Red ↠ JENYONG

IX

"JISUNG!" a voice Jennie never thought she would be relieved to hear, resonated through the room.

"Oh, Taeyong! Good timing! I was just getting to the good part," the boy whose name Jennie now knew was Jisung, shouted excitedly and looked back at her with his eyes glinting with excitement.

She shut her eyes again, feeling the pressure of the knife once more, drawing out more blood, but it disappeared as quickly as she felt it. Jennie opened her eyes and saw Taeyong holding the blade with three fingers, stopping it from injuring her any further.

"Last time I checked I did not give you permission to lay a hand on her," The moment he spoke these words, the atmosphere turned unbelievably tense.

"And? Why do you even care? She's gonna die sooner or later anyway for trying to escape," Jisung brushed off lightly.

Taeyong stared blankly back in response.

"You still disobeyed my orders and tried to kill her when I told you all not to harm her in any way until I say so," He spoke after a few moments of silence.

Jisung just raised an eyebrow and withdrew the knife, walking away from the tense room. Right after he closed the door behind him, Jennie's legs turned into jelly.

Taeyong swiftly wrapped his arm around her waist and brought her closer to his body. Jennie looked up, instantly regretting it as she immediately got trapped into a pair of enchanting dark brown orbs, full of mystery and secrets.

She raised her hand up to his cheeks and caressed it gently. He looked slightly startled by her action but didn't remove her hand off his face. Even Jennie didn't know why she did it, but it just felt right. His eyes.....it looked so sad. The mystery and secrecy shrouding it told a story in itself, that it's seen too much for its own good, that's he's been through so much.

She wanted to cover his eyes and protect him from the world's horror, although he's probably already seen it, she still felt the need to. She suppressed the urge to because it would just be awkward and weird in this situation for him. Don't even mention the nature of their relationship. Coming to her senses, she retracted my hand and looked down at the ground.

"You have 2 choices. The first is you join us. From the observations earlier, I noticed that a lot of people came up to talk to you, and how you handled Ms. Jung truly impressed me. Your acting skills aren't too shabby and as long as you keep it up, your family and friends will be safe," Taeyong paused, wiping the blood from the cut on Jennie's neck.

"The second option, well you can figure it out yourself. If you ever try and escape again, I'll have no choice but to leave you to be in the hands of Jisung and you and I both know he'll be more than happy to leave your head rolling on the floor," he continued with his thumb pressing harshly against her wound, causing it to sting badly.

"Choose wisely sweetheart," he waved off.

Jennie collapsed on the bed the moment he left the room. She was so lost. She really thought she was going to die just a mere 20 minutes ago. She could never forget the cold and indifferent expression on Jisung's face, despite how young he looked, when he was rushing forward to kill her. It was like he didn't care about human life. That to him, it was only worthy to be stepped on, like ants.

Then there was that whole moment with Taeyong. And oh my god, Kai. Jennie felt guilty for forgetting about him. He'd never treated her badly throughout their 2 years of dating and our families have always been friends.

He's just been busy nowadays due to him being a senior and his exams coming up. Kai was never an affectionate person but Jennie knew he constantly worried over her and that he cared through his little actions. They never had any problems with their relationship. She missed him a lot, especially now.

She was confused when Taeyong offered her a choice and even more so when he asked her to join. She remembered she used to hear about NCT on the news, she never would've thought she would be here in this position now.

To be completely honest she didn't care too much if she died now. From the second she woke up in this very room, she readied herself to die. The only reason Jennie tried to escape and try to survive for as long as she could, was for her parents.

If she died now with her parents or loved one's not knowing what happened, she'd feel guilty until her last breath. She at least wanted to say goodbye to them.

Knowing her mum, she'd feel terribly bad if she ever found out what happened to her because she believed her saying she was ok. If Jennie did something foolish and provoked them, they would've died to her stupidity along with her. It wouldn't be fair to them.

This was her only chance at protecting her family, there was no way in hell she was going to ruin it. Even if she had to do illegal things and perhaps even murder people, she would protect them.

As the only child, her parents always treated her like a princess and protected her from the harsh world. Jennie's closest friends who she considered family, had never discriminated or wanted anything from her despite her background.

She recalled once she got really drunk after a highschool reunion and she couldn't walk straight. Jennie wasn't looking carefully, falling onto the road. A truck came straight at her. This was the only other time she really thought she was going to die.

Even when only one of them had to push her out of the way, they all did together. It wasn't a serious accident as the truck avoided them last second, and they only got small scratches but it was the fact that they were willing to risk their lives for Jennie without a second thought.

They protected her before, now it's time for her to do the same.