fortuitous odds

[21] forget about me

___________

"You step foot in this room and I'll run you through. And don't think for one second I wouldn't."

"Just let me see him. I need to tell–"

"He doesn't want to see you! He hates you! You're lucky I didn't kill you out there, don't push it." Taehyung's voice was gravelly and sharp, like he was spitting jagged rock against the older man standing too close for comfort. He had squared his whole body in front of the doorway, defending the boy within with his life. That included protecting him from their estranged guest.

It had been hours and the boy hadn't stirred, his pulse still so weak and his body unresponsive. Nonetheless, he was alive. Time would tell if Jungkook had survived the debilitating effects of the smoke that had drowned his lungs. If not, they were all certainly dead.

"What happened when he first came here? He told me he ran away, but that was a lie, wasn't it?" Queried Elias whilst standing firmly in front of the doorway, refusing to step any further back regardless of the threats that had been made.

"I'm not telling you anything." Snarled Taehyung, eyes squeezing shut in a grimace when he heard the onslaught of chaos outside. The town had never felt so empty, remaining seven barricaded within the dining hall with thick metal sheets propped up against any openings.

All their kids were gone. He hoped Hye had found somewhere safe for them to stay. The fight had to happen here or else Hye would forever be on the run and all of this would be for nothing. "Your co-workers are persistent, care to try reasoning with their insanity? Or are you going to hide in here like the coward you are and let them destroy my home?" Most of the questions didn't need an answer, more of a taunting malice than curiosity itself. Yet Elias seemed to ponder on his own responses, callused fingers grazing over the stubble on his chin that concealed the gruesome scars along his jaw. 

"None of this was what I wanted." He eventually answered, wincing when he felt a metal twang echo throughout the room. "When I first joined the Katharós it was out of survival. There were so few places where we could live safely, and everyday things got worse and worse." Taehyung rolled his eyes and scoffed, propping up against the wall to prepare for the bullshit excuses. "I saw the way you all survived in the contaminated zones. My goal was to find a way for us to do the same. 'Blessed are the pure in heart; for they shall see God.' That's where the name Katharós came from. To be given a gift by God to survive in a place that had been tainted. We wanted to make a man-made version of your mutation."

"So you wanted to be like us but you called us Deviants? You called us the Devil's tools? You're spitting lies just like you've told Jungkook his whole life! We've seen the disgusting things you did." Without thinking about the company around him, he spat the accusation harshly, "You shot his mother and then took him in as if he were your own! You kidnapped a child!" A rustle, then a breath, followed by the sharp bang of something hitting the metal at the main entrance.

"Is it true?" The voice was so fragile, both freezing up upon hearing someone who should've died three times already. He should've been by his mother's side all those years ago, forgotten about just like she was.

"Jungkookie," Elias was the first to speak, tainted with a mourning weakness that contradicted any of his usual confidence. Because staring up at him with glassy eyes was his bunny. Except those eyes were full of betrayal not love. "Please listen to m–"

"Is it true?" Cried the boy a second time, a little stronger, but no less haunting.

"Go on, answer him." Sneered Taehyung to the man that had him twisting his fingers around the hilt of the blade in his pocket. Temptation. "Answer before your co-workers get inside and murder him for what he is a second time."