WARNING: HARSH LANGUAGE AHEAD

Chapter 21

Jonghyun had turned just in time to see Taemin lose his battle.  He saw the dancer’s eyes drift closed and in slow-motion, saw his body start to crash to the floor.  He reacted without thought and jumped from his chair and dove for the younger man.  He managed to catch Taemin’s head before it could slam into the stage, but only barely.  He gently laid the boy’s head on his own thigh and cradled the other’s pained face.  The boy’s entire face was crunched up and showed great pain and the bluish-tinge that his lips were taking could not be good.    

Jonghyun gently laid his hands on the edges of Taemin’s face, “Taemin…” he softly called, “Taemin…hey kiddo…come on kiddo, open your eyes…Taemin, Taemin!” 

There was an odd sound, like several marbles clinking around in a plastic box, that could be heard every time Taemin took a struggling breath.  Jonghyun’s eyes were dragged down to the dancer’s chest when he heard that noise.  Usually when a person breathes, you can see their chest rise and fall as one.  But as Taemin’s lungs took in their meager breath, portions of Taemin’s chest appeared to be moving separately from each other, accompanied by a rattling and grating noise that filled Jonghyun’s ears each time the young boy attempted to breathe.  “Taemin…” the singer cried.

Before he knew it there were paramedics circling round and pulling Jonghyun away from his bandmate.  Jonghyun watched in terror as men in white jumpsuits with a bright red-cross insignia rushed around the body lying prone on the floor of the set.  They spoke in some code that he couldn’t understand, though at this point he thought he was in so much shock that he could have been a doctor and he still would have no idea what was going on.    

How had this happened?!  Taemin had been fine when they arrived on the set, and he had been so excited to do this show, with things finally starting to return to some semblance of normalcy after the rollercoaster ride they had been on for the past few weeks.  He had been quiet as the show started, but he was usually nervous going into talk shows….

As one of the paramedics shifted Jonghyun saw something that ran his blood cold.  One of the paramedics had smudged the dancer’s make-up as he worked on the young man and angry purple bruises glared up at Jonghyun from Taemin’s face.  They looked fresh; in fact, the tissue was only just starting to swell.  It was as though Taemin had been beaten up…today…but Jonghyun had been with him the whole day!...except when he went to talk to Yesung-hyung and the others…Taemin had been finishing up some homework in the waiting room and hadn’t even really noticed the older singer leaving…

Who would do this?!  Why would someone want to hurt Taemin?  He was so kind and sweet, why would anyone ever want to hurt him of all people?

Jonghyun felt his world spinning around him as the thoughts and questions barreled through his mind.  Glancing around as though to catch his bearings he was shocked to see their former manager standing behind a camera, focused on the trauma on the set.  But while everyone else was looking on with expressions of shock, concern or fear for the maknae, he looked gleeful, and almost victorious…

Before Jonghyun was aware of what he was doing he had already covered half of the distance across the set between them.  The man was so engrossed in the sight of Taemin on the ground that he never noticed the singer approaching him, but he definitely noticed when Jonghyun’s fist planted itself in his jaw, sending the man flying into a stationary camera before crashing to the floor. 

Jonghyun didn’t even feel the hands of others around him trying to hold him back.  He was so enraged that despite his small stature, he threw them off and ran over to the huddled form.  Fueled by rage, he picked the form up off of the ground.  He grabbed his former manager’s collar with his left, and before anyone could seize him again, managed to land two solid punches to the horrible man’s face before he once more found his top half being restrained, this time by four people.  No matter though, as he managed to strike out with his legs and land a few good kicks in on the former manager as he lay on the ground where Jonghyun had dropped him.  Eventually those around him, stars and crew alike, managed to subdue his strikes but he still struggled against them, choosing to shout his attacks now, “You son of a !  How could you do that to him?!  He’s just a kid!”  And various turns on those phrases. 

Shindong had recognized the man as an SM manager and had moved to help the man up.  However, when he heard Jonghyun’s ravings, he backed away from the man as though he was leaper.  He remembered how much work Super Junior had put in to protecting their SHINee dongsaengs from the efforts of this man to disrupt and discredit them, and knowing now that this man was the cause of all of SHINee’s suffering he felt nothing but distaste for the man shifting on the dark studio floor.  

Shindong’s eyes darted between Jonghyun and the man on the floor, and as he made the trip back to his labelmate, he saw a pleading in the singer’s eyes, “He did that to Taemin, he’s been gunning for him for weeks!  That’s why we don’t have a manager right now…”  Jonghyun was crying now, trying desperately to get someone to understand that the man was dangerous.  He had given up his struggles and was hanging limp in the arms of the six people that had been required to subdue him. 

“Jonghyun…how can you know that it was him?” Shindong asked, glancing between the two men.

“Taemin has bruises…someone has beaten him up, and he is the only one who has a reason to want to hurt him…” Jonghyun cried, tears flowing down his cheeks. 

“But how can you know that it was…” but Shindong was interrupted. 

“He deserved it!” Came a crazed voice.  SHINee’s former manager was rising to his feet, holding his right hand to his face trying to stem the blood that flowed from his lips and a gash above his eye, while leaning heavily on his left leg due to Jonghyun’s unearthly good aim during his kicking spree.  Half-mad eyes sparkled in a hazy delight as he took in Jonghyun being restrained from him.  “He was disgusting and his behaviors were like a cancer.  You need to eradicate it with one foul swoop or it is worse for everyone in the long run.  I was just doing what is best for SHINee, even though you tried to stop me. DIRTY DISGUSTING !”

Everyone watched the mad man with a sick sense of awe, not inspired but repulsed by the man with whom they had once worked. 

“SHINee is my life; everything I do is for the good of SHINee!  And Taemin threatened that good! All because HE WAS A ERT!  A FILTHY LITTLE ER! He should ROT IN HELL! He deserved every punch! He has ruined everything!”

But the PD had heard enough and this time he landed the punch to the insane man’s jaw.  “Let him go,” the PD ordered the crew still half-heartedly hanging onto Jonghyun.  Looking at the singer he said, “I’ll get security to hold him and pull the tapes from backstage.”  Turning and looking at the manager he said loudly, loud enough for all the fans in the audience to hear, “It looks like someone beat Taemin up pretty badly backstage, good thing we have cameras up to capture anything that goes on back there.” 

The fans hissed and booed as what little color was left in the shell of a man’s face fled.  Security came and handcuffed him and took him to a backstage room while waiting for the police.  He screamed mad accusations that no one listened to while fans threw whatever they could get their hands on at the man as he was paraded out. 

The PD then kindly placed his hand on Jonghyun’s shoulder and said, “We’ve already contacted Onew to explain, but they are going to take Taemin away to the hospital soon so you should go be with him.” 

Jonghyun merely nodded and took off running for the stretcher that the paramedics had placed Taemin onto and were beginning to wheel away. 

The PD turned towards the audience and walked over to the elevated railing keeping the people back from the stage.  “Excuse me!” he called out to the audience, “I know some of you caught that man on tape with your cameras.  If you think you have the video we would like for you to go with one of our studio staff and they will make a copy of it from your camera for us to give to the police.”

“Is Taemin-oppa going to be okay?” one fan cried out.

“The proper people are seeing to him.” And the man turned and attempted to sort out the chaos that had overtaken his set.  Between distraught idols and the loud cries of outrage from managers and the phone in his pocket that he knew was ringing from studio heads who had already heard about what happened – it was going to be a long, long day.

Uh oh....by the power of fancams....

BTW - the picture was chosen because it looks like Jonghyun could be the crap out of someone in it - which the manager has totally earned.