“Hey slow down!” Suho yelled at the beagle lime as they went rushing forwards, “You’re going to trip and fall and hurt yourselves!”

“Yah! Grandpa Suho is being a bossy boot!” Chen yelled back cheekily, spinning in circles as he continued to run down the hill, “he’s going to have more grey hair than anyone by his next birthday!”

“I do not have grey hair!” Suho yelled back, feeling a hand land on his shoulder and turning to look up at Chanyeol who was grinning at him like an idiot.

“Don’t stress,” the giant said towards him, “we’re supposed to be having some fun today.”

About to pout and complain about the fact that if the others weren’t careful they would get hurt and that wouldn’t be fun at all, the leader of Exo came to a stop at his words as he turned to watch his nine children running about. Chanyeol was right, if he stressed too much about things he wouldn’t enjoy today and that was the whole point. They were supposed to be having fun, distressing and making up for lost time with their departed friends. A sigh escapes him but he nodded, “Fine I’ll lay off the complaining but if anyone gets hurt they’re going to be in so much trouble tomorrow.”

Giving the other a firm push, Chanyeol chuckled, “Let someone else take the strain for a little while, Joonmyeon, it’ll make you feel better.”

Before Suho got a chance to reply he was suddenly picked up off the floor by Kai of all people and with what appeared to be a few quick steps was suddenly tumbling into the stretch of privately hired pool that they were using for today.

Water immediately shot up Suho’s nose and mouth and he came up spluttering only to immediately slip back under as his feet didn’t quite reach the bottom and his hair was in his eyes. Kai was quick to grab him upright and pull him back to the shallower end of the pool, laughing at the series of expletives that were coming from Suho’s lips, “Ha-ha! Joonie can swear.”

“Yah what is this?” Suho complained, just managing to cover his face before he was splashed by an over enthusiastic combination of Sehun and Tao dive bombing into the pool, “Pick on the leader day?”

“No,” Baekhyun said, latching an arm around Suho’s neck, “it’s play with Joonie day!” within seconds Suho was once again back under the water though this time it was a ploy to get him out of his long sleeved t-shirt and to take off for his shoes too. Chen had dived in to help with that and with the pair of them going there was no doubt about the outcome of that one.

Laughing as he sat down on a blanket which had just been spread out, Lay shook his head and smiled, “It’s so nice to see Suho getting some attention isn’t it?”

“Yup,” Kyungsoo replied with a grin as he too chose to sit down and leave the pool for now, “he won’t let on but he needs it more than any of us at times.”

Nodding Lay fell into silent contemplation as he watched the other lollop about in their crazy fashion and had to admit that this was a really fun way to celebrate their missing brother. Everyone had come to the general agreement that they wouldn’t always go to the shrines of their departed friends because schedules really got in the way sometimes and plus they kept missing the dates by miles. Instead EXO decided that the best thing they could do was to do something around the date of passing for their two friends to mark their departure but also give them a chance to relax, have fun and let it all out. For Kris they had gone out for a lavish meal at a restaurant that did every possible kind of chicken imaginable and had taunted the photograph by heaping bits of chicken in front of it and constantly asked “Is this your style gege?” Before falling into fits of giggles.

Everyone had eaten far too much that night and most had very bad stomachs in the morning which became a joke of Kris getting them back for not getting him the right pieces of chicken.

Luhan passing had been a little trickier to think of something until Xiumin mentioned about a little resort that had individual cabins that was near a natural lake which he had said was one of his favourite places. It had taken about a week to find the place and booking had nearly been stubbed completely with an upcoming come back but they had managed to somehow fit it in and were completely off work now for a few days and everyone was taking advantage of it.

Xiumin came up to the pair with a basket of food and set it down, “Looks like they’re having fun.”

“Gege!” Tao called, waving from the bank, “Come and play!”

“Just so you can drown me?” Kyungsoo called back, “No way Tao!”

Chen laughed as he splashed water towards Baekhyun, “Stop being so responsible and grown up. We’re here to have fun!”

“Save me from the maknae!” Suho half shrieked as Sehun was pulled back under the water once again.

Though it was clear that he was in a fit of giggles himself.

Before either one of the two sitting down could protest that they were perfectly fine, Chanyeol had scooped up Lay to shed him of his t-shirt and then throw him over his shoulder to carry him to the lake whereas Xiumin at least gave Kyungsoo the dignity of removing his own clothes as it gave him an opportunity to put down the two photo frames before grabbing the smaller man by his wrist and tugging him straight into the water. The next few hours were filled with nothing but laughter, yells and splashes as the group worked their energy out and played like children because they could do so without anyone paying the least bit of attention to them.

As the sun began to head slowly towards sunset, the boys regretfully pulled themselves out of the water in order to collapse on and around the blanket whilst they dished out a variety of food dishes and enjoyed some well earned warming tea. Kai, Sehun and Tao opted to take a five-minute nap next to the smiling photographs of Luhan and Kris and all three promptly passed out into deep slumbers that they could not be aroused from even with the smell of freshly brewed coffee.

“Aww don’t they look cute,” Baekhyun said, snapping photos on his phone.

“You wake them and you’ll pay for it,” Chanyeol said, shifting onto his back from where he was sunbathing for now.

Chen chuckled, “Don’t worry, Kris and Luhan have them so they won’t be waking up anytime soon.”

“They better else they’re going to be asleep in the photograph,” Xiumin said as he started to adjust the settings on his camera to capture the image. It had become a part of the tradition to take a group photograph with the missing members pictures but at Kris’ meal the glass had reflected the flash really badly so he wanted to minimise the affect.

Lay chuckled, “Let them sleep. Lord knows they haven’t gotten much lately.”

“Don’t tell me they’ve been having nightmares again,” Suho said, pouting a little at the faces the others made, “You are supposed to tell me these things you know.”

“You need sleep too hyung,” Chen said, “You can do this all by yourself you know.”

“Yeah, plus they more just sort of sort themselves out anyway,” Kyungsoo said, reaching across to affectionately pat Kai head which got him a grumble and a half swat to get the offending hand away before he gravitated closer to Sehun who had somehow ended up in the middle of the pair.

“And don’t you bloody start with the whole leader thing either,” Xiumin said, standing up to get the tripod balanced, “We’re here to look after you as well.”

Closing his mouth, Suho sighed and prodded Baekhyun along so that they were closer to the centre of the photograph that was about to be taken, “Oh honestly. What am I to do with you lot?”

“Look pretty and say cheese,” Chen said, grabbing onto Suho’s arm and hugging tightly as a picture was taken without Xiumin because he pressed the wrong button.

Playfully the group moved about to get into a better picture position and accidentally they woke Tao up when they tried to move Kris’ picture which made him pout dramatically before snuggling up to Lay instead and slowly drifting back to sleep. Eventually everything was set up and Suho felt a slight cold touch on the back of his neck but thought that it was probably one of the others that was just messing with him and soon the photographs were snapped onto the camera.

It was decided that it was time to retire to the house and Sehun stirred as he was pulled up onto Taos back since the elder had pretty much woken up, “Did gege make the photo?” he asked still half asleep whilst Kai started to snore very loudly from Chanyeol’s back.

Tao nodded, “Yup both of them will have.”

Sehun smiled happily before almost immediately passing back out and he did not wake up until the next morning.

It came as no surprise that when the photographs were developed, a few days later, there were two additional smiling faces in the picture. Kris held a slumbering Kai on his lap and was making a silly face in one of the pictures but it was possibly due to a wasp that was flying around which had bombarded a couple of the pictures which made them all look quite funny.

Then to the right, gently cradling Sehun as he slept and being hugged by Tao was Luhan smiling brightly and looking healthy like he was supposed to do. Unlike Kris he did not changed position, merely remaining static in his appearance but it really didn’t matter to anyone in the slightest. The images were printed off, framed and placed on the wall of the dormitory so that they could always have a memory and a feeling of all twelve of them being together no matter what happened in the future. 

authors babbling:

And there we go. All finished and the sorrow should hopefully be lifted - unless you're reading Overdose which is also coming to an end and the chapter for that is half done thankfully. I hope that I've not scarred and tortured you too much with this fic and that you've enjoyed it in some ways and if you like please feel free to read some of my other stuff. I promise it's not as despressing as this particular arch...leastways I don't think it is