Pain everywhere

Everywhere there is immense pain.

My body is burning in the agony of this pain. How can one survive such a furnace? It’s like hell is residing within me. Burning, burning my insides slowly, agonisingly, helplessly.

Will somebody end my suffering?

My eyes opened. I blinked, feeling like my lids had been taped down. In my torso near the left the burning was at its worst.

“W-where am I?”

“Nurse, give me the anaesthetic please.” A clear mask was placed over my mouth and nose with a gloved hand. I blinked and soon I saw nothing but blackness.

No wait what is this place?

It was so serene. Beautiful trees, lush green plants with leaves that fanned out. Seagulls cawed above my head. The next thing I knew I was on a beach. Lying in deck chairs with sunglasses on, chilling like they had not a single care in the world was the members.

“Hyung,” I went over to them. “What is this place?”

“This is our summer break.” Yongguk hyung said tipping his cap. “We completed our mission and so Head Quarters is allowing us to spend three weeks away.”

"We completed our mission?”

Hold on. Which mission?

“Hyung.” I stood next to him. “Which mission did we complete?”

He looked at me. Despite his large, bug eyed shades I saw his eyebrows go up in confusion. “We managed to infiltrate the border and we performed on a radio frequency reviving good music in the North.”

No.

It couldn’t be.

We hadn’t finished the mission. Now I remember we had been caught. We had tried to go to the destination but had been caught by some undercover cops.

But if we weren’t at the final place then where were we? Where was this?

All of a sudden I found myself being pulled backwards. They looked over as they watched me getting further and further away. I reached out, hoping to be saved. Yongguk hyung stood up, knocking his chair over. “Where are you going?”

“I don’t know! Help me, Zelo, Jongup, Daehyun, Himchan, Yongguk hyung!”

They all turned to each other in panic. “How can we?”

“What are you saying Jongup?!”

“This isn’t real.”

“T-then… THEN WHERE AM I?!”

I saw a light, a bright light. Sitting up too fast I could feel my lungs tiring as I panted. Lifting my hands I saw them, blood stained on the tips, a clear tube attached to my right hand.

Glancing to my side I saw the stand, a plastic, clear bag dripped fluid. On the other side stood monitor with three lines beeped, going up and down in peaks. Looking forward I saw a bed accompanied by a sleeping man who had tubes going into his nose.

I was in a hospital. How could this be? Where were the others? Where was Himchan hyung or Daehyun hyung? Had they been caught? Were they still alive or…

It couldn’t be.

Wincing I found the sore spot. Leaning back against the bed I swallowed my throat stuffy and blocked. “Himchan hyung, Daehyun hyung, where are you?” Closing my eyes I had to try and start breathing normally. However I found tears building. The dam was going to break. Biting my lips I fought against the sobs but in the end it was the former that defeated.

After my crying I woke to see a woman in a nurse’s uniform standing, reading off a clipboard. She noticed I was awake and moved her head to sympathetically smile. “How do you feel?” She looked young, no more than twenty five at least. Why was I even wondering this?

My voice was really raspy from lack of water. “I-I… It hurts.” Nodding she walked over to where I was. Without verbalising it she pulled back the covers.

“H-Hey what are you doing?!”
 
“You’re bleeding.” I saw what she meant. There was an obvious red patch where it had been sore which was steadily increasing. She pressed a button and then beeping like an alarm was heard. A man in a doctor’s coat ran in. “He’s been bleeding.”

He looked down at the spot. It was this moment that I felt self concious. The hospital gown wasn't very long. “Seems the stitching may have ruptured, take him to the operating theatre.”

“I’m bleeding?!”  They grabbed the ends of my bed, wheeling it out of the ward.

“Please stay still.” The nurse said to me gently. She pressed my head down so I had no choice but lie on my back.

“Please miss, have you seen my friends? They have blonde hair like mine.”

She shook her head. “No one has come in.”

With a sigh I relaxed a little. “Ah that’s a relief.”

They rushed me in, gave me something so I wouldn’t feel anything and then started to work. They had to put a cloth with a square cut out over the area and a canopy in front of my face so I couldn’t see.

What happened to Daehyun and Himchan hyung? Had they managed to escape? Did they find our leader? When they finished they wheeled me back to the bed, the nurse from before assigned to stay by in case something happened.

“Let us know if anything changes.” The doctor stated. She nodded. They went away. Now they were gone I could ask her questions.

“What is this place?”

I got no response. Maybe she didn’t understand, everyone spoke in different dialects here. “Excuse me, where am I?”

“You’re in hospital.”

Ok a little more specific please. “Which hospital are we in miss?” Again she did not say anything. I breathed out. “This is the North, North Korea correct?” She nodded. “Where did you… Find me from?” I figured that they would have had to call an ambulance to get me since this wasn’t the place we’d been captured.

She paused, closing as if she didn’t want to speak. “You want to know where you were before? Why do you need to know?”

Through her gaze of concern I found fear creeping in. But the truth was there; she needed to tell me. “Please, it’s important that I know.”

“You were at Hoeryong concentration camp.”

I clutched my bed rail, my stomach threatening to return whatever laid in there. I was at that horrible place?! I’d heard the warnings from the Head Quarters, they had high security, plenty of guards and the complex was huge. Rumour had it they even had gas chambers as well as inhumane experiments for the doctors who may as well not give a damn about human life.

It made sense though why they had tried to brain wash us. We were just guinea pigs to them. Fools, idiots, morons who’d been caught and now were experiencing what hell was like on earth.

The thought of the other members back at that place brought tears to my eyes. “Miss, my friends… We were prisoners there. How are they going to survive?”

Her fallen expression made my heart sink. “They won't be able to. The means of torture they use there are… Severe, no one lasts there. If malnutrition doesn’t kill them, the conditions of the prison cells will.” With hesitation she also added. "I'm sorry."

“But we were in there and we were ok.” Well except for Daehyun who got sick. I saw her eyebrows go up in question.

“You must have been in the newly developed laboratories.”

It made sense. Now I had a bigger problem on my hand. How do I get out of here? How do I warn them about the horrors that were there? If only I wasn’t injured then I could find my way there without difficulty.

Yongguk hyung, Himchan hyung, Daehyun hyung, Jongup and Zelo; please stay strong. Wait for me.

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The place exists and from what I read about it, it really sounds horrible. To commemorate me reaching 60 subbers I decided to update a week earlier so thank you everyone.