2
Third Person Pov
The office was silent.
Not calm... just silent. The kind of silence that comes before a storm breaks openn.
The kind that hums in your chest like static, loud in every corner of the room, even without a sound.
Jeon Corp’s main office was bathed in sterile, grey light. Outside, the city pulsed on...unaware or maybe uncaring of the chaos blooming inside its tallest tower.
Inside, however, something was unraveling.
Jungkook sat behind his desk, unmoving.
Back straight. Shoulders squared. Hands folded neatly on top of a glossy black folder that held nothing relevant anymore. His face gave nothing away.
Just… blank. Like the news flashing on the wall-mounted television didn’t matter. But it did.
The Jeon Corp logo rotated like a curse in the corner of the screen, anchored beneath a screaming headline:
“Anonymous Report Alleges Illegal Drug Trials... Jeon Medical Division Under Fire”
A news anchor’s voice played faintly in the background, weaving in and out of phrases like “patients used as test subjects” and “leaked documentation.”
There were grainy clips of hospital corridors. Blurred faces. Charts redacted in thick black lines. One woman sobbed on camera, clutching a photo of a child who hadn’t made it past a final round of trials.
They were accusing Jeon Corp of playing god.
Of funding unapproved, unethical medical experiments. There was no proof Jungkook had signed off on it.
But that didn’t matter. Not to the media.
Not to the people.
It didn’t matter that the hospital in question wasn’t even one of his reviewed sites. That he hadn’t touched those budgets, hadn’t seen those contracts.
He was the face. And the face is always what gets burned.
The tension cracked when Seokjin finally spoke. “We need to respond.”
His voice was rough not because he was uncertain, but because he’d already spent hours yelling at lawyers, PR teams, board members, and anyone else who wasn’t already running for the hills.
Jungkook didn’t respond. Seokjin stared at him for a second longer the way someone might look at a statue in a war zone and wonder what it’s still standing for.
“You didn’t even know about this,” he snapped, voice louder now. “You didn’t approve that project, didn’t sign a goddamn thing. That wasn’t you.”
Jungkook's eyes remained locked on the screen, where footage cut to black-and-white images of a press conference that hadn’t happened yet the kind of empty podium that waits for someone to admit guilt.
Seokjin ran a hand through his hair, exasperated.
“But that’s the problem, Jungkook. They think you did. They don’t care if you were innocent. You’re Jeon Corp. And right now? Jeon Corp is the villain.”
A beat passed. Jungkook leaned back in his chair. Head tilted against the leather cushion. The way he moved was too calm like watching something die from the inside out.
“We’ll pay them off,” he said.
His voice was quiet. Emotionless. Like he’d said it before, a hundred times, about a hundred different messes.
Seokjin slammed his hand down on the desk.
“No, Jungkook. We can’t. This isn’t something we can bury with hush money. Not this time. This is international. This is—”
He gestured wildly at the TV, his tone sharp. “Reddit threads. Twitter hashtags. Think pieces. Morning talk shows. Headlines in four languages. We’ve got people picketing outside hospitals we don’t even run.”
He leaned forward, voice lowering but colder.
“We’ve got death threats, Jungkook.”
Still, Jungkook didn’t flinch.
“I’m not apologizing for something I didn’t do.”
The words came slow. Icy.
Final. Seokjin stepped back.
“No,” he said softly. “Of course not. You don’t apologize. Not you.”
He turned, pacing toward the window, where Seoul’s skyline blinked in the distance.
Then, quietly, “So we give them something else.”
That made Jungkook look up. Not fully just a shift of the eyes.
“What do you mean?”
Seokjin turned back, his gaze now razor-sharp. The strategist in him had kicked in. The cousin who watched Jungkook build this empire from ash and silence and sheer brute will. The only one who still stayed when the world turned ugly.
“We change the story,” Seokjin said.
“We drown the hate in something softer.”
He stepped forward again. No hesitation now.
“We make you fall in love.”
Jungkook stared at him. As if the words were in another language.
“…What?”
“You marry someone,” Seokjin repeated. “Someone kind. Innocent. Poor. A charity case the world can’t bring themselves to hate. Someone who looks at you like you’re not the monster they’re painting you to be. Someone who makes the public think you’re worth saving.”
Jungkook’s lips curled, the faintest ghost of a scoff escaping. He looked away, shaking his head just once.
“You want me to get married to fix someone else’s fuck-up?”
“Yes.”
The answer was instant. Sharp. Like steel. Seokjin leaned down, palms flat on the desk.
“You built this company with blood, sweat, and silence. You didn’t speak when they dragged your name through dirt. You didn’t retaliate when they turned on you. But if you stay silent now, you lose it all.”
Another pause.
“And if you want to keep it? You marry someone so far beneath your world that the media pities them for being next to you. Someone too scared, too grateful to fight back. Someone who won’t even know they’re a pawn until you’ve already won.”
Jungkook’s face didn’t change. But the air in the room did. The shift was subtle, like a knife sliding into place behind a curtain.
His jaw twitched. Just once.
Then he nodded slow, cold.
“Fine,” he said.
A beat.
“Find me a pawn.”
.
.
.
The glass door to the CEO’s office whispered shut behind Seokjin like it was sealing in something rotten.
He exhaled sharp, tight and yanked at his tie as he stormed down the corridor, each step echoing across the marble like a countdown.
His shoes clicked like ticking seconds.
Pressure built behind his temples. In his ribs. In the base of his throat.
The hallway stretched ahead, clean and gleaming too clean for what it was hiding.
Jeon Corp’s elite passed silently behind glass doors etched with gold.
Legal. Finance. Medical Strategy. Innovation.
All the things they’d built from nothing.
Seokjin's jaw clenched. His eyes, normally warm, were carved in frustration now sharp and bitter like glass in a wound.
“He didn’t even blink,” he muttered under his breath. Of course he hadn’t.
Jungkook never blinked. Not when their competitors threatened to sue. Not when their first trial fell apart. Not when their father died in front of them.
Unshakable. Cold. Dangerous. Seokjin had seen Jungkook burn down men with a single sentence and walk away cleaner than the smoke he left behind.
But this time? This time the fire wasn’t coming from outside. It was inside their walls- and it was eating them from the bones.
.
.
.
He reached the end of the corridor and leaned against the wall outside the strategy wing, dragging a hand through his hair, his pulse still pounding. His reflection stared back at him in the polished steel nameplate above the elevator:
It was his department. But none of the charts or media statements in the world could fix this. They needed a distraction. A redirection. A weapon dressed like softness.
“A marriage.”
The word still tasted wrong in his mouth. Not a real one, of course.
Just a press piece with a beating heart.
But not just anyone would work.
This person had to be harmless.
Invisible. Desperate. Quiet. Someone who wouldn’t have lawyers, or backup, or secrets worth protecting.
“We need someone clean,” he whispered. “Someone who can't fight back… but makes him look like a savior just by standing next to him.”
A face for redemption. A soul to sacrifice.
.
.
And two floors down unseen, unheard, and walking home with the weight of a child's illness on his shoulders. Kim Taehyung was wiping the edge of a conference table.
His world already on fire. Unaware that fate had just selected him.
The corridors here smelled of bleach and tired dreams. Sterile. Overcleaned. Yet never clean enough to hide the exhaustion soaked into the walls.
The flickering of old fluorescent lights buzzed above constant, and completely ignored. No one ever bothered to fix them. No one really noticed them.
Except people who worked in the quiet.
People like Taehyung.
He sat on a narrow bench beside a dented metal supply closet, elbows resting on his knees, posture caved forward in a tired curve. His uniform sleeves were rolled to his elbows pale wrists marked with faint bruises and the grey-blue dust of the loading bay.
His hands were stained with old ink and mop water. The kind of mess that never really washes out.
Beside him, Old Man Yoon..Jeon Corp’s oldest janitor... was stacking worn-out disinfectant bottles onto a rusted cart.
“You headed home after this shift?” the man asked, voice low and gravel-warm.
Taehyung nodded, eyes still cast downward. “Yeah. After I pick up a few meds.”
He pulled a folded slip of paper from his pocket, the edges soft and creased like it had been touched too often. His eyes didn’t move as he spoke.
“Binnie’s appetite’s dropping again. White blood cell count’s low. Doctor says he might need a new line of treatment soon.”
Old Yoon let out a breath and gave a half-smile. “Ah, Binnie… That boy’s tougher than all of us.”
Taehyung’s lips twitched. Not quite a smile, not quite a sigh.
“He was asking me last week if I believed in stars,” the old man chuckled. “Said there’s one out there shaped like his appa’s hair.”
That made Taehyung huff softly.
“Yeah, he draws them on everything now. The stars. Lunchboxes, my locker, my ID badge… even on my shoes.”
He lifted a foot slightly, revealing a faint scribble near the sole a blue crayon star. Smudged, barely visible. But still there.
Still trying.
“Says they’re for luck.”
“Maybe they are,” the man said.
Taehyung was quiet for a moment. He stared at the wall across from them the dull kind of white that no one bothers repainting. Cracks near the baseboards. Stains in the corners from years of rinsed mop buckets and missed fixes.
“You know…” His voice was lower now. Calmer. “I never wanted to be a father.”
Old Man Yoon turned to look at him.
Taehyung’s eyes didn’t move. “But now…” He paused, swallowing something invisible. “I think it’s the only thing I’ve ever been good at.”
It came out steady. Not weak.
But heavy the kind of weight you don’t complain about because it’s all that’s holding you together.
“I didn’t choose it,” he said. “But Binnie… he’s the only reason I wake up every morning. Even on the days I wish I didn’t.”
The silence that followed wasn’t awkward. It was full. Like the kind of silence that carries everything someone’s too tired to say out loud.
“Don’t say that, son,” Old Yoon murmured, his voice gentle now. A hand on Taehyung’s shoulder, warm and grounding.
“It’s alright,” Taehyung said, and this time he smiled. Softly. Sadly. “I don’t mean it in a bad way. Just… he’s the reason I’m still here. That’s all.”
The older man didn’t speak right away.
But when he did, it came like something final.
“He’s lucky to have you.”
Taehyung shook his head. Not in disagreement just in quiet belief.
“I’m the lucky one.”
☆☆☆☆
Unseen. Half-shadowed.
Minho... the assistant, stood just beyond the hallway’s edge, clipboard tucked neatly under one arm.. posture stiff, breath held. He hadn’t meant to stop. He wasn’t even supposed to be here.
He was only passing through checking basement supply counts before heading back to Strategy. But something…
Something in that boy’s voice made him freeze.
Not the words. The way he said them.
Raw. Tired. He’d seen employees lie. Seen interns exaggerate stories just to curry sympathy. But this wasn’t that.
This was a man on the edge of survival, who had nothing left to prove and even less left to protect.
A janitor. A ghost in the system.
Minho leaned back slightly against the wall, out of sight, gaze fixed on the pair in the break alcove Old Man Yoon murmuring something, Taehyung nodding in silence.
He’d heard the boy’s name before somewhere...Probably in the payroll spreadsheet he’d skimmed during quarterly reviews.
Kim Taehyung. Quiet. A name that passed like mist.
Until now.
There was something... painfully clean about him. Not innocent in a naive way but pure in how deeply he'd been damaged, and still didn’t rot.
Minho’s fingers moved to his coat pocket and slipped out his company phone.
He tapped into the internal employee database. Typed fast.
His thumb hovered for just a second.
Then, with precise efficiency, he opened his messenger app and forwarded the file.
To: Seokjin [PR / Crisis Team]
Attachment: Employee Profile
Message:
He hit send. Then straightened his tie and walked away.
.
.
Taehyung unlocked the door and stepped inside, gently nudging it shut with his elbow. A crinkle of paper bags was tucked beneath one arm.
“Binnie,” he called softly, slipping off his shoes. “Appa’s home.”
There was no thundering of little feet. No scream of excitement. Just a quiet shuffle from the other room and a familiar voice... soft, careful, older than its age.
“Welcome home, Appa.”
Taehyung turned toward the sound and smiled.
Gyubin stood in the doorway of their small bedroom, wrapped in a cozy hoodie several sizes too big and mismatched socks. His face was pale from the recent treatment, eyes slightly tired, but his smile, the soft kind that reached only one side was still there.
Taehyung lifted the bag higher.
“I brought your favorites.”
Gyubin’s eyes lit up in that subtle, contained way of his. Still no jumping. Still no wild cheer. But he moved closer, eyes already scanning the top of the bag with a practiced gentleness.
“Did you find the honey chips?”
Taehyung knelt down and pulled out the small yellow packet.
Gyubin’s face bloomed not loud, not big but warm enough to melt something heavy in Taehyung’s chest.
“Got you banana milk too. And those almond biscuits you like, the soft ones.”
Gyubin took the bag carefully, hands still smaller than the snacks they held.
“Thank you,” he said quietly. Then paused. “Did you eat?”
Taehyung blinked. Then let out a small, breathy laugh.
“I knew you were going to ask that.”
“You forget sometimes,” Gyubin mumbled, looking down. “Or lie about it.”
Taehyung held up his hands in surrender. “I got kimbap on the way home, I promise.”
“Okay,” Gyubin said, looking satisfied but still unconvinced.
They sat together on the floor, cross-legged between the faded rug and the low table with chipped corners. Gyubin opened the chips, offering one to Taehyung first. A little tradition.
Taehyung took it with a mock-serious nod and crunched it loudly, making Gyubin smile behind his cup of banana milk.
Outside, the sun had already started to dip smearing orange and gold against the cracked windowpane.
The soft rustle of chip packets and the quiet slurping of banana milk filled the little room like a lullaby.
Gyubin sat cross-legged on the floor, a cushion under him, head slightly tilted as he munched slow and careful, always mindful of his appetite. Taehyung watched from across the low table, resting his chin on his hand, eyes full of something tender and tired.
“Appa,” Gyubin said suddenly between bites.
Taehyung hummed, still chewing.
“When I get better,” Gyubin began, tone calm but dreamy, “can we move to a house with a garden?”
Taehyung raised a brow. “A garden?”
Gyubin nodded, serious now.
“Yeah. Not big. Just… enough space for some flowers. And a bench. And a tree, maybe.”
Taehyung chuckled under his breath.
“A tree too? You planning on growing a whole forest?”
“No,” Gyubin said, shaking his head, lips stained from the chips. “Just one tree. For shade. And under it… I’ll plant star-shaped flowers.”
Taehyung leaned back slightly, watching his son’s face.
“Star-shaped, huh? Those exist?”
“I’ll make them,” Gyubin said simply, like it was the easiest thing in the world. “I’ll name them too. Binnie Stars.”
Taehyung smiled wide this time, the kind of smile that dimples his cheeks and makes his lashes lower.
“You think flowers can be named after you now?”
“Of course.” Gyubin grinned rare and precious. “And when people ask what kind they are, we’ll say, ‘These only grow in gardens filled with dreams.’”
Taehyung swallowed softly, his gaze dropping for a moment.
His throat tightened... but he nodded.
“That sounds like a good plan, Binnie.”
Gyubin sipped his milk and added casually, “You’ll have to build the bench though. I’m not allowed to use hammers.”
Taehyung laughed a short, quiet sound.
“I’ll build two,” he said. “One for me, one for you.”
The boy beamed. “And maybe one for the stars too, if they want to sit.”
Taehyung reached over and gently ruffled his hair. “They’ll be honored.”
Outside, the streetlights flickered on.
Inside, in that dim little apartment, a garden was already blooming... in sketches, in dreams, in a child’s quiet belief that someday, there would be space for stars.
.
.
The apartment was quiet now.
The only sound left was the soft rhythm of Gyubin’s breathing.
.. slow, even, threaded through the stillness of sleep.
He lay curled under a faded blanket, his hand still loosely holding a crayon, a half-finished star drawn on the corner of his notebook.
His banana milk stood untouched on the table beside him.
Taehyung watched him for a long while.
He knelt down and tucked the blanket tighter around his small body, brushing a thumb gently across Gyubin’s cheek. The boy didn’t stir... just murmured something inaudible and turned his face to the side.
Taehyung smiled. Just barely. Then stood.
He stepped into the bathroom quietly, shutting the door behind him with a soft click. The lock turned. The light buzzed overhead faint yellow and too bright for the kind of night it was.
He stood in front of the mirror for a moment.
His reflection stared back at him
messy hair, under-eye shadows, uniform creased from the floor he’d been scrubbing, lips dry and bitten from holding back too many words all day.
Still young. But too worn.
He turned the tap on and let the cold water run over his hands.
It felt sharp. Not refreshing just real.
His fingers gripped the edge of the sink, knuckles white.
And then, finally...... it cracked.
Taehyung bowed his head, shoulders trembling as the sob caught in his throat like a bruise.
No sound at first. Just the water running and the aching pull of held-in grief.
Then came the first breath... sharp, hitched. And the first tear. Then more.
He tried to muffle it the way someone does when they’ve cried too many times already. When even their sorrow feels tired.
He pressed the heel of his palm against his mouth and leaned against the sink, breath shaking.
“I’m trying,” he whispered.
It didn’t echo. Porcelain doesn’t echo. It just absorbs.
“I’m trying so hard…”
No one answered. Only the faucet, the dim light, and the small space where he let himself break. just for a few minutes.
Just while Binnie slept.
Because come morning, he would have to be whole again. For stars. For smiles.
For a boy who believed in flowers and benches and a garden that didn't exist yet.