Work Text:
Sebong Metropolitan City, 2025
Jihoon is locking up the clinic with Jeonghan when Black Carbon shows up, which is why he doesn’t immediately turn the supervillain away. He wouldn’t regardless because of that pesky little promise to do no harm, even if it’s technically just for animals. But it feels better if he makes it about his friend. Sure, as villains go, Carbon isn’t the worst of them. He’s strong (and according to the internet, decently good looking) and he’s mean in a fight whenever the Elemental Liars really get going, but he isn’t Nomitori. He isn’t Apathy or Titanium White.
Carbon does some sort of fuckery that turns his entire body into impenetrable black crystal; he’s not going to spit acid on Jeonghan (à la Nomitori) or set Woo’s Animal Hospital on fire with Jeonghan inside of it (à la Apathy or Titanium).
Still, Jihoon has to look out for Jeonghan, because Jeonghan is one of Jihoon’s two (2) employees. If Jihoon lets him get killed by a supervillain, Jihoon would be remiss as a boss.
“Jeonghan-hyung, go home,” he says, stepping in front of his vet assistant and facing the supervillain entirely. “I’ve got this. I’ll be fine.”
“Woo-baksanim,” says Jeonghan hesitantly, the stupid nickname that Jihoon hasn’t been able to get him or Mingyu to stop using coming out a little forced. “That’s—that’s Black Carbon.”
“I know.” It would be impossible for Jihoon not to know at this point. Carbon’s costume leaves pretty much nothing up to interpretation. It’s made of your standard skintight black spandex, although it does seem nice quality, and definitely looks on par with any of the stuff Yeongseok-hyung made for Change Up. All the Liars have a specific color, and Carbon’s—as expected—is black. His belt is (mostly) black and his boots and gloves are a darker black, but over top his left pectoral sits a giant white “C”: the chemical symbol for carbon. He’s got the atomic number for carbon—six—as a belt buckle, too.
Tonight both of those symbols glint tauntingly at Jihoon in the setting sunlight.
As always, the urge to say something flippant about how the entire thing is a little too on the nose is strong. But also because of Jeonghan, Jihoon swallows the impulse down.
“It’s fine,” he says to Jeonghan again. “Really, it’ll be okay.” Jihoon glances up and down Carbon’s body for a second. “What is it this time?”
“Energy blast,” says the supervillain flippantly. “But it only grazed me. I could probably still use some stitches.”
“You know I’m a veterinarian, correct?” says Jihoon.
Behind him, Jeonghan mutters, “This time?” incredulously.
All Carbon does is smile. Or so Jihoon assumes, because Carbon’s mask covers his entire face, unlike the ridiculous chinstrap-goggles get up that Seungcheol’s got the Diamonds wearing. “Yep,” the supervillain says, and poses a little before wincing.
Energy blasts means Altair, the leader of the Starlights. They’re a decent enough superhero group, though Jihoon understands that they mostly do battle with Chained Up. It’s interesting that Carbon was fighting them.
Jihoon sighs, and turns once more to Jeonghan. “Seriously, Jeonghan-hyung,” he says. “Go home. It’ll be fine. I’ll text you once he leaves.”
Carbon slaps a gloved hand to the center of the stupid “C” on his chest, crowing on and on about how he’s not even been here a minute and already “Jihoonie” is kicking him out, which Jihoon ignores. He does his best to gaze beseechingly at Jeonghan.
His vet assistant also sighs, stepping forward and—horrifyingly—pulling Jihoon into a hug. He doesn’t let it go on for too long (so Jihoon isn’t actually going to fire him for the gross liberties taken) and soon enough he steps back, heading quickly over to collect his bag and backing out of Woo’s Animal Hospital while glaring at Carbon the whole time. “Text me,” he mouths furiously as he goes.
Jihoon watches him leave out the doors and disappear out of sight, before turning his attention to the supervillain currently darkening his place of work. “You really got grazed by an energy blast?”
Carbon raises a hand to his right bicep and reveals a broken bit of costume, the slightest sliver of tan skin and sticky blood peeking through.
Again, Jihoon sighs. “Well, you know the drill,” he says, and gestures Black Carbon into the singular exam room.
Jihoon is barely finished tying off the thread from his latest line of stitches in Carbon’s arm before the supervillain is swiping all the tools off of Jihoon’s exam table and shoving Jihoon up onto it instead. Thankfully Jihoon hadn’t left the bottle of disinfectant open this time so nothing spills, but his needle and thread and also the gauze pads he used to clean the wound are on the floor now, as is Jihoon’s poor lab coat, his shoes, and his pants.
He has absolutely no idea how Carbon is so good at taking Jihoon’s clothes off, but Jihoon figures it must be some sort of superhero and supervillain talent—not that Jihoon was ever any skilled at such a thing back in his day. Seungcheol can go from lounging like an unwanted, parasitic symbiont on Jihoon’s couch to suited up and off to save the day as Sapphire in the same amount of time that it always takes Carbon to get Jihoon as good as naked with the villain’s hand down his boxers, so Jihoon feels like there’s something there.
Too bad he never thinks about it any other time. It’s hard to bring it up, when you’re being kissed within an inch of your life while simultaneously being jerked off.
“W-wait,” Jihoon manages to say, in between the bruising, too-good press of Carbon’s mouth against his own.
As ever all the supervillain has done is pull up the mask enough to reveal a surprisingly attractive set of lips, though they are marred by the lines of black crystal that seem to forever cross Carbon’s skin. He will at least take his gloves off soon—he can’t finger Jihoon open while wearing them—but so far he has left them on, and because of that the drag of his fabric covered fingers on Jihoon’s sensitive cock is just shy of painful; Jihoon hates how much that gets him hot. Most importantly, Carbon isn’t waiting. Even though Jihoon knows he heard him. Even though Jihoon knows he knows what exactly Jihoon’s going to say.
“I didn’t lock the door—”
“It’s fine,” Carbon interrupts Jihoon quickly. “If anyone comes in I’ll kill them.” At Jihoon’s more than disgruntled expression of displeasure, the villain amends quickly, “I will trap them inside a wall of black crystal so that they cannot see or hear.”
Jihoon’s probably going to hell, for still having his dick be hard. Oh well. “Is that a new thing you can do?” he says, trying to wiggle his boxers down below his ass while not separating too much from Carbon nor falling off the exam table, which feels cold against Jihoon’s flushed skin. “Was there a news report that I missed about it? A HYBE special? A new exposé on the Liars by Xu Minghao?”
Carbon’s unfairly pretty mouth turns down at the corners, yet all he does is take his hand out of Jihoon’s boxers and step a little away from him, helping Jihoon get fully naked with selfish efficiency, before finally taking both gloves off and reaching for his stupid atomic-number-for-carbon belt.
Jihoon is always surprised to see that the costume isn’t one piece, but then again, it shouldn’t be all that shocking. Who wants to be forced to get naked every time you need to take a piss? Besides its not like Jihoon has much time to think about the logistics of Carbon’s costume—not when Carbon’s got his unfairly perfect dick out and is refusing to come over and use it to rail Jihoon, instead throwing a bottle of lube at Jihoon and demanding that Jihoon work himself open, while the fucker opts to watch.
“Lazy,” Jihoon tells him, popping the bottom open and rearranging himself on the table for a better position, wincing a little at the coldness first on two of his fingers and then right against his hole.
“Supervillain,” corrects Carbon, now fisting his dick while watching Jihoon like some kind of frat boy idiot. He’s picked the perfect spot for Jihoon to see everything, though so Jihoon can’t really complain. Not when Carbon’s dick is so, so pretty, beading out little pearls of white for Jihoon to pant after and drool over as a distraction against the initial discomfort of sticking his first finger in. “Careful,” the supervillain says. “Don’t hurt yourself, Jihoonie.”
Jihoon makes a face at that, and shoves the finger fully inside just because. He can’t help the way his breath hitches once he has done that, but too quickly it feels good and he doesn’t care anymore—even when Carbon smirks at him and works his own cock even faster. Jihoon can’t see his real eyes because of the stupid mask and the eye holes the Liars all have make them all resemble bugs, but Jihoon still imagines that Carbon is watching him avidly. When he adds a second finger and starts to hook himself a little more open, he’s definitely putting on a show.
Now would be when Carbon would want Jihoon to use more lube, and insist that he fuck himself on four fingers. Instead Jihoon picks up the lube with his free hand and holds it out to the villain, eyes falling half-closed.
Carbon doesn’t make him say anything. He lets go of his dick and steps hurriedly close, nearly tripping in his haste. That makes Jihoon laugh at him, but any attempts at teasing him are lost in the sharp press of the supervillain’s own fingers into him. Carbon never affords Jihoon the pretend dignity of starting with only one finger, preferring to begin with two.
Jihoon doesn’t mind—they do this often enough and his roommate-less apartment contains a fair collection of well-loved sex toys, so it’s not like starting with two fingers isn’t sufficient . . . But Carbon’s always so fucking mean about it, which Jihoon feels like he should be mad about.
Only.
That’s good too, the humiliation.
The bite.
The little attractive growl Carbon always makes when Jihoon automatically clenches down so that he has to force it a little, his hand in Jihoon’s ass almost meanly, fingers unrelenting, crystalline, hard.
Jihoon hasn’t actually been brave enough to ask to have sex with Carbon in his crystal form, despite often wondering and fantasizing about it. But when the villain is just beginning to work Jihoon open, Jihoon can almost pretend.
“Oh, Jihoonie, you’re so good and easy for me,” Carbon purrs suddenly, dragging Jihoon’s thoughts out of the gutter and sending him spiraling with a well-timed stab of his fingers even deeper inside. He’s already moving too fast, working those fingers in and out Jihoon’s ass without any consideration for him at all. All Jihoon can do is scramble against the table and take it, his own hand having fallen out of the proceedings who knows when ago, and now relegated to gripping the edge of the thing to keep from slipping and falling or flying away.
It’s good, despite the way Carbon is refusing to let this bit of fingering be more than preparation. He knows every well where to aim his fingers and keeps missing with an almost impressive care. But this isn’t about Jihoon’s pleasure—it’s about forcing him open wide enough so that Carbon can put his dick in him at last.
“Ngh, where’s the—do you have the—the condom—”
Some of Jihoon’s dyed-blond hair has fallen out of the ponytail he keeps it in while working, and is now getting in his eyes. It gets in his mouth too, but Jihoon doesn’t even spit it out or deal with it, too busy trying to locate his fallen lab coat or his pants.
Had he put the condom there? Had he even put a condom anywhere? There’s no way Carbon will have one, and if Jihoon doesn’t get it together soon enough Carbon’s not going to wait. Already Jihoon can see the supervillain grinning, wide mouthed and teasing. He’s turned lazy about the way he’s fingering Jihoon now, almost like he is actually waiting—but not to be considerate; just to be cruel.
“Too slow,” the villain says, and moves his pelvis forward at the same time he tries to pull his fingers free, and Jihoon locks up with panic before he can help himself. His brain produces the memory of sticking a condom in pants pocket that morning as usual, but not nearly fast enough; luckily for Jihoon, the way he’s tightened up means that all Carbon can do is nudge the wet head of his dick against the back of Jihoon’s thighs. “Oh, Jihoonie baby,” Carbon says, tone rude and patronizing. “If you do that when I get my dick in you I won’t make it. I won’t last.” He still can’t get in, but he fucks his hips forwards hard enough that Jihoon gets knocked up a little more on the table. “You wouldn’t want that, would you? Especially not without a condom. You tense up like that again and I’m going to absolutely paint your insides.”
Jihoon sucks in desperate gulps of air and tries not to see the way his own cock is now leaking against his abs in enthusiastic support, swallowing the first curse word—“fuck”—and searching for other words. “The condom,” he says. “It’s in my pants pocket.”
Carbon clicks his tongue and rubs the tip of his dick around in the mess of lube that’s ended up smeared on Jihoon’s ass and down the backs of his thighs from the earlier rough treatment. “Well, alright, if Jihoonie insists,” he says. “But if I’m letting you get on your knees you may as well make it worth my while.”
“Asshole,” Jihoon tells him, hoping that the shakiness of his legs is not too apparent as he does as he’s allowed and gets on the ground next to his pants to find the remembered item. At the corner of his eyes, he sees Carbon settle on the examination table with far more grace than Jihoon had ever managed, running a hand back behind himself and bringing it to his lips with almost morbid curiosity.
Jihoon doesn’t immediately understand what it is he’s doing—not until Carbon’s very pink tongue darts out to taste the pads of his own fingers, and the lascivious way the supervillain looks at Jihoon’s bent over ass provides the necessary information for Jihoon to realize. Jihoon’s cheeks burn.
It’s nothing more than excess lube there on the table. Jihoon’s not a girl, or anything. But the direction of Carbon’s eyes is as good as any verbal insinuation that he is, and the effect on Jihoon is heady. Disorientating. Hot.
Somehow he grabs the pair of condoms he stashed in his pants pocket that morning and tries not to be too smug about having correctly determined that he would need more than one, as ever. Carbon might catch on to the fact that Jihoon actually wants to start the main event on his knees with the villain’s cock down his throat, and change his mind.
But then again, no.
Even if Carbon knew how very much Jihoon gets off on it, the deeply committed way Jihoon has gone about losing his gag reflex in the name of sucking dick better than anyone is impossible to pass up.
By the time Carbon is gasping out curses and dragging Jihoon off his gently pulsing dick by his hair, the lube has gone sticky on Jihoon’s skin and half-useless where it’s still wiped around inside of him. But as ever Carbon reveals himself not to be a complete bastard, because he produces two fingers more of it to make sure, helpfully sitting up while Jihoon pinches off the first condom, chucks it in the direction of the trashcan, and slides on the second with ease.
Carbon is surprisingly gentle as he bends Jihoon face down over the exam table. Not for the first time, Jihoon wonders if Carbon’s non-existent refractory period is somehow related to his powers. And then he chews on his own lip to keep from thinking about other people who boasted at that on account of their powers, focusing instead on the fingers inside of him, reminding himself of how very much he wants them to be cock.
“Ready?” Carbon asks, just so that Jihoon can turn his head and glare at him over one shoulder. Then he slides all the way in on one thrust, muffling Jihoon’s startled shout with his hand.
It’s good, which is all of the problem, and why Jihoon had let Carbon do it the first time and kept letting him do it over and over and over and over again. It’s too fast and too hard and so mind numbing that all Jihoon can do is hold the table and take it. He doesn’t need a hand around his dick, but Carbon gives him one regardless. That way when Jihoon comes far too quickly because of how fucking good it is, he’s already there to keep touching him, rubbing and stroking and polishing his fist around Jihoon’s poor aching cock until all that’s left for Jihoon to do is to somehow come again, and sob.
When it’s done, and Jihoon’s trashcan has two embarrassingly filled up condoms for him to rush out to the dumpster out back because Jeonghan and Mingyu cannot find them inside it, Carbon doesn’t do more than pat Jihoon lazily on the left cheek, before tucking away his dick, pulling down the bottom of his mask, and swanning out the front doors, whistling.
Jihoon doesn’t even think he even bothers to fully close them.
But then:
That’s fucking a supervillain, for you.
The first thing Jeonghan says when Jihoon meets him at the clinic the next morning is, “Oh good. You’re alive.”
Jihoon has the split second realization that he did not in fact text Jeonghan right after as promised, but in his defense, Jihoon locked up, went home, somehow showered, did not eat dinner, and then passed the fuck out still dressed in bed, so. Many people were let down by Jihoon yesterday. His cats, including the stupidly active baby idiot that got him into this in the first place, are very lucky they all even got fed. (Not that Jihoon could ever forget, the way they had all been meowing the moment he first got the apartment door open.)
But unlike Kisa, Kyou, and their much younger baby brother, Yoon Jeonghan can’t be won over with chin rubs or ear scritches or liquid treats. So Jihoon does his best to smile at his vet assistant like he means it. “Sorry, Jeonghan-hyung.”
For two seconds it seems like Jeonghan isn’t going to forgive him, and Jihoon might need to consider finding someone else to hold the cats and dogs, clean cages, and help manage paperwork, etc. Then Jeonghan smiles, and reaches out like he’s going to pinch Jihoon’s cheek.
Jihoon growls and steps away from him, leaving Jeonghan to pet empty air.
But Jeonghan doesn’t miss a beat. “Oh, Woo-baksanim,” he says, hand falling back to his side as if that was what he’d intended. He’s once more using that infernal nickname (thank God). “Don’t hurt yourself apologizing. I’ve seen today’s schedule. You’ve got an absolutely full day.”
Jihoon raises an eyebrow and glances at the clock to see if it’s late enough that they should be worried about missing Mingyu. “I’ve got one appointment before lunch and one right after it and nothing else.”
“As I said.”
Jihoon rolls his eyes. He notices that the informational pamphlets Mingyu keeps on the front desk are out of order. Someone kept the first one as they usually are but shifted around the back parts of each stack, and helpfully Jihoon can see a tiny black crystal calling card, letting him know just which someone fucked with his shit. He scowls, and strides over to remedy this travesty. But moving that quickly across the room is perhaps a mistake.
In actuality, Jihoon is no stranger to this particular type of soreness, and it’s not all that bad. It’s pleasant, actually; the sort of reminder that makes Jihoon feel like he has a particularly lurid secret. It’s like being stiff after working out, but instead of it being a satisfying badge of Jihoon’s physical prowess, it’s proof of other, sexier things.
Unfortunately, Jihoon isn’t expecting the minor ache in his ass while walking so he stumbles. Only slightly, but enough for his ears to burn hot. Shit. Maybe Jeonghan hasn’t noticed. Maybe Jeonghan wasn’t even looking. Jihoon reaches the front desk, pockets the little black crystal, and begins straightening the pamphlets, trying to seem at ease.
“Oh my God,” says Jeonghan suddenly from directly behind Jihoon. He sounds positively giddy with excitement, and all the hairs on Jihoon’s body stand on end.
“What?” Jihoon stubbornly continues arranging the display on the counter, making a point to wonder if Mingyu is stuck in some sort of traffic, and that’s why he’s running late. It might be worth getting online and seeing if any of the usual groups have attacked the subway.
“Your special friend is the supervillain Black Carbon!” Jeonghan exclaims.
There’s nothing good that Jihoon can say to that. Really it’s out of consideration to Jeonghan’s clearly delicate and easily hurt feelings that Jihoon continues to fiddle with the pamphlets in front of him on the desk instead of responding. They had just made up about the lack of Jihoon texting him, after all. And Jihoon really cannot afford to fire him.
“You know,” continues Jeonghan, with an annoying amount of excitement and apparently very little concern about Jihoon firing him. “The one you see occasionally and always end up humming after meeting! And limping. Oh my God, the limping. Jihoon-ah! Are you letting the supervillain Black Carbon do you in the ass?”
The non-cowardly thing to do would be to turn around and face Jeonghan. Jihoon continues rearranging paper.
“Jihoon-ah!” Jeonghan repeats. He’s unrelenting. Jihoon is going to have to give him something, or risk never hearing the end of it for as long as the two of them live.
“Yes,” he says, turning to face Jeonghan, and trying not to have the feelings equivalent of an allergic reaction to the terrifying expression of glee on Jeonghan’s handsome face. “But only the one time.” Jeonghan makes a noise. “A couple of times,” Jihoon amends. He stops fiddling with the front desk and heads back into the exam room, hoping that Jeonghan won’t follow him.
No such luck.
“It was a moment of weakness,” Jihoon ends up telling Jeonghan, because he is at his core, a liar. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
Jeonghan makes a noise of understanding and nods extremely seriously. “That’s okay, Jihoonie, of course. I completely understand,” he says. “I would never pry.”
Jihoon squints at him, untrusting. “Thanks.”
The front door opens, dinging with welcome before Mingyu calls out to them both. “Jeonghan-hyung! Jihoon-hyung! Sorry, I’m late!”
“Mingyu-yah, we’re in the back!” shouts Jeonghan. “Woo-baksanim got his back blown out by the supervillain Black Carbon! He’s his special friend!”
There is a worrying crashing sound, like Mingyu dropped all of his personal belongings and also possibly fell down, and Jihoon takes advantage of the pause before Mingyu’s further reaction to glare at Jeonghan. “You understand?” he accuses, repeating the asshole’s falsehoods immediately back to him. “You’d never pry?” He waits, listening to the sounds of Mingyu still struggling in the other room as if to determine if there was an actual injury involved; from the noise level, it seems unlikely. “You broke Mingyu,” Jihoon still says.
“I’m fine!” Mingyu comes tripping into the examination room with his hair in complete disarray, flushed and staring between Jeonghan and Jihoon with enormous brown eyes. “I’m fine. Jihoon-hyung,” he says. “You—you’re sleeping with the supervillain Black Carbon?”
That said, Mingyu glances first at Jeonghan then back at Jihoon, repeating the gesture a few times like he’s a spectator at a sporting event with a net.
Jihoon reaches up to pinch the bridge of his nose. He shuts his eyes for half a second, but when he opens them again both of his employees are still there. “One time,” he answers Mingyu. Jeonghan makes that noise again and Jihoon corrects similarly: “Several . . . times.” He sighs. “Look, it’s purely physical. It’s not like we’re seeing each other.”
Jeonghan interjects again, but this time seems less voluntary. “Well, of course not,” he says. “He’s a supervillain.”
For some reason Jihoon has the urge to stab him in the eye with a pen. Some of that desire must show on his face, because Jeonghan’s eyes flick briefly to Mingyu as if he’s confirming they have an audience—a fact which should keep him safe.
Jihoon sighs a second time. “It isn’t a big deal,” he says. When Jeonghan’s mouth opens once more, Jihoon fully commits and glares at him.
Jeonghan grins back, but all he does is go over and grab Mingyu, tugging the receptionist out of the exam room instead of continuing to antagonize Jihoon. “Come along, Mingoo,” he says. “Let’s leave Woo-baksa to his thoughts and get back to work.”
Mingyu gets pulled out of the room whining to Jeonghan about how he hadn’t started work to begin with. Jeonghan waggles his eyebrows at Jihoon right up until the door closes, but otherwise leaves him be.
Jihoon’s counting that as a win.
The next day, Carbon comes back to Woo’s Animal Hospital, making it twice in one week.
For that reason alone, Jihoon hadn’t been expecting him, but mostly, Jihoon is too tired to be expecting him. He’s had a really long day. It was one of those rare Wednesdays where what felt like every single one of the stubborn regulars he acquired from his time studying under Bumzu-hyung made a point to come in and see him, and unfortunately earlier that morning both Mingyu and Jeonghan called in sick.
This felt like the hundredth time they’d done that together (in actuality it was probably the tenth time, maybe?), and Jihoon began the day wondering if it would be grounds for a harassment suit from either of them if he outright asked them if they were dating. Surely they couldn’t expect him not to realize, since it was always something respiratory that seemed to take them both out at the same time.
Because of Jeonghan and Mingyu’s absence, Jihoon was left to do everything. Answering the phones, greeting clients, examining animals, and then typing up his notes as quickly as possible before the next client came in. On his lunch break he got forced into an unending call with Seungcheol, since apparently the Diamonds were doing battle with the Liars at a JYP National somewhere in downtown Sebong. Instead of their usual heist across the city trying to locate the stolen cash, Titanium had set up some sort of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire style game where Seungcheol’s team had to play for the bank employee’s lives instead of money. The questions had all been regarding previous Diamonds vs Liars altercations, and Jihoon’s stupidly good memory had been Seungcheol’s singular life line.
Turns out, it’s very hard to hang up on your best friend when the wellbeing of random bank employees who keep crying loudly in the background of your conversation is at stake. Even Jihoon, a self-professed asshole, had been unable to click end call.
So he didn’t even get to eat lunch.
Therefore when the bell dings and it’s Carbon darkening Jihoon’s doorway, both Jihoon’s brain and body are so lacking in energy that he can’t lift his head.
“We’re closed,” he rudely says, not even bothering with politeness. He hadn’t thought he could be offended by the idea of a walk-in, but he is. New clients are an opportunity for regular payments, and regular payments mean Jihoon doesn’t have to think about living on ramen at minimum once a month; yet right now, Jihoon is so tired he could just die. If he were dead, it wouldn’t matter that he might have to beg Seungcheol to send him several of his complimentary Neoguri packets with Sapphire’s face on them.
When whoever has walked in says nothing, Jihoon is forced to drag his head off the front desk so that he can look at them. Upon seeing Carbon’s stupid bug eyed mask, Jihoon jolts in his seat.
Apparently he’s so wiped that seeing the supervillain gives Jihoon’s body an automatic fight or flight response that has his own powers activating, but as ever, Jihoon shoves them right back down.
“Why are you here?” he says. The benefit of having almost used his powers is he doesn’t need his eyes to know that Carbon is injured. “And why are you hurt? Weren’t you playing Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? Last I checked, that didn’t involve fists.”
Carbon seems to frown with confusion underneath his mask. “How did you know about that?” he asks.
Shit.
“The news,” Jihoon says, scrambling. “Joshua Hong did a livestream.” He doesn’t know for sure, but it’s a safe bet; Joshua Hong (for HYBE News) always manages to live stream the Shining Diamonds. It’s part of the reason he went from moderately popular influencer to HYBE’s new anchorman, despite being so young.
Carbon takes Jihoon’s excuse in stride. “Oh, awesome,” he says. “Titanium will be so thrilled to hear that. We’re trying to beat The Strays for this month’s brand reputation index, but we haven’t been able to do it since the Fenrir incident. People are always talking about that online.”
Well, yeah; Jihoon understands why that would be the case. Superhero and supervillain groups can lose members for all sorts of reasons, but going from nine to eight people because one of your number ate another one of them isn’t usual at all. If Jihoon were the sort of person who talked about that stuff on the internet, he’d never stop bringing it up.
“Anyway, to answer your question, Sapphire got tired of dancing to Titanium’s tune in the middle of the fifth round,” says Carbon. “Morganite was keeping up a really impressive illusion of the whole team participating in the game while in actuality Garnet was running all the hostages right out of the building; and when Sapphire had him drop it to rub it in Titanium’s face, things got . . . messy.”
Jihoon winces with understanding. “Ah.” Sometimes the fact that freshly debuted hero Seungcheol used to run with someone who could heal most team injuries instantly, despite how often Jihoon would yell at him and Soo—at the whole team that he wasn’t a fucking LOL Enchanter and they needed to stop relying on him, still does rear its ugly head. And that’s not touching whatever weird, near-sexual rivalry Seungcheol and Titanium have got going on that seems to make Jihoon’s friend particularly stupid.
“Yeah.” Carbon pulls off his right glove and pushes up his sleeve to show Jihoon an inflamed burn mark on his arm, which is shocking on two counts. Jihoon hadn’t thought that Carbon could burn, given that he tends to be in crystal form for most of his fights. And also, Titanium doesn’t usually burn hot enough to hurt his own team.
The third, more-annoying realization is that Jihoon isn’t going to be able to do much of anything for Carbon without using his powers. At most he can sanitize and bandage the burn, but the actual healing will be left up to time and Carbon’s immune system.
Usually, if it’s just removing bullets or disinfecting scrapes or bandaging whatever, Jihoon feels pretty confident that Carbon isn’t going to die from an infection because he thought that Jihoon’s veterinary practice was a legitimate stand-in for receiving actual medical care. He’s not sure how things work for villain groups, but hero groups generally have someone with an actual degree in medicine that they can harangue. He knows the Diamonds have Hyejin-noona, and even Change Up had Youngjun-hyung in that role.
But burns can be nasty. And Titanium is a pyrokinetic and therefore probably less likely to understand that fact. The thought of Carbon ending up septic because of Jihoon, however inadvertently, makes Jihoon’s stomach clench.
He’ll just have to be careful. It won’t be hard—he’s so rusty at this point that maybe he won’t even be able—but he’ll just have to heal the supervillain ever so slightly. Enough that Carbon would still be hurt, but he could recover in only a day.
“Jihoon?”
Jihoon totally spaced out there. He chews on an apology because Carbon is a supervillain, and gestures him back into the exam room without uttering a word. Carbon is quiet while Jihoon cleans and deals with the wound, and if he feels Jihoon send a sliver of healing energy into the inflamed skin that he finds there, he certainly doesn’t react. All he does is sit on Jihoon’s examination table and kick his feet back and forth, staring across the room in the direction of the instructional paintings Jihoon has on his wall.
“All done,” Jihoon says, pleased to see that he hasn’t lost it and straight up healed the burn entirely. Some of the faint veins of black that mark Carbon’s skin around the spot on his arm appear to have faded slightly, but Jihoon doesn’t make a point of staring at the supervillain (that’s a lie) so what does he know; that could just be something those lines of whatever always do.
“Thank you,” Carbon says with surprising politeness. He stays perched on the table until Jihoon has pulled his costume sleeve down over the gauze. And then he smiles, the expression somehow evident to Jihoon despite it also being covered by familiar black spandex. “Your turn now, Jihoon-ah.”
Jihoon shakes his head. “I’m too tired,” he says, in very real protest.
“I’ll do all the work.”
“If I have an orgasm I’m going to be too dead to get home”—Carbon’s interruption registers belatedly and Jihoon’s nose wrinkles—“the fuck are you talking about? You never do any work.”
Carbon audibly pouts, the expression hidden and therefore kept from full effect. “I do work all the time. Yesterday—” He cuts himself off.
Jihoon raises an eyebrow despite himself. “Yesterday?”
“I’ll take you home,” says Carbon, instead of continuing to poke the beehive.
Jihoon’s train of thought disintegrates in the wake of that. “You know where I live?” In honesty, it’s slightly relieving to know that he is actually horrified at the prospect of that.
“No, but you’ll tell me, once I’m finished blowing your brains out,” says Carbon. Then he jumps off the table and puts Jihoon up on it, going for the zip and button of his pants before Jihoon can begin to respond.
There’s no point in telling him “no”—he’s too single-minded, and almost selfish in the way he manipulates Jihoon’s body to his liking. In no time at all, Carbon’s got Jihoon’s pants and boxers down below his ass, his own mask pushed up to the bridge of his nose, and is sinking the hot cavern of his mouth down onto Jihoon’s rapidly hardening cock. Jihoon is too stunned by the sudden rush of endorphins to kick him off.
As ever, Carbon stays still until Jihoon gives in to him and puts both his hands carefully onto the sides of his head. He’d love for the opportunity to tug Carbon’s hair (does Carbon even have hair?) but this will have to do.
Once he feels those two points of contact, Carbon hums happily and begins to slowly move.
“Fuck,” Jihoon swears, and holds back the urge to rock his hips up inconsiderately. “You do realize that saying that generally has the connotation of shooting someone in the head?”
Carbon hasn’t even got eyes to gaze at Jihoon with, but Jihoon still imagines the unsaid words.
“Yeah, I know,” he breathes. “I’ll still be shooting and you’re giving me—shit—you’re giving me such good head.”
Carbon rewards Jihoon for the praise with a sinful curl of his tongue, humming again because he knows that the vibrations of his throat really get Jihoon off. He’s got no gag reflex, seems never to feel his jaw get tired, and Jihoon is reaping the benefits of his oral fixation. Those protestations he had about being too tired to go home after this were legitimate, but right now telling Carbon Jihoon’s address seems equally likely.
Fuck. Dear God.
With one last toe-curling suck, Carbon pulls off to pant sloppily against Jihoon’s pubic bone, gazing up at Jihoon behind those infernal, bug-like eyes. “Come on, Jihoon,” he says. “Fuck my mouth.”
He gives Jihoon no illusions of the request being the beginning of a discussion, sinking back down swiftly until the head of Jihoon’s dick hits what feels like the back of Carbon’s throat.
Jihoon’s hips are moving before he can stop them, and it’s only once his ears have stopped ringing and he’s determined that he didn’t actually shoot off like some sort of hair-trigger teenager that Jihoon speaks. “And you said—ngh—you said—shit—you weren’t going to make me do all the work!”
All Carbon does is swallow, is what it feels like. Jihoon lets go of the villain’s head so that he can reach behind himself for something else to hold onto, scrambling his perfectly arranged exam room desk in his haste.
It’s too good actually; Carbon’s hot mouth, Carbon’s wet tongue, Carbon’s tucked away teeth. His lips are red and stretched wide and there’s so much spit and precome getting everywhere. Jihoon feels like he should be disgusted—should close the clinic and deep clean it all of tomorrow. But even that thought is fleeting; Jihoon is about two seconds from losing control of his entire body, from losing his mind.
“Ah, God, shit, fuck—I’m coming,” he says, maybe? Hopefully? Either way he ends up with one hand down gripping the back of Carbon’s head to hold him there while his hips involuntarily buck up.
It’s rough enough that Carbon does actually gag, which only makes Jihoon come all the harder, the hand that isn’t holding Carbon’s head in place now frantically in his own mouth trying to stifle the scream. It hurts, one sharp spike of pain in the middle of an ocean of pleasure, and Jihoon feels his powers hum to life before he can stop them once more. It’s a side effect of the exhaustion, but hopefully Carbon is too busy coming untouched in his pants like he always does whenever Jihoon shoves his dick down his throat and makes that particular high pitched sound.
It’s not presumptuous—the bastard likes to tell Jihoon in explicit detail just how much those two things really get to him, usually while working himself open across the room where Jihoon can’t get to him, before coming over and riding Jihoon until the examination table beneath them worryingly creaks and groans.
When the orgasm is done, Jihoon is as dead and boneless as he’d expected. But Carbon is just as thorough and gentle as he had intended, cleaning Jihoon up with a gently rasping tongue, before putting all of Jihoon’s clothes back to rights. He finds Jihoon’s wallet in the process of doing that, and rifles through the content in search of his ID.
Jihoon is way too fucked out to protest, even going so far as the let the supervillain steal the white coat right off his back.
Carbon puts it on inside out, and Jihoon is too dazed to understand that he’s doing that so that where Jihoon’s name (which is stitched on it military-style) doesn’t show. Then he tugs Jihoon up into standing, before tugging him gently in the direction of the door. He even turns out all the lights, makes sure all the computers are off and Jihoon’s got all the necessary belongings, before watching Jihoon lock the place up.
The subway ride home is more than a little surreal, but Jihoon is far too fucked out to pay it too much attention. He assumes wearing a doctor’s coat isn’t enough to distract the public from the fact that Black Carbon is on the subway with them, but no one seems inclined to antagonize the supervillain. And somewhere in the middle of the familiar after work ritual, Jihoon stops following along after Carbon and begins charting his way home all by himself, on autopilot. So it’s not like anyone is going to think Jihoon is with Carbon whenever they post about the encounter online.
Jihoon’s last memories before passing out in bed as he’s been needing to do since the end of that morning, are of Carbon coming into his apartment and immediately bending down to pet Woozi, saying, “Omo, Jihoonie. You kept him!” while Jihoon struggled to get his shoes off without falling onto the ground.
“Of course I did,” Jihoon thinks he said in response. The fluffy white kitten (who isn’t actually a kitten anymore, but semantics) is how the two of them met; Carbon had rushed into Woo’s Animal Hospital more than a year ago with the little guy tucked frantically against his chest. He’d just watched a car hit him and drive off.
Jihoon had been too focused on saving the cat’s life to think about how the supervillain Black Carbon was in his office, and by the time it was all said and done and Carbon was glancing at Jihoon’s stitched name tag and frowning because it didn’t match the name outside for the animal hospital, the time to panic about that fact had passed.
Woozi recovered.
(Woozi was named “Wooji” by Carbon because Carbon was a supervillain bastard, and it wasn’t—it didn’t mean anything, because it was just a coincidence; Jihoon kept the name because the cat had started to respond to it, nothing else.)
Woozi got along with Kisa and Kyou despite their age difference, and Jihoon couldn’t get rid of him now, if he tried.
Once Jihoon got his shoes off and then they were set upon the other cats, Carbon said, in a tone that was odd and a little breathless, “Jihoon. Your cat is like a little tiger.”
It’s good Jihoon doesn’t remember much of anything after that.
But when Jihoon wakes several hours later with a painfully empty stomach in a sheer panic, his apartment is as if no one else had ever been inside it, with not a thing out of place. If it weren’t for the innocuous black crystal sitting on Jihoon’s bedside table—or the text message from Jeonghan linking to a post on a forum with pictures of Black Carbon riding subway that the general public didn’t notice Jihoon was also in, but Jeonghan of course saw and added hearts next to Jihoon’s head when also sending them to him—Jihoon would almost swear he’d imagined the whole thing.
On Thursday, Seungcheol comes into Woo’s Animal Hospital. Or rather, Sapphire comes into Woo’s Animal Hospital, and Jeonghan is there to see.
It’s late, and Jihoon had honestly lost track of the time, but Jeonghan doesn’t appear to be suffering when Jihoon finally comes back to himself. He’s sitting next to Jihoon in happy near-silence, humming quietly to himself. Jihoon’s been typing up written notes into the computer, since he’s stubbornly committed to writing things up by hand after every single appointment, and as long as he’s willing to transcribe his godawful handwriting each evening, Jeonghan couldn’t care less. (And Jihoon’s the boss, so it wouldn’t matter if he did.)
Jihoon always gets like this, when he’s doing a repeated task. It served him well for the limited number of years of schooling he did before he was part of Change Up, and helped him survive veterinary school after—after that.
Right now, it’s why he doesn’t notice Seungcheol until the superhero is clearing his throat pointedly, turning both Jihoon and Jeonghan’s heads.
Neither of them swears, but Jeonghan does throw a pen across the room automatically. Of course Seungcheol ducks—an unnecessary reflex reaction, because simultaneous to that movement he creates a forcefield, which bounces the projectile harmlessly aside. The blue glow around Seungcheol’s hand shimmers for a brief second, before fading away.
“Seu—Sapphire.” The good thing about Seungcheol’s hero name starting with almost the same consonant and vowel means that Jihoon probably gets away with that almost slip up. “You—what are you doing here?”
Seungcheol had been pouting in the direction of Jeonghan’s fallen pen, but now he looks at Jihoon with a similarly aggrieved expression. He’s fully masked up with the pseudo-goggles obscuring his pleading brown eyes, and the blue chin strap hugging tight to his handsomely cut jaw. His nose and mouth are exposed, turned down into an attractively plush moue.
The rest of his costume looks as Jihoon is used to—blue, skintight, and flattering, with the only other color being the Shining Diamonds’s three-trapezoid logo etched in white on the left part of his chest.
Although when Jihoon casts his eyes down, he notices that the costume isn’t as usual. There appear to be several gashes across the chest and arms showing skin underneath it. Seungcheol has somehow managed to get cut up so that a wide swath of his six pack is showing, the glory of which being slightly diminished by the presence of four, sluggishly bleeding lines.
They remind Jihoon of claw marks.
“What the hell happened to you?” he can’t help but ask.
Seungcheol plods despondently across the room with even his hair wilting. “Lycan,” he says.
Jihoon is going to have to revise his opinion on the leader of The Strays, because he hadn’t thought that anything could rip through a costume made by Na Yeongseok.
“I need—can you please—”
Jihoon sighs, but hits save on the computer. Then he glances at Jeonghan. “Can you log this one for me?” he says. “Put it in as Blue, owned by Choi Seungcheol—there should already be a record in the system.”
Seungcheol’s eyes aren’t visible, but Jihoon imagines them flinching regardless. Inwardly Jihoon winces, because he didn’t need his friend’s disapproval to let him know that he’s just said Seungcheol’s full name in front of a civilian. But it’s unlikely that Jeonghan will make that connection, surely. And if Seungcheol is going to treat Jihoon’s veterinary clinic like his own private hospital, Jihoon will damn well continue to bill him for materials used and services rendered. The night Jihoon got drunk and decided that Sapphire could be a toy poodle named Blue if he fucking wanted him to was one of the happiest of his life.
“Sure.” Jeonghan is looking between Jihoon and Seungcheol with a worrying amount of nothing in his eyes as he gazes at them.
Jihoon gives it until the end of the week until his vet assistant goes through the clinic records and determines that Jihoon has guiltily been paying for all the stock he uses to treat Carbon out of pocket, acting like client Lee Jihoon—who generally takes his cats to see Bumzu-hyung because that’s the smart, unbiased thing to do as a veterinarian—has gotten a new kitten named Shadow which for some reason he isn’t taking to his mentor.
It would only draw more attention if Jihoon acted like anything notable was occurring, so he gets up to go into the exam room without looking to see that Seungcheol is following.
When they get there and the door closes audibly behind them, Seungcheol whines quietly, “Jihoon-ah, you said my real name in front of him.”
“I wouldn’t have to if you’d stop treating me like your private physician,” Jihoon replies to him, also making sure to keep his voice low. “I am a veterinarian—”
“You’re better than any doctor. And you’re certainly better than worrying Boo.”
Jihoon can’t help but wince in agreement at the reminder. Seungcheol’s boyfriend, Boo Seungkwan, is an incredibly overstimulated twenty-something, who recently changed careers from working fulltime as a personal assistant for some chaebol’s son to only working only parttime for his rich asshole, with the rest of his time spent as a newbie reporter with the Daily Atlas. He works with Minghao and Junhui, two people that Jihoon knows only by name, as they cover the Liars and the Diamonds respectively, and Seungcheol is a terminally online insane person who keeps up with that sort of thing.
Seungkwan is nice, but if Seungcheol started coming home with scrapes and scratches without Jihoon being the one to look after them, things would definitely not go well. Both in Seungcheol’s homelife, and generally.
Resigned to his fate, Jihoon turns to gather the necessary supplies.
Shockingly, it’s not the fact that Jihoon used Seungcheol’s real name or has been logging his Carbon appointments religiously that gets Jeonghan’s attention. It’s the fact that Jihoon was so familiar with Sapphire that sticks in Jeonghan’s brain. Jeonghan uses that bit of information along with the unfortunate fact that Jihoon stopped growing long before he was ever part of Change Up to come to an even worse conclusion.
“Jihoon-ah,” he says, on Friday when Jihoon turns up to work with grim determination. Mingyu is already there behind the front desk busy with his phone, so at least Jeonghan is attempting to whisper his accusations to Jihoon. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me you were Ruby!”
Honestly, Jihoon is stunned. This wasn’t an outcome he had predicted—even entertained, really. As such, he is completely blindsided. And Jeonghan is too smart not to draw the correct conclusions from all of that. He grins.
“Who?” says Jihoon, after only another second.
“Jihoon,” says Jeonghan.
“I mean I’m not,” says Jihoon.
“Jihoon,” repeats Jeonghan.
Jihoon looks for something to do, finding nothing. The clinic looks spotless; every flat surface is clean and shining, and even the stack of paperwork Jihoon has been haranguing Jeonghan about since he started working for Jihoon has disappeared.
“I—why would you . . . even . . . think that?” Jihoon tries out a couple of expressions and positions before ending up with his elbow on the desk and chin nestled in his palm, hopefully looking normal enough that Mingyu doesn’t look away from his phone.
Jeonghan doesn’t even glance at Mingyu before producing a pair of printed out photographs, both of Jihoon.
“God.” It takes all of Jihoon’s self-control not to gag at the sight of Change Up’s stupid costumes, which for reasons beyond Jihoon included shorts. But he supposes it is kind of nice to see the first iteration of the jewel belts that Seungcheol had carried over into the Diamonds’s costumes. And at least it’s a solo shot of Ruby.
The second photo is of Jihoon from what has to be the same year, also wearing shorts. Jihoon doesn’t recognize it, but it looks pulled straight out of a photo album, so Jihoon assumes Jeonghan got it from his parents, the traitors.
Seeing that Jihoon has had time to look at both photos, Jeonghan makes an impatient noise. “Well?”
Jihoon stays silent and counts to ten just to be contrary. “Why are you showing me these photos?”
Jeonghan lowers both pictures, scowling. They disappear somewhere onto his person before Jihoon can try to at least take the one from his mother back. “Fine,” says Jeonghan. “Be that way.”
Jihoon blinks, and in that time Jeonghan produces a letter opener. He makes hard eye contact with Jihoon, not even looking away once as he slices open his palm on the sharp edge of the thing.
“Jeonghan-hyung!” Jihoon gasps, stunned, but Jeonghan continues not to react.
Mingyu is the one who looks up, sees what’s happening, and rushes over having produced a first aid kit. He grabs the letter opener away from Jeonghan and hurls it aside. “Jihoon-hyung,” he says, snapping Jihoon back out of it.
Between the two of them they get Jeonghan patched up, and Jihoon takes advantage of Mingyu’s fussing to examine the culprit. It looks sharp—sharper than any letter opener has any business being. Jeonghan must have come prepared.
When at last Mingyu returns to his spot behind the desk Jihoon levels Jeonghan with a glare. “Hyung,” he hisses. “We cannot be doing this.”
It’s almost too easy to feel Jeonghan’s wound with only his powers—that little bit of working on Carbon yesterday had reminded them that they even existed, and now they were a wild animal begging to be let free.
For an incredibly long moment all Jeonghan does is regard Jihoon, and then he lowers his bandaged hand.
“No,” he agrees, apparently having seen how very serious Jihoon was about this not about to turn into “Jeonghan hurts himself to try to get a reaction out of Jihoon and ends up in the hospital because he’s an idiot” day. “But you are Ruby, and I’m going to prove it,” says Jeonghan. “I’ll get you to confess.”
It’s all Jihoon can do not to scream and stab him with the stupidly sharp letter opener.
In the end, Jihoon lasts until Saturday. He doesn’t have enough regular clients for more than that.
Having determined that hurting himself wasn’t going to do anything, Jeonghan moved on to word play. For the first two hours of the workday, every other word out of his mouth was aimed at getting Jihoon to slip up and respond as if he were the retired superhero Ruby. After that, he moved on to talking to Mingyu about Change Up while misrepresenting the facts.
That nearly did get Jihoon—but not because Jeonghan was slandering himself.
No, it was because Jeonghan started talking badly about Onyx. He stopped when he saw the look on Jihoon’s face and actually gave Jihoon a break from the interrogation for his entire lunch break, but he also spent the hour on his phone reading and typing furiously. Jihoon was too nervous that he’d given away something he couldn’t bear to, and so was unable to join that reprieve.
But eventually, in the final hours of the workday on Saturday, Jeonghan breaks Jihoon. He isn’t actually saying anything at that point—only is silently looking at him—but Jihoon caves spectacularly under that pressure, all the same.
“Alright!” he shouts, interrupting the suffocating silence caused by how Jeonghan is no longer watching HYBE News’s oddly exploitive coverage of their weatherman, Lee Seokmin, being kidnapped by yet another member of the villain group Tempest on his computer. “Alright, yes! I’m Ruby! Or I was Ruby. You figured it out! Do you want a fucking prize?”
Jeonghan, of course, looks gleeful, but Jihoon doesn’t give him time to enjoy it.
“I don’t know what you think you’re going to get out of this,” he says. “I obviously don’t do that anymore.”
The cut on Jeonghan’s palm is healing well enough on its own, but it was probably more annoying for Jihoon than it was for Jeonghan, so Jihoon reaches out and grabs the hand in question, slapping a bit of healing to the skin there without even pausing in his tirade.
“I’m retired,” he says. “And yeah, Sapphire clearly hasn’t gotten the memo but that’s because I was the only one in Change Up with any sense—”
Jeonghan has unwrapped the bandage around his hand and is staring at the unblemished skin he finds with an oddly fanatic look in his eyes. Without lowering it he turns that fervent gaze on Jihoon, who balks, backing away from him quickly. The door to the clinic rings to signal its opening, but Jihoon doesn’t notice, he’s so worked up.
He can’t have Jeonghan looking at him like that—like Jihoon is some sort of idol. Like Jihoon is someone important, but not just because he saves (animals’) lives. Jeonghan’s supposed to call Jihoon “Woo-baksanim” because he thought it was funny that Jihoon named his hospital not after himself. He’s supposed to needle him to sleep more and drink less Coke—they’re supposed to be an oddly balanced workplace friendship, because Jeonghan is technically a year older but Jihoon is the boss.
Jihoon doesn’t want Jeonghan to look at him like he’s the superhero he hasn’t been since 2017.
“I was Ruby,” he repeats. “But I’m not anymore. I haven’t been Ruby since the Netizens killed the love of my life.”
Jeonghan’s expression shatters with shock.
Hah. There. That’ll teach Jeonghan to pry.
That’ll put this entire debacle into the “do not mention if you’re a polite Korean person” category.
Jihoon’s fragile peace will be safe.
And then Jeonghan’s eyes flick somewhere behind Jihoon, before going carefully blank. They’re still very, very wide, but there is a raw intelligence hiding deep in their depths. It reminds Jihoon of the calculating way Jeonghan had looked at him the first time they met, a year ago. It was only a few days after Jihoon had saved Titanium because of Carbon, and the stupid kitten that brought the supervillain into his life to begin with was keeping Jihoon up at night. He’d been exhausted. He needed to hire an assistant. Jeonghan came in without an animal and Jihoon had just put an ad online, so Jihoon had assumed he was there for that. For a split second after Jihoon asked him it seemed like an incorrect assumption, but then Jeonghan smiled and agreed.
The way Jeonghan looks now reminds Jihoon of that moment—the half-second pause filled with everything before the frighteningly beautiful smile.
Only this time, Jeonghan’s expression doesn’t change. “Onyx, right?” he says. “The one of you who died?”
Jihoon is not allowed to punch his employee in the face, so all he does is nod. “Yes.”
Jeonghan licks his lips. “Which—which Netizen?”
Jihoon stares at him, utterly taken aback. “Which?” he manages. “Which—Pann?” he somehow produces without really thinking before talking. He’s not sure what direction the conversation is taking. “You—what does that have to do with anything—”
“You should ask Carbon where he came from,” interrupts Jeonghan. “Oh, would you look at that, he’s here right now. Carbon-ssi!” He smiles at last and it’s terrifying. “Hi, I’m Jeonghan! Tell Woo-baksanim where you came from! Okay bye!”
It feels like it only takes a second for Jeonghan to gather his belongings and disappear out of Woo’s Animal Hospital. The only reason Jihoon doesn’t chase after him while shouting is because when he turns around, he actually finds Carbon standing there.
The supervillain is expressionless due to his mask, but the frozen position Jihoon catches him in resembles someone being stared out during the walk of shame. After a beat, Carbon even raises one gloved hand and waves it. Then he bows.
“Jihoon . . . ssi.”
“You haven’t called me Jihoon-ssi since you first put your dick in me,” Jihoon dismisses him crudely. “Why are you here this time? Did you get into a fight with”—he scrambles to come up with a viable option—“The Vampire again?”
Carbon falters, but Jihoon is already kicking himself. The Vampire is a hero, despite the awkward dissonance of his villainous name, and he and Carbon did have a thing three years back, sort of. It all blew up when Carbon gave a painfully earnest interview to some insane social media influencer who was on the street talking to supervillains about how The Vampire was his mortal nemesis, and almost simultaneously to that video’s release, The Vampire was filmed asking a reporter “who exactly are you asking me about again?” with reference to Carbon.
At least all of Sebong Metropolitan City got a firsthand class on how villainous Black Carbon could be if he were not tempered by the guiding hand of Titanium White and the Elemental Liars.
Jihoon shouldn’t have brought it up. All he can think of to change the subject is Jeonghan’s nonsense, however. So:
“Where did you come from?” he asks.
Carbon freezes, and Jihoon assumes if he weren’t currently wearing his mask, he’d be blinking. “The Liars found me in the Netizens’ lair?”
For some reason it sounds like a question. That’s fair. Jihoon suddenly has a million questions too. “The Liars what?”
“Apparently Pann had me on her wall?”
This new piece of information is not helpful. “Pann had you on her wall?”
“Like this.” Carbon raises both of his hands and tilts his head to the side, most likely also pulling a face, not that Jihoon can see that too. “Well, more like this.” Black crystal climbs Carbon’s body and he solidifies into his other form. He actually seems larger than usual—not just a crystal man, but more . . . lumpy. Like the sort of thing the supervillain Pann could have had on her wall.
Carbon changes shapes again after only a moment of being like that, returning to a more familiar, human body.
“Anyway, Lithium maintains that Strontium poked the crystal and made me fall out of it as a human, but Strontium insists that Lithium did it,” Carbon says, unbothered. “Either way it was very disorienting. I didn’t appreciate it. And all I could remember was that my name was—”
Abruptly Carbon breaks off.
Jihoon stares. He should be more alarmed that his vet assistant Jeonghan was the reason he got onto this line of questioning, but every piece of information has been earthshattering, landing upon the ground between Jihoon and Carbon like the meteorite that gave humanity their powers all those many years ago.
“Your name was what?” Jihoon asks.
Carbon stays silent.
Jihoon waits, hoping it’s just hesitance and not obfuscation, but nothing else comes. Shame is a hot stripe across Jihoon’s cheeks, and anger is far too close at hand. “Oh, right. Right, sorry, my mistake. I forgot that all I am to you is a convenient hole to fuck—”
Carbon flinches.
“—which just so happens to also have medical expertise. You come here for one thing and one thing alone. Well, you’re in luck. It just so happens that I’m sad and lonely and easy so have at it—”
“Hoshi,” Carbon says, interrupting Jihoon’s outburst and halting Jihoon with both hands still clutching his lab coat half-open. “My name was Hoshi. My name is Hoshi. I came out of that crystal and that was the only thing in my head.”
Ten Years Ago . . .
“You don’t think the jewels theme is a little . . . contrived?” says Soonyoung.
Jihoon still isn’t entirely sure how he:
- Determined which building Jihoon was sitting on top of with his feet angling off the side like a suicidal idiot;
- Got himself up onto the roof of said building to join him, also without incident;
- Knew that talking to Jihoon before right this instance would have resulted in a poor response.
But Soonyoung did. And Jihoon no longer feels likely to shove either of them to their doom, so. “You’re just mad that Cheol won’t let you be Tigereye,” he says.
All Soonyoung does is hum.
It’s night, but as ever Sebong is a hum of life below them, all those millions of people going about their lives without any cares or knowledge of how Jihoon’s life is going to change come tomorrow morning. Although granted, very few people know such a thing. Yeongseok-hyung knows, but that’s because Yeongseok-hyung designed Change Up’s costumes. Jihoon’s parents know, but Jihoon’s parents raised a child afflicted by the meteorite. And Seungcheol and Soonyoung know because they’ll be right there with him.
Change Up.
Sebong City’s latest superhero group.
Sapphire, Ruby, and Onyx.
Not Tigereye.
Jihoon risks a calculating glance in Soonyoung’s direction, finding the other boy now kicking both his legs back and forth over the side of the building. His head tilts side to side in a similar rhythm, and Jihoon doesn’t figure out what song he’s hearing in his mind because his hair keeps changing. That happens sometimes when Soonyoung spaces out; his features start shifting.
If it’s his face or body it tends to be like body-horror—watching someone’s hands reshape themselves into the entire kaleidoscope of prehensile, human appendages is not for the easily nauseated—but when its his eyes or hair, Jihoon just finds it . . . distracting. People aren’t meant to have naturally pink eyes or naturally green hair, but Soonyoung’s powers make it so.
Right now he seems to be favoring the three colors Yeongseok-hyung decided would be best for the three of them, Soonyoung’s hair flickering between Jihoon’s red, Seungcheol’s blue, and his own black.
It cycles over and over like a timelapse video of winter devouring a tree’s leaves. Jihoon could watch it for hours.
(But then, Jihoon could watch Soonyoung for hours. That’s why his name is on the waitlist for a purebred Toyger kitten, what little money he’s made working and selling his music being set aside for the final purchase, and an embarrassingly heartfelt confession being practiced over and over in the mirror so that, when the time is right, he doesn’t fuck it up before Soonyoung can even see the cat.)
“Tigereye is a jewel,” says Soonyoung.
The song he’s kicking his feet to is “Loser” by Big Bang. If he keeps going at it like this, he’s going to overbalance and fall off the building. Jihoon may be able to heal most anything, but neither of them can fly or teleport. By the time he got down to Soonyoung, it’d be too late.
Unfortunately Jihoon comes to that conclusion half a second too slow, but Soonyoung appears to realize what’s happening half a second too fast. They both move, and the resulting tumble is thankfully off the ledge of the building and back onto the concrete roof. Sure enough the two of them end up injured, but Jihoon’s powers do their part.
“Five seconds,” says Soonyoung breathlessly, sticking one skinny arm up into the air and pretending to check a watch like he’s become Seungcheol. “Not bad, but you’ll have to be faster if you want to be a superhero, Jihoonie—”
Jihoon fumbles around to his right until he slaps him, taking advantage of the point of contact to make sure he got everything. “Shut up, you idiot,” he says. “This is your fault.”
“It’s a good song,” Soonyoung replies.
It is.
Jihoon hates him, especially for how much he doesn’t.
They should really get up off the roof, but for some reason, lying side by side like this—despite how only seconds prior they were both bleeding—is nice. Even if Jihoon’s legs do feel a little bit like jelly after the near miss.
“Onyx is cool too,” Soonyoung says. It’s good that at least one of them is actually maintaining this conversation. “It’s just—”
“Not Tigereye,” interrupts Jihoon. “I know. Cheol knows. Yeongseok-hyung knows. We all know, Soonyoung-ah.”
Out of the corner of his eye he can see when Soonyoung pouts. “You don’t have to be mean about it,” he says. “You’re the reason Cheol-hyung wouldn’t change his mind, anyway. I think Opal would have been a pretty name for you.”
Soonyoung had come prepared to the final name meeting with several multicolored gemstone options to further his argument in favor of getting to be a superhero with a tiger in his name. Opal for Jihoon, and either Agate or Flourite for Seungcheol. Yeongseok-hyung appeared to consider it—it certainly widened his costume color options—until Jihoon said that he wanted to be red—Ruby. And then Seungcheol got in his head about being Jihoon’s honorary hyung—being neighbors who’d both moved to Sebong for high school really ended up bonding them—and Soonyoung’s dreams were laid to waste.
Love is an illness, because Jihoon hears himself say, “Sorry.”
At least Soonyoung also looks aghast.
They’re both twenty-year old idiots, so washing away the gross from Jihoon’s feelings is a whole production, and it’s only once that’s done and they’re both settled back down on their backs staring at the sky, that Soonyoung once again continues to steer the conversation on course.
“I suppose I’d have to have animal related powers if I really wanted to force the issue,” he says. “Like Beast.”
The superhero Beast can certainly turn into a whole host of animals, although they never seem to be anything recognizably found on Earth.
“Oh well,” says Soonyoung, like trying to find the bright side. “Onyx is cool too—”
“Well, what if we came up with our own secret names for each other?” The moment the words come out, halfway interrupting Soonyoung’s, Jihoon regrets them. But Soonyoung is already losing his mind.
“Genius,” the idiot breathes. “Jihoonie is a genius. Do mine first. I’ll have to think for a while if I want to name you. All I can think right now is like . . . Maestro.”
“Never mind,” says Jihoon.
“The Producer?”
“I wish I’d never met you.”
“The God of Music?”
Jihoon curls his lip back and stares.
Soonyoung lies back down in a huff. “Well, what were you thinking for me?” he asks.
Jihoon wasn’t, is the problem. At least not really. He just wanted Soonyoung to stop looking so fucking sad.
Luckily, Jihoon has always done some of his best thinking under pressure. “Hoshi,” he says after several painful moments, before he can think better of it. “It’s Japanese for star.”
Soonyoung is quiet for a long while. “Hoshi,” he repeats slowly. Then he says, “Jihoonie . . .” like he’s a lamb that’s been brought for slaughter.
“Oh my God,” interrupts Jihoon, ears blushing. “I won’t die if you criticize me, Soonyoung—”
“I criticize you plenty,” protests Soonyoung.
“—It’s like . . . the tiger’s gaze,” says Jihoon. “Which is like . . . a tiger’s eye. You know.”
“A tiger’s gaze,” repeats Soonyoung. “A tiger’s eye. Hoshi.” He smiles, and it makes Jihoon’s heart hurt. “I love it. You should be Our Jihoonie.” He tries to pinch Jihoon’s cheeks, adopting an older woman’s tone. “Omo, our darling Jihoonie.”
“I will kill you,” says Jihoon.
“Our wonderful Jihoonie. Our lovely Jihoonie. Wooji. Wooji . . . Woozi, Woozi, baby—”
Soonyoung doesn’t stop laughing even when Jihoon begins to strangle him, that fuck.
Sebong Metropolitan City, 2025
Somehow, Jihoon keeps it together while taking the subway with Carbon for the second time. He’s much less exhausted and so much more aware of the way they attract attention, but Carbon is under strict instructions not to so much as look at Jihoon for the entire train ride. Jihoon could have just told the supervillain to show up at his place, the two of them left to get there by themselves, but for some reason (ha) the thought of letting Carbon out of his sight gives Jihoon the shakes.
There’s no way that Carbon is Soonyoung.
Soonyoung’s powers were shapeshifting. He could turn himself into any other person, but that had never involved black crystal.
(But then, when it happened, Pann was charring him into something unrecognizable no matter how hard Jihoon raged at her and tried to get his powers to work. Maybe it had been black crystal, when Seungcheol pulled Jihoon off of him. Maybe Soonyoung was black crystal, when Pann took him to her lair and put him on her wall. Only for the Liars to find him—)
The cats are excited to see Jihoon when he and Carbon arrive, but this time Jihoon has no interest in indulging them. He herds them all in the direction of his home office with the false implication that he is going to feed them, and then he shuts them in there unceremoniously, ignoring the chorus of affronted meows and trusting them not to kill each other while he and Carbon . . . talk.
The supervillain is waiting for Jihoon in the entryway, boots still on. His breath hitches when Jihoon goes down on his knees to take them off.
“Jihoon-ah, you shouldn’t—”
Jihoon isn’t sure what he was expecting, really, underneath Carbon’s boots. Bare feet that he would immediately recognize? That wasn’t his fetish; he wasn’t going around staring lecherously at Soonyoung’s toes.
Carbon is wearing black socks.
Jihoon tips his head back to look at him, and finds the supervillain unreadable underneath his mask. Jihoon flinches.
He stands back up, glancing anywhere but back at Carbon. His thoughts feel messy, like his mind isn’t his own. “Her name is Kisa,” he says, for some reason caught on the previous conversation that they had in his entryway. “The tiger cat. I got her for—I got her for—I got her for Onyx’s birthday.” He still can’t look at Carbon, who may be Soonyoung. “She’s the reason I became a vet.”
She’s the reason I’m still alive.
Almost as if he’d heard that unsaid confession, Carbon reaches out and touches Jihoon’s shoulder. Unbidden, Jihoon flinches away. And Carbon’s hand falls back down to his side. Even the fall of his shoulders is familiar. Gestures that Jihoon hadn’t thought about twice take on a phantasmal tone.
Jihoon swallows a scream. “Onyx died,” he says. “But in June, on his birthday, I suddenly had a Toyger kitten—I’d been saving up for years just to be able to afford her and it wasn’t like I could return her. She wasn’t an object; she was alive.”
Carbon says nothing.
“She’s Kisa because of Fruits Basket,” continues Jihoon. “When she was a baby she got very sick and I rushed her to the first vet who would see her and his name was Kye Bumzu. He saved her. He’s why I do what I do today.”
Still Carbon says nothing.
“Kyou was an accident. I must have left a window open and he came in and made himself at home. He’s such an idiot, but she loves him, really.” Jihoon’s throat feels filled with glaze. “Why did you name him Woozi?” he finally asks.
Carbon is quiet only for a beat. “Because of Woo’s Animal Hospital and your name—”
“Woo-ji, I know,” interrupts Jihoon. “But it wasn’t—it wasn’t for any other reason?” The glass is in his stomach now, doing vicious battle with all the butterflies.
Carbon’s masked head tips slowly to the side. “What other reason could there be?”
“Right,” Jihoon says. “Right, yeah.” He swallows with his torn open throat because he needs the gesture to be brave for this. “I’m just going—I need to—I’m sorry.”
Carbon’s mask feels exactly as it always has when Jihoon puts his hands on it. He’s touched it so many times, in the time that they’ve known each other. And not always in the context of orgasms, although that was the most often. Once Jihoon had even kissed it—sloppy and teasing. Now he dips his fingers into the hem and begins to peel it up and off.
Carbon’s throat hitches. His fingers twitch against his thighs like he’s going to reach up to stop Jihoon. But ultimately he does nothing, standing there like a statue in Jihoon’s front room. The mask comes off, slow and steady, revealing lips, nose, cheeks. Black crystal lines where nothing had been previously, oddly beautiful veins of darkness that would be more at home in marble and not a human face.
Jihoon notices none of that.
Because what’s under the mask is—
“Soonyoung,” Jihoon says, voice a watery rasp.
Black Carbon—Onyx—Kwon Soonyoung—Hoshi—Soonyoung, flutters out a breathy sigh.
Soonyoung’s memories aren’t there to be found under the mask with him. All he’s got is the name Hoshi, and a painfully familiar love of striped big cats.
But when Jihoon cups both his cheeks and does his best not to sob too badly at him, Soonyoung looks emphatically back. “Jihoonie, please don’t cry,” he says, in a voice that is panicked because for the last of the eight years that he’s been Carbon he’s been seeing Jihoon, essentially.
Jihoon fights the urge to swat at him because his concern doesn’t help.
He used to worry that he’d forget what Soonyoung looked like. He has photos and video, but so many of the formative moments were the two of them in masked costume; and because of that Jihoon became convinced that he was going to forget the exact color of Soonyoung’s eyes.
He was one of the few people who really knew it, since Soonyoung pretended to be vain to cover up his teenage self-consciousness.
Soonyoung’s eyes are brown.
Not copper, or gold, or hazel. Not green, sometimes blue, or even purple (for a week after he read some stupid article online about immortal, periodless women).
Brown.
Like chocolate, but darker.
Like the night sky, but kinder.
Eight years ago Jihoon made peace with the fact that he’d never get to gaze into them again. Turns out, that fact was a lie.
“Jihoon?”
Jihoon exhales and his breath only comes out a little shaky. “Soonyoung-ah,” he says again.
Between Soonyoung’s brows—which also look just as Jihoon had remembered, though they (and the rest of his hair) are shockingly pale, now—crinkles adorably. “Hoshi,” he corrects.
“Sorry,” Jihoon says. “Hoshi.”
Soonyoung—Carbon—Soonyoung shudders. He chews hard on his bottom lip. “I know how Onyx died,” he says, which is a bit of a non sequitur. “Titanium is obsessed with the Diamonds and Sapphire.”
So of course he’d know.
“I don’t”—Soonyoung remains adorably perturbed by the state of things, apparently—“what do I get if I’m him?” he asks. “If I’m your Soonyoung?”
“What do you get,” repeats Jihoon. How supervillain. (He doesn’t think about how he feels hearing the other talk about being Jihoon’s Soonyoung).
“Do I get you?” says Soonyoung suddenly. He steps forward and puts both of his gloved hands on Jihoon’s cheeks like Jihoon had been doing to him, gazing down at him with painfully familiar, blazing eyes. He always got like that, when he cared about something—when he was serious. Like nothing in the world could deter him. Like nothing else mattered but doing what he said he’d do.
Change Up saved a lot of people, because of Soonyoung’s passion.
“Jihoon-ah?”
Jihoon composes himself. “I was in love with Kwon Soonyoung,” he says, a momentously important admission—though all Soonyoung does is furrow his brow cutely again. “I—I like Carbon—”
“Then I’m Soonyoung,” interrupts Soonyoung-Carbon. Then he falters. “But I don’t remember being him—”
Jihoon kisses him. It’s all he’s wanted to do since he saw the face he thought he’d never see again, unhidden from him by part of a mask. It feels familiar. Things are slower than previous, but ultimately their mouths click together the same. Although Soonyoung-Carbon tries to stop kissing Jihoon much too soon.
“Jihoonie, please be serious. This is serious—”
“I don’t care,” says Jihoon, though he does. (He does. He does. He does.) “I liked you before I knew what was under the mask.”
The way Soonyoung-Carbon glows upon hearing that is the exact same as the Soonyoung of Jihoon’s memories.
“Okay,” he says, eye flicking down to Jihoon’s mouth and then back up again. “As long as you’re aware—”
“Oh, intimately,” says Jihoon, taking care to lick his lips purposefully. It’s invigorating to watch Carbon react to him, especially with the knowledge that he is in fact Soonyoung. Jihoon’s Soonyoung. The one who got (taken) away.
“Great,” Soonyoung says, in the same tone as he’d said “okay” previously. “So—”
“Kiss me, Hoshi-yah, you idiot,” Jihoon says.
Probably they could have done it any number of ways. For only having been doing this since May last year, they’ve certainly managed to never grow bored, or fall into too much of a pattern. Yes, generally Jihoon is more partial to getting pounded by supervillain cock, but he’s certainly not been one to deny Carbon his own ride. It just feels different, knowing that he’s Soonyoung.
Jihoon lets the cats out after sending his supervillain into his bedroom to get ready. He hurriedly opens cans of cat food and fills two bowls and one slow feeder while trying not to panic too badly, muttering to Kisa the whole time that, as eldest and most dominant, she better make sure no one eats anyone else’s food.
And then he’s running back into the bedroom to join Carbon, whereupon he’s struck all over again by how Carbon is Soonyoung, because that’s who is waiting for Jihoon, naked and in Jihoon’s bed.
Although it’s not really an erotic picture; Soonyoung is sitting cross-legged and has apparently found the photo album Jihoon pulled out the other night thanks to Yoon Jeonghan. He’s frowning looking down at it, and only frowns harder when Jihoon comes hesitantly over to join him. The pictures he has the book open to are all the precious few that Jihoon has of Change Up without their masks—including several unseen professional shots from when Yeongseok-hyung and fucking Soonyoung thought that making them all wear blindfolds would be chic.
In an embarrassing number of the photos Soonyoung is laughing and Jihoon is staring at him like a lovesick idiot. In all the others, Soonyoung is being ridiculous and Jihoon is the one laughing like it’s a competition that he needs to win.
“Hoshi—”
“You do love him,” Soonyoung says. His words come out petulant, but Jihoon doesn’t have to work very hard to see the insecurity underneath.
Getting on the bed and kissing him is the easy option; it works, so Jihoon isn’t too pressed. Soonyoung briefly kisses back, though he does try to pull away so that he can brandish the photo album.
Jihoon brushes it aside and replaces it with himself, straddling Soonyoung’s lap instead. “Hoshi-yah,” he says, since that seems to be the safer option than saying Soonyoung or Carbon.
But Soonyoung tips his head back stubbornly and insists: “Soonyoung-ah.”
“Soonyoung-ah,” Jihoon concedes, hoping that the sudden pounding of his heart is not too noticeable. “It is stupid to be jealous of yourself when I have been letting you put your dick in me since May of last year. I wouldn’t have done that if I didn’t at least like you a little bit.”
Perhaps that was taking it too far; Soonyoung’s forehead furrows further, and his lips turn down.
Jihoon sighs, then swallows, then offers his own heart to the idiot. “If you’d like . . . I could try healing you. I’ve never done anything with brain injuries, but—”
The way Soonyoung’s face lights up makes Jihoon hurt. “Yes,” he says, nodding enthusiastically. “Immediately—only.” He glances down quickly, before looking back up at Jihoon.
Jihoon follows the line of his sight to Soonyoung’s suddenly hard cock, poking up against Soonyoung’s stomach, and not nearly trapped enough between them. Jihoon hasn’t even gotten his clothes off. That slag.
“Needy.”
“Opportunistic.”
“Desperate.”
“Maybe, but only for you, so please?” Soonyoung grins at him.
Jihoon sucks air between his teeth. “Take my clothes off,” he says softly. Then he leans down and attaches his mouth to Soonyoung’s own.
It is mean, the way Jihoon worms a hand down to find Soonyoung’s dick and keeps rubbing it whenever Soonyoung seems to be particularly focused on the task he’s been given. But really Jihoon can’t help himself. Soonyoung is Carbon, and Carbon is only ever submissive like this when he wants something; also there’s some small part of Jihoon that is rapidly becoming larger that cannot handle the fact that Carbon is Soonyoung and Soonyoung is alive. His Soonyoung. His Hoshi. Not dead, and killed eight years ago.
Alive, and kissing Jihoon. Disrobing Jihoon. Wrestling Jihoon onto his back and pinning him so that he stops touching Soonyoung for long enough that Soonyoung can properly undress Jihoon, tugging off the lab coat, the dress shirt, the slacks. He seems particularly inclined to leave Jihoon, as ever, in only his underwear, but then gets off the bed to go hunt for materials without the sort of propriety that Jihoon would never have afforded the supervillain Carbon.
It’s because he’s Soonyoung that Jihoon allows him to rummage through his drawers. But it’s also because he’s Carbon that all Jihoon does is raise an unbothered eyebrow when Soonyoung finds his stash of condoms and a half empty bottle of lube and tries to start something about its fullness.
“That’s technically your doing,” he says, then laughs when Soonyoung fumbles the hold and nearly drops the bottle on his way back. He takes advantage of the lull to kick off his boxers, settling back against his pillows and spreading his legs purposefully as part of the show.
But Soonyoung gets to the edge of the bed and hesitates, fingers curled tightly around the lube almost protectively.
Jihoon tips his head further back, and drops one hand into the crease of his left thigh and the other around the base of his dick as a test. Soonyoung’s eyes follow the curve of Jihoon’s fingers. When Jihoon strokes himself harder than he likes because the discomfort of too-dry fingers never fails to get him wet enough, Soonyoung’s throat bobs with want.
Ah.
Jihoon swings his legs closed, thighs tensing as part of a different, but no less mouth-watering, show. He flexes his hips into the beginnings of his masturbation, making sure to show off the power he could put behind his thrusts.
Soonyoung’s mouth drops open.
Jihoon smirks.
Soonyoung’s nostrils flare in his need, but he somehow manages to speak. “You’re much meaner to me now that you know who you think I am,” he says.
“That’s true,” says Jihoon. “But couldn’t you say that it’s because you know who I am now, too?” At Soonyoung’s vaguely startled face, Jihoon lets go of his dick and lets his powers hum between his fingers. He doesn’t usually manifest it like this—can’t, actually, for long periods of time, at least—but this was something he and Soonyoung did when they were bored.
Because Seungcheol—or Sapphire—was so fucking showy about his forcefields, Soonyoung and Jihoon decided they needed to figure out how to be too. Soonyoung’s way around this was to start naming (and announcing) his transformations. Jihoon’s was to grit his teeth and bare it until he manages to manifest his healing abilities as some sort of weird purple lightning between his hands.
In retrospect, it was weird, and probably should have been impossible. But so was a meteorite striking the northern half of the Korean peninsula and giving humanity superpowers, so there.
Jihoon can only manage a couple of seconds, but it turns out to be enough.
Soonyoung can’t seem to get on top of him fast enough, dropping the lube and condom onto Jihoon’s chest and insisting that Jihoon open him up because Soonyoung doesn’t have the patience to do it well enough, and he knows Jihoon will get mad.
“Look who’s already begging,” Jihoon says.
Soonyoung glares down at him, a familiar stubbornness showing through unfamiliar eyes. It’s Carbon, masquerading as Kwon Soonyoung. The black lines of crystal that work their way down his arms to reach his hands—which are holding tight to Jihoon—are an evidence of that. The supervillain doesn’t use his diamond strength to grip Jihoon, but the threat of it—and the difference in texture between all the warm, brown skin on top of him and the rocks wrapping around Jihoon’s shoulder caps—is a lot. Jihoon’s dick jumps between them, and of course Soonyoung notices.
His lips curve with villainous amusement. The black doesn’t cover any further parts of him, but he must do something with his internal structure, because suddenly the weight in Jihoon’s lap increases. Not enough to be painful, but enough to stun him with even more aroused shock.
Jihoon had been too focused on the idea of getting literal crystal dick in him. He hadn’t thought about the potential for bondage—for getting pinned thoroughly down.
But maybe he should have. He’d certainly had no shortage of wet dreams about Soonyoung, back when they were both teenagers, because Soonyoung went on and on about how his powers somehow meant he had no refractory period, when really Jihoon had the sort of powers that should bless a person with such a thing. Imagining the guy you’re in love with turning himself bulky so that you can use him as a weighted blanket slash dildo has got to be the same? Right?
“Jihoon,” says Soonyoung. “What are you thinking about?”
“Nothing,” Jihoon lies. He pops the lube open and wets the necessary number of fingers. He decides to leave the business of the condom up to Soonyoung. Seems only fair, after Monday.
Though maybe that was being too charitable.
Soonyoung doesn’t actually need all three of Jihoon’s fingers, but somehow he ends up with them, and he’s utterly useless for all of the process, to the point where Jihoon pushes him off and to the side so that he can roll the condom onto himself, trying to reconcile all his fantasies about having sex with Soonyoung with the reality.
It’s nothing as expected—as hoped.
But then, how could it be?
Soonyoung is Carbon, with no memories, and a fuck ton of trauma, and years spent doing evil, villainous things.
By contrast Jihoon is no longer Ruby, and terribly aggrieved by all the memories, with years spent saving the lives of animals because he couldn’t bear to put hands on another human with the intent to heal.
Together, they could probably fund the child of some enterprising therapist’s college education.
“Jihoon,” whines Soonyoung from where Jihoon left him on his side somewhere to the right.
“Soonyoung,” Jihoon replies, to no flinching, introspection, or otherwise putting the brakes on getting it on. All the other does is spread his legs and wait for it, when Jihoon rolls over and crawls up over him, playing at trying to get into him without either of them reaching down with a hand to help.
It’s teasing and tormenting and nothing like what Carbon had done to Jihoon days ago, but the growl that Soonyoung makes is all Carbon. The furious hands he puts on Jihoon’s ass to direct him are familiar too.
But so too are his perfectly brown eyes, lashed all around as just as Jihoon was so frightened he wouldn’t remember.
He wants to say “I love you.” He doesn’t, because if he did, Soonyoung would definitely balk.
Fucking his dick into him seems close enough to that confession; it’ll have to do.
“Ngh, Jihoon-ah!” Soonyoung puts his head back and shoves his chest up, arching into the initial stretch with a cry. He’s tight enough to cross Jihoon’s eyes. But before Jihoon can really get into fucking him, Soonyoung hurriedly goes on. “Wait—I mean don’t wait—don’t stop—” Soonyoung actually growls.
Jihoon, with a hardly disguised smirk of amusement, waits . . . but doesn’t pull out. The movement of his hips is more teasing than anything, though.
“You should—now,” says Soonyoung. It isn’t particularly descriptive. Then he raises his hands and waves them about his face, like that’ll help.
Unfortunately, Jihoon knows him—the supervillain and the hero he was before. “You want me to try healing your brain . . . now?”
Every single smile is only Soonyoung, no Carbon. Jihoon’s heart aches again. “Yeah!”
Cautious, Jihoon puts both of his hands on Soonyoung’s head, like he might when getting his brains sucked out his cock. It’s not hard to use his powers—almost welcoming—but there’s nothing. No sense of injuries swallowed; nothing.
“Sorry—”
“It’s fine—” Soonyoung’s disappointment is obvious, but the way he tries to rally is sweet. “You can just—God, Jihoonie, come on!”
Swallowing a grin, Jihoon takes hold of his supervillain’s hips and finally begins to move.
“Yes,” Soonyoung sighs, bossy. “Like that, yes. Good—h-hah—” His words terminate in moaning.
Jihoon wants to heal Soonyoung, honestly. He’ll settle for fucking him stupid. In the end, they both see God. Another kind of healing; another kind of death.
In the afterglow, Soonyoung is vulnerable; Jihoon is too. They dispose of all the used supplies, crack the bedroom door to avoid a cat bloodbath, and end up curled together without an audience. All three cats come in to see what’s up, but all of them are too disgusted to stay in the room with them.
Once Kisa has left after both her brothers, Soonyoung speaks. “You really got her for me?”
Jihoon manages to talk around the sudden lump in his throat, tucking his chin more solidly over the top of Soonyoung’s blond head. “Yeah.”
“To say I love you?”
Jihoon doesn’t remember telling him that, but maybe he’d been obvious. No use making a big deal of it; what will be, will be, and Jihoon’s not letting go this time regardless.
“Yeah,” he says again. “You loved tigers.”
Soonyoung is quiet in Jihoon’s arms for a long, long time. “I still do,” he admits finally.
Jihoon holds him tighter.
“This doesn’t change anything, though,” says Soonyoung suddenly. “I’m still Black Carbon. And you’re not Doctor Woo. I’m not going to stop being a Liar just because of you.”
Jihoon’s lips twitch, unseen. “No, of course no,” Jihoon says. “I’m not Ruby anymore, either.”
“Right.” Soonyoung nods. “Right, yes.” He turns around somehow in Jihoon’s arms, resettling so that he’s still the little spoon, but now looking seriously into Jihoon’s eyes. He was never this old, in Jihoon’s memories. Never this blond, or marked by time.
Each day will be a surprise.
A new memory filled up with Kwon Soonyoung.
“But you are mine, right?” asks Soonyoung. “Jihoon?”
Jihoon could let him suffer, but he’s not the one of them in the Liars. “For eternity,” he says.
Soonyoung’s answering smile is straight out of Jihoon’s past, though the face that looks back at him is somehow unknown. The press of his lips against Jihoon’s mouth feels like a homecoming all the same.
