Thunder was loud, but it was rivaled by the door slamming as Jungkook left the conference room. Anger clouded his vision more than the clouds in the stormy sky outside as Jungkook walked with a purpose back towards his office. He breezed past his secretary's desk, seeing her mouth open out of the corner of his eye as she stood up from her chair.

"Sir, I..."

"I don't want to hear it! Just send it in an email!"

"But sir I..."

Her interrupted sentence was punctuated by the sound of Jungkook slamming his office door behind him, leaving an ominous and awkward silence in the air. The secretary sighed as she sank back into her office chair, seeming to have forgotten that it was on wheels and had slid back when she stood up suddenly. Her behind caught the tail end of the chair and sent it sailing backwards even further. Certain that she was going to be dealing with a sore behind for the next several weeks, she closed her eyes to brace for impact. The impact didn't come though as the sound of running footsteps came her way followed by her rescuer grabbing the chair and re-securing it underneath her. Opening her eyes, she turned to look at the person that had come to her rescue. It caused a blush to fly to her cheeks. It was none other than Jungkook's assistant, Park Jimin.

"You okay?" Jimin asked as the flustered secretary could do nothing but nod her head.

'Jimin is the one that ought to be running this company,' thought the secretary.

She wasn't alone in her thinking either. It was obvious that the man before her was kind, considerate, and smart enough to handle this company. He had also been working there, going up the ranks from intern to the CEO's righthand man. When Mr. Jeon had gotten sick, it was pretty much a given that Jimin would take over as CEO. Instead though, Mr. Jeon's ill-tempered son got the job.

'Monarchy. Have to love it,' thought the secretary as Jimin raised his brows, indicating that he had asked a question that remained unanswered as he looked at her.

"I'm sorry...what did you say?"

"I was asking if there was any call yet from Mr. Jeon's nurse," said Jimin. "I am going to go and try to talk Jungkook down. I thought I would relay this information too if you had it."

"You must be a mind-reader Mr. Park," said the secretary as she ripped a note off her pad before handing it to him. "The nurse just called and requested Jungkook's immediate presence."

"Thank you," said Jimin as he set his lips in a hard line, "and please drop the formalities. You can call me Jimin."

'Can I call you a studmuffin?' thought the secretary dreamily as she lost the ability to speak, simply nodding her head again.

Jimin turned his onyx eyes towards the page, narrowing them when he saw what was written on there.

'Well this certainly won't help his mood,' thought Jimin as he nodded goodbye to the secretary before being brave enough to venture into the lion's den known as Jungkook's office.

- x - x -

Looking down at the phone that sat on his overly polished desk, Jungkook's eyes traced the phone line that came out of the back of it. His eyes continued to follow it as it snaked across the light gray floor and to the plug on the far wall. If it rang, he had half a mind to rip it out of the wall. He had already had enough of today the moment his alarm abrasively rang and told him to get up.

The shareholders were expecting some sort of magical solution from a twenty-seven-year-old man who never in a million years had being a CEO on his radar. Jungkook had wanted to travel the world and make music, but he had to trade in his passion to his dying father's whim. Now he felt suffocated and trapped with middle-aged men expecting him to perform a miracle on a Titanic like company.

The minute he caught the door to his office opening out of the corner of his eye, Jungkook lifted his gaze to look at who was entering. Of course it would be none other than Park Jimin. He was the only one that was brave enough to come face him when he was this upset. In truth, Jimin was the only one that Jungkook could halfway stand.

"Are you intent on breaking something today?" asked Jimin as he closed the office door behind him.

"I'm intent on escaping here with my sanity," remarked Jungkook. "If breaking something is collateral, then it is what it is."

"You're such a drama queen all the time."

"You're really going to talk to your superior like that?"

"And you're really going to talk to your elder like that?"

"You're only one year older than me."

"And yet so much wiser."

Jungkook clenched his fists under the desk at Jimin's latest remark, turning his attention from the smirking man before him and out the window. On the twenty-fifth floor, he felt above the world like a bird, but at the same time it felt like it was hunting season and all the rifles had their sights set on him. The gunshot like sound of something being slammed down onto his desk caused Jungkook to turn from the window to see the sticky note Jimin had put there.

"You scared your secretary with your temper so she didn't dare give you this."

Jungkook looked at the supposed 'this', frowning immediately. Written simply on the note in the secretary's scrawl was the message: 'Mr. Jeon has passed.'

'What an unremarkable way to find out,' thought Jungkook.

"I'm assuming the nurse is the one that called?" asked Jungkook as he looked up from the note and at Jimin. "After all, mom's away on an extended excursion and my younger sister is still attending boarding school abroad. There's no one else at home aside from the nurse."

The black and white gray striped tie that Jungkook currently wore over his white button up seemed to have morphed into a noose as he reached up a hand to adjust it. Everything seemed to be piling up to the point where it felt like he was bearing the weight of the world on his shoulders. Jungkook slowly rose from his desk as he made his way towards the door.

"Do you want me to go with you?" asked Jimin as he watch Jungkook shake his head.

"Stay here and field calls from the shareholders," said Jungkook, "and don't tell them about my father's passing."

"But Jungkook, they are going to find out eventually..."

"Then they will find out eventually," said Jungkook. "Until they do, I don't need them treating me like a child by walking on eggshells. They don't need anymore of a reason to see me as such."

Jimin could see the way Jungkook was pressing his lips together into a tight line as if trying to hold back the dam of emotions that was threatening to break. However - after getting to know Jungkook over the last year - he knew better than to push Jungkook for answers when he clearly didn't want to supply any.

"And your fiancée?"

"If she calls, tell her to meet me at my father's," said Jungkook, "but I'm sure she'll already be there."

Jimin just nodded, watching as Jungkook opened his office door. As Jungkook walked by the secretary he had stormed past earlier, he could see her rise out of the corner of his eye. He knew he owed her an apology, but Jungkook was too caught up in everything. The world owed him an apology for straddling him with a life that made him feel like he was dead while he was still alive. Entering the elevator, Jungkook jammed his finger on the ground floor button. Thankfully he didn't encounter anyone from the building and through the parking garage to where his car sat.

The moment he sat down in the driver seat, Jungkook locked his car doors. He was grateful for the tinted windows that hid his flood of emotions from the entire world as he let out the scream that he had been holding in, punching at his steering wheel like it was one of the punching bags he used to hit at the gym. A squawk or two from his victimized car horn echoed through the parking garage before everything eventually fell silent as Jungkook leaned forward to rest his forehead on the steering wheel. His knuckles throbbed as the tears rolled lazily down his cheeks, giving him a cold kiss of comfort. On days where things piled up to this extreme, Jungkook swore that he must be cursed. He couldn't figure out how one person could shoulder all this burden.

Lifting his forehead off the steering wheel, Jungkook looked at his knuckles to see that they had cracked open. It revealed to him what he knew but what he felt others around him didn't; that he was human and not some sort of god.