"Get him!" Yoongi orders as soon as the attacker goes down.

Several soldiers grab him, cuff him and take him away.

Jimin runs over to Hoseok and helps him up. "Are you okay?"

Yoongi goes down on his knees, clutching his shoulder.

Major Song Joong-ki was by his side in an instant.

"Call your wife," General Min hisses, "She's the only one I trust to take out this fucking bullet." He groans but gets up nonetheless. The Major nods and pulls out his phone. Yoongi begin walking out of the hall.

Hoseok appears next to him, stops him. "You should wait for an ambulance," he insisted.

The general scoffs, "You're kidding right? I can fucking walk."

"But there's a lot of blood."

He rolls his eyes, "Jung Hoseok, you do realize that the reason I'm like this is because of you, right? I had a clear shot at the guy before you jumped on him."

"He was going to shoot Jin-Hyung."

"No. He wasn't. I was going to shoot him down before he had a chance to pull the trigger, but you got in the way. For fucks sake, I could've shot you."

Hoseok opened his mouth, the closed it. Then looked down at the floor. General Min walked past him, didn't look back as he headed out.

Jimin placed his hand on Hoseok's shoulder and told him to let it go.

Seokjin walks over to them, grabbing Hoseok and pulling him into a hug, "Thank you," he whispered. "I can't imagine how scared you were."

Yeah, he had been scared out of his wits but he couldn't just stand by and see his friend get shot.

One of the soldiers nearby told them to head to the waiting room, the three of them walked there in silence, the adrenaline of the moment dying down.

The little girl was in the waiting room. As soon as they entered the room, she ran to him and hugged him. Seokjin smiles down at her, whispers, "I'm glad to see you're okay."

Captain Song took her away, assuring them that he would make sure she got to her mother safely. As he left Hoseok stopped him, the others watching him curiously.

"How's General Min?" he asks.

Captain Song smiles reassuringly, "He's been through worse. My wife is taking the bullet out as we speak so he should be fine."

Hoseok nods and lets him leave.

"Never knew you were so interested in General Min," Jin jokes.

A blush appeared on Hoseok's cheeks, faint but still evident. "I'm not," he insists. "I just feel bad because he had to save me."

"That's the second time he's gone out of his way to save you," Jimin notes. Hoseok doesn't comment.

"Kim Seokjin!"

Seokjin turns as a soldier calls his name. The soldier signals him to follow. Seokjin hears everyone whisper as he follows, the other candidates think that he's going to get a scolding for acting so recklessly.

He's lead to another building at the end of the courtyard. Seokjin wonders which building this is, seeing as he has yet to properly memorize the name of every building inside the palace walls. The soldier opens the door and tells him to go inside. The door hadn't finished closing when Seokjin felt a pair of arms wrap themselves around him and pull him in.

Namjoon crushes their bodies together. "Are you alright?" he whispers, not letting go. Also not letting Seokjin answer since his mouth was pressed against Namjoon's chest. "I told my soldiers to grab you, fuck, I told them to bring you with me, but Yoongi said they couldn't because I that would be suspicious. Then you went and ran in front of that gun and—damn it, Seokjin, never do that again."

Raising his head, Seokjin pulls away slowly and raises his hand to brush back Namjoon's hair with his fingers. "Did you really call me just to scold me?" he teases. "I'm older than you, you know."

"Still," Namjoon insists. Seokjin throws him a look, to which the king just sighs. "Right. You're okay. That's what matters.?" He pauses. "You are okay, right?"

A laugh escapes Seokjin's lips. "I'm perfectly fine," he assures the other. "Although, you really should be careful. You can't just call for me privately whenever you want. Someone could see."

"Don't care," Namjoon replies, pouting. "As long as I can have you by my side for a moment, I'm happy."

"It's dangerous, Joon-ah."

Namjoon lets out a snort. "My whole life is dangerous, Jin." Grabbing the elder's hand, he rubs the back of Jin's hand with his thumb. "I get death threats every day, I have people wanting to go to war, I have politicians that want to dethrone me before the throne is even really mine. And the only thing that comes to mind is how I don't want you to go through such danger. I don't want to bring you into this world and put you into harm's way, but I'm so selfish because I want you by my side. I can't see anyone else by my side but you."

Jin feels the tips of his ears burn. Namjoon keeps his gaze on him and has to lower his head to pretend not to notice the way Joon is staring at his lips but is failing to do so. Namjoon just smiles at him, teasing.

They stay in silence for a few moments. Neither wanting to mention that they've been too long away from the others. Seokjin takes the task up on himself to speak up. "I should go."

The King's arms came around his shoulders. "No," Namjoon whines. "If you leave then I am forced to go to a meeting and I'd much rather spend my time with you."

Chuckling, Seokjin pulls back. "You have a country that you're going to run soon, Your Majesty. Those meetings are important."

Pressing his forehead to Jin's, Namjoon groans whispers. "Not fair. You're going to be running with me. Maybe I should start taking you to meetings with me."

The words left Seokjin's mouth before he could stop them. "Maybe it won't be me." Nothing was set in stone after all. 

Namjoon pulls back, brows furrowed, face showing his evident confusion, "What?"

Seokjin attempts to wave it off. "Nothing," he says quickly, awkwardly.

"Seokjin." 

Seokjin lifts his head to look at him. Namjoon is frowning at him, lips pressed into a thin line. Jin takes a step back. "They said that you had no choice in this," he tells him. "Told us that it doesn't matter who you liked if the public doesn't like them. Also that in the end, it's your politicians that have to agree."

Namjoon's face remains stern. "Who told you this?"

"The staff."

Namjoon takes a moment to process this. To soak it all in. The staff was going around saying these things? That was rather...unsettling. "They can say whatever they want," he says, "but in the end, I'm going to choose you."

"What if the public hates me?"

Namjoon laughs at that, rubs Jin's cheekbones with his thumbs. "Baby, no one can hate you. You're literally perfect."

"I'm not," Seokjin insists.

"You are."

It was precious having someone say that to you with such confidence, it brought a sweet smile on the elder's face that he tries to hold back, not wanting to show how such simple words made him so happy.

There was a knock on the door. The soldier was telling them that the meeting was about to start. Seokjin turned to him, "I'm going back now."

Nodding, Namjoon reaches out behind Jin to open the door. "Don't miss me too much," he says, his eyes clearly showing that it was him who would be missing Jin.

The elder smiled, "I'll try not to," he said before he went out the door.

His friends were waiting for him when he got back to the waiting room.

"Did you get in trouble?" Jimin asked worriedly.

Seokjin shook his head. Tae seemed to be the first one to catch on, "Was it the King?" he asked in a low voice so that the other candidates didn't hear them..

The elder's blush gave them a clear answer.

Jimin gave Hoseok a smug look. Hoseok remembered the last conversation he had had with Jimin regarding his suspicions of Jin and the King.

"Aish," Hoseok says, patting Jin on the back, his voice a bit louder. "Don't make us worry like that. Here I thought you were going to get kicked out, but a warning isn't bad at all! Just be careful next time," he laughs. "Wouldn't want anything to happen to you!"

Taehyung notices that fewer eyes are on them now. He instantly understands what Hoseok was doing. There were too many curious ears here. Too many competitors that were a threat to Jin, whether he saw it that way or not.

"What do you think will happen now?" Jimin asks. "The fan meeting was a failure. How are they going to make it up to the public now?"

"I'm sure they'll think of something," Taehyung comments. "They always do."

And indeed they did. It was the next day that the stylists were doing their hair and makeup once more. This time for a photo shoot. The candidates were all excited about this, for it was a moment where they could show off their good looks. 

Seokjin sat patiently at his seat when Sungkyung appears, whispering in his ear. "I'm changing your hair color," she says suddenly.

"What?"

"We've got a bit of a situation," she says, checking her surroundings before continuing, "that stunt you pulled yesterday, saving the little girl?" Seokjin nodded and waited for her to continue. "The grand public loved it. They love you. You've been on Naver's top searches ever since you pulled the whole opening bags with you feet thing but rescuing the little girl really did them in."

"What does that have to due with my hair though?"

Sung-kyung leans in, "Look around. Everyone is pulling out hair dye. Pink, orange, blue, mint. The stylists are trying to catch the public's attention with vibrant colors, trying to have the other candidates outshine you. I need you to stand out."

"So what color will my hair be?"

"Blonde. I wanted to go back to your original black hair, but I got a word in that the king is going ashy blonde. So I thought it would be cute for you two to match, you don't want to outshine the King."

He gulped. He wasn't sure he could pull that off. "Shouldn't you do the same for the others?"

"Oh I will," she assured, "but since you're the star right now, I'm focusing on enhancing your assets."

It was about an hour later that Seokjin had a new hair color and could sense that several people were staring at him. He noticed that the stylists of the other candidates didn't seem too happy about how he looked and were considering a change. Sung-kyung laughed as they scurried around.

"I hid the black, blonde and brown hair dye," she whispered to him.

Seokjin was surprised at how far she was willing to go for him. He didn't feel bad however. Instead he felt a bit of...pride?

Knowing that he was currently a public favorite. Knowing that he had his friend's support. Knowing that he had a team that wanted him to try his hardest. Seeing how the others watched him in jealousy. It all caused a new sensation in him. Gave him confidence.

With this new side of his, no one was taking Namjoon away from him.

It was on like Donkey Kong.