Nothing can truly begin without a set of foundations. Efforts were worthless if one could not climb the ladder to the top.

This thought plagued him as he danced in front of the mirror. The panes of glass reflected everything – the coarse movements of his body, the miserable expression on his face, his insecurities. The wood floor seemed to be spinning and the ceiling, painted to be blinding white, was now decorated with disorienting, dancing colors. It took Sanghyuk a moment to realize that this was a result of dehydration.

He stopped his limbs from moving with the music, ripped away the strings that bound him to the rhythm. It's hard, he thought, to just stop when you had work to do. He hated his body. The way it became tired easily, how it always wanted to take a break despite there being no time for that. He wanted to retie himself to the music and force himself to dance as the world delved further into night.

For now, however, he had to drink water. It was hard to lift his legs. One step forward and he felt his knees threaten to collapse and force his body into the polished wood below him. He couldn't allow that. This floor was too valuable to be ruined.

With this his thoughts began to work again, work to ruin any progress within Sanghyuk. You have brought yourself so low to the point where you think a damn floor is more precious than you, they said to him. The voice confused him. He wanted to tell the voice to leave him alone, let him drink water. But he wouldn’t know who he would be talking to.

His backpack was settled in the corner of the room, farthest from Sanghyuk so that it would be harder to reach. It was some sort of game he liked to play with himself – if he could reach it without collapsing after a practice session then it would show that he truly deserved the water it held for him. The simple task of walking became a challenge in itself.

He reached the bottle of water and poured its contents down his throat, felt its coldness strike his insides and calm the fire within his belly. It did nothing to cool his anger.

He looked to the mirror and studied himself as if he were still dancing. His facial expressions, the way he moved, the way his self-loathing seemed to stare straight back at him.

He wanted to practice more, wanted to keep clinging to the belief that maybe, once he achieved a level of greatness he thought he didn’t have, he could finally be happy. But right then he was standing, letting tears quite opposite the temperature of the water he had just drank flow down his cheeks. He couldn’t go to his hyungs. To let them see him as he really was – a pathetic child who could only dream of being what they were - it would be a disgrace.

So he ran. Out the door and into the quiet city streets. He remembered that Hongbin had said that there was=s a special place in the outskirts of the urban areas: a wood isolated from the lights and allowed the stars to glow above all men.

He willed himself to find it. He let the pounding of his feet against asphalt echo throughout the city, disrupting the silence it seemed to enjoy. He grabbed at his hair and tried his best to ignore this. Again, with the power of his mere existence, peace was sundered and broken. He ran faster, cursing at his mind for hammering him and splitting him apart with words.

Run and never come back. You aren’t wanted here.

He tripped and fell and hit his head onto grass. This voice, Sanghyuk realized, was his own.

Sanghyuk was surrounded by trees and the music light breezes created as it flew through leaves. It was like a dream, a dream he wished he could have instead of the nightmares that were conjured up every night. The ones in which his hyungs abandoned him because he was failure and a disappointment.

He looked up and the sky disarmed him, made him forget that he was pathetic and crying. The stars were looking down on him, pitying him for what he was. Sanghyuk felt fear stir in his chest. These godly entities, he was in their presence and felt unworthy to even admire them.

He sobbed. He wished he could be like those stars. He wished he could be better. A better singer like his hyungs, so he could stop being a burden to them. He yelled this to the heavens in such desperation he didn’t even recognize to belong him. The stars seemed to acknowledge this as they let a star shoot across the deep, ink blue sky.

Another flew across the spectacular firmament. Then another. And suddenly all the heavens were glowing with thousands of shooting stars zipping past at the same time. The light expanded across the sky, making it as if it were daytime.

Sanghyuk had never seen anything more beautiful.

He was brought to tears again, this time out of awe. His eyes were so locked, so immersed into this phenomena that he didn’t see one of those stars whirl down, straight for him.

He only noticed it when the great ball of light embedded itself into his chest, filling him with warmth he did not recognize at first. It was a burning, something that could be compared to the feeling he experienced when he was laughing with his hyungs – Hakyeon, Jaehwan, Wonshik, Hongbin – all of them. He wanted to feel this forever. But only until the burn became too unbearable. He felt it intensify and blister every single one of his nerves.

It was searing. The scratches Sanghyuk made on his chest felt like nothing compared to this.

Deeper the star went until it disappeared into his . His chest illuminated with white light and suddenly Sanghyuk was overwhelmed.

He has a ball of burning gas inside of him.

He screamed as the burn intensified, seemed to incinerate everything – his throat, his stomach, and especially his heart. He didn’t faint as he expected himself to, so he limped back to the practice room, taking hours upon hours to reach its door. The pain was ripping him apart, leaving a searing, sweltering area on his chest that he clawed at for the duration of the trek.

The light emerged from the same spot it burrowed itself in once Sanghyuk collapsed onto the familiar floor of the practice room. It was a slow five minutes, torturous for him as the object made it clear that it wanted to take its time.

Nevertheless it manifested out of him and levitated into the air. The man was in too deep of a pain to comprehend what exactly was happening.

He saw a figure form out of the light, watched as it transformed. He swore he heard a whisper saying his name from it, trying to comfort him and tell him that it was all okay.

It wasn’t.

There was a man sitting against the mirror. His dark, ink-blue locks covered his face and he was wearing robes of the same color that seem to shimmer against the light. It didn't take Sanghyuk even a moment to realize that this man was beautiful.

Sanghyuk croaked, still in a withering pain that made him want to cry, but tried nonetheless to confront the other. “Who are you?” the words poured out of his mouth. He felt heat emit from his throat as he said the phrase, making him regret ever waking up.

The other man slowly turned his head to him, scanned him, made Sanghyuk want to sink into the farthest corner where his backpack is. The man with blue hair sighed, whispered in a voice Sanghyuk could scarcely hear.

“I am your wish.”