• deuces up, weapons down; daebaek | daehyun (bap) baekhyun (exo) spy au

Baekhyun is a successful spy for EXO, once a minor investigation agency gone big (and undercover), while Daehyun is a part of B.A.P., which was supposed to be like EXO, but slipped along the way, so now they work odd jobs for neighbors and grandmas and grandpas and they’re nice ppl so they do it but this definitely isn’t what they want for their lives. Dae runs into Baek in a bar one day while trying to investigate a thieving incident that was assigned to his agency (after years!! this was their big break, they all believed), when all of a sudden a brawl is caused by an angry mob of alcoholics that are somehow involved in whatever Baekhyun’s assignment is. Daehyun is unwillingly pulled into the fray, and once it’s all over, Baekhyun looks over to him, heaving, cheeks burning red and sweat framing his face, and Daehyun searches him for a flicker of recognition in his eyes but finds it nowhere.

“Thank you… where’d you learn to fight like that?”, and Daehyun doesn’t expect Baekhyun to remember him, but he’s still pretty offended, so he lets his ego take over and is like, “I never should have assumed that an elite, successful EXO member would even remember what B.A.P. is.” (this is a shitty script 4give me i’ll com up w smth better)

(Here’s the plot twist: Baek totally knows who Daehyun is, he’s remembered ever since he saw his terrible bleached-blonde head for the first time five years ago, and then again two years ago when EXO and B.A.P had fought on the same ground for the first-- and possibly last-- time during a nationwide underground conflict, Operation 1.0.0.4, he’s remembered, on all of those moments he spent on his phone in the few minutes he could spare not doing something important, searching for B.A.P after their sudden disappearance from the scene)

Baek, who is double offended, turns a deeper shade of red, and scoffs, “Maybe I’d have remembered if you guys were better at your job. Or are you doing something else for a living now? Fetching cats from roofs, maybe?”

Daehyun raises a hand-- “Well, actually--”, then lets it fall, defeated. Baekhyun smirks, knowing he’s won this round.

(Plot twist 2: this is probably, definitely, when Daehyun falls in love with Byun Baekhyun’s snarky personality)

Dae brushes himself off and goes to help Baekhyun up despite their little spat, but Baek being Baek (I have dignity, he says), pulls himself off of the ground and brushes the dust from his army-green trench coat, and Dae looks him up and down and chokes back a laugh (Huh. Practical, he deadpans. Baekhyun huffs at him, adjusting his collar. It’s a personal preference.)

Baek is about to walk out of the bar before Dae stops him, remembering his own mission-- “Wait, do you know anything about--”

(What should I do here?? Should I have Baek easily give into Dae and be like Ugh, fine, since I would have died without u, here’s the info… or should I have him be like Oh, I’ll help you, but in exchange, you’ll have to do something for me, and Dae’s like WHAT?! but i literally just saved your ass back there! and then Baek smirks and says, Well, I said Thank you, didn’t I? And Dae thinks back and, damnit, he did, and instantly knows he’s fucked.)

<Cue recap section, where we find out how exactly Daehyun came about the Bar, how he lost Youngjae in a night market, the whole ish history between B.A.P and EXO and who they are and what Dae’s mission is-- to track down an undisclosed, but very large sum of money that has been stolen from a very important client in Gangnam.>

The next time Daehyun runs into Baekhyun, he’s in a suit, thick-framed glasses perched on his cute lil nose-- wait, what? Anyways, they meet outside of a banquet hall, and Daehyun’s got his sunday best on-- a white loose turtleneck that peeked through a plain white dress shirt half-tucked into his slacks, layered under a long blazer he had borrowed from Himchan (aka his NOIR outfit LMFAO). The chain from an old pocket watch hangs out of his coat pocket-- for effect, Himchan had insisted.

Baekhyun sizes him up and snorts. “What is this, the medieval ages?”

“No trenchcoat today? So where’s the rest of your squad?” (Baekhyun sneers, Ha, Ha, HA. Aren’t you funny?)

“It’s just you and me tonight, buddy.” Baekhyun cheekily hooks his arm around Daehyun’s, pressing their arms together. Daehyun hopes that he can’t see the red rushing to the tips of his ears. Instead of letting go, Baekhyun starts walking towards the entrance to the building, pulling Daehyun (who is reluctant to pull away) alongside him. They step into a grand salon with marble floors and gilded walls that stretch metres above them-- Dae has to squint to avoid going blind from all the gold.

“Wait, what does that mean.”

“It means that no one in EXO knows that I’m here. And since this mission runs the risk of turning sour, I decided that I needed you. Because any sidekick is good, so long as you have one, right?” (Sidekick?! Daehyun is ready to FIGHT.)

Daehyun has to stop himself from erupting in order to continue this streak of going relatively unnoticed-- so far, they haven’t attracted that much attention, if only intrigued looks from curious girls that they’ve passed in front of. Not that he blames them, Daehyun smiles to himself, it isn’t everyday that you see two relatively dashing men in impeccable suits suddenly apparate before you.

“Are you telling me,” Daehyun says through gritted teeth disguised as a calm smile. “that since no one knows you’re here, if we somehow get into a situation that requires back-up, no one will be on stand-by, guaranteeing our failure and probable demise, and that since you decided to call me over, essentially translates into you seeing me as a meat shield of some sorts?”

Daehyun hears his smile, that infuriating, Colgate smile, in Baekhyun’s voice, without even needing to look towards the man that has somehow plastered himself to his hip. “That… sounds pretty spot on.”

“Byun Baekhyun,” Daehyun purposefully tightens his grip around Baekhyun’s arm until he hears him squeak in discomfort. “If we get out of this unscathed, then I swear… you won’t be okay by the end of it.”

“Listen, listen, ow-- hey, loosen up, will you?! I have my reasons-- OUCH -- didn’t you say you need hel-- ow ow OW will you STOP, people are starting to look!!” Baekhyun hisses, pulling his arm loose from what Daehyun has turned into a rendition of Twister, minus the mat, only involving a pair of arms.

“You were saying.” Daehyun says numbly. Is his eyesight getting blurry? All he knows is that he sees the drinks table, and he’s pretty sure his biological compass is planning on leading him in that direction. Rightfully so.

“This guy is involved with whatever your mission is. I’m doing you a favor here, so work with me, capiche? Jeez, what’s with you? Pretty sure I’m going to bruise… you’ll pay for staining my perfect skin (Oh Baekhyun, there’s so much more from where that came from :^)...” Baek mumbles. Dae’s tuned him out-- he’s caught sight of his new target, and he doesn’t plan on letting this fateful encounter go to waste.

(Caught by dude > Win(win) > Baek’s confession > Dae’s dilemma & eventual resolution > Daehyun coming to terms with how he feels about working with EXO on the side (like, do they even know?? is baekhyun doing this Legally?? If not, then…. why?) >

So what exactly is Baekhyun’s assignment?: Exo have a list of particularly important individuals for whom they do periodic work for (mostly for immunity, to keep these big name officials protected from unsettling rumors that might be bad for their reputation in exchange for EXO’s guaranteed protection against gov’t intervention, so yeah, in this case, i guess that EXO are kind of bad in their own way)-- there’s never an “end” to the assignments of this nature, but it just so happens that this individual is a target of the guy Daehyun is hunting down as well-- while doing research he heard BAP’s name flying around (yeah, I heard that those kids, y’know, the ones that showed up roughly around the same time as yerselves but fell down some rabbit hole along the way, they’ve been asking around about these guys. What was their name again? Rice?), and this is it, this was his opportunity, his time to act, because although Baekhyun understands a lot of things (that makes him one of EXO’s most valuable agents), he’s never understood his attachment to BAP. Coming across a member of BAP during this mission is something he expected to happen, but that member being Daehyun is... unprecedented, to say the least. And kind of nerve wracking, maybe. For reasons Baekhyun shall withhold for now. But he plays along with himself, under the guise of a rival agent that’s returning a favor, though in reality Baekhyun is very much aware that all of his actions are self indulgent. Of course he’s told EXO about their banquet excursion-- he just refused Chanyeol’s accompaniment, telling Junmyeon that he wanted to challenge himself, that assignments like this have gotten boring, mediocre, that it’s been four years-- he can handle it. In reality though, maybe he just wants to spend a little more time getting to know Daehyun better. I mean, as the saying goes, keep your enemies closer, right? Yep, that’s it. That’s definitely all it is.

• stars apart; suchen, romance angst, highschool au, pg-13

“beyond the gates inside a galaxy of stars, i spot the brightest one” - sarishinohara; mikitop

Jongdae leaves everything behind to become a star.

/ Kim Junmyeon has always been better; he comes a privileged home, where a Roomba swallows the crumbs from his breakfast each morning (cream cheese on toast, with a single sunny-side up egg, and a cup of black coffee), and his mother doesn’t pester him to do his own laundry. He lives on the 24th storey of a high-rise smack-dab in the middle of Apgujeong, and can see the pale-grey roof of Gwanghwamun Gate if he squints while peering out of his bedroom window, minutes away across the river. He gets good grades at school, and excels in both the arts and sports. He can sing--kind of-- and has thought of taking up dancing as an extracurricular activity. He loves his family. They love him back. But most importantly, Junmyeon is better because he knows Kim Jongdae. And Jongdae is the best thing that has ever happened to him.