too fragile for your love (too strong for your heart)

and when i begin to dream of you (fate begins its serenade) pt two

     the funny thing about anger is that when it comes in through the door, everything else disappears.

     sitting outside one of the emergency healthcare rooms in the med bay of the skvhc, jake stares down at the floor between his feet, his eyes tracing scuff marks and miniscule traces of dirt that his shoes have tracked in, almost unseeingly, while his mind replays the events of the last hour with obsessive care.

     “jake?” sunghoon’s voice comes from somewhere above him. “heeseung hyung’s on his way here, right now. he told me to tell you not to worry too much-”

     soo-eun lets go, and ningning goes down, collapsing on the ground like a marionette whose strings have been cut. he barely registers three pairs of footsteps racing past him, on their way out the door, as he throws himself onto the floor, beside ningning-

     “-spontaneous vampiric transformations don’t generally go wrong, so she should be safe now that she’s been put under observation-”

     -her blood spills over his hands, as he tries to stem the bleeding, and prop ningning upright at the same time. there’s a shrill ringing in his ears, along with the distant sound of sunghoon’s shouts, and a painfully loud crack-  

     “-no one blames you for this, jake. ningning just happened across the wrong place at the wrong time-”

     -ningning’s fingers scrabble weakly at the front of his t-shirt, even as she gasps, crimson flecking her lips with every shuddered breath. he can practically see the venom working its way through her system, turning her blood to sludge and her bones to steel-

     “-jake?”

     “-my lao lao,” ningning spits, her mouth foaming, “m-my lao lao, s-she doesn’t know- she doesn’t know, j-jake- please-”

     “jakey-”

     he looks up, at sunghoon, and attempts a half-smile. “yeah?”

     “you don’t look too good,” the younger boy says, uncertainly. “do you want me to get you some blood?”

     “that would be nice,” he replies, nodding, smile still firmly in place. “thanks, sunghoon.”

     “i’ll be right back,” sunghoon says, turning on his heel, with a relieved look on his face. “two minutes tops, promise!”    

     he waits until sunghoon’s turned the corner and disappeared from view, before he gets up, and heads down the corridor, straight for the elevator. a gaggle of med personnel pass by him, their chatter nothing more than unwelcome white noise to his ears.

     when he enters the lift, he’s greeted by huh yunjin who looks at him, with deep-seated confusion. “dude, you’re still here? i thought you went home with the boss.”

     he stares at her, for a moment, his mind blank. “i- i had something to do, so, i had to come back.”

     “work sucks, huh?” yunjin says, sympathetically. “which floor should i press for you?”

     “i…” he stops, his mouth halfway open. “i don’t-”

     yunjin tilts her head, questioningly. “you here for ability practice?”

     he shakes his head, before she’s even finished her sentence. “no, i- i just need to-”

     “-i don’t want to- to d-die, jake, please- please- i-”

     “somewhere big,” he blurts out, his fists clenching automatically. “somewhere empty. somewhere quiet.”

     “um, the practice rooms are out of the question, then. maybe, uh- let’s see- the gym? no, that’s full, too. wait- there’s no one up in the ceremonial ballroom!” yunjin taps the button for the fiftieth floor, and beams at him. “no one ever is, unless it’s for a formal event or something.”