The dream shifted.  As always, gray fog descended in thick plumes until it completely surrounded him.  He tried to navigate through the fog, but it only became denser as it swirled around his body.  Slashing his arms through the gray mass proved useless, so he gave up and stood still.  As if it could sense his surrender, the fog billowed forward with great force.  It brought him to his knees and compressed the oxygen right out of his lungs.  All but consumed, he gasped for air, but there was only the fog.  It burned his throat and sinuses, leaving behind a foul taste and an acrid smell.  He kept gagging until tears streamed down his face.  Then, with the last of his remaining strength, he tried to inhale one more time.

            Yoongi jolted awake on a ragged gasp.  Disoriented, he blinked rapidly until his surroundings came into focus.  It took him a solid ten seconds to realize that he was in his bed at the dorm.  His first thought was that he should check the time, but it was more than he could handle to simply roll over.  A sudden chill ran through him, making him notice that he was soaked in a cold sweat from the nightmare.  His heart was still racing, too.

            Remembering the awful feeling of suffocation, Yoongi took in a shaky, deep breath.  When he exhaled, he expected to feel better, but it was as if he had exhaled every ounce of energy from his body.  He felt heavy, like he was sinking through the mattress.  In the back of his mind, he knew that obviously was not the case, but it did not make the feeling seem any less real.  Rather, he continued to breathe shallowly to avoid the sensation of sinking.

            This was happening too often.

            Yoongi had been struggling with this particular nightmare, and sleep in general, for the past couple of weeks.  Ever since Kobe.

            He wanted to avoid the nightmare, but being awake was not a desirable option, either.  In the nightmare, the problem at least had the courtesy to represent itself as an impersonal fog.  The prospect of facing the real problem was unimaginable.  At this point, Yoongi did not know if he would rather be awake or asleep.  The answer quickly became clear, however.

            Because the waking nightmare had just begun.

            It came back.

            Yoongi rolled onto his back and gritted his teeth against the onslaught that was coming for him.  His gaze was firmly set on a random spot in space; he refused to make direct eye contact with It.

            “Aw, that’s so harsh…I knew you wouldn’t greet me, but now you won’t even look at me?” It asked.

            Yoongi did not respond.

            “Oh, come one, you’ve tried that before.  It doesn’t work, remember?”

            In his peripheral vision, Yoongi could see the general form It had decided to take today: a thin, young man of average or so height.  It was a solid, pitch black shadow.  The thing was always shaped like a human, but it shifted between male and female, child and adult, depending on what kind of ammunition it brought to torture him.  Yoongi had a feeling that this was going to be an especially bad attack.

            “Don’t ignore me!” It screamed.

            Yoongi flinched at the sudden change in tone.  Then he felt the shadow’s strong hands clamp onto his ankles with a vicelike grip, holding him down on the bed.  He did not want to show any sign of weakness to It, but his stomach lurched at the sensation of being trapped.

            “You’re pathetic, really.”  The shadow laughed humorlessly.  “How long have you been in bed?  I guess I don’t even need to hold you down.  You wouldn’t be able to get up anyway.”

            Yoongi mentally noted that that was a good point.

            “Yeah, I know,” It answered immediately.  “But I’ll still take that as a compliment.”

            The thing could hear his thoughts.

            “I know everything about you, Min Yoongi.  I know more about you than you do yourself.  Impressive, isn’t it?”

            Without warning, the shadow let go of Yoongi’s ankles and started pacing around the small dorm room.  A moment of silence stretched between them, making Yoongi’s skin crawl.

            “What do you want,” he asked It.

            The shadow abruptly stopped moving.

            “Oh, this isn’t about what I want.  It’s about what you want, Yoongi.”

            “I want you to go away.”

            “Oh, please.  We both know that’s not true.  You love having me around.  You like having an excuse.”

            Yoongi narrowed his eyes.

            “I know that you revel in this.”

            Angry, Yoongi squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head.  He would not admit to something so absurd.

            “You think I’m wrong?  Then by all means, tell me what you want.  You’re a selfish guy, so I know the list will be long.  But don’t worry, I’ll listen anyway.”

            The muscles of Yoongi’s jaw clenched as he tried to ignore the shadow.

            “Okay, okay.  Don’t tell me, then.  I already know.”

            It sauntered over to the bed and sat down on the edge.  Yoongi felt the mattress dip under its weight.  He opened his eyes just enough to see the shadow hold up a hand and start ticking off its fingers as it spoke.

            “‘I want to be successful.’  That’s pretty lame, you know.  Too generic.  ‘I want to go home.’  Who doesn’t, buddy?  You’re not special.  ‘I don’t want to be alone.’  How rude—I’m right here.  ‘I want it to stop.’  Just to clarify, which ‘it’ are we talking about here?  Me?  Or life in general?”

            There was a pause before It extended its pinky finger with one last blow.

            “‘I want to make things right.’  Oh, that Kobe incident is still tearing into you, huh?  Too bad you can’t actually do anything about it.  You broke your promise and backed out.  That’s that.  You’re just a numb son of a who can’t keep the promises you made when you were actually a halfway decent person.”

            That was the last straw for Yoongi.  His eyes snapped all the way open.

            “Go away!” he shouted.

            Yoongi glared at the back of the shadow’s head, willing it to leave and never come back.  But It just sighed and shook its head.

            “Yoongi, Yoongi, Yoongi…  That’s not how this works.  You will never be able to get rid of me.”

            He could not bear the thought of never being able to escape from the shadow—it was one of his worst fears.  Living a life while constantly being dragged down by It hardly seemed worth the effort.  Yet at the same time, Yoongi knew that deep down, he was also afraid of fully letting go of the shadow.  Even when life was going relatively well, he always left a little space for It in the corner of his heart and mind, just in case.

            Just in case what?

            “I am a part of you,” the shadow whispered in an uncharacteristically soft voice.  “A very important part.  You know that you can’t live without me.  You need me.”

            Yoongi’s eyes began to sting because he was starting to believe the shadow.  He was slipping.  Agreeing with It was like sliding down a steep slope—once he started to fall, there was no slowing down or stopping.  Rather, he would only gain momentum until he either reached the bottom of the ravine or crashed into an obstacle.

            And the shadow knew this.

            It moved so quickly that all Yoongi could see was a black blur.  One moment, It was sitting on the edge of the bed, and the next, the thing was on top of him.  Yoongi attempted to shove the shadow away, but before his hands could even come into contact with its chest, his arms were pinned down above his head.  Panicking, he began to struggle underneath the shadow, but to no avail.

            The shadow was stronger than him.

            It leaned downward until its face was only a few inches from Yoongi’s.  Automatically, Yoongi shut his eyes and turned his head to the side.  He could not stand looking at the shadow’s ugly face.  Then, when he heard It in a deep breath, his whole body tensed.  He knew what was coming.

            “You wanted success,” the shadow growled in a deep, warbled voice.  “And now that you have it, it’s not enough.  It will never be enough.  Your insatiable greed makes all of your achievements taste bland.”

            Yoongi cringed away from the words he has heard countless times.

            “You have become a monster unrecognizable to your family and friends.  How does it feel to be idolized when you can’t even stand being in your own presence?  How selfish must you be to hold onto your pedestal when all you can think about it is jumping to your death from it?  How can you live with yourself, knowing that you survive on the love of people that you do not deserve?”

            Terrified, Yoongi started trashing underneath It.  He did not want to hear the harsh words that were being stabbed into him by the shadow’s sharp tongue.

            “Leave me alone!”

            “You know it’s all true.  That you’re pathetic, useless, unwanted—”

            “Shut up!”

            “—cold, numb, selfish—”

            As the shadow continued, its voice became even deeper and louder.  Yoongi felt like his eardrums would burst; he could not take it any longer.

            “Go away!” he screamed at It.

            “You cannot escape me.  Look at me.  Look at me.  LOOK AT ME.”

            Yoongi writhed in pain but refused to do as the shadow commanded.  Hatred boiled in his blood for the thing that existed only to torture him.

            “No!  I hate you!”

            “You don’t hate me because—”

            “Yes, I do!  I hate you!”

            Suddenly, It grasped Yoongi’s jaw and forced him to face it.  Against his own will, Yoongi’s eyes opened and made contact with the shadow’s solid black ones.

            “I—”

            “I HATE YOU!”

            “AM—”

            “I HATE YOU!”

            “—YOU!”

            In an instant, the shadow changed from pitch black to full color.  With absolute horror, Yoongi recognized who the young man was.  And for the first time in years, he was face-to-face with none other than…himself.

            It was only for a moment that the shadow revealed itself before disappearing completely, but it was enough to annihilate Yoongi.

            Free from It’s grip, Yoongi rolled onto his side and curled into a ball.  Gut-wrenching sobs punched out of him so forcefully that he felt like he was suffocating again.  Tears streamed steadily from his eyes onto the pillow, and his entire body shook.

            The realization that the shadow had become him, or rather, that he had become the shadow, shattered Yoongi.  He really was a monster, just like It said, just like…It.  He did not deserve the love of his fans.  He did not deserve any love, not even his own.

            Self-hatred bubbled up in Yoongi until he could taste its bitterness in his mouth.  The hatred that he thought was aimed at the shadow had really been directed at himself all this time.  Which meant that everything the shadow had ever said to him, in whatever form it had taken throughout the years, was undeniably true.

            Yoongi’s sobbing redoubled.  He could hear the hysteria building in his own voice as he continued to cry.  Was this it?  Was this the point that he would finally break beyond all hope of repair?  Was he so utterly ruined that there was only one option left…to throw himself away?  But what if—

            Without warning, Yoongi felt a hand rest on his shoulder.  Thinking that it was the shadow again, he convulsed under the touch and let out a feeble whimper.  There was no way he could handle another attack, not in this condition.

            “…Hyung?” a tentative voice asked.

            That was definitely not the shadow.

            Yoongi whirled around to see who it was.  Hoseok was standing at the edge of the bed, hand still outstretched from touching Yoongi’s shoulder.  Concern was etched all over his face, from the deep creases on his forehead to the grim line of his mouth.

            Yoongi had not even noticed the door opening, let alone Hoseok coming into the room.  With tears still streaming down his cheeks, he glanced at the doorframe.  The five others were all there, watching nervously from the hallway.

            Instantly ashamed, Yoongi wiped his face with the sleeve of his sweatshirt and looked away from all of them.  He consciously tried to control his erratic breathing as well.  A few seconds that seemed like an eternity passed.  Then, Hoseok’s voice broke the silence.

            “It’s okay, guys.  Shut the door.”

            In his peripheral vision, Yoongi saw the others retreat and shut the door behind them.  Now it was just the two of them in the dark room.  Yoongi did not know what to say, so he simply mumbled a “sorry” before lying back down and turning his back to Hoseok.  He vaguely felt bad for ignoring his dongsaeng who only wanted to help, but there was nothing he could do.  This was his battle.

            Yoongi sniffled a little bit and focused on slowing down his heartbeat.  It was still racing from the surprise of Hoseok’s hand on his shoulder.  He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.  He was just so exhausted.  Maybe if he appeared calm enough, Hoseok would leave.

            That was not the case.

            Without saying anything, Hoseok lifted the covers and crawled into bed behind Yoongi.  Disgruntled, Yoongi scooted closer to the wall, but Hoseok simply followed him until his front was flush with Yoongi’s back.  One arm slipped under Yoongi’s head, and the other wrapped around him and pulled him even closer.  Part of Yoongi felt relieved, another part felt trapped, and still another embarrassed that he was sticky from sweating.

            Truthfully, he was not used to this—unintentionally exposing his pain and having someone comfort him.  Yoongi always tried to bottle everything up inside since showing his inner feelings and struggles made him feel weak.

            Oh, God…all of them had heard him crying.  How was he supposed to be a role model for his dongsaengs when he could not control his own emotions?  They must have thought he looked ridiculous and pathetic.  Unshed tears began to sting his eyes again, which only frustrated him further.

            “Hyung…” Hoseok whispered gently.

            Yoongi bit his lip at the tone of genuine concern in Hoseok’s voice.

            “…I’m here for you.”

            The tears that were b in his eyes cascaded down the bridge of his nose and temple.  He started shaking in Hoseok’s embrace.  He was ashamed of needing this, of needing Hoseok.

            His battle with the shadow had made him realize that he did not even have the strength to face himself.  He was too full of self-loathing and fear of the person he had become.  And yet he forced on everyone around him the burden of dealing with him.  Especially Hoseok.  It was selfish and despicable.

            Echoes of the shadow’s words, or rather, the words that he directed at himself, vibrated in his skull.  Pathetic, useless, unwanted, cold, numb, selfish…surviving on the love of people that he does not deserve…

            Yoongi started crying in earnest.  Hoseok remained silent, but held onto Yoongi fiercely.

            Time passed, and Yoongi found himself beginning to focus more on the warmth of Hoseok’s body than the barrage of dark thoughts in his mind.  And at some point, he had stopped crying altogether.  The sound of Hoseok’s breathing had lulled him into a relatively relaxed state.

            All in all, he felt…better.  Not good, by any means, but better, yes.

            Yoongi shifted a little bit in Hoseok’s arms and closed his eyes.  They were swollen and heavy from crying so much.  And he was so tired.  Sleep was beckoning him with the tempting promise of escape.  He was on the brink of drifting off when Hoseok’s arms tightened around him once more.

            The last thought Yoongi had before falling into a dreamless sleep was that Hoseok’s arms were stronger than the shadow’s.