THE BABY MILL [[{SHINee}]]

THE BABY MILL [[52]] ECTOPIC

          Since their failure JongHyun had spent his time completely alone. He didn’t want to think about what had needed to be done to get him into solitary confinement. Whatever had happened he was getting anxious. He had almost become like a shorter version of MinHo with the way he was pacing throughout the length of his room.

            He had already spent too much time in this sparsely furnished room. It couldn’t even be said that it was furnished since the bed was nothing more than a mattress spread on the floor. The hole in the corner couldn’t even be called a toilet. But JongHyun had to accept it or have an even more miserable time pining for his old apartment. He would even settle for the closet that had been his dorm room during his first years studying. \ His body wasn’t going too well either. He assumed he had obtained this gash during their attempt at escape when the workers had pulled him away from Key and the others. It had started as nothing but a line down his palm but now it had become an enflamed mess. Swollen rises bordered the blood red center with spots of purple flocking the area. There was no longer a moment that JongHyun didn’t feel a throbbing from the wound. It intensified when he applied even the slighted pressure on it. The heat that emanated from it felt surreal to the donor who had often had chills and cold sweats flow through his body.

            When his body tired of pacing, which it often did ever since his wound had flared up, he curled up on his mattress with his knees tucked into his chest. He laid there for hours… Or what felt like hours. JongHyun fought against incessant shivers, losing consciousness and his own thoughts.

            Key was still alive. The workers had come religiously to take his sperm which meant they had to be bringing it to somebody. It wouldn’t take long for them to come back… For a bath or something else… They never left his side yet he had this cut that desperately needed treatment and none of them noticed. Had the floor manager accompanied the staff during the last few trips then maybe he would have gotten treatment earlier.

            Who knew what time it was or how much time had passed, but the door opened. JongHyun was curled up on his mattress when they arrived. Raising his head he caught a glimpse of the pink and blue of a badge and he sent a silent cheer of thanks to whoever was listening.

            “Get up, it’s time to take your bath,” a worker to his left snickered.

            There was shuffling and JongHyun landed on his feet one man holding him up. He gasped at the tight grip on his forearm. A sensitive area where the infection had spread.

            “What the hell’s wrong with you?” the man holding him up questioned. The usual reply was silence but as expected the floor manager suspected all that wasn’t said.

            Without a care he pushed aside the worker next to JongHyun, keeping him up with an arm around his body. His free hand tugged at his hand until his palm was facing the ceiling. The welt was easily recognizable now that it was staring everyone head on.

            “That’s disgusting! Jesus Christ, no wonder he stinks,” someone in the room gagged.

            JongHyun didn’t blame them for being so disgusted. It was quite repulsive with the puss oozing out and the discolouration… He had adjusted to the aroma wafting from it, not having a choice since he had been living with it 24/7.

            “Ugh, the thing’s infected!” another man chimed.

            “Shut-up and get him to the medical wing. Call the boss. This needs to get treated quickly,” instructed the floor manager. He chastised a few other workers who dared snivel about having to host “the vegetable”, blubbering about how there were worse things than a damn cut to gag over.

            JongHyun turned a deaf ear to it all, not wishing to hear the horrible things they had to say about him.

            He floated down the aisles, the mean around him doing the work. Scarping noises came from his heels dragging along the floor. There was nothing left in the donor: energy, spent, life itself had drained out of him till he was nothing but a shell of his past existence.

            It was rare that he made a visit to the medical wing. The last time he’d been here formally was so long past that a fleck of dust from the memory was all that remained. Coming back to it now didn’t exactly raise any pleasant memories either.

            They passed curtained off area and a room with dimmed lights that allowed only shadows to be seen through the glass.

            While they pulled JongHyun along his eyes locked into something. Though he had seen that face a handful of times only he was able to distinguish the sharp facial angles and that hair from all the other people he had seen here. There was no mistaking it.

            Machines and wires were attached to the body spread out on the bed. Alive from what he could see of the blips on the monitor, but barely.

            A squeak of a noise died in JongHyun’ throat. He desperately needed to reach out to him – to let him know that there was hope. They were each others hope. Their life lines were each other. If he could just reach out and tell him to hold on and they could go all out together to find safety.

            “K-K…” he croaked, his vocal chords so unused to speaking after being clammed shut for so long.

            “Shut up,” the floor manager snapped, shoving him on his lower back.

            Like before, JongHyun ignored the man, fixated completely on establishing some form of communication with his carrier.

            “K-Key, “he rasped, trying to break free of the holds the workers had on him. Hearing his voice earned him another slap to the back. “Key! K-Key!” he continued. He hardly had the time to place a foot out of line before the workers had him pinned to the floor. It wasn’t hard to sweep him off his feet in his current state.

            A knee pressed between his shoulder blades and kept him there till he stopped struggling.

            The floor manager’s mouth pressed close to his ear, his hot, rancid breath ghosting over the skin at the nape of his neck as he hissed, “If I was you I would go back to being quiet.”