The bright way too fuzzy pandas were not the usual thing that Sehun was ever prepared to watch in the slightest, even as a kid they had not been his favourite thing in the world, but considering the fact that he was spending the morning – or as much of the morning as could be spared – snuggled up on the couch with their resident and extremely sickly looking Panda Tao right at that moment in time, the maknae was not going to complain. Hell he wouldn’t even complain if he had to put up with that god awful Barbie series which Tao liked, just as long as he got to hug the other and remain by him for as long as humanly possible then that was the most important thing in the whole wide world now.

Too many of his friends had already been lost and he would be damned if he was going to lose Tao as well.

Not that he blamed the slightly older and taller man of course, the company had basically turned him into the replacement for the fearsome dragon and girly deer in the hopes of settling the fangirls nerves and making things just go back to normal. Tao was being pushed into all sorts of different things, shows, movies, adverts and generally being the spokesperson even though he wasn’t leader because M had been merged with K to make things just a little more manageable and Sehun couldn’t stand seeing it all again. How could the company not learn? They had pushed Kris into having a heart attack and Luhan had basically had a seizure which had resulted in him choking on his own build-up of salvia because no one was aware of just how bad it had all gotten.

Granted Tao didn’t have anything quite as severer as that, but considering the fact that his feet and lower parts of his legs were a blistering bright red and no amount of rest would make the swelling go away, Sehun was understandably worried. Tao had been to see the doctor to get some cream but it would probably be better for him to be in the hospital to get proper treatment. Though that wasn’t going to happen in a million years because that cost money and despite them making probably a fortune, no one was listening.

Sehun had appealed to their manager to get Tao some further treatment on top of the literal begging that Suho had done and the man had gotten very annoyed at the whole situation because the K Maknae was apparently the seventh person to come to him in regards to it and he wasn’t going to hear no more. Thankfully Tao was getting a couple of days off from promotions, just to stop tongues from wagging to the wrong places – which had set Baekhyun scowling – and hence why Sehun was currently spooned up against Tao watching a show about silly panda’s doing silly things even if he wasn’t paying enough attention to actually focus on what was actually being said.

“Sehun,” Tao said at length with a gentle sigh, “Suho’s calling for you.”

The other groaned and hugged tighter around his best friend, “Don’t wanna.”

“You’ll get in trouble,” Tao said with a tired voice, he’d appeared to be sleepy of late but that could just be the fatigue finally catching up with him in the grand scheme of everything.

“He’ll try,” Sehun replied brattily and snuggled closer, “I wanna stay here.”

A chuckle came out of Tao, “And watch cartoon’s that you don’t understand? You’re insane Sehun.”

“Oh hush, we bonded over cartoons that you didn’t understand,” Sehun said with a playful dig to the others ribs.

“Pororo does not count!” Tao pouted playfully towards the other, beginning to shift upright whilst trying not to expose the fact that his feet protested at the movement, “Plus you really will get into trouble and I don’t want that.”

Before Sehun could even begin to argue, a pillow landed harshly into his face, “Yeah we’ve already got enough on our plates as it without you being a brat on top of it,” Kai said with a cheeky grin, “Now come on, up otherwise I’m going to give you a sofa bath!”

“There’s no such thing!” Sehun complained, even as he was grabbed roughly by the hand and dragged off the sofa by Kai which very nearly dislodged Tao off the sofa and it would have done if not for Lay being there to catch the youngster into a tight embrace.

“There will be if you don’t hurry up and get ready,” Lay playfully snapped towards the youngster, “Hurry up otherwise manager will come and chase you around with a broom.”

Sehun scowled but grudgingly set off to the bathroom to get washed and dressed for the day’s activities. Tao couldn’t help but chuckle just a little, “Man he’s so fussy over me.”

“Well we’ve all got a right to be,” Lay said gently as he guided Tao back down to the sofa with that sort of focused air about him which suggested that he was going to give a little lecture, “But please Tao, promise me that you’ll behave and stay indoors today and not do anything stupid? Suho is beside himself with worry over you and the others are trying their best not to cave to it to.”

“I know, Gege,” Tao said, snuggling lightly against Lay, “I promise that I’ll behave. Plus there’s a ‘Hello Panda’ Marathon on today so I’ll sit and watch that.”

“You better, you little brat,” Baekhyun said as he came up behind the younger and pulled on his hair, “I seriously don’t want to see or hear anything about you today other than crappy rumours.”

Before Chen or Chanyeol could join in on the teasing however the manager appeared with a stern look on his face and some form of pills in a yellow tub, “Here, take these, they should help with the pain.”

“What are they?” Tao asked before they were forward and the order was repeated once again. Taking two with some water, Tao gently sat back on the couch to pout as the man began to hustle everyone up and make sure that they were ready for another long gruelling day.

Kyungsoo took a minute out of his time of straightening Xiumin’s shirt buttons to wrap a hug around Tao’s body, “Don’t push yourself today okay?”

“I won’t Mama,” Tao said cheekily in response as he was playfully swatted around the head by the elder and the others made similar passing remarks as they were herded out of the door like a flock of sheep by an overly keen sheepdog of a manager and the panda eyed maknae happily began to snuggle up to the sofa once again to continue watching his cartoon.

However there came a sound of running feet and Tao just about managed to raise himself a couple of inches before being knocked down to the sofa by none other than Mama Suho. “Zitao,” Suho said, hugging him tightly, “Stay here.”

“I will do, Joonmyeon, I promised like a million times,” Tao replied, not understanding why Suho was so worried over something which he had said that he wouldn’t do.

“No, I mean…stay here!” Suho said, over empathising the word whilst looking at the other with wide and worried eyes, “Don’t go following any lights or anything like that okay? I want to come home and find you just right where you’re supposed to be.”

“Suho?” Tao asked, finding himself completely bewildered and just a little freaked out by the comment but the manager yelled and his leader was gone. Shaking his head Tao let out a sigh and got himself as comfortable on the couch as he could manage before going back to watching his cartoon show.

Suho meanwhile glanced at the photograph which was placed near the door to the dormitory which showed Yifan and Luhan smiling brightly together and felt his heart give a tug, “Please…please not Tao. If you can, please keep him here, in this world,” he whispered quietly towards the photograph before heading out to join the others and temporarily forget his worries for a little bit.

~*~

When Tao woke up there was an indescribable pain in his legs and it made him whine and yell in pain. It was just far too much and he couldn’t really focus on anything else but the pain. Tears welled up in his eyes as he tried to move to a sitting position but the pain just kept coming in more and more waves.

It just hurt so much and Tao couldn’t focus on anything else.

Somehow he managed to find his way to the kitchen where someone had left him some pain medication and after popping the top of the tube he was quick to down the pills with some help from a can of healthy fruit juice that belonged to one of the others that normally tasted disgusting to him but right now anything would be better than trying to put up with this pain.

Of course the next problem was that he was going to have to wait for the medication to kick in which was a pain and the best thing that he could think of to do right there and then was to go take a hot shower. It would be soothing and would hopefully distract him, though he’d have to take Baby in cause he still hated showering alone but no one was there to whine to for that privilege.

Plus sometimes it was nice to just pretend that the cuddly toy dog he had bought with Kris all those years ago was in fact his missing Gege, it just sort of made everything feel a whole lot better.

The warm water and silence however did not help the pain in any great way, causing Tao to whine as the cold air hit his body. He had no idea when his other band mates were going to return and there was not a chance that he could make his body behave itself without some kind of pain medication. Whilst he knew that he had promised not to go out anywhere, Tao couldn’t linger in this state of pain and even if he asked Suho to bring home some medication it could be hours before he came back.

Somehow he managed to pull on his clothes, a simple pair of jeans and an overly large t-shirt that had been lent to Luhan by Kris when they were trainee’s and just never given back and pulled on a baseball cap though he doubted overly much that it would actually help him to hide his identity in the least bit. Hobbling to the door he was grateful to find a pair of crutches that he could use and almost gleefully grabbed them.

If he remembered rightly there was a pharmacy just down the road from the dorms and it was pretty much used by everyone so there would be no questions asked.

How he got there, bought the medication and got back to the dorm within half an hour Tao was almost positive that he would never be able to explain to anyone in the slightest. Especially not Suho, god if he found out that he had left the dorms there was literally going to be hell from their leader over it but right now at the very least he had some pain killers that were going to sort out his foot and just make everything else float away into pure bliss.

Tao wasn’t to know that he had completely lost track of time when he took the newest set of pain killers and was far too early for doing so. He also wasn’t to know that the ones that his manager had given him were far stronger than they should have been and that the ones left on the table were not meant for him. Part of him reflected that maybe reading the instructions properly would have helped but right there and then the only thing that the youngster could focus on was the fact that both of his feet were still killing him and that the pain would just not stop.

He couldn’t even enjoy the food he had made, everything just tasted like ash in his mouth and it was vile and disgusting. Not even a glass of water helped for the better part of an hour.

Then somehow he found himself relaxing and just feeling like he was in a big fluffy marshmallow of a blanket. Vaguely he was aware of the television being on but he didn’t remember switching it on and other than a few vague coloured blobs on the screen he couldn’t focus on what was going on. His breathing became thick and heavy, in a comforting sort of way and it was easy to imagine that he was just drifting off into one of the best sleeps that he had ever had. Not even the occasional twitch from his foot was enough to disturb him right now.

A noise briefly broke through the cotton filled world and with a groan he turned to grab the source which turned out to be his phone vibrating but his eyes wouldn’t focus on the details and somehow he clumsily knocked the device to the floor which thankfully stopped the buzzing which had raked painfully through his hand and down his body.

That was when the pain returned tenfold to his feet and Tao couldn’t take it, swallowing down a few more pills to just try and get back to sleep because that was all that he needed. A nice long peaceful rest before the others got back home to pester the living daylights out of him. Maybe he had been spotted coming out of the pharmacy and someone was ringing to tell him off for leaving the dorms but there was no way he could have put up with the pain anymore.

Plus now it was quiet, so fluffy to the Chinese maknae’s mind that none of it mattered anymore. Instead he just allowed himself to slip away into this pleasant darkness because it made sense to his exhausted mind and body. He’d put up with the stick that the others were going to give him when he woke up but right now…sleep was the best thing for him.

“It’s not fair!” a voice cut through Tao’s happy soundless sleeping which slightly startled the youngster but didn’t allow him to open his eyes just yet, “Why him? Why must it be him?”

“I don’t know,” a deeper more familiar voice that wouldn’t quite register in his mind just yet replied, “If I could do anything to…”

“Oh shush! Stop giving me that damn line already!” the first speaker said, sounding a little high pitched and nauseated by it all, “Tao’s a baby! He shouldn’t go through this…not in the slightest.”

A groan escaped Tao, he hated being called a baby even if the two voices arguing above him were far older than him no matter what happened and a pout came to his lips because it would have to be his two gege’s arguing that would disturb him from his wonderful sleep.

There came a long sigh, “I know he is…I hate it too but there’s nothing that we can do other than…”

“There’s got to be a way to stop it!” the second voice came back, tears clear even in the tone, “This is going to kill the others!”

“We can’t cheat death Han, you know that,” the first voice said in a tone that was filled with so much regret.

Another groan went straight through Tao cause really, did they have to be like that, “Why are Gege’s so loud and annoying when I’m enjoying a good night’s sleep?” he yelled out which caused clear gasps of shock and surprise.

For a few seconds there was silence and then a large hand, familiar in a long forgotten sort of way gently caressed the back of his head, “Zitao?”

Slowly Tao opened his eyes, almost unsure if he wanted to do so for a second or so only to find a very sad, remorseful looking Luhan kneeling in front of him by a few feet. Panic raced through his heart for a second before the hand on his head moved ever so slightly and the boy looked up to find the now black haired young man with the familiar sad smile on his face. Tao blinked, “Yifan-ge?”

“So it had come to pass,” Yifan said softly, lowering his head a little to sigh before reaching out to the other to pull him up into a sitting position, “I’m sorry Tao, but you have to come with me and Luhan now.”

Tao blinked, not understanding before feeling the urge to turn back and a yell escaped his lips for a fraction of a second. Through a rapidly closing window he could see himself, no correction, his body lying on the couch looking all peaceful but also stretched out, like butter which had been spread across too much bread.

Strangely no tears came to his eyes, no ill thoughts passed through his brain and he just somehow came to a natural understanding. Gently he lowered his eyes, “Suho-hyung is going to kill me.”

“More like us if he gets the chance,” Luhan said, moving closer to take hold of the youngster’s hand, “Come on Tao, you’ll like it where we’re going.”

Tao nodded before allowing himself to be picked up into the familiar arms of Yifan as he was carried over to the next life. He felt sad for leaving and knew that there would be many questions but at the same time he knew that this was not completely his end.

“Will I get to say goodbye?” he asked to no one in particular.

“Yes,” Luhan answered with a smile, “In seven days’ time.” 

authors babbling:

yeah...I'm sorry -gives out hugs, chocolate, tissues, toys and whatever else she can to stem the tears- 

and sorry for taking an age to update as well, life went bonkers and maybe I'll get back to a more normal frame of life soon. 

please comment and let me know how I've done okay?