couldn't get it out of my head so I just had to write it!

A/N: 

I am giving some light to the characters that haven't gotten much light in BWBW, focusing a lot of Jeno and Haechan. 
If anyone of you have read "Welcome to Ashgate", you'll be rather accustomed to the new character that will be adding. 

This short fic will be focused on friends, family, maybe a tad bit romance, but because I am consistently stressed: crack. lol

If you read it, do leave a comment and try to not be a silent reader. 

Sending love. xoxo 

In the year of 4057, Neo Culture Training Center has become its own standalone agency for players. It has been seven years. This was a good thing, everyone getting to stay with their friends without having to move to different teams and continuously have to make….

“New family members,” Jaemin preached. “We need more new family members in the NCT Training Center.”

Kyungsoo leaned back on the swivel chair, turning sharply towards Jaemin’s eager gaze. Jaemin was still playing in the arena and teaching students at the center alongside of Jeno (he was a… professor, as he would proudly announce to everyone), however, as a man who liked to plan ahead (as in retirement plan, marriage plan, children plan) for the far future – he insisted to do more than just play and teach on the arena.

Jaemin wanted a pay raise. He wanted one because, he stated, he would want to have kids in two years with his girlfriend and they would have to start saving.

Therefore, he would like to market NCT Center. Like a ing product you’d buy over everything else in the supermarket, he said drunkenly to Kyungsoo when he proposed it to him at a bar.

Kyungsoo agreed. It’s not like he ever cared about marketing or about the intake of students of NCT Training Center. He had always guessed that they were reputable enough to draw children in.

“So you think we need more young players?”

“Good students,” Jaemin emphasized. “Star students.”

“Are you saying our students are not good enough?” Kyungsoo asked, taken aback by Jaemin’s emphasis. He thought the grandmaster players were pretty good – no doubt. They all ranked top of the Grandmaster tier of whole of South Korea.

“They are good, they just aren’t…. They don’t have that blingaring star quality. They’re boring, Kyungsoo,” Jaemin made a gun sign and pointed it towards his head. “It’s like they are a bunch of Jenos.”

“Hey!” Jeno grunted from the side, looking up from his book.

Jaemin ignored him. “We need spice. Back when we were solely playing, the training center got most of its income from fan presents and them buying our merch. Even our fancams! We don’t do that anymore!”

The industry of ‘The Battle of Peril’ has always been intense and people regarded it as some Olympic team sport. However, through the seven years, the hype was more focused on more player cams. Therefore, everyone trained harder and more rigorously, cutting all the “celebrity events” away from their agenda.

“You want to put our students into a marketing campaign, even when their priority should be to focus on training? Johnny would not like that,” Kyungsoo snipped. Jaemin rolled his eyes before staring at Kyungsoo.

“Who cares about what Johnny likes? Before, Jung Jaehyun was “the face”,” Jaemin made quotation marks in the air, “of the training center—"

“Actually, it was Taeyong,” Jeno interjected.

“— Who do we have now? Kim Bunny and her massive face on the train stations, repping a new brand of lollipop?”

“I think it’s cute,” Jeno hummed mindlessly, eyes gliding across the book. Kim Bunny did get a side job advertising lollipop. She started a Tiktok channel reviewing all of them. The other day, Jeno had to bring her to the closest hospital because she claimed she was “crashing from sugar”.

She was. The doctor said even though she had quite a high metabolism, she was on the highway towards diabetes and health problems.

“How am I supposed to have kids? They are expensive!” Jaemin wailed. “If I don’t do well, how am I supposed pay for their education?”

“Just leave them in the landfill like my mother did to me,” Jeno joked.

Jaemin narrowed his eyes on Jeno, about to attack his mouth-full-of- of a best friend when Kyungsoo cleared his throat.

“Okay.” Kyungsoo gave a single nod. “Find me a player. Find me someone marketable. Someone with the… blingaring star quality. Once you find me three of them, you get a pay raise.”

“Good. Right on it.” Jaemin clapped his hands in the air with joyousness then stalked out of the room.

“Jeno?” Kyungsoo said softly, Jeno humming in return with his eyes glued to the book. “The crazy person has just walked out of the room.”

“Oh.” Jeno murmured, closing the book shut with a snap. “Well. Thank you for your time, Headmaster. I I sure hope the meeting was fruitful.”

“Jeno! Where are you!” Jaemin’s voice erupted from beyond the office.

“I’ll be on my way.”

With a charming smile, Jeno exited the office.

[Guy just wants kids]

Professors Lounge

By the time Jeno found Jaemin, he was sitting in the lounge were all the professors would sit during lunch time. Bunny, his girlfriend, bounced over to him to give him a kiss. She aimed for his lips but got his Adams apple instead. To correct it, she rubbed his Adam’s apple with a finger and reached up to place that finger on his lips as if to transfer the kiss.

“How’s your detox on sugar going?” Haechan asked his best friend when he entered, Bunny shrugging.

“It ain’t bad.”

Well, of course it wasn’t bad. She had hidden skittles inside her bra.  Jeno pretended not to know about it. He knew better than to question her and must deal with her lips turning down. People like Bunny had to suffer more than once to understand that something was bad for her.

“Good. Sugar is bad for you.” Haechan grabbed an apple, bit into it and left.

“I still don’t know where to find a player with the star quality,” Jaemin was telling Yuta who was pretending to listen. “How hard can it be?”

“Ask Oh Dana. Isn’t she a star back in Shanghai now?”

Jaemin’s eyes widened. Oh Dana had quit being a player full-time. Her marriage with Johnny was six years ago when she was promoted to Legend and in one game she played alongside of him. She came back with a broken nose, freaked out, and got a rhinoplasty.

Because being a player would most likely lead to be slammed onto the ground and turrets, Dana quit to preserve her new nose and became a beauty blogger. She now had eight million followers, aliens and humans combined.

But because she was a player, she posted lifestyle blogs of her playing in the arena whenever she came back to visit to show her audience that “she still got it”, on some days it would be her doing pilates, or something physically challenging.

“Let me call her.” Jaemin lifted up his phone and call her.

It took her two seconds to answer, her face clear on his phone screen. She was under the hot sun.

“Did Johnny tell you to call me?” she demanded, everyone feeling the immediate tension in the air.

Just because two people got married did not mean that they’d stop fighting.

“No?” Jaemin replied.

“Hi Dana! Whatcha doing?” Bunny asked from across the table, her eyes sparkle. She leaned over and Jaemin and Yuta got an eyeful of skittles.

“Hey Bunz,” Dana greeted. “I’m here lining up for the iPHONE X Thousand and One. I’ve been here since morning and people keep pushing. My secretary gave up since the first day and quit so now I must line up all on my own to get myself a new phone. The aliens here have deployed their alien gang and are fighting against humans to be the first to get their hands on it.”

“Didn’t you just buy the iPhone X Thousand, like, a year ago?” Bunny asked, Dana shrugging.

“Yeah, time for a change, don’t you think? Anyway, Jaems, what do you need help with?”

“I need to find someone of a star quality, Dana.”

“Thank god, all the current plays right now are stale as . Like bread. A bunch of Jenos, I told Johnny.”

Jeno glared at the phone in Jaemin’s hand.

“Is Jeno there with you? Nevermind, like I care if he hears. Hey Jeno!”

“Hey Dana…” Jeno’s voice trailed.

“See? Even his greetings are boring. How I wish you’d have a twin I can converse with Jeno. I’d love to talk to another you who has both the looks and the personality. Anyway,” Dana paused. “That’s what you need, Nana. You need someone with a personality!”

Jaemin and Dana conversed for a while, talking about what personality entailed. Did they have to be bold? Charming? Sweet? All of them, Dana said. They had to be all of them.

Jeno draped an arm around his girlfriend, nonchalantly when he saw her sneak a skittle into . He found humor in how she thought she could fool him.

“What should we eat for dinner today?” he asked Bunny who jumped like a deer caught in headlines. “Should we eat at the cafeteria or go out?”

“Huh?” Bunny’s voice rose nervously, a hand pressing against her chest. “Oh. Sure. If that’s what you want.”

“Anyway, thanks Dana. When are you going to come to visit, by the way?”

“Whenever Johnny wants me back,” Dana snapped. “Haven’t talked to him for three days. He didn’t even text me.”

“Maybe you blocked him? Like you always do?” Yuta voiced.

“Oh . Wait. I think I di—” The phone went dead.

Jaemin pocketed his phone. “That is that.”

Jeno wanted to see if Bunny forgot. She did.

He did not blame her. Sometimes Bunny would even forget her real name.

He gave a sigh as he massaged his shoulder, staring straight at the mirror. He had lost all his baby fat throughout the years. His eyes were tired, but still full of life. There was something about him that he could not put a finger on.

Mature. Yes, he had grown more mature.

That is why he would not make a big deal out of Bunny forgetting their seventh-year anniversary. He was too mature for that.

Going down to cafeteria to eat dinner with all of them instead of going out as they did every year. To which, every year, it was Jeno planning it because Bunny could not plan for anything even if her life depended on it.

A month before this, she missed her flight by three days. Jeno has heard of someone missing their flight for “a few hours” but seventy-two hours was insane. She insisted that she did not forget. She just missed it.

“Hi hi!” she chirped, sticking her head through the door. “Time to eat!”

Jeno turned to look at her, her chubby cheeks smiling so wide he did not have the heart to break it to her.

“Time to eat,” he repeated. Leaving the room, Bunny waited for him to offer her his hand. He did, as usual and she tightened her grip. She bounced alongside of him, chattering on and on about what happened throughout the day.

“Nabi unnie and Jaehyun oppa fought again.”

“About marriage?” Jeno asked. The topic of Nabi and Jaehyun had been a hot one.

Dana and Johnny were always on a rough patch, so no one ever took their fights seriously. Nabi and Jaehyun hardly fought – even if they did, Nabi would put Jaehyun in his place rather quickly.

“Yeah. He just really wants to get married. Nabi unnie came into my room last night and asked to sleep on Dana’s bed.”

“Huh, was the fight that bad?” Jeno asked, Bunny shrugging.

“You know Nabi unnie. She stands her ground and if she makes up her mind, she won’t budge.”

“Did she mention why she doesn’t want to marry him?”

“She just murmured, “Not like this”. Aera did not press her, too.  We both are very scared whenever Nabi unnie is angry.”

Jeno understood. Nabi’s anger was a quiet and cold, until unless Jisung was involved. Nabi’s anger whenever Jisung was picked on or not treated well was like an explosion of lava from a volcano. Other times, he knew she was an observer and would state facts, not insults.

Bunny fell quiet, Jeno noticing it the moment her energy shifted. He turned to see her, noticing her thinking face.

“You’re thinking about when we’re going to get married,” Jeno stated.

By this time, he knew her like the back of his hand. Bunny’s thoughts never strayed far from the conversation. She wasn’t like Jaemin. If they were talking about hamburgers, Bunny would be thinking of hamburgers. If he was talking to Jaemin about hamburgers, Jaemin would be thinking of a peacock.

The topic this time was marriage.

Bunny let out a dry laugh. “N’awwww, Jeno, I’m just wondering what it would be like. If it would be with you or—”

Jeno felt offended. “If it would be with… Of course it’ll be with me, Bunny. What are you saying?”

“I…” Bunny paused. “Seven years is a long time, Jeno.”

Jeno blinked, knowing where she was getting at. She let out a sigh, the cafeteria coming to sight. People were laughing. Haechan was telling another one of his stories – he had just recently got engaged to a girl named Sunshine who was playing for the team in Thailand.

He met her years ago when they went for a game in the Arena of Siam. They exchanged emails and a few days after he came back to Korea, he took a flight back to Thailand just so he could bring her on a date.

Lee Haechan was absolutely smitten by her.

Seven years after, they got engaged and their engagement was blasted on bulletin boards, Haechan professing his love for her for the whole nation of South Korea to see.

Maybe it was because everyone’s relationship was developing to the next step. Jeno never really had the conversation with Bunny – he did not know how to.

Sitting down, they began to eat. Taeyong waved at them, telling them about one of his assassin players got nominated as the “The Most Talented Player” of 4057.

“Who is it?” Bunny asked, chewing on her salad.

“Who else would it be? It’s Shin Aera’s brother.” Taeyong jerked his head to the Control Center Head who could be seen doting on a younger boy. “Hey! Shin Aro!”

Jeno remembered Aro when he first came to the center. He was a boy who wore all green and befriended Tae-il pretty fast. For one point in time, they all thought he’d man the creature cage, but he ended up being one hell of an assassin.

Aro bowed at Taeyong, focusing back to his sister who was talking to him.

“Kinda reminds me of you, eh?” Taeyong asked, motioning to Jeno. “He used to talk a lot. Now he just sits and stares at me when I talk.”

“Jeno never talks a lot.” Jaemin slid into a seat. “That’s why I say we need to—”

“I know. Kyungsoo mentioned. A marketing campaign. Star player.” Taeyong reached over and patted Jaemin’s hand twice. “You’ll figure out a way. Besides, aren’t you both playing against YG tomorrow?”

“Yes. The press is going to be there, so I pushed to play. Marketing, y’know?” Jaemin frowned then looked at Jeno. “Wait…”

Jeno shook his head warningly at Jaemin. Don’t say it. Don’t say it. Don’t say it.

Jaemin did not get the point.

“Why are you both here and not out celebrating your seventh year anniversary?”

Jeno pursed his lips. Bunny froze.

“Oh no!” Bunny wailed, both hands tugging on her pigtails. “I forgot our seventh-year anniversary!”

“I-I…” Bunny heaved, burying her face