ENG - Fractured Fates ʰʸᵘⁿˡᶦˣ

5

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Hyunjin POV

After the blonde-haired orderly finally left, I let out a heavy, pained sigh. His whole overly friendly shtick and the way he spoke with puffy niceness was extremely irritating to me. Every word seemed contrived and artificial and I could literally feel the fake friendliness. Simply disgusting.
I absolutely couldn't cope with superficial guys like that. Sure, he had to be friendly as a carer, but that didn't make it any less annoying. Ironically, I was no different when I sold my drugs to these desperate people. After all, no one wanted to buy anything from someone who was in a bad mood. Still, this guy annoyed me.
With a heavy sigh, I pressed my head into the pillow, which felt hard and uncomfortable. I closed my eyes, which felt incredibly dry and heavy as lead. I was so incredibly tired, but my body just wouldn't let me fall asleep. The constant beeping of the machines I was connected to with countless tubes pierced the silence of the room and made trying to sleep even more impossible.
Every time I closed my eyes, I felt a searing pain from the punctures in my upper body. The puncture wounds felt like they were tearing my insides apart and burning me.

Even breathing was fucking agony, as was every little movement. And the fucking shackles on my arms and legs made me feel like a fucking prisoner. It was downright ridiculous, lying here, bound and helpless, while my body nearly died of pain.
"I'm going to kill this bastard," I muttered between clenched teeth as I thought about the guy I was lying here for. It wasn't my fault that his bitch girlfriend was cheating on him.
I grimaced in agony as new stabs ran through my body. Then I remembered that I still had to tell Minho what had happened. I sighed with annoyance and tried to ignore these thoughts for a moment and at least get some sleep.

But every damn second felt like I was lying on a bed of fucking nails.


Felix POV

After leaving the unknown man's room, I went to see a few other patients to complete the routine check-up.
When I finally came back to the ward room, my eyes immediately fell on Jisung, who was still sitting in the same place where I had left him, with his cell phone in his hand. After noticing me, he waved me over and said, "Look what I found." I sat down next to him and looked at his cell phone.
His eyes lit up childishly as he showed me videos he'd found on Instagram that he thought were particularly funny. In between fits of laughter, he told me about his last date, his tone wavering between hope and despair as he talked about his desperate search for a partner.

Suddenly, he interrupted his story and held his cell phone out to me, which showed a profile on a dating app. "What do you think of this guy?" he asked me as he pointed to the picture of the stranger. His voice trembled with excitement and his eyes sparkled with anticipation as he waited for my reaction. "He looks pretty damn good, doesn't he? Do you think I should write him a message?"
I couldn't help but smile slightly when I realized how excited Jisung was. His desire for affection was so cute that it warmed my heart. "Of course, try," I encouraged him as my eyes slid over the stranger's profile. "At least he's handsome."
Jisung's eyes lit up with anticipation as he prepared to compose a message. I couldn't help but be happy for him that he might finally find what he was looking for. Jisung's fingers danced across the screen of his cell phone as he composed his message to the handsome stranger. There was a hint of nervousness on his face, but his determination was unmistakable.
I could literally feel his heart beating faster as he waited for a response after he sent it. "Oh my God, I really did it," he mumbled as he reread the text.

Suddenly he jumped up and his expression betrayed panic. "No, no, no!" I looked at him in surprise, but before I could say anything, he held the display in front of me again and pointed to a spot. "I've made a spelling mistake! Now he must think I'm stupid or something! Should I apologize and correct it?" he babbled frantically, while I was still busy reading the text, which was surprisingly sweet and didn't seem like a standard text at all.
"It's not that bad and you're definitely not stupid. Just wait and see what happens and don't correct it. Otherwise it'll look like you have a compulsive urge to improve," I explained to him calmly.

Jisung sighed as his eyes remained glued to the screen with concern. I could literally feel his head rattling right now. "If he's really interested, he won't care about the typo," I added, putting my hand on Jisung's arm to reassure him. "The most important thing is that your message is honest and from the heart."
His heavy swallow was audible and he nodded slowly, as if reluctantly agreeing with my words. "You're probably right," he mumbled and then put the phone aside.
Shortly afterwards, my timer rang, reminding me that two hours had passed. I got up and stretched. "I'm going to check on the strangers," I told my best friend. He waved at me absently as he held his cell phone in his hand again and looked at it intently.
I made my way through the dark, quiet hospital corridor until I finally arrived at the room I wanted to visit.

I opened the door quietly, assuming that the patient was asleep and I didn't want to wake him. But to my surprise, he was still awake, as I could see from the dim light of the night lamp.
I approached the bedside and looked at him with concern. He looked incredibly exhausted and tired. "You should get some sleep, don't you think?" I asked gently as I began to meticulously record the latest vital signs.
When I was done, I turned to him, only to find him staring at me silently without answering. "I need to call someone," he whispered in a brittle voice. His voice sounded brittle and the pain he was in was unmistakable. "Of course, who?" I asked, looking at him. "My roommate, I'm sure he doesn't know about anything here yet," he continued to mumble as he continued to look at me.
In contrast to before, he now seemed strangely calm, almost reassuring and yet pleasant. "Okay, I'll call him for you if you give me his number," I replied calmly, repeating the same research I had done two hours ago. "Let me call him," he breathed again as he allowed me to look at his wounds without resistance.

As I looked at his wounds, I felt the unusual heat of his skin and put my hand on his forehead to check his temperature. "You have a fever. Why didn't you say anything? You must be freezing," I sighed and rushed to the heater to turn it on.
"I'll give you something for the fever and the pain. It will also make you tired, so you can sleep better," I explained as I entered the information about the fever in the folder, which I had measured briefly beforehand with the thermometer that is always in my bag.
"Let me call Minho," he urged, but I hesitated. "Agreed, if you swallow the tablets I'm about to give you without saying anything back," I suggested, although I knew it wasn't right to impose such conditions on him. But I hoped it was a compromise that could help us both, as I think he would refuse the tablets otherwise.
"Okay," he agreed, which made me look a little surprised.

A little taken aback, I looked at him and then nodded in satisfaction once I had regained my composure. "Well, I'll just get the tablets and then we'll call him together," I said as I left the room. In the ward room, I picked out the right tablets, grabbed my cell phone for the call and a glass before returning.
When I was back in the stranger's room, I first placed everything on the bedside table and then sat down on the chair next to his bed. "Do you know your roommate's number? Is he even still awake? It's 2 a.m. after all," I asked him, already getting ready to enter the number. He nodded slightly and gave me the number, followed shortly afterwards by a beep.
I had set the cell phone to loud and held it out to the red-haired stranger. "What bastard is calling me at this godforsaken hour and disturbing me?" an angry voice rang out as soon as the call was answered.

With a skeptical look, wondering if it could be the wrong number, I looked at the man in front of me, who just rolled his eyes and a hint of tiredness showed on his face as he spoke softly. His voice sounded weak as he said, "Minho, it's me."
There was silence on the other side for a moment. "Hyunjin?" the voice inquired. "You miserable bastard ran off with my money. I'll kill you! And what kind of number is that?" A sigh accompanied the clicking of the redhead's tongue. "Shut up Minho. I'm in the hospital, some bastard stabbed me, and I'm calling from another cell phone right now. So come over and get me out of here," the man in front of me spoke in a tired voice.
Then there was silence again on the other side of the line. "I see," the voice replied calmly, as if it was nothing unusual, which gave me an uneasy feeling in my stomach. "Which hospital are you in?" the other man finally asked.
The stranger looked at me and I understood immediately. "He's in Seoul National University Hospital," I said into my cell phone and an annoyed sigh could be heard on the other side. "God, so far away too," the voice moaned.
This Minho snorted audibly. "You're so incredibly annoying, Hyunjin." Hyunjin, as he was apparently called, laughed lightly, despite his injuries. "What do you want, Minho? Where would the fun be if I didn't add a little drama and variety to your life every now and then?"
"Variety? All you do is provide the drama and now I have to drive halfway across the city in the middle of the night to pick you up," replied the person on the other end of the line. "You've got nothing better to do anyway," the red-haired man countered with a mischievous grin.

His counterpart's reply came immediately, accompanied by a hint of sarcasm: "You're making it really hard for me to like you, Hyunjin." Hyunjin couldn't help but smile slightly before continuing, "I'm your pet peeve. You'd be bored without me, wouldn't you?"
"I highly doubt that," Minho muttered, and a door on the other side of the line was heard to slam shut. "You're more like an annoying mosquito that just won't go away."
Hyunjin couldn't help but laugh softly. "You'd be far too bored without me," Hyunjin replied weakly. "There are plenty of other ways to amuse yourself, believe me," Minho replied dryly. The red-haired man sighed theatrically. "But none as entertaining as mine," he said with a faint grin on his lips.
I could literally see the other man on the other line roll his eyes as he spoke again: "I really don't know why I'm doing this to myself."
"Because you know deep down that you'd be lost without me," Hyunjin said without hesitation. "Besides, I know that you secretly love being my knight in shining armor," Hyunjin continued to tease his roommate.
Minho snorted again. "You're exaggerating wildly, Hyunjin. If you've made fun of me, you'll regret it," Minho growled, but his voice sounded more amused than seriously annoyed and he hung up abruptly.

After the call ended, I put my cell phone back in my pocket and looked at Hyunjin. What I had just heard between them sounded like a strange friendship, but somehow it seemed to work. "So your name is Hyunjin, right?" I then asked him with a slight smile, but his answer was a shrug of his shoulders, signaling that he still remained distant towards me.
"I hope that you'll be able to talk to me in such a relaxed manner at some point, at least while you're still here," I said and went to fill the glass with water. "I've held up my end, now it's your turn," I added and walked straight towards him. "True," he replied curtly and put the tablets in his mouth without arguing.
I propped his head up a little to help him drink from the glass. Satisfied, I put the glass back and sat back down on the chair. "You do know that you're not allowed out of here, don't you?" I asked him with a smile to remind him. He turned his head in my direction and looked at me. "Thank you for letting me call him," he said weakly and closed his eyes, not responding to my words.

I looked at him in surprise and smiled faintly. I got up to switch off the big light so that only the night light illuminated the room. I sat down next to him again to wait for him to fall asleep.

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