"A very nice gem you have there."

Yoongi stopped breathing. Someone, a woman, judging by the voice, was there with him. He couldn't see her or know exactly where she was, but his ears placed her between the kitchen and the living room, so he looked in that direction, trying to discern something in the darkness.

"Where is all that confidence you had?" Yoongi didn't know if the question was rhetorical or if it was really directed at him. In any case, he was silent. "You were quite talkative before. I will have to force the words out of you then."

Before he was fully aware of it, Yoongi was speaking. "Who you are?"

"Wrong question." The voice said with an amused tone. "The right question is: why am I here?"

"To screw up my existence." He answered without thinking, causing the voice to burst into laughter.

Yoongi tried to follow the direction of the voice, but something quite complicated it was. Every time she spoke, it was as if she got inside his head and resonated inside him. With slow steps, he detached himself from the door, skipping a little when the keys fell from the lock and echoed in the house's silence.

"You are quite funny, boy." At that moment the shadow became visible. She was sitting on the windowsill with her legs crossed one over the other, but that's all he could see; the darkness and the fact that it was a shadow made it difficult for him to distinguish any other features. "But you're right. That is our job. And you're our target."

Our job. Was there one more shadow right now? Was she distracting him so that others would seize the opportunity to hurt him? He looked from side to side, tried to see if there was anyone else with them.

"Just relax. It's just you and me. No one is going to interrupt us, at least for now." The shadow spoke in a soft tone, as if it had read his mind. Although it wouldn't have been difficult to figure it out either, Yoongi hadn't been very subtle.

"Why me? Why now of all time?"

"The correct question is: since when?"

Ah, that was easy to answer. "Since two years ago."

"You're wrong." Yoongi frowned at the answer. "We have been close to you since you gained your gem, but you were never aware of our presence until recently, as you have said."

"You have not answered my other question. Why me?" strangely his voice did not tremble once, although on the inside it was the opposite.

"In this world, there are things that are right and others that are wrong." The shadow began. "Similarly, if there is light, there will also be darkness. We are creatures that belong to that darkness; we sow chaos and feed on the hatred, pain and despair of others. Therefore, you are not our only target, but one of many. A very interesting one."

"Interesting? Is that why you don't leave me alone?," He asked incredulously.

"We have been with the aim since it gets its gem, but it cannot see us until the end." The shadow answered after a pause.

"Until the end? Do you mean when they are about to die? "

Those memories returned to his memory of the night that he had woken up because of a nightmare, memories of a night in the bathroom, memories of when he was about to end everything. Suddenly, he wanted to cry, because if what this shadow was telling him was true, he was about to die. He was going to die at the hands of the shadows and no one would know, because they would surely make it look like a suicide.

"Is that why you are here? To kill me?" He couldn't contain the tremor in his voice. It terrified him. All of this was surreal and real at the same time.

"Others maybe, but not me. I only came out of curiosity, to confirm a suspicion." The shadow answered calmly.

"Are you satisfied with what you have found?"

"Actually, I'm surprised and even more curious than before." She answered. "But my suspicions are not confirmed yet."

"Are you going to let me live to find out?" He asked sarcastically.

"That does not depend on me, I just follow orders. But I admit your case is interesting enough to make an exception." She said while tilting her head slightly. "Did you know that when you dream of a light it means your soulmate is very close?"

At the mention of his soulmate, Yoongi visibly tensed. He didn't know exactly why, since he was the first to insist that he didn't want to meet her. But knowing that the light that protected him at night belonged to his soul mate made him feel strange things inside.

"The colour of that light corresponds to the colour of your soulmate's gem." She informed him. "It doesn't happen to everyone, but it is not unusual for them to dream of that light either." The woman continued as she lowered herself slowly to stand up. "What is strange, and very rare, is that this light can repel our... Invasions, attacks, whatever you want to call it. My colleagues are confused because they do not understand what is happening."

"Clearly, your presence shows tonight could not protect me." He said swallowing dry.

"Understandably, you are surrounded by negative energy." She replied as she spread her arms to encompass the entire room. "And you haven't met yet." He said lowering his arms. "But despite all the factors against you, your soulmate is trying to help you. Don't you notice it? I'm sure your gem has calmed down."

He was right. His gem was no longer cold but emitted a certain pleasant, almost imperceptible heat. Yoongi opened the palm of his hand and gazed in fascination at the faint pink light emitting from his gem.

Yoongi looked up at the woman. "How have you...?"

"It's all about energy." She answered. "I am in a higher rank than the creatures that have been harassing you. Let's say I'm their boss. I have certain abilities that they do not possess, so they have sent me their concerns about that light in your dreams." With slow steps, the woman approached him but still could not distinguish her features.

"Min Yoongi." The woman spoke his name slowly, as if savouring each syllable. "I have certain personal reasons that are more important than my work, and that leads me to think that perhaps your case is the key to finding what I have been looking for so long. So I'll let you go."

Yoongi was silent for a few moments, waiting for the woman to elaborate more, but she didn't. "And that's it? Do you expect me to believe that you will let me go so easily? What are you putting your job on the line for whatever it is you are looking for? You've lost your mind if you think I'm going to believe your lies."

"Listen to me well, young man." The woman said in a threatening whisper. "If I wanted to, I could kill you before you could blink, without touching you and without entering your mind, but you serve me more alive than dead. We both benefit from this: you live and I find what I'm looking for. It's that simple."

Yoongi nodded as best he could. He would be lying if he said that the woman's words hadn't freaked him out further yet. The atmosphere was more stuffy than before and the temperature in the room had dropped, of that he was sure. After a few moments, he heard the woman take a deep breath and speak to him in a softer tone.

"Listen carefully to what I'm going to tell you because I don't have time to repeat it." She waited for Yoongi to make an affirmative gesture to continue. "I am here to confirm whether you are a threat to our plans, so my subordinates are waiting for my signal to pounce on you. I was telling the truth when I told you I was going to let you live, but it has to be on my terms, or they will never leave you alone."

Yoongi never imagined making a deal with precisely the creatures that tortured him, but this time the woman in front of him was the one with the upper hand. Furthermore, she had the power to end his life in an instant, and he had nothing to defend himself with if the case came. "What conditions?"

"When I go, the others will come for you. At first, they will try to scare you, they like to play with their prey before finishing with it. So take advantage of that time to lock yourself in the bathroom and ask your friends for help, they will ..."

"Wait, I can't get my friends into this!" He interrupted as he shook his head.

"Listen to me! It's all about energy. Your friends are attached to their soul mates, so they cannot harm them, they will flee the moment they notice the energy of their gems. God, they've done an excellent job keeping you from learning the basics." The last sentence was spoken in a barely audible whisper.

"What?"

"Nothing. Do you understand what I have told you?," Yoongi was quick to nod. "Very good, one other thing. When you're in the bathroom, you're going to hear things. Ignore them and, above all, never drop your gem, whatever you hear and feel what you feel, okay?"

"Agreed."

With a nod, the woman turned around.

"Wait!" Yoongi reached out his hand to stop her, but regretted it at the last moment for fear that she would send him flying. "What do I do next?"

"Live." She replied. "When all this happens, you will never hear from the shadows again, not even from me. After this, everything you see will be the product of your own fears and insecurities."

Yoongi watched the woman walk to the window where she stopped to look at him over her shoulder one last time.

"Take care, Min Yoongi."

After that, all hell broke loose in his house, just as the woman had assured that it would happen. It was as if his house had turned into a great black hole that only absorbed shadows. They were going from one place to another, on the floor, on the ceiling, and even through the air, messing up and destroying everything around him while laughing at how scared he was.

Wasting no more time, he went to the bathroom and closed the door and then locked it. Outside the pitched battle continued, which had now moved to the kitchen, from where plates and glasses could be heard falling.

With panic in his body, Yoongi took the mobile from his pocket with his right hand to call Jin while with his left he clung to his gem, as the woman had showed. After the fourth tone, which seemed eternal to Yoongi, Jin answered.

"Yoongi?" The concern in Jin's voice was clear even with all the surrounding noise, but to Yoongi it was music right now.

"Hyung ..."

"Yoongi, are you okay?"

Yoongi couldn't help it and burst into tears, albeit silently because even surrounded by so much chaos, he didn't want to be a bother to his friends. On the other end of the line, Jin kept calling his name, asking him if he was okay. He could hear Namjoon and the others in the distance, probably asking if something had happened.

"Hyung ... They've come back. The shadows have returned." He finally said between sobs.

"The...? Shit! We're coming now, Yoongi. Hold on, please hold on."

This story belongs to @nometoloko on AO3. I'm just her translator.

Surprise update. This is the only thing that makes me feel better. Hope you like it.