Hoseok groaned in his sleep when the alarm clock rang in the once quiet room. He put his blanket above his head, trying to block the annoying sound out but to no avail. A small sigh escaped his lips before he stretched his hand out and turned the alarm off. Slowly, he sat up on his bed. His eyelids felt unusually heavy and his body and mind were drained of energy. Normally he would get out of his bed and begin his morning routine, but today he felt something was off with him.

Was he ill?

That’s strange. It was unusual for him to fall ill just like that. He planted his hand on his forehead, checking his temperature but it felt normal. Maybe he didn’t feel well because he didn’t sleep properly. Even that was unusual. That night he kept turning and twisting in his bed, trying every position to help him fall asleep. He even tried to drink a cup of warm milk to make him tired. But nothing worked. Nevertheless he had to go to school, maybe he will feel better later? He groaned, rubbing his eye with his fist as he made his way out of bed and began to walk to the door.

He glanced to the full-length mirror to look at himself. He had gotten it from his elder sister after she bought a new one. Stickers of flowers and cute animals was stuck on the corners of the mirror. He didn’t bother taking them off—they were cute and matched his bright room. He blinked his eyes when he saw himself and halted his steps. Tilting his head to the side, he examined himself. Nothing looked wrong with him, he looked healthy as he usually did. But when he looked closer, he could spot dark circles underneath his eyes that must have appeared from his poor sleep. He let out a sigh. With his lips pressed into a firm line, he spared a quick glance to his houseplants that was right beside his window.

To his shock, they all had wilted.

“What the—?” He looked around his room to every houseplants he had. Just like those by the window, they all had wilted. “No..” He breathed and walked to a plant to examine it closer. The closer he came toward the plant, and the other plants around it, the more it wilted. Upon the sight made him halt his steps, and slowly back away from them. “No…” His breathing became heavier as he darted his eyes on every houseplant in his room. “No, no, no!” He stumbled back and fell to the ground on his bum. The pain from the landing was dull compared to the painful reality. He crawled back till he hit his back on a wall. “No, no, no, no, no,” he kept rambling to himself, like a mantra, as he brought his knees up to his chest and hugged himself. “Not this… Why?” he whispered and buried his head in his arms.

‘Why is it happening again?’

~*~

Heavy rain was pouring down from the ash grey sky. The witch, who was sitting inside a classroom, watched the rain patter against the window she sat at with a sulky pout on her lips, her head resting on her open palm. It had been raining ever since they returned from Busan, and it seemed it would continue for some time. A small sigh escaped her lips at the thought and she glanced forward to the teacher, who was lecturing the group of witches the art of potions and elixir.

“...you then add three drops of blood from a venomous snake - this one is from a viper which can be found all around the world - then you blend everything together.” Everybody carefully watched the bright yellow liquid slowly change colour into deep purple. The teacher raised the bottle of potion for a better view. “This potion can cure illness but only if you drink a small amount of it,” she said.

A girl, who sat a few rows infront of Soojin, raised her hand. “If this is a potion that can cure then why did you pour blood from a venomous snake? Shouldn’t it have the opposite effect?”

“Good question, Hyemin” remarked the teacher. “Someone who can answer her question?” Her eyes trailed on every witchs’ faces till they stopped on Soojin. “Miss Jo, can you answer the question?”

Soojin prevented herself from letting out a sigh. She knew the teacher would pick her, as always. “Because of the large amount of dart frog, lotus and cold darnes the potion becomes posionous. The blood of a venomous snake neutralise the potion and makes it drink-able but its curing effect still remains.”

The teacher nodded in approval. “That’s right, Miss Jo.” She glanced to the clock that was hanging on the wall above the door. “I hope you all learned something today. This will come on next week’s test so I hope you have noted everything I said.” She allowed the witches to leave and the girls quickly grabbed their belongings and went out of the classroom.

As Soojin was heading toward her locker, a figure approached her from behind and walked beside her on her right. She looked up to see Taehyung grinning widely at her. He had his blazer hung over his right shoulder and his left hand inside his trouser pockets. “How was class?” he asked.

“The usual,” she answered with a shrug. “How about you?”

“Same,” he replied. “We were dismissed quite early so I decided to pick you up.”

She smiled. “Oh, my class usually ends later than yours. How long have you been waiting?”

Taehyung looked up, thoughtfully. “Not so long. Maybe 10 minutes, I guess?” he said. That was a lie. He had been waiting for her to finish her class for more than 30 minutes, but that wasn’t something he was going to tell. They went to her locker so she could place her backpack inside it. “Jimin went ahead to meet Namjoon and Jungkook,” explained Taehyung as she closed her locker.

“Can we go to the cafeteria before we meet up with them? I’m a little hungry…” She rubbed her stomach while pouting.

“Of course.” Taehyung playfully circled his arm around her shoulders. “You won’t be able to go upstairs if you don’t have food in your belly,” he teased, making her laugh and gently punch his side for teasing her.

~*~

“Hmm…”

“Uhhh….”

“Aha! Uh—no.. Hmm….”

Jungkook shifted his gaze from his phone to Jimin, who was making those noises. He watched him staring intensively on the ancient book in his hands with his brows furrowed. The werewolf tilted his head side to side, as if it would help him. Namjoon who was sitting on a couch on the opposite side of the room, was playing on his phone while jamming to the music he was listening to, not hearing the noises the werewolf made. As Jimin was tilting his head far to the left, the fire mage decided to question him. “What are you doing?” he asked.

Jimin froze in his position before shifted his gaze to meet the fire mage’s. “I’m trying to solve this riddle.”

The fire mage made his way to the werewolf and sat down beside him. “Let’s see…” Jungkook rapidly blinked his eyes after he read the riddle. “Uhh…” Now he understood his friend’s struggle. “Hey, Joon. What do you think of this riddle?” he asked and read the riddle out loud. His brows furrowed when he didn’t hear any replies from their friend. “Joon?”

They tilted their heads up at the same time to look at their friend, who was still listening to music. As soon as their eyes landed on him, their eyes grew big in shock. “N-Namjoon?” Jimin stuttered at the shocking sight of their friend. His head was out of proportion—not that it was stuck on his back or under his armpit—but instead of seeing a human head on a human body, the shapeshifter now had a head of a gorilla and a body of a human. What made it even worse was that he hadn’t noticed it, yet.

“Namjoon!” Jungkook shrieked, this time he got a reaction. "Y-You..."

The shapeshifter glanced up before he plugged his ear-in out of one ear, “yeah?” He got confused by the expressions on their faces. “What? It’s rap.” They did not move an inch. Getting uncomfortable by their stares, Namjoon paused the music. “Do I have something on my face?” he asked this time.

“Yeah…” Both of them nodded. “In fact; you have something all around your head,” remarked Jungkook. He pointed to his phone, “maybe you should take a look.”

Namjoon rose a brow up at him. Whatever it was, it must’ve been horrendous enough for them to act like that. He tapped on his phone to activate the front camera, “if it’s my hair then you should just tell me I won’t get—” The sight of his head made him scream like a little girl and drop his phone, which landed on his lap. “What?” He grabbed his head with his hands and felt the rough fur instead of his normal soft hair. “What?! How can this happen?”

“I don’t know!” Jimin shook his head.

“This has never happened to me before!” The shapeshifter jumped up on his feet, not caring that he possibly cracked his phone screen, and began examining his body. “How come only my head was turned into a gorilla? And why?!”

Jungkook returned his calm and he, too, began to question the wierd shape shifting. “That’s strange…” he mumbled. Judging by the way the shapeshifter reacted, the transformation were not intentional.

The werewolf and the fire mage watched the shapeshifter glow and shift into various animals before he got back into his human form. Namjoon planted his hands on his face, touching his smooth skin to make sure the transformation really worked. “I’m back to normal now?” he asked. Their confirm made him sigh in relief.

“Your shape shifting are much faster now,” commented Jimin, who was still recovering from the previous shock. He blinked his eyes when he noticed something moving behind Namjoon. He pointed at it, “I think you missed a spot.”

“Huh?” Namjoon turned around to see a long black tail, possibly of a panther. “What the- !?” He sighed in defeat and fell, face first, onto the couch. A frustrated groan escaped his throat and his tail wiggled furiously in the air. All Jimin and Jungkook could do was to stare at him (but mostly the wiggling tail) in worry.

~*~

Yoongi impatiently tapped his cup of coffee, desperately wanting to get our of the crammed cafeteria. But Jin, however, was not making an attempt to escape. Instead, he was having a discussion with some girls that suddenly had appeared right beside their table. The vampire was listening to their conversation with one ear. It turned out the girls were from the school’s council and needed to discuss with them about the annual summer festival. He, and his friends, are always helping the council with the arrangement, so it was no surprise that the girls had things to discuss with them. Yoongi would gladly be more active with the discussions if it weren’t for all the loud people in the room.

“... yeah that will be, I’ll fix the firework then.” Jin said and gave the girls a gentle smile.

One of the girls, who had blonde hair, clasped her hands together in excitement. “Thank you so much for your help. We really appreciate it.”

Jin shrugged his shoulders. “You’re welcome. We’ll gladly help you with this, right Yoon?” When he glanced to the vampire he immediately noticed something was off with him. The latter was staring down on his drink while tapping it continuously. “Yoon?” he tried again, this time there was some reaction.

“Hm?” The vampire slightly lifted his head up to look at the light mage.

Jin almost let out a gasp when he saw that the colour of the vampire’s eyes had changed from chocolate brown into glowing violet. He quickly turned his gaze away from him and smiled to the girls not to make them suspicious. As he began to discuss further of the topic, averting their attention from the vampire, he wondered why the colour of his eyes had turned into violet. When the girls talked to themselves, the light mage leaned closer to his friend and whispered, “Close your eyes.” Yoongi did what he was told, though he got confused by the sudden change of behaviour of his friend. He was not aware of the change of his eye colour.

“We have to go now,” said Jin as he stood up. Yoongi stood up as well. Then the mage circled his arm around the vampire’s shoulders and carefully led him toward the exit of the crammed cafeteria. He made sure not to bump the vampire into people. As they were walking, his eyes scanned the cafeteria till they stopped on a particular witch and werewolf. His eyes narrowed at the sight of them eating snacks together. Without thinking he made his way toward them while dragging Yoongi along with him, who still had his eyes shut and couldn’t see where they were going.

“Ey, Jin! Where the hell are you taking me?” asked the vampire but the mage did not answer.

Soojin chuckled at a joke Taehyung made as she was unwrapping a chocolate filled bun. “That would’ve been awesome though.” She laughed and took a large bite of the bun.

“Haven’t you eaten breakfast?” asked the werewolf while watching her take another bite of the bun.

“I have,” she replied. “I’m just hungry today.” She was about to take a bit of her bun when she noticed the look he gave her. “No.” She shook her head. “I assure you, it’s not because of that.”

Taehyung raised his hands up in defense. “I didn’t say anything,” he said. “But thank you for clarifying.” He laughed when she gaped in disbelief and gently punched his arm.

Seeing their interaction made Jin fasten his speed, and made Yoongi to stumble a lot when he tried to keep up with him. “Hey!” The light mage greeted loudly when he approached his friends.

It was also that moment when Soojin swallowed a large piece of the bun.

His loud voice startled her and the bun got stuck in , causing her to cough. “I’m sorry!” Jin quickly patted her back in hope to reduce her coughing fit. Hearing her sudden coughing fit, Yoongi opened his eyes to see the scene infront of him.

Taehyung handed her his bottle of water, which she accepted immediately and gulped down half of its content within seconds. “Thanks,” she gasped when the coughing eased. “Gosh, I think my life flash before my eyes!” She turned around to face the light mage, “and you were in it most of the time.”

Jin blinked his eyes. “Is that supposed to be bad..?” he mumbled in disbelief.

“Huh?” The werewolf shifted his gaze to the vampire, who was staring at the witch in worry. “Yoongi… your eyes are violet.” He furrowed his brows in confusion upon the unusual sight.

His statement made them look at the vampire, but they quickly averted their stares from him as soon as he looked at them. “Are you feeling unwell?” asked the witch in concern.

Yoongi closed his eyes. “Honestly, I don’t know. All I know is that I want to get out of here and to be somewhere where I can breath properly,” he said.

They glanced at each other in worry but eventually led him out of the cafeteria and to an empty hall. Yoongi still had his eyes closed after they stopped walking. He refused to open them even when they told him it was alright for him to do so.

Jin let out a small sigh in defeat at the vampire’s refusal. He bit his bottom lip as he tried to come up with various reasons to why his eye colours had changed. The sound of someone crunching disturbed his train of thoughts. Irritated, he darted his eyes to the culprit, who was no other than the witch. He eyed the armful of snacks with a scowl on his face. “Are you really going to eat all that by yourself?” he questioned.

She looked at him, still chewing on the crisps she ate. “Yeah that’s exactly what I’m going to do,” she replied before her eyes darkened, “witch killer.”

“You’re not dead,” he wheezed. “And I’m sorry for almost sending you to the other side. It wasn’t my intention to startle you like that.”

The witch stared straight into his eyes for a moment before she cracked a smile. “I accept your apology,” she said, brightly. “I couldn’t hear your apology from earlier because I was coughing so hard but now I’m satisfied.” She gave him a large grin while he sighed in relief, glad that she wasn’t mad at him anymore.

“Jimin texted me,” announced Taehyung. “Namjoon is having trouble with his powers and he and Jungkook don’t know what to do.”

“Trouble?” Soojin muttered and glanced to the vampire, who still haven’t opened his eyes. “Do you think this is somehow connected to Yoongi?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” replied the werewolf as he put his phone into his pocket trousers. “I think we will find it out when we meet up with the rest.”

~*~

The four supernaturals quickly met up with their friends inside a room at the school, where they could not be disturbed. Namjoon demostrated for them how he could not fully shift back into his human form despite his effort. With a frustrated sigh, he sat down on the floor with his arms crossed above his chest. The supernaturals did their best not to snigger at his big chimpanzee ears. Yoongi, who still had glowing violet eyes, was watching his friends with half-closed eyes but did not dare make eye contact with them in fear of accidently hypnotizing them.

“Is someone experiencing something similar to Namjoon and Yoongi?” asked Jungkook. Everybody looked at Soojin, who still was eating her bag of crisps. She immediately noticed their stares and glared at them for judging her like that. “I mean your powers not girl problems.”

“For the last time; it’s not because of that!” she retorted but got ignored by the boys. They all knew how flustered she gets when it came to topics about things only a girl could understand. They’ve at least tried to talk to her about those certain topics—the only response they got was a punch somewhere on their bodies. However, there was only one person who she could talk to and that was the healing mage.

“Speaking of girl problems,” Jimin blinked his eyes when he noticed a missing presence, “where’s Hoseok?”

“I haven’t seen him today,” said Yoongi.

“Me neither,” muttered Namjoon. “I know he messaged me a few days ago telling he was ill but I haven’t heard of him since then.”

The group fell silent, all wondering if the mage really was ill. Jin glanced out through the window to see it was still raining heavily outside. Could it be that the weather was representing the healing mage’s feelings?

“Maybe we should check on him to see if he’s okay,” said the witch, breaking the silence.

“Let’s do it,” said the light mage. “I have a feeling his ‘illness’ is not the real cause of his absence.”