A knock on the door is what finally tugs Namjoon's attention away from the financial records he's been going through for the past... Jesus, has it really been two hours already? Rubbing his aching eyes, he calls for his visitor to enter and stretches his arms over his head. Pleasant surprise flutters around Namjoon's stomach when Mikhail Kalkaska slips into the office, quietly shutting the door behind him.
"Are you busy?"
"Not doing anything important," Namjoon says quickly, shuffling his papers aside. He's been at this for hours; he deserves a break. "You aren't interrupting."
Kalkaska approaches the desk and leans up against the side of it, folding his arms across his chest. He looks like he's just returned from the gym—hair pulled up into a messy ponytail with sweat still damp on his temples. "I think I am interrupting. You're just happy to be interrupted."
Namjoon can't help laughing. He raises his hands in defeat and says, "You caught me."
They've developed an odd sort of camaraderie over the past year. Even if Namjoon hadn't been working for Haneul, his natural inclination would be to stay away from people like Jeongguk and Zodiac. Those two are violent and unpredictable, and Namjoon thinks that he could've lived well without either of them knowing his face. That feeling extends to Kasey Dragunov as well, because of whom Namjoon has needed to replace an entire private room of carpeting and fixtures. And although he and Taehyung are technically supposed to be on the same side, per se, Taehyung has his own issues. Namjoon is just trying to do a job and not lose his toes.
As it turned out, Kalkaska was very much trying to do the same.
Their relationship wasn't really anything because it couldn't be. Whatever was going on behind the scenes between Jeongguk and Haneul—it was too risky to get involved with someone who was essentially an enemy. Namjoon only knows a tiny fraction of the details, but that was how Taehyung put it when he asked if there was anything going on between him and Kalkaska. That Jeongguk would be upset one of his dogs was 'fraternizing with the enemy.'
For a long time, they kept it to casual chats in Namjoon's office or a drink at the bar downstairs, but lately, Kalkaska has seemed on edge. Ever since Jeongguk began dealing with Park Jimin, it's been like the breath that everyone is holding has gotten bigger and bigger. When the tension releases, it'll snap like a whip.
And right now in particular, Kalkaska seems troubled.
"You look pensive," Namjoon says. "Is something wrong?"
They met for dinner not too long ago—Kalkaska waffled on accepting initially, but eventually did, and they had a nice evening. Casual, nothing too serious. He seemed a little off that night, too, but he hadn't offered any explanation for it and Namjoon didn't ask.
Kalkaska doesn't respond immediately. He just stares for a long couple of moments, expressionless. Even while tipsy, Namjoon has never seen him smile. It took a long time to squeeze the smallest bit of humor out of him. "Things are changing," he eventually says. "Things are changing really quickly."
Namjoon furrows his brow. "What do you mean?"
"It used to be my side versus your side. But now it's more like we're all scrambling to protect who we want to protect before the fucking apocalypse hits," Kalkaska replies dully.
"Who is it that you want to protect?" Namjoon asks.
"I don't know. I wanna protect everyone, but I can't," he says. "This isn't the kind of situation where you can just diffuse everything peacefully. At some point, we're all gonna have to make choices. Who we wanna save."
The notion that real, actual lives hang in the balance wasn't something that Namjoon intially considered, but Kalkaska is so startlingly plain about it. Taehyung occasionally refers to Jeongguk's dislike of Haneul, but Namjoon has always seen that as some kind of given. The estranged son doesn't like the father.
