-Before the War-

You sit in an enveloping darkness.  Tears swell in your eyes before silently leaking out after it becomes too much to hold them in. Almost as if to mock the happiness you felt once in your life, your tears of anguish roll down your face as you trry to keep a calm face.

Only it's nearly impossible when your devastantingly fragile mother lays on the bed before you, withering into nothingness. Your gleaming eyes sit in place, taking in the sight of it all. Your eyes sit there and see the sight of what months after months of battling against the disease has brought your mother. Seeing your mother lay there, wilting like an unfed flower, sickens you; enough that the sight shakes you to your core with a dangerous amount of anguish and a tinge of the predictable lonelines that will only come after her death. The sadness wants to envelop your body and let this end already. You fight back like the young warrior you are, though. At least for now while you still see an option for brightness in the future. 

Your mother is dying and yet to hold on to the small fragment of your heart that keeps believing she can pull through, is utter foolishness. Your mind knows better than what your heart could ever tell you.  Your mind tells you there is no point in holding onto desperate hopes that she would pull through; like the fairytales go: just awake at the touch of her loved one. Your mind knew even before she lay on those soft sheets, the color of the sky. Your mind kept pounding on your head, yelling at you saying that she would not pull through this wretched disease.

"Mother." Your word came out as a broken whisper as you struggled to fight back the overwhelming sense to breakdown than and there. 

Your stubborness was showing as you would not show her anymore that you were actually just still a child; one who still needed countless more moments of compassion and guidance. You couldn't show her that you weren't ready to handle the world, without that guiding hand that your mother had always provided since she first held you in her arms. It was but a hand that could -and would- surpress all fears if need be, for the sake of her two precious gems and also one that would bring you the world's greatest joy when she would place her soft hand anywhere on your skin. It was a sensation no child could live without and a feeling no mother could go without. 

You just would not. This was your mindset and you were determined to accomplish it until- ...

As you opened your mouth to try and speak again, a loud, bubbling noise emerged from your sore throat. It was the sound of you gasping for air, as you ,beyond the shadow of doubt, broke down into heart-shattering sobs. As a way to comfort you, your mother tried her absolute best to smile back at you but her muscles would not allow it. She could only lay there, staring back at you with kneaded, hazel eyes. 

"Mi-" a raspy voice voice called out to you. You looked up, your eyes wandering like an animal on the hunt, thinking there was an intruder. Having scanned the room a few times, it came to you at a rushing speed that it was her voice that had tried to speak your name. You mistook that voice of your mothers for someone else's. It broke your heart futher into pieces.
 

You feel the pain she must be feeling when you notice your mother make a tremendous effort to squeeze your hand. Indirectly, with the look in her eyes, she was telling you not to worry. 

You look at her dried, pruny lips as she continues struggling to form words but cheerelessy enough, she the words weren't undistingushable enough to be coherent to words at all. They were all just tiny gasps, pants and slight grunts. 

"Mother!.. Please don't strain yourself. Remember now, you have to pull through. You-you p-p" you break out into another unhappyily ugly fit of sobbing before completing your sentence "promised.. you would never leave us both, Bummie and I, alone until we've grown and matured both pyscially and mentally. A-and" Once again you sentence brakes off into shattered cries of anguish. The unbearable pain in your soul, is enough to make an army of men tear. 

Your mother gently the backside of your hand , which lays underneath her own hands' flesh. Unexpectedly (for you but not so much for time) her body convulses, opening in a gaping "o" before contorting into a sickening twist. Her legs shake ferociously and her back falls back to the surface of the inviting bed. The small touch, not even a grasp, you felt from her hand disappears as her hand quietly falls to the side of the, dangling like a clock's arm over the edge of the bed. You sit frozen in time, your body not reactioning, staring back at your mother's hollow body, her face tilted your way. 

The way her eyes stare back at you, with no glints of life her once exciting and cherishable life makes you loose all direction of remaining hope. Now you live to survive and solely for that purpose. 

You question your mind, on when you yourself can die. You want to wither so badly on the same bed your lifeless mother lays. You wish to  be trampled by a million horses or face the same disease as your mom, so long as you don't have to put up with the angst of loosing your loved one. 

Your mother was once a fresh flower, hand picked from the many other dozens of them, specifically chosen for KiBum and you. You wish to be the same. You ARE the same. Only more do you wish you could crawl into a ball, before exploding. You would die. You would kill yourself. Suicide is likely until you remember KiBum. His kind smile reappears in your mind, his hands outstretched to hug you. You can't murder yourself when clearly such a young[er than you] child still needs a caring hand. Who else than you to care for him. An orphanage is out of the question and you have no other relatives that live here in Seoul. KiBum still depends on anyone and veryone that are willing to lend him a (aiding) hand. He's still that much more of a young deer than you are. 

You stand, your shirt stained with the tears of anguish, sadness, destruction, pain, sufferment. All of it. And more. It's a feeling no one wishes to face at such a developing age. You've only seen happiness even through your father's leave. If he really did leave..

Your lips are trembling and your eyesight blurry with the fresh pool of tears forming in your eyes. Some escaping the cage of your eyes because they can't take the claustrophobic room while others decide to stay back in order to hold back what could be an outbreak of raging emotions. Your heart isn't whole anymore; instead it's shattered and tattered, it's left feeling like a wired car whose circuit has cut short in the middle of nowhere without food or water. The car was only meant to take you but so far. 

You grab the courage to say goodbye to your mother for the final time. 

You gently stretch your hand out, the flames within consuming your mind as you are angered with the world and its people, closing shut the eyes of a devastated , distressed and grief-stricken soul. Right before you close her eyelids, you give her a small smile behind a tearful face, thinking,and once again hoping it would make a difference in bringing her back to life.

Lies.

The last thing you saw of hers that seemed to hold even the smallest bit of light, were here silent, frightened eyes, glistening back at you. They screamed "I'm sorry". 

Wherever she may be in the sky now, she knows and understands your pain. She can't help it and so she cries. Outside, the rain starts pouring, trees shake ferociously; the streets flood with the sudden outpour of water. Her wails of anguish are the claps and chants of the infuriated thunder. Her agonized, streaked face are the shots of bright lightning that illuminate the city with its bright light.

God has cursed you. But he also gave you a reason enough to know something: to know that the thunder was the signal given to you, that day, to show you that your mother did not want to die.

She loved you dearly. And will,,  forever more. 

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You break from your dream of recalling the past. The memories that plague your thoughts and the way you function to survive in this diesase-struck Seoul, the streets lined with limping souls who only want to survive. Beggars are what they're called. They won't survive longer than those who search for their own food. The sound of approaching footsteps broke your memories. A man's rough, barren voice echoes throughout the back alley of your small, partly destroyed home. The pain the war caused. You slowly stand from your seat at the kitchen table near the kitchen window, flip your hair that reaches to the middle of your back, where the elbows can meld into the sides of your skeleton, as you reach out with an empty hand for the knife laying on the kitchen counter. Or what is it of, that is. You turn to face the window, knife raised high before silently opening the window from its' rusty hinges. You wait there, like a silent killer but after a minute you conclude there is no one there. That or the man meant no harm as he passed the houses' back alley. 

"Most likely all just another game from the Kingdom. They're messing with our heads too much." You speak in a pititul tone to the darkened room hence the sun is setting. 

You sigh, pulling your head back in. Your about to shut the window closed before you realize you have to check the sun for time. You were one of the luckier homes to have electricity during the outage prior to the current Tyrant's rule. Reason being: before the war and evne during the beginning of the battles that would lead to Seoul being the terrible place it is now, your father worked for the country's armed forces. Those who worked for their country, during this era, were cherised higher than others. It was an accomodation, you would always said. That is the Tyrant took control, and the electricity was shut off in every home of Seoul. Whether you were poor, beautiful, rich or homeless, no one lived to see the spark of what it meant to easily turn on a light switch and be enveloped with a kissing yellow light. Only the kingdom was allowed because those people controlled the city. 

"That damn tyrant" You said, clenching your fists after you gently shut the window, setting its' metal bolts back into place on the inside of your home. That only meant no intruders because the only way out was from inside. No one would dare crack it. You would kill. 

You sighed a strained out sigh, your stomach rumbling with a hunger that needed to be fed. 

"It's that time again, eh." 

And with that you step in front of the door, turning to grab your fathers' previous sword he had used before and during the war, until it was shipped over to your family's residence again. Your fathers' whereabout unidentifiable. It was a mystery. 

You slid down on the doors inner stoop, to put on your boots and slide up the zipper. You made sure to tie back your hair with the strand of string you used as a substiute for a hairband, blew out the candles and her your cat, Floo-Poo, meowing. She was too hungry. You crouched down to pet her head and scratch her ears, causing her to purr melodically; the sound sweet music to your ears, before saying to her in a kind tone "I know. You too. I'll make sure to bring back a big loaf for you too." You smiled, giving her one last sratch before quietly opening the door. You let your eyes wander around the street, checking for clear that there was no one armed in sight before you headed out. Floo-Ploo looking back at you with huge eyes was the last thing you saw before you gently drew the metal door closed, locking it and making sure to seal it with a metal bind. 

That should do.

Satisfied, you started your journey to the center of the city where the food source came once every three days. The night's dark back, encompassed your lonley self. One for another they always say.