“We are not going to hurt you,” muttered Sunggyu, approaching the trembling male with, “You really are injured, if you don’t trust me about that, please look at your side.”

“Sunggyu, leave him be,” muttered Woohyun, “it is a waste of precious time the longer we go without finding an escape route, the less likely it is that we will escape – all because of that idiot.”

“Woohyun,” growled Sunggyu, sending the younger male a pointed glare.

Woohyun huffed out in anger, turning back towards the wall, resuming his search and resisting the urge to lash out at Sunggyu and the newcomer.

“Lash out at them…kill Sunggyu; make all the others fear you. Give the newcomer a reason to be afraid of you all. Succumb to the anger that hides deep within you, let the darkness consume you. Get rid of him so that you can save yourself, so that you can survive…do it…do it now!”

Woohyun froze in shock, not understanding the disembodied voice’s intention; however, after recovering from his shock, it finally clicked in his head causing him to shudder.

“Kill Sunggyu and all your problems will disappear; you’ll get to walk out of here free and alive.”

“No,” muttered Woohyun, trembling, “No!”

All attention turned towards him, Sunggyu approached the younger – worry obvious between his furrowed brows.

“Kill him!”

“No!”

Sunggyu froze, where he stood, not understanding what was going on. The male’s heart dropped in his chest as he watched Woohyun drop to his knees, continuously chanting “no”. Woohyun shakily covered his ears with his hands and repeatedly shook his head. As Sunggyu approached him, the convulsions got worse and Woohyun seemed to whimper in pain.

Sunggyu jumped in shock, spinning on his heel as a hand landed on his shoulder, coming face to face with the newcomer – whose face was partically illuminated by the flood lights outside the room. The newcomer’s eyes were glued onto Woohyun’s curled up form, his eyes were glistening from unshed tears as a wavering breath slipped from between the male’s lips.

“D-Don’t approach him,” whimpered the newcomer, sorrow dripping from his voice as he continued to stare at Woohyun.

“What’s going on?” whispered Ricky in fear to no one in particular.

“T-The Sh-shadow is communicating with him…” whimpered the newcomer.

“What?” questioned Sunggyu, confusing marring his features.

“The shadow is communicating with him,” stated the newcomer, his voice lower but louder, his hands trembling on Sunggyu’s shoulders.

“How do you know this?” questioned Dongwoo, suspious and weary of the new comer.

“This has happened to me before,” stated the newcomer, a bit hesitantly before rambling on, “N-not what’s happening to him, but this situation…I’ve been through it before.”

“With one of the other two people the doctor was talking about before?” questioned Hoya, raising an eyebrow out of curiosity.

“N-no…neither of them have been through this, well, as far as I know,” whimpered the male, “H-however, almost all the others who had started out with us in this place did. Well, two of the three.”

“What happened to them?” questioned Changjo, knowing that nothing good would be said.

“One went off like this and babbled on and on about physical and mental vessels, about how we would find freedom with death and the appearance of the ‘new’ specimen,” muttered the newcomer, “After that, we all found a safe place to rest…”

“And?” muttered Ricky in fear, grasping ahold of Changjo’s arm tightly.

“We woke up to find that he hung himself…he willed himself in this hell hole,” whispered the male, “The other died protecting Taeil-hyung from the doctor, and…the third…” The newcomer’s eyes shone with sorrow as his tears finally escaped, forming rivulets down his cheeks – obviously the third meant something to him, “We don’t know if he’s alive or dead…he left the three of us to ‘protect’ us, he went through an episode like him and said something about physical and mental vessels being connected, something about ‘the Shadow’ trying to convince him – who claimed he was a mental vessel – to kill me.”

Sunggyu froze, suddenly stating the words the voice had spoken to them upon reaching the asylum, “I see the trust has easily been severed with simple words…I wonder what the reaction will be once it is completely severed by actions. I shall patiently await the outcome. To every person here, there is an opposite, one person you are tied to and in order for you to survive the hell I’ve created you must outlive your opponent. You all are either my mind or my body…but I will not dare to say which is which, although two are probably already obvious. The rules of the game are, you all must not kill – for you all, from the previous game, are obviously not fighters. You all can run, you can hide, or you can die.”

The male peered at Sunggyu in confusion, having never heard the words before.

“Did anyone kill each other in the group you came with?” questioned Sunggyu.

The newcomer shook his head, “No.”

“Why is the shadow trying to get the mental vessels to kill people off?” pondered Hoya, “He told us that we couldn’t fight – we couldn’t kill.”

“Maybe he said that to keep us from killing  each other until he told us to lash out on each other,” muttered Ricky, “M-maybe he decided that we all should play the game with him being the person making us move…like we’re the game pieces and he’s the player…”

The others paused to think about the second youngest’s words before nodding.

“Anyway, that is beside the point right now,” muttered Sunggyu, “so, your companion left out of fear of harming you?”

The newcomer nodded, “He had many of these episodes upon us entering the asylum, however, at first he only had them when we were alone together, but after Kyung and PO’s deaths the episodes cam more often…eventually his mental state completely deteriorated…he was constantly paranoid, checking over his shoulder every six of seven seconds…he didn’t speak and couldn’t eat, so it really shocked us when he left.”

“Did you see him leave?” questioned Hoya.

“No,” whispered the obviously distressed male.

“Then how do you know that he left and wasn’t dragged away by some creature that resides in this asylum?” questioned Dongwoo, the newcomer flinched at the relatively sharp and hurtful words.

“The shadow convinced him to leave,” whispered Woohyun, his voice wavering and dripping with pain, the male was still tensed and trembling, still very panicked from the communication with the shadow, “He wouldn’t stop boasting about breaking a specimen with such a strong mental state.”

“Is he still here?” questioned the newcomer, “I know he lingers sometimes…”

Woohyun shook his head and whimpered as his muscles slowly relaxed, they ached and felt weighed down from exhaustion, “He’s gone. He mentioned something about Sungyeol and Niel and the doctor’s current location…”

“So you guys really aren’t like them, then,” whispered the newcomer.

“No, we aren’t,” responded Hoya, “We’re just victims of their morbid feud and game.”

“So…” muttered Sunggyu, wanting to know the newcomer’s name.

“Yukwon,” responded the newcomer.

“Can I please examine your wounds now?” questioned Sunggyu, “The one on your arm is still bleeding…”

“I-I guess,” responded Yukwon.

“We’ll resume our search then,” whispered Dongwoo, his mind still thinking about the point Sunggyu, Hoya, and Ricky had tried to decipher earlier, moving towards the wall. His gaze locked onto the vent, which was reflecting the light of the flood light in the hall, “Hoya, boost me up….”

Hoya turned to face the elder, his mind occupied on thoughts of his cousins – worrying about Sungyeol more so than Sungjong since the shadow had mentioned him, “Did you find a way out?”

“No, but I found a loose grate that could possibly become our escape route,” muttered Dongwoo.

“If that becomes our escape route, how would we get Woohyun up there?” questioned Ricky, concern written over his face for the elder male.

“Don’t worry,” stated Sunggyu, finishing up bandaging Yukwon’s forearm, “We’ll get Woohyun up there, don’t worry about it too much Ricky and help them, alright?”

The younger nodded, resting his head on Changjo’s shoulder, peering at Woohyun’s crumpled form – who was still in obvious pain, “Will he be okay?”

“He’ll be fine,” stated Sunggyu, stepping hesitantly towards Woohyun.

Woohyun agreed, “I’ll be fine.”

“A-are you sure?” questioned Ricky again, wanting to be positive that the elder would be fine.

“He’ll be fine,” stated Yukwon, “Especially if there are more people in this group, if there are more than just you guys here.”

“B-but we’re all here and he still had an episode…” muttered Ricky in concern.

“It rarely occurs,” stated Yukwon, speaking from his past experiences, “Please just trust me on this…trust me this one time.”

“A-Alright,” muttered Ricky, his gaze shifting towards the barely visible silhouettes of Dongwoo and Hoya as he heard the rattling of metal as Dongwoo attempted to remove the vent grate.

Yukwon had a sudden light appear in his eyes as an idea popped into his mind, “Maybe you guys should move the desk so that it’ll make it easier for you to reach the grate; it’ll make it easier on you two.”

“Nah,” muttered Dongwoo, “I’ve almost got this; however, we can use it as a means to get into the vents.”

Yukwon hummed in understanding, however the male paced back and forwards a bit anxiously, worry making itself apparent between his furrowed eyebrows. Sunggyu moved towards the windows, keeping a look out – trying the best he could to keep an eye out just in case the doctor decided to randomly reappear. Changjo and Ricky got to work on removing everything from on top and within the desk so that it was easier to move. Meanwhile, Woohyun had finally garnered enough strength to uncurl, to straighten out his cramping legs and resting his back against the cool metal of the lockers. The males fell into a relatively calm – but still tense – silence, which was broken often by the rattling echo of the grate being removed.

There was a thunderous thud as the grate finally popped off, once it was off Dongwoo handed it to the awaiting Yukwon in order to make less noise, feeling as though he had already attracted enough attention from anything outside the room while he was attempting to remove it. After that, Hoya happily let Dongwoo down, stretching his aching arms from having to hold the older male up – not that he was extremely heavy or anything. The duo then moved towards the metal desk, which had been completely cleared up and out by the two magnaes, moving it with their aid to below the vent.

Once the desk was in place, Dongwoo turned towards Sunggyu and motioned for him, “You climb up in the vent first, surely there is nothing in there otherwise we’d be dead already. After you climb up there, we’ll aid Woohyun in getting up there as well.”

Sunggyu nodded, climbing onto the surface of the desk, trying hard to ignore the slight squeal of the metal as it slightly buckled under his weight until he pulled himself up into the vent. Once the older male was up in the vents, Dongwoo and Hoya moved to Woohyun, who they forced up onto his feet, dragging him to the desk. The duo stepped onto the desk and then picked Woohyun up, handing him to Sunggyu with slight difficulty.  They then helped Ricky and Changjo up followed by a still rather shy Yukwon. However, when they were the only two remaining on the ground, they picked up the metal desk and moved in front of the door, that way if the doctor did return; he’d be unable to enter the room until they were long gone. Once the desk was in place, they aided each other into the vents. 

Hope you all enjoyed the double update. ^^

Thank you all for reading.