Title: drenched, drownded

pg-13, adventure, hurt/comfort
(MAMA!AU) After a mission on earth gone horribly wrong, EXO-K is missing and feared dead. EXO-M is tasked with the impossible; to bring the 12 back together and come out of Earth alive. What makes it worse - EXO-K's powers are now corrupted, and they would stop at nothing to kill EXO-M. 

We troubadours and poets sing.
That love is all and everything.
We promise you, all human kind.
Tomorrow will be fine.
Live in glass and live in stone.

-       IU, Age of Cathedrals

Chapter 8

The signs of trouble stirred quickly. The gush of water from the pipes suddenly squirted in sporadic bursts in all directions, as the water around the mouth of the pipe started to crystallise into ice.  Xiu Min.

“Not another fight,” Luhan murmured to himself, desperation in his voice. He backed away, wringing his hands behind his back, as if it was a training he could choose to opt out from. Electricity cackled in the air, sending goose bumps tingling down their flesh. In the distance, forked lightning branched against the rapidly darkening sky. Chen. The percussion drum of thunder that rolled a second later seemed to cause the earth to tremble, deafening them.

There had to be someone between the two of them to be responsible, and it appeared that Luhan had pushed the job to Kris. “It’s a warning from them,” Kris inferred cautiously. “I need you here, Luhan.”

“What about Lay?”

Kris looked around, doing a three-sixty. The wooden shed was just begging to be reduced to sticks. “He needs to get out—never mind, he knows.” They saw a figure running quickly into the cover the forest provided. Lay gave them a wave, and pointed to his eyes and then at them (I’ll be watching you) before the darkness swallowed him whole.

Then, the wind picked up. It started with a violent howl and suddenly died. The process repeated. It was not natural.

“Sehun.” A faint look of wonder appeared on Luhan’s white face. “Kris, Sehun’s here! He’s on Earth and he’s fine!”

Xiu Min came first. He ran towards them and momentum carried him forwards so that he had slammed Luhan into the ground. Luhan was unprepared, giving a shout, limbs flailing. Xiu Min wrestled Luhan down into a half-hug, half-grip. He was the only one who ever dared to manhandle Luhan, not fooled once into thinking the latter was as delicate as he looked.

“We found Sehun,” Xiu Min began. “But you already know that.” He stared straight at Kris. With that nonchalant tone of voice though, he could have been talking about the weather. “You need to be on your guard. He tried to hurt us when he saw us.”

Luhan’s eyes flashed immediately. “Did you do something to him?” And then, “Ow ow! Yah, Xiu Min!”

“Of course we didn’t,” replied Xiu Min indignantly. “It was temporary. I don’t know; something is causing him to flare up and act weird. It’s like passing moments of seizure. I just came ahead to warn you. Be on your guard.”

Kris had other priorities. “Did Tao or Chen get hurt?”

Xiu Min shook his head. He slowly released his grip, rolling his eyes at the exaggerated sounds Luhan was making consequently. “Tao disappeared into time about halfway back.”

Disappearing into time was something only the time traveller could do from time to time; vanishing into the past or the future. Occasionally he did it for pleasure, if he could get away with it, but sometimes a look of urgency dawned on his face and he would be gone.

 “Ah, we didn’t get any food,” realised Xiu Min belatedly, as he looked around. Like he expected, the news of Sehun eclipsed their dire food status. Still, Kris managed to spare him a slightly disapproving glance. Xiu Min shrugged back. “Where’s Lay? He shouldn’t be inside that shed; it’s not safe.”

“He went into the forest for cover,” Luhan interjected, a bit absent-mindedly, still wide-eyed. He would see Sehun soon.

The two did not expect the horrific expression. “No! Sehun – well, normal Sehun – was telling us about EXO-K’s crash landing. Chanyeol is there.”

“That’s –”

“– not good!” Xiu Min started backing away from Luhan anxiously. “I can’t explain it quickly. Ask Sehun. I’ll get Lay first.”

And he began running again. He did not even spare a glance behind.

Kris and Luhan would have yelled at him, if they had not caught glimpses of a brown and a black head in the distance.

It was disgusting to see.

Chen was sweating profusely. “Something went wrong with him again,” he stated, tiredly, obviously, “after Xiu Min and Tao were gone.”

Sehun was knocked behind his knees, so he was kneeling on the ground. He dug his thin fingers into the dry earth for purchase. There were strings of blood in his saliva that he spat out, before wiping his mouth with the back of his scratched hand. “Hello,” he said viciously, glaring up at Kris.

He deliberately trained his gaze on the leader, ignoring the lithe man behind who was barely breathing at the sight of him. “Where is Lay? Where did Xiu Min go?”

Kris ignored the question. It was too soon to tell whether Sehun was to be trusted and Lay was vulnerable. “What happened to you?”

Chen stood slightly behind Sehun, his feet apart and his arms hanging loose in front of him with ropes of electricity crackling along them. He looked uncomfortable to be using it on another guardian but his jaw was set in weary determination, concentrating on Sehun. Kris forced himself not to look at Luhan either.

Sehun stared, turning the long moment awkward. He was good at that. His face was shut down, unreadable.

“Too much happened?”

Unreadable – to everyone except Luhan.

Luhan’s voice was light, maybe not exactly chirpy, maybe shocked around the edges. He managed to make it seem as if he was striking up a conversation. It was definitely a far cry from the tough stances that the other two had adopted.

“Stand up, Sehun,” Luhan continued; his voice barely a whisper. He took one step forwards, and then another. Sehun’s eyes widened a fraction though he was still looking down. “Let him up, Chen. You’re treating him less than he deserves.”

Sehun squeezed the grass in the fists of his hands. He had dreamt of Luhan’s voice, yearning to here it again – and there it was. Irritable. Oh, so grating to the ears. Pain.

Chen remained unfazed by the frank assessment. Kris bristled on his behalf. “I’m not doing anything to him,” Chen told them.

As Luhan approached closer, Chen could feel the panic almost radiating from the boy. A slight crease appeared between the upturned eyebrows.

Then, Sehun opened the palm of his hand like how a cat would whip out its paw to extend its claws. It happened in barely a blink of an eye; he swiped down in the air and a yell of a man taken by surprised filled the silence between the thunder claps. Deep, crimson lines cut deeply into Luhan’s knees, which were level with Sehun’s hand just now. Luhan fell forwards, his knees buckling in the sudden pain, and Chen’s voice in the background distinctly shouted, “Stop, Kris!”

“Sehun is hurting Luhan! Damned if I’m going to let it escalate!” The voice was a rasp growl, barely man.

There was a lift of an intense gaze that Sehun could feel, as Chen ran pass him and held Kris by the arm. The height difference was of a man and a child. Chen was firm though. “Xiu Min explained it to you, right? It’s still Sehun, just… not him now. You need to cool off. I don’t know how.”

“Go get Xiu Min and Lay,” suggested Luhan, rolling onto his side and sitting up. He examined his knees, in a mildly curious manner. “I wish Suho was here,” he muttered, and only the nearest person could hear him, “I need water to clean these.”

Chen spared Luhan an annoyed glance from behind his shoulder. Love blinds, he thought in frustration. Luhan was purposely ignoring the fact that Sehun just hurt him. They needed to find out what was causing Sehun to act in these moments, like Xiu Min suggested (and Sehun surprisingly made no comment to). How were they going to do that if Luhan would not face the facts?!

No you don’t! Sehun wanted to cry out, but the words got stuck in his throat. He was never one to call attention to himself, preferring the insolent expressions. The chest pains were worse. He gave out a low moan. Before he knew it, the world tilted and he fell onto the ground, curled up into a foetal position.

“Sehun!”

The fingers running in his hair were gentle, meant to soothe rather than anything else practical. “We need Lay,” Sehun heard Chen repeat, frantically.

Sehun was dull in the haze of pain. He needed the bloodshed to vent. But there was something important. Like a drowning man struggling to get to the surface of the water, he forced himself to think.

“Forest. Bad.”

Too painful. There was an overwhelming urge to hurt someone. In a rational state of mind, a person would have thought twice and ignored the momentary rage. But why couldn’t he? Just a flick of the wrist is enough. Yah, why wasn’t anyone listening to him? He should hurt them!

The blast of wind was equivalent to a bomb explosion. Luhan’s ears popped and then a stuffy silence buffered over all other noise. If he hadn’t known better from what Xiu Min just told him, he would have thought Tao slowed down time around him. He made time to see Sehun stagger to his feet, putting his hands onto his thighs as black sweat rolled down his face.

Kris is not okay. The tall boy was thrown back, just like the rest, except his landing was smooth on his feet. It was too dangerous for Chen to be standing so near him. But then time suddenly accelerated forwards, and this time Luhan knew it was no trick of the mind, because in the space of a few seconds replacing the minutes usually required for the transformation, a full-grown dragon was on the ground. What was Tao doing!

The black dragon had a long, slim body that made an ‘S’ shape on the ground. Its legs were thin but muscular, with five digits on each foot and thick black claws extending from each digit that gleamed. The fine scales were as hard as battle armour. They were the colour of cold ashes, fading into darker shades from its spine to its underneath. There was a fin of spikes along its back that moved as it did. The snout was long, with dagger-like teeth revealed as its lips upturned to let loose a growl. The wings were tucked in, but its edges were black and jagged, as if they had been burnt off and never could grow again (Chanyeol was to blame).

Chen looked up at the dragon, his mouth hanging open. He too had been knocked onto his by Sehun’s wind. It was the first time he had seen the dragon up close. Even with all fours on the ground, the dragon towered above him at about six foot.

The dragon moved its head from left to right swiftly, as the pain of the transformation exploded in its mind when it should have been a gradual, relatively painless change. Fear was interjected into Chen’s heart, but he couldn’t move.

“Get out of the way!” Luhan shouted, as he made a movement in the air with his hand. He drew a sharp intake of breath. His power was a mere ripple in the air. With a deafening roar that caused the ground to tremble, the dragon lifted itself on its hind legs. One of its legs came within inches of Chen’s white face.

“Luhan.” A soft whisper. Luhan swivelled around. Sehun had staggered up to his feet. His nose was bleeding from the overexertion of his power. It made his face seem drained out of colour.

Sehun made Kris lose control.

Kris, who had been struggling to keep them together since they arrived, bewildered and more than a little frightened.

Xiu Min and Chen were right.

Something in Luhan snapped. This wasn’t the same Sehun he had cried over, and worked so hard for that glimmer of hope that he would still be alive. When the hand clutched a fistful of the front of his shirt, and narrow brown eyes met doe brown eyes, Sehun merely looked tired. “I thought so,” Sehun said quietly. “You don’t care about me anymore.” All the fight had left him, energy spent with that bomb simulation. Tears started b in his eyes. Like a sledgehammer, Luhan was forcefully reminded at how young Sehun was.

Xiu Min guessed an external factor was affecting Sehun’s behaviour. It’s not as if Sehun was doing it on purpose.

…Right?

“You stupid, stupid boy.” Luhan pushed Sehun back. “Would I really be here if it weren’t for you?”

“EXCUSE ME!” Chen yelled, cupping both hands around his mouth. His face was completely drained of colour. “A DRAGON WENT INTO THE HUMAN FOREST!”

A/N: The image for this chapter is the hint for the next chapter. I'm on tenderhooks for university offers, please wish me luck~ I can't write as often or as lengthy chapters - with this story being so complicated - so with whatever I have that I deem good enough for the story, I'll post it up! Rewrote this chapter for weeks. So here's the Hunhan meeting. Whoosh. It was so hard to try to keep everyone in character. How can Sehun or Chen, who speak the least, have so much screen time? T__T Still featuring olderbrother!Xiu Min and wearyleader!Kris.

To everyone who commented on the April Fool's chapter, thanks for entertaining this author's whim to post it up :) 

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