❝ I know I'm bad, but it's the only choice that life ever gave me. ❞
She was the crime world's errand girl and he was the police detective that vowed to save her.
multifandom crime!au
I'll embrace you, who has been wandering, beautiful angel
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
━━━━━━
SPECIAL CHAPTER
perhaps in a different world
━━━━━━
Pessimism is not a choice, it's a lifestyle. It's how you have to be if you want to survive in my world. Waiting and hoping won't help you go through the cruel nights and it sure won't bring food to your plate. I tried it, but after I got hungry enough and I couldn't bear to keep listening to my stomach's growling, I realised that if I didn't want to die, I would have to get up and get to work on my own. And that's what I've been doing ever since.
'' You're kidding, right? '' I emotionlessly mumbled and stared at the man in front of me. My hands were stuck in the pockets of my worn-out jacket and my fingers were tightly wrapped around a knife. I managed to keep my face impassive as I stood in front of a small stall where you could buy pork buns, or opium - depending on how you answered the seller's opening question. I wasn't there to do either one of those things, but still, things weren't going well. '' If you aren't going to give me my money, then give me the opium back. I'll come by and bring it to you in a few days, when you'll manage to gather enough cash. I'm not a bank. I don't do no loans. I can't just give you the drugs and hope that you'll give me the money for them tomorrow. If I come back to your supplier without cash, he'll compensate it by selling my organs to your neighbor. ''
I raised my chin and gestured to the construction that was built next to the stall where you could buy pork buns. The shanty of a well-known organ trafficker was just one of many at the underground black market, the place where thieves like the pork bun seller thrived, together with con artists, pickpocketers and other criminals who sold anything from food to weapons. It was dangerous to linger around for too long and there was always someone lurking in the darkest corners, full of litter, empty needles and sewer water.
I had a special hatred for the market and wanting to leave it as soon as possible, I made the fatal mistake of showing the bag of opium to the pork bun seller instead of asking him to give me the money first. I was mentally cursing myself and trying to blame my lack of clear thinking on how hungry I was, but I couldn't deny that it was a stupid decision. It was always stupid to blindly trust someone who lived in the tunnels underneath Seoul. We weren't good people and we learned to do what needed to be done for survival - sometimes even at the expense of others, often innocent people who didn't do anything wrong.
I bit my lower lip and my eyes traveled over my surroundings. My gaze stopped on a pot full of steamed buns and I wondered if I could pull some kind of trick on the seller and distract him by knocking it over. That could give me enough time to snatch the opium from him and run.
