CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

The darkness pressed in like a weighted blanket wrapped around one's neck; it was smothering and the silence only made it worse. The place suffocated the life out of anyone, even the tiniest bit of what was left of it for the singular prisoner held captive in the Ministry dungeons. But, in truth, the almost unbearable darkness and the foreboding silence was the least of the prisoner's concerns.

He was used to it by now, after siting idly by for days on end until he lost track of time and couldn't even pinpoint what day of the week it was. 

He sat there in bated breath, waiting for the final blow; for the darkness to consume and swallow him whole, for the end that he had waited for so long to finally come. 

How long had it been since the near-escape? Since Nayeon had so impulsively and stupidly carried out an order from the Dark Lord without an preparations of any sort? If Nayeon weren't dead, then it would have been better if she was. Death would be the less painful option than suffering for an eternity under the thumb of the Dark Lord. 

(Eternity... or what's left of the remaining days of the war if the Aurors would get their together.)

Taehyung would know because he's lived through it once and never again will he succumb to such torment. The things he had experienced while under the cruelty of Voldemort is something he wouldn't wish even on his worst enemy. 

The jet-black walls of the dungeon was cool to the touch but moist, sticky even, and it smelled like piss and sewage water in here. Regardless, he leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes, conjuring her face from the back of his mind as how he often would whenever he had the opportunity to spend a moment of peace and recluse. 

He used to picture her smiling at him, because somehow it would ease the guilt and the heaviness that settled in his chest. There were times he felt that it was sort of selfish of him to think of her like that, for her to be smiling so brightly at him when he ruined her. But he can't help it, her face had always brought him comfort and calm, even it was fictional. A fictional image of her that existed only in his mind.

But after having seen her in the past week, almost always in battle and with her wand aimed at his face, all he can see now is her frown of disappointment permanently etched onto her features whenever she saw him. 

Taehyung opened his eyes and heaved a sigh, loud enough that it filled his cell but low enough that the remaining guards in the dungeon couldn't hear it over the incoming footsteps echoing from the staircase.

In the shadows, Taehyung sat on the ground, quietly assessing the situation of the frantic-looking Aurors that had just descended. He shamelessly started eavesdropping on their conversation as he watched them with narrowed eyes. 

"She's not here," came a familiar voice from one of the Aurors that Taehyung frequently encountered before, usually when he was in an Imperiused state. 

She looks at his figure sitting from behind bars, eyes scanning over his obscured face before turning back to the others with pursed lips. "Jisoo's not here." 

Jisoo, Taehyung thinks of her name when he hears her mention it. He spells out the letters in his head while turning his engagement ring around his finger and his jaw clenches.

Hearing Kang Seulgi's voice in the battlefield always sounded like she was shouting at him underwater, perhaps because his consciousness takes a back seat whenever the Dark Lord decides to use him like a puppet for his raids. But now, he can hear her crystal clear. It's an almost surreal feeling to be hearing her's and everyone's crisp voices after being underwater for so long, so to say. 

"I haven't seen her since she was being patched up, and that was what? Like over three hours ago?" Another of the Aurors chimes in. 

Taehyung remains tucked away in the dark, but he continues to stare at the group of Aurors that have arrived. There were four of the, two men and two women. Taehyung knows the other one is the Head, Park Jinyoung, and the one beside him is Seulgi, one of the more skilled Aurors they often send out to stop the Death Eaters' and their plans. She's also the one Taehyung has had the pleasure of meeting on multiple occasions, usually they're always at the end of each other's wands like how it's been with Jisoo the past couple of days. 

"Hoseok, were you the one who treated her?" Jinyoung turns to the other male Auror. 

He shakes his head. "Nah, I was on clean-up duty. I think it was Jungkook patched her up." 

"Come to think of it," the girl beside Seulgi taps her chin thoughtfully. "I haven't seen Kookie since the incident as well. Could it be they're together?"

The three of them looked at Seulgi, who was chewing her lower lip with a concerned expression. "It's not like either Jisoo or Jungkook to just disappear or leave the Ministry grounds without informing either me or Jinyoung." Seulgi says, but the concern continues to peek through the tough exterior she tries hard to project to the rest of the team. 

Taehyung's ears perked at the mention of one of the names they had uttered. Not Jisoo's, but the other one, Jungkook.

It was the name Nayeon mentioned earlier, when she was busy dragging Taehyung through the bodies of the unconscious guards and towards the stairs that led out of the dungeon and to their escape. 

"We run through the main lobby to the nearest Floo network. Another one of the spies, Jungkook, will be joining us during the run so we better hurry. He's already waiting for the signal." 

Taehyung feels his eyebrows furrow. Under what context were the Aurors mentioning his name for? And mentioning him in the same sentence as Jisoo's? He didn't know all the details yet, and he sure as hell didn't know what they were talking about, but Taehyung could already sense that it wasn't something good. Add to the fact that both of them were presumably missing and nowhere in sight. 

"Where's Jisoo?" 

Just as the four Aurors were about to head back up after finding out that Jisoo was not in the dungeons as they had hoped, they were stopped in their tracks by a deep voice coming from behind.

The other girl was the first to look back, glaring at him with all the hatred and loathing she could muster. "Why do you care?" She spat. 

Taehyung ignored her, directing his question at the two Aurors with the most authority among the others. At his meaningful gaze, Jinyoung and Seulgi exchanged glances. 

They didn't reply right away, perhaps because it was the first time Taehyung ever really said anything directly towards them since he was captured. He only ever talked to Jisoo. Even during Jinyoung's interrogation, Taehyung never initiated the conversation nor did he make an effort to go beyond one-word replies if he could help it. It was the first time they heard his voice, his real voice without any deadly curses tampering his consciousness, in years. 

"Where is Jisoo?" He repeats, a silver of urgency leaking out of his voice when they don't answer him with the reply he knows they will give. If she's really with that Jungkook fellow... then things were going to get messy. 

Seulgi turned to face him completely, frowning as she quietly debated in her head if she should talk to him or not. After exchanging another look with Jinyoung, she opens before she could think over it again, before the rational side of her being an Auror could take over. "We're... not sure. Why? Do you want to talk to her?" 

Taehyung had come out of the shadows and was standing directly behind the bars of his prison cell, looking at them standing cautiously a few feet away from him. They all had their guards up, as if anticipating his strike at any moment. 

They're clearly not the brightest bunch because why in Merlin would they allow him to be in a dungeon cell again with only a measly chain around his right foot to restrict his movements, after almost escaping from the same cell not less than three hours ago? Perhaps the Ministry was just bankrupt; out of wands and out of money for a new and better holding facility. 

Or, you know, perhaps they were just plain stupid. It would explain why this war dragged on for so long. 

"No, it just sounded like you don't know where the hell she is." He was looking at them like they were idiots. How could they have lost track of their best Auror? In the middle of all that chaos, they were caught off-guard and were embarrassingly unprepared, which goes to show how the Ministry folks are amateurs just like what the other Death Eaters tauntingly said over feasts at the Kim's Manor. It's a miracle they even lasted this long into the war. 

"Again, why do you care?" The other girl reiterated. He's seen her before in some of their collisions but didn't care enough to know her name. "Weren't you the one who was trying to kill her this past week? On top of threats and claiming you killed her parents and best friend? Your concern for her whereabouts right now is giving... manipulative and desperate ex." 

Taehyung rolled his eyes, her words bouncing off of him like harmless cotton balls. She didn't understand, none of them did. The events that had transpired in the past few days between Taehyung and Jisoo were the result of bad decisions and their ill-fated destinies, something Taehyung has learned recently not to meddle with at this point because look at where they were now; her locking him up in a cell as he awaited his trial. He didn't mean for any of this to happen and it was never his intention to hurt Jisoo this bad. He endured all of the mental, physical, and emotional abuse while in the Dark Lord's command just to keep his family and Jisoo safe. 

But all of his sacrifices meant nothing. The Dark Lord slaughtered his parents, his relatives, and he's sure he'll do the same thing to Jisoo. 

It was all his fault. Since the very beginning. He should have never gotten close with her, never fall in love with her when they were still students in Hogwarts (a memory that seemed like an entire lifetime ago). The two of them quite literally belong in two different worlds, her being muggle-born and him being a pure-blooded git who had hurt her a hundred times over. 

How,ever in spite of those differences and their complicated history of entanglement, Taehyung and Jisoo did share one thing in common and it's the fact they both lost everything to this war. Their determination to end it, or at least Taehyung's determination to end his own life the "right" way through fair trial, also somewhat coincide. And it's in these shared goals and shared pains that Taehyung feels like the two of them aren't that different after all. Not really. 

And with all things considered, with the silver band still encircled around his finger, a part of Taehyung, a part that's not broken or twisted or corrupted, still loved her. A part of him that's pure and untainted, no matter how microscopic, yearned for her even after all this time and after everything had had occurred. 

But he knows Jisoo will never take him back after putting her through so much hell. 

Still, that won't stop him from saving her. "You have to let me out." Taehyung tells them, eyes sharp and voice firm. It was only to cover the panic he felt rising inside his chest at the thought of Jisoo captured. It was a rather foreign feeling to have after so long. "If —"

The other guy, Hoseok as Jinyoung had called them, actually burst out laughing at his statement and had rudely cut him off. He hunched forward and wiped a non-existent tear from the corner of his eye as he laughed. The other three didn't look so amused, their stances tensing and becoming more alert at his words. "Oh, man, nobody told me you were a comedian. I'd say that's about the funniest thing you've said in your entire life." 

Taehyung glared at him, but the Auror seemed to be unfazed. At his current state, locked up and chained in the same clothes he's been wearing for three days now, his threats were harmless. 

"Hoseok, enough." Jinyoung utters in a commanding voice, sending a pointed look at the other Auror's way. 

He immediately dropped his smile and shrunk back behind his superior. Taehyung would have smirked smugly, but he was more preoccupied with the fact that Jisoo was still missing and that she was with a Death Eater. 

Which could only mean one thing. 

"Jisoo's been captured." He informs them. "If she's with that Jungkook guy, chances are he's taken her to the Dark Lord. He's been asking for her capture, the same way you have been asking for mine, ever since you brought her back into the scene."

Shock colors Seulgi's face but Jinyoung and the other girl remain skeptical of his words, feeling unable to trust him. As Jinyoung was about to open his mouth and speak, Taehyung stepped forward until his chest was pressed against the steel, enchanted bars of the prison cell and the chain enclosed around his ankle strained against the distance.

"Listen to me," he said, his voice low. All the guards in the dungeon, all six of them, straightened their backs and casted a sideway glance to his direction, waiting to pounce on him if he ever tried something. "Nayeon mentioned that the Dark Lord was gathering all his followers today. That's why she waited until today to blow her cover and risk getting me out. Jungkook is the other spy that the Dark Lord planted. I didn't know until today, when Nayeon mentioned his name. If the Dark Lord is gathering everyone, then that means Jungkook is there with Jisoo and he's finally going through with the last phase of his plan, which is going to be bad for all of you. He's going to destroy this country before he moves on and destroy the entire world." 

Silence followed right after he spoke. It was the bad kind where nobody knew how to break it, where his words hung in the air, heavy and terrifying. They were speechless, at a loss for words, but Taehyung could still sense the mistrust and cautiousness they practically radiated towards him. 

Taehyung turned to Jinyoung and gave him a hard, cold stare. "Look, get inside my mind for all I care. You'll see that what I'm saying is true." 

Jinyoung hesitated but he tentatively took a step forward before Seulgi had extended her arm to block him. "Jinyoung, you can't be serious. You're recovering from poison and what he's saying is not... it's not worth it."

There. A hint of doubt, a trickle of second-guessing. It's all Taehyung needed to convince them that he was telling the truth. He didn't joke or lie when it came to Jisoo's safety. She was, and still is, his number one priority. And right now, with his parents and nearly half of his family gone and his only true friend still stuck in other side, she was the only one he had left to protect. 

"You're lying." Jinyoung stood face to face with Taehyung, the only thing keeping them apart were the bars to his prison cell. "I would have known if Jungkook or Nayeon were spies w