Chapter Text
"Do you need a partner?"
Minho stops setting up the pieces onto the board, glancing up in surprise at the stranger. The guy is all lanky limbs and soft brown hair growing just past his ears; an even softer looking jumper with his white shirt collar neatly peeking out. There's a strangely determined look in his gaze as he waits for a response, unwavering when Minho only stares back in silence. Minho hears the thoughts of everyone surrounding them overlapping with the usual chatter that fills the room, images clashing in his head along with verbal thoughts: —need to eat— Would they get mad— fuck, I don't remember which order— never listens— why is he talking to Minho?
And then: wow, he's handsome.
Minho clears his throat, tearing his gaze away, his face grows warm and he does his best to ignore it. It's not the first and won't be the last time that he's heard that same thought in relation to himself but it still flusters him. He focuses on the voices, one of the others pity the poor guy for even coming up to Minho of all people. He hears some of them being relieved that they won't have to deal with playing against Minho during this session of the club meeting.
The guy clears his throat, "Is that okay?"
Minho blinks at him, frowning, "Whatever."
He offers a small smile as he removes his messenger bag, gently hanging it over the back of his chair before sitting down across from Minho. His eyes dart over the chess board before grabbing the pieces Minho has yet to put back in their spots. "I'm Kim Seungmin," he offers.
"Lee Minho," he answers as he places down his final pawn, shifting his arms onto the table, elbows propping up his hand as he rests his chin on it while looking at Seungmin.
"I know," Seungmin says, eyes focused on the board and pieces, "I've been wanting to talk to you."
That causes a spike of anxiety to lace through his veins, he moves his fingers up to his temple as he watches Seungmin, hoping to zero in on his thoughts. It's a habit that Hyunjin often makes fun of him for since it's quite the opposite of subtle, but it's the easiest way for him to focus his abilities on one person. Otherwise everyone's thoughts will only be amplified more than they already are, drowning out Seungmin's. He's been trying his best to get rid of this habit, of teaching himself how to focus without having to do so.
"Yeah, why is that?" he asks, hearing Seungmin's thoughts more clearly. There's flashes of their shared professors, Minho's papers he's written on genetics, and—
"I've read your papers," Seungmin says, Minho raises a brow, "The ones about the possibilities of mutation in humans... Professor Choi says you plan to write your dissertation on the topic."
Minho zeroes in again, he can sense the nervous thoughts and worry at the forefront of Seungmin's thoughts drowning out most of his other thoughts. But he seems genuinely curious about Minho's research, not like so many others who roll their eyes and make fun of it.
A lot of their peers do not take Minho seriously and even more just find him strange. He's tried his best to ignore them which is not an easy feat when he can hear exactly what people think of him.
"Are you going to tell me that I'm wrong?"
"What?" Seungmin says, finally looking up, he looks surprised. "No, I just..." he trails off, glancing off to the side.
Minho focuses in again, Seungmin's wondering why the fellow members of the chess team are staring, but more importantly he has questions he doesn't want to ask while others listen. Minho sighs.
"If you win," Minho starts, "You can ask me about my dissertation."
Seungmin's gaze is back on him, eyes searching before setting into a look of determination. He nods, "Deal."
Minho smirks, gesturing at Seungmin to begin.
In the end he leaves Seungmin confused and staring at the board, he can hear him mentally going over the moves to see where he went wrong. He's left wondering how Minho had anticipated his every move.
It's two days later when he and Hyunjin are sitting in the courtyard under their favorite tree, far enough away from the crowds of students to dim the sounds of thoughts. They're each working on different things: Hyunjin is doing sketches for his newest art project and Minho is reading. He hears the worry of interrupting first before the thought gets brushed off and he decides to follow through.
"Incoming," Hyunjin comments, "Do you know him?"
Minho doesn't bother looking up from his book, "Kim Seungmin."
Hyunjin huffs, "Well, he looks very serious."
"I beat him in chess."
"Ah," he says, laughing, "That explains it."
A few moments later a shadow blocks the sun from them as Seungmin finally comes to a stop in front of them. Minho turns the page in his book, Hyunjin shifts to sit forward.
"Hi," Hyunjin greets, "How are you?"
Seungmin's surprised by the question. "Hi, I'm Kim Seungmin," he starts, polite as can be. "I'm good, how are you?"
"Good, thank you," Hyunjin answers, "I'm Hwang Hyunjin. And this is my brother, Minho."
"It's nice to meet—"
"He knows who we are," Minho answers, closing his book, finally looking up at Seungmin. "Don't you?"
There's a flash of guilt of Seungmin's face, he's been asking questions. "Everyone knows you two."
"No," Minho says, "Some do and they think we're weird. So."
"Hey, they don't think I'm weird," Hyunjin argues, frowning. "Maybe weird by association to you."
Minho makes a noise to show his disagreement. He focuses on Seungmin, frowning, "What do you want, Kim Seungmin?"
"I want a rematch," he says, hand gripping the strap of his bag a tell of his nerves. He offers a smile. "Same deal."
Minho hums, scratching his temple as he searches Seungmin's brain.
"What deal?" Hyunjin asks, eyes darting between the two of them like the answer will come to him through the air.
"I told him if he won, he could ask about my research," Minho tells him.
"You're interested in learning about mutations?" Hyunjin asks; Minho's always done his best not to read Hyunjin's mind, but it's never been easy since Minho can't fully control what he hears, always surrounded by the voices, the constant symphony of noise no matter where he is. He does his best to avoid digging deep, it's the best he can do, but even without his ability, he'd know that Hyunjin was concerned. "Why?"
Seungmin's silent for a long moment but Minho hears it all loud and clear, he's debating what to say. Half-truths and lies cycle through his brain quickly. And one damning thought that Seungmin refuses to admit aloud to them: Seungmin's one of them.
"I think it's interesting."
Hyunjin hums, nodding, "What do you study?"
"Law," Seungmin answers, "And History."
It's obvious that Hyunjin feels uncomfortable at why a future lawyer would want to know about genetics. It's always something they've worried about; it goes hand in hand with the possible laws that would be put into place if the truth became widespread. But Minho sees, he knows Seungmin's interest is genuine and personal, he subtly nods and knows Hyunjin relaxes slightly.
"What do you study, Hyunjin?" Seungmin asks.
"Art," Hyunjin smiles, then asks the question that they both have, "But why is a law student interested in genetics?"
Seungmin shifts, nervously, "I told you I think it's interesting, I want to know more."
Minho glances at Hyunjin, they share a look and Minho's brows furrow as he mentally tells him that Seungmin seems genuinely curious. They're quiet for several beats too long as they silently communicate, it crosses Minho's mind that this is must be why people think they're strange. Seungmin adds, "I wonder if you truly believe what you've written about."
Minho laughs suddenly, looking at Seungmin, "Why else would I waste so much of my time researching it?"
"For the grade," he deadpans.
Hyunjin laughs, ignoring the way Minho shoots him an annoyed glance. "He's got a point."
Seungmin smiles, clearly pleased, "So, will you play a game or are you scared to lose?"
"I'm the undefeated champion."
"Not for long," Seungmin retorts.
"I like this guy," Hyunjin announces decisively, "Sit down."
Seungmin looks over at Minho, clearly smug, although hesitant to actually sit down. He's waiting for Minho to invite him as well.
Minho huffs, packing up his books before gesturing to the empty space in the grass in front of them. "Aren't you going to set up the board?"
"You let me win," Seungmin accuses, frowning. They're in Minho and Hyunjin's apartment, it's the fifteen game they've played in the past week or so, and only the first that Seungmin has won in the entire two and a half months of knowing each other. He mostly kept it up to see whether Seungmin would give up, it's been interesting seeing him so determined to beat Minho just to pick Minho's brain further on the topic of mutations.
(Hyunjin accused him of testing the poor guy, which isn't that far from the truth. He is, but more than that, he finds Seungmin fascinating. From what he's seen Seungmin is polite, people seem to generally like Seungmin. But his thoughts are a hurricane, lingering sadness and anger and pain and darkness beneath that contradict his calm outer shell. There is more than that though, there's genuine kindness. He is not pretending when he puts on a polite face, he's just a well of half-truths and bitten back remarks when others don't deserve that politeness.
It's fascinating.
He is, also, one of the only other mutants that they've met.)
"No. I didn't," Minho argues, which is not completely true, he tried not to focus on Seungmin's thoughts. He can't fully stop hearing them but he tried not to look for the next possible moves as he usually did. If he really was going to let Seungmin win, he'd purposely sacrifice pieces and sabotage himself.
Seungmin is not happy with Minho's answer.
"You finally won," Minho says, leaning back in his chair and staring at Seungmin. "Don't you have your questions?"
"Yeah, why'd you let me win?"
Minho mimics the buzzer noise, tapping the table. "Incorrect. That is not a question about my research."
Seungmin's jaw tightens, his annoyance loud and clear, Minho doesn't even need his thoughts to tell him so. Seungmin rolls his eyes as he grabs his Queen, holding the solid piece between his fingers. His knuckles bruised in shades of light purple with a tint of green, on the way to healing, from the boxing classes he's been taking.
Minho tears his gaze away, instead focuses on resetting the board as he waits for Seungmin to finally ask a question. He hears the murmur of Seungmin's thoughts, he finds it comforting.
He sighs heavily, finally asks: "If it's all true, what do you think that would mean for the world?"
Minho's lips quirk, shaking his head, "I'm sure you have your theories."
"I want to hear yours," Seungmin says, gaze cutting away from the queen towards Minho, "You're the expert."
Minho swallows, doesn't speak for a long moment, he focuses on the board. He's been going purposely slow, the pieces causing soft thuds in the quiet of the apartment, but he's nearly done resetting it all.
"Ideally," he starts, "those who have mutated to gain abilities will be able to coexist freely. No need to hide."
That's the dream, at least.
A dream that he and Hyunjin have been spinning in their heads since they were children. One that he knows won't be easy to accomplish, not by a long shot, but that he wants so badly to believe in.
Hyunjin doesn't deserve to pretend to be someone he's not. Nobody should be afraid of what would happen if they slip up and show that they're not quite normal.
Seungmin scoffs, it's followed by a bitter laugh; his thoughts muddied in darkness as he tries not to think about something, Minho gets glimpses: a man, a coin, a gun, a body, blood, blood, blood—
Destruction. Followed by a hospital like room.
It makes Minho feel dizzy, he frowns, it's not enough to get the full picture without pushing further into Seungmin's head which he doesn't want to do, he doesn't want to invade his privacy like that. But he gets the general idea of what Seungmin has been through, likely what countless of people just like them have been through because they were caught. Something he's always feared would happen to Hyunjin, or even himself, studied and tortured for something out of their control.
He stares at the board, not wanting to give anything away, he has the final piece to place. The sun setting through the windows is distorting the shadows of the pieces onto the board.
"History has shown that humanity doesn't do well with those who are different," Seungmin says, voice thick with emotion, he swallows audibly, "What makes you think mutants would be any different?"
Minho swallows, he knows that; hell, he even knows the awful things everyone thinks every single day, haunting him as he tries to go about his own life.
"I don't," he admits, because he knows, God, he knows that it won't be easy. "But the world is always changing and evolving."
Seungmin frowns, brows pinching together, "People fear what they don't understand."
"They're idiots then," Minho says, almost instinctively, then: "They just need to understand that mutants only want to live their lives like anybody else. They're just people."
"You can't change people," Seungmin says, sighing, "If anything they'll only lock them away or hunt them down. Murder them for sport because of what they could do."
"That's why they need people fighting for their rights. Working to protect them," he argues, he's placing the knight onto Seungmin's side of the board, it makes Seungmin snort, amused at how fitting it is. "They shouldn't have to hide anymore."
"I agree that they shouldn't have to hide," Seungmin says, "But humanity is cruel. Hell, people hate us for being Asian. For being Korean," he shakes his head, "Imagine what they'd do if we had the kind of abilities you talked about."
Minho is bitterly amused. He swallows down the laugh, it's not even amusing, it's terribly tragic how true it is.
"There'll be people who don't share that hatred, that'll help," he argues, "It won't be simple. But eventually, it can work."
Seungmin snorts, he's hovering the queen over the board. "Your idealism is foolish."
Minho scrunches up his nose. "You're a fool, Kim Seungmin."
It's a childish remark, but he can't find it in himself to care especially when Seungmin laughs and his whole face lights up, the seriousness washed away for just a moment.
"We should tell him," Hyunjin says, while he's washing dishes, it's something that's been weighing on him for the past few weeks. Minho's just been waiting for him to verbally admit it.
It's been months since Seungmin had started hanging around, at first it was just chess games and debates over the mutant issues. Somehow it formed into debates over less serious topics, switching out chess games for meals and study sessions and movies. Hyunjin easily got comfortable around Seungmin not long after their friendship had formed.
It was strange to allow another person into their world, for a while now it's just been the two of them against the world, but Seungmin had slotted in easily. He keeps up with Minho's threats that are never serious, quick with his own smart ass retorts. He claims not to understand Minho but never stops listening to what he has to say. He matches Hyunjin's dramatics with jokes of his own, and knows the best ways to cheer him up when he's in his sensitive moods. And Minho knows that Seungmin thinks similarly, that he finds comfort being around them.
More importantly he makes Hyunjin feel safe, which in turn makes Minho feel safe.
It's been months and Minho has wanted to tell him, mostly he's been waiting for Seungmin to admit it first. He certainly has his own suspicions, he's not quite correct about Minho's abilities, but he does suspect there's something there.
Minho hums to show he's listening, he's not sure what to say.
"Unless there's a reason you don't think we should," Hyunjin prods, turning to look at Minho, shutting off the water. "Is there?"
"No," Minho says, letting his book close, he won't be able to finish the chapter any time soon. He meets Hyunjin's gaze. "If you want to tell him, I won't stop you."
Hyunjin frowns, drying off his hands as he comes over to the table, "What happened to 'one slip up could mean death or worse'?"
Minho shrugs, the suspicion is obvious, but he just focuses on getting up to get himself something to drink. He wonders if perhaps he should've put up a fight, but Hyunjin seems determined to do that anyways. He thought he'd be happy with Minho's easy agreement.
"So you won't get mad at me?"
"When have I ever done that?"
Hyunjin scoffs, "Literally always. Remember when I had that little slip up? And you told me not to talk to you because I did it on purpose."
"That was because you were being careless and stupid."
"It was an accident, I was upset!" Hyunjin argues, the annoyance coming off of him in waves, "You said we can't trust anyone. That I shouldn't even dare to admit it unless I was sure that it would end well."
Minho hums, turning back around, Hyunjin is in the middle of the room with his arms crossed over his chest. He looks like he's trying to puzzle something out. "You don't need my permission to do things, Hyunjin," he finally says.
Hyunjin holds his gaze, firm and a little angry, before he huffs and turns away. They fall into silence, it's not uncomfortable, but it isn't smooth either.
"Can we trust Seungmin?"
Minho sighs, rolling his eyes, "You heard the way he talked about mutants."
Which is to say that Seungmin believes they deserve rights and protection, however he doesn't believe that's a likely feat to make happen. He has complicated thoughts on how to go about making it possible, nothing solid and things he knows won't change how they're treated even under the law. What he doesn't tell Hyunjin is that Seungmin is one of them. He figures that's something for Seungmin to admit.
"So that's a yes," Hyunjin states after a long moment of staring at Minho in scrutiny.
Minho makes a noise, "That's not what I said."
"No," Hyunjin agrees, smiling, "But I know you and you would be more direct about it if you didn't trust him."
"Oh, so you're a mind reader now?" Minho drawls out, showing his annoyance as he stares him down.
"Nope," he replies, happily, "Just a Minho reader. And I know you trust Seungmin. You like him."
"I'm going to kill you," he says, Hyunjin jumps up and darts away when he sees Minho reach for the dish towel.
It turns out for all his talk about wanting to tell Seungmin about being a mutant, Hyunjin is still afraid to admit it. Which is only a given, Hyunjin has spent his whole life hiding in a way that Minho doesn't necessarily need to. Minho's mutation is invisible, it's an unknown and will be chalked up to perceptiveness if he slips up. His ability will only be known if he manages a major slip up of epic proportions.
On the other hand, Hyunjin doesn't have that luxury, not completely. The only saving grace is the fact that he can make himself look like any normal human, he can hide in plain sight as long as he maintains the cover. His slip up would be far more damaging, Hyunjin knows what could happen if people find out what he can do. He knows how they'd react when they see his true form.
Minho has always suspected that there are others like them out there who have to be completely hidden, that can't even walk the streets like they can without worry. They have a privilege even if it doesn't feel like it most days.
But he understands why Hyunjin is hesitant despite wanting to let Seungmin in on their secrets.
So Minho takes matters into his own hands, or well, he decides to have some fun with it. He mostly wants to see how long it takes for Seungmin to notice what exactly he's doing, he makes comments regarding what Seungmin is thinking but not speaking. The first few times are spread out enough that Seungmin has a momentary lapse where he thinks he must've said something out loud, or that Minho knows him too well.
Then Seungmin gets suspicious, so Minho ups the ante until there's no doubt and all that's left is confrontation.
"So that's why you're so good at chess," Seungmin states one day a few weeks after Minho had began his, for lack of a better word, mind games. He doesn't sound upset or accusing, just amused.
"Hello Kim Seungmin," Minho drawls out, closing his book with his fingers between the pages as he tilts his head to look at him. "How are you? I'm fine, thank you for asking."
Seungmin huffs, rolling his eyes. Today he's wearing a hoodie with their school's name splashed across it, he slips off his bag; it's his duffel bag meaning that he just got out of baseball practice which explains the wet hair. He drops the bag near Minho's feet and sits down beside it, facing him.
"You're a cheater," he says, almost gleefully, there's a mischievous glint in his eyes and general smugness over him feeling confident in cracking Minho's secret.
As if Minho hadn't been flashing it like a neon sign for the past two weeks. This time he scoffs, ignoring the fondness that forms at the happy puppy like glee coming off of Seungmin in waves, his smile is nearly blinding.
"I am not, I'm just an amazing chess player," Minho argues, turning away from his bright smile, he cracks open the book again. "If anyone is cheating it's you."
"No. I'm not," Seungmin says, "Your championship title is a lie."
Minho stares at the words on the page. "You're a lie," he retorts, shutting the book when Seungmin laughs loud and delighted.
"Yeah, you would know," Seungmin retorts, almost childish and he's like a dog with a bone.
"I don't know what that's supposed to mean," he says, finally looking at Seungmin, the sun shining bright does nothing to dim the grin on his face. He looks less like a puppy and more like the cat that caught the canary.
Yes, you do, Seungmin's thoughts practically scream, You know exactly what I mean.
Minho only smirks, leaning back against the tree. He moves his hand to his face, pressing his temple, no I don't, he thinks loud and clear and sending it to Seungmin's mind.
He feels delighted at the way Seungmin's face drops, eyes widening for a moment in shock, then a smile forms, he laughs as he smacks Minho's leg. "That's so cool," he whispers, like he means it and Minho knows he does. A million questions forming in his head about Minho's abilities.
"I wish I didn't know about your abilities," Seungmin says, he's sitting on their couch, hand over his head. "Stay out of my head."
Minho only laughs, but stops abruptly at the crash hitting the floor, he turns to see the bowl and popcorn strewn across the floor. Hyunjin standing there with his hands holding air, his eyes wide as he turns to Minho.
"Yeah, he knows," Minho answers the unspoken question.
Hyunjin turns to Seungmin. "You know," he says, like a revelation, "And you're not... Weirded out?"
Minho looks over to see Seungmin sit up, he frowns, "I mean, it's a little weird to know Minho's in my head."
"I can't help it," Minho argues, then adds before Seungmin can offer some form of comfort in knowing, "I try to keep it at a minimum. It could be worse."
That catches Seungmin's attention. "What does that mean?"
Minho clears his throat, he isn't ready to explain just how much he doesn't know about his own abilities. The things he managed to do once that scared him and hasn't attempted to try again, so he doesn't answer just turns to Hyunjin and blurts out, "Seungmin's one of us."
Hyunjin's eyes widen in disbelief for several moments, it settles in for Seungmin at just about the same time.
"You're a mutant—"
"What can you do?" Hyunjin asks, delighted as he steps over the mess he created, straight over to the couch and flopping down right beside Seungmin. He's happy to finally have someone other than family to talk about it with, someone new with powers he doesn't know yet.
"Yeah, great, let me just clean up your mess," Minho grumbles as he gets off the couch and heads towards the kitchen to get the broom.
"Thanks Minho," Hyunjin says, sounding oblivious to Minho's sarcasm, but Minho knows he's purposely ignoring it. "So?" he prompts, nudging Seungmin.
"I'll show you," Seungmin laughs, sitting up, he looks around their living room for any metal.
Minho scoffs when he walks back with the broom and dustpan. "Careful, Seungmin, you sound like a perv. 'I'll show you mine, if you show me yours.'" He badly mimics Seungmin's voice as he sweeps up the popcorn, he feels something hard hit his shoulder causing a sharp pain to erupt in the area. There's a clatter on the floor, he looks down to see a coin spinning out until it stops. Perfectly standing on it's side, clearly Seungmin's doing.
"Sleep with one eye open," Minho threatens, Seungmin doesn't look bothered, he's smiling a bit as the coin lifts off the ground floating towards a delighted Hyunjin.
"Wow," Hyunjin says, "That's incredible. Can you move everything?"
Seungmin shakes his head, brows furrowing as he lets the coin fall into Hyunjin's hand. "I can control anything metal and form magnetic fields. I'm not great at those yet."
"That's still really cool," Hyunjin tells him, nodding; "Maybe we can help you get better and expand your powers!"
"Oh." Seungmin says, "I don't know about that."
"Minho helped me get better at using mine. I used to only be able to control it for a short amount of time, but now it's constant," Hyunjin explains, "He could help you too."
Minho stops from where he's picking up the last bits of popcorn up, he looks over and hears the question being asked before Seungmin even opens his mouth. "It's all about focus and practice," he explains, turning to go throw away the garbage.
Seungmin hums, nodding as if that makes perfect sense. "I know Minho's a telepath, but what about you?"
It causes Hyunjin to stiffen, he clears his throat, "I, um... Well, I'm a shapeshifter."
"Now that's an interesting gift," Seungmin says, grinning and eagerly asks to see him shift. "Only if you want to."
Minho lingers on the use of the word: gift. It's a gift to be granted abilities, he thinks he likes that way of thinking.
Hyunjin looks at Seungmin for a long moment, turning towards Minho leaning against the doorway, before taking a deep breath and in a quick blink Minho is staring at a version of himself sitting on the couch. It surprises Seungmin but he doesn't let it show, only grinning in response.
"Wow," he breathes out.
Minho sighs. "Why'd you have to choose me?"
Hyunjin laughs, and in another blink of an eye he's shifting again, leaving Minho to stare at two Seungmin's sitting on the couch.
"Oh," Seungmin says, a laugh startling out of him, "Is that really what I look like?"
"Yes," Hyunjin says, voice mimicking Seungmin's voice perfectly, another part of his gift. That startles Seungmin as he tilts his head to look at him.
"No," Minho says, "You look uglier."
He darts away right as the keys he left on the table come barreling towards him. The echoes of Seungmin's laugh filling the apartment.
"How does it feel to finally be finished with school?"
Minho makes his way to Hyunjin and Seungmin, they're the only family he has left, the only family he needs honestly. He heard them cheer the loudest when he was giving his speech and again when his name was called to get his diploma. Once he's within reach, he hears: I'm proud of you, Mom would be too.
She'd be proud of you too, Minho tells him, patting Hyunjin's shoulder and Hyunjin reaches up to tap his hand.
Hyunjin smiles, soft and fond, "Congrats, Doctor."
He gently waves the bouquet of flowers in his hand. There's balloons Seungmin's hands: two plain ones in the school colors and two graduation themed ones.
Minho wrinkles his nose, "Don't call me that."
"Why not?" Hyunjin asks, almost pouting, "Alright, what about Professor? Professor Lee Minho. It has a nice ring to it, doesn't it?"
Minho scoffs, but Seungmin grins, "He's right. It does."
"You're both annoying," he grumbles, holding his hand out. "Let me have my gifts."
"Nope," Seungmin says, moving away from Minho's grasp and using his arm to block him from being able to reach the flowers from Hyunjin's hands. "If we're so annoying why should we give them to you."
"Because I deserve nice things for suffering through getting my doctorate," Minho retorts, "And because you love me."
"Who said that?" Seungmin remarks, raising a brow and frowning. "Did I ever say that, Hyunjin?"
"Nope, not that I recall," Hyunjin answers, making a face as if he's truly trying to remember a time he had.
"I do."
"You're delusional," Seungmin says, shaking his head, "Come on, Hyunjin we need to stop being friends with him."
"You're a liar," Minho says.
Seungmin laughs. "Here," he says, handing over the balloons, "Congrats. We're proud of you and we love you."
"Thank you," Minho says, after a moment, grasping the balloons. "Um, let's go to dinner." After a pause, "Your treat."
Seungmin laughs, but relents. The three of them weave their way through the crowd, stopping at home to drop everything off before heading to the restaurant that they've eat from far too often.
"So," Seungmin says, once the food is on the table and being eaten. Minho grilling the meat for them. "What do you plan to do now?"
Minho hums, truthfully he had planned to go on with his research find somewhere he could do good. Perhaps become a professor and teach. But over the past year his priorities have changed.
"I'm going to open up a school," he announces, flipping the meat, he looks over at the two and tells them: for mutants.
Hyunjin straightens up, "What do you mean?"
Minho shifts, looking around, the place is dead at this time except for two other tables. The servers off to the side, doing prep while watching the tables and waiting to offer a hand.
"Seungmin you said it'd be great if they had a place to turn to," Minho says, keeping his voice low, "We can do that. We can start the change we always talked about."
"That was just a dream," Hyunjin says, catching on quickly, he looks hopeful and worried in equal measures.
Seungmin is staring, lost in thought. Minho's briefly worried he's against the idea but just as quickly he's bombarded by Seungmin's thoughts. He's thinking through the technical aspect of what opening up a school like that would mean.
"I have the building already," Minho interjects, "Our family home. It's... Well—"
"It's basically a castle," Hyunjin jokes, "Tons of rooms and space. It's perfect."
"Let's talk about this more in private," Seungmin offers, he's looking over at the door as new customers come in and the server that's coming closer.
It causes Hyunjin to frown, clearly upset that Seungmin doesn't like the idea. Minho clears up the confusion, mentally telling him Seungmin agrees and is only concerned about someone overhearing them. Hyunjin relaxes and smiles, changing the subject to one about some movie he's been wanting to see. The frown on Seungmin's face eases as he looks over at Minho, like he knows what just happened.
Their childhood home is practically in the middle of nowhere, large and surrounded by acres of land. It looks just as it did when they left for school. Albeit it's clear that it hasn't been kept up with as much as it should have. Their mother had passed away a few years ago leaving everything to the two of them despite arguments from her siblings who thought they deserved some of the assets. Minho wouldn't have cared, he would have let them take the house, but as his mother was on her death bed she was a well of confessions.
Her mind was a mess of emotions and secrets that she had kept guarded, some of which Minho had already known by proxy of his powers, she had gripped his and Hyunjin's hands. The will had been written, it was binding, everything to her children, blood related and otherwise. But she made Minho promise not to give them what they wanted if they tried to ask, that it must all go to Hyunjin and him.
Right now he's glad that she had, otherwise they wouldn't have a place to start their mission.
The house hadn't been visited by them in awhile, they used a portion of the inheritance money to hire help to keep the place functional and neat though the housekeepers only really show up once a month. The garden is no longer existent, the grass is green and not too overgrown which is better than nothing.
Seungmin lets out a low whistle as he stares up at the large building. "You weren't kidding when you said it was like a castle," he says, "I don't know how you survived such hardship."
"Shut up," Minho says, as he grabs his bags from the trunk.
They're sitting cross legged in one of the common rooms, takeout and papers spread out around them. Seungmin has been looking into the legal side of things, all the proper paperwork needed to create a school and right now they're going over it now.
Hyunjin sighs from his spot across from where they're filling out the paperwork. He's laying down on the floor, head turned towards them, "I think we need to point out the elephant in the room."
Seungmin hums, immediately stopping where he was scribbling in information. "What's that?"
"Finding students and faculty," Hyunjin says, brows furrowed, "We can't necessarily advertise what we're really doing here. I mean, not without exposing ourselves and safety."
"I've been thinking about that," Seungmin says, "I actually have a theory—"
"You think I could locate mutants?" Minho asks confused.
Seungmin nods. "Yeah, I think we can figure out a way to amplify your telepathic waves and basically make a honing device." Then he pauses, "We'll have to work on that but, for now, I think we can scour public records and reports for anything... abnormal."
"We'll be like cryptid hunters," Hyunjin jokes, shaking his head, "Do you think it'll work? Your theory, I mean."
"It's worth a shot," Seungmin says, looking at Minho for any confirmation, or agreement.
"It's a start," Minho says, after a long moment as the two wait for him to share his opinion, "Until we can get our bearing. Eventually we'll be able to rely on word of mouth, only once we start up a network with other mutants."
Hyunjin sits up now, brimming with hope and excitement, "God, can you imagine? There could be so many others like us who think they're alone, we'd be able to help so many people." He runs his hand through his hair, a look of determination crossing his face, "Where do we start?"
"It's going to take time," Seungmin admits, smiling as he watches Hyunjin nod along. "But we'll get there.... One step at a time. We start with a sanctuary and then maybe one day we can work on the bigger picture. At being able to be truly free and live among others without fear."
It makes Minho pause, he searches Seungmin's mind, he's no longer hesitant. He has his concerns, but he seems willing to try. "I thought you said it was foolish idealism?"
Seungmin huffs, trying his best to bite back his smile, "I've been told I'm a fool."