As Kibum entered the mystery man's cabin, he was immediately greeted by a concerning chemical smell that quickly made him cough and cover his face with his hands. The man seemed unaffected by this, perhaps used to it by how long he had been living in such a place. The small space seemed even smaller with the many scientific instruments cluttering nearly every surface. There were test tubes, pipettes, and beakers mainly with various coloured liquids inside. Although, it seemed like there was a lot less order than appeared on the surface. This was a mad scientist's lab, not one of any sort of purposeful standing. "What is all of this for?", Kibum inquired with concern.

The man sat on his bed, picked up an open mason jar, and drank the contents first before answering. His eyes darkly loomed and his gaze never lifted from the floor. He no longer seemed to be the same man Kibum had followed from group therapy. This man was no longer joking around and playfully toying with his mind. It seemed as though his mind had grown too weary from the day during just the short walk to his cabin. "It's there to feed my misery. A memorial of my failures. A memento of what could never be", he said sullenly and laid back on his bed. With his arms crossed behind his head, the man stared wistfully up at the ceiling. It was as if he had forgotten Kibum was there now.

 

"You said.... That you tried to revive the one you lost... Were you really serious? Was this how you did it?", Kibum asked with wide eyes. No one in group therapy earlier had actually thought him serious. It had been thought to be simply a dramatic metaphor or exaggeration. Not once had anyone thought that this man would've actually been crazy enough to raise the dead. Although, he wouldn't have been the first to try something so desperate. The thought naturally horrified Kibum, yet was soon overtook by inspiration. Hope flickered its deceitful flame within his heart yet again. There would be a driving fire within moments as he was swept up by past winds once more. Kibum rushed from the cabin as if death were chasing him. The icy weather cut across him as he glided over the snow packed terrain. Once he reached his own cabin, his heart was pounding wildly. The warmth invited him to stay, but he did not for long. Among his relics of the old world to which he felt prisoner to, he retrieved a weathered, yet kept folded paper. Kibum could make nothing of its inscriptions, but he had the uncanny instinct that this mad scientist he befriended could put it to some use.

 

The man had manage to intoxicate himself by the time Kibum returned a few minutes later. This did not bring about the hesitance that it rightly should've in Kibum. He was already too blinded again by the hope that he had sworn off of. This isn't anything too be surprised about, considering that Kibum knew from the very beginning that should he be tempted again he would be unable to resist; such is the life of an addict. Kibum sat beside him on the edge of the bed. He unfolded the paper and presented it to him without explanation. The man furrowed his eyebrows and squinted at first. What he read seemed to sober him up a little at least by the shock displayed on his face. "Where did you get this?!", the man screamed angrily as he threw Kibum up against the wall that the bed rested against.

 

Kibum gasped and writhed in the man's tight grasp, but was ultimately pinned by his force. He felt just as helpless as before now, but he wasn't afraid. Fear had left him long ago. One can not be afraid anymore once their worst possible fear has already come true. For Kibum, that was his loss of Jonghyun. "M-My husband... He was like you.... He liked to meddle with nature. I don't know much about the science of it, but he brought back to life long dead roses. This was all I could find of his work. I don't know if this is even relevant to it, but this is all I have. With this.... could you bring people back? Could you bring back my husband and yours?...", he asked with large eyes, enough to capture the stars in their gaze.

 

The man trembled with every nerve. At first, it seemed to be the shock of such a otherworldly proposal, but as the man released him and laid back, Kibum knew that it was much more than this. The man's skin rippled with distress. Kibum turned him on his side before taking to the wind outside. Several nurses from the center followed him back to the cabin. Kibum took the paper back from the man and stuffed it into his pocket before the nurses took him away on a stretcher. A couple nurses stayed behind to sample the various containers around the room to test for harmful materials. Undoubtedly, everything here was probably unsafe for inhalation or consumption. Kibum stayed behind for a few minutes after the others had left. Similar papers covered one wall completely. There were several equations and other random scrawlings over every inch of these papers. As he observed them, he found it more strange than would usually be considered. The paper in his pocket was of the same family. All had been weathered and kept in similar patterns. They all had the same feel, the same hue, the same ink, the same depth...

 

...and the same handwriting.