A burning pain was drilling each inch of his stifling skin. He gasped, the urge to scream irradiating from all of his body. But as much as he wanted no sound could escape from his aching throat. Even the air was barely breathable, leaving him panting and left on his own. The pain was spreading all over his body, he could even feel the tormenting ache consuming his flesh. Time felt like it has stopped abandoning him in his never-ending agony.

He was sore and he didn’t even have the force to move a finger neither he have the force to open his mouth. He wanted to scream, to tell the world how suffering he was, how bad he felt. But all he was able to do, was to close his heavy eyelids, abandoning himself to his fate.

His messy hair was sticky from the sweat his body was producing, raising the temperature and making the pain more and more unbearable. A wave of pain ripped him apart once again and sent him contrived in his last retrenchment. 

And then it stopped.

The sickness gradually vanished from his body.

His last string of energy escaped from his lifeless corpse, everything began to slip away. He mind went blank and he lose ground.

He was curled up, crumbled on the floor, tears falling down his cheeks. Then, he slowly fell in a deep state of unconsciousness.

Only the off screen voice of a late documentary could be heard in the tiny room. The shadows of the screens were reflecting on the sleepy face for almost twenty minutes when his cellphone rang. The young man opened lazily his eyes before scratching his head and stretching his arms to reach his cellphone. His eyes took some time to adapt to the darkness of the room and he groaned while reading the name of the person disturbing his sleep.

"Yeah Minho?" He said without trying to hide his annoyance.

"Jinki? Were you sleeping?" A deep voice asked. Jinki didn't respond, swallowing a curse. He wasn't in a state to argue with his friend.

"Obviously not" He reached for the remote control to shut down the screen and push the button of the alarm clock next to him to display the time. It was 1:34pm.

"Can you come get me?" His friend said in a low voice. He stayed shut, his sleepy mind trying to process the information. Why on earth would he find Minho in the middle of the night?

"Please" The voice on the phone was now trembling. Jinki sighed.

"Where are you?"

He ended the call and extirpated himself out of his bed reluctantly.

Twenty minutes later, he was there. He entered the bar scanning the crowd with his eyes. He already had an idea where he could find his friend and began to slip by the crowd. He caught a familiar figure surrounded by glasses sprawled on the counter of the bar and smiled weakly.

"You stink"

The brown haired man whose head was lying on the counter didn't respond to his friend comment. He only turned his face towards the man and smiled widely, a drunken smile who actually looked more closely to a grimace than an actual smile.

His big eyes had a hard time focusing and he ended up closing them. His long, slender figure seemed to have lost all his strength. Jinki watched his friend take a sip of his drink and sighed.

"Minho, let's go home" Jinki grabbed his arm and pull him away from his chair but Minho opposed and hold into his drink firmly.

"M-My drink" he muttered in a low distorted voice. "Let me finish it at least...the only thing that seems to love me..."

He didn’t take time to Jinki to understand what was happening.

"So she left you" he said in a sigh, taking a seat next to him and starring at his friend with concern. Minho shook his head before taking another sip. His eyes were fixed on an invisible spot on the counter of the bar, the one he always choose to drown in sorrow when he was heartbroken.

"Come on, you were the first to say she wasn't the one for you"

Minho pouted. "For the first time of my life… I wanted to be the one who break up. I am always the one who feel like a "

"You are a "

Minho glanced up. "Thanks, it's not like I needed a confirmation from my friend. Do you want to break up too?” He retorted in a rebellious tone.” Yeah let's break up. That will be the best for the both of us. Yeah this is the best idea I had for the past years. My love life fall down since I met you."

He paused drinking his last sip and stretched out.

"Yaah I feel so much better now. I didn't know it was that easy to make an end to a relationship.”

He sat up straight, his eyes focused on an imaginary thing like he was in deep thought.

“No. I should feel better but I'm not. What's wrong with me? I really feel like a now.” He shoved his head in his arms and whined.

Next to him, Jinki couldn’t retain a laugh and gently patted the back of his friend. He knew Minho since kindergarten. It was funny how he could held him responsible of his love life disaster. But it was a fact, Minho might be the most unlucky man on earth when it comes to love relationship.

He met his last girlfriend at a party where she was waitress. Minho fell in love as soon as she pour him his first shot. She fell for him as soon as he handed her her first tip – a 100,000 won bill. Once in love, Minho was the cheesiest wet noodle Jinki ever knew. Too kind, too nice, too blind.

He was too dazzled to notice what really was happening around him. These were always the base of their most serious disputes, Jinki always becoming his enemy when he tried to reason with him. But this was before Jinki finally decide to give up and started to collect a drunk Minho at the bar once in a while.

Jinki put his friend on his feet with some efforts and dragged him towards the exit. He placed Minho on the backseat of his car, fastened his belt and sat behind the wheel.

Minho really began to worry him. He knew that his friends was the brightest and the liveliest person on earth but recently he was feeling as lonely as ever. Hopefully their next mission will begin soon, and Minho would be able to forget his heartbreak for a while. Or at least, he hoped.

He drove carefully, not wanting his friend to spill his stomach on his freshly clean car. He took a look at Minho from time to time in the rear-view mirror. He looked distressed and miserable. And he hoped that it was mostly because of the alcohol he had ingurgitated.

He parked in the basement on their apartment lot and dragged his ill and sleepy friend toward his room. He put Minho in his bed and covered him with a thin blanket. He was ready to close the door when his friend shout at him in an almost inexistent voice.

“Jinki?”

The latter just hummed.

“Let’s date”

Jinki gently smiled. “You’re not my type Choi Minho”

He finally closed the door while Minho was already lost in his dreams.

“LEE FRANCESCO TAEMIN”

“DON’T CALL ME THAT” an angry voice shout in response through the closed door of the bathroom.

Taemin has taken the bathroom hostage since one hour and if he didn't hurry up Kibum will probably be late for work.

It was the same every morning.

They fought over every little thing of their morning routine and it was getting on Kibum’s nerves. They weren't the only one living in the house. Actually it wasn't even their house but Mrs. Cho's, the woman who took them under her gentle wings and treated them like her own sons.

They were lucky to have her, she loved to take care of the two idiots, cooking for them and only allowing them to financially participate to the communal expenses. It's not that they didn't try but her persuasive manners made them accept the fact. And to be honest, it was pretty convenient with their petty salary.

The only big inconvenience living in that house brought was that Kibum had to tolerate Taemin every day and Taemin had to tolerate Kibum every day. It was tiring.

"I swear, if you don't come out at 5 I will consecrate the rest of my life destroying yours, and I promise it will not-"

The door suddenly opened up and a wet Taemin came out, not allowing Kibum to finish his sentence.

"It’s not like it wasn’t already the case, stop being annoying early in the morning"

Kibum said nothing, not wanting to waste more time arguing with his pointless friend. Taemin took advantage of it to make his way through his bedroom and disappeared. Kibum finally entered the bathroom thinking of a way for seeking vengeance. Speeding up, he took a few minutes to wash and prepare himself for work. He rushed towards the kitchen, stole a few toast Mrs. Cho had prepared, left the house and hurried up to the bus stop to reach his workplace.

He arrived fifteen minutes later in front of the private psychiatric clinic where he worked for almost two years now. He was a psychiatric nurse and was mainly in charge for short or long period patients whose trouble or disability prevent them from living by their own or whose family couldn’t take care of them. It wasn’t serious troubles or to be exact, the patients weren’t harmful toward themselves or their entourage.

During his time at the clinic, he has seen all kind of disorder he never thought could exist and his patients wouldn’t stop to surprise him. Some of them wouldn’t look like an ill person and sometimes he wondered why they were even here but some of them, he was ashamed to admit, scared him.

That day, he was in the communal room, watching over his patients, waiting for lunch to come. It was a large rectangular room, big enough to contain twenty people without feeling like suffocating. In the left corner, at the bottom, a big screen was surrounded by two couches and a few chairs. A big wooden table was in the center, and another smaller covered by all sort of magazines was just in front of the only big window of the room. The decoration was basic, only a few pictures that depict various sceneries hanging on the white walls. Kibum always found the decor simple but relaxing.

It was like an ordinary day at the clinic and all the residents were lively bragging or playing. Except for Mrs. Moon who isolated herself from the others in a corner of a room, mumbling about an incomprehensible string of words and figures as usual, they were all gathered around the table or around the TV. The TV group was silently watching a cartoon in which a malicious tiny mouse was chased by a poor clumsy cat. The others were playing a card game that Kibum gave up trying to understand the rules, if it ever had one. The important thing was that they seemed to understand each other.

He watched an old man got up from his chair and make his way in his direction. He took a seat next to him and sighed. “Isn’t it boring Kibum? Spending your day watching over a bunch of crazy people?” He laughed to himself and continue. “Because I am”.

He smiled looking at the others fooling around, like he wasn’t one of them earlier. Kibum said nothing, he was used to hold this kind of conversation with the old man. To be honest, he always find kind of fun to look after them. They weren’t severely ill, he wasn’t a problem to deal with them – most of the time. He certainly attended every day to unexpected behavior and that prevent him from a monotone day. There were time they were out of his control, mostly because the mood was contagious, but it was kind of rare and always ending up without too much fuss.

“You lost again right?” Kibum said to the other man, his sharp lips curling into a smile and his eyes still fixed on the people playing on the table. The other man sighed loudly in disagreement. “I don’t mind losing but I might be the only one that way. Don’t want to upset anybody” The nurse laughed, gently pressing his elbow in the older man ribs. “So kind of you”.

The other groaned. “At the time I was a mafia leader nobody would dare making fun of me” he warned glancing up. “Oh you must have been really scary back then” Kibum mocked. “Too bad I can’t get rid of someone as easily as before” the patient retorted with a serious tone.

Kibum ignored him, looking at his watch. It was almost noon and they will soon have to get ready for lunch. “I know deep inside of you that you love me a lot Mr. Park” The latter chuckled. “The day you will find out that I never lie once since I got stuck here, you will regret your words!”

“Sure” Kibum simply responded with a laugh, standing up and calling for the patients to gather in the cafeteria.

The doctors believed that Mr. Park suffered from psychogenic fugue, a pathology in which a patient forget about his anterior life and started building a new one, a new identity he strongly believed is his. It was a form of amnesia resulting from something he probably wanted to forget they said. Mr. Park never have been a mafia leader or something like this, all the documents they had about him stated that he was born, grew up and worked in a farm in the countryside.

He left work, still reflecting on the conversation he had with Mr. Park earlier. He was deep in his thought when the bus driver dragged him out of his mind hurrying him to leave the bus. Kibum thanked him with a light head motion, thankful that at least one person remembered where he lived and stepped out. He headed for the café “Gusto” right in front of the bus stop and sat at a window. It was a small and cozy café with round tables disposed in front of a large display stand. Soon after his ice Americano was on his table. It was his after work ritual, and the waiter already know what he wanted and the fact that the owner of the café was Mrs. Cho made things easier. He was treated like royalty.

He pulled his smartphone from his pocket to check the news and take a deep sip of his Americano. As a horrible salty taste overwhelmed his senses, his split the liquid straight away from both his mouth and his nose. The waiter rushed at him eyes wide opened, handed him a piece of tissue. Kibum didn’t even give it a glance and stand up angrily. The waiter became pale but Kibum walked pass him heading to the counter.

Usually, the coffee shop served the best café in the area. Unfortunately, it was also the one that stupid guy worked at.

“LEE TAEMIN!”

“Heavy clouds darkened the sky, preventing the moonlight to enlighten the winding road taken by an old broken car. As if it wasn’t enough, a rainstorm weakened the roof of the tiny car, throwing shivers down to the spine. Trees and leafs covered the wet road, accentuating the sinister scenery they were now trapped in. The air was suffocating and the three miserable passengers already known that their end was near. The deafen rain covered the sound of the three man sobbing in unison and now the…”

“Jonghyun”

“Yeah?”

“You’re the only one crying” Minho said with annoyance from the passenger seat.

Jinki parked his car in front of the restaurant. The weather was bad today and even if it was noon it seemed like the sun was already ready to sleep.

“And that was it. The car took his last breath in a deep roar. A thick smoke was escaping from every orifice that could be find. They were in the middle of nowhere, condemned. The end came earlier than expected.”

“Jonghyun shut up, we just dragged you out from your house, and you aren’t going to die unless you keep going on with your petty story” Minho shoot.

“I was well at home before you had the brilliant idea to kidnap me”

They stepped inside the tiny restaurant with a retro design and sat at a table without a word. A waitress came to take their order and they silently process to swallow their lunch.

“The food was tasteless and unappetizing, the two vicious men were staring at the other with malicious and mischievous eyes, a smile put on their sinful mouth…”

“Stop narrating! We didn’t drag you here to see you act like this. This is petty” Minho hissed with exasperation.

“Right, you should have let me alone. I can handle all of it on my own you see”

Minho mocked. “Sure, you look great indeed. Look at you! My friend isn’t like this”

“I get it, I’m only your friend when I look good”

Minho was caught off guard, his mouth wide open not sure of what to say. Jinki who has been quiet since the beginning finally decide to prevent his friend from going for the throat.

“What did I do to deserve such kind of friend? You both are the same!”

 He was surprise by Minho’s reaction. It was only a few hours after he was retrieving him at the bar. At first he was glad to see that his friend wasn’t as devastated as he was expected but his harsh tone toward Jonghyun let him think that it wasn’t maybe the case.

His two friends were in an almost similar situation. One has just been left by his girlfriend because “he wasn’t who she thought he was”, the other was abandoned by his boyfriend without a word.

A bunch of conqueror, really.

He wasn’t sure if there were a break up that hurt less than another but Jonghyun seemed deeply broken. Even if it wasn’t recent, he still hasn’t turn the page and dragged everyone in his sorrow. He hadn’t have the chance to get an explanation or neither had he the chance to say his farewell and he was convinced that all of this was his fault. Jinki couldn’t deny that they weren’t the best couple he knew, always fighting, yelling and fighting again but he believed that what was happening between them was strong. He was probably wrong.

“Let’s go somewhere,” he finally spoke. They didn’t object more than ready to leave the place and paid for their meals. They left the restaurant the stomach still half empty while he heard Minho mumbled a “last time I let Jinki choose the place”.

“Drop me home then” Jonghyun said as soon they reach their car.

“I will. Just after”

Jinki drove his now two quiet friends to a place they know too well.

“Do you think I’m in the mood for that” Jonghyun mummed. It wasn’t a question and eventually Jonghyun dropped off the car without complaining and walked to their favorite bowling place. They enthusiastically played a few games, Jinki ball never seemed to find the skittles while the other two were busy competing in a not always fair battle. Minho defeat cries could be heard time to time but it was enjoyable.

They were finally seating around a drink at the end of the day. Minho was talking cheerfully to an absent-minded Jonghyun while Jinki exhausted by the day was watching over his friends. It has been a long time since they gathered like this and it will probably be the last before a while.

Minho and he will soon start to work…

That night, Kibum was lying on the sofa, watching a soap with Mrs. Cho next to him. He wasn’t his thing but he needed something to fill his mind before he could find a way to get painfully rid of that parasite named Lee Taemin.

Taemin came into his life one year ago now. At first he thought it was a blessing that the young guy almost rolled under the wheels of his car the day he met him. He seemed so vulnerable, so lost that he wanted to protect him. Today he couldn’t believe he have thought that way. He wasn’t over the salty Americano yet and probably wouldn’t before a while. Taemin has gone too far.

The TV was now showing a bed scene in which two bodies were moving in slow motions under a white sheet. Before his eyes, they looked more like two slugs trying to reproduce in a disgusting way. He blushed and looked away, suddenly aware of Mrs. Cho presence. It was starting becoming ridiculous how he still felt embarrassed to watch this kind of scene in the company of an older person. He was himself in age after all and it was something natural between two adults. Human were mean to procreate, weren’t they?

His thought were interrupted by a dark shadow blocking his eyes from the light of the TV screen. Taemin was standing in front of him, handling a fresh drink to Mrs. Cho before turning to him another drink in his hand.

“I swear hyung, I come clean”.

Kibum looked at him with suspicious eyes but took the drink anyway. Taemin sat down between the two and opened his can. Nothing was said while there were watching an old CEO kissing a woman who didn’t look like his actual wife and who Kibum was sure was his rival in the last episode. He didn’t try to understand what was happening and remembered the fresh drink he had in his hand when the wet can began running down his pant.

“” He looked up, searching a piece of tissue with his eyes and met for a few seconds Taemin’s gaze. He looked like his was about to say a malicious comment, his lips trembling but was trying hard to contain himself. Kibum stood up and reached for the tissue on the coffee table disposed in front of the TV.

“What is happening again between the two of you?” Mrs. Cho broke the silence. She didn’t once lose contact with her favorite characters but anybody could feel the awkwardness that filled the room when Taemin entered.

“Nothing” the two boys replied in unison. “That must the first time I see you agree that fast” she said in an amused voice. They said nothing, Kibum wiping his pant and the can with the tissue. Silence fell once again.

“I guess it’s time for me to move out”.

Taken aback Kibum glanced at Taemin. “Euh?” He knew the past few days were not sunshine and happiness between them but he didn’t think it was a reason enough to come to that end. After all, it was his home too and they were mature enough to come to an agreement. The thing was they were just too lazy and maybe in the end a bit childish to do it.

“Taemin what are you saying? How can you say that in front of me? Was I too nice to you to let you think you could left the house as you want?” There were anger and sadness in Mrs. Cho voice and Taemin couldn’t help but feeling bad for that.

She was the one who adopted him with an open heart without him saying anything. If he was able to live that way and work it was all thanks to her. She gave him a home and a salary and now he felt like an idiot. He never prepared her for that and he was feeling like a beggar. “My boy you are not going anywhere until a badass girl comes to me and fights me to get you out of here!”

Taemin smiled as he let his mind drew the scene for him. He could imagine too well Mrs. Cho fighting to protect him from all evil people trying to desecrate his ‘pure soul’ like she liked to call. She was overprotective towards Kibum and him and kind of funny too.

Kibum reached for Taemin’s hand, the one holding the drink and pushed it toward his mouth so the can could brush his lips. “Drink, you idiot” he said before returning his attention to the screen showing off the credits.

The guy was the biggest trouble magnet in knew but he still was like a little brother for him. He sure will regret his thought tomorrow but if Taemin was about to leave the house it could only be because he would be the one kicking his out.

They didn’t discuss much about the issue after, busy to make fun of the actors and the scenario as another episode was broadcasting. More exactly, Kibum and Taemin were the one bashing the show while the lady of the house was trying hard to defend her favorite characters.

“I swear that old man had laid down all the women of his neighborhood! Can you believe it? That gross man!”

“He must be the father of half of the kids!” Taemin outbid loudly.

They could hear Mrs. Cho hooted. “You can’t understand! I will give everything to have the chance with him!”

“Ugh???” The boys shoot in a same voice, offering her their best disgust face.

“You don’t know how it is to be alone for a middle-aged woman. Come to me when your two ignorant will know what life is”

They argued some more, loud voices echoing in the living room as usual.

Jinki absently moved his cup of black coffee to his lips, one hand holding the newspaper. He was enjoying his last free day in the best of way, lounging on the sun deck of an old café. The sun was high and was throwing back a comforting warmth for the first time this week, as if it was saying to him his last goodbye. He smiled, his face up to the sky, leaving the warm air caress his face. Once the heat became almost unbearable, he plunged back his attention to the headlines of the newspaper his was holding.

There weren’t nothing really eye-catching, just random articles mainly about politics and some economic analysis. He turned the pages, smiling at articles about entertainment and showbiz related reports. It must indeed be really entertaining that was the only thing that could explain why it filled almost five pages of the thirty-paged paper. He chuckled. People always loved to bury their nose in other people business. It must be what humans do the best.

He was now near the end of the journal when his eyes landed on an article on a subject he knew too well. He read it with his eyebrows furrowed.

“With a number of victims constantly decreasing - from twenty cases per week in the beginning of the phenomenon to barely a few today, the Authorities have believed that the smuggling of ODD was coming to an end. But the recent events showed that they were too optimistic. Early this week, the police made an unfortunate discovery during the raid of a hideout supposed to belong to a drug dealer. Instead, they came across a house filled with unconscious young people. The police already took contact with the victims' family and they were all transferred to different nearby hospitals.

As a reminder, it was estimated that a total of 2852 victims suffered in a direct manner of the consequences of ODD’s black market for the past few years. More than a hundred beds of the country hospitals’ were still occupied by victims and approximatively the same number were hospitalized at home, under the eyes of their helpless relatives. The allocated number of death was of 451 for the three last years, making it one of the most dangerous drugs in circulation. The most affected are young adults, representing over 70% of us