The ache in his head felt like someone decided to bang the festival drum in his head.
Why does it hurt so much?
The last thing Shin Yi could remember is looking into Ji-hye's eyes as he took the poison.
Was he dead and is this hell?
Are the gods punishing him for being foolish when he lived. For yearning for Ji-hye even when she belonged to another.
He opened his eyes and everything around him looked different. The walls looked like a solid cage, painted in white, and what is this machine that keeps making the weird noises. And the oddly wire thing connected to his body.
Are they sucking his blood?
Whatever this place is, he needs to get out. Maybe the poison didn't kill and the King sold him to their enemies and this is a form of torture chamber.
With sheer force of will Shin Yi pulled himself to a sitting position and then pulled the cannula connected to his hand. He dropped his legs to the ground and tried to stand. Immediately he was seized by a massive pain so forceful that it tore a horrifying scream out of his mouth.
His hand held his head as he screamed in pain. Unrecognisable images bombarded his mind.
Inside his head he could see blurring images of boys in weird looking uniforms. There were five of them. One of them looks very fat and scared of the other four. Their conversation wasn't clear in Shin Yi's head, but he could feel the fat boy's fear like it was his own.
The four boys were taunting the fat boy with words that caused tears and terror to rain down the boy's cheeks, and they kept on invading his space until the boy stood at the age of the roof.
If he wasn't in so much pain Shin Yi would have felt sorry for the boy. The images not only will they not stop they were making his pain worse and Shin Yi lacks the understanding why this was happening to him.
Despite the danger the boy was in his tormentors wouldn't stop. They kept on moving forward, a sick grin of excitement on their faces as they hurled ugly words that Shin Yi didn't understand at the boy.
A look of despair and hopelessness flashed through the boys eyes before he turned and leapt off the roof leaving his tormentors with slack jaw and a look of horror. It was obvious that they didn't think the boy will jump.
Shin Yi screamed as if to save the boy but it was too late as his young body plastered to the ground and blood began to sip out from his head.
His screaming alerted the nurses and doctors and they all rushed into his room to find his vitals signs going haywire.
"What is going on?" One of the doctors yelled unable to understand why their patient is awake and screaming with so much pain.
"I don't know!" A nurse replied as she tried to take Shin Yi's observation again.
Lost in the horrifying memories that are clearly not his own and confused why he was remembering someone else's pain, added to the excruciating pain of his head Shin Yi tried to resist the strangers help. He didn't recognise them or the strange uniform they were wearing. Everything feels off and that scared him so much that he fought his helpers.
The doctors and the nurses struggled to bring the thrashing Shin Yi under control but he was a big boy who seems to have the strength of a thousand.
"Can someone withdraw 10 mls of Diazepam and give him, no make that 20mls for a boy of his weight 10pms will not be enough," the lead doctor yelled out.
"Why is he so strong?" Commented one of the female nurses trying to keep Shin Yi still.
Few dry chuckle sounded through the emergency room. There was nothing funny about her words but the light humour helped relieve the growing tension in the room as they all tried to save their patient's life.
His blood pressure was climbing through the roof, so is his heart rate and the ECG monitoring wasn't looking good either.
One of the junior doctors in the room quickly did as the senior doctor instructed but when he tried to give the medication there wasn't a line.
"Shit!" The young doctor exclaimed with a clueless look on his face.
"What is it?" The lead doctor frowned at the junior wondering why he hasn't giving the medication already.
"He took out his line," the junior doctor muttered softly with a nervous look towards his senior.
"Fuck me!" The senior doctor cursed in a low voice. Getting the boy's line hadn't been easy and there is no way they will be able to get in another one with him struggling with them.
"Alright people we will try and hold him still so Dr Jun-hyeok can give the medication IM."
The doctors and nurses trying to keep Shin Yi still all looked strained and sweaty.
The door to the room opened and a woman entered, she is Shin Yi's mum. An average height slender woman with short dark brown hair cut in a bob, and her face telling the story of the hard life she is living.
She screamed in alarm when she saw what was happening in the room, but before she could approach her son one of the nurses broke away and took her outside.
Dr Jun-hyeok looked so nervous that his hand shook. He just started his emergency rotation and this is his first time being in this kind of emergency were the patient is violent.
"You can do it, boy," the senior doctor encouraged seeing the agitation on the younger doctor's face.
Dr Jin-hyeok took a deep breath, steadied his hand and then went ahead to inject the medication into Shin Yi's buttocks.
It took few minutes for the medication to work.
They all exhaled in relief when Shin Yi fell unconscious and his vital signs began to normalise.
The lead doctor instructed one of the middle grade doctors to help with the patient's line.
"Is his head scan back?"
The patient was rushed in few hours ago unconscious with a head injury. It is a shock to the lead doctor that the young man is awake.
"Yes, doctor," one of the doctors answered after clicking the computer to check for the patient results.
They all gathered around the computer to look at the scans.
"He seems to have haemorrhage in his brain, and it looks like it is growing. If we don't take him in now we might lose him. Dr Jun-hyeok call the theatre and have them prepare for this patient. Where is his mother?" The lead doctor asked.
"She is outside Dr Se-ha," one of the nurses replied.
"I will go speak to her," Dr Se-ha walked out of the room.
As soon as Shin Yi's mum saw the doctor heading towards her she flew off the seat and hurried to meet him on the way, looking very anxious and terrified.
"How is he doctor?"
"I am sorry Mrs Yi, I don't have a very good news."