Another chapter! I apologise for the delay in posting, exams and assignments took up my time in the past few weeks. Enjoy! :)

Waking up to the sound of his alarm clock, Seungri quickly sat up and looked around him. Phew, he thought, still in my room. He'd done this the last few mornings as well, and fortunately he'd always been in his familiar, normal room. Relaxing, he stretched out and turned off his alarm. As much as he'd love to stay in bed and sleep for another hour or seven, he had a schedule to keep and a leader who would kill him if he was late. Being the maknae was no fun after a taste of being the leader of a group - he may not have been the oldest, but at least being the leader meant he wasn't actively bullied by s.

**

"Ya! Maknae!" Seungri heard Jiyong sunbae's voice cut through his nap and he groaned. His elder had no interest in being friends with him, and he wondered what he could possibly want with him now. Jiyong barged into his room and demanded that he 'go get us water'. Seungri's sleep addled mind attempted to process this order, and came back negative. His coherent response was "wha.. what... why now?...", and Jiyong snorted derisively at him. "Get UP maknae!" he said louder, "we want you to go get us water." So Seungri sleepily got up and out of his pyjamas, and went out at midnight in order to fetch the older trainees water - although he still was unclear about why they needed water at this time of night.

**

Getting ready quickly, Seungri was soon on his way out to go to practice. The last few days had been full of dance practice for bang bang bang and sober, and he was loving the dancing - although spending time in a group who danced intensely during their songs had made him realise just how little real dancing Bigbang really did.

As he walked into the dance practice room, he found himself forgetting his worries about whatever it was that had happened to him. Daesung was sat in the corner of the room on his phone, but also watching Youngbae trying to help Seunghyun with the dances. It seemed, however, that Seunghyun didn't have much interest in dancing, as he showed surprisingly light footwork as he flitted away from Youngbae. He watched as Youngbae half-heartedly attempted to grab Seunghyun, but was foiled by Jiyong, who laughed as he jumped in his way to 'save' Seunghyun. This easy friendship was something which he had missed during his time with the other group - he certainly didn't feel a deep connection to them like he did for s. Grinning, Seungri joined in by wrapping his arms around Seunghyun to catch him, and he yelled to Youngbae, "Quick! I've got him!", although Seunghyun was succeeding in escaping his grasp.

After a scrimmage, and Jiyong and Seunghyun lying on top of him in order to pin him down, they settled into actually practicing. Seungri found himself losing himself in his dancing and letting go of his worries about anything more complicated than making sure that he danced as best as he could, and avoiding Seunghyun treading on his toes as he stepped confidently in the wrong direction at least 43% of the time.

After they had practiced for several hours and were worn out enough that they could have filled a small pool with their sweat, they took a break and sat down together around the edges of the room. Seungri found himself sat next to Daesung, watching as Jiyong and Youngbae played an overly competitive game of rock paper scissors. Without even thinking about it, Seungri heard himself blurt out "hyung, do you believe in parallel universes?" Daesung turned to look at him with an extremely confused look on his face. "I don't know," he replied, "I hadn't thought about it... I don't think I do believe in them, no." Seungri laughed in a way which didn't even sound convincing to his own ears. "Me neither," he said in a voice that was slightly too high pitched to be completely believable.

"Are you alright Seungri?" Daesung asked in a comforting voice, "you've gone awfully pale." Before he could blurt out the secret of the few days he had spent in what he suspected was another universe, he shook his head and went to bug Seunghyun to distract himself.

Soon after, they resumed practicing, and try as he might, Seungri couldn't rid himself of his worries in the dancing this time. Daesung didn't even believe that parallel universes could exist. Could he have hallucinated the whole thing? It was possible that he could have been drugged, but then the whole thing had felt so real. Caught up in his thoughts, Seungri didn't notice Seunghyun's foot colliding with his own feet in time, and Seungri felt himself falling. In an attempt to stop himself, he frantically grabbed at whatever he could in order to steady himself, which happened to be Seunghyun's shirt. Given that Seunghyun wasn't exactly in a position to be steady himself, they both crashed to the ground, causing Seungri to bash his head on the hard floor of the practice room, and have Seunghyun's weight crush him from above. Groaning, he pushed Seunghyun off him, since he made no move to remove his own dead weight off of Seungri's lungs.

Deciding that they'd practiced enough, Seungri was relieved when Jiyong announced that they were allowed to go home. In the mood that he was in after worrying more about his experiences, with being crushed and bruised added on top of that, he really wouldn't have been much good for any more practice.

Getting home was a relief for Seungri. He ate a large dinner to make up for the practice of today, and watched several hours of mind-numbing TV for entertainment. Once it got late he decided to simply go to bed and sleep.

**

Seungri sat in the chair getting his make-up done. They were due to go on the music show soon and perform their song, and he felt slight nerves in his stomach. He listened as the others bickered somewhere behind him, arguing over which of the recent song releases from other artists was best. Seungri didn't recognise any of the song titles, but that was okay, he didn't need to know of every song in the industry. As soon as his make-up and hair were done, he got off the chair and went to join the others. He sat down next to Kibum, who turned his head to smile at him, before rejoining the argument. Seungri was happy to sit there and listen to what the others said, feeling strangely calm. He figured that he was simply more confident about the performance they would give - after all, he was a good dancer and singer, he rarely messed up onstage.

Soon enough, they were called to take their places onstage, and Seungri still felt calm as they began to dance. He felt light on his feet as he danced, sure of his movements, and looking around it seemed like the others were too - Taemin looked serene as he danced, Minho looked serious, and Jonghyun looked like he was having fun. Caught up in looking at the others as he was, he didn't move fast enough with the others, and Jinki bumped into him, causing them both to stumble.

The music continued to play, but Jinki stopped dancing even as Seungri attempted to get back into position, and the others soon noticed that something was wrong. They also stopped dancing, and came over to where Seungri and Jinki were stood still. Seungri registered the fans begin to whisper, wondering what was happening, and Seungri wondered that himself. Kibum began to berate him like he had done the last time Seungri made a wrong move onstage, and Seungri's previous good mood vanished. Jinki, as the oldest, began to tell Seungri off as well, over Kibum's speech - "honestly Seunghyun, you're meant to be a good dancer" "you're our leader, you can't just-" "-bad dancer-" "-bad leader-" "-should never have auditioned-".

Seungri's head spun as all five members shouted insults at him, and the audience began to boo at him as well. He looked on as fans with 'Seunghyun' signs began tearing them and throwing them onstage at him, and even this didn't stop the other members of SHINee from shouting at him. Suddenly Jiyong hyung was stood in front of him. He was shaking his head, and said "I guess you really aren't a good dancer, Seungri." He then turned around and walked offstage. Seungri took one last look at the irate audience, and the people who should have been his friends, and ran after the one person who had - nearly - always believed in him. He couldn't believe that his hyung would say something like that to any one, he couldn't -

Seungri woke up in his bed, panting. He groaned, and rolled over onto the cooler side of the bed. Well he may not have been certain whether his other experiences had been real, but that had certainly simply been a dream. During the short amount of time he had spent with SHINee, he had got to know them enough to know that they would never do something like that, and he knew for sure that his leader would never behave like that either. Sighing into his pillow, he knew that that dream wouldn't help his confidence with the dance he would have to perform the next day at an awards show. He drifted off again into an uneasy, but thankfully dreamless sleep.

**

Seungri felt a strange sense of deja vu come over him as he sat getting his make-up done. He made sure to focus on looking in the mirror at the people behind him - it was definitely Youngbae and Seunghyun having a completely serious competition to see who could do the most push ups (Youngbae was winning by a mile). As much as he could from facing the other way, he tried to cheer Seunghyun on, but unsurprisingly it made little difference to the outcome.

Jiyong entered the room looking frazzled, as he often did before shows - the perfectionist in him was always slightly nervous for performances, even after nine years of doing this as Bigbang. The door stayed open after he came in, and from where he was sat Seungri could see people walking in the corridor outside. He was unperturbed by this - after all, there were many people in this place for many reasons. He then heard a familiar voice declaring his love for the drama Secret garden, and another disagreeing with his opinion. Seungri froze as those people walked past the door, barely sparing a glance for the people inside it. Jonghyun's eyes slid past him without any kind of recognition besides that which was between two performers who weren't friends, an odd sensation after spending lots of time around him for a few days.

Feeling slightly shaken, Seungri went with the others to prepare for their turn onstage. He bounced nervously on the balls of his feet, hoping that this performance would go smoothly - he didn't think he could take having anything going wrong in real life.

As soon as the music started, they went into their performance, and Seungri concentrated as hard as he could on simply dancing. A few times he found himself nearly tripping up, but fortunately for him he managed to recover swiftly. The fans seemed to love it, if their screaming was anything to go by, and it was overall a success.

**

The party in the club was in full swing - Seungri and some of the others had decided to celebrate a successful performance by going out. He spent his time there getting as drunk as he could afford to while in the middle of promotions, and allowed himself to forget his worries in his dancing. He had no ulterior motives in being there - he simply wanted to enjoy life's simple pleasures.

He knew he wouldn't remember much of this the next day, but that was alright.

**

The first thing Seungri registered was a pounding headache, and a sour taste in his mouth. He moved gingerly, and his muscles protested the movement in their stiffness. Deciding to give up on movement, he stilled and attempted to get back to sleep, Jiyong hyung's scheduling be damned.

This plan of sleep was disturbed by the slow realisation that the sheets on his bed were the wrong colour, and were too small to have been for his bed at home. Using all his strength to roll over, he cracked open one eye, and groaned. He was back.