At sunrise, the light in one of the headquarters' office switched on.
Being the only one in the building, Hyunwoo was accompanied by a stack of documents, almost taller than him, and a cold can of coffee. The frosty air of the morning that would usually put him off provided comfort today, as even it was less agonizing than his own thoughts.
The rhythmic ticks from the clock echoed in his mind as he looked through the papers. Soon, the building will become filled with people he'd never seen before if the paper in his hand was beneficial for their future.
"Why are you here so early?"
Hyunwoo looked up and let out a sigh of relieve as he saw Kei. He had already prepared an excuse for if someone asked but he knew there would be no point lying to Kei who could tell something was off.
"Why do you think?"
"What did you do?"
After hearing what happened, Kei gave a chuckle rather than words of comfort. Only because he knew how Hyunwoo acted was nothing new. But if Hyunwoo had came in early in the morning to read through a bunch of contracts that wasn't even assigned to him, just to lift the burden off of someone, then at least he was acting on his regrets rather than sitting on helplessness.
"What?"
Kei blinked, forgetting he was just staring at him. "Nothing, it's just rare to see you doing work without complaining."
Hyunwoo chuckled. "Anyway, what are you doing here?"
"I just came to take a look at the contracts." Kei looked as Hyunwoo pointed to the pile on the table that had already halved in size and widened his eyes. "Yeah, no way. Oh and, I was supposed to tell you you're going to be training someone from K company."
"Who?"
Kei's lips parted as he was about to answer but heard footsteps stopping in the doorway. Seojun looked away quickly as he accidentally made eye contact with Hyunwoo. There was a look on his face like he didn't think anyone else would be here.
"Well," Kei clapped, "I will leave you two to it." He exchanged a glance with Seojun as they passed by each other but ultimately didn't say anything.
There was a moment of silence between them as if both thinking about what to say until Seojun finally broke it.
"I can go through the rest myself."
Hyunwoo paused before nodding.
Seojun held his breath as he walked by him, only breathing out when the he heard the door shut. He was scared Hyunwoo may have really went back on his words and he wasn't ready to talk, not yet.
For some reason, he couldn't figure out what he wanted to hear or why he was feeling the way he did. It felt like the time he didn't study enough and lost first place to a classmate who barely showed up to class, or the time his grandparents confused him with his cousin, their favourite grandchild, and he saw every muscle in their face change as they realised it wasn't him.
No.
It was more like when he found out he would never be able to do what he wanted.
-
"We're home! Seojun, we brought something back for you."
The little boy waited patiently as his dad grabbed something out of the trunk of the car. He made a futile attempt at hiding it behind his back as he walked over, and with a small grin on his face, he handed the guitar to the boy.
"What do you think? It's cool, right?"
Seojun held it up carefully, his eyes bright as he beamed. "Yeah!"
His father's relaxed brows and smile to his reaction created the illusion in Seojun's mind that this was something he'd support.
During his last year in high school, him and a few friends had arranged a performance so their peers would take a small break from studying but his father somehow found out.
"Don't waste your time on stupid things like that."
"It's not stupid."
"It's ridiculous. Do you think playing the guitar, putting on a show during your final year in high school is going to get you into the top university? Do you think you're so smart you don't need to study anymore?"
"No, I—"
"No, exactly. You should only be focusing on school." His father sighed. "...What would a musician do for this family?"
Seojun scoffed. Of course that's what it came down to.
"This family? Right, like this isn't about your reputation."
He felt a harsh slap on his face immediately.
Ah...
Why did he even bother arguing? It's not like he's ever changed his mind before. Right, this was something he was used to. He won't get upset. Because he's used to it. This was just how things were, so it's fine.
Seojun swallowed the lump in his throat and held his head down.
"If you get one thing wrong on that exam, you will never touch the guitar again."
-
It was funny that no matter the circumstances, there would always be a crowd gathering to watch a fight and Hyunwoo would usually be with the spectators but unfortunately, today was not his day.
Normally if a guy punched him out of nowhere and had him by the collar, he wasn't be stood still with his hands by his sides so why was today different? Was it because he had fallen out with Seojun or because he knew the guy?
Hyunwoo looked at him and all of a sudden, he could feel everyone's gaze on them. The inaudible murmurs from the crowd and the guy shouting at him was drowned out by a loud ringing in his ear. He didn't want to accept this as reality.
He didn't want to accept a fragment of the past had made it back into his life.
But the moment he had subconsciously admitted that, Hyunwoo had gone back to the past.
Hyunwoo was blessed with his ability on a random day in high school, well, that's what Hyunwoo wanted to remember it as. On his walk home that night, he remembered not being able to see anything but spots of red and blurry lights, later, he would realise the little red dots he saw wasn't random - capillary perception allowed it's users to see blood vessels, or in Hyunwoo's case, the place on their body where people were most vulnerable.
He had learnt how to use it over the years but why was it like he'd lost control over it all again?
Hyunwoo knew he could stop it, that it wasn't so foreign and he can change what he was seeing. But he didn't, he didn't want to see anything or anyone. If he stayed like this, nothing bad would happen.
Seojun who was blocked by the crowd when trying to leave sighed as he made his way through them. With his mind still unclear, he didn't pay much attention to what was happening until he got to the front of the crowd.
Hyunwoo?
"Are you really going to ignore me? What, are you too ashamed after what you did?" Not getting a reply from Hyunwoo, the guy was starting to grow physically agitated. "Hey, say something. You bastard—"
The sound of a small thud cleared Hyunwoo's mind and his eyes slowly started to adjust to it's surrounding. Being met with Seojun's back to him and the guy who had stumbled a few steps back, he realised the sound he had heard was a punch but he wasn't the one hurt.
Before he could say anything, a loud clap came from where the crowd was clearing up.
"Okay, break it up."
"Ha, who do you think you are?"
Haneul turned to Hyunwoo as Kei stopped the guy from raising his fist. With a tap from him, the guy felt a numbness over his entire arm before a sudden rush of pain made him fall to his knees.
There was a look of hesitation on Haneul's face as she spoke, almost as if she knew something she wasn't supposed to. "Go get cleaned up."
The leader of Aphids approached them as Seojun dragged Hyunwoo away, two bodyguards by his side and the person Kei had been looking forward to seeing, absent.
Haneul let out a small sigh, "you have certainly made an entrance, Mister Han."
He had a somewhat smug look on his face but his tone was a lot more serious as he spoke. Though whether that was out of respect or anger that one of his men had been hurt was unclear. "That was not our intention. You will have to forgive us for our Seungmin here's behaviour but considering what you've done to his arm, I'd say we're even, no?"
Haneul gave Kei a small nod and though reluctant, he bent down and quickly tapped his arm despite him backing away with a horrified look on his face.
"There, all better."
He gave his arm a small shake, realising it was back to normal, and looked to his boss as he gathered the strength to get up but froze as he realised Kei hadn't moved. The restriction in his movement felt instinctive, almost like his brain's way of warning the body of a predator.
Kei leaned in and spoke to him in a low voice.
Seungmin went pale. The rumoured paladin of Roses wasn't Hyunwoo - it was Kei.