A/N: Here’s the next chapter! And it’s kind of an important one.

Okay, here goes. I really, really hope that I don’t mess up this chapter. *takes in a deep breath* I hope you guys like it?

Book 4: Blast from the Past

Chapter 2: Fate

It has been about a month since the “father questions” incident (or, as Kyuhyun would like to refer to the event, “the-time-my-precious-little-dumpling-nearly-gave-me-a-heart-attack-and-killed-me”). Since then, Kyuhyun had been quite busy. And no, the stubborn and dense evil maknae wasn’t busy trying to figure out how to explain everything to Minhyun.

Instead, Kyuhyun, showing a great deal of pigheadedness, was busy trying to keep his son busy.

The evil maknae figured that keeping Minhyun distracted would keep the “father questions” away.

So, for the month following the “father questions” incident, Kyuhyun found all sorts of activities for Minhyun to engage in. He encouraged his son to join a small production number at his pre-school. He took Minhyun to trips to the farm parts of their small town to see Kyuhyun’s “improvements” on the feeding machines for the farm animals. He tried to bake pastries for Minhyun (which of course resulted with their apartment nearly burning down again, if it weren’t for Xiari and great skills at using a fire extinguisher). Kyuhyun also brought their “training sessions for evilness” to the next level (Kyuhyun was now teaching Minhyun about different weaponry and battle strategies and how to give varied kinds of evil and scary looks for varied situations). He also took Minhyun to an amusement park, to a museum in a nearby city, and to a zoo.

Kyuhyun was nothing if not determined.

Determined to avoid any more questions about his ex from his son.

For all his efforts, though, Kyuhyun would soon see that he would tragically fail (and failure itself was also already something that the evil maknae genius had difficulty accepting in the first place; evil geniuses like himself don’t fail!).

It seems that Kyuhyun was fond of being enemies with abstract concepts. Ever since Minhyun was born, Kyuhyun had wanted Time to be personified so that he could actually kill it. Kyuhyun had always been of the opinion that Time was playing tricks on him with how time was flying by and his little dumpling was growing up too fast. Now, Kyuhyun had issues with Fate.

As the evil maknae would see, some things will happen no matter how much he tries to avoid them and fight against them. Some things are meant to be. Some things are fated.

No matter how hard Kyuhyun tries to fight Fate.

One month after the “father questions” incident found Kyuhyun pressing the buzzer/doorbell to Hankyung’s apartment, with his son bouncing up and down excitedly at his side.

Over the years, Kyuhyun had taken Minhyun to visit Hankyung sometimes in Beijing. Minhyun was also excited about these trips, and he was fascinated by all the things that he sees in “the big city.” This time, Kyuhyun and Minhyun were in Beijing because Kyuhyun had a conference with the mayor and some of the other town officials (they were hoping to secure more investments and funds for Kyuhyun’s “improvements” to the town). Kyuhyun and Minhyun were to be in the city for a week; the actual conference was to be held for three days in a building not too far from Hankyung’s apartment, so Minhyun will spend those three days with his Uncle Hannie, and after the conference was over, Kyuhyun will spend the rest of the week bonding with his son and his hyung (well, bonding with his son and terrorizing his hyung might be more accurate, really).

Kyuhyun also hoped that this trip to Beijing would help with distracting his son.

Just then, Hankyung opened his front door, a worried expression on his face.

“There you are!” Hankyung cried out when he saw the mother and son duo outside his apartment, relief starting to take over his face. “You’re late! I was getting worried!” The Chinese man had been expecting his dongsaeng and his nephew an hour ago! But they were late, and Hankyung had practically spent the last hour worrying about what had happened to Kyuhyun and Minhyun.

“You’re such a worrywart, hyung,” Kyuhyun rolled his eyes as he ushered Minhyun into Hankyung’s apartment.

“You wouldn’t even answer my texts!” Hankyung accused, his eyes narrowing. He would have felt better if Kyuhyun had only answered his text messages that inquiring where Kyuhyun and Minhyun were.

“Ehh, you know that it’s not good to text and drive,” Kyuhyun said dismissively to Hankyung.

That made Hankyung pause. Well, Kyuhyun was right with that. He supposed that it was better that Kyuhyun didn’t risk texting him when he was driving. Especially when Minhyun was in the car with him.

However, Hankyung was just starting to nod at Kyuhyun’s words when Minhyun suddenly said happily, “We saw a diner by the highway, Uncle Hannie! I asked umma to stop by. I was hungry, and I saw a picture of milkshakes there! The place has delicious milkshakes, Uncle Hannie!” Minhyun his lips, no doubt thinking about the milkshake that he had consumed at the diner.

Hankyung now glared at Kyuhyun. “You couldn’t have answered my texts while you were at the diner and not driving?”

“Guess I just forgot then,” Kyuhyun said cheekily. Hankyung looked quite annoyed, so Kyuhyun said quickly, “Okay, it’s time for umma to go, Minhyunnie! I’ll be late for the conference.”

Kyuhyun bent down and kissed the top of Minhyun’s head.

As the evil maknae was going out of Hankyung’s apartment, he said to Minhyun. “Behave for your Uncle Hannie, okay, Minhyun?”

Hankyung’s eyes grew wide. Was this really the evil maknae that was telling his son to behave?

But then, Kyuhyun added, “But not too behaved!”

That had Hankyung groaning. “You couldn’t have left it at just the first part, Kyu?” He knew that Kyuhyun telling Minhyun to behave was too good to be real.

Kyuhyun shrugged. He wanted Minhyun to behave just enough so that he wouldn’t risk hurting himself. But not too behaved that Minhyun would already act like a goody-goody two-shoes.

“Being too behaved is boring,” the evil maknae said simply. He turned to his son again. “Bye, dumpling! Love you!”

“Love you, too, umma,” Minhyun waved goodbye to his mother.

As soon as Kyuhyun was gone, Hankyung let out a sigh. “Boring sounds pretty good to me,” he muttered.

Then, he looked down at his nephew. Minhyun smiled brightly up at him.

Only… there was a glint of mischief and evil in his eyes.

Hankyung gulped. Yep, boring definitely sounded good to him. But it didn’t look like Minhyun was going to be too behaved and boring.

The Chinese man then knew that he was in for a rough few days.

Oh, the joys of babysitting the little evil minion.

“Hangeng! We need you to go here to the TV network as soon as possible! The last commercial that you shot was damaged. Something about the video file from the cameras being corrupted. You need to reshoot it!”

Those were the words that greeted Hankyung as soon as he answered the call from his manager.

Hankyung frowned deeply. Sure, it was annoying that he would have to reshoot. But that wasn’t Hankyung’s greatest problem at the moment.

He was in a dilemma.

“I’m currently babysitting Minhyun at my apartment.”

“Well, bring Minhyun along if you must!”

That only had Hankyung frowning more deeply.

Because that was precisely the source of his dilemma.

On one hand, Hankyung would actually love to have to work even when he was supposed to be on a short vacation. The Chinese man had realized a long time ago that work was definitely much easier (and better for his sanity) than babysitting Minhyun. It was already the third day of Minhyun’s stay with him, and as much as Hankyung loved his nephew, he couldn’t wait for Kyuhyun to come back later that evening so that he could hand over the little evil minion to the evil maknae. In just these three days, Hankyung had dealt with more whoopee cushions, fake snakes popping out of things that he was opening, and surfaces with goo than he could count. Having to work would be a relief from these things!

On the other hand, going to work meant taking Minhyun along with him since he couldn’t possibly leave the little boy alone in the apartment (let’s not ask if Hankyung’s more worried about his nephew or about his apartment remaining intact in that situation). While his manager did say that he could bring Minhyun, Hankyung was positive that Kyuhyun would murder him if he brought Minhyun along. Kyuhyun was currently a K-pop idol that was in hiding, and he would surely go bonkers if Hankyung took his son to a TV network building. Sure, logically, no one would know that Minhyun was actually the son of the currently missing Cho Kyuhyun, but still, Hankyung knew that Kyuhyun would not like him taking the risk.

So, again, he was in a dilemma.

What to do? What to do?

At the other end of the line, his manager was getting impatient. “Oh, come on, Hangeng! You really need to be here! Hurry up and get over here!”

Hankyung understood that his manager was being pressured by the management and the TV network probably. But still. Was it worth risking the wrath of the evil maknae?

Just then, Minhyun came running into the room. “Uncle Hannie! Uncle Hannie! I figured out how to dye the white curtains in the kitchen purple! I can do it to your bedsheets, too, if you want?”

Andddddd that made Hankyung’s decision.

“We’ll be over there in half an hour,” he told his manager.

Hankyung may be risking the wrath of Kyuhyun with this move, but he was also positive that his sanity would be even more at risk if he remained at home with Minhyun today.

Minhyun was watching the happenings in the dressing room fascinatedly. So many colors! So many funny objects! So many people hurrying around! So much activity!

The flurry of activity with trying to prepare for the shoot was enough to catch most kids’ attention, and Minhyun’s attention had definitely been caught by everything that was going on around him.

Hankyung was currently sitting in front of a dresser, with Minhyun standing beside him, his little hand resting on the arm of Hankyung’s chair. Minhyun’s head kept turning left and right, trying to see everything that was going on at once.

“Oh, who is this?” a hair stylist had come to work on Hankyung’s hair, and she was now smiling down curiously at Minhyun.

“This is my nephew,” Hankyung explained. “I was supposed to watch over him today, so I brought him with me.”

“Well, aren’t you such a cutie pie?” The woman grinned as she pinched Minhyun’s chubby cheek.

Minhyun scowled, rubbing the cheek that she had pinched. Why was everyone saying that he was cute?! He was evil! He was going to be the future supreme overlord of the world! “I’m not cute. I’m scary,” he told the stylist firmly.

However, the woman just laughed and this time pinched the other cheek that Minhyun wasn’t rubbing. “So cuteeee!”

Minhyun scowled even more. Maybe he should make her see why she should find the little evil minion scary? His umma did say that “a proper demonstration of evil” is sometimes necessary…

Hankyung saw the expression on Minhyun’s face and, having too much experience with dealing with Kyuhyun, correctly guessed what the little evil minion was thinking.

“Behave, Minhyunnie,” Hankyung said sternly.

Minhyun pouted. Aww! Now, he won’t get to unleash his evilness on this poor, unsuspecting woman! Minhyunnie was quite disappointed.

Hankyung’s manager now came forward. “Why don’t you sit over there while your uncle is getting ready for the shoot, Minhyun?” The man pointed to a small couch by the wall.

As the pouting little evil minion went to sit on the couch, Hankyung checked to make sure that the hair stylist was busy with getting the necessary hair products. Then, he said to his manager in an undertone, “Kuixian’s going to kill me for this. If I disappear, it’s because he murdered me.”

“You don’t have to tell him that you brought Minhyun here,” the manager whispered back.

“Minhyun tells his mother everything. There’s no way that Kuixian won’t find out about this.”

“Oh, well, it’s still good that you spend time with Minhyun, anyway,” the manager just shrugged. The man was still of the opinion that spending time with Hankyung might bring Minhyun