Chapter 14 (1/1)

--CHAPTER 14You’re lying. It’s not true, is what Baekhyun wanted to tell Chanyeol and say against his words, yet he had no voice to do so. How could that be? Baekhyun had never even known a world like this had existed before he met Chanyeol let alone he had never been there before to even be something like a beast tormenting their world. How could he have been the beast? Baekhyun’s head began to shake in a furious manner—his eyes were clenched shut and he bared his teeth. How could that be true? He never would do something like that.“Baekhyun, you’re listening to me, right?” Chanyeol asked as he noticed Baekhyun’s hands rising to his head and his palms lying against his ears.Of course he was listening to him.“Don’t be mad! I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want to upset you!” Chanyeol began to plead in a fruitless effort. He wanted to calm Baekhyun—who had been shaking where he sat—but it seemed to be slightly impossible.Baekhyun told himself that there were many things that Chanyeol hadn’t told him—that not only how he was the beast was something of mystery this whole time, but the fact of what the beast was had been an enigma as well. Truly, if Baekhyun—the timid, mute college student—was something of a beast in this world of many things and odd possibilities, then… how? How could he have been? The beast was something of fear, right? Baekhyun was nothing of the sort, though. Baekhyun continued to shake his head in disbelief of the statement. None of it could have been true. Was this world even true? In fact, now that Baekhyun thought of it, was that so called beast even real? He had never even seen it before, even if it was him apparently.Chanyeol’s eyebrows arched and he held his hands out toward Baekhyun, though Baekhyun’s quivering discouraged him from laying his hands on Baekhyun. “Please don’t be deceived, Baekhyun. It was for the best that you were the beast. That’s why I never told you…”Was that really all it was, Baekhyun wondered to himself. After a time of denying Chanyeol’s attention while also shaking where he sat, Baekhyun paused and finally allowed his hands to remove from being plastered against the sides of his face while also lifting his head in order to make eye contact with Chanyeol. He moved his hands out toward Chanyeol and made a pleading gesture with them, moving them up and down just a bit while pressing them forward. His eyes were wide and desperate looking; he wanted to ask Chanyeol to tell him more without being able to say anything or sign it to the man. He figured that acting irrationally and wondering upon things instead of getting answers would get him nowhere.“You’ll listen to me now?” Chanyeol asked quietly.Baekhyun nodded. He should have been listening to Chanyeol long ago, shouldn’t he have been?Chanyeol sighed. He took in a large breath of air which made it seem as though he had plenty to say. He most likely did. His eyes widened a bit more than usual and when he made eye contact with Baekhyun, there was a look in his gaze which was slightly unreal—like the rest of this place. It made Baekhyun want to listen to him more. “Since you’re the beast, Baek, it means that only you can stop it—only you have the power.” Chanyeol leaned forward and placed his hands on Baekhyun’s slightly quaking shoulders. “I’ve known this the whole time, and I’m sorry that I never told you, but there was a reason why. You just needed to be ready.” He smiled brightly—first only curling his lips to form the smile, then flashing all of his bright white teeth to make a greatly enthusiastic grin. “You’ve changed, Baek.”At that, Baekhyun’s round eyes darted back and forth, catching a glimpse of every angle of Chanyeol’s face. He looked somewhat desperate, but in all reality he was just taking in all of what Chanyeol had to say. So since he’s been in this world, he’s changed? Was it for the better or for the worse? By the way Chanyeol’s smile looked so positive and encouraging, Baekhyun could only guess that his change had been for the better. Baekhyun’s lips were hanging slightly ajar while he looked forward and his slightly lost expression made Chanyeol giggle.“Now it’s your time to take down the beast so that this world can go on, okay? Jongdae and I want to have more picnics in peace,” Chanyeol said with a smirk.Baekhyun smiled and nodded. He felt ready to do anything now—he felt Chanyeol’s hands on his shoulders and felt such great comfort from his firm grip. Chanyeol’s hands were warm on his shoulders and they made Baekhyun feel as though he was prepared for anything this world had to throw at him. Now he was ready, but what was he to do? How was he to take down the beast—take down himself?“So you want to know how to take down the beast now, right, Baek?” Chanyeol asked. His look was firm, but not threatening.After a pause, Baekhyun nodded. It was too late to turn back now and Baekhyun felt like there was no reason he should turn back. It was only forward from there as he saw it now.“Okay,” Chanyeol replied. He took in a large breath of air which was so large that it made his chest rise and he left his right hand on Baekhyun’s shoulder, gripping it harder now and he lifted his left hand and quickly pressed his palm against Baekhyun’s eyes. At this, Baekhyun quickly shut his eyes so that there was no contact to the eye-balls themselves and he paid much attention to the pressure on his shoulder. It reminded him of those many years ago—the first time when he met Chanyeol and how Chanyeol’s strong hand provoked him to speak. Now it was by Chanyeol’s urging that Baekhyun would be able to accomplish something else—something he wasn’t quite sure of its entire substance or matter, but a feat which he wanted to conquer. “I’m going to have to leave again,” Chanyeol said after some moments. “You’ll be fine without me, though. I know you will, Baek.”As Chanyeol said those words, Baekhyun felt himself begin to shake. Why? Well, he knew he was nervous. For all he knew he was about to be flung into some sort of fight which he had no idea of whether he could win or not. It scared him—it really did—but Baekhyun had come so far already that he felt great confidence in himself. He wasn’t going to lose his confidence this time around. Baekhyun nodded gently against Chanyeol’s hand which was still firmly over his closed eyes and after he nodded, he felt something odd which caused a greater tremor in his body. It felt as though the hand that was over his eyes began to pass through him and through his head and soon after it was as though Chanyeol’s entire body faded away through Baekhyun’s being. Baekhyun gasped soundlessly after he felt this and quickly his eyes bolted open, but now he was not in the vast green space previously filled with mist, but a place of complete blackness.The Void, Baekhyun thought to himself. Chanyeol was gone now and it made Baekhyun upset since he wouldn’t have that reassurance and encouragement he felt from being around Chanyeol, but Baekhyun knew this is what he had to do. Okay, he was alone now in The Void, so where was this leading to? He was meant to take down the Beast, as he knew it, so where was it?Baekhyun’s brown eyes wandered around the black space, trying to search for something visible other than complete blackness, which proved futile overall. He was alone in here again. After some time, Baekhyun stood up—he had still been in a sitting position from when he was sitting on the ground of the previous location with Chanyeol. He continued to look around, still trying to catch a glimpse of anything. Of course, he was unable to.So now that’s how it was? He was left to be alone and fend for himself… Baekhyun shuddered at the thought. Yes, he knew he was used to solitude since not many people would associate him due to the communication barriers, but the thought of having to accomplish fateful and troublesome tasks all on his own was something of a different sort. No one was around for him to seek help from nor was there a soul there to show him the way. Baekhyun felt like he needed a compass… Oh yes, a compass. That’s what Chanyeol had been for him throughout all of this. Too bad he wasn’t there now…Baekhyun began to take his sandaled feet forward, walking just a bit of a way since he truly didn’t know which direction (if it was safe to say there were any separate directions in a place such as this) to take.Where do I look, Baekhyun wondered to himself. What do I look for? As those words crossed Baekhyun’s pondering mind, he looked down in front of himself and oddly enough something was occupying the space there. When Baekhyun bent downward to observe the object further, he noticed that it was something of complete familiarity to him. It was his notepad which he used to write down things he needed to say to people who would not be able to understand his sign language and alongside it was a pen for him to write with on the notepad, he presumed. Baekhyun took the notepad and pen up in his hands and looked at the pages of the notepad. He noticed that none of them had been previously used and they were all pristinely blank. It was as though that notepad had been waiting for him here for all this time.So now he had the means of communication he assumed he needed, but who was Baekhyun meant to communicate with? This was all very vague.“Well,” a sudden voice made its way to Baekhyun’s ears. Baekhyun could recognize this voice—it was familiar though in all honesty he knew it shouldn’t have been since he was mute. It was his own voice speaking to him again.Baekhyun nodded just once and shrugged his shoulders. Just as his own voice seemed somewhat lost, so was he.“Are you going to just stand there or will you talk with me?” his voice asked, sounding quite sarcastic and impatient.Quickly, Baekhyun raised his eyes and opened the notepad to the first page and began to write. He wrote, “Hello,” and held it up in the air to see if the voice could notice it from any vantage point.It sounded like the voice chuckled. “Hi,” it replied. After a pause it asked, “Are you ready for this, Baekhyun?”Baekhyun nodded and wrote down, “Yeah, I think I am.”“Okay,” the voice said. Then there was another pause within the sound which made Baekhyun uncomfortable, but then from a distance, Baekhyun heard it arise once again. The voice breathed out. “So there have been many things in your life that have deterred you, Byun Baekhyun. It’s been rough, hasn’t it?”Baekhyun processed these words for a moment and then nodded apprehensively.“No,” was how the voice replied. “I need you to communicate with me.”Quickly, Baekhyun wrote something down. He lifted the notepad to reveal that it read, “It’s been hard since I don’t have a voice of my own.”A pause and then the voice said, “You don’t?”Baekhyun knotted his brows and scribbled down, “No, I don’t.” He held it up and continued with his frustrated expression on his face.“That’s only what you think,” the voice said in a very plain manner.What? Baekhyun wondered to himself. Of course he didn’t have a voice of his own—he was born mute. So what gave this voice he heard in his ears the right to deny that point? Though, when he thought about it, the voice he had been talking with at the moment was his own—Baekhyun remembered the sound from his times when he was capable of audible speech. “How can you say that? I’m mute,” Baekhyun wrote down to retort with.It sounded as though the voice had chuckled in a sarcastic tone. That bothered Baekhyun. “So some of us are born mute, what can we do about it? But that doesn’t prevent us from having a voice. It’s how we believe in ourselves. It’s how we believe in us, Baekhyun.”Us… “Us” wasn’t much of a word that Baekhyun used often. He was someone of solitude and lonesome, though he wouldn’t deny that sometimes he wouldn’t prefer it that way. But as Baekhyun thought of how the voice mentioned “Us,” Baekhyun wondered if maybe he and his voice were two separate things. They were separate, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t a way for them to work together.“You don’t believe me?” the voice asked after noticing no reply from Baekhyun after a time.Baekhyun swiftly wrote to respond. “I’m thinking about it.”“I’ll admit, there is much thinking you need to do. Especially if you want to change, that is.”“But what am I changing, exactly?” Baekhyun scribbled down. As he lifted the notepad to ask this question, he arched his brows in a slightly lost and desperate expression.There was a heavy and exasperated sigh from the voice. “Well, you can’t expect everyone around you to be able to change so easily. Maybe it’s your turn?”Baekhyun bared his teeth. “But what is it?” He underlined his words to emphasize his speech. When he was going into this, he thought that maybe he would have more confidence than this, but somehow his goal was eluding him and everything was beginning to morph into a blur of frustration. What was he to change? He was mute and that was that.“After all of this you’ve been through…” the tone of the voice was one of great disappointment. It paused as Baekhyun shook slightly where he stood. “Don’t you know that you created this Void, Baekhyun?”At that, Baekhyun’s eyes widened. “How?” he quickly wrote down and held up. What the voice had just implied seemed utterly impossible—or at least, it should have been.“It’s simple, really. How could there not be a Void created when someone is so detached from reality and society. You sunk yourself into your fake books and made sure not to be around anyone else. Was it because you couldn’t talk?” The voice’s tone become keener as it spoke and its sound began to dig at Baekhyun’s ears. “Was it that,” it continued, “or was it just that you’ve been terrified your whole life?”Afraid… Gosh, Baekhyun knew he couldn’t deny that fear was always something instilled within him ever since he was young. He had been bullied at a young age and he had always been wary of trying to communicate with those who could not interpret sign language. What was there that he shouldn’t have been afraid of? But separation creating a void… When Baekhyun, thought about it, it made more sense. There was such an emptiness between him and the world and deep down Baekhyun knew it to be so. “So I did this,” Baekhyun finally wrote down in a slightly saddened manner and held it up slowly to present it.The voice made a humming sound which acknowledged Baekhyun’s words. “Of course you did. And along with a void, you also created a beast. There is a beast now manifested in you, Baekhyun, and it is eating away at you because you are too scared to face it.”Baekhyun’s eyes widened and then fell. What was he to say in response to that? All he could do was listen to what this voice had been telling him.“The Beast never was anything that you could see, but it was something you could hear, wasn’t it?” the voice asked.Baekhyun nodded.“That’s because,” the voice went on, but paused as though it was slightly wary of its next words. “It’s all because the Beast is me, Baekhyun. Me—your voice—is the beast.”Just then, Baekhyun’s shoulders heightened and he raised his head. His face bore an expression of bewilderment and fear. Of course his voice had been the Beast. How could it not have been when all his life Baekhyun had treated his own voice as something to be afraid of? Now it was time he had to face it—he supposed—and that was why there was Chanyeol and his world who was ready to take Baekhyun on the journey to discover that having a voice but not always being heard wasn’t something to be completely in fear of. Chanyeol was there to give him his direction and so was everyone else on the way—Minseok, Leeteuk, Jongdae, Yixing, Joonmyun, Tao, Kyungsoo—everyone was the team who was there to give Baekhyun the confidence he needed, that which was not there previously. My voice, Baekhyun thought, was always something I had but never used or faced. My voice is my inner beast.The voice brought Baekhyun out of his reveries. “Now that you know,” it said, “isn’t about time you faced your fear?”Baekhyun blinked numerous times.“Isn’t it time you face the Beast?”A/N: Okay I have kind of been working on the end to this... I'm terrible. Okay i hev also been drawing some dumb things like this: ***rated M for pene***panda-taomblr.tumblr.com/post/90988512497/xiuchen-food-play-im-dumbI've lost having a life btwHopefully the end will be updated on here soon >_>