A/N: Hi, guys! Here’s the next chapter! I hope you enjoy it. :)

Book 4: Blast from the Past

Chapter 7: Running

When Kyuhyun woke up the next morning, he was a bit disoriented. He sat up on the bed and looked around the room, wondering for a moment where on earth he was. As he looked around the hotel room, the events from yesterday came flooding back into his mind.

And he suddenly wished that the goddamn memories remained forgotten.

Yesterday had been a complete disaster. A nightmare. A nightmarish disaster.

Kyuhyun now looked at his son, who was still sleeping peacefully beside him.

Well, if you could call somehow lying down horizontally across the bed instead, tangled up in sheets and his limbs sprawled everywhere as peaceful. Minhyun sometimes really could end up in the craziest positions when sleeping. Kyuhyun fondly shook his head.

Well, even if Minhyun’s position looked quite uncomfortable, the little boy’s face was at least relaxed.

Quite different from the red, crying face that the little boy was sporting for the most part of yesterday.

The evil maknae let out a heavy sigh. He had promised his son last night that things would be okay. But he didn’t really know how to make it okay. Kyuhyun wasn’t quite sure where things would go from here, but the one thing that he did know was that things won’t be the same as before now. Things just can’t go back to how things were before.

Not now with Minhyun knowing the truth about his mother’s past idol life. Not with Super Junior knowing about where Kyuhyun was and about Minhyun. Not with Changmin knowing about their son.

Maybe he could run again? Take Minhyun with him and find another nice place where he and his son can live in peace? After all, Kyuhyun had managed it before when he first left for China.

But then again, if there was something that Kyuhyun had learned from yesterday, it was that you definitely can run… but there’s no way that you can hide forever.

Oh, what on earth was he supposed to do?

Just as Kyuhyun was forcing his genius brain to come up with a brilliant solution to his problems, his phone, which had been on the bedside table, started ringing.

Not wanting it to wake up Minhyun (God knows that his little dumpling needed to rest after all the craziness from yesterday), Kyuhyun quickly grabbed his phone. Kyuhyun, however, frowned when he looked at the caller ID.

His no-good, betraying Chinese hyung.

For a second, he wondered whether he should just reject the call. But knowing how pushy, and annoying, and clingy his worrywart hyung could be, Kyuhyun figured that he might as well just get it over with. If anything, he could at least let off some steam and rant again at his hyung for ending up revealing his location to the other Super Junior members.

Kyuhyun let out another sigh and answered the call.

The evil maknae wasn’t even able to let out a (snarky, of course) greeting. No kidding—his worrywart hyung started his panicked jabbering as soon as Kyuhyun had the call connected.

“Kyuhyun?! Ohmygod! Where are you? Are you okay?! Is Minhyunnie okay?! I was so worried and—”

“Hyung!” Kyuhyun interrupted loudly, starting to get annoyed. Seriously, he just had a stressing day yesterday! The last thing that he needed the morning right after was coddling from his hyung! His hyung that betrayed him, he would like to emphasize.

The maknae heard his hyung take a deep breath from the other end of the line, the Chinese man obviously trying to calm himself.

“What do you want?” Kyuhyun asked irritably.

“Uh… Erm, your forgiveness, your current location, and your future plans? In that order.”

Kyuhyun’s eyes narrowed. He got up from the bed and moved away as far as possible from Minhyun. He didn’t want to wake his son, but he didn’t think that he would be able to keep his voice down for the rest of this conversation.

“Number one, forgiveness is impossible after your betrayal—”

“But, Kyu—”

“My current location—no way I’m telling you; I can’t trust you to not let the others know! Again… My future plans—well, I don’t know myself, and if I did, also none of your business anymore.”

“Oh, come on, Kyuhyun! I—"

“Okay, goodbye, hyung—”

“No, wait, Kyu!” Hankyung cried out, obviously panicked.

“What?!”

“You—uh, you need to—to get Minhyun’s things! Yeah! You need to come over here! Minhyun’s things are still here!”

That made Kyuhyun frown. In his rush to get out of there last night, he didn’t bother gathering Minhyun’s things that had been there during his little dumpling’s stay with Hankyung.

Still…

“I’m not going back there,” Kyuhyun insisted.

“But Minhyunnie’s things, Kyu!”

“It’s not like I can’t just get him new ones,” the evil maknae rolled his eyes even though his hyung couldn’t see the action. Okay, maybe it was a bit wasteful to buy new things to replace the perfectly fine clothes and toys that were left in Hankyung’s place, but in Kyuhyun’s opinion, dishing out money for replacement things was much better than the option of going back to his hyung’s apartment. Given what had happened there yesterday and all that.

“Minhyunnie’s favorite pajama sets are still here! You know, the ones with ice cream and donuts, and the other set with chicken legs.”

(Yeah, the little food monster’s favorite pajamas are of course the ones with prints/designs of food. No surprises there.)

That had Kyuhyun frowning again. Those were indeed Minhyun’s favorites. And they weren’t easy to replace. Xiari had especially ordered those pajamas as gifts to Minhyun last Christmas, and the kid had of course gotten quite attached to the “food pajamas.”

He could just make his hyung mail Minhyun’s things back to Kyuhyun’s apartment, but the evil maknae was sure that his son will be upset once the little boy realized that his things weren’t with them.

And given all the emotional distress that Minhyun had experienced yesterday, Kyuhyun didn’t want his son upset again any time soon if he could help it.

So, Kyuhyun supposed that maybe he should go and get Minhyun’s things first before they went home.

The evil maknae, being the evil genius that he was, was rightfully suspicious, though.

“The SM idols won’t be there waiting for me again, will they?” Kyuhyun asked suspiciously. He wouldn’t put this past his betraying hyung. No doubt Hankyung might have thought that getting Kyuhyun back there again today might help with fixing his relationship with the others. Especially with Changmin.

“Of course not!” Hankyung responded quickly.

A bit too quickly for Kyuhyun’s liking.

“Hyung,” the evil maknae growled softly. His hyung better not be trying to trick him!

“The SM idols had schedules to deal with today! Honest!” Hankyung yelped from the other end of the line.

“Grr. Fine. I’ll be there after lunch. I want those things ready so that I can just be in and out in a flash.” Demanding, maybe, but this was the evil maknae, after all.

Andddd he didn’t want to risk any idols showing up unexpectedly. The quicker he was with getting Minhyun’s things and then getting himself and his dumpling back home, the better it would be, in Kyuhyun’s opinion.

“Why so long? Why can’t you come now?”

Kyuhyun’s eyes narrowed. “Geez, hyung! It’s not like we didn’t have a stressing day yesterday! Forgive me for wanting to get some peace with my son for a bit!”

“Oh. Right. How’s Minhyunnie?”

“Fine,” Kyuhyun replied shortly. “He’ll be better when I get him back home and far away from all this mess again, though. So, have those things packed and ready. See you later, hyung.”

“Kyuhyun is so going to kill me,” Hankyung muttered in despair when the phone call ended.

He knew that he was already in a hell lot of trouble with Kyuhyun for all the things that happened yesterday. What on earth possessed him to agree to this plan and get in even more trouble with his evil maknae?

Then, Hankyung felt the evil gaze that currently on him. The evil gaze of another evil maknae.

And Hankyung remembered. Right. This was why he agreed to the plan and made the phone call to Kyuhyun. Sure, Hankyung was worried about having to deal with his evil maknae, but Changmin was also an evil maknae, and Hankyung knew that he didn’t want to have DBSK’s evil maknae after his blood as well.

“Well,” said Leeteuk, who was also in Hankyung’s apartment with Changmin, reasonably. “You’ve been saying since yesterday that Kyu will kill you. Yet you’re still alive, aren’t you? Who knows? You still just might survive this whole mess breathing, Hankyung.”

Hankyung let out a groan of protest, and Leeteuk cut him off and added, “Besides, think of this as making up for hiding the maknae from us. You kept Kyuhyun hidden; now, you can help us get him back.”

That just annoyed Hankyung even more. “For the last time, hyung, it wasn’t like I kept Kyuhyun hidden on purpose!”

“You willingly didn’t tell anyone about his location,” Changmin now countered, narrowing his eyes at Hankyung.

“I was trying to help!” Hankyung said exasperatedly, his arms even flailing at his sides in his exasperation. Really, why can’t people get that? Why can’t they see that he was just trying to help?

Leeteuk sighed. Yes, he been downright furious with Hankyung yesterday when he found out the truth. But now that he was calmer, he understood why Hankyung agreed to Kyuhyun’s wishes of staying hidden, and he understood that Hankyung only had the best intentions.

But still…

“You can now help again. By helping us get our maknae back,” was all that Leeteuk said firmly.

Hankyung let out a heavy sigh. No wonder he had agreed to make the phone call to Kyuhyun. The DBSK maknae was already scary enough. Add the Super Junior leader to the equation, and there was no way that Hankyung could say no.

Even if it did mean that Kyuhyun will kill him even more for this.

“What do you want, Kuixian?” Xiari asked soon as she answered Kyuhyun’s call. (A/N: as usual, lines that are completely italicized/conversations involving Xiari are in Chinese.)

“You need to come to Beijing.”

Kyuhyun said it so casually that it was as if he was just asking Xiari to go to the store that was just a block away from their apartment building. When he was actually asking the woman to make a long drive to a far city.

“What?!” Xiari said in a—rightfully—disbelieving and incredulous tone. “Are you nuts? You know that Lin and I are supposed to visit my husband tomorrow!”

“That’s for tomorrow! Come to Beijing today!” Kyuhyun insisted.

“But I need to prepare for our trip! Get our things ready and all that!”

“Come to Beijing!”

Xiari was about to rant about how inconsiderate Kyuhyun’s sudden request was, but there was something about Kyuhyun’s tone that made her pause. Though he tried to hide it, she could hear the desperation.

“What’s going on?” Xiari asked slowly. Suspiciously. “Did the conference with the mayor and the other official not turn out well?”

“No, the conference ended successfully yesterday.”

“Well, what the hell is up, then??”

Kyuhyun let out a sigh. “I need you to come over here and pick up Minhyun. Get him, and take him back there.”

“But why?? Aren’t you two supposed to stay there with Hangeng for a while after your conference? And if you need to get Minhyun back here, why don’t you take him back yourself?”

“Plans changed. We can’t stay here in Beijing anymore. I need you to come here and bring Minhyun back home. I want him far from here as soon as possible. I need to stay a bit to sort some things out, though.”

And that definitely sounded ominous to the ELF’s ears.

“Kuixian, what in heaven’s name is going on?!” Xiari demanded outright, starting to get seriously worried by Kyuhyun’s words.

“You’ll understand later! Just get over here and pick up Minhyun!”

Again, the obvious desperation in Kyuhyun’s tone.

“I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what the hell’s going on!” the Chinese woman insisted. Kyuhyun was stubborn, but Xiari sure as hell can be stubborn as well. Also, the ELF wanted to know if there was trouble and if she should bring her pitchfork along. Just in case.

“You really want to know what’s going on?! Fine! Super Junior just found out where I am! They were in Hangeng’s apartment! They saw me yesterday, and now, they know where I am! As if that’s not enough, they also know about Minhyun! Oh, and did I mention that DBSK was also there and that I saw my ex again? And that he now also knows about our son?!”

Talk about dropping a bombshell on the woman.

For a moment, Xiari stood frozen on the spot after Kyuhyun’s rant. Then, she was already dashing around her apartment. Not to prepare for their visit to her husband, but to prepare for rushing to Beijing.

Less than two hours later, there was frantic knocking on Kyuhyun’s hotel room’s door. And the evil maknae opened the door to see the Chinese woman looking quite harassed and rushed. Strands of hair fell loose from the bun that she had at the back of her head, and her clothes were slightly creased.

“That was fast,” Kyuhyun remarked as he let Xiari into his hotel room and closed the door again. Even when Hankyung rushed the drive from Beijing to their small town, it still took about two hours. Xiari didn’t even take two hours.

“Well, what else did you expect me to do but go way over the speed limit when you dropped a bomb like that on me?” Xiari retorted. Then, she saw that Minhyun was still fast asleep on the bed.

“Minhyunnie’s still sleeping?” Xiari asked with a slight frown. It was already past 10 in the morning, and Minhyun was usually an early riser. It’s not that the little boy didn’t like sleeping, but his abyss for a stomach that consistently demanded food made Minhyun get up early so that he can have breakfast early.

Kyuhyun sighed as he ran his fingers through his hair. “Yeah. I guess he’s still quite drained from yesterday.”

Xiari frowned even more. Poor Minhyunnie. She could only imagine what yesterday had been like for the boy. ELFs’ little prince shouldn’t have had to go through something like that.

“Why don’t you have Lin with you?” Kyuhyun asked Xiari now. He had just noticed that the young girl wasn’t with her mother. And Kyuhyun knew that Xiari very rarely went anywhere without her daughter.

“Yeah, like I was going to bring my daughter with me into the car when I knew that I’d be speeding and driving at a dangerous speed to get here asap,” Xiari said sarcastically. “I left her with landlady of our building.”

Kyuhyun nodded, and he walked to the bed and sat at its edge, his gaze on his still sleeping son.

Xiari remained standing, her arms folded across her chest. “What are you going to do now, Kuixian?”

“Know any other remote towns where Minhyun and I could move to?” Kyuhyun asked, still not taking his eyes off his son.

“You’re not seriously considering running again?” Xiari asked incredulously.

Kyuhyun just shrugged. “Or maybe your husband can get a place for me and Minhyun to hide in for a while. He’s in the military; he surely knows secret locations.”

“Are you being serious?! You want to go into hiding again? When you’re still technically in hiding already?”

“I’m not exactly in hiding anymore,” Kyuhyun frowned at her. “Not with some SM idols knowing where I am…”

“So, you just want to run away again?” Xiari asked once more. Incredulously again. Because really, how many times did Kyuhyun think he can run away from his old life?

“It’s an option.”

“But not the only option!”