The protector

99 Luftballons (M)

Author's note: this chapter is a long one, very long one. Though it's divided in parts. You can read it whole or part by part. Take your time, there's no hurry since the next updates won't come that soon.

Pyongyang, 2028, July

Breakfast

The sun was enlightening the room with summery, arrogant rays that only the early hour of the morning was mercifully assuaging. The man raised to consciousness gently, with no hurry, pandering a recently acquired laziness. There was nothing to do if not resting and recovering, to what end hurrying to wake up, then?

Sitting cross-legged, her fingers swiftly fumbling over the keyboard, In-ah was at his side, as usual. A wire connected the device to her ears, signalling she was yet wasn't in the room. Jeong Hyeok realized that what had awakened him was a familiar scent coming from the cup she was holding. Smelling of coffee, dressed in that despicably inappropriate attire made of top and shorts, he couldn't help but think she was breathtaking.

The man moved a hand to brush her knee and gently warn her that he was awake. In-ah turned to him showing a wide smile, removing the headphones without stopping what she was listening to. "Good morning beautiful."

"What are you doing?"

"Breakfast. What about a little bit of coffee?"

"You allow me to drink?" He asked with an unconvinced and teasing face. Caffeine had been forbidden. Walking had. Thinking too much had. Wouldn't have he loved all of that, he would have considered In-ah the living definition of 'golden cage.'

"Here," the woman leaned on him, dirtying his lips with the coffee's drops directly from hers. "Just this little bit is ok, but don't say it to your pain-in-the-ass-girl, ok?"

Jeong Hyeok seized her upper lip in his to prolong the kiss a little more than the coffee sharing requested. "I miss our breakfast."

They both were. Even if spending the whole day together in the same room for weeks was undisputably pleasurable – net of their circumstances -, none of them could deny that they were missing their daily routine. It was a life they'd designed on their needs and tastes. It was simple, maybe it could have even been called boring, and it surely was routinary, but it was theirs.

"I miss it too. Deal: when you'll feel a little better, we'll have an enormous brunch and then we'll stay the whole day reading on the couch."

"Deal."

Right at that moment, the music inside the headphones increased vivacious, propagating a harmony he didn't recognize.

"Is this new?"

"Pretty old, cold war and Berlin wall's days. Take" she gave him one headphone and restarted the song.

As soon as the German words unfolded inside his ear, the man had clear the reason why it was the first time for him to listen to that old song. It was a story about 99 balloons flying free in the sky and causing a big mess. A song about stupid militaries and useless borders. The old In-ah would have never dared to play it in front of him.

"What's the title?"

"99 Luftballons."

"I like it."