Episode 16
“No. But I’ve called in security. You won’t see them, but they’ll be watching you.”
“I already have security.”
The door opened and Jamal entered, followed by two more men in suits.
“I’ll leave you to your next session,” the Merchari said.
Jun met Jamal’s eyes and then looked back to the Merchari. “No. You are my next session.”
The Merchari frowned. “As nice as your voice is, I’m not interested in karaoke.”
“This isn’t karaoke.” Jun nodded to Jamal. The two men with him moved in, taking the Merchari agent by the arms.
“Sir, you’re under arrest.”
“Whatever they want to know,” Jun looked the startled Merchari in the eye, “I suggest you tell them. Every conversation we’ve ever had, they already have. You were never playing against me. You were playing against The Residency. Maybe the courts will offer you a better deal than you offered me.”
He walked out of the door, leaving the arresting officers to do their job.
Back in the main room, the party had matured and settled.
Groups had formed and people were in conversation.
Su-jin was charming a circle of prominent producers and distributors.
Geun, Yohei, and Jaewoong were still in the back doing karaoke.
Another round of sessions were due to start in half an hour. Everything was running at it should.
Perhaps they would come out of this unscathed.
Mi Hi stopped beside him, her tablet clutched to her chest as always.
“How’s it going?” he asked.
“Good. We’ve had a few questions about whether someone left, but so far nothing major. No one suspects anything.”
Jun pinched himself to stop a yawn from forming. His feet hurt. His eyes burned. Every part of his body was asking for the evening to be over.
“Is there any way to move up the next round?”
Mi Hi grimaced. She looked significantly towards an undercover police officer. “One of the rooms had to be shut down.”
Jun grimaced. That didn’t sound great. “Everyone all right?”
Mi Hi nodded. “Maleko will need a doctor, but he’ll be all right. Geun is taking a moment. He was caught up in it.”
“I’ll go check on him.”
“We put him in your room, the one with a view of the river at the end.”
Jun signaled Jamal that he was heading to the back. Jamal nodded and dropped in behind him.
“Maleko got hurt?” Jun asked, when they were in the hallway alone.
“Chair to the head. He’s bruised, but it missed his eye and didn’t break his nose.”
“Good.” Jun shook his head. “I’m glad that’s all that’s happened.”
Jamal opened the door and Jun went in. Yohei was already there, sitting beside Geun, holding one cold pack to Geun’s head and one to Geun’s hand. Neither of their security were with them.
“How bad is it?” Jun said.
Geun shrugged.
“It’s a solid bruise to a knuckle,” Yohei answered. He pulled the ice off and showed the purple mark.
“It’s fine,” Geun said. “We’ve had worse in practice. That last one was really not going quietly.”
“Yes, we’ve had worse.” Jun pulled up a chair and took Geun’s hand in both of his, turning it this way and that.
“And we take care of ourselves if that happens. At least, we do now.” He looked up into Geun’s eyes.
For a moment, it looked like Geun was going to argue, his lips tight, his forehead furrowed.
Then he sighed and looked away, capitulating. “I’m fine, really.”
“Dude, we’re way more worried about your head than your hand,” Yohei snorted.
“I know.” Geun’s shoulders dropped and he looked down at the ground. Jun stood and Yohei let Jun check where Geun had been hit. The skin had split, but not badly. For the moment, his hair would cover it.
“I heard the guy was using a chair.”
“Caught me with one of the legs,” Geun grumbled. “It was fucked up, okay, but it wasn’t bad. Maleko is the one who really got the worst of it. Well, him and the police officer. They had to carry the officer out. I don’t know if he was okay. But I’m fine. Give me a glove and I can go back out.”
Jun sighed. Of all the outfits in the room, he was the only one who had gloves. He pulled one off and gave it to Geun. “Here. Now everyone is going to think we’re dating.”
Geun’s lips twitched and his eyes crinkled up a little. “I’ll tell them you’re adding me to your harem.”
Jun snorted and offered Geun a hand up. Yohei rose with them. He met Yohei’s eyes. Stay with him? he asked his second silently. Yohei inclined his head, taking on the task. He tossed the cold packs to the side out of sight.
“One more round. Mi Hi can get them to start early, then we’re getting your head looked at and getting some rest. There’s nothing scheduled tomorrow,” Jun said.
“What happened to sleeping for a week?” Geun groaned.
“No matter how many times you threaten to do that, you never sleep more than sixteen hours,” Jun patted Geun’s arm. Too bad they were probably going to have to keep waking him up to check for a concussion.
Geun smothered a yawn. “I’ll just lay there and look pretty.”
“Take a picture and have Mi Hi tell me you’re working,” Jun ribbed him.
Yohei chuckled. “That would be working.”
“We need to get you covered, now that Maleko is down for the count,” Jamal said to Geun.
“Timothy should be free.” He spoke into his headset and got confirmation.
“Jun, can you stay here? We don’t want you all re-entering at the same time without any returning guests, and you were the last one to leave, so you should be the last one to go back. There’s still one more arrest to make.”
Jun nodded.
Yohei and Geun headed out to the hallway where Timothy met them. Jamal and Timothy spoke for a moment with the door to the room open, then Timothy left with Geun and Yohei. Jun looked out at the water through the glass and sighed, dropping down into a chair.
Jamal stuck his head into the room. “You okay?”
“Yeah, yeah.” Jun waved his hand. “Just…lost in my head. How long did Mi Hi say we should wait?”
Jamal didn’t answer. He rose up on his toes, propelled from behind. His eyes rolled back in his head, and he fell into the room, body crashing prostrate to the floor.
Jun stood, smashing the panic button in his pocket. When the sessions were going, someone was watching the cameras and listening, but Jamal had been his personal security for the event. There weren’t any sessions scheduled in the room until the next set of raffle winners came back.
A Korean man in tinted glasses stepped over Jamal’s body, dropping a hard metal tool on Jamal’s back.
He pointed a gun at Jun. A hand gun. Small, black. There was a silencer attached. He pulled off the glasses and reached into the collar of his button-down shirt. The skin of his throat wrinkled as he grabbed at it and pulled.
It was a mask. A full head mask. Professional grade. The kind only seen on film sets with large budgets.
Bak Sahyuk stared triumphantly at Jun over the barrel of the weapon.
And just like that, nothing mattered. Jun was done. Deep in his bones. Tired. Angry. Not just done, beyond done. Past ready to be over all of it, every last shred of it.
Sahyuk pushed Jamal’s feet into the room and shut the door. He knelt, keeping Jun in his sights and touched his fingers to Jamal’s pulse point. Jun looked towards the object Sahyuk had dropped. It looked like a portal razor. Maybe a zapper.
Sahyuk pulled a capped syringe from his pocket and flicked the end off with his thumb.
“Don’t,” Jun said.
Sahyuk looked at Jun. “So, you’ve probably heard by now, Gyeong is dead.”
Jun shrugged. At least, he felt like his body shrugged. His sense of self was standing very still in the core of his consciousness, watching Sahyuk like prey.
“This is a sedative,” Sahyuk held it up. “Just so we can have a talk.”
He stabbed it into Jamal without moving his gun, or even looking from Jun. “So now that that’s out of the way, and we’re here”—Sahyuk smirked—“Sing for me. That’s all you’ll be doing, from now on out, anyway.”
Jun reached for the switchboard with one hand. “Is that so, Father? Won’t the Merchari still have something to say about that?”
Sahyuk smirked. “That’s being handled. They’ll fall in line if they know what’s good for them. Now sing.”
Jun wrapped his fingers around the microphone, one digit at a time. “You’re so sure.” Either Sahyuk had a hell of a lot of backup, or he didn’t know the security trap he’d walked into. Getting one bodyguard out of the way wasn’t going to be enough. Though he was clearly practiced at it.
But how would he know? The Merchari hadn’t known. All the clients and operatives already arrested hadn’t seen through the facade. Sahyuk thought he was on his own turf, swanning about masked in a party like he had a thousand times before, spending money made from Jun’s labor.
Sahyuk had walked into a trap. Of his own volition.
Jun selected a song from the set list. The lyrics in English, Korean, Japanese, and Chinese would show on the screen behind him.
Sahyuk dropped into a chair, facing Jun. “Go on, boy. Prove to me that Gyeong was all that stood between you and me getting things back to how they should be. Sing.”
“Sure.” Jun pressed play, the opening lines of one of the first songs he’d written on the new album started to stream out of the speakers. He stared at Sahyuk and lifted the microphone to his face for the first verse.
Hate all the way down
Shadow so callow
Few words between us
each one a blade
Standing epitaph of sin
Father I call you
“Not this one!” Sahyuk snarled, jumping to his feet.
Jun raised one eyebrow in defiance, charging onward in a full-throated rendition delivered with more conviction than he’d ever felt before.
I would bleed to be free
Of all you have done
But here I am
Evidence
Ink on my skin
I’m not important
But your crime is
Sahyuk gestured with the gun. “Stop it.”
Jun didn’t, but he did step forward, meeting Sahyuk in the middle, the gun and the microphone between them.
Sahyuk raged. “I gave you an order.” He reached to turn off the track.
Jun blocked him with his body.