Taehyung shakes out his hair with the slight messy part. There is something about it that he likes. He wraps his fingers around the black box that held gifted rifle as he pushes into the training room.

Seungri had said to bring it today, and Taehyung knows that today’s training would be rough.

Watermelon and Seunghyun are sleeping on the couch in the corner of the large training room, balanced against each other with her head on his shoulder, and his head on hers. Seungri jumps across the two, landing on their lap.

Watermelon wakes up, startled and looks down, seeing Seungri comfortable and his head in her lap. She pushes him off without a second thought, pulling her head out from under Seunghyun’s, making Seunghyun wake up too.

She stands up, blinking, and Taehyung realizes that she is dressed for work. Her black, long-sleeved crop top barely overlaps with her joggers that tuck into her combat boots. Her dark red hair frames her face, weighed down by a baseball hat. Her sleepy and blinking eyes peek out from underneath.

She yawns under mask. “Is it me, or did you get uglier, Min Yoongi?”

Yoongi snarls back at her, fresh blonde hair falling into his eyes, “You must have gotten blinder, Kumquat.”

“Watermelon!”

No one listens to Namjoon’s correction.

The edges of her eyes crinkle, giving away that she was joking. Her eyes shift, and suddenly she’s looking back at Taehyung. Something in her eyes change, and she stands up, breaking eye contact and picking up a box next to her.

“Seungri, are you driving, or am I?”

“Best I drive. Blindfold him,” Seungri nods towards Taehyung, who takes a step back. He wasn’t sure that he trusted being around Big Bang without the rest of Bangtan there.

Namjoon apparently had the same idea, and he steps forward, murmuring in hushed tones to Jiyong, who had been quiet until now. Their quiet exchange barely lasts for thirty seconds before Namjoon nods.

A blindfold covers Taehyung’s eyes, and he pulls at it, not comfortable with the idea. But then gentle fingers wrap around his, pulling his hand along with a whispered, “Come on.”

Taehyung follows without protest as she carefully leads him around corners, pushes him into a car, and waits for him to buckle the seatbelt before telling Seungri to drive.

At first, Taehyung counts the turns and tries to estimate the direction, but it becomes too much to try to figure out. He gives up, settling against the seat and listening to the banter between the girl and Seungri.

“So about your mission the other day-”

“We can’t talk about it with him in the car. Rules, remember?” Her low voice makes him think that it was something important.

Seungri exhales, “One day you’re going to get yourself killed.”

“Better than letting me sit as a stranded duckling.” She murmurs quietly. “You know very well that within half a year…”

Her voice trails off, leaving Taehyung full of questions. He focuses, staying perfectly still so he could hear the conversation.

“You won’t.” Seungri’s voice hardens.

“We’re not talking about this right now.”

“If not now, then when? You keep running away from this. So you won’t. Not in half a year, not any time soon.”

She sighs. “I will. And I’m not sure that you can prevent that.”

He pauses, “Jiyong and Seunghyun will cry for months.”

“Taeyang will cry the most. I know under all of that snooty attitude he loves me.”

“Make sure you don’t go down without a fight.” His tone is resigned and almost choked.

“Okay.” She sounds tired herself, as if she’s ready to call it quit. But there’s a waver in her disguised voice. “If you find my body, put it next to his.”

“Why aren’t you afraid?”

“I’ve overstepped my due date too many times. It was only a matter of time before the reaper came for me.”

The two fall into silence, and something in Taehyung’s heart sinks. A part of him wanted to start opening up to the girl to try to get more information about her identity, but hearing her serious tone made him realize something. Up until now, he had seen her fighting, teasing, alive. But he never saw her broken.

That’s how she sounds under all of that bravado and bluntness. Broken. Just like everyone else in the gang world.

The car stops, and the doors shut. Taehyung struggles with the belt, unclasping it, and getting out with his black box at his side.

Gentle fingers undo the knot of the blindfold, and the black fabric drops away to reveal her shielded eyes. If she had sounded sad and broken in the car, she doesn’t look like it now. The sides of her eyes are crinkled, hinting at her smile, and she backs away, spreading out her arms.

“Welcome, to the range.” She tilts her head back towards him, eyes lit up, as Seungri walks towards the targets. “By the way, I like your new hair.”

Suddenly, Taehyung feels like he's going to keep his hair black for a long time.
 

A hundred meters away from the target, Shira sits behind her assembled rifle as Taehyung tries to put it together for the first time. She offers no advice, since he would have to figure it out by himself eventually, and he doesn’t bother asking for any.

Seungri is adjusting the targets. They would have to zero the rifles first, and then try to figure out how quickly Taehyung would be able to grasp the weapon.

Shira watches with soft eyes. It had been years since she had picked up her first sniper rifle. The sight takes her back to memories that were now painful.