Unwanted--BTS--Soulmate AU

Questions

I was so tired.

I heard Dr. Lee say something to Yoongi in a sharp tone.

After a moment, I felt a hand wrap gently around my wrist and not long after a sense of relief and utter rightness started to ease through my system.

Yoongi must have been holding my wrist, trying to ease my pain, though I didn't know why. I wanted to question him, but I was afraid to look up, too frightened to scare him off.

Still feeling tired, but less faint, I slowly sat up and tried to tug my wrist back, but Dr. Lee stopped me by laying a hand on my shoulder.

"Ms. Randall, I get that this is hard for you too, but you cannot stop the contact right now. You will suffer again, very quickly and I should say with much worse symptoms," he chastised.

I took a deep breath in and nodded, still averting my eyes from Yoongi. Instead, I looked at how his long fingers had wrapped around my wrist, the pads of finger tips brushing against my soul mark. Maybe that's why it felt so good. 

My heart started an upbeat staccato at the feeling of his skin on mine, knowing that he was touching me. It wasn't a particularly intimate moment, but it felt almost sensual to me.

Dr. Lee moved back to his seat, giving us some space, but I didn't want to be left alone in the silence again. So instead, I decided to be the first one to talk after all.

"Dr. Lee, when you say we are life mates, how is that different from regular soulmates? I get that we need each other to live, but don't all soulmates need each other?"

He adjusted his glasses as he replied, "You are correct that soulmates do need each other, but not quite to severity that life mates do. Soulmates can be separated for long periods of time and even indefinitely. They won't be in pain or in danger of losing their lives. They will instead feel somewhat unhappy and never truly fulfilled deep inside but we have some therapies to assist with those symptoms."

"So, soulmates can separate and be happy, in theory, but life mates cannot?" I queried.

"You are missing some of the nuance but essentially, yes. However, it has been observed that life mates can separate after a period of time, but it would be at a cost. You are almost guaranteed to never find another partner you can be happy with again. You will always feel a sense of missing. And you will have broken the life mate bond irrevocably, which does cause damage to the soul. But, if that is truly what is best for both parties, then it can be done under medical guidance with the help of a professional therapist," Dr. Lee said.

I heard Yoongi shift in his chair a bit, but I continued to ignore him and asked, "In what situation would it be best for life mates to separate like that?"

Dr. Lee hummed and folded his hands on the table.

"Imagine you meet your life mate only to find out that they have an incurable, deadly disease. Or a severe mental and/or cognitive disorder. Or perhaps they are in prison for an unspeakable crime. You see, there are theories in Soul Medicine that postulate that soul bonds are formed at birth. These bonds don't take into account how a person can change and shift over a lifetime. Your soulmate is supposedly your other half but at what point have you as a person changed so much that your other half no longer reflects who you truly are inside?"

The doctor shook his head.

"It is a strange and imperfect thing, these soul bonds. Researchers are only just now starting to grasp the very edges of this phenomenon. It is largely an unknown to us, but we do our best to facilitate soul bonds and yes, to break them off, if need be," he finished solemnly.