(Edited)

The other MBLAQ members had been dragged out of Cheolyong's ward room by Byungki and Kyungho who had been complaining about them being late to their schedule especially Changsun who apparently got his tab filled with solo schedule for today and the next day. They had been adamant about keeping the maknae company until their youngest member will be wheeled into the operation theatre but Cheolyong simply waved them all off, almost shoo-ing even, with words of, "Work hard, hyungs! Then you can pay the cost for my surgery."

          Half an hour later, Cheolyong was lying down on the bed, waiting for the anesthesia to take effect before the surgery when the door to his ward room was opened from outside. He turned his head slightly, already feeling the drugs numbing his system when he saw his second older sister and his mother approached his bed.

          What were they doing here? Oh yea… They did still have to act like one happy caring family.

          "How do you feel? Sorry we came a bit late." Mrs. Bang took a seat on the chair next to the bed. She on Cheolyong's dark brown locks gently. The touch felt so soothing and special. Was this what people called a motherly touch? "Your father is outside. The nurse don't want too many of us coming in. Hyosun is waiting outside too." She informed.

          "You shouldn't have come up here." Cheolyong said slowly and weakly, feeling too tired to spoke.

          "We have to." Hyojin interrupted, her pair of large eyes seemed to be holding something back as she stared down at Cheolyong. And Cheolyong swore he could see the glistening of unshed tears inside those orbs.

          Why? Why would she cry over her fake brother? And it was not like he was dying or anything.

          "We'll wait here until you're out of your surgery. Don't be scared, okay? You'll be fine." Mrs. Bang continued, leaning closer and pressed her lips onto Cheolyong's forehead.

          Closing his eyes, Cheolyong felt like the warm kiss from his mother sent a kind of strength he never experienced in his life before. Once he felt the lips retreated, he opened back his eyes, looking up in confusion at his mother. He was thrown into more spiral of confusion when it was Hyojin's turn to kiss him, this time on his cheek. The kiss lingered longer than needed and like the kiss from his mother, it awoken something which had long dead inside him. And warm him with the kind of heat that sooth you during freezing winter. And his cold dead heart beat again.

          "Cheolyong-ah…" Mrs. Bang whispered, watching as Cheolyong's eyes blinked in a slow motion, slowly drifting into deep sleep. When Cheolyong's large eyes were shut completely, only then she let her tears escaped her eyes. She sobbed slightly when Hyojin hugged her from behind. "Hyojin-ah…"

          "De, Umma."

          "Can't we just tell him?" Mrs. Bang asked, she caressed Cheolyong's cheek with the back of her hands, restraining her strong urge to cradle her precious baby into a tight embrace and kissed him all over his face, telling him how much she loved and miss her baby.

          They were so closed, yet so far…

          Why do our own family feels like stranger…?

          "We can't, Umma. You know we can't." Hyojin's voice cracked as her own tears streamed down her face. Pain evident in her eyes as she stared down on her brother's still figure on the bed. "We just… Can't." She turned her head away and closed her eyes.

          "Why… Why did our family turned this way?" Mrs Bang grabbed unto Cheolyong's hand and brought it to his lips.

          "Umma…" Cheolyong mumbled, waking up for a moment before falling back to sleep, half-conscious.

          Mrs. Bang took this chance and was half-hoping Cheolyong would forget what she was about to say half hoping, his son would remember it for life. "Ahdeul… My precious son. My precious son Cheolyong. I named you Cheolyong myself. Cheol for the light and Yong for the end because I want you to light even until the end. And please remember that umma, appa and your noonas all love you. We never stop loving you and we have never forgotten about you. Whatever might happen in the future, please promise Umma that you will survive and you will keep pushing forward strongly like you have always been. Forgive this umma that had failed in protecting you. I love you, Cheolyong, my son…"

############

Cheolyong felt all hazy and blurry. He inhaled and exhaled weekly, trying to breathe deeply but fail miserable. His head was still spinning and as he slowly opened his eyes, he saw the white ceiling tainted with a few dark spots. His sight was too dull that he needed to keep blinking until he could make out the lines clearly.

          Slowly, his mind reeled around to remind him of the last thing he remembered and his face scrunched up into a frown. A deep groaned made past through his slightly parted lips and his hand went to grab his hair. Something was pounding so strongly inside his head.

          What was that?

          "I want you to light to end-" "Cheolyong, I name you myself-" "We all love you-" "My precious son-"

          Cheolyong gasped when white light flashed behind his eyes and he felt his breath quickened when blurry images came to greet him. It was as if he was lying at somewhere else instead of the hospital bed, even the beeping of the machines around him was drown out as his past washed over him like a raging wave. Everything was white until he was brought to a small yet comfy house. It feels like home. A home he thought he never had.

          Mrs Bang smiled down at her maknae son who was snuggling against her, making a few cute noises of a child. "My precious son." Mrs Bang whispered and nudged her nose into Cheolyong's fluffy locks and let her lips kissed the side of her son's head lovingly.

          "He's so cute. His eyes are so large. Look. Look. He scrunched his nose in this picture, looks so much like a puppy!" Hyosun commented as she and Hyojin looked into the photo album filled with their one and only baby brother throughout his three years of life, giggling at the photos of Cheolyong as a newborn baby.

          "He'll be so pretty grown up." Hyojin added, flailing her short six years old limbs excitedly.

          "He's going to be a handsome man, Hyojin-ah. You're going to be the pretty one." Hyosun corrected, pinching Hyojin's button nose playfully.

          "Aniyo! He's going to be pretty!" Hyojin stubbornly said. "Look. He is pretty." Hyojin pointed towards his sleeping dongsaeng inside their mother's cradle. "Can I hold him?" She asked with puppy eyes.

          "Aniyo, you will drop him." Hyosun answered instead of their mom.

          "But… He is big enough already, so do I. I can hold him, right?" Hojin fixed her eyes on their mother whom chuckled softly at her children's cute antics. Who was her to deny her daughter's request?

          She moved Cheolyong a bit in her arms and smiled adoringly when his maknae son was whining cutely for being moved while taking his nap, however, she didn't manage to pass Cheolyong over to the waiting Hyojin when the front door to their small humble apartment was being thrown opened and stumbled in Mr Bang with his clothes wet with his own blood.

          "YEOBO!" Mrs Bang shrieked in horror as she put Cheolyong onto the couch and ran to her husband's side. "Yeobo, what happened?"

          "O-our children. Our children. H-hide them. T-they… They are taking a-all of t-the other children." Mr Bang spoke out with much hardship but Mrs Bang couldn't even start to soak in Mr Bang's order when a few men dressed up in mold color uniform filed into the house and started to pull on screaming Hyosun and Hyojin, even Cheolyong was woken up and started to cry out loud when he realized he was in arms of a stranger.

          "No! Let them go!" Mrs Bang had to leave his husband's side and tried to retrieve back all of his children but then again, what kind of power a woman like her held? She was weak.

          But she was also a mother!

          No strength could defeat that of a mother.

          She didn't care, didn't flinch, didn't wince even as those men taking her children were hitting her with baton, kicking her mercilessly.

          "UMMA! UMMA!" Cheolyong shouted loudly, he struggled and when he felt hold around him loosened, he climbed onto his capturer's shoulder and clung on the capturer's back and using his small power of a young child, he grabbed onto the man's face from behind, digging his fingers into the man's eyes and never stopping as he heard the scream and even when blood started to drip along his forearm.

          He was stopped by another man and was thrown on the road. He saw the man's boot coming closer to his face yet he kept his glare but the boot didn't sink into his small body like he thought it would when another man with scarred face stopped the commotion. He looked down on Cheolyong with poker face before he turned to the beaten up Mrs Bang. With a deep growly voice yet sound so calm, he spoke, "If you want to see your children again, you can do it by serving under me." He threw a card towards the mother of the three children. "If you obey, your children will be kept alive." He turned his cold eyes towards Cheolyong who held his glare at him, amused to how strong such a small child could be. "And I believe, he would be the one that will be chosen among the others."

          And just like that, Cheolyong felt something sharp hitting his nape and he was falling onto the road like a wet rag before his small body was lifted and was brought away, farther and farther from his mother.

          "UMMA!" Cheolyong shouted as he was yanked back to the present, unable to control the overwhelming different emotions attacking him all at once. The machine was beeping loudly beside him and struggled with the pain in his chest. He had a family! He had parents! He had sisters! And he was living with them all these time yet he didn't recognize them. He thought he was alone in this world and that he was always alone even from the start.

          "Bang Cheolyong-shi. Calm down." The nurse came running and saw Cheolyong was wildly tossing around on the bed and calling out for her other colleague to help her holding Cheolyong down. "Call the doctor!" She told one of the new staff nurse and the younger girl went out running.

          "Umma! Umma! Umma!" Cheolyong chanted and for the first time ever since he could remember, his tears came streaming down. Not those fake tears he always forced out to perfect his fake character but it was the realest tear of a heart broken child whom long for his family. "Umma!" He shouted and the door slammed open again.

          It wasn't the young nurse with the doctor like the nurse who was holding Cheolyong down had thought. It was none other than the leader of MBLAQ, running into the ward room with worries pasted all over his face.

          "Sir, you can't enter now. Please wait outside." One of the male nurse helping in holding Cheolyong down left the bedside and tried to usher Seungho out but the leader was one of a stubborn lad. He always got things his way.

          Pushing the male nurse aside, he went to the wailing maknae and pushed all of the nurses crowding over the bed. And when he saw Cheolyong struggled to get up and off the bed, he wrapped his arms around the maknae. "Hush, Cheolyong-ah. It's me. It's hyung. Don't be like this. You just got out of the surgery. I'll call your mother okay? I'll bring her here. Just don't do this. You're going to tear your stitches open." Seungho continuously whispered into Cheolyong's ears and he felt how Cheolyong slowly relaxed in his embrace. "I'll bring your family here." He promised once again and bit his lips when he felt Cheolyong weakly hug him back and wept into his chest like a small child and kept on calling for his mother. What happened, Cheolyong-ah?

          Cheolyong had never acted this way. Sure, the lad had cried before and he was there to hold Cheolyong in his safe embrace and to wipe away the maknae's tears but there was something different this time. There was something different to the tears that he saw today. And slowly, his heart was cracking at the sight of the maknae.

          The machine stopped beeping frantically after a while and the nurses exchanged a look between each other and when the young nurse came back with a doctor on tow, the doctor didn't took too long of time to figure out that Seungho was needed beside his patient so he ushered the others out and told them to let Seungho be.

          Seungho was thankful for such understanding. Pulling away only after he felt Cheolyong had stopped crying, he smiled sadly at how swollen and red Cheolyong's large eyes had turned out. He never thought this kind of event would happened so abruptly and he was relieved that he decided to come here knowing Cheolyong had gotten out of the operation theatre and would be woken up again in any time. He couldn't imagine if he wasn't here when this happened.

          "Now… Feeling better?" Seungho asked, cupping Cheolyong's cheeks tenderly before pushing Cheolyong to lie back on the bed. "You should rest. You just got out of the surgery." He reminded.

          "Mianhae, hyung. I was. I was just." Cheolyong swallowed, unable to explain his sudden emotional break out, his hands trembled as and he clenched hard on the blanket. He was overwhelmed by his newly returned memories and newly found reason to hate Jiman even more. Jiman had taken him away from his family and returned him to them without him knowing anything. Without him recognizing his own family. His own flesh and blood and he had been so close to them… All these time… All these ing time! How much time had been wasted away?

          "It's okay Cheolyong. Just rest."

          "I want to see them." Cheolyong grabbed onto Seungho's arms, shaking the older slightly, trying his best not to sound too desperate. He failed.

          "I know. I'll call your mother." Seungho assured, taking out his phone and was glad that he was pretty close with Cheolyong's family.

          Cheolyong closed his eyes, feeling another tear trailed down his cheek which was almost immediately wiped away by the leader and he felt the leader's warm soft lips on his forehead, reminding him strongly of the kiss his mother and his older sister had given him, reminding him of how it felt having the love of a family. Reminding him of how it feels to be alive.

          They had been so close and he was never alone but why? Why didn't they tell him? Why did they pretend they were just strangers who happened to be agents serving North and had to work under the pretension that they were one family when they really were one.

          Oh god… How it hurts… Now that he finally remember…. It hurts so much it's almost unbearable. And he felt how his heart beat again. Alive than it had ever been. Was living supposed to hurt this much?

          "Wait a sec, Cheolyong." Seungho's phone suddenly rung when he was browsing his contact for Cheolyong's parents.

          Curious, Cheolyong's eyes clicked opened and studied Seungho's features which turned tense by each second as the older lad listened intently to the other end of the line. "Hyung. What's wrong?" Cheolyong asked once Seungho finished the call and put his hand over Seungho's and to his confusion, he felt Seungho's hand trembled under his touch. Something must have happened.

          "J-Joonie. Our Changsun." Seungho stuttered and swallowed loudly, alerting Cheolyong whom now wore a strict look. "That stalker got to him. The others, they... Oh god. Cheolyong, I have to go. The others well be here soon." Seungho stood up, looking so distraught and worried as he rushed out of the ward room, leaving Cheolyong behind without another word. I shouldn't have left the others…

          Cheolyong shook his head. Now it was not time to drown in past memory. Like he'd ever let some crazed fan hurt Changsun or any of the MBLAQ members. Pushing himself up from the bed, he went to the socket where the machines were plugged in and switched all of them off before taking all of it off of himself so that it won't beeped and alarmed the hospital staff. Pulling the IV drip out of the dorsum of his hands and just took a small towel inside the drawer by the bedside to tie it around his bleeding hand.

          He couldn't help but smirk. The other members of MBLAQ would have been surprised seeing Cheolyong who was supposed to be so scared of the needles casually yanked all of those probe out of his body.

          Cheolyong took his phone, trying to reach Jinwoon but surprisingly, there was no answer. This never happened before. He guessed, he'll just do this by himself. The maknae decided and he made way sneakily out of the hospital building.

          One place was on his mind. That shop belong to that woman named Minyoung.

############

Hongman stared long at the young lad standing across his table. It was the first he saw that perfectly trained detective showing his emotion so openly. It was the first time to see his one and only apprentice looking so distraught.

          "Doing this might risk exposing your identity." Hongman spoke out after a long silence.

          The young lad slammed his palms on the table, looking up defiantly at Hongman which was also the first time that ever happened. There was a lot of first time he was experiencing tonight so it seemed.

          "I don't care. At this rate, Changsun might-"

          "Detective Yang!" Hongman raised his voice.

          Seungho jolted back slightly. Hongman was always gentle despite his rank in the police sector but this time maybe Seungho had crossed the line.

          "Remember why I sent you there in the first place." Hongman reminded. "We can't sacrifice the whole country for one man."

          "What country sacrifice their own man?" Seungho rebutted, eyes cold.

          Hongman opened his mouth and closed it back. A smile danced on his lips as he shook his head. Like he had expected. Even if Seungho was his student, this young lad would definitely surpass him if not already.

          "If you won't help me, then I'll do it myself. If I can't protect my own brother, how can I protect the country?" Seungho spun on his heels and marched to the door but was stopped by Hongman.

          "You are right." Hongman sighed in defeat knowing Seungho could be even more stubborn than him and this conversation would ended on Seungho's side. "I'll send my men to track after him." Hongman decided.

          "Thank you. But I want to be there too."

          "Knowing you, I expect nothing less."