— he was so close to us
the whole time.

OCTOBER 17:
KIM NAMJOON

==

"no."

it takes a full minute for the word to be uttered after jae is done talking, cutting the silence with a heavy whisper, and namjoon slowly turns his head to the speaker. jimin, who's struggling to contain his emotions, has disbelief painted over his face. taehyung has lived with jae for four years. four years...

"no," jimin repeats, shaking his head, "no, it's not possible. i was there to see him buried, he—he can't have just been here these four years, alive, it's not...it's—"

"it's true," jae murmurs. "and you must be confused. i am, too. i don't know how you six are able to see abraxas, but—"

"abraxas?"

"the monster. that's what we've named it. oh lord," she chuckles almost solemnly, "there is so much to tell you..."

namjoon turns to the others, mind reeling. their expressions of shock are unwavering as they digest jae's words slowly, like their actions are drenched in molasses. and he isn't different. he had formulated so many ideas, so many forced answers, and yet jae's words are still baffling to him because hell, that's the last thing he expected to hear.

"we?" namjoon manages to say, locking eyes with jae. "are there others?"

she massages her wrinkled hands and pauses, the age in her face seeming to grow. "there is a society. it's small, extremely small, and global—we work with people from all countries, it's...putting everything aside, it's quite a fascinating organization, actually. it's incredibly inconspicuous, mostly to take abraxas's attention away from us, but also to shield ourselves from governmental policies and regular people. "

"shield yourselves?" seokjin asks, eyebrows scrunching in confusion. "why?"

"a scarce number of people can see abraxas, so if the government were to know that people like us—daytime rich doctors, lawyers, engineers, people with money—are using our earnings on 'psuedo science', they'd shut down the organization immediately."

there's a span of tense silence.

"it's horribly hard to join and even find the society because of that," jae continues with a sigh. "i've been with it for twenty years, even though i actually began to research abraxas and the other world a few years years before that. there's a locked communication system throughout the society for us—perks of engineers, i suppose.

"most of us can see abraxas, but only about half of those who inherently see abraxas in its forms are part of the society. the rest are somewhere in the world, confused, just as you are. usually it isn't difficult to function in society with this..." jae pauses. "burden, is the correct word. abraxas rarely disturbs regular, 'unseeing' people, so some can go their whole lives without even witnessing abraxas."

"but that's what its doing now," yoongi breathes out shakily. "it's destroying things, and killing regular people."

"yes," jae nods, "and because of specifically taehyung."

"but—" seokjin speaks up. "but taehyung had hallucinations, jae. he couldn't go a day without seeing this—this abraxas, so what made him different?"

"there are two types of 'witnesses', as we call it," jae says. "the first are people like you, who can see abraxas in its forms only, when it grabs hold of people like taehyung and uses them. and the second...the second are people like taehyung. people who are completely ruined by abraxas, tortured by it. there's such a small number of them, and paired with the fact that almost no one can see abraxas nor its other forms, doctors label them insane. lunatics. mentally ill.  they send them to insane asylums or keep them locked up, give them false treatment, because they don't know.

"their hallucinations, taehyung's hallucinations, all their hallucinations are real. every time. abraxas follows them each and slowly sucks the life out of them, making their life hell, to sustain it's own life essence. it's how it manages to thrive outside of the other world. second witnesses are the only ones able to see abraxas's true form, which is supposedly a horrific monster of some sort. i," jae swallows thickly, "i'm a first witness. i only see abraxas's forms, which are created because of second witnesses."

"what?" hoseok furrows his brows.

"the horrific thing about abraxas," jae continues, "is that it can create havoc to this planet without even being seen. if it is able to find a strong enough second witness, a host, and completely envelop their life essence, it can cause physical damage to people and things but still retain its 'invisibility'. if it's able to ruin a host enough, completely torture them to the point of suicide, abraxas can take that physical form, change itself into a form that can be seen by both witnesses. if it has enough power to, abraxas can even kill a second witness on its own and develop their form, but that is extremely uncommon."

"but that's what it did to tae," jimin whispers.

"tried to do. abraxas found taehyung to be a desirable host, one with enough 'essence', per say, to sustain that physical form long enough to cause destruction. taehyung had—has—an enormously strong spirit. it was basically a jackpot form for abraxas. so for seventeen years—longer than any second witness has lasted—it dedicated itself to ruining taehyung, appearing in his day-to-day life, which easily threatened abraxas's entity. if it isn't able to find a host in time, abraxas's being will falter, and it will be forced to go back to the other world."

"that's why." jimin runs a hand through his hair, chewing his lip. "that's why the fucking meds didn't work. this shit is paranormal, for god's sake."

"it's a cycle, for abraxas. it finds a host, spends an extremely long time—several months, even up to a year—absorbing their physical form, memories, everything that allows it to thrive. but soon the form degrades. it doesn't take long for it to—a month, at most, and abraxas is back to its true form, unable to cause any destruction to regular people and regular things. the more abraxas does in its form, whether it be to murder a witness or destroy a car, the faster it degrades, and the quicker it has to find a host to feed off of.

"most of the time, abraxas isn't able to do much," jae continues. "its hosts' spirits are weak, barely allowing it to even exist in their forms, much less wreak havoc. whatever it has attempted in the past has been labeled as a 'technical accident', or some interesting oddity. but taehyung..."

she trails off, lowering her eyes. jeongguk is the one to lean forward and quietly ask, "taehyung what?"

"like—like i said, taehyung has an enormous spirit. that basically means that, if abraxas was able to take him as a host, his physical form would last longer or be more powerful. so after abraxas took his form, it spent a full four years cultivating it, much longer than any other. and that's how it's able to do all of the things it's doing right now—blowing up buildings, drawing the attentions of regulars, killing people..."

jae shakes her head. "but this...this is where it trails off from our research. taehyung wasn't killed that night four years ago, when the media had labeled it as a mysterious suicide. i only found those articles a year after i took him in, so i didn't connect the dots before. and yet, abraxas is still able to use his physical form."

"abraxas has to kill its host, though," hoseok mutters. "and it didn't kill taehyung, right?"

"exactly. somehow, some way, that night taehyung was able to escape. with all his wounds, i have absolutely no idea how, but he did it. except...abraxas had already taken his memories, copied taehyung's physical form. so although he managed to survive, abraxas had already taken what it needed from its host—of course not all of taehyung's essence, because he was still alive, but enough. all that was left was to cultivate it, rest, allow it to grow into a stronger form. the form he used to blow up that subway, crash those cars, explode that building."

"but—but his funeral," jimin stammers. "we buried taehyung's body in the grave, and...and when we dug it out—"

"you dug his grave out?"

"we...had to figure shit out," yoongi forces a bitter chuckle, "so we dug his grave out. and his body wasn't there."

jae nods arrhythmically. "oh, i—i see...that's a way to go at it, i guess—" she coughs. "but anyway. my assumption is that the body you buried was a decoy, jimin. something created by abraxas to cover up the fact that taehyung had survived. abraxas was expending itself on cultivating its form, so it didn't have power to go after taehyung and...and kill him, i suppose." she shakily exhales. "so taehyung was able to escape, but...but you, and...and his family...you were convinced, because of the decoy, that taehyung was dead."

so it wouldn't have even mattered if the body was cremated or not.

they turn to jimin. and it's as if you can see the entirety of sorrow in his eyes.

"i thought taehyung was dead," jimin breathes. "for four years, i thought my best friend was dead, murdered. and he wasn't. the whole time..."

"but abraxas...abraxas is able to do that?" jeongguk asks. "able to create a decoy? one that regular people can touch?"

"it would have taken an immense portion of its power," jae responds. "but since it had already found a host and taken what it needed, it was able to. it makes sense. how else is abraxas able to use things like gasoline, or mess with subway tracks, or create fire? it has a physical embodiment, so—in just the same way it copies someone's physical appearance and form—it creates a body. but instead of using its power to control that body, abraxas made it visible to regulars, too, and used it as a decoy."

a decoy. namjoon's head is spinning, and he has to close his eyes for a moment to stabilize the dizziness in his brain. and that's when he thinks back to what he told hoseok, jimin, and yoongi, all those days ago in his office, a simple shot in the dark. a shot that turned out to be true.

what if taehyung never died in the first place?

"so taehyung had lost all his memories, like i told you. but once abraxas began to destroy things, extinguish its physical form gradually, taehyung gained them back, gradually. almost like an exchange of some sort. the more abraxas lost its form, including the memories, the more taehyung remembered. and because of all the destruction abraxas is doing, its form is depleting quickly, and taehyung is gaining his memories and flashbacks quickly. but..."

"but?"

"because abraxas's form is wilting," jae whispers, "so is taehyung."

there's silence.

"wilting?" jimin asks, voice wavering. "what do you mean, taehyung's wilting?"

jae's fragile, aged frame quivers as she takes a deep breath. "ever since abraxas finished cultivating taehyung's form and started using it, taehyung has been gaining his memories, like i told you. but...but he's also been retching. blood. black blood. the color of abraxas's blood."

there's a pounding in namjoon's ears. retching black blood.

"their beings are intertwined, because of abraxas. so since—since its form is bleeding, so is taehyung. and he won't stop until abraxas's form is gone."

a collective pause. a heavy gulp. a shaky breath. the six of them are beyond baffled, past the point of shock and now into the point of numb acceptance, until their senses of motivation eventually come back. jimin stands up, the rest of them following, and he turns to jae.

"taehyung is alive, then," he softly says, "and he remembers me?"

jae nods.

"it's time to meet him, then."

==

everyone's making theories &
im just so pro u d yall are great
also i'm traveling rn so!!! instead of making you guys wait on my lazy irresponsible ass i decided to prewrite some chaps in this book
you'll have updates a bit more often now c:
have a great day!!