Don't worry guys, Taemin, Minho, and the game should be coming back shortly. What will the encounter of the new Cerberi be?

Key widened his eyes when the words slipped out of Onew’s mouth.

“Kill them”

He let the words echo through his ears before his hand caught his friend’s shoulder. Onew met his gaze. As if already knowing what he was going to say, the boy shrugged, making Key’s hand slither from his touch.

“Onew, let’s talk this through. We’re not going to kill anybody. Hell, we don’t even know how to control what we are, let alone actually strike someone.”

Onew rolled his eyes.

“Do I need to show you your aunt right now?” He retorted.

“Onew, that was a monster! Plus, Taemin and them aren’t even here. You heard they left school early.”

“Convenient.” He scoffed.

Key blew some stray strands that hovered in the front of his face and turned his whole body, his legs transforming into a bowing form as the covers scrunched up around him.

“Onew, look at me. Like…really look at me.” He demanded. Key was done. He loved his best friend to death, but he was getting sick and tired of this I-Can-Do-Anything-Because-I’m-Mad attitude.

With a half-sneer and an uninterested gaze, Onew, once again, met his friend’s face. Truthfully, he was sick and tired of finding different ways to defend those two who’s done nothing to earn their trust, to begin with. This was the thought that simmered through his head when he looked at Key.

“Look Onew, I know you want some sort of revenge right now because you’re angry. Because you’re tired of people lying to you, but even if you did attempt to attack them, you’ll be dead in two seconds. Not even considering if they’ll actually attack you.”

Onew sighed and was about to get off the bed when Key grabbed his arm and pulled him back down on the mattress with a blank force.

“J-Just, listen to what I have to say.” He quickly spurred.

“I mean Key if you’re gonna keep defending them-“

“Onew, you think I’m not upset about this whole ordeal. You know I am. You’ve treated me like this fragile baby ever since you and your mom found me in the woods. I know, that you know, that I am hurting. That doesn’t mean I want to spring into action because I’m angry at all the adults in this house right now. Yes, I’m upset neither Aunt Kim or your parents said anything, but, it’s too late to stay mad about that. It’s happened, we know the truth now, it’s over. What we need now…” he paused to catch his breath. “What we need now is to do exactly what you said we were incapable of doing in the first place.”

The words were spilling out of his mouth like falling sand, but it was the very last thing that Key said, that really made Onew stop what he was doing.

“Exactly…what did I say?”

 “The part where you mentioned we weren’t prepared before. That if we were, we could have been mentally and physically ready for anything that was going to surprise attack us.”

“I’m listening…” Onew nodded.

“Your mom has a door that apparently only you and her can open-“

“She still never told me why. Though…I’m guessing now it has something to do with another magic ward or whatever they call it.”

“Well, we need to get into the room. You saw what she made your dad bring out. You must’ve seen what else she had in there.”

Onew tapped the bottom of his chin. Indeed, he did. The multiple jars filled with herbs, the orange spotted flowers with yellow stalks, and all the other odd shaped plants was something that was not easily forgotten. He nodded his head.

“But won’t my parents stop me?” He couldn’t believe the question was coming out of his mouth, of all people, but it was definitely something that’d popped into his mind a few times.

Key shrugged his shoulders. In all honesty, he was done with the boundaries the adults had placed on them with and without their knowledge. If they were going to get answers, this was the only way. Key was, in fact, a little frightened of the Cerberi showing back up from wherever they went, but it wasn’t something he was going to tell Onew. All he needed was to give his friend a little boost of confidence in his thoughts of not to trust them. No, there had to be something more to all of this. Something they were all missing, something he was sure Minho and Taemin didn’t know. Otherwise, why would they share so much of what seemed, sacred information with him and Onew, if they knew all along what they were?

“The adults can’t stop us from finding stuff out anymore,” Key answered. “Come on.”

He bounced off the bed as if a minute or so ago he didn’t have a high fever and the sandwiches were forgotten on the mattress as they walked out. In Onew’s house, there wasn’t such a thing as sneaking around when his parents were home. Their hardwood floors were beyond loud and could sound off an intruder even if they were on their toes. So, when the boys touched the dark floor and the creaking echoed through the hallway, his mother, Min-seo, called out.

“Boys? You’re up?” Afterward, there were quick footsteps and soon, his mother, looking at them dead in the eyes, but not accusingly. Rather, interested or surprised that they were out the room, that they were even setting foot in this atmosphere.

“We’re going to the back room to look at the scrolls,” Onew replied in a monotone.

Key opened his mouth to correct the situation but Min-seo nodded her head faster than he could react. There wasn’t an argument, or a debate, not even a hesitation before she did it. There was, though, a lingering sadness in her eyes when Onew spoke and Key caught it. He glanced at his friend that nodded back at his mother and turned around. Key again, tried to open his mouth but Min seo caught hold of his motions and placed her hand in the air, then shook her head. With a small, half-construed smile, she turned around and walked away.

He wondered, for a moment, if this was how their species solved things. They were, in fact, two wise animals. Did the owls just not argue? Was this how it was in the past before either of them was born? It all rushed through his head before he heard Onew calling his name from the door, already open and ready for them to explore.

“Here I come.” He answered.

****

Two hours had gone by and they still dug through old scroll, upon old scroll, making sure to be careful with the ancient paper they held in their hands. The boys had discovered too many bundles to count when they searched further in, a lot more than Onew had initially seen when it was just him and his dad. They’d grabbed the bundles as carefully as they could and dragged them back into Onew’s bedroom, where they laid some on the mattress, some of the coffee table, and the rest on the floor where they wouldn’t get stepped on. They each took sections; Onew took the floor while Key took the bed.

So far they’d found old ‘spells’ that protected Gumihos in the care of Night Owls and ways to use the odd plants that laden the shelves in the back room. Key did find a particular scroll that held a beautiful painting of a Gumiho in full form, fox and all. The painting made him pause his search. He gazed at it with lingering eyes, then looked at his own pale hands, opening and closing his palms. How could he possibly turn into something like this? Fearsome and powerful. His fingers rubbed up against the old browned paper and the subtle colors that had darkened over time. A previous painting before this one had shown another Gumiho in their human form. Almost the same one as the one they’d seen earlier, except it was a beautiful man with silver hair that touched his toes and of course, the tails that flowed around his body like wandering clouds.

It was only this picture, the one he held now of the full body Gumiho, that seemed any different. But none of them, including the spell scrolls, helped them in any shape or form. He sighed and placed the painting aside like all the others. Lightly turning around, he found Onew on the floor, closely digging his eyes on the pieces just like he always did with his schoolwork. His stack was much neater, piled next to one another like important business forms. His fingers brushed the thin paper as he read...read? Key realized then that the two of them had been reading all these scrolls without a problem. Weren’t these scrolls like thousands of years old? Or at least a couple of hundred minimum? How were they understanding? The inquisitive side of him made him scoot down off the bed and join Onew on the floor who looked up when invited by his presence.

“Find anything?” He asked.

Key shook his head.

“Onew?” He asked.

“Yeah?”

“You realize we’re reading really old…I mean…old stuff.”

“Yeah, what’s the problem?” The boy went back to reading.

“This stuff is super old. Don’t you find it weird that we understand it?”

Onew paused in his movements, his finger freezing at the word “heal.”

“I guess,” he ushered out in a small voice, “I guess this is part of our…creatures developing? I’m not sure what we’re calling it.”

Then he shook his head and went back to reading.
“If it’s getting us answers, I’m not going to question it.”

Key huffed again and leaned back against the front of the bed.

“But is it? We’ve been sitting here for two hours and I feel like we’ve gone through hundreds of scrolls only to find more protection stuff that will help us if we need some healing assistance from all those weird plants in the back room, but does nothing for us now. There are no pieces of advice in the attack department and nothing that’s going to help us with…you know…developing our ‘other sides’.” He put two fingers in the air and made quotation marks as he spoke.

“If I knew you were going through those scrolls for that,” came Min seo’s voice.

Both the boys jolted and turned around with a force, staring at Onew’s mother from the open door that surprisingly, neither one of them heard open.

“Then I would’ve told you, you weren’t going to find anything.”

She paused for a moment, looking down at the floor as if getting her words together. The boys stood unanimously.

“Then what do we have to do?” It was the first time since all this happened that Onew asked her a genuine question without sounding like a jackass.

His mother pursed her lips when she looked back up. Her eyes bore into their’s, gazing on their figures and their small frames. Fragile, ignorant to their world. Her fingers fidgeted a bit as she thought about how to answer. She even looked back out the door as if someone was going to come through and interrupt them. Then she sighed a heavy one, before speaking again.

“Usually…a Gumiho must learn from another Gumiho but as your aunt is predisposed of, Key, that’s not an option. Onew, us, on the other hand, we Night Owls learn from experience and growth. Everything you have to know to bring out your owl side, you must learn on your own, without my help. Unfortunately,” her eyes turned back to Key, “you must do the same thing Key. It won’t be easy. Foxes are stubborn animals and Gumihos, no matter how powerful, are no different.”

“Mom, as much as I love your riddles-“

“The Forest.” She interrupted.

Onew stopped mid-eye roll. Their mouths gaped opened.

“As much as I hate to say this. You two might need to go back into the Forest. When Key was stuck in the tree, that particular forest made a connection with him. And since you, Onew, woke him up, so did you. The more I thought about this, the more I realized. The Forest didn’t just come alive when Key stepped back into it. No, that was just the start. It was when both of you went back that it woke. And as much…so much….as I hate to say it again, I think it’s the only way to wake up your sleeping sides.”

“You want us to go back!” Onew screamed. “You do realize there was a monster out there a night ago.”

Key pursed his lips.

“I think she’s right Onew.” His voice was blunt.

Onew turned a wide eye to his best friend.

“Key you do realize-“

Key put his hand in the air.

“Yes Onew, I’m very damn clear what happened in the Forest and what going back could lead to, but I don’t think it’s a crazy idea. I mean, it’s your mother giving it after all.” He gestured his hand over to her in the lingering doorway.

“Don’t worry,” she nodded, “now that we have an inkling of what we’re dealing with, I can help with protection. But, I don’t think that creature will be coming back anytime soon. Either way, when you boys go back, find a safe place. Somewhere you know you won’t be vulnerable.”

Key nodded, and immediately after, the image of blossoming glowing flowers revealing themselves with his every move, his experience he had the first night he went into the woods—came to mind. There was a safe peace of enclosure that hugged his mind when he thought about it again, the same feeling he’d gotten before he heard the creature lingering near him the first night.

“I know an area.” He answered. “But, before we go…

Min-seo raised her brows in question.

“The morning before all this happened. What…who were you and Aunt Kim meeting exactly. There was…a strange man that followed me to school that day, I know it, but when I got to school Onew said he didn’t see anyone behind me.”

She smiled gently.

“That is something I can definitely explain to you boys later. It’s not much of a secret, I just think you boys have enough on your minds right now. Plus, I have to convince myself and my husband that this is a good idea. We thought yesterday was a clever idea too…” Her voice lowered to the point where the last part of her sentence was nothing but a whisper.

But no matter what she said, that was also something that bothered him. There was something eerie and dangerous about that man, whoever he was when he saw him. Something that gave Key goosebumps when he thought about it again. Maybe Onew was right. Secrets always seemed to be a problem with this family of theirs.’.