The Seizure at Seven [About Two Years Later / Emergency Room]

Hajun suffered another major seizure at seven.

It came without warning.

He was drawing at his desk after dinner when his pencil slipped from his hand.

His body tilted to one side.

Jian’s face went white.

(Jian) : “Hajun?”

A second later, the seizure began.

Taekyung was thrown back into an old memory.

Three years old.

Eight minutes, three seconds.

The ambulance.

The emergency room.

This time it was more frightening.

It was Hajun’s first major seizure since the secret surgery at five.

The first thought that crossed Taekyung’s mind was that perhaps the surgery had never truly ended.

[Night / Outside the Imaging Room]

CT.

MRI.

EEG.

The tests continued.

Jian’s hands trembled.

(Jian) : “What if this is because of what we did?”

Taekyung could not answer.

It was the question he had feared most.

Several hours later, the attending physician called them in.

(Doctor) : “Fortunately, the seizure itself appears to have been caused by a temporary issue.”

Jian held her breath.

(Doctor) : “At this point, medication should control it, and there are no immediate life-threatening findings.”

Jian finally exhaled.

But the doctor was not finished.

He brought up the MRI and enlarged one area.

(Doctor) : “However, we found something in the brain imaging that I can’t quite explain.”

Taekyung’s expression froze.

The doctor pointed to one region.

(Doctor) : “This neural tissue is integrated surprisingly naturally with the surrounding areas, but the structure itself is unusual.”

Taekyung said nothing.

The doctor stared at the current MRI, then pulled up older scans.

When Hajun was three.

Before the surgery at five.

The present.

Three images appeared side by side.

(Doctor) : “That’s strange.”

Jian looked at Taekyung.

(Doctor) : “This tissue wasn’t present before the surgery.”

Taekyung’s fingertips went cold.

The doctor reopened the old surgical record.

It documented only the brain surgery performed to reduce seizures and pressure.

There was no mention anywhere of placing new neural tissue.

The doctor compared the chart and the images again.

(Doctor) : “The surgery documented here doesn’t explain the structure we’re seeing now.”

A moment later, he added,

(Doctor) : “Radiology and neurosurgery will need to review the old scans and surgical record together.”

Taekyung stared at the screen.

The transplanted tissue had not died.

It had settled inside Hajun’s brain,

connected with the surrounding tissue,

and grown alongside him.

But Taekyung could not say that here.

No—

it seemed he would no longer be able to hide it at all.

The secret he had kept for more than forty months

was revealing itself precisely because his son was alive.

Taekyung knew in that moment.

It was over.

His laboratory.

His professorship.

The name he had built over a lifetime.

Everything was about to collapse.

And strangely,

he was not only afraid.

Hajun was asleep in the hospital room.

A seven-year-old boy.

Alive.