Blood Ink ✔️

29: Shots Fired

It takes you a minute to fully realize the words he's just spoken to you, and a minute more to screw your mouth up into a wrinkled line of disgust. "Your targets deserve it? Are you serious? Yoongi, I was your target."

He points a finger at you. "Incorrect. We were never supposed to kill you. Our target was the man coming after you."

"Still." You can't believe that they have the audacity to think that they can choose who deserves to live or die. They aren't God. Just the thought makes you want to grab him by his slender shoulders and shake some sense into him, making him realize that his vigilante idea of justice isn't the right one.

Sighing as if he senses your thoughts, Yoongi leans his weight back against the table and rolls his shoulders. "Okay, I'll edit that. It's more like we make sure we don't go after the good guys that get caught up in some drug leader's grudge. We screen our hits; we research their background and lives, and make sure that they aren't innocent. Better?"

"Maybe." But not really. You never imagined yourself having such a conversation - trying to convince an assassin why he shouldn't be an assassin. "What I'm really asking is what gives you the right to decide who lives or dies?"

At the question, Yoongi twists his mouth into a severe frown. "We chose to go after men that won't stop unless we stop them. Rapists and abusers that are on good terms with people that will keep them out of jail for years, Y/N. Did you know that the man coming after you had a history of raping his targets before delivering them where they needed to be brought?"

At that, your mouth goes dry.

If Jungkook and Taehyung hadn't interfered, and if he had caught you that night...

You shiver as your skin crawls, unable to meditate too deeply on the possible outcome of that scenario. You don't know what to say.

Even though you still gape at the idea of the Bangtan Boys playing judge, jury, and executioner as they see fit, you also now have to admit that the practice probably saved you from an experience worse than death.

"Not so against it now, are you?" days the man before you smugly. He must've read your expression.

You're about to answer him when a the ringtone of a cellphone cuts you off, echoing around the exposed beams of the house and bouncing inside of your eardrums.

Swift like a striking snake, Yoongi's hand darts into the pocket of his jeans, and then the phone is pressed to his cheek. "News?"

You go stock still as his knuckles tighten around the tiny metallic box, then relax. Yoongi's body slumps, his shoulders going lax, and he lifts a hand and pinches the bridge of his nose. "Yeah, okay. Got it. Thanks."

Your heart is about to beat it's bloody way out of your chest.

What if Jungkook dies?

What if he'll never wake up again?

What if Jimin and Taehyung hate you for the rest of your life, blaming you for something that, although you regret your involvement in it, really isn't your fault. You truly hope that he wakes up, not only to resolve your guilt, but because you know that the six other men that surround him and support him will suffer a gaping hole of blackness in his absence, bearing the weight of his loss for the rest of their lives.

You have to admit that you might feel a little pull from that black hole, too.

When Yoongi breathes out a gentle sigh and whispers, "Jungkook woke up," all your worries go flying out the shattered window of Hoseok's childhood home.

Those big black does eyes finally opened.

"Come on," says the small-statured man in front of you, motioning with a flock of his wrists. "Let's go back to the house."