Guts (EXO)

Are You Ready?

Tonight is the night.

Durus laced his hands together and placed his elbows on top of a lone wooden table in the vast emptiness of his chambers a couple of feet under the busy streets of Seoul.

Closing his eyes, he inhaled the odor of sewage; a smell that he had been accustomed to ever since his childhood when his father became a lunatic. Ever since their life began to fall apart.

"Tonight is the night," he whispered roughly to himself, but he knew he wasn't alone.

A few feet away from where he was sitting, the monsters that his father had created listened, their abnormally long, flexible limbs crawling on the ceiling and their razor sharp teeth oozing with drivel, hiding behind masks to disguise their true appearances.

They crept closer towards the muscular man only to be shunned away when he abruptly stood up, lifted the table, split it in half with his knees and threw it towards their way. The slender creatures crawled back as Durus stared hotly into the darkness where they hid.

"Tonight is the night," he repeated, listening to his own heavy breathing afterwards.

---

Hyerin raised the paper napkin to her face, closely observing the two words scribbled messily on its surface.

'Stay Away'.

Her brows knitted together as she tried recalling the events earlier that morning; she opened her locker like she normally did every day to get her things for first period but instead, a paper napkin greeted her instead of her textbooks. Nobody was around to see who it was that put the paper in her locker, nor was there any name to indicate whom it was from.

Not only was the message strange, her books were gone as well.

"Kim Hyerin!"

Hyerin looked up, only to be met with four pairs of eyes staring at her.

"Huh?" she mumbled.

"What is with you? It's like we're not even here." Sehun pouted. "What is that anyway? You've been staring at that napkin since we got here in the cafeteria!"

Sehun grabbed for it but Hyerin put it away in her pocket just in time. "Nothing. Just a number," she dismissed. "What were you guys talking about?"

"You and your lack of attention," Lay deadpanned.

"That," Chen said, taking a spoonful of macaroni and cheese, "and also your fight with Kyungsoo."

Hyerin shook her head dismissively. "It was nothing. Just a little argum-"

"Little, she says."

"-about something stupid! Can we just drop it? Where even is Chanyeol?"

"You banned him along with the others from this table a five minutes ago because they were too noisy, remember?" Suho reminded, giving her a worried look. "Are you okay, Hyerin? It seems like you've been in a daze today. Are you sure you're alright after what happened with Kyungsoo?"

Hyerin shook her head. "Nonsense, we were both just having a bad day at the time. I just have a lot on my mind that you guys shouldn't be worrying about." Like this anonymous person and their eagerness for me to stay away from something to the point of stealing my books.

"Well, you know we're here for you in case you want to talk about it." Suho ruffled the top of her head while Sehun reached out to do the same, accidentally toppling over a plastic cup and spilling its contents on the table and all over Chen's slacks.