Hunted

Running off to see Rick had been necessary for his mood. Luo couldn't stand any more of whatever it was that freaked him out; whether it was that blond, the other blond, or some aspect of the shitty situation. It felt good to be in control of something at least, but he knew it wouldn't last long. Rick even ripped away most of the good feeling as he left, reminding him of what could happen if Ramesh came around.

Going back to that apartment brought back memories of what happened a few hours back. Maybe it was petty of him, but he felt a slight relief to be staying in the largest bedroom. It had grown to something of a status thing among them, and it was at least something. Of course, he couldn't likely split up Kyun and Julian, so he'd have to stay on the couch. That bit sucked. Still, it was better than nothing.

Fuck, who was he trying to fool? His back would start aching soon after a few nights on a bloody couch...

With luck, the other guys would've calmed down somewhat by then. Being around nervous people when he felt like a failure was no good. That hope was quickly extinguished when he saw one of the blond fuckers - Leandor, the one who had arranged this place to stay - making his way down the stairs, looking distracted and out of place. Something probably happened... so Luo stopped at the top of a flight, looking at him with concern. "Hi."

It almost seemed like the blond hadn't heard him, but sure enough he came to a stop in front of Luo, a couple meters away. No longer walking, it was becoming more obvious that Leandor was trembling and there were tears under his eyes. When he spoke, though, his voice was as steady as ever – reluctant, but still steady. “... Hello Luo.”

The Korean sighed. It was incredibly hard to stay mad at the guy at this point, seeing him like that after the help they had received. Perhaps that was for the better anyway. The less conflict among them, the better. His eyes sought the other's when he inquired, "what's going on?"

“They...” He seemed to be struggling to say it, so he paused and took a deep breath. His eyes wandered, though not actually looking at anything. “I suppose there's no easy way to tell someone this, but your apartment has been burned down.” The blond leaned against the nearest wall and lowered his head. “They're trying to murder us. You'd think I'd be used to this kind of thing by now.”

A moment of doubt flashed through Luo's mind, but that was soon forgotten when he took in the other man's body language. He swallowed, then moved slowly over to him. The Korean reached tentatively around him, and when there was no sign the motion was unwelcome, he used a hand on Leandor's upper back to pull them together. With a sigh, he tried to keep as firm and steady a voice as possible. "Good thing you got us out of there, then."

“I hadn't wanted to,” the blond confessed, his voice starting to crack. “I didn't want to ask a favour of someone I just met for people I didn't know. That kind of thing is for people with consciences. But then you said that shit about letting me stay without asking for anything in return, so naturally the retort had to be helpful in some way.” There was a bitter laugh cut off by what almost sounded like a sob, but he somehow stopped himself from crying. “My selfishness almost killed everyone.”

In a twisted way, that was funny. Getting in each other's faces saved them? His hand brushed over the blond's back as he thought about what to say to that. The last thing he wanted was for the guy to get down over this. It was hard to deny that possibility without indirectly blaming the help for the fire, though, so that was no good. "I'm glad you decided to retort..." He paused, wanting to add to the physical comforting, but resisted. "We'll get through this. Trust me."

Leandor rubbed his eyes as if that would stop them from tearing and shook his head. “This isn't right. You should be the one needing comforting, not me. I'm a fucking wreck.” He pushed his hair out of his face with the back of his hand, but despite these motions, they didn't seem to help him tremble any less. “I'd say you should go deal with your friends, but I think they all started making out. I could be wrong, I wasn't paying much attention when I left.”

At least that was something to be happy about. He wouldn't have felt all too well if Leandor thought he needed comforting... he sighed again, then forced a weak smirk. "You seemed to be on your way somewhere. Maybe I should take you there? Wouldn't want you to meet that Ramesh fellow all by yourself..."

“Oh... Yeah, I suppose not.” He blinked a few times quickly and then took a step away. After a failed attempt to offer a smile, he turned to start leaving again. “Thank you, Luo. You're a good man. You can go back now, I'm not going far. The fucking God boy will probably be too busy still, so I'm going to play with Bradley. Might not even have to leave the building for that.”

Well, that was probably not true, but if the guy didn't want him along, that was as good an excuse as any. Luo shrugged, then gave Leandor a light smirk. "Have fun, then..." He started covering the last flights up to the apartment, wondering what the blond had meant by 'all making out'. Oh well. Probably an exaggeration.

“You know, these circumstances truly are unfortunate.” The blond spoke up again as some other people entered the stairwell. His voice carried a touch of playfulness. “If we had met during better times, and if I wasn't deathly afraid of big, manly hunks touching my ass, I would gladly let you do me... I'll see you tomorrow, Luo.”

That Leandor... well, being called a big, manly hunk and a god in one evening wasn't that bad, was it? Luo smiled weakly to himself as he moved up to the door. After knocking it took a good while before the door opened to reveal the little purple-haired guy.

“Oh good, you're back. I was getting worried.” Julian smiled shyly and moved aside so the larger man could enter. “Careful where you step. There's some glass on the floor... Did you hear what happened?”

"Yeah." Luo took care to give the guy as friendly a smile as he could; he might not have come across as particularly friendly earlier, so there was no need to add to that. Gazing across the room, things didn't look as bad as he had feared. Kiyoshi was sitting on the floor nipping at a soup, close to Nele who was going nuts with the remote control. Kyun was lying topless on his stomach on a couch, probably in the process of getting a massage, Luo guessed.

Once Luo was inside, the little guy closed the door and locked it again. “The soup is still hot if you're hungry.” He walked back over to the couch and climbed on to straddle Kyun's legs as he glanced nervously toward the television.

Nele, however, didn't appear happy at all with the return. A scowl was sent in Luo's direction and the redhead opened his mouth, starting to say something, but seemed to think better of it. After some quick reconsidering, he looked back at the screen as he kept pressing buttons. “They made homeless men out of all of us. We can't let them get away with this, big guy.”

Soup sounded good. What didn't sound good was all the noise from the zoo - formerly known as Nele and Kiyoshi's bedroom - but Luo decided to keep that to himself. After taking his boots off, he moved over towards the kitchen, stopping by Nele to rest a hand on his shoulder. "I wasn't planning to. You guys figured out a plan yet?"

Wasn't even spared another glance. The redhead was acting a bit moody, but eventually answered. “You're the ringleader, aren't you? I thought I'd leave the honours for you... But I think Takuya and Choi are figuring something out. They went prancing into there on their own, and that either means they're fucking or they're plotting. It makes me wanna puke to think that anyone would want to fuck Takuya, so it must be the second option.”

Luo met Kiyoshi's gaze for a moment, but managed to keep a straight face. It was none of his business to break that little secret to the redhead, so he decided to play around a bit instead. "Yeah, I have a rather complicated plan..." he started in a thoughtful voice, grazing his cheek, "can I count on your help with some of the dangerous stuff?" He fixed Nele a contemplative gaze, then turned around to walk towards the kitchen. Wouldn't want his face to split into a grin just yet.

“That's a stupid question. You should know by now I wouldn't wimp out if they fucking paid me.” The redhead's attention was fully on Luo at that point. “What's your plan?”

Taking his time to pour soup into a bowl, the Korean considered what would be more fun, but eventually deciding pissing the guy off markedly more would just bring him a headache later on. "I haven't worked out all the details yet," he fished the phone out of his pocket, "but I've got Ramesh's phone number now."

“You're fucking shitting me!” Nele got up and was at Luo's side in an instant. The big brown eyes stared at him in awe and then he attempted to grab the phone. “Give me the number! I wanna call that one inch prick and tell him exactly what I think of his big pyro ass!”

It was nice to be so impressive for an instant, but that didn't seem like a particularly good idea. "Sounds constructive," Luo said sarcastically while hiding the cell back in the pocket and zipping it up. "If he knows we have the number, don't you think that kind of fucks up any advantage we might have from that right now?" He sighed, picking up his bowl with the opposite hand.

The redhead took a short time to consider that, and then he crossed his arms stubbornly. “Fine, no calling him, but I want the number anyway. Just in case you wimp out and fly away to Mexico. If you think I won't kick your ass to get it out of your pocket, think again!” Yet he made no move to follow through with that announcement.

Why Takuya enjoyed picking on the firecracker so much was starting to dawn on Luo, but he had no intention of going in that direction. In fact, he simply flashed Nele a cocky smirk, then started moving back into the living-room.

Wasn't surprising when the growl followed him and a head of red hair whizzed by to land on the floor next to Kiyoshi again. Nele stuck the middle finger up at Luo before slipping an arm around the Japanese back as he grumbled to himself. “Jackass thinks he's all big and mighty. We'll see how big and mighty he is with that fucking cell phone shoved so far up his ass he'll be shitting ring tones for a month.”

Walking over to a chair nearby, Luo sat down and started devouring the soup. He was hungry, and it was rather tasty. Wasn't too hard to figure out that Takuya had taken part in making it. Which reminded him... Choi and Takuya off in another room? Why? He thought about it for a moment, but couldn't think of a reason for that. Unless, of course, they figured that redhead would be too noisy to hear themselves think. The spiky-haired one turned over towards the couch. "Any idea what the other two are up to?"

Kyun seemed to be enjoying the massage greatly, but spared him a few seconds of eye contact. "No, I have no idea. They've been in there since the fire was on TV." He finished off with a content groan, obviously trying to fix Julian a gaze, but failing.

That would be worth checking out once he was done eating.

~~~~~

This is a collab, written together with Chlover. You can find her author profile here: http://original.adult-fanfiction.org/authors.php?no=26260