✓ 𝑺𝑬𝑹𝑷𝑬𝑵𝑻𝑰𝑵𝑬

the sacred taking

Gazing at the clock hanging up against the wall, seconds soon turn to minutes and Areum feels her eyes begin to burn from how painful the silence had become.

"Well?" She looks towards Jimin, who was too busy lighting up a cigarette, wrapped up in his own chain of empty thoughts.

Areum can feel Yoongi's gaze burning holes into her cheeks yet she refuses to look at him.

She wasn't about to dive head first into the flames of the hell he'd constructed.

Not yet, at least.

"Can someone fucking answer me—?!"

"There's been a change of plan." Yoongi slices Areum's sentence in half, plush lips turning up into a slight smirk, just to piss her off even more.

It sure as fuck did.

Lent against a wall, Areum flares up at the one she used to call her own.

Not that she recognises the man he'd become.

She doesn't want to.

It simply hurts too much.

"Well, if you could inform me of what it consists of, that would be nice." Areum hides her weariness with the spitting of venom, tongue so sharp, she may as well have attached a knife to the end.

A hard lump begins to rise in her throat as she thinks over all the possibilities to this so-called 'change of plan.'

It was making her feel vulnerable, and if there's one state of mind she feared the most, it was vulnerability.

"Don't be alarmed, baby. You know we've been worried about your mental state recently . . ."

Areum's worried eyes find Jimin's from the other side of the room as he walks towards her, his usual calculated steps coming into play.

She watches as he takes another deep inhale of his cigarette, only adding to the suspense filling the air like the smoke from his cancer stick.

"Jimin . . . what's going on?"Areum gulps, desperate irises looking up to him in search of answers to the many questions flowing through her mind.

"I'm sorry, angel—"

"Would you like to steal the honour of telling her or should I, Park?" Yoongi speaks coldly, tone cutting through the air like a dagger.

He'd evolved into one, cold-blooded motherfucker.

There was no doubt about that.

"Tell me what, Jimin?" Areum concentrates on the man currently looking down on her with solemness filling his beautiful eyes.

In all the time she'd known him, Areum had never seen him behave this way before.

Something was extremely wrong.

Without uttering another word, Jimin moves his hand down the side of Areum's face, silky skin against the tips of his fingers.

Jimin wanted to protect her but he couldn't.

He simply didn't have the power to do so.

After all, he was nothing more than a cub in a zoo full of jaguars and while he was always able to assert authority over Areum, that wasn't the case with anyone else within the organisation.

"Since you've decided to be a pussy about it, I guess I'll have to tell her myself. Or rather, show her." Yoongi smirks once again, locking eyes with a vengeful Areum.

"Yuri, darling. It's time to meet your replacement."