Ever so carefully and anxiously, Hansol walks through the hallway of the school, the students noisily chatting whereas he feels that it's too quiet when Seungcheol isn't by his side. His walking slows at his locker, seeing Chan messing with the lock of his own locker that was next to Hansol's.

"Hi Hansol-hyung!" Chan looks up and smiles before it quickly disappearing in confusion, "Where's Seungcheol-hyung?"

At the mention of the name and the sound of lock unlocking, Hansol suddenly feels stiff, "Er..." he sighs on the inside as he goes to open his own locker, "Complications..."

He opens his locker and sees a familiar letter sealed with red wax in his locker and Hansol feels dread. Gently taking the letter out, he couldn't help but feel slight confusion when there wasn't a second letter in the locker.

"Oh... that's still a thing?" Chan looked slightly disappointed at the sight of a nearly identical letter laying in his own locker.

Hansol simply shakes his head from side to side, not understanding why the Fox Game was so popular and infamous at their school. With a heavy heart, he opens the letter and nearly feels his world collapse.

I'm so sorry that Choi Seungcheol has associated himself with Jeon Wonwoo and Kim Mingyu. I am yet again saddened that yet another student has been tainted. What makes this situation even worse is that he has chosen bullies over his own childhood friend, even letting him get hurt by others...

~ Mr. Fox

"H-Hyung... this isn't true... right?" Chan was just as frozen as Hansol.

"No... God no..." in frustration, Hansol crumples the paper and tears it, only shreds of the letter left with one piece having the red wax seal of a fox remaining on it. He couldn't believe how incorrect and generalized the letter was about their situation.

"Hey~! What's up Hansol!"

He nearly jumps when the oddly positive voice and sudden pat on his shoulder is suddenly heard. Hansol turns around to see a grinning Soonyoung and a fidgeting Minghao behind him.

"What's that you got there in your hands?" only after that day did Hansol realize how false everything that left Soonyoung's mouth was.

"... Nothing," Hansol stuffs the shreds of paper into the pocket of his trousers.

"Hi Chan-ah! How are you doing?" Soonyoung suddenly realizes Chan's presence.

"Er... better before seeing what was in my locker..." Chan murmurs, uncomfortable with thinking about how the cheery boy associated himself with such a cruel game.

"You guys know each other?" Hansol notices.

"We're in the same group for music class..." Minghao says quietly, a thick accent was noticeable in his soft voice. Hansol soon realizes that this was his first time hearing the other's voice.

Soonyoung laughs, as though he was ignoring the whispers when students began opening their lockers and letters, "I hope you don't mind me dragging Hansol-ah here to talk to him about something~."

Chan glances at Hansol unsurely before carefully saying, "It's fine... Just make sure that you guys head to class on time..."

"Yeah yeah, see ya later," Soonyoung grabs Hansol's wrist and pulls the younger with Minghao following them, quickly passing by Jisoo and Jeonghan, the latter being the only one to notice and send a worried glance at Hansol.

Eventually, the dragging comes to a stop, the three standing in an isolated area at the turn off a hallway where there are empty classrooms that were used as storage areas.

The blond boy sighs as his shoulders droop, the bright smile immediately disappearing, "Listen, this might sound crazy, but Minghao found something out and needs to warn you about something before you're quite mentally and literally hurt by Mr. Fox."

"What's more to hurt me other than talking about and hurting my friend?" Hansol sighs, feeling slight despair.

"Oh I don't know," Soonyoung simply rolls his eyes, "Ever thought about literally yourself? Jisoo-hyung? Jeonghan-hyung? Especially Chan-ah?"

"Okay okay, I get it, being depressed won't help with anything," Hansol's head suddenly feels slightly heavier at such a pressuring thought. He looks over to Minghao expectfully.

"He say to stay away," Minghao says, worry apparent on his face.

"First off, the word is 'said' in Korean," Soonyoung corrects quickly before turning back to Hansol, "Second, see, I told you it's a bad thing."

"'Stay away'? From what?" Hansol's eyebrows scrunches up slightly before the bell rings abruptly.

A groan comes from Soonyoung, "Ugh, we'll meet up during lunch."

Hansol walks into the classroom and is immediately flooded by classmates at the doorway, words varying from a simple 'are you okay?' to 'I heard you were that 'childhood friend'. I'm sorry that you were betrayed' to a painful 'I can't believe that jerk had the nerve to pull a move like that. You can sit with my friends during lunch if you want.'

"...uys! Guys!" everyone stops and looks behind them to see Jisoo, a worried expression on the latter's face, "Calm down please, you're startling Hansol more than he already is..."

Slowly but surely, they spare Hansol one last pitiful glance before heading back to their seats.

Pity.

He honestly hasn't received such a glance in such a long time and feels slightly stunned. The event that occurred slowly processed in his head as he slowly makes his way to sit in the seat he sat at last time.

"Are you okay, Hansol?" Jeonghan asks, walking over and kneeling down to Hansol's level.

"Yeah... wait- honestly... no..." Hansol murmurs, massaging his temples.

"Hang in there, I'm sure you'll be able to talk to Seungcheol soon," Jeonghan smiles reassuringly.

"Hopefully..." Hansol looks up to see Junhui pass by them in order to head to the back of the room to his usual seat, but he swore he saw Junhui glare at him; he just doesn't know for what reason.

"Is something wrong?" Jisoo walks over to the two and asks.

"Junhui-ssi was glaring at me... I think..." Hansol murmurs in an absent-minded way, to which Jeonghan looks slightly worried and Jisoo awkwardly laughs, "Yeah, that seems to be the only type of look he has."

The door opens as Minki enters, making Jeonghan and Jisoo swiftly and quietly get up to head to their normal seats, Hansol's gaze following them but ends up looking over to Junhui. The actor barely casts a glance over to the two who passed by his seat.

He remembers his first meeting with Junhui and how his voice was soft, speaking with hesitance as though any slip-up with his words will lead to the downfall of his life. Adding on to what Jeonghan had told him when they were working, Hansol just couldn't fit the academy's description of him with the truth.

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