Chapter Text
Haknyeon almost chokes on artificial snow.
It comes out as half of a cough, and then he holds it in.
At the odd sound, Chanhee lowers his camera, a brow raised at Haknyeon’s sheepish look.
“We can take five, you know,” Chanhee points out.
Haknyeon heaves, and that’s that.
The transparent glass-like sphere around him dissipates out of existence, and the illusion of being trapped in a snowglobe is immediately gone to him. The fire around the dreary, post-apocalyptic set also ceases, probably through the control of the tech guy he’d seen walking around here earlier.
Haknyeon steps off the round elevated stage, grabbing the hand Chanhee offers when he nearly slips in a misstep. His hand is cold, Haknyeon notes, almost wanting the heat of the fires to come back alive.
A stylist rushes to his side, slinging a jacket over his shoulders. Today’s outfit involved a sleeveless top, for the sake of flexing his arms in the various poses he’d been asked to do with the bow and arrow. Imagine the apocalypse among us, Chanhee had said. He feels a little too exposed for the apocalypse, but pairing it with the bow and arrow prop did make him feel cool, at least.
Haknyeon had pretended not to notice the longer stares Chanhee had given him before needing to raise his camera. He thinks nothing of it.
Chanhee wears nothing as revealing as Haknyeon does, in fact he’s the opposite. Haknyeon watches as he brushes his own hands against the front of his dark cropped sweater, his motions revealing a slip of skin beneath the edges. Haknyeon almost lets his gaze linger on the skin-colored underwear strap that peeks above his beige slacks. Almost.
It’s a choice that reflects his identity. His place in all of this. In Night City, fashion is everything. Corporates in their uniform suits, embodying the most rigid and corrupt population of the city. Street kids in their shiny and flexible getup, complete with the straps for the weapons they carry around with them. Edgerunners were, for instance, discernible by a mere glance over their style choices.
Then, there’s the ones who prefer not to stand out. While Chanhee’s outfit definitely makes Haknyeon’s mind race in certain ways, it was more fitting to categorize it under a more subtle style.
“Did you inhale the snow?” Chanhee says, and Haknyeon grimaces. Chanhee grins, of all the things. “I’ll get you some water.”
“It’s fine,” Haknyeon croaks out, but Chanhee is an unstoppable force. He moves to exit through the back of the studio, but Haknyeon is insistent and follows.
The cold air and distant city noise greet them upon stepping out. The building’s back entrance overlooked the Japantown subdistrict of Westbrook, which was alive as ever and brimming with lights and sound even as midnight neared. It’s a flash of light that makes Haknyeon squint into the distance, having to look away when the city square begins to project its hourly Koi fish floats into the air. The bursts of orange are wondrous against the backdrop of the rest of the city’s tall, dark buildings.
Against the wall, right where the stairs to leave are located, sits a lone vending machine. It has everything you could possibly crave at the click of a button, and click a button Chanhee does, a whirring sound filling the silence before a bottle of water drops out. Chanhee takes it and turns to Haknyeon, offering it without another word.
“Thanks,” Haknyeon rasps out. He wastes no time in opening it, tilting his head back to get rid of the snow stuck in his throat.
He silently watches as Chanhee walks past him, going on to lean against the railings and look out into the city.
Haknyeon considers things for a moment.
It was a hit, that’s the thing. The photoshoot from last time. As soon as it was slapped on the face of every magazine, e-zine, and even catapulted across data shards, Haknyeon suddenly had more value to his name, and the cyberspace buzz persisted until the following week or two.
There are always critiques, of course. Mostly ones that Haknyeon deemed nonsense, but maybe that was just him. Critics would often attack Chanhee for his preference, slapping on the dreaded label of ‘pretentious’, calling it a weak attempt at trying to be better than generative artists. It baffles Haknyeon, but the good side of the reception is strong enough and more good than bad that it gets them another job. Together. A company or two decide to pair them up again for more covers and promotional runs, and Haknyeon eventually finds himself booked for the rest of the month.
It brings them to this moment.
Chanhee was a nice person to work with, and Haknyeon had found himself agreeing with the stylist from last time. He’s not pretentious, but the world thinks he is. He’s quiet, sometimes intimidatingly so. But when he smiles, it isn’t born out of snark or sarcasm—he’s a friendly soul, and maybe a little misunderstood by people who didn’t know him.
Well. Not that Haknyeon knew him. Far from that, actually. Chanhee is still a mystery. His online galleries are devoid of personal details, his cyberspace accounts pretty but captionless. It’s Haknyeon’s second time working with him, and he doesn’t quite know what certain glances or smiles mean yet, but if he was truly a good judge of character, then he knew what this moment was.
It was an invitation.
Haknyeon twists the cap of his bottle and walks forward, leaning against the railing with a decent amount of space between them.
It’s a cold night, but the warm lights of the city provide some level of comfort, even when an eyesore.
To his left, Chanhee hums.
“I’m sure you’ve seen the comments,” Chanhee says, and it isn’t a question.
Haknyeon snorts. “Of course.”
Chanhee twists in his place, back against the railing as he partially turns to Haknyeon with a small smile. “And? What do you think?”
If you listen carefully enough and focus, you can hear the bustling Westbrook crowds, the warning sounds of sirens, or the gunshots ringing through chaos-ridden streets, even at this time of day. Haknyeon chooses to shrug.
“We work well together,” Haknyeon says. It’s a sentiment that cyberspace has been echoing for quite some time now. Haknyeon had some time to look back at their work, and there was no doubt about it. Chanhee knew Haknyeon’s strengths, Haknyeon knew what Chanhee wanted from him. But…
“But?” Chanhee says, tilting his head.
It prompts Haknyeon to speak his thoughts. “But I have to ask, why me?”
“I already told you.”
“I’m phenomenal?” Haknyeon scoffs, smiling cheekily. “I know that.”
Chanhee lets out a loud laugh, and he doesn’t hold back, nor cover himself with a hand. Haknyeon stares at him and at the way the city lights, different colors almost blending into one another, shine against the back of his head.
When he calms, he looks at Haknyeon with a certain glint in his eyes. “I saw your work with Resurface.”
Oh. Rookie work. It’d been Haknyeon’s first job, the first his agent had ever gotten for him. He was awkward, stilted, and the reception had been warm at most. That was a year or two ago. It feels like a long time since then.
“Not so phenomenal back then,” Haknyeon says, shaking his head. He discontinues the thought, leaning towards a topic that had been itching at him for a while now. “Why do you work with… people?”
Chanhee looks up in thought. Haknyeon chooses to stare ahead.
“Because someone stares back,” Chanhee simply says. Haknyeon doesn’t understand it, but he figured that artists would find some sort of way to answer so mysteriously. But Chanhee says it with such a delicate tone, that Haknyeon turns to him, only to find him already looking.
Someone stares back.
“You’re not going to die if you lean more,” Chanhee tells him.
“That’s very easy for you to say,” Haknyeon shoots back. He considers the bright red rails for him to grab and does so. Once his grip is secure, he puts all his weight into leaning out of the train’s doors, hit by a blinding pink lighting and a gust of wind that he hopes provides enough of a cinematic effect.
Chanhee’s eyes flash in a Kiroshi purple before he raises his camera to snap a photo.
“If I die,” Haknyeon says, feeling his hands sweat. Even cyberware for hands won’t save you. “This is very much on you.”
“I’ll take the responsibility,” Chanhee says, still snapping away. Haknyeon spots the smallest hint of a smile on Chanhee’s lips.
The stylist was right. Chanhee can get obsessed with his work. He doesn’t shut himself off, per se, but you can tell his focus tends to elevate whenever a shoot starts. Sometimes, it gets hard to get his attention back. He’s silent, always thinking, and asks for more time when unsatisfied (with Haknyeon’s own consent, of course).
Now, it’d be their fourth time working together. And Haknyeon still doesn’t know a lot about the man behind the camera, but he knows how to talk to him. How to make him laugh or smile. It’s an odd development and one that Haknyeon never really expected.
At some point, Chanhee lowers his camera and Haknyeon manages to take himself out of his daze.
Chanhee reaches out, brushing aside a lock of Haknyeon’s reddish brown hair. It takes the air out of Haknyeon’s lungs as he stills, waiting for Chanhee to finish fussing with his hair.
When he finally steps back, raising his camera, Haknyeon takes a stupid, silly leap.
“Do you call every model you work with phenomenal?” Haknyeon tries to say it with a level of nonchalance, but he’s sure he fails.
Chanhee lowers his camera, biting his lip. “You’re never gonna let me live that down.”
Haknyeon shrugs. “Hey, you said it.”
Chanhee seems to consider his words for a moment. Haknyeon watches the way his black hair, a little longer than his own, sways with the fan behind him. The pink lights slightly dim, adjusting to a more serious mood. It’s a scene straight out of a film.
“You’re confident and you know what your strengths are,” Chanhee says. “I admire that about you, so I don’t think so.”
Haknyeon feels his cheeks heat up, praying to himself that the dim lights give nothing away as Chanhee looks satisfied with himself behind the cover of the lens.
Clearing his throat, he tightens his grip around the rail bar and leans further. The pink lights around them brighten, and Chanheeʼs eyes flash purple again.
“Thanks,” Haknyeon simply says.
Chanhee doesn’t reply, but he lowers the camera for a moment to give Haknyeon a meaningful stare.
The fans continue to whir, and the lights dim.
A thousand reflections.
Haknyeon keeps staring upwards, at the strips of clear glass spheres hanging from the ceiling. He faces himself a thousand times, different angles of his being reflected on all the little orbs.
Chanhee tries a shot with some flash. He lowers his camera, humming, and Haknyeon finds himself looking towards him and walking over like an automatic reaction.
He looks at Chanhee’s screen and wonders how Chanhee sees him this way.
“Not satisfied,” Chanhee mumbles to himself. He starts to go through the pictures, but Haknyeon finds nothing wrong with them. Everything’s perfect—the angle, the composition, the set. And yet, Chanhee is…
“We can take five,” Haknyeon says. Chanhee stops, frowning at his screen and sighing.
“Sure,” he says, and that’s all the motivation Haknyeon needs to grab his hand and drag him off the set.
“When I agreed to take five,” Chanhee starts, but doesn’t protest as Haknyeon brings him out through the back entrance. “I would expect to sit down and drink water, you know.”
The street’s lights are immediately blinding, a contrast to the normal lighting within the studio. This time, they’d been granted a studio near Japantown’s bustling center, so it wasn’t hard to navigate a turn or two and end up in front of Cherry Blossom Market. Haknyeon and Chanhee admittedly look out of place in their get-up—Chanhee in his professional and clean turtleneck paired with slacks, and Haknyeon with his exaggerated blush and far-too-formal outfit meant for the elegant shoot.
Dozens of red lanterns hang above the market area and its ever-busy crowd. Against the darkness of the night, it takes a lot to adjust as usual, but it doesn’t stop Haknyeon from walking past the holographic sakura tree by the entrance and dragging Chanhee to the best ramen shop there ever was.
“You ever eaten here?” Haknyeon wastes no time in getting up one of the stools, patting the one next to him.
It’s nice to know Chanhee isn’t judgemental of the way the ramen shop is constructed with a rickety bar, vents above that are close to rusting, or the overall seedy nature to it—the neon sign above flickers every few seconds, but the vendor never ceases in his smile as he takes their orders. That’s how it is in Night City. Haknyeon orders two of his usual choice.
“Haven’t gone around Japantown much. Plus, my motorbike broke down, and you know how the metro maintenance can be,” Chanhee answers, prompt. Haknyeon almost, almost malfunctions at the image of Chanhee on a motorbike. Chanhee stays unaware as he leans against the bar with ease, going through his photos as they wait for their orders. “My place is back in Heywood. Have I said that?”
“Ohhh.” Haknyeon leans back to look at him, grinning. “Heywood boy. Fancy.”
Chanhee shrugs. “Newly moved.”
Haknyeon considers himself well off enough. Not struggling, but not the best. He owns a decent room on the upper floors of Watson’s megabuilding, and he’s not hired enough due to the size of the industry, but he’s hired enough to have a name and a comfortable life for himself. He figured Chanhee would somehow be above him in that aspect, and he was right. Though controversial, Chanhee was still one of the bigger figures in the industry.
But it didn’t change anything. Chanhee sits there, tongue poking out the corner of his lips as he challenges his camera to a staredown.
As the vendor gently pushes the bowls of steaming ramen towards them, Haknyeon decides to reach out and take Chanhee’s camera away from his own restless hands. Chanhee’s eye twitches at the gesture, but he lets it be.
“You should eat,” Haknyeon says. He switches out of the gallery to take a picture, lifting it up. He watches Chanhee break his chopsticks apart through the camera’s screen.
“Ju Haknyeon, don’t you dare drop my camera.”
Chanhee lightly blows against a small wall of noodles, wasting no time to consume once painless enough. It’s almost as if there are sparkles in his eyes as he takes in the flavor of the meal.
An expected reaction, Haknyeon thinks. He is almost proud of himself as he lifts the camera, snapping a quick picture of Chanhee at his cutest. He gets a glare afterwards, Chanhee slurping up the rest of the noodles between his chopsticks as he waves at Haknyeon.
“Don’t waste my storage,” Chanhee warns, but does nothing about it. Haknyeon clicks down once more, capturing the unserious frown on Chanhee’s features.
Cute guy in a turtleneck willing to share a meal with them during a very unprofessional and untimed break.
You can’t feel like the best in Night City, but Haknyeon sure does feel like it.
Haknyeon looks through the pictures. He smiles to himself. “You know, if I didn’t know you, I would’ve thought you were a model.”
Chanhee rolls his eyes, smiling. “And what exactly are you trying to say, Haknyeon-ssi?”
“I think you know.”
“You should enlighten me.”
“You’re very pretty,” Haknyeon says, not missing a beat as Chanhee’s eyes widen ever so slightly and close to a blink at the flash of the camera. Haknyeon overhears the vendor’s cackle as they talk to a different customer over on the other side of the ramen bar, the loud boom of an advertisement on the nearest holographic screens, and the hushed deals made in the darker corners of every alleyway. He doesn’t dare look up, not until Chanhee calls out—
“Haknyeon.”
He doesn’t. “I love working with you, but I don’t know if I—” he starts, the truth lodged in his throat. Fuck it. Cyberspace be damned. “If I can keep it the way it is, and—”
“Haknyeon.”
He finally lowers the camera, meeting Chanhee’s gaze.
A part of him wonders if this is how he stares at Chanhee in between the photographer’s clicks: with pure, unabashed admiration. A hint of desire and want. A silly thing to be feeling atop the seats of this nearly broken down joint.
He doesn’t let the camera drop from his grip, even when Chanhee leans over the edge of his seat, entering Haknyeon’s space to let their lips meet.
When the cold of Chanhee’s touch graces his cheeks, and the bowls tremble against their cracked wooden surface, and the odd sense of being real fills his chest, he pays no attention to any of it.
Haknyeon raises his hands to feel, and in the chaos of the city, it feels enough.