▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄

"I don't know why I imagined you to be... much older than you are when I first heard of you." The Underboss spoke, a glint of interest in his eyes as he watched Mari cautiously. Despite being much older than her and probably a lot more confident in his abilities, he refused to let his guard down around her.

If Mari escaped at any given moment he'd be in very big trouble with his higher-ups so letting his guard down with Mari wasn't even possible. Good for him, being cautious of the consequences but it's not like Mari had any idea of how to escape in the first place. "Does the Seo Faction use child soldiers?" The man questioned her, pondering at how the inner workings of the Seo Faction must work compared to his own. "How unethical."

"I don't think you really have a say on that sort of thing," Mari answered him, a frown on her face as she sat in the back of the room she had been kept in. She didn't know exactly how long she had been in the room, but it couldn't have been any longer than around two days or so at most. She was still dressed in the same white dress she had worn to the Kim Faction residence yet it wasn't stained with filth like the rest of the cold and dark room.

"Aren't you a part of the faction that's got a literal group of assassins and one of them is still a teenage boy?"

"Four of them," He corrected her with a shrug. It took a moment for it to click in her head, the feeling of dread washing over her like a tidal wave for a moment. It was safe to assume that the other three members of that group were Seonghwa, Mingi, and Yunho. There was no one else close to Hongjoong that could be used as leverage over both of them. "Touché, though, I guess we all can't be perfect. Teenagers are just so much more... impressionable and controllable than grown adults don't you think?"

She narrowed her eyes at the Underboss, unable to truly respond to his question. She didn't even know if she wanted to respond to him in the first place, but all Mari was good for at the moment was talking. "I guess we are, huh."

If only Mari could move from the spot she had been stationed in, bound to the ground of the room with a chain pulling at her ankles and her hands stuck together with handcuffs tightly wrapped around her wrists. She probably would have scratched the Underboss's eyes out with her nails if she could approach him. Mari wondered if Jaerin had told them of her horrific temper when she was still around, maybe that's why they had limited her movement to only five feet away from anyone else.

It was a good idea on the Kim Faction's part, restricting her that was. All Mari needed was a muzzle and spiked dog collar and she'd look exactly like one of those dogs everyone labeled as dangerous and aggressive. What could she say? Mari just had a lot of pent up anger that she would let explode at any given moment if she could.

Though, the only thing Mari could do at the moment was talk. Talk just like she always had when she was forced into these kidnapped scenarios, this current one wasn't all that different from when she was snatched up by the old Underboss of the Kim Faction. There were some differences, but for the most part, it was the same. Minus the fact that she had no backup to come to recuse if she was being threatened with death.

All she had to do was use her words, use her charms to either stall whatever plans that her enemies had or simply get on their nerves enough to set herself free. Usually, it was the latter and Mari found enough enjoyment in that simple aspect. But the current Kim Faction Underboss? He wasn't annoyed at all, in fact, he was enjoying her company and small talk much more than she had originally anticipated. It wasn't the goal, but anything to preserve her life for as long as she possibly could so that Hongjoong or San could find where she was and help her escape.

But... not even Mari knew exactly where she was. All she remembered after Seonghwa had boldly betrayed her and turned her into the enemy was that she had been injected with some sort of drug that made her pass out while she was at the Kim residence. Mari had no memory of the trip to wherever she was being held, and she only remembered waking up in the same room she was being kept in now.

"Where are we?" Mari asked after a moment of silence, playing with the jingling chain of her shackles as she spoke. A bold question to ask as if the Underboss was going to give away such information, but she decided to try anyway. Maybe he was an inexperienced Underboss?

The man didn't answer her right away and the girl felt her breath hitch at his sudden hesitation. He looked as though he was truly contemplating on whether or not it was a good idea to reveal the location they were currently in. Mari's hands fell to her lap, crossing her fingers out of sight and silently begging whatever divine being there was above to grant her wishes. Though he shrugged his shoulders after a moment of thinking to himself and responded to her.

"Why would I tell you that?" The Underboss asked, and Mari cursed to herself. Of course, it wasn't going to work, but at least she knew now there was a chance for her to sway his decisions. All Mari needed to do was make conversation and soon she'd find a breakaway for freedom. "All you need to know is that we weren't stupid enough to make our base of operations in the home of our godfather after all."

"To be fair, we didn't think you'd actually find us one day. It was a worse case scenario type thing," Mari chuckled, though she was talking to herself more than anything. "Both factions are generations in the making, after all, the thought always crossed the mind but never was a big enough problem to pay attention to."

"Unfortunate," He told her, crouching down to her height and digging around in his pockets. Mari instinctively tried to move away, her back pressing into the stone cold wall and leaving her nowhere to run. Though the Underboss pulled out a few photos the darkness of the room made it hard for her to see exactly what had been printed on them. With a mischievous grin, he looked from the photos and back to Mark before asking, "Tell me, are you a daddy's girl?"

"I don't consider myself one and wouldn't want to be," She answered him, confused as to why that was the question he decided to ask.

"Maybe you should have been one before you had gotten yourself caught," The Underboss explained, taking one photo out of his small set and putting in front of her. Cautiously she raised her hands to grab what he had presented to her, the chain jingling across the floor as she shifted around to get a better look at the photo. She was stunned for a moment, unable to say the words that were on the tip of her tongue.

"What..." She choked, her grip around the photos tightening as her voice grew hot with anger. "What the fuck is this?"

"They are pictures," The Underboss told her, his tone mocking as he snatched up the set of photos away from her. "Well, pictures of your Godfather's wife begging for her life before my men shot a bullet straight through her chest." He clarified, forming a finger gun with one hand and pointing it straight towards Mari. The man closed one eye and put one hand under his fist as if he were holding a real pistol, getting ready to pull his make-believe trigger once his fingernails aligned right with Mari's chest.

"Oh, and pictures of you. Knocked out cold on the nice floors of the Kim Residence and a needle wound right on the wrist," He finished off, a smug smile stretching across his face as he lowered his hands. "We take nice pictures here in the Kim Faction, don't you think?"

"Give those to me," Mari demanded, standing up on her knees and holding out her cuffed hands towards him. There was an indescribable fire in her eyes as she glared daggers straight into the Underboss's soul, a million emotions running through her brain, and none of them something she wanted to focus on. "Give those to me right now!"

The Underboss laughed, a hearty and taunting laugh that made the girl's blood burn with pure wrath. "And why would I do that?" He asked her, simply taking a few steps away from her so that the chain attached to her could resist her from coming any closer. "Do you not like the way I took them? Should I go dig up that woman's grave and take a picture of her decaying corpse? Want me to take a new picture of you in the state you're in now?"

"I said to give those to you, you bitch!" She cursed, desperately reaching her hands out towards him as she tried to force the chain around her legs to stretch out further. But the metal chain stayed in its place, successfully keeping her held back from the Underboss and practically growling at him like a dog. "Give it."

"No," He denied her, waving the photos out of her reach. "I think these are just perfect to send to Seo Faction's Godfather! Just imagine the amount of anger that bubbles up inside of him when he sees a picture of his wife on her dying breathe? And then the amount of despair and fear that replaces it once he sees a picture of his daughter vulnerable and out of his sight. He won't know how to act after that."

"You're using me as a ransom, you're trying to draw him here." Mari realized, her eyes widening with every word that comes out of her mouth. "That's sick as fuck."

"And when he comes to save his daughter, as I will ask that of him," The Underboss continued, completely ignoring the death glares that Mari was sending his way. "We'll kill him. Murder him the moment he takes a step towards you and make sure he never rises again. The Seo Faction cannot function without its pillar, its prime leader! And it cannot take so many losses back to back, they'll be forced to surrender to the Kim Faction, just as they should have long ago. Doesn't that sound like fun?"

"Fuck you!" Mari screamed, throwing a tantrum in the little space she had to herself. "Once I get out of here, I'll kill you. I'll kill you for hurting my friends and family. Do you hear me, you bastard? I'll kill you and anyone who tries to stop me!"

The Underboss laughed at her outburst, walking towards the door that kept the two locked inside the room together. "Are you sure you wanna do that though?" He asked her, turning his head to her with a mischievous smirk. "Your friend worked so hard to keep you alive this long though. Threatening to kill me will simply make me break his promise."

Her friend? "Wooyoung," Mari mumbled, immediately dropping everything to stare at the Kim Faction's Underboss. "Wooyoung? Where's Wooyoung, what did you do to him?"

"What did I do to him?" The Underboss asked, thinking to himself for a second. "I didn't do anything to him. We simply struck a deal with each other, and I can't break my promises. I've never broken a promise."

A look of terror overtook her face as the Underboss opened the door, revealing one of the Kim Faction soldiers carrying an exhausted looking Wooyoung in his arms, practically manhandling the boy as he struggled to himself upright. "Surprise," The Underboss smiled, "I'm keeping my end of the deal."

"Wooyoung," Mari breathed, unable to truly get the words she wanted to say out of her mouth.

The boy gave her a meek smile, a hint of desperation and brokenness she had never seen in him glint in his eyes. "Mari."

With a sudden shove, Wooyoung was thrown into the same room as Mari and the door closed behind them. Before the two could even react, their only means of escaping the dark room was locked in nearly an instant, leaving them trapped but together this time. The Underboss had made his exit out of the room as well, which meant no more questioning and conversation with the person closest to the Kim Faction's boss. But that wasn't Mari's main problem at the moment anymore.

"Wooyoung, what happened?" Mari asked him, urging him to come closer since she went as far as the chain would let her go. The boy seemed... smaller than before.

His frame was much thinner than she remembered him being and he looked tired, beaten to the bone even. Not to mention the awfully bright red rings around his wrists and just a few scars on his face as that she could immediately see. She was surprised that he was still even awake from the shape that he was in.

She had only been snatched by the Kim Faction for what felt like a few days, but Wooyoung? he spent weeks alone with the Kim Faction. Who knows what they had done to him while he was here?

"You know I'm in love with you, right?" The boy asked her with a trembling voice, ignoring her first question as he scrambled over to where she sat.

"Unfortunately I do," Mari nodded in response, unsure of how to continue the conversation topic. "But should we really be worrying about that right now? You're injured, you're weak, Wooyoung."

"Good," He spoke, ignoring her once again. "That's all I need to know." Wooyoung grabbed the chain of the cuffs and forced Mari to him, crashing his lips on hers with such a sense of desperation that it nearly overpowered Mari completely. Despite how fast he came in, Wooyoung was surprisingly soft. He handled Mari like she was Fine China, going to break at the slightest hint of toughness within his fingers.

Wooyoung's grip on the chain tightened as he pulled away, almost as if he was resisting any other sort of temptation that wanted to overcome him. Mari stuttered for a moment, unsure of how to respond or how to react. "Wooyoung? What...? Why did you...? Right now..."

"I know this is not the ideal place to kiss you," He told her, saying whatever was coming to his brain first. "And I know I shouldn't be kissing you... because you like Hongjoong. But I've fucked up, Mari. I've fucked up because I can't get over you and they used it against me, I'm sorry. Jesus, I'm so sorry Mari."

The girl was still recovering from the sudden affection, trying to hide the very evident burning of her ears and the flushing of her cheeks. Mari could barely make direct eye contact with him, how was she going to keep a straight face throughout the rest of the conversation? "What did... what did you do, Wooyoung?"

"I made a deal with Jaebeom, the Underboss of the Kim Faction. He wanted to lure both you and boss to him together, and he was going to slaughter both of you right where you stood without hesitation." He explained, fumbling with his hands to distract himself from the words coming out of his mouth.

"But then he realized I was fond of you. He realized that even though I said I'd let you go, I couldn't. So we struck a deal, that he wouldn't kill you if I gave him the information he needed to successfully lure the boss to him."

"And you did?" Mari managed to croak out, her eyes beginning to brim with tears. "Wooyoung please tell me—"

"I had no other choice," He stressed, guilt twisting his face as he spoke. "There was no other opinion for me to take, and I wasn't just going to let them kill you. I couldn't live with that feeling if I just let you die."

"You're fucking kidding me," Mari cursed, letting her head hang low to hide the pure terror and fright that had crossed her face. Wooyoung had saved her from a future death but at the cost of her father, the only paternal figure she had left. Can she save her father in time if she escapes away from the Kim Faction? Can she even save Wooyoung and herself when she doesn't even know where she is? "God fucking dammit!"

▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄

this was NOT the plan for
this chapter but hey, it's been
awhile since I wrote for
domino so enjoy it :)