"far, far away but close, close to you" part III
Fandom: EXO
Title: Far, Far Away but Close, Close to You
Pairing(s): chinguline, major Baekhyun/Jongdae, minor Jongdae/Kyungsoo and Chanyeol/Kyungsoo (+ additional pairings in further chapters)
Genre: comedy, humor, prince!au, crack for occasional bad Kpop references
Length: Chaptered
Summary: Being a middle child sucks. Being a middle prince is even worse. Jongdae knows it well especially when his parents leave him with choices A) go and find your inner peace in a monastery and B) go and find your own fairytale. No wonder what he chooses but what follows is beyond everything Prince Jongdae, 2nd Prince of Far, Far Away has ever expected...
Rating: PG-15 (please, keep in mind that the rating always depends on the actual chapter)
Warning(s): use of language, making fun of height (I don't intend to hurt anybody, especially not my chinguline, don't take it so seriously)
Disclaimer: I do not own EXO. Hell I would though. I love fairy tales and such even though I handle them in this story carelessly and a bit lame. The idea has just popped into my mind, any similarity with other works must be an accident.
Word Count: 2,384 (altogether ~20,000)
Previous Parts: 1 2
Morning comes fast and sunny.
Jongdae stretches his arms above his head with a pleasing yawn. It’s been long since he had such a nice sleep. He quickly blushes after that thought because the bathroom encounter from yesterday has a lot to do with that.
Will he see her today? If he’s quick she might be down in the dining room.
Jongdae dresses up, makes himself presentable in the mirror on the wall and sprints to the door. He’s in such haste that almost knocks into Kyungsoo by the stairs.
“Whoa, easy there. Are you this hungry?
Not for food, Jongdae would say but after that he would also slap himself across the face. What is he thinking? He’s the 2nd Prince of Far, Far Away. He’s polite and well-mannered and not thinking eating up beautiful girls! (But he’s also an eighteen-year-old boy with little to no love experience so he actually does.)
“Yes, I am. What’s for breakfast?”
Kyungsoo eyes him for a second with his I-know-you’re-hiding-something-my-prince-look but at the end lets it go with:
“I’ve helped Minseok hyung to make kimchi pancakes. Let’s go down.”
Minseok waves at them behind the counter when they arrive to the ground floor. The dining hall is more crowded than it was yesterday evening but Jongdae and Kyungsoo find a free table after few seconds of searching. They both sit down.
Jongdae whips his head around a few times to see the mysterious beauty but the hall contains mainly males and the few females who are present are way too wrinkled to be her. Did she leave already?
He’s ready to turn back to Kyungsoo (and mourning over his never-completed love story in his head) but a boy from a few tables up turns around right then. Their eyes meet for only two seconds but the boy’s face immediately reddens and isn’t that shade of red slightly familiar? Also that color of black hair…
“What are you looking at?” Kyungsoo cranes his neck.
Jongdae shifts in his seat with a shake of head. He’s just had a very vivid dream, that’s why he’s imagining things.
“I thought I saw somebody familiar but nah I’m still sleepy… Have you checked the horses? Can we depart after breakfast?”
“The horses are fine.” Kyungsoo answers and spreads the map out to the table right after that. “There’s going to be a big forest a few kilometers away though. It’s described as dense, dark and even dangerous. We might have problems with it.”
“Well, before that you have a problem with us.”
Jongdae and Kyungsoo look up from the map hearing the intruder’s voice. Huh, it’s the boy from a few tables up with another tall one. (He’s also familiar somehow for Jongdae.)
“Excuse me, sir, but you’re probably mistaken.” Kyungsoo reacts. He sounds calm but the way he pronounces sir screams get off. “Now if you left…”
The boy snorts and points a finger at Jongdae:
“I might have nothing to do with you but I have an issue with him.”
The tall one puts a hand on the boy’s shoulder.
“It’d be better if we settled this outside, Baekhyun.”
The boy named Baekhyun nods and motions with his head towards the door. Kyungsoo and Jongdae exchange looks (“Do you really know him?” “I have no idea but let’s follow them before we initiate a barroom brawl in here”) and stand up simultaneously.
As soon as the cool morning air hits Jongdae in the face, there is also a fist hitting his face.
Kyungsoo immediately runs to his side to check if he’s okay. Jongdae tastes blood on his tongue.
“Did you go nuts?!”
Baekhyun puts down his fist with flaming eyes.
“That’s the least he deserves.”
“Wasn’t that a bit much?”
“Shut up, Chanyeol.”
Jongdae gets back on his feet and wipes off the blood from the corner of his mouth with the sleeve of his shirt. That Baekhyun boy better has a reason for this.
“What exactly did I do?”
Baekhyun goes red again but answers finally:
“It’s more about what you didn’t.”
“What is he speaking about, Jongdae?” Kyungsoo asks worried but Jongdae can’t answer.
Not because he also doesn’t but because… he knows.
The smooth skin, nice curves, plump bottom and long fingers… Those nice things all are this boy in front of him! The beauty from the bathroom is this Baekhyun! What the…?!
Now that Jongdae knows it’s obvious though. Baekhyun is the height he saw yesterday, has the same fluffy mop of black hair... One look at his face and Jongdae is one hundred percent sure.
Baekhyun has small but mischievous eyes (now they are narrowed and glaring but Jongdae recognizes the glint of playfulness hiding in them) with a dainty nose and pouty lips. The face Jongdae sees goes perfectly with the body he saw yesterday.
Apparently Jongdae was only wrong about one thing - Baekhyun is a beauty it’s just that he’s a he not a she.
“Stop staring and say something before you get punched in the face again, please.” Baekhyun warns in a low voice, face still on fire.
Kyungsoo takes a step closer to him.
“If you punch him in the face again, you’ll get one under your eyes, ‘kay?”
“Nobody punches anybody!” The tall guy, Chanyeol, exclaims by standing between the opponents with wide-spread arms. Jongdae now know why was he familiar too. He was the person who questioned what he’s doing in front of the bathroom. “We’re grown men. We can handle this with less violence and more wisdom, can’t we?”
Jongdae sighs and is trying hard not to care about the embarrassment which paints his face red and the overall awkwardness of the whole situation.
“I apologize for my rude behavior. I should have left as soon as I realized there’s somebody inside.”
The look in Kyungsoo’s eyes gets cloudy.
“You really did something, didn’t you?”
“I didn’t do it on purpose!”
“Oh please.” Baekhyun snorts. “Based on your look you were standing behind me for at least two minutes. You liked what you saw, huh?”
It’s an understatement but it’s not the time for Jongdae to say it out loud.
Chanyeol facepalms.
“I knew I heard someone’s screaming.”
Kyungsoo shakes Jongdae’s arm. He’s not good at reading between the lines (this time).
“Don’t be a pussy, Kim Jongdae, and tell me what the fuck you have done!”
Jongdae looks up at Baekhyun’s face. He seems less angry but he’s still blushing. Well, Jongdae would too if he would be in his place. (On a second thought, maybe that’d be sexy - 2nd Prince Kim Jongdae of Far, Far Away, go back to your senses, it’s a crisis situation!)
“I thought no one is in the bathroom but it was under use and… ”
Now Kyungsoo finally gets it.
And he freaks out of course.
“2ND PRINCE OF FAR, FAR AWAY YOU WERE PEEPING AT SOMEBODY?”
Jongdae has already got a headache even if it hasn’t been an hour since his wake up and Kyungsoo’s tirade doesn’t help a lot on it.
“Kim Jongdae, that’s what your parents taught you? HOW COULD YOU?! Oh I seriously hope for your good that you didn’t do it on purpose -“
“I didn’t.”
“THEN WHAT? Minseok hyung clearly explained that an UNDER USE tag exists. You know what tags are good for? FOR AVOIDING SITUATIONS LIKE THIS! Fairy tales -“
“There was no tag on the door.”
Chanyeol sends a look to Baekhyun.
Baekhyun’s face reddens once again. (Jongdae finds it amusing how quickly and often can said boy do that.)
“Yeah, I forgot about it. But he still could have knocked.”
“YOU HEAR THAT?” Kyungsoo continues like nothing has happened. His voice cracks a bit from the shouting but he’s still super loud and in super rage. “Even that blowfish knows knocking is a must! … And even if you walked him in on, why didn’t you leave? DON’T SAY YOU ENJOYED THE VIEW BECAUSE I -“
“I get okay? I GET IT!” Jongdae screams back because he’s so fed up with his friend’s screaming and scolding that he can’t take it anymore. “I fucking walked him in on and didn’t leave when I should have! I’m fucking sorry too, okay? Sorry to both of you and to everyone else out there who is disappointed with me I just don’t know about them.”
Kyungsoo seemingly wants to retort something but at the end clamps his mouth shut. Jongdae eyes the ground.
Baekhyun and Chanyeol don’t know what to do with the situation.
“Whoa, that was loud.”
“Shut up, Chanyeol, you’re not helping.”
“But -“
“Of course they were loud. They apparently have a situation.”
Jongdae can’t help but look up with a raise of a brow.
“We have a situation? Who do you think I should thank for that?”
Baekhyun quickly realizes it’s a rhetorical question.
“Hey, you’re the one playing Peeping Tom.”
“Well, you’re too sensitive.”
“I might be but you were staring at my naked butt, Prince Jong-douchebag.”
(Among all things.)
“And what’s so great about that? Nothing. Your naked butt is nothing to be sensitive about, Mr. Bastard-hyun.”
(What a lie.)
Baekhyun now looks straight offended.
“You little -“
“Is today International Pick up a Fight Day or what?” Chanyeol intervenes with a cry. He looks helpfully(?) at Kyungsoo but he’s still too down to say or do anything other than standing and acting like a (very little) signpost. “Jesus. I feel like I’ve entered an angry version of Lilliput with little angry Lilliputians.”
The other (undeniably small) three looks at him killingly.
“I mean you have no point in this argument.” Chanyeol tries to rephrase but it’s obviously so late for that. “Baekhyun did get peeped at but why is that such a big thing really it’s not like Jongdae did anything spectacular, anybody inside and outside this inn would have done the same in his place, you have a hot little body, Byun Baekhyun, everybody knows that. So you too, Kyungsoo, shouldn’t be freak out over this the way you did earlier… Though it was pretty impressive. How can be so much anger bottled up in such little body?”
Kyungsoo finally does something: rolls his (on the contrary) big eyes.
Baekhyun is chewing on his red lower lip not knowing what to do.
Jongdae pretends he doesn’t see the action (it does weird things to his brain) and marvels over the fact that how reasonable Chanyeol sounds for such a giant he is instead.
“I’ll propose to introduce ourselves properly.” Chanyeol continues working wonders and pokes Baekhyun in the side. “You start, my prince.”
Jongdae chokes on nothing. Prince?!
“I’m Prince Byun Baekhyun, 2nd Prince of Never, Never Land.” He says in a different voice. (It’s a voice Jongdae uses when he wants to sound royal or serious in general.) “The fine man next to me is Knight Park Chanyeol, my companion.”
Chanyeol smiles with a that’s-how-it-should-have-been-done-in-the-first-place one.
“Knight Chanyeol at your service!”
Jongdae would like to say “see Kyungsoo-ya that’s how knights look” but their relationship is not at it’s finest at the moment.
“I’m Prince Kim Jongdae, 2nd Prince of Far, Far Away as you’ve heard.” He says instead. “The ball of sulkiness over there is my dear friend, Do Kyungsoo who travels along with me.”
“Is he your sidekick or something?” Chanyeol coos. “Cute~”
Baekhyun sizes Kyungsoo up.
“He looks more like a henchman.”
Kyungsoo comes out of (his inner) the shadows.
“I’m none of that. I’m a -“
“He’s a knight… He’s going to be one. Training at the moment.” Jongdae interrupts him in a chirpy voice. “Right, Soo?”
His friend accepts the explanation with a nod. The corners of his mouth are lifting so Jongdae knows they’re good again.
Chanyeol’s eyes are practically sparkling.
“You’re under training? Awesome! I could help you with that.”
Jongdae smiles. Kyungsoo crooks a (creepy) smile too.
Chanyeol is nice.
“You could but you won’t.” Baekhyun is not. “Come on, ‘Yeol. We have a forest to cross.”
Forest? Is it possibly the same forest Jongdae and Kyungsoo have to cross?
Baekhyun might be a male and has a rude behavior but somehow he left such a deep (and unforgettable) impression on Jongdae that a latter feels the urge to stick to him. Like if Jongdae lets Baekhyun go, they might never see each other again and that… well Jongdae doesn’t know how would that be but he’s not that eager to find it out. The loud pounding of his heart is almost impossible to ignore too.
So before 2nd Prince of Never, Never Land could go back to the inn with his heartbroken sidekick (Chanyeol looks literally like that) Jongdae finds himself to say:
“Let’s go together.”
Baekhyun turns back with a doubtful look.
“Why would we?”
Because I can’t let you go - no, there must be a better reason.
“The forest is dangerous.” Jongdae continues, face radiating confidence (at least he hopes it does). “If a raid happens, we can join our forces and repulse much stronger.”
After such speech, Jongdae practically sees Vice Head Guard Zitao shedding tears of joy. He’d be so proud of him if he was there.
But the people present aren’t so far from that either. Kyungsoo and Chanyeol look almost convinced and Baekhyun… Byun Baekhyun is Byun Baekhyun.
“I’m not out of my mind. I know what your intentions are… Not to mention your henchman called me a blowfish earlier. Be nice and forget about me, Prince Jongdae.”
Jongdae sighs out loud when he and Kyungsoo go back to the counter to find a terrified Minseok.
“To the Heavens, are you okay?” Minseok notices the bruise in the corner of Jongdae’s mouth immediately but the latter doesn’t say anything. He’s more occupied watching the beauty and the beast in one person going upstairs without looking back. “Did you get into a fight? I heard shouting.”
“It was only a minor disagreement, hyung.” Kyungsoo responds with a straight face.
Minseok snorts.
“Huh they seemed to be nice people… Anyway, I’ll bring some alcohol to disinfect the bruise. I’ll be right back.”
Jongdae turns to Kyungsoo as they’re left alone in two.
“Kyungsoo-ya -“
“You better not say anything. Just eat some more pancakes before we depart, Peeping Tom.”