That morning, when Aya had woken up beside Baekhyun, she’d thought it was going to be a beautiful day.

 

Lamiya seemed to have been getting better: she still had blackouts, but seemed more collected than before, as if the side of her that had lost grip on reality had stopped clouding her mind outside of the times when she was having an episode. She hoped her friend would be fine soon. She missed her and had so much to tell her about Baekhyun, so much to ask about Sehun and she just wanted to have her back.

 

The others had almost completely lost touch with their powers, but they seemed to have been getting used to it and accepting the fact that they’d have to fight their battle without the supernatural help.

 

Suho told her that, as weird as her power was, she was going to play the main role when the time came for it. They were aiming for a stealthy operation of getting into the SM base, rescuing Kris’ girlfriend and finding the cure for Luhan’s sickness, which would free their comrades. In that way they’d gain their support once again, and since they both seemed to be having no difficulty with using their powers, they’d be able to help them both physically and tactically, since they knew the base and its residents. At least, that’s how Suho hoped the events would turn out.

 

Having a plan seemed to finally cheer up everyone, including the adorable overgrown 4-year-old that was making noises in the bed beside her. He was the weakest of them all, but Aya couldn’t help herself; she had to help him every once in a while.

 

Every morning, she’d awake before he did and put a hand on his stomach, where his power dwelled - or, well, what was left of it. Then she’d do what Lay had taught her: she’d close her eyes, take a deep breath and find her own energy, guiding it towards the tips of her fingers and letting it flow out of her and into him. His hair remained grey, because she was careful not to give him too much, fearing he’d notice and then get angry at her, but his cheeks would immediately become rosy and he’d sigh contentedly as he rolled over and hugged her tightly in his sleep.

 

She’d asked Lay if Baekhyun would notice, and he’d smiled at her, telling her softly that to a certain extent, they all did, because it was her energy - not as strong as her powers, but still obviously distinctive and different than Baek’s, and they could feel a trace of it whenever he was closeby.

 

The first morning, when he’d opened his eyes and yawned like a big puppy, her heart stopped beating for a moment, expecting for him to growl at her in disapproval and demand for her to promise him not to do it ever again. But as his eyes settled on her, inside of them was the ring of light she’d gotten so used to seeing and she’d known he wouldn’t get angry at her even before he’d smiled at her sweetly.

 

She did not know whether he was too weak to be aware of what she was doing for him or not, but if he really was aware of it, she was thankful for his silence because she would’ve gone crazy had she had to watch him getting weaker and weaker as the days went by. When he’d began coughing and gotten a fever, she seeked out Lay to give her advice on how to help him, and he’d explained to her that she could give her energy to her mate, similar to how Sehun had saved Lamiya from dying back when Baekhyun was abducted for the first time.

 

So she repeated the ritual every morning, not caring about the fact that she felt light-headed and that the world spun every time she got up, or that she had to hide those things from Baekhyun. She knew she was pushing her luck, but she had to help him somehow. She wouldn’t watch him get sick and die, even if she had to endure hardships herself in return.

 

Worse than that, knowing that she did have the power to help but not being able to use it hurt more than not being able to help. Being useless was awful, but being useless because someone was stubborn was another matter completely.

 

She was so afraid that Baekhyun would forbid her to give him energy boosts to keep him functioning because he’d done the same thing when she’d offered to help her friend Lamiya - he’d growled at her and pulled her by the hand to a place where the others maybe wouldn’t hear them and told her she would not do it, how she had no idea what would happen to her once she fell asleep or if her picking through her friend’s mind would even do any good to her.

 

And so she’d had to comply, because he was weak and obviously shaken and she did not want to make things worse. He’d made her go through the forced uselessness once; she would not let him do that to her a second time.

 

But right now, all worries disappeared as she gave her puppy the energy that would keep him energetic and happy for the day, making him whimper contentedly and rolling to his side, trapping her arm between his in the process.

 

He was a work of art - at all times, but especially at times like these, she could not understand why or how someone could’ve touched this person in a harmful way. He wasn’t a guardian because he was super-brave or trying to prove something. He was just this beautiful person full of light on the outside the same way as on the inside, and his mission was to make the world a better place, a place in which darkness would not exist.

 

And she loved him with her whole heart. Surprisingly, it wasn’t Baekhyun who was having difficulties with keeping his arms to himself - it was her, who missed the feel of his lips burning trails on her skin and making her forget about all of her worries and obligations.

 

That morning, she couldn’t remember that she’d had any in the first place.

 

“G’ morning,” he whispered lazily what seemed like an eternity later, one eye squinting at her as the light shone from it, while the other was tightly shut and covered with his arms. His head was now in her lap, and she was waving her hands through his strange hair that bore witness to all the hardships he’d had to go through since coming to this planet.

 

“Hey,” she answered softly, her movements not ceasing because he’d told her how much he loved the gesture around a million times already, and today, she wanted to humor him. He closed his eyes, and she thought he’d fall asleep once again and let the peace of the sunny morning in their warm room filled with light envelop them until someone pulled them back into their everyday lives, but he began humming instead.

 

They were always touching in some way - yes, they were pushing their promise of not breaking the laws of her religious beliefs, but the touches were meant only to soothe each other. After having lost him in such a stupid way, so easily and fast, Aya didn’t want to risk that ever happening again, so she always intertwined their hands as they walked beside each other or touched the small of his back if she was behind him, or found some other way to stay glued to him in order to calm her heart.

 

He didn’t seem to mind; on the contrary, it seemed like he understood her intentions completely, which was a regular thing she somehow couldn’t ever get used to, so he seeked her out and played with the hem of her shawl or pulled at her clothes all the time too, and she kept falling in love with this person who could tell her so much without saying a word over and over again.

 

That was why they shared the same bed - she couldn’t handle the possibility that someday, when she opened her eyes in the morning, she might wake up to an empty bed and the information that he was abducted again.

 

The weight of his bracelet on her arm was comforting. It reminded her of what she had to lose, what she had to protect with her life and get back at those freaks who’d tried to scar him for life.

 

That morning, Aya felt like they could win. As if maybe, just maybe, they’d be able to succeed in their plans and get rid of SM once and for all.

 

“Why are you looking at me like that?” the boy with blushing cheeks whispered half-hysterically as he giggled, rolling around the bed a couple of times, away from her and then back into her lap again, his eyes never leaving hers. “You kind of look like a maniacal fan.”

 

She laughed, feeling bubbly and so incredibly happy for some reason. It must’ve been because she went to bed earlier that night and got more sleep than usual - the whole world seemed to be shining, her love at the very center of it.

 

“You don’t know?” she said as she raised her eyebrows at him, leaning over to whisper in a conspiratory voice, “I’m actually the president of your fanclub. The girls all agreed that I could have you first, and if you got tired of me, then they could give it a try, too.”

 

Baekhyun grinned and propped himself on his hands, his face now moving to stand in dangerous proximity to hers. Her eyes kept moving to his mouth, no matter how much she tried to look at the eyes that sang about his love confession every time she looked into them. “They can dismiss the fanclub, then,” he whispered.

 

Then her energy inside of him allowed him to swiftly sit up and pin her to the wall behind her back, pressing her against the bed’s headframe. “Because I’ll never get tired of my aeri.”

 

That morning, Aya could’ve sworn some of Baekhyun’s scars had disappeared and been replaced by smile wrinkles, as it should’ve been since the very beginning.

 

But then they heard shouts from the outside and quickly got up, just to find a freaked-out Soo clutching the back of his neck as he shouted a million incoherent things, Lamiya and ran away among them.

 

Time seemed to speed up suddenly - everyone looked as disheveled as they did, but a plan was created quickly which included finding Lamiya as soon as possible and preferably before she got hurt.

 

Baekhyun’s hand didn’t let go of her as they all sped up, going into the woods and trying to secure as wide a perimeter as they could as they searched for her.

 

Kai said it was a trap. Chanyeol insisted she’d gone completely crazy and thought Soo would be a danger to her achieving whatever crazy goal her mind had come up with.

 

Aya didn’t know what was going on, but she had a bad feeling - it was as if there was a string that kept being pulled tighter and tighter and now it’d reached its breaking point.

 

What would happen when the string snapped?

 

Baekhyun’s hand clutched her more tightly when they got to the edge of the forest and he stopped running abruptly.

 

“Aeri,” he said in a strange voice, not turning back, “I want you to find the others and tell them I said wiheom.”

 

“Baekhyun,” she said slowly, suddenly terrified. Why wouldn’t he turn around so that she could see his face? There was nothing out of the ordinary in front of them - just a cliff. It was a dead end, and she didn’t understand why she had to leave him or what that word meant-

 

The hand that was holding hers tightly let go.

 

“Baekhyun,” she tried again, confused and scared and not understanding why he was moving away from her, his back still turned to her-

 

“Now, aeri!” he shouted, and all thoughts disappeared.

 

She blinked harshly to stop the tears from clouding her vision as she began running back into the woods, away from him and not knowing what was happening, but knowing it was something bad.

 

The first person she’d managed to find was Kai. His face was pulled in a mask of indifference as he looked around himself when she’d basically run into him.

 

He put his hands on her shoulders in an attempt to steady her, but her face must’ve said everything because his indifference turned into fear as his hand tightened on her shoulders. “What is it, Aya?” he said loudly.

 

She didn’t know where to begin. “Baekhyun- he-” she began but couldn’t form the words correctly because she was sobbing. “He told me to tell you wiheom. Jongin, I have to go back and-”

 

“Where is he?” he now shouted as his eyes widened and he seemed to have started panicking. “What did he do?”

 

She shook her head as she tried to fall apart. “Outside the woods, he- he told me to go back…”

 

Kai turned and ran away without a word, leaving her in a mess, clutching the nearby tree’s trunk steadily because she did not know if her legs would give out. She wiped the tears from her face and began running again, hoping this time she’d find someone who would tell her what exactly was going on.

 

She found Lay very soon, having run in the opposite direction from Kai, assuming he’d alarm everyone he found along the way about Baekhyun’s message. He seemed to be more collected, at least, as he looked at her in astonishment and gasped. “Aya, what happened? Are you okay? Did you get hurt somewhere?” he said and raised his hands, as if to inspect her for wounds, but she didn’t have time for such things.

 

“Wiheom,” she whispered. “He said to tell you wiheom.”

 

Understanding immediately lightened his face, and he nodded along as he started running somewhere, too.

 

But she would not let him go away without a word like she did Kai - she was prepared for this, so she caught his shoulder with her hand before he got away too far from her.

 

“What does it mean, Yixing?” Her voice was hollow and desperate, and she wasn’t sure if she wanted to know. But she needed to, if she was to save Baekhyun before it was too late.

 

“Danger,” he whispered in an apologetic voice. “It means danger, Aya.”

 

Her stomach sank and she fought another round of tears and sobs, but she had to be strong and not wonder how he’d known that something dangerous was closebay, why he hadn’t went back into the safety of the woods or why he hadn’t stayed with her.

 

She’d done what he’d asked her to: Lay and Kai would find the others and tell them, she was sure of it. She couldn’t focus on anything but the panic that was accumulating in her chest with every second she spent away from him. What if they captured him again and began torturing him?

 

What if the next time she saw him, he was completely the person who he became sometimes, ranting about some dream he didn’t want to end?

 

What if there was no next time?

 

She turned abruptly and started running again.

 

Aya was never much of a runner, but she ignored the burning in her lungs and muscles as she got to the edge of the forest once again, slowing down to be able to sneak up on whoever was trying to hurt her Baekkie.

 

She was determined to put an end to whoever those SM people were - she would not live in fear anymore. She didn’t care what it took or what she’d have to sacrifice if it would mean that Baekhyun would finally be safe and stay that way.

 

That morning, Aya had woken up feeling as if they’d get another day of sweet, blissful ignorance and not knowing what was waiting on the other side. He sometimes said he didn’t want to wake up; she felt like today, they’d dream a beautiful dream together.

 

The clearing in front of the cliff was empty. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary - the sun was shining upon a small grassy field, a giant cliff at its edge, and the whole world was silent.

 

It was as if he wasn’t standing there just a couple of minutes ago - or at least, that’s how long she thought had passed since he’d barked out that strange order at her - holding her hand, safe and healthy and alive.

 

Would she be able to save him?

 

What was she even saving him from?

 

When she walked over to the edge of the cliff, she saw that it was looking over a small town, but there wasn’t a sight of Baekhyun anywhere. She could discern that there was some kind of a gathering at the main street, with many people huddled around something - she couldn’t see what it was, though.

 

The sinking feeling in her stomach intensified and she found out a small path leading towards the town a little bit on the right from the clearing and the cliff. It was very steep, but she didn’t care - she only wanted to get a hold of Baekhyun before he ended up in whatever the mess at the main street was.

 

She wished she could feel Baekhyun’s energy, or at least her own surging inside of him, but she didn’t possess such abilities. Chen had explained that it must’ve been because she wasn’t truly a guardian, but some kind of mutant, and only guardians could feel the difference in the energies of others. So she had to do things the old-fashioned way and try to find Baekhyun by catching up to him.

 

It would be difficult, though, because she had no idea where he was heading, and she couldn’t sense the danger he’d warned about. She suspected that he was able to feel the presence of SM only because he’d received a fresh dose of Aya’s energy and she blamed herself for being the cause of this. Had she not supplied him with sufficient energy for power-sensing, he wouldn’t have been able to sense that SM was closeby and they would’ve returned into the woods to search for Lamiya.

 

And now she had to make things right somehow before everything fell apart, and she had no idea how she’d achieve that.

 

That morning, Aya had kissed her love’s forehead and closed her eyes, wanting to feel peaceful just for another moment.

 

When she arrived into the town, she could hear cries of pain and distress from the place where she saw smoke rising into the blue sky. She tried to be stealthy, moving slowly and close to the walls of the buildings at the side, prepared to hide in the closest alley as soon as she saw something that could prove to be dangerous.

 

Instead, she arrived to the sight of people in all kinds of conditions, from knocked out to bleeding to death. A nearby building was on fire, which was the cause of all the smoke, and there was shattered glass all over the street, some of the shards in the people’s bodies.

 

The mass of hurt people seemed to have been out of it, because many of them clutched their heads with their hands without tending to their wounds at all. Those whose sleeves were rolled up had black marks on their arms, and she suspected that she would’ve found the same on those whose skin wasn’t showing.

 

She didn’t know what it meant, but black didn’t seem good so she proceeded with uttermost caution. She would’ve tried to avoid the whole street completely, but she likely would’ve gotten lost in the maze of alleys and she didn’t have time for that. The only thing that mattered was that Baekhyun wasn’t there and so she needed to move further and explore all places until she found him.

 

At the center of the street was a slumped form breathing heavily, as if the person had ran a thousand miles without stopping to take a breath. It looked kind of familiar to Aya, but she couldn’t see the guy’s face because it was looking at the ground, and the hair color wasn’t right, but it kind of reminded her of-

 

Luhan? she thought, but at the same moment one of the defeated SM soldiers seemed to have realized that she was an intruder, so he shouted, “Hey!” at her and raised awareness along the group.

 

Not all soldiers were badly wounded, and those who were healthy enough sprang to action and moved towards her as if to catch her. She wasn’t much of a fighter either, but she balled her hands into fists because she planned to punch her way out of this mess.

 

The first soldier ran towards her, trying to strike her with a punch, but she moved out of the way and expertly grabbed his hair, not losing a moment with putting her other hand at the back of his neck and putting him inside the memory of falling asleep, effectively knocking him out.

 

The next soldier was quick on his feet, hissing as he jumped at her and grabbed her, making her fall to the ground. She didn’t try to crawl out of his grasp, instead using the opportunity of such closeness to sneak her small hand to his giant neck and making him fall asleep, too.

 

She had difficulty with getting out from under his giant, heavy body, though, and as soon as she was free, she had more people to fight.

 

One by one, she incapacitated them because they couldn’t seem to understand why their comrades were falling asleep and they seemed too disoriented to track her movements carefully. By the time nobody was brave enough to get up and fight with her, she was panting and nearly out of her mind from so many minds she’d touched and so many memories her brain needed to process.

 

The next time she fell asleep, it would be a rough night, to say the least. She’d never touched more than two persons on the same day, and she’d barely survived having to go through so many memories afterwards. She’d also never went through the entire memory scope of a single person before Baekhyun, though, and she’d managed to survive that avalanche many times and she’d do it again and again for as long as he needed to, so she didn’t want to think about such things.

 

There was only one thing on her mind: Baekhyun.

 

She went over to the slumped form - had he not been panting, she would’ve thought he was sleeping, but as she kneeled next to him she saw that it indeed was Luhan and she had a dreadful feeling that it wasn’t a coincidence.

 

She also had to keep reminding herself that Luhan was the enemy, but it was hard to do so when she’d seen all the memories and feelings he’d showed to her back when she’d willingly given him a bit of her own powers.

 

“Lu?” she spoke softly, not sure what was wrong with her friend; she’d decided to hell with the whole friend-turned-into-an-enemy-by-force thing. Luhan would not hurt her - even if he wasn’t in the state that she’d found him in, with ghostly pale skin and chapped lips, he wouldn’t ever hurt her.

 

He raised his head slowly and seemingly with much pain, whispering, “Lamiya?”

 

Aya furrowed her eyebrows. “Was Lamiya here, Luhan? Do you know where she went? Who did this to you?”

 

Were they even giving him the cure anymore? Perhaps they were blackmailing him more cruelly nowadays, not giving him the cure to the disease they’d made him get, but what good could he possibly do to them if he was at such a state, almost unresponsive and unable to move?

 

No, this was something different, Aya was sure of it. He looked too different from the man who’d abducted her boyfriend with sadness in his eyes on that rooftop. Luhan looked as if he was very tired, not sick, though she couldn’t be sure of anything.

 

“She said…” Luhan said slowly and silently, making her lean closer towards him, “She said Sehun was just a tool.”

 

Luhan was definitely out of it - was he hallucinating? Aya waved a hand in front of his eyes and they barely blinked, following it lazily. Well, at least he was conscious, though he wasn’t making any sense.

 

“And then she took my energy…” he breathed, “Not my powers, just energy… And said to wait for her…”

 

She took his energy, but not his powers? But how would Lamiya be able to do such a thing? Now Aya was almost certain that Luhan was either dreaming or hallucinating, but she decided not to take chances and put a hand at the back of his neck, knowing it was the fastest way to get some answers out of him.

 

She quickly sorted through his most recent memories while he whimpered - the poor guy, she felt bad for making him go through another hardship - and put him to sleep as quickly and as painlessly as she could.

 

I’m sorry, Lu, she whispered to herself, believing him now.

 

As she ran in the direction where Lamiya had went, Aya tried to sort out through the newest information she’d found out. Through Luhan’s eyes, Lamiya had looked beautiful and she’d made him believe her words completely, but to her, she looked completely crazy. After all, what was she going to do with his energy? And how did she even know how to take it?

 

Aya didn’t know any of the answers, but she had a feeling that the key to finding Baekhyun was with Lamiya, so she decided to find her as soon as possible.

 

A couple of seconds later, though, she heard a scream that sounded distinctively like Baekhyun’s, so she ran into the closest alley, not caring about the fact that it was probably some kind of bait for her - she would not let them hurt him again, no matter what it took.

 

The alley led to a small square with a modern-looking building at the end of it. She came just in time to see a flash of silver hair and the navy-blue shirt Baekhyun was in when they’d jumped out of bed to see what Kyungsoo was shouting about.

 

Baekhyun. She ran as fast as she could, crossing the square in a few strides and noticing the blotches of red on the pavement, a dreadful feeling growing inside of her as she tried - and failed - not to look what was in front of her on the ground, focusing on getting into the building and saving him first.

 

Just like Chanyeol had said what seemed a million times ago, first they’d assess the situation and then start fixing things in any way they could.

 

“Baekhyun!” she screamed as she entered the building, panting and sweat rolling off her forehead, but she did not care how many SM agents came at her - she’d get through them all instantly just to get closer to him.

 

She heard a muffled sound coming from her left side, where a door was, supposedly leading to the stairway, like it usually was in buildings like this. She didn’t have to call for him in order to be able to track him down, though - the blotches of red were a clear enough guidepost which she followed immediately.

 

She saw something move out of the corner of her eyes, at the reception which she hadn’t even looked at properly, but once again, she didn’t care. She could feel her heart beating in her ears and seemingly humming the word Baekhyun, Baekhyun, Baekhyun over and over again.

 

She ignored the bloody trace of what seemed like a hand around the door’s handle. She ignored the muffled sounds she could hear from somewhere downstairs as she ran as fast as she could down and down until she reached the end of the stairs. The door in front of her didn’t have blood smeared around the handle and it was closed. Probably locked.

 

Two pairs of strong hands caught her own suddenly and she tried desperately to get away, but she couldn’t do a thing when her hands were incapacitated. She was so close to where he was, she knew she was, and if only she could get through the door after somehow slipping from their hold-

 

The door opened, and she trashed against the SM agents holding her because Baekhyun was in front of her, Baekhyun was alive but he was scared and whimpering and his eyes were widened as he looked at her and shook his head-

 

“Enough play,” a strange voice said and she somehow managed to stop looking at Baekhyun and at the woman that was holding his wrists in a hold with one hand, her other one behind his back.

 

Aya had seen her before in his memories, yet nothing could’ve prepared her for what she was seeing right now.

 

The person in front of her looked the same as she did, except for the fact that she wasn’t wearing shawl. In fact, she was wearing things she never could’ve even imagined putting on - a tight pink top with a wide cleavage and… denim shorts? Definitely not something Aya would ever wear.

 

She wasn’t that shocked because of what looked like her identical twin grinning at her victoriously; instead, she couldn’t take her eyes off the blood sliding down her arm full of black marks and onto the ground.

 

It was a trap, she suddenly realized.

 

“Welcome, sister,” the woman sneered at her. “Now let’s get this show going.”

 

That morning, Aya had thought Baekhyun was hers.

 

But the illusion was shattering.

 

What would happen when the string snapped?

 

Aya knew the answer now.

 

She would snap with it, never to be repaired again.