Serendipity {Vmin}

14. The traitor

Recommended song: BTS - Don't Leave Me (Piano Cover by Smyang Piano)

Jungkook sat with a stolen phone in his hand in one of the hidden little places in the basement, which was mostly used to keep unnecessary stuff that got thrown there. At other times, the wooden door wasn’t even opened, since the room was practically a small hole that no one ever looked into, but even if someone would’ve found him there it wouldn’t be a problem. Not like he wasn’t allowed to get away somewhere. He wasn’t hiding. At least not in theory. Practically, on the phone – which he had to give to one of the men at the end of the day anyway who they send for the stuff and money they collected – more than twelve games were downloaded, and of course he shouldn’t have left it on as police could track the phone down, yet Jungkook couldn’t stop himself from trying all the apps out. He couldn’t own a phone because it could’ve taken him closer to the outside word, so he could only try out games on stolen mobiles.

These days a zombie game was his favorite; however, it was hard to figure out who owned that particular app. And it wasn’t the smartest move to use internet if a stolen phone was in one’s hand. So Jungkook mostly stole from boys his age. Not only because the zombie and shooting games, but because maybe the other kids feared their parent’s rage too much to tell them immediately: they successfully lost their expensive phones.

Jungkook constated with a happy grin: his game was there! He quickly opened the app, and while it loaded the boy tried to get comfortable in the dark room between a bunch of useless stuff. After he successfully made himself a seat of torn clothes and a backpack, he took the smartphone back in his hand and excitedly began to set his preferences for the game.

Outside on the metal stairs sharp yet relatively soft knocks began, which could only mean one thing: Lisa arrived along her boots, which hit the iron hard at every step, but still didn’t make as much noise as any of the other adults – who, of course, were all men, and at least twice the size of the girl.
“Hoseok!” came Lisa’s voice not far from Jungkook’s hideout. “I want to talk with you.”
Jungkook raised his brows.
Lisa wanted to speak with Hoseok, and she didn’t say it like “Get your ass here because I have something to say” or “Hey, you, drag yourself here”. This wasn’t normal.
Forgetting his phone, the boy silently crawled closer to the door, looking for a crack on the old wooden surface that he could see through. Eventually, he found a small hole at the joint of the wall and the door, which served the purpose.

Lisa stood a few steps away from him, at the end of the stairs. The girl’s messy-braided blonde hair lay wet on her face, and her boots were muddy due to the rain outside, from which Jungkook also fled back to the Estate.
Hoseok finally reached the girl, with a broom still in his hand. The leader usually busied himself like that when he had nothing to do. Lisa only nodded towards the same-aged boy and dragged him away from the curious eyes. Right towards Jungkook.

The fourteen-year-old pulled back a little from the hole while the two elders looked towards him, then when he heard their whispers, he leaned his forehead back to the door.
‘What happened?” Hoseok’s worried whisper had just filtered through the walls.
Lisa remained silent for a moment, and despite the semi-darkness, Jungkook could still see that the girl was standing in front of the leader with her brows furrowed.
“I saw Jimin.”
“What?! Where?!” shouted Hoseok, in the same time as Jungkook’s breath got caught, and he almost yelled too. Jimin was in Seoul? How could that be? How come they haven’t caught him then? And anyway, what was he still doing there?! If once he decided to escape, if not abroad since he didn’t have a passport, but at least he should have gone to a different city to hide, not stay in front of the gangsters’ nose!
“Quieter you idiot! You don’t want anyone to know, right?” hissed the girl irritably, and combed her hair with her hand.
“So, where is he?” held back his voice the boy.
“I saw him in front of Lotte World. He was with another boy. He got his hair dyed and he was wearing branded clothes.”
“Seriously?”
“Yes. They fell with bikes, so I could see the rent-number on them, and I may have accidentally peeked into the record at the renter… “
“And…?”
“The boy’s name is Kim Taehyung. I went into a net-cafe, but the Naver only showed that the boy builds robots and wins competitions with them. Nothing else.”
“Do you think he found his real family?” furrowed his brows the leader, only earning a shrug from Lisa.
“I still have something else.”
Hoseok glanced at the girl with a troubled look.
“Jimin… Didn’t recognize me. Or at least he pretended not to. But when he saw me, I didn’t see in his eyes that he would have any idea about who I was.”