Chapter #16:

         The After Math.

Baekhyun was sitting on his bed idly while staring in the distance. His back was comfortably rested against the cushioned back of the bed, as he tipped his head backwards and closed his eyes. It was obvious that the crown Prince was deep in thoughts; the frown on his face and the deep furrow between his eyebrows was the proof. He occasionally, raised his left hand and examined it thoroughly before sighing and placing it back down on his lap. He was discharged from the hospital – well he may or may not have forced the doctor to issue him the discharge papers way sooner than necessary, but still he came home after the two-day stay at the hospital; which was a hell for him. However, it was just a false scene of beauty that he watched from afar because at the palace it was worse than the hospital. Nobody allowed him to get off the bed and he was starting to go crazy with all the idle time that he have. His brothers took away his entire workload. Even Sehun was working on the damned files that he was supposed to check.

That kid hates working!

There was so much that he could take. After a whole day of torture, he demanded his brothers to bring all the files to him with his laptop so he could at least take care of the paperwork which he was doing right now. The incident, of course, has cost him a lot of energy and he felt really tired, still he thinks that working is better than just sitting there doing nothing. Although, it was nice when all his brothers sat around him and fooled the whole day…but like before, that is too much weirdness for Baekhyun to take. His parents have been visiting him frequently too. It got awkward when his mom started crying and hugged the living daylights out of him. The eldest was sure that if he was not going to die from the bullet, he was going to die from that hug which fortunately was broken by his father. Surprisingly, Haejin had been a lot more considerate towards him than before. Baekhyun likes to think that it was because she thinks that he took the bullet for her; that he did, but he likes to think he did not. Don’t ask. This is some kind of Baekhyun logic. It’s not to the point where she is confessing her undying love for him. Heck! She still hates him and the crown Prince wasn’t a fool to think that everything between them was settled.

But you still can’t deny the fact that she stayed at the hospital with you all the time.

Baekhyun’s inner self reprimanded.

Shut up!

Baekhyun thinks that he has gone crazy because now he was telling himself to shut up. He released another sigh and looked down at the bed where his laptop and files were scattered around. Raising his hand again, he pointed it towards the fancy floor lamp that was placed in the corner of the room and squint his eyes a little in concentration. Not a second later, the bulb in the lamp flickered and became dim for a moment before becoming steady again.

“Damn it!” The eldest cursed under his breath and tried again, but this time the bulb didn’t even bother to flicker. He let out an annoyed huff and brought his hand back down when he felt a painful jab at the gun wound.

“You know that it’s not going to work so why are you putting yourself through pain?” Baekhyun turned his head towards Xiumin who was now casually leaning against the frame of his door way and was looking at him with a brow raised in question.

“You want something?”

“Stop being a . I just came here to check on you.”

“Am I five years old?” Baekhyun asked with a scowl and crossed his arms over his chest with a huff; barely concealing the whimper of pain that was about to escape his lips because of his rash actions. Xiumin rolled his eyes at his brother and lifted his body of the frame before walking towards the bed.

“You sure are acting like one.”

“How long are you guys planning to imprison me in this room?”

“Depends.” Xiumin replied with a shrug and took a seat by the eldest’s side.

“You shouldn’t try to use your powers when they are not working Baekhyun. It only makes everything worse. You never listen, do you? Minjoon told you that it won’t be a great idea to arrange the ceremony while you have not completely recovered, but you didn’t listen. Look where it brought you today.”

“Everything was going well. I just didn’t expect them to go after Haejin and it was normal for me to not suspect that, but I guess I made a mistake there.”

Like are they stupid! They have to know that without an heir their Kingdom would be destroyed. There would be no money that they could use for their experiments then. Stupid people!

“This is not about Haejin! What about you?” Xiumin inquired in an irritated tone and send his elder brother a glare.

“What if they were after you? Without any help, without your powers could you have fought them off without getting shot?” He continued with the same irritation visible in his voice and rubbed his temples. He should have stopped Baekhyun from arranging the ceremony himself when the eldest refused to listen to Minjoon and now he was regretting it. Baekhyun might be the most powerful among them all due to those experiments that were done on him, but there is the downfall to everything. Those experiments had one too. It was his brother’s healing powers. It may look like a gift and maybe it was, but not when it consumes all his energy and leaves him powerless and vulnerable to the world. Minjoon and Minseok are the only people besides Baekhyun who are aware of this fact. Not even two weeks ago, his brother was severely injured with gushes of knife everywhere on his body. Most of the wounds were deeper than they looked when they were made on his body freshly, but by the time they were able to see them they were already healed to some extent. He may have recovered over night, but after that he was not able to use his powers at all seeing the amount of energy that was used in healing. It was different with the minor ones, but the big ones like the gun wound his brother got recently left him completely vulnerable. Baekhyun was aware of it, yet he didn’t give it a second thought.

“You don’t get it. Do you think I am stupid? It would have been different if they were after me. I would have stayed with the guards and fought with them.” Baekhyun explained and heaved a tired sigh and looked at Xiumin’s scrunched up face.

“Baekhyun you are completely powerless right now. For now, it’s only me and Minjoon who knows that, but don’t you think that your latest stunt would make everyone curious that why the hell did you decide to get shot instead of using your powers? I refrained from using my powers too when we were fighting so that those people from foundation would think that we were just trying to keep our powers hidden from the eyes of the public, but it won’t be late when they would figure something out if you continued like this,”

“I know, but look at the brighter side. We got the sympathy from the people and now the transfer of power could be done in secrecy.” Baekhyun stated with crooked smirk and took hold of one of the files again so he could start getting some work done again.

“I can’t believe that you just said that!” Xiumin exclaimed incredulously and got up from his place.

“It’s called politics, Minseok. Learn it.”

“No thanks! Aren’t you taking this ‘turn your weakness into your strongest point’ a little bit too seriously? You-” Xiumin was about to give his brother a piece of his mind, but stopped in the middle of his sentence when he turned around and saw Chanyeol standing at the entrance of the room. The younger looked at them with a sheepish smile and started stepping backwards.

“I will pretend that I didn’t hear anything.” He claimed and dashed out of the room before Baekhyun or Minseok could react. Xuimin turned towards the crown Prince when he heard the latter sigh and shook his head.

“He is going to tell everyone isn’t he?” Baekhyun asked in a dejected tone and looked at the door with wistful eyes.

“Yeah and no one is letting you go out of this palace when you’re injured.” Xiumin continued his sentence with a smirk and started making his way out of the door too.

“Good luck with mom, though.”

“I hate you.”

“You sure do.”

“Damn! I am so sleepy. When will they come and get this kid for experiment so we could have some rest?” The fifteen-year-old Baekhyun lifted his head up to stare at the two guards that were sitting in front of the cell that he was kept in and looked down at his tied wrists again with tears in his eyes. It has been three days since he was brought there. The young prince, himself had no idea that how did he managed to keep the track of time, but somehow he did. He wanted to get out of the shabby place as soon as he could, but he couldn’t use his powers. He knew that they were feeding him with something weird which rendered his powers useless, but he couldn’t do anything. He had to stay alive and if he refused to take the food they would just inject the drug in him. It shouldn’t be that way. They can never render the powers that were granted to them useless, but he was still a kid and his powers were still developing. That was the only reason why they only took the kids.

“I don’t know man. All he does is sit there and wait for his fate.” The other guard replied which made Baekhyun snort despite himself. He was kid, but he was not stupid. He knew well that retaliation would take him nowhere. He had to wait patiently and strike when the opportunity comes. Till then, he just hopes that he would stay alive for long enough. Both guards turned towards their captive and threw him a seething glare when they heard his scornful snort.

“Did you hear that? Someone is getting daring.” One of them mocked and got up from his place to walk closer to the cell bars.

“Oh- don’t get fooled by his boy-like innocent features. There is a ruthless monster hiding inside him.” The other guard replied and followed his companion’s suite. Tears again burned Baekhyun’s eyes when he heard that, but he refused to let them flow. He was not going to show them that they won; he would never let them know that their words were having an effect on him.

“If I am a ruthless monster than what do you have to say for yourself?” The hot-blooded prince couldn’t stop himself from retorting back and lifted his hatred filled gaze to stare at the two elderly men.

“Why you little piece of !” The first guard exclaimed angrily and was about to open the door of the cell to teach the kid some lesson when a gruff voice was heard from behind.

“What is going on in here?”

“M-Mr. Jung!” Both of them squeaked together and Baekhyun shifted his steeled eyes from the guards towards the man who was the sole reason why he was there. Mr. Jung also shifted his gaze towards the young prince and let a cruel smirk graced his lips when he noticed the heated glare that was sent his way.
“Get that petty Prince and bring him to the experiment room. Make sure, you don’t harm him in any way. We want him intact for the experiment. You can have your fun with him later when we are done.” Baekhyun’s young mind and heart didn’t know what he was supposed to be afraid of- the experiments that were going to be performed on him or the two guards who were ready to beat him to death. He tried his best to break free when they started to drag him out of the cell. He even tried to use his powers, but they failed him too. He felt completely helpless and for the first time since he was kidnapped fat tears rolled down his cheeks without his permission.

“Let me go!” He shouted and struggled against their hold in the hopes of getting free.

“I don’t want to go there.”

“Damn you kid! Follow us silently.” The guard that was earlier about to have his hands on him grimaced and exclaimed in an irritated tone. Despite his struggling, the young Prince was brought inside a room