Saeyoung was in the middle of slowly but steadily eating his dinner with Saeran and frowning down at his brother's book. His curiosity had him leaning over to try to read what Saeran was reading, but Saeran gave him a short reprimanding look as his eyes darted to Saeyoung's dripping food. Saeyoung leaned back a little bit and popped the bite on his fork into his mouth and chewed it before he sipped at his Ph.D. Pepper.
"You should really take a break." He recommended. "When you're not on the computer, you're reading up on computers. Give your mind a rest."
"I can't." Saeran admitted with a frown of his own, rubbing at his eyes underneath of his glasses. They were red again from having worn his contacts all night and all day long. Saeyoung didn't understand why he didn't just wear his glasses more at home. "The boss scolded me about being slow." He hesitated.
"Tell me." Saeyoung prompted in a lower voice. Saeran still didn't answer. "Come on, don't hide things from me. No secrets, right?"
"It's not a secret." Saeran protested with a sigh. "I'm just…" He ran a hand into his hair, allowing his sadness and frustration to appear on his face as he admitted, "I was compared to you again…"
Saeyoung really hated the agency. His brother wasn't allowed to look like that. "Stop letting it get to you so much. They compare us to each other to pit us against ourselves. You know that."
"I do know that." Saeran agreed, still upset, "But that doesn't mean it doesn't bother me, hyung. They just...God, they know how to get under my skin!"
"And that's exactly why they do it! You can't show it so much. Just like with the bullies and those assholes we fought."
Saeran glared at him. "I already know that." His anger turned downward again, oscillating between anger at the situation and himself. Why did he always have to beat himself up so much? "I'm not like you, hyung. I'm not strong and confident in myself. I have to constantly work hard to even keep up with you. It's not fair."
"Stop putting me on such a pedestal!" Saeyoung scolded, once again attempting to nip those budding weeds from Saeran's heart before they festered. "You keep acting like we're not the same. You don't have to be strong or confident because you're smart! You work hard at what you learn and you're better than me at it no matter what the assholes in the agency say!" He sighed. "You're amazing, Saeran-ah. And you're stronger than anybody I know."
Saeran's eyes flicked over to where Vanderwood was talking on the phone in the other room. Saeyoung looked too just in case. The man hadn't heard Saeyoung's words. Good. He needed to be careful saying his brother's name in front of anyone else's presence.
Saeran turned back to him, staring at him. Saeyoung waited as his brother considered the words before he said, "I'm the weaker twin...you know that."
"There is no weaker twin because if one of us is strong then we're both strong." Saeyoung reached out and gripped his brother's arm. "So, I'll be strong for both of us when you're not feeling up to it, just like I know you'll do the same for me. Right?" Saeran gave a small smile, temporarily reassured, and nodded once.
The weight in Saeyoung's heart felt some relief from the crushing pain at the sight. It seemed that no matter how old the two of them got, Saeran still suffered from their past together. Saeyoung wished to take his brother away from this life with all of its stress and let his brother finally heal from all of the trauma they had both endured. It helped having friends and other people to communicate with, but the threat to their lives was still always there. Saeran needed to be away from that.
They needed to leave the agency as soon as they could, but would leaving the RFA cause more harm than good in the long run for both of them? Saeyoung didn't know if he had the strength needed to cut all ties and make a run for it, but if they didn't then all of their friends may be in danger from the agency. Saeyoung still didn't know what to do.
He took another bite of his meal as Saeran went back to reading his book. He looked towards Vanderwood as the man hung up on his phone call and approached the two of them to take a seat at the table as well. He raised an eyebrow at the sight of Saeyoung's food.
"Do you only eat properly when your brother is here?"
"Sometimes it's the other way around." Saeyoung joked.
Saeran huffed at that.
Vanderwood shook his head. "Hey Five, what about you? Did you eat yet or do I have to force you?"
"I already ate."
"Are there any leftovers? If you made it, then it will actually be edible." He lifted his head to try to see the stove from where they were. Saeyoung made an offended noise.
"My cooking is fine, thanks!"
"If you like bricks." Saeran glanced at his brother out of the corner of his eye, a smile quirking on his lips. Saeyoung groaned.
"Fiiiiiive!" He whined.
Vanderwood got up to go grab a plate and some food before he returned to the table. None of the men spoke for a while, but that wasn't uncommon. They weren't really friends, but Vanderwood was one of the few people Saeyoung didn't have as big of a problem with. Vanderwood was actually a guy who didn't speak a whole lot unless it was necessary anyway. He tended to text more than he would say out loud. He had no reason to talk to either of the brothers unless it was to force them to work more or to give them warnings.
Saeyoung, though, had a question that he was willing to take the risk to ask. He just needed to be careful with it. "Hey, Ms. Vanderwood…"
"Stop calling me Ms." Vanderwood scolded.
Saeyoung ignored him, "What did you plan on doing after leaving the agency?"
Saeran stopped reading his book.
Vanderwood smiled in a disbelieving way, as if he was humoring Saeyoung's question. "Leaving? Where did you get the idea that we can just leave?"
"I didn't say it would be easy." Saeyoung denied. "I'm just wondering."
"You're hearing me wrong. You know we can't just leave the agency. This is our life, remember? They own our lives." Vanderwood frowned.
"Humor me~" Saeyoung pulled on his 707 persona, leaning forward with a grin. "There has to be something you'd want to do with your freedom~"
"I'm happy being able to erase my old life."
"Even though you can die anytime?"
"Do you think that's any different from my old life?" He countered. "It's the same for you, isn't it?" Saeyoung didn't respond, but he wasn't able to maintain the 707 smile in the face of that question. "Exactly."
"So, you don't ever want to leave the agency? Even if you could possibly have a free shot at a new life without threats?" He pressed with his own serious frown.
Vanderwood was suspicious now. There wasn't any way an agent could talk about these things with other agents without putting them on high alert. "Why are you asking these things, 707?"
Saeran shifted, crossing his ankles under the table. A warning signal to Saeyoung. Saeyoung already knew, though.
He grinned again and held his hands up. "Whoa whoa, calm down~ I'm not implying anything if that's what you think! I'm just thinking out loud here! We don't know much about our dear handler, after all~"
"It's better kept that way." Vanderwood rolled his eyes but marginally relaxed. 707 was the best at defusing tension. Vanderwood was practically trained to respond in a more exasperated manner to 707. Thank you, Pavlov!
"I'm mostly wondering because look at how dangerous the world is these days! Who knows what could happen in the future? The agency might even be taken down at some point! What will you do then? You've gotta think of these things!"
"That could be considered a threat, 707."
"It's not~"
Vanderwood shook his head, but his face was one that showed he was actually considering things. Saeyoung waited and made sure he wasn't looking too expectant. He pretended to drop the subject as he finished up his food and went to wash his plate in the sink. That should earn him bonus points for actually cleaning up after himself!
"Hey, your brother isn't trying to gain some kind of blackmail on me, is he?" Vanderwood murmured to Saeran, warily watching as Saeyoung actually cleaned his plate.
Saeran shook his head. "He was asking me about these things too...I think he's just curious."
Vanderwood sat back and crossed his arms. "Oi! 707! If you want to know so badly about my thoughts, I'll tell you under two conditions. One, you two need to do deadweight training. When was the last time you did it?" Saeyoung and Saeran both groaned at that. They both hated deadweight training. "And two...why don't you two tell me yours?" The look in his eyes was sharp. "Information for information."
"Jeez, what is this? A mission?" Saeyoung complained as he returned to his brother. Reluctantly Saeran stood up. Saeyoung motioned for Saeran to get on the floor. When the man dropped to the floor as if he was gone, Saeyoung went through the efforts of trying to maneuver his brother's body onto his back. It may be useful to know how to carry people like this and be prepared for this kind of weight during missions, but it was such a pain in the ass. Especially with a live person. Saeran would be next.
They both needed this information even at the cost of this. Saeyoung knew that he had Vanderwood on the line. Now he just needed to carefully reel him in without the man escaping his hooks.
"I don't really have much of an idea. I just know I'd want to live with Five somewhere! Maybe find someone and settle down." He grunted as he got his brother onto his back and pushed back up to stand up fully. "Right, Five?"
Saeran hummed in agreement. "Although...I'd like to have a new family…" He confessed softly.
"Any kids of mine are kids of yours too!" Saeyoung assured him with a grin as he started his laps around the living room. Vanderwood seemed disarmed but interested as he followed them out and watched them. At least he wasn't on his guard anymore. Excellent.
"I'm not sure even 500 would want to share children with you. Even if you are brothers." He huffed a laugh at that.
"Well what about you then? Information for information."
Vanderwood tapped his fingers on the table in thought. Only when he was taking a while did Saeyoung begin to whine at him. Vanderwood scowled, "Jeez, shut up already! I was thinking. What would I want to do…? I don't know. Maybe go back to England. I'm tired of living here. Go back to normalcy, although I'd have to change my looks again. Just somewhere far away from here and start over."
"Wife and kids? Husband and kids? Husband and kinks? Husband and dogs?" Saeyoung prompted. His legs were shaking a bit by mid-lap two. Why was his living room so big?
"Why do you assume I'm going to get a husband?!"
"I don't know, Ms. Mary Vanderwood~"
"Ugh, you're so obnoxious. Are you done being an idiot now? Focus on your training if you're only going to be talking about impossible scenarios!"
"Okay okay, I will. But you never answered me earlier."
"About what?" Vanderwood sighed.
"Would you even want to leave the agency?"
"You never asked me that."
"Pretty sure I did."
"You didn't."
"Avoiding the question." Saeran muttered.
"Yeah yeah! He's right! Answer me!"
"God...You were less annoying to deal with when you were younger. And not addicted to soda." Vanderwood rubbed at his forehead. "I don't know, 707. Maybe I would if I knew I could get away with it. But I'm tired of hypotheticals! Especially if they could get all of us killed!"
"There aren't any bugs in my house." Saeyoung assured seriously. "You know that I wouldn't risk something like that just to talk hypotheticals."
Vanderwood met his gaze. Saeyoung didn't look away. Saeran watched both of the men neutrally. Vanderwood finally nodded. "Fine. Get back to work."
"Yes ma'am!" Saeyoung saluted.
"Stop calling me ma'am!"
It was late at night and Saeyoung found himself exhausted from staring at his computer all day. His work was finally almost done. He just needed to work for a little bit longer. But because he knew he was so close to being done, the urge to procrastinate was even stronger. He had already been on the RFA chatroom earlier to look through all of the recent messages, though, so he was already caught up with that. V had yet to answer his or Saeran's calls. Saeyoung was itching to make something or do something with his hands. He wasn't sure what, though.
His phone rang then. Saeyoung lifted it up, heart racing with the hope that it was V, but instead he found Yuna's profile picture waving at him. That only made him more excited in a different way, but also confused. What was she doing calling this late? She shouldn't be up. Had something happened to her?
Vanderwood was still lurking, though. He would get mad if he saw how close Saeyoung was and he had stopped to chat on the phone. Saeyoung eyed the man as he got up from his seat and answered the phone, hurrying past Vanderwood towards the garage.
"Shh shh, hang on. Give me a few seconds." He told Yuna in lieu of a greeting. The woman on the other end giggled a bit as Saeyoung hummed and entered the garage, closing the door behind him and heading over to one of his cars. He had left a swivel chair next to the one he had been working on recently, so he took a seat there and spun in the chair as he said, "Okay I'm good. What's up?"
"Hi, Luciel." Yuna yawned loudly. Her yawn was cute, Saeyoung decided as he laughed a bit.
"If you're tired, why are you calling me?"
"We haven't talked on the phone since you took me to Rika's apartment." Yuna explained. "I missed hearing your voice."
Saeyoung felt warm at that. It had been on purpose that he hadn't called her or picked up her phone calls, though. He had needed to recover and remind himself to restore a careful distance between them after he had almost kissed her back at the apartment.
"Sorry, I've just been busy. You wouldn't believe how obnoxious work is being. I can't even find time to track your phone."
Yuna sighed at that, but she didn't sound as upset about the topic as she did this morning over the chatroom. "Ooh, I love it when guys hack my phone to find my location~ So sexy~ I'm so turned on I don't know what to do, Luciel~"
Oh God, even if she was playing she couldn't say his name like that. It put all kinds of images and thoughts into his head. She had to know what she was doing to him, right? He tried to ignore it and play instead, "I'm glad you like it so much since it seems necessary~"
Yuna hummed, which sent shivers down Saeyoung's spine. It was a good thing he had decided not to be around Vanderwood for this chat. "Actually…" Yuna's tone of voice changed as it lost its silliness, "maybe you're right…"
"Yuna?" He asked, shaking off the spell of the moment as he realized she was being serious.
"Before you get too worked up, don't worry a lot." She warned. "I'm not saying that you guys have anything to worry about. But...I don't know. Today was a bit weird."
"Weird how?" Saeyoung asked.
"Can I tell you? I haven't told Zen or anyone yet...but I thought you would be the person to talk to about this. You know about weird things, right?"
"I'm practically a jack of all trades!" Saeyoung agreed. "Tell me about this weird thing."
Yuna yawned again. He heard the shift of skin on cloth and realized she must have been in that bedroom she had mentioned earlier. Didn't she say she wasn't able to walk around on her own in that place? It seemed really suspicious. He hoped that she would decide to leave sooner rather than later.
"Okay...Remember how I said I was going to hang with the Savior earlier?"
"Yeah?"
She lowered her voice a bit. Who was she trying to make sure didn't hear her? "Well...What we spoke about was strange. She kept mentioning the darkness inside of her...and inside of everyone there. And how nobody really understood it. And she's totally right of course. I don't get it at all. But she was saying that to understand a person you have to understand their darkness. Do you get that at all?"
Understand their darkness? Yes, he could kind of see that. Saeyoung certainly had many dark things in his life. Could anyone really understand him without knowing that darkness? He wondered. He didn't really want anybody to know about it, though. Saeran knowing was enough for him. "Uh...kind of?"
"Yeah, that's about where I'm at too. She wants to come to the RFA party. She thinks me being the coordinator is a great idea."
Saeyoung still had a bad feeling. Something was bothering him, but he didn't really know what. "Okay? Yeah that's weird, but I'm not sure what you're expecting me to get out of it to be honest."
"Hear me out. I'm not done yet." Yuna shifted again. Wherever she was now echoed more. It sounded like it might be a bathroom. "The weirdest part, Luciel, was that she acted like she knew about the RFA. Like, she seemed to know a lot more than even I do!"
Saeyoung sat up sharply. "What do you mean? What kind of things did she say?"
"I can't remember them all. It's just the way she spoke. She has such a way with words that even at the time when they made sense I'm over here really thinking through them and they're just...confusing? But I don't feel like she's totally wrong? I just feel like I don't understand yet." She took a breath. "Luciel, I'm wondering if V and the Savior know each other somehow."
Saeyoung frowned. Why would V know anything about Mint Eye? Even if he did, why would he warn Yuna against it? If it was so important, why wasn't he answering any phone calls made to him? Or calling back? V, where the hell were you?
"It's...possible." He finally admitted. "V and Rika...they had more connections than a lot of us here. Who knows what they did and didn't tell us?"
"That's another thing. Do you think the Savior knew Rika too?"
"If she knows V, she probably knows Rika."
"This is confusing." Yuna sighed. "I thought this would be a pretty straightforward thing, but it's becoming a bit messed up." She paused and there was a smile in her voice as she said, "I'm actually kind of relieved to hear that you're gonna at least know where I am."
"Are you worried about your safety? You should just leave if you are. You can't stay there if you think you're in danger!" Saeyoung didn't know what he would do if Yuna ended up being in real danger. He probably wouldn't be able to sit still for it.
"I don't think I'm in danger...but if I am I'll let you guys know. Something is really weird here and I wanna get to the bottom of it. If worse comes to worse, I do know self-defense. That should at least help me out in a pinch."
"Self-defense isn't always the best choice. If you get suspicious, you should just run."
"Hmm...okay." Yuna sounded exhausted. It must have been pretty disturbing if she was staying up this late just to talk to Saeyoung.
"Yuna, I'm serious. You have to stay safe, okay? The party isn't worth you getting hurt."
"I don't see myself getting hurt...but if everyone's so worried I'll be more on guard. I just really wanna know what the heck is happening here."
"Be careful."
"I will. Thank you, Luciel." For a long while, neither of them spoke. Saeyoung liked just having her on the line with him. He wanted to see her in person again. Maybe he could make something for her? Would she want some kind of gift? He was about to bring it up to her when she spoke again, "I should get some sleep...Will I see you on the chatroom tomorrow?"
"Sure! You'll always see me there!"
She laughed. "Okay~ But make sure you sleep too. I don't want to hear you missed sleep again!"
"Gah, I'm being mother-henned!" He joked.
"Yes, you are! If I have to be, then you have to too! I'll be your mother, Saeyoung!"
Saeyoung shook that image out of his head. "Will you be a good mother and feed me when I'm hungry?" He asked.
"I'll feed you and kiss you good night every night~"
Saeyoung's cheeks warmed. He could imagine Yuna crawling into bed with him and snuggling up next to him. She would lean in and he would gladly meet her for a kiss as he would link his fingers together with hers. If he could fall asleep like that every night, he would. He wanted that.
"H-haha, sounds like you're ready to be a good mother!" Saeyoung stuttered and cursed himself for doing so. He really needed to get a grip. He wasn't equipped to deal with so much flirting from someone he actually liked.
"Pfft!" Yuna began to laugh. "I flirt with you and you tell me I'd be a good mother? Haha! You're so cute!"
Saeyoung couldn't deal with it anymore. "A-Anyway! I should get going! You need to rest, and I need to finish my work!"
"Nooo! I'm not done teasing you yet~"
"Good night, Yuna! Sleep well and dream of Yoosungs tonight!"
"Can I dream of you instead?"
She gets really flirtatious when she was tired, didn't she? "Oh! Maybe 707 will make an appearance in your dreams tonight?! You'll have to sleep to find out! And I have to sleep too...maybe I can figure out how to enter other people's dreams…"
"If you do, I'm a willing participant!"
"But maybe I wanna visit my dear Elly?"
"Come to me first and let's go together. I wanna see Elly too!"
"It's a deal!"
"Good night, Luciel. I hope you have very good dreams tonight."
"You too. Good night." He hung up the phone. If he was lucky, he would dream of her. He hoped she dreamed of him too. Maybe he really would somehow visit her dreams tonight.