Dear readers, I'm afraid I can't fulfill all your wishes but well, see for yourself. This is the last regular chapter. I hope you'll enjoy it. However there is an epilogue to come to round up everything and fix a couple of lose ends (hopefully).

Anyway I'd like to thank all of you for reading and commenting especially those who have encouraged me not to delete the story but carry on :)

-------------------

For a long second I cannot even move but stare at Taemin who is staring back at me frozen in place. No, oh please no, please no, God please please ...

I want to rush around the corner and at the same time I believe I don’t want to know. As long as I don’t see it, it’s not true, right? But Taemin is tougher than me and just drags me along.

He’s on his knees. My Kibum kneels next to the girl, next to her twisted body. Her head rests in a rapidly growing puddle of blood. Mercifully she’s lying face down.

I just want to grab him and pull him away but he is untouchable, stunned.

Even Taemin stops, doesn’t reach out.

“Bummie?” I finally manage to say.

He just raises a rejecting hand.

But when his shoulders start shaking in silent tears I can’t hold back anymore, let go of Taemin and hop over to kneel down next to him. Although I fear to be pushed away I put my arms around him and hug him to my chest. He stiffens for a second but then gives in.

I hold him for the longest time, his hair wondering why it has become so hard to be that close to him and to all of them. Taemin puts on his own jacket and brings Kibum’s squatting down next to us and wrapping it around his hyung. I’d like to carry Kibummie out of the hall but I can’t. So we just get up all together and help each other to get away from that terrible place.

Just when we reach the gate finally the police and an ambulance arrive. Fishy’s father is back, too and helps to sort things out and he takes care of the immediate issues so we can leave and let the ambulance take us to hospital.

--------------

I wake up.

It looks like early morning and I’m in a hospital bed. The sky outside is grey but it’s not raining anymore.

I feel stiff and sore all over.

My brain needs a second to remember but then it does: the store-house, Yoogeun, Taemin and Kibum dancing, Jjongie collapsing in my arms, Minho white as a ghost and the girl ... shooting at us.

Where are they? What happened?

I bolt up with a moan when somebody rushes over from the window.

“Hyung, don’t move!”

And Kibum sits down on the bed next to me with a soft smile.

“You’re alive I say lamely.”

“Yeah, I’m alive, so are you.”

“What about everybody?”

“Taemin has suffered from minor hypothermia but he’s recovering and right now sharing the bed with Yoogeun to keep him company.

Minho’s concussion is pretty serious and he’ll be sporting a better scar than I. However it’s not anything to worry about.

Jjongie’s foot is broken, it’s a comminuted fracture; he won’t be able to dance for months. But we’ve dealt with that before, haven’t we?”

“And what about you?” I ask him, grabbing his hands.

“I’m fine”, he replies quickly, but I know it’s a lie.

“Tell me”, I say, “tell me everything.”

And he does. He tells me everything from the point where I was shot till the point everybody arrived in hospital and further on. He tells me how he argued with the girl named Haegi, how he reached out to her and tried to make her surrender ... and failed; and how in the end she took her own life.

He cries and it breaks my heart but still I’m relieved that he’s here now, that we’re all safe and alive and I haven’t lost any of them.

Later Taemin comes over, pushing a grinning Jjong in a wheelchair. Jjonggie looks battered but happy and our maknae ... I don’t know, did he really grow up within a night or is it just that I didn’t notice as much before? He is calm, relaxed and perceptive.

Minho can’t get up yet, I’ll visit him later. But Taemin says he’s doing fine.

A nurse brings Yoogeun over for an hour in the afternoon. He doesn’t talk a lot. His parents have already contacted a psychiatrist and he’ll hopefully get all the help he needs to overcome the trauma. But he seems comfortable with us and when Kibum takes him onto his lap cradling him he accepts it, wraps his arms around Kibum’s neck and lays his head on his shoulder.

We’re not as noisy and chaotic as we usually are and I guess we won’t be for a long time. But right now I’m content to have my boys safe and sound, all of them.

There is a diffuse sadness in my heart over a lost life and the pain that led to it and the pain that resulted from it; a pain that hit Yoogeun and Kibum most of all even though they aren’t physically hurt. There is a lot of healing to be done but we will help each other to get well soon.