N/A: This is a chapter inspired by that thing I read once about Top and Jiyong fainting of exhaustion and being rushed to the hospital for it; I know next to nothing about it, and for all I know, my mind could've made it up. I think it was around 2008, from what I'd understood.

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2008

His head hurt so bad, and he couldn’t remember why, or where he was; the last thing he remembered was having just come back to the dorm with the others and then, there was only nothing, a blackout. He tried to open his eyes, but had to close them as soon as his pupils were hit by the light reflected by the brightly white ceiling.
 
There was an annoying beeping sound somewhere near and he felt the need to ask somebody, anybody to turn that damn thing off because it was making his head explode and he couldn’t stand it anymore.
 
He tried to get up without opening his eyes, but he immediately fell back against the pillow and the soft bed; grimacing, he tried to recognize where he was once again, but he couldn’t seem to focus.
 
After a moment, where’d halted his movements in order to fully recover from the torpor he was feeling since he’d woken up, he slowly opened his eyes again, trying to look around instead that above him; he carefully sat up and swung his legs over the bed, almost reaching the floor, and tried to get up on his feet, but didn’t have the time to even try.
 
“Hyung, what are you doing?” an almost alarmed voice reached his ears before he could move, and he didn’t have time to realise what was going on, before finding himself being pushed back up on the bed by a pair of frantic hands, as the voice continued to tell him that he shouldn’t have tried to move because he still wasn’t strong enough and he didn’t want him to collapse again like he’d done a few hours before, because he’d scared everyone to death, and then the situation had gotten worse because Jiyong had fainted too and everything had spiralled into a disaster.
 
He had to admit that he’d gotten lost after a few seconds, finding it harder than it should’ve been to concentrate, but at least he’d started to remember how fast his head had been spinning and how heavy his eyelids had felt before everything had gone dark.
 
Trying to stop that river of words, he blindly reached out for one of the hands and grabbed it tightly, stopping the owner in his tracks for a moment.
 
“I’d say you’re giving me a headache but I don’t think it could hurt worse than it does now.” he said after a moment, his voice low and hoarse like it’d never been before, trying to raise his head properly to look at Daesung, finding that his neck hurt too much for him to do it.
 
He obediently got back into the bed, without letting the other’s hand go, and laid down, closing his eyes once again, now that he knew where he was and knew he hadn’t been kidnapped or something like that.
 
He asked his dongsaeng what had happened and how he ended up in a hospital and the latter explained to him again, more calmly and slowly, that they’d brought him and Jiyong to the hospital after they had fainted at the dorm and that the doctors told them that it was due to exhaustion, that they needed to rest and that everything would be fine (he also said that the leader had basically freaked out after hearing that information, because he’d said he needed to work and to write songs and to learn choreographies and to produce the songs and that he didn’t have time to rest and the only one who’d been able to calm him down had been Youngbae, even if Seungri had helped by staying at his side being forced to hold his hand).
 
For some reason, when he finished speaking, they remained submerged in an awkward silence for several minutes, unable to find anything to say, but Seunghyun was happy to stay like that, finding an almost inexplicable comfort from their joined hands.
 
“You actually scared me.” Daesung finally said, as if it’d taken him all that time to word that thought properly, as if he was afraid something bad was going to happen if he said that out loud; Seunghyun apologized softly, not knowing what to say exactly, knowing it would’ve been kind of tactless to remind him that it wasn’t entirely his own fault, but more of their really packed schedule.
 
They looked at each other for a long moment, descending again in a pit of embarrassing silence, broken only by the beeping sound of the medical equipment in the room; the younger was the first to lower his eyes, keeping them on their hands placed upon the white sheet on the bed, purposefully avoiding his gaze, before he found the courage to speak again.
 
“And I just want you to know how—important you are to me and how much it hurts me to see you suffer.” the rapper was a bit taken aback, because his dongsaeng wasn’t one to directly express his feelings, he knew he found it difficult because he was never sure he was saying the right thing; that was maybe one of the reasons why they’d become close friends rather quickly in the past years, because they compensated each other with their personalities.
 
Seunghyun knew that his habit to say things exactly for what they were, wasn’t always all that positive, but he also knew, that, at least, he had the extraordinary ability to be sincere and straightforward and that had helped him a couple of times before; the other was the exact opposite, because he always put a lot of thought in what he said and it’d taken him some time to trust them enough to come out of his shell, and sometimes he still kept his feelings for himself because he thought it was better that way. That way, they always helped each other some way; he would always help the singer be more extrovert and the latter had thought him several times before that there wasn’t anything wrong in quietness, sometimes.
 
“What I’m trying to say is that I—” he stopped in his tracks, like the words had gotten stuck in his throat and closed his eyes; the older could swear he was shaking and he felt the sudden urge to wrap his arms around him and whisper to him that everything was going to be alright, that he was fine and things could only get better, that he was going to pay more attention to both his physical and psychological health, but he didn’t move, he just tightened his grip on his hand and patiently waited for him to continue.
 
“I need you.” those three words struck him like nothing had ever done before, in all their simplicity and honesty, maybe because he’d never excepted his dongsaeng to say them or maybe because he’d never expected anyone to say them, ever; no one had ever told him something as heartfelt as that in just a short phrase, and he had no idea what to answer to that, for the first time in his life, he really didn’t know what to say.
 
Maybe he’d just never expected someone to ever feel like that in his regards, he’d never thought someone would ever feel like he was that important to them; he felt like someone had just pushed a dagger inside his heart and he didn’t even know why.
 
He felt like there was nothing more important than those three words, there weren’t any other words in the world that could ever be more important than them; as a person who’d started to value friendship more than anything else, it really made his heart ache, maybe simply because he’d just realised that he cared too much.
 
In that moment, he knew the only thing he could do was act, because he understood that he would’ve broken down had he tried to speak; he propelled himself forward and slung his arms around Daesung’s shoulders, holding him as close as the bed permitted.
 
He didn’t say anything, but he understood from how strongly the younger was gripping the back of his shirt, as if he was his lifeline, that he knew he felt the same way about him and he hoped he knew that he would never stop feeling like that, that he was one of the most important people in his life and he would always be.
 
And he realised that his dongsaengs had started becoming more important to him than his own family, because their bond had started to be stronger than blood and he felt like, whatever would happen in the future, nothing would ever be strong enough to divide them, nothing.