going down swinging.

a loaded gun complex, cock it and pull it

[idjuniper-blog]

tide.

[idgun-blog1]

idjuniper --

“haven’t we been at this long enough now? we used to have a lot more fun in practice rooms.” she brings it up mostly because she feels, in many ways, as if she’s a memory from his past he’d rather forget. one she’s more than happy to continue rubbing in his face, even if, in truth, that hardly makes her feel fabulous.

gun carries a lot of regrets. it’s just how he is. of course, that never stops him from doing or saying things he knows he’ll regret later on, but that’s a whole different problem on its own. point is, there are a lot of moments in his life he would redo with no hesitation if given the chance. juniper is one of them. well, sometimes. mostly. or, okay, maybe not. maybe that's the issue itself. he never really knows when it comes to her. then again, when does he ever really know when it comes to matters of the heart? and therein lies the rub, too, because since when did oh jua have anything to do with his heart? physical, he reminds (lies to) himself. everything between them had always only ever been physical.

and musical (maybe that's where it has to do with his heart), like now. both of them sitting in his minimally decorated studio that has only recently grown in size after much requesting on his end. he has a few knick knacks and musical equipment arriving in the mail soon enough and he can't lie, he's a little proud, a little greedy for more more more. so, yeah. he's being maybe a little more picky than usual on atlas' upcoming track. because it's colored in hues of bright bright pink and blue and it’s a complete departure from anything he's most comfortable with. admittedly, it is an earworm, a perfect, public-friendly summer release that the company's confident will capture the hearts of many, but gun is nothing if not a perfectionist with a thousand worries that this will be it. the track that starts the downfall he's been bracing for ever since they started to rise.

and so, there he is. poring over the track for the thousandth time. this time with june in tow because he's wondering if it's at all possible to make her voice sound just that much sweeter. far enough into the session later, he thinks it might just be an impossible task. "that was then," he answers low without so much as a glance over in her direction, eyes laser focused on the colorful bars on his screen, "this is now, in my brand new studio that i'd much rather not dirty up before i even finish decorating it." 

after making a few minor adjustments, he gestures for her to put her headphones back on for a listen. he slides his on too, dark hair tousling as he does before leaning back in his chair and clicking play, arms crossed loosely over his stomach. “you know, maybe you’re right,” he says as her chorus finishes with a hint of a smirk on his lips, clicking the pause button and sliding his headphones off to hang around his neck, “that’s probably as sweet as i can ever make you sound.” 

[idkiwon-blog]

home.

[idgun-blog1]

idkiwon -- 

so, when he goes fishing for the mask he’d been saving for tonight, to cool down the redness and brighten dark circles, and finds it missing, he knows exactly the culprit. the only person in the dorm who would take something of his without asking, who wouldn’t bother buying his own stupid masks, and who would, on top of that, be battling the same genetic dark circles he was. he stomps down the hall, exaggerated footfalls, and into the other’s room, barging in aggressively. “you took it, you took my mask, right?” he grumbles, it’s enough to turn his mood, to sour it. “you’re such an inconsiderate fuck, hyung,” he continues, wrenches one of the desk drawers open and begins to rummage around in it. ‘i’m gonna take something too, see how you like it,” he announces with pursing lips, glances to the side to shoot a glare at the other. it’s petty, but he’s in a bad mood, he’d wanted that time to rest. like meditation, dozing without anything to think about but maybe a podcast. an excuse to stop moving. because without one, kiwon is perpetual motion, activity incarnate, expending energy far faster than he can accumulate it.

there’s really only so much gun can take at any one given point in time. sure, maybe the core reason he’s gotten to where he is now is because he’s always gone against the grain, always going one step beyond the limit, but, god. it’s been years of that now and he feels like he’s become the poster child of exhaustion, his limit lowering with every promotion period. does that stop kjh from telling them, barely a month or so after they’ve officially wrapped up their last comeback, to start getting ready for another one? that he should start sending tracks or lyrics their way asap if he wants any to be included in their next album? of course not, they’re atlas. does the perpetual heaviness in his eyelids lure him to not care about that and sleep early instead while he has the chance before prep and promotions start taking up every possible waking hour of the day? absolutely not. 

so, yeah. maybe he didn’t have the time (read: couldn’t be bothered) to head out and grab some masks or even order any online to be shipped. maybe he rifled through kiwon’s stash and grabbed one or two or five. maybe he’s already used them all over the past few nights because he’s rested his eyes a grand total of 8 hours across all days and darkness has started circling beneath them. but, so what? it’s the least kiwon can grant him, as far as gunwoo’s concerned, for losing sleep over writing the majority of their songs for them and making sure kiwon’s voice suits every single one. in fact, in his stressed state gunwoo’s almost miffed he didn’t offer the stupid masks directly to him and had to go fishing for them himself. it’s irrational in every sense, but kiwon always seems to bring that side out of him. perhaps there’s a lot to unpack there, but gun always opts just throw the whole damn suitcase away. it’s easier to ignore that way. 

it’s a lot harder to ignore, though, when even over his semi sound cancelling headphones, he hears a series of stomps heading towards his room, followed by the slamming of his door open. he doesn’t even have to look up or hear him speak before knowing who it is. “yeah, sure, of course you can come in, kiwon, thanks for knocking,” he gruffs out as he slides the headphones off his ears to rest around his neck, sarcasm thick in every syllable. he looks at the clock on his laptop, belatedly realizing how long he’d been sitting there working without human contact. explains the rasp in his voice, he figures before clearing his throat and spinning around in the chair to watch kiwon search through his drawers angrily. he shrugs, yawning as he does, “probably. i think i used it already too because i ran out of masks today. i meant to tell you, i really liked the brand you got this time. what do you think though, did it work?” pissing kiwon off even more is probably not the smartest choice, but he smiles up small at him anyway, the back of his hand resting flat underneath his chin. 

he doesn’t last too long in position though, snorting as he lets his hand drop back down into his lap, “calm down, kiwi, it was just a mask. i can buy you another if it means that much to you. so if you’re done having a tantrum now, can i get back to mixing this track?” 

[idgun-blog1]

rain again.

[idgun-blog1]

idjinsung --

so when the music dies down and the door to the practice room gets wrenched open, jinsung turns to the intruder with venom ready on his tongue, but stops short at the sight of the camera. instead he carefully swallows his anger and arranges his face into a wide splitting grin. his anger ebbs and amusement flows in instead, leaving his grin to fade into a soft smile, one that he actually means. “and what about you, hyung? didn’t you miss my pretty face too?” jinsung’s voice drips with a teasing tone as he draws in closer, tossing an arm around gun’s shoulders and flashing a victory sign to the camera. “i know i missed our fans, my world!” this probably won’t end well for jinsung but he lives it up while he can, loving the fans attention and bothering gun at the same time, what more could he ask for?

objectively, gun gets it. even when he throws the door open and several years of familiarity allows him to catch that brief flash of annoyance in jinsung’s body-language, he gets it. it’s all in the eyes, he thinks. big, wide, and doe-like, even when gun first met him back when he had significantly less muscle in his arms and didn’t tower over him, they pulled him in, triggered his older brother instincts and made him feel like he had to protect him. of course, that changed as soon as jinsung had opened his mouth, but for a brief moment he saw what he thinks the fans see even now, years after he’s grown well out of his baby days. 

because, sure, it’s the eyes, but it’s also the shagginess of his hair and how the ends cling to his forehead from sweat, a testament to his hard work. it’s the grin he slips into with ease and lets melt into something soft, something gun has both envied and abhorred. and then it’s the way he calls gun hyung and throws an arm around him before quickly addressing the fans, too. he’s an idol through and through, the perfect opposite of gun, so, objectively, he gets it. why he was added to the lineup, why he has so many fans, why so many of them like seeing the two of them together. 

personally, though, gunwoo hates it. jinsung’s arm weighs heavy around him like a big burden and he wants nothing more than to shove him off. so, he does. it’s part of the reason the fans like them so much anyway. he ducks down to escape the weight and snorts as he steps forward a few steps, adding as much tease to his voice as he can when he answers, more truthful than fans would like to believe, “i already see you enough every day that you show up in my nightmares too, why would i ever miss you?” he ends on another half sort of laugh to soften it further for the fans, eyes even crinkling in the corner when he looks at the live video. he hates doing that, too, but what else can he do? jinsung’s their sunshine, and supposedly gun’s too, because who can hate anyone that holds the stars in their eyes and the warmth of the sun in their heart? (gunwoo can, because none of that is real). 

“i just came here as a goodbye present to our world since they wanted to see you,” he starts again before trying to read through the comments, purposefully just getting jinsung in the shot, his baseball cap again the only part of gun the viewers can see. predictably, there’s a whole slew of ship comments that gunwoo tries to avoid until their live catches up to his words and suddenly the chat’s filled with crying emojis. teasing once more, he tilts the camera back down to himself while moving a hand up to remove his baseball cap and run fingers through his flattened hair, “hey, come on, i already told you guys the live would only be fifteen minutes and i already even found jinsungie for you, what more do you want from me?”

and in near desperation to end the live and get the hell out of there, gun swallows his pride and steps back beside jinsung. he tugs his cap snug onto jinsung’s head and pulls on the lid to face it backwards, a small grin on his face as he does, “alright, any last words you want to say to our world?”

[jimiyoong]

[archivedidjowi-blog]

sleepless in

[idgun-blog1]

idjowi --

he continues sardonic, a wry twist to his lips and she smiles at him. it’s a sweet smile, the kind that creases her eyes and rounds her cheeks and shines benevolent on him, and kind, and warm. “that can be arranged,” she tells him, hooks her thumb into the band of her shorts and slides it to the side, pauses to pull it low, over the protrusion of her hip bone, baring another inch of skin to the heat of his attention. “if you ask nicely.” she fits a fingertip beneath his chin to redirect his gaze, lifts his head to meet her eyes once more. “i think you’ll do just fine. they’ve basically given you a mini concert to perform and you’ve never had a problem working a crowd. just really bring the… anger. and the passion. they’ll like it.” i like it, is the unspoken qualifier.

when they met, they had burned too bright too fast. and gun was like a moth to a brand new flame, flocking to it like a lifeline because his old one, stoked with ambition and dreams, was slowly dying of exhaustion. the crackle of electricity between them in stolen moments, in secrecy, in raw passion he was afraid might go dormant, reignited the fire in him, woke him up when he needed it most. in hindsight, those weeks had him standing in the eye of a hurricane but he’d been too focused on the twinkle in her eyes and everything between them to notice the wall starting to close in. so when it did, taking her away from the radio show and more importantly from him, it blew out the fire and left him aching, furious in its abruptness.

he spiraled out of control after that, turned elsewhere to try and fill the void she’d left him with, to try and find that fire once more like a withdrawing addict. old flames, new faces, familiar bottles, he turned to them all in what he denies was desperation, longing. but nothing matched the intensity that was ahn jowi. nothing captivated him as wholly as the burning grip of her fingers, the temptation in her eyes. and the more he tried, the further he got, anger growing more and more, running hot in his veins, threatening to explode until it did, bringing him back to where it began. with her. except without the hushed laughter or warm smiles and warmer hands laced together, replaced with slurred words and piercing eyes and rough hands enough to bruise like he’s desperately searching for something that no longer exists.

even now, he continues searching. eyes tracing down the curve of her slow, voice unfiltered and honest for a split second, a convenient slip of the tongue betraying the hold she still has on him to this day, a literal thousand miles away from what they were. an error fixed unconvincingly enough that it draws her to him, closer, closer, until he has to look down to see her, eyebrow raised. for a brief moment, her smile looks like it used to, warm, inviting, and the beat of his heart picks up speed almost like it’s hopeful. gun knows better, though, slides his eyes back down to follow the telltale movement of her thumb baring more skin. he wastes no time to fit a hand over it, curling his fingers into her and pushing the door behind him shut.

no escape route now (as if he ever looks for one).

“well, which one is it?” he asks, reaching for her finger under his chin and pulling it away before digging into the other side of her waist. fingers pressed deep into warm skin drag her closer and his lips slant into half a smile, words leaving rough when he speaks them, “anger?” he pauses to slide a hand up her back, grasping at strands of hair and tugging lightly like a preview of what’s to come. “or asking nicely?” he adds, letting go of the strands to reach up and smooth down the crown of her head, to tuck her hair behind her ear, to graze a thumb gently down her cheek. he almost gets lost in the actions until he lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding and drops his hand away from her face, gripping her waist once more, “it’s always mixed signals with you, isn’t it? i’m getting tired of it and i have to get ready for that mini-concert soon.”

“so, pretty please, jowi,” he starts, not pretty or nicely at all, voice gruff and sardonic, “won’t you tell me straight?”

[archivedidjowi-blog]

sleepless in

[idgun-blog1]

idjowi --

her tongue drags over her lips, quick flick. it tastes like lipstick, salt, gloss.  he makes her nervous, like a kid. like an idiot. it’s a good nervous, vibrating, energy that builds up and up and up, into a  frenetic, fidgeting, staccato stab at her temples. she remembers long hours in the studio, the quiet twilight flicker of the soundboard, the rustle of his lips against the mic when he leaned too close - a habit he’s long since brushed off, polished out to perfected pitch. she curls a finger into a long strand of hair, hanging to the small of her back. “yeah, could i get a comprehensive review of my performance?” she drawls, pauses a beat and lifts a brow, “you watched it, right? both of them?” she thinks about the way his fingers curled around his water bottle back then. around her waist thereafter. she thinks about a hundred, thousand times brushing past him backstage, and secret smiles, and quiet laughter tucked in the slant of his lips. he’s hesitating, so she reaches a hand out, hooks it into the waistband of his jeans and drags him closer. not close enough to touch though, not yet.

being with ahn jowi always feels a little like being in liminal spaces.

like how it began, in a dimmed radio studio after hours and everyone else is gone but them. or how it continued when it shouldn't have, with him stumbling down eerily quiet, orange lit hotel hallways at two in the morning. or like right this moment, in this enclosed room in an unfamiliar country thousands of miles away from home. where the screams that felt near suffocating just minutes ago sound muffled now, like they don't exist inside this room, not until he steps back out of it to where he's supposed to go, to who he's supposed to be. being with ahn jowi feels uneasy, dangerous, like he's somewhere he isn't supposed to stay for too long, like if he doesn't leave he'll never make it to his destination.

sometimes, he isn't sure he wants to anyway.

sometimes, he stays.

always, it's a mistake.

"yeah," he answers truthfully before he can think to stop himself, mistake number one. gun's usually good about filtering his words, managing his expression, every idol has to be after all. but with jowi, he falls for her bait every time, becomes no gunwoo with lowered inhibition that drags his eyes down the curve of soft bared skin and gives himself away by answering in all honesty. until he pulls himself together, straightens up and shrugs, lies with a tilted grin on his lips, "i mean, they were alright i guess."

they were amazing, he means. mesmerizing in every sense. he's proud of her, he wants to add. maybe even a little jealous of her solo stages, of the fire in her eyes throughout every performance, the way she's glowing even now while he hasn't even gone on stage yet and god, he feels exhausted and looks it too.

"if i had to criticize anything, your stage outfits could've done with far less i think," he adds on instead because this is who they are, sarcasm obvious in his tone, in his snort. not a drop of the sincerity in the back of his mind that feels like it would be mistake number two if spoken.

"what about you, you'll watch ours, right? got any words of advice for me? chile's crowd seems wildly different."

[archivedidjowi-blog]

sleepless in

[idgun-blog1]

idjowi -- 

gun is always like this. always has this effect on her, as if there is something magnetizing, as if there is something impossibly compelling. he has no right, truthfully, to be that way. he’s not the most attractive man she’s ever seen in her life, and even if he were, she likes to think she’s moved past the teenage starstruck years, having spent so long surrounded by such attractive people. he’s not the smartest person in her life or the kindest. but he is, undeniably, the one that has most relentlessly taken hold of her. she resents him for that.

it never really gets old, the screaming. it never gets comfortable, either. really, it only gets worse as time goes, pressure mounting tenfold the louder it gets. the hosts just mentioned their name and even through a screen backstage it feels overwhelming enough to get him out of their styling area for a few moments to breathe as gunwoo.

it helps, for a few minutes. until as luck would have it, it's jowi he finds instead of his members when he swings the door open on his way back. because, of course. no rest for the weary. only tension in the second frozen between them, broken only when she speaks and he finds his bearings.

'yes,' he wants to say, 'in more ways than one.'

"no," he answers instead, a beat too late to sound convincing despite the roughness of his voice. "no," he starts again, loosening the sweaty grip he has on the doorknob and jamming it into his sweat's pocket, "wrong room, thought it was ours. i should've learned some spanish before getting here." it's a bad joke, terrible even, all things considered. like the fact that their name is written in plain english as always, just one more door down. a testament to his exhaustion, or maybe to her distraction. the bare skin of her waist, the weight of her eyes on him.

he's still in sweats and a t-shirt, hair clipped and half messy, in the middle of being styled. a sight that she's seen before, surely, but tonight, in this exact moment with her skin glistening and stage outfit on, coming back from a performance he admittedly couldn't take his eyes off of -- well, he feels underwhelming. not that he shows it, grin tilting sideways, eyes locked on hers, letting silence stretch thin between them a split second too long. "you look more like you could use some help," he adds teasingly, eyebrow raised as he leans against the doorframe, "anything i can do?"

[archiveidjuniper-blog]

no way.

[idgun-blog1]

idjuniper --

she bites at her lowerlip to hide a smirk when she sees him, steps into his studio and grins. “you’re letting me in the studio still? not making us meet at one of the kjh ones?” the suppressed smirk fails to hide now, spreading slow and amused over rounded features, too youthful for the image she’d like to present. “i’ve sent the track over, did you get it?” she questions, collapsing onto the chair beside him, rubbing a hand under her eye as she peels off the face mask, a pathetic attempt at obscuring the exhaustion written on her features. 

it’s difficult to hide from anyone in this industry. gun’s learned as much the hard way multiple times over and possibly the hardest with june. it’s not that he needs to hide from her, necessarily, but it’d be nice if he didn’t run into her so often when he’s just trying to get to his studio, or to the practice room, or to any damn room in the company building. they were supposed to end three years ago, not begin again two years later even less serious than before. but maybe there’s a reason he hasn’t changed his studio passcode because, as gun knows all too well, old habits die hard -- except for when time interferes.

because through end of the year festivities, then comeback prep, then a whole whirlwind of promo for possibly atlas’ biggest era yet, he hasn’t had much time to even sleep, much less revisit someone he shouldn’t. he’s closed in on himself for months now, laser focused on atlas, on producing, on his career, leaving no room for much else. his studio’s become his home even more than before, so when kjh had asked him if he was interested in producing a song for another artist, he jumped at the chance before even asking who for. it’s everything he’s wanted to do, after all: to start solidifying his name as not only atlas’ gun, but producer no gunwoo. 

as his luck would have it though, the opportunity comes with a price and her name is june. 

keypad beeps and the quiet creak of the studio door signal her entrance, forcing him to sit up from his slouch and spin the chair around. he snorts and shrugs by way of greeting, kicking the chair next to him out for her. “why would i?” he starts, knowing very well why, knowing what’s happened more than once in his very studio, knowing the risk of it happening again, “when mine’s better than all of theirs combined?” 

he mirrors her smirk and already he thinks maybe he should have asked them to meet elsewhere. but it’s too late now, so he clears his throat instead and turns his attention back to his computer screen, opening the track she’d sent him. “i did, it’s good. so are the lyrics,” he says, because it’s the truth, because they always did match musically when nothing else did, because he resonated with her lyrics and he knows more than he should how anxious she must’ve felt performing them on tv. “i watched your performance for the original, too, what’d your dad think about that?” he asks, probing maybe a little too far for what they are now. 

[idgun-blog1]

rain again.

with @idjinsung​ at the kjh building { detail your character doing a vlive broadcast } they say tomorrow is another sunrise, those rainclouds tell me otherwise

it’s never a coincidence that gun’s vlives are usually about ten minutes long and not much more if he can swing it. he just hates doing them. can even name a million and one reasons why. but the number one reason is: 

where’s jinsungie? ㅠㅠㅠ

it’s not just jinsung they ask for, to be fair, but more often than not it is. enough that he notices it more than most. and what’s worse is they don’t ask for jinsung because they don’t want to see gun, but because: 

gunwoo looks bored without his sunshine ㅋㅋ someone call jinsung quick ㅋㅋㅋㅋ

he hates humoring them. so, he doesn’t. “wow, the comments are going by so fast i can’t even read them,” he answers instead, voice scratchy, a quiet laugh following soon after. at least it’s only half a lie. he leans forward in his studio’s chair, eyes squinted as he tries to hold and stop the comments flying by to read them. unsurprisingly, he lands on a bunch of short phrases in english and yet another jinsung comment. annoyance is all he feels now, lips almost betraying the emotion live on camera before he catches himself, forces out a laugh of sorts and a click of his tongue. 

“why do you all want to see jinsung? is my handsome face too much for your weak hearts already? it’s only been eight minutes,” he teases, all while he reaches for his phone and pushes himself up out of his chair. he still hates humoring them, hates perpetuating a ship he desperately wants sunk, but it’s only getting harder to swallow the sharp words sitting at the edge of his tongue -- and, so, “okay, okay, let’s go find him.” he slips out of his studio, calling out jinsung’s name for their goddamn entertainment as he walks through the halls of the kjh building in search of the last person on earth he wants to see. 

gun’s about to give up when, like clockwork, he spots a familiar head of brown hair dancing around the practice room and barges in. he angles the camera to try and get them both in frame, only to end up with just his eyes and black baseball cap showing and a full body shot of a very sweaty jinsung looking half confused by the sudden intrusion. good enough, gun figures. he didn’t want to do this stupid live anyway. “they wanted to see you,” he deadpans by way of both greeting him and introducing him to the viewers. 

[idgun-blog1]

n0gun 💥 일하는총~ #너무궁금했어그치 #기대해쥰세요 #흐흐히 load more comments...

atlas.eng [eng tr] working~* #you’re curious right? #please look forward to it** #heuheuhi  * instead of using the correct ending ~중 he ended it with 총, gun in korean  ** instead of the correct spelling of 주세요 he spelt it with 쥰, which sounds like june 👀 yesgun go to sleep T___T l0veyourself wow... they’re being really obvious though aren’t they...? 

[archivedidjowi-blog]

lure.

[idgun-blog1]

idjowi -- 

she steps back from him abruptly, as if she has been burned. “so, good show.” she tells him, grabs a bottle of water, twists it open. takes a gulp, as if that will dampen the heat that blooms inside her.

there's just something about the atmosphere during radio shows.

something gun can't quite put his finger on. maybe it's the fact that (at least for the shows he's done) they're not viewable broadcasts, only focused on sounds, like the deepness of his voice, the pure listening quality of music without visual aids, or maybe it's the softness of her laugh. maybe it's the small enclosed space, the warmth it creates, the lack of flashy stage lights and screaming fans, or maybe it's the weighted tension that sparks something in him, strikes fire between them.

so, maybe it's just ahn jowi.

the furtive glances, his inability to keep his lips straight, to keep his hands to himself, to keep himself from wanting more, more, more. even now as he does his closing ment, the heavy thump of his heart is all he can really hear, the weight of her eyes on his lips the only thing he can feel, the growing tension as the show's end draws closer and closer and he passes it off to her to say her goodbyes the only thing on his mind. she feels the same, he can tell. a smirk blooms on his lips and he wants but he stays professional to the end. greets the staff goodbye until they're the only ones left.

the room seems to shrink as the door shuts behind the last staff member and only the light in the studio remains on. his phone buzzes against the table, most likely his manager, but her breath right next to him drowns it out, clouds his judgment. because that's what ahn jowi does to no gunwoo. consumes him until there's nothing left but her. so his phone goes unanswered and he almost shivers when her heat leaves his side.

his lips crook as he watches her gulp water and he leans back against the desk, hands gripping at the edge of it. he shrugs, snorts before he starts, "yeah, great show, even. won't be much anymore without you though. how am i supposed to carry the show now? with just my rugged charm?"

his smirk grows, but so does his wanting. and so, he takes. reaches out, wraps pale fingers around her wrist and tugs her closer, pulls the water bottle out of her hand and sets it on the desk behind him. he slides his arms around her, crosses them behind the small of her back, thumb idly grazing it.

"seriously, though, you sure i can't convince you to stay on a little longer? i can be very persuasive if i want to be," he says, volume dropping, eyebrow raising along with the slant of his lips.

[bwisou-deactivated20190916]