Eunhyuk did the only logical thing he could think of and started to poke the man to confirm the status of his vitality. He was also shielding his eyes from the scandalous nekkid-ness, so he ended up poking the man in the eye.

That got a reaction. The man shot up, gesturing wildly and angrily. He seemed either mute or shocked speechless, but he looked pretty pained nonetheless.

“Sorry!” Eunhyuk flailed his arms back at him. “Sorry sorry sorry I didn’t mean to I just wanted to make sure you weren’t dead and I didn’t want to violate you with my eyes so I shut them—” he stopped when he realized that the man before him had stopped being angry and was now staring at him in awe (cradling the left side of his head with his hand). Eunhyuk sighed. “Why are you here and flashing everyone anyway?”

The man continued to stare.

“Can you talk?”

He hesitated, then shook his head.

“Oh, um…what’s your name?”

The man made some scribbles in the sand that looked like nothing except for maybe ‘dog’, ‘cane’, ‘cloud’ to Eunhyuk.

“I see…” Eunhyuk this chin. “I’ll just call you Donghae then! Since I, like, found you by the East Sea. Do you have any clothes?”

Donghae gestured around him.

“The sand…? Oh! You mean you don’t have any! Okay, well, I can go get you some right now! Uhhh…stay? Don’t go!”

Donghae nodded slowly.

***

On Eunhyuk’s way back to the castle, he ran into Minho and almost toppled over.

“Dude, where are you going?”

“No time to explain! man needs clothes!”

Minho circled around the prince and walked away.

Unfazed, Eunhyuk pranced into his bedchambers and snatched up some clothes that he thought would fit Donghae. While he ran back to the beach, he though he saw someone unfamiliar pacing in the garden under Minho’s room. Maybe he’d talk to his general about that later.

***

Eunhyuk covered his eyes while Donghae donned his clothes and refrained from poking anything this time. “Are you done? Does it fit?” He felt a sharp tug on his sleeve and peeked out from under his hand. “Oh, phew, you’re not anymore. Not that your body is unattractive or anything, it’s just—I, um—I’ll just stop now…”

The newly dressed not--anymore man’s face had a “no, no, do continue” look on his face, but Eunhyuk thought maybe he was imagining things now.

“Do you have a home we can take you to? Anywhere to stay?”

Donghae shook his head and smiled at him expectantly.

“Oh…well, you can stay with me for now!” He scratched his head awkwardly. “I, um, live in a castle. I hope that’s okay with you?”

Donghae gave him a huge smile that nearly knocked Eunhyuk over because smiles that big and white and glamorous can do that; they can blow all your thoughts to smithereens and leave you without any coherency.

Thankfully, Eunhyuk had admired his own smile in the mirror enough times to develop a sort of immunity those kinds of smiles, so all he got was a giddy feeling inside.

The first person they ran into, as Eunhyuk led Donghae to his castle, was Joon.

Joon seemed to find the situation hilarious. “Oh, Prince Eunhyukkie,” he warbled as he squished himself between the two and slung his arms around both of them, “that must be fate! And you’ve asked him to move in already? My Siwon, I never knew you to be so…so forward!”

The possibility of Donghae being Eunhyuk’s OTL hadn’t even crossed his mind; he couldn’t even talk! How could he have been the one to sing that beautiful song about how beautiful Eunhyuk was? It wasn’t like Donghae was…unappealing or anything; he was actually very good-looking. He had soft brown locks that framed his chiseled face very nicely, a pretty ing hot bod, as he’d be shown, and…well. Anyway. Eunhyuk glared at his brother’s general because the man was jumping to conclusions way too quickly. He decided to vocalize his opinions.

“You’re jumping to conclusions way too quickly! Shouldn’t you be more worried about your own love problems?”

Joon looked genuinely confused. “What love problems?”

“Oh, so you mean you and Mir have gotten together at last?”

The octopus of a man abruptly stopped and retracted his arms from around them in favor of twitching awkwardly. “What makes you think—I never—that’s ridiculous—”

“Oh shut up, you’ve had eyes for him ever since you guys were kids. You should make a move already.”

“I—no, you—asdfjkl;—”

“I’ll tell Mir that you have something to say to him the next time I see him, okay?”

He grabbed Donghae’s hand and moved on, leaving Joon flailing around and sputtering and walking into things (i.e. conveniently placed suits of armor) and hitting himself.

“Haha, er.”

Donghae’s laughed silently and stuck his tongue out behind him, even though he had nothing against Joon and really did support his notion (Eunhyuk was just so dreamy and handsome and perfect and everything he thought he’d be and more and good Siwon, he hoped he’d be able to make this man his).

Oblivious to his companion’s thoughts, Eunhyuk continued to lead him along on a half purpose-driven, half tour of a trip. The castle seemed to really fascinate Donghae, and he went around touching things every few steps they took (knocking down even more suits of armor than Onew and Joon combined while he was at it). When they finally got to the main hall, it was dinner time. The most excited one to see Donghae was, wow surprise, Kevin.

“So you mean he can’t talk? Oh, you poor man! It’s okay, I’ll talk for the both of us.” Around the table, everyone agreed and groaned silently because yes, Kevin would. He definitely would. Nonetheless, Donghae looked at him thankfully (Kevin would always insist that it was a thankful look and definitely not one of trepidation and claustrophobia).

***

On a mission to walk off the calories gained during his hearty meal, Eunhyuk found himself wandering around the back gardens of the palace (Donghae had been left in the care of Kevin, who assured the prince he wouldn’t lose him or anything). Somewhere around the residential rooms, he heard a very familiar voice singing a very familiar song about things that are very pleasing to eye.

Eunhyuk’s mind short-circuited and he whipped his head around everywhere trying to figure where the voice was coming from. He braved gnarled tree branches and evil thickets and paths that wind way too many times until he finally came upon the source: it was a slight, nice-looking boy singing under what he knew to be Minho’s window. Eunhyuk had no idea why the boy would be under Minho’s window, but omaigawd this must be his OTL and omaigawd he was not going to let this chance slide.

“You’re from the sea, aren’t you?” He blurted. The boy jumped three feet in the air and stared at him with frightened eyes.

“How did you know?” His voice was much lighter and softer, now that he wasn’t singing.

Eunhyuk frowned. “You don’t remember me?”

The boy squinted at him. “Um…no, not really.”

Oh. Well. Eunhyuk supposed that his face must have been hard to see in the water. “…So what’s your name?”

“Taemin,” the boy fidgeted and focused his gaze between the fountain and the rosebush behind him. “Please…don’t tell anyone?”

“I won’t, I promise!” Eunhyuk grabbed the startled boy’s hands. “You should stay in the palace while you’re here, though, since I’m assuming you don’t have a home…”

Taemin inhaled sharply and his eyes darted to the window above them. “Wow…um, yes, thank you.”

Yes!Eunhyuk did a mental fist-pump. It would be the second time that day that he’d rented out space in their castle for free, and this rate the place would be approximately flooded by the end of the month, but now he’d have more a chance to win his OTL over.

He could do this. He’d show the world that he could find true love too.

--------------------------

A/N: PLEASE READ THIS IN ITS ENTIRETY!

Alright, so…sorry for the ridiculous dry spell! I hope I didn’t lose any of you in the last…um…couple of months? I actually had a legitimate excuse though; I had to get my AP exams over with.

And they are now officially OVER WITH.

Since pretty much all my classes were AP’s, I kind of have free reign over everything I do now and I have more time than I know what to do with. (I don’t have an excuse for why it took so long afterwards to get this chapter out though /shot) (It just wouldn’t come out. I had to put “Wowowow” on repeat for forever just so I got into a crack-y mood. So sorry this is even shorter than the last chapter; I think I just need to get back into the swing of this fic.)

Anyway, a couple of things have happened in the past few months. First, I wrote a YunJae oneshot. If you like YunJae, go here!

The Finish Line

Secondly, I’m going to start writing a crack tutorial. If you like crack and want some tips from me (I don’t know…why…but this was requested a few times so I guess there are people out there who want it?), or if you just like seeing/reading me talk, click here and subscribe! (Please? =D)

Five Minute Crack: A Tutorial for Writing the Crazies

That's all! I'll try to get on a much more reasonable update schedule for now on. OTL THANK YOU SO MUCH to all of you who have subscribed and commented, you mean the world to me. <3