June stood from the bed, flinching as he felt a slight rip in his stab wound.
"Woah," Dr. Oh exclaimed. "I wouldn't get up just yet, young man. You might just risk being bed-bound for more than a week at this point."
"A week?" June asked, still standing up. "I'm sorry, doctor. But I'm afraid I can't do that. We have a mission on Wednesday. It's already Saturday, so my teammates are probably practicing right now. I can't be here for a whole week."
Minjun clicked his tongue. "You're going back for what? To ruin the performance? You can't even raise your left arm," he smirked.
June glared at the young kid and shook his head. "I'm fine," he insisted. Again, he's suffered much worse than this. When he was in the White Tiger gang, he had to go on an undercover mission after his abdomen had just been stabbed!
"Unfortunately, you are not," Dr. Oh said. "I'm already being generous by giving you only a week. Besides, my dear friends, Yena and Yejin, instructed that I should let you stay here until you're all better."
"And the competition?" June asked.
"Do not fret. You are still a part of Rising Stars," Dr. Oh said. "You can come back the next week just in time for the eliminations."
June pursed his lips. He couldn't afford to miss out on the Concept Mission!
He had finally bagged a song he actually enjoyed performing, where everything seemed to be going well. Besides, being idle for even one mission meant that his chances of debuting were going to regress.
It was the cruel rule of life.
A butterfly effect happens when you miss out on something.
"Well, I just came by to relay the news to you," Dr. Oh said. "Don't worry. We'll be monitoring your wound every day, and if it gets better, we'll let you go."
And with that, the white-haired and eccentric doctor left the room while humming a Little Meow Meow song.
June groaned as he plopped down on the bed. "I need to go back," he said.
Grandma clicked her tongue and slapped his chest. "Stubborn young child. You just got stabbed, but you're already thinking of going back to work? You heard what the doctor said. Recover first, then you'll be able to come back."
Minjun nodded in agreement. "That's right. Why don't you inform your fans that you're better in the meantime? Some are already looking for your gravestone in certain cemeteries."
"Yeah, you do that," Grandma said. "In the meantime, I have to enroll Minjun in school. Can't you believe this little rascal is already going to become a 7th grader?"
"Yeah, can't believe it," June said. Minjun, despite his immature taste in music and crybaby tendencies, might as well be Jun Hao's age with how witty he is.
"See you later!" Minjun waved his hand. "We'll go back this evening."
June nodded and waved goodbye with his good arm.
In the meantime, he decided to do what Minjun had suggested. He has yet to upload a selfie on his account because of the scandals that broke out last week, but since everything has died down, he thinks this is the perfect time to complete the mission.
However, just as he was about to open Navel, he was bombarded with texts from his friends.
'Streets are saying that big bro's dead' - Jangmoon.
'Who's dead, you bastards?' - June.
'June!' - Akira
'Bro huhu' - Jisung.
'You're alive?' - C-Jay
'You saw what happened. Why'd you think I died?' - June
'C-Jay said you were stabbed in the chest. I really thought you bled to death.' - Jangmoon
'The sites are also saying you incurred major injuries. I covered my eyes when Alex jumped up the stage, so I don't know what truly happened hehe.' - C-Jay
'Tsk. I'm fine. I'm thinking of coming back before the performances.' - June
'What? You've just been stabbed. How can you come back before Wednesday?' - Akira
'I'll figure something out' - June
'Yeah, you better come back. We're going to be kicking otsdjseghuy' - Jangmoon
'What?' - June
'The production crew instructed everyone to decide who they'dashgefaduyhgbh' - Jangmoon
'What the fuck are you talking about?' - June
'Don't mind them, brother. Akira just wrestled Jangmoon on the floor. Focus on your recovery for now.' - Jisung
'Hey, what's really going on?' - June
'Bye, June! We're heading to practice now. Get well soon.' - Akira
And with that, their online status turned to offline.
June clicked his tongue and shook his head. Is something going on in the training center?
Ah, whatever.
Those kids are always over-dramatic.
Let's just get the last mission over and done with.
June opened his camera app and decided to take a selfie. Again, this was probably the first time he took a selfie for the sake of posting it, so he's a bit clueless about what to do.
As his face came into view, he clicked his tongue. Is it just him, or has his camera quality degraded even more? The camera lens was shaky, and it made a weird clicking sound when he opened his camera app.
"What the fuck is this?" he cursed, hitting the phone camera with his fist. However, it seemed like he underestimated his strength since the clicking sound suddenly stopped, and the camera lens finally stopped shaking.
However, that came with a bigger consequence.
It looked as if he was taking a picture at the bottom of an ocean…or maybe on the highest peak of Mount Everest, where fog had covered the entire area.
It was blurry, a bit hazy, and with not much contrast.
June clicked his tongue and decided to snap a picture anyway.
He then proceeded to inspect the picture. He had a forced smile on his face, and since it was blurry as fuck, it appeared similar to the picture of Jeff the Killer.
Thinking that he couldn't do any better than that, he decided to post it on his Navel account.
Minjun had taught him how to post a picture before, so he didn't have a hard time because
of that.
'Hi, guys. It's me, June, from Rising Stars. Just wanted to say that I'm okay.'
Afterward, he attached the photo and clicked 'post.'
'Hi_ImKittyJunexxR1s1ingSt4r5 has posted a new photo.'
Now, June just had to wait for the post to gain traction. He posted it under the topic of his stabbing incident, so he believes that it'll gain over a hundred thousand interactions tonight.
It did.
Just not the kind of interactions he expected.
