When Alexa woke up the next morning, she was shocked to find she was still in the hospital, and even more shocking on a bed with a mattress. 

Her body hurt, but she couldn’t remember why.  As her mind tried to find a reason, she shut down, knowing somehow, she didn’t want to know what happened. 

She turned in the bed, to see Seokjin at a desk pouring over some paperwork. 

‘Seokjin?’ she mumbled, confused.  Why was she here?

‘Alexa.  How are you feeling?’  Seokjin answered, running over to her. 

‘Why are you here?’ She asked her. 

Seokjin frowned, shifting her eyes around the room.  No one else was there. 

‘Jungkook appointed me as the medic for the prison, so I can check on you and make sure you’re ok.  How do you feel?’ She asked her again.

‘Um,’ she thought about it. ‘Sore.’ She answered.

‘Do you remember anything from last night?’  Seokjin pressed.

Alexa looked up at her big brown eyes.  Going over the night step by step she remembered footsteps, she remembered hoping to see Taehyung, and then she remembered the look in the guards eyes as they came into her cell. 

‘I know it’s hard.  If you can remember can you tell me.’  Seokjin’s voice was very soft.

‘I thought it was Taehyung.  I thought he had snuck into see me at night.’  She mumbled feeling incredibly stupid with herself.

‘Do you remember Jungkook bringing you in here?’  Seokjin asked her nodding at her answers. 

‘No.’  It was the truth.  After the guards came into the room, her body filled with terror and she didn’t want to remember.  Everything was black until this moment. 

‘Ok.  Try and get some rest, I’ll get some food for you.’  Seokjin squeezed her shoulder gently as she left the hospital ward, locking the door behind her as she left. 

It didn’t make any sense to her why Seokjin was here, though she was grateful.  Jungkook didn’t particularly make her feel any more relaxed, although they had some kind of understanding between them now.  But Seokjin did, she had always been kind to her and no matter what had happened, Seokjin would be able to fix her. 

Within a few minutes Seokjin had returned with a tray of food, real food, not the usual gruel she had to endure. 

‘How is it?’  Seokjin asked her, half way through eating. 

‘It’s ok.’  She answered.  ‘Better than I am used to.’ 

‘We’ll be making sure you’re fed properly now.’  Seokjin told her with a smile. 

‘Jin,’ Alexa stopped eating to look at her.  ‘Something bad happened to me didn’t it?’  It was in the back of her mind, this nagging feeling, but she really didn’t want to open that door of her brain to find out what it was. 

Seokjin moved from her desk to sit on the bed with her, giving her sad eyes as she looked her over. 

‘It was bad.  But you’re ok now.  You’ll be staying here for a while, so I can monitor you.’ 

‘Will I die?’ she whispered.

‘No honey, it’s not that bad.’  Seokjin smiled kindly.  ‘I expect they won’t let you stay in here forever with me though.’

‘Taehyung.’  Alexa said suddenly.  ‘Is he ok?  Jungkook said you were looking after him at your house.’ 

Seokjin frowned before she answered, ‘He’s in our house for now.  I’m giving him painkillers, whenever it gets bad for him, but it’s not often, don’t worry.  Try and rest for now ok?  I have some paper work to finish, and some tests to do.  I’ll be here when you wake up.’ 

Finishing the food, she agreed to Seokjin’s requests and went back to sleep.  Something had changed in her mind, some kind of wall had come up and she felt tired all the time. 

Seokjin kept her in the hospital ward for a week before she would let Jungkook take her back to her cell.  She was satisfied she would be fine, although she did have quite a heated argument with Jungkook before she allowed him to take her back. 

‘I’m sorry Alexa,’ he told her as he accompanied her down the hallways. 

‘You know the rest of the force gets suspicious and we can’t go upsetting them too much yet.’

‘It’s ok.’ She told him having recovered from her ordeal, though she still blocked the event from her memory, refusing to let it come into her mind.  It had been nice, spending time in Seokjin’s company for a change instead of her own mind and sometimes she had put music on, some of Yoongi’s songs, which had been a welcome change. 

She was still sleeping a lot though.  With little else to do she figured being bored and left alone made her more tired than ever.  It didn’t bother her to sleep though, sleeping was like blocking out large chunks of time she didn’t want to spent missing Taehyung or hurting. 

A few weeks later, after seeing Seokjin once a week, when she continually asked her a multitude of questions about how she was feeling, she was woken up one morning with an ice bucket.  They had stopped waking her up that way since she was taken to the hospital ward.  Since she had been back in her cell she had only had contact twice a day with guards who threw a bowl of food at her and left without another word. 

It was a matter of time until it started again though.  The guards were relentless and hated her.  Though she never asked Seokjin, she guessed that whatever had happened to her the night Seokjin arrived caused some guards to be suspended, and Jungkook was behind her being left alone for a while.  It couldn’t last though, she knew that for certain.  Jungkook nor Seokjin could be at the prison every day, and as soon as some guards who were annoyed with her had the chance, something else horrible would begin again. 

Opening her eyes to the guard standing over her, she recognised the man.  He was the one who whipped her the day Taehyung had taken her home with him.  It took her a few minutes to remember the conversation she had with Taehyung about this man.  He had punched him.  Swallowing down the fear threatening to bubble up inside her she knew this wasn’t going to end well for her. 

‘Remember me?’ he hissed at her, pulling her chains so she fell on her knees in front of him.  Keeping shut, she battled with the pain in her mind. 

‘You and your little boyfriend got me suspended.  No pay, dishonour.’  He knelt to speak to her, calmly as you like.  ‘Got my friends sent to prison too, and their families.  All because they gave you what you deserved.  Where’s the justice there?’  He continued to jibe at her. 

‘Well, Junior Chief Jungkook isn’t here to save you today sweetheart.  Officer Taehyung is done with you.  So, no more easy ride for you here, no one here is going to save you today.  GET UP!’ He yelled pulling on her, so she fell again as she fumbled to get to her feet. 

Keeping her eyes on the floor she followed the guard through the familiar walk way to the room with the whip.  It was hard, knowing exactly what was coming, knowing how excruciating the pain would be to keep it from her mind.  Nevertheless, she managed to keep her mind blank, she managed to keep herself from shaking as he tied her up with her hands above her head, practically dangling as her toes barely touched the filthy floor. 

The crack of the whip echoed before it hit.  She felt the pain a thousand times, just as she had the first time the whip was unleashed on her.  Biting down on her lip she kept the pain locked inside as she repeated to herself, better me than Taehyung, better me than Jungkook or Jimin.  She would take each lashing a million times over, so they would never feel it.  It helped, to keep her silent.  Though it wasn’t impressing the evil guard who had his score to settle with her. 

‘Toughened up being on house arrest, did you?  I guess I’ll have to just keep going until you break.’  His voice echoed with the leather torture device as she bled through the overalls she was wearing.  Each time it connected her body would tense so she hung from her wrists for a few seconds before the pain was bearable enough her toes found the floor. 

He kept at the whippings until she passed out.  Though she didn’t scream once.  Her agony was contained within her as the blood spilled in and the world went dark again. 

When she woke the next morning, her body was in pure agony.  She’d been stripped of the overalls and put into new ones, clearly after her cuts had stopped bleeding. 

It happened again three days later.  Same guard, same day, everything was the same except now the pain was worse.  Lashings on top of fresh wounds seemed to be worse than fresh cuts.  Given time to half way heal and then lashed again meant she wasn’t able to tolerate it for long before she did scream out, to the hysterical laughter of the guard inflicting the pain. 

She woke the next day to Seokjin in her cell, dabbing medicine into her and a conversation between her and Jungkook. 

‘Did you know he was the one Taehyung knocked out?’  Seokjin was asking.

‘No, I don’t know how he even got in here, he was still on suspension.’  Jungkook was responding. 

‘Where is he now?’  Seokjin said.

‘Fired.  Dad fired him.  Thank god Namjoon got that bill passed that he could fire him.  He needs to hurry that paper work through.’  Jungkook was sighing.

‘He’s doing all he can Jungkook.  He’s really stressed out right now, and then there’s Taehyung at home.  We love him, but it’s hard on him to see hi