The other side

You gasped for air as he retrieved his hand and folded over, coughing uncontrollably.

Your eyes kept darting at his face as his figure loomed tall above your kneeling-down self.

" Are dreams supposed to hurt this much?" You murmured under your breath as you held one palm above your chest, eyes wide and mind still racing.  "I really have never seen such a realistic dream in my life"

" It's not a dream. " He cut you off, looking pissed off at your behaviour as he reached down, grabbed you by the collar of your shirt, and pulled you back on your feet.

" That's what a dream person would say. " You smiled, finding it slightly funny, but as he kept staring at you, your smile faded away, and you gulped down with difficulty.

"Well-" you trailed off, observing his face up close, and noticing how real the skin looked.

Nah, it's impossible. If he really was the character I had created, I would be doomed.

You joked in your head and shook it around, as you lifted your hands and started touching Jimin's face, while he squinted his eyes more, staring at you.

"You don't expect me to really believe this tho? Like you literally don't exist. I made you up," You uttered as if trying to convince him, and he just tightened his grip on your collar, making you pause your touching.

" You didn't make me up. Just because you were getting information about my life downloaded in your mind, that doesn't mean I am your creation, you arrogant little brat!" He pushed you against the wall again, the impact pain, conflicting once more with your denial to believe this.

" I need to wake up. I don't like this dream!" You tried to push him, and he just let you, seeing you hurrying around the room in search of a door, which was very obvious, but you seemed too shocked to take immediate notice of it.

He watched you sprint out of it once you got it, though, and just let a sigh escape his lips; then he looked down on his bleeding palm, slightly regretting the mess.

You rushed down the corridors in a frenzy, but once you found yourself at the top of the stairs and you saw down the living room that awaited on the floor below, you froze in place, for it was the exact room as you had imagined the living room of Professor Park's mansion to have been in the books.

Every little piece of furniture, decoration, and colors, all were identical to the images you had in your mind while describing and writing about it.

I am going to admit myself to a mental asylum tomorrow. As soon as I snap out of this hallucination. The straight jacket is the only solution at this point.

You thought as you went down the stairs, touching everything carefully and grabbing whatever object came to view to examine it up close.

" Don't drop anything. They are pretty expensive." Jimin's voice echoed from the shadows as he appeared soon after at the top of the stairs, making you look back at him. And just stand still, observing him walking down and bringing himself to stand before you again.

" Okay, I don't want to alarm anyone. But I am so ready to start screaming and freaking out right now." You laughed even though you meant your words. Nothing about this was funny at all.

" You can scream. No one will hear you anyway," He deadpanned as he went and took a seat on his couch, his bleeding hand leaning from the armrest in order not to dirty it.

" Aha! Because it's a dream! I knew it!" You exclaimed as if you had caught him lying, and he just looked unimpressed at your hopeful face.

" Because I have activated the security system and everything is shut down." His words left you looking around and rushing towards the glassy door to check, only for you to get hit by an electric wave and be sent flying to the floor right after.

"Holy shit!" you exclaimed, as you felt your whole body vibrating and tingling.

" Try not to kill yourself. I went to so much trouble to bring you over. I need you alive," Jimin yelled at you as he stood up, rolling his eyes at your stupidity.

" That hurt. That really hurt! " You rushed to get up on your feet and stand before him. " It hurt, but it didn't kill me because the system is designed to scare people off. I remember cause I literally thought about it. I designed this!"

" Can you leave your God complex aside for a moment and focus on what is important?!" Jimin took hold of your arm with his wounded hand and forcefully pulled you towards the couch, shoving you to sit on it. Then he leaned over, trapping you between his arms and the couch.

" I need my life back. " He demanded. " Exactly how it was."
As silence fell between you and you kept looking at him like an awestruck deer at a headlight, he brought his hand to travel down his face in irritation.

" Fine, go ahead. Look around as much as you want. " He gave up, understanding that for anyone to believe that they travelled to a parallel universe would be a bit of a shock. So he just watched you for hours, roaming around his mansion like a maniac, each time returning in his view with a worse state of hair and a worse facial expression.

Then he just watched you collapse on the floor, rolling around and pulling your hair while mumbling to yourself.

And she is supposed to be the all-mighty author? What a joke.

He sneered as he shook his head at your state and went on to pay attention to the bandage he was placing on his palm after he had taken care of his open cut and stopped the bleeding.

"So this is real? It's really my book! The world of my book?" You asked him as you stood up from the floor, hair flying around as you had been in a fight with some wild animals.

" Are you sane enough to listen, or will I be wasting my breath again?" He raised an eyebrow at you, and you paused, for although everything was proving that this place was real. Way too real. You couldn't help but deny it.

" Let's assume. Let's assume I believe you. And all this is not a production of my mind finally losing its sanity. " You lifted your palms, dramatically emphasizing that this is just an assumption and you ain't crazy enough to really believe that this is happening. " If it's really real, and I am here. Why am I here? Why the heck did you bring me here?!"

" I didn't think it was gonna work either, " Jimin admitted, as who in their right minds would really believe that following a ritual he found in a book would really work on summoning someone. He was just too enraged and desperate; hence, he had gone ahead and done it, but he too hadn't expected to truly get the person responsible for his life to just drop from the ceiling.

"What do you mean?"

" I didn't know that I would be really pulling you over to my reality. I wanted to talk to you, though. Cause you need to fix the mess you have made out of my life!" He demanded, eyes narrow and sharp as he put aside the first aid kit and walked over to you.

His accusatory finger rested on your chest as he pushed you slightly, his eyes firmly keeping eye contact, intact.

" You gave me everything. You gave me happiness and fixed my life once. You need to do it again."

"I don't understand what you mean"

" Don't play dumb! I became aware. I know from what moment on, my life was under your control. I have felt it multiple times. You pulling the strings," He admitted, and you blinked as the realisation settled that all those times that you were writing and updating your chapters, you were actually dictating the real-life events of a real person, in a parallel universe.

"I think my mind will explode," you uttered as your hands reached to your hair again, struggling to accept the information.

But it makes sense. Why the heck does it make sense?

You complained inwardly, as all the times that the characters felt like they were writing themselves and all the times they kept going off script and off plot on their own swirled in your head.  You had thought that it was just something that happens when someone is in the flow of writing.  The story takes you on its own sometimes. It happens to most authors. It should have been normal. But at this very moment all those instances morphed into proof that these characters have been real all along.

" I let you. I let you turn wheels. I kept hearing this voice that I should trust, so I trusted you. Because I prayed, I prayed for someone to come save me, then you started writing, and I felt things changing. " Jimin went on, his hand retrieving and getting entangled in his blonde hair, as he felt the pain overwhelm his chest.

" I thought this was the answer to my prayers. I thought this was God, finally working on my life. Even though I didn't fully believe it either. The awareness was looming at the back of my mind-"

" But I ruined it-" you cut him off, eyes wide as it clicked in your mind what you had truly done to him.

In Hush, you had brought people over to him and mended his wounds; in Uproar, you had strengthened their connections and literally given him the reality he was always longing for. His brother by his side, loving him, friends he could feel understood by, and a love life he could give his all to without fear of being broken.

You had given him everything, yet at the very end, you had made his happy ending a lie. Because of book 3. Instead of letting him live on in his new happy life, you had taken everything back. By simply writing some extra sentences.

" Everything disappeared." Jimin's eyes softened as he admitted the truth, and his breath halted in his throat.

" Everything went back to how it was before you started writing the first book. And I am left here, knowing how it feels to have had it all, and being kicked out of it." His expression shifted to anger as he went on, his hand finding its way to the back of your neck and pulling you closer.

" And I want it back. I want it all back. And you will return it to me, no matter what." His grip tightened around your skin as he stared into your eyes, and you halted your breath, feeling the seriousness of the atmosphere settling within you.

" How dead am I if I tell you  that I don't know how?" You smiled awkwardly as you admitted the truth, then slowly brought your hands to travel up to his chest, getting ready to push him, if need be.

He chuckled momentarily at your reply, then left a chilling smirk to rest on his lips, instantly making you recognise that expression.

" I never said I won't try... I will figure it out...I WILL DEFINITELY DO IT." You started adding to your previous statement as his face kept coming closer and closer, and panic started rising within you, making your voice go higher and higher with each sentence.

" No matter how much of a living hell your life was on the other side, just know I can make it ten times worse. So you better get down to business and make it flawless. " His low voice sent chills down your spine as his breath fanned against your lips, his eyes gleaming under the lights of the chandelier.

" Of course. I will make it even better than before. You can rest assured. " You pushed him while laughing forcefully and uttering promises you had no idea how to keep.

Because now you were in his world. And you held no power to dictate his reality while in it. Just like you held no power over your own life while you were in your reality.

He should have thought about that before bringing you over, but you were in no position to be scolding him at that moment, so you just smiled, nodded, and reassured, while inwardly you were contemplating your funeral.

I am so screwed!

--- To be continued ---