Saejin rose to his feet without a word. He started walking forward, calm and steady, like it was nothing. Yuwon didn't speak or growl this time, instead the chains rattled once, a low warning in metal, and as Saejin stepped closer:
Teeth.
Impact.
Blood.
Yuwon lunged again and this time, he reached him. The bite caught just above Saejin's collarbone, it was sharp and brutal, without hesitation. A spike of pain tore through him and the skin split. He felt the warmth spilling down his chest in slow, deliberate rivulets, but didn't scream. Didn't move to stop it. The force of the attack took them both to the ground: Yuwon half over him, still snarling, breath hot and ragged. But Saejin... Saejin stayed still beneath him.
"I said you hadn't found my threshold" he murmured, voice steady through clenched teeth.
Yuwon didn't answer. His mouth remained at Saejin's skin, teeth still pressed, still threatening. But something in the tension changed: the chains were no longer pulling and Yuwon's breathing had slowed down. The vibration in the air, the one Saejin had felt since entering, began to thin as well.
"You weren't going to kill me" Saejin whispered. "You just needed to feel like you could."
Yuwon's jaw loosened and blood pooled quietly beneath them. Saejin reached up, lifted a hand, and tapped his forehead gently to Yuwon's.
Contact.
And suddenly, the vibration in the air was gone. Yuwon exhaled, the sound low and rough, like a pressure he'd carried too long finally slipping free, chased away by the warmth of another body. His own body, still pressed against Saejin's shoulder, sagged under a weight he could no longer carry, no fight left in him now, just the raw gravity of being human.
The bite had broken the skin, but not the bone. Yuwon's jaw hung open slightly now, teeth no longer clenched, mouth parted, like a fading threat that had forgotten its meaning.
"Why didn't you stop me?" Yuwon asked.
His voice was low, ragged and tired. Saejin didn't answer right away, he let his eyes close for a few moments, forehead still resting lightly against Yuwon's.
"Because sometimes... guiding isn't about control."
"Then what is it about?"
Saejin opened his eyes again.
"Frequency."
Saejin stayed still, back resting against the floor, one hand gently brushing the side of Yuwon's head where the chains didn't reach. Yuwon hadn't moved either, his breathing had slowed into something that barely moved the air. The weight of him wasn't threatening now, it was just weight.
Saejin's eyes traced the lines of the ceiling, low, reinforced, it was the kind they used in red zones. He knew this room. Well, not this exact one, but they were all the same, all built for collapse. He remembered another room like this: a girl hiding under the bed, a boy sitting in the far corner, fists clenched in silence. He had learned to bleed quietly, so she wouldn't have to know what it cost to keep her safe. He hadn't had the words back then anyway. Only the frequency.
"Is that how you always do it?"
Yuwon's voice cracked through the silence.
"Do what?" Saejin asked.
"Make people forget what they are."
Saejin didn't answer right away. He looked down at him instead, Yuwon's eyes half-lidded now, but still watching.
"I don't make anyone forget" he said. "I just stay long enough for them to remember something else."
A knock suddenly followed: two short raps, clean and mechanical. Saejin didn't turn. Beside him, Yuwon's fingers gave a small, involuntary twitch, like a ripple through still water: subtle but impossible to miss.
"Don't let them in yet" he murmured.
The request was so quiet it could've been easily missed, but Saejin heard it and simply said:
"I won't."
The knock didn't come again.
Yuwon had closed his eyes. Saejin stayed beside him, gaze steady, body at rest, but somewhere, deep beneath the quiet, behind the smooth tone of his breath, a thought surfaced. It wasn't really his own, just a strange flicker, a single strange sentence:
"He looks better when he's calm."
Saejin blinked. He hadn't meant to think that... The thought passed, small and warm like static, and then it was gone. Afterwards he closed his eyes and said nothing more.