taehyung focus
as usual jungkook ploughs his way through the pedestrians that share the sidewalk with him, his hand is, of course, wrapped round taehyung's wrist which he tugs at when taehyung fails to keep up with his fast march.

taehyung trails after jungkook blankly, an expression of sadness imprinted on his face as they move further and further away from his new (possibly best) friend's apartment and down towards the area where jungkook had parked the motorcycle yesterday afternoon.

he sighs and lifts a hand to his furrowed eyebrows, his hand making a shield for his tired tired eyes. the sun was way to bright for a hungover taehyung.
never drink again, taehyung, he reprimands himself, body worn out by the after effects of alcohol and manic dancing in too small boots.

he groans internally when jungkook tugs hard yet again on taehyung's wrist, almost dislocating his hand from his arm.
"yah," jungkook calls over his shoulder, sending a sharp look at a lagging and exhausted taehyung "hurry up."

not wanting to make his captor mad, taehyung stumbles over his lazy feet as he tries to catch up to jungkook's side. they walk together (well, jungkook marches ahead and taehyung lags purposefully behind because of his bruised up blistered feet) like that for a minute before jungkook speaks up, breaking the silence between them.

"okay. what's the fuck is up with you?"

taehyung looks at his side to see jungkook intensely staring him down as they walk down the bustling pavement. "w–what?" taehyung murmurs, quickly looking away before he could, i don't know?? melt under jungkook's hard gaze??

"i said— " jungkook starts by stops abruptly when he catches sight of something in front of him, "what the fuck has happened to the motorcycle?" he asks, teeth gritted together as he stares ahead.

taehyung lifts his head up to see the motorcycle which should've been in pristine condition and standing parked by the side of the road, but is now lying across the asphalt road, metal parts strewn all over the concrete and paintwork dented and scratched up by something.

taehyung's mouth drops open.
how the hell are we gonna send this back to the owner without having to pay for replacements??? taehyung thinks as he intakes the destroyed motorcycle lying just two metres away from them.

jungkook focus
jungkook, on the other hand, is not worried about the motorcycle's true owner, but is (slightly) worried about the recognisable men that stand by the now shattered motorcycle, casually swinging baseball bats to and fro. the men looked almost comical with their greasy branded nike tops and low slung tracksuit bottoms, shaven hair and kids baseball bats in fisted hands. the people of this city don't even seemed fazed by their swinging baseball bats: many pedestrians warily glance at them but ignore them, quickly walking away from the taunting sneers of the overweight tracksuit clad ahjussis.

they're all looking down at the battered motorcycle, shit eating grins etched on their faces as they admire their handiwork — shit eating grins that jungkook recognises as the ones belonging to the men from last night who'd attacked him and taehyung. only it seems they've multiplied overnight; now becoming a group of maximum ten and not four.

you've gotta be kidding me, jungkook thinks.
the one who jungkook had broken the nose of is also there, his ugly bruised nose fixed up by a measly tan plaster that does little to nothing to help the injury inflicted by the fists of jungkook. just looking at the aggravating man, the ring leader of the group, makes jungkook's hands unwillingly curl up into fists again —— no, jungkook, you're not meant to engage into any fights. last night was an exception but now, what you need to do is get moving and take taehyung to hyung.
no fighting, jungkook orders himself, finality in his mind.

just then, taehyung seems to recognise the man as well and gasps quietly, turning his head to face jungkook, "jeon, aren't they the ones from last—?"

"yeah." jungkook breathes, cutting off taehyung, "shit yeah, they've tracked us down — dunno how the hell did that, but they did." jungkook quietly murmurs, speaking more to himself than taehyung. how the hell did these outdated gangsters find us in this huge ass city? jungkook asks himself, irritated at the situation at hand.

jungkook turns to face an alarmed looking taehyung, "we have to go." he announces quietly, pulling taehyung's body close to his side and forcefully turning him around, pushing him; implying taehyung to walk quickly in the opposite direction of the group of thugs. because if he doesn't, the men'll spot them in seconds. and jungkook does not want to have to face an encounter with these baseball bat wielding neighbourhood gangsters.

despite jungkook's wishes, the men notice the pair with their beady eyes when jungkook pushes taehyung to indicate him to walk ––but taehyung doesn't look where he's going and accidentally stumbles upon an elderly lady's foot with his borrowed boots from jimin. the woman shrieks in pain and taehyung, feeling absolutely guilty, hurriedly removes his foot from the woman's and apologises profusely, ninety degree bowing down and all, even though jungkook's hissing behind him to "fucking move, kim, move."
due to the woman's wild shrieking, the greasy looking thugs crane their flabby necks to look at the sea of faces on the sidewalk where dozens of businessmen and women, tired mothers walking their groaning children to school and elderly folk going to early morning yoga classes, occupy.

jungkook looks over his shoulder for a split second — bad mistake, jeon (fucking hell, you fucking idiot — why'd you turn your head for? jungkook frustratedly yells at himself for his stupid action) — and immediately catches the attention of the man he'd wanted to dodge. mr fucked-up-nose.

the man narrows his eyes in realisation and scowls at jungkook's face before swiftly turning to face his men, barking a series of orders and pointing an accusatory gnarled finger in jungkook's direction. the group of ten or so men swivel their necks round at once to find jungkook and as soon as one captures jungkook identifiable baseball capped head, the men charge towards them.

"shit, shit, they saw us—" jungkook curses, barging past the angered senior who screeches at a bewildered taehyung in a unknown language, and dragging taehyung down the road as he runs past several protesting pedestrians. taehyung gets the memo and surprisingly runs to catch up with jungkook's usain bolt like speed.

behind them jungkook can hear many shouts of "watch where you're going!" and distressed screaming of female pedestrians as the group of ahjussis run after them, ploughing their way through a group of teenage schoolgirls who gasp at the roughness of the overweight uncles.

jungkook's eyes dart to all directions as they run down the stretch of a sidewalk — ahead of him is countless more people walking towards their direction, to his right is a wide road where cars and trucks are stuck in traffic, on his left is a fucking red brick wall (very helpful mm) and then behind him, right on their tails, is a ten member gang.
wherever they go, there's people surrounding him which is 50% good, 50% not so good. lots of people mean a good coverage — they can use it to their advantage by hiding in and out of clusters of people. but it's not so good what with the amount of people they're possibly endangering by pushing by them and exposing them to the comical but still threatening group of ahjussis.

so jungkook, not wanting to cause an accident on this busy sidewalk, steps on to the road and dashes in and out of cars stuck in traffic. he ignores the beep of horns and yells of drivers as he jumps over bonnets and runs past side mirrors, nearly knocking them off the cars.

he looks over his shoulder to see taehyung following him close by, simply running with all his might and not doing the extreme athletic jumping and dodging jungkook does. his long fringe is blown back by the wind he's running against, revealing dark eyebrows and an unblemished forehead. if they weren't running from getting beat up, jungkook would've come to a standstill, wouldve laughed and thought it kinda cute. but, you know, they're possibly about to get battered by baseball bats, so jungkook quashes that thought and turns around, dodging a cyclist before climbing on to the opposite sidewalk where it's less busy with people.

he hurtles down the sidewalk, tugging taehyung along with him as they round the corner. he looks over his shoulder for a split second to see the ahjussi gang dodging in and out of the traffic, manically denting cars and smashing windows as the make their war towards the breathless pair, venting their anger towards the fast duo on the merciful vehicles surrounding them.
crazy bastards, jungkook thinks at once.

now's the chance to lose them whilst they're stuck in traffic, jungkook thinks quickly, panting hard as he rounds the corner. he slows down into a jog as he assesses the new street; it's as crowded as the last, possibly more, but there's something additional about this street: there's an old car park — a three storey car park for a shopping mall nearby. it's the perfect hiding place: inside, it's darkened to the max, the only source of light being the orange glow of the exit and entrance signs and the vague sunlight streaming it through the gaps in the crumbling walls.

jungkook speeds up without telling taehyung, making the older gasp at the sudden speed impacting on the stitch in his side. jungkook ignores taehyung's weak whines and forces him to run towards the car park where all types of cars are lined up, waiting to park their car into an empty spot and go shopping for the day.

beat up sneakers slam against hard concrete, his backpack whacks him repeatedly on the square of his back and his heart is pounding against his ribcage, threatening to burst and split his chest into two if he keeps up with the intense running. taehyung is in similar condition, his knees feel like they're about to break and there's a terrible stitch in his side, making it pretty difficult for taehyung to continue simultaneously breathe and run.

but they don't stop — no, they run to the entrance of the parking lot and duck under the blocking pole that allows cars to enter the parking lot by lifting itself up after receiving a certain amount of money paid by the driver. there's a number of shouts behind them as they duck under the pole and run into the dark car park but both ignore them, the blood rushing through their ears deafeningly loud.

taehyung focus
they run to the nearest parked car and duck behind it for a few seconds as they try to regain a normal breathing rate.

"im uh, ex, uh, exhausted." taehyung chokes out, chest rising and falling rapidly as he slides to the ground pathetically. a hand goes round his side, massaging his stitch as he pants for more air to fill his burning lungs.

jungkook reluctantly bends down to meet eye to eye with taehyung, "c'mon, kim." he urges breathlessly.

"no no no," taehyung breathes, shaking his head tiredly, "too tired," he pants.

"kim, we can relax as soon as we lose these guys but we're not gonna lose them if we're sitting here." jungkook pants, but his words seem to not follow his body because he struggles to not follow suit and collapse besides taehyung.

"but it hurts." taehyung whines, pushing jungkook's enclosed hand away from his wrist weakly. "i cant run anymore." he says, closing his eyes.

"kim, im not gonna," jungkook tiredly hoists a limp taehyung up to his feet, "get killed just because your stupid ass can't handle a little more running." he grits out, marching taehyung down the pretty much desolate car park, people-wise.

taehyung groans behind him but staggers after him, following close by to the younger as they duck behind cars and run across open spaces with hearts racing, fearing being seen by the ahjussis.

after ducking behind another row of cars, taehyung holds his ground, refusing to budge anymore, "jeon, there's no one here. can we just rest for a second?" taehyung wheezes out as beads of sweat roll down his neck and down his back, making his white shirt cling to his body uncomfortably. "please." he begs.

"kim, we're—" jungkook gets cut off abruptly when he sees something behind taehyung. before taehyung could further his whinging, jungkook places both hands on taehyung's chest and harshly pushes the older to the hard ground. taehyung falls backwards on to the rough gravel, hissing in pain as his elbows and the back of head collide with the ground, scraping his skin up painfully. he looks up, angered by jungkook's sudden actions and wanting to yell at the younger for being such a fucking brat.

only, he stops his ministrations and words from flowing when he sees jungkook hunched over a little, blood oozing out of a wound on jungkook's forehead. thin crimson tendrils trickle down the side of the boy's face, coming to a stop by his clenched jaw.

"j–jungkook?" taehyung whispers as he sees the younger straighten his body and glare at something behind him with a careful hand pressed against his wound.
following jungkook's gaze, taehyung turns his head quickly to see the thug from last night, the one he'd pissed off, the one jungkook had marred the face of with a heavy punch to nose, standing thirty centimetres in front of jungkook. the lone thug's holding a baseball bat of his own, swinging the now blood stained wooden bat maliciously in his hand whilst donning a smirk on his ridiculously ugly features.

taehyung heartbeat stills for a second.
did jungkook push me down so he'd get hit instead of me? taehyung thinks blankly as he stares up at both men.

he catches sight of the bloodied bat and gulps at the red — oh my god, no, jungkook.
suddenly fearful, taehyung scrambles to get up and practically crawls to get to jungkook's injured side, clasping a hand round the boy's forearm. "jungkook." he repeats softly as if he's affirming something. jungkook doesn't reply.

"knew you kids'd come in here." the man chuckles heartily, "whatta prediction." the man beams, proud of himself.

the proud smile on the thug's face is soon overtaken by a dark sneer, however. he brings his bat to his face, inspecting the wet blood smeared on his bat before looking at jungkook, eyebrows raised.
"surprised you're not unconscious, young man," the man muses, "should i hit ya again?" he questions rhetorically, chortling when he lifts the bat into the air and taehyung flinches.

"which one do i hit? pretty boy or little bastard here?" the thug asks himself innocently as if he was deciding whether to pick rainbow sprinkles or choc chips as his main ice cream topping.

the man looks over at taehyung who trembles silently besides jungkook. "you annoyed me first so ill hit you first." the man decides, pointing the tip of the bat at taehyung.
jungkook immediately reacts and pushes taehyung behind him, protective stance on. he probably shouldn't in this situation but taehyung feels his heart skip a beat at the small action.

he also feels jungkook scarily cave in to his front slightly after pushing him behind him —— it's as if the little action has made him unable to stay standing up for any longer and was about to soon lose consciousness due to the exertion. taehyung bites his lip, worried.

"cute." the man quips before locking eyes with jungkook, "then howa 'bout you? you've gotten all quiet, havent you? last night, you had so much to say — same with you too, pretty boy." the guys sniffs, "where're the jeon muscles now, huh? im holding a bat, how're you gonna cope, lil bastard?" he asks, mockingly, twirling his bat round to prove his words.

it's silent for two seconds before jungkook quietly voice out: "all bark but no bite."

"what did you say?" the man growls immediately, advancing towards taehyung and jungkook with a firm grip on his bat.
taehyung bites into his lip harder.

"hey, old man," jungkook starts, smiling lazily despite the blood covering a third of his face, "im holding a gun," he says, lifting his m9 into the air and positioning the sleek weapon at the man's chest. the man stops in his tracks, surprised at the sudden appearance of the boy's weapon in his hand.

jungkook cocks his head, "how're you gonna cope?" he questions mockingly as he runs the pad of his thumb over the trigger.

"you little shit." the man snarls but he doesn't make any further movement — he stays stock still as he waits for jungkook to make his decision.

jungkook half smiles, satisfied at the man's silence. he brings a slow finger to the trigger.

the man might not see it but taehyung can see the unsteady waver in jungkook's raised arm.
please. just do it already, before you get hurt, taehyung pleads mentally.

perhaps jungkook had somehow heard taehyung's worlds or felt taehyung's unease because he pulls the trigger, allowing a loud bang to follow out the small bullet that leaves the gun's chamber, heading straight towards the man and finding home deep in the man's chest — initiating spurts of dark blood to leave the bullet wound, marking the man's cheap white shirt.

"you should know not to mess with me after last night." jungkook hums, looking at the struggling man with distaste.

the surprised expression denoted on the man's face drops once the bullet embeds itself in the man, his expression now resembling one of deep guttural pain. the bat clatters to the ground. shortly afterwords, the   greasy thug drops to his knees with a wet croak and lands face first on the concrete ground, maroon blood seeping out of the man and flowing on to the ground beneath him, creating a thick puddle.

taehyung gasps at the sight and hurriedly looks away, unconsciously burrowing his face into jungkook's neck.
jungkook smelt like faint cologne and sweat; it's somewhat a comforting smell for taehyung.

h–he killed him?

well, it was either him or you, a familiar tiny voice in his head reasons with him. besides if you're shocked at jungkook for killing the man, why're you hugging him—?

taehyung gets snapped out of his thoughts when jungkook suddenly tilts backwards on to him, his whole weight bearing down on to a startled taehyung. taehyung struggles to hold up jungkook's weight so he lowers him to ground slowly, his lacking muscles pressurised to the extent that it kinda hurt. he sets the boy on to the ground and sits by jungkook's head, ignoring the dead man by his feet and the blood that starts to stain the tip of taehyung's borrowed boots.

"jungkook?" taehyung asks blankly, eyes wide. "h–hey, wake up. we have to go! hey!" taehyung says rather desperately when he sees jungkook's closed his eyes, mouth parted the slightest bit as weak breaths escape. "please don't die on me!"

he frantically looks around him, needing help but all he can see is darkness, faint outlines of cars and the vomit inducing body behind him.
what do i do? taehyung asks himself as he rakes a shaky hand though his brown locks.
he turns back to look at jungkook, "please please wake up." he begs in a soft tone, patting jungkook's cheek in attempt to wake him up. "jungkook, please, you said we have to stick together — please don't leave me alone now." tears start to prick taehyung eyes as he stares at jungkook's unconscious state, at the incessant amount of blood dribbling down his face, feeling utterly helpless and alone without jungkook tugging and almost dislocating his wrist in order to guide him.

out of nowhere, someone barks," boss! you called for us!" taehyung hears stomps of many feet sounding throughout the car park, sounding only a mere distance away.
taehyung freezes.

"no. no no no." taehyung whispers as his hands fly over jungkook, unsure about what to do. "that's his men, jungkook please, wake up." taehyung pleads quietly, tears now spilling down his cheeks as he hears the heavy footsteps, the footsteps belonging to people who'll beat him senseless for killing their boss.

what to do, what to do, what to do, taehyung chants as he racks his head for ideas.

being the son of the best businessman in south korea has its perks, he's been trained since birth on how to negotiate difficult deals and how to think quickly in tricky situations — at that age, he probably knew better how to be a businessman than a fucking toddler who was supposed to spew baby food from his mouth and poop on his dad's lap etc. but he thanks his father now as he drags his eyes upwards to see a black SUV parked directly in front of him, his reflection visible in the sleek coloured metal.

the gap underneath the car looks spacious enough to fit a human in, taehyung's mind immediately proffers upon seeing the car's heightened wheels. taehyung gulps at the idea forming in his head.
oh god, this is crazy, taehyung thinks but his body seems to have a mind of its own as his arms push jungkook upright, hands snagging against his backpack. taehyung pushes the accessory off of jungkook and pushes the item under the car first before slowly lowering jungkook's head to the ground and moving him inch by inch towards the ten-centimetre-away SUV but it's difficult what with jungkook's body weight. his body also hurts from dancing and drinking last night, from running as fast as he could down two streets and now his unathletic arms ache in protest as he budges jungkook's almost lifeless form under a godamn SUV.

despite his weak limbs, taehyung manages to do the task just in time; jungkook's pushed to somewhere centre of the car's underside. he has about thirty seconds to slide under the car, dangerously close to the edge, when the dead thug's men round a car to see the tonnes of blood scarring the floor and their leader, lying dead with a bat by his head. 

taehyung wasn't a religious man but he prays to whatever god/gods upstairs as he hears the shouts of the ahjussis as they run towards their leader, rage in their voices as they crowd round the body, completely unaware of taehyung and jungkook's presence underneath a car besides them.

taehyung lays still, unmoving, beneath the car. it's horrible; it's dark and the stench of petrol and grease is strong, assaulting taehyung's sensitive sense of smell. he looks over at his side to watch the scene unfurl whilst opening his mouth to breathe through.
the men's feet are the only thing taehyung can identify from where he's lying on the ground but he listens to the group's sharp cries.

"boss! what's happened to you!"
"boss!! wake up!" several of the men bend down by the dead body, trying to shake the man awake with thick gold ring clad fingers.

"i bet it was those bastards — just lemme get my hands on them, ill break their bones for what they've done to boss." one man roars.

"yeah! let's go n hunt them down. they're bound to be here somewhere!" someone grunts, standing to his feet and walking close to the SUV, his dirty trainers coming close to taehyung's face. taehyung holds his breath as new tears fall from his face, hot fearful tears which sear into his cheeks as they roll down.

he's afraid, so very very afraid. he doesn't want this — he didn't want this man to die, shitty gangster or not, he clearly had people caring for him and his heart clenches painfully as he watches them try to awaken their leader. he doesn't want to be hiding under an polluting SUV with an unconscious body besides him, he doesn't wanna be here in this moment.

"not now brother, we gotta get boss to the hospital!" one man exclaims, "something's wrong!" he cries, and taehyung feels even shittier as he watches from the bottom of car, a group member feeling for the pulse of the dead man. "i don't feel a pulse." the man chokes out, making the men grow still and quiet.

"bullshit, he's alive — get him up boys, he needs to see a doc." a man orders but his tone wavers slightly. the men follow his orders quickly, perhaps he's their second-in-command? either way, they gather the thug in their beefy arms and await for next orders.

taehyung lifts a hand carefully to help him clamp his mouth shut because sobs threaten to fall from his lips. he places his sweaty palm over his mouth, suppressing his sobs as the man's lifted from the ground, giving taehyung a clear view of the man's blood engorged face and chest. it wasn't a pretty sight — wasn't something taehyung wanted to see.

"im going to skin those bastards alive and make them pay." a man emotionlessly states as they walk away from the unsuspecting SUV. taehyung shudders. no one replies or protests as they hurriedly march towards the exit of the parking lot, desperate to find a 'doc' to treat the already dead thug.

even when he's sure he's heard the last footsteps recede, even when it's been five minutes of silence underneath the car, taehyung doesn't move — nor does he stop muffling his cries. hes too afraid to do so. so he lies there besides an unconscious jungkook and a cesspool of still warm blood, breathing in pungent car fumes and crying pathetically. whilst crying, he pats around behind him for jungkook and grabs ahold of his hand, enclosing his palm round his index finger like a child would do.

he doesn't know why he did it — perhaps he wanted something grounding him? to remind him of jungkook's presence? perhaps he wanted to feel reassured, safe?

if that's the case, having taehyung enclosing a sweaty palm round jungkook's hand is useless. because taehyung still feels utterly frightened.

___________________
me preparing my weaves/wigs n shit for hoseok's mixtape:

bihh, im readYy to be snatchedt.