As promised by Kyuhyun, the fox joined the town and started cohabiting with the other animals. No one knew where he stayed but Leeteuk had said that as long as he doesn’t cause any trouble, he is welcome to stay.

The rest of the animals residing in the town and area heard about it and were still feeling uneasy even though Leeteuk had assured them. When the fox walked across the town and meet the eyes of the other animals, they gave him a suspicious and cautious look before averting their eyes when the fox turned his head towards them. The parents often asked their children to avoid the fox as much as possible, and these bad rumours of the nine-tailed fox eating young animals had spread like wildfire.

“Why did Leeteuk-hyungnim allow this beast to join us?” Kyuhyun heard it when he was walking amongst the trees, towards the waterfall near the river.

“What if he eats our offspring?” There were gasps amongst the gossips.

Kyuhyun ignored all of them and walked leisurely towards his destination. Upon reaching the river, he walked upstream and scaled the waterfall with a few practised steps into the air. There was a huge boulder just right in the middle of the stream that leads to the waterfall. Kyuhyun jumped onto the boulder and sat cross-legged, a common posture for meditation. Reaching into his sleeves, Kyuhyun pulled out a wooden flute and placed it against his lips. The wind blew gently against the fox’s skin, rippling the water underneath the boulder, making a slight waving sound, which was melodic when accompanied by the wind. As Kyuhyun in lightly and blew into it, his fingers moved accordingly. His brown orbs slowly slide shut as he immersed himself into the music, allowing the music to travel far and free.

*.*

Down the waterfall, was the river, and the riverbank where Kyuhyun was first found, which means that was where Jongwoon’s chamber was.

Beneath the slow-moving river, Jongwoon was making Jongjin scrub his shell.

“Do we really have to do this every day?” Jongjin grumbled. The younger turtle was in his human form, while Jongwoon was in his turtle form, lying in front of him. The older turtle nodded his turtle head vigorously, glaring at the younger to quickly finish his work. Jongjin sighed and started scrubbing his brother’s shell with a special kind of rock that made the shell shine and the spikes on the shell sharper.

“I’m done!” Jongjin exclaimed proudly when he examined his brother’s shell with a smug grin. It was shining and reflected off the light shining through the waters. Jongwoon nodded in satisfaction and shifted to his human form, his robes.

“Good job! I’ll help you with yours now!” Jongwoon beamed, grabbing the rock from Jongjin’s hands.

“I can’t believe we’ve been using this rock for hundreds of years now.” Jongjin marvelled, sitting down and getting ready to shift.

“Abeoji passed this down for us to take care of it. I’m not sure what it does but it sure does help us to meditate and train better after using it to scrub our shells.” Jongwoon shrugged, looking down at the kind of worn-down rock after using it for so many years.

“Only you will think of using it as a scrub, hyung.” Jongjin chuckled when Jongwoon hit him in the head.

“Get read-“Before Jongwoon could finish his sentence, a sad but soothing melody travelled and flowed through the waters.

“What’s that?” Jongjin asked.

“Jongjin-ah.”

“Yeah, hyung?”

“I changed my mind. I’ll scrub for you tonight.” Jongwoon grinned at his brother and handed him the rock before disappearing into the waters above.

“HYUNG!”

*.*

Ignoring his brother, Jongwoon flew out of the water and followed the melody, which was easy, considering it got significantly louder when he was out of the waters. As soon as he was out, he snapped his head upwards.

“The waterfall?” he mumbled to himself. With his curiosity gnawing at him, Jongwoon flipped up easily into the air and scaled the waterfall with ease. His eyes widened when he spotted a figure sitting on the large boulder.

He knew this boulder. It was the spot where he likes to sunbathe on. Jongjin and himself used to play at the top of the waterfall a lot, where they would train and spar with each other before collapsing on the large boulder and sunbathing together. It contained a lot of memories.

Now, it was occupied by someone else, and not by anyone else! It was the nine-tailed fox. Jongwoon had thought before that he would be pissed off if someone were to snatch away his brother’s and his favourite spot, but surprisingly, Jongwoon was okay to allow the fox to sit there.

With a few spins and leaps in the air, Jongwoon landed gracefully beside Kyuhyun, his robes slightly touching the other. The turtle sat down beside the fox silently and listened.

Kyuhyun continued to play the wooden instrument. He knew the turtle was there. His senses were not in the least bad at all. In fact, he was one of the best animals in sensing with only just a wag of his tail. But he chose to ignore the presence and continued his piece. It wasn’t like the turtle was disturbing him. He would leave after this anyway.

And so, Kyuhyun finished the piece and his hands lowered down with the flute. Before he could even open his eyes, there was a blast of applause right beside his ear. His eyebrow twitched and slowly turned towards the offending sound. It was the turtle’s clapping hands and grinning face that met his when he finally turned to face him.

“Wow! I didn’t know you were such a great flute player!” Jongwoon finally ceased his clapping and exclaimed his praises. The fox had a poker face on and turned back in front, unacknowledging the turtle.

“Kyuhyun, right? What are you doing here?” Jongwoon tried to strike up another conversation.

“Can’t I be here? Do you want me gone too?” Kyuhyun suddenly spoke, his tone a little rougher than intended, making the turtle flinch.

“Uh no! That wasn’t what I meant!” Jongwoon quickly denied while shaking his head vigorously, his hands in front of him to make sure that the fox understood. The fox did not reply and faced back front. They stayed in awkward silence for a while, Jongwoon not knowing what to say after that weird outburst between the two.

“Hey, d-do you know t-that this boulder was a childhood memory for my brother and I?” Jongwoon wanted to beat himself up for stuttering over his words in such a simple sentence. When Kyuhyun did not answer, Jongwoon took it as a cue to continue, and so he did.

“We used to train and spar on this boulder and this river. We started out as reckless wrestling as baby turtles, often falling off the boulder and getting washed down the waterfall.” Jongwoon chuckled as he reminisced about the good old times.

“We would challenge each other to see who could scale the waterfall and reach this boulder first. Guess what? I thought I was older so I would be stronger. Instead, Jongjin got to the top first because I was so clumsy and keep slipping on the rocks.” Jongwoon laughed at the fond memory.

“Because of my clumsiness, Jongjin is always kind of protective over me in front of strangers. Just like when we first met.” Jongwoon turned to Kyuhyun to see if he had any reaction ever since he started the one-sided chat. But there was none. The fox was still staring into the distance, not having any reaction whatsoever. Jongwoon wasn’t even sure the fox had heard a single word.

“But don’t underestimate me! I’m still strong though!” Jongwoon puffed up his chest and hit it twice with confidence. Kyuhyun was, however, still ignoring him.

All of a sudden, Kyuhyun snapped his head towards him, surprising the turtle.

“Wha-” The fox gave him a smirk and disappeared with another whirl of autumn leaves.

“What’s with him?” The turtle blinked in confusion.

*.*

“I assure you that none of those rumours are true. Don’t worry, I will not let anyone hurt us.” This was the umpteenth time Leeteuk had said to the animals that had visited him this whole morning and afternoon about the rumours of the kitsune eating young animals.

“Having a hard time?” Leeteuk initially thought it was Heechul but the voice did not match, so he tiredly raised his head up to see his visitor.

“Kyuhyun? Why are you here?” Leeteuk asked the lavender robed man, who had sauntered his way into the headquarters.

“Was finding something to do,” Kyuhyun replied, nodding towards the bulletin board nearby.

“So, you’ve heard?” Leeteuk asked.

“Heechul told me,” Kyuhyun replied as he followed Leeteuk to the bulletin board.

“It’s Heechul hyung to you.” Another voice joined in and Leeteuk was sure that it was the cat this time. The black cat sauntered the same way in and joined them at the bulletin board. At his words, Kyuhyun just shrugged.

“Anyway, I’ll explain it to you in case Heechul missed out any information,” Leeteuk said, gaining a playful smack on the shoulder.

“This is our bulletin board where the headquarters will put up ‘jobs’ for the residents here to pick up if they are bored. They are ranked from 1 star to 6 stars. 1 star being the easiest job, usually taken up by adolescents. You-” Leeteuk was explaining half way when Kyuhyun cut in.

“Whatever. Just give me all the hunting jobs. I’m itching to hunt.” Kyuhyun growled at the last words. However, Leeteuk and Heechul were unfazed.

“Right. There are jobs like these, which satisfy the omnivores’ and carnivores’ urge to hunt and spill some blood.” Leeteuk stated like he did not just said something gory. The duck turned to the bulletin board and pulled out a few job lists.

“Our warehouse is running low on food. You can go on supply hunt.” Leeteuk hands the lists over to Kyuhyun for him to look through.

“These will be fine for now. I expect a greater challenge and more blood to spill the next time I request for a mission.” Kyuhyun scanned through the lists and nodded.

“Okay. You know what to do right?” Leeteuk asked.

“Yeah, to wear the star armband, right?” Kyuhyun plucks one of the armbands which had one golden star hanging off on the stands beside the bulletin board.

“Yes. This is to notify the residents that you are on supply hunt and not going berserk and killing whatever animals you find in the forest. We still need to keep the population balance you see.” Leeteuk explained.

“Bring the supply to the warehouse after you’re done and report back here.” Heechul piped in.

“See you.” Kyuhyun nodded to the founders and started to leave.

“Wait!” Leeteuk called out to the fox, making him stop in his tracks.

“About those rumours… Please ignore them. I know it’s not true.” Leeteuk sighed, his tone filled with guilt. Kyuhyun’s posture was relaxed. He slightly turned his head and the founders could only see one side of his face. Kyuhyun’s lips curved up into a smirk and disappeared, leaving a trail of autumn leaves behind.

“Why did you say we are low on food?” Heechul asked when he was sure that Kyuhyun was out of hearing and sight.

“When Kyuhyun is back with supply, the residents would see that he is contributing to the town and not harming it. I want the rumours to stop.” Leeteuk let out a huge sigh and returned back to his seat.

“You’re working hard in making them trust him.” Heechul pointed out plainly.

“I don’t know why. But I think Kyuhyun can be a great asset to our town.” Leeteuk clutched the fabric of his robes where his heart would be.

“I trust you Teuk. You always have good judgement. Just look at all of the animals that joined us.” Heechul placed a comforting hand on the duck’s shoulder.

“Not always though.” Leeteuk suddenly lowered his head, his blond hair covering his eyes, while Heechul’s hand slowly slide down and away from his shoulder, knowing where Leeteuk was going.

“I’m sorry.”