“Hurry up!” Jonghyun complained, watching impatiently as Key slowly and carefully zipped together his five-hundredth suitcase.

“Hurry!” Taemin urged as well.

“Hurry,” Minho said half-heartedly, playing Angry Birds furiously.

“Please hurry up, our sweet and kind rapper and vocalist.” Onew commented.

“Thank you, Onew.” Key mock-glared at the other three members and linked arms with Onew, dragging him and his suitcases out the door. Onew struggled to get his own suitcase, and the other three members sighed with relief.

“Puh-lease, nobody will care what we wear; it’s a boot-camp.” Hyoyeon emphasized. She had finished packing in three minutes flat, which was inconsiderate, considering how for the rest of the hour, she had to watch her members eenie-meenie-miney-mo their closet to choose what to bring along.

“Unnie, are you sure you don’t wanna bring fancier stuff?” Yoona said, concentrating on her pile of skinny jeans.

“Bring fancier stuff and get them ripped? No thanks, Yoon.” Hyoyeon laughed nicely, and walked over to help her younger groupmate stuff clothes into her suitcase.

“Thanks, Hyo-unnie.” Yoona smiled gratefully.

“Hyo-ah! What should I bring, the white jeans or the really,really faded blue jeans?” Jessica screamed from the other room.

“The really, really faded blue jeans!” Hyoyeon screamed back without even thinking.

“Hyoyeon! Pink tank top or really, really faded red one?” Tiffany shouted.

“Really, really faded red one!”

“Hyo-ah! Yellow jacket or really, really faded green one?”

“Really, really faded green one!” Hyoyeon shouted back to Taeyeon.

“Dancing Queen!” her fan-made nickname popped up, and she groaned.

“YES?”

“We’re ready to go.”

Hyoyeon looked behind her and saw her eight sisters, and let out a long breath of relief.

Kyuhyun killed monsters in his victorious way whilst his hyungs spazzed over what shirt to bring. “Stop being such girls. Keep squealing and I’m moving to 2NE1’s dorm or something.” He rolled his eyes at his gaming computer, which, of course, he was bringing along to SM Elite.

“Yah, blue or white?” Heechul barked, and Kyuhyun pointed to a random shirt in Heechul’s mountain of shirts.

“Kyu! Which pair of shorts do you think I’ll need?” Donghae asked, shoving Nikes and Adidas in front of Kyuhyun’s eyes.

“Mmf,” Kyuhyun grunted, pointing to the shorts closest to him.

One by one, all the members realized that he had spare time and dropped by for Kyuhyun’s opinion.

“Kyuhyun!” Kyuhyun was about to turn around impatiently, but he recognized this familiar voice.

“Oh Kyu, should I bring more jeans or sweats?” Sungmin asked worriedly.

“Well, I think according to the weather report, bring a fair amount of both.”

It was the wisest and nicest advice Kyuhyun had given in that hour, and the members were surprised.

A few minutes later, Sungmin returned with a pained expression on his cutely sculptured face.

“Hyung!” Kyuhyun smiled widely, welcoming Sungmin.

“Kyu-ah…” Sungmin said guiltily and pulled out a list.

“Yes?”

“So, Leeteuk wants to know if red matches with green when it’s not Christmas, Heechul wants to know if you have the Wonder Girls’ numbers, Yesung wants to know if turtles can wear skirts, Shindong hyung wanted to ask you if hamburgers can talk-what the?- Eunhyuk wanted to ask if…”

Kyuhyun rolled his eyes. Of course, he might be an evil maknae, but that came from his sneaky hyungs.

Amber didn’t know what to make of the sudden news for SM Elite. She had hoped for closer relationships with everyone else from her company, but she found the idea of SM Elite bizarre.

“Amber?” Krystal said quietly, and Amber yelped.

“Woah! You’re so silent,” she laughed and invited the maknae inside her room.

“Hey, having a talk ad forgot to invite umma?” Victoria teased. Amber invited her inside, and Luna followed.

“Group meeting and guess who’s missing?!” Sulli said, dragging her suitcase inside Amber’s room.

“I don’t know what to make of this boot-campy thing.” Krystal announced and enveloped her head with her hands.

“Me neither, I know it’s a scheme to get us all friendly and all, but…” Amber added.

“It’s not that we don’t want to, it’s because we’re all shy.” Victoria stated.

“Exceptionally,” Luna continued.

“Hm?” Sulli asked, surprised. “Exceptionally?”

“Yeah, Krystal and SNSD, Sulli and Heechul, Amber and Henry-” Luna replied.

“That was a Christmas project!” Amber protested.

“Alright, alright. So we have a little bit of connection, but not enough.”

“Guys, the manager is here,” Victoria announced in her choppy Korean, putting down her phone.

“Kaja~” Krystal dusted herself for invisible dirt and smiled at her group bravely.

“No matter what happens, we stick together, arasso?” Amber, too, mustered a big smile, her heart pounding.

The five girls walked out their dorm with confident smiles.

“Hyung, hurry.” Changmin hurried.

“Maknae, hurry.” Yunho retorted.

The two grinned at each other and grabbed their bags at the same time.

“Come on, hyung.” Changmin laughed.

“Come on, maknae,” Yunho smiled gently, “we have hoobaes to unite.”

After two hours of agonizing car trips for all five groups, they arrived at a deserted campsite, on the outskirt of urban Seoul.

The managers shooed their groups out of the car and before anyone could protest, five vans zoomed out of sight, leaving behind the nervous idols.

Everybody looked around, expecting their president to pop out from behind a bush. But everywhere they looked seemed to scare them. They were at a ditch where a campfire once existed. Behind them were tall frightening trees that didn’t give away anything that the forest contained. They had no idea whether dangerous animals lurched behind the trees or not.

“I’m rethinking about the sanity of all of us…” Heechul muttered, brushing a hand through his dark hair.

“Come on, it can’t be that bad. It’s just some trees, and it’s barely nighttime.” Donghae mustered, staring nervously at the shadows casting beneath their feet.

“Baby I’m so lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely…” Taemin grumbled, stubbornly pulling out a bottle of banana milk. He had thought about drinking them wisely, but he was extremely bored.

The sky darkened and soon, they found themselves under the mere illumination of the moon.

“Where are we supposed to live?” Krystal shivered as a gust of wind whistled by.

“If it’s a boot camp, don’t we sleep in a tent?” Leeteuk wondered aloud.

“Or on the ground, with dirt as blankets.” Tiffany gasped with horror.

A dove soared from the sky.

“Isn’t that the dove from our The Boys music video?!” Sooyoung exclaimed.

“Your dove was animated…” Siwon commented.

The dove landed gingerly on the floor and stuck out a leg commandingly.

Key rushed forward and seized its wings gently, his hands expertly untying ropes on the dove’s leg.

The rest of his labelmates watched him quietly, and finally he pulled out a small fancy piece of paper. The dove, freed, flied away.

“Wow, sending messages with doves. I’m not surprised.” Yunho chuckled.

“At least he’s not like Harry Potter, using owls! But that would be pretty cool,” Eunhyuk smiled.

Key unrolled the paper and started reading.

“Dear HoMin, Super Junior, SNSD, SHINee, and f(x) children,

I will not be able to personally tell you the following due to a schedule. I will arrive tomorrow morning. Please take care of yourselves. You must be wondering where you are sleeping for the night, are you not?

Hold your hands out and make a big circle. Wait patiently! ^^”

“Make a circle?” Minho asked in disbelief.

“Well, if that’s’ what sunbaenim wants us to do, then we’ll do so.” Yunho shrugged and grabbed Changmin’s hand.

Everyone spread around the campfire ditch, waiting anxiously for what surprise their president would bring next.

Without warning, six packages fell from the sky, attached to parachutes.

Jonghyun rushed forward and pulled Hyoyeon aside, avoiding a black package that was about to hammer her in the head.

He grabbed a piece of paper taped to one of the packages and read aloud.

“Dear HoMin, Super Junior, SNSD, SHINee, and f(x) children,

Here are six tents. Super Junior can decide how to split into two groups. You will build all six tents, together with all thirty-three of you, and then sleep in your respective groups.

Better have a good nights’ sleep, because you never know what awaits tomorrow~!”