The boomerang clatters at Chen’s feet.

“Alright, try again.”

Chen groans, rubbing his shoulder and giving it a stretch. It has been only a week since the Lucifer met up with the Angel crew. Onew had already sent the letters thanks to Luhan’s eagles, and at one point, a question was raised about Lucifer’s concealment due to its assistance with Angel. Key had explained to Chen about the illusion spell he placed on the ship, and the whole crew of Angel was in awe. It also prompted Onew to summon a pseudo-cumulus congestus cloud to surround both ships, leaving a bubble of clear visibility for both crews on the Angel to work with.

Hidden in the clouds, the Lucifer crew had been training with the Angel crew on some days, often relaxing on other days. This day has been quite productive for everyone, and they have shown signs of improvement. Well, at least some of them have.

“This is the twentieth time already today…and my boomerang hasn’t returned to me at all. What am I doing wrong?”

Chen has received his wooden boomerang that was made by Key a few days ago, and has been practicing with it whenever the chance he gets. He read so much about the basic techniques of handling a boomerang and the applications, but when it came to doing it, his attempts were futile.

“What about those five times it did?” Luhan pipes up from the helm. Chen glares at him.

“You sabotaged it! Just like you did yesterday and the day before!”

“Me? Nooo,” the pilot of Angel guffaws. “Don’t be silly.”

“I’m not!”

“Calm down, don’t get your got in a twist. You know your throw is becoming very weak today…or maybe it’s actually your mind.”

“Shut it!”

“Chen, I really do think your arm is telling you it needs a break…” Jonghyun murmurs softly, standing next to the navigator. “You need to keep your emotions and distractions at bay, and keep focusing on the boomerang as the extension of your arm.”

“Extension of my arm?” Chen stoops to pick it up and rises back on his feet, scowling at the boomerang. “Well…My arm does feel like it’s already ripped off, sewn back, and the process repeat itself all over again.” He looks up to see Luhan happily sitting on the railings. “And Luhan, why don’t you freaking help me out here for a change, instead of sabotaging it?”

“Nope.” The pilot of the Angel shakes his head. “I’m only here to keep your boomerang at bay, if it ever goes awry out there.”

“Awry, my . You almost cost my boomerang a few times earlier today!”

“That was just for good fun, Chen…” Luhan chuckles.

Chen growls. He closes one eye, aiming for an invisible target in the sky, and hurls the boomerang. What happens next shocks the three of them, as the boomerang finally makes a come back. The three of them gape for a moment before Luhan yells at Chen to get ready to grab the boomerang. Chen braces himself as it nears toward him at an accelerating speed.

“OW!”

There is a noise of a clatter as the wooden boomerang falls to the floor several feet away from Chen, its momentum broken from colliding with Chen’s hand. Cursing, the navigator is shaking his hand to ease off the pain, while Jonghyun watches on flabbergasted.

“How could you miss that chance to catch it?!” Luhan yells. “You only had one out of two chances, two easy chances by the way, and you failed to catch it??”

“Easy for you to say, you can just stop it with your mind…you mind freak,” Chen growls under his breath as he walks toward his boomerang.

“I heard that!” Chen whirls around and looks up, startled.

“I didn’t say anything!”

“No, but your voice was being annoying in my head,” Luhan smirks. “Seriously, Chen, even if you whisper or not say a word, no matter how much your brain tries to shut off its voice, I will still hear it.”

- - -

Meanwhile, Jinki is mentoring Xiumin on his sword techniques and sparring with bamboo sticks. Minho is also sparring with Chanyeol, giving him pep talks throughout their practice. Neither of them has broken a sweat yet, a little breathless. The intermittent clack-clack sounds of the clashing poles offset the swoosh sounds of the scabbards and Minho’s voice. They go at each other every other day, while in other days, Jinki and Taemin would practice with Angel’s four eldest members.

But today is sparring day for Xiumin and Chanyeol. Baekhyun and Lay are watching nearby, with Lay’s archery equipment standing between them.

“Would you look at these guys? They’re crazy good. No, not even good, they’re amazing…” Baekhyun murmurs in awe, complimenting the two Lucifer crewmembers. Lay nods as he watches the scene.  “But I suppose that’s what happens when you’ve been around for so long, training in combat with the enemies and monsters.”

Baekhyun fiddles with one of Lay’s arrows grouped in a case. “Why didn’t you ever put your archery skills into good use ever since Luhan turned twenty-one, twenty-one and he got his pendant? We knew by now he’s a telepath, but ever since he revealed to us that he is one, you stopped using your bow and arrows at all. You haven’t even been practicing the past few days…“

Lay shrugs as he runs a finger along the string of his bow. “I figured since he was going to be a telepath, what with communicating almost all beings, and I usually hunt for game, I wouldn’t dare harm them, except for those in water. It’s hard not to feel guilty if I did something unto an animal that Luhan might find helpful. So I stay away from them unless Luhan tells me it is alright.”

“Well, okay but you are also helping D.O with his cooking supply of food, think about that. I mean, no offense, we’ve had delicious seafood meals in the last few months with a few meat dishes here and there that were not of your own doing, but…couldn’t you just go ahead and hunt anyway? I’m sure most of us have already noticed by now, the shift in our eating lifestyle…”

“I suppose…” Lay mutters as the line fades into the air.

“But even if it isn’t about the food, you still have that exceptional skill. You’re quite an odd person of contrasting abilities, Lay…you know that? Being a healer as well. Archer and Healer never go in the same sentence.” Baekhyun and Lay chuckle at the last line.

“It's like I control life and death…” Lay notes. “And that’s a very strange thing…”

Aboard the Lucifer’s deck, Key is teaching Sehun how to work the crossbow, lending him one of his old training crossbows that he made, as the co-captains of Angel watch on.

“Keep your eye on the target but line your vision up with that hole on the bow. It’ll help you fire with accuracy, got that? You’re aiming for the chest unless you wanna make him drown in his blood by the throat.”

Sehun nods, and Key smiles proudly. The kid’s learned fast, Key thinks to himself, as he looks at the large canvas of an outline of a dummy placed at the pole of the mast.  He sees some arrows right on the spot, the chest of the outline, and then a lot around the neck area. There are only a couple of arrows that are on the head, but these had been Sehun’s first few attempts.

“Key, you’ve been training with our youngest for the past forty-five minutes. Let him have a break; we need training, too,” Suho negotiates with the mechanic.

“I don’t need to train with you two lovebirds,” Key says with a sass thrown in the captains’ direction. “The first fifteen minutes of the hour, the both of you kept making gooey eyes and it made me sick watching little hearts float around your heads. Why did I get stuck with you two, I don’t even know…” He shudders, as he turns around again to work with Sehun. “Such annoying lovebirds…”

“How is that any different from you with Minho and Taemin?” Kris smirks as he notices Key tensing up. The taller captain recoils a bit under the light slap on his chest from Suho’s hand, despite the shorter captain having a half-amused, half-shocked expression.

“Yifan…” Suho mouths silently, his awed expression still on his face. Kris shrugs slightly, his smirk still on his face.

“For your information, Kris…” Key whips his head around to glare at the taller captain. “Between you and me, I’m not the one getting owned and whipped by my lovers.”

That wipes off the smirk off Kris’ face, and earns a chuckle from Sehun.

At the railings of the Angel’s side, not facing Lucifer, four young men are looking out to the cloudy horizon. D.O and Kai are in their little world, standing far away from Taemin and Zitao. Taemin does not mind, and so he takes his chance to learn a little bit about the priest next to him.

“So Zitao, you’re a priest… what’s your take on the prophecy?”

Zitao eyes Taemin warily. “What do you mean?”

“Don't you have some sort of…I don’t know, issue of conflict over this?” Taemin shrugs.

“Well, no, not really? I mean, in my time, being