The Broken Dancer

The First Faultline

The hospital hums with a kind of too-bright quiet that makes the world feel sharp around the edges. Overhead, fluorescent lights buzz faintly, turning everything the colour of bone. The linoleum floor is slick with rainwater dripping steadily from the hem of Jimin's soaked clothes, pooling around his shoes in small, uneven circles. He stands just outside Yoongi's room, staring at the closed door like it might swallow him whole.

The corridor stretches on in both directions, lined with sterile white walls and thin metal benches. Strangers pass by in muted waves - nurses pushing carts, a doctor with tired eyes, a man in a grey coat speaking softly into a phone. It's too open. Too loud. Too bright.

Jimin hasn't been outside like this in years. The father's world was made of dim lights, rehearsed steps, controlled rooms where he always knew the shape of the air. This place feels like standing on a cliff with no edge to hold on to. His chest tightens as his gaze flicks over the nurses' station, the swinging doors, the red emergency signs. The smell of antiseptic makes his stomach turn.

For a moment, he isn't here. He's small again. A boy clutching his mother's hand in another hospital hallway, listening to the mechanical breathing of a machine that would soon fall silent. The sound of the fluorescent lights is the same now as it was then. The smell is the same too. The memory burns at the back of his throat like smoke.

Seokjin touches his shoulder lightly, grounding him. "You're safe here," he whispers. The words are soft but not convincing. They both know safety is a fragile, borrowed thing.

Taehyung can't keep still. He paces the length of the hallway, shoulders stiff, eyes darting between the door and the reception desk like he's expecting the father to appear any second. The sound of Taehyung's boots on the tile echoes in the otherwise too-still air.

Jungkook isn't with them. He stayed back at the club, still sitting somewhere in the shadows, the necklace Yoongi gave Jimin clenched in his fist like it might anchor him. Jimin can almost feel the weight of that necklace around his own throat - the way it slipped off during the chaos - and the absence of it now feels like a hole he can't stop touching.

A nurse appears, clipboard in hand, face politely unreadable. "Only one visitor at a time," she says. "He's stable, but heavily anesthetized. Keep your voice low."

There's no argument. No hesitation. Every gaze turns toward Jimin.

Taehyung stops pacing, stepping closer, his voice quiet and steady despite the tension in his jaw. "Go," he says. "He'll want to see you first."

Jimin's mouth is dry. His fingers twitch at his sides. It's not just fear for Yoongi that roots him in place - it's the world itself. This place is unfamiliar territory. It's wide and bright and unscripted, and he doesn't know how to move here.

But beyond the door is Yoongi. Yoongi, who has always been the quiet constant in the storm.

He takes a step forward. Then another.

As he reaches for the handle, his hand trembles, but this time it's not just fear - it's the first fragile crack in the walls the father built around him.

The hospital room is dim, a stark contrast to the harsh fluorescence of the hallway outside. A single lamp casts a muted pool of light against the wall, not quite reaching the corners. Machines hum in low, mechanical rhythm - the most prominent sound a slow, steady beep from the heart monitor beside the bed. It's a sound meant to reassure, but it wraps around Jimin like a vice.

Yoongi lies still beneath crisp white sheets. His chest rises and falls in shallow, even breaths. His ribs are wrapped in clean bandages, the thick white cloth stark against bruised skin. An IV line runs from his arm to a bag hanging overhead. His lip is split, stitched neatly. A bruise, deep and cruel, blossoms along the edge of his jaw, mottled purple against pale skin.