “You’ll rest better if you’re not alone.”

Gi-hun didn’t answer. Couldn’t. The lump in his throat made words impossible. He didn’t want to admit how much he needed to stay. How terrified he still was. How desperately he’d believed—if only for a second—that he’d come into the room too late, and In-ho would be gone.

“I’m going to get the monitor,” In-ho said. “I’ll be right back, I promise.”

His breath hitched as he watched In-ho leave the room, fighting to stay upright as the panic weighed heavy on his chest. His breathing eased slightly when In-ho returned, the monitor in his hand.

“I’ll keep it right here,” In-ho said. “If she so much as stirs, we’ll hear her.”

Gi-hun finally looked up, his vision blurry. In-ho stood beside the nightstand, setting the monitor down, its faint static hum filling the silence.

“Lie down,” In-ho said, returning to him. “Just rest. I’ll stay up. You’re not alone.”

The words hit harder than they should have. He’d been so alone for years, and he couldn’t go back to it. Gi-hun swallowed thickly, and after a pause, nodded. He lay down slowly, body still trembling, still full of dread. He stayed on top of the covers, like he didn’t quite belong here, but didn’t quite know how to let go.

But In-ho didn’t press. He sat beside him, not touching, not crowding. Just there and present.

Gi-hun stared at the ceiling. His chest rose and fell, too fast at first. Then slower. Then slower still.

He turned his head slightly, toward In-ho’s silhouette in the low light. He could smell In-ho on the pillows—his shampoo, his soap, his cologne, him—and slowly his breathing steadied. The weight pressing down on him began to lift. Not gone, but no longer crushing.

Eventually, his eyelids began to sink. The room felt secure, safer than he’d felt in a long time.

And just before sleep pulled him under, he heard In-ho’s voice one last time, quiet and certain.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

Notes:

Thank you all for your patience! I'll be back to the regularly scheduled madness now.

Huge thank you to everyone reading - sorry I'm behind on answering your wonderful comments, I'll try to get back on top of it now :)

Chapter 13: Under the Skin

Jun-ho kept his hood low, rain tapping a restless rhythm on the fabric. Min-hyeok walked beside him, their steps almost matching, shoulders brushing now and then. Woo-seok led the way down a narrow alley that stank of rotting produce, the streetlights behind them fading into smeared reflections in the puddles.

Woo-seok stopped at a dented metal door, knocking twice, pausing, then adding a quick, coded triple-tap. The slot slid open, a pair of eyes glinting in the dark. They lingered on Jun-ho for a moment, flicked to Min-hyeok, then disappeared. The door opened.

Heat rolled out, thick with cigarette smoke, fried food, and cheap alcohol. Inside was a dingy bar, its lights jaundiced and its clientele sharper than broken glass. Conversations dipped, just slightly, as they stepped in. Jun-ho felt the weight of the room measure them, then turn away.

Woo-seok, in his element, grinned at a pair of card players as if they were old friends and led the two of them to a booth in the far corner. “These people hear things,” he murmured, sliding in and signalling for drinks. “If someone important’s sent a dog sniffing around after you, they’ll know.”

Jun-ho sat opposite Woo-seok, Min-hyeok beside him, close enough that their knees brushed under the table. Jun-ho subtly pressed back against him.

“Is it something to do with…them?” Woo-seok asked, leaning forward.

“The games?” Jun-ho asked. “Yeah. Not long after we encountered him, he found Gi-hun’s new home.”

“Is Mr Seong alright?” Woo-seok asked, concern knitting his brows together.

“For now. They were really looking for us. Me and In-ho.” His voice stayed steady, but his mind wasn’t still. He thought about the VIPs who didn’t live to get away from the island. The ones who did. Then his mind flashed back to the first games he infiltrated, to the gilded panther mask and the reek of whiskey, to the hideous, bloated body of the man who would have assaulted him had he been literally anybody else.

If there was any recorded security footage of him on the boat, of him escaping with In-ho, that man probably saw it. He would have recognised Jun-ho. Would have known In-ho. And it wouldn’t take much to put two and two together and find out his name.

And out of everyone, the man in the panther mask would be the one who would want revenge the most.

“The scout we’re after,” Jun-ho continued, “would likely have been hired by a rich American.”

Woo-seok nodded. “Ok,” he said. “I’ll ask around. See if anyone foreign was hiring local muscle. Sometimes the muscle talks, if they’ve had too much to drink.”

“Then let's make them talk,” Min-hyeok’s said, his voice was quiet but certain. He slid a handful of notes across the table to Woo-seok.

Woo-seok grinned at them both, a flash of teeth that was all warmth despite the grim topic. “You two stay here, drink up, order some food, and try not to draw too much attention. I’ll start asking around.”

Woo-seok slipped away into the crowd, all easy charm and familiarity, already clapping one man on the shoulder and leaning in to whisper something that earned a laugh.

The bar’s hum closed in around them—the clack of pool balls, the shuffle of cards, the low drone of music from a dusty speaker. Jun-ho sat back in the booth, fingers tapping lightly against his glass. Min-hyeok’s thigh stayed pressed to his, warm and steady, like an anchor against the restless churn of his thoughts.

“You’ve gone quiet,” Min-hyeok said, his voice pitched just low enough for Jun-ho to hear over the noise.

Jun-ho gave a faint smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “Just thinking.”

“About the scout?”

Jun-ho’s gaze drifted to the far wall, where a cheap poster curled at the corners. “About a lot of things.” He hesitated, then let his shoulder rest more fully against Min-hyeok’s. “If the person behind it is who I think it is… it’s personal. And we might not get a second chance if we mess this up.”

Min-hyeok’s expression softened, the sharp edges of his usual confidence dimmed for a moment. “Then we don’t mess it up.”

It was simple, certain—the kind of certainty Jun-ho found himself wishing he could believe in as easily. His eyes tracked Woo-seok’s progress across the room; the man was already deep in conversation with someone, leaning forward like they were old comrades.

Ds-hyeok’s hand shifted under the table, brushing against Jun-ho’s. “You’re not doing this alone, you know,” he murmured.

Jun-ho let out a long breath. “I know,” he said, trying to inject a little more confidence into his voice.

The food and drinks came—a bottle of soju with three glasses and a plate of fried dumplings still spitting in their oil. Jun-ho poured without a word, waiting for Woo-seok to work his magic. He had a way of melting into a crowd and coming back with things people didn’t even realise they’d given away.

When he slid back into the booth, his tone was light, but Jun-ho caught the edge beneath it.

“Some high-powered types were sniffing around a while back,” Woo-seok said, taking the glass Jun-ho poured for him and knocking it back in one swallow. “Definitely not your usual street-level troublemakers. They wanted muscle — serious muscle — but no one knows the men they hired.”

“Don’t know, or won’t talk yet?” Min-hyeok asked.

“Don’t know,” Woo-seok said, tearing into a dumpling. “Apparently one of the guys they hired had a southern accent. Busan, maybe. Or one of the smaller ports.”

Jun-ho sat back, rolling the detail over in his mind.

“It’s not much of a thread,” Woo-seok went on, as if reading his thoughts. “But if we start tugging on it, maybe something unravels.”

Min-hyeok met Jun-ho’s eyes, his own gaze steady. “It’s a start,” he said simply, as if that alone was reason to hold onto it.

Jun-ho poured them all another round, the faint burn of the soju doing nothing to settle the tension in his chest. South coast. Not local. Hired hands for someone with money to burn. If they could find one of these men, maybe they could follow the leash back to the man who wouldn’t stop until they’d found him.

***

The air outside was damp and cool, smelling faintly of rain and fried food from a stall down the block. Neon light bled across the slick pavement, and the chatter of the bar dulled into a low hum behind them as they stepped into the street. Woo-seok had peeled off in the opposite direction, promising to follow up on another lead, leaving Jun-ho and Min-hyeok alone.

Jun-ho kept his hands free, eyes scanning the mouth of every alley they passed, noting the shadows that moved and the ones that didn’t. There was a weight in his gut, the kind that told him they might not be as alone as they looked. A van idled at the far corner, headlights off. A man leaning against a wall glanced up just as they passed, eyes lingering a beat too long.

Min-hyeok slowed his pace until they were walking in step. “Someone bothering you back there?” he asked casually.

“Not yet,” Jun-ho murmured, but his gaze flicked to a darkened shop window, catching their reflections in the glass. No one obvious trailing them, but no relief either. “Let’s take the long way.”

They cut down a narrower street, lit only by the flickering sign of a seedy karaoke joint, until the noise of the main road was far behind. Min-hyeok’s footsteps were steady beside him, his hands buried deep in his jacket pockets, but Jun-ho could feel him watching, weighing him, maybe even worrying.

“You okay?” Min-hyeok asked finally, hands buried deep in his jacket pockets.

Jun-ho gave a short laugh. “Define ‘okay.’”

“Not pacing the room at three in the morning. Not checking the locks six times. That kind of okay.”

Jun-ho glanced sideways at him. “You been counting?”

“Hard to sleep with you stomping around like a cop on a stakeout,” Min-hyeok said with a half-smile.

“Old habits die hard,” Jun-ho countered.

“Guess all I’m saying is… you don’t have to do all this by yourself.”

It was such a simple statement, and yet it landed like something Jun-ho hadn’t realised he’d been holding out for — proof that someone might stay, even with the danger pressing in.

Jun-ho and Min-hyeok turned toward the route that would take them back to the safe house, keeping their pace steady and casual. Still, every time their footsteps echoed too sharply or a shadow shifted in their periphery, Jun-ho’s muscles tensed. Min-hyeok seemed to notice too—his gaze flicked to the dark mouth of each alley they passed, his hand hovering near the fold of his jacket where he kept his sidearm.

They didn’t speak again until the third time Jun-ho caught himself glancing over his shoulder.

“You feel it too,” Min-hyeok said quietly. Not a question.

Jun-ho didn’t answer, but his jaw tightened. Whoever it was, they weren’t making a move—just hanging back. Watching. That was almost worse.

Jun-ho’s mind ticked through options. The safe house was off the table—they couldn’t risk leading him there and putting eomma in danger. They needed somewhere quiet and out of sight. He caught Min-hyeok’s eye, a silent exchange: we flush him out.

They cut down the next alley, narrow enough that the brick walls seemed to press in on either side, trash bins lined up like sentries beneath the dead glow of a flickering neon sign. Min-hyeok peeled off without a word, melting into the shadow behind a dumpster. Jun-ho kept going, the picture of distraction, his phone in hand and his pace unhurried.

Behind him, the footsteps followed—quicker now, the faint crunch of grit under shoes. Jun-ho didn’t look back. He walked past Min-hyeok’s hiding place and kept going until the tail came level with it.

There was a blur of movement — Min-hyeok lunging out, arm hooking tight around the man’s neck, yanking him sideways into the dark. The stranger’s grunt was muffled against the mercenary’s shoulder as Jun-ho turned back, closing the gap in three fast strides. He caught the man’s wrist before he could draw, twisting until a small folding blade hit the ground with a metallic clatter.

“Evening,” Jun-ho said, voice calm, almost polite. “You’ve been keeping us company for a while.”

The man struggled once, but Min-hyeok’s forearm pressed harder, cutting that short.

“You want to do this the easy way,” Min-hyeok said, his tone flat, “or the way where you don’t walk straight for a week?”

The stranger’s breath came fast, eyes darting between them. No denial. No excuses. Just the raw edge of being caught.

Jun-ho stepped closer, letting the silence stretch until the man couldn’t hold his gaze. “We’re going to have a conversation,” he said quietly. “And you’re going to be very helpful.”

They moved him quickly, head down, into the shell of an abandoned laundry at the end of the alley. Inside, they bound his hands with a length of cord that had once been a drying line, and gagged him with a strip torn from an old sheet.

Jun-ho took out his phone, thumb hovering over In-ho’s number. “Let’s see what my brother thinks of our new friend.”

***

Mid-February, and the snow outside had crusted into a dull, icy sheen that caught the light like glass. Three months now—more than that even—they’d been under the same roof, and the air between them had shifted in ways In-ho hadn’t expected.

Gi-hun still hadn’t forgiven him. Probably never would. It showed in the small fractures of everyday life—the way his tone could turn razor-sharp over something as minor as In-ho leaving a cupboard door open, or the snide comments he might make if something In-ho cooked wasn’t seasoned precisely to his taste. Sometimes it was subtler: a sudden withdrawal into silence mid-conversation, his gaze slipping past In-ho as if something had yanked him backwards into memory. Those moments often ended with Gi-hun muttering a name under his breath—one of the dead, one of the friends who hadn’t made it. He never looked at In-ho when he said them, but the weight of accusation hung in the air all the same.

And yet, trust—in its fractured, uneasy way—was growing. It was in the quiet things: the mornings when Gi-hun would wordlessly leave an extra cup of coffee by his elbow, the moments when he would leave Hae-in with In-ho without a worried backwards glace.

It had started that night the nightmares hit him worst, when Gi-hun had stumbled, terrified, into In-ho’s room. In-ho had told him—quietly, without making it a thing—to go to sleep in his bed. And it had worked. He’d slept straight through till morning.

Since then, it had happened twice more. No words, no explanations. Just the soft sound of the door opening in the dark, Gi-hun slipping under the covers beside him, settling into the same side each time. In-ho never moved or asked questions. He simply let him be until the tension in his breathing eased.

In-ho’s phone vibrated against the lacquered grain of the table, shaking him from his reverie. Jun-ho’s name flashed on the screen. He snatched it up and answered immediately. “Everything ok?” he said, keeping his voice low.

“We’ve got someone who was following us. Says almost nothing, but he’s… not just some idiot. He’s trained. Knows not to shit himself, even with a knife at his throat.” Jun-ho’s voice was tight and brittle.

In-ho’s mind narrowed to a pinpoint.

“Where?”

“Old laundry in Banghak-dong,” Jun-ho answered. “We could use the backup, hyung. He’s not…easy to break.”

In-ho’s gaze slid across the room. Hae-in was asleep in the other room, and his eyes fell on the monitor on the coffee table. Through its speaker, her breathing came as a steady, reassuring rhythm.

Gi-hun sat on the couch, leaning forward just enough for the lamplight to fall over his hands, the pale glow of his phone lighting his face from below. There was a faint crease between his brows, the kind that came when he was holding something in—an ache too deep to name out loud.

In-ho’s chest tightened, though whether it was from the call or the sight of him like that, he couldn’t tell.

“You listening, hyung?” Jun-ho asked, dragging his focus back. “I know it’s a risk. But if we can get him to talk we can find out who sent him.”

“I know,” In-ho cut in quietly. His eyes stayed on Gi-hun, tracing the slope of his shoulders under the warm lamplight. He hadn’t confirmed what was on that screen—who or what Gi-hun had been looking at with that wistful expression—but he could take an educated guess. Gi-hun had never reconnected with the daughter from his failed marriage, and In-ho could see the guilt that weighed heavy on him, even if they never spoke of it.

He turned away from the sight and imagined leaving, the cold air knifing at him the moment the door shut, the distance between here and Banghak-dong stretching like a wire he couldn’t see but would feel every second. He imagined leaving Gi-hun alone in such a state of melancholy, and the guilt clawed at him like a living thing. But needs must. He had no choice.

Jun-ho waited, breathing faintly in his ear.

“I’ll come,” In-ho said finally. “Send me the address.”

“Got it.” The line clicked dead.

He set the phone down, the faint warmth of the call fading beneath the cool air of the kitchen.

Gi-hun looked up from his phone, thumb hovering mid-scroll. “Was that Jun-ho?” he asked. His voice was clearly trying to sound casual and off-hand, but In-ho caught the strain beneath it.

He nodded once, trying to give Gi-hun the dignity of pretending he hadn’t noticed the upset. “They caught someone following them. Trained. Not some street kid looking to make a few won. This one was sent.”

Gi-hun’s expression tightened immediately, the weariness in his eyes shifting to alertness. “You think he knows who’s behind it?”

“If we can make him talk, maybe. If not…” In-ho let the sentence trail off. They both knew the weight of that silence.

The monitor between them hummed softly, Hae-in’s breathing a steady reminder of what they were protecting.

“You’re going,” Gi-hun said, his voice heavy with reluctant acceptance.

“I have to,” In-ho said. “If this trail goes cold, we might not get another one. And the closer they get without us knowing who they are, the more dangerous it gets. For all of us.”

Gi-hun was quiet for a beat, then set his phone down on the couch beside him. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Just… be careful, alright? I can’t…” He stopped himself, exhaling sharply. “I can’t do this alone.”

In-ho swallowed, unable to speak for a second. He stood there, as if bracing for more, but Gi-hun came to his feet without another word. He crossed the room—two quick steps—and set a hand on In-ho’s shoulder. The contact felt electric, charged, a current that made something flutter behind In-ho’s ribs. Gi-hun’s hand lingered a moment too long, and when he finally stepped back, his face wore the expression of a man startled by his own reflexes.

In-ho stared at him. Neither of them spoke. The moment stretched, fragile and awkward, until Gi-hun shifted his weight and glanced away, clearing his throat like he wanted to mutter something but couldn’t shape the words.

“I’ll be back soon,” In-ho said softly.

“I know,”

He left within two minutes, pulling on his coat and boots, and pulling the hood up against the wind. The cold snapped at his ears, stinging and sharp; he regretted not grabbing a scarf, but time was already short. The car was halfway down the drive, dusted with the soft, deceptive powder of frost that looked beautiful and burned the skin raw after a few seconds’ contact.

On the main road, his mind kept looping back to that moment in the living room, Gi-hun’s hand on his shoulder, the weight of it heavy and real. It hadn’t just been reassurance. It had been something else, something neither of them could name without breaking it. That brief touch had said more than Gi-hun would ever admit aloud, and it left In-ho with an ache he didn’t know how to sit with.

He wanted more—more than the brush of a palm over his shoulder, more than the wary glances and unspoken truces. And the fear lodged under his ribs was that if this went wrong, if he didn’t make it back, he’d never get it. Gi-hun would never know.

In-ho tightened his grip on the wheel, pressing the accelerator a little harder, the road stretching out ahead of him in the cold dark. There was no room for mistakes tonight.

***

Banghak-dong was a maze of narrow streets and sagging shopfronts, their paint peeled by winters that had outlasted owners. The old laundry sat at the end of a crooked alley, its windows blacked out with cardboard, the faded lettering on its sign barely visible in the weak streetlight.

In-ho killed the engine and let the silence settle before stepping out. He pushed the door open, the hinges giving a long, complaining squeal.

Inside, the cold felt heavier. The place was dim but not dark—a single bare bulb swung from the ceiling, throwing a slow pendulum of light across the room. Jun-ho was there, leaning against a cracked table, his arms crossed, gaze locked on someone in the chair at the centre of the room. Min-hyeok stood off to the side, posture loose but eyes sharp, like a man waiting for the first bad move.

The captive sat with his hands bound behind him, a strip of cloth tied tight over his mouth. His head was tilted just enough to keep In-ho in sight as he entered, and there was something in the man’s stare—not fear, not quite—but calculation.

“You made good time,” Jun-ho said, straightening from the table. His voice was flat, but his eyes gave away a glimmer of relief.

“Didn’t want to give him the chance to decide he’s done talking before he’s even started,” In-ho replied, stepping closer to take in the man’s build, the angle of his jaw, the faint scuff of salt-and-pepper stubble. Military, maybe. Definitely used to keeping still under pressure.

Min-hyeok tossed a glance between the two brothers. “He hasn’t said a word yet. Admittedly, we’ve not pushed him too far, but…”

In-ho’s gaze didn’t leave the captive. “Good. Then let’s get to work.”

The man’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t flinch. It was going to take more than threats to crack him—and they all knew it.

Jun-ho moved first, pacing a slow circle around the man, boots scraping faintly over the tiled floor. “We’ll start simple,” he said, voice calm, almost conversational. “Who sent you?”

The man blinked once, slow and deliberate. No answer.

Min-hyeok crouched in front of him, resting his elbows on his knees, the lazy posture a sharp contrast to the cold steel in his gaze. “See, here’s the problem,” he said lightly. “You got caught. Which means either you’re sloppy… or the people paying you don’t care if you come back alive.”

The man’s mouth twitched under the gag, but it could’ve been amusement as much as irritation.

In-ho stepped forward then, unhurried. He took his time dragging a chair across the floor, the sound loud and grating, before settling directly opposite the captive. He didn’t speak right away. Just studied him—every twitch of the jaw, every flicker in his eyes.

When he finally spoke, it was low, even. “You know who I am?”

A beat. Then the faintest nod.

“Then you know I’ve seen enough men like you to know which ones will break… and which ones will burn.” In-ho leaned in slightly, voice barely above a whisper. “You’re the first kind. You just don’t know it yet.”

Jun-ho came to stand behind the man, resting a hand lightly on the back of his chair. “Let’s lose the gag.”

Min-hyeok pulled it free in one swift motion. The man licked his lips but said nothing.

“Here’s how this works,” Jun-ho said. “We ask questions. You answer. The more you stall, the less comfortable this room gets. And trust me,” he added, nodding towards In-ho, “he can get real creative.”

The man’s eyes flicked between them, calculating again. “You think you’re the first to try this?” His voice was rough but steady. “I’ve been trained to outlast worse than you.”

In-ho gave a small, humourless smile. “Worse than me?” he said. “I very much doubt that. If you know who I am, you know what I’m capable of…” He paused for a moment, allowing the words to sink in. “What’s your name?”

The man’s gaze sharpened. His lips were quirked just a hair, like a bad actor in a cop drama trying to look unimpressed. “You won’t find out,” he said.

In-ho didn’t blink. He reached into his breast pocket, letting the silence stretch, and retrieved a small notepad together with a plain black ballpoint, clicking it open with a curt snap. He tapped it impatiently against his notepad, then looked up. “Your name,” he repeated, with the kind of flat finality that was itself a form of violence.

For a moment, the man stared at the pen like it was a trick, a joke. Then, slowly, he gave a name. “Kim Chul-su.”

“Bullshit,” Min-hyeok said, almost amiably, from his place against the wall. “There’s a shortlist of names guys like you use, and that’s one of them. Try again.”

A flicker of amusement crossed the man’s face. In-ho kept the pen poised, tapping it impatiently once again. “Why are you following us?”

A shrug, the universal gesture of indifference. “Someone pays, I follow.”

"Who?”

A second’s pause. “Didn’t meet. Cash in an envelope, instructions printed on paper.”

“Printed where?”

Another shrug, a little less cocky now. “Hotel. Near Seoul Station.I was given the room to check into, found the packet waiting in the trash. I don’t ask names.”

In-ho nodded, wrote it down. “Describe the person who gave you the job.”

The captive hesitated. In-ho nodded towards Min-hyeok, who grabbed hold of the back of the captive’s chair and tilted it back, making a show of balancing it on two legs.

The captive gave a short, derisive laugh at Min-hyeok’s action. “Is that the best you can do?”

In-ho didn’t answer. He just reached forward, the ballpoint pen in his hand, and drove it straight down into the man’s thigh.

The sound was small but ugly — a wet, muffled thunk — followed by the hiss of air between the captive’s clenched teeth. He jerked against his restraints, eyes wide, but In-ho was already pulling the pen free and wiping it clean of blood. Then he calmly leaned back in his chair, as if nothing had happened.

“Describe the person who gave you the job,” he repeated, his voice low and measured.

The captive’s eyes watered, but he didn’t make a sound beyond the taut, measured breathing of a man who’d been trained to expect suffering. In-ho watched the colour drain from his face, the way the pupils tightened—it was all information. Pain, real pain, rubbed the layers off you until only truth remained.

“Big,” the man spat, a breath at a time. “Foreigner. Bald.”

“Accent?”

“American maybe. Fancy suit. Teeth too white.”

In-ho noted every word. “Anything else?”

The man’s breathing was rough, wet, not quite a gasp. “Smelled like expensive cologne. Real strong, but not cheap. Tie was purple.” He tried to grin, but his lips peeled back in a grimace. “That enough for you?” He licked blood from his lip.

In-ho didn’t react. “Plenty. This American—did he mention a name? A client?”

A flicker of calculation crossed the captive’s face, and then his mouth clamped shut. He pressed his lips together as if the pain might leak out if he let it, and his eyes fixed on a point just over In-ho’s left shoulder. The silence stretched. He wouldn’t give them another word.

In-ho let the quiet stretch until it became something ugly, heavy enough that even Jun-ho shifted on his feet. The man was tough, but nobody was unbreakable. It was just a matter of pressure and time.

He eyed his pen food a moment, as if deciding whether to keep writing or simply put it away. Instead, he reached for the captive’s hand, curling the fingers back until the blunt crescents of his nails faced up. Without a word, In-ho slipped the tip of the ballpoint under the index fingernail and pressed, slow and relentless, until the lacquered blue of the pen disappeared under the nail bed.

The captive barely made a sound. His eyes rolled up, then snapped back to In-ho, raw and desperate. The knuckle whitened around the pen, then flexed once, twice, before the pressure gave and the pen popped free, the tip slicked in blood and something clear.

The index fingernail was a new colour, a smeared bruise blooming under the cuticle.

"Name," In-ho said, his voice flat and emotionless.

The man stayed silent.

“You have nine other fingernails for me to choose from. You want me to do that again?”

More silence. In-ho shrugged and repeated the process three more times, but the man was clearly well trained. In-ho stood up silently, brushed the creases from his trousers and adjusted the cuffs of his sleeves. Then he took a step closer, and looked up at Min-hyeok. “Hold his head steady,” he said.

Min-hyeok did as he was asked. In-ho came closer, and with one hand, held the man’s left eye open. “This would be a lot easier with a knife. Even with a spoon. But this pen has proven pretty useful so far, so I’m pretty sure I can get your eye out with it eventually.” He moved closer, then pen hovering near the man’s pupil, as if he were considering where to start.

The fear from the man grew palpable.

"I don’t know a name,” he blurted out. “Just a call sign—’Zebra.' Like the animal." Each syllable came out sharp, staccato, as if the words themselves cost him more than pain.

"Zebra," Jun-ho repeated, jotting it quickly in his phone. "Anything else?"

“Just that he wasn’t the man at the top. Someone else pulls the strings.”

“You know who Zebra works for?” In-ho asked, voice conversational. “Or do you just take money and wait for orders?”

The man spat onto the floor. It was an insult, but a calculated one, and In-ho let it slide. He leaned in, close enough that the captive could smell the sweat and winter chill still clinging to his collar. “Zebra’s not coming for you,” In-ho said quietly. “You’re a pawn. If you fail, they’ll send another. But you tell me what I want, and I make sure neither Zebra, nor whoever he works for, ever finds you. You walk out of here. New name, clean passport, whatever you need.” He let the words drop like stones. “Or you stay silent, and it gets so much worse for you. Your call.”

There was the faintest air of defiance still. In-ho raised one eyebrow, and slowly unzipped the man’s fly. The man looked at In-ho disdainfully, then with a sudden force, he drove the tip of the pen deep into one of the man’s testicles. Both Jun-ho and Min-hyeok winced and looked away as the man screeched in pain.

In-ho didn’t pull away. He pressed down harder, drawing another full-body tremor. The man grinned, a grimace that bared his gums. His face was slick with sweat, the way a body got when the pain was one click past bearable but not enough to knock you out. He looked past In-ho, to Jun-ho this time. “All I know is he wants you alive. Some kind of unfinished business. He was on his way when you took me.”

In-ho punched him, sharp and fast, a direct shot to the side of the head. The man’s eyes rolled, the muscles in his arms jumping, and he slumped sideways in the chair, cheek mashed against his own shoulder. A thin thread of spit trailed down his chin. For a second, no one moved, the noise of the impact ringing against the tile and then fading into the old, chemical stink of wet laundry.

In-ho stood, pulled back his sleeve, and wiped the blood off his knuckles on the edge of the man’s shirt. He looked at his brother, then at Min-hyeok. “We need to go,” he said, voice as bare as the concrete. “Now.”

He didn’t wait for an answer. He turned and strode out, the cold air slapping him awake the moment he hit the alley.

“You’re coming back with me,” In-ho said. “I don’t want to hear protests, I don’t want excuses. Until this is over, I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

Notes:

Oooooh..... the plot thickens! And the slow burn continues to burn at the slowest rate I've ever written 😂 But I have a feeling things will start picking up a wee bit at least from the next chapter ;)

Thank you to everyone reading, and for making this the most popular fic I've ever written, I'm truly humbled <3

Chapter 14: Close Quarters

Hae-in’s giggle as Gi-hun played peek-a-boo filled his heart with a lightness he hadn’t felt in years. She reached for his hands as he covered his face, squealing when he pulled them away again.

“Boo!” he said, drawing the word out until she burst into a high, delighted shriek, the kind that made her whole body wriggle.

He grinned so wide it almost hurt. “Oh, you like that one, do you? Should I try it again?” He covered his face quickly, then popped back out with a mock gasp. Another shriek. Her fists pumped in the air, feet kicking wildly against the little blanket beneath her.

“You’re going to wear yourself out before nap time,” he murmured, though he didn’t slow down. He lived for that sound—bright, unguarded, and free. It was a kind of joy he hadn’t known in so long, and each laugh felt like a small miracle.

When she finally slumped back, still hiccupping tiny laughs, he gathered her into his arms, pressing a kiss to the downy hair at her crown. “Alright, little one. Truce,” he whispered. “You win this round.”

She made a slightly annoyed little coo, and tapped her mouth with the back of her hand. “Ok, ok,” he said to her, as he stood up, and began preparing her bottle. He held her close against his chest, and Gi-hun let the moment settle around them like a blanket—the quiet, the warmth, the sense that, just for a breath, the rest of the world was very far away.

Something in it pulled at an old place in him. He remembered sitting cross-legged on the floor years ago, a much smaller Ga-yeong balanced between his knees, playing the same game. Her giggles had been higher, her eyes bright, her little hands clutching at him like he was the whole world.

Before everything went wrong.

He swallowed, blinking as Hae-in’s tiny hand brushed his jaw. The image of Ga-yeong now—older, in America, living a life without him—was harder to hold. He still hadn’t called her. Not once. The phone was always there, her number buried in his contacts, but every time his finger hovered over it something in his chest locked up.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to hear her voice. He wanted it more than anything. But wanting it and deserving it felt like two entirely different worlds.

And in his gut, he couldn’t shake the belief that he didn’t belong in her life anymore.

Hae-in gave another hiccup of laughter, pulling him back into the moment. He smiled at her, softer now, and whispered, “Your appa’s a screw-up. Biggest one there is. But…” He brushed his thumb over her tiny fingers, feeling how impossibly small they were. “I’m gonna try not to be. For you.”

Her eyes were still wide and bright, too young to understand, but she gurgled in reply like she was agreeing anyway.

Gi-hun let out a heavy sigh and pressed a kiss to the top of Hae-in’s soft hair. “Yeah,” he murmured, rocking her gently. “We’ll figure it out. One day at a time.”

The words sounded steadier than he felt. In-ho had been gone since the night before, and Gi-hun hated that the absence gnawed at him. He didn’t want to care, not after everything—not after betrayal stacked on betrayal—but the worry was there all the same. He told himself it was just about safety, and nothing more. But that wasn’t the whole truth.

In three months, the man had become part of the rhythm of this place. The silence at the breakfast table felt heavier without him, the air colder at night. Gi-hun kept catching himself glancing toward the door, listening for boots on the porch, as if some part of him had already started to count on In-ho’s presence. Worse still, he’d begun to believe the change in him might be real.

A sudden gust rattled the kitchen window. The wind had picked up outside, carrying with it the brittle sound of branches scraping the glass. Gi-hun’s eyes flicked toward the door without meaning to, the habit drilled into him now. Every sound catalogued, every shadow checked twice.

He told himself it was nothing.

Still, his chest pulled tight when Hae-in stopped giggling mid-squeal, her little gaze swinging toward the same window as if she, too, had sensed something.

Then came the crunch of tires on frozen gravel. Gi-hun’s pulse jumped, his arms tightening protectively around her. Headlights swept across the wall in a long, slow arc before cutting out, and he stood frozen for a beat, listening hard.

The front door swung open, a draft of cold air spilling into the room along with the low murmur of voices. Gi-hun’s shoulders dropped, tension bleeding away even as irritation sparked at himself for caring this much.

In-ho stepped in first, boots thudding against the mat, Jun-ho close behind. A third man followed, taller and broader through the shoulders. Gi-hun’s brow furrowed immediately. The face stirred a flicker of recognition, but he couldn’t put a name to him.

Jun-ho gave him a short nod; the stranger only glanced his way before shifting his weight near the door, as if he wasn’t sure he should step farther in.

In-ho’s eyes went straight to Hae-in—a quick sweep to see she was safe—before landing on Gi-hun. “Everything alright?” Gi-hun asked, trying to keep his tone casual.

In-ho nodded shortly. “For now,” he said. “We’ll catch you up once Hae-in’s asleep.” His gaze flicked to Jun-ho, then back to Gi-hun. “But for the foreseeable future, they’ll be staying here.”

Gi-hun blinked. “Here? As in—” He glanced around at their small living space, the walls suddenly feeling closer. “We’ve only got two bedrooms.”

“We’ll work it out,” In-ho said simply, like it wasn’t a problem worth discussing.

“And who are you?” Gi-hun said, turning towards the stranger.

“Kim Min-hyeok,” he said, with the slightest of bows. “I was on your payroll, Mr Seong.”

Gi-hun flushed red, embarrassed for not recognising him, but still unsure why he was here. He adjusted Hae-in on his shoulder and shook his head. “Two bedrooms isn’t enough,” he said. “This isn’t a barracks, it’s a house. There isn’t space.”

Jun-ho lifted a hand, calm and even. “It’s alright. Min-hyeok and I can share a room.”

Gi-hun’s eyes flicked instinctively to In-ho. A muscle ticked in his jaw, sharp and sudden, gone almost before it appeared—but not before Gi-hun saw it.

He frowned, wondering. Was it disapproval? Of Jun-ho sharing with someone else? Or something else entirely?

In-ho didn’t look up, didn’t acknowledge the glance. Instead he stripped off his coat, his voice level, almost clipped. “I’ll take the couch. That way Gi-hun and Hae-in won’t be affected at all.”

The words landed heavy in the air, final and immovable.

Gi-hun opened his mouth, then shut it again. Something twisted in his chest—an odd mix of relief and guilt. Relief that his room, his nights with Hae-in safe beside him, wouldn’t be disturbed. But guilt too, because In-ho was so quick to exile himself, like it was the obvious solution.

And beneath all of that, another feeling, sharper, one he was almost embarrassed to think about. When the nightmares came—the worst ones—he had taken himself into In-ho’s room, wordless, only able to sleep again with the warmth of someone there. If In-ho was on the couch, what then? Would he still go? Or lie awake, shaking in silence, because he couldn’t bring himself to cross that line again?

The thought unsettled him, made him snap sharper than he meant: “Fine. But don’t think this makes it simple.”

In-ho only nodded, eyes on the floorboards, as if simplicity was the last thing he expected.

***

Later, when the sound of low voices had settled into the background of the house, Gi-hun drew Hae-in into his room. The light was soft, a warm pool from the lamp by the cot, the kind of glow that seemed to make the walls lean in close.

He sat on the edge of his bed with her, the weight of her small body curled against his chest. A children’s book lay open in his lap, his voice low and careful as he read the simple lines. She didn’t understand the words yet, of course—only the rhythm, the rise and fall. Still, she watched his mouth move, her eyes wide, until the sound lulled her into soft coos and half-formed giggles.

When the last page was turned, Gi-hun closed the book with a whisper of paper and pressed his lips to the crown of her head. He kept rocking, slow and steady, as her eyelids drooped.

“You don’t know how much I need you,” he murmured, voice hardly more than breath. “You’re… everything, Hae-in.”

Her tiny fist batted sleepily against his shirt. He huffed a shaky laugh. “You don’t let me give up, do you? You’re the reason I keep telling myself I can do better. That I have to. I don’t know what’s going to happen with these men, with In-ho, with any of it… but I promise you, I’m not going to leave you alone. Not ever.”

By the time her breathing evened out against him, the words had grown quieter, blurred around the edges. He stood carefully, lowering her into the cot with gentle tenderness.

For a moment, he just stood there, watching the soft rise and fall of her chest, and let himself believe his promise.

Finally, he stepped back out of his bedroom and pulled the door closed with the slow care of someone terrified of a creak. For a beat, he just stood in the hallway, listening to the silence of her breathing on the other side. His body ached with the need to stay there, to keep watch, but the low murmur of voices from the kitchen reminded him he couldn’t. Not tonight.

When he walked in, three sets of eyes flicked his way. In-ho was already sliding a small glass across the table, the clear burn of soju catching the light. Gi-hun hesitated, then sank into the chair opposite.

“You’ll need it,” In-ho said simply.

Gi-hun took it, the alcohol warming his throat before the words even started. He set the glass down with a quiet clink and leaned forward, gaze moving between the three of them. “Alright,” he said. “Tell me.”

Jun-ho glanced at In-ho, then began. “We picked up someone tailing us. Not your average street thug. Military training, or something close enough you can’t tell the difference. He kept his mouth shut for a long time, until...”

Gi-hun felt his jaw tighten, but didn’t interrupt.

“Until we found a way to make him talk,” Jun-ho finished, voice flat, almost like he didn’t want to say it aloud. His eyes flicked sideways toward In-ho.

Gi-hun’s stomach shifted uneasily. He looked at In-ho, who was calm as ever, pouring another round. “And?”

In-ho slid the bottle aside and finally met his gaze. “He told us he was hired anonymously. Pickups were happening near Seoul Station. Hotel trash drops, instructions printed out, no names.” His tone was steady, but something coiled beneath it, tightly held in place.

Gi-hun let the words settle. Hotel, station, anonymity—threads of a web tightening around them. He tipped back the rest of the soju and swallowed hard, the heat doing nothing to ease the cold in his chest.

“And this man? The one following you?”

Jun-ho’s silence told him more than words. Min-hyeok shifted in his chair, arms folded, as if waiting for permission to speak.

In-ho reached for the bottle again, his movements deliberate. “He won’t be following us anymore.”

Gi-hun’s gaze lingered on him, sharp and questioning, but he didn’t ask the thing sitting at the back of his tongue. Instead, he leaned back in his chair, the weight of what wasn’t said pressing down as heavily as what was.

Gi-hun set the glass down harder than he meant to, the sound sharp in the quiet kitchen. “What happened to him?”

For the first time, In-ho’s eyes didn’t meet his. He refilled his glass instead, slow and careful, and said, “Don’t ask me that.”

The words dropped like a stone. Gi-hun’s stomach knotted. He wanted to push, to demand the truth, but the look in In-ho’s face—controlled, but edged—made him stop.

In-ho finally went on. “Before he broke, he said someone was on their way to collect Jun-ho. We didn’t know if it was a bluff. So we went back, kept watch.”

Jun-ho leaned forward, elbows braced on the table. “It wasn’t a bluff.”

Min-hyeok, who had been quiet until then, spoke for the first time. “At least four. We all spotted them. Separate approaches, staggered enough to close a net if we’d stayed in place. Military coordination. Too many for us to take down clean.”

Gi-hun rubbed a hand over his face, trying to think past the pounding in his temples. “So what—you just let them walk?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Jun-ho said. “We could take down a hundred of the pawns, but the game keeps going until you take out the King.”

“So who is it?” Gi-hun said, turning towards In-ho. “You must know who was on your guestlist?”

“I never knew names,” In-ho responded. “Only Il-nam did, and after he died… The organisation changed. I told you. I was little more than a receptionist in comparison to them. But—” he began, seeing the look on Gi-hun’s face, seeing the words about to come spilling out of him— “you don’t get as rich as they were and be able to stay entirely anonymous. Jun-ho thinks he knows who is behind this, and he would know the man if he saw his picture. So… we just have to start researching the world’s richest assholes.”

Gi-hun sighed and reached for the soju, pouring himself another glass. “And then what?” he said. “People like that are untouchable.”

“No-one is untouchable,” In-ho said.

Gi-hun swirled the soju in his glass, watching the liquid catch the dim light. “No one’s untouchable?” he muttered. “I once thought that about you. And look what it cost me.”

No one answered. The silence pressed in, thick as smoke. In-ho’s gaze dropped to the table, his features tightening with something that looked too much like guilt. Jun-ho shifted in his seat, eyes flicking between them, as though caught in the crossfire of a conversation he had no place in. Min-hyeok busied himself with straightening a coaster that didn’t need it, the scrape of cardboard on wood absurdly loud in the hush.

Jun-ho broke the moment by standing up, and ignoring the odd tension. “We’ll get started tomorrow. I’m turning in,” he said, tone clipped. Then, without hesitation, he glanced at Min-hyeok. “You coming?”

The other man nodded once, pushing his chair back with a scrape. It was so casual, so natural, Gi-hun almost missed it—almost. The way Jun-ho lingered just a second, waiting for him, the easy tilt of Min-hyeok’s mouth when he stood—it clicked.

And when Gi-hun looked back at In-ho, he caught it: the faint, tense muscle jumping in his brother’s jaw, a tightness in his posture that hadn’t been there a moment ago.

Gi-hun said nothing, just watched as the two men disappeared down the hall. The faint murmur of their voices drifted back before the door clicked shut.

When the silence settled again, In-ho busied himself with stacking the empty glasses. His movements were precise, controlled, but Gi-hun could see the edge in them, the way he gripped the rim of the last glass a little too tightly.

“Don’t,” Gi-hun said quietly.

In-ho glanced up, the faintest flicker of surprise in his eyes. “Don’t what?”

“Don’t look at him like that,” Gi-hun said at last, the words slipping out before he could stop them. He leaned back in his chair, trying for casual, but his jaw was tight. “He’s a grown man. He can make his own choices.”

In-ho’s eyes flicked to him, sharp and unreadable. “You’re not his brother,” he said, voice cool, clipped. “You wouldn’t understand.”

Gi-hun almost barked out a laugh, though there wasn’t much humour in it. “Jesus. You have to be in control of everything, don’t you?” His pulse ticked faster, irritation rising in his chest. He hated that he could see shades of the Front Man in that tone—commanding, cold, a man who decided and expected everyone else to fall in line.

“It’s not about that,” In-ho replied.

“Oh?” Gi-hun asked, tilting his head, narrowing his eyes. “So what is it about then?”

For a moment In-ho hesitated, his lips parting, his throat working like he was choking something back. The silence stretched, taut as wire. When he did speak, the words came quieter. “I just… want what’s best for him. That’s all.”

Gi-hun’s stomach twisted at that. He wanted to believe him. Some part of him, traitorous and tired, wanted to cling to the idea that maybe this man really did care about his brother, that maybe all the things he’d done had been twisted efforts at protection. But the other part—the larger part, the one that would forever be haunted by all the deaths, by Sang-woo ending his own life in front of him, by the sight of Jung-bae falling to the ground—flared with hot disgust.

He leaned forward, his voice a low growl. “Says the man who shot him off a cliff.”

That landed. He saw it. In-ho’s gaze snapped up to meet his, his eyes narrow and brittle. His hand closed around the soju bottle, knuckles blanching, and he tipped it back for a long swallow, straight from the glass neck. His throat worked as he drank, and when he set it down, his voice was steady but hard. “I did what I had to do to protect him. I won’t apologise for it.”

The lack of remorse made something inside Gi-hun snap. Maybe it was the certainty in In-ho’s tone, the arrogance of it, the same tone he had used when he’d compared humans to horses on a track. Gi-hun’s hand darted out, snatching the bottle before he could think better of it. Likewise, he didn’t bother with the glass, just tipped it back himself, the sharp burn tearing down his throat. He drank more than he should, partly to spite In-ho, partly to shut up the buzzing in his head that told him he was only tangling himself deeper in this man’s orbit.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” he snapped once he came up for air, the taste of cheap alcohol still coating his tongue. He didn’t even know which part he meant—the lack of apology, the obsession with control, or the way In-ho could sit there and sound so damn certain. Maybe all of it.

In-ho’s eyes glinted, something like challenge there. “That I have my brother’s best interests at heart?” he asked, his tone deliberately angled, twisting the meaning, forcing Gi-hun to either back down or double down. “Good. It shouldn’t.”

Gi-hun felt his annoyance spike higher. His pulse was loud in his ears, his chest tight. Without answering, he tipped the bottle back again, another harsh mouthful searing down his throat. He slammed it down on the table harder than he meant to, the glass clinking against the wood. Then he pushed back his chair with a scrape that felt louder than it should’ve been in the small room. He couldn’t stand to look at In-ho anymore—not with that unyielding calm face, not with the certainty in his voice that made Gi-hun want to either hit him or laugh in his face.

“I need some air,” he muttered, though it wasn’t really for anyone but himself. He snatched the soju bottle off the table as he went. The front door clicked shut behind him, letting in a bite of winter sharp enough to clear his head.

The night was dark and still, the kind of stillness that carried sound far, every rustle and crunch magnified. He lit a cigarette with shaking hands, cupping the flame against the wind, and pulled in smoke as though it could steady him. The burn in his lungs dulled the edge of his thoughts. He drank straight from the bottle again, the heat of the soju competing with the cold that gnawed at his ears and fingers.

He stood there a long time—smoking, drinking, and staring out at nothing. Part of him wanted to keep standing there until the bottle was empty, until the cold drove him inside, until the fight inside him dulled enough that he could breathe without cursing the man in the next room.

The door creaked behind him. He didn’t turn, but the crunch of boots on gravel gave it away before the quiet voice followed.

“Gi-hun-ssi.”

In-ho’s tone was different now—softer, stripped of that edge of authority. Gi-hun kept his eyes on the faint orange glow of his cigarette.

“I meant what I said,” In-ho began after a pause. His voice faltered, then steadied. “I want what’s best for Jun-ho. I’ve always wanted that. But…” He exhaled, the sound heavy, like something dragged from deep inside. “I was raised in a Christian household. The idea of—of two men together—it doesn’t sit easily with me. It never has.”

Gi-hun barked out a laugh, harsh and humourless, smoke spilling into the night. He finally turned, eyes narrowing on In-ho in the faint wash of moonlight. “That’s your big excuse?” He jabbed the cigarette in his direction. “That’s what makes you look at him like that? Because some sermon you heard thirty years ago told you it was wrong?” The silence stretched between them, cold air frosting their breath. Gi-hun took another long pull from the bottle, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and shook his head. “After everything you’ve done,” he said, quieter now, “after all the blood on your hands—you really think you get to be the one who sits in judgment?”

 

In-ho’s jaw worked, but he said nothing.

“Get over it,” Gi-hun said flatly, taking another drag and exhaling slow. His voice dropped, quieter but sharper, aimed like a knife. “If he’s happy, he’s happy. That’s all that matters. You don’t get to decide how he lives his life just because it doesn’t fit into the neat little rules you were handed as a kid.”

In-ho didn’t fire back this time. No sharp retort, no cold dismissal. He just stood there, shoulders taut beneath his coat, eyes fixed on some point beyond Gi-hun like he couldn’t bear to meet his gaze. The silence dragged long enough that Gi-hun thought maybe he wasn’t going to answer at all.

When he finally did, his voice was low, stripped bare. “You’re right.” He shifted his weight, gravel crunching under his boots, the sound small in the wide quiet of the night. “After everything I’ve done… I don’t have the right to judge anyone. Least of all him.”

Gi-hun blinked, thrown off by the concession, by the almost fragile quality in In-ho’s tone. He expected defensiveness, another excuse, another wall. Not this.

“I just…” In-ho exhaled hard, a cloud of misted breath in the cold. His hands flexed at his sides, restless, like he didn’t know what to do with them. “It’s hard to let go of what was drilled into you. But… you’re right. If he’s happy, that should be enough.”

For a flicker of a moment, his eyes lifted, meeting Gi-hun’s. There was something raw there—something unguarded that Gi-hun felt in his chest, sharp and unsettling. And just as quickly, In-ho looked away, clearing his throat, turning slightly as if the night air itself had grown too heavy to bear.

Gi-hun dragged on his cigarette again, trying to ignore the strange tightness curling low in his stomach. He wasn’t sure what unnerved him more: that In-ho had actually listened to him, or that look in his eyes just now, the one that felt like it was carrying something unsaid.

“Good,” he muttered at last, breaking the moment. “Then leave him be.”

In-ho gave the faintest nod. He didn’t move to go back inside, though. He just stayed there, a quiet, steady presence a few feet away, like he didn’t trust himself to say anything else without it spilling over into something he couldn’t take back.

The cigarette burned low between Gi-hun’s fingers. The soju was sharp on his tongue. And somewhere beneath the haze of both, he felt that strange current again—the one he didn’t want to acknowledge, not yet.

Gi-hun took one last drag, the cigarette flaring red before he ground it out under his heel. He held the bottle loosely for a second, weighing whether to keep it, then wordlessly extended it toward In-ho. “Here,” he said, almost gruff, though the gesture itself was softer than he’d meant it to be.

In-ho’s fingers brushed his as he took it. Too brief to be called contact, but enough to send a flicker of something through Gi-hun’s chest. He ignored it, turning on his heel and heading inside before it could linger.

The house was quiet, shadows stretched long under the low light of a single lamp. Gi-hun padded to his room, easing the door open with care. Hae-in slept soundly, tiny fists curled up by her head, her breath steady and rhythmic. He froze a moment just to watch her, the heaviness in his chest softening at the sight.

Moving quietly, he slipped his pillow from the bed, tucking it under one arm, then dug through the wardrobe until he found a spare blanket. He hesitated, glancing once at the cot, at her tiny form bathed in the glow from the hall light. Then he pulled the door shut with the gentlest click.

Back in the living room, he dropped the pillow on the couch and shook out the blanket. In-ho was still outside; Gi-hun could see the faint shape of him through the frosted glass, unmoving, bottle dangling at his side.

“Goodnight,” Gi-hun muttered under his breath, though whether to himself or to the man on the other side of the door, he didn’t know.

But rest didn’t come easy. His mind buzzed, replaying the night in restless fragments—the sharp edge of In-ho’s words, the guilt in his eyes, the strange almost-look between them outside. He shut his eyes, willing himself to sleep. But all he could feel was the hollow ache of wanting things to make sense—and knowing they didn’t. Not yet.

***

In-ho lay flat on the couch, the blanket Gi-hun had left for him tucked haphazardly under his arm. He stared up at the ceiling, shadows drifting where the faint glow from the porch light bled through the curtains. He should have been able to sleep—God knew his body was exhausted—but his mind refused him the luxury. Every time he shut his eyes, his thoughts twisted into knots too tight to ignore.

He turned on his side, arm curled under his head, but the ache of wakefulness followed. His thoughts drifted first, as they always did now, to the task at hand—the impossibility of it. Hunting men with power like gods, invisible but omnipresent. He pictured the men they’d seen earlier: faceless shadows, four where they had expected one. And that was only the edge of the knife. The person behind it all was still hidden in the dark.

It was like trying to fight the wind. And yet—what choice did they have? If they didn’t strike back, they’d be picked off, one by one, until there was nothing left but bodies in the snow and Hae-in orphaned before she could even walk.

The thought of her brought a pressure into his chest he didn’t recognise. She wasn’t his, not by blood, not by name, not by anything but circumstance, and yet—when he’d walked in tonight, when his eyes had found her before they even landed on Gi-hun—that had been instinct. He couldn’t deny it anymore. Protecting her wasn’t just a duty. It was something closer to compulsion.

Jun-ho would have laughed at him for that. Or maybe not laughed—maybe smirked knowingly, that infuriating little twist of the lips he always got when he knew he was right. Jun-ho had always lived freer than him. In-ho had been the responsible one, the model student, the dutiful son. Jun-ho was allowed to rebel. To try and fail. To be his own man.

And now, he was. Entirely. In-ho had seen it tonight, in the quiet certainty, the ease of someone who had stopped pretending to be anything other than who he was.

It should have made In-ho proud. Maybe some part of him was. But the larger part—the one he hated, the one that curled its lip and sounded like his step-mother’s voice in the back of his head—felt unsettled. Wrong-footed. Raised in a household where certain things were not spoken, not allowed, not even thought, In-ho had learned to silence that kind of impulse before it ever formed. And yet here was Jun-ho, living it openly, without shame. And happy. Truly happy, if In-ho let himself admit it.

He rolled onto his back again, staring into the dark. Jun-ho’s happiness shouldn’t unsettle him. It should be a comfort. But it wasn’t. Because every time he thought of Jun-ho, his thoughts turned—against his will—toward Gi-hun. Because seeing Jun-ho that way forced him to confront a part of himself he had been desperately trying to ignore.

It had begun as obsession, he could admit that much. When Gi-hun walked away from the Game, bloodied but alive, with his winnings hanging over his head, In-ho hadn’t been able to stop watching him. At first, it was professional. The kind of professional that bordered on personal, yes, but still detached enough to justify. Gi-hun was a loose thread in a world that survived on secrets. He was dangerous, even if he didn’t know it.

So In-ho had watched him. Studied him. Learned him. The slump of his shoulders, the way he carried grief in his hands, the foolish tenderness he still showed to strangers who didn’t deserve it. He’d told himself it was strategy. That knowing your piece on the board meant knowing how to move it.

But it hadn’t stayed that way. Somewhere along the line, knowing Gi-hun had shifted into feeling him. Into sensing the man behind the ruin—the loyalty, the stubborn refusal to give up, the small flashes of humour that broke through even when he was drowning. In-ho had told himself he admired him, maybe even envied him, though that word had always tasted bitter on his tongue. But the truth—that it was something warmer, closer, hungrier—was one he still couldn’t quite force himself to say.

And God, it terrified him. Because he had never, not once in his life, wanted another man. He’d been raised to see it as weakness, as sin. Even now, lying on Gi-hun’s couch with the ghost of his lingering touch still on his shoulder from the previous day, some part of him recoiled. It wasn’t who he was. It couldn’t be.

But then Gi-hun’s words outside came back to him. Simple. Blunt. If he’s happy, he’s happy. That’s all that matters.

Could it really be that simple?

He closed his eyes, listening to the house creak around him, the faint wind rattling the eaves. He tried to picture a life where he could just let it be. Where Jun-ho could be with Min-hyeok and he could—what? Follow this feeling wherever it led? Let himself admit that what had started as obsession was becoming something else?

The thought was dizzying. Terrifying. It made his stomach twist in knots. And yet, when he pictured Gi-hun—his laugh when Hae-in shrieked with delight, the heaviness in his voice when he admitted his fear of being a screw-up, the simplicity of sharing a bed when the nightmares closed in—it didn’t feel dirty. It didn’t feel wrong.

It felt… human.

Maybe that was worse.

He pressed the heel of his hand to his eyes, exhaling sharply into the quiet. If he let himself want this, it could destroy them both. He’d already gambled and lost everything once—for Yoo-na. And while he’d been away, while he was fighting for the scraps of someone else’s amusement, she had died. Nine years gone, and still the thought of her left him hollowed out.

Since then, he hadn’t allowed himself to even look at another woman, hadn’t even let the thought of it cross his mind. To do so felt like betrayal, like erasing her. If he couldn’t be faithful to the memory of the only woman he had ever loved, what kind of man was he?

And now—this. Not a woman. Not anything he’d ever imagined. A man who was jagged and wounded, who carried his own ghosts in the slump of his shoulders and the lines of his face. A man who was just starting to find a rhythm again, a fragile thread of hope. What chance would he have, opening his hands to something so strange, so forbidden, so far from the life he had known?

And yet…

The silence stretched on. The blanket slipped from his chest to his waist, the air cold against his skin. He lay awake, wrestling with himself, knowing sleep would not come. Not with all of this storming inside him.

Not with the memory of Gi-hun’s voice echoing in his mind. If he’s happy, he’s happy.

And for the first time, In-ho let himself wonder—not just fleetingly, not as a thought to stamp out before it bloomed—but truly wonder…What if he could be, too?

The house was still but for the faint ticking of the clock and the occasional groan of the pipes. In-ho lay on his back, eyes wide open, when a sound brushed faintly against the quiet. At first he thought he’d imagined it—just the creak of wood, or the wind nosing the eaves again. But then it came again. Low. Drawn out. A noise somewhere between a groan and a plea.

He stiffened, listening. Another sound followed, sharper this time—a ragged exhale, almost a whimper.

Gi-hun.

In-ho sat up slowly, blanket pooling around his waist. The sound was faint, muffled by walls and closed doors, but unmistakable once you tuned your ear to it. A nightmare. Again.

The first time he allowed Gi-hun into his bed following a nightmare, he sat awake beside him, watching, waiting for any hint of the terror’s return. The next few times, when Gi-hun had crawled in beside him, he told himself it was a simple practicality. That Gi-hun needed rest. That while he insisted on the lion’s share of care duties, ensuring he was well slept was the least he could do. He’d let him in each time, no questions asked, just shifted aside so Gi-hun could take the empty space beside him until the trembling stopped. Always without words. Always without acknowledgment in the morning.

Now he imagined what it might be like to wake up beside him every day with intent, without the excuse of needing a presence to keep the nightmares at bay.

The sound threatened to rise, to wake Hae-in in the next room. In-ho hesitated, fingers curled into the blanket. He should ignore it. Gi-hun had always come to him, never the other way around. But the small, broken noise came again, and before he could argue with himself any further, In-ho was on his feet.

The hallway was cold beneath his bare feet, the wood chilled with the night air seeping in through the thin walls. He paused at the door, his hand hovering over the knob, listening. Inside, Gi-hun muttered something unintelligible, then gave a sharp cry that made In-ho’s chest tighten.

He slipped inside.

The room was dim, lit only by the faint glow leaking around the curtains. Gi-hun thrashed faintly on the bed, face twisted, fists clenched in the blanket. He looked younger like this, strangely fragile, as though all the years of hardship had melted away to leave only raw fear behind.

“Gi-hun,” In-ho whispered, crossing the room. He crouched beside the bed and reached out, resting a hand lightly on his shoulder. “Hey. Wake up.”

The man jerked beneath his touch, eyes snapping open with a strangled gasp. He blinked wildly, chest heaving, until his gaze latched onto In-ho’s face. Recognition flickered there, confusion following close behind.

“It’s alright,” In-ho said, his voice low, steady. “You were dreaming.”

Gi-hun rubbed a hand over his face, still trying to catch his breath. “Shit… I—” He broke off, his voice cracking under the weight of exhaustion and embarrassment.

“You’ll wake Hae-in if you keep at it,” In-ho murmured, not unkindly.

That landed. Gi-hun sagged back against the pillow, groaning softly into his hands. His body still trembled, though, little shudders that rippled down his arms and chest. He wasn’t going back to sleep like this.

In-ho lingered only a heartbeat longer before making a decision he told himself was nothing. Practical. Necessary. He eased the blanket back and slipped onto the edge of the bed. The mattress dipped beneath his weight.

“What are you—”

“You need to rest,” In-ho said quickly, keeping his voice hushed. “And you’ll wake her if you keep thrashing around.”

Gi-hun stared at him for a long moment, but didn’t argue. Maybe he was too tired. Maybe he was too used to this already. He shifted slightly, making space without comment, and let the silence close in around them.

In-ho lay back stiffly, hands folded across his stomach, staring at the ceiling. He told himself it meant nothing. A kindness. A practical solution.

But the warmth of Gi-hun’s body seeped through the narrow space between them, and it was impossible not to feel it. The steady sound of his breath—still ragged, but evening out—brushed against In-ho’s awareness, dragging his thoughts somewhere he did not want them to go.

If he’s happy, he’s happy. That’s all that matters.

Gi-hun’s words circled back to him with cruel clarity. He swallowed, throat tight, and dared the smallest glance sideways. Gi-hun had his eyes closed again, his face slack with exhaustion, though his brow still creased faintly as if shadows of the dream clung to him. Vulnerable. Trusting. And somehow, unbearably close.

What if—?

The thought burst unbidden into his mind, hot and sharp. What if this could be more? What if the restless need that had driven him into this bed tonight was something other than obligation, other than habit? What if he allowed himself to follow the pull that had grown inside him ever since Gi-hun first looked at him not with fear or hatred, but with trust?

His chest tightened painfully. He had no right to think like this. Not here, not now. Gi-hun was a broken man trying to piece himself together, raising a daughter who deserved safety and stability. The last thing he needed was another complication.

And yet, lying there, listening to Gi-hun’s breath even out, In-ho felt something unfamiliar stir beneath the fear and shame. Something perilously close to hope.

He clenched his jaw and closed his eyes, forcing himself still. He would not move closer. He would not reach out. This was meaningless. Practical. Temporary.

And yet the thought lingered, stubborn and bright in the dark: what if it didn’t have to be?

Notes:

1000 kudos? I'm genuinely blown away, thank you, I've never reached that on any fic before!

Anyway, In-ho's taken a bit of a step forward, and they're one step closer to finding the VIP after them too! Let me know what you think, I love reading your comments <3

Chapter 15: The Man Behind the Curtain

In-ho had barely slept. The hours had bled together in a haze of shadows and restless turning, his body heavy with exhaustion but his mind refusing to quiet.

Gi-hun’s words clung to him, circling like vultures over carrion. They pressed against him like a thumb on a bruise, finding every tender place he thought he’d buried, every fracture he had carefully disguised beneath armour. He tried to shove them aside the way he had shoved everything else aside—his faith, his sins, the memory of thousands of bodies crumpling in the Games—but unlike those, this wouldn’t sink beneath the surface. It stayed, raw and insistent, asking him to look.

He knew it was absurd. If he weighed his sins on a scale—the Games, the blood, the betrayals—what chance did a man loving another man have of tilting it further? None. It was laughable, obscene even, to hold them up together. The deaths would crush the scale in an instant.

But knowing that didn’t silence the voice that hissed in the marrow of his bones. The one that told him love like that was wrong, that it was weakness and corruption. That it made men dirty.

And yet, he couldn’t deny that Jun-ho was happy.

That was the part that kept scraping against his ribs. His brother, whose life had been ripped apart by his hands, whose trust he had shattered, was building something new. Something freer. And In-ho—what right did he have to disapprove? To cling to an old morality when he’d long since abandoned every other one?

Jun-ho couldn’t know how deeply their childhood faith still burrowed in him. Couldn’t know how it shaped the way he watched, the way he judged, even as he forced himself not to. He had only just gotten his brother back. If In-ho spoke aloud the twisting, ugly discomfort inside him, he risked losing him again.

So he determined to try. For Jun-ho’s sake.

And—if Gi-hun noticed him trying, all the better. Because if Gi-hun’s approval meant something—if Gi-hun seeing him as more than the sum of his cruelty led somewhere further—

He cut the thought off before it could fully form.

It was too confusing. Too contradictory.

Too alluring.

He rose out of bed before Gi-hun did, his body heavy from lack of sleep, his mind raw from circling the same thoughts until they blurred. But determination propelled him forward. He would act. He would do something—anything—to begin rebuilding the bridges his brother didn’t even know had been set alight.

The kitchen was quiet at that hour, shadows stretching across the counter. He busied his hands before his thoughts could drag him under again, getting everything ready for Hae-in’s first feed, sterilising the bottles, then adding formula to the Perfect Prep machine, ready to be switched on.

From there he moved to the fridge, and pulled out the ingredients for enoki fritters and kimchi pancakes. One of Jun-ho’s childhood favourites. He remembered how Jun-ho would sit at the table, swinging his legs, grinning, shoving the food into his mouth as though he had never been fed before.

In-ho hadn’t thought about those mornings in years. They were so innocent back then.

The hiss of batter hitting the pan brought him back to the present. He flipped the pancakes carefully, focusing on the neatness of each edge. It was easier than letting his mind spiral. Easier than confronting the truth of why he was doing this at all.

He heard Gi-hun’s footsteps before he saw him, the shuffle of bare feet across the floor. A moment later, the man was at the counter, hair mussed, eyes still heavy with sleep.

“You’e making breakfast?” Gi-hun’s voice was soft, touched with surprise.

“I am,” In-ho replied, keeping his attention on the pan. The fritter sizzled as he pressed it down with the spatula. “Hae-in’s too. Just need to flick the switch.”

There was a pause, the quiet weight of Gi-hun’s gaze settling on him.

“Thanks,” Gi-hun said finally, and though it was a single word, it sank deep. Gratitude, simple and unguarded. In-ho drew a shallow breath and let it out slowly, pretending the sudden warmth in his chest was only from the stove. He kept his posture rigid and controlled, the picture of perfect composure. But beneath it, he was acutely aware of the silence that stretched between them.

Neither of them mentioned last night, how In-ho had crept in beside him in the night, how by the time In-ho decided he should get up, Gi-hun had turned towards him in his sleep, legs wordlessly tangling into his own. He absolutely didn’t mention how natural it felt. How right.

By the time Jun-ho and Min-hyeok emerged from the bedroom, the table was set. Both looked rumpled and slow, the way people did when sleep had been comfortable and long. Min-hyeok yawned openly, rubbing at his eyes, while Jun-ho trailed behind him, already reaching for a glass of water.

“Morning,” In-ho said evenly, plating the last pancake, and ensuring his face remained neutral. “Did you sleep well?”

Jun-ho blinked the sleep away, and grinned at the layout of food in a way that reminded In-ho of those halcyon days

“Yeah. We did.”

In-ho gave the smallest of smiles, turning back to the counter. “Good.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Gi-hun watching him, with a quiet, assessing look that almost seemed to strip him bare. Gi-hun knew what this was—not for Jun-ho, not really, but for him.

And when Gi-hun gave the faintest nod, almost imperceptible, something tight eased in In-ho’s chest.

A few days later, the research lay sprawled across the table—open laptops, stacks of papers, names scribbled in Jun-ho’s restless hand. Billionaires in energy, shipping, real estate. Men who owned islands, art collections, politicians. Shadows they had to drag into light.

But in the middle of it, life threaded through. They were taking a quick break. Gi-hun sat on the rug, playing with Hae-in, and Jun-ho busied himself with making coffee, while Min-hyeok sat at the table, hunched over a book of crossword puzzles.

“You’re showing off,” Jun-ho muttered as Min-hyeok solved the puzzle too quickly.

Before In-ho could stop himself, he said, “Some things don’t change. You’ve always liked the smart ones, haven’t you, Jun-ho?”

The silence stretched, then broke with Jun-ho’s laugh. Min-hyeok grinned. Even Gi-hun smiled faintly, shaking his head.

The joke lingered after, unexpected and strangely freeing. And when he glanced up, Gi-hun’s eyes were on him again—soft, unreadable, and as perceptive as ever.

***

The ground still held the bite of frost in its shadowed corners, but the air smelled different now—damp soil, thawing grass, and the faintest trace of something green struggling to wake. Gi-hun shifted Hae-in in his arms as he walked the narrow path that wound between the skeletal trees, the weak sunlight glinting off her dark eyes.

She blinked up at him, wide-mouthed and content, her small fists batting occasionally at the fabric of his jacket. At four and a half months she was sturdier now, heavier in his arms, her personality beginning to push through the soft, sleepy haze of infancy. She rewarded his nonsense sounds with shrieks of delight, and every time she laughed, it cracked something open inside him that he hadn’t realized was still locked tight.

“See that?” he murmured, tilting his chin toward the budding tips of the hedge. “Means it’s nearly spring. You’ve never seen spring before, huh? Just wait. The world gets so much brighter. Louder too. Wait till you hear the birds singing. There’s no sound like it.”

Her lips parted in another gummy smile, and Gi-hun felt the corners of his own mouth tug upward despite the heavy drag of his thoughts.

Because beneath that small moment of lightness was the truth he couldn’t escape: weeks had gone by, and still no answers.The four of them had scoured leads, and though pieces surfaced here and there, nothing had snapped into focus. Gi-hun could see the anger in In-ho, his frustration barely held in check.

But at least his attitude towards Jun-ho and Min-hyeok seemed to have softened somewhat following their talk. Neither of them were particularly open about flaunting what they had, but Gi-hun could see it was still new and exciting for them. And when their hands brushed together, and the muscle in In-ho’s jaw flexed, it didn’t appear to be out of anger or disdain, but something else, an emotion Gi-hun couldn’t quite place.

He shook the thought away and continued to walk the garden.

He shifted Hae-in higher against his shoulder, and looked over the patchy grass with a wistful eye. “You know,” he said softly, his voice pitched low as though she might actually understand, “I always wanted a garden of my own. Not a big one—just enough space to dig around in the dirt, plant a few things. Never lived anywhere that had land though. Only concrete and walls.”

He paused, rubbing her back absently, letting the wind carry the faint scent of thawing soil to him. “We could grow carrots out here. Sweet potatoes. Maybe peppers if the weather’s kind. Imagine, you running around, pulling up radishes and holding them up like treasure. We could keep chickens, too. Fresh eggs every morning.”

The image—bright, impossibly ordinary—made his chest ache in that quiet, raw way that came from wanting something so simple it felt out of reach. He glanced down at her, her eyes wide and curious, her breath puffing in soft little sighs against his collarbone.

It was easy to talk when she couldn’t answer. Easier still when she didn’t know the weight behind his words.

Because what pressed on him harder than the dream of chickens and radishes was the truth of his nights. How, without a single conversation, In-ho had moved into his room. One night turned to two, then to weeks, until it was simply fact. They shared a bed now. Nothing more, nothing less.

Gi-hun couldn’t make sense of it. That first night still replayed in his mind—the tense silence after discovering Jun-ho and Min-hyeok, the way In-ho had admitted his discomfort, his upbringing, how two men together wasn’t something he knew how to reconcile. And yet, only hours later, he’d crept into Gi-hun’s room, slid beneath his covers like it was the most natural thing in the world.

The contradiction gnawed at Gi-hun. Why had it bothered In-ho to see Jun-ho’s hand brush against Min-hyeok’s, but not to lie beside him night after night? Maybe because there was nothing there. Nothing to be read into it, nothing to fear. Just… practicality. He supposed that must be it. A man sharing a bed with another to keep the nightmares at bay was a far cry from love.

Gi-hun tried to tell himself that was all it was. That was why In-ho didn’t flinch, didn’t tense the way he had watching his brother. Practicality. Not intimacy. Not anything that meant something more.

He had expected discomfort to gnaw at him—expected whispers of awkwardness or shame to creep in—but it hadn’t. If anything, it was the opposite. The edge of his nightmares had dulled. He still woke sweating sometimes, breath caught in his chest, but the moment he felt the steady weight of In-ho beside him, the panic receded.

It unsettled him, in ways he couldn’t pin down. Because In-ho hadn’t said why, hadn’t asked permission, hadn’t explained. And Gi-hun… hadn’t asked. He let it happen. Welcomed it, even.

He glanced down again at his daughter, shifting her carefully so she nestled closer. “He helps, you know,” he murmured, his lips brushing the soft baby hair at her crown. “When he’s there, I don’t fall apart so much. Guess that means something. Don’t know what yet, but it does.”

Jun-ho poked his head out of the back door. “You want a coffee?” he asked

He nodded, and Hae-in gave an approving little coo. “Not for you, babo,” he said with a grin.

Inside he was greeted by the rich and bitter scent of coffee. In-ho placed a mug down in front of him, and Gi-hun smiled to himself. A soy cappuccino with chocolate grated over the top. He had never bothered with anything so fancy when he lived alone. A spoonful of instant in a mug with boiling water and sugar was enough, but he had gotten used to the additional comfort.

“Here,” In-ho said, reaching for Hae-in. “We’re taking a break. You should too.”

Gi-hun hesitated for only a moment before letting her go. Hae-in wriggled in In-ho’s arms, making a soft squeak before settling against his chest. In-ho reached for a prepped bottle, then tipped it to her lips, watching her latch on with a concentration that seemed almost too sharp for such a simple task. His features softened, though—not enough for anyone else to notice, maybe, but Gi-hun had learned the small shifts. The way his shoulders lowered a fraction, the faint looseness around his eyes.

Gi-hun wrapped his hands around the warm mug before taking a careful sip. For the first time in what felt like forever, he could just… sit. No questions, no decisions hanging like knives over his head. Just coffee, the sound of Hae-in’s steady sucking, and the quiet hum of a household in motion.

His gaze wandered toward the sofa. Jun-ho was stretched out along the cushions, socked feet crossed over the armrest, scrolling his phone with the lazy focus of someone who had finally learned to steal small pockets of peace. On the rug below him, Min-hyeok leaned against the couch with a sudoku book balanced on his knee, pen tapping absently against the edge as if daring the numbers to give up their secrets.

Something in the picture made Gi-hun’s lips twitch into a smile. Ordinary. It was so disarmingly ordinary. For a heartbeat he could almost forget the shadows trailing them, the faceless men who wanted Jun-ho and In-ho silenced, the weight of a fight they still didn’t know how to win. Looking at the four of them like this—child, siblings, friends, lovers—it felt like he had stepped sideways into someone else’s life. A life that was safe.

He let the warmth of it sink into him, even as part of him whispered that it was fragile, fleeting, maybe even doomed. But right now, it was real.

He took another sip of coffee, savouring the sweetness of the grated chocolate melting at the edge of the foam. Across from him, In-ho adjusted Hae-in’s hold, murmuring something low and soothing when she fussed for a moment before latching on again. Gi-hun’s eyes lingered there longer than he meant them to.

For so long, Gi-hun had believed In-ho was made of stone. A man who lived behind glass walls, every word and gesture measured, every breath locked tight against feeling. He had seen him ruthless, cold, and unreachable, and had hated him for it. Gentleness had never seemed part of his nature.

And yet here he was, cradling Hae-in like something fragile, feeding her with a patience Gi-hun wouldn’t have thought him capable of. His broad hands, the same ones that had killed,that had done unspeakable things, now moved with delicate precision. The sight stirred something unexpected in Gi-hun’s chest, something soft and startling. His mouth twitched upward before he could stop it—a small, quiet smile that belonged to no one but this moment.

He sank into his chair, letting the warmth of his coffee ground him, but it was the warmth of something else—something blooming low in his chest—that made him hold In-ho’s gaze when it lifted to his. Just for a second, their eyes met. No words. No masks. The faintest of smiles passed between them, so subtle it might have gone unnoticed by anyone else. But for Gi-hun, it landed like a spark in dry kindling. Heat spread slowly outward, fragile but real, chasing away the chill that had been rooted inside him for years.

And as much as it comforted him, it terrified him almost more.

Before he could even begin to make sense of it, Jun-ho’s voice shattered the stillness. “Holy shit,” he blurted, sharp enough to snap everyone’s attention toward him.

Gi-hun jerked his head around. Jun-ho had swung his legs off the couch, sitting forward now, phone clutched tight, his expression caught between disbelief and triumph.

“What is it?” Min-hyeok asked quickly, dropping his pen and leaning closer.

Jun-ho swallowed hard, his eyes never leaving the screen. “I… I found him.”

“You… what?” Minn-hyeok asked, while In-ho said, “How?”

Jun-ho turned the phone so they could see, his hand trembling just slightly. “I was scrolling my newsfeed and someone posted about the Epstein files, and then… Look. That’s him.”

Jun-ho held up his phone.

Gi-hun leaned in, heart pounding against his ribs. His brow furrowed as he looked at the photo of the American President stood beside a smug looking man with silver hair.

Gi-hun pointed to the photo of the President. “Him? Really?” he asked.

“No,” Jun-ho said, impatiently and a little exasperated. “Behind him. I’d recognise that face anywhere.”

Gi-hun looked again, and this time he saw him. An older man, heavy set, with wide, bulging eyes, grinned behind the two other men, a young lady, at least half his age, on his arm.

In-ho came closer, Hae-in still nestled in the crook of his arm. He peered down at the image on Jun-ho’s phone. “You’re sure that’s him?” he asked.

“I’d bet my life,” Jun-ho said without hesitation, his eyes burning. “I’d never forget that face. He was there. He was one of them.”

Min-hyeok cursed under his breath. “If he’s tied to Epstein’s circle, that means—”

“It means power,” In-ho cut in, his expression hardening, though Gi-hun could see the flicker of unease in his eyes. “It means money, connections, protection. And if he’s the one looking…” His voice trailed, the rest unspoken but heavy in the room.

Gi-hun forced himself to breathe, his gaze snagged on the photo again. The world outside the frame—the garden, the coffee, the warmth of Hae-in’s body in his arms—felt miles away. The ordinary life he’d dared to imagine just minutes ago cracked like glass under the weight of that single face on the screen.

“Looks like we know who our King is,” he said finally, his voice rough. “And we know who we’re up against.”

But even as he said it, his insides knotted. Because looking at that smug smile in the photograph, Gi-hun couldn’t help but think—what chance did people like them really have against men like him?

Notes:

The plot thickens even further! I wasn't sure whether or not to go down this route, but eh... in for a penny, right?

Firstly, I'm really sorry for such a short chapter. Hopefully they'll be a bit longer from here on in.

And In-ho's religious guilt will take a while to get past, but one step at a time. Re: his religion... I may have made a booboo here. I genuinely thought In-ho being christian was canon! But I can't find where I saw that, and I'm beginning to think I may have dreamed it up. I definitely included it in another fic too, because I was certain I'd read it somewhere. Ooops. Sorry folks! Ah well. It's another obstacle to overcome in this slow burn, because why not 😅

One quick thing - I was SO unsure if crosswords would exist in Korea, but they do appear to. I'm not sure how they work, if they use hangul or the romanized versions, but I did find a Korean website dedicated to them.

Thank you all so much for reading, for your comments, and for your kudos. They mean the world to me <3

Chapter 16: For a Little While

Having a face—an actual face—on a photograph that anyone in the world could stumble across had made the hunt almost insultingly simple. A few hours of digging and they had a name: Leonard De Vriess. Old European money, a dynasty polished and lacquered across generations. In the eighties, he had turned that inherited fortune into an empire of his own, slick and sprawling, the kind of wealth that insulated a man from consequence.

And consequence had certainly stalked him. The records were there, hidden between headlines and court whispers: allegations of assaults, lawsuits smothered before they could breathe, women silenced by payoffs or the simple brute force of power. Every article carried the same undercurrent—De Vriess was untouchable.

In-ho was used to being around the untouchable, carrying out their whims while wearing a mask. But seeing De Vriess’ face in a casual snapshot beside Epstein, so ordinary in the background, was different. It made him human. Fallible. Killable.

The effect on Jun-ho was immediate. In-ho noticed the change in his brother almost at once: the way his shoulders straightened as he read, the restless energy in his hands, the faint brightness in his eyes that had been dulling bit by bit at every dead end. He devoured everything—business dealings, offshore accounts, old gossip columns. He stayed up late, fingers tapping across the keyboard, building a portrait of the man hunting them.

In-ho watched quietly, pride and dread tangling in his chest. He wanted Jun-ho to feel that fire again, but he also knew the truth: knowing wasn’t enough. Names, histories, court cases—all of it built a portrait of information, but none of it brought them closer to sliding a knife between De Vriess’ ribs. None of it would put an end to him. Knowledge without proximity was just another kind of torment. Another dead end.

The frustration seeped into the hanok like damp. He felt it most keenly in Gi-hun. At first it was subtle—the longer pauses at the window, the way his eyes lingered on the road winding away from the house. But soon it became undeniable. Four months trapped in the hanok: food and supplies arriving by courier, no footsteps beyond the garden gate. Yes, they had the land around them, the garden that Spring was slowly coaxing into life, the hills rolling away in every direction—but it wasn’t freedom. It was gilded confinement, a larger cage.

Gi-hun bore it quietly, but In-ho saw it in him all the same: the twitch of restlessness in his hands, the faint slackness in his smile. He carried it in his walk, a yearning for something ordinary—for the shuffle of strangers in a marketplace, the rattle of a train, the smell of food cooking on a street corner.

That night, long after the others had drifted off, In-ho sat at the low table with the glow of his laptop painting his face in cold light. De Vriess’ smirk from that grainy photograph stared back at him from the corner of the screen, and In-ho closed the file with a heavy sigh. He was just about to call it a night and go to bed, when he was struck by a sudden urge, and he began looking up small market towns nearby.

Images filled the page. Farmers’ stalls with their neat pyramids of apples and persimmons. Elderly women squatting behind baskets of herbs. It was nothing remarkable—ordinary, forgettable even. But maybe that was the point.

His chest ached at the thought of Gi-hun’s face if he saw this: the way his eyes might soften, how his shoulders might lose some of the tension wound into them. He pictured Hae-in strapped to her father’s chest, wide-eyed at the colour and noise. He tried to picture himself walking beside them, carrying bags of fruit or vegetables, maybe even catching Gi-hun’s smile across a crowd.

The images pressed against something he’d been trying not to touch, something far too close to wanting. He clenched his fists once, hard, then let the air out through his nose.

When Gi-hun padded into the kitchen the next morning, rubbing sleep from his eyes, In-ho already had coffee waiting. He set the mug down in front of him with a rehearsed confidence that masked his nerves.

“There’s a village market I thought you might like,” he said, almost abruptly. “In Seo-myeon. It’s not far. We should go.”

Gi-hun blinked at him over the rim of his coffee. “Go?”

“Just you and me,” In-ho clarified quickly. “And Hae-in, of course. Jun-ho and Min-hyeok can stay here. I thought…” He trailed off, not used to offering explanations, not used to laying his reasoning bare. “…You might like it. To get out. To see something beyond the garden.”

For a moment, silence hung between them. Then Gi-hun’s expression shifted—confusion, surprise, and finally something softer. Something warm.

“You’re serious?”

“Yes.” The word came out steadier than he felt. “You’ve been restless. You need air. And the others… they can use the time. Alone.” He forced himself not to think about what that would mean for them.

A smile tugged at Gi-hun’s mouth, crooked and almost boyish. “I didn’t think you noticed.”

“I notice,” In-ho said simply. More than he should. More than was safe.

Gi-hun ducked his head, but not before In-ho caught the faint blush rising in his cheeks.

The drive was quiet, but not uncomfortably so. Hae-in gurgled in her car seat, gummily chewing on a soft rubber giraffe, as the road wound through fields beginning to green. Early spring sun filtered across the dashboard, pale and tentative, and In-ho found himself easing into it, loosening his grip on the wheel as if the light itself coaxed him toward something softer.

Gi-hun sat in the passenger seat, leaning one elbow against the window, the other hand curled absently in his lap. His gaze drifted across the blur of fields and stone walls. “It’s been years since I went to a market,” he murmured, almost to himself. “Not since… before…” His voice thinned into silence, lost somewhere between memory and ache. His brow furrowed as if the thought itself weighed too heavily to carry aloud.

In-ho’s hands tightened on the wheel. The responsible thing, the disciplined thing, would be to apologize once again, to acknowledge his role in stripping Gi-hun of his light and joy. But when he opened his mouth, what came out instead was simply, “Then we’ll make the most of today.”

They parked on the edge of the village, gravel crunching beneath the tires. Gi-hun strapped on the carrier, settling Hae-in against his chest. She gurgled once, then fell quiet, her dark eyes darting in every direction.

The short walk to the square was filled with sound before they even arrived: the low murmur of voices blending into laughter, a street performer plucking at the strings of a gayageum, the rattle of coins in a tin. The air thickened with the scents of frying oil and charred chestnuts, tangy fermented kimchi and roasted peppers.

The square spread out like a tapestry of colour and chaos. Pyramids of tangerines gleamed bright against the dull wood of stalls. Bundles of herbs hung from beams in neat green ropes, their smell sharp and clean above the crowd’s heat. Ribbons crisscrossed from awning to awning, shifting in the spring breeze.

“Look at all this, jagi,” Gi-hun whispered, leaning down towards Hae-in, who blinked wide-eyed at the kaleidoscope of people and stalls. “All the treasure in the world, right here.”

In-ho stayed close, careful to angle his body so no one jostled too near the baby. The voice in his head that scolded him—that whispered of recklessness, of wasted hours when they should have been hunting—was shoved down, smothered beneath the simple sight of Gi-hun’s hand resting over his daughter’s back.

It would only be today. One day. That couldn’t undo everything.

He glanced over to Gi-hun, who held up a square of embroidered jogakbo, tilting it toward Hae-in as if she were capable of discussing its intricacies, his voice exaggerated with playful seriousness. She squealed, and he grinned. Later, when an old woman leaned over her stall and offered a sliver of persimmon to the baby, Gi-hun popped it into his own mouth instead, eyes crinkling in amusement when Hae-in shrieked as if she understood the trick. The laugh that followed spilled from him open and unguarded.

It was disarming. Dangerous, even.

“Here,” Gi-hun said as he pressed a steaming paper cup into his hand. Hot chestnuts, the shells splitting from the heat. Their fingers brushed in the exchange—only a fraction of a second, but enough for In-ho’s breath to falter.

“Don’t just stand there looking like a bodyguard,” Gi-hun teased. “Eat something.”

In-ho glanced down at the cup, then back at Gi-hun, trying for flatness. “I kind of am a bodyguard.”

The corner of Gi-hun’s mouth lifted. “Not today. Today you’re just a guy at the market with his… with his family.”

The word struck like a stone dropped in still water, rippling outward in ways In-ho couldn’t control. Family.

His throat tightened. He ducked his head, peeling a chestnut with deliberate precision, as if the task required all his attention. He shouldn’t let the word take root. Shouldn’t let it fill his chest with warmth, shouldn’t let it tempt him toward something he had no right to.

But the sweetness lingered anyway, as stubborn and dangerous as Gi-hun’s smile.

They drifted from stall to stall with no urgency, as though time itself had softened around them. At one stand, Gi-hun leaned in toward an old woman selling vegetables, his voice dropping into an easy lilt. He grinned, cracked a joke, let her laugh at him before countering her price with mock offense, and within minutes, the vendor was shaking her head, grinning despite herself, and tucking two extra spring onions into his bag with a fond swat at his arm.

Watching him, In-ho felt the corner of his own mouth twitch upward before he realized it. The word cheapskate flickered unbidden across his memory, echoing in Jung-bae’s teasing voice. He could almost hear the laughter that had followed, Gi-hun huffing softly at his friend’s joke as if embarrassed but not truly protesting.

In-ho almost said it aloud—the cheapskate of Ssangmun-dong—the words burning on the back of his tongue. But his chest went cold before he could open his mouth. He couldn’t remind Gi-hun of Jung-bae. He swallowed hard, burying the memory. Instead he focused once again on the chestnuts in his fingers, breaking the shells apart with unnecessary care.

By lunchtime, the air had warmed, and they found a small table outside a café at the edge of the square. The table wobbled on uneven stones, the chairs were rickety, and the food—simple bowls of hot tteokguk—steamed between them.

Gi-hun lowered Hae-in onto his lap, and began feeding her a pre-prepared bottle. With her tucked into the crook of his arm, he admired a pair of bright yellow silk shoes he’d insisted on buying—at a reduced price—for Hae-in, despite them being far too large. “She’ll grow into them,” he had said stubbornly when In-ho raised an eyebrow and pointed out the obvious. He tucked them carefully into their bag of produce as though they were treasure, then turned to his food and spooned broth into his mouth. “Feels almost normal,” he murmured.

The words landed heavier than they should have. Normal. That was what In-ho had destroyed for him, for all of them.

He wrapped his fingers around the cup of barley tea in front of him, letting the heat seep into his palms. “That’s the point of today,” he said, though he couldn’t admit what else he had wanted from this—the selfish part of it. That while he wanted Gi-hun to feel normal again, personally he had wanted to now what it would feel like to be normal with him. To know what it would feel like to sit across from Gi-hun in a market square, to watch him laugh at something small, to be folded into something that looked like a family.

Later, they wandered into the narrower lanes that spun out from the square, where the noise of haggling softened into a steadier murmur. The stalls here felt more specialist—hand-carved flutes lined up on velvet cloth, jars of locally produced honey catching the light in thick golden pools, calligraphy scrolls hanging from wooden beams like banners whispering in the breeze.

Gi-hun slowed near one such stall, where an old man dipped a brush into ink with deliberate care and watched as he swept it across the parchment—each stroke fluid, sure, brimming with an ease that came only from decades of practice.

“He makes it look so easy,” Gi-hun murmured, almost to himself.

In-ho watched the profile of his face in the afternoon light, the way his expression softened in simple wonder at a sheet of paper and ink. For Gi-hun, it seemed everything could be like that—effortless, unselfconscious, as if joy was something you only had to reach for and it was already in your hands. He made being present look easy. He made caring look easy. Even after all the ruin, all the scars carved deep into him, Gi-hun could stand in front of a stranger with nothing more than a brushstroke to admire and still mean it.

In-ho’s chest ached with the sharp awareness of how foreign that felt to him, and how dangerously easy it was becoming just to exist beside Gi-hun, to let himself be folded into that warmth without thinking. The more he tried to keep his distance, the more natural it felt to stand close. He nodded once, forcing his gaze back to the paper, though the words pressed at his throat—something reckless, something future-shaped—but he bit down hard and let the silence hold.

He shifted his eyes instead to the neighbouring stall, where painted ceramics glowed like tiny suns. The colours were almost painfully bright, a distraction sharp enough to steady him.

They moved on slowly, letting the crowd carry them along. The laughter of children darting past, the murmur of vendors calling out prices, the hiss of oil hitting hot iron pans—it all folded around them, strangely gentle. In-ho walked close enough to catch the faint brush of Gi-hun’s sleeve when the street narrowed, each touch sparking something he tried desperately to ignore.

At the edge of the market, the world seemed to exhale. The crowd thinned, the noise of barter and laughter fading into the distance, and in its place was only the low rustle of branches overhead. Above them, a plum tree stretched skyward, its limbs heavy with blossom, pale petals loosening with every breath of wind. They fluttered down in lazy spirals, catching in Gi-hun’s hair and on the curve of his shoulder, where they clung like fleeting ornaments.

Gi-hun tipped his head back slightly, his face lifted to the drifting fall. For a moment, In-ho thought he looked… lighter. Not like the man broken by the games, or the man restlessly fighting terror during his sleepless nights, but something nearer to peace. A version of him the world had almost stolen but hadn’t quite managed to erase.

In-ho’s hand twitched at his side. The impulse rose sharp and sudden—to brush a petal from Gi-hun’s hair, to let his fingers graze the soft curve of his temple, to do something utterly foolish. He locked his hand into a fist instead, nails biting into his palm until the ache dulled the urge. He could almost hear the voice of his childhood priest: temptation begins with the smallest touch.

Gi-hun glanced at him then, eyes dark and unguarded, and smiled—a small, wry thing, but it stole the breath clean from his chest.

“They’re beautiful, aren’t they?” Gi-hun said softly, nodding up at the blossoms.

“Yes,” In-ho replied, his voice low, steady only through will. He didn’t look at the tree when he said it.

The wind shifted again, carrying the faint sweetness of plum blossoms between them. A petal landed on Gi-hun’s cheek. This time, In-ho forced his gaze away, pretending to study the distant rooftops, because if he watched even a second longer, he feared he might give himself away entirely.

“Thank you,” Gi-hun said suddenly, his voice almost as quiet as the wind.

“For what?”

“For today. For… making it feel like life again.”

The words hung in the air, as sweet and dangerous as the drifting blossoms. In-ho wanted to tell him he felt it too, that this fragile ordinariness was more intoxicating than any victory he’d ever clawed for. But he bit it back, because wanting it was already too much. In the end, all he managed was a small nod, because the truth pressed too close to the surface: that he had wanted this as much as Gi-hun had. Maybe more.

When Gi-hun shifted Hae-in higher against his chest, smiling down at her in her sleep, something in In-ho cracked silently open. The guilt still burned—guilt that he was here instead of hunting De Vriess, guilt that he wanted what wasn’t his to want—but beneath it, softer and more treacherous, was the warmth of belonging.

The drive back was hushed. Hae-in slept in her car seat behind them, while Gi-hun sat in the passenger seat, watching the blur of countryside slipping past. The fading light caught in his hair, illuminating strands that had grown just long enough to begin curling slightly at the ends.

In-ho’s eyes lingered a moment too long before he forced them back to the road. The change was subtle, but unmistakable. The faint softness in Gi-hun’s cheeks, the way his frame—still lean, still scarred—no longer seemed hollowed out. He was regaining a little of what had been lost.

He’s mending, In-ho thought. Against all odds, he’s mending.

And it stirred something in him—that he wanted to be part of what made him mend.

Back at the hanok, after a sleepy change and another feed, Gi-hun shifted Hae-in gently from his chest to her crib, lingering with his hand on her belly until her breathing evened into deeper sleep. The sight of him bent over her, his expression soft and unguarded, was almost too much for In-ho to watch. It felt like trespassing on a moment too intimate, too pure.

So he busied himself with the bags instead—stacking the vegetables neatly on the counter, setting the little yellow silk shoes aside as though they were fragile.

“Leave it,” Gi-hun murmured behind him. His voice was low, frayed with fatigue. “We’ll sort it later.”

In-ho straightened, turning just enough to see him leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed loosely, eyelids heavy. That stubborn half-smile curved his mouth.

“You’re tired,” In-ho said. It came out more gently than he intended.

Gi-hun shrugged. “Good tired.” He pushed off the frame, brushing past In-ho to pluck a rice cake from one of the bags. “Better than restless.”

For a moment their shoulders brushed, a fleeting contact in the small kitchen. Gi-hun didn’t flinch, didn’t pull away. He just leaned casually against the counter, chewing his rice cake, looking—if not at peace—then something closer to it than In-ho had ever seen.

It was such a small thing, yet it rooted itself in In-ho like a seed.

Later, when Gi-hun finally drifted to his room, leaving the quiet house behind, In-ho lingered in the kitchen. He made himself a cup of tea, stared at the silk shoes again, and let the guilt wash back over him.

Now the hanok slept, every corner steeped in stillness. And In-ho was left alone in the living room with only the faint hiss of the woodstove and the whisper of wind sliding along the beams of the house for company.

He sat at the low table with his tea, elbows braced against the wood, fingers steepled in front of his mouth.

The day played in loops behind his eyes. Gi-hun at the chestnut stall, pressing the warm paper cup into his hand. Gi-hun’s hair catching petals like a crown beneath the plum tree. Gi-hun laughing with a vendor as though the years had not hollowed him out. For a handful of hours, In-ho had been someone else. Not the man who had worn a mask, not the man who ordered others to die, not the man carrying a ledger of sins he couldn’t even begin to balance.

Today, he had been—what? A companion? A friend? Perhaps even something nearer to a father. The thought made his chest tighten, sweet and cruel all at once. He had moved through the market as though it were his natural place, carrying bags, peeling fruit, watching Gi-hun cradle the baby with unguarded tenderness. Pretending, if only for an afternoon, that the weight of the world and its dangers had loosened its grip on them.

Pretending.

He rolled the word over in his mind. There was freedom in the lie, but also danger. It was too easy to want that life, too easy to let it settle into his bones like a possibility instead of the impossibility it truly was. Still, the thought lingered. If he could pretend for one day, why not another? Why not more?

He drew in a sharp breath and pushed the thought away, staring down at his untouched tea. His reflection wavered in the surface, distorted, hollow-eyed. The truth was that pretending could only carry them so far. And when he stripped away the illusion, reality was waiting. Leonard De Vriess. Money and power stretching across continents. A predator shielded by wealth and silence.

They had his name now, his history, his photograph. But none of it meant they could touch him. For weeks they had clawed at scraps of information, piecing together timelines and associates, hoping for a weakness, but every path led to another locked door. Another dead end. The frustration gnawed at In-ho. He could see it eating at Jun-ho too, though his brother masked it in determination, redoubling his research every morning like penance

The tea had gone stone-cold by the time the thought rose to him, clear and sharp as if it had been waiting all along. Pretending. Masks. Playing a part until the part became real enough to fool everyone watching.

Jun-ho had done it once. Slipped into the belly of the games by wearing another man’s skin, standing among the guards and becoming one of them until he found his way through. A dangerous gamble—but it had worked.

In-ho closed his eyes, and he thought of how his brother had fooled even him, invisible in plain sight, surviving by the grace of deception. If Jun-ho could do it once, he could do it again. They could all do it.

That was the way forward. Not chasing De Vriess through the labyrinth of his wealth, not trying to break into circles too fortified to touch. The man’s hunger would betray him. He would attend another game, somewhere in the world. He would go where his vices led him, where the spectacle promised him fresh blood to feed his appetites. And there, behind a mask, behind the armor of pretense, they could slip close enough to strike.

The idea solidified in him like stone. He could already hear the echo of Jun-ho’s voice, telling him it was reckless, dangerous, nearly impossible. But it was something. A crack of light in the wall that had hemmed them in.

And hadn’t today proved it? Pretending could be survival. Pretending could give a man the space to breathe, to move, to draw near to something otherwise untouchable.

He exhaled slowly, pressing his hands flat to the table. Yes. This was the way. They already had training, they just needed coordination. But it was a path, finally, where before there had been none.

His gaze drifted toward the closed door where Gi-hun slept. For a moment, his resolve wavered. What would it mean, leaving him behind? What would it mean, stepping back into the theatre of slaughter while Gi-hun and the baby waited here in fragile safety?

The questions pressed hard, but he forced himself to stillness. There would be time for those doubts later. Tonight, there was only this: the memory of a day spent pretending to be someone better, someone freer—and the knowledge that sometimes, the mask was the only way to get close enough to change anything at all.

Notes:

This chapter just poured out of me, I hope it made you as happy reading it as it did me writing it :)

Progress, not just for Inhun (I can't promise smooth sailing still though 😉) and progress against the VIP too! Writing this chapter also helped me fully plan where this is going, and I'm really excited, so there may be several quite quick chapters coming up, if I can get these ideas down before they escape 😉

Anyway, as always, thanks for reading, I'd love to hear your thoughts, and feel free to come talk to me about anything inhun related on tumblr too :)

Chapter 17: Fragile Peace

The sound of Hae-in crying cut through the dark like a knife. Thin, reedy at first, then swelling with urgency until it filled the little room.

Gi-hun blinked awake, his body sluggish with the kind of heaviness that came after too little sleep strung over far too many nights. For a moment he didn’t know where he was, and was only aware of the crying, the dim outline of the ceiling above, and the faintest glow of dawn pressing at the edges of the windows. Then the weight of the blanket reminded him. The hanok. Safety, for now.

He moved to push himself up, hoping he was swift enough to help Hae-in before the noise woke the man beside him. Too late; In-ho stirred, a faint groan escaping him, and turned his head toward him. His eyes cracked open, barely more than slits in the dark.

“Need help?” The words were mumbled, rough with sleep.

Gi-hun shook his head, already swinging his legs out of bed. “No. I’ve got her.” His voice was quiet, but firm enough to leave no room for argument.

A soft hum was the only reply. In-ho turned over, sinking back into the blankets. For the briefest moment, Gi-hun let himself look at him, at the curve of his shoulder under the thin shirt, the strands of hair mussed from sleep, the slight crease of his brow that suggested—even now—that rest never came easily. Something confusing stirred in him, a strange fondness he couldn’t quite explain. He turned away quickly before it could grow roots.

Hae-in’s cries sharpened, and Gi-hun padded over to her, picking her up out of her cot, and walking out into the hall.

The kitchen was cool against his bare feet. He moved on autopilot: flicking the switch for the formula prep he knew In-ho had set up, and flicking on the kettle for his coffee. A couple of minutes later, and her cries queitened as the bottle touched her lips.

“There, jagi,” he whispered, lowering himself into one of the wooden chairs. She latched on greedily, tiny fists pressing against the fabric of his shirt. “I’ve got you.”

The kitchen was still except for the rhythmic suck of her feeding, the occasional wet gulp. Gi-hun let his head fall forward, closing his eyes for a moment, breathing with her. It was strange—how something so exhausting could also anchor him so firmly. She was small, helpless, but she was also real. A reason to move, to fight, to stay alive.

When she finished, he burped her against his shoulder, rocking gently and kissing the crown of her soft hair, half-singing hazily remembered nursery rhymes to her between kisses.

He cleaned and changed her then checked the clock as they sat down together on the couch. 5:15 a.m. The digits glowed faintly red in the dim room. Too early to start the day, too late to crawl back into bed.

He rubbed a hand over his face, trying to scrub away the fog of exhaustion. “Guess we’re up for the day, jagi,” he said. The TV screen flickered to life and he picked out a cartoon—something bright and ridiculous, colours bleeding together in a way that didn’t demand thought. He turned the volume down low, just enough for her to catch the sound, then picked her up against his chest and laid back on the couch.

Hae-in rested her head against his heartbeat, her breathing calm and even now, and Gi-hun tucked a light blanket around them both, ensuring she wouldn’t accidentally roll off him. He sighed deeply, and tried to let the cartoons wash over him. But his mind refused to quiet.

The market came back to him in fragments, vivid and insistent. The smell of chestnuts roasting, fragrant smoke curling through the cool air. The gleam of sunlight on glazed pots, too bright to look at for long. The voices from the vendors, warm and resolute as they tried to sell their wares. Tthe way petals from the plum tree had fallen around them, soft and silent as snow..

He restlessly rubbed the sleep from his eyes. It wasn’t just the market, not really. It was the feeling of the day, the weightless illusion of it. For a few hours, he hadn’t felt like a man hiding from faceless enemies. He hadn’t been a failure of a father, a washed-up gambler, a survivor who didn’t deserve to survive. For a few hours, he had been something else: a father at a market, with his daughter, with… with someone who could almost have been—

He stopped himself there, his jaw tightening.

But still, the thought had been there all night, even when he tried to close his eyes. The way In-ho had hovered just close enough to shield them from the crowd. The way his voice kept softening.

The way the word ‘family’ had slipped from his own lips so easily.

Hae-in shifted slightly, raising her head off Gi-hun’s chest for a moment to giggle at the tv, before flopping back down again. Gi-hun reached down and let his fingertip brush her knuckles, small and impossibly fragile.

Before he could stop it, his eyes burned, and he turned back to the TV. A cartoon dog was chasing its tail in an endless loop, bright and stupid and strangely comforting. He tried to let it fill his vision, tried to push out the warmth of yesterday, the memory of In-ho’s hand brushing his as he passed him chestnuts. Tried to push out the thought of what it would mean if those kinds of moments became something more.

But the harder he tried not to think of it, the sharper it pressed.

The minutes blurred together, marked only by the shifting light of the cartoons and the sky outside shifting from deep blue to pale grey. Gi-hun had drifted into that strange half-state between sleep and waking, head tipped back against the couch, when he heard the sound of a door sliding open down the hall. Then soft footsteps, hesitant at first, and the faint creak of the floorboards under a familiar weight.

He straightened, blinking himself awake, and found In-ho in the doorway. His hair was rumpled, sticking at odd angles, and his shirt hung loose against his frame. Barefoot, eyes still heavy-lidded, he looked more human than Gi-hun was used to seeing him — stripped of that composed, guarded air he always carried.

“You didn’t come back,” In-ho said quietly, voice rough with sleep.

Gi-hun shook his head. “She was up early. I didn’t think she’d go back down, so…” He gestured vaguely at the bright colours on the TV.

In-ho’s gaze flicked to Hae-in, still nestled against his chest, her eyes wide and curious. Something softened in his face — a flicker Gi-hun almost missed. He stepped forward, and said, “Shift your feet,” before lowering himself carefully onto the other end of the couch.

For a while, neither of them spoke. The glow of the screen painted their faces in shifting colours, pink to blue to yellow.

“She looks comfortable,” In-ho murmured after a moment, almost as if he didn’t want to break the quiet. “Nicely settled.”

Gi-hun nodded. “For now. Don’t get used to it.” He tried for a smile, but it came out crooked, worn at the edges.

In-ho’s lips twitched—not quite a smile, but close enough to one. He leaned back against the cushion, fingers tapping an unsteady beat on his knee. Gi-hun noticed, not for the first time, how much tension he always carried in his hands, as if he could never quite let go.

The minutes stretched. Gi-hun found himself listening—not to the TV, but to the rhythm of another’s breathing beside him. The warmth of another body in the quiet hours when the world was still asleep. It had been a long time since he’d sat so peacefully like this with anyone.

“You didn’t have to get up,” Gi-hun said finally, glancing sideways.

“Yeah, I did.” In-ho’s eyes were on the screen, but his voice was steady. “Couldn’t get back to sleep.”

Gi-hun huffed softly. “Guess we’re both cursed, then.”

That drew something like a laugh—low, brief, but real. Gi-hun’s chest tightened unexpectedly at the sound.

Gi-hun shifted slightly, stretching out his legs a little, careful not to jostle the Hae-in or kick In-ho. When he glanced up, he caught In-ho watching Hae-in, his expression intent.

“You look like your brain’s running a marathon,” Gi-hun said softly.

In-ho blinked, as if pulled from far away. “Do I?” His voice was neutral, but there was a crack beneath the surface.

Gi-hun angled his head, studying him. “What’s wrong?”

For a moment, it seemed like In-ho might answer—his lips parted, his brow tightened—but then he shook his head once, sharp. “I’ll tell you. Just… when Jun-ho and Min-hyeok are awake too. I’d rather not have to repeat myself.”

That didn’t sit right with Gi-hun. His chest gave a little twist of worry. “You’re not hiding something, are you?”

“No,” In-ho said quickly, then softened it with a sigh. His eyes flicked toward him, briefly, then away again. “It isn’t that. I’ll tell you later, I promise.”

Gi-hun studied him a moment longer. There was a tension in him that hadn’t been there at the market the day before, and he couldn’t place it. Still, there was something in In-ho’s tone—an assurance, quiet but firm—that made him let it go. For now.

“All right,” Gi-hun murmured, settling back. “Later.”

The cartoon dog was once again endlessly and hopelessly chasing its tail. Somehow, it felt fitting.

They watched in silence for a while longer. Eventually, he sighed and leaned forward, setting Hae-in gently down onto her play mat in front of the couch. She stirred, blinked, then began batting her tiny fists at the dangling shapes above her.

“I’m gonna make more coffee,” Gi-hun said, pushing himself upright. His back gave a faint crack as he stretched his arms overhead. “Want one?”

“I’ll do it,” In-ho said quickly, rising to his feet. His hair stuck up even worse in the half-light, and he brushed it absently out of his face as he moved toward the kitchen. “No offence, Gi-hun-ssi, but your coffee tastes like dishwater.”

Gi-hun let out a bark of laughter, sharp and genuine. “Dishwater? That’s cruel.”

“Hmm, I guess so. Sugary dishwater would be more accurate,” In-ho replied dryly, though there was the faintest upward tug at the corner of his mouth as he disappeared into the kitchen.

Left alone, Gi-hun leaned down and rested his elbows on his knees, watching Hae-in as she kicked and flailed, her little legs pumping like she was running some invisible race. His heart tugged with that familiar mix of exhaustion and fierce tenderness. How small she still was, and how every day she seemed to learn something new, to grow in some tiny, astonishing way.

He stood and stretched again, rolling the stiffness from his shoulders. When he looked down, he froze.

Hae-in had rolled onto her side.

In itself, that wasn’t unusual—she’d been doing that for a while now—but this time she didn’t flop back onto her back. She squirmed, her face scrunching with effort, her arms reaching, and Gi-hun felt his breath catch in his throat.

“Oh—oh, wait—” He turned, half-whispering, half-shouting. “In-ho! Get in here!”

There was a clatter in the kitchen—something hitting the counter—and a moment later In-ho rushed in, eyes wide and panicked. “What? What happened?”

“Look!” Gi-hun pointed, his hand shaking just slightly with excitement.

Together they watched as Hae-in strained, her body rocking with the effort, until—slowly, almost clumsily—she tipped herself all the way over onto her stomach. She lay there for a beat, stunned, before letting out a tiny victorious sound, her fists thumping against the mat.

Gi-hun let out a breathless laugh. “She did it. She actually did it.”

In-ho crouched down beside the mat, his hands hovering instinctively as if to catch her even though she didn’t need it. His face—usually so carefully guarded—was lit with astonishment, eyes wide, lips parted. He looked at her as though she’d just performed a miracle.

“She rolled,” he murmured, almost to himself. “She rolled over.”

Gi-hun felt something crack open in his chest at the wonder in his voice. He knelt too, close enough that their shoulders brushed, and together they watched her push weakly against the mat, trying to lift her head, grunting with the effort.

“She’s strong,” Gi-hun said, unable to keep the pride from his tone.

In-ho nodded slowly, still watching her, his expression soft in a way Gi-hun had never seen before. “She’s going to surprise us. Both of us.”

For a long moment, neither moved. The only sounds were the faint, tinny chatter of the cartoon still playing, the soft rasp of the baby’s breathing, and their own quiet exhales. Gi-hun could feel the warmth of In-ho’s arm against his, solid and steady, and it settled in his chest in a way he didn’t want to end.

When Hae-in finally gave up, flopping her cheek against the mat with a tiny sigh, Gi-hun chuckled under his breath. “That’s it. She’s done for the day.”

In-ho’s lips curved upwards. He stayed crouched a moment longer, studying the tiny rise and fall of her back, before pushing himself slowly to his feet. “I’ll… finish the coffee.” His voice was quiet, almost rough.

In-ho returned a few minutes later, balancing two steaming mugs. He set one on the low table within Gi-hun’s reach before lowering himself onto the floor beside him, close enough that Gi-hun felt the warmth of his shoulder again. Neither spoke at first. Hae-in was lying on her back again, kicking her feet and cooing softly, her little hands reaching towards Gi-hun’s mug.

Gi-hun raised his coffee just out of her reach. “Don’t even think about it, jagi. You’re not ready for this kind of bitterness.”

In-ho huffed quietly, and when Gi-hun glanced sideways, he saw the faintest ghost of a smile. He took a sip of his own coffee, then leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he studied the baby’s determined kicks.

For a long stretch of minutes, that was all there was: the soft gurgle of Hae-in, the faint clink of mugs on the table, the morning light spilling across the floorboards. No tension, no plans. Just two men and a child, content to be in each other’s presence.

Gi-hun shifted Hae-in onto her belly again. She grunted in protest at first, but then, with surprising resolve, started wriggling her arms, pushing her head up a fraction higher than before. Gi-hun applauded softly, grinning. “Look at that. You’re getting stronger every minute.”

“She’s stubborn,” In-ho murmured. His voice had softened without him seeming to notice.

“She gets that from me,” Gi-hun said lightly, though his chest ached with pride. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed In-ho begin to open his mouth as if to say something, but thought better of it.

Hae-in let out a delighted squeal when Gi-hun wiggled his fingers above her head. She flailed, reaching for them, and In-ho—hesitant at first—lowered his hand as well, letting her catch one of his fingers. Her tiny fist closed around it, and Gi-hun caught the way In-ho froze, as if startled by the strength packed into something so small.

“She’s not letting go,” Gi-hun teased, amused by the sight.

“No,” In-ho said quietly, eyes fixed on her. “She isn’t.”

They stayed like that for a while, both men crouched on the floor, alternating between coaxing little giggles from her and falling silent to watch her attempts to push herself up. The cartoon on the television went on forgotten, though its cheerful chatter filled the background.

Gi-hun felt an odd peace in it all, as though the three of them were sealed inside a bubble where time didn’t press forward, where the world outside didn’t demand anything of them. Every laugh Hae-in gave felt like it scrubbed a layer of grime off his heart, letting something cleaner and lighter show through.

And In-ho… he wasn’t the same figure Gi-hun had first begrudgingly allowed to stay—distant, unreadable, all hard edges. Here, in this tiny space on the floor, he seemed gentled, undone by the simple gravity of a baby’s hand gripping his finger.

But eventually, the bubble broke.

The soft creak of a door opening down the hall drew their heads up. Jun-ho padded into the room, hair mussed from sleep, eyes narrowing briefly against the sunlight now streaming across the floorboards.

“Morning,” he muttered, voice rough. Then his gaze flicked from Gi-hun to In-ho, and something shifted in the air—because In-ho was no longer soft, no longer caught in the spell of the child’s fist around his finger.

He slipped free gently, placed his mug aside, and straightened his back. The warmth drained from his face so quickly that Gi-hun’s stomach twisted with unease.

“We need to talk,” In-ho said, his voice firm in a way that brooked no delay. His eyes went not to Gi-hun this time, but to his brother. “All of us.”

Gi-hun’s chest tightened. The sudden change in In-ho—the way the light had gone out of him the moment Jun-ho walked in—was impossible not to notice. Whatever tenderness they’d shared on the floor only moments ago had vanished behind the old mask of command. And Gi-hun knew with a cold certainty that whatever came next would shatter the fragile peace they’d just built.

Jun-ho blinked, still half caught in the haze of waking. “Now?” he asked.

“Now,” In-ho said, leaving no room for question. He straightened, rolling his shoulders back until every trace of softness had been replaced by a clipped precision. “Go wake Min-hyeok. Get yourselves some coffee, water, whatever you need. Then come back here.” His gaze flicked to Gi-hun briefly, unreadable, before returning to his brother. “We don’t have time to waste.”

Jun-ho frowned, but he didn’t argue. With a backward glance at Gi-hun—one that carried its own weight of worry—he disappeared down the hall.

The house fell quiet again, except for Hae-in’s small noises and the faint chatter of the television. In-ho stood motionless, arms folded, eyes fixed on nothing. The silence stretched taut, every second pressing down until Gi-hun wanted to speak just to break it. But he didn’t. He kept his hand against Hae-in’s back, rubbing slow circles, and trying to ignore the gnawing sense of dread as he waited for the others to join them.

Footsteps sounded soon enough—Jun-ho again, this time with Min-hyeok trailing behind him, both mencarrying mugs. They settled into chairs with the awkward gravity of people who could sense the seriousness of what they were about to hear.

Only then did In-ho move, pushing away from the wall and turning to face them fully. He stood with his arms folded, gaze flicking over them all before landing on Jun-ho. “Last night I realised something. If we want to get close to De Vriess—close enough to take him out—it won’t happen here. Not in Korea. Not in the open.” He hesitated, jaw tightening. “And we can’t wait for him to strike at us again. We’ll have to infiltrate another set of Games.”

The words landed like a stone dropped into Gi-hun’s gut. His ears rang with them, the room seeming to tilt around him. He shifted Hae-in higher against his chest, her warmth grounding him as he tried to make sense of what he’d heard. His mouth went dry, but the question ripped out of him before he could stop it. “Another set of games? There are others?”

The words cracked in the quiet, harsher than he intended, and Hae-in stirred at the sudden edge in his voice. Gi-hun rocked her instinctively, his hand smoothing over her back, but his eyes stayed locked on In-ho.

In-ho nodded, unable to fully meet his eyes.

“Where?”

“That I know of?” In-ho said. “China, Russia, Germany, America, Japan, South Africa—”

“You knew? All this time, you knew there were other games, and you never told me?”

In-ho’s face barely flickered, but it was enough—a faint tightening around the eyes, a small shift of his weight—that Gi-hun saw the guilt he was trying to bury.

“What good would it have done you to know sooner, Gi-hun-ssi?”

“You should have told me,” Gi-hun pressed, anger surging hot and fast now that the dam had cracked. “After everything—after everything I went through—you don’t get to just hold that back. Do you know what it’s like, waking up every day with those faces in your head, thinking maybe it was all over at last? And now you tell me it wasn’t? That it isn’t? That it’s still happening somewhere else?”

Jun-ho sat frozen on the edge of his chair, his eyes darting between them, as if afraid to breathe too loud. Min-hyeok stared into his mug, shoulders tense.

“I told you before that killing me wouldn’t put a stop to them.”

“I thought you just meant—I thought here, that—that someone else here would—” The world was closing in on him, his vision blurring.

“Gi-hun-ssi—”

“When that island blew up,” Gi-hun continued, “It already felt like a hollow victory. All those lives lost, and you—both of you—” he added, turning to Jun-ho— “but now?” he said, his voice cracking. “It wasn’t just hollow. It was pointless.”

“Depends on your point of view, Gi-hun-ssi,” In-ho said, and a bitterness he hadn’t heard in In-ho’s voice in quite sometime came back. “Was it pointless to save Hae-in? Pointless to stop thousands of people in future entering them here? Of course, if you look at the flip side, that means you’ve condemned those same people to a lifetime of poverty and misery—”

“Don’t,” Gi-hun said, his voice dropping low and cold as ice.

“Both of you, stop, “Min-hyeok interrupted. “Gi-hun-ssi, please, I know you’re hurting, but I have to know how to protect him.”

The words hit harder than Gi-hun expected. He froze, his anger snagging on the sudden intrusion. He turned his head, staring at the man across from him. Min-hyeok’s voice was steady, measured, but beneath the surface was something that gave Gi-hun pause: determination, edged with fear he wasn’t trying to hide.

“In-ho-ssi, please continue,” he then said, once he was certain Gi-hun wasn’t about to interrupt.

In-ho nodded shortly, then took a deep breath.

“None of the games take place at exactly the same time each year. That helps keep them from being discovered. Stops police investigations looking too closesly. Except for one. The German games run like clockwork. Recruitment closes on the twenty-fourth of September every year. The games themselves begin on the first of October. And we need to be there when they do.”

“Infiltrating the games," Gi-hun said, his voice shaking. He could feel his pulse in his throat, in his fingertips where they pressed against Hae-in’s blanket. “Do you hear yourself? You’re talking about walking back into hell. About sending yourselves into the same place that chewed us up and spat us out. You think you’ll be any different? That you’ll walk out alive, just because you planned it?”

“Jun-ho did it once. Without any planning.” In-ho glanced at his brother. “We do what he did. Take the place of three workers. Be there when De Vriess arrives. Take him out. We get out. We come home.”

Jun-ho’s hands clenched on his knees. “That’s not the same and you know it,” he said. His voice was steady, but there was steel in it. “I got lucky. But you—” he broke off, jaw tightening before he forced himself on, “you’re planning to walk three men into Germany and pass as guards. Do you even speak German?”

“A little,” In-ho answered.

“A little?” Jun-ho laughed. “That’s not enough, and it's still more than me. How about you?” he asked, turning to Min-hyeok

“Not a word,” he admitted.

Jun-ho turned back to In-ho, sharp and unforgiving. “Then it’s not possible. We need to be able to understand orders. You know that as well as I do. More than I do. What happens if we fail to carry out an order, hyung?”

But In-ho didn’t flinch. His arms remained folded, his face unreadable except for the tight set of his mouth. “We have five and a half months.”

Gi-hun stared at him, incredulous. “You think you can learn a whole language in five months?”

In-ho’s gaze didn’t waver. “We don’t need to be fluent. We need enough. Commands. Routine responses. The language of the job. Guards aren’t expected to chat philosophy in the corridors.” He shifted his weight, as if bracing against their disbelief. “We drill it every day. Morning, night. By September, it will be instinct.”

Jun-ho gave a short, sharp laugh without humour. “Instinct? You slip once—once—and you’re finished.”

In-ho didn’t argue. He just looked at his brother with something almost weary. “Then we don’t slip.”

Gi-hun felt the back of his neck prickle. The absolute certainty in In-ho’s voice, the refusal to allow doubt… He was still angry at In-ho. Furious, even. But this plan pushed that rage momentarily to one side and left him cold. Because if this went wrong, then the baby sleeping against his heart would grow up never knowing the man who had just knelt on the floor and watched her roll over for the very first time.

Notes:

Thank you all once again for reading and for your wonderful comments, I treasure each and every one <3

God, I'm so sorry to all of you (and to Inhun too) but this is a major spanner in the works *evil laugh* But what's a slow burn without a few hurdles to overcome, hey? ;)

Chapter 18: Roots and Ruins

They began straight away. In-ho set the notebook on the table, neat lines of Hangul paired with unfamiliar German syllables. His voice was steady and authoritative, as if he were in a classroom instead of a home. “Guten Morgen. Good morning. We’ll start there.”

Min-hyeok leaned forward, pen already in hand, repeating the phrase carefully. His determination was quiet but solid, every syllable deliberate.

On the other side of the room, Gi-hun slouched back in the sofa, Hae-in balanced on his knee. He didn’t even glance at the three men trying to learn before repeating the words in a flat, mocking echo. “Gootun Morgan.”

In-ho took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. Gi-hun’s anger hadn’t simmered this close to the surface in a long time. He couldn’t blame him. He tapped the notebook. “Again. Guten Morgen.”

“Guten Morgen,” Min-hyeok repeated.

“Guten Morgen,” Jun-ho said.

“Gooootun Mooorgan!” Gi-hun bellowed from the sofa, stretching the syllables until Hae-in squealed in surprise. He laughed softly to her, kissing her hair, then glanced back at them with a crooked grin. “Perfect, right? That’ll fool anyone.”

Jun-ho shot him a glare. Min-hyeok didn’t look up from his notes, though his grip on the pen had tightened.

In-ho ignored it. “Wie geht es Ihnen? How are you?” He traced each syllable slowly on the page. “It’s formal. You’d use it with strangers.”

“Wie gehts Ihnen,” Min-hyeok repeated, stumbling slightly but correcting himself.

Jun-ho’s was flawless. “Wie geht es Ihnen.”

“Vee gets eenan!” Gi-hun crowed from the sofa, holding a hand theatrically to his chest. “Would you like a nice death game with your schnitzel?” He chuckled to himself, bouncing Hae-in gently as though she were his sole audience.

In-ho swallowed his irritation. He reminded himself—again—that Gi-hun had earned the right to be angry. He’d been lied to. Kept in the dark. And yet…

“This isn’t for fun,” In-ho said evenly. “It’s survival.”

“Maybe you should be teaching them how to beg instead. That’ll be more useful.” Gi-hun’s laugh was hollow, without mirth. He kissed the top of Hae-in’s head as if to soften it, but his eyes stayed locked on In-ho, hard as glass.

In-ho inhaled slowly through his nose. He deserved the anger, he knew that. But it was threatening to choke the air from the room, and if he didn’t keep the lesson moving, it would all collapse under the weight of Gi-hun’s fury.

“Next,” he said, flipping the page. “Bitte. Danke. Please. Thank you.”

“Bitte. Danke,” Min-hyeok echoed dutifully.

Jun-ho followed smoothly.

Gi-hun scoffed. “Thank you? For what? Letting me think it was over? That you’d changed?” His voice cracked sharp in the air. He jostled Hae-in, his hands gentle on her even as his words came out like blades. “Why do you really want to go back, In-ho? You want to actually be one of the guards, perhaps? Start from the bottom and work your way back up to the top? Because—be honest with them—if you’re teaching them to understand orders, you’re expecting them to carry them out, too. I mean, it’s not like they can refuse without giving themselves away. And we both know what that means, In-ho. If someone fucks up a game, you will have to be the ones to kill them. How long has it been since you pulled the trigger on someone, In-ho? Was Jung-bae the last one? Are you itching to do it again?”

In-ho’s grip on his pen tightened, the knuckles blanching white. He made himself keep his gaze on the notebook, though every word Gi-hun spat hit like a blow to the ribs.

“You’re right,” he said at last, his voice clipped but steady. “If we infiltrate, there will be orders. And some of those orders will be to pull a trigger. To end lives.” He lifted his head then, meeting Gi-hun’s eyes across the room, refusing to flinch away. “If we hesitate, we’ll be discovered. And if we’re discovered, we die. Those players will die with or without our interference. So yes, Gi-hun-ssi. We may have to kill players.”

Min-hyeok stiffened beside him. Jun-ho’s jaw tightened.

“And you’re justifying that?” Gi-hun’s laugh was sharp, disbelieving. “You, who already spent years covered in their blood—you’re telling them to do the same?”

“I’m telling them the truth,” In-ho snapped, the words breaking out before he could temper them. His voice was harder than he intended, but there was no point in softening it now. “And the truth is that sacrifices will have to be made. Do you think I like it? Do you think I want to put my own brother in that position? Of course not. But this isn’t about what we want. It’s about what we have to do.”

Gi-hun shifted Hae-in higher against his chest, holding her as though to shield her from the words. His eyes were burning holes through In-ho now, bright with fury.

“You disgust me,” he spat.

For a moment, In-ho felt the sting of it lodge deep. Then he forced himself to breathe, to keep steady, and when he spoke next his voice was low but deliberate.

“I recall it wasn’t all that long ago that you were willing to let ‘innocent’ players die in order to try and kill me.”

That stilled Gi-hun, just enough.

“You talk about disgust,” In-ho went on, leaning forward slightly now, each word sharp. “But don’t forget—you tried to do the same. You wanted to stage your little uprising. You rallied others, you told them to fight, and you knewwhat that would mean. Blood on your hands. Allowing players to kill other players as a distraction? Stopping us fighting in the night, something which could have all but guaranteed the ‘X’ voters would have won? That was cold, Gi-hun. All for what you believed was the greater good. And then after? After your mess you made, you killed a young man who’s only crime was being afraid.”

Gi-hun’s breath was coming fast now, his face taut, but he didn’t answer.

In-ho pressed on, relentless. “So don’t stand there now and tell me I’m any worse than you. You were willing to pay that price. The only difference is that I don’t pretend to not know what it costs.”

The silence after was thick and suffocating.

Min-hyeok had gone very still, staring fixedly at the page until then, and he set his pen down. His voice was quiet, but firm. “That’s enough.”

Gi-hun turned his glare on him, startled, but Min-hyeok didn’t falter. His eyes, usually calm and open, were flinty now.

“As painful as it is,” he said, “In-ho-ssi lis right. This is the only way. De Vriess won’t stop coming after us—after Jun-ho. We have to deal with him before he finds us again.”

Gi-hun’s laugh was hollow and disbelieving. “So that’s it? You’re willing to wear the mask, hold the gun, kill whoever gets in your way, just to deal with one man?”

“Sounds pretty familiar, right, Gi-hun?” In-ho said.

“I said that’s enough,” Min-hyeok said, shooting a glare towards In-ho. His jaw worked, and for a long moment he didn’t speak. Then he turned back to Gi-hun and said, low but steady, “If it means keeping us alive, yes.”

In-ho felt the knot in his chest ease, just slightly, though he didn’t allow himself to show it.

“You’re all insane,” Gi-hun muttered at last, his voice rough. He shifted Hae-in higher against him, holding on as if she were a lifeline.

“Maybe,” Min-hyeok said, his tone steady and resigned. “But this is how we stay breathing.”

The silence after was heavy again, but different this time. Not suffocating with anger, but taut with the weight of what they all knew was true.

Gi-hun looked away first. His gaze dropped to Hae-in’s tiny hand, curled around his thumb. When he spoke, his voice was quieter, though no less sharp. “You’re walking into hell with a smile on your face. Don’t expect me to clap for it.”

“I wouldn’t,” Min-hyeok said simply.

A muscle flexed in Gi-hun’s jaw, and in silence he stood up and walked away, taking Hae-in with him.

In-ho let out a slow breath, setting his pen down at last. The lesson was broken for the day—there was no salvaging it—but something else had shifted in its place. A line had been drawn, and for once it hadn’t been him wielding the pen.

His gaze lingered on Min-hyeok. The steadiness in his posture, the quiet conviction in his words. There was nothing performative about it, nothing done for recognition. It was conviction born of care, even love—for people who weren’t his blood, weren’t his responsibility, yet he shouldered them anyway.

In-ho felt the old reflexive shame twitch inside him, all the warnings about weakness and sin. That love like that was dangerous. But sitting there, watching Min-hyeok meet Gi-hun’s fury without flinching, then turning to Jun-ho with something so much softer—he felt something different stir. A small, startling understanding.

He understood, suddenly, why Jun-ho was drawn to him, and for the first time ever, he couldn’t find it in himself to condemn.

***

The soil was stubborn. Hard-packed from years of neglect, it resisted every thrust of the spade like it was daring him to give up. Gi-hun didn’t. He set his jaw, drove his boot down onto the blade, and forced the earth to split. The crunch and give of it was satisfying in a way words couldn’t touch. He heaved the chunk of dirt aside, chest heaving, sweat stinging his eyes.

The sun was nearing its peak, and an unseasonal heat clung to the air, heavy and damp. His shirt was plastered to his back, the fabric sticking as he bent, lifted, and broke the soil again and again. Each movement was sharp and deliberate. If he stopped—if he gave himself space to breathe—his thoughts would rush back in. And he couldn’t have that.

So he took his rage and fury, his grief and fear, and his sense of helplessness out on the earth instead, finding solace in the physicality of it, the sweating, the aching, the pain.

Behind him, Hae-in shrieked with laughter. The sound carried across the yard, clear and bright, as she bounced up and down in the colourful jungle-themed bouncer. She kicked her legs with wild abandon, hair flying, her fists clenched tight around the straps as though she could launch herself higher by will alone.

Gi-hun risked a glance over his shoulder. She was radiant, flushed cheeks and eyes like sunlight caught in glass, her laugh bubbling up so freely it made his chest ache. She was happy—blissfully, thoughtlessly happy. A part of him wanted to stop, to scoop her up, to let her joy wash the heaviness out of his bones.

But another part—the stubborn, furious part—kept digging.

His hands were raw already, blisters threatening at the base of his fingers, but he gripped the wooden handle harder. He welcomed the sting of pain, the tremor in his arms as he forced the shovel down again. Sweat trickled into the lines of his face, caught in his stubble, and he swiped at it with the back of his wrist, smearing dirt across his skin. He wanted the exhaustion. Wanted the ache. Maybe if his body was screaming loud enough, it could drown out everything else.

But it couldn’t.

He heard In-ho’s voice anyway. Calm, measured, like he hadn’t just ripped Gi-hun’s world out from under him again.

“We have to infiltrate another set of games.”

“I told you before that killing me wouldn’t put a stop to them.”

“You killed a young man who’s only crime was being afraid.”

The words echoed through him like a hammer on an anvil. Gi-hun slammed the shovel down, the blade cutting into the dirt with a dull, violent thunk. He leaned on the handle, breath dragging, shoulders working like bellows. His jaw clenched until his teeth ached. Sweat stung his eyes, and he spat into the soil just to have somewhere to put the bitterness crowding his mouth.

He hated him for it.

But no—that wasn’t the whole truth.

He hated the anger. The way it rose like a tide when he looked at In-ho, pulling all the old fury back up with it. Rage for the mask. Rage for the silence. Rage for the way In-ho had let him believe it was all finished when the island burned. But beneath that burning rage there was something heavier, colder, like iron sunk in his chest.

Dae-ho.

The name pierced him, as sharp as glass. Six months hadn’t dulled it. He could still see the boy’s wide eyes, still hear the shallow rasp of his breathing as they hid in that pastel-coloured nightmare, when he had said he would go back for more ammunition, to not let the others down. But Dae-ho hadn’t come back. He’d frozen. He’d panicked. And when the rebellion crumbled, when blood soaked the floor and their chance at escape collapsed into ash, Gi-hun had laid the failure squarely at his feet.

Gi-hun remembered the heat of his grief, the weight of rage inside his chest, the way it drowned out reason. And when the chance came his hands had closed around the boy’s neck. Tight and merciless. He remembered the fear in his eyes, the pleading, the rasp of a breath trying to force its way past crushed windpipe.

He’d held on until there was nothing left. Until the boy went limp.

Gi-hun gripped the shovel harder, knuckles whitening until the wood creaked. He could still feel the heat of the boy’s skin under his palms. Still hear the broken gasps. Still see his face, eyes wide and shining with betrayal as the life bled out of them.

You killed a young man whose only crime was being afraid.

The words burned because they were true. Gi-hun had answered that supposed crime with violence, made him a target for all the grief he couldn’t put anywhere else. He’d blamed him, then punished him with death.

And now? Now that moment was carved into his chest like scripture.

He dug harder, harder, as though he could bury the memory under sweat and earth. Each thrust of the shovel was a denial, a rejection, a desperate rhythm to keep the truth at bay. He hated In-ho for speaking it aloud, for holding it like a mirror to his face.

But maybe what he really hated—what he couldn’t admit—was himself.

And beneath it all was the fear.

The fear that what he’d built with In-ho these past months—this fragile, tentative trust—was about to snap clean in half. That if In-ho walked back into the belly of that machine, back into the violence and control and cruelty, he wouldn’t come out the man Gi-hun knew now. He’d come out the Front Man again. Cold, ruthless, and gone.

Gi-hun slammed his boot into the shovel, driving it deeper. The thought made his stomach turn. He wanted to believe the man he knew now—the one who held Hae-in with steady hands, who argued with quiet conviction, who had a silly, unexpected humour—was the real one. That the mask had been the lie. But what if he was wrong?

Another grunt, another heave of dirt. He tore the weeds from their roots, flung them aside with unnecessary force. His breath came ragged, his spine slick with sweat. He focused on the rhythm—dig, lift, break, toss. The ground would yield eventually. It had to.

Hae-in squealed again, high and triumphant, her little legs pumping against the bouncer. A bubbling laugh spilled out of her, half giggle, half squeal.

Gi-hun’s throat tightened. He forced a smile over his shoulder. “Good work, kkomeng-i! Keep kicking like that and you’ll fly away!” She shrieked with delight as if to prove him right, arms flailing in wild, joyous rhythm.

His smile faded as he turned back to the dirt.

In the end, that was the point of all this—to keep her safe, to keep her laughing like this.

He dug harder.

The truth was, he understood. He understood why they had to prepare, why they had to learn the language, why Jun-ho and Min-hyeok were willing to go. Hell, he even understood why In-ho was pushing them toward it. If De Vriess kept hunting them, they couldn’t hide forever. They needed to face him, end it before he ended them.

It made sense. He wasn’t an idiot.

But sense didn’t erase fear. It didn’t erase the thought of Min-hyeok bleeding out because he’d hesitated over an order, or Jun-ho cornered and shot in a stairwell, or In-ho—his In-ho—slipping that mask back over his face and disappearing behind it forever.

Gi-hun shoved the spade into the earth again, this time so violently the handle shuddered in his hands. He let it stand there, bent at the waist, hands braced on his knees, panting as he dragged a hand down his face, leaving a smear of dirt and sweat. He closed his eyes, and for a moment he let the sound of Hae-in’s laughter fill him, push back the fire burning in his chest.

He couldn’t lose her. He couldn’t lose

them.

The shovel bit into the dirt with a dull crunch, earth splitting in a jagged line. Gi-hun leaned on the handle, sweat dripping from his chin, chest rising and falling in hard bursts. He told himself he’d clear another strip, maybe two, before going in. Then he could wash his face, pick up Hae-in, and pretend the knot in his chest didn’t exist.

The sound of the back door creaking open made him stiffen. For a second, he hoped it was Jun-ho—or even Min-hyeok, come to drag him in with some excuse about lunch. But when he glanced up, it was In-ho.

He paused a beat at the edge of the yard, eyes flicking briefly toward Hae-in’s bouncing form nearby, her laughter still filling the morning. Then, wordlessly, he came down the worn steps and crossed the uneven grass to where Gi-hun stood.

Gi-hun’s throat tightened. He wanted to snarl at him, to tell him to go back inside, to leave him the hell alone. But his body betrayed him; he stayed bent over the shovel, his grip tight on the handle, jaw clamped shut.

In-ho didn’t say anything. He pulled a pair of old work gloves from his pocket, and reached for the second spade propped against the shed. The scrape of metal against wood rang in the morning air.

Gi-hun said nothing, and for a while they worked in silence.

The rhythm shifted—the two of them side by side now, the alternating strikes of metal into earth syncing like some unspoken agreement. Dirt piled up between them in uneven heaps, the ground slowly surrendering to their effort. The heat grew heavier, pressing down like a weight, and still neither man broke the silence.

Gi-hun felt it in every motion: the way his own anger bled into each shove of the spade, the way In-ho’s movements were steady, measured, never hurried. Not avoiding him, not challenging him either. Just there. It grated on him more than words would have.

Minutes stretched, while Hae-in’s laughter carried, her rhythm of squeaks and squeals oblivious to the tightness binding the two men across the garden.

At last, when the soil between them was broken enough to show real progress, In-ho leaned on his spade. His breath came steady, faint streaks of dirt smudging his forearms. He didn’t look at Gi-hun when he spoke.

“I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”

The words landed soft, but heavy.

Gi-hun froze. He kept his eyes on the ground, on the ragged clumps of earth and the roots jutting out like exposed veins. His chest was still heaving, his hands raw, his heart thudding too loud in his ears.

In-ho’s voice was lower now, quieter. “You were right to be angry. About me not telling you. About…” He trailed off, his grip tightening on the spade. “About other things too.”

Gi-hun swallowed hard, his mouth dry. His instinct was to lash back, to say ‘damn right I was. To shove the blade into the dirt again just to drown out the sound of In-ho’s voice. But he didn’t. Not yet. Instead, he wiped the back of his wrist across his forehead, smearing sweat and grit, and stood there in silence, the spade heavy in his hands.

Slowly, the anger inside him shifted—not gone, not even dulled, but tangled with something else. That pre-emptive grief. The fear of loss.

Gi-hun’s hands flexed on the spade handle until his knuckles ached. The silence pressed in, thick as the heat. He told himself not to answer—that In-ho didn’t deserve it, that any reply would only give him ground he hadn’t earned.

But the words pushed their way out anyway, ragged and low.

“You think I’m angry because you snapped at me?” His laugh came out short and bitter. He stabbed the spade back into the earth, hard enough to send a jolt through his arms. “I’m angry because you… you make all these plans, and you stand there looking so damn calm, like you already know how the rest of us are supposed to feel. You lie, and you keep secrets, and I’m supposed to just be ok with that, I’m supposed to…” He stopped himself abruptly, swallowing the words down as the image of In-ho stepping behind that mask again rose up inside him.

He turned then, finally meeting In-ho’s eyes. There was sweat dripping into them, stinging, but he didn’t blink. “I don’t care how much sense your plans make. I don’t care how clever you think you are. You go back into that place, and I know what’ll happen. I’ll lose you.”

The last words tore out of him harsher than he intended, too naked, and he gritted his teeth as if he could shove them back down. He bent again, shoving the spade deep into the dirt, punishing the ground for letting the truth escape. “I can’t watch you turn into him again. That mask. That voice. You think I can just watch you walk straight back into hell and not wonder if you’ll come out of it worse than before?”

Hae-in squealed in delight from the steps, bouncing harder, her laughter cutting sharp through the heavy silence. Gi-hun’s head dropped, sweat dripping into the soil at his feet. His grip tightened on the spade, grounding himself in the ache of his muscles.

When he looked up again, his voice was low, flat, but shaking beneath. “You want to risk yourself? Fine. But don’t expect me to pretend I’m okay with it. Don’t expect me to stand here smiling like some loyal little soldier while you gamble what’s left of yourself. Because I’m not.”

He shoved the spade into the dirt again, hard enough to make the handle rattle in his hands, and leaned on it, breathing hard. His jaw was set, but his eyes betrayed the fear pulsing through every word.

In-ho didn’t answer.

He just kept working beside him, the steady rhythm of his spade cutting into the earth, turning soil, tamping it back down. Each movement deliberate, precise. Almost penitent.

Gi-hun tried to ignore it. He told himself he was glad for the quiet, glad In-ho wasn’t pushing back, glad there wasn’t another lecture in that low, controlled voice. But as the minutes stretched, the silence grew heavier, thicker, until it felt less like agreement and more like a judgment passed down without words.

He slammed his spade into the ground with a grunt, dirt scattering. “What, nothing? That’s it?” His voice cracked with disbelief. “You don’t even have the guts to answer me? You’ll argue with me in front of everyone else, but when it’s just us—you’ve got nothing to say?”

In-ho’s spade bit into the earth again, unhurried, the line of his jaw taut, but still, the man said nothing. Just another cut of soil, another turn of the spade.

Gi-hun’s frustration twisted tighter, an ache beneath his ribs. “Say something, damn it!” His voice broke, raw and sharp. “Anything. But don’t just stand there like I don’t matter. Like what I’m saying doesn’t matter.”

The words hung in the hot air, ragged and trembling, ad the silence pressed like a weight between them, heavy enough to choke on. Gi-hun’s chest heaved, his hands trembling on the spade handle. He thought—hoped—that maybe In-ho would keep holding back, because then he could keep throwing his anger at him like stones, keep bleeding it out through his throat and his fists in the dirt. But when In-ho finally did speak, the words cut clean through all of it.

“I won’t,” he said quietly, without looking up. His spade dug deep, turned the earth, then stilled. “I won’t be lost to it again.”

Gi-hun blinked, thrown.

In-ho finally met his eyes, and there was no mask, no coldness—only raw steadiness, as if he’d been waiting for the right moment to force the words out. “Not the Front Man. Not the man I was there. That part of me—it doesn’t get to live again.” He swallowed, his voice taut but certain. “Because if it does, I lose more than myself. I lose you.”

The words hit harder than any shout could have.

Gi-hun opened his mouth, but nothing came. His throat tightened, a burn rising behind his eyes he couldn’t blink away. For a moment, all he could hear was Hae-in’s laughter, shrill and bright against the suffocating quiet, as if she alone were keeping the world from tipping.

In-ho leaned his weight on the spade, knuckles pale where he gripped it. “That’s not a risk I can take, Gi-hun-ssi. Not anymore.”

Something cracked inside Gi-hun, his anger faltering, spilling into something messier and more dangerous. His breath caught on a ragged edge as he tried to form words—any words—but all that came was a hoarse, “You’d better mean that.”

“I do,” In-ho said, steady and unflinching. “More than anything.”

Gi-hun wanted to believe him. He really did. His eyes flicked over to Hae-in, who was still crouched in the dirt, utterly absorbed with a worm she’d discovered wriggling between her fingers. For a fleeting second, her laugh cut through the heavy fog in his chest. Then the dread crept back in, and he couldn’t hold it anymore. He hurled the shovel down into the soil with a sharp crack and blurted out, “What happens if… if you get there? To the games. And De Vriess isn’t there? If he doesn’t come.”

In-ho froze. Gi-hun saw it—the small stillness that betrayed him before the practiced words came. “Then we try again. We figure out where the next games take place, and we go there.”

The answer landed like a stone in Gi-hun’s stomach. He dragged a sleeve across his sweat-damp face, then let his legs buckle and folded onto the ground, sitting cross-legged against the shed. His palms braced against his knees, but he could feel them trembling. The silence stretched between them, taut as wire, and in that silence, his own pulse roared in his ears until it almost made him dizzy.

His voice came out hoarse. “And then what? What if he isn’t there either?”

In-ho shifted beside him, lowering down as though to mirror his posture, though the careful way he did it only twisted the knife deeper—like he was trying to steady the air between them. “Then we keep going until we do find him.”

Gi-hun’s laugh cracked out, brittle and hollow, scraping his throat raw. He tipped his head back against the shed, staring up at the blank stretch of sky, as if maybe it would give him answers. “Is that what would become of us?” His voice broke around the word us, and he hated how much it gave away. “That we just keep trying? That you just… keep going back? Over and over. Until you have nothing left in life again. Nothing except the games?”

His eyes slid sideways. He saw In-ho flinch—barely, but enough. The faint tightening at the corner of his mouth, the way his hand flexed once against his thigh before curling into a fist.

“I’ve seen what it does to you,” Gi-hun went on, heat rising in him now, almost spilling over into anger—but the anger wasn’t entirely at In-ho. It was at the world, at fate, at the cruelty of it all. “You spent years drowning in it, and I—” His throat closed suddenly, the words fighting him. He bent forward, pressing his palms hard against his eyes, as though he could shove the feeling back inside where it belonged. His voice came out muffled, broken. “I can’t lose you back to that. I don’t care what you think you deserve. If you go back too many times, if it becomes everything again… I’ll lose the man I’ve come to know. The man I—”

The word caught in his mouth, snagged sharp on his teeth. His chest heaved once, and he forced it back, clamping down, shaking his head hard as if he could physically rattle the truth loose and cast it away. He couldn’t say it. He wasn’t even sure if he believed it, despite how it so nearly fell from him.

When he finally dropped his hands, his eyes burned, red-rimmed. He stared down at the dirt between his knees, not daring to look up.

Out of the corner of his vision, he saw In-ho move. Not a dramatic gesture—just a shift of weight, a slow lean closer, the brush of a shadow reaching toward him but stopping just short. When Gi-hun dared glance up, In-ho’s face was turned toward him, jaw set tight, eyes unreadable in the harsh daylight but fixed on him all the same, like he was seeing right through the cracks Gi-hun had tried so hard to plaster over.

In-ho closed his eyes, as though bracing himself against the tide of memory, and dragged a slow, deliberate breath into his lungs before speaking.

“I told you, very briefly, that the games were worse before I took over. Worse in ways you can’t begin to picture.” His hand flexed once against his thigh, tendons taut, as if he were fighting the urge to clench a fist. “I saw people stoop to levels of depravity and violence I didn’t think possible. I tried to hold on to who I was, back then. Tried to stop the other players from fighting, from…”

He broke off, his jaw tightening, and Gi-hun caught the flicker in his eyes—a shadow of something so vile, so unspeakable, it pulled the air from the room. For a second, he looked younger, haunted, his face momentarily stripped of the mask he wore so well.

“Some of them knew me,” he went on finally, his voice quieter, almost flat with shame. “Criminals I’d arrested. They blamed me for their being there, and they made sure I knew it.”

Gi-hun’s breath snagged, his stomach twisting. The way In-ho said it—it was clear this was a wound that had never scabbed over.

“By the night before the final game, I hadn’t slept in more than two days,” In-ho continued. His gaze drifted past Gi-hun, past the walls around them, as though he were standing back there again. “The guards came for me while everyone else slept. Brought me upstairs.”

Gi-hun’s pulse spiked—he could see it, the memory overlapping with his own, when the guard had come for him that night, when he’d finally seen who was behind the mask.

In-ho’s hand twitched suddenly against his knee, betraying the phantom weight of something. “Il-nam pressed a knife into my hand. Told me to kill the others in their sleep. He said they were already plotting to kill me come morning. That the only way to survive—the only way to win the money to save Yoo-na—was to strike first.”

The silence stretched. Gi-hun felt his throat go dry. He imagined it: the bunks lined with bodies, the sound of their breath filling the dark room, and In-ho standing over them with a blade. His stomach churned, nausea pressing hot against his chest.

“I did what I had to do,” In-ho whispered. His throat worked visibly, his shoulders stiff, as though the confession itself cost him something irretrievable.

Gi-hun flinched hard, his mind pulled back to that moment when In-ho had handed him the knife and told him to do the same. In the moment he was so hurt by betrayal that he didn’t see the pain that must have been there in In-ho’s eyes.

“I didn’t know at the time,” In-ho went on, his voice breaking lower, almost pleading now, “but Yoo-na was already dead. Il-nam knew it. He saw… an opportunity in me. A man who could be broken by love. Who would give up his morals for a cause that was already lost. Someone he could shape. Someone he could pass the torch to.”

“And he was right,” Gi-hun bit out, but the words came ragged, raw with contempt that didn’t quite mask the tremor beneath them. He dragged both hands over his face, fingers scraping down hard against his skin as if to try and claw back control.

In-ho took the blow without flinching. He didn’t look away, didn’t protest. His silence was a strange kind of defiance—as though he accepted the weight of Gi-hun’s judgment but refused to retreat from it.

“When I came back,” he said finally, his voice softer, “and found that Yoo-na was gone, I thought that was it. That I’d burned everything left inside myself. Whatever spark of wanting that lived in me—it died with her.” His gaze drifted, his body folding inward slightly, like the memory itself pressed down on him. “So I walked away from my life. Because I wasn’t a man anymore. Just a shell. A body. Everything worth keeping was already gone.”

Gi-hun’s chest ached. Against his will, he saw him: not the mask, not the man who had betrayed him, but a hollowed figure standing alone in an empty apartment, the air silent where laughter should have been.

“Because when I returned to an empty home and no future,” In-ho continued, his voice scraped raw, “I was ready to end it all. I drank—constantly. Until there was nothing left in me but fumes. And one night, I found myself on the banks of the Han. On the Mapo Bridge. I was halfway over the railing when a limo pulled up.”

His eyes closed for a fraction of a second, lashes trembling as though he still tasted the night air, the river below him, the metal cold against his palms. His voice cracked as he spoke. “It was him. Oh Il-nam.”

Gi-hun watched him, every line of his face pulled taut, his heart a torn thing between disgust and pity. He wanted to hate him, to shut himself off—but something in the brittle tremor of In-ho’s voice made it impossible.

“He offered me a purpose,” In-ho said at last, flat, brittle as glass that could shatter with one more word. “And I took it.”

His gaze dropped, fixed somewhere on the dirt at his feet. “The first year was the hardest,” he continued, voice rasping with old scars. “I hated myself every day, but I was too much of a coward to end it. So I built walls instead. I hardened my heart. And then I kept doing that, brick by brick, until there was nothing left to feel.” His jaw worked, muscle twitching as if he were chewing back bile. “I thought that was it. That I’d finished hollowing myself out.”

The silence seemed to press on him, forcing the next words up against his clenched teeth. His throat bobbed.

“I never expected to feel… anything again.”

His hands betrayed him—flexing restlessly against the dirt, clenching, unclenching, as if his body were trying to shake the truth out of him before his mouth could quit.

Gi-hun sat taut as he listened, his shoulders stiff, his brow drawn tight, his whole frame strung like a bow pulled to breaking. He looked as though he were bracing for impact, for words that would split him in two.

“Not until I met you,” In-ho finished softly. The words barely cleared his throat, almost breaking apart before they could take shape.

The silence that followed was thick, suffocating as smoke. Gi-hun’s throat bobbed. His lips parted like he might speak—but no sound came. His eyes lingered on In-ho for a breath, before flicking away, unable to bear the weight.

In-ho let the pause linger, but he wasn’t finished—not yet. He dragged in a breath that shook at the edges, steadied it, then pushed forward.

“After your first Games,” he said, his voice quieter now, more hesitant, “in the limo… you intrigued me.” His mouth curved faintly, not in a smile but a grimace at his own helplessness. “I wanted to know why Il-nam had taken such a liking to you, out of everyone. Why you.”

That snapped Gi-hun’s gaze back to him, sharp and unyielding. “I ‘intrigued’ you? What the hell do you mean by that?” His voice cracked like a whip, but beneath it, there was something raw, a tremor of confusion and hurt.

“Exactly what I said,” In-ho answered, forcing the words out though they scraped like glass in his throat. “You intrigued me. At first, because I thought Il-nam must have seen something I couldn’t.” He exhaled sharply, looking down at his hands now, fingers curling tight against his knees. “So I kept watching you. I wanted to understand what it was about you that caught his eye. But then…” His throat tightened, his voice faltered. “Then it became more. I’d never met anyone like you before. And when you became obsessed with finding me, chasing me… it wasn’t just intrigue anymore.” His mouth twitched in something halfway between a bitter laugh and a sigh. “It was—flattering. In a way I didn’t know I could still feel.”

Gi-hun’s eyes flicked toward him again, and this time he couldn’t look away.

“When you returned, and I stepped into your Games, and I finally got to know you,” In-ho continued, his voice dropping lower, quieter now, “that feeling of being flattered turned to excitement. Because I thought—at last. At long last, someone who could share the emptiness with me. I thought I could break you. Pull you over to my side. Make you understand the coldness I lived in.” His jaw worked, shame and memory grinding together. “But you didn’t break, did you?”

“I did.”

Gi-hun’s voice cut in suddenly, soft but sharp enough to slice clean through the air. In-ho’s head turned, eyes snapping to him.

“I did break,” Gi-hun said again, quieter, like the admission itself was tearing strips off him. His shoulders hunched, his face crumpled. “When… I…” His lips trembled, trying to form the name. “Dae-ho.”

The name strangled out of him, broken, and then the tears came—fast, hot and relentless. They streaked down his cheeks unchecked, and his hands pressed over his face as if he could hold himself together with sheer force. But he couldn’t.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered to the memory of the young man, the words catching and cracking apart in his throat. His whole body shook with the weight of it, with guilt that had waited too long to be spoken. “I’m so sorry.”

In-ho’s breath caught. For a moment he only stared, seemingly torn between reaching for him and staying frozen where he sat. Then he shifted closer, like approaching something half-wild and wounded that might bolt at the wrong touch. His hand hovered, hesitated, then—slowly, as if asking permission he didn’t dare voice—he slid an arm around Gi-hun’s shoulders.

Gi-hun resisted at first, his body locked tight, breath snagging somewhere between protest and collapse. But the fight bled out of him almost instantly. His strength slipped, leaving him sagging sideways until his forehead found In-ho’s shoulder. The fabric there darkened with his tears, hot against his own skin, and the shame of it only made them fall faster.

“No, Gi-hun,” In-ho’s voice came low, fierce, close enough that Gi-hun felt the vibration of it where their bodies touched. An arm tightened around him, steady and unyielding. “You did what the game demanded of you. You survived. But even then—” His words broke, strained. “You didn’t let it hollow you out. Not like it did to me. Not really.”

Gi-hun’s eyes squeezed shut. The sound of that voice above him, threading steel and ruin together, should have been unbearable. But the warmth of In-ho’s temple resting against his hair—the simple weight of it—pulled at something fragile inside him.

“And since then…” The words came ragged, and Gi-hun could hear the cracks running through them, hear the way In-ho fought to keep them whole. “I was sleepwalking for years. A decade. Empty. And now—” He faltered, and Gi-hun felt the tremor in the breath against his scalp. “Now I’m awake again. Because of you. And no matter what happens, I am not going back to that.”

Gi-hun’s breath hitched, sharp, his chest stuttering with it. For a while, he let himself stay there, against In-ho, held in the circle of his arm. Then, almost ashamed of himself, he dragged a hand across his face, roughly scrubbing at his eyes. The wetness smeared but clung, refusing to vanish.

“What if…” His voice was brittle, words snapping under their own weight. “What if it goes wrong? If you’re caught?” His gaze lifted, raw and searching, almost like a plea.

In-ho straightened just enough to meet his eyes head-on. He didn’t look away, didn’t soften the truth into something easier. He let each word land with deliberate weight, grounding them both. “I don’t plan to leave you. Not to chance. Not to failure. Every step is being counted, every detail checked twice over. I am not walking in blind.”

Gi-hun’s breath broke, hitching again. His throat worked as he tried to speak, words trembling on the edge of collapse. “But what if—”

“I’ll find a way out,” In-ho cut in, steady, absolute. His gaze didn’t waver, though something flickered in the depths of it—fear, maybe, or the shadow of desperation. “Back to you.”

Notes:

Folks - I wrote their first kiss last night. I can't guarantee which chapter it'll be in, but I just wanted you to know.... IT EXISTS. And I think it'll be coming pretty soon!

I'm sorry for the stress I put them through in this one, after the last couple of peaceful chapters, but it had to be done, and I hope you all enjoy the feels <3

Thanks as always for reading, and please let me know what you think, as I love to read your comments <3

Chapter 19: Absolution

Notes:

I really *really* hope you enjoy this chapter - I really struggled with this one, and I'm still not 100% sure on it, but... gah. I'll let you make up your own minds

Since their conversation in the garden, something had shifted between them. Nothing spoken, nothing obvious, but In-ho felt it all the same—a deeper understanding, as if some hidden thread tied them closer together.

He glanced toward the kitchen. Gi-hun was there with Hae-in, the little girl perched proudly in her high chair. The table before her was scattered with neat piles of food: orange wedges, fingers of buttered bread, pieces of egg, soft rice cakes cut into strips.

Gi-hun cut each one so carefully, In-ho was almost surprised he wasn’t using a tape measure and spirit level. He watched her like a man about to defuse a bomb, and every time Hae-in raised a morsel to her lips, his shoulders stiffened, eyes narrowing with the kind of dread only a parent could carry. In-ho caught the tiny tremor in Gi-hun’s breath when she gagged lightly, then managed to chew. Gi-hun sagged back with relief, his face crumpling into a laugh that was half-exhale, half-prayer.

He had been reading up on baby-led weaning, parroting advice he half-believed to anyone who would listen. “It helps them learn to chew, and encourages them to try new things. It’s good for independence.” But the worry was there in his eyes—in the way he hovered, in the way his hand twitched every time Hae-in coughed, already halfway to scooping her out of the chair before forcing himself still. He wanted to trust it, to trust her, but every swallow felt like a roll of the dice.

In-ho lingered on the scene for longer than he should have—on the tenderness, coupled with the constant, gnawing vigilance—and allowed the sight to fill him with warmth.

The sight caused warmth to spread in In-ho’s chest. He should have looked away by now—should have gone back to the lesson he’d set up at the low table where Jun-ho and Min-hyeok were waiting—but his eyes clung to the scene. Gi-hun’s patience, his fear, the raw devotion etched into every movement.

At last, he pulled himself back, spine straightening. The lesson wouldn’t wait.

He looked down at the notes spread across the low table and picked up one at random, then looked up at Jun-ho and Min-hyeok, who were both sat cross-legged before him, like schoolchildren waiting for a test.

“Spieler dreihundertachtundsiebzig eliminieren,” In-ho said in a clipped voice.

Jun-ho frowned. Min-hyeok shifted, lips moving silently as if counting syllables. They looked between each other as if trying to read each others’ mind.

“Quickly. Translate it,” In-ho said.

Min-hyeok swallowed. “Kill… Player 378.”

In-ho nodded curtly, then continued. “Bringen sie die leichen zur verbrennungsanlage.”

Jun-ho hesitated, then tried, “Dispose of the body?”

“Dispose of it how?” In-ho snapped. “If you can’t understand in the moment, you die in the moment. I said, ‘Take the corpses to the incinerator.’”

They both nodded, stammering their way through the German repetition. In-ho corrected each syllable, forcing them to spit the words back clearer and sharper. He pushed them again and again, the phrases ringing out across the room.

“Good,” he said. “Try this one. ‘Bringen sie wieder unter kontrolle.’”

He heard Jun-ho and Min-hyeok stumble through the sentence—Get them under control—but his attention faltered, tugged sideways.

Across the room, Hae-in had managed to smear yolk across both hands, bright yellow streaked up her wrists like war paint. She grabbed a strip of buttered bread with her fists and shook it triumphantly, scattering crumbs across the tray. When it slipped free and landed squarely on top of her head, she froze for a beat—then burst into shrieking laughter, legs kicking against the high chair as though she’d just pulled off the greatest trick in the world.

Gi-hun half-laughed with her, the sound tight, strangled around the edges. The corners of his mouth pulled upward even as his eyes darted back to her face, tracking the way her throat worked when she shoved another morsel straight into her mouth. Every time she gagged or coughed, however briefly, his whole body jolted, hand twitching towards her. It was clear that he was forcing himself not to snatch the food away, not to panic, but his shoulders stayed locked, jaw clenched so tightly it must have ached. The laugh that slipped out of him again sounded more like a release of nerves than joy, as if he were standing on the edge of something precarious.

There was something raw and unbearably human in Gi-hun’s helpless mix of amusement and terror—like he was being undone by love one heartbeat and strangled by fear the next. And Hae-in, blissfully unaware, squealed and clapped, smearing yolk further into her hair as if to crown herself in chaos.

For a fleeting moment, In-ho felt the corner of his mouth twitch before he forced it still. He turned back to the low table and couldn’t help but notice the slight smirk pass between Jun-ho and Min-hyeok.

“Bringen sie die spieler zurück in den schlafsaal,” he ordered, ignoring the rising heat across his chest.

Min-hyeok squinted, lips shaping the words in silence before testing them aloud. “Bring… the players… back to the dormitory?”

In-ho gave a curt nod. “Good. Say it back to me. Faster.”

They stumbled through it, tripping on consonants, repeating it until In-ho was satisfied.

Behind them, a shriek of laughter broke loose—high and unrestrained. In-ho’s eyes flicked to the side before he could stop himself. Hae-in was smacking both hands against the tray of her high chair, scattering rice cake fragments like shrapnel. Gi-hun chuckled as he tried to save the pieces the hadn’t landed on the floor.

“Wachposten übernehmen,” In-ho snapped, trying to regain his focus.

Jun-ho faltered. “…Take… over guard duty?”

A clatter caught everyone’s attention momentarily. In-ho saw Gi-hun bend down to pick up Hae-in’s dropped water cup, only for her to immediately throw it down in delight once again.

“That’s right,” said In-ho, although his attention hadn’t fully returned to the lesson.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jun-ho glance at Min-hyeok. Min-hyeok raised his brows, lips twitching in something dangerously close to a grin. In-ho forced his eyes back to them, but another bubble of laughter from Hae-in cracked the air, and he couldn’t help but look over. Gi-hun was brushing crumbs from her hair while she gleefully snatched the spoon from his hand, smearing yolk across her cheek in triumph.

“You’re not here with us today,” Jun-ho said at last, his tone almost amused. He sat back from the table, arms folding. “Go on. Stop glaring holes in us and just join them.”

Min-hyeok snorted, trying and failing to smother it, and In-ho shot them both a look sharp enough to cut. But it didn’t change the truth of what Jun-ho had said, nor the pull at the edge of his vision that kept drawing him back toward the kitchen.

He refused to rise to Jun-ho’s jab. He only set his jaw tighter, as if sheer discipline could drag his attention back into line.

“Wiederholen,” he ordered curtly. “Again.”

But before they could continue, Hae-in had decided she’d had enough of the high chair. She banged the spoon against the tray in protest, then flung it onto the floor and let out a thin, grating wail.

Gi-hun was back out of his seat at once, scooping her up, pressing her sticky cheek to his chest while he soothed nonsense into her hair. The cries quieted but didn’t stop. He glanced once toward In-ho, as though apologising for the interruption, before carrying her toward the bathroom. After a moment, the sound of running water, together with Gi-hun’s low voice humming, drifted faintly back into the room.

The lesson collapsed under the silence. Jun-ho leaned back on his hands. “Hyung,” he said, his voice sounding almost impatient. “Go to them. These are the moments you don’t want to miss.”

He was just about to cave and agree, when a knock came, sharp against the wooden frame of the hanok’s front door.

All three men froze, and for a heartbeat, the only sound was the muffled splash of water from the bathroom.

Then In-ho gave a tight nod. No words were needed. Jun-ho and Min-hyeok slipped silently toward the back, vanishing into the garden like smoke. In-ho rose to his feet and crossed the hall with careful, quiet steps.

He found Gi-hun bent over the bath, Hae-in pink and slippery in his hands, giggling as she tried to slap her palm against the water. Gi-hun looked up at In-ho’s shadow in the doorway, a wide smile on his face. “Did you see how well she did?” he said proudly. “She even managed to swallow some of it!”

“Door,” In-ho said quietly.

Gi-hun’s expression shifted immediately, the smile falling from his face. He looked over In-ho’s shoulder, just as there was a second knock at the door. “Just a minute!” he called out, quickly scooping Hae-in up. Water dripped down his arms, as In-ho reached for the towel hanging nearby. He held it open, and Gi-hun eased her into the soft fabric, swaddling her tight against his chest.

“Thank you,” Gi-hun said, lifting her a little higher and squaring his shoulders as he headed for the door.

In-ho lingered in the hallway, just beyond sight of the front door. He stood perfectly still, every muscle tuned to the faintest sound.

Muffled voices carried through the hanok—he heard Gi-hun apologise for taking so long, explaining that he was bathing his daughter and heard the polite reply of a stranger. The timbre of it allowed In-ho to relax; the reply came with the faint edge of routine, and In-ho moved a little closer, peering around the corner as he watched Gi-hun sign for a package.

A moment later, the door clicked shut and In-ho stepped out into the open. Gi-hun held a slim, brown package, which he held out to In-ho.

“You expecting something?” he said.

In-ho felt the corners of his mouth lift up into a smile. “Yes, actually.”

He took the parcel, which was addressed to Gi-hun—as were all incoming parcels, to maintain the illusion of him living alone—and could already picture the neat folds of paper inside, the stamped seals, the careful fabrications that would soon become their truth. Names that weren’t theirs, lives they had never lived, but ones they would soon step into.

The profiles he had built were of three Koreans who had fled the country not long after the sixth of November the previous year. Their absence was already written into the world; all he had to do was reframe it. Posing as former guards from another country’s Games would definitely draw less scrutiny when it came to any potential language barriers. The organisers in Germany had no reason to doubt it—and no qualms about hiring foreign soldiers, not when those soldiers had already proven themselves useful in the Games’ originating country. Death was a language everyone understood, and service to the Games needed no translation.

He called Jun-ho and Min-hyeok back inside, and handed them their new passports and identities.

“So does this mean we can give the german lessons a rest for now?” Jun-ho asked casually, as he flicked through his file.

“No, idiot,” In-ho snapped at him. “You still need to be able to follow orders.”

“I meant today, idiot,” Jun-ho said, his eyes glancing over towards Gi-hun.

In-ho followed Jun-ho’s gaze. Gi-hun sat slouched on the sofa, thumb moving idly over his phone while Hae-in wriggled and squealed in her bouncer. The screen’s glow lit his features faintly, softening the lines of exhaustion carved deep into his face.

He lingered a little longer, letting Jun-ho and Min-hyeok murmur over their documents in the background, before his feet carried him toward the sofa. The closer he came, the clearer the small flickers on Gi-hun’s face became. The faint lift of his lips, the tension in his jaw. In-ho leaned ever so slightly, and caught a glimpse of the screen—photographs of a girl smiling, photographs of a younger version of himself, happy and carefree beside her. Ga-yeong.

Gi-hun’s thumb swiped across one image, then lingered on the next, eyes soft and far away. The weight of longing in his expression pressed at something inside In-ho, something he quickly forced back down.

The moment Gi-hun realized he was being watched, he jolted as if caught. The phone clicked dark, shoved hastily onto the cushion beside him. His mouth opened like he might explain, then shut just as quickly.

In-ho said nothing. He let the silence stretch between them,, his gaze steady while Gi-hun’s flicked away, as though embarrassed to be seen carrying his own grief.

“How are the lessons going?” Gi-hun asked, his voice oddly strained.

“They’re doing well,” In-ho replied. “Jun-ho’s being a little shit about it all, but that’s brothers for you.”

Gi-hun gave the slightest nod of his head. “I always wanted a brother or a sister. Its what I wanted for…for Ga-yeong too.” He looked over towards Hae-in, his face full of melancholy.

In-ho lowered himself onto the sofa beside him, the cushion dipping between them. The silence stretched, awkward at first. He searched for words, something to meet Gi-hun’s melancholy with, but nothing came that didn’t feel clumsy or insufficient.

From across the room came a sudden peel of laughter—Jun-ho’s quick and sharp, Min-hyeok’s softer, following after it like an echo. In-ho’s gaze shifted, catching sight of them with their heads bent close over the papers, shoulders brushing. They looked easy, and natural. No hesitation in the way Min-hyeok nudged Jun-ho with his elbow, no second-guessing in Jun-ho’s grin.

It struck him in the chest, sharp and unbidden—a want so simple it almost felt foreign. To be that free. To sit this close to Gi-hun without the constant guardrails of restraint. To laugh with him, lean into him, without fear of the weight behind it.

His eyes flicked back to Gi-hun, to the tired set of his face, to the phone now turned face-down between them. He thought, as he so often did, of their conversation in the garden, of Gi-hun’s voice breaking when he admitted how much he needed him. The memory came with its own ache, sweet and suffocating all at once.

If he were braver, he would close the gap between them now. He would let himself reach across, take Gi-hun’s hand where it rested on his knee, feel the warmth of it and the tremor of a man who’d already lost too much. But instead, he stayed still. The wish pressed hard in his chest, and he forced himself to look away before it became unbearable.

Hae-in continued to bounce happily, the springs of the bouncer squeaking in rhythm with her kicks. Then, all at once, she stopped, opened her mouth wide, and declared at the top of her lungs, “Bababa!”

The sound startled a laugh out of both men before they could stop themselves. Gi-hun slid off the sofa, crouching down in front of her with a smile that softened every line of his face. “Appa,” he coaxed gently, tapping his chest with a finger. “Can you say ‘appa’? Appa.”

Hae-in only shrieked with delight, her mouth opening in another string of babbling nonsense. She flapped her hands excitedly, grinning as if she knew she’d just won something important.

Gi-hun laughed, his voice rich with warmth, and reached for Hae-in’s hands as she squealed and started jumping again. “Appa,” he repeated, his voice soft and gentle. “Appa.”

In-ho found himself smiling despite everything, the tension in his shoulders easing. Without thinking too much about it, he slid off the sofa and lowered himself onto the floor beside Gi-hun. Close enough that their knees almost brushed, close enough to feel the hum of warmth radiating from him.

Gi-hun glanced sideways at him, then turned back to Hae-in, trying again. “Appa,” he said once more, exaggerating the syllables. “Can you say it, jagi? Appa.”

In-ho let the sound of it roll through him. It was soft, full of longing and love, and he didn’t even try to hide the fondness in his face as he watched the two of them. For once, he didn’t feel the need to keep his distance. His hand twitched against his knee—so close to Gi-hun’s he could almost imagine reaching out, bridging the last inch between them.

He almost did it. Nearly let his hand stray over, just for a second. He wanted to know if Gi-hun would lean in or flinch away, what would pass over his face if In-ho let himself—just once—be direct. But Gi-hun looked up at the same moment, caught his gaze, and cowardice got the better of him.

“I should… get on with… you know,” he said, nodding his head towards where the paperwork with his assumed identity lay waiting.

Gi-hun nodded very slightly, and for a fleeting moment, In-ho thought he caught something there, something that looked like disappointment, but he shouldered the moment away, got up, and returned to the table.

***

The room was thick with silence, broken only by the occasional shift of the old hanok timbers. In-ho lay on his side, eyes wide in the dark, staring towards the bed’s other occupant.

Beside him, Gi-hun slept on his back, one arm flung loosely above his head, the other curled protectively across his stomach. His breathing was steady, deep, and soothing. Hae-in’s soft baby snores drifted from her crib across the room, a tiny counterpoint to her father’s rhythm.

In-ho closed his eyes, willing himself to match them, to surrender to sleep, but his mind refused. It churned instead, circling endlessly.

He thought of Hae-in earlier, her hands sticky with egg yolk, her triumphant grin as she smacked her tray, the near-miss choking sounds that had made Gi-hun go rigid with fear. She was growing, changing before his eyes—each day something new. A sound, a gesture, a spark of understanding.

And Gi-hun, his presence, his light. The way he had come back to life since becoming a father again. His incredible attentiveness and patience and pride for her.

In-ho’s thoughts snagged on that and twisted, as they always did, into places he couldn’t quite follow through. Wishes, what-ifs, the dangerous ache of wanting more than he dared to reach for.

He rolled onto his back, staring at the ceiling beams, and tried to drag his focus elsewhere. To the Games. To De Vriess. To the silence that had followed the capture of the spy.

Weeks now, and nothing. No message. No retaliation. Not even the whisper of a shadow on their tail.

Had De Vriess cut his losses? Written them off as a failed lead, moved on to safer ground? Or was he only waiting, biding his time for the strike that would undo everything?

If the threat truly had passed, if the silence meant freedom, could they return to some semblance of a life? Could he stop himself thinking like a hunted animal, stop counting the seconds between breaths?

The thought was seductive, dangerous in its softness. A life where they weren’t always preparing to run, to hide, to kill if necessary. A life where he might let himself be what he wanted to be.

But the weight of the darkness pressed back against him, reminding him that safety was never more than an illusion.

Gi-hun shifted beside him, mumbling something in his sleep, the edge of his hand brushing against In-ho’s arm before falling still again. The touch was barely there, accidental, but it lingered like fire on In-ho’s skin.

In-ho watched him closely, studying the lines of his face. He wanted to touch them, to trace his finger along the curve of his jaw. To feel the slope of his nose, the soft bow of his lips, the faint grooves carved around his eyes from too many years of laughter and grief alike. He wanted to map every part of him, to hold on to something solid, something real, when everything else in his life had been built on lies

Gi-hun shifted again. At first it was just a murmur, a restless twitch of his hand against the sheet. But then his breath changed—shallow, uneven. His shoulders drew taut, muscles pulling tight even in sleep. A nightmare was gathering. And Gi-hun would need his presence, his comfort, to return to sleep.

In-ho reached out slowly, a palm on Gi-hun’s chest, hoping that would be enough to quiet the fear rising within him. Gi-hun’s breath hitched, and his fingers curled against the sheet. His lips parted, forming shapes without sound. Then a broken word slipped free—too faint to make out, but heavy with fear.

Then there was a sharp gasp—like someone breaking the surface of water after nearly drowning. Gi-hun sat upright, chest heaving, sweat darkening the collar of his shirt. His hands were fisted in the sheets as if bracing against a tide only he could see.

“Hey,” In-ho said in a low voice, as he slowly and deliberately moved closer, his arm sliding across Gi-hun’s shoulders, drawing him down inch by inch until his head rested against In-ho’s chest.

“You’re ok,” In-ho murmured once.

Gi-hun let out a strangled sound, half sigh, half sob. His breathing stuttered, then steadied, syncing with the rise and fall of In-ho’s chest.

The warmth between them grew until In-ho felt it seep into him as well. It was foolish and dangerous, he knew but he couldn’t stop. Each time he touched Gi-hun like this, each time he felt the thrum of his pulse ease against him, it was harder to imagine letting go.

Gi-hun’s voice broke the silence at last, barely more than a whisper against In-ho’s shirt. “It was Ga-yeong.

In-ho stilled, though his hand kept its slow, steady path across Gi-hun’s back.

Gi-hun’s breath shivered out. “There was this—this shadow. Almost a man, but—I couldn’t see its face. It was just this… this huge thing. Black and faceless. It came for her. She was screaming for me. And it told me…” His throat closed, forcing him to stop, to swallow hard. “…told me the only way I’d see her again was if I gave it Hae-in.”

The words cracked, raw with helplessness. His shoulders shook once, sharp and brief, as if the nightmare still had its claws dug in.

Gi-hun’s fingers curled tight in the fabric at In-ho’s side, his voice rough as gravel. “And it wasn’t just her. There were others behind it, in the shadows… Jung-bae, standing there bleeding out. Sang-woo, with the knife still in his neck. Jun-hee—she kept whispering that I left her there. And Sae-byeok…”

He broke off, breath hitching, a sound like he was choking on the names.

“They all knew I’d put them there, that if I’d just been better, smarter, stronger, they’d still be alive.”

In-ho’s chest tightened. Not a single one of their deaths was Gi-hun’s fault. He kept his arm steady, but his jaw clenched hard against the ache of it.

Gi-hun shuddered. His voice dropped lower, trembling. “And then… then I saw you.”

In-ho froze.

“You were there, too. Behind them. Masked. Dressed in black. And they reached for you, the dead, all of them—pulling, dragging—and I couldn’t move. Couldn’t stop them. They were pulling you down into the dark with them and I—” His voice broke completely. “I just stood there. Watching. Doing nothing. Like always.”

The words collapsed into silence, and for a long moment there was only the sound of his breathing, ragged against In-ho’s chest. His weight pressed into him, hot and trembling, every shiver transmitting itself through In-ho’s body like aftershocks.

Slowly, carefully, In-ho tilted his head down until his lips almost brushed Gi-hun’s hair. “I’m not in the shadows,” he murmured, the words steadier than he felt. “Not anymore.”

Gi-hun let out a harsh, uneven breath, and his grip only tightened, fingers clutching at In-ho’s shirt like a man bracing against undertow. Instinct took over; In-ho’s arm curved more securely around him, holding him through the tremor. He let his hand rest between Gi-hun’s shoulder blades, drawing slow circles into the fabric—offering comfort in the only way he knew how.

For a long while, neither of them moved. Gi-hun’s breath rasped softly against his chest, shallow and uneven, his body a knot of tension slowly unwinding under the touch. And then—without warning—he shifted. His weight pressed closer, his forehead brushing against the line of In-ho’s throat. The warmth of it, the sheer closeness, made In-ho tense instinctively. His breath caught, heart lurching with a sudden, dangerous urge to close the gap fully, to pull him tight and not let go.

But before he could act, Gi-hun’s body stilled. A beat later, he pulled away.

He sat up abruptly, dragging a hand down his face as if trying to scrape away the nightmare still clinging to him. The absence of him left the air colder and emptier. In-ho’s arm dropped uselessly to the mattress, fingers curling against nothing.

Gi-hun swung his legs out of bed and padded barefoot across the floor, the boards creaking faintly under his weight. He bent over Hae-in’s cot, his silhouette outlined in the faint light leaking through the curtains. In-ho watched the way his shoulders softened for the briefest instant as he checked her, that helpless tenderness he only ever gave his daughter.

Then he straightened, hesitated just long enough for In-ho to hope he might look back—and without a word, he slipped from the room.

In-ho stayed where he was, staring into the dark. He told himself Gi-hun would come back. Minutes passed. Too many. The cold in the sheets spread.

Finally, In-ho rose and followed Gi-hun out into the living room.

He was sat cross-legged on the floor, back braced against the sofa, the room swallowed in shadows. The only light came from the moon spilling through the wide window, pale silver painting across his face. Even in that dimness, In-ho saw it: the tremor in his hands, the uneven rise and fall of his chest. He was shaking.

In-ho’s throat tightened. He wanted—no, ached—to close the distance, to reach for him without hesitation, but all he could do was sink down beside him. He folded his hands in his lap and waited.

For a long while, Gi-hun didn’t speak. The silence pressed thick between them, broken only by the faint hiss of the wind slipping under the eaves. Then, his voice came low, rough with exhaustion.

“Why are you still here?”

The words weren’t sharp, but they landed heavy. In-ho turned his head, studying the curve of Gi-hun’s profile—his hollowed cheeks, the tight pinch at the corner of his mouth.

Gi-hun’s gaze stayed fixed on the window, on the night beyond it. “You could’ve gone already. You should’ve gone. But you’re still here. Sharing my roof, my bed, pretending like…” He trailed off, dragging a hand through his hair. “…like any of this makes sense.”

In-ho’s pulse thudded in his ears. “Do you want me gone?”

“No,” he said earnestly. “But why?”

“I’m here because I want to be,” In-ho said carefully.

Gi-hun gave a short shake of his head, as if refusing to believe it. “But what is this, In-ho? Hm? What are we? I can’t—” His voice cracked, and he broke off, pressing the heel of his hand against his eyes. “I can’t keep guessing. I don’t know what any of it means. You—you sit with me, you look at me like I’m the only thing in the room, and then—then you pull away like it’s nothing. Like I imagined it.”

The tremor in his voice sliced clean through In-ho’s restraint. He hadn’t expected this—Gi-hun, raw and asking the very questions he’d been avoiding for weeks.

“And I can’t—I don’t know how to forgive you. But I can’t stop—” He broke off, dragging in a shaky breath. “I can’t stop feeling like this, either. Like something’s happening between us, and I don’t even know what the hell it is.”

The confession hit In-ho harder than any blow could. His throat worked, but the words stuck, caught in the wake of everything unsaid.

In-ho swallowed, throat dry. “It’s not…nothing,” he said, knowing how pathetic the answer was the moment it left his lips.

Gi-hun’s hand dropped from his face. He turned, finally meeting his gaze, and in the silver wash of moonlight, his eyes looked bruised with weariness. “Then what is it?”

In-ho’s chest tightened so hard it hurt. He wanted to answer, to give words to the pull he felt every time Gi-hun’s hand brushed his, to the ache of watching him with his daughter, to the way the thought of leaving pressed like a blade against his ribs. But the words still tangled and caught in his throat.

Gi-hun ducked his head, his breath uneven, his hands restless against his knees as if he could scrub the moment away. In-ho watched him—watched the rawness carved into his face, the fragility threaded through every line of him—and something inside refused to look away.

“Gi-hun,” In-ho murmured. Just his name, but it made Gi-hun lift his eyes, startled, vulnerable.

The ache sharpened into something perilous. In-ho should have looked away, should have forced the distance he always told himself was safest—but his hand lifted instead, almost without permission, fingertips brushing the dampness from Gi-hun’s cheek. The warmth of his skin seared through him; he felt the tremor running beneath the surface, the faint hitch of breath. And Gi-hun didn’t pull back. He stilled, then leaned infinitesimally closer, as though even he hadn’t realized his body had chosen.

That was when the weight of old guilt surged, thick and suffocating. Sermons echoed in his head, words burned into him since boyhood: abomination, temptation, sin. The demand that he turn away, bury it deep, lock it down before it ever saw the light. He almost did. His throat tightened, his chest heaved—but Gi-hun’s eyes wouldn’t let him.

Broken. Aching. Searching.

How could this be wrong, In-ho thought, when it felt so untainted? When it felt like the first true thing he had touched in years?

Slowly, carefully, he leaned forward until their foreheads rested together. Their breaths mingled, trembling, as if the smallest movement might collapse the fragile space they had carved out. For a single heartbeat, there were no gods, no judgment, no rules—only this.

Then Gi-hun shifted, tentative as though afraid of what it might mean, and his lips brushed In-ho’s. A touch so feather-light it might have been an accident, an almost-kiss either of them could deny come morning. It lasted only a breath before Gi-hun pulled back, shaky and uncertain, his lips parted like he might speak but couldn’t find words.

But In-ho was already moving. Drawn forward not by choice, not by courage, but by something deeper—a want, a need that was stronger than fear. Their mouths found each other again. This time the kiss lingered. Their lips pressed more firmly, still trembling with hesitation but unwilling to retreat. Gi-hun exhaled against him, a shiver of air that caught in In-ho’s chest, and for one impossible moment it felt like surrender.

Their breaths tangled, lips brushing once, twice, before finally parting—only by a fraction. They didn’t move away. They stayed close, close enough that In-ho could feel the uneven rhythm of Gi-hun’s breathing, the way his chest rose and fell like he was afraid to break the silence.

Neither spoke. Words would have shattered it—this fragile absolution, this quiet rebellion against everything he’d been told to believe.

And still, beneath it all, the old guilt whispered. Wrong, wrong, wrong. But In-ho pressed it down, shutting it away like a lid sealed tight on a box. If this was wrong, then let it be wrong. Because nothing so gentle, so pure, could ever be sin.

Notes:

*hides and peers through fingers* Sooooo..... ? Was it ok? I didn't want it to be a moment of 'let's rip each other's clothes off!' and it's still going to be a slow, and long time until that moment, but....

Yeah. I hope this ok.

*runs away*

Chapter 20: Borrowed Peace

Gi-hun woke before the dawn. The room was still heavy with night, its corners washed in the faintest blue-grey light that crept through the curtains. From across the room, the gentle sound of breathing told him Hae-in was still deep in sleep. Another rhythm, deeper, slower, pulled his attention to the man lying at his back.

In-ho.

For a long moment, Gi-hun didn’t move as he remembered the warmth at his side, the soft swipe of a thumb over his cheek, and the startling gentleness of lips meeting his in the dark.

They hadn’t spoken after the kiss. No questions, no confessions. In-ho had risen to his feet and held out a hand, and Gi-hun had taken it wordlessly, allowing In-ho to lead him back to bed. They had climbed under the covers together, and in that moment, in Gi-hun’s sleep-addled and confused state, he had half expected things to go further. But In-ho had slid close behind him, and wrapped an arm around his waist, pulling him close, and had made no other demands, falling asleep soon after.

Now, with the pale light of morning creeping closer, he rolled over slowly onto his other side. In-ho lay facing him, still asleep, his expression smoothed of the guarded sharpness he carried through the day. The difference was striking—without that armor, he looked younger somehow, almost vulnerable.

He studied him quietly, as if the stillness might shatter if he looked too hard. The faint rise and fall of his chest. The shadows beneath his eyes. The faint crease that lingered even in sleep, like his body had forgotten how to rest without vigilance.

The urge to reach out was almost unbearable. To brush a thumb along In-ho’s brow, to smooth away the stubborn crease. To trace the mouth that had pressed so hesitantly to his own. But he stayed still, caught between fear and want, watching the steady rise and fall of a man he hadn’t yet decided if he could forgive—and who he wasn’t sure could ever forgive himself.

Eventually, In-ho stirred. His breath hitched, a faint twitch running across his brow before his eyes cracked open. For a moment he just blinked, heavy with sleep, then found Gi-hun looking straight at him. The sight seemed to catch him off guard. He tensed faintly, as though unsure if he’d woken or was still dreaming.

Neither of them spoke. Gi-hun thought maybe he should—something light, something safe to cut the weight of silence—but the words wouldn’t come. He only kept watching, caught between the urge to look away and the strange pull of staying.

It was In-ho, finally, who broke. His mouth twitched, searching for shape, and then he said, voice scratchy with sleep, “You know… staring at someone while they’re unconscious is technically frowned upon. Some would call it creepy.”

Gi-hun raised an eyebrow. “That’s rich coming from you.”

In-ho smiled slightly but looked away quickly as though embarrassed.

Gi-hun let the silence linger for a few breaths longer, still smiling faintly. Then, softer, he said, “Maybe you should take a break today.”

In-ho turned his head back toward him, brows faintly drawn.

“I mean it,” Gi-hun went on, shifting so he was propped on one elbow. “You’ve been pushing yourself nonstop—training, planning, worrying about every little detail. We don’t have to go far. Just… a walk. Out in the woods for an hour. Clear your head.”

For a second, In-ho only studied him, the crease between his brows deepening. Gi-hun could see the resistance there—the instinct to argue, to say he didn’t have time, that there was still too much to do. His mouth parted, just about to form the words.

Gi-hun didn’t give him the chance.

He leaned forward, closing the distance between them, and pressed his lips to In-ho’s. It was quick, certain, without the trembling hesitation of the night before. A decision made before fear could creep in.

For a heartbeat, In-ho went still. Then Gi-hun felt him exhale against his mouth, soft and unsteady, while his hand shifted slightly, grazing over his ribs.

When Gi-hun pulled back, just enough to meet his eyes, he whispered, almost teasing but with something raw beneath it, “Don’t argue with me. Just… take the break.”

For a breathless moment, Gi-hun thought he’d pushed too far. The silence between heartbeats stretched, sharp with the fear that he’d made a mistake—that In-ho would pull away, build that wall up again.

And then, slowly, In-ho leaned forward and kissed him back. The press of his mouth was warm and unyielding, and when his hand brushed against Gi-hun’s shoulder—light, almost reverent—it sent a tremor racing through him.

Gi-hun breathed into it, relief flooding in where doubt had been, and when they parted just slightly, foreheads still leaning together, he searched In-ho’s face in the pale morning light.

An almost-smile tugged at In-ho’s mouth. His voice came rough with sleep, but certain.

“An hour. I’ll give you that much.”

“What do I have to do to get you for longer?”

The moment the words left his lips, he regretted it. He felt a furious heat flood his face, as if he’d stepped far beyond what either of them had agreed to admit aloud. He braced himself for In-ho’s silence, or worse—for him to pull away again.

But In-ho only huffed, the smallest exhale of something caught between disbelief and amusement. “Don’t push your luck,” he muttered, though there was no sharpness in it.

Gi-hun let himself smile, shaky but real. For a fragile heartbeat it felt like they were suspended in something outside of time, a place where nothing pressed on them but the warmth of the other. But he knew better than to hold on too long. He drew back slightly, enough for the air between them to cool, and pushed himself upright.

“I should check on Hae-in,” he said, torn between parental instinct and the want to stay put.

The cot creaked faintly when he leaned over it, and the sight of her sent his chest loosening in ways no words ever could. She was sprawled on her back, mouth slack, one chubby fist pressed against her cheek. Completely at peace.

Gi-hun watched her chest rise and fall for longer than necessary, drinking in the simple rhythm, until a thought crept into his mind: how this was a life he never imagined he’d still be here to see. He smiled down at her, and quickly wiped away the wetness that threatened to fall from his eyes.

“Jun-ho could watch her,” In-ho said suddenly.

Gi-hun glanced over his shoulder. In-ho was sitting up in bed, watching him closely.

“Jun-ho could—?”

“Watch her,” In-ho repeated. “It’d only be for an hour. And we could…be alone.”

Gi-hun hesitated, unsure if he’d heard right. He glanced back to Hae-in, and felt a strange mix of giddy possibility coupled with nerve-wracking terror. The thought of leaving her alone made his breath catch in his throat. But it was only an hour. And they wouldn’t be far…

His eyes flitted back to In-ho. “Just the two of us?” he said.

In-ho nodded, his gaze steady and unflinching. “We could walk the ridge, or just… anywhere.” He sounded almost uncertain, as if ‘anywhere’ was too soft a luxury for people like them.

Gi-hun tried to imagine it: the two of them out there on the path above the tree-line, away from the constant tick and hum of the hanok, away from lessons and mail drops and the endless shadow of the past. Just walking side by side, maybe saying nothing at all. The picture made his chest tighten, sharp and tender all at once

They waited until the sun had fully risen, its golden light spilling through the windows in warm rectangles across the wooden floor. Hae-in, milk-drunk and already drowsy after her first feed of the day, was settled on her playmat, tiny fists occasionally batting the toys above her. When Jun-ho finally emerged from his room, In-ho cleared his throat and announced their plans with studied casualness.

Gi-hun watched the silent conversation pass between the brothers—Jun-ho's eyebrows lifting slightly, the corner of his mouth quirking upward in that knowing half-smile, while In-ho's jaw tightened, his eyes narrowing in a clear warning that made Gi-hun wonder if In-ho was preparing to take back his donated kidney.

As they prepared to leave, Gi-hun found himself checking and rechecking the baby, making sure Jun-ho knew exactly how to change her or bathe her if needed. "One hour," he whispered, more to himself than to anyone else. "Just one hour, and we'll be close enough to hear if anything happens."

The path curled up into the woods like an invitation, narrow and half-swallowed by fallen needles. The trees leaned close together overhead, their branches filtering the morning light into shifting fragments—dappled gold on moss, silver where the dew still clung. Each breath Gi-hun drew filled his lungs with air that was startlingly clean, tinged with pine and damp earth, and he couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt anything so sharp and alive.

For the first stretch, they didn’t speak. They didn’t need to. The forest had its own conversation—birds chattering in high, jubilant notes; the faint rustle of a squirrel leaping branch to branch; the low murmur of the wind combing through leaves. Their footsteps fell into rhythm, the hush of In-ho’s stride measured and sure, Gi-hun’s a little uneven, clumsy at times but still keeping pace. Somehow, walking beside him like this, Gi-hun felt the restless noise in his head dim, replaced by something quieter and steadier.

He glanced sidelong at In-ho once, catching the way his shoulders carried a stillness Gi-hun couldn’t name. Not tension exactly—more like he was always listening for something only he could hear. Gi-hun almost asked what it was, but the peace of the morning held him back. It seemed enough just to walk here together, saying nothing at all.

The path steepened and the ground underfoot shifted from pine needles to loose stone. Gi-hun shuffled sideways to keep his balance, but his heel slipped. A sharp jolt ran up his leg, and before he could even try for a recovery, In-ho’s hand closed around his wrist—steady and strong, with no hesitation. Not a word passed between them. In-ho held tight until Gi-hun righted himself, then, instead of dropping away, his grip slid down to his hand, fingers closing around his with a pressure that was careful but impossible to misread.

They kept walking.

It was a small thing—a gesture so simple Gi-hun almost laughed at the absurdity of how much it shook him. But the pressure of In-ho’s hand around his own, the warmth of it, the refusal to let go even after the risk had passed—Gi-hun felt it as a wild charge through his whole body, equal parts terror and relief. He found himself gripping back, not letting go even when they slowed, even when the path levelled out and there was no danger left at all.

They walked together that way until they reached a small clearing, a mossy circle cupped by birch trees. Beyond the trees, a shallow drop revealed the valley, mist still clinging to the far-off fields. Gi-hun stood rooted for a moment, letting the view soak in, then sat down heavily on a broad, flat boulder. It was cold beneath him, but he didn’t care. He let his legs dangle and braced his hands beside his hips, palms splayed wide over the roughness.

In-ho didn’t sit at first. He paced the edge of the clearing, his hands tucked into his jacket, gaze tracing the tree line. Gi-hun watched him, trying to read whether he was searching for threats, or for danger or for something else entirely, but Gi-hun didn’t feel like he had to fill the silence. He watched In-ho’s slow orbit, the way the cold light caught in his hair and the rigid line of his shoulders.

“Sit,” Gi-hun called out after a while, patting the rock beside him. “You make the trees nervous, pacing like that.”

In-ho hesitated—almost comically, as if unfamiliar with the concept—but then crossed the clearing and lowered himself onto the stone with less grace than usual.

The rock was broad enough that they didn’t need to touch, but still In-ho shifted closer, shoulders brushing. Gi-hun felt it, sharp as a jolt, but forced himself not to pull away. The silence stretched, filled only with birdsong and the rustle of the breeze through birch leaves.

Then, as if some invisible decision clicked into place, In-ho’s hand moved again. Slowly, deliberately, he reached for Gi-hun’s, his fingers sliding back into that familiar grip. Their palms fit together with a kind of inevitability, and once more, he didn’t let go.

Gi-hun’s chest tightened. He stared at their joined hands, the contrast of them—In-ho’s wide, broad, and strong, his own long and slender.

They sat like that for a long while, letting the forest settle around them. Gi-hun could feel the pulse in In-ho’s hand—quiet, strong, maddeningly calm—and it made him ache in ways he didn’t have words for.

At last, he swallowed hard, his voice barely louder than the rustling leaves. “Do you think… this will ever be our normal?”

The question broke from him before he had the chance to leash it. It hung there between them, fragile and unanswerable, a thread he half-wished he could snatch back the moment it left his lips.

He turned his head then, meeting In-ho’s profile—the careful stillness, the slight flicker of his jaw as though the words had landed somewhere deep.

Gi-hun squeezed his hand tighter. “I mean this. Us. Not just stolen hours or….” His throat tightened again. “Do you think we’ll ever get to have it without having to watch our backs all the time?”

In-ho didn’t look away. For a moment his jaw worked, as if he were chewing on the words before releasing them. Finally, softly, he said,

“I hope so.”

The simplicity of it struck Gi-hun harder than any long speech could have. Not certainty, not empty reassurance—just hope. Fragile, human, and honest.

Gi-hun’s chest ached. He studied In-ho’s face, the fine lines carved by years of restraint, the way his eyes softened in rare, unguarded moments like this. He thought about the man who had carried masks and secrets, who had walked too far into shadows—and the one sitting here beside him now, holding his hand as if it were the only thing keeping him tethered to the earth.

Their gazes locked. The silence wasn’t empty anymore—it thrummed, alive with all the things neither of them could quite say.

“Kiss me.” Gi-hun’s voice came out low, uneven, his throat tight. “Please.”

He half expected refusal. A shake of the head, a quiet warning that out here they could be seen, a reminder of the gulf that still stretched between them. Instead, In-ho leaned in without hesitation. Their mouths met with a surer weight this time, less tentative, though still threaded with care. The world hushed around them—the birdsong fading, the breeze dying down—until all Gi-hun could feel was the heat of the kiss, the press of In-ho’s lips against his, steady and real.

Gi-hun let his eyes fall shut. He tried, with everything in him, to let go—of the games, of the blood, of the endless parade of ghosts that clung to In-ho’s name. He tried to focus only on this moment: the taste of shared breath, the way In-ho’s thumb brushed lightly against his knuckle, the fragile proof that here and now, they chose each other.

And for the first time in longer than he could remember, Gi-hun didn’t feel like he was drowning. He felt like he was surfacing.

Gi-hun was the one who broke it. Reluctantly, slowly, he eased back until their foreheads brushed one last time. His voice was low, apologetic, though he couldn’t quite say what for. “We should… head back. Before Jun-ho starts thinking we’ve eloped.”

The corner of In-ho’s mouth twitched, but he didn’t argue. He only nodded, quiet as ever, and rose from the stone. Gi-hun let himself be pulled up, his palm sliding naturally back into In-ho’s.

They walked the path in near silence, hand in hand. The woods had shifted in the hour since they’d entered, the light warmer, more golden, dappling across the undergrowth like spilled honey. Gi-hun held on tighter than he meant to, like if he loosened his grip even a little In-ho might slip away into the trees, into shadows, into the past that still clung to him like smoke.

For most of the way, In-ho didn’t let go. His hand was warm and steady, thumb occasionally brushing against Gi-hun’s in the smallest, subtlest movement. But as the roof of the hanok appeared through the trees, In-ho’s fingers shifted. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, he pulled his hand free. By the time they reached the edge of the clearing, there was nothing between them but air.

Gi-hun swallowed against the sting that rose in his chest. He didn’t say anything—not here, not with the house in sight and the world waiting to press back in—but the absence of that touch left his palm cold.

He forced a smile instead, shallow but serviceable, and stepped ahead to slide the door open. Behind him, he felt In-ho hesitate, just for a heartbeat, before following.

The hanok was warm when they stepped back inside, the air thick with the faint smell of barley tea and rice still steaming from breakfast. Hae-in was sprawled across her playmat on her stomach, fists pounding in determined thuds as she tried—and failed—to push herself forward. Her squeals of frustration rang through the open space, punctuated by little gurgling laughs when Jun-ho dangled a spoon just out of reach.

“Come on, general,” Jun-ho coaxed. “Charge the spoon. Don’t let it escape.”

Gi-hun couldn’t help but laugh, the tension of the woods easing from his shoulders as he crouched to scoop his daughter up. “You’re lucky she didn't start crawling. If I’d missed that first, you’d have a very jealous appa to deal with.”

“You think I couldn't handle that?” Jun-ho said, grinning as he tossed the spoon lazily into the air and caught it. “Anyway…” He glanced over the room towards Min-hyeok, who was sprawled on the low sofa, a newspaper open in his hands.

They exchanged a knowing look, before Min-hyeok folded away the paper. “Nice walk?” Min-hyeok asked, his tone light but the smirk pulling at his mouth unmistakable.

“Fresh air suits you,” Jun-ho added. “Both of you look… flushed.”

“You were gone a long time,” Min-hyeok said casually, snapping his paper straight. “Long enough for… contemplation.”

Jun-ho snorted. “Contemplation. Right.”

The exchange played out like they’d rehearsed it a hundred times. Jun-ho tossing out bait, Min-hyeok layering on, both of them grinning at the flush creeping up In-ho’s neck as he ignored them with military precision. He busied himself at the counter, filling a kettle with too much focus, as though boiling water required every ounce of discipline he had ever learned.

Gi-hun couldn’t help but watch it all, warmth tugging at the corners of his mouth despite himself. Everything felt so…normal… The rhythm of teasing, of everyday chores, of laughter tucked into corners—it wrapped around him like a blanket he hadn’t realized he’d been missing.

He shifted Hae-in on his hip, pressing a kiss to her temple as she batted at his chin with sticky fingers. He thought—just for that heartbeat—that maybe, somehow, this could last.

His phone rang. He let his eyes linger on the scene a few moments longer, before he pulled it out and glanced down at the screen.

His stomach jolted when he saw who was calling.

Eun-ji.

She never called. Not unless something was wrong. Not unless it was about Ga-yeong.

His breath stuttered as he swiped to answer. “Eun-ji? Everything ok?”

But the voice that answered wasn’t hers.

“Don’t speak. Just listen.”

Gi-hun froze, every muscle in his body tightening. The room around him went muffled—the hiss of the kettle, Jun-ho’s ribbing of Inn-ho, and Min-hyeok’s responding laughter—all fading beneath the low, steady cadence of that unknown voice.

“If you care about your daughter, you are going to follow my instructions to the letter. Do you understand?” the caller continued, each word deliberately measured

The phone felt suddenly heavy in Gi-hun’s hand, his throat locked tight. His eyes darted across the room—at In-ho, at Jun-ho, at Min-hyeok, all oblivious to the voice dripping venom in his ear. Hae-in wriggled in his arms, laughing at some private joke of her own.

Gi-hun’s heart thundered so loudly he thought it might break through his ribs.

“Yes,” he breathed. His grip on the phone trembled, and he quickly ducked down to put Hae-in on her mat. Then he lifted his free hand sharply, palm out, demanding silence. The shift in the room was immediate. Jun-ho’s grin vanished, Min-hyeok’s smile froze, and In-ho, kettle still in hand, went utterly still.

Without a word, Gi-hun tapped the screen, switching to speaker. The caller’s voice filled the hanok, calm, deliberate, almost bored.

“A courier is on his way to you now. He will knock at the door within minutes. You will answer. You will sign. And then, while you remain on this line, you will open the package in front of you.”

Gi-hun’s mouth went dry. His throat locked around words that wouldn’t form. Finally, he managed, “Do… do you want me to—?”

“Don’t ask. Listen.” The interruption was like a knife, sharp and absolute. “Do you understand?”

Every eye in the room was on him. He felt pinned by their stares, the weight of their silent questions pressing in, but he couldn’t look away from the phone.

“I…” He swallowed hard, his voice catching. “Yes. I understand.”

The line went quiet, save for the faint hiss of static. The man was still there, waiting.

And then, as if conjured by the words, the crunch of tires on gravel echoed from outside. A white courier van pulled up in view of the narrow window. Gi-hun’s pulse hammered in his throat, in his ears, in his fingertips.

The knock came. Sharp. Ordinary. A sound that belonged to any normal morning, only now it struck like a death knell.

In-ho shifted, half-rising from his seat, but Gi-hun shot him a warning glance—don’t. If the caller was watching, if they were already under surveillance, any deviation could mean danger.

So Gi-hun went. His legs felt wooden as he crossed the floor. He opened the door to find a young man in uniform, holding a clipboard. His face was bored, his tone routine.

“Delivery for Seong Gi-hun?”

Gi-hun forced his hand to steady as he scrawled his name across the form. He accepted the slim, brown parcel and closed the door behind him with a muted thud.

The room was silent when he returned. He set the package down on the low table.

“You have it?” said the voice on the phone. “Open it.”

Mouth dry, and fingers fumbling at the tape, Gi-hun pulled the top of the parcel open. Inside were two numbered envelopes, and another, smaller parcel.

The voice on the phone crackled again. “Open envelope number one.”

Gi-hun’s fingers hovered over the stack. His pulse thudded against his ribs. He reached for the first envelope, marked clearly with a bold black 1, and began to tear it open, paper splitting beneath his shaking hands.

The paper rasped as Gi-hun slid the photograph from the first envelope. His stomach dropped before his mind even caught up.

It was them.

Him, In-ho, and Hae-in. At the market. The moment they had stood beneath the blossoms that fell about them like scented snowflakes.

A private moment, stolen.

His fingers tightened around the photo until it bent.

The caller’s voice cut cleanly through the silence. “Now you see. We know. We know you are in contact with the Hwang brothers. And here is the proof. Now, open the second.”

Every breath in the room seemed to vanish. Jun-ho’s jaw was clenched so tight the muscle ticked in his cheek; Min-hyeok’s hands balled into fists. In-ho sat rigid, eyes locked on the photograph, his stillness more frightening than fury.

Gi-hun forced himself to breathe, shallow and unsteady. His hand reached, trembling, for the second envelope.

Inside, glossy photographs spilled into his lap, and his heart lurched so violently he nearly choked.

Eun-ji. Her husband. Their young son.

And Ga-yeong.

All of them bound to chairs, wrists tied, mouths gagged with strips of dirty cloth. Their eyes were wide, fixed on the camera, terror etched deep into their faces. Ga-yeong’s cheeks were streaked with tears, her whole body twisted as if she’d been thrashing against the ropes.

The floor seemed to tilt beneath Gi-hun. His throat burned as words clawed their way out, ragged and sharp. “If you lay a single finger on them—”

“Open the package,” the voice interrupted, smooth and merciless.

Gi-hun froze. His gaze dropped to the small, neat box. His hands shook so badly he could barely pull at the tape. The paper gave, slow and reluctant, as if even the box itself resisted being opened.

Inside was a plastic baggie. He pulled it out of the box and held it up, then immediately recoiled and ropped it, bile rising hot and sour in his throat. Inside the baggie, pale and stiff, one end ragged and marred with dried blood, was a human finger.

His vision swam. Somewhere behind him, Min-hyeok swore under his breath; Jun-ho’s breath came out in a harsh hiss. In-ho was silent, his face unreadable stone.

“You can sit with that for forty-eight hours,” the caller said, his tone calm, almost conversational. “IIt should give you enough time to decide where your loyalties lie. In forty eight hours we will call you again, from a private number. You will give up the Hwang brothers’ location. Fail, and you’ll be sent another piece.”

The line went dead.

The silence that followed was unbearable. Gi-hun’s lungs heaved, his body frozen, the photographs spread across the table like a nightmare laid bare in the open. He couldn’t speak. Couldn’t move. His entire body buzzed with a kind of numb, electric cold. The photographs, the bagged finger—that was real. Not a threat in some distant shadow, but here, in his hands, inside their home.

He pressed both hands to his face and tried to breathe, tried to focus on anything but the wordless scream running through his veins.

Jun-ho crossed the space first, yanking the phone from Gi-hun’s hand. He thumbed through the last number, the time stamp, the call log—just a routine, maybe, a need to do something. In-ho snatched up the photographs, flipping through each one, gaze flicking so fast it blurred. No panic, no shaking, just a harsh, clinical focus that made Gi-hun want to smash things.

Min-hyeok moved to the window, pushed the curtains aside, and stared into the yard as if expecting an army to rise from the trees. He stood like that, tension radiating off him, until Gi-hun thought he might shatter the glass by staring alone.

Gi-hun’s mind played back the photographs on a feverish loop: Ga-yeong’s face, streaked and desperate; Eun-ji, her head bowed, knuckles white where her hands gripped the ropes; the boy, so small, feet not even touching the ground. The bagged finger sat in front of him like accusation and sentence both. Larger than a child’s but still delicate. It belonged to Eun-ji, he was sure of it.

His body wanted to run, to throw up, to smash the table and collapse in the same instant. He stared at the bag for so long he almost forgot where he was. The walls of the hanok receded to a thin membrane, holding back the world by only inertia and habit. He didn’t hear the others at first—Jun-ho and Min-hyeok muttering, In-ho’s voice low and razor precise, the patter of Hae-in fussing and the whine of the kettle left too long on the heat. He just sat, coiled around the raw center of himself, the photographs and the finger and the echo of the caller’s voice looping through his head until it scraped him hollow.

Something clinked near his hand. A glass. He blinked and looked up, slow, like the movement cost him. In-ho had set a tumbler of whiskey beside the photographs, half an inch poured, the amber refracting against the dark grain of the table. He didn’t say anything—just sat across from Gi-hun, hands folded on the wood, his gaze on Gi-hun. Waiting, not for explanations, but for the moment he could push his own plan into the open.

Gi-hun didn’t want the whiskey, but he took it anyway, desperate for the numb heat. It caught in his throat and scalded all the way down.
"What do I do?" The words scraped out of Gi-hun's throat like broken glass.

In-ho's eyes flashed with something dangerous. His knuckles whitened as he pressed them against the table. "You give us up," he said, each word a bullet. "There's no other way."

Min-hyeok slammed his fist against the wall. "Like hell—" Jun-ho lunged forward, chair clattering to the floor, but In-ho's hand shot up, cutting through their protests like a blade.

"You. Give. Us. Up." In-ho leaned across the table, his face inches from Gi-hun's, voice dropping to a lethal whisper. "But in those forty-eight hours, we're going to build a trap that will drown them in their own blood. I swear on my life, Gi-hun—your daughter will come home. And De Vriess will beg for death long before I grant it."

Notes:

Thank you all! And we're really about to get into it now....

Comments and kudos are always welcome :)

And special shoutout to tearsandholdme for helping me get my thoughts in order! 💖💖💖

Chapter 21: Cold Calculations

In-ho’s mind was already racing, but his immediate priority was Gi-hun. He had seen Gi-hun broken down and devastated, had seen him during the worst moments of his life, but never like this. Frozen and terrified and completely paralyzed.

In-ho leaned forward, voice low and steady. “Gi-hun.” No response. Not even the flick of his eyes.

He reached across the table, closing his hand gently over Gi-hun’s wrist, grounding him with warmth and pressure. He felt the tremor under his skin, the faint, rapid thrum of his pulse. “Look at me,” he said, firm now, cutting through the silence. “You are not alone in this.”

Gi-hun’s eyes finally dragged up to his, and they were glassy and unfocused. His mouth opened, but nothing came out—just a hoarse rasp that broke into silence again.

“Breathe,” In-ho instructed. He waited, holding the stare until Gi-hun dragged in a shaky, uneven breath. And another. Still jagged, but steadier.

“Good,” In-ho said softly, tightening his grip just slightly. “Again.”

Gi-hun’s chest hitched, but he obeyed—dragged another breath down into his lungs. His free hand curled into a fist against the table, his knuckles white, as though he needed the physical act of holding on to keep from splintering apart.

In-ho didn’t let go. He leaned in closer, enough that Gi-hun couldn’t drop his gaze again, couldn’t retreat back into that spiraling panic. “Gi-hun, listen to me, we’re not giving up.”

A flicker passed over Gi-hun’s face, something like fear, something like anger. His lips parted. “Ga-yeong… Eun-ji…” The words cracked, unfinished, his throat closing around them.

“I know,” In-ho said quickly, before he drowned in the weight of the names. He squeezed his wrist, steady and unyielding. “We’re going to get them back.”

Jun-ho hovered nearby, but wisely kept quiet. Min-hyeok paced behind him, jaw set. None of them moved closer, all waiting on the fragile thread between Gi-hun and In-ho.

In-ho’s mind was already several steps ahead, though he kept his face calm and his voice gentle. The caller had revealed too much—proof of surveillance, yes, but also impatience. Forty-eight hours. That wasn’t a lot of time to set any counter measures in motion, but In-ho was counting on them believing it to be impossible. And nothing was impossible.

Forty-eight hours was a timeline he could work with.

But first, Gi-hun. Without him steady, none of it mattered.

“You’re not going to lose them,” In-ho said, softer now. “Not to him. Not while I’m still breathing.” He let the words sit between them, not just as reassurance, but as a vow.

In-ho reached for the bottle, tipping another measure of whiskey into Gi-hun’s glass. The sound of liquid meeting crystal was loud in the silence, but Gi-hun’s hand closed around it without prompting. He lifted it to his lips in a slow, shaky arc, but he drank. That was something.

“Good,” In-ho murmured. He leaned back only enough to glance at the others, then called, “Jun-ho. Min-hyeok. Sit.”

Jun-ho crossed the room first, shoulders tight, every inch of him braced for a fight that hadn’t yet arrived. Min-hyeok followed with a calm focus that matched In-ho’s own. They took the empty chairs, their eyes flicking between Gi-hun and the photographs still scattered on the table.

In-ho folded his hands together. “We don’t waste time. They’ve given us forty-eight hours. I want every contingency covered before that time is up.”

Jun-ho leaned forward, his voice clipped. “First priority is tracking the call.” He turned to Gi-hun. “He used your ex wife’s phone?” Gi-hun nodded blankly.

“Probably knew you wouldn’t answer from a withheld number,” Min-hyeok added.

Jun-ho nodded. “It makes getting a trace on it much easier.”

“You’ll have to be quick,” In-ho interrupted. “If he’s got any sense, he’ll have already lost the phone. But pull every favour you can, use any contact at the station you trust. We can at least find where that call was made, and get the area searched.”

Jun-ho nodded, jaw set.

Min-hyeok drummed his fingers against the wood. “You’ll need boots, too. People who can move quiet and fast, no questions asked. I can call in mercs. Not amateurs—ex-military, the kind who’ve done rescue pulls before. But it won’t be cheap.”

In-ho’s gaze flicked once to Gi-hun, then back. “Money isn’t the obstacle. But trust is. They answer to you, then they answer to me. Make that clear.”

Min-hyeok gave a short nod, eyes narrowing.

In-ho shifted his attention back to Gi-hun. He was drinking again, small sips, but his hand still trembled faintly around the glass. In-ho let a beat pass, let him see the calm in his own expression before he spoke. “Gi-hun. You don’t have to carry this alone. Do you understand? Your job is to hold steady. Ours is to get them back.”

Gi-hun’s throat worked, his eyes shimmering with a raw hurt. The pain in his eyes reflected deep in In-ho’s chest. “I won’t let him hurt them. That’s a promise,” In-ho said.

In-ho looked around. Jun-ho was already bent over his laptop, pulling maps and data into place with quick, silent focus. Min-hyeok moved to the window, phone pressed to his ear, his voice low and measured as he made the first of what In-ho knew would be many calls. The room shifted into a rhythm—gears already grinding into motion.

Across the table, Gi-hun moved suddenly. He rose without speaking, glass of whiskey still clutched in his hand like a tether. He didn’t so much walk as drift, his shoulders low, gaze fixed somewhere far beyond the walls. He lowered himself onto the sofa with slow, heavy movements, as though the weight in his chest physically dragged him down.

In-ho watched him for a beat. Watched him stare at the baby on the playmat, her tiny hands batting at the dangling toys, her small, contented noises filling the silence. Gi-hun leaned forward, forearms braced on his knees, and the way he stared—rigid and hollow—made something in In-ho’s chest twist.

He got up. Left Jun-ho and Min-hyeok to their work and crossed the room, settling down beside him on the sofa. Not so close that it startled him, but close enough that Gi-hun would feel him there. A line of warmth against the chill creeping into the man’s bones.

He said nothing. Just let his gaze drop to the same point: Hae-in. The only anchor in this storm.

For a long time, there was only the patter of tiny fists on plastic, the click of keys, the hush of Min-hyeok’s voice. Then, hoarse and sudden, Gi-hun spoke.

“She’s so innocent,” he rasped, eyes locked on his daughter.

In-ho said nothing, but merely nodded.

“Ga-yeong, too,” Gi-hun added. “She’s—” He couldn’t seem to finish the sentence. Instead he wiped his eyes on the back of his hand, and stared in Hae-in’s direction without focusing, his mind clearly imagining all kinds of horrors.

“She’s going to be ok,” In-ho finished for him.

He could sense Gi-hun’s whole self coiled around that promise—desperate, faithless, and clinging anyway. In-ho paused for a moment, and glanced back over his shoulder to where Jun-ho and Min-hyeok were already working, then, before his courage gave out, he gently placed his hand on Gin-hun’s knee. “We don’t let him define what comes next. Not for her and not for you.”

The baby squealed, a wet, bubbly sound. Gi-hun looked at her with an ache so plain In-ho had to look away.

His hand stayed on Gi-hun’s knee. He could feel the faint tremor still running through him, like the aftermath of some internal quake. He pressed his thumb down gently, the smallest circle of pressure.

Gi-hun let out a breath that hitched, and when he began to speak, his voice broke. “I still haven’t… I haven’t spoken to her in… I kept meaning to. I kept wanting to call her, but… I was afraid. I thought she might hate me for…for not being there. And now—” His throat closed, and he shut his eyes hard, fingers tightening around the glass in his hand as though it were the only thing keeping him tethered. “I can’t lose her, In-ho. Not Ga-yeong. I can’t—”

“You won’t,” In-ho said.

“And not just her,” Gi-hun added, his gaze falling on to In-ho’s hand. He knocked back the rest of his drink, then slumped back against the sofa cushions.

In-ho looked over his shoulder towards Jun-ho, towards Min-hyeok, and thought about how easily they could show affection. Gi-hun deserved that. He deserved that level of openness. He needed it. Especially now.

He turned back towards Gi-hun, slumped against the cushions, whiskey glass slack in his hand. His words still echoed—not just her—and though Gi-hun hadn’t looked directly at him when he said it, In-ho had felt the weight behind them, a tether pulling taut between them.

Across the room, Jun-ho and Min-hyeok bent close over their laptops, trading quiet murmurs. He thought of how they behaved around each other in front of other people. The brush of shoulders, the occasional glance and smile—it was so casual it might have passed unnoticed, but In-ho caught it. He caught everything.

He tried to imagine himself being so open but the thought of it—of letting anyone see him this way—tightened his chest with something sharp and suffocating. Jun-ho almost certainly already knew; his brother had always been too perceptive, too quick to read silences. And still, that didn’t ease the old shame pressing in on him. The reflex to hide was strong, almost instinctive. But against it, something stronger pressed back: the pull toward Gi-hun, the quiet ache to not keep this secret anymore, to claim even the smallest piece of truth in the open air. Fear snarled in him, but alongside it, a startling, dangerous desire: to let himself be seen.

So he made the choice.

He shifted, pressing his shoulder firmly against Gi-hun’s. His hand stayed on Gi-hun’s knee, until finally he lifted his arm and drew him in fully, wrapping around him with quiet certainty. Gi-hun resisted for only a heartbeat before giving way, pressing his face into In-ho’s shoulder with a sharp, shuddering exhale that broke into sobs.

In-ho tightened his hold, tilting his head to press a steady kiss into Gi-hun’s hair, lingering there for a moment longer than he meant to. His other hand stroked slowly down Gi-hun’s arm, a rhythm meant to soothe, to ground. He let him cry like that, held close against him, his shirt dampening under the heat of tears.

And still, beneath the ache that pulled at him with every sound, his mind split cleanly in two. One part held the man trembling against him, offering the comfort he so clearly needed. The other part catalogued everything: the threat, the leverage De Vriess thought he had, any allies they could still call upon, the pieces of the board that might yet be turned in their favour.

When the storm inside Gi-hun finally eased to something softer—sniffs, uneven breaths that no longer tore him apart—In-ho loosened his hold just enough to look at him. He kept one arm around him, his thumb absently tracing along the fabric of Gi-hun’s sleeve, but his tone shifted—low, steady, practical.

“I want you to do something for me,” he said.

Gi-hun blinked at him, eyes still raw, his expression muddled with grief and exhaustion. “What?”

In-ho hesitated for only a moment. He knew how it would sound—like control, like distrust—but it wasn’t. It was insurance. He leaned in slightly, pressing his lips once more to the crown of Gi-hun’s head before he spoke. “I want you to have the tracker put back in. The one in your tooth. Just as a precaution.”

Gi-hun stilled. For a few beats, he just stared, the request hanging between them like something heavy. His mouth opened, shut, then he let out a long breath. In-ho felt the tension return to his frame for a moment, but then, slowly, Gi-hun’s shoulders dropped. “Alright,” he murmured, voice rough. “Just…just in case.”

Relief flickered across In-ho’s face, though he kept it contained. He gave Gi-hun’s arm a slow stroke down to his wrist, then tightened his grip once more. “Good. That’s all it is. Insurance. Nothing more.”

Gi-hun gave a tired, humourless laugh. “Feels like you’re planning for me to run headfirst into danger.”

In-ho didn’t smile. He just held his gaze, steady and unflinching. “I’m planning to make sure you come back if you do.”

***

The forty-eighth hour came and went like a blade across his throat.

Gi-hun sat hunched at the low table, elbows digging into the wood, his eyes fixed on the phone that lay in front of him. It hadn’t rung yet. Not since that first call. But he knew it would. He felt it, like a weight pressing against his chest, like the air itself was straining to hold still until the moment it broke.

He’d barely moved in hours. The others circled him—Jun-ho disappearing in and out of the back room with curt updates, Min-hyeok hammering at his laptop, In-ho pacing tight orbits like a man tracing the edge of a trap. Gi-hun barely heard them. The house was thick with noise—footsteps, the faint scrape of Hae-in’s toys on the floor, the whisper of the wind outside—but all of it blurred into nothing around the stillness of the phone

Gi-hun pressed his tongue against the crown in his tooth, the one In-ho had insisted on having put back in. A tiny tracker, hidden where no one would think to look. “Just a precaution,” In-ho had said, voice too careful, too even. “I only found it before because I had been told it was there.”

The thought tore Gi-hun in half. Being so prone, so vulnerable, and In-ho himself removing the tracker that could have saved everyone.

He forced himself to push the thought aside for now. In-ho wasn’t that man anymore.

But he was clearly afraid Gi-hun might be taken. His mind wouldn’t stop replaying the images. Eun-ji, head bowed, shoulders locked in panic and fury both. The boy, too small for the ropes that bound him, his feet kicking at air. And that finger. God, that finger. It was seared into him, the pale curve of it pressed against plastic, proof that every second lost was another part of them stripped away. And Ga-yeong… his daughter, her face wet with tears, staring out at him with raw, terrified eyes. The sight hollowed him out.

He didn’t care about pride, or blame, or whatever stood between him and Eun-ji now. That was long gone. All he wanted—all he burned for—was to keep them safe. To know Ga-yeong would get to grow up. That Eun-ji would live to raise her son. That their lives wouldn’t end taped and terrified in some nameless room because of him.

The silence in the hanok was unbearable. Hae-in babbled on her playmat, and even that sound, sweet and innocent, cut into him like a blade. He thought of her too—his second chance, his proof that maybe, just maybe, he wasn’t doomed to destroy everything he touched. He couldn’t let this darkness reach her.

His hand drifted toward the glass of whiskey In-ho had set there earlier, but he stopped short, fingers curling in on themselves. No. Not now. He had to keep his head clear. He had to—

The phone buzzed.

Gi-hun jerked upright, the sound detonating through the silence. His breath caught. His hand shook as it hovered over the device, slick with sweat, and for a heartbeat he thought he might drop it.

A shadow moved beside him. In-ho. Standing so close Gi-hun could feel the heat of him, could sense the coiled readiness in his stillness. He didn’t speak, didn’t try to take the phone—just let his gaze anchor Gi-hun, sharp and unyielding, and as steady as stone.

The screen flashed. The unknown number felt as though it were mocking him.

Gi-hun swallowed, his throat raw. His eyes flicked to In-ho once more—he hadn’t moved, but his presence pressed against Gi-hun like a brace, holding him upright. He forced himself to answer.

“Hello?”

“Mr. Seong.”

The voice rasping down the line was the same one from two nights ago. Calm and cold. Not hurried, not angry—completely patient, as though everything in the world bent to his timing.

Gi-hun’s stomach lurched. His grip tightened until his knuckles whitened, his words scraped out past the lump in his throat. “Where are they? I want to talk to them.”

A dry chuckle. “So eager. But first, you’ll tell me what I want to know.”

Gi-hun felt his arm tremble. He almost faltered—but then In-ho’s hand brushed, just barely, against his sleeve. The faintest touch, but it steadied him like nothing else could.

“No.” The word came sharp, sharper than he expected, like he’d pulled it out with a blade. His pulse roared in his ears. “Not until I know they’re alive. You don’t get a thing until I hear their voices.”

Silence. Long enough that Gi-hun thought, wildly, that maybe the line had dropped. Then the voice spoke again, and Gi-hun could hear the mocking laughter in it. “You’ve grown bold.”

“I don’t care what you think,” Gi-hun shot back, though his hand trembled harder now. “I don’t care what you want. If you’ve touched them—if you’ve hurt them any more—” His voice cracked, fury collapsing into desperation. “If you want me to cooperate, you prove it. Now.”

Another pause, even longer this time. Then he heard the scrape of a chair leg against concrete, muffled grunts, shuffling.

And then, at last—“Hello?” A girl’s voice, speaking in English.

Gi-hun’s heart seized. Ga-yeong. Small and ragged, thin with fear but hers. He nearly dropped the phone, knees threatening to buckle.

“Ga-yeong,” he choked, every muscle in his body going weak. “Baby, are you—”

“Appa?”

The sound crushed him, jagged and unbearable. He almost broke right there—until he felt it again: the pressure of In-ho’s hand against his arm, grounding him, holding him together when he might have shattered.

“I’m here, jagi, I’m going to get you back, I’m—”

The line muffled. In the background he heard a cry that sounded like Eun-ji, frantic and smothered. Then the caller returned, smooth as ever.

“Proof enough?”

Gi-hun’s chest burned, vision blurring at the edges. His grip on the phone was so tight he thought it might snap. “If you touch them again, I swear—”

“You are not in a position to swear anything, Mr. Seong,” the man cut in. The calm had cooled to steel now. “Forty-eight hours are over. Your family is alive, for now. Their continued survival depends entirely on your honesty. Where are the Hwang brothers?”

The voice slithered through the line, coiled tight with threat. Gi-hun’s breath snagged. Beside him In-ho moved—barely. Just a tilt of his head, the smallest nod, supporting him to go on. Gi-hun swallowed hard, forcing air into his lungs. His tongue felt thick, useless, but he pushed the words out anyway. “I’ll bring them to you. I presume you know the motel I own?”

“I do, Mr Seong.”

“Good. You bring my family there. Midnight tomorrow night. You do that and I’ll—” He paused and looked up at In-ho once again, who gave him the strength to carry on. “—I’ll give you what you want.”

There was silence. And then, a low, rolling laugh. It scraped down the line, cruel and deliberate.

“Oh, Mr. Seong,” the kidnapper drawled. “Do you really think you are in a position to make demands?”

Gi-hun’s throat closed. His hand trembled so violently he nearly dropped the phone. The laugh went on, needling, until it cut sharp into silence again.

“Every moment you waste posturing, they suffer.” A pause. He could almost hear the smile in the man’s voice. “You do not set the terms.”

Gi-hun’s vision swam. His instinct screamed at him to scream back, to plead, to fight—but then he felt the weight of In-ho’s eyes on him, unblinking and steady. In-ho’s presence pressed him like a hand between his shoulder blades: Hold the line. Don’t give him more than he already has.

Gi-hun’s lips parted, breath harsh, but his voice was steadier when he finally said, “I’ll bring them to you. Tell me where and when.”

The line hissed with static, then the voice returned, low and deliberate. “You will bring the brothers to the dock at Yeongjong Pier. The old customs warehouse, south side. You will arrive at ten-fifteen sharp. You will be alone. Any deviation, any sign of police, and you’ll be getting pieces of your family sent to you every week for the rest of your life.”

A click, then dead silence.

Gi-hun kept the phone pressed to his ear, as if his breath alone could somehow force the man to reappear, to give him a chance to plead or reason or rage. The numbness in his limbs spread slow and cold, his whole body quivering in the aftermath. In-ho’s hand settled over his, strong and steadying enough to pin Gi-hun to the present.

He let the phone slide from his fingers. It hit the table and spun, like a coin deciding a future. His breath caught, then stuttered out with a whimper. The house had fallen silent, every creak, every breath of wind outside the hanok gone, even Hae-in’s babble stilled, as if the world itself had paused to hear the verdict. Gi-hun’s ribs ached, breath scraping inside him like he was breathing powdered glass.

He waited for the tremor to pass. It wouldn’t.

In-ho’s voice, quiet but somehow the only real thing in the room, anchored him. “This is what we needed, Gi-hun.”

He closed his eyes and let out a deep, heavy breath. Thanks to Jun-ho, they knew the first phone call had been made in America. And Min-hyeok had already recruited men who were heading to the last known location of the caller, getting into position. What they needed was time. And that was what they were doing. Buying time. If only they had the location…

He tongued the tracker in his tooth once again.

Gi-hun jerked his gaze up, the weight of everything splitting the numbness. He wanted to break, to collapse into the cushions and let himself sink, but In-ho’s grip on his hand made that impossible.

“They think they’ve got us cornered,” In-ho continued, his tone unwavering. “They want us desperate. Predictable.” His eyes, hard now, glittered with something Gi-hun had never had—the ability to see through the game, even when he was the pawn. “We play the role they want us to, and then we break the script.”

Gi-hun squeezed his hand back, his own fingers numb. A rush of air staggered out of him. “What now?”

In-ho glanced toward Jun-ho and Min-hyeok, sat on the opposite side of the table. “You heard?”

Min-hyeok nodded tightly. “Every word.”

“We’ve got our timeline,” In-ho said. “They want us at Yeongjong Pier, old customs warehouse, ten-fifteen sharp. No shadows, no deviations or they pull the plug.”

Min-hyeok’s laptop snapped shut. “They’ll watch every approach. Drones, probably. Runners. If we move the wrong way, they’ll see.” He seemed to be thinking in blueprints, mentally mapping every last angle. “We’ll need to set up the handoff exactly as they expect—and be ready to improvise if they don’t play by the script, either.”

“Then we’ll be ready to improvise,” In-ho said. He met Gi-hun’s gaze, and for a brief moment Gi-hun felt a chill run through him.

In-ho’s eyes glittered with a darkness that reminded Gi-hun, suddenly and without warning, of the black mask. There was no costume now, but the intensity was the same.

Gi-hun’s heart hammered. He waited for In-ho to break the tension with some human gesture, some flash of warmth, but instead In-ho’s gaze sharpened as he mapped out the approach, his mind already running dozens of possible outcomes. The precision of it—cold, unyielding—should have scared Gi-hun. But it didn’t. Not anymore. This was the man who’d navigated hell and decided it was preferable to powerlessness, after all. For one sick second, Gi-hun envied him, for his ability to switch everything off like that.

He forced the thought away. For one terrible moment, he had understood the righteous anger that had led In-ho down the path towards becoming the Front Man. He was already at risk of losing Ga-yeong forever. He didn’t want to lose himself too.

Notes:

Gah, I really, REALLY struggled with this one, so I really hope it's ok! Please let me know, your comments are love <3 (I apologise if I don't always reply to them, I do try but sometimes I'm so overwhelmed that my brain just shuts down)

Anyway - I think an end *might* be in sight for this one! Definitely still got a few more chapters to go, but its always good to have the final goal to work towards ;)

Thank you so SO much to everyone reading, liking, and commenting, you make this all so worthwhile <3