Personally, you've away been a huge fan of roller coasters.
Even with your isolated and lonely life back at home, your father always allowed you to go to a theme park on your birthday, supervised by exactly three bodyguards and accompanied by Jisoo. The two of you, ecstatic with celebration, would hit up every roller coaster in the park at least twice.
There's something about those few seconds of weightlessness, and that plunging drop in your gut as you plummet down a massive slope that gets your adrenaline pumping.
It's like flying for a split second. A sensation that humans can never experience in reality, only under simulation, yet something that generation after generation has chased.
Flight.
This is not that.
This is falling, with no safety bars or bungee cords to catch you before you hit the hard, solid ground.
This isn't adrenaline and fun and heart-felt joy: this is pure, unadulterated terror.
You're terrified.
At first, it's simply a few seconds of stomach-dropping freefall, you trapped against the heavy mass of Jungkook's body with his arms wrapped around you like a vice.
When you hit the first branch, it's him that takes the brunt of the impact.
He gasps in pain as his shoulder rams into the wooden obstacle, the hit spinning your bodies mid air so that your back is the one that gets ripped up next. Leaves and wood and long, protruding branches fly by in the side of your vision, scraping harshly against your sides and the exposed part of your face.
The next major branch that you hit slams into your back with excruciating force. You feel yourself arch away from it, only to contort your body back as Jungkook gets pummeled from behind.
Pain radiates down the length of your spine when the momentum shreds the rough bark down your back. Unconsciously, you bite your lower lip, as if the new tiny wound can distract you from the torn skin of your back.
It hurts, a lot. You can feel the jagged edges of ripped material brushing against your bare skin, which is serrated and wet with hot blood.
Something warm and wet is leaking onto your hand where it clutches Jungkook, originating from his shoulder, but you're too busy being bashed over and over again by branches to think too much of it. You're bleeding too - you can feel the heat of blood flowing over your arms and back as you get hit again and again.
Although, in reality, it last for probably a handful of seconds, it seems like you're falling for infinity. Time slows down, making each hit an impact in slow-motion. All the more painful.
The only good thing about the heavier branches at the bottom is that they slow down your descent, providing a solid obstacle to slow the moment of your two bodies as you get closer to the ground.
Then, finally, with a dull thud that's almost laughably insignificant, the two of you slam into the hard-packed earth like a downed plane.
It's Jungkook on the bottom and you on top, the vibration of the landing shaking from his body to yours. Your forehead bashes against his chin, knocking your teeth together, and his knee jabs into your thigh.
After your bodies and the earth beneath you still, you just lay there, exhausted but alive. Blood is seeping from your cuts: you can feel it, but nothing is broken or torn enough that you can't stand. The branches at the bottom, although painful as you smashed into them, really did help to lessen the force of your crash into the ground.
Groaning, you lever yourself up. Your arms tremble at the effort, but you manage all the same, rolling off of Jungkook to lay by his side. Your chest is heaving up and down as the fear subsides.
"We're alive," you whisper. You can hear your own incredulity playing back in your voice, the shock that you've managed to come through that fall conscious and able to move. "Holy crap, I can't believe that we're both conscious and ali-"
You stop abruptly mid-speech when your ears finally pick up the heavy breaths that are panting out of the man beside you. It's a different kind of heavy breathing.
A dangerous kind.
You sit up and look at him, noticing the glaze of sweat on his forehead, and how his eyes are squinted shut in pain. In the dark night, you can barely make out how the T-shirt covering his shoulder is soaked through with warm, life-giving liquid.
Crap, you completely forgot about the fact that he was stabbed. All of the commotion must have made the fresh wound open back up.
He's breathing, but they're not healthy breaths.
His entire body moves with them, shakes with them, and the pale skin of his face makes your stomach drop. His whitened skin makes the black ink of his tattoos stand out in stark contrast, highlighted by the moonlight.
You have to get someone. You have to help him, he's not-
Wait.
No.
Shaking your head, you push yourself to your feet. You can't help him.
He's the reason that you were in that tree in the first place, the reason that you're here.
He wants to hurt you.
You take a few stumbling steps away from him, but you hesitate when a small moan of pain sounds from behind you.
Curse your soft heart.
You hate that you're like this.
If you were going to be involved in this world, with these types of people, your father could have at least raised you to be strong and confident and not get sucked into sympathy. But no, he left you on your own, where you developed a sense of sympathy that's probably stronger than normal.
When people are in pain, you can't take it. You can't take it.
"Freaking weak," you hiss to yourself even as you pivot, scampering back to Jungkook wherr he lies prostrate on the ground.
In his thin T-shirt and sweatpants, he's shaking from the temperature. The loss of blood and the cold are getting to him.
Biting your lip, you make a split decision and pull your wallet out of your pocket, tugging your outer coat off. You wrap it around Jungkook's shivering form, following up by pressing the gloves in the pocket over his wound in a pitiful attempt to staunch the blood flow.
This won't work. He needs help.
Sighing, you carefully pat at the man's pockets until you find the lump of his cell phone. It's easy to fit his thumb to the home button to unlock it, and you pick the first contact on his recent list.
"Kook?" says a slightly-worried voice from the end of the line. "We haven't found her yet. Anything from you?"
It's Hoseok, judging from the tone of voice. They'll move quick after this phone call, so you have to move faster.
"He's here," you mumble into the phone. "To the right of the house. He's bleeding a lot. Come quick."
"Y/N?!" Hoseok coughs. "Wait, don't hang up! Why are you running? We want to help you!"
He's stalling. You can hear the sound of quick footsteps treading on leaves in the background.
"I can't trust someone whose loyalty is for sale," is all you sputter our before you end the call. You toss Jungkook's phone beside him, hovering for a second longer.
You remember his grip on you as the two of you fell, and know that during the fall, there were times where he deliberately turned so as to take the hits for you.
You don't know why he helped you or tried to save you when he wants you dead, but you don't owe a debt now.
You're even.
"Good luck," you tell his unconscious form quietly. "Hope you make it out semi-alive."
With that said, you jog away from him, away front that house, and disappear once again into the dark woods.
[A/N]
Unedited
I'm sorry lilpockets, I haven't been feeling well the past couple of days so it's been hard to focus on writing. I'll try to be quicker. 💕💕
Personal Insta: vl_bow
Inkitt: pocketbangtan