Chapter Two – Afraid

”So, how are you? You look tired. Did you get any sleep last night?”

Seohyun looked with concern at Yoona who was sitting in her office chair eyes closed. She felt really tired, her whole body out of strength as if she had just been out to run a marathon. After the previous day’s events she had been afraid to go to sleep and so had attempted to stay up as long as she could. Sleep eventually took her and to her relief in the morning she noticed that she hadn’t dreamt of anything at all.

“I slept decently or I thought I did but I’m just really ti-i-ii-red.” Yoona finished her sentence yawning and stretching both of her arms as wide as she could.

“Did you dream again?” Seohyun had pulled her own chair inside Yoona’s cubicle and sat next to her friend.

“No, I was really surprised that I didn’t. I was terrified of going to sleep last night but… nothing.” Yoona opened her eyes now and looked left at Seohyun who rested her head on her arms supported by the knees. “So about yesterday…”

Seohyun straightened herself in the chair crossing her legs and arms, her expression full of contemplation and doubt. Arms crossed she was clearly on the defensive trying to distance herself from the event of the previous day. It was understandable that she would want to do so because of the impossibility of the situation. However, even if she would have liked to deny that anything had happened it wasn’t normal for Seohyun to dismiss something without properly clearing the air and investigating it thoroughly. She had to make sense of what had happened or it would bother her to no end.

“So you had a nap,” Seohyun started. Yoona nodded which prompted Seohyun to continue. “In this dream you were someone who was at the event, who came somewhere close to our stand so you could see me and Hopper, and who met up with a blonde girl-”

“Who I-… she, who I was, called her Hyoyeon,” Yoona interrupted. She didn’t say anything else and waited for Seohyun to continue, the silence stretching out to a minute as Yoona’s eyes showed signs of pensiveness waiting for Seohyun to continue.

“Yes. I have to admit after the video call I can’t just dismiss it and say you were merely dreaming things up. You were very accurate of your description of me.” Seohyun looked at Yoona questioningly.

“Well you looked nice, and to be fair it wasn’t me who looked at you it was the person I was in. She was the one staring,” Yoona corrected Seohyun who nodded in response.

“I see, true,” Seohyun smirked, “it’s good to know you wouldn’t look and stare at me like that.”

Yoona’s face flashed hot red and she stumbled around with her words trying to give a proper response before realising there was no way out of the trap, and instead eased her way back into her seat closing . Of course she would look at Seohyun. Just… well there was no way to say it without sounding obsessed or uncaring. But as a friend you would look after your friends look in public right?

“I would,” Yoona finally responded. It was too late for a witty comeback. “I need to make sure that my friend is presentable.”

Seohyun hummed in response raising her chin as she got up from her chair and looked down at Yoona who in return crossed her arms and stared back, a defiant expression on her face. Seohyun gave an air of pride and arrogance as she nonchalantly walked out of the cubicle pulling her chair with one hand across the corridor with exaggerated movements.

“Trying to look pretty are we?” Yoona asked Seohyun who glanced over her shoulder at a smiling Yoona.

“I don’t even have to try,” she responded coyly as she sat down back on her chair, flipping her hair for dramatic effect and then concentrated on her computer screen. “Now enough of this useless chatter and let’s get on with our work.”

Yoona chuckled and spun around in her chair holding to the edges of her seat. She did a few rounds around before the chair stopped spinning on its own and she was facing her computer. With a loud yawn she began working.

The office was heating up in the blazing afternoon sun and Yoona felt increasingly tired as the day advanced. She took off her jacket and shoes placing them behind her on the floor. Bored out of her mind, she leaned on her right hand while flipping through the transportation statistics that she had to write a report on. Slowly but surely the pace at which her left finger scrolled down the page on the screen slowed down, and Yoona closed her eyes.

The little girl was crying and the boy who had been with her ran off out of the room. Yoona walked over to the little girl patting her head and lifted her up. She looked around behind her where the entrance to the room was. “Get back here, now!” She shouted after the little boy who had stopped by the doorway to look back before rushing off down the corridor. Yoona followed across the room littered with toys out the door.

The corridor was lined with various children’s drawings and had very light yellow coloured wallpaper. Small images of bunny’s and other friendly forest creatures were plastered all across the yellow background. At the edge of the floor were multiple shoeracks with only a few little shoes left. The little boy ran into the room at the far end of this corridor.

“Kyuhyun get back here!” Yoona shouted before a blonde woman with her hair tied into one big knot at the crown of her head, dressed in a comfortable light green jumper and black sweat pants walked out dragging the little boy who was trying to fight against the blonde’s grip.

“Thank you, Hyoyeon,” Yoona said before walking over to the little boy. She kneeled down letting the girl in her arms stand on her own feet. The blonde, Hyoyeon, placed the little boy in front of her as she kneeled down behind him. She said something but Yoona couldn’t hear it.

Yoona’s mind caught up with what was happening. Hyoyeon? No sound other than her own voice could be heard? Panic gripped her mind as she once again felt like she was trapped. She felt like running away but knew that she couldn’t do anything. Calming herself she instead focused on what was happening.

“Kyuhyun, you have to apologize,” she said. Hyoyeon said something again poking the little boy’s back. The annoyed frown on the little boy’s face faded a little and he mouthed what looked like an apology.

Right then their attention was directed behind them to the opposite end of the corridor where a large double-paned glass door glimmered with the afternoon sunlight. Hyoyeon stood up and ran to get the door while Yoona looked after her as she opened it to let a man in his thirties into the building. Hyoyeon bowed to him and Yoona stood up and gave a deep bow, hitting her head very hard on her desk.

“Aaaaahhh!” Yoona let out a loud yelp and brought her hands up to her forehead. She rolled her head around as the pain spread from her forehead to the rest of her skull.

“Yoona what’s wrong?” Seohyun had gotten out of her chair and was now standing next to Yoona. She leaned in placing her hand gently on Yoona’s head.

“I banged my head,” Yoona whined and let go of her face to look at Seohyun who was observing the bump that had started to form. She scrunched her nose and gently touched the spot that had created a beautiful red hill onto Yoona’s cranium. “Aish, be careful. It huuuuurts…”

“How did you manage to bang your head?” Seohyun straightened herself and looked at Yoona who was pouting and whining while carefully touching the bump.

“I fell asleep leaning on my hand… I think. And then my hand must have slipped.” Yoona looked up at Seohyun who shook her head.

“You silly goof. I’ll get some ice and painkillers for that.”

Seohyun turned around and left the cubicle leaving Yoona to hold her forehead. She looked across to Seohyun’s cubicle and at the various papers that were pinned up on her board. Among them was a drawing of Keroro that Seohyun’s cousins five year old daughter drew up for her last spring. The drawing always made Seohyun smile and in return Yoona smiled thinking of the little five year old.

Five year old children…

Her dream! When she had hit her head on the desk the pain had brushed off any thoughts about the experience she had while sleeping. Now with some time to recover and think, aided by the adorable drawing of the frog, the dream flooded back into her memory.

Seohyun returned with an icepack wrapped in paper to prevent the ice from being in direct contact to Yoona’s head. Before Seohyun could say anything Yoona’s eyes gleamed with the returned memory.

“I was somebody else again,” she started.

Seohyun glanced at Yoona and gave her the icepack who then placed it carefully on her forehead before continuing.

“I was in some kind of kindergarten. I was holding this little girl and… and then this boy was behaving poorly. Then that blonde Hyoyeon came out and we made the boy apologize to the girl and…”

Yoona stopped talking as she noticed Seohyun’s expression. It was one of deep concern.

Seohyun wanted to believe her friend and the experience from the night before proved that she knew things that she couldn’t have witnessed herself. But it all was very unbelievable. One doesn’t simply travel inside another person’s mind. It doesn’t happen, it’s impossible. It was something that Seohyun just couldn’t accept easily unless she saw some real evidence. But for Yoona’s sake she would at least give her the benefit of the doubt and see where things would lead them.

“I sound crazy don’t I…” Yoona cast her eyes down taking the icepack off her head for a moment so that her head wouldn’t freeze. She let it rest on her legs, feeling the cold spread through her thighs the same way doubt was spreading in her mind. When you thought about it, all of it sounded like the mad ramblings of a crazy person.

“It does sound very crazy…” Seohyun responded but was disheartened by the deep frown and disappointment on Yoona’s face. So much that she had to take her side. Even if it sounded crazy, she would take her side, “but I know you wouldn’t lie to me. Also what happened yesterday, well, it is curious isn’t it?”

Yoona looked up at her friend who smiled at her. Her confidence rose and her sulky face disappeared as she smiled as much as the pain pounding her head allowed her to. As long as Seohyun told her that she believed in her even if she really didn’t, Yoona was good to go.

“Were you in the same person as last time? Or are you assuming so based solely on the fact that this blonde Hyoyeon woman was there?” Seohyun asked as Yoona lifted the icepack from her lap back onto the impressive bump decorating her forehead. “Because, it could be that you are taking the persona of someone who is physically close to this Hyoyeon at the given time that you sleep.”

Yoona had never thought of that. Maybe she was just somehow following Hyoyeon, being a different person each time. But then she felt like the latest person she was in had been the same one from the previous night. She was confused and there was no way of telling at the moment if Seohyun was correct or not.

“I think I was the same person but now I don’t know. You could be right.” Both of them stopped to think of the situation for a moment. “But then again yesterday morning who would I have been then?”

“Possibly a family member? Hyoyeon’s sister? Or if she is roommates with somebody,” Seohyun answered. She found it slightly humorous that they were already talking about this person by a name. Hyoyeon.

She smiled instinctively while carefully leaning on the cubicle wall, making sure that it wouldn’t break under her weight. Sometimes the cubicles hadn’t been linked properly and there had been incidents where the wall had given out under the weight of someone leaning on it. Yoona had done so on one instance earning a proper scolding from Hopper about her clumsiness.

Yoona leaned back on her chair the icepack still on her forehead. The cold was starting to radiate more and she would have to remove it soon as to not freeze her brain.

“Aaaaaah I’m annoyed! All this thinking is giving me a headache.”

“I think the headache is a result of that bump,” Seohyun snickered and Yoona smiled at her before yawning once again feeling suddenly very tired. She would have loved to take another nap. She closed her eyes to think.

There were only a few people on the street as she walked along the sidewalk briskly, looking around at the pedestrians passing her by.

“But you know how much I like to play games,” she said.

Why was she outside? Wasn’t she back at the office? She stopped walking and placed her right hand to her forehead where the icepack was covering her bump. No icepack. She looked to her left and Hyoyeon was once again standing there, the smile that graced her lips fading away as her eyes furrowed and she asked her something which she couldn’t hear.

“I don’t feel too good either. My head feels… cold. It’s freezing… my head,” she heard herself say and turned around to look at the reflection in the window of a coffee shop. Yoona was not herself at all. She was a cute short-haired woman who looked confused and in pain.

No, not again. Not again! She wasn’t even sleeping! Why was she seeing things again?! Or was she falling asleep at random? Was she really going crazy? She must be!

The cold was spreading and her head started pounding harder, terror overwhelming her senses. The earlier feeling of curiousness and eagerness to find out what the dreams were had faded altogether. Nothing but pure fear filled her thoughts. What was happening to her? Why was she asleep again?! Why her?!

The cold sensation on her forehead burned stronger, like small icy tendrils making their way through her head along her brain, her synapses firing ice instead of neurons. The cold got so unbearable that she finally opened her own eyes launching herself from her office chair onto the floor, the icepack flying out to the corridor.

“Yoona! Are you alright?!” Seohyun fell onto her knees next to Yoona.

She laid motionless on the office floor with cold sweat streaking down her face, breathing rapidly and a hot sensation burning up in her eyes, eventually a tear dripping down her cheek. More tears started to fall and soon she was crying, her body shivering as she attempted to gasp for air in between the spasms of her loud wailing that reverberated through the office halls.

She was broken. Terrified. Her body wouldn’t respond to any of her commands and Seohyun’s queries of concern went unheard. She lay limply on the ground crying, until Seohyun lifted her into her arms pulling Yoona’s face close to hers and gently her head to calm the crying girl.

Yoona was shaking her head while crying, managing to whisper her thoughts through her dry and raspy mouth. “I think I’m going crazy.”

“You aren’t going crazy. You are just tired and hurt. It’s alright. It’s alright.”

A couple of the workers in the nearby cubicles had now come to see what was going on. They were standing at the entrance to Yoona’s cubicle looking at the two sitting on the ground. Behind the crowd a person pushed themselves through and soon Hopper appeared to find out what all the commotion and the loud crying was.

Before he could say anything Seohyun told what had happened.

“She tripped on one of these loose cords and banged her head on the table; I think she might have a concussion.”

Hopper looked at the floor, a loose piece of cable was stretched out along the corridor. There had been some new installations in the office and all of the cords and cables had not been properly covered leaving some of them lying openly on the office floor.

“This… ah. Bloody technicians leaving the cables out to…”

“Can I take her to the hospital to get her checked?” Seohyun cut him off trying to get out of the situation as quickly as possible. Yoona was still immobilized, now quietly sobbing in Seohyun’s arms.

Hopper looked at Seohyun whose eyes were wide, pleading and demanding at the same time. He then glanced at the sobbing girl and finally his cold expression softened up a little.

“Yes you better take her to the hospital. I’ll see about her hospital bills from the insurance company.”

Seohyun put Yoona’s shoes on, took her jacket and slowly helped Yoona up with her. She took hold of Yoona’s bag and as she brushed past the staring eyes of her co-workers asked one of them to give her bag as well. With both bags and Yoona in hand she slowly made her way to the elevator. Yoona was still crying softly, her mind blank from terror.

Seohyun had never seen her like this. She couldn’t even remember if she had seen Yoona cry before. Never seen her scared. She had never seen her broken like this and it tore Seohyun apart.

The elevator doors slid open and the two shuffled in, finally getting to the ground floor where Seohyun hailed a cab that took the two to the hospital.
 

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As the sun dipped below the horizon and faded away, the city lights blossomed to illuminate the night sky. Another quiet evening was drifting in silence and from the eleventh floor living room window; the view to the city was splendid. Living in the centre of the city definitely had its perks.

In the dark living room only illuminated by the city lights, a short girl in red jeans and a white long sleeved wool shirt sat back in her leather armchair. Her shoulder length hair hazel coloured and tied into two short pigtails, she scrolled through another patient report that had been filed that evening. She leaned forward to inspect a detail, placing her left elbow onto the black oak desk letting her head rest on it as she continued to read the report.

“The patient has no signs of injury other than a minor laceration on her left knee, most likely a result from falling unconscious and scraping it in the process. No previous records of any mental illness, sleep apnoea…” She continued scrolling, eventually letting out a sigh of defeat and leaned back in her chair.

Her stomach grumbled, demanding sustenance.

“Alright, alright I’ll get to you in a minute,” she said as she got off her chair. She walked across the poorly lit living room to the other side where a sofa was covered in darkness and let herself fall freely head first onto it, taking the cushion in front of her into a tight embrace.

“What’s taking her so long? I’m dying here.”

She stared at the piles of papers and files that had been littered across the long glass coffee table in front of the sofa. Multiple patient reports, some suspect reports, dead ends, loose ends, conspiracy theory blogs and fake scientists. All had been gathered to find a clue, something to tie all the people together. Anything to help them proceed in the investigation.

Recently people had been falling into spontaneous comas. No reason had been found and in all the cases there had been no head trauma, no drug overdose, no mental illness or any kind of defect or sickness in general that could lead to a coma. All the people had been going about their daily routines normally and out of nowhere fallen down on the ground seemingly dead. All rendered into a vegetative state and unlike typical comas these patients had no damage to their brain. They didn’t follow any signs on what a typical coma patient was like, other than being in deep sleep.

It had been two days prior when the will to investigate these coma patients had started. After her previous investigation had been completed she was taking it easy and not looking actively for a new case. She had been at the mall to get some goodness from a small ice cream store. As she had entered the store there was a young girl by the counter who was about to pay when she had suddenly fallen to the ground. She had called an ambulance and checked up on the girl to see if everything was alright.

Earlier today she had gone back to the hospital to check up on the girl but there had been no recovery, no good news other than the fact that she was stable. The hospital told her that the amount of coma patients in the city had been increasing and in their hospital alone they had received twenty-five new coma patients in the past three weeks. What the total figure in all the hospitals of the city was no-one knew, but it would be many times higher. It was something that had never been seen before and research facilities were full throttle trying to understand the reasons behind it.

It was getting late. Where was the food? Maybe she should call her.

She pried her phone from under her limp and starving body unlocking it when she heard the front door open.

“I’m back! Were you waiting for me?” A cheerful happy voice echoed from the front door. A few quick steps and a tall delightfully curvaceous girl with long wavy dark brown hair slid herself into view; holding a plastic bag in each hand, posing with one hand reached out for dramatic effect.

“Yah! What took you so long?! You were supposed to go to the restaurant just around the corner!” The small body still lying lazily on the sofa flailed its arms around.

“I did, I just stayed to chat with the owner for a while,” the tall girl replied feigning innocence as she walked over to the coffee table. The shorter girl was still lying on her stomach and attempted to move the few files on the coffee table that she could barely reach out of the way of the food.

“Did you find out anything?” The taller girl asked as she sat down on the floor in between the sofa and the coffee table close to the others head. She pulled the boxes of food out and opened a couple of them.

“Nothing in particular really. I started to plot the locations where people had fallen into a coma on a map. Also we’ll have to go through the patients backgrounds… Yah! You should give me food first.”

The bearer of take away food dipped her fork into her box and grabbed a piece of chicken.

“Say aaaah…” She directed the fork into the mouth of the other who took the food gratefully and blissfully munched away with a smile.

“You are such a kid, Taeyeon,” she said taking a bite out of her food.

“Well I can be a kid if I have you take care of me,” Taeyeon replied. She looked at the taller girl eating her food in silence and tapped her on the head to receive another forkful of food.

“Yuri, gimme mooore~,” she cooed, opening wide. The fork once again travelled into and she took another bite.

The coma patients really bugged her. Maybe something would come up once they check the backgrounds of all the patients. If it was some sort of drug that was being used they needed to find the cause and people behind the drugs. Even if the tests showed that there were no illegal substances in the patients, it could be something new and advanced. They needed to find out what was going on in the city.

Whatever it was tomorrow was going to be a long boring day going through the backgrounds of all the patients. There had to be some link. This wasn’t just some accident. It couldn’t be. Or maybe she just wanted it to be something bigger. Was it her short stature that made her like big things? Possibly.

Taeyeon tapped the head of Yuri again who automatically directed her fork into Taeyeon’s mouth.