We Are Bulletproof

(New one? :D If you could start that'd be awesome! No rush tho!)

(Yes ma'am! Dinner in a bit, will be back to post later! :D)

(Can probably assume Rae and Alva make their way to the other apartment and have them re-enter the other thread? :D Should we start the thing with Kinley/Kero/Inferior Panda/Dragon?)

(Yaaasssssss queen!)

Kyoung Ho massaged his temple; he had a raging headache now and he didn't even know what brought it on. Maybe still hunger, although maybe it was also that weird thick fog. Maybe it was the shiver that ran up his spine just now as he gazed out of the window, only to see a wall of gray.

"Ah. Yes, sorry." It was probably not a good idea to let a stranger loose around the house, but Bax would keep an eye on him. It felt rude to just leave Wen to his own devices, though.

"We have a theater room upstairs. How about some movies?" Baxter nosed around Wen's legs and feet, then gave a soft bark. His tail wagged expectantly, for a head pat or some kind of recognition.

"...no idea," Kyoung Ho muttered distractedly as he searched for his door keys. It was so hard to see anything in the damned fog. "Down Bax!" he called, and the scratching stopped. Kyoung Ho slid the key into the lock and opened the door, and Baxter leapt on him, both paws on his shoulders. He wobbled around for a bit while trying to calm his dog down.

"You okay, Bax?" It wasn't like him to jump on people--even Kyoung Ho. Absently patting Baxter's head, he looked inside. A funny kind of shiver in the air attracted his attention, right by the entryway leading into the downstairs family room. "Hey... that's..." It looked eerily similar to what he saw back at the gas station, come to think of it. Kyoung Ho walked inside and turned on the lights, bathing the entryway in a warm, golden glow.

When he looked at the shimmery something again, it was gone. Kyoung Ho toed off his shoes, mystified. Maybe he was so hungry that his vision was starting to go. "I think... I'm going to lay down for a little while. I'm starting to see things."

"He'd better be, I'm starving. I haven't eaten for over a day," Kyoung Ho grumbled as they climbed up the path with all the speed of an aging turtle. The snacks that he had bought earlier at the convenience store had already been consumed and they staved off the hunger pangs briefly, but they wouldn't tide him over for the rest of the night.

There was probably food in the fridge at home, but Kyoung Ho was no great cook. In fact, he was pretty terrible. In university he ate out or counted on certain willing individuals to feed him and look after him (shamelessly using the heavy law school curriculum as an excuse). In retrospect, maybe he should have picked up some basic cooking skills but it was too late now.

"I can barely make out the houses from the road." He craned his neck forward to get a better look at the buildings on either side. Was his house close, or did they still have a ways to go? The fog obscured any visual cues that he could have used to find his way back home. Still, they should have been close, and it wasn't like the path ran forward indefinitely. The road ended in a cul-de-sac a little ways ahead, so if he hit that, he'd know that he had gone too far.

"I think that's the one." Kyoung Ho turned into a driveway that he hoped was his.

For some reason--though he asked it first--Kyoung Ho expected Wen to decline. Maybe it was that aloof air about him, or the fact that he lived alone up in the mountains, that intimated a certain reluctance for company. Kyoung Ho wasn't overly social himself; people seemed to find him intimidating.

Not Wen, it seemed. Although he didn't take his eyes off the road, Kyoung Ho nodded. "Sure. It's probably not a good idea to keep running the generator all night anyway." One, it was a waste of gas and two, he didn't want Wen overwhelmed by fumes. Depending on how efficient his generator was, it might just do more harm than good. Besides, Kyoung Ho had electricity--Wen didn't. Just because he wasn't social didn't mean that he was pitiless.

"Bax will keep you company. I'm in the middle of a big case so I might have to disappear for a little while." Baxter was good company, though; he wasn't one of those frantic dogs that tore around with frenetic energy. They began the long ascent up the mountain and the car slowed to a near-crawl. Kyoung Ho didn't want to risk plunging off a cliff, or rounding a sharp corner too quickly.

"I ordered pizza before you got here," he remarked, mostly to himself. "The delivery guy's probably not even there yet."

Wen beat him to it; Kyoung Ho also reached for the tab on the side of the door to lock the car doors. He wasn't the type to be easily spooked--he was very practical and not at all superstitious--but that prickle down the back of his neck, all the way to his tailbone, couldn't be ignored. Kyoung Ho, however, didn't look back at the convenience store. He was too busy pulling away from the gas station.

Out on the road, he felt better, and mentally chided himself for acting like a nervous kid. Really, it was just... a trick of the light. The fog playing tricks on him, swirling and moving the way it always did and appearing as though something lurked within. Kyoung Ho let out a low sigh and eased up on the gas pedal. Maybe monsters weren't real but cops were.

"They say it'll lift soon," he said doubtfully. Couldn't even see ten feet in front of him on the road; he had to pay attention to anything that looked like the lights of a car, to avoid plowing into somebody. "But it doesn't look like it will, does it?" He didn't dare take his eyes off the road so he didn't look over at Wen. "Are you going to be okay up on the mountain by yourself?"

That sound...

Kyoung Ho couldn't pinpoint it at first; the fog was so dense that it even distorted most sounds. He looked around a little wildly to find the source of the noise as the hair stood on end at the back of his neck. Idly, Kyoung Ho rubbed at the area; it prickled uncomfortably with the sensation at the back of his mind that something wasn't quite right here.

"I thought there was a shadow just now," he said slowly, not wanting to give in to idle speculation but unable to help the goosebumps that rose along his arms. When he looked inside the convenience store, the guy inside was gone. Briefly it looked like there was a distortion where he used to stand just behind the counter. Like the air shimmered slightly, the way it might during an intense heat wave. It wasn't hot, though--it was ice cold.

"...come on. I'll drive you back."

(HASTEN! Haha! I can start if you can handle another one.)

"I'll go with you," Kyoung Ho said as he undid the seatbelt and let it slide back into place, reaching for the door handle. He saw the bored-looking clerk inside through the fog. He also saw racks of convenience store junk food and he... he was so hungry that he'd risk a bag of chips. Just one bag, to tide him over until he could get some real food.

Outside, a stiff wind picked up and he hurried towards the convenience store. The attendant inside gave him a bit of a strange look--probably because he was dressed in an expensive coat, with a pair of silly pajama bottoms underneath--but Kyoung Ho was far past the point of self-consciousness. Besides, what did he care if a convenience store/gas station attendant judged him?

He bought a bag of chips and some dried fruits and nuts and wandered outside to check up on Wen. Presumably he had money on him. "Everything all right?" He asked as he approached, mildly frowning at the dense fog crowding in around them. For a second, he could have sworn that he saw something moving in the fog, but when he blinked, it was gone. Kyoung Ho shook his head lightly. Must be the hunger getting to him. And the lack of sleep.

Kyoung Ho's thoughts wandered during the silent ride into town, revolving around his work and the sensation of his stomach eating itself in his ravenous state and--mostly--around a certain somebody who worked at the pharmacy in town. Maybe he could stop by. He was a smart man (though not so much after more than 24 hours without sleep). He could make up an excuse for being there...

That was so pathetic. It was almost as pathetic as when, back in university, he manufactured reasons to be at approximately the same places that Tori was, at the same times. Kyoung Ho wondered if Tori ever knew how hard he actually worked to appear effortlessly coincidental in some of their meetings. (Or if he knew and never said anything to avoid embarrassing Kyoung Ho.)

He was so absorbed in his thoughts, in fact, that he half-started when Wen spoke. Left? Kyoung Ho blinked. Almost missed that turn! He quickly changed lanes and made the correct turn to get himself to the gas station in town. "Thanks," he said, glancing swiftly at Wen. Kyoung Ho didn't know if the silence made him uncomfortable, the way it did to other people. He was fine with it himself, but he was often told that that was unnatural and 'weird.'

"Almost there." There, he tried to make some kind of conversation.

"Ah."

That was code for "mind your own damn business," Kyoung Ho was sure, so he didn't pursue the subject. For all he knew, Wen could be a drug dealer--or worse, a user of drugs. There were rumors of drugs being peddled in and out of town and while Kyoung Ho hadn't personally handled cases involving them, he knew that some of the others at the firm had.

Since he had gotten all the information he needed--or that Wen was willing to divulge--Kyoung Ho fell silent. He wasn't unduly bothered by the quiet. If anything, he preferred it over meaningless chatter about the weather, or the local sports team. As they drove down the mountain and into the outskirts of town, Kyoung Ho slipped a surreptitious glance or two at Wen, when he thought that Wen wasn't looking.

Something about him felt really strange. It was like an aura surrounding him, maybe. A vibe. Kyoung Ho wasn't given to superstition but he swore he felt it.

OKAY SEE YOU IN 5!