[Neo Zone] Population: 23 Kids

A Suh-prise

Mrs. Suh was completely whipped and ready to quit after having run the cafe by herself for a couple of hours while Mr. Suh went on a side quest, but that didn't stop her from smiling brightly when the kids from the elementary school came through the door.

"Stop right there, no one's allowed in the basement right now. But you're welcome to help me out." She took a moment to kiss the top of Jisung's head and fix Hendery's hair before returning to the waiting customer.

Normally when the elementary kids came over after school, it was a slow trickle of them coming in or someone had something they had to go do first. Today, everyone ended up at the cafe at the same time, including Renjun who was dragged there against his will, so there were fourteen kids behind the counter now.

There wasn't enough stools for everyone to sit at, so those who had more homework to do went to the kitchen table upstairs, and the rest did shifts with each other so there wasn't an overabundance of kids trying to work behind the counter.

"Why can't we go in the basement?" YangYang asked, handing the man in front of him his change.

"Because there's a surprise and we want you all to see it at the same time."

"What kind of surprise?"

"Well it wouldn't be a surprise if I told you. Where's Jaehyun? I need help with the coffee orders."

"I'll get him!" Lucas ran upstairs and then ran back down dragging Jaehyun with him without ever telling him what was going on. He got the hint when his aunt pointed to the unmanned coffee machine, and started working on the orders.

"How do you do this?" Jaemin asked, appearing next to Jaehyun and watching how he worked the machine.

"Are you asking because you want to be able to make coffee whenever you want or because you want to help?"

"Can't it be both?" Jaemin smiled cheekily, really hoping that Johnny hadn't told him he was banned from even getting near the coffee machine.

"Alright. You've got to pay attention because I'm only going over this once."

"He's not allowed to touch the coffee thing!" Hendery pointed out, earning himself a killing glare.

"I don't have time to question that."

"But-"

"He doesn't have time to question it, Hen."

Xiaojun poked Jungwoo's shoulder. "Is Leon still in the basement?"

Jungwoo shrugged, so Xiaojun turned to Jeno and repeated the question.

"Probably, he's supposed to stay down there."

The six that were in middle school then came back from school, all of them immediately confused as to why Jaemin was even near the coffee machine.

"Who let Nana near coffee?" Kun asked, looking around to see if there were empty coffee cups laying around.

"He's fine, he's just working."

"So he hasn't had the Americano from hell?"

"Johnny! Language!" Mrs. Suh turned to him with wide eyes.

"No, that's what it is." Doyoung added to back him up, having heard Johnny mutter much worse words under his breath when doing homework.

"Why isn't Jaemin allowed to help out? You guys act like his parents." Taeil was confused as to why he even bothered questioning what they did at this point.

"Because I am and I'm not about to deal with a hyperactive Nana for the next five hours." Taeyong responded.

"Why are we all up here?" Yuta asked, really wanting a nap.

"If you get the boys from upstairs I'll let you go down."

So Mark ran upstairs to gather the others, and they headed down. Except there's no way they could all properly see what the surprise was when they were walking down stairs with twenty people, so those in the back were very confused what was going on.

Mr. Suh was just finishing up building a ridiculous amount of bunk beds. One for each kid, plus an extra. They thought it was for the pets, but then they saw the other kid they didn't recognize helping him.

"String danger! String danger!" Chenle screeched, resembling a dolphin being used for a fire alarm. He stopped going down the stairs, haulting everyone behind him.

"No one told me the cult keeps growing." Renjun mumbled.

"Oh it's always growing, but I don't know who this is." Haechan whispered, wishing he had his sunglasses.

"Why did you guys stop? Who's there?" Mark tried standing on his toes to see over their heads from the back, but that wasn't helping. Which only succeeded in almost knocking them all down the stairs.

"Can we please get down the stairs before Jisung tumbles over?" WinWin asked, holding onto him from behind.

Mr. Suh and the new kid just laughed at them, and Chenle continued walking down the stairs when Jungwoo nudged him from behind.

"I see you've finally got yourself some friends, John."

"Oh shoot he knows him."

"I though Mrs. Suh just kidnapped him for us."

"Wait, Johnny has friends?"

"I do have friends, but if it's who I think it is, he's not supposed to be here."

"Your Mom never meant it when she banned me from the cafe. That lady at the library, though, she meant it."

"Ten!" Johnny had to refrain from pushing past the rest of the slowpokes on the stairs to punch his friend.

Yeah, he could've hugged him, but he'd rather punch him for not telling him he was coming.

"But it's not summer."

"Don't question why I'm here and just get down here."

Ten punched Johnny on the shoulder before the older could do it first, starting a punching war between them that Haechan decided was a good idea to copy with Renjun. That earned him a headlock and almost death.

The other kids weren't that interested in the reunion going on, and instead started claiming bunk beds. That was the more important task at the moment.

"Why are there all these beds when some of us can never sleepover?" Jeno asked, honestly a little disappointed that he'd be left out.

"So on the rare occasion that you can, you have a bed like the rest. There was also a really strange sale on bunk bed kits, and I had to buy ten to get them all half off." Mr. Suh rubbed the back of his neck, exhausted from how much work that was. And it wasn't like Ten was much help.

"But this is only the third day I've even come... And that was against my will..." Renjun mumbled.

Jungwoo attached himself to Mr. Suh from behind in a tight hug.

"Thank you."

"Anything for my kid and not-technically-my-kids-but-that-doesn't-matter. Except Ten. I still don't know what you're doing here."

Ten momentarily stopped punching Johnny, which the older took as a win.

"I got kicked out of my school in Thailand because I kept painting my face rainbow when the art teacher said I couldn't put the gay flag in the background of my drawing. So now I have to live with my Dad here."

Mr. Suh sighed and Johnny gave him a high five, the others not bothering to question it. After all, it was a legitimate reason to get kicked out of anywhere.