Baekhyun

Where is Chanyeol…. I swear he was in his bed just a moment ago… I couldn’t find my buddy.  We’d only been back at ‘basecamp’ since midday yesterday and already I’ve lost him. Who disappears at 4 in the morning?

I crawl out of my bed and pad through the uneven floorboards of the shack we call home. The beds are split into two rooms; I share with Chanyeol and Tao while the others slept in the other room. I see a light from the living room. I peer through the door.

“Chanyeol?”

“No, just us.”

It was Yixing. He was still sitting at the sofa, a mug of hot chocolate between his hands. The pale form of the Tree was curled up beside her. Yixing looked up to me with half-alert eyes, deep dark circles marking above his cheeks.

“Have you seen Chanyeol?”

Yixing shook his head. After a quick thought, he changed his answer to a nod.

“He walked through here half an hour ago. Tried to turn on the stove, and then discovered we had no gas. Then he left. I don’t think he noticed me.”

“You should get some sleep, you look exhausted.”

“No, someone should look after the Tree. It’s dangerous to leave her alone. It’s our task after all.”

“Let me look after her. I’ve gotten some sleep; I’ll call for you if we need any help.”

“No, you should find Chanyeol. He’s one of us and we’ve gone through too much trouble to lose him after a day.”

He was right, but so was I, so before I left the place I shook Suho awake.

“Suho wake up! I’m sorry but Yixing won’t leave the Tree alone so he’s staying awake!”

“Wha— Yixing! Oh, no you don’t! It’s our task to protect her, you go get some sleep I’ll look afte-“

I closed the door behind me, satisfied that Suho’s motherly instinct will get Yixing some sleep. Now, if I was a firebending lanky Korean male, where would I go at 4 in the morning? Of course, I couldn’t answer it, so I just started walking.

It was cold outside, and I was glad I was wearing my puffy jacket. I had a beanie on, and a scarf wrapped up over my nose. I never wear gloves though, just in case I need some light. It was going to snow soon. Not soon as in today, but probably in the next few months. I kept walking down the streets, not really caring where I was going. I knew the neighbourhood as well as Chanyeol, so I didn’t know of any landmarks or nearby shops.

I cursed to myself for losing Chanyeol. Ever since Tao and Kris returned, Tao was attached to ‘his saviour’ 24/7, and had basically chained himself to Kris’s ankle. I think Kris was almost relieved to take his flight up to Japan to look for Xiumin.

Even since Suho and Luhan came back with Chen at midnight Chen seemed to fit in. Granted, I only really got to talk to him to introduce myself and say ‘goodnight before we all fell asleep’, but my first impression was of a confident boy who seemed to have already been in our team.

My train of thought was broken as I looked down the street and saw another man approaching. Chanyeol, I thought to myself, there you are. He carried a plastic shopping bag in his hand, and in the other hand he flicked a lighter on and off. Gradually the distance between us lessened until we were in talking length. I walked along beside him.

“Hey, where did you go? We were a bit worried.

He held up the shopping bag to show me the contents.

“We were out of milk,” His white teeth flashed in the dark.

I peered at the bag. There were a handful of colourful shapes cluttered at the bottom.

“And…. We were out of lighters, by the looks of it.”

Chanyeol looked at the ground.

“Yeah, I lost all of mine at my old place.”

I realised why Chanyeol wanted the lighters.

“You smoke?” I asked, raising an eyebrow

“No, never have, never will. It’s just that I can’t create fire, so I like to carry around a lighter with me.”

“Fair point. But does that really mean we need…. 30 plus lighters?”

Chanyeol stopped walking and I had to backtrack to stand with him.

“Look, can you not tell the others? I’ve… I’m a bit dependant on having a lighter. I just… I don’t function without one. My breathing stops… and I… I just…”

Chanyeol’s voice cracks and he can’t find his words. I know I’m horrible with words of reassurance, my only talent with speaking is giving witty remarks and insults, so instead I lean into Chanyeol’s chest and hug him. His chin just rest on the top of my beanie, and we hug in silence for at least a minute. I can feel Chanyeol’s raised heartbeat and heavier breathing through his chest, and the slight breeze ruffles the plastic bag of lighters.

“Thankyou” Chanyeol whispers, and as I pull away I see that his cheeks have slight wet lines down to his chin.

“Look, we don’t have to tell anyone unless you want to. And it’s perfectly fine; everyone’s allowed to have troubles, including tough fire men like you.”

We keep walking back to the house, and just out of instinct, I reach over and hold his hand as we walk. Obviously I’ve done a good thing because he gently squeezes my hand and entwines his fingers with mine.

We’re almost back at the dorm.

“I’m afraid of the dark.” I blurt out.

I feel Chanyeol looking back at me, but I keep my gaze down.

“Ever since I discovered my power, I had troubles dealing when I couldn’t use it when it was dark. Eventually I realised how much I depended on light for peace, so I slept with a nightlight."

We reach the front doorstep but Chanyeol stops me from opening the door. Instead, he pulls me into his embrace once again and kisses the top of my head.

“Thankyou,” I mutter into his chest. And this time it was my turn to fight back tears.

Chanyeol opens the door and we go back inside.

---------------

The next morning, I found a piano. In our apartment block, there were plenty of empty apartments, some with doors hanging off their hinges. While going on my morning exploring, I discovered the most ancient upright piano that hadn’t felt love in a million years.

She was a dusty Lindeblad, with intricate carvings covered in spider webs. I gave a test middle C, but it came out as more of a ‘middle C flat’. It was horribly out of tune, but when I played an entire song, the melodies shone through the ages of ignorance and disregard.

I was stopped mid song as a silent presence pricked the hairs on the back of my neck. I turned around.

“Don’t stop, you have a beautiful voice.” Chanyeol grinned, leaning against the doorway.

I blushed. I didn’t realise I was singing….

I found it difficult to continue with the piece.

“What song was that?” Chanyeol asked, sliding onto the seat beside me. He places two chipped mugs of coffee on top of the piano.

“I wrote it, well, I wrote half a song. I never finished it, though.”

“You should finish it! It was beautiful. If you weren’t a Protector of the Tree, you could totally be a singer, one of those Korean pop Idols.”

I laughed at the idea, sharing a smile with Chanyeol.

“I call the song Miracles in December. I sing it when I want it to snow.”

“You like the cold?”

“I like the white. Do you like the snow?”

“It’s better than rain, I guess. And I don’t feel the cold, with my power. So yeah, it can be quite beautiful sometimes.”

Chanyeol stood up and walked to the door. I felt colder with him away from me.

“So, I was digging around the junk behind the apartment buildings and I found a cage thingy… I think it looks like a bird cage, but I guess it’s up to interpretation.” He was fiddling with something out of my sight. “And I was thinking about what you said to me last night; about the whole, dark thing. So I made this. “

He pulled out a misshapen bird cage from around the corner and handed it to me. Inside the cage was a little bird, similar to a sparrow, fluttering calmly around the enclosure. The strange thing about the bird was that it was made of fire. It shook it’s head and it glowed brighter.

“You… you made this?”

“It’s a gift, for the dark. It barley takes any of my brain power to keep it going, I could probably leave it for an entire month without giving it a boost and it will stay flying. See, with the other’s powers, such as Suho, he controls the water but if he doesn’t concentrate he loses control of it and it falls to the ground, but with my power, I have to concentrate to contain the fire instead of letting it go crazy because it has a mind of its own and can-“

I press my finger to his lips.

“I love it.”

I lean in and give him a kiss on the lips.

I think I’ve done something wrong. At first, so I open my eyes, but I don’t make eye contact, Chanyeol has his eyes closed too. Instead, he raises a warm hand to the back of my neck and pulls me in closer. Our kiss lasts for a minute, leaning over the flaming bird sitting on the piano stool between us, casting red glowing light on our chins.

We finally break away and I smile back at Chanyeol’s grin. His elf ears are red from blushing. He holds my hand and traces my mark gently with his thumb.

Luhan’s scream from in the apartment block rings down the stairwell and in through the open door.

“We’re being attacked.” We say at the same time. We run up the stairs to the apartment, clutching the bird to my chest, leaving our cups of coffee forgotten on the piano.

We barge in to the main room to see Luhan in a defensive pose, floating a saucepan in front of him. Yixing is holding his blood nose with a glowing hand, trying to stop the bleeding.

“Teleporter,” Luhan panted “he just appeared and punched Yixing in the nose and then he left.”

Suho walks in to the room, tugging a hoodie over his bare chest and wiping sleep from his eyes, accompanied by an equally sleepy looking Tao. Chen opens the bathroom door and zips up his fly.

“What’s going o-“ Chen begins to ask, but then a boulder smashes through the outside wall.

In a blur, Tao pushes me out of the way, pinning me to the floor as the boulder flies over my head.

Suho walks over to the window. “It’s the earth guy. And that must be the teleporting guy. And there’s a third one.”

“Why are they attacking us?” Tao asks…

The window smashes inwards and we are showered with glass. Chanyeol jumps on top of the Tree, protecting her from the shards. Wind whips into the room and lifts all the objects into the air.

Chanyeol retaliates by clicking his lighter and a wave of fire rushes out of the window onto the floor. Suho attempts to do the same with water from the sink, but the two elements mix together and fizzle out to steam.

The dark boy reappears in the room and grabs the tree by the hand. Smoke pours around him, but for some reason, he can’t disappear. Chen hits him with a sharp jolt of electricity.

The boy freezes for a few moments, then disappears. Yixing rushes to the Tree’s side.

The two other boys down in the courtyard have disappeared. We have only seconds of peace before the front door is blown inwards and the two barge inside, rocks flying. The wind boy and the rock boy are ruthless and organised, sending blasts of wind to knock Yixing out against the wall, gravel shooting out like pellets to pepper our skin with tiny blasts.

The attackers don’t even have to do much work. Tao’s attempt to hit the boy with a piece of shattered chair was stopped by Chen’s attack, accidentally crossing paths to zap Tao with electricity.

I shine an intense ray of white light into their eyes, but at the same time I also hit Suho across the room. With the assailants blinded, Luhan knocks them with a flying table, and Chanyeol quickly pins them down and ties their hands behind their backs.

Suho was still blinded, walking into walls.

“Suho, stop walking, you’re going to hurt yourself.”

“Well I wouldn’t be blind if SOMEONE hadn’t shone light into my eyes!”

Luhan nursed a cut from the glass up his elbow. “I think the window cut me.” He said.

“Just get Yixing to heal it” Suho said.

“I would if he wasn’t passed out!”

“Can someone check on the Tree?”

“Where did the teleporter go?” Chanyeol asked, whipping his head around to watch 360 degrees at once.

“I think I drove him away with my electricity.” replied Chen

We had won, but we were terrible. We had gotten in each other’s way, and now Tao lay crispy on the floor and the main area of the apartment is destroyed. We needed to get better, much better.

Suho blinked tightly, shading his eyes and peering around the room.

“I think my sights coming back. Come on; let’s find out why these two attacked us.”