First Arc: Fraternity or...Sorority?

Act I: The Lee Family

Scene Three

“So is he the guy?” Xiumin asked casually, sitting down on the couch between Baekhyun and Chanyeol.

Groaning, Baekhyun replied, “He seems to be. Are you doing this to piss me off or—“

“I’m doing this to tease you,” Xiumin cut him off.

Kyungsoo had just laid down a bowl of fresh strawberries on the center table. Kris’ hand was already diving into the sea of berries in a second when Xiumin slapped the blond’s hand and lifted the bowl off the table then placing it on his lap.

“You know they are mine!” Kris hissed at Xiumin.

Xiumin rewarded him with a poker face. Not like he cared. Anyway, Xiumin grabbed a berry and shoved it into Chanyeol’s mouth. Surprised, Chanyeol stared at Xiumin with those big eyes of his and swallowed the fruit as a whole. Choking and pounding an arm against his chest like Tarzan, he asked Kyungsoo to give him a glass of water. However, Kyungsoo meaningfully rolled his eyes to look at Baekhyun. Chanyeol then turned to look at Baekhyun, who glared at him and made a slashing motion across his neck to emphasize his point while mouthing the words ‘Go to hell!’

Lay, out of pity, stood up and went to the kitchen to bring poor Chanyeol a glass of water. While he was away familiarizing himself with the kitchen—the place that would soon be his kingdom—the other boys were talking all sassily about him.

“Foreigner,” Kai sighed, splaying his arms over the back of the couch across from the one where Xiumin, Chanyeol, and Baekhyun sat. “He doesn't know Korean.”

“He knows Chinese!” said Tao.

“How would he get along with us then?” Chen raised the question. Everyone stared at him. Well, that would be a problem, right? Communication, that is.

“Well, we can teach him little by little!” Chanyeol offered.

“You seem so enthusiastic about it,” said Chen, raising a brow. He felt rather disappointed.

“Of course! I mean, we have a new brother!”

Sehun butted in, not daring to hide the grimace that was contorting his proud ulzzang face. “That would mean a new favorite.”

Baekhyun nodded and pointed an accusing finger at Lay who was already starting to walk out of the kitchen. “A new competitor.”

“Well, that's the challenge!” Kai clapped his hands to make his point. Seeing their disapproving faces, Kai pouted his lips. “What? Don't you want it?”

Lay returned and handed the glass of water to Chanyeol, who received it merrily. All the boys watched and listened to him noisily gulp the clear liquid.

“Pig!” Baekhyun exclaimed.

Ignoring Baekhyun's squeak, Kyungsoo narrowed his eyes at Kai and said, “You say that because you're bored.” Apparently, everyone had already expected Kai's reaction. After all, he was always bored and could do nothing but plan the craziest and most evil schemes and played pranks on everyone in the house whenever he felt like doing it.

“No, I'm not. I'm pretty busy myself.”

“If I were you—“

“Guys!” Suho interrupted. His brows had become one and the creases on his forehead were so evident the other boys had to worry about his health status. Upon reflex, Kris actually had his iPhone5 ready, his fingers poised to press the green button whenever they had a need of an ambulance. “Would you just shut up for a while? We're not gathered here to argue about the inheritance. We're here to get—“

“Yeah, we know that already. Who's the new jerk anyway?” said Chen, clearly irritated already.

“Chen!” Suho snapped.

Chen shrugged. “Was just saying.”

Suho sighed, running a hand over his face. “Well, I believe Kyungsoo or Kris can translate for him.”

Kris shot Suho a death glare, which made the smaller man cower in awkwardness. “I'm not doing that.”

Shifting to his dog eyes, Suho turned to the one person he thought who would. “Kyungsoo?”

Kyungsoo had his mouth opened into a wide ‘O’ when Luhan raised his arm like a student reciting in class, his voice raised into a girly squeal. “Oh, I'll do it!”

Suho frowed at Luhan. “Are you sure, Luhan?”

“Why not?”

“Because you're disastrous,” Sehun remarked, his eyes shooting daggers at Lay, who in turn was very oblivious to the younger’s murderous glare.

Offended, Luhan said defensively, “My Korean's quite perfect!”

Turning to look at Luhan properly, Sehun told him frankly, “I don't mean your Korean. I mean your attitude. Just don't get too attached.”

Kris crossed his arms across his chest and looked down at Luhan, as if challenging him. “Let him be. He knows what he's doing.”

Luhan groaned.

Kai exclaimed, “And it'd be fun!”

Feeling that it was the right time for him to speak, Lay started with the introductions in English. “So I'm Zhang Yixing. Call me Lay please.”

Chen rolled his eyes. “He uses ‘please’. Sooooo polite.”

This time, it was Xiumin’s turn to reprimand the singer. “CHEN!”

Kris raised an eyebrow at Chen, a sarcastic smile lighting up his face. Luhan could tell Kris was having his share in this fun-slash-bullying-game perpetrated by the Demon King. "You understood what he said? Since when have you gotten good in your language skills, huh, Chenchen?"

“Anyway I'm not interested in this. I’m leaving.” Chen turned around and detached himself from the group. He grabbed his jacket from the nearby racks and went out of the house, slamming the door behind him.

“CHEN!” Xiumin called, following suit. “Come back! Chen!”

Luhan stood closer to Lay and wrapped an arm around the boy’s shoulders. “I'm sorry, Lay, but Chen can really be problematic sometimes.”

“What do you mean sometimes?” Sehun asked. “That's all he's ever been!”

“Ssshh!” It was Kai. “No warring. We wouldn't want to scare Lay away, would we?”

Fortunately, Suho found his voice again amidst the chaos. “Quiet down everyone! Okay, so why don't we start the formal introductions? My name's Joonmyeon but you can call me Suho. Nice to meet you.”

Suho extended an arm to Lay, who took the former's hand gladly into both of his. It would be nice to befriend someone like Suho. He seemed approachable enough.

“And I'm Sehun. Don't get near me, I'll be ready to shoot through your skull anytime.”

Lay flinched. Even though he couldn’t understand, he could feel and understand the depth of Sehun’s threat. It irked him, and he felt weird about it.

Pressing a hand on Lay’s shoulder, Luhan said, “Don't mind him.”

“Well, I didn't understand what he said anyway,” Lay said truthfully.

Tao sidestepped and whispered into Lay’s ear. Lay’s timing seemed to have been perfect though. “I'm telling you, Ge, beware of Sehun.”

Lay hadn’t really listened to Tao because when the black-haired boy turned up on his side, Lay had shifted his gaze to Kris, who had also been looking at him, albeit with his body as rigid as the trunk of a tree and his skin as pale as snow. Kris immediately broke the eye contact, and how much he regretted that he did that because his eyes landed on Kai next, who had been giving him this dirty, mischievous look coupled with his y smirk.

“Duizhang…” Kai started to sing-song. “Duizhang Kris~”

“KKAMJONG!” Kris bellowed, his hand turned into fists. He had been biting the inside of his lips, and he could feel the blood seeping through. He swore he was going to kill Kai.

“I was just kidding…” Kai said. “I guess?”

Unable to control his annoyance, Kris threw a pillow right into Kai’s face. To Kris’ horror though, Kai held his beloved alpaca in his hands—how did he get that?—and threw it across the living room to Lay. Lay bewilderedly caught the stuffed toy. Kris, his face reddened like a tomato plump, stood up and grabbed the stuffed toy from Lay. “This is mine—if you don't mind.”

“Shut up, Kris! By the way, I'm Chanyeol! You can come to me whenever you feel distressed.”

Ah, so you're Apollo, Lay thought to himself.

“Yes, people sure do call him happy virus for a really good reason,” Baekhyun said, all humor coming back to his speech. Then, he turned to Chanyeol. “I wonder why you can't touch Chen at all?”

“Because I'm scared of him!”

“You're bigger and older than he is!” Baekhyun retorted. Chanyeol's way of reasoning...he usually found it funny...in a way.

“Guys!” Sehun exclaimed. “Could you please stop using whatever words you’re using? My imagination’s running wild!”

Baekhyun looked at him innocently.

“It’s obviously not their fault, Sehunnie, that your mind is that green,” Luhan said.

Chanyeol shrugged. “Well~”

“I'm starting to get fed up with this. Wanna go out, Yeollie?” Kris spoke, hugging the alpaca close to his chest, afraid that someone would take it away from him. Though, he would sneak a glance at Lay from time to time.

Chanyeol’s face lit up at the pet name. Baekhyun saw that and it made him feel a little bit angry.”But—“

“It's okay if you don't want to. I'll just take Tao with me.”

Tao pointed a finger to himself. “Me?”

“Yes, you.” Sensing that Tao was hesitating and knowing that Tao would rather spend the rest of the day interrogating Lay, Kris laid out his trump card. “It so happens that I'm in the mood to buy you some Gucci stuff.”

“I'm going!” Tao beamed. Luhan facepalmed. He could almost see Tao's tail wagging from left to right. Like a dog after its bone.

Chanyeol pouted, crossing his arms and legs. “Fine! You two go and have fun! I'll stay here.”

“It's up to you.”

“I'm sorry,” Luhan apologized to Lay again. “The taller one is called Kris. The other one is Chinese-panda-maknae Tao. They're both actually not good with first encounters.”

Surprising Lay, Kyungsoo suddenly spoke up from behind. “They're really awkward so don’t mind them if they’re being like that.”

“Can I ask?” Lay said.

“Go on,” Luhan encouraged him.

“It hurts me a little but don’t you think they’re being a cold bunch of people?”

Luhan cutely scratched the tip of his nose with the dull tip of his fingernail. “Um, the explanation to that is really complicated, I don't think now is the right time to discuss about it.”

Then, stepping up before Lay was… “Anyway, I'm Baekhyun and this is Kai.”

“And you remember me, don't you?” Kyungsoo pointed to himself, his eyes hopeful of a positive response.

Lay smiled enthusiastically. “Of course, of course!”

Luhan asked, “So, do you remember all of us?”

“I think I do. You've left impressions on me and you might as well want to hear about them.”

“He's the trusting type,” Kai muttered.

“The honest type,” Baekhyun attempted to correct him.

“Hey, I have an idea,” Kai urged and started whispering words into Baekhyun’s ear. “Wanna bet?”

“I'm in.”

“Sehun!” Kai called. “Wanna join the game?”

“No, thank you. I don't want to sacrifice whatever penny I have left.”

“Guys, you should stop doing that, you know,” Luhan told them, sounding tired and lazy all of a sudden.

“We're doing this for fun! Don't tell me you're backing out as well. We had a contract.”

His voice emerging from the group of children’s choir again, Suho said, “Well, I guess this meeting's been adjourned. I think I'd be leaving you in Luhan's care?”

“No problem!” said Luhan. “Come, Lay, I'll show you to your room.”

[A/N]: Hello, guys!!! I'm so so so so so so so sorry that it took me so long to update this one! As a reward for waiting, I'd be giving you a sneak peak of the next chapter. Just a snapshot of conversation between who and who. HahahahXD Of course, I'm not telling you. The thrill would be gone if I did. So, was the chapter fine? Too much convo and descriptions. Making the twelve of them interact in one scene is kind of difficult. But, this is how I ended up with things. Please be kind to me~ Um, if you're confused, I would like to clarify that everytime Kyungsoo speaks to Lay, it's always in English. The Chinese members speak to one another in Chinese but can shift to Korean without trouble when they talk with their Korean brothers. It's only Lay who totally has no idea how to speak Korean. Please do leave comments! Highly appreciated! Thank you once again for taking your time to finish reading this chapter and my long, long note! Happy reading everyone~

PREVIEW:

"So you and Kris don't get along well?"

"Yep. We act like complete strangers towards each other."

"Even though you're brothers?"

"It's not that easy, especially if you grew up apart from each other."

"Isn't that why you're living under the same roof?"

Wanna know who's Kris' full-blooded brother? Find out in the next chapter! See you guys! >.<

And about the main image...What should the cat's name be? I'm open for suggestions. He's going to appear in the later chapters because he is such a cutie that the ultra-super-mega cat lover among the twelve siblings can't resist. Who's the cat lover? Find out!!!