There is a girl staring at Junhong.

Icy rain pelts the windows as the scenery flashes past, sometimes the frigid countryside and other times glimpses of cities he doesn’t know the names of. The sky is dark, cloudy. The windows fog with condensation. When he gets really bored, Junhong breathes onto the windowpane and draws stick figures in the fog.

The train lurches along the track at a steady pace, warm and cozy and brightly lit by the fluorescent lights overhead. He’d brought a book with him but he got motion sick pretty easily and couldn’t get more than a page into it. He’s never been that big on reading anyway.

The girl is still staring at him.

She’s the only other passenger in this compartment. She’s probably a few years older than him. He notices that she’s rather filled out in the chest department – always a plus, in his hormonal opinion – but that she has, rather lamentably, an acne-scarred complexion. She’s wearing a too-short skirt despite the temperature outside, pretending to read a magazine or play on her handphone when really she’s just staring at Junhong.

He tries to ignore her. Though he had something of a reputation back in his hometown, he’s not looking for a train hookup. Rather than look at the girl, he shoves his hands deep into the front pocket of his worn hoodie, fingers curling automatically around the envelope shoved in there.

Junhong pulls out the familiar envelope, taking in his name and address printed neatly on the front. He unfolds the letter from inside the envelope. It is worn, having been handled countless times before. But it doesn’t matter how many times he reads it; it always says the same thing.

As acceptance letters come, it’s pretty normal, he supposes. In fact, it probably says the exact things schools are supposed to say when they accept new students.

Only Junhong had never applied to this school, nor had his aunt. Hell, Junhong had never even heard of this school before receiving this letter. What’s more, this school is accepting him despite his atrocious grades, his lack of anything resembling community service or extracurriculars, and his track record with local police. On top of that, they are offering Junhong a complete scholarship, meaning he’s not going to have to pay anything to go there. And this being one of the most prestigious preparatory schools in Asia.

He finds the whole thing fishy, to say the least, but try telling that to Aunt Sumin.

He feels a pang of guilt twisting his insides at the thought of his absent-minded but well-meaning aunt. He knows that she’d accepted a huge burden when she’d taken him in after his parents’ death when he was two. She is an unmarried schoolteacher in a remote fishing village down south, and her salary is hardly enough for one to live on, much less two. And Junhong hasn’t made it easy for her, he knows. He’s on a first-name basis with the majority of the police in town and has spent many a night down in the village’s little jail.

Junhong knows that his inability to stay out of trouble is one of the reasons Aunt Sumin had pushed so hard for this. When they’d first gotten the letter, Junhong had been ready to throw it in the rubbish bin and write it off. It was only at Aunt Sumin’s insistence that he accepted the scholarship.

“Think of it, Junhonggie,” she had said, a pleading note in her tired voice. “Think of the future you can have with an education like this!”

“This isn’t the kind of future I want,” he’d replied stubbornly. “I don’t want to go to this school. This isn’t right, Aunt Sumin.”

But then she’d put her foot down. “You’re going,” she’d said, assuming the teacher voice she usually reserved for when he’d gotten into trouble again. “I won’t discuss this any further.”

Junhong isn’t even sure why he’s so against going to this school. It’s not like he has any loyalty to the village, even though it’s where he’s spent the last fourteen years of his life. His only real friends are a couple of drunks that hang out at the local bar; most of the kids his own age avoid him like he’s got the plague. He has very few fond memories of the village; mostly he just thinks of the rotting smell of fish. And Seoul is a big, exciting new city. He’s sure he’ll fit in better there, at any rate.

But there’s something about this school that unnerves him, though it’s something he can’t quite put his finger on. He sighs and shoves the letter back into the pocket of his hoodie. There’s nothing he can do about it now, he supposes.

The girl is still staring. She’s got her magazine open in her lap – some trashy tabloid tossing out gossip about this or that celebrity – but she’s gazing openly at Junhong. She’s wearing too much eyeliner, Junhong decides. She’s not very pretty. He looks back down at his hands.

He’s grateful that Aunt Sumin couldn’t come with him to Seoul. It’s a long train ride from the south of the country to the north, and she’s got work early the next morning. It’s not that he dislikes his aunt. On the contrary, she’s one of the few adults that he genuinely likes and gets along with. But Aunt Sumin is chatty, and he’s grateful for some time alone with his thoughts. He doesn’t need her constant lectures about good behavior and studying hard and making a good impression on his new teachers. He’s heard those lectures about a billion times already.

Junhong sighs and checks his watch. He’s already been on the train for four and a half hours. Another hour and he should be arriving in Seoul. Though he’s not ready to get to his new school, he’s ready to get away from the train and this girl with the prying eyes. His is starting to go numb.

The train is speeding into the city before the girl finally works up her courage to say something to Junhong. It’s amazing that it’s taken her this long, he thinks dryly. She’d gotten on the train about an hour and a half into his trip and has been staring at him since.

“Excuse me,” she says, her voice sounding loud in the empty car. “Do you have the time?”

He glances at her pointedly. “It’s not on your cell phone?” She’d only been checking the device every five minutes for the past two hours.

The girl blushes unflatteringly. “It’s dead,” she mutters.

Junhong rolls his eyes at the blatant lie but he checks his watch. “It’s a quarter after three,” he mutters.

“Thanks,” the girl says, and she doesn’t say anything else. When the train pulls into the station in downtown Seoul, she gets off before him without another word.

He follows at a more leisurely pace, stretching his long legs and pulling his luggage from the rack. The platform, when he descends from the train, is packed with other travelers, some with luggage and some with screaming babies and some with nothing other than their cell phones. Even though the platform is outdoors, there are walls shielding the terminal from the bitter March wind and rain. Still, Junhong shivers as he drags his suitcases up the stairs in search of a taxi that can take him to the school.

There is a line of taxis outside the terminal, waiting for passengers just like Junhong. He is ushered to the front of the line, where a man with a lined face loads his luggage into the boot of the cab and helps him into the backseat.

“Where to?” the driver asks, adjusting his meter.

Junhong digs the envelope out of his pocket again and checks the address on the school’s logo. “Here,” he mutters, handing the piece of paper to the driver. “This is where I’m going.”

“Peritia Academy, eh?” the driver says, sounding slightly bemused. “That’s a bit of a ways out, son. Long trip. It’s gonna cost you.”

“How much?” Junhong asks, digging a wad of cash out of the pocket of his jeans. Aunt Sumin and some of the friendlier neighbors had banded together and come up with some money for his trip, but it’s not much.

“How much do you have?” the cab driver asks cryptically.

Junhong counts out the money. “Two hundred and ten thousand won,” he answers shortly.

The cabbie puts his taxi into drive. “That’ll do it.” And he pulls away from the curb and into the thick, toxic Seoul traffic.

The radio is playing some poppy song, but it’s low enough that Junhong can’t make out the words. The driver taps his fingers along to the beat as they wait in bumper to bumper traffic. “This your first time in Seoul, kid?” he asks conversationally.

Junhong hums noncommittally. Though he’d been born in Seoul, he’d been down south with his aunt for most of his life. He doesn’t remember anything about this city.

“Where are your parents?” the taxi driver asks next, lighting up a cigar. The sweet-smelling smoke fills the car pleasantly.

“Dead,” Junhong replies flatly.

The driver looks taken aback and then falls silent, assuming – correctly – that Junhong doesn’t exactly want to chit-chat. They finish the rest of the hour and fifteen minute drive in silence.

Eventually, though, the traffic thins out and the car picks up speed on the highways. Then the driver is pulling up to the curb in front of a rather pretentious-looking sign with the name PERITIA ACADEMY emblazoned on it in some sickeningly elegant font.

“Here you go, kid,” the driver announces, throwing the car into park and calculating the cost on his electronic meter. “That’ll be two hundred thousand even.”

Junhong peels out a measly ten thousand won and hands the rest of his cash, rather ruefully, to the driver, who counts it out with lightning fast fingers before determining that it’s all there. Then, smiling to himself, he hops out of the car to help Junhong with his two suitcases.

“Good luck, kid,” he says, setting the suitcases onto the pavement and shutting the boot. He jabs his thumb in the direction of the enormous stone archway beside the school’s sign. “You’re gonna need it. From what I hear, this is one hell of a tough school.”

“I think I’ll manage,” Junhong says dryly, but he doesn’t really believe it. His grades were horrendous back home where the teachers were lackluster and the curriculum was a joke. He’s pretty sure he’s going to be eaten alive in a competitive school like this.

The driver only smiles knowingly and wishes him luck once more before climbing back into his cab.

Junhong shivers as he turns towards the stone archway. The rain has subsided into a chill drizzle, but it’s still freezing and all he has for warmth is his ancient hoodie. He finds himself actually looking forward to getting to the school, if only for the warmth the building will offer.

Sighing, he picks up a suitcase in each hand and walks underneath the stone archway.

And there he promptly stops. “You’ve got to be ing kidding me,” he mutters, dropping his suitcases back down onto the pavement with a wet squelch.

“You must be new,” an amused voice says from behind him. “Most new kids have that sort of reaction to the school.”

Junhong turns around to see a slender boy with close-cropped dark hair carrying two suitcases of his own. “That’s not a school,” Junhong says stubbornly to the bemused boy. “That’s a castle.”

“Can’t it be both?” the boy asks, completely unconcerned about the medieval European castle stretching out about a mile ahead of them down a lane of imported yellow gravel. He smiles again. “You’re new, right?”

Junhong nods, a raindrop dripping down his nose.

“Haven’t you got a heavier coat than that?” the boy asks next, eyeing Junhong’s ratty hoodie with a mixture of concern and disdain. “You’re going to catch a cold in this weather.”

“It’s all I’ve got,” Junhong answers shortly. With Aunt Sumin’s meager paycheck every month, nice things are sort of a foreign concept to him.

The boy nods as if he guessed as much. “We’d better get you inside then before you freeze to death. I’m Kim Jiyeop,” he introduces himself. “I’m a second year.”

“Choi Junhong,” Junhong replies flatly. “First year.”

“I assumed,” the boy called Jiyeop grins. “Well, let’s get going. It’s a bit of a trek to the castle, as you can see. But I can tell you about the school, if you’d like.”

Junhong doesn’t really want to hear about the school, but the ever-helpful Jiyeop launches into an explanation anyway.

“This stone archway here is called the Outer Gate,” he explains. “This gate is locked every evening at nine o’clock and opened again at six the following morning. There are grave consequences for those caught breaking curfew, but of course it doesn’t stop people from sneaking out. This here is the Outer Ward.” He gestures to the courtyard they are currently crossing through, too green and lush for this time of spring, lined with perfectly-pruned hedges. “This is where the stables and outdoor biology classroom are located. You probably won’t need to use either of those, though. Most first years don’t.”

They cross the Outer Ward and go underneath a second stone archway, this one smaller and missing the great iron gate that the first archway had. “This is the Inner Gate,” Jiyeop continues in his helpful explanation. “The moat is purely for show now, but they say that way back when, this castle as actually used during a battle and that people actually died in this same moat. Cool, huh?”

Junhong simply shrugs one shoulder.

Jiyeop, however, continues happily. “This is the Bailey, the inner courtyard,” he explains as they cross into yet another too-green expanse of land. “We have assemblies and stuff here. And there is the school building.” He’s gesturing to the castle, and Junhong still can’t fully wrap his mind around the fact that the school building is a castle. “All the dormitories and classrooms are located in the main part of the castle. That’s where the Great Hall and infirmary are as well. That tall building past the castle is the donjon. That’s where the teachers and staff live, so I would avoid that at all costs. It’s off limits, at any rate. I wouldn’t risk the detention sneaking into it, if I were you.”

“Thanks for the advice,” Junhong mutters flatly, still dragging his suitcases behind him through the yellow gravel.

Thankfully they reach the castle then, and Jiyeop leads the way into a grand entrance hall. The arched ceiling vaults high above them, echoing in the darkness. There are framed photographs of men and women lining the wall, alternating with intricate tapestries that seem so ancient they might be as old as the castle itself. There are electric sconces lighting the walls, giving off a faint glow at regular intervals. Though the castle is still cold and drafty, it’s at least out of the wind and rain.

“You can go into the Great Hall to get your room assignment,” Jiyeop explains, looking up the stairs as if longing to get to his own room and out of his wet clothes. “Good luck, Junhong-ssi.” And then he’s gone, lugging his bags up the stairs. Junhong realizes regretfully that the castle probably doesn’t have elevators. He hopes that he’s on one of the lower floors.

He pushes open the door to the Great Hall. Like the entryway, the ceilings vault into darkness, too high to really fathom. There are great murals painted on the walls, murals of religious scenes and famous scenes from history. The paint is a little faded, but the artwork is exquisite. There are several long tables arranged at the front of the room, where hassled prefects are handing out room assignments to incoming first years. Junhong sighs and gets into line behind a boy that’s nearly as tall as he is.

It takes forever; there’s a lot of bumbling on the part of the prefects and complaining on the part of the students. Eventually, however, it’s Junhong’s turn and he steps up to the table.

“Name?” the prefect on duty sneers at him, squinting through tiny glasses.

Junhong doesn’t like this guy’s attitude, but he supposes starting a fight before classes even really start will not do him any good. So he swallows the trite retort that hovers on the tip of his tongue and simply says, “Choi Junhong.”

“Choi, Choi, Choi,” the prefect repeats, typing the name into the little notebook computer sitting at his side. “Ah, here you are. Room 314.” He digs around in a box for a moment and then hands Junhong an old iron key with the numbers to his room engraved on the handle. The key weighs a ton when the prefect drops it into his hand.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Junhong mutters, looking at the old-fashioned key. “Isn’t there something a bit more updated? Like an electronic key-card or something?”

The perfect’s lip pulls back in a sneer. “Go to the Hilton if you want comfort, little boy,” he says snidely. “This is Peritia Academy, not a resort. Now get moving. You’re holding up the line.”

Junhong pockets the too-heavy key and takes his luggage up the stairs in the entrance hall. He’s only on the third floor – which he decides is terribly lucky – but he’s still huffing and puffing by the time he reaches room 314 despite him being in pretty decent shape.

He fits the heavy key into the old fashioned lock on the door and turns it, pushing open the door so he can get a first look at his new room.

The first thing Junhong notices about his room is that – thankfully – it has been updated. There are no stone floors or walls, and there are heavy brocade drapes covering the window to keep the chill of the March evening out.

The second thing that Junhong notices about his room is that his roommate has already arrived. Or at least he assumes that the pale, sandy-haired, expressionless guy sitting on one of the neatly-made beds is his roommate. Otherwise he’s already got problems with intruders.

“Uh, hi,” he says when it becomes clear that the stranger isn’t going to say anything. “I’m Junhong. I guess I’m going to be your roommate this year.”

At first the boy doesn’t say anything, just looks Junhong over with scrutinizing eyes. “Jesus, you’re tall,” he finally says.

Junhong barks out a short, humorless laugh as he comes into the room, kicking the door shut behind him without bothering to lock it. “Yeah, I’ve been told that before,” he says dryly.

“I’m Sehun,” the boy introduces himself. “I went ahead and took this bed. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Naw, doesn’t matter to me,” Junhong mutters, dropping his suitcases onto the second bed and pulling his nearly-soaked hoodie over his head.

Sehun watches him for a moment, ping his suitcases and rifling around, before he returns to his laptop and whatever he was doing before Junhong arrived. He doesn’t speak, and Junhong finds himself thinking that they could get along quite well if this was how things were going to be.

Junhong has mostly finished putting his things away in the half of the closet that Sehun hasn’t taken when there is a knock on the door.

Both Seuhn and Junhong look up, then at each other. As first years, they don’t know anyone on campus so they’re both pretty sure it’s not for them. In the end, since Sehun only looks at Junhong with that blank stare, Junhong goes to answer the door.

On the other side, he finds a short blonde guy with delicate features and a beaming smile. “Are you Oh Sehun?” he asks hopefully.

Junhong shakes his head.

“That would be me,” Sehun mutters, appearing beside Junhong and eyeing the guy in their doorway, who must be older than them but is shorter than both.

The boy’s eyes crinkle into nothing as he smiles. “Great. I’m Ha Minwoo. I’m your shepherd.”

“His what?” Junhong wants to pretend he’s not interested – not interested in this school or the people or the weird castle-like things they talk about – but he can’t help the words from slipping out.

Minwoo’s smile drops a bit. “His shepherd. I’m his shepherd and he’s my sheep. Didn’t they explain the shepherd program to you when you visited the school?”

“I didn’t visit the school,” Junhong replies dumbly. “Was I supposed to?”

Minwoo shrugs. “I suppose not, though most people do. Anyway, the shepherd program is where a second year gets paired with a first year to sort of show them around and help them get adjusted. I’m the second year who’s been assigned to Sehun.” He turns back to Sehun then, smiling again. “Are you ready to go? I’ll show you around the school and stuff.”

Not really having another choice, Sehun grabs his coat and follows Minwoo out of the room.

It takes Junhong’s shepherd two more hours to appear, knocking on Junhong’s door loudly. He starts before answering it, finding a shorter guy with dark hair and kohl-rimmed eyes standing on the other side.

“Uh, hello?” he says uncertainly.

The boy flicks his slightly too-long hair out of his eyes. “, man, sorry,” he says in a good-natured sort of tone. “I got busy doing stuff and lost track of time. Are you Choi Junhong? I’m your shepherd, I guess. I’m Byun Baekhyun.”

“Hi,” Junhong mutters, a little wary.

“So, I’m supposed to show you around and ,” Baekhyun says. “I guess I can go show you around and ?”

They both turn to look out the window, where night has fallen and rain is once more pelting the windowpanes.

Junhong bites back a smirk. “Nah, that’s okay. Some kid already showed me around anyway.”

Baekhyun’s face splits into a relieved smile. “Awesome. Well, I’m gonna go grab some dinner then. You wanna tag along?”

“No thanks,” Junhong says shortly. “I’m not very hungry.”

“Suit yourself.” Baekhyun pauses before he leaves. “Ah, I almost forgot. We have to meet up at the Sunrise Service tomorrow morning, so give me your cell phone number so I can call you.”

“Sunrise Service?” Junhong repeats, plugging his number into Baekhyun’s expensive handphone. “What’s that?”

“The bane of my existence,” Baekhyun replies dryly. “It’s the start of the school year service, and it takes place at dawn in the Bailey. It’ll be freezing, just so you know.” And then he disappears. 

Choi Junhong (Zelo) [BAP]

Kim Jiyeop (Kevin) [Z:EA]

Oh Sehun [EXO]

Ha Minwoo [Z:EA]

Byun Baekhyun [EXO]

I know, I know. Another story. This one is most definitely NOT hetero though lol

There are going to be A LOT of characters in this story, so I'm giving pictures to help you keep track of everyone a bit better. 

<3