i promised

block b/lc9 | ~2.4k | action, angst | gangAU

In a dark alley of Hongdae in Seoul two gangs are having a brutal fight. When LC9 face Block B, can leader Rasa keep his promise?


The thunder was roaring above our heads as rain was pouring down, wetting the streets of Hongdae. The water droplets ran down my bare arms and I flexed my muscles in the cool breeze, ready to attack and take another blow if necessary. We were in a dark back alley behind some poorly looking housing complex, our seven rivals standing in front of us with grim expressions on their faces which were smeared over with blood and dirt.
One of the guys was called Zico and he had a big scratch that went from his left eye down to his upper lip that I had placed there earlier. He was the leader of the seven guys who called themselves Block B, a gang that was quite known here in the area. They existed for already a pretty long time compared to us, LC9, a newly formed gang. We were short-handed against them since we were only five boys. Originally our gang had six members, but AO was too young to fight along with us. I wouldn't let him get involved and beaten up. No, I wouldn't want him to get hurt. In contrast to Block B's leader I cared too much about my friends, I would always try to prevent them getting badly hurt. AO kept telling me that he's old enough, that he wanted to fight against Block B at our side and that he didn't want to hide. I always replied by patting him on his blonde locks and busying myself with more important things again which always made him angry and frustrated. But I didn't want to discuss any options. The only option was to keep him safe. I promised that... And I will keep my promise.

Over the loud sound of the rain I could hear Eden growling. He was the one of us who hated Block B the most and instead of talking he rather let his fists speak for him. If I didn't keep an eye on him during every fight, he might even kill one of our enemies one day. Not that I would have minded, I loathed them, too, but if we killed one of them the cops would eventually find out and that meant having to go back to jail again. And never would I want to return there again. I'd rather die.

"What are we waiting for?" yelled King in my direction. "Let's finish them already, Rasa!"
His blonde hair that was styled into a tall mohawk slowly lost its shape due to the increasing rain. The bluish patch around his right eye he got last week in a fight still hadn't faded completely and already a new fresh blotch formed on his left arm. Luckily, those were the only visible injuries. King was the most hyperactive person I'd ever met and always ready to beat someone up. Sometimes I asked myself why I even hang around with these guys. Life would probably be easier without all the street fights and all the trouble. There was no going back, though. After all it's not that easy.

"OK, let's end this..." I breathed out and flexed my neck, staring straight into the dark eyes of Block B's leader whose lips formed into a grin.

"Well, it's about time" he answered as his white teeth flashed in the darkness of the alley.
In the next minute the little place was filled with yelling, screaming and sounds of fists crashing into jaws. It was one of the longest fights we've had with our enemies so far and I knew this time it wouldn't end that quickly. The bad weather was only one of those omens and something told me that there were more bad things to come tonight.

Even though we were only five and they were seven we did a good job with defending ourselves and striking some good blows that sent three of them to the ground. One of them was that girlish guy with long brown hair he always tied up into a ponytail. I think his name was Jaehyo. The other guy had feline-like eyes and chubby cheeks and was a wimp, he actually never lasted that long in any fights or little quarrels. The third guy who was lying on the wet ground was the oldest of them, called Taeil. I had noticed that Eden had hit him really badly in his stomach, that's why the black-haired was breathing and coughing heavily while clutching onto his abdomen.

One of our members was injured pretty badly as well, though. Jun was leaning against a brick wall and holding his right leg. I guess one of the Block B guys had kicked him against his shin. He was clenching his jaw and apparently had to endure a lot of pain. I was really proud of how long he was able to fight against the others. I hoped that his injury wasn't that bad as it seemed in that moment.

We - Eden, King and I - were so caught up in our individual fights that we didn't notice how one of our rivals - I think his name was B-Bomb - had J-Hyo trapped in a tight grasp. B-Bomb was cutting off J-Hyo's air supply and the latter struggled immensely to get his opponent off of his back, it seemed like every effort was in vain. For the short moment that I was concentrating on what was happening between J-Hyo and the B-Bomb guy, Zico rammed his left fist into my jaw and made me stumble back a few steps. The pain shot up into my bone and I held my jaw for a while. Shit, that hurt!

Fuelled by anger I started another attack on the opponents' leader without catching another glimpse at J-Hyo who was still stuck with B-Bomb and had no one to help him.
Then I suddenly heard a deep shout ringing through the air.


"Motherfucker!!! Let him go or I will chop of all your motherfucking limbs, you little fucker!!!"
I don't know where the fuck he had gotten that axe from, nevertheless King made his way to B-Bomb who still had his hold on J-Hyo.

"SHIT SHIT SHIT, what is he doing?!" yelled a gang member of Block B who had black glasses on. "Dude, do something!" he yelled again, this time in my and Zico's direction.
I immediately ran towards King and shouted at him to let that fucking axe go and let it fall to the ground. If he were going to kill someone he would have to go to jail for sure and I surely knew that I didn't want that to happen to him.

"King, fucking listen to me! If you're really gonna do this now then I guarantee you that this will have consequences you really would not like to happen!"

I was frantic. I didn't know what to say so that he would stop what he was going to do. I desperately wanted him to stop. I never felt so helpless before.

"King!" shouted even Eden who never spoke a lot.

The fear B-Bomb had in his eyes was conspicuous, even his voice was shaking as he yelled to me: "If he doesn't put this fucking axe away, I'm gonna kill your buddy here!" and visibly tightened his grip around J-Hyo's throat who tried to desperately get B-Bomb's hands off.

"Don't be stupid, King!" screeched Jun from the wall he was still leaning against.

Something must have made King aware of what he was doing and in the next moment he let the axe fall down to the ground. I let out a breath of air I didn't know I had been holding the whole time, relieved that King came back to his senses before he did something seriously stupid. Suddenly, though, B-Bomb's facial expression turned into a big grin and the whiteness of his teeth shone through the dark. "Well, what a shame that I'm going to fucking kill your buddy anyway!" he said and started to laugh sardonically.

"NO!!!"

I heard another voice that seemed familiar to me and in the next moment a head with curly blonde hair appeared in my perspective. My hands were growing cold and my eyes widened with a fear I hadn't felt before.

"No..." I whispered.



What happened during the next minutes happened with such a velocity that I couldn't react fast enough. Or maybe I wasn't reacting because I was too shocked to move.

AO ran towards B-Bomb and clawed his finger nails into his back which made the latter cry out in pain and loosen his grip on J-Hyo who then turned around and smashed his fist into B-Bomb's face. All the gang members were alarmed and started to fight against each other again. Me against Zico and Kyung, Eden against P.O and Taeil, King against Jaehyo, Jun against the kitty cat and J-Hyo and AO against B-Bomb. Everything could have gone well until I heard an excruciatingly loud scream piercing through the air and I immediately knew who it was.

"AO!!!"

I turned around, not caring about Zico and Kyung or any of the other Block B members, to spot AO on his knees with the axe stuck in his left shoulder, blood gushing out of a wound I couldn't tell how deep it was. My eyes went wide while the guys ran to AO and Block B stood there, glued to the spot.

"No... NO!" This couldn't be real. This couldn't have really happened.


I felt all the noises and surroundings fade out until everything was just irrelevant except for the fact that AO got hurt which I had tried to prevent for such a long time. I had always told him he wasn't allowed to fight with us, he wasn't allowed to start fights in school, he should not get involved in anything that could threaten his life or get him into trouble.
A long beep filled my ears and the blurriness still hadn't vanished. Everything went in slow motion. Like in a movie. Subconsciously I noticed how the boys lifted AO up, carried him away, I didn't know where to, maybe to our car, how Zico was mad and yelled at his friends, how footsteps scurried away until a strong grip on my shoulder retrieved me from the hypnotic-like trance I'd been in for I don't know how long.

"Rasa."


My name made me aware of everything again and after being in a state where I couldn't move, full of shock, anger flooded my body, coursed through my veins to spread into all the tiniest angles of my muscles.

"ZICO!!!" I roared through the back alley, but the one I was addressing was long gone.
I started to walk through the streets with angry steps and balled fists while yelling for Zico to crawl out of his hiding place. The rain hadn't stopped pouring down yet and even though my clothes were soaked I didn't stop.

Eventually I arrived in the area Block B mostly hung around and shouted Zico's name again. A guy dressed in black came up to me out of nowhere.

"If you're looking for Zico, then you should follow this alley" he said and pointed to a direction. I followed his finger with my eyes and then looked back into the stranger's face. I grabbed him by the collar and whispered in a low voice: "I swear, if you wanna mess around... You better not, understand?!" The guy shook his head in fear and I let him go again, determined to find Zico and to beat the shit out of him.



"Why are you here?" Block B's leader stood there with his arms crossed over his chest.
"Oh, I don't know" I said sarcastically. "Maybe because one of your buddies rammed an axe into my friend's shoulder, what do you think?!"

Zico sighed and ran a hand through his bleached hair. "Let's go talk somewhere else. B-Bomb's gonna flip and totally go crazy if he sees you here."

We walked out of the alley and to a park that was in the centre of the district. The dark night sky above us calmed me down for a split second and I hadn't noticed that it had stopped raining until Zico and I were standing next to a big tree in the park, surrounded by bushes and trees. The cool air made me freeze and my wounds began itching uncomfortably.
"You told me you wouldn't harm him..." I whispered and stared down onto my feet. I heard Zico shifting around in front of me while I kept replaying the scene of AO bleeding out of his shoulder. "I promised..."

Then I felt a hand on my shoulder that spread out heat on my cold skin, a burning sensation that made me hiss slightly. "Gunwoo..."

When I looked up I saw Jihyo's clear eyes looking back into mine. Another wave of anger rushed trough me and I fisted his shirt in my hands and pushed him against the tree next to us.

"You told me you wouldn't let any of your guys harm him!" I yelled and felt a tear spilling out of my eye. I gritted my teeth and repeated: "You told me!"

Zico got angry, too, and wrapped his hands around my arms and tried to push me back, sinking his finger nails into my skin, but I was stronger. "I know that I told you that" he emphasised every word. "But how could I have known that things would turn out so bad tonight?!" I watched how he furrowed his brow and felt his grip tighten. "I'm sorry, Gunwoo” he said in a low voice that sounded through the night. More tears spilled and I couldn't hold back the sobs. I let my hands sink down and bowed my head, crying my heart out. I promised to protect him...

I turned around and began to walk away, lifting my head to look up to the dark night sky, walking farther away from the tree I pushed Zico against.

"Tell him I'm sorry, Gunwoo!" I heard his faint words resounding behind me while the wind was blowing against my face, cooling my tears that were running down my cheeks.

- I promised. -


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