--: Author's POV: --
The silence of St. Jude's Hospital was different from the silence of the penthouse. In the penthouse, the quiet felt like luxury—a blanket of privacy for two people who owned the world. Here, the silence was a predator. It was heavy, suffocating, and reeked of antiseptic, floor wax, and the metallic tang of blood that no amount of scrubbing could truly erase from the memory.
The surgery had lasted six agonizing hours. Six hours where time didn't move in minutes, but in the frantic heartbeats of those waiting in the hallway. Six hours of Jay-Jay pacing the linoleum floors until the soles of her feet felt raw. Six hours of Keigan and Keiran sitting shoulder-to-shoulder, their youthful faces hardening into the same cold, unyielding masks their older brother always wore when the world tried to break him.
When the 'Surgery' light finally flickered off, the news wasn't the relief they had spent their souls praying for. The bullet—a professional-grade rounds fired with surgical intent—had missed Keifer's heart by less than two centimeters. But the "near miss" was a hollow victory. The trauma of the impact, the massive internal hemorrhaging, and the sheer, brutal exhaustion of a man who had been carrying the weight of two empires on his back for months had forced his system to collapse.
"He is stable in the most technical sense," the lead surgeon had explained, his voice sounding like it was coming from the end of a long, dark tunnel. "But his brain has retreated. He hasn't regained consciousness. His body has entered a deep comatose state—a protective shutdown. We don't know when he will wake up. At this point, we are no longer in control. We can only monitor the machines and wait for him to decide to come back."
They moved him to the Private Intensive Care Wing—a high-security fortress of glass and monitors where the powerful were sent to either recover in secret or wither away in expensive solitude.
--: Jay-Jay's POV: --
The heavy glass door of the ICU room hissed shut behind me, the sound echoing like a final seal. It cut off the muffled whispers of the nurses and the distant chime of hospital pages, leaving me in a world that consisted of only two things: Keifer and the machines keeping him from drifting into the abyss.
The rhythmic *hiss-click* of the ventilator was the only breathing in the room. The steady, haunting *beep... beep... beep...* of the heart monitor was the only pulse.
Keifer looked so small.
The man who had stood like a titan in the boardroom, the man who had roared at the world just to keep me safe, was now buried under a mountain of white sheets and clear plastic tubes. His face was a terrifying shade of pale, his skin looking almost translucent under the harsh LED lights. The "Lion" was gone. In his place was a broken, silent boy who looked like he was already half-gone.
I dragged a heavy plastic chair to the side of his bed. My movements were slow and leaden, as if the very air in the room had turned into wet cement.
I sat down and reached out, my fingers trembling so violently I had to tuck them into my palms for a moment before I could find the courage to touch him.
I finally rested my hand over his. It was cold. A deep, unnatural cold that made my skin crawl.
"Keifer?" I whispered. My voice didn't even sound like mine. It was a raspy, broken thing that died the moment it hit the air.
He didn't move. His long, dark lashes—usually so sharp and attentive—didn't even flicker against his cheekbones. There was no sign that he could hear me, no sign that he was even in there anymore.
"I'm here," I said, leaning closer until my forehead was almost touching his shoulder. The scent of his expensive cedarwood cologne was almost entirely gone, replaced by the sharp, stinging smell of iodine. "I'm so sorry, Keifer. I'm so, so, so sorry."
The tears I had been fighting since the moment Honey called finally broke. They didn't just fall; they scalded. They splashed onto his motionless hand, trailing down his knuckles, but he didn't flinch. I gripped his fingers, squeezing them, begging for a twitch, a squeeze, a single sign of life. But his hand remained limp—a heavy, terrifying weight in mine.
"It's all my fault," I sobbed, burying my face in the edge of the stiff hospital mattress. The guilt was a physical thing now, a jagged blade twisting in my gut. "If I hadn't been so stubborn... if I hadn't screamed those horrible things at you... you wouldn't have stayed in that office. You would have followed me out. You would have been in the car with me. You would have been safe."
The image of my hand hitting his face replayed in my mind like a nightmare on a loop. Every time the heart monitor beeped, I felt the phantom sting of that slap in my own palm. I could still see the shock in his eyes when I did it—the way the Lion had looked wounded by the person he was trying to protect.
"I called you a monster," I choked out, my chest heaving with a pain so intense I thought my ribs might actually snap. "I told you I hated you. But I lied, Keifer. I lied because I was small and I was scared and I didn't want to admit that you were right. You were trying to carry the world for both of us, and I just added more weight to your shoulders. I became exactly what you said... I became a responsibility. I became a burden. And now look... I broke you."
I reached up and touched the diamond earring in my ear—the silent, glittering vow he had given me to prove I belonged by his side. It felt like it was burning my skin.
"You were right about the fog," I whispered into the crook of his neck. "I thought I could handle London. I thought I was strong enough to be a Mariano and stand beside a Watson. But I wasn't. I left you alone in the dark, and you stayed there waiting for me. You were waiting for me to come back and apologize, weren't you? And instead of me, those men came."
The ventilator hissed again, a mocking, mechanical breath.
"Please don't punish me like this," I begged, my voice rising to a broken, desperate wail that echoed off the glass walls. "Wake up and yell at me. Be the Lion again. Tell me I'm being emotional. Tell me I'm being a liability. Tell me I'm acting like a child again—just say something! Don't leave me with the silence, Keifer. I can't breathe in the silence."
I stayed there for hours, lost in a trance of grief. I talked to him until my throat was raw and my voice was a ghost. I told him about Keigan and Keiran standing guard in the hallway, refusing to eat or sleep. I told him about how the London sky looked from the window—how the fog had swallowed everything, making it look like the world had ended the moment he closed his eyes.
I confessed everything. I told him I'd sign the Mediterranean contracts. I told him I'd give up the company. I told him I'd stay in the penthouse and never leave his side if he just opened his eyes.
"I'll be the shadow," I promised, pressing a desperate, lingering kiss to his cold knuckles. "I'll be the trophy. I'll be whatever you need me to be just to see you breathe on your own again. I'll be the weight, Keifer. I'll carry you. Just come back."
But the monitors didn't change. The heart rate stayed steady, rhythmic, and utterly indifferent to my begging.
The door hissed open, and a nurse stepped in, her face full of pity. She placed a gentle hand on my shoulder. "Ms. Mariano, you've been in here for four hours. You need to step out. The doctors need to run the night checks."
"No," I rasped, clutching his hand tighter. "I'm not leaving him."
"Just for a few minutes," she urged softly. "He needs the rest, and so do you."
Keigan appeared at the door, his eyes red-rimmed. He walked over and gently unpicked my fingers from Keifer's hand. He didn't say anything; he didn't have to. He just led me out of the room like a ghost.
As the glass door hissed shut for the final time that night, I looked back over my shoulder. Keifer lay there, a prisoner of the silence I had helped create. I had walked out on him when he was alive and fighting for us, and now, the universe was forcing me to walk out on him while he was drifting in a void I couldn't reach.
The "Real World" had finally won. It had taken the King, and it had left the Queen drowning in a fog that felt like it would never, ever lift.
______
--: Jay-Jay's POV: --
The hospital hallway was a tunnel of infinite, blinding white. Every time I looked at Keigan and Keiran, I felt a fresh wave of nausea. They were teenagers—boys who should have been at home, safe and sleeping, but instead, they were sitting in a sterile trauma ward in the middle of the night, waiting for news that might never come.
I wiped my face with the back of my hand, forcing the tears to retreat. I couldn't be the broken girl right now. If I collapsed, they would fall with me. I had to be the Ate. I had to be the Mariano they could lean on, even if my own bones felt like they were made of glass.
"Keigan, Keiran," I said, my voice sounding hollow but firm. "Go to the cafeteria. Get some coffee. Get something to eat. You haven't moved in ten hours."
"We're not hungry, Ate," Keiran muttered, his eyes fixed on the ICU door.
"It wasn't a request," I said, putting on the same authoritative tone Keifer used when he was being stubborn. "You need to stay strong for when he wakes up. Go. Now."
They hesitated, but seeing the steel in my eyes, they slowly stood up and walked down the hall. The moment they turned the corner, the "Mariano" mask shattered. I slumped against the cold wall, my breath coming in short, jagged gasps. I felt like I was being buried alive under the weight of London.
I needed help. I needed the only people who truly understood what it meant to fight for one another.
My hands were shaking so violently I almost dropped my phone. I scrolled through my contacts until I hit a name that felt like home.
Horoscope
The phone rang three times before he picked up. It was probably midnight in the Philippines. But I didn't care.
"Jay-Jay?" His voice was raspy, sleepy. "Jay? What's wrong? Why are you calling at this hour? Don't tell me that idiot did something again!"
"Aries..." I choked out, and the dam broke. I sat on the floor, pulling my knees to my chest, hiding my face.
"What happened Jay?? Are you crying?" His voice turning serious almost instantly.
"It's Keifer. He's... he's been shot."
The silence on the other end was terrifying.
"The office... men broke in. He's in a coma, Aries. The doctors don't know if he'll wake up. I'm all alone here with the boys and I don't know what to do. I'm scared. I'm so scared."
--: Aries' POV: --
"What did you just say?"
I didn't realize I was standing until my chair hit the floor with a loud *thud*. The world seemed to stop spinning. My heart hammered against my ribs, not out of fear, but out of a cold, rising fury that made my vision blur.
"The office... men broke in... shot..." Jay's voice was a broken whisper on the other side of the world.
I didn't wait for her to finish. I was already scrambling out of my bed, kicking my door open so hard it hit the wall with a bang.
"KUYA ANGELO! KUYA!" I roared, my voice echoing through the silent halls of our house.
I didn't care that it was midnight. I didn't care that everyone was asleep. I ran down the hallway, my chest heaving. Angelo burst out of his room, looking disheveled and alarmed, his eyes darting around for a threat.
"Aries?! What's happened? Why are you screaming at this hour?" Angelo grabbed my shoulders, trying to steady me.
"Keifer," I gasped, the name tasting like blood in my mouth. "Jay-Jay just called. He was shot at the office in London. He's in a coma, Kuya. He's down."
Angelo's grip on my shoulders tightened until it was almost painful. His face, usually so calm, transformed into something dark and lethal. The air in the hallway turned freezing.
"He's in a coma?" Angelo repeated, his voice a low, dangerous vibration. He didn't ask how. He didn't ask why. He just looked at me with eyes that said someone was going to pay. "We are going to London. Now."
He let go of me and turned toward his room to grab his keys and phone. "Call everyone. Tell them to get ready. No excuses. We leave on the private jet in an hour."
I didn't need to be told twice. My fingers flew across the screen. First, I dialed Yuri in the Philippines.
"Yuri, get up. Keifer is in coma. We're flying to London. Angelo's orders." I didn't let him reply, and instantly cut the call.
Then I hit the international contacts. I called Thyme in Thailand.
"Thyme, it's Aries. Tell the rest of F4 and the girls. Keifer was shot. We're heading to London right now. Meet us there."
I called David. I called everyone who mattered. But then, I remembered someone who was already in the heart of the storm.
Percy
He was already in London for a business trip. My heart skipped a beat as the call connected.
"Percy! Where are you?" I yelled the moment he picked up.
"Aries baby? I'm just leaving a dinner, why? Did you miss—"
"Go to St. Jude's Hospital. Right now!" I barked. "Keifer's been shot. Jay-Jay is there alone with Keigan and Keiran. They're surrounded by the fog, Percy. Get there and don't leave her side until we land. DO YOU HEAR ME?"
"I'm on my way," Percy's voice turned like ice. The call cut off.
I looked at Angelo, who was already fully dressed, his face set in stone.
"The Lion's pack is awake," I whispered, the fury finally settling into a cold, hard resolve.
They thought they could touch Keifer because we were thousands of miles away. They thought he was alone in that boardroom. They were about to find out that when you strike one of us, you wake up an army that doesn't know how to stop until everything is burnt to the ground.
London was about to get a lot more crowded. And a lot more dangerous.