not afraid to fall [chapter 9]
Title: not afraid to fall [chapter 9]
Author: ivoryroyale
Genre: supernatural, drama, hurt/comfort, friendship
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: language, mentions of blood
Summary: in which a group of six aren't afraid to stand tall because they have each other
Note: 4,629 words.
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[prologue] [chapter 1] [chapter 2] [chapter 3] [chapter 4] [chapter 5] [chapter 6] [ chapter 7] [chapter 8] [ chapter 9] [chapter 10] [chapter 11] [ chapter 12] [chapter 13] [chapter 14] [ chapter 15] [ chapter 16] [ chapter 17] [ chapter 18] [ chapter 19] [ chapter 20]
not afraid to fall
chapter nine
When they burst through the double doors, Youngjae's the first out of all of them to even react; responding faster because he was expecting something like this. Smelled the blood wafting through the hall the moment they entered the building.
His mind is running at a thousand miles per hour when he rushes to Junhong, on the table, switching between thoughts like a pulse, I need to check for a pulse and is he still breathing, oh God, tell me he's still breathing, and oh my God, Junhong, please no, Junhong, please tell me this isn't happening, Junhong. "Fuck, somebody help me," He finally screams, shouting for somebody, anybody - Yongguk, Himchan, Jongup, maybe even Daehyun, he doesn't even care - to help as he tears helplessly at the black belts around the boy's wrists. His breathing is harsh, inhaling through his mouth because the smell - pungent, metallic, iron, and like meat rotting - practically hurts his nose.
He manages to break the others out of their petrified trance at the door enough to get at least Yongguk to run over and work on the remaining bindings around the boy's ankles.
"Fucking hell," Youngjae mumbles after he finally gets the restraints around the boy's wrists to give. I have to check if he's breathing, he reminds himself, dipping his head to lean his ear just centimeters away from Junhong's mouth, tilting the boy's head back a fraction, checking for a breath, feeling for a gust of air, looking for the rise and fall of his chest while simultaneously ghosting his hands along the length of the boy's neck to find a pulse.
He exhales a sigh of relief when he feels a beat, weak but there, and a shallow breath tickling his cheek.
"He's alive," Youngjae states, glancing up at Jongup who's busy holding his breath, holding back tears, holding onto Himchan, and holding his gaze on his best friend. Youngjae goes back to scanning Junhong's bleeding form.
His brain calculates: blunt hit to the back of the head, stab wounds to the shoulder and abdomen, lacerations (two) along the length of his stomach, and several cuts on various parts of the body (mostly his face).
He realizes, almost bitterly, that he's losing too much blood.
With a growl, Youngjae rips the jacket he's wearing off his shoulders to hold it tightly against Junhong's abdomen where most of the blood is leaving his system. I have to stop the bleeding, he thinks frantically. I have to do something. "One of you," He says, voice unusually calm, not a break, not even a tremor in his vocals as he glances up at the four in front of him. "I need one of you to hold this to his stomach and apply as much pressure needed to stop the bleeding,"
Out of the four of them, Daehyun rushes up first, curling his fingers around Youngjae's, leaving enough space for the genius to slip his hands away. He does so, and ignores the slight stutter from his heart when they brush against the blonde's palms, turning to the other stab wound. "Jongup," He starts, gaze never leaving the gaping hole in Junhong's shoulder. "Do the same thing with your own jacket except with Junhong's shoulder, alright?" And he looks up just in time to see the younger swallow, nodding while letting go of Himchan's arm to shakily make his way over to the table, stripping himself of his jacket as he does.
"Himchan hyung and Yongguk hyung," Youngjae continues, running hands through the thin strands of his hair before closing his eyes and breathing. He needs to stay as calm as possible. Needs to be as calm as possible because he needs to think, '"help me look around this room. Bring me gloves, forceps, bandages, sterile, sutures, anything that'll help Junhong," He lists, talking fast because he's panicking and Junhong can't lose too much blood. Just as he's saying the words, he makes his way to nearby white cabinets strewing the walls, not even bothering to see if Himchan or Yongguk are following his orders, throwing them open to reveal several containers of syringes, scalpels, beakers, clamps, and bandages.
Youngjae makes a grab for the bandages, knocking over a few of the containers in the process and consequently sending a rain of beakers and scalpels to the ground that nick painfully at his arms as they fall.
It burns horribly, but Youngjae doesn't really care because he's too focused on remembering how to suture a laceration, the proper tools you need to do it, what to do to treat gashes, stab wounds, and cuts.
Because no one else is going to be able to operate on Junhong but himself.
Youngjae knows what to do when someone gets hurt.
He knows what to do when someone gets a severe burn because sometimes, Yongguk burns himself with his fire manipulation. He knows how to treat a sprained limb or broken appendage because Jongup sometimes manages to hurt himself when he's lifting something especially heavy for too long. He even knows how to treat minor cuts because Himchan accidentally cuts himself occasionally when he's cooking.
He has common sense and because nobody else in the house is a healer, he's learned how to perform basic first aid.
However, he's never stitched up lacerations or stab wounds before. (Especially none like this, long and bloody with the obvious fact Junhong might die if he messes this up.)
He doesn't know what else to do though because they can't exactly call for an ambulance when they're slap dab in the middle of nowhere at a prohibited government laboratory.
"I'm going to need gloves, forceps, sutures, cloth, and more bandages," Youngjae instructs, shouting it so that Yongguk and Himchan can hear him while running back to the table with his hands full of bandages and sterile, tossing them out on a nearby table with a shelf of empty beakers and a bloody scalpel. He almost freezes when he sees the scalpel, because he realizes, almost all too quickly that that is the thing that hurt Junhong, and in a fit of anger, he knocks it impulsively off the table to make room for the materials Yongguk and Himchan are hurriedly bringing over.
When the two men deposit all the equipment he needs onto the table, Youngjae quickly slips on a pair of sterile gloves. As he does though, he realizes Yongguk is staring at him warily. "What?" Youngjae asks, and he didn't notice it before, but his voice is trembling a lot more now that he isn't ordering people around and his hands are shaking terribly and he seriously wants to throw up because Junhong might die on him any second now.
"Are you okay with doing this?" Yongguk very nearly demands and Youngjae furrows his eyebrows at the question.
The genius swipes up a sterile and cloth. "No, not really," He answers after ordering either Jongup or Daehyun to gently take Junhong's shirt off so he can see the wounds better while he cleans them, "but I'm not going to let Junhong die either," He gives Yongguk a leveled stare that makes the older man give him this look that Youngjae can't bother himself to place before turning away from him to stand wherever Himchan is, staring worriedly at Junhong with a tight hand clutched to his chest.
After Daehyun manages to peel Junhong's shirt up enough for him to see the cuts clearly, Youngjae turns away too.
Somewhere between Youngjae disinfecting the lacerations on Junhong's stomach and pulling the first suture through the stab wound, Himchan leaves the lab in a flurry of helplessness, anger, fear, and sadness, pushing open the double doors with a loud bang and possibly scaring the hell out of the kids when he does it.
Helplessness and sadness because that is his baby on the table, and he can't do anything about it besides trust Youngjae and let him stitch up the gashes littering his abdomen. Anger and fear because the guy who did it is still somewhere out there.
He doesn't know what to do.
"Himchan, are you okay?" He hears coming from behind him, echoing off the white walls of the hallway, and when he recognizes the voice instantly, Himchan whips around abruptly.
He's face to face with a stunned Yongguk before he starts, going off like a bomb, like he's been wanting to do ever since they found Junhong like that.
"No," Himchan states bitterly, biting his bottom lip because he can see and feel fresh, hot tears flooding his vision. "I'm not okay," He wipes viciously at his eyes to keep them away, feels his teeth draw blood from his lip because he's biting down too hard, and then he continues. "Who the hell does that to a kid, Yongguk?!"
For a moment, Yongguk looks a little bit hurt and still stupefied by Himchan's outburst. "I don't kn-"
"Did you fucking see him?!" Himchan demands, cutting off Yongguk in his fit of anger. "They stabbed him! Junhong has two fucking holes in his stomach- and- and his shoulder and- Jesus fucking Christ- and they cut him open," At the sudden fact being said aloud, out of his own mouth no less, his knees nearly give out underneath him and if it weren't for the wall right beside him, he would have fallen right onto the ground or right into Yongguk.
He latches himself to the wall, falling into it, shoulder first, then his back next and feels the sudden need to throw up becoming evidently bigger with the more he says. "They- they left gashes in his stomach, Yongguk, fucking gashes all along his stomach and then," A sob rips almost painfully out of his throat and he feels the ground underneath him give way beneath his feet because fuck, they hurt his baby and he couldn't do anything. "Then they just left him there to- to-"
They left him there to die.
Before he can choke out the sentence, he feels arms pulling him from his spot propped against the wall, feels them wrap carefully around his neck, feels a hand on the very back of his neck, pressing his face into the hollow of a shoulder. "Fuck, Yongguk, fucking let me-" Himchan tries to say, tries to protest, hands limp at his sides, flexing and twisting but never once touching Yongguk; voice broken and choked by tears, he can't seem to make out the rest of the sentence.
"It's okay, I've got you," Yongguk whispers, voice gruff and almost as broken as his, and Himchan can feel his head moving, tilting his chin up to rest it lightly at the very top of his head, consistent shushing sounds leaving his mouth. "It's going to be okay," His best friend reassures and Himchan can feel it as another sob tears its way out of his mouth, into the air, getting stuck somewhere at the junction between Yongguk's neck and shoulder.
"He's going to be okay,"
He doesn't sound all too convincing.
And that's when Himchan completely gives in, hands shooting up to cling at the back of the soldier uniform Yongguk stole, digging into the fabric trying to pull him closer, closer, closer please. A broken whimper snakes its way from the confinements of his mouth and Himchan doesn't even have time to be embarrassed about it because Yongguk's grip on him tightens and he's trembling and Himchan can feel slight droplets falling into the mass of his hair.
It takes him a while, but he realizes with a sense of nostalgia and heartbreak that Yongguk is crying.
"I'm going to find who did this to him," Yongguk promises and Himchan closes his eyes as tight as possible, trying to block back the new wave of tears caused by how fucking shattered Yongguk sounds right now. "I swear,"
And all Himchan can do is press his face deeper into the crook of Yongguk's neck, hiccups wracking his chest and fingers digging as far as they can into his shoulder blades.
Start from the middle of the wound, wind, and pull. Youngjae repeats the instruction over and over in his head as his shaking hands hold the suture, folding it into skin, pulling the needle out ever so carefully with forceps, winding the suture around and around the cuts and gashes, remembering left right, right left, left right as he pulls each stitch, closing each wound.
He's already stitched up the stomach (twelve stitches for each laceration and three for the stab wound) and all he needs to do is the shoulder wound and he's done.
He should be happy but he's not.
He finds out exactly that he isn't because he starts crying over Junhong's shoulder the moment he finishes wrapping the sterile bandage around the wound.
Jongup and Daehyun are staring at him from their side of the table and Youngjae thinks fuck, why am I crying?
It doesn't even register to him that the question is tumbling off his lips until he hears the words "Why am I crying?" echoing off the walls of the lab. A somewhat split between a crazy and humorous laugh erupts from his throat in a huge puff and Youngjae sees Daehyun's and Jongup's eyes flare up in what he can only detect as pained. "I just saved one of my best friend's life; I should be happy, right?" He rips off the bloody gloves from his hands in disgust, looking down, hiding his eyes with his bangs as his only attempt to save face.
"So, why-" He throws the gloves with the rest of the equipment, running frantic hands through his hair after he does. "Why am I-?"
He doesn't finish the question, just brings his hands up to clamp them angrily over his face as a way to stop the tears because he doesn't deserve to be crying.
He isn't the one that nearly died alone on a tabletop.
A sob somehow makes its way through the cracks in his hands and Youngjae is about to curse, is about to start saying this isn't supposed to happen; I'm supposed to be cool about this like any other doctor would. I'm not supposed to be crying, but he's stopped by a pair of cold hands trying to peel his hands away from his face.
"Youngjae," He hears, and his heart nearly stops in his chest, because God dammit, this is fucking embarrassing. "It's okay," Daehyun says and that is all kinds of unfair because everything feels instantly better after he says that. "He's okay. You saved him. It's alright,"
Youngjae wants to scream no, it isn't! It's not alright! That is my brother on the table and I don't know if he'll ever wake up again because whoever did this bashed him on the back of the head; how the hell can you say it's alright? but before he gets the chance to, Daehyun manages to pry his fingers away from his face and he's looking at him with big, worried eyes and all the words die away in his mouth to be replaced by a short hiccuping sob.
"He's alright," Daehyun murmurs, letting go of Youngjae's hands to bring his jacket sleeve up to wipe at Youngjae's nose gently. Youngjae wants to protest again, wants to point out that Jongup is here, looking at them, and he doesn't want him to see him so weak, but Daehyun continues to talk, tracing the fabric underneath the lines of his eyes. "You're alright,"
And Youngjae feels more tears rolling down his eyes and he bites his lips to keep another sob in because he definitely isn't alright at all.
"Go to sleep," Daehyun commands suddenly, and Youngjae can practically feel his voice making his vision blurry, his eyes droopy, his whole body going slack. "You've had a long day; you've done enough,"
His last thought before he falls forward, consumed in darkness, is that he hates voice manipulators or manipulators of the like.
Or maybe he just hates the fact Daehyun has the power to do this to him and he doesn't know exactly what 'this' is.
While Daehyun busies himself with carrying Youngjae to an empty corner of the lab and finding a blanket of some sort to throw over him while he sleeps, Jongup stays latched to Junhong's side, clutching his hand in his, and whispering whatever comes first into his ears so low, Daehyun can't hear.
"You know," Jongup murmurs, moving his unoccupied hand to push back the bangs splayed over Junhong's forehead, "this is the first time I've ever seen Youngjae hyung cry,"
"He's really worried about you, you know. Everybody is," When Junhong doesn't answer him back, he bites at his lips.
"I'm really worried about you," Jongup admits, an abrupt, odd sort of laugh escaping his mouth. "I can't believe you did something so stupid for me," He glares the slightest at Junhong's closed eyes and rubs his thumbs over the boy's fingers delicately. "Something so stupid yet so completely you; I can't even be mad at you, you jerk," Another laugh, but this time Jongup can hear how broken it seems.
"I just-" Jongup swallows, feels his throat clenching in that I'm-going-to-start-crying-like-a-six-year-old way, but he tightens his eyes shut, maneuvering in a shaky, deliberate breath to force it back. "Just- please- please just wake up," He begs, opening his eyes to stare down at his best friend, fifteen and tortured bloody.
This is all my fault, Jongup thinks.
"Can you- can you please just do that? For me?" Jongup asks, voice a mere breath, leaning his head closer to bow over Junhong's.
But he doesn't wake up.
Jongup leans back, rolling his bottom lip between his teeth before sighing. "I guess that was kind of stupid of me to think you'd wake up if I said that," He admits, running a hand through his hair but still keeping a tight hold on Junhong's hand. He's not going to let go, not until he knows Junhong's okay. "I mean, I'm not Daehyun hyung or anything,"
A sudden weight drops onto his shoulders and Jongup startles, whipping around in his chair to see what it is because someone might be here to hurt Junhong again. When he sees a fire blanket draped over his shoulders, Jongup visibly relaxes. "Even if you did have my ability, you shouldn't use it to wake him up. He needs to rest," Daehyun scolds.
Realization hits Jongup like a truck and the boy feels a heat spreading from the tips of his ears to his cheeks. "How much of that did you hear?"
Daehyun thinks for a moment, reaching for another chair nearby and plopping down next to Jongup. "All of it?"
A tiny squeak-whine leaves Jongup's mouth and he doesn't know what to make of it but it sounds humiliating to his ears. "I thought you were looking for a blanket for Youngjae hyung,"
"I found one?" Daehyun replies, making it sound like a question because he doesn't want to brainwash Jongup and he left his mask and post-its at the house, pointing over at the genius, propped against the lab wall with a blanket around him from the neck down. "I got one for you too, you know?" He says, amusement lacing his voice, pointing down at the fabric around his shoulders.
As if to verify that, the hand not holding Junhong's flies to his shoulder, feeling at the fabric. "Oh," He says, rather lamely. "What for?" He asks, voice sounding a little overwhelmed. Jongup doesn't understand what for though.
Daehyun shrugs, eyes ghosting over Junhong. Jongup follows his gaze, eyes dusting over Junhong's bandaged stomach. He swallows back more tears. "You looked a little cold to me," Daehyun says simply, crossing his ankles together like he's trying to keep himself from running. "You were trembling."
Jongup is about to point out that he was probably trembling because he was trying so hard not to cry, but he decides otherwise, tugging the blanket further down his shoulders to hold the edges at his collarbone. "Thanks," Jongup mumbles, tightening his grip on Junhong's hand just the slightest.
"Don't you think you should sleep soon?" Daehyun asks, and Jongup kind of wants to smile at the slight worry tinging his words. 'Sort of' because he doesn't really feel like smiling at all right now.
"No, I don't want to leave Junhong," Jongup answers honestly, eyeing their conjoined hands. From the corner of his eye, he can see Daehyun start to open his mouth and he cuts him off. "I swear, if you pull that jedi mind trick and make me sleep like Youngjae, I will punch you when I get around to waking up," Jongup promises, tone light, but Daehyun shuts his mouth anyway. "Besides, shouldn't you sleep soon too?" Jongup asks slyly. "Why aren't you sleeping?"
Daehyun purses his lips. "Would you believe me if I said I didn't want to leave you?"
In what seems like forever and a day, Jongup cracks an unexpected half smile. "No, not really," He admits, running fingers over Junhong's. Daehyun doesn't seem like the type to stay awake because of someone like him. Out of all of them, Jongup thinks that Daehyun probably likes him the least; what with the whole waking-him-up-in-the-morning-by-lifting-his-bed-up-into-the-air thing.
Of course, that was Youngjae's idea, but still.
"Then it's because I can't sleep," Daehyun confesses and Jongup nods, believing it. Even if he wasn't set on staying up to watch Junhong, Jongup would probably have trouble sleeping in this creepy looking lab too.
They're silent for a moment before Jongup speaks up again, "I wonder where Himchan hyung and Yongguk hyung are," He mumbles, getting a bit worried. They stormed out of the room the moment Youngjae started the first stitch on Junhong's wound and have yet to show up again.
"In the hallway," Daehyun answers. "I think they crashed out on the ground because of crying too much. I made sure to give them a blanket too,"
Jongup's mouth forms a little 'o', nodding his head, before going silent.
"You know, everyone's cried except for you," Daehyun points out and Jongup opens his mouth to protest because he started crying when they first saw Junhong, hurt and unconscious, nearly dead. "And I don't mean tearing-up crying. I mean bawling-my-eyes-out-how-could-this-happen crying."
Jongup curls his fingers a little more, clutching tighter to the blanket around his shoulders while winding his hand closer to Junhong's. "You haven't cried either," Jongup deadpans weakly.
"Because I barely know Junhong," He reminds and Jongup furrows his eyebrows. "You, on the other hand, are his best friend - from what I've gathered. I expected you to be the most upset out of all of us,"
"Why are you so set on me crying?"
"I'm not," There's something about the way he says it though that makes Jongup think Daehyun's a horribly sneaky person. "It's just surprising."
Jongup clenches his teeth. "I can't cry," He admits, rubbing at his eyes, at invisible tears that he refuses to shed. "I have to be strong for Junhong,"
After all, the boy went through so much for him. He at least owes him enough to be stronger in front of him, even if he isn't awake to see it. "Is that why?" Daehyun asks, voice little over a whisper, looking a little bewildered. Jongup nods sharply. "Jongup, you don't have to-"
"But I do, Daehyun hyung," Jongup insists, silently cursing when his voice cracks. "He did all this to make me happy. He went through all this," Jongup motions toward Junhong, out cold, stomach adorned in bandages, cheeks decorated in patches of bandages, "so that I could be happy. If I cry then- then maybe he'll-"
Maybe he'll get hurt again.
Maybe he'll leave me again.
"Jongup," Daehyun says, voice sounding sympathetic and it somehow gets on Jongup's nerves, making him wipe angrily at his face with the blanket wound around him. "You make it sound like this is all your fault-"
"Because it is my fault," Jongup roars, whipping toward Daehyun to glare at him through his blurry eyes. The older man looks shocked and Jongup thinks that he has right to be. He doesn't yell very often. "It's all my fault and you know it! You heard! Yongguk hyung said he went off to look for my brother!"
"Jong-"
"If I'm happy he'll be okay," Jongup says, but he sounds more like he's trying to convince himself. "If I don't cry, then- then he'll be fine-"
"He didn't do this so that you'd pretend to be happy," Daehyun suddenly shouts with so much force that it almost knocks Jongup out of his chair. "He did this because he wanted you to be happy without needing to pretend it all the time," Daehyun's hand shoots out, shaking at Jongup's shoulder as if to wake him up from some kind of dream. Some sort of nightmare. "He did this because he loves you," And Jongup feels a huge punch at his gut from hearing that. "He doesn't want you to pretend and bottle up your feelings all the time," The older man adds, letting go of Jongup's shoulder and Jongup almost falls forward, stomach lurching, gut twisting, a huge lump in the middle of his throat.
He stares at Daehyun, bringing up a hand to hold over his wobbling lips, trying to ignore his heart slowly sinking into his stomach. And Daehyun gives him this look that almost looks like he's about to cry. "It's okay to cry. It's not weak, alright? It's okay,"
It's okay.
And Jongup feels it as the tears finally burst their way out of his eyes without his permission, feels it as the lump in his throat slowly lifts to be replaced by sobs and the sinking feeling in his stomach is exchanged with a sort of dull numb that he doesn't know if he should place as an improvement or a drawback.
After a while, he feels lightheaded, so he leans forward to drop his forehead on Daehyun's shoulder. Jongup laughs shortly, voice a wreck, when he feels the blonde stiffen underneath his touch. "If you want me to get off of you then that's too bad," He croaks out, letters tearing themselves out of his mouth between choked breaths, gulping in air with every few words. An almost-smile ghosts over Jongup's mouth because he somehow feels better, but also worse at the same time. The hand intertwined with Junhong's hand fidgets with his fingers and Jongup turns his head a bit for it to fit more comfortably against Daehyun's shoulder, head burrowing its way into the hollow of the man's shoulder and Jongup doesn't even care if his hair is tickling the man or if he's making the blonde feel awkward because he's fucking comforting and warm and everything Jongup needs right now. "You should have thought about that before you made me cry," Jongup laughs again and it sounds a little helpless.
Daehyun decidedly loosen up, shoulder becoming much less rigid, and Jongup sighs through a sob, inclining his head closer. The blonde lifts up an arm to wrap it around Jongup's shoulder and through another hiccup, he chuckles, because it's so clumsy and it reminds Jongup vaguely of a stunned child. "I didn't mean to make you cry," Daehyun whispers, beginning to move his hand in slow, soothing motions up and down his arm.
It makes Jongup shiver and cling to Junhong's hand more securely. "Oh, shut up,"
And he does, obediently.
And they fall asleep like that, leaned up against each other; Jongup's head in the crook of Daehyun's shoulder and his hand wound in Junhong's.
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