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Five Minute Overdrive

Summary:

After a string of increasingly bizzare criminal cases started to appear throughout the city; Reports of humans developing their abilities late and mutants spontaneously combusting, Detective Choi Seungcheol was asigned an ordinary case in comparison.

At least, it was at first glance.

Lee Chan, a kidnap victim quickly proves his case was anything but ordinary.

Seungcheol found himself spiraling. Uncovering secrets more convoluted than what he had anticipated. But with the help of his partner Junhui, and lab technician Jihoon, the detective might just be able to solve the case.

And perhaps along the way discover romance in a form of a stubborn shapeshifter name Jeonghan. Long lost friends he'd thought he'd burried in the past and new friends who might just stick with him through it all.

Or

The one where Seungcheol is a telepathic detective, Junhui is his empath partner, and Jihoon is their chlorokinetic lab technician. And they meet a bunch of other (mostly) gay mutants whilst trying to solve a kidnapping case. falling in love with each other along the way.

Chapter 1: They Used to Shout My Name Now They Whisper It

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

The first thing Chan noticed whilst on the brink of consciousness was the pungent smell of antiseptic floating everywhere, lemony scented and overly processed. A pathetic imitation of freshness that lingered bitterly inside his nose. The second thing that incited him further into alertness was the metallic flavor encompassing his tongue, flooding his senses even more as his brain worked overtime to keep his defenses up.

With a startled gasp he finally awakened, eyes bloodshot and wide, squinting strenuously upwards at the brilliantly white light blinding him. He tried getting up, wincing, vertigo overcoming his foggy brain, his mind spiraling off as his body abruptly seized attempting to be further upright, jolting back down with a thump. Focusing off beside him, his eyes bugged, thick leather straps were restraining his wrist so tightly that his veins bulged out. Inside one of them a needle was sticking out. His vision followed the lines of the miniscule metal that was attached to an elongated tube and saw it was connected to an IV with clear-colored liquid inside.

Thoroughly freaked out he thrashed around on the contraption constricting him. Taking in everything surrounding him and frightening himself even more. Everything was bone-chillingly anemic and clinical, nothing that he was familiar with. But the ache he felt in his chest was familiar, he wanted to return home.

"Oh, please," he tried shouting, his voice coming out horse and weak, a growing lump in his throat as he felt increasingly agitated at the situation. Attempting - failing - to wriggle away from his shackles only to discover that his feet were both constricted as well. He was lying on the table spread-eagled, vulnerable and helpless, the sudden realization furthering his panicking hyperventilation.

His breathing were shallow ragged intakes of oxygen. His defenses aligning into his fight or flight reflexes. Tears were flowing freely down his face, cascading downwards his cheeks in thick droplets where it previously gathered around rimming his bloodshot eyes. "Please," he pleaded mirthlessly. Nobody's coming to safe him.

His body was burning, the blood in his veins thrumming, boiling with the necessity to escape. "Please!" He shouted again a little louder, eyes falling from white wall to another, claustrophobia choking him as sweat started to build up on his forehead.

Where am I?

"Please!" He cried out and the room erupted into scorching heat. Flames danced all around the room, like a hurricane of fire swirling around the miniscule space. Destroying every single thing that is white in the room, charring it. Chan observed safely in the eye of the hurricane, seeing the straps constricting him melting away. He gathered his limbs into order, beginning his escape. His mind a mess of, I need to get out, I need to get out, I need to get out.

Righting himself up he staggered onto his tremulous feet, the previously blindingly white room, now a pitched-black burnt color. He didn't pay much attention as he set his sights on the door ahead of him.

"Please," he whispered, hoping once more to himself before revving up. Slowly he covered his body in a ball of powerful inferno, taking his stance. Bowing down towards himself he then ran head first onto the door, demolishing it with his shoulders.

Running as quickly as his weaken state allowed, he steadied himself with shaky hands resting on the freezing wall of the darken hallways. Hearing sirens bursting all around him he bloomed fire underneath his fingertips and made his escape, praying for his body to not collapse.

He needed to go home.

 

💊💊💊

 

Growing up, all Seungcheol ever desired was to help everybody around him. He had this enthusiastic way in taking on life, self-appointing himself the responsibility of assisting people who needed it, cultivating destructive, self-aggrandizing behaviors, wanting to become a hero in every situation.

The ability he possessed aided him in his endeavors, it was easier for him to pick-apart people with unpleasant intentions when he could effortlessly wander inside these people's minds, cherry-picking information he needed to enforce what he blindly assumed as justice in the situation.

As a child, all he ever heard were praises; people always approached him for help in resolving a problematic situation and frequently he happily open his arms for them. He remembered manipulating his ability for petty things, assessing low-level situations; like that one time when one of his childhood friends, Mingyu, accused his other friend, Seungkwan of stealing his food when he wasn't looking. He chuckled and simply observed inside his friends memories, watching their greedy little hands stole the mouthful of noodles from right out of his friend's plate. Relaying the information caused his friend to hilariously blew up in each other's faces.

It always ended in a fit of giggle, and jutted out bottom lips. Being the middle ground for everyone was a blessing of an ability for the natural leader to have, and he utilized it to the fullest.

In hindsight, this train of thought was childish and very clearly sugarcoated from the realities of the world surrounding him that he was participating in. Not everything is black and white, not everyone is good or bad, and not everyone had such genuine intentions as him.

He remembered the first time his mother found out about his telepathic ability. She had required him to do a favor the next day, inviting a thirteen-year-old Seungcheol to one of her business meetings, under the guise of learning experience when everyone knew he was much too young to understand anything being presented to him.

The building he was escorted into was gargantuan, doe-eyed gaze fell upon every unimportant detail he saw; glass paneled windows, high-tech vending machines, a ginormous marble-lined lobby. He took everything in innocent stride, falling for the honey-dewed trap the glamorous building had set up for him.

His mother had tugged him aside before entering the room where the meeting would be held, whispering in his ears, "Read what you can from him." She pointed at a frowning man, balding at the top and a sleazy grin on his face. Seungcheol's hair stood up at the back of his neck, the moment he inspected the man, he knew he had less than virtuous intentions. So he readily accepted his mother's request, happily receiving the phone with the notes app opened she trusted into his hands, and sauntered inside with the intention of reading the man and relaying the information in a typed out format.

Seungcheol didn't remember much of the incident, a bunch of the words were unfamiliar to his immature ears, the vocabulary to advance for his capacity. He wrote it down anyways and relayed the information to his mother.

It was years later did he finally realized how his mother became the CEO of that company, why the man was suddenly out of a job. It was an unpleasant truth to be presented with; he should've realized that with every business men – hell, every men there were both positive and negative intentions inside all of them. That the greediness he saw inside that man gave him no right to strip him away of his title, the way he had no right giving his mother the position to replace him.

Ever since then he started pulling further away from the lifestyle he was born into, becoming hyperaware of his parents manipulations that resulted in them gaining profit. They always praised him on his abilities, complaining about their own practically useless one; his mother's language proficiency and his father's seconds memory eraser, one he frequently used on Seungcheol to keep him in a disorienting loop, especially when he started to figure them out, were only useful to an extent. He despised how much he was manipulated, hated the circumstance of his birth.

He frequented less and less of business events, family gatherings, instead worked assiduously to receive a scholarship so he didn't have to disburse his parents’ dirty money anymore. He eventually joined the academy, where he hopefully could atone for his past mistakes and utilized his ability to truly help people instead.

His mother was furious when he refused to accept one of the branch companies she owned and had planned for him to run, became even more furious when she discovered that he refused because he decided to become a detective. His father though, was much calmer, pulling his wife aside, whispering the most corrupt of things to her ears. "It's fine," he had murmured. "Now we got a man on the inside." It sent shivers down Seungcheol's spine.

Seungcheol rejected those offers. Now he's twenty three, living alone, refusing to contact his parents (it's been two years now) and was working as a rookie detective at the Mutant Enforcer and Investigator Agency.

It sounded amazing, even in his mind, having a steady-paying job, a spacious apartment of his own (his parents paid the first few months, but he refused to acknowledge it to himself), a small circle of friends that also had similar mindsets to him. That is until he shifted his eyes beside him and was reminded once again of the stack of paperwork he has yet to process.

Oh right, he thought, he was useless here.

Pushing away from his desk, the wheels of his chair squeaking alerted his partner positioned beyond the partition of his agitation. Junhui quirked his brow up in inquiry only to be met by his partner's malicious stare. Begrudgingly, he rolled his chair nearer to the stack of paperwork, grabbing one randomly, thumbing through it, sighing with every syllable he read.

This was going to be a long night.

He threw himself back onto his chair unceremoniously, moaning and sighing every few milliseconds, a mess of tension knotting his back.

Seconds later he felt this tension uncoiling, straightening out the knotted mess of thoughts inside his brain, relaxing him further onto his chair.

"Wait!" He suddenly shouted, earning glares from other people working at the desks surrounding his. He paid them no mind, choosing instead to point an accusatory finger at his partner. "You, I told you to stop doing that."

His partner shrugged, already used to his friend's intimidating anger (he knew better than to fall for it, Seungcheol was a ball of fluff inside). "I was just trying to help. That massive chip on that shoulder of yours is giving me a massive headache."

Seungcheol pouted secretly grateful that his partner was attentive enough to his emotions. "Sorry," he eventually relented, watching Junhui chuckle at how obvious he was.

"No problem. What are you doing anyways?" Junhui leaned in, peaking his light-brown head of hair through the partition, chancing a glance on whatever Seungcheol was doing.

"Paperwork," he muttered plainly, hearing his friend hummed his ascent.

"Yeah, I did mine yesterday."

Seungcheol was bored of being a desk-worker detective. What was his purpose of being in this agency if he was only going to be relegated to processing paperwork after paperwork for people above him? What was the purpose of him having a partner if he had to do the exact same thing? He knew he was young and quite entitled, aware that he had much to do before he could be a field agent like every other veterans in this building. He was just impatient of waiting for that day to arrive, for the chance to prove himself.

"Choi," someone behind him called, followed by another stack of paperwork plopping on top of his already towering one. He sighed, deflating right back down onto his swivel chair in defeat.

"Woah there rookie, don't pout, you look like a camel."

Seungcheol glared at Jihoon, who happily grinned at him mockingly, looking absolutely drowned inside his dirtied, too large lab coat. There were soil on the white fabric that Seungcheol was positive was the result of yet another one of the tiny lab technician's botanical experiments, he briefly wondered what sort of plant Jihoon managed to grew inside the lab this time. Was it another mutated Venus flytrap? Seeing inside the technician's mind he saw a gigantic elongated structure of a green-purplish plant, a pool of liquid inside where a couple of what he thought were animal carcasses, rapidly dissolving.

Seungcheol grimaced, pulling back from his friends mind and automatically putting a hand to cover his nose even though he couldn't actually smell the dissolving carcasses.

"Fuck, what the hell are you working at with that thing?"

Jihoon chuckled. "You saw didn't you? That's what you get for sneaking into people's mind." The technician stood back, leaning against the empty desk behind him, opening up one of the case files in Seungcheol's lump and slipping a couple things inside.

"Uggh, just do your job why don't you? What even is that?"

"What even is what?" Junhui intercepted, interested in the conversation he's missing. Only now noticing the technician was there, waving and smiling at the smaller one in a way too enthusiastic greeting.

Jihoon rolled his eyes at the two detectives. Why oh why out of all the professionals inside this agency did he ended up making friends with the utmost idiotic people within it. He ran a hand through his short raven hair and sighed, picking up another case file.

Jihoon nodded to himself once he stored the evidence paper in the correct case file, slamming it shut and throwing it back to Seugcheol who readily caught it.

"For your information, I am working. I'm testing out the new mutated pitcher plant."

"For what?"

"Trying to test out the acid theory," he answered simply, when the two detectives threw him a questioning glare, imploring him to continue. Sighing exaggeratedly, he did, "One of the guys from autopsy came to me with this weirdly disfigured body that they thought was melted inside an industrial acid waste, since they found the guy inside one of the chemical factories downtown. But the agency didn't want to give them money to seize an entire factory so they can throw animal carcasses in there to test out if the body was burned via acid or not. So...I made the pitcher plant thing. It has similar enough acidic properties as an industrial acid waste." Jihoon didn't think the body was thrown inside an acid waste, the pig carcass he threw in dissolved much too quickly for a body of the same size to stay intact after being thrown inside one. Plus, the body of the pig he fished out was burned on the inside as well as the outside, it's meat and muscles falling of the bone much too easily whilst the body that they found was much more intact, and absolved of any chemical burns inside.

Whatever, he's sure he'll figure this out. He's not a working veteran level lab technician in the agency for nothing.

"Your work is so disgusting," Junhui commented, grimacing at the thought of melting bodies. He knew full well as a detective he might one day encounter equally as gruesome crime scenes as Jihoon's melting bodies, but he didn't think he'd have the stomach for inducing such a harrowing experiment voluntarily himself.

"At least I have work."

"Uggh," Seungcheol groaned, swiveling back towards his desk. "Don't remind me."

The stack of paperwork was mocking him with its egregiously large stature.

Jihoon giggled in amusement. "Oh come on, I'm sure it's not that bad." He sat down on a chair, scooting it next to Seungcheol and picking up yet another case file. He opened one and started reading. "Think of it as reading a mystery novel or something." The case file that he picked was definitely interesting enough. "Huh."

"What?" Seungcheol leaned in, already getting glimpses, pictures of crime scenes inside the technician's mind.

Jihoon flipped to see the front of the case file, seeing the serial number. "What's case 1083-A?"

"Oh." Seungcheol leaned back in his chair, remembering the success the two lead detectives in the agency got last week. The whole floor had erupted when the detectives had finally taken down one of the hardest underground crime syndicate to pin, that's been wreaking havoc throughout the city. There was a celebration and pizza, which the two detective rookies were conveniently excluded of as they were herded to their desks to immediately work on – that’s right, paperwork.

He remembered something about bodies being found inside the underground den of the syndicate, with weird and various markings on them, but he remembered nothing more.

"It's that big bust that happened last week," he simplified, not wanting to get into it incase his jealousy fester inside his stomach.

Jihoon shook his head in exasperation. "Yeah no shit genius, I can read – is there any more information? Like did they found something weird?"

Seungcheol recounted the words that were said throughout the party, but he didn't remember any information that had caught his ears.

"Oh! One of the lead detectives in the case said that they had to take down one of the escaped convicts he'd put in jail a while back during the bust. He said it was weird since the guy was listed as human when he was imprisoned, but the guy was definitely a mutant when they caught them again," Junhui excitedly chortled. He even saw the convict being carded in a wheelchair, unconscious, before getting put inside the transporter where the criminals inside were going to be transferred somewhere. He remember catching a glimpse of the guy, seeing his eyes suddenly opened wide, glowing bright crimson before laser beams shot out of his irises in various directions, before he was tranquilized seconds later.

It freaked Junhui out enough that the memory became vivid, especially knowing that the guy had been human just a couple months before.

"So he turned into a mutant? – Really, a middle aged man?"Jihoon asked, incredulous, Junhui nodded as an answer. "But that's impossible."

"Late bloomer?" Seungcheol suggested, watching Jihoon frown deepens, shaking his head.

"No, even if you have the mutagene it dies when you reach twenty - twenty five, at most if it's not activated." He hummed, flipping between evidence and calculating aspects that didn't add up in his mind. He needed more information. "Can I take this?"

Seungcheol shrugged, "Go ahead, the paperwork is always backed up anyways. Just give it back to me when you're done."

"Thanks." Quickly, Jihoon returned to his lab, Balenciaga screeching on the linoleum floor as he turned the corner until he's unseen by the two dumbfounded detectives.

"What was that about?"

"Genius being a genius – Don’t mind him."

The two went back to their works, Seungcheol to his monstrous stack of case files and Junhui to whatever he was doing before.

Deep down, Seungcheol was quite envious of Jihoon. The technician was a year younger than him, but a couple years ahead of him in the workplace. Jihoon started working in the agency since he was seventeen, after graduating college early, taking up and passing laboratory science and forensic pathology with flying colors, he was recruited by the agency and marveled as a genius at what he does. He was given leniency at every corner; people come to him begging for his help. Jihoon had accomplished so much in his shorter life-span than Seungcheol ever did, he felt incompetent being there.

He didn't realize he was working his mind up into a stupor until he feels the tendrils of his partner's ability coaxing him downward into a calm and relaxed state.

"Thanks," he said in a small voice.

"No problem." Junhui smiled and went back to work.

Seungcheol had to believe he was there for a reason, and that one day he'll receive numerous opportunities to help people the way he always wanted to.

"Choi, Wen!" Someone shouted from across the room. "The chief wants to talk to you."

Maybe his opportunity was closer than he thought.

 

💊💊💊

 

Chan was hyperaware of his surroundings; everything was either blindingly neon-colored or painstakingly loud. A store that he had passed through several blocks down had suddenly blasted music from within it, startling him into stepping onto a puddle of muddy water. Now with soaking wet bare feet, he stumbled his way through another neighborhood.

People were giving him openly curious glances inside this neighborhood. A couple blocks down were mostly empty of anyone, the further he ran, the more people started becoming aware of the oddity of an existence he was. People were scrutinizing the boy wearing the torn, semi-burnt hospital gown, stumbling barefoot along the unsanitary streets of the city. He's aware the more people stared, the closer he was to the wealthier side of the city.

Nobody in the slums ever inspected one another; people there got their own difficulties to handle.

"Hey," somebody said, following a hand on his shoulder that Chan immediately shook off, attempting to get away from.

He pivoted around, seeing a seemingly compassionate woman observing him, her arms outstretched, palms open in a placating manner. Like she was attempting to tranquilize a frantic wild animal. "It's okay." She soothingly whispered. "Are you lost?"

Chan's cognizant of how he must've appeared; disheveled, skeptical, and yes, he was lost, but he wasn't about to trust some random woman from uptown, no matter how sincerely she presented herself. His slumrat intuition wouldn't allow it. He began moving his feet ready to escape when his legs caved underneath him, darkness overtaking his vision once again.

The next thing he realized, he was being picked and prodded on by several hands in a clinically disinfected area into unconsciousness.

Later he startled awake, causing a commotion on the gurney he was forcibly constricted in, about to yell for assistance when doctors and nurses noticed him awake and simmered him down.

"You're at the hospital," one of the nurses explained.

"Can you answer a couple of questions? A detective is here to see you," asked another.

Chan relaxed reluctantly into the pillows, nodding weakly as an answer.

The process following was exhausting, it reminded him of the first time he had gotten arrested and subsequently thrown into juvie. The agency he was processed in now was as unforgiving, and no matter how many people referred to him as a victim, he still felt like a criminal being held unwillingly in the interrogation room.

He was questioned, thoroughly, apathetically. There was a thick, fog-like partition guarding memories that he couldn't reach towards. He practically served no help for the Captain sitting expectantly in front of him.

"That's alright, I have a detective that just might be able to help you, we can take you home and question you again tomorrow."

Chan shook his head immediately at that. "No, I – I don't remember where my home is anyways." That was a lie; he just didn't think the other slumrats would appreciate it if he was returned back inside a detective's vehicle. They'd have questions he won't be able to answer, neighbors breathing down his neck.

No, he didn't want any authority's attention on the slums.

"Okay then," the Captain easily agreed, suspecting the younger one's trepidations, able to deduce several fearful lingering expressions with his ability. He figured there was no point in terrifying the boy further; he'll talk once he's calmer. "I hope you're okay with minimal accommodation? One of my detectives might have a spare room where you could sleep for the night.

"Sure." And the conversation ended.

 

💊💊💊

 

Whatever situation Seungcheol had expected after entering the captain's office, it certainly wasn't what he had ended up being presented with.

Cap, or the chief detective in MEIA was a charitable man, his head always full of loaded cases his underlings constantly approached him for guidance. His job was complicated, demanding. Seungcheol was sure if he was in the Cap's position then he would've disintegrated days after taking up the position. That's why when Cap entrusted he and Junhui the task as the resident desk-worker detectives, he understood the other's restriction. From what he read, Cap knew that they had potential, but was hesitant on the younglings’ ability to go through a case as rookies that recently graduated the academy. He still hated his job description, so when Cap requested them both into his office, he was immediately ecstatic only from reading several lines from within the Cap's mind.

"You're giving us a case?"

"What did I say about reading me?"

Seungcheol nervously chuckled. "To…not do it?"

Cap nodded firmly, hunching his back before pacing to his leather seat. He was tired, had a long day, and wanted nothing more to sleep it off. Of course life came with many surprises as it promptly deposited a child at his doorsteps at the dead of night.

"Yes, I got a case for you two – a small one," he quickly added, carefully navigating the increasing elation on the rookies' faces, not intending to get their hopes up.

"Yes, anything, whatever, thank you."

Cap sighed; those youngsters were going to be the death of him.

"There's a kid that came in just a couple hours ago, he said he was kidnapped, didn't know where he was, where he came from," he explains, throwing the case file at Seungcheol, who's expression immediately brighten at the sight. Considering he had been ogling at numerous case files for paperwork, the sight of another one should've deepened the frown he had on his face, but he was overly enthusiastic right now. Next to him he could feel Junhui vibrating, barely containing his excitement. "I want you to interrogate him, read him if you have to, check out the last place he remembered being, and report it back to me." The kid, Lee Chan, was most likely a victim of one of yet another very common mutant kidnapping around the slums area. He had the record of the victim ready after seeing the kid staggered inside the interrogation room, dressed in nothing but a hospital gown. He figured the boy had been experimented on the same way a number of mutants who were kidnapped were as well.

Unfortunately these cases were frequent, large quantities of mutants from the slums gets kidnapped daily and sold into trafficking. Their value determined in the underground traffic market based on what abilities they had. Though they haven't gotten another disappearance case in quite some time – the kid never even been reported as missing, most likely because he had nobody who could report in if he was living in the slums – they knew that these cases still runs rampant and the possibility of it ever stopping is slim to none, thus the reality of the world.

Cap was just grateful that the kid was already of age. Barely, turned eighteen a few months back. So they didn't have to endure child services. The kid was declared lucid and of sound mind enough to be released, and was decided to be entrusted to the agency after that. Cap decided that the boy probably required rest, and Seungcheol might have a spare couch in his apartment available.

"I'll take the couch."

"Seungcheol," Cap reprimanded. death of him, he swore.

"Just be nice to the kid, gather as much info as you can, and take him home. Once you're done then report back to me, got it?"

"Yes," the rookies affirmatively answered, excitement barely contained in their voices.

"Okay then, you're dismissed."

Descending the staircase on their way to collect the kid, both Seungcheol and Junhui couldn't contain their growing enthusiasm; it's their first case after all.

So…sleepover?

"Sleepover," Seungcheol assented, following his skipping partner ahead of him.

 

💊💊💊

 

Chan observed as the detective drove further and further away from the heart of the city, wondering which direction the car would take; the darker parts of the city, crime-ridden, sanguinary, and unsympathetic – or the wealthier side where equal amounts of crimes happened but carefully concealed whilst simultaneously shamelessly glorified. He couldn't tell, he never really traveled anywhere outside of the slums even within parameters of the city, so the amount of ginormous, expensive looking structures was his only marker. He didn't have time memorizing the city when everyday he's busy trying to survive an unforgiving society.

"Finish your shit, then you can sightsee." Jeonghan used to say in reply to his whines when he was disallowed to meander longer during their rare excursion to the city. He learned to value his time more ever since then.

"How much further?"

"We're close," came the immediate reply. So detective Choi is quite wealthy from what he could gather. His apartment wasn't too far away from the city, the glimmering skyscrapers still within a seeing distance. However, he didn't know much pertaining to the detective in the passenger seat – detective Wen. Was he just as rich as detective Choi? – More? This was the information he required before deciding if he should trust them or not.

Seungcheol looked apprehensively behind, at the boy in the back seat – eighteen years old, not that much younger than him, but the way the boy's hunching in on himself, glowering at everything that sparkled like it was going to attack him made him look much younger to Seungcheol's eyes.

The detective was aware of the case profile the boy was secretly building in his head against him and his partner. Knowing what he did about Lee Chan, Seungcheol didn't blame him. A young boy maturing in the slums, having to scavenge and swindle people for sustenance and means to live every day, being in and out of juvenile systems; Seungcheol wouldn't blame him for disdaining both authority and affluence. And here Chan was faced with both of them. Seungcheol just hoped that the boy would disregard that part of him, focusing towards his intention instead, because he genuinely wanted to help.

"We're here," Seungcheol unnecessarily announced, vehicle already swerving halfway down the parking basement.

Chan was surprised on how moderately sized the apartment building was. Nothing like the gargantuan structures of luxury and glamour downtown. This one was a little more...modest, with its blue tinted paint thoroughly covering the exterior of the building, smooth with no damages nor cracks present. It wasn't glamour, but it definitely wasn't the slums either.

"I hope you don't mind, my room isn't exactly huge."

The three of them advanced inside the elevator, and Chan right there knew the exterior of the place was absolutely deceiving. There was a smell of expensive perfume lingering in the tiny metal box taking them further upwards. The lights on the elevators didn't flicker, persistently bright and crimson, and there wasn't any jostling that might cause paranoia. They weren't in danger of plummeting from electrical failures of any kind.

Again, not glamour, but this was luxurious enough.

Seungcheol sighed where he stood; not liking that he's losing the boy's trust before conversing with him about a topic of substance. He didn't realize how difficult the people in the slums had it, the more he peaked inside the boy's mind the more he was reminded of his past and how privileged he was – still is.

Seungcheol could feel the happiness he had within him from receiving a case trickling away when they finally reached his floor.

Junhui watched him in concern when he felt his partner's positive emotions took a nose dive.

"Please." Seungcheol ushered the boy out, herding him from behind.

You okay? Junhui asked.

Yeah, it's just – I’ll tell you later.

The three of them made their way into Seungcheol's apartment. Junhui immediately acquainted himself with the furniture, already familiarizing, opening up the case file the Captain had given them. Chan was a bit more tentative in his measures, observing everything in equal measure of astonishment and trepidation.

"Sit." Seungcheol offered the small ottoman and the kid sat perching himself on the edge.

This was going to be a long night.

Once settled, Seungcheol offered the boy some refreshments that the boy vehemently refused before accepting the offer of water.

The air in the room quickly became serious.

"So, Chan, can I ask you a couple of questions? It won't be long; I'll let you rest later."

Chan nodded absentmindedly, refusing to meet the detective's gaze. "Just so you know, I don't really remember much." He'd informed the other detectives this, but nobody had paid attention.

"Yes, I know, that's why you were assigned to me. Full disclosure, I am a telepath; I can see your thoughts and memories." he was pretty incredible at excavating too, was classified one of the top telepaths in the country because of it. That's how he got his position at the agency (besides his wealthy background), his ability might be useful on some trauma cases where victims unknowingly burry memories within their mind, aiding in unearthing them. It broke Seungcheol's heart knowing people have to go through such trauma that their minds literally needed to forget in order to survive, and that the boy in front of him was one of those victims.

Chan was panicking a little in his spot, he didn't like being in close proximity with someone who could instantaneously wander through his memories. He was from the slums, he's done a couple of egregious actions in life, and Seungcheol's a detective, someone who could penalize him for it, especially now that he's eighteen.

His heart palpitated within his chest; his fingertips were beginning to burn, sparks of fire beseeching permission for release, his fight or flight reflexes triggering, he was about to combust and then –

Tranquility – washing over him, and he knew enough compulsers to know that this feeling wasn't natural.

"What are you doing?" He meant it as threatening, but the way he melted onto the backrest, presented him as otherwise.

"I'm sorry; I have to get you to calm down." Chan stared at the other detective, who finally said something to him. "I'm an empath, and we're going to need you to calm down if you're gonna answer some of our questions, okay?"

Chan nodded absentmindedly, too relaxed to care.

Seungcheol felt trepidation taking hold, wondering if attempting this might betray the boy's trust, that might resulted in him closing up on them both furthermore. But this was all for the boy's benefit and for a lot of other mutants benefit as well, so he'll just have to endure everything one at a time.

"Okay, Chan, could you please tell us again what happened? Where did you escaped from?"

Chan started to recount what he had told the other detectives, relaying the information mechanically. He tried his damnest to remember what he was instructed to, but there was a haze in his mind that's stopping him from remembering anything.

This was different than any ordinary trauma cases he'd been presented in training. Chan's mind was filled with fog that felt medically induced more so than the brain's protective mechanism. He managed to see a few things though; a white room, an IV, a dilapidated looking building, and a sign, and –

He could feel Chan's mind starting to overwork itself, firing alarms signs, a mechanism to push him out. He figured this was as far as they could traverse tonight. For now, the information he received was enough, and he nodded at Junhui, allowing the boy rest.

Almost instantly like magic, Chan fell into unconsciousness, his brain registering nothing but absolute darkness.

Seungcheol Immediately grabbed a pen and paper, writing everything down, one label in particular sticking out.

Junhui peaked over his shoulders, reading Seungcheol's scrawls of letters.

"Red Hill Medical Centre."

That's it, that's where they needed to go.

Notes:

Hi everyone! i'm new to the fandom, so I apologize if I get anything wrong. Also, english isn't my first language so excuse my poor grammar. Otherwise, enjoy and thanks for reading. Also comments are greartly appreciated <3
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Chapter title from Lorde - Yellow Flicker Beat