"I KNOW we made a terrible mistake..." Felix began, his eyes teary, "But we're going to get on that flight, and leave the country."

Mal rolled her eyes, shaking her head in dismay.

"If you- you know, if you want to say goodbye to us, we can wait for you? I wanted to... I mean, we still have an hour left, and I want to see you." he explained nervously, biting his lower lip in heartbreak.

He wanted to see her so much.

"No, Felix, don't wait for me."

His heart was shattered into pieces as soon as the sentence hit him.

"What? W-Why not?" he questioned, tears streaming down his face.

"We already broke up, and we're not friends anymore. Why would I want to see you?"

Her voice came out so cold and harsh, it made a chill run down his spine.

"Because I-I wanted to apologize? And... The others too-"

"Felix, I said no. It's final. Please, just let it go."

His heart ached at the sentence.

"Please, Mal, we don't have to break up..."

She scoffed and shook her head.

"We already did. Goodbye."

As soon as she hung up, Felix turned to his friends, holding the phone close to his chest as he tried to hold in his tears.

"So?" Jisung questioned, "What happened?"

He turned to sit down on the nearby seat, his eyes teary.

"She's not coming," he choked out, "she's really upset."

A moment of taken aback silence passed before they all hurried towards their friend, muttering apologies as they hugged him.

"Felix, we're really sorry. I don't know why we did that..."

Felix shook his head in guilt and regret, a wave of dread filling his insides.

"Can we just go, p-please?"

Chan sighed and eventually nodded.

Jeongin finished the second half of the story, another wave of guilt rushing through him.

"He really wanted to see you, noona. I wanted to see you too, but we knew you were upset... We weren't the same without you."

She nodded and hugged her younger friend tightly.

"I know... I wanted to see him too. That's why I came to Korea in the first place, so that he could apologize and we can get over it or whatever," she explained, clearly hurt by the memory, "but we never did. And it's all because of me."

He squeezed her torso tighter at the sentence.

"No, it's not... Please, stop."

She allowed tears to stream down her face as she enjoyed her friend's presence, knowing that he was the only thing that was left from them.

"Noona, it's not your fault, okay? It's what God wants..."

She faintly smiled at him quoting her sentence when they were back in Korea.

"Yeah. It definitely is. Anyways, let's go to your room."

☂︎

The steady beeps of the heart monitor was the only thing they could hear for a long time.

A wave of despair filled Felix's insides as he glanced at the rest of the six beds, and could find the six faces above them staring back at him with eyes filled with tears.

"Felix, how are you? How is your back? I know it's been hurting before the incident," Jisung asked before the memory of the terrible incident crossed his mind.

"Yeah... It hurts a lot. I feel numb in most of my body because of it, as the doctors say."

Hyunjin let out a choked sob while he cried.

"We shouldn't have come here. This is all our fault..."

"No, it's not. Hyunjin, stop it," Minho began, sitting up straight on the bed, ignoring the wave of pain radiating through his shoulder. They all did the same, slowly to stop themselves from feeling more pain, "How were we supposed to know, anyway? We're not psychics."

Chan clutched his stomach before flinching.

"Minho is right. But we should've talked to our parents about it. None of us wanted to go back anyway."

Felix grabbed his waist, winced in pain, then turned to his friends.

"Where are Mal and Jeongin? Do you reckon they're still here?" He asked, hopeful.

Chan shook his head.

"No, they're not."

"How can you be so sure?"

He sighed. "Before we were taken by the ambulance I told her that I wished that she would take good care of Jeongin. My best guess is that she realized that they weren't safe here and probably left the country."

Felix could practically hear his heart being crushed in a distance.

"But... Where would they go?" Changbin asked.

"We only know their location in one country, the United States, so we can only hope they didn't go somewhere else. We can't contact them or visit them if they do."

Seungmin adjusted his position, squeezing his thigh to ease the pain.

"What's Mal's hometown? Maybe they went there."

"Egypt." Felix deadpanned, a wave of hopelessness filling him.

Seungmin rolled his eyes, "I mean, where in Egypt?"

"Alexandria."

Chan rubbed his temple.

"That's gonna make it so hard for us to find them, considering that we don't know anything about Egypt except that it has pyramids and that the people there speak Arabic."

Jisung bit his lower lip. "I didn't know that either."

They all shook their head, agreeing with Chan.

"But..." Felix started, "We have to find them, right? Please, Chan?"

The older boy thought for a moment, unsure how to answer.

"I mean, yes. But we need a plan."

They all sighed in relief.

____________________