‘What the ?’ Sehun’s words summed up the entire experience nicely.

‘He can create clones? Not just illusions but actual clones?’ Chanyeol couldn’t seem to get over that.

‘We need to get Chen’s body back.’ D.O announced. It was the only thing he’d said ever since they’d come back. ‘Evil’s destroying it and if we wait too long, there won’t be anything left.’

‘I know.’ Suho sounded stressed and with a good reason. They’d known Evil was doing something differently, managing to possess so many people at the same time. Now, they knew how. He could ing clone himself.

‘How…?’ Baekhyun couldn’t get over it. He created his own illusions all the time but it never ended up acting of its own free will. And to behave like that… it needed to have a part of your soul… like a Horcrux.

‘Seriously?’ Sehun rolled his eyes. ‘Harry Potter?’

‘You got any better ideas, genius?’ Baekhyun snapped. The entire ordeal had shaken him up – excuse him for being a bit short.

‘Don’t fight.’ Xiumin patted their backs soothingly and after a little glaring at each other, both of them subsided into silence.

‘What next?’

‘If we want to get Chen’s body back…’ Suho began but D.O interrupted with a growl, ‘Of course we do, what d’you mean if?’

‘Okay, to get Chen’s body back we need to get him out again… he can apparently open up portals anywhere he wants which… is baffling…’

‘Not at all.’ Lay had been staring out of the window all this time they’d been talking, his eyes lost in that faraway world of his own. ‘We all know he mixes up powers and uses them together.’

‘But portals…’

‘Space and time.’ Lay told them gently. ‘We discussed this before.’

Tao’s eyes rounded with an ‘oh’, Kai’s frown deepening. Suho glanced at them for an explanation. Kai bit his lip, unsure how to say it but Tao took it over for him.

‘I think… well, I control time and Kai literally rips open a hole in space every time he teleports. Considering the time-space model of universe… it’s technically possible to transverse through space anywhere at any time. If I control the time period and Kai decides where he wants to be, by combining our powers, we can manage to open up a portal anywhere that’d literally lead us wherever we want to go. Add his clones – and I’m assuming he clones his essence rather than the vessel he’s possessing – and it’s not a mystery how he can be present in multiple places simultaneously… that’s probably what he did in Heirfercourt and Cabalix…’

There was silence as all of them stared at Tao in shock and wonderment. ‘What?’ Tao whined, not liking their looks.

‘Ya, I always forget he’s actually smart.’ Baekhyun shook his head and earned himself a punch on his shoulder. Suho closed his mouth and cleared his throat, pride clearly written all over his face. ‘So, as Tao explained…’

‘Wait, does that mean Killer is also an Evil clone?’ Sehun interrupted. They looked at each other, then nodded. ‘Seems like… although, he’s been a bit erratic of late…’

‘A soul divided is a soul dead.’ Lay spoke mysteriously, still staring out of the window.

Another round of silence followed as they waited for him to expand on it but that was apparently it. Then D.O broke it. ‘So he’s dying? Killer or Evil?’

‘Both?’ Baekhyun suggested, thinking over it. ‘Because Evil is consuming Killer’s body but he’s also breaking down himself?’

‘Wait, this also explains how he kept the same body for so long!’ Chanyeol jumped up excitedly. ‘Cause his clones consume slower than usual!’

‘So now we’ve explained everything… except how the is he cloning himself.’

‘Baekhyun said it already…’ Lay’s voice drifted over.

‘Horcrux?’

‘Seriously?’ Sehun looked pissed off, especially since Baekhyun was poking his tongue out at him.

‘Not exactly…’ Lay finally deigned to look at them. His eyes were haunted, dark circles under his eyes. ‘Evil is a force of destruction – he consumes, he cannot create.’

‘We know that…’ Sehun interrupted but the others hushed him.

‘That was true until the last time we faced him together and pushed him back.’ The others nodded, wondering what he was getting at. ‘What you guys don’t know…’

He glanced at Baekhyun, eyes pleading. And it suddenly hit him. ‘Do you mean…?’

Lay nodded, looking miserable. ‘I think I gave him my ability.’

‘Care to share?’ Luhan waved his arm at the rest of them. ‘In the dark here!’

Baekhyun his lips, eyes on his Shadow. ‘You’ll have to start.’ Nodding, Lay stared at his hands as he started talking.

‘Some time after we threw him away, Evil escaped.’ There were gasps and sounds of objection but Baekhyun glared until they silenced. ‘And he ended up on our planet…’ his eyes met Kris’s. ‘Remember that time I was really, really sick and you couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me?’

Kris nodded. They’d been sure he would die and it had been terrible – Suho had gone crazy, relaying anything and everything he thought could help him.

‘Well… Evil showed up at the forest and attacked me…’ Luhan hissed angrily at that. Lay and Baekhyun were, offensively speaking, the weakest among them and it was obvious why Evil had targeted him. Coward. ‘…and I might’ve… sort of healed him.’

‘You did what?’ Suho sounded exasperated. ‘Do you know what that means???’

Lay nodded, still staring at his fingers. ‘It… drained a lot of my powers and…’

‘No wonder I felt like crap.’ Baekhyun stated sardonically.

‘Wait, you knew about this?’ Suho rounded on him. Baekhyun shrugged. ‘Kind of. I knew he’d messed with something terrible, I had no idea he was trying to ing heal the Evil. Since he was draining so rapidly, I had to force my own energy into him so he’d keep standing.’

Lay bit his lip, looking sheepish. ‘Well, he broke free of my hold and ran back immediately. I couldn’t understand how he’d vanished so quickly back then but now that I think about it, he’d probably used the portal.’

‘So you’re saying, you gave your healing ability to Evil?’ Chanyeol sounded curious.

‘I think it’s more worrisome that he took Evil’s darkness into himself.’ Suho sounded pissed. ‘What were you thinking?’

‘I wasn’t…’ Lay’s words trailed off and he gave a cute smile, glancing winsomely from underneath his lashes.

‘Lay!’ Both Kris and Suho reprimanded in the same time and Lay put his head down again. Baekhyun went to his side, patting him.

‘No wonder he ran away.’ Baekhyun commented, now fully understanding what his Shadow had been attempting. ‘You were trying to heal him again, weren’t you?’

There were disapproving glares from Kris, Suho, Luhan and ironically, Tao.    

 ‘I can track him.’ Lay offered by way of appeasement.

‘WHAT?’ D.O jumped in front of him, grabbing his chin. ‘Can you really? Where is he now? Tell me!’

‘Geez, give him space!’ Baekhyun pushed D.O back but Lay stopped him, smiling up at the Legend. ‘I can as long as he’s on earth. I found that out last night – as long as he’s in the same dimension as I, I can feel his presence and track him down… kind of like with the Shadows.’

‘So you’ll know when he shows up?’ D.O’s eyes were wide with anticipation and they didn’t need to see his evil-lord smile to know he had plans churning in his head already.

Lay nodded. ‘Yeah.’

‘Good.’

Evil was in for a huge surprise.

………………

ing Legends! Evil seethed, struggling to get rid of the light that threatened to encroach into his body. He cut his wrist and let it flow, the blood black and clotted as he forced it out of the Legend’s dying body. He could just possess a vessel, turn it into his puppet. If there was no soul inside, the bodily function would cease.

And the healer had to show up – it wasn’t enough he’d pushed him back into the Abyss and forced him to stay there for who knew how long, plagued by the creatures of darkness because he’d been touched by light. Evil stared at the finger marks that were branded into his vessel’s chest, the spots clearly glowing in the darkness.

ing healer!

The spots were like burning coals, burying into his core. He could feel the healing energy eating away at him and thought it was prudent to just abandon the body.

Following his idea, he shifted into the amorphous black smoke that was his real form and poured out from the orifices in the body, watching apathetically as it fell, unable to stand now that there was nothing inside.

Good thing Abyss didn’t have any chronologic dimension because this body was only good for a single use and Evil needed to be very, very careful. His plan had failed so far – he had no idea where the Tree was and despite possessing the Legend, he couldn’t track the others if they decided to stop using their powers.

His viewing spheres were useless if he had no idea about their whereabouts. Before, they had been unaware of his presence and it’d been easy to find them since they weren’t all that bothered about hiding themselves. But now…

Especially since he’d taken one of their brothers.

He supposed he could always target the humans they were close to. The overprotective arrogant bastards will probably come running even if he attacked anyone they didn’t know but he always liked keeping things personal.

One of the spheres lit up and he gazed into the streets of Oulphesden. They had shifted places and he’d been rather busy putting his plan in action, so he’d missed where they were hiding. But he knew where their humans were.

There. The girl was strumming with her guitar, gazing into the distance. Well, wasn’t she cute? Bet the leader would lose it if he messed with her, intimate as they were.

Planning ahead always gave him a sense of accomplishment.

So, if the Legends somehow managed to beat him this time – unlikely but still, he had to be practical – he knew who to target next. Satisfied, he turned to look at the body he’d abandoned.

The Legend’s body seemed to be going through the final throes of death, trembling and quivering and Evil heaved a disgusted sigh. He had no desire to be contained within the vessel, contaminated as it was but if he wanted to use it again, he had to make sure the body didn’t completely die… it was uncomfortable trying to move a corpse that had already gone through rigor mortis.  

Disgust filled him but he forced himself back into the body and moved his limbs, ignoring the nails-hammered-into-bones sensation. They moved more fluidly than they had before – had to hand it to the Healer, he knew how to fix someone up.

Climbing into his throne, Evil retreated into thinking mode, pondering over his next move.

…………………

A/N

Hello :) 

I hope you're liking this part so far? I know its a little intense but don't worry, plenty of fluffly, lighthearted stuff ahead. Do comment and let me know what you guys think. I added this chapter mainly to provide an explanation about how Evil's operating this time around so the readers can get a better picture. Tell me if it worked and if there's something you can't understand, feel free to ask :) 

Okay then, happy reading (oh the irony) 

oh and in case anyone's confused, the viewing spheres are something like that vvvvvvv ('cause Luhan could see EXO K in there and I thought it'd be nice to use that in the story - K and M interacted through these spheres when they were in Shadow Planets... make sense? No? I'll just go away now)