pairing: BaekLay
length: 1493 words

“You have fifteen minutes. Don’t waste them.”

Yixing snorted loudly at the prison guard’s worthless warning. After all, in five minutes’ time, he would soon be sleeping like a baby. As long as Baekhyun hadn’t messed up the dosage earlier.

“It’s good to see you, Captain.”

“I’m surprised they let you visit me,” Yixing commented airily as he leaned back in his wooden chair, haughtily resting his legs up on the wall. Although the prison garb was anything but fashionable, the slender male still somehow managed to look both confident and stylish. His wide shoulders were drawn back and a saucy smirk decorated his lips.

“How could they say no to me when I’ve been on such good behavior?” Baekhyun cheekily replied, giving the other man a two-finger salute.

A loud grunt echoed from the side, causing Yixing to snort again.

“Don’t mind Leo. He’s always grumpy,” the Chinese male flippantly explained. He then gestured to the wooden chair near the back corner of the room. “Come, take a seat. I’d be an incredibly rude host if I had you stand the entire time, especially after all the effort you put into coming here just to see little ole me.”

Baekhyun turned to Leo, the prison guard, and sweetly asked, “May I?” with a dramatic, sweeping bow.

The prison guard grimaced at the cloying theatrics, but reluctantly sent the smaller man a curt nod in response.

In seconds, Baekhyun was seated in front of Yixing, right leg crossed over his left knee, and twirling a black ballpoint pen in his right hand. “So,” he began with a shark-like grin, “when are they letting you out?”

Yixing hummed in thought before answering with a shrug, “Who knows? They never tell me anything down here. In fact, I had no idea you were coming until Leo mentioned a surprise coming my way when he brought me breakfast this morning.” Yixing wiggled his fingers in a wave towards the prison guard while gleefully calling out, “Thanks, Leo! You’ve always been my favorite!”

“Can it!” the prison guard growled, hands instantly reaching towards his scabbard.

“Whoa, whoa, okay, my bad.” Yixing hastily held up both hands in defense. “My apologies for thinking the feelings were mutual.”

Baekhyun chuckled loudly as Leo sent a death glare to the Chinese male. “Aren’t assumptions and misunderstandings what landed you here in the first place, Captain?” he then snarked with a knowing look.

“Is being friendly that big of a crime?” Yixing easily countered with a good-natured shrug as he slipped his hands back into his pockets and tilted back even further in his seat. “Clearly I was friendly enough for you to come all the way out here and visit me.”

“What can I say? You make the best egg fried rice I’ve ever had,” Baekhyun quipped with a toothy grin. “There’s no way I’ll ever forget the taste of that in this lifetime. Although, I’m guessing your cooking skills are pretty rusty nowadays, considering there’s no kitchen around here,” he mildly observed, sweeping his sharp gaze around the drab room. “Unless they let you use theirs?”

“I wish.” Yixing pouted childishly as he swung his feet back to the ground and stared longingly into the distance. “Apparently, I’m too ‘important’ to be allowed into the kitchens or anywhere else, really, so all I’m allowed to do is read whatever books Leo fetches for me every weekend.” The Chinese male grinned again at the prison guard, whose glare only deepened.

“Any recommendations you have for me then?” Baekhyun asked as he plucked a notepad from his front shirt pocket and clicked the ballpoint pen, poised over a fresh white page. “It’s been awhile since I last read a good book and I’ve had a lot of free time recently.”

“Treasure Island is still the best. You can’t ever go wrong with the classics.” Yixing’s voice then dropped an extra octave as he darkly continued, “Right, Leo?”

At that, Baekhyun darted from his seat and deftly caught the suddenly unconscious prison guard, preventing the tall man from crashing head-first into the concrete floor. “You really didn’t waste any time with that, did you?”

“Given that we only have ten minutes left, I say we leave the chit-chat for later,” Yixing smartly replied as he languidly stood up and shoved his thin arm through the bars of his cell. “The keys should be in his left pants pocket, if you don’t mind reaching in there for me.”

“I’ve risked every single one of my limbs in missions under much more treacherous conditions, Captain,” Baekhyun pointed out with a playful chuckle. “You must be losing your touch if you’re warning me about something as trivial as this,” he added before successfully swiping a golden key ring and gleefully twirling it around his pointer finger.

“Well, we can never be too careful,” Yixing replied with another carefree shrug as he motioned for his loyal subordinate to toss the key ring to him. Having practiced the maneuver many times at night, under the cover of darkness while Leo usually napped, Yixing was able to unlock the gate in one swift movement. He then quickly scooped up his meager belongings—a glass bottle, a silver spoon, a leather notebook, a black fountain pen, and a golden pendant—into a small burlap bag and swung it over his shoulder before meeting Baekhyun at the entrance, giving Leo a sharp kick in the shin on his way there. “That was for spitting on me during my first day here, you brute.”

“I see your pettiness has only grown since coming here, Captain,” Baekhyun said with a saucy grin as he handed Yixing a black bandana before tying his own blue bandana around his face to conceal his identity.

“When you’re bored to death in a space like this¸ you don’t have much to do expect be petty.”

“Good thing I’m your favorite then,” Baekhyun answered cheekily while beaming brightly under his bandana.

“Of course you are,” Yixing cooed, petting his subordinate’s messy dark hair. “You’re the only one I could ever trust with such a important mission and you’ve done a brilliant job so far. Once we’re out of here, I’ll make sure you’re rewarded handsomely afterwards.”

The younger male preened happily from the praise.

“Are all the cameras jammed?” Yixing asked as they stepped out of the room, looking left and right for any prison guards that might be roaming around nearby.

“On a perfect loop until they catch on to our ruse and reset the system,” Baekhyun answered, patting the front pocket where his ballpoint pen was securely clipped. “But we’ll be long gone by then.”

Yixing smiled dangerously under his bandana. “Perfect.”

And the two dashed through the corridors, keeping to the shadows like wraiths. Thanks to Baekhyun’s thorough preparations, every guard they passed was knocked out in a corner and every trap was securely deactivated. With that, they were able to easily slip through a secret passageway that led them past the stone walls of the prison and safely exit the perimeter with minimal trouble. And waiting in a divot behind the main prison building was a small wooden boat, helmed by a thin man who perked up when Yixing and Baekhyun jumped down to join him at the shore.

“Welcome back, Captain! You made it!”

“I’m glad to be back,” Yixing replied with a smirk, which was no longer hidden by the black bandana. “And stellar job of holding down the fort during my absence, Jongdae. It’s good to see that none of you let me down.”

“Of course, sir!” the thin male answered with a two- salute. “We couldn’t have done it without Baekhyun’s expert leadership!”

“Oh?” Yixing ruffled the young subordinate’s dark hair again, while Baekhyun laughed merrily from the compliment.

“I learned only from the best, Captain,” the first mate answered with his toothy grin.

This time, it was Yixing’s turn to preen with pride. “As you should.” The Chinese male then turned back to the other small male. “And everyone else, Jongdae?”

“The rest of the crew is waiting for us on the main ship. They’re all very excited to have you back. And…” Jongdae excitedly waved a roll of parchment in the air. “…we’ve already collected all the supplies we’ll need for our next destination.”

“Excellent.” Yixing grinned as he stretched his arms behind him and faced the vast sea, deeply inhaling the salty ocean air for the first time in weeks. “Let’s move then. We only have two months until the Tidal Festival ends.”

“Yes, Captain!” Jongdae expertly unhooked the boat from its makeshift post on the beach and began rowing earnestly into the sea.

As the boat pulled away from shore, away from the cage that Yixing had been cooped up in for far too long, the pirate captain gazed into the sunset, wearing that devilishly dangerous grin once more.

“Captain Lay, the Conqueror, is back.”

♈♈♈

A/N: Happy eleventh anniversary to our lovely boys of EXO! And I am SO excited that everyone is finally back from the military, even if it's just temporary before our youngest two have go. But can you guys believe it?! We haven't had everyone back together since 2019, before Xiumin enlisted! Four whole years! My life was so different back then, haha. :') I was living in Korea, fresh out of university, and the world hadn't been wrecked by a life-changing pandemic that lasted three years too long. And now, I'm back in America, working six part-time jobs, about to enter my late twenties, and the world is just now easing up on pandemic restrictions. Sometimes, I feel like I'm frozen in time because of the pandemic and EXO's enlistment era. But then, I look back and think about what I've accomplished during this time, what the boys have accomplished these past few years, and it's wild to realize how we've all grown since then. And can we also talk about how much content we've been getting the past few months especially?! The boys really said GOODBYE to the content drought and now we're inundated with more content than I can keep track of, hehe. ^^ I haven't been able to properly watch anything because of my insanely packed work schedule, but I do see clips and tweets here and there, and it feels like I get an extra shot of serotonin every time I see their lovely smiling faces. ^^ And the news of EXO COMEBACK 2023 has got me HYPED and I can't wait to see what we're getting this year, especially since DFTF feels like a lifetime ago. We started off Q1 really strong, even with all of the craziness happening at SME HQ (which I don't wanna think about because of how much of a mess it was OTL), so I'm really excited to see how the rest of the year pans out! ^^

And I know I say this every time, but life has been especially busy the past couple of months. I have a bunch of big deadlines to meet the next few weeks and my sleep schedule is non-existent at this point, LOL. :') But things are progressing in my career and a project I'm ecstatic to be involved in will be released this month! I won't be sharing any details beyond that, to retain my anonymity on the internet, but it's a really amazing project that I've been part of for the past two years so I couldn't resist at least mentioning it. ^^; Anyway, I hope you all are doing well! Please stay safe and healthy during this time! Have a wonderful day and once again, happy eleventh anniversary to EXO!