Work Text:
"Are you... napping on the floor?" Sunoo asks, hovering over his friend's head. His brows are faintly creased, more out of confusion than worry as he watches the male underneath stretch. Ni-Ki's extends his arms and legs, starfishing as his hands turns into lazy fists, closing like the paws of a pleased cat. "Why?" Sunoo asks, voice softer than original as the other lay, eyes shut still.
"It's a nice, cool floor." Ni-Ki replies, like it's supposed to explain anything. And pats the spot next to him. "Try it."
"I did already. When I was exhausted from rehearsing. I know it's a nice floor when you're overheated from repetition. But," The older male sighs. "this isn't where you should be napping."
Ni-Ki blinks, opening his eyes as a pout draws itself on his lips. "Why?" He questions.
"Because you could get trampled by people rehearsing." Sunoo replies. "And that's like reason 30. Reason number one being, it's horrendous for your body. Reason number two, it makes me worry about you and I worry about enough stuffs so please, just, sleep somewhere better. For my health."
"Oh, that's a low blow." Ni-Ki replies, sitting up.
"I know." Sunoo replies, a smug smile gracing his lips. "But apparently the only to make you care about yourself, is if it makes you care about others."
"Don't give that trick to other hyungs." Ni-Ki asks, a little displeased.
"I so will. You know it. I will. Especially Heesung hyung. He's good at guilt tripping people into having a better health."
Ni-Ki shivers. "I still can't believe he almost cried when he learned I skipped lunch three days ago."
"And forced you to take multivitamins with dinner." Sunoo recalls, amused.
"He also put me to bed. Too early." Ni-Ki shakes his head.
"It was 7 p.m." Sunoo replies, fondly rolling his eyes.
"Yeah and you guys had a Harry Potter movies marathon without me."
"We didn't see all of them, just the first three." Sunoo replies before reaching out to pinch Ni-Ki's cheeks. "Ah, the tough life of being the maknae."
"What are you torturing the kid with?" Jake asks, entering the repetition room with Jay.
"Health." Ni-Ki somberly replies.
"Good." Jake says, approaching the two to boop Ni-Ki's nose. "You should be healthy."
"I am healthy." Ni-Ki argues.
"You should be healthier." Jake amends.
"The healthiest." Jay agrees. "Babies' health is a top priority." Ni-Ki's right leg flail around for a couple of seconds as he attempts to kick Jay while still being held in place by Sunoo. Who apparently won't let go of his cheeks, even to giggle at Jay as he dodges.
"Children." Heesung says and sighs dramatically, as he enters the repetition room with Jungwon besides him.
"He says even though he's not legal yet either." Jay points out.
"Right! Hyung, you're a teenager too!" Jake remarks.
"I'm sophisticated though." Heesung replies.
"I..." Jungwon furrows his brows. "I've seen you try to lick the bottom of a strawberry yogurt tub just two minutes ago."
"Sophisticated, indeed." Sunoo says, raising both eyebrows as a wide smile settles on his lips.
"Anyways," Heesung put on the hoodie of his sweater. "What were you guys talking about?"
"Our maknae's health." Jay replies, dodging another, better aimed kick.
"Why? What happened? Are you not feeling well?" Heesung asks, growing visibly worried as his gaze zeroes on Ni-Ki.
"Ah jeongmal..." The gifted dancer let himself fall backwards. "I don't remember anyone babying Daniel this much." Ni-Ki spoke, staring at the ceiling.
"It's because Daniel was born a well-equipped adult." Sunoo replies.
"I'm fairly sure I've seen him baby Geonu hyung once. And he didn't protest." Jungwon points out, a nostalgic smile appearing on my features.
"Anyways, are we rehearsing or what?" Ni-Ki asks, standing up.
"What." Sunoo replies.
"Sunghoona isn't there's yet." Jake adds on.
"Apparently he's on his way back from school. The traffic to get here is pretty bad." Jay informs, looking up from his phone's screen. "Hopefully, he'll be there in fifteen minutes."
"Well, that's enough time for a micro power nap." Ni-Ki says, happily getting reacquainted with the spots he left merely a minute ago.
"A what where now?" Heesung questions, brows creasing and eyes narrowing.
"Yeah, he naps here." Sunoo says and sighs.
Heesung brings a hand to his heart, sighing deeply. "You guys are so bad for my health." He taps his chest a few times. "I'm gonna have grey hair before I'm twenty five, I can tell."
"Yeah, don't bother with the guilt tripping, hyung." Jay comments. "I think he's already went back to sleep."
"What?" Jungwon blinks. "There's no way. Nobody can just..." He crouches besides Ni-Ki. "What the fuck?" He whispers, upon hearing that telltale sound of discreet snores.
"How does he do that?" Jake inquires, waving a hand over their maknae's face. "Should we be concerned he's got narcolepsy or something?" Heesung's eyes widen with sheer distress at the words.
Sunoo sighs. "Nah. He just likes it in here. More than his bed apparently."
"Yeah. It's his microhabitat." Sunghoon says, as he enters the dance studio.
"His what?" Sunoo asks.
"Microhabitat." Jay repeats, even though he's not certain where this is going.
Sunghoon nods. "Remember the drama we wanted to start a couple of days ago but it was vetoed because it could be too scary for some?" His eyes go from Jay to Jake.
Jake nods. "When the Devil Calls Your Name."
"Well, we might have started it on our own." Sunghoon admits. "And basically, there's a character who explains that a Microhabitat is a shelter you crawl into under the rain. A place for a worm, a bird or a cat to hide in. Even us, people, need such a safe space to rest."
"Huh," Heesung says softly. "So the dance studio is his microhabitat?"
"More like dance is." Sunoo rightfully guesses.
"So anywhere he can freely express his passion ends up being somewhere he feels safe." Jungwon finishes.
"I get that." Jake says. "I think, you guys are mine, in a way. Having friends my age who understand what I really want and why, it makes me feel a lot more at ease."
"This turned weirdly emotional." Jay comments. "We should probably wake him up though, now that we're all here."
"Yeah, we probably should." Heesung agrees, making, however, no move to proceed.
"It's creepy to watch people sleep." Sunoo adds on, whipping his phone out to take some pictures.
"Does anybody have a pen?" Jake asks.
"I do!" Sunghoon replies, sliding the backpack he held off of his shoulder and opening it.
"I don't like where this is going..." Heesung comments, narrowing his eyes as Sunghoon hands his friend a black pen.
Jake uncaps said pen and carefully holds out his arm, planning to give their youngest member a thick unibrow. But as soon as the pen's tip reaches bare skin to draw the first line linking a brow to another, Ni-Ki starts to stir. His nose scrunches up as his brows creased, detailing the pen's trajectory up to a little above the interior corner of one of his eyes. Jake gasps softly and withdraws his hand as Ni-Ki blinks awake. The first thing he sees, is a concerned Heesung hovering right above his head. So he offers a lazy smile and waves. "We're good to go." Jay says, before anyone else can say anything. "Sunghoona is here." Ni-Ki nods and stands, missing the way Jake handed a pen to Jungwon who hid it in the front pocket of his hoodie.
One tiny, crucial though, detail: The room has a mirror wall.
And as soon as they get into stretching in front of it, Ni-Ki gets a good look at his face. The maknae sighs deeply, and turns to his other hyung's unimpressed. "I'm not gonna ask. I know you guys are mature enough. And the person who did it will either come forward or suffocate in guilt until they can no longer breathe and end up dragged to the lowest pit of hell."
"What the fuck?" Jungwon whispers softly, a nervous laughter coming out of his nose.
"That was damn intense." Jay comments.
"Face doodling is frankly beneath you guys. And that's exactly where hell is." Ni-Ki replies.
"Thank you Satan, we'll keep that in mind." Sunoo shoots back.
"You're welcome. So?" Ni-Ki gestures at his face. "Who did it?"
"I did it." Heesung comes forwards, ready to take responsibility.
"No you didn't, I know you didn't." Ni-Ki replies, shaking his head gently.
"He's right, hyung." Jungwon agrees. "I did it."
Both Ni-Ki and Sunoo scoff at that. "Right."
"But I really did!" Jungwon reaches out in the front pocket of his sweater to produce the black pen he'd been handed earlier.
"No, he didn't." Jake argues. "I did it!"
"No, I did it! It's my pen." Sunghoon goes on.
"No, I did it!" Jay goes on, for the single and best reason that this is his chance to take part into an actual reenactment of Spartacus.
Sunoo's brows creases as his eyes wander from a confused Ni-Ki to the rest of the group. "I'm not taking part of that. I didn't do it." He shrugs.
"Why are you guys like this?" Ni-Ki asks, half exasperated, half incredibly fond.
"The power of friendship." Jake replies, sounding an awful lot like something taken straight out of My Little Pony.
The maknae sighs. "Okay fine, Niki hyung will forgive y'all today since apparently I have to be the mature one. I'll be back." He declares before heading out to clean his face.
"He's gonna somehow take his revenge isn't he?" Sunghoon asks, eyes narrowing.
"Obviously." Jay replies.
"My phone's already out and ready to film for documentation." Sunoo adds on.
^_^
Before they notice, dinner rolls around and Ni-Ki still hasn't taken his revenge. They're all somewhat on edge, except for Sunoo whose far too amused about it. Ni-Ki isn't even doing much, maybe he truly has chosen to be the mature one about it, maybe he has even forgotten about the whole ordeal after a session of productive, intense training. But the hyungs are stressing. And well, it turns out uncertainty is as good a revenge as any.
And so, Ni-Ki peacefully munches baby carrots, quietly minding his own business as he watches footage of their individual repetitions. He's taking his job as dance leader very seriously, mind you. At least up until Sunoo approaches, poking at his cheeks to catch his attention while he reviews Jungwon's moves. After several, growingly insistent cheek pokes, Ni-Ki looks up, and blink when he's met with a GoPro held far too close to his face. Sunoo giggles as he draws back, to get a good image of his full face. Or what he gets to see, hidden beneath a tightly wrapped hoodie and a hat. "You look like those tall mannequins from the Vines!" He announces. And of course, for some obscure reason, the mannequin head dance is amongst the choregraphies Ni-Ki knows. So he's on his feet, executing the moves as Sunoo records, giggling in the back.
It's footage nobody will really see except for them. But it's good footage still. And they'll laugh about it huddled together in the future. That's how memories are made. That's why Ni-Ki indulges his friend.
"Is he having a stroke?" Heesung asks, standing a couple of feet back.
"He's doing it for the Vine." Jake replies.
"Oh My God, why did you have to remind me? Now I just wanna watch compilations of Vines." Jay sighs, glancing between his pan and his phone on the counter. "No. Food first."
"A potato flew around my room before you came." Jake singsongs in his ear.
"You're a horrible person." Jay speaks, through gritted teeth.
"Well," Jake pauses, lips curling up. "excuse the mess I made."
"Oh My God," Jay huffs. "When will you learn? When will you learn that your actions have consequences?"
"Look at all those chickens." Sunghoon says, approaching the other two and walking past them to get to the fridge.
"I hate all of you." Jay says, glaring at the pan in front of him.
"Even I?" Jungwon asks, eyes wide with distress.
"Not you, of course, baby. Everybody loves you." Jay replies, making the younger male smile. "See that Ni-Ki? Some people don't mind being called baby!" Jay calls. And he's met with a tongue being stuck out.
"Very mature." Sunoo comments. "Certainly proved the point you were trying to make about not being a baby."
"He's not a baby." Heesung says, amenably as he wraps an arm around their maknae. "He's a toddler, it's different." Laughing, he swerves as an elbow comes to meet his side.
"Leave my son alone," Jake says, holding his arms out as he approaches Ni-Ki. "He's grown okay?" He adds on, wrapping his arms around their youngest members, who hugs him back. "He's at the very least a whole ten years old now."
"And a half." Sunghoon chimes in. "The half is very important for children."
"I think he's actually ten and three quarters." Heesung corrects, patting Ni-Ki's head.
"Wait for it," Ni-Ki grumbles. "soon I'll be taller than all of you and we'll see who gets the last laugh when I look down on all of you hyungs."
Jake laughs, probably being the only one who heard that and amongst the shortests. "Then I gotta enjoy it while you're still relatively tiny." He chooses to reply, hugging the other a little tighter. "Our baby." Ni-Ki groans but makes no move to free himself.
"Dinner's ready." Jay announces. "Somebody just has to cut the meat."
"I'll do it." Heesung volunteers. "Come on kids, gather around."
^_^
It's night. And it's the continuation of a Harry Potter marathon. And quite frankly it's offensive for Ni-Ki to think he's been excluded and sent to bed early when half of his hyungs are asleep by the middle of a second movie. Jay was the first to fall asleep, head falling straight on Ni-Ki's shoulder, who was nice enough to lean back in the couch and properly settle his hyung. Then it was Jake, who'd settled on the floor with Sunoo to be closer to the popcorn and ended up asleep with his head on his friend's lap. Odds are, he'd wake up with a little popcorn in his hair. Jungwon and Heesung, who'd huddled together on a couch had fallen asleep around the same time, as Harry, Hermione, Ron, Ginny, Luna, and Neville were flying to the Ministry of Magic on Thestrals.
"Don't go in there, it's not gonna go well." Sunghoon comments, as the group enters the Department of Mysteries.
"What do you mean it's not gonna go well? There are three other movies. It's definitely gonna go fine." Sunoo argues. Well, except for Sirius, but we don't talk about that here.
"1000 wons that the bottled prophecy ends up destroyed anyways, somehow." Ni-Ki says. And two pair of eyes fall on him. "What?" He asks.
"You, you haven't seen those movies before?" Sunoo questions, taken aback.
"No." Ni-Ki shrugs.
"Oh my God." Sunghoon scrambles for the remote, stopping the movie. "You haven't seen them before and you started with the fourth one?" Ni-Ki nods. "And you didn't ask any questions or a recap?"
"Well," Ni-Ki rubs at the back of his neck. "I didn't want to bother you guys. I would have looked it up eventually. After this was over. No big deal."
Sunoo gasps. "No way. No way." He shakes his head. "Nah dude. We're restarting right now."
"What?!" Ni-Ki's eyes widen. "You can't leave me on a Cliffhanger like that. Let's finish this one before we just—"
"Tut tut." Sunoo interrupts. "Listen to your me. It's for your own good."
"He's right." Sunghoon says. "We have to do this in the right order."
"Wanna talk about order huh?" Ni-Ki asks. "Okay, then in what order would you watch the Star Wars movie?"
"Obviously chrono—ah." Sunghoon huffs. "Good one." He rolls his eyes. "I'm not a puritan. I just watch stuff in the order it got out. I don't care."
"I..." Sunoo narrows his eyes. "I've never seen Star Wars."
"No way." Ni-Ki whispers, amazed.
"It's so long though." Sunoo argued. "And I don't care about all that galactic war thingy."
"I mean, it's okay." Ni-Ki says. "I thought I wouldn't be into it too at first."
"Maybe you just didn't have the right company to see those." Sunghoon offers, wiggling his eyebrows.
"Oh okay, we're doing that now, huh?" Sunoo asks, glancing towards Ni-Ki who just shrugs. "I guess we're doing that."
"Yeah, maybe not, it's kinda half past one a.m though." Sunghoon sighs.
"Can we watch something fairly short then? I don't want to go to sleep yet." Ni-Ki says.
"Like what?" Sunghoon asks.
"Mini dramas." Sunoo suggests. "Like those 12 to 30 mins episodes kinda thing."
"Do you know a good one?" Ni-Ki asks.
Sunoo giggles. "That's not how it works. You have to find the most cheesy stuff so you can have a good laugh. Here, let me." He makes grabby hands at Sunghoon to get the remote. And the other hands it before taking back his seat.
"This is fairly morally ambiguous." Sunghoon comments, eyes narrowing as he reads the synopsis of the drama Sunoo currently paused on.
Ni-Ki hides a giggle behind his hands as he lays his head atop of Jay's. "I think it's perfect." He comments, and Sunoo nods in approval, launching the episode.
"Please tell me we're not supposed to believe she's an actual archery coach when she carries a pink plastic bow." Sunghoon says, as the opening credits rolls on.
"Bold of you to assume we'll even see her use a bow." Sunoo shoots back.
"What do you mean? She's a, she's an archery team coach, of course she's gonna, right?" Sunghoon's brows crease as he turns to Ni-Ki. "Right?" The other just shrugs, a confused expression on his features. That makes Jay stir a little but he merely resettles, wrapping his arms around Ni-Ki's left one. "I..." Sunghoon huffs, completely baffled.
"Pretty much." Sunoo says. "Now that's the spirit. Come in with an empty mind and enjoy the wild ride." Ni-Ki laughs some more, hiding the sound behind his hand as Sunghoon burries his fingers in his hair, looking absolutely appalled by what's happening on screen while Sunoo peacefully munches on popcorn. "This is getting good."
"Her imagination is so inappropriate." Sunghoon comments.
"You've never been on a late night drama binge before, have you?" Sunoo questions.
"I have!" Sunghoon argues. "I just have good taste." He opens his mouth, catching the popcorn sent his mouth with an infuriating ease. So Sunoo throws a handful next. "You'll have to clean this." Sunghoon simply comments, brushing the kernels off of his hair.
"Children," Ni-Ki chimes in. "shut up. Hyung is watching the television."
"H-hyung?" Sunghoon questions, blinking repeatedly.
"Indulge the baby. We all wanted to be grownups when we were kids." Sunoo replies. Sunghoon chuckles at that, and leans forward to get a handful of popcorn, but ends up having his hand smacked away. "Eat what was in your hair first. It's not good to waste."
"Kim Sun Woo." Sunghoon says, standing up and trying his best impression at authority. It earns his laughter from the other two awake.
"Were you trying to channel your inner Jay?" Sunoo asks, grinning still. Sunghoon huffs, blowing strands of hair off his face. "Alright, alright." The younger holds out the popcorn bowl towards his hyung.
Their laughter, however, was enough to make Heesung stirs. And once the eldest one is awake, it means everybody else is going to sleep. "Alright, tv off." Heesung whispers, after checking the time. Gently, he runs his fingers through Jungwon's hair to wake him up. "We're going to bed." He softly says, helping his friend up.
The three others share glances before sighing. And Sunoo caringly pokes at Jake's cheek to wake him up. While Ni-Ki softly blows on Jay's head. Soon, the two stirs and are helped up by their fellow members. "Hold on, weren't we watching Harry Potter?" Jay asks, eyes settling on the screen.
"No, we were watching Star Wars." Sunghoon replies, before turning off the tv.
"What?" Heesung asks, confused.
"It definitely was Star Wars." Sunoo agrees, as they all head towards their respective rooms.
"You guys don't remember?" Ni-Ki asks, furrowing his brows. "Maybe we should restart then."
"Mhmm, yeah." Sunoo agrees.
"Wiser." Sungoon adds on, as they reach their doors. "Definitely."
Heesung sighs. He's fairly sure he's being played to watch Star Wars. But he's frankly too exhausted to argue about it. So he just waves the kids goodbye before disappearing in his room. Soon enough, it's the three of them left in the corridor, Ni-Ki, Sunoo and Sunghoon.
"Goodnight fellow bingers." Sunoo declares, opening his door as 'good nights' are uttered back. Ni-Ki even waves as he closes the door, making him chuckle.
Trying his luck, Ni-Ki says : "Goodnight Sunghoona." And spins on his feet, ready to disappear in his room.
But after a fond chuckle, all he's met with is a "'night baby." And it sounds a little different, Ni-Ki finds, as he closes his door. He's not mad about this one.