Minseok was the first one to be arrived at the school yard. He succeeded on slipping out of his Biology class he just stepped in using a toilet excuse after Luhan sent him a short message with only “code red” written. He was short of breaths, panting ever so low in volume to hide it, an obvious evident of how he had sprinting his way. When he discovered his younger brothers from afar, Luhan was sitting on a bench with sleeping Kai’s head on his laps and Sehun was on his right -he had his knees up to his chest and his chin nestled between them- alongside Tao at the right end of the bench. A glance on them convinced him nobody was harmed and it relieved him a bit. Although with a longer observation he noticed apart from Kai, none of them were appeared delighted; Sehun was moping silently, Tao was sullen and Luhan looked like he had foam at the mouth. Perhaps he should be more concerned than he already was.

Luhan lifted his head when a shadow suddenly wrapped them from the blazing sun, “Fill me in” Minseok said between his indistinctly heavy breaths, towering him. There were lines of wrinkles on Luhan’s forehead, his eyes which usually full of sparks were squinting menacingly and lips were smacked tightly in a thin line so pressed. Minseok didn’t know what or who had troubled him but what he was assured of, whoever or whatever it was, they would be doomed.

“Hyung...”Sehun outstretched his hands, “up..” he added, whimpering. His tiny eyes were glistening with few beads of water and plump cheeks were stained with a stream of dry tears. Minseok wondered whether it had something to do with the code-red-message Luhan had sent whilst hoisting Sehun up by his armpits and positioned him firmly in his embrace. Sehun nuzzled the right side of his head on Minseok’s crook of neck, making himself comfortable, letting his older brother ran his soothing palms gently along his back to calm him down.

In some ways, Minseok knew Tao would be growing as the second Baekhyun as he waved his hands dismissively before folding his arms in front of his chest, sitting with the right leg crossed; a signature body language of Baekhyun’s. He whispered, “Telekinesis him is a good idea”

The scene didn’t help Minseok to have an understanding on what exactly had happened but confusing him even more. He gestured to Tao in question, urging Luhan to enlighten him.

Kris showed up right before Luhan opened his mouth to answer Minseok, impeccably relax like he just took a stroll in a nice afternoon of spring while his eyes were sweeping them in anxiety to search for any explanation. How he didn’t gasp for air told Luhan that Kris used his flight power to get to them but he didn’t have any time to waste to confront him about it right now, hence letting it slide.

“School called. Chanyeol, Baekhyun, Jongdae and Kyungsoo.” Luhan simply said, believing the minimum information already put everything in the picture clearly.

The sound of a long sigh let out by Minseok was buried by Kris’ sharp and loud groan.

“Kyungsoo.” Added Luhan to stress how severe the problem probably was, remembering them that Kyungsoo, who was once in a blue moon troubled himself, was also took his part on it.

“What else now?” Minseok asked, recovered from the news faster than Kris.

Luhan’s face turned even grimmer instantly on the question, the line of his lips grew unbelievably thinner. “Fight” He replied in a low volume, as if someone had shoved him something hideous down his throat, it was clogged.

Kris rumbled while choking on air and Minseok’s face turned really antagonistic immediately, livid. He could forgive every prank they pulled even found it hilarious at times but fighting was a limitation they should have had known better than crossing it. He gave few motions to Luhan to signal the younger one to get up and clean the mess, did not fully trust himself to talk without exploding and freezing the whole school at the moment; angling his chin up to point on Luhan then tilting his head to suggest Luhan to follow him, before transferring Sehun to Kris’ arms.

Kai was sleeping like a log that he only mumbled few meaningless words when Luhan moved his head from his lap carefully. And that struck Kris. “Do I have to take care of them, don’t I?” Kris was stunned, his eyelashes were batted comically.

“What? You don’t want to? Want to come instead?” Luhan bit tersely.

Kris gulped down his own spit, took a few steps backward for a good measure like a scaredy-cat, his eyes wavered, “oh, yeah, ‘course ngg take care of them...” He stammered. How on earth a feminine face like Luhan could turn really devilish like that?

The timber door was opened by a petite lady. She escorted Luhan and Minseok to come in and Minseok was the only one who was somewhat in his right mind enough to say thanks and maintained his common courtesy.

Right after Luhan stepped in, he scrutinized the room, finding the office was packed with other pupils, eight women and three men, also his brothers seating side by side on the corner of the room. A glimpse on them confirmed him that there were no bruise neither scratch mark on their faces but Luhan might have just missed it since the four of them hung their own head down to their chests.

Judging by how crowded the office was, if Luhan didn’t know any good, he’d thought their brothers just involved in a street fighting between gangs.

“Oh there you are. Glad to see you, gentlemen, glad to see you! Please make your selves comfortable, Mister Luhan...” Luhan heard lots of loud gasps. “....Mister Minseok” An old and plump Lady greeted them, her eyes were twinkling. Luhan and Minseok knew the lady just like she knew them; she used to be their Headmistress after all. If they weren’t stumbled in her office with an agenda to discuss about their brother’s issue, Luhan would express how delighted he was to meet her, face all scrunched up in joy while jumping roundabout, because actually Luhan admired the Lady with her wise persona and melodious tone of voice. Instead, past a brief handshake, the Lady waved her hand to the only two chairs which left empty in the room and both of them stiffly sat.

The Headmistress then began to request each of them to introduce their selves and they proceeded as instructed yet Luhan was excessively distracted. In due course, his impatient part and his temper got the best of Luhan as he whipped his head to his younger brothers who sat far behind him. He intended to murmur slowly or even mouthed if he could control himself enough but his anger betrayed him as he found himself almost screaming across the chamber, blurting out “What happened?!”

The Headmistress coughed, astounded by what Luhan had just done, trying to gain the interest of her audience which now owned by Luhan.

Baekhyun looked up to meet Luhan’s eyes. He loured, crossing his hands on his chest, biting the left bottom of his lips strongly while Kyungsoo, who sat on his right, had both of his fist clenched powerfully, his knuckles turned whiter than his skin already was. On Baekhyun’s left sat Chanyeol who, from time to time, ran his hands through his black hair as if the act would prevent him to set the building on fire. Jongdae was the only one to open his mouth for a second before closing it again after Kyungsoo’s right hand quickly grabbed his left wrist, appeared as if Kyungsoo just awakened him from the wild idea of talking and explain everything, he preferred to hush himself.

No one answered Luhan.

A ginger-haired middle-aged woman spoke up, “Who are you?” she was sounded high-pitched, the kind of intonation which would make you thought of the witch you were familiarized from the bedtime story your Mother told.

Minseok replied politely, even so he still couldn’t hinder the coldness in his tone, “We are their brothers” There was a momentary silence before he could hear a weak commotion of a discussion about “...so young..”, “where are their parents...?”, “Aren’t they a gay couple?”, “I thought he was a girl”, “So pretty”, “He must have been a transual”

Luhan grunted.

Somebody in the room surprisingly yelled, “Your brothers beat up my son!”

The Principal coughed again, rather loudly.

Minseok didn’t deny the fact that both of them were angry at their brothers. However that didn’t grant anyone any right to accuse them without any proof. They knew their brothers and they trusted that none of them would ever do such thing as fighting if they weren’t provoked, especially since there was Kyungsoo sitting among them. Their parents had made sure they understood about it right after each one of the family members discovered their power.

Thus, Minseok swung around fast to stare piercingly at the man. For a split second, both Luhan and Minseok forgot about their civility, the Confucianism taught which implemented in a tradition to respect the elders that they had been held since they were a bunch of toddlers and how they were younger than the man. Luhan was about to jump from his seat and lurched forward squeezing the life out of him when Minseok, gained his self-control earlier than Luhan, instantaneously snatched his uniform and put him in place. Luhan muttered something about Colonel Blimp and codger.

The Headmistress decided to clapped her hands like a nursery teacher in a class trying to make her pupils focus on her, cooing on them. When she was assured that every eye was finally on her, she hummed. “Now, Ladies and Gentlemen, I deem it’s best for us to keep our calm.” She flashed a beam. “Please allow me to explain from what I have collected first. As you might already have predicted and informed by phone, they were engaged in a fight on the hall this midday with lots of pupils witnessing them. It’s not an excellent example and hurt the value this school dearly holds, of course. While I must say I unfortunately haven’t heard their side of story...” She swatted her right hand in the air to Chanyeol, Kyungsoo, Baekhyun and Jongdae. “....because they refused to talk, Mister Lee here, “She pointed to a pale young boy wrapped by the silky-black hair woman. His shirt was burnt, right at his chest and there was a smear of blood on the crook of his lips. “...told me how the four of them had acted aggressive to him first. I have questioned on why but Mister Lee and his mates convinced me all right that he didn’t do anything which deserved to be quarrelled over. I have to make sure that the pupils know we cannot tolerate any violent acts in the school area therefore, although I believe a fight shall not take place without any reason, since the four of them didn’t give any clarification and enlighten me, I don’t think I could do something to help them from having a suspension because the injured party...” he signalled to 8 pupils situated beside Jongdae “...at this point were wounded fairly bad.”

Luhan and Minseok couldn’t deny but to accept the statement what the Headmistress had just uttered because except for their brothers, almost all of the other pupils in the room were injured badly; bleeding nose, blood on the tip of the lips, bluish face caused by bruise, also lines of red here and there on their body.

The lady in brown blouse howled right after the Headmistress finished her last sentence “It was clear that my child was victimized. Look at his sweet face!”

To be fair, Luhan thought the child was quite adorable with his chubby cheeks and tousled puffy hair but to call him sweet might be a stretch. He only had a few red lines on his skin and a brown scorched mark on his shirt but that could be anything and had Luhan wondered whether he was the only one who thought it wasn’t clear.

Minseok threw the Headmistress a faint smile which didn’t touch his eyes, “Would you please benevolently give me a minute to ask them about it? That way I suppose we can hear about their side of story. I promise you that.” The four younger brothers shuddered with fright at the last sentence. The draughtiness of his speech was spread through the room as the atmosphere became stagnant and the Headmistress nodded without even realising it.

“What happened?” He said after turning to face his younger brothers, slowly sauntered to have himself nearer to them.

Nobody responded him and he began to knock his heel on the floor with a dull rhythm. The taps rang threateningly and the air started to feel more suffocating to the four of them. Apart of Baekhyun was sure Minseok had something to do with it.

The stillness damaged Jongdae’s common sense as he began to be a little antsy on his wooden chair as if it was thorny and ultimately mumbled, “We can’t. It’ll hurt you”

Promptly, Luhan fled from his chair and darted with his long strides to them and Minseok once more had to take a good grip of his shoulder to prevent him from harassing his brothers in public, right in time. He trembled to contain his fury and the tip of his ears went fuming red. His pitch was unstable as he said, “Young men, one of you better tell me because help me God you’re in trouble if you won’t”

“Just let us take the punishment, all right?” Baekhyun snapped.

Someone murmured on the subject of anger management and hormones.

It was hard enough for Minseok to control the rage boiling in his self yet he had to be alarmed of Luhan’s wrath which might happened anytime that he felt like freezing the lad to keep him from hopping onto their brothers and strangle them. Firmly grasping Luhan’s bicep, Minseok tried another approach on them, softened his intonation, “Let me help you, please. If it turns out that you are actually the one who were maltreated, and I believe it is, I’ll never forgive myself for letting you have the suspension yet lacking of any knowledge on why.” There was sincerity and genuine on it.

When the silence grew longer, he continued, crouching in front of them and speaking tenderly “I am not Mum and I don’t know how to deal with this kind of happenings let alone expertise on it so if you won’t me helping you, at least have a mercy on me, please.”

As if Minseok had cracked a thick shell that wrapped them in the mention of their Mother, Kyungsoo sighed, his head rose. Chanyeol, Baekhyun and Jongdae peeked on him thoughtfully, and that was when Minseok knew Kyungsoo was the key to get into them. It appeared the beagle line had chosen to seal their mouths and kept their silence if it wasn’t Kyungsoo who spoke up.

Kyungsoo glanced on the Headmistress who gave him an encouraging smile, glowing as usual. His eyes darted around warily, assessing the situation before landing on Minseok’s feature. If it was Lay in the room, he would have reached for Kyungsoo’s hand and rubbed it sympathetically or embraced him to soothe the younger when Kyungsoo held himself, hands wrapped around like he wanted to make sure that he was secure at the moment neither shattered to pieces, yet. But he was Minseok and all he could offer was an expression which suggested how eager he would try to understand him, hoping it would cross to the younger one.

“Please...” Minseok begged.

The little boy rocked his body back and forth trying to buy some times to sway himself. It was then he recalled about the scene when Minseok hugged Luhan on the other night and gifted him a gist about Minseok might not be fragile but he had a crumble of soft parts and he didn’t like to spoil it by baring the truth about what his schoolmates had done to him, at least for now. On the other hand the scene also had him believing all right that Minseok would be loathing himself in the future if he didn’t handle this issue excellently; protecting his younger brothers. Also, Kyungsoo wasn’t the only one on this. There were three of his older brothers who would be suspended unjustly if he kept on silencing himself. So, Kyungsoo held on to the two last notions, his voice was shaky as he explained, “They called me Shorty at first and I didn’t even bothered a slight while I reckon later that my mute had pushed them on. Then they began to assault me, sandwiched me with his bulky body to a locker when Chanyeol, Baekhyun and Jongdae happened to find them. So Chanyeol dragged me over and tried to avoid any violence but they called Kris hyung, Luhan hyung and Lay hyung Chinks, all right?! Lots of them went all sniggering and mocking and that’s when they said nobody wanted all twelve of us and that’s why we have no parents and I couldn’t have it ever so I lashed out.....” He stopped himself abruptly, shaking his head as if he regretted what he had just said.

Luhan’s face had went impossibly scarlet, he looked like every hair on his body stood up and he could grow horns on his top any second while Minseok had his jaws twitched and eyes went narrowing, his ambience turned frosty. Looking at Luhan and Minseok right then was like looking into Mordor and Antarctica.

Chanyeol trailed off, “Kyungsoo might have punched him a bit....” considering Kyungsoo actually had an earth power also inhumanely strong, Chanyeol was stating the truth; the evidences showed them that it was indeed a bit.

“A biiittt?” Another man squeaked like a scoundrel making Luhan turned his head swiftly to spot the one who had dared to exclaim after all Kyungsoo had shared them.

“NO! NO!” A boy who before was referred as Mr, Lee by the Headmistress quivering as he jumped to his feet, frantically cried. “He lied! I didn’t do anything! They just beat the life out of me and my mates!”

“I got to fry that arsehole and extract his kidney!”

“Bastard gave his cobblers again!”

“Should have just burnt that bugger!”

Minseok never realised how rich his brothers’ vocabularies in profanities until today as the beagle-line grumbled in unison, making sure the parents and the Headmistressdidn’t hear them. If only Suho was in the room....

The oldest of the twelve gave a do-not-talk-in-that-language-if-I’m-around-do-you-understand?-stare before throwing a look to his back, “I’m not finished. Would you please kindly...?” Minseok said, deliberately hung his sentence, a smirk plastered on his face unemotionally, intimidating. “So what did you boys do?” He went on, didn’t hassle himself to wait for the kid’s reply.

“I beat Lee, yes.” Kyungsoo admitted, swallowing his voice. “But Jongdae strangled me to cool myself except this one mate suddenly shoved Baekhyun and he was knocked off, fell on the floor, bottom first. So Chanyeol charged on to push him away.” Minseok knew he was referring to the chubby cheeks boy. He also knew that Chanyeol didn’t simply push him; the boy definitely used his fire power on him while making a contact with his shirt. “Then it was all like billy-o messy. The eight of them all tried to attack us at once so I might have kicked some of his mates out of anger to defend myself, don’t know, it’s hazy, I wasn’t myself.”

The room went noisy from all the complaints of the parents but Minseok decided to feigned ignorance.

“What else?” He boomed. The parents hushed themselves at once.

“Most likely, done some of my Hapkido moves on them.” Baekhyun acknowledged his faults, eyes boring the floor.

“Uh, yeah, kicked a bunch of butts and smacked bunch of heads” Jongdae answered.

Chanyeol looked at Minseok, trying to put across what he truly meant by saying, “Lost my control a bit...”

The fuss went on again.

“We got a bit brute l own that up!” Jongdae barked amidst the mayhem. “But that’s just because we know it wasn’t the first Kyungsoo had to put up with!”

Kyungsoo’s face went paler.

“That’s right! The bast-lad, had bothered Kyungsoo all his years but when we finally knew and confronted Kyungsoo, he said he was fine and begged us not to park our nose. I know Kyungsoo could crash them all right in one blow if he wanted but he didn’t so we just kept our distance like bunch of bloody Muppets while Kyungsoo was being bullied all year and we made sure he was fine and didn’t have to be admitted to hospital! That brat-...” Baekhyun cried.

“Shut up, Baek” Kyungsoo cut him, glaring. Baekhyun groaned in frustration yet respected Kyungsoo’s request. Back off.

Luhan made a weird noise, hissing and puffing, out of wrath consuming him and Chanyeol was in fact rather amazed that he didn’t telekinesis anything yet.

“It’s not the first, is it?” Minseok was determined to get to the bottom of it.

“What?”

“They bullied you?”

Kyungsoo could sense his heart somersaulted. “Ugh...” He replied lamely, evaded Minseok’s gaze.

“I take it as a yes” He was solemn.

Rile all of a sudden was back once more filling Kyungsoo in. It was hard enough for him to confess about the confrontation while being in the same room with his schoolmates as he didn’t want to be recognised as a talebearer in his year and being bullied all over again because of that. Admitting that they had been bothering him before was already humiliating because it made him felt pathetic. He considered himself nice enough to think about how their brothers would feel about what they had did to him to be hesitated first before telling him the story yet how could his brothers still egged him on? He wanted everyone to just leave him be, was it too much to ask? How was it so hard for his brothers to understand?

“I’m fine! It’s just a simple fight, all right? Just let me accept the punishment and go home!”

“I know when you lie” and Minseok didn’t lie when he said that. Kyungsoo had a habit of maintaining eye contact without blinking too much while subtly shuffling his feet and brushing his hair when he was uncomfortable or lying and currently the boy did lots of those actions.

It ticked Kyungsoo off, how he knew that Minseok just told him the truth because he was acquainted with the fact that the oldest had a knack on observing others. Half of him was irritated with himself, the other half detested Minseok for being accurate and they both kicked the anger in him. Indifferent to others’ eyes in the room which set on both of them, he shrieked, “I wish Mum was still alive because if it was Mum, he would just leave me alone! Why can’t you just do the same? Don’t act like you care! I am fine!!”

Minseok went agape.

The Headmistress took it as her cue for her entrance again. She claps her hands, melodiously this time. “Mister Lee, are your friends telling the truth? Did you bully Kyungsoo, didn’t you?”

“Headmistress, I’m offended that you accuse my son like that” The silky-black haired lady replied instead, cold.

“I believe I did not just accuse your child of anything. I simply ask for a confirmation because if I’m not, your son will be punished wrongly and we won’t it to be happened, do we?” When she didn’t get any answer, she backed her attention to Lee once again. “So...?”

“What?” He said, flabbergasted. “No! No! No! Of course not!” and Minseok knew he was lying.

It was all happening very fast; the lights in the room was all illuminating, ever so blindingly before the bulbs blasted out, there were slashes of lightings and a phoenix flied out on the windowsill, flaming and blazing. Shrieks were heard followed by cried and ruckus of panic while everyone tried to stoop so low or curled their selves in protection from the shattered glasses. Luhan just stood there in the middle of the room, stupefied and Minseok was the first one to snap back, grabbing Chanyeol by his upper arms which were sizzling under his palms, hissing “Dismiss her!” followed by Kyungsoo who hurriedly snatched Jongdae and Baekhyun’s wrist and yanked them to reality. Hoping nobody saw the Phoenix, moments later, Minseok smiled awkwardly, “Everybody’s all right?”

Ps:This chapter will be divided into three parts (I guess) because as you see now, it's too looonnnngggg
Btw, 71 subscribers?! It feels like I have a responsibility to run the universe, I mean... OMG THANK YOU SO MUCH :* Also, I read all of the comments and thank you for the compliments, it's strenghten me hihihi xoxo