Yoongi knew that it was a terrible idea to let Joohyun go to the hospital all by herself but he couldn’t make her stay. He didn’t want to look clingy or persistent, he wanted to respect her privacy without nosing into everything she does.

So he trusted his gut and checked on her at the hospital. He knew she would need to pick up her sister at 5pm, thus Yoongi arrived ten minutes earlier. He assumed that Joohyun would be there around the same time as him.

However, as minutes passed by, Joohyun was still nowhere to be seen. There was only one entrance of the hospital, so he should have seen her if she was on time. But she didn't come at 5pm, nor five or ten minutes later. Due to Yoongi's invisibility skills, when he tried hard, he could be invisible and this particular ability of him came in handy this time. Though he never really used it because he was happy that little children believed in him and he wasn't totally invisible anymore. He only used it when he was snowball fighting with the kids and he wanted to surprise them but because they called it cheating (only when they got totally drenched because of his snowballs), he usually didn't make use of it.

On the other hand, he didn't want to risk anything and see headlines of a 'creepy, anime-like figure' (he had enough of that description, he wasn't an anime character for God's sake, he was a Guardian!) crouching beside a window, eyeing the patients in the room like a stalker.

Because that's exactly what he did.

No matter his age, he was flexible and fast when it came to jumping from rooftop to rooftop or climbing buildings. He was probably the most fit out of the Guardians though Bunnymund always persisted that he was faster than Yoongi. Maybe his boomerangs were faster than Yoongi's snowballs but he himself was almost as clumsy as Santa Claus when it came to moving around.

Anyway, the thing is that Joohyun’s little sister ‒ Yerim ‒ was all alone in the room, worriedly trying to call someone ‒ probably Joohyun. There was still no trace of the said girl even though her sister was already dressed up, ready to go.

"I have a bad feeling about this." Yoongi mumbled to himself, biting his lip in frustration. What if Joohyun backed off? No, no, she wouldn't do that to her sister, she loved her too much to abandon her and to let her down. What if she got scared in the hospital? She had once told him how much she hated hospitals ever since the accident of her parents. She hated everything about them and if she could, she avoided them as much as possible. What if she hurt herself because she couldn't deal with the overwhelming anxiety that was triggered by the place?

Yoongi jolted up at the thought. Even though she had made a significant progress, she was trained for only three weeks and the problem was that she managed to keep her emotions at bay when it came to a brand new anxiety-provoking situation, but what if the memories of the accident were so vivid that she couldn't handle everything all at once?

There was no use of dwelling. Joohyun was gone and Yoongi had no idea where she went. He had to do something to make the most of the suspicious situation. Just as much as he wanted to tell Yerim that everything will be alright and Joohyun would come soon, he wasn't sure if he could talk to her in the first place. Yerim was thirteen years old and this was the age children either started to lose interest in the Guardians or the adults made them doubt if they ever existed. Yerim might not even believe in him.

One thing was for sure, a missing person might be in more trouble than a patient who's waiting to be discharged. He couldn't help both girls, so he called for assistance. Not literally but he used his telepathic skills to let Sandman know that he needs help and the said Guardian was there with him in a blink of an eye.

There were four things in common with the Guardians of Childhood; they could all teleport from one place to another or travel at the speed of light if needed, they could be invisible if they wanted to and use telepathy between the five of them, they couldn't use it on humans. So when obstacles like this arose, they often used telepathy to communicate with each other and Yoongi liked to call Mark because he couldn't talk back to him and he couldn't say no to anything Jack Frost asked him to do. That boy had a heart of gold.

"Look, Mark..." Yoongi scratched the back of his neck as he tried to re-collect his thoughts without confusing the other Guardian. "Joohyun was supposed to meet her sister and 5 and it's already 5:30 but she hasn't been here, so I think something's going on with her. Please, do something to help her sister! You can make her fall asleep or if she sees you, you can also reassure her that everything’s going to be okay. I know you can't talk to her but try your best to make yourself understand." Yoongi stuttered, his thoughts racing like cars. Worse and worse scenarios came to his mind as he wasn't even sure the hospital stuff would let Yerim go alone. "Just make sure she's safe." He concluded hastily, then left a confused Sandman at the rooftop of the hospital while he went to check the area near the hospital.

When his search didn't prove to be fruitful, he had another idea in his head. Joohyun probably didn't go to their flat, so the only place she could have been that Yoongi also knew of was the warehouse.

No matter how embarrassing it was to go back, revealing that he was stalking on Joohyun, he headed back and a heavy weight was immediately lifted off his chest when he saw that the girl was there.

Joohyun was snuggled up in the corner, her back to the wall, her eyes fixed on the table in the middle of the room. She probably didn't look at anything in particular because her orbs looked like glass; inexplicable and expressionless. He couldn't pinpoint what might have happened to her, but he was sure that it was something grave because she wouldn't have looked so frightened otherwise. She was usually easy to read but this time Yoongi couldn't even imagine what might have happened.

"I'm sorry." Joohyun mumbled as soon as their eyes met, hers were teary and puffy while his were overly affectionate.

Yoongi saw her trembling hands and uneasiness settled in his stomach. What if something happened to her? What if she hurt herself? Or others? For this reason, Yoongi searched for any sign of bruises or injuries but fortunately he didn't see anything odd about her.

"What happened?" He asked gently as he took a step closer to her. Joohyun didn't budge this time. She let him get closer to her, thus Yoongi crouched down to be at eye-level with her. He didn't know why but he was fond of the way her eyes were a mirror of her emotions except this time because he couldn't see anything, only numbness and fear. Excruciating, stern and unbreakable fear.

"I killed a man."

The atmosphere froze as a pond does in winter. It was so sudden and surprising. He assumed that Joohyun would start talking about what had happened in details and then confess what made her shake in fear like a twist in a story. Instead, she coughed out the words as it was a poisonous liquid that she wanted to get rid of.

By the Yoongi could come back to his senses, Joohyun had already tore off her gaze. She didn't want to meet his eyes even though he didn't want to reprimand him. He was sure she didn't do it on purpose.

"Tell me what happened exactly." The Guardian requested patiently. Despite the fact that it took everything in him not to start interrogating her like a police offer because he was so eager to know what happened. He knew there was no use of yelling at her or punishing her when he didn't even know the whole story. Joohyun may not have been able to control her power but she would never use it against anyone, especially not to take someone's life.

"I was supposed to meet Yerim but I couldn't drag myself to the hospital. All those horrible memories from the accident, my parents' death and my near-death experience came to my mind all at once and the sudden turmoil I felt inside of me was overwhelming." Joohyun gulped thinking of the memories but scooped herself up to continue. "So I turned back and ended up in a dark alley. That's when this stranger came up to me and started saying things like he just wants to play with me and‒"

"That son of a ..." Yoongi cursed under his breath, taking Joohyun by surprise. The girl's eyes widened like Bambi's when she started walking and had the chance to properly look around the woods. "Did he do anything to you? Did he hurt you in any way?" He inquired fervently, already feeling the anger and disgust boiling up inside of him.

Please Subscribe to read the full chapter