The first race, Pt.1
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Just because he was used to the lingering stares and the hushed whispers, it didn’t mean he liked it.
When Jin was younger, maybe eight years old, he used to tell his nanny that one day he would be famous - that everyone would recognise his face.
He took in the few people gawking at him and let out a mirthless laugh. Well, that much of his dream had at least come true. Though right then he wished he had been much more grateful for his anonymity when he had had it. When he could freely roam the streets wearing whatever he pleased instead of having to hide his face, and smiling at people, secure in the knowledge that they would smile back.
He pulled his snapback lower, to cover the top half of his face, hoping that it would dissuade the other people in the viewing room from turning to look at him and figuring out who he was. He didn’t want them to shamelessly stare at him as though he was the exhibit instead of the hoverboard races on the screens lining the walls that were due to start soon. It didn’t make a difference. If anything it only made them much braver.
And stupider, he realised, when one of the guys who had been eying him for quite some time got up, drink in hand, and strutted over. There was a gleam in his eyes that Jin didn’t like. It didn’t help that he already looked like he had placed one foot in the land of alcohol-induced idiocy. Jin sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose when said man kept coming closer, the obnoxious number of shiny trinkets on his hands and around his neck making him resemble a wannabe Midas.
Jin really didn’t want this.
The stench of alcohol reached him before the guy all but stumbled into his personal space, leaning a bit too close to his face for his liking, and leered at him, drink sloshing out on all sides. Jin wet his lips and clenched his hands into fists, praying that the personnel who were supposed to be standing guard inside the room came back soon from their bathroom break.
He really didn’t want to break the pudgy nose in front of him and get blood all over his favourite suit.
Or, have his friend come back and accidentally press his knife against the vein throbbing in the man’s neck. He didn’t want to be the reason a blood bath started even before the tournament had begun, because he knew that by the time they entered the final round that year, war would have broken out.
He knew it the moment he had agreed to take in the five of them, train them and help them win the tournament. The moment he had resigned himself to the fact that he would have to participate too. That Hoseok would have to participate too. Because you needed to be a team of seven in order to compete, even if the first level required only five.
“Hey pretty,” Midas whispered in a constipated voice which Jin assumed was the man’s way of flirting.
“Sir, could you please go back to your place? The races are about to start,” he replied evenly, his most disinterested mask on, even though all he wanted to tell him was to shove his glass up his ass and go back to kissing screen one, the locality with the so called ‘posh’ hoverboarder teams who couldn’t even stand properly on their boards, much less compete. It was a pity that one team from every locality moved on to round two. There were much worthier hoverboard teams in the other localities.
The man didn’t take the hint and just flopped onto the seat next to Jin, Hoseok’s seat, and laughed obnoxiously, as though Jin had just uttered the joke of the century rather than asking him to fuck off. But at least he seemed to be bothering Jin only for his face and not because of -
