Yoongi has his headphones on, familiar music pumping through his ears as he makes his way back to the dorm.  He hooks his blazer behind his back and keeps his eyes forward as the buggy drives him through the streets and lanes. The sun casts a shadow that follows him at his side, and on the grey gravel road lay his black form, except that the shadow seemed a lot more hunched and tired. Under the falling sun, even his facade was exposed, no matter how hard he tried to conceal it.

He’s lost count of the number of nights he’d stayed up, just gathering as much information as he could about Natalie. When he confronts her, he  intended to bury her in so much information that she’d have no choice but to admit to his allegations. The thing is about digging for information is that it isn’t all that easy, and gave him more of a headache than relief.

Honestly, it probably would’ve been so much easier to ask his mother what she remembered of the girl, and pick up from there. She probably knew more than he did at this point. Except that it’s been years since he last spoke to his mother. She was never the same after that day, and Yoongi was always afraid that he’d say the wrong thing and everything would come flooding back.

He didn’t want to be the second man to break her.

Yoongi had made sure to get a copy of Natalie’s file when he broke through the police office firewall back when he was fifteen, but he realised that even the police knew little about the people they were protecting. Insignificant certificates and achievements littered the internet, and gave away little about her identity. It was completely clean. Nothing out of the ordinary, and almost as if she spent her life doing nothing. It was just too convenient. It should’ve deterred him, being faced with endless dead ends, but really it just proved that she had things to hide. And he was determined to find out just what that was. So he dug deeper, beyond the surface of the web, and broke the layer that held the bank of information most people didn’t even know existed; he had wandered his way into the deep web.

He pulled up a search engine within the space, and entered Natalie Burg. The only thing that turned up was a lone document about a substance abuse incarceration lasting two days at the station before bail. He thought it was weird for someone to be freed so quickly after being taken in for the act. It would’ve required a ton of money, power and even then he wasn’t sure that was enough. But he brushed it off, settling on the possibility that the woman just had money to burn and a very powerful lawyer.

It was a plain arrest warrant, with no picture of the individual except a pretty vague description of the woman. But anyone could just change the way they look with some surgery, contacts and a dye job, so it didn’t help at all. He was too caught up in the details that he failed to see the simplest, most important clue; the state. And when he did, he knew he had the right person. Right on the top in the left corner was a stamp of the location, Sacramento County Superior Court.

Sacramento.

The city he lived in as a kid.

The city his father was found dead at.

His eyes then swept over the document once more, checking every single inch of it for any more details. The date, that’s the only thing left that would validate his thoughts. Somehow, deep within the recesses of his mind, he hoped that it wouldn’t. He’d come so far all these years, to get to the one place where he could finally lay his ghosts to rest, but the small boy from his past wanted nothing but to pretend nothing ever happened and go back to leading a fairly ordinary life. Yoongi, a small part of him anyway, wanted to reject the thought of a lady working at Northlyn being the cause of his father’s death. He just didn’t know what he’d do if it were true, what his next action would be if it turns out that Natalie Burg was indeed behind the murder of his father.

So when he placed his sight on the officer’s scrawly writing, he felt his stomach drop and the sudden urge to hurl.

30th July, 1999. Just a few days after the date printed on his father’s death certificate. Location and a motive.

The car comes to a halt, and the suited man in the front of the buggy turns to face him as if to announce their arrival. Yoongi hops off the vehicle, but not before nodding a thanks at the aged employee. Yoongi may be a lot of things, but impolite is not one of them. As he nears the front door, the other pair of dress shoes catch his attention. He hasn’t had a decent conversation with his dorm mate as of yet because the other guy never seemed to be home when he was, or when he’s awake at least. He guesses the day had come for him to muster up all the strength to part his lips and speak.

It was no secret that Yoongi was a bit misanthropic. After all he’d been through, to only come out antisocial is a miracle. He kept to himself, and no one really knew who Min Yoongi was because he just wouldn’t talk to anyone. It wasn’t a wallflower that he was. It was as if he wasn’t even there, kind of like invisible air that lingered around. But it wasn’t his fault. He saw death and what it did to his mother, and he swears a part of him died that day as well.

Yoongi slides his card through the slit and the light turns green. The sounds of crashing and gunshots reach his ears from his inside, and he takes a deep breath before pushing the door open. What greets his eyes is the back of his dorm mate’s head, eyes religiously trained on the screen as the character on the sixty five inch television moved in the direction that his thumb commanded. Here goes conversing, Yoongi mumbles under his breath as he released his hold on the door, letting it close and lock which would definitely catch the other’s attention.

“Hey,” the other boy says without even turning, “You up for COD?” Yoongi doesn’t really know how to respond, because he’s not sure whether to be mad that the male didn’t have the decency to turn to look at him or to be relieved that he didn’t have to initiate the conversation. But he decides to go with the latter and places his messenger bag on the dining table before joining the boy on the couch.

He picks up the second controller and slumps down on the white furniture, subconsciously leaving a good cushion between them. The other boy loads the multiplayer option, and then they play in silence with nothing but the sound of gunshots and running boots filling the room. It was the first encounter Yoongi’s had that didn’t feel all that weird. In fact, he appreciated the second avenue of communication; killing each other’s characters.

It’s their second mission in that the other boy pauses the screen and turns to him quickly, as if he were bewildered. “You don’t know me?” Yoongi an eyebrow and tilts his head slightly, “Should I?” The face the boy makes is a mix of surprise and slight disappointment, at least that’s what Yoongi can make out anyways.

“Jeon Jungkook? No?” He tries again, and only to see the same look of disinterest. “Huh. That’s new.”

From what he’s seen, this Jungkook boy must be some big hotshot around school. Unfortunately for him, Yoongi paid no attention to the inner workings of Northlyn’s social hierarchy. He just needed to find the information and then he’d be out of there.

Yoongi just stares at the boy—Jungkook, he reminds himself, before stretching his hand out. “Yoongi.” He figures that tapping into Jungkook’s contacts and possible following could help him with his search. And it couldn’t hurt to be nice to his dorm mate, after all he can’t escape the boy when they live together.

He takes Yoongi’s hand and shakes it. “You don’t talk much, do you.” It wasn’t a question, so Yoongi decided he’d just nod.

“People aren’t really my thing.” Yoongi says monotonously, and somehow Jungkook cracks up at his statement. It’s more of a snigger, but it manages to crack through his smug mask and Yoongi sees the flash of a young boy who’d just grown up way too fast.

“That’s one way of putting antisocial. I’ll call for pizza?”

When Yoongi nods, he hears something ring which prompts Jungkook to slide his phone out from his pocket. Jungkook takes one look at the screen before setting the ringer on silent, tossing it behind him where it sinks into the gap between