N sat around the common area of his dorm with Leo, Ken, Hongbin, Hyuk, and Ravi all sitting around him. They’d been silent ever since coming in and N wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. He knew why they wanted to talk, but he didn’t know what to tell them.

“Hyung,” Hyuk finally spoke, “why didn’t you tell us?”

“Same reason you never told us,” N sighed, “fear.”

“Of being rejected?” Ken scoffed, “yeah right. You knew we would have accepted you no matter what.”

“Not fear of being rejected,” N frowned, “of what could happen to you by knowing what I am.”

“Why is that bad for us?” Hyuk asked.

“Changelings don’t have high life expectancies,” N explained, “but what about those who know about them? They probably get killed in the search for the changelings. That’s why no one talks about them, they’re scared it will draw attention to them and they’ll get killed because someone thinks they know where a changeling is.”

“We wouldn’t have said anything,” Ravi frowned, “no one would have known.”

“Until someone slipped up,” Leo sighed, “one of us could let it slip in passing by accident. N could make a mistake and change his aura in front of a bunch of people. There are countless ways for the secret to get out, so the less who know the better.”

“Exactly,” N nodded.

“Sori knew,” Hongbin pointed out.

“Jihu and Minji figured it all out,” N explained, “and they asked her to be, like, my bodyguard.”

“She is one of the strongest shifters,” Ravi pointed out, “she’d be a perfect bodyguard.”

“Kris, Hyuna, and Suho all knew what you are too,” Ken frowned, “why so many of them but not us?”

“Suho say my aura change from a dragon to a werewolf before Sori was shot at,” N explained, “he probably didn’t know exactly what I was until Youngjae and Jiwook called me a changeling. As for Kris and Hyuna I think they went to Yuri.”

“It still hurts that you didn’t tell us,” Hyuk pouted, “but we get why.”

“I’m sorry,” N looked down at his hands ashamed, “I know I should have told you, but I didn’t want to put any of you in danger.”

“Not that it matters now,” Hongbin sighed, “we’re all in danger if Youngjae and Jiwook are right.”

“They’re right,” Leo frowned, “everything that’s happened up until now seems to be pointed to war. The ghostly warnings about danger. The attacks on Kris, Yuri, and Sori. The council suddenly deciding to make Sori a council member. It all leads to something big happening.”

“The only thing missing is Jaesun’s visit from back at the start of the year,” Ravi frowned, “he wanted to tell Kris and Sori something, but they sent him away.”

“I wish we knew what he wanted,” Hyuk sighed, “then we could know what side he’s on. Does this thing go beyond the councils? Are the gangs a part of this too? Or are they in just as much trouble as we are?”

“I didn’t think of that,” Ken sat straighter, clearly alarmed, “what if some gangs are involved? And who’s to say there aren’t some ISBIP agents in the ranks of our enemies?”

“You’re right,” Hongbin frowned, “we could have enemies hiding all over the place.”

“So we trust in each other,” N decided, “we trust in our friends and each other. We know where our allegiance lies.”

“Right,” Ken grinned, jumping on N and pulling the older into a hug, “we trust each other with our lives. Forget everyone else.”

“We can’t trust Jihu,” Kris announced, entering the room with Luhan close behind him.

“What?” to the best of N’s knowledge, Jihu was probably the only ISBIP agent Kris trusted. Well, other than Suho and Hyoyeon, but they were friends so they didn’t count. Hyoyeon was only an agent to help shut down illegal gangs and Suho had joined to watch Kris’ back at Jihu request.

The point was, Sori, Hyuna, Yuri, Suho, Hyoyeon, and Kris had only ever said good things about Jihu. None of N’s other friends would say anything bad about him either. But now here was Kris saying that they couldn’t trust him and that worried N to no end. Jihu knew what he was, too.

“We overheard Jihu talking to Minji,” Luhan explained, “He wants to send everyone home. Too many attacks have happened and he’s convinced that Dark Lake isn’t safe.”

“If he knew what was really going on,” Leo frowned, “he’d do more then send us home. We wouldn’t be able to fight in this war either.”

“So we can’t tell him,” Kris crossed his arms, glaring at the floor, “not yet. Not until there’s no way he can push us aside. Until then, we can’t trust him with anything.”

“Is Minji on board with sending us all home?” Hongbin asked.

“I don’t want to go home,” Hyuk whispered, “I don’t want to have to hide what I am again.” Hongbin pulled the younger into a comforting hug, assuring him that he wouldn’t have to hide his heritage again.

“She doesn’t want to send us home,” Kris explained, “she thinks that too many of us would be unsafe at home. Someone like Chen and Kai might be fine since they live with other werewolves, but students like you guys would be at risk.”

“She brought up N’s heritage,” Luhan added, “said that sending him home would put him at risk and sending him anywhere else would draw unwanted attention to him. Jihu couldn’t argue so he said he’d back off for now.”

“We’ll need to keep what we’re doing quiet,” Ken frowned, “if he finds out we’re training, he’ll want to know why.”

“And then we’re being locked up someplace,” Leo finished.

“Where are Sori and Suho?” N asked, finally noticing that both were missing. He could have sworn that they had gone with the others.

“Sori and Suho are informing the others,” Kris said, “we’ll meet up tomorrow after classes finish. At the ceremony grounds. We can decide how to handle things from there.”

“How do we handle things?” Ravi rolled his eyes, “We train, that’s how we handle things.”

“It’s more than that,” Luhan explained, “We need to have times to train. We can’t all be out working at the same time, too many people would notice that. Some of us are rooming with people outside our circle of friends, remember?”

“So we need to step up a timetable?” N asked, “And teams and lookouts and all of that.”

“Yeah,” Kris nodded.

“It really does sound like we’re fighting a war,” Ken said, “I mean, I know we are. But this just makes it seem………real.”

“I know,” Luhan nodded, looking troubled, “it’s one thing to talk about what’s coming, it’s another to actually start planning for it.”

“We’ll be fine,” N spoke up, “so we don’t need to worry.”

“How do you know?” Hyuk looked at his oldest hyung, silently hoping that he was right. He was scared. Really scared. He just didn’t want to admit it, especially when Hongbin looked so scared. Hongbin had always been the one to help him, to be strong for him, and now it was Hyuk’s turn to comfort his closet hyung.

“Because we’re fighting for good,” N grinned, “and good always wins in the end.”

“He’s right,” Kris nodded even though he didn’t agree with N’s reason. He knew that good didn’t always win the battle. Sometimes the bad guys won.

“Plus,” N added, “We have Kris. And Sori. And Suho. We have a lot of other strong people on our side.”

“We have a changeling, too,” Kris smiled slightly, “that’s something I know they don’t have.”

“He’s right,” Leo nodded.

“With the proper training,” Ravi said, “you could be our trump card, hyung. Our ace in the hole.”

N nodded and faked a smile. Truthfully, hearing that made him feel scared. He wasn’t sure if he was comfortable with all of that responsibility being put on him.

A/N: to training to fight a war starts……….soon.