GB 85

Was it because he had been in a similar situation a few hours ago, so he knew what they were doing?

Haero suddenly felt very wronged and angry at the same time. He clenched his fists tightly. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to do something like that; he couldn’t.

How many years had he spent abstaining because of Yoon Moo-hwa? It had been four years since he had the right to sexual self-determination, and he hadn’t been able to have a proper relationship because of his heartless first love, and now he was stuck on the ship. They had been close to each other until a little while ago, but he had become cold for reasons he couldn’t understand, and now he was even on a different floor. There was no reason for him to be trapped.

Haero’s lower lip was painfully crushed by his white teeth. He didn’t even want praise for retracting the words that he wasn’t fit for the military during his cadet days, so he would strip that heartless and twisted Yoon Moo-hwa bare out of spite.

He had no night duty, and his time as a medical officer was temporarily stopped. He had done it once, so why couldn’t he do it twice? 

Although it was an incredibly painful thing, he would strip Yoon Moo-hwa bare today. This time, he wouldn’t play the role of stopping. 

For whose benefit? 

He thought he would be called right after work, but was the excitement due to the artificial eyes over? 

Not on his watch.

As if someone had pushed him from behind, Haero strode to the ship’s elevator and got on. It was for officers only and headed to the 3rd floor, where the captain’s office was.

The 3rd floor was quiet. Only the humming of the engine could be heard. Haero headed to the captain’s office, which he could now go to with his eyes closed. He grabbed the door and quietly pushed it open, and it opened smoothly as if welcoming him. It was one of the most secure places on the ship, but Haero’s personal information was unimpeded. Haero didn’t notice that his heart was open to him unconditionally. He was too nervous.

The bedroom was quiet and very dark. His eyes were tired after passing through the corridor filled with low-chroma red lights that were turned on to minimize location exposure as the sun set, so Haero had to blink several times in the darkness.

Even if his eyes adapted to the darkness, there was a limit in the pitch-black sea. Haero didn’t have artificial eyes, and he couldn’t tell if Yoon Moo-hwa was awake or not. He could only vaguely make out the bed he would be lying on and his silhouette.

Haero, who had sneaked in, moved carefully to avoid bumping into anything.

If he got caught here, it would be undeniably his fault. He had sneaked into his superior’s bedroom without permission, so even if he was suspected of plotting something very dangerous, he would have nothing to say.

Besides, he had come with a dangerous intention, so he couldn’t even make excuses.

Haero stood next to Yoon Moo-hwa’s bed and clearly confirmed that there was only one silhouette. If there had been two people, today would really have been the day he went to military prison, or was detained in the underground isolation room.

Before going up on the one figure, Haero took off his pants. Thanks to taking painkillers on time, the pain was less. But how long would the effect last? The first and last time he did it was once. Yoon Moo-hwa’s situation took much longer than common sense, but if it was just once like that, it would be okay.

‘I’m crazy again. I’m crazy.’

Even knowing that, Haero couldn’t stop. Yoon Moo-hwa’s blanket was folded at his feet. 

‘Was he just taking a nap?’ 

He swallowed hard and sat on top of him. He felt something hard that could never be called comfortable on his butt. It was because of his body, which seemed tense even when resting, with his muscles raised.

Haero quietly caught his breath. Apart from boldly intruding here, he was nervous. Especially after getting on top of him, his body stiffened even more.

In his dreams, he had experienced pleasures he had never experienced, but in that act that was hard to call sex with Yoon Moo-hwa, there was only pain. That memory made his tailbone feel a tingling sensation.

He placed his hand on Yoon Moo-hwa’s chest like that. He felt a soft vibration. It was because his heart was beating.

His body didn’t move easily. Haero knew that he was satisfied just being like this. He felt good just being like this.

“… Aren’t you going to do anything?”

Haero was so surprised by Yoon Moo-hwa’s sudden voice that he literally jumped.

Even when he looked at him with wide eyes, he could only see the silhouette, not his expression.

“Sneaking into your superior’s room without permission and all you’re doing is taking off your pants, getting on top, and playing horsey?”

“Horsey…” Haero mumbled falteringly.

“Do you think I’m joking?”

Even though he was complaining, he couldn’t hide his nervousness.

Suddenly, the floor he was standing on shook. It was because Yoon Moo-hwa pushed himself up on the bed with his elbows. He caught Haero’s waist, who was staggering backward as he raised his upper body, and leaned against the wall at an angle.

“It shouldn’t be. It’s a problem if it’s a joke.”

“If a joke is a problem, what’s next?”

“……”

“Are you going to detain me then?”

“No. I was wondering if I should detain you if you don’t.”

A bolt of lightning struck at that moment. It seemed that another small typhoon had occurred in the sea, not too far away but off course. Haero saw Yoon Moo-hwa’s face in the fleeting flash of light. He seemed to be smiling slightly, or maybe he was angry.

“I was waiting. I couldn’t even sleep.”

… The fleeting moment was not enough.

With that regret, Haero unconsciously reached out to Yoon Moo-hwa’s face. The outstretched hand was caught before it could reach his face. 

Yoon Moo-hwa slowly pulled the hand he had caught and brought it to his forehead. “This is the forehead.”

The low voice, teaching him step by step as if teaching him letters, added memories to this strange atmosphere. Haero slowly traced Yoon Moo-hwa’s face, as if grabbing and flipping over a letter card.

It was a face he knew well, a face he could draw clearly even in his dreams, but feeling it with his hands felt quite new. Yoon Moo-hwa’s face, felt only through touch, only through peripheral nerves, was more masculine than he had thought, and somehow… had a fierce impression. And it was hotter than it was cool.

His thin fingers went to the tip of his chin and then back up. He aimed for Yoon Moo-hwa’s left eye. His fingertip caught on the edge of the eyepatch. When he gently lifted the caught fingertip, the hard fabric was slightly lifted.

There was the artificial eye that Haero liked.

He didn’t like it because it was an artificial eye, he liked it because it was Yoon Moo-hwa’s.

“If you were going to be like this… why were you so cold during the day?”

“I told you. Haero, even hyung gets hurt.”

“So you’re angry? That’s a lie. Hyung doesn’t get angry over such childish things.”

“Why is that a childish thing? Why is that a reason not to be angry? It wasn’t childish or trivial to me. I sincerely didn’t care who came in then, or what happened.”

“Why all of a sudden… Why did your attitude change so suddenly? Are you doing this because you want to sleep with me, or have you changed your mind?”

“Does that answer matter if both apply?”

“Yes. It matters to me.”

Silence again. Noise that would be headache-inducing to others sounds like the quiet song of whales to them. The sound of the ship’s engine on the third floor became quite faint. Because of that, Haero was very nervous that Yoon Moo-hwa might hear him swallow.

“If it’s not sudden.” Yoon Moo-hwa replied with a sigh. The answer tickled Haero’s nape and bare thighs like the wind.

His thighs really tickled. He unconsciously tried to scratch them, but something hard touched his hand. It was Yoon Moo-hwa’s finger bone. Yoon Moo-hwa was touching his thigh. Even the very inside, the bare skin. 

Since when has he been doing this? 

He had no idea.

“If I tell you that I’ve been waiting for you and was anxious that you wouldn’t come to get me, would you understand?”

Yoon Moo-hwa hid the fact that he had seen Haero before, that he had registered his biometric information in his small rooftop room, and that he had left a lot of marks on his back that no one could see, marks that he would rather show off if someone did see them, while they were masturbating together in the bathtub when it was raining heavily.

“Haero.”

He had no intention of explaining all of his anxiety. Like very ordinary people, Yoon Moo-hwa had no intention of proudly showing off his flaws in front of the person he liked.

“You’re the first and I’m the last.”

Haero’s heart dropped. For four years, what Haero feared most was that Yoon Moo-hwa would meet someone else and settle down. He was afraid that he would give his heart to someone. He was afraid that his end would be decided, but Yoon Moo-hwa hesitated because he was afraid that he would make a second or third.

They were coming to the same place in completely different directions. As if that was the only way for them to meet in the same place…

Yoon Moo-hwa smiled bitterly. It was a smile without confidence. He was afraid. Just as Haero envied the difference in the time Yoon Moo-hwa and he had lived, he worried about the time Haero had not yet lived.

‘Lovely.’

Haero’s heart swells unbearably.

‘I’m going crazy because I love you, who is only insecure and scared of me. I can even sweetly overlook what has been bothering me all this time. No, rather, I understand. I know that just liking someone creates a penalty, that I become very weak. Like the sea, people die countless times because of this heart, but without it, they become extinct. I, who doesn’t like Yoon Moo-hwa, will not exist.

Is it the same for you?

I can find out about that little by little.’

“Are you that insecure? That I will choose Yoon Moo-hwa as my second, third, and last?”

A stubborn soldier, a stubborn mule who doesn’t listen to a word. And… even showing a weak side so that I can’t even get angry and cowardly. Haero began to accumulate a lot of words to criticize him in his throat. 

Just as he was about to burst them out at once, Yoon Moo-hwa whispered in a lowered voice with a smile, “Rather, I want to ask you.”

“What? What do you want to ask?”

“Even if your heart changes and you like someone else, even if you see someone else, even if you want to get off the ship, I won’t allow it anymore, can you handle that?”