GYEOM POV:

"Absolutely NOT." I hiss angrily, glaring at (Y/N), who has the audacity to sit there and look put-off and upset by my refusal. The nerve of her to widen her eyes and try to tug my hand back between hers, from where I'd ripped it free from.

"Gyeomie please..." she begins, voice soft and pleading, reaching forward for me.

I move back, avoiding her touch. Because when she can't use words, she always tries to use touches and soft tender gestures to calm me down, to agree in whatever preposterous idea she wants me to go along with.

Not. This. Time.

"(Y/N)...no." I say firmly, eyes bleeding red as I look at hers, at the soft vulnerability and plea in them.

She frowns, leaning back when she sees me avoiding her touch and curls her knees up towards her chest, silently staring at me from the opposite end of our couch.

"Why not?" she asks softly, gently. As if what she had suggested had been nothing more than a normal, day-to-day conversation, a habitual occurrence.

Her calmness makes me angry. Makes me mad and infuriated. Because why can't she understand? Why is it so hard for her to see what I want her to see? 

When she'd called to say she was back at our apartment, I'd hurried to my feet- more than ready to go to our home and see her and have her to myself. Thinking happily that maybe we'd indulge in some quality bloodmate bonding time- cuddling together, binging on junk food and having a show or film play in the background as she petted my hair and laid happily on me.

Not this.

Her stance is one that always comes out when she feels hurt or vulnerable, when she wants to shut herself away.

But why can't see how much her idea tears me apart just contemplating it let alone actually considering it or going through with it?

"Why not? Why not? Because (Y/N)...I am not willing to lose you again. Is that so hard to believe?" I say incredulously, voice rising with my anger and hurt aching heart. She flinches, shrinking back looking as if my words have struck her across the face.

I sigh, trying to force the tension to bleed out of me, taking deep long breaths to try and calm down.

"I can't (Y/N). I just can't. Can't be the one you need to stand by you as you put this plan into action. I will do anything but really...you want me to willingly stand back and let this happen. You want me as your bloodmate to be by your side and do nothing and pray your plan doesn't fall apart?" I say, voice shaking and trembling with the force of repressing all the emotions threatening to burst out.

She fiddles with the jumper, JB hyung's jumper I realise, that envelops her smaller frame, face silently contemplative. I know that look...I hate that look...dread it. Because when she gets that look I just know she's trying to find a loophole to slip through.

And it's at times like these I fear and resent her clever mind.

"But I want you. You as my bloodmate, you as my friend, you as the first person who made me feel true happiness after my parents died." She begins, her words striking at my weak soul, making me tense and wince.

Don't do it (Y/N). Don't go there I silently beg.

Her words make me see her not as the young woman she's grown into but the same young lost girl I came across years ago. The same person who'd looked at me with a sort of deadness, empty unseeing eyes and just shuffled up a bit to make space for me to join her in the small hiding space in the thick of the woods, amongst the overgrown mass of bushes.

Her words remind me of just how much we've gone through together, how many ups and downs, sharp curves and bends we've helped each other through. From how we grew as kids into young adults.

"I want you there because I trust you with my life and know unfailingly that you're there with me, that you've always been there and you'll continue to be there." She says softly, voice free of any sort of manipulation or persuasion. Just sheer honesty. That makes my heart ache and threatens to make my resolve dissolve. 

But still...what she's asking is also for me as her bloodmate to be there through something that could very well go wrong, that she wants me there in a scenario that should anything go wrong, I'll be left to drown in the guilt, to fester in it and die in the choking suffocating force of it.

"(Y/N) I'm begging you. Don't do this. Don't do it like this. Any way...any other way and I'll do it. I'll do it all." I say desperately, voice cracking and becoming choked up with emotion- silently screaming and pleading and crying for her to change her mind.

"You know that this is the quickest and easiest way...that it's dangerous but it's also fool proof." She says, knees lowering and her body shifting closer- eyes flickering red with vulnerability and a rawness.

And when I feel myself wavering. Only because it's her. Only because if there's one thing I've always suffered and had difficulties with, it's with saying no to her. With not helping her.

But then she delivers the final blow, that abolishes any resistance I could possibly harbour.

"If you don't help me Gyeomie then I'll respect that and I won't ask again. But I will go through with the plan anyways." She says firmly, eyes sparking with determination and resolute insistence.

And that does it.

Throws out any resistance.

Because there's no way I'm letting her do that alone. I know I'll be tormented and torn and even more guilty if I let her go through with her plan and not help her through it.

At least this way I'll be able to protect her, be there with her.

I move closer to tug her by the arms, drawing her straightened up figure into my arms, pulling her onto my lap.

"I hate the idea, hate that you're doing this but I'll do it with you. I'll do it so I don't lose my mind with worry not knowing what's going on." I say, voice muffled and tucking her head under mine.

She sighs, nodding- pressing a kiss to my neck- a chaste peck, that goes to relieve far more tension than I thought the small gesture would.

"I hate you." I mumble, arms tightening around her.

"I love you too Gyeomie." She whispers.

(Y/N) POV:

If I thought convincing Gyeomie was going to be the real challenge, then I was in no way prepared for the intensity of the Ims, or MJ oppa and Eunwoo when they caught wind of the idea.

After Gyeomie had agreed, even if his countenance and eyes screaming his displeasure, it was nothing compared to the way Jinyoung oppa seemed to swell and exude silent exasperated rage and worry from every pore; bristling indignantly as he dropped the food onto our table and glared at me.

"You're thinking of doing what?" he asks in a level calm tone as if his eyes weren't scanning me intently and then proceeding to dart around the room, mentally cataloguing all the escape routes out- so he could keep me inside.

And when he'd heard, I'd seen the full realisation hit him, saw his pupils dilate pushing the rim of red to a thin circle as he joined us on the couch. He silently held his arms open for Gyeomie to hand me over and when he'd trapped me in his comforting and protective arms, he'd silently nuzzled his head into my neck, trying to calm himself down by breathing in my scent.

I don't think it worked.

Not when we ended up spending the better half of the next hour arguing our points back and forth.

Because in all honesty I could see where he was coming from, but he also needed to see that I wasn't willing to let this continue on.

"Do you know the recent cases of missing students have something in common?" I suddenly say, cutting off his argument.

From this angle I can see his frown, turn to face him from where I'm perched sideways on his lap.

His eyes turn apprehensive and wary- indicating that he doesn't want to know, doesn't like where this is going.

"The females all hold resemblances to me." I say bluntly. I'm not bringing Yoongi oppa into this, he deserves his privacy from another coven, it's something only he has the right to divulge.

Jinyoung oppa's face becomes struck, shocked, and pained, so deeply pained it makes me move closer and nestle close in slight guilt.

And opposite me Gyeomie holds a thunderous expression.

Both promising Chul pain but me too. For not sharing that detail when I was set on convincing him. I knew it would've been harder to that way.

But sometimes people need to know the full extent of problems to realise just how much is at stake, just how urgent it is to take action.

"And I'm not letting Chul keep killing people. Because of me. I won't be able to live with the guilt oppa, so this is why you have to let me do this. Why all I want is your support, your belief in me." I say, turning to face him.

It's painstaking waiting in silence for the unknown stretch of time and watching the war, the conflict occur internally inside his soft eyes. To stay still and not fidget when his eyes turn appraisingly, carefully observant on me.

A tight nod.

"But...only if I know the exact details and know just how it'll unfold. Who'll be there, what is it that you'll be doing. I'm not letting you head in whilst we're all sitting ducks." He says carefully.

But he's not smiling, his soft gentle features firm and unwavering.

I nod.

"I'll talk to the coven." He starts but is disrupted by the silent and sudden appearance of the living room filling up with said coven.

Jaws clenched, eyes burning red and faces hardened.

"No need Jinyoung-ah. We heard her. And we have no choice but to support her. And I'm beginning to regret making such a vague promise." JB oppa says as he breaks the silence, a look of heartbreak and worry on his face. They're all silent but also all silently reassuring, shooting me small nods in agreement- that even if they hated the idea, they would do it. Because they'd all sworn to help...in whatever way they could.

And they'd never imagined their words would come back to bite them like this.

But I had had enough of waiting around, of reading into Chul and finding him even less than an animal the more I learnt. It just made me realise we couldn't have such a person free on the streets.

The police had been informed, the Institution of InterSpecies Relations, the authority that dealt with especially crimes committed against either race, were notified, and the own governing force for vampires knew.

The plan was all put into place.

All I had been waiting for was the agreement of the people who mattered to me.

But also because I wanted them to know exactly what I was heading into, and whilst we'd planned things down to the finest detail, there was always the tiniest chance things could go wrong. So I had wanted them to know just what it was that was happening if things should go to hell.

But I prayed it didn't come to that.

Because I had a reason to live, reason to continue on living. And seven beautiful mates waiting for me on the other end.

Because if Chul tried to separate me from them, then I couldn't guarantee I wouldn't become a monster to defend them. Because for me, they mattered. And if Chul tried to take my loved ones away one more time, then I would have to enter the fray and show him just what it meant to be toyed and tormented.

Because if you pushed at something hard enough, put enough pressure onto it- then it would shatter. And I hoped we could solve things before it came to that.

My mates had been hard enough to convince, but when I'd told them I had no intention of heading in without the seven of them- they had been appeased. It had taken days of planning, of making sure everything was in place and now that we were finally reaching that moment of executing it, it made me feel nervous and jittery.

And it made me reflect. Just what was at stake, who I was doing this for.

That this was beyond me, beyond Yoongi oppa, beyond the victims, beyond everything we'd all suffered and experienced. This was for something greater than just us, than the world we shared and existed in with each other. It was for much much more. 

And I hoped when the time came I wouldn't be afraid, wouldn't clam up and seize up in fear. Hoped and prayed I had the courage to face the demon in my life and get rid of it.

Prayed that when the time came, I embraced those fears and sorrows and griefs and allowed them to build me up and not shatter me.

----

It's something deep inside me that prompts me to ask if we can all go the nesting room, that despite being changed and curled up in blankets sleep evades me easily. That as we lie together, curled together- bodies touching, breathing the same air, the same space I find myself looking up at the ceiling. That though there are arms around me and heads curved towards mine, I find myself feeling alone.

And it's sheer compulsion that has me calling out into the silent room, knowing that they're not asleep. They're all awake just like me. Unable to sleep.

"I just want you to know that I love you all. That for all I've been through I felt that you all being my mates has been the universe trying to make up for the wrongs done to me. And that I'll love you forever." I say, feeling hot tears trickle down the sides of my face and soak into the pillow, into my splayed hair. My hands almost feverishly clutch at the arms around my waist, relishing in the comfort, in the feeling.

Trying to commit it to memory, to emblazon it across my soul and to burn it across my heart. That this feeling, this sense of belonging had been what I'd been craving all my life. That every pain, every moment of suffering was so I could be soothed by this. By them.

And wishing I could have this forever.

For eternity.

(A VAGUE CHAPTER- BUT HONEST TO GOD, TELL ME PLEASE IF IT MADE NO SENSE, IT WAS RUBBISH OR JUST SEEMED SUDDEN AND NOT FITTING WITH THE PLOT. IT'S A FEW DAYS AFTER THE LAST CHAPTER, THE PLAN WON'T BE REVEALED FOR OBVIOUS REASONS BUT PLEASE PLEASE LET ME KNOW YOUR THOUGHTS AND FEELINGS FOR THE CHAPTER. I DON'T WANT TO CONFUSE YOU AND THERE'S A REASON WHY WE DON'T KNOW WHAT THE BOYS ARE THINKING. SO I'M REALLY NERVOUS ABOUT THIS CHAPTER. BUT IT'S NEEDED SO WE CAN FINALLY GET TO THAT PART OF REVENGE- THE SENSE OF FOREBODING AND OMINOUS SENSE IS MEANT TO BE THERE. I'M WORRIED. DON'T HATE ME. DON'T KILL ME. BEAR WITH ME MY LOVES. STAY SAFE AND ENJOY! AND AGAIN- HONESTLY LET ME KNOW!!)

When life is uncertain, scary, or daunting remember you're not alone. That there are people in the world feeling the same as you, experiencing things that we can't envision or imagine- that whatever we suffer with, somewhere out there pains just the same or more. That you're never alone. That we're all looking at the same sky and living in the same world.

Borahae! 💜💜💜

PurpleQueenie <3