ANCIENT | SEQUEL TO YOUTH | JJK

as crystal

When Yoongi finally gets back to Taehyung's apartment, it's three in the morning. He's exhausted from traveling, his neck hurts from the uncomfortable airplane seat and his lip is swollen and busted from Jeongguk. Every time he thinks of his first altercation with Jeongguk in a year, he shudders. How did he take such a turn for the worse? Yoongi wasn't present when Jeongguk surprised everyone with leaving Haneul at the airport, and he doesn't know what he's been through since, but nothing should have yielded such a hostile reaction from his friend. If he could even consider Jeongguk a friend anymore.

Yoongi opens the door, and his friends, who are asleep on the various surfaces of Taehyung's apartment, stir. Ever since his disappearance, they have all been camping out, in the event that he might come back and they would be there to greet him. But it had been three weeks, and there had been no changes—their hope that he might return to his apartment with some crazy explanation was diminishing quickly. The first to awaken enough to acknowledge Yoongi is Wooseok, who gently shakes Haneul and Hoseok, sleeping next to him on the couch, awake. They look at Yoongi briefly, before training on the doorway behind him, clearly waiting for someone to follow him inside. Jeongguk. When no one does, they return their gazes to Yoongi.

"Yoongi, where's...where is he?" Seokjin asks from
his place next to Namjoon. Yoongi sighs, debating how to tell his friends the harsh truth—that the Jeongguk they knew isn't the Jeongguk he saw. He flips on the lights, and they illuminate his scuffed face and swollen lip. This wakes everyone up properly, and Haneul is rushing towards him to examine his minor wounds.

"Who did this to you?" She murmurs worriedly. Yoongi sighs heavily once more, closing his eyes for a moment.

"Jeongguk." He finally breathes out.

"What about him?" Namjoon asks, and the others look equally confused.

"Jeongguk did this to me." He explains, and it feels like all the oxygen has been suctioned out of the room. "He's not coming back." Haneul drops her hands from Yoongi's face then, and he can see the tears in her eyes. She turns her face into Hoseok's chest and he holds her, with his own tears accumulating, too. Seokjin and Namjoon look at each other solemnly, disappointment evident. None of them had a problem with Jeongguk leaving. They missed him to death, but they knew he needed a fresh start. But this—blatant refusal to come home, to act like their friend, to help them find Taehyung—this was something they never could have expected. It felt like a slap in the face. Wooseok's crestfallen face says it all: their last resort to help them find his soulmate disappeared with some harsh words and the slam of a door.

"He...he did?" Hoseok asks, struggling to picture his best friend violent.

"You told him Tae's gone?" Namjoon asks, trying to stay logical. Yoongi laughs humorlessly at this.

"Yeah. And then he asked me if that was all I had to say. And then he kicked me out." He recounts.

"What?" Hoseok exclaims in disbelief. "That doesn't sound like him at all."

"I know, but—something's not right with him. He's not our Jeongguk anymore." He says, and for the first time since the whole ordeal, he feels himself beginning to break down. "He doesn't want anything to do with us. He made that painfully clear." He sighs, gesturing to his messed up face.

"Oh, Jeongguk." Haneul murmurs, shakily sighing into Hoseok's chest as he rubs her back comfortingly.

The first six months without Jeongguk were hard for all of them. He talked to at least one of them daily for about a week, then sporadically for two, but a month into his absence, he stopped communicating with them all entirely. It was like he dropped off the surface of the earth—no texts, no FaceTimes, no phone calls. Every time they tried to call, it would go straight to voicemail. The months that followed were miserable.