Wooyoung slowly opened his eyes, he felt as if a truck had run over him. What happened? Where was he? His vision slowly returned, revealing the sleeping beauty that was snoring next to him. Wooyoung's heart skipped a beat. What an angel! A peaceful breathtaking angel. A messy drooling angel. Wooyoung moved his shoulder so it wouldn't be caught in the ever growing puddle of saliva that was in the making on the floor beside him. Chansung was completely out of it, it was as if someone had knocked him unconscious.

Wooyoung's fingers itched, he had the urge to run them gently over Chansung's eyelids, following the outline of his neat eyebrows. His face really was a work of art. Not the showy kind of art found in yuppie galleries where the pretentious people would gather and pretend to understand it when it didn't even make sense to the artist himself, but the real kind of art. The purpose of art was to appeal to your senses, make you wonder about your place in the world, and the world's place in the universe, stirring up emotions you didn't even know you had. And stir it did. Although Wooyoung had long known about these particular emotions. How could he not. Every time Chansung put up a silly face, every time he stuck his tongue out at him while rolling his eyes, every time he heartily laughed, making his nose get crinkles, every time he looked at him with those big puppy like eyes, every time he unwittingly smothered Wooyoung in his many, sometimes a bit too harsh embraces, Wooyoung's heart surrendered a small part of itself to him. Bit by bit, he was losing his heart to Chansung.

Chansung mumbled something as he inelegantly turned over to the side, interrupting Wooyoung's train of thought. Chansung's leg flew forcefully through the air like a huge missile. Target: Wooyoung. Sleeping Chansung often mistook him for a foot rest, or a huggable teddy bear, squeezing him a bit too hard. The Beauty and the Beast – that was Chansung, two in one. With the role of the love interest eliminated, since her main purpose was to be beautiful and Chansung definitely had that covered, where did Wooyoung fit in? He decided he was going to be his cute adorable little teacup. Cheerful, mischievous and chatty, he was going to stay by Chansung's side, happily keeping him company, waiting for the opportunity to quench his thirst. As long as Chansung kept giving him his fair share of attention, Wooyoung was confident he could handle it. After all, since Chansung was already the major shareholder of his heart, he was no longer in control, the board of directors listened only to Chansung.

When Wooyoung finally managed to tear his eyes away from that slobbering Greek sculpture that had wrapped its extremities around him, weighing down on him like a ton of marble, he realized he had no recollection of how he'd actually gotten here. He remembered being led into a room full of smoke, making it a bit uncomfortable to breathe, but then everything went blank. What had happened? Had it all been a dream? It must've been. In the light of day, the memories seemed fuzzy and far away. Like it had happened in another life, an alternative universe.

As he searched through the deleted files section of his brain, quietly wishing he had installed a file sorting system so he didn't have to dig through this mess, he felt a familiar tingling on one of his cheeks. Wooyoung's eyes closed automatically as a stampede of butterflies washed over him, a few remaining behind in his stomach, fluttering around. He lived for these little moments. Chansung had the habit of groping Wooyoung's behind in his sleep. He knew full well Chansung was fast asleep, he had done elaborate tests in the past to make sure of that. Chansung was probably just dreaming about some girl that was on his mind, or maybe not even thinking at all, but for a moment, for that brief little moment in time, he could imagine ..

A little while later, Chansung released his hold on him and turned over onto his back again, snoring quietly. Even though he was lying right beside him, Wooyoung missed him. Only when Chansung held him tight was he completely at ease, feeling like he belonged. It was like he was a lone jigsaw puzzle piece that had gotten lost a long time ago, pushed under the sofa where no one could see him. He longed to be found, to be put in his rightful place. He could see the unfinished puzzle on the table, all that was missing was that one piece. Him. Yet nobody seemed to be looking for him. Please let me complete your puzzle, Chansung.

Suddenly his behind started to vibrate. Ah, he still had his phone in his back pocket since he had apparently fallen asleep fully clothed. What really happened last night?

He checked his phone, there was a message.

'Stage 1: Panther'

“Panther?” Wooyoung repeated perplexed. As he checked to see if he recognized the caller ID, a memory came rushing back. It was so vivid it almost gave him a headache. His lungs constricted as if they were back in that smoky room. He could see the slithering silhouette of a small rotund body a little ways off. He wasn't sure if it was only his imagination or just the sound of his growing headache, but he could hear some sort of low chanting in the background.

Out of the chanting rose a mesmerizing voice, it reverberated throughout his skull.

“Control.

Control your brain, control your surroundings.

Breathe.

Start small.

Focus.”

The mysterious voice in his head repeated these incantation-like instructions several times. Somehow, they made sense to Wooyoung. Without knowing why, he stuck his hand deep into his right pocket, letting out a tiny gasp as he touched something smooth. A pouch. He took it out, it was a neat little velvet pouch. How had it found its way into his pocket? As his fingers caressed its smooth surface, he could feel there was something inside. Holding his breath, he opened it and shook the contents out onto his palm. Wooyoung's eyes opened wider. Woa! It was a small sparkling gemstone. It looked expensive. Wooyoung held it up to his eye, watching how the light was refracted through it. Right then, the voice spoke again as if from a faraway land out of a long forgotten dream.

“I'm entrusting you with this yellow emerald,

it will help focus your energy.

Be careful of its power.

Use it only with a pure heart.”

Wooyoung stared at the yellow emerald he was holding between his fingers. The light shone through it cast a yellow hue on Chansung's shoulder. Using the yellow light from the emerald, he wrote an invisible message on Chansung's uncovered chest. The words fleetingly moving over Chansung's pecs, ending in a circle around his . A tiny smirk tickled Wooyoung's lips. He was glad to have spoken his mind, even though Chansung's pecs would forever guard his secret in complete silence.

The voice continued.

“Only an open mind can open another's,

melding together as one.

Visualize.”

The moment the voice had released the last of its words, Wooyoung could feel it had left him, he was on his own. He returned the emerald to its luxurious velvety home, he didn't want to dirty it with the sweat that had started accumulating inside of his palm. He had selected his first mission, but his nerves were all over the place. He took a deep breath, crushing the pouch in his hand, trying to get courage from the emerald. Pure heart, that was not a problem. Open mind.. how did one open one's mind? Okay breathe, visualize. Breathe.

Wooyoung took a couple of deep breaths, backing up, positioning his behind as close to Chansung's hand as humanly possible. Every cell in his body trembled. If this worked.. Wooyoung tried to keep his calm. He had to focus. He took as deep a breath as his lungs would allow him, it almost hurt. He closed his eyes, visualizing his wish. He squeezed his eyes shut, using his mind's eye to will Chansung's hand to move. He pictured it gently his backside, before returning back to the floor. Wooyoung watched his breathing as he pushed his mind to open up, allowing it to meld with Chansung's.

He felt kind of silly in this position, with his bottom sticking out, thinking he could actually control Chansung's mind. But he couldn't afford not to try. If it didn't work, then no one would be the wiser. He would probably feel quite silly, but that was a risk he was willing to take. If it did work however, that was a whole other story. Ah, he was getting sidetracked. Why was it so hard to focus?

“Touch my , touch my , touch my ,...” Wooyoung whispered almost inaudibly, filling his mind with only that thought and nothing else. It had already been over five minutes and nothing had happened, but he wasn't prepared to give up that easily, even though his hand was about to cramp up from squeezing the emerald's pouch too tight for too long.

“Touch my ,

touch my ,

touch my ..”

As Wooyoung was about to give up, he thought he felt something brush up against his left buttock. Had he imagined it? He held his breath, directing all his senses to his seating area, shushing his heart which was beating like crazy, preventing him from feeling or hearing anything but “du-dung, du-dung, DU-DUNG”. He swallowed. There it was again! Chansung's thumb brushed up against him ever so slightly. Wooyoung's stomach retracted into a small knot, it had worked! Okay, Chansung hadn't done exactly what he had been aiming for, but close enough!

Wooyoung rolled over onto his back, staring at the ceiling, speechless.