Hearing the heartbeat of a girl stutter while standing in front of him comes as so surprise to Baekhyun. The vampire knows he is attractive to the opposite and physiological responses cannot be helped. The girl was pretty enough to attract attention herself. Tall with a thin but athletic build. Enough curves in the right places. Soft red lips. And wide eyes staring right into his.

“Boys, this is Maeri. Maeri, this is EXO-CBX,” Hana began introductions pointing out the members one by one. “Xiumin, the oldest and a Fey connected to cold. Next to him, Chen, a mage with a specialty for electricity. And lastly Baekhyun, our vampire on the team.” Then turning to Maeri, she introduced her for the others sake. “This is Maeri. She is a mage with a focus on the mind,” seeing a shrug and a nod from Maeri as her description of her power’s focus was close enough, Hana continued. “She is a brand new recruit to SM and will most likely be working with you for your upcoming CBX music video, and maybe the full group’s video as well. Now let’s head in and talk to the director. You all can get to know each other later during the screen testing.”

Hana led the way into the conference room and Xiumin as a gentleman held out a hand to Maeri clearly conveying the concept of “Ladies first.”

Stepping into the room and out of earshot, Maeri missed the next comments between the men in the hall.

“Does anyone else think her powers feel weird?” Xiumin asked the others, not really expecting a response since the other supernatural beings had weaker senses than the Fey.

Chen was the first to respond, “I didn’t really notice anything. Maybe her powers are just underdeveloped since she is new to the agency and has maybe not had practice with them like we have. She is a bit old for being a new recruit given her strength.”

Baekhyun looked the others in the eyes before stepping into the room himself, “We will see what her powers actually are soon. But regardless, at least she is pretty enough for the video.”

“He always does think about image first, doesn’t he?” Chen mumbled under his breath.

Xiumin responded with a chuckle, “Well physical image, yes. Mental image, still probably not. No matter how old we get, we have to stay young for our fans.”

“Well thank God for our excellent anti-aging genes then right?”

The two were laughing out loud as they walked in to meet the director.

__________

“Look straight into the camera. Give us a smile. Turn in a slow circle so we can see your face from the sides. Now walk toward the camera and then run away looking over your shoulder.”

This was just the last three minutes of Maeri’s solo screen test. From not fully understanding what it would be, she determined that it was simply playing Simon Says with the camera crew as the director watched her from the monitor, picking out her best angles from which to shoot and making sure her actions looked natural on camera to limit the need for retakes after the shooting occurred.

“Okay. Chen, you are up first. Go stand next to one another.”

The male mage walked to the female one and they stood side by side looking at the camera.

“She is a little tall, don’t you think?” The director said under his voice to Hana.

Her only response was a shouted, “Maeri, take your heels off.”

Balancing on one foot to take the other heel off, Maeri felt a steadying hand land on her elbow.

“Thanks,” she muttered trying to focus on unclasping the heavy black shoes from her feet.

“No problem. Heels are a pain.” Though she missed it, a smile stretched across Chen’s face making his already strong chin appear both sharper and younger at the same time.

“And how would you know that.” Maeri responded with a slight sigh as she got her heel off and moved on to the other one.

“Cross dressing is sometimes a required part of the job. The others make much prettier women than I do, so I am especially happy you are here so I don’t have to try to make googly eyes at them while filming.”

Her second heel came off and her shoe dropped to the ground. If not for the hand on her elbow, the girl might have dropped to the ground too out of shock at Chen’s statement. Her wide eyes looked up at him now, seeing his smile just for a second before he threw his head back to laugh.

“I can’t even tell if you are serious right now.”

“Oh he completely is,” Xiumin said as he walked to the pair in front of the cameras as well. Maeri’s heels were shifted to the side off camera and then he returned to hold the opposite hand from Chen and tug her to face his direction. “When we were rookies we all had to go in drag for various events for work. But we also had to do it a couple of times to escape our fans. Some were pretty rabid when we started getting popular. Now there are just a few to really look out for, but we have also learned how to get around them without dressing as women. Now, most of us have gone years without wearing heels and skirts. Well except Joonmyun and Baek. They either got roped into it by our seniors or volunteered. You can guess who did which.”

“They were passable, although that dress did nothing for Joonie’s figure.” Chen’s laughing continued from over her shoulder and Maeri couldn’t help but join in.

The voice of the director calling Chen off the stage seemed to imply that the girl missed the comment that sent Xiumin on the stage. She was so caught up in his blinding smile that she stopped listening to the directions.

“Look coupley for us Xiumin,” the director called out.

Not knowing what to expect, Maeri’s laughter died out as she tilted her head to the older man.<