Warning: double update.  Make sure you've also read chapter 7

Taemin managed to lose their tail just long enough for them to actually get into a hospital, but things went to hell as they were waiting for a specialist to see Weiyi.  Better versed in computers than injuries, Kyungsoo had left Taemin there for the explanations and went to keep a lookout in reception.  He hadn’t been there more than two minutes before the enemy appeared.

He did the only sensible thing he could think of: he bolted, not even bothering to ring Taemin.  A quick turn into a narrow side street ensured that nobody would be after him in a car, but it was still a good half hour before he lost them again and slumped down in a doorway, very out of breath.  The first thing he did was fish out his phone to find thirty-nine missed calls from Taemin.  Trying to calm his breathing, he rang back.

“Doctor said it wasn’t anything lethal and she should be okay in a few hours, but where the hell are you?” Taemin hissed.  “The hospital’s surrounded.  I’m hiding the toilets right now with an unconscious girl and a bag of her clothes.  It’s weird.”

“I decoyed for us,” Kyungsoo managed in one breath.  “Do you think you can get her out of the hospital?”

There were shuffling noises, followed by a long pause.

“Yeah,” Taemin said eventually.  “I have a tranquiliser gun with me.  I think I might be able to make a break with her, but I’ll have to steal a car.”

“Meet me at the train station.  I need to swing by my apartment to get a couple of things on the way, but we should be able to leave the city within an hour or two.”

“Roger.”  Taemin hung up.

Taking the bus back home was shockingly tranquil after basically running for his life.  The mundanity of it all and the normalcy with which other people were going about their lives really jarred Kyungsoo, and he found himself wondering how they couldn’t notice how so much was going wrong right beneath their noses.  One or two enthusiastic teenagers were discussing Luhan’s escape (details of how he had got away were now on the internet), but that was it as far as criminality was being noticed.

His phone buzzed as he got off the bus just around the corner from his apartment, and he picked up, already suspecting that it was Taemin.

“This is impossible.”  The man sounded in pain.  “The station’s swarming with them, Kyungsoo, and one of them got me with a knife.  Where are you?”

“I’ll be along in about ten minutes,” Kyungsoo told him, rounding the corner.  “Can you hold out until—”

His words died in his throat when he saw the congregation of people at the base of his apartment block.  There were two patrol cars, but the police were standing with the crowd rather than trying to disperse it, and the black leather and tattoos told him more than enough.

“Oh, ,” he whispered.

“Problems?”  Taemin managed a wheezy laugh.

“Yeah,” said Kyungsoo.  “There’s a hard drive with some really important software that I need to bring to Busan with me and it’s in my apartment and a whole group of thugs are standing right outside it.”

Neither spoke for a moment or two.

“I need to go to hospital or I’m going to pass out from blood loss,” Taemin said eventually.  “Can you forgo the hard drive?”

“It’s a pain, but yes.”  Backing up, Kyungsoo turned to head back to the bus stop.

And found himself face to face with the leader of an even bigger group of thugs.

“Code red,” he told Taemin before hanging up.  This was not going to be good.  He didn’t even have time to run before something heavy crunched into the side of his head, sending sickening pain through him, and everything went black.

Taemin almost cried when Kyungsoo hung up.  He was sitting behind two large bins out the back end of the station, hand clamped over the knife wound in his side and Weiyi slumped against the wall beside him.  It was not a pretty situation, to say the least.  And now Kyungsoo was out of it.  He needed backup, and he needed it fast.  He also needed medical attention, and he needed it fast.  The longer he stayed where he was, the bigger the problem was going to get.  And people were searching, he reminded himself as a door nearby opened and two bickering Chinese speakers came out into the open air.  Taemin was glad he’d had the forethought to arrange the stinking bin bags so that neither he nor Weiyi could be seen.

Massive problem, he texted to Lay, pressing harder on his injured side to stop the blood flow.  It was so painful he nearly bit through his tongue in an effort to keep silent.  D.O.’s code redded.  I’m code blue and injured.  No way I’m able to get her safely on a train.  Station full of thugs.  Can’t even carry her and doctor said she’ll be unconscious for a few more hours.  I need medical care.  Probably going to pass out.

Lay tried ringing him, but he didn’t dare accept the call, swiping to ignore it.  Getting the hint, Lay texted him instead.

I know somebody who lives very close to you.  I’ll get him on it.

Taemin passed out before he had an opportunity to find out who that was.

Sehun’s first reaction was you have got to be kidding me.  Unfortunately, Minseok was not kidding him in the slightest.  He genuinely had found an unconscious policeman and an unconscious female behind the bins at the back of the station, and the place really was swarming with creeps.  He just counted his lucky stars that he’d trusted his brother-in-law enough to ring an ambulance before showing up, because he was pretty sure that Taemin’s conditi