Chapter Text
The rain falls as if the sky is in mourning.
Purple and red lights intertwine like serpents on the dance floor. They make Taehyung’s head spin and twist with visual pleasure.
His black shirt is open down to his chest, a silver earring gleaming in the neon glow. He holds a drink in one hand and a stranger’s waist in the other. He’s so high that his body no longer responds properly—it moves on instinct. The stranger touches him, and his body reacts. He moans, arches, responds.
"Like an animal," Jimin had once said, laughing, never realizing how deeply that phrase would embed itself under Taehyung’s skin.
A tongue brushes his neck. Taehyung doesn’t flinch. He feels everything and nothing at the same time. A jolt of electricity that doesn’t excite him, but distracts him. Keeps him away from his own head.
The sensual haze forming in his mind is shattered by a crash that slices through the air. Tae, still nestled in the stranger’s shoulder, growls at the interruption. He turns violently—and horror clears every trace of drug in his system in an instant.
Jimin’s slender legs dangle a few inches above the ground. A massive man holds him by the throat, lifting him like he weighs nothing. Jimin’s face, normally full of life and warmth, is now twisted—blood at the corner of his mouth, tears down his cheeks, eyes wide from lack of oxygen.
“What the fuck?”
Taehyung reacts as naturally as he breathes. He doesn’t think twice—doesn’t think at all.
He shoves the stranger he was dancing with aside and rushes toward the nightmarish scene. The neuron meant to stop him from doing something insane is clearly offline, dulled by drugs. What comes next is straight out of a film.
He grabs the buckle of his belt—the one that keeps his pants from falling—and charges at the man holding Jimin (not in the way Jimin might enjoy). Still not thinking. He leaps. Doesn’t aim. Just lets the buckle pierce through flesh, bone, and horror.
The stranger howls and drops Jimin. Taehyung grabs his friend’s hand as he gasps for air and drags him through the crowd, disappearing into the chaos, searching for the nearest exit.
They finally stop outside. Jimin coughs. Gags. A trickle of blood. Then air.
Taehyung exhales the breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.
“You always have to make everything so dramatic,” Jimin rasps, trying to smile.
Taehyung hugs him tightly, knuckles bleeding, heart pounding in his temples.
And for the first time in a long while, he doesn’t know if he’s more high…
or more awake than ever.
---
Going into another bar might not be the brightest idea, but Jimin’s hurt and Taehyung is far too strung out to think straight.
“How the fuck did this happen?”
“I swear I thought the guy just wanted to dance,” the blonde defends himself. “He was all over me.”
Tae sighs. He needs to clean the small but visible wounds on Jimin’s neck. In the chaos of escape, it’s Jimin who leads them into a place—a tiny, hidden bar at the end of the street that looks like the basement of a brothel.
Rational thought tries to kick in, but Tae’s still too high and too wired to offer anything useful.
When they push open the door, the scene that greets them is not what Jimin expected. People in suits. Women with barely any clothes. The scent of expensive perfume. And too much silence for such a sleazy joint.
Taehyung blinks several times, trying to force his mind through the fog to take in the details. He grabs Jimin’s arm and walks through the tables like he hasn’t just stabbed a stranger. Like his knuckles aren’t bloodied. Like his shirt isn’t soaked in sweat.
“I think we just walked into a fucking private club,” Jimin mutters, swallowing thickly, hand pressed to his neck.
“It has alcohol. It has ice. It has seats,” Tae replies, as if that’s reason enough to stay. He collapses onto the nearest sofa.
Jimin’s about to argue when a figure materializes in front of them.
“You okay, kid?” says a deep, rough voice. It’s the bartender. His shoulders are broader than Tae’s life expectancy.
Tae gives a thumbs-up.
“Two glasses of ice. Just ice,” he adds with a crooked smile. Jimin laughs despite everything.
Jimin stumbles to the edge of the couch, trying not to wince every time he swallows. The wound on his neck isn’t deep, but it burns like fire under his skin. Beside him, Taehyung clumsily digs through his pockets until he finds something vaguely helpful: a wrinkled handkerchief—maybe dirty, maybe not. He shakes it out and presses it to Jimin’s neck without a second thought.
“Ouch! You bastard—does this have perfume?!” Jimin hisses, pulling away.
“Doesn’t smell bad,” Tae says seriously, eyes still slightly wild.
“You’re such an idiot!” Jimin croaks.
“But it numbs the sting, right?” Tae insists, cradling his friend’s head like some makeshift nurse. His movements are clumsy, careless—but there’s genuine tenderness in the way he touches him.
From the bar, Seokjin watches in silence. His hands are busy polishing a glass, but his eyes—sharp, experienced—are locked onto them.
Not out of annoyance.
Out of concern.
“You sure you don’t need a hospital?” he finally asks, walking over with confident steps.
“You a doctor?” Jimin croaks.
“Studied three years of med school before becoming a bartender. Enough to diagnose idiots,” Jin replies, setting a glass of ice in front of them.
“Then help,” Taehyung says, pointing at Jimin’s neck. “You don’t know what went down. It was like a Tarantino movie. But without the soundtrack.”
Seokjin raises an eyebrow.
“What the hell did you take?”
“I don’t know. A little of everything. Something green. Something pink. I think someone offered me mint.”
“Mint?”
“But it was liquid.”
Jimin laughs through a cough.
“I really thought the guy just wanted to dance,” he says, looking down. “He followed me into the bathroom, started kissing me... then just grabbed my neck like I was some toy.”
Jin looks away, leaning on the counter. He looks pissed—but not at them. At what this implies. At how it probably isn’t the first time he’s heard something like this. His eyes harden for a second, then he forces himself to breathe.
“This place isn’t for you, kids.”
“Neither was the last one,” Tae mutters.
“So what’s the plan?” Jin asks.
“Wait for the shock to pass. And the drugs. In that order,” Jimin answers, pressing an ice cube to his throat.
Jin nods in silence. He heads back to the bar, rummaging through a drawer. When he returns, he places a small first-aid kit on the table.
“It’s not a hospital. But I’m not just a bartender either,” he says with a strange laugh.
The kit has barely touched the table when the back door creaks open.
Seokjin stiffens, eyes locked on Taehyung’s clumsy movements.
The murmurs fade. The girls straighten. The suited men move aside like a storm has just entered the room.
Taehyung doesn’t see him at first. He just feels the air shift—heavier, darker. Like someone turned the world off.
“The boss is here,” Jin murmurs.
A man emerges from the shadows, coat soaked from the rain, walking like he owns fucking hell. Raindrops trail down his jaw, over his tattooed neck, past the scar peeking from his left brow.
His eyes meet Seokjin’s. That’s all it takes.
“What the fuck is this?” he asks, low and cold enough to make the ice tremble in their glass.
Seokjin sighs, wiping his hands on his apron.
“Two injured kids. One clearly high.”
The man looks at Taehyung.
Half-slumped on the couch. Shirt open. Chest rising and falling fast. Lips parted. A mess. A beautiful, recklessly stupid mess.
Taehyung looks up.
And for the first time, his body reacts differently.
Not out of fear.
Out of desire.
And like the masochist he is, he smirks.
“Who the fuck are you? The pimp of this dump?”
The man doesn’t respond.
He walks right up to him.
Leans down.
Grabs his face with one hand, forcing him to look up.
“Do you even know where you’re standing, pretty boy?”
“Clearly not,” Taehyung grins—and with a slick motion, drags his tongue lasciviously across the man’s palm, staring him down without blinking. “And you?”