Midas Touch ➸ Taekook

- Third -

A good shitty day. Those were the only words that crossed Taehyung's mind as he fell back onto his bed straight after coming home from school. His discussion with Chris this morning had completely destroyed his mood. And now that he was alone, locked within the four protective walls of his room, he couldn't stop the tears from flowing.

He felt so pathetic. How could he have believed it? He wasn't in love with Chris. But he had once hoped to be. He just wanted to prove to himself that love wasn't out of his reach. Okay, normal humans would always be afraid of him, and he would be a danger to them anyway. But he thought that with another mutant, things could work out, because they would understand each other. In a world that rejected them completely, they would support each other. What a joke. Chris hadn't waited long to start dating again, and this time he'd set his sights on a totally normal girl from their high school. He'd drawn the line between Taehyung and himself. Between Taehyung and anyone else.

He was too dangerous. No one would want to have a relationship with someone who could kill them with a touch. His tears redoubled. How could he survive in a world where he was destined to receive no love? He wanted to feel a hand against his cheek again, he wanted to know what it felt like to have a body against his, not separated by a thick layer of clothing, and the constant fear of hurting them. Just imagining a future where he had no chance of knowing all this made him want to die.

The loudspeakers in the Institute's corridors suddenly began to crackle, quickly giving way to a deep voice that echoed into his room.

"The members of the intervention team are invited to go to the danger room."

Taehyung sighed, awkwardly wiping away his tears. The intervention team was the one that was sent to rescue other mutants around the world, or to deal with other mutant-related problems. When a student joined the Institute, they were given the choice of joining or not. If the student accepted, then they had to undergo daily training before they could be sent on a mission. This team was called the X-Men. And Taehyung was one of them.

When he had been told about the X-Men a year ago, he had initially wanted to refuse. But after thinking about it, he agreed. Because in his eyes, it was a way of making up for his sins, of helping others. And it would give meaning to his life, because at the moment it was perhaps the only thing keeping him alive. He was needed somewhere. It was a weak motivation, but he clung to it as best he could.

So he dragged himself limply from his bed and out of his room, along the long corridor of his floor to the elevator. He pressed the 'X' button, then entered the security code.

"Tae wait!"

The boy looked up and saw Hoseok running towards the lift. Taehyung quickly blocked the doors, allowing him to jump into the elevator.

"Thanks! Mr Hodkins kept me after class, so I was afraid I'd be late!"

Faced with Hoseok's big smile, Taehyung could only imitate him.

"I feel you, especially as it's Logan who's supervising the training today..."

Hoseok shuddered at the mere mention of the name.

"Oh my God, I'm never going to survive, he hates me..."

"Stop it, he doesn't hate you..."

"I put tape on his bedroom door last week, and he took it right in the face."

"He definitely hates you."

The two couldn't contain their laughter. Hoseok was the little joker of the team, always in a good mood, no one could really dislike him (except Logan, who was a big grump), he was literally friends with everyone in the Institute, including Taehyung. He was one of the few people the boy felt comfortable around, because he knew Hoseok wouldn't judge him. He was the kind of person who only looked on the bright side of people, and that was rare these days.

They finally arrived in the changing room of the danger room, where other people were already changing. There weren't many of them in the X-Men team: there were all the teachers, so Namjoon, Auroro, a woman with long white hair who controlled the rains and storms, Logan, or as he was comically known, the legendary Wolverine, and Jin, whose power of telepathy and telekinesis was very powerful ; As for the students, they were Kitty (who could pass through people or objects), Piotr (whose body was entirely covered in metal), Yoongi, a mysterious fellow whose black smoke was so thick that it blocked vision and could even asphyxiate people's lungs, Hoseok, who called himself the Iceberg, mocking his icy power, and Taehyung himself. Other students sometimes joined the training sessions, but it was quite rare.

A little late, Hoseok and Taehyung hurried to change into their training outfits and joined the others at the entrance to the Danger Room. In fact, this room had combat equipment that would make the army jealous. It was aptly named, as it was so dangerous that a normal human would not survive it for more than a few seconds, and you had to undergo training before being allowed to enter. Taehyung had been training there for a year now, so he was pretty skilled.

They all gathered around a man, not very tall but with very impressive muscles (much more than Namjoon's), his black hair styled strangely, but nevertheless, all you had to do was meet his eyes and all desire to laugh disappeared. His eyes were piercing, and he seemed to be in a bad mood (he was always in a bad mood, so today he seemed rather normal, in fact).

"Well, since everyone's here, let's get started." he said.

"Shouldn't we wait for Namjoon and Jin, Logan?" asked Kitty, who was still tying her long chestnut hair into a ponytail.

"No, not today."

Hoseok leaned over to talk to Taehyung without Logan hearing them.

"I think they're on a date." he murmured, smirking. "Namjoon's been trying to work up the courage to invite Jin for months."

"It's about time. He's been hanging around him for so long. Jin was getting impatient."

It had only been a year since Taehyung had been here, but that had been more than enough time to observe the love situation between the two of them: Namjoon too shy to dare ask him out, and Jin getting impatient with the man taking so long to tell him how he felt. The whole Institute seemed to know that they were in love with each other, except for the two of them.

"In short, I'm not interested in the affairs of these two troublemakers." Logan continued. "Today's training is quite simple: all you have to do is survive for five minutes in the Danger Room."

The smiles disappeared immediately. The words 'simple' and 'survive' should never have been in the same sentence, let alone together in Logan's mouth. And the sadistic smile on his lips only confirmed their fears: they should have skipped it. They were going to suffer. They were beginning to curse Namjoon and Jin for having chosen this moment to declare their feelings.

"We'll see how clever you kids are."

~🌻~

I started uni again, so I don't really know how the updates will go. I have some chapters in advance for now, but I hope I will be able to continue to write a chapter per day😖🤞🏻

However, I hope you liked this chapter! Because the story in the little complicated, I take my time to introduce everything to you! But don't worry, the interesting part will come soon!💕