- The Clan Prequel Chapter 1

Tùy Chỉnh


"Don't open your eyes... Look at me!" A strand of thin voice hovered in the air. Someone was singing. A girl?

"Look at me." The girl whispered again. Her small lithesome hand waved in front of Jooheon from a far distance. Walking towards the direction where the voice came from, Jooheon touched around to find a clue of something. Maybe walls. Maybe something to hold on. He was not sure. The whole space surrounding him was dark. Pure dark. Despite being embraced by uncomfortable darkness, he had shown no sign of fright.

"Look at me. Don't open your eyes." The girl called out to him again. "Come here and I will sing you a lullaby."

That was weird. The girl ordered him to come to her. He wanted to, but he was moving so slow in this unknown dark space. It was like something was holding him back. She suddenly burst into peals of laughter and started running away.

"Hey wait!" He shouted out, pleadingly, asking the girl to stop running. He looked down at his feet. They were running so fast, unlike a minute ago when he could not even walk. His feet gained energy out of nowhere. Though, he couldn't see the ground. It felt like the wind lifted him up and carried him amongst the air. Everything around him was so dark and invisible. The only thing he saw was his own body. His whole body glowed up. He finally reached the door where the girl just stepped into. Heavily fisting against the locked door, Jooheon begged again, for the girl to open it. He twisted the knob violently, hoping the door would swing open on its own. He wanted to come to her, so she would sing him a lullaby. He wanted to fall asleep.

The walls now appeared visible and were moving toward the center of the room, trying to crash against him. In the panic, he knocked on the door even faster and stronger, crying "Help! Help!". He could hear obviously the laughter from the other side of the door. As waited, the door swung open for him. A smile crept upon the corner of Jooheon's lips when he saw lights. Two girls were sitting across the room on brunette armchairs made out of wood. One was wearing a pink sweater with a grey fluffy skirt. The other was wearing a black checkered high-neck dress. There are frames of pictures on the blueish green painted wall behind them. Even though he couldn't see their faces, but he owned the feeling that they were staring at him. A chill ran down his spine. He took one step towards them.

They slowly vanished into thin air.

"Wait!" Jooheon groaned in frustration.

The vague dissatisfaction didn't have to hang around for long, as he started falling down. A wave of invisible wind sucked him down strongly. He kept falling and falling. His face had gone pale with fears. He was scared of the dark, the endless falling, the unseen and unknown surrounding.

The female voices echoed out from nowhere, capturing his consciousness, slapping onto his face. Too many at once. Their voices overlapped one another repeatedly. It hurt. His whole face and body. The pain was the same with thousands of needles stabbing onto his skin.

"Lullaby, don't go today."

"Even when the morning comes, stay with me. Every day."

"I will never leave you alone."

"Don't go..."

His fists were clenched tight, his legs were kicking in nothingness. The pain was unimaginable. He struggled to escape from this whole abnormal event. Knowing something was wrong, he screamed out for help. However, as he was drowning in the dark, his voice was sucked away. He couldn't stand it anymore. He wanted to let go. He wanted to abandon his life here in this terrifying nightmare. He relaxed his muscles, let himself fall deeper and deeper into darkness, hoping that he would reach the bottom and die soon; thus, he would no longer feel the pain.

Luckily, that was when the magical blue flower extract liquid started kicking in and the horror show was ended. The black background transformed to sparkling white, and fireworks of blue flower exploded in the middle of the air. The giant flowers stretched their long, rounded petals. The edges' color gradually spread out, dissolved into the background as if the flowers were drenched in water. Jooheon fell onto one of the biggest flower's petals and they wrapped around him, keeping him away from the pain.

He fluttered his eyes open seeing a familiar male figure standing above him. Back in reality, Jooheon's conscious reminded him that someone just called him and with the impatience while watching him struggle in the black dreamland, that person violently shook him off of the deep sleep. In spite the fact that he was shaken, he still didn't wake up. Therefore, the person had to do what he had to do: pouring some drops of the blue flower extract into his mouth. And magically, Jooheon came back to life awake.

The good-looking guy dressed up in a simple white button-down, a pair of ripped jeans, and a black feather jacket outside. His black hair drooped to the front as he was looking down at Jooheon. He wore his favorite smoky colored lens which made his big double-lid eyes look even rounder. A black thin choker hung around his long neck. His perfect skin glowed up which caused Jooheon to think that he saw an angel without wings just now.

"Hyungwon... What... what happened?" Jooheon sat up, burying his face onto his palms. His silver colored hair was a big mess and his brown pupils were shaking with the small amount of the stagnant scary feeling.

"You were having bad dreams? You murmured weird things in your sleep, tossing and turning." Hyungwon handed his friend the small glass bottle that contained the blue liquid he used to wake him up.

Jooheon took it from Hyungwon's hand with a nod of thankfulness. Then immediately, came the puzzled look on his face. "Really? I don't remember anything... Maybe a little bit. I only remember something was very dark." He emptied the liquid off the glass bottle and gulped down all at once.

"That properly didn't work." Hyungwon raised his hand, pointing at the dream catcher – a simple blue one, with three flocks of feather under, decorated with white pearls – hanging on the head of Jooheon's bed. "Where did you buy it? You should ask for a refund."

"Oh, that!" Jooheon turned around and pulled the dream catcher off of its hook. "I didn't buy it though, but you are right. I'm gonna ask the girls why I still have bad dreams even though I used this." He shoved the dream catcher into his pant pocket.

"Girls?" One of Hyungwon's brow raised up in a questioning gesture. His distorted face looked funny, yet handsome.

Jooheon jumped off his bed and headed towards the closet without a moment of hesitation after checking the time. Rummaging through a tall pile of neatly folded clothes, he explained, "Yeah, the new girls in town. They just opened a kiosk in our market yesterday. They are very cute." He wiggled his eyebrows at his taller friend and pulled out a black t-shirt. The closet was full of black clothes anyway. His face lightened up with joy and excitement, in contrast with his clueless friend. "They gave me this as a free gift. Too bad you weren't there."

"I was busy sleeping—" Hyungwon hissed through his gritted teeth. Numerous questions ran through his mind. He surely missed out a lot for the whole week he spent resting. What was with these girls that got Jooheon so excited?

"Right. Sleeping all day. Not surprising at all." Jooheon put on a snapback and eyed himself in the mirror. He nodded in agreement with what his reflection told him then flashed a bright eye smile – a hint of satisfaction. "You wanna pass by the market with me today, before going to the club?"

A moment of alarm was switched on inside Hyungwon's heart. Jooheon was asking a question that he had no option to choose as an answer. "Erm... I thought it was a must?" Hyungwon eyes widened in surprise and carefully checked the other boy's facial expression to see whether he was joking or serious. As Jooheon could realize, Hyungwon already got prepared to go out. Jooheon stormed out of his room and dashed down the stairs in fast pace ignoring the clueless boy behind. He seemed completely excited. Hyungwon trailed after, "I mean, the other members of The X-Clan went on holiday of their own and we were assigned to take care of the farm and the market and—"

"Really." Jooheon cut off Hyungwon's sentence before he got a chance to finish it. His brows furrowed in anger. "And there was this guy who let me do everything on my own. He even abandoned the club we both own together. All he did was sleep. For the whole past week." His voice grew rough and salty. He was definitely mad at Hyungwon.

The two boys walked down the street as the argument continued. The sun shone through the little spaces among the leaves of a tall tree, peppering little sunshine flowers on the pavement. A light wind flew by, yet strong enough to remind Jooheon and Hyungwon how hot the weather was that day. Their shadows fell flat on the road.

"Oh, C'mon. I was tired!" said the whiny Hyungwon, "Jooheon, we have been working as The X-Clan for a hundred years! We are human, we should rest some times." His voice's volume turned down when it came closer to the end of the sentence. Jooheon threw him a glare as in to warn him not to bring up the topic when they were outside.

Hyungwon hissed again, breathing in and out slowly. Using his upper teeth to bite down the pillowy plump lower lip, he shot back a glance at the shorter boy. They stopped their steps, standing there exchanging eye-contact for a while. The whole conversation was spoken in eye language, therefore no sound was made. Eventually, Hyungwon shook his head then nodded once, admitting his wrongdoing by slurring a soft apology.

It was just another normal day.

Hyungwon checked the time on his phone screen before taking a look at the farm robot workers gathering the ripen blue flowers onto their baskets then again emptying the baskets into the truck cabin. He was not fond of it, totally bored. The movements of his eyes wandered around proving how impatient he was. All he wanted was just to quickly get to the club. He couldn't wait any longer. His arm was lifted to wipe away a bead of sweat running down his temple. Summer had arrived.

He was sitting on a firmly built fence that was staked down the greenhouse's ground by the robots. His eyes wandered from this flower to another in boredom. All of his senses are now awake and sensitive. He could feel everything around him, even the slightest movements of the bees. Closing his eyes, Hyungwon breathed in the smell of wet earth. The atmosphere had changed. The scale of the game had changed. But the smell of wet earth was still the same. The unique scent of the blue flowers and the appropriate temperature inside the greenhouse, they were still the same. He stretched his legs in relaxation whilst recalling where it all started. The flashbacks appeared at the back of his mind one by one, faded to grey color but still very clear. 'The X-Clan' was created already one hundred years ago. Every face was as new as ever. He could see himself inside his younger self of one hundred years ago, running together with his six other brothers down the street of the old city where they were born and grew up together. Shownu – the oldest and the biggest – he was taking the lead with a proud smile on his face, eyes curled up in happiness and became too thin for other people to see his dark brown pupils. Right behind him was Wonho – the second oldest – with bright pinky hair. The color was so bright that it almost outshined his black round eyes. Hyungwon were at the same pace with Kihyun – a guy who was just two months older than him. They all owned dark black hair. Next to their side was Minhyuk. His white-washed hair bounced with every step he took. At the back, Jooheon and Changkyun tried to catch up with their older brothers. Hyungwon could still hear loudly the laughter echoing within him. It was a very hot summer day when they all tried to struggle through the heat in thin simple clothes.

They were just young boys getting lost in life when the society they lived in was a whole mess. As they were as reckless as youth could be, they suffered through loss: loss of loved ones, loss of freedom, loss of living purpose; and pain: pain of guilt, pain of shame, pain of failure. They were losers, but not anymore. The memories were still fresh as if it was just yesterday when they secretly discovered the blue flower seeds then risked their lives to grow them, and 'The X-Clan' was formed among seven of them to take an oath of keeping the secret as long as they are alive. Hyungwon hung his head down and fetched a sigh in relief. When he killed himself in the bathtub. When Shonwu lost his grandfather. When they successfully developed the blue flower extract into medicine. The kind of medicine that can cure all kinds of pain and illness, from physically to mentally. It can even bring dead people back to life.

Hyungwon's flow of thought got cut off by the footsteps of his friend Jooheon getting near. Jooheon tapped on the latter's shoulder and sent a signal for him to stand up, "The robots have done the collecting. Let's check them!"

"Okay." said Hyungwon. Nonchalantly.

The two boys let the robots queue up back to their charging places. Once they had lined up in their so-called beds, Jooheon and Hyungwon switched them off. Then before heading off, they checked the robots to see if they needed any maintenance issue. After testing the security system once again, they eventually got in the truck and left the place. 'The X-Clan' had always been careful regarding taking care of their farm since how chaotic the world would be if the secret of the blue flower got revealed. People would definitely kill each other just to own the secret of eternal life: the blue flower.