BETTERSWEET

Ch.18

A higher power must have had their hands in playing with the realm of time and space alike in this dingy basement, you are certain of it. You do not think you would be able to stay conscious for this long, and being a practicing surgeon, you are much too aware of the extent of a human's physical capabilities. How are you still awake? You do not know.

Try as hard as you might though, there is no stopping the steady flow of blood coursing out of the untreated wound on your neck. And you are afraid that the cloth you are holding onto the cut is getting too damp with your blood for your liking.

Yet, here you are sitting, fully conscious, and perhaps even angry, glaring your eyes at the man who took you away.

He does not shy away from your glare. Rather, he looks quite impressed if the shine in his eyes is any sort of tell. "Things getting fuzzy?"

"No," you croak, fixing your grip on the cloth and placing more pressure on the bleeding cut. "I was thinking you didn't give me a sterilized piece of cloth to keep this wound properly shut. You can only imagine how upset I am."

"As you can see," he waves his arm around, slow, making sure you are following him. "This here ain't no luxury of a hospital your lover has."

"Your henchman might be blind, but I'm not, I can tell what's what," you say, blinking your eyes a little. They are getting teary and you could only guess how red the whites really are from all this futile effort of staying awake, but you really can't afford to lose your consciousness now. Not now. "Why did you kill him?"

The chair he is on scrapes backwards, making a freakishly sharp sound that rings in your ear, too loud for comfort, not that you currently have any. "If I knew you would be asking so many pointless questions instead of answering mine, I would have cut your tongue off."

"Then why haven't you done it?"

He chuckles, his broad, heavy shoulders shaking along.

"If you had a need for me to be quiet, you would have shut me up a long time ago." You continue slowly.

"Just save your energy, lady." He warns, before leaning back on his chair again, watching you closely.

It is not until you start slumping on your chair, perhaps an hour or so later since you last said anything, that he starts to speak again.

"He was going against an explicit order I gave not to touch you."

You look up towards him, failing to hide your surprise as you let out a small gasp.

He harrumphs, switching his attention to the door. "I may not be a man of high honor, but I still would not do something so foul," there is an irregular tapping of fingers on a surface. He is drumming on the back of the chair now, still not looking at you. "The two of you are so similar that it is starting to scare me."

You heave yourself up again as much as you could, your arm placing pressure on the wound is now beyond stiff. "I don't think I..."

"Juyeon has always been a fighter," he starts, his tone is proud, like that of a father voicing his adoration to his daughter, and you do not understand it in the slightest. "Too smart for her own good, too," at this, he draws a small pause, standing up and going further away from where you are sitting, heading into the dark. "Perhaps that is why you are drawn towards her, and she to you."

Gathering the track of his footsteps becomes much more difficult when he starts walking around the empty basement, and the echoes are throwing off your guesses on where exactly he is.

"She is also a genius," he says, now his voice comes from somewhere to your right, and you immediately turn your head towards that area, feeling a chill running down your spine at his following words. "Absorbs all of the skills she needed as a ruthless hitman like a sponge."