2. A GAME OF FEAR

There is a buzzing in Kyungsoo's ears when he wakes up, a soft rumble which steadfastly transforms into an incessant siren and a chorus of firm voices. His body is swaying from side to side in a rather aggravatingly jagged rhythm which he can’t make sense of - he shouldn’t be moving, he should be asleep on his bed at home on solid ground.  

He opens his eyes and makes to look around, wants to figure this all out, but he finds he cannot - his face boxed in.

This must be a nightmare, he thinks, though he has never once before feared the idea of confinement. He wants to try to wake up but he cannot even think of forming any words and there is sharp pain in his lip which he does not want to test, even in his dreaming state.

Kyungsoo's head spins and it is not long after that a cold air strikes him, a frenzy of voices where some have an urgent undertone and others soothe him with nonsensical promises - how he is in "safe hands" and "everything will be okay." He wants to ask why he needs safe hands to begin with but, before he can, the sky outside turns into a blurred expanse of white and there are more sets of footsteps around him, more people walking by his side and boxing him in.

"This is 17-year-old Do Kyungsoo," a voice says, sounding distant, "he's been assaulted. 'Got a query lower leg fracture - closed wound -, some serious facial lacerations and bruising, and a deep laceration to his lip which has punctured through the upper dermis. He also has a query head injury, and his GCS has been around 13 throughout, though-"

"Stay awake."

His eyes, which had begun to droop shut for a short second, open into slits, the stern voice shocking him back.

How can he stay awake? He is not awake in the first place.

He grumbles under his breath, annoyed and mumbling things like, “can’t even rest my eyes in my own dream” and “stupid, inconsiderate people,” as the ceiling above him changes and the voices around him seem to grow louder still.

He hears another voice call out his name, another chorus of saccharine reassurances which he cannot comprehend, but he also feels an irrepressible heaviness in his eyes, and the need to close them strikes him once more - stronger than he has ever felt.

He lets them fall shut and the voices around him picket, calling out in urgent tones and abruptly loud voices, but he barely registers them, and does not stop himself from falling once more.

Kyungsoo feels groggy when he comes to, his eyes so heavy that he does not want to open them.

He registers a repetitive sound in the room - what is that, his alarm? No, no, that isn't right - and something akin to a buzz of voices further away, all talking over each other and nothing he can properly decipher.

Kyungsoo presses his lips together, thinking his mother might have guests and hadn't warned him beforehand, but immediately relaxes them again when a dull throb forms there, an ache in his head too. 

That doesn't make sense - that shouldn't be hurting as much anymore; it's been days.

The incessant beeping sound seems to grow louder and he thinks he can hear even more voices approaching too, muffled against his bedroom door, but one's he cannot recognise. He scrunches his brows, trying to make sense of things, trying to understand what is going on around him, but it is only when he moves his hand slightly and feels something tug back, that he suddenly opens his eyes, shocked.

White, white, white, that is the first thing he sees, a clear expanse of white which shouldn't be there because he should be home, sleeping under cream ceilings with the tone of his alarm awakening him, not this (now-erratic) beeping.

Kyungsoo panics, shuffling where he lies and making to look around himself, when a voice calls out to him - a soft, "oh, you're awake."

He looks to the side, wincing at the sting in his lip, and his eyes widen when he sees his sister sat beside him, on a foreign chair by the side of this foreign bed, her expression patient but somewhat relieved.

"Eun-seo?" He questions, his face scrunching slightly at the sudden pain in his mouth. "W-where..?"

"You're in the hospital." She explains, granting him a small, reassuring smile.

The hospital?

He jolts up in bed, ignoring the pain in his lip and looking around himself wildly, becoming more urgent still when he feels a weight around one of his legs, but his sister stands up and holds him still - eyes stern.

"Stop moving," she scolds, "you shouldn't aggravate any of your injuries."

"W-Why am I here?!” he asks, his head still turning from side to side to take in his surroundings. “What happened?!" He asks, finally setting his eyes on her.

The beeping sound, he now realises, is from a heart monitor, and has picked up in his frenzied state, now repeating itself in a fast but scrambled pattern. The tug on his hand is from a line connected there, a fluid being forced into his body, and the weight on his leg is from a cast - thick and white and dragging from the top of his ankles all the way up to the bottom of his knee. He momentarily loses his train of thought because how did this happen?, but his sister’s voice brings him back.

"You don't remember?" Eun-seo asks, eyes patient yet expectant.

He is about to shake his head no, thoughts too scrambled to be able to comprehend what she is talking about, but the motion stops midway - a small, inexplicable doubt striking him. His brows scrunch together and he wracks his brain, trying to make sense of his sister’s words, and it is only then that, like a nightmare he'd suppressed, the safety barriers collapse and it all comes flooding back to him.

The punches.

The kicks.

The crack.

The leader's glinting eyes.

The heart monitor beats pick up just slightly, giving away the irrepressible slick of fear which strikes him, and he can see his sister's face darken from beside him, her nails clawing into her knees.

"I thought as much," she seethes to herself, eyes knowing.

She does not say anything more about it, just gets up from her seat with a, "I'll go get the doctor," and Kyungsoo is left alone in the unfamiliar room, heart still beating fast with the monitor.

When she returns, it is with a man who is young but clearly several years older than himself and who grants him a gentle smile, approaching slowly with a stethoscope around his neck and a white coat around himself like in the movies. 

"Hello Kyungsoo," he says, voice sweet and his accent foreign, "I'm Doctor Zhang - it's good to see you finally awake." 

He smiles widely, a dimple showing in one of his cheeks, and, Kyungsoo thinks he's kind of stupid for thinking this now of all times, but, wow, his doctor is seriously cute.

"Tell me, Kyungsoo, does anything hurt anywhere?" Doctor Zhang questions, tilting his head to the side inquisitively.

"Err," he starts, blinking a few times, trying to focus on what he is asked, "My lip kind of stings a bit," he admits eventually.

"That makes sense,” the doctor hums, stepping closer suddenly and reaching a hand out to tilt Kyungsoo's chin up.

(Kyungsoo really hopes that the man did not just hear the slight jolt in the beeps from his heart monitor at the abrupt contact, something which his annoyingly smug sister does not miss and raises an amused brow at from behind the doctor's back.)

"Your lip has split pretty badly," his doctor explains, fingers still on Kyungsoo's chin whilst the younger tries to lessen the blush in his cheeks, "so we had to stitch it up. It's normal for it to feel tender right now and sting if you put too much pressure on it, but if the pain becomes too much then we can just give you some more pain killers. How does your head feel? Are you drowsy or dizzy in any way?”

Kyungsoo shrugs his shoulders, “Not really. It throbs a bit, but that's all."

Doctor Zhang smiles sweetly at this, relieved, and Kyungsoo feels like a ing schoolgirl with a crush when he inadvertently pinks at the cuteness.

"That's good news," Doctor Zhang says, ignorant of Kyungsoo’s state of embarrassment, "the first time you became unconscious we feared it may be due to head injury, but it appears to have been the shock of having broken a bone instead. It's only a very mild concussion, but I think it must've been successive to another recent injury in the head, which would explain why you became unconscious - am I right?"

Kyungsoo thinks back to the incident that occurred a week back and nods his head. "Mild concussion?" he offers as his only form of explanation.

Doctor Zhang hums again and finally leans back - his eyes suddenly turning stern. 

"Do you know who did this to you, Kyungsoo?" He questions suddenly, and Kyungsoo is caught off guard, not expecting the sudden change of subject.

"No," he lies instinctively, purposefully turning away from his sister's squinted, displeased eyes. "I didn't see their face."

Doctor Zhang stares at him speculatively, clearly questioning the truth behind his words.

He shrugs his shoulders and expands slightly. “They must’ve come up behind me.”

Doctor Zhang nods his head after a short moment and Kyungsoo releases a short breath of relief.

"Okay," the doctor says, “though that’s peculiar…” he continues, voice thoughtful but slow, enunciating. “The bruises on your hips suggest that they were standing right over you," the doctor says, his eyes knowing as they meet Kyungsoo’s.

Kyungsoo hears the words being spoken to him and the subtle implication held beneath them, but he does not react - stays silent and unmoving. In the man's eyes there is nothing to give away what he is thinking, but his solemnity and brooding calm is more than enough for Kyungsoo to know that the doctor knows he is lying.

"Make sure he doesn't aggravate the stitches too much," Doctor Zhang instructs, addressing Eun-seo instead and (thankfully) dropping the subject. "We have to keep the line in and he can't eat until they've healed a bit more. If anything changes, please don't hesitate to call."

Doctor Zhang turns around and takes a step forward as if to leave, but then he suddenly releases a sharp gasp and turns back.

"I almost forgot to ask." He says, reaching into the big pocket in his doctor's coat. 

Kyungsoo watches as the doctor's hand comes back into sight, now gripping a phone and a tangle of headphones which he recognises as his own.

"This is yours, am I right?"

Kyungsoo's eyes widen, fearing the worst. "Has the screen cracked?" He questions, lip wobbling when he reaches for the device.

Doctor Zhang chuckles, shaking his head no and placing the mobile in Kyungsoo's outstretched hands. 

"No, it's fine," he assures, smiling widely for a short moment. "Does your phone possess the function of blocking other people's numbers?" he then asks, and the question is just as abrupt as the one earlier, taking Kyungsoo by surprise once more, though he eventually manages to gather himself enough to nod his head.

Doctor Zhang hums happily, walking backwards to the door and smiling a gentle smile but with eyes that hold no humour.

"I suggest you use it, Kyungsoo,” is the last thing he says before he leaves.

It takes Kyungsoo five minutes to understand the point of the doctor's words, whilst his sister has gone to take his parents up to him and he is left alone in the small hospital room.

He presses the home button on his phone and the message there lights up - much like it must've done for the doctor when it was first sent.

"Don't snitch " it reads, number foreign.

Kyungsoo stares at it for a long moment, silent, and then unlocks his screen to do exactly what Doctor Zhang had suggested.

Kyungsoo has to stay in the hospital for the night, is told that he has hit his head and the doctors need to be there in case his condition suddenly changes for the worst in the next several hours.

Right now he is by himself, his sister having quickly driven home to get him a few of the necessities, and sleep is not coming easily for him today.

He has learnt that he was found on the ground, unconscious, by a passer-by just a little before school started, and was rushed to the hospital for treatment. No one knows exactly what happened or who did it, no eye-witness accounts in the surrounding houses, and Kyungsoo uses the excuse of head injury as an explanation for his poor memory.

He does not remember, he says. The details are all sort of a blur.

Doctor Zhang is the only doctor who doesn't believe him; Kyungsoo can tell from those intense and focused eyes. He is surprised that the doctor has not mentioned anything about the text message to the police, for Kyungsoo would bet his life that he has seen it, but he is also glad for it. 

He does not want to think about what has happened or what it means for him now when he goes back to school.

"Kyungsoo," his sister calls out, startling him back to the present. He quickly closes his eyes, pretending to be asleep. His parents have gone home by now, have to wake up early for work and can't stay with him here, but his sister has no classes and has taken the day off from her part-time job on account of a family emergency in order to keep him company.

"Kyungsoo," she repeats when he doesn't respond, walking over and settling the stuff on the table beside the bed.

Kyungsoo can feel her standing over him, inspecting his face intently to see whether or not he is actually asleep, and he breathes more softly, makes his lashes flutter slightly to make it more believable.

After a short moment he hears her sigh and walk over to the long sofa seat at the other side of the room. He thinks his deceiving has worked, though he doesn’t dare to open his eyes, but then she speaks again - suddenly.

"Kyungsoo..." she starts, and he tenses, keeping his eyes firmly shut. "I really hate to see you like this."

"How... How can I help you?" She asks eventually. "How can I make this go away?"

Kyungsoo has never heard her sound like this before. His sister has always been unbelievably strong and powerful, bristling with confidence and a boisterous, natural extrovert who sticks up for what or who she believes in no matter what, but right now her tone is dejected and tired, frustrated and weak, powerless and, Kyungsoo would even go so far as to say, tortured. 

It feels like hours but in reality it is less than half of one before he hears his sister's breathing even out and she falls asleep at last.

Kyungsoo lies awake much longer than that, thinking and realising that, for the first time in a little over three years, he wants to fight back.

A/N

SO HI EVERYONE.

I ACTUALLY MANAGED TO UPDATE AFTER A WEEK LIKE I WANTED TO DO WTH I AM SO PROUD OF MYSELF.

anyway

I swear he’s going to go to the group in the next chapter lol

I didn’t think this chapter would be so short but I decided to do it like this because it makes more sense for the structure of the next chapter and whatnot

I know its relatively short, but I still hoped you liked it :D

BTW, THANK YOU FOR SUBSCRIBING OMF 41 ALREADY WHHAAAAAA YOU GUYS ROCK ^-^

Please comment below what you thought :D