The snow leopard and black panther (ONE SHOT)

The rain started at 0300 hours.

By 0400, it was a downpour that turned the forest floor into mud and swallowed sound. By 0500, the man running through it had lost the feeling in his feet.

Jeong Taeui didn’t know where he was going. That was the problem with running from an army that no longer existed for you. North Korea was a wound still bleeding. The war hadn’t officially ended, but for him, it had ended the moment his unit was ordered to shell a village for refusing to hand over their grain stores.

He ran because he couldn’t stay.

He ran because if he stopped, the faces would catch up.

The border had been a gamble. Soviet patrols were lax in the Karelian sector, or so the rumors said. He’d crawled under barbed wire, through a river that stole his boots, and collapsed in a copse of birch trees just as dawn bled gray across the sky.

He was caught two hours later.

*Part I: The Report*

“General Riegrow. Sir.”

Ilya Riegrow didn’t look up from the map. His aide, Captain Morozov, knew better than to interrupt a man like that without cause.

The room was too large for one man. High ceilings, gilt molding from a palace that had been stripped of its tsar but not its ego. A single lamp cast a pool of light over the table, making the red of the Soviet border lines look like dried blood.

Outside, Moscow was thawing into a wet, miserable spring. Inside, it was always winter.

“What is it, Morozov?” Ilya’s Russian was flawless, guttural, without a trace of the Prussian cadence he’d buried in 1943.

“A deserter, sir. Korean. Crossed the border near Vyborg at dawn. He’s unarmed, malnourished. Claims he won’t fight anymore.”

Ilya’s pen stopped.

For a second, nothing happened. Then his mouth curved, not quite a smile.

“Won’t fight anymore,” he repeated, rolling the words like he was tasting them. “How interesting. And he gave himself up?”

“Yes, sir. He’s in holding.”

Ilya set the pen down. He stood slowly, unfolding to a height that made most men adjust their posture without realizing it. White hair, cut short and military, fell over a forehead too smooth for a man of 33. His eyes were the unsettling part—jet black, pupil and iris indistinguishable in the dim light. Like looking into a closed door.

“Bring him to me,” Ilya said. “Tonight. Not the interrogation room. My study.”

Morozov hesitated. “Sir, protocol—”

“Protocol says I can interview any person of interest to state security in any location I deem suitable.” Ilya’s voice was soft. That made it worse. “Unless you’d like to explain to Comrade Stalin why I was bored enough to skip dinner.”

“No, sir.”

When Morozov left, Ilya went back to the map. His finger traced the line where Finland ended and the Soviet Union began. He’d crossed that line the other way once, in the other direction, with a different uniform and a different name.

Ilay Riegrow was dead. Ilya Riegrow had never existed.

That was the game .

And he was bored.

*Part II: The Bedroom*

Taeui woke to the smell of old books and tobacco.

For a second, he thought he was back in the barracks. Then he realized the mattress under him was too soft, the sheets too clean, and the ceiling above him was painted with gold leaf that had chipped in places.

He sat up too fast. His head spun.

“Easy,” a voice said.

Taeui jerked around.

The man sitting in the armchair by the fireplace wasn’t wearing a uniform. He was in a black dressing gown, sleeves rolled to the elbow, revealing those define forearms. White hair, almost silver, caught the firelight. Black eyes watched Taeui like a scientist watching a rat in a maze.

“You’re awake,” the man said in Russian. Then, seeing Taeui’s blank face, he switched to accented English. “Do you understand me?”

Taeui’s throat was dry. “Who… who are you?”

“I am General Ilya Riegrow,” the man said. “You are in my house, Jeong Taeui. You ran very far to get here. I admire that.”

Taeui’s heart dropped.

He’d heard the name. Everyone had. Riegrow, the German who defected, the man who’d fed Stalin entire divisions of Wehrmacht positions in 1943. A traitor to one country, a hero to another. A ghost story told to keep soldiers from deserting.

“You’re… you’re supposed to be dead,” Taeui whispered in Russian. It was the only language he trusted not to betray him.

Ilya’s lips twitched. “Everyone is supposed to be dead, at some point. It’s a matter of perspective.”

Taeui swung his legs over the bed. His knees shook. “Where are my clothes? I need to leave.”

“Leave?” Ilya stood. He moved without sound, like a cat. “And go where, Jeong Taeui? Back to Korea? They’ll shoot you for desertion. To the West? They’ll interrogate you for a year and then use you as propaganda. Here, you have one other option.”

He stopped at the foot of the bed. He was close enough that Taeui could see the faint scar cutting through his left eyebrow.

“Stay,” Ilya said. “With me. As my guest.”

Taeui laughed. It came out broken. “Guest. Right. You don’t keep guests like this.”

“No,” Ilya agreed. “I keep interesting things. And you, Taeui, are interesting. A soldier who refuses to kill. That’s dangerous. That’s useful.”

“I’m not useful to anyone.”

“Everyone is useful to someone,” Ilya murmured. “The question is what they’re willing to pay for you.”

Taeui stood. He was shaking, but he stood. “I’m not staying.”

Ilya didn’t move to stop him. He just said, “The door is locked. The guards outside have orders to shoot anyone who tries to leave without my permission. Including you. Especially you.”

The silence that followed was worse than shouting.

Taeui looked at the door. He looked at Ilya. He looked at the black eyes that held no warmth, no pity, only calculation.

“What do you want from me?” he asked.

Ilya smiled for real this time. It was cold.

“To play a game, Jeong Taeui. And you’re my new piece.”

*Part III: The Terms*

They didn’t sleep that night.

Ilya didn’t touch him. He didn’t need to. His presence was enough to make the room feel smaller. He sat at his desk and worked, signing papers, reading reports, speaking to someone on the phone in low Russian. Taeui sat on the edge of the bed, too afraid to lie down again, too exhausted to stand.

At 2 AM, Ilya pushed the papers away.

“Tell me why you ran,” he said.

Taeui didn’t answer.

Ilya sighed. “Fine. I’ll tell you why I stayed.”

He rolled up his sleeve.

“I was 19 in Stalingrad,” Ilya said. “On the other side. We were told we were defending civilization. Then we ran out of food. Then we ran out of ammunition. Then we ran out of men who weren’t children. I watched a boy of 15 try to light a Molotov with shaking hands. I shot him before the Russians did. Mercy, I told myself.”

He dropped his sleeve.

“When the encirclement closed, I made a choice. I walked out with a white flag. They thought I was a coward. I thought I was smart. The Soviets didn’t care why I came. They only cared what I knew. So I told them everything. Every plan, every weakness, every lie my own commanders told their men.”

Taeui stared at him. “You betrayed them.”

“I survived,” Ilya said simply. “Betrayal is just a word the losing side uses. Now I serve the winning side. It’s more comfortable.”

“And if the winning side loses?”

Ilya’s eyes darkened. “Then I find a new winning side. That’s how people like me live, Taeui. We adapt. We play the game better than anyone else.”

Taeui swallowed. “I don’t play games.”

“Everyone plays games,” Ilya said. “You just don’t know the rules yet.”

He stood and walked to a small bar cabinet. He poured two glasses of vodka. He offered one to Taeui.

Taeui didn’t take it.

Ilya drank both.

Ilya didn't notice but Taeui's eyes were on his hands, which were exposed to the air. "Do you like my hands?"

The question pulled Taeui out of his haze. "yes.."

“Here are the rules,” chuckling he said. “You stay here. You eat, you sleep, you don’t try to escape. In return, I don’t hand you over to the MGB. I don’t let them ‘ask you questions.’ You’re safe. As long as you’re useful to me.”

“And if I’m not useful?”

Ilya set the glass down.

“Then the game ends.”

*Part IV: The Game*

Days passed.

Taeui learned the rules of the house. He ate at Ilya’s table. He walked in the walled garden under guard. He was not a prisoner, but he was not free.

Ilya was meticulous. He never raised his voice. He never threatened. He just… existed. A constant, quiet pressure. He asked Taeui about Korea. About the war. About what it felt like to fire a rifle and miss on purpose.

Taeui answered in fragments. He didn’t trust the man, but the silence was worse.

“You have good hands,” Ilya observed one evening, watching Taeui mend a tear in his borrowed shirt. “Steady. A surgeon’s hands.”

“I wanted to be a doctor,” Taeui said before he could stop himself. “Before.”

“Before what?”

“Before they told me healing one person meant killing ten others to make room.”

Ilya was quiet for a long time. Then he said, “That’s why you ran.”

Taeui nodded.

Ilya leaned forward. “Do you know what I do when I find something rare, Taeui? Something that might break if I handle it wrong?”

“What?”

“I keep it in a glass box,” Ilya said. “Where no one can touch it. Where it can’t hurt itself. Where I can look at it whenever I want.”

Taeui felt cold.

“I’m not an object.”

“No,” Ilya said. “You’re better than that. You’re a problem. And I like solving problems.”

That night, Taeui didn’t sleep.

He planned.

*Part V: The Rain*

The plan was stupid. It had to be stupid. Anything complex would get him caught.

He waited for the storm.

When it came, he slipped out of the bedroom during Ilya’s 0200 phone call. The guards were trained, but they were human. They looked away for three seconds.

Three seconds was enough.

He ran.

The forest was worse than he remembered. Mud sucked at his ankles. Branches whipped his face. The rain was ice cold, soaking through his shirt, making his teeth chatter.

He didn’t know where he was going. He just knew he had to get away from the house, from the black eyes, from the man who looked at him like he was a puzzle to be solved.

He heard the whistle first.

High, sharp, cutting through the rain.

It was a signal. A hunting call.

Taeui ran faster.

“I thought you were smarter than this, Taeui!” Ilya’s voice echoed through the trees, distorted by the rain. He wasn’t running. He was walking. Calm. In control. “You can’t outrun me in my own forest!”

Taeui didn’t answer. He couldn’t breathe.

His foot caught on a root. He went down hard, mud filling his mouth, his lungs burning.

The whistle stopped.

Footsteps approached. Slow. Deliberate.

Ilya stepped into view, a silhouette against the lightning. His coat was soaked, plastered to his frame. A rifle rested against his shoulder, easy, casual.

He didn’t look angry. He looked… pleased.

“Found you,” Ilya said softly.

Taeui pushed himself up, mud and blood on his hands. “Don’t—”

“Don’t what?” Ilya knelt in the mud without caring. His black eyes were inches from Taeui’s. Rain ran down his face, making him look younger, wilder. “Don’t catch you? Don’t bring you home? Don’t you understand? I don’t lose my pieces, Taeui. Especially not the ones I’m still trying to understand.”

Taeui stared at him. He was shaking—from cold, from fear, from something else he didn’t have a name for.

“Why?” he whispered. “Why me?”

Ilya’s thumb brushed mud from Taeui’s cheek. The touch was gentle, infuriating.

“Because you’re the first thing in ten years that made me feel like I wasn’t just moving pieces on a board,” Ilya said. “Because when you look at me, you see a monster. And you’re not wrong. But you don’t run from me because of fear. You run because a part of you wonders if I’m right.”

Taeui’s breath hitched.

“You’re insane.”

“Probably,” Ilya agreed. He stood, offering a hand. “Come home, Taeil. The rain is getting worse.”

Taeui looked at that hand. He looked at the rifle. He looked at the man who was both his prison and the only person who’d ever asked him why he ran.

He didn’t take the hand.

He grabbed Ilya’s collar and pulled him down, kissing him with all the frustration and fear and anger of the last two weeks.

It was messy. It was wet. It tasted like rain and blood.

Ilya froze for half a second. Then he made a sound low in his throat and kissed back, one hand coming up to cradle the back of Taeui’s head like he was afraid Taeui would break.

When they broke apart, both were breathing hard.

“It's Taeui, my name. And I don't want to play your silly little game” Taeui said against Ilya’s mouth.

“Good,” Ilya whispered. “Because I think I want to change the rules.”

*Part VI: The Morning After*

Taeui woke up in the same bed.

Ilya was gone, but the side of the mattress was still warm. On the nightstand was a cup of tea and a note in Russian, clumsy Korean characters underneath.

_You don’t have to run anymore. If you want to leave, the door will be open. If you stay, the rules change.

—Ilya_

Taeui read it twice. Then he got up, walked to the door, and opened it.

Morozov was outside, looking uncomfortable.

“General said not to stop you,” Morozov muttered. “Said you’re allowed in the library. And the kitchen. And… anywhere, actually.”

Taeui nodded. He didn’t leave.

He went to the library.

*Author’s Note:* Can you tell I was demotivated to write this crap....I had to search the history of WW2! Anyway I basically had a dream about my fav pair cause I think of them so much (I'm addicted). And that's why I wrote it.

Hope you enjoyed ~

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