The last day of break they had before the comeback preparations began passed much like the one before – with Minhyun bickering both with Soojung and Soomi about being called Ahjusshi, and Sora bickering with none other than Jongsuk – who he as on the same maturity level as. Ha Joon hung out with Shin for most of the day and the two decided, after about six hours of putting up with the constant bickering and noise within the dorm, they were going to go enjoy their last day off for a while – despite the cold temperatures that had fallen over Seoul.

The day following that one, they were into preparations for their comeback and back into various different solo schedules – it had been a while since any of them had had any.  The boy’s schedules slowly picked up gradually changing from a lot of free time to very little sleeping time.  They all were busy with vocal and dance practice, but the closer they got to their comeback time the less they really saw of each other since they were all being pulled in different directions in their company’s attempt to get their faces out there, to get their names known – to make this comeback a little bit more successful than the last.  

The males were getting their faces out there in various industries like the previous times. Sora had been casted for two different dramas; Shin had been casted in his first drama; Xue, Minhyun, and Woojung had been chosen as endorsement models for various different companies who believed that they fit their clothing style/products – in some cases the trio were working together while in others they were by themselves. Woojung also got casted yet again into one of the same dramas as Sora. As for the leader, he busy with other sorts of things such as making appearances on various variety shows, radio shows, he as acting as a guest MC on some of us the music shows, and every now and then he would have a modeling job or would make a cameo in a drama but it was not as often as it had been before since he had already made a name for himself in those industries – just like how his group mates were starting to do so.

The first time the male’s had actually spent over eight hours with each other since the beginning of their comeback preparations – which had begun during the dawn of the new year – was during their music videos shoot, even then they hadn’t really talked since they were busy filming the music videos they were to release for their comeback.

“We’ll take a short break!” called the director, chuckling lightly as he saw all six of the males collapse onto the floor of the set after spending the past three hours doing the dance shots – which they had not even come close to finishing yet, “In ten minutes we’ll resume from the very beginning.”

“Neh,” called the boys as they were all pulled onto their feet by the stylists who automatically went into fixing every little detail of their outfit, of their appearance while trying to have a conversation with the exhausted males.

“Boy’s you’re nearly done,” stated Hyun Soo as the six finally made it off the set and out of the hold of the stylists, collapsing into the chairs that had been set up for them, “Only a couple more dance shots and then a few solo shots.”

“So another six hours until we are done,” muttered Minhyun, earning a nod from the rest of the members.

Sora had his head resting on his lover’s shoulder, slowly drifting off to sleep as the others continued to speak. Woojung rested his head against Sora’s and fought off slumber by carrying on with his conversation with Hyun Soo, who seemed a bit concerned for Minhyun – who was limping from an accident the previous day during their practice. Shin on the other hand, was absorbed with making sure the magnae was comfortable as the boy drifted off to sleep as well. The leader on the other hand was standing by the monitor conversing with the director as he monitored the previous dance shot they had recorded.

Hyun Soo looked towards Minhyun, “You really should get your ankle checked. I saw it when you were changing clothes earlier – it’s pretty swollen for it being nothing.”

“I already told you hyung, its fine,” growled Minhyun, just wanting to fall asleep like all the others were doing.

Hyun Soo resisted the urge to roll his eyes, deciding to simply shake his head in slight disappointment, “You’re limping on it and it’s the size of a baseball – there is clearly something wrong with it Minhyun. You need to get it checked out because if it is serious we need to know so that we can delay your promotions because we do not want you getting seriously injured, plus, we would prefer to have all six of you promoting the song rather than just five.”

Minhyun growled, “I’m fine hyung.” Minhyun punched Young Hun as the elder brushed past Minhyun and gently brushed his fingers against the younger’s elevated foot, the one that was supposedly ‘not hurt’, “What the hell hyung?”

Younghun turned to look at Minhyun with a rather serious gaze, “Did that light of a touch really hurt?”

Minhyun kept silent and sternly made eye contact with the leader, scowling towards the male whose every action seemed to make him annoyed for some nameless reason.

“Don’t worry Younghun-ah, he’s going to the hospital once we finish up here,” stated Hyun Soo sternly, “No if, ands, or buts.”

“Hyung!” called Minhyun in slight aggravation; however, the manager was not going to hear any of it, “Damn it hyung, why did you have to do that?”

“Injuries are not things to be taken lightly,” responded Younghun, kneeling down in front of Minhyun, pulling off the younger’s show and tsking as he took in the sight of the severely swollen ankle, “Did you ice it last night like I told you to?”

Minhyun scowled at the leader, “It isn’t that serious, I can walk on it and I can dance on it so why are you continuing to make a big deal about it?”

“Because if you don’t treat it with care it could become more seriously injured,” stated Younghun, “and rather than it being a temporary injury it’s a permenate one.”

Minhyun rolled his eyes, “You think I don’t know that?”

“Well, with how you’re acting, it seems as if you don’t,” responded Younghun, pulling something out from his pocket. Minhyun winced as he felt the older male gently touching his wounded ankle, at the same time he shivered as something cold was put onto his skin.

“What are you doing?” questioned Minhyun, glaring towards Younghun as the elder continued to message whatever he had onto the younger’s ankle and foot.

“It’s medicine that’ll make the rest of the recording easier on you,” replied Younghun, before pulling out an ace bandage, silently wrapping it securely on the younger’s foot, before putting the younger’s shoe back carefully onto his foot, “It’ll heat up a bit and help with the pain in the muscle, but it won’t fully take it away, but it should make it durable until you have the chance to get to the hospital.”

“It’s not that bad,” growled Minhyun.

“Minhyun, I’m positive it is a light sprain,” stated Younghun before standing up, he picked up the medicine he had borrowed from one of the workers in the studio and moved towards the bathroom stating, “Also, Min-ah, you’re still a second late in the second chorus…”

Minhyun frowned, his eye twitching as the leader ended up continuing on.

“The faster you corrected yourself, the faster we would be able to get out of here,” stated Younghun.

“I hate you,” growled Minhyun.

“Keep telling yourself that!” responded Younghun cheekily with a gentle smile playing on his lips, his eyes shining with amusement before stating, “Your body says otherwise.”

“W-w-what is that supposed to m-mean?” questioned Minhyun, mentally slapping himself as he stuttered as nervousness rose up from the depths of his heart as he peered at the leader.

Younghun pointed towards his cheek, hinting towards the younger male’s cheek bones that had been dusted over with a rather bright red – that was not the result of too much makeup. Minhyun grew even more flustered and glared at Younghun as the leader walked away, laughing heartily.

“Your little game is back firing now isn’t it?” questioned Woojung from where he sat, his arm around the slumbering Sora.

“Shut up,” muttered Minhyun, his gaze following Younghun until the oldest vanished into the depths of the bathroom while his hand subconsciously sat over his racing heart.

“Just confess already,” stated Woojung, “I know he’s already confessed to you countless times already, so just return his confession because it’s obvious that you like him just as much as he likes you, and he knows that too.”

“I’m not going to confess to him,” growled Minhyun, cursing himself for how weak his voice sounded upon carrying on, “because I don’t like him.”

“You don’t like him but you do love him,” stated Woojung, causing Minhyun to glare at him, a smirk played on the younger’s lips as he whispered, “You’re just too scared of commitments and so you’re letting a good one get away.”

“He’s not getting away,” growled Minhyun, not knowing what had possessed him to say such a thing.

Woojung scoffed a bit before stating, “Not yet, but I guarantee, if you keep playing with him like this for much longer he will give up and find someone else to give all his attention to…if you keep this up, I’m sure he’d find someone else – someone who isn’t afraid to love him back.”

Minhyun’s eye twitched and Woojung smirked, knowing that his words were getting to the elder male – although the elder male refused to show that they were, although the older male acted as if they had no effect on him.

“I mean after all, I would do that as well – especially if I liked someone as stubborn as you,” stated Woojung, “As aggravating as you.”

Minhyun looked at his friend in aggravation, wanting nothing more than to punch the younger and state that what he was saying wasn’t true, that Younghun would not just suddenly stop liking him. However, the more he thought about it, he saw the truth to the younger’s words. He shook his head, they had to be wrong, after all Younghun seemed to flirt with him all the time after all and he did not flirt with anyone else – that he knew of at least.

“You, he’s right,” stated Shin, “It’s only a matter of time, when Younghun and I were working together on the album I was shocked at how many trainees talked about liking him – how many confessed to him.”

Minhyun’s eye twitched again.

“There had to be about six of them,” stated Shin, acting as if he was thinking about it, “There were many others who stayed relatively quiet about liking him.”

“You’re lying,” stated Minhyun, not knowing why he was getting so worked up, not knowing why he felt so angry at their words.

“Not everyone is like you, Minhyun-ah,” stated Shin, smiling a bit as he saw that it was the last straw.

Minhyun stood up from his seat and stormed towards the dressing room, grumbling something about being left alone until the shoot resumed. As soon as Minhyun was out of ear shot, Shin burst into laughter.

“Is that true?” muttered Woojung in wonder.

Shin shook his head, “No, but he doesn’t need to know that.”

Woojung laughed in amusement, “It’s going to take quite a bit more to get him to actually put aside his fear of commitment, but I believe we’ve made a great deal of process today.”

“Definitely,” responded Shin, “It’s just getting aggravating watching them.”

Woojung nodded in agreement, “Watching Minhyun, really.”

Shin nodded in amusement, a smirk playing on his lips. 

Hope you enjoyed the chapter, it's pretty decent...sorry about it focusing on Minhyun and Younghun again - they just have the most work that has to go into their relationship.