The clock on the Aether-Watch displayed three hours into his twelve hour safety window. Shi Yoon couldn't focus on the Chronos-Needle fabrication; the silence of the Zero Point Analysis was too loud, the void of information on Seo Jun's fate too maddening. He needed to verify the boy's security and, perhaps more crucially, satisfy the nagging, uncharacteristic pull of his own curiosity.
He opened a discrete portal in his secured apartment, connecting it to the ventilation unit of Seo-Jun's newly acquired safe house. He stepped through, cloaking himself in a minor invisibility veil a simple precaution against the apartment's automated wards.
The safe house was sparse, functional, and devoid of personality a perfect containment unit. Seo Jun was sitting on the floor in the center of the living area, reading a battered paperback, his back to the door.
Shi-Yoon dismissed his veil. The soft hiss of air brakes made Seo-Jun look up. His eyes widened, not in fear, but in surprised recognition.
"Shi-Yoon," Seo Jun breathed, slowly rising. "I thought… I thought you were gone."
Shi Yoon walked to the center of the room, his tall, imposing figure filling the small space. He didn't offer a greeting. "I deployed logistical measures to ensure your safety. They are sufficient."
"But you're here anyway," Seo Jun countered, a spark of unexpected insight in his voice. "The car, the apartment... was that you? Why not just send a text?"
"My method of contact is irrelevant. You are an anomaly I must monitor," Shi Yoon stated, his voice flat, his typical wall of cold indifference firmly in place. He was here for an inspection, not a reunion.
"An anomaly," Seo Jun repeated, a touch of pain entering his eyes. "Is that all I am? After... after all this time?"
Shi Yoon hesitated, the word "time" hitting him hard. Eleven years. "You are the consequence of a reckless act," he corrected, his voice hardening. "My act. You are a variable I must control to maintain dimensional stability."
"Control," Seo Jun murmured, running a hand through his hair. "I don't understand. Why me? Why am I always where the bad things are?"
"Because of the Mark," Shi Yoon explained, tapping the obsidian pendant beneath his collar. "The Reaper's Blade touched you. It tied your soul to a power you can't comprehend, severing your predestination. You now resonate with beings who share that zero-fate index. You are a beacon, and I am the lighthouse keeper."
"A beacon..." Seo Jun looked down at his chest, where the mark had long faded to an invisible scar. "You risked your life for a beacon? In the park, just now…"
"I risked my life to prevent a catastrophe I caused," Shi Yoon interjected, his voice sharp. "Do not mistake duty for sentiment."
"And the scythe?" Seo Jun pressed, ignoring the coldness. "The cane turned into that terrifying blade. Why is it only you who has that power? Why are you the Reaper?"
Shi Yoon sighed, a rare display of exasperation. "The blade is an anchor, a fragment of a greater authority. I am simply the one it chose." He was about to reiterate his need for distance when he looked directly into Seo Jun's eyes.
That's when it happened.
Seo Jun's usually warm, brown eyes flared to a startling, brilliant crimson. The light wasn't reflected; it originated from deep within the pupils, fierce and unsettling. It lasted less than a second a retinal flare of pure, foreign energy.
Shi Yoon froze. The color was too vivid, too dimensional. It was the energy signature of a high-grade dimensional breach, but localized entirely within the boy.
"What was that?" Shi Yoon demanded, taking an involuntary step forward, his indifference completely shattered by shock.
Seo Jun blinked, his eyes returning to their normal, soft brown. He looked utterly confused. "What was what? Did I say something wrong?"
Shi Yoon stared, his hand instinctively going to the Aether Watch. He initiated a rapid, focused scan on Seo Jun's optic nerves. The watch showed nothing but normal human vitals.
"You look like you just saw a ghost," Seo Jun observed, a nervous laugh escaping him.
"I saw an intrusion," Shi Yoon corrected, his voice low and dangerous. "An invasive dimensional signature, active in your ocular cavity. It was Grade S."
"S?"
"S is for Sovereign. You didn't feel anything?"
"I just... I felt cold for a second," Seo Jun admitted, rubbing his arms. "Like the power was going out, but then it came back on. It happens sometimes, especially since that whole thing at the library."
Shi Yoon felt a cold dread supersede his earlier frustration. He was correct; the boy was attracting anomalies, but they weren't just attacking from the outside. They were attempting to breach his mind, his very being. And the red flare was a defense mechanism, a surge of pure chaos energy pushing the intruder out.
"This changes the logistics," Shi-Yoon announced, his voice regaining its analytical chill, though his internal alarm bells were deafening. He had to hide the fear this sudden intimacy had caused.
"Changes what, Shi Yoon? The fact that you have to watch me from afar?" Seo Jun challenged, finally pushing back against the cold facade. "If I'm such a threat, why not just leave me? Why not just 'clean up the mistake' and end the variable? You could do it, couldn't you? With that terrifying scythe."
The accusation hung heavy in the air. Shi-Yoon met his gaze, his own black eyes unyielding. He walked closer, crowding the younger boy, his tall shadow enveloping him.
"Yes, I could," Shi Yoon confirmed, his voice barely a whisper, yet holding the weight of mountains. "And that is precisely the question I have asked myself for eleven years. But the Mark is more than a tie; it is a resonance. When I try to impose an end upon you, I meet an equal force. A paradox. It would cause an uncontrolled dimensional cascade that would destroy this entire district."
He paused, letting the fear of that truth settle between them.
"You are safe not because I am kind, Seo Jun, but because you are too dangerous to destroy. My duty is to contain the chaos I created, even if that means spending my life standing between the universe and the single greatest weakness in my power."
He stared at the boy, his gaze intense, a flicker of something unreadable was it exhaustion, regret, or that strange, cold protective instinct revealed for a fleeting second.
"You will stay here. You will not leave. If you defy these parameters, I will be forced to employ aggressive containment measures."
With that, Shi Yoon activated the self contained portal, turning his back on the boy and stepping through, the image of those brilliant, terrifying red eyes seared into his memory. The twelve hour countdown was now irrelevant. He had to finish the Chronos Needle in the time it took for the next intrusive dimensional spike to occur. He was racing against a threat that was not outside, but inside his blind spot.