“Haemi, it’s time to wake up. It’s time to leave.”

You felt a gentle shake at your shoulders, but you refused to wake up. When the shaking persisted, you cracked open an eyelid to glance at the window. The sun hadn’t even come out yet.

“Come on Haemi, it’s almost daybreak,” a rougher voice sounded.

“No, I don’t want to go on the mission anymore,” you childishly replied as you wrapped yourself tightly in blankets. “I’m calling it off.”

“Haemi,” a voice growled warningly.

“Let her sleep,” another voice sighed, and you inwardly thanked the heavens for him, whomever he was. “I’ll just carry her for now.”

“I’m not so sure her brother’s going to allow that,” a voice chuckled.

With annoyance, you slowly opened your eyes to see D.O, Baekhyun, and Kai standing in front of you.

“The princess has awaken,” Kai smiled, patting you gently on the head. “Come on now, it’s time to go. Kris and Chanyeol are already almost ready in their own room, and Tao has been waiting for ages.”

You felt guilty when you heard about Tao, so you reluctantly sat up. “But it’s so early,” you murmured, rubbing the sleep out of your eyes.

“Cute,” you heard someone murmur under their breath. If you had been more awake, you would have punched them, but you were too tired and sleepy to fight.

“But I’m tired,” you stated plainly, staring at the three of them with droopy eyes.

“We can clearly see that,” D.O chortled.

“Baekhyun, I’m sleepy,” you whined, targeting the kindest warrior out of the three.

“I can carry you,” Baekhyun offered with outstretched hands.

You sighed inwardly, choosing to roll regretfully out of bed. To be quite honest, you wouldn’t have minded taking Baekhyun up on his offer, but in his arms you doubted that you could actually fall back asleep. The pounding of your heart would be way too loud.

You walked sleepily into the bathroom, bumping into Sehun along the way. You simply raised a hand up as an apology before stumbling into the room to fix yourself up.

“Woah, someone’s a little tired,” Sehun teased as he watched you lifelessly brush your teeth with drooped eyes.

“You don’t say?” you mumbled back with less attitude then you wanted. After washing your face, you felt a bit more awake and alert and changed your clothes before stumbling into the hallway where everybody had been waiting. They were all equipped with large bags that you guessed were supplies you all would need and you held out your hand.

Confused, Sehun took it into his own and smiled brightly at you.

“No, Sehun,” you sighed, slipping your fingers out of his grip. “What I meant was where is the bag I’m going to carry.”

They all exchanged looks and you narrowed your eyes, “If one of you dares to say that I don’t need to carry one, I’m going to kill you.”

Baekhyun smiled gently at you before walking into the room and reappearing with a bag. “It has food and clothing in it, so it’s not some useless bag,” he explained as he handed it to you.

You frowned when you noticed that it was relatively smaller… a lot smaller compared to the packs the others were carrying, but you took it without complaints, not really wanting to start an argument you knew you were going to lose so early in the morning.

“Come on, let’s start moving,” D.O said when your pack had been strapped onto your back completely. “The food in these bags will only last us a week and a few days, maybe two weeks if we eat carefully. After that we have to count on getting our own food.”

You nodded understandingly, and before you knew it the 8 of you were stepping out of the tower with only a thin strip of the dawning sun to greet you.

You glanced back at the tower, and mentally waved it and Soar good bye. When turning back around you met eye contact with Tao whom had completed the same mental procedure as you, and exchanged a small smile.

It had finally begun.

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“Haemi, do you want to take a rest?” D.O asked in a quiet voice.

You looked at him with surprise, and teased, “Aren’t we on a tight schedule? Is the almighty D.O getting tired?”

“It’s not for me, you idiot,” D.O sighed. He glanced at you with concern but spoke no more.

It was stupid, really. You could battle with the other boys for ages, so a simple hike should seem like a walk in the park! Boy, were you wrong. After a few hours of walking a consistent uphill slope, you felt yourself steadily slowing down. You knew that D.O’s asking of rest was for you, but you refused to be any more of a burden than you already were. You weren’t going to slow them down on top of already promising to flee in the face of danger.

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