Jungkook pov~
It was so dark, yet I could see clearly as if the room was basked in light. My eyes opened wide onto my ceiling, the old peeling plaster staring right back at me. I can't remember what I was doing last, and the very thought of recollecting the past made my head buzz painfully.
I shot up in my bed, the twisted sheets hindering my efforts for a moment. My room as exactly as it should be, as its always been; somewhat a catastrophe, faded paper falling off the walls and all sorts of clothes dotting the floor and hanging off cupboards, evidence of my laziness to put things away despite the immortal timeless life I was granted.
I turned, trying to sense if anyone else was in the house. Something was wrong with my head, and I had to ask Jin about it.
But I could feel nothing, none of my brothers were here. Unusual at best.
Stiffly, I stepped out of my bed, and the moment a single foot touched the floor, everything in my sight disappeared and faded out to white, but I didn't fall onto where the ground should be in absence of my bed, I stayed floating in the air.
What the fuck is going on!?
I tried to call out and use my voice, but no sound passed my lips which only made me panic even more. Everything seemed too familiar, the empty white space I was only just in, but the nagging in the back of my mind turned into a pounding ache, and I groaned to myself, clutching the hair on either side of my face in an attempt for it to stop even for one moment.
"The truth never stops."
I knew that booming voice, and sure enough when my head whipped up, she was standing just a little out of my reach, calm to the point of almost looking distant and untouchable.
"I am untouchable. I am just a thought."
Sero, what's going on?
"You can use your words now. I just didn't want you to scream or yell and give me a headache from it."
I groaned again, giving up on making the pain disappear. "Did you make my head hurt like this?"
She shrugged. "Yes and no. It's not every day that I pull someone from reality, and it's not every day you get pulled."
Her confusing words only made my head hurt more and I silently pleaded for it to just leave me in peace. She laughed then, without real amusement.
"You are far from peaceful."
"Why am I here? Are you going to educate me on the importance of yoga to clear one's mind?"
She sneered, making a face as if she'd just smelt something unpleasant. "You've ruined your second chance already, you idiot."
I rested in the silence, trying to recover. There was no fucking way it was over already. Sero persisted, digging in the hurt and the panic even further into my soul with a roll of her eyes.
"I can see already, how stubborn you're going to be about this. You've doomed the girl already, Jungkook."
"N-no, it's only just restarted, I still have to save her-"
"You've already messed everything up," her booming voice rang in my skull, trapped inside my head. "You didn't hit her at school this time, your kindness has already ruined your chances; your mercy has already killed her."
"But I don't want to hurt her!" I yelped and wailed, anxiety shooting through the roof. "I made her scared of me last time, I didn't want to have to put her through that again-"
"Why don't you get it?" Her voice raised, almost yelling in my ears while her lips barely parted to let sound through, the crease on her forehead and burn in her eyes conveying her frustration more than well. "Everything has to be the exact same as last time, or it'll never work."
"It'll work," I whispered, almost in a chant. This had to work. I couldn't lose another of my brothers because of my own stupidity. It wasn't fair to them, or her.
Sero didn't answer back, knowing when even a pure being of ultimate and no power simultaneously wouldn't be able to break through the stubborn barrier I'd sealed myself in. Her arms folded over her chest, and I could only watch while waiting for her to make a move.
"If you won't believe my words, how about we take a little trip down the memory book that hasn't been completed yet?"
I frowned up at her. What the hell does that mean?
The white that was everything around us darkened, filling into countless colours, before it focussed and we were placed in a dark street. My senses were screaming that it was the middle of the day, yet the sky was dark and the clouds boomed and shook the canvas of the sky. My body finally landed, succumbing to gravity, and I looked up at Sero, bewildered.
Her lips were clamped shut, body stiff as the very outermost layer of her form melted away like smoke. She let out a whimper at a particularly large wisp that departed from the back of her neck.
This world, this realm, it must be hurting her.
"Look around," she ordered, demanding my attention not be on the parts of her that were literally being eaten by the air itself. I did what she asked, I looked around, trying to figure out where we were, and why she had brought me here. The street was too dark to distinguish it from others, and only when I breathe deeply to sigh did I realise exactly where we were.
The river beneath us churned and crackled as the ice sealed over the topmost layer before the rage underneath broke clean through, and it never stopped, ravenous for more. I stumbled to my feet on the bridge, my sense of balance here not quite right. Leaning against an empty car for support, I tried to walk, senses overloaded.
I could smell dozens of individual tracks of blood, I could see the disarrayed parking lot the bridge had become, I could her the sky cracking and distant screams, I could taste the stench of death in the air. Every roof I touched to steady myself on crumbled under my fingers, the acidity in the air destroying everything.
Why bring me here to this?
"Right there," she pointed to the other side of the bridge where I could just make out a few heads struggling and tripping in the same gravity difficulty I was stumbling through. I moved faster though, limbs pumping with the fuel of desperation; I had to find my family, I had to find my love.
At last, I finally reached the downward stretch, and I glanced once at Sero who was beside me, walking calmly and collectively, completely unaffected by the lack of gravity. She looked faded, and I could only guess that she was only visible to me. I passed the last discarded car, and what my eyes landed on had my entire body frozen in horror.
My brothers, my family, were broken. I couldn't look away from how there were laying, eyes still open as if they were as shocked to meet their end as I was. I looked further, my ears just catching the light sobbing, and I cried out to her.
Her head shot up through her suffering, and her face contorted further into pain as she cried back. I started towards her, legs numb as they stumbled forward. She stumbled herself, practically crawling to meet me. I looked down at my brothers, and saw that only Taehyung, Namjoon, and Yoongi were collapsed on the broken pavement. I couldn't move forward, falling onto the ground as she cried, moving closer with a strength I never possessed. She fell right on top of my frozen form, tripping one last time over the dead and empty body of Taehyung.
I closed my arms around her, unable to keep her safe from anything. The cracks in the sky were deafening, so loud that they emptied my head of thoughts and ability to speak.
'W-where did you go?'
I swallowed hard, holding onto her tighter. Even her thoughts sounded pained and confused.
I'm sorry, I never should have left you alone.
'Where are the others? They left with you-'
A cry cut through the air, and our gazes spun up to face Jin holding back Hoseok who was writhing in despair at the sight of his love mangled and tossed on the ground, mouth and eyes open but motionless. Even our leader was no match for raw emotional trauma, as Hoseok broke through, dashing to where Yoongi lay, shaking hands trying to touch his frozen face. Jin opened his mouth and reached to grab his son back, but he froze just as quickly, his own gaze instantly glued to Taehyung's dulled blue eyes, his hair shuffling in the wind.
Inori dug her face into my shirt, and I could only hold onto her tightly hoping to offer some comfort while Hoseok and Jin bent over the empty shells of their loves. Jin was stunned, despite how many times he must have felt this pain, and Hoseok wailed, his whole body shaking as he couldn't move the boy he loved. My own eyes ached, throat constricted, chest weighed down with the world, but I couldn't look away.
"Hoseok, d-don't you dare-"
The boy stood up, hand unwillingly leaving the skin of his lover's unbeating heart before it covered his own, and I could only look between them as Jin tried to convince him out of it while knowing how pointless it was.
Just like Jimin, he was going to sacrifice himself.
Hoseok, that's enough, stop now.
He ignored my thoughts, and I couldn't move from the rubbish, the girl I loved hiding deeper into my skin. I concentrated, isolating my mind from everyone else's ears, giving a pleading glance to the ethereal being that just stood and watched beside me.
Sero, that's enough, please. I want to back to the emptiness, please.
She stared at me, and I could feel the memories flooding into my head, two sets of getting to know Inori, the lifetime that involved Jimin and the lifetime without. I didn't have to hear Hoseok chanting his existence away, the familiar pain stabbing into my heart. My girl faded from my arms, everyone and everything wisping away.
The horrible scene around us slowly disappeared into white, and the voice of the void was silent until we were completely surrounded in the blinding emptiness. I was shaking, having absolutely no control of my shocked body.
"You have to show cruelty, or it won't work."
I shook my head frantically. "I can't do that, I can't risk breaking her-"
"You broke her last time."
Everything in me, every emotion and every thought froze at her words. It was untrue, she was lying, she had to be, trying to get my attention and cooperation any way she could. But of course, she continued, and I could only float in stunned silence as she wiped away my dreams and my memories.
"The girl you loved was something that you created. She was knew in her own life, nervous and anxious. Your actions, your cruelty, changed her into what she became, you made her into something you could love."
So, I really am a monster, then.
Her disapproving tone cut through the despair and self-loathing lacing every cell in my body. "Stop being so dramatic. You loved her, didn't you?"
My teeth closed tight. I still love her. Sero wasn't lying; at the points I had snapped and hurt Inori, I had been changing how she was piece by piece, thought by thought. I hadn't even realised I was controlling her so tightly, and she was too blind to see it.
"She was blinded with you," she cut into my deepest thoughts, the ache throbbing painfully from my head to my heart. "She loved you so madly."
"I love her!" I screamed out into the empty open air, and it did not echo, yet it remained trapped and bouncing around in my head for what felt like hours after I'd shouted.
"So do something about it," she challenged, very clearly fed up with having to give a supposedly grown vampire a pep talk. "It's in your nature to be cruel whether you consciously think about it or not. Just be yourself."
"That's so comforting, thank you," I spoke lowly, and she ignored my sass out of pity. The next time I looked up, I could see Jin floating in the empty space, and my stomach plummeted.
That was all real? Sero launched me into the next future, filling my head with everything that would have happened, letting me watch how I had failed a second time as Hoseok had given himself away just as carelessly as Jimin had.
"I hope you've learnt from this, Jungkook." She spoke in a monotone, turning away from me and Jin altogether, the white space suddenly feeling that much more empty. My brain felt numb, and I was on autopilot as I hugged my knees to my chest to give myself comfort, while Jin could hardly look at me, outrage stinging his eyes. I'd done it wrong again, and now his son was gone forever.
well this chapter was gonna be a birthday upload as well as the next chapter in voluptuous but I fell asleep before editing so here my gift to u and if u could give me a gift by commenting your thoughts or how you think things will eventually turn out for these lovebirds I would love that thanx