vanish [2] || sj : lt

LOG .01 PRESENT_

He stared at the red dot on the board, twirling the butterfly knife in his hands and swiftly turning around to gracefully chuck it towards his target.

Bullseye.

He gives his partner a sly look and grins, a shit-eating grin that his partner hates so much, but puts up with it like he has for the last 5 years.

"50 points for Tennie- now where's my well-deserved slice of cheesecake- hm Xuxi?"

Said Xuxi groaned softly at the mention of his name, "Ten please- you don't have to say it like that- geez... I'll get the damn cake just- Lucas or even Yukhei is better."

Xuxi, as Ten affectionately puts it, is the other half of the dynamic duo that consisted of them. The two met a while back in Thailand when Ten was in middle school, the other was actually his underclassman to Ten's surprise. Xuxi was too tall for his age- as Ten sees it of course- he dwelled at a good six feet and almost two inches as far as he could remember (Ten was stuck at a measly five feet and six inches). The boy was only 17 when he graduated university, having excelled in Computer Science and becoming a highly paid Cyber Security Analyst and Head of Cyber Operations under their expendable careers.

Now the boy is a 20 year old who carried too much knowledge and experience for his own good, Ten was only two years older and yet he acted more like his physical appearance rather than his actual age. The two had been friends for as long as Ten could remember, going through thick and thin, heartbreaks, arguments, fist fights and even as far as dating for a few months (which ended on neutral terms because they knew way too much about each other).

The two were inseparable, stuck to the hip.

Ten laughed and shook his head as he slipped off his glove with his teeth then tossing it at the counter, wiggling his brows suggestively at the taller man.

"Oh? But what? Wong Yukhei? I win anyways. Get me what I want, kid."

Lucas looks down at him with a raised brow at the challenging tone of his voice.

"Don't 'kid' me, you may be older but you know damn well I have the say between us," He jabs his finger at Ten's ribs, his voice dipping even lower, "Say sorry or I'll shove your favorite thing in your mouth when I get the chance."

"Which is?"

Lucas snorts, "Strawberry cheesecake you dumbass-"

Ten's palm swiftly connects with the back of Lucas's head in a quick, but firm smack.

"Fuck that fruity shit ew- I can't believe you're my best friend ugh-" The older rolls his eyes playfully and shoves Lucas away.

Everyone who knew Ten, knew that he loathed fruits to the depths of hell and Lucas found it especially amusing whenever he threw around the chance to.

An amused grin creeps up Lucas's face as he watches Ten leave the target range, he takes the knife that Ten left on the table and follows suit, slipping the sleek weapon in Ten's back pocket. Lucas swiftly reaches up to whack the back of his head.

"You deserved it you little shit, admit it-"

"Don't flatter yourself fucker-"

Unknown to them, a one man audience sees their interaction as they leave the target range, shaking their head at the shameless display.

"Tsk tsk- Ten and Lucas- when are you two going to ever learn that rooms and other people exist?"

The two turn their heads to find their constantly-shaking-my-head friend doing as he was named for, sighing in slight disapproval as he fixes his glasses.

Lucas immediately shifts into speaking Mandarin, "Not my fault Sicheng- why don't you tell Ten to stop being so damn childish-"

"I could. But maybe if you could also stop being so loud with him so late in the night as well- we don't need to hear war cries in front of a 60 inch TV after a successful virtual mission, we already lack enough sleep as it is." Sicheng retorts plainly.

Ten sort of giggles at this revelation as Lucas stumbles at his words for a second.

"Interesting, who else filters into our late night station, Sicheng?"

He dismisses it with a wave of his hand, eyebrows scrunching together softly, "Anyways- I came here to tell you that Yong wants to speak to you two. Must be important since he suddenly grabbed you at the middle of the day."

Ten raises a brow and the two look at each other before shrugging and walking the opposite direction, towards said man's office.

Lucas suddenly scrunches his brows a bit, his voice dipping lowly, "You think it's about the Arms Deal struck in Taiwan this time? I haven't gotten news from Kun about it and it's a bit unnerving even if he's the best at what he does."

Kun is one of their best field agents next to Ten himself, Ten's specialty is being a double operative, meaning he traveled to wherever the sharks gathered for a meal- figuratively- he stood at the crossfire of deals to witness the show as a spy and took his knowledge back to HQ by faking his death or other tactics of the sort. Ten had several jobs with Kun and Lucas being the back-end man just in case the operation was to fall. Although Kun was a field agent, he was more of a spotter in the background and often snooped around to collect information from careless pinheads that were stupid enough to trust him.

Their headquarters were based in the heart of China, meaning they could get in between shady foreign deals in a snap as well as having several operatives that they could send anywhere and everywhere. They were expendables, so to say, gathered by the enigmatic Lee Taeyong who led the organization under the name Neo Technologies. Neo Tech to the public eyes, was a multi-million corporation that made top notch hardware and software from simple desktop computers to talking and AI that put the fictional Jarvis to shame. It was like Stark Industries, but better and more intrinsic than some engineer in a CGI flying suit.

The two entered the eastern corridor and towards the familiar cherry wood double doors, simply accented with black fixtures that gave it a traditional feel. Lucas knocked twice before Ten opened the door and entered, Taeyong's hands were laced together as his sharp eyes stared at something on his huge desk, a static faded out as they stood close in front of his desk.

"Lee?" Ten plainly spoke and the latter eyes shifted towards him, Ten almost shivered at his intense gaze.

Those were the eyes of a merciless man.