TF Entertainment recruits kids as young as the age of nine. Yifan had been accepted when he was nine years old, and had started at the bottom of the long chain of seniority. He’s worked his way up to a fairly respectable level, but it wasn’t easy.

Training isn’t just improvement in singing and dancing. It’s also strengthening one’s mental and emotional barriers, a kind of preparation for future encounters with anti-fans. It’s vicious, and not even the best will necessarily survive to debut.

The entertainment industries are searching for younger stars, but their standards are still high. There are rumors that the company is intending to debut a new band, this one consisting of much younger teens in an effort to compete against other mainland and Taiwanese bands.

Yifan still remembers the earlier years, the numerous auditions followed by his first step into trainee life. The first few extremely trying weeks, when he would dance despite bruises and cuts, when he would fitfully fall asleep without the presence of his family. He remembers the occasional meetings, when he would smile and assure them that he was fine.

He isn’t sure anymore. His last two birthdays have passed in a blur, and he goes to his lessons in an almost mechanical daze. He doesn’t remember why he’d wanted to become a celebrity in the first place, the motivation that had gotten him through.

But he does know that the water fountain on the third floor always supplies cold water, that Wenxin and Tianyu will offer support if he ever needs it, and that maybe only three or four of them will make the last cut.

Hazing is a common occurrence, one that every trainee has to go through, one of the most difficult tests of will. It can last anywhere from one week to over a year. It’s an unspoken rule, but one that most follow anyway because they’d gone through it themselves. Even the teachers don’t try to interfere; if anything, they encourage such actions, believing that it helps the trainees in the end.

Yifan doesn’t take part in the actual hazing, but he participates as much as anyone else. He ignores the new trainees and turns a blind eye on their troubles. There’s no room for sympathy, no helping hand waiting for you should you ever fall.

But it’s not every day that they receive a new trainee from Korea. News travels quickly, fueled by faintly suppressed outrage. It’s no secret that China’s main competition is Korean when it comes to the entertainment industries, and even bands like Mayday, the ones that had been there since the beginning, can’t compete against the skyrocketing fads from Korea.

The new trainee isn’t just Korean; he’s also fairly small and has very little comprehension of Chinese. This makes him an easy target, practically asking to be torn apart. He won’t last a week, the whispers say.

It’s no different from the other countless, faceless boys who had stepped a foot into this industry and were thrown out unceremoniously. So Yifan doesn’t know why he breaks the unspoken rules.

He’s walking out of the showers when he passes the boy in the hallway. He’s probably headed for the bathroom, where a group of older boys are no doubt waiting for him. Maybe it’s because he looks up as Yifan passes, and Yifan catches a glimpse of wide, innocent eyes, unhardened by the years of torment. It makes Yifan wonder if he had ever looked like that, unaware of the horrors the world could hold.

Without stopping to think twice about his decision, Yifan grabs him by the wrist. “Come with me,” he says, leading him back down the hallway. “You have to be careful here,” he says, speaking quickly. “They’re not going to go easy on anyone. Stick with everyone else. The boys usually go off by themselves. Just be careful…” He’s rambling, voice too soft, and he doubts that the boy understands most of what he’s saying. “Go on,” he says, once they’ve reached the cafeteria doors. “I’m not eating.”

He sits in an empty hallway and puts his earphones in, closing his eyes and waiting for the next session. Once, he would have been too scared to sit by himself; once, he would have constantly looked over his shoulder; once, the silence, even with the loud music pounding against his eardrums, would have been too much. But now, it’s a welcome solitude, a break from the otherwise hectic days.

A light touch on his shoulder startles him, and he looks up to see the boy from before offering something to him.

It’s a protein bar, one of the few things that aren’t on the long list of food they shouldn’t eat. Their diet is measured strictly, a limited amount of sugar and fat. It takes most of the taste out of the cafeteria food that they eat, and even the food in the two vending machines available to trainees in the building are stocked with healthy snacks. Yifan had never liked protein bars, but he depends on them now, finishing one after another at the end of long, exhausting dance practices.

“Thanks.” He starts to unwarp the bar, and the boy makes a move to leave. Yifan reaches out a hand to stop him, his earbuds jerking out of his ears from the sudden movement. “What’re you called?” he asks, speaking around a mouthful. When the boy stares blankly at him, Yifan rephrases his question. “What’s your name?”

“Kim Joonmyun,” he says, the words soft and foreign. He repeats the name, using Chinese pronunciation this time, stumbling a bit over the vowel sounds. “Jin Junmian.”

“Joonmyun?” Yifan looks up at him. If he were standing, he would be about half a head taller than the boy. He looks young, too young to be alone in a foreign country. His features are delicate and sweet. It’s not unusual; trainees are also chosen based on looks. At a time when plastic surgery claims make headlines, TF Entertainment seeks to boast of natural beauty among its child stars.

“Let’s see how long that’ll last,” some have said. But Yifan can’t help thinking, as he looks up at Joonmyun, that he might last, and in more ways than one.

“It’s nice meeting you,” Yifan says, the courteous words sitting heavily on his tongue. How long has it been since he’d last spoken them?

Joonmyun smiles and bows before he leaves.

In a way, Yifan is relieved that Joonmyun doesn’t follow him around, doesn’t show any flickers of recognition when they’re among others. He seems to know that much, understanding the basic hierarchy of the place. But Yifan finds himself watching Joonmyun closely, caring perhaps a little too much.

It doesn’t look like Joonmyun’s suffering any serious injuries. There are no obvious bruises, and he doesn’t wince as he moves. Joonmyun seems to fit in well enough, picking up words and phrases the way only a child can, even if his reading and writing are substandard. He isn’t an outcast, but there aren’t any strong bonds among the boys his age, either.

This is only natural; real friendships don’t develop until late teens, when debut is practically certain. They’re not all made out to be stars; some end up as models, actors, or backup singers and dancers. To date, TF Entertainment has only debuted one girl group, with members in their early twenties, and supports about half a dozen other celebrities. It’s not much, but there are rumors that TFE is going to produce the hit of the decade.

This, of course, is glamorous rumor and speculation that is lost somewhere between busy days filled with dance practices, vocal lessons, and normal school.

Joonmyun waits for Yifan sometimes, standing in the empty hallway until the other comes. Sometimes he has a protein bar, which he gives to Yifan, and other times he only offers a smile. Yifan worries about him waiting alone sometimes, but he can’t deny that he looks forward to the younger male’s presence.

Beyond that, Yifan doesn’t know the particulars. The company has several dorms near the building, and it’s not much of a secret that if you show enough promise, you get to live in one of them. This is especially for the trainees whose families live far away. Yifan’s family is a good four hours away by train, so he was offered a room. Joonmyun was offered one as well, and he must show considerable promise, if only because the company wouldn’t pay that much for a Korean just to stay in China if there weren’t benefits to be reaped.

But it’s dangerous to care too much, so Yifan stops himself from approaching Joonmyun when he sits alone after dance practice. In the end, their greatest competition is each other. It’s dangerous to offer a helping hand when the same person could come back and beat you in the next assessment, so that you end up not making the cutoff.

The cuts are vicious, and few remain by the time they’ve reached their late teen years. Only a handful of the dozens that come in through the auditions make it.

Yifan works with the hope of making it to the end. So he’s careful to balance the amount of attention he shows Joonmyun, even if the younger must be incredibly lonely in a foreign country without a single friend. He hands Joonmyun one of the few bottles of ice cold water sometimes, puts a hand on his shoulder and offers advice in words Joonmyun probably wouldn’t understand. Sometimes he even starts speaking in Cantonese, worried that others might hear and understand. If Joonmyun doesn’t understand, he doesn’t ask, just listens with wide eyes.

Yifan treats him the way an impassive older brother might treat a younger sibling. They’re not friends, can’t afford to be—not yet, anyway—and neither one of them questions it. Joonmyun probably sees Yifan as one of the few offering him support in a new environment, and Yifan—Yifan doesn’t think about it.

It’s not to say that Yifan doesn’t have friends, even if they are few and selectively chosen.

There’s Wenxin, whose family lives nearby, close enough that he can walk to the training building and their local elementary school.

He doesn’t make the next cut, and Yifan’s there to see him off. Yifan shifts awkwardly as they stand facing each other. He searches for words to say and comes up empty because, really, what is there left to say?

Wenxin smiles, and it occurs to Yifan that he’s never seen Wenxin smile so widely before. “You’ll make it, right? You’ll make us proud.”

Yifan nods. He’s not one of the highest ranked trainees, but he’s in a safe range.

“See you,” Wenxin says, but it’s a courtesy, not a promise.

Yifan wonders, later, what it would have been like to have become friends with Wenxin in different circumstances. He wonders if they would have even met, if they would have considered the other worthwhile to get to know him better. If they could have become friends out of choice, not necessity.

They don’t talk about Wenxin after he leaves. It’s another one of the unspoken rules that govern the place. Sometimes, Tianyu looks like he’s about to say something when he stares at the empty seat at their usual cafeteria table. But the weeks pass, too quickly, and someone takes Wenxin’s seat.

“I feel like I should say something,” Yifan confesses to Joonmyun one day, speaking quickly in Cantonese. He uses the language around Joonmyun sometimes when he’s confessing something he doesn’t want anyone else to know. He doubts that Joonmyun understands, but he watches Yifan with sympathetic eyes, and that’s enough.

They have an understanding of sorts, not quite a friendship, but something like a symbiotic relationship—mutualism, as explained in their last science lesson.

“Are you lonely?” Yifan wants to ask Joonmyun sometimes, or even, “Are you tired?” But these are questions that are never asked, and as much as Yifan wants to ask sometimes, when he notices that Joonmyun’s staring at something far away, he never does. “You hungry?” he asks instead, and hopes that Joonmyun can understand the unspoken words as well. 

A/N: I don't actually know anything about trainee life in TF Ent., so excuse any inaccuracies.