Chapter Text
There aren't a lot of people left in the store.
Which is only logical, because it's almost 9PM. People are starting to filter out, the shop is closing down. Jungkook's mother is somewhere hidden between the shelves, frantically trying to figure out which brand of detergent they've been using before the check out line empties.
Jungkook is at the front, near the ugly vending machines that sell toys and snacks that no living human would buy. He's seven years old and he has enough class to know that no, edible rings aren't cool, they're fun for about two seconds and then they're just disgusting.
The cashier wishes everyone a good day as she sends them off, somehow much brighter than she was half an hour ago - possibly because everyone is leaving. The check out line empties slowly. Finally, Jungkook's mother gives up on figuring things out and just picks one of the detergents, joining the rest of the people in line.
She catches Jungkook's eye and doesn't smile, doesn't frown - just stares blankly through him the way she always does when she's stressed. Like she doesn't actually know that she's staring at him and is thinking about three hundred things in her head - the dishes, the laundry, her boss, her husband, the fact that Jungkook has school tomorrow and probably hasn't done his homework. His mother worries a lot. Sometimes it makes Jungkook worry too.
He turns back to the ugly machines and perks up a bit at something that looks a bit unlike the others. It's a fortune teller, according to the label. The paint is faded and old and features a smiling lady who looks like she wants Jungkook dead.
He pushes a hand into his pocket - there are some coins left over. He pulls one out and wonders what to ask about.
He could ask if he'd finish his homework. If he'd pass that test next week. If his father will be home when he gets there, if the new Spiderman movie would be any good.
In the end he pushes the coin into the slot and thinks, tell me something useful.
The machine whirs to life, creaking so terribly that he takes a step back to pretend he has nothing to do with it. No one pays him any attention.
Finally, a small piece of paper falls out of the slot. Jungkook grabs it, straightening it out, and reads:
You will lose to Kim Seokjin.
He stares at it for a second, mouth agape. Who the hell is Kim Seokjin. Is he someone famous? He must be, for his name to appear in an ugly fortune machine.
He pockets the message because it amuses him. His mother finishes buying things and Jungkook takes the bags from her, and she smiles at him for the first time that day. Inside his pocket, Kim Seokjin is forgotten.
Behind them, the shop sign flips to closed.
/
For the most part, Jungkook forgets about the fortune.
He keeps the piece of paper because it's a fun story to tell Jimin from school - sometimes they sit together and talk about who this Seokjin could be. Maybe he's a wizard. Or a terrorist. Or a firefighter or a pirate or an alien.
In half of their fantasies they cast Seokjin as the hero, and Jungkook as the dastardly villain - because it does say that he'll lose. In the other half they make Seokjin the dastardly villain instead and turn the whole thing into a tragedy. There are so many possibilities and Jungkook has fun with them all, acting out scenarios in Park Jimin's backyard.
Jimin is two years older than him but he calls Jungkook his best friend. He's in middle school, now, and goes to school in a different building from Jungkook - but they still see each other at home. Or at the park. Sometimes they wander far enough and end up at the beach.
That's where they are today, building a fort in the sand. Jungkook is on his knees, digging into the sand with determination - he's going to build the biggest fort ever. It's going to be incredible. It'll have two layers of tunnels and spy towers and a drawbridge and an entire army of robots.
Jimin has given up on the fort after they finished the base, and instead he's collecting sea shells to lay around Jungkook's masterpiece. Jungkook complains that he's ruining the effect, but Jimin ignores him and keeps putting them in place.
"Imagine if Kim Seokjin tried to break in," he says, marching one of the sea shells to the fort entrance. "Nothing would stop him."
"The robot army," Jungkook argues. "It's still in progress."
"Robots can't hurt Kim Seokjin. He's like, half robot himself. He's probably hacked into their brains and programmed them all to take his side."
Jungkook frowns, because robots are, admittedly, a flaw. He should use something that won't take sides, that just has a rabid urge to kill.
"Piranhas?" he tries.
Jimin scrunches his nose. "That's a bit...barbaric."
Jungkook spreads his arms, making claws with his fingers. There's sand in his hair and all over his face, and his jeans are rolled up to his knees. He doesn't feel barbaric but he does feel like he could set piranhas on a bad guy and it would make him feel like a boss.
"He's the bad guy," Jungkook reminds him, reaching an imaginary claw towards an imaginary force. "We destroy him by any means."
Jimin shrugs, going back to collecting shells. Jungkook goes back to digging, reaching deep into the hole he's made to get firmer, wetter sand.
His fingers snag on something like paper, and he pulls it out.
It's old, faded, and looks like it's been torn out of a newspaper. Jimin sees him looking at it and immediately tells him to throw it away, you don't know where that's been, why is basic hygiene so hard.
But Jungkook frowns. And keeps staring. Because there, in the printed, faded lettering, are the words: You will lose to Kim Seokjin.
This time, it's slightly more confusing.
/
The real trouble starts when Jungkook is in high school.
It's the first time he's gone out with Jimin's friends, and he's already regretting it. Jimin is in his last year, and he's cool and popular and somehow still a dork, and all his friends are almost as incredible as he is. Jungkook has refused to hang out with them for every day of his life, and had planned to keep it that way forever - but this time Jimin caught him with a whole emotional drama about it's my last year here and you're my best friend and I want to have fun with you too, and Jungkook can't say no when Jimin plays the guilt card.
So here they are, in this shitty arcade, with Jungkook the only weird kid who's two years younger than the rest of them. They all smile at him, ask him questions, but it's obvious he's not one of them. He doesn't know their inside jokes, he can't follow their rants. The only person he's sort of okay with talking to is Kim Taehyung, because he's hung out with him before and he's a really nice guy.
Taehyung isn't from around here - he's a student from Daegu. His accent is thick and his grin is wide, and he hangs around Jungkook the whole time they're at the arcade and asks to play half the games they cross.
Near the end of it, Jimin drags them both into a photo booth. It's cramped with three people but they make faces at the camera, ensuring that all the photos come out as ugly as they possibly can. When they're done Taehyung draws over all of their faces, making them even worse. It's fun somehow.
Jungkook sits near the back of the arcade, looking through the photos and smiling despite himself. Jimin was saying bye to all his friends, but they've gotten distracted and are laughing about something else instead. He watches his best friend smile and there's something sad in his chest, knowing that it's going to end soon.
Because Jimin will be off to Seoul soon, ready to take on the world - and Jungkook will still be here, with no one to build ugly forts with because he hadn't wanted to do it with anyone else.
He's startled by a cold sensation, jerking around to see Taehyung pressing a cold drink to his shoulder. Jungkook mumbles his thanks and takes it from him.
"You know you could come with us, right?" Taehyung says, taking a sip of his own drink.
Jungkook blinks. "Huh?"
"To Seoul. When you graduate. Jimin won't forget you."
Jungkook frowns. He wants to, for sure - he'd probably follow Jimin into hell if it came down to it. But Seoul is another world, and he has a feeling Jimin would fit right into it. That he wouldn't have a need for him anymore.
Nothing is more terrifying than the idea of following him there, and finding out his best friend doesn't want him around anymore.
"Here," Taehyung says. He sits next to him and pulls his phone out, typing away into the search bar. "This is what I do whenever I want to know something about the future." He hands Jungkook the link he's opened, and Jungkook stares in disbelief.
"A magic eight ball?"
"It's not as dumb as it looks," Taehyung says, offended. "It's never been wrong before. It's...admittedly pretty vague, but it makes you feel better. Ask it what you want. Try to make it a yes or no question, but it's sort of flexible."
Jungkook stares at the image of the ball on the screen, unsure if this is a joke or not. But Taehyung seems sincere, so he decides to indulge him.
Will good things happen if I go to Seoul, he types into the ask bar. He presses ask.
There's a short moment where nothing happens, and then the ball on screen pretends to shake, finally spitting out an answer.
You will lose to Kim Seokjin, it says.
Jungkook's heart stops.
Taehyung makes a confused noise. "That's...odd and specific," he says. "What the heck."
It's been years and years since Jungkook last saw that name, and something unnerving settles into his chest. Maybe he doesn't move for too long, because Taehyung sounds more worried than confused, and Jimin is looking at them oddly.
/
Seoul is a terrifying city.
From the moment Jungkook gets off the train - no, even before then, he feels out of place. It was hard leaving his family behind, harder still trusting that Jimin still wanted to be friends. His parents aren't too happy with him for leaving - while they want him to have a good education they thought he'd be just fine in Busan, where he could stay under their watchful eyes and away from harmful influences and would grow up into everything they wanted.
Jungkook knows his parents think he's weird. He knows, every time his mother stares at him with that vacant empty stare, or when his father glances at him and turns back to his newspaper without a word. He knows when he sits alone at the beach building complex forts that he must be too old for and when he sits alone in his room, in the dark, stalking every profile on social media with the name Kim Seokjin.
Jungkook is weird, and a little bit lonely, and was all but born with the name of his arch-nemesis in his hands: so he does the rational thing and breaks out of his parents' watchful eyes and goes to Seoul.
Both Jimin and Taehyung are there at the train station to pick him up, and Jungkook maybe, maaaybe wants to cry a little. They hug each other and Jungkook realizes just how much he missed them, but crying is decidedly uncool, so he holds himself back and pretends he didn't miss them at all.
They see right through it but don't call him out on it, and then they pile into someone's car that Taehyung has borrowed (Jungkook hears the story twice and still can't figure out who, just that whoever they are, they're making a grave mistake) and speed off towards the university.
The university, if anything, is even more terrifying, because it's full of people who are about Jungkook's age but somehow look functional.
It takes him days to get used to it. He hangs out with Jimin and Taehyung a lot, awkwardly third wheeling. When his parents call he tells them that he's fine. When no one is looking he stands near the notice boards and scans them for any mention of Kim Seokjin.
At freshmen orientation there's a whole row of stalls and Jungkook stares at them in awe. They're messy, and the seniors who are hosting them look way too excited, calling out for them to sign up for clubs and meetings and free stuff. At one point he passes the divination club, and he decides it's a sign.
He enters the stall quietly. If he hears one word about Seokjin he isn't sure what he'll do.
"Hello!" the senior at the desk tells him. He's smiling widely, gesturing for Jungkook to sit. "I'm Jung Hoseok, from the fine arts department. What's your name?"
Jungkook takes a seat hesitantly. "Jeon Jungkook."
"Well, Jungkook, you want to join our club? It'll be fun. I mean, it's also a bit stressful, and people will chase you around during exam season until you tell them that the stars say that they'll pass or some shit - but mostly it's fun." He smiles again, and Jungkook wants to say yes just because he likes him, but he quickly remembers that's not what he's here for.
"I haven't decided yet," he says. "Which club I'm signing up for, I mean. I - um. I just came here because I saw the sign outside."
Realization dawns on Hoseok's face. "Ah," he says, reaching out for a stack of cards under his desk. "You want your fortune read? I can do that."
He shuffles the cards with practiced ease, laying them out in front of Jungkook. "Pick three," he says.
"These are playing cards," Jungkook says.
"I get that a lot," Hosoek agrees. "Cartomancy. 13th century. Developed from tarot cards but we play games with them now. Pick three," he repeats.
Jungkook does, feeling a bit foolish.
"Lay them open."
Jungkook does.
"Well," Hoseok says, eying the spread strangely. "This is odd."
A quick scan at the open cards tells Jungkook that none of them say Kim Seokjin, which he thinks is a drastic improvement.
"You have the six of spades, which means you can't escape fate," Hoseok says. "Then there's the five of hearts, which means you'll face loss. Then the jack of spades - that's a real jerk." Hoseok tilts his head thoughtfully. "I guess it comes down to you'll face a real jerk and might lose."
Jungkook winces. "Thanks," he says anyway, sort of mournful.
"No problem," Hoseok says. Then he leans forward, conspiringly. "I lied though," he confesses. "I hate this club."
/
Jungkook doesn't much like coffee.
He drinks it more out of an urge to stay alive than an urge to be happy. He has five major assignments due in the next week and he doesn't think he can make it through them, so here he is, facedown in a coffee shop, wondering if he should pour the glass over his head instead of down his throat.
He hasn't seen Jimin in a while. He's probably busy. Jungkook is a bit - just a bit - upset.
Who is he kidding, he's going to jump into traffic tomorrow.
He hears someone laughing loudly from the table behind him, and it grates on his nerves. When will people realize that you aren't supposed to be loud in public places. You aren't supposed to speak. You aren't supposed to exist. If everyone on the planet doesn't disappear by the time Jungkook counts to three he's going to make them disappear.
...no wonder he's going to lose to blasted Kim Seokjin, he has the makings of a supervillain already.
The people at the next table are the worst kind of loud - maybe worse than Jimin and Taehyung together with too many drinks - and Jungkook is slowly starting to lose his mind. He pokes at his mug of coffee in a mix of fury and despair, hoping it would let him drown in it to end his misery. Why live this life if, as Hoseok put it, he was going to lose to 'a real jerk' anyway.
"Vanilla milkshake and strawberry shortcake for Kim Seokjin!" the lady at the counter calls.
Jungkook freezes.
Nothing goes silent, but to Jungkook it does. The guy behind him, part of the group that was too loud, excuses himself and gets up - making his way to the counter to retrieve the order. Jungkook doesn't dare sit upright, watching in a sort of dazed horror as the man smiles at the lady and thanks her, a dimple in his cheek, looking altogether too much of a gentleman to be the cause of Jungkook's despair.
But Jungkook isn't fooled. He hasn't trained for nothing. Half of him can't believe that this is happening, his heart is beating so loudly that it hurts, which is maybe why he does what he does.
He takes a deep breath, balls his fists, and jumps to his feet, standing in front of the man who has his food in his hands.
"Um," the man says, blinking.
"Kim Seokjin-ssi," Jungkook says, voice carefully controlled. He raises his balled fists higher, trying to look threatening - which probably isn't working out because most of him wants to bolt. "Fight me."
There's an awful silence.
"...um?" the man says again, tilting his head in confusion.
"I won't lose to you," Jungkook says, trying to ignore all the confused looks he's getting. This has to be done. He needs to catch the man when he's still unaware. Before he knows who Jungkook is. "I won't lose ever. So fight me."
The other man looks like he's honestly given up on trying to understand what's happening, and he looks to someone over Jungkook's shoulder in distress, and then Jungkook hears a voice speak up from behind him. Amused. Sort of soft even then.
"That's not Kim Seokjin," the voice says.
Jungkook jerks around in confusion, his stance more protective than threatening, and finds another man standing a few steps behind him. He's tall, a bit taller than Jungkook, and there's an amused, curious smile on his face.
"I was in the bathroom so I guess I've missed something," he says. "But I'm Kim Seokjin. And you...want to fight me?"
Jungkook will say, when literally no one asks him later, that what startled him was how put together Seokjin was. The fact that Jungkook was standing here in the middle of some damned cafe announcing his urge to kill, and that Seokjin took it all in stride like it happened every day.
Whatever it was, his fists faltered. He took a step back, and another, nearly crashing into the other man who he'd mistaken for his arch nemesis. The man lets out a yelp as he tries to get out of the way and the sound sets off the first wave of panic in Jungkook's head, and before anything else can happen he turns heel and flees the room.
For too long, he's scared that someone is chasing him. He remembers that he'll lose, he'll lose, he'll lose.
He wishes the stupid fortunes would tell him more than that.
/
As expected, his friends give him precisely zero help.
"You literally went up to him and said fight me," Jimin deadpans.
"Nope," Taehyung says cheerfully. "He went to the wrong person and said fight me." He's grinning too wide for his face and he's going to crack any moment now, Jungkook is sure.
Jungkook buries his face deeper in the cushion he's holding and sinks into the couch.
"And he wasn't even fazed," Jimin continues.
"And he wasn't even fazed," Taehyung agrees.
"You could - I don't know," Jungkook supplies. "Shut up?"
"Never," Taehyung says. "This is the best day of my life." But he sinks onto the couch right next to Jungkook and throws an arm over his shoulder, tugging him closer. Jungkook tilts sideways, in his curled up position, nearly faceplanting into Taehyung's lap. He catches himself at the last minute and buries his face in his shoulder instead.
"I didn't know these fortunes bothered you that much," Jimin admits. "I thought it was just funny."
"It was," Jungkook agrees, voice muffled in Taehyung's shoulder. "Until I tried about fifteen different fortune telling websites and they all mentioned his name."
There's an awkward silence. "Well," Jimin says. "That is odd."
"Is it?" Taehyung asks. "He probably hacked into the systems and put his name there himself. It might not have even been him. Could be a crazy ex or something."
"Or a different Kim Seokjin," Jimin adds helpfully.
There's a pause.
"I'm never going out in public again," Jungkook says, the most helpful of them all.
"Oh come on," Jimin says. "You went nineteen years without crashing into a single Kim Seokjin. I bet you can go another nineteen years."
"What if he's looking for me because he wants to kill me?"
"Then he wouldn't do it in public," Taehyung says, patting his head, as if that somehow makes things better at all.
"I'm going to die," Jungkook realizes.
"You're going to lose," Taehyung corrects. "Not necessarily your life."
"But still possibly my life."
"...still possibly your life."
Jimin looks between them both, a deep frown on his face. "Idiots," he decides at last, and then sinks into the couch on Taehyung's other side. They end up staying there for hours, watching whatever shitty movie comes on TV. Jungkook drifts in and out of sleep, hearing his friends laugh at the screen, curse at it, sometimes fall dead silent. It's an odd feeling, and he doesn't know if he's awake or not most of the time, but - he feels okay. He probably won't leave the house ever again, but he feels okay.
/
If there's one thing that Jungkook is good for, it's that he doesn't know when to give up.
One week and three days after his miserable encounter with his nemesis, which left him holed up in Jimin's apartment with zero will to live - and he's back in the same coffee shop that he met the man at, but this time with a plan.
"Status report," Taehyung mutters next to him, voice muffled a bit by the black mask he's pulled on. It's the best disguise in the area because the pollution around here sucks, and there are more people with masks on then off.
"...status report of what?" Jungkook asks, his voice just as muffled.
"Do you see him," Taehyung presses.
Jungkook scans the room quickly, carefully. He doesn't see a single face he recognizes - and certainly not one that he's made a fool of himself in front of. "No."
Taehyung makes a noise of disappointment. "Let's just order something and wait then," he decides.
They each buy a drink and go over to a table in the shop corner, ideal for spying on people while remaining undetected. Jungkook stirs his coffee but doesn't drink it, because once he drinks it he'll have to leave, and that would ruin the entire point of being here.
They wait. Nothing happens.
Taehyung, for his part, seems to be enjoying himself. He's watching everyone in the room quietly, carefully, and is actually so inconspicuous about the whole thing that Jungkook is worried he's a secret agent in disguise. No one notices him watching them even once. It's like he's not even there.
Jungkook, on the other hand, stares a bit too openly. Finally he settles for dropping his head to the table and staring vacantly into thin air.
He wonders, not for the first time that day, why it's Taehyung who's here with him and not Jimin.
"Oh, cool," Taehyung says suddenly. "It's Namjoon hyung."
Jungkook blinks and grunts in affirmation - though he doesn't actually know who that is. He's heard his name brought up in conversations before, but he's never met the guy. He finally pushes himself up to see where Taehyung is looking and then - his blood runs cold.
"Shit," he says, stomach sinking.
Taehyung doesn't seem to hear him. He's waving at the older man excitedly and Jungkook panics, because he knows that face. Apparently it's Namjoon. All Jungkook knows him as is not Kim Seokjin.
"Hyung," he tries urgently. "Hyung - he's the one I - "
Namjoon chooses that moment to spot them and respond with his own friendly wave, and - he doesn't recognize Jungkook yet, thankfully. But then he's getting up to join them at the table, excusing himself from his friends, and Jungkook does the rational thing.
He pulls his hood over his head and ducks under the table.
He'll just pretend he's tying his shoes. Forever. Till the day he dies. Which might be sooner than he thinks.
"Hyung!" he hears Taehyung say. "I never see you around here."
"It's a nice place," Namjoon says. "The coffee is good too. I haven't been here in a while because - well, I've been a bit on the lookout, but the coffee is too good to not come back to."
Under the table, Jungkook feels his face burn.
"Lookout?" Taehyung asks, confused. "For?"
"Ah, that's an interesting story actually - " there's an awkward pause. Jungkook doesn't know what's happened until -
"Jungkook?" Taehyung calls. "What are you doing?"
"Tying my shoelaces," Jungkook says.
There's another awkward silence. "Okay?" Taehyung says, doubtful. "What's the story hyung?" he asks Namjoon again.
"There was this kid," Namjoon starts, and Jungkook feels his stomach sink. He needs to get out of here somehow. "He thought I was one of my friends and jumped up and insisted on fighting me? Then my friend appeared and he ran away."
There's a terrible silence again.
"By any chance," Taehyung says, sounding both done with his life and morbidly fascinated at the same time, "Was this friend Kim Seokjin?"
Jungkook hits his head against the table leg. It's a terrible idea.
"You know Seokjin hyung?" Namjoon asks, surprised.
"I don't," Taehyung says cheerfully. Too cheerfully. "But we're here today to fight him again. Right, Jungkookie?"
Jungkook hates his life.
/
Namjoon isn't a bad person, really.
In fact he's really really nice. He doesn't judge Jungkook at all, even when Jungkook meets him at Jimin's apartment and ends up dumping his entire collection of fortunes in Namjoon's lap.
And, well - he has a lot. From when he was seven years old till last week at a weighing machine near the theatre, plus all the screenshots of all the websites he's tried it on. Namjoon sifts through it all with the fascination of a scientist and decides that if he was Jungkook, he might have gone a bit insane too.
And then he does the last thing Jungkook expected him to do - he offers to introduce him to Seokjin.
"He's a nice guy," Namjoon says, while Jungkook stares at him like he's grown a second head. "A bit hard to get to know, but he's a good person."
"Someone told me he was a jerk."
"I mean," Namjoon looks conflicted. "He can be. But aren't we all?"
Jimin tells him later that it's a good idea, that meeting Seokjin will help him 'get it off his chest'. Taehyung says that he'll watch his back in case Seokjin tries anything funny, even though he trusts Namjoon with his life. In the end, Jungkook agrees, if only because he's getting sick of stalking the coffee shop and pretending that he has a life.
Of course, nothing ever works out the way it's supposed to - except for all the bad things - so the whole plan ends up not happening at all.
Jungkook has had a long, terrible day, with about three hundred lectures and five hundred reasons to die, and by the end of it all he just wants to sleep for three years and he barely remembers his arch nemesis even exists. He pushes the button for his dorm elevator tiredly. No one understands why their elevator is so slow. Or why it makes such weird noises. No one has dared to ask because that would mean maintenance, and they all know that maintenance means that the thing will never be repaired and that they'll be stuck without an elevator forever.
A faulty elevator is better than a dead one, is the collective decision. The funny thing is that none of them even talked about this - it's just something they all know.
When the doors finally open Jungkook slips inside, pressing his floor and leaning against the wall. He could sleep here, even. The elevator music is soft and addictive, and it could lull him to sleep. Anything could lull him to sleep.
The door pings and he blinks, thinking it's his floor - but it's only the first floor. Someone must have pressed it. Sure enough, the door opens and someone steps in, hitting a different number.
Jungkook sinks back against the wall. He wants sleep, so much.
"Still want a fight?" a voice says next to him, and - Jungkook jerks up.
There, leaning against the elevator wall, the slightest hint of amusement in his eyes - is Kim Seokjin.
/