Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Hyunjin had decidedly not been having a good time recently.

Well- none of them had.

It was comeback season where they were all promoting their newest album with interviews, music videos, and more dance practices.

While Hyunjin, Minho, and Felix worked extra hard in the dance studio on any given day- Chan, Jisung, and Changbin were holed up in the studio most nights. Hyunjin rarely ever saw them back at their shared dorm, and he often got lonely so he simply spent most of his nights at the other dorm with the others.

So yes, they all had a lot on their chest with busy schedules and little to no time to themselves.

They were all overworked, so when Hyunjin woke up feeling lightheaded and dizzy, he ignored it to swing his legs over his bed and gain his balance as he slowly stood up. The good thing about separate dorms was that they all had their own personal rooms now, so no one was around to see him stumble slightly on his way out to the restroom.

The world spun uncertainty around him as he used the wall for balance to get to the restroom. Distantly, he could hear the rustling of pots and pans from the kitchen- rare, since most mornings they forwent breakfast to get straight into their schedules.

And rare because usually Hyunjin was the only one who was at his dorm.

3RACHA must have actually had a restful night. Hyunjin had fallen asleep on the couch the previous night, and faintly remembered Chan actually returning home at a decent time to wake him up and drag him to his own bed so that he wouldn’t have any back cramps the next morning.

Hyunjin’s eyes drooped as he closed the restroom door behind him, ignoring the sounds coming from the kitchen as he splashed water on his face in an attempt to wash away the dizziness.

It worked, for a solid moment.

When Hyunjin looked up at the mirror, his skin was a shade lighter than it normally was, and his eyebrows were pronounced.

Hyunjin quickly looked away from his reflection to divulge in his skin care. There was no way he was sick, or else he’d probably have other symptoms.

As an idol, he was used to the feeling of exhaustion, and that was what this was. Mild exhaustion that he would work through because they had group dance practice today to polish a song off.

Hyunjin took a moment to lean his forehead against the marble countertop, simply existing as the world around him rocked like he was on a ship.

He was so out of it that he hadn’t even noticed Jisung entering the restroom to brush his teeth.

They had an open door policy when it came to their restroom, because getting ready for schedules last minute sometimes meant taking a shower while someone else took a piss.

“Morning Jinnie,” Jisung announced his presence, and it took Hyunjin a full moment to compose himself and lift his head from the countertop to see Jisung watching him worried as he brushed his teeth.

“You okay?” Jisung asked, some toothpaste falling to his chin.

“Mhm,” Hyunjin nodded, and immediately regretted the decision when his head spun.

Jisung spat his toothpaste out and turned the faucet on to wash it down the sink. Hyunjin blankly watched him gargle mouthwash and when Jisung was done, he gave Hyunjun a pointed look.

“What is this- why are you watching me like some kind of nature documentary?”

Hyunjin couldn’t help but crack a lazy smile, “Han Jisung in his natural habitat, brushing his teeth. Stay would love that.”

Jisung snorted and rolled his eyes good natured, “yeah, whatever. Come on, Chan made breakfast.”

Jisung practically strong-armed Hyunjin out of the restroom, inadvertently taking his weight for him as they entered the kitchen together.

Chan was manning the stove with a sleeveless top and a bright pink apron that said ‘9/10 in the kitchen, 10/10 in the sheets’ while Changbin scooped the food onto plates.

The smell was glorious and terrible at the same time, because it made Hyunjin’s stomach clench. He didn’t remember the last time he had actually eaten a solid meal and not half of a microwave dinner.

“Morning guys,” Chan greeted, smiling in a way that his eyes turned into tiny crescents. “Sit down, breakfast is ready.”

Jisung let out a rowdy ‘morning’ of his own, and Hyunjin couldn’t find it in himself to let out more than an exhausted ‘thank you’ as Jisung shoved him down to a chair and Changbin slid two plates in front of them.

The food looked good, it really did.

He just wasn’t sure if he could eat it all.

Changbin must have noticed him eyeing the plate with worry, because he leaned forward on the table to place a hand on Hyunjin’s shoulder. “Jinnie?” He asked, tone laced with concern, “is something wrong with the food?”

“I can make something else,” Chan immediately offered as he sat down next to Changbin, like he saint he was.

“No,” Hyunjin immediately shook his head, “I’m just not too hungry this morning, Hyung.”

He tried to smile in a reassuring way, but Changbin’s frown only deepened. “Are you sick?” He reached to brush Hyunjin’s bangs back and feel his forehead. “You don’t have a fever…”

“Just no appetite,” Hyunjin slapped his hand away in a playful way, pointedly taking a chopstick to stab into the food and bring a good portion of it to his mouth.

And as soon as he tasted the food, his stomach growled and he was immediately scooping the rest up like some malnourished child.

“Yeah, ‘no appetite’ my ass,” Changbin muttered, and Chan nudged him.

“Leave him alone, it’s early and we need to leave soon anyway.”

Right.

They still had dance rehearsals.

But the food that Hyunjin shoveled into his mouth was enough to momentarily chase the lightheadedness away for the rest of the morning, all the way up until they loaded into the company car.

They were already running a bit behind schedule, so Chan was quick to usher them to the van. Hyunjin and Jisung, as the younger ones, usually always sat in the back row with Chan and Changbin in the seats ahead of them.

They kindly greeted the driver before buckling in, and the rest of their conversation faded to the background as Hyunjin set his face against the cool window to look at the surroundings.

The surroundings that blurred as the city passed by in a dizzying whirl.

The sight of it made Hyunjin squeeze his eyes shut for relief, and the little airflow in the back of the van made him slightly nauseous.

“Hyunjin?” Jisung’s voice sounded close, for some reason, but Hyunjin refused to open his eyes. “You look a little sick, do you need anything?”

Hyunjin’s eyeballs rolled around in his skull like a ping pong match as he smushed his cheek against the window. “Air conditioning would be nice,” he muttered, and Jisung immediately reached an arm out to adjust the vent above Hyunjin’s head.

A moment later, the cool air hit his face and chased away the clammy sweat from his hairline.

“Thanks, Sung.”

He couldn’t see the look on Jisung’s face with his eyes closed, but he could hear the shuffling as he nodded. “Yeah, why don’t you take a nap? I’ll wake you when we get there.”

A nap sounded nice.

He hadn’t even realized he had fallen into an uneasy sleep until Jisung was gently shaking him awake. “We’re here,” he announced, and dragged a half asleep Hyunjin out of the company van and to the building's elevator.

“Did you get any sleep last night?” Chan asked worriedly as the elevator ascended to the fifteenth floor practice room they reserved the previous day.

“You found me on the couch,” Hyunjin answered in leu of an answer.

“Right… Well, try not to fall asleep there again.”

“Yah,” Changbin agreed, “that couch is uncomfortable and lumpy. How did you do it?”

“A mixture of exhaustion and sleeping skills,” Jisung answered for Hyunjin before Hyunjin could even defend himself.

“Hey guys!” Felix greeted them the moment they entered the room and set their bags down by the mirror. The music was already playing and the other four in their group were already going through a round of stretches.

Hyunjin’s body was sore and achy, and he didn’t feel quite as flexible as he normally was, but he tried his best to keep up. Minho had quickly approached after seeing his lackluster stretching, leaning against his back and helping Hyunjin stretch out even further across the polished wooden floor.

“Did you pull a muscle?” Minho asked after noticing Hyunjin wasn’t touching his toes like he normally could.

“No, my muscles are just a little tired.” Hyunjin grunted as he eased himself back up to sit criss crossed on the floor. Minho massaged his stiff muscles for a few moments, and Hyunjin relaxed into the touch.

“Take it easy today, then. We aren’t recording until tomorrow.” Minho ordered, and as their dance captain, Hyunjin was obliged to agree.

“I heard you were sore,” Felix said as they got into their general positions, and Hyunjin hummed in agreement. “Here- we have a few moments and I have some KT tape, so hold still.”

The dizziness slowly returned to Hyunjin as he closed his eyes and looked up to the ceiling, allowing Felix to tape his shoulders up until they were slightly less sore. Felix patted his head, “better?”

“Yeah, thanks Lix.”

Minho clapped, startling him from his stupor. “Alright! Get into starting positions for a run through.”

And practice was more hellish than Hyunjin had expected for it to be.

At first there was a mild tightness in the back of his head every time he moved too abruptly, but it quickly transformed back into the lightheaded feeling he suffered through that morning.

They went through a simple position run through to check formations, and then a slow run through with Minho yelling out counts instead of music.

It was hard from Hyunjin to keep up right from the start, which was rare because Hyunjin was always on the beat.

Minho monitored them from the mirror with sharp eyes, narrowing on Hyunjin occasionally when he noticed his sloppy footwork, but thankfully he didn’t say anything for the first few mistakes.

Until the music started to play and fog coated over Hyunjin’s brain enough for him to stumble over his own feet a few times.

“Hyunjin, focus up,” Minho called over the music, then returned to scanning the room and yelling at the others.

It was brutal, really.

The world around him twisted and turned, and just when Hyunjin felt he would fall over, Minho called for a water break.

He nearly stumbled over himself to lean back against the mirror and chug down his water, finishing it off and tossing the empty bottle to the trash can. He still felt dehydrated, even after chugging an entire bottle- and a fresh new bottle was pressed against the side of his cheek like a blessing.

Hyunjin blearily cracked an eye open to see Jeongin offering him a new bottle from the mini fridge. “You look parched, Hyung.”

“Yah! My Innie’s worried!” Hyunjin grinned happily as he took the water, sweating with condensation as he unscrewed the lid to shakily put the bottle up to his lips.

Jeongin just rolled his eyes in an exasperated way as he returned to the others on the couch. Hyunjin would have joined them, but as it was, his legs wobbled underneath him like a newborn deer when he stood, so he remained rooted to the floor until the water break was over.

His suffering lasted for approximately another thirty minutes.

Thirty minutes of sweat beading his forehead and soaking through his workout clothes. Thirty minutes of leaning over to heave for oxygen between every run through while the others just panted lightly. Thirty long minutes of his exhausted body screaming in protest.

He couldn’t do this for a full day, but he pretended that he could anyway, brushing away the others' concern every time they asked if he was okay.

In the end, though, they were all exhausted and with little to no sleep, Hyunjin wasn’t special just because he stayed up extra long to practice or skipped out on meals.

They all did.

They were all impatient and wanted to end practice, but the more that Hyunjin messed up, the longer they had to stay.

“Hyunjin,” Minho sighed after his fifth mess up and third water break. “Your movements are sloppy today, and I know it’s an off day, but we have a recording tomorrow and we need to make sure that we all understand the choreography.”

Minho was understanding, but the chiding hurt considering that Hyunjin spent countless hours perfecting the dance with him in order to help teach the others. Now- they were the ones teaching him.

“Hyung, I know the dance, trust me.”

Minho raised an unimpressed eyebrow, “do you?”

It felt a little like betrayal to Hyunjin, but he nodded and straightened up from his position since his hands were on his knees. “You and Lix know that I practiced this.”

He wiped sweat away from his forehead as Minho crossed his arms, “then show us on the next run through, and we can all he done for the day.” His tone was stern, but Hyunjin knew that he was only doing it to push him past his limits and get him to perform.

But the thing about limits was that, some of them shouldn’t be passed.

“Alright,” he agreed, “I’ll do it perfect next time.”

Felix patted his back reassuringly as they got back into position, Hyunjin starting off on the floor. The moment he stood from his crouch, he stumbled a little, but Chan helped nudge him into place so that he could regain his footing and continue the choreography.

Minho shot him a disapproving look through the mirror, but didn’t stop the music to correct him.

Hyunjin swallowed down the bile that crawled up his throat.

He could do this.

Sharp movements.

Well practiced, legato dives, and kicks all the way up until the music ended and they were all at a standstill until Minho finally started to clap. Hyunjin couldn’t help but grin.

“That time was our best yet. Good work, Hyunjin.”

It was the best compliment that Hyunjin would get from him, so Hyunjin bent low into a bow to thank Minho.

“Hyunjin, you don’t have to do that.” Minho ruffled his sweat through hair while he was still bent over, “get up and get some water into your system. We’re done for the day.”

“Thanks, Hyung.” It felt like a massive weight was lifted from his shoulder as he battled away the negative thoughts.

He did it. He danced just fine even when he felt like hell.

He lifted himself back up from his bent over position, and suddenly the world tilted on its axis from underneath him. He stumbled a little, but luckily, Jeongin was behind him and managed to steady him by the shoulders. From his front, Minho furrowed his eyebrows.

“Hyunjin,” Minho frowned, and Jeongin kept a steady grip on his shoulders until Hyunjin felt secure enough to pull away from him. “Eat a big meal when you get back to the dorms, yeah?”

Hyunjin smiled sheepishly, “don’t worry about me, Hyung.”

Minho studied him closely for a few more minutes as the groups slowly started to filter out of the dance room to the waiting vans down below. “Actually, I’m visiting and cooking dinner for all of you. Lord knows that 3RACHA barely eats anything edible these days.”

“Hey!” Jisung called from the door, offended. “I made toast the other day! It was burnt, but edible!”

“My point still stands.”

Hyunjin huffed and trailed behind the group and onto the elevator. A nice warm meal sounded really nice, so he didn’t protest the thought of it.

The moment Hyunjin got back to the apartment, Jisung claimed the shower first, forcing Hyunjin to wait in front of the door with his towel because he was sure that if he sat down to wait on the shower to be open- he wouldn’t be able to get back up.

“You’ve been waiting out here this entire time?” Jisung asked when he exited the shower, a towel around his waist because he always forgot to bring an extra pair of clothes in with him.

Hyunjin only groaned and shouldered past him to take the shower all to himself. The mirrors were all fogged up from the steam and the floor was slippery, but he still managed to use the last of the hot water.

The steam made him light headed, but he would rather be dizzy than shivering under the water as he washed his sweat away.

He was feeling particularly trashy, so he slid on a gray pair of sweatpants and one of Chan’s tank top shirts that was just slightly too short on him before he exited the room- using the wall as a crutch.

“Jinnie! You’re out!” Felix called from the couch- because apparently, whenever Minho cooked, it was an invitation for everyone to join in on the cookout and cram themselves into the small dorm. “Come sit with us! Jeongin’s about to beat Seungmin in smash bros.”

“I’ve never played,” Seungmin reminded him, and Hyunjin just shrugged.

“I’ll be there in a second.” Because the thought of seeing Seungmin get his ass handed to him by their youngest was a sight that he didn’t want to miss.

But the smell of food coming from the kitchen was enticing, and Hyunjin was hoping to steal a spoonful of whatever stew Minho was making.

Jisung and Changbin were sitting at the table playing a fierce game of speed while Chan helped Minho out in the kitchen. “Smells good,” Hyunjin complemented, feeling the life seep back to his body after a nice shower.

If he actually managed to get a good night of sleep tonight, the dizziness lingering in all of his movements would probably disappear.

Minho pointed an accusatory spatula at Hyunjin, “it better be good enough for you to eat your entire bowl plus seconds.”

Hyunjin held his hands up in surrender as Chan laughed from his place chopping the onions (because he was the only one of them who didn’t cry when he did so.)

Hyunjin leaned against the counter, “is there anything that I can do to help?”

Minho shrugged as he turned the burner off and spooned the soup. “Just grab the bowls from the shelf to set out on the table. But you can make Jisung get the silverware.”

Hyunjin hummed in affirmation and reached up to open the cabinets and grab a stack of bowls. Eight exactly- and color coded so that no one argued over which one was theirs.

As soon as he closed the doors and twisted around to set the bowls out, his vision darkened around the edges and his fingertips grew numb. He tilted to the side and all eight bowls immediately crashed to the floor with a deafening shatter.

All that Hyunjin could think was ‘oh no, our bowls’ like some useless idiot as he blindly reached out for the counter to steady himself.

“-Jin?” A distant voice asked him, but it was inaudible over the ringing in his own ears.

He tried his best to lift his head up, to tell the voice that ‘he was okay,’ but unfortunately, he lost equilibrium and his vision grew completely dark before he could do so.

“Hyunjin?” Minho asked, the moment the dishes fell to the floor. Chan immediately put the onions and knife down to wipe his hands off and watch the scene worried, while Changbin and Jisung poked their heads into the kitchen.

Hyunjin didn’t answer, leaning against the counter, and before Minho could question him again, his body was crashing to the floor like a sack of bricks.

“Hyunjin!” He called, and luckily, Chan was close enough to grab him under the armpits before he hit his head on the tile, easing his body to the floor and resting his head in his lap.

Away from the glass littering the floor.

There was a lot of it.

“Hyunjin?” Changbin called worried, but before he could rush into the room, Minho stopped him as he crouched next to Hyunjin’s left side.

“There’s glass all over the floor, Changbin, grab a broom, and Jisung, you grab a medical kit and a wet rag.”

“I’ll get the fan,” Felix offered, because the younger members eventually made their way to the scene. It wasn’t the first time one of their members had collapsed, but it was the first time it had been done with such fanfare and broken glass. Leave it to Hyunjin.

Chan pillowed either side of Hyunjin’s face as his eyes fluttered under his eyelids. He pressed a hand over Hyunjin’s lips, “he’s still breathing pretty well, it’s just a fainting spell.”

“Probably overworked,” Minho mused, leaning down to push away Hyunjin’s wet bangs from his forehead. “I shouldn’t have made him dance so hard.”

“And I should have noticed sooner.”

“Enough of the blame game, you two,” Felix announced as he returned to the room. He masterfully avoided the glass shards while Changbin cleaned them away, holding a mini fan close to Hyunjin’s face.

“Hopefully he’s not out for too long,” Felix mused as Chan lightly tapped his cheek.

“Jinnie? You with us?”

Hyunjin only groaned and his eyebrow twitched, but Felix continued to talk to him. “It’s okay, take your time coming back to us. Just focus on your breathing first, then your body while your brain reboots itself.”

Hyunjin let out another aborted whimper, and Chan rubbed soothing circles around his shoulders as Jisung handed the med kit and a cool cloth over to Minho.

Minho used the hair clip that Felix offered him to keep Hyunjin’s hair out of his face as he laid the cloth on Hyunjin’s forehead- and Hyunjin immediately leaned into the touch of the fabric.

“I called the manager,” Seungmin announced, holding his phone to his ear as if he was still on the other line. “He's sending a medic to look over him and see if he needs to go to the hospital.”

“Good,” Chan sighed, patting a hand on Hyunjin’s chest to follow his breathing, and Felix continued to support him in a low tone. “Thanks, Minnie.”

Minho made tentative eye contact with Chan before adding on, “go ahead and tell him to cancel tomorrow's schedule.”

Jeongin’s eyes widened in surprise, “but Hyung- aren’t we making a dance recording tomorrow?”

Minho scoffed, “screw the dance recording. Tell the manager to suck it if he has a problem with that-“

“-Don’t say that,” Chan cut him off with a reassuring smile, “just tell him that we refuse to record tomorrow. In a nice tone, please.”

Seungmin just shrugged before pressing the phone back to his ear, grumbling “whatever way works best.”

It wasn’t long after that before Hyunjin’s fingers were twitching and his eyes were sliding open, wincing at the light above him. Jisung was quick to dim them, and Felix encouraged Hyunjin to open his eyes fully.

“Jinnie? Are you back with us?”

Hyunjin groaned, and let out a choked, “Lix?”

“Yeah, we’re all here. Do you want to sit up? Or do you think you should lay down for a few more moments.”

The exhaustion must have been hitting Hyunjin like a freight train, because he trembled with exhaustion as he continued to lay down in Chan’s lap.

Jisung was quick to sit down next to Hyunjin’s other shoulder. “Open wide,” he announced as he poked the straw in the water bottle past Hyunjin’s lips. Hyunjin hummed and drank the water from the bottle until Jisung pulled it away. “Not too fast, now.”

It took another ten minutes of Felix playing with Hyunjin’s hair and Chan asking him questions as he faded back to life before they stood Hyunjin up and settled him down onto the couch.

“Hyunjin,” Chan warned as he sat on the coffee table across from Hyunjin. Once the others recognized that there was nothing more they could do, they dispersed among the apartment to do their own things until Minho reheated the soup for them all.

“I know,” Hyunjin groaned, leaning his head back against the couch cushion. “I’m sorry, I’ll get new plates-“

Minho scoffed, crossing his arms. “You think the plates are what we’re worried about?”

Hyunjin’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion, “…yeah? I kinda broke all eight of them.”

Minho facepalmed in a way that said ‘can you believe this idiot?’ While Chan sighed. “Hyunjin, we’re not worried about the dishes, we can get new ones. What we can’t get another one of is a Hyunjin.”

Hyunjin pouted and Chan grabbed his hands because he was beginning to pick at his nail bed. “So that means you have to take better care of yourself. Eat full meals, get good sleep. Do you hear me?”

Hyunjin nodded guiltily, and Minho knew that his brain was probably feeling too fuzzy to comprehend what their leader was saying, so he decided not to add on anything else.

Hyunjin leaned his head against Felix’s shoulder, because he was the closest to him and playing video games with a low volume. Felix hummed lowly to lull him to sleep, Hyunjin drooling against his shoulder, all the way up until there was a knock on their door.

“Will you grab the door?” Chan asked Jeongin, “it’s probably the medic.”

In the end, luckily, a medic wasn’t needed. But to Chan- when it came to his members, it was always better safe than sorry.

Chapter Text

It all started off with a weird message from an unknown number.

Unknown number: I see you

Hyunjin looked down at his phone screen with raised eyebrows, setting his water bottle down lightly onto the practice room floor.

He, Minho, and Felix were hard at work late into the night, so it was weird to get a message at midnight as it was- let alone from some unknown number. Hyunjin suspiciously eyed Minho from his place on the couch with Felix at his side.

“That’s a very funny prank, Hyung. You can stop now.”

Minho looked up from his own phone to give Hyunjin a deadpan look, and Felix from next to him looked confused in a concerned way.

Oops.

“I don’t know what kind of prank you think that I pulled,” Minho sat up, looking a little peeved because he was always in an agitated mood when they were out practicing late.

Hyunjin immediately put his hands up in surrender, nervously backing up into the foggy mirror. “Oops, sorry. I thought…”

At the look Minho shot him, he definitely wasn’t in the mood to pull any pranks. And neither was Felix.

“Just for that accusation, your water break is cut short,” Minho ordered, clicking play on the music. “Run through it yourself while me and Felix watch.”

Hyunjin groaned and got up from the hard floor, not even bothering to argue against their dance captain. He left his phone on the floor, the text message forgotten.

Unknown number: You look nice today. You should wear that pink cardigan more often.

Hyunjin huffed at his phone and rolled his eyes. He blocked the number again, but he knew that the persistent person would just create a new number and keep texting.

Hyunjin cleared his throat and looked at the others so that he could gain their attention. They were all seated at the airport- a blocked off room so that they could have some privacy waiting for their plane to land.

“Does anyone have a change of clothes I can wear? Or a spare jacket?”

The others all eyed each other curiously and Hyunjin self consciously fiddled with his cardigan before Jeongin reached into his backpack to pass a big dark hoodie over to him. “Are you cold, Hyung?”

“You better not be getting sick,” Felix fussed, reaching over to help Hyunjin get his arms through the armholes. Jeongin was just as tall as Hyunjin, so it was a nice fit. Hyunjin let Felix mess his hair up to feel his forehead because he knew it would probably make him less worried.

“I’m fine,” he answered, smile growing sour along the edges. “I just regret choosing this outfit this morning.”

Felix hummed, like he didn’t believe it, and pulled away.

Hyunjin’s phone buzzed again.

Unknown number: who are you trying to impress?

Hyunjin and Jisung left the dorm to get smoothies. Well, they snuck out- because Chan and Changbin were holding them captive before dinner, but they had a spark of inspiration and disappeared into the room to Chan’s computer.

Hyunjin and Jisung decidedly did not want to get involved in whatever epiphany they had, so they choose to cave in to their sweet tooth.

No one had to know that they strayed from their diets aside from the two of them.

Hyunjin and Jisung worked hard to put on baggy clothes, masks, ball caps, and even shades to mask their appearance. It worked most of the time- so Hyunjin freely allowed himself to order a banana smoothie without any guilt while Jisung ordered a strawberry one and forced him to pay for it.

On their way back, Hyunjin hummed happily to himself as he slurped from the straw, idly holding onto the strap of Jisung’s backpack to keep pace with him because despite his shorter legs- he walked like a speed demon.

“Your text tone is going off,” Jisung informed Hyunjin, who hadn’t even heard it.

He let go of the backpack to slide his phone from his pocket.

Unknown number: a banana smoothie? Are you sure that you should be drinking something so sweet?

The smile fell from Hyunjin’s face, and Jisung stopped in his tracks at the crestfallen look. “Jinnie? Is everything okay?”

Hyunjin cleared his throat and put his phone on mute. “Yeah- yeah. I’m fine, do you want the rest of my smoothie? I’m not feeling too thirsty anymore.”

Jisung’s bottom lip jutted out like it always did when he was worried. “But you barely drank half of it…”

“So? Do you want it?”

Jisung shrugged and slowly took the cup from him before they resumed on their merry way. Maybe, in the end, the number was just one of his managers watching him to make sure that he kept his diet strict.

There would be no smoothies for Hyunjin in the future.

Hyunjin had stayed late at the studio- even past his normal time. Minho and Felix left hours ago with a wave over their shoulders and a forced promise to make sure Hyunjin texted them when they left. “At a decent time, for God’s sake,” Felix had chided.

Hyunjin looked at his watch as he entered the elevator.

Midnight could be counted as a decent time.

In fact, Chan himself usually didn’t leave until the early morning, so he was doing pretty good for himself. Luckily, the JYP building wasn’t too far away from the dorms so the walk was bearable. Even nice, with the cooler weather outside.

Hyunjin adjusted the windbreaker over his sweaty body as he waved to the front desk security and exited the double glass doors, and when he looked back in front of him to see where he was going- he was promptly pushed back and landed right on his ass.

Hyunjin hissed in pain, rubbing at his sore tailbone as he desperately looked up at his attacker to see a man in a dark jumper and even darker hat. “I apologize,” Hyunjin admitted, climbing to his feet. “I should have looked where I was going-“

“-you should be sorry.” The man interrupted him, and Hyunjin’s mouth opened and closed in surprise.

“…I’m sorry?”

The man scoffed and crossed his arms, and now that Hyunjin was on his feet using the wall as support because his whole body ached- he could tell that the man was taller than him. A rare thing.

“I said, you should be sorry. You need to apologize to me, now.”

Hyunjin’s eyebrow twitched, because dealing with an asshole at midnight was not on his bucket list- especially when he was bone tired and just wanted to pass out into his bed. “Sir, I apologize for running-“

“-Say it like you mean it. I want you to bend over and put your nose to the ground.”

Hyunjin took a deep breath to compose himself, hands clenching into a fist. He really didn’t want to bend down in front of a random stranger and get down on his hands and knees.

But the man was looking at him so intensely, and just when Hyunjin moved to set his bag down and bow, there was a warm band kneading his shoulder.

“Do we have a problem?” Chan asked and Hyunjin immediately leaned back into his touch. Hyunjin quickly shook his head, not wanting to involve his elder in whatever this creep wanted, but he didn’t have to because said creep turned on his heels to walk away at a brisk pace as soon as Chan said something.

Hyunjin just watched him go.

“Hyunjin? What was that about?”

“I dunno…” Hyunjin pondered, trailing off into a yawn. “Let’s get back to the dorms, Hyung. I’m tired.”

Chan chuckled and patted his shoulder before leading them down the sidewalk- leaving his arm there because Hyunjin was stumbling sleepily.

The weird text messages simply continued, and Hyunjin blocked them every single time.

He grew skittish. Everytime he went out in public, he made sure to frequently check over his shoulder in case there was anyone around him flashing pictures of him to text him.

He also made a point to never go out in public alone, dragging one of the others out with him. They willingly went along, just because they could tell that there was something off with him.

His tension hit boiling point when they were having a water break during their day-long vocal rehearsals. He was next to go up in their set, so he had his back turned to the group, facing the studio wall so that he could have some time to himself and warm up

But when he looked down at his phone to see even more text…

Unknown number: I’m right behind you…

A hand landed on his shoulder, and it took everything in Hyunjin not to scream. He quickly pushed the hand back and held his phone close to his chest as he spun around and wildly searched the room.

Only to find a very confused Minho retracting his hand back to his side.

The entire room fell silent, even Chan, looking up from his laptop.

“Hyunjin,” Minho said with a sharp tone, and Hyunjin sucked in a breath because that was not his hyungs nice voice. “You need to tell us what is wrong. Right now.”

Hyunjin’s hands shook from the scare as he set his phone and water bottle down. Everyone was watching him, so he tried his best to plaster on a fake smile. “I’m just tired.”

Seungmin scoffed, unimpressed. “That’s a lie. You are such a bad liar, Hyunjin.”

Hyunjin sighed and crossed his arms. If he told the others, how bad could it really be? The worse they would do was taunt him a little before helping him out.

“Don’t do that,” Felix reminded, and Hyunjin realized that he was biting at his bottom lip like he always did when he got nervous.

“Sorry- it’s just… I’ve been getting some weird messages lately.”

Chan, now interested, turned his chair fully away from his work so that he could carefully observe Hyunjin.

“Weird messages?” Changbin asked, “like- on bubble? You know you can just let the manager know to block them.”

“No,” Hyunjin shook his head, his hair falling from behind his ears at the movement. “No- it’s over text. I block them- but they just keep texting from a new number.”

Chan clasped his hands in front of his face, “so what you’re saying is-“

There was a small, polite knock to the door before their vocal coach walked in, dissipating the ramping tension in the small room. Chan gave Hyunjin a pointed look, saying ‘we’ll talk about this later’ before he stood up to greet the coach.

It looked like Hyunjin was saved by the bell.

In the end, the conversation never happened simply because everyone was so busy with their mounting schedules. 3RACHA were never at the dorm anymore, leaving Hyunjin alone to fend for himself after intense dance practices that left his muscles aching.

Hyunjin would have enjoyed his alone time if he actually felt safe on his own.

But how was he supposed to feel safe when a random stranger was sending him messages with pictures of him attached? Hyunjin had stalkers a few times- they all did, it came with the job. But those stalkers were just over excited fans and paparazzi that followed them around.

This was different. The intentions were skewed.

Hyunjin just put on some relaxing music to play through the speakers as he hummed along to himself. Minho had taught him how to make basic meals and he had tended to start making large servings so that he could leave them in the fridge for the others to eat when they returned.

Cooking was relaxing- when he knew what he was doing.

When he wore his relax clothes in the comfort of his own home, with his hair up and not a care in the world for his public image. Just him, the food, and the music playing in the background.

Ding.

…and his text tone.

Hyunjin left his phone on silent recently- but after missing a rehearsal, he decided it was best to turn his notifications back on after his Hyung’s disappointed stares.

He sighed and wiped his hands off on the rag before grabbing his phone and flipping it over.

Unknown number: what’re you cooking?
Img_jpg.

The image was of Hyunjin’s back to the stove, zoomed in and taken from somewhere outside.

Hyunjin’s heart seized in his chest as he quickly turned around. They lived pretty high up, but the curtains were wide open for anyone down below or anyone in the business building across to see.

Hyunjin nearly stumbled over his own feet to draw the curtains closed. His hands shook as he tapped to his other group chat with the 8 members.

Hyunjin: please tell me if anyone is playing a prank on me. I’m freaked out.

One moment later.

Jisung: ?

Felix: Jinnie? What prank are you talking about?

Jeongin: Hyung? Are you okay?

Hyunjin put a hand over his mouth in an attempt to ward away the growing nausea. None of them were lying or pranking him- someone was genuinely stalking him, and it wasn’t a crazy fan. It was someone who wanted to cause him bodily harm.

Suddenly, there was banging at the front door that nearly broke the thing from its hinges, accompanied by shouting. Shouting of someone who Hyunjin had never heard before. “Let me in!” The male shouted, “I text you, but you never reply! Let me in! I just want to talk!”

Hyunjin’s breath stuttered in his chest as he tumbled to the door in an attempt to hold it closed- but that would only last for so long.

“Leave me alone!” He practically sobbed, pressing his cheek to the jostling door.

The banging suddenly stopped, and for one hopeful moment, Hyunjin thought he had finally given up and left him alone- but then the door was being kicked with so much force that not even Hyunjin’s weight would be able to hold it down.

If a well placed kick hit the door right above the doorknob, Hyunjin was screwed.

Quickly, he stumbled into the restroom and locked the door, placing his back against the very far wall. He caught sight of his reflection in the mirror- with his jostled hair, red rimmed eyes, and quivering body. He looked terrified.

He was terrified.

Panic pooled in his chest cavity as he shakily took his phone out and dialed the first person that he could think of.

Luckily, Chan picked up after the third ring.

“Hyunjin?” He asked, “is everything alright? We’re on our way back now, only a few minutes out.”

Hyunjin choked on a panicked sob as he cupped his hand over his mouth to remain silent- even if it didn’t matter because the man was still banging intensely on the door.

“Chan,” he gasped, “Chan-“

Chan’s tone immediately turned stoney. “Hyunjin? What’s wrong?”

“Someone- so-someone trying to-to b-break into the dorm.”

Over the line, Hyunjin could hear shuffling and a small “shit” in English along with a “what?” From Jisung. There was a short conversation before Chan was bringing the phone back up to his mouth with a soothing tone.

“Hyunjin. Jinnie, I need you to listen to me, okay?”

Hyunjin tried his best to swallow the panic down as he nodded.

“Hyunjin? Are you there?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m here.”

“Okay, good. That’s good. Changbin called the authorities, and they should get there very soon.”

The front door crashed down, and Hyunjin let out an embarrassing shout.

“Hyunjin? What just happened.”

“I don’t have a lot of time,” Hyunjin hissed into the phone, “he just broke the door down- he’s he’s going to get to me!”

“Hyunjin, listen to my voice and breathe. No he’s not. Are you in the restroom?”

“Yes- yeah, I am.”

“Okay, good. Make sure that door is locked and listen to me. Is there anything sharp in there? Anything that can be used as a weapon?”

Hyunjin felt sick. “You- you want me to attack him?”

“Yes Hyunjin. We’re almost there, but if he does get in there before us, you need to be ready. Just in case.”

Hyunjin’s eyes scanned the restroom for something- anything- but the sharpest thing they had in there was Changbin’s dull razor.

Then, he remembered the hammer kept in the bottom cabinet for anytime they needed to build a table set. Hyunjin got to his knees and took the tool out with shaky fingers. It was heavy in his hands, like the weight of the world.

“I-I got a hammer, hyung.”

“Okay. Okay, that’s good. Go ahead and get in the bathtub for me and hunker down.”

Hyunjin robotically crawled into the rub and pushed the curtains closed, right as the banging started again, but this time it was the weaker restroom door that would cave only after a few moments.

“I know you’re in there!”

Police sirens rang, and coupled with the yelling, it was too loud for Hyunjin so he simply covered his ears and rocked himself back and forth. He shouted inaudibly for the man to go away and for the noise to just stop.

And like his prayer had been answered, the noise subsided and it was blissfully silent. Almost too silent aside from the ringing in his ears.

Hyunjin curled in tighter on himself, just waiting for the pen to drop and for the man to pull the curtain back and attack him because the door was opened and there were footsteps and-

The curtain reeled back and Hyunjin readied to bring the hammer right down onto his attacker- except, Chan was holding his arm to prevent him from hitting him and the hammer was clattering to the bathtub floor along with Hyunjin’s body.

There were hands on him, but they weren’t unfamiliar volatile hands because it was just Chan steadying him and climbing right into the bathtub with him to let Hyunjin fold into his lap.

“Hyunjin, shh, it’s okay now.” He reassured as he ran a warm hand in circles around Hyunjin’s stuttering back. Hyunjin just leaned further into the warmth as he tried to open his eyes and peek over Chan’s shoulder- just to make sure the man was no longer there.

“The police are over there. They got him.” Chan placed a hand on the back of Hyunjin’s head to prevent him from looking.

“No, don’t look. Just stay here and breathe with me.”

It took Jisung and Changbin a full ten minutes to give the police their statement and identify the perpetrator (whom they had never seen before in their lives.)

As soon as the police were done with them and their apartment was no longer considered a crime scene, they stepped over the overturned door in an effort to race to wherever Chan and Hyunjin were.

“Jisung-“ Changbin’s grabbed onto Jisung’s collar to stop him from running, bringing them right to Hyunjin’s room that was a mess.

Weird- because Hyunjin always kept his room neat.

Changbin pushed past the cracked open door and blinked stupidly at the sight before him. At the artwork tossed and shredded onto the floor and clothes strewn across the floor.

Even his bed was unmade, and it looked like someone had sat down on it.

“That’s just fucking weird,” Jisung scowled, before quickly shutting the door behind them. “Let’s not mention this to Hyunjin until he’s ready. He can sleep in one of our rooms tonight.”

And when they got into the restroom to see Chan leaning back against the porcelain bathtub with Hyunjin in his arms, they stopped in their tracks to just stare because Hyunjin’s face was swollen and red from crying.

He still hiccuped and sniffled, even if he was obviously dead asleep in his arms.

“Is he okay?” Jisung whispered from the doorway, and Chan just shook his head. Of course he wasn’t.

“Let’s keep a close eye on him overnight. Help me get him up.”

Changbin immediately stepped into the tub with him to help ease Hyunjin out and protect his head from hitting the bathtub.

Together, they got him organized on Chan’s bed and under the blankets because he was still shivering from his adrenaline wearing off. Chan sat on the edge of the bed because Hyunjin had a death grip on his hoodie and refused to let go, even in his sleep.

Ringing filled the silence of the room, and Changbin looked down at the phone and sighed. “It’s Minho. We have a lot of explaining to do.”

Jisung shooed him away, “have fun with that.”

Changbin scoffed, rolling his eyes as he held the phone up to his ear. On his side, Hyunjin muttered under his breath and shifted under the thick blankets.

After he settled, Chan pulled the blanket back up to his chin and Hyunjin just smacked his lips before going back to sleep.

He would be okay, and Chan would make sure that it stayed that way- even if it meant checking his phone for any creepy text messages like some overprotective mother.

Chapter Text

Hyunjin really shouldn’t have lost at that rock paper scissors game, because now he was on a boat at seven in the morning with a fishing pole in his hands.

They were filming a SKZ code episode, and Hyunjin lost the stupid game- landing his ass onto a boat in cold morning weather- so muggy that the sun wasn’t even In the sky.

At least he had Jisung and Seungmin to suffer alongside him- and neither of them looked too thrilled at the prospect of fishing in the turbulent waters either.

Before they left (it was still dark outside then) the manager had forced them to pop pills that would apparently help them with any seasickness- but Hyunjin was too tired to actually ask what it was.

It only made him drowsy.

Not drowsy enough to sleep on the ship, because the constant rocking was keeping him annoyingly awake.

While Jisung and Seungmin remained to the back of the boat as they drove out, Hyunjin lingered at the front and let the wind blow through his hair and make his nose red with the cold. It was worth it though- because the fresh air prevented him from throwing up.

It was fine when they were moving- but when they stopped and the staff put bait on the poles for them to cast out the rod- it got a lot worse.

Standing still and sleepily blinking down at the waves only made Hyunjin feel off kilter.

“I got one!” Jisung shouted happily, breaking the morning silence as he reeled his first fish in. And then another. And then another one after that.

Hyunjin tried his best to act excited for the camera, complaining about how he’d never got even a bite and demanding to trade spots with Jisung, but after thirty minutes at sea- he decided that the medication he ingested was not working.

Dazed, he glanced over at Seungmin and Jisung to see if the two of them were affected, but they just happily reeled in their catches.

So- that was a no.

“Thirty minutes left before we head back!” The boat operator announced and the cameramen around them were quick to work on strapping down their equipment.

Thirty minutes.

Hyunjin tightened his grip around the fishing pole.

He could do thirty minutes.

Twenty minutes later, he was leaning over the side of the boat and retching out whatever dinner was left in his stomach.

“Hyunjin?!” Jisung cried, instantly rushing over to rub circles into Hyunjin’s back as he vomited into the sea below. Seungmin, on his other side, kept his shoulders secure so that he didn’t tip over the side of the boat and fall into the sea.

Hyunjin groaned and nearly choked on his own vomit until everything finally abandoned his system.

Hyunjin went limp, but Seungmin and Jisung carefully lowered him to lean back against the ship's railing.

“Are you done now?” Jisung asked, brushing the hair away that fell out of Hyunjin’s beanie. Hyunjin just weakly nodded, hiccuping pitifully. He didn’t have anymore energy to expend other than clamping a hand to his mouth when he grew green again.

He spoke too soon.

Suddenly, a bin was being placed underneath his mouth and his head was being lowered down as he released even more of his stomach.

He heard the faint chatter of the cameramen and crew above them, ordering the ship operator to head back inland before his sickness could get any worse.

They did have a medic on standby, but the only thing that he could do was offer a water bottle that Seungmin held up to Hyunjin’s lips to help him sip from.

It didn’t matter- because in the end, Hyunjin threw that up too.

The ride back was a blur, but Hyunjin leaned back against Jisung at his favorite place in the front of the boat.

When they got to land, Hyunjin being supported by the others around him, he still felt the waves even on solid ground. Like he was in the ocean himself.

“You’ll probably feel the effects for the rest of the day,” the medic said apologetically before Hyunjin was packed away into the back of a car.

‘Keep him hydrated, take anti nausea meds, lay him down’ was all the instruction they were given- and they took it to heart.

The moment that Hyunjin returned to the shared vacation home with the others, Jisung helped him over to lay down on the couch. The others who had blessedly slept in while they all fished were all filtering sleepily into the kitchen.

“Morning guys!” Felix announced, sounding much too happy for it to be so early in the morning. As soon as he laid his eyes on Hyunjin sprawled on the couch, dead to the world, he frowned.

“…I take it that fishing didn’t go too well?”

“Not at all,” Seungmin answered from his place on the loveseat while Jisung sat by Hyunjin’s legs. “He started throwing up, so we had to come back in early. Don’t worry- we still got plenty of fish.”

Felix scoffed and his slippers clomped against the tile as he knelt in front of Hyunjin to brush his messy hair from his sweaty forehead. His eyes were squeezed shut, like he was still dizzy, and his cheek was squished against the fluffed pillow. “The fish are the last thing I’m worried about. Has anyone given him anymore medicine? And water? And maybe even a cool rag?”

Seungmin and Jisung made eye contact before shrugging, and Felix immediately got up from his crouched position. “I’ll take care of it, don’t worry guys.”

“That’s right,” Chan called from the doorway of the kitchen. He had his curly morning hair and was armed with a spatula. “The others are all cooking in the kitchen with Minho. You three just stay in here and relax, you did all of the hard work getting the food here.”

Jisung gave him a cheeky smile, “thanks, Hyung.”

It took another few hours for the fish to be fully cooked and for lunchtime to roll around. During that time, the others would occasionally pop their heads in to check on how the fishers were doing.

Felix and Chan had worked together to sit Hyunjin up and poke a straw past his lips to coax him to rehydrate and take some more anti-nausea medicine.

Then, Minho had come in to escape the chaos of the kitchen with his apron and a big frown on his face. “Are you two okay?” He asked Jisung and Seungmin, who were both regaining their bearings from the sea- and both of them nodded.

Minho approached Hyunjin’s restless figure on the couch and just sighed as he placed a wet rag on his forehead. Hyunjin’s eyelashes fluttered against his cheekbones as he let out an audible noise and leaned into the contact.

“I’ll be back in another ten minutes with another wet rag. Call us if you need anything.”

It was too bad that before the ten minute mark could hit, Hyunjin was groaning and leaning over to vomit over the side of the couch. Jisung cursed their lack of foresight because none of them bothered to place a bucket in front of him.

“Guys!” He called to the kitchen as he stumbled to keep Hyunjin’s head lowered between his knees so that he could breathe the dizziness away.

“Just breathe for me Jinnie- this floor tile is really pretty and we wouldn’t want to ruin it, now would we-“

It was too late, Hyunjin was gagging some more and bile seeped past his lips.

Luckily, before the floor could get the worst of his stomach acid, Changbin was sliding an empty trash can underneath his head and pulling his hair from his face as he whimpered some more.

“It’s okay, I know it sucks, but just let it out.”

Changbin was surprisingly good at comforting, because he managed to get Hyunjin to stop crying as he laid back down on the couch- on his side this time, as he curled in on himself.

“Yah- Hyunjin, it’ll be okay, you don’t need to cry.” Changbin grumbled as he continued to brush the sweaty bangs from his forehead. Hyunjin sniffled some more and hiccuped, covering his mouth to hide the sounds.

Jisung and Seungmin almost got sick themselves just by looking at the sight, so they returned to the kitchen with the others and traded places with Felix.

“I think that this will help,” Felix said softly as he plugged the heating pad into the wall and carefully shuffled it comfortably against Hyunjin’s stomach as he squirmed in discomfort.

“Thanks,” Hyunjin grumbled into the pillow, and Felix smiled sadly.

“The fish is ready, do you think you can eat some?”

Hyunjin groaned, “don’t talk about fish right now. Please.”

Felix have him a sympathetic pat on the back, “okay, no fish for you then. How about you go to sleep while we all record and eat? When they finish up- I’m going to cook some nice stew for you, it’ll be easy on your stomach.”

And Hyunjin obviously didn’t have the presence to argue, so he just sleepily nodded and slipped back into an uneasy sleep.

Felix and Changbin left the room, forcing their manager to stay back and keep watch over Hyunjin while he slept.

The next time Hyunjin woke up, it was to the smell of kimchi stew right next to his nose.

He blinked awake, the world rocking around him as he made eye contact with Chan holding the soup up to his face.

“I found a new way to wake you up,” he taunted, “do you think that you can sit up?”

It took some effort, but eventually they got him into a seated position. The world tilted on its axis around him, but he remained steady as Chan carefully spooned the soup over to him. Off to the side, Hyunjin could see a camera rolling for SKZ code, so he sent the device a small smile and waved weakly over to it.

Chan paused when he realized the cameraman at the doorway, and frowned. “We’re a bit busy here,” he said pointedly, not appreciating one of his members being caught in a vulnerable moment. “Go away.”

The camera left, and Hyunjin thanked his Hyung so that he could lay back down and curl back under the covers.

“The video?” Hyunjin asked him, and Chan just signed.

“Don't worry about recording, we’ll handle it. Just focus on feeling better, yeah?”

Hyunjin was already asleep again before he could agree.

The next time he woke up, his stomach was cramping furiously and he let out a shocked groan at the pain, writhing around to escape it.

“Jin?” A worried voice asked, and when Hyunjin managed to crack his eyes open, Jeongin was looking down at him in concern. A wet rag had fallen from his forehead and somewhere down onto the floor.

Outside, the light was dimming, telling Hyunjin that it was sunset.

The medicine must have knocked him out pretty well.

He didn’t need to throw up anymore, but his stomach still cramped excruciatingly.

“We’re done recording for the night,” Jeongin answered Hyunjin’s unasked question, then furrowed his eyebrows. “Are you in pain?”

Hyunjin grunted affirming and squeezed his eyes shut, curling even more into the fetal position.

“Okay, hold tight. I’ll see if we have any Advil anywhere.”

Hold tight, Hyunjin did.

Barely ten minutes later, the weight of the couch was shifting and Hyunjin opened his eyes to see Felix sitting on the edge of it with Chan sitting on the coffee table. They both looked like they had a fun day recording.

“Innie said you were in pain?”

“Stomach,” Hyunjin confirmed Chan’s question.

Felix hummed lowly as he reached a hand out to move the heating pad. Hyunjin missed the comfort and pressure, but when Felix replaced it with his own hand, he felt so much better.

“Is this okay?” Felix asked, and Hyunjin Took Felix’s wrist and held it in place as an answer.

Felix laughed under his breath, tucking his hand underneath Hyunjin’s shirt to knead at his lower stomach and massage the pain out.

Chan shoved a straw past Hyunjin’s dry and cracked lips, ordering him to take small sips.

He fell asleep to the gentle soothing from the others.

He would never go fishing again- really.

Chapter Text

Jisung had never felt so scared in his entire life. Not when he slipped and fell on his ass in front of the entire audience, and not when he was surrounded by people at the airport and they wouldn’t stop crowding him.

It was dark outside, and while Changbin and Chan had stayed extra late at the studio to work on their last track, Jisung went back to the dorms and claimed that they were psychopaths who loved pain and sleep deprivation.

When he entered the dorm, toeing his shoes off with a heavy sigh, he expected for Hyunjin to pop his head out of his room and give him a sweet smile and a “welcome home!” But it was utterly silent.

Jisung took that as a sign to stay silent and not announce his presence as he gently set the keys down on the counter.

Jisung quickly snickered and snapped a picture when he noticed Hyunjin asleep on the couch, curled up and drooling on the pillow. It wasn’t unheard of to find him out by the couch, but Jisung knew that if he woke him up now- he wouldn’t budge at all.

Instead of trying to drag Hyunjin back to his room because he was tired himself- he just reached over Hyunjin to grab the remote balanced precariously In his loose grip to turn the TV off and slink back to his room and plop down on his bed.

An hour later, his room was pitch black.

Almost too dark for Jisung to make out the shadow that stood next to his bed.

He rolled over on his side with a grunt and then noticed his cracked open door that he had definitely closed when he went to bed.

Then, he noticed the figure looming over him and promptly let out a very unmanly scream as he threw the blanket back and scooted his back against the wall.

“Hello?” He asked, still half asleep as he reached over to flick his lamp on, and when the soft light filled the room-

“-Oh, it’s you. Hyunjin, why in the hell are you just watching me like that?”

Instead of answering him, Hyunjin simply swayed on his feet and stared down at him with half lidded eyes. Jisung furrowed his eyebrows and snapped in Hyunjin’s face.

“Hello? Earth to Hyunjin?”

Still no reply.

Hyunjin’s eyes were still half closed, but staring straight ahead of Jisung like he was seeing through him instead of what was right in front of him.

“Are you asleep?” He asked stupidly, and it wasn’t like he had ever expected an answer, so he just continued to talk to himself as he slid out of bed, his blankets falling to the floor. “Yah- are you so exhausted that you’re walking around in your sleep?”

He continued to chide Hyunjin as he pushed Hyunjin down the hall and back towards his room to plop him back down onto his own bed.

“Now stay there,” he instructed, even if Hyunjin was already snoring. “No more sneaking into my room, you creep.”

It was one of the rare nights where they had time off from their schedule to relax and decompress after a harsh comeback.

They were all achy and sore, so it was only natural for them to all collect onto their large sectional couch to play a drama that they had all been meaning to watch.

As expected- Chan, Changbin, and Jisung surrendered to sleep only half an episode in, dark circles pronounced under their eyes because they stayed up late at the studio for too many nights in a row.

“Should we wake them?” Jeongin asked, and after Chan let out a particularly loud snore, Minho shook his head and played the next episode.

“No, just let them sleep.”

Hyunjin was still next to Felix, his chest rising and falling at an even pace with his head propped up against Felix’s shoulder. Felix had thought he was asleep- all the way up until he sleepily stumbled up from Felix’s arms and into the connected kitchen.

“Hyunjin!” Jeongin called over his shoulder, “will you make me a glass of water please!”

Hyunjin was gone for their youngest- and normally he’d reply with a loud ‘of course, Innie!’ But after a full beat of silence, there was no response.

“Hyung?” Jeongin called again, just in case he didn’t hear him, but there was still no response.

Instead of badgering him anymore, Jeongin just shrugged and focused his attention back to the drama- and the interaction went to the back of Felix’s mind all the way up until he realized that it had been ten whole minutes and Hyunjin still hasn't returned.

“Hyunjin? Are you still in the kitchen?” He asked, low voice reverberating through the dorm, and still got no response.

Worried, Felix slipped off of the couch and right into the kitchen, Minho silently on his trail.

The kitchen light was off, and Felix turned it on in confusion as to why it was off in the first place, only to see Hyunjin standing in front of the fridge with a half full carton of milk hanging from his fingertips.

The milk would have fallen from his lax grip if it hadn’t been for Minho diving to catch it in time.

“Hyunjin, watch it,” Minho warned as he took the milk from his hands and placed it back in its rightful place. Felix frowned in confusion because he knew that Hyunjin was clumsy- but instead of responding, he just leaned forward to rest his cheek against the refrigerator with his eyes closed.

“Jinnie? Are you sick?” He asked, brushing back Hyunjin’s bangs to check his temperature.

It wasn’t warmer than normal.

Minho turned back to them, took one glance at Hyunjin, and decided. “He’s asleep on his feet .”

“Oh,” Felix intelligently replied, pulling his hand away and Hyunjin unconsciously chased after his warmth. “He’s that exhausted?”

Minho shrugged, “maybe. But sometimes people just sleepwalk too. It could be a mixture of things.”

“Well, let’s get you back to the couch, yeah?” Felix aimed the question to Hyunjin, and he hadn’t actually expected an answer- but he did get one.

“Mmm, yes Lix.”

Felix’s face brightened as he grabbed onto Hyunjin’s elbow, Minho taking the other to help lead him.

“Ah, so you’re talking to me? Even in your sleep? How sweet, Jinnie.” He smiled, the freckles on his cheeks creasing with the movement as they entered the living room.

The only other response he got was a hum as he and Minho delivered Hyunjin down onto the couch. He immediately shuffled down right back to Felix’s side.

“We found him trying to make a glass of milk,” Minho announced at Jeongin and Seungmin’s confused look- “but he was asleep.”

Seungmin nodded slowly, “I can see that.”

Jeongin crossed his arms, “but he didn’t make me a glass of water?”

From on Felix’s shoulder, Hyunjin’s breath puffed against the junction of his neck as he slurred out a small ‘sorry.’

Felix scoffed at the youngest. “Look what you did! He’s sad now.”

“…he’s asleep.”

“Shush,” Felix gently covered Hyunjin’s exposed ear. “He can hear you.”

And Hyunjin just grumbled sleepily and drooled some more onto his neck.

It was like Changbin won the lottery, because for their SKZ episode they were at a vacation home and split into pairs for their room.

Of course- he was over the moon when he won Hyunjin as a roommate, and on camera Hyunjin Whined and complained about Changbin’s clinginess and denied his advances- but off camera, he was just as happy to be sharing a room.

They didn’t have bunks, just one queen sized bed, but they made it work between them, because they always did.

Changbin always took the spot closest to the door because he liked being close to the exit, and Hyunjin took the other side because he was opposite way and didn’t like being by the exit (and closer to the charging port.) so it worked out perfectly.

“Are you ready for the lights to go off, Jin?” Changbin asked as he adjusted the propped up camera on the nightstand. Hyunjin, from his curled up position under the duvet, gave him a sleepy thumbs up.

Another good thing about them was that Changbin always kicked off the blankets in the middle of the night because he got too hot, and Hyunjin stole them away.

Like a perfect symbiotic relationship.

Except for when Changbin was startled awake in the middle of the night to Hyunjin abruptly sitting up fast enough to shake the entire bed.

Changbin blinked sleepily, smacking his lips as he rolled around onto his back to see Hyunjin sitting up in bed.

At first, he assumed that he just needed to use the restroom, but when he remained seated, he quickly grew concerned. “Jinnie?” He asked, voice raspy with sleep as he groggily sat up. “Did you have a nightmare?”

Instead of actually saying something back like a normal person, Hyunjin stared down at him with unseeing eyes.

“Are you possessed?” Changbin asked, sleep quickly leaving his body to be replaced with fear. Hyunjin said something under his breath, but it was inaudible, so Changbin leaned in to better hear him. “Come again?”

“Kimchi stew,” he slurred, and Changbin tried his best to cover his mouth and hide the loud cackle. In his sleep, Hyunjin pouted like he knew that Changbin was laughing at his expense. “Kimchi,” he replied, this time more adamantly.

“Okay, fine”, Changbin relented, placing a hand on Hyunjin’s chest to carefully push him back down onto the bed. “I’m sure Minho can make you some nice Kimchi stew in the morning, hmm?”

Hyunjin dreamily sighed as he curled back up under the covers, pressing his cold nose right into Changbin’s neck.

That’s what he got for teasing him, he supposed.

It was around midnight when Chan’s phone buzzed with a text message. He tore his eyes away from his computer screen to slip the phone out of his sweatpants pocket. Normally he left it on silent when he worked- but it was already midnight, and no one should have been texting him at midnight anyway.

Changbin and Jisung already left a while ago, so it was just him in the studio.

He glanced at his phone screen.

Minho: We just ended dance rehearsals- me and Felix left Hyunjin asleep on the couch, and we wanted to let him get some extra sleep. Will you take him home with you on the way out?

Chan leaned back in his seat and sighed.

Chan: That was a late practice

Minho: Me and Felix had duet work to do, but he stayed back to watch us and fell asleep on the couch.

Chan; I’ll scoop him up on my way out. Should be about an hour.

An hour turned into an hour and a half because Chan became absorbed with his work, and the next time he looked at a clock, it was half past one. He should have been back at the dorms by now.

He cursed as he quickly gathered his belongings, shoving his laptop into his bag before turning the lights off and locking the studio door behind him.

Luckily, the dance room was only a floor above the personal studios, so it didn’t take him long to get to the reserved dance studio with ‘stray kids’ on the door. He loudly pushed the door open and flicked on the light, because he knew that it took nothing short of an atomic bomb to wake Hyunjin up.

Except- when he looked over to the couch, it was empty.

There was the imprint of a body on it, telling Chan that someone had been laying on the cushions, but Hyunjin was nowhere to be found.

Chan huffed in confusion as he took the phone from his bag and dialed Felix’s number because he was sure that Minho probably fell asleep right when he got back to the dorm, and Felix liked to stay up late and play video games.

Felix answered after the third ring, the sound of remote control clicking in the background as he greeted Chan. “Chan? Did you get back to your dorm safe?”

Chan gave the room one last cursitory scan. “Hey Lix… you said that you left Hyunjin on the couch? In our practice room?”

“…Yes?” Felix replied, slowly, like Chan was a child. “He was sleeping like a baby when we left. We even turned the lights off.”

Chan scratched at the back of his head.

“Well, about that…”

Chan could hear Felix drop the controller on the other end of the line, his video game pausing. “He’s not there…?”

“Nope.”

“Should I come over-“

“-No, try and go to sleep, Felix. He probably just headed back to the dorm early, but I’ll call you when I find him. Bye now.”

He ended the phone call before Felix could start his worried rambling, shouldering his bag and locking the dance room before taking the elevator down to the first floor.

He was sure that he already headed back to the dorms and was showering, or else he would have answered one of the multiple phone calls that Chan gave him.

Except-

He spotted a familiar figure in the lobby on his way down. The desk person had already signed out and security was napping at the desk instead. Very unimpressive, but Chan just ignored security as he approached Hyunjun through the dim lighting.

“Hyunjin, were you waiting for me-“ he immediately cut himself off, because when Hyunjin turned around at his voice, his eyes were glazed over and there was a string of drool on his bottom lip.

Chan sighed, “…you’re not even awake, are you?”

His answer was a sleepy noise as he slightly tilted forward. “Oh- okay,” Chan caught his shoulders before he could tip over onto the ground. “Hyunjin? Can you hear me?”

Hyunjin let a sleepy groan into the fabric of Chan’s jumper, but didn’t even try to move away from his chest. He was dead asleep.

“Alright- let’s go back to the dorm, yeah?”

Chan was glad that he had started to work out more often with Changbin, because it was at least a little easier to lug Hyunjin onto his back.

His legs were long and almost brushed against the floor as they walked, but Chan kept a good grip on his thighs as Hyunjin’s head rolled onto his shoulder.

“You owe me one,” Chan grumbled, blowing a strand of Hyunjin’s dark hair away from his sleeping face.

Even if he really didn’t owe him anything.

Chapter Text

Hyunjin had an overwhelming fear of needles, and that much was obvious with his band mates. Luckily- none of their fans had caught on to his fear because there was no need for anyone to approach him on stage or in a SKZ code episode with a needle.

So it remained a well guarded secret between their group and their managers.

And they all forgot about it until the beginning of winter rolled around and they were all due for their flu shots. Luckily, the other vaccines they were obligated to receive were every other year while the flu shots were every winter.

And when Hyunjin got his schedule for the week to see that all eight of them were slotted to take turns getting their shots Friday morning, anxiety settled in his gut, sinking down like an anchor in a turbulent sea.

He spent the entire rest of the week walking on eggshells around the others. They didn’t have a crazy busy week since they were between comebacks, but Hyunjin would have preferred to be busy rather than actually having time to think about things.

Because the more he thought, the sicker he felt.

“Hey man, are you alright?” Changbin asked him the day before, when he was staring down at the dinner that Minho had made for all of them.

“I’m fine,” he replied, voice sounding devoid even to himself. “Just not too hungry.”

Minho narrowed his cat-like eyes as he watched Hyunjin toy with the chopsticks. “You aren’t hungry.”

Hyunjin avoided his eyes, slightly guilty. “…no?”

Chan looked perplexed, “are you feeling okay?”

In all honesty, he wasn’t in the slightest, but he just nodded anyway.

The movement made him want to throw up, so he stood- his chair sliding back against the floor- as he bowed politely at Minho. “Thank you for the food, but I’m tired, I need to get some sleep.”

He left the room with little fanfare, the others watching his back as he disappeared down the hallway.

“He’s acting weird,” Seungmin pointed out, pretty unhelpfully because all of them had noticed as much the second Minho called him out.

“No shit,” Jeongin said, mouth full of rice. Minho shot him a nasty look and pressed a napkin over his mouth to get him to stop talking with his mouth full.

“I don’t think he’s sick,” Jisung commented, the others looking at him in question as he thoughtfully chewed on his food. His cheeks were stuffed like a chipmunk, but they deflated when he swallowed his food. “I think he’s anxious.”

“Anxious?” Changbin questioned, “is Hyunjin known to have anxiety?”

“As far as I know, no, but I’ve noticed the way he’s been acting the past couple of days. He always bites his bottom lip when he’s nervous, and he’s been doing it a lot more recently.”

The table was silent for a few moments, Chan searching through his phone in a very uncharacteristic way because he never checked it at the table. He made a small noise of surprise, and then turned the phone screen for the rest of the group to see. “Do you guys see what tomorrow is?”

Jeongin’s slanted eyes widened comically and Felix gasped from next to him- in a way that would have been dramatic if the others didn’t share the same sentiment.

“Tomorrow morning we get our flu shots.”

It was always hard to wake Hyunjin up in the morning. He was the heaviest sleeper out of them and enjoyed resting the most, falling asleep in random places until someone finally forced him awake.

The moment he opens his eyes that morning to Seungmin shaking him awake- because Seungmin was always the one who was sacrificed to wake him up- he closed them again and simply rolled over.

“Stop acting like you can’t hear me!” Seungmin practically shouted, trying to tug the duvet off of Hyunjin that he had used to cover his face. If the others weren’t awake, then they were certainly awake by now.

Hyunjin groaned and rolled over some more, his bed hair spreading around his head like a lion's mane until Seungmin gave up and stomped out of the room. Maybe he had given up and he would leave him to sleep in peace and not get a flu shot.

It was wishful thinking, because not even ten minutes later, Chan was entering the room.

They brought in the big guns.

“Seungmin tattled on me?” Hyunjin’s morning voice cracked as he sleepily looked up at Chan who stood disapprovingly at the foot of the bed with his arms crossed.

Hyunjin squirmed a little under his gaze.

“Seungmin didn’t tattle on you, but we’re going to be late if you don’t get out of bed now. The car’s are already waiting downstairs.”

Oh.

Did they purposely let him sleep in?

It gave Hyunjin less time to think about all of the ways how this could possibly go wrong. Hyunjin did little work to get himself ready, only putting on the baggy clothes that Chan tossed at him, and when he stood up, Chan adjusted a bucket hat on top of his head and a mask on his face.

“Good?” He asked, patting at Hyunjin’s arms like he was dusting him off. The touch was welcome, but it also felt like fire under his skin.

“Mhm,” Hyunjin nodded.

“Good, let’s go then.”

Chan smiled at him in a proud way before grabbing him by the elbow to lead him out of the apartment and to the elevators.

The entire drive to their private doctors office was spent with Hyunjin contemplating every single life choice he had made to lead up to this. If he hadn’t become an idol- wouldn’t have had to sign a contract that made him get vaccinations, and he could have holed himself up in an apartment from society.

He was shoved in the back between Felix and Changbin so that there would be no escape when they all got out of the car, hooking their arms on either side of his elbows and practically dragging him up to the door.

“We’re here,” Jeongin announced, much too happy, and opened the door for them to guide Hyunjin inside. He was slightly glad that they decided to manhandle him for some reason because his legs felt like jello, and he would have looked like a newborn deer trying to walk all on his own.

The waiting room was empty, since they scheduled to have personal appointments an hour before the clinic actually opened. Hyunjin felt less embarrassed when they plopped him down onto the chair and there were no strangers to see him shaking when a doctor entered the room with a clipboard.

She politely greets them with a bow and Hyunjin could only find it in himself to give her a small head tilt as a hello because it felt like his insides were liquifying at the sight of her stark white coat.

“Hello, who should I take back first?”

Everyone’s eyes immediately fell on Hyunjin, and he shook his head wildly because if anyone tried to take him back to that room right now, he would sink his heels into the tile and cry-

“I’ll go,” Chan offered, like the wonderful leader he was. Hyunjin almost teared up because at the angle he was sitting at- Chan looked like a Divine god who had just taken a bullet for him. “Let’s go in age order.”

Despite going in age order, they skipped right past Hyunjin without question, never gone for more than ten minutes to the back room (torture chambers) where they got their shots. They all exited with cute dinosaur band aids on their elbows and big smiles

There was no possible way that anyone could be so happy after receiving a shot.

Even if the dinosaur band aids did look pretty dope.

Jeongin entered the room with a big thumbs up to the others, and the doctor clicked her keyboard with her pen before making direct eye contact with him. “Hwang Hyunjin? It looks like your last.”

Hyunjin wanted to throw up.

Scratch that- he needed to throw up.

He scrambled from his seat, ignoring the others' cries and questioning shouts as he made a mad dash for the single family restroom, locking himself inside.

Almost immediately, there was knocking at the door and Hyunjin just curled in on himself and clamped a hand to his mouth.

“Hyunjin?” Chan asked, and there was more shuffling on the other side, the distinct female voice of the doctor-

“Is he sick?”

“-No…” Chan went to explain further, but Hyunjin didn’t hear it because his ears were ringing and he just wanted to cry and go home.

“Hyunjin?” Another voice- Felix’s - asked, “can you open the door for us please? If you don’t, we will have to open it ourselves. The doctor has a master key.”

Right.

Hyunjin needed to be an adult and get on his feet and open that door because he was being pitiful right now. The other members were probably so embarrassed by him.

But he did feel like a little kid.

He wanted to kick and scream against anyone who would even try to stick a needle into his skin.

But…

He was an adult and he would try to make a compromise.

“Hyunjin?” This time, Minho asked, so Hyunjin shuffled to his feet and cracked the door open just enough to see his groups concerned faces and the doctors standing in the background.

“I’ll come out,” he said, “but I don’t want to go alone.”

He didn’t want to get a shot by himself.

Changbins eyes gleamed with pride (because last time this happened, they actually had to bodily drag him into the doctor's office.) “yah- Hyunjin, we would never let you go alone. Which one of us do you want to head back-“

“-actually, Hyung,” Seungmin cut him off, looking regretful. “Some of us have schedules directly after this and need to leave now. There are cars outside.”

Hyunjin’s heart sank. Oh no.

He forgot that half of their group had an interview to go to, while later in the day, the other half of them had the same interview in different perspectives. Chan looked down to his phone to check the schedule and for one horrifying moment, Hyunjin thought that they would all leave him behind, but he looked back up.

“Okay. Seungmin, Jeongin, Jisung, and Changbin, you guys go ahead and get into the van. Me, Minho, and Felix will stay behind.”

Hyunjin was sad to see the others go, and Changbin left with a supportive kiss to his cheek, but he was at least happy that the others could stay to support him.

All the way until Minho and Chan had him trapped between them down the hallway, like they were leading him to an execution.

Felix gave him a sympathetic head pat when they sat their prisoner down onto the medical bench, the tarp crinkling ominously under his ass when he shifted uncomfortably.

“Hyunjin? What can we do?” Chan asked when he noticed how pale he had grown, along with the unsteady rise and fall of his chest.

Hyunjin let out a long, stuttered breath before he answered. “Sit by me?”

Felix, never one to deny a request, immediately scooted onto the bench to his side with Minho and Chan still standing diligently on either side of him. Felix rubbed circles into the small of his back as the doctor rolled a tray up to explain the process.

Even if her voice was just a background noise to his own panic, he absentmindedly nodded along and focused on Felix’s hand rubbing soothing patterns on him.

“You shouldn’t look,” Minho instructed, grabbing onto Hyunjin’s chin to tilt his face in the other direction once the doctor wrapped the rubber tourniquet on his upper arm so tight that he could barely feel the tips of his fingers.

The doctor said something, but Hyunjin didn’t hear it over the blood pumping in his ears, so he looked up at Minho helplessly.

“She said to clench your hand in and out of a fist,” he calmly instructed, and Hyunjin tried his best to follow his orders and listen to his voice.

He jumped slightly when something wet and cold touched his inner elbow, and instinctively tried to pull away, but Chan (on the other side of him) gently held his arm still by the shoulder. “She’s just cleaning the area,” he informed, and when Felix wrapped a hand to press down onto the nape of Hyunjin’s neck, he was forced to relax.

“Focus on your breathing,” Minho said, the same way he did when he was leading Jisung through a panic attack. “In and out, try square breathing.”

So Hyunjin did, inhaling for four, holding his breath for another four, and then exhaling for four until he felt the tip of a needle press into the crook of his elbow and he was panicking even more.

“No-“ he whined, and he would have been embarrassed at the noise if he hadn’t felt so desperate in that moment to get out. He couldn’t move though, because Chan’s warm hands were on his upper arm like a betrayal.

Hyunjin’s breath hitched some more and he let out a panicked groan from deep in his chest. He couldn’t help but wrench his head away from Minho’s grip to look at the needle embedded in his skin.

And suddenly, he felt very lightheaded.

“Shush, don’t look,” Felix cupped a hand over his eyes and led Hyunjin’s head to rest on his chest, and he tried his best to focus on Felix’s fingers carding through his hair, but he couldn’t when suddenly his whole body felt numb and his mouth was full of cotton.

“-Jin?” A lighter voice- Chan- asked, but he was already too far gone because his hearing was muffled and his eyes were rolling to the back of his skull.

When Hyunjin went limp in Felix’s arms, he cursed and secured a tight grip by hooking his arms under his armpits. “I think he passed out,” he informed as the doctor slipped the needle out of Hyunjin’s elbow and replaced it with cotton and a band aid. It wasn’t a dinosaur one, because the only ones they had left were the hello kitty ones.

“That’s alright,” the nurse informed, “let’s lay him down into the recovery position so that he can come back to us quicker. Are you good if I leave for a second to grab him some water?”

“Yes, go ahead,” Chan waved her away absentmindedly, because he was too busy grabbing one of Hyunjin’s shoulders to help Felix lower him down on the bed.

His head limply lolled back as his hair spanned out behind him like a halo, and Minho then rolled him over to his side into the fetal position.

“You’ll be okay,” Felix assured, rubbing circles into Hyunjin’s ankle while Minho wetted a cloth and dabbed it onto Hyunjin’s clammy forehead.

“Take your time coming back to us,” he instructed, and Hyunjin groaned before cracking open half lidded eyes. “Welcome back.”

Hyunjin groaned again, his tongue poking out from his mouth to moisten his dry lips. Like he didn’t want to be back.

“Did I do it?” He asked, wincing hazily at the doctor office lights above his head.

“Yes, Jin,” Felix patted his sweatpants clad thigh, “yes you did. Good work.”

The doctor returned back to the room, passing a cup with water to Chan when he reached for it, along with a sugary mint. He thanked her before saddling in beside Hyunjin and offering the straw.

“Thanks,” Hyunjin grumbled as he started to suck on the straw. Chan dutifully unwrapped the candy and plopped it into Hyunjin’s mouth, letting it dissolve under his tongue.

They stayed like that until Hyunjin felt alive enough for Minho to help him up into a sitting position, albeit leaning slightly against him.

“Hyunjin?” Chan asked, making Hyunjin look up curiously from Minho’s shoulder. “How would you feel about canceling the rest of your schedule for the day to stay at the dorm and watch movies with us? We can eat a nice meal, too. Something with a lot of meat.”

Hyunjin’s mouth practically watered at the idea of a relaxing day off with the others, and he was so exhausted that he couldn’t even feel guilty at the thought of rescheduling the interview for another day.

“Yes Hyung, that sounds nice.”

Chan hummed and put the phone up to his ear to make a phone call to their manager. He walked out the door, and Minho and Felix helped Hyunjin up to his feet.

The movement caused Hyunjin to get a good look at his elbow, and his plump lips formed into a small, dopey, smile.

“I like my band aid.”

Chapter Text

Hyunjin didn’t get sick pretty often, so when he did- it got pretty bad.

It was in the middle of their concert schedule when he woke up one night to an achy body and chills. He had spent most of the night tossing and turning, kicking the blanket off of him and then pulling it back up when he got too cold because he couldn’t regulate his temperature for the life of him.

He probably annoyed Jisung who shared the bed with them, since their hotel apparently didn’t have two beds available, but Jisung didn’t seem to mind and never once told Hyunjin to hold still. Small wins.

When he sluggishly cracked his eyes open early in the morning, (so early that it was still dark outside) at first he thought it was because he was having a hot flash again, but then he registered his stomach crawling all the way up his throat as he gagged.

Hyunjin quickly tumbled to the floor in an attempt to get to his feet, the blanket tangling around his limbs to bring him crashing to the tile. The sudden weight against his stomach caused Hyunjin to gag some more as the nausea roiled in his gut.

“Hyunjin?” Jisung’s sleepy voice asked as he sat up in bed, but Hyunjin didn’t have the energy to tell him why he had fallen to the floor because he was too busy desperately clamping a hand over his mouth as he hiccuped. He untangled himself from the blankets and made a mad dash to the restroom.

The next ten minutes of his life was spent desperately clawing at a toilet lid as he emptied dinner from his stomach. His knees bruised with the force he had fallen to the floor with and he groaned miserably as he choked on his own vomit.

Eventually, Jisung sleepily padded into the restroom, turning on the light and settling on the floor beside Hyunjin to pull his sweaty hair out of his face and rub circles into his back. “It’ll be okay,” he grumbled, “just let it out, yeah?”

Even if Jisung had never seen Hyunjin this sick before- at least, not seriously sick- he tried his best not to be too anxious as he helped Hyunjin through his bout of vomit until he was just dry heaving.

Finally, when Hyunjin’s stomach felt empty enough that he couldn’t possibly throw up anymore, he leaned back against the glass shower door with a low groan.

Jisung was immediately kneeling in-front of him, brushing back his sweaty bangs to place a hand on his forehead. He winced and pulled back as Hyunjin just sat there with his eyes squeezed shut, panting like a dog.

“You definently have a fever. Stay right here.”

Jisung highly doubted that Hyunjin would be going anywhere anyway, but he still made sure to keep an eye on him in case he passed out as he ruffled through the medical kit that Chan always made sure they kept in their bags.

His hands shook as he shuffled around the medical kit for a thermometer, and when he finally found it and returned to Hyunjin, his eyes were closed and his head was lolling downwards.

“No no no, stay awake for just a bit longer,” Jisung instructed as he forced Hyunjin’s head back up by the chin. He winced when he noticed the saliva that coated his bottom lip.

Jisung lightly patted Hyunjin’s cheek until he groaned and cracked his eyes back open.

“Good job, just stay awake so I can make sure you’re, like, not about to die or something.”

It probably wasn’t the best thing to say to a sick person, but Hyunjin didn’t even seem to hear him as Jisung made quick work of pressing the thermometer under his tongue, and then carefully cleaned the drool from Hyunjin’s lips with the edge of his sweatshirt.

And the moment that the thermometer beeped and revealed his temperature, Jisung was fumbling with his phone to text Chan to get to their room. Chan was way more well versed in taking care of a sick person than Jisung was, and he was probably still awake looking over their concert videos for things to fix.

That was just how he was.

“101.7 isn’t as high as I thought it would be,” Jisung grumbled as he took the thermometer away and slid the cap back on, “but still not good, Hyung.”

Hyunjin just nodded, because he was tired and he wanted to go to sleep but Jisung kept talking his ear off until Chan showed up at their door with medical supplies, as requested.

“What happened?” He immediately asked when Jisung led him to the restroom, “did someone get hurt? Did you slice your finger open again-“

“No, hyung, it’s not me you have to worry about,” Jisung said sheepishly, pushing past the door. He had been in too much of a rush to elaborate what specifically was wrong over text, probably scaring the shit out of his leader with his vagueness.

“How high is his fever?” Chan asked, the moment he spotted Hyunjin slumped against the glass shower door.

“101.7,” Jisung replied immediately, reaching out to flush the toilet of vomit to at least try and preserve Hyunjin’s dignity by a little. “He woke up vomiting, barley made it to the restroom.”

Chan sighed as he knelt next to Hyunjin and pulled out a cold compress from his bag, holding it against his forehead. Hyunjin immediately let out a sigh of relief and leaned into the touch.

“He’s probably overworked himself,” he supplied, “if he had a stomach bug, all of us would by now.”

If he had any type of viral sickness- they would all have it by now.

Hyunjin had overworked himself on quite a few occasions to fainting- but never to running a fever. “What do we do?” He asked Chan helplessly as the elder pulled out fever reducers.

“Make a glass of water for him. You can go to sleep, and I’ll keep an eye on him to keep him hydrated until the morning. We’ll assess his condition then to decide whether or not he can perform in the concert tomorrow, but I think a good night of rest will do wonders.”

Jisung shifted on the floor, uncomfortable by the hardness of it. “Is there anything you need help with?”

Chan took a second to hum in thought, “hmmm, grab his other arm and help me to his bed. Then get some water bottles. They should be stocked in the mini fridge.”

Together, they worked on lugging Hyunjin back to his bed, and even when he shivered, they didn’t tuck him in because he was sweating buckets. Jisung quietly gathered the water and set them on the bedside table while Chan sat on the edge of the bed and rolled the compress onto the colder side.

Hyunjin immediately fell to sleep upon falling to the mattress.

“Is there anything else you need, hyung?”

Chan didn’t even look up from where he was uncapping a water bottle to tip it slightly and wet Hyunjin’s chapped lips. “No, I’m just going to stay here and make sure he stays hydrated. You can go and take my bed, I’m in the next room over to the right with Felix. He won’t care if you take the bed.”

When Jisung slid into the other side of the bed with Felix, Felix just rolled over and sleepily wrapped his arms around Jisung. Which, in the end, he needed because he was a bit keyed up after seeing Hyunjin throw his guts up in the toilet.

“Jisung?” Felix asked into the back of his neck as a question.

“Hyunjin’s sick and Chan’s looking after him for the night. Sorry I’m replacing him.”

“‘S fine,” Felix mumbled sleepily.

Jisung just huffed and patted his arm. “Go back to sleep, Lix.”

As promised, Chan stood by Hyunjin’s bedside for the rest of the night and made him drink water every other hour until his fever lowered.

By the time morning rolled around, Hyunjin felt dehydrated and dead on his feet despite how much water Chan force fed him, and he threw that up too until he was finally able to hold down a solid bowl of soup for breakfast.

“Your fever broke,” Chan noted, taking the thermometer away from Hyunjin’s lips when it beeped. The morning light flickered through the room in the rectangular shape of the blinds, and Hyunjin looked up at Chan Hopefully.

“If my fevers gone, I can still perform tonight?”

Chan leaned back against the headboard of the bed as Hyunjin looked at him Hopefully from under the blankets.

“I think you should sit this one out,” he finally admitted, “that way you can be fully recovered for the next one.”

Hyunjin sighed and sniffed down into a dejected way, looking up at Chan with his puppy eyes because he knew that Chan could never resist them.

Finally, he relented and reached for his phone, “fine, but on a few conditions.”

Hyunjin innocently blinked up at him like he hadn’t seen the image of him gagging over the toilet a few hours ago. “Of course Hyung, I’ll do anything.”

“Fine, then i'm going to call a medic in here to see if they can give you some IV fluids and a few Covid test. And then from there, if you’re negative and feeling better and can actually hold a meal down, I’ll let you attend tech rehearsal.”

“And if I do well at the tech rehearsal, I can perform?”

Chan nodded as an answer, absentmindedly running his fingers through Hyunjin’s fever sweaty hair. He scrunched his nose in disgust. “You need to take a shower.”

Hyunjin groaned in embarrassment, reaching behind him for a pillow to hit Chan with.

In the end, even if Hyunjin felt like shit- he was able to perform.

Chan had quarantined him from the rest of the group until he took two Covid tests that both came back negative, and then, just to be safe, a flu test. It also came back negative.

After that, Felix apologetically led the doctor into thr hotel room, and it was a good thing that Hyunjin was too exhausted from puking all night to cry too much when the IV was placed into his vein. (Well, he did cry and panic, but Felix was there and Felix always knew how to get his mind off of needles by hugging him and massaging circles into his shoulders that nearly knocked him right out back to dream land.)

In the end, he followed all of Chan’s rules and even stayed cooped up in his room to sleep for the rest of the day until the manager collected him and drove him over to the venue for the tech rehearsal. (Apparently, everyone had gone an hour ahead of him to get started early and let him sleep in.)

Yet- he still felt like shit.

He managed to get through the tech rehearsal with his hoodie and sweatpants making him sweat far too much, trying his best to smile at the fans who paid for early seating.

He tripped once, and that was enough to warrant a worried look from Chan and a reprimand from Minho, but not enough to take him off of the roster to perform, thankfully. (He had Felix go over the move with him after, just to make sure he actually knew it and it wasn’t just because he was lightheaded.)

During their hour break in between the tech rehearsal, the manager and the band forced him to take a nap on the couch. He thought he wouldn’t be able to fall asleep, since he had slept nearly all day, but he could feel the fever threatening to bubble under his skin again and he was exhausted.

Thirty minutes before the show, Changbin gestured to the couch. “Should we wake him up?”

Luckily, Chan had convinced the makeup noonas to do Hyunjin’s makeup while he was sleeping on the couch.

He looked all dolled up, laying down and snoring (because his nose was stuffed) with long eyelashes and some blush on his pale face. The makeup noona pulled away from him, blowing on his face and poking at his cheekbone. Despite the rough treatment and prodding, he didn’t even twitch.

“Yeah,” Chan decided, “he needs to get his clothes on and some Gatorade in his system before he goes up anyway.”

“Should I make some ramen?” Felix offered, wiggling the pack in his hands.

“He probably shouldn’t eat too much before he goes on,” Chan denied, “maybe share half of it with him.”

Felix nodded, scurrying off to microwave the meal leaving Changbin to deal with waking up a very grumpy Hyunjin.

He didn’t talk to any of them, only blinking the sleep from his eyes as Changbin guided him to a chair and forced him to drink electrolytes while the hair noonas messed with his hair. Luckily, they put it in a half bun, his favorite hairstyle so maybe he’d be a little less grumpy.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Changbin questioned at the sight of Hyunjin. “You look…”

“Dead on your feet,” Felix chimed, and Hyunjin squinted his eyes to give them a little pout. Felix, as a peace offering, held out a bowl of noodles. “Food?”

Ultimately, he only ate a few bites before he pulled away with pursed lips, like he was about to throw up, and Changbin was about to just call the whole thing off and tell Chan to get over here and help him strong arm Hyunjin out of the performance clothes and makeup to take home-

But the bells were ringing backstage and the managers were calling places to them, leaving Changbin no choice but to keep a subtle and steady hand on the small of Hyunjin’s back to guide him to his starting spot.

Hyunjin didn’t know how he lasted the entire performance. He was dead on his feet the entire time he was on stage, waving and smiling while ignoring the nausea bubbling in his gut. A few times, he discreetly ran off stage to gag a few times around the helpless tech crew before getting back on stage.

Occasionally, Minho or the others would push and tug him to a correct formation on the stage.

And whenever it came to the portion of the show where they were supposed to toss their water to the audience, Chan forced him to sit on the side of the stage and drink it instead.

His vision blurred on multiple occasions as the thrumming of the music worsened his headache, and in the end, Hyunjin was glad he decided not to eat much before the concert or he would have thrown up all over his beloved audience members.

During their goodbye announcements Hyunjin leaned heavily into Jeongin’s side, and while STAY would misconstrue it as his normal clinginess for his Makne, Jeongin was holding most of his weight up and sending him concerned looks.

By the time they all crowded off of the stage, the moment they were out of sight, Hyunjin’s legs gave out on him and hands were grabbing onto him to lift his limp body from the floor and all the way to the couch.

Hyunjin felt like he was floating- but that was probably because he was being carried.

The moment his exhausted body was set on the couch he was curling onto his side and gagging some more.

“Shit,” a voice said, and a container was placed under Hyunjin’s head as he vomited, undigested food landing into the container with a sickening splat that only made Hyunjin gag some more.

He was too exhausted to even hold himself up, so Changbin held his shaking body steady while Jisung freaked out in the background and Jeongin dutifully clipped his hair out of his face.

“Sorry,” Chan announced to the staff in the room, “can you please leave? We can handle the rest by ourselves.”

Chan, so thoughtful about keeping Hyunjin’s embarrassment between just the eight of them and not the staff and management.

“Seungmin, run and grab a medic and let them know what’s happening while I stay here and monitor.”

Seungmin ran off, taking Jisung with him, while the rest of the paced the room helplessly until Hyunjin finished throwing up and settled back down onto the couch. His chest heaved under the black tank top and sweat beaded his forehead.

Minho dabbed the sweat away, and when he felt his skin, he frowned. “His fever feels too high. We should have never let him perform in the first place.”

Before Chan could feel too guilty, the medic was entering the room with a banana bag to insert an IV. Hyunjin flinched when his fevered glazed eyes spotted the needle, but Minho just shushed him and blocked his eyesight until he fell back into an unrestful sleep.

They all watched anxiously over the medics shoulder as he performed tests on their passed out band mate until the medic pulled away. “He’s severely dehydrated and overworked. Take him home immediately to rest and take fever reducers as appropriate.”

Once the IV bag was drained and the medic left the room, Minho rolled his eyes and crossed his arms. “That guy was useless. He didn’t tell us anything we didn’t know.”

“Minho,” Chan warned, sounding weary. “We can focus on that later, now, we need to get him back to the hotel and watch over him.”

They argued over who got to ride in the same car as Hyunjin, and ultimately, Jisung, Felix, and Chan won with Jisung and Chan in the middle row and Hyunjin laid down in Felix’s lap in the back. Luckily, their driver didn’t mention anything about Hyunjin’s state.

Felix spent the entire time during the ride holding still and occasionally monitoring over Hyunjin’s condition, so he was focused when Hyunjin twisted his head to look up at Felix with half lidded eyes.

“Jinnie?” He asked, pushing back a stubborn strand of hair that fell out of his hair clip. “Are you with me?”

Hyunjin squinted up at him, like it took his boiling brain a solid few seconds to determine who was speaking to him. “Where… where are we?”

“In the car,” Felix answered calmly. “We’re going back to the hotel. You did such a good job at the concert, Jin. We called a medic-“

At the word ‘medic’ Hyunjin immediately stiffened in his lap and started to struggle to sit up and curl himself all the way on the other side of the car. “No ‘ospital,” he muttered, over and over again until it became louder and he was curled into a shaking ball.

Felix watched, his hands held out a few feet in front of him as Chan and Jisung turned back to them. “What’s wrong?” Jisung asked, his eyes glowing under the passing streetlights with concern.

“I don’t think he’s fully… with us,” Felix answered breathlessly, “he’s delirious right now. I think his fever spiked.”

Chan, who was in the seat directly in front of Hyunjin, reached back to gently place a hand on Hyunjin’s shivering shoulder. Hyunjin immediately reeled away from the contact and looked up at him with painfully confused eyes.

“I’m sorry,” Chan pulled back, and Felix was sure that he was probably uncomfortable with the new position, his ass in the air so that he could look backwards at Hyunjin. He was sure that their driver had a great view. “I’m sorry, I won’t touch you. Do you know where you are?”

As a particularly bright streetlight passed, Hyunjin’s face looked deathly ashen underneath it compared to the red flush of his neck and cheeks. “Car?” He finally said, and Felix nodded.

“Right, yeah, we’re going to a hotel so that you can sleep?”

And Hyunjin looked hopeful at that, “sleep?”

“Yes, sleep. Your body needs some good rest Jinnie. How does a nice soft bed sound?”

Felix wasn’t used to talking to his members like they were children, but Hyunjin was so out of it at the moment and looked so confused that he couldn’t help himself. Especially not when Hyunjin pulled the pouty lips that he always did.

“Come here,” Felix opened his arms invitingly, and Chan and Jisung watched from the front as Hyunjin slowly scooted closer.

Right when Hyunjin was about to curl into his arms, Hyunjin gagged and immediately covered his mouth.

“Shit,” Jisung cursed, “he’s gonna throw up. Does anyone have a bag or something?”

Apparently, no one did because they were still frantically looking for something that Hyunjin could throw up in by the time he was gagging.

“There’s no time,” Felix decided, putting a hand on the back of Hyunjin’s neck and gently guiding him forward so that he would throw up on the floorboard.

Hyunjin’s gags turned into full on vomiting, and while the asshole driver yelled back at them, Chan yelled right back at him while Jisung reached over the seat to hold Hyunjin’s hair back so that Felix could keep a steady grip on his shoulders.

“It’s okay Jinnie, just cough it up and you’ll feel better.”

Hyunjin whimpered between each gag.

By the time Hyunjin was finally done, Chan and the driver were still going at it while Felix was shushing Hyunjin and pulling him close to his chest.

“‘M sorry,” Hyunjin weakly brought a hand up to clamp down on the fabric of Felix’s shirt. Like a newborn baby and their iron grip. “I didn’t… didn’ mean to. This ‘is embarrassing.”

“Don’t be,” Felix reassured as the car slowed to a stop in the parking garage of their hotel. It was blocked off by security, so the paparazzi were far out of sight. “You shouldn’t be embarrassed- I’m sure that Chan Hyung is going to sue the driver for not having any barf bags on hand anyways.”

Because that sounded like something that Chan would do- only for the expense of his members.

He was still exchanging nasty words in English with the driver by the time Felix and Jisung managed to drag a stumbling Hyunjin out of the car and straight to the elevator. Chan barely managed to make it in time before the doors slid closed.

“‘M sorry,” Hyunjin blearily apologized again, like a broken record, and Chan just sighed heavily.

“Don’t be sorry, I shouldn’t have let you perform in such a state.” The leader moved closer to wipe the spit and vomit from Hyunjin’s chin, just like he had the previous night when he should have kept a closer eye on him.

Hyunjin leaned his head to the side to rest on Jisung’s head, his cheek smushing into his hair. “‘M tired.”

“I’m sure you are,” Jisung scoffed, but continued to let Hyunjin use him as a personal space heater all the way up to their floor. “Let’s get you into a shower, Minho will make some soup for you, and then we’ll all watch a movie together. How does that sound?”

Hyunjin’s lips tilted upwards into a smile that was lopsided because he really was only halfway conscious at the moment. “Sounds good.”

It took some manhandling and teamwork to get Hyunjin bathed. Then it took some even more elbow grease to get some fever reducer, fluid, and soup into his system, but by the time all was said and done, they picked a movie and settled down into the cramped hotel room made for two people.

Hyunjin barely made it ten minutes into the movie before he was snoring trapped between Changbin and Minho. Minho ran his nails over Hyunjin’s scalp in the way he liked and Changbin was warm, so he was done for the moment he sat down.

Chapter Text

Hyunjin loved most everything about Australia. The scenery was Divine, the animals were cute, Felix and Chan were happy, and the oceans were sparkly enough for him to get good pictures to sketch later. The only downside was that it was freakishly hot, especially during the summer.

The heat here was different than the heat in Korea- because it was heavy in the air and less thin, almost so thick that he could physically see the waves of it.

Chan and Felix immensely enjoyed it, especially running around with their tank tops, shorts, and flip flops on like they couldn’t do back at home because modesty was something held at too high of value, in Hyunjin’s opinion. In turn, the two Australians hated the cold of the winter since they were so accustomed to the heat, and Hyunjin thought it was a fair trade off.

If only they could all just regulate their body temperatures.

Hyunjin would like to visit the glaciers of Antarctica without freezing to death. Just so that he could paint them.

But it was summertime and Hyunjin was sweating his ass off in Australia because they were filming promotions at two of their members hometown for work before they start their tour.

Their schedule was a jam packed week full of fan meetings and blog filming for the official YouTube account. Since Chan’s family home was so large, his mother welcomed to accommodate all of them, and Hyunjin would rather sleep on an air mattress on the floor than an unfamiliar hotel room, if only to see Chan so happy at waking up with his family.

As usual, Hyunjin was the last one to wake up since their schedule didn’t demand them to wake up for an early fan meeting- not like yesterday's did. (It was outside and Hyunjin had sweat an embarrassing amount in his white tank top, luckily, Chan was sympathetic and offered him his workout top that was a little loose on him but black so that it hid his sweat stains.)

“Hyunjinnie!” An abrupt voice knocked him away from his peaceful sleep, “wake upppp!”

He simply rolled over, smacked his lips, and bruised himself further into the comforter he and Jisung had been forced to share. The warmth that Jisung offered him was no longer there, telling Hyunjin that he must have woken up a long time ago.

“Should we just leave him?” Another voice asked from above him, “he doesn't need breakfast. We’ll save him some.”

“Yah- he looks so cute, let’s just leave him.”

Luckily, in the end, they did let Hyunjin continue to snooze and catch up on his beauty sleep before Chan was shaking him awake with a plate of breakfast in hand. The aroma of eggs and bacon was enough to get Hyunjin to sleepily sit up as Chan just laughed fondly and placed the plate in his lap.

Hyunjin blinked his tired eyes open even more to see the sunlight filtering through the blinds of the empty living room they transformed into he and Jisung’s bedroom.

Chan sat at his bedside, nudging the food even further into his lap. “Are you so sleepy that you want me to feed you?”

Hyunjin just hummed sleepily, and he was sure that he looked a mess with his long hair in a bed head swollen face- but luckily he didn’t have any wired glasses marks on his face because when he fell asleep reading, Jisung plucked them off of his face for him so that he wouldn’t roll over and break them.

Hyunjin finally managed to wake himself up enough to throw on the clothes that Chan found in his suitcase (luckily, clothes that were well fit for the heat) wash his face, and brush his teeth before he was deemed presentable enough to enter the living area where people were already no doubt recording their blogs.

“Look, it’s our sleeping beauty!” Changbin pointed his camera directly in Hyunjin’s face, poking his puffy cheek. Hyunjin tried his best to give the camera a sleepy smile and wink In which Changbin squealed out a “cute!”

Felix was the next on him with a good morning greeting. He set the camera down and looked at Hyunjin, “can I do your hair for you?”

Hyunjin went bright red, because he already forgot about his massive bed head.

“Yeah, just don’t make me look ugly, please.”

Felix’s smile brightened and he turned his camera on, announcing to their stays that he was going to do Hyunjin’s hair as he pulled him to the couch to sit Hyunjin between his legs.

And as Chan’s family and the others all chatted in the background, occasionally laughing loudly, as they talked about their schedule for the day while Hyunjin lost himself to the feeling of Felix’s dexterous hands carding through his hair with a hair brush.

“I think he fell asleep,” Felix whispered to the camera with a low chuckle, startling Hyunjin to wakefulness when he shifted behind him. Hyunjin didn’t even realize that he had been leaning his back against his chest.

This weather was making him feel off- slightly drowsy and so hot that he could never get cool, even with the cold shower he took last night (to which he got yelled at for not taking care of himself because he could catch a summer cold.)

Felix lightly tugged at a strand of his hair, in the half up half down hairstyle that he liked so much, and slid out from behind Hyunjin with his camera. “We’re leaving in half an hour, better get your hiking boots on.”

He left Hyunjin sitting on the couch dumbfounded.

They were going hiking?

It was so hot outside that Hyunjin honestly didn't think that he could do it.

But in the end, they were filming a SKZ episode for their precious stays, and he would pull through for them. Even if he probably looked like shit doing so with buckets of sweat running down his face. (Even though Jeongin just stated that it added to his sex appeal.)

So he sucked it up and let the RV bus drive them through the winding mountains, and it was so curvy that Hyunjin felt car sick. It was a good thing he sat towards the front, so that the SKZ cameras could really only catch the back of his head, and there was no way the editors would add in a camera angle of him looking sick anyways.

The others chatted excitedly for the sake of the cameras, Chan and Felix introducing their hiking trail and the challenges that apparently they had to fulfill by the end of the day. Hyunjin didn’t really hear them, but he was okay with losing to the others today.

“-What do you think, Hyunjin?” Changbin asked from the row across from him, trying to find a way to involve him in the conversation because he was obviously silent.

Hyunjin jumped slightly in place and blinked at Changbin for help, who only laughed to play it off. “Such an airhead~”

“Pay attention,” Minho scolded from the row behind him, “this is important. When we stop, the staff is going to hand over a sheet of paper with your challenge on it.”

“Sounds good,” Hyunjin nodded his approval, ignoring the way his head spun. He quickly leaned his cheek against the hot window of the RV while the others talked, and he would have completely fallen back to sleep if Chan hadn’t settled himself down into the empty seat next to him.

“Hyunjin?” He asked, and when Hyunjin peeled open his burning eyes, Chan looked concerned. “Are you okay? Carsick?”

“Yeah,” Hyunjin hummed in agreement, “the roads are a little…”

“Curvy,” Chan chucked, “I get it.”

Hyunjin watched as Chan leaned down to unzip his backpack and rifle through it until he retrieved a water bottle and placed it into Hyunjin’s hands, unscrewing the cap for him. “Here, drink some water and try to just focus on the driver window, it’ll help with the dizziness. Other than that, are you feeling okay? You’ve been pretty out of it since this morning.”

Now that Hyunjin thought about it, sweat beaded down his neck even if they weren’t even outside. He had been helplessly hot all day- like fire was lingering under his skin.

“‘M hot,” he admitted, and Chan hummed thoughtfully before he reached over Hyunjin to tug the window down. The air blowing against his face eased the heat at least by a little. “There, is that better?"

“Mhm, thanks.”

Chan smiled, patting his back before returning to his seat to join the group conversation. If Hyunjin fell asleep now, stay would just think that he was napping like he usually did.

By the time they made it to the hiking trail parking lot, it was lunchtime and the sun was high in the sky, blazing down on them. Hyunjin absentmindedly let Felix lead him to the others to line up and film their greeting.

“We’re going to hike a mile up to the halfway point, and that’s where we’ll have some lunch before we make our way up to the viewpoint,” Chan told the cameramen. The crew was relatively small today, with only three other members who would trail behind and in front of them to record. At the viewpoint and lunch station, Hyunjin assumed there were more staff with tents set up.

A mile, and then a break. Hyunjin could do that.

“Some of our members aren’t as accustomed to this weather as we are,” Felix told the camera with a small, teasing smile, and they all knew that he was talking about Hyunjin and Jisung respectfully. “So me and Chan will be looking out for them, don’t worry.”

As if on cue, Chan brought out bottles of sunscreen, water, and hats for them all respectively to take for themselves. As Felix, to the audience, described the best ways to keep cool during the hot summer, Minho pulled Hyunjin to the side and slathered his face with sunscreen, and Hyunjin just obediently sat still and let him lather it into his skin and squish his cheeks together while a cameraman got a good angle of them.

“You’re being less whiny than usual,” Minho noted out loud as he left a lingering poke to the tip of his already sunburnt nose. Hyunjin just grumbled in response, his tongue feeling like lead as Minho pushed shades up the bridge of his nose and a sun hat on his dark hair.

“Take note stay,” he told the camera, “this is how Hyunjin is when he’s tired.”

Hyunjin just blinked slowly, playing up the sleepy card because he’d rather the audience think that he was tired than nauseous and sweaty.

He loved Australia, but he hated the heat.

He tried his best to keep his energy up as he hiked the trail with the others, but they were excited enough to lift even his low spirits. As Chan led them and Felix took up the rear of the group with their own cameras, Changbin even offered to carry Hyunjin on his back.

Hyunjin would be an idiot to say no to that, because halfway there, his legs had started to feel like jello and his mouth felt like it was stuffed with cotton balls. His legs were cramping and shaky underneath him too, like he was a newborn deer, and the others seemed to notice as well because they hung around him for the remainder of the hike.

“Your skin’s flushed, Hyunjin,” Seungmin noted, sliding in next to him from where he was on Changbin’s back. “Did you put some sunscreen on?”

“Mhm,” Hyunjin hummed, because he honestly didn’t know if he had the brain function to get any solid words out. His brain felt like it was boiling inside of his brain, like his eyes were on fire inside of his eye sockets.

He was so hot that he wanted to crawl out of his skin.

He was too out of it to notice that he wasn’t even sweating anymore.

That was good right? Maybe he was cooling down.

Their hike continued on until they finally reached the halfway point, though none of that mattered to Hyunjin’s Brain because he was simply seeing everything play in flashes around him like a broken record.

Everyone’s voices around him were muffled, like he was underwater; but he could blink sluggishly and see that there were multiple tents set up around them to offer some shade from the blazing sun.

Hyunjin almost felt faint with relief at the sight of them because that meant he could escape the heat, if only for a minute.

Suddenly, there were cold hands pushing his hair back away from his forehead, his hat tipping precariously off of his head. “Hyunjin?” Felix’s garbled voice asked, “are you feeling okay?”

Hyunjin felt weightless in Changbin’s arms, and all he could do was lazily blink at Felix and his clone because there were two of Felix's standing before him, looking down at him worriedly.

He opened his mouth to say something, but all that came back was a garbled sound because his tongue refused to work with him.

Felix’s worry turned to a look of alarm as he quickly placed his hands on either side of Hyunjin’s cheeks, and then he pulled back with a hiss. “Changbin, set him down. Now.” His tone left no room for argument, because quickly, he was being set down into his own two feet, and it was a wonder that he could hold himself up with how terrible he felt.

Like his skin was on fire and he needed to rip it off of his skeleton to feel cold again.

Hyunjin pointedly looked down to his feet and the twisting gravel underneath him because the world was morphing around him like a kaleidoscope. Someone- Felix or Changbin- had a grip on his elbow as someone else hissed “Chan, get over here.”

Soon enough, two new hands were placed on either of his shoulders and Hyunjin was forced to look up at Chan. Once the older got a good look at his face and his eyes, he let out a strained sigh and quickly turned around to hold a hand in front of the camera person who was hovering around them. “Back off, this is private.”

And Hyunjin was thankful that Chan ordered the cameraman back for some privacy, because it wasn’t long before he was bending over and vomiting all over the rocky terrain below him. Normally, Hyunjin would feel embarrassed, but he felt too hot and sick to care too much, and his brain wasn’t working to the full capacity like it normally was.

He should be alarmed by that, but he was too hot to worry about anything other than finding a way to get cool.

“Shit,” Chan grunted as he hooked Hyunjin’s arm over his shoulder to drag him under the shade of the white tent with coolers.

His insides burned like he had been cursed as he remained bent over, eyes feeling heavy and lips feeling extremely dry.

Hyunjin wretched some more as someone else patted his back, and when he was finally done, he wanted to look up at Chan and tell him ‘thank you’ or ‘I’m fine,’ but he couldn’t quite get the words out in time before his legs were buckling underneath him and his eyes were rolling to the back of his head.

Felix had seen heatstroke before. He lived in Australia before moving to Korea, and he had even scored a lifeguard job to save up money over the summers, so he could recognize the signs pretty easily.

He couldn’t stop the guilt that consumed him for not recognizing the specific symptoms Hyunjin was having sooner.

His sluggishness and flushed face should have told him enough, especially when his muscles started to cramp and Changbin carried him because he was ‘Hyunjin’s loving wife who would do anything for him.’ At least, that was the excuse that he used for the cameras to not worry their fans.

And then, when he felt Hyunjin’s burning skin that should have been covered with skin- it was completely dry. When Felix asked him a question, his tongue was too heavy to reply, and that was when Felix’s brain caught up to the situation and he called Chan over and tried his best to help Hyunjin.

Ultimately, once they got under the shade of the tent, Hyunjin’s entire body went limp, forcing Changbin and Chan to catch him on either side and slowly lower him to the ground- away from the puddle of vomit. Felix quickly emptied his backpack and set it under Hyunjin’s head so that he wouldn’t hurt himself in the dirt.

His worried shout immediately gained the attention of the others, who crowded around the tent with worried questions until Felix noticed Hyunjin’s body tensing up so much that his neck retracted almost backwards in a horror-esque way.

Shit.

“He’s going to seize,” Chan sounded calm, compared to Felix’s frantic thoughts. Jeongin clapped a hand over his mouth while Jisung stumbled backwards at the sight, and Felix would have comforted them if he wasn’t too busy watching the way Hyunjin’s eyes rapidly shifted underneath his eyelids, his eyelashes fluttering against his flushed cheekbones.

“We can’t move him while he’s stiff like this,” Felix said grimly, “we could hurt him or he could accidentally hit us, we need to wait.”

And judging by how taut Hyunjin’s muscles were, Felix could tell that he would be sore for a long while after this.

“Where are the medics?!” Minho quickly whipped around to the staff members who luckily, put their cameras down to begin digging into the ice chest for water and cold compresses. One was even useful enough to bring a medical kit. But none of them were doctors.

“They went up to the viewpoint first,” one of the cameramen offered, and Felix missed their manager back in Korea, who was always on top of things. “They were scouting out the area to make sure it was safe before you arrived here.”

Minho looked like he was about to punch something. “And you didn’t think to get them down here in case something went wrong?” He seethed, and as he continued to beef with the cameraman, Hyunjin’s muscles suddenly started to spasm.

“On his side, now.” Chan ordered, and together, and and Felix rolled Hyunjin on his side while Changbin carefully removed the shades and hat away from him along with anything else that could be a hazard.

“Someone time this,” Felix looked up Hopefully to the others, and Seungmin nodded before fumbling with his phone to set a timer. He may appear the most unbothered out of all of them, but when something like this happened, he couldn’t help but let that facade falter. Felix couldn’t blame him, because with the way that Hyunjin convulsed on the floor, saliva and vomit still seeping past his lips, he also wanted to look away.

But he didn’t have the luxury to do that because he and Chan were probably the only ones who knew what to do, especially since apparently, they were without any medical staff.

“Changbin,” Felix looked to the older, who had his hands hovering on either side of Hyunjin’s thrashing head uselessly. “He’s going to need medical help. Call the number triple zero and lead an ambulance down to the parking lot.”

Changbin quickly nodded and pulled out his phone, but whatever he was saying the the 000 operator faded to the background as Felix helplessly watched Hyunjin seize and vomit some more, and for modesty, he spotted a tablecloth on a nearby stand up table and draped it over Hyunjin’s lower half to hide the wet patch on his pants.

As Minho shouted over the walkie talkie to the medical staff to get them to rush down faster, Hyunjin’s body finally relaxed enough for his seizure to be considered over.

“How long?” Felix nervously asked Seungmin, because if the seizure was anything over five minutes, he would need rescue medication- especially since it was a tonic clonic seizure.

“A minute and a half.”

It felt like a whole lot longer than that.

“Okay, get me ice and a lot of cold water!” Chan ordered to the fumbling staff around them as Felix gently wiped the remains of drool from Hyunjin’s chin. He let out an aborted groan as his fingers twitched, like he was trying to communicate, but Felix quickly shushed him. “Just take some time to let your body come back online. Don’t rush anything.”

Luckily, Hyunjin didn’t seem to be temporarily paralyzed after the seizure, because his leg jerked absentmindedly as Chan pulled the table cloth up and started to stack bags of ice along his body. Felix continued to talk Hyunjin out of his seizure stupor, helping him gain his motor function back and calmly describing to him what had happened, even if he didn’t know whether he could actually hear him or not.

Minho quickly swooped in to help in setting ice packs under Hyunjin’s armpits, and then handed a pack over to Felix so that he could hold it against Hyunjin's forehead.

“Jeongin and Jisung went up to Lead the medics down, they wanted to feel useful,” Minho said in a low voice to Felix.

“It’s a good thing that they’re away from this, they don’t need to see anymore than they already have.” Because Felix knew that he would be having nightmares about this for days.

“Do you have any cold water?” Chan asked the staff, and one of the cameramen quickly unlatched a nearby cooler for Chan to find the colder bottles at the bottom.

“We need to get his body temperature down, quickly.” Chan instructed as he passed them uncapped bottles, “pour it over him, and it should buy us time before the ambulance comes with cooling blankets.”

Hyunjin’s clothes, in the end, got soaked through, so it was pretty useless to even try and cover him up with the tablecloth in the first place. Felix carefully cupped a hand over Hyunjin’s mouth and nose as he poured the water in his hair and face, and that seemed to be enough for Hyunjin’s eyes to flutter open in confusion.

He let out a choked groan, and Felix could only imagine how much his entire body hurt right now, so he rubbed soothing circles into his cheekbone while Chan and Minho continued to cool him down with water. “It’s okay,” he instructed, “it’ll be okay.”

Hyunjin looked up at Felix blankly and tried to talk, but his tongue only lolled out past his lips uselessly. It hurt to see him like this, with desperation in his eyes wondering just why his body wasn’t working correctly.

“It’s okay, you had a seizure so it may take a moment to recover your motor function,” Felix repeated for what felt like the millionth time. But he would repeat it a million more if it meant Hyunjin would be comfortable.

“Guys,” Changbin announced, interrupting Felix’s next sentence. “The ambulance is parked below and they’re on their way up with a stretcher.”

Felix frowned, “they couldn’t airlift him out of here?”

Changbin shrugged helplessly, “apparently he’s in stable enough condition for the next few minutes while they hike up.”

Felix scoffed and only continued to mess with Hyunjin’s hair in the way that he knew he liked. “He had a seizure, there’s nothing stable about that.”

From underneath him, Hyunjin flinched at his yelling and Felix soothed back a lock of his hair apologetically.

Hyunjin let out another helpless sound.

There were so many different people that Felix wanted to sue right now.

But he would have to do that later, because now, the medical staff arrived on scene following behind Jisung and Jeongin to quickly push Felix aside and check his vitals. It was too bad they didn’t have any IV kits in there to get him some water. He just had a seizure, so it would be risky to make him drink water orally if he could choke on it.

As Felix stood up, Chan grabbed him to force him out of the way as the medics worked, and as soon as he caught sight of the crestfallen look on Jisung’s face, he was quick to pull him into a hug.

“You did great, getting the medics,” he reassured, and Jisung only shook in his arms like he was on the verge of a panic attack. He stayed with Jisung and watched helplessly as Chan calmed the others down and the ambulance workers finally ran in with a stretcher and momentarily talked with the medics before rolling Hyunjin’s body on the stretcher.

As they lifted him up, Hyunjin let out an alarmed noise and reached out to grab at something, but was only met with air. Felix was the first to run over and clutch his hand as they ran Hyunjin down the hiking trail. The others were close by behind them despite the cameramen’s chagrin because apparently, even if one of their members just had a seizure, they still wanted to record enough content for a full episode.

Felix decided that he would sue them first, because Hyunjin was whimpering and holding onto Felix’s hands like he would disappear from him at any moment. It made his heart ache because he was confused and in pain.

When they finally reached the ambulance, Felix didn’t waste another moment, climbing in with them, Hyunjin’s hand still in his hold.

“Why can’t we go in with him?” Changbin immediately argued, and Chan simply held an arm out to stop him.

“We can’t all fit in there.” He looked pained to say it, and Felix knew that he would much rather be there on Hyunjin’s other side. But he was the leader, and he needed to look after the others.

Changbin’s lips curled down into a worried, and even slightly angry frown. “But why can’t we just-“

“Do you really think that Hyunjin wants all of us in there to see them use a rectal thermometer on him?” Chan finally snapped, causing the others to reel back. It was silent for a few moments before Chan sighed, “I thought so. Let’s go, we’re riding in the RV-“

And the rest of his sentence was cut off by the ambulance doors slamming shut.

When Hyunjin woke up, he expected it to be to an immense amount of pain, like he had gotten run over by a train.

Thankfully, the only thing he felt was a fuzzy tingling sensation through his entire body.

Hyunjin hummed and cracked his eyes open to flinch at the bright light above him. The bright lights of a hospital, because the thin paper gown against his skin barely hid anything and the sheets were just as itchy.

“Hyunjin?” A voice asked, and thankfully, his ears were working again and the voice didn’t sound like it was under water.

With great difficulty, Hyunjin weakly tilted his head to the side to see Minho sitting on the uncomfortable plastic chair, watching him carefully. The rest of the room was empty, and Hyunjin’s fuzzy brain struggled to catch up with his mouth.

He poked his tongue out to run it over his dry lips, but when he tried to talk, all that he could get out was a garbled groan.

Minho scoffed, amusement evident in his cat-like eyes. “You’re pretty hopped up on muscle relaxants right now. Maybe you should go back to sleep.”

Hyunjin tried to talk again, but only groaned again. At least this time, the groan took the shape of a ‘Where are the others.’

“They’re at the cafeteria downstairs,” Minho answered after translating Hyunjin’s sluggish words. “They’ve been trying to nag the staff into sneaking in your favorite ice cream flavor, since they don’t have it here.”

Hyunjin would have laughed if he was feeling better, so he settled with an amused huff. It sounded like something that they would do.

He didn’t remember much, especially not immediately after passing out, but that didn’t matter much to him because everyone was here and apparently trying to fight off the hospital staff in his honor.

“How are you feeling?” Minho asked, scooting his chair closer so that he could take Hyunjin’s hand and rub a circle into the knuckle of his thumb. “They’ve got you hooked up to IV’s because you were severely dehydrated.”

Hyunjin felt a little light headed when he noticed the needle in his vein, but Minho kindly covered it with his hand to block his sight.

“M okay,” Hyunjin finally decided, because he as was high as a kite and couldn’t focus on much else aside from the tingling of his fingers. Like he was about to pass out, but not in a nauseating way.

Minho patted his hand gently, “good, that's good.”

And if their fans saw Minho so caring and worried, their lives would probably be flipped upside down. They would probably go insane. But to Hyunjin, Minho was always caring, even if he covered it up on camera.

Hyunjin’s eyes felt heavy, and the only thing that he wanted to do was let sleep take him away again. But before he did that…

Hyunjin pointed to his backpack that was set in the corner of the room. Minho raised an eyebrow, “do you want something from it? The doctor said that you shouldn’t look at your phone for too long and just rest-“

“… Side pocket,” Hyunjin rasped, and Minho sighed before standing up to shove his hand into the bag's side pocket and retrieve the bright paper from it.

The bright paper that the staff handed to him before the hike.

Minho scoffed. “This was your mission paper. Does it even matter anymore?”

Hyunjin just tilted his head in a way that said ‘just open it,’ and watched in amusement at the way Minho’s facial expression shifted when he unfolded and read it.

“I win,” Hyunjin said simply. “You owe me a meal.”

“You’re not nearly as funny as you think you are.”

Just then, the others entered the room silently until the realized that Hyunjin was awake, and then Jisung and Felix were practically jumping onto the bed to hug him while the others shouted and offered him multiple tubs of mint chocolate chip ice cream.

Minho dropped the folded paper to the floor that said ‘Mission challenge- convince another member to pour water on you.’

Chapter Text

After debut, Hyunjin expected for all of his pre-debut problems to go away. From the weird lingering glances that adults sent his direction, to the way the other trainees treated him like a close friend, only to speak nasty rumors behind his back. He was keen to it and he knew all that they said about him because they weren’t necessarily sly about it- but Hyunjin decided to leave it alone because there wasn’t much he could do about it.

He would mind his business, ignore them, and keep training in the multiple dance and vocal classes. He hadn’t found his niche quite yet- but even if he was a little clumsy at it, dancing made him feel free. Of course, he was nothing compared to the seasoned trainee dancers who had been at it (Hyunjin was scouted on the street, afterall. He had no formal training.) but he still enjoyed the movement of it.

When he debuted with stray kids- it was like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders because the survival show was the single most stressful event of his life. Even if the other trainees had told him not to worry because he was the ‘visual,’ he was also a hard worker and wanted to be seen for that rather than his face. His face was just the thing that drew them in to see the real him.

Of course- none of his issues could be solved so easily because even months after debut and working on their comeback, Hyunjin still experienced the salty attitude of the trainees. He continued to get specialized training classes on top of schooling and a busy comeback schedule, but Hyunjin was okay with the extra work. It meant he could ignore the trainees to get his job done.

That was- until he was no longer jam packed with work to actually notice.

It was a break between their comebacks and since they were a hit among their target audience- and surprisingly, North America- they were promised more time as a group together until the contract expired. Hyunjin had four years to make the most of his guaranteed time with the group.

Hyunjin liked the way their group worked compared to the others- how they were self produced. It helped them bond better. Even he and Jisung had grown fond of each other when they were at each other's throats pre debut. They could still use some work- but they were much better than what they had been. 

It was needless to say that Hyunjin was doing pretty good for himself- minus the fact that he was still ignoring the jabs being thrown his way. He ignored it, until he couldn’t.

He had been at the vending machine straight across from the trainees dance room when they were released from class. Normally he would have joined them- but he had a practice dance session with Minho Hyung and Felix and momentarily left to get a drink during their break.

“Look who it is,” a voice startled Hyunjin from his thoughts on how to remember the sequence Minho taught them, and he turned back to see the two trainees that always buzzed around him like unwanted mosquitoes. He would have left- but his drink was still vending, so he patiently waited for the slow machine to accept his payment and ignored them.

“Wow,” the second trainee- a foreigner called Parker- huffed. Moving to lean his back against the machine next to Hyunjin so that he couldn’t possibly ignore him. “Look at him, Chul, he’s pretending that we don’t even exist.”

“He’s let debut change him,” Chul settled in on his other side with a sneer. “You forget about us just because you left us behind? You think we’re lesser than you?”

In any other situation, Hyunjin probably would have responded that no- he didn’t forget them and he just didn’t want any trouble- but he knew that anything he said would just make the situation worse, so he just waited and tapped his foot a little. The vending machine let out a clunking sound and Hyunjin’s water was finally dispensed.

He crouched down, tugging the bucket hat on his head forward a little to block the sight of the trainees still sending jeers his way as he reached into the machine for the bottle.

His short break was ending soon. He needed to return back before Minho Hyung got too mad. He was intimidating, but he was a good teacher and he accepted Hyunjin as a student when Hyunjin showed up pre-debut with the hopes of becoming a good dancer. He was clumsy- but Minho Hyung saw something in him.

“Wow. Can he even hear us?”

“Nah man, maybe we should be louder?”

Just as Hyunjin was about to stand from his crouched over position, a rough knee connected with his vulnerable ribs, sending him crashing to his side on the floor and the water bottle rolling uselessly away.

Hyunjin prorobably should have guessed that this would happen, but it still didn’t make it any less surprising when the breath was kicked away from him once again, this time from his stomach. He coughed when the foot reeled back from the kick and he curled in on himself.

“You think he notices us now?” One of them asked from above him, but Hyunjin was too dazed to distinguish who it was.

“Go away,” he managed to regain his breath from the kicks and blink his eyes open. Instead of looking at the trainees above him, he got up on his hands and knees to look for the discarded water bottle that had rolled away down the hallway.

“Damn, he’s still ignoring us even after that?”

“Do you think he likes it?”

“Maybe. He knows he’s nothing to his group but a pretty face.”

And Hyunjin thought that was how it would end. He thought they would say a few more parting words and walk away because that’s how it always went, and if he kept his head down, it would be fine.

Unfortunately- that wasn’t exactly how it panned out.

A knee landed between his shoulder blades and sent him back to the floor with the weight of a human sitting on top of him, digging into his back painfully. “Go away before someone sees you,” Hyunjin hissed up at his attacker, cheek squished against the floor as his ribs and torso ached from the abuse.

“No,” the voice above him said, with an accent that told him it was Parker on top of him. “Not until you admit it.”

Hyunjin was growing frustrated. “Admit what?” He snapped, though his bravado faded when the weight shifted on top of him and he coughed as the air left his lungs.

“Admit that you didn’t deserve to debut. That you know you’re nothing but a pretty face for your group with no talent-“

“No, that’s not-“

“Hey!” A new voice shouted, and Hyunjun angled his head up ever so slightly to see a pissed off looking Minho exiting the next door practice room, Felix behind him looking between Hyunjin and the trainees in a worried way. Minho’s eyebrow twitched upwards. “What’s going on here?”

The intrusion was enough for the trainees to stutter and quickly stumble away from Hyunjin. Now that the weight was off of him, he felt his lungs inflate and he could breathe again.

“It’s nothing!” One of them- Chul- laughed nervously. We were just-

“Save it,” Minho narrowed his eyes, and Hyunjin was so focused on his Hyung thoroughly chewing the apologizing trainees out that he didn’t even notice that Felix was at his side until he was gently guiding him up to his feet and letting Hyunjin lean against him.

“Are you hurt?” Felix asked, his bright eyes shiny with concern as he eyed Hyunjin up and down. Hyunjin gave him a tight smile- even if his ribs would be bruised the next day.

“I’m okay.”

Felix frowned, unconvinced. Before he could question him anymore, Minho was dragging the two trainees by the collar to dispose of them in front of Hyunjin. Hyunjin had never seen Minho so agitated before when he forced the two into a low bow. “What do you have to say to Hyunjin?” He asked them with one perfectly arched eyebrow, and Hyunjin thought he looked scary like this.

The two trainees both apologized at the same time at the same drone of voice- and Hyunjin knew that they didn’t mean it and that it was more a formality to look good in-front of their elder. “I’ll accept it,” Minho nodded after a moment, then looked at Hyunjin. He seemed to scan him for any visible injuries. “Do you?”

“Huh?” Hyunjin startled, and Felix’s arm around his shoulder tightened. “Oh- yeah. It’s okay, we were just… playing around.” His ribs ached.

Minho seemed apprehensive, like he didn’t believe a word Hyunjin said, but he nodded anyway. Before turning to the two trainees. “If I catch you roughhousing in the hallway again, you won’t get off with a warning next time.” He would tell a manager or instructor and they would be punished and disciplined- at worst blacklisted from the company.

The two apologized lamely once again, bowing to Minho before scurrying back off to whatever lesson they were supposed to be at. As Felix fretted some more over Hyunjin- asking him what they wanted from him and why he had been on the floor, Minho stooped low to pick up the water bottle and pass it over to Hyunjin.

“Let’s go back to the practice room, yeah?”

Felix’s eyes went wide and he gave Hyunjin a concerned look, “but Hyung-“

“Hyunjin?” Minho leveled him with a blank, yet analyzing look. “Do you need to go to the clinic? Or file a report?”

Hyunjin quickly shook his head- and Minho looked like he had expected as much. Felix only looked even more worried. Hyunjin shrugged, because he just wanted to forget that this ever happened and move on. “Let’s just keep practicing. I’m fine.”

And that was that.

At least. It should have been.

Of course, the trainees laid back on their bullying after the incident- and they were so silent with him that it worried Hyunjin. The following week- he felt like he was walking on pins and needles both around trainees and around his own group.

Apparently- Minho hyung or Felix had told Chan about the altercation because he pulled him aside during one of their recording sessions to ask if he was okay and that he couldn’t have any fights with the trainees and risk their group.

Of course- Hyunjin wouldn’t fight them back if it meant their group on the line, and he denied them ever being a problem because he didn’t want Chan to keep looking at him in worry like Felix was. (Even so, he occasionally caught him looking in his direction as if to check on him.)

The trainees would pass him in the hallway roughly, pushing by his shoulder, and they would make remarks from behind his back about his Hyung saving him, but Hyunjin severely doubted that they had the guts to do much else. They were on the track to debut within the next year- and bullying allegations would surely ruin them from that… right?

Wrong- apparently.

Because Hyunjin missed the big group session where the trainers announced that they wouldn’t be debuting in the group they were expected to. They would need to wait another year- since they didn’t pass their inspections. Meaning Hyunjin missed their trigger and thus- the warning that they would no doubt take it out on him.

It had been a pretty normal day for Hyunjin considering he woke up to Jisung being loud, and then went back to sleep. The second time he woke up was because Jeongin was shoving him awake and forcing him to put on a school uniform so that he wouldn’t be late.

Normally Hyunjin was the first one awake for school so that he could go to the practice room early, but he was feeling especially sleepy that day after spending all night rehearsing.

School was tedious as always- with students flocking him for some reason, but he kept his head down because his headache was only increasing every time someone talked to him. Luckily- the instructors noticed his condition and let him back to the dorms with a pack of work to do. (Of course, instead of going back to relax at the dorm- he went straight to the JYP building and to the training room labeled ‘Stray Kids’ so that he could keep working. If he wanted to be anything other than a face in their group- he needed to work harder than the others.)

No one was in the room, which was good for him. The others were probably out doing their own thing- and 3RACHA were probably hard at work in their studio a floor up. Even if Hyunjin’s head pounded, he worked through stretches until he was out of breath, then decided to go to the restroom to wash his face off.

And when he was doing just that- standing in front of the large restroom mirror and drying his face- the restroom doors opened and the room filled with two familiar voices. They stopped once they caught sight of Hyunjin. He slowly backed away from the sink to face them. “Look… I don’t want any trouble.”

Parker scoffed, clenching his fist. “You sound like shit, Hwang. Maybe you should have stayed in bed and let your Minho Hyung take care of you. You know, he interrupted us last time- didn’t even let us finish the job.” He turned to Chul and Hyunjin had a sinking feeling. “Should we finish the job?”

“Mmm. I think so.”

Hyunjin knew that if he even tried to fight back, he would risk their group. It was his word against theirs, and there were no cameras in the restroom to prove his story. He really was screwed. Hyunjin slowly backed up until his back hit the tiled wall, and he put his hands up in front of him placatingly. “You two… you shouldn’t put your debut at risk like this.”

And that seemed to hit a sore spot with the two, because Hyunjin could practically see the veins popping from their necks. He would only find out later that their debut was pushed back yet again- later after it was too late to save his own ass from receiving a beating. 

All Hyunjin could do was helplessly put his arms over his head to protect his face as he was sent to the dirty bathroom floor by a flurry of punches and kicks, so harsh and so fast that Hyunjin didn’t even know where the pain was blooming from. He didn’t lift a fist against them.

“Hey- he’s hiding that pretty face of his.” The voices swam above Hyunjin’s head- but everything in his body hurt too much to move or argue.

“I say let’s take it away from him- then he can see just how hard it is without it.”

“Good idea. Get your phone out and record it so we can get a before and after.”

Hyunjin really wasn’t aware of what was going on around him other than the hands twisting through his dark hair and yanking his head up to face the bright flash of a camera. “Say hi to the camera, Hwang.” All he could do was flinch at the brightness of the camera that enunciated the pounding in his skull. His brain felt like mush and his battered body cried.

Hyunjin wanted to cry.

Before he could ask them- beg them- to put the camera away, his face was being shoved back down to the dirty floor unceremoniously, making his cheek hurt in protest. He let out a sound between a grunt and a groan in pain.

“Hey Hwang- lick the floor, won’t you?”

Hyunjin couldn’t possibly hide the look of disgust that crossed his face, and he shook his head in protest, even if the hands in his hair forced his face even closer to the floor so that his lips pressed against it. Even so, Hyunjin kept his mouth firmly shut and squirmed against the hold of the person holding him down, but he was too weak and sore to break free.

The voices above him just swirled and laughed as he struggled to keep his face away from the floor.

“Man, look at him trying to keep his dignity. He really doesn't want to stoop down to our level.”

“If he doesn't want to lick the floor- we won’t make him. We’re not evil. Get him up.”

As Hyunjin’s weak and jelly-like body was hauled up- Patrick’s hands locking his arms behind his back to hold him still- he had a bad feeling. That annoying camera was still pointed right at his face. “Hey world- meet Hwang Hyunjin, the famous visual of the stray kids group. He won’t be their visual much longer- so enjoy how he looks for now.”

More words were exchanged, but Hyunjin couldn’t hear them because his ears were ringing. His half lidded eyes could see the phone camera being set down on the sink, and then like a flash, there was a fist aimed right to his face.

Somehow- the pain of knuckles connecting with his cheekbone hurt worse than the kicks to his ribs. Than the other fist as an uppercut, spiky rings leaving gnarly cuts along his skin. Then a final one- hitting his nose so impactful that he could hear the crack resonate within his skull. The thick crimson liquid seeped from his nose and to his split lips until it was all he could taste.

He felt like he would choke on it.

The instinctive tears that fell from Hyunjin’s tear line hurt when they left trails along his bruised cheeks, and he could no longer hide the pained noises ripped from his throat with each impact. It seemed to last forever until he was silently sobbing and his body gave out on him. The only thing holding up were the arms behind him, forcefully keeping him on his feet.

“Damn, was that too much?”

“Man, look at what a mess his face is.”

“Quick, catch it on camera.”

Hyunjin’s eyes were swollen shut, so he couldn’t get a good look when the hands reached out for him and grabbed onto his hair once again to bare his battered face for the camera to see. He was sure he looked ugly- so he kept his eyes shut in shame and tried not to cry some more because crying hurt his entire body.

“Dude, there’s blood everywhere… should we wash it off for him?”

“Good idea.” The creaking of a stall door. “Drag him over here, I’ll get the camera.”

Hyunjin’s legs dragged underneath him as he was forcefully shoved into the larger stall and forced down to his knees that would no doubt be bruised from the impact. Dully, all he could see was his bangs and the way the crimson blood from his face dropped down into the toilet water, infecting it with red like dye.

The toilet?

Why was he here?

“Hold your breath, Hwang,” was the only warning he received before his face was shoved into the water and held there until he was struggling to be let up when he was out of breath.

Hyunjin’s entire body burned with humiliation and shame, and as the air left his lungs- he could only hope that the video wouldn’t spread and no one would see him so ugly. So fractured. So beaten and bloody.

He was hurt- but most of all, he was embarrassed.

Chan had experienced a lot of new things in life ever since he debuted, specifically involving the parents of his members. He sat at dinner with Jeongin’s parents while they lectured him to take good care of their Makne and he sat through the concert knowing that his own parents were watching him try to act all sexy on stage. 

It was strange, that Chan was now the adult in a group in charge of people younger than him. Some of them were even kids still in school- but he took his job very seriously. Or at least, he tried his best- even if he made some mistakes at times.

What he hadn’t expected was to receive a call from a contact he had saved but never actually bothered to talk to- Hyunjin’s mom. He had never actually conversed with her in person before, and as far as Chan knew, Hyunjin’s dad wasn’t in the picture. And he saved his mothers contact as just a courtesy. He hadn’t expected her to actually call him.

“Hey guys- let’s take a break,” Chan told Changbin and Jisung from his place at the laptop while the two recorded demos in the studio. The duo looked up at him in surprise- because they had been making good progress- and when Chan showed his phone, they nodded and exited the recording booth to plop down dramatically on the couch.

“Hello?” Chan asked uncertainty, answering the phone and feeling more like a kid himself. “This is Christopher?” The parents, for some reason, preferred the name Christopher.

“Christopher? This is Haori, Hyunjin’s mother.”

“Ah- hello. Not to be straightforward, but was there a reason you called?” Chan winced at the rudeness, but he had been working pretty hard, ‘in the zone’ as Changbin and Jisung called it.

“I just got a call from Hyunjin’s academy that he went home sick? As his parent- I’m informed of when he misses classes. I’ve been calling him but he hasn’t checked his phone and I got worried, so I was wondering if he was with you?”

Chan leaned back a little in surprise, his laptop becoming irrelevant before him because now he had something better to focus on. He waved a hand to Changbin and Jisung, and they both looked up from their places on the couch as Chan put the phone on speaker. “So you’re telling me that Hyunjin went home sick?”

“From what I understand- the nurse sent him home and he walked.”

“I see,” Chan hummed, “well- I’m at the recording studio, so he’s not here with me now, but I’m going to call and check on him.”

“Ah- thank you, Bang Chan. Please call me when you hear from him. He usually always answers his phone, so I get worried.”

And now that Chan thought about it- Hyunjin did spend an awful long amount of time on his phone making calls. The others always teased him and called him a player by talking to all of the girls at school- but only Chan knew that it was his mom on the other end of the line. Hyunjin never corrected them, so Chan didn’t bother either.

By the time he ended the call with Hyunjin’s mom, Chan looked up at Changbin hopefully, who had been texting on his own phone.

“Any good news?” He asked him, and Changbin shook his head.

“Minho Hyung just texted. He and Felix are back at the dorms, but Hyunjin isn’t there with them. Maybe he’s still on the way?”

“Or maybe he was sick enough to pass out on the way,” Jisung worried at the bottom of his lip, anxiety running rampant even if the two of them had never had the best relationship. They were patching it up, thankfully.

“If he was that sick, then the school staff wouldn’t have let him walk home. I doubt that’s the case.”

“Or,” Chan interrupted Changbin, standing up from his chair. “He’s probably here at the studio working. You know how he is- he always practices before and after school, he may have come here as a routine.”

Jisung’s eyebrows shot up to his hairline in surprise. “He does?”

Changbin looked at him like an idiot, and maybe he felt a little like one because once he had claimed that Hyunjin wasn’t a hard worker even if he always had been. “Come on,” Chan broke whatever spiral he was going through, “let’s go look for him. He’s probably downstairs.”

And Chan didn’t find him in their normal practice room- but he certainly hadn’t expected to find him in the adjacent restroom.

“Chan hyung,” Jisung tugged on his sleeve to catch his attention after they searched the room. He looked up at him with those big boba eyes. “I heard some noises coming from the restroom.”

And when Chan entered the restroom along with the other two- he had expected for it to be empty with maybe an employee or trainee washing their hands. What he had not expected was for there to be such a ruckus from the larger end stall, laughing and camera shutters. Taunts and jeers and the overall sound of struggling.

Chan decided it would be best to not make their entrance known, and Changbin seemed to agree because he quickly stepped forward to tip the stall door open and reveal a sight that Chan never wanted to see. One of two familiar looking trainees was holding Hyunjin- still in his school uniform- down into the toilet. His head was underwater and his clothes were ruffled and Chan could even see bruises-

“Hey!” Jisung snapped, causing the other two to freeze. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” He barely gave the two surprised trainees the chance to jump in shock because he was already approaching to grab them by the back of the collars and toss them away. Changbin was quick to help in the attempt to get them off of Hyunjin, yelling accusations all the same, and Chan’s body finally unfroze when he realized one of his youngers- barley even a legal adult- was hurt.

“Hyunjin!” He called, sliding down to his knees to grab his torn collar and lift him from the toilet. He emerged from the water coughing a lung up, hair wet and framing his face. Chan’s blood ran cold because Hyunjin’s face was so swollen that he could hardly recognize him- a broken nose and puffy cheeks and thick split lips. “Shit.”

At his curse, Jisung looked back and only spared a glance before he looked like he was ready to jump the other two. Changbin already had them with their backs against the restroom wall, one of their phones in his hand as he scrolled through footage. “Were you trying to fucking waterboard him?”

“What? No! We- we were just having a little fun-“

Hyunjin continued to cough and Chan blocked out the situation behind him- knowing that Changbin had it handled- so that he could wrap an arm around Hyunjin’s torso and support his weight and rub circles around his back until he finished coughing up water to the tiled floor. Blood dripped slowly down along with it, and Chan felt Righteous anger at the sight.

“Hyunjin? Are you with me?” He asked gently, slowly easing Hyunjin’s beaten body to lean against the stall door so that he could kneel between his legs and get a good look at the damage. There was so much that Chan didn’t know where to start.

Instead of answering him- Hyunjin let out a strangled whimpering noise, and when his eyelashes fluttered under bruised eyelids Chan realized that he couldn’t see and probably had no idea what was going on. “Hyunjin- it’s me, Chan. You’re safe now. No one’s going to hurt you anymore.”

Hyunjin’s tense body went lax ever so slightly, and for a moment Chan worried that he passed out so he gently prodded at his shoulder. “Hey- stay with me. Stay awake please.” Hyunjin’s finger twitched and he grabbed weakly at the hem of Chan’s shirt in as strong a death grip that he could muster. Chan’s heart squeezed in his chest.

More blood oozed past Hyunjin’s red nose, so he gently grabbed toilet paper and held it under to catch the blood. His school uniform would need to be replaced- as it was stained crimson. He tried his best to dry Hyunjin’s wet and bleeding face, but he flinched all the same.

“He looks fucked up,” Jisung’s voice sounded over his shoulder, and Chan turned back to him. Hyunjin’s hand tightened on his shirt.

“Not helping, Jisung. Where is Changbin?”

“He’s walking the two to their manager's office. They’re sure to get blacklisted- you should have seen the shit that they recorded.”

Chan honestly didn’t know if he wanted to- but there would surely be a court case that would gain everyone’s attention, so in the end, he knew that he would have to. Chan couldn’t possibly care about whether the publicity of their member getting beat within an inch of his life would be good or bad- because he was too focused on the way Hyunjin continued to make pained noises under him paired with laborious breaths.

“We need to get him to a hospital,” he finally decided- and he had not expected Hyunjin to fully flinch at the suggestion. He winced and shook his head blindly, scooting back even further into the stall to curl into a ball. It looked like it hurt.

“No ‘ospital,” Hyunjin said, and the way he talked gave him a slight lisp. He must have bit his tongue, or he was purposefully talking stiff to not move his bleeding lips. “Please.”

“Don’t be an idiot,” Jisung scoffed, crouching down next to Chan with much less tact. “You’re bleeding and you may need stitches- one of the bastards got you with his ring. Are all of your teeth even intact?”

At Jisung’s words, Hyunjin’s body shook and tears began to slip past closed eyes. He let out a broken sob, and Jisung’s face fell. “Wait-“ he scrambled before Chan could scold him, “I didn’t mean to insult you- you need help. We can’t help you.”

“He’s right,” Chan agreed, “Hyunjin- your nose is broken and you’re in pain. Please let us take you.”

Hyunjin adamantly shook his head- and his stubbornness was like a double edged sword. Once he committed to something, he usually never changed his mind about it. It bit them in the ass in this specific situation.

“What about the clinic?” Jisung suggested. “It’s a few floors up.”

Hyunjin seemed less against that idea, and Chan couldn’t believe that it took Hyunjin getting beaten up to agree with something Jisung said.

“Good, can you stand?” Chan asked, and when Hyunjin struggled to get to his feet for a few moments like a newborn deer, Chan had mercy and scooped him onto his back with Jisung’s help. “Hold onto my neck,” Chan instructed, keeping Hyunjin’s thighs secure. Regretfully- because there didn’t seem to be a square inch of his body that wasn’t bruised and battered.

Hyunjin whimpered and his bloody face once they entered the hallway, and Jisung once again surprised Chan by draping his own jacket over Hyunjin, flipping the hood up so that Hyunjin was practically invisible minus his long legs.

Luckily- the clinic was empty when they entered. The good thing about having professional doctors for their building was that if someone twisted an ankle or had a minor injury that wouldn’t be worth traveling to the hospital and alerting paparazzi- they could hide out here.

“We need doctor Choi,” Chan told the nurse at the reception desk, who immediately stood at the sight of them. “I’ll tell her it’s an emergency-“ she nodded before dialing a number on the landline phone. While they talked, Chan and Jisung worked together to sit Hyunjin down on the cot. Chan would have liked to let him lay down and curl up in a ball like he wanted- but he didn’t want him to choke on the blood from his nose.

Luckily- it looked to be drying up.

Hyunjin flinched when new gloved hands touched his face- and Chan had to calm him down and reassure that it was just the doctor cleaning up his face. The thing that Chan liked about doctor Choi was that she never asked any questions, she was efficient and she did her job. She especially didn’t say anything when Hyunjin looked so scared, only gently maneuvering his face to clean a wound and put a bandage on it.

She prodded Hyunjin's nose and he let out a noise of pain, instinctively backing away from her hold. Chan moved to sit next to him and wrap a supportive hand around Hyunjin as she assessed the damage and efficiently straightened the bone out. It looked like it hurt- but apparently it was a relief to have it back to normal because Hyunjin sighed and wavered against Chan’s shoulder. Chan let him lean down against him.

Changbin entered the room looking pissed, right as Hyunjin was curling up on the cot to look much younger than he actually was. Chan held onto his hand and rubbed circles into the knuckle as the doctor prodded at his ribs- thankfully, none of those were broken, but they were still bruised and that fact was enough to make Chan even angrier.

“Their manager called security on them to have them escorted to the police station,” Changbin answered Chan’s silent question, and Jisung (from his place on one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs) perked up in surprise. “They’re going to jail?”

“Well, yeah, Sung. What they did was assault, and they got it on video too.” Changbin moved to sit down on the chair next to Jisung, pocketing his phone. “I called the others too- Felix was worried and wanted to come over but Minho managed to convince him to stay and help him cook dinner. He said he’d bake some brownies to make him feel better.”

Chan’s heart melted a little in his chest, because even if Felix may not know what was going on half the time with the language barrier, he tried his best for his friends. He and Hyunjin had a special relationship. The two of them connected easily. “Good. That’s good. Thank you, Changbin.”

“I also called Hyunjin’s mom.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, Minho had her emergency contact from the school and sent it to me. She says thank you for taking care of Hyunjin and to call her when we get the chance.”

Chan felt guilty- because he hadn’t managed to protect Hyunjin like he wanted. He was laying on a hospital cot beaten up- but he knew the others wouldn’t see it the same way. He would keep that nagging thought to himself. He sighed, shifting his weight on the edge of Hyunjin’s bed as doctor Choi pulled away.

“I placed a liquid IV in his arm to get him rehydrated with some fluid. No bones were broken, thankfully, and I’ve already given him something for the pain. I recommend he stay here until the IV runs its course, and then you can get him settled back at home and perhaps call an in-home doctor to visit him tomorrow to check on him.”

Chan couldn’t help but let out a sigh of relief. “Thank you, doctor. Is there anything you recommend that we do?”

“I’ve already printed out an instruction packet with some pain medication. This is a private practice so he won’t need to pick up the prescription.” She passed over a clipboard to Chan with printed details. “On there is the dosage, as well as bandages and ointment for the bruises. I recommend a liquid diet and only letting him drink through straws for the next few days until the swelling of his face goes down, and…”

Chan continued to listen intently to her instruction, feeling a bit overwhelmed by the responsibility as he thumbed through the pages on the clipboard. Luckily- the company had medical responsibility over Hyunjin, as stated in their contract, so he wouldn’t be making any of the medical decisions because taking care of him was hard enough as it was.

“Will there be… any… lasting damage? To… to my face?” Hyunjin’s small voice asked from the bed, and his voice shook. He sounded more scared than after Chan found him on the floor. Changbin gave a heartbreakingly sympathetic look as he reached for Hyunjin’s hand- the one without the IV- to squeeze it supportively.

“Thankfully- there shouldn't be if you take care of yourself. It may take a few months to get back from swelling, and it’ll be painful to heal, but the damage shouldn’t be permanent.” Chan let out yet another sigh of relief- and it sucked because they had a comeback planned, but none of that mattered to him because Hyunjin was safe.

Hyunjin’s face was so bandaged that Chan couldn’t see if he was making a facial expression, but he lightly patted at his stomach comfortingly anyways. “Good. That’s good.”

As the IV dripped it’s way lower and lower Changbin stood to excuse himself. “I’m going to call and let Minho know the good news. The food should be ready when we get back, but I’ll make sure there’s some soup for Hyunjin- and one of the younger ones can run to the store and buy straws and ice packs.” He exited with even more thoughts, but that faded to silence as Jisung shifted in his chair to play a game on his phone and Chan watched the IV.

And Chan nearly jumped off of the cot in surprise when Hyunjin blindly reached to grab onto his elbow and speak. “Chan Hyung.”

“Hyunjin? I thought you were asleep.”

Hyunjin’s bottom lip wobbled dangerously, and if he wasn’t dehydrated then Chan was sure he would be crying. He sniffled painfully through his bruised nose, dried blood flaming at his upper lip. “Hyung… are you going to- to kick me out?”

Chan blinked slowly in surprise, and Jisung looked up from his phone with furrowed eyebrows. “Why would he even kick you out? Are you crazy?”

“Jisung.” Chan warned.

“My…face,” Hyunjin admitted, sounding heartbroken. “It’s… it’s not good anymore. We… We have a comeback planned and- and I’m supposed to look good. It’s- it’s the only reason I’m on the team.”

Chan let go of Hyunjin’s hand in shock, and Jisung even dropped his phone to the floor. It was loud and echoed throughout the relatively empty clinic. Chan’s heart froze in his chest. “Hyunjin… you think that the way you look is the only reason you’re a part of stray kids?”

Hyunjin didn’t confirm or deny- but his silence was enough of an answer. Chan tenderly reached forward to brushed Hyunjin’s drying bangs from his face, snd Hyunnin flinched at the contact. “Sorry,” Chan apologized, “but who let you think this?”

“It’s… it’s what the trainees told me.”

“They’re wrong,” Jisung interrupted suddenly, glaring holes into Hyunjin’s skull. “There’s a reason they’re still trainees, and I hope their sorry asses get shoved into prison.” Just when Chan was about to lecture him to lower his voice because Hyunjin winced at the loud noise, Jisung approached the side of the bed to lean over and get a good look at Hyunjin.

“You know that Chan Hyung isn’t shallow enough to pick for looks. He picks for talent- and you’re a hard worker. I think you work harder than anyone else on this team. Going to dance before school? That’s psychotic. You’re a psychopath, Hwang Hyunjin. But we don’t tolerate you for your face, but because you work your ass off to get better, and that inspires the rest of us to work harder to Match you. Do you understand?” By the end of Jisung’s lecture, his cheeks were red with embarrassment, and Hyunjin looked so shocked that Chan could nearly see his wide eyes.

Chan couldn’t possibly stop the fond smile that played at his lips. He rubbed a circle into Hyunjin’s hip bone and ignored the way he sniffled some more. “He’s right. You’re a lot more than your face, Hyunjin. The trainees were just jealous.”

Hyunjin’s slanted eyes opened ever so slightly under heavy eyelids, and the hopeful look that he gave them was almost heartbreaking. “…okay,” he finally accepted. His ‘thank you’ went left unsaid because he was exhausted and his eyelids were already shutting on him, but they got the sentiment.

And surprisingly- Jisung sat at the other side of the bed resolutely, playing with his hair like some kind of guard dog. When Changbin entered the room again and realized Hyunjin was sleeping, he smiled a little sadly and hopped up on the other side of the cot. Chan scooted down to make room for him.

“Do you think he’ll be okay?” Changbin asked after a moment- and Chan wondered if he heard their conversation from outside the door. Changbin fondly tugged the blanket further up Hyunjin’s body and grabbed a rag to gently dry the flakey blood from his hair.

“I think so.”

Chan knew they would be fine.