Fox has never been very good with people. Try as he might, he always managed to put his foot in his mouth or miss context cues or honestly miss tone altogether. Partly this was because he didn't really care what people thought about him. He cared what they thought about his magic, but that was a seperate element altogether.

Mingyu, though...

Fox cared far more about what people thought about Mingyu than he could really even admit to himself.

"Ah-- No. Not really? Um - I kind of. Found the tattoo. And uh, put two and two together." He wet his lips, brows knitting to look down at the ground. Words. He could string words together. This was a talent he had. Might have had. Maybe.

"I didn't need to see anything else. I can, um-- I could see what it did by looking at it. The tattoo, I mean. I, uh.. kind of specialize in them." A pause. "Specialized, I guess, according to him. Past tense. Which is the reason he made it in the first fucking place. He wouldn't - he wouldn't even have it. If it wasn't for me. Wouldn't have had the tools or knowhow to make it, and wouldn't have wanted it anyway. I'm not-- Look, I'm not trying to 'catch up' or like... fill in details or whatever. And you can tell me to piss off. I just - I wanted you to know that I knew it was fucked up. That's it. That something I caused, indirectly or not, was really fucked up."

His shoulders sank into a helpless shrug and then he sighed. "It's fucked up, and I'm sorry."