Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“There are violets in your eyes

There are guns that blaze around you

There are roses in between my thighs and fire that surrounds you

It's no wonder every man in town had neither fought nor found you.”

26^th March, 2017 | 11:52pm | Apartment 3B, Red Light Sector

Yoongi pulls on the silk black collar around his neck, sleeves already unbuttoned and folded to his elbows, to loosen it somewhat. A little bit behind him, Hoseok clutches the older man’s suit jacket in the room’s crooning shadow, eyeing him with caution as he creases the velvet black material with tight concern in his grip.

A low murmur of a simmering liquid serenades the room, as all three people present in the moonlit room wait.

Hoseok waits with unbreakable attention, Yoongi waits with hot impatience and…

“You’re a fucking idiot, you know that, Junghee?”

Junghee waits with understandable fear.

Everybody, this side of the city and the other, has heard the horror stories that surround traitors and assailants against the Mariposa gang in the Red-Light sector: how people go missing, along with organs, limbs or facial features depending on who’s doing it and what sort of mood they’re in. 

It’s rare for the boss to take care of the assholes himself, but Yoongi easily made an exception this time.

A smile of twisted amusement disturbs Yoongi’s face and he tsks at the man, leaning back against the solid black marble countertop of his victim’s apartment. It’s a nice place, far, far too nice for someone in his position and, really, Yoongi could’ve taken one look at this place and known that he was a snitch. There’s no way any sort of pathetic brawns of a mobster could afford somewhere this fancy. It was compensation for risking so much.

Yoongi hopes it was nice while it lasted. The man would need a lot of compensation for the risk that had materialised in his joke of a life tonight.

“Trying to bring down my gang with, what? A little bit of poorly guarded information?”

He makes no move to say anything – not that he could anyway with the dish rag stuffed in his mouth – instead, opting to stare Yoongi down angrily. A façade. Yoongi can sense his fear. He can see the tips of his fingers tremoring. His smile widens.

“It certainly amused me. It amused me so much that I called up my little brother and said to him ‘Jungkookie, don’t bother cutting out this sorry motherfucker’s tongue. I’ll do it myself.’”

Junghee’s muscles tighten against the restraints. He gulps. Yoongi adores the way they jitter and tremble under his skin.

“But then I thought, no, I can’t cut out his tongue. Do you know why?”

Silence.

“Because then how can I find out where this pesky little piece of information’s went? And I’m not stupid, I know you’re not going to tell me. You wouldn’t be able to face your gang again would you?”

Yoongi nods, answering the question for himself before he rounds the marble counter, walking towards the large silver cooking pot with an out-of-place sense of composure.

“Of course not. So, that’s why I’m gonna help you out with that.”

Junghee’s eyes widen curiously. Hope. Yoongi thinks he sees a miniscule spec of hope in his eyes. It’s laughable. In another situation, maybe, Yoongi would feel slightly bad for it – or at least Hoseok would tell him he should – but not now. Not when his body’s almost shaking with anger - and a sick sense of thrill.

“I’m going to make sure they wouldn’t even recognise you if you tried,” he says gently, as if he hadn’t just unleashed the revelation of most pretty boys such as Junghee’s worst nightmare.  

Junghee is pretty. He has big brown eyes, a small, high-bridged nose, beautifully thin lips and perfectly fixed copper hair. Or at least it was – now it pertains much closer to being restlessly dishevelled. Like he’d been dragged from one place to another with much protest (Yoongi doesn’t need to wonder why.) Furthermore, he’s got a faultless, doll-like complexion. Smooth, smooth skin that sets a jolt of eagerness through Yoongi’s veins like a lovesick artist before a fresh canvas,

But, really, had he not turned out to be a dick, he would’ve been the exact sort of boy Yoongi would’ve normally went for. It was a shame. But looking at it in perspective, perhaps Yoongi’s night is going to be even more fun than it would’ve been had he met Junghee under different circumstances.

He snaps his fingers at Hoseok who drapes the suit jacket over a solid-wood dining chair and hands Yoongi a small jar. He takes it in hand, thick leather glove making it slightly more awkward to hold than he cares for, before sneaking a knowing glance at Junghee who’s ascended the state of fear – right into complete horror.

“You like coffee, right? Everyone with an ounce of decency in them does,” Yoongi says casually, his tone conveying nothing more than an absentminded hustle of small talk; which entirely contrasts with the look of outright wickedness on his face.

He scans the label of the jar in his hand with a disapproving gaze.

“This is the sorta type that tastes burnt, you shouldn’t drink this.” He says seriously, lips curling downwards in partial disgust. He should’ve known that the prick had no taste, “Of course,” he adds slowly, devilish smile creeping back, “perhaps it’s fitting for the moment.”

Yoongi lifts the heavy metal lid off of the cooking pot and steps back from the overwhelming heat that erupts in steam when he does.

“I’ve never used this brand, obviously, so I don’t know how much you put in it… but…”

They both watch the entire content of the jar pour and dissolve in the pot. Yoongi drifts back towards Junghee, crouching to maintain proper eye contact as Hoseok stirs the concoction with a large metal spoon.

“You look tired. Caffeine would be great right now, wouldn’t it?”

Junghee likely tries to disagree but the sound comes out as nothing but a gargle. Yoongi nods.

“That’s what I thought.”

Yoongi holds out his hand, “Hoseok, if you would…” and he grins when he feels the heat of the heavy kitchen utensil even through the leather.

“Did your mom ever tell you to be careful with these because they get hot easily?” Yoongi now asks, dragging close with the spoon propped sturdily in one hand, the other, gloveless, and hovering above the end of it. The heat from it is quite surprising. This is the first time Yoongi’s done this with kitchen utensils, making it a little more interesting than the other times, he supposes. He’s not a fan of blood, way too messy, too pungent. He’s here to make the mess, not clean up, so if he’s gonna be doing something himself, he makes sure that it’s virtually mess-less. As mess-less as torture can be, naturally.

Junghee makes another noise, but Yoongi doubts he was answering his question anyway.

“Mine didn’t. She was too busy getting shitfaced and burning me with half-smoked cigarettes when she felt like it to worry about something stupid like that.” Yoongi tilts his head at him, “It explains a lot, doesn’t it?”

More muffled sounds.

“It’s okay. We’ll both learn that lesson right now.”

Yoongi places the tip of the utensil on Junghee’s bare knee, them having already stripped him down to his underwear much earlier - it made everything a lot easier later on – and he almost chuckles at the agonising scream that barely escapes past the rag.  

Tears threaten at the man’s eyes as Yoongi says, “Hey, I’m teaching you a valuable life lesson!”

As Hoseok sets down the cooking pot beside him Yoongi begins to wonder what will happen. He’s burnt people before, of course, using a variety of methods. But this is the first time he’s thought of using boiling coffee from water in a cooking pot.

He keeps hoping that someday he’ll see something more than just swelling and peeling skin because that gets old rather quickly. Seokjin keeps telling him that you can’t exactly melt skin, but that doesn’t deter him from wanting to try it.

Yoongi puts the large spoon back into the pot, swirling it around languidly as he looks Junghee in his petrified pretty eyes.

“I’m hoping we’ll at least see some bodily fluids leaking out from the burns but I’m not sure what temperature we’re at. You don’t have a thermometer, do you?”

Yoongi’s colleagues (for lack of a better word) often tell him how fucked up it is that he talks to the people he’s threatening like this, but what they don’t understand is that he has to keep up appearances of being a psychotic-ass bastard in order to keep his gang on top. People wouldn’t have the same level of fear of him if he just slit a few throats and moved on.

Hoseok, at least, gets that. In fact, he understands that so well that he also understands that Yoongi could go overboard at any second. So, he watches attentively lest the older man tries to light the place on fire again. That was a lot messier than it needed to be. Yoongi tries to keep that in mind as focuses again on Junghee.

And, the result is slightly disappointing at first.

Yoongi pours some of the pot over Junghee’s head, and the skin on his face and torso swells and reddens and blisters in time to the excruciating cries that creep from his mouth like it always does but it’s disappointing.

“Hoseok, hold his head back.”

Yoongi rips the rag out of his mouth, immediately clamping it over with his hand as he sharply tells him to shut the fuck up before he does cut his fucking tongue out.

“Okay, Junghee. In about six seconds I am going to dump this entire thing down your throat until you pass out from pain or drown. You have until then to tell me where the info is.”

One.

Junghee shakes and yells and whimpers because Yoongi’s one bare hand is now making contact with the very fresh and painful burns on the skin around his mouth - but it’s fruitless.

Two.

Yoongi is staring back at him with a bored expression. This is the part he hates: waiting.

Three.

Hoseok’s hand taps the wood of the dining seat, impatiently.

Four.

Junghee stops resisting.

Five.

Yoongi grins.

Six.

He lifts his hand from his mouth. Hoseok lets go of his head.

“It’s not here. I don’t have it.”

Yoongi’s smile drops. Crashes to the floor, angrily.

“You… don’t have it?” He repeats, voice thick with malice suddenly, chasing the faux-casualness that was presence before hauntingly.

“No! But, I-“

“Hoseok,” Yoongi gestures to his friend, and the man pulls his head back again.

“Wait- I’ll tell you who does!”

Yoongi takes the large utensil into his hand again, hovering it right above a particularly nasty burn on Junghee’s right cheek. His face isn’t pretty anymore. Yoongi feels a certain sense of achievement from being the cause of that.

“Speak.”

Junghee swallows.

“Th-there’s a kid. Down in a nightclub not far from here. H-he’s got all of it on a pen drive.”

With Junghee himself being clearly young, he briefly wonders just exactly how young this boy must be for him to call him a ‘kid.’ Yoongi and Hoseok exchange unspecific glances.

“A pen drive,” Yoongi drawls, grip tightening on the utensil as he holds it near Junghee’s cheek. Never in all his years has he heard of a gang keeping crucial information on one pen drive in a dingy little club. With a kid, no less.

His blood is starting to heat up. Boil, to fit tonight’s theme. “I hate liars, Junghee. You undoubtedly should know that by now.”

He shrugs against the rope, ineffectively, “I’m not lying!”

Junghee’s chest puffs in and out like he can’t quite get enough air in it. Maybe he made the restraints too tight. Regardless, Yoongi continues to eye him with a bored expression.

“I c-can prove it. My text messages. Check my phone- the texts …”

Yoongi agitatedly waves Hoseok off with a roll of his eyes to collect the phone from the man’s jacket, partially ripped and thrown onto the floor. Yoongi keeps firm eye contact with Junghee. Many times in the past have people tried to fool him like this: telling him fake information to try and save their ass. It never works; Yoongi kills them no matter what they say, because nobody that falls into Yoongi’s hands is a good person. And bad people don’t deserve mercy. But all humans thrive on hope, he guesses.

However, there’s something unmistakeably genuine in Junghee’s eyes. Fear. And that makes Yoongi want to consider believing him.

“Password?” Hoseok asks, and Junghee tries to twist his head to look at him, but Yoongi grips his jaw and pins it right back to his direction.

“Zero, three, two, six,” he spits, staring Yoongi down like he had earlier in the evening – before the ugly burns. Earlier the look had sent an approving shiver down Yoongi’s spine, lips quirking upwards. Now he just feels irritated.

0326. Hoseok punches it in, fingers tapping and scrolling until he comes to stand beside Yoongi, handing him the device, and taking the metal spoon from him, carefully, by the plastic handle.

The latest (and only) message on it is from a ‘M.S.H.’ and Yoongi’s eyebrow quirks at it.

Moon Seonghyeon. Leader of the Syndicate. Probably sitting on his insignificant ‘throne’ in the Crescent Sector now, sneering or barking at something. He’s a disgusting excuse of a man, of a mob boss. Picking fights with weaker gangs and innocent people just to make himself feel powerful.

That’s not what a rebellion group should do. It’s the fucking ‘government’ that are the ones they should all be fighting against. The assholes that break up families and take money from the poor and beat down any sign of resistance. The ones in Amenity and the Highway Districts, the Desolation District. They’re the real bad guys.

And if he has to kill off a couple of low-life mobsters from a rival gang of bastards with sticks up their asses and blind hatred in their eyes just to get a chance at being able to reach the asshole in charge of this wasteland of a city – then so be it.

Yoongi takes a breath to focus on the current situation. He needs the information out of their hands if he doesn’t want to be end up completely transparent and targetable. A number of messages flood his screen when he taps onto it, the latest ones detailing to go straight to a so-called Étoile in the Galaxy Club on Ruby Street, Red Light Sector and get them to hand over the pen drive, to take to their HQ in the Crescent. At the very bottom, there’s a threat that if he gets caught, he should not mention anything about the location of the information or the mission in general or Moon will personally cut his dead body into tiny pieces and feed them to his fucking dogs.

“Well? What d’you think, Yoons?”

Yoongi’s eyes flicker up to Hoseok, his irises almost glowing in the dark of the room.

“I think he might be telling the truth.”

Junghee sighs with relief, “I am. God, thank you for believing me I-“

Yoongi cuts him off with a sharp laugh.

“Why are you thanking me?” he scoffs, “You’re not getting out of shit.” Junghee’s mouth falls open, “Nothing’s changed; you still stole our information, did you not?" He questions rhetorically, "And, hell, I heard you like to steal things often: money, valuables – from people's homes and shit, right? Do you like stealing from innocent people?”

“I-“

“Well do you know what I like?” Yoongi continues, cutting the asshole off, “Punishing people like you.”

Yoongi hands Hoseok back the phone, picking up the cooking pot with ease in his gloved hand and smiling cordially. He sees his friend’s mouth form a thin line and he can almost hear the ‘you’re getting weird again.'  Yoongi lets his eyes drift to Hoseok, winking at him mockingly before he turns back to the matter at hand.

“Pl-please, I-“

Yoongi shifts to stand at Junghee’s side, holding his head back himself and grinning maniacally down at him.

“No pleading. There’s nothing you can do to save yourself.”

All he has to do is wait for the right opportunity.

“I told you everything I know! Mi-“

Before he can even finish his name, Yoongi takes his open mouth as an invitation, jarring it open with the rim of the pot and pouring. Pouring. Pouring. Pouring. Screams of pain getting stuck and mangled in the poor man’s throat, his throat getting mangled. Gargling of blood and oh that’s what happens. Blood. Lots and lots blood piling up in his mouth. Yoongi watches it mix with the dark brown liquid from the pot and maybe he overkilled it a little with the amount he made because when Yoongi pinches Junghee’s nose with his other hand, no longer needing to hold his head back because the force of the pot is just fine, it only takes a minute or so for the struggle to slowly come to a halt. Junghee’s prying hands fall by his sides. Blood pouring out of his mouth along with a disgusting concoction of coffee and saliva and what looks to be pus.

Yoongi drops the pot with a large clank on the hard-stoned floor.

“Hoseok, call somebody to help clean up the mess,” his nose twitches at the sight of what he did after getting too carried away. Blood. Yoongi despises blood. He takes off his glove and throws it into the pot, low-heeled shoes clicking across the floor as he goes to collect his jacket from the dining chair Hoseok had draped it over.

“Are you sure you killed him?”

Yoongi gives him a long look over his shoulder.

“If I didn’t, make sure to wake him up and tell him it’s his lucky day.”

Hoseok looks shocked, “And let him go?”

A chuckle trickles out from his lips. It’s cynical and heavy, like something thick and toxic’s mixed in with it.

“No,” he says. “Kill him.”

He leaves Hoseok in the apartment, a faint smile on the younger man’s face in a fond sort of way that wouldn’t make sense to anybody but them.

Yoongi reaches for his own phone in the tight pocket of his leather pants and fuck, it’s too hot for those. He made a huge mistake. He scrolls down his contacts and presses ‘call’ before holding the device to his ear.

“Hyung, wanna come help me ruin someone’s night?”

Contrast to what Yoongi said earlier about being in Mariposa ‘for the greater good’, he’d be lying if he said he didn’t enjoy things like this a little too much.

27^th March, 2017 | 12:47am | The Galaxy Club, Ruby St, Red Light Sector

“Have you made a reservation, sir?”

Ruby Street itself is dark and dirty looking even with the searing neon lights with tacky words and lettering plastered on buildings. In Korean, in English, in every language that could maybe draw the right kind of attention.

It’s a street packed with twenty-odd businesses, each stuck crushingly beside each other, save for a few allies and turn-ins. Bars, clubs, brothels, drug dens. Any criminal at all in the Red Light Sector that had enough resources to set up somewhere, set up somewhere around this street. He supposes the distractions made it the perfect place to hide some stolen information. If it wasn’t for a snitch with a loose mouth (even looser now) and the fact that the owners of said information’s building was a few short blocks away.

The Syndicate always have been a gang of idiots.

“We don’t need one,” Yoongi says firmly, “Min.”

It’s been months since Yoongi’s done any job like this himself. So, hearing his name come back to him leaves a weird taste in his mouth. A bad taste, a feeling that it shouldn't even be his to say, because he hadn't been the one to say it all those years he'd grown up. 

When they'd taken over the gang, Yoongi had passingly expressed his distaste at it and Hoseok had suggested they all used nicknames, instead- Spanish words to fit with the gang name.

Yoongi quickly told him to wise the fuck up, he did not want to have his gang sound like a team of Spanish pro-wrestlers. There’s some strange trend going about Seoul that involves everyone using random words collected from other languages when naming things. He guesses the kid they’re after with the pen drive is one of them. Yoongi thinks owning a gang with one of those names is bad enough, but he can only blame his late father for that one.

Mariposa. It translates to butterfly- and though it's a symbol that he's rarely to never seen referenced, he's sure there's poetic connotations in it somewhere. But his father never told him them. He said it 'just sounded right.' 

It would surprise Yoongi that the bouncer hadn’t recognised him, considering in the North of Seoul his face was plastered on just about every lamppost with the writing ‘any sighting of this man in the Northern Districts must be reported immediately to your nearest police station.’ And in the South, people either knew his face because they worked for someone who worked for someone who worked for him, or because they worked for someone who worked for someone who worked against him.

And of course, he’s got Hoseok in his gang – a national treasure in the eyes of the public for his high reputation as a performer and his 'upbeat personality.'

It’s amazing what people choose to ignore based on their observations that ‘they seem nice.’

Regardless, though, it would surprise him any other time, but, right now Yoongi isn’t too shocked because the mask covering the lower half of his face probably makes him a little hard to distinguish in the low, red lighting, anyway.

Besides, the man’s eyes light up right away when he uses his name, which is, again, hardly astounding considering his gang runs the entire Southwest of the city, never mind the Red Light Sector. Seokjin huffs beside him, clearly thinking that Yoongi’s ego needs re-checked as he adjusts the pale pink bomber jacket adorning his broad shoulders.

Yoongi swears that Hoseok and Seokjin have started a rebellion against him to embarrass the gang with their clothing choices (judging by the blue sequin suit jacket Hoseok’d been wearing earlier.) It’s not even the pink that bothers him – it’s the fact he’s wearing a black t-shirt and skinny jeans with it. He looks like a college student.

“Shit, sorry, sir – wh-who was it that you wanted to see?”

Yoongi removes the mask from his mouth, slipping it just under his chin, “Étoile,” he says in a mediocre French accent. Yoongi wonders what it means. French is a language he never bothered to learn. They don’t need to communicate much with the outside world. He knows Korean, enough English and the Spanish that his father taught him before he died. The man had a flair for languages, thought it was necessary for someone in his power, but Spanish was always his favourite.

Yoongi scowls at the memory.

The man nods nervously, taking out something that looks similar to a walkie talkie but with more advanced features and unnecessary lights, and quickly informs the person on the other side that ‘Étoile has a visitor.’

His French is noticeably better.

The man he'd been talking to arrives at the entrance, and leads them down a narrow, sweat-scented hallway that seems to have a level of fog crowding it. Yoongi’s used to this sort of environment, from the amount of dealings that have taken place in them, but this is the first time he’s been here. The lighting continues with the dark, reddish theme that Yoongi supposes comes from the name of the sector – and the only proper illumination in the corridor is a large neon pink sign depicting the words ‘The Galaxy Club’ across the wall. Yoongi’s mouth twitches in disapproval at the name, but at least it’s not in a random language.

The man stops outside a deep mahogany door that looks surprisingly fancy for the club. He turns around and Yoongi notices a bead of sweat on his forehead.

“This is the dressing room. The boy you’re looking for’s in there. We can’t let you into any of the bedrooms without a reservation- so.”

Yoongi hums, so Étoile’s a boy. Interesting.

“We won’t need it,” Seokjin says dismissively, hand already on the door knob and twisting it before the man can say anything else.

“If you need anything, please-“ They walk in and shut it before he finishes. Yoongi notes how well it blocks out sound. That could come in handy if the kid isn’t willing to play nice.

...Except, the room’s empty when they look around. And it’s not a big room.

There’s some dressing tables housing products upon products, make-up, hair supplies. Yoongi thinks he sees remnants of drugs (a couple of needles, loose powder, ripped plastic baggies) and that doesn’t surprise him, saying people like Seokjin like to supply to places like this a lot.

There’s racks with clothing on them, gaudy, revealing outfits that don’t leave a lot of room for dignity never mind coverage.

There’s a few arm chairs, a rickety looking table, and a small kitchenette with a mini-fridge, sink and two counters.

But there’s no boy.

Not until Yoongi makes a sound of frustration, at the unbelieving fact that they’ve been stood up. Then, two small hands appear from behind the wooden privacy screen at the other end of the room, gripping cautiously onto the edge of it, and then comes the top of a face, eyes blinking slowly.

Yoongi takes one look at him and understands why Junghee called him a kid. God, he looks barely older than Jungkook.

Yoongi would guess that he’s eighteen, maybe nineteen, at best – but it wouldn’t shock him if he was younger, considering that places like this don’t really care about age restrictions.

His cheeks are fairly rounded, tinged with a hint of pink, probably from the warmth of the room and it gives him a youthful sort of look that contrasts strikingly with the chiselled line of his jaw and the piercing, defiant glare of his eyes, ringed very subtly in black eyeliner. Every detail of his face looks somehow carefully considered, as if he was crafted to almost perfection – any ‘flaw’ or unusualness about his appearance only coming together to make him even more… breathtaking.

Yoongi’s sure he feels the air punch out of his lungs for a moment.

His hair glows a warm brown in the sharp lighting of the room, parted messily on his head as he straightens up, seemingly composing himself, and pushes a hand through it, stepping out from behind the screen.

His outfit isn't exactly what he was expecting.

It looks like nothing he’s ever seen on a person of his line of work, nothing on the clothing racks in the room. A long, black and white striped t-shirt drapes down to just below the middle of his thighs that leave a gap of skin exposed before the rest of his legs are covered by plain black knee socks- Yoongi guesses he was in the middle of changing when they walked in.

The only thing typical about his appearance is the thin velvet choker sitting at the bottom of his neck, with a small silver charm on it in the shape of a star.

“Who the fuck are you two?”

Yoongi would be taken aback by the sudden outburst, if he hadn’t heard the words a million times before. It’s a classic line from every self-assured, independent asshole that he’s had the poor misfortune of having to deal with. His jaw clenches slightly.

“Étoile, right?”

He nods, a fire in his gaze that makes heat swim around Yoongi’s body, as if it was emitting from the boy himself.

Seokjin stands stiffly and professionally beside him, but that’s never been Yoongi’s style. No, instead, Yoongi walks right over to Étoile, almost prowling, before he sits breezily on the edge of an armchair, not even a meter away from their target.

“I said," the boy seethes, "who the fuck are you?”

Yoongi lightly snickers at his obvious frustration. It's a raw sort of anger that, at first, he never would've betted could have come from the boy. But he guesses that first impressions are, in many cases, bullshit. 

"We're the people you stole information of." 

Étoile's anger falls flat off his face, replaced with a blank sort of confusion. He cocks his head, arms folded tightly over his chest, "What information? What people?" 

People lying is one thing, but playing stupid is a game that Yoongi never has the patience to participate in. He doesn't feel like getting angry in the presence of such a strikingly beautiful boy, especially one that looks as clueless and young as he is, and he most certainly doesn't feel like having to resort to the same sorts of methods of gathering the truth that he normally does. 

So Yoongi just sighs, crossing his own arms over his chest and looking evenly at the boy. 

"You really don't want to make me angry, I haven't had enough fun tonight yet to make me wanna take my time being nice and patient with you. Tell me where the pen drive is and we won't pull out your fingernails." 

It's an empty threat, but he's the only one in the room who knows it. 

Which is why it's bizarre when Étoile doesn't look scared but enraged again, giving Yoongi a disgusted scan of his figure and spitting, "Who the fuck do you think you are?" at him so venomously, Yoongi wonders if his name's French for a type of snake. 

Yoongi gets up, brushes off his suit jacket and gives his tense frame a small shake. 

"Okay, then," he says, a small smile creeping onto his lips, "we'll do this the fun way." 

In an instant, Yoongi's pinned the kid to the wall, right arm sticking against his windpipe and the other braced against both of his arms. He wedges a leg between Étoile’s and leans in towards his face. 

He doesn't struggle much, just growls in frustration at him and snaps, "I don't know anything about a pen drive, for fuck's sake!" 

Yoongi's eyebrows shoot up mockingly, “Really?" he asks, "Because we’ve got evidence from your bastard leader to suggest otherwise.” His voice is starting to raise to match the boy’s beneath him, just as the annoyance with this whole situation is starting to reach its peak.

“Leader? You mean Joonho? - the club manager?” Étoile murmurs with confusion, nose scrunching up in a way that somehow looks condescending despite the fact that his head’s currently tilted upwards and pressing against the wall – he should look vulnerable or pathetic, like every other  but the spark of wild self-assurance in his glare rinses that out.

“No,” Yoongi pushes on his throat a little and the boy gasps, searing anger audible in it, “I mean Moon Seonghyeon. Your actual boss.”

Étoile’s eyes widen and the anger molds into plain shock. His voice is unexpectedly calm and level when he says, “Fuck, of the Crystal Syndicate? You think I’m involved with those slimy bastards?” The force in Yoongi’s arm quivers for a second at this.

The boy scowls at no one in particular, adverting his eyes to the side of the room instead. “The last time I ran into one of them I got an unwanted ass grab and a torn shirt,” he mutters, tone completely scornful, but Yoongi thinks there’s something slightly embarrassed on his face, cheeks gathering even more colour to them than he noted at first glance.

Yoongi grits his teeth.

“Seokjin, I think we’ve been set up.”

He releases Étoile from his pin and steps back, smoothing out the creases on his jacket again.  He had a feeling this entire time that something was off, but he just keep shrugging it off as paranoia. Junghee could’ve been a fantastic fucking actor.

His goddamn password to his phone, Yoongi noticed at the time, was 0326, today’s date – 26^th March – probably so that he wouldn’t forget the pin in the moment, but Yoongi just put it down to coincidence. The guard at the door was using the hybrid walkie-talkie he’s only ever seen gangsters and rich nine-year-olds use, but, hey, maybe they were moving up from the regular walkie-talkies and just really needed e-mail and browser access for their job. Then, the decent pronunciation of the boy’s name, as if he’d been told how it was supposed to be said (he doubts he could actually speak any French. About five people in this city actually speak a different language) but maybe it was common knowledge and Yoongi was just ignorant. And the last, perhaps most abstract sign, was the fact that Seonghyeon cares far too much about his ugly, inbred mutts to feed them such a worthless person. And the man doesn’t make empty threats, unlike Yoongi.

“What do you want to do, now?” Seokjin asks, leaning idly against the wall as if they hadn’t just landed themselves in the greatest amount of shit Yoongi’s had to deal with in months.

Yoongi crosses the room with a sense of urgency, pulling out his phone from his pocket, “Get everyone together, we need to figure out who the fucker is that we’re looking for,” he dials Hoseok’s number first, hoping to God he did what he asked and didn’t just wander off and leave someone else in charge of clean-up. Seokjin hums in approval, but then his eyes flicker past Yoongi, over his shoulder.

“What about the kid? What if he’s screwing with us, too?”

He eyes the boy he’d had against the wall mere moments ago with caution, watching as he runs a frustrated hand through his hair to smooth it back into place, how he looks at himself in the mirror with something heavy in his gaze. He doubts it, but his assumptions haven't played out too well, tonight.

“We’ll take him with us,” Yoongi says low enough that his voice doesn’t travel any further than to the man in front of him. “Call Joon, ask him to bring a van and a few guys. I don’t think that kid’ll take kindly to this plan.”

Chapter Text

27^th March, 2017 | 5:28am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Yoongi really didn’t expect to have to deal with three fucking interrogations in one night.

It’s 5am now, them having spent the last few hours trying to get their new hostage to shut the hell up while they pushed their resources and allies to work out who they’re looking for. Who really has their stolen information.

Étoile’s turned out to be more of a handful than Yoongi wanted to deal with. Most kids his age would’ve shut down from fear in this situation, he’s sure, but if anything, the brat’s amplified in volume, aggression and ability to irritate.

“Couldn’t you have at least let me change first – goddamnit I hate gangsters-“

Yoongi is sitting silently in his single armchair by the middle window of the open-plan living area - his favourite one, where the moon always shines the brightest - trying to get some financial-based work done that's needed for a meeting tomorrow while he waits for his crew to come back with their target, because there's never 'spare moments' to do this kind of shit as a mob boss and he doesn't trust any lower members to do it and not fuck them over, somehow.

Turns out, it’s Seonghyeon’s very own right-hand man that’s got what they’re looking for. Hoseok was distressed about this (“An eye for a fucking eye, Yoongi- what if they come for me?”) once they discovered this fact through a few measly beatings of low-standing Syndicate members in back alleys of clubs and bars across a couple blocks. Yoongi always wonders why they even hang out in their part of the city, considering how many times they’ve been caught like tonight. But, he supposes it’s probably down to two things: drugs and sex.

In a way, he has people like Seokjin to thank for the former, considering he supplies most of it.

And for the latter... he figures he has people like Étoile to thank for that.

But right now, Yoongi wouldn’t feel like thanking the boy for anything, past his endless fucking ranting and, God, he should’ve gagged him.

Considering Yoongi didn’t do anything to him, he thought he’d be a lot more courteous. Civil at least. But no, the boy sits, knees tucked up to his chest on Yoongi’s best sofa, a silk throw tucked around his legs to keep them covered, cold glass of water gathering condensation on the coffee table untouched, as he glowers and sneers and spits at the older man with significant contempt obvious in all of it. 

At last, Yoongi throws down the stack of files he’d been sifting and making notes on onto the table, almost hitting the boy’s glass as he uncrosses his legs irritably. The loud smack of the sheets makes the boy’s shoulder’s jerk, but the momentary lapse of shock erases almost just as quickly.

“What the fuck do you want me to do, huh? I have no choice here,” Yoongi snaps, hands gripping the sides of his chair to make soft indents into the material, “My gang’s, my own, my friends’ and even the people that work for me’s lives are at stake here. If that information stays in those bastards’ hands long enough we’re all fucked, don’t you get it? So, don’t fucking complain to me that you’re a little pissed off for being taken away from your shitty job for a night because that is the last goddamn thing I care about now, Étoile.”

Yoongi relaxes back into his chair, crossing his leg again with a hefty sigh whilst massaging his forehead, eyes closed. Shit, tonight is just too much.

When he re-opens them, he sees the boy staring at him, no trace of anger as there was before, just a look of vague irritation across his mostly blank expression. “Don’t call me that,” He says.  

Yoongi can barely believe what he’s hearing.

“Don’t call you what? ‘Étoile’? Why? Does it remind you too much of how degrading your job is?” Yoongi taunts, “How many nights you’ve avoided your reflection from the humiliation? It’s your name - what the hell am I supposed to call you?”

Something else flashes across his face, the same look he noticed in the boy’s eyes as he watched himself in the mirror a few hours ago.

“Jimin.”

It echoes.

Yoongi stares, angry words of frustration dissolving on his tongue.

“My name-  it’s Park Jimin,” he clarifies in an almost whisper, hastily adding, “call me that instead.”

For a moment, Yoongi doesn’t say anything. Perhaps an entire minute passes as the two continue to lock eye-contact, barely blinking. The shoddy natural lighting, the blanket, the curled-up form - all suggest a sense of vulnerability about him that Yoongi hadn’t seen since the very moment they’d first made eye contact. He’s just as breathtaking, which he’d practically forgotten entirely through all the venom that was being shot at him through words and looks, but it’s still there. Blindingly apparent.

Yoongi’s heart nearly sympathises with him, out of pity, except he’s not sure what he’s pitiful of. There’s just something buried in the hollow guise he’s seeing now. He almost feels unjustified, overkill with his harshness.

“Alright,” he says, subdued, “fine, Jimin.”

Jimin’s mouth almost, almost quirks upwards. But not enough to say it actually does.

It’s a better name than Étoile, anyway. Yoongi’s pronunciation was getting worse and worse each time he said it.

Neither of them look away until the front door bursts open, Hoseok and Seokjin (followed by the three remaining members of his inner gang: Namjoon, Taehyung and 'Jungkook') waltzing in, gripping onto a bound, sleazy looking man with a red, enraged face. He yells various obscenities at Yoongi as soon as he spots him, whilst his friends push him to kneel on the ground. Jimin is staring out the window, lip being gnawed between his teeth, looking in deep thought. His eyebrows crease together. Yoongi uncrosses his leg from over the other and lets out an exhausted breath. 

Round three. 

"Youngsoo!" Yoongi greets as he rises to his feet in an over-the-top jovial fashion, "Thank you so much for meeting us so early in the morning. I know you need your beauty sleep." 

"Fuck you, Min - you fucking band of kids think you can run over our plans?" Youngsoo barks back at him, but where he should probably feel insulted, he feels an ounce of pride that, yes, that's exactly what this band of kids plan to do. 

Yoongi creeps closer to him, rounding the sofa that Jimin (for the first time tonight) sits silently on. Yoongi’s fingers trail the top of its soft woven cover, and he shrugs. 

"I'll let that one go since you're probably tired. Old men need their naps, don't they?" Yoongi ignores the dark look of rage that floods the man's face, "Don't worry about it- you'll be napping indefinitely in about... ten minutes." 

Yoongi stops just in front of Youngsoo, leans against the sofa and hears sharp rustling behind his back, followed by light footsteps softly padding across the floor. He quirks an eyebrow as Jimin comes to stand beside him, looking down at the bound man with a strong frown on his full lips. 

Heavy silence falls on the room. Yoongi’s gang exchange questionable looks. Youngsoo continues to steadily glare at Yoongi. He’s tired of people glaring at him tonight.

"Hey bastard," Jimin suddenly says in monotone, "do you remember me?" 

Everyone in the room, including Youngsoo, looks to Jimin. The man's unappealing face contorts into a half-thinking one, no less irritated, however. He seemingly doesn't. 

"The Galaxy Club. Two weeks ago." 

Some form of realisation comes into his face then but it doesn't seem to be enough of what Jimin's looking for because he says, "You work there? So, what? - I meet a dozen little whores like you every night. Do you think your special?" 

Jimin's jaw clenches, but then he sighs, a smirk working its way to his lips. 

"Not at all. Likewise, I meet a dozen dirty, unrespectable, tactless, disgusting old men like you every night, too." 

Yoongi notices the faces of his friends grow more and more confused. He puts a hand on Jimin's shoulder, who immediately shrugs him off, snapping "Don't fuckin' touch me. This asshole owes me the satisfaction of kicking his teeth in." 

"And you'll get it," Yoongi says impatiently, yet his face remains completely even and blank. "Once we get our info back, we'll give him what he deserves, trust me." 

"But-"

"Look, kid, I don't know what your fucking deal with this guy is - but this is our problem," Yoongi says, moving towards Hoseok and holding out his hand, palm upwards. He reaches into the waistband of his trousers and takes a simple pistol out, placing it into Yoongi's grip. "You can be the one to shoot him in the head when we're done if you really want, but until then just sit over there and shut up," he points with the gun to the sofa and Jimin's mouth snaps closed immediately. He takes his gaze away from Yoongi and leans against the back of the sofa, staring angrily at Youngsoo. 

"Now, you - my friend - have given us quite a bit of bother tonight," Yoongi says plainly, examining the pistol in his hand with weariness. He's been up for far too many hours to care about theatrics. Get the information, shoot the fucker and try and finish the rest of his paperwork before 7:00am. That'll give him two hours of sleep, at least. Maybe, if he can get Hoseok and Seokjin to take his place at the meeting with the heroin dealers from the Downtown Sector in the morning, he can sleep until eleven. 

"All I want is the information, and you can die quickly - but," He pauses, "if you don't give it to me, then it's gonna take a lot longer, and it'll be a lot messier," he brings his face closer to the man's, bending down patronisingly. "And I hate messes." 

He springs upright again, taking a few steps back and tilting his head at him with clear judgement. 

"I heard it was on a pen drive. I buy that. You're dumb enough to try and set me up twice, you're dumb enough to put it on something defenceless and hide it somewhere obvious. Because you think you're untouchable, don't you?" 

Youngsoo doesn’t respond to Yoongi’s question, he only snarls "You want that information you can check your fucking ass because I'm not giving it to you." 

Yoongi laughs, it's dark and void of real amusement. But he still laughs. He adjusts the pistol in his hand, gripping the handle and feeling its weight without much thought. 

And then there's a sharp whip of air following Yoongi’s hand before a loud crack of bone cuts it off. 

He straightens up, taking the silk handkerchief Seokjin holds out to him to wipe the blood off the pistol's barrel. 

Youngsoo groans, spits more blood onto his lovely wooden floor, but doesn't say a word.

Impressive, Yoongi thinks. He's probably taken quite a couple of beatings considering what a bastard he is. He imagines there's a lot of people after his ass. 

"Not enough?" 

The man glowers through narrowed eyes. Yoongi notices that he knocked a tooth out. His jaw looks vaguely out of shape.

Stubborn.

"It's gotta be in your apartment, right? Under a bed? In a drawer? A safe? Humour me, Youngsoo," Yoongi says with an uninterested expression, "am I getting warm?" 

No reply.

Yoongi clicks the magazine free, scanning over the bullets, before pushing it back in and cocking the gun.

“Five bullets,” he totals, gazing at the man before him with an unfitting look of tranquillity, “One for each limb, and one for your head- though, some people count that as a limb, too. I'll let you decide that one, I don't mind.”

The man spits again, a little closer to Yoongi’s feet this time.

Yoongi pulls a face of repulsion.

“Now,” he says, “Where should we start? Elbow or kneecap?” He aims the gun at one then the other as he says it, dull grin on his face. Youngsoo murmurs something and Yoongi cups his hand around his ear, leaning towards him as he mocks, “What was that? I know your mouth hurts but you have to speak louder.”

“I said,” he barks, “that you should start by shooting yourself in the ass-“

“Mention my ass one more time and I’ll shoot your ass," he says, cutting the man right off with a frown. "I’ve never done that before,” he informs him, “I’m dying to try it.”

This is taking far, far longer than Yoongi’d hoped it would. It’s almost six already and the man is showing absolutely no sign of giving way. He smacks him with the gun again, partly out of the hope that he might loosen up a little, and partly to vent out his own annoyance at losing more sleep.

“Namjoon," he calls wearily, grasping at straws and the usual tactics of these sort of situations as he tells him, "check his jacket for his phone. Maybe there’s something on there that’ll help us.”

Namjoon draws closer to him, Seokjin quickly grabbing Youngsoo’s hair to stop him from trying to headbutt him or something equally as idiotic. He checks a few pockets before finding it, immediately clicking the lock button and illuminating a bluish glow onto his face.

“It’s a pattern lock,” he says, amusement garnishing his face and Yoongi almost shares it, but he huffs instead.

“You think you can get into it?” He asks sarcastically and Namjoon shoots him a look of playful aggravation.

Namjoon’s easily hacked into bank security systems, government files and his own ridiculously and excessively secured computer when he locked himself out once. He can do almost anything with technology, the fucking prodigy. Yoongi wouldn’t be surprised if he was part cyborg – plugging himself in at night or some shit.

He has no doubt that he can do this. Yoongi could do this.

“I don’t know, let’s see.”

He holds the device up to catch the moonlight streaming in from the window, the last of it before the sun starts to rise, and looks at the finger tracks made on the screen.

There’s a click, and Namjoon hands the unlocked phone to Yoongi with a disbelieving smile.

“It was a Y.”

Jesus.

“You really are an idiot,” Yoongi tells the kneeling man on the floor, now looking up at them both with a face full of shock.

“And you should clean your screen more often,” Namjoon adds.

Yoongi doesn't pay much attention to the contents of the man's phone - his eyes skim across a few business apps and some banking ones that's to be expected of someone as high up in a mob as he is – he instead looks for anything that could lead to where he's put the information. 

His messages are wiped, his notes are clean, there's nothing else Yoongi can think could be of any help. That is until he sees the photo gallery app, tucked discreetly into the corner, blank wallpaper background making it difficult to see. 

A smile tugs on Yoongi's lips as the app loads. 

There's two pictures: one of a locker and its designated keys, number 53, and another seemingly accidentally taken of tiled floor that Yoongi immediately recognises as the floor of the Southwest train station, judging by the large ‘SW Station’s adorning every few tiles.

"Planning to make a quick escape tonight?" 

It was fortunate that they caught the bastard on time, wherever they picked him up from. Had they been half an hour too late, the fucker could’ve been on a train to the Crescent Sector by now – and that’s dangerous territory for them to follow to.

He looks at his friends with a calm smile, “Locker 53, the train station. No doubt the keys are in his jacket somewhere.”

Hoseok nods, seemingly taking the information in to recall later. Namjoon sifts through Youngsoo’s jacket for the keys, Seokjin protecting him from the man’s potential aggression again and for the first time tonight, Taehyung speaks, with his usual probably-out-of-place enthusiasm.  

“Do you want us to sort out this guy, boss?”

Yoongi’s eyes flicker to Jimin, still glaring hazily at Youngsoo with an intensity he can’t ignore.

“Nah, that’s alright. We’ve got it. You go with Hoseok to the locker.” Yoongi’s eyes wander to Namjoon, who’s now retrieved the keys with an obnoxious smirk, and then to Seokjin who’s grinning stupidly at the hacker.

“Send it over to Namjoon once you get it. Check what’s on it in case we’re still being led and then destroy it. I want all of our files protected doubly from now on. No more breaches in security, Nams, or you’re chasing it down next time.”

The man pouts slightly, but doesn't argue.

“Jin – Get some rest, I’m hoping you can take the deal tomorrow morning with Hoseo-“

“Can’t! Sorry boss,” Hoseok chirps, way too pleased for a genuine apology, “I’ve got rehearsal tomorrow morning.”

Yoongi sighs. Sometimes he wonders why he recruited a damn idol into his gang. 

He notices Jungkook restlessly shifting from one foot to another behind Seokjin’s shoulder, looking wistfully at Yoongi.

“No, Kook-ah, you can’t go with him.”

“Oh, come on, hyung – he can protect me. Or I can protect him. You showed me how to use a gun, it’ll be fine.”

Yoongi’s little brother has, what he likes to call, a childhood dream of becoming a mobster. He’s no idea why. He tried everything to raise him away from that, just like their parents did. He tried to get him interested in biology, but he only ever wanted to know about injuries and dissection. He tried to get him interested in business and finances, but he only ever wanted to look at how to run a gang like theirs. He tried to get him interested in art, but he always asked to use past victims and evidence to base his pieces on which was... way too disturbing to let him keep up.

Yoongi tried everything, but the kid’s just as fucked up as everyone else in this line of work.

Yoongi looks at Seokjin, tiredly, who has an expression of fond amusement on his face.

“Fine.”

Jungkook’s eyes light up and he whoops, proclaiming, “I won’t let you down, bro!”

A serious gang member.

When they all clear out, there’s a heavy silence; the only three in the room being him, Youngsoo and Jimin. Yoongi can almost feel the tension in the air. He sees Jimin’s hands curl into small fists. He hands him the pistol.

Jimin looks at him with a raised eyebrow, taking it with only slight hesitation. He turns his attention back to Youngsoo, even as Yoongi says “You can do what you want with him, now. I need to finish these papers for the transaction tomorrow before I can sleep.”

A minute passes, Yoongi having settled back into his armchair, files stacked neatly on his lap, and Jimin’s back is still to him, unmoved. The muscles in his back aren’t too hard to pick out through his thin shirt - tensed up, practically solid-looking.

Another minute goes by. And all Yoongi can pay attention to is how Youngsoo is still alive, muttering swears and insults. And Jimin has not moved.

“Jimin,” he calls out, “are you gonna let him stand and gawk at you or are you gonna blow his limited brains out?”

The boy lets out a heavy sigh.

Yoongi imitates it, setting down the stack of paper for the umpteenth time tonight. He gets up from his chair, wandering over to Jimin with an edge of caution, not entirely convinced that he doesn’t want to turn that gun on him. His head’s dipped to the ground, not looking at Youngsoo at all, and when Yoongi stops beside him it’s suffocatingly silent.

Then there’s a small sniff.

Yoongi’s frustration with him dwindles somewhat. He clears his throat, before asking “Have... you never shot anyone before? Do you want me to show you?”

Jimin slowly raises his head, looking straight ahead of him. His face looks flushed and damp, he turns his head to his left, away from Yoongi, blindly handing him back the gun.

What is...?

“You mentioned a guest bedroom earlier,” he mutters, voice tight and shaky. Yoongi nods, before realising he can’t see it and lets out a mild “Uh, yeah, down the hall to the right,” instead.

Jimin walks straight past him, no glance to anywhere except in front of him. He takes the blanket from the sofa on his way past and trails off down Yoongi’s hallway, disappearing from sight quickly.

Youngsoo finally shuts up, his constant droning in the background having had given Yoongi an oncoming headache. Yoongi loosely points the gun at him, trying to figure out what the fuck just happened.

The man laughs vilely. Yoongi’s eyes shoot to him with a look of hard abhorrence.

“What?” He beckons, voice dripping with contempt and impatience. He’s infinitely too tired to deal with this.

Youngsoo looks up at him, a lazy aggression in his eyes.

“Who knew filthy little whores could be so sensitive?”

Yoongi doesn’t ask for context, a surge of anger shooting from somewhere within him.

His jaw tenses.

His hand grips tight around the gun’s handle.

He pulls the trigger.

And then he merely watches as the disgusting man’s body falls to the floor, thick, sickening blood spilling out onto the wood. He takes one last look down the hallway where Jimin vanished to, before going back to finally finish his paperwork.

27^th March, 2017 | 7:18am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Daylight is starting to filter through the windows when Yoongi finally finishes, head feeling groggy and his body having the sleepy weightlessness to it that is so familiar, he can feel it in his bones most days.

He makes a neat pile on the desk, scribbling a ‘you’re welcome, assholes’ onto a spare blank page for Seokjin and Hoseok to find in the morning (or, in a few hours), before getting up and stretching his arms above his head with a tired moan and subtle popping of joints.

Yoongi’s already beginning to take off the collar around his neck and unbutton the first few sections of his shirt when his eye catches a glimpse of someone in the kitchen, through the creeping open door in the extensive hallway.

“Jimin,” Yoongi calls knowingly to the boy, sitting hunched over on a stool by the island counter, staring absentmindedly into space with none of the fire and spark that he had a few hours previously. The vulnerability he saw in him earlier in the night seems to have shifted none, only having lost some of its poor cover-up.

Jimin’s head twists to Yoongi instantly, who leans up against the doorway, a sort of strong look on his face that even he himself can’t really decipher.  

“What’re you doing up?”

Jimin grows a formidable frown on his face, as if he suddenly remembers his surroundings and situation, and he mutters, “I’m going. I have other shit to do.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea right now,” Yoongi says calmly, a nearly caring tone dusting his words that makes him realise that, God, he really needs to sleep. “The Syndicate don’t take kindly to people fucking up their missions. You won’t be safe,” He doesn’t move any further into the room, doesn’t even move. He wonders why he even cares about what happens to a random stripper- prostitute, whatever he is, and one as sulky as he is for that matter – but he decides that, hell, he doesn’t.

But he still can’t let some innocent risk their safety for no good fucking reason, and he can’t let The Syndicate think that they can use people like human defence systems.

Jimin looks as if maybe he knows he won’t be safe as well, a flicker of something unsettled unwittingly passing by on his face, but he ultimately shrugs, swinging the chair around to face Yoongi, an obviously forced nonchalance to his movements.

“I’ll be just fine, don’t worry about me, honey,” He says, voice dripping with sarcasm as if he can sense the fact that Yoongi’s concern is conditional.

“They’ll come for you, you won’t be fine. They’ll beat the shit out of you.”

Jimin laughs scornfully, “I can take care of myself. Big boy and all.”

Yoongi doesn’t point out how easily he’d pinned him to the wall earlier in the night, how easily someone else could do the same and take it a whole lot farther with a whole lot more dead corpse by the end of it, but he’s certain it’s implied in his lifted brow.

Yoongi sighs, suppressing a yawn and he looks at the clock to see it blinking far too many minutes past seven. He gives Jimin another glance, how he’s swinging his legs in the stool, leaning his head on the hand supported by the counter – bored look gracing his features as if he’s truly, truly not bothered. But Yoongi notices the tightness in his shoulders, the way his other hand grips the edge of his t-shirt, how his mouth forms a too-firm line.

“Fucking hell, fine,” Yoongi relents, “Whatever. Do whatever shit you want, I don’t care.”

Jimin doesn’t reply – but Yoongi notices a spark of surprise in his expression, just for an instant.

That unwelcome feeling of sympathy Yoongi had makes a brief reappearance as he thinks, shit, what if something does happen to him? How could he defend himself against a mob of brutish assholes? 

Yoongi holds Jimin’s gaze for a steady moment, trying to catch something else. A sliver of regret, uncertainty, anything that could make him change his decision.

But there’s none of that. His eyes are blank, as if staring at nothing again.

Yoongi nods as some sort of dismissive goodbye and backs out, shutting the door behind him. 

After all, it's not his business what that kid gets up to. 

27^th March, 2017 | 11:57 am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Jimin’s gone in the morning.

Hoseok tells him this when he barges into his room, deal having gone well, telling Yoongi to wake the fuck up and get dressed – Namjoon wants to see him.

In his groggy state, Yoongi managed to tell Hoseok to stick Namjoon’s wants and needs up his ass, and tell him that Jimin doesn’t need to be hearing him stomping around so early – the kid probably hasn’t slept properly in months, knowing the sort of people with his occupation.

“Jimin?” He echoes, “He isn’t here. He must’ve left early; he wasn’t there when we came to get your files a few hours ago either.”

Yoongi doesn’t react much, after all the boy had said he was leaving. Alternatively, he just mumbles something about a lack of gratitude to his host – not that he expected it – and that he better not turn out to be working for the Syndicate. But something pangs in the back of his chest; guilt he thinks, considering how he left the boy so abruptly last night.

Yoongi’s more sleep deprived than he thought.

He puts an arm over his face, blocking out the bright light and the Jung Hoseok that’s trespassed into the room which seem almost synonymous at times like these. He hears the younger man make a sound of complaint, followed by “Fuck, man, you really need to stop staying up late,” as if he’d spent the night watching shitty movies as opposed to preparing contracts and profit calculations and details so that the deal they set up this morning went smoothly.

Not even a ‘thank you for helping my pathetic ass, sir’. Not from Hoseok. Or from Jimin.

Kids, Yoongi laments – despite the way that the young man making excessive noise at the other end of his room is in fact only a year younger than him.

Yoongi is about to ask him whose grave he’s digging up, according to the sheer magnitude of the upheaval he’s making, but when he lifts his head to see, he’s met with a luxurious, cashmere white shirt slapped into his face, chased by an outstandingly-stitched deep blue suit.  

If it wasn’t a combination Yoongi was so fond of, he would likely complain a lot more.

Instead, he just sits upright, taking the items of clothing out of his vision and looks a chuckling Hoseok, straight in the eye, as he very plainly states, “Fuck you.”

Hoseok grins, “Unfortunately, Yoongs, this requires you putting clothes on – not taking them off.”

Before Yoongi can even say something back, Hoseok winks at him and makes his way out of the room, telling him to hurry up before he comes back in and dresses him himself.

“You’d probably like to, you creep!” Yoongi yells after him, resisting the urge to fall back into his mattress with a sigh. No, he already slept in for too long, judging by the flashing clock by his bedside. So, he hauls himself out of bed, not appreciating the chill in the room when he does, and grabs his clothes, thinking about getting a coffee from the machine in his kitchen before meeting up with Namjoon – and not thinking about how the mysterious, intriguing boy sat in the middle of said place a few hours previously, blaring fragility and power all at once like some kind of human contradiction.

Gang reasons. That’s why he’s concerned about him.

Hoseok bangs on his door to tell him to hurry the fuck up, and Yoongi leaves the doubt in his mind lingering, abandoned.

--

Car rides with Hoseok and Seokjin always feel much, much longer than car rides with anyone else.

Namjoon asked to meet in the diner below his apartment, since he hadn’t had breakfast yet and neither had Yoongi (Coffee doesn’t count, according to Jin and Hoseok) and it’s only a few minutes away from Yoongi’s penthouse. But somehow they both make it feel like a few hundred.

In between a mismatched, pointless discussion about something the dealer was wearing this morning when they met him, Yoongi breaks it with a sharp, “Seokjin,” to which the man, hands firmly on the steering wheel but eyes drifting sideways, looks at Yoongi in the passenger seat.

“I want people keeping an eye on that kid from last night.”

Seokjin looks vaguely incredulous, but he’s good at hiding things like that when he wants to. Yoongi hates that, but he can’t say he doesn’t do it either.

“Étoile? What’d you say his name was, again?”

“Jimin,” Yoongi repeats, quieter for no particular reason. He looks out the window. “Yes. That kid. I want people watching him. People who’re competent.”

“So, you mean either me or Hoseok.”

Hoseok snorts, not denying it. Yoongi doesn’t either- not because he agrees, but because he doesn’t have the energy to get sidetracked.

“Whoever you think. As long as they’re not dumbasses, it’s fine.”

Seokjin nods, eyes turning back to the road more permanently again. But then he takes a small breath, as if he’s about to say something. Yoongi sees Hoseok smirking in the reflection of the rear-view mirror.

“Why?” He asks simply.

Yoongi takes to staring out of the window again. He shrugs, “Just because. He could be working with The Syndicate, or whatever.”

“But why do they need to be so competent then? Wouldn’t anyone do?”

“You know,” he mumbles, leaning on his hand too stiffly for the action to be casual, “in case he… causes trouble.”

“But-“

“Just fucking get it done!" Yoongi snaps, head whipping around to glare at the older man, who looks unfazed and, if anything, a little amused. The corners of Yoongi’s mouth plummet into a grimace at the sight.

The car falls into a strange silence, one that Yoongi but neither of the other two apparently find awkward. Hoseok lets out an entertained puff.

“What?” Yoongi asks, staring irritably into the mirror to catch the man’s eye.

“Nothing,” He says, and Yoongi almost looks away, feeling slightly less pissed. That is until Hoseok mutters, “Just didn’t know you’d develop a sweet spot for anyone except Jungkook – especially not a bratty, audacious, ignorant child,” He says, using Yoongi’s own words from a conversation pertaining the kid earlier. “And a Red-Light prostitute, out of all things. That’s wild.”

His teasing tone is almost unbearable. Yoongi kind of wants to throttle Hoseok, but he thinks that might distract Seokjin from driving.

So, he says nothing, and decides to wait until they get outside.  

27^th March, 2017 | 12:39pm | Velveteen Diner, Red Light Sector

Namjoon waves them over when they finally enter the diner, after a solid minute of Yoongi ‘scolding’ Hoseok, ear pinched between his fingers comedically, considering their height difference.

“You think it’s funny to make fun of your hyung like that? Your boss? Huh?”

Seokjin was laughing the whole time, commenting “Surely if you’re getting this annoyed over it, Hoseok must be right?” and when Yoongi threatened to tell him that he was next if he didn’t shut up, he retorted with “I’m older than you, kid,” as if it didn’t matter that he worked for him. And, frankly, it didn’t. Hey may not call him 'hyung' much anymore, but that’s one of the burdens of having your friends as your subordinates: they get away with disobedience way too easily.

And Seokjin is the worst for getting away with it, minus Jungkook just because he acts so much like his older brother after living with Yoongi's family for so long while they were growing up that Yoongi actually forgets it isn't true, sometimes.

They sit down at the booth in front of the man, typing away at one of his probable thousands of laptops, and he looks up and smiles at each of them, a little bit of mischief sinking into it when he notices Yoongi’s expression.

“Let me guess,” he drawls, “Hoseok was being a nuisance, again?”

“No,” Hoseok replies before Yoongi can agree, “I wasn’t a nuisance. I just made the rusty old gears in his heart think about moving again for a second.”

Yoongi glares out of the corner of his eyes, but then focuses back on Namjoon, who looks satisfied enough with the explanation. He shuts down the lid of his computer and interlocks his fingers together, leaning back in the booth with a soothing exhale. Namjoon is the kind of man to always dress extravagantly – whether it’s a luxurious sort of extravagance, or an idiotic kind. This morning, he’s combined the two: wearing a plain white button shirt with a drooping collar, but also a shimmering grey suit jacket – no doubt bought when out shopping with Hoseok. Yoongi can see the content glint in the aforementioned idol’s eyes as he notices it. The glasses perched on the man’s face are thick and square, but fashionable, Yoongi supposes.

He’s just glad he isn’t wearing one of his four-meters-too-long cardigans again. They make him look like a spider.

“Whatever,” Yoongi mutters, “What did you want, Namjoon? I was having a good sleep.”

Namjoon rolls his eyes, something along the lines of ‘sorry to wake you, your highness’ being mumbled in-between it.

No respect in this gang. None. 

Namjoon grabs a small, plastic file from beside him, and passes it over to Yoongi, who opens it with an air of false disinterest when, in reality, his curiosity has been burning ever since Hoseok told him Namjoon wanted to see him almost an hour ago.

Inside are a few grainy pictures, seemingly from CCTV footage, outside a dingy looking nightclub that Namjoon mentions is the Galaxy they visited just last night.

Hoseok snickers beside him, asshole.

The photos show a group of men, Yoongi immediately recognises as being Syndicate members, entering the club. There’s another of them in the hallway. And another in the dressing room, crowding around a small-framed boy with an obviously rebelling gaze – easily discernible even in the low quality. The next photo shows a member grabbing him by the throat, the next having the boy angrily kneeling on the floor, and the following few showing the gang’s exit. The very last one has the boy dismally holding a small rectangular piece of plastic that makes a weight in Yoongi’s stomach drop.

“Namjoon,” he says, voice sounding hollow, “What was in that locker last night?”

“A pen drive, like we thought,” He answers, “But it was empty. Though, I don’t think even Youngsoo knew that.”

Yoongi’s fist immediately bangs on the table.

“So this kid has it, after all, doesn’t he? Fuck, where’d he put it? Where’s the CCTV footage Nams, how come you’ve only got photos?”

“You know how tight government security cameras are these days, I can only retain a few clips at a time. It’ll take, a day, maybe two to recover all of this morning.”

Yoongi stalls, anger bubbling at the back of his throat being swallowed back down. He unclenches his fist, repeating, “This morning? As in, after he left my place?”

Namjoon nods, “Yeah,” he confirms, “You’d be surprised what some gangs take care of so early in the morning.” He pauses, taking the file back out of Yoongi’s grip and packing the photos in again. “He didn’t lie to us, though. He had no idea about this pen drive until a couple of hours ago.”

“How do you know? He could’ve-“

“I called him twenty minutes ago,” He says, “told him that you were coming ‘round to see him soon and he’d be best to explain himself to me now before you knocked his front tooth out.” Yoongi frowns. Now he has to go see the kid again, as well?

“He told me everything he knew; sounded frantic as hell - scared, you know? He mentioned you telling him he wouldn’t be safe and said ‘I guess the bastard was right.’ They told him to keep the pen drive until they asked for it, and not to make any contact with us at all,” he explains, opening his computer back up again as he talks.  

Yoongi doesn’t say anything, for a minute. There’s an easy chance of them being set up once again. This could be an ambush, or another empty pen drive. But either way, one thing’s for sure: there’s valuable information roaming out there about them somewhere and they are well and truly fucked if they don’t destroy it.

His eyes wander to the window, he watches as the clouds begin to gather darkly in the sky, tainting the city with a heavier, gloomier afternoon light. Perhaps a sign of complication arising - though, this entire affair’s felt like a complication since the very beginning.

He promptly ignores Hoseok and Seokjin’s obviously quirked mouths and exchanges of knowing glances when Yoongi stands up, adjusts his suit jacket and announces, “I’ll go see him now, then.”

Even Namjoon smirks behind his laptop.

“The sooner the better, boss.”

Chapter Text

27^th March, 2017 | 12:48pm | The Galaxy Club, Ruby St, Red Light Sector

Jimin doesn’t look surprised to see him, just lightly irritated.

He’s almost entirely void of make-up, in comparison to their previous meeting, so Yoongi easily locates a substantial-looking bruise on the boy’s cheek – purple and gleaming, contrasting starkly against the gentle rose-pink of his other. He fidgets noticeably, pulling on his sleeves and the hem of his sweater as if the black material isn’t enough to make him feel non-exposed, ignorant of the matching leather pants clinging to his legs and thighs. It's, of course, unsurprising that he’d changed his clothes, considering how much he’d complained about them last night, but if this is the boy's idea of comfort, then... 

“Did those Crystal bastards give you that?” Yoongi points out, in lieu of a greeting, finger directed to the deep stain on his otherwise faultless skin. Jimin scowls.

“Probably, fuck,” he swears, “I don’t know who the fuck they were I-“ he sighs, pressing a rough hand to his temple in annoyance, eyes squeezing shut. They open again in a flicker of piercing brown that nearly makes Yoongi flinch.

“I don’t know what’s going on. I just know that they wanted me to keep this safe, and that I don’t want anything to do with it,” he digs out the plastic device in question, holding it out flat in his palm towards Yoongi. Yoongi travels across the room in a few steps, and snaps it up from the boy’s hand – as if he’d consider taking it back. There’s a beat of silence between them, neither having anything left to say.

Yoongi doesn’t think Jimin looks as lively and bold as he had earlier in the morning. He looks tired, defeated. Susceptible, again. There’s harsh, tell-tale signs of bruises to come around his neck, on his wrists. Above all else, the fire in his eyes is completely missing. He blinks irately, agitatedly – but it somehow looks devoid of actual emotion.

“If that’s all you wanted, feel free to leave,” Jimin mutters, wearily, practically sinking down into one of the armchairs when he sits.

“It’s not,” Yoongi replies, and Jimin gives him a questioning look, before gesturing half-heartedly to one of the chairs in front of him. Yoongi obliges, throwing a leg over the other as he relaxes into the seat. Jimin sits stiffly, a frown denting his looks, like in the same way an insomniac might lay in their bed at night.

“What happened after you left this morning?”

He scoffs. “You know what happened. I told Namjoon, and you know because you came here. Why ask?”

“Because I want to hear it from you; now, speak.”

Jimin looks like he wants to object, something about him not having to listen to him, but he doesn’t. His jaw visibly tightens, running a tired hand over his face.

“I came back here to get my things- since you kidnapped me I didn’t have time to collect my belongings, so I had to come back,” there’s venom in his tone though it doesn’t match the blank expression of his face, “and suddenly this gang of dickheads burst in, demanding that I do something for them.”

“Syndicate members?”

“Seems like it,” he confirms, “but, at the time, I was running on, say, one hour of sleep – if even that. I had no fucking clue what was going on,” He says, which explains the tired droop of his eyes, all the lifelessness, Yoongi guesses.

“But it wasn’t like you and that other guy busting in yesterday,” Jimin continues, “these fucks were fairly passionate about wanting to beat the shit out of me if I didn’t comply.”

“And?” Yoongi inquires, eyes landing on the bruise again. The answer’s fairly obvious. Jimin grins lazily.

“I didn’t comply.”

Yoongi laughs shortly, in a low hum under his breath.

“So, they knocked me around a little bit. Nothing too bad, I’ve had worse,” Yoongi thinks back to the rough handling he’d seen in the photos and wonders how much shit this kid’s been through, “And finally I told them to tell me what the hell they wanted – that’d be a good place to start.” He taps his cheek, “that’s when I earned this baby, right here.”

“And they wanted you to, what, keep the USB for them?”

Jimin nods, “Apparently has some crucial shit on it. I’m assuming it’s the stuff you’re after, but they never mentioned it. Take it, anyway. I don’t wanna hold onto it for them. I considered crushing it right there and then, in front of them all, but any more bruises and I’d have a little trouble at work tonight.”

Yoongi hums, examining the object in his hand – disregarding his thought to ask what sort of ‘trouble,’ full well knowing it’d have nothing to do with anyone’s concern for the boy.

It’s a tiny thing, would’ve been easy to hide themselves, so why did they want Jimin to hide it?

“What’s wrong,” Jimin asks, “You don’t think it’s it?”

“Could be,” Yoongi says, “but probably isn’t,” he adds, twisting it around between his index and thumb distractedly, “The Syndicate seem to have gotten a little smarter lately.”

“Smarter? Really? They seemed dumb as fuck to me.”

“You should’ve seen them before. But, saying that, I know for certain this is empty – the safety plastic is still on the end of it.”

Jimin huffs amusedly – a small smirk playing on his lips. Yoongi gets the urge to follow it up with something, a story of another example to make him laugh, maybe, but he stops himself. That’s not what he’s here for.

“Even if this isn’t it, there’s a reason they gave it to you,” He ponders, “There must be. They know we know you, now. They sent us to you in the first place. But, why?” Yoongi stares firmly at the wall behind Jimin in thought, yet he can see the boy’s face morphing into curiosity in his peripheral.

“A scapegoat?” He suggests, but Yoongi shakes his head.

“They know we wouldn’t fall for that. You don’t exactly look like a mobster,” Jimin’s expression hardens, though he certainly didn’t mean it as an insult, “It feels more like… a timewaster.”

“You mean, they’re using me to stall you?”

Yoongi makes a low sound of agreement, suddenly uncrossing his leg and leaning forward in the chair, “For the same reason they’re giving me empty pen drives.”

“Why?”

He sighs, getting to his feet sullenly.

“To find a way to use the information against me before I can stop it.”

Yoongi almost goes straight out the door, but his conscience (though rarely in use nowadays, according to his friends) makes him falter, fist gripping the handle.

“Jimin,” he calls, sounding much calmer than he feels, right now.

Fuck, he’s angry – and stressed to all hell - but it doesn’t show when he speaks.

Jimin glances up from where he’d been staring at the empty space of Yoongi’s armchair, tiredly.

“What are you gonna do when they come back here, hm?”

He looks as if he hadn't hadn’t considered it.

“I, well, I figured… now that we know it’s probably a fake they… wouldn’t?”

Yoongi almost laughs at his naivety but his brow works into a line of concern instead. He scoffs, “They’ll come back to teach you a lesson for snitching on them – decoy or not.”

“I can take a beating,” he says firmly, with a kind of assertion that makes Yoongi want to believe him. But there’s a hesitation about that statement clear in the tight line of his shoulders, and the glassy look of his eyes. Yoongi frowns.

“I’ve asked some guys to watch you,” for what, he doesn't say, though it's obvious the boy want's to ask. “But, they can’t keep your ass safe 24/7, so be careful, okay?”

Jimin looks like there’s a part of him that wants to protest, show the foolish independence that Yoongi’s seen get people killed time and time again in this world. But he nods instead, either too tired to object, or knowing that it’d be no use.

Once he leaves, he pulls out his phone, holding it apathetically to his ear when he presses two on his speed-dial (‘one’ obviously being his little brother).

“Hoseok-ah,” he says, knowing the two men will likely be together, sorting out trivial business right now, “tell Seokjin to contact the Syndicate and ask them what the fuck they want for that information back.”

Yoongi is done playing treasure hunt.

27^th March, 2017 | 11:04pm | The Galaxy Bar, Ruby St, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi has only met the head of the Crystal Syndicate a few times in his life.

He is indefinitely thankful for this fact. 

But now, Moon Seonghyeon himself sits across from him, nursing a glass of classy wine with a girl that definitely doesn’t look old enough to be here, tucked into his side provocatively, but clearly emotionless.

Yoongi wants to ask, why, out of all places he asked to meet here, in the adjoining bar to the same-name club, when it's arguably the skeeviest place in the entire sector. Neither of them are particularly interested in any of its other services, either (at least, Seonghyeon isn't tonight.) There's a thousand other places more suitable for them to meet-up. Fancier places with better drinks- or even somewhere that's simply more private, a smarter location to discuss the matter at hand.

Yet, he chose here.

Yoongi's just glad that Jimin happened to be working in the bar instead of the club tonight, so he can keep an eye on him. Knowing that his newest ally isn’t getting beaten to a pulp in one of the back rooms or anything will make it easier to focus on the asshole in front of him, instead.

Yoongi always makes a point of looking after his allies, and now that the boy has unwillingly become one, that makes him his priority too (not that his tiny-brained friends can grasp that concept.)

But, the fact that Seonghyeon wanted to meet here, when there’s all those other million bars, much closer to where he came from (the depths of hell, Yoongi assumes) to choose, still makes him uneasy.

Seonghyeon maybe senses this, because he pushes the extravaggant bottle towards him, along with his untouched glass. “Have a drink, Min,” he coos, mockingly “you seem tense.”

Yoongi is fucking tense. He’s always tense in the man’s presence because he never knows what his aim is. The Syndicate might be a gang of fucking bafoons but their leader is so batshit that it always gives some sort of mystery to him that Yoongi can never catch. Seokjin’s good at it, Namjoon too – hell, even Hoseok can sort of get it better than Yoongi can.

But none of them are here. Because the bastard asked to see him alone.

‘You don’t bring any of your ‘colleagues’ and I won’t bring any of mine.’

Yoongi didn’t feel the need to point out that his men were much more of a threat to Seonghyeon than Seonghyeon’s were to him. Instead, he obliged, because getting the man pissed before he sees him is never a good idea. Not when that gives him leeway to scheme like the crazy fucker he is.

Yoongi watches the man pour the drink for him. He accepts the glass when it’s filled to a standard of proper social etiquette, but doesn’t put it to his lips. He’s made the mistake once of drinking something a mobster had offered him and almost lost his kidney because of it.

Thank God for Kim Taehyung’s expert knowledge of who likes to drug people and sell their organs on the black market in the city- otherwise his gang maybe wouldn't have retrieved him in time. With Taehyung's complicated background and vast experience in drug-trafficking for the gang with Seokjin, it'd be surprising if he didn't. Besides, the kid's always been a magnet for trouble.

“I wonder why you’re so tense tonight,” Seonghyeon muses, swirling the deep red liquid in his own glass, “Could it be because you had a bad day? Or because you’re worried about that troublesome snippet of information we have on you?”

The mutual glare they give each other likely signifies that both men know that it’s not because of either of those reasons. Yoongi doesn’t care about the information enough to be outwardly nervous because, hell, he knows he’ll get it back before those idiots can figure out what to use it for.

But his grip on the glass tightens when Seonghyeon says, “Or is it maybe something else?”

The man’s eyes flicker across the room, and Yoongi chases his gaze, until it lands on a boy in all black, keeping a tray of glasses balanced with the help of his hip as he takes empty ones from a table. He tugs tiredly on the wide collar of his low-cut shirt tucked into belted leather – as if its uncomfortable - necklace on his chest glinting against the joint’s neon lights when he does. His hair looks much darker, almost black in the lighting, and Yoongi’s jaw tightens when he feels that acquainted pang in his gut at once again witnessing the boy’s beauty.

Seonghyeon clicks in the face of another waiter passing, who looks as if he’s holding back a scowl of disgust when he stops. The man whispers something to him, pointing in Jimin’s general direction and when the waiter scampers off, he glances back at Yoongi with a look of superiority.

Yoongi finds himself inwardly revolted, but he grits his teeth through a blank face.

Seonghyeon is by no means an unattractive man, unlike his (late) right-hand man. He’s a plethora of years older than Yoongi is, sure, meaning the man automatically thinks he has some sort of power over him, but for a guy of his age, it’s easy to say he’s aged well. Though, saying that, there’s not many people who’re attracted to him. Yoongi likes to think his hellishness shines through his handsome appearance. That, behind those sharp eyes glow a warning and his angled features signal danger to anyone that gives him a second glance. He is ugly, but from the inside out.

Yoongi hopes that people can’t say the same about him at that age.

He pours himself another drink while they wait (for what, Yoongi can have a fairly confident guess at). He eyes Yoongi’s glass, still untouched, with distaste.

“It’s rude not to accept what’s been given, you know.”

Yoongi wonders how many times he’s used that to get other people to obey. He scoffs.

“I’m driving,” he lies. Seonghyeon likely knows this, considering he’d seen Yoongi be escorted by Hoseok to their table, before the man had to leave. His lips coil into a disturbing smile.

“Smart kid,” he praises. Yoongi’s stare darkens.

And then the man opposite him is grinning even more unnervingly, and Yoongi sees why when he turns his head to his left, in time to see Jimin glower at him, before Seonghyeon’s pulling him by the wrist, pushing the girl sitting beside him away. She lands with a shriek and huffs, standing back up and muttering something along the lines of 'bastard' before he's jerking Jimin down beside him to replace her.

He batts the man’s hand away before folding his arms across his chest, anger stiffening his back and shoulders.

“You know Étoile, don’t you, Yoongi?” He asks sinisterly, snaking a possessive hand through the boy’s hair, one that gets a lot rougher when he tries to shudder away, gripping strongly onto a few locks. Jimin scrunches up his nose in irritation. A deep flurry of something unfamiliar to Yoongi clenches in his chest. 

“Of course you do,” he says, “I heard you were nice enough to accommodate him in your home last night. Was the poor baby scared of my big bad gang?”

He never has any idea where he gets his fucking intel from.

Yoongi snorts, loudly, and jeeringly says, “Good one, Moon. Your gang couldn’t scare a class of school children.”

Yoongi had been trying to not rile the man up, he really had – he’s a pain in the ass when he is. But something just dissolved his filter.

The quirked-up corner of his mouth twitches briefly, but he simpers through it.

“Let’s get to the point, shall we?”

Yoongi gruffs.

“I think you have a certain, let’s say, interest in this pretty little thing right here,” Seonghyeon says, a wolfish glint in his manner. Yoongi keeps his gaze controlled, face set in a frown. He avoids the raised eyebrow Jimin gives him out of the side of his view.

“God knows why,” The man continues, hand still carding through the back of the boy’s hair, “You’ve only known him for, what, 24 hours? It’s not like you’re looking to fuck him, you think you’re too good for that sort of thing, don’t you? Can’t imagine how, just looking at him. You wouldn’t believe the way he begs-”

“I thought we were getting to the point,” Yoongi bites, cutting off the man in whatever twisted game he’s trying to play. Seonghyeon looks all too amused, like he's said something brilliant. But, in reality, Yoongi didn't say anything out of the ordinary. Seonghyeon's got a flair for theatrics that the younger man's simply never cared for.

But he doesn't see it like that. Instead, he wonders, “Who’d have thought Min Yoongi could get so,” and pauses, voice dipping pointlessly low as he utters, “infatuated?” 

Yoongi grimaces. He's no idea where he pulled that one from. Jimin looks marginally annoyed, marginally confused at the suggestion, but his ego's way too fucking big if he believes that.

So, Yoongi doesn’t erupt in objection like he knows the man wants him to. Instead, he relaxes a little more in his chair, de-tensioning himself from his previous outburst. He shrugs as he replies “I just don’t like people wasting my time,” with ease.

Seonghyeon’s eyes gleam as if that’s the reply he wanted, and Yoongi swallows down the confusion that emerges from it.

He really can't read him, after all, can he?

“Then, I suppose, you want a quick exchange, hm?”

Yoongi quirks an eyebrow at that.

“Of what?”

He takes Yoongi’s still full glass from his reach and passes it to Jimin instead. He has a grim sort of expression that makes him look as if he’s considering pouring the drink over the man. Both men, maybe.

“Drink up, sweetheart,” He mutters to him but Jimin stares Seonghyeon down, brows snapping together heatedly.

“Fuck you,” he swears, pushing the glass away so forcefully it almost topples over the man, but he catches it just in time, slamming it down a hell of a lot more severely than he did before, hand finally whipping out of his hair. Jimin almost whimpers when the bastard grasps his jaw all of a sudden, forcing the boy’s eyes on him and Yoongi wonders why for a moment, before he sees the way Seonghyeon’s fingers are digging mercilessly into a dark bruise, lightly covered by makeup, just past his chin.

“I said drink,” he presses, letting go and handing the glass to him directly. Jimin takes it, averting his eyes irately to the wood of the table and raising it to his lips. It begs the question of why the man’s being so adamant about a drink. It’s evident the wine itself hasn’t been drugged, considering he’s been drinking from the same bottle all night.

Then, the glass? Maybe he knew Yoongi wouldn’t drink from it, maybe he wanted to give it to Jimin all along.

But, Yoongi doesn’t take the glass from Jimin like his mind tells him to- it wouldn't be a wise move to make any accusations against Moon right now just in case he gets it in his head that he does care a little too much about this kid. He just watches as the younger pulls a face after downing it.

“Sorry,” Seonghyeon quips, face completely void of any of the threat it had a few seconds ago, “it’s slightly bitter, right?”

“You paid money for this shit?” Jimin asks, setting the glass back down on the table with an air of audacity. Yoongi doesn’t miss the small tremor in his fingers, though.

“I paid a lot,” he agrees, “Money not very well spent.” There’s a moment of silence that falls over them all like a storm cloud in which Seonghyeon twists slightly to get a better look at Jimin, arm falling over the back of the seat so that his hand just touches the boy’s farthest shoulder – who’s now leaning against his hand, covering half of his face and grimacing. Yoongi’s mouth forms a thin line.  

“There’s better ways to spend my money here, isn’t there? I bet you could show me a few…”

“Seonghyeon,” Yoongi snarls, imploring an ounce of surprise in the older man, due to the simple fact that Yoongi rarely, if ever, calls him by his first name to his face. “What the fuck do you want? – I haven’t got all night.”

Seonghyeon’s gaze narrows.

“No, of course you don’t.”

He pushes the bottle to the side of the table, moving to lean over the surface, as if he’s suddenly surpassed his sleaze and become a man of business. Yoongi wants to laugh.

“You want your information? I’ll give it to you.”

He waits, not letting any reaction form on his face because there’s always a catch.

“What do you want?” He asks apathetically, as if talking to a spoilt child. Seonghyeon regards him for a moment, before shaking of the analytical look and smiling jovially instead. It doesn’t suit him.

“I want him,” He gestures to the boy beside him, one who’s developed a hazy look in his eyes, a strange slope in his shoulders not there a few minutes ago. He gives little reaction to this statement, head lulling back against the top of the chair, a simple huff escaping his lips.

Spiked. Just as he thought. God, with the pace that worked at Yoongi’s grateful for himself being a stubborn bastard otherwise he would’ve been fucked.

“He’s not mine - is that really an exchange?” Yoongi asks, keeping an eye on the younger boy as he tries to look unbothered to Seonghyeon. It’s not that he is bothered – it’s more that he knows exactly what the man would plan to do if he agreed to hand Jimin over, and the kid doesn’t deserve it: Spending the rest of his (drastically reduced) life drugged up and systematically sold each night, most likely. Yoongi knows all too well how much that can affect a person. At least, working here, he has some sort of control.

“Maybe he’s not yours, but you don’t want him to be mine either, do you? You’d stop me if I tried.”

He sighs and hates that he’s fucking right – that the man probably knows himself what a bastard he is, why Yoongi despises him so much, that he knows why he wouldn’t let him take Jimin, and yet continues to feel no remorse.

“You wouldn’t give me the information even if I agreed,” Yoongi retorts coolly, eyes drifting back to Jimin who’s seem to have lost almost all touch with reality, staring blankly at the ceiling, eyes flickering between open and closed as if he has no control of it.

That’s not good, Yoongi thinks to himself. He needs to make sure the kid isn’t left by himself after this. God forbid he has some sort of reaction to whatever’s in his system while he’s alone. Honestly, even passing out in this place by yourself would probably be dangerous. Yoongi makes a mental note to tell Hoseok to deal with it after they finish up here.

“Do you always avoid confrontation like that?” Seonghyeon asks, sounding almost frustrated, but as if he’s trying to conceal it with an easy-going tone. Yoongi doesn’t know why he bothers.

“Do you?” He counters.

His teeth grind slightly, Yoongi can see it.

Then he snickers, unsettlingly, “You and I are more alike than you think, I believe.”

I am nothing like you, Yoongi wants to say, but that argument would add at least another minute onto their time and Yoongi’s starting to feel concerned over the state of the boy sitting across from him – as if any minute now he’ll just drop.

“You knew I’d say no, just like I knew you wouldn’t give me the information back, so, what? What is it you really want?”

Seonghyeon doesn’t say anything for a moment, gazing at Yoongi calculatedly, and honestly, he just wants to punch that slimy look from the asshole’s face. But he keeps his fists clenched underneath the table.

“I want you to realise that you can’t fight against me. I want you to see that your stupid gang of kids is nothing more than a juvenile attempt at resistance. You can’t fight us forever. You won’t last,” He spews and if Yoongi already didn’t feel the impotent weight of anger mold in his stomach, he would’ve when he says “Just like your father didn’t... did you enjoy celebrating a few weeks ago? First anniversaries are always the most important ones.”

Yoongi launches to his feet, grabbing the collar of the man who just grins, satisfied, at him and it only inflames his rage further.

“You motherfucker!” He growls, “Don’t you ever, ever talk about my father – you don’t know shit about that.”

People at the tables around them look back in shock, seeing an impudent young man seethe at, with first glance, a perfectly respectable adult. This would probably get Yoongi kicked out in another situation, because of the prominent age hierarchy in the city, but upon closer look the men are recognized as two of the most famous people in the South of Seoul. One for being the king, and the other for being the villain. Neither incredibly liked, but certainly respected.

So, instead, they just gawk at the fact that the men are meeting (fighting, even) face-to-face, unguarded, right before them.

Yoongi raises his arm back to take a swing at him, when the man drops two words that makes him lose his grip on his repulsive ass all together.

“Don’t I?”

Yoongi slowly puts his arms back down by his sides, fists clenching impossibly tight.

“What the fuck are you saying?” he demands, virtually breathless with anger. He hates when he gets like this. Always because of his father – he fucking hates it. The man knows his biggest weakness and loves to use it against him.

“Never mind about that, my darling boy,” he mocks, making Yoongi have to grip the edge of the table to try not to attempt to punch him again, “It’s time for us to depart. I’ve said all I need to, and, well, as you said, we both knew from the start of this meeting that I’d never give you your files back.” He stands up, makes a move to grab Jimin by the wrist but Yoongi gets there first, pulling the boy up to his feet to lean against him. Seonghyeon chuckles, dangerously, as if he half-expected that reaction.

“Men like us, Yoongi,” he drawls, “We aren’t allowed to have things we care about. If I were you, I wouldn’t even think about starting to get too attached to that tantalizing whore of yours. You never know when he could just be,” he places a hand on Jimin’s unresisting shoulder, “ripped from your grasp.”

Delusional. He's fucking delusional. 

Jimin sighs heavily from where he’s settled his head against Yoongi’s neck, as if he wants to bite back at the man, but can’t. He wonders what he’d say, as he can barely locate his own words. Yoongi finds enough anger in him to spit a final “Fuck you” at the man when he passes by, and feels immediately childish for it in comparison afterwards.

“I tried to warn you, Min. I did.” The man pauses just as he’s about to exit, “Oh and one more thing:” Yoongi waits.

“Don’t think I’ve forgotten what you did to my right-hand. If I were you, I’d keep a close eye on yours. In fact,” He continues, “I’d keep an eye on everyone.” His gaze flickers to Jimin again, before he finally leaves.   

Yoongi’s hand involuntarily tightens around Jimin’s waist, who groans at it, obviously having hit a bruise there. The kid's probably littered with them.

He mutters an apology, turning to leave with Jimin supported steadily on his shoulder, the boy having serious trouble walking – so it turns into more of a drag - which would be fucking fine if Yoongi doesn’t then find out that his car, with his right-hand man in it, is absolutely not parked outside the club as he left them.

Yoongi whips out his phone and sees a collection of texts from the man himself, Jung-fucking-Hoseok, all explaining rather hastily that he got a call from his company and needs to go to the studio right away. Forty minutes ago. He’s still not back.

He calls him. Gets no answer. Goes to call Seokjin for a back-up lift, and his phone powers off. ‘Low-battery’, the blinking caricature of which politely tells him.

It takes every single grain of will-power in his body (and a calmingly light tinker of laughter from the boy leaning against him) not to throw his phone at the goddamn wall.

“Jimin, can’t you fucking walk properly? My apartment is three miles from here.”

The boy makes a sound that sounds kind of like a ‘no’, but Yoongi could’ve guessed that even if he hadn’t said anything.

He murmurs something else, and Yoongi has to ask him to repeat it because it was so incoherent.

“Mine’s… closer,” he says breathily, Yoongi silently thanking whatever higher power’s out there that he doesn’t have to walk three miles with an unbelievably bratty, deadweight kid.

“What’s the address?” Yoongi asks and he thinks he says something about the apartment block on Cerulean Road, he compresses a scoff, echoing “The Cerulean Block? Fuck, seriously?” Yoongi’s been down there a few times to chase down dealers that burnt them out or meet with shady people that probably don’t come out any other time of day. It’s not just rundown, it’s fucking decrepit. He can’t help but voice his surprise, considering how well Jimin seems to compose himself. How nicely dressed he’s been at all three of their run-ins.

“I’m a… hooker at the sleeziest club in Seoul, what’d… you expect?” he says slowly, but without any malice in it (he probably can’t find the mindset to do it). Yoongi hums, adjusting the boy slightly from where he was starting to slip off of his shoulder.

“I thought prostitutes in this sector were supposed to be rich,” Yoongi says, because out of what he’s heard, this was most certainly the case. Designer clothes to walk the streets in and a whole host of decent-quality drugs in their system.

Jimin laughs, feebly, “Maybe the self-employed ones.”

Even still, Yoongi’s vaguely surprised. Jimin doesn’t look like he does drugs, or drinks heavily – so his wages must be fucking awful. Then, why work there at all? Yoongi wouldn’t even consider it, having disgusting, pathetic, assholes touching him without shame all night. For what, a couple of bucks a night and a slap on the ass well-done at the end of the night from that creep of a manager he’s seen hanging around the workers? No fucking way.

They manage to cross the road when Yoongi has to stop, almost having had Jimin drop flat to his knees twice. His apartment might not be three miles away, but it’s still a few blocks and at this rate, it’ll take them half of the night. The boy can’t hold his own weight and, however light he might be, at the awkward angle he’s supporting him, neither can Yoongi.

“Jimin, fuck, I can’t drag you along-” He laments, setting him on the ground, propped up against the wall of a long-closed down bookshop.

“Don’t you have a phone?” he asks, considering Namjoon said he’d called him earlier. But Jimin shakes his head, saying “At home. Your friend called me on Juh-Joonho’s earlier… but he’ll be pissed if he… finds out I’m leaving.”

Yoongi lets out a long sigh, taking in the sight of the boy, helplessly staring up at him with admirable focus. Shit, what was in that glass? He needs to get him some water and try and get it out of his system soon – or at least let him sleep it off.

Yoongi has no choice, and if Jimin were himself right now, from what he’s gathered about his personality, he’d probably object to the older man crouching down beside him and taking him up into his arms, supporting the boy under both his knees and across his back. This Jimin, however, seems to think this is viable enough, letting his eyes close contently as his head hits Yoongi’s chest.

Jimin’s easily carried – light enough, doesn’t make too much of a fuss, and doesn’t drool on him, so he’s already better than Jungkook when he was young enough to scoop up like this.

Unfortunately, Jungkook is both taller and stronger than Yoongi now, so it's more likely that the kid'll pick him up, one of these days.

Regardless, it does seem to be going much better than hoped, and they’re almost at Cerulean Road, hassle-free, when Jimin starts to whine a little, muffled by Yoongi’s shirt.

“What’s wrong?” He asks, understandably taken aback by the boy’s sudden disturbance, considering how Yoongi’s pretty sure he hasn’t even been awake for most of the walk.

“You’re not as…” the rest is too mumbled to make out, and Yoongi almost laughs at him, telling him to repeat himself because he can’t form simple sentences.

“As bad as you prete-tend to be.” Yoongi’s hold on him stiffens, and the amusement shifts off of his face, brow creasing in confusion.

“You don’t even know me,” Yoongi reminds him, ignoring the way he feels the younger’s laugh reverberate through his chest.

“I’m a g-good judge of… character,” he reasons, giggling when he adds, “or maybe you’re just cliché.”

Yoongi tries to keep a straight face, but he lets out a disbelieving laugh, defending himself with a “Shut up, you brat. I’m less cliché than you are, at least.”

“Really? Hard-ass rich kid takes over late father’s gang,” he lists, almost taking Yoongi by surprise that he knows that – but, of course, his past has become common knowledge among the city’s inhabitants by now, “Becomes… powerful, intimi…dating leader – leaving innocent people like muh- me quaking in their boots – but maybe, deep down, they're actually vaguely human, after all.” Yoongi notes how he seems to be somewhat more aware of his surroundings now, and breathes a sigh of relief that the drug hasn’t fucked with his brain or anything.

He mentally splutters at his observation, though.

Jimin? Innocent? Something makes him doubt that very much.

“And he meets a brash, audacious, self-important kid with a degrading job,” Yoongi jibes back, “Too pretty for somewhere so sleazy but too tragically poor to do anything about it. How many books have you seen with that plotline? I could name at least ten.”

Jimin leans back his head to look at his carrier, smiling lazily when their eyes meet.

“And what n-normally happens to them?”

Yoongi falters, shrugging simply to brush off the question. He hasn’t actually read any; it was just a joke – he could guess but…

“Cause in the ones I’ve read… I’m pretty sure that they almost always end up fucking.”

Jimin looks absolutely impish when Yoongi raises his eyebrows at him. He breaks into a jolt of laughter, still light and breathy – but livelier than earlier. His sudden giddiness a side-effect of the drug, he’d assume, but for all he knows, that could just be Jimin’s personality.

“Your face, wow. I must be hot. Everyone wants to fuck me.”

It feels redundant to call him a brat again, so Yoongi doesn’t reply, sneering not-so maliciously at him as he tears his eyes away from the bleary-eyed boy in his arms to open the door of the apartment building (the lock doesn’t work on it – Yoongi isn’t surprised).

“Elevator’s broken,” Jimin tells him when Yoongi’s eyes flicker towards it. Again, he isn’t surprised.

“What floor are you?”

Jimin grins, “First – lucky, huh? It works dreams on the nights my ass is sorer than usual.”

Again, Yoongi doesn’t know whether Jimin’s oversharing because he’s half-out-of-it or because he’s genuinely so blunt, but he shakes his head at him anyway.

He thinks he'd get on quite well with Taehyung, somehow. 

They reach his apartment after an exhausting few flights of stairs and Jimin remembers that he’s lost his key. But, before Yoongi yells at him, he tells him to try kicking it in the bottom left corner, near the hinge.

It fucking works. 

This apartment block is terrible.

But, apparently, it’s nothing compared to the inside of it: a cramped, undecorated living room with no working light fixtures, no curtains, holes in the floorboards and support beams from the ceiling coming down in random places. On one of the lesser eroded brick walls of the room, there’s the bookshelf Jimin was talking about, but it only has four books – all missing the coverings on the spines.

There’s one room without a door, leading into the kitchen, another surrounding a cupboard-like structure he assumes is the bathroom, and at the darkest part of the main room is a rotting door, seemingly leading to the boy’s bedroom.

It’s unsanitary, not at all safe and generally just sad. 

Not for the first time, Yoongi feels a twinge of pity for him.

But Jimin doesn’t seem to notice Yoongi’s hesitation in his delirium, instead tugging at the man’s collar and pointing to the aforementioned rotting door.

“My bedroom,” he explains, waggling his finger ever so slightly as if the gesture was not enough. Yoongi nods, taking them across the room (cautiously, because of all the holes and cracks in the floor) and brushing lightly against the door with his shoulder, finding it opens with as much ease as every other door in this building apparently does.

His bedroom’s not hazardous, at least.

In it, lies a cheap double bed with a thin duvet on top, and two pillows – right in the middle of the room. There’s a small wardrobe that’s more like a thin rectangle than anything, wedged into the leftmost corner, and a dresser crookedly sitting on the right side of the bed. The floor’s carpeted, at least, although it peels up at some of the edges, and there’s a rickety-old turntable and two records peeking out from underneath his bed frame.

It looks homely, in a way. Although not a home Yoongi would ever want to call his.

He lets Jimin down on the bed, about to leave and go get him some water to try and flush out his system when he feels a hard tug on his arm and is suddenly tumbling forwards onto the springy mattress, younger boy giggling languidly when he does so.

“Don’t leave,” he says simply, slipping an arm around Yoongi’s waist and pulling him closer. Yoongi can’t fucking believe it. The audacity of this kid-

“I’m gonna go get you a drink-”

“I don’t want one,” he says firmly, maybe confusing the word ‘drink’ as a euphemism for alcohol in his confused-state, but either way he refuses to let go of the older man.

Yoongi doesn’t think he can pull away without having the boy cause a scene, and drug-induced tantrums from someone so bold is the last thing he wants. So, he tells himself that he’ll get up once he falls asleep. He’ll probably fall asleep in no time at all, considering how drowsy he is.

What he doesn’t count on is that right before he does, he says something that practically freezes Yoongi to where he lies.

“You know,” Jimin says contentedly, “you’re exactly the kinda guy I could fall for, Min Yoongi.”

Yoongi almost chokes on his breath, and his mind is yelling at him to leave, get the fuck out of this kid’s shitty little apartment and don’t contact him again. Jimin doesn’t even know him, how could he say that? It’s the drug, it must be. They only met a day ago.

Shit, he should really go- this is all too fucking bizarre. Like some kind of shitty sitcom.

One of those cliches they were talking about. 

He should go.

But he doesn’t. And maybe there was something Seonghyeon was pumping through the vents at the bar, because he stays right where he is, Jimin’s face pressed against him, his arms curled around his back, warmly and soothing and unlike anyone Yoongi’s ever shared a bed with and maybe he even ponders on what ‘kinda guy’ that is, exactly.

Who Jimin must think he is to say that. What terrible taste he must have, what a terrible judge of character he has to be, in total contrast to what he claimed earlier.

He should go.

But he doesn't. Not at all. Yoongi stays right where he is. 

All night. 

With a strange boy pressed against him, and the warning bells of his conscience and his enemy acting as a twisted lullaby. 

Chapter Text

28^th March, 2017 | 9:39am | Jimin’s Apartment, Cerulean Road, Red Light Sector.

Flashes of carnelian, deep, deep crimson run along in a ghastly river to his feet. The boy feels paralysed, his weak frame almost shutting down entirely, as he falls to his knees, coating the bare skin there in the thick fluid.

And he fucking cries. He cries and cries and cries as his baby brother comes up behind him, sobbing himself, and asking what happened. He cries as he watches the man take his last breath, mere metres away from him. He cries as they take his body away and force Yoongi up, handing him over to a ‘friend of the victim’ that doesn’t look much older than he is. And he cries as the man pets his hair and tells him that it’s okay, he’s allowed to cry over this.

His father was murdered, right before his own eyes. And all he did was cry.

Min Yoongi was nineteen. An adult. And he cried.

Yoongi doesn’t know when his dream morphs into consciousness but it takes him five minutes and the smell of something burning for him to come to his senses.

“Are you okay?” A feeble voice comes from the doorway, and Yoongi looks to see Jimin, standing in a knitted sweater that looks like it’s threatening to swallow him whole, a shocking blue stripe painted along its middle. It’s incredible how a change of outfit can warp his entire demeanor. Last night he looked sinful but, now, he just looks small.

Yoongi blinks at him, wordlessly, for a moment, before he feels hot tears spill down his face, mingling with the ones that had been drying there already and he understands why the boy had asked.

He hastily rubs at his eyes, clearing his face of the humiliation before he looks down, grunting “Yeah, I’m fine.” It sounds harsh, probably too harsh for the situation, and he hears Jimin verbally hesitate before he says a light, “Okay.”

Yoongi realises at this point that, apparently, Jimin had tucked him under the covers at one point and, honestly, he wonders how the kid who got spiked is more together than he is right now.

He hates that damn dream. It always reoccurs when someone brings up his father, and especially when he’s had barely any sleep. Shit, it’s one of the reasons Yoongi doesn’t sleep sometimes – instead choosing to work himself to exhaustion. Seokjin always scolds him for it.

When he pulls back the covers, he finds out he was kind enough to remove his jacket for him too, so it didn’t get creased, presumably, and hang it up against his wardrobe for him.

Jimin’s still standing near the door.

“Jimin, what’s burning?” He asks, and the boy looks scandalised, cheeks almost snapping into a rough pinkish colour.

“I-I, you can smell that, huh? Well,” He stammers, and Yoongi almost watches in awe at how drastically his entire mannerisms have changed. He’s not snarky or bratty or ignorant. He’s flustered – seems almost cautious. Jimin heaves out an exasperated breath, at his stutters or whatever he burnt, Yoongi doesn’t know.

“I tried to make breakfast. But I don’t really… make breakfast.”

“You don’t eat breakfast?” Yoongi questions, a tone of alarm decorating it and Jimin looks even more embarrassed when he says, “Not like that- I… can’t always afford it, so…”

Yoongi understands. He supposes it shouldn’t come as a huge shock: he can’t afford to fix a few floorboards, or buy more than four books, or even find an apartment with a lock. Half of the population with money skip breakfast, so he probably doesn’t see it as a big deal. But then again, those people aren’t all as obviously slim as Jimin is. And they don’t work until the crippling hours of the early morning every night, either.

“I’ll buy you breakfast,” Yoongi says, getting out of Jimin’s bed with a stretch, and padding over to collect his jacket and shoes (which he apparently removed as well.) He refuses almost immediately.

“You don’t need to do that,” he says, “I can take care of myself. You should go home.” Yoongi turns to give him a disbelieving look, immediately noting the vague traces of hope on the boy’s face, regardless of his denial.

“I’m not taking you for a five-course meal, Jimin. It’s just breakfast.”

He seems to have a confliction going on in his mind, as if trying to decide to accept or not (like he actually has a choice. Yoongi would’ve sent food over if he refused,) but, ultimately, he obliges, nodding his head meekly and entering the room himself, heading for his wardrobe.

Yoongi doesn’t see a problem with what he’s wearing already (except that he needs pants) but he doesn’t object, just sets himself down on the edge of the bed as he watches the boy sift through his (limited) closet with a furrowed brow.

He pulls something out, a striped red and black t-shirt and his fingers curl around the hem of his jumper, lifting it upwards until he catches Yoongi’s eye.

“No need to stare,” Jimin says quietly, voice still much less entertained and giddy than it was the night before – not teasing and playful like he’d imagine it’d be any other night, as well. Instead, it holds some sort of shyness that Yoongi feels practically stunned by.

“As if you haven’t stripped in front of hundreds of guys before,” Yoongi quips, and though he means it as a joke, both of them seem to wince for a second as soon as it’s said out loud. Insensitive, Seokjin would call that; it’s something Yoongi’s supposedly been for quite some time now.

The older man’s mental nagging paired with Jimin’s somber expression would likely have goaded an apology from Yoongi, but then Jimin brushes it off, a slight smirk (a ghost of his ones from the other night) appearing as he says, “Try a few thousand,” and there’s a playful warmth to it that makes Yoongi think that maybe the boy didn’t mind so much after all.

But then he reasons that maybe he’s just good at laughing off shit. He guesses that’s what his sort of life does to people - when you’re expected to be amiable and compliant all the time.

Then, Jimin pulls off his jumper, exposing what seems like miles of smooth flesh – a hypnotic light honey colour, almost golden in some places from the saturated light of the early morning. The skin’s morbidly decorated with a few rough looking bruises here and there that remind Yoongi of some of the other things that that ‘sort of life’ does to people.

Yoongi can see a substantial outline of some of his ribs, and is almost surprised at himself when he decides he needs to get Hoseok to send some groceries over to the boy’s apartment, knowing Jimin’d probably dismiss his idea of bringing him to a store himself. But, of course, he can’t have one of his allies dropping dead for no decent reason. Yoongi’s never known what it’s like to be poor, but he’s met enough good people that have – and he’s seen too many ruined by it, as well. He likes to help when he can, bearing the teasing of his friends who coo over their ‘soft-hearted’ boss.

Then, as soon as it appeared, the expanse of skin’s gone, covered up by the boy’s thin t-shirt, and Yoongi watches as he steps into a pair of fitted black slacks, hiding his just-as-mesmerising thighs as well. As Jimin does up his belt, Yoongi has no question of how he supposedly has so many people lusting after him, as he said last night. His body is incredible. Yoongi has to clear his throat to bring himself back to reality.

And that reality is, they’re both probably hungry as fuck. Yoongi sure as hell is. So, he stands up again as Jimin shimmies a foot one at a time into his shoes, the action endearing enough to make the older man smile. He acts as young as he looks, sometimes, Yoongi guesses. And that observation makes him realise something.

“Jimin,” he says, “What age are you?”

His gaze snaps to Yoongi, a sort of startled look in it until he comes to his senses and his eyes happily crease a little as he says “Sorry, it’s been a while since someone’s asked me that… you know,” he prompts, “without the intention of fu-fucking my brains out straight after.” Hearing that, Yoongi would guess that Jimin is always that blunt about that part of his life, but he doesn’t miss the tiny stammer as he cusses – and he knows the boy has no problem with swearing.

“I’m eighteen, as of…” he says, face twisting in thought briefly before he calculates, “…six months ago.”

Yoongi makes a small noise of understanding, because, yeah, that sounds about right: Just on the line of teenager and adult, still clinging onto his boyish looks and that pesky rebellious nature. He’s basically the poster boy for eighteen-year-olds everywhere.

“That explains the moodiness,” Yoongi murmurs and Jimin sends him a look of scandal, maybe about to rebuke that statement when his stomach growls and he’s too embarrassed by that, holding his arms over his front as if it’ll drown it out, to even remember Yoongi’s jibe.

Yoongi’s mouth quirks up quietly, going to reach for his phone to tell Hoseok he owes them one free lift, since he bailed, but remembering that a) his phone is dead and b) even if it wasn’t, he would never fucking hear the end of it if the man found out he ‘stayed the night’ at Jimin’s.

As Yoongi tells Jimin that they have to walk, exiting the building with the boy being contented enough with that fate, he wonders if he does have a ‘sweet spot’ for the kid, after all - but he dismisses the thought just as quickly. He barely knows him, after all. On top of that, he’s rude, defiant, and annoyingly stubborn. Who in their right mind would be susceptible to that? Yoongi’s already too easy on Jungkook, who’s definitely rude, defiant and stubborn quite frequently as well - he doesn’t care to have another brat in his life. Hoseok’s clearly just trying to mess with him, he decides.

That is, until they step out the door and the younger boy swears colourfully at the sudden cold they’re expected to submit to. Because, in that moment, Yoongi shrugs off his suit jacket without any hesitation and slips it around Jimin’s shoulders, face expressionless as if he’d do it for anyone else (other than Jungkook.)

“W-wait, aren’t you cold? I can go get a sweater, it’s not a big deal-“

“It’s fine,” Yoongi assures, “If we take any longer my stomach’s gonna shrivel up. I’m sorry it doesn’t match your outfit.” He glances at the boy blankly, but there’s the tell-tale signs of a smirk drifting onto his lips, “If you kept on your sweater it would’ve.”

Jimin snorts, “I can’t go out wearing something like that.”

Yoongi looks at him quizzically as they walk down Cerulean Road – a lot less threatening in the day, but still unpleasant with undisposed garbage, wrecks of buildings, boarded up windows and, he swears, dry blood in some places littering the entire street.

“Why not?” Yoongi asks, stepping around a particularly large crack in the path with a disdainful tut.

Jimin’s brow quivers as if he’s confused that he has to even explain himself. He shrugs, “Because,” and supplies, “I don’t like looking bad in public.”

“Bad?” Yoongi echoes, surprise catching in his throat from the outburst, “In that? I thought you looked cu-“ He cuts himself off, Jimin looking at him now with curiosity as a touch of heat runs through the older man’s cheeks. God, what is he, a teenager? He clears his throat, sticking a hand in his trouser pocket as the easy wind rustles through his shirt and fuck it’s cold. Yet it’s doing nothing to cool down the blossoming flush on his face.  

“Okay,” Yoongi clarifies, “You looked fine.”

Jimin has a funny little smile on his face, as if he’s trying not to laugh, when he thanks him.

28^th March, 2017 | 10:22am | Velveteen Diner, Red Light Sector.

Jimin, like Yoongi had expected, is quite happy to eat a lot once he orders for him (the boy initially kept saying he’d eat anything, he didn’t care.)

French toast, eggs and bacon, waffles, pancakes, a generous side of fresh fruit, orange juice, an entire pot of coffee and a strawberry milkshake all come to the table. It’s probably more food than Jimin’s ever seen at once in his entire life, judging by the way his eyes snap open wide when the server brings the food over, eyeing them both, nosily, as if Yoongi’s got some sort of sugar daddy arrangement going on – which Yoongi in no way looks old enough for, thank you very much.

Out of the entire order, Yoongi has two cups of coffee and half a waffle that Jimin basically forces him to eat because he feels bad eating all of the food himself, and, naturally he can’t. Although he definitely attempts to, sampling everything that’s been brought to him. He hits the bottom of his milkshake with a sharp slurp and sinks back into the booth seat, an exasperated groan escaping from his mouth, hand rubbing his tummy dramatically.

“I’ve never been so full in my life,” he swears, then, grinning a little as he lazily looks across to Yoongi, saying, “well, you know, with food.”

Yoongi shakes his head at him, as if he’s trying to get rid of the chuckle threatening to escape yet failing.

“I do feel bad leaving all of this, though. Do you think they could shove it into a container, or something? I’m pretty sure this’ll feed me for, like, two weeks.”

Yoongi tells them they probably could, undoubtedly still amused by the boy’s difference in attitude towards him than at their first few meetings. Maybe it’s because he’s buying him food, maybe it’s because he saved his ass last night – if Jimin even remembers – or maybe it’s because he’s not such a brat after all, but whatever it is, Yoongi finds it interesting.

They’ve easily both avoided the events of last night popping up in conversation, like Yoongi’s also avoided the topic of the boy witnessing his tears this morning; he doesn’t need or want to explain himself – but he’s curious of something Seonghyeon had said last night, which might lead him onto another question he’s had for Jimin since last night.

“You know Moon, then, do you?”

Jimin looks up from where he was dipping his fingers into the milkshake glass and licking the remains (so much for full) and his expression darkens from a gentle sort of contentedness to full-on frustration. He groans again, only fairly angry this time and says “Fucking hell, do I,” a little too loudly, resulting in a few looks from the scarce other people occupying the diner.   

“The bastard comes to piss me off at least once a week. He’s got a reputation in the club – I keep telling the manager to ban him, that’s what everyone else there wants too, but the asshole’s so money-hungry that he won’t,” Jimin scoffs before he adds, “’Suck it up’ he says, ‘You of all people can’t be picky.’”

“Reputation?” Yoongi questions, though, knowing the man fairly well, he already has a pretty good idea. Jimin waves a hand half-heartedly around, in a sort of ‘you know’ gesture.

“The usual shit from someone like that: drugging, spiking, hitting, forcing, threatening. He’s not the worst I’ve ever had to deal with, but he’s persistent as fuck, so I guess that makes up for it.”

“Shit, Jimin, what was the worst?”

The boy halts in his action of clearing the glass, setting it down onto the table lightly. He hums, tilts his head to look out the window, now leaning on his hand as if he’s considering it. There’s a puckered frown on his lips, and he shrugs, looking back at Yoongi as he decides, “I don’t think it’s a good topic for the breakfast table.”

Yoongi feels a tug in his chest, an urge to lighten the mood, so he leans back in the booth with a sigh of “Yeah, I guess you’re right,” catching Jimin’s eye, who adorns a confused raise of his brow at Yoongi’s strange tone.

“Why don’t we talk about what kinda guy I am apparently am that you’d fall for me, instead?”

Jimin looks unbelievingly puzzled for a moment, as if he’s missed the joke, but then he slaps a hand over his mouth, eyes gusted wide.

“Fuck,” he says, and Yoongi laughs at the boy as he recalls the night with horror, ears tinging an obvious pink.

28^th March, 2017 | 4:17pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

When Yoongi finally makes it back to his apartment, after walking Jimin back to Cerulean Road and then going the next few miles to his own place, he immediately goes to his room and sleeps off his exhaustion from carrying someone several blocks last night, then not actually sleeping until early morning and then walking three miles to his apartment. It’s reasonable, he thinks. And when he wakes sometime around 4pm, reasonably later, and exits his bedroom to go make himself some sort of late lunch, he is immediately bombarded by a small riot coming towards him, emerging from his living room.

Suddenly, his friends have encompassed him into a crushing bear hug. And there is nothing he can do about it besides the small grumble of get the fuck off me, you idiots.

They do, eventually, and Seokjin thumps him on the back of the arm when he says “Where the hell were you all morning? You said meet here at eleven, and then you didn’t answer your phone. We went out to look for you but Hoseok said you must’ve walked back, and when we came and you were sleeping. We didn’t wanna wake you so-”

“Hoseok?” Yoongi cuts the older man off as he scans the room, seeing three of his subordinates and his little brother, but not anywhere does he see the bumbling idiot he’s assigned as his right-hand.

“Where is Hoseok?”

Then, there’s a kick delivered at Yoongi’s front door and in walks Jung Hoseok himself and Yoongi immediately scowls in contrast to the man’s blinding grin.

And, honestly, he really shouldn't look good at all, hair parted in the centre beneath an obnoxious pink beanie and gym bag swung across his sticky-looking t-shirt (the problem with having an idol in your gang is that, apparently, they prioritise practice over meetings.) But he does, and he likely knows it by the way he strides into the room. Yoongi scoffs at him, fondly, as the man says “I’m right here, baby, did you miss me?”

“Was hoping you were gone, actually. And don’t kick my fuckin’ door.”

Hoseok snorts, setting down his bag before he says, “I almost had to kick it last night when you didn’t return any of my goddamn calls. You’re lucky I cut a spare key,” wait, what? “And then you weren’t even here, so I drove around the sector city looking for you – even crossed into Downtown and you know I hate that place. Where the hell’d you go?”

Yoongi looks around at the questioning faces in the room and he gives a vague shrug of his shoulder, pushing past them and making a B-line for his favourite armchair in front of the middle window as he tries to maintain an air of authority.

“Nowhere,” he mutters, gesturing for the rest of them to sit on the suite in front of them as Yoongi says, “Anyway I talked to Seonghyeon last night, don’t you wanna hear about that?”

Hoseok gazes at him suspiciously, but waves a hand to let the man know he’ll drop it. For now, knowing him. The rest obviously replicate Hoseok’s curiosity, but seem to let it slide as well.

“Well, first,” Yoongi says before they can change their minds, “the fucker refused to give us back the information. He made some sort of hollow exchange deal with me but I declined, so-“

“What was the deal?” Namjoon asks, clearly taken aback by the fact the man had offered any sort of exchange at all. Yoongi pauses, considering how to phrase it in such a way that doesn’t sound like he has a so-called ‘sweet spot’, as the man sitting closest to him on the adjacent arm chair had said.

“He wanted Jimin – and obviously, I said that that wasn’t an exchange, because I don’t own him but the kid was drugged up and I figured he meant to let him take him as opposed to give him and, well, I wouldn’t let him just take someone that’s-“

“Barbaric,” Seokjin supplies, genuine surprise in his features even though they all know that the man’s exactly the type to do something like that. Yoongi nods, murmuring an agreeing ‘exactly’ before he continues.

“Regardless, he’s definitely got his eye on Jimin – which concerns me, because why would he need someone like that?”

Hoseok scratches his head with a thoughtful hum. “Maybe he doesn’t,” he proposes, “Maybe he just wants you to think he does for leverage.”

“Leverage? How does Jimin give him leverage?”

Hoseok raises his eyebrows suggestively. It takes all of Yoongi’s strength not to hurl a cushion at the man sitting smugly in the armchair to his left. The other three notice the two’s exchange and look at each other questioningly, while Seokjin minutely smiles.

“Anyway,” Yoongi says firmly, making Hoseok grin, clearly pleased with himself, “when he left he said something cryptic – but it sounded like a threat.”

“What’d he sa-“

“It doesn’t matter,” He stresses, not knowing if he can take more of Hoseok’s mocking. “What matters is what we do next.” He acknowledges that by this point he’s probably more irritated than he should be, but chalks it up to a late night and having to think about that asshole, Seonghyeon, again so early in the afternoon.

 “Anyone have any ideas?”

The room falls silent. Jungkook stares into space with wide eyes, Taehyung seems to get an idea, mouth breaking open before Seokjin gives him a ‘are you sure what you’re about to say isn’t stupid’ look and he closes it again, avoiding eye contact. Namjoon looks pensive, but in the sort of way you would when you don’t want to be asked a question in school, while Hoseok just keeps staring at Yoongi with that damn smirk.

“Fucking fantastic,” Yoongi snaps, rubbing his face tiredly to keep himself from exploding at his friends.

“Well,” he says, “I guess we continue questioning Syndicate members to see if we can get any leads. Namjoon, do you have the actual CCTV footage, yet?”

He nods, reaching for his laptop inside of his bag, “I’ll show you it once it renders.”

“Okay, good,” Yoongi says only slightly condescendingly, as if the fact that Seonghyeon is a slippery bastard is because of them. “Then, if the rest of you find out anything at all about this, call me immediately.”

“Will you pick up, this time?” Hoseok taunts, and Yoongi actually does throw the cushion at him now, only to have the man high kick it across the room, smacking Taehyung in the face instead.

“Yoongi,” the boy whines, a puppy-like pout on his face when he recovers from the initial shock. Jungkook shakes his head at his older brother, like it was his fault, and pets a soothing hand through Taehyung’s hair. Sometimes it’s really hard to believe that Taehyung’s not the youngest in their group. Hoseok cackles mercilessly in the background.

Honestly, he has the least professional gang in the entire world.

“Be careful when you’re investigating leads, they’ll probably try and set us up again,” Yoongi warns sternly, because, as they may be getting smarter, the Syndicate are still a gang of fucking idiots, “and in the meantime, I’ll continue to come up with an actual plan, so we all just need to retain our normal duties until then.”

“Speaking of which,” Yoongi continues, “what do we have, Jin?”

Seokjin purses his lips in thought, before a cloudy expression brushes over his face and he looks at Yoongi with neutrality (it’s his business face), “A few guys backed out of some of our contracts.”

“Which guys?”

“Just a few of the ones we got hooked in that coke push a few months ago. Nothin’ big, but I know you always wanna know when people don’t keep up with our payments.”

Yoongi nods contently, unfortunate that they lost a deal, but he can just hope they decided to kick the stuff altogether and didn’t find a better deal somewhere else. He shifts in his chair, “What else?”

Seokjin hesitates for a moment, and Yoongi ponders why until he says, “The syndicate beat up a few of our guys in the Umbra Sector.”

Umbra?

“What the hell are they doing there?” Yoongi barks, because, shit that’s way out of the Syndicate’s part of the city. It makes sense that they come to Red Light, it’s the Mariposa’s base sector. If they were to cross over into their side of the city, they’d come there, or to one of the border sectors: Full Moon or Demonia. But Umbra’s at the very west of Seoul.

“Apparently making a drug trade, according to the guys who got beat,” Namjoon says, obviously having discussed the matter with Seokjin already, “But I don’t know, Yoongi. It’s strange timing, right? With all of the set-ups lately… and our information getting stolen.”

Yoongi makes a noise of agreement, signaling he doesn’t want to discuss it anymore, and he looks back to Seokjin who looks unsure again before he says, “The… government have been talking about changing some of their policies-“ but Yoongi holds up a hand, eyeing the boy with barely hidden disapproval.

“They won’t. They’ve got their power over the whole damn country, they won’t change a fuckin’ thing.”

Seokjin looks at him as if he’s in disagreement, but he doesn’t say it, just nods.

“Next?”

Hoseok clears his throat with audible smugness beside him and Yoongi’s eyes drift to him in the form of a glare.

“What?”

Hoseok stands up, addressing everyone in the room with an air of propriety about him that, as usual, does not come off in his clothing choice – but at least he’s not sparkling today and leaving glitter on his furniture. Just sweat.

“I got a movie deal!” He beams, and everyone immediately whoops and claps him except for Yoongi who deadpans him with, “What, as the villain?”

“I’ll have you know I’d be the sexiest damn villain in film history. But, no, you ass – as the protagonist.”

Yoongi lets out a noise of frustration, turning his attention back to Seokjin and wordlessly asking him to continue as Hoseok contentedly sits back down.

“A few kids are behind on rent in some of our flats. They apparently got scared and ran off to stay with some friends named Choe Woojin and Kim Joowon, according to some of the other people in that block.”

Yoongi can see Jungkook’s face light up out of the corner of his eye, a silent please, please take me with you, hyung, tangible in it.

Yoongi sighs.

“Kookie and I’ll go check up on them, later.”

The boy pumps a fist into the air, adorable little grin on his face and, ugh, it’s so unfair to be expected to say no to that kid.

“You’re the best, hyung!”

“I know,” he says dismissively, even though a smile tugs quietly as his lips. He glances back to Seokjin again, “Anything else?”

“You, and by default us as well, were invited to the opening of some restaurant as a VIP gue-“

“No,” He sees all five of the men around him flash disappointment. But Yoongi’s not some fucking celebrity, even if three out of five of the other people in the room are, to some degree.

“Then that’s all,” He sighs, wistfully, as if the man had already been thinking about how the network connections he could’ve met.

Yoongi stands up, walking the few short steps towards Namjoon, who seems to know exactly what Yoongi’s about to ask, because he turns the laptop on his knee around to reveal a small video already on screen.

“This is the footage?” Yoongi asks, though it’s fairly obvious already, and Namjoon nods, pressing play.

There’s nothing much at first, the footage being fast-forwarded as Yoongi crouches down to see the screen properly. People go in and out, but no one particularly striking – and certainly not a gang of assholes, ready to beat on a kid.

But then, Yoongi sees a small huddle of hooded black approaching and the footage slows down to normal pace. They talk with the bouncer outside for a moment, seemingly crowding him and the man appears to relent, letting them in.  

The video cuts, following the men in the hallway. None of them seem armed, although Yoongi already knows Jimin wasn’t anything more than a little bruised after it, and, honestly, beside from the fact they’re virtually prowling the hallway in plain black hoodies, like a pack of wolves, they don’t even seem that out of place in the club. If anyone passed them they’d probably just think they were there to fuck some poor kid, not threaten someone to hide fake stolen information. 

And then, it flicks to the dressing room and Jimin, a lot more visible than he was in the photos, looks like he almost jumps out of his fucking skin when they burst in. It’s strange in the moment before, though, the few seconds where he’s just sitting dismally at the other end of the room, staring into the mirror as he flattens down his hair and fiddles with the buttons on his shirt, no sign of any of his liveliness and confidence at all. And, once again, Yoongi finds himself surprised by how different the boy can act depending on the situation. A part of him kind of wants to know which is his real persona, but the train of thought’s broken as soon as he sees the boy’s anger visibly shift onto his face, even from the grainy footage. Yoongi think he sees him say something along the lines of “what the fuck are you jackasses doing?” and the corner of his mouth tips up with a short amused snort.

They crowd around him, blocking the view and the video switches from the camera at the back of the room, to one to the right of the boy instead, slightly closer than the last.

He seems to say something else that Yoongi doesn’t quite catch, and one of them smacks him across the face. Yoongi flinches, involuntarily. They show him the pen drive, sticking it close enough to his face that he lurches back, hitting the man’s ugly blotch of a tattooed hand with irritation, and really, the kid is too damn brave for his own good, because next thing that happens is one of the men with more muscle than most body-builders shoves Jimin so he hits hard against the wall, head hitting the stone concrete with an inaudible cry of pain. He doesn’t get time to do much more than glare, because suddenly one of the other men pulls down his hood and the video zooms in on him for a moment to catch the blurry grain of his face, something on it that could be a mark or a tattoo, and then it zooms out again just in time to get how the man takes both of Jimin’s wrists and pins them above his head as he leans into him. He’s saying something, and by the look on Jimin’s face it’s not something he wants to hear at all and his body jerks, arms pulling hard to try and break free but he can’t, especially not when the man presses his hips against him to keep him still. His free hand roams down the boy’s body and Yoongi hopes that his friends don’t notice the way his own hand curls into a fist when Jimin’s stare grows darker, his mouth seeming to twitch enough to be visible even in the low-quality footage.

“Namjoon, is there anything useful in this?” He asks, tearing his eyes away from the screen as the man’s hand doesn’t stop. Namjoon shrugs, “I haven’t watched it. I only skimmed through it, I thought it might help us identify a few of the guys. Just… check to see if there’s anything particularly recognizable about them.”

Yoongi doesn’t see anything, besides the guy who’s literally got bigger biceps than both of Yoongi’s thighs side by side - but so does half of the Syndicate.

When he watches the screen again, the man who’d smacked him first’s got him in a choke hold now, waving the pen drive in his face and probably explaining what he had to do. Jimin glares, but nods as best as he can, and the man lets go, the boy dropping roughly to his knees on the hard floor. He throws the pen drive at him and it hits off of his face, landing in front of him. They exit, one of them saying something to Jimin on their way out, and the boy flips him off. The video ends.

“Well?” Namjoon asks, taking his laptop back from Yoongi’s view and snapping the lid shut, “Was there anything?”

Yoongi shakes his head, “Not really,” he says. “A few general things, I guess, but nothing I could point out in a street – you know? The footage was way too shitty.”

“I’ll try and get you HD next time,” Namjoon jokes, and Yoongi just glares at him.

He feels weird having watched the incident occur. Jimin left out a lot of the details, it seems, and he can’t help the wedge of guilt that settles in his stomach upon thinking back on the ordeal, because, after all, what had happened was down to Yoongi and his gang, and Yoongi failing to keep their information safe. Because of that, a lot of things had been happening lately that shouldn’t have.

It ignites an even stronger desire in him to get it out of the fucker’s hands, and he looks to Jungkook, gesturing him to get up. After all, if he can’t chase the information right now, he needs to at least let the Syndicate know that their ploys won’t distract him. And the best way to do that, is to pretend they aren’t.

“Hoseok,” he calls as Jungkook walks confidently to the door, arguably looking like a mobster more than most of his friends do in his white shirt and plain black tie, just purposely loose enough to look like it was accidental. Hoseok doesn’t have to be told what Yoongi’s asking of him, he grabs the keys to one of Yoongi’s cars (the only one he ever actually uses, a black Jaguar, that Jungkook loves ‘til death do them part) and follows both of them out the door as Yoongi tells the remaining three to get their asses to work, there’s plenty of shit to be done.

They collectively scoff at him.

Jungkook asks to sit in the passenger seat (more demanding than asking, the little shit he is) and Yoongi lets him, partly because of the kid’s spoiled pout and partly because Yoongi hates sitting in the front, anyway.

Yoongi closes the door after him and breathes in the fresh scent of the vehicle, which is unsurprising considering how little he uses it. He bought it only a few months ago to replace his old one which had enraged Yoongi so much every time he looked at it, that he’d sold it the year before and let Hoseok drive him around in his until he started complaining about how he didn’t want to have to keep cleaning blood off of his seat. So, Yoongi bought the car that Jungkook had been asking for his next birthday, and promised he could have it when he turned nineteen.

Nineteen. Yoongi knows the boy’s not even three years away from that, and if he could put up with his whines for another additional year, he’d probably push that promise back to his twentieth.

Because, to not sugarcoat anything, nineteen is a death year.

Yoongi’s nineteenth birthday had been saturated with death, and only a week after that he crashed his car and almost killed him and Jungkook.

Hoseok’s been driving him ever since.

Jungkook says something about not being able to wait until he gets this car, and Yoongi sighs.

Hoseok starts the engine, pulling out of the spacious garage filled with Yoongi’s other, totally unused cars. He remembers when his father had bought most of them, promising Yoongi that he could use them all once he could drive, and he was excited to speed down streets and highways and get longing looks of envy whenever he pulled up to some nightclub or party. It’s almost funny, when he thinks about it now. He told Jungkook no when he asked if he could drive any of them.

“They’re dad’s,” Yoongi had said very simply, and the boy never asked again.

They only get down the first street before Hoseok catches Yoongi’s eye in the mirror and there’s a determined glint in it that makes Yoongi want to immediately look away.

“So,” he says, and he can just tell what the man’s about to say, “Where were you last night? For real?”

“I told you it didn’t matter,” Yoongi says and Hoseok wags a finger at him, a condescending tut repeating from his mouth, “Actually, Yoongs, you said ‘nowhere.’ Strike one, baby.”

“What? How is that a strike? I-“

“You’re avoiding the question. Now, I will ask you again: Where’d you stay? Because you weren’t at your home, I called Jungkook and he said you weren’t with him at your mom’s house either. I called all of our friends, none of them knew where you were. I went to the Galaxy Club again,” he says, tone becoming annoyingly obnoxious “and, curiously enough, people said they saw you leave with a young boy.”

Yoongi pales.

“Now,” Hoseok says with a chirpy manner, “I thought to myself, ‘who would Yoongi possible leave with? He doesn’t go to those places to take someone home, the last time he got laid was probably 1973, so, who could he possibly be with? Wanna answer?”

Yoongi shrugs, too busy trying to act unbothered to retort back at his 1973 comment. He takes his eyes away from Hoseok to stare at the window. The man sighs, obviously discontented that he has to continue.

“I knew it wasn’t Seonghyeon, that man’s a dinosaur, not a young boy, so-“

And with that, Yoongi’s had enough.

“It was Jimin, fuck, okay? The kid got drugged, I took him back to his apartment so he didn’t fucking die and he made me stay with him, alright? And no-” Yoongi snaps when Hoseok’s brow shoots up in shock, “we didn’t fuck. We didn’t do anything. I stayed because he was probably too scared to be alone in case he choked on his own goddamn vomit or something.”

Hoseok’s silent when Yoongi finishes, a slight breathlessness to him. He looks satisfied, as if that’s all he wanted to hear, and simply he asks “Where does Jimin live, anyway?”

When Yoongi replies that he’s from the Cerulean Blocks Hoseok suddenly smiles oddly and Yoongi almost wants to snap at him - but Jungkook cuts in first with “Cool - you stayed with Jimin hyung last night? That’s good, mom was worried about you when Hoseok called and told her he couldn’t find you.”

Yoongi almost smiles, but then he catches onto something.

“Hyung? You’re calling him hyung?”

Jungkook turns around in his seat, a vaguely condescending look on his face that Yoongi knows he gets from himself.

“Yeah, he told me I was cute and to call him hyung when Namjoon and I bumped into him while we were talking to the owner about the CCTV footage yesterday. You told us to check if he’d seen the men in the footage, remember?” Jungkook asks as if that was the thing Yoongi was confused about. But no, that was definitely not it.

“You don’t even call Namjoon ‘hyung’,” Yoongi points out and Jungkook leans back in his seat, putting his feet up on the dashboard as he says, rather obnoxiously, “Yeah, well, I’m a mobster.”

Yoongi hits the headrest of his seat.

“Anyhow,” He diverges, turning his attention back to the fact that Hoseok’s been driving and Yoongi hasn’t even asked where they’re going.

“Where were these kids last seen, Hoseok?”

He laughs lowly.

“Cerulean Road.”

And suddenly the wicked grin the man’s kept ever since Yoongi mentioned Jimin’s address makes sense. He tips his head back against his seat and closes his eyes with defeat.

“Let me guess. The flats?”

And although Yoongi can’t see the man’s face, he can hear purely from his voice how delighted he is as he says “That’s our best bet, boss.”

Yoongi groans.

Chapter Text

28^th March, 2017 | 5:37pm | Jimin’s Apartment, Cerulean Road, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi expected Jung Hoseok to decide that they need to ask around the other residents whether they’ve seen these kids or not. And he expected that they’d probably bump into Jimin at some point. What he was not expecting, but probably should’ve been, is how Hoseok immediately goes to Jimin’s apartment, through some form of otherworldly power, most likely, and Yoongi is no longer thankful for the boy’s apartment being on the first floor.

Hoseok knocks on the door, taking in Yoongi’s tight shoulders with an air of suspicion.

There’s some shuffling around audible inside of the apartment, as if the person inside is approaching the door rather hastily (having seen the boy’s apartment, he probably had to jump over a hole in the floor.)

“You assholes better fuck off, if you knock on my door one more time I swear to fucking God-“

“Jimin,” Hoseok calls, stopping the boy in his rant, “It’s Jung Hoseok. Can we talk to you for a bit?”

Jimin lets out a small ‘oh’ before there’s a scrabbling sound, and the door handle jerks back and forth until he manages to get it open, revealing the boy with a neutral expression until he spots Jungkook, his face lighting up with a substantial smile as he says “Hi Jungkookie!”

“Hi hyung!”

Yoongi scoffs, resulting in Jimin’s eyes flickering to him. He immediately frowns.

“What now?” He asks and Yoongi is genuinely stunned, because that is nothing like the boy he had been having breakfast with this morning. That’s the one whose first words to him were asking him who the fuck he was, in lieu of a greeting. 

Yoongi finds himself wordless, so Hoseok cuts in, an annoyingly chipper look on his face when he and Yoongi catch each other’s eyes.

“We’re looking for a few kids, around your age maybe, that came here to stay with some friends? Probably loud, scared? Looking for help?”

Jimin narrows his eyes at Hoseok for a few seconds, then he nods, seemingly in remembrance.

“They’ve been knocking on my door half of the morning, something about their friends not letting them in because they’re scared of the people chasing them. They think since I’m only a little older than them they’re my concern. Your fault, I’m assuming?” Jimin’s eyes drift to Yoongi when he asks this, and Yoongi scowls, ready to rebuke that statement when Hoseok interposes again.

“Where’d you last see them?”

The boy shrugs as if it’s obvious, “Outside my door.”

“That doesn’t help-“

Jimin folds his arms impatiently, countering with “Well? What the fuck am I supposed to do about it?”

Yoongi sighs, getting both of the men’s attention.

“Jimin, does your landlord keep records of who stays where?”

The boy’s demeanor softens ever so slightly, somewhat starting to calm down from whatever had been pissing him off earlier – Yoongi doubts a couple of scared kids knocking on his door would’ve got him so mad.

“Yeah,” he answers, “But good luck getting it from him – he’s a stubborn asshole. I’ve been telling him I need a new lock on my door for months now.”

Yoongi’s hardly shocked: the block looks as if it has no landlord at all.

Yoongi nods, turning on his heels, before saying “Alright then, show us his flat.”

He hears Jimin sneer from behind him, saying “You can’t just waltz in and demand that I drop what I’m doing - fucking mobsters, I swear-“

Yoongi gives a tired look over his shoulder at the boy standing with his chest puffed out, tension stifling back into his posture.

“Jimin,” he says calmly, “just help us out for a bit, okay?”

The boy grits his teeth, but Yoongi knows that he probably wasn’t actually doing anything important. What could he have been doing? Reading one of his four books? Breaking his ankle on one of his broken floorboards? Yoongi suppresses a snort as Jimin moodily tells them to follow him, leading them down to the ground floor again.

To the right of the entrance is a small hallway, with a door cited ‘Keep Out – Do Not Enter’ on it, and Yoongi would’ve gotten the idea of what kind of landlord this guy is solely from that.

Jimin knocks on the door and steps back a little, shoulder almost brushing with Yoongi’s in the cramped corridor. From inside there’s a shout of “what the fuck do you want?” and Jimin mutters something angrily under his breath before hitting the door a little harder with his fist, snapping “Come out here, you bastard.”

There’s swift stomping and a faint rant of I’m gonna kill this kid someday, the little shit before the door swings open and a man even smaller than both Yoongi and Jimin stands in a bathrobe, looking undeniably pissed. He looks at Jimin, then at Yoongi, then behind Yoongi and back at Yoongi.

“Who the hell are all you?” he grumbles, “You live here?”

“They don’t,” Jimin replies quickly, “But it’s not like you’d know if they fucking did.” The landlord screws up his face with agitation at the boy and sighs heavily.

“What do you want, Park?”

“They want to see the room records. If you even keep them up to date.”

He scoffs, “Of course I do, how else would I know if someone skipped on rent?” He looks back at Yoongi and the downturn of his mouth seems to solidify further.

“You’re not getting those records. For all I know, you could be policemen or something.”

Yoongi raises an indignant eyebrow, “Why would that matter?”

“Shouldn’t you know already, officer?”

“They’re not damn policemen!” Jimin erupts, snapping his hands onto his hips in frustration, “They’re looking for a couple of kids, wanna know what room they’re in.”

The landlord squints at all four of them, before he seems to relent, muttering “Alright, alright,” – probably too annoyed to carry on the conversation – and he tells them to wait there, before he goes back into his flat.

The silence is admittedly a little awkward when the man disappears. Yoongi can feel Hoseok staring at him as he scans the hard-set jaw and irritated pout of the boy's lips, trying to figure out what the hell could've caused such a mood switch from this morning. And Yoongi almost considers asking him, but then the landlord comes back out, and shoves the book into Jimin's hand, who immediately holds it out to Yoongi.

"Be quick with it," the landlord says, "I need it back."

Yoongi doubts that's true, he's probably just not convinced that the men are not here to investigate whatever illegal activities are going on in his apartment block. But he takes the book, glancing at the man with a vague expression, and starts flicking through it.

"Choe Woojin and Kim Joowon," Hoseok reminds him and Yoongi hums, running his finger down the information grids of the residents on each page. There’s a surprising amount of people living in the block, for such a small building. Yoongi figures that, like most other landlords of these sorts of places, the apartments themselves are mostly ridiculously small. Jimin’s only has a few rooms, from what Yoongi’d seen earlier, but even then, he thinks that the boy could be one of the luckier ones here: if the number of people to the size of the building is anything to go by.

"5A. Floor 3," he says a moment later, the landlord having been tapping his foot impatiently the entire time. Yoongi hands him back the book and he snatches it, holding it tightly to his chest all the while looking at Jimin with a vaguely agitated gaze.

"Don't be late with rent this month, Park. At this rate, I'm going to go bankrupt because of you," the man grouses and, with that, he shuts the door of his apartment harshly in their faces. Jimin's mouth is slightly agape.

"What a dickhead," he mutters, making Yoongi snort quietly.

They make their way back towards the stairs, climbing up to the first floor when Jimin suddenly breaks off from the other three, catching their attention easily. The boy runs a hand through his hair absentmindedly, saying "As nice as it was to see Jungkookie, I've gotta go get ready for work now, so..."

Yoongi and Hoseok partially frown at his bluntness, but Jungkook waves happily as Jimin begins to walk down the hallway. Yoongi's eyes drift to the single window outside. The sky’s delving into a murky blackness, fading out from deep purple. Street lights line the road poorly like candlelight, some dim, some flickering. Yoongi’s brows draw together.

"You're walking?" he calls abruptly, making Jimin halt in his steps. The boy turns slowly, eyebrows cocked in a non-verbal 'duh.' Yoongi really, really doesn't know what's wrong with himself, maybe the mold on the walls and the thick smell of smoked drugs is messing with his brain, because he doesn't hesitate at all when he says "I'll drive you.”

And, when all three people look at him with differing levels of shock, he mentally stammers over his words for a second before he says, “The Syndicate could be trying to get you back for snitching, you know?”

Hoseok’s looking at him like he just committed mass murder.

Jimin’s hard expression starts to dwindle again. He nods neutrally, shrugging while he says “Sure, okay. I’m not gonna say no to avoiding getting my ass kicked again,” An edge of playfulness might flash over his face when he adds, “Not unless you plan to do it for them.”

Yoongi chuckles, surprisingly to himself and both of his subordinates, “We’ll see,” he jokes and the boy even laughs a little in return. Yoongi looks over his shoulder to Hoseok and Jungkook who both stand wide-eyed.

“Yoongi, are you sure you don’t want me to- I mean, driving?”

“Hyung, I don’t know about that…”

The older man shakes his head adamantly, half-confident, half questioning where the fuck that other half came from. He feels his hands start to tremble slightly and stuffs them into the pockets of his pants, resolutely.

“5A, third floor. Choe and Kim. Make sure they’re okay, tell them not to worry about the rent.”

Yoongi sees Jimin’s eyes flicker with surprise, but Hoseok and Jungkook remain stoic (after recovering from their boss’ decision), as if they expected nothing less. But really, why would he want to terrify kids? That’s the Syndicate’s job. Yoongi’ll kick any bastard’s ass like some brooding vigilante, but kids? Just for the hell of it? He doesn’t have the time or the fucked-up mindset for that.

“Let’s go, Min, I don’t have all day,” Jimin says airily, and Yoongi looks back to the boy a few steps ahead of him, staring at him with a strange mixture of contempt and amusement.

Yoongi sighs, and follows him down the hall, raising a half-hearted hand to his subordinates, who still both seem undeniably bewildered, underneath their professional appearances. 

“You better not be hoping to watch me change again,” Jimin jibes once they get into his apartment. Yoongi scoffs as the boy pushes open the door of his bedroom, glancing back over his shoulder as Yoongi stalls at the frame, leaning against it.

“What’s with the attitude, huh? You weren’t such a bitch this morning,” He says very plainly, and Jimin shoots him a glare, pausing his rummaging through the closet. He lets his arms drop to his sides, loosely – head irately tilted at him as he seems to think.

“I was probably still a little bit high,” Jimin says simply, despite the aggravated mood of his demeanor, and Yoongi can’t help but let out a patronising laugh.    

 “Sure,” he teases, resulting in the boy squinting at him with something unreadable.  

“Fuck you,” Jimin snaps, “get out so I can change,” but there’s hardly any bite to it. Yoongi smirks. He shifts his weight back off from the doorframe, and nods overdramatically, closing the door behind him. He hears Jimin mutter ‘asshole’ and chuckles to himself.

Jimin’s living space is void of much furniture, minus a few chairs and one beat-up settee, so Yoongi has little choice but to sit down on the two-seater sofa, and let his mind wander whilst he waits. In this time, he thinks about the room’s owner, mostly. How long he’s been living here, how he ended up working where he does, how he got involved with the Syndicate at all – why they chose him. Yoongi doesn’t know the answer to any of these questions, and that makes him want to find out.

Jimin’s an interesting kid, Yoongi’s concluded. Killer mood swings that scope across a vast stretch of varying intensities and civility along with the way he seems simultaneously so sure of himself and so completely lost. It’s… interesting.

And it’s also interesting how Yoongi falters so easily: how his eyes automatically widen when Jimin pushes open his bedroom door, shocking red shorts clinging to his waist and thighs, loose white shirt already threatening to shrug off of his shoulders. It’s interesting how Yoongi completely loses his train of thought simply from the boy’s obvious beauty - even when they gaze at each other with mirrored indifference.

Jimin tilts his head at Yoongi with a soft ‘hmph’ falling from his lips, and it’s the way he says “Look any longer and I’m gonna have to charge you,” that has Yoongi snapping back into reality from the contrast of the boy telling him not to stare this morning as well.

Yoongi stands up, a half-entertained expression stuck on his face. A corner of Jimin’s mouth twitches upwards with deviance.

“I’m giving you a ride,” He replies, “Doesn’t that balance out?”

The boy snorts.

-

Yoongi’s hands are noticeably shaking as he grips the steering wheel. Jimin gives him an estranged look, but doesn’t question it: not even after Yoongi exhales a little unevenly when he starts the engine.

Yoongi isn’t that much of an impulsive person (outside interrogating, at least.) He likes to think about things, consider his options and arrive to a well-thought out conclusion before he makes decisions. Namjoon and him both work like that, which nicely counteracts the other four who constantly switch from calm and rational to stupid. But, in the rare moments that he has not done this, he usually begins to worry - ever so slightly.

However, this is an even rarer moment: Yoongi is not worrying, he’s fucking terrified.

But Jimin doesn’t question it. So, Yoongi tries to ignore it as well.

He manages to get the car unparked, and onto the road, eyes glued to the scene in front of him – the white road lines barely visible in the darkening night and being sucked under the hood of the car as he drives. There’s no great tragedy that occurs when he slows down at the stop sign, no cars in sight along any of the adjoining roads of the intersection. The concrete beneath him doesn’t crumble to dust and pull the car deep underground when his foot presses slowly down on the acceleration pedal. Nothing crushes them to smithereens as he incessantly looks around him when they drive forward to the continuing street. Absolutely nothing happens. Yoongi drives. Jimin sits, staring despondently out of the window. He sort of wants to laugh at himself, at the way his heart won’t calm down – beating three times the speed that it normally does – but it gets stuck half way in his throat and he has to cough to stop himself from choking on ungrounded fear.

Jimin’s head snaps towards him at this, confusion lacing itself into his features as he takes in Yoongi’s greyish complexion and tight-gripping knuckles on the wheel. Yoongi hopes he’ll say something, anything, just to take his mind off his anxieties; when he doesn’t, the older man scans his head for something to bring up himself.

“The people I asked can watch you while you’re working,” Yoongi says, feeling minutely better when the boy glances at him, judgmentally. It’s something, at least.

“But I can’t have them chasing after you all day, obviously. So, I’ll get Hoseok to send you my number later on – you can call me if anything happens.” Jimin’s face clouds over with something partly suspicious, and partly surprised. Yoongi clears his throat, hands readjusting on the wheel as he cautiously veers the car onto the next street.

“With Syndicate members, that is.”

Yoongi expects Jimin to nod, maybe thank him (although he’s beginning to think the kid was never taught good manners by his parents,) but, naturally, he doesn’t.

“Why?” Jimin asks bluntly, staring at Yoongi, brashly – gaze full with disdain.

Yoongi’s so dumbfounded he forgets almost entirely about the tangible fear he feels.

“What do you mean ‘why’?” He barks, “I need a damn lead on this info and if any of them say anything to you about it, then you fucking call me – alright?” Yoongi’s eyes flick to the boy for a brief second, disbelieving, and he catches the tightening purse of his lips. He nods, but it somehow seems rather defiant.

The car falls into silence for another minute. Yoongi’s glad the club isn’t that far from Jimin’s apartment, and that the sector seems to be completely dead right now, because his knees are starting to quiver noticeably as well, and he’s afraid it’ll start making his foot jerk on the accelerator.

Then, all of a sudden, Jimin sighs very loudly, and Yoongi’s foot nearly does jerk. But he remains sturdy, only cutting Jimin a sharp glare out of the side of his eye.

“What?” He asks curtly. Jimin shrugs down into the leather passenger seat, lolling his head towards Yoongi with a down curve of his lips.

“I have to go talk to my manager.”

His voice is whiney and softer than it was before. Yoongi makes a mocking ‘tch’ noise, turning onto the road right before Ruby Street.

“So?”

Jimin’s brows press together, mimicking the thick line of his lips. He takes his eyes off of Yoongi to look ahead at the road as the car approaches their destination. He seems to slink down even further.

“He’s…” The boy’s voice trails off, words seemingly falling off his tongue. Yoongi taps the wheel as he suggests “Annoying?”

“A complete fucking creep,” Jimin corrects, letting out another lengthy sigh.

 Yoongi slows down, a shocking wave of relief so big crashing over him when the car comes to a standstill that he doesn’t even think (again) when he says “I’ll come in with you, then.”

Jimin blinks, and Yoongi fully expects him to question him, as he had been doing so, or outright refuse his offer. Yoongi himself is shocked that the words left his mouth, because he doesn’t get why he’d need to escort the boy. Jimin’s probably dealt with a thousand ‘complete fucking creep’s. Yet, even as Yoongi’s thoughts have turned rational once again - no longer clouded with fear, the way the boy looks wordlessly thankful, tension alleviating from his stiff shoulders and clenched jaw, makes Yoongi understand what provoked the offer. Hell, it was probably the same thing that made him face the thing he’s been fucking horrified of for over a year.

(His knees are still shaking. He wonders if he could ask Hoseok to come pick him up.)

But, no, Jimin doesn’t refuse. The corners of his mouth start to lift very slightly (despite being clearly quite confounded) and he says, “Alright, then,” clicking off his seatbelt and getting out of the vehicle. Yoongi follows moments after, tailing the boy who walks ahead with assurance – no sign of any of the reluctance he had to enter the building minutes before.

He halts at the entrance, muttering something to the bouncer and pointing back at Yoongi, who returns the man’s firm stare.

Then Jimin catches his attention with a suggestive tilt of his head. He simpers, almost purring as he says “Come on, baby, I’ll show you what you’re after,” waggling his fingers at Yoongi in a motion intended to bring him forward. But Yoongi almost halts in his steps, giving Jimin a look of outright shock. He tilts his head again, this time towards the bouncer, just out of the man’s sight so he can’t see the obvious gesture, and Yoongi realises his intention. The ambiguous shudder Jimin’s words had unleashed through his body gets hastily shoved away.

Once they’re inside Jimin obnoxiously splutters with laughter.

“Your- oh my God,” he snorts, “I was kidding last night when I said you wanted to fuck me- but, seriously.”

Yoongi scowls. He goes to deny it, but quickly realises that a denial would just sound immature (and unconvincing), so, instead, he laughs sneeringly at him.

“You think way too highly of yourself.”

Jimin’s face flickers for a second – a break through the teasing brightness in his expression – but then he grins again, a little less brightly and a lot more suggestively when he says “And you don’t? I’m not the one thinking I’m too good for an ass like this,” he pats said ass clearly. Yoongi shakes his head at him, a breathy laugh escaping his lips.

He’s about to answer something back, but he’s interrupted by an immediately insufferable exclamation of “Jimin! There you are, gorgeous.”

The boy sends Yoongi a comical look of dread before he turns around on his heels to face the man at the other end of the corridor.

“Mr Lee...” He responds rather flatly, resulting in a strange frown to come onto the older man’s face.

He reaches them both, and Yoongi notices that the man’s significantly taller than both of them. His face is structured in a way that looks half-intentional, half-accidental and, despite the chiseled lines making up his upper body and facial area, he’s notably unattractive.

"How many times have I told you, baby? You can call me Joonho. We know each other well enough, don't we?"

Yoongi notices how Jimin's jaw seems to clench as Joonho smirks, all kinds of suggestions littering the phrase ‘know each other.’

There's something non-debatably unappealing about the man, past his actual appearance, that Yoongi quickly relates to being the 'creep' part of Jimin's short description of him. Perhaps it's from the way he towers over them both, but stands slouching, almost too closely. Or, due to his unkempt hair and too-open silk shirt. But, Yoongi figures, the most tell-tale sign is probably how he's unashamedly eye-fucking the boy with every move he makes. Almost a minute passes before Joonho even acknowledges Yoongi. He doesn't like the dark edge that sparks in his eyes when he does.

"Who's this? Did you bring us a customer? Or is he looking for work?" There's a tone of inference that Yoongi has to force himself not to screw his face up at, as if the man's already planning out his contract in his head.

"Neither," Jimin replies tightly before Yoongi gets a chance to, "He gave me a ride, wanted to check out the club."

Joonho's face dampens with visible disappointment, but his tone is shamelessly hopeful when he says "First time? I could make some suggestions for you...”

“He’s not here for that,” The boy says shortly. He shifts his weight to one leg, impatiently, hip jutting out as he says, “You said you wanted to talk to me?”

“Ah, that,” Joonho says with false amiability. “Okay, well, come into my office, then – your shift starts soon. Apparently, tonight’s gonna be busy.” Joonho leads them further down the corridor, opening a door on the left with a brazen squeak. Jimin feeds a hand through his hair, face pointed tiredly to the ground.

“Great…” He mutters, but Joonho doesn’t hear his sarcasm, going to sit too casually on the edge of his desk to be honestly relaxed. He gestures to the office chair sitting in front of it, opposite his own, and Jimin reluctantly takes a seat. Yoongi stands just slightly behind him, seeing as the man doesn’t seem to care to offer him a seat.

“Now, my little star,” Joonho begins, and Yoongi acknowledges the look of hunger in his eyes as Jimin huffs quietly, leaning an elbow on the arm rest of the chair. Joonho leans forward from where he’s sitting, just enough so that he’s only a few centimetres away from the boy. His hand trails the empty arm rest, too close to his bare thighs for Jimin to try and not look uncomfortable.

“You look very pretty tonight,” he murmurs, “You’re gonna make me a lot of money aren’t you, you pretty little thing?” Jimin doesn’t reply.

“You know how popular you are, don’t you? No surprise, of course. Just look-” Joonho’s hand almost reaches out to brush the boy’s face but Yoongi grabs it instinctively before it does. Both men look at him with astonishment. Yoongi feels a rush of heat build-up on his face as he snaps “I thought we had to be quick?”

Joonho looks unconstrainedly livid.

“Right,” he grits, “In that case…” He straightens up, away from Jimin, and Yoongi removes the hand he didn’t realise he had on the back of the boy’s chair. Joonho crosses his arms stiffly, looking irately at both of them.

“Last night,” he begins, “You just left. Middle of your shift. Care to explain what the fuck that was about?”

Jimin wavers, “I-“

“-One of your own damn customers drugged him,” Joonho’s agitation grows as Yoongi cuts in, his arms seeming to become even more rigid. He eyes Yoongi with contempt, as he spits “And you would know, how?”

He mirrors the man’s expression. Jimin sighs tiredly.

“Because I was the one who had to make sure he didn’t fucking die.”

Then, realisation floods Joonho’s face. Yoongi looks at him with notice as the man drawls, “Oh, of course. You were one of the assholes causing a scene last night, weren’t you?” He doesn’t say anything as the man smiles somewhat bitterly at him, before it falls off his face and he flatly states, “This is none of your business.”

Joonho finally uncrosses the stone fixture of his arms, adjusting the wide-open collar of his shirt before leaning on a hand on his desk. He looks at Jimin with unreadability, then, his focus flickers back to Yoongi.

“I’ve had enough of gangs,” he says, “I thought I recognised you.” His finger gestures lazily to Yoongi, an unenthusiastic shake to it. “Min Yoongi,” he sneers, “You were here a few nights ago and stole my employee then, too.” The man lowers his finger to Jimin, an unsettling smile spreading across his face.

“Go get ready, baby. You’ve got a long couple of hours ahead to make up for last night.”

Jimin’s mouth opens and closes, as if he’s about to object, but he doesn’t. Instead he just annoyedly huffs and moves to get to his feet. Yoongi seizes his arm before he can walk past, resulting in the boy halting to stare at him incredulously. Yoongi doesn’t fully return the look, his attention on the manager’s angering demeanour.

“You were the one who didn’t protect him from getting involved with a gang like the Syndicate,” He clips, hold on Jimin unrelenting enough for the boy to indignantly shake him off. Joonho notices the exchange and his brow raises, pointedly.

“And the Mariposa’s supposed to be any better?” He asks, gaze flitting to Jimin, who looks uncomfortable, standing between both men. Yoongi’s mouth twitches at the inference the man’s making. Him? Being as bad as Seonghyeon? That’s fucking absurd. There’s no way the fiery glare the younger boy gives him is anything even remotely close to the way he looks at that bastard.  

Joonho seems to take Yoongi’s silence as an end to the discussion, so he grins boastfully and hisses, “You’re not paying, so get the fuck out of my club.”

Joonho takes a step towards Jimin, likely about to go take him to his dressing room before Yoongi presses a firm hand to the older man’s chest and snaps “Fuck off, I am paying.”

Jimin’s eyes shoot open, erasing the bored, and quietly irritated look they held before, whilst Joonho simply squints at him. Yoongi digs his wallet out of his pocket, flicking it open in an instant and grabbing the fistful of notes neatly tucked into the back compartment. They scrunch as he slams them down onto the desk behind the older man. Yoongi has no fucking idea how much he just paid, but he’s fairly certain that it was definitely a couple grand. At least.

Fuck, he’s gone insane.

“Jimin’s taking the night off,” He says, watching as the man’s eyes seem to glow when he picks up the stack of cash, flicking through it. Jimin’s lips remain parted, subconsciously.

Yoongi doesn’t wait around for the man to reply, lest he ask for more. And it’s too fucking late to take it back now. So, he takes the boy’s wrist and pulls him out of the room, silently walking him out of the club until the cold night air hits them both with a substantial contrast to the club’s immense heat.

Jimin snatches his wrist out of Yoongi’s grip.  

“What the fuck was that?”

His eyes are still a little wide from disbelief, lips now pulled into a loose lock. His arms hang idly by his side and although he shivers he makes no move to try and warm up.

The wind whips through both of their hairs as Yoongi shrugs. Jimin stares expectantly, but he doesn’t answer.

That’s the third impulsive thing Yoongi’s done tonight because of him. That is not a good thing.

“Were you pissed off earlier because of him?” Yoongi asks instead and Jimin cocks his head with vague surprise, like he hadn’t expected Yoongi to even notice. He nods.

“The fucker called me after I got back this morning – immediately started saying shit about ‘coming to see him’ when I got in later because I’d just disappeared last night, but I can’t remember a single time he’s said that with the actual intention of talking.” He says it without much emotion in his voice, but Yoongi doesn’t miss the sliver of disgust and annoyance that brushes over his face.

He hums, about to complain about the cold and tell the boy to hurry up and get to the car as if what he just said doesn’t make Yoongi want to knock the fucker out, when Jimin places a hand on his shoulder before he can turn away.

He doesn’t say anything for a moment, confusion bubbling indiscreetly on his face. But then his eyebrows scrunch a little together.

“Why’d you do that?” He asks.

Yoongi hears a strange thrumming in his ears, through the ambiance of the ever-busy street – similar to the sound of blood sloshing around or a pulse beating. A man walks past them half-drunkenly as many early-evening-drinkers do, bumps into his shoulder and looks too long at them both.

He can’t meet the boy’s eye as he shrugs off his hand and moves to get to his car, dismissively, saying “You seemed tired, who cares? Let’s go,” He removes his car keys from his pocket, a soft click resonating when he presses the button. Jimin falters in his first few steps, only going to join the man once he says “Hoseok’ll want his car back.”

Neither of them mention that it isn’t Hoseok’s car.

“…Okay,” Jimin says slowly once he reaches him. Yoongi opens the door for the boy and he climbs in, shutting it gently behind him. When Yoongi gets in, fastening his seatbelt with wavering hands, he decides that his jumbled thoughts and rushed decisions made tonight are just the stress of the whole information ordeal catching up to him.

Jimin thanks him, without an explanation, at one point during the short drive. And even through the waves of terror and nausea he gets from every turn he makes and car that passes, Yoongi still needs to suppress the urge to smile at that.

29^th March, 2017 | 10:19am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

“Fuck off.”

Hoseok’s mouth dips dramatically into a pointed frown when Yoongi says this.

The man sits, cup of Yoongi’s favourite coffee nestled between his hands (even though he told him he couldn’t have any,) wedged into the corner of Yoongi’s long sofa, feet tucked underneath him (even though he told him he was supposed to be here for business and should act like it), pestering him about his decision the previous night (even though he’s told him three times already to drop it.)

“Come on,” Hoseok urges, coffee sloshing slightly in the cup as he shifts impatiently on the cushions. Yoongi eyes it dangerously. If he gets another stain on that damn sofa…

“Nobody else is here – and I’m your best friend!”

Yoongi almost splutters, lowering his own mug onto the coffee table beside him for safety. He leans forward in his favourite armchair, elbows resting on his knees as he says “And what exactly makes you think that?”

Hoseok puts a hand to his chest in offence, but Yoongi can’t even really tell if it’s an overreaction or not. It’s almost impossible to tell with the man.

“I’ve known you the longest!” He exclaims, and Yoongi can’t argue, because he has. Hoseok’s been trailing around him from even before Jungkook was born. For the record, three-year-old Jung Hoseok was somehow much less annoying than 19-year-old Jung Hoseok. Their fathers worked together, so, Hoseok came around to the Min household every time his dad did. Yoongi never minded, then, though. Hoseok was excitable and friendly.

And now he’s mostly just irritating and invasive.

“So?” Yoongi replies back, even raising an eyebrow at him for emphasis.  

Hoseok shakes his head. “Ah, you’re really something, Yoons…” He says defeatedly, sinking into the back cushions of the sofa with a loud sigh.

Yoongi leans back into his chair as well, saying, “Hey, you’re the one asking if I fucked a kid we’re supposed to be keeping safe from the Syndicate.”

Hoseok is mid-sip when he swallows suddenly to snap, “Would you stop calling him a kid? He’s only a year younger than me.”

Yoongi purses his lips, as if he doesn’t see the issue.

“Aren’t you a kid, as well?”

Hoseok gasps, drink jostling in his mug once more, “I’m only a year younger than you!”

Yoongi chuckles, fondly, resulting in a smile growing on the other man’s face as well. Hoseok slurps from the cup, audibly, but Yoongi ignores it, biting back a remark about his point of him being childish having just been proven. Instead, he gets up, taking his own cup and reaching out for Hoseok’s as he passes him who takes a last gulp before handing it over and escaping the cushion alcove the sofa had consumed him in.

Yoongi makes an exit to his kitchen, the younger man following closely behind him. He sets both mugs down on the counter, beside his sink, and turns around just as Hoseok says, “So, did you-”

“Fuck off,” He bites.

Hoseok laughs mischievously, though, the curiosity must eventually get the better of him when he pinches Yoongi by the collar on the back of his loose black t-shirt, just as he goes to leave the kitchen, again.

“Okay, seriously,” he says, and Yoongi’s tired enough of the man sounding like such a broken record that he doesn’t walk away, though he could. He spins slowly to face him.

“Seriously,” Yoongi repeats, almost warningly to the man that he better actually be serious. A grin tugs at the younger’s lips, but he brushes it off with a professional shake of his head.

“Why’d you drive him?”

Yoongi had been, honestly, trying to avoid the question ever since Hoseok crashed through his door an hour earlier, Yoongi already having been awake for hours (he actually slept at an acceptable fucking time last night) but no less unimpressed to see the man’s early presence anyway.

“I don’t know,” he answers honestly, and, perhaps, most people would think he was simply avoiding the question, but Hoseok seems to be able to tell that he isn’t. Perhaps their decade-and-then-some together have brought them closer than Yoongi’d admit.

“You know I could’ve easily driven him if you really wanted – and you know that he probably would’ve been fine walking, anyway.”

Yoongi does. He still can’t quite figure out what came over him. Maybe it was the contrast to how the boy’d been acting that morning to when he’d met him again later in the day that gave him the idea that something was off. Maybe he felt some sort of debt to him, that he had to drive him because he was technically the reason he was involved with the Syndicate at all.

He doesn’t know. Doesn’t understand it, doesn’t want to try. Hoseok watches him, not looking as if he’s expecting a response, more as if he’s waiting just in case the older man decides to give him one. Yoongi feels his phone buzz in his pocket, and takes it out, seeing ‘Taehyung’ flash on the screen.

“I don’t understand either, Hope,” he says, thumb hovering above the ‘accept call’ button.

“And that’s worrying.”  

By the looks of things, Hoseok doesn’t seem to entirely agree with him, but before either of them can explore that possibility, Taehyung’s chipper voice is speaking into Yoongi’s ear, and the moment passes.

(The strange knot in Yoongi’s stomach, however, does not.)

Chapter Text

29^th March, 2017 | 1:02pm | Sea-Salt Shopping Centre, Mariana Sector.

Three hours later, Yoongi is still being pestered by Hoseok; except, now, it’s because he refuses to buy the most horrendous suit he’s ever seen. Hanging with an obnoxious pride from the shop assistant’s hands is the gaudiest, most attention-grabbing eye-sore in existence (besides from a good percentage of Hoseok’s clothes.) It’s got an overdose of colourful sequins, from bright reds to squinting yellows to headache-inducing blues. And it shimmers, dear God, does it shimmer. The collar of the jacket is a smooth black material that brutally clashes with the silken black shirt and loose bow accompanied with it underneath. Hoseok, Taehyung and the shop assistant all smile expectantly.

Yoongi snorts.

“You’re all fucking crazy if you’re expecting me to wear that.”

The hope slips off of their faces.

Two hours of rejecting awful clothes from seven different stores and nine different assistants (two got so frustrated that they refused to help him any further.) All to go to a party that Yoongi already said he wasn’t going to.

Taehyung had told him on the phone that Seokjin was adamant about them going, because the restaurant that the opening party was being held for and at, were interested in making a contract with them to let them use one of their ports in Demonia for food shipments, since it's way cheaper to deliver to there than anywhere in-land. Then, he slipped in that they’d also mentioned a cut of their profits in exchange for it and, well, Taehyung desperately needs the money (he doesn’t need the money. Yoongi already pays him more than he should get. The kid bought a Bugatti Veyron Super-Sport last week for no reason.)

When Yoongi had told him they could go without him, Taehyung said that, actually, they’d already thought about that – but the manager had insisted that Yoongi came as well, since he was the boss and would have all the information (Seokjin was marginally offended about this.)

Yoongi said that he’d have to drag him and Taehyung said he told Hoseok to do just that if he said no – he was outside in his car waiting to take them shopping because, in his words, ‘all your clothes are fucking boring.’

(Hoseok didn’t have to drag Yoongi; he’s got enough intelligence to know the man absolutely could – and his ego doesn’t need the proof of that hanging over him.)

Taehyung’s mouth forms a pouting stance, and he looks to the sale’s assistant with sloping shoulders, asking “Isn’t there anything else?” in a tired, exasperated voice. The lady looks to Yoongi with evaporating optimism (she’d been laughing and jovially teasing the man for his pickiness a mere 30 minutes ago) and Yoongi feels the need to specify again what he wants – but, as Taehyung outright refuses to let him have that, he reconsiders his tactic, telling her what he doesn’t want instead.

“No sequins or glitter,” he says, eyeing Hoseok, the ambassador for both of those things, warningly. “Nothing that sparkles at all. Nothing yellow, or any sort of neon colour.” Taehyung appears to be slightly offended as he adjusts the bright mustard yellow cardigan adorning his shoulders.  

“Subtle colours, for the love of God.”

“But!” Taehyung cuts in, “Something other than black and white as well.”

Yoongi grimaces but doesn’t discredit his input. The woman seems to regain some of her previous enthusiasm, and smiles confidently, declaring “I think I have an idea.”

9^th April, 2017 | 8:38pm | Diamante Bistro, Red Light Sector.

It's been two weeks: two weeks since he realised that the so-called ‘end’ to searching for his gang’s information was a lot further than he thought. Two weeks since he first met the temperamental, bratty hooker by the name of Park Jimin – not Étoile. And two weeks since he met with Moon Seonghyeon, and became considerably fixated with his not-so-subtle threats.

It’s also been two weeks since they received the invite to that restaurant’s grand opening, and Yoongi’s somehow dreading it more now that he’s arrived. The restaurant turned out to be farther away than Yoongi wanted to travel – as in, longer than fifteen minutes. But he thinks his impatience is justified, considering he’d made the two-hour-long journey to the Demonia Sector earlier in the day, following another dead-end lead to the information.

That’s the third this week. His frustration from that, on-top of the fatigue from travelling most of the day, his unwillingness to be social with anyone in the aforementioned states and the fact he can’t even drink a little to calm himself, in case a lead on the info pops up while they’re there…

Well, it’s easy to say that Yoongi isn’t in much of a party mood.

Taehyung tells him he looks great in his new suit when they all get out of the damn limousine the restaurant had sent for them, which is backed up with the agreement of the other four. Yoongi looks down at the velvet red roses littering the black undergrowth of his jacket and also agrees, to their surprises. He looks presentable without standing-out too much like his friends do.

“I still don’t like these, though” he states, gesturing to the white long bow around his banded collar, and the black waistcoat underneath. Those, Yoongi thinks, make him look like a Disney prince (which was what Taehyung liked about them, supposedly.)

“They look cool,” The man in question defends, running a fascinated hand across the soft fabric of the bow. Yoongi laughs under his breath.

“Sure they do.”

 There’s a surprisingly large queue in front of the restaurant, despite the fact the event had started at 8:30. The people in it stare at them as they approach the doors, whispering and nudging each other because no fucking way it’s Min Yoongi and Kim Seokjin, and – hey, isn’t that Jung Hoseok?

Taehyung sniffs dramatically when, naturally, no one recognises him. Namjoon pats him sympathetically on the back. Yoongi, meanwhile, silently laments the fact that his gang’s become a band of celebrities, as opposed to people to back away from. VIPs guests at a restaurant opening; that’s absurd.

And commercialism.

There’s a guy standing with a clipboard, lists of names attached to it, when they get to the entrance, past the row of people waiting to get in. He’s probably too unpleasant-looking for the establishment itself – but maybe just unpleasant enough to intimidate anyone who tries to sneak or bribe their way in. His face is distorted into an off-putting grimace, right cheek garnished with a healed-over scar and a prickly-looking stubble decorating his chin and jaw area.

“Min Yoongi – we were invited,” Yoongi says to him, ignoring the agitated huffs from the people in the line behind him of God, gangsters are so self-entitled.

The man runs a finger down the list, stopping with a short tap to it before looking back up and nodding.

“Go on in, sir.”

He looks at the other five with little change in expression, “And your friends can go too.”

Seokjin splutters. “Hey! I run this damn gang, no, wait- Namjoon stop pushing me-“

Yoongi pulls open the door to the restaurant, and is kind of surprised to see that it’s almost entirely full, despite the large size of the room, because there’s probably at least half of the number in here, still waiting out there.

Immediately a waiter passes by them, offering a tray of some sort of champagne. Yoongi declines, to his own reluctance, but his friends are more than happy to accept a glass.

The restaurant is void of any tables, only offering a few booths around the side, to house more people. It’s not a traditional sort of opening, with rich middle-aged people sipping expensive wine and sitting at luxuriously clothed tables, listening to the host or a speaker. The lighting’s rather dim – similar more to a respectable bar, than a fancy restaurant – and there’s fairly upbeat music playing, nothing that’d be in one of the nightclubs a few blocks away or anything, but no slow, pretentious instrumentalist stuff either.

It’s certainly a unique sort of restaurant – probably a hipster joint – and what’s even more unique is the apparent host of the evening who comes up to greet them - short, peculiar-looking moustache perched above his upper lip and a small round pair of glasses hanging off his nose.

“Welcome! I’m so glad you could make it - I’m the manager here,” he says happily, holding out his hand to Yoongi to shake. There’s an unattractive choice of script underneath a gem inked on the back of it. Definitely a hipster joint, Yoongi thinks, taking said hand with little interest and giving it a quick shake.

“Thank you for inviting us,” Seokjin chimes in, holding out his own hand with an unashamedly seductive tilt of his head, “I’m Ki-“

“Kim Seokjin. It’s an honour.”

Seokjin’s face fucking lights up. He nods enthusiastically, saying “Absolutely. Say, about that deal-“

“We’d love to be allowed use of your port- for whatever percentage of profits you require.”

Yoongi supresses an unappealing snort and cuts in the conversation before Seokjin asks for ninety and robs the place dry or some shit.

“Is there somewhere we can sit?”

The manager’s jovial expression stutters for a second, then, he laughs embarrassedly and apologises, claiming “I’m new to all of this. But follow me, I’ll get you a nice table.” He looks at Seokjin, Taehyung attached onto his shoulder like an eagerly-waiting puppy.

“Maybe we can discuss this more comfortably then?” He asks Seokjin, and the man vehemently nods back.

“I’d love to!”

Yoongi’s eyes drift to Namjoon with unspoken dread and the younger man quietly laughs in response as Seokjin subtly pumps his fist in triumph at them.

Robbing bastard. 

Yoongi zones out for most of the conversation, merely catching that they need good access because they don't want to run the risk of their food spoiling in delivery and, wow, with how powerful and handsome Seokjin is, surely their restaurant will be booming in no time with the usage of their excellent port.

The man really knows how to keep Seokjin happy, considering the easy compliments have him smirking with burning self-assurance. Yoongi’s sure the deal will go quite well – as long as it doesn’t run into any more meetings or jobs Seokjin’s already obligated to do for him. Letting Taehyung take Jungkook out on another drug push while Jin’s busy finalising contracts and checking the shipments way out in Demonia is just a bad fucking idea. They get on too well, and Taehyung’s too excitable to be with someone so… influentially impulsive.

His friends are into their third or fourth glasses of champagne (Yoongi capped Jungkook at one, much to the younger’s annoyance) when his phone buzzes impatiently in his pocket, as if a round of notifications had just set it off.

Sure enough, when Yoongi digs it out of the pocket of his black slacks, there are several messages decorating his lock screen from the person he’d immaturely named ‘Brat.’ Yoongi unlocks it with an odd sense of caution, considering he’d told the boy not to contact him unless ‘something happened.’ He scans the messages with a set frown.

ur guys really did a good job watching out for me. (received 9:48pm)

u think they got drunk or laid?? (received 9:48pm)

Yoongi texts back, obviously confused, because, fuck, he specifically asked for capable guys. What the fuck happened to that?

Syndicate? Otherwise I’m not coming. (sent 9:49pm, read)

He’s reluctant to admit, even to himself, that that’s probably a lie.

ya, fucking syndicate. who else. get ur ass here, u owe me. (received 9:49pm)

Yoongi inwardly scoffs. The audacity of this kid.

Fine. (sent 9:49pm, read)

In all honesty, Yoongi’s more than glad to get out of this fucking party. He can’t drink, can’t fuck, can’t do anything even remotely interesting so what’s the point? He stands up, garnering attention from all of the people at the table and says, “Syndicate business. I’ll be back soon,” without waiting for any of their replies. The clouding confusion on their faces is a response enough.

When he gets to the door, the man from before opens it for him, obviously having either admitted or sent away the people who’d been waiting to come in before.

“Leaving already?” He asks, and Yoongi grunts in response, not feeling up to small talk whilst he waits for the limousine driver from before to get out and open his door for him. A waste of time, in Yoongi’s eyes, but he supposes he should follow some sort of social etiquette.

“Have a nice night, Mr Min,” the man calls as Yoongi at last gets to climb into his seat. He waves a disinterested hand towards him.

“Galaxy Club on Ruby Street,” He tells the driver with forced indifference, “Quickly, please.”

As the car makes its way out of the more presentable looking areas of the sector, Yoongi’s heart beats at a gallingly fast pace.

9^th April, 2017 | 10:11pm | The Galaxy Club, Ruby Street, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi walks up to the club with purpose after sending the driver back to the restaurant, knowing his friends would want to kick his ass if he left them without an acceptable mode of transport back home. He gets ready to give the security guy a look of impatience so he doesn’t ask him any excess questions than, maybe, his name if he didn’t recognise him. But he finds that, actually, there’s no security at all.

Which he would say explains how the Syndicate got in – but, apparently, they got in past the ‘intensive’ security a few weeks ago as well, so, either way it likely didn’t matter. He still makes a point of telling that sleazy manager about it the next time he runs into him, though.

The first wave of sweat and miscellaneous drugs hits him in the suffocatingly tight corridors of the building, a mumble of music echoing through the walls, bass-orientated and arguably perfect to cover up any and all types of illegal activities. Yoongi has to swerve around a few eager couples, promiscuous drunkards and money-craving employees to get to Jimin’s dressing room. He gives the door one light knock before throwing it open.

Jimin is sitting by the window, on the floor between the two armchairs they had sat in at one of their last meetings. His face is slightly discoloured, as if bruises are due to form in a day or two, and his hand is poking at a rather nasty cut on his lip. He looks at Yoongi with lazy aggression when they lock stares, but besides from that, Yoongi wouldn’t call it much of a thrashing.

Besides, he’s here to see if the Syndicate accidentally gave him anymore leads – not to make sure that the boy’s okay, regardless of whatever the upsurge of relief that blows over his body when he sees that he is would infer.

The room’s silent for a moment, neither of them really knowing what to say – or, maybe, Jimin waiting for Yoongi to speak and Yoongi unable to find the words past the unsettling anger written on the boy’s face; as if any minute now, he’ll snap.

“You were right about them wanting to beat the shit out of me,” Jimin says all of a sudden, and Yoongi merely looks at him with disbelief.

“You don’t look that bad,” He comments, gauging the cut on his lip again with plainness. Jimin shrugs.

“Guess not,” he says, “But then there’s this…” His fingers grip the material of the black shirt he’s wearing (he must’ve been waiting tables tonight, since that’s part of the uniform) to reveal a sticky mess of- fucking hell - bright red blood, steadily leaking out from an obviously very fresh wound, about three inches long, just below his ribcage.

Yoongi almost chokes on his breath.

“Oh my- Fuck, Jimin.”

There’s so much blood, Yoongi panics, dropping to his knees beside the boy to get a closer look. Even the damn sight of blood makes him queasy – it was bad enough when it was pouring out of Junghee’s mouth last month – but this is a fucking puddle of it, forming on the boy’s stomach and dripping down to stain the hard, indigo carpet beneath them.

“Could you get the first aid?” Jimin says shakily, “I tried to stand up a minute ago and almost blacked out – did you know getting stabbed hurts like a bitch?” There’s a sliver of amusement in his tone, matching to the slight up tilt of his lips, that Yoongi can barely fathom coming from the boy in the situation he’s in.

“I don’t think they have fucking stitches here; you need to go to a hospital-”

“No,” the boy snaps, the sudden movement of the outburst making his wound ache as he winces obviously, hand clasping over the thick line on his torso. “I can’t go to a hospital.”

Yoongi stares at him inquisitively. Once the boy opens his eyes again, recovering from the new strike of pain, he stares right back.

“Because I’m a whore, remember?” he asks as if Yoongi’d somehow forgotten, “Definitely illegal. I could name five kids that had this exact same thing happen to them – and got arrested once they recovered.”

Yoongi sighs, knowing the kid’s probably right. They don’t take kindly to people like him, regardless that he’s merely a victim of it all, and not even Yoongi’s control over the west of the city can override the government’s influence.

“Okay, fine. I’ll take you back to your apartment.”

Jimin looks content enough, likely knowing that there’s no way in hell he could work tonight (or any of the next nights either, but he probably isn’t thinking that far) and Yoongi first decides to call a cab, since he sent off his allocated transport, before trying to get the boy off of the floor without causing him too much pain.

“Fuck- Ow,” he swears when Yoongi tries the first time, quickly realising that pulling him by the arms most likely isn’t the best method.

“Could you maybe not cause me any more agony?” he asks, sarcastically, hand over his wound and a sturdy scowl moulded onto his face. Yoongi sighs, crouching down beside him.

“Your manager’s gonna hire a hitman for me,” he laments, making the boy snicker past his glare. Yoongi wasn’t kidding. This is, what, the fourth time he’s taken the boy out of his work? He digs into his pocket, removing a roll of cash he’d intended to spend at a bar somewhere after the restaurant party had died down and throwing it onto the chair beside them. Jimin’s eyebrows shoot up, but he doesn’t say anything.

“Okay, bear with me – the last time I did this you weren’t five minutes away from bleeding to death-”

“Fuck off I’m not bl- shit, ow-” He whines as Yoongi almost literally peels him off of the floor, the sticky mess of blood being a sickening sight for them both, as he takes the boy into his arms and unsteadily rises to his feet again. Jimin rests his head against Yoongi’s chest like he had last time, only, now, he’s stiff and clearly uncomfortable and very aggravated when he says “Why does bad shit always happen when you’re around?”

Yoongi scoffs unbelievingly, before muttering “I’m saving your ass – you didn’t get stabbed with me in the room.”   

“I didn’t get stabbed with the guy’s you got to watch me in the room either – what the fuck happened there, huh?”

Yoongi doesn’t reply, because, honestly, he has no fucking idea. All he knows is someone’s getting fired. He can’t have incompetent people in his gang.

Jimin whines for most of the cab journey, and Yoongi doesn’t tell him to shut the hell up like he’d maybe like to – because he realises that the boy’s probably in quite a lot of pain. He’s been stabbed a few times, naturally as a mob boss, and it really does ‘hurt like a bitch’ to quote the brown-haired boy himself.

Explaining what the fuck is wrong with him, though, to the driver is more complicated than he would’ve liked.

“Too much to drink,” is Yoongi’s flimsy explanation, “he gets bad stomach-aches from alcohol.”

The driver looks at them both through the rear-view mirror, a mistrustful glint to his stare.

But then, he unexpectedly jokes “He sounds more like he’s been stabbed.”

Yoongi has to force laughter for one of the first times in his life.

They finally come to a stop and pay, Yoongi stepping out into the cool night air, starting to be less bone-chilling than previous nights, as the April weather begins to hint at warmth. He opens Jimin’s door and helps the boy out, who manages to half-stand on his own feet, now that he’s not attempting to drag himself up from the floor. Yoongi hooks the boy’s arm up over his shoulder and thanks the cab driver, who drives off with an uncertain shake of his head.

“Bad stomach aches,” Jimin repeats once the man is gone, “Are you fucking serious?” Yoongi gazes at the boy blankly as he pushes open the apartment block door.

“He didn’t question it, did he?”

“Probably because he knows you’re a goddamn mobster.”

Yoongi doesn’t dispute that fact.

Getting Jimin up to his apartment is a bigger issue than he’d hoped, and he finds himself once again thankful that he lives on the first-floor up. They figure that trying to get his apartment key out of his pocket is probably more hassle than it’s worth, and Yoongi simply kicks the door in the corner again to get it to lurch open.

“You really need to get that Landlord of yours to fix that,” He comments, and Jimin snorts quietly, muttering “Do you not remember him?”

Yoongi takes Jimin into his bedroom, unhooking his arm around him so the boy can sit up himself – though he struggles to do even that without scowling in pain. Then, he takes a few steps back, shoving his hands into his pockets to look at Jimin disapprovingly. He’s definitely going to need stitches – but how the hell can he get those outside of a hospital?

“I’ll tell your manager you’re not coming in for a week or two,” Yoongi says sternly, knowing that not only will the boy probably not want to talk to Joonho, but there’s no fucking way he can work in that condition – although, he was likely intending to try, judging by the look of shock on his face.

“I need my pay,” Jimin argues, shifting very slightly on his mattress, and resulting in a large gasping breath erupting from him at the sharp shoot of pain that emerges from it. Yoongi’s eyebrows snap up, like his point has been proven.

“You don’t,” he says easily, making Jimin wedge one of his eyes open that had been previously shut in pain, just to look at him, condescendingly, “I’ll buy you groceries like I did last month, and-” He takes a glance around the room, out into the rest of his apartment through the creaking open door. The cracks in the walls, pieces chipping onto the floors to leave a crumbling sort of dust, the mould in almost every corner – threateningly dark colours, - the dust piling up, the cobwebs, the smell of damp and cigarette smoke (which he doubts is due to the boy himself); the general uncleanliness of the place makes it look like something out of an emergency home-makeover TV show.

Yoongi’s face screws up in disgust, “God,” he breathes, “You’re gonna get an infection in this place for sure.”

Jimin denies this claim, even as Yoongi pulls out his phone, scrolling down his contact list to get to Seokjin – arguably one of the more responsible of his gang and, more importantly, one of the only ones that can hold his liquor.

“Yoongi,” the man says when the call goes through, “are you thinking about coming back anytime soon?” His voice is annoyingly patronising, but undoubtedly sober. In the background, he can hear murmurs of voices along with not-so-sober laughing and half-shouts. He realises then that he’s unexpectedly more grateful to be here, with a stubborn, bleeding eighteen-year-old than he is to be there. 

“Something came up,” Yoongi brushes off, “I’m not gonna be back. But, Jin, do you know anywhere to take a stab victim?” The question sounds even more ridiculous said out loud, so much so that him and Jimin even share a look of amusement as the younger softly chuckles.

“Besides the hospital?” Seokjin asks, belittling tone mixing in with a state of obvious shock.

“Shut up,” Yoongi bites without any actual aggression, “no authorities can find out, he shouldn’t be working where he is, so-”

“Who’s ‘he’?”

Yoongi pauses, glancing quickly to the boy on the bed who stares back at him, curiously, since he’d just stopped talking. He knows he’ll get more shit from Hoseok for the fact he left because of Jimin, but he realises that his pride is probably less important than somebody’s life. However, that doesn’t stop the prickle of heat shifting onto his neck.

“Jimin,” he says quietly, resulting in the person in question tipping his head to the side with a soft frown.

There’s a beat of silence in which Yoongi can only hear the noisy ambiance of the restaurant and the crackling of a poor network reception (unsurprising in Jimin’s apartment.)

“Taehyung could stitch him up, he’s done it enough times,” Seokjin suggests, tone now void from much else other than a clear sort of optimism. It’s weird, but Yoongi doesn’t linger on it. His friends are confusing; he’s used to it.

He hums in consideration, figuring that Taehyung could easily come over and tend to the boy – if he’s as experienced in stitching as Seokjin says (last Yoongi heard he definitely was not.) But then he realises something quite wrong with that situation.

“Yeah, but his apartment’s a hazmat suit short of a biohazard – stitched or not, it’ll get infected.”

Seokjin laughs at the man’s joke, but Yoongi doesn’t miss the unimpressed pout that surfaces on the lips of the boy beside him.

“In that case,” Seokjin says, “Maybe you should let him stay at yours for a while. You’ve got extra rooms, haven’t you?”

Yoongi lets this idea sink in. Having Jimin stay in his apartment until he’s able to stand up without immediately dropping? How long would that be? Would the boy even want to stay with him? He can’t imagine so - but then again, it’s not like he’d really have a choice. Yoongi clears his throat.

“Y-yeah, I could do that.”

“I’ll send Tae ‘round to stitch him once he’s done talking – he’s gotten pretty good at it, you know.”

That figures, Yoongi thinks. The kid’s been getting himself into trouble for so many years that, if it wasn’t for his acquired medical skills that he’d learnt on the streets overtime, he’d most definitely be dead right now. By the time Yoongi had found him, pointing a gun alertly in his direction while clutching a nasty looking gash near his hip, he’d already learnt how to disinfect wounds with things you could find thrown out in almost any dumpster in the city, and how to reduce swelling of a fractured limb. Yoongi told him to put the damn gun down and let him see the damage done to his side, lightly stunned when he lifted up his shirt to see it perfectly clean – but still open. Stitching was something that, up until right now, Yoongi knew the boy never quite grasped.

“Good for him,” Yoongi replies with an edge of fondness. Taehyung was different back then: rougher, more naïve – yet still with that charming strangeness to him that appeals to pretty much everyone he meets. Yoongi smiles slightly as he presses the ‘end call’ button, Seokjin sniggering with non-verbal finality.

He puts his phone away, catching Jimin’s anticipation easily, as the boy gapes at him without a word.

“You can’t stay here,” Yoongi tells him, and although his brows draw together, he doesn’t look surprised, nor does he object.

“Where do I go, then?”

Yoongi smooths out a crease in his rose-patterned jacket, avoiding eye-contact as he says, “Jin suggested I let you stay with me,” not knowing how the boy’ll react.

Against Yoongi’s expectations, he doesn’t, really. He lets out a short puff of air through his nose, as if he’s reluctant, but he doesn’t give any sort of outburst like he was assuming he would.

Maybe it’s because of the blood-loss.

Yoongi calls another cab, hoping that they end up with a different one than last time, and then he takes a moment to analyse the boy’s condition, as well as he can without having much medical knowledge at all past what he’s merely experienced from his friends, allies and enemies and whatever jargon Taehyung has told him over the years, as a self-proclaimed medic.

His skin has paled significantly, his eyelids droop slightly and the black of his t-shirt has been coloured even deeper, from the blood seeping through it. His hands are a mess of drying crimson, staining the sheets underneath him as well. Yoongi can’t really do anything to stop the bleeding, not until Taehyung gets there, at least.

Still, his clothes don’t look the most comfortable things to be wearing with a stab wound, considering how his shirt sticks to his wound.

“We should get you out of those,” Yoongi decides, gesturing to the blood-soaked garments the boy’s wearing. He nods in agreement, weakly, and moves to unbutton his shirt before he’s interrupted by an involuntary cry of pain, his head dropping downwards harshly. Yoongi flinches, startled by his exclamation, and he crouches down beside him, trying to catch the boy’s eyes that stay screwed tight.

“Hey,” Yoongi says with mild firmness, making Jimin open his eyes and look up, expectantly. Yoongi doesn’t say anything for a moment, trying to keep his actions rational for the boy’s sake – though that’s proven to be difficult on multiple occasions.

“I’ll do it for you,” he resolves, fingers moving with a shadow of hesitation to the boy’s shirt. Jimin’s mouth quirks up teasingly as he undoes the first button but, for once, he doesn’t say anything to try and fluster him – probably knows he doesn’t need to from the way Yoongi’s fingers fumble with the second button.

Yoongi realises he’s being ridiculous, considering the number of people he’s undressed in his life, all of them for a much different reason than this, yet, he still finds himself unable to meet the boy’s eye, even when he untucks his shirt from his pants and makes him hiss in anguish.

His body’s no less beautiful, Yoongi finds out when he carefully pushes the shirt off of Jimin’s shoulders, even decorated with the cut and new bruises, and he finds himself taking a quick breath as the poor light of the moon feeds in through the single, haphazardly shuttered window, coating him in a light blueish glow.

Then, his gaze snaps to Jimin’s and he stops breathing entirely.

Yoongi doesn’t dwell on how Jimin’s eyes practically glimmer with something completely unannounced when they meet, nor the way his own chest seems to constrict at it. He pushes any jumbled thoughts to the back of his mind and picks up Jimin’s shirt from where it fell on the bed after he took it off, examining the stain on it loosely. Then, he looks to the bleeding wound on the boy’s torso, daring to reach out and gently touch around it – checking for any sort of swelling.

“It doesn’t look infected or anything, yet. You’re lucky it’s not that deep.”

Jimin laughs feebly, “Yeah, I guess, but – aren’t you supposed to apply pressure or something to it?”

Yoongi falters. Right, he completely forgot.

He looks at the shirt in his hand and uncertainly folds it, until it makes a decent square of cloth. He places it against the wound, telling the boy to sit back slightly so he can get a good angle.

“Okay, hold that there,” Yoongi says and Jimin does, a burn of discomfort whipping over his expression as his shoulders stiffen when the material presses down on his wound. Yoongi’s mouth curves downwards as he gets to his feet again, only to cross the room to open Jimin’s rickety closet.

“What are you doing?” Jimin asks, pain evident in his voice and even more obvious in his general tension-filled posture when Yoongi turns around with a look of disapproval in the boy’s direction.

“You seriously don’t have any sort of jackets or coats? Nothing you can wear while you hold that?”

Jimin shakes his head. Yoongi exhales with light frustration, eyes scanning the room for anything he could wrap around the boy to stop him getting hypothermia when they leave the building.

“What about this?” He asks, feet guiding him over to a thin, greyish blanket, neatly folded on top of the boy’s dresser. It feels warm enough, a slight fleeciness to it that only comes with a material that’s been used and washed countless times. Jimin doesn’t reply, just watches intently as Yoongi unfolds the blanket, gauging the size of it. It almost reaches his ankles, spreads out the width of his arms opened outwards.

“This should do,” he says more to himself than to Jimin, and the boy merely continues to blink at him as he crouches down beside him again, carefully guiding the blanket around him to cover his back, before crossing over the ends of it as it meets his front, so that it limply lies on his shoulders.

Neither of them say anything for a few seconds, Yoongi examining one of the boy’s hands, pressing his shirt over his wound, to the other, shaking whilst gripping onto the ends of the blanket to keep it from falling off. He takes in the weariness in his features, his sickly complexion, the tiredness in his eyes as they slowly open and close as the blanket practically drowns him. He needs to get him to Taehyung. Right now.  

Yet Yoongi pauses when he’s about to say this at the sound of the “Thank you,” that Jimin says, the words so quiet that Yoongi almost thinks he’s hearing things, but then he notices the way his lips tilt upwards, meekly, and how it doesn’t even remotely resemble the gutsy kid that seems to think the entire world is against him.

Yoongi doesn’t bother asking what he’s thanking him for: whether it be the fact he saved his ass from bleeding out, that he’s letting him stay at his, that he won’t let him starve just because he can’t work or even something as simple as giving him the blanket. He just nods, eyes slipping away from the boy’s gentle demeanour as he stands up, checking the time on his Rolex.

“Let’s go,” He says, holding out an arm for Jimin to grab onto, “the taxi driver’s probably pissed and we need to get you to Tae as soon as possible.”

He lets the boy stand up by himself, so he doesn’t accidentally hurt him again, before moving to secure an arm around his waist, his other hand landing on the one the boy has pressed against his wound, helping add to the pressure for him as he likely has very little strength at the minute.

Jimin’s hand isn’t as warm as it should be, and he catches the way it tenses and then almost immediately relaxes, as if the warmth of Yoongi’s was a little shocking. Whether because of the change in temperature or the fact it went there at all.

Generally, he doesn’t feel as cold as he did, at least. He’ll have to do without a shirt for now, and stay in the, likely uncomfortable, pants he’s wearing. He can borrow some of Yoongi’s clothes once Taehyung’s fixed him up enough that he doesn’t have to hold a bulky shirt to his skin. Then, he needs to ask him about what actually happened – see if there’s anything about the Syndicate’s plans or anything at all that he can find out.

Part of Yoongi hopes that this was just an attack because the boy went against them. Because although that mindless act of violence would lead him nowhere and piss him off – it would make it a one-time thing.

But, somehow, instead, the nagging feeling in his gut makes him consider the involvement of Moon Seonghyeon for a more personal reason, thinking back to his farewell threats last month.

And that really pisses him off.

In the taxi, Yoongi lets Jimin rest his head on his shoulder, making sure he doesn’t pass out at the risk of going into shock or something. It’s protocol when taking care of someone injured, Yoongi knows, but it’s hard to say that with the faint smile playing on his lips as the boy tries his hardest to fight off sleep.

Chapter Text

10th April, 2017 | 12:42am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi sits quietly in his favourite armchair, reading over some of the e-mails he’d been sent while he’d been out virtually all day. There’s nothing extremely out of the ordinary: one or two from Seokjin, sending him the updates on new contracts that had been signed with Taehyung the previous night, or new tenants that had moved into one of their few apartment blocks over the West of the city.  There’s another from Namjoon, who’d promised that the security system had now been fully updated – he’d double checked it. Yoongi scoffs sullenly at that. It’s a bit late for that now, isn’t it? It wasn’t explicitly the man’s fault, of course, not at all – but Yoongi can’t help being vaguely bitter over the whole ordeal.

He considers looking over the CCTV footage Namjoon had sent him a couple of weeks ago again, to see if there’s anything else he missed, but even the sender had admitted that there was very little the grainy footage could tell them. Besides, now that the victim was a mere few rooms away, it felt almost uncomfortable to watch the incident again – even more so than it had been at first.

Regardless, Yoongi should probably tell Joonho to get better fucking cameras – better security, for that matter. It’s still strange to him how there wasn’t any man at all watching the door tonight, and even weirder than that is where the fuck his own guys who were supposed to watch Jimin went – and why they haven’t responded to any of Yoongi’s calls. It’s not often he calls his employees himself, usually he gets Hoseok or Seokjin to do it, but he’d actually asked Namjoon for their numbers just so he could cuss them out personally. However, they hadn’t picked up.

He decides to send Namjoon an e-mail, asking him to find out where the fuck they went, and just as he clicks send, Taehyung enters the room, light blue shirt from the party unbuttoned at the collar and sleeves rolled up too high for it to be for anything but convenience. He looks rather flustered, but nods with assurance when Yoongi tilts his head questioningly at him.

“He lost a lot of blood,” Taehyung says, confirming Yoongi’s suspicions, “but he’ll be fine once he rests. I’ll stick around ‘til the morning in case he needs anything else.”

Taehyung flops himself down easily onto the large sofa across from Yoongi, expression dissolving into something totally level and cool. It’s sort of bizarre to see Taehyung like this, sometimes; with such a stark difference to his usual lively personality. Seeing him serious and professional is very rare outside of when he’s taking care of a job – and even then, it’s not that uncommon for him to be rather enthusiastic. It always reminds Yoongi of when the boy was younger, like when he first found him.

And those aren't days either of them particularly like to keep in mind, he's pretty sure.

“I appreciate you doing that,” Yoongi says, closing the lid of his laptop and reaching out to set it on the coffee table in front of him. Taehyung grins lazily, the serious attitude melting away as he replies “My pleasure, actually. He was a breeze – laughing and giggling for most of it.”

Taehyung’s good at that: making people laugh to soothe them. It’s something him and Hoseok have in common, and it’s arguably not a bad trait for a makeshift doctor to have. Yoongi’s brow rises at Jimin’s supposed reaction, however. Did he get lightheaded from the blood loss – or is it just another uncovered side of him that Yoongi didn’t know he had?

“How’s it going, by the way?” Taehyung asks all of a sudden, “Did you find out anything about the info?”

Yoongi shakes his head, “I haven’t had the chance to ask him about it – is he conscious enough to talk to him now?” He asks, considering how the boy had supposedly been somewhat giggly, according to Taehyung. The man opposite him’s eyes roam the room in thought, before he simply shrugs.

“You could try,” he suggests, “I gave him some pretty strong painkillers, though. He hasn’t got a great pain-tolerance, according to him, but he also got stabbed, so…” Yoongi chuckles under his breath, amusement pulling on his lips.

“I’ll go see,” he decides, getting to his feet as Taehyung gives him a casual thumbs-up. He crosses the living room, shoes audibly clicking down the wood floor of his hallways until he reaches the spare bedroom he’d let the boy borrow the last time he was here. It’s only a room over from the other guest bedroom that Taehyung’ll likely stay in for the night, in case the boy does need anything.

He knocks lightly on the door, and hears a sleepy chime of ‘come in’ before Yoongi enters the room, shutting the door gently behind him. Jimin lies on his back, head turned in the direction of where the older man is now standing, hair fluffed up a little from the pillows and duvet pulled up to his chin. He smiles gently at his entrance, shifting to try and sit up before his face clenches in pain and he ungraciously flops back down. Yoongi’s hand instinctively starts to reach out, but he forces it by his side again before the boy can notice.

“Careful, idiot,” Yoongi says, tone far too soft for there to be any malice behind the words. Jimin’s eyebrows crease slightly as he retorts with a short “Hey,” a small giggle following the word. Taehyung was right, evidently. The boy is in a vaguely cheerful mood – at least for a stab victim.

Yoongi approaches the bed, Jimin almost seeming swamped with the sheer size of it along with the volume of the pillows and duvet. It makes him look small, though he’s not much smaller than Yoongi is, and as he sits down on the edge of it, he smiles at that fact.

“How do you feel?” Yoongi asks, kind of awkwardly, because honestly, he’s never really been in this situation. He’s been through robberies, kidnappings, murders, torture, set-ups and betrayals. Yet here he is, dumbfounded by an unexplainably endearing boy, cocooned in his spare bed. It’s almost laughable, the way he’s known Jimin a mere two weeks, yet he’s managed to throw him off on so many different occasions.

Jimin hums, shrugging his shoulders carefully, so he doesn’t hurt himself again. He lowers the duvet from his chin, tucking it over his chest instead and stares at the roof, as if trying to decide an answer.

“Okay,” he says at last, and Yoongi’s mouth curves up on one side as he asks, playful teasing in his tone, “You haven’t had worse, have you?”

Jimin laughs outright, “I say that a lot, huh?”

He looks back to Yoongi, merriment dancing in his eyes, “No. I don’t think I’ve had anything worse than being stabbed. Hopefully I don’t.”

Yoongi agrees with a nod of his head.

“Taehyung gave you the clothes, right?” He asks now, referring to the things he’d asked the man to help him into earlier. Nothing special, just an old sweater Yoongi never wears (his only one, naturally) and a pair of sweatpants he hasn’t worn for a long time. He doesn’t need lounge clothes, considering he’s always working. And even when he isn’t, there’s no telling when he will be. He needs to always look presentable. His friends used to jokingly ask him if he slept in his damn suits.

Obviously not - they’d crease.

But Jimin replies that he did, thanking him happily.

“They’re pretty comfortable, I didn’t expect you to have things like that.”

“I don’t,” Yoongi says, “You’ll have to borrow a few of my shirts or something until I can go to your apartment to get some clothes.” Of course, he could always ask one of his friends to go for him, but a part of Yoongi wants to go himself. He reasons that it’s because he knows the boy better than they do (even if it’s only a little more) and would be able to pick him out things he’d feel comfortable in. But, even so, he doesn’t dwell on the strength of that justification.

“I won’t need much” Jimin adds, “I’ll only be staying here for, like, a week.”

Yoongi has to hold back a splutter of laughter at his idea. The wound might not be that deep but there’s no way in hell it’ll heal in a week. The kid winces anytime he moves a millimetre. And his job involves quite a bit of movement, especially since he supposedly walks to and from it every night.

“Two, very minimum,” Yoongi says in such a final tone that Jimin only shows an air of surprise, and doesn’t show any protest past the quiet disapproval simmering under his expression. Yoongi knows what he’d say anyway: that he needs to work because he needs money, but they already had that conversation and, in short, he doesn’t. Yoongi’ll reimburse him, considering it’s largely his fault he got hurt in the first place. Whether he objects or not, he’ll pass along some money to him to make up for it. Maybe even a little more, just for the trouble. After all, it’s not like he makes much.

“I need to ask you about tonight. It might help us find a lead on the information.”

Jimin nods, yet his eyes start to flutter shut, though he seems to be trying his best to keep them open, gazing at Yoongi sleepily. He moves around, cautiously, at one point, as if a different angle will keep him awake. A few locks of his hair falls over his face from this, but with the glassy look in his eye, he isn’t even sure if the boy notices. Yoongi’s hand stretches out on its own to push it back for him, the owner of it smiling drowsily at him with silent gratitude. The older man scarcely shivers as an intruding warmth settles in his chest.

He looks sweet, Yoongi decides and, though he’s not sure why the thought came to him, it’s sweet how he’s bundled up like that - fighting off sleep like it’s a nuisance and not what he likely needs most right now. He mumbles something, barely even audible past his hazy state, but Yoongi hears him ask “Wha..what do yuh-you wanna know?”

He yawns, eyes squeezing shut as he clamps a sloppy hand to his mouth. And then, his eyes don’t open again, and Yoongi stops himself from laughing as the boy lets out a content sigh.

“This bed’s real comfy, Yoongi…”

He makes a sound of agreement, fighting back the urge to ruffle Jimin’s dishevelled hair as he stands up. He starts to back away quietly, as not to disturb him – after all, it’s not like he’s going anywhere. He can ask him later.

“Yeah, well, I’m not sleeping in it with you this time,” Yoongi jibes, earning an amused huff from the half-awake boy. 

“’Shame,” he murmurs – or at least Yoongi thinks he does – and he stops in his tracks to shoot Jimin a look of surprise, but, when he does, he sees the younger now breathing a little slower than before, a little more rhythmically, and figures that it’s probably best just to let him sleep.

He finds himself smiling even once he leaves the room, but doesn’t stop to think why.

11th April, 2017 | 11:06am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi graciously decides to leave a day between the night of the party and their usual daily-sometimes-every-other-day meeting at his apartment, fully-well knowing that the men likely got substantially trashed after Yoongi texted that he wasn’t coming back, under the liberty that no longer would the man come back and lecture them all on the importance of staying sober and alert as a mobster.  Although Taehyung had seemed to be in a perfectly normal state of mind when he arrived last night, that was simply due to the fact that he doesn’t drink anything more than champagne, nowadays, since his tolerance is embarrassingly low (saying that, though, he can drink an entire bottle of champagne and come out only a little airier than usual.)

Seokjin, though sounding fine when Yoongi had called him to ask him about where to take Jimin, likely moved straight onto bigger and better things when his boss had said he wouldn’t be returning: bigger and better things, of course, being whatever complimentary drinks the owner likely gave him.

And tequila.

As for Namjoon, Jungkook and Hoseok: Yoongi was fairly confident that they had nearly cleared out the just fully stocked bar – the youngest cheerfully ignoring the alcoholic cap his brother had given him and likely staying at his own apartment that night, knowing their mom would have the same stance on the ordeal as Yoongi had.

And Yoongi turns out to be absolutely right, on all cases, as when everyone gathers in Yoongi’s living area – quiet, you fucking idiots, Jimin’s still asleep – and Yoongi asks about how the night went, Seokjin chips in about their soon-to-be contract with the establishment, while the predicted alcoholics of the night all hesitate and mutter about it being fine, as if none of them can really remember.

Taehyung on the other hand, smiles impressively wide and exclaims “The guy said I could run shipments through the port for him,” he pauses for a second, letting the point build up because sorting out deals really isn’t anything new for Taehyung, “and he would pay me.”

At that, everyone in the room immediately looks to the kid.

“Is this a late April Fool’s joke?” Yoongi asks, resulting in a bitter glare from the dealer in question.

“No, it’s not,” Taehyung stresses, “He said that if I’m friends with Mariposa's very own right-hand-man – who selflessly taught me everything I know, including hand-to-hand combat so that I may defend any treacherous heathens that may try and steal their good ingredients – I must be worth the extra coin.”

Hoseok bursts out in laughter at this, half-choking on the cereal he had unhesitatingly stolen from Yoongi’s kitchen as soon as he came in. (“You’re the one that holds eleven AM meetings, Yoongi – that’s breakfast time.”)

“When have I ever,” he asks, once recovered, “Ever, taught you literally anything?  Like. About anything?”

Taehyung grins at this, something along the lines of a glint of mischief hanging off of it.

“Well, now that I’ve promised that, I suppose you’ll have to, right?”

Hoseok’s doubtful expression clearly shows that he disagrees with that statement. 

“I’m just an errand boy! I can't fight!”

Taehyung looks to Yoongi, as if he's going to say 'prove him wrong, hyung! he's valuable!' but the man merely shrugs his shoulders.

"He's not wrong. He's probably the worst right-hand any gang has ever had."

Hoseok nods for all of three seconds until he realises that the man just severely insulted him and he snaps a, "Hey!"

Yoongi ignores him, slapping a hand over his face at the realisation of how badly they’re getting off track. He’s about to divert the conversation back to the reason they always meet up – to discuss what’s going on, new developments in any of the Syndicate business and to decide who’s doing what – when Jungkook says something (this is a rare moment, as the boy rarely says anything when discussions are going on, just merely throwing in his input every once in a while.)

“If Hoseok doesn’t want to teach you anything, then I could teach you some self-defence, at least,” He says to Taehyung, them having started the meeting at opposite ends of the sofa but somehow having made their way beside each other as the minutes went on, as they so often do.

When Taehyung gives him a curious look, perhaps a little insulted to be hearing this from someone two years younger than him, Jungkook immediately throws his hands up in case of a harsh punch coming his way from the elder, quickly clarifying “I've been doing lessons in that for even longer than that time when hyung tried to get me into singing- and that was ages."

Yoongi sorely remembers that: in the midst of all the things he tried to get Jungkook to find an interest in, music was the thing that he almost showed an interest in the most. He had high hopes, telling his parents that it’d be good for them to get Jungkook some singing lessons, and naturally they’d agreed, considering they were hoping Jungkook would grow up vaguely normal as well.

Jungkook liked singing, he liked the lessons. He did not like not spending day and night hooked onto his older brother and his friends at every chance he got for it, however.

Yoongi let him quit a few weeks after their father died, once he found out the boy had been skipping the lessons anyway to walk around aimlessly for an hour or two. He can still recall the ache he felt at finding his younger brother, knees pulled up to his chest on a park bench, staring blankly ahead of him while his body shivered mechanically from the light drizzle that’d fallen across the sector. He’d had a fucking heart attack when he went to pick him up for once and his teacher told him she hadn’t seen him for weeks; he drove around like a maniac hoping to catch a glimpse of him.

Yoongi is brought back to reality by a harsh kick to the side of his leg and he doesn’t even have to wonder who possibly could’ve done it – Jung fucking Hoseok – and he shoots the man a vicious scowl before noting that all of his friends are staring intently at him.

“What?” Yoongi mutters, rubbing at the spot on his leg with annoyance.

“You were spaced out,” Hoseok says plainly, as if that was any reason to attempt to break his leg. That man has been too free-willing with his kicks as of late. First his door, then the cushion, now his leg.

Before he can start what would no doubt develop into one of their infamous bickering matches (Hoseok calls them Best-Friend Squabbles), Namjoon manages to diffuse the tension from Yoongi – something he’s very versed in – as he simply asks “Are you alright, hyung?”

This causes Yoongi to remember the situation at hand, and he dismissively waves the question off with a quick ‘fine’ before saying “Why don’t we actually get started, huh?”

He notices a thinly veiled frown on the man’s lips at this response, but knows perfectly well that he’ll drop whatever it is about it that bothered him.

13th April, 2017 | 9:02am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

It’s a few days before Jimin’s able to walk around, and when he does Yoongi’s surprised to find that he’s something of an early riser. Or at least, he must be, because Yoongi had just stumbled out of bed, still rubbing the sleep out of his eyes when he finds his guest in the kitchen, cookbook Yoongi has never used in his life, out on the counter, ingredients, he didn’t even know he had, beside it.

When he enters the room, Jimin looks up, flour on his nose.

Yoongi tries admittedly hard not to break into a grin.

“I thought you couldn’t cook,” He says, approaching the younger with an air of caution, just in case there are any fires or tragically burnt breakfasts (or pieces of furniture) nearby. Jimin sighs deeply at this, closing the book and folding his arms across his chest.

“I can’t,” he says, very definite of that fact and making Yoongi chuckle quietly, “But I remembered the pancakes I had when you took me out for breakfast and- well, I really wanted pancakes.” Jimin unrolls his sleeves that he had clipped out of the way – likely to keep them clean, but Yoongi notices the batter stains against the soft white material. Then, he tuts, disapprovingly.

“Yah,” he quips, grabbing Jimin’s attention instantly. Yoongi gestures to the shirt he’s wearing – his shirt – which Jimin’s yet to take off despite the fact that Yoongi brought him his own clothes.

“Who bakes in a Louis Vuitton, press-stud, hand-stitched and embroidered white silk shirt?”

Jimin looks down at the shirt, generously stained with various ingredients, and he has the nerve to simper at the older man.

“Well, I’ve been wearing it to bed, so I figured it didn’t really-“

Yoongi pauses.

“To bed? You know that thing cost $900, right?”

Jimin’s expression falls flat off of his face.

“Nine-hundred fucking dollars – what the fuck?” He looks down at the shirt he’s wearing with wide-eyes and whilst most people would probably immediately take it off and apologise, Jimin just gawks at Yoongi, exclaiming, “Fuck, this shirt costs more than, like, everything I own. Who the hell spends that much money on a shirt, are you insane?”

Yoongi laughs, shoulders shaking with the light tinker rising from his chest, in fact, he laughs so much that Jimin looks startled all over again.  

“What?” he asks, a small, subconscious pout working onto his lips in his confusion. Yoongi shakes his head.

“Nothing – shit. Just… go watch TV or something. I’ll make you pancakes.”

Jimin looks undeniably surprised and he thanks the man, incredulity evident in his voice, before he exits the kitchen, padding down the hall to the living room.

-

“Yoongi, did you really just call to ask me how to make pancakes?”

“Jin, just tell me how to make the damn things. It’s important.”

“How are pancakes imp-“ He sighs, “Okay, first, get a medium sized bowl-“

-

Yoongi leans back in his chair, bitter, acidic aftertaste coating his taste buds as he drinks a mouthful of coffee. Jimin was slightly patrionising about Yoongi’s cooking at first, until he sat down and started eating – satisfaction clear on his face. Now, he takes another bite, making one of his cheeks puff out slightly as he says, “I didn’t know you could cook, Yoongi.”

Obviously, he wouldn’t know that, considering the two hardly know each other – but Yoongi figures that the boy means that he didn’t expect he’d be able to. He watches as Jimin swallows his food, neutral expression interrupted with just a hint of approval, before Yoongi shrugs a shoulder in response to his statement, putting the mug down on his dining table, the object echoing slightly against the glass of the table’s surface.

"Seokjin and our maid, Misook taught me when I was younger."

It's true- just... unfortunate that he couldn't remember Misook's pancake recipe this time. At least Seokjin did.

Jimin gives a soft giggle, deeming it as, "Cute."

Yoongi’d planned to eat in his dining room, as he often would with guests over, but Jimin had insisted they dine on the small glass table on Yoongi’s balcony area, as the morning had been particularly warm – a sign of the spring approaching, Jimin said.

“I don’t know if you’d consider it a good topic for the breakfast table,” Yoongi begins, earning the boy opposite to him’s interest as he echoes his words from their last meal together, “but I need to ask you what you remember about the other night.”

Jimin’s aura seems to darken for a moment, as if he doesn’t consider it a good topic, after all – but then he simply nods, likely knowing that Yoongi would be asking eventually, anyway.

“I was working in the bar,” Jimin says, proving Yoongi’s observation from that night correct, “nothing that weird was happening: a few people probably too drunk to still be getting served, waiters getting touched and taunted most of the night, Joonho hanging around me like a leech – the usual,” Yoongi almost laughs at the boy’s plainness, the way he genuinely dismisses it all with an indifferent wave of his hand. That that sort of thing is the usual for him. He supposes it shows the stark difference between the people, like Yoongi, who dismiss those sorts of businesses, and the people, like Jimin, who they employ.

“There were a couple of guys at one of the tables that I thought, maybe, I recognised a couple of them. But I wasn’t really thinking straight, Joonho was pissing me off and the place was too filled with cigar smoke and marijuana for me to focus. Now, I’m thinking some of them must’ve been there the night I got beat up a while back.”

“Do you remember what any of them looked like?”

“From way back then? Not really, ‘was too busy trying to stop one of them putting his hands down my pants to get a good look at him,” he laughs then, but it sounds flat, and Yoongi’s hand almost reaches out to touch the boy’s arm in sympathy, but he brushes off the urge in the last second.

“That night is a blur for me, whatever shit Seonghyeon gave me, I guess. But, anyway, back to the other night. I thought there was something vaguely off about them, but I wasn’t serving them – actually, I was on the other side of the room – so I didn’t really care, you know?”

Yoongi nods to show he does.

“Unfortunately for me, Joonho is a money-loving bastard – so, there’s a rule in the bar that if you see a waiter you like, you can take ‘em out for some ‘alone time.’” He mocks, hand moving in an aimless circle in the air at the words.

“And they did?”

“Fuck, did they. Joonho came over to me, saying just that, but didn’t bother leading them to one of the rooms like any good manager might – just said he’d come get me again after,” Jimin says, a harsh roll of his eyes as he adds, “Probably just wanted to see me naked.”

Yoongi gives a short, condescending laugh, but really, he doesn’t doubt that assumption at all, considering how the man had acted around Jimin when they’d last met.

“I led them out of the bar, across to the club, instead, and then out of fucking nowhere they grabbed me when we were passing the dressing room and pulled me into there. The rest is kinda fuzzy. I have the idea that they wanted to get back at me for snitching, one way or another – and, of course, being the goddamn idiot that I am, I got stabbed because I can’t keep my confrontational mouth shut.”

Yoongi can’t argue with that one.

“And them? Do you remember any of their faces?”

“I don’t know. The painkillers your doctor friend’s been giving me are pretty strong - blocked a lot of it out. And I don’t know if I would’ve remembered much anyway; losing a lot of blood kinda messes with your head, a bit.”

Jimin pauses for a minute, seemingly wracking his brain for something else before he says, “Saying that, though, there was one with something on his face – can’t remember what – but he was a creepy bastard, as far as I can recall. And – oh – a huge guy, all muscle. I think he was there the last time, too. I’m just glad he didn’t punch me, I probably would’ve went into a coma.”

Though Yoongi lets out a small laugh at this, he easily believes it, having seen many of those sorts of guys in the syndicate and even taking punches from a few of them. He's heard stories of broken bones in a single half-hearted punch and although most gang rumours are simply that, in a bid to deter people from messing with them, he wouldn't be totally shocked if that one in particular was very real.

Jimin goes back to eating, despite the fact that the gentle breeze sweeping by them on the balcony has likely cooled his food way down, and Yoongi doesn't bother questioning him any further, knowing that the boy definitely needs to eat because he was too skinny to begin with, unable to afford proper food a lot of the time; but with a healing wound he needs it even more. Taehyung told him to keep him well-fed, so, Yoongi plans to.

Instead of continuing the questioning, he decides to check up on his mom, considering it's almost certain that neither Jungkook or Hoseok would be available right now - the younger being likely asleep (or maybe finally going to go to school for once), and the older probably practicing or discussing his flourishing career with his manager.

She picks up half-way through the second ring, sounding lightly flustered when she says "Hello? Yoongi, baby, is that you?"

"Yeah, it's me, mom," he replies, casting Jimin a plain look as the boy gazes up at him, clearly taken aback.

"Good - Great! I thought so. I couldn't figure out where I'd left my phone so I was skipping around the room and pressed accept without checking who it was," She says, a sweetly bashful sound to her voice and Yoongi guesses that explains the fairly hasty way she'd greeted him.

"I was lucky it wasn't someone trying to sell me insurance - but I'm so glad you called! I've only been hearing about you from Jungkook lately."

Yoongi feels a pang of guilt at this, knowing the woman gets worried when either of them are gone too long (though, Jungkook rarely is. The boy has an apartment here in the Red-Light sector but he still often travels to the Freeland to where their mother lives when he can.)

“What’s he been saying?”

“Just that you’re working hard as usual. There’s something going on with the Crystal Syndicate at the minute, right?”

“Yeah,” Yoongi says, full of relief that Jungkook clearly didn’t specify what, knowing she’d likely reprimand him for being careless. “Nothing too bad, though, Ma’ – I’m sure we’ll get it sorted out soon.”

“I’m sure you will, Yoongi, if you’re anything like your father. And I know you are.”

Yoongi's mouth automatically slopes downwards at the mention of his father. She always seems to do that, weave him into their conversations. Jungkook talks about him all the time, apparently, but with Yoongi, she always says it's like trying to squeeze blood from a rock. Opening up about it will help him, she says, but Yoongi keeps telling her there's nothing that needs fixed. His father is dead, has been, will stay so, and there's nothing he can do about it. That's fine.

He ignores the look of concern that Jimin gauges him with.

He's fine.

"Thanks Ma’," he says, for once not negating her for his mention. Maybe it's due to how calm he feels now, from being surrounded by the cooling breeze of the early morning, or from how the boy across from him smiles radiantly when Yoongi gazes at him a moment too long.

He feels his heart pulse harder than usual, just once - like a thump - and has to ask his mother to repeat what she'd just asked him.

"I said how are you feeling, lately? Jungkookie said you'd met someone..."

"It's not like that," Yoongi rushes out, eyes flickering to Jimin who looks up minutely startled from his breakfast. Yoongi's eyes drift to the scenic view of his balcony as if the eye-contact had never been made.

"I don't know what he said, but it's not..." he takes a breath, trying to keep his thoughts from getting jumbled as they so often do as of late, "like that."

His mother makes a soft sound over the crackle of the phone, somewhere between deep thought and surprise.

"He just said you'd been looking after someone lately," She says, a flood of relief flying through Yoongi for a reason he can't even quite decide. Why was he nervous? Was he worried what the woman would think of him? Or that hearing another person suggest that he had an interest in Jimin would drive him fucking insane?

"But I do want to know what you've been getting yourself into lately."

Yoongi tries not to grimace at the knot of defeat kneading into his stomach. He lets out an audible sigh, quickly chased by the light tinker of his mother's laugh. It's not quite as enchanting as it is in person but he still feels a rush of pleasant warmth run through him at the sound.

"Hold on a minute, 'Ma," Yoongi mutters, standing up from his seat at the table and nodding at Jimin as a non-verbal sign of his exit. Jimin gives him a funny look, somewhere between confusion and curiosity, but nods simply back. 

Yoongi slides open the double glass doors of his balcony, partially thankful for the gust of warm air he's met with inside because a cool breeze in April is still pretty fucking cold. He closes the door again behind him, giving one last glance at Jimin to see him admiring the cityscape contentedly again before clearing his throat.

"Alright," he says "What do you wanna know?"

"Don't pretend to be so burdened Yoonie, I just want to make sure you aren't getting into more trouble than you need to."

Yoongi resents this sometimes: the fact that his mother's already way too knowledgeable about how the gangs in the South work for someone he's trying to keep away from it all. Not because he doesn't think she'd be able to handle it or anything, after all, his mom was his father’s right-hand from pretty much the moment they got together before Yoongi took over and because of that there's a lot of things she knows about even better than he does. It's for a more selfish reason than that.

He just can't imagine losing someone else to this life, so he wants to hide them away from it.

It's why he wants to keep his mother safe, why he wants to keep Jungkook safe, why he wants to keep his friends safe even though Yoongi knows they're all capable enough to protect him and each other, never mind just themselves.

It's why he even wants to keep Jimin safe now too, the boy having proved that his mouth's not trustworthy enough to keep himself out of conflict and Yoongi perhaps caring too much about that for his own good.

"I'm not," Yoongi assures her, "I know what I'm doing; you don't have to worry about that."

"I'm sure you do, honey. But Jungkook told me you met with Moon Seonghyeon recently?"

Yoongi groans in disgust, "I did, unfortunately. The fucker tried to drug me, ended up drugging my-" he falters, words suddenly failing him. He exhales, "Jimin - he's the kid Kookie was talking about. I had to take him back to his apartment."

His mother makes a sound of agreement, "Mm hm, that definitely sounds like that son of a bitch," Yoongi chuckles, knowing the woman's hatred for that man is likely tenfold his own.

"And he's okay, this boy?" She asks, and Yoongi thinks back to how he'd been calm and coherent the next morning: a certain type of rawness about him that he hadn't seen before. He was perfectly okay after that. Unfortunately, the boy's got terrible luck and too much pride.

"Oh well," Yoongi says, "he was fine the next day from that but a couple of days ago some of Moon's guys, I'm guessing, stabbed the poor kid." Even a simple mention of it, of that man, makes Yoongi’s head spin from the burst of anger that speeds through his blood flow. He recalls how sickly and drained Jimin had looked after and is at least thankful that he seems to have some actual colour back in his complexion.

"Oh god, really? How is he? Have you heard from him since?" She snaps in response, sounding understandably shocked.

Yoongi's eyes drift to the window again, humming in thought as Jimin seems to have finished his food, and now sits relaxed in his chair, mug of hot tea in both hands, watching the city go by. She could say that he has, he supposes.

"Yeah,” Yoongi replies, “he's fine."

He can basically hear the concerned frown on her face right now as she says, "Still, I hope he got it treated properly - you and I both have seen some nasty wounds in our lives, I'm sure."

Yoongi almost laughs at that – how absurd of a similarity that is between a parent and their child. Of course, both of Yoongi’s parents were mobsters and his birth mother was a regular at every low-life part in the sector. He’s absolutely certain that isn’t the only thing they have in common regarding that part of his life. Nasty wounds, though? They’d unquestionably both seen their fair share, but Yoongi wouldn’t be surprised at all if she’d seen twice the amount he had.

"It's healing well,” He tells her, “It hasn't been a week yet, but I've gotten Taehyung to check it every day, so…"

She makes a small noise of barely hidden disinterest.

"That's nice of him,” she says, as if she doesn’t think it’s much of a feat, at all.

Ah, that. Yoongi forgot about that, somehow, past the boy’s never ending pleads and complaints to Yoongi to help him fix it. His mom’s first impression of his friend was rather poor, unfortunately for Taehyung, as well as all the other impressions that have come after that in the boy’s desperate attempt to reconcile with her.

The first time, he’d been caught grabbing Jungkook by the collar in their home, pinning the boy against the wall with misinterpreted rage. Though, Yoongi never found out what the real explanation was except for Taehyung’s ‘hyung, seriously it was such a misunderstanding’ and Jungkook’s ‘I don’t know if I can show my face to her again’ (they tend to like to challenge each other by proving their apparent strengths, so Yoongi never really bothered asking.) His mother apparently did not buy any of the excuses Taehyung proceeded to rapid-fire give her.

The second time hadn’t been much better. Though, instead of roughhousing with her son, he’d broken the crystal bowl she’d gotten for her wedding day. Again, Yoongi never heard much about it minus Jungkook’s ‘Seriously - I really, really can’t face her now, hyung.’

He was promptly banned from the house after that. And while perhaps most people would simply tell their child not to bring their disruptive friend around again, his mother took the approach of pushing Kim Taehyung out the door herself saying “If you come to this house again I will take the remnants of that bowl and shove it up your-“

Jungkook cut her off by slamming the door on his best friend with nothing more than an apologetic look. Taehyung is still discreetly mad about that.

His mom unsurprisingly changes the subject. 

“Where does this Jimin live, is it an okay area?"

Yoongi practically laughs at that, "Not exactly,” he says, “His apartment itself is something of an international cause for concern. Cerulean Blocks."

"Cerulean?” She repeats, reputation of the place clearly giving her a good idea of what Jimin’s apartment is like.

“God, that place isn't good - especially not for a healing wound."

Yoongi nods, though the woman can’t see it, "Mm, that's what I said."

There’s a brief silence through the line and his mother sounds sceptical as she says "Yet you just... let him?"

"What? Oh... no," He replies quickly, "I let him stay in one of my spare rooms."

"Oh, Yoongi listen to you! That's the compassion of a good leader."

Yoongi scoffs, finding himself to be far from a good leader – the mere idea of it giving him a considerable amount of amusement.

"Yeah, yeah - well, for the record, he's a pain in the ass. I sort of regret it," He says, the words somehow sounding false even to his own ears, "Had to make him pancakes this morning."

"Pancakes? That's harder than caring for a stab wound, huh?"

"Well, no but-"

"Still,” She cuts him off, parental tone seeping into her words making Yoongi tilt his head disapprovingly as she says, “I'm impressed you actually cooked for once. Jungkook tells me you always go out for breakfast when you decide to have something other than coffee. Really Yoongi, you used to cook constantly, how many times-"

Whilst his mother rambles on, though most would cut her off, assure her they’re fine and that they’re an adult now, Yoongi can't help the fond smile that warms his face as she scolds him.  

Chapter Text

15th April, 2017 | 6:58pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi is reading a book in the single lounger in his bedroom that he’s neglected for quite a number of months now, never having been able to find the time to continue it, when he hears Jimin yell from the other end of the long corridor of bedrooms and ensuites.

“Yoongi! What the fuck is this?” He asks, voice seemingly coming closer and closer as the boy slowly figures out what room he’s in. The door snaps open and Yoongi glances up with a face of clean judgement, ready to discredit the boy for whatever he’s found.

In Jimin’s arms is a round, adorably cuddly brown-furred cat with puffy, furry cheeks and large eyes.

Yoongi looks on expressionlessly.

“That’s Mochi.”

Jimin’s mouth silently copies the name as he proceeds to look bewilderedly back and forth from the cat to Yoongi.

“You have a cat… called Mochi.”

Yoongi takes one last look at his book, storing the page number in his head for later (he hates bending pages and keeps losing his bookmarks) and shuts it, having a feeling that the boy isn’t going to leave anytime soon. He nods, gesturing with his hand for Jimin to come over to him, which he does, letting Yoongi affectionately scratch behind the cat’s soft ears before Jimin decides to sit himself down on Yoongi’s bed, Mochi purring in his lap as he strokes her fascinatedly.

“I’ve always wanted a cat,” he admits, looking down wistfully at the creature almost smiling at him. She rolls over, stretching out across his thighs so Jimin can pet under her chin as well.

“Mochi,” he repeats, “That’s cute. It suits her.”

Yoongi draws his mouth into a fixed line, and mutters “Actually, my dad called her Mochila, originally,” which makes Jimin look up with an air of curiosity.

“Mochila? That sounds fancy-“

“It means backpack in Spanish.”

“Oh.”

Yoongi snickers at the boy’s reaction, before smiling to himself admittedly fondly as he recalls the reason.

“My dad went backpacking across Spain one time when I was a kid – Mariposa was just a random word he came across that sounded right to him, but after that he got interested in the country,” He tells him, the younger immediately smiling to himself as he presumably never knew about the origin of the gang’s name. Which makes sense – even Yoongi’s friends don’t know the full thing - minus Seokjin who’d worked for his father before Yoongi took over.

“That was then he met my stepmom-“

“Stepmom?” Jimin asks, and Yoongi pauses for a second – the term so rarely used it feels foreign and out-of-place on his tongue. He supposes that piece of information isn’t public knowledge, then.

“Yeah – Jungkook’s mom,” Yoongi explains, “She’s been around more than my own mother ever was, so I call her my mom, too.”

“I thought you and Jungkook didn’t look that alike.”

The passing comment makes Yoongi chuckle, before the boy silently gestures him to go on.

“When he came back with a cat I was obviously excited – Jungkook wasn’t born yet, so she was the closest thing I had to a sibling, besides Hoseok. And then he wanted to call her Mochila. It only clicked with me why not so long ago.”

His mother had made a fleeting comment about the cat’s name when Yoongi was taking her with him on the day he was moving out and he almost dropped her from the shock of it.

“So, when did they meet? How old were you?” Jimin asks, sounding genuinely interested – and Yoongi smiles at that, especially when he moves to sit cross-legged, scooping Mochi up with him so she doesn’t get too surprised at the change.

“I was three, I think. My actual mother OD’d the following year, but all I can remember about her was how fucking awful she was. I don’t blame him for being infatuated with my stepmom when they met. His own wife was atrocious,” Yoongi admits without hesitation. Judging by the wince on Jimin’s face it must sound harsh, but he wasn’t being hyperbolic at all.

“She was always either high, drunk, both or hungover so she was never in a particularly pleasant mood, you know? She’d smack me if I made too much noise – she did it in front of Hoseok once. I was mortified,” He confesses, recalling the incident far too well in his opinion. The sharp sting, the quivering lip, the way Hoseok hugged him so tightly that the tears threatening to fall from his eyes never did. He was a good friend, then.

(Yoongi silently and begrudgingly admits that he’s a good friend now, too.)

“She always told me what a bad kid I was for doing jack shit and, now, I know it doesn’t really matter but I was, what, three? Four? That messes with your brain at that age.”

Jimin nods, several times, as if he agrees unquestionably, and Yoongi takes a minute to wonder why he’s even telling the boy this. How did he get from talking about his cat to sharing his depressing childhood? Yoongi’s about to end the conversation, tell Jimin to take Mochi out before she tries to sleep with him tonight, but he doesn’t get a chance before he gets asked another question.

“Did your dad know?”

Yoongi would brush it off, maybe, on another day – with another person. But Jimin looks so immersed in the story that Yoongi finds the words spilling out of his mouth.

“He wasn’t home a lot. They… didn’t get on,” Yoongi admits, getting out of his chair to join Jimin on his bed, shuffling to sit cross-legged like the younger boy.

“H-he was home a lot when my stepmom came along, though. It was… good,” He says, his lips curving up without much thought to it. Then, suddenly he grins, a soft laugh entering the quiet ambiance of the room as he remembers more.

“He used to tell Jungkookie and I how they met and it wasn’t that exciting but the way he’d tell it, God, it sounded like the most romantic thing ever.”

Jimin’s eyes flicker with something microscopically. Then, he asks “How’d they meet?”

“Oh, uh,” Yoongi wavers, not actually expecting Jimin to ask. He reaches out to pet Mochi in Jimin’s lap as he tries to remember the details. It’d been a long time since he’d last heard the story.

“While he was in Spain, Dad ended up in this little village town somewhere near the coast – a really old place with winding, cobbled streets and tiny little shops that’d been handed down through generations,” Yoongi says quietly, finding himself falling a little flat on the descriptions. The way his father used to tell it made him feel as if he was there, as if he could smell the sea salt and feel the gentle breeze, hear the sound his shoes made against the cobbles. For someone who used to read so many books, even considered writing as a career at one point before he took over the gang (something he’s never actually told anyone but Hoseok), he can’t help but feel at a loss for words.

“He’d dropped his credit card somewhere along the trek from one town to another, so he’d come into that one hoping he could use a phone to cancel it before someone ended up bankrupting his entire gang.”

Both of them share a smile at that, the absurdity of such a powerful and intelligent man doing something so normal and yet careless.

“Did your mom have a phone?”

“Sorta,” He says, “He found a little bar on the corner of one of the streets, it wasn’t particularly luxurious or anything but he thought they’d at least have a landline. There was a girl behind the bar and dad always said that the first time he saw her, he thought he was hallucinating from walking so far in the heat – that’s how beautiful she was. He didn’t believe in love at first sight but talking to her, he felt something he’d never felt before, maybe something close. He said it felt like all the air had been knocked out of his lungs.”

“Romantic,” Jimin practically sighs, hand stilling mid-pet of Mochi. Yoongi never guessed the kid to be such a sucker for romance.

“Yeah,” Yoongi agrees, a strange feeling washing over him that he can’t quite describe. Familiarity, almost. And maybe it was because he was hearing the story again after so long, but it felt odd. He gives the cat one last pet before his hand falls down limply by her side. It takes a few seconds and Jimin glancing down at it to realise that he’d let it land on the boy’s thigh. He snatches it back into his own lap, shattering their eye-contact immediately as a prickle of heat inches up his neck.

He continues with the story before he can embarrass himself further.

“He asked her for a phone and she said that he’d have to buy a drink first. He explained he lost his credit card, otherwise he’d absolutely take her out for a drink over dinner and she called him an asshole,” Jimin makes a sound of surprise at this, clearly not having expected that (no one ever does from his mom – that’s why she was a great gangster,) and he laughs so brightly that Yoongi even looks at him again, just to see it.

He shrugs, then, “But he said he knew she wasn’t serious from the way her mouth curled upwards as she said it.”

Yoongi leans back on his hands behind him, tilting his head to the roof in some attempt to envision the story for himself.

“She let him use the phone, gave him a free drink, too, as long as he promised to pay for it eventually. Originally he was only gonna stay there for a few nights until his card was sorted out. But he stayed for almost two months.”

“Two months?” The boy repeats, just like Yoongi had when he first heard it, because – naturally – at that age he had no perception of time, so the revelation when he was older was quite a shock to him.

“And then?”

Jimin shuffles closer to him, impatiently waiting for him to complete the tale.

“Mom was stuck in a dead-end job, in a country she barely spoke the language of. Dad offered to take her with him and she didn’t hesitate. She didn’t mind that he had a wife, said that she liked him even if he couldn’t like her. Dad did, but he didn’t tell her that…” Yoongi’s smile begins to shift to something more uncomfortable as the story dips into the part he’d pieced together on his own, later, from overheard conversations and passing comments.

“…until my real mother died,” he finishes, Jimin’s expression becoming more sombre as well.

“Mom met with him in the hospital to console him – but dad was more upset at how she’d been treating me, you know? It might sound heartless, but-“

“No, no… I understand,” Jimin insists, and Yoongi nods contently at that. His father was a good man. It’s important for people to know that.

“He did love her at one point,” he assures him, “but it was before I was even born. He deserved to be happy.”

The words feel loose and yet heavy on his tongue. The realisation that that wasn’t how it went makes him want to stop talking immediately. Push Jimin out of his room and climb under the covers like a child. But he doesn’t. Because Jimin speaks first, again.

“I agree,” he says to Yoongi’s surprise. Jimin didn’t know the man, he has no idea the sorts of things he had to do as a gang leader, so maybe the words should be seen as being hollow, like required condolences. But the way Jimin’s mouth forms a tiny smile makes Yoongi think he really means it.

“So you lived with your real mom mostly?” He asks, but Yoongi shakes his head.

“Not really. She was usually out or so fucked up she might as well have been,” he says with a grimace. “Our maid, Misook, looked after me most of the time. She was nice, sweet. Not much older than I am now, so she always felt more like an older sister than anything. Jungkook wasn’t that close to her because he had his own mom, I suppose. But, really, she kind of raised me for a while. Even after dad married mom. She even taught me how to cook.”

His parents always treated Misook like part of the family. They’d have meals together, and Yoongi would happily help her clean up after. She played games with him and Jungkook, read them bedtime stories, take them to school a lot since his parents were often busiest in the mornings. It was a good time in Yoongi’s life, to put it simply.

“What happened?” 

“Hm?”

“You’re using past tense.”

Yoongi frowns, shoulders slumping with an unsteady sigh.  

“I… yeah. They k-killed her the night they killed my dad,” Yoongi’s voice shakes a little, and Jimin moves to put a sympathetic hand on his own with a soft smile.

“She was trying to protect him, apparently. They were always close,” He tells him, giving Mochi a soothing pat on the head for no other reason than to stop himself from thinking about it too much.

“My real mother couldn’t stand her because she thought they were having an affair, which they weren’t. But I think it was one of the reasons she accidentally OD’d. Especially after he’d whisked off to Spain and came back with such a beautiful woman. Mom told him she was pregnant a few weeks after they came back. They didn’t know what to do. And a few months later my real mother died and mom said that she’d leave, that he didn’t have to worry about her – but then dad proposed.”

Jimin smiles brightly again. Yoongi thinks he likes that a hell of a lot more.  

“It happens to a lot of people, but they said it didn’t feel like it was forced – it felt like fate. Like it was supposed to all come together like that. They loved each other more than anything in the world.”

Yoongi hesitates before he speaks again, wondering how the words will sound out loud, what Jimin’ll think of them.  

“I-I don’t really believe in love at first sight but… they make me re-think it, sometimes.”  

Jimin looks contemplative, as if he’s about to say something, but then Mochi makes a loud mewling sound in Jimin’s lap and both look down at her in surprise, watching as she shimmies around, paws playfully reached out in front of her, big eyes blinking slowly around the warm brown of her fur.

Yoongi looks from the cat to the boy cradling her, a slow realisation forming.

“She kind of looks like you.”

Jimin’s eyes dart up to Yoongi with a serious expression for a moment, before he breaks into a grin, accompanied with the sweetest giggle he thinks he’s ever heard. Mochi meows to the same tones, eyes sparkling in the same way.

“How come I’ve never seen her before?” Jimin asks now, giving the cat an affectionate pet around her chin. Yoongi shrugs, the thought not even having crossed his mind. He barely sees Mochi half of the time, considering how well equipped he has her.

“She spends most of her day in her room – it’s got everything she needs, so…”

Jimin’s eyes widen, making Yoongi stop in his explanation.

“You have… a cat room?”

His brows snap together as he asks, “Don’t most people?”

They do not, apparently. Jimin admits that he never would’ve guessed that Yoongi would have such an obvious sweet spot for something.

Yoongi seems to be finding out that he’s got numerous sweet spots for things, lately.

18th April, 2017 | 1:15pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Jimin does not like the idea of being ‘babysat’ by Taehyung and Namjoon, evidentially by the whine he gives when Yoongi tells him he’s got business to attend to, and this is how he’s leaving him.

“You’re not even supposed to be out of bed, Jimin. It’s either you’re being babysat or nursed like a pensioner.”

It’s true. Taehyung had told him to stay in bed because just two days ago he had been (unashamedly sensually) dancing around the living room to a song playing on one of the music channels on TV, rolling from his shoulders down to his hips and pulling all sorts of quick steps unsurprisingly well, considering the boy likely dances often at his work.

It was somewhere between Jimin’s teasing glances at Yoongi, his appeals for the man to join him and a song with too high of a BPM for a fairly new patient that Jimin had managed to rip one of his stitches in his wound which had been far from healed, and practically crumpled to the floor (consequently scaring the shit out of Yoongi.)

Because of this, he’d been condemned to not moving at all if he couldn’t be trusted to not give his temporary landlord an indirect lap dance. But now, the boy stands, arms folded sulkily across his chest, clothed in Yoongi’s white silk Louis Vuitton shirt – which is now freshly-dry-cleaned after Jimin had demanded the food stains to be taken out of it before Yoongi used it to blackmail him later on.

(He had briefly considered it when he brought the idea to his mind.)

He blocks the door of his bedroom, and though Yoongi could easily push him out of the way or even pick him up if need be, he lets him block his way, simply because of the determined frown on his face of convincing the man that he doesn’t need looking after.

“Where are you going, anyway?”

Yoongi tries not to grin at the boy’s indignant tone, knowing that he probably doesn’t really care about gang affairs, more that he wants to know what’s so important that he’s having to be watched by almost-strangers for the day, instead of the usual way that Yoongi sits quietly in the room with him, reading a book until Jimin asks him to read him a chapter, or tell him the plot.

Yoongi has no idea why Jimin’d find that any more entertaining, but evidently, he does.

“There’s another lead on the information,” Yoongi says, reluctance obvious in his voice because, really, Yoongi hasn’t had the best of luck with these lately. Everything he’s tried has led him to a solid dead end: misheard words, misunderstandings, miscommunications. It’s all been a complete waste of time, oddly enough.

In fact, Yoongi’s beginning to wonder if Seonghyeon’s doing this on purpose.

He sighs, silently answering that with an assured 'most likely.'

Jimin scoffs as if he could've guessed that, considering most of the time Yoongi spends not reading he spends on the phone or on his email, trying to find something on the situation from home.

"What is the information, anyway? You've never mentioned that."

Yoongi hums, not eben having realised that he hasn't. He isn't sure all of his gang even know, which probably just shows how important it is for all of it to be kept secret and not in the grubby hands of Moon Seonghyeon.

"It's files, mostly," Yoongi explains, checking the time on his watch very briefly. He'd arranged to meet with the man, Kang Dawon, at 2:00pm, though he'd have to wait for Hoseok to show up and most likely tease him for most of the rather lengthy journey into the Downtown sector (the reason he'd decided to go wait for said man outside) and he'd also like to be there a few minutes early.

"What sort of files?" Jimin asks, curiosity arising in his tone. The impatient line of his shoulders has relaxed somewhat now, and the determined frown is replaced with something slightly skeptical.

Yoongi isn't really in the mood to talk about this, especially not before going to see if he can find out anything new, knowing that it'll only stress him out further if he can't. But regardless, he tells him, if for anything, because he knows that the boy probably won't drop it if he doesn't.

"Finance information, intelligence about every single member of this gang and every ally we have. Future plans, past missions - things that could throw us all in jail because of how damming of an evidence it'd be."

Yoongi takes a slow breath, frustration rising in his gut just at the thought of the Syndicate having all of that. Would they want him in jail? Probably not, but could they use that to blackmail him? Absolutely.

"It's secrets that my father kept for decades. It's not just some information, it's the key to all of it. I don't know if the Crystal Syndicate know that, but, if they find out we're all fucked."

Jimin doesn't say anything for a moment, his face evident of his surprise, obviously not having thought it was so important. Yoongi would not have spent the last month busting his ass over something if it wasn't important.

"You'll get it back," Jimin says then, stepping out of the way to let Yoongi pass. Yoongi hadn't expected him to say that of all things, but he nods at the boy regardless.

He goes to leave, almost closing the door behind him when he turns back and says, "Stay in bed, okay? You're just adding weeks onto your recovery and I know you don't want to be here longer than you have to."

Jimin looks contemplative, as if he's about to say something, but instead, he mutters an agreement and makes his way to the bed as Yoongi asked.

-

Hoseok shows up almost immediately, once Yoongi steps out the door, which is unexpected because punctuality is not the man's strong point - at least not when it comes to Yoongi's requests.

He's not in dance practice clothes or an obnoxious suit today. Actually, he's in a plain black blazer and matching slacks, a simple white shirt underneath. Yoongi asks him if there was a funeral.

"No," Hoseok scoffs, hitting the elder's arm with his elbow as Hoseok pulls out of his parking spot when Yoongi closes the door.

"I was at a meeting to discuss my film."

Yoongi almost scoffs then, instead giving a short huff of air when he says 'my.' He supposes he shouldn't complain too much, considering his right-hand is at least appropriately dressed for once.

After a few minutes of silent driving, Yoongi having told him to just get onto the N7 Highway, Hoseok says, "The guy we're meeting - who is he again?"

Yoongi definitely already told the man that, but he supposes Hoseok had more important things on his mind then – like ‘his’ film.

"One of the men that was working with Jimin at the Galaxy the night we were at the restaurant opening."

"Oh,” He says, dragging out the sound slowly, “you mean the night the men you asked to watch Jimin disappeared which resulted in him getting stabbed and you ditching the party and letting him stay in your apartment, tending to him for whatever minor need he has?"

There it is. Yoongi was wondering when the man would bring that up.

"Sure," he replies, knowing Hoseok likely wanted to hear him argue his case a little at least by the confused down curve of his lips (really, it’s closer to a pout) once he says no more.

"The Brawns that disappeared still haven't shown up, this guy was the only person from that night that's contacted us. One of our Brawns in the Downtown Sector called me saying he'd found him - pretty shaken up, so-"

"Downtown?” Hoseok echoes, and Yoongi internally groans. Hoseok, for one reason or another, despises the Downtown Sector. His justification for it’s never been very good and generally varies from ‘it rains too much’ to ‘there’s too much traffic.’

Yoongi’s pretty sure the real reason is that he’s still scarred from the time he almost got robbed by a gutsy teenage thug one night when he and Yoongi were walking back to the car after dinner (they’d been there for business, but Hoseok insisted on going to the fancy new Italian place down the block, after.) He must’ve recognised Hoseok (which wasn’t a surprise; even back then his face was everywhere), because he was fairly confident in the man being loaded. It wasn’t until Yoongi threatened to make a substantial sized hole in his forehead, gun cocked and steadily aimed in a flash, that the kid decided Hoseok’s pocket change probably wasn’t worth it and that bullets certainly beat pocket knives.

He was right to walk away; Hoseok didn’t have anything – he makes Yoongi pay for everything, even though the man’s richer than 99% of the city’s population.  

“Shit, is that where we're heading? When you said to drive down the highway I hoped we were going to Mariana."

Mariana on the other hand is the sector Hoseok likes best, even more than the Red Light, because it’s where everyone treats him like a golden god, rather than a mobster. He gets almost everything for free, is gawked and stared at by literally everyone and is stopped for autographs and pictures every three metres down a street. If he could, he would probably always park a good mile from their destination, just to experience it, but Yoongi outright refuses.

“I am not voluntarily standing awkwardly beside you like your insignificant sidekick while your ego gets inflated even more.”

In hindsight, Yoongi doesn’t think that’s possible. But, deep down (deep, deep down) he guesses it’s good to see Hoseok so confident in himself, because he wasn’t like that at all when they were kids.

But, he’d never tell Hoseok that. His ego has definitely gotten out of hand, and if he knew Yoongi was secretly okay with it? It would escape the stratosphere, never mind anyone’s hands.

"Nope, the guy's still in Downtown,” Yoongi confirms past Hoseok’s sullen expression, “pretty far from where he started, actually."

The man hums, fingers tapping the wheel (he does that when he thinks, it’s annoying, but simultaneously comforting and familiar) "You think it was the Crystals that spooked him?"

Yes, Yoongi’s brain immediately answers, but he’s learned over the years (and especially from this ordeal) that jumping to conclusions in this world results in missed leads and unwanted surprises.

"We'll have to ask Dawon, but..."

"Likely?"

"Almost fucking certain."

Truthfully, Yoongi had had a good feeling that the whole thing was Seonghyeon's doing from the very night he'd found Jimin like that. Sure, Jimin himself had said when it happened that it was the Syndicate, but the boy wasn’t exactly in the right state of mind – Yoongi just went along with it because, as Jimin said, who else?

The man's threats had gone all too sweetly with it, after all, and it made Yoongi feel even more paranoid than usual. He doesn't want to start thinking about what that means if it was the Syndicate, though, nor talk about it with Hoseok quite yet. Once it's confirmed by someone who didn’t lose half of the blood in their body, then, he can theorise - but until then he shouldn't let his mind wander too much.

"Seok," Yoongi says, the nickname catching the man's attention immediately as it’s not something he calls him very often (asshole, idiot, bastard – those are much more frequent.)

"Why don't you tell me a little about your movie deal?"

He needs something to block any decent thought in his head, after all.

18th April, 2017 | 1:56pm | Apartment 27d, Renaissance Block, Downtown Sector.

Dawon is, understandably, a little uneasy looking when Hoseok and Yoongi are led into the living area by the Brawn, Jitae.

"Kang Dawon," Hoseok says, immediately grabbing the worker's attention as he basically plummets into a shaky bow, "I'm Jung Hoseok, this is Min Yoongi, but I'm sure you know that."

It's unexpected. Yoongi was prepared to meet a tough-looking handsome man in his 20s like most club workers and prostitutes in Seoul, but here, sitting in front of him is a rather twiggish kid with soft, pretty facial features. Yoongi would be shocked if he was older than 17.

"You don't have to feel so burdened, Dawon," Yoongi says, tapping the boy's hunched over form to get him to rise, "We just want to know what happened - you're not in trouble."

He uncurls slowly, peeking one eye at a time as if Yoongi's about to hit him with something. He bites back a chuckle at it.

"I-I'm not... Sir?”

Yoongi never quite gets used to people calling him that – most likely because he rarely ever talks to anyone that isn’t one of his disrespectful subordinates (friends, whatever), or someone who’d much rather call him something a whole lot worse. It always sounds odd to his ears – wrong, as if it doesn’t fit him. His father, his mother: those people suit that level of honorific, but Yoongi’s never felt as if he’s met up to that standard.

"No,” He says calmly, “I'm just tryna figure out what happened."

Dawon's previously rigid form untenses (somewhat) at this. He doesn’t sit down though, despite the quivering in his knees that likely means he probably should before he passes out from unease or something. Instead, he stands opposite of Yoongi, meekly postured, in the middle of the room while Hoseok and Jitae stand off to the side.

"It’s just... when I heard what happened... People were telling me that the leader of the Mariposa's l-lover got hurt when I..."

Yoongi almost chokes.

"Wait, what?” he interrupts, causing Dawon to stall suddenly, wide-eyed as if he’s done something horrendous. Yoongi tries not to scowl so much when he repeats, “My lover? I don't have a..." Then, out of the corner of his eye, he sees Hoseok grinning behind the hand he’s unsubtly covered his mouth with.

"Hoseok for fuck's sake."

"Just a little joke, sugar,” he chimes, tone entirely unapologetic, shit-eating grin somehow widening when Yoongi’s expression darkens further. He despises that nickname, but Hoseok seems to be unable to go five seconds without calling him something.

It’s a matter of professionalism, Yoongi always says, but in reality, he just doesn’t want the man calling him Yoongo in public (or at all.)

Yoongi turns back to the fidgeting boy and shakes his head, reassuringly, "He's fine, Dawon there's- Well, Jimin's fine he's not my... lover."

He dares Hoseok to make any sort of objection with a sharp glare from his peripheral.

Dawon’s face reddens in embarrassment as he stutters, "Oh, s-sorry, Sir, Joonho and the others always say that..."

So, it’s coming from Joonho and Hoseok? Perfect.

Yoongi doesn’t respond to that, he’ll yell at Hoseok about it later. Instead, he turns back to the matter at hand, the reason he was stuck in a car journey for most of the afternoon with his insufferable (right now, at least) best friend.

"About the others: what happened? When I got there Jimin was alone. There should've been someone, right? Another worker at the club? Security? Mariposa members?"

"I... Well, the club wasn't that busy that night,” he admits, “so, Joonho sent most of us over to the bar to maybe get more people over," How typical. Money-loving bastard. "I was told to stay in the club because I had a few... bookings..." he flushes at the word, and for a moment Yoongi asks himself how someone this timid and prudish could do what he does for a living, before he remembers that, unfortunately, that sort of thing probably appeals to a lot of the creeps that go there.

 "And after a while I was taking a break in the dressing room and suddenly these guys come in, pulling Jimin along with them. I've talked to Jimin a few times. When I first started there, he taught me how things worked and said if anyone did anything to me to tell him and he'd knock them out for me-" A smile tugs at the corner of Yoongi’s mouth. That sounds just like the kid, and he doesn’t doubt he would, either.

Dawon looks vaguely at ease for the first time as he says, “He’s always been protective of all of us there, so, when he told me to get out I listened and I know now I shouldn't have but... but-" His face warps from its previous easiness to palpable guilt, and he bows his head, tensing up again likely from fear that now Yoongi knows the truth, he might want to actually hit him this time.

But, Yoongi lays a hand on his shoulder, giving it a soft pat as he says "It's okay, Dawon,” and the boy’s head shoots upwards again, eyes huge and blinking at him. Yoongi promptly removes his hand before he explodes.

His voice is more strained now, but not from guilt or terror - just shock, and his explanation comes out in a slur of words that Yoongi just barely catches when he rushes out, "I was gonna tell security but they were missing and t-then I remembered people saying you had some gang members keeping watch on Jimin and I went to find them but they were gone, too. Joonho would’ve been pissed if he knew that I’d left the club, and everyone in the club was b-busy. By that stage Jimin was already hurt and I was so scared of what you'd do that I... ran."

Yoongi frowns. It’s things like that that makes him hate the stigma he has around him. But, naturally, a mob boss that doesn’t strike even a tremor of fear into someone’s heart when they hear their name is guaranteed to fall. Hell, it’s what Yoongi’s spent the past year building – this façade that he’s so much scarier than he is through his unconventional methods of retrieving information from people and his temperamental ruthlessness. That hazy state he gets into when he goes overboard. That hasn’t happened for a little while, now. Really, not since the night they found out that that this issue wasn’t as simple as retrieving a pen drive. The night he poured fatally hot coffee down a man’s throat, shot another in the face, and temporarily kidnapped a beautiful boy in the wrong place at the wrong time.

"If I'm pissed at anyone, it's Joonho, that greedy bastard,” Dawon nods understandingly at this, and then, Yoongi asks the question that honestly dragged his ass all the way to this sector.

“Were they Syndicate members?"

"Definitely,” He answers immediately, “We get a lot of them there, I think I maybe even recognised them."

Yoongi knew it. He gives Hoseok a look who returns it, knowingly.

Moon-fucking-Seonghyeon. What’s he trying to do?

"Do you remember what they looked like?"

The boy makes a noise of agreement, before explaining "One was huge. He looked like a bodybuilder. Another had weird facial hair, but his hood was up, so I couldn’t really see the rest of his face... A-and the one that had the knife had a mark on his hand. It was dark, but there was definitely something on it. It covered most of the skin there."

Yoongi stays silent for a moment, thinking. The so-called bodybuilder could be the same guy Jimin mentioned and the same from the CCTV footage. Or, they could all be different. The Syndicate’s filled with obscenely muscular men, it could honestly be any one of them.

A man with weird facial hair, and someone with a mark on his hand? What kind of mark? That’s barely helpful. And weird facial hair is something he hadn’t heard before, or recalled seeing. Yoongi doesn’t really know what he was hoping to hear. Something to go off, he supposes, but it seems the only thing he got out of this is that it’s definitely the Syndicate’s doing.

Which gives him a reason to be pissed, at least. And another to be more careful in the future.

“I’d keep an eye on everyone.”

Was that a pre-warning for what happened to Jimin? And was he trying to kill him or just scare Yoongi into taking his warning more seriously? Does he let Jimin go before it gets too dangerous, or keep him close to protect him? Should he even care about the boy’s fate?

Maybe it’s too late for that last question. Yoongi feels a headache coming on.

"Thank you for wanting to contact us, Dawon. You're free to go back now, but...” He pauses, taking in the boy’s fragile stance with a sense of sympathy.

“Honestly, I think you should try getting a new job - or an education."

Dawon unashamedly gapes at this, mouth hanging open before he seems to realise and he shuts it quickly, nodding rapidly, same blush from earlier flurrying around on his cheeks.

“I'll think about it, Sir. Jimin always tells me that, too."

He hears Hoseok chuckle and he looks at him pointedly.

18th April, 2017 | 3:17pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi is getting out his key, other hand on the handle of his door when he hears murmuring inside, followed by a vaguely familiar melodic giggle that makes Yoongi’s searching-hand stall. Jimin.

Then, he hears Taehyung’s voice, mentioning his name.

“-I’m serious. I had a fever so bad, even I didn’t know how to remedy it, but Yoongi single-handedly nursed me back to health.”

Then, Namjoon seems to join in, adding, “Voluntarily. He told the rest of us to go back to work – the only person allowed in was him and Jungkook when he finally whined enough. He said it was because we were annoying but Tae told us he said it was actually because he didn’t want us to get sick as well.”

“He made me soup, kept me cool or warm – even though it was erratic as fuck. He got me smoothies, brought in his TV...”

“He barely slept because he was so worried about him. Seokjin and I had to intervene at one point and takeover before he got sick.”

“He even played piano for me which I’d been begging him to do forever. There’s this one song I really like-”

And that’s when Yoongi opens the door, all three guests in his home’s heads whipping towards him, differing levels of shock on his face. Jimin looks lightly startled, Namjoon seems vaguely anxious, and Taehyung looks as if he’s about to get thrown out a window.

Yoongi doesn’t ask what they were doing – he doesn’t want to know. Maybe it’s a part of their grand scheme to debunk the myth that Min Yoongi is a terrifying and merciless ruler. Sharing embarrassing stories? That’d ought to break a person’s tough-boy reputation.

No, Yoongi doesn’t ask about that. He simply slips off his jacket, folds it on his arm and approaches the suite in the middle of the room, where the three are sitting.

“I thought you said Jimin wasn’t supposed to be out of bed,” He says to Taehyung, because, quite clearly, the person in question is swaddled in a thousand blankets and pillows, sinking right into the corner of the L-shaped sofa where it’s most comfortable, clutching a mug of what appears to be hot chocolate. Yoongi doesn’t own any hot chocolate.

Taehyung’s fear seems to breeze away at this, and he smiles brightly at Yoongi, before throwing a (careful) arm around Jimin and nuzzling his head against his.

“He wasn’t – but he’s too cute to say no to, look at him!”

Yoongi does, an eyebrow raised, judgingly. Jimin’s cheeks are slightly reddened from heat, the warmth of the drink and the blankets most likely, and he’s looking up at Yoongi with blinking eyes of hesitation, almost embarrassment.

It’s cute.

Yoongi sneers.

“Whatever,” He says, going to sit in his usual armchair and slinging his jacket over the back of it, as far away from the trio as possible. It doesn’t surprise Yoongi at all that the two made close friends with Jimin in such short time, to be entirely honest. Kim Taehyung could make friends with his murderer, and Namjoon isn’t far behind him.

“Well, while you were lounging about all day-”

“Like you asked, hyung,” Namjoon interjects.

“I was interrogating a kid who was in the Galaxy the night Jimin got attacked-”

Yoongi notices Jimin’s brow crease at this and it’s only a moment later when he asks, “Who?”

“Kang Dawon.”

“Dawon?” He repeats, face forming a solid frown in strong contrast to his previously cheerful attitude. He folds his arms across his chest (with partial difficulty due to the sheer volume of the blankets) and says, “You should have told me – I wanted to make sure he’s okay,” in a shamelessly whiney tone. 

“He’s fine,” Yoongi assures him, tiredly, “I told him to quit and give himself a better life.”

Jimin’s mouth falls open in offence at this, but then he snaps it up into a small scoff.

“Thanks for the confidence boost.”

“You’re welcome,” Yoongi quips back, earning another quiet huff from the boy. He’ll get over it in a few minutes; sometimes, they bicker like this several times a day. It’s exhausting.

“Now, I didn’t find out much, except that it definitely was the Syndicate who stabbed Jimin. Dawon told me what they looked like, but it wasn’t anything that helpful: a muscular guy, a man with weird facial hair and someone with a mark on his hand.”

Namjoon rubs his hands together in thought, and then says “The muscular guy we’ve heard before. The other two aren’t much to go off on.”

Yoongi nods, with slight disappointment that the man couldn’t link it with anything else either. He sighs, saying, “That’s what I concluded. But, there’s something I’d like to talk to you about, Namjoon.”

Namjoon raises an eyebrow at this, beckoning Yoongi to continue but he shakes his head, saying “Not now.”

A slow smile appears on his face and both Taehyung and Namjoon seem to know the look well enough to give each other a dreading glance.

“Now, I want you two to get the fuck out.”

They give a mutual groan, but stand up almost immediately – Taehyung rather huffily, yet he pets Jimin’s head, while Namjoon just looks burdened, still giving Jimin a cheerful wave before they both leave.

“I like your friends,” Jimin concludes once they’re gone, easy smile on his face as if their small quarrel had been all forgotten. He was most likely just trying to wind Yoongi up for fun anyway. Yoongi’s somehow gotten used to that in the short time the boy’s been here.  

“They’re my subordinates,” Yoongi corrects, but the words sound fake even to him. He knows that, obviously, they’re much more than that, but it’s not information he exactly enjoys being put out there. It makes them and him look vulnerable. An easy way to take them down. What kind of mob boss is friends with his men?

Jimin laughs at Yoongi’s statement, as if he doesn’t believe it for a second. Yoongi didn’t expect him to.

“I didn’t know you were so nurturing, by the way,” the boy adds once enough seconds have past that Yoongi had been led to believe that the conversation was finished. He sighs.

“Yeah, well, Tae’s taken care of me more times than I can even remember. He’s my little brother’s best friend and he basically helped me keep him from going off the wall when our father died. I owed him that much.”

Jimin makes a quiet noise at the back of his throat, as if he’s half-content with Yoongi’s answer, at least. And then his mind seems to turn to a new topic, because he asks, “So, then… why do you owe me?”

Yoongi’s face half-screws up in confusion.

“Huh?” He asks, resulting in Jimin throwing him a look he’s come to recognise as a warning for his teasing. Nothing good ever comes of it.

“You’re kinda doing the same thing now, aren’t you?”

Yoongi’s silent for a moment, the realisation coming to him that, yeah, he guesses he is. Only this time it’s missing the sturdy reasoning that he had with Taehyung (not that he needed that for him either.)

“I think you should get some rest,” Yoongi decides, quickly, “Do you wanna stay here or go to bed?”

Jimin actually snorts at him, the little shit. Then, he smiles lightly (knowingly?) and gives a gentle shrug as he says, “Here’s fine. Plus, that quiz show you like’s coming on in a few minutes.”

Yoongi has no idea when they fell into this strange routine. But it doesn’t stop him from slumping down beside the boy, or stealing a small portion of one of his blankets, either.

Chapter Text

19th April, 2017 | 9:32am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi can barely keep his eyes open.

He’d spent most of the night on a surprise trip to the Full Moon Sector (a three and a half fucking hour drive) with Hoseok, after hearing some commotion going on at the border between some Mariposa members and some Crystal Syndicates that supposedly had something to do with some ‘information.’

Yoongi doesn’t know how that rumour got so warped by the time it got to him – a shitty take on Chinese Whispers, he guesses – but a fight over ‘information’ is certainly not the same as a small tiff over who really owns the territory of Houston Avenue, since it technically crosses the border of the East and West.

“Fucking Seonghyeon,” Yoongi had sworn repeatedly on the drive back, every good few miles or so, just for Hoseok to reply “Hey, we don’t know it’s actually Seonghyeon setting all of these up.” It took him only a moment before he laughed too loudly for Yoongi’s exhausted state, because, yeah, as if it isn’t that fucker’s doing.

He ended up only getting back sometime after 6:00am because, of course, Hoseok wanted to stop to get food – “I’m fucking starving, Yoongi, I haven’t eaten in twelve hours.” Yoongi gave up protesting when his own stomach growled at him too loudly to ignore.

When he got in, he found a note sitting on his coffee table from Namjoon – who he had left to watch Jimin again – that said ‘Hoped you’d be back before I had to leave, but since you aren’t, remember that I’m coming around at ten tomorrow to talk, like you asked.’

Yoongi had completely forgotten.

Now, he’s slumped over the island counter in his kitchen, on one of his stools, trying not to fall asleep again, listening to the low humming of his coffee machine, joined by the slightly higher humming of Jimin, standing over the machine.

Yoongi feels a tap on his head accompanied by the arrival of his breakfast in front of him (coffee and toast) and he sits up slowly, blinking confusedly at his guest, who’s already moving to clean the crumbs off of the counter and put the butter and milk back in Yoongi’s fridge.

“Making me breakfast?” Yoongi asks, too tired for it to sound teasing like he intended it to. Instead it sounds flat. Dead. Lifeless. Yoongi feels all of the above.

Jimin had woke him up almost an hour ago to tell him that a parcel arrived for him and he needed to sign for it. It sits unopened a few feet away. Yoongi forgets what he ordered. (Later, he’ll find out that it was actually not him that ordered it but Jung Hoseok who claims that fans keep stealing his mail, and he really didn’t want to re-order the same pair of BVLGARI sunglasses for the third time just because people keep taking them as a keepsake from oppa or whatever. Apparently each pair are around $4000 dollars. Yoongi will call him an idiot, and tell him not to make him sign for stupid shit under his name ever again.

Hoseok will do it again the next week.)

Regardless, that means two hours sleep after a day in which he’d travelled too far for his liking, followed by a night where he’d travelled far too far for even his moderate civility. Once Namjoon comes and goes he is going immediately back to bed. Fuck the Syndicate, Yoongi won’t be able to handle them if he dies from sleep deprivation.

“A thank you for making mine,” Jimin explains, tucking a loose hair behind his ear as he sweeps up the last of the crumbs. The ‘every morning’ is implied. Yoongi should really teach him how to make some things without burning his apartment down before he leaves. But he guesses toast is a start.

He looks at the meal in front of him with wariness as he mutters, “I don’t know if it’s much of a thank you, considering your cooking skills.”

Jimin stops cleaning for a second to frown at the man, snapping “I’m talented in other areas, try the coffee,” in a strangely confident tone for someone who can’t even make pancakes.

Yoongi does. He raises the cup to his mouth, coincidingly raising an eyebrow at the boy patronisingly as he does, and takes a sip.

“Fuck,” he swears.

It’s incredible. It’s better than anything his own coffee machine’s even produced and it’s instant coffee.

“Better than your shitty tap water coffee, that’s for sure.”

Yoongi ignores that statement, cleanly, and instead looks on at him dubiously as he asks, “Seriously, how’d you make coffee this good with that?”

Jimin closes the fridge after putting away all the things he used, and stares at Yoongi blankly for a moment, no words coming out of his mouth.

“I worked in a café for a summer job when I was younger,” he explains, coming close enough to Yoongi to lean lightly on the counter and he guesses that backs up the cockiness he has surrounding how good it is – people probably told him that a lot – but, still; how can his turn out so differently from Yoongi’s?

“Oh,” Yoongi says, taking another sip and somehow feeling almost immediately more awake (definitely a placebo effect) from the hint of a bitterness that chases the familiar crisp, almost sweet taste.

“Why’d you stop?” He asks now, the words ‘why would you work at the Galaxy instead?’ following them, silently - but he knows that Jimin understands from the subconscious frown that flutters onto his face, gone again in an instant. Yoongi feels vaguely bad about that.

“They, uh, let me go,” he says quietly, picking at the cuff of the sleeve of his jumper (he’s wearing his own clothes, not just Yoongi’s, for once.) He doesn’t seem to want to meet Yoongi’s eyes as he adds, “They were looking for someone with… different qualities, I guess.”

Yoongi wants to ask about that – what kind of qualities were they looking for? Someone who’s not so bold and whiney? But, then, he knows Namjoon’s arrived because Yoongi hears him swearing after he trips over something in the living room and, as all of his friends do, after inviting himself into his home he invites himself to take advantage of Yoongi’s well-stocked kitchen – which is well-stocked exactly for this reason.

Jimin backs away from the counter, going to stand across the kitchen again as the older man rummages around the room after a brief greeting to both. Yoongi notices that Jimin’s picked up the book he’d lent him last week again. He’s been reading it constantly, lately – almost everywhere in the apartment, since he now once again refuses to lie in bed all day. Yoongi thought he’d like it, since he’d mentioned liking fantasy stories a while ago, and evidentially he does.

Namjoon takes the seat beside Yoongi – his arrival so swift that he wonders if he’s still half-asleep as the man sits with a bagel in one hand, glass of orange juice in the other.

“Sorry,” he apologises with a touch of genuineness, despite the fact that Yoongi is well used to his friends treating his house like theirs by now. He rarely complains about it anymore.

“I didn’t get a chance to grab anything – Jin called this morning at 8:00am and wanted me to bring a folder to him he needed so he could prepare for a meeting with your casino owner friend in Umbra. He didn’t even bother making me breakfast, like he usually does. He’s so busy nowadays.”

This takes Yoongi’s thoughts immediately away from his friends’ audacious personalities, because Yoongi had virtually forgotten about those meetings – with all of the Syndicate business going on at the minute. He disregards Namjoon’s complaints about Seokjin; the man has been busy lately. Even busier than Yoongi’s been, actually. It doesn’t faze him he didn’t offer to whip up a five-star-meal. But, it seems to bother Namjoon, comedically, considering the man’s probably a worse cook than Jimin.

“Was a day arranged?” He asks, pushing his mug (after draining the remainder of it) and plate away from him as he does so. They meet every month around the same time, so he could certainly estimate – but it’s good to be prepared.

“Nah, she contacted Jin saying she was free to meet up when you are. Jin says to let him know so he can arrange a date.”

Over Namjoon’s shoulder, Yoongi sees Jimin’s forehead crease at this, as he peers at Yoongi over the book.

“Who?” Jimin asks without much emotion, lips pressed together seemingly firmly into a rather straight line. He flicks a page without looking.

“Ryu,” Yoongi answers, plainly.

“Ryu?” The boy repeats,

“Ryu Jihu – everyone calls her Ryu. She owns The Solstice, ever heard of it?” Jimin shakes his head. “Biggest casino in Seoul. But the reason I know her is because she practically runs everything for me in Umbra. It’s a big place, I need someone capable enough to keep it in check.”

Jimin cocks his head at him, then, asking “Do you have people like that in every sector?”

“No,” Yoongi replies, giving Namjoon a quick side glance, because they’ve technically gone off on a tangent – but Namjoon seems unbothered, lifting his shoulder in a half-shrug ‘what can you do about it?’ sort of way.

“Just Umbra and Demonia since they’re the biggest. Demonia’s relatively quiet, compared to Umbra, but I have a friend who owns the port there – so I always know what’s coming into my influence and going out.”

Jimin, admittedly, doesn’t seem that interested in the actual details; but he nods politely anyway, a more contently neutral expression garnering on his face now.

“Either way, Namjoon – I’ll let Seokjin know,” Yoongi says, making a mental note to do just that right after he gets some actual sleep. He clears his throat, turns around in his chair a little more to face Namjoon better and says, “Now, what I wanted to talk to you about…”

Both of their heads turn to Jimin.

“Um, Jimin” The elder calls, grabbing the boy’s attention who had just begun reading again, “could you leave us alone for a while? You’re still not supposed to be out of bed, never mind standing around all morning.”

“Hey,” The boy snaps, nose crinkling at Yoongi’s words, “If I didn’t ‘stand around all morning’ you would’ve fallen asleep on the kitchen counter and died of starvation.”

Yoongi gives him a look, something along the lines of a ‘get out of here, you little brat’ and it seems to work just as well on him as it has been lately (he’s been using it to make him stay in bed, or to stop pestering him to take him out somewhere,) because the boy sulks off and goes out of the kitchen with his book, grumbling to himself as he does.

A commendably warm smile tugs at Yoongi’s lips, but he doesn’t realise it until Namjoon clears his throat.

“So, what was it that was so important? You look like you need another,” He scans Yoongi up and down, making the older man’s lip pucker out agitatedly, “80 hours of sleep.”

He does. But that wouldn’t even begin to compensate for the amount of sleep he’s lost on account of the gang over the years- especially since he took over.

“You remember my meeting with Seonghyeon a few weeks back – when I told you he said some things that sounded like threats to me?” Namjoon nods quickly a few times, eyes slightly wider as his interest piques. That asshole seems to have that effect on people: for all the wrong or right reasons, depending on who you’re talking to.

“He told me not to get attached to Jimin, because he could be ‘ripped from my grasp,’ and-”

Namjoon’s face contorts in shock, “Are you attached to Jimin?”

“Wha- that’s not the point,” Yoongi bites, pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration. The younger man hums, non-verbally retracting the question with a silent apology, and gestures for Yoongi to continue.

“Well, after that, he basically told me to keep an eye on Hoseok, because he hasn’t forgotten that we murdered his right-hand man.”

“Oh, shit,” Namjoon mutters, any amusement falling immediately off of his face, because, even Yoongi must admit, that doesn’t sound good. After all, as stated before, Seonghyeon doesn’t make empty threats. Like hell he’ll let the man gets his way, though.

“And then,” Yoongi says, resulting in Namjoon’s expression crumbling even more, “he said to keep an eye on everyone, and looked at Jimin again.”

Everyone. How far does that even go? His friends? His little brother? His mom? His allies? His great great step-grandmother living in Argentina? Yoongi can’t keep an eye on everyone and Seonghyeon knows it. But, then, did he say that to make him crack from the pressure – or to keep him on edge?

“Yoongi, fuck, you should’ve told us this sooner,” Namjoon says now, and Yoongi knows he should have. He knows that now. But a few weeks ago, he thought this would all blow over. They’ve always been able to handle Seonghyeon. Hell, even his father handled him. It wasn’t the Syndicate that brought him down – those bastards aren’t good enough.

But Yoongi keeps underestimating them, doesn’t he? And that’s going to fuck him over if he doesn’t have anyone to keep him in check. Which is why he wanted to talk to Namjoon first.

“What is that supposed to mean? He has it out for everyone? But especially Jimin?”

“I don’t know,” Yoongi says truthfully, “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I know you guys can handle yourself – I trust you - and, sure, Jimin isn’t exactly a damsel in distress – but he doesn’t know when to back down, either. And…”

“You don’t know whether to protect him or not,” The other man finishes for him, a calculating look in his eye that rivals the gentle features on the rest of his face. Namjoon’s good at that: knowing what people are thinking. It’s a handy skill to have in a gang.  

“Yeah,” Yoongi confirms, closing his eyes for a brief moment as the reality of the problem settles in on him properly. God, if wasn’t talking to Namjoon about this right now, he probably would’ve exploded eventually. Or royally fucked up.

“And if what I’m thinking about Seonghyeon’s involvement is true, then I don’t even know if I can.”

Namjoon looks uncharacteristically serious. The man can be serious, sure, but even underneath that there’s always this sort of uplifting aura about him. But, now, the intensity in his demeanour is so unusual that it makes Yoongi feel oddly alert.

“Hyung, I know you have this mentality that everyone around you is your responsibility to protect.  And I get why, after what happened to your, you know, dad,” The man falters, checking Yoongi’s reaction with a glimmer of his usual compassion. Yoongi intentionally has no reaction, so Namjoon continues, “But, sometimes you have to accept how people’s lives play out, and you don’t get a choice on whether you can protect them or not.”

Yoongi doesn’t say anything for a moment, taking in the younger’s words. He’s stupidly wise, and sometimes Yoongi resents him for it – when he points out his faults, tries to tell him to open up, for fuck’s sake, hyung, - but then there’s times like this when he’s never felt more grateful for his friend’s intelligence.

“You’re right, I know. But… what if I want to?” The words are out of his mouth before Yoongi even registers that he does want to. He’s been thinking all this time of whether he should, whether he can. It never occurred to him whether he wanted to.

But he does, apparently. He doesn’t know why. Doesn’t want to think about it. He wants to protect them. All of them. But he wants to protect him, too.

He wants to protect Park Jimin.

Namjoon’s solemn aura evaporates, and he lets a small smile slip onto his face as he says, “Well, then, you can try your damn hardest. You do it with us, right? And we’re doing fine.”

He does. God, does Yoongi bust his ass to keep those guys in check. He swears, he’s going to get grey hairs before he’s 25 at this rate. Or die in some catastrophic event trying to make sure none of them get their idiotic selves blown to smithereens or shot to pieces.

But Yoongi knows they’d do the same for him.

They sit in comfortable silence for a minute, until a question re-emerges in Yoongi’s brain and he knows it won’t go away until he asks.

“Do you think Seonghyeon was trying to kill him?”

Namjoon looks inquisitively at him.

“What do you think?” He asks instead, like he knows Yoongi’s already got a fairly firm idea in his mind. Yoongi tips his head idly as he gathers his thoughts.

“I… assumed it was been a reason for me to take his warning more seriously but…”

The younger’s watching him with calm attentiveness. Yoongi runs a thumb across his lip as he hesitates and then he sighs, decides to say it no matter how paranoid it sounds.

“With all of these false leads, lately, I’m worried it might’ve been a test.”

“A test?” Namjoon echoes with a sharp raise of his brow. It’s not condescending - more as if he hadn’t considered the possibility.

“To see whether I’d come to help him. To see if Jimin’s worth their time. If he’s worth mine.”

Truthfully, the more Yoongi thinks about this theory, the more he believes it. Every false lead is too strange, too seemingly perfect until he gets there. It always feels like a set-up. But he still has to go, regardless, because it’s always so seemingly perfect that he has no way of knowing whether a lead’s real before he goes. And, of course, test or not – Jimin was going to likely bleed to death if Yoongi hadn’t come and got him that night and although he didn’t know that when Jimin initially texted him, it’s a good thing he went anyway – despite his growing annoyance at false leads.

“It’s a bit of a stretch, right?” Yoongi says once Namjoon stays quiet. But, to Yoongi’s surprise, the younger shakes his head, a light chuckle tinkering out with it as he quips “You can never be sure with that crazy bastard.”

Right. And that’s exactly the issue. But it’d be too easy if Seonghyeon was like any other idiot mobster. The universe doesn’t play nice with Min Yoongi, he’s come to figure out.

“Then, that leaves one problem.” The top of a problem, anyway. The petal over the stem. There’s probably roots as well. Yoongi doesn’t really know where it ends, unfortunately. The centre of the earth, perhaps.

“Which is?”

Yoongi huffs a breath.

“How do I protect him?” He asks pointedly, “If the Syndicate are keeping an eye on him, should I cut our ties with him before they think he’s some sort of leverage, or protect him myself?”

Namjoon blinks slowly at Yoongi. He can basically see the wheel in his brain turning as his bottom lip gets caught between his teeth. The answer is fairly simple, but the kind of simple that only Kim Namjoon can point out.

“Why don’t you just watch him for now?” He suggests casually, “See if anything else happens. That way, if you’re right about the Syndicate, they won’t immediately see that Jimin is worth something.”

Yoongi can’t control the grin that catches his lips, and he smiles sincerely at his friend when he says, “I’m glad I called you, Nams.”

He scoffs, accompanied with an obvious eyeroll.

“I’m not the brain of this gang for nothing, you know.”

19th April, 2017 | 10:54am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Namjoon leaves some time later, probably waiting purposely until Yoongi’s almost completely exhausted – just to make him suffer a little.

Yoongi is ready to sleep the day away as he puts his dishes on the counter beside the sink to clean later, and makes his way out of the kitchen, down the corridor to his bedroom, when his feet automatically stop outside a room with the door slightly ajar.

There’s a soft, half-painful, half-uplifting melody coming from the room, creeping out through the gap in the door into the hallway and for a second, Yoongi thinks he’s still dreaming again when he pushes the door open further slightly and sees a boy hunched over his dusty old grand piano, fingers gliding across the keys that somehow emote a feeling of nostalgia from Yoongi, though it doesn’t feel like his.

He wonders if it belongs to the player, instead.

“I didn’t know you could play.”

A wrong note, then silence. Jimin turns around in the stool to face Yoongi, a funny sort of expression on his face that’s not entirely embarrassed, but definitely startled.

“I used to, when I was a kid.”

Yoongi wants to point out that that sort of familiarity, that ease, no matter how long it’s been, can not be counted as a ‘used to.’ But he doesn’t, instead he comes closer to Jimin, watches as the boy shifts back around in the seat, and leaves room for Yoongi beside him, as if he somehow knew he’d join him.

“Keep playing,” he tells him, and Jimin seems to debate this instruction in his head for a moment, before he silently abides and, hesitantly, he picks up where he left off.

“How many years have you been playing?”

Jimin gives a shrug as best as he can without jeopardising the piece, adding “I never really kept track. It was on and off. I never got lessons. I just played what I wanted, when I wanted. Sometimes I went months without touching a single key. It was always just a hobby. My parents hoped for more from it, even entered me into a few recitals. And I won them, but it wasn’t what I wanted.”

“What did you want?”

“I didn’t know. I was too young to have that figured out. My school offered dance classes, I’d sometimes go to those after the school day ended and… well I never told my parents that maybe I liked that more. Looking back on it, I don’t know why I didn’t.”  

He smiles slightly as he looks over the piano with a wistfulness in his demeanour. He says, “But, sometimes, I still want one - a piano. I miss those days, you know?” and Yoongi understands. Not about missing piano, but missing happy memories. The indolent fear when you realise that you can’t quite remember it as well as you used to. Yoongi doesn’t want the day to come when he realises that he can’t quite picture the faces of the people he’s lost, anymore.

But Yoongi doesn’t have to think about it, because then Jimin laughs lightly, and the sound captures his attention instantly before the boy says, “It’d probably break my floor, though, so I’ve never bothered.”

Yoongi laughs then, too, though he’s sure Jimin isn’t wrong. The revelation does make him wonder how Jimin ended up how he has, though. How does someone go from a future professional pianist to a street corner shy of being a prostitute?  

Jimin stops playing, or maybe he already stopped before that. Yoongi was too busy paying attention to his words to hear his playing.

“I learned piano because of Jungkook,” Yoongi says once the boy looks as if he’s about to leave. Jimin gives him a funny look. Maybe a bit sceptical, as if he’s waiting for the catch.

“You wanted to play for him?” He asks, a vague squint to his stare but Yoongi shakes his head.

“Not exactly,” he says, “we hired a tutor to come teach him, but he refused every time she came – so she always just taught me instead.”

Jimin’s lips lift up at the corners when Yoongi says this – most likely in a ‘Oh, there’s the catch’ sort of way.

“I stopped doing grades a few years ago, but I still like to play sometimes.”

Jimin seems pleasantly surprised, small smile warping into something closer resembling an intrigued smirk.

“Really? Your turn, then. Play me something.”

Yoongi hadn’t entirely expected the boy to ask. But his fingers seem to think better of saying no, because they position themselves, and almost immediately start to play a song that Yoongi actually has to scramble his brain in order to remember the title of (it’s called ‘Sweet Dreams,’ coincidentally.)

Jimin bumps shoulders with him accidentally at one point, and when Yoongi sneaks a glance at him, he’s looking at him, not his hands.

His chest feels light and fluttery. It must be because of the music.

Chapter Text

24th April, 2017 | 6:03pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

"You were the one that begged me to take you somewhere,” Yoongi says, leaning up against the wall with his arms folded across his chest, somewhat impatiently. Jimin’s voice is muffled slightly from behind the door, but he can still hear the exasperation in his tone as he says "Yeah, but I meant, like, a fast food joint - not as your date to a fucking high-end casino dinner to meet your... whatever."

“Plus one, not a date,” Yoongi corrects, veering his stare away from the door, as if Jimin can see through it. He abruptly feels a little too hot (the summer weather must be creeping in at last), and snaps "Do you wanna go or not?"

“You said you need a date.”

“Plus one,” Yoongi tells him again, not realising his muscles had become so tense until he looks down at his fingers digging into his arms. He usually brings Hoseok to these meetings, since it’s proper etiquette for a guest to bring another guest with them to dinner, Ryu always insists. But he’s pretty sure she only actually says that because she’s secretly a huge fan of Hoseok’s. Initially, when Ryu told him to bring ‘his friend’ along, too, Yoongi thought it might’ve been because she was attracted to the man. But he figured out that was definitely not the case through the duration of that evening considering she didn’t reciprocate any of Hoseok’s light flirtation at all.

It would’ve been awkward if it wasn’t so hilarious.

“And, yes, Hoseok normally comes with me, but I don’t need a-”

"I'll go, I'll go,” Jimin says, cutting him off, “Just... I feel stupid in this suit."

Yoongi had to lend him something to wear, since it’s a formal setting. It’s a suit he’s never worn because he thinks the colour’s too unusual for him to wear anywhere (a deep burgundy that Hoseok and Taehyung ganged up on him to buy) but it seemed right for him.

"We don't have all night Jimin, just come out,” Yoongi complains, not for the first time this evening. At last, he hears the bedroom’s door being opened and he attempts to reassure the boy with a firm "I'm sure you look f-"

The word gets caught in his throat.

Fucking wow.

Jimin’s hair (a little longer than it used to be, now, since he’s been here) is neatly parted, but he still tucks a strand behind his ear anyway as he steps out of the bedroom, hands going to meet behind his back. He watches Yoongi from his peripheral, head dipped as he gives his shoulders a small shrug, as if to adjust the burgundy jacket. Yoongi was right, it seems; he looks far more incredible in it than he ever did.

The pants may be tighter than intended around his thighs (after all, it was tailored for Yoongi) but it doesn’t look out of place. It’s a perfect fit. Yoongi feels oddly breathless when Jimin finally looks at him.

He looks perfect, even as he returns his gaze with such obvious self-consciousness.

“What?” he asks, sounding almost irritated as he crosses his arms over his chest in a defensive-looking stance, half-mirroring Yoongi.

“What's that face, huh? Is it that bad?" He says, and Yoongi tilts his head ever so slightly out of curiosity, because he has no idea what face he’s making. Then, he catches his reflection in the mirror of the opposite wall – notices his wide eyes and slightly agape mouth and tries not to flush at himself, erasing the look immediately.

"No you look..." He falters when Jimin quirks an expectant brow at him. He takes a glance around the uneventful hallway when he finishes with "good, you look, great Jimin. Now can we please go? Ryu's driver's been sitting outside for fifteen minutes." There’s a growing smile on the boy’s face as Yoongi straightens up, gesturing to the direction of the front door.

"Just, give me a second,” He says, watching himself run a hand through his hair and smooth down his suit in the hall mirror.

"Seriously, you look great,” Yoongi reassures him and he inwardly cringes at himself when it’s said out loud because his voice sounded far sincerer than intended. He sighs, desperate to just leave before he says something else equally as stupid. Perfect, he thinks again and he curses his unconventional thoughts on the late night spent discussing profits and recent events with Taehyung, in concern to the gang’s drug trade to prepare for the meeting. Jimin’s pretty, Yoongi realised that when they first met but clearly his tired mind’s exaggerating.

Then, Jimin grins charmingly at Yoongi through his reflection in the mirror, and he didn’t even realise he’d been staring, but it makes him freeze for a moment.

"I know,” he says breezily, and Yoongi’s confused at the boy’s response for a second before he explains, “I just wanted to hear you say it again.” Yoongi’s stomach drops.  

But he doesn’t even get a chance to retract his comment because, then, Jimin’s stepping towards him, hand outstretching to grasp Yoongi’s arm as he chimes, “Now, come on Min Yoongi, it's impolite to keep your date waiting."

Jimin links them, small hands gripping around Yoongi’s elbow, and Yoongi barely hears himself mutter "Plus one," through the white noise unexpectedly filtering through his head.

He sees Jimin smile to himself, but he isn’t sure what caused it.

--

They sit in silence for a good portion of the journey. Jimin had made a few passing comments at the start: about the Red Light sector looking very different from the highway at night (Yoongi wondered if it was the first time he was seeing it) and how nice the car Ryu had sent them is (another limousine; unnecessary but not unexpected considering Ryu’s personality.) Additionally, Yoongi chatted idly with the driver for a short time, as is expected with your transporter - especially when you were late coming out to them. Ryu thankfully understands Yoongi’s ‘driving-phobia’ as she puts it, and sent someone to pick them up, instead.

But, besides from that, they had spent at least half an hour in a silent, albeit comfortably silent, atmosphere.

The fact that they can even have a comfortable silence is a bit of a foreign concept with Yoongi, as it’s something he can rarely get used to with anyone that isn’t one of his close friends – and even then, it can always feel a little awkward now and again.

Taehyung had come around the other day to check up on Jimin’s recovery – he’s apparently healing very well; it won’t be long until he can go back to his job which Yoongi could’ve guessed considering how lively and restless the younger had been lately.

But he’d arrived in the middle of the two keenly watching The Conjuring because Jungkook had mentioned about how good it was one day when he’d come to visit his big brother and chastised them both when he realised that neither of them had seen it.

Jimin was lying across the couch, legs stretched out over Yoongi’s lap as he insisted since he was ‘wounded’ and all, and, naturally, Yoongi’s hand was resting on one of his thighs because the boy left him no other place to put it. He had somehow taken up all of the comfortable hand-resting space around him.

Later, once Jimin went to get some snacks for them and Taehyung lamented that he, unfortunately, couldn’t stay to watch it with them, his friend had made the observation of “You two seem to have gotten close,” which made Yoongi tear his eyes away from the screen and hit pause like Jimin had told him he better do before he left the room.

“We have?” He’d asked doubtfully, noting the subtle grin on the other’s face.

“Looks that way to me,” He shrugged, “You’re not at each other’s throats anymore.”

“We argue all the time,” Yoongi had pointed out, but it only resulted in Taehyung snorting with light condescension.

“So? You argue all the time with Hoseok, too.”

Yoongi struggled, “That’s different- We’re…” His words failed him. It was different. He was sure of it. Taehyung was just being weird.

And yet…

The other man must’ve noticed the conflict in Yoongi’s expression, because he gave a short chuckle and said “Forget I mentioned it, hyung. Make sure he doesn’t attempt anymore stunts in the next week or so. He’ll be out of your hair soon enough, if that’s what you apparently want.”

And though Taehyung’s words sounded as if they were meant to reconcile the situation, Yoongi has often found himself thinking about it since.

Have him and Jimin become close? To the level of friends, even? He doesn’t know. Maybe it shouldn’t even matter that much and he supposes it’s perhaps natural to become fairly acquainted with someone once you’ve been living with them for over two weeks. And they have ran into each other in a plethora of strange situations in the month they’ve known each other. Things that would likely bring any two people closer. Yoongi’s saved his ass majorly twice now, it makes sense.

But then, he thinks about Taehyung’s secretive grin when he’d pointed it out, and Hoseok’s several remarks about an apparent sweet spot over the past few weeks and he feels strange again. Jimin had lost almost all the rude, bitterness that he’d possessed when they first met, now. In fact, he’s been amiable lately and Yoongi’s found it easier to return it than he had at the start. It’s been a certainly nice break from dealing with the too-serious gangsters that work for him and the unpleasant assholes that certainly don’t all day. They definitely still argue, still insult each other and make jibes – but there’s rarely any genuine malice behind it.

Yoongi doesn’t know what to think.

And he’s grateful for a moment when Jimin finally speaks again, because he felt like his thoughts were going to drive him insane. He’s grateful until he actually registers what the boy says, that is.

“Feels like I’m going to prom.”

Yoongi gives him a look of clear bewilderment.

“You’re going to a casino where illegal gambling takes place to talk about how the illegal activities of an illegal gang is going under the guidance of the owner of said illegal casino… with a mobster.” 

Jimin giggles (Yoongi doesn’t think about how it sounds admittedly charming) and mutters some sort of agreement, before he justifies his feeling by saying “But the limo… and the suit… and the handsome boy accompanying me-”

Yoongi’s brain splutters for a second, yet on the outside he has little to no reaction to the flirtatious glimmer in the boy’s gaze and chalks it up to being a miraculous event that he doesn’t.

“Weird prom,” he says instead, and Jimin laughs again, a small lift of his shoulders in a shrugging gesture as he says “I wouldn’t know, I never got to go to mine.”

“I didn’t know any schools in the Red Light Sector even did prom,” Yoongi says, because, in all honesty, the sector doesn’t exactly value education. Most of the people who live there are gangsters – or at least related to a gang of some sort somehow – and there’s only a few schools available, none of which do any sort of festivities or really do much besides provide a mediocre education that’s enough to get its students some sort of satisfactory qualification. Or Yoongi had thought so, at least.

“Oh, I grew up in Freeland,” he says and Yoongi figures that that makes a lot more sense. And then, the information actually sinks in and he looks at Jimin with a flash of shock on his face.

“You lived in the Freeland Sector?” He doesn’t mean it to sound so condescending, as if he couldn’t imagine someone like Jimin living there – which isn’t the case. He just wonders why he’d voluntarily leave it if it wasn’t for something like a career, like Yoongi.

He doesn’t exactly count working at the Galaxy as a career. Not because it’s essentially a brothel, but simply because of the overwhelming sleaze of the place. Although, he supposes being a mob boss isn’t exactly a career, either.  

“Yeah,” Jimin confirms quietly, diverting his attention to the outside of the car. Yoongi can see the small frown on his face in the reflection of the window’s glass and gets the idea he doesn’t really want to talk about it.

It’s funny, though, because Yoongi grew up there, too, and the thought of how he could’ve been living a few blocks away from Park Jimin his entire childhood is bizarre. The Freeland isn’t a big place at all, he could’ve passed him in a street, locked eyes with him across the playground. Bumped into him in the cramped hallway of his High School.

Did Jimin even go to High School? How long did he live there? How the fuck did he end up here of all places?

Yoongi’s suddenly burdened with a thousand questions, and, though he isn’t usually so inquisitive – at least not in personal matters – he finds himself seriously wanting to know the answers. Because it’s odd, isn’t it? How they probably had similar upbringings (minus the whole gang thing) but their lives turned out so differently.

“Prom’s not all it’s cut out to be,” Yoongi tells him honestly and a trickle of amusement appears on Jimin’s face as he glances over at him again.

“You went?” He asks, in a tone similar to Yoongi’s when he asked about him living in the Freeland – payback, he supposes – as if he cannot believe that at all. Yoongi isn’t offended. He doesn’t exactly look the prom-type. But, regardless of however his life is now and however he looks – he was a semi-normal teenager at one point. Jungkook, however, has never and will never be even a sort of semi-normal teenager.

“Yeah, my parents insisted,” he says, recalling how as soon as they found out he’d actually been asked to go with someone, they wouldn’t let him refuse.

“My date thought I was boring for not wanting to dance, drank too much smuggled alcohol with other students in the bathroom, made out with one of my friends and threw up on my shoes.”

Jimin gapes.

“And that was just one prom,” he finishes, and suddenly the younger’s laughing loudly, sincerely, out of disbelief. His eyes crinkle at the corners a little when he does that, Yoongi notices for the first time, despite having seen the boy laugh many times before. It makes Yoongi smile, too, but he doesn’t acknowledge that until Jimin recovers.

“I still would’ve liked to go,” he says after a minute or so, a slow nod of his head as if he’s confirming that statement for himself. Yoongi’s mouth tips up at one corner.

“Well, there’s no dancing at a casino, I’m afraid. Not unless you count the stage performers.”

Jimin snorts, “I do enough stripping as it is, thank you very much.”

The casino’s a little fancier than that – no strippers – but he doesn’t tell the boy that. Instead, he makes an only half-serious note at the back of his mind that if he ever perhaps needs a plus one to some sort of formal event involving dancing… then he might just bring Park Jimin along.

24th April, 2017 | 8:12pm | The Solstice Casino, Umbra Sector.

Jimin’s never been in a proper casino, he tells Yoongi once the driver gets out to open the door. He’s only ever played a few games of Texas Hold’em in a poorly-lit room in the back of a shitty bar in Red Light that smells like stale cigars and probably blood.

His point is, he doesn’t know what to expect. What if he gets put into an insane amount of debt?

Yoongi thanks the driver once he opens his door, and pats him briefly on the shoulder, going around to get Jimin’s door himself.

“We’re not here to play anything, Jimin,” Yoongi reminds him when he opens the boy’s door, who looks stunned for an instant, clearly having expected the driver, not him. He only makes a move to get out when Yoongi reluctantly holds out his arm, intending him to take it. Jimin does, silent smirk on his face when they close the door behind them.

“We probably won’t even be in the main casino that long – Ryu doesn’t like to spend too much time there, she’s afraid she’ll bankrupt herself at her own casino.”

Jimin’s expression flickers to something vaguely sour for a moment – maybe confusion – but he doesn’t say anything about it. Just wonders aloud about where they’ll be dining instead.

Neither of them have a coat with them, so they politely decline when the worker at the entrance asks. The nights are getting warmer, at last, and a decent suit is enough to not freeze your ass off.

They don’t unlink their arms when they enter the main casino – actually, they don’t unlink at all until Ryu spots them, darting over to them as best as she can in a long, flowing red dress (that matches neatly with her hair) and she pulls Yoongi into a tight reunion hug, causing the contact to break. Jimin doesn’t shift away from him, though, and he holds out a hand to Yoongi’s friend with an odd smile.

“You’re Jimin, right?” She asks him with a jubilant smile, brushing a strand of her deep garnet hair over her shoulder so she can politely take his hand without getting hair caught in the equation. Jimin nods and she beams even more.

“Yoongi told me you were handsome but honestly.”

Yoongi freezes, throwing a look of scandal to his friend.

“I did not,” he clarifies, but Ryu simply laughs, ungraciously. The kind of laugh that’s sort of infectious, and he’s grinning despite himself, while Jimin just looks lightly confused.

It’s weird, Yoongi thinks, considering he’d been generally cheerful all evening.

“Well, he is handsome. You’re both handsome. Don’t you clean up well when I make you, Yoongi-yah?” She teases, giving him a light bump on his arm, which Yoongi shoots a faux-scowl at.

“I’m always this well-presented, thank you very much,” he replies, resulting in Ryu nodding approvingly, quipping, “Hm, I can believe that.”

Jimin cuts in, then, rather sharply for the mood of the conversation, with “So, what sort of things can you do here?” He asks, and for a brief moment Ryu and Yoongi catch each other’s eyes – the former looking vaguely unsure while Yoongi is blatantly puzzled.

“Uh, well – gambling… mostly,” She says rather redundantly, as it is a casino, “But there’s a spa, a bar and a restaurant as well. Most people here are loaded, obviously, so it’s not a bad way to make a little extra profit.”

Yoongi laughs at that with a disapproving shake of his head as he says, “Always in it for the money, aren’t you Ryu?” because, honestly, as long as he’s known her she’s always been scheming on how to make easy money.

He knew Ryu before she opened up the casino, as they’d met in High School (though she was two years above him) and they became somewhat friendly – before she graduated - over the firm bond that both of their parents were in some sort of shady business. He thinks that had something to do with how a kid got their own casino, fresh out of education.

It's been a few years now and not much has changed, bar the fact that her casino is now classified as high-end, making her one of the richest people in Seoul.

“You’re one of the only guys I know who isn’t, Yoongs.”

He huffs amusedly at that, but doesn’t tell her she’s wrong. Yoongi’s never had a very strong interest in money. Sure, it’s nice not having to worry about rent and being able to eat - like people such as Jimin have to - but he doesn’t crave it. And it’s certainly not the reason he runs Mariposa. He would’ve taken a way easier job than that to get rich if he’d wanted to.

Yoongi at first did it, simply, because it was what his father did. It felt right at the time to carry it on.

Now, though, he does it for the same reason the man himself had.

Not for money (not really – he was slightly more passionate about it than Yoongi is, however) but because, in that time, Seoul needed control. Order. The government were corrupt and oppressive, and there was a crazy bastard in the east that had started doing bullshit things, trying to gain control, acting big like he wasn’t all talk.

Someone needed to bring some sort of peace to the city, even if it wasn’t that peaceful after all. It was better than nothing. It needed control.

It still does, and that’s why Yoongi does it. That’s what his reasoning’s been for the past year.

Yoongi only realises he’d gone off on a mental tangent when he feels a small hand brush his back, settling somewhere just above his waist, that brings him back to reality. He takes a quick glance over at Jimin and finds the boy isn’t looking at him at all, his eyes are just drifting languidly around the casino.

He’s about to point out the gesture with some sort of remark, but then Ryu says, “Anyway, enough chit-chat – let’s get down to business, shall we?” and Yoongi entirely forgets.

--

He catches Jimin yawn out of the side of his eye, and he seems to make no effort in trying to cover it up, which doesn’t particularly shock him. Why bother acting attentive if the discussion’s going over his head?

“-but, yes, besides from a few small confrontations like that, business has been good. Demand has kept steady and our profits have increased…” she runs a finger down a page beside her, the dinner table having been taken over by food and various documents.

“2.7% - which isn’t too bad this early in the year, but I’m confident it’ll increase even more in the next two months.”

Yoongi hums, satisfied at the increasing profit, and he’s about to tell Ryu this when he sees Jimin break out into another yawn.

It’s funny: at the start of the night, he’d looked his age – technically an adult, yet still pleasantly youthful in the same way that Taehyung manages to pull off. But now, he looks younger, the way he’s sitting in a half-slouch, failing to appear interested. Yoongi supposes a long journey, paired with standing around in formal attire and then having to listen to a discussion surrounding something that doesn’t even involve you was perhaps a bit advantageous for the boy’s first outing since his incident. But he had insisted on it, himself.

“Jimin,” Yoongi says, the gentleness in his voice not a conscious decision, but not completely foreign to him either, “if you really want I can call somebody to take you home.” His own mouth twitches once the word ‘home’ slips out. To my home, is what he meant to say.

Ryu chimes in then, saying “I’ve got plenty of drivers – it’s no trouble, sweetie-”

“-I’m okay,” The boy replies swiftly, miniscule frown pursed on his lips, “Just a little tired.”

Her eyebrows pinch together for a short moment before she smiles softly and says, “You look a little peaky, are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” He says, a bit too much firmness to it to be completely true. Ryu peers at him for a fleeting second, but it’s gone before Yoongi can even properly acknowledge it.

“Are you sure, Jimin?” Yoongi asks in a low voice, patting the boy’s thigh to get his attention. They lock eyes, and Jimin silently blinks at him, before he nods his head rather decisively. 

“I’m sure.”

Yoongi studies him fleetingly, not quite agreeing, but then he turns his attention away to tell Ryu “He got attacked by the Syndicate a few weeks ago – s‘been recovering at mine in the meantime, I’ve had Taehyung monitor him.”

Ryu sounds vaguely mocking (but mostly playful) as she says “Oh, I see. How attentive of you,” she points a finger at him and adds, rather sure of herself, “I always knew you were a sweetheart, deep down.”

Yoongi thinks he hears a small scoff from the boy beside him, which is surprising because clearly he’d forgotten how he’d practically told Yoongi the same thing the night he’d defended him from Seonghyeon.  

“You mentioned Taehyung – as in, Kim Taehyung, your little pal?”

Yoongi lightly chuckles at the nickname, “Not so little anymore.”

“Ah, I haven’t heard you mention him in ages. How’s the medical pursuit going, then?”

“Better than his music career is.”

Ryu smiles and then shrugs, jokingly claiming, “I’d invite him to play here, but I think we both remember what happened last time he came.”

Yoongi snorts, the memory still, to his detest, ingrained into his mind.

Jimin looks back and forth between them, eyes widened slightly as he questions “What? What happened?”

He looks at Ryu in a ‘do you want to tell it or shall I?’ sort of way. She makes a gesture to let him go ahead and Yoongi turns a little in his seat to see Jimin better.

“He was overexcited to be here in the first place – but Ryu made the mistake of showing him the bar, and Taehyung really can’t hold his liquor, so within half-an-hour he was more than a bit tipsy, and got himself accidentally involved in a game of some professional rendition of poker, with some of the best players in the casino.”

“Regulars,” Ryu supplies, and Yoongi nods, a smile playing on his lips. He’d forgot about that.

“Tae doesn’t know how to play cards at the best of times, nevermind when he’s intoxicated and playing a game that Ryu’d never even heard of. In short, he kept forgetting the rules – to the point that every other player probably wanted to off him right then and there. But somehow, by some ridiculous kind of Kim Taehyung luck, he won. Everyone thought they’d been hustled until it became evident that Tae hadn’t even realised he had won. They got into a fight, which resulted in Ryu and I watching in horror as Taehyung tackled three large men.”

Jimin’s giggling, brightly, by the time he finishes, but yet he doesn’t seem all that shocked. Which makes sense, Yoongi thinks; after all, if anyone was to get into that situation it would be Taehyung.

“And that is why I always take Hoseok with me. But, of course, the man prides his musical career over his duty as my right-hand man, so he skipped tonight to discuss the supposedly dire issue of fanmeets with his company.”

Yoongi’s said for ages he can’t do fanmeets. He’s a mobster – what if the Syndicate decide to pay a visit? Or literally any other gang, since most of them seem to have it out for Mariposa for keeping a sliver of actual order in the city. Hoseok keeps protesting this point, saying that the majority of his fans are young girls within the age range of ten to, like, twenty-five – he thinks a burly man with an eyepatch or whatever the hell they wear would stick out quite a lot.

Which is, in a way, a fair assumption since Yoongi really can’t recall many members of the Syndicate that don’t look like that – but that doesn’t mean they can’t hire them! And he’s sure they probably have a few handsome boys (he’s not certain they actually have any women) in their early 20s employed as well.

And Jung Hoseok is a fool for pretty anything.

Taehyung, on the other hand, had whisked his little brother away for the night to show him how drug pushing worked – even though Yoongi’s told him a thousand times not to do that – but Yoongi doesn’t think he would’ve taken Jungkook with him anyway. He definitely would’ve wanted to play a game of something and, similarly to Taehyung, definitely would’ve gotten in a fight from winning.

At least he would understand the rules, though.

Namjoon and Seokjin on the other hand, had been up all night tending to more leads that they’d found and been told about. Sometimes, Yoongi thinks Seokjin’s network of allies is too big simply because of the sheer number of things they’ve heard lately. Yoongi was kind enough to acknowledge that neither of them would probably want to come out tonight, considering the messy text he’d received from Namjoon this morning at around 12:00pm to let him know they were only getting to sleep now at Seokjin’s and probably wouldn’t be able to attend the meeting.

“Ah,” Ryu says in realisation, “I was wondering what happened to Jung Hoseok.”

“Disappointed?” Yoongi jibes with a soft smirk, alluding to her comical fixation with him. Looking at her, Ryu doesn’t exactly seem the musical type – but she’s vaguely obsessive over quite a few idols.  

“Not entirely. It’s been nice getting to know Jimin, even though he’s not much of a talker…” Yoongi’s about to laugh at that statement, before he realises that Ryu’s serious. And then he consequently realises that, actually, Jimin hasn’t talked much at all tonight and anything he has said has been… unusual.

Yoongi takes a look at the boy who’s pushing around his food on the plate, though it’s bound to be cold by now. He must be tired, he concludes. He should try and wrap the conversation up soon – after dessert.

Ryu grins when Yoongi looks away from Jimin, and she says “And I’m always happy to see you, Yoongi. You should visit more often.”

Yoongi shoots her a half-glare.

“Maybe if you tried coming to see me for once,”

The woman crosses her arms across her chest, reasoning “You know I hate travelling!”

“So do I!” Yoongi bites back, playfully, making Ryu snicker for a moment before she argues “Yes, but you’re a lot more selfless than I am.”

“Not difficult,” He says with a scoff in response, to which the woman simply shrugs. Jimin’s stopped playing with his food now, instead just leaning back in his chair, probably too upright for him to do so comfortably.

“Anyway, what about dessert, huh?”

Ryu nods in agreement, immediately complying with “Of course,” and she raises her hand to catch the attention of the waiter across the room.

Naturally, as the owner, she has her own private dining room that she’d just so desperately wanted to try with guests (Hoseok’s normally keen on using the public one, so they do, most of the time – but it’s probably just because it’s more people to bask in his celebrity status.)

Yoongi likes the private one more. He doesn’t have to keep their discussion censored, or have people staring at them. Or worry about the Syndicate showing up and trying to start a gunfight, or something.

She asks for dessert menus, and the waiter comes back with three of them, handing one to Ryu and the others to Yoongi and Jimin.

“What do you want?” He asks the younger boy, once he’s made no move to look at his menu.

“I’m full, thanks,” He claims, and Yoongi stops his reading of the list to glance at the boy dubiously.

“You are?” He asks, knowing fully well that he barely touched his food. Maybe Ryu was right about him being sick. Jimin gives a small nod.

Yoongi hums, “You don’t even want the sundae, then?”

Jimin told him just the other day about how much he was craving ice-cream – and though it was likely just a temptation to get Yoongi to take him out of the apartment, he did seem fairly keen on that idea specifically. Besides, Jimin doesn’t seem like the kind of person who can afford to buy excessively priced sundaes very often (or at all,) so, Yoongi doesn’t really know why he’d refuse.

He happens to catch the slight quiver in his resistance at the mention of the sweet, however, as his eyes snap to Yoongi transitorily, before pulling away again and figures that, maybe, he just doesn’t want to cost Ryu more money – saying she offered to put the meal on the house. Or, perhaps he doesn’t think he’d be able to keep a sundae down without puking.

“How about we share it?” Yoongi suggests as an alternative, and Jimin looks at him properly then - but he can see right through the boy’s half-scowl (the cause of which, Yoongi has no idea.)

“…Fine,” Jimin mutters, and Yoongi feels oddly satisfied at the small victory. He decides to pick the flavour, himself, lest the boy change his mind (not that he would.)

--

“I’ll let you know if there’s any updates on the information – but thanks for trying to help, anyway, Ryu.”

She smiles politely at him, vaguely apologetic as she says, “That’s alright, Yoongi. I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you anything. But aren’t you forgetting something else you’re supposed to keep me updated on?”

Yoongi’s silent for a second, scanning his brain for what she’s referring to. He just about forces down a groan when he remembers.

“Hoseok’s film.”

“Absolutely,” She chimes, rather wistfully adding, “I’m sure it’ll be amazing.”

Yoongi’s about to make a less assured comment about that, but then Ryu puts her hand to her forehead with a small sigh as she realises something. When she looks at Yoongi he gets a bad feeling.

“Oh, damn - Yoongi, would you go get my purse? I left it in the restaurant.”

There it is.  

“I always tell you not to wear those bloody heels, you can’t walk anywhere in them,” He complains, but doesn’t refuse, obviously – not after the woman bought him dinner. He tells them he’ll be back in a minute, striding off across the main longue in the casino to get to the dining area.  

Yoongi thinks over the night as he walks. He didn’t find anything out about the Syndicate – Ryu said she hadn’t heard about anything particularly unusual involving them here. No grand schemes, no suspicious individuals, nothing. But, on the other hand, it’s good to know that business is going well in the Umbra Sector – as far as their drug trade goes, at least.

Overall, it was a successful meeting, and it certainly helps that the food in the casino is incredible. Now, he just has the tragically long drive back home to sit through, and it’s then he seriously considers telling Ryu to build a hotel onto this place as well, because he is far too exhausted.

The waiter gives him a look that’s half-alarmed, half-suspicious when he arrives at the private dining room again as if he’s going to shoot something or someone, and then when he explains he’s just here for a bag, his expression gets even more comedically confused.

Seriously, the reputation of a mobster can be such a burden. 

Yoongi vaguely expects to come back to see Jimin glooming or sulking, a good few feet apart from Ryu, looking as if he’s either ready to throw up or fall asleep on the spot. But he sees neither.

Jimin’s smiling at the woman, a faint blush coating his cheeks and Yoongi catches the tinker of laughter – it sounds slightly embarrassed, even. Which is definitely not what he expected.

“Here it is, your highness,” Yoongi mocks, handing the item to the woman who graciously smiles at him, a quick ruffle of his hair which the man tries not to grimace too much at.

“Good boy,” she coos, placing the bag on her shoulder and giving an approving nod to them both as she looks them over.

“You know, Yoongi; maybe you can bring your dashing young friend here with you more often, hm?”

Yoongi almost gapes at her. It’s a big request, since she literally idolises Jung Hoseok, and Yoongi really didn’t think the two got on very well at all tonight. He doesn’t bother telling her that Jimin isn’t exactly someone entirely likely to be sticking around in his life, because he isn’t actually sure how true that statement is. It sort of feels as if their paths are gonna cross whether they like it or not.

“It was nice to meet you, Ryu,” Jimin says, then, and was that the most words he’s said to her at one time this entire night? It could’ve been.

Yoongi is partly stunned as the woman pulls them both into a hug, and wishes them a safe trip. Jimin links their arms again, but Yoongi doesn’t even notice until they have to part to get in the same limousine from earlier. It’s the same driver too.

 He’s fairly certain said driver probably doesn’t appreciate his task tonight, it being a grand total of eight hours driving since it’s roughly two each way.   

They’re only about ten minutes into the journey, when Yoongi asks “What were you and Ryu talking about?” Since whatever it was practically made the boy do a 180 in his mood.

Jimin looks at him for a second, before shrugging and saying “Not much…” which leaves Yoongi just as puzzled as he already was.

“She was just telling me about her girlfriend,” Jimin says, and Yoongi fails to find a correlation between this and his attitude. Maybe he’s a romantic, and hearing stories of love makes him cheerful.

Not that it’s the most romantic story in the world. They’d started dating sometime when they were still in high school. They met one day when they were both skipping class on the roof of the school, and Ryu said they almost fist-fought each other over who’s territory the roof was and the fact that this girl was the only person (and still is) to call her Jihu.

Yoongi only met her a few times, back then, despite how often he saw Ryu, because they continued skipping classes to meet each other there.

That was also the reason Yoongi realised that Hoseok’s flirtation the first meeting he came to was fruitless, because the aforementioned girlfriend had showed up at the end of the night to visit Ryu, as she so often does.

Yoongi laughed at Hoseok for a good 15 minutes going home.

It’s a while later, when Yoongi’s trying to stop himself from falling asleep, and he’s pretty sure Jimin has, leaning against the window with his arm up as a makeshift pillow, that he is apparently wrong, and the boy asks about the meeting.

“Is a 2.7% profit good?”

Yoongi’s lightly surprised that he even remembered, considering he has to think for a moment over what he’s referring to.

“This early in the year, it is.”

Jimin yawns, sounding just as tired as Yoongi feels when he says “You must be happy, then.”

Yoongi thinks this over for a minute. Obviously, yes, it’s a good thing. But does he actually care that much?

“Running the trade was never something I really wanted to do,” He confesses, earning a curious look from Jimin – as if all mob bosses thrived in the industry, or something. On second thought, most probably do.

“I don’t really have much of an interest in the whole scene, but Seokjin had already been heavily involved in it when he’d worked for my father,” He pauses, closes his eyes momentarily, and when he opens them again he sees Jimin staring intently at him.

“After he died, Jin failed to see another way to keep the gang afloat that was reliable and that we had a good enough knowledge of. Essentially, we’d been dwindled down to a couple of kids. Most of the men that had worked at the top with my father stepped down, either because they couldn’t handle the idea of the gang going to a kid, because they couldn’t handle the guilt of how they didn’t protect their leader or because they were afraid that they were next.” Yoongi’s voice is quiet when his mouth upturns the tiniest bit, and he says “I understood.”   

“My mom was grieving and bitter and wanted nothing to do with it at all. She even protested against me taking over for a while, until I reminded her that if I didn’t, then dad basically would’ve died for nothing.” He hadn’t meant for the conversation to get so melancholic, and he considers leaving it there, until Jimin gives him a considerably encouraging smile, and he continues.

“Seokjin was determined to get the gang back on its feet, with the first point in his plan to make sure we didn’t go bankrupt. Hoseok’s father continued working in the background of the gang for me, while Hoseok offered to take his own father’s place as one of my personal subordinates – but I made him my right-hand man. He was really shocked, for some reason. I’d taken Taehyung reluctantly under my wing a few years before, after I found him wandering the streets, and, as I knew, he’d already had his fair share of experience with dealing so he was more than happy to help out.” He thinks that says something about Taehyung’s personality – that he was not only willing, but happy to aid an infamous gang in re-establishing themselves by helping run an entire drug trade.

“Namjoon was Hoseok’s supposedly computer-genius friend – and we really needed someone to help with our security at the time; it was obvious things were too dangerous to leave it the way it was. He was about to start attending university on a complicated course that none of us ever exactly understood when he’d tried to explain it. He dropped out a while later after the gang became too time consuming.” Sure, he’d already made enough money to retire, at that point, but Yoongi was silently touched that the man had offered to throw away his education at the time.

“As for Jungkook, I certainly didn’t ask for him to get involved such a dangerous lifestyle – but he’d unfortunately well-befriended Kim Taehyung by that point, so, somehow, he managed to tag along until it became evident that there was nothing I could do about it.” Their friendship has always been somewhat of a pest to Yoongi because of the plain fact that, together, those two are twice as hard to control. And twice the trouble.

…And twice as annoying.

“So, you don’t do it for the money… you obviously don’t do it for the fame – I’ve never seen anyone complain so much about getting stared at in my life-” He’d maybe mentioned that a bit too much tonight, “You don’t do it just to throw your weight and power around, since you’re apparently a national treasure according to everyone close to you,” Yoongi grimaces at that. He blames it mostly on Taehyung’s and Namjoon’s supposed storytelling session a few days ago.

“What’s your point?” He asks the boy, who lethargically lifts a shoulder in a shrug.

“Why do you bother with all of this?”

Yoongi thinks back to what he’d concluded with himself earlier in the night: simply, that Seoul needed order. But the boy’s question makes him ask himself if, maybe, it’s not quite that that made him start.

He hasn’t thought about it for a while, not since the night he’d dealt with Junghee. Even then, it was a fleeting thought; something that he’d rarely admitted to himself, because it’s crazy, right? But, then he’s saying it without any hesitation.

“I want to avenge my father.”

Jimin looks hesitant, as if he already knows the answer to the question he’s about to ask.

“How do you plan to do that?”

Yoongi sighs, fingers playing with one of his earrings as he tries to answer him with a sense of coherence, “It’s easy to forget this sometimes with the way we act, but both Mariposa and the Crystal Syndicate are rebellion groups. Well, the Syndicate claim to be anyway. In a way, we should have a mutual goal – but they’re more focused on their power, I guess. After I took over, I re-established us as rebels, and the Syndicate followed suit because, due to the Government’s policies, they’re not allowed to take action on rebellion groups. Just illegal gangs. It’s something they’ve been trying to override for years, but they haven’t found a way to yet, I guess.”

Jimin nods, eyebrows raised slightly as he admits, “I never knew that.”

“It’s not exactly public knowledge. In fact, I’m not even sure my friends know the whole thing. They know how much I hate the government for what they did, but I don’t think they really believe I’d ever actually do it.” 

“But I am,” Yoongi decides then, for the first time with any sort of certainty to it. “I’ll avenge my father by getting the man who killed him. By taking down the fucker in charge.”

Neither of them need to say it. There is only one more despicable human on earth than Moon Seonghyeon: and it’s revolting that he just so happens to be the person with the most power.

Yoongi needs to ruin the government.

Somehow, the younger boy manages to laugh at him past the revelation.

“You’re fucking crazy, Min Yoongi – you know that?”

25th April, 2017 | 12:23am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi practically has to guide the boy up to the apartment, he’s so physically exhausted by the time they arrive. He kept telling him to sleep on the ride home, but the boy insisted on talking, even though they didn’t really talk about anything serious, after Yoongi’s exposure of his ambition.

“Go to bed, I’ll see you in the morning, okay?” Yoongi tells the, oddly reluctant boy, as they stand outside the door to Jimin’s temporary bedroom. He suggested they stay up for a little while, but Yoongi could see through his playful suggestion that it was a poor idea, considering he could barely keep his eyes open as he made the proposal.

Yoongi’s not convinced he’s quite ready to start working again yet, given how drained he is from a simple dinner night (regardless of the travelling.) Maybe he should start taking him out to places when he asks, after all, just to see how he manages.

Jimin grabs Yoongi’s arm before he can walk away, and Yoongi turns in surprise.

“I still feel a little sick.”  

He probably shouldn’t have shared dessert with him after all, even if the boy did seemingly appreciate it. But the statement now, does explain his reluctance to go to bed, he supposes.

Yoongi looks at him for a minute, before deciding “You do look a little pale, still. Maybe I should call Taeh-”

“No!” Jimin says so suddenly that Yoongi almost flinches. He looks vaguely sheepish as he says, “I mean, he’s probably still with Jungkook, and you wouldn’t want to interrupt their deals…”

Yoongi sighs, knowing he’s probably right. Taehyung’s particularly tetchy about being ‘thrown-off’ like that, as he claims.

“Then, how am I supposed keep an eye on you in case you take some sort of… infection-induced fever?” Yoongi, personally, doesn’t believe it’s infected – Jimin just looks as if he’s feeling the effects of tiredness. But, he doesn’t know anywhere near as much about people as Taehyung does, so he can’t exactly say that with any assurance.

Jimin scratches behind his ear, glancing down the corridor at what appears to be nothing while he mutters, “Well, you could just let me sleep in your bed – we’ve done it before.”

Yoongi feels a small, but familiar, flutter run through him. He manages to scoff despite the peculiar rushy-feeling, and makes his tone remarkably flat when he asks, “You were barely conscious; do you even remember that?”

Jimin meets his eyes, mumbling “Vaguely.” But he isn’t so sure what that means. How much of it does he remember? As much as he does? Does he remember how they slept? How the boy presumably woke up in the morning intertwined with him and drifted off to attempt to make breakfast? Yoongi feels his chest clench when he wonders whether Jimin will want to sleep with him like that again, tonight.

Then, he decides that that’s ridiculous. Because it was only because he was high. He probably didn’t know what he was doing if he couldn’t even remember it clearly now.

“Alright, whatever,” he complies, and the boy grins all of a sudden, telling Yoongi he’ll meet him in a minute, once he gets out of his suit. Yoongi spends most of the time it takes him trying to figure out not only what on earth’s up with Jimin, but how they even got to this point at all.

--

“I’m sorry you didn’t have a great night,” Yoongi says into the silence of the room. Jimin’s wearing his Louis Vuitton shirt again, he thinks. It was dark when he finally came into his bedroom. Yoongi had to find a t-shirt to sleep in, since they’re not something he ever really needs, and the image of him in a worn-out t-shirt from his high-school track team was so unnatural, that he turned out the lights and got into bed, lest the younger boy make a comment on it (for the record, he wasn’t involved in track; Hoseok lent him it when they were younger as Yoongi was sleeping over for the third day in a row and his friend decided that he’d had enough of the elder supposedly smelling too much like teenager. Just for that, Yoongi told him he was never giving him it back.

Hoseok thought he was joking.)

“I had fun,” Jimin says a small distance beside him (he isn’t planning to sleep with him like that, it seems. Not that it matters.) Yoongi can’t give him any sort of look in the dark, but he’s pretty sure his silence conveys his opinion.

“Okay,” The boy concedes, “the actual meeting was boring as fuck – but the food was nice, and being inside an actual casino was cool as hell.”

Yoongi finds that slightly amusing, too, considering he barely even ate any food, and was frowning most of the time he was in the casino. He nods, though Jimin can’t see it, and says, “Yeah, Ryu runs the place well.”

“She does,” Jimin agrees, which somewhat disconcerts Yoongi, because, again, he got the feeling that they didn’t exactly click, except for maybe at the very end of the night.

Jimin doesn’t sound as terribly exhausted and sickish as he had though, at least, just a little sleepy.

“You like Ryu, then?” He asks, still slightly sceptical of the boy’s attitude.

“Yeah, she’s cool. Why?”

He hums, distantly, “Nothing, I just thought you were acting kinda weird with her.”

There’s a short pause.

“Was I? I didn’t notice.”

Yoongi snorts softly, teasing tone seeping into his words as he smirks, and says “Yeah, if I didn’t know any better I would’ve said you were jealous or something.”

There’s a long pause. About twenty seconds of complete radio silence, which makes Yoongi look over to the boy, eyes adjusting to the dark enough to notice his tensed form, mouth drawn into a thin line.

Yoongi’s smirk wavers for a split second.

“Oh my God,” He breathes, watching the boy as his own mouth becomes the equivalent of a shit-eating grin.

“What?” Jimin basically snaps at him, peering at the elder with narrowed eyes.

“Park Jimin – were you jealous?”

Jimin just about explodes, rushing out “That’s stupid. Why would I be? Besides, you were the one who paid Joonho $2500 to get me out of work for the night because he was flirting with me-”

“-I did that for you, I-”

“-You’re the jealous one, Min Yoongi. I just wasn’t sure whether I liked her at first. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but most of the people involved with you tend to be bad fucking news. Need I remind you, you are indirectly the one that got me involved with this whole Syndicate bullshit, considering you couldn’t keep track of your own information.”

The boy ends his short rant with a large sigh, and Yoongi’s sort of stunned. He was just fucking with him...

“Sorry,” The older man says, making Jimin’s deepened line of his eyebrows soften partially. For a moment, anyway, until he says “I just assumed since, you know, I’m exactly the kinda guy you could fall for and all…”

Then, Jimin really does seem pissed.

“Fuck off – you know what?” He sits up, pushing Yoongi’s duvet off of him and he has no idea what’s sparked such a reaction from him (it reminds them of the first night they met, amusedly) but suddenly he bites, “I’m gonna sleep by myself. Fuck you, I hope you feel bad when I die or something in the ni-”

Yoongi pulls him back into bed by his wrist and Jimin lurches to him so suddenly he lets out a yelp of surprise as they end up face to face. Yoongi brings a hand to the boy’s cheek, and the younger’s eyes widen, mouth dropping open, before he moves it to his forehead.

“You are pretty warm,” Yoongi admits, an arches an eyebrow when they lock eyes again, adding “But is it from being sick or embarrassed?”

He scowls again, as if he’d forgotten his annoyance momentarily, trying to back away from Yoongi’s touch before Yoongi relents, arms wrapping around the boy’s waist to keep him here.

“I’m only kidding, Jimin. Don’t make me worry about you all night, just stay here.”

His scowl crumbles then, a sort of mildly endearing look of incredulity as he asks “You’d worry about me?”

Yoongi scoffs, deadpanning “How many times have I helped your ass in the month we’ve known each other?”

Jimin glares for a solid moment, before shutting his eyes and saying, “Shut up. Goodnight.”

Despite his apparent frustration, Yoongi doesn’t miss the laugh he sounds as if he’s trying to hold back, or how he doesn’t pull away when Yoongi rests his head on the boy’s chest, intent on keeping him here.

He doesn’t know why he doesn’t want Jimin to go so much, but he falls asleep before he can think about it any more.

Chapter Text

10^th May, 2017 | 11:19am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Park Jimin is the messiest packer on the planet.

Yoongi finds this out too little, too late, because before he even realises, having been on the phone to Taehyung about a deal him and Seokjin are to carry out this morning, his apartment is in shambles. 

Yoongi had just put his phone down, walking back into the corridor from the living area and straight into some sort of… nuclear warzone.

And it’s now, Yoongi decides, that he really shouldn’t have bothered bringing the kid’s clothes because Jimin supposedly has half of his thrown over the place in addition to his own and it would’ve been so much easier if he only had Yoongi’s things everywhere.

But most guests would at least apologise, right?

Not Park Jimin.

“Yah, what the fuck is all this, huh?” Yoongi asks him, poking his head into the chaos that is the boy’s temporary bedroom and how the hell did he knock over a lamp?

“What? I’m packing,” the boy explains, lifting up a shirt that is definitely not his and when did he even borrow that?

“You call this packing?” Yoongi says, looking around the room that seems as if it’s getting messier by the second, “You didn’t wear half of this stuff – you don’t even own half of it!”

Jimin’s eyes snap to him once he tosses Yoongi’s shirt across the room, looking fairly normal about it, as he explains, rather sourly, “I’m looking for something.”

Yoongi scoffs at that, “Looking for what? Buried treasure? You know looking for things doesn’t require throwing clothes into the hallway, right?”

Or, somehow knocking over a lamp.

“I had to keep track of what I’ve searched through,” Jimin says, like it’s a perfectly reasonable explanation to toss half of Yoongi’s belongings around the house. Park Jimin has gone insane. Really. He’s not fully recovered. Maybe he should take him to the hospital, after all.

Why else would he throw a rolled-up two hundred and fifty dollars Versace silk tie out of the room like some sort of designer hand grenade? Seriously, Yoongi’s never cared about the price and brand of his belongings until he experienced his (thankfully) temporary housemate run wild with them.

“What could you have possibly lost in my room? In my clothes?”

Jimin throws a pair of real leather Gucci loafers priced roughly seven hundred dollars next, and Yoongi thinks they land suspiciously near him as the boy vents “It’s important! I’m being thorough!”

He looks at the boy digging through the seemingly endless pile of clothes at one end of the room with an indisputable feeling of light-heartedness and something he can’t quite name as he clicks his tongue and jibes “Wow, honestly, Park Jimin you really are something. I am ecstatic to be getting rid of you.” He comes a little further into the bedlam and sits himself down on the bed, own mouth daring to twitch upwards as the boy’s falls open.

Then, he just looks entirely doubtful and mocking and he raises an eyebrow, lips curling amusedly when he says “Oh, are you? Really? Who’s gonna watch your stupid TV soaps with you, now, hm?” and for a moment, Yoongi actually has to think of a reply because every one of his friends hates them, claiming that dramas and soaps are for lonely people and young teenagers which Yoongi strongly disagrees with as he’s neither.

“Jungkook,” He answers, and Jimin immediately snorts at that because they both very well know that Jeon Jungkook watches nothing but anime and horror films.

“Right, sure,” Jimin replies, digging back into the pile. He picks out a pair of expensive-looking slacks (he’s got too many and they all look too similar – he has no idea where it’s from) and chucks it across the room. Then, he finds a pair of socks and how could something be lost in a pair of socks?

Jimin balls the pair up and throws them without looking, hitting Yoongi square in the face.

When he exclaims, the boy erupts into laughter, but doesn’t apologise. Not that Yoongi expected him to. 

“Okay, fine” Yoongi submits after a few more close-calls (one of them being a damn pair of timberlands that, on second thought, are definitely Jungkook’s and not his) “What the hell did you lose?”

Jimin stops searching then, opting to look at Yoongi for an instant before he dramatically plummets his face into the pile of clothes.

“My necklace!” He yells, but it’s so muffled that it’s barely even audible and doesn’t sound even remotely intimidating – just hilarious.

But, then, Yoongi pauses.

His necklace? His stupid choker with the stupid star on it? That?

That sleazy-looking thing is the reason why he’s unleashed utter carnage upon his entire spring collection?

God, he sounds like Hoseok.

“Why do you always wear that thing, anyway?” He asks him because, really, he’s seen the same sort of thing on far too many workers in the Galaxy to ever view it as just a fashion statement ever again.

Jimin raises his head from the mound of clothing, something more sombre on his face than before.

“It’s… part of my uniform, I guess,” He answers simply, after a short silence. Slowly, he goes back to looking through the pile again, as if the question never came up, and Yoongi wouldn’t find it peculiar in the slightest if he hadn’t recalled seeing the boy wear it when he wasn’t working, too.

Yoongi stands up, clears his throat.

“Right. Well, I suppose I should probably help look for it before you turn out my entire wardrobe and suffocate both of us in Saint Laurent,” he jokes, but, honestly, he’s got a walk-in-wardrobe bigger than most public swimming pools.

Taehyung and Hoseok’s idea.

“Besides,” He continues, grabbing the boy’s attention who looks at him with subtle interest, “if you show up to work after an entire month, missing such an apparently essential part of your uniform I’m fairly confident Joonho will hire a hitman to murder me.”

He bursts into breezy laughter. Melodic. Yoongi smiles with him.

10^th May, 2017 | 3:31pm | Jimin’s Apartment, Cerulean Road

They found the stupid necklace, eventually: underneath Yoongi’s bed, with neither party mentioning how it got there since it was simply because they casually ended up sleeping in the same bed once or twice over the past few weeks – no big deal. It was just on nights that Jimin’s recovery hit a slight snag and it seemed best that Yoongi could keep watch on him.

Taehyung had told Yoongi some time yesterday afternoon that Jimin seemed to be well enough again to go back to work, or at least go home without risking an infection if he didn’t want to go back just yet and both of them had mutually agreed to leave it until the next morning because there was so much to pack (Yoongi didn’t even know what sort of packing hell was coming his way, then) and, also, the elder had promised he’d order Indian food and it’d be borderline treacherous to rob the self-proclaimed ‘poor, pitiful hooker-boy’ of such a delicacy.

Yoongi couldn’t tell what Taehyung was thinking at the time, his face professionally blank when both him and Jimin decided that then and there, but he got a rough idea later on when he got a message from Hoseok; a simple text of ‘sweet spot’ because, obviously, Taehyung had felt it important enough to tell the busiest man alive (who also felt it important enough to even text him that, amidst his busy schedule.)  He has a promotional photoshoot for his film tonight and he’s been “preparing” for it for about a week and a half now.

How you ‘prepare’ for a photoshoot is beyond him.

Yoongi now stands in Jimin’s apartment, the state of it having been so forgotten in his mind that he’s one again overwhelmed as he looks around the place and he swears it smells even damper in here than it used to.

But Jimin seems entirely unbothered, hauling his (finally sorted at last) suitcase that Yoongi had lent him to transport all of his clothes into his bedroom, and not even flinching when the door creaks obscenely loudly and scares the shit out of the elder.

“You know,” the boy says, “it’s kind of nice to be back.”

Yoongi gawks at him.

He’s a little insulted if he’s honest; the fact that Jimin thinks this place is level, if not better than his penthouse. This place.

One of the walls literally has a hole leading to the outside like some… shitty window.

“Is it?” he asks the owner of said shitty window, once he returns from arguably the only semi-decent part of his home, rubbing his hands together because it is fucking freezing in his apartment. It’s freezing… in over twenty degrees Celsius, seventy degrees Fahrenheit, heat.

Yoongi isn’t even wearing a suit today. Jimin insisted it was too warm and he’d spotted a godawful black short-sleeved shirt with white lilies on it, and a striped white and navy t-shirt to go with it that Yoongi still can’t remember even buying, and once he had seen it, there was no single thing Min Yoongi could say that would result in him not having to wear it today.

He has no idea why everyone’s so adamant about ‘livening up’ his wardrobe. He would’ve continued to refuse but then Jimin said it looked pretty, and Yoongi figured that it looks professional enough to work in.

Of course, if he’s cold in here, then Jimin must be ten times worse, considering the boy’s only wearing a too-long shirt. Yoongi’s too-long shirt. Yoongi’s nine hundred dollars, Louis Vuitton, press-stud, hand-stitched and embroidered white silk too-long shirt. All because Jimin had the audacity to ask Yoongi to let him wash all of his clothes before he went, because laundromats are expensive – which is why it took them three hours longer than it should’ve to pack all of the boy’s things and bring him back to his apartment as they added washing and drying, like, five hundred things to that mix.

Which brought Yoongi to the conclusion that, coinciding with his shitty wages, Jimin may be so broke because he spends too much money on clothes.

Jimin stops rubbing his hands together and looks at Yoongi with a commendable sort of contentment.

“Yeah, I mean, it’s definitely not five-star living or anything, but…” His voice trails off and he looks around, expression clouding significantly.

“Alright, it’s a shithole,” he concludes, and Yoongi lets out a short laugh at his bluntness. Jimin smiles, puts dramatic hands to his heart and says, “But it’s my shithole.”

Yoongi can’t fault his optimism.

They fall silent for a moment or two, Jimin walking around the place in some apparent attempt to re-adjust to the apartment after a month of not seeing it and eventually settling on falling back onto his beaten-up couch, coughing slightly when a gust of dust emerges from the impact.

Once he recovers from the dust-attack, he tilts his head ever so slightly at Yoongi, a faint smile on his face as he asks, “So, what’s the plan, now?”

Yoongi falters for a moment, realising that this is maybe his cue to go. After spending an entire month with the boy, virtually day-in, day-out, he almost forgot that Jimin is staying here, and he’s going.

“Might call Hoseok and check I haven’t completely lost him to the general public – or I might go home and clean up your mess,” he says mock-pointedly, resulting in the boy grinning cheekily at him.

“What about you?” He asks and Jimin hums, cranes his neck to look at the (cracked) clock on his wall and turns back with a shrug.

“I’ve got a while before work, so I guess I’ll just hang out for a little. Unpack, then get ready to go.”

Yoongi gives the boy a scandalised look, “You’re going back to work already? As in, tonight?”

“Yeah,” He says as if it was obvious, which Yoongi supposes it should've been, considering the boy's strangely consistent work ethic for his job (likely due to the fact that he really needs the money.)

“I need to go back as soon as possible otherwise Joonho’s gonna probably fire my ass. And then I’ll have no money for food, starve and die," he says, looking hilariously serious as he tells Yoongi this.

He laughs at the boy’s dramatics, whose shoulders slump as he lays back into the sofa, before he says “And I’ll blame it on you,” and Yoongi scoffs, taking faux-offence.

“Me?” He echoes with a small crinkle of his nose.

“Yeah!” Jimin confirms, “You got me into this mess, after all.”

Unbelievable.

He sort of did, but it's unbelievable anyway.

“Oh," Jimin says, sitting up properly again to look at Yoongi when a minute goes by, "about this shirt-,”

A loud vibration hums through the air, resonating from Yoongi's pocket, and he digs his phone out of the slightly too tight jeans Jimin had also insisted he wore, reading the call ID as 'Seokjin' before accepting and bringing it to his ear. Jimin reluctantly closes his mouth.

"Yoongi," Seokjin's voice comes through with an undeniable sense of urgency and the man in question feels a shiver run over him because he's really not prepared for any sort of business right now. And he was kind of considering asking Jimin if he wanted to go get some food before work.

"Okay, first of all, don't freak out, okay?" 

Yoongi stills, eyebrows puckering together at the man’s suggestion that he would. And the fact he said ‘okay’ twice in one sentence.

He doesn’t ‘freak out.’ He hates when Seokjin says that.
"I'm not gonna-" there's a growl in the background and what sounds like Seokjin, hissing at someone to shut the fuck up, and Yoongi stops.

"Was that Taehyung?" He acts, voice coated with understandable concern.

"Yes, but don't freak out,” he repeats, “I swear to God if I have to deal with two pissed off mobsters.”

Taehyung? Pissed off? That’s rare. The man gets pissed over two things: People trying to scam and/or drug him and Yoongi telling him his fashion sense is terrible. Which he hasn’t done today, so he gets the feeling there’s business to attend to, after all.

“What’s the problem, Jin?” He asks, not wanting to waste any more time if there is one.

“You know the sale we had this morning? The one with some dealers from overseas?”

Yoongi makes a sound of agreement, catching Jimin’s inquisitive look out of the corner of his eye from where the boy’s still sitting on the sofa. He mouths ‘gang stuff’ to him, and he seems to lose interest after that.

Typical.

“Tae almost got fucking shot because of it.”

Yoongi nearly drops his phone.

“He what? What the fuck, what kind of psychos? Oversea fuckin’ dea-,”

“No, no,” Seokjin interrupts, Yoongi halting in his rant with confusion, “here’s the thing: The stuff we were supplying them? Fake.”

Yoongi’s stomach clenches and he barks “Fake? But we got it from Jinki’s guys, why the hell would they give us fake stuff?”

They’ve been getting most of their higher quality supplies (coke and heroin mostly, but the occasional shipment of acid, too) from Lee Jinki’s gang even before Yoongi took over. It’s a small group, only five members and a handful of other low-ranking workers to haul the stuff around for them, so they’ve practically become an extension of Mariposa, they’ve known them so long. Hoseok even knew one of the members, Taemin, from his old dance school (he, however, dropped the idol ambition when he became a gangster, unlike some.)

“They didn’t know. They said it was a different supplier for them this month too, some guy they’d never seen before but he had all the right documents. We already went to them, trust us,” Seokjin says and Yoongi feels a little calmer at that, knowing that some of their closest allies haven’t purposely tried to screw them over.

“Okay,” he says, vaguely irritated, “then what dumbass supplied them?”

“We’ve got Nams tracing them right now, it shouldn’t be hard, they left quite an easy trail, apparently.”

Interesting, Yoongi thinks, his mind already questioning the Syndicate’s involvement, like it seems to with everything lately. Hoseok says he’s paranoid.

He probably is in some cases.

“What happened with the guys we were supposed to sell it to? Did he explain?”

Seokjin lets out a soft chuckle, “Well, he didn’t really get time to – Tae ran for it and I drove away before he could even explain it to me, never mind them.”

Yoongi groans at that. That deal’s certainly gone to hell, now.

“Shit, okay. Alright. I just left Jimin back to his apartment, so come pick me up on Cerulean.”

Seokjin quickly agrees, and Yoongi hangs up, letting out a sigh as he runs a hand through his hair in vague frustration.

“What’s the matter?” Jimin asks, seemingly a little more interested now that he’s noticed it isn’t just regular, everyday gang business. Although, this sorta shit has been happening more often lately. He hopes it doesn’t become everyday business.

“Some fucker sold us fake coke – our supplier’s supplier,” Yoongi laments, situation dawning on him properly now. He can feel his annoyance building.

“God,” the man continues, “Tae could’ve got his ass shot if he tried selling that without Jin waiting for him, shit.”

Jimin looks rather condescending towards the aforementioned supplier as he snorts, asking “Who tries to sell fake drugs to the owners of the biggest drug trade in, like, Asia?”

Yoongi grins, snickering with him as he answers, “Idiots.”

“True, but uh, your shir-,”

“-I better get down there before Seokjin and Taehyung show up and bust a fucking blood vessel having to wait for me for 0.2 seconds. I’ll see you later, Jimin,” He says, not having meant to cut the boy off, but realising that the matter at hand’s most likely more pressing.

“Try and stay out of trouble for once, okay?” 

Jimin’s mouth manages to work into a subtle pout as he says, “Fine. I’ll try,” looking vaguely contemplative when he adds, “But, Yoongi, before you go…”

Yoongi stops from where he’d began to cross the room, turning back with an air of curiosity.

Jimin inhales and exhales clearly, then says, voice close to a mutter, “I just wanted to say that I know if… if you hadn’t come for me that night I’d probably be in a much worse condition right now. Or, you know, no condition,” he jokes, resulting in mirroring smiles between the two.

“And if you hadn’t let me stay at yours I probably would’ve gotten four diseases and went to work anyway.”

Yoongi laughs at that, too, yet he doesn’t doubt it for a second.

“So,” he drags out, tucking a loose strand of hair behind his ear as he says, “what I mean is… thank you.”

Yoongi hadn’t exactly been expecting that, but he nods regardless.

“You were quite the pain in the ass, so…”

Jimin’s warm expression falls flat off of his face as he snaps, “Hey! I was trying to be nice, you asshole.”

As if he hasn’t seen him be nice before.

Yoongi looks away from Jimin, scanning the room instead as he says, “If I’m being totally honest your company wasn’t…” he pauses, catching the boy’s suspicious glance in his peripheral, “entirely unbearable.”

He huffs out a breath, then clicks his tongue in exasperation at this, “Oh, fuck off – just admit we had fun.” 

Yoongi purses his lips for a moment, contemplating this, before he tilts his head with a small smile and says, “It was nice having you around,” cocking an eyebrow at him as he asks, “There. Happy?”

Jimin nods contently. 

“Now, I do have to go. I have to go teach some asshole a lesson. But you,” he says sternly, pointing a finger at the boy in front of him, “I want no lessons taught to you, okay? I mean it when I say to be a good boy and stay out of trouble.” The words come out sounding somewhat stranger than he’d meant them to, and Jimin’s eyes flicker as he notices.

“Yes, sir,” he quips, with a hint of suggestion in his tone, winking quickly to Yoongi’s frustration.

“Bye, Jimin.”

The boy waves with a jibing edge of flirtation to it, “Feel free to stop by at the club some night!” he says as some sort of joke arrangement he knows Yoongi’d never meet.

He’s been in the Galaxy enough times in the past month to last him his whole lifetime, thank you very much.

--

"Okay, what's the deal?” Yoongi asks as Seokjin drives out of where he’d briefly pulled over, the younger having been waiting, like the man had hoped, “Did Namjoon find the asshole, yet?"

"He'd be insulted if he heard you ask that,” Seokjin says breezily, though it’s likely not untrue, "The guy is either very, very stupid, or wants to be found. And despite your Syndicate Set-Up theory, I don't think anyone in their right mind wants three pissed mariposa members on their backs."

Yoongi chuckles at that, taking in the elder’s outwardly calm appearance, in contrast to Taehyung who’s fumingly crossed his arms over his chest in the backseat, "You're pissed too, huh?"

"I am now I’ve been told we were outsmarted by an idiot, yes.”

"Then this should be fun, right?" Yoongi asks, silently gauging the man’s reaction. He notices a frown flicker onto his face, but it’s gone once he turns onto the next street.

"Let's try and keep it clean, Yoongi. You know you get over the top when you’re mad."

Usual Seokjin. Though, contrary to what he must be thinking, Yoongi actually agrees. Unless he gets a good reason, making a bigger mess than necessary’s more of a chore than anything.

"I’m calm, okay?” Yoongi says easily, holding up his hands in some sort of surrender. Taehyung snorts in the back, either because he doesn’t believe him or because he can’t believe he isn’t, when he clearly is. Most likely both.

“Angry? Insulted? Sure, but this'll be quick. We go in, get answers, decide the bastard's fate and go home before the sun even sets.”

Seokjin gives him a doubtful glance, but doesn’t argue.

“Where’d Nams say we have to go, anyway?” Yoongi asks for a change of topic, settling to look out the window instead when Seokjin turns onto the road that will eventually lead them to the highway.

“Downtown.”

Yoongi’s head snaps around to look at the driver, mouth immediately curled downwards.

“During rush hour?”

“That’s why I want you to be quick.”

10^th May, 2017 | 7:44pm | Abandoned Warehouse, Dive-Bar Avenue, Downtown Sector.

Two hours of traffic. Two hours of trying to locate the asshole, bring him somewhere quiet, and get some answers.

In other words, four hours of hell.

"Yoongi, please, we've been at this for ages, now. He's not gonna tell us shit,” Taehyung snaps, surprisingly, considering he’d been all for finding out the guy’s reasoning at first. He guesses after so long he just wants to kick his ass and leave.

But it’s not that simple for Yoongi.

"So, what? I'm just supposed to let it go?” He asks the younger, who simply shrugs in a sort of ‘I guess?’ way. Damn, for a kid who was furious just a few hours ago, he’s sure taking this lightly now.

Yoongi scoffs, turning back to the man on the floor, nose bent in such an odd angle now that he feels vaguely sick looking at the pieces of crushed bone sticking out, almost poking through his skin. He supposes they’ll have to get someone to clean up the blood that’s still slowly dripping from it.

“Something about you is so familiar, you know that?” He asks the man, still oblivious to even his name. Namjoon could tell them a grand total of jack shit about him except he was definitely the guy who confirmed the fake stuff being sold, and that he could’ve sworn he recognised something about him. In addition, the guy in question has also told them a grand total of jack shit.

“Yoongi, stop it,” Seokjin virtually groans, patting his arm arguably too forcedly to be considered playful, “neither of us recognise him and we’re the ones that do most of the drug deals. He probably just looks like someone.”

Yoongi takes another look at the man, and then back to Seokjin. He sighs, muttering “Just… wait until Namjoon gets back to us.”

Seokjin does groan then, voice getting slightly higher by the second as it always does when he gets riled up, snapping “Namjoon’s horrible with faces. Don’t base your decisions on Kim Namjoon saying someone looks vaguely familiar.”

Yoongi’s mouth quirks up in amusement when the man uses his full name. So much for gang privacy. Not that this fucker’ll be leaving here alive if Namjoon figures out why he’s familiar. Of course, either way they’ll probably kill him, but he’d rather it was for a more viable cause than a guy wanting to make a hell of a profit. 

To be entirely honest, Yoongi wouldn’t normally trust Namjoon with this sort of thing. But if this guy’s linked to the Syndicate, then that could support his set-up theory, and he really doesn’t want to be wrong about that; because then the Syndicate are a lot slier than they thought, since there’s been so many dead ends, and their information really is going to be a challenge to get back.

“We’ve got all night, asshole. Tell me why I might know you, and I’ll reconsider chopping your fingers off.”

The room falls silent. Yoongi’s seriously not used to the people he’s interrogating not cussing him out, at the very least.

“This is driving me insane,” he confesses when the silence drags on, running a tired hand over his face, as if he can feel a headache coming on.

“Then stop,” Seokjin stresses, and Yoongi has to hold back a sigh, “No need to cut anything off, just… do whatever you want to him for giving us fake coke. Minimal time and blood.”

Yoongi looks at the elder blankly for a second, before turning to Taehyung, asking, “Tae, what do you think?”

Taehyung shoots him a sceptical look, “About the time and blood?”

“No, about his face. Does he look familiar?”

Yoongi ignores Seokjin’s look of exasperation.

Taehyung studies the man on the floor, humming to himself before concluding, “His… moustache looks familiar.”

His moustache.

“Oh, I know. The restaurant manager a couple of weeks ago had a weird moustache, too. Although, he didn’t have a tattoo on his face. Maybe it’s a trend, now, I saw someone else with one yesterday as well.”

He’s sorry he asked.

Yoongi turns to Seokjin, instead, asking “Any update from Namjoon, yet?”

The elder practically growls in frustration, snipping “He’s not gonna find anything, Yoongi, would you just-,”

Seokjin’s ringtone interrupts him. His mouth forms a fine line as he slowly reaches for his phone in his pocket, and reluctantly hands it to Yoongi.

Yoongi grins as he answers it, “Joon? Do you have something.”

“Okay, Yoongi, don’t freak out.”

His grin deteriorates at this. Not Namjoon, too.  

“I won’t,” he insists, “who is he?”

“You remember the CCTV footage I sent you a while back? When Jimin was given the fake pen drive?”

Yoongi mutters an agreement, a spark of anger flurrying through him when he remembers its content.

“You said back then there was something on one of the guy’s faces. I looked it over again, and it could match with the tattoo on your friend there’s face. But, check the back of his neck. There should be some sort of…” He pauses, as if he’s still trying to identify it, “triangleish shape at his nape. Then we’ll know for sure.”

Yoongi feels himself fill with a weird sense of excitement at this man being potentially linked to the Syndicate – to the information. If he is, then that’s one over on Seonghyeon, it has to be. He wouldn’t willingly let Yoongi catch someone clearly a part of his latest scheme.

Yoongi walks around to the back of the man, and pulls down the hood of his black jacket, small smile budding on his face. (Hoseok would probably call it disturbing, if he was here for once.)  

Yoongi falters when the neck’s been exposed.

“It’s not him.”

“It’s not?” Namjoon repeats incredulously, as if he’d been as confident about it as Yoongi had.  

The elder shakes his head though the other can’t see it, saying, “No. Sorry for wasting your time, Nams. But thanks.”

“I really thought I recognised him.”

Yoongi felt like he did, as well. How weird.

“I told you not to base things off of Kim Namjoon’s memory,” Seokjin says immediately once Yoongi gives him his phone back, the younger trying not to grimace at the elder’s nagging tone, “Besides, how would you even recognise this guy? You said the footage was grainy as hell.”

Yoongi stares at Seokjin pointedly for a moment, before asking, “How many people in this city have huge random things stretching across their faces, huh?”

“In the Syndicate? About every one in twelve,” he retorts, a considerably patronising look on his face.

Yoongi can’t even argue. It’s probably true.

“Well, whatever,” he says instead, “We’ve already wasted enough time, here,” he decides, which Seokjin and Taehyung both immediately agree with. Yoongi turns to look at the man on the floor. The asshole who was apparently dumb enough to try to sell them fake coke for his own gain and nothing any more cunning unlike what he’d thought.

“Connected to the Syndicate or not, you’re not getting off free with this. But I’ll save the theatrics for another night.”

The building hangs silent, again. The man doesn’t even look up at Yoongi.

“Are you still not gonna talk?” he questions, disbelievingly, “Even in the face of death?” He really hasn’t dealt with this sort of thing before. Quiet ones come along every once in a while, but nobody ever stays quiet when they’re about to die.

And then the man proves Yoongi’s observation to be true when he says very simply, “I’ve nothing to say.”

Okay, maybe not.

“You’re gonna die anyway,” he says rather agitatedly, the situation being much slower and useless than they’d all been hoping, “Just tell me why you bothered with all of this, huh? Easy money? Not so easy, after all, was it?”

He shakes his head slowly, as to not irritate his broken nose, “Not that.”

“Then, what?”

The man doesn’t speak for a minute, raising his head to stare Yoongi down instead. In fact, Yoongi’s about to tell him to stop, hit the blooming bruise near his cheek with the handle of his gun again, before the man smiles, eerily, and says, “He’s a pretty little thing, isn’t he?”

Yoongi’s stomach drops. He can sense Taehyung and Seokjin’s confusion.

“Who?” Yoongi demands, gripping onto the man’s shoulders all of a sudden, fury rippling through him warningly, even though he already knows the answer.

The man continues to smile, short, peculiar-looking moustache perched above his upper lip.

Who knew weird facial hair was coming into style?

Weird facial hair.

Just like what Dawon had told him about.

“You were there the night he got stabbed, weren’t you?” Yoongi says all of a sudden, disbelief obvious in his tone, “You are part of the Syndicate.”

Fuck, no wonder he recognised something about him. He’d never seen the man in person before tonight, but the description had rung a bell with him and Namjoon. Was this another set-up? Or have they really got one over Seonghyeon? Were they trying to get Taehyung fucked up from selling fake stuff? Or was it just a test?

Yoongi hates how he can’t find a solid answer to any of these.

The asshole laughs then, sounding hollow and fucking creepy before he says, tone far too light for the words, “I hope you can keep him that pretty.”

The fury running through him practically ignites at that.

He points the gun at him, though the man has little to no reaction, just as he seethes “You shut the fuck up, you can’t even touch him,” though the statement sounds lightweight even to his own ears due to the simple fact that they had before. What’s to stop them from doing it again?

“Yoongi, shit, okay calm down,” Seokjin calls, approaching Yoongi with Taehyung to place a hand on his shoulder, both of them clearly aware of their boss’ minutely shaking aim.

“He’s just winding you up, hyung,” Taehyung says and Yoongi wants to believe that, he really does. That whatever that asshole on the floor just said isn’t some sort of warning for worse to come. But Moon Seonghyeon is an unpredictable bastard, and the world does not play fair.

He shoots before the man can say any more. He doesn’t want to hear it, however childish that may be. The sound of the shot, tearing through the man’s flesh, almost resonates for a moment, even after his lifeless body falls flat to the ground.  

“Let’s go, it’s a long drive,” Yoongi mumbles, tucking his gun into the back of his jeans as Seokjin and Taehyung follow, rather uneasily. He makes a mental reminder to reinstate some better people to keep a watch on Park Jimin, and another to get someone to clean up the body he just left in his wake.

10^th May, 2017 | 10:22pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi’s significantly tired when he finally gets home, after roughly six hours of travelling and interrogating, thanks to the still awful traffic in Downtown on the way back.

It’s weird for the place to be so quiet, though it honestly shouldn’t be, as he’d long been used to it. But, lately, he’d gotten used to coming in at night and having Jimin telling him to keep the noise down, since he’s ‘trampling around at ass o’clock’ while he’d been sleeping soundly on the sofa, again. Yoongi would’ve asked him why he bothered sleeping on the sofa, when his room was just down the hall, and the conversation would spiral off until they’d somehow end up watching shitty sitcom re-runs until three in the morning.

Yoongi kicks off his shoes, the silence feeling vaguely overpowering. He wonders how the boy’s first night back at work, was – if Joonho wasn’t a complete dick for once. He doubts it, but you never know.

Yoongi turns off the lamp he’d kept on for himself before going out, having installed a timer for it to go on once it goes dark since he never really knows what he could get caught up in, and he really doesn’t want to trip and break his neck anytime soon. He takes off his stupid-looking shirt as he goes, t-shirt underneath clinging to him slightly from the heat of the car and the night’s humidity, all ready to go to bed ridiculously early for once, when a phone interrupts for the third time today.

He takes it out, reads the ID as Hoseok, which vaguely surprises him since he’d heard little from the man lately, and answers it with a tired “What do you want?”

Hoseok doesn’t even chastise him for it before he says, in a whisper, “Yah, Yoongi… I think I was set up with this movie; there’s Syndicate guys here,” and Yoongi immediately feels alarm flooding his chest.

Seonghyeon told him to keep an eye on his right-hand. Is this why?

“Shit,” Yoongi swears, pulling his shirt back on and immediately going to retrieve his shoes, “Where are you?”

“Hiding in a bathroom stall,” the man confesses, and Yoongi has to hold back his laughter, though the situation certainly isn’t funny.

“Text me the address, I’m on my way. Just don’t do anything stupid, Seok,” he says, slipping on his shoes. The younger softly snorts on the other end of the line, a non-verbal ‘not likely.’

Yoongi hangs up, going to call a taxi since driving is already a horrible idea by himself, but on top of him quietly fearing for the safety of his best friend it becomes nothing but an idiocy.

Jung Hoseok is a pain in the ass.

But he’s lucky that he’s a pain in the ass Yoongi’s unconditionally fond of.

Chapter Text

10^th May, 2017 | 10:34pm | Kerosene Road, Red Light Sector.

Telling Hoseok to not do something stupid is like telling him not to take up random movie deals when his gang is facing one of their biggest problems in years.

Naïve and futile – and Yoongi knows it’s going to happen anyway.

The place seems shady as hell when the taxi driver pulls up outside it. There’s a large metal fence around the perimeter, the gate of which looks as if it hasn’t been in use in years. There’s no sign indicating the name of it, either, just faint, peeling black hangul on the dirty yellow wall of the building that may have once said something – but Yoongi can no longer even guess what.

He also can’t even begin to fathom how Hoseok saw this as a legitimate location. It has set-up written all over it.

Yoongi gets out of the car, paying the woman and thanking her for the ride. The warm breeze lightly rustles through his hair as she drives off, faint murmurs of clubs and bars alive as the nightlife begins to reach its peak, though the area around this building, in particular, would likely be completely black if it wasn’t for the slightly longer hours of daylight as the summer starts to arrive.

His shoes click against the concrete as he approaches the building’s entrance, doubting whether he should go in so indiscreetly, before he decides that it’s not worth wasting any more time. Who even knows if the Syndicate is expecting him? And if they are…

Well, he’ll cross that bridge when he gets to it (God, he sounds like Hoseok. Again.)

The front door’s stiffer than it should be to push open, telling him that, once again, this place is shady and his friend is an idiot. It creaks and slams against the wall when he does get it, echoing through the empty looking corridors. Yoongi didn’t think he’d need a damn flashlight, but here he is standing in what looks like the set of a horror film, ironically.

Hoseok didn’t think to text him where in the building he’s been hiding for god knows how long, so, Yoongi stands near the entrance, perplexed and rather peeved at the standstill, for all but three seconds before he hears a string of obnoxious shrieks that could honestly only belong to one man. 

Yoongi gracelessly strides down the corridor, cursing himself for even letting the man take up this deal without running any sort of background check at all. But his own damn agent, his company said it seemed totally okay and Yoongi knows for a fact they didn’t set him up because they’ve continuously begged Hoseok to move somewhere safe and continue his career away from the gang violence or at least don’t get so involved for just about his entire career (and he started as a child actor.)

Yoongi understands that. If his most successful musician, who they’d practically watched grow from a loud, hyperactive child to a louder, more hyperactive man, was putting himself and his career in danger literally every single day, he’d want them to stop it as well.

But Hoseok was his first! He promised when he was three years old to be his right-hand when Yoongi took over someday. Neither of them expected it to end up being so soon, and Hoseok had pretty much forgotten the promise when it came time to fulfill it, but Yoongi employed him first, therefore, if anything, he should quit being an idol.

On second thought, the man would probably never leave his side if he was his right-hand man and his right-hand man only. Yoongi doesn’t know if he can handle that again after dealing with it for most of their childhood. 

“Hoseok-ah?” Yoongi calls out, pushing open the door of the bathroom that his best friend had supposedly chosen to hide in (Yoongi’s pretty sure it’s the women’s room, too) and he’s inside for about five seconds before said friend starts yelling again at the top of his lungs which is very unnecessary considering Yoongi’s right there. He turns the corner into the main area (it is the women’s one) and notices that the room is rather spacious for the bathroom of such a run-down building, with a long row of sinks mirroring an equal length of cubicles, and an empty space of ugly green tiles littering the floor between them that match the walls – each varying in different levels of grime and damage.

Yoongi steps a little further into the room, and then he sees why his friend is so frantically yelling “Yoongiyoongiyoon, hyunghyunghyuuunghyungiehelpmeohmygodhyunghelp” since he’s practically wrestling with a 50ft hulk of a man with the typical insane Syndicate Member Muscles that stretch thicker than both Yoongi and Hoseok’s heads together.

Hoseok shrieks again from where the man’s got him pinned up against the row of sinks with one hand against his throat and it’s impressive that he can even produce that sound with the death grip the man seems to have on him.

“Yoongi,” he coughs out, hands scrabbling at the brawn’s grasp as he asks, “What the fuck do I do?” while Yoongi approaches him with barely concealed panic because, sure, they can fight but how the hell do they fight someone twice their height? Yoongi makes a reach for the man’s hand, trying to pry it off but then, he feels a blow to his chest and he’s stumbling backward, trying not to fall over as he insists “Anything, Seok – do something.”

Hoseok’s hand immediately falls to his side, scrambling around the counter area of the sink and knocking over the plug of one into the basin. His eyes whip to the tap. He spins it with a sharp flick of his wrist, water gushing out after it. The man holding him looks at the action with confusion.

Hoseok slits a hand through the stream, splashing the water onto his attacker’s face who recoils for a second, grip loosening enough for Hoseok to kick him hard in the shins and rush over to Yoongi, gripping the elder’s shoulder almost painfully.

Out of all the things he expected to happen, that was not one of them.

The brawn recovers quickly, naturally, already stomping over to them with a new-found sense of rage as Hoseok clings even harder onto Yoongi. He takes a swing, and Yoongi gives Hoseok a shove in the opposite direction that he dives to, the fist missing them both by an inch. Yoongi curves around him, pulling his arm back to dig an elbow between his shoulder blades. No reaction.

He grimaces, the impact having likely hurt him more than the man as he turns around slowly with a glower.

Is he made of fucking metal?

He looks at Hoseok, whose wide-eyes imitate his own, and Yoongi only yelps a little when the man grabs him, keeping both of his arms stuck to his body as he looks as if he’s getting ready to hurl him out a window. Hoseok leaps into action, slamming his fists and heels into the guy’s back. He barely reacts. Instead, he turns around and hurtles one at the other, both of them crashing to the ground in a hail of smacking limbs.

“Please, for the love of God, Yoongi, tell me you brought a gun.”

Yoongi rolls his eyes over to look at the younger man lying beside him on the ground with distaste. He reaches into his pocket, muttering “Of fucking course I did,” as he tries to bring himself back up to his feet, pulling out the gun as he does. Hoseok gets up after him, just as the guy starts to come towards them again. He aims at his head, finger steady on the trigger as he takes a step back. He pulls it.

Nothing happens.

“What? But I…” he mumbles to himself, shaking the weapon as if that’ll magically make it go off. The man snorts, laughing at him as Yoongi pulls back the slide, which locks, and frantically tries to take out the pistol’s magazine and reload because, apparently, he didn’t bother doing that the last time he used it. Fucking idiot.

Yoongi takes another step back, attention fixated on the gun to the point that he doesn’t realise why his foot slips out from underneath him and he crashes to the ground for the second time in a minute, until he feels wetness coat his entire back.

The gun skids along the floor, ammo spilling everywhere as Yoongi groans, Hoseok cussing as he dodges another punch from the brawn, trying to pull Yoongi up without slipping as well.

Then, their attacker seems to get a better idea.

“H-hoseok, the gun!” Yoongi stresses through gritted teeth, pointing at where the man’s heading with urgency and Hoseok stops, dropping Yoongi’s arm from where he’d had him half pulled to his feet so he falls again.

Yoongi sees him vault onto the brawn’s back just as he brings himself to a stand. Then, he follows, skidding across the floor as he makes a grab for the gun and some ammo at least, watching out of the corner of his eyes to see Hoseok hitting the man’s face repeatedly and resembling something close to a fussy toddler.

Yoongi’s hands fumble slightly when he reaches the weapon, head still spinning from his slip. Hoseok cries out when he’s thrown off the man’s back, the sound of him hitting the tiles, hard, echoing in the spacious room. Their attacker makes a grab for him. Yoongi ducks, dodging himself to his right and avoiding the fucking puddle this time as he leads back.

The magazine gets stuck as he tries to push it back in. Hoseok writhes on the floor. The man reaches out towards Yoongi, launching forward in an almost pounce. Yoongi jerks.

The man slips, falling on his wrist and exclaims, pain evident in his voice.

He breathes, reloads the gun, cocks it and aims.

“I don’t know if you’re one of the assholes involved with our information. Whether you’re one of the ones that beat up my friend,” The man squints at him, as if the fall was enough to make him delirious. The bone in his wrist is twisted unnaturally, cradled in his other hand.

“But, regardless, you tried to kill me and my right-hand man, and that I can’t let you get away with. Understand?”

Yoongi pauses, lets the man process his words. He half expects some weird, cryptic nonsense to come out of his mouth like the last low-life they took care of.  But it doesn’t. He doesn’t say anything, just grunts and throws his head back onto the floor. Yoongi almost feels bad, before he remembers that he likely wouldn’t have had any hesitation, never mind remorse if the roles were reversed.

His fingers tighten on the trigger, a shot rings out – the sound reverberates in the room.

“Hoseok, are you alright?” He asks the younger, shoving the gun back into his jacket and approaching his friend on the floor with an edge of caution. He cracks an eye open, glaring at him ever so slightly.

“Just fine,” he snips, and Yoongi can’t help but laugh at it, feeling as if they’ve switched personalities for a second. He holds out a hand, mouth still curved upwards with amusement, and the younger man takes it, grinning too when he does.

Hoseok winces when he straightens up, hands on his back and stretching until he hears a crack. Yoongi feels his head starting to throb from its impact with the floor.

“We should go,” Hoseok decides after a moment of them adjusting to what just happened, “I don’t have the energy to fight anyone else.”

He’s right, and Yoongi agrees, already walking to the bathroom’s exit as he says, “You lay on the floor for most of it.”

Hoseok laughs, jovially, though he swears, “Fuck off, I did not. Plus! You forget I spent a good five minutes with that douche before you got here.”

Yoongi pushes open the door, taking a look around before deciding that the coast looks clear enough for them to make a run for it. The door gets stuck when they try to open it, again, and Yoongi tries kicking it in the bottom left corner, near the hinge and grins to himself when it works here, too. No wonder people call Red Light one of the biggest shitholes in Seoul (he’s positive the Crescent Sector have them beat, though.) 

They’re outside on the pavement, a good street down from the building just in case and waiting for a taxi before either of them even speak again.

“Ah, seriously,” Hoseok whines, “I can’t believe the whole thing was a hoax.”

Yoongi’s mind immediately jumps to the reply of ‘I can’ but then he stops himself when he notices the younger man’s drooping demeanour: the way he’s standing almost lethargically, shoulders slumped, arms loosely folded, frown subconscious on his lips.

And Yoongi smiles softly, instead, giving his back a quick pat when he says, “It’s okay, Seok, there’ll be more things in the future.” Hoseok looks at him for a second, warm light in his eyes until Yoongi adds, “You know, real ones,” and he settles for burying said eyes behind his hands, groaning “I’m never gonna hear the end of this.”

“You are probably the only person in our gang that’d fall for that,” Yoongi agrees, thinking of the top members rapidly and concluding, yep, Hoseok’s definitely the one.

“Shut up,” he says without any malice to the words, “You aren’t supposed to talk that way to your best friend.” Then he pauses, a strange disconnected look on his face as he says, “Or you know, your ‘right-hand.’”

Yoongi snorts.

“It was gang business. I can’t call you my best friend on business.”

The younger gives him a sharp look out of the corner of his eye from where he’s staring straight ahead of himself.

“So, you admit I am your best friend?”

“Who else, dumbass?”

“Well,” the man drags, nothing good ever coming from it when he does so, “you called Jimin your friend. That’s a new title. I thought I might be getting replaced.”

Yoongi falters for a minute, admittedly caught off guard because he can’t even remember saying that, but okay. He hesitates for another instant, saying “That’s- that was just.” He pauses, a firmer stance taking over him as he turns to Hoseok with an assured “We’re not friends, I had to call him something.”

Hoseok grins. Why does Yoongi feel like he just fell into his trap?

“Then what are you?”

“Allies!”

The man has the audacity to scoff at him, face a non-verbal ‘uh huh.’ Yoongi promptly dismisses it with a clean, “Go to hell,” before asking, “How’d you even end up in the women’s bathroom, by the way?”

Hoseok stops his shit-eating grinning and scrunches up his nose in distaste.

“Ah, that. My manager dropped me off because she had another meeting to go to about my next album, and I didn’t really know where I was going, so I wondered for a bit-,”

“-in that creepy ass building…”

“I was tired, okay? It seemed normal on zero hours of sleep. I was rehearsing my lines all last night-,”

“-for a photoshoot?” Yoongi asks, incredulously. They're photos. There’s no audio.

“Shut up! You always have to be prepared in the entertainment industry,” he claims, moving on swiftly when Yoongi looks ready to argue, “Anyway, when I got down the corridor a little I heard voices. I couldn’t make them out perfectly but I heard the words ‘actually fell for it’, ‘that Mariposa bastard’ and ‘are you gonna kill him or should I?’ and got a pretty good idea of what was going down.”

He’d seriously never hear the end of it if he hadn’t.

“I was gonna go to the entrance door, but then I heard more people from the other direction, and I hurled myself into the first place I could find. I was hoping they’d check the men’s room first.”

In fairness, that was probably a pretty decent assumption, Yoongi figures, but he says “Well, you’re lucky I came to save you,” anyway.

Hoseok nods wholeheartedly, to his surprise, agreeing, “I am, actually. Thank you for being my knight in shining armour, Yoongo.”

The elder cringes outwardly.

“You’re welcome,” he mutters.

The taxi arrives, and just as they’re about to get in, Hoseok knocks Yoongi’s arm, shrugging his shoulders up in some attempt to look cute as he asks, “Can I stay at yours tonight, by any chance? Namjoon left my apartment key on my kitchen counter when he went to collect some transaction receipts with Seokjin, earlier.”

Yoongi nods without much thought, but then he stops.

“Again?”

“I’m calling a locksmith first thing in the morning. ‘Have them saved in my contacts, now.”

11^th May, 2017 | 12:01am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Hoseok sits in his reclaimed high school t-shirt after he complained too much about not wanting to sleep in his short-sleeved, custom-fit Armani shirt, ‘you dick’, and Yoongi didn’t have anything else to give him, really, besides that.

He’s sitting cross-legged on Yoongi’s bed, shoveling cheerios into his mouth (he’s the only one who ever eats them,) just having finished his small rant about how he totally thought he lost this t-shirt, but it was Yoongi this entire time. His own best friend. What a cruel world.

Yoongi just watched him, quietly waiting for him to finish.

When the man’s done with his bowl, he makes a sound of satisfaction and places it onto Yoongi’s nightstand which he will not remember to clean up himself tomorrow, throwing himself down onto the elder’s bed with a sigh of contentment.

“Are you gonna lie there all night?”

“That’s how you sleep, Yoongs.”

“In my bed.”

“You go sleep in the guest bedroom then – you know yours is ten times better, you selfish bastard.”

Yoongi sneers, but doesn’t argue any further than that, taking off his tacky shirt and jeans hopefully for the last time tonight, before he crawls under the covers, putting a pillow between him and Hoseok because, as he learned when he was barely six years old, Hoseok is a clingy sleeper and Yoongi despises it.

The room falls silent, and for a moment Yoongi thinks Hoseok’s gone to sleep before he opens an eye to look at him and catches his gaze following the floral pattern of his ceiling.

Yoongi waits a moment for the man to maybe say something, and when he clears his throat Hoseok glances at him briefly, a contemplative expression on his face.

“Something wrong?” The elder asks, and he hums, eyes scoping the room over Yoongi’s shoulder, distractedly.

“I was just thinking.”

Rarely a good thing.

“About?”

The man shrugs, saying, “Namjoon told us what you said about Seonghyeon making threats about all of us. And I realised… tonight was it, right?”

Oh.

‘If I were you, I’d keep a close eye on yours.’

Somehow, Yoongi didn’t even have time to properly make that connection.

“Yeah,” he admits, “I guess it was.”

Hoseok makes a funny noise, something contrastingly between sounding content and sounding troubled. It’s weird to see him like this: pensive and anxious. If he’s like it to anyone, it’s Yoongi. But, even then, it’s not a side of him the man ever really shows.

“We made it out okay, obviously,” he says then, “But it made me see that you were right about the Syndicate being able to get close to me, you know? Like, that was a company-approved deal. We had meetings, we met the people who were shooting and casting the movie. The people funding it. But it wasn’t real.”

Yoongi hums in agreement. He believed it without a doubt when he heard about the set-up, but it still shocked him. The plan was incredibly intricate. If it wasn’t for the gangsters who’d been talking in the corridor, then…

“Is this your way of admitting fanmeets are a bad idea?” Yoongi asks, suddenly, trying to break the tense atmosphere before both of them start making conspiracy theories together or something (because regardless that Hoseok often calls him paranoid, they’re as bad as each other.)  

He snorts, saying “Yes,” which was somewhat an unexpected answer if Yoongi’s honest.

“Fanmeets, signings, free acoustic sets, walking about Mariana, concerts, for God’s sake. I can’t really do any of it safely until this is over. What if one of my fans gets hurt, never mind me.”

He sounds beaten up about it, obviously. Yoongi wouldn’t expect any less from him. He sighs.

“Seok,” he says, the nickname having become a lot more frequent lately, to the younger’s amusement, “I’m only gonna say this once, okay?”

Hoseok looks at him, intently, head resting sleepily on his pillow. He nods.

“Your career means a lot to you. I know you like it more than the gang – don’t bother denying it-,” he adds quickly when Hoseok opens his mouth, sharply, “and I know you like seeing your fans and interacting with them however you can. I know you don’t want to play it safe, and that in itself is a warning sign for fuck-ups. So, what I’m suggesting is that, instead of jeopardising yourself with the power of reluctance, maybe you should get a couple of good people from Mariposa that you trust to keep around while you’re doing all of this. Like… bodyguards.”

He just hopes they work better than the men turned magicians he hired for Jimin.

Hoseok gapes at him.

“Seriously? I thought for sure you were gonna tell me to quit music.”

“I considered it,” Yoongi admits (only half-joking,) “But, I understand that it makes you happy.”

The man’s silent for a moment, and then erupts in something akin to an explosion, grabbing Yoongi’s cheeks and fluffing his hair, nuzzling their faces together (no, really) as he coos “Awhhh, my Yoongi-yah – aren’t you sweet?”

Yoongi pries himself from the younger’s iron grip, mumbling, “Shut up, idiot,” the ‘respect your hyung’ dying in his throat because when will any of them, as he pretends to be tired enough to sleep. Except he is and didn’t expect letting his friend crash to turn into a very strange cross between a sleepover and an episode of Dr Phil.

And just when he thinks they’re done talking, Hoseok asks “So, what’s been going on while I’ve been gone, huh?”

Yoongi peels his eyes open again, trying to convey some sort of ‘I’m tired let me sleep’ look to him, but Hoseok just smiles in anticipation.

Sleep may have to wait, apparently.

“Before you called, Seokjin, Tae and I ended up having to drive to Downtown to deal with a guy who sold fake stuff to our suppliers, who sold it to us. Which ended up with Taehyung almost getting shot trying to sell it to some buyers from overseas.”

The grin slips off of his face, replaced with wide eyes as he breathes “Fuck, no way. Did you get the guy?”

Yoongi nods, “We did. He wouldn’t tell us shit. But, then, just as I was about to shoot him I realised who he was; he started talking about Jimin – weird shit about ‘keeping him pretty.’”

“Wait, who was he? How’d you recognise him?”

Yoongi feels like he’s telling a rather morbid bedtime story.

“A kid that was there the night Jimin got stabbed told us about the men who did it, said one of them had weird facial hair. If the man didn’t start saying all of that bullshit, I wouldn’t have thought much of it, but it fit too well, I guess.”

Hoseok laughs, lightly, “Weird facial here? Strange thing to get called out on.”

Yoongi gives a small snort in response, and the room grows nice and quiet again. Yoongi can feel his eyes drifting shut, his breathing start to slow just right and any minute now, he’ll-

“So, you left Jimin home earlier?”

Yoongi doesn’t even open his eyes this time. Just internally yells.

“Yup.”

“Did he settle in well, again?”

Yoongi produces a short ‘pff’ at the question. It was like he never left, really.

“Went back to work tonight.”

Hoseok makes a soft sound of astonishment, “God, what a workaholic… you two have that in common.”

They do, unfortunately.

“He needs the money, I guess, He hates when I buy things for him,” Yoongi explains, the boy having told him that practically every time he said anything along the lines of ‘I’ll buy you it, don’t worry.’

Hoseok shakes his head, judging by the rustling sound of his hair against the pillow.

“Passing up a handsome older man willing to buy you anything? Is he crazy?”

“Yah, I just meant food and stuff. And not everyone is as shameless as you lot are.”

The younger makes a sleepy sound, settling under the blankets with a yawn.

“You love us anyway,” he says, confidently.

“Debatable.”

Hoseok reaches out (blindly?) and thumps Yoongi’s arm.

He doesn’t even trust the faux-silence this time. Just hopes that he might genuinely fall asleep mid-conversation because Hoseok always knows when he fakes it.

“Are you gonna see him again?”

Yoongi doesn’t say anything right away. He doesn’t know if his friends are even capable of not asking something like that at least once in a conversation, these days.

“Why are you all so interested in us?”

There’s a long pause. Yoongi thinks Hoseok’s fell asleep. And then he wonders if maybe he fell asleep, instead. But that’s not the case, evidentially, because eventually Hoseok starts trying (and failing) to form a sentence.

“It’s… We-,” he stops, exhaling lengthily, and there’s another short bought of silence before he says, “Jimin’s the… first person we’ve seen you give a shit about that isn’t one of us in, you know, a long time.” He knows exactly what he means. The ‘you know’ seems to be some sort of common phrase between all of them when they’re referring to his father’s and Misook’s deaths.  

“We want you to be happy, Yoongs,” he says, sincerity almost tangible in his tone, “And there’s something about Jimin that makes you act… like yourself again. I mean, you were always kind of a pissbaby-,”

“-hey-,”

“But over the past year, you’ve built up some sort of wall. You’re more human around him. We just… want to see what Jimin can do for you, I guess.”

Yoongi nods, though he doesn’t know if Hoseok’s even looking at him. On some level, he had the idea that that’s what his friends were trying to do. It’s strange to hear it admitted, though. He never really knew they felt that way about him.

He guesses Taehyung and Namjoon’s Storytime with the boy a few weeks ago makes more sense, now.

He’s noticed that ‘wall’ too. He can’t really remember when he changed, or how, but he knows that he didn’t used to feel so bitter all the time. So… hollow.

“Yeah, well. It’s not like that with us, if that’s what you’re implying.”

Hoseok sounds disbelieving, but he still says “Okay, then you need to find someone that it is like that with, then. Why don’t you go out? Get laid.”

Yoongi bites back a groan. Certainly a turn in attitude.

“Sex doesn’t solve everything, Hoseok.”

He swears he tells him this, like, twice a week.

“You used to think it did! You’ve gotten so tame, lately.” Yoongi scowls, eyes still closed, “In high school you were crazy. Every time I thought, ‘hey I haven’t heard from Yoongi tonight – where could he be?’ the answer was always a party or a bar.”  

“I’ve grown the fuck up, then,” Yoongi replies, but Hoseok just huffs, seeming a little less excitable than before.

“So quickly?”

“Hoseok-,”

“I’m just saying. Last party you went to without threatening to cut us all up into little pieces for even suggesting it was for your nineteenth.”

Yoongi knows. He remembers.

“Don’t,” he says, firmly, yet it loses its edge once it passes his lips.

“We just care about you, Yoongi.”

He knows.

“Fine, you know what?” he says all of a sudden, blinking his eyes back open to look at the man beside him as he shifts up onto his elbow, “Maybe I will go get laid. If you honestly think that’ll somehow fix this mess, then I’ll do it just to prove your ass wrong.”

Ignoring the fact he just called himself a mess.

“Good,” Hoseok enthuses, though Yoongi can hear the testing tone in his voice, “Let’s go out soon, then. I’m free next week, are you?”

Yoongi mentally swears. Numerous times.

“I never really know, being a mobster and all-,”

“Trying to bail?”

“No,” he says shortly, settling back against his pillow again.

“Next week it is, then.”

If Yoongi ends up becoming some sort of ‘fucking all my problems away’ person because of this, he is suing - Vaguely wonders if maybe Hoseok wants him to release that won’t work, or if he’s just hoping it will.

“Goodnight, Yoongi. Sleep well.”

He smiles - fondly somehow. Even past the annoyance.

“Night, Hoseok.”

18^th May, 2017 | 1:43pm | The Zinnia Tea Room, Ashtown Sector

There’ve been very, very rare times in his 'career' as a mobster that Yoongi has had nothing to do. No leads to pursue, no deals to partake in, no discussions with other gang leaders or Mariposa members. No confrontations to deal with. No annoying friends to drag him somewhere.

And it’s within these brief instances that Yoongi takes the time to do something he actually likes to do. More and more frequently, this has been taking a taxi to Ashtown (today he made it in a shorter than usual 36 minutes) and spending some time in the old tea room his parents used to take him and Jungkook to on summer afternoons. He hasn’t even told Jungkook he does this, sometimes, for no other reason than the fact that the kid was never very appreciative of tea and he’d rather not bring him along and have him complain the entire time.

The shop is relatively small, a pearly white sign decorated with zinnia flowers and stating the name of the place in pale blue. It’s always busy, every time Yoongi visits, but it’s rarely much louder than soft chatter, the kind that people listen to online to study.

It’s peaceful. Beautifully peaceful. And as Yoongi takes a sip from his cup, relishing in the hint of vanilla that follows the initial kick of strawberry, he appreciates the tranquility and the quiet. He loves being able to sit here, reading a book or just sitting and appreciating everything going on around him with no stress, no nuisances, no interrup-

His ringtone pierces through the gentle atmosphere. He gets amiable looks of surprise from most of the customers. No one here gets angry everybody’s too nice for that. It’s more of a pleading look than anything.

Yoongi answers it immediately, putting it up to his ear with a low voice as he greets the caller.

“Yoongi, you busy right now?”

It’s Namjoon. Yoongi internally sighs.

“No, not really,” yes, yes I am, “What’s up?”

“You’ll be excited to hear that I think I’ve found one of the men from the first CCTV footage.”

Yoongi sits up straighter in his chair. He’d asked Namjoon to have one last look over it, just to make sure he absolutely could not get anything useful from it. He didn’t expect for the man to find one of the bastards. God, his friend’s some sort of bloody wizard. 

“Shit, good job, Nams,” he praises, completely forgetting about his volume level and probably startling most of the lovely suburban families in the shop.

“I’m in Ashtown right now, but I’ll be on my way back, soon. Get some help and bring him to my apartment.”

“Right away, boss.”

18^th May, 2017 | 2:39pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Yoongi leans up against the back of his large sofa, awaiting the arrival of his friends with his soon-to-be victim.

He’d watched the footage again, just to refresh his memory on which bastard they’re talking about here, based on Namjoon’s descriptions. It’s the one they thought they had last time, apparently. Thing on his face, tattoo on his nape. Said thing is a scar, apparently. Go figure.

The video made him feel just as sick as it did when he’d last watched. Just as pissed and uncomfortable, if not amplified.

He takes note of the way his fist is clenched, knuckles white against the blanket thrown over the sofa and frowns at himself.

Definitely amplified.

And by the time the door finally swings open, Yoongi’s riled himself up enough to feel like being vaguely theatrical about the whole ordeal. Hoseok’ll call him a ‘fucking weirdo’ for it later, but to deal with a creep, it seems right to be one yourself.

The door handle bangs against the wall, it might leave a dent, but he’ll cuss them out for it later because right now he’s pre-occupied with the five men that have just thrown one scumbag at his feet.

Five men? Not often that happens, lately.

He sees Hoseok grin in a ‘happy to see me?’ sort of way. Yoongi grins back. But not because of his presence (he’d scoff any other day.) Because of all the fun they’re about to have.

Yoongi looks over to Namjoon, raising an eyebrow in question, and Namjoon understands the gesture immediately after seeing it a billion times.

“Kim Minjun.”

Yoongi nods appreciatively.

Kim Minjun, as he is apparently called, could be the spokesman for Syndicate members. Besides the large scar clearly retrieved in some sort of knife-fight, he’s got a natural glooming scowl and a generally nasty looking appearance from his unkempt hair, to his patchy stubble to his clothes tattered with slashes, holes and what appears to be blood.

A cliché, right at his feet.

Yoongi crouches. Eye-level introductions are important to him. He slants his head at him, grin spreading as he says “It’s good to see you, Minjun. Welcome to hell.”

Yoongi should’ve expected the spit, really. He snickers, wiping his face with the back of his sleeve before he stands up again. He takes a step back, gauging the man for a brief second before he swings his leg, heel connecting with his jaw with such force he falls to his side.

The cracking sound and his cry fill the room.

Yoongi slowly approaches Minjun, nodding to himself at the satisfying reaction. The fucker’s hand reaches out, trying to grab Yoongi’s leg but he raises his foot again, bringing it down with a loud snap.

The man wrenches the limp hand away with another wail, fingers distorted and sickening to look at. His friends remain silent.

Yoongi towers over him, bending his posture ever so slightly just to get a sliver of eye-contact.

“Disgusting, pathetic, despicable creeps like you don’t need those fingers. Not if you don’t know how to use them properly.”

He doubts the man even remembers what he’s referring to in particular. He’d considered showing the CCTV footage to him – show him exactly what he’s here for, but a part of Yoongi just wanted to see if he’d remember all on his own.  

“Do you know why you’re here?” He asks, then, cutting off whatever stupid remark Minjun was likely about to make. The man watches him for a moment, unadulterated anger striking up in his eyes.

“You want to know about your information.”

Yoongi snaps his fingers. That’s half of it, at least.

“Bingo.”

Then he sighs, “But… I’m not an idiot, Minjun. I know you don’t want to tell me. If I were you I wouldn’t want to tell me either. But I know you were there that night. Whether you remember or not. And that, in itself, is enough for me to want to make this the worst fifteen to twenty minutes of your life.”

Minjun lets out an amused huff.

“I don’t have anything to tell you about the information. Even if I wanted to, I don’t know anything. They don’t tell people like me things like that.”

“I see,” He says tiredly, sparing a glance to his friends who look on as equally despairingly. Another dead end. He isn’t incredibly surprised. But at least he’s ridding the world of one more asshole.

“But, I can tell you something…”

Yoongi peers at him, suspicion glaringly clear in it. There’s a catch. There’s always a catch. He’ll lean down, as the man is beckoning him to, and he’ll get headbutted and have to deal with a nice bruise on his otherwise bruiseless skin.

Yoongi stoops down again, anyway, following Minjun’s finger until they’re face to face.

“That boy,” he whispers into Yoongi’s ear, “is just a slut. And you can’t protect him. Not from the people he serves every night, not from the Crystal Syndicate, not even from yourself.”

Yoongi’s teeth clench as he stands up immediately, anger shooting through his veins. He’s tired of people bringing him up like that. He kicks a foot at the man’s injured hand again, barely feeling even half the amount of contentment he did from his groans before. He ignores the intent stares from his friends, knowing they’ll ask what he said later.

Minjun retracts his hand back to his chest again, sniffing hard with a weird easiness to his stare when he says “No matter what you do, Min, it won’t end the way you want it to for him.”

Yoongi wants to throw the bastard down a flight of stairs. Vaguely wants to throw himself down them, as well.

“How can you even know that?” he bites, grabbing a fistful of the man’s hair in his rage, “You said they don’t tell people like you their plan.”

Minjun shakes his head when Yoongi lets go, resting it against the wood of the floor, “I said they didn’t tell me about your information.”

He growls lowly, somewhere in his throat when he snaps “It’s the same, isn’t it? It’s all connected!”

The man smiles lopsidedly, almost to himself, rather than Yoongi.

“Yeah, I suppose it is.”

To Yoongi’s surprise, Taehyung cuts in here, appearing at Yoongi’s side in an instant.

“You meant Jimin, right? What do you mean it won’t end the way we want it to? What does he have to do with this, at all?”

It’s not a question Yoongi would’ve considered asking, but it’s one he’s been wondering practically since they met. Besides, they’ve got time, it’s not like Yoongi’s got anything to do except grind this man to a fucking pulp.

Minjun shrugs.

“Seonghyeon’s mind doesn’t work the same as anybody else’s. I don’t know if he even meant to get him caught up in it. Maybe he just wanted an excuse to fuck him. Everybody does.”

Kim Taehyung, chairman of the ‘Yoongi, do you have to be so violent every time we do this?’ committee, lands an absurdly strong kick to the bastard’s stomach, bringing his foot down on his mangled hand when it falls free from his protection.

Yoongi would be lying if he said he wasn’t impressed.

“It’s disgusting that you talk about a kid like that,” Taehyung adds, leaving out the fact that he’s the same age. Maybe that just further enforces his point.

Yoongi figures that the two must’ve built up quite a bond during his doctoring in order to get that sort of reaction from him.

Taehyung seems finished after that, drifting back to lean against the sofa with a soft frown. Yoongi looks down at Minjun, clutching his bleeding, bent, garbled hand, feeling nothing but a low swelling of anger in the pit of his stomach.

He slowly drops to his knees, takes the man’s other hand who has little resistance, noticeably woozy from the agony he’s likely in and clutches his pinky finger.

“This,” he says, “is for making me rush my favourite tea.” He pulls the finger to the side in one swift motion until there’s a loud snap. Minjun wails again, trying to pull his hand back, but his weakness is increasing, and it’s not like he can use the other one to help.

“This,” he continues, grabbing the next finger, “is for making me freak out the customers in the shop that sells my favourite tea.” Another crack, another sob.

For spitting at me.

For telling us jack shit and wasting our time.

For making them dent my wall with my goddamn door.

Fingers all successfully broken on both hands, Yoongi stands up. Breathing a sigh of relief.

“And now, Minjun,” he says tonelessly, reaching out a hand to the table behind the man for what he’d retrieved just for this moment, earlier.

“This is for Park Jimin. For what you did to him, for what your boss wants to try to do to him, and for making me believe for a second that you were right – that no matter what I do can’t save him.”

Yoongi runs a finger along the knife, smiling slowly.

“You’re familiar with this, right? Judging by that,” he points out the scar on his cheek, tip of the weapon poking it.

“I wanna give you a scar of my own. What do you want? A heart? An ‘X’? How about I do one better and make a clean little line across your neck, instead?”

Minjun makes a disorientated noise, face half-pressed to the floor.

“You’re gonna have to speak a little louder, if those are your last words.”

He inhales and exhales sharply, repeats himself louder this time.

“You… you can’t keep everybody safe. There’s no happy e-ending for you.”

Yoongi laughs, a dark, quiet sound trickling from his mouth.

“No, Minjun,” he corrects, placing the blade against the man’s throat who simply sighs at it, “There’s no happy ending for you.” 

He pulls his wrist across, blood gushing from the spot immediately as the man gasps and flails, hands useless in stopping the inevitable. Yoongi takes his eyes away from the scene, taking the handkerchief Hoseok holds out to him to wipe the blood of the knife, before handing it back.

His stomach feels sick, but not just because of the sight of blood.

18^th May, 2017 | 9:21pm | The Amnesia, Red Light Sector

Apparently, ‘Hoseok, I murdered somebody seven hours ago’ is not a valid excuse to get out of going out to some sleazy bar with him.

“If you always followed that rule, Yoongi, you would literally never leave the house,” was his reply, and he had to admit, he did have a point.

But, now, sitting the bar on a hard stool that seems as if it’s going to break and Yoongi’s going to fall on his ass any minute, Yoongi feels as if it wasn’t such an awful idea, after all. He maybe got a little too hot-headed over Minjun’s comment about Jimin, earlier. Hoseok’s right. He needs to get out. Distract himself from getting too… involved.

Hoseok even offered to buy him a drink, and now the two of them sit together, talking easily about anything at all and Yoongi feels kind of nice. But that could just be the third round talking.

“Just tell me if you see someone you like – I can take a hint,” Hoseok says for the fourth, maybe fifth time. Yoongi merely laughs around the bottle this time instead of telling him to shut up.

The place is somewhat quiet, the evening being still too early for most people despite the fact that the ‘nightlife’ kind of runs 24/7 in Red Light – it just doesn’t reach a real height for another hour or so. Yoongi feels reasonably content in the moment, and though it’s likely not what Hoseok had in mind, they’re still having a good time and really all that matters is he’s having a night out with his best frie-

“Oh, yeah, hello?” Hoseok says into his phone, the incessant vibrations which Yoongi had been blocking out all evening finally ceasing when he answers. Hoseok’s eyebrows crease over and he looks to Yoongi, asking the caller “Can’t I reschedule? I’m busy right no- Wait, they what? But I liked that song why would they scrap it without aski-,” he cuts himself off, frustration multiplying by the second.

A lengthy sigh.

“Fine, fine. I’ll come talk it out with them, just… make sure they don’t scrap the third track I’ve wanted a salsa number for years.”

He ends the call, sets his phone down on the bar and chugs the last of his drink. Then, he looks apologetically at Yoongi.

“My producer just told me that the company are going through my next album right now and taking things out. I need to get over there, they can’t say no to me when they can see me – I’m too cute,” he says, tone comedically melancholic for the last comment. Yoongi shrugs, pats the man’s shoulder and smiles a little as he says, “No big deal. Go ahead, I wanna finish this,” waving the bottle slightly in his hand.

Hoseok squints in disagreement at him, arguing “But I have to leave you home. Just down it and go.”

“I can walk back. Go before you don’t have any album left.”

Hoseok’s eyes light up at this as if he just remembered that that’s totally a possibility (they practically did it once before,) and he stands up, looking unsurely at Yoongi like it’s ‘Baby’s First Night Out’ or something.

“Don’t drink too much,” he warns, pointing a solid finger at him, “And get laid!” He adds soon after, making Yoongi grimace at him. It’s probably the only reason he’s agreeing to letting him stay.

Hoseok takes his phone from the counter, sliding it into his back pocket before giving Yoongi another quick glance, repeating “Get laid,” and then his brain seems to go back into its strange faux-hyung mode as he says “But don’t drink too much!”

Yoongi asks him if he’s hoping his album’s unrecognisable by the time he gets there. He goes soon after that, shooting him a thumbs up before he disappears.

Then, it’s peaceful again. Hoseok left his credit card.

“Hey,” Yoongi calls to the barman, waving the card at him, “can I get another round… or two. Make it two.”

This is for all the times that asshole didn’t pay him back.

Chapter Text

18^th May, 2017 | 11:09pm | The Galaxy Club, Red Light Sector

Jimin scowls when he catches his reflection in the mirror, noticing the carnage that’s formed with his hair, sticking up in clumps and spikes in just about every direction he can think of.

Some people seriously don’t know the difference between pulling hair and pulling hair from his head.

He smooths it down as best as he can, then, licking a finger and running it under his eye, he tries to clean up where his eyeliner’s smudged harshly because where the fuck are all the make-up wipes in this place? He swears if they’ve been all used up again by Chaewon or Hanuel (Or… Début and Sky, whatever he’s supposed to call them) Jimin’s gonna wake up with bad skin and unleash utter destruction. They’ve called him out for being pissy twice tonight already and it’s barely past eleven o’clock. Which he isn’t.

Okay, he’s a little pissy.

But, in fairness, most people would be a little pissy having to work in this absolute hellhole. Man, after a month of not working, somehow, Jimin forgot just how bad this place was. But now, a week on, and he’s fully, fully remembered.

And the worst part is, he’s not even sure if it’s the prostitution part that bothers him the most.

He doesn’t have time to wallow in his own self-pity right now, though, because he has no bookings left, i.e. has to go back into the main area to maybe pick up some drunk loser instead before he doesn’t make his share for the night and has to work in the club three nights in a row (nobody wants to work club three nights in a row.)

He finishes re-tucking his ugly 90s dad-style striped shirt into the clingy leather of his pants (and honestly who decided silk and leather went together? If any sort of light hits him he’s gonna reflect it and blind somebody,) and then he tries not to look as bitter as he feels. Practices a slow, alluring smile to the mirror, feels stupid and gross and decides, yep, all’s back to normal – let’s go.

The main area’s busy, which isn’t surprising because he can’t even really remember any times that it wasn’t, at least not so early into his shift. Jimin takes a disinterested scan across the room. He can see Hanuel- Sky, whatever- chatting up a group of drunk, giggly girls (Jimin never bothers with that. They won’t pay more than $50, he’d bet his entire ass on it) and Début entertaining some older men who’re sitting, relaxed, on one of the lounge seats, oozing a kind of superiority and egotism that Jimin wouldn’t willingly subject himself to.

Though Début and Sky are the two people he talks the most to (though it doesn’t mean much, because Jimin spends as little time here as possible,) generally, Jimin knows everyone he works with – so much so, that he recognises the faces of most regulars that come here, too, regardless of whether he’s personally dealt with them or not. He certainly knows about them, and who to avoid if he can simply from the rest of his colleagues’ bitching. It’s a funny sort of community, but Jimin cares for them, in a weird way. Most of them think he’s weird for that but he knows deep down they care, too.

For the most part, every client in the room is occupied, workers spread out evenly through the room. However, Jimin’s eye catches a lone figure in the corner, sitting on a cube seat with their back to him. He watches as a girl – Charity, if her signature red stockings are anything to go by – approaches the person, but they wave her away. Jimin watches the exchange with an air of confusion because if they’re not looking to get chatted up, why are they here?

The only reason he can think of is that they might be waiting for someone, but clients normally get to go straight to their appointment. Unless they’re waiting for someone from outside the club.

Before Jimin can stop himself, he goes and taps their shoulder.

“Excuse me, but can I help you wi-,”

Jimin stops as they turn around, taking in the pale skin and conflicting red lips. The stark black hair. The dark eyes that blink slowly back at him. The fucking mobster equivalent of Snow White, really. Fairest of them all, and everything.

“Yoongi?” He asks, confusion sinking obviously into his tone, “What the hell are you doing here?” Because he has no reason to be. He wouldn’t… get involved with any of this – he’s said it himself that he finds it depressing, inhumane (a nice kick in the teeth for Jimin, but anyway.)

And then, he realises just what the man probably is doing here, because Yoongi laughs a little, in an odd way he hasn’t heard him do before, almost sheepish, and he leans into him, clearly struggling with his motor skills and oh, Jimin can smell the alcohol off of him. Like a punch.

Yoongi rests his head on Jimin’s shoulder from where the younger boy’s crouched slightly and says “’Wanted tuh-to see you…” so slurred and quiet that he has to ask actually ask himself whether that was what he said.

“Oh?” Jimin asks, moving away from the man, but keeping a hand cupped under his chin so he doesn’t fall off the chair or something.

“What did you want?”

Yoongi shrugs, sloppily grinning at him – a version of his gummy sort of smile he’s had the pleasure of seeing quite a few times. Or, it could be some sort of smirk; it’s difficult to know with his condition, really.

“Did you want something? A room?”

Jimin expects him to say no, he really, really does.

But he nods, cheeks flushed pink from the liquor, a somewhat hazy look on his face and Jimin wants to ruffle his hair, knowing for once he wouldn’t knock his hand away and cuss at him for it.

But he’s too taken aback by the response.

It makes sense, he supposes. He’s not sure if it’s even possible for a drunk person to pass up sex but Jimin would not even consider doing anything for him like this. He will happily take his money, though and when the man digs into his pocket, bringing out his wallet, and pulls out some crumpled notes, he reminds himself to apologise for doing so the next time they meet.

Jimin tells him to follow him, and Yoongi seems a little more durable on his feet somehow than he was sitting down. He reaches out to grab Jimin’s hand, clumsily interlocking their fingers – a struggle Jimin would’ve helped with if it wasn’t so endearing.

He doesn’t hold client’s hands. Their wrists, at most, but he lets Yoongi. Technically, he’s not a client, anyway.

He opens the door to one of the empty bedrooms, closes and locks it so people know it’s occupied, and leads Yoongi over to the bed, disconnecting their hands with amusement.

“So, Min Yoongi – why are you piss-drunk and all alone, hm?”

Yoongi doesn’t say anything, just blinks at him seeming disconnected. Jimin wonders if he can process what he’s saying at all. Does he even know where he is right now? He must if he said he wanted to see him. Wanted a room, no less.

Tough luck, sweetheart.

Jimin goes closer to him, sits beside him on the bed, lets his hand ruffle his hair this time in some sort of attempt to make him more alert, though the man just smiles dopily and nothing more. Jimin had no idea he was even capable of acting like this, if he’s honest.

“Come on, baby boy, tell me so I can make sure you haven’t killed anyone or something.”

Jimin’s hand stills in the elder’s hair when he looks at him questioningly, and he retracts it with a sheepish kind of grin and a heat to his cheeks that he hopes Yoongi’s too out of it to notice. Breezily, he chuckles and says “Habit, sorry.”

Habit. Yeah, sure.

Jimin would vomit if he ever had to call one of his sloppy, greasy clients that.

But Yoongi doesn’t need to know.

“I like it.”

Oh, he thinks with an edge of amusement. He hadn’t been expecting that, either. Min Yoongi’s full of surprises tonight, apparently.

He gives a drunken sort of giggle and flops himself back onto the mattress.

Jimin sighs, but it comes out sounding a lot warmer than he’d intended it. And that’s a little disconcerting.

He needs to get Yoongi home before he pukes everywhere because knowing his luck Jimin will end up having to work in the club again tomorrow and he can’t work in a room smelling like vomit – no matter how much he always wants to puke, anyway.

“Can I borrow your phone, then, baby boy?”

Yoongi mumbles something along the lines of an agreement, coming out as a soft mm hmm and Jimin resists the urge to pinch his cheeks or something because who would’ve thought one of the most feared men in the damn country is actually adorable when intoxicated?

Seonghyeon probably grinds nails between his teeth and shoots his men for leaving the door slightly ajar (actually, he might already do that sober.)

He reaches into Yoongi’s trouser pocket where he can see the outline of his phone - although, Jimin’s heard him complain enough times about it digging into his thigh when he sits to know that it’d be there anyway – and he pulls it out with ease, flicking on the screen in hopes to see a cute picture, but it’s just an ocean view, seemingly abroad if the cobbled road and white buildings are anything to go by.

“Where’s this from?” He asks rather pointlessly, because it’s just a stock image from the looks of it. Probably a default that came with the phone, even. He’s really just wasting time because he doesn’t wanna actually work, isn’t he?

Yoongi lifts his head for a moment, staring dumbly at the screen but then he seems to remember – thankfully. He would’ve been slightly concerned if he hadn’t – and drops his head back down onto the bed, saying “The pluh-place m'parents met. Jin had a meeting with some associates awhile back in…” he pauses for a minute, face screwing up dramatically, “Madrid,” he says suddenly, sounding rather pleased with himself.

“‘N I came ‘cos I wanted to travel to the village after. He doesn't really... do much travellin' anymore though.”

Jimin lifts an eyebrow at this, entirely amused at the revelation.

“You’re a pretty good photographer, Yoongi,” he tells him, because the fact alone that Jimin thought it was a stock photo – the kind on a brochure or something - is evidence enough of that. An unusual talent for a mobster, but he supposes he was a teenager with interests and hobbies at one point too.

“What’s your password?” He asks, then, wiping the thought from his mind because the last thing he needs to be wasting more time thinking about is Min Yoongi as an awkward, probably scrawny teenager, unless he wants to not meet his share tonight and be considering burning the building down by the time his shift ends tomorrow.

Or, considering it more than usual, at least.

Yoongi mumbles to himself for a moment, as if he’s trying to recall before he answers “One, six… zero. Three. Zuh-zero, nine.”

Jimin types it in easily, pausing to himself slightly as the number flashes up on the screen. 160309. For a second, he thinks it’s just his birthday but then the 16 confuses him. One of his birthdays in particular?

He shrugs it off, figuring it’s not really any of his business anyway, and he clicks on the contact app when the phone opens, looking for Hoseok’s name before realising he doesn’t have to look very far because it’s pinned to being the second number on the list.

At least Jimin assumes ‘Seokie’ is the man he’s looking for.

How cute. He’s tempted to scroll down and see if the man has him saved as anything.

He promptly gives in and looks for his number, not having to go much further than the B’s when he spots it.

Brat.

Seriously, what kind of asshole has he gotten himself mixed up with?

Jimin definitely isn’t dumbly smiling at the name when he scrolls back up, finger hovering over Hoseok’s contact as he tells the man “I’m gonna call Hoseok to come get you, alright?”

He’s not smiling. It’s an insult. It’s a grimace on his face right now.

He’s just about to press call when Yoongi’s hand almost knocks the damn device out of his hand, his motor skills apparently having gone to shit with the alcohol as he outright whines “Wait… not yet, Jimi- Ji..Jiminin, Jim-,”

“Jimin, baby. Two syllables,” he reminds him, smoothing a hand through the elder’s hair and laughing under his breath at the man’s fumbling. Then, his brow creases lightly at his request.

“Why not yet? You need sleep.”

Clearly.

“Wanna sleep.”

“Exactly, so I’m getting Hoseok-,”

“No,” he snaps, but it’s nothing like the usual snaps he pulls. It’s not firm and cold or sarcastic, it’s pouty, almost childlike and Jimin finds himself completely in awe when he mumbles “with you.”

He stalls for an instant at that. With him? He doesn’t even try to stop his mouth from curving up in a surprised smile, though he still says “I’m working, Yoongi, I can’t-,”

“I paid you, duh-didn’t I?”

Jimin snorts softly. Pretends he can’t believe the words that come out of his mouth next, but knows he’d be more surprised if they hadn’t.

“Fine, just for a little.”

After all, he can probably coax the man into lending him another hundred or so just so he meets his share. He’ll pay him back! Eventually.

Jimin joins him, lying down on his back and relishing in the way the elder shuffles over to him, lets out a sigh as he curls his arms around him in a vice sort of grip that, again, he’s putting down to confused motor skills, and he lays his head on the younger’s shoulder.

Jimin strokes through his hair, peering at the sleepy, half-lidded eyes on the other man whose so close. He takes in the contented little pout of his lips along with the murmur of ‘you’re warm, Jimin,’ and the younger man giggles as quietly as he can, careful not to disturb him. He presses his mouth to Yoongi’s forehead, whispering to him. He doesn’t know if he even catches it, if the slow huffs of breath tickling Jimin’s neck are anything to go by.   

19^th May, 2017 | 11:38am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

“Go to sleep, baby boy.”

Yoongi takes a sudden breath, wincing when his eyes break open, unprepared for the blinding brightness feeding into his room. He heaves for a moment, heart racing why is his heart racing? He can still hear the lull of those words swirling around in his head and he doesn’t know why.

He forces himself to his feet after staring at the ceiling for no longer than a minute, instantly feeling a wave of nausea crash over him and his head is suddenly pounding. His tongue feels like it has no moisture at all, his throat’s scratchy. He can’t remember shit from last night.

Hangover.

Which is good. He’s not dying like he briefly assumed. That’s good.

He cracks open his bedroom door, stumbling down the corridor with zero poise and whips open the door to the kitchen. He just needs coffee. And water. Then he can calm the fuck down.

“I just had the weirdest dream,” he says to Hoseok who’s sitting casually at the counter, newspaper in hand. Last week’s from what it looks like, which is strange. Most people would find the fact that a person they had not remembered inviting over was in their kitchen, but Yoongi’s well, well used to his friends inviting themselves over.

One time, Taehyung stayed for a week in one of his spare room before Yoongi even noticed. He had wondered why the TV remote kept getting moved, but he figured it was just Mochi fucking with him.

“About?” Hoseok asks rather disinterestedly which is a little rude if you ask him but, again, used to it.

Yoongi joins him at the counter, slumping down in one of the stools as he tries to remember it properly.

“We went out last night… but you had to leave early and-,”

“Yeah, that wasn’t a dream. You got drunk like I told you not to, spent the night with Jimin and passed out.”

Yoongi splutters, feeling like his stomach just dropped out of his ass.

Well, that revelation certainly cleared his symptoms up a bit.

“Oh my God.”

Hoseok nods, flicking a page in the paper with a hum, “That was my reaction, too. Didn’t know you had a thing for him, like, in that way,” he doesn’t, what the fuck “But he said you got there around eleven and he didn’t call me until, like two. Plus, I checked your wallet because I wanted bagels for breakfast. Zilch.” 

They didn’t. They really, really didn’t. They wouldn’t.

But then, Yoongi thinks, maybe they did. Three hours at a club with a hooker, down roughly… five-hundred dollars.

There’s not really much more that can make it any more obvious.

“Anyway,” Hoseok says then, surprising Yoongi because he’s still not over this news, but fine, “I was waiting until you got up so we can go get proper breakfast instead - since I don’t know where you keep your secret stash of money.”

“The bank, Hoseok-ah,” he mutters pathetically, rubbing a delirious hand over his face. If he didn’t already have a headache, Hoseok would’ve given him one for certain.

“Really? I imagined a painting switch that’d turn around a wall and unveil a walk-in safe. You are a mob-boss after all. Credit fraud nowadays is a big issue.”

Yoongi stares at him, expressionless. He maybe laughs a little on the inside.

“Just… let me get dressed. Think of a place to go eat.”

19^th May, 2017 | 12:13pm | Carnelian Café, Red Light Sector

Trust Hoseok – freeloader since birth – to pick the most expensive café in the entire sector. He wanted to go to a place in Ashtown which would’ve been somehow even worse but Yoongi had pacified him by saying they could go shopping in Red Light’s (infamously overpriced) high-street after.

Probably a worse idea, but at least he won’t have to waste his gas as well.

“So, how come nobody could meet today?” He asks only lightly pissed, because trust all of his friends to bail on him the day that he told them was an important meeting. He was planning on letting them all in properly on his plan to take down the government and all that. Quite heavy stuff. Important things that he’d need everybody there for, to hear their opinions and ideas.

But no. Yoongi can’t have plans that run smoothly, of course not.

“Namjoon has a date with his mother – you know how close those two are, try telling him no. Jungkook says there’s some sort of double-AP week going on in one of his games – I don’t think he’s slept for, like, three days. And he has two accounts to look after since Taehyung’s busy today meeting at the bistro with Seokjin and Mr Han-,”

Yoongi makes a face in confusion, cutting in with “Who? Where?”

“You know,” Hoseok prompts, though he clearly doesn’t, “the manager of the restaurant we went to last month? Weird moustache… tiny glasses… an ugly tattoo of a diamond on the back of his hand. It looks more like a huge blotch, though, if I’m honest. The bodyguard guy had a scar on his face and some stubble…”

He stares blankly for a minute, letting the words sink in because all of that seems familiar… but not just because of the restaurant opening… how weird is that-

“Oh my God,” he breathes again, earning an alarmed look from Hoseok that he promptly ignores because they’re all so fucking dumb how did he not see it.

“What?”

“We have to go,” he says firmly, standing up at their pleasant table beside the window and promptly dragging Hoseok along, too. Thank the lord that Yoongi didn’t decide to go out in a t-shirt and sweats like the younger had suggested because he thought he was gonna take too long otherwise.

“Wha- now? But our food hasn’t arrived yet, Yoongi!” Hoseok whines, pulling at the grip the elder has on his wrist with no use and a lot of confusion. Yoongi throws a $50 note on the table and pulls him out of the café, startling quite a number of people in the establishment.

Yoongi walks briskly with Hoseok in tow down the sidewalk, feet almost stamping against the concrete as he huffs and sighs and grumbles to himself.

The Syndicate keep fucking up his plans. He’s going to have to deal with them and the problem with the info before he can go after the government, isn’t he?

The mere thought makes his blood boil.

“Get in and drive to the restaurant,” he stresses when they reach the car and the younger finally pulls away and demands what the hell he’s doing.  

“Okay, fine,” he relents, getting in just as Yoongi does, but looking extremely unsettled about it – as if his friend’s gone completely crazy and Yoongi has not. Not yet.  

“But what the fuck’s going on?” He asks, starting the engine. Yoongi doesn’t even bother flinching like he often does when he turns the key in the ignition.

“Our descriptions of the men from the CCTV, the ones from Dawon. We figured the one with the mark on his face was Minjun, right?”

“Yeah…”

“We’ve seen him before!” Yoongi says so suddenly and borderline excited that Hoseok flinches (though he flinches at most things,) “The bouncer guy at the restaurant had the same scar and stubble I swear.”

He looks at him, sceptical, as best as he can without taking his eyes off the road too long.

“Are you sure? It was kinda dark, Yoongi, and-,”

“Someone with a mark on his hand, covering the entire back,” he reminds him, “The restaurant owner has a tattoo that covers his hand. You said yourself it looked like a blotch! Hell, the muscular guy we kept hearing about could’ve been the one we ran into at the shoot last week!”

“I think you’re slightly hysterical,” The other man decides very calmly and how can he even be calm in this situation? Yoongi’s ready to pop off.  

“You don’t believe me?” He asks, voice rightfully shocked because it’s Hoseok.

“No, I believe you, I always believe you,” the man reassures, and Yoongi lets himself smile for a moment, feeling oddly jittery because they were stupid not to see it earlier, but they’re about to spoil things for the Syndicate again. It’s weirdly thrilling.

That is, if they aren’t too late. That is a thought he does not feel so excitable about. He doesn’t even know what accounts as too late. What are they trying to do, anyway?

“I just don’t want you to go off when we get there, okay? If the Diamante Bistro is Syndicate-owned then they have two of our friends right now.”

“The… Diamante. His tattoo was a diamond, the Syndicate’s mark is a diamond,” Yoongi says in disbelief, ignoring the younger man with a sense of practised ease.  

“Oh my God, you aren’t even listening to me, are you?” 

19^th May, 2017 | 12:29pm | Diamante Bistro, Red Light Sector

“Okay, you have your gun, you’re stocked up? We don’t know how many there are in there…” Hoseok whispers, crouching beside the entrance, weapon held tightly between his hands.

“Yeah, yeah. Now, be alert once we’re in they could be coming from any angle,” Yoongi replies from the opposite side, trying to peer through the crack in the door but seeing nothing.  

Hoseok nods twice, gives a silent countdown.

Three.

Two.

One.

Yoongi delivers a solid kick to the door, which bursts open, smacking against the wall with a loud bang. Hoseok and him rush in, aiming, fingers on the trigger.

“Jesus, fuck- Yoongi? Hoseok? What the hell are you two doing?”

Yoongi looks around the restaurant. The tables and chairs are all stacked, obviously the establishment isn’t open today. He expects to see goons and weapons and lots of dangerous, trademark Syndicate things. But his eyes land on a wide-eyed, lightly angry Seokjin who’d just questioned him, a Taehyung whose mouth has dropped open in disbelief and the manager – Han – who looks a ‘boo!’ away from a heart attack. All of them sit quietly at a table, with what looks like a contract in front of them for the partnership they’re supposedly striking up.

“He’s… he’s with the Syndicate!” Yoongi says, sounding suddenly very unsure, pointing a slightly deflated finger.  

Taehyung and Seokjin look at each other for a moment, shock evident on both of their faces.

Then they burst out laughing.

“Shut up Yoongi, no he’s not,” Seokjin says half playfully half Min Yoongi do not ruin this for us. He then turns to Hoseok, who’s started to lower his gun when Jin asks “Hoseok, is he high?”

Hoseok’s face flickers for a second, showing he’s just as confused as Yoongi is.

“No… he’s…”

“I’m so sorry about this, Mr Han,” Seokjin cuts him off, turning back around to the manager with a smarmy yet charming smile, explaining “Yoongi’s been paranoid lately and-,” but then he stops when he takes in his expression.

They all stop, because suddenly the manager has an unsettingly twisted smile on his face and he starts laughing. Big, maniacal, super-villain laughing.

His hand snaps up from where he’d had it hidden behind the table and unveils a small pistol, and when he points it at his friends sitting at the table Yoongi feels a dread-induced knot tighten in his gut.

Yoongi gapes. Hoseok brings his gun back up immediately.

He knew it.

“You have a skill for getting in the way, don’t you?”

Nobody says anything. Han seems displeased at how they both seem to adjust their aim.

“Put both of your guns down.”

“Like shit,” Hoseok snaps and Yoongi feels a spark of admiration towards him for it….

For about all of three seconds, because then Yoongi feels someone grab him from behind, arm digging into his windpipe as his own arm is bent back to the point where he accidentally lets go of the gun and he gets pushed to the ground. He gets only a brief glance at Hoseok, seeing the same thing having happened to him before he feels the unmistakeable sensation of the barrel of his own gun pressing against the back of his head while someone else ties his hands together. 

They fucked up.

“There we go. No more getting in the way for either of you. Now, gentlemen,” he says to Seokjin and Taehyung, both sitting mutely at the table, “let’s continue, shall we? We have a contract to sign.”

Yoongi’s mind is going wild, trying to figure out how to get out of this. And then, he sees Seokjin mysteriously widening his eyes at him and looking over to Han and then back, raising his eyebrows in an attempt to signal something to him.

Does… he want him to keep him talking?

Yoongi thinks for a second, gauging the manager who’s looking over the contract himself and he experimentally asks “What’s in the damn contract, Han?”

The gun pulls back from his head for a moment and he almost feels relief but then it’s being smacked against his temple and he curses at the pain of the hard metal that seems to sting even after the initial shock is passed.

Seokjin grins, and Yoongi reaches the conclusion that that is what he wanted. Unless he’s just grinning at watching him get hit. He doesn’t know if Seokjin actually has some sort of plan but he might as well go along with it. He always does.

“Speak when spoken to, Min.”

Yoongi stares him down, bitterness swelling through him because why does everybody use his name as some sort of mockery?

“But, if you must know, it’s something that’ll hand over the rights you have on these two workers of yours to the Crystal Syndicate, instead.”

Yoongi huffs. Of course it’d be something like that. Complicated and pointless. Most gangs would just shoot the two of them but the Syndicate always do things convolutedly.

“Why? So, they can’t run my trade for me?”

“Precisely,” Han says, beginning to look vaguely annoyed at Yoongi’s questions.

“You want them to start up a trade for you?”

“No,” he barks, “We don’t need that. We’ll just sell them to someone, most likely. It’s all quite legal with your signatures." He turns back to the two sitting at the table. Taehyung's face is contorted into a harsh frown, expression complex and confusing- Seokjin just looks lightly pissed. "Now, speaking of signatures…”

The latter gives him another desperate look and Yoongi’s mind struggles for an idea.

“Did… Moon put you up to this?”

Yoongi should’ve expected this hit, but once again the gun collides with his face, this time striking closer to his forehead and goddamn, is he bleeding?

“You should show some respect, you brat,” Han chastises. Yoongi’d roll his eyes if he didn’t want to risk another hit and a resulting concussion.

“Try telling him that.”

“He doesn’t have to show you any re- just. Shut up! Stop talking!”

“I will once you answer my question!” Yoongi bites back, lurching forward a little bit for dramatic effect. He doesn’t really care. It’s obvious that he did, if he’s talking about him so fondly, but Seokjin wants him to keep him talking so pulling out bullshit is the best he can do.

“Yes, he did. He said I could do with them what I felt best for the gang,” he mutters heatedly. Then, he pushes the documents closer to Seokjin with a harsh shove.

“Now, sign it.”

“What about Hoseok and I? What happens to us?”

“For fuck’s sake!” Han near about explodes, arms flailing upwards as he glares at Yoongi with frustration practically burning on his face.

He points a finger at Hoseok, fuming “For one, that idiot right there shouldn’t even be alive. But you got in the way! The whole attack had to be called off.”

‘Called off?’ Does he mean at the movie shoot? Hoseok was really supposed to… die?

Christ.

He’d silently wondered where the rest of the men had gone that night, but investigating wasn’t as high on his priority list as not dying was. It was called off because Yoongi showed up.

Jung Hoseok is one lucky bastard and judging by the look of astonishment on his face right now, he feels like it, too.

“Why?” Yoongi asks, not even having to fake his curiosity this time because it doesn’t make sense that they’d call it off since Yoongi showed up. That should’ve been lucky for them, right? “Don’t you all want to kill me, too?”

Han locks eyes with him for a moment, silent.

“Okay, that’s enough. Someone get him to shut up.”

Fuck.

Yoongi makes the same sort of gestures to Hoseok, praying he knows what he’s getting at when another man comes out from one of the back rooms of the restaurant, the area now filling up slightly with presumable Syndicate members, almost like an audience. The new man comes up to him holding what looks like a substantially nasty looking cloth, probably used to clean the kitchen, and Yoongi’s about to tell him not to go anywhere near him with that but then it’s too late and all that comes out are agitated muffles.  

Hoseok at least got his message and stumbles over his words for a second, seemingly as lost with what to say as Yoongi was.

“Uh… I need to go to the bathroom.”

Yoongi groans against the cloth.

“That’s literally the oldest trick in the book I will blow your brains out right now,” Han emphasises, shaking his gun at the younger man, “if you speak again.”

He throws a pen down at Seokjin, growling “Sign it!”

Seokjin sighs, picking up the pen and giving Yoongi a small glance of defeat. He just touches pen to paper when the door swings open again and he jumps so much he makes a line right across the page.

Before Yoongi can even look around to see what’s happening, there’s several gun shots, and Yoongi feels the gun against his head fall away, landing around his thigh. The few goons accumulated in the room drop one by one and Yoongi and Hoseok look up at the same time to see Kim Namjoon and Jeon Jungkook, a gun in each hand, looking like they just walked out of an action movie.

Exactly how Hoseok and Yoongi expected to walk in, actually. 

“Step away,” Namjoon demands in a low, furious tone that even makes the hairs on the back of Yoongi’s neck stand up.

Han’s face is the epitome of shocked, bordering on pissed his pants and his reaction seems to loosen the muscles in his body too because his gun plummets to the floor, arms shooting up in surrender.

Seokjin and Taehyung both stand up then, towering over the man when they do. Taehyung takes the contract in his hand and rips it up right in front of him, and Yoongi almost thinks the two are just going to leave him to grovel (which he would most definitely complain about- he took two hits,) but then Seokjin seems to want to get payback for him, because he pulls back his arm and hits a clean uppercut to the man’s jaw, who howls and stumbles backwards.

Taehyung lifts his gun off of the floor, holding it in his hand for a moment before aiming it.

“We’re gonna need a contract termination, Mr Han,” he says, pulling the trigger before the man can say anything in response.

Trust Taehyung to go for a corny one-liner right before he kills someone.

The restaurant quietens down as they all stare at each other. Yoongi gives them a second before he makes an unintelligible noise of one of you assholes remove this it tastes revolting and his little brother has the gall to laugh at him before he stoops down at removes the gag.

“At least someone got you to shut up - huh, hyung?”

That little shit.

They all laugh and Jungkook looks pleased with himself as he reaches to untie the elder’s hands as well, while Hoseok asks, “So, do we have telekinesis now, or?”

Yoongi gives Seokjin a look who wiggles his eyebrows at him, digging out his phone from his pocket as he says, “I have Nams on speed-dial, he heard the entire conversation.”

Speed-dial. Yoongi scoffs. He bets he has every single one of them on there, in order of trouble.

Namjoon nods, confirming, as Yoongi gets to his feet, rubbing his wrists because nylon rope hurts a whole fucking lot when someone wants it to.

“I was already over at Jungkook’s apartment because your mother asked me to check on him since the only time he stays at his is when he’s doing something he shouldn’t be.”

Jungkook grins seeming conisderably satisfied with this statement. But, then, he gives a short gasp when he looks across the room and sees Taehyung casually leaned up against the bar, without a scratch- but the boy still rushes right over to him, cupping his face in his cute little hands and muttering a whole string of mushy shit that Yoongi doesn't care to listen out for (Seokjin can't relate, by the looks of things) as if his best friend has just been through hell and back.

You know, like his own brother kind of has been.

Instead, Yoongi looks around the room at the dead bodies littering it and hopes that no civilians come in before a Syndicate member does because they’ll probably get the biggest surprise of their life.

“Anyone hungry?” Hoseok asks, suddenly- too suddenly... and before he can tell him he’s not taking everyone out for food--don’t get any ideas, he adds, “Yoongi made us leave before we even got breakfast.”

To save two of our friends’ lives.

And yet those backstabbing friends agree. All of them do, infact- even the boy clinging onto his almost-sold-off-to-gangsters best friend.

Yoongi sighs. He feels his wallet hurting already.  

21st May, 2017 | 10:24pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

It seems that Ryu took his complaints to heart last time they met, because she informed him a few days previous that she had business with an apparently unruly gambling den down in Full Moon who’d been keeping a little profit for themselves, and once she was done, she could pass through Red Light on the way back and come to see him.

She’d spent the first half an hour complaining about what a burden the entire thing had been. Not even worth telling Yoongi about (though she proceeded to in immense detail anyway) but she knew if she didn’t go it wouldn’t be sorted. On top of that, there’d been the almost two-hour journey to get to the den and he knows she hates travelling.

She chirpily reassured him that the thieves would be replaced quickly and with people a lot more loyal and then begged Yoongi for some sort of alcohol so she could hopefully fall asleep on the journey back and not have to make small talk with her driver.

By now, well over an hour since she’d arrived, they’re down a bottle of white wine and have promptly updated each other on all the important business issues that each other should know about.

“No news on the Syndicate in Umbra?” Yoongi asks, already anticipating the answer since the woman hadn’t come into his apartment bursting to tell him about it.

“No,” she says as expected, taking the other bottle Yoongi lay on the coffee table into her hands and popping it open. Then, she tugs on her tie to loosen and throws her feet up on Yoongi’s sofa, looking very satisfied as she does.

It’s strange seeing her in anything but an evening gown, since he always visits her at the casino nowadays, but she’d explained that this was her business suit. She needed the gangsters to take her seriously, after all, and that rarely happened in a dress – in fact, it rarely happens at all if they don’t work directly for her.

‘Get some fake facial hair, really assert your dominance to them’ he’d jokingly told her. She looked at him very seriously and said ‘I’ve tried that.’

“It’s been weirdly quiet up there, actually,” she admits after taking a quick drink, “I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not.”

“We can be thankful for it until we’re given a reason not to.”

Ryu looks at him suspiciously out of the corner of her eye.

“Not a very cautious attitude. Very unlike you.”

Yoongi sighs, accepting the bottle when she hands it to him, sitting with his feet up on the coffee table beside her and takes a swig before he says, “Everyone keeps telling me I’m too paranoid. On the inside, I’ve already thought of three reasons why it might be so quiet – none of them good.”

“Let’s hear.”

Yoongi hands her the bottle again, and holds up one finger.

“They’re trying to lure us into a false sense of security.”

He adds another finger.

“They’re too busy plotting something bigger.”

He lifts up his thumb.

“They’re trying to stay out of our radar to surprise us later.”

Ryu studies him for a minute, seeming to think about his ideas with a thoughtful “Hm.”

“Hm?” Yoongi echoes, intrigued to hear her insight on it.

But then she deadpans, “Your friends are probably right, you sound a little paranoid.”

“Not you, too-,”

“But it’s good that you are!” She cuts him off with an eccentrically enthusiastic gesture. Yoongi and just about everyone else disagrees. “You’re alert. You’re prepared. You just told me your paranoia saved two of your friends’ asses the other day, right?”

Yoongi smiles at this, nodding to himself and feeling oddly pleased. Hell yeah his paranoia’s got him somewhere - suck it, everyone.

He evaluates this remark over in his head and decides he’s probably had enough alcohol for one night.

A small silence befalls both of them and while Yoongi finds is peaceful, Ryu doesn’t like silences that much, she’ll start whining if he doesn’t say something.

“So, what’s been going on in your life, lately?”

She looks marginally relieved and happily replies, “Business, mostly – I’m sure it’s the same for you.”

It always is, depressingly.

“Yeonja and I had a picnic last weekend.”

“How romantic,” Yoongi quips, the idea humorous to him although he’s always known Ryu to be a bit of a hopeless romantic. He guesses it’s just the idea of a gangster eating triangle-cut sandwiches on a picnic blanket with her girlfriend.  

“I am quite the Casanova,” she admits readily, oozing charisma and grease when she winks at him. Yoongi scoffs. “But how’ve you been? No romantic endeavours?”

Yoongi gets a brief flash of Hoseok telling him how he’d spent his drunken night a mere few days ago, and tries not to shiver and catch himself out. It still makes his entire body squirm just thinking about it.

“No, I don’t exactly have time to go out and woo somebody,” not a complete lie. “This whole problem with the Syndicate’s been driving me crazy. I keep waking up in the living room and the kitchen with my face smothered to my laptop because I got used to Jimin telling me to go to bed when it got late,” he gripes, still having a small crick in his neck from having fallen asleep in his arm chair and rolled onto the floor last night. He woke up and banged his head on the coffee table.

“Poor idiot,” she says cooingly and Yoongi gives her a light shove to which she snorts at, taking another sip from the bottle with surprising poise. How high is this woman’s tolerance? She drank most of the first bottle, too. And she said she had a few beers down at the den just to supposedly 'fit in.'

“He healed up well, then?”

Yoongi gives her an affirmed nod and she smiles, clearly pleased, chiming, “Good, I’m glad. You should’ve invited him over!”

He crinkles his nose at this, looking away from her beaming face because the thought of inviting Jimin over, having to actually face him makes his stomach clench and he’s still holding onto the hope that Hoseok got it wrong because if he didn’t then Yoongi looks as bad as the boy’s clients – as if he thinks that sort of thing is okay.

And it’s not. It’s not okay to pay somebody to do that when they don’t want to and it’s certainly not okay that all that’s been going through Yoongi’s head lately is how he can’t remember it at all and that makes his imagination do things it shouldn’t. Wonder what they did, how he sounded, what he said. Remembers his chest and his thighs from when he’d seen them a few months ago in the boy’s apartment and thinks how it must’ve been to touch and…

Ryu’s staring at him, isn’t she?

“Why? He’s probably working, anyway,” Yoongi mumbles, feeling his palms sweat slightly as he tries to focus on something else. God, he needs help. This has been plaguing him ever since and it needs to stop. Hoseok’s probably right, he should’ve gotten laid. Not drunk… If that’s what really did happen - he can’t remember.

“Because,” Ryu says, still looking at him strangely, a look which Yoongi cleanly avoids, “I barely got to even talk to him at the casino except for, like, two minutes before you left.”

Oh. Yoongi’d completely forgotten about that mystery.

“About that. What happened while I was gone? I got the feeling he didn’t like you all that much,” Yoongi says, wincing at himself when he realises he’s avoiding even saying the boy’s name for fuck’s sake.

“Misunderstanding,” Ryu replies rather secretively, a corner of her mouth upturned for effect.

“By what terms? He said you were telling him about Yeonja?”

“I was,” she confirms chipperly, “I was telling him about how when her and I first met, we fought constantly. It was kind of comical to everybody else, but we had this sort of rivalry going on. We were friends, but god, did we bicker.”

“You did,” Yoongi almost groans, remembering how much he had to listen to her complain about it.

“And you remember I hated her friend, right? The football player?”

“The one you religiously called ‘Douche King’ for like three months, yes.”

To his face, once or twice, might he add.

“And I never realised why I hated him until one day Yeonja had enough of my death glares and asked me. And I couldn’t answer her. All of the reasons I had for hating him had to do with them but not him. Things like they told their own private jokes that I didn’t understand or they sat too closely together. I was just jealous because I had a raging crush on her, you know?”

Yoongi hums, trying to remember a younger Ryu telling him this, likely shaking his shoulders hysterically and yelling.

“Yeah, he was actually really nice, wasn’t he?”

Yoongi actually thought he met the wrong guy at first with how wrong the things Ryu’d said about him seemed to be.

“Uh huh. So, I told Jimin all of this and then I asked him: why don’t you like me?”

Yoongi raises an eyebrow at this. Bizarre question.

“And what did he say?”

“Nothing. He laughed, went a delightful shade of pink. Apologised and said he did, he just thought he didn’t. And do you know what I said?” She asks him leaning over to them with an intensely questioning gaze. Yoongi shakes his head, telling her to tell him and finding himself weirdly on edge just from her theatrics.

“’That’s what I told Yeonja that day, too.’” She says grandiosely, as if she just dropped the biggest secret of the century and Yoongi’s vaguely entertained, snorting at her. Then, she leans back a bit, smug look on her face when she asks, “You understand what I’m saying?”

Yoongi blinks at her.

“You… you had a point to that story?”

The smugness disintegrates and she throws her head into the cushion beside her, letting out a loud groan.

“You’re as dense as a sack of bricks, Min Yoongi.”

Chapter Text

24^th May, 2017 | 9:58pm | The Galaxy Bar, Red Light Sector

Yoongi has spent the last three days going slowly insane, he’s sure of it.

Trying to figure out the Syndicate’s next move, whether anything else could be a set-up in their lives (he’s asked all of them if they’ve gotten any offers for anything at all lately – it’s a unanimous ‘no’) and what to actually do to end this problem.

And then, there’s also the issue of trying to figure out why Ryu had left so frustrated with him the other night and what her point to her story had been.

But really, the cherry on top of the ‘Yoongi’s going to implode’ cake is Park fucking Jimin.

Poor choice of words, perhaps.

Any sheer mention, passing thought, an advertisement for Louis Vuitton has left him feeling jittery and restless and he doesn’t understand why.

But now, the very thing that could make it worse is that his ally from Demonia that owns the port wanted to meet with him to discuss the shipments that would be arriving next month since he’d been visiting relatives in Ashtown and figured why not? Also, he’d heard about one of the bars in Red Light and really, really wanted to try it out.

Fate wants to see Min Yoongi suffer. Really.

Because Yoongi is sitting in The Galaxy Bar out of the probable thousands of other places in the sector (hell, Yoongi would’ve went to Ashtown if he wanted – though it’s mainly just cafes) and he’s trying to pay attention to what he’s being told by his ally, Choi (not first-name basis.)

Except that’s proving to be practically impossible because he’s been caught looking-not-staring at Park Jimin a total of three times, and each of those times the boy has either smiled or winked at him and Yoongi has blushed, no sugar-coating. He’s really felt the heat burn onto his skin and he has no idea why.

Okay, he has a little of an idea why. It’s the first time he’s seeing him after their last meeting and Yoongi has had far, far too many thoughts of the night to really look the boy in the eye ever again.

But he has. Three times.

And now, Yoongi’s finding it even harder to pay attention to Choi because Jimin’s standing at the table just opposite them, chatting to the man sitting there by himself with little interest in the boy’s part and too much in the man’s.

“And we’re expecting an order of heroin coming in from Thailand in a few weeks. Would you like us to keep an eye on that for you, find out where it’s heading?”

The guy is definitely too interested. Yoongi’s expecting him to start drooling any minute now and oh, God, where is that hand going is he- wow, he’s really touching his ass.

“Mr Min?”

Who’s that shameless? Yoongi takes an angry gulp of the red wine in his glass. It’s not that great. This bar is sort of shitty. The customers here are sort of shitty. That guy right over there?

Shitty.

“Mr Min.”

Yoongi feels a light tap on his forearm and his gaze swings round to look at Choi.

“Yes?”

“I… the heroin? From Thailand?”

Yoongi has no idea what he’s talking about.

“Yeah, sure thing, Choi… sure…” he looks back over to the table and neither the man nor Jimin are there. In fact, Jimin isn’t in the room at all. His first thought is Syndicate – as if on automatic - but then he remembers it’s likely just Joonho’s money-loving ass’ rule.

‘if you see a waiter you like, you can take ‘em out for some ‘alone time.’

Yoongi’s grip tightens around his glass. Though, he forces himself to look back at Choi and actually try to pay attention now. Jimin’s a prostitute. He does stuff like that almost every night of the week. It’s no big deal, it’s his job. No need to linger on it.

“What else has been happening?”

Choi’s brow furrows.

“At the port, sir? Nothing besides what I’ve told you. It’s mostly been either drugs or regular things like clothes and-,”

“No, no,” Yoongi interrupts, “I mean in Demonia. What’s been happening?”

The man opposite him hesitates for a moment, and then he makes a noise of indifference, following it with a light shrug.

“Nothing, really. There’s of course, been the usual things like a few gang conflicts. Mostly stuff that’s travelled over from Full Moon – you know how that place is,” he says and Yoongi nods in complete agreement. Full Moon is something of a problem area, being on the border between Yoongi’s territory and Seonghyeon’s. It’s somewhat a breeding-ground for fighting and skirmishes between Mariposa men and Crystals.

It’s sort of the unwanted child among Yoongi’s family of sectors.

“Besides from that, I haven’t heard of anything else. The Crystal Syndicate haven’t even made any orders or claimed any shipments lately.”

Yoongi narrows his eyes at this, looking past the man’s shoulder in thought.

Another person telling him the Syndicate have been laying low. Why are they laying low? Why haven’t they done anything with the Mariposa’s information yet? They have it, don’t they? Can they not crack it? Did they not break through the security fully?

Choi keeps chattering on for twenty minutes or so, talking about anything and everything from funny shipments for things like five-hundred thousand bouncy balls, to how his wife and kids are doing.

And it’s after those twenty minutes that Yoongi notices the guy who’d left with Jimin comes back and sits down at his table, obviously having done something judging by the blissed-out look on his face and the redness littering his skin. Jimin doesn’t come in after him, so Yoongi decides he must be getting cleaned up. Maybe catching his breath. So, he waits.

Choi tells him about how they almost dropped a crate of ruby-encrusted jewellery into the ocean after one of their machines used to take the shipments off of the boat malfunctioned.

And he waits.

Choi mentions how he and his daughter had planned on going to a football game last week but it rained so hard the pitch was completely flooded and they got a free ticket to watch basketball next weekend instead.

And he waits.

He tells him about how his wife decided she was going to cook something from a recipe she’d seen online earlier in the day and she burnt it so badly that it melded onto the cooking pot and they had to throw it out. It’s not her fault, apparently, he’s the one that normally cooks in their family.

But there’s no Jimin.

So, after another fifteen minutes, Yoongi excuses himself in the middle of the man’s story about how he accidentally opened a crate of locusts after worrying about the buzzing sound being potentially dangerous and he had to call an exterminator before his boss got back - and Choi looks surprised, mouth closing mid-sentence with slight disappointment.

Some people just love to hear themselves talk, don’t they? (He’ll admit, though, the one about the crew ordering in a load of party poppers for their supervisor’s birthday and getting him to open it and scare the living shit out of him was pretty good.)

Yoongi leaves the bar through the back exit, feeling the warmth of the night in full-swing when he steps out, going along the alleyway and to the fire-escape of the club, right beside the dressing room. He doesn’t have to guess where Jimin’ll be. Almost every time they encounter each other here, that’s where Yoongi finds him.

He doesn’t knock, just opens the door, though he thinks he can hear sniffing before he does and, sure enough, when he enters the room, there’s a person crouched over beside one of the mirrors, dabbing at their face with a wet-wipe.

He seems to have expected someone else, perhaps another worker just coming in for a break, because when he sees Yoongi he simply chokes on a sob, looking away again with a small frown that he knows has nothing to do with him, personally.

Yoongi steps further into the room, voice soft and gentle when he says, “Jimin-,”

“Go away,” he mumbles, though he sounds somehow unsure - not turning to look at him again, just continuing to fix his appearance. And it’s only when Yoongi gets close enough to see the boy’s reflection properly in the mirror that he realises what he’s trying to fix.

“Did that just happen?” Yoongi asks, sitting down beside him on his knees and pointing at a gush of blood spouting from a split in one of his lips, and observing red marks across his cheeks and jaw that look like spots to grow into bruises. It’s rather obvious they did. Yoongi definitely would’ve spotted them at the bar, make-up or not.

Jimin nods, hand shaking as he wipes his face more, another tear slipping down his cheek while he does.

“Does it hurt that much?”

He shakes his head now, dropping his hand into his lap. He takes a moment to try and steady his breathing, sounding ragged and uneven from crying, and says, “I-it’s not muh-my f-face…”

Yoongi arches an eyebrow, about to ask him to elaborate when he freezes.

The boy seems to know the exact moment Yoongi realises, because suddenly his body is wracked with sobs and he’s shaking, shoulders convulsing as if he has no control over them and every cry makes Yoongi feel paralysed and helpless.

It’s his job, Yoongi’s brain says, but still, he doesn’t think twice before he’s wrapping his arms tightly around the younger and pulling him into his lap, careful not to disrupt him too much in case he puts him in any more pain.

He brings his mouth close to his ear, whispers “You’re okay, now, darling. It’s alright,” and for a moment it’s as if the words actually soothe him. But it’s just a fleeting effect, because then he’s trembling again, hands curled into almost angry fists near his face.

Yoongi’s never once seen him like this in the two months he’s known him. He’s hardly ever seen anyone cry this much. But, yet, the boy sits in his lap, bawling against the smooth material of his suit jacket and, for once, Yoongi wishes he would’ve worn something more comfortable. A jumper he could’ve wrapped him up in, instead of the boy’s stiff-looking uniform.

“I didn’t know you still got like this.”

He shouldn’t feel surprise, but he guesses that he mistook Jimin’s upbeat personality for meaning he was immune to the sort of turmoil that he faced on a nightly basis.

Jimin hiccups, forcing down another sob when he says, “I-it d-d-doesn’t get easier,” and though it’s muffled by his clothes, Yoongi can hear the bitterness, the fragility in his tone and he holds on tighter, rubs a soothing hand over his back and leans in to press a chaste kiss against the boy’s neck, where the black shirt dips into a collar and not even grasping that he did until he pulls back. Jimin’s too distraught to react.

“What happened?”

He can’t help but recall the fact that Jimin had once told him he had ‘had worse’ in reference to his work as well, and wonders if that still rings true - if he’d been in an even bigger state then. Had he had anyone to comfort him like this or was he alone?

Yoongi guesses the latter, but hopes he isn’t right.

Jimin doesn’t speak immediately, just sniffing to himself until he lifts his head from where he’d cushioned it against the crook of Yoongi’s neck and looks at him with a hesitant expression, eyes glassy and wide for a moment. Then, he diverts them to look to the wall behind them, instead.

“I d-don’t know. Nothing was… different. He wuh-wanted to take me to the club. Buh-but when we got there I… didn’t want to. I never want to but I ne-ver usually s-say it...”

Yoongi’s hand reaches up to pet his hair, and the boy falls back against his shoulder again with a minute sigh.

“B-but he did. And that’s all that m-m-matters...”

Yoongi thinks his heart breaks a little hearing that. Something so repulsive being so obviously normal to him - reducing him to such a state.

“It’s not right, Jimin. This isn’t right at all.”

And then, something ignites in Yoongi without his permission because words tumble out of his mouth before he can even stop them.

“You’re not working here anymore.”

I can’t have someone hurt you like that again.

He feels Jimin tighten up in his hold and the boy pulls back with barely hidden panic.

“What? Yoongi d-don’t be silly, I have to. I need the muh-money.”

Yoongi shushes him, hand petting through the back of his head as he assures him, “You don’t, it’s fine. You can work for us,”

I’ll buy you anything you’d ever need.

He has no idea what Jimin could do in Mariposa – what he’d allow him to, more specifically - but he doesn’t take it back. He wouldn’t dare, not when the boy looks so underlyingly hopeful.

“I have to finish up this meeting, but you need to tell Joonho, okay?” He seems vaguely unsure, taking his bottom lip between his teeth in something akin to worry, but then Yoongi says “Or I’ll tell him myself.”

And he nods with a sense of firmness, as if he’s trying to convince himself rather than Yoongi.

“Alright.”

It’s maybe now that they’re both supposed to move. Go do the things they’d just decided they would. Yoongi can’t believe he agreed. He can’t believe he suggested it at all, but above that, he can’t believe how relieved he feels now that he has.

He doesn’t understand it. Doesn’t understand why he wants Jimin to never, ever hurt again so badly. Why every sob made Yoongi flinch, like they stung him. Why he’d been unable to keep his eyes off of him all evening, or practically any time he’s been around him – now that he reflects on it.

Doesn’t understand it at all.

That is, until he grasps how his arms only tighten around the boy when he shifts to maybe move, and how content he feels when he dips his face back to the crook of his neck. Then he realises.

He doesn’t want to let go.

His mind is a flurry of half-finished thoughts and raw, unfiltered feeling. He feels light-headed and completely grounded all at once and it’s when he feels Jimin’s arms loop around his waist, feels his weight shift on Yoongi’s thighs to make himself more comfortable that Yoongi has a second realisation, much bigger than the last.

He likes Park Jimin.

The statement itself sounds childish, but then, it matches the widespread grin that emerges on his face in the moment. One he’s very, very glad the boy doesn’t see.

He cares for him. He wants to be with him. Right now, he wants nothing more than to hug him tight and not let go.

They sit there for what feels like a lifetime, and yet still not enough. Jimin makes Yoongi promise that, if the guy is still there when he goes back out, he won’t kill him.

Yoongi promises. But only because it’s him that asks.

The compromise itself makes him wonder how he hadn’t figured any of this out sooner. Had he felt this way about Park Jimin the very night they met?

He thinks back to how he felt so breathless when he first saw him, to how protective he felt soon after and decides that, yes, maybe he had. And maybe later he’ll think of this revelation as a bigger issue, how it’s a sign of ‘getting attached’ just as Seonghyeon had told him not to. But right now, with the person he wants to be with safe in his arms, Yoongi thinks that’s okay.

--

They’re walking back to Jimin’s apartment, and the boy is all smiles now, as if tonight never happened. Yoongi tries not to think about how that’s slightly worrying, a little unhealthy and just be glad he is instead because Park Jimin smiling and happy is the version he likes best.

Except, version is perhaps misleading, now because up until very recently, Yoongi thought that the timid, insecure kid that had tried to cook him breakfast, and almost burnt down his apartment, the dazzling, beautiful man with sensual eyes and more shine to him than the sun and the fiesty, self-important troublemaker that picks fights with the worst people and gets himself into more problems than he should were all entirely different people. Facades, almost. He wanted to know which was ‘The Real Park Jimin.’

But now, on the night that he’s practically seen every so-called version of him in a matter of moments, he's come to the conclusion that they’re all an incredible amalgamation that make up the boy himself.

Yoongi wants to hold his hand, which isn’t an entirely new thought – but one that he no longer pushes to the decrepit areas of his mind. However, he settles for watching the boy cross his arms over himself, talking dynamically and pulling Yoongi’s jacket tighter around him (it’s still not that cold, but Yoongi’d insisted.)

Jimin offers for him to come in, stay for a while, even though it’s getting rather late and Yoongi was planning to walk back to his apartment instead of taking a taxi. Though, regardless, he accepts because, as he knows his friends would put it, he has that sweet spot for him. Something he’s decided he can no longer deny, and promptly appreciates that it could roughly translate to being whipped.

But it’s when Yoongi’s sitting cross-legged beside the younger who’s laying on his side on the covers of his bed, as Jimin’d told him that his sofa wasn’t the most comfortable place to sit, that Yoongi vaguely comes off of his high of liking Park Jimin, because it’s only then that the quiet anguish present in the boy’s aura earlier makes a reappearance.

Yoongi’s heart sinks, particularly when he remembers his drunken escapade, and he doesn’t dare reach over to touch the boy in sympathy when he says, “After seeing you tonight, Jimin… I… feel revolting for ever being involved in that – sober or not.”

Jimin pushes himself up to his elbows, giving Yoongi a look of sheer confusion.

“You didn’t. You… when did you?” He sounds scandalised, and Yoongi almost flinches at it, looking away from the boy’s judging eyes as if they’re too much for him.

“When I was drunk? Last week. Hoseok told me I paid you… and stayed for a few hours, so-,”

Jimin sits up in a flash, and this time Yoongi does flinch when the boy grabs his arm and snorts, “Oh my God, Yoongi we didn’t- You didn’t. We didn’t have sex.”

He stops, brows pinching together.

“We didn’t? Y-you mean… nothing happened?”

He’s been lowkey freaking out over nothing?

“Yes!” Jimin says loosening his impulsive grip on the elder with clear amusement. Yoongi feels an overwhelming sense of relief wash over him.

“I’d never do that to you when you were drunk. That’s just as bad as paying someone.”

Oh. Oh.

Yoongi can’t think of a reply, but he doesn’t need to. Jimin laughs colourfully, and flops back down onto the mattress, dragging Yoongi with him until his head hits the pillow. He shuffles closer, throws a leg over Yoongi’s and rests his head against his chest, making a noise of contentment as he does.

The gentle hum of traffic from the open window is soothing, but nothing’s more soothing than laying with Park Jimin.

That is, when he’s quiet.

“On second thought,” he says, resulting in an immediate stiffening of every muscle in Yoongi’s body.

“I did find out you like a certain nickname.”

Yoongi has no idea what he’s talking about, tells him this in a mutter so he doesn’t hear the dread in his voice because he has a feeling he might remember exactly what he’s talking about.

“Don’t worry about it,” He says with a gentle sigh, “Goodnight, baby boy.”

Yoongi doesn’t make a sound. Doesn’t move. Not until he knows Jimin’s asleep.

Then, he lets out the biggest smile into the shrouding darkness of the boy’s room.

25^th May, 2017 | 9:57am | Jimin’s Apartment, Cerulean Road, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi wakes up to Jimin still laying entangled with him which shoots a shameless spark of joy through his body. Partly because he’s warm and comforting and him, and partly because it means he isn’t starting a house fire, right now.

Yoongi shimmies a little to retrieve his phone from the pocket of his jeans, wincing a little from the light of the device, though the sun is starting to creep through the uneven blinds, and decides to send Hoseok a text before the man tries to get into his apartment by almost breaking down his door again.

Don’t break-in, I’m w/ Jimin. Meeting today is mandatory, or ill kick all of your asses individually. (sent 9:57am.)

He sighs, setting his phone onto a vacant space of his chest, just past the sleeping boy’s head. He can only hope Hoseok will pass the message on to the rest of them. For a moment, Yoongi almost considers making the group-chat that Jungkook kept telling them was ‘a thing’ nowadays, but then he re-remembers his response each time.

They’re mobsters. What mob uses a group-chat?

His phone buzzes on his chest, and he doesn’t miss how Jimin’s nose crinkles cutely at the sensation.

Clearly, Yoongi should stop applying such generalisations to him and his friends. They are nothing like regular gangsters. Not at all.

Shocking info :/ see you at 11. There better b big news, I was planning on doing nothing today.

(sent 10:02am, read.)

There is, inform the rest, too.

Also, get me someone w/ a shooting range and tell them I’ll be paying them a visit later.

And Jungkook’s self-defence teacher.

 (sent 10:03am, read.)

That’s better than having his right-hand do nothing, like he’d apparently planned. Yoongi intends to involve the rest of the gang in learning how to protect themselves after his and Hoseok’s struggle at the movie lot. Evidentially, they are not as versed in combat as he thought and since he was planning on getting Jimin some effective protection for himself, too – he might as well get them all there.

Well, all minus Jungkook, of course. He could already kick all of their asses and the Syndicate’s in a heartbeat.

Yoongi puts his phone back down beside him, just as Jimin’s eyes flutter open and he looks on confusedly at the elder for a minute before he grins.

“Good morning,” he says sweetly, eyes still vaguely heavy and cheeks tinged red with sleep. He looks beautiful. So, so, beautiful. Yoongi doesn’t know how he never properly acknowledged it before – always dismissing the fluttering in his stomach and the smile that’d pull onto his face along with it as meaning nothing.

Yoongi was an idiot, less than twenty-four hours ago.

An idiot for ignoring his feelings, an idiot for blowing off all of the signs.

But it’s when he’s just got off the phone with the taxi service, asking them to pick them up in ten minutes because Jimin has no decent food in his house and they need to get to Yoongi’s before the rest of gang arrives that Yoongi realises… he’s still an idiot.

Jimin comes out of his bedroom with a strange choice of skin tight jeans with holes in them that travel up most of his thighs, his thin black choker with the metal star on the end and a white graphic t-shirt, looking as if he doesn’t quite know what he’s supposed to wear to this new job he’s taken up.

“I think we’re gonna need to get you some new clothes,” Yoongi says, eyeing the boy up and down with an air of judgement (mentally thinking he’d look good in anything) and he simply scoffs in reply, folding his arms over his chest and quipping “Thanks, my confidence is booming.”

Yoongi puts his phone back in his pocket, and turns to look at the boy properly.

“I didn’t say you didn’t look good. You always look good.”  

The boy snorts, tries to hide the smile on his lips and the rising heat of his cheeks by looking off to his side and Yoongi wants to reach out and get him to look at him again. He wants him to know he’s serious. He deserves to know that.  

And Yoongi knows he’s an idiot, for certain, because, all of a sudden, he remembers that this is Jimin.

He has feelings for a boy he wasn’t supposed to fall for at all. A boy he said he wouldn’t get attached to. One he wasn’t even supposed to see again after he found he wasn’t connected to the information.

He has feelings for a boy who does not have feelings for him, and the awareness of that strikes out any joy he had flooding through his veins since he first made the discovery.

Yoongi’s been through robberies, kidnappings, murders, torture, set-ups and betrayals without feeling a thing. No sense of guilt, no sorrow. And yet, here is this boy who he’s suddenly learned makes him feel like he has the world, sometimes, just by looking at him. And, then, without him even knowing, he tears him back down when Yoongi’s reminded that he doesn’t have the world. He doesn’t have him. Because he can’t reach out and touch him like that out of nowhere. Can’t kiss him like he wants to, right now, as he runs a tongue over his bottom lip.

Not even in his worst nightmares had he ever expected to be finally broken down, so swiftly,  – finally made to feel so carelessly for the first time in so long - by a stunning boy with a hot silver tongue and diamond smile.

It’s terrifying.

And he feels exhilarated by it.

“Cab’ll be here soon,” Yoongi mutters once he snaps back into reality, “we should be down there so they don’t have to wait.”

“Great, I’m hungry as hell,” the boy chirps, making for the door. He turns back with a curious smile when he sees Yoongi hasn’t moved.

“You okay, baby boy? Aren’t you coming?”

Beautiful, he thinks.

Yoongi gives a curt nod, trudging after the younger and trying not to focus too much on the warmth in his chest, and the tingling over his skin just from being near him.

Yoongi is an idiot.

But he finds that, in that moment, he doesn’t mind. 

25^th May, 2017 | 11:07am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi taps his fingers along the arm of his favourite armchair, waiting for everyone to shut up.

Jimin, he notices, has been under the strong attention of Taehyung ever since the two made eye contact when Taehyung arrived. Even now, he’s talking animatedly to him, hand gestures and facial expressions going wild and Jimin’s giggling more and more at him the longer he talks.

Jungkook’s sitting happily beside Taehyung, looking on at them with a wide grin, often laughing along and acting as silly as the older boy. Yoongi thinks they look like normal friends, right now. Teenagers who met somewhere mundane like the cafeteria at their school - not in the penthouse of a mob boss – one of them half-kidnapped and two ready to help kill a man for what they wanted, if they had to.

It’s easy to forget that they are teenagers sometimes. It’s easy to forget that all of them are practically still kids.

Seokjin’s been giving him a strange look, even though Namjoon’s trying to show him something on his laptop about one of the issues he’s sure they’ll bring up in a few minutes, once they start business. It’s almost as if he knows why Jimin’s here already. Furthermore, he looks like he even knows Yoongi’s small epiphany about the boy but he can’t. There’s no way. He’s not psychic.

Jung Hoseok, on the other hand, totally knows. He has to. He always knows what Yoongi’s thinking. The man’s gaze has been flickering from Yoongi to Jimin ever since he arrived (twenty minutes before everyone else, of course because it’s him.) Yoongi wants to throw something at him or hiss at him to knock it off, but he knows that’d just incriminate him, further.  

Instead, he stops tapping his fingers, and instead clears his throat, capturing everyone’s attention. He never usually feels nervous starting these meetings, but today there’s a small prickle of heat inching up his neck and he doesn’t have to wonder why.

“So, before we start; Jimin works for us now, okay what do we have-,”

There’s jumbled protests to Yoongi’s swift announcement and he sighs, resting his head on his hand as his friends continue to talk at him in confusion. 

“Wait, wait - explain,” Jung Hoseok, of course, says first. Yoongi looks to his left with an arched eyebrow, as if silently telling the man there’s nothing to explain. Hoseok reflects the look with an eyebrow of his own. How audacious.

Yoongi gives in, eyes flicking to Jimin who shrugs nonchalantly, as if it doesn’t matter how much he tells (though he knows, deep down, the boy wouldn’t appreciate all of the details,) so he keeps it brief, saying “I was at the Galaxy Bar last night for a meeting with Choi – our friend from the port in Demonia, right?” There’s common agreement across his friends, all familiar with the man in that they at least all know of him.

“I ran into Jimin,” he continues, suddenly feeling rather awkward talking about the boy when he’s right there, “and something happened that made me think it wasn’t a good idea to keep him around in there any longer. So, I asked him to work for us, instead.”

Namjoon in particular has an interesting reaction to this, nodding rather unsurely and looking at Yoongi and he knows it’s likely down to the fact that they’d agreed to just keep a watch on Jimin, not take matters into their own hands just yet – to see if the Syndicate would do anything else.

But then, Yoongi’s emotions got involved and he thought fuck that, I’m protecting him myself.

It’s worked out well so far. Though, it’s been less than a day. Besides, he’s just taking him out of his shitty job – he didn’t ask him to move in, for God’s sake.

Yoongi shrugs at the man, and he seems to make peace with it rather quickly – knowing Yoongi’s rather stubborn when he gets an idea or makes a decision so abruptly like that - compared to Kim-intrusive-Seokjin and Jung-burden-Hoseok who do not make peace with it and are both looking at him like he’s walked the Sahara Desert for the boy.

But Yoongi has a gang to run, he doesn’t have time for that.

“What sort of things are you gonna have him do?” Hoseok asks, and Yoongi smiles faux-brightly at him, patting his knee with a “I’m glad you asked! I thought he’d just do the things you’re supposed to do, but don’t.”

The younger man looks affronted, and Yoongi almost feels bad, until he replies “Yeah, well, it’s good you’ve found someone who will kiss your ass and trail after you like you want them to.”

“Yah!”

“Okay,” Namjoon says sternly enough that both Yoongi and Hoseok stop and look at him before they start bickering, “Let’s just start the meeting.”

Yoongi mutters an agreement, trying not to let the blush on his cheeks appear too obvious as he looks over at Jimin and sees him in a similar state.

“Right. Hoseok, instead of being a dick – why don’t you update us on something important for once?”

“Yoongi,” Namjoon warns him, eyebrows drawn together in frustration. It’s a look that makes the elder feel genuinely scolded, somehow, and he coughs awkwardly, veering his gaze away with a quiet apology.

Hoseok huffs beside him, saying, “Well, your highness-,”

“-Hoseok,-“

“I took your advice and hired a couple of people I know well enough to trust that they can keep me safe.”

“Meaning?” Taehyung asks, clearly feeling out of the loop like the rest of them as they only discussed the issue privately.

“Meaning I don’t have to stop seeing my fans just because the Syndicate have some stupid grudge against us. I’m free to idol it up.”

Yoongi chuckles, smiling at the man despite their argument. That’s the beauty of their friendship. Neither of them can stay mad for longer than five seconds.

“So, Jimin really will fill in for you,” Yoongi says, amusedly, and the man shoots him a wink.

“Both of you are welcome.”

Yoongi ignores him instead of snapping back at him, this time. Namjoon looks pleased.

“Jin, what do you have on the trade?”

Seokjin opens the folder in his lap, seemingly scanning for something before he taps a line on a few pages in with a small ‘ah-ha.’

“Jo Junghoon, runs a lot of our trade for us in the southern parts of Red Light, some in Downtown too – you remember him?”

Yoongi nods to show he does. Quite well in fact, they’ve met several times in the past. He was involved even back when his father was still in charge.

“He wants to expand some of his territory into Umbra. And, I believe, it’s your job to talk to him about it, right?”

Yoongi agrees, each of them having their little roles when it comes to their trade. People contact Seokjin who arranges a meeting with Yoongi who they tell what they want while he decides if they can have it. Yoongi relays the information to Seokjin, who’ll arrange a meeting with a dealer or pusher they trust, depending on what the request is. A lot of the times it’s Taehyung – since he’s by far the most knowledgeable man they have on the topic, but not always. Namjoon records the transactions and makes copies of the files, printing them out for Seokjin who keeps them. Hoseok used to come along with Yoongi, for moral support and back-up but that’s not much of a solid fact anymore.

Jungkook isn’t involved if Yoongi can help it.

“Arrange a meeting with him as soon as possible,” Yoongi says as he always does, then, on second thought, he adds, “preferably somewhere close, but a little classy.”

“Restaurant or bar?” Seokjin asks, and Yoongi ponders it for a minute. He soon decides he doesn’t want to be obligated to spend over an hour with the man and says, “Bar. But a nice one. I don’t wanna be half-high from passive smoking marijuana and smell like booze when I leave.” 

No way is he having another meeting in the Galaxy.

“Got it. I’ll let him know as soon as we’re done here. I’m thinking sometime next week?”

“Sounds fine. Does that work for you, Seok?”

Yoongi looks from Seokjin to Hoseok’s grimace, as if he doesn’t want to say it.

“Let me guess: album recording.”

“They trashed half of my last takes! I’ll be swamped all next week, sorry Yoongi. But, hey! You’ve got a back-up Hoseok, now.”

“I’m not a back-up you,” Jimin says, lightly irritated while Hoseok simply beams at him.

Yoongi rolls his eyes, concluding, “Okay, I’ll bring Jimin with me then. Speaking of which, Jimin I’m taking you to a shooting range to learn how to use a gun today.”

Jimin’s eyes go wide at this, as if he hadn’t considered needing to use a gun in a mob. Yoongi nods at him slowly, an encouraging sort of ‘it’ll be fine’ and he seems to believe him for the most part – though still looking vaguely unsettled. Everyone’s like that at first.

Except Jungkook, of course. That weirdo. He was way too excited.

“I’ve also gotten Hoseok to arrange for all of us to take a few lessons with Jungkook’s self-defence teacher soon since I think we rely too heavily on guns - just in case.”

“I thought self-defence wasn’t really recommended for fighting back?” Seokjin asks, seeming marginally alarmed at the idea that six of them will be training to fight with their hands. It does sound slightly absurd, but after the ordeal in the bathroom with Hoseok, Yoongi’s not taking any chances. 

“She’s not just self-defence. She says that to keep a low-profile. Government don’t like the idea of offensive training, nowadays,” Jungkook says, sounding as if he’s talked about this with her in depth, before. From what he’s told them about her, she’s likely ranted about it a few times.

“Okay, now that that’s all out of the way: Jin, what about the Syndicate?”

The man closes the folder on his lap now and thinks for a second, before shaking his head.

“Nothing big enough to be considered unusual,” he says, and Yoongi feels somehow restless at the fact, “There’s been a couple of the usual conflicts in Full Moon. No trucks of theirs passing through Ashtown,” he adds and he knows that’s a good thing. It means they’re not taking advantage of the suburbia of the Ashtown Sector to smuggle their own drugs into Yoongi’s circles.

Yet, he feels unsettled upon hearing it.

“Downtown and Mariana have both been clear, lately. There’s been some sightings of a few of their members skulking around Red Light – but mainly in bars and clubs.”

“Probably trying to steal some of our profits,” Taehyung says distastefully, the man himself having had much experience in this happening to him: from getting mugged to pickpocketed.

Seokjin makes an unhappy noise of agreement, then continuing with “Ryu says Umbra’s been a little lively; with the talk of the drug trade territory changing there’s a few people who’ve been trying their luck to cash in around the area before it’s under our control. A lot of them Syndicate, but a lot not as well.”

Yoongi sighs. Then that’s to be expected, and not out of the ordinary.

“And the gambling division?”

“Smooth as ever.”

Yoongi’s mouth forms a firm line at that. He should be relieved that everything’s quiet, naturally. But he can’t help but feel like he’s right about it being some sort of ploy. False sense of security, distraction – whatever.

“Okay,” Yoongi says, getting up from his chair and smoothing down the material of his pants.

“I guess that’s it then. Everyone out.”

“Hey, what sort of goodbye is that?”

“Shut up, Hoseok.”  

3^rd June, 2017 | 8:58pm | Vivre Bar, Red Light Sector.

“So,” Jimin says, shuffling slightly against the leather seat of the cab, “what are the chances of me having to shoot somebody tonight?” He asks, holding his new gun in his hand with much more confidence than he’d had last week (he was pretty pale by the time he’d finished his first round.) He aims it around the vehicle a little, and Yoongi can see the driver stiffen significantly in his seat.

“Minus three percent,” he says, putting a hand on the weapon so he’s pointing it at the floor, instead. The safety’s on, thank God – but Yoongi doesn’t want to risk traumatising one of the men from the only taxi company he trusts not to mug him (most ones in the sector are infamous for it.)

“I only taught you to use that in case of an emergency,” He tells him rather tiredly, feeling as if he’s dealing with a child (Jeon Jungkook) all over again.

“How can I use it in an emergency if I never get practice?”

Yoongi looks to him, disapprovingly. He’s right, but that doesn’t mean he’s willing to admit it.

Feelings or not.

“Just keep your mouth shut when we go in, I’m not looking for confrontation, alright?”

“Hey, I can help with this – I’m very persuasive.”

Yoongi scoffs at him, “Absolutely not.”

Jimin looks at him wordlessly for a moment, before he fiddles around with the gun in his hand some more and lets out a condescending ‘pff.’

“Yes, boss.”

Yoongi doesn’t know why he puts up with this.

--

"Min! Good to see you,” Jo says, waving them over to the table of choice with a jovial call. The bar is fairly nice. No people smoking, no one piss drunk. It’s well lit, a cool colour scheme of blues running through it, and comfortable enough looking chairs.  

Yoongi doesn’t return the man’s enthusiasm, instead just shaking his hand when he stands to greet them with an even-toned, “Long time, Jo – how are you?”

“You know how it is,” he waves off, as always. Not a man that likes to talk about himself. Small talk, absolutely, but as long as it’s not on him. His eyes drift to Yoongi’s accomplice and he raises his eyebrows, obviously quite surprised when he asks “Who’s this beauty? Thought you usually had that famous kid with you? Hoseok, wasn’t it?”

Yoongi nods, trying not to sound too bitter when he says, “Yeah, well, Hoseok's been busy as of late. This is…” He pauses. They shouldn't use his real name. Once that shit spreads there's no chance of unassociating yourself with it. Jimin might not wanna be a gangster forever.

Yoongi doesn’t have to struggle to think of a fake name, though, because Jimin cuts in , holding out a hand as he charmingly says, “Darling - nice to meet you.”

The man takes his hand gallantly, giving it a firm shake. Yoongi looks at Jimin with curiosity, but the younger boy simply smiles at him. Had he been thinking about this, earlier? Or was it just the first thing to come to his head? 

“Polite one,” Jo says, sounding impressed, “Where’d you find him, huh?”

He doesn’t know if that’s supposed to be some sort of jibe at him or Hoseok. Probably both, considering his friend isn’t all that skilled in the art of civility when dealing with gangsters – and neither is Yoongi… when dealing with most, he supposes.  

“Doesn’t matter,” Yoongi says, proving his own point, “We’re here to talk business, aren’t we?”

“Always so formal,” Jo says, finally taking a seat, and waving at the other men to do the same.

“Gets things done.”

He shakes his head with a hearty chuckle, the kind that sort of reminds him of an uncle he’d vaguely dislike.

“Makes you cranky and uptight, is what it does,” the man retorts and Jimin, the traitor, actually giggles at it, eyes crinkling at the corners in that pretty way and everything.

“He’s both of those things already, trust me.”

Yoongi cannot believe what he’s hearing (except he can. He’s used to it.)

“See that – you,” Jo says, pointing a finger at the boy who tilts his head with intrigue and a small upturn of his mouth, “You’re a person I wouldn’t mind getting ripped off by. Him, however?” He looks at Yoongi and grimaces dramatically, a fake shiver running through his body.

“I’m not ripping you off,” Yoongi snaps, running a frustrated hand through his hair just as a waiter comes over with requests for drinks. Waiters that aren’t available for takeout, that’s better.

Yoongi orders a glass of white wine, and Jimin points at a vibrant looking cocktail. He asks him what the hell he just ordered, and he simply shrugs, saying it’s his first time in a proper bar. He’s never had a cocktail, wouldn’t chance the ones at the Galaxy – a lot more alcohol in them than there should be.

One the waiter returns, and they run no more risk of being interrupted, Yoongi grabs his glass but doesn’t drink, saying “Now, Seokjin said you were looking into expanding some of your territory. Umbra sector, right?”

Jo takes a gulp of what looks to be just a pint of lager and says “Yep.”

Yoongi makes a hum of agreement, “That’s not a bad idea. Most of Mariposa’s involvement there is to do with gambling, so getting a larger cut from the drug trade there would be beneficial. How much do you need?”

“Loan of five grand to cover the cost of hiring people, setting up a few dens. Then, I’d say…” he stalls for a moment, likely checking over the number in his head, “about fifty pounds of marijuana to start. Don’t need any heavy shit until we get adjusted.”

He snickers slightly. Fifty pounds. That’s quite a lot, but Umbra’s a big place and Jo’s always been ambitious.

“Alright,” Yoongi agrees, easily “I’ll tell Jin that, and he’ll arrange it for you to meet with one of my guys to collect it, I’m not sure who yet, but he’ll let you know. I’ll also tell him to give you the contact number of a dealer for when you wanna move on from only selling weed. His name’ll be Kim Taehyung, nice kid if you stay on his good side,” Yoongi says, a tone of warning lacing through the words. He’s sure the deal’ll go fine, Jo’s generally a good guy and Tae’s hard to piss off.

But, it never hurts to deter someone just in case they want to try something.

“If I don’t?”

Yoongi smiles, a little too happy for the words when he says, “Let’s just say I don’t always tell him what he can and can’t do. If someone’s disposable to him, they’re disposable.”

He looks amused.

“You run a tight ship, Min.”

“Gets things done.” He repeats, earning another laugh from the man, “I’ll be meeting with you some time within the next few months to check up on the expansion – make sure you’re not doing anything stupid.”

Jo puts his hands out in front of him, palms facing him, as a gesture to say he won’t.

“What are you thinking for your cut?” He asks then, a slight challenge to the words because this is the point Jo always thinks Yoongi ‘rips him off’ at.

“I’d like to say eighty but I can see the blood running from your face already, so I’ll be nice and go seventy.” Taehyung taught him that one. Always shock your customer a little bit before giving your real price, so it seems better. You can get away with more like that.

See, Kim Taehyung – that man is a con artist and a half. Not Yoongi.

Jo snorts, clearly satisfied with the deal as he gives a solid nod of his head before pointing at Jimin again and saying, “Now, see, if he said that – I would’ve went eighty.”

He can see Jimin smirking at him out of the corner of his eye, a non-verbal ‘told you so,’ and Yoongi reluctantly says, “I’ll keep that in mind for the future.”

They don’t stay long after that. Jimin’s surprised at his cocktail, he says he can barely even taste the alcohol in it and Yoongi tells him that most bars do that so you buy more to get drunk, and they save money. This fact astonishes him.

“Have a nice night, Mr Jo,” Jimin says once the man tells him he’s got to go before his partner gets mad at him for being late (it’s an anecdote that makes Yoongi chuckle from how normal it sounds, as if he hadn’t been discussing drugs for the better part of the evening) and the boy flashes him another pleasant smile, shaking his hand again. The two seemed to get on rather well once business was over. Jimin explained how he was a new recruit of Yoongi’s, but they’ve known each other for a little while. Jo said he was vaguely taken aback at that, he figured Yoongi spent all of his time alone, brooding in the dark when he wasn’t working.

Dickhead.

Jo lays a small kiss on the boy’s hand, who laughs brightly at it (Yoongi isn’t jealous at all.)

“You too,” He says, amiably, then checking, “Darling, right?”

“That’s me.”

“How cute,” The man says, shaking his head with a smile. Then, he looks to Yoongi with unconcealed judgement as he says, “See, Min? You need that sorta charm.”

Yoongi clicks his tongue, trying not to laugh as he says, “Get outta here before I take that eighty, you asshole.”

They sit together for a little while after Jo leaves, Jimin quite enjoying his drink now that he’s discovered it’s practically alcohol free. Turns out, the boy doesn’t like drinking that much – which is unexpected considering he worked in a bar for God knows how long.

They turn to talking about how the night went, and Yoongi coolly says, “Not bad for your first time, Jimin. Not that you said much.”

He shrugs, cocky smile etched onto his lips when he replies, “If you let me you could’ve walked out a happier man – keeping my mouth shut didn’t work out so well, after all. Did it?”

Yoongi, to the younger’s surprise, actually agrees, and tells him “Well, next time we have a deal I’ll let you do more of the talking, okay? You’ll have to read up on it before you go, though.”

Jimin runs a finger around the rim of his glass, picking up the pink sugar on the tip of it and licking it off before he breezily says, “Eh, facts and figures don’t get sales, baby boy – words do.”  

Yoongi lets him simmer in his confidence for a moment, ready to shatter it when he asks “Is that right, Darling?”

Jimin’s finger stops, mid-sugar collection and his gaze runs from Yoongi to the table.

“Where’d that come from, huh?” He asks, giving the younger’s shoulder a small bump with his hand.  

Jimin shrugs, wiping the substance on his jeans as he mutters, “Just something you said the other night. Stuck in my head, I guess…” he picks up his glass and takes a large drink from it, all the while still avoiding eye-contact.

Yoongi remembers when he said it, the affection he’d subconsciously put into it - a warmth whirls through his stomach at the knowledge that it’d supposedly stuck in the younger’s brain.

“Ah,” He says teasingly, “do I have a comeback to use on you, now?”

“It’s not like that,” Jimin stresses, hand gripping around his glass too tight to be calm, “I don’t-,”

“Don’t worry about it, we should go wait for the cab,” Yoongi says kindly, standing up and noticing the relief flash over his features for all but a moment before Yoongi nonchalantly adds, “Finish your drink, darling - I’ll go pay,” and he walks to the bar, just barely hearing the younger whine, “Yoongi, I swear to God.”

Baby boy and darling, he thinks, that could work.

12^th June, 2017 | 2:14pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

“You spend more money on cab fares than I do on basic necessities, Min Yoongi – that’s a problem,” Jimin insists, sprawled out on Yoongi’s sofa, upside-down, but still somehow giving him a rather intimidating look. Though, that could just be because his nerves are shot right now from the boy’s intention.

“I have the money to spend,” Yoongi retorts in his chair across the room. Jimin frowns more, and it looks a little funny, like he should be acting like he’s eight again and drawing eyes on his chin.  

“Yeah, well you also have the car to drive. A couple of cars from what I heard from Jungkookie.”

That little shit.

“Seriously, Jimin,” Yoongi says now, the amusement of the situation dying out as the younger doesn’t let up, “I can’t drive. It’s. It’s…”

“It’s what?” He asks, sounding a little frustrated as he turns himself up the right way again, looking disorientated from the blood flowing to his head, as he tells him, “Hoseok filled me in, Yoongi. You think you can’t drive because you almost crashed one time.”

“That makes it sound simple,” he almost whines, feeling fairly patronised by it. It’s bigger than that. It’s…

He sighs.

“Because it is,” Jimin says so confidently that he feels a part of him (the whipped part) immediately believe him.

His tone changes to something a lot softer now when he smiles encouragingly at him, getting up to approach him as he says, “Yoongi, you can’t spend the rest of your life scared of something like that. It’s a weakness,” he stresses, resting a hand on the man’s arm when he gets to him. Yoongi hopes he doesn’t notice the way he’s shivering every so often.

“What if someday you have to drive, but because you never broke your fear you can’t?” He asks him, and Yoongi doesn’t have an answer, feeling like a scolded child. He never even considered that.

“You’re the leader of one of the most powerful gangs in the modern age, for fuck’s sake. You face danger every single day. You could die any time.”

Yoongi guffaws at that, quipping, “Great comfort, thanks.”

“Hear me out,” Jimin says, grabbing his attention again instantly when his hand moves to his shoulder, instead, soothing along it in a slow loop.

“You aren’t scared of any of that bullshit. It doesn’t make sense to be scared of something that pales in comparison. You’re Min-fucking-Yoongi, for crying out loud. You’re not scared of shit!” He says with a boom of enthusiasm that makes Yoongi gawk at him slightly.

“Besides, you drove me to work that one time. That was fine, wasn’t it?”

“Because you were there,” Yoongi argues weakly, despairing at how dependent he sounds. It’s weird. He’s never open about that sort of thing.  

“And I’ll be there now, too,” he says quietly, and Yoongi really hopes he doesn’t feel his pulse beating embarrassingly quickly when his fingers drag closer to his neck.

“You have to nip this in the bud before it grows into one of those man-eating plants.”

He laughs somehow, past his nauseating anxiety and the fact that oh, Park Jimin is stroking his neck. If it was anyone else, that pep talk wouldn’t have worked – that, he’s sure of.

“Okay. Fine. Let’s do it.”

“Great!” He says excitedly, “I was hoping we could go grab some food.”

Ah.

So, that’s why he sprung this on him.

--

Jimin rubs at his back as they get back out of the car. Yoongi tries not to make it look so obvious that he’s thinking dry land, thank fuck when they step onto the pavement.

“It wasn’t so bad, was it?”

“I think I’m gonna throw up.”

“That’s just the pizza! Probably.”

It was bad. But it wasn’t so bad.

But if acting like it was keeps Jimin’s hand on the small of his back, then he’ll pretend a little while longer.

Also, if it means he doesn’t have to get his ass back in that car in the next twenty-four hours. That’d be nice, too.

Chapter Text

15^th June, 2017 | 12:54pm | The Golden Hall, Red Light Sector.

When Yoongi falls on his ass for the sixth time that hour, that’s when he goes “No, no – okay, no. Fuck this- I’m done.”

He cannot believe this woman has annihilated him six times. That hour. 

But it’s not because she’s a woman – hell, no.

It’s because she’s half his height and has a baby face.

A really baby face. Like, had he met her anywhere else he would’ve thought she was a middle schooler. 

She’s twenty-five. Supposedly.

Twenty-five, four foot nothing, probably and possessor of superhuman strength.

“Ah, ah okay Kyunghee-ssi – relent, please, relent.”

Sounds like Hoseok’s given up too.  

Jungkook, naturally, is the only one left standing – but even he only lasts another minute or so when faced with the woman on her own before he’s plummeting to the ground with a groan, the same as the rest of them.

Kyunghee looks displeased, to say the least.

“Am I really fighting mobsters here? The top of the Mariposa of that. Wow… You guys seriously need my help.”

She’s spent the entire morning roughhousing with them… to tell them what they already know.

“And you,” she says to Jungkook who seems to be taking his beating significantly harder than the rest of them, “what did I tell you about grappling, huh?”

Jungkook sits up into a kneeling position, hands in lap and looking down at the floor.

“It takes years to master…” He mutters, shamefully.

“And?” Kyunghee prompts, moving to stand in a threatening power-stance a few feet in front of him.

“It could get me killed in a real fight…”

“And?” She asks, leaning further towards him with squinting eyes.

 “You don’t want me to stretch out your shirt again trying it on you and not a dummy…”

“Absolutely!” She proclaims, sticking a finger in the air and Yoongi did not expect that to be what she was waiting to hear, “that was my favourite shirt. I won gold medals in that shirt.”

Kyunghee takes a look around at the rest of them (Yoongi thinks a few of them even flinch when she does.)

“Besides, if you really do want to try it you’ve got six other dummies in this room right now. Living, breathing, destined to get themselves killed if they ever come into combat without a gun, dummies.”

None of them argue against her.

She lets everyone lay pathetically on the floor for a minute, Jungkook looking far more scolded than he ever does with him or their mom, before she’s telling them all to get up – it’s time to learn.

17^th June, 2017 | 2:46pm | Beach-Front Mall, Mariana Sector.

Two days later and Yoongi is still in pain and significantly bruised on his ass, probably.

Except, now, he’s obligated to walk amidst the pain in order to take Jimin shopping as well. 

It’s not like it wasn’t his idea – because it totally was – but he didn’t expect that he’d be the one to actually have to take him. He thought he’d be able to load it off on the self-proclaimed 'style icon' of their gang, but Seokjin’s way down at the very edge of Full Moon for a week or two for a whole collection of meetings and decided to take their second-in-command fashion guru, Kim Taehyung, with him so the younger could get ‘experience.’

What experience? Taehyung already knows as much as the rest of them. There's no experience to get from a dull meeting in Full Moon, Seokjin just wants somebody to go out to fancy dinners and unload the hotel room's minifridge of its alcoholic content with him.

So, Yoongi texted Hoseok – his third and pretty much final option – but, as with Yoongi’s luck, he’s still recording.

So, Yoongi ends up walking around a building with very little air-con, holding onto an iced americano for dear life, and trailing after Jimin who has just about as much of an idea of what’s appropriate to wear to gang-related-meetings as Jungkook does (owner of everything from overalls to a bright red trench coat.)

But the thing is, the fact that Jimin doesn’t know what to wear isn’t a problem, really, because Yoongi’s easily been able to point things out.

The problem is, he won’t let Yoongi buy him anything.

“Jimin, we’re here to actually get clothes, you know, to ” he tells him for the tenth time, as the boy’s clutching onto a short-sleeved black shirt, patterned with butterflies that he took an immediate liking to until Yoongi told him to put it on the counter for the clerk to ring up.

“I know, but, shit, can’t we jus somewhere normal? – I swear I could pay rent for, like, two years with some of these things.”

Yoongi tries not to let his immense frustration show as he says “I make two years rent in an hour, darling, I don’t think you need to worry about it.”

That shuts him up.

There’s some sort of strange game between them lately where Yoongi’s found out that calling him that brings the younger to a brief standstill, which can be useful in a lot of situations. The only problem is that Jimin’s found that out about Yoongi, too.

The joke’s on him though - Yoongi’s heart just flutters when he calls him his nickna-

Wait, is that a good thing?

He takes the shirt and puts it on the counter before he can feel any more pathetically infatuated than he already does, lately.

It’s been getting progressively worse, Yoongi thinks. From wanting to kiss him because he’s beautiful to wanting to kiss him because he’s amazing and adorable and makes him happy.

This shopping trip? Making it worse.

It’s incredibly busy, being around lunch time and all, and Jimin has grabbed onto his arm thrice in case they get separated because, as he put it, he “couldn’t find his own ass in this fucking sector.”

And Yoongi knows it’s bad when he laughed more because it was cute the way he said it than because it was simply funny.

“I appreciate this and all, Yoongi,” he says once they’ve paid and the clerk has stopped looking so very afraid that Yoongi’s gonna shoot somebody (seriously, you can’t go anywhere as a mob boss.) “But is making your goons carry everything really necessary?” He asks, pointing out the two tree-trunk sturdy looking men with a dozen bags hanging off their arms each.

Yoongi gives Jimin a confused look, as if the thought hadn’t occurred to him at all.

It’s a habit he picked up from Hoseok. His staff carry everything for him. Does the same not apply to goons?

“Compared to the things the rest of them are doing today, they’ve got it pretty cozy, trust me.”

Jimin grimaces, staring at him for a moment before he shakes his head and hands the bag to one of the men.

“I don’t even wanna know.”

29^th June, 2017 | 10:19pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi sits with his phone in his hand, staring over the balcony as he listens to the boy on the other end brag. What’d started as a call to inform Jimin of the fact that Hoseok would be free for the next meeting he had to go to, so he wouldn’t need him to come along, ended up as Jimin trying to convince him that he’s a much better choice.

“Just admit it, Yoongi – I did great last time.”

He can hear the boy walking in the background, probably on his way home from somewhere which doesn’t settle all that well with him, since around now is when most of the sleazes decide to come out.

Despite his urge to, he can’t admit that the boy didn’t do well.

“You did. Thirty thousand grand for a kilo of coke… That’s higher than most professionals in this damn gang get.”

“All down to my charm.” He says, sounding as if he just pushed the door open to his apartment block. It sticks half way through, so you have to give it a nudge. He’s climbed the stairs by the time he adds, “But I guess it makes sense now that we’re partners in crime – one’s always gotta be char-,”

He cuts himself off, sounding as if he’s stopped walking, too. Then, there’s a few steps, and he mumbles, “That’s weird… my door’s open. I could’ve sworn I locked it.”

Yoongi scoffs, swallowing down the small sense of panic that emerged for a moment at the boy’s sudden silence. That stupid apartment.

“That door is shit, it probably opened on its own.”

“Hey!” There’s a long creak of the door being pushed open, and then a small gasp.

“Oh…”

Yoongi arches an eyebrow, though the boy can’t see it.

“What happened?”

“I don’t know. I…” He mutters, sounding just as thoroughly confused as Yoongi, “the lock’s snapped. Ah, that asshole of a landlord finally just fixed it, too.”

“Someone broke in?”

“Maybe... Thieves in this block wouldn’t surprise me but I’ve got nothing to steal. It looks… searched?”

Yoongi feels his stomach tighten at that, his mind already fluttering to Syndicate.

“How would you even know that place has been searched? There’s nothing in it.”

He hears the boy snort on the other end of the line, but he picks up a small tremble of panic in his voice when he says, “Shut the fuck up, Min Yoongi. God, I-, I leave the place for, like, thirty minutes…”

“Where were you, anyway?” Yoongi asks, having forgotten to ask at first whilst trying to argue why he was taking Hoseok instead of him.  

Jimin sighs like it doesn’t really matter, “Just wanted some air – the mold and damp really get to you in here, after a while,” and he sounds understandably a little pissed when he adds, “Clearly not a wise decision.”

Yoongi leans on the railing of his balcony, taking a look over the glowing streetlights of the city as he wonders, “Why did they search your apartment?” and finds it funny how neither of them even need to voice who the culprits were.

Damn Seonghyeon’s getting more predictable by the day.

He’s just glad the boy was out. He doesn’t want to have to find him beaten up again.  

“I don’t know!” Jimin stresses, and Yoongi can almost picture the pout forming on his lips, “I guess now that we work together they’re looking for something to do with you?”

“Doubt they found much. They probably couldn’t find anything to do with you, never mind me.”

“Hey,” he whines, sounding as if he’s tinkering with the lock, “what the hell am I supposed to do now? It’s totally busted. My Landlord won’t replace it again for, like, a month just to spite me.”

Yoongi straightens up from the balcony railing as he thinks about it. They could always call a locksmith, but then there’s nothing to stop it from happening again. He isn’t safe there. The Syndicate know where he lives, now. He could get him a hotel room, or-

“You could always stay with me.”

Um, Min Yoongi. Mouth. Doing its own thing.

“You mean… until my lock gets fixed?”

“Uh. No, I mean…” He hesitates, feeling his face warm from something other than the humid summer night, “Well- they know where you live now. It’s not smart to stay, and…”

“Min Yoongi,” Jimin says very calmly, somehow because Yoongi feels like his calm just got thrown in a blender and he is just too smitten because he almost drops his phone when Jimin asks, “are you asking me to move in with you?”

“Don’t put it like that,” he barks, saying, “If you wanna stay and get kidnapped or shot then be my guest.”

“Wow, so cold.”

He’s lying his ass off.

“Okay,” Jimin says cheerily before Yoongi has time to even process what he’s asked, “Come pick me up. You can help me pack, again.”

Lately, driving hasn’t been such an issue, but right now, for some unknown, completely unthinkable reason, it sounds very daunting all over again.

“O-oh. Maybe I could just call a ca-,”

“You’ve driven me lots of places lately. You can do this, too.”

“I know, but-,”

That was when you were there.

Jimin’s silent for a moment and Yoongi can hear the smirk in his voice when he asks, “Want me to stay on the phone with you while you drive?”

Yoongi internally groans. Is he that easy?

“Yes.”

Answering both his and Jimin’s questions.

“Speaker phone, please – you need both hands on the wheel.”

29^th June, 2017 | 11:06pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

“Ah,” Jimin says, kicking off his shoes and taking a look around the spare room (his room, now,) “it’s good to be back.”

Yoongi sets down his things, daring to look at the younger with a fond smile as he jokes, “You sound as if you’ve just come home.”

Jimin chuckles, turning around to face him as he asks, “Well, it is my home now – is it not?”

The smile slips off of his face. Dear Lord, this brat doesn’t even know when he makes his heart pathetically skip like that.

“Just remember who’s paying the rent,” Yoongi says, folding his arms across his chest with an air of fake indifference.

“I would help if you actually paid me.”

“What’s the point in that? It’s still my money - I’d still be paying the rent.”

Jimin raises an eyebrow at him, mirroring his folded arms as he mockingly asks, “Am I a Victorian housewife? No property? No wages?”

“No,” the elder insists, “you’re a pest that’s mooching off of my fortune.”

“You bought me a fifty-dollar pair of socks the other day for no reason. You’re purposely spoiling me.” 

Yoongi frowns. He did but… “Just-” he exhales sharply, trying not to sound so defensive when he says, “I’ll see you in the morning.”

Jimin grins at him, one corner tipped up a little more than the other as he chimes, “Night, baby boy.”

Yoongi leaves before he does something stupid like stay.  

5^th July, 2017 | 9:14pm | 4J Highway, Freeland Sector.

Once a year there's a charity event in the Freeland Sector that Yoongi's now annually invited to. He'd planned to go by himself and meet up with his mother, but Jimin refused to leave it alone once he heard about it, which meant that Yoongi had to explain why he gets an invite. 

“You’re invited… as an influential figure?”

How rude.

Now, the two sit in the back of a cab, and, really, Yoongi should’ve invested in a chauffeur a long time ago but now that he’s ‘learning to get over his stupid fear’ as Jimin had put it, the boy refuses to let him get one.

“I haven’t been back here in a long time…” Jimin mutters so low that Yoongi thinks for a second that he wasn’t even talking to him. He nods in agreement.

“I don’t go that often either, but-,”

“No,” he says, cutting the elder off with an unintended sharpness, “I mean… not since I came to Red Light. Not once.”

“Oh… well-,”

That’s different. It makes him wonder just how long that is – but he doesn’t ask. Jimin hasn’t been exactly open to talking about that part of his life, any time Yoongi’s tried.

“I’m not afraid of being recognised by my old friends or family or anything,” he tells him, knocking down Yoongi’s assumption of exactly that, “I’ve changed too much, but it’s just weird. A little scary – that’s all. I know Park’s a common surname, but-,”

“Don’t worry,” Yoongi says, reaching over to pat the boy’s thigh without thinking about it, “I’ll just introduce you as Jimin.”

The boy laughs a little at this, turning to face him with an upturn of his lips as he says, “’This is Jimin, my….?’ What’ll you say? Am I your date this time?”

“Well, I guess- technically, but-,”

“Just say yes, idiot.”

He does, somehow, over the volume of his heart hammering in his chest. His hand is still on his thigh but, as Jimin barely even seems to notice, he doesn’t take it away.

They fall into a comfortable silence after that, Jimin choosing to stare out the window at the cars zooming by and Yoongi tries not to stare too much at him, but it’s hard when you’re looking at probably the most gorgeous thing you’ve ever seen (definitely.)

But it’s when Yoongi notices the boy’s eyes are fixated on himself, in the reflection of the glass, that he notices the despondency in his gaze, the heaviness that he realises he hadn’t caught him looking at himself with since they’d first met.

And Yoongi thinks to himself for a moment what that could mean.

He looks amazing with his hair pushed back like that, a light layer of makeup though he doesn’t need it, and his new grey suit complemented with the pink tie Yoongi bought him without hesitation because he looks ethereal in pink. He’d insisted that Yoongi wear grey, too, to match him – picked out a slightly darker suit with a soft blue shirt that’s surprisingly okay but it could never reach him.

But now, as he’s watching the boy look at himself with such contempt he wonders whether it’s possible that he can’t see that for himself.

--

“Mr. Min, it’s so nice to have you join us, this evening,” The hostess says in greeting, and Yoongi smiles, shaking her hand politely as she continues with, “Thank you so much for your donations, they mean a great deal to the children.”

Yoongi can feel Jimin’s intrigue sky rocket.

“So, that’s why you’re invited as an influential figure.”

Surprise – a mobster that puts a heap of his earnings towards a charity for children’s therapy.  

“Oh, did he not say? Such a modest young man,” She says, giving Yoongi a warm look as he, coincidentally, feels his face heat up, “Mr. Min is one of the biggest financial supporters of the charity.”

Jimin makes a soft noise beside him, followed by a giggle and a nudge to his ribs whilst the elder averts his gaze to the other end of the hall.

“Jimin, meet Mrs. Kim – she’s the founder and our host for the evening,” Yoongi says, watching out the corner of his eye as the boy gives a small bow, the woman returning it when he adds, “Mrs. Kim, this is Jimin. He’s my… date… for the evening.”

“Oh, of course,” she says, and Yoongi doesn’t know what she means by that, but stops himself from dwelling on it, “What a charming man, it was good to meet you. I must go greet the rest of the guests, though. I hope you both have a good night!”

“You too, ma'am,” Yoongi says, Jimin giving her a lively smile in response.

Then, Yoongi looks over at him and he’s still grinning, almost teasingly.

“What?”

“Nothing, nothing,” he says rather obviously thinking children’s therapy, huh? and Yoongi can only give him an unamused look before he’s asking, “Hey, didn’t you say your mom lives in this sector – is she here tonight?”

“Should be… She funds as much as I do,” He shrugs, giving a look around the hall to see if he can spot her. Every year they rent out this huge hotel reception room for the event, and, just like last year, it’s too grandiose to find the woman in. “Why?”

“I want to meet her,” Jimin says like it’s perfectly normal and obvious.

And it might be. If it wasn’t Park Jimin asking.  

“You want to meet my mother?”

“When you say it like that it sounds like a big deal,” Jimin says, staring at him as if he’s the one being weird, “It’s normal to meet the relatives of the person you’ve moved in with.”

“I… We’re not-,” Yoongi really is going to combust because of this kid. He relents, letting out a sigh that Jimin lights up at, before he says, “Fine. But just for a minute,” since he knows the woman would scold him over the phone for an hour later if he didn’t go see her.  

It doesn’t take too long to find her, for once. Maybe Yoongi was just hoping it’d take longer. But, as soon as she sees him, she swiftly shuffles over in her long white dress, lace trimming around the neckline that makes her look rather angelic.

Jungkook takes after his mom, wholeheartedly in looks. He has her small button nose and wide, rounded eyes, right down to the bunny teeth. Yoongi didn’t look much like his father or his real mother, and Jungkook didn’t look like their dad either, but him and their mom?

They don’t look like identical, of course, but if you lined the three of them up in a row, you could tell which of the sons is biological without a second glance.

“Yoongi? Is that my boy? In the flesh? Am I hallucinating?”

Yoongi snorts. Does she always have to greet him like that?

“Good to see you too, ‘Ma.”

She grins, pulling him into a tight hug and laying three large kisses on his cheek. She’s taller than him, so it’s unavoidable (not that he would try if he could.)

“I was beginning to wonder if you’d show up, at all,” she says and Yoongi nods, knowing they’re a little later than usual (blame that on Park Jimin wanting to figure out which lip-tint complimented Yoongi’s skin the best. The younger’s got a surprising amount of them and Yoongi’s mouth hurts from all the reapplying.)

“We were talking to Mrs. Kim, so…” His mother looks over to Jimin, then, curiously – as if she hadn’t even realised he was with someone. Then, she looks back at Yoongi, peering at him and he resists the urge to swallow hard.

“Going to introduce me?”

He glances at the brunette who’s smiling widely at him, and he mumbles, “This is Jimin.”

“Oh, the boy you’ve been telling me about on the phone!”

Oh, God.

“Well, I-,”

“It’s great to finally meet you, ma'am – Yoongi’s talked so fondly of you. You are just as stunning as he said.”

This kid is the smoothest, damn-

“I like him,” his mother says in a bad attempt at a low voice, “Good taste, Yoonie.”

Yoongi half-gasps, blurting out, “He’s not-,”

“I’d insisted on meeting you,” Jimin cuts in, and he can see the mischievous glint in his eye right before he says, “you know, since Yoongi and I live together now.”

His mouth drops just as he sees his mother’s do the same - albeit for a different reason.

“Yoongi!” she cries, smacking his stomach lightly, “You didn’t tell me that.”

“It just happened recently,” he fumbles, “It’s not a big deal-,”

“Not a big deal? After what you’ve been saying-,”

“Mom,” Yoongi says very firmly, face void of any emotion other than stop, oh my God.

He can see the realisation forming on her face.

“Oh… It’s… Oh.”

Yoongi has never felt more awkward in his life – and it doesn’t help that Jimin is looking completely lost beside him.

“Well, I should leave you two to it, I suppose. There’s lots of refreshments going about – you should go get a table before the night starts.” Of course, she bails after doing that. She usually stays with him for most of the night but Yoongi’s sort of glad she’s decided not to for once. He doesn’t think he can take any more of that.

“I hope I can see you again soon, Mr. Park – keep my Yoongi in good company, and remind him that it doesn’t hurt to go see his mom every once in a while, – you should come along, too. I’d like to get to know you, properly.”

Yoongi tries to roll his eyes at her but they’re stuck, staring at the ground out of mortification.

“Yes, ma'am! It’s been a pleasure meeting you,” he hears Jimin chirp beside him who still sounds marginally confused but Yoongi doesn’t plan on enlightening him any time soon.

“How lovely. And you, young man,” Yoongi looks up, then, to see his mother pointing her finger in his face with a half-playful stern look as she warns, “I’ll be talking to you later, okay?”     

Should he block her number?

No, then she’ll just come and ‘mother him’ in person, won’t she?

“See you, ‘Ma,” he says rather meekly as she plants another kiss to his cheek. She even kisses Jimin, too, much to his apparent joy. She must’ve liked him – she barely does that to anyone. Minus Seokjin. Those two get on ridiculously well, and she did work with him even longer than Yoongi has.

“She’s amazing, Yoongi,” Jimin says once she’s out of earshot, smiling wistfully in the same way most people do when they meet her. “You two are so different, though.”

He tries not to take offence to that.

“Yeah, I’m… a lot more like my father,” Yoongi admits, having heard it from everyone else a thousand times. His mom is outspoken and bright and observant in the sort of way that makes her a little dangerous because she says what she sees, no filter. They made an odd pair. The sort of opposite dynamic that a lot of people would be driven crazy by, but they always made it work. 

“Then he must’ve been a very good man,” Jimin says sincerely, eyes creasing as he smiles in the way that makes Yoongi’s legs shake, he swears. The compliment pulls right at his stupid heartstrings, and he feels a little ridiculous as he smiles right back.

They find a table quite easily, all of them placed in a rectangular shape around a large open space that Yoongi doesn’t quite recall being there last year. As they sit down together, joining a couple already seated since that’s supposedly what you’re supposed to do at these events – mingle with random people – Yoongi’s quite happy just to sit back and enjoy the event, when Mr. Kim, the hostess’ husband, greets everyone with the microphone, asking them to sit down.

It’s a nice cool down from the embarrassment still simmering in his stomach. 

But it’s only ten minutes in when Yoongi finds out what the cleared space is for. Apparently, this year, they’ve brought in an orchestral band so all of the guests can join in on the performances too.

“Everybody’s encouraged to get up. If you don’t have a partner, then find one!”

A sweet, slow melody comes in on the upper strings, rounded off by the deep tone of the cello and double bass – flutes and clarinets joining to create a light counterpoint. It’s every cliché slow-dance song in the world at once.

“Ooh, dancing,” Jimin enthuses, already standing and tugging at the sleeve of Yoongi’s jacket as he says, “Come on, Yoongi!”

“What?” He panics, trying to retrieve his arm from the boy’s iron grip, “Wait, Jimin I can’t dance-,”

“You don’t have to, I’ll lead. Come on, please?”

Really, honestly. Yoongi is not going to be able to go on because of Park Jimin. One day he will melt on the spot, and the boy won’t even know why.

Jimin drags him to his feet, joining the numerous other couples already dancing and that, at least, makes him feel a little better. They’re not going to get constantly stared at.

That’s the thing about the Freeland. In most of Seoul, people are too caught up in gangs and drugs and other illegal shit to really care about things like that. Like them. But, in the Freeland, life is almost entirely void of any of that – the only connection to any of it being what they hear on the news since it’s legally thought to be a different island with the body of water surrounding it. They were able to govern it independently with the help and protection from neighbouring countries. It’s really the only place left in the city that’s like how life used to be before any of the gangs emerged; before the government turned out to be a label short of a dictatorship.

And since they don’t have gangster shootouts and unbelievably easy access to any drug imaginable to worry about, they create their own problems. Like, the weather being inconsistent or how high their taxes are.

Or two men looking a little more romantically involved than they supposedly should. 

Yoongi’s lucky enough to have grown up under the protection of his parents, so nobody ever dared to comment on it when he lived here (though, saying that, there were a lot of queer kids at his high school) but he knows that for people like Jimin, who didn’t have mobster parents or go to the queerest school ever (he’s never mentioned what high school he did go to, just that he didn’t go to Yoongi’s), it must’ve been a lot harder.

But it doesn’t matter. Because they’re not romantically involved. They can stare all they want. It’s just two guys… having a good time. One of them insanely attracted to the other…

Jimin tells Yoongi to put his hands on his shoulders, and he feels incredibly awkward doing it, but complies, while the boy grips his waist. Jimin does know how to dance. He sways in time to the piece’s steady rhythm and spins them with a tinker of laughter at all the right moments. He doesn’t mind when Yoongi steps on his feet a few times, just like Yoongi doesn’t complain when he dips him so suddenly he almost falls over.

But it’s on the fifth, sixth song, where the light hits him just right, that Yoongi thinks fuck.

You are the most beautiful person in the entire universe, Park Jimin.

He almost feels a little nauseous, looking at him. Like he’s too wonderful, too much. And he’s realised this time and time again but each time he does he just sees it with more intensity, more clarity.

He's all dressed-up, and Yoongi wants to kiss him then and there. In front of everyone. Go home, away from prying eyes and undress him - kiss him more. Through the night. The morning. Fuck, the next year. Forget about the charity event, completely. Go to sleep with his arms safely around him, head on his chest and feel completely content with it. Not left wondering why he can’t have him in that way. Why the universe decides to mess with him like that.

And he almost does kiss him. Hell, he feels himself leaning forward a little, feels his throat run dry – and he almost lurches backwards when he catches himself after Jimin says, “Yoongi, everyone’s staring.”

The song ended. The band have started putting away their instruments, and the guests are returning to their tables.

Yoongi takes his hands off of Jimin’s shoulders, still in too much of a daze when he gets back to his seat to notice how the younger’s watching him so carefully.

--

The rest of the event, Yoongi was unable to snap out of that same daze. The hum of the car driving over the perfectly smooth roads of the Freeland sector only helps to keep him in deep thought. He doesn’t remember saying goodbye, hopes he did, but doubts that Jimin would’ve let them leave without mingling some more.

Yoongi can see him out of the corner of his eye, now, staring straight ahead of him, a light rose to his cheeks from the few glasses of champagne he initially said he wouldn’t have but did, and his tie loosened to accommodate the two undone buttons of his shirt. Alcohol makes him too warm, he says.

He doesn’t even get surprised anymore when he feels one of his vital organs do a flip. Could be any one of them at this point. Stomach, heart, lungs.

Kidney, who knows?

Then, Jimin’s looking at him and talking before Yoongi even registers it asking, “You remember when you told me how your parents got together, and you said they make you re-think love at first sight?”

Yoongi tells him that he does, unsure why he’s bringing it up all of a sudden.

“I think I believe in it.”

“Really?”

He doesn’t know why his muscles stiffen so much, why he can feel his heart pounding at his words.

“Yeah.”

Then he laughs, staring dreamily out the window with a perfectly wide smile.

“After seeing that chocolate fountain, I’m not sure I could deny it.”

Yoongi bursts out in laughter, the kind that Jimin tells him is far, far too rare for something so lovely (Yoongi thinks he sounds kind of like he’s dying, but anyway.)

And when it quietens down again, Yoongi thinks about the conversation, minus the chocolate fountain, and wonders about that sort of love again for the millionth time since his father first told him that story.

7^th July, 2017 | 3:22pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.

Yoongi scrolls through his e-mails for the third time that day, trying to convince himself he’s working right now and not just bunking off, enjoying the company of the boy silently reading beside him. But it’s not by choice, really. There’s nothing that concerns him at the minute. Seokjin’s been catching up on all the things he missed while he was away in Full Moon, so Yoongi hasn’t had to work extra like he had when he made the trip.

Taehyung’s the same, making sales like there’s no tomorrow. He’s been in a very good mood since he got back. He didn’t learn any high-end tips from Seokjin, but Jungkook did give him a big hug as soon as he stepped foot in the penthouse- and that's enough to keep him happy for the next week, maybe decade, it seems.

Hoseok’s working the same amount as usual: only to the extent that Yoongi tells him to work, maybe. While Namjoon is consistently taking care of the technical things that go over the rest of their heads by 50ft.

There’s nothing really to do that’s important enough to require his attention instead of the attention of one of his friends or their hundreds of workers underneath them.

He’s about to refresh and pretend he’s very interested in the offer to upgrade his current package from his internet provider, when his phone buzzes with a text message, flashing Koo-Koo up on the screen. He opens it with vague interest. It’s not often his little brother texts him. He usually just appears out of nowhere.

Hey, hyung – mom wanted to know about u n jimin-hyung since you’ve been ignoring her calls so I told her. hope you don’t mind (she said ur an idiot)

(received 3:26pm.)

“Ah, Jeon Jungkook – such a pest.”

Jimin looks over to him from his book with amusement, giggling to himself for a moment before he scrunches his face up a little and says, “Wait… I just realised something. Why is Jungkook’s last name Jeon?”

“Oh…” Yoongi mutters, having completely forgotten, once again, that that isn’t common knowledge. “I told you how mom got pregnant when dad was still married to my real mother, right?”

Jimin nods, intently.

“He was born before the legal papers for the marriage got through. They weren’t married, technically, so, his birth certificate said Jeon. Mom doesn’t even use Jeon these days, but Jungkook never bothered changing it.” Yoongi pauses briefly, thinking over his assumption until he says, “I think he always felt a little closer to her, so he hasn’t.”

Jimin makes a noise of understanding, tilting his head with curiosity as he asks, “Were you closer to your dad?”

“I loved them both, of course, but, yeah. As I said, my dad and I were pretty alike. Makes sense that we were always a little closer.” Nowadays, he’s extremely close to his mom. He always was, but even now Jungkook’s on that woman like a leech, he can’t compete. He’s a little quieter when he admits, “I think that’s why it’s harder for me. Jungkook was younger, and when we stopped being so little, dad got busier, again. Not out of choice, just unfortunate timing. Things with the gangs started escalating. I remember the days when he was there all the time more clearly than Jungkook does, I think.”

Jimin’s eyes flicker with something Yoongi hopes is fondness when he finishes. He opens his book again, thumb having been bookmarking his page, and decides to throw his head onto Yoongi’s lap, nudging the man’s laptop out of the way.

Oh well, not like he was using it anyway.

“I’m glad you get to have those memories,” Jimin says in a tone he hasn’t heard from him before. It sounds almost melancholic, but a little nostalgic, too.

“Family’s important,” Yoongi agrees, and the boy stiffens for a moment, before he goes back to reading.

“…Yeah, it is.”

13^th July, 2017 | 8:34pm | Jo’s Office, Umbra Sector.

Yoongi sits with his head leaning on one of his hands as Jimin rattles on about how Jo was totally right, he is good at this.

“Really? Thirty grand?” The man echoes, eyes widened at the revelation and Jimin grins almost cheekily, smiling over at Yoongi as he says, “Yup, and that was just one time. He won’t take me to any of the recent ones.”

Yoongi rubs an eye from exhaustion of having this conversation again, “I told you that’s because Hoseok was free-,”

“He was only free because you begged him! Just let me do deals with you. It’s so much fun.”

Yoongi takes in the expression on the boy’s face he has deemed as the ‘I’m Park Jimin, give me what I want’ look that continuously makes him give him what he wants every time – whether he knows he’s doing it or not. He can’t help it; his eyes are too wide and pretty and his mouth is too pouty and soft-looking to say no to.

He vaguely wonders if he got it from Taehyung. It looks suspiciously puppy-like.

“Fine. Okay,” he agrees, the boy seemingly pleased when he does, and Yoongi quickly brushes off the conversation, asking, “Anyway, Jo – how’s business been for here? You settling well?”

The man nods, rather proudly, “We’re making quite a lot, actually. Expect your share to come at the end of the month.”

“Seventy-five, right, Jo?” Jimin cuts in, grinning boldly at him because they all know that was not the arrangement.

“I think it was seventy, but I could maybe slip in that extra five percent.”

Unbelievable.

Yoongi’s phone starts ringing just as the man is telling him about a few squabbles his dealers have come across, people from little gangs and the Syndicate alike angry that they’ve taken over the territory. He pulls it out and sees Ryu, who must’ve caught wind that he’s in the sector at the minute.

Anything to get him out of listening to Jo talk for the next hour is very much welcomed.

“Oh, I should probably take this. You don’t mind?”

The man waves it off with a dismissive hand, seemingly content as long as he has someone to talk to, saying “No, go right ahead, Min.”

“Right,” he says, standing up, finger hovering over the accept button. He brushes a hand along Jimin’s back, telling him, “I’ll be back in a minute, darling,” and for a second he forgets that that’s even his nickname, he’d been calling him it so often, lately.

With unashamed earnestness, as well.  

He closes the door, but can still hear Jo telling him about some wild deal he had selling his products last week, and Jimin’s laughing beautifully, as per usual.

Is there something about his gang that just makes none of them serious and stoic?

“Ryu?” he says once he puts his phone to his ear, “What is it?”

“Yoongi, thank fuck,” she breathes, sounding thoroughly stressed as she rambles, “I heard you’re in the sector tonight. You need to come to the casino, right now.”

“Why? What’s happened?”

He swears he hears some sort of commotion in the background on her end.

“Syndicate’s shooting up the damn place. So much for being quiet, huh?”

Shitting hell.  

“Fuck, yeah. You think they were doing that on purpose, take you by surprise?”

Just like he’d suspected and once again not took precautions on behalf of?

“Well, they certainly did that,” she somehow jokes in the moment, “I don’t know. Just… come through the back entrance to my office. I’m gonna need an extra hand.”

Yoongi screws his face up at that, questioning “You don’t want us to get you away from there?”

“No, God – that’s what they want, isn’t it? Ruin my livelihood so your gambling trade’s hindered.”

Oh.

He’s very lucky to have Ryu as a friend. That would’ve taken him at least a fall in profits to realise.

He nods to himself, checking his jacket for his gun as he tells her, “Jimin and I’ll be there as soon as we can.”

She tells him he better, or she’s gonna burn his apartment down – see how he likes it - and he hangs up, hurrying back into the room to announce, “We need to go, Ryu needs a little help.”

“With what?” Jimin asks, seeming shocked at the man’s sudden entrance. Jo doesn’t seem much interested, Yoongi has a habit of sudden exits - being involved in every major gang-related shit storm in the city, most of the time.

He grabs the boy’s arm lightly tugging him up as he says, “I’ll explain on the way - come on, darling.”

He seems confused, yet not surprised as he says “Okay…” and turns politely to the man on the other end of the table, saying, “Good luck with the drugs, Jo!”

Yoongi snorts. Likely the first time he’s heard that one.

Chapter Text

13^th July, 2017 | 8:51pm | The Solstice Casino, Umbra Sector.

“It took you long enough, Christ, Yoongi,” Ryu hisses, pulling both of them in by the collar when they slip into her office. The room is a mess, but not in the way Yoongi half-expected. It’s less ransacked by attackers messy and more where the fuck did I put my gun sort of messy.

“We came as soon as you called,” he says, full-well knowing that if they’d arrived in thirty seconds the woman still would’ve said the same thing, “How many of them are there?”

Ryu shakes her head, still scampering about the room, lifting objects up and setting them back down a little less neatly each time.

“Too many. They’re fucking everywhere. The foyer, the bar, the restaurant. Skulking around the private rooms and the balconies. It’s only a matter of time before they figure out how to get in here, too.”

She doesn’t sound panicked, as such, more sure of the fact and for once Yoongi’s actually glad of her excessively cautious idea of hiding the hallway to her office behind a set of emergency stairs down from the casino’s balcony. He’d initially laughed when she showed him the button underneath the banister that made the steps tilt up to reveal a tiny door that vaguely resembled the one from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and then the vending machine that opened up as the back entrance, but, now, it seems like it was genuinely a good idea.

“Then what’s the plan? Where’s your pistol?”

“I’m not looking for a pistol Yoongi – it looks like half the bloody Syndicate turned up. And, they’re holding my customers hostage! I want to blow their heads off.”

“Then what are you-,”

“Ah-ha!” She exclaims, holding up a tiny gold key that glitters in the light of the room. Yoongi and Jimin exchange unsure glances, and the elder asks, “What’s that for?”

Ryu gives him a smug look, walking over to her bookshelf and oh my fuck is she for real.

She slots the key into the lock on one of the cabinets, twists it two times to the right until there’s a click, and then pulls, the entire bookshelf swinging open to reveal a walk-in wardrobe sort of area jam-packed with weapons and ammunition.

“Holy shit,” Jimin breathes as the both of them walk over to it in amazement. Ryu scans the racks before pulling out some sort of sniper rifle and tossing it onto her shoulder by the strap.

She looks over the rows some more and then asks, “You know how to use an assault rifle, Yoongi?”

Not the weirdest question to ask. A fair assumption, being a mob boss, he supposes, but still. It’s not like he’s been involved in that many shootouts in his brief reign as head of the Mariposa.

“I’ve never had to use one, no.”

Ryu hums, as if she’d been expecting that answer, and throws the gun into his grip, anyway, dismissively saying, “It’s not all that different to a handgun. Just watch for the recoil – my shoulder ached for a week the first time I used one.”  

Great.

“Jimin…” she mutters to herself, eyes flicking across her stock, “what should I give you…?”

Uh.  

“He’s never had to use a pistol in actual combat, Ryu – don’t give him anything else.”

“Okay, then,” she says easily, “Two handguns. But which ones?” Yoongi hesitates when the woman pulls out two well-polished firearms, “Revolver? I’ve got two .38 specials.”

“Actually, Ryu I think-,”

“Woah, they look awesome,” Jimin enthuses, hands reaching out to take them before Yoongi can even finish his sentence.  

“Mm hm. Long-ass barrel. Good damage.”  

Yoongi glares at her with a steady glower.

“Don’t give me that look, Yoongi – you look like I just gave him an RPG.”

“He’s never used those before,” Yoongi reminds her, the boy having, after all, only been okay with his own gun in the safety of a firing range.

“It’s not gonna be for fun out there. Real people that really want to kill us.”

“Oh, come on,” Ryu says, giving a light shrug as she adds, “It’s not that big of a deal,” in her usual, care-free hey, if we die it’s all heroic, isn’t it? attitude that Yoongi does not relate to right now (or ever, really.)

“I think it is, actually. His fucking life matters to me, you know?”

Jimin stops fiddling with the guns then, shoulders dropping as he gapes at Yoongi for an instant, the expression quickly fading away and he smiles with agreement, a quick nod of his head to Ryu, saying, “Ah, he’s right. I’ve no idea how to shoot two things at once. I’d end up missing. Plus, they can only carry a few bullets at a time, anyway.” 

Ryu’s mouth is curved up ever so slightly when she takes the guns back, almost like she’s entertained by the boy’s decision.

“Alright, then. We should go before they decide to blow the place up, or whatever.”

She closes her secret bookshelf, puts the key in the pocket of her suit trousers (good day not to wear a dress she can barely walk in without tripping) and she adjusts the rifle on her shoulder just as Jimin asks, “Have you called the police?”

Ryu lets out a short laugh that would probably have been a lot more condescending if it was towards Yoongi and she asks, “To my illegal business?”

Jimin lets out a vaguely embarrassed ‘ah...’  

“I’ve called a guy who owes me one after I stopped his den from going bust out of the goodness of my heart.” Yoongi arches one very sceptical eyebrow.

“…And his watch but, whatever. He’s sending a couple of his people over. But, I can’t wait that long. If people die it’s on me, you know?” 

Yoongi snickers under his breath.

“Rather moralistic for a person who likes to encourage gambling addictions in their customers.”

Ryu double checks the back entrance is closed, and gives another scan around the room, likely making sure she hasn’t missed anything valuable that people could take if they break in here, after all.

“Death is different. Maybe not to you, since you’ve probably dwindled the city population by at least 3% by now with all your lackeys.”

Yoongi’s about to correct her on that (it’s probably more,) but he notices the sudden tightness in Jimin’s frame, as if he’s uncomfortable with the fact and he shakes his head instead, only lying a little bit when he says, “It’s out of my hands for the most part…”

If he didn’t want people dying left right and centre at the hands of his gang, he’d have it. But sometimes you need to shed some blood to instil some order.

But if it makes Jimin think he’s some sort of asshole, he’ll cover that fact up as best he can.

“Well – put it in your hands tonight,” Ryu says with a fiery grin, “we’re about to dwindle the population some more.”

Yoongi gives a short ‘pff.’

So much for morals.

“What’s the plan?” He asks once she’s done scouting the room, leading them out of her office and into the cramped corridor that opens up to the room acting as an alternative set of steps to the balcony, in case of an emergency. She closes the door behind them, seemingly knowing her way despite it being almost pitch black (probably another defence mechanism.)

“I’m thinking… clear the balcony first. I’ve gotta put this rifle to good use, naturally. Then, we’ll see how many of them we’re dealing with.”

It sounds like a solid-enough plan. Not rash or risky like Ryu’s usual style. She must be taking this seriously for once.

She opens up a tiny door, hitting a switch beside it that tilts back the staircase with a surprising silence, and prompts them to crawl through into the small vacancy the stairs leave. She gestures for both of them to move onto the space beside the stairs so they don’t get crushed or anything (that would be unfortunate, before they even get out there, she jokes) and presses the switch underneath the bannister to bring the stairs back down.

“Woah,” Jimin utters quietly, the owner of the party trick grinning at him, excitably.

“I know, right?”

Ryu brings them up the stairs, gesturing for them to be ready, and she kicks the door open, already aiming down the sight of her gun and taking down the man nearest to them with impressive precision with the swiftness of it all.

She moves out onto the balcony first, ducking behind the arm of one of the sofas with an invigorated smile.

Trust Ryu to actually be enjoying this.

Yoongi waits until the shooters firing at the door need to reload, and then tugs on Jimin’s wrist and makes a break to crouch behind the safety of the (bulletproof, of course) glass railing that runs around the balcony in a stretched-out U-shape, on its side, protecting them from the shots of the people opposite and adjacent to them.

In the middle of the balcony is a large set of steps that Yoongi watches several men run up to join them. Below, there are an absurd number of people, casino-goers mixed in with gunmen but with each second of chaos that unravels, more and more civilians are crouching to the ground.

They’ll just have to be careful with who they’re shooting.

Ryu’s taken another couple of shots in the time that it’s taken for Yoongi to scan the area, and he quickly peers through the glass of the railing to see a man crouching opposite of them, across the stretch of the balcony.

The gun feels heavy in his hands as he lifts it up, takes aim at the gap that exposes his shoulder – unbeknownst to him – and fires, the man jolting back in pain, falling flat on the floor as he grips his arm and writhes.

Jimin remains partially frozen as he watches this happen, gun gripped loosely in his hand as if he’d never even held one before.

“You’re gonna need to shoot at some point, you know,” Yoongi says, sounding focused, aiming at another man making his way up the stairs with caution. He pulls the trigger hard and watches as he falls back down.

“I know,” Jimin says, yet he sounds as if he doesn’t really know that, at all. Yoongi wants to reassure him, to let him know what he’s doing right now is a life or death situation, because, clearly, the boy has a grand issue with death – as those who’ve never been exposed to it, often do, Yoongi finds.

But he can’t. Getting caught off guard is how you die in situations like this. He stays silent. He’ll shoot when he’s ready.

Yoongi takes out another three or four men before they realise that coming up to the balcony is like lining up to die, really, and the area stays clear.

Ryu calls over to them then, shifting over to a position where she can see the rest of the casino, not just the balcony.

“I should be able to get a lot from up here. I’ll need you two to find the ones that are hiding, though. I can cover you, don’t worry.”

Yoongi has no issue going down there. Most of the civilians are out of the way, by now, either crouched or fled to somewhere safer, so he shouldn’t have trouble getting clear enough shots. But, then, he looks to Jimin and a knot of dread forms in his stomach.

The one night he decided to bring him along.

Yoongi crouches down beside Ryu before the two travel downstairs and says, low enough for just her to hear, “If he gets so much as a scratch because of this, I’ll blow this casino up myself.”

She snorts, waving him off as she mutters, “I wouldn’t doubt it for a minute…”

They close the door behind them, waiting at the top of the steps and Jimin finds his voice again, at last, teasing, “Care to go first, Min?”

Yoongi’s hands rest on his rifle as he climbs down the steps, watchfully, but reaches the bottom undisturbed, lowering his gun as he calls “It’s clear, Jimin – come dow-,”

Hands yank around his neck, pulling him backwards into a choke hold, the oxygen flooding out of his body so suddenly that he can’t find the coordination to lift the heavy rifle in his arms, it clatters to the floor as he struggles to pull the hands from his neck.

There’s a shot, ringing out into the concrete walls of the room, and the hands loosen entirely, body slumping to fall to his side as Yoongi catches his breath.

At the bottom of the steps, stands a startled Park Jimin, clutching his pistol in his hands with the face of a first-kill if Yoongi’s ever seen one.

“Okay, fuck that gun – I’m using mine,” Yoongi says, stooping to take the ammo out of the rifle so no one decides to use it later, and dismissing what just happened and instead being very fucking grateful the boy didn’t miss, considering his head was right beside his almost-murderer’s.  

“You’re welcome, by the way,” Jimin says once he gets over the moment, too, gun swinging by his side with an air of casualness as if he’d shot through his reluctance, as well. Incredible what adrenaline can do. 

Yoongi rolls his eyes.

The two squat either side of the door, leading into the main hall, and Yoongi takes a quick glance out of the tiny window, printed over with the words ‘emergency only’ to survey their route.

“Okay, here’s the plan: we make our way to the blackjack table and flip it over so we’re covered.”

“And then?”

Yoongi smiles, blankly.

“Hope Ryu’s cleared most of them from the balcony.”

Jimin’s face screws up at that, muttering “That doesn’t sound very concrete…” as if he has a better idea.

Yoongi dismisses his concern, justifying, “We’ll be covered by the wall immediately to our left and this place’ll cover our back. We just have to watch the right and the front.”

Jimin looks at him, wordlessly, for a few seconds before he’s simply shaking his head, saying “I can’t believe this. In the span of four months, I’ve gone from practically a prostitute living in a shithole because of a dead-end job to protecting a casino from getting shot up with a mob boss – what the fuck?”

Yoongi laughs at that.

In four months, I’ve gone from a cold-hearted bastard with little time for anyone to smiling at every single thing you do, Park Jimin.

“Change comes for us all.”

Jimin lets out a quiet giggle, telling him “You sound like Namjoon.” 

Jimin has ended up spending more time with the other five, now that he’s an official member. Regularly they end up talking before and after their meetings which delays things a little more than Yoongi’d like, but he’s too fond of him to put an end to it. Besides, it’s nice to just… talk with his friends sometimes. Not about gang stuff, or whatever the Syndicate’s doing.

But he won’t tell any of them that.

“Let’s go. You ready?”

“As I’ll ever be, baby boy.”

Yoongi scoffs, turning his view back to the door as he mumbles, “Stay alert,” to keep the attention off the blush rising to the elder’s cheeks.  

They break the door open with a little more force than necessary, and, as if waiting, bullets are propelled towards them in streams that last a good five seconds before Ryu seems to put a few shots of her own into the back of the offenders’ heads.

Yoongi takes a look at their destination, the blackjack tables only a few feet away. There’s no one else around them. He tells Jimin to cover him, and he keeps low as he dashes out towards the cover, skin tingling with the anticipation of waiting for a bullet to fly over his head, but he gets to the table before it can.

He flips it over with haste, turning it to a slight angle so they’re partially protected from the right and front and he gestures for the boy to come join him. He does, approaching with commendable speed as Yoongi takes out another man aiming at him with much greater ease, without having to trail around the extra weight of his rifle’s body.

“There’s not that many,” Yoongi tells him, scanning around less than twenty shooters still left in the room.

“Are you kidding?” Jimin almost chokes, looking around the same area as him with much wider eyes.

“A little…” He admits, before adding, “We’ll take out who we can from here, and then we’ll move behind the fountain. It’s more central.”

“Less covered,” Jimin points out in disagreement.

“If we do our jobs right here, we won’t need so much coverage.”

Jimin looks uncertain of that fact, but nods anyway.  

“You protect us from the front, I’ll keep an eye on the right. See someone aiming either duck or shoot them first.”

“Sure, yeah – I can do that.”

Contrary to his words, he does not sound very sure of that.  

Yoongi leans from coverage, spotting a person crouching beside a neighbouring table. He shoots the foot of it, causing them to jump back in surprise, and he takes the moment of delirium to aim at their head. They drop to the floor.

He hears Jimin shooting this time and out of the corner of his eye he notices people stumble and fall from his bullets and feels security in the fact he’s not going to die a horrible death tonight because his partner is too afraid to pull the trigger.

Die a horrible death because of something else? Maybe. But it won’t be down to incompetence and that’s good enough for the moment.

Yoongi’s just gotten rid of enough guys for their right to not pose a threat, from as far as he can see, when a bullet shoots right through the table, the wood obviously starting to weaken. It zips right between them both, making them each miss their aims entirely. They crouch lower under the table as shots curve over the top of it with loud clanging of metal.

“Shit – fuck. New plan, we need to go now.”

“To the fountain?”

“No…” Yoongi says, peeking out to try and find somewhere that won’t get them killed, eyes landing on the thick wooden protection a few metres away from them.

“The bar.”

“There’s guys there.”

“There’s two. We can take ‘em out.”

They’re more central now, and they can’t risk going one at a time when two people are waiting for them, so Yoongi just hopes Ryu can cover them and he counts to three, waiting until the bullets stop hitting their table before they both make a run for it. Yoongi feels a shot go past his ear and fumbles in his step a little until he feels Jimin’s hand brace his arm to keep him upright, and he regains his balance, vaulting himself over the counter and knocking one of the guys down flat.

He puts a round in his head, just in time to look over and see Jimin dive to the ground, shifting his body weight so that his legs flip over him, stalling in the air for a moment before he falls more and shoots, the man dropping hard as he scampers in behind coverage to join Yoongi.

“What the hell was that?”

Jimin looks as if he doesn’t quite know either.

“Tumbling? We learned it in dance class. I just hoped my aim was right and shot.”  

“Fucking hell,” Yoongi swears and Jimin smiles at him, amusedly, boasting, “Could’ve been the top of my class if I went more.”

Yoongi takes a look over their coverage, firing shots at anyone he can get a clean run at and he ducks back down, scoffing, before saying, “Just– be careful where you're putting those legs, okay? Unless you want a nice neat bullet hole into one of them.”

Jimin giggles, the most unusual sound in amongst the firing of bullets, and he brings his gun up again, hesitance melting away with each shot.

“Yes, sir.”

Yoongi gives him a sharp look out of the corner of his eye.

“I mean it, Park Jimin,” he warns, breaking out the full name – the globally-renowned sign for his endearment towards the younger. He vaguely wonders if he’s picked up on that.

“Okay. No more tumbling.”

Yoongi keeps his eyes trained on the gunmen still in the area, saying “There really aren’t many left this time.” He gives Jimin a brief glance, adding, “We should be done soon-, Jimin, look out!”

He reaches out a hand to yank the boy down, who lets out a yelp of surprise as the shot curves over their heads. Yoongi springs up and fires three shots at the culprit. He squats back down to Jimin’s level, both of them breathing hard as Yoongi gives him a vehemently stern look, brows pinched together, angrily.

“What did I say about staying alert?”

“I’m s-sorry,” he stammers, “I just-.” There’s a long sigh that follows his words before he seems to steel himself for the moment and says “It won’t happen again,” with as little tremor in his voice as he can.

His heart swells a little once it stops racing.

“It’s fine, just… let’s get back to Ryu. We’ll get rid of as many as we can on the way, alright?”

Jimin doesn’t reply, seeming a little dazed at the close-call, eyes wide and unblinking at him and Yoongi gives a soft smile.

“Okay? Jimin-ah?” He puts his hand over the boy’s shaking one, the gesture making him stall entirely, “You’ll be fine, darling. You can do this.”

Jimin nods twice, three times, a newfound assurance on his face as he declares, “Right. Yeah, let’s do it.”

“Partners in crime, you know?”

He smiles right back.

“I’m still the more charming one.”

Brat. He’s not even wrong.

Yoongi reluctantly lets go of his hand, scanning over the counter for their next move.  

“There’s no coverage if we go the way we came. The blackjack table’s shot up and it looks like Ryu’s blocked the door to the side staircase.”

Smart move on her part.  

“Fountain?”

“Hopefully it goes smoother this time. From there we can take the main stairs up to Ryu. Watch each other’s backs.”

“Always.”

He doesn’t know why the simple response fills him with so much of a rush, but he’ll take it. Adrenaline of any sorts is always good for situations like these.

They hop over the counter, both shooting the gunmen in their path as they go and as they reach the fountain, Jimin pulls Yoongi down this time.   

“Thanks,” he says a little distantly, the younger simply grinning at him.

“No problem. I’m getting pretty good at this, if I do say so myself.”

“Night isn’t over yet. Don’t get cocky.”

They take shots around the main stairs, Ryu already have taken out most of the people there, she gives them a short wave when they spot her. With protection on their back and front, Jimin protects their left, and Yoongi their right, trusting Ryu to keep the stairs clean for them.

When only a few remain, the doors to the casino burst open with Ryu’s apparent reinforcements – shady men that definitely don’t belong to the Syndicate and Jimin stands up with a sigh of, “Oh thank Go-,”

Yoongi tugs him back to the ground, hissing, “Quiet.”

Jimin looks alarmed, taking another look at them as he asks, “What? Aren’t they the guys Ryu called? Friends?”

“They’re the guys, but they’re not friends,” Yoongi tells him. He runs a frustrated hand through his hair as he quietly says, “I should’ve told Ryu at the time. Shit.”

“Yoongi?” Jimin asks, voice laced with concern as he taps him on the shoulder to get him to look at him, “What is it? Who are they?”

“Another gang, I can’t even remember the name – it’s not important. The important thing is, it’s run by one of the people that left when I took over. Mouthy shithead who thought the gang should’ve went to someone like him.”

“And? What’s the point?” Jimin asks, gaze littered with confusion. Yoongi looks at the men who’ve now spread themselves substantially across the foyer, taking out the last few remaining Syndicate members and seemingly caring little for the traumatised civilians.

“The point is, it’s not just the Syndicate that want me dead, nowadays. I should’ve told Ryu who had it out for us. She’s lucky they don’t know her connection to the Mariposa, otherwise, we’d be heading for round two.”

Jimin lets out a slow exhale, suddenly realising the secondary shit they’ve landed themselves in. “So, now what?”

“Get Ryu, explain the situation. Leave before they shoot me and then you, by association.”

Jimin looks as if he’s really wishing he didn’t pick up the association part.

Because of their reluctance to come out of hiding, Ryu makes her way over to them with confusion. Yoongi signals her to crouch beside them and she does, giving them both looks of strong caution, mouth drawn into a strange frown.

“Come on guys, help’s here. We need to get up; apparently, more Syndicate are on their way.”

“Your reinforcements are just as likely to wanna put a few good shots in me as the Syndicate are.”

Ryu’s eyebrows raise up to her hairline at this, she gives the gang a glance before asking, “What? Why? I know they’re shady-looking, but-,”

“You remember I told you about the couple of people that left Mariposa, and how they joined their own gangs, instead?”

Her understanding floods clearly onto her face in an instant.

“Oh fuck. Why didn’t you tell me sooner?!”

“I didn’t know you had favours with one of them.”

Ryu puts a hand to her face, mumbling, “Everybody owes me something, Yoongi.” Then, she looks at both of them with urgency, snapping, “You two need to get the fuck out of here.”

“I’m sorry that we have to leave yo-,”

“Don’t worry about it,” she says rather seriously, in contrast to her usual airiness, “You saved my ass tonight, regardless. Now, I’m saving yours.” She points a sharp finger at Yoongi, warning “When you get back, though, I want a full list of people who want to bust your face.”

“I’ll get Seokjin on it, right away.”

She nods contently at that, giving both of them an easy wave of her hand as she says, “See you around, boys. Jimin – make sure he doesn’t do anything too stupid for me anytime soon, alright?”

“Should I tell Yeonja the same thing?” Yoongi asks, prickle of heat rushing to his face when he realises he accidentally compared Jimin to Ryu’s girlfriend. But, in the intensity of the moment, nobody seems to notice.  

“Yeonja gets into as much as I do, unfortunately. She’ll kill me when she hears I didn’t call her tonight. She would’ve happily broke the speed limit driving from Downtown.”

Yoongi laughs at that, giving her a warm look as he says, “Good luck, Ryu.”

“Won’t need it. I can practically sit back and relax from here on out.”

They leave out the way they came in, undetected, and laugh disbelievingly with each other when they make it out, in one piece, into the night’s cooling air.

14^th July, 2017 | 12:45am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.  

“That was wild. I feel like a proper gangster now,” Jimin says blissfully, kicking off his shoes and throwing his gun onto the counter with an easy smile, considering what he’d been doing all night.

“Is that a good thing?”

He thinks a moment, making a drawn out ‘mm’ sound before he decides, “It’s an improvement.”

The elder laughs lightly at him, taking off his suit jacket that most definitely did not leave him enough arm space to be shooting around a casino. He thinks he’ll have red rings around his shoulder from where it dug into him every time he lifted his arms up. Jimin stretches his own arms above his head ‘til he hears a small pop and then lets them drop to his sides.

“You tired?” Yoongi asks, but the boy shakes his head, to his surprise.

“Not really. I’m kind of on an adrenaline high, actually.”

“Ah,” Yoongi murmurs, definitely not feeling that. He could sleep any moment. “Everybody gets that with their first kills.”

Jimin loses his easy smile when his mouth drops open.

Oh.

“Oh my god, how did I forget about that, I-,”

Oh.

Yoongi puts a quick hand on his shoulder, hushing, “Hey, no it’s okay – it was them or us.”

“Shit. I’m going to hell.”

He snorts once he realises the boy isn’t about to have some sort of emotional breakdown like he’d seen Hoseok pull on his first kill. Total mess. Snot and everything. Not that he particularly blamed him, Hoseok’s always been a little more emotional than he has.

“You were already going to hell, it’s fine. I’ll be there too.”

Jimin smirks, mocking his words from earlier when he asks “Is that a good thing?”

“It’s an improvement,” Yoongi echoes back, the boy smiling properly at him then, with a tinker of laughter. Yoongi takes his hand off of his shoulder as Jimin gains a more serious expression.

“Fuck, still though. I can’t believe I just forgot that in the moment. It felt like a movie at the time, you know? Like… it wasn’t a big deal but wow.”

Yoongi forgets sometimes that Jimin wasn’t born into this life like he was. He likely hasn’t seen that sort of shit before, definitely hasn’t done it himself. He wraps his hand around the boy’s wrist, gently pulling him to the sofa.

“Come, sit here.”

He stays sombrely quiet beside him, waiting for Yoongi to speak.

“You did insanely well for your first time. I know that’s not what you probably want to hear, but this world’ll eat you alive if you let it, Jimin. You protect yourself and the people you love – and that’s all you can do.”

Jimin thinks this over for a little, before he makes a noise of vague agreement, plainly saying, “I guess the Syndicate are trying to kill us.”

“Exactly. Plus, think of all the innocent people you saved tonight.”

He quirks an eyebrow, questioningly, asking “Is that a priority for you?”

“I don’t kill innocent people. I only kill when it’s necessary,” Yoongi shrugs, and the boy squints cautiously at him when he says, “About that: you don’t still do any of that here, do you?”

Yoongi swallows.

“Not… recently.”

“Yoongi.”

“Okay, okay. Not anymore.”

The boy falls back against the sofa, pulling his knees up to his chest and jibing, “How gracious of you.”

“I’ve been told I’m quite the charmer,” Yoongi tells him, earning a huff that equates to no, you haven’t, “Now, let’s watch a movie or something to take your mind of things, huh?” He asks, grabbing the remote and flicking on the television, illuminating the room with a pale blue glow and background noise of a laughing track.  

“I don’t wanna make a habit of that. Seriously,” he says while Yoongi’s surfing channels. He hums to let him know he’s listening. “I’d like to keep killing to a minimal – only when I’m backed into a corner.”

It’s funny how when he was given that gun he thought he was all ready to shoot someone – and now that the opportunity’s arisen and gone, he doesn’t want that responsibility anymore. Sometimes, Yoongi wishes he could just drop it like that, too.

“Like a bee, I get it.”

“What?”

Yoongi stops his channel surfing only to look at the boy blankly.

“Only sting when in danger,” he deadpans.

Jimin laughs, loudly, beautifully. The tension of the night wilting away.

“You are nothing like what I thought you first were.”

“And what did you think I was?”

He doesn’t hesitate for a moment before he answers, “A self-entitled, emotionless jerk that didn’t care about anyone but himself.”

“Ouch,” Yoongi says dramatically, curving his lips downwards as the boy grows a slightly scandalised look. He bats his arm with the palm of his hand, defending, “I said you aren’t!”

“Well, do you know what I thought about you?” He asks rhetorically, Jimin purring inquisitively at him in response. 

“I thought you were a bratty, disrespectful child that needed to know when to sit down and shut up.”

“And?” Jimin asks, half-expectantly, mouth tipped up in interest.

“I still think that sometimes…”

“Hey!”

Another hit to his arm.

Yoongi laughs at him, waits for him to quieten down again before he pauses. His voice is much softer when he asks, “But, really, you were just looking out for yourself then, right?”

Jimin looks at him with vague awe, as if he didn’t think he’d come to that conclusion.

“Yeah. I guess I was. And now, for the first time in too long, I have other people to look out for, don’t I?”

“You do,” Yoongi replies reassuringly, affection emitting from his gaze, “And we’ll look out for you, too.”

“You have been, this whole time, Min Yoongi. Don’t lie-,” he says when Yoongi opens his mouth to deny it, “you’ve saved me whenever I’ve needed you. I wanna repay you for that anytime I can.”

Yoongi thinks they’ve come rather far in the time they’ve known each other. Not exactly brief time, when they’ve seen each other almost daily and shared experiences that would be sure to bring even the most unlikely of friends together. They’re not at each other’s throats all the time anymore, not seriously at least. It’s strange. Yoongi knows Jimin’s got him in a way no one else ever has, and he can’t quite label it. But it’s there. And yet, for once, he doesn’t feel scared about letting someone in like that. Not at all. 

“In that case, I’ll pick the movie.”

Jimin laughs shortly through his nose. A smack to his arm again and Yoongi’s glad he doesn’t bruise easy because this boy really doesn’t know his own strength.

14^th July, 2017 | 6:59am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.  

When Yoongi wakes up in the morning, he’s disorientated. It’s too early and he feels floaty and heavy, all at once. There’s pain aching all over his body, and he fails to remember why for a moment until he cranks his eyes open, the light of the room bleeding in as the sun starts to make a predominance in the sky, and sees that he fell asleep on the sofa.

Then, he remembers the night before – at the casino – and briefly wonders if Ryu made it out and then figures, yes, she must’ve since Yeonja hasn’t broken down his door with a knife, ready to gut him, yet.

He tries to stretch, but can’t seem to move one of his arms and he looks down to see why - finding it wrapped around the waist of a boy sleeping peacefully in his lap, the younger’s arms hugging to meet on his back, face pressed against his collarbone, legs intertwined from where they’re stretched out across the sofa.

It’s not the most comfortable position; Yoongi’s got a crick in his neck, and his arm’s sort of numb from having apparently clung so tightly.

But he forgets all about that when he takes another look at the boy resting soundly on him.

The boy that’s sneered and jibed his way into his life. Into his heart, even, as he thinks to himself how beautifully the rising daylight falls on him. How it highlights his honey complexion, emphasises all the curves and muscles in his back, through the thin shirt he’d changed into before their movie last night. He’s started working out lately, now that he has extra time and that, paired with the fact that he no longer has to struggle to get money to eat means that the boy’s developed a physique to envy.

He’s no longer jutting bones and sharp angles and Yoongi decides that he doesn’t miss that at all.

His free hand moves to feed through the boy’s hair, glowing caramel in the morning sunshine. It’s soft to the touch, as always, and Yoongi finds himself once again feeling lost in his aura.

But something feels different, today. As if the tight knot in his chest that he feels every time he looks at Jimin is starting to unravel. Like a fog’s clearing.

Like all the air has been knocked out of his lungs, and he tries to remember where he’s heard of that feeling before, mind suddenly drawing a blank.

The boy stirs underneath him, letting out a barely audible sigh of satisfaction as he continues to brush his fingers through his hair. Yoongi feels the heat of his breath puff onto his chest and he smiles at it.

“’Morning, darl-,”

Jimin’s eyes flick open, immediately connecting with Yoongi’s and it’s then. It’s that moment right there, that everything halts. He chokes on the word.

Too many things happen in the next second.

Yoongi remembers where he’d been told of that feeling of breathlessness, before. Realises it’s not the first time he’s felt it, either, looking at Park Jimin.

His parents. His father. The story.

‘He said it felt like all the air had been knocked out of his lungs.’

‘Romantic.’

“Yoongi? Is everything alright?”

No. No, no it’s not. It’s not alright – this is…

This is not alright.

His heart is beating like it’s about to erupt, his head is pounding – he thinks he might vomit and Yoongi doesn’t even know why. His brain hasn’t caught up yet and everything’s just a haze of Park Jimin’s face and smile and eyes and the way he smells like roses even before he’s sprayed anything and how he never remembers to use a coaster and has left far too many cup rings on every surface in their apartment and how he always makes stupid jokes to Yoongi until he’s laughing with him on the days the elder’s too stressed out to function.

Park Jimin. He thinks about Park Jimin.

And then, everything unfreezes itself and Yoongi’s brain finally catches up with a sharp smack and it takes all of the willpower left in his body to stop himself from saying-

Everything’s just fine, darling.

Because I am desperately in love with you.

Suddenly, every single overzealous and rash action based on the boy makes sense. The boiling anger towards anyone who’s said so much as an insult to him. The fluttering heart, the want to kiss and hold and touch, the soft words – the way he so easily let him get under his skin, break down his walls.

The way he has so willingly given himself to him.

All of it that always seemed too intense for a simple infatuation, because it wasn’t that at all.

Yoongi thinks, that maybe Jimin was right, maybe love at first sight isn’t such bullshit, in the end. Not when it’s him.

“I’m- I… uh. I-…”

Jimin laughs, and it sends shivers down his body and Yoongi doesn’t know how he couldn’t have realised this sooner. The boy rests his head on his chest, again, and he hopes he can’t hear his heart pumping.

“You’re always so tongue-tied in the morning.”

It’s because of you, Yoongi thinks, it’s always been because of you.

The tongue-tying, and everything else, too.

14^th July, 2017 | 11:27am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.  

Yoongi can barely focus at their meeting that day.

It’s hardly a surprise. Falling in love’s a pretty big thing, so he’s heard. Though, he doesn’t think he ever really believed it until he felt it for himself.

His eyes can’t help but drift to the boy any time his own attention isn’t needed 100%.

“Yoongi,” Seokjin calls out to him again, but it takes Jimin raising an eyebrow at him, ripple of amusement on his face for catching him staring at him to actually bring him back.

“Yes?”

Seokjin doesn’t look particularly annoyed, contrary to how he usually would if Yoongi’d zoned out on him. Maybe he knows, now. Yoongi doesn’t know if he even properly knew about his affection for the boy, but maybe he can sense a change.

“I was saying, that there were a few people who’d been messing with our deliveries coming from Ashtown. They had to be dealt with, but they weren’t Syndicate. Just some randomers. Junkies most likely.”

Yoongi barely hears about this sort of thing these days, since it happens so often – and rarely to the scale that requires Yoongi’s attention. Jin tells him sometimes anyway, usually when it’s to do with the Syndicate, but he guesses today he made an exception. Maybe he just wanted an excuse to stop him staring.

He doesn’t know much about what goes on in the lower ranking issues of the gang, like that, except that there’s people with a lot of missing things running about because of them (or not running at all.) It used to interest him, he’d ask to hear about the stories in detail – maybe that’s why Seokjin still elects to tell him sometimes – but nowadays even the excitement he once had of inflicting violence himself falls flat.

He rarely deals with it himself, never really has, but he’s become less and less interested in doing it even occasionally, now.

Doesn’t have to wonder why: brutality isn’t exactly the favourite quality of a certain brunette that he fucking adores.

Jimin looks slightly less uneasy about the situation when Yoongi says, “Tell them to crack down on actual threats, from now on, not lowlifes. They’re wasting energy and resources, otherwise.”  

Seokjin makes a hum of agreement, but Yoongi doesn’t miss the edge of mirth in it.

20^th July, 2017 | 4:03am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector.  

Yoongi wakes with a start, bile building up at the back of his throat and tears stinging in his eyes, the vision of his father falling to the ground in a pool of his own blood, again, tormenting his most immediate thoughts.

They’re always so vivid – that same damn dream. Are dreams supposed to be so fucking vivid? God, he can feel the blood on his hands. Cold and wet and nauseating. He stumbles out of bed, feeling around in the dark, plummets through the door of his ensuite and drops to his knees at the moonlit toilet bowl.

Sometimes, when this happens, Yoongi half expects to vomit blood. His blood. The blood that slid down their hall that night like a river. Running so deep, a wrong step would let him drown in it.

They usually aren’t so frequent, these dreams – memories, whatever they are. But lately, it’s been happening more and more until sitting, shaking on his knees in the early hours of the mornings have become a regularity in his routine – occasionally, multiple times in one night.

And sometimes, he gets them in the day too. Staring into space, thinking too hard and then.

Yoongi pulls on the chain and makes an attempt to get to his feet again, legs trembling so much it still feels like that night all over again.

He just wants it to stop. Stop feeling so much guilt, so much hatred, so much disgust. The mere sight of pooled blood these days is just sending him into this loop. He needs it to end.

“Yoongi?” Jimin asks sleepily, head peeking out from the top of the duvet, almost carefully, when he returns to the bedroom. He tries not to jump too much in response, but it’s hard with his exhausted state.

He forgot Jimin decided to sleep in his room, tonight. Something about the Wi-Fi being better and him wanting to watch a new episode of a drama he’s following, but Yoongi just pretended that was an excuse.

Did he hear him? He’d caught him in the midst of one of his ‘episodes’ many, many months ago, and he swears he’s heard the boy’s bedroom door open a few times when Yoongi’s gotten up, lately, too. Was he imagining things? Or did Jimin wake up and silently check on him?

“I’m here. Go back to sleep...” 

As Yoongi climbs underneath the covers, facing away from Jimin, things are silent, and he figures that he’s dozed off again.

But, then, a small hand comes from the younger’s side and gently rubs his back in little, soothing circles and he swears, he isn’t just imagining things when he hears a whisper of, “You’re safe, baby boy. You’re okay.”

He doesn’t have the dream again, that night.

20^th July, 2017 | 2:05pm | The Golden Hall, Red Light Sector.

“Tumbling, huh?” Kyunghee asks, sceptical tone very obvious past the boy’s misplaced confidence.

“Yup! Pretty well executed, in my opinion.”

“Mm hm,” she says, and Jimin smiles for a moment before she adds, “and if you weren’t so lucky it could’ve gotten your legs shot off.” And just like that, it crumbles.

“Now, let me teach you combat tumbling.”

Kyunghee tells Jimin to show him how he did it and the boy looks slightly hesitant to, knowing she’s going to tell him off for it. He straightens up, takes a worried glance at the teacher who gives a firm nod, and he does it just like he had at the casino, diving to the floor, legs suspending in the air for a brief moment before he shifts his weight and mocks pulling the trigger.

The guys all seem vaguely impressed, until Kyunghee shakes her head and they immediately fall silent like they hadn’t been impressed at all.

The power this tiny human has over them is amazing.

“Your legs hover too much in the air. The trick is one leg at a time. It’ll help you propel forward faster and makes them a harder target to shoot.”

Kyunghee gestures him to stand back, then spreads her arms out, one in front of her head and one behind, diving down to land on the first and kicking a leg forward, one at a time, effortlessly landing in the perfect position to shoot, had she had a gun. She moved so fast that the only one who Yoongi thinks would be able to follow what she just did is Hoseok, who he’s seen learn dances at full-speed with his choreographer. But Jimin looks as if he gets it.

He tries it out, copying her actions movement for movement and the rest of them actually keep to their impressed reactions when even Kyunghee congratulates him on it.

“I hope you won’t need it again, but it’s important to learn.”

Jimin nods, giving her a small, appreciative bow, saying “Thank you, Kyunghee-ssi,” before he turns to Yoongi and jokes, “Hey, Yoongi, I’m gonna start waking you up like this every morning.”

Yoongi barely has time to scoff before the younger’s tumbling towards him, foot planting firmly on his forehead and knocking him right of his feet, Jimin landing on him from the momentum with a fit of giggles.

“Brat,” he quips, poking his forehead hard from where he’s stayed hovering over him, breath reaching his face in warm, short puffs, body heat emanating from them both. Yoongi distracts himself from the proximity and his mind’s flurry of dear God you are even more beautiful this close, Park Jimin, by half-jokingly asking Kyunghee, “Can I learn to do that, too?”

“I think we should leave the flexibility to the dancers – ex or not.”

“Oh, in that case,” Namjoon says, amusement clear in his voice, “– Hoseok, you’re up.”

“Hell no.”

Kyunghee laughs, for once. It captures all of their attention. She shifts under their stares, obviously confused as she says, “Right… how about I teach you some disarming techniques instead? Someone pull out your gun.”

They all pass glances around the room, full-well knowing whoever accepts is going to get their ass kicked. Jimin rolls off of him then, but stays sitting beside him on the floor and he genuinely thinks his heart breathes a sigh of relief.

“Jungkookie,” she calls, the kid visibly startling when she does, “set an example as my student. Come on. Gun out. Make sure the safety’s on, I know I push you hard but it doesn’t mean you should shoot me for it.”

Jungkook sighs loudly, pulling out his gun and hey, how many times has he told him not to carry that around? and he holds it up, reluctantly.

“Okay, now, what you do is-,”

She doesn’t finish her sentence, catching him by surprise as she moves fast, swipes a foot under his leg, puts one hand on the gun so it points away from her and the other pushing his arm down until he falls to the ground, losing his grip on the weapon just like that.

“There. Easy. Now, in the case that they don’t let go of it – Jungkook hold the gun-,”

“I don’t wanna-,”

“-Hold it. Good,” she says, ignoring the younger boy’s whines of protest, “Now, if that happens then all you have to do is this.”

She lands a firm kick to his elbow and the gun pops right out of his hand again, Jungkook holding onto the elbow with a cry.  

“Now. Who wants to try?”

Taehyung sticks up a hand, awaiting permission for a question. Kyunghee points at him with a, “Taehyung-ah.”

“If I volunteer, do I get to kick Jungkook, too?”

“Yep.”

“Then, sure,” he complies, waltzing over to them both with a mischievous glimmer.

“Hyung.”

25^th July, 2017 | 10:36pm | Outskirts of Ashtown Sector.

The radio fills the car with gentle ambience for literally the first time ever. He’s never used it, not until Jimin insisted for the longish drive back from another (successful thanks to his ridiculous art of persuasion) meeting in Full Moon. Jimin’s humming along under his breath, not quite loud enough for Yoongi to hear properly, but loud enough to know he is.

They’re passing along a straight road somewhere outside of Ashtown, soon to turn onto the highway when Jimin jumps alive in his seat, pointing eagerly outside of the window, gushing, “Oh, oh – can we stop up there?”

Yoongi looks to where he’s pointing at a small dirt road, leading up to a hill overlooking the suburbia of the sector.

“Up there? Why?”

Jimin smiles to himself, claiming, “The stars are really clear up here. You can’t see them at all in Red Light. There’s too much light pollution.”

The stars. Of course. He just secured almost $100,000 on a cocaine deal for a bunch of gangsters, and now he wants to go watch the stars. How Jimin.

He’s so damn fond.

“Alright, of course we can,” he watches the boy grin into his hand, and he thinks he falls just a little harder, somehow.

Yoongi pulls the car to a stop, not feeling the once usual jitter driving would leave him with hardly at all anymore. Whether that’s him getting used to it, or just Jimin’s calming presence, he doesn’t know.

Jimin gets out, and Yoongi rolls down a window when he watches him jump onto the hood of the car, chin pointed up to the sky in wonder.  

“What are you doing?”

“Watching the stars, what does it look like?” Jimin says, eye-smile already out-twinkling every last one. Why would he want to watch anything else? “Come on. Turn the radio a little louder and sit with me.”

Sitting very quickly turns into laying, and Yoongi can’t keep his focus trained to the sky for too long before his attention’s turning to Jimin again. The boy’ll look at him, and Yoongi’ll look away, a little redder each time.

Jimin’s singing at full volume now, to a stupid love song that’s come on and he easily adds his singing to the very, very long list of things he loves about him.  

The younger takes his hand when the song mentions it and Yoongi feels his heart jump into his throat, tries not to react too much as their fingers intertwine, his high, delicate voice singing better than anyone on that damn thing ever could. He could be singing all the wrong notes and Yoongi would still think so.

“Ah, that’s funny they’re singing about the stars-,”

He cuts himself off as the singer moves on to talking about falling in love right in that moment, grip tightening on his hand as he mutters, “Oh…” a breathless little giggle following it.  

Laugh all you want, Yoongi thinks, I already have.

The song passes, and so does the brief tension, Yoongi now holding his stomach with both hands as he wheezes over Jimin trying to follow along with a 90s hip-hop song.

“Like you could do any better,” Jimin sneers once he stops, Yoongi having to wipe tears from his eyes. Then, he sits up, giving the boy a very serious, almost offended look, as he says, “I’ll have you know I won my middle school talent show by rapping.”

“Oh, okay, Kanye…” a pause, Jimin’s smile widening more and more by the second before he says, very quietly-

“Min Yeezi.”

If Yoongi thought he’d laughed hard before…

On the way back, they both sing to the radio, Yoongi even shows him that secret middle school talent and Jimin has to admit, it’s pretty good.

Sometime through the rest of the journey, he realises that he doesn’t hear Jimin’s voice singing, and looks over to see him fast asleep.

He turns the radio off and brushes back a hair that had fallen into his face with a gentle smile.

4^th August, 2017 | 5:32pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

They’re sitting in their usual spots on their sofa (their sofa,) side by side, feet stretched out onto the coffee table in front of them, watching the latest drama that’s pathetically captured both of their attention. Jimin continues giving his usual commentary throughout, Yoongi adding in his own sometimes.

It’s the type of thing the rest of his friends would laugh at them for. Never stop laughing at them for, most likely. Ever since Jimin joined Mariposa, the Min Yoongi You Are One Smitten Son of a Bitch comments have amplified. Tenfold.  

If only they knew.

“God, he’s such an idiot,” Jimin laments, waving an agitated hand at the screen as if the character’s been ignoring him, “– he’s obviously in love with you, what the fuck.”

Yoongi laughs at him, but it dies in his throat when Jimin shifts in his spot to lay his head in Yoongi’s lap, seeming physically exhausted by the character’s apparent obliviousness.

“You think?” Yoongi asks, not really having picked up on it himself, if he’s honest.

“Uh huh. It’s so obvious, but you know what? The writers aren’t gonna develop it because they never do.”

Funny how Jimin thinks he’s so good at figuring out the romantic interests of those characters, but he can’t even see the one of the boy he’s curled up with.

Jimin pulls one of Yoongi’s hands up from where it’d been resting by his side, and makes him run his fingers through his hair, Mochi already lying beside him on his other side after demanding the same thing. Jimin finds it soothing, apparently. He likes it when he plays with his hair.

He swears Mochi and him get more and more alike every day.

“It’s just gonna stay a sad, unrequited love because the writers won’t wake up and let the guy confess.”

Yoongi feels a slight prickle at the heat of his words. Sad… unrequited love. Huh.

“Well… maybe the guy knows he’ll be rejected,” he defends, Jimin giving him a scandalised look when he does.

“He should still go for it!” The boy says like it’s common knowledge, then adding, “Love is useless if not shared.”

“Poetic, where’d you hear that one?”

The words settle with him, though, past his dismissing jibe.

“Pulled out of my ass,” he answers, giving a glint of a smile when he quips, “Like half of this plotline.”

They laugh together, the boy seeming rather pleased with himself as he settles back into watching the drama, only other disturbance being when he squirms a little once Yoongi’s hand stops gliding through his hair for a second.

At the next commercial break, Jimin turns onto his back, staring up at Yoongi with an unfittingly cheery look when he says, “Oh… yeah – I don’t think I can return your Louis Vuitton shirt anymore. I put it in the washing machine the other day when you told me to ‘clean up your shit, Park Jimin or so help me God you are on the streets’ but it’s dry-clean only.”

“I-,”

His smile takes any sincerity out of the apology.

“And now it’s all bally. Not very silky.”

Oh my god.

“I can still sleep in it, though!”

He’s still been sleeping in that?!

Yoongi can’t even find the willpower to be remotely mad about it – he just grins like he’s heard the sweetest thing in the world. 

8^th August, 2017 | 7:57pm | Daffodil Gardens, Ashtown Sector

“It’s not a date,” Yoongi tells him again, the boy rolling his eyes at him, purposely obvious about it as he nudges his side, saying, “Oh, shut up. Humour me. You take me to your favourite tea room you haven’t even taken your best friends to – and now we’re sitting under a tree at sunset in a park full of bloomed daffodils?”

“You said you wanted to go somewhere,” Yoongi mutters, shade of the tree unable to hide his incredible embarrassment because he is definitely right, this is high-key a date setting.

“I did, and you took me somewhere. It’s nice,” he admits without any of the teasing in it, now, “Makes me forget about all the, you know… shittiness in our lives.”

Yoongi sighs in whole agreement with that. Jimin, in general, kind of makes him forget about all the shittiness in his life.

“Maybe we should go places more often.”

A brief second of silence falls over them.

“Like, more dates?”

“Brat.”

“I’m just kidding, Yoongi,” he says earnestly, patting the man’s thigh with a sweet chuckle, saying, “Thank you for spending time with me. I probably would’ve went insane by now if it wasn’t for you.”

“In the apartment?” Yoongi asks, considering how many times the boy has claimed to be stir-crazy.

“I was thinking more in the Galaxy, before we met,” he says, and oh, Yoongi thinks. That far. “– but yeah, your apartment can get pretty lonely when you decide to ditch me.”

“Our apartment,” he corrects without a second thought, the other’s eyes dancing with amusement when he manages to look at him without shrivelling up, somehow.

“Our?”

“You said it yourself, didn’t you?” Yoongi asks, eyes loitering over the orange glow of the sunset to keep his voice even. To keep the hey, I love you, you know, in.

“Just surprising to hear you admit it.”

Yoongi waits a moment, thinking back over what Jimin just said and then he frowns, saying, “Wait, I don’t ditch you.”

“You do too!” He snaps back, no malice in it at all – just a grin- “Always going off to the dangerous things by yourself.”

“You said you don’t want to hurt anybody unless it’s necessary.”

He expects Jimin to slump down against the tree again with a childish murmur of true, like he usually would when Yoongi stumps him like that. But the boy remains very quiet, just staring at Yoongi with an unspoken softness.

“I don’t want anyone to hurt you, either,” he confesses after a little while longer, a shine in his eyes that Yoongi isn’t sure is the sunlight.  

“I’ll be okay,” he promises, daring to touch Jimin’s hand, and when the boy doesn’t pull away, he laces their fingers together, just like the night they watched the stars. “I’ll always come back – if I didn’t, who would feed Mochi?”

“I feed Mochi just as much as you!” Jimin defends, looking genuinely affronted at his statement.

“You feed her human food. She’ll have a heart attack.”

“I can’t resist the way she looks at me.”

Yoongi looks away, again, laughter catching in his throat, tumbling out of his mouth as he thinks to himself, you two really do have a lot in common.

It’s only a little while later, both of them sitting in comfortable silence, hands still clasped, when Yoongi feels Jimin’s head drop onto his shoulder. He looks at him with intrigue, hearing the soft wisps of breaths he knows very well by now to be the sound of him sleeping.

“Ah, always snoozing, aren’t you?” He asks quietly, waiting for the boy to jolt up and rebuke his statement. But he just keeps breathing.

“Jimin? You’re really not awake?”

Silence. A calm breeze rustles its way through the park, the sun dying down to a red glow, coating them both in the hues.

“Then, can I tell you something?” He asks, voice barely audible even to him.

He dips down, presses a kiss to the crown of his head, waits for him to make any sort of movement, just in case. When he doesn’t, he whispers into his hair, the words carried off by the next breeze that drifts through the locks.

“I am so, so in love with you, you idiot.”

Jimin doesn’t stir like he still half-expects him to, and Yoongi’s heart stops pounding so much.

He lets him sleep on, long, long after the sun’s set – just when it starts to get a little bit too chilled to sit out in any longer, the summer already starting to break into the autumn haze that September passes onto August.

Then, he picks him up in his arms, light as a feather, and carries him back to the car. He starts up the engine, and allows himself to press one last kiss to his temple, just to get it out of his system.

For now.

That boy’ll never be out of his system.

Chapter Text

15^th August, 2017 | 3:28am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Jimin doesn’t know what to do.

It seems like a lifetime ago now, the first night Yoongi slept in his dingy old apartment. Jimin had extinguished the small flames that had caught in his attempt at breakfast and gone in to check on the asshole he’d hazily pulled into bed with him under the influence of whatever it was Seonghyeon gave him.

Ever since then, Jimin’s been wondering about that. That… nightmare he seemed too accustomed to even from the first time he witnessed it for it to be just a one-off bad dream.

He almost forgot about it over the months, until Yoongi asked him to move in with him. Now, he’s seen it too many times to count.

The shaking, the crying, the vomiting. The muttering to himself that would make anyone else think he’d gone mad.

Jimin’s seen or heard it every single night it’s happened. It’s as if his mind’s purposely tuning in to it, to wake him up just in time to remind him that you know, you should probably do something.

But Jimin doesn’t know what to do.

Even now.

He wakes up tonight with a scratchy, dryness in his throat and realises he’d forgotten to take some water with him to bed (he’d teased Yoongi about being an old man for doing that at first, but it’s saved his ass from getting out of bed a few times, he’ll admit.)

He hauls himself up, pulling off the covers and feeling an unusual coolness in the night air, and decides to pull on the red silk bathrobe haphazardly hanging on the end of his bed to combat the chill - as best as silk can, anyway.

But, he only gets to open his bedroom door before he stops in his tracks.

The sound of running water.

…Is Yoongi taking a shower?

At three in the morning?

Jimin steps out into the hallway, approaching the bedroom door of the elder with a touch of growing uneasiness that doesn’t exactly make sense because it’s weird but so what?

“Yoongi?” He calls out, giving the door a slight knock.

There’s no answer, but the water keeps running.

Jimin opens the door, scanning around the room tinted blue from the unshut curtains letting in the outside’s dull light, and he swallows down his nerves when he finds it empty.

There’s light pouring in from a crack underneath the door to the ensuite.

His feet barely carry him quicker than a crawl, though the pounding of his heart makes him feel as if he’s sprinted.

“Yoongi? What are you doing?” He asks, ear pressed against the unpleasantly cold wood. There’s no sound except the water.

“Are you okay?”

He can’t tell if the choked noise inside is just his fear imagining things.

“Baby? I’m coming in-,” The handle doesn’t budge when he presses down on it. He jostles it a few times, other hand pressing on the door as if that’ll somehow help.

“D-did you… lock the door? Yoongi, let me in.”

He bangs the wood with his palm, other hand not leaving the handle. God, what the fuck is he doing?

What is he supposed to do?

“Yoongi, I’m serious…”

He knows he is. He has to hear him. Why isn’t he letting him in? Why did he lock the damn door in the first place?

Why didn’t Jimin insist on sleeping with him, tonight?

His voice is higher, louder know as he keeps pounding on the door, begging the man to open it because what the fuck is going on?

“St-stand back, okay? Get away from the door.”

No fucking answer. Is Jimin’s pulse always this loud?

He takes a deep breath, running his eyes along the door, just to give Yoongi time to move if he was anywhere near it (and to calm himself down.)

He lines up his foot underneath the door’s lock mechanism, roughly and pulls back his knee, snapping it forward again with a harsh thud. It barely budges, the door far too damn expensive to be knocked open by a boy practically dizzy with fear.

“Shit,” he swears, looking around the room for something that could help. Yoongi’s bedroom’s always been rather empty, and there’s nothing that would provide enough weight to bust open the lock.

But then, something metallic and shining in the night.

His gun.

“J-just hold on, Yoongi. Please, for the love of God stand back,” he warns again, stumbling over to the gun on the nightstand, popping out the magazine to check it’s loaded.

When he sees that it is, he moves back over to the door, takes aim just beside the lock, where the mechanism feeds into the frame around the door.

“Okay I’m gonna shoot it – don’t kill me when you need to get a new lock, tomorrow. Promise?”

No reply, the water still spraying down into the silence.

He pulls the trigger, flinching when wood splits back out. He tries the handle again, but it still doesn’t budge.

“Where’s that damn rifle of Ryu’s when you need it?” He mutters to himself, aiming again. The door splits around the handle, this time, and Jimin rushes over to it, pulling the handle and feeling it creak now. He takes the hilt of the gun and slams it into the weakened part of the door, until it chips enough for it to burst open.

Jimin’s eyes immediately lock on to the crouching figure of the corner, squinting a little at the sudden burst of bright light in the room. He looks so much younger like this, hunched over on his knees and shivering to himself. Jimin realises, then, that the running water is the shower and Yoongi’s drenched in it – but he’s fully clothed; half in, half out of the shower’s spray yet seeming almost completely unaware of the saturated material clinging to his skin.

He wasn’t home when Jimin went to bed. Usually, on the nights he doesn’t take Jimin with him, he’d wait up for him, but he didn’t tonight – the sort of exhaustion that comes from a day of doing very little weighing down on him early in the evening.

God, he wishes he did.

“Yoongi? Yoongi!” Jimin almost wails, stepping over to him with no regard for the danger of the puddles of water forming on the floor. He drops to his knees, the bare skin wincing at the cold of it as he takes his face in both hands, trying to coax him to look up at him as he asks, “Baby, are you okay? Are you hurt? Yoongi? Baby boy, look at me.”

Yoongi does, face just as wet as the rest of him, despite it not being touched by the shower’s stream. His eyes are red, unblinking and distant and he looks so damn vulnerable that Jimin can’t help but stare. This, right here, is his Yoongi – in a way he’s never seen him before.

He doesn’t like it. Doesn’t like seeing him as anything less than his usual half-warm, half-teasing self but he’d be lying if he said he doesn’t think he looks breath-taking right now with his damp hair clinging to his forehead and red lips glossy and pouting at him.

He pulls him into a hug, as tight as he can, not caring at all for the cascade of water now hitting against him as he buries his face into the man’s shoulder.

“What happened? G-god you scared me I thought something… I thought you…” he mumbles into his skin, thought weighing too heavy in his mouth for him to finish it. He hears the elder sniff loudly, and he whispers, “I’m sorry.”

Jimin’s chest tightens at that.

“You’ve nothing to apologise for,” he tells him firmly, pulling back to look him in the eye when he demands, “Tell me what’s wrong. Let me fix it.”

“You c-cant, Jimin.”

“Why not?” He practically cries, “I can. Let me.”

“B-because he’s dead, already.”

His mouth drops at that. What is Yoongi talking about?

Did something happen tonight?

“Who? Who’s dead? Nobody’s dead, baby. I think you just need to sleep.”

Yoongi looks at him without a word, without even much emotion – the only sign of his turmoil being the tears pooling in his eyes. But then he lets out a loud sob, face screwing up before he’s throwing his arms around the younger and howling against the material of his bally silk shirt.

“He’s dead and I didn’t do anything, I didn’t. I st-stood there a-and watched muh-my d-dad die.”

Oh, Jimin thinks. That’s what this is about.

“Oh, Yoongi…” he says, voice softer than he’s ever had it, he rubs the man’s back in soothing strokes as he assures him, “You couldn’t have done anything, sweetheart.”

“It’s auh-all m-my fault. I didn’t… I should’ve…”

He hushes him with a gentle ‘shh’, moving his free hand to cradle the back of his head as he promises, “It wasn’t your fault at all, don’t say that, baby. It wasn’t.”

“Y-you don’t even know what h-happened.”

“I don’t. But I know it wasn’t your fault.”

Yoongi seems to consider this, with how certain Jimin sounds, but then a shudder runs through him and he chokes, “B-but he was bleeding. So m-much. And I didn’t help him. I didn’t help either of them. Misook was already dead in the other room and I didn’t even know.” He takes a deep breath, trying to steady his emotions in that way that’s so typically Yoongi. Always wanting to put on a brave face, even when he’s in shambles. “I watched him die I… just watched him die from the end of the hall, on my knees like a fucking kid.”

“You were a kid,” Jimin says without hesitating, “We both still are. We’re just… kids. And sometimes we make mistakes, or feel like we could’ve done more but sometimes we can’t. We do what we can,” Jimin tells him, fingers gliding through the sopping locks, “But there’s nothing you could’ve done.”

Yoongi shakes his head, swallowing down a cry as he insists, “I sh-should’ve said g-goodbye… I didn’t even- I should’ve gotten mom and Jungkook. They didn’t get to-,” He doesn’t swallow down the next one and it echoes, to Jimin. Crashes against his heart and every single one just makes him want to hold him tighter and tighter. “J-jungkook found us just before he passed. His last fucking breath, because of me.” He sniffs, then lets out a huff so biting towards himself that Jimin gets a chill.

“I tr-traumatised my own baby brother. I sh-should’ve just stayed away.”

Jimin feels tears pricking at his own eyes, just from the man’s voiced thoughts. The knowledge that this has been what was eating at him for so long. He obviously hadn’t even told anyone until now and that stings every inch of the younger man. But he composes himself. Yoongi doesn’t need someone to cry with him right now, he needs someone to pick him back up.

“You weren’t the one to kill him, Yoongi,” he says, voice a little sterner now. “You think it would’ve been better for Jungkook to find him like that on his own? Hell no. The people that did this, the government – those cold-hearted fuckers. They’re the bad guys. Those are the people that don’t deserve peaceful sleep. Not you, Yoongi. You don’t deserve any of it. You’re good,” he whispers, meaning every word of it, too.

This man is a beautifully compassionate, wonderful human being that uses the guise of being an asshole to protect himself and the people close to him because he thinks he’ll hurt them and himself if he lets them in.

Jimin can see right through him. Easy as hell.

“I-I’m not. I’ve d-done shit, Jimin. Things you’d hate me for.”

Jimin almost scoffs at that. Yeah, sure.

“I’d never hate you, Min Yoongi,” he says with raw honesty.

“You would.” Never. “I c-can’t even stand blood anymore because my father’s death turned me into a monster that craved it. The sight of it makes me sick because it just reminds me of it all. His death at their hands, and the deaths at mine.” He stops hugging so tightly on to the boy, and moves back, a troubled sense of guilt in his stare as he says, “I d-don’t kill innocent people, but I’ve killed people who don’t deserve to die.”

Jimin shakes his head. It doesn’t matter. None of it matters. “But not anymore, right? You’re not like that anymore, Yoongi, you know you aren’t. It’s okay to regret it, but what’s done is done. We…” He feels a substantial weight emerge in his stomach as his next words stagger on the tip of his tongue.

“We’ve all done things we’re not proud of, haven’t we?”

Yoongi stays silent for a minute. Each second passes by as a lifetime in Jimin’s head as he watches the man before him seem to struggle with some sort of internal conflict. He feels a surge of heat climb up the back of his neck as he worries that he said something wrong, but, then, after what feels like forever, Yoongi seems calmer when he speaks again.

“I just wish I could make them stop.”

Jimin tilts his head at him, stroking a delicate hand down the wet coldness of his face. He pulls the man out of the range of the shower, and takes off the robe draped around himself to hang around Yoongi’s shoulders instead, hoping it’ll help him stay a little warmer.

“The nightmares?” Yoongi gives a small hum of confirmation.

“I wish I could make them stop too, baby boy,” he says, like he’d been saying to himself for as long as he’d known they’d been going on, “But only you can. And your anger is stopping you from grieving and moving past it. You’re haunted by guilt and trauma because you think you could’ve done more, right?” Yoongi nods, and Jimin lets his mouth curve upwards a little in reassurance as he adds, “But deep down you know you couldn’t have. You’re just angry because of what happened. Angry because you couldn’t stop it.”

Yoongi seems a little surprised by Jimin’s observations, which he takes to mean he was right. He’s always been a little more perceptive than people expect him to be. It’s sort of insulting, but it’s also kept him out of a lot of dodgy situations in his past. Or it would’ve, if he’d ever actually followed through with his own advice. The Galaxy being a fine example of not doing that - his early teenage years being an even better one.

“That’s why I’m going to avenge him.”

Jimin snorts quietly, looking at the elder with an inch of sympathy. Yoongi doesn’t really like that. Most people don’t, he finds, but the statement’s so naïve Jimin can’t help but feel pitiful.

“You don’t have to be so brave all of the time. You think if, somehow, you were able to take down the government right now that’d make it all better?” He asks, voice a little judgemental and it makes the older man frown at him in a way that’s less disdainful and more frustrated, like a child.

“You’d still feel guilty and angry – just without any reason to believe it’d get resolved. Trust me, Yoongi, making rash decisions won’t fix things. Getting revenge on someone, or just walking away from it – that won’t help anyone,” He says, without doubt, the experience in it himself powering the words, “You might fool everyone else, but don’t you dare think you can fool yourself. Or me.”

Yoongi looks away from him, scathing look in his eye that’s a little more familiar but none the more comforting. He just needs to break down this defence mechanism too. He can’t help him if he’s scowling at him like a pissy teenager.

“You keep talking as if you know everything about me.”

“I don’t,” Jimin admits, the fact almost disheartening him a little before he says, “But I know how you feel. Not anywhere near to the same extent, but I’ve had things taken from me, as well.”

“When?”

Jimin shrugs then, the ache he hasn’t quite got a hold of yet surfacing a little at the thought. But he’s trying, and Yoongi should too.

“I’ve lost count of all the times. But I don’t think you’re in a good enough state right now for me to unload my life history. I’ll tell you a little once we get dried off, alright?”

Yoongi gives him a long look, as if he’s trying to get a read on him. But he gives up, nods shortly, and lets Jimin pull him up onto his feet.

--

Once Yoongi is brought back to his senses, he can’t really even look at Jimin properly without embarrassment coiling through him – hot and alarming. The boy had to break his door over one of his stupid episodes. He was crying in the shower for fuck’s sake.

And yet, Jimin had been so caring towards him. Caring even now as he sits in bed beside him, gently toweling the elder man’s damp hair and smiling at him enough to set his heart ablaze when he feels courageous enough to look.

“You’re gonna catch a cold in August, you lunatic,” he jibes, poking the man in his side as he throws the towel to the bottom of the bed, “What were you doing with the shower on?”

Yoongi shivers just thinking about it, and the boy gives him a saddened, pitying look that he tries to ignore.

“I… I had. It felt like there was blood all over me. I needed to… get it off.” There’s a small silence in which Yoongi hears how batshit he just sounded – who is he? Lady-fucking-Macbeth? – and he dips his head towards his thighs, covered by the thin summer sheets of his bed as he mutters, “I’m sorry, I sound crazy, tonight, I know-,”

“No, no,” Jimin cuts him off, making him look to him instead of the sheets with an air of wonder, “You’re just going through some shit. It’s okay, it’ll stop.”

Yoongi wavers on whether to ask the question in his mind, not knowing whether the boy’d even want to answer it.

“Has it stopped for you?”

Jimin looks confused, but in the sort of way you might to try and stall a little.

“You said people took from you as well. Have you gotten over it?”

He gnaws on his bottom lip, and Yoongi can almost feel the pain in it, but, somehow, he smiles carefully at him as he says, “Sometimes, certain things take a little longer. Things might even scar, but you know what? It’s a reminder that you pulled through.”

Yoongi feels so small in the boy’s presence tonight, like he’s some sort of endless bought of wisdom.

“You’re… you’re right.”

He had no idea that anyone could ever make him feel so at ease like this. Nobody, not even his best friends could make him really, honestly feel like his hurt would subside eventually. Not until him.

Jimin seems to decide to tell him about it, though Yoongi wasn’t going to ask – thinking he put the boy in enough distress tonight. He’s still smiling, but it seems a little less cheerful now.

“The ‘worst’ thing I had to deal with that I kept alluding to when we first met… It was a few weeks before you showed up, when I still worked at the Galaxy.”

Shit, that’s a lot more recent than Yoongi expected. The boy picks at the edge of the bedsheets, still weakly smiling to himself.

“Working in a place like that, things happen that stick with you. Anger and d-,” he stutters on the word, heaving a small breath before amending, “disgust. It boils and corrodes inside you until you just become desensitised to it, I suppose.”

Yoongi hates the look on his face when he says that. Like he’s so… tormented by it. Who knew they were both bottling so much up shit? That they were both so catastrophic?

“I couldn’t shoot Youngsoo, all those months ago, because he reminded me of my place in the world.”

Yoongi stays in curious silence, and the boy stops picking at the sheets, and opts to hug his knees to his chest instead, eyes tearing away from anywhere near Yoongi.

“Sluts don’t take,” he recalls, “they’re not… here to be heard. They’re seen and taken from. That’s it. And once you give yourself like that, once you fade into the background, lose your voice – your right to be anything but silent like that - there’s no going back.”

Yoongi feels sick just seeing how Jimin obviously still believes those words. How that’s the reason behind the hesitance, the strangeness he sometimes notices him have when he’s alone or thinks no one’s watching.

“That’s what he told me before we met; but then when I finally got the payback I’d been wishing for, for two weeks, he asked me if taking his life would change that and made me realise that it wouldn’t. I’ve been called shit, dealt with things no self-respecting human being should have to, but he was the first to ever, truly make me feel like nothing.”

Jimin looks at him again, an eerie calmness in his features that must be down to the apparent numbness he’s mastered, and he says, “That’s why I’m telling you that revenge doesn’t mean shit if you can’t get over it in your head. I’ve had a lot of people ruin me over the years… to the point where, even now, I can’t stand my own reflection most of the time. You were right when you said that. That’s the exact reason I hated the name Étoile.”

“Jimin-,” He feels like a fucking asshole.

“It means star, you know,” he says with a weird tinker of laughter: strained, unnatural, pained, “I liked it at first because I thought it’d make me feel amazing and bright and unique. But it was a constant reminder th-that.” He takes a deep breath, exhaling it with a contrasting sense of languidness when he finishes, “Well, I’d never be anything more than just lust-worthy and provocative. Sought after and romanticised, like a star, but never actually cared for.”

Jimin nods but it doesn’t fit what he says, as if he’s answering a thought in his head as opposed to his words. “That’s why I wear the necklace. Joonho told me to, and I think it was supposed to be some sort of reminder. Just like what Youngsoo said. Once a slut, always a slut. I feel weird without it now…”

Yoongi still sees him wear it a lot. He always got a bad feeling from it, but now?

He wants to burn it. Or choke Joonho with it. Resurrect Youngsoo and decapitate him with it, somehow.

“That’s not true,” He almost seethes at him, a startling difference to the other’s boy’s stillness, “None. None of that is true.”

“How isn’t it?” Jimin asks and God, Yoongi had no idea he felt like this. His Jimin, plagued with all of this by himself for so long, “I don’t see anyone proving me wrong.”

“I-,” love you, he almost says for the millionth time, “care for you. You’re… a lot more valuable than that, Jimin. If not to anyone else, then to me. You’re the most beautiful person I’ve ever met. Inside and out.”

He should feel embarrassed being so frank about it, but it’s so much the truth that it feels almost natural to say it. Besides, the grin on Jimin’s face is perfectly worth the risk.

“No one’s ever said that to me before.” Yoongi laughs a little, giving one of his shoulders a dismissive shrug as if that fact doesn’t make his head soar, “Who knew you were such a romantic? Just like your dad.”

Yoongi doesn’t roll his eyes at him or shove him for his teasing. He smiles.

After a little while, when Jimin’s on his back, staring up at the ceiling, he says, “I’m sorry for unloading all of that on you when you have your own things to deal with. I just thought it might help to know you’re not alone in your struggles.”

You deserve to be heard, Park Jimin. You deserve to have every single word of yours cherished.

“It did. Really, Jimin, thank you. For everything. I want to move on. I don’t… want to feel so angry and guilty anymore. But I do want to avenge him. I won’t be able to shake that feeling, I know. But I want to do it for him. Not for me.”

Yoongi sees the boy smile up at the ceiling light and he knows that if it was turned on, he’d outshine it.

“That’s good, Yoongi. I’m glad you’re ready to try this.”

Yoongi nods confidently before he says, “I will. On one condition.”

“What’s that?” Jimin asks, looking over at him with curious eyes.  

“You let me help you get over your problems, too.”

Let me make you believe how incredible you are.

Yoongi sees relief in the boy’s gaze, as if he thought he would ever leave him to suffer alone. No way in hell. He’s making it his priority to do just that.

“It’s a deal.”

Little by little, Yoongi’s nightmares start to lessen from that night onwards. They both know they won’t stop completely, not so soon, at least, but Jimin promises him he’ll help him through it – just like Yoongi’ll help him, too.

(“Does this mean you’re inviting me to sleep in your bed more often?”

Never leave.

“Brat. Go to sleep.”)

13^th October, 2017 | 10:19am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Things do start to get a little better over the following months. Yoongi’s dreams are less frequent, and he’s always calmed down and held and talked to by Jimin, almost as if the boy’d been waiting for it in his sleep. It’s not magic. He still can’t shake the guilt and the anger and grief that he hasn’t let himself seal shut yet. His craving for vengeance fluctuates to all-time highs, some days. But it’s okay. It’s getting there.

Jimin’s getting there too, Yoongi thinks. It’s hard to tell. There’s something about him that makes his emotions simultaneously easy and impossible to read unlike the all-knowing looking glass the boy seems to be able to see him with. He supposes it’s because, like he said, he’s been through the same sort of shit already. He’s further on in the ‘hey, I’m trying’ process than Yoongi is.

So, Yoongi pays more attention. Tells him that he’s important to him as much as he can without it turning out as a full-on confession.

That’s something he’s been thinking about a lot more recently, too. Telling him. But, with all of the shit going on in their heads at the minute – the metaphorical faucet finally bursting with them both, after storing it for a long time – and the shit with the gang, Yoongi doesn’t know if it’s the right time.

It’ll come, though. He doesn’t know what he’ll say when it does but, as Jimin told him, love is useless if not shared.

For the meantime, Yoongi’ll share his just enough to not raise eyebrows. Just enough for Jimin to know he thinks about him, but not that he can’t get him out of his head.

“Happy Birthday, Park Jimin. Do I have to stop calling you a kid, now?”

Jimin grins at him, eyes bleary from sleep as he staggers his way into the kitchen to see the small buffet he’s put together for the boy.

“No. We’re kids. Let us be kids. I don’t want to grow up yet.”

Nineteen.

A boy who’s had a whirlwind of a damn life. He’s presumably left his family, he’s quit his dreams of dancing and his parents’ of being a pianist, he’s been a prostitute, accidentally gotten involved with two of the most dangerous gangs in the country. He’s been beaten up, stabbed, shot at. He’s killed gangsters, moved in with a mob boss and made said mob boss fall hopelessly in love with him.

And he’s only nineteen.

Yoongi almost feels like congratulating on simply not going crazy, yet.

“You made all this for me?” He asks, disbelievingly staring at the spread of French toast, eggs and bacon, waffles, pancakes, a generous side of fresh fruit, orange juice, an entire pot of coffee and a strawberry milkshake (that he bought at a corner store, he doesn’t know how to make milkshakes,) as close to the breakfast he’d loved so much one time as he could make it.

Additionally, he made birthday cake too – but he’ll tell him that later.

Yoongi scratches behind his ear, avoiding the intensity of the delight on Jimin’s face, explaining, “I was considering taking you out to that diner we went to one time but you said-,”

“- that I like your cooking better. And I do. Very much so.” He finishes, looking charmingly pleased as he continues, “I really appreciate this, Yoongi. Really.”

Yoongi smiles to himself, feeling a burn in his jacket pocket as he tells him, “There’s… one more thing, actually.”

Jimin raises his eyebrows, astoundingly – like he doesn’t deserve all of this. But, really, it’s not enough. The world would not be enough.

Yoongi digs into his pocket, pulling out a small, royal blue box covered in silk that sits comfortably in the palm of his hand, and Jimin stifles laughter with a bite of his lip, teasing, “I hope you’re not proposing – I’m a little young to get married…”

Everything in his body malfunctions. Total shutdown lasting a good three seconds because shitting hell, he didn’t realise what this would look like.

“Shut up and open it,” he mutters, handing the box to the boy who takes it eagerly, eyes crinkling with amusement as he complains, “You’re not supposed to be mean to people on their birthday!”

He opens the box with a grin that Yoongi subconsciously mirrors when it lifts even more upon seeing what’s inside.

Draped over deep blue velvet lining is a sterling silver necklace, twinkling in the kitchen light from the tiny diamond star at the bottom of it, a similar-styled moon a few centimetres to its right.

There’s a little note inside of it, attached to the top, and Jimin picks it up, curiously.

“’I hope this can change your mind about the value of stars. And remind you that the moon is never too far away.’” He reads, looking undoubtedly moved for a moment until he raises his gaze to Yoongi with a wiggle of his eyebrows, asking, “Are you my moon?”

Oh.

“I mean, well-,” He splutters, stopping when the boy presses a finger to his mouth, smiling brilliantly. Jimin leans over and presses a soft kiss to his cheek.

“You’re sweet, you know that?”

Yoongi loses the feeling in his legs.

“Shit, though – how much did this cost you?”

He doesn’t even register the words coming out of his mouth, all that’s going on in his head right now is fuck, fuck, fuck-

“You’re not supposed to ask people that.”

Jimin squints.

“Two years rent, maybe,” he says, half-mocking the boy with his own comparison.  

“You better be talking about my old shitty rent and not yours.”

His silence speaks volumes.

“Oh my fuck. You are something else, Min Yoongi. Seriously out of this world,” he says, like he wouldn’t spend everything he had on him. Yoongi manages to get over the shockwave of he kissed my cheek, and avoid the thought of would I even survive kissing him properly? and answers, “Well, I am your moon,” rather coyly for someone who’s lost the feeling in his legs from a kindergartener’s kiss.

Jimin giggles and it’s somehow even more beautiful than usual (though, Yoongi’s biased. He thinks every time he hears it is better than the last.)

“Now you can get rid of the other necklace, too.”

Then, he stops giggling – that stupid look of doubt on his face he’s come to know as his ‘I’m not good enough’ look. The one that makes him want to hold him and not let go until he realises that that’s utter bullshit.

“Jimin… seriously. It doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t represent you, at all. That,” he points at the silver sparkling in the box, “This necklace is you. Beautiful and cherished and… important to me.”

He nods, each one becoming more and more assured until he says, “You’re right. You’re right, Yoongi.”

They laugh as the moment passes - progress, Yoongi enthuses – and Jimin says, “Wow, I’m gonna have to get you something huge for your birthday.”

Yoongi makes a noise of disagreement, brushing it off with little interest as he says, “I don’t really celebrate my birthday.”

“You don’t?” the younger asks, sounding scandalised, as if this wasn’t the first time today he’d celebrated it in a while, too, according to him, “Even as a kid?”

“No, I did then – just… not recently.”

“Why?”

Yoongi tries not to sound too depressing, reluctant to put a dampening on the boy’s birthday, when he tells him, “My dad was killed on my nineteenth. Misook too. You know, doesn’t seem right to celebrate when two people close to me died then.”

“Oh,” Jimin says, as if he’s had a small realisation, adding, “that’s why your password’s 16, not 93.”

What? How does he know his phone password?

Jimin laughs when he sees Yoongi’s obvious confusion, explaining, “When you passed out at the Galaxy a couple of months ago, I had to get your password to call Hoseok, remember? It’s been bugging me ever since.”

“Ah,” Yoongi mutters, embarrassment threatening to surface at the foggy memory of that night, “Yeah, I suppose it’s kind of cliché to have it as that.”

“I don’t think so,” he says, warmly, “It’s important to you. It’s good you honour them like that, in a way.”

“I didn’t honour them very well before that,” Yoongi half-chuckles, though he doesn’t find much delight in the fact.

Jimin wordlessly asks for him to explain and Yoongi shrugs, like there’s not much to it.

“I had a thing for parties in high school. So, obviously, for my nineteenth we wanted to do something big. Too big. Ended up trashing the house. Both of my parents were pissed as hell and Misook spent all day cleaning,” he says, remembering the day with a stab of guilt. He’d felt it then too, but was too stubborn to act on it. “I shouldn’t have even had them over, you know. With the gang and all that it was risky having people in the house. But it sounded like a good idea at the time, and my parents were away on an overnight meeting.”

Secret parties that are done while someone’s parents are away never end well. He should’ve known, really.

“We didn’t actually speak a lot the day before my birthday, but the night, before we all went to bed, was alright. I guess they couldn’t stay mad. My mom’s great at holding grudges but my dad was always surprisingly soft-hearted for a mob boss.”

Jimin chuckles sweetly, admitting, “I wish I could’ve met him.”

Yoongi smiles back, deciding, “I think he would’ve liked you a lot. Would’ve said something like… you’re good for keeping me in check. Help me see the bright side of life.”

Jimin’s eyes twinkle like he can imagine it while Yoongi continues the story, saying, “But I was a kind of brat then, so, I was still huffing. I barely even let them say goodnight to me – but dad managed to pull me into a hug, tell me he knew I’d grow up well, now that I was about to be an adult. No more partying, no more wildness. It’s why I don’t go to things like that anymore when my friends ask me to.” He’s quiet for a moment before he confesses, “I’ve never really told anyone that.”

Park Jimin, breaking down another wall of his.

“I’m glad you got to resolve it.”

“Me too. It,” he fumbles, the words coming out before he can even catch up, “It makes it hurt a little less.”

They share a comfortable silence, letting the conversation settle before Jimin springs back into action, coaxing, “Come on. The food’ll get cold and I’m starving. Plus, you need to help me put this necklace on – I’m awful with these sorts of clasps.” 

22^nd October, 2017 | 4:05pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

It’s a typically rainy autumn day in Seoul, the sky greying everything it touches outside – which is a lot considering the rain takes no prisoners, bouncing off their numerous windows like bullets – and the sound would almost be soothing if not for the sheer boredom the older man’s experiencing right now.

Honestly, you’d think there’s never a dull moment as a mob boss.

There’s no meetings or arrangements or deals or issues that require Yoongi’s attention today, so instead he’s forced to just go through the documents that Seokjin sent him in relation to what was discussed at the meeting earlier (i.e. not a whole lot.)

The problem is, it’s mostly just line after line of numbers and dates indicating the incomes and expenses of the main parts of their trades and Yoongi can barely keep his eyes open reading them, despite the fact that it’s late afternoon and he’s been up for a reasonable amount of time (which is, saying that, a little later than usual since Jimin likes sleeping to the sound of rain and, furthermore, likes to cling to him for everything he’s worth when he doesn’t want that peace to be disturbed by Yoongi going to make breakfast.

They were both joking about sleeping in the same bed more often, back then, but that hasn’t stopped it becoming true. In fact, Jimin hasn’t stepped foot in his own bedroom for weeks. All of his stuff is in Yoongi’s bedroom, somehow, and they keep calling it ‘their room.’

Nothing ever happens conventionally with this boy, Yoongi’s come to realise. Things just happen.)

But, Yoongi keeps looking through the documents, finding a vaguely interesting section on the Syndicate’s actions in other sectors recently. They haven’t made much of an appearance in Umbra since the night at Ryu’s, and the rest of the sectors are once again quiet, leading Yoongi to believe that they’re plotting something else.

Likely something with their information which only reiterates the point that they need that back before they can take down the government. He’d finally properly discussed that with the rest of the gang today at their meeting and they’d all easily agreed with him.

Ah, Seonghyeon. A pain in his ass in more ways than he even means to be. That’s some asshole magic right there.

But Yoongi’s mind begins to wonder, naturally – you can only take so many figures before your brain starts to bail – and it ends up on the thought that Yoongi has been having pretty often as of late, the fact that he’s basically told Jimin everything about himself now. Things he hasn’t told anyone before, with only a few minor worries and problems surfacing in his mind left. And yet…

He doesn’t even know when he moved to Red Light. Or why. But there’s one thing in particular about Jimin’s past that Yoongi’s been personally curious about, since it’s so… bizarre to him.

“Jimin,” he asks the boy who’s lying stretched out beside him reading a new book of Yoongi’s that he borrowed after the other four he’s read since moving in. He looks over the pages at him, gentle attention on his face.

“How did you lose contact with your parents?”

Because that. That doesn’t make sense to Yoongi. Maybe it’s because he was so ridiculously close with his father, and loves his mom to the end of the damn universe that just giving it up like that doesn’t make sense to him. Not when they’re both alive.

Jimin doesn’t lose the gentleness of his features, as if he’d expected Yoongi to ask him this someday soon. He looks a little melancholic, maybe, but folds down the corner of the page he’s on (he used to hate doing that but when Yoongi showed him how many of his books already had folded corners he gave up) and he sets the book down at his side.

He sits up, shuffles closer to Yoongi, legs crossed and hands folded in his lap as he begins, “I was considered some sort of golden child, by my parents.” Yoongi raises his eyebrows, involuntarily at this because wow and Jimin laughs shortly, saying, “Crazy, I know – considering how it all ended up. But I did everything they wanted me to do. Studied hard, didn’t get into trouble, played piano like they wanted, always came straight home from school. I didn’t really have any friends, but my parents were happy – and that was sort of enough.”

It’s surprisingly sweet, Yoongi thinks, and only makes him a little mournful of the obvious unhappy ending that follows it.

“One day, a boy moved in next door. Sanghoon. Typical cute boy at that age. Nice smile, good hair. Made me laugh. Weirdly charming,” Yoongi nods in understanding, recalling a few of those at his school too. The ones that scream ‘two-week relationship,’ not that he ever dated any to find out.

“He was my age, but didn’t go to my school – so we became friends like some teen movie. Over the fence conversations that turned to actually hanging out together. That turned to doing everything together. He was my first proper friend,” Jimin says a little quieter, as if remembering the fact vividly. Yoongi feels a pang of sympathy at that. His first proper friend was Hoseok, and he’s still around, annoying him, to this day. Jimin obviously didn’t get to have that.  

“Time went on, and we both grew up a bit and realised that we may have had… some sort of thing for each other. I had a raging crush on him, he thought I was cute enough. We were in his backyard one day, and I kissed him. It wasn’t anything to talk about. Just a peck, really, but my parents saw.”

“And they didn’t like it?” Yoongi asks, almost disgusted – understanding if that’s the reason he doesn’t talk to them anymore. But Jimin shakes his head vehemently, as if the thought was outrageous.

“It wasn’t that. His parents didn’t, and mine knew that. My parents were embarrassingly honest people. It would’ve eaten them alive if they didn’t tell, considering they’d made friends with them like I had with Sanghoon. They didn’t expect it to kick off. To matter so much, I realise that now. But it did.”

Jimin takes a breath, no longer looking at Yoongi - more so like he’s watching the events unfold on the plain wall of their penthouse instead.

“One day, I came home from school, and I hadn’t seen Sanghoon in a while. I figured his parents had drilled it into his head that I was gross, or whatever, and he didn’t want to see me anymore. That was a little painful, but I understood. I guess I felt guilty about it myself,” He shrugs, indifferently, and Yoongi thinks it sounds very Jimin. To just accept something and move on like that. Amusing to know he was like that then, too.

“But, then I noticed some sort of commotion going on outside Sanghoon’s house. My parents were out in our garden, and Sanghoon was with his in theirs. There was a weird van I’d never seen before – looked very official – and some people in stiff suits. It all seemed very serious. I asked my parents what was going on when Sanghoon and his family were shooting daggers at me all the while I walked past.”

“They were mad at you?” Yoongi asks, and Jimin nods, reluctantly, “Why?”

“His parents were sending him away to some sort of… institution, because they worked for the government. God knows why they were living in Freeland. But regardless, he was sent away. And he hated me for it, I could tell.”

Yoongi blinks at him, not having expected that. They sent their son away? Who does that?

Though Jimin’s probably lucky they didn’t send him, he supposes.

“Fuck, Jimin. That’s awful. It wasn’t your fault, what the hell?” He swears and the younger boy crinkles his nose up, like he still doesn’t get it, “But, if your parents were so nice, then how did you end up without them?”

He looks at Yoongi again, guilt lining his features as he half-grimaces at him.

“Ah, that… that was definitely my fault.”

2015-2016.

He can’t get Sanghoon’s face out of his head.

Not in the way it used to be. It’s not following the thoughts of ‘my friend’s attractive and that’s a nuisance for my concentration.’

He’s never seen someone look at him with so much… contempt. He shivers at the memory of it, every time.

An institution? They’re sending him to an institution? What the fuck is this, the nineteenth century?

He hasn’t spoken to his parents in a week. He knows he should. They’ve apologised so many times. Probably more times than Jimin’s sat curled up pathetically in bed, bawling his eyes out. And that’s been every day, so far.

But he’s just so… angry.

Angry at them, at Sanghoon’s parents. At himself. He’s never felt this way in his entire life. This… anger. It’s unnatural. He feels out of sorts being anything but cheery and polite but this…

This makes him feel like he’s going to burst. Like he’s being slowly wound up, just waiting for it to explode.

And it does. God, does it.

It starts off slowly.

Jimin goes back to school the next week, having taken a few days off just because he couldn’t pull himself out of bed, couldn’t look in the mirror without crying. It got to the point where he wasn’t sure why he was crying so much. Guilt, maybe. Because he wasn’t in love with Sanghoon or anything. It was just a simple crush. Not enough to be crying as much as he has. But, thinking now, Jimin isn’t sure it’s just guilt.

Raw, unfurling anger. At nothing?

Then, he guesses, no. It’s not anger at all. It’s more like… desperation.

Nobody at his school knows Sanghoon, but there’s talk of a boy going to an institution in one of the Districts in the North – who knows where (it’s Amenity. The capital, for God’s sake. Isn’t that overkill?) So, life goes on pretty much as normal there. Jimin’s ignored, but not bothered. And it’s okay for a while.

Until that thing, winding up inside of him, starts to creak with tension.

He doesn’t do his homework for that week, and the teachers are sympathetic at first, because Jimin’s a star pupil and he just had a week off, probably still properly recovering. But then, they start to get confused by it. And frustrated. He doesn’t do work in class either, and then he’s getting lectured almost every lesson but-

It’s not enough. It doesn’t fix that urge inside him.

He stops playing piano, next.

First, he doesn’t practice for the recital his parents enter him into – doesn’t win it, obviously. And then he stops playing entirely. The instrument just sits there, untouched and gathering dust.

His parents ask him why. Jimin, why aren’t you playing piano anymore? Why are your teachers calling us about your school work?

He never answers. Just shrugs. Goes to his room. Doesn’t cry anymore. There’s nothing to cry about.

He’s fine. He’s just…

Waiting.

He gets tired of people shouting at him every class, so he stops going to class. He hangs about in the bathrooms, in the empty parts of the school like the spare classrooms or the old corridor that used to be for science lessons until they got an entire new wing for it.

He supposes he should’ve known things were getting bad when he doesn’t even go to dance class after one lesson in which his teacher asks him if he’s feeling alright, that she’d heard about him not showing up to his classes – he’s still learning the routine for the competition isn’t he? Is he not excited about it anymore?

It pains him to not go, but it pains him more to see himself losing his energy every class - so he stops.

And it’s not long after that, that he realises there’s not much point in going to school at all if he’s just going to hang around, doing nothing. He might as well hang around somewhere more interesting.

He stops going to school.

His parents get calls from his principal about it, and they start leaving him to school by car, threaten to even walk him in, but don’t. Jimin waits around the corner for ten minutes – knowing they’ll hang around for a little to make sure he doesn’t come back out – and then he leaves.

He gets smarter about it. He can’t get in serious trouble. Just enough to feel a little satisfied. So, he comes to class to get registered, then goes. Nobody notices for a while.

But that just makes him more restless. He realises that he wants to get in trouble. So, he goes to school some days, just to cause that trouble. He gets his first detention, revels in the fury on his parents’ faces. Finally. Not concern. Not pity. They’re angry at him.

He starts getting several detentions a week, for anything he can do. Walking out of class. Swearing at the teacher. Kicking things over, throwing things. He says things he doesn’t mean, things that whatever’s left of his conscience gasps at.

And he loves it.

This finally gets him a group of friends, conveniently. Kids he meets in detention, now that he’s become something of a notable figure in school.

They tell him he’s too tame. Ask him if he wants them to help him show him how to really get a thrill.

They sound like a bad idea, but that’s what Jimin’s looking for. A thrill. He thinks.

There’s a boy in the group that catches his eye in particular. He’s handsome and older by one, two years. He doesn’t know. But the boy calls him pretty and Jimin decides he likes hearing it.

They let him hang out with them in their ‘place’ between the bike shed and the old corridor. They teach him how to smoke, how to drink. The handsome boy’s name is Eunjung, he tells him, but Jimin finds he doesn’t really care.

Eunjung asks him how old he is as he’s kissing him against the bike shed, the other kids in their friendship group out to get more alcohol. Jimin feels lightheaded, like he’ll fall over any moment and tells him he’s seventeen, not sixteen – but gets the feeling Eunjung wouldn’t have cared either way.

He gives him his first hickey, maybe would’ve given him more if it wasn’t for the rest of them coming back, wolf-whistles and all. Jimin feels like part of something, for once. If his parents notice the mark, they don’t say anything.

They take him to parties at houses of people he doesn’t know, in parts of the sector he’s never been, and the music’s loud and the rooms smell like things Jimin’s never smelled before – drugs, he finds out later. Everything’s warm and too sweaty and he loves it.

Lots of people talk to him there. Some of them give him bad vibes, but Jimin is never anything but amiable and smiley to them. Maybe a little flirtatious, too. He loves the attention, he decides.

He loses his virginity at sixteen to a boy he doesn’t even remember the face of. He vaguely hopes Eunjung would get jealous because of it, but he congratulates him.

“Who knew you were such a little whore, huh?”

Jimin doesn’t know why that makes his stomach twist so much.   

The teachers find out about him getting drunk and smoking on school property, and threaten to suspend him – even talk about calling the police, and the very word sends a jolt of excitement through Jimin’s body.

His parents aren’t angry this time, they want to understand. They want him to stop bringing random boys home, they want him to go back to studying and playing piano and please, Jimin, take that piercing out of your ear. We were fine with the ones on your ear lobes but that’s too high.

Eunjung gave him it. He tells them to go fuck themselves. He thinks he hears his mother crying when he leaves the room.

He smashes his piano to pieces, that night, and leaves for Eunjung’s who laughs when he tells him and calls him crazy. Says his mom sounds like a bitch and Jimin agrees, but he feels a weird ache in his chest as he does.

From then on, his parents are livid with him pretty much all the time. They still try to understand why he’s turned out like this, and Jimin finds himself getting less satisfaction from their anger every day.

He doesn’t talk to them anymore. But not like he didn’t after Sanghoon left. He only snaps and shouts and screams at them now. He slams every door, keeps the lock on his room all the time and only leaves through his window to go meet with his friends.

He gets another piercing and thinks it gets infected because it hurts so much. He doesn’t know what to do. Eunjung tells him to stop being a baby.

Jimin takes it out himself one night, crying at the pain of it. It’s swollen and bleeding and a strange colour.

The older boy doesn’t apologise for fucking it up. It scars. Not very big, but it’s there as a reminder. But it’s no longer a reminder Jimin finds fulfillment in. He hates it. He doesn’t feel wound up anymore. He feels stretched out. Wrung dry.

He’s still waiting, but now it’s for something he thinks he might’ve missed.

Jimin doesn’t like going to parties anymore. The people that talk to him don’t make him feel safe. His “no thank you, leave me alone”’s start to fall on deaf ears. He doesn’t tell anyone but the people tell everyone else. The kids at his school find out, and he doesn’t go back to it again, despite how he sort of wants to.  

Eunjung keeps calling him a slut. He doesn’t think he means it maliciously, but it still hurts.

It’s on a particularly nasty night when Jimin comes home too late, a little drunk and still shaking from the events of another party he didn’t want to go to, that he finds his parents waiting up for him in the living room.

“Your school sent us this letter today,” his father says, warmth missing completely from his face for the very first time. He doesn’t feel good about that.

“I don’t care,” Jimin slurs, trying not to look too confused, too affected by it all, but his emotions are all jumbled right now. And not because of the alcohol.

“You’ve been expelled from school.”

He doesn’t try to understand, neither does his mother. They’ve accepted that they won’t ever know what happened to their son. Jimin swallows.

Then, the yelling starts. But it’s not just on Jimin’s end anymore.

When Jimin tells them he wishes he’d never have to see them again, the back of his father’s hand smacks off of his left cheek. Three pairs of wide eyes stare at each other in shock.

“Jiminie, I’m sorry, I-,”

“Your father didn’t mean to-,”

He doesn’t stand around to listen. He storms upstairs so they don’t see him cry. He locks his door, ignores their pleads of please, sunshine, please listen – we’re sorry, we’re so, so, sorry. It won’t happen again – we’re sorry.

He believes them. He knows they won’t.

He packs a bag and takes one last look at his room. Almost reconsiders.

He doesn’t.

His cheek stings, but knows it wasn’t even hard enough to leave a mark.

He tells Eunjung he owes him for fucking up his ear, and the boy lets him crash at his.

A few weeks pass, and Jimin lets himself believe that this is actually alright. They get high and smoke and drink and fuck and things are fine.

One day, Eunjung comes home from school or… somewhere… and tells him he’s got a way for him to ‘earn extra money’ by applying for a job at a place called the Galaxy Bar.

Jimin doesn’t know what or where it is, but Eunjung says he owes him for all the money he’s spent on him, lately. And letting him sleep at his. It sounds sketchy as hell and he doesn’t want to but Jimin says okay, because it’s not like he can get a job anywhere else.

He’s a dropout, sixteen and the last job he had was at a coffee shop that fired him once Sanghoon’s parents told him he was gay and ‘corrupted’ their son. How fucking petty of them to go out of their way to ruin something else for him.

He says okay, again, because the manager even offers him an apartment – even if he looks at him a little weirdly – and he figures that working in a bar wouldn’t be so bad, considering how much he’s learned about alcohol in the last few months. He could be a bartender, he thinks.

But he’s not a bartender and it’s not even a proper apartment, he realises when he gets there. Eunjung tells him to suck it up, he drove him all the way to Red Light himself – he’s not driving him back.

They fight, and break off whatever it was they had. Jimin doesn’t feel remorseful about it. He feels alone, but knows he would’ve felt alone even if Eunjung had stayed.

The job isn’t even much to do with a bar, but Jimin has nowhere else to go. Nothing else to do. He’s heard stories about this sector, gangs that run over it. The Mariposa, a name that sends chills down his spine. One that he’d heard stories and rumours about in the playground and corridors growing up.

Apparently, its leader’s been murdered recently and now there’s chaos in the sector. People say it’s going to be taken over by his oldest son, cold-hearted brat from what they’ve heard.

Jimin never wants anything to do with any of the gangs in this damn city.

So, he stays working at the Galaxy. Even when they decide to put him in the club, too, because ‘so many people’ve asked’ and ‘you’re seventeen now, anyway.’

Joonho, the manager, gives him a necklace with a star on the end for part of his uniform, since he’s his little star.

Jimin studied French for a little in high school, before he left. Joonho asks him what he wants his working name to be and he says “Étoile.”

He likes how it sounds for a while.

Jimin realises too late, one day sitting in his shitty apartment, why exactly he started acting out all those months ago.

He just wanted his parents’ attention.

He wanted them to see him, not as their perfect child, but as him. Jimin. Even if it meant changing who that was.

And it’s as he sits in his apartment, that he thinks about turning back. Going back home.

22^nd October, 2017 | 4:19pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

“But, then, I realised that I was too far gone. I got myself into that mess with my body, so that was my punishment. Seventeen-year-old-me sure loved irony,” Jimin finishes, seemingly more relieved now that he’s got it all off of his chest. Yoongi wonders if he’s the first person he’s told about all that, and realises he must be, it’s not like he’s had anyone else.

He’s quiet for a second before he adds, “I still wish I’d gone back, sometimes.”

Jesus. He’d been making inputs with each revelation up until the end, but now, he’s speechless.

And so fucking sorry. That he had to go through that alone, that he had to at all. All of the shit that happened to him and he was sixteen for the most part.

He lost his parents from spinning out of control, and his self-discipline’s kept him from going back. A punishment – Yoongi almost laughs at that. For what? Failing to deal with something like an adult? He was a teenager, it wasn’t anything to lose his parents over. 

He misses his dad so much, and barely gets to see his mom amongst all of the gang stuff, while Jimin’s are right there, probably still waiting for him.

“Jimin… you have to make up with them. I’m sure they’d want to know if you’re alive, at least.”

He doesn’t look as if he’s even considered that, gaping at him in an almost panic.

“No, Yoongi. You don’t understand-,”

“I understand what it’s like to lose a parent,” he says seriously, getting the boy to cut off immediately at it, “You still have both of yours, Jimin. And you just told me everything. I understand.”

He doesn’t reply immediately, like he’s thinking this over in his head. Then, after a while, he softly admits, “I’m afraid of what they’ll think of me.”

Yoongi smiles as reassuringly as he can, patting a hand on the boy’s knee as he tells him, “They won’t think anything. They’ll think ‘wow, our son came back to us.’” Jimin dips his head, sternly, feeling the heaviness of the situation before Yoongi cracks a grin and says, “Then they’ll think, ‘oh, he brought a mob boss with him.’”

“Oh God.”

“I’m kidding. Hey, I’ll wear a mask.”

“No, no. I…” Jimin shakes his head, now, deciding, “if we’re going to do this I want to be completely honest with them from now on. Tell them everything I’ve done. Including… joined the Mariposa and… moved in with its leader.”

“After quitting your job as a prostitute,” he reminds him, the younger snorting, immediately concluding, “I think I’ll leave that part out.”

It’s amusing how they both know they’re doing this together. Yoongi could easily leave Jimin off, let him rekindle with his parents and go to see his own mother while he waits. But he wouldn’t dare, and Jimin wouldn’t let him.

It’s normal to meet the relatives of the person that’s moved in with you, after all.

“We’ll leave first thing tomorrow.”

Jimin gives two short nods, like he’s trying to psyche himself up (for good reason, Yoongi’d likely be bricking it as well.)

“Alright.”

23^rd October, 2017 | 10:03am | Outside of the Freeland Sector

“God, I’m so fucking nervous,” Jimin says for the sixth time.

“Do I look okay?” He asks for the eighth.

Yoongi turns a corner confidently, such a change from a few months back when he couldn’t do it without vigorous shaking and one minute to look at both sides of the road.

“Are you trying to get me to go all sappy on you again? I told you, you look adorable and that’s the type of impression you should give your parents. You’re probably still their little boy in their eyes.”

Jimin wasn’t overjoyed about the suggestion of putting him in one of his oversized knitted jumpers – but he looks so cute, Yoongi had to physically try not to pinch his cheeks.  

“Easy for you to say, over there looking like a model.”

Yoongi’s grateful for the sunglasses perched on his nose (it’s always bright in the Freeland, no shit – and driving in it without sunglasses is an accident waiting to happen) because they kind of hide the obvious blush rising to his cheeks at the compliment.

“Listen. I have to look put-together and trustworthy if your parents do recognise me so they know that I’m at least able to treat you right if they think I’ve kidnapped you or something.”

Jimin laughs, brightly – as bright as this damn sector, if not brighter – and teasingly asks, “Remember that one time, when we first met-,”

“We do not speak of that ‘one time’ today, Park Jimin – I actually want your parents to have a good impression of me.”

And saying ‘yeah, when your son and I first met I thought he could’ve been lying about stealing our information so my gang and I forcibly took him to my penthouse just in case’ doesn’t really make people think ‘ah, yes, a good man to have around my child.’

“Why?” Jimin asks, catching Yoongi off-guard as he struggles to think of a reason that isn’t is that not what you’re supposed to do when you’re in love?

“Because, if they don’t, by some miracle, recognise me – then they’ll probably think we’ve got some sort of sugar…” Jimin looks at him as he pauses. He’s still not old enough to be a sugar daddy, “hyung… thing going on. And I don’t want them to think I’m a creep! So, if by dressing like a nice young man they don’t think I’m buying you expensive things in exchange for your company, then it’s a small price to pay.”

“Sugar hyung, huh? Never heard that one,” Jimin grins so widely that Yoongi gets the well-known feeling of don’t do this Park Jimin.

“Should I start calling you that, hyung?”

It’s then that he realises he can’t recall a single time Jimin’s called Yoongi ‘hyung’, even though he technically should. But no, he really, really shouldn’t – hearing it out loud.

“Stop. Immediately.”

“Hyung,” he whines, and Yoongi’s grip tightens on the steering wheel, eyes trained to the road with a formidability mountains would envy, until he adds, “buy me food.”

Then, he just laughs a lot. They both laugh. And Yoongi doesn’t think about Jimin calling him hyung. Ever. That’s being buried right now.  

23^rd October, 2017 | 10:29am | The Parks’ House, Freeland Sector

“Remind me why I agreed to this again.”

“Because you love your parents and want them to know you still exist.”

Jimin tucks a hair behind his ear, untucks it, pulls on both cuffs of his jumper and says “Okay, yeah. Sure.”

“Stop jittering. You look like you’re on something.”

“I can’t I’m too nervous!”

Yoongi smiles then, finding all the boy’s nervous quirks significantly endearing, and he nudges his arm to grab his attention from its, even more formidable than his, stare at the front door.

“Here,” he says gently, carefully knocking against Jimin’s hand with his own, until the boy catches on and they curl their fingers with each other’s.

Yoongi goes to ring the doorbell, knowing Jimin won’t, but then there’s a crushing pain in his other hand and he yelps, “Ow - you’re gripping a little tight, darling.”

“Sorry, sorry. Shit.”

Wow.

“Honestly, Jimin, everything’ll be fine,” he tells him, giving his hand a squeeze of his own (but not with the death grip the younger boy just had) “And if it isn’t, we can go get a tub of ice-cream when we get home and I’ll pet your hair while we watch Hello Counselor.”

His favourite thing to do, despite its inane simplicity. Yoongi could take him to the most expensive restaurants in the city, buy him anything he wants, at all. Hell, they could go to Hong Kong tonight if they wanted to, but whenever he asks what he wants, that’s it.

“Can we do that anyway?”

He’s so fucking soft for this boy.

“Of course.”

They stand, quietly chatting outside on the porch of his parent’s house, and the boy seems to pluck up enough courage to tell Yoongi, “You ring the doorbell.”

It’s an advancement, at least.

Yoongi lets the doorbell sound out, feels Jimin shift backwards a few steps until the elder tugs his hand forward and detaches them, standing behind him to put both arms around his waist, instead, keeping him in place.

“You can do this,” he says into his ear, “I’m right here.”

The door opens, and a small woman appears with rounded cheeks that remind him of her son’s very first thing in the morning, when sleep’s puffed them up so endearingly, and she says, “Hello, may I help yo-,”

There’s a long silence.

“Ji-Jimin… is that you?” She asks, voice already a little watery, and Jimin giggles softly, Yoongi able to feel the vibrations in his chest.

“Hey, mom.”

“Honey!” the woman suddenly yells, making both of them flinch, comically, “Come here!”

A man approaches, sharp eyes and a familiar cutesy looking nose, asking, “What is it, swee-,”

The sharp eyes blow open at the sight of the younger boy.

“Jimin.”

“Hi, dad.”

Yoongi has to let go of Jimin when he’s pulled into a bone-crushing hug by both of them, mutual laughing and sniveling and full-on crying going on as they mutter to each other words of greeting and “We missed you so, so much, sunshine – so, so much.”

Yoongi stands off to the side, rather awkwardly.

“I missed you too. Everyday. Really. I’m so sorry. I was an idiot. A really big idiot.”

“We’re sorry too,” his father says, “but you’re back now, Jiminie.”

Sunshine… Jiminie… he looks amusedly at the younger boy who gives him a quick warning glance, flawlessly conveying the message of ‘don’t say a word Min Yoongi.’

They finally let go of each other, and Jimin re-joins Yoongi’s side, looking from him to his parents as he attempts to introduce them with, “Uh, yeah – so… mom, dad… this is my-,” he seems to get stuck on that, to the elder’s dismay, correcting “This is Yoongi.”

They recognise him. Definitely, if the wide-eyed look of oh god is he here to tell us he’s kidnapped our son exchanged between them is anything to go by.

“Oh. Um.”

“He’s cool!” Jimin assures them, hands held up in front of him before they decide to pepper spray him or something, “Really. Nice guy. Mariposa are a nice gang.”

There goes his street-cred. Operation: Nice Young Man Impression is underway.

“Okay! Good. It’s lovely to meet you, Yoongi-ssi,” his mother says, joyfully to him, now that she believes he’s not going to murder one of them, and Yoongi laughs lightly, shaking his head at her, saying, “Ah, please – just call me Yoongi.”

“Alrighty,” she agrees, pleased smile on her face. Point one to him. Then, she looks at Jimin with a coy expression and he now knows exactly where the boy gets it from, as she stage-whispers to him, “He’s handsome, kiddo – good choice.”

Yoongi pops a blood vessel somewhere, proabably, rushing to explain, “Oh, we’re not-,”

“Yeah, he’s… one of the good things that came out of what happened,” Jimin says over his denial, looking at both of his parents earnestly, “Yoongi means a lot to me. I’m happy you get to meet him.”

No, really. He pops a blood vessel. In his heart, maybe.

“Of course!” His father chimes merrily, looping an arm around his wife’s shoulder as he says, “We’re happy too. We’re so happy, Jimin. Thank you so much for coming back.”

Jimin beams right back at him, but then looks vaguely reproachful of himself as he says, “Thank you for… not slamming the door in my face like I probably deserve.”

“Oh, sunshine-,”

“No, really,” Jimin says whole-heartedly, “I said some awful things to you guys. I just want you to know I never meant any of it. I was tired of trying to act so perfect for you. I wanted to be myself, but it was like a total flip in my brain. I’ll never do anything like it again.”

His parents share a warm look with each other.  

“Then that’s all that matters,” His mother decides, moving on quickly as she steps aside, ushering them into the house and before they know it, they’re sitting down at their kitchen table as Jimin’s father makes tea and his mom sits happily beside her son, hand linked with his.

Their house is bright and homely looking, just like most places in the sector are, and somehow it matches up with the exact sort of loving vibe that Yoongi imagined it having. Jimin tells him it hasn’t changed at all.

“It was your birthday a little over a week ago! Did you do anything nice?” His mom asks, looking nothing but nostalgic as she gazes at her son, “You’re nineteen now. Time flies so quickly…”

“Yeah, we did,” Jimin tells her, only a little guiltily this time that they’d missed it, “Yoongi made me breakfast and- oh, look at this.” He puts a hand down his sweater to pull out the necklace, glittering in the sunlight, beautifully (if Yoongi does say so himself) “You should’ve heard his explanation behind it. It was so sweet.”

Yoongi happily takes the cup offered by Jimin’s father to distract himself from the blooming heat on his face.  

“You’re quite the charmer, aren’t you, Yoongi?” The man asks, and he catches the younger boy looking at him, amusement swirling in his eyes and they resolve into quiet, knowing laughter.

Now he has been told he’s quite the charmer, take that Park Jimin.

“It’s the first time anyone’s said it, but, yeah. He certainly is,” Jimin admits to his amazement, only feeding into the embarrassment simmering on his skin and his heart practically twists in fondness.  

The conversation moves on, then, and it’s no surprise when his mother asks, “So, what have you been doing? Where did you go?”

Jimin lets out a small sigh against his mug, setting it down with apprehension before he explains.

“Red Light,” he confesses, pushing on past the shocked look of his parent’s faces. Not a place with the best reputation in Seoul, he’ll admit. “Uh, I got a job and ended up mixed in with some bad people – again. But, Yoongi saved me. He let me work for him, but I think that was just an excuse to get me out of there.” He’s right for the most part. It was also an excuse to see him more often. “I live in his- well, our – place now. It’s a penthouse. Top quality, seriously guys.”

The ‘our’ never fails to warm his Park-Jimin-Loving heart. He chuckles at the quality remark.

“We’d like to see it sometime,” His father says, not seeming all that astonished despite the fact his son just confessed that he lives with a mob boss. Maybe they really do believe he’s a nice guy.

Which he is. It’s just hard to believe.

“You’re very welcome to,” Yoongi tells him politely (charmingly, even) but laughs with playfulness to himself, taking a glimpse at the younger boy before he says, “I’ll make sure Jimin tidies his mess first, though. It wasn’t so bad when he had his own room – I didn’t have to see it. But, now that we share one it’s awful. Plus, he kicks when he’s sleeping someti-,” Yoongi cuts himself off, looking at Jimin with mirrored oops.

Not exactly the information you tell to keep up the Nice Young Man Impression, considering how it sounds.

“You share a room, too?” His mother asks, tone void of any sort of emotion. Yoongi swallows.

“Yes, ma’am, but-,”

“My, my Park Jimin you’ve really gotten yourself quite a life,” she says in something akin to awe, peering at both of them, entertained, as she quips, “Even if it is with a mob boss.”

Jimin and Yoongi look at each other, and the younger smiles in a way that looks as fond as he feels, he thinks.

“Well, I hope you like said mob boss because I doubt he’s going anywhere anytime soon.”

Like hell, he isn’t. You’re stuck with me, brat.

“Ah, yes. We haven’t grilled him yet,” his father conveniently remembers then, sitting down next to Yoongi, opposite of Jimin’s mother, as the two of them stay cornered in between. “As your parents, that’s an essential part of the first meeting.”

They totally think they’re dating, don’t they?

“Ask away,” Yoongi says, expecting a few minor questions about his gang and work, making sure he’s a safe housemate for the son they’ve just been reunited with.

What he doesn’t expect is having to relay most of his childhood and current life to them, trying to dodge around anything that might set off alarm bells.

‘Did you play any sports in high school?’ ‘Basketball, sir. I was on the team for all four years.’ ‘What are your hobbies?’ ‘Reading, cooking. Jimin and I like to watch movies and tv series together.’ ‘Do you have health insurance?’ ‘Of course.’ ‘Are you prepared to protect our little Jiminie at all costs?’ ‘Of course.’ ‘Are you two eating healthily?’ ‘As much as I can make him.’ ‘Is he involved in anything dangerous?’ ‘If he ever is, I protect him like my life depends on it, ma’am.’ ‘What are you doing to keep him out of danger?’ ‘Everything I can, sir.’

Yoongi seems to answer well, if their satisfied smiles are any sign of that once they’ve run out of questions. Even Jimin seems impressed with him, grinning and laughing every time he responded to something particularly difficult.

‘Do you know Jimin’s blood-type in case of an emergency?’

‘It’s A, ma’am.’

He knew that from a quiz Jimin found online once, the boy asking him eagerly for his blood-type and then bursting out into laughter when he told him “It says we’re the best match for each other – but a relationship between us could either be perfect or horrific. Sounds about right, doesn’t it?”

Yoongi didn’t know whether it was uplifting or depressing that it did.

Eventually, time passes on and it’s almost late into the evening by the time they’re heading out the door, Jimin’s parents insisting on having them stay for dinner (they even showed Yoongi how to make the peach cobbler for dessert, since it was always one of Jimin’s favourites as a kid.)

They’re being accompanied to the door, Jimin equipped with his favourite scarf he’d left behind a long time ago and each of them holding several Tupperware containers of leftovers as his father says, “Please, call us Jimin – and don’t forget to visit, too!”

Jimin promises they will, the ‘they’ making Yoongi smile, particularly when Jimin’s mom adds, “And make sure to let us meet your mother, next time you come, Yoongi!”

It feels pretty domestic, he thinks, and he decides he very much likes it.

Jimin’s being handed more things by his father: a hoodie, some socks, a few family picture books and more while his mother pulls Yoongi aside, just away from the exit and she turns to him with a warm, affectionate smile.

“Thank you for taking such great care of our little sunshine. He probably never would’ve come back had it not been for you,” she says, sounding entirely serious about it, hands clasped tightly and held under her chin as she looks up happily at him.

“Oh, ma’am, honestly it’s been no problem,” Yoongi insists, the credit feeling way too much for him. He just did what Jimin would’ve done for him, “I… Jimin… we’re…” He sighs, a small break in his thoughts as he can’t put it into words exactly what they are, just like Jimin couldn’t.

“He’s saved me every bit that I’ve saved him. He means the world to me,” he confesses without a second of a doubt because he does. He really, really does. Nobody else has ever meant as much to him, in the same way, that Jimin does.

His mother closes her eyes for a second, lips curled upwards as if that’s all she wanted to hear - the security that her son’s in safe hands.

“I can tell he does,” she says and Yoongi falters for a second, though he isn’t astounded. As he’s figured before: you can’t love that boy quietly.

“He needs that. He needs someone that’s as enamoured with him as he obviously is with you to look after him well.”

At that, however, Yoongi isn’t just astounded. He thinks his heart drops out of his ass.

He doesn’t want to have some sort of meltdown right here, though, with the boy in question only a few feet away and God he’s glad that the Parks can talk for the entirety of South Korea because he didn’t hear a word, nor has he noticed the way Yoongi.exe has stopped responding.

“Uh huh,” Yoongi says as convincingly as he can, smiling something vaguely frantic but hoping that she doesn’t pick up on it. They say goodbye, and Yoongi tries not to look like one of those animatronic Santas left outside in the cold for too long as he waves back and gets into the car.

The drive goes quite peacefully for a little bit, Jimin just looking out of the window and smiling to himself though he’s piled high with Tupperware and childhood mementos on his lap after refusing to put them in the trunk of the car.

The radio pays soothingly, and Yoongi tries not to freak himself out with his mind constantly chanting back the phrase ‘as enamoured with him as he obviously is with you’ and scrambling to create an explanation for what she means.

“What were you and mom talking about?” Jimin asks, as if on cue to make it worse, and Yoongi flounders silently for a moment, raking for a summary that isn’t ‘oh she thinks we’re in love with each other.’

“She was just… telling me to take care of you,” he says instead, and Jimin laughs to himself, obvious affection for her spilling out with it as he mumbles, “Ah. That’s so her.”

He smiles to himself some more, before eventually saying, “Thank you for making me do that, Yoongi. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

“I didn’t really-,”

“No, you did. I’m serious. I don’t think you know how much you matter to me, Min Yoongi.”

He doesn’t respond to that. How can he when he can’t even hear his own thoughts over the earth-deafening pounding of his heart right now?

As enamoured with him as he is, huh?

Yoongi isn’t sure that’s even possible. 

Chapter Text

10^th November, 2017 | 5:02pm | Sunset Plaza, Mariana Sector

It’s starting to get somewhat cold again Yoongi realises belatedly, already caught in the wintering atmosphere that’s reaching even the warmest part of the city with little more than a light suit jacket on.

Hoseok had some business to do with his latest album - finally released with minimal changes - in Mariana today, so, naturally, Jimin whined at Yoongi until he let him come along with the promise of ‘we can spend the day together!’

Sold (insert sound of an auction gavel here) to the boy in the back row with the irresistible smile and glossy brown hair.

Yoongi didn’t have anything else to do today, just some phone calls in the morning to check up on a few of their men across the sectors, nothing out of the ordinary, therefore he decided that wasting the day with Park Jimin didn’t sound so bad.

(It was great.)

They walked along the promenade beside the beach which was moderately busy for November, and Jimin wanted to try just about every food stand along it, justifying it with the fact that he hasn’t been to Mariana very much, it was actually his first time even being that close to the beach there.

Logically, that had to be followed up with ‘Yoongi, let’s go in the ocean’ and before he could say ‘don’t be ridiculous’ the boy had already torn off his shoes, rolled up his jeans and taken off down the sand.

 “I told you it’d be cold, don’t give me that look,” he said after he managed to procure him and dry his feet as best as he could with his $415 jacket, no less.

“Take me back next summer?” Jimin asked, sniffling a little at the chill he’d caught. Hardly surprising, the water’s cold even when it’s the middle of summer, half of the time.

“I’ll bring a towel next time, too.”

After that, they went on a mission to find the most authentic-looking Italian restaurant, and counted how many cafes claimed to do the best coffee in Seoul (seven, from what they saw.)

They went shopping in the streets of the sector, too, instead of the mall, and Jimin didn’t have to be almost threatened into buying things for once.

Now, they’re just waiting around in the plaza outside one of the buildings of the company Hoseok’s signed to, sitting on a bench as Jimin intently watches the street dancers in the square, gathering a substantial crowd.

“I miss dancing, sometimes,” he says, distractedly, eyes lighting up with each change of song and rhythm and looking so nostalgic towards it all that Yoongi had already figured that out, even before he said anything.

Of course, it was a dream he never got to properly pursue, wasn’t it? He stopped going to classes before he could even win a competition.

Yoongi understands that – not getting to carry out your dreams like that. Most people have an idea of who they want to be, but few of them ever stick it out to get it. Yoongi had to take over the gang, Jimin ran away.

“Well…” Yoongi says slowly, chuckling as the boy only half-turns to him, not wanting to miss the routine, “You complain about not having anything to do when you’re not working. Why don’t you ask Hoseok to let you come to his practices every once in a while?”

Emphasis on ‘every once in a while.’ He doesn’t want to lose him to idol life as well.

But, then, as Jimin’s entire face glows with utter delight, Yoongi thinks that maybe that’d be worth it – to see him that joyful all the time.

Hoseok’s more than happy to agree, and Jimin hugs Yoongi disarmingly tightly for merely suggesting the idea.

12^th November, 2017 | 8:57pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

It’s later than usual in the evening when Yoongi’s sitting relaxed on the sofa, finishing up business for the day in which he had no physical meetings or deals to attend. Seokjin’s going on about unimportant things that’ve happened in the city, just to keep him vaguely up to date with the rest of them now that they’ve realised that even silence from the Syndicate can mean something. 

“Territorial fights in Full Moon? What else is new?” Yoongi says in reply to the man bringing it up, and Seokjin snorts softly on the other line, saying something in agreement that Yoongi misses because then, the door to the penthouse opens and Yoongi catches sight of Jimin, back from dance practice.

A very underdressed for the winter weather in just a tank top and some sweatpants (Yoongi’s?), damp hair pushed back off of his brow, incredibly attractive Jimin back from dance practice.

He feels his mouth go dry. Tumbleweeds probably being blown across his tongue and all.

“Yoongi? Yoongi!” Seokjin’s voice snaps him out of the daze he was in, as Jimin lifts a hand to him in greeting and he watches him wiggle out of his shoes instead of just untying them with a little fondness but a whole lot more of something else that burns deep in his stomach as his eyes run over the muscles and curves of his back – like he’s trying to memorise them before they disappear.

“Huh?” He asks dumbly, not a single ounce of Seokjin’s obvious frustration clicking with him.

He hears him saying something about a solution to the problem in Full Moon but it’s completely drowned out by wow, Park Jimin as the boy puts his shoes away and smiles at him from across the room.

“Yeah, yeah that’ll be fine, Seokjin – I’ve gotta… got to…” Yoongi says, already taking the phone away from his ear, trying not to stare so blankly at the younger boy as he comes over and settles onto the sofa right beside him.

“Yoongi-,” He hears Seokjin say rather warningly in a ‘don’t you dare hang up on me’ sort of way, right before he presses the button to end the call and hang up on him.

“Important stuff?” Jimin asks, stretching his arms above his head so Yoongi can see the flex in his biceps, the way he tilts his head to the side to deepen the action, and a tiny drop of sweat rolls down his neck to settle somewhere past his collarbones.

“Not r-really,” Yoongi mutters, following another droplet with a subconscious stare. His voice sounds almost alien to him, this is absurd. He’s pretty sure Jimin’s giving him an odd look right now but does that snap him out of it? Unfortunately not.

“How did. Uh, how did practice go?”

“Really fun!” He enthuses, bringing his arms back down and crossing his legs together cheerfully before he slopes his shoulders a little, leaning into the cushions and sighs, “I’m exhausted though. It’s been forever since I’ve done it and I just got thrown into a professional dancer’s class.” The boy blinks languidly at him, circulating air to his chest by pulling on the collar of his top a few times, each outwards tug revealing a small expanse of the honey-like skin there.

Dear fucking God.

“I’m sure you… did great,” He tells him, barely even aware of what they’re talking about and he feels a little bad because Jimin’s obviously excited about it but he really, really can’t help the situation.

The younger laughs, regardless, stops fanning himself and instead turns to Yoongi with a slight simper plaguing his lips, saying, “Not at warming-up, apparently. My back and shoulders are all tight, now.” He rolls his shoulders, once, twice. Reaches to attempt to press out a presumed knot in his back and there’s those stupid biceps flexing again, Yoongi inwardly curses himself for being so easily distracted (not that he usually is. Just right now. No need to wonder why.)   

“Oh, that’s-,”

“Do you think you could massage them out for me?” Jimin cuts in, simper gone and replaced with a pitiful jut of his bottom lip that Yoongi can’t recall ever once saying ‘no’ to. “I’d do it myself but it’s kind of an awkward angle.”    

A massage. He’s got to be kidding.

Some higher power in the universe is having a fucking ball right now.

“Yeah, sure thing,” he hears himself say without any permission from the logical part of his brain at all. Jimin seems pleased at this, and he moves across the sofa to get closer to Yoongi, turning so his back’s to him.

Then, the realisation comes to Yoongi that he doesn’t actually know how to massage someone.

He gawks at the back of the boy’s head for a few seconds, until said head turns around to him with a sharply arched brow and a teasing of “Are you gonna stare at my back or fix it?”

Option one definitely sounds more likely.

But, despite the numbness in his brain right now, Yoongi places his hands on the boy’s shoulders, gripping the muscle there experimentally between the heel of his hand and his fingertips. It takes a few tries off it before the boy makes a pleasant noise, muttering “Hey, you’re not that bad at this.”

Maybe it’s the fact he’s blood-related to Jeon Jungkook – but that seems to spark some sort of competitiveness within him and he scoffs, retorting, “Yeah? You’ll be begging for me to keep going in a minute, Park Jimin.”

Jimin lets out a round of giggles, looking back not with the usual crinkling eyes and grin as he’d expected, but a sort of mischievous glint that Yoongi almost frowns at in his confusion.

“You’re gonna make me beg, Min Yoongi?”

A brief silence.

“Oh,” Yoongi gushes, a prickling running all over his skin that he really doesn’t know what to do with. His hands tighten on the boy’s shoulders involuntarily, as he feels a rush of heat, stuttering, “Oh, no- uh-,”

“Relax, I’m just- ow – kidding, stop squeezing.”

He apologises, grip loosening and fingers curling back in surprise as Jimin snorts softly, looking ahead of him again instead.

“You get flustered so easily lately…”

“Fuck off – no I don’t,” The older man grumbles, hands going back to the boy’s shoulders as if to prove a point. Even if that point is wrong because he kind of does.

He runs his hands contrarily down the slopes of his neck to shoulders, and then back to meet again, pressing softly into the warm skin, making the younger hum, as if he’s forgotten his comeback.

“Honestly you could be right,” Jimin tells him almost wistfully as Yoongi rubs circles into his back with his thumbs in the hopes to loosen some of the tightness there, “If you keep this up I just muh-might not let you stop, after all.”

Yoongi pauses for a second when Jimin seems to stammer but keeps going when he realises if he stops he’ll likely call him out for it.

He runs the pads of his thumbs up the back of his neck, stopping at his nape, just a little firmer each time and stalls again when the boy shivers.

“Sorry, did that hurt?”

Jimin shakes his head and he swears he’s biting his lip as Yoongi moves a hand down to his back, kneading into the space beside one of his shoulder blades, other hand perched on the opposite shoulder for “No, not ah-, at all.” The breathy sound shoots a spark of warmth through him and he tries to ignore it because whatever, that’s normal for getting your muscles all de-tensioned, isn’t it?

Five minutes later, Yoongi isn’t so sure.

He’s finally getting out that knot in the boy’s back, heat in his stomach festering irately at him at this point and Yoongi tries to figure out why as he’s attempting to block out the boy’s consistent sounds of approval that range from gentle sighs to full out moans.

“Shit, Yoongi – where’d you luh-learn that?” He practically whines, a shaky sigh following it and Yoongi briefly wonders if he’s fucking with him before the thoughts completely overshadowed by the realisation of that heat pooling in his stomach not quite being in his stomach after all.

He smooths a hand up and down his back, over the spots he’d told him were the worst and when the boy lets out a long ‘mm’ sound Yoongi feels a shot of warmth between his thighs, not in his stomach and it takes a lot of self-control not to fall backwards off of the sofa.

Yoongi’s getting fucking turned on, isn’t he?

“Hey, why’d you stop?” Jimin asks, innocently blank look on his face as if he hadn’t just spent the last few minutes making sounds that would forever be imprinted in Yoongi’s mind, probably.

“I just remembered that I… need to call Seokjin,” He reasons, taking his hands away from the boy and hoping he doesn’t turn around to look at him because his face is probably a goddamn picture of ‘guess who’s popping one – this guy’ right now and he’d really rather not have to hear about that for the next four years.  

“Didn’t you just get off the phone with him?”

Fuck.

“I meant Hoseok.”

He can hear the clear suspicion in Jimin’s voice, even though he can’t see his face when he says, “Hoseok left his phone in Mariana yesterday, remember?”

“Namjoon,” Yoongi says far too suddenly for it to be casual, but he knows that one’s entirely plausible, at least, “I meant Namjoon.”  

Jimin cocks his head, clearly a little unsure but he says a slow “…okay, then…” anyway.

Yoongi’s blaming Hoseok for this entire situation.

19^th November, 2017 | 5:20pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Yoongi gets back home after a somewhat annoying day of chasing down some fuckers with Hoseok that’d been interfering with a couple of their coke runners lately. Stealing goods and selling them for themselves, supposedly. 

‘Supposedly’ being the key word because there was no fucking trace of any of it and these false leads are hacking at Yoongi’s sanity. He thought they’d stopped or lessened at least for a little bit there.

Honestly, he’s considering sending Seonghyeon on some goose chase to find his goddamn mind, considering he’s clearly lost it.

Yoongi sighs heavily to himself and checks the time on his watch, seeing it’s still rather early in the evening – or it would be if he hadn’t been out since seven, trying to get to the bottom of something that didn’t even have a top to begin with.

No wonder it took them ten hours to realise.

He’s about to call out to Jimin, wherever he may be right now, and ask him what he wants him to make for dinner, until his eyes catch a tuft of brown hair, peaking out behind the sofa cushion and then, he picks up on the gentle sound of breathing filling the room.

Yoongi approaches the area, soundlessly, and when he peers over the cushions he smiles with a puff of laughter, just at the sight.

Jimin’s lying curled up, fast asleep on the sofa with a just-as-knocked-out Mochi, nuzzling up to the boy’s neck, lying contently on his chest. One of Jimin’s hands is resting on the cat’s back, fingers moving through the fur every so often. 

Yoongi rolls his eyes despite the affection rolling off of him, barely surprised to see them like this considering how close they’ve gotten since Jimin’s been living here. He told him it was Mochi’s fault but Yoongi has the feeling the boy just gets a little lonely the occasional times he’s here by himself. Either way, she certainly doesn’t stay in her cat room all day anymore.

The room’s cooled down significantly since Yoongi left it this morning, and he finds out why when he feels a breeze brush his skin, only to see that Jimin left the balcony door open again.

‘I like hearing the city’ he says every time Yoongi tells him he’s going to get sick, leaving it open in the winter like that.

The boy shivers minutely when Yoongi looks back down at him, despite the likely warmth of the cat sleeping on him, and so he grabs the blanket from the other end of the sofa and drapes it over the both of them, making sure to keep Mochi’s head above it.

Jimin stirs slightly, almost threatening to open his eyes when they flutter briefly, but as Yoongi runs a hand gently through the younger’s hair and leans down to press a quick kiss to his forehead he relaxes again, hint of a smile on the pouty swell of his lips.

Mochi does wake up, however, looking displeased that he forgot about her and Yoongi relents to her round, spoiled eyes, kissing her as well on the crown of her head and earning a low purr that he thinks translates to ‘that’s what I thought.’

Dinner can wait, he guesses. Jimin’ll probably wake up in an hour or so, complaining about the obscene noises his stomach’s making, and Yoongi’ll cook something quick and not as nutritious as it should be.

He swears the boy falls asleep on purpose, sometimes, just for that.

He’s about to go out of the room, maybe go consider at least preparing something vaguely healthy and then just opting to sit through the younger’s hungry whines later as it cooks, but he doesn’t even get a step away from the sofa before he feels something grip around his wrist. 

He looks back to see Jimin’s hand holding onto his arm, eyes barely even open they’re so heavy from sleep. He doesn’t say anything, just lightly pulls on the man’s wrist, shifting along the sofa until he’s tucked into the corner and there’s a free space at the edge. Yoongi gets the message once the boy lifts the blanket with his other arm.

It’s pleasantly cozy when he lies down next to them, back pressed to the boy’s chest now that Mochi’s moved to lie across both of them, instead, clearly figuring out she’ll be more comfortable if she does. His pulse quickens at the contact and just as easily slows down as sleep understandably weighs in on him fairly easily, considering how exhausted he is.  

Jimin sighs, sounding content. The heat of it hits the back of Yoongi’s neck and he’s only further lulled by it. The boy slings an arm over the older man’s waist, careful not to hit their stretched-out cat.

Dinner can wait. Definitely.

9^th December, 2017 | 9:14pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

“Jimin! Food’s here.”

Dinner could not wait on this particular night, however, and Jimin was barely two feet in the door before Yoongi, hungry as hell and overworked with deals, pounced on him, asking what he wanted from the Chinese place a few blocks away.

It was a somewhat redundant question because Jimin always just tells Yoongi to order for them both, and eats out of whatever the other man ordered, as well.

‘You can’t just have one dish, Yoongi, that’s unsophisticated.’

Yoongi brings the bag holding the containers over from where he’d left it on the table to take his shoes off. Delivery charges are too high for somewhere so close to him, so he always walks to collect it. Not that he can’t afford paying it, but that doesn’t mean he likes blowing money for no reason.

Besides, getting delivery to the penthouse of a mob boss isn’t that great of an idea, really. His home address isn’t exactly printed in the local tour guide, and he’d like to keep it like that, thank you very much.

Jimin emerges from the hall, happily bundled up in a worn-down hoodie that sleeves stretch out past his hands – though he doesn’t think it’s intentional, just overused – and trailing their duvet behind him as is standard for them when they order food in.

The boy’s hair’s still slightly damp from the shower that Yoongi suggested he had to get out the ache in his back when he came back from dancing. Cleanly avoided that whole situation from reoccurring. Hasn’t erased the forever engrained memories, but there hasn’t been a repeat at least. 

But now, there is a new problem.

They’re quite some time into the movie Jimin picked out, food set between them because, naturally, they end up sharing no matter what. Yoongi’s secretly grateful for it. He doesn’t know if he could eat that much lemon chicken on his own without something to break up the bitter tang to it.

But that’s not the problem.

The problem is that at one point, Yoongi looks over to the boy, just to see he’s not making a mess or anything and he isn’t. He’s honed in, attention on the screen until he seems to feel the older’s stare and turns to look at him, too. Except, they’re closer than he expected them to be and Yoongi sees his eyes widen in shock a little, just for a moment, before it flickers away.

And then, his gaze flickers down to Yoongi’s mouth. And back up. And then back down, almost as if he’s trying to not look at all. But he does, eyes locked onto Yoongi’s lips and he’s never felt such a conscious urge to wet his mouth as he does right now.

Yoongi doesn’t know what he’s doing, doesn’t know what Jimin’s doing as the boy starts to lean all that much closer and what the fuck is he-

Jimin swipes a thumb over Yoongi’s bottom lip, showing him the blob of sauce on his fingertip. He leans back and licks it off, casual as hell, before telling him, “You’re such a messy eater.”

Yoongi’s chest finally unclenches a little from where it had wound up tighter and tighter from the very moment Jimin looked over because he is that weak, actually and that’s the new problem. Except it’s not really a new problem.

He completely ignores what he thought was going to happen and instead is about to say something playfully scathing in response, but then the boy makes a little ‘oops’ sound and Yoongi looks down at the duvet to see it covered in a fair amount of the same sauce that had been on Yoongi’s mouth.

“Park Jimin!” Yoongi snaps in partial awe at how quickly he’d just done that, the boy grinning cheekily at him as he tries to dab it clean again with the napkins he made sure were provided because his housemate is too accident-prone too often for him not to be careful.

And he’s the messy eater.

21^st December, 2017 | 10:02am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Jimin stumbles into the kitchen, a little fuzzy from having just woken up, most likely, just as Yoongi gets ready for a relatively quiet day of checking up with clients and gangsters via telephone. Nothing particularly important, but something not all that stressful and that’s what he cares about.

“Oh, yeah,” Jimin says after the older man greets him, hopping up onto the counter beside Yoongi and taking a sip of his coffee against his non-verbal protests.

“– My parents are coming tonight for dinner.”

Yoongi’s glad he’s no longer holding his coffee because he probably would’ve just dropped it. He’s about to take it off of him, again, when the boy adds, “So, I called your mother and invited her, too,” and he’s very glad he didn’t.

He gapes at the younger boy, unblinking.

“What? What’s with that face?” He asks, poking Yoongi’s cheek with a little finger, brow furrowed in his own confusion. Did he not open his eyes at all on the way to the kitchen this morning?

“Jimin… have you looked around our apartment?”

The kitchen itself is a state, and it really shouldn’t be, because Yoongi cleaned it yesterday. But, somehow, it’s managed to be stocked with dishes and empty packages and random spillages across the counter. From memory, Yoongi knows that the living room isn’t much better. Cups of half-finished coffee, cat-fur, blankets wrinkled and books with bent pages strewn across the place.

Even their hallways are messy. And Yoongi wholeheartedly blames it on Jimin. Seriously, he doesn’t know how it gets so untidy just from him. He goes with him to pretty much every meeting and deal – and even other things when Hoseok’s busy. He’s not here that much. Not enough to cause this tsunami of filth that reminds him a little bit too much of a college dorm in an American movie.  

“Oh…” Jimin says, seemingly remembering this like a horrible flashback, judging by the dread-stricken expression and the sudden slump of his shoulders.

“Yeah.”

And that is how they launch into a winter rendition of spring cleaning, trash bags upon trash bags filled with junk because there’s this strange thing that happens when you clean which is you realise that you’d been ignoring other pieces of junk lying around the place. Like your mind had just decided to skip over it and it’s only when you start to get somewhere with it, saying ‘hey this isn’t so bad, we’re almost done’ that you realise how far that is from the truth because how did that get up there and why won’t this stain come out?

It hits eleven AM all too soon, Jimin and Yoongi not really having gotten anywhere yet, both of them too busy trying to fathom how it even got this messy and bickering about who did what. And it’s then that five bumbling idiots come into the room at the most fortunate time for Yoongi and Jimin, but likely the worst possible time for them.

“Meeting’s canceled guys,” Jimin announces, holding out a broom and another trash bag, “We’ve got a bigger mess than the Syndicate to sort out, today.”

Even with how persuasive that boy is, they all still hesitate – reluctance to clean understandable and painfully evident on their faces. Yoongi probably would’ve been laughed out of the room if he’d asked.

But they do help, and it only takes a few hours. A few rather irritating hours in which he can’t pass one of them without hearing something about domesticity and dinner with the parents, how romantic. Yoongi ran out of curses to mutter in response.

After they’re all done, he thanks them sort of because do assholes really deserve proper thanks? And then he shoos them all out because now they have to decide what to cook and go buy the ingredients to make it and having five food-loving idiots hanging around doesn’t really work well with that.

Jimin’s laughing as they get pushed out with equally stunned faces – clearly all having expected a taste of tonight’s food. Maybe even get an invite.

It’s fine. Seokjin can cook. They won’t starve.

Most likely.

--

“I literally just wanted you to make sure it didn’t burn. One minute. I was gone for one minute,” Yoongi tells him in naïve disbelief. Really, he should’ve expected this, staring down at the black smoke venting in wisps from the once fleshy, silver coloured fish now looking rather pathetic in the pan. Of course, he can’t leave him alone in the kitchen for one minute. Not even thirty seconds.

But then he looks at Jimin who’s smiling so amusedly at him, cheeks a little tinged from either the heat of the pan, or slight embarrassment. His eyes sparkle with unsounded laughter, creasing into crescents to match the curve of his lips.

Yoongi feels any annoyance flood out of him.

“God, you are lucky you’re so cute, Park Jimin,” he says rather dismissively, taking the pan from the boy’s cursed hands and trying to scrape the fish off of the bottom with the spatula. It’s not an easy task. Yoongi’s prying and prying at the bottom of it, like he’s back in school and has wrongly glued a page where it wasn’t meant to go, now trying to remove it with a ruler. Except it was Jimin’s fault, not his.

“You think I’m cute?”

Just like that, Yoongi’s hand shifts forward, dismantling the fish from the pan. Did he say that? Those words?

“Do you know what isn’t cute?” Yoongi asks instead, artfully dodging the confrontation by jibing him with “That poor mackerel stuck to the frying pan – are we making Gogalbi or volcanic ash?”

It works, Jimin’s left with a slack jaw, looking unbelievably insulted – though, Yoongi doesn’t miss the glimmer of laughter twitching at his lips.

“It’s not that burned, you asshole!”

Suddenly, there’s ear piercing beeping resounding in the room and the both of them look up to the ceiling to see the smoke alarm flashing angrily at them – either telling them to get the fuck out or hurry up and burn.

Jimin avoids Yoongi’s judgmental gaze, eyebrow quirked in a silent ‘are you sure about that?’

--

“And you made this all by yourself, Yoongi?” Jimin’s mother asks, pleasant smile on her face as she looks at the spread of food he slaved away to make in time. Jimin was banished from touching any of it after the Mackerel Fiasco and instead spent his time humming pop songs and swinging his feet off the counter where he’d perched himself on, stealing bites of some of the ingredients when they tempted him.

Yoongi, like usual, couldn’t bring himself to be mad. But he pretended a little, at least.

“Yes ma’am,” he replies, trying not to seem too proud of himself even though he absolutely is, “Jimin tried to help but he’s probably the worst chef in Seoul.”

Jimin puts down his chopsticks with an exasperated look of betrayal, countering “Taehyung!”

Yoongi snorts.

“Oh, you’re definitely worse than Tae.”

“Namjoon.”

He thinks for a moment. Namjoon hasn’t almost set his apartment on fire, but he’s burned his way through many pots and pans.

“It’s a close one.”

The table lifts with warm laughter from the parents and it’s enough to make Jimin let it go, likely knowing he’s right, anyway.

“That’s my Yoongi,” His mom coos, reaching over to fluff his hair from where she sits beside him. Yoongi tries to subtly pat it back down as she tells them all, “He used to help our maid, Misook, with the dinner almost every night when he was little,” in that half proud half ‘isn’t my child great?’ way that parents often like to compete in.

Yoongi’s mom is like that. Jimin’s parents, however, are not.

“Well, it’s amazing!” Jimin’s mother says earnestly, his own mother looking more prideful at the comment than Yoongi does. “Jimin never was good at cooking. I can’t tell you how many pots of mine he ruined trying to make dinner for us.”

Huh. Maybe he is worse than Namjoon.

“Ah, you always said you liked my cooking,” Jimin complains, likely feeling well and truly betrayed tonight, with both Yoongi and his parents (lovingly) insulting him.  

“You were always very hard to critique, sunshine,” his father says in a somewhat apology, and the younger boy sighs, far too dramatically, looking faux-reflectively at Yoongi over the table where he’s sitting opposite to him.

“Yoongi doesn’t have a problem with it…”

“I compliment you as much as I insult you,” he responds, immediately, not entirely sure it’s true but he has to right? At least in his head!

“I’m gonna need some statistics to prove that,” Jimin says rather seriously, making the older man snort at him.

“Okay: you are a horrible cook – but you hum nicely when you’re doing it.”

Jimin laughs in such a way that it’s like his own mouth’s betrayed him because he looks a little put-out once he stops, obviously about to defend himself when there’s a loud, attention-seeking meow and Mochi jumps up into his lap. Most likely wanting food. 

“Oh!” Jimin’s mother says, a little bit shocked at the intrusion as she asks, “You have a cat?”

“Yeah,” Jimin says smugly, as if it’s his cat. Although, the boy does keep claiming her as ‘theirs’ and Yoongi’s caught himself saying it a few times too, so he guesses he isn’t far off. “This is Mochi. Her full name’s Mochila which means backpack in Spanish.”

Yoongi doesn’t think he’ll ever meet anyone who doesn’t give him a weird look after announcing her name.

“She was the family pet,” Yoongi explains to move past the whole ‘my cat is named backpack’ thing, “but I took her with me when I moved here.”

His parents make a sound of understanding, now knowing their son hasn’t gone and bought a cat with a mob boss. Yoongi can tell they’re still a little weird about that, even if they’re not outright about it.

Which is fair enough, he guesses. There are some horrendous rumours floating around about him (most of them true, but whatever.)

“Jimin always wanted a cat as a kid. Didn’t you, Jiminie?” His dad asks, pointing a vague finger at him in recollection to which the boy nods enthusiastically at. Jimin told him that way back when he first found out about Mochi, but he could honestly tell even if he hadn’t. The way he fusses over her is ludicrous (and endearing.)

“They’re inseparable half the time. He’s the only other person besides me that she doesn’t scratch,” Yoongi says, Jimin smiling with arrogance like he’s some sort of cat whisperer. Although he wouldn’t be that surprised. His friends, as much as they love her from a distance, refer to her as a devil cat half of the time, but Jimin’s never had so much as a nip.

“She’s just a little antsy sometimes, aren’t you princess?” Jimin asks her in a cutesy voice, scratching her behind the ear as he’s figured out she loves. Yoongi’s mother shakes her head at this, letting out a quick sigh while she watches Jimin pet her, unscathed. 

“Antsy. That’s a new one. That cat is diabolical,” She insists, refuting the looks of doubt from both of Jimin’s parents, who clearly see her as sweet and friendly, as she says, “I have the scars to prove it.” 

Mochi meows in apparent agreement, like she’s pleased with that.

Honestly, Yoongi’s glad Jimin’s parents already like him. His mother hasn’t painted a great picture of him tonight with the whole satanic cat thing – on top of recounting how much of a supposed rebel he was in high school and asking him how his drug trade was going.

What do you even say to that? ‘Oh, yeah, it’s going good ‘Ma. Very illegal.’

Yoongi ignores the hesitation of Jimin’s parents, and continues eating.

“Oh,” His mother says once everyone’s practically finished their meal, “excuse me for a moment – I just remembered I need to give our youngest a call.”

There’s a round of mutual excusings, and the woman gets up, taking her phone from her bag and looking for Jungkook’s contact number. Yoongi’s surprised she doesn’t have him on speed dial.

Actually, she probably does.

“Why’s that, ‘Ma?” Yoongi asks her, a suspicious glance in her direction because it’s certainly odd, with how shifty she’s acting right now, hunched over her phone.

She looks a little guiltily at him, before she seems to steel herself in that parental way of ‘what I’m doing is correct’ and frowns, admitting, “... Seokjin told me he was hanging out with that Taehyung tonight. I just want to make sure he’s not troubling him.”

She will literally never let this go. Ever.

“Right… Well,” Yoongi says awkwardly, trying to glaze over the fact that he’d mentioned Taehyung was one of their friends earlier and Jimin’s parents are looking slightly worried – as if they’ve befriended a psychopath or something. But no, it’s just Kim Taehyung’s misfortune and poor timing that resulted in this.

“You can go into our bedroom to call him so no one hears you cussing Taehyung out for three minutes.”

His mother’s eyebrows shoot up near her hairline at that, giving him a weirdly suggestive look as if he should know what she’s shocked by.

He doesn’t.

Then, he catches her mouthing ‘our’ at him, followed by a slight narrowing of her eyes in such a way he can somehow hear the ‘Min Yoongi, you deviant.’

“Or, you know what – the hallway is probably fine,” he says quickly, not wanting her snooping.

…Not that there’s anything to find… but he still doesn’t trust her.

She’s still looking at him like that when she backs out of the dining room.

Yoongi has to avoid all three of the Parks’ stares, shovelling cold scrapes of food into his mouth as if he’s still hungry.

22^nd December, 2017 | 7:38pm | Acacia Street, Ashtown Sector

Although Jimin doesn’t actually have any intention of buying anything (though Yoongi has started paying him for his help, even if it’s just so he won’t starve to death someday if he’s out or so there won’t be another juice stain on his nice white carpet because he had no money to go buy carpet cleaner) they end up going late Christmas shopping at the boy’s request.

“The lights turn on at eight, exactly,” Jimin says, reading off of the cracked screen of his phone as the two walk around the busy main street of the sector, everyone either waiting for the lights to turn on, as well, or realising ‘shit, I forgot to get my distant cousin something.’

“You can see past the damage on that thing?” Yoongi asks sarcastically, earning a smack to his arm from the huffing younger boy, who waves the device in his face, claiming “Yes, look it’s just fine.”

It doesn’t look just fine, in all honesty.

“Just be careful you don’t cut yourself on the glass, okay?”

Jimin lets out a breathy laugh through his nose, muttering “Aish, so protective.”

“Your phone’s a death trap and you’ve inherited klutz-syndrome from Namjoon. It’s not excessive for me to say that.”

“Mm hm, I suppose you want to hold my hand so I don’t fall over my klutzy feet too, rig-,” and just as he says it, the boy stumbles, phone flying out of his hand as Yoongi wraps both arms around him in a frantic effort to keep him from crashing to the ground.

Jimin goes defeatedly limp in his hold, clearly having taken Yoongi’s point to be proven.

“This is why I’m protective of you, darling,” he says to him, laughter biting at the words as he steadies the boy on his feet again, who slowly pulls away and does a walk of shame over to his face-down phone.

He picks it up with wildly reddened cheeks which is strange, Yoongi thinks, because dropping his phone’s hardly something he’d find embarrassing. It’s the sort of thing he’d make fun of himself for.

Yoongi looks over his shoulder at the glass now chipped out in several places. The boy gives it a shake, tapping the lock button a few times without any response.

“How long do we have until the lights?” Yoongi asks him, making Jimin jump slightly, as if he hadn’t heard him approach. He sighs, softly, carefully holding his broken phone so it doesn’t cut him, just like the elder asked.

“It starts at eight. It’s around twenty minutes to, now. I can’t tell you exactly.”

Yoongi takes a look at the shops down the street, spots one with a glowing caricature of a mobile phone outside it and says “Alright, let’s go get you a new one. One with a case, probably, considering the amount of times you dropped that one.”

Jimin looks a little shocked at the suddenness of his idea, but then smiles gratefully at him, lifting an eyebrow as he asks, “Is this my Christmas present?”

Yoongi hums in partial agreement, not having even considered the whole gift giving thing. His friends usually just come over and they watch old Christmas films, then go to Yoongi and Jungkook’s mom’s house for dinner.

“Ah, how can I give you something you don’t already have?” He mumbles to himself and Yoongi’s about to snort at him before he realises Jimin looks genuinely worried about it, and the thought alone is borderline hilarious (threatening to curve into depressing) because there is one thing in this world Yoongi wants but can’t have and it’s standing right next to him.

“You don’t have to buy me anything.”

“-Oh, I’ve an idea.” He says, completely bypassing Yoongi’s comment and halting the older man in his tracks.

“What-,” The words stick in his throat when he feels the boy’s lips press against his cheek, warm and comforting in the chill of the winter’s night. He giggles when he pulls away, and Yoongi gapes at him, looking for an explanation.

“It’s a placeholder. Once I figure out what you want, I’ll get you it.”

He has no response, just smiles stupidly at him when the boy keeps walking, until he notices Yoongi isn’t. He looks over his shoulder at him, confusing clouding his features as he asks, “Aren’t you coming?”

Jimin rolls his eyes when he doesn’t reply again, trekking over to him to tug on his hand, lacing their fingers and pulling him along with him, muttering “Looks like I’m not the one that needs their hand held.”

--

“Hey, take a picture of me beside the tree, Yoongi,” Jimin says once he snaps out of his giddiness at the unveiling of the lights. The celebrations have died down, festive music lulling through speakers in the main square and Jimin stands in front of the twenty-foot tree, sparkling and glittering with a whole scope of lights and decorations.

Yoongi unlocks his phone, scrolling to his camera app, and takes the picture after a moment of lining it up the way he wants, and counting down for the younger to pose. He takes a few, because he knows he’ll want to choose, and then calls him over to let him see.

Jimin puts his hand over the one Yoongi’s holding his phone with and drags it closer to him, the heat of his hand something he’s thankful for other reasons besides the fact that he thinks his fingers are going to drop off.

“They’re really pretty,” he says in awe, and Yoongi replies something along the lines of ‘pretty subject, pretty picture’ that he beams at, knocking him playfully with the palm of his hand through the smile.

“Where’d you learn the photography skills, anyway?” He asks, pulling his hand away as Yoongi stuffs his phone back into his coat pocket.

“I was planning to study photography at university, so I took a couple of classes in high school.”

Jimin looks surprised at this, like he expected him to want to be a mob boss from birth, even if he already knew that wasn’t exactly the case.

“Obviously, I couldn’t. But it was a nice idea.”

He nods in understanding, looking back over to the tree almost dreamily when he tells him “Well, maybe someday you can. You’re still young.”

Yoongi snorts, “Yeah, once I wipe out the Syndicate and the government.”

“Yup,” the younger agrees, throwing him a greasy wink as he adds, “and when you do, I’ll be your model.”

(Jimin gets him a camera for Christmas. Yoongi thinks that’s the only thing he wanted that wasn’t the boy himself – Mariah Carey be damned.)

1^st January, 2018 | 12:00am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

“Happy new year!”

His friends are drunk and very excitable about the incoming year.

“Why wouldn’t we be, Yoongi?” Hoseok slurs to him, “This is the year we’re gonna do shit, right? We’re guhnna… we’re guhnna...”

“Rip Moon’s head off!” Taehyung chimes in, sloshing his drink in his glass as he motions the activity with his hands. They talked him into drinking something other than champagne again, like they somehow do every year.

“Yeah! Decata- decu… décor-,”

“Decapitate him,” Yoongi finishes, Hoseok smiling at him with too much thankfulness and slapping him on the back too hard.

“That’s the one,” he tells him, though he doesn’t even sound sure of himself.

Yoongi promptly makes an escape into the living room once he’s confiscated his camera from a clumsy and lightly tipsy Kim Namjoon in order to avoid the game of alcoholic truth or dare – those never end well.

This is how every New Year’s goes, except now there is a not entirely sober Jeon Jungkook running around too since he thinks that he’s close enough to eighteen. Yoongi disagrees but he’s not ready to fight four intoxicated gangsters who want their ‘littlest friend to chill out.’

At least this year he has one other entirely sober counterpart.

“Going well in there?” Jimin asks him, observing the fireworks from Yoongi’s favourite armchair that he decided to turn around to face the windows.

“About as well as that can go. I’m expecting something to be broken in the next five minutes.”

Jimin giggles when there’s a smashing of glass.

He budges over when Yoongi directs him to get out of his seat, not exactly following his request, but compromising enough for him not to argue, not even when the boy slots himself back into his lap, feet slung over the armrest.

He’s tired, and just a little buzzed, he’ll let himself have it.

“How’s the photography going, Ansel Adams?” He asks, prodding at the camera slung around Yoongi’s neck. He laughs, taking it in his hands and turning it on to flick through the gallery.

“Pretty much all of it is either the view from those windows, one of the guys messing around, or you.”

“Hey, I wasn’t kidding when I said I’d model for you.”

Yoongi looks away from the digital screen to the boy’s face, a mere few centimetres from him, and watches as the colours from the explosions outside light up his complexion in an array of hues.

Yoongi leans back a little, raising the camera and capturing the intensity on his face while he stares at him. He doesn’t wonder why he was looking so seriously at him until he’s checking his gallery much later in the night.

--

“I’m not tired, yet,” the boy insists, head lulling over to him, contradicting to his words.

The rest of his friends had stumbled their way to Yoongi’s guest rooms about twenty minutes ago, the thrill of New Year’s finally wearing off on them, and the promise of sleep luring them too easily with the cloudiness of liquor in their heads.

Jimin, on the other hand, switched on a radio station on the TV and fell back onto the sofa with a content sigh, clearly basking in his own kind of sleepiness that he’s too stubborn to submit to.

“Not tired?” Yoongi asks him, doubt practically tangible between them, enough for Jimin to shoot him a lightly offended look that he would even doubt him like that. 

He’s definitely tired. He gets whiney when he’s tired.

“No,” he tells him again, eyes watering a little as he tries to suppress a yawn.

“I think you ar-,”

“Ooh, I love this song!” He says, cutting him off as he jumps to his feet, a newfound sense of energy coming from nowhere.  

“Really?” Yoongi asks skeptically, making the boy groan at him like he’s purposely trying to deflate him. He sort of is, it’s getting very late.

“Yes,” he insists, holding out his hand with a small wiggle of his fingers as he asks, “dance with me?”

Yoongi doesn’t see a need to hesitate and he lets him pull him up onto his feet. The song’s not exactly slow but not too fast either and Yoongi feels like it’s the charity event all over again with the way they sway and turn around the room. A knot forms in his stomach at the thought – the kind that makes him aware of a confession on the tip of his tongue - and he’s far too tired to trust his mouth to not say something stupid, so he keeps it shut, just lets them move in time to the song, and the next without a word.

One minute, Jimin’s giggling at something the radio presenter says about ‘dancing to this next song with your baby’ in that classic slightly greasy way they seem to master and the next, Yoongi’s feeling the boy’s head drop against his shoulder.

“Jimin?” He asks, unsurely, craning his neck to try and get a glimpse of the boy’s face and sure enough…

Out like a light.

Yoongi reaches for the remote, trying to turn off the television without disturbing the boy’s slumber (he’s even whinier being woken up) and then he realises that dragging him on his feet to bed will most certainly disturb him.

He supports one arm underneath his thighs, the other around his back so the boy’s arm falls over his shoulder and lifts him up. It’s been a while since he’s carried him like this, but thankfully it’s not because he’s been drugged or stabbed this time.

Yoongi smiles to himself as the boy shifts to bury his face in the crook of Yoongi’s neck with a soft hum.

“Always falling asleep on me, Park Jimin. Always.”

14^th February, 2018 | 4:16pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Yoongi and Jimin are attempting to clean a little, having developed that habit from the first dinner in December, which has since become random, sporadic offerings to eat together – whether at Yoongi’s, theirs, his mother’s or a restaurant – and more often than not, Jungkook’s decided to start coming with them too.

‘I need to get acquainted with them too, hyung. We could be related someday.’

Such a brat.

But, regardless, it means that they don’t want to go through another cleaning epidemic like they had the first time, and no sugar-coating it: it’s weird.

It’s weird to be cleaning their apartment. It’s weird enough to even be sharing an apartment with Park Jimin. But they share meals, and chores and a bed.

They share a goddamn cat.

And, sure, it’s a little late in the timeline of this development to be realising that, but polishing windows and watching the boy prance about with a feather duster makes him realise how unbelievably domestic they’ve gotten.

If someone'd told Min Yoongi a year ago that he’d be cleaning his apartment with a pretty boy he saved from being a prostitute after getting beat up by the Syndicate. A boy that he’d initially think he’d hate very much.

He would’ve punched them in the face, probably.

“Yoongi?” Jimin calls, trying not to get the duster torn up by a far too interested Mochi. And this is where things get absurd. His life is absurd because of this one question.

“Can we go to dinner tonight?”

He’s stunned, truly stunned. But not because of that. Jimin likes to eat in fancy places. It’s hardly surprising for someone who likes luxury as much as he does (and he really does, the more time passes.)

“Why?” Yoongi asks, not pausing in his shining of the wall length mirror beside the entrance door.

“It’s valentine’s day!” Jimin says, a ‘duh’ short of true condescension. Yoongi does pause then. That stuns him. He looks up at him with a neutral expression even though inside his mind is going what the fuck this is too much.

“Oh,” Yoongi says, “And?”

Jimin throws down his feather duster, skipping over to him and pulling his phone out of his pocket, chiming, “You get the really good deals on food in fancy restaurants, then.” He unlocks it and shows Yoongi an article on his phone titled ‘Best Places to Eat in Seoul This Valentine’s Day’ “Look!”

Yoongi scans down the list, not all that interested until he sees the prices.

“Five courses for $15 per person? What the fuck?”

“Exactly!” Jimin says, nudging his arm while he coaxes, “Come on! Date night!”

Here is the boy he’s in love with asking him out on a quote unquote date on Valentine’s Day. Fuck the prices, he can eat anywhere he wants. He’s loaded. But it’s Jimin.

“…Fine. Let’s go,” he says, finally putting down his polish and trying to rid his hand from cloth fibers. “How fancy are we talking?”

Jimin makes a loud drone in thought, looking back down at the article to see the pictures of the place of choice.

“Smart casual,” he guesses, “Any fancier than that and the portion sizes wouldn’t be worth it.”

“True.”

(They end up a little underdressed, anyway. The portion sizes aren’t that worth it, after all, and the waiters are stuck-up assholes – but Jimin’s smiling the entire time, and the sight alone would make getting a broken rib seem worth $15.)

Chapter Text

19^th February, 2018 | 3:53pm | Near Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

It’s a cold, crisp day when everything goes to shit.

Fitting really.

Yoongi feels the wind bite into his chest, pull through his hair unwelcomed as he walks with unbridled haste, just because he wants to get home before he catches something or his fingers drop off – and he’s only a few blocks away when he feels his phone buzzing in his pocket.

He pulls it out, seeing Namjoon’s name flash up and puts it to his ear, answering “Hey, Nams. What’s-,”

“Yoongi, thank God,” he breathes, the short greeting ridden with so much panic that it almost stops Yoongi right in his tracks because Namjoon is rarely anything but calm when he calls. Rarely anything but calm most of the time, actually.

“I can’t get any contact with half of the gang. They’ve fucking quit on us or something. There’s people looking for you. They know where your apartment is- I don’t know how, but-,”

Yoongi’s hand clenches around his phone, anger surging through him almost electrically.

“The fucking information,” he spits, enough to make his pace quicken in anger, because he fucking knew they weren’t gonna just use it as leverage. That’d do jack shit. He’s seen this coming for a long time and yet was powerless to stop it. They didn’t do anything in time.

Namjoon doesn’t need an explanation, judging by the sharp intake of breath on the other line.

“Shit, Yoongi, where are you right now?”

Yoongi sniffs, passing the question off as rather irrelevant because he’s not even in his apartment. The problem is that half of their gang’s left them now because of this getting leaked, and he has nowhere to go.

“I just got finished at an arrangement with a dealer – told Hoseok I’d walk home because he had a thing with his manager-,”

He stops so suddenly he almost throws himself off balance.

They know his address.

Yoongi’s not there.

“Fuck, fuck, Jimin,” He practically yells down the line, shoving his finger on the button to end the call and giving himself no time to even put the device away before his feet are carrying him down the street in a furious sprint, down this street and the next and the next. He weaves in and out of people on the paths, cuts across roads with cars driving by, ignorant of the frantic beeping of horns and he’s heaving by the time he gets to the entrance of his apartment building – sweat clinging to his skin despite the cold. He shoves the door open after punching in the number with a heavy hand and yet shaking fingers and bolts up the stairs because fuck elevators they take too long.

He gets to his floor, lungs burning with exhaustion and downright terror because he doesn’t even have to fumble for his keys; the fucking door is busted up, not even on its hinges and who the hell had so much brute fucking strength to do that?

Yoongi’s whole chest feels like it’s been smashed when his feet drag him inside.

The living area is wrecked, to put it simply.

Everything that was on the shelves, walls and tables is on the floor. Ornaments and lamps are broken, hell even the goddamn coffee table’s glass is shattered all over the carpet and Yoongi calls out for Jimin until his throat is screaming at him and there’s nothing. There’s no response, he’s not here and Yoongi wants to burn the place down. Burn himself, burn every goddamn thing because how the hell did he let this happen?

He scans all of the destruction across the room, the obvious signs of struggle and general roughness and he feels physical pain at thinking about Jimin going through all of this, all by himself.

He lets out a strangled yell, full of raw anger and feels stinging in his eyes, blurriness making its way into his vision and his mind immediately goes to Syndicate until he catches a glimpse of something amongst the broken glass of the table. A note. A fucking note.

Yoongi goes to pick it up, not caring about being gentle of the glass and one of his fingers get cut but who the hell cares right now? Jimin could be sitting with broken bones, cuts everywhere. Why would Yoongi give a shit about himself?

‘He’s a pretty little thing, isn’t he?’ the note reads, and Yoongi almost vomits on the spot because nobody. No-fucking-body should be able to get away with calling him that. He’s about to throw it out of his hand like a fussy child when he sees a scrawl of an address and a time written underneath with the added warning of ‘Come unarmed, alone. We’ll exchange him for you. If you bring anyone with you he won’t be so pretty anymore.’  

He nearly rips the paper in half, then, but then a wave of level-headedness crashes onto him and he sees that that would be stupid because he needs the address and he’s so, so stupid and he can’t afford to make any more mistakes like that, so he doesn’t. He crumples it in his hand, gripping tightly enough that his knuckles ache and thinks about where he’s heard that before. Who’s called Jimin that?

Joonho.

Fuck, Yoongi should’ve gotten rid of him when he had the chance. Sleazy bastard’s probably been planning this for ages and Yoongi had no idea, and now it’s gone perfectly with the Syndicate’s plan. Leaking their information to smaller gangs probably for a small sum, just to screw Yoongi over.

Of course, the Syndicate themselves wouldn’t bother with something like this. Seonghyeon can just sit back and watch it happen for him, without even telling people to. In fact, he’s practically crime-free this time. And that pisses Yoongi off.

But not as much as when he notices the sparkling silver underneath where the note had been.

Jimin’s necklace. His necklace.

He picks it up, runs the cool metal along his hand and sees that it’s unclasped, not broken, which means that Jimin must’ve done it – it didn’t get caught on anything and it wasn’t pulled off. He puts it in his pocket, tries to calm the hell down because he can’t do shit about anything like this.

But he can’t. He can’t calm down because he just looks around and feels that anger, that desperation build all over again, just as violently.

His friends arrive soon after that, not all at once but within a small timeframe and Yoongi doesn’t even bother lifting his head from where he’d ended up crouched on the floor until all of them get there because having to explain what happened more than once would chip away at him. He knows it’s all his fault, and that’s hard to take.

“Yoongi,” Hoseok says at last, prodding him carefully at the top of his back because it’s rather obvious that the man is horrendously unstable right now, even if he can’t see his face and he asks, “What in God’s name happened? Where’s Jimin?”

Yoongi raises his head but not to look at him, he just pathetically looks ahead of himself, cheeks sticky with wetness that rolls down in hot bursts of exasperated tears and he growls “They took him,” so quietly that it doesn’t sound much like a growl at all. It’s not strong. He sounds weak. He’s weak, weak, weak.

“They want me in exchange for him,” he says and he doesn’t even know why. To kill him? Beat him up? Get revenge on him for doing nothing except dominating the west of the city that they only secured because everyone else was too frail to take it themselves? He doesn’t know. He doesn’t even care. He just wants it fixed. He needs to fix this.

Yoongi gets up off the floor because now is not the time for acting like a goddamn toddler, and he irately wipes the dampness off of his face while he’s at it, looking at his friends with a deadly seriousness that all of them squirm at.

Hoseok looks particularly unsure of himself, as if he already knows the answer but doesn’t want to hear it, asking, “What are we gonna do?”

“I’m gonna go,” he says, no hesitation. Hesitation got him into this mess, not acting quickly. He’s had enough time to think about this. There’s no more room left to hesitate - the meeting time is at 5:00pm and he’s already well past four.

They look shocked, as if they can’t believe this is his plan, but what else can they do?

Yoongi turns his attention to more important things, instead, like his own fucking men walking out on him.  

“Namjoon, what happened to the gang?”

The man in question shifts on his feet, the others looking at him inquisitively, obviously not knowing about any of that part yet.

“They… they’ve walked out. Their information’s been leaked and they don’t think we’ve done enough to keep them safe so they-,” He draws in a breath, looking utterly defeated when he says, “They’re gone, Yoongi. Not everyone but… everyone that matters.”

Hoseok seems to realise that this is only backing up Yoongi’s plan and he cuts in, pissed in a way he’s rarely seen him as he snaps, “Yoongi, you’re acting fucking crazy, right now – you can’t go along with their plan. It’s a set-up, you know it is. What sort of bullshit plan is that?”

Something’s been coiling up inside of Yoongi since he first got the phone call from Namjoon and now at Hoseok’s objection, he feels it break. Feels himself unhinge like his bloody door and God, Jimin must’ve been terrified, deep down. Outwardly, he knows the boy would’ve fought tooth and nail with them. He just hopes, for once, he didn’t go overboard.

Yoongi stands there, looking at all of them with such… disappointment in himself that he actually finds the strength to shrug with cold laughter that certainly sounds crazy once it’s out there.

“We have no allies, no backup. No supplies, no inside information. No idea what to expect. Nothing but a slip of paper mocking me a-and Jimin,” He lists, voice surprisingly level while he’s trying not to sound so damn broken. Jimin. His Jimin, taken right under his nose like some… some sort of object. Some sort of valuable bait when he’s a person, for fuck’s sake. One of the most important people in his life.

And he just let him get taken like that.

Like hell, he’s not gonna do whatever he can to get him back.

“We have nothing,” he spits – the bitterness in it feeling like it’s burning his own tongue. “No one to trust because this. This right here?” He gestures to the six of them, the movement jerky and fuelled with clear distress.

“This is all we are.”

The six of them. Like Yoongi always thought it’d come down to eventually.

Of course, lately, he thought it’d be seven. That didn’t seem so bad then, somehow.

“We…” Seokjin starts, own voice shaking and Yoongi can see how affected they all are by this, too. He knows they understand to an extent. They care for Jimin just as much as they care for each other, but they still don’t understand enough.

“We’ve come back from this before.”

Of course, he’d say that. He was practically the one to pick the gang back up the first time and maybe Yoongi would believe him in any other situation. But he doesn’t know that he can right now. This gang is fragile, threatening to fall apart at any moment and cracks are already deep. Pieces have already crumbled away, fed up of being apparently neglected.

“A couple of guys stepping down isn’t the same, Jin,” he argues back, not meaning to sound so damn scathing about it but he can’t help it. The man’s optimism is killing him right now.

“Half of our fucking gang have left us!” he shouts, voice suddenly peaking and making Seokjin stare at him in shock, mouth clenched shut. “Because it’s not safe for them anymore. I don’t have a choice here, there’s only one thing I can do.”

There’s no argument from them this time, just sombre looks and pitiful frowns that Yoongi can barely stand. But he’ll have to.

After all, he’s got his love to rescue.

19^th February, 2018 | 4:58pm | Abandoned Warehouse, Red Light Sector

He feels sick the closer he gets to the location. He doesn’t feel the cold this time, he doesn’t feel anything but a dull ache in his chest and that swirling nausea. There’s no gun in his pocket, no weapon at all and he feels like an idiot doing this – knowingly walking into a trap, but what else is he supposed to do? This is the plan. It’s flimsy, and easily knocked down. But it’s all they’ve got.

Yoongi makes it to the location with two minutes to spare but doesn’t wait. It killed him enough to wait the extra half an hour; if they’re not ready for him then that could play to his advantage.

He lifts up the metal shutter door to the decaying building, hearing it creak obnoxiously before stepping inside and dropping it again. It hits against the concrete with a heavy thud.

The room is poorly lit, relying on the rapidly decreasing daylight to shine in through the windows in the high roof, which leaves much of it in significant shadow. There’s a few beams, a few boxes, but besides from that, the only other thing visible in the room is a brown-haired boy right in the centre, kneeling with his head down, seemingly oblivious to Yoongi’s intrusion.

He doesn’t trust this one damn bit, but his mind tells him to walk anyway.

The closer he gets, the more he notices on the boy. His stupid white once-soft-silk-now-bally shirt is torn in places and wrinkled. His knees are bare and he’s shivering a little to no surprise because it’s freezing – probably colder in the building than outside it - and here he is in just a shirt.

There are red marks over what he can see from his thighs and neck and the little of his face that’s visible. Red marks and small cuts and blooming bruises and, honestly, it doesn’t look good and that – the fact they did this to Park Jimin, his fucking darling.

That pisses him the fuck off.

But it’s okay, he’s here now, and he’s walking over to him, asking, “Jimin are you alri-,” but the words are cut off as Yoongi feels a heavy kick to his back and he’s plummeting to the floor, head smacking off the concrete with a spike of thick pain.

Everything looks blurred out and hazy as he rolls onto his back with a groan, the ceiling seeming to twist in swirls. He hears Jimin shout in rage at the impact but it sounds like he’s underwater and he can’t even make out the words. 

Then, an ugly assortment of facial features making up the sleaze-bag of a cause of all of this – and likely the person to just kick him to the ground – comes into his distorted vision, grinning arrogantly like he’s some sort of fucking genius.

“Joonho,” Yoongi half-mumbles, squinting to try and get his vision back in check. “I had a feeling this was all you, you greasy low-life.”

Joonho doesn’t even bother with the theatrics as he brings his foot down hard on Yoongi’s stomach, making the man lose the air in his body with a wheezing breath. He coughs a little too harshly, feeling his already tender throat flaring up again in protest and ugh, he thinks he can taste blood.

He takes a moment to recover, then starts to mumble, “At first, I thought it was the Syndicate – force of habit at this point –,” trying to cover over the difficulty he has saying sentences right now because his head feels like it’s on fire and his throat and stomach are dying. He doesn’t want to give Joonho the satisfaction of that, though.

“But then I remembered you calling Jimin a ‘pretty little thing’ one time, like in your letter, and figured that this plan was just too cliché and too mundane for it to be Moon. The asshole’s got creativity I’ll give him that,” He says, managing a laugh that sounds all too deflated for it to have much impact. But, Joonho is rather easily wound-up.

And as predicted, his jaw clenches in his limited view and then he steps back so Yoongi has to lift his aching head to watch him stand defensively, arms across his chest, sounding too smug as he says, “It doesn’t matter. This was all fake. We’re not exchanging you two at all!” like it’s some big revelation.

Yoongi snorts. At least his nose doesn’t hurt at the sensation.

“How dumb do you think I am?”

The man scowls, pouting like a preteen and barks, “Shut the fuck up!” as he comes closer to Yoongi again, crouching down to his level to just hover over him in an attempt to intimidate, most likely. It doesn’t work. Yoongi’s numb to intimidation from most – he’s been a mob boss long enough to not let it affect him much anymore.

“Originally, we’d planned to kill you and then sell him-,” he gripes, gesturing to Jimin with a bitter glare, “but I guess that’s too mundane.”

He stands back up, calls out to somebody standing in the dark part of the warehouse, saying, “Byungho – bring the van around,” before he looks back to Yoongi with a crooked smile twisting onto his face.

“Instead, Min, we’re gonna kill the boy. Nice and slowly… just like you do to people. We’ll even let you watch, and then we’ll kill you as well.”

Yoongi shifts to sit up, watching Joonho as he makes a signal to more goons in the shadows, and they start to march towards Jimin whose eyes are locked onto Yoongi – a mixture of concern and terror circling in them and Yoongi’s heart practically leaps into his throat as he watches his attention flick to the men standing over him now, that fiery glower encompassing his face that Yoongi’d almost missed. But he hadn’t wanted to see it again like this.

Intimidating him doesn’t work, but he’d be a damn liar if he said he wasn’t beginning to feel a little fearful from Jimin being in danger. Really, he must’ve developed that stupid ‘too confrontational for his own good’ syndrome from him.  

One of them grabs Jimin by his shirt collar, hoisting him up to his feet even though he’s clearly too weak to stand properly because it’s then that Yoongi notices the bleeding gash on his forehead and realises what smashed the coffee table.

His fear skyrockets.  

And he snaps.

“Don’t fucking touch him, you bastards!” He yells, outrage and sheer panic rattling through him and he tries to move forward on his knees, still too disorientated to climb to his feet, spitting “Don’t touch a hair on his goddamn head, or I’ll-,” He chokes when he’s knocked back by a ruthless kick to the side of his face, landing back down on his side and watching Jimin being dragged out of the warehouse, fighting and cussing as he does.

Joonho is fucking dead. Yoongi’s going to bury him.

The asshole towers over him now as Yoongi tries to lift his head off of the floor again but finds it too heavy to. He feels something warm running out of his mouth, can taste the metallic tang easily. But he isn’t pissed because of him, he’s pissed because he knows Jimin had to go through all of this by himself, before Yoongi got here. He’s pissed because he let this happen. And he can’t complain now.

He just needs to fix it.

“You know, Yoongi? I’ve had my eye on that boy for a long time. A long, long time.” If Yoongi hadn’t already felt nauseous as hell, he no doubt would’ve now, listening to the disturbing, obsessive way he’s speaking right now.

“And then you made him quit. Finally gave me a way of getting to him.”

God, he does want to be sick. Puke all over this psychopath. He’s just thankful Jimin isn’t having to listen to any of this, not even wanting to think about what he might’ve already said to him.

Yoongi’s sort of seeing stars by the time the goons return to pick him off of the floor, Joonho deciding to give him another kick to his back as they do just because he’s some sort of sadist, clearly, but Yoongi gives nothing more than a short grunt at it.

He’s pushed into the back of a van, landing on his front as any glimmer of light disappears once the doors are shut and Yoongi manages to pull himself to a sitting position, lying making him feel as if he’s about to upchuck an organ.

“Jimin?” Yoongi whispers, trying to squint in the dark but not being able to see a goddamn thing.

“I’m here,” a voice snaps in the corner, and Yoongi follows it as best as he can as the boy says, “this is all your fault, you bastard.”

Yoongi laughs, actually laughs. The relief of the boy being okay making him slightly delusional along with all the knocks to his head and other vital parts of his body.

“Why’d you come for me? You’re an absolute idiot – that’s what Joonho wanted, Yoongi. You don’t even have a plan, do you?”

Yoongi almost laughs again at that. Is he serious? Thinking he’d actually throw himself into this mess without a plan?

There’s no way Joonho’s letting either of them out of this alive. Yoongi needed a plan, he knew that from the moment he got the letter.

“Of course, I have a fuckin’ plan, Jimin. I always have a plan.”

It’s still a risky plan, but it’s a plan.

The boy snorts, and Yoongi can almost imagine the playful condescending look making his eyes roll and lips twitch into a smirk.

“What’s the strategy, then, Napoleon? Both of us die and complain about it in hell together?”

Yoongi’s not going to pretend, their stupid bickering is kind of helping him not to tear a hole in the side of this damn vehicle right now. He hears the engine start up and as there’s no outburst of anger or thrown insult, he thinks that Jimin probably feels that way, too.

“Tempting,” Yoongi admits, keeping his voice low for the next part because he doesn’t exactly need Joonho hearing it, “But no. In about… ten minutes Hoseok will be tailing us with the rest of the guys.”

Jimin’s confusion is practically audible, and he asks, “How is he gonna tail us after ten minutes?” scepticism clear in the question to which Yoongi simply pulls the delicate necklace from his pocket, and waves it in front of the boy’s face, hoping his eyes have adjusted by now just as Yoongi’s start to as well.

He sort of sees the brief look of scandal on his face as he looks down at the object, then back up at Yoongi.

“You did not put a tracker in that.”

“I got a feeling this would happen someday! I just didn’t expect you to take it off.” The follow-up question of why did you take it off, idiot? implied.

“I didn’t wanna lose it! Or have them break it!” Jimin says in justification, “It costs more than I do.”

Yoongi holds it out to him, sighing, “Just put it on, dummy,” to which the boy sounds all too mischievous at when he tells him, “I can’t. They handcuffed me.”

“Why?”

“I kept throwing punches.”

Why does he feel a sense of pride at that? Park Jimin really would try to beat anyone’s ass if provoked.

Yoongi starts to clumsily manoeuvre behind the boy in spite of the bumping vehicle, muttering a ‘fine’ and attempts to put the necklace on in the dark for him. He drapes it around his neck, pulling the ends back behind it and just barely brushing against his skin, then he fiddles with it for a little until it clicks in place. Jimin huffs, sounding thoroughly entertained – as if Yoongi’s priorities are slightly misplaced.

And they might be. His priority is always him, so sometimes it might be. In everyone else’s eyes, at least.

The van grinds to a sharp halt, both of them jerking to fall over onto their sides in the back with nothing to hold on to. Yoongi hears Jimin curse under his breath and would probably laugh at it, if he could manage it past the sudden weight of uncertainty clenching down in his stomach.

He almost forgot Joonho’s threats of murdering them both here in the brief minutes of solace Jimin’s company had given him. If something’s went wrong with their friends, then they’re fucked.

The doors slide open with a horrendous shriek and thump and neither of them get much respect, obviously, as they’re dragged out with sharp pulls to their hair and thrown onto the ground, outside.

Yoongi blinks a few times, trying to get his eyes to focus from the change in light as he feels a sandish, gravely substance underneath them. Everything’s dull and lifeless – some sort of wasteland and Yoongi commends them on finding such a lovely place for murder.

Joonho doesn’t even crack a sarcastic smile when Yoongi says this, raising his head off of the uneven ground to stare up at him. His ego is unable to take any sort of insult at all, it seems.

Yoongi’s face is already too raw to rest his head against the floor, scrapes from being dragged and thrown around making it sting almost relentlessly. So, the kick from the back of Joonho’s heel that connects with his jaw is downright agony and the pain of it’s almost numbing, making his teeth collide so hard electricity travels up and down his nerves.

He spits out blood beside the man’s foot and hears Jimin give some sort of teeth-clenched yell, as if trying to hold back from sounding pained after a similar sounding blow to Yoongi’s.

“Your…” Yoongi huffs, voice croaking stickily as he swallows down the blood in his mouth, “your hospitality is… luh-lacking.”

He should’ve expected the stamp of a heavy boot on his back. Not Joonho this time, one of his do-don’t-think lackeys instead.

Ten minutes must have already passed, by the time they each take another few beatings and Yoongi’s moved over onto his back, staring at the sky and he thinks if the burning red that’s coating it was the last thing Joonho got to see once he got his hands on him, he wouldn’t deserve it.

Are the clouds really moving that fast or is his head just fucked?

But, even though, it’s over ten minutes, there’s no sign of Hoseok – and Yoongi’s bad feeling in his gut only swells and crunches even more and he thinks he’s going to spit more blood or maybe puke but then as he’s turning over onto his side he realises that this isn’t just a feeling. He tries not to dribble all over himself like a goddamn baby when his stomach twists and lurches out a cascade of vomit, the bile burning the back of his throat as his bleeding teeth add to the mess as well.

The taste in his mouth is sour and makes him feel as if he’d retch again if he had anything left in his stomach.

Joonho makes a disgusted noise, some of it probably having splashed onto him, if Yoongi’s lucky, and cusses him out for it, as if Yoongi was the one who kicked himself twenty times in the stomach. He can imagine the black bruise that’ll surface on his skin with that one – and that’s if he’s fortunate enough to not have secured a fractured rib or two from it, too. He doesn’t know, everything hurts the same.

But then finally, like fucking salvation, he hears one of the goons shout across the space to Joonho, telling him, “Boss, there was a black car sighted a mile or so away just now,” and Yoongi feels a victorious smile tear onto his face, making his bruises and cuts sting because he’s won, goddamn it.

The asshole in charge turns to him, something like uncontrollable fury raging on his face as he spits, “You set us up, didn’t you? You little fucker,” and he lands a blow to Yoongi’s ribs that really might fracture this time but he doesn’t even care at this point. Beat him up all he wants, he’s saved.

“Mundane,” He croaks, bloody teeth smiling at him and he can tell the look alone causes something to shatter inside Joonho because he practically shrieks “Fuck. Fuck! Okay, you piece of shit, you asked for this,” and Yoongi’s ready for him to hit him a few more times, welcoming it almost but it doesn’t come.

He tries to move up onto his elbows when he hears Jimin firing insults and protests but his strength in his arms has practically melted, leaving him falling back down with a dull thud on the ground. He turns his head towards the boy to see him yelling and trying to break away from Joonho’s grip as best as he can with his hands cuffed behind his back – which is not very well – and his heart sinks.

“Jimin,” he mutters, hands scrabbling in the dirt in front of him as he moves onto his stomach, trying to get himself up because Joonho shouldn’t get his filthy fucking hands on him even for a second, and he manages to form a sort of crawl, elbows and knees supporting him but he’s not fast enough because Joonho’s already dragging him away telling the man nearest Yoongi to “Stay here, beat the shit out of him – I don’t care what you do. Kill him if you want,” Yoongi lets out a puff of air in some imitation of a scoff. They won’t get a chance to.

“The rest of you can come with me. We’re gonna have a little fun with this boy, like we’ve all been waiting so long for.”

That, though. That makes Yoongi struggle to push himself up onto his feet because his boy. They want to hurt him. Not just hurt him. They want to have their sick fucking way with him. And that’s not something his friends arriving can prevent unless they do it now.  

But they don’t.

Every one of his limbs feels like it’s on fire but he pulls through it, despite how it’s almost like he’s being ripped apart just by standing with his cuts and he can’t even remember what caused them but he’s bleeding and if he’s bleeding Jimin’s likely bleeding too so he doesn’t care.

“Joonho- you… yuh-you…”

He staggers on his feet and everything’s spinning and shit, is he gonna pass out? Joonho’s laughing at him, he thinks. Laughing because he thinks he’s won but Yoongi sees no sign of Hoseok, and wonders if maybe he has.

“Jimin… - don’t t-tuh… touch him…”

He sees Jimin’s eyes blown wide and unblinking at him as they try to get him into the van and why is he looking at him like that? Why is he looking at him like he thinks he’s gonna-

Yoongi falls to the ground and everything fades to black.

--

Jimin can’t see.

Not because the van’s stupidly dark, though that’d be an issue, too. He can’t see because Joonho put a fucking blindfold on him.

“What the fuck is this Joonho, huh? What are you even tryna to pull here?” He says to no one in particular because he doesn’t even know where he is. They’re in the van, he can hear the road humming underneath them but where is Joonho in this godforsaken rust bucket?  

“This, my angel, is my reward.”

He feels his breath on the back of his neck, and quickly finds his answer.

“Reward?” Jimin scoffs, trying to look behind him until the man forces his head forward again with a heave that makes his growing headache amplify. “For what? Being a sick bastard? Do they give awards for that nowadays?”

Jimin hears movement towards the front of him and looks up to where he thinks the man’s probably staring down at him. Likely enjoying all of this a little too much.

There’s a sharp, stinging slap to the side of his already raw-skinned cheek and he tries not to hiss at it. The man doesn’t deserve that satisfaction.

“Stay still and be quiet, like a good boy. You always followed orders well.”

That’s because I knew if I didn’t we’d be in this position a lot sooner.

Jimin’s known Joonho’s had his eye out for him since practically day one and it made his skin crawl for two years.

He thought he’d cleanly avoided something like this happening but evidentially he’s not that damn lucky.

“Yoongi’s gonna tear your fuckin’ throat out,” He says through gritted teeth, disgust boiling up so much it feels like it’s burning his insides, “He’s gonna-,”

The next slap reverberates in the small space. A harsh, crack-like noise that feels more like he’d been struck with a weapon than a hand.

“Not if he doesn’t have a pulse, whore.”

Well, at least he’s lost the table manners now. Joonho’s never said that so abrasively to him before. True, ugly colours out on display at last.

“Don’t underestimate him. And don’t call me that either,” Jimin gripes, the words bothering him more than he should let the man know. Yoongi won’t die. He’s fine. He always fights. He’s probably laughing it off right now, corpse of the goon Joonho left behind on the floor beside him.

Right?

“Do you think your status’ changed just because you like to play house with the head of Mariposa, now? Min Yoongi – the infamous mobster? Do you think that makes you any more than his plaything?”

That, that hits him hard. Yoongi doesn’t see him like that. He’s never asked anything like that of him.

“Shut the fuck up, it’s not like that, you don’t know shit about him.”

“No, but I know enough about you,” Joonho says, voice sounding far too close to him for his liking. Right beside his ear so he can feel the uncomfortable hotness of his breath. Not comforting like Yoongi’s. Shit, he just wants to get out of this. Go back home.

“Park Jimin. Slut. What else is there?”

He doesn’t realise how much he’s fucking with his head right now until he feels a warm wetness against the blindfold, right by his eyes and he’s crying like a stupid baby. He’s probably got thirty different bruises and half a concussion and here he is crying at a couple of names.

Yoongi told him Joonho was wrong about that. But why does he feel like he’s right, now?

“Where’s your old necklace, huh?” He asks then, and Jimin’s stomach drops. He’d forgotten entirely about that stupid thing. Yoongi told him it didn’t matter anymore. It doesn’t. “Don’t tell me you lost it. Didn’t I tell you you had to wear that?”

“I don’t work for you, motherfucker.”

His voice wavers. He knows Joonho notices it.  

“But you did. Nothing’s changed from then. Like I said, you’re just playing house. Dress-up.” He pauses, and Jimin can practically hear the twisted grin in his words.

“Do you dress up for him, huh? Does he like you looking pretty before he fucks you?”

He shudders. He’s gonna throw up. This is too fucking much. He’s tried so hard to move past this.

But once a slut always a slut, isn’t that how it went?

Maybe it was too much to think he could get over it.

“Wouldn’t you like to hear all about that, you sicko,” Jimin says but it doesn’t sound threatening at all. He practically whimpers it and he feels so damn pathetic about it.

“So he does.”

Jimin sniffs, hard. Hopes the man can tell he’s glaring at him.

“Screw Yoongi, I’m gonna rip your throat out you perverted, repulsive, nauseating excuse for a human being.”

It’s weak. The words are hollow and they both know it but he’s trying.  

“No wonder you were so popular, little star. Lots of men like the ones that can pack a punch. Give them something to fight.”

He knows. He knows that. He wants to scream just thinking about it. He wants Yoongi to tell him it’s okay but he can’t he’s not here. He’s alone and Yoongi could be anywhere. He could be dead in that stupid wasteland.

“You want a punch? I’ll knock you out-cold,” Jimin says, and he can practically anticipate Joonho’s response as soon as he lets out a slow, cold snicker – the iciness of which he can pretty much feel against his skin.  

He doesn’t slap this time. His fist connects hard, right on the side of his cheekbone and Jimin’s knocked straight off of his knees, landing on his back onto some scrap metal that jags and points into him. Not enough to pierce him, but enough to fucking hurt.

“No. I think I’ll do the hitting around here. I was never one for anything but submission.”

Jimin wants to say something back. But he can’t.

--

“Yoongi? Yoongi!” The voice is distant. Spacey. Like it’s a million miles away with some crazy megaphone. He opens his eyes. Or he thinks he does, because he doesn’t see anything.

“Yoongi, wake the fuck up, we have to go.”

There’s some light tapping on his face but it’s annoying. Who the- he knows that voice. 

“Jung Hoseok, I’m gonna- ow-”

His face hurts like shit but he can’t remember why. It feels like he’s got a thousand tiny scrapes across it. Or broken every part of his skull but he’s pretty sure neither’s the case.

“Don’t talk, hyung, you’re fucked up like hell,” another voice says. Sounds like… Namjoon? Why is everyone here? Did they tread their way, uninvited, into his apartment again? Is he late for a meeting?

“We need to go now. Jimin’s been on the move while you’ve been knocked out.”

Everything comes back to him at once. The letter, Joonho, Jimin, the wasteland. His eyes do rip open this time and he jolts up, only getting halfway into a sitting position before there’s a crippling pain across his stomach that sends him right back down, gasping for breath from the shock of it.

He rolls onto his side, the staring faces of his friends being too confusing right now and almost pisses himself when he sees someone else staring at him, a few centimetres beside him on the floor. Only there’s a bullet wound oozing blood out from his head.

“Jesus Christ!”

“We had to kill him, okay?” Hoseok says, running over the fact that he almost touched a dead body with his face rather easily. And he sees him gesture to someone when Yoongi moves to lie on his back again, saying, “Now, let’s get you up. Jin, little help?”

There’s arms hooking under his, and Hoseok trying to lift him from underneath his waist but any slight movement to it aches like he’s being cut open and Jesus, has he been cut open? Or just cracked something?

He looks down, taking a moment to study his shirt because he didn’t remember putting on a red shirt this morning and… oh.

Oh…

“Seriously, we thought you were dead. No wonder. You look like shit.”

“Thanks, Seok,” Yoongi pants, air practically being punched out of him at this point. His voice is thin and rasps against his throat, barely sounding like him at all but he’s probably swallowed so much blood at this point that it’s dried in his throat.

“No problem,” the man quips, still in oddly high spirits for the situation, “Where the hell is Jimin?”

Yoongi almost cringes at the memory, grits his teeth as he grumbles, “Joonho… took’em.”

The man grimaces, obviously having known that was likely to be the case but, of course, hearing it out loud just makes it more real.

“Well, at least you got the necklace on him again. Still weird as hell you put a tracker in it.”

“Safety precaution.”

“Whatever helps you sleep.”

Anything would help him sleep right now. He’s gonna pass out again if he doesn’t sit down soon, the way they’re dragging him over to the car is expending what little energy he actually has.

But then, as his ass hits the passenger’s seat the reality of the situation hits him again and he wakes the fuck up a little upon realising that Park Jimin needs him not to be a goddamn pissbaby right now.

He sits up as straight as he can, ignoring the loud protests of the pains across his back and stomach and everywhere else and blinks hard, trying to get himself as aware as possible.

“Where’s… all this... blood from?” Yoongi asks them, as if they’d have any idea. He looks down at his sodden shirt – bad day to wear white – and is almost afraid to lift it.

“I think it’s mostly from the guy we killed, but..”

Taehyung sounds so unsure that Yoongi loses all will to check. He’ll check later, once Jimin’s away from that disgusting creep and Yoongi can die in peace if he has to.  

“Hyung, fucking step on it. They haven’t been gone that long,” Jungkook speaks up from the backseat, leaning forward to get Hoseok’s attention whose hands grip tight around the steering wheel as the car roars to life.  

“Yeah, yeah. Everybody hold on.”

And they fucking need to, Hoseok drives like a maniac at the best of times, but in an actual emergency Yoongi sometimes wonders if he’s going to die before he even gets into the crossfire.

They hit actual road sooner than expected, trailing the tracks left in the gravel by Joonho’s van and hurtling around the tight bends that lead them out of the middle of nowhere and back into the sector.

Hoseok makes sharp turns onto side streets, simply blaring the horn at people in the way and hoping they jump out of the way in time. A few cuss and swear at them, shaking fists, on the way past, but Hoseok doesn't take it as a sign to slow down, thankfully.

After a few short minutes of tearing through their tires and leaving tracks with every skid, they catch up to a suspicious looking van that’s driving as conspicuously as possible, likely wanting to try and blend in. But, unfortunately for Joonho, Yoongi can sense his sleaze from here.

“Is that them, Yoongi?” Hoseok asks, obviously having the same feeling as him, and Yoongi nods, feeling a little more life in him now that they’re so close. Fuck, he wants to pummel him. For the first time in months, he actually wants to inflict some serious damage.

“Yuh-yeah. Yeah, it is.”

Hoseok drives even faster - if that's even possible - weaving in and out of the cars in front to try and get closer and for a second Yoongi wonders if they’re gonna have to conduct some sort of action movie jump onto the damn thing, but then they don’t get a chance, because the back doors open and there’s fucking Joonho with a rifle, shooting at them. He thinks he sees Jimin in behind him, lying on the floor and his heart aches more than anything else.

Bullets hit the hood and roof of the car and it seems that all of them exclaim at once, ducking down into their seats as pedestrians about the streets scream in terror.

“Fucking hell, they don’t give up, do they? Everyone heads down,” Hoseok demands, stooping lower himself just enough so that he can see out the windshield without getting his head blown open.

Then, the car jolts and screeches, a loud hissing noise coming from the tire and it seems to tilt, grinding to a halt as Hoseok slams down on the pedal. They spin off to the side, almost hitting another car but they miss it by no more than an inch.

“Shit, shit!” Yoongi swears, unbuckling his seatbelt with as much haste as he can and practically booting open the car door.

“What do we do now? Uh- Yoongi- where are you-,”

Yoongi pushes himself out of his seat, crumbling to the floor but he does nothing more than clench his jaw at the fall, staggering up to his feet again and trudging into the middle of the road, arms spread open to stop the oncoming car that shrieks with the force of the breaks.

“G-get out! Guh-get outta…” Yoongi yells, sounding wasted instead of just fucking panicked and half-dead, probably. He flings open the door to the driver’s side, the man inside looking absolutely terrified, even when Yoongi says “I need your car.”

“What? You need my car? You can’t just-,”

“Give me the fuckin’ car,” he snaps, the driver flinching as he begins to unbuckle his seatbelt with shaking fingers. “You… you see Seokjin over… over there?” He points to his friend who’d just exited their car, intending to assess the damage. Either with the tire or Yoongi. “Talk to ‘em. He’ll get you a Ferrari, if yuh-you want.”

He doesn’t seem to have much of a problem with it after that. Maybe a little dubious, but what can he do about it?

“C’mon, Seok,” Yoongi calls, already climbing in the other side of the car. Hoseok follows over in a run, swinging his door open and not even putting on his seatbelt this time.

“They stopped a couple of blocks away. Hopefully, it’s a building and they’re not just throwing us off. Tae said he’d keep an eye on the tracker and text if they move.”

Yoongi barely even hears the words. Now that he’s come around a little, all he feels is swelling anger, as opposed to pain. Black and sticky like tar in his gut.

“I am going to obliterate this man.”

Hoseok chuckles, as he often does to try and lighten Yoongi up.

“Feeling better?”

“Adrenaline does wonders,” he tells him, then, honestly admitting, “Later on, I’ll probably pass out for three days.”

He feels like he could sleep for a month. Only with Jimin in his arms, though. That boy is not going out of his sight from now on.

“We’ll try to be quiet for you.”

Yoongi doesn’t manage a laugh, though he knows the younger man’s trying his hardest. He keeps his eyes trained ahead of him, frown solidified on his face as his jaw stays clenched. Maybe out of rage, maybe to stop him from breaking down. He’d rather not find out.

He watches the city pass by him at a more reasonable speed, now that they know where they are - but Yoongi wishes he'd drive a little faster anyway. It's not about where they are, after all, it's when they get there, that really matters here. 

“Are you okay, Yoongi?” Hoseok asks after a minute or so of deathly silence that he’s sure made the other feel very uncomfortable. Like waiting around a time-bomb.

“Bruises heal, Hoseok.”

“I mean you.” He knows he does. “I know this is probably a little terrifying for you right now.”

A little? Understatement of the century.

“Yeah, it is. And it sucks fucking ass but it’ll all be better once I shove my fist down that asshole’s throat and rip out his lungs. Maybe I’ll cut his goddamn tongue out too. What good has it ever done?”

“No, I mean. It makes us angry as shit, too. But you’re…” He doesn’t sound as if he’s entirely sure he should even finish his sentence. Tapping on the steering wheel as his thinking habit but Yoongi needs to know, even if he thinks he has an idea of what he’ll say already.

He asks him what he means, and there’s another heavy silence falling over them as Hoseok drives with more caution now.

“Yoongi, are you in love with him?”

He waits a second, two, three. It’s almost a whole minute before he says anything.

“Do you think I’d be doing this if I wasn’t?”

The younger man laughs, then. Brightly, as if he’s happy about it. Relieved maybe.

“Yeah, because you’re a good person, dipshit.”

Is he? Yoongi doesn’t know these days, but... Jimin tells him he is and why shouldn’t he believe two of the closest people to him?

“But… I don’t think I’ve seen you this angry over anything that isn’t your dad before.”

Yoongi inhales, and exhales, slowly. Nothing more than a stall for time because he already knows. He’s right. He was an angry mess in the apartment. An angry mess in the car. An angry mess as he’s come back into reality, now, too. It’s painfully obvious why. 

“… Yes, I’m in love with him.”

“A lot?”

God. Too much.

“It hurts, Seok,” he confesses quietly, no longer just because his throat burns too much to talk properly. “More than anything I’ve gone through today, gone through in a long time. Because I can’t have him, you know? And now Joonho… he’s…” He sighs, bitterness in it so clear it almost stings him. 

“And I don’t even mind that it hurts.”

The other man’s smiling softly, asking “That much, huh?” Yoongi doesn’t reply, just feels a solemnness take over his anger for a moment and Hoseok obviously picks up on it, because he tells him, “It’s okay, we’ll get him back.” 

“Like fuck, we will.”

The man snorts.

They pull up to where Hoseok said the tracker showed them stopping, and sure enough it seems to be some sort of old inn, disguising their hideout most likely. It’s a shitty looking place. That’s what happens with insignificant gangs like this one, he supposes. If Joonho even has a gang.

Hoseok stalls the engine, and both of them get out simultaneously, halting at the entrance. Yoongi realises he doesn’t have a weapon with him, but Hoseok catches his eye with a grin, pulling out his pistol from the back waistband of his jeans and handing it to him.

“You’re lucky to have me, Min Yoongi.”

He is. He seriously is.

They don’t bother being quiet and careful about this. Irritation is fuelling both of them by now and they bust the door in, prepared for a shootout upon entry, but the foyer area is empty. They give each other a glance, stepping in with caution, and see the way the place is littered with doors leading to rooms and other parts of the building.

Yoongi’s about to ask Hoseok what they should do, when there’s a loud, pained wail that cracks in the middle, from the room just to their left. The sign says ‘no entry, staff only’ and he figures that must be the bastard’s office.

“Jimin,” he mutters redundantly, but Hoseok doesn’t comment on it, just laying a hand on his tensed shoulder as they both stride over to the door.

Yoongi doesn’t hesitate in kicking the door open, gun already raised as it does and what it reveals makes him feel like breaking on the spot. Shooting every bastard in the room forty times over. Sobbing, maybe.

He feels sick, because Jimin is being pinned to the floor, hands uncuffed now but above his head, one of Joonho’s arms keeping them there. His shirt’s torn open and his legs are shaking either side of Joonho who’s kneeling between them, ravenous look in his eye. His other hand’s somewhere between them. Yoongi can’t even force himself to look.

Jimin’s crying. Enough that it’s starting to pool on the hard wooden floor beneath them and Yoongi’s organs scrunch inside him even looking at it because he’s only seen him cry that much before once. One time. And he never wanted to see it again.

The few goons are just standing around the room watching. Were they really just going to let this happen? Were they going to let Joonho just do this?

Yoongi feels even more repulsed – no, he’s furious – when he realises that, actually, they were probably planning on joining in soon enough.

“Get the fuck away from him right now!” He practically screams, marching into the room before Hoseok can tell him to step back. He’s not sure the man would’ve anyway, jaw slack and horror in his eyes at the scene unfolding before him.

Joonho looks up, nothing more than a bored look in his eye as if he’s spoiled his fun and it just makes Yoongi want to paint the fucking walls with his blood.

“What’s wrong?” He asks, a certain jesting tone to his words that pushes him even further into hysteria because how fucking dare he treat this as a joke? Treat trying to sexually abuse the boy he’s in love with as a damn joke?

“Not willing to share? He was mine first you know.”

What the fuck is wrong with him? Nobody owns Jimin. He’s not a goddamn toy. The man runs a hand down the boy’s face who squeezes his eyes shut, bottom lip caught between his teeth, like he’s embarrassed to even be seen like this.

He probably thinks he’s being weak right now. Probably tearing into himself in his head. Yoongi wants to tell him he isn’t, wants to take him into his arms but then-

“Yoongi!” Hoseok pulls him down all of a sudden, both of them hitting the floor behind a small leather settee and it’s then he re-feels all of his aches and pains again, the adrenaline wearing off of him because seeing that is too much. Sucked the energy right out of him again and it’s not a good time with bullets pummelling into the material as they both shield themselves with it. Hoseok attempts to land a few shots, but he can’t get a chance with at least six people shooting at him all at once. Yoongi can’t find the strength to even lift his gun, his hands shaking fiercely when he tries and Hoseok tells him not to risk it. He wants to, though. Dear lord, does he want to.

Just to smear that bastard’s brains across the room.

“This isn’t looking good…” Hoseok mutters, coming back down again after a few close calls with some shots. He got one, he thinks. Yoongi can’t tell. His vision’s practically strobing in and out of blackness right now.

“I know…”

The material of the chair’s creaking. It’s thick leather, thankfully. Otherwise, they would’ve broken it ages ago, but it’s not bulletproof. They both know it’ll cave in very soon, but there’s nowhere else to take shelter.  

“Just be careful. They’ll run out of bullets eventually,” he promises, but he doesn’t even sound sure of that himself.

Finally, a bullet shoots through the leather, and then another, and Hoseok looks at Yoongi with tremendous fear, though he’s not even shaking. He rarely does in situations like this and it’s something he envies. He jumps at anything that goes bump in the night, but when it comes down to it? He's a brave fucker. Yoongi, uncharacteristically, is practically vibrating at this point.

But just when they think they’re fucked, there’s several sharp shots echoing in the room, yet they don’t come through the chair. Nothing does. They hear several thumps, all around each other, half merging and Yoongi’s sheer curiosity results in him peering around the chair.

The goons are all dead.

“Did we just eradicate your whole gang, dirtbag?”

He hears someone call. Fucking Jungkook. Jungkook, talking big like that. It’s incredible.

Hoseok helps Yoongi to his feet, matching shit-eating grins to his own as they look over to an almost paralysed Joonho.

The man makes one pathetic last attempt at saving his ass, grabbing Jimin towards him, to his feet, and putting his gun to his head like a bad fucking action movie. The kind that woulda had him jumping to Joonho's van earlier. Jimin isn’t crying anymore, just sniffing a little. He’s clearly shaken up, but mostly he just looks pissed off to hell and back.

Yoongi can relate.

He leans on the shot-up chair, instead of Hoseok, wanting the glory of appearing still vaguely strong to Joonho in his last pathetic moments. He finally gets his gun up, erasing the shake of his arm that burns in pain as he holds it, pointing towards him.

“You have five seconds to step away from him before I blow your brains out.”

Joonho looks panicked, but he scoffs to try to cover it up. Yoongi can tell. He’s been trying that all day.

“As if you would. You wouldn’t risk breaking your precious doll, you cocksucke-,” Yoongi’s had enough. There’s a sharp bang once he pulls the trigger, bullet lodging nicely in his chest and the man’s grip loosens around Jimin from the shock of it. He probably doesn’t feel any pain yet because of that, but Yoongi likes to think it’s unbearable.

Jimin launches into action, hitting Joonho’s arm and twisting his gun out of it like they’d been taught. He gives him a kick to the face for good measure – karma, even - and as the man’s stumbling backwards he aims and shoots him in the head with his own gun.

That’s my boy, Yoongi thinks, pride absurdly apparent in him.

Joonho falls to the ground with a last rattle, and a short quiet falls over them all, just from the stun of all that’s happened.

“Kyunghee’d be impressed, kid,” Jin finally says at last, breaking the silence and making Yoongi snap out of it. Jimin manages a smile at the man’s joke, but when he sees Yoongi limping over to him with as much pace as he can without crashing to the ground, it falls back to concern.

He’s concerned. Over him.

God damn, Park Jimin is an angel.

He reaches him, hands cupping his face with a sense of unnecessary urgency, as if the boy’ll drift away if he doesn’t hold him right now. He traces the tear tracks on his cheeks, the blood and cuts and bruises that he’s sure they both match in and feels completely in awe at how strong, how fucking brave this boy is. How incredible it is that he hasn’t just thrown himself to the ground because Yoongi thinks he would’ve.

Park Jimin, still standing after all of this. He deserves a fucking medal. He deserves more than that.

His darling boy. So strong and goddamn brave, even now. Even after the horrors he’s went through today.

“Fuck, you’re okay. God, thank fuck,” he practically sobs. He is, he’s crying. Jimin’s eyes well up at the same time he says, “You gave me a goddamn heart attack, Jimin, you know how much trouble that all was?”

He says that instead. He has to say that because the only other thing he would’ve said is the one thing he can’t say. It’s on the tip of his tongue, ‘I love you, Park Jimin, I love you so much – I’m never leaving you like that again.’

Jimin’s jaw drops, comically clashing with his teary eyes.  

“Excuse you, asshole, this is all your fault!” He argues, one of his hands placed over Yoongi’s on his cheek but he doesn’t pry it off, just continues ranting, “I didn’t ask for this bullshit. If you just left me alone at the start, then I would’ve been fine!” His grip tightens when Yoongi almost removes his hand.

“You’d be dead by now.”

“Probably better than dealing with your shit.”

“Damn,” He says, both of their voices still far too soft and delicate for this, “I should’ve sold your organs on the black market like any other mobster would’ve done.”

They’re glaring at each other, but it’s all bullshit, because they break into smiles. Jimin beaming at him in the most captivating, blinding way in the entire world and they fucking laugh because they’re both so full of shit. Squabbling insincerely when all they really want to do is smile at each other like this.

Yoongi moves his head closer, presses their foreheads together and closes his eyes, just breathing in Jimin’s perfectly floral rose scent because, honestly, it smells like home. It smells like everything good in the world. Like beauty.

Like love.

“…I’m glad you’re okay, Yoongi,” Jimin whispers, the words coming out so gently it’s like it’s their own little secret.

Yoongi opens his eyes to look the boy in his for a moment, before he leans up a little to kiss his hair, then pulling him tight to his chest, like he’s not planning on letting go anytime soon.

“I’m glad you’re okay too, ‘min.”

Chapter Text

9^th March, 2018 | 5:28am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Jimin feels like he can barely cross the room without someone suddenly appearing at his side to accompany him, nowadays.

There was no need to move apartments, per se. Gangs like Joonho’s are too afraid to even look at them now, after hearing about what they did with just the seven of them. Turns out there were a lot more of Joonho’s goons that they thought in the building that day, and it turned into some sort of bloodbath on their way out, after the remaining members heard the gunshots in the other part of the building.

Seven people obliterating a gang of well over forty will certainly turn a couple heads; in the opposite direction, apparently.

But, naturally, Yoongi couldn’t leave it alone at just that. He did end up spilling Joonho’s guts everywhere, just like he’d planned to and, for once, Jimin didn’t feel like trying to stop him. The bastard deserved it.

After that, knowing that they wouldn’t have any more trouble from other gangs, Yoongi got a new front door and upgraded the security system at the entrance into the apartment building, throwing in some intimidating looking body guards to man the area for them since Yoongi owns the entire building anyway. No need to worry about neighbours complaining about not being able to go in or out without a head-to-toe search.  

Jimin doesn’t particularly like it, not ever really giving Yoongi a reason but he has a feeling that the man sort of knows that after the whole ordeal with Joonho Jimin’s just freaked out by strange men he doesn’t know hanging around. But Yoongi’s promised that if any of them even look like they’re going to step out of line – they’re gone, and, he’ll always be accompanied by either him or one of their friends in the rare moments he needs to actually go somewhere. 

That’s one thing Jimin seriously doesn’t like. Yoongi outright refuses to take him on any missions anymore. He’s constantly being babysat by somebody and something as simple as even walking across the street to get a decent cup of coffee requires at least one other person. Yoongi bought him a coffee machine for the apartment when he complained about this, but he feels like he sort of missed the point.

He knows he’s doing it to protect him— and Jimin also knows that the chances of him walking around the sector by himself and getting jumped by some sort of gangster or general lowlife is pretty damn high these days, considering that just about everyone knows that he’s got close links with Min Yoongi and any gangs left that have the balls to still try and fuck with them would likely see Jimin as the perfect leverage.

But that doesn’t mean he has to like it. And that doesn’t mean he can’t go with Yoongi to do gang things. Except it does, according to Yoongi.

Jimin wakes up one morning, feeling a cooler atmosphere in the room than usual, and he rolls over onto his side, peering one eye open and sees the covers pulled back, space empty. He frowns at this because, though it’s not entirely unusual for Yoongi to be out of bed before him, (actually, it’s pretty likely,) he looks at the clock and sees that it’s only half past five – and that is a little weird.

He sits up, rubbing his eyes to break them out of the mistiness of sleep and peels back the duvet, almost walking straight out of the room until he sees a figure out on the balcony.

Yoongi never uses the balcony in their bedroom, since the one in the living area is much less cramped. Yet, here he is, standing in it, peculiar tendrils of smoke being carried off by the wind as he leans his elbows on the railing, back to him. Jimin slides open the door, but the man doesn’t move.

“I didn’t know you smoked.”

Yoongi still doesn’t turn around, just sighs heavily, like he knows he’s been caught but doesn’t care enough to react properly.

“Hoseok helped me quit a while ago,” he says, back to him as more wisps float off into the icy morning wind, “I did it a few times ‘just because’ in high school but it got out of control after dad died.”

Jimin stays by the door, listening to the man talk without intruding him and gives a gentle hum at that. Not pitying, but sympathetic.

“It’s funny though, because it wasn’t long after I stopped smoking that I started craving… well, you know, violence and shit instead,” he says though somehow, he doesn’t sound all that amused by it. “Addicted to blood rather than nicotine.”

A heavy silence falls over them, and Jimin’s mind starts to unclear from its sleepy fog when he realises, “It’s the anniversary today, isn’t it?”

That’s why he’s out here.

Yoongi gives a simple nod and Jimin does approach him now, hand going to rest on his back and glide down it in wordless comfort. The older man gives him a side glance, glassy eyes glittering at him in the beginnings of morning light.

“Do you wanna talk about it?” He asks, watching the elder carefully for his reaction. His face remains as stoic as it has been, the tears occasionally rolling down his face the only giveaway of any emotion at all. He takes another drag, as if to steel himself, and taps the ash off the balcony railing, down into the streets far below. 

“About what? Him?”

Jimin shrugs, still staring intently at the man, even if he’s avoiding his gaze.

“About anything you want, baby boy. I’ll listen.”

Yoongi seems to think this over for a second, eyes flickering over the view of the sector, even if he isn’t actually focusing on any of it.

After a short pause, he admits, “I don’t know what to say…”

Jimin sees that he’ll have to help Yoongi through this, his emotions seemingly jumbled today which is entirely reasonable. The root of his problems start with this day, it’s normal that he’s upset, even if he won’t openly say it at first.

“Well, you’re smoking again. Why? What are you feeling?”

Yoongi laughs, sounding worn out and tired – and he doesn’t think it’s because it’s so early in the morning. He taps the end of his cigarette again and says, “Same as always, Jimin.”

Jimin gives him an inquisitive look, telling him to say it out loud and the older man laughs a little more earnestly this time, remarking that he sounds like a therapist.

Still, he complies, likely trying to look unaffected as he lists, “Guilt. Disappointment…” Then, there’s a brief stop in which the façade flickers and he says, “Fear.”

“Fear?” Jimin echoes, barely able to even believe it because it’s Yoongi. He’s not scared of half the things he should be. Admitting his fears towards something is like snowfall in July— but Jimin always vaguely had the idea that was merely part of the man’s tough act. Yoongi finally looks at him properly, stubbing out the cigarette butt and flicking it off the edge of the balcony. 

“I-I’m…” He stammers, then, shuts his eyes for a moment, inhaling air instead of smoke and that seems to do him a lot better, because he sounds calmer when he says, “I’m scared, ‘min.”

Jimin moves closer to him now he’s out of range of his cigarette, arm wrapping around his waist instead and he asks, “What are you scared of?”

Yoongi looks as if he’s considering dropping it, eyes wandering over the balcony but then he looks back to Jimin with a brush of determination on his face.

“What my dad might think of me, now. If he was still around, you know?” He confesses, but Jimin doesn’t interrupt him with any sort of acknowledgement. “His last day alive he spent with his eldest son ignoring him entirely, until an hour or something before he was almost dead.” He sighs, Jimin giving his hip an encouraging rub before the man adds, “A-and then I didn’t even save him.”

The younger boy frowns, heart sinking to its knees as he watches the elder attempt to smile through it, looking at him with quivering lips and pooling eyes. 

What did he say about pretending to be brave all the time?

“We’ve talked about this, Yoongi. There’s nothing you could’ve done.”

“I know… I know,” he says, sounding like he actually might. Which is progress, Jimin thinks. “But I can’t help but keep thinking that I shoulda told him it was okay, or something. That I’d take over for him, avenge him. Should’ve hugged him,” he says, voice plain and almost indifferent despite the array of emotions now being projected on his face.

“He died alone, I don’t know if he even knew I was there— like really knew I was there, he was so far gone...” There’s a few seconds of silence as the man dips his head to the floor, contemplating something before he mutters, “I can’t get closure, now.”

Jimin puts a hand underneath the man’s chin, gently coaxing his head up to look at him again, which he does without much resistance.

“You can’t get closure from him. But there’s other ways to get it. You need to forgive yourself, first.”

“I dunno if I can…”

“You will,” he insists, hand moving to cup the side of his face, stroking his thumb over a fresh tear, “It’ll heal, trust me, it will. Not when you get revenge – that won’t do it. It could be before or after that – but it’ll come. I’ll make sure it will.”

Yoongi’s been trying so hard to help Jimin, that he’s barely given himself time to heal, too. But that’s all they both need, he thinks. Time and support.

Time and each other.

“I just feel like I let him down that night,” He admits as he diverts his stare to the traffic down below, like it’s too intimate of a confession to keep eye contact. Jimin guides his head back towards him lightly with his hand. The older man blinks, a ghost of sincerity brushing the smile on his lips now.

“That’s why the information’s so important to me,” He explains, and Jimin guesses it’s starting to make a lot more sense now. “Everything my dad tried so hard to keep secret… just gone.”

Yoongi frowns now, seeming like his emotions are too jumbled to decide whether he’s sad or not – continuously flickering from trying not to cry to trying to smile.

“That’s why the government killed him,” he continues after a moment, “They wanted a way to bust Mariposa, but he died keeping that information safe.”

“It’s really that important?” The younger asks, sceptically – not having had the faintest idea that that was why his father was murdered. He just figured they didn’t like him having so much power but, he guesses, that that makes more sense. They wanted something from him. Probably knew that just offing him wouldn’t bring down Mariposa, as it didn’t.

Yoongi nods a few times in the younger’s hold, clearly surprised he even asked such a question as he tells him, “Yeah, Jimin, it really is. What the Syndicate stole… it’s like… a big network of folders. And each folder contains documents and files that hold information about Mariposa. Everything about Mariposa. The government’s wanted it since then, so I guess the Crystal Syndicate wanted it first.”

“You told me before it was things like… financial information and plans?”

“Yup,” he confirms with bitter amusement, “Stuff that would destroy any one of us in court. Transactions with dealers. Shipments. Every single person that’s ever died at our hands is recorded. Unless it’s something like Joonho’s gang. Then, it’s just a toll count.”

Every person? Who the hell even has the time to record all that? Don’t lower members of Mariposa kill people every day?

“Shit, that’s crazy, Yoongi,” he utters a little breathlessly and the older man gives a soft snort.

“I know,” He agrees, sounding like he can’t quite believe it himself, now that he’s said it out loud. “And that’s just some of the illegal shit. There’s personal files too. I’m guessing they let slip one of the folders that gave out our location. The address of the apartment. I don’t know if they’ve even cracked the rest of it, but there’s everything from date of births to past involvements and jobs carried out for the gang to how they like their goddamn coffee on there— in regards to every member. It’d put their family, friends, themselves at risk if it got leaked because gangsters have it out for gangsters, quite simply. That’s why so many of them left. Probably moved somewhere safer, or were just so pissed off that they didn’t wanna associate with us anymore.”

Damn, the Syndicate have their hands on that kinda stuff? Jimin just assumed it was a couple of names and addresses and some business information. But that… that’s a lot.  

“I can see why your dad tried so hard to keep it safe.”

The older man hums, musing, “He did. And he did it well,” before the fond sense of serenity from thinking of his father depletes, and he scowls, muttering, “But one tiny fucking error ruined the entire thing.”

Yoongi brushes the boy’s hand off of his face, moving to lean back against the railings, rubbing his own hand over his face instead in frustration as he laments “Namjoon wanted to fix that security months before it happened, but I told him that it was fine. Stop worrying, who can touch us?” He brushes his hair back off of his forehead with a sigh, making it stick for a moment as he says, “I did nothing and… and I disappointed him again.”

“I don’t think he’s disappointed,” Jimin cuts in, the man’s head turning to him with profound surprise, like he can’t even comprehend the possibility that he isn’t.  

“He would be.”

“That’s not what I meant,” He says softly, tucking a lock of Yoongi’s hair back behind his ear after it falls free from being brushed back. His hair’s getting a little long, these days; it suits him. “I… look, if it means that much then we’ll just have to prove we’re stronger than that, won’t we?”

Yoongi looks rather dumbfounded when he echoes, “We?”

Jimin caresses his face in both of his hands this time despite the man’s earlier action towards it and he tells him, “Hell yeah! We’re partners in crime, remember?”

Yoongi smiles then, and for the first time in the conversation, it looks entirely genuine.

It doesn’t feel right to say ‘happy birthday’ when he knows it’d sound like a lie. So, he just grins right back instead.

15^th May, 2018 | 11:26am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Slowly, their gang has been rebuilding. Some people who’d left them coming back with muttered apologies that Yoongi maybe wouldn’t have accepted some time ago and entirely new people dropping out of their own gangs or independent dealings to join after hearing about them. Out of being impressed, having respect or fear, he doesn’t know, but he’ll take it as long as they pull their weight.

Taehyung brought a new recruit himself, in fact. A pusher that used to float around drugs for gangs in Japan - a man named Doyun - and he decided it was the perfect opportunity to formally introduce him to everyone at their meeting, since the two have been working closely together in the trade as of late, while waiting to rebuild it to what it used to be.

Doyun’s rather quiet, but friendly enough and, most importantly, hard working with good results –  so Yoongi has no complaints.

Jeon Jungkook, on the other hand, very much does.

“Everyone, this is Noh Doyun. He and I’ve been looking after the trade in Red Light lately, so we owe him a lot!” The be nice, Jungkook, tangible in his voice as the boy sits pouting on the sofa as far away from the new recruit as possible.

Upon Taehyung’s initial announcement of his new friend whom he introduced as being ‘hilarious, sweet and incredibly handsome’ the boy was certainly displeased, but without any real explanation. It was around that time that he started working out more, curiously enough, but he swears it has nothing to do with that at all.

Jungkook frowns like a spoiled child (or a jealous one) across the room, despite his now solid build giving him the physical appearance of a man much more mature than he.

A horribly misguided judgment, if you ask Yoongi.

“So, you’re helping to get my trade back on track, Doyun?” Yoongi asks him, trying to get this meeting away from passive aggression via Jeon Jungkook before it starts, and the man nods, standing rather uncomfortably beside Taehyung, as if he can feel the judgment coming off his younger brother in waves.

“Yes, sir,” he replies politely. Not many people call him ‘sir’ – mainly because he rarely talks to anyone who should address him as such. Maybe his friends, but Yoongi never even attempted to try that. Losing battle from the start.

“Tae and I’ve been trying to strike up as many deals as we can – and see if we can get any more allies to replace the old ones.”

Jungkook scoffs over Yoongi saying ‘That’s good-,’

“And what have you been doing yourself?” The seventeen-year-old asks, every eye in the room shooting to him with mutual what the fuck is he talking about?

“Huh?” Poor Doyun asks, sounding utterly dumbfounded.

“You know. You and Tae are doing this. But Taehyungie does shit on his own, too. What do you do?”

Okay, really: what the fuck? Where did this come from?

“Uh, well. We kind of do the same thing. We’re both pushers-,”

“I see. So… you don’t really bring anything new to our gang. Interesting.”

“Jungkook-,” Taehyung tries to cut in, but he’s dually ignored by the younger, who tilts his head at Doyun with condescension, asking, “Where’d you come from, again?” Though, somehow, he manages to make it sound more like ‘who let you in here, anyway?’

Taehyung seems to pick up on this as well, hissing, “Jungkook,” and making weird faces at him that all convey a different level of ‘stop it, you little shit.’  Doyun looks at Taehyung and then at Yoongi, who gives him a light shrug to let him know he’s on his own at this point.

Jungkook could probably beat him to a pulp nowadays. He won’t chance it.

“I was a runner for a gang in Japan, then I moved over here once things got too dangerous. My mother wasn’t happy with me being involved in something like that.”

Seokjin makes a soft noise, like he finds the story rather pleasing, yet Jungkook just glares harder, if anything.

“And so, you became a pusher for Mariposa? Aren’t we dangerous?”

“I… guess so… but-,”

“Now, onto my next question-,”

“Jungkook!” Taehyung snaps with more force now, looking like he’s about to smack the boy on the back of the head, “Stop with the interrogation, for fuck’s sake. We have a meeting to get through.”

That may just be the first-time Taehyung’s ever tried to get a meeting to start instead of delay it.  

20^th May, 2018 | 2:03pm | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

“Min Yoongi take me out of this damn place before I scale down the balcony.”

“You will not.”

He might.

Jimin stands with his arms crossed firmly over his chest. He arches an eyebrow at Yoongi’s dismissal.

“Try me.”

The thing is, Yoongi knows by now that he cannot win against this boy. His heart is just tragically unable to say no to him and he’s pretty sure Jimin knows it. Yet, he pretends to think this over for a moment anyway, just so he doesn’t seem too much of a pushover regardless of the fact that he absolutely is.

“Where do you want to go?”

And, likewise, Jimin looks pensively around the room, humming out a long drawl of hmmmm but Yoongi can tell by the twinkle in his eye he already has an exact place in mind.

“You said we could go to the beach…”

“In Mariana?” He asks, having expected him wanting to get lunch or go shopping or something, you know, not an hour and a half away. If the traffic’s good in Downtown. Which it won’t be because it’s summer now and four hundred degrees outside.

“You did promise…” Jimin mutters, letting out a long sigh that’s absolutely over dramatic and yet Yoongi’s treacherous heart skips a beat.

“Okay, fine. Let’s go.”

20^th May, 2018 | 4:14pm | Shellside Beach, Mariana Sector

Yoongi is surprisingly comfortable, right now, stretched out on a towel in a hidden alcove of a very, very busy beach – away from prying eyes that might find it strange to see a mobster sunbathing.

Maybe it’s also just because Yoongi is blindingly white compared to the honey-toned Park Jimin, and also refuses to take his shirt off, unlike the honey-toned shirtless Park Jimin who is just a little too willing, sitting over there with his sunglasses perched on his nose, smooth curves of his muscles honestly trying their best to distract Yoongi.

He screws his eyes shut after peeking for the nth time, probably enough to be able to file for a restraining order but he doesn’t mean to be weird about it. It’s just very hard not to stare at the bare torso of the man you’re in love with, is all.

Yoongi listens intently to the faint chatter of the populated beach next to them, the crash of each wave washing over the sound of it until it sounds rather blurred and Yoongi feels actually relaxed.

That is, until the brat beside him interferes.

“It’s too hot,” he whines, and Yoongi peels open an eye to see him fanning himself with his hand, not under the shade of the parasol like Yoongi is at all and greased up in enough suntan lotion to wax a surfboard.

He frowns, serenity ruined by the boy’s inevitable complaint.

“What do you want me to do about it?” He asks, closing his eyes again in an attempt to just… block him out. But, of course, that doesn’t work.

“Move the sun, obviously,” he deadpans, and Yoongi doesn’t even have to look this time to imagine the stupid grin on his face.

“Can’t sorry. Forgot my magic wand today,” The older man mocks back, earning a strong belt of laughter from the other before he settles back down and there’s a little more peace again.

For all but a few seconds because this kid can’t keep his mouth shut, saying, “Ah, seriously, it’s too hot,” and Yoongi forces himself to open his eyes again, giving him a side glance and the boy’s already looking back at him with ‘pity me’ eyes through his sunglasses as if he’s not roasting alive too.

“Go in the ocean.”

Jimin tips his sunglasses down his face, peering at Yoongi with a scandalised look and he can basically feel the patronisation. 

“Me?” he gasps, slapping a hand to his oily chest in faux-alarm, “Allowed to go off… by myself? Are you sure you’re not worried about a shark getting me? Maybe one from the Syndicate?”

So much for the ‘Oh, I’m not mad about this, Yoongi. I know why you don’t want me walking about by myself’ he’d said earlier. He guesses it makes sense, he can’t expect the boy to not be mad at the arrangement (especially not one as violently independent as Jimin.) Yoongi himself would go crazy. It probably feels a little like a prison to him, but Yoongi can’t explain himself fully without telling him he’s insanely in love with him so he’s been avoiding the topic as best as he can.

“Very funny.”

“It won’t be very funny if I drown,” Jimin continues, no longer jibing at Yoongi but just being generally overdramatic – a tendency that both of them share too well – “I haven’t really swum much in my life, it’s plausible.”

He’s not going to shut up about it until he goes with him, is he?

“Just to cool off?” Yoongi checks, already being 100% defeated, of course, because it’s him.

“Yep!” Jimin assures him, “Don’t worry.”

It isn’t just to cool off.

They end up swimming for hours with spontaneous races and contests to hold their breaths. Yoongi had no idea he’d actually enjoy it, but maybe he just enjoys the boy’s company more than anything— enough to make even the most annoying activities fun.

Or maybe he just secretly likes the ocean.

At one point, a long time later, they decide to see who can dive the deepest, and when they resurface the sea is a glittering orange that they hadn’t noticed before their competition.

Jimin looks like an angel in the warm lighting of the setting sun, skin glimmered with water droplets and hair pushed back off his forehead, soaking wet.

When he smiles at him goofily, announcing himself as the winner, Yoongi’s fairly certain the entire world stops for a moment, just to stare.

8^th June, 2018 | 1:08am | Yoongi’s Penthouse, Red Light Sector

Yoongi gets back after a long conversation with a few men in the Umbra Sector, looking to strike up a contract with Mariposa to give them a larger profit cut than they would usually have if they reclaim some of their lost territories for them.

It was such a lengthy discussion because it was three versus one, Hoseok being busy promoting and Jimin obviously banned from missions for the foreseeable future. Yoongi was trying his very hardest to make sure he was not getting scammed, but he thinks he still got a little bit scammed.

Huh, maybe he should start taking Jimin out again.

He opens the door to his apartment and is greeted by Namjoon, who was assigned to ‘babysit’ for the night, sitting on the couch watching some shitty late-night documentary and seemingly very relieved when he sees Yoongi.

“Where’s Jimin?” He asks as casually as he can, though he feels a jolt of fear run through him despite fully-well knowing that there’s nothing that could’ve happened. If Namjoon picks up on it, he doesn’t say anything.

“Reading in your room, I think. He said he wanted to wait up on you - seems a little off tonight, though.”

“He pretty much always waits for me to come home.”

He thinks it’s better for them to fall asleep together. ‘I don’t have to try to sleep worrying whether you’ve been riddled with bullet holes or something and you sleep better when you have someone to talk you into it.’ 

Yoongi smiles a bit at the thought.

“Yeah, but I mean… I don’t know,” Namjoon confesses, “He seems sad or something. On edge.”

Yoongi shakes his head, dismissing, “He’s probably just tired.”

Namjoon is silent for a moment, maybe considering arguing, but he doesn’t – which is good, because Yoongi doesn’t want to have to spill the boy’s secrets to explain that he just gets like this sometimes.

“Well, so am I. I’ll see you tomorrow, Yoongi. Let me know if you need me to hang out with him, again. He’s good company.” The when he’s not like that is implied. But that’s okay, Namjoon doesn’t know why Jimin’s upset and he doesn’t have to. Yoongi understands and, better yet, he’s ready to do what he can to calm him back down – just like the boy does for him when he needs it.

The man leaves without another word, just a gentle wave, and Yoongi makes his way to the bedroom, giving the door a light knock before entering. There’s a mumble of ‘come in’ on the inside of it and Yoongi lets the door creak open, eyes immediately flicking to the boy tucked up, covers up to his waist and one of his washed-out jumpers clinging to his frame, book in hand.