p o i n t - g u a r d

TWENTY-SIX

THE TRAITOR

It took Choi Siwon nearly ten minutes to notice the commotion, but to be fair, he'd been distracted by the overwhelming sense of home he was currently feeling.

It had been a good decade since he'd stepped a foot into Seoul, after all. A good decade away from the roaring engines and the neon lights. A good decade away from the guns and drugs. There were some times that he missed his past life, of course- who wouldn't? The thrill and the adrenaline pumping through his veins then would have built a crazed addiction in anyone. And Lord, let us not start on how well he was known. His name echoed fearfully from neighborhood to neighborhood, city to city. There was not a single place in South Korea that people had not heard of his name. Forget your whatsoever little boy bands, Choi Siwon was the man, the myth and the legend all in one. He was that someone everyone thought no one could ever beat, and at some point he had even thought the same way as well, alas, as they say 'security is mortals' chiefest enemy'. His fame had not last for long.

A loud crash of what seemed to be glass caught the man in his late thirties' attention and he turned in the direction of the sound, curious. In the middle of the room and atop a table, stood a boy, a cocked pistol in his hand. Glittering fragments of broken glass pooled at his feet as he continued firing at the arms of the grand chandelier.

Siwon blinked, a feeling the French would call deja-vu- the feeling that 'I have been here before'- tightening his chest.

This boy's face stirred the depths of his memories, seeming to bring the past back to present. This was a face from the past, Siwon was damn sure about it. It was one of the most fine faces he'd ever recalled seeing, afterall. One doesn't just forget things like that. This face was so finely cut that the shabbiness of the shady den was suddenly excused- this was a beauty that burned so fiercely and brightly that the lights the boy had just shot out was put to shame. The lines of the boy's cheekbones, his jaw, and his throat- exposed by a linen shirt open at the collar- were so gentle and perfect that he almost would have looked like a statue were it not for the much disheveled and slightly curling hair falling into his face, as black as midnight against his ivory skin.

The years drew Siwon back again, the fog and dim streetlights of a Seoul more than ten years lost rising to claim the man. He found his lips shaping a name: Daehyun. Jung Daehyun. Or was he considered a Kim now?

Siwon stepped forward instinctively, the movement feeling slightly awkward.

As if sensing a possible threat, the boy's eyes went to him, and a shock passed through Siwon. They were not Daehyun's eyes.