So how old are the boys this chapter? This old:

Minseok: 8
Joonmyun and Jongdae: 6
Baekhyun: 4
Chanyeol: almost 3
Sehun: 19 months

which isn't much older than last time but hey

~~~~~~ ~~~~~~

“It’s just thunder.” Jongin mumbled groggily to whoever was shaking his shoulder. He was awake enough for his brain to have worked out that what he was hearing was rain lashing against the window and the wind howling around the house which meant the storm that everyone kept saying was heading their way all day had finally reached them but not awake enough for his eyes to want to open. “It can’t hurt you.” He added after receiving another shove to the shoulder.

“That’s reassuring to hear but that’s not why I need you to wake up.” The person hovering over him hissed.

“You’re not Joonmyun.” Jongin observed eventually managing to blink his eyes open, voice still slurred by sleep. After hearing the storm outside that’s who he’d expected it to be. Out of all of their children Joonmyun was definitely the lightest sleeper and he never had been a fan of thunder and lightning. But no, it wasn’t Joonmyun shaking him awake it was Kyungsoo who was standing by the side of the bed he realised. A really annoyed looking Kyungsoo.

“No. I’m not Joonmyun.” He bit out. “And I think the fact that we have no power right now is a far bigger problem than the weather outside.”

“We have no power?” Jongin echoed making an already irritated Kyungsoo frown harder. He couldn’t help it though, he’d only just woken up, his brain wasn’t quite working yet.

“That’s what I just said. We have no power. Why would I lie to you?”

“I didn’t say you were lying.” Jongin protested, finally deciding that it would be a good idea to sit up. And sure enough the only light in the room came from the mobile phone Kyungsoo was using for a torch, there were no numbers lit up on the digital clock on the bedside table and no light coming in under the door from the hallway. “What time is it?”

“Twenty to three.” Kyungsoo told him.

“Then we can just go back to sleep can’t we?” Jongin reasoned. He didn’t know why Kyungsoo was making such a fuss. It wasn’t as if they could do anything about it until the morning anyway, not if it was a widespread power cut and looking out the window at how dark their street was that was what it appeared to be.

“We can’t ‘just go back to sleep.’” Kyungsoo snapped. Jongin was starting to get the feeling that his husband wanted to hit him but he couldn't work out why. They didn’t need the power to be on when they were asleep and it wasn’t as if he could do anything about it even if they did, he wasn't an electrician. “We need to go to the hospital.” Ah, so that was why.

“Now?” Jongin asked which wasn’t as stupid a question as one might think. Yes, it was true that Kyungsoo was a day past his due date and it was something Jongin had been expecting to hear at some point but Kyungsoo had also been pregnant enough times for Jongin to have an idea of how this usually went. It usually began with Kyungsoo telling him they probably needed to go to the hospital soon and then spending a good few hours getting the house in order and the kids sorted out before telling him to go and get the car. With Baekhyun it had been a little different, waters breaking in the supermarket different, but Baekhyun always had liked to be the exception to the rule.

“Not right now but as soon as possible would be good.”

Oh. “Really?” That wasn’t what he’d been hoping to hear.

“Yes, really.” Kyungsoo told him a hand going to grip the bed post, his eyes taking on a faraway look.

Ah, Jongin had pretty good idea what that expression meant. “Are they close together?” he asked.

It took a good thirty seconds for Kyungsoo to answer and even when he did it was only a nod, his eyes still slightly unfocused as he continued to hold onto the bed post for support.

“Okay, right, well then…” First thing first he should probably call his parents and ask them to come over and watch the kids. “Phone…” he mumbled and he started searching through the jumble of stuff on his bedside table. “Phone…”

~~~~~~ ~~~~~~

Fortunately for Jongin his father had remembered to keep his phone by the bed and the volume set to loud. Unfortunately for Jongin with the weather being so bad it was going to take his parents a while to get there and Kyungsoo hadn’t been lying when he’d told him his contractions were getting closer together. They were sitting side by side on the bed and Kyungsoo was gripping Jongin’s forearm this time instead of the bed post in a way that was bound to leave marks. But since Kyungsoo was probably in more pain than he was right that second Jongin supposed he shouldn’t complain.

“You okay? Want to walk around a bit?” He asked as Kyungsoo finally began to relax his grip.

Again it took a while for his husband to answer and again all he could manage at first was a nod. “Yes.” He added when he’d pulled himself together enough to get his words out. “Let’s go downstairs, we need to set up the living room for your parents so they’re not sitting in the dark when they get here.”

“Good idea.” Jongin said getting up and offering a hand to Kyungsoo and pulling him to his feet too. Getting things ready for his parents might make the time go a little faster.

“We need to move the food in the fridge into the freezer too.” Kyungsoo continued as Jongin began rummaging through the bottom drawer for the torch Kyungsoo had put in there for emergencies. “The power hasn’t been out for long so it should still be cold enough in there to keep some of it fresh.”

“I don’t think now is the right time to be worrying about food spoiling.” Jongin said, finding the torch and switching it on.

“I’d rather worry about the food in the fridge than the fact that I’ve gone into labour in the middle of a power cut during a storm if that’s okay with you.”

“Fair enough.” If that was going to make Kyungsoo feel any better about this then it was definitely okay with him. “So, find something to light the living room, move stuff from the fridge to the…” He started to say, listing what they were going to do in a bid to distract his husband further but before he could finish he was interrupted by a distressed cry from across the hall. “That doesn’t sound like Sehun…” He said slowly, sharing a confused look with Kyungsoo.

“No it doesn’t…” Kyungsoo agreed and then realisation dawned. “Chanyeol.” He breathed at the same time as Jongin muttered the words ‘The night light.’

He was usually such a good sleeper but of course the one time the power happened to have gone out would be the one time Chanyeol decided to wake up in the middle of the night, it was just their luck.

~~~~~~ ~~~~~~

By the time they got to Chanyeol’s room he’d already woken Baekhyun with his crying. Baekhyun for a change was acting the concerned older sibling which was lovely to see. Knowing his baby brother well enough to realise why he was approaching hysterics he’d found the shark torch he’d gotten for his birthday and made his way over to Chanyeol’s bed. The reason Chanyeol was still crying despite his brothers attempts to make him feel better was because the slide up switch on the torch was broken and Baekhyun was still trying to switch it on. “Shhh,” he was hissing at his brother when his parents entered the room, “it’s not my fault it doesn’t work, you broke it not me.”

And Jongin was just about to suggest he hand it over so he could switch it on for him and then tell him well done for looking after Chanyeol when Baekhyun finally worked it out for himself. Worked it out for himself and then turned around to see who’d come into the room, shining the torch straight in Jongin’s eyes as he did so.

When Jongin had gotten over being temporarily blinded by a novelty children’s torch he and Kyungsoo had decided it would be best to take Chanyeol and Baekhyun downstairs with them. There was no way Chanyeol was going to back to sleep in his own bed without his night light and Baekhyun was never going to agree to stay upstairs if Chanyeol was going to be allowed downstairs. Kyungsoo had told him to bring Sehun too, he’d miraculously stayed asleep through all the commotion but if he happened to wake up later they’d only have to go back up and get him anyway so Jongin had agreed. And they were almost at the stairs, Jongin in front lighting the way with the torch, a still sleeping Sehun held to him with his free arm, Kyungsoo behind him with Chanyeol and Baekhyun holding onto one hand each when Baekhyun shouted out “Wait!” bringing them all to a stop.

“What?” Kyungsoo had asked.

“Jongdae has a torch too!” Baekhyun had exclaimed excitedly and with that he’d made a dash for his older brother’s room before either of them could stop him.

Unsurprisingly Baekhyun had managed to wake at least one of his brothers during his torch hunt and that brother had been Joonmyun who had wanted to come downstairs too because of the storm but had refused to go anywhere without Jongdae. So Jongdae had been woken and informed of the power cut and hearing of their plan to set up camp in the living room had decided that it wasn’t fair to leave Minseok out. Jongin could see where he was coming from so hadn’t really been able to argue but it did mean that all six of their children were now downstairs in the living room at three in the morning and five of those six children were also wide awake. Sehun thankfully hadn’t stirred when Jongin had put him down on the rug and placed a blanket over him, five children awake was bad enough they didn’t need it to be six.

Half an hour later and Sehun was still the only one asleep “Can everybody just sit on the couch and stay still!” Jongin barked trying to bring some sort of order to the room. It was no surprise that it wasn’t working, his kids rarely did as they were told at the