Once he has reached the shop, Takuya lifts his foot and kicks the door at the entrance of the café, the hinges making a gratifying creaking sound as they give way beneath his foot and swing the door open with a dramatic effect. Simultaneously, he yells out in the loudest singsong voice he can muster.
“Oh Jooooooooooo! Come out and play with me!!”
He smirks at the boy’s reaction, strutting up to the counter and placing his weight on it with both palms momentarily, before swinging his legs up and over the counter so he’s standing on the other side with his friend. A few cups topple off the counter, but Takuya pays them no mind.
“I’m booooored. Let’s do something crazy tonight, Joo.” He swings an arm around the smaller boy’s neck, squeezing his shoulder.
“C’mon! Be risky, kid.”
Closing hour was always a nice, peaceful time. Not many people wanted to be the ones packing up, of course ( what with the absolute MESS the rest of the day incurred ) but Byungjoo found it to be pretty tame.
The few cafe-goers that did patron in the later hours of the day did so in a quiet, demure fashion; drifting in then out and rarely causing much hassle. Sure, there were quirky ones every now and then, or the straggler that hooked up to a laptop all the way up until closing time ( Byungjoo relates greatly with this hyung ), but for the most part ? Much more preferable to the hectic chaos of rush-hour mornings and noon. Not to say evening customers weren’t as demanding as the usual, but they usually had a bit more time and Byungjoo fumbled less.
Tonight had been one of those nights, when almost no one had a taste for evening coffee ( in fact, the last customer had actually been a mom and her small daughter peckish for hot chocolate and a muffin ) and the weekends-and-some-evenings barista had left Byungjoo the honor of being The Sole Closing Proprietor. Fewer coffee drinkers and no coworkers meant more time spent thinking about the next article while wiping down the machines; something Byungjoo found he had zero qualms with even after he’d finished up and settled against the back counter, having a steady staring contest with the chalk board wall that sat across from the cash register.
hmm, he’d been wanting to investigate a certain goings-on in nam-gu for a week now. Oh, and he reckoned he owed a certain witch friend of his a visit. A reader wanted to know if arrowroot had any adverse affects when infused in a certain anti-toxin elixi –––
Forget pleasantries, the door was a chorus of tortured screams as Byungjoo very nearly jumped straight out of his apron. His fingers twitched in the anticipation of a spray of shattered glass and screeching alarms, perhaps with a few explosions and panicked yells for good measure ( some of which, granted, would probably be his own in an alternate reality ).
He was still seeing stars and death and the apocalypse by the time a shrill and very loud sing-song cut across his senses, a limb hooking around his neck and clasping him in a one-armed embrace. He hadn’t even noticed when he’d skittered back to make room for the incoming vampire, too preoccupied by the clatter of paper cups ricocheting off of the floor.
“ This side’s for employees only! ” he yelped in mechanic fashion, mind catching up in leaps and bounds and then backtracking a little too far. “ That door could've died tonight, Takuya! That’s a great risk to everything’s safety! ”
A minute pause to recollect scattered timelines, before brunette youth turned to look incredulously at his vampire companion.
“ ... You don’t mean crazy as in the tame type either, do you ? ”
Euh... C 1027 ? C 1029 ? Byungjoo squinted accusatorily at his phone, one hand perched on the spine of a shelved book and the other one scrolling through the library’s online directory. It said the book was on shelves, and yet he couldn’t find it ? And he’s sure not for a lack of trying; he’d been scanning the C 1000 section up and down for the past ten minutes.
... Which reminded him, the library was closing in twenty.
He poked his head out of the shelves, looking for help he could hail down. This search was brought to a jarring halt, however, when a subtle shimmer in the hands of the resident librarian caused sorrel hues to widen into saucers. The moment was short-lived, however, as the youth was off like a shot; the bang that resulted from boy vs bookshelf enough to wake the dead as he essentially overcame any and all obstacles through brute tripping power alone, making a stumbling beeline towards the poor mint-haired librarian.
A mistake. Byungjoo could have felt the onset of a cringe miliseconds before the accidental firing of the camera shutter, cue slow-motion look of horror as the sound echoed unbelievably loudly in the narrow alleyway. The effect was instantaneous: three heads turned almost in sync, and Byungjoo didn’t stick around to hear the chorus of unholy screeches ringing off of concrete wall.
Flinch turned into a full-out stumble, loose gravel becoming airborne as shoes lurched across pavement. Sure, Byungjoo had never been the king of the track team, but he was sure any coach would be proud to see him positively flying through the empty back alleys of beok-gu Sunseong –– though probably having been disqualified for taking off so close to the starting pistol. Internal screaming that blotted out all conscious thought was as good a stand-in for the cheer of actual spectators as any, so much so that Byungjoo barely noticed when screeches became distant and a labyrinth of industrial buildings and warehouses grew around him.
Without thinking twice he dove into the nearest building that offered easy entry, his sneakers kicking up clouds of dust to mark the single pause in his mad sprint. It was, however, in severe lack of foresight, as all the dust-and-probably-asbestos went straight into his face and subsequently into his greedy, air-sucking lungs.
Trotting out of the self-inflicted cloud of doom, choking on a coughing fit and trying desperately to shield his camera from the blight of lens dust ( while also, of course, mentally berating it for betraying him like this. Whose fault was it that he’d been forced to become a temporary Olympian anyway ? Condemned to death by airborne particles ? ). He rubbed at watery eyes and patiently hacked up a lung, confident that he could apply for a hard-earned gold medal in long distance sprint and sure that he would never, ever attempt such a herculean feat ever again.
He froze, however, as his nose was filled not with the scent of cancer in powdered form, but rather the smell of blood.
... Ahem. Byungjoo had stumbled a bit further in than he’d anticipated.
“ That’s ––– a bit illegal, isn’t it ? “ he wheezed out, hands on his knees.
the boy loves steak,,, has a second stomach for steaks,, could eat three steaks in one sitting no problem
is unbelievably bad with naming things
is a v healthy boy and rarely gets sick but as a result is a huuuuuuge baby when he does catch a cold
there's a certain face he makes when he's looking for one word in particular and he just can't catch it and hE'LL INSIST that it's at the tip of his tongue and he almost has it but really,,
if he really can't find it he'll settle for something else and it'll be unsatisfying but bet on it he'll yell the word totally out of context sometime way down the line and this is integral INTEGRAL
alternatively the news will be delivered via text IN ALL CAPS. this is crowing in triumph except digitally
speaking of words his vocabulary is actually p okay ( as could be expected,,, language arts was his best subject )
ok so he CAN cook ( and p decently actually ?? like not a master chef but it’s def edible and doesn’t taste bad ?? like ok he can feed himself and not be malnourished ) but like,,, boy,, boy have you s e en his instant ramen confections you didn’t know the things one can do with a cup of noodles and boiling water this is social media worthy
he doesn’t make it often tho because instant noodles are unhealthy
the reason this came about was because as a kid he was angry the ?? insides ???? didn’t look like what was advertised on the packaging ??? even when he followed all the instructions ?? so he went and tried to make it look as close to that as possible and the rest is evolution history
Preferred name: tbh I’ll respond to any noise you make in my general direction but Inc is totally fine as well !!
Preferred pronouns: any ?? any,,
Timezone: MST (UTC -7 or smth) ey -yodels at the top of the Rocky Mountains-
Preferred writing style:
hahah is it news that I don’t have a preference ?? tbh I’m super cool with any format, para, sms, dialogue or otherwise !! I actually find it a mote easier to respond to styles that are naturally shorter but thats jus bc I feel like it’s less pressure and I don’t have to fiddle with words for nine billion years pFSFSFSSS but I love em all the same !! just,, might respond faster to shorter ones just because its easier for me haaa
Preferred writing genre:
boy I’d love to try anything at least twice hahah //shot
exploring different themes is always a treat in my experience ?? wherever the inspiration takes us ! I just believe that putting a muse into different situations can showcase different sides that wouldn’t have otherwise come to light !! does the usually distant or socially awkward muse have a chivalrous streak ? is the quiet one actually good with comforting people ? does the tough one have a way with children ? does the small one LOVE CHEESY GARLIC BREAD CHIPS ?? it’s always a discovery and I think it’s pretty great pFFFS,,, explorinn find the new things
I’ll admit tho I’m all for them crack and dank memes
Genres you’re less interested/would rather not partake in:
as a minor I’m neither interested in nor willing to write smut or excessively sexual content :’> anything else is really fair game !!
Any other writing preferences?
ah I guess ?? I usually prefer small text but really it doesn’t matter either way hahaha anything else is pretty Aesthetic but also time consuming so I’m like ?? wow ?? amazing but also ahahah I’m so lazy so um yeah I’m pretty minimal on formatting,,
Favorite color:
right but listen here every color is beautiful in its own right like yeah some are drab some are neon some are pale and others aren’t and that is honestly incredible *DEEP BREATH* tl;dr how do you expect me to choose
Favorite/lucky number:
uuuhhhhh,,, well idk the number 9 or 1 / 11 appears a lot in my life I guess hahahaha
A song/show/drama you’d recommend:
a friend of mine would like me to promote Scorpion (cbs) and I’ve seen the first two episodes and it’s pretty great so far ?? either way I’ve peeked into quite a few different corners of music/show/drama tho but at the sam time I know like nonE AHAH,,, tho for real you can get me into pretty much anything ?? I always find something to appreciate pffs
Fill in the blank: “You’re always free to message me about ___!”
yelling ?? idk man for real I’m a huge chatterbox and I always want to talk to people haha !! really feel free to start a conversation with me about like,, most anything tbH,, if it’s a topic I’m not familiar with you should 100000% tell me about it ?? I’d love it :00 ( also we can always just hold a conversation in just screeching I’m down for that also )
If you could choose a species in Obscura that you’d like to be, what would it be? Why?
geeeee all the species r pretty cool ?? tho bein a vampire or a werewolf is to u gh so like I honestly don’t think I could pull it off hAHAHA,,, tbh a beast blooded would be mighty cool !! I’d totally want to be a dragon :‘DDDD
What is your ultimate weakness; what makes you feel all soft and squishy inside?
um,,, tbh ships ?? and not even just the romantic kind like give me familial ships,, friendships, hateships, platonic ships ???? I’ll just m elt inside hahahaha wow I’m super lame.,, just some kids just having to deal with each other’s existence in their lives is honestly the best,,, angst also makes me cry and hurt forever but I love it 8")
Write the first thing to come to mind in caps:
tHATS NOT WHAT THE FROG COLOR IS
Three random facts about you:
HAHAHAH whoops I absolutely,,, s UC K at these pFF ok um,, um lessee other than the fact that I’m lame
a pair of magpies were going to build a nest in this smol conifer right up against a window in our house and like ?? yo you could see the beginnings of the twigs getting threaded through there and I was like :000 !!! hype ?? wow they chose this place to be home and I was so ready 2 take pictures of ugly baby dinos I mean cute baby magpies since it’s like I could sit on the arm chair that’s up against the window and I could have full vantage of the lil nest ??? as I was saying, hype !! bUT THEN MY MOM TOOK OUT A FRUIT KNIFE THE ONE WE CUT WATERMELONS WITH AND SAWED OFF THE WHOLE BRANCH AND THREW IT TWIGS AND ALL INTO THE TRASH AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHG -sobs softly- im just sorry for the poor magpie pair,,, I’m sorry we wasted all your hard work,,, ( mom’s explanation: this is my house so I’m not going to let them build a home on my home I was here first !! ) tho like I don’t think the magpies moved out tbh I saw the other day they were perched on our tree so ???? I’m just sad I missed out on the great pictures sob it was like a fairy tale ( I tried to talk my mom out of it by saying about how a pair of magpies were considered auspicious n all and I’m disappointed it didn’t work ?? I made a pretty good argument I feel ;v )
right so like last week we had a few slices of raisin bread from T&T ( our local Asian food supplier in the form of a supermarket eyyy ) and I was like,,, wow ??? dude how great would raisin bread french toast be like wOW !!? I’ve never made french toast before and tbh we’re like rice everyday ™ and honestly the inside of our fridge has never seen cheese or cream or pasta ( ok look I know uncooked pasta doesn’t go in the fridge but I was making a point ) and certain other western-type foods are rare guests ( a tragedy rly because I love that stuff ) bUT ANYWAY !! I was thinking about french toast and going,,, woah,,, woah woAH ??? we might actually have all the ingredients ?? we always have eggs, and… oh, half and half…? aw… we don’t have that— oH but you can make it with milk and butter ??? gasp i actually think we have like 1 stick of frozen butter from waaaay back and I’m sure it’s saved there omg this’ll work. we don’t have nutmeg but… I distinctly remember getting vanilla extract and my mom says we have cinnamon ?? I didn’t even know we had cinnamon !! wow this is going to work imma make it for breakfast tomorrow it will be great !! so cue tomorrow, I wake up earlier to get it ready ( lmao since usually I wake up like 5 mins before transit comes and toss stuff into my backpack and leave ) and,,, and it turns out we I overestimated what we had in our fridge aHAHA,,, what I thought was a stick of butter was actually yeast and there was ?? no sugar ?? I could not find sugar,,, we didn’t have milk either and I was v disappointed in myself bUT !! I still made it using soy milk and brown sugar ( it was super hard I was chiseling it with a spoon ) but luckily I did manage to dig out the vanilla extract + the cinnamon was def there, as were the eggs and salt was around. of course, had to use vegetable oil instead of butter to grease the pan as I’d planned but !! it totally turns out great and was a p good success considering a first attempt hahaha,,, topped it with bananas, crumbled walnut and maple syrup and it was great :^))))))
ummmmmmmmmmmm wow those turned out long hAHAHA,, uh no other interesting stories are coming to mind right away but like ?? I guess one time when I was a kid we were in Toronto I think and I,,, rushed some pigeons ( like when u try to make people flinch right ?? yeah ) some pigeons that were in a courtyard and like,,, ok so there was a lady eating subway and she was a respectable business lady or smth bUT SO THE FLOCK OF PIGEONS ALL TOOK OFF AND SHE ( understandably ) SPOOKED AND DROPPED HER SUBWAY AND WALKED QUICKLY AWAY AND WOW I FELT SO BAD AAHHAAHAAAaaa,,, either way the pigeons descended on the subway and it was never seen again,,, I still feel rlllyyy bad abt it I’m so sorry for like ruining that woman’s day sobbbbb
ohey and we come full circle aHahah,, one story about birds, another story about food, and then a story about birds and food aahhaahaHAHAA,,, pretty accurate reflection of my life tbh,,, I’m all about birds and food
oH,, oh,, ‘nother story came to mind which involves a rly majestic nosebleed but uh hmmm let’s save that one PSHH
Two roads diverged in grassy suburb: one which lead to where Byungjoo should have been going, and the other...
Well, the other which didn’t.
He’d been up to something of moderate importance, that much he was sure, but apparently whatever it was didn’t quite make the ‘significance’ cut — as could be judged by the noted absence of details regarding the aforementioned “moderate importance.” Whatever it had been had lost all relevance the moment the youth had backpedaled comically to a stop, the concept of that-thing-I-was-planning-on-doing-but-is-escaping-me-now fleeing almost as quickly as the speed of his double-take. Camera was out before sorrel hues had even fully identified the cause of the detour, heartbeat suddenly audible in the wake of — was that what he thought it was ?
Sneaker-clad feet would pick a quick trot over rounded cobblestone, bringing him closer to the onlooking windowsill that had caught his passers-by attention. The path itself, bordered by leafy green and a myriad of sweet-smelling flowers, had been admire-worthy in their own right; though it’d been one, red-leafed plant like a dragon’s tongue, that’d caused him to jettison his life’s duty as a responsible, polite, private-property respecting citizen to chase what could very well be mirages into a wonderland of flowers.
Camera pointed up towards the last known location of the plant which shall not be named in case it gets his hopes up ( though who was he kidding, the anticipation was eating him from the inside out ), Byungjoo changed tactics to slow backwards steps, hoping to catch the angle that’d afford him a good shot. The windowsill’s lip was quite prominent ( which... sounded like a really awkward appraisal now that he thought about it ) and was doing an ovation-worthy job of being in the camera’s line of sight. It was a hundred years too early to lose faith, however, and already Byungjoo dared to think he spotted a bit of red peeking out from around the —
Thoughts would be cut off by a strangled yelp as his stomach dropped out from beneath him, something ( see: his feet ) catching the back of his heel and knocking his balance straight off the face of the earth. Not even wings could have counteracted the incredible speed at which the brunette-haired boy went down, camera falling out of grasp and killing him instantly.
... which wasn’t that much of a hyperbole, really, all things considered ( how about dropping a mobile device onto one’s face, except it’s five pounds and has Robust Edges ? )
One winded lung later, Byungjoo is brought back to life by a stinging in his left, probably a skinned wrist, but it’s heard to tell because his vision is still swimming in the aftermath of camera armageddon. If his face regained half the motor functions it possessed pre-camera impact 2017, he was a lucky man.
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