“Let’s try that again,” the voice trainer instructed.

Ara was slowly losing it. She’d been singing this same line for forty-five minutes already and he wanted her to do it again? This was madness. She wanted to refuse… or dump his unconscious body in the Han River…

It wasn’t fair; Onew’s voice was like Heaven, drizzled with brown sugar and melting strawberry ice cream. She had wondered if his voice would stay, even though it was still his body, his vocal cords. However, when she sang, she felt her heart clench and her mind completely stopped processing anything. It was still Onew’s voice, his beautiful, warm, melodic voice.

It was enough to bring her to tears, but they wouldn’t come out, for the strangest reason.

And even though it was perfect, the instructor didn’t approve. Over and over again he instructed Ara to sing, repeating the same line over and over because there was some kind of invisible error that Ara couldn’t hear, couldn’t see. It drove her insane.

It wasn’t fair.

“Alright.” She cleared and waited for the cue to start. Said cue was given and she tried again… Only to have her voice crack. Key snorted.

Onew’s high notes and his puberty. Even at 23, his voice was still fragile and broke. Ara would laugh at his mistakes that he couldn’t help, but she began to wonder at this point if his voice was just tired. He was able to hit the notes at first…

The trainer sighed, “Alright. Take a break. Switch it up!”

Key stood up, as did Ara in order to trade seats. Ara slumped into the seat that Key had just vacated. She grabbed the bottle of water meant for Onew and drank half of it. She could feel its icyness stream down how cold water would feel on a burn. It was refreshing, and Ara sighed in relief.

Key began to sing. Somewhere her brain registered the cue and Key’s first attempt. He was cut off by the trainer who gave some instruction and then the process was repeated.

As Key sang again, she was jolted awake by his voice. She sat upright in her seat as his crisp, smooth voice was ejected from his throat. Her eyes widened and her jaw dropped.

She knew Key;s voice was incredible, but she could hear his improvement from the first try. His voice was chilling.

Ara suddenly felt a lump in . She didn’t know why, but it was there, threatening to choke her. She couldn’t understand it; his voice never moved her like this, if it moved her at all.

And even though it was also seemingly perfect, the instructor also stopped him with improvements.

The lump in Ara’s throat began to recede, but only just. Again, Ara could not understand why.

This continued on and on for just under an hour during which time the trainer seemed to approve of Key’s progress and told them to switch again.

Why was this nessessary again?

They sounded fine last night.

What was the purpose of this… This torment?

Was it just this morning that she'd woken up in what had originally been her dream, but was starting to become a nightmare?

They rotated repeatedly, three more times, with about an hour each for each turn, but it felt like she'd been doing this since... Well, it seemed like it had been alot longer than just a few hours.

"Alright. I think we're done here." The instructor pulled his phone and checked it, muttering something about “trainees.” Key stood, as did Ara.

“Thank you very much.” Key bowed toward the instructor, thanking him. Ara hesitated, yet bowed as well, catching Key’s concerned eye as she went down.

Ara followed Key out the door and down the hall. People passed them from both ways, many of them calling out greetings. Tiffany and Yoona of Girls' Generation came rushing down from the other end of the hall.

OMO, GIRL’S GENERATION!!!  Ara squealed on the inside, and stumbled on the outside, feeling a blush creep across her cheeks. Her biggest rolemodels were approaching her. They were as gorgeous as they were in photos, only more so. Ara felt her heart speed up, even though she was still thinking like a girl, and she certainly didn’t swing that way.

“Onew Sangtae~” they teased happily. They gave the pair a quick wave before disappearing behind a door. Ara waved a second too late, but she knew that a silly expression had to be plastered on her face. Or at least, there should have been one.

Even though all of this happened, she certainly didn’t lose her fangirl part when she swapped bodies with Onew. And through all of this, she was still so happy, and so surprised to see her idols and be so close to them. It was twistedly magical, like a diamond in the rough, like euphoria in a nightmare.

But Key snapped her out of her daze.

“What’s up with you by the way?” Key asked at random, trying to sound innocent. They turned a corner and down another hallway.

Ara hesitatted, before she shrugged, “Nothing. Why?”

“Well… you flipped out on Jjong this morning. According to him, you were about to punch him in the face and then you asked where you were and, to top things off, you acted like you didn’t know who he was,” he replied as though he were ticking things off a list. His voice was laced with some sort of irony mixed with disbelief and concern. Ara had to check his eyes to make sure he wasn’t seeing right into her.

He wasn’t. Key was just the mother who knew things without one telling, but not quite knowing how bad things were.

“Oh yeah… That…” Ara looked down, her eyes studying the flawless wooden floor.

“I had an… Odd dream.”

“Really? …What’d you eat last night?” Key asked.

Crap. Ara gulped, gaping at Key as she ripped her eyes back to his.

And just like a mother, Key was always concerned about food.

“Why do you ask?” Ara attempted to not sound defensive, but as she spoke, she could literally hear the venom as it laced her tone. Key was unfazed by it, fortunately; perhaps he didn’t hear it. Or he chose to ignore it.

“Because you were rather depressing last night,” Key replied matter-of-factly.“When you’re feeling that way, you tend to eat weird stuff and it messes with your head.” They continued on down the hall in silence for a minute, before Key gripped Ara’s shoulders and moved in front of her, staring her down.

“Jinki.” His voice was filled with desperation. Ara’s eyes widened and she felt a blush creep across her cheeks.

This is where OnKey fics come from… Stop it! Ara mentally slapped herself as she thought of such a sultry scenario. But if fans saw this…

“What’s really wrong?” Key asked, snapping her out of her trance. Ara stuttered.

“U-uh?” Then Ara’s face paled.

Oh boy… was he rehashing the conversation from last night?

“You’ve been out of it all week… More so than usual. Is it something we said? Did? We can’t help you if you don’t talk to us.” His tone had changed; he was worried.

“I can’t keep shielding you, hyung. Jjong is about to go postal on you. He’s frustrated and I get it because I’m frustrated too… I just… You know how I am.”

“Everyone’s worried,” he went on. “You’re not yourself and we’re trying to be patient, but it’s been going on for long enough. You either need to snap out of it or talk to someone. Talk to Siwon-hyung. Talk to me! Just-” he cut himself off and sighed. He gave Ara’s shoulders a gentle squeeze, looking away from her.

The air was tense. Ara wanted to say something, anything to ease it. The problem was that she didn’t know what was wrong with Onew. Last night was the first time she’d heard that the group was having problems.

She was right about assuming that this problem had been ongoing, judging by how tense the atmosphere was.

But she couldn’t fix anything, or attempt to fix something, if she didn’t know what was going on. They went up a set of stairs and down yet another hallway. Key put his hand on the door and gave Ara a meaningful look before opening the door and walked in. Ara hesitated before following him. Taemin and Minho were already there, warming up.

Taemin and Minho. The quiet, thoughtful ones. Ara eyed them as she approached them, before feeling an idea bubble up within her.

These two might know something. They didn’t say much this morning, and don’t really say much at all. It was usually Jonghyun or Key that spoke the most, and they certainly couldn’t have had an answer, judging by the dinosaur’s anger and the umma’s desperation.

But Minho’s the thoughtful type.

And the maknae knows all.

Ara eyed them. She certainly wasn't going to be able to leave now, and she wanted more opinions, more input on what in heavens was going on in this poor group.

~*~Author's Note~*~

Aloha~! It feels so great to be back!

I'm telling you guys right now, I had the WORST, and the CRAZIEST week of my life... Finals  and projects up the wazzoo x.x Dat college, yo. I feel dead... But relieved that I can finally write again!

I have two more finals on Monday, then I'm done for the semester!!!!!!! THANK YOU LORD.

Over break I'll be trying to finish up a threeshot, as well as (hopefully) another fic of mine, called "Long Road Home." It's a story starring Key, as well as some EXO members as well ^^

Phew. I missed you guys T_T And I'll be keeping in touch, for sure now!

-ArtisticSeoul