The doorbell had barely rung once before the door was opened by a very excited Taiyang who immediately threw himself into the waiting arms of Kai, “Uncle Jongin! It’s been too long!”

“You can say that again,” Kai smiled brightly at the young boy, “Look how much you have grown and ah…hello Yueliang, you pretty little girl, I nearly didn’t recognise you there! Look how much prettier that you’ve gotten since I last saw you.”

“Don’t go spoiling her too much or she’ll expect praise all of the time,” Yifan smiled as he got around to the door, leaving Yixing to finish up in the kitchen for a moment as he hugged the younger man and then smiled to Kyungsoo before immediately plucking Sooyeong out of her mother’s grasp, “And just look at this little lady, getting so big and pretty with every passing day.”

“What was that you were saying about not spoiling her?” Kyungsoo asked as he hugged the twins before finally being able to get inside, “I swear you just like girls because you get to dress them up so cutely in pretty dresses like they’re dolls.”

Yifan pretended to look offended by that remark, “I don’t only like girls, I love all of my children and all of the additional ones that we’ve got and are going to get over the years.”

Kai laughed, “Yeah, Chanyeol’s got a betting system on to try and work out whose next out of us.”

“With the way they’re behaving I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s Sehun and Tao,” Yixing said, shoving Yifan inside so that he could drag the pair of them into a hug of his own, “Though Baekhyun has been a mega diva of late so he may as well be pregnant to make up for it all.”

Kyungsoo laughed, shaking his head as he hung up his coat, “No chance of that unfortunately. They’re on another ‘break’ apparently.”

Yifan groaned from the living room, “Oh good god, what over now?”

“It’s Beakyeol,” Kai said with a shrug of his shoulders as he sat down on the floor to grab Taiyang, “Now little mister griffin are you going to show me what Santa brought you or not?”

“With sissy!” Taiyang said, moving quickly to Yueliang’s side, “But after we’ve made Soo-Soo smile!”

Said little girl was happily sitting on Yifan’s lap, looking around with wide eyes at all of the pretty decorations and was watching her two cousins with interest. For being only three years old she certainly had a grasp on reality but always liked to assess the situation first. Or maybe she just had a crush on Yifan and didn’t want to leave his lap anytime soon which wouldn’t surprise Kai since his daughter was already displaying signs of liking the pretty boys which in one way was cute but in another was completely freaking the young father out.

The doorbell rang again and Yifan leant his head back to yell but the door was already opened and Suho appeared, along with Chen who had caught a lift and Tao and Sehun who were giving a lift to Chanyeol and Baekhyun who were sort of talking now but not as noticeably much as they would normally do so appeared not five minutes after the others pair.

Yueliang let out a happy sound as Tao set down a basket in order to give his Gege a hug because the second that the panda did so, Candy leapt out with an figurative cry of ‘Freedom!’ and immediately went running around the room in a mad high flustered barking parade that received a mixture of cute, irritated and funny responses as they tried to get the dog who was no longer a puppy but surely looked like one back into the basket. It did not work in the slightest but to be honest, no one really cared as she kept the kids amused and gave the adults something to do other than constantly crane their necks to find out what was going on with the kids.

The ‘adult’s’ mainly spent the time sitting around, drinking and catching up with one another, occasionally remembering to try and get in contact with either Luhan or Minseok to find out where on earth they were since they couldn’t open the presents until all of them were there. It was a silly little tradition that they had adopted to be all together to share Christmas long before they had debuted and even though there had been a slight blip at one time it had pretty much remained as it had done.

Though at one point during the day’s events, Yifan found himself stealing away from the fun of Tao trying to make Candy let go of one of the dragons from Taiyang’s castle to the kitchen where Sehun was trying to sneak yet another round of cucumber sandwiches in. An eyebrow was raised, “Either you’re on a really strange diet or there’s something that you’re not telling us, Sehun.”

The K-maknae managed to look completely sheepish, “I’m not on a diet…”

“Then why the sandwiches?” Yifan asked, trying to hide the smirk which he knew was already forming.

“I don’t know, I just started wanting cucumber sandwiches about a month ago and it’s about the only thing that I,” Sehun flushed a little when Yifan stepped closer to him and almost appeared to shrink down which was a feat given how tall he was.

Yifan tried to sound serious but couldn’t keep a straight face as he said gently, “Go upstairs to the bathroom and in the cupboard under the sink you will find a couple of pregnancy tests which I keep in there. I suggest that you go and use one just to make totally sure.”

Sehun paled, “But I’m not…I can’t be…we…we…”

Yifan gave the boy a sympathetic look as he gently rustled his hair, “Listen to me, Sehun, I’ve been there and done that and I can pretty much tell you that I did the exact same thing with Kyungsoo too. Please go and at least see because otherwise you’re going to have to go to the doctors for an entirely different reason but I somehow doubt that a sudden craving for cucumber sandwiches is anything else.”

Nodding, Sehun took a shuddering breath and headed upstairs quietly, almost bumping into Suho who happened to be walking into the kitchen to refill one of the trays which Yifan had technically gone to do. He frowned as he watched Sehun go upstairs, “What did you do to him to make him cry?”

“Nothing,” Yifan said with a roll of his eyes towards his fellow leader, “I just told him to go and find out if he’s pregnant or not.”

Suho blinked, “Pregnant?”

“You didn’t think that a sudden craving for very strange sandwiches was a bit of a giveaway?” Yifan deadpanned, “After you had to call me to convince Kyungsoo to do the same thing?”

“Well that was a bit more obvious,” Suho defended with a knowing grin, “he was literally eating everything. Sehun’s picky at the best of times.”

Yifan chuckled, “Well if anything we’ll have another one to add to the family soon.”

“Who’s pregnant now?” Yixing asked, walking into the kitchen after yet another failed attempt to get hold of their missing members even though it was not like either of them.

“Possibly Sehun,” both leaders spoke in unison before bursting into laughter.

Yixing rolled his eyes, “Okay, stop that right now. I am not putting up with Mama Suho and Dada Kris right now.”

“Sorry, force of habit,” Yifan shrugged, pulling Yixing close and pressing a kiss to his temple.

Suho glanced up towards the ceiling, “By the length of time it’s taking him I think you’re hunch is pretty much right.”

“Those things take a while but they’re accurate,” Yifan said with a smirk, leaning against Yixing a little more, “Though I’ve yet to be proved wrong on a prediction like that yet so I’m fairly safe in that bet.”

“What bet?” Chanyeol said, appearing to grab some cup drinks for the kids, “You’ve made no bet with me.”

Yixing sighed, “I did for the pair of us and by the end of the day I should be collecting.”

Chanyeol blinked, “You think Sehun’s pregnant?”

“Like that wasn’t obvious,” Kyungsoo said, grabbing a cloth before rolling his eyes, “Candy knocked a drink over, I’m sorry.”

“Stain resistant carpet,” Yifan smiled, handing over a cleaning fluid regardless, “best invention known to man.”

“We need to invest in some,” Kyungsoo said, ducking back out, “Channie is going to lose big time tonight.”

Baekhyun pouted, “Yeah, like no one would have predicted that.”

“Baek, no arguing,” Suho warned, shaking his head to stop Chanyeol pouting.

Tao suddenly appeared, carry Candy who clearly looked like she had done more than knock a drink over on the floor and would probably need a bath, “What are you lot going on about?”

Yifan couldn’t resist, “Oh just about how someone has been a very naughty panda and may have possibly not used protection at some point over the last few weeks.”

A frown rippled across the youngsters face before there came a very loud, clear and rather annoyed sounding, “Huang Zitao! Get your arse up here now!”

Without so much as a pause, Tao passed the soaking Candy to Suho as he was closest and went running up the stairs as fast as his legs would carry him. “Oh dear, someone’s in trouble,” Yixing said with a smile.

“Ha, hardly,” Chanyeol said, “They’ll have the biggest and nosiest make out session going on in a minuet.”

“Why are all daddies and uncles in the kitchen, mostly?” Yueliang asked, appearing around the corner hand in hand with Sooyeong and blinking up at the pair.

Yixing smiled and picked up his daughter and niece, “We’re just sorting the world out. Come on you two, let’s go and see what mess little Miss Candy has made.”

About to join the general throng as they headed back to the living room, Yifan paused when his phone blared into lie and the caller ID displayed ‘Xiumin’. “Finally,” he muttered to himself, answering the call and raising it to his hear, “Min! Where on earth have you been? We’ve been trying to get in contact with you for the better part of the…”

“I know!” Minseok’s voice came back, sounding a mixture between terrified, teary and completely at a lost, “I’m sorry!”

“Xiumin, what’s wrong?” Yifan immediately dropped any pretext of joking as he recognised the fear and worry in his friends voice.

“It’s Luhan,” Minseok sobbed virtually, “Oh god…I just…”

“Where are you?” Yifan asked feeling his own heart clench in fear, “Is he all right and alive?”

“Sorta, I don’t know,” Minseok sounded so broken, “They won’t let me in the operating room.”

“Operating? Oh god, Minseok where are you?” Yifan tried again, “Which hospital are you in?”

There was a pause, clearly the other checking, “Sacred Heart….Seoul.”

“Stay there, we’ll be there as soon as we possibly can,” Yifan felt as though his head was about to explode, “What happened?”

“I don’t know, he was fine and then he just….he just…collapsed and started complaining of pains and…” Minseok clearly broke down on the phone and Yifan passed it over to Suho.

“Lu-ge’s in Sacred Heart, he collapsed,” he said towards the others who had re-gathered in the kitchens, “Anyone sober enough to drive?”

Kai raised his hand, “Me for certain and Tao hasn’t touched anything either.”

“Right, get the kids bundled up and let’s go,” Yifan said, hurrying to the living room to grab his daughter and son. He didn’t need to ask anyone if they were going to go to the hospital or not, he already knew that they would be chomping at the bit to get going and even Tao and Sehun, despite having undoubtedly good news knew that Luhan held a higher importance to them all.

As they got into the cars and set off down the road, the members swapping the phone around to each talk to Minseok to convince him that he wasn’t alone in this situation. Yixing gripped lightly onto Yifan’s hand whilst he hugged Taiyang to his chest, praying time and time again that everything would be okay and that their little deer would be perfectly fine. 

Authors babbling:

Yes I'm being mean to poor Luhan again but I promise that this time it's for a really good reason and that you have nothing to worry about or fear. 

Sorry for taking a frigging age to update though, between Christmas meet ups, sodding icky head colds that floored me, work being a total pain and Christmas I've had to slowly play catch up with everything and work out what on earth I'm doing with myself. But thankfully I managed to get my spiffy new laptop all working so I'm back to working now and I'm happy to be doing so. 

So Merry Christmas to everyone, even if it's belated and I hope you all enjoy this chapter update and don't want to kill me too much for it. Comments are much loved and I wanna see if anyone can guess what Luhan's going to get for his special Christmas present ^^ 

Catch you all again soon

much love and hugs

Chia