Masquerades

Silence.

Silence greets Jongin as he walks the dark, narrow, suffocating corridor towards the last room in the villa. Not a soul responds to his fervent calls. There is no electricity. There is a gale blowing outside. Yet, it pales in comparison to that in Jongin’s mind. He reaches the door at last. His hand hovers unsteadily over the doorknob. Images of what lay in the four previous rooms assault his mind. His throat feels like he’s swallowed sand. His heart is thumping, hard, in his chest, the dull, hollow sound ringing in his ears like a warning. He turns the knob. The click echoes through the empty corridors. Why did they agree to take this vacation?

Strange silhouettes and shapes stand out in the semi darkness. He can gauge the outline of two figures on the couch- one sitting, the other having fallen on the former’s lap. Visions return to Jongin’s mind.

Freshly raised out of a deep, almost drugged slumber, he had not seen anyone around in the darkness, nor had anyone responded to his calls. Kris and Tao’s room was the nearest and the door was unlocked. Two figures lay, sprawled, upon the bed. Jongin had leaned against the door frame, prepared to pass a witty comment. Then lightening flashed- thousands of volts of electric charge lighting the sky and the room-killing the words in Jongin’s throat. Tao had had his head on the elder’s shoulder, his hand clutching onto the fabric of the Kris’ shirt and Kris had one arm under Tao’s head and the other dangling off of the side of the bed… and then there was the blood. Blood that had flown from the two deep, fatal wounds- one in Tao’s abdomen and the other in Kris’s chest- and bathed the sheets red. Jongin had been too stunned to cry. He had wondered if they died trying to protect each other. But that did not matter. What mattered was that they were dead. Dead. Tao and Kris were dead.

Jongin steps further into the room. His shaky breathing the only sound in the air, barring the dull monotony of the rain on hard ground. He knows what waits for him inside.

Joonmyeon and Yixing’s room had seemed empty, the door to the bathroom left slightly ajar. Joonmyeon lay on the floor, limbs askew, eyes wide open- and lifeless- a far cry from the warm angelic looks that everyone was used to… but Jongin had wondered if “everyone” was alive to begin with. Then there was the blood, which ran small rivulets on the bathroom floor, flowing from a gash in Joonmyeon’s throat- flowing everywhere. The desperate urge to throw up had risen within Jongin as he backed out of the bathroom, only to trip and falter. Yixing, bleeding from a wound on the head, had been slumped against the wall. The wall itself had horizontal stains from the Chinese boy’s blood. Jongin had known Yixing had put up a fight. He was the type to put up a fight to the death. But the point was just that- death. Dead. Joonmyeon and Yixing, the angels, were dead.

 Jongin doesn’t need lightning to tell him that it’s Minseok who is sitting on the couch with his head thrown back, while Jongdae lies with his head on the elder’s lap. He doesn’t need lightning to tell them that they’re dead. They must be. Dead. Jongdae and Minseok were dead too.

He needs to breathe. A lump is blocking his throat. Tears are welling up in his eyes. He needs comfort. He needs support. He needs someone. So he raises his head and screams into the still air.

“Kyungsoo-hyung!”

The smell of alcohol had assaulted his nostrils as he entered Luhan and Sehun’s room. Luhan had been laying on the bed, dressed in a bathrobe, his hair still uncombed and askew. He looked like an angel, except for the lifeless eyes and the robe dyed red from blood- that reached the tips of his blond hair. A bottle of beer had rolled out of his hands and shattered on the floor. Among its tiny fragments, Sehun was sprawled out, the tiny crystalline shards dotting and piercing his pale skin. Jongin had not known where to turn. He stared at the two. His chest had begun to ache. Dead. How could Luhan and Sehun be dead?

Jongin’s cry dies out in the darkness. There is no response. The oppressive silence returns once more. He fears the worst. There is no way Kyungsoo could have survived this. Not his innocent and defenseless hyung. Tears are falling, thick and fast, down his dusky skin. He raises his head to shriek again.

“Kyungsoo hyung!”

Chanyeol and Baekhyun’s room had been locked. Jongin had not thought twice before breaking the door and entering. The wood had given in after a few tries. Then, he had stopped in horror. Every visible surface had been splattered with blood- the walls, the carpeting, and the furniture. In the center of the room, Chanyeol had been curled up, with Baekhyun against his chest, arms and legs a tangled mess and every inch of their skin covered in deep gashes, shirts torn to ribbons, hair matted with blood. Anger had bubbled within Jongin. They had ben butchered. Butchered and then left to bleed to their deaths. Dead…. How could the very signs of vitality, Chanyeol and Baekhyun be dead?

“Jongin-ah.”

There is a soft voice behind. Jongin’s heart leaps to his mouth he knows that voice all too well. His body acts of its own accord as he pivots around and engulfs the shorter male in a bone-crushing hug. First he laughs in relief, which then turn to choked sobs, which evolve into ear piercing shrieks of anguish. For all his mature looks, Jongin is still a nineteen year old boy. Kyungsoo is oddly calm as he rocks Jongin back and forth on the balls of his feet. He lets the younger cry himself to exhaustion till the only sounds coming are quiet sniffles, muffled by his face in Kyungsoo’s hair. Jongin feels selfishly glad he isn’t alone. He inhales deeply to calm his shaking nerves. The smell of spices and kimchi, that is forever a part of Kyungsoo, calms his rattled nerves. He memorises the feel of the small elfin body between his hands. The smile on his face.They are the only ones left. Then- a flash of lighning, a glint of steel, a quick scuffle, a decisive stab, a hot flash of pain and a whiplash of thunder that drowns Jongin’s scream. There’s another flash. Kyungsoo has just enough time to note the meat cleaver sticking out from Jongin’s back, before the dancer’s dead weight causes his knees to buckle and he toples backwards, under Jongin’s weight, and crashes into the side table behind. There is darkness for both boys. One, unconscious, the other dead. Yes… dead… he may know it, he may not, but Jongin too is dead.

………………………

“Something doesn’t feel right…” says Cho Kyuhyun, staring at the bright screen of his laptop, the lights casting odd shadows under his eyes. “Something does not feel right.” He says again. Sungmin stares at him in the dimly lit dorm room. He knows what the maknae is talking about. A few months and a thousand articles later, no one has reached the end of the bloodbath that has been dubbed the “Jeju Island Getaway Mystery”- that had left eleven boys massacred and one unconscious. “How did Kyungsoo survive?”

“Are you saying he should have died too? They found him unconscious under Jongin… the killer must have thought he was dead too…” Sungmin sighed.

“All this while and the only explanation is ‘anits’ or ‘sasaengs’? I don’t get is… there must be something that no one is looking at.”

“There isn’t anything in there… all that there is, are the boys’ fingerprints… and that is normal!”

“There was that one report that said the fingerprints on the cleaver that killed them was weird…”

“Kyuhyun-ah! That was a rumor… let things be… anti-fans are a good bet.”

“Even if it was them... how do people do such things…?” he shivers. Sungmin places a calming hand on his shoulder.

“No one ever knows what lies beyond a person’s face… even the sweetest smiles hold the darkest secrets…” Sungmin’s words cast an image into Kyuhyun’s mind- a pair of large, round eyes and a sweet heart-shaped smile. Could it be…..? He shakes his head and looks at the half-empty bottle. No, the wine must be getting to his head.

I am very aware of what I implied at the end.... and I take no pleasure in doing that....
Oppa, jjincha, jeongmal, jeongmal, nomu mianhamida. Saranghamida (^.^)
I finally discovered my Exo muse.... oh boy...

Touch- ChenMin

Physical contact is important to human beings. It means comfort, security, and sense of belonging. For Kim Jongdae, physical contact was something he never paid attention to, but that did not mean it wasn't important to him. Anyone who followed him around would note his almost compulsive dependence upon his ability to keep in physical contact with his hyung, Kim Minseok, more often known as Xiumin.
It was something that initially rose out of a need for security. For Jongdae who'd never been away from home, being packed off to another country, with five other boys was very close to his worst nightmare. Not being able to speak the language just made the situation even better.... in being worse. So somewhere in between the schedules and walking in the airports through a sea of rabid fans, Jongdae started clinging onto his hyung.
To anyone, Minseok might seem the childish one, however, five minutes into any conversation with him, his caring, kind self emerged. It was this side that led Chen to seek his hyung when he was the least comfortable. Hooking his arm into the older male's, clinging onto his hands, glad for the contact, Chen took to the habit of walking through crowds almost stuck to Xiumin. Though, because of their heights it seemed that Xiumin was the one in need for protection, but everyone in Exo knew that it was just the other way around.
Walking through the crowd, in a foreign country, through a crowd of foreign people, chanting for in words, words he was not sure was meant to praise or hurt him. In that, to be at Xiumn's side, knowing that the older would not let go, made him feel at home. At times Chen wondered if that sentiment made him sound like a love stricken girl, but he really couldn't argue, he needed his Hyung and if it made him sound a little... well, gay, then you could shoot him for all he cared, because it was still the truth.
Somewhere down the line, Minseok, with his sensitivity, realised that he was needed by the younger. That, the younger needed him to be his security blanket. Somewhere down the line, he added Jongdae's Bodygaurd, to his mental list of roles. He ensured that the younger was beside him during interviews, at the airport, on the streets..... not that he needed to, Chen stuck to him like a baby koala.
Eventually, the need for security turned into a need for comfort, on both sides. It wasn't very surprising. The two Koreans were bound to drift together because of their common nationality in a foreign nation. It wasn't very hard either, what with all the clinging Chen did, all the time they spent studying Chinese, and all the time they spent on stage, with the translator behind them, and Chen and Xiumin, always Jongdae and Minseok hyung, to each other, became used to the fact that wherever one was the other would never be too far behind.
It wasn't very hard to notice that the two boys gravitated towards each other, airport or stage. It wasn't very hard to see that Jongdae repaid his hyung by taking care of the older when he himself was unable to. It wasn't very surprising to see him lead his hyung through the airports, while they were blocked by fans, or wrap his hying in a back hug, with a towel, when the older fell into a pool on a show, or crack the world's lamest joked that made his hyujng look like a happy baozi. On Minseok' part, he was grateful for his dongsaeng's care. Not that he wasn't a one hundred percent sure that the other members would not help him, that he knew they would, but he was more than happy to realise that Jongdae cared for him as much as he cared for Jongdae, blissfully unaware when the need for security and comfort, on Jongdae's part, had turned into a sort of compulsion. Jongdae himself did not realise this until he was no longer in possession of the liberty of contact.
It had been an epic argument. An argument that the four Chinese members of Exo-M watched from the sidelines. Tao, because he really had no idea of what was being said, Lay, because he kept spacing out, and Luhan and Kris because they had never seen sweet and kind Baozi look so infuriated. It probably wasn't all of Chen's doing. Sure, he had cracked some pretty bad and lame baozi jokes (so lame, that Luhan would later remark that the jokes couldn't even stand with the help of crutches).... Still it was mostly because Xuimin had been on too many shows and experienced (suffered, to his mind) several Baozi jokes and had really felt the need to retaliate. For something, that would have usually involved Jongdae cracking baozi jokes, Minseok puffing his cheeks with air in irritation, Jongdae pinching his puffed cheeks and hence restoring the normal order of things, it became a bad case of wrong-place-wrong-time with Jongdae cracking baozi jokes, Minseok snapping in anger and then everything spiralling downwards from there on. There had been raised voices (raised enough for Tao to wonder if their group mates in Seoul could her them). Neither had backed down, yelling and shouting every possible fault of the other, until Kris had snapped out of his initial shock and returned to his usual, Duizhang, self, ordering the two to their rooms, which they complied to... after yelling at each other's turned backs.
So, for lack of schedules, interviews or airport runs, Jongdae hadn't spoken to (save the occasional "pass the pepper" or "please move"), laughed with, or, and most importantly, hugged his hyung in two days. On the third, he was on his bed, curled into a ball in a corner, occasionally whining about the uselessness of the world.
"Chen-Chen?" Jongdae knew it was Luhan that poked his head through the door and sat at the end of the bed. "Chennie?" He peeked through his blanket and pillow cocoon (no! It was certainly not a baozi substitute) at the older, doe-eyed male. For a moment Luhan felt like he was looking at a kicked puppy. He patted Chen's head and said, "does your heart hurt Chennie?"
Chen bolted up in bed, flustered and irritated. "Wha-?! What?!? Gege! Seriously!" From the other bed in the room, Kris' heavy laugh filled the air, joined by Luhan's softer one.
"Baby don't cry tonight~!" Half-sang Luhan, and added a wink at the end. Kris was still chortling from his bed and then added, in his rapper's voice,
"My heart be breakin'."
Chen pounded on the bed, like a petulant child, "you guys are so mean! I'm telling Min-" and then he realised that he'd been caught out. Loud laughter exploded in the room and Luhan wiped fake tears from his eyes, while Kris said,
"You've spent the last two days looking like you've been dumped, bro."
"And you're acting like you're hung up over Minnie gege so don't argue with us. Go make up or whatever." Sighed Luhan. Chen opened his mouth twice, like a fish and then closed them both times without saying anything. Kris cleared his throat and Chen realised the Duizhang was standing over his bed with a look that made the members respect him and girls (and Tao) gush all over the place.
"Chen, whatever it is that you need to do, do it. I'm sick of seeing a kicked pup on the other side of the room."
"I can almost feel an aura of negativity from this room every time I pass by," added Luhan, with a solemn nod. Chen dived back into his cocoon (no, it was still not a baozi substitute) and shook his head violently.
Kris looked at Luhan, and in a moment of superb understanding, the leader and the little deer grabbed Chen's arms and legs respectively and hoisted him into the air between them. This was met by a loud yelp of sheer horror and and angry shout of, "what the hell are you doing?" from Chen as he attempted to kick and struggle, to no avail.
"What I should have done two days ago," remarked Kris, through gritted teeth as he attempted to drag Chen out his door and towards Luhan's shared room.
Xiumin had been pouring over his Chinese all morning, with Lay for company, only to be interrupted by a horrified yelp, followed by indistinguishable angry shouts.
"What is that...?" He asked Lay, who looked at him with equally confused eyes and replied,
"Maybe they're murdering someone...?"
"It sounds like Jongdae..." began Xiumin, though he didn't have to wonder for long.
The door to the room flew open and the strange posse of three entered, Chen slung, uncerimoniously, between Luhan and Kris as if on an invisible hammock, still kicking and screaming, which he stopped as soon as he saw Xiumin gaping, wide eyed, at him. Lay covered his mouth with a notebook.
"This, I believe, belongs to you, gege," said Kris, stepping to Xiumin, with Luhan, Chen still in the air between them, as Xiumin looked at them in utter confusion. Lay rose.
"I'm going to get coffee, do you want some gege?" Xiumin shook his head mutely as he looked at Chen, who tried, and failed miserably, to look dignified. Tao poked his head through the door, hoping to catch some of the action, but was pushed outside by Lay, on his way out.
"I think you broke him," said Luhan with a smile that made Chen shiver, "I'll leave the fixing to you." With that ominous note, the two boys dropped Chen onto the floor, at Xiumin's feet, where he curled up into a petulant ball, and walked out.
For a while Jongdae didn't know how to begin a conversation with his hyung. Yes Minseok would always be his hyung. Gege to the others but hyung only to him. It would be an understatement to say that he was shocked when Minseok's voice, next to his ears, asked, "Jongdae.... gaenchana?" He started violently out of his self made ball. Minseok had joined him on the floor.
He looked up in a way that made Minseok see him in the same way that Kris had earlier- a kicked pup. Jongdae looked somewhere between his hyung's feet and the floor and whispered, "Hyung.... I missed you..."
Minseok raised an eyebrow and asked,
"Exactly how did you? I live next door- literally!"
"I erm....." Jongdae did not know how to go on as the older looked at him in confusion. There was a beep that distracted their attentions. Minseok looked at his phone.
"It's from Luhan...?" Warning signals rang in Jongdae's head.
"Hyung!! Andwae!! Don't read it!" But Minseok had already begun to read.
"...ask Chennie if his heart still hurts..?" He looked at his dongsaeng in utter confusion. "Did you breakup with someone? Three days and you get a girl- and break up with her too!"
"What-? Hyung no! There is no girl. Just forget it!" Jongdae started walking towards the door.
"Jongdae-ah. Khajima..." Minseok sat on the bed with pursed lips. "Don't you think maybe we should talk about what happened?"
"What happened!?" Jongdae turned around, the pent-up rage and frustration bubbling up inside him, almost as if someone had turned on a switch. "You want to talk now?! Where were you two days ago?!"
"Are you kidding me!" Minseok threw his arms in the air. "Each time I tried to get near you, you'd say 'move out of my way please' or 'pass the salt'- even if we weren't at the table!- and you looked like you'd been sucker-punched, so I thought you had other things to deal with!" Jongdae's switch had suddenly been turned off. He hung his head.
"Mi-mianhae hyung...." He took a few hesitant steps closer. "Can I hug you?" Minseok raised an eyebrow but rose and put his arms around the younger, yet taller male. It was then that Jongdae started crying. Of cousre it wasn't all of Minseok's fault. Sure, he had hugged the younger after a good forty-eight hours but Jongdae was mostly homesick, tired and frustrated with his lack of Chinese skills. "I hate us not being friends.." Minseok kept quiet and patted his dongsaeng's back. "I feel so lost and alone here... at least you remind me of home.... oh lord! I sound like a freaking girl!" Minseok started laughing.
"No, you sound mostly like Tao."
"Oh holy Lord! I sound like Tao!? That's worse!" Jongdae was still sniffing, but his tears had reduced. But before he had so much as a chance to say another word, the door flew open.
"Hey! I heard that! Not cool bro!" Yelled Tao, but the effect was somewhat destroyed by his wide grin. Behind him, Luhan and Kris were smirking, obviously having been evesdropping, while Lay clutched two mugs, looking very sheepish.
"So no hearts be breakin' tonight and no babies be crying either?" Luhan winked at Chen, who narrowed his eyes and hissed,
"Hyung, get a car, we need to run over a deer." Xiumin laughed and flashed a grateful smile at the others before pushing Chen out of the door.
"Come on, let's get you some ice cream, before you get arrested for animal cruelty towards the deer."
"Animal cruel-?! That deer was cruel to me!" Minseok laughed as they stepped into the chill air of the night. "Besides, I'm not a kid, I want a cappuccino."
"Fine, but you sure do act like one." Jongdae puffed his cheeks out.
"You look like one."
"Your comebacks are getting worse Dae-ah." Jongdae flashed a grin that could only be termed as Jongdae-like to Minseok's mind.

Only when it comes to you hyung.

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For anyone who's notice the way Xiumin and Chen/Minseok and Jongdae are stuck to each other wherever they go, even if the translator isn't present.
This is my take on the relationship between the two boys.. I mean men... :P