In the drafty warehouse with the metal roof, the rumbles of thunder sounded as though they would shake the walls apart.

Jungkook stood between two of his father's friends, rocking back and forth from his heels to his toes. A draft crept though the wide open door behind him, slipping through the knit of his black sweater so that goose bumps rolled along his skin. Water kept splattering in through the entryway, but no one bothered to close the door.

Jungkook didn't really get what they were doing here.

He was tired - it was night time, and usually he was already in bed.

That's where he wished he was, really. Curled up beneath his covers and feeling safe with all the lightening flashing like strobe lights between the slats of his blinds.

Instead, his father had demanded he get dressed and dragged him outside, stuffing him into a van with all of his uncles and his father's friends. Jimin hyung wasn't here, either, which was odd since Jimin hyung was always there.

Event since Jungkook could remember, Jimin had been there beside him. He'd always been the one to help Jungkook back up when he skinned a knee, or to pat his head well done when Jungkook's father wouldn't.

It was strange that Jimin hyung wasn't anywhere to be seen.

Jungkook glanced up at the faces of the men beside him, sober and stone-faced.

Whatever this was, it seemed serious.

Jungkook's father strode out ahead of him, hands tucked and clasped behind him. He didn't seem worried by the storm or the mysterious situation, nor was he worried about the fact that Jungkook was worried.

A few days ago, Jungkook's father had taken him to a gun range not far from their house. Jungkook has been practicing for several weeks in advance with Jimin, and his father had seemed pleased with his performance at the range. His lips had tilted up into an infinitesimal smile when the bullets had successfully targeted vital points on every target dummy.

Jungkook's father didn't smile very often.

He wasn't smiling then, either.

Another crash of thunder made the metal walls screech in protest, and made Jungkook jump.

"What's going on?" he asked in a whisper.

No one replied - another oddity.

Jungkook was used to getting a lot of attention from everyone but his father. Usually, people answered him right away, with a strange kind of respect that he didn't understand.

It was suddenly as if he didn't exist.

It made Jungkook want to puff out his chest and stand tall on his toes, so he didn't look so small next to them.

A sudden shuffling and a loud cry drew Jungkook's attention to the far wall of the warehouse. In the drafty dampness, he could barely see a small line of people against the wall.

They were on their knees, their hands tied, and their faces were covered by black hoods.

One of his father's friends put a hand on his shoulder and pushed him forward. Small, wet footprints were left by Jungkook's tennis shoes as he stumbled toward the people.

When he was closer, the only thing he could really see were their hands. Black cord strained against their wrists, tied together so tightly that it looked painful.

The first two in line had hands that were clasped together, with matching wedding bands. One pair of hands was masculine and large, cradling the other more feminine one within them.

The third pair of hands was older and a little wrinkled, resting serenely on their owner's knees. They looked sort of like prunes. If Jungkook looked closely enough, he could see an almost indecipherable tremble shaking through them.

The last pair of hands looked disturbingly similar to Jungkook's own. They were large and gangly, and a little too big for the lanky frame of the person they belonged to. A young boy, maybe even the same age as Jungkook.

Soft sobs from the couple at the front of the line ricocheted off of the warehouse walls, reverberating though Jungkook in a foreboding pulse.

He looked uncertainly to where his father stood silently behind him. What were they doing here?

For the first time since entering the place, Jungkook's father looked at him.

He kneeled on the ground so that he was level with Jungkook, even though the motion made Jungkook feel even smaller. His father's pursed lips made his back straighten.

"Do you see those people, son?" he asked Jungkook.

Jungkook nodded, frightened but exhilarated by the attention.

"Are they bad people?" he asked in reply. "Why are they tied up like that?"

They had to be bad. Surely his father wouldn't tie them up unless they were bad.

His father's eyes were hard and dark, even more so than usual.

"Sometimes good and bad doesn't matter. Sometimes, it only matters who people belong to."

The answer didn't ease Jungkook's confusion at all. How did one person belong to another?

His father continued on. "You are going to show them, Jungkook. What power is."

Oblivious to his son's turmoil, Jungkook's father stood tall again, rising from the floor with a crash of thunder and a flash of lightening.

"Every king needs an heir," said his father amid the storm's screaming. "You've watched my son grow from a child into a young man. Tonight is the night he'll prove his worth as your future leader."

Him?

Jungkook glanced around, as if there was someone else his father could be talking about. He hadn't ever considered the thought that he would follow in his father's footsteps.

And what did he mean by 'prove his worth?'

Uneasiness rumbled in his stomach, echoing the thunder.

Jungkook's father turned again to face him. With a sudden realization, Jungkook noticed that his father and the rest of the men appeared as an army standing against him, towering with a nerve-shattering presence.

Their eyes speared him through with expectation.

Pressure weighed down his shoulders.

Behind them all, the captured woman uttered a small cry.

"Here," Jungkook's father murmured softly. He beckoned Jungkook forward in a gentle, dangerous way.

Jungkook couldn't resist that draw.

His father didn't see him very often. Jungkook wasn't sure exactly what was happening here, but his father was watching, no - seeking him out. For once.

Like a snake drawn to its charmer, Jungkook drifted without will toward his father.

Something cool and smooth was pressed into his hands. Jungkook knew the feel of a gun when he held one.

"Do you understand what you have to do?" Jungkook's father asked him.

He did.

But Jungkook didn't want to understand. He didn't want to realize why those people were tied up against the wall, or why his father had gathered up all of his closest friends, or why there was now a loaded gun clasped loosely in his fingertips.

He swallowed hard. He nodded, again.

What else could he have done? His father was watching, pressuring, pushing.

It was a crushing feeling.

He wished Jimin hyung was there.

Jungkook pivoted slowly, horror beating at his chest at the same time that the howling winds beat at the walls. He was propelled from behind by the eyes of his observers, until the tip of his shadow reached out before him and nipped at the solitary forms against the wall.

He trembled.

The thunder crashed.

He didn't want to do this.

The first shot was a thing of habit, straight and true, and the first man went limp. The woman's crying was cut short. Her breath came out like the pants of a terrified animal, and her hands clutched at her husband beside her.

The second shot was much harder, because Jungkook's eyes were beginning to blur. The gun was shaking in his hands, but the the bullet was somehow still steady.

The woman went limp as well. She slumped to the side, resting against her husband.

Jungkook's breathing was horribly uneven, but he tried his best to even them out. There was nothing he could do to stop the tears from streaming down his face.

His father was watching.

Even with that reminder, it was too much to bear.

Jungkook began to turn back, to throw the gun away and say he couldn't do it. Before he could, a large hand caught the curve of his small shoulder.

His father's face looked closely, not looking at him but at the two victims bleeding freely ahead. The old man and young boy were shaking and silent.

"Finish it," Jungkook's father demanded softly.

"I can't," Jungkook whispered. "I just-"

"You will." His father's eyes were molten metal, angry and sparking.

"Can I see Jimin hyung?" Jungkook whimpered. He knew he looked weak and hated it, but if he could just talk to Jimin, and hear his voice telling him that it would be okay, that he could get though it-

Jungkook's father grabbed him by the shoulders, spinning him around and glaring into his face.

"You can't see Jimin," said his father in a kindly threatening tone. "If you can't do this, maybe you'll never see Jimin again. This is your future Jungkook. Get it done."

Get it done.

His father backed away, and Jungkook faced his task once again.

The old man.

In theory, it shouldn't have been hard. An older man, towards the end of his life. Jungkook wouldn't take that much from him.

He tried to convince himself.

As he pulled the trigger, a crash of thunder followed.

The old man didn't make a sound. His body folded gently, as if he had simply drifted away to sleep.

And then Jungkook was faced with the fourth and last person - the young boy.

He looked again at the hands, young and smooth and so similar to his own when he glanced down at them.

Jungkook suddenly knew.

If he pulled off that black hood and looked at the face beneath, who would be looking back at him?

His own eyes.

Young.

Frightened.

Devastation clawed Jungkook's throat, like acid eating at his skin, and a lightening flash burned his eyes.

With the boy still trembling before him, Jungkook let the gun fall from his fingertips to the ground. It landed with a dull metallic thud, accompanied by his teardrops.

For once and all, he couldn't do it.

More lightening flashed behind him, like strobe lights, making his shadow look monstrous. Jungkook was scared that the black phantom outline of his own self was going to swallow him whole.

Thunder rumbled in the background, a low swelling of sound, and then shattered the silence with a thunderous roar. It filled his ears, his mind and his senses so that he was suffocating in the air's fluctuation.

He could feel the presence of his father rising up behind him as well. A monster bigger than Jungkook's shadow, even more prepared to consume him.

Jungkook closed his eyes against the lightening and the boy, the gun on the ground and his father.

He waited for the thunder to shake the walls to the ground, for the might of it to collapse the entire building around them and bury them all.

But it didn't.

And when Jungkook's father hauled him up, striding fiercely to the door, and stuffed him back inside the vehicle they came in with violence in the curve of his mouth....

The walls never fell.

***

When Jungkook saw Jimin next, it had been several weeks since the night in the warehouse.

To Jungkook, it had felt like years. Years full of dark rooms and hard fists and pain. He didn't feel like a human anymore - more like an animal, edged out and fidgety. Scared. Anxious.

Jungkook couldn't see well since his eyes were swollen shut. His throat was very dry, and he was hungry.

When Jimin has caught sight of him, bruised in too many places, skinnier than before and with blood crusted around the corner of his mouth, he had cried out softly.

Ran to enfold Jungkook in his arms.

Jungkook was glad to see that Jimin was safe and hale, even after his father's threat.

He let the other boy embrace him, thinking the whole time.

They couldn't stay here. The two of them had to leave.

The second his father had placed that gun in Jungkook's hand, Jungkook's mind had set.

Maybe they couldn't do it today, or the next week, or in a month or even in a year, but someday they would go.

They wouldn't stay here.

Not with Jungkook's father waiting on the fringes of his mind, a predator waiting to leap on him the second his free will was shown.

No, Jungkook thought as he let himself be crushed half to death but Jimin's embrace. There's no safety here.

No future.

No life.

Jungkook would keep them safe.

Jungkook would save them.

[A/N]
Unedited
Okay, I hope y'all aren't confused. This chapter was honestly really hard to write. I restarted it at least twice, and I'm still not completely satisfied with it. I feel like I didn't do Jungkook's trauma justice. But I hope you enjoyed it regardless, and please leave me some feedback if you feel like I should change or clarify anything! I also know that there are some questions that will be answered in the next chapter!
As always, thanks for reading!
❤️PB