Promise

37: Closure

It was early in the morning, the sun not even having a chance to rise, when Hongjoong walked down a desolate street. He couldn't say he's been here before, or at least in recent years. There was some sense of familiarity to a few of the older buildings, years and years of wear and tear evident in their walls. Every streetlight flickered, but Hongjoong wasn't necessarily worried.

The vampire looked down at the compass in his hands, his right eye definitely not what it used to be, but he could at least see out of it. Letting out a sigh, he looked up at the antique store he stood in front of, looking up a bit further to see that it was merely called Treasure. Glancing back down at the compass, he was certain that the beautiful object was pointing him here. He had done four laps around the block, each time becoming more and more certain that the compass was pointing directly into the store.

Hongjoong didn't understand why he was being guided here, but he wouldn't shy away from it. Stepping closer to the door, he let out a heavy sigh upon noticing the store hours, definitely not opening for another few hours. He already felt bad for leaving the warehouse without a word, but he needed to do this, and he needed to do it alone.

Despite all of his efforts to shove his personal problems aside, this was just eating at him. He knew if he could get to the bottom of this piece of the puzzle then he could completely focus on keeping his crew safe, and getting to the bottom of that whole situation. Right now, he was at a loss, he didn't know if he should go back and inform the others, the right thing to do, or if he should just wait around here for the store to open.

It might serve him well to have some alone time out and about, but that struck a nerve at the same time. He has people to protect, people to worry about, and here he was idling in front of a closed store in the dark, a sprinkle of rain staring to fall around him. Not to mention, despite doing better, he still wasn't one hundred percent.

Just as he was about to give up, turning away to walk in the direction he came in, his ears perked up. A little bell chimed nearby, getting him to look back at the antique shop, his heart stopping when an older woman stood in the doorway, staring down Hongjoong from the elevation.

"Can I help you?" The woman asked, cocking her head to the side as she looked the vampire up and down. "You've been standing there for twenty minutes."

Hongjoong's eyes widened. There's no way that much time passed, he couldn't believe it. "I apologize, I must've got lost in thought."

The woman hummed, again looking Hongjoong up and down, before nodding her head back into the store. "Come in, please."

There was a switch that flipped in Hongjoong's brain, forcing him to analyze every single detail about this situation. He listened out for anything off within the store and nearby, finding nothing. The woman's heartbeat is steady, a slight difference in the sound of her steps due to a limp, a creak in the floor randomly ringing out with no pattern. Hongjoong deemed it safe enough to follow inside, knowing he would have the upper hand at escaping if anything were to go down. He was being led here after all, why wouldn't he accept the offer?

Hongjoong's eyes trailed over the assortment of antiques all across the store, filling it to the brim, a dusty haze to the air even if it were dark. A dim light illuminated over the register area, the woman likely sitting there before she went out to approach Hongjoong, especially since she went straight over there. As she sat in the chair behind the counter space, she gave Hongjoong a look that was admittedly difficult to read at first. But after a second of thinking, Hongjoong realized he was just being observed the same way he's observing her.

"You a vampire?" The woman questioned, despite her voice sounding frail, held a lot of confidence.

"Who's asking?" Hongjoong narrowed his eyes, allowing them for a brief moment to turn red. He wasn't afraid of the societal repercussions of revealing what he is, unlike others. Hell, he even engrained it in his crew to be careful, and yet he himself doesn't follow the same customs.