Chapter Forty-Seven: Escapade
A Crack in HistoryOne hand was clutched around the drink bottle, the other tightly gripping Jongwoon's wrist. The next thing he knew, they were hidden in the shade of a shipping container. As a soldier walked by, they suddenly were his shadow. Walking in time with him as to not be seen, Zhou Mi kept the bottle close to his chest, and his gaze on Jongwoon, who was watching out for both Kyuhyun and him. They ran into the shadow of one of the watch towers.
The layout of this port was different to the other, more rectangular than circular, and the entrance and exit was a guarded gate. Beyond that was a road that led into a forest that probably found civilisation. Zhou Mi stumbled as Jongwoon tugged him along into the thin bars of the iron gate. His heart thumped heavily in his chest and he constantly was checking on the water bottle.
"Jongwoon, Kyuhyun, Zhou Mi, keep going!"
Heechul's voice rang through all of their heads, and Jongwoon darted towards it. It sounded so close, yet they all knew it was inside their heads. Jongwoon dashed into the darkness of the forest. Becoming one with the blackness around them, he urged them deeper into the shadows, further from the port.
Commands split from the older's mouth, instructing them what to do, where to turn, when to duck. Minutes passed, and he and Kyuhyun had both had their fair share of trip ups and stumbles. Zhou Mi didn't know how long they'd been running, as time went on, it began to seem like forever (Jongwoon had indicated it had only been approximately half a kilometre, but they had been full out sprinting, so being tired wasn't exactly surprising to him) but his lungs were becoming inable to inhale as much oxygen as his body demanded. His legs felt like they were going to give out on him. Kyuhyun's increasing ragged gasps reached Jongwoon's ears, and Zhou Mi was surprised to see the older sweep him up on to his back and continue running. It was kind of cute. In the strangest way possible.
Jongwoon stopped somewhere in a gap of the trees, searching for the others. His ears pricked and he pulled them left, running again, hitching Kyuhyun up on his back, the Death element's arms wrapped around his neck loosely.
"How much further do we have to go?" Zhou Mi panted out as he ran, the drink bottle in his hand becoming slippery with sweat.
"Heechul's located somewhere near the sea," Jongwoon answered between trained breaths. "Presumably, a beach. Seeming we are close to a coast. But too close to the port would cause suspicion, so I suspect another few kilometres."
"Didn't he say he could only do short range teleportation?!" Zhou Mi gasped as Jongwoon yanked him to the right.
"Doesn't stop him from doing it again, and again," Jongwoon shrugged with a shake of his head. "Heechul's tactical, much like Master Kyuhyun. He knows that we can't be too close."
Zhou Mi couldn't really reply because he was too busy attempting to breathe to get one out. Jongwoon blinked and skidded to a stop.
"Rest." Was all he said before letting Kyuhyun down.
The Death element seemed reluctant to continue, but he looked up at the sky. The canopy of trees seemed to cover most of it, but little pieces of it peered through the leaves. Zhou Mi took this chance of rest to wipe his hand and the bottle of his sweat, and to catch his breath of course. He had no idea how, but Jongwoon seemed unfazed by the massive sprint.
"How are there even trees here?" Kyuhyun breathed out shakily.
"Humans barely rely on natural resources anymore, well, trees. They use sources of electricity and water," Jongwoon explained to his master. "Trees have been allowed to flourish again. You'd think that we'd use them all a few centuries ago, but we didn't, we moved on. I think it's rather innovative. And I like trees, so I think it's a good thing they're still here. I'm sorry Junha, Nari. We have to move on now."
The two nodded (even though Zhou Mi had no idea what junha or nari meant) and then Jongwoon was dragging them through the forests again. Zhou Mi kept constantly looked at the bottle in his hand, even missing one of Jongwoon's commands to jump and landing on his face to keep an eye on it. Jongwoon had also placed Kyuhyun on his back again. He guessed Kyuhyun had asthma or something...?
Time blurred into a long line and it felt like it had been hours when they finally reached sand and met Heechul and his group.
"That was a lot faster than I thought you'd come," Heechul remarked with a hint of shock. "You you must've run the whole way here..."
Zhou Mi let out a strangled yelp as they came to a stop.
"We practically did," Jongwoon translated his babble. "I didn't want them in danger, so I got them out of there as fast as I could."
"Interesting..." Siwon noted slowly.
Jongwoon let his hand go and placed and tended to Kyuhyun. Zhou Mi immediately collapsed on the shore, legs too tired to carry his weight. The drink bottle landed on his chest, bobbing up and down as he inhaled and exhaled. Oxygen escaped his lungs as soon as it got in at first, but as he found more time to breathe, he found he gradually got it back. Once able to move his tired limbs, he grasped the bottle again and crawled to the water. He unscrewed the cap and drained the contents into the sea, watching as it bloomed into a blue luminescent cloud.
The water trickled upwards out of the ocean, and began taking the form of an anthropoid figure. It only became a top half before glowing and become flesh and bone. Zhou Mi looked up at him weakly.
"You didn't lose any of me," Henry's voice reached his ears. He sounded confused. "Why did you put me in the water?"
"... Just... Making... Sure..." Zhou Mi panted softly rolling on to his back again.
Henry blinked at him incredulously, before his legs appeared, tucked beneath him. His clothing wasn't getting wet despite the waves lapping at his back and knees. He smiled at Zhou Mi with something that could only be described as graditude, and Zhou Mi smiled back goofily. Henry drew up a handful of the sea in his hand, yanking it in one direction and watching as all the sediment fell back into the ocean. He hobbled over on his knees to the exhausted Fire element and sat him up, leaning him against his chest, the bubbles of water hovered in over his palm. Henry drew a small portion of it out of the big amount.
"C'mon," he urged softly. "Open your mouth."
Zhou Mi obeyed and weakly parted his lips too tired to protest, closing his eyes in great relief when water sluiced down his throat. Henry kept slowly trickling the liquid through his lips until the bubble in his hand was drained. Zhou Mi was still panting though, he concluded he hadn't gotten him enough, and scooped up a bigger amount of water and cleaned it before pulling Zhou Mi from the edge of the ocean and towards the group, still allowing the older to lean on him while he fed the water into his mouth.
"... There's a graze on your face..."
"Hm?" Zhou Mi gargled through a mouthful of liquid. "Oh... That, it's nothing."
"It covers your whole cheek."
"Eh..."
"It wasn't there before..."
"I fell over," Zhou Mi exhaled with a sheepish grin. "Stupid really, don't worry about it."
Henry let some of the fresh water from his hand trail up and clean the dirty wound on the older's face, shaking his head with an exasperated sigh. Seeing Kyuhyun had drained the bottle Jongwoon had given him he used one hand to hold the bubble of liquid to Zhou Mi's mouth, to let him bite bits of it off to drink. He drew more water from the ocean, enough to full a drink bottle, and cleaned it. He called out to the older, gesturing to the empty bottle.
"Jongwoon!" He yelled, catching his attention. "Here!"
The Darkness element unscrewed the cap of the bottle and held it out. Henry directed the stream of water into it, and Jongwoon called back a 'thank you' before giving it back to Kyuhyun.
Zhou Mi had finished the water in his hand by the time he'd finished that, and was resting his head in his lap now.
"Do you want more?" He asked curiously.
"A bit... If it's not... Any trouble..." Zhou Mi's breathing had calmed, but he still sounded tired.
"I think not," Henry chuckled softly. "Thanks, by the way... You practically carried me here."
"You were in a drink bottle, and you weren't that heavy," Zhou Mi pointed out with a shallow laugh. "I hardly think that needs thanking for."
"You're exhausted," Henry countered as he cleaned more water. "Here, open up."
The Fire element's lips opened once more and Henry dripped the aqua into his mouth, taking care not to choke him. He looked up as Sungmin, Leeteuk and Han Geng arrived, all tired, but there and safe. The only ones left now were Ryeowook and Eunhyuk.
"Where are the others?" Leeteuk brow knitted with concern.
"Haven't arrived." Jongwoon clucked his tongue.
"What?!"
"Calm down, I'm sure they're fine," Heechul sighed exasperatedly. "I'll try contact them."
Heechul walked around as he telepathically called out the the missing two as Han Geng and Sungmin recovered (Leeteuk was too worried to at the moment), the latter coming to sit beside him.
"Mind if I have some?" Sungmin breathed uneasily holding out his flask. "Mine's empty."
Henry nodded, and went through the process of cleaning and pouring water into the flask. Sungmin thanked him before he went back to carefully quenching Zhou Mi's thirst. He whined when he ran out and Henry rolled his eyes to collect another bubble of water for him to lap up.
"Jeez, it was hard finding you guys," Sungmin ran a hand though his hair after having a couple of deep gulps. "How long have you guys been waiting here?"
"Seven, ten minutes," Henry shrugged as he began to continue dribbling water into Zhou Mi's mouth. "Not too long, well, not enough to be concerning to anyone here..."
"That's good," Sungmin hummed lazily, chewing on the stopper of his bottle. "What's up with him?"
"Jongwoon forced him to run from port to here with only one stop," Henry sighed as the Fire element drank greedily from his supply. "I feel sorry for him, they were practically sprinting... I'm glad I didn't have to do it."
"Yeah, you're lucky," Zhou Mi said through a mouth of water. "My legs are so sore, and the amount of times I fell over was ridiculous."
"Sorry..."
"You guys seem close," Sungmin commented, watching the interaction between the two. "You've become really close over the last week or so..."
"Yeah, well, we can't stay mad at each other forever can we?" Henry closed his eyes as he poured liquid down Zhou Mi's throat.
"Are you... Y'know..." Sungmin frowned uneasily. "... A thing...?"
Zhou Mi spat the out the aqua he had been swallowing into Henry's face. He contemplated on apologising, but that may or may not have came across as suspicious. Henry shook his head and drew the water off his face and back into Zhou Mi's agape mouth.
"What?! No!" Zhou Mi protested harshly, it came out as a high-pitched gurgle. "Whatever made you think that?"
"Um... The way you've been acting?"
"We're just friends," Henry sighed pouring the rest of the water into Zhou Mi's mouth. "Nothing else."
"Whatever you say..." Sungmin mused while standing and walking away.
Zhou Mi sighed, gulped up the water in his mouth before abruptly sitting up and looking at Henry with scared eyes.
"I'm so sorry..." he stuttered out shakily.
"It's fine," Henry smiled understandingly. "You were just shocked, I was too."
"You didn't look it." Zhou Mi frowned confusedly.
"Yeah, I don't express emotion well," Henry laughed softly. "Except anger... And being calm. Anyway, it's fine, I don't mind a bit of water in my face, even if it's been in someone's mouth, I can just wash it off."
"I'm still really sorry..." Zhou Mi mumbled. "I didn't meant to make it sound so harsh either, I'm surprised you're not offended."
"Well, we're not a couple so, why would I be?" Henry said lazily. "It's no big deal honestly, you sound like I'm really mad..."
"That's because I think you are."
"I'm seriously not."
"Are you sure?"
"Of course."
"Guys? Guys?!"
Zhou Mi and Henry both looked around curiously.
"That sounded like Eunhyuk." Zhou Mi stated blankly.
"That's because it was," the Electricity element's voice rang through their heads again. "Heechul set up a temporary telepathic thing-wait, not the point. Look, do you have something electronic...? Or metal? I would use Donghae but he might not like it. And I don't want to talk to him right now."
"I can hear you Monkey Brain."
"... Goddammit..."
"... Doesn't Leeteuk have a laptop...?" Kyuhyun spoke aloud. Zhou Mi guessed they could all hear him.
"How do you know?" Leeteuk looked at him with an astonished expression.
"I saw it, not intentionally, but when we were looking for food," Kyuhyun shrugged nonchalantly. "I didn't mean to intrude."
"It's okay..." Leeteuk shook his head. "Yeah, I have a laptop, I'll get it out..."
The Life element drew out the bulky, black device, opened the lid and turned it on. It only opened on to the locked screen, but that was enough for Eunhyuk.
"Okay, we're coming through now," Eunhyuk called out. "Stand back..."
The computer sparked, and then a stream of yellow and orange flashed from one of the plug sockets. Eunhyuk appeared first, landing face-first on the sand with Ryeowook seated on top of him.
"Smooth." Han Geng commented.
"Shut up."
---
I really apologise for not getting any new chapters up. Apart from being busy in the real word with exams, having no computer for three weeks, being sick, and now starting back into the new school year, I have been stuck on what to do plot wise with this story. Time filling really, because I know what's going to happen in the end, but there has to be stuff before it. Annoying if I have to be honest.
Character analysis is Leeteuk, because everyone wanted him as well as Zhou Mi. So here we are. Leeteuk is pretty calm with everyone. Like, even if he's the leader, he is probably one of the most relaxed people there. Actually, he probably is the most relaxed person there, even more so than Han Geng. I think this is because he is the Life element, and where Life is, hope should be there too. He's an eternal optimist for this reason, and that optimism is able to bring out the hope and life in the other elements. Probably why he's a good leader.
Quick reminder if you didn’t memorise what was written in the previous chapter (Don’t worry, I haven’t either, just using the copy and paste technique and adding a few alternations, haha): Each sentence has a person’s name next to it. The person whose name is there, is the person that Leeteuk is ‘talking’ about (He’s talking in a way that it sounds like he’s immediately talking to them, but he actually would never say these word to them). RED means a hostile relationship, BLUE means a positive one, and GREEN means an unsure or unsteady one. Underlined means Cognate (Friend, similar element) and bold & italicised means opposite (completely contrasting, opposite powers, e.g. Water and Fire). Any name that's got both colours in it means the relationship between those two people is kind of teetering between the two statuses. Parentheses (Brackets) with any text in them are what a person thinks about them, but doesn't directly express (e.g. Sungmin -> Kyuhyun: "One step closer, and I'll gut you like a fish, sew you back together, and do it again. (You killed my brother you... You... You demon... Why?!)" <- This bracketed part is what Sungmin doesn't clearly express towards Kyuhyun. If there are a set of parentheses (brackets) that have "..." like this -> (...) or have incoherent words (... You... why... I can... No...) <- like that, then the person has hidden or obscure thoughts about the other person (basically, if I didn't make them dots or random words, I'd be giving huge spoilers)
Here we go then,
Leeteek:
-> Han Geng: "Just like back in the old days huh? Taking on the world and everything I have to throw at me! Ah, I missed this! What are we waiting for? Let's go!" (I'm so scared... I love you so, so much and I... I don't think I could lose you... Not again...)
-> Eunhyuk: "Oh, my dear Eunhyuk, you must stop worrying so much! And don't yell at Donghae, it doesn't do any good for anyone... Your recklessness and spontaneity... I worry about you, you know..." (Poor, poor Eunhyuk... I... I...)
-> Ryeowook: "What's wrong with Jongwoon??? He's nice once you get to know him! And all you ever do is put him down... I'm not sure he likes it all that much... But then again... He doesn't seem particularly minded by anything..."
-> Donghae: "I apologise for Eunhyuk's behaviour, really. He just doesn't know how to socialise with others... Maybe because your his opposite, the feeling of knowing that someone will work with him, as opposites do, scares him..."
-> Zhou Mi: "Your disbelief will drag you down. To be able to succeed, you need to believe in us. But I suppose in order to do that... You need to begin to believe in yourself. The past is the past, no amount of sulking is going to change that." (You told me you are angry at the scientist who left you in that test tube... But you must realise that it was the only thing which managed to unite us... So humanity actually has a shot at life. Surely that makes you happy???).
-> Henry: "You seem very mature for you age, Henry... And I like the way you appear to be handling things with Zhou Mi... I admire you for being able to sort that out by yourself... If only Eunhyuk would learn..." (So young... He's only sixteen... That's no age to get this upon them... Well, actually, no one should ever have this burden- wait, getting distracted as per usual, haha!)
-> Jongwoon: "Ah, hello Darkness, my friend... Is that a quote from a book? Or movie...? Sounds like it. Anyway, you seem so serious! You should relax a bit, have fun on the job, right? Even Kyuhyun agrees."
-> Kyuhyun: "I'm glad you approached me in the hospital. It seems now I have a better understanding of you, and myself, for that matter. Thank you."
-> Siwon: "Ah... Ha... Ha... Ha... Do you want something to eat???" (He doesn't like to talk all that much... Does he...???)
-> Heechul: "You must try talk to someone! You can't be walking down the back and be happy! You're so lonely... It makes me sad..."
-> Sungmin: "Hello, hello! Yes, yes... Mmm... I like you! You have a good personality! Determined young soul (although I'm not that much older, haha), ready to do anything... However, your attitude towards Kyuhyun could be a little lot better... Do you hold something against him???"
Leeteuk is the only character with no hostilities. And I do believe it is because he is just such an approachable person. I actually feel as if even if he wasn't the Life element that he'd be an approachable person, and he's willing to help whoever needs it. That's his best quality in this fic, in my personal opinion.
Are there any artists here on AFF? I'm just curious, because I have seen some pretty cool fanarts on Tumblr and stuff ^_^
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