"Do you have any idea where we are going?"

The wind whipping against their faces prevented Taehyung's voice from being fully audible, or maybe it was just the horse's thundering hooves colliding with the rosy stones heavily. The prince looked back towards Jungkook sitting right behind him, as if he was supposed to have any answers.

They had been riding for about an hour, this being probably the furthest trip Taehyung had ever been on and therefore making him nervous.
"You don't expect me to actually answer that, do you?," the brunette called back, shaking his head and holding on to the older's waist to stabilize them in spite of the abnormally high speed.

They were truly lucky with the weather, the sun shining bright and gold for the approaching hour of noon and peeking through the coats of healthy green leaves blocking them from its light. This led to the boys being able to see their surroundings properly and truly, Taehyung had no idea where they were as he had neved dared to go this far into the woods. He was also starting to worry about his horse's strength, as they did not have any food or water with them to strengthen themselves.

Jungkook seemed to have the same thought. "Damn, we should've brought snuck of those wedding snacks with us. If anyone deserves to eat those cream tarts, it's us," he muttered to no one in particular.
"It'll be fine, don't you worry," he then spoke into the prince's ear loudly, squeezing his waist to reassure him.

And about ten minutes later, Jungkook saw something that made him gasp. "Weeping willows! I remember seeing those on my way here!" And indeed, it was the trees with pearly white trunks and luscious red roses with bronze, silver and gold thorns embellishing them and appearing just like in a fairytale. Was this the solution? Was this some sort of border between Elysium and the common world?

It was just as he had remembered. The glittering leaves of the willows touched the ground like curtains shielding them from what was behind them and the neatly laid out rosy stone path stopped here, plain earth and common wallflowers stretching out before them.

Roseanne seemed to sense the change of surrounding, for she stopped in front of the willows with a confused neigh. "I know this is new for you," Taehyung panted. "But we have to keep going. Or we'll spend the rest of our lives locked in the dungeons, father will make sure of that." He patted the horse's head swiftly, and as if she understood, she strutted forward and passed the weeping willows carefully.

And just as they had crossed the border-like accumulation of weeping willows, there was something that made the animal neigh out of panic. It had collided with another, much smaller, animal.

All Taehyung and Jungkook could see within the small blink of an eye in which the little animal was visible was a dotted furcoat and long and thin legs, perhaps also a slender neck. Jungkook had a sudden déjà vu-like feeling.
Was it possible that he had seen this animal before?

Roseanne surely hadn't, she was suddenly very agitated and almost panicky. And although Taehyung tried to soothe her by softly patting her fur, her muscles were extremely tense.

And all of a sudden, she started galloping at full speed again which might have thrown the boys off her back (due to the lack of a saddle), if the prince hadn't instinctively gripped her mane and Jungkook hadn't instinctively gripped him.

There was no doubt of it, she was following the animal that had just bumped into them, if out of curiosity, anger or else they could not know. But after a journey worth of two or three hours, Jungkook and Taehyung mentally noted how the trees were starting to look more like normal trees and how the earth was starting to look like regular dirt.

Truly, no one had any idea where they were going or where they were supposed to go. The horse followed the strange animal and the two boys on its back simply went along with it. They didn't have much of a choice, as they didn't exactly know where to go, either. Where even was their destination? Did they have one?

Both of them felt their leg muscles ache, riding a horse for this long was truly exhausting. While Taehyung longed for a place to simply rest and stretch out his limbs, maybe a massage included, Jungkook felt his stomach rumble out of hunger and wished for nothing more than a delicious and warm meal.

It was a truly strange situation. The realization of what they were actually doing failed to hit them for several more hours. They were running away from a secret hidden kingdom, from an arranged marriage with a royal princess from another secret hidden kingdom. And the King's soldiers would probably do everything to arrest them and lock them in the dungeons- that or behead them.

Quite an unusual situation for two boys that age.

Without any idea about what was about to come, they had no choice but remain seated anxiously, feel the cold wind blowing in their faces and listen to Roseanne's hooves thumping against the ground loudly.

°○●○●○°

Roseanne let out a pitchy neigh, causing the funeral guests to scream and gasp once more.

Yugyeom and Yoongi and few other people who were still kneeling on the Jeons' freshly mown lawn gaped as if aliens from Mars had decided to randomly crash their UFO and say hello- this simply *couldn't* be. They had to be hallucinating!

Curious and a little alarmed about the sudden fuss, more and more guests stepped back outside and formed a little crowd.

At last, Jungkook's mother and father emerged from the house, and they might just have fainted out of shock as they saw what had parked itself in their garden. They seemed more than at a loss of words, they seemed as if they had just entirely lost their sanity.

Taehyung was used to people staring at him, he really was. Being the crown prince of Elysium, he was bound to get unwanted attention constantly. But this was different. These people were different. Their clothes, their hairstyes, their postures, their demeanour was different. In fact, he felt as if he had entered a whole different world.

A different dimension.

During his long journey on Roseanne's back, he hadn't really thought of what running away would mean to him. Of course, they had no destination. But somehow, the horse had brought them straight to where Jungkook lived. As if there was some sort of trail leading it.

It had followed the animal- a deer, as it turned out to be- for several miles before the delicate animal decided it did not want to be followed anymore and manoeuvred its way outside their sight, stalking off somewhere amid a dense cluster of trees. And surprisingly, Jungkook seemed to suddenly recognize the environment.

He had dropped his keys somewhere around there, and while having to race back and forth to retrieve them, his brain seemed to have subconsciously remembered a few identifiable things: a thick tree trunk with two names cut inside the wood, a heart shape surrounding it. The tree next to it, one branch much larger than the others and dangling loosely in the air, making the entire tree look unproportional. And the tree next to it, with such abnormal amounts of treesap that seemed to be leaking from the wood.

Nature surely had its ways of being peculiar, and only those who looked closely would notice.

Of course, Taehyung immediately felt the different atmosphere once he entered this new world; Jungkook's world. Everything seemed... *rougher* here, the wood of the trees, the dirt on the ground, the wind. While Elysium was flawlessly delicate in every aspect possible, alone the atmosphere here felt somewhat rough in a way he could not describe.

He had let out gasps of surprise when he saw the roads filled with cars, street signs and houses. Why- the houses had such strange shapes, it shocked him. It surely was different from the fancy castles and châteaus he had occasionally visited when he was a child.
"If you think this is crazy, you should see Seoul," Jungkook had spoken into his ear with a chuckle, knowing how his reaction would be without having to look at his face.

And now he was here- the place Jungkook had spent almost all his life in. He had heard the brunette tell him various stories of his childhood but never properly tried to imagine what it actually looked like. And truly, it was the most unusual place he had been to.

The house was small, surrounded by a little garden at least a hundred times smaller than the one Elysium's royal family owned. There was a tiny garage and a drive-in in the front that Taehyung had not seen yet as they entered through the backyard. The house looked cozy, white walls and a nice litte balcony with white wooden chairs and tables and even a little barbecue grill.

Not once in his life had the prince seen a house from the 'other world' properly before. What he found most peculiar was the shape of the roof, it was flat. And as different as it was, he somehow felt comforted just by looking at it, compared to the monstrous and spacious palace he had spent his entire life in. If he weren't so caught off guard presently, he would have spent hours imagining Jungkook and his childhood in this little house, growing from a little boy into a handsome teenager.

"J-Jungk--" Yugyeom covered his mouth with both hands so tightly as if he wished to choke himself, leaning onto Yoongi for support. The latter seemed almost unable to stabilize him, too preoccupied staring at him as if he were a pig flying on tea saucers.

"Uh yeah... hi?" The brunette showed an awkward smile, although this was not a laughing matter, dismounting the horse and looking around the place.

Within the tense silence that now erupted, he managed to put two and two together and concluded that he had just busted his own funeral. His mouth formed the shape of an 'o'. "Uh, yeah... so..."

"Y--You-- You...," Yoongi intervened. "You're... *alive*? I'm hallucinating, I'm hallucinating, I'm hallucinating," the redhead whispered to himself with his eyes closed shut and gasped when he opened them again and his so-called hallucination had still not disappeared.

Jungkook shrugged. "You're not, though. Of course I'm alive. I can't believe you thought I died. You didn't even find a body." He shook his head in disbelief, not knowing if he should be surprised, disappointed or happy that he was back.

"This can't be. You- You were pronounced dead days ago! And now you just--" Covering his entire face with his hands, Yugyeom kneeled on the floor while shaking his head continuously.
"Yes, I'm back. I can't believe they pronounced me dead. How impatient can you be? I was gone for what? Two weeks?"

Yugyeom shook his head, his dirty blond hair flailing around helplessly. "Three and a half months," he whispered weakly. "I wish we hadn't given up so easily, either. But... You need to understand what it looked like. Your bike, completely trashed, caked in mud-- I think they even found some house keys or something from your pocket."

The brunette scoffed slightly. "Probably the key to my garage. So you found my bike. Big deal. But that doesn't explain how the hell you thought I was dead. Did you want to see me dead or--"

"Jungkook!," Yoongi exclaimed in shock. "What has gotten into you? How about you start explaining to us where the hell you were? We should be the ones complaining, you running off and leaving us here all worried, heartbroken!"

"Exactly. How can you put the blame on us? Yoongi and I searched the entire forest and found nothing. You put us through hell and back, literally. Part of me wants to beat you the fuck up and the other part of me wants to hug you and never let go again because at least I know you're safe now, you're actually alive..."

"I--" Jungkook's voice cracked, many different emotions raining down on him like boulders. "It's a long story. I don't know if you'll believe me. But trust me, I didn't choose to disappear. It's... It's bizarre. Like a crazy dream."

"How about you start by telling us why you just stormed into your backyard on a bloody horse?," Yoongi asked, pointing towards Roseanne, shaking her silver mane elegantly.

"And who is this?," Yugyeom added, pointing a finger towards a very perplexed-looking Taehyung who was clutching the material of his cloak with both his fists.

"Oh." Jungkook cleared his throat, wrapping his arm around Taehyung's shoulder awkwardly and pulling him forward a little, wondering how he would ever manage to explain this bizarre occurring to his two best friends.

"Well... Guys, meet Kim Taehyung. Taehyung, meet my friends Yugyeom and Yoongi."

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

(A/N: kind of a filler i suppose XD

i've been so busy studying for exams and preparing a cello competition up until now and now everything's over so things are pretty weird tbh🤔 i'm also thinking of randomly starting a new story that i've been planning for years actually, i just never had the time but maybe i will soon?

ya girl also turned 17 recently, sadly i'm still not allowed to buy vodka but i guess i'm looking forward to next year already :( anyways hope you could kinda enjoy and thank you very much for reading this love ya💜💜)