The parents erupted again. "See! He has nothing to say! A violent, delinquent child! Probably learned it from his... brothers," Minwoo's mother spat, her eyes raking over them with disdain.
It was the wrong thing to say. The temperature in the room dropped ten degrees. Jimin's smile became sharp enough to cut glass. Yoongi's eyes turned to ice.
But before any of them could speak, Jungkook moved.
He slid off the chair. The movement was silent, fluid, utterly unlike a child. It was how Taehyung moved when he didn't want to be seen. He put one hand in his pocket, a perfect mimicry of Namjoon's thoughtful, authoritative stance. He puffed his chest out just slightly, a shadow of Jimin's fighter's posture.
He walked towards the two bullies, his steps slow and deliberate. He stopped in front of them, and then he did something that made the breath catch in Hoseok's throat: he smiled. It wasn't a happy smile. It was Hoseok's most dazzling, disarming, weaponized smile, and on a nine-year-old's face, it was terrifying.
Then he spoke, and his voice was a perfect, chilling replica of Yoongi's cold, flat monotone.
"You've been tripping me in the hallway for two weeks," he stated, his eyes locked on Minwoo. "You called me 'orphan' seventeen times. You stole my lunch money last Tuesday." He turned to Seojun. "You told everyone I live in a dumpster because no one wants me. You pushed me into the fence today first."
The parents were staring, open-mouthed. The principal looked like he was seeing a ghost.
Jungkook reached up and swiped his hair back from his forehead, a gesture Minho made a hundred times a day when working on an engine. He began to slowly circle the two boys like they were a problem to be assessed, a broken-down vehicle.
"My hyungs," he said, each word dripping with a cold, adult menace that did not belong in a child's voice, "taught me not to lie. Or to trouble anyone who doesn't trouble me first." He stopped his circling and leaned in close to Minwoo's face. "But my hyungs did teach me how to put bullies in their place. Did your parents not teach you that? Or should we search for the gutter you crawled out of?"
A sound escaped Jimin—a strangled squeak that sounded like a stepped-on mouse. He covered it with a violent, fake cough, his eyes wide with a mixture of horror and overwhelming pride.
Jungkook's gaze was absolute. "My hyungs taught me to finish things. So. Let's finish this. You will tell him," he pointed at the principal without looking away from Minwoo, "everything you did. The truth. Or what I did today..." he glanced dismissively at the ice pack, "...becomes a permanent arrangement."
The threat hung in the air, so perfectly Yoongi-esque in its cold, logical delivery that Yoongi himself felt a jolt of surreal pride. The two bullies, faced with this tiny, terrifying doppelgänger of six dangerous men, completely broke. They started sobbing, confessing everything in a jumbled, hysterical rush.
The parents were horrified into silence. The principal looked like he needed to sit down.
YOU ARE READING
Taste Of Algorithm Jinkook/Kookjin story
RomanceKim Seokjin has survived a life that should have broken him - poverty, humiliation, and a family riddled with violence. His restaurant is the only sanctuary he's built with his own hands, and he guards it fiercely. Love? Trust? They're luxuries he c...
