Kingdom of Knuffel

Lain said he didn't have to help him with what he didn't need to learn. Tae wanted to offer to help anyway. But he bit his lip. It was probably better that he didn't. He didn't want to make things awkward. Lain smiled and Tae gave him a small smile back. Then his hyung started the music. He marked the dance first. Trying to make sure he remembered it all.

Lain watched Tae for a while, making mental notes to copy his movements once he took stock of them. Then, he began moving, trying to stay in sync or at least follow Tae's movements by watching him in the floor-to-ceiling mirrors. Tae had always had a style of dancing that Lain found easier to emulate than the others'.

Tae figured the dance out a little more this time. It was a little easier. They had done it once. Then Tae looked to Lain. "Um, is there any party of the dance you want to slow down?" He asked. He wanted to at least try to be helpful.

"Yeah, the dance break, same as you," said Lain. Truth be told he needed help with the whole beginning of the dance that he'd missed, but there wasn't time to go over it all right now anyway. He could learn the dance break with Tae and ask Ju-Kan or the choreographer to go over the rest of the beginning of the song with him tomorrow.

"Should I rewind the song to that part? Actually, I could snip the song so only the dance break is on loop," added Lain.

Lain started talking about playing the song from the dance break. "Let's wait on the music until you have it down." He told him. "We can go slower and just count out the steps." Sometimes he practiced without the music just to make sure he had the progression of the moves.

"Good idea!" said Lain. He switched off the speakers for now.

Then he went over the steps with Tae, in sets of four. For instance, they'd do the first four steps, counting it out as one-two-three-four until they had it down, then they'd do the next four, five-six-seven-eight. Then they'd practice doing steps one through eight.

After around half an hour of practice, Lain was pretty sure he'd be able to do the steps correctly to the tempo of the song, after practicing it slowly and broken up. "Hey. I wouldn't have picked it up so easily if you didn't think of doing it like this," Lain told Tae.

Lain finally got it. "I'm glad." He said. "He does tend to teach the choreo pretty fast..." If he had to choreograph a dance and then teach it, it wouldn't be so fast. Especially when it was so difficult. Lain looked a bit tired to him. They had been working pretty hard. "Um, if you're tired, you can go back to the dorm. I, uh, I want to stay and work a little longer..." Although it had been hours since they started. However, with everything that happened, Tae wanted to spend a bit more time away from everyone, trying to pretend none of it happened.

Lain nodded in agreement. The choreographer did try to pace things according to the members' abilities, but he was also not a patient person. Sometimes that push was needed but sometimes it left them floundering.

"Okay. Yeah, I'll go back to the dorm," said Lain. "I do want to rest." And now that he had learnt the dance break Lain thought he should find Ju-Kan to learn the first half of the song as well. Ju-Kan would be resting at the dorm, so Lain decided to go back to the dorm and rest for a while too before asking Ju-Kan for the favour.

"Don't push yourself too hard, Tae." Lain said. If Tae was going to continue to practice, he'd definitely need to replenish his energy, so Lain decided to buy sandwiches and an energy drink from the cafe across the street. After running back to the practice room with them, he opened the door of the practice room and kept the food next to Tae's water bottle. Then he left for the dorm.

Tae watched him go. When Lain had shut the door, Tae turned on the music. It didn't take him long to focus on just the music and dance. He hadn't even realized Lain came back. Until he got hungry. He stopped the music and went to grab his bag, heading for the cafe. When he noticed the sandwich and drink. He smiled a little bit and took the break to eat. After that, despite knowing he should head back to the dorm, Tae kept dancing. It wasn't until it got very late and Tae almost collapsing from dancing the whole day did he make himself stop. The studio had showers, so Tae took a shower and changed into clean clothes before heading back to the dorm. He wondered what the others did with their afternoon off. He used to love the time they got, but he didn't think he could spend it with them now.

When Lain got to the dorm, he found Ju-Kan snoring on the couch. It looked like he had toed off his shoes and gone straight to the couch to crash on it. Lain put one of their table fans near him, it swung its head to and fro and Lain hoped it would be enough to cool off some of his sweat.

Haneul was in the living room too, gaming. He wasn't being exactly quiet but Ju-Kan slept through it like a stone. Lain sighed. Ju-Kan's naps were unpredictable so he had no idea how long he'd have to wait. But resting in the meantime would be good for him, too. Lain went to his room and lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling. Sometimes he just breathed long and slow, counting the beats, while looking at nothing. It relaxed him. That's what he did now. He couldn't stop the flow of thoughts- he'd wonder when Ju-Kan would wake up and whether Tae ate the food he bought him- but instead of holding onto the thoughts and dwelling on them, he let them go. Soon the throbbing of his exerted body dulled and he felt peaceful and rested.