The densely packed air threaded like rope around the necks of passerby as they scurried for shelter. Oh Sehun weaved through the mess of frantic bodies while carrying a grindle bag, running with just as much need for closure as everyone else. The harsh droplets tainted his wrinkled white blouse from the long neck down to the tucked creases.

He still made it inside of the St Louisa asylum without contacting the viscous winds, all the while the darkened sky roared of deep resonance. He touched his full head of dark streaks and swiped the water away while approaching the stairs.

When he arrived to his office, he was taken aback to have found a brown headed stranger sitting on the rusty wooden guest chair.

“Who are you? And what are you doing inside of my office?” He questioned, hard and rough.

Light lashes swept up and round chestnut eyes centered on him. They were lost and confused as they quickly flashed back down onto the ground, but Sehun only saw another disturbed thing. “They told me… to wait here,” a hushed voice escaped his scratched lips, so minuscule that all Sehun heard was a mumble.

Sehun sneered and paced over to the opposite side of the large desk. “There’s always more of you,” he had muttered while taking out a piece of scroll paper and readied his ink. Before he had commenced the normal procedure, though, he gave the man a once-over and inspected his angular body. Sehun’s eyes slanted with dissatisfaction, he saw more bone than he would prefer. “I can not allow you into this institution, you are far too malnourished. You will not be able to handle our treatments,” he said, blunt and curt.

The other man rose his brows in horror as if it was the worse news that he could have ever heard. “B-B-But I… have no where t-to go,” he grew frantic as his fingers dug into calloused skin.

“That is what they all have said, and none of you have succeeded in your lie.” Sehun gestured for the door, his expression uninviting and forbidding. “Now leave, before I call for someone who will make you.”

The brunette swallowed a hard gulp, his life had already been hard enough, now why must this happen?

“I-I do not h-have money… bu-but I can of-offer my body,” he stuttered with great uncertainty, for these are the words that he knew by heart and had hoped he would never use ever again.

Repulsed, Sehun’s cheek bones elevated as his mouth pressed inward. “How dare you mention such filthy actions so bluntly? Get out this instant!”

Flinching, the man circled his hand around his pointed wrist and stood up, his head hanging. He stepped towards the door and left with a shaking frame.

Sehun watched his leaving back distastefully, and to think that that this bashful man was going to be the least bit innocent. But then he thought to himself: no one here was innocent, and if they were, then they had their insanity to tarnish it.

* * *

The earth grumbled with pitter-patters as two gentle, four-legged giants stumbled upon it, galloping across the dirt tracks merrily. However, the two who rode them were anything but merry as their bickering reached sky high.

“Why must you always act this way?” There the copperhead went again, whining vexedly.

Sehun rolled his eyes and gave the horse a smack to get him further away from the man behind his headaches.

“Ignoring me will not make anything better, you must speak with me eventually!” He hollered, to which Sehun pulled on the reins and gave him an expression of pure exasperation.

“What do you expect me to say, Baekhyun? You have ruined our family’s name, and what more, you do not seem to have the slightest interest!” He finally released, after endless pleas and tiring efforts.

Baekhyun rode up closer to him and casted an earnest mien, firm and unbreakable. “Do you honestly believe that I do not care? If mother found out I would be disowned! ”

“That should not be an issue– you have Park Chanyeol to offer you a bed, as he had done plenty of times before,” it was spiteful and malicious, hinting towards the deadly sin that had been keeping him up all night. “You were always the one with such strong opinions, but having an affair with a man– that is punishable by death! It is not a part of our nature! You should have a conscience at the very least.”

“Is that truly what you think? Or are you just speaking for mother and the senseless law, just as you always have?” Baekhyun shouted back just as loud, and the question was left to hang in the humidity as a shuttering noise suddenly blew past their ears. It captured Baekhyun’s attention, but Sehun was still rooted to his furious role.

“At least I realize the significance of–”

“Shhh,” Baekhyun hushed him altogether and drew his brows together in suspicion. Sehun creased his eyes in slight perplexity and followed Baekhyun’s wandering irises.

“What are you doing?”

Copper hair wiggled with the whisper of the breeze as Baekhyun whipped his horse to move further down the grimy path. He looked around at the buildings and continued until the shuttering became more audible.

“I can hear something!” He hollered Sehun over while moving further down the dark pathways of the town, keen on figuring out this unanticipated enigma.

Sehun did not follow behind him, but when Baekhyun shrieked out horrifically, he lashed the mammal and pursued him like a constable chasing a thief.

“What is it?” He asked with urgency, only to find Baekhyun off of his horse and scrutinizing a curled up shivering body, hugging itself in disparity.

“Oh lord, are you alright?” Baekhyun reached out to touch the trembling mess of flesh and bones, but Sehun descended and grabbed his wrist before he could do so.

“What do you think you are doing? This is just another peasant! We have no business with him,” the poor man seemed to have been alerted as his head peeked out from its shell of limbs and spotted the owner of the voice. The lantern in Baekhyun’s hand offered Sehun some light, allowing him to have a better look at those round midnight spheres. “You?”

A line formed between Baekhyun’s auburn eyebrows, puzzled. “You know this man?”

Right at that instance, a sentence came flying back to his mind– B-B-But I… have no place t-to go.

He truly was not lying.

“We have to help him.”

Sehun was too busy visualizing an image to respond to Baekhyun, one that ticked around the corner of his brain and often visited him in his dreams, never leaving him to rest. It was of a child who was rocking back and forth on the balls of his heels, surrounded by trash and rubbish as tears streamed down his filthy face. In despair, scared, and alone.

“Sehun, what in the name of lord Francis are you thinking about? Come quick and help me hoist him atop the horse.”

Blinking, Sehun shook himself out of the gutter and went around to help Baekhyun with the limp lad. As soon as he touched his thin build, he had absorbed the freezing of his skin like a leech, and a hollow trench grew deep within his stomach. It did not feel well, to say the least.

* * *

Sehun sat cross-legged on a stool, eyes scanning the newspaper and searching for a particular column that sparked his interest, but nothing managed to make the cut. Ever since Leonardo Da Vinci first dissected the human body, all the other news began to pale in comparison.

“Hey, did the pale boy wake up yet?” Baekhyun’s voice broke through his quest for concentration, and he sighed heavily.

“I do not know, and I am not planning to find out,” he replied, still glued to the sprawl of inky words that were in front of him.

“What do you mean? We must check up on him, he looked hurt last night. You are the doctor, it should be your first instinct,” he reasoned with him, which was rare because all Baekhyun ever did was hold up a string of arguments-- most of the time.

Before Sehun had a chance to render a retort, a woman dressed in a gown and several undergarments obtruded to take the side that she had always taken. “Your brother is correct, Sehun. You must go see him, you have brought him into our home after all.”

Both dark pupils darted to the ashy haired woman and Sehun thinned his lips, unpleased. “Mother, I am not that kind of doctor, you know this. And I did not wish to bring him here, Baekhyun insisted.”

“Whatever it may be, you are all that we have right now. You know what it is like to get a hold of a doctor around here. And not only that, but he must be frightened. You would be, would you not?”

She was such a persuasive woman, but righteous as well. Not many people would take a stranger in when prompted and Sehun admired that greatly about her. “Alright, fine,” he said and stood up, provoked.

“Wait, take this with you–” his mother turned to the wooden table and picked up a tray to hand to him; a bowl and a spoon rested on top of it. “–I made some pottage, let him have some. He was shaking and looked very ill this morning, so this should help.”

Sehun took the tray from her then ascended up the stairs. He moved about the rush floor until he had reached the oak door. Before going inside, however, he found the need to take in a breath as if bracing himself; he would like to think that it wasn’t guilt.

The man was awake, back limp against the wooden headboard. His eyes diverted to the path of the exit upon sensing the creaking of the door, and although fear swam in his glossy brown globes, his features somehow loosened when recognizing Sehun.

“So, you are awake.” Sehun first said, placing the tray down onto the square table on the side.

Mahogany ruffles of hair hid further into the feather pillows as he attempted to conceal himself away. Sehun could see that he was afraid, but he wished that Baekhyun was here to ease him out of this fragile state. He, on the other hand, was not able to foster such forbearing abilities.

“I am aware that you are uncomfortable with this situation, so I am not going to make you speak,” he managed to relieve the man to some extent, as his shoulders deflated from their stiff posture.

After a few seconds, though, the man asked what had been on the top of his head since waking up in that strange room. “What… did you do to me?” His voice was like the whisk of July wind, barely noticeable but surely present. And he did not look at him, it was like he was speaking to the bed sheets.

“Nothing. You have been sleeping ever since my brother found you.” Sehun caught his eyes flicker onto him for a split second, wavering. It was then that he decided to do what had come for and grabbed the tray to secure it onto his lap. “My mother wanted you to have some of this.”

The man glanced down at the pottage and took a gulp of his saliva before picking up the silver spoon and plowing into it, not bothering with questions at this point. Sehun watched as he ate with savagery and untamed desire– he probably had not eaten for days.

The door opened and Baekhyun entered the room with the intention of being quiet, but when finding everyone up and awake he resumed to his springy personal. “Ah, so you are awake. Splendid! I thought you were going to sleep forever!” He came over to the fidgety man and sat on his right side, as opposed to Sehun, who was on the left side. “So, what is it that they call you?”

His question alerted Sehun slightly– he had not asked for his name yet.

“Luhan…” The glassy eyes finally had a name to them, one fitting for such a small and breakable being.

“Ah, well it is nice to make your acquaintance, Luhan. I am Baekhyun, Sehun’s brother,” Baekhyun said with a bright smile, which Luhan struggled to return as he shrank back down to fill his mouth with thick soup.

A woman named Hyejin came into the room soon after Sehun and Baekhyun had left. Luhan learned that she was their mother and had come to offer him the chance to bathe. He had thought that she was going to take him to the public bath, but it appeared that there was a private bath located inside of the house. Surprised did not do justice to describe his reaction, but he had suspected that these people were wealthy from the meat in the soup and the silver of the spoon, not to mention that one of the sons was a doctor.

It was peculiar indeed how he had wound up here, and although he finally put something into his stomach after days of gathering scraps from various dumpsters, all he wanted was to leave. After the bath, which Hyejin had pushed him into taking, he planned to do just that. It was true that he had nowhere to go, but no matter how many times these people had told him that he was safe, he would not believe them.

The bath, however, was extremely delightful nonetheless. To be washed and cleansed from the filth of neighborhood benches and the guck filled earth…  it felt impossible to replicate the sensations into human words. It was like a whole layer of his body had been stripped away, and he felt much lighter than usual if that was even possible.

When he had reached the room, he found hose and breeches laid out on the feather mattress, along with a doublet waiting for him. Hyejin must have fetched him something to wear, therefore adding to his list of oddities. Luhan took a look at his soiled shirt and ripped up pantaloons over on the other side of the bed, and it was hard not to see that getting back into them would put that whole bath to waste.

He pursed his lips and the soft fabric of the new clothes, the freshness of it taking him back to a time of relentless battles and piercing shouts. The terrorizing scenes made a treacherous reappearance in his head and he had to squeeze his eyes shut as a means of reprimanding them. His bony fingers recoiled as if they had just touched burning lava, prompting his eyes to quickly reopen before his heart could shoot out of his sweaty chest.

Luhan took in a heavy breath and released one with equal heft. It went on until he could regulate it, or at least come to a point in which hyperventilation was out of his reach. He crouched down onto the ground and held his head between his bare legs, the towel coming undone around his thin torso.

It was stuffy and the walls felt like they had closed in on him, his p