Jooheon had been keeping a close eye on Shownu since he'd surfaced at his apartment out of the blue. He'd wanted to kick the older boy out, but he'd decided (wrongly, in hindsight) that it wasn't worth arguing to the others. There'd been something magical almost about having M-wing together outside of M-wing.
To have them be...friends.
Not patients forced to be in the same space, but real, actual friends, something none of them had anymore.
He'd wanted it to work out, he really had. But when he'd swam up to see Shownu strangling Hyungwon, he'd regretted letting the older boy ever get back in touch with them.
He'd swam to shore as quickly as possible, his lungs burning as he focused on distance and speed rather than breathing comfortably. Once he could feel solid ground beneath his feet, he'd rushed forward, hurtling all of his weight into Shownu's mass.
His head instantly ached, but the momentary pain was worth it once he confirmed that he'd dislodged Shownu from Hyungwon.
"Damn it, Shownu!" he yelled at the nearest figure on the ground, who was just flexing his fingers calmly. "You just tried to kill Hyungwon!"
Shownu looked up as though he'd only just realized that someone was talking to him. "I guess I did."
Jooheon clenched his jaw. "Hyungwon is our friend, Shownu."
Shownu looked down. "I know. But he told me to do it. I said no but he said I had to."
"Did you kill Kihyun?" Jooheon asked after a moment, a sick feeling in his stomach. He'd known that something like this could happen, and yet...he'd only been a few seconds away from a dead Hyungwon.
"No," Shownu answered, and even though Jooheon didn't trust Shownu's intentions, he trusted his words. "Kihyun really is dead, though. He told me so."
"Shownu," Jooheon said, his voice breaking somewhat. "When are you going to stop listening to him and doing what he tells you? All he does is hurt people, Shownu. He makes you hurt people. Is that what you want?" He swallowed. "Hurting your friends? Is that what you want?"
Shownu was silent, and Jooheon just shook his head, going over to Hyungwon.
"Hey," Jooheon said, but when he touched Hyungwon, the thin boy flinched, and Jooheon retracted his hand. "Shit," he whispered, taking in Hyungwon's state. The boy was sobbing, curled up in a ball, rocking back and forth, hands over his head to protect himself from any possible threats.
Jooheon didn't think this was something that would just go away by itself.
He wanted to get Wonho or Changkyun since they'd roomed with him and probably had more experience handling his panic attacks, but that would mean leaving Shownu with Hyungwon, and Jooheon was too scared to let that happen.
But then something else happened.
"I found something," someone yelled from the lake, and the other swimmers gathered. Jooheon hesitated, wanting to go forward and help, but his eyes slid over to Shownu, who was lying still on the dark grass.
"They probably need help," Shownu said after a second, avoiding eye contact with Jooheon as he rose and waded back into the lake.
Jooheon stayed on land, watching Shownu gradually get smaller and smaller until his figure was submerged in the inky depths, and then Jooheon looked back to Hyungwon, whose condition had neither improved nor changed. Jooheon had seen enough cases like this, Kihyun included, to know that it would only make it worse if he attempted to intervene. Usually, the patient would be sedated, but since they'd removed Hyungwon from the institution, there was no one to sedate him.
Jooheon bit his lip as he was struck by a troubling thought. Did we make the wrong decision in breaking him out?
Because honestly, he had never felt more helpless in his life, and he knew that they couldn't fix Hyungwon. He didn't know if the institution could, but if there was an answer out there, they weren't it.
And for someone who had only recently gained something akin to friendship, it was physically painful for him to be forced to watch his friend writhing on the ground in internal agony and be unable to soothe his pain.
A distraction presented itself, however, as dark, glistening figures approach the shore. The only sound was the soft but repetitive lapping of water against the shore.
Jooheon felt his heart sink a bit lower in his rib cage when he made out an indistinct white shape among them, and it wasn't the reflection of the moon.
