“You just made a huge mistake.”

Soo Jung snapped her leg up, slamming her knee into the ribcage of the soldier with the gun to her head. He grunted from the sudden impact, his gun lowering away from her head. She ripped her arms out of the grips of the two soldiers beside her. She grabbed the gun and jumped behind the two that had been holding her arms, she snapped the of the gun to the back of their heads, the two of them crumpling to the ground from the force of the blow. The soldier that had just been disarmed raised his hands in surrender as she swung around to face him, the gun pointed directly at him. “Knees.” She snapped, her glare fierce as he dropped to his knees without a word. She stepped up beside him, flipping the gun around before hitting the back of his head, sending him to the ground beside his companions.

She turned to face Jungkook, horrified to see that Namjoon was holding a fistful of his hair, a gun placed at his temple. Namjoon grinned at her. “What happened to going without a fight?” he teased. Soo Jung eyed the gun in Namjoon's hand warily. One wrong move, and Jungkook would die. She slowly placed her gun onto the ground, her hands raised in front of her. “Kick it over.” Namjoon instructed. She straightened up and kicked the gun in Namjoon's direction. “Just let him go and I’ll go with you. You don’t need to hurt him.” She said, purposely not looking at Jungkook, she wasn’t sure she could control herself if she did.

Namjoon chuckled darkly as he moved the gun from Jungkook's temple and held it up towards her. “Soo Jung, no! You can’t do this!” Jungkook said, his voice full of fear of what would happen to her. She glanced down at him, giving him a sad, half smile. “I’m so sorry, Jungkook.” She said. “I’m sorry you had to get mixed up in my life.” Namjoon laughed as he released Jungkook's hair and stepped around him, slowly making his way towards Soo Jung. She kept her arms raised as he approached her. “Hands behind your back.” He said as he pulled two zip ties from his back pocket. “Make a move and lover boy over there gets one right between the eyes, got it?” he warned as he lowered his gun.

She took a deep breath as Namjoon stepped behind her. She let him tighten the first zip tie around her left wrist before she snapped her right elbow up, catching him on the nose. He cursed loudly, immediately whipping his gun back out. “Jungkook, RUN!” she screamed over her shoulder as she grabbed Namjoon's hand that held the gun, trying to wrestle it from him. Jungkook struggled to his feet, but he was too scared. His body didn’t feel like it was his own. His legs felt like they were made of lead as he watched Soo Jung battle Namjoon for the gun.

He flinched, his eyes screwing shut as the gun sounded twice. Both Namjoon and Soo Jung grunted. He slowly opened his eyes and turned to face them. Soo Jung was now holding the gun, while Namjoon held his bleeding shoulder, his broken nose forgotten about for the moment. “I’m not going to kill you.” She said, her tone cold. “Tell Malcolm that I will never go back to the Institute.” She said as she unloaded the gun and threw it behind her. “He’ll find you. He’ll make you go back.” Namjoon ground out, his teeth clenched from the pain. “I’d rather die.” She said as she turned to face Jungkook. “Let’s go.”

He stumbled after her, not looking back at Namjoon who spat out the blood from his mouth as they passed. Once they got out of the warehouse Soo Jung turned around and Jungkook froze. She stepped closer to him and he jumped backwards, trying to put as much space between them as possible. Her eyes softened. She could only imagine what he thought of her. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m just going to cut your restraints.” She said softly. “Will you let me do that?” she asked softly, too scared to move closer to him. The fear and confusion in his eyes was almost more than she could bear. He hesitantly nodded, holding his breath as she approached him. She cut the zip ties with a small pocket knife as quickly as she could before stepping away from him. His posture showed that he wasn’t comfortable being near her anymore. The thought was heart-breaking, but she forced it down.

She indicated to the car behind her. “Get in. I’ll take you back to the dorms or wherever you want to go.” He looked at the car, debating whether or not to get in. “I won't hurt you, Jungkook.” She said, feeling her chest constrict painfully. He opened his mouth to say something but shook his head and closed it again as he made his way to the passenger side. She slipped into the driver’s seat, noticing that he had all but pressed himself against his door, putting as much distance between them as was possible in the confines of the car.

She sighed as she started up the car and sped off, leaving the warehouse behind them. The car was deadly quiet as she drove. She wanted him to speak, to say anything to her, but she was also afraid of what he might say. When they were halfway back to the dorms he finally spoke. “Stop the car.” he said, his voice barely a whisper. “Jungkook we’re in the middle of-“

“I said stop the damn car!” he roared. She quickly pulled over and Jungkook threw himself out of the car. She bit her lip, terrified of what was about to happen. She slowly got out of the car and watched Jungkook as he paced back and forth in the light of the car’s headlights. “Jungkook…” she said softly and he spun to face her, his face showing a mix of emotions. Fear. Confusion. Anger. Disgust. She lowered her head, the tight feeling returning to her chest.

“What the just happened?” he asked as he resumed his pacing, unable to keep still. He felt like his nerves had been fried. “It’s complicated.” She said lamely. Jungkook turned to her again, she felt like she had been physically struck by his intense gaze. “I’m going to need a bit more than ‘it’s complicated’ Soo Jung.” He said angrily. “Is what Namjoon said true? Are you some kind of assassin?” he asked, desperately praying this this was all some kind of sick joke. She hung her head. “That’s what I was raised to be.”

Jungkook cursed loudly as he carded his hands through his hair. “But I was saved from that life a long time ago!” she added quickly. “My dad…”

“He’s not your dad.” Jungkook spat at her. She bit her lip again. Namjoon really had told him everything. “No… he’s not. When the Institute I was raised at shut down, he took me in. He raised me. Tried to let me lead as normal a life as possible.” He scoffed at her words. “By training you to kill people?” she narrowed her eyes at him, she would accept anything he had to say about her, but she wouldn’t let him say anything bad about Yoongi. “Yoongi is a good man. He was a soldier and he decided to take me in to save me from being put in a cell to rot and die.”

“Isn’t that what’s supposed to happen to a murderer?” he said, levelling his gaze with her. All the air left her lungs and she stumbled back a step. His eyes softened the tiniest amount at the look on her face. “I didn’t choose that life.” She said, her voice weak and small. “My mother sold me when I was a baby. I had no choice. I did what I had to do to survive. You have no idea what they did to me.” She said, her voice gaining strength as she poured out feelings that she had never shared with anyone, except for Yoongi. “They tortured me, beat me, starved me, experimented on me!” she shouted. “I was a baby. I was helpless and alone. I hated every minute of it. But what could I do?”

“You could have tried to get away.” Jungkook said, his anger slowly slipping away from her confession of the secrets that she had lived with her entire life. She let out a bitter laugh. “I tried. My first attempt I was around six years old. Do you know what they did to me when they caught up to me? For five days, they didn’t let me sleep or eat and gave me the barest amount of water to keep me alive. They made me fight with people more than double my age. Regardless of what injuries I had, I had to keep on fighting. When I fell down and couldn’t get back up they would Taser me. For a full five days. And that’s not even the worst of their punishments.”

“Stop.” Jungkook said, his voice a harsh whisper, his eyes clenched shut. She wanted to stop. She didn’t want Jungkook to know any more about how she was raised or the pain that she hidden in the deepest corner of her heart, but she couldn’t stop. “I’m so sorry that you had to find out about his part of me. I stupidly thought that I could hide it. You were my first real friend, Jungkook. I had given up hope of anyone ever accepting me, but you did. You were so kind to me and you didn’t have any ulterior motives. You were just kind.” She let out a laugh as an unfamiliar burn started behind her eyes. “I’m an idiot. I should have known better. There's no way someone like me could ever fit into your world.”

She took a few steps closer to him and he backed away, almost falling over in his hurry to keep the distance between them. The burn behind her eyes became stronger and she realised that she was on the verge of tears for the first time in years. “I’m so sorry. Please just try to forget what happened today. I promise that this is the last time you will ever see me or need to hear my name. Just pretend that I didn’t exist. That this was all just a horrible nightmare that you can wake up from. Let me fade from your memory and everything will go back to how it was before.”

She took a step back, taking a last chance to take in his features. Even with the blood running down from his eyebrow, he was still breathtakingly handsome. A sob made its way out of and she her heel and ran. Her tears blinded her as she ran. She knew she was miles away from home, but that didn’t bother her. She purposely left the main road so that when Jungkook drove the car past her he wouldn’t need to see her.

She ran down several side streets until the pain in her side became too much to handle. She slumped down the side of a building, tears pouring from her eyes. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” She muttered as she wiped away the tears. She winced as she sat up, pulling her jacket open to reveal her blood-soaked t-shirt. She muttered a curse at the gunshot wound in her side. She was certain that Jungkook hadn’t noticed her injury with everything that had happened to him. She laughed as she let her head fall back against the cold stone behind her. “Maybe it’s better this way. This way I’ll never be able to hurt anyone I love again.”