(Y/N) POV:

It's just over a week later, a week of waking up in the middle of the night feeling constrained and frozen as though I've been strapped into a straitjacket, a week of waking up with horror flooding my veins and panic blinding me and clouding normal reasoning until I saw Kookie safe and sound, tucked up in someone's arms or sometimes spooning me. A week of where I didn't go into work because I'd have to walk pass that road, I was bothered that it was getting to me so much. Ashamed that it was reverting me back into my old self even if it was by a fraction, but I'd hated who I had been and never wanted to go back to the shell I used to be.

It was a feeling that made me feel revulsion towards myself, even though the boys kept reassuring me that it was a normal reaction, a warranted response, I couldn't help feel as though I'd failed myself somewhat, as if I had failed the promise I had made to myself and to my parents that I would be stronger. If I was strong, why had I fallen weak when it mattered?

The only thing that stopped me from feeling absolutely pathetic was the fact that Kookie had bounced back quickly, if he had suffered or had a long term impact from Yuna and Choi then I would've stormed over to set them right, whether or not I was still traumatised wouldn't have mattered.

I hoped slowly with time that memory would fade for him, dissolve into nothing and if it meant I would wake up terrified sometimes whilst he slept peacefully, it was a sacrifice I would make in a heartbeat.

But what was weighing down on me I needed to talk it out. With someone. There were still shadows from my past that hovered over me, a personal cluster of gloomy clouds that hovered over me and threatened to block out the happiness I was experiencing at present. There were still countless demons I hadn't faced. Had pushed to the side in hope that they wouldn't come rearing their ugly heads. But how long could I count on ignorance for? How long until the path ended and there was no where to run?

Hobi oppa and Joonie oppa had sat me down between them, cocooned me in the warmth of their bodies and gently talked to me, waited for me to open up with what it was that was sending me careering into a panic. It had helped. A lot.

Having someone to lean on, someone to talk to. They'd understood when I burst into tears and gasped between breaths, getting out that the incident had been stirring up old memories I had repressed, or tried to. Had sat there patiently, providing me with silent support through hugs and warm touches and let me get it out. It had felt like the fist that squeezed my heart every time I thought of my past was slowly easing it's grip. Slowly I felt like there would be a day when I could look back at my past and be proud that I had survived it.

There was something so reassuring, so comforting about the way they'd looked at me. Not with pity, not with sympathy but with understanding, with empathy that I had difficulties and that I was trying to cope with them. it made me feel on an equal level, like I could voice my thoughts and they would always respect them and value them.

That's why I was able to stand at the door, unafraid, ready to go to the station and say goodbye to the chapter that was Yuna and Choi. I had Joonie oppa, Yoongi oppa and Tae with me, Kookie had been more worried for me, he didn't want to see them, and shot me a reassuring look from where he sat comfortably on Hobi oppa's lap.

I could do this. I would do this.

----

I couldn't do this.

I stood outside the door to the holding cell, eyeing it nervously as though it would suddenly collapse in on itself and reveal to me the two who had hurt me.

But I gathered up my resolve, gathered every shred of my broken self and pulled myself together, looked at the reassuring and strong gazes of my soulmates and gathered courage.

I entered through the cell, unprepared for what met my eyes.

Choi and Yuna. Faces oversaturated with expressions of hurt, pain and disgust. Eyes red-rimmed and swollen, faces slightly gaunt, lips twisted into a pitying frown. I recognised that look. It was one I knew too well. Self-depreciation.

Their eyes were haunting to look at, a deadness in them so starkly different from the malicious glimmer that had shined in them only a week earlier. What on earth had happened to make them like this, I wondered even if a small part of me was glad. I was glad and the thought of it sickened me. I pushed away the small seed before it grew, not allowing it to take root and grow. I didn't want to lose humanity for the sake of making them pay. I would never want to become them in the slightest.

I turned to see hardened expressions from my soulmates. Nothing soft or forgiving. Their faces looked as though they'd been carved from stone and ice.

The ground shuddered slightly, sound waves radiating off Yoongi oppa, literally uprooting the ground from under Choi and Yuna's feet. I saw the hysterical panic which grew in their eyes, saw them go to clutch at their ears even though the frequency oppa was emitting was nowhere near dangerous. It looked like they were recalling the last time.

Joonie oppa who was so soft, so tender, so full of tenderness and mellowness now looking at them with darkening eyes, roving over them with disgust. He scoffed; I knew he'd seen their auras.

No doubt surrounded with vile dark shades of greens, poisoned personalities often took that shade, saw the black that would be hanging over them in weighed down amounts- the evil that seeped out of their every pore. I felt sorry for oppa, no-one wanted to see that. Come across such vile people.

And Tae. Tae was like a storm; I could almost see his anger as the crackles and sparks of lightening and when he spoke it was a thunderous low boom.

"Why did you do it Yuna? Why did you think it was fine to hurt one of ours?" his voice isn't his usually hypnotic drawl, it's firm and thick with authority and command. There isn't persuasion at play, this is someone who wants the answers, demands them.

I see her shudder, the words flowing out of her in a choked voice. Gone is the voice thick with lust and dripping with sultry tones. Here is someone defeated.

"It wasn't always about you boys. I had always hated (Y/N). Hated her from the moment I heard her name and I saw her so happy, smiling, smiling after everything she put my family through." And I can hear the venom, the hate. It hits me in the face.

Her family? What had I ever done to her? I didn't even know Yuna.

Choi speaks up, even though there is no command forcing him to.

"Think back (Y/N), think back and remember what you did. You tore apart our home. You did it the day you ruined it all." He hisses.

My mind is reeling but I try to recall a time. I don't remember. Why can't I remember?

"Say it clearly Yuna. We don't have time for your petty tricks." Tae commands.

"Why don't you ask her? Why don't you ask her what she did to my mother? What she did to the woman who became her stepmother?" and each word strikes at me, like a vicious stab to the gut.

She is her daughter?

My mind bursts with flashes of memories. Of voices echoing and overlapping. Red cruel lips.

"You don't deserve love; you don't deserve to live."

Pain. Endless pain.

The feeling of being paralysed. Of my limbs failing to cooperate.

And then the last puzzle piece slots into place. Mind manipulation. The same ability that haunted me then and tortured me now.

Yuna is the daughter of my stepmother. Yuna is the daughter of the woman who took everything away from me.

I don't recognise the guttural scream that tears out my throat, don't feel my knees buckle until they sharply collide with the ground, barely register the three voices that cry out in alarm, can barely feel the hands that come to touch me, ground me.

My head is full of one thing. Pain. And it tears my world apart.

KOOKIE POV:

I'm sitting with my hyungs when I a notification pops up. The next episode of 'Cursed Fate' is out. I sit up eagerly, dodge the swat Jin hyung aims at me after he let out a startled yelp.

I scramble off his lap going to grab the tablet lying on the table, quickly opening it and getting the episode up. It had been sheer torture knowing that (Y/N) knew what the episode was about, knew that just metres away or rooms away she might've drawn it and still I didn't know, didn't get told a single detail.

It made the suspense heighten; the anticipation grow.

"Ooh Kookie, let's read together" Jiminie hyung pipes up, appearing over my shoulder and bouncing in excitement. It doesn't take long for Hobi hyung and Jin hyung to join us on the carpet, my head resting on Jiminie hyung's stomach.

I want to know who the little boy was. And now we can finally find out.

----

"Why aren't you scared? You're meant to scream and run away and beg the big bad lion to let you go." The boy huffs, his breath making a small cloud as he exhales, eyebrows furrowed as he looks down at the small girl.

She turns slowly, almost fatigued, and weary in her movement. Her eyes slowly rise to meet his gaze and he looks at them, the way they're blank. Uncaring.

"What? You don't care if I eat you? You could pretend to be scared you know. And why are you moving so slowly, are you a halmeoni?" he questions, tone incredulous.

He bends down to be at the same level as her, looking her dead in the eyes.

"You don't talk much do you? Why not?" he continues to talk.

Secretly, he's aware of the horrifying void that fills her head. The few lone thoughts that stray out are very depressing, very melancholic. They're the thoughts of someone who's given up.

And if there's one person who doesn't give up. It's him.

He knows exactly what he's getting himself into. But everyone needs a friend. Love and hugs are something everyone deserves. And he's going to make sure she gets her fill, more so.

It's a promise he makes silently to himself and to the girl.

He finds her in the same place everyday, always sitting there silently like a little statue. He wonders if she gets cold, if she aches from sitting on the frozen ground, if her parents tell her off for coming back with dirty clothes. But never asks.

He's seen the way her eyes well up when he chatters on about the adventures he's gone on with his parents, seen her little fists clench tightly until he's afraid she'll hurt herself so he scoops her hand in his and natters away to distract her. Talking about this thing or that, about his likes and dislikes.

Some nights after his mum has tucked him in, he'll turn on his little rocket nightlight and wonder about what is that'll help her. He thinks he is helping her, slowly but surely, he can see some life return to her eyes. He's seen the faint but still present glimmer in her soft eyes. When he talked about their old dog dying, he swears he felt a brief squeeze in his hand, the one she now so readily lets him scoop up and swing between them or just watch as they sit there intertwined.

The next day, several months into what the boy is so assured is friendship, he sees her sitting there again. He strides forward and plops down next to her. He automatically begins prattling off stories and he's just got into a heated one-sided debate about why pineapples shouldn't be on pizzas when something out of the ordinary happens. Something that causes him to jerk back and gape wide-eyed.

"Don't you ever shut up?" she huffs and it's not said in a mean way, her voice is soft and lilting, it washes over him and immediately envelops him in warmth, like the feeling of having hot chocolate on a winter's night whilst being wrapped up in a blanket.

The boy breaks out into the biggest smile, it stretches from ear to ear, his messy hair is tousled with the wind. She leans forward and gingerly brushes it back.

"Sometimes you can sit there quietly, you know." She says and there it is. A small, slight tug at her lips. So different to the stoic line its always pressed into. Even though it's minute, it's there.

The boy pulls her into a hug, tight and firm and sways from side to side.

"I'm Jae!" he chirps in her ear, grip still firm on her as though she'll vanish from his arms.

"I'm Dae Hyeon." She whispers back into the thick wool of his scarf.

And between them blossoms a small tether, one of lifelong companions. And it chips away at the rock-hard mask she wears. And maybe, just maybe for the first time in a long while she lets herself truly breathe.

And the soft flowery scent of detergent and the thick softness of the scarf tickles her nose.

And she lets herself hope.

----

"Who do you think the boy is? You know since Dae Hyeon is (Y/N)." I pipe up, turning to my hyungs.

Now that we know who Dae Hyeon is, who she represents, it makes me even more observant of every detail, every tiny image in case there's something hidden in the webtoon.

Hobi hyung hums.

"Maybe it's one of the boys? He muses.

There's a thought. But who?

It's warming to know that (Y/N) hadn't been alone during the hardest moments of her life but also makes me slightly jealous. I wish we could've gotten to know her when she was young, see her blossom into the beautiful soul she is today. But we have a long, long time to make those memories. To cherish them.

But when the door bursts open and the rest of our soulmates rush in, panic and distress seeping into every crevice of the house, my heart thuds violently and the image I see before my eyes makes me fearfully wonder just how long our time is.

(BACK AT IT WITH THE ANGST AND HURT...FOR ALL OF YOU WHO WERE BEGINNING TO RELAX...TO ATTENTION MY LOVELIES, THERE'S A WORLD OF HURT WE GOTTA NAVIGATE AND PULL (Y/N) OUT OF. HOW DID YOU FIND IT, LET ME KNOW AS USUAL. YOUR COMMENTS ARE SOMETHING I EAGERLY LOOK FORWARD TO EVERY DAY! WOW, WOW. IT HURT BRINGING BACK THE PAIN BUT FOR EVERYONE WHO HAS BEEN THEORISING, WONDERING...YES! YUNA IS THE STEPMOTHER'S DAUGHTER. LET'S SEE IF YOU GUYS PICK UP ON IT! NOW...IN THE WORDS OF THE FAMOUS DOCTOR WHO...ALLONS-Y!)

Your smile is beautiful, it's unique. It's what sets you apart from everyone else. Never stop smiling!

Borahae! 💜💜💜

PurpleQueenie <3