(FIVE DAYS LATER)

Mir squirmed about in his bed for what felt like the thirtieth time in two minutes, but he just couldn't seem to find a comfortable position to sleep in no matter how hard he tried. If he laid on his side, his neck and hips hurt, if he laid on his back, his spine and head hurt, and he couldn't even consider moving to lay on his stomach, because that would just crush the baby beneath his weight. So what else could he do? Stay awake? No, he was too tired for that, and it wasn't good for him or the baby anyways. What if he asked Joon for some spare pillows to balance out the curve of his body on the mattress? But that would require the task of waking Joon up—since he liked to hog all of their extra pillows whenever they went to bed—and that wasn't something Mir was really willing to do at one in the morning, because he knew he'd just get yelled at, pregnant or not.

He let out an irritated sigh, and readjusted himself once more so that he was instead sitting up against the wall alongside his bed, but that didn't help much either. Nothing really did anymore to be honest, and Mir was starting to get sick and tired of being subjected to all of that pain and discomfort from the minute he woke up to the minute he went to bed (if he even did at all). But he knew he had to do it, for the baby, and he knew that there were only a few months left to take it before he would be done... But it was still quite aggravating, to say the least, and sometimes he wished he could just storm into the hospital and demand them to inject all kinds of painkillers into his bloodstream to help numb up his tender nerves.

Thunder however, was the exact opposite in his opinion (but of course he was), and he'd told Mir several times over that he needed to just let his body handle things naturally like it was meant to. And at first, Mir had (reluctantly) agreed to do so... that was, until the next morning came around, when he awoke to a raging headache, and a pain in his back so horrific that he had to be carried around the whole day, even on the set of the show he was scheduled for. But that hadn't deterred Thunder in the slightest (it would have if he'd been the one knocked-up, Mir had grumbled), and so he just kept urging the maknae to take his route instead, since it was safer for the baby in the end.

"Hm, but it hurts," he moaned out into the darkness, before he moved his hands down to his sides and massaged at them gently. "I can't even sleep anymore because of it, Doongie-hyung."

Blankets rustled in response, and he knew that he'd woken Joon up when a groan of annoyance followed soon after. "Cheolyongie," he whispered, sounding far too tired to have even been stirred in the first place, "what are you doing up so late? You need to rest for the baby."

Mir just rolled his eyes; Joon could be so oblivious sometimes... But then again, he hadn't even been back for a week yet, so he probably didn't know all that much about the pregnancy like the others did. "I-I know," Mir replied. "But I just... I can't sleep."

More sounds of movement could be heard emanating from Joon's bed, and before Mir knew it, another body was curled up beside his own against the wall, and the two of them were snuggled deep into his comforter to keep warm. "Talk to me," Joon then said, to which Mir just smiled; he was glad the two of them were back together again.

"Being pregnant ," he stated plainly. "Everything always hurts, and I can't do anything anymore. All I do is sit around here and twiddle my thumbs, or I go on TV only to end up being overrun by other idols who want to get a feel of the baby, or to ask me a thousand questions I don't really want to answer. And then there's also the fans... I mean, I know I still have a lot of them, and I know that most of them will support me and MBLAQ no matter what, but Bear-hyung and Rain-hyung were telling us just the other day that our ratings have dropped off a lot ever since we went on Weekly Idol, and sometimes I just feel like I'm bringing all of us down by being here when I should just be back on the farm, and caring for the baby instead of my career."

"Babo," Joon murmured against his shoulder, forcing Mir to briefly wonder if he had maybe fallen back to sleep, and was merely carrying on this conversation in his dreams. "Pregnancy is going to for everyone involved, not just you. Think of how Doongie feels whenever he sees you in pain or sleeping all day long. He gets worried sick, and he goes around pacing the room and acting all weird until the hyungs have to literally restrain him on the couch. And you know, if you don't want to talk to other people—idols and interviewers included—just tell them to go away. You're pregnant, you're allowed to do that. As for the fans..." he sighed. "There's always going to be those who disagree, and who want nothing more than to see us all suffer, but you have to be strong for the ones who care, Cheolyongie, because their influence on you will always be so much stronger than the negative ones. People who don't understand that we're humans too, and that we sometimes screw up and make mistakes, are the same people who would rather see you married to some girl you have no feelings for, than to end up with one of our groupmates just because you're both males. They're also the kind of people who are going to look down on your daughter, and say cruel things about her just because you're her parents, but you have to stand up to them and show her that you're not going to let them hurt her, and that there's absolutely nothing wrong with her existence."

Mir turned his head down to stare at his tummy, and Joon did so too not even a moment later, before he reached out and slowly rubbed his hand over the bump; Mir tensed up at the contact, but he let it continue on nonetheless, just because he knew Joon was already more in love with the baby than even he was; and he wasn't about to keep his sweet hyung from being close to her, not even when she was still just an unborn bulge on his torso. "And Cheolyongie..." Joon added, to which Mir just nodded slowly. "You're not bringing anyone down but yourself when you talk like that. Do you really think any of us would blame you for not being able to keep up? You're carrying a child inside of you, which is a feat in of itself, and yet you're up and about just as much as you've always been. You're the one keeping the fans interested, and happy, and not a single true A+ will hate you for being this way. How could you ever think to say that you're bringing us down when you're the one who's keeping us going?"

He sat up and turned to face the maknae, whose cheeks were covered over in hot tears at that point, and hugged him tightly. "We love you, maknae, and we don't want to lose you. So just... stay here, and trust us when we say that you're not hurting anyone when you're just being yourself."

"Hyung, you're making it seem like we're in some stupid romance movie," Mir choked out in between his sobs of utter happiness, and Joon couldn't help but to laugh along too. "But I like it... Thank you so much for this..."

"You're welcome, Cheolyongie," Joon replied. "Now, lay back and rest while I go get some heat pads and hot water bottles for you."

"Okay," Mir scooted to lay back down against his pillows, and Joon made absolutely sure to tuck him in nicely before he left to go get what he needed.

When he returned back a few minutes later, he pulled Mir up and laid the water bottles behind his swollen back, before he ripped the heat pads from their wrappers, and stuck them to Mir's sides and thighs to help relieve some of the ache. "There," he whispered when he was done, and Mir sat back with a sigh at how well the things were actually working for once, "how's that?"

"Much better. Thank you, hyung," Mir replied with a smile. "And... I'm sorry about waking you up."

"Don't be," Joon insisted as he took another seat at Mir's side, and gently ran a hand over his forehead. "This is what a real man is supposed to do when he's around a pregnant person. Otherwise I would just be a jerk, right?"

Mir giggled. "That, or tired... That's why I didn't want to wake you up when I thought about asking you for some of the extra pillows before. I thought you would be mad at me since you haven't been getting all that much sleep lately."

"Yeah, but Cheolyongie, you're pregnant... I already told you you're allowed to do those kinds of things, and no matter how tired we are, the other hyungs and I are obligated to help. We're not going to make you do this on your own and suffer."

"Yeah, I guess..." Mir conceded, before he settled back further into the water bottles and let their heat work deeper into his overworked muscles. "Thank you..."

"Hm, you're welcome," Joon nodded. "Actually, Cheolyongie..." he started again a beat later, and Mir looked back up to him curiously to see if his face could give away what his next statement was going to be. "The hyungs and I were talking the other day, when I got back here again, and we thought we'd ask you... well, about Doongie."

"Huh? What about Doongie-hyung?" Mir asked, looking more than confused about what he'd just heard. "Did he do something wrong?"

Joon squinted his eyes as if he wanted to answer yes, but he instead decided to shake his head in the opposite; when he thought about it properly, he knew that Thunder really hadn't done anything wrong. It was just that... he got out of hand sometimes. "Uh... no, not at all," he assured Mir, and he even waved his hand about for emphasis. "But we noticed that he's just a bit... overprotective of you and the baby, and that he gets incredibly upset whenever one of us even dares to go near you. But that's not how we want things to work. We're all in this situation together, and we're her oppas, so we were just wondering if you could, you know, talk to him about this, and get him to back off a little..."

Mir bit at his bottom lip to keep from just bursting out into laughter at Joon's request, but he held it in and nodded instead. He knew Thunder could go overboard at times when he thought one of the others was moving just a bit too close to Mir or his stomach, and more often than not he would just yank Mir from the room to go hog him all to himself in the safety of one of their bedrooms, but at the same time, he needed to be a bit more open about the hyungs and their affections for the baby (since she got it more so than Mir ever would). Whenever Seungho sat down beside him and shifted to press his hand against the spots where she was kicking, Thunder would jump right in between them and cut off their communication; whenever G.O. volunteered to help Mir bathe at night because he couldn't even reach his knees anymore without help, Thunder stared him down in a glare unbefitting of his pretty face, and instead picked Mir up to carry him off and do it himself. Granted, sometimes the hyungs would shoo him away and tell him to go to Thunder anyways, since it was his job as the appa, and since they already knew they were going to be stopped, but it was still kind of rude to just keep them at arm's length all the time, especially when they were just as involved in this whole mess at their maknaes were.

And Joon, well, Mir could already tell that there was going to be some tension from him and Thunder if someone didn't say something soon. They used to be so close, but ever since Joon had arrived back home, all Thunder did was lead Mir far out of the way of him, until they hardly spoke more than a sentence to each other a day. And all three of them knew it was because Joon wanted to catch up, and get just as used to being around a pregnant Mir as the rest of them were. He wanted to know what everything felt like, what foods Mir could eat, what things he liked to do the most, what colors and name ideas he had—everything; if it had to do with the baby, he was all in. And Thunder was scared of that fact, because he didn't want to lose Mir to someone who knew more than he did, and could act as a much better appa than he was. But that was just the thing: he was a perfect appa, and boyfriend, and just a friend in general. How could Mir possibly think to give that up? And their daughter, Mir knew she was going to love him so much; she already kicked out for his attention whenever he touched Mir in any way, almost as if she knew he was there looking for her, and Mir was sure she would be the same way even after she was born. Nope, there was absolutely no doubt in his mind that she was going to be a daddy's girl when she grew up... He just hoped Thunder would have more confidence in himself though, once he realized that that fact was nothing but true.

"Yah, maknae, are you there?" Joon waved a hand in front to his face to draw him back into the real world, and out of his thoughts. "Aish, don't go to sleep on me now when you haven't even answered me yet."

"Sorry, hyung, I was just thinking," Mir said, before he reached out and took the dancer's flailing hand into his own. "And yes, I will talk to Doongie-hyung for you. I agree that he's a bit too... close to me sometimes, and that it's going to be hard on the rest of you if he stays that way. But I can't guarantee that he's going to change. He's really happy about the baby, and he doesn't want to mess it up and ruin his chances of being here for her."

"Well... as long as he knows he's being a pain," Joon sighed. "And thank you, maknae. Now, go to sleep, and if you need anything else, just call for me, okay?"

"Nae, hyung," Mir nodded in return. "Good night."

"Mm, goodnight, Cheolyongie," Joon yawned as he collapsed back onto his bed, and fell asleep again in less than a minute.

Mir giggled at the sound of it, since his eyes weren't really adjusted to the darkness yet, and he too curled up under his blankets, his back still supported on the hot water bottles, before he let unconsciousness take over his mind for the first proper time in weeks... And it was all thanks to Joon.