warning: character death, violence

"why leave so early? i thought you guys wanted to see me."

jungkook immediately halted his sprint and catches jimin doing the same in his peripheral. with tensed shoulders, the two slowly turned their heads back to see who it was.

the younger felt his heart get heavier when he saw him, the man behind taehyung's disappearance and the man who took them here. his head was peeking out from behind the doorway of the room they just managed to get out of, which concluded that the pair didn't exactly run as far down the corridor as they thought they had.

a creepy grin was stretched across the man's oddly pale face. chills then shot down jungkook's spine as the realization of something dawned on him.

was he in the room with us the entire time?

jimin seemed to have thought the same thing because he soon looked up at jungkook with the most horrified expression he has ever seen on the older male. the ravenette didn't need to ask in order to know that he probably also has that same expression on his own face.

"ah, that reminds me, i never introduced myself. i am kim daehyun, pleasure meeting you," the man spoke up, temporarily bringing jungkook and jimin out of their terrified states. "you both want to see taehyung, no?"

jungkook's breath hitched at the question. he opened his mouth to reply but instantly closed it at the confusion of why this daehyun guy is offering to bring them to his captive. "w-will you actually bring us to see him?" he asked with a dry throat.

"of course~" daehyun happily responded with a tilt of his head, that disturbing smile still plastered on his lips. "after all, he wants to see you too."

after a moment of hesitation, jimin and jungkook followed the man back into the room they woke up in. the man flipped a switch and dim lights emitted the room, revealing multiple outlines of doors that the students obviously failed to notice in the darkness.

the culprit walked over to the door situated in the middle of the wall on the right and tapped on it a couple of times. jungkook watched with furrowed eyebrows and tightened fists as the door proceeded to slowly slide open, revealing another room that was pitch black.

"and here you are," the man announced before flipping presumably another light switch.

one by one, the rows of lights in that room orderly turned on in a sequence, from the front rows to the back rows — huge spotlight in the center was the last light to be switched on. jungkook felt the air being knocked out of him as the brightness shone down on someone situated on a chair right below the spotlight.

"taehyung!"

jimin's shout was the first thing jungkook heard, followed by the loud maniacal laughter of the perpetrator next to them. jungkook didn't think twice before hurriedly running over to the weakened body of the lavender-haired boy and dreadfully knelt down.

"t-tae," jungkook cried out, voice cracked and eyes tearing up. through the rapid beating of his heart, he managed to hear jimin's sobs in the background.

"tae, please wake up," jungkook pleaded, shaking the elder by his shoulders and freezing when he found blood on his retracted hands. "tae!" he exclaimed, glancing back up and spotting fat bruises and wounds underneath the torn parts of his shirt. "f-fuck, please just open your eyes. please. please let me know that you're okay, please wake up and tell me that you're still here. please. i beg of you, tae, please tell me that you'll never leave me."

please, god.

"a melancholic reunion is always a lovely sight," daehyun commented with a dreamy sigh, which caused more sobs to come out of jimin's mouth. "although i must admit, i might've taken it out on taehyung a bit too roughly. but what can i say? he deserved to go through the same pain i did when he ran away because of his whore of a mother," he added sadistically.

hearing this made jungkook beyond infuriated. quickly pushing himself back up onto his feet, he stomped over to the chuckling man and punched him square in the jaw, hard.

the man grunted, reeling back from the force of the hit and lifting a hand up to the area of impact. "tsk, you bitch," he smirked, eyes seemingly growing larger and reflecting pure insanity. "you'll regret that," he declared lowly and reached behind his back to pull out a gun.

jungkook's blood ran cold. fuck.

pointing the gun right at the younger, daehyun tilted his head exaggeratingly to the left side so much that it looked like it was going to snap any second now. jimin gasped and his whole being stopped functioning in absolute fear.

"hey, jeon jungkook, i have a question for you before you die," he began with a smile. "why do you love taehyung so much?"

"a heartless monster like you would never understand even if i explained," jungkook retorted with a growl.

the man shook his head in mock disappoint at the lad's answer. "do all kids nowadays have such a bad mouth?" he questioned but wasn't expecting a reply.

it was at this moment that the sound of a chair creaking suddenly echoed throughout the room, bringing the conversation and cries to an end as they stayed nothing but cautious.

"hngh, k-kook."

taehyung!

jungkook's eyes widened as he directly looked over to where taehyung was to see him gradually stirring awake. "tae!" he said in relief as he momentarily forgot about the pistol aimed at him and was already running over to the boy who was half-awake.

"keep your eyes on the enemy, jeon."

a click was heard, followed by a bang, then the sound of something — or rather, someone — falling over, and then came an agonizing ear-splitting scream.

jungkook reopened his eyes which he instinctively closed at the piercing sounds and with trembling hands, carefully turned his body around.

that's when jungkook felt his world shatter for the second time within a week.

"j-jimin!" he screamed, unable to properly process the view of the bloodied body of jimin laying on the ground just a few inches in front of him. "no! you fucking bastard!" he growled in anger whilst all he could see was red.

his blood boiled inside him as he lunged towards a somewhat stunned daehyun, possibly from the shock of killing someone who he didn't intentionally want to kill — in other words, missing his target.

"you damn motherfucker! you fucking killed him," jungkook hissed, grabbing the man by the collar and throwing him onto the ground roughly, effectively causing the gun to slip out of his hold and land somewhere else in the room. jungkook didn't care about the gun, because in his rage and fury, all his could think about was murdering daehyun.

in came one punch to daehyun's stomach.

this isn't enough.

then another two punches to his abdomen.

this is still not enough.

the next blow was to his face.

he hurt taehyung.

one punch went to his jaw again, and the other went to his once perfectly-shaped nose.

he killed jimin.

with unstable and heavy breaths, he glared down at daehyun's now distorted face and dropped him harshly back onto the cement ground. the younger's eyes then moved away from his victim and trailed over to where the pistol ended up.

he needs to die.

but the gun... was right under taehyung's feet.

taehyung was now fully awake as well despite his head being hung down. he got up from the seat with a little stumble and bent down, picking up the gun with his thin fingers and looking back up.

jungkook somehow felt all the anger go away when his eyes met those familiar brown ones. but the only thing missing was that the once shining pair of caramel orbs now appeared dull, almost lifeless.

"t-taehyung... you're awake," jungkook breathed out, unable to move a single step.

taehyung's eyes lingered on jungkook for a while before it trailed over to jimin's corpse on the floor, and then over to the writhing man behind jungkook.

taehyung frowned, glancing back down at the gun in his hand.

"taehyung, please give me the gun," jungkook tries to calmly say.

the older lad considered it for a bit but ended up shaking his head in denial. "you did enough, jungkook," he mumbled, voice hoarse from the days of dehydration. "thank you."

taehyung pulled on a weak smile before he cocked the gun and raised it, pointing it straight at the groaning daehyun who was still on the ground, unable to get up due to the pain racking over his body.

jungkook's head hurt at the sight of taehyung, the kim taehyung, holding a gun, preparing to shoot his own father.

just before he pulled the trigger, jungkook swore he saw something akin to sadness flash prominently in the elder's darkened irises.

"die."