Mai stared in horror and scrambled backwards as they forced Zico away. He was glaring daggers at her and baring his teeth. She shivered and slid as far away as she could.

"Alright, guys, let's just calm down," one boy said. He was rather short, but he had a cute baby face that did not match the eyebrow piercing, arm tattoos, and spacers in his ears. "We're scaring her."

"Who gives a crap?" Zico snarled, trying to jerk out of their grip. "She stole my diamonds. MY ING DIAMONDS!!! This chick is NOT leaving this ship alive!"

"Don't be ridiculous, Zico." One suddenly snapped in a quiet, cool voice. "You think killing her would solve anything? Besides, since when have you ever killed anyone?"

As if by magic, all of them calmed down. Zico was still breathing heavily, his white contact lenses flashing as he glared at Mai with all the conviction of a hellspawned demon. "Fine, B-Bomb," he growled, clenching and unclenching his fists. "But make no mistake, I can kill her if I TRIED. We're throwing her overboard right now."

"Are you kidding me?" The handsome boy with the dark, messy, ponytailed hair jumped up as though stung by a wasp. "Throw a defenseless girl into the ocean? I can't allow that, it goes against my morals."

"What morals?" Zico snapped back. "We can still see Vietnam, she won't have to swim far."

"Uh, guys, I don't think she's fit to swim anywhere." Mai stared as one boy with spiky hair and extremely muscled and toned arms walked towards her. She flinched and tried to drag herself away.

He flashed her a mega-watt smile that temporarily blinded her, and bent down. "Looks like she twisted her leg bad." He gently touched her ankle, and Mai hissed in pain.

"Ouch, looks like it hurts." The boy looked at her closely, his eyes landing on her hair. "Is that a wig too?"

Mai reached up and patted her hair. "This? Are you kidding me? Of course it's real." She fought back the urge to roll her eyes. Why on earth would she wear another wig underneath another one? Honestly.

The boy smiled again, his whole face lighting up. "SHE'S A KEEPER!"

"SHUT UP U-KWON!!!" Zico yelled. "And why should I care if she twisted her ankle or not? She can still swim, can't she?"

"Hyung, we can't just leave her to fend for herself!" A tall boy with long blonde hair was protesting. "It's kind of our fault that we got her injured, anyway."

Zico grabbed the boy by the collar. "I'm not saying this again. We are throwing her over --"

"Zico, enough." This was the red-haired boy speaking. Mai stared in bewilderment at them all. Although she always thought the chicken-chaser was kind of an idiot, he was serious now and definitely not smiling. "We may be pirates, but we are not leaving a girl behind when she's in pain. The least we can do is heal her wound and then drop her off at the next port."

Zico glared at them all, before muttering "Then keep her out of my way," before stomping to the inside of the boat. Mai could distinctly hear a door slam downstairs.

"Ignore him, he's just grumpy," the red-haired weirdo said cheerfully. "I'm Kyung by the way. And you're the cutie who tripped the chicken."

"Yeah ..." Mai mumbled, feeling her heart start to beat normally. so they WEREN'T going to throw her off the boat?

"P.O! Jaehyo! You lucky tall bastards! Move her downstairs!" Kyung commanded.

"You're not in charge of us!" The tall blonde stuck out his tongue in a surprisingly cute way.

"I am Zico's best friend, and as a result, I am in charge when my hubby is in a bad mood!" Kyung said smugly. "Now come on! And be gentle!"

"Right!" The blonde boy with the weird eyepatch bent down next to her and smiled cheerfully. "Hello! I'm P.O, the maknae of Block B! What's your name, thief lady?"

"M-Mai ..." she stammered.

"Mai? Cool. This is gonna hurt, so hold on."

"W-what's going to huUUAAAAAGH!!!!" Mai shrieked as waves of pain shot up her body. P.O and the other handsome guy (who was probably called Jaehyo) had lifted her up.

"Careful, es!" The megawatt-smiley boy looked horrified. "You're hurting my potential soulmate!"

What did he just say? Mai glared at him and opened to tell him off, but instead all she said was "EuughWAAAAAGH!!!" As they accidentally jolted her ankle.

"Watch it, you two!" The tattooed/pierced boy said. He shot Mai an apologetic glance. "Sorry about those two. They aren't the best people to trust in a dangerous time, but they are the tallest and strongest. I'm Taeil, by the way." He gave her a little smile, and Mai decided that maybe, just maybe, there was a normal person on this boat.

"Here," he dug in his pocket and fished out a lollipop. "This will help."

Mai hesitantly took the lollipop and stared incredulously at him. "Are you kidding me? CANDY will help me?"

Taeil stared at her as though she just said something ludicrous. "Of course it will."

Mai hesitantly took off the wrapper, sighing when the one person she thought was sane turned out to be just as weird as the others. She stared at the lollipop, unsure.

"Are you sure this will really --" Mai started to say, but P.O and Jaehyo began to carry her down the steps to the interior of the boat, and each jolt brought severe pain to her ankle. She quickly shoved the lollipop in , and the sweet taste of strawberry exploded on her tongue.

It DID help the pain. Just a little.

"Watch it, you guys," The smiley guy warned them. "You're being careless."

"We're totally watching i -- oh, sorry," P.O yelped as they accidentally smacked Mai's foot on a wall. Mai shut her eyes tightly, her head swimming with pain. Black spots swam in front of her vision.

They finally brought her into a room and gently laid her down on something. Mai blinked away the spots and realized it was a kitchen, and they had set her down onto the smooth wooden table.

"Okay, which one of us knows first aid?" Taeil announced to the five boys currently crowded in the kitchen. They all stared at him blankly.

"Okay, looks like I'll have to do it. Kyung, go get the first aid kit."

"Hey, I'm the first mate!" Kyung protested, pouting childishly. "I should be the one ordering people around!"

"Never mind. P.O."

P.O blinked at him. "Do we even have a first aid kit?"

"Okay, never mind. B-Bomb."

The serious, silent boy Mai didn't know the name of (but was apparently called 'B-Bomb') nodded and disappeared.

"Sorry about this, Mai," Taeil said politely, wincing as he took off the deathly high heel on Mai's injured foot and pulling up the dress to somewhere shin-length so her ankle was free. "We aren't exactly the best people to trust with injuries."

Mai couldn't help but snort despite the pain. "You guys are seriously pirates? You're the most awkward, ridiculous pirates I've ever seen. And you're all really young too. Why is that?"

"It was Zico's idea," Jaehyo explained, sitting down on the benches. He flashed her a charming smile, one that no doubt had stolen many young girl's hearts at one point, and Mai flushed despite herself. "He thinks the younger you are, the more chance you'd have fooling adults. Plus, you'd be younger, healthier, and faster too. "He found us all in South Korea. Most of us were homeless, or in orphanages. We all met him in certain ways that made him decide he wanted us for his crew --"

"Jaehyo hyung hacked his Twitter account," P.O added with a foolish grin. He pulled off the eyepatch, and Mai saw that the hidden eye looked perfectly normal. What was the eyepatch for? 

Jaehyo's cheeks turned pink. "P.O, shut your face!"

P.O ignored him and kept talking. "Zico got pissed off and snuck into a government building and used their machines to track him down. Then he beat up hyung. Then hyung got pissed off back and hacked into his bank account next."

"For the love of god, P.O, I will cut off all your hair in your sleep if you don't shut that giant gaping pie-hole you call a mouth ..."

"So Zico hyung ended up losing more than half of his stolen savings. So he tracked down Jaehyo hyung again, except this time he asked him to join his pirate crew."

Mai turned back to Jaehyo, unable to stop being curious. She had a feeling they were only talking to distract her from her pain, and it was actually working. "And you accepted?"

Jaehyo shrugged. "It sounded fun. And even better, no nosy old nuns in smelly, damp children's homes would be scolding me for my computer genius."

Mai frowned. She didn't quite know what to expect with these weird, hyperactive boys. "What'll I do when my ankle heals? How will I get home?"

Taeil shrugged, looking sympathetic. "I'm not really sure. I don't think Zico and his pirate pride will let us turn around and drop you back off at Vietnam. I'd say your ankle will be fine in a week or two, and if we were heading up the map, there are plenty of Chinese ports we could've dropped you off at, but unfortunately, we're heading down to Malaysia. I don't know when you're able to get off."

Mai felt a lump in her chest when she thought of the weeks she'll be away from her leaky old home, cranky Miss Chau, and her best friend Lien. Weeks without the fun of scamming a naive or foolish person, or the thrill of being chased by Tuan's furious men. All that money, sitting in her account. Gone to waste.

Then a hand landed on her head. She turned to see U-Kwon, smiling adorably at her. She looked up at the hand he placed on top of her head. "Why is your hand in my hair?"

"It's short," he said gleefully, running his hands through her hair. "I can't stand it when girls have long hair. It's so suffocating and heavy and thick and I don't like it. Short hair is pretty, YOU'RE pretty. I'm so glad you're the one that Zico got cheated, Mai Darling!"

Mai froze. "Wait ... w-what did you call me?" She felt a dark, heavy blush crawl it's way up her neck to her cheeks and forehead. He did not just call her such a cringy, cheesy, shudder-inducing nickname ... did he?

"Mai Darling," he repeated, looking completely proud of himself. "It's quite clever, isn't it, Mai Darl --"

Mai's fist made contact with the side of his face. U-Kwon staggered backwards.

"I WILL MURDER YOU IF YOU CALL ME THAT AGAIN!!!" Mai shrieked, trying to ignore the sniggers and snorts coming from the rest of the pirates in the vicinity.

"Whyyyyy?" U-Kwon wailed, clutching his injured jaw and looking around frantically for someone sympathetic. "B-BOMB!!! B-BOMB!!! Mai Darling just hit me! Why, what did I ever do wrong?"

B-Bomb had just walked in, carrying the first aid kit. Without a word, he handed it to Taeil, completely ignoring U-Kwon.

U-Kwon hung his head sadly and turned to Kyung instead. "Why is everyone so mean to me?"

Kyung cheerfully clapped a hand on his back. "I dunno, ol' buddy, but I think you just ruined any chance of being romantically together with Mai after making up that nickname."

Mai winced a bit more as Taeil wrapped up her leg. "You should be glad you didn't cut it somewhere," Taeil said, worry in his voice. "It might get infected, and I'm just not sure how we can deal with that."

"Yeah, no ... it's fine. Thanks, I guess." Mai scowled and chomped viciously at her lollipop as she realized something. "Oh, great. I was all prepared to hate you guys for kidnapping me and taking me from my home, and now I can't really find it in my heart to be terrible, because you just helped me out. Thanks a lot, Taeil."

Taeil gave her a smile and patted her on the shoulder softly. "Don't worry about it, Mai. I can assure you, you'll have plenty of reasons to hate us by the time this trip is over." 

I've just recovered from a fever. Ugh, it's terrible. Now I keep coughing and it feels like my throat's on fire. Bleeegh.

Anyway, I technically should be updating Hey, Boys! because of the pattern, but I really had no ideas. So Block B comes first :D