sliceofselcouth

[sliceofselcouth]

Knights of the Galaxy: Halfsies

The art of enjoying gimbap? Allow your face to be shoved into the dirt and wiggle in vain as your friends steal your lunch. Obviously.

Chanyeol crouched down beside his partner in crime, practically vibrating on the spot and gnawing at his fingernails in an attempt to contain his excitement. “Do you honestly think we’ll pull this off?”

Ever so calmly, Ayumi reached over and slapped his arm. "I thought you said you had gotten faster?”

Chanyeol pouted at her. “I have gotten faster, but so has he!” Wiggling a little closer, he tried to peek over her shoulder to catch a glimpse of their target. “He’s been training with Minseok for all of last month. He’s a menace to society with his speed.”

Ayumi leaned forward so that her nose barely brushed hide own, and his eyes crossed a little. "Would you like for me to practice what I learned on your head?”

Chanyeol leaned back to prop his chin on the palm of his hand and grin widely at his friend. While filled to the brim with bodily threats, Ayumi was never one to actually go through with them. "That's okay. I mean, can we do it after we blindside him?”

It took an unsettling amount of strength to not roll her eyes at him before turning back to the direction that Baekhyun would, hopefully, be coming from. A sliver of her guilt ridden conscience berated her for what they were about to do to Baekhyun, but the rest of her was filled with the undiluted, smug delight of someone who had been jibed at one too many times. He should have learned his lesson three years ago when they shoved him off a low level bridge.

“He’s out!” Chanyeol hissed, eyes widened to the size of saucers. He grabbed at her shoulder and shook her like a rag doll. “He’s out!”

Ayumi spotted their target emerging from the training unit, forehead scrunched as he rolled his shoulders. There was a small bruise on the curve of his cheek. Minseok had definitely gone a little harder on him than usual today.

“Okay, you remember the plan?"

Chanyeol rolled his eyes. "Obviously. My killer visuals will distract him, you trip him, and then we pin him down together."

“Good.” They’d need to tie him up with something to restrain the limbs. Reaching down, she blindly felt for the rope she’d told Chanyeol to bring. A little confused, she looked down when her fingers grazed nothing but grass, then looked up at him. There was an alarming lack of material. “Where’s the rope?”

Chanyeol had the gall to look a little embarrassed, the tips of his ears flushing an adorable shade of pink. “Junmyeon said I looked too suspicious and confiscated it,” he grumbled, clearly not wanting to delve deeper into the matter.

Their precious leader had crossed paths with Chanyeol at the wrong time, taken one look at the rope coiled around the would-be perpetrator’s arm, and deemed the situation too conspicuous to ignore. Chanyeol had soon after been left with no rope and one hell of a lecture.

“Doesn’t matter, I’ll grow some vines,” Ayumi said, fingers already digging into the dirt. “Won’t take too long.”

“Yeah, but you know he’ll beat our asses to oblivion if he even thinks he knows what we're planning."

Ayumi eyed him and flashed an impish smile. "It’ll be hard to do that with a mouthful of grass, don't you think?"

5 minutes later

“Great forces of all that’s holy!” Chanyeol exclaimed in genuine joy as he bit into a gimbap, eyes fluttering shut in bliss. ”It was so incredibly nice of you to bring lunch, but you must have forgotten how much I hate tuna."

Baekhyun’s words were lost in translation to what sounded like aggravated hissing noises. Humming, Ayumi adjusted her position on his shoulder blades, making a point to wiggle just enough to drive his gut deeper into the ground. Threading her fingers through tufts of unruly hair, she lifted his head with ease. “What was that?"

"I’m going to kill—.“

She shoved his head back down.

Chanyeol awarded her with a thumbs up and a dazzling smile, immensely proud of their achievement. He readjusted his own position, cross legged on the back of Baekhyun’s knees, pinning his legs to the ground. Neither trusted the fact that his feet and hands were tightly constricted in vines.

"Now, now. This is for your own good,” Chanyeol told his friend with the patience one would use with a child bordering a temper tantrum. "Junmyeon always says that sharing and teamwork is important! This is a life lesson!”

A screech of muffled rage was his only reply.

"Oh, how nice! This one has sesame seeds." Ayumi said cheerfully. "Baekhyun, I can’t tell you how nice your generosity and caring nature is. We hadn’t had lunch today!”

More incoherent snarls came from below them.

Chanyeol cocked his head, cupped a hand behind his ear and nodded in agreement. "I think he wants you finish them off, Yumi. You know how he hates for you to go hungry."

Ayumi batted her lashes at him and hid a tiny smile behind the last bit of her gimbap. "You’re making me blush! I have a better idea; how about we go halfsies?"

Chanyeol slapped a hand on his knee, his eyes practically sparkling in insuperable joy. "Excellent idea! Nothing would honour me more than to go halfsies with my best friend!”

Nimble fingers fished the pocket knife from Baekhyun’s back pocket, then he neatly sliced the last kimbap in half and tossed the weapon away from reach. With a graceful flourish that was not undramatic, he handed over the bigger half. Raising them up, they saluted each other before finishing them off in record timing.

"So?" Chanyeol asked, wiping his fingers on the back of their victim’s shirt. In return, a wiggling Baekhyun thrashed with insurmountable strength to try and throw them off. "What do we do now?"

Ayumi licked her finger and spotted a wide eyed and exasperated Minseok heading their way. "I'm thinking we run like hell?"

Chanyeol leaned forward with a sharp smile. "You're just so full of amazing ideas today, buddy of mine."

She grinned brightly. "I couldn't do it without you!"

“Nobody move!” Minseok’s voice bellowed across the space.

His fingers hovered over the vines tied around Baekhyun’s feet. The corner of his mouth kicked up and he tilted his head as Minseok’s shouts grew dauntingly closer. They really were in so much trouble. “Ready?”

“Set?” She shifted back, slowly, and gripped the tie around Baekhyun’s hands.

“Go!”

Baekhyun could not track down the meddlesome duo for three days.

[sliceofselcouth]

Masterlist

💫Knights of the Galaxy 💫

No one told Ayumi how much of a migraine that galavanting across the galaxy to uphold peace and harmony would bring her. Then again, no one told her that she’d have to do it with a bunch of headache inducing oddballs either. What an interesting adventure this ought to be.

Not posted in chronological order.

1. Telmar

Part One Baekhyun didn’t think that in order to rescue one idiot, he’d accidentally have to leave another behind.

2. Halfsies

What would you do when bored out of your mind? Why, steal Baekhyun’s lunchbox and shove his face in the dirt!

[sliceofselcouth]

Knights of the Galaxy: Telmar

Summary — In a galaxy not so far away, Ayumi wonders what colossal sin she had to have committed in her previous life to be thrown into outer space with a group of idiots.

Notes—

• FIRST FANFIC ALERT! A thousand apologies to every single grammatical error made! I’m going to improve, I promise you that!

• There will be no set timeline to the stories, rather just drabbles of what the original character goes through in her tumultuous life and the colourful characters she meets.

“Find Jongin. Bring him home. No, I don’t care if you have better things to do, Baek.”

Baekhyun didn’t say a word. He preferred to stare motionlessly straight ahead, unseeing, into the bleak horizon. There was an odd sort of comfort in cursing out his leader from within the confines of his own mind.

The icy wind was relentlessly sharp and unforgiving tonight. His hair whipped about his head, slapping his forehead with the force of small pinpricks that did little to soothe his temper. Their pod was hidden a few miles south of the terrain of low hills, cocooned in the safety of a sheet of mist they had managed to stumble across after landing.

Baekhyun wondered why he had agreed to this rescue mission. The planet was mostly uncharted territory with unpredictable weather patterns, so his fellow crew mate honestly had no business here in the first place.

He jerked in surprise when something knocked against his knees. With a grunt, he bent to help straighten Ayumi, who had taken a tumble from a particularly strong gust of wind. As one of the few crew members with an elemental ability, she had practiced for years to be able to harness her core energy to heal. While a strenuous effort, Baekhyun had yet to even hear a single complaint from the woman.

It was then that he realized that Ayumi was looking up at him and moving her lips, but Baekhyun couldn’t hear the words over the ferocity of the howling gusts. Instead, he shrugged to show that he didn’t understand a word, and kept a steady hand over her shoulder.

No matter. She should be done soon, he figured.

In front of her, lying on the ground was a seemingly comatose Jongin; eyes closed, brow pinched and head propped up on Ayumi’s lap. Looming over him like a scary mother hen, her hands were splayed on either sides of his temples. Baekhyun didn’t think that he would ever get over the thrill of seeing her heal; there was just something about the way her hands would ablaze radiant with a pearlescent white that sent goosebumps down the length of his arms.

Or maybe it was because the wind was becoming unusually colder. Eyebrows curled against each other, his eyes narrowed with a gnawing suspicion.

He knelt down, wincing when his knees dug into her back. “Can’t we carry him to the ship and heal him there?” He yelled, voice booming in her ear at such close proximity.

She shook her head, ponytail smacking him in the face. Spluttering out a few strands of hair from his mouth, Baekhyun decided that there was no point in rushing her. He strained to hear what she was saying, but he could only catch the words “spine” and “cautious”. So being the dutiful teammate that he was, he provided more light from the conjured orbs surrounding the trio and held a firm grip on Ayumi’s shoulder, lest another bout of wind knocked her clean off her knees.

Peering over shoulder, he looked down at his teammate. The shade of Jongin’s skin had improved considerably, from a sickly pallor back to a healthy tan. While it concerned Baekhyun, he knew that the man was in good hands. Now, if he could just figure out what happened to him in the first place.

The planet of Telmar was reportedly barren of life and stripped of any light. An astonishingly lack of reports were borne from the fact that no one was willing to explore and charter a planet that had no hope. It was also not on Jongin’s current itinerary. So why was he here and what had happened?

The air was permeated with doom and unanswered questions, and it unsettled Baekhyun to come to terms with the fact that if a creature did this to Jongin, it was probably still lurking around. Unless he provided more light orbs, there was no way of seeing past even two feet of the inky darkness surrounding them. But he couldn’t afford to bring another orb into existence–the promise of luring predators was hanging tantalizingly low over their heads.

Baekhyun had little to no intel on whatever monstrosities occupied Telmar. He had to get these two back to safety before they’re given the chance to find out.

“Okay,” he said, yanking Ayumi’s ear, and subsequently her whole head, closer to his lips. “Speed it up!”

At the same moment when Ayumi shot him a baleful glare for practically spitting in her ear, Jongin inhaled a frightening large bout of air and shot up, effectively knocking the top of his head against her chin.

Surprised at the sharp pain traversing from her nose up to her head, Ayumi jerked back into Baekhyun’s chest. With a grunt, the two were blown onto the ground in a flurry of flailing limbs as they fought in vain against the wind. He had ducked in time to avoid an elbow to the face as she scrambled up to her feet, eyes watery as she blinked against the increasing velocity of the gale.

Now awake, Jongin’s wide eyes flitted past the light orbs hovering above him before he twisted around to gawk in disbelief at his friends. Ayumi helped a disgruntled Baekhyun -whose face had flushed a remarkable shade of cherry red- to his feet. Though Jongin couldn’t quite hear them them, he could see their mouths moving rapidly, frustration evident on their faces.

Flinching at the sheer strength of the wind, Jongin realised that the howling of it alone was the reason for his lack of hearing. Well, at least he wasn’t deaf. Wiggling his toes and flexing his fingers with ease, he realised that he must have been healed. Deciding to take a chance and get back up on his feet, he paused to take a deep breath. The world spun unforgivingly fast around him, the light orbs melding together to form one luminous line. He pressed the heel of his palms into his eyelids, just until splotches of colour bombarded his vision.

This mission was nothing short of a disaster, and he just knew that Junmyeon was going to kill him.

Cool hands, rough with a littering of aged scars, pressed gently against his cheeks. Almost immediately a tidal wave of warmth washed away his nausea, a revitalizing burst of energy unfolding from within his chest. Eyes flickering open, he saw Ayumi kneeling in front of him, brow pinched as she concentrated on redirecting the flow.

Baekhyun had turned around to keep an eye out for signs of movement in the darkness, one hand reaching behind him to grab a fistful of Ayumi’s jacket. He was still recovering from the last mission, so his powers were limited at this given time. If they could just hurry and regroup on either one of the pods, they could get the hell off this cursed land. He detested the dark. “Would you mind telling us why we found you unconscious?” He shouted over his shoulder.

And just as Ayumi stepped back and opened her mouth to repeat the same question in case Jongin hadn’t heard, the wind ceased abruptly. Her ponytail flopped back down just as the lapels of her jacket flattened against her chest.

Alarmed, Baekhyun twisted around to lock gazes with Jongin. Not daring to utter a single word, the man cocked his head to relay his utter confusion. What the fuck?

The cold claws of dread crept up Jongin’s spine. The silence was daunting, but it was the loss of even a single breeze that truly left him unsettled. His fingers twitched with longing to toss his teammates over his shoulder and teleport far away from here. Something was so incredibly wrong.

Brow furrowed, he strained his ears to listen. No one moved a muscle. Baekhyun could hear his own heartbeat; he could even hear Ayumi’s nervous breaths. They needed to go. “Okay,” he said as quietly as he could. “Jongin, get up. Our pod’s closer to reach than yours, so let’s—.”

One of the the orbs flickered. The man almost snapped his neck when he whipped around to gape at it. It blinked, fighting for life, until it gave out completely into the darkness with a final shudder.

“Baek?” Jongin called out softly, wincing at the sharp stab of pain in his throat. Tongue heavy and mouth parched, he wanted nothing more than to chug an entire bottle of water at the moment. He was in no mood for one of Baekhyun’s attempts to scare him. “Switch your lights back on.”

The man in question looked just as confused as he did. “I... didn’t do that.”

A horrific screech, one that couldn’t possibly be human, ripped through the air. The rest of Baekhyun’s orbs flared momentarily, the lights waning rapidly as they spun erratically around the trio.

The screech was jarring, but it did well to break Ayumi from her stupor. Quickly grabbing a fistful of her teammates jackets, fingernails clawing into the material, she yanked them just as her feet propelled towards the direction of the jet.

“Run!” She cried out desperately just as another screech tore through the air, this time noticeably closer.

Words fuelling their own legs, Baekhyun and Jongin managed to move quickly, racing after Ayumi. Gritting his teeth, Baekhyun willed a few of his orbs to lead the way, illuminating the jagged rocks and crevices they jumped over.

Heart hammering thunderously against his chest, Jongin ducked just in time to avoid a bare tree branch nearly slicing his head clean off his shoulder.

“Jongin!” Ayumi screamed over her shoulder. “Now would be a great time to teleport!”

Jongin nodded vigorously, unable to find the words to verbally respond.

Baekhyun grunted as he leaped over a protrusion of rock jutting from the ground. The cave was a considerable distance away, and he didn’t think that they would make it without a fight if whatever it was decided to pounce on them. “Pod sixteen!” He yelled over his shoulder.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

Minseok blinked, taken aback when two bodies landed in a small heap on his beloved carpet.

Jongin heaved, lungs protesting when Baekhyun landed ungracefully on his back.

Minseok leaned forward to peer at his two boys sprawled on the carpet. “Not to be rude, but I’m busy.”

Baekhyun staggered to his feet and bit back a curse. The dolt had transported them directly back home. When he realised that he’d have to somehow get back to Telmar and get the pod back, the annoyance tripled till he had to force himself to bite back a curse. “Jongin,” he said.

“What?” The man groaned from his spot on the ground, one arm flopped lifelessly over his eyes.

“You’re getting the pod back,” Baekhyun snapped as he rubbed vigorously at his temples. He never boded well with the dark, and Junmyeon would have to bodily threaten him before he ever stepped foot on the cursed land again. What even was that god awful thing that screeched at them?

Jongin grunted.

Minseok shook his head and sighed, setting aside his cup of tea. “You really need to start calling the pod a jet. Also, you transported directly home? Smart. Junmyeon’s going to kick your ass for that.”

Sitting back up and groaning at the ebbing headache pounding to life behind his ears, Jongin shook his head. “To be fair, my mind was a bit scrambled because we were running away from this horrific thing in the darkness.”

Minseok quirked an eyebrow. “What horrific thing in what darkness?”

“Telmar. It was pitch black and there was some mister lurking in the darkness,” Jongin explained as he stood back up. “It screeched so loudly I thought my eardrums were going to burst!”

“Really? Interesting,” Minseok mused as he brought the teacup to his lips. Telmar was a land left unexplored on account of the death of its nearest sun a some years ago. Records stated its history, but no one had ventured its plains since it harboured rumours of vile creature lurking in the darkness. At least now there some substance to the rumours. “So why were you two in Telmar in the first place?”

“Two?” Baekhyun parroted. He frowned in confusion when Minseok pointedly looked from Jongin to Baekhyun. “What do you mean? Yumi is right—.”

Jongin’s eyes widened to the size of dinner plates when he realised that it was only Baekhyun standing in front of him. Oh God... The dreadful claws of nausea climbed rapidly up his spine to wrapping its constricting talons around his throat.

His breath hitched in his throat as he watched Baekhyun look around the space wildly, hands quivering as the lightbulbs above flickered manically. “She was right in front of us, I swear.” He could hardly hear his own voice. “She was right there!”

The temperature in the room plummeted. Pinpricks stabbed at his skin as Baekhyun released a breath, visible in the chill of the room. Panic would be one word to describe what he was feeling at the moment, but he knew that the eldest member responsible for the cold was frothing mad.

“You left Ayumi in Telmar?” Minseok demanded, voice as unforgivingly cold as the temperature. He rounded the desk slowly. “Alone?!”

Jongin’s knees buckled, legs wobbling like jelly, as black specks dotted his vision at an alarming rate.

“Take us back!” Baekhyun barked in fury, wheeling around to grab Jongin‘s collar and yank him closer. Fear for her wellbeing was soon filtering to reveal the pure rage flaming in his chest. “Take us back right now!”

Jongin was shivering now, eyes unfocused as his hands clawed desperately at Baekhyun’s. There was too much going on. The sensory overload was too much! He couldn’t think clearly! How could he have been so careless? How could he have let his best friend slip through his own fingers and not even realise it? “I’m so sorry, I don’t know what happened! She was right next to me, I thought... I—.”

Baekhyun’s eyes narrowed dangerously as he took a step up; at first glance, he might seem human, but something about his aura crackled, something about his eyes were too bright and his movements too graceful. “If anything happens to her—.”

“Baekhyun, his nerves are shot.,” Minseok interrupted as he walked over to clap a hand over Baekhyun’s shoulder. The protrusion of crystalline is as blanched and jagged as a shattered rib cage, jutting up toward the ceiling in a cacophony of razor sharp ice. “Rest, recuperate, and bring her back.”