stray kids x female reader
angst, mafia!au, mention of death
the aforementioned staggers back a bit, eyes widening at the question soaking his name. he searches your face for a moment, trying to make himself remember you. he doesn’t.
‘The mere utterance of his name elicits one of two reactions: either the most unsettling flood of fear or just a modicum of peace because what usually follows isn’t too far from the first. His name alone holds power, its mention guarantees entry through any door, respect from any enemy. It matters how you say it though. I’ve seen Jisung and Changbin hyung spit it out like the very need to say it meant someone was going to die. Minho and Hyunjin sing it like a threat, they always bite back smirks at the panic it evokes. Felix and Seungmin use it as little promises, of Chan hyung’s scope, Stray Kids reach. Like the use of his name is a silent reminder of his reign.’
It matters how you use it.
So, when you mumble his name like you’re reading it off of your sweaty palm, squinting up at the tall man questioning you in the gloomy dark of the alley behind the inconspicuous warehouse — it’s a given that the guard tilts his head in confusion.
“Are you asking me or telling me?”
“What do you think?” You can’t stop yourself before you can lose control, the tall guard’s gaze darkening at the childish insult. “I’m here to see Bang Chan.”
Scouring your mind for a split second, you beg yourself to think up a single person he had spent hours rambling on and on about before it came to you. His name is still heavy in your heart, and even heavier on your tongue, but you force it out as best you can, throat tightening as you whisper it aloud, “Jeongin. Yang Jeongin.”
The name forces the already towering guard’s back to straighten, his throat clearing as he excuses himself. “Wait here.”
Thinking yourself successful, you exhale for the first time since you arrived. Seconds later you feel a sting in your neck, your knees buckling as you fall into strong arms that carry you away in one swoop. The last thing you hear before the dark and what is evidently a toxin consumes you, is the slam of a heavy metal door and a deep, booming voice calling for the one you came to see.
The next thing you see is a face that is easily one of the most beautiful you’ve ever laid eyes on. The only thing more striking than it is the harsh slap the stunning boy delivers you before a bucket of ice cold water pours over you.
“Hyunjin, do you have to do that?” A bored voice sighs from somewhere out of sight, your eyes struggle to focus on anything as everything remains blurred. “She’s clearly just waking up.”
“Who cares?” This voice seems slightly amused, as if enjoying your suffering. “Who even is she?”
“I don’t know, but she asked for I.N by name.” Feet hit the ground and carry the voice to stand right before you. His accent rings throughout the room. Deep and booming. Australian. Even in your haze, you hear Jeongin’s voice loud and clear.
‘He’s Australian too. Super weird, but nice.’
The aforementioned staggers back a bit, eyes widening at the question soaking his name. He searches your face for a moment, trying to make himself remember you. He doesn’t. “How do you know who I am?”
“I’m here to see Bang Chan.” It’s all you had practiced before coming here. Any name or word outside of that sentence was meant for none other than him. You saw the confusion worm its way into his kind smile, his eyes finding something he missed terribly in your fearful gaze, something he can’t bring himself to address.
“She’s clearly done her research,” the calmest one among them tuts, his neat hair bouncing and crisp shirt shifting as he moves to stand beside Felix.
‘He probably has the most brain cells out of us.’
“Seungmin?” Though you catch them off guard again, listing their names only works to prove his theory.
“She must work for them,” he’s wrong there but you admire his deduction. He seems like the one least charged by rage so he’ll likely be the one most useful to you after Chan himself. Smart didn’t mean merciful though. “I say we question and then kill her before the rest even get here. Save us all some time.”
“Cool with me,” Hyunjin, the pretty one from earlier, agrees. “She must have a message or something. Probably a threat.”
“I don’t know,” the last one mutters, full cheeks reddening as he rubs at them. There is fatigue in his slouch but excitement in his eyes. “I’m all for eliminating threats but not ones this pretty.”
“Are you fucking kidding?”
“Listen, it isn’t every day a pretty girl with a death wish drops herself at your doorstep.”
“Enough,” the depth in Felix’s voice makes the air thick, his sad eyes still inspecting how peculiarly you regard them. “We can’t kill her.”
“____?” The notes of surprise coating Chan’s voice has every one of them flinching. The way his eyes take in your figure, the violent speed with which your chest rises and falls of, the squint in your bruising eye, your damp clothes and trembling figure. All, he assumes, to be products of your fear. “Untie her.”
“Untie her,” the suspicion surrounding your appearance should have them refusing. But Felix obeys, his eyes a touch more perceptive in this time of grief. He’s alert though, when the ties fall away, the room falling silent as they wait for your next move, sure you’d been dormant while bound.
You can’t move or think or talk. You can only glower as he steps closer to you, your heart beating dangerously hard in your chest as you watch him kneel in front of you.
That is when you snap out of it.
Your knee bending and heel rising as you strike his chest with so much power, you pray it may pass right through. He clutches at his ribs in pain iron filling his senses as he coughs up blood, gulping down air in ragged breaths to restore the wind you’d purged from his lungs. You pray his ribs have broken.
“Leave her!” Chan chokes out at the shadow looming over you both. Your hands have clasped around his throat, tightening every second, yet all he can do is defend you. “Don’t touch her!”
It’s Felix who shoves Changbin away from you both when he ignores Chan’s direct order. How Felix can just vouch for Chan, and indirectly vouch for you, a complete stranger, has Hyunjin seething. “Lix! She’s trying to kill him!”
“____, I’m sorry.” The pathetic plea in his voice only has your fingers tightening, his bulging eyes and swelling face doing nothing to dissolve the hatred in your heart. “Jeongin,” he chokes out his name, hands closing around your wrists as your hands tremble around his throat. “He wouldn’t want this.”
“Don’t—” you’re blinded by an ear to ear grin and mooned eyes, an over the top whine and a glare of feigned disinterested. “Don’t you fucking dare—” The joy in his giggles and ache in his sobs. The delight in his hums and the chill in his fear. “Don’t tell me what he wanted!”
“She knows Innie?” Confusion laces his words more tightly than your grip, Changbin’s struggle in Felix’s hold slowly weakening. “Who are you?”
“His sister.” Felix’s successful deduction renders you powerless. His words deepening the void you’ve felt growing in your heart since he passed. Can you still be a sister when you have no one to call your sibling?
Seungmin flinches when he realises all their braincells actually belong to felix now. “He said ____ was his cat.”
“His sister, his cat, who gives a fuck!” Hyunjin groans as he realises he may be the only one in the room with any sense right now. “I.N has been dead for months, what the fuck did you do to save him, huh? Where the fuck were you?”
“So you‘re stupid and deaf?”
“What did you call me?” Minho sniggers when Hyunjin basically answers your question, the younger’s head snapping to his hyung. “So you’re just fine with her walking in here after all this time?” No one answers him, suddenly alert as they watch you rise from where you straddle Chan’s wheezing body to stride over to Hyunjin. “I don’t give a fuck who you are, Innie died! Where have you been?”
“Jeongin liked you, so I won’t kill you for how you’re speaking to me and for laying your hands on me earlier.” Before he can say a word, you quickly add, “I also won’t kill you for letting him die.”
Nodding, you turn from him, slapping a full stop at the end of your conversation. When your eyes meet Chan’s red rimmed, tear stained ones however, feelings change. “I can’t say the same for you, though.”
There’s a fearful silence that washes over the room as you round on Chan again. This time you keep your cool, peeling the soaked fabric away from your skin. Though you’re the once who is wet, a chill washes over him when you speak.
“I’m only here to tell you I’ve found Woojin’s base.”
Their faces confirm you’re not the only one searching for their rogue member. The proof is written in their clenched jaws and gritted teeth. The seven remaining Stray Kids are visibly shaken at the mention of their former member, his face still haunting their dreams every night since his departure.
“I don’t work for you, prick, don’t ask me shit,” it’s impossible to picture you as the kitten Jeongin spoke so fondly of for so long. For a moment, they could understand why keeping his sibling a secret. However now, as you roll your shoulders and crack your neck, they realise maybe it was you who struggled to keep Jeongin away from them. “Consider this a familial courtesy for Jeongin: when I‘m done with Woojin,” you hum as easy as you would your favourite song, “I’m coming for you Bang Chan.”
“____, there was nothing I could do—“
“You could have died for him, Chan. That’s what you could have done. You could have died for him but you didn’t. Instead, you just sat here and watched my brother die like the good for nothing piece of shit that you are. So, yeah. Once I kill Woojin, I’m coming for you and one thing you should know is that I haven’t changed since you last saw me. I actually keep good on my promises.” The boys can’t place the sudden tension, but they can guess from the hurt on Chan’s face and glory on yours that their leader promised the opposite of reality. “So don’t bother getting ready for me, because there is no place you can hide, no man who can protect you and no words you can say to stop me.
“There is nothing I wouldn’t do to avenge him.”
“And that’s where we differ.”
“You say that as though you’re not the one who changed for the worst, Bang Chan.” The name falls of your tongue with so much disdain, you almost grin when he winces. “Bang Chan, illustrious leader of the underground gang Stray Kids,” though mocking him proves most satisfying, you can’t help but wither at the fact this is his reality now. “What happened to Chris, huh?”
“Yeah,” you affirm, snatching a stray hoodie off a coat rack before stripping, “Chris who swore to protect Jeongin at all costs.” All eyes flutter away from you as you change, all but one. One you recognise from feeling alone. “Chris who promised to keep my brother safe.”
“____, I tried. I promise I tried.”
“Yeah,” you hum, boots slapping the concrete slabs in the cellar as you gather yourself. “I’m sure you did. I’m sure Innie, wherever he is now, is so glad you tried, Chris.”
“____, please don’t leave—”
“I’ll be back,” you remind, the words hang in the air almost hauntingly. “I promised remember?”
And if there is anything a Yang can do?
‘I promise I’ll make you proud, noona!’
It’s make good on their promise.
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