“Have you ever lost control?” Soo-hyun asked. “Gotten so caught up in your excitement or rage that you disappeared?”
Kali shook her head only slightly. Her questing blue eyes told Soo-hyun to continue.
“It’s the greatest feeling in the world,” Soo-hyun said, breathily.
“Then why are you so afraid?” Kali asked.
“I don’t trust myself. It’s so easy to lose control, to do something you’ll regret later, to hurt someone you love.”
“So you toil away in the workshop alone because you’re afraid you might hurt someone.”
Soo-hyun nodded.
“I will let you in on a secret, Soo-hyun: life is pain. You will hurt people, and you will be hurt. This isn’t shameful, isn’t something to be avoided at all costs. It is proof that you’re alive. When is the last time you truly felt alive?”
Soo-hyun thought for a few seconds, then shook their head and shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“You’ve trapped yourself in the workshop because you’re afraid of living. Because you think that who you are is somehow wrong, that you are somehow broken. You are broken, Soo-hyun. We all are.”
Soo-hyun’s chest jolted with a sob they quickly stifled. They felt seen, understood, for the first time in entirely too long.
“I appreciate everything you do for Liber, but I no longer need the Soo-hyun that hacks together drones in their workshop. I need someone with rage in their heart, I need bravery, I need soldiers. I need the Soo-hyun that threw homemade bombs at police dogs during the Sinsong riots. Where has that Soo-hyun gone?”
Before Soo-hyun could answer, Kali spoke louder: “Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“You do know. You know because you buried them. You buried them deep down because you’re too afraid to let them live. But I need them. You need them.”
Soo-hyun nodded and sniffed, their eyes burned with building tears.
“If you’re not ready for this, if you’re not ready to be close to me, I can’t force it. You have to want this, you have to work for it. You have to be ready to dig deep and find your old reckless self, your true self. The tattoo means you will never be alone, you will always be connected to me, and all the others. You have to accept the tattoo for the gift that it is.”
Soo-hyun swallowed a hollow pain in the back of their throat. “Okay, I’ll do it,” they said in a breathy whisper, worried that if they spoke normally their voice would break.
“I knew you would,” Kali said. “Welcome.” She sat on the leather chair, opened a cupboard beneath the counter, and retrieved a pair of black latex gloves, a tiny plastic cup, and an eyedropper stained black with use. She carefully unscrewed the lid on the ink pot, and using the eyedropper, decanted a couple of drops into the plastic cup. “You’re going to need to strip.”
“Strip?” Soo-hyun said.
“Sorry, I should have warned you not to wear coveralls.” Kali connected the tattoo gun to a small box that sat inside the cupboard, cables joining it to a power point and a flat round pedal on the floor. She looked up, and Soo-hyun still hadn’t undressed. Kali sighed. “I don’t expect you to do anything that I wouldn’t,” she said.
Kali stood and, without hesitation, lifted her dress over her head, before dropping it in the corner of the room. She was naked but for a pair of gray briefs, her skin white enough for Soo-hyun to see the red, blue, and purple of her veins meandering beneath the surface.
Soo-hyun stared, eyes shocked wide.
Kali made no effort to cover her breasts, or conceal the different tattoos that marked her flesh like ancient hieroglyphs or the forgotten sigils of some dead god. She sat back down, and continued working at the tattoo machine. “I’m not even looking, Soo-hyun; take your time.”
Soo-hyun exhaled. Without thinking, before they could change their mind, they pulled down the zip on the front of their coveralls, listening to the plastic sound of the teeth being pulled apart. They took their arms from the sleeves and pushed the rough canvas fabric down past their hips, letting it pool on the floor at their feet. They kept on their underpants and a T-shirt, embarrassed by the stains that marred the armpits.
Kali glanced up, and patted the leather bed. “Take a seat.”
Soo-hyun did as they were told, stretching out across the plastic wrap that clung to their skin, scritching as they peeled their limbs away, repositioning their legs until they could sit comfortably. With their right