looping
kyungsoo/jongdae | pg-13 | 6045 words
perhaps it is a gift.
warnings for minor descriptions of injury and violence.
written for this year's round of sooheaven and originally posted here. the prompt for this was doctor!kyungsoo who can heal people with his voice. thanks to #mmdgz as usual for the egging on and the sighing whenever i tell them i've taken on more exo fic to do. sighs at self.
The first time it happens, he is five years old.
"I fell down," he cries, running to his father, who picks him up and sets him on the table, taking a careful look at his knee. "Daddy."
"It's okay," his father says, soothing. Kyungsoo quells his tears, and glances down at his knee, bruised up and a little bloody, having scratched it as he'd tripped on the sidewalk outside. "Let me go get you a plaster, alright?"
His father leaves momentarily. Kyungsoo sniffles, and looks down at his knee again, poking around the wound gingerly with a finger. "Stop hurting," he tells his knee, and the tinge of pain it emits in response only makes him bite his lip harder.
He remembers once, the girl next door had fallen and scraped her knee too. Her mother had sang to her, soft tones and a hum that had enraptured him. Nobody had ever sang for him before. It'll make you feel better, the girl's mother had said to her, do you feel better now, baby? And the girl had nodded, hugging her mother tearfully.
Kyungsoo wonders if it will help. He flattens his tongue against the roof of his mouth, and hums, nonsensical tunes that he pulls from the back of his mind. He presses his lips together and hums to himself, distracting himself from the pain as he recalls the theme song to the cartoon he'd watched on television yesterday.
His father reenters the room, and freezes, looking at Kyungsoo.
"What's wrong, daddy?" asks Kyungsoo, and he glances down in the direction his father is looking. His knee is healed up, with just the slightest bruise now to indicate that he'd even been hurt. Only dried blood remains.
Kyungsoo's father reaches over, and silently brushes the flakes of blood off Kyungsoo's knee.
"I hummed, daddy," says Kyungsoo, "like Soeun's mommy from next door when she fell down. She said singing would make it better. It made it better, daddy!"
"It did," says his father, sounding a little hoarse. Maybe even a little sad. He unpeels the plaster anyway, a soft neon-coloured one, and puts it over what remains of the bruise over Kyungsoo's knee. "Good boy," he says, placing a hand over Kyungsoo's cheek, "but you have to promise me that you won't tell anybody that it worked."
"Why not?" Kyungsoo gazes up at him, curious.
"Because it's special," says his father, "and you have to keep it a secret for me, because it wouldn't be fun if anyone else knew, would it? Then everyone would want to be the same as you."
Kyungsoo makes a face. "I want to keep it for me!" he announces, and his father pets his cheek, still a little sad in the eyes. Kyungsoo wonders if he's hurt too. Maybe he'd hit his hand on the corner of the sink again. Kyungsoo wonders if humming will make him feel better too. "Daddy?"
"Good boy," says his father, and he pats Kyungsoo's hair again, before picking him up and placing him down on the floor again, back on steady feet. "Go and play."
Kyungsoo watches him walk out of the room, five years old and too young to understand why.
He soon finds out that it isn't just humming. He falls down again, and instead of calling his father, he first goes to his room, and sings, so softly that he can barely hear the words himself over the sound of the lawnmower in the neighbour's yard, but he watches the wound heal with a strange pinch of pain under his skin, and the blood dries up just like back then, again.
"Special," he whispers to himself, pressing a finger over the healed wound.
He doesn't tell anyone, true to the promise he'd made to his father, true to himself as well, and he keeps it hidden away, using it only for himself.
His father doesn't seem to want to acknowledge it as much as Kyungsoo does, only nodding at him whenever he tells his father about what he'd done with the special thing that day, whether it be healing a scrape or making a stomach-ache go away.
"Maybe I can make you feel better too," he tells his father one day, at age eight, "you always look so sad, dad. Is it a stomach-ache?"
"No, boy," says his father kindly, and he runs a hand through Kyungsoo's hair. "It's nothing."
"If you're sure," says Kyungsoo, and he hugs his father, before running off back to his room.
His father doesn't smile, but he reaches for the half-empty glass on the table, and refills it.
Perhaps it is a gift.
Something blessed, something kind, something beautiful. He goes to church in the earliest years of his youth and spends his days glancing up at the heavens and wondering what it is about him that had compelled the ones above to grant him with this strange oddity.
If it had even been them.
Kyungsoo stands amidst the pews, eleven years old and questioning, and asks his father, "Why did God make me like this?"
"Because you're special, boy," says his father, one hand smoothing down his hair. Not Kyungsoo. Just boy. His father has never called him anything else, to his memory. Kyungsoo doesn't mind, though.
"Okay," he says, reaching over to clasp his father's hand. His father shakes it off, placing his hand into his pocket. Kyungsoo settles for holding the hem of his jacket, just happy to be able to be around his father. "I love you, dad."
His father says nothing. Kyungsoo glances up again, and wonders if his father is speaking to God in his silence.
He grows up, too quickly, too precociously. He spends his time indoors instead of elsewhere, finding books his best companion instead of the children who gather around outside to play games and jump around and dance and laugh.
They wouldn't understand anyway. Why play when there are things to know? Things to learn? Things that could help him use this gift a little better?
Kyungsoo realises that fixing things other than scrapes is harder than it seems. Scrapes are superficial, easy to heal. Knitting skin back into place is much different than knitting tendons back together, or mending a bone. He discovers this the hard way, when he breaks an arm when someone pushes him into a ditch on accident at age fourteen.
He tries his hardest to mend it, not wanting to go to a hospital or tell his father until he knows he can't do it. The pain overwhelms him, but he grits his teeth and forces his voice to stabilise under the pressure. He doesn't bother to hum or sing. Instead, he realises that he can talk it out, use his voice in a way that can fix it up without nonsense lyrics and tunes that sound horrendously out of place in the quiet of a dim room filled with nothing but hurt.
It works, but it takes him three hours. Three painful hours, by which Kyungsoo is left reeling by the pain of forcing the bones back into place with an unsteady voice, and tear tracks on his face, still drying.
The first time he helps someone, he is sixteen years old.
He sees a car accident in person. Like slow motion, the car swerves and slams into a lamp-post. It's surreal. He's never expected something like this to be witnessed by his own eyes, and it takes him a second to respond to the groans inside the car.
"Help," wheezes the man in the car, and Kyungsoo nearly panics when the man reaches out to grab at his arm, but he reigns himself in. The man is bleeding profusely, and Kyungsoo isn't sure where to even begin. His leg seems the worst off, bent at an angle that is terrifyingly unnatural, and there's something sticking out of his arm that seems like glass. The man seems more frantic than anything, though, and Kyungsoo worries that his heart might be the thing that gives up on him before proper help arrives. "Help me."
"Call an ambulance," he tells the only other person there, who's already got their phone out. Kyungsoo glances up at the skies and thanks somebody, anybody, that he'd been walking home at eleven o'clock at night after a late trip to the nearby store.
The groceries lie forgotten a little way off. Kyungsoo focuses on the man's breathing, and wills all of the gift into his words, as he tells the man, "You're going to relax now, sir. You're going to calm down, and listen to me."
The man's breathing evens out. Kyungsoo begins to hum, soft enough that the person behind him can't hear as they talk to an emergency responder over the phone, trying to remember the address to the street they're on.
"Good," says Kyungsoo, when the man has loosened his grip on Kyungsoo's arm. Kyungsoo glances over the man as well as he can in the darkness of the night. Several injuries. Broken leg, maybe. The dashboard has caved in, squashing him into place, trapping the lower half of his body. The lamp-post hadn't fallen over, thank god, and Kyungsoo thinks the man might have just escaped a very narrow death. "What's your favourite song, sir?"
"What?" asks the man, confusion lacing the pain in his voice, "what for?"
"Just tell me," says Kyungsoo. He knows the person behind him has come nearer to crouch beside him, unsure of what to do now that she's called for help. She's a woman in her thirties, concern in her features. Kyungsoo doesn't know how much he wants to let either of them see, but this is more important.
And the man does. Kyungsoo begins to sing it softly, and the man's surprised inhale is the only reaction he gets, when his leg begins to heal. The woman behind him notices, perhaps, when he sees her raise a hand to her mouth. It must be the way the man's knee is beginning to straighten out of its own accord.
"Don't tell them," Kyungsoo says, later, when he hears the sirens thundering down the road. "Please. Just tell them that we were here to keep you company."
The man nods, and grasps his arm once more. "Thank you," he says, genuine emotions flooding his voice, "I have a son your age."
Kyungsoo nods at him, and the woman places a hand on his shoulder, a silent gesture of appreciation, one that will stay in his memory for as long as he can remember.
When he reaches home later, he takes a hot shower, letting the water slide over his face, dripping to the floor as it washes off the dust and the grime of the day, and the little flecks of blood on his palms from where he'd touched the man and the car.
Special, he thinks to himself, glancing down at his hands. They are regular hands. Completely normal. There is nothing out of the ordinary about him.
He raises a hand to his throat, and feels the soft rumble of his voice when he speaks.
"Special," he says, echoing in the bathroom, and the water seems to agree with him, running down his face like the careful embrace of warm hands against his cheeks.
Kyungsoo is sixteen when he decides to become a doctor.
"We've got another one," says Baekhyun, the nurse at the counter when he comes in, "broken leg, minor lacerations. Car accident."
"I'll take it," says Kyungsoo, accepting the file with a smile.
He is twenty-seven now, and he enjoys his job, helping people. His father hadn't said anything when he'd decided to become a doctor, merely nodding and saying that he'd provide. Kyungsoo had schooled his face straight, devoid of the disappointment he'd felt when he'd hoped his father would say something more. About how proud he was that Kyungsoo would choose a profession like this. About how glad he'd be that Kyungsoo would choose to use his gift to help people like this, even if nobody knew about it, truly.
But his father had just placed a hand on his shoulder, and told him to be well.
Kyungsoo enters the room. "Good morning, Mr. Kim," he says, and the man lying on the bed gives him a wide smile, much more cheerful than many of the patients he's seen this week. It's refreshing. "Kim Jongdae, car accident?"
"Well, if that's how you'd like to remember me, instead of for my devilishly good looks," says the man, and Kyungsoo nearly flushes, until he remembers that he's a professional, and he just smiles back. "Just kidding. I probably shouldn't scare off my doctor before I get out of here, should I?"
"Not if you'd like to leave with all your limbs intact," says Kyungsoo solemnly, picking up the clipboard at the foot of Kim Jongdae's bed.
"And I hope you're just kidding too," says Jongdae, mock-shuddering. "What did I do to deserve someone this terrifying?"
"Get admitted, probably." Kyungsoo flips through his charts. "So, Mr. Kim-"
"Just Jongdae is fine."
"Just Jongdae it is. So then, Just Jongdae, how are you today?"
"A doctor with a sense of humour, of course."
"Consider it a bonus." Kyungsoo smiles at him. It's not the first time he's felt this comfortable around a patient. Perhaps it's just the way this one smiles, like he's known Kyungsoo for years and years. It's a rarity to find someone this open, these days. "So, since you know what I do for a living, how about you?"
"I'm a lawyer," says Jongdae, bright and well.
“You?” Kyungsoo lets an eyebrow rise. “You don’t strike me as the lawyer type.”
Jongdae’s chuckle is an expected response. “And why not, doctor?”
“You’re much too nice to be one.”
Jongdae’s laugh is like windchimes. Kyungsoo likes it. “Hasn’t anyone ever told you about the folly of stereotypes?”
“Well, I have come across my fair share of less-than-friendly lawyers, in my time.” Kyungsoo sneaks another smile in, just for good measure. “This is a hospital, after all.”
“Of course,” says Jongdae, not looking wounded in the slightest by the comment about his industry. More agreeing than anything. Kyungsoo decides he likes this man a fair deal more than any other lawyer he’s ever met. “lawsuits are abundant in a place like this, I imagine.”
“Just last month,” says Kyungsoo, reaching forward to make an adjustment to the drip beside the bed, “some rich miser decided to sue over the conduct of one of our residents. All they did was clean his room while he was asleep! It was ridiculous.”
“Did he lose?” asks Jongdae, completely engrossed in the situation.
“He did,” confirms Kyungsoo, “god bless his soul.”
Jongdae laughs. “He must have had an awful representative, that’s for sure.”
“You figure you could do any better?”
“I know I could do better.” Jongdae sends him a wink. Somehow, it seems to come off as flirting, just the dash of an expression that belongs to first-time meetings at parties and coffeeshops, not in the room of a hospital where the sendee of said gesture is lying on a cot with his leg in a cast. “You’d do well to remember to call on me, the next time you ever get into any trouble.”
“I’ll keep that in mind if I ever decide to get sued.”
Jongdae’s grin is contagious. “Have a good day, doctor. Come back to keep me company soon, yeah?”
Kyungsoo figures he might find himself occupying this room a fair bit more than expected.
He drops by a few more times after that, eager to begin conversation with his patient, besides the regular check-ups on his leg. Jongdae seems to enjoy his company, and Kyungsoo finds himself wanting to see the man more and more, despite barely knowing anything about him.
Maybe he's just been waiting for someone like this to come along. Loneliness strikes too deep, sometimes. It does get hard to handle, staying in a small flat alone with nothing to keep him company save a couple of houseplants.
And Jongdae is everything he hadn't expected. Cheerful, despite the pain of the fracture in his foot, and the occasional boredom, staved off by television reruns and talking to Kyungsoo.
He gets a room-mate after a while, a sweet little girl who stays for a couple of nights for a surgery on her hand, after she'd fractured her wrist. Jongdae is more than glad to make conversation, and Kyungsoo finds it sweet.
Late at night, he comes to the room to find Jongdae asleep, and the little girl sitting up in bed, looking uncomfortable. "Hey," he calls softly, and the girl turns her head. "How are you feeling, Minyoung?"
"Sick," she admits, and Kyungsoo stands beside the bed, placing a hand against her forehead. She feels warm, possibly a fever. He can hear the hint of a wheeze when she speaks. It wouldn't be good for her to catch a cold now.
"Shall I make the sick go away?" asks Kyungsoo softly, and she nods, big eyes glancing up at him. Kyungsoo smiles approvingly. "When I was little, someone told me that you could make someone feel better if you sang for them. Would you like me to sing for you?"
"If you wanna," she whispers, and Kyungsoo sits beside her, brushing the hair off her forehead.
"Close your eyes," he instructs, and she does, obedient little thing. He begins with a few notes, reaching around his voice for the illness in her chest, carefully unwinding it with the right tune. She squirms a little, obviously feeling some discomfort, but he whispers for her to calm, and she does.
When she opens her eyes, she takes in a deep breath, and says, "It feels like it's gone."
"It is," says Kyungsoo, still soothing, "but you have to promise me that you won't tell anyone about it, okay? Because it's something special. And I don't always do it for everyone, so you have to make sure no one knows, alright? It'll be our secret, Minyoung."
"Okay," she says, and she smiles, a wide gummy smile that warms his heart.
He checks again, just to be sure. Her fever is gone. "Go to sleep now, okay?"
She nods, and curls up in her cot, clutching at her stuffed toy. Her mother is going to come back from the cafeteria soon, he supposes. It'd be good for her to get some rest too, now that her daughter is feeling less sick, and able to sleep.
On his way out, though, a voice stops him. "You sing very well."
Kyungsoo freezes, and turns to look. Behind him, Jongdae is still lying in the same position he'd been in when Kyungsoo came in, but now, his eyes are open, and there's a sleepy smile on his face. "Wish you'd done that for me when I'd gotten in."
"You saw?"
"I'm a very light sleeper, doctor." Jongdae sits up, careful to not make too much noise, in case he wakes up the now sleeping Minyoung. "Have you always been able to do that?"
"Since I was young." Kyungsoo steps back in, and takes the empty seat by Jongdae's bedside. "Your discretion is appreciated." His heart is racing. This is the first time anyone's ever caught him doing this without him telling them beforehand, or being the person he's healing.
"I'm a lawyer," says Jongdae, shaking his head, "discretion is all I know."
"Of course." Kyungsoo pauses. "I don't always do this. Getting caught like this is what I've been trying to avoid. Not everyone takes it very easily."
"Kids, because they're young, and they don't fully understand what it means that a doctor can heal them with just his voice?" guesses Jongdae.
"That, and the fact that I'd like to avoid being treated like some kind of experiment." Kyungsoo glances down. "I could, you know. Since you already know. If you'd like."
"Heal me?" Jongdae blinks at him, and bites his lip. "Well. I guess it would be interesting to see."
"It wouldn't be complete, though," Kyungsoo tells him, "I'm not too good with fractures of this kind just yet. But, it'd definitely speed up your stay."
"By all means."
Kyungsoo does, choosing a soft collection of words to flow from his lips that have always helped with mending bones. Jongdae can obviously feel it, with the way his eyes widen, and his fingers grip at his blanket. "Wow," he says, when Kyungsoo finishes, just a short two minutes. "The pain's lessened."
"Good," says Kyungsoo, "you'll be back on your feet in no time."
"The only downside about this is having less time with you," says Jongdae, a light chuckle in his words, and Kyungsoo snorts. "Really. I don't always flirt with my doctors, but you're something. Even before I knew you could do-well, this."
"I'm flattered." Kyungsoo smiles, despite himself. "And I bet you'll find a way to stay in touch with me even after you leave."
"I promise it," says Jongdae, and it's something light that settles in Kyungsoo's heart, and stays for the rest of the night.
True enough, Jongdae promptly presents Kyungsoo with his business card when he checks out of the hospital, smiling all the while. He won't have to use crutches for more than a week, since Kyungsoo had fixed him up well enough to speed up the recovery process.
"Call me," he says, and Kyungsoo takes the card with two fingers, completely aware of the way the nurses at the counter are murmuring behind their hands, smiling at Kyungsoo. God, he's going to get so much teasing for the next few days. "The sooner I get to take you out for coffee, the sooner my life will be blessed."
"Great," says Kyungsoo, giving him a look, "I can make sure you're doing well on that leg."
Jongdae laughs. "Off the job, please."
Kyungsoo waves him off, and leans against the counter. One of the nurses, a friend of his, goes, "He's cute."
"He is," agrees Kyungsoo, "I'm doomed."
"You need to get out more," says Baekhyun, the staff nurse on duty, as he rearranges a stack of files, "I'm telling you, honestly, your houseplants are going to suck all the life out of you if that's all you keep doing. Staying at home."
"Says you, Mr. Clubs-All-Weekend-Until-Someone-Pages-Me."
"At least I have a life," says Baekhyun breezily, and he flits away.
"Worst," mutters Kyungsoo under his breath, and the rest of the nurses titter away.
They begin to meet regularly, outside of the hospital. Kyungsoo hasn't dated anyone in a long time, so it does come as a bit of something new, having someone in his life after so long.
He truly enjoys Jongdae's company, and it helps that he doesn't have to spend his nights alone anymore. The last time he'd dated someone, they'd hated the fact that he worked odd, long hours. Jongdae works hours just as odd and long as he does, and it's perfect.
It's perfect for a few months, until the strange occurrences begin happening around the city. The constant arrests that are being made, or the deaths that are marked anonymous in the papers, and the way Jongdae seems to be working more these days. Night after night, week after week. There's got to be something behind the way Jongdae keeps meeting him with dark circles under his eyes, and fatigue in his limbs.
"You've been okay?" presses Kyungsoo, each and every time, but Jongdae always just waves him off, even when Kyungsoo offers to take the strain off.
"Great," says Jongdae, the next time they meet up, and this time, he looks completely exhausted beyond belief. "It's just work, honestly, I'll sleep it off when we're done."
"Big case?" asks Kyungsoo, reaching over to rest a hand on Jongdae's nape, soothing motions occupying his fingertips. Jongdae just nods, and leans into the touch. "Please do rest. You look fucking awful."
Jongdae laughs, but there's no humour in it. Kyungsoo knows that Jongdae does take on brutal cases sometimes, but there's something about him now that he's not telling Kyungsoo.
"Whatever it is, you know I'm here for you, right?"
"Of course," whispers Jongdae, and he glances over at Kyungsoo. "Thank you, Kyungsoo."
Kyungsoo just threads their fingers together, and hopes that it really is nothing.
He speaks too soon.
Some kind of major pile-up occurs downtown, and all hands are on deck as they wait for the ambulances to pull in. There are crying, screaming kids all around. Adults bleeding out on stretchers. It's an emergency everyone has been hoping to avoid happen over the years, but god, it's happened, and it looks terrifying.
Kyungsoo rushes about, doing what he can, and it seems almost too dire to save some of these people, these innocent kids who hadn't even deserved this fate, these people who'd just been on a bus at the wrong time. Nobody had expected anything like this to happen today. The world just works a certain way.
And if Kyungsoo can help, he should. He will. He's not going to stand here, helpless, with his gloves on and just his medical knowledge to back him up. He's here to save lives, and he'll do it through any way possible. Even if it costs him everything.
"What are you doing?" hisses Baekhyun, who's attempting to resuscitate a patient who's going under, when Kyungsoo elbows him out of the way, and leans in close. "Doctor!"
"Trust me," says Kyungsoo, and that's all anyone can go on right now, trust, and Baekhyun just stares when Kyungsoo proves him of that trust. The patient stabilises, and Kyungsoo just turns back to Baekhyun, who's staring at Kyungsoo like he's grown a second head, and he says, "I'll explain everything later."
"You sure as hell better," says Baekhyun, and he pushes Kyungsoo in the direction of the others who need help.
That day, Kyungsoo saves twelve people from dying. That day, the entire floor learns about what he can do, too. And by the next day, the authorities arrive.
Kyungsoo sits in a consultation room, and resigns himself to his fate.
"You," says the man, looking intimidating in all his drawn-up stature, and the suit he's wearing. He seems to be some kind of special agent. Kyungsoo sits up straight, and remembers to breathe through his nose. "You are going to tell us every single detail about how you managed to do what you did."
"I don't know," says Kyungsoo, "I've always been able to do it."
"We cannot possibly allow you to remain out in the open like this, you do realise, Mr. Do," says the man, setting a thick file down on the table. Kyungsoo eyes it warily. "For the safety of the people."
"I saved those people," says Kyungsoo, "give me a break. I'm not dangerous."
"We don't know that, Mr. Do." The man leans in. "The government does not know this."
"Where are you going to take me?" asks Kyungsoo, knowing that he won't be getting out of here anyway, no matter how much he tries. "To jail? For saving twelve people? Just for something I was born with?"
"Your forthcoming placement will be disclosed to you in due time. Now, tell me just how you... saved, those people."
"He doesn't have to answer anything," comes a familiar voice, and Kyungsoo glances up in surprise to see Jongdae walking into the room, a briefcase in his hand, suited up neatly. "You have no right to be talking to him or taking him anywhere without a lawyer present."
The man gazes at Jongdae, and Jongdae just gazes back, challenging. Kyungsoo remains silent, unsure of what's happening, and how Jongdae had gotten word of what had happened.
Then, Jongdae says, "I could put you on file."
"Just try," says the man.
Kyungsoo feels completely out of his depth. Does Jongdae know this man? What does he even mean? "Jongdae?" he says, and Jongdae doesn't look at him. "What's going on?"
"You move him, and I swear to god," says Jongdae, but his voice has dropped to a growl, a strange rough whisper that Kyungsoo has never heard come out of his mouth before, "I'll take out everyone standing between me and the front door of the hospital."
"He's that liability of yours?" The man laughs, a harsh bark. "Should have known, sympathiser. We're taking him anyway, and you know you can't change their minds."
"Jongdae!" says Kyungsoo, standing up, "What the fuck is going on?"
"Oh, you go on ahead and tell your little boyfriend." Jongdae is bristling now, and Kyungsoo doesn't know what to do besides stare at the both of them. "Tell him what you are, before he comes along with us."
"Kyungsoo," says Jongdae, eyes not leaving the man's face, "when I say get down, you get down."
"But-"
"Get down!" shouts Jongdae, and Kyungsoo immediately ducks, exhaling sharply when the sound of a silenced gun goes off, barely heard but for the little whizzes through the air. "Kyungsoo," says Jongdae, and he's crouching beside Kyungsoo, and there's a gun in his hand, Jesus Christ. "Kyungsoo, we have to get out of here, now."
"Who are you?" croaks Kyungsoo in horror, eyes still on the gun, and Jongdae's face crumples, but he takes Kyungsoo by the arm anyway, and drags him up and out of the room.
Jongdae shoots the two agents standing guard outside as well, before grabbing Kyungsoo's hand and telling him to make a run for it.
The agents drop to the floor, bodies slumped over. The people around them scream, immediately drawing attention to them, but Jongdae ignores them, and takes Kyungsoo with him anyway.
“Christ, Kyungsoo, what the fuck is going on?” asks Baekhyun, when they reach the main corridor. Baekhyun looks concerned and scared all at the same time. Kyungsoo feels a tinge of guilt, and tells Jongdae to hold on for just a second. “Kyungsoo?”
“They’re coming for me, Baekhyun,” Kyungsoo tells him, and Baekhyun’s eyes go wide. “I don’t know where we’re going to go, but I don’t want them coming after you, so just... if they ever ask you about me, just tell them you don’t know me. Okay? Just take care of yourself.”
“I’ll find you,” says Baekhyun, and Kyungsoo’s heart hurts at the thought of having to leave one of his only friends behind, but he nods, and Baekhyun glances over at Jongdae. “Or you’ll find me, I suppose.”
Footsteps ring out behind them, heavy slams of soles against the tiles. People, running towards them. Probably more agents. Kyungsoo sends him a last goodbye, and leaves.
They sprint down the stairs, avoiding the elevators, and a million thoughts are running through Kyungsoo's head as well. Who was that man? Where was he going to take Kyungsoo? Who is Kim Jongdae?
"You killed them," says Kyungsoo, thoughts fragmented even as he speeds through the hallways, Jongdae at his side, "god, you killed them, Jongdae! What the hell is going on? Where are we going?"
"Somewhere safe," says Jongdae, only answering that question, and he manages to duck them both out of the hospital, panting for breath.
They both head into a nearby alley-way, hearing sirens from afar, and Kyungsoo takes a moment to lean against the wall, inhaling deeply. Everything is too much, right now. He'd known that he would get in trouble for having this gift, but he hadn't expected the government to be involved. To want to take him with them.
God knows what they would have done to him.
"You're going to tell me everything, right now," says Kyungsoo, and Jongdae pockets the gun, rubbing at his temples tiredly, and suddenly, it's the Jongdae he knows that appears again, the one that's soft around the edges. "Tell me everything, Jongdae."
Jongdae glances up at him. "I am a lawyer, Kyungsoo. I didn't lie about that."
"But?" presses Kyungsoo.
"I'm a special agent. Part of a branch that tracks down the existence of individuals with supernormal abilities who exist in the world today. People like you, Kyungsoo. The government is trying to round up people like you."
"What for? And-wait, you... " says Kyungsoo, brow furrowing, "you work for them? You were going to turn me in to them?"
"I would never!" says Jongdae, reaching out to encircle his wrist reassuringly. "Kyungsoo, please, believe me."
“You lied to me,” hisses Kyungsoo, and he attempts to wrench his grip out of Jongdae’s hand, but Jongdae clutches at his wrist tighter, and tugs him nearer, leaning in.
“I was protecting you!” Jongdae sounds pained. Kyungsoo isn’t sure whether it’s because he had to lie to Kyungsoo, or whether it’s because Kyungsoo thinks of it as betrayal. “I had to. I had no choice! I did what I had to do to make sure I could keep everyone safe.”
The words catch Kyungsoo. “Everyone?” he says, uncertainly, and Jongdae chances a glance around the corner of the alleyway. “What do you mean, everyone?”
“You’re not the only one,” Jongdae tells him, with a hard breath. “There are others. Not like you exactly, but they have powers too. They can do things, different things. The government has been trying to contain them. I’ve been working with an underground organisation to feed the branch non-truths about the existence of those who haven’t yet come to the government’s attention.”
“So,” says Kyungsoo, reeling from the shock of the information, “you’re a, what, double-agent? You lie about these other people to keep the government from taking them?”
“Yes.” Jongdae’s voice is determined. “My cover’s blown now, Kyungsoo, do you understand? I can’t go back there, and I can’t let you go back there.”
There’s a long pause.
“What,” says Kyungsoo, finally finding his voice, “what do we do now?”
“We run,” says Jongdae, something alight in his eyes, “and we don’t look back.”
And is Kyungsoo prepared to do this? Drop everything at the bat of a lash, and go on the run from the fucking government with a rogue special agent, to god knows where?
“I,” starts Kyungsoo, but then he remembers that there are others. He’s not the only one. He could get answers. And he could-maybe he could find out who his real mother is.
Jongdae looks at him, a question in his features.
And Kyungsoo knows what he has to do. “Yes,” he says, and Jongdae nods, relief breaking through, “how are we going to get there?”
Jongdae is already on it, pulling his phone out of his suit jacket. “Lu Han,” he says, into the mouthpiece, and oh, thinks Kyungsoo, a jolt of recognition surging through him along with a shudder, that had been the name of the man who’d jumped off the Dongjak Bridge after a high-speed police chase last year. Have all the strange happenings been because of the government chasing down people like him? “We’ve been found. Send Yixing to the safehouse in Mapo with a car.” And he hangs up.
Kyungsoo watches him with a surprisingly calmness in him. “Safehouse?”
“We’ll be meeting someone there who will take us to the main base.” Jongdae gazes at him, worry in his eyes, and Kyungsoo realises that it’s the same look that Kyungsoo has given numerous people, time and time again. He’s never had anyone look at him like this before, having grown up taking care of himself. It makes him feel something topple inside him, and he reaches out to take Jongdae’s hand, determined. “Kyungsoo?”
“If there’s any way I can help, you know I will.” Kyungsoo threads their fingers together. It feels right. Jongdae glances down at their hands momentarily, before smiling, a fierce, protective smile that Kyungsoo wishes to emulate. “Let’s go, Jongdae.”
“After you, doctor,” says Jongdae, and Kyungsoo laughs, taking the gun carefully from Jongdae’s other hand, the cold metal feeling strange in his grip.
But he’ll do whatever he can to survive, and if this is how the world wants to throw the rest of his life at him, then god, he’ll take it. He’ll damn well take it as it is.
Anything can happen now.
Kyungsoo breathes out.
perhaps it is a gift.
warnings for minor descriptions of injury and violence.
written for this year's round of sooheaven and originally posted here. the prompt for this was doctor!kyungsoo who can heal people with his voice. thanks to #mmdgz as usual for the egging on and the sighing whenever i tell them i've taken on more exo fic to do. sighs at self.
The first time it happens, he is five years old.
"I fell down," he cries, running to his father, who picks him up and sets him on the table, taking a careful look at his knee. "Daddy."
"It's okay," his father says, soothing. Kyungsoo quells his tears, and glances down at his knee, bruised up and a little bloody, having scratched it as he'd tripped on the sidewalk outside. "Let me go get you a plaster, alright?"
His father leaves momentarily. Kyungsoo sniffles, and looks down at his knee again, poking around the wound gingerly with a finger. "Stop hurting," he tells his knee, and the tinge of pain it emits in response only makes him bite his lip harder.
He remembers once, the girl next door had fallen and scraped her knee too. Her mother had sang to her, soft tones and a hum that had enraptured him. Nobody had ever sang for him before. It'll make you feel better, the girl's mother had said to her, do you feel better now, baby? And the girl had nodded, hugging her mother tearfully.
Kyungsoo wonders if it will help. He flattens his tongue against the roof of his mouth, and hums, nonsensical tunes that he pulls from the back of his mind. He presses his lips together and hums to himself, distracting himself from the pain as he recalls the theme song to the cartoon he'd watched on television yesterday.
His father reenters the room, and freezes, looking at Kyungsoo.
"What's wrong, daddy?" asks Kyungsoo, and he glances down in the direction his father is looking. His knee is healed up, with just the slightest bruise now to indicate that he'd even been hurt. Only dried blood remains.
Kyungsoo's father reaches over, and silently brushes the flakes of blood off Kyungsoo's knee.
"I hummed, daddy," says Kyungsoo, "like Soeun's mommy from next door when she fell down. She said singing would make it better. It made it better, daddy!"
"It did," says his father, sounding a little hoarse. Maybe even a little sad. He unpeels the plaster anyway, a soft neon-coloured one, and puts it over what remains of the bruise over Kyungsoo's knee. "Good boy," he says, placing a hand over Kyungsoo's cheek, "but you have to promise me that you won't tell anybody that it worked."
"Why not?" Kyungsoo gazes up at him, curious.
"Because it's special," says his father, "and you have to keep it a secret for me, because it wouldn't be fun if anyone else knew, would it? Then everyone would want to be the same as you."
Kyungsoo makes a face. "I want to keep it for me!" he announces, and his father pets his cheek, still a little sad in the eyes. Kyungsoo wonders if he's hurt too. Maybe he'd hit his hand on the corner of the sink again. Kyungsoo wonders if humming will make him feel better too. "Daddy?"
"Good boy," says his father, and he pats Kyungsoo's hair again, before picking him up and placing him down on the floor again, back on steady feet. "Go and play."
Kyungsoo watches him walk out of the room, five years old and too young to understand why.
He soon finds out that it isn't just humming. He falls down again, and instead of calling his father, he first goes to his room, and sings, so softly that he can barely hear the words himself over the sound of the lawnmower in the neighbour's yard, but he watches the wound heal with a strange pinch of pain under his skin, and the blood dries up just like back then, again.
"Special," he whispers to himself, pressing a finger over the healed wound.
He doesn't tell anyone, true to the promise he'd made to his father, true to himself as well, and he keeps it hidden away, using it only for himself.
His father doesn't seem to want to acknowledge it as much as Kyungsoo does, only nodding at him whenever he tells his father about what he'd done with the special thing that day, whether it be healing a scrape or making a stomach-ache go away.
"Maybe I can make you feel better too," he tells his father one day, at age eight, "you always look so sad, dad. Is it a stomach-ache?"
"No, boy," says his father kindly, and he runs a hand through Kyungsoo's hair. "It's nothing."
"If you're sure," says Kyungsoo, and he hugs his father, before running off back to his room.
His father doesn't smile, but he reaches for the half-empty glass on the table, and refills it.
Perhaps it is a gift.
Something blessed, something kind, something beautiful. He goes to church in the earliest years of his youth and spends his days glancing up at the heavens and wondering what it is about him that had compelled the ones above to grant him with this strange oddity.
If it had even been them.
Kyungsoo stands amidst the pews, eleven years old and questioning, and asks his father, "Why did God make me like this?"
"Because you're special, boy," says his father, one hand smoothing down his hair. Not Kyungsoo. Just boy. His father has never called him anything else, to his memory. Kyungsoo doesn't mind, though.
"Okay," he says, reaching over to clasp his father's hand. His father shakes it off, placing his hand into his pocket. Kyungsoo settles for holding the hem of his jacket, just happy to be able to be around his father. "I love you, dad."
His father says nothing. Kyungsoo glances up again, and wonders if his father is speaking to God in his silence.
He grows up, too quickly, too precociously. He spends his time indoors instead of elsewhere, finding books his best companion instead of the children who gather around outside to play games and jump around and dance and laugh.
They wouldn't understand anyway. Why play when there are things to know? Things to learn? Things that could help him use this gift a little better?
Kyungsoo realises that fixing things other than scrapes is harder than it seems. Scrapes are superficial, easy to heal. Knitting skin back into place is much different than knitting tendons back together, or mending a bone. He discovers this the hard way, when he breaks an arm when someone pushes him into a ditch on accident at age fourteen.
He tries his hardest to mend it, not wanting to go to a hospital or tell his father until he knows he can't do it. The pain overwhelms him, but he grits his teeth and forces his voice to stabilise under the pressure. He doesn't bother to hum or sing. Instead, he realises that he can talk it out, use his voice in a way that can fix it up without nonsense lyrics and tunes that sound horrendously out of place in the quiet of a dim room filled with nothing but hurt.
It works, but it takes him three hours. Three painful hours, by which Kyungsoo is left reeling by the pain of forcing the bones back into place with an unsteady voice, and tear tracks on his face, still drying.
The first time he helps someone, he is sixteen years old.
He sees a car accident in person. Like slow motion, the car swerves and slams into a lamp-post. It's surreal. He's never expected something like this to be witnessed by his own eyes, and it takes him a second to respond to the groans inside the car.
"Help," wheezes the man in the car, and Kyungsoo nearly panics when the man reaches out to grab at his arm, but he reigns himself in. The man is bleeding profusely, and Kyungsoo isn't sure where to even begin. His leg seems the worst off, bent at an angle that is terrifyingly unnatural, and there's something sticking out of his arm that seems like glass. The man seems more frantic than anything, though, and Kyungsoo worries that his heart might be the thing that gives up on him before proper help arrives. "Help me."
"Call an ambulance," he tells the only other person there, who's already got their phone out. Kyungsoo glances up at the skies and thanks somebody, anybody, that he'd been walking home at eleven o'clock at night after a late trip to the nearby store.
The groceries lie forgotten a little way off. Kyungsoo focuses on the man's breathing, and wills all of the gift into his words, as he tells the man, "You're going to relax now, sir. You're going to calm down, and listen to me."
The man's breathing evens out. Kyungsoo begins to hum, soft enough that the person behind him can't hear as they talk to an emergency responder over the phone, trying to remember the address to the street they're on.
"Good," says Kyungsoo, when the man has loosened his grip on Kyungsoo's arm. Kyungsoo glances over the man as well as he can in the darkness of the night. Several injuries. Broken leg, maybe. The dashboard has caved in, squashing him into place, trapping the lower half of his body. The lamp-post hadn't fallen over, thank god, and Kyungsoo thinks the man might have just escaped a very narrow death. "What's your favourite song, sir?"
"What?" asks the man, confusion lacing the pain in his voice, "what for?"
"Just tell me," says Kyungsoo. He knows the person behind him has come nearer to crouch beside him, unsure of what to do now that she's called for help. She's a woman in her thirties, concern in her features. Kyungsoo doesn't know how much he wants to let either of them see, but this is more important.
And the man does. Kyungsoo begins to sing it softly, and the man's surprised inhale is the only reaction he gets, when his leg begins to heal. The woman behind him notices, perhaps, when he sees her raise a hand to her mouth. It must be the way the man's knee is beginning to straighten out of its own accord.
"Don't tell them," Kyungsoo says, later, when he hears the sirens thundering down the road. "Please. Just tell them that we were here to keep you company."
The man nods, and grasps his arm once more. "Thank you," he says, genuine emotions flooding his voice, "I have a son your age."
Kyungsoo nods at him, and the woman places a hand on his shoulder, a silent gesture of appreciation, one that will stay in his memory for as long as he can remember.
When he reaches home later, he takes a hot shower, letting the water slide over his face, dripping to the floor as it washes off the dust and the grime of the day, and the little flecks of blood on his palms from where he'd touched the man and the car.
Special, he thinks to himself, glancing down at his hands. They are regular hands. Completely normal. There is nothing out of the ordinary about him.
He raises a hand to his throat, and feels the soft rumble of his voice when he speaks.
"Special," he says, echoing in the bathroom, and the water seems to agree with him, running down his face like the careful embrace of warm hands against his cheeks.
Kyungsoo is sixteen when he decides to become a doctor.
"We've got another one," says Baekhyun, the nurse at the counter when he comes in, "broken leg, minor lacerations. Car accident."
"I'll take it," says Kyungsoo, accepting the file with a smile.
He is twenty-seven now, and he enjoys his job, helping people. His father hadn't said anything when he'd decided to become a doctor, merely nodding and saying that he'd provide. Kyungsoo had schooled his face straight, devoid of the disappointment he'd felt when he'd hoped his father would say something more. About how proud he was that Kyungsoo would choose a profession like this. About how glad he'd be that Kyungsoo would choose to use his gift to help people like this, even if nobody knew about it, truly.
But his father had just placed a hand on his shoulder, and told him to be well.
Kyungsoo enters the room. "Good morning, Mr. Kim," he says, and the man lying on the bed gives him a wide smile, much more cheerful than many of the patients he's seen this week. It's refreshing. "Kim Jongdae, car accident?"
"Well, if that's how you'd like to remember me, instead of for my devilishly good looks," says the man, and Kyungsoo nearly flushes, until he remembers that he's a professional, and he just smiles back. "Just kidding. I probably shouldn't scare off my doctor before I get out of here, should I?"
"Not if you'd like to leave with all your limbs intact," says Kyungsoo solemnly, picking up the clipboard at the foot of Kim Jongdae's bed.
"And I hope you're just kidding too," says Jongdae, mock-shuddering. "What did I do to deserve someone this terrifying?"
"Get admitted, probably." Kyungsoo flips through his charts. "So, Mr. Kim-"
"Just Jongdae is fine."
"Just Jongdae it is. So then, Just Jongdae, how are you today?"
"A doctor with a sense of humour, of course."
"Consider it a bonus." Kyungsoo smiles at him. It's not the first time he's felt this comfortable around a patient. Perhaps it's just the way this one smiles, like he's known Kyungsoo for years and years. It's a rarity to find someone this open, these days. "So, since you know what I do for a living, how about you?"
"I'm a lawyer," says Jongdae, bright and well.
“You?” Kyungsoo lets an eyebrow rise. “You don’t strike me as the lawyer type.”
Jongdae’s chuckle is an expected response. “And why not, doctor?”
“You’re much too nice to be one.”
Jongdae’s laugh is like windchimes. Kyungsoo likes it. “Hasn’t anyone ever told you about the folly of stereotypes?”
“Well, I have come across my fair share of less-than-friendly lawyers, in my time.” Kyungsoo sneaks another smile in, just for good measure. “This is a hospital, after all.”
“Of course,” says Jongdae, not looking wounded in the slightest by the comment about his industry. More agreeing than anything. Kyungsoo decides he likes this man a fair deal more than any other lawyer he’s ever met. “lawsuits are abundant in a place like this, I imagine.”
“Just last month,” says Kyungsoo, reaching forward to make an adjustment to the drip beside the bed, “some rich miser decided to sue over the conduct of one of our residents. All they did was clean his room while he was asleep! It was ridiculous.”
“Did he lose?” asks Jongdae, completely engrossed in the situation.
“He did,” confirms Kyungsoo, “god bless his soul.”
Jongdae laughs. “He must have had an awful representative, that’s for sure.”
“You figure you could do any better?”
“I know I could do better.” Jongdae sends him a wink. Somehow, it seems to come off as flirting, just the dash of an expression that belongs to first-time meetings at parties and coffeeshops, not in the room of a hospital where the sendee of said gesture is lying on a cot with his leg in a cast. “You’d do well to remember to call on me, the next time you ever get into any trouble.”
“I’ll keep that in mind if I ever decide to get sued.”
Jongdae’s grin is contagious. “Have a good day, doctor. Come back to keep me company soon, yeah?”
Kyungsoo figures he might find himself occupying this room a fair bit more than expected.
He drops by a few more times after that, eager to begin conversation with his patient, besides the regular check-ups on his leg. Jongdae seems to enjoy his company, and Kyungsoo finds himself wanting to see the man more and more, despite barely knowing anything about him.
Maybe he's just been waiting for someone like this to come along. Loneliness strikes too deep, sometimes. It does get hard to handle, staying in a small flat alone with nothing to keep him company save a couple of houseplants.
And Jongdae is everything he hadn't expected. Cheerful, despite the pain of the fracture in his foot, and the occasional boredom, staved off by television reruns and talking to Kyungsoo.
He gets a room-mate after a while, a sweet little girl who stays for a couple of nights for a surgery on her hand, after she'd fractured her wrist. Jongdae is more than glad to make conversation, and Kyungsoo finds it sweet.
Late at night, he comes to the room to find Jongdae asleep, and the little girl sitting up in bed, looking uncomfortable. "Hey," he calls softly, and the girl turns her head. "How are you feeling, Minyoung?"
"Sick," she admits, and Kyungsoo stands beside the bed, placing a hand against her forehead. She feels warm, possibly a fever. He can hear the hint of a wheeze when she speaks. It wouldn't be good for her to catch a cold now.
"Shall I make the sick go away?" asks Kyungsoo softly, and she nods, big eyes glancing up at him. Kyungsoo smiles approvingly. "When I was little, someone told me that you could make someone feel better if you sang for them. Would you like me to sing for you?"
"If you wanna," she whispers, and Kyungsoo sits beside her, brushing the hair off her forehead.
"Close your eyes," he instructs, and she does, obedient little thing. He begins with a few notes, reaching around his voice for the illness in her chest, carefully unwinding it with the right tune. She squirms a little, obviously feeling some discomfort, but he whispers for her to calm, and she does.
When she opens her eyes, she takes in a deep breath, and says, "It feels like it's gone."
"It is," says Kyungsoo, still soothing, "but you have to promise me that you won't tell anyone about it, okay? Because it's something special. And I don't always do it for everyone, so you have to make sure no one knows, alright? It'll be our secret, Minyoung."
"Okay," she says, and she smiles, a wide gummy smile that warms his heart.
He checks again, just to be sure. Her fever is gone. "Go to sleep now, okay?"
She nods, and curls up in her cot, clutching at her stuffed toy. Her mother is going to come back from the cafeteria soon, he supposes. It'd be good for her to get some rest too, now that her daughter is feeling less sick, and able to sleep.
On his way out, though, a voice stops him. "You sing very well."
Kyungsoo freezes, and turns to look. Behind him, Jongdae is still lying in the same position he'd been in when Kyungsoo came in, but now, his eyes are open, and there's a sleepy smile on his face. "Wish you'd done that for me when I'd gotten in."
"You saw?"
"I'm a very light sleeper, doctor." Jongdae sits up, careful to not make too much noise, in case he wakes up the now sleeping Minyoung. "Have you always been able to do that?"
"Since I was young." Kyungsoo steps back in, and takes the empty seat by Jongdae's bedside. "Your discretion is appreciated." His heart is racing. This is the first time anyone's ever caught him doing this without him telling them beforehand, or being the person he's healing.
"I'm a lawyer," says Jongdae, shaking his head, "discretion is all I know."
"Of course." Kyungsoo pauses. "I don't always do this. Getting caught like this is what I've been trying to avoid. Not everyone takes it very easily."
"Kids, because they're young, and they don't fully understand what it means that a doctor can heal them with just his voice?" guesses Jongdae.
"That, and the fact that I'd like to avoid being treated like some kind of experiment." Kyungsoo glances down. "I could, you know. Since you already know. If you'd like."
"Heal me?" Jongdae blinks at him, and bites his lip. "Well. I guess it would be interesting to see."
"It wouldn't be complete, though," Kyungsoo tells him, "I'm not too good with fractures of this kind just yet. But, it'd definitely speed up your stay."
"By all means."
Kyungsoo does, choosing a soft collection of words to flow from his lips that have always helped with mending bones. Jongdae can obviously feel it, with the way his eyes widen, and his fingers grip at his blanket. "Wow," he says, when Kyungsoo finishes, just a short two minutes. "The pain's lessened."
"Good," says Kyungsoo, "you'll be back on your feet in no time."
"The only downside about this is having less time with you," says Jongdae, a light chuckle in his words, and Kyungsoo snorts. "Really. I don't always flirt with my doctors, but you're something. Even before I knew you could do-well, this."
"I'm flattered." Kyungsoo smiles, despite himself. "And I bet you'll find a way to stay in touch with me even after you leave."
"I promise it," says Jongdae, and it's something light that settles in Kyungsoo's heart, and stays for the rest of the night.
True enough, Jongdae promptly presents Kyungsoo with his business card when he checks out of the hospital, smiling all the while. He won't have to use crutches for more than a week, since Kyungsoo had fixed him up well enough to speed up the recovery process.
"Call me," he says, and Kyungsoo takes the card with two fingers, completely aware of the way the nurses at the counter are murmuring behind their hands, smiling at Kyungsoo. God, he's going to get so much teasing for the next few days. "The sooner I get to take you out for coffee, the sooner my life will be blessed."
"Great," says Kyungsoo, giving him a look, "I can make sure you're doing well on that leg."
Jongdae laughs. "Off the job, please."
Kyungsoo waves him off, and leans against the counter. One of the nurses, a friend of his, goes, "He's cute."
"He is," agrees Kyungsoo, "I'm doomed."
"You need to get out more," says Baekhyun, the staff nurse on duty, as he rearranges a stack of files, "I'm telling you, honestly, your houseplants are going to suck all the life out of you if that's all you keep doing. Staying at home."
"Says you, Mr. Clubs-All-Weekend-Until-Someone-Pages-Me."
"At least I have a life," says Baekhyun breezily, and he flits away.
"Worst," mutters Kyungsoo under his breath, and the rest of the nurses titter away.
They begin to meet regularly, outside of the hospital. Kyungsoo hasn't dated anyone in a long time, so it does come as a bit of something new, having someone in his life after so long.
He truly enjoys Jongdae's company, and it helps that he doesn't have to spend his nights alone anymore. The last time he'd dated someone, they'd hated the fact that he worked odd, long hours. Jongdae works hours just as odd and long as he does, and it's perfect.
It's perfect for a few months, until the strange occurrences begin happening around the city. The constant arrests that are being made, or the deaths that are marked anonymous in the papers, and the way Jongdae seems to be working more these days. Night after night, week after week. There's got to be something behind the way Jongdae keeps meeting him with dark circles under his eyes, and fatigue in his limbs.
"You've been okay?" presses Kyungsoo, each and every time, but Jongdae always just waves him off, even when Kyungsoo offers to take the strain off.
"Great," says Jongdae, the next time they meet up, and this time, he looks completely exhausted beyond belief. "It's just work, honestly, I'll sleep it off when we're done."
"Big case?" asks Kyungsoo, reaching over to rest a hand on Jongdae's nape, soothing motions occupying his fingertips. Jongdae just nods, and leans into the touch. "Please do rest. You look fucking awful."
Jongdae laughs, but there's no humour in it. Kyungsoo knows that Jongdae does take on brutal cases sometimes, but there's something about him now that he's not telling Kyungsoo.
"Whatever it is, you know I'm here for you, right?"
"Of course," whispers Jongdae, and he glances over at Kyungsoo. "Thank you, Kyungsoo."
Kyungsoo just threads their fingers together, and hopes that it really is nothing.
He speaks too soon.
Some kind of major pile-up occurs downtown, and all hands are on deck as they wait for the ambulances to pull in. There are crying, screaming kids all around. Adults bleeding out on stretchers. It's an emergency everyone has been hoping to avoid happen over the years, but god, it's happened, and it looks terrifying.
Kyungsoo rushes about, doing what he can, and it seems almost too dire to save some of these people, these innocent kids who hadn't even deserved this fate, these people who'd just been on a bus at the wrong time. Nobody had expected anything like this to happen today. The world just works a certain way.
And if Kyungsoo can help, he should. He will. He's not going to stand here, helpless, with his gloves on and just his medical knowledge to back him up. He's here to save lives, and he'll do it through any way possible. Even if it costs him everything.
"What are you doing?" hisses Baekhyun, who's attempting to resuscitate a patient who's going under, when Kyungsoo elbows him out of the way, and leans in close. "Doctor!"
"Trust me," says Kyungsoo, and that's all anyone can go on right now, trust, and Baekhyun just stares when Kyungsoo proves him of that trust. The patient stabilises, and Kyungsoo just turns back to Baekhyun, who's staring at Kyungsoo like he's grown a second head, and he says, "I'll explain everything later."
"You sure as hell better," says Baekhyun, and he pushes Kyungsoo in the direction of the others who need help.
That day, Kyungsoo saves twelve people from dying. That day, the entire floor learns about what he can do, too. And by the next day, the authorities arrive.
Kyungsoo sits in a consultation room, and resigns himself to his fate.
"You," says the man, looking intimidating in all his drawn-up stature, and the suit he's wearing. He seems to be some kind of special agent. Kyungsoo sits up straight, and remembers to breathe through his nose. "You are going to tell us every single detail about how you managed to do what you did."
"I don't know," says Kyungsoo, "I've always been able to do it."
"We cannot possibly allow you to remain out in the open like this, you do realise, Mr. Do," says the man, setting a thick file down on the table. Kyungsoo eyes it warily. "For the safety of the people."
"I saved those people," says Kyungsoo, "give me a break. I'm not dangerous."
"We don't know that, Mr. Do." The man leans in. "The government does not know this."
"Where are you going to take me?" asks Kyungsoo, knowing that he won't be getting out of here anyway, no matter how much he tries. "To jail? For saving twelve people? Just for something I was born with?"
"Your forthcoming placement will be disclosed to you in due time. Now, tell me just how you... saved, those people."
"He doesn't have to answer anything," comes a familiar voice, and Kyungsoo glances up in surprise to see Jongdae walking into the room, a briefcase in his hand, suited up neatly. "You have no right to be talking to him or taking him anywhere without a lawyer present."
The man gazes at Jongdae, and Jongdae just gazes back, challenging. Kyungsoo remains silent, unsure of what's happening, and how Jongdae had gotten word of what had happened.
Then, Jongdae says, "I could put you on file."
"Just try," says the man.
Kyungsoo feels completely out of his depth. Does Jongdae know this man? What does he even mean? "Jongdae?" he says, and Jongdae doesn't look at him. "What's going on?"
"You move him, and I swear to god," says Jongdae, but his voice has dropped to a growl, a strange rough whisper that Kyungsoo has never heard come out of his mouth before, "I'll take out everyone standing between me and the front door of the hospital."
"He's that liability of yours?" The man laughs, a harsh bark. "Should have known, sympathiser. We're taking him anyway, and you know you can't change their minds."
"Jongdae!" says Kyungsoo, standing up, "What the fuck is going on?"
"Oh, you go on ahead and tell your little boyfriend." Jongdae is bristling now, and Kyungsoo doesn't know what to do besides stare at the both of them. "Tell him what you are, before he comes along with us."
"Kyungsoo," says Jongdae, eyes not leaving the man's face, "when I say get down, you get down."
"But-"
"Get down!" shouts Jongdae, and Kyungsoo immediately ducks, exhaling sharply when the sound of a silenced gun goes off, barely heard but for the little whizzes through the air. "Kyungsoo," says Jongdae, and he's crouching beside Kyungsoo, and there's a gun in his hand, Jesus Christ. "Kyungsoo, we have to get out of here, now."
"Who are you?" croaks Kyungsoo in horror, eyes still on the gun, and Jongdae's face crumples, but he takes Kyungsoo by the arm anyway, and drags him up and out of the room.
Jongdae shoots the two agents standing guard outside as well, before grabbing Kyungsoo's hand and telling him to make a run for it.
The agents drop to the floor, bodies slumped over. The people around them scream, immediately drawing attention to them, but Jongdae ignores them, and takes Kyungsoo with him anyway.
“Christ, Kyungsoo, what the fuck is going on?” asks Baekhyun, when they reach the main corridor. Baekhyun looks concerned and scared all at the same time. Kyungsoo feels a tinge of guilt, and tells Jongdae to hold on for just a second. “Kyungsoo?”
“They’re coming for me, Baekhyun,” Kyungsoo tells him, and Baekhyun’s eyes go wide. “I don’t know where we’re going to go, but I don’t want them coming after you, so just... if they ever ask you about me, just tell them you don’t know me. Okay? Just take care of yourself.”
“I’ll find you,” says Baekhyun, and Kyungsoo’s heart hurts at the thought of having to leave one of his only friends behind, but he nods, and Baekhyun glances over at Jongdae. “Or you’ll find me, I suppose.”
Footsteps ring out behind them, heavy slams of soles against the tiles. People, running towards them. Probably more agents. Kyungsoo sends him a last goodbye, and leaves.
They sprint down the stairs, avoiding the elevators, and a million thoughts are running through Kyungsoo's head as well. Who was that man? Where was he going to take Kyungsoo? Who is Kim Jongdae?
"You killed them," says Kyungsoo, thoughts fragmented even as he speeds through the hallways, Jongdae at his side, "god, you killed them, Jongdae! What the hell is going on? Where are we going?"
"Somewhere safe," says Jongdae, only answering that question, and he manages to duck them both out of the hospital, panting for breath.
They both head into a nearby alley-way, hearing sirens from afar, and Kyungsoo takes a moment to lean against the wall, inhaling deeply. Everything is too much, right now. He'd known that he would get in trouble for having this gift, but he hadn't expected the government to be involved. To want to take him with them.
God knows what they would have done to him.
"You're going to tell me everything, right now," says Kyungsoo, and Jongdae pockets the gun, rubbing at his temples tiredly, and suddenly, it's the Jongdae he knows that appears again, the one that's soft around the edges. "Tell me everything, Jongdae."
Jongdae glances up at him. "I am a lawyer, Kyungsoo. I didn't lie about that."
"But?" presses Kyungsoo.
"I'm a special agent. Part of a branch that tracks down the existence of individuals with supernormal abilities who exist in the world today. People like you, Kyungsoo. The government is trying to round up people like you."
"What for? And-wait, you... " says Kyungsoo, brow furrowing, "you work for them? You were going to turn me in to them?"
"I would never!" says Jongdae, reaching out to encircle his wrist reassuringly. "Kyungsoo, please, believe me."
“You lied to me,” hisses Kyungsoo, and he attempts to wrench his grip out of Jongdae’s hand, but Jongdae clutches at his wrist tighter, and tugs him nearer, leaning in.
“I was protecting you!” Jongdae sounds pained. Kyungsoo isn’t sure whether it’s because he had to lie to Kyungsoo, or whether it’s because Kyungsoo thinks of it as betrayal. “I had to. I had no choice! I did what I had to do to make sure I could keep everyone safe.”
The words catch Kyungsoo. “Everyone?” he says, uncertainly, and Jongdae chances a glance around the corner of the alleyway. “What do you mean, everyone?”
“You’re not the only one,” Jongdae tells him, with a hard breath. “There are others. Not like you exactly, but they have powers too. They can do things, different things. The government has been trying to contain them. I’ve been working with an underground organisation to feed the branch non-truths about the existence of those who haven’t yet come to the government’s attention.”
“So,” says Kyungsoo, reeling from the shock of the information, “you’re a, what, double-agent? You lie about these other people to keep the government from taking them?”
“Yes.” Jongdae’s voice is determined. “My cover’s blown now, Kyungsoo, do you understand? I can’t go back there, and I can’t let you go back there.”
There’s a long pause.
“What,” says Kyungsoo, finally finding his voice, “what do we do now?”
“We run,” says Jongdae, something alight in his eyes, “and we don’t look back.”
And is Kyungsoo prepared to do this? Drop everything at the bat of a lash, and go on the run from the fucking government with a rogue special agent, to god knows where?
“I,” starts Kyungsoo, but then he remembers that there are others. He’s not the only one. He could get answers. And he could-maybe he could find out who his real mother is.
Jongdae looks at him, a question in his features.
And Kyungsoo knows what he has to do. “Yes,” he says, and Jongdae nods, relief breaking through, “how are we going to get there?”
Jongdae is already on it, pulling his phone out of his suit jacket. “Lu Han,” he says, into the mouthpiece, and oh, thinks Kyungsoo, a jolt of recognition surging through him along with a shudder, that had been the name of the man who’d jumped off the Dongjak Bridge after a high-speed police chase last year. Have all the strange happenings been because of the government chasing down people like him? “We’ve been found. Send Yixing to the safehouse in Mapo with a car.” And he hangs up.
Kyungsoo watches him with a surprisingly calmness in him. “Safehouse?”
“We’ll be meeting someone there who will take us to the main base.” Jongdae gazes at him, worry in his eyes, and Kyungsoo realises that it’s the same look that Kyungsoo has given numerous people, time and time again. He’s never had anyone look at him like this before, having grown up taking care of himself. It makes him feel something topple inside him, and he reaches out to take Jongdae’s hand, determined. “Kyungsoo?”
“If there’s any way I can help, you know I will.” Kyungsoo threads their fingers together. It feels right. Jongdae glances down at their hands momentarily, before smiling, a fierce, protective smile that Kyungsoo wishes to emulate. “Let’s go, Jongdae.”
“After you, doctor,” says Jongdae, and Kyungsoo laughs, taking the gun carefully from Jongdae’s other hand, the cold metal feeling strange in his grip.
But he’ll do whatever he can to survive, and if this is how the world wants to throw the rest of his life at him, then god, he’ll take it. He’ll damn well take it as it is.
Anything can happen now.
Kyungsoo breathes out.