I'm not going to be mean and get these endings out before I post the next chapter. Enjoy! (Or not, since I don't think people will with this...)

(From Chapter 42)

“I feel like someone put IcyHot in my chest.” Taemin couldn’t help but smile when he heard people around the room jump from him speaking. His eyes were still closed and he wasn’t too keen on opening them, but he’d been awake for a while and just listening to them. “Speaking hurts…”

“Then don’t do it pabo.” Key didn’t really sound all that upset or angry even as he was scolding Taemin. “The doctor said you probably wouldn’t be able to talk, but you’re never the normal one.”

“Hmm…” No one knew if that was an agreement or not and Taemin himself didn’t even know. But he did finally open his eyes, surprised to find the lights still off.

“Write on here.” Minho handed over a whiteboard and a marker and Taemin looked at it for only a few seconds before gently uncapping the pen and holding the board so he didn’t have to move his arms too much.

Because that was the first thing he found out. It hurt to move his arms. And he was sure there was some sort of pain medicine dripping into his veins, but just that small movement sent knives into his chest. ‘Why am I writing on here?’

“You said speaking hurt. Do you want some water?” He gave the slightest nod he could and Jinki leaned forward with the glass already in hand, lifting the oxygen mask Taemin hadn’t realized he had on off the boy's face.

A straw was pressed between his lips and he greedily sipped some of the water until the cup was half empty. ‘Thanks.’

“Not a problem.” He placed it back on the table before taking his seat again by the other three. “Do you want to let some others see you then? You don’t have to talk; just let them know you’re awake and okay.”

Again, he gave a little nod and Jinki disappeared from the room for a few minutes. While he was gone, Jonghyun spoke up. “You aren’t as funny waking up as I thought. Maybe the camera should go away…”

‘Just wait until the medicine makes me loopy and you’ll be getting nonsense you can’t read.’ He held the board up and Key took the camera to film it while Jonghyun read, laughing a little at the end. Taemin quickly erased it and scribbled down a new note. ‘Why are you laughing already?’

“Because it’s already hard to read…”

Taemin woke in the middle of the night freezing cold and feeling like he was going to be sick. The call remote was near his hand by someone’s smart idea and he barely managed to press the button before he was leaning over the edge of the bed as best he could as his body got rid of anything at all in his stomach. The pain in his chest only increased with that, but there wasn’t much to do as more just came up.

A nurse came running in at just the perfect time to steady him back in the bed. A small pan was placed by him as she immediately started looking at all the monitors, scribbling down notes as she took it in. “I need to take your temperature, okay?” He gave a lazy nod, already too tired to sit even remotely straight. His bed, however, was set straight up to recover from the surgery, and all that happened was his body started to slump forward. With a guiding hand on his shoulders to keep him up, the nurse slid the thermometer over Taemin’s forehead, recording the temperature when it came.

“I’m going to recline your bed slightly. Try your best to sit straight, okay?” Again, all she got was a lazy nod, but Taemin managed to keep himself mostly-upright when he was leaning back just a little more. He never even realized the nurse had hit a button to call more people in, but suddenly his room had a doctor and another nurse as well.

While the second one got set on cleaning the mess of clear liquid he had thrown up, the first nurse explained to the doctor quickly and in a hushed voice Taemin could only wish to have been able to understand. But then the man took the place of the nurse in checking him over and keeping him away. “I need you look at where they made cuts, okay? So I have to take off the gown.” Taemin blinked at him and nodded a few seconds later as it registered in his mind what the man said. Before he knew what was happening, though, the top of his gown was undone and slid down, revealing his whole chest to the freezing air. He couldn’t help but jump at the coldness and at any other time, the doctor would have laughed.

But right then, he was only focused on the ugly pink incisions that were looking nothing like they were supposed to. “Taemin-ssi.” He looked at the doctor, but didn’t say anything. “It seems the wounds got infected. We are going to have to treat it right away for you to get better. Understand?” Once again, it took a few seconds, but he nodded. “You’re going to be moved to another room and they are going to give you some medicine that’s going to make you really sleepy. Like before the surgery. But it’s going to be longer until you wake up. Understand?” There was another pause and then another nod, as if that was all Taemin could do.

At that moment, it was.

“Jonghyun, can you hear me?” The singer groaned in response. “Then sit up and look at me.”

“What do you want Jinki?” He still listened, but glared at the leader instead of simply looking at him. “I was sleeping.”

“I got a call from the hospital. Something has happened with Taemin and since I claimed guardianship that one time, I have to go. You have to come with Minho and Key when you can.” Jonghyun realized with a start the leader was already half-dressed, having jeans and a shirt on instead of his sleeping pants, glasses perched on his face. “It’s really an emergency, so please just do it.”

“Got it.” He stood from the bed and didn’t even bother stretching as he started to find something allowable to walk out of the apartment in. “You just go. We’ll be there soon. Keep me updated.”

“You got it.” And the man was gone.

The three could tell Jinki had been crying the second they saw him in the hospital waiting room, no matter how much he tried to hide it. Key had been the first one to take the seat next to him, grabbing onto the eldest’s hand for support. “What went wrong?”

“An infection formed in his chest. It must be really bad, because it was so wide-spread after only a few hours…” He gave a shaky breath, giving up on trying to act so strong. “They moved him to ICU and put him in a medically-induced coma. The doctor was saying they can try and treat it with antibiotics, but it doesn’t seem like that will do much.”

“Isn’t there a surgery or something they can do to clear it out?” Minho—the walking encyclopedia on all of this—looked to Jinki, not liking how his expression darkened even more at that.

“There is… but,” he sighed and looked at the floor in front of him instead of at anyone, not being able to face them as he said it, “that has even less of a chance of survival. He’s too weak for it; his heart would most likely give out before they could do much to help.”

“So what are we supposed to do?” Jonghyun took the seat next to Key to try and stop his death-grip on Jinki’s hand before he broke any bones. All that happened was the diva changed people he was holding on to.

“Wait. That’s all we can do.”

All of their schedules were canceled as the four sat by Taemin’s bedside all day every day. And every day he was still hooked up to the machines, their expressions darkened. Every talk with the doctor made Jinki’s shoulder slump a little more and brought more tears to the group.

Taemin was dying right in front of them, and there was nothing anyone could do.

The Saturday should have marked a week of him staying in the hospital and only a few days left. Now it marked the day they found out Taemin’s death sentence. Jinki simply walked into the room after another talk with the doctor and sat down, not saying anything before bursting into tears.

Not sure what to do, the three had tried to comfort the leader, but nothing had seemed to work to stop the tears. “He’s dying. He’s really dying.”

Jonghyun leaned close to the eldest, wrapping an arm over his shoulders to hold his shaking frame closer. “What did the doctor say?”

“The infection spread. The medicine isn’t doing anything and they won’t go through with the surgery anymore.” His tears were joined by the others as their friend, their brother, laid lifeless in the hospital bed. He had absolutely no idea his life was coming to an end and looked too peaceful for that. Like an angel right before being beheaded, completely oblivious to the fate ahead.

It was two-seventeen in the morning on the fifth of August when Taemin’s heart gave out and never came back. It was two-twenty-one that the downpour started on what was supposed to be a sunny day.

It didn’t let up until after the funeral. That was days of rain so hard it seemed all of the world’s oceans were emptied on Seoul.

But the rain was only the tears people couldn’t cry anymore. The four had been front-row at Taemin’s funeral with Taesun and no one else from the Lee family, dry-faced and sleepless. Their eyes were ringed with black circles that put Tao to shame, and not even the diva tried to cover them.

His makeup hadn’t been touched since the day they got the news of the infection. It still sat sprawled across the counter where he had thrown it in his anger at why everything had to happen to the loveable maknae that had every reason to live. But those reasons weren’t enough to keep him alive.

SHINee would have broken up and they simply stayed a group of friends, if Jonghyun hadn’t found the letters the day after the funeral. First line on the first one for all of them had only one request.

Even if I’m not there anymore, please continue as SHINee. Continue making music for the fans as one. They already lost one person; don’t let them lose all of you.

And who were they to go against a dead boy’s last request?

SHINee stayed, even if they weren’t as into it as before. They were a five person band, always were and always will be. But there was an empty spot without Taemin. The never filled it though.

No one could take that away from Taemin.

It was what he had worked most of his life for, and he was proud of that spot. They weren’t going to take it from him just because they couldn’t see him there.

Because he would always still be there, even if invisible.

Because the five of SHINee were indivisible.