Ryeowook

“Wookie, wookie! Wake up!”

I feel hands gripping onto my shoulders, shaking me violently. My eyes forces them open and I struggle to catch my breath.

Oh.

I look around and realize that I am not in the bank.

I am at the park. My head is resting on strong thighs and my best friend’s face is inches away from mine. I can feel his warm breath against my lips and I feel my cheeks starting to grow warm. Kyuhyun, on the other hand, is looking down at me with intense and worried eyes.

“Wookie, are you okay?” Kyuhyun asks, running soothing fingers across my hair.

I sniffled but do not respond. Kyuhyun only sighs and continues my hair, his touch on me somehow managing to bring a calming effect on me.

“You’ve been having those types of dreams too frequently nowadays.” Kyuhyun points out.

There’s a heavy silence before I softly whisper, “His death anniversary is approaching.”

Kyuhyun gives me small saddened smile, his dark shining eyes gazing down into mine. “I’m sorry, Ryeowook.”

I look away when I feel my eyes starting to well up. I don’t want to cry, I don’t. I squeeze my eyes shut, wanting to just block out all these dark feelings.

My father died when I was thirteen. I saw him getting killed. He was shot. Not once, not twice.

My father was shot a total of seven times. I saw it.

My father, Kyuhyun and I were at a bank. Until now, I don’t even know what we were doing at the bank. My father had mentioned something about paying but I couldn’t remember what it was about. All I remembered was that Kyuhyun wanted to tag along and my father promised to buy us ice cream after dropping by the bank. Kyuhyun and I were elated.

But something happened.

A group of robbers came and ambushed the whole place. There were people dying, blood splattered everywhere, things breaking and gunshot everywhere. I was afraid. Kyuhyun was afraid. And I knew, my father must have been terrified too.

My father got killed on that day by one of the robbers. The police arrived just on time as Kyuhyun had managed to pull me out to escape. The robber had no way out and he knew he was going to go jail for a long time. He could have just surrendered himself. He did surrendered himself. But not before killing my father, right in front of my eyes. I didn’t know why, I couldn’t understand why.

But after that moment, I knew I changed.

I didn’t view the universe as I how I had viewed it now. I grew up on my own, then. My aunt took me in but it felt like I had grown up on my own. She provided me a home and food but she was never at home. We never talked, she never liked me.

The only thing that kept me going was Kyuhyun.

If it had not been for Kyuhyun, I would have long given up. I was depressed. I had nightmares of my father dying every time I closed my eyes. I was lonely. My father is dead.  My mother had died while giving birth to me. Kyuhyun took care of me. He was there, he knows what I have been through. He looks out for me and often reminds me that there was many good people out there.

But Kyuhyun and I view the world differently.

This is the biggest flaw between our friendship.

Kyuhyun is funny, witty, handsome, cute, respectful, trustworthy, patient and kind. Kyuhyun believes that the world is filled with good. I… I don’t believe such a thing. I mean… How can I after what I’ve witnessed?

“Your father was a good man, Ryeowook.” Kyuhyun takes a deep breath.

“He didn’t deserve to die like that.” I close my eyes shut.

“Everything happens for a reason, Ryeowook.”

At this, I slit my eyes open. What?

“Everything happens for a reason?” I repeat, angrily getting up. “You mean, my father was supposed to die?”

Kyuhyun flinches a little, waving his hands desperately in the air. “No, no! I mean… I believe that there-”

“Don’t tell me what you believed, Kyuhyun.” I sneer, slapping Kyuhyun’s chest, “You don’t know how it feels like! You don’t have any ing idea how much it hurts!”

Kyuhyun quickly apologizes and I let it go. This argument have been going on for years. I know I’m being too sensitive but… I just cannot help it. No one understands this pain. My mood is sullen and the weather suddenly turns dark. Kyuhyun cracks some lame jokes about the weather and then sighs in defeat when he notices that I’m not going to crack a smile.

“I guess we should get going.” Kyuhyun says, “It looks like there’ll be a thunderstorm.”

Kyuhyun gets up and starts to dust off the dirt from his pants. I follow suit and Kyuhyun reaches out and dusts out the dirt from a corner of my shirt that I missed. I mutter a thank you and follow after Kyuhyun. We walk through the park in an awkward silence. I hate awkward silences with Kyuhyun. It always ends up making me feel guilty, like I’ve hurt him. I’ve no intention of hurting Kyuhyun. He’s an angel. How can I ever hurt someone as precious as him?

While walking, the clouds turns grey and… I stop walking, my gaze looking up. The skies are a mix of purple and orange. That’s weird. It’s only twelve in the afternoon. Kyuhyun seems to notice this too as he stops next to me to look up. All of a sudden there’s a loud sound of booming thunder followed by a nearby lightning. The lightning struck a nearby tree and I start to scream as the tree catches on fire. Kyuhyun grabs me by my wrists and starts to run.

“We need to find a shelter!” Kyuhyun yells.

It starts to rain, so heavily, it hurts. We run and run and as we are about to reach a sheltered spot, another loud thunder boomed. I feel hands pushing me across the sheltered spot and then it happened.

Kyuhyun… The lightning.

Kyuhyun is being struck by lightning!

He’s shouting and screaming in pain. The white lights from the lightning engulfs him and I don’t know what to do. All I know is that I cannot just stand here and watch my best friend being struck by lightning. Kyuhyun is in pain. I need to help him.

I make a rash decision. I don’t even think.

My intention was to pull him away or maybe push him out of the lightning. I don’t know a thing about getting hit by a lightning. All I want to do is help him and so, I run out into the run and into the lightning, with Kyuhyun.

And then I can feel it.

The scorching heat.

The intense pain.

The shifting of bones, the shift in emotions, molecules and cells in my body.

All I can see is Kyuhyun’s face, all I can feel is Kyuhyun’s touch. And then, I black out.

***

My eyes slit open at the sound of loud sound.

I don’t even know what sound it was but all I know is that my whole body is aching, I feel different and my hands… My hands feels like they are on fire! My eyes widens in pain and I scream, jolting up.

Am I in hell?

But no.

I’m still in the park.

I’m confused as I look around. I find Kyuhyun lying motionless on the ground and I run to him, touching his face. However, the second my skin meets his, I hiss and jump backwards. Kyuhyun’s skin… Kyuhyun’s skin is on fire! It’s burning hot! I try again and I cry out in pain. Why… Why is Kyuhyun’s body so warm that I cannot even touch it?

“Kyuhyun!” I call out as loud as I can. “Kyuhyun!”

Movements… There’s movements and finally, I release the breath I have been holding. Kyuhyun’s eyes slits open and they look around. When his eyes locks on mine, he smiles.

“Ryeonggu…”

“KyuKyu,” I crawl closer to Kyuhyun, whispering out his name, thankful that he is alive. But… Why?... Why is he burning?

“Wookie, you’re alright!” Kyuhyun stumbles as he gets up and crawls towards me. He reaches out to touch me but I back away. I can’t do it… I can’t let him touch me. It hurts too much.

Kyuhyun’s expression falls as he asks with a worried tone, “What’s wrong?”

“I… Can’t touch you.” I say, frightened. “You’re… You’re too… Warm.”

Kyuhyun looks confused and lost and so I brace myself. I don’t know if Kyuhyun will feel anything but I know I will. But I’ve got to touch Kyuhyun. I’ve got to show Kyuhyun what is going on. I’ve got to find out what’s happening. Because I don’t think I can ever live a life not being able to touch Kyuhyun.

I reach out and attempt to touch his cheeks. As our skin touches each other, I jerk back and so does Kyuhyun. He stares at me with wide unbelievable eyes.

“Wookie,” Kyuhyun breathes. “You’re… Cold.”

I’m about to ask him what did he mean but a loud booming thunder sounds ahead of us and we both cover our ears. Suddenly, rays of lights of black and white flashes from the clouds and down onto the earth. Kyuhyun and I look at each quizzically.

A light ray falls around Kyuhyun.

And another falls on me.

But Kyuhyun’s light is white. Mine is… Black.

Kyuhyun looks down to the ray of light circling him and then his eyes meets mine. Kyuhyun blinks and then disappears.

My heart stops.

My breath catches.

Before I can even do anything… My world starts to spin and then it goes completely dark.

***

Trumpets.

The first thing I hear is the sound of trumpets being played eerily. I look around, confused. Wait a minute…. How did I get here? I’m at… I don’t even know where I’m at. It looks like I’m on a field? I don’t even know but the air of the whole place feels weird. The skies are dark, everything feels heavy. I look around and there are confused faces mirroring mine, there are hundreds of people standing around the field, all of them looking around. Another blow of the trumpets catches out attention and we turn our heads to the source of the sound.

I gasp.

A man… There is a man floating in the air. He’s… He’s literally floating above the ground. His arms are spread out and he has his eyes closed. His features are well-defined and his skin is so milky white. He looks almost impossible to be human and when the man slits his eyes open, I feel a cold shiver run down my spine. The man releases a laugh as he looks around. He smirks and then finally with a strong powerful voice, he welcomes us all

“I am the Dark Lord, Lord Heechul.” He smirks, looking at all of us. “And in ten seconds, a war will begin and only the strongest amongst you will survive.”

The man snaps his fingers and I step back, my eyes and mouth wide open in horror. There are suddenly hundreds of wild giant beasts’ right up front. They look like a mixture of giant dogs, lions, bears and wolves. They’re huge, they’re gigantic and they’re glowing with a kind of black energy around them. There are chains around their necks and it looks like the man is holding them. Everyone looks around, confused and frightened. There is terror in everyone’s eyes but the man does not give a single . He starts to countdown from ten while everyone starts running around.

10…. 9…. 8… 7

My head spins, left and right. I don’t know what to do. I’m panicking. I’m lost. I’m cold. I want to find Kyuhyun and I want to get out of here.

6…. 5….

I want to wake up from this nightmare. Please… Let me wake up from this nightmare.

4… 3… 2…

1

The man laughs and snaps his fingers once more, the beasts are unleased. Everyone starts running for their lives.

“Let the darkness begin.”

***

Kyuhyun

Where am I?

Where is Ryeowook?

I look around in dismay. I am in a room, a cold white room with hundreds of other strangers that I barely recognize. I press my hands to my forehead and try to think of what just happened… The lights! I was surrounded by a white coloured light ray and Ryeowook was too, however the colour of the light ray that surrounded him was black. What did that mean? Where is Ryeowook?

I want to ask the person next to me what is going on but I don’t have to ponder for so long because all of a