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With a clap of the slate, another scene for In the Soop was finished.
“You guys are free to do anything now. Good work for today! We’ll be going!” The production team called out as they hauled their cameras and tripods onto their shoulders, departing the river for their van.
“Good work, everyone!” The trio of Seungcheol, Wonwoo and Chan echoed back, waving from the rocky riverbed, watching the crew disappear up the slope.
Seungcheol was the first to drop onto his haunches on the ground, sighing.
“Ah, why couldn’t we catch anything? The net was so heavy too,” he groaned, skipping the pebbles around him into the river one by one.
Wonwoo joined him in agreement, commiserating with him over their unfortunate lack of success in river fishing.
“I genuinely didn’t see a single hint of fish in the water though. Maybe they’re all somewhere else today.”
“It’s so cold today. They could be hibernating down South.”
“What if the production team caught all the fishes beforehand so that they could shoot some failure scenes?”
The attempts to rationalize their miserably empty fishing bucket grew wilder as they both came to the conclusion that they weren’t bad, they were just playing an unfair game.
“Chan-ah, why do you think there weren’t fish? Wonwoo thinks it’s unfavourable weather, so they ran away. I personally think the production team is pranking us.” Seungcheol turned from the pebble pile he stacked midway.
“Huh?” Chan was snapped from his reverie as he stood at the edge of the water, gazing into the ripples.
“River no fish. Why?”
“There were fish though.”
With a tilt of his head, Chan made the simple statement, an upwards inflection at the end as if it was so incredibly obvious.
“Fish my foot! All I saw in the stream were rocks and sand!” Seungcheol protested, and his rock sculpture fell apart, earning a yelp from him.
“Did your LASIK surgery give you superhuman vision or something?” Wonwoo quipped with a laugh. His rock sculpture was still standing, fortunately.
“There were fish! You guys just sucked at holding the net!”
“Yah, you didn’t catch shit either, you can’t judge us!” Seungcheol yelled incredulously, and tossed the pebble he was going to stack at Chan’s feet.
“I just wasn’t at my full potential.”
“Full potential? What is this Second Year Syndrome shit?” The pair fell onto the rocks laughing at Chan’s declaration, which he said aloud with the seriousness and commitment of the history schtick he had kept going for the past two years.
Chan looked around, as he did when he was searching for surprise cameras. He moved to Wonwoo and Seungcheol, leaning in as if he was passing along confidential information.
“Actually, I’ve been waiting to tell you guys about it but there just wasn’t a good opportunity.”
Wonwoo and Seungcheol stared at Chan with wide eyes.
The words Chan uttered after sent the older pair into near fits from their guffaws.
“What the fuck? Have you been looking at too much of CARATs’ furry fanart of you?” Seungcheol choked out.
“Yah, then can I become a cat with glasses too?” Wonwoo wheezed. The query was half serious, but no one had to know that for now. Maybe he’d ask Chan to teach him how to be a furry too, secretly.
Chan protested his hyungs’ disbelief, elaborating on his revelation with intense detail and imagery, on his family’s history and the origins of the power.
Wonwoo and Seungcheol, now reseated on their little folding chairs, were rapt as they could be watching their maknae speak absolute bullshit with the gravity of a U.N. speech.
“Chan, we’ll always accept you, you know that right? Furry or not.”
Wonwoo extended a hand to Chan, smiling up at him.
“I’m not a furry! It’s for real!”
“Do you have a fursuit? Why haven’t I seen it in your closet?” Seungcheol’s eyes were bright and curious.
“I TOLD YOU, I’M NOT A FURRY! I don’t have a fursuit and why are you poking around my closet anyways?”
“That’s what someone who has a fursuit hidden back there would say,” Wonwoo mock-whispered to Seungcheol behind a hand.
Seungcheol rose from his seat and slung an arm around Chan, giving him a firm pat on the back.
“I guess it isn’t that strange for you to explore your interests now. You spent your formative years practicing in the Pledis Melona Prison, now that you have more freedom it’s good that you’ve got more time to get into different subcultures.”
His solemn encouragement to Chan was accompanied by Wonwoo reaching out to squeeze Chan’s hand in agreement.
That was, until Wonwoo’s hands were grasping mere air and Seungcheol’s arm fell to his side.
In Chan’s place was a creature with a long, slim body and short legs. (Not like that didn’t already apply to him, but his legs were even shorter now, they supposed.) It peeked out of the hoodie Chan was wearing, now a pile on the floor, snout twitching.
“Holy crap!”
Wonwoo and Seungcheol were in shock for a good ten seconds at the sight. Then they overcame their shock and collapsed back on their chairs laughing at the absurdity of the situation.
There was a screech from the otter, and then Chan’s loud voice, continuing in the same cadence as the indignant animal sound.
“You guys won’t take me seriously no matter what, huh?”
“We take you seriously plenty, Chan.” Seungcheol spoke gravely, but his round eyes had tears precipitating at their edges, and his face was red as a tomato.
It was, indeed, difficult to take Chan seriously at the moment though. He was now naked after his transformation back to a human self. It wasn’t a particularly shocking sight to the two seniors, but the man sitting there, covering his bottom half with his hoodie, was yelling about sacred magic and his animal powers.
“Okay, okay. Um. Your power is very cool, Chan. Never seen anything like it.” Wonwoo offered the praise tentatively.
“Well, my family is the only one with the power in Korea.” Chan responded with genuine pride. Seungcheol let a sputter slip and Wonwoo kicked his ankle hard.
“So you’re like, serious about the fish in the river thing?” Seungcheol asked after recovering his composure, aiming a sideways glare at Wonwoo after posing the question to Chan.
“It’s not like I can see the fish in X-ray vision or something, but it’s like I can feel their presence. It’s only restricted to freshwater bodies of water like rivers and ponds.”
“So it’s like a Spidey-sense.”
“So you’re like a fish medium.”
“No.”
Seungcheol opened his mouth.
“You’re both wrong. It’s not like either.”
Seungcheol closed his mouth and his eyes flicked between the bubbling river and Chan. Then, he asked the question him and Wonwoo both had at the front of their mind. As leader, he thought it his responsibility to take the mauling instead in case Chan was severely offended.
“Can you catch us some fish? In that form?” A growl from his stomach filled the space between the timid questions.
Chan stayed silent. Seungcheol braced for a clawing, or maybe a regular punch from human Chan, but then he finally spoke with a sigh.
“When have I ever denied my hyungs?”
Without a puff of smoke or explosion of light, he was back to his furry form.
Wonwoo and Seungcheol went closer, squatting next to Chan to scrutinise his now animal features. Interestingly, his ear piercings remained, at the tips of his now much smaller ears.
Wonwoo reached a hand to pet the furry coat, but Chan slinked away before he could make contact, entering the water naturally.
He rose to the surface in a sort of dog paddle, to his seniors’ amusement. The amusement quickly turned to awe when the otter dived underwater again smoothly, body moving lithely and tail following with a light splash. The surface of the river was close to still, as they peered out as far as they could from the bank looking for Chan.
A brush of fur on Wonwoo’s bare legs sent him reeling backwards. A small catfish lay at his feet, flopping futilely.
Seungcheol quickly scooped the fish into the bucket, still shocked by Chan’s sudden appearance, with fish no less, after basically disappearing into the water for a few minutes.
Before Chan could reenter the water, Seungcheol called out his name.
The otter paused and turned.
“Did you bite this? Don’t otters bite their prey and stuff? I don’t really want to get rabies from the food...” Seungcheol was quickly interrupted by a shrill yelp from the otter.
Chan stood on his hind legs and presented his webbed front paws as far as the little limbs would go.
He turned back and dove into the river, the tail propelling him far in a wake of bubbles. Going back and forth, the bucket that Wonwoo held grew in mass, and Seungcheol was soon struggling to keep up with the rate that Chan was dumping fish in front of him. Even as the fish was slipping around the ground, his grip barely sufficient to transport it into the bucket, Chan would come back with more. It was a mocking gesture, Seungcheol was sure, when the otter would look up at his senior grappling with just holding a small fish, clutching the same fish perfectly with his much smaller webbed paws.
Still, him and Wonwoo couldn’t deny the fact that they were impressed by Chan’s otter abilities. The water was clear enough for them to see a distance underwater around the edge. They watched Chan use his small paws and hind legs alternately to cut through the water to greater depths, then to scrabble at the sparse vegetation at the bed. It was like a guarantee that he would uncover a fish, almost magically, from what looked like just a bunch of rocks and weeds. The fish were no piddling anchovies or minnows either. They thought the first catfish was a stunt of sorts by Chan, to show off, and a slew of typical tiny fish would follow. But the otter brought tilapia, carp and other sizable edible fish with natural ease and speed. Seungcheol was starting to doubt their group’s ability to finish the food, and he had never had his confidence in the eating capacities of 13 growing men waver in all his years around them. Wonwoo, too, was beginning to strain while steadying the bucket.
“Chan!” Seungcheol called out to the water. He prepared to shout again, unsure if Chan could hear him from deep underwater.
A tiny head poked out from the waters close to the other bank. Seungcheol could have sworn he saw the otter cock its head in the same way Chan did inquiringly.
“Come back! I think we have enough!” Seungcheol yelled, beckoning Chan back with his hand signals.
The otter blinked and sank underwater. A few moments later, he was back at Seungcheol and Wonwoo’s side at the bank. Wonwoo raised his hand in permission this time to pet the fur, and somehow, Chan was able to replicate the grudging stare they were familiar with in his animal form before he padded closer to them. They stroked the damp pelt with excitement, murmuring about the smoothness and softness, words that Chan preened at.
“Seungcheol-hyung! Wonwoo-hyung! Chan!” The shout echoed from the forest just off their river.
The human pair whipped their heads around to find Seokmin walking over, waving.
Seokmin craned his neck, trying to see what Seungcheol and Wonwoo were bent over.
He rushed over, gasping at the sight, “Holy moly, is that an otter? Wait, but the production team said we shouldn’t be touching any wildlife here,”
Concern quickly replaced the initial surprise in Seokmin’s voice, seeing Seungcheol and Wonwoo’s hands on the otter’s back.
Seungcheol quickly supplemented an excuse, “Oh, well, this one was just super friendly and came to us first. It was like he wanted to be petted—”
The otter screeched again, and Seokmin jumped back with a scream, clearly doubting Seungcheol’s rosy description of the wild animal.
“We’ll be back at the main house with this load of fish we caught soon. Can you go back and tell the guys to prepare the sauces and grills?” Wonwoo asked.
“Y-Yeah. Yeah, that I can.”
With a shaky reply, Seokmin scampered off. Once he was out of sight, Chan returned to his human form. Seungcheol and Wonwoo, who were watching Seokmin disappear back into the underbrush, found their hands suddenly on warm skin, and lurched back in shock.
“Give us a warning next time, jeez!”
“I would have if you didn’t spread lies about me,” Chan responded simply, putting his shorts and hoodie back on.
“Was the fishing tiring?” Wonwoo asked, standing over the heavy bucket of Chan’s harvest.
Chan answered the question with some convoluted explanation of how movement in water was different in land and that his capacities in the animal form were different from when he was human. Chan never really answered the question but Wonwoo gathered, from the length that he yammered on, that no, the fishing was not tiring for him.
The trio got up, holding the bucket of fish, and made the slow walk back to the main house. When they arrived to the smell of marinades filling the air, no one questioned why Wonwoo and Seungcheol were completely dry, while Chan’s hair was still dripping with water. There was a silent understanding that the maknae was probably tossed into the river as a punishment for having been born the latest. Still, that was the last thing on their minds when they had a huge bucket of fresh fish for them to cook up and devour.
It was barely a day later when another fishing trip was arranged, this time at deeper waters and further out in a lake. Mingyu, Jeonghan and Jun joined Wonwoo, Seungcheol and Chan this time. They discussed the arrangements the night before before bed, sitting in a circle. As the experienced ones who had gone on fishing trips in their childhood were engrossed in discussions of baits and tackle, Wonwoo elbowed Chan.
“So, you gonna use your full potential tomorrow?”
Seungcheol, overhearing the question, hid his head in his hands to keep his laughter in.
Chan took a sip of his water bottle and pretended he didn’t hear anything, absolutely regretting everything he did the day before.