Where do I even begin right now? I mean, sure I know how I got into this situation, because of some strange group that wants to blow us all up to kingdom come just because I happen to be here, but I’m still a little perplexed by everything. I mean, come on, I don’t even know what story to believe any more even though I’m sure that my memories are one hundred per cent correct.

Plus, I’ve got a reliable source in the team to confirm that I was pulled out of a burning house by Xander Cage himself, so I’m not going crazy.

But Becky, our new little computer buff whose as ditzy as they come and thankfully either completely failing to fall for Baekhyun’s ability to fail at flirting or else just ignoring it, has just told us all something that nearly caused me to drop Sehun. If you know, the little limpet hadn’t been clinging to me like I was the most comfortable creature in the entire universe which is something that Sehun just wouldn’t do.

Mental note, get a picture on at least three phones because then he can’t deny it happened.

But back to the main point of my absolute confusion.

“Run that by me again?” I asked Becky.

The girl smiles, happy to be doing something I suppose and points back to the screen, “I was playing back the security footage from the fight earlier and there was two of the man you called Suho.”

I blink and look towards Luhan who looks to be lost but I think it’s cause he’s having trouble translating what Becky said, even I find it hard to sometimes and I spent years living in the West. To save some time I tell Luhan what she said and he immediately shakes his head.

“No way,” he states in Chinese.

Becky grins back, “Yes way. Look, I’ll show you.”

She taps the screen and brings up an image of the van just before Suho steps out onto the road and causes the crash. She pauses it before he does step out and looks at us, “What do you see?”

“Err the truck speeding down the road and Suho should just be about to step out...” I say, wondering if there really is any sense left in the world right now.

“Look closer though and tell me what you see,” Becky says in a tone which suggests smugness but is just actually her high level of enthusiasm.

Baekhyun beats me to the screen, damn heavy baby kitty Sehun and for a moment or two he scans the shot before pulling back and looking at the girl with exasperation. Becky grins and highlights a small portion of the screen, the side of the van in fact and just faintly there is a figure. “Now before any of you start saying that it may be just someone passing by, consider the fact that this is a main highway and there’s guns, bombs and total hell breaking loose.”

“And?” I ask, though there’s a funny tingling feeling in the back of my head.

“When you switch to the CCTV view from bridge security footage,” Becky says, flicking the said image onto another screen with a finger extended to point out the figure standing on the opposite side of the bridge my stomach literally drops.

It’s Suho, standing there but he’s dressed completely different and doesn’t have those strange blue eyes that the other one possessed. I open my mouth to comment but Becky stops me. “Watch,” she says and starts the video playing.

When the Suho steps out in front of the truck, causing us to crash, this other Suho remains impassive and just stands there. Then when the crash is complete, he is gone from sight despite having not appeared to have done anything at all. Immediately my eyes flash back to the first screen where for a second there is nothing, not even the first Suho, then suddenly the other Suho is in the middle and pushing the truck back away from a dangerous covering that could easily cause us to explode. He’s gone an instant later which makes no more sense.

Except, there’s a tiny voice in the back of my mind that question’s how he got hold of those powers. He would have had to be in direct contact with...

“Normally I would write this off as camera glitches but then when I was analyzing the footage to make sure there was no editorial interference, this came up,” Becky flicks a grainy image onto yet another screen and I find Baekhyun suddenly latching onto me as well whilst Lay supports Luhan who looks like he’s about to faint. It’s a simple triangular shape with a circle in the center that’s got all these cool twists on it and I know that symbol. I know it so well.

“I didn’t recognize it as any gang symbols or anything so I did a little digging and it comes up with...” Becky starts but finally I find my voice.

“The EXO Program,”

Everyone turns to look at me, eyes a mixture of expectant, confused or slightly horrified and all I can do is pull Sehun a little closer to myself. A familiar burning tingle starts at the top of my spine but I clamp down on it for now before shaking my head to clear the millions of building thoughts.

“Care to explain?” Xander asks, looking at me with a raised eyebrow before glancing back to Becky when I remain quiet.

“It’s a Program that was supposedly abandoned a long while ago,” Becky starts, her voice neutral as she watches me with an interested gaze, “It was supposedly some Chinese, Korean collaborative experiment to see if the inner locked abilities of the mind could be pulled forward to be used as a physical force or a weapon of some kind. The experiments naturally failed but...hey, where are you going?”

“Out!” I say, having unexpectedly stood up, handed Sehun to a bewildered Luhan and then just walked out of the room where we all were.

It’s a stupid move, even I know that but my head fells like it’s going to explode and I just want a minute. I don’t know of that program, but yet I do and oh my god this is just hell on earth. There’s ideas forming in my head, words from conversations past and present, screams, tears, the pain, blood, the stench of something clinical, staying awake for days on end just trying to see their little faces once again and confirm that they are indeed alive and blood. So much blood. The pain spikes through me suddenly, incision after incision, burns, scalds, pinpricks of needles and for a second I just want to throw up.

In fact, I do throw up, crashing to the floor of the roof, how the hell I got up here is a complete mystery and I blatantly realize that I’m going to have to wait for someone to come and open the door because it’s slammed shut but I don’t really care. I need time to think, to clear the thoughts from my mind because there’s just too many.

There’s so much noise, so many voices, so many cries, so many softly spoken words in the middle of the night and a faint feeling of lips brushing gently against my own and it just won’t stop and I’m going to be turned inside out and left to die on this roof I swear.

Then it’s just silence. The blazing sun isn’t too hot anymore, the wind just blows a slight pleasant breeze and I feel relaxed

Maybe I’m going crazy or there was something still lingering my blood from when Sehun struck me, even though that still doesn’t make any sense in the slightest, or it could just be a mirage caused by the sun which is reflecting off the almost sand coloured stones of this dull concrete building that I’m on top of, but there’s someone there.

Someone whose smaller than me in height but still manages to hold my attention, someone with brown hair and warm brown eyes that are just glistening with tears and they’re in a pair of grey jeans, a shirt of darker grey and a black leather motorcycle jacket which I’m faintly sure is mine but right now I couldn’t care less if it was.

My confusion, sickness and disorientation is gone the second I get to my feet, take a few steps forward and wrap my arms around the all too familiar figure. I breath in his smell, feel the firmness of an actual body there with me and just hold him tight, “Joonmyeon,” I breath out heavily.

“Hello Yifan,” he speaks in a small voice, clinging tightly to me as though he’s not believing that this is real either.

I don’t want to let go of him, so I don’t. I just hold him, “What are you doing here?”

“Making sure you don’t lose your mind,” Joonmyeon says, pulling back a little to place his hands either side of his head, “You can’t let yourself. Not now Yifan.”

“You never said that it would be like this though,” I say back, not understanding my own words, “I don’t know what to believe anymore.”

Joonmyeon nods, “I know but this is how it must be. I need you to take them to Kevin.”

“Kevin?” I frown and then blink, remembering my best friend in Japan, “How do I even being to explain all of this?”

“Simple, you twit,” he smiles up at me in that soft way that makes me melt all of the freaking time, “Follow the dragon.”

Before the stupid question can come out of my mouth, he places his finger onto my lips and the next second he replaces that with his own lips before pulling back and grinning, “Got you first. Now go back to them and make sure to keep them safe.”

“You’ve got Kai and Kyungsoo with you?” I find myself asking, holding tightly onto Joonmyeon once again.

He nods in response, “The others are too far away. Hopefully you’ll come across them or they’ll come across you first.”

A hum escapes my throat, wondering vaguely about that before sighing, “It’d be easier if we could just tell them.”

“That would compromise us all,” Joonmyeon replies, “They’ve already seen Suho, we can’t give them any more than that.”

“I know, I’ll keep them safe,” my lips touch his forehead and my eyes close, just as I hear a whispered, “Goodbye Yifan” and then I’m standing on the rooftop completely alone just staring at the sky.

A plane starts flying overhead, low enough so I can see the design of it and the fact that someone has painted a flaming red and orange dragon on the side of it. I hear footsteps approaching and Lay is next to me, looking pale and worried along with Luhan, Sehun and Baekhyun who also share the same look of disbelief.

“Kris?” Lay asks, reaching a hand to touch my forehead, “Why did you leave like that?”

Before I can answer, a yelp escapes my lips when a finger touches at the top of my spine and a jolt goes through my entire being. I turn sharply, finding Baekhyun looking at me with a shocked expression before his face sets into a more somber one, “Your tattoo was glowing.”

“Tattoo?” I asked, rubbing my fingers over the spot to feel the same jolt as before. I mean I know I have tattoos but there’s never been one there before.

Luhan and Lay look at it but it’s Sehun who says, “It’s a dragon.”

“Kris,” Lay’s voice holds a worried note and I know what that means.

“We need to go Japan,” I say, pulling out my phone to search for a number immediately.

“Japan? Why there?” Luhan asks, looking confused.

It’s Baekhyun who answers however, “Because that’s where you get the best dragon tattoos, right Fan?”

I give Baekhyun a long sideways glance before raising my phone to my ear and praying that Kevin picks up, “Yeah, sure.”

Wherever this is leading, I hope I end up back in Joonmyeon’s arms by the end of it.

authors babbling: yup the ship is sailing ^^