Act I, Scene I: In Medias Res

Gangnam-gu, Seoul, South Korea - 0700 hours

On a bright Sunday morning, just as the first rosy finger tips of the sun’s rays bleed into the sky, Do Kyungsoo is savagely dragged out of pleasant dreams by his fellow EXO member screeching his lungs out the window.

“That doesn’t count as vocal warm-ups, Baekhyun,” he grumbles blearily, smothering his face back into the pillow. “And if that’s supposed to be a rendition of ‘Tears,’ just stop trying to compete with Jongdae. You lost when you were born.”

Baekhyun screeches again, and Kyungsoo whimpers, mourning his lost sleep. “Please shut up. Please. Please. I don’t have the willpower to get out of bed to put you in a chokehold right now.”

Paying him no mind, Baekhyun sticks his head out the window again. “Hey Sana! Sana Sana Sanaaaaa!”

What the hell? Kyungsoo isn’t awake enough to deal with this, so he just whimpers again. Sana? Like “shy shy shy” TWICE member Sana?

“Guess why your fans are called ONCE?” Baekhyun jeers, hanging half out the window. “What? Don’t know? It’s because you only have to hear their fanchant once to know they’re stuuuupid!”

Kyungsoo blinks, some of the sleepiness wearing off. “Dude, that doesn’t even make sense.”

“Should’ve traded songs with Red Velvet, because all your fans are dumb dumb!”

A vague niggle probes at Kyungsoo’s belly, and after a few seconds of pondering whether it’s the telltale pangs of panic or just the typical morning urge to find a toilet, he concludes it’s probably the nanogram of giving-a- he still possesses after eight years of idol life. Nice to see you’re still hanging in there, little buddy.

The niggling nanogram pokes him again, and he forces himself to sit up and throw a pillow at his uncharacteristically aggressive fellow member’s head. “You know, you probably shouldn’t be screaming insults at a member of one of Korea’s top girl groups at this time of day,” he says in a tone he is proud to characterize as very reasonable indeed. “Not good for the image and all that. Also more importantly, I was sleeping, you bastard.”

Baekhyun ignores him again, but someone - Sana, presumably - drowns out any and all of Kyungsoo’s complaints with a colorful string of curse words in both Korean and Japanese. It’s still too early for Kyungsoo’s brain to be quite functional, but he catches something about Baekhyun’s mother and a banshee’s backside before a flying plastic thing crashes into the other EXO member’s face.

“Ouch!” cries Baekhyun, rubbing at his head before sticking it back out the window. “Dumb ONCE stan! Think you’re a real keyboard warrior huh, hurling computer keyboards at a loyal EXO-L fan like me? My fandom is better than yours, dumb dumb!”

“That still doesn’t make sense.” Kyungsoo groans. “And do you want to tell me why you’re yelling at TWICE’s Sana this early in the morning from my bedroom window?”

“The living room window is occupied.” Baekhyun waves a hand half-heartedly at the door and turns back to Sana in the street. “Yo Sana, you should stan real talent! ONCE is a bunch of nugu fans! That’s right, I said it! Nuguuu!”

Tilting his head, Kyungsoo briefly considers pushing Baekhyun out the window - he’s pretty much halfway out, anyway, and it’s not like the other members would miss him very much - but the thought