"You're coming with us," he tells the stranger - Tao. "SM'll take you in."

It takes some convincing, but when Xiumin wants something, he gets it.

--

When Tao crosses the border, from the Wasteland into SM’s territory, there’s a palpable difference. It gets a bit quieter, and there’s actually grass growing – scrubby little things, but odd splashes of green vibrant, obscenely lush against the dry, cracked ground. Even the shoulders of the mercenary in front of him loosen.

“We’re here,” the mercenary besides him says, in their hometown language.

What can Tao say? “Brilliant,” he says. The mercenary actually rolls his eyes.

“Excuse me for being polite,” he says, moving away. Tao feels a quick stab of loss, but that’s normal. He’d never got along with the people from his homeland, the Middle Land, anyway. He wouldn’t have set out into to cross the Wasteland if he did.

Funny how he keeps hearing the soft words over and over again.

“There’s grass,” he says.

The mercenary keeps plodding along, face stiff.

“There’s grass,” Tao says, and then “You’re walking like an offended cat.”

The mercenary’s face twitches at that.

“Your hair stands up like an angry cat that got dipped in dye.”

He actually yowls a bit, pained, at that. “You’re an ,” he grumbles. He does look up at Tao at that, and , he looks so young. If Tao hadn’t seen him take down a spider by himself, coolly placing bullets through each of its eight eyes, he wouldn’t – but then this was the Next Age, and they were all born into the Fight, wasn’t it?

His smile dies at that.

“Hey – I’m Luhan,” the boy says. “Who’re you?”

It really has been too long. “If you want to ask me out, you’ve got to do better than that,” Tao says snarkily, just because he can.

“But, baby, I thought you liked me,” Luhan says without missing a beat. Tao looks at his devoutly serious face and actually cracks up, a bit. Luhan grins boyishly, triumphantly. It’s a good look on him.

“Tao,” he says. And then he extends a hand.

“Bro,” Luhan says, wrinkling his nose, “You have spider guts in your nails”.

Tao likes him already.

--

It started out as a bad day, but Kris is cautiously optimistic. Luhan – who’d been quiet for awhile, ever since when he doesn’t even know – Luhan is talking again in Middle Speech, cracking jokes with a stranger like the Luhan Kris remembers.

Kris glances over his shoulder – Lay’s all the way at the back – but Chen catches his eye, which is rare. Chen actually cracks a small smile, which morphs into a surprised one as Kris stumbles, over one of those dead tree roots that protrude in lumps from the sandy ground.

“Clumsy,” Chen says, gripping his elbow to steady him. It’s familiar – the first nickname the EXO-M members ever gave him.

Kris claps his hand over Chen’s. “Chen,” he says. He can’t help it – it comes out as please don’t let go, boiling up over the past few months of growing tension and shaky unsteadiness, as their team got sent on progressively harder and harder missions.

Kris rips his hand away the next second. “Sorry,” he says brusquely, looking away over the rocks and broken, dry ground. He thinks he can see SM in the distance, stacked sandstone walls silhouetted against the huge blue sky.

Chen’s face, soft, darkens. “Fine,” he snaps. He takes his hand away without ceremony and strides past Kris, taking larger steps than he usually does. Kris watches his boots, realizes how scuffed and banged-up the black leather is, and thoroughly rubbed through with orange sand from the desert. He’ll have to see if he can get better ones – not new, but more sturdy, perhaps.

Luhan hurries past Kris without a word, face serious. He’s probably after Chen. Kris feels like he got kicked in the gut, and maybe he deserves it for putting that look back on Luhan’s face.

“Hey,” the stranger says carefully. “You okay?”

“None of your business,” Kris says. And then, because Kris just doesn’t talk like that, “Sorry.”

The stranger – Tao – arches fine eyebrows. He has a very expressive face, Kris notes, and at this second it’s saying clearly this guy is mad.

“It’s fine,” Tao says. “You couldn’t be rude if you tried.” He glances away, in the direction of Luhan and Chen.

“You speak good Rainese,” Kris offers, because when there’s a silence he fills it.

“Oh, please,” Tao says. “I know I sound Middle, and don’t tell me I don’t because I want to and I think I know how I sound myself, anyway.”

“Right,” Kris says.

Tao casts an unimpressed, slant-eyed look at him. “Bro, you are such a doormat.”

“You know what, whatever,” Kris throws up his hands and starts walking, picking his way carefully across the roots. “You can say whatever you want.”

“I do that already,” Tao says from beside him. He balances easily on the harsh ground, as though he’s strolling. “Just, you’re already such a doormat, you don’t need to walk over yourself as well, that’s what I’m saying.”

Kris almost falls over again. Tao does grab his elbow.

“Thank you,” Kris says, caught off-guard very literally.

“Whatever,” Tao mimics slyly. Kris actually laughs.