Loner [CN Blue]
Title: Loner (the Like a Child remix)
Main Character: Minhyuk
Length: 2,362
Rating: G
Warnings: None
Summary: Wondering what if? is like screaming into the void. You never know who might be listening.
Notes: Remix of andersenmom's Loner. Originally posted here.
There is an undocumented yet much discussed phenomenon shared among musicians: after years of devotion to one's craft counted by months of intense preparation, weeks repeatedly committing the same actions repeatedly almost to the point of being able to do them even while asleep, days of exhaustion slowly piling up literally dreaming of nothing else, and right on the hour of power when the performance is in stride the musician enters a state of trance. It doesn't matter how many people are in the audience, it doesn't matter how big the event, what matters is the single-mindedness and the sheer passion, the exhaustion of preparation, and the single, controlled release of all that effort culminating in a drunkenness of the Here and Now and I have never felt so alive, a moment of crystal clear euphoria that This is what I live for.
This is the musician's high. They enter the trance and there is nothing more in the world but them and their music.
Kang Minhyuk enters this trance for the first time three days after his twentieth birthday while playing for a small, private party with the rest of CN Blue.
The trance state in itself is uneventful. What follows is the standard musician's high, then a slight post-performance depression that is admittedly strange but still understandable. Jonghyun assures him that it's natural. It's a mark of adjustment. That Minhyuk's mind has accepted his new life as a musician and finally configured itself to maximize his latent talent.
"It's the same with sports," Jonghyun says afterward with a proud pat on Minhyuk's shoulder. "Well, not exactly the same, I guess, but there's always that moment when everything just seems so perfectly clear."
Emotionally-attuned people like Jonghyun, Minhyuk supposes, are no strangers to the effect.
It's the second trance - when he wonders if he could find this same feeling when he's not playing music - that changes everything.
Minhyuk takes a while to realize that he can't hear anyone else playing, that he can't hear their third song for the set and he has no idea why and at what point everyone else stopped. He pauses mid-beat, looks beyond his drum set, and the first thing he sees is Yonghwa hovering in mid jump several inches from the floor.
Minhyuk stares for three more seconds before looking at everyone else. A drumstick falls from his hand.
Everybody is frozen. Everybody. His bandmates, the concert staff, the few hundred select fans who were fortunate enough to be present in this mini concert. Everybody is frozen. As in a picture. A snapshot in time.
"What-" but he doesn't know what else to say. He gapes around him.
"My, but this is interesting."
Minhyuk jumps to his feet and finds a woman standing beside Jungshin where moments ago there was only empty space. She's wearing red. Minhyuk normally ignores what people wear, but he has a suspicion that he's never seen red this intensely before. As if the color itself is has form. Minhyuk takes a moment to consider his thoughts. He determines his first question. "Did you do this?"
The woman stops admiring Jungshin and strides closer to Minhyuk. "I didn't. Really, nothing happened to anyone. Except for you."
Minhyuk has made it a point to never ask stupid questions. He decides to be on guard and stay quiet.
"Technically," the lady continues, "what happened is that you… stepped outside of time. Yes, that's a nice simplification for a mind that experience the universe in three plus one dimensions. I personally didn't expect my fifth opportunity to approach me. Normally it's the other way around."
Minhyuk is grateful that his ego is strong. That his mind works with its own momentum. "What are you?"
"Correct question," the lady says. There are feathers shaped like fire embroidered on her sleeves. "Sadly, your people haven't evolved the language that can suitably express what I really am. We have to simplify. Perceive me as an agent of change. When people wonder about what might have been, I'm the force they call on for help."
Minhyuk sits back down on his drummer's stool and picks up the stick he dropped. All the readier to resume playing after he - what's the right term? - steps back into time. Whatever that means. Maybe he’s having hallucinations. Maybe this is why he shouldn’t drink to calm his nerves.
"I'll show you the way back," the lady offers helpfully.
"How did I get here in the first place?" Minhyuk asks. He needs to know so he won't do it again. Even if this is just a weird yet highly detailed dream.
The lady pauses to think about that. "Let's say you stumbled into a junction in time where everything is susceptible to change. Don't be so surprised. You're not the first one to do so. Although you're the first one I met who did it willingly."
"I didn't do anything," Minhyuk defends himself.
The lady grins. It is not a pleasant action. "You mean you didn't wonder about who else you could be? You didn't consider, even for a fraction of a second, what other life you could be living?"
Minhyuk hesitates. In that same instant music slams back into his ears. He rushes to find his beat but the break his playing is noticeable. Everyone stops playing, he stands and bows and apologizes sincerely (if still smiling confusedly), and they take the song from the top.
"What happened back there?"
Yonghwa doesn't sound angry. More... concerned. Tired but still high from the adrenaline. It's only been minutes since they stepped off the stage.
Minhyuk bows his head. "I lost focus. I'm sorry. Please be lenient on me."
Yonghwa sighs deeply. "Let's deal with that later. Let's just cool down right now."
Minhyuk grins at the watching Jungshin and hopes his expression isn't as brittle as he feels.
Yonghwa's "punishment" is for Minhyuk to insert an additional hour of practice daily for the next two weeks. Minhyuk accepts it.
"It's not like you to lose focus." Jonghyun volunteered to stay with him under the pretext of needing to sharpen his skills further. He likes to play the role of an uninterested older brother but he always fails miserably at being subtle. "You're the most single-minded of all of us when it comes to performances."
"My drumset isolates me from everyone," Minhyuk explains. "But I'm not perfect, hard as it may be to believe."
Jonghyun snorts and strums an E7. "You've also been weird ever since the concert. Quieter. A lot more serious. As if you're turning things in your head and you don't want us to know."
"And if I succeeded we wouldn't be having this conversation." Minhyuk pointedly looks back at his drums and starts the introduction to Oetoria.
Jonghyun is well-practiced in ignoring hints. "If you keep thinking about whatever it is, it's just going to distract you more."
He does have a point. Minhyuk drops the song. "Hyung, have you ever wondered about who you could have been if we're not in this band? If we failed that audition? Or if we didn't go at all?"
"And we never met and I'd still be in Busan and I might be focusing on sports instead," Jonghyun continues Minhyuk's thoughts while absently plucking notes from his guitar. "I might have let my loss motivate me into being a better fighter, I might have won more medals, beat tougher opponents. Or maybe just beat anyone, I can't really say." Jonghyun shrugs. "I was a pretty angry teenager. I was very emotional back then."
"You're still very emotional even now," Minhyuk points out, which earns him a laugh. "So you've been thinking about it?"
"Call it a privilege," Jonghyun says. "I had options. Not a lot of us do. Yonghwa has a few answers too, but I'm pretty sure it all still involves music somehow."
Minhyuk considers this. "To preface, I love what I'm doing," he says quickly. He doesn't want Jonghyun thinking that he wants out. "I love that I'm making music and that I'm playing the drums for a living and I love that we have fans."
"Same here. But…?"
"But I just wonder… what else is out there? Who else could I have been?" Minhyuk thinks about it. "I don't have an answer."
Junghyun sets his guitar aside. "That's natural. Sounds like you've only just started thinking about it."
"The thing is, I started thinking about it when- remember when we were playing at that publishing company's campaign launch and I had this moment when I felt like I was at the top of the world and you compared it to something even athletes feel?" Minhyuk sits on the floor and rests his back against the wall. "I had one of those moments during the concert. Then right in the middle of the high I started wondering. Where else can I get this high?"
"And that distracted you." Jonghyun's tone is understanding. He doesn't use it much. It sounds nice.
"It's like time stopped for me." That's a handy expression, Minhyuk isn't actually exaggerating even if Jonghyun takes it metaphorically. "I mean, even when I felt like I had everything I want, I started wondering what else is there. That's…"
"Demoralizing," Jonghyun answers. "Yeah."
"Maybe this isn't the life I want and I just don't know it yet."
"That's a big maybe." Jonghyun stands up and fans wipes the sweat off his face. "Not something I can help you with, too."
Minhyuk peers at him. "Then what good are you for as a hyung?"
Jonghyun flicks a finger against Minhyuk's forehead. "I'm only a year older than you, give me a break. Even I'm still trying to figure it out."
Minhyuk logs in to his private Naver account and reads through blog entries from years back, from a life he barely remembers. The entries are so scattered.
Gushing about a street stall that served the most authentic takoyaki. The day he accidentally spilled iced tea on his girlfriend's new skirt and she didn't get angry at him and he knew they'd be together forever. (Right.) Opening a souvenir gift from his aunt and seeing a jade bracelet with his name carved inside the band.
He remembers writing so he can remember these memories. And it's a good thing, too, because he could barely recall them anymore.
"Hyung?"
Yonghwa blearily opens an eye to look at him. Minhyuk feels guilty, Yonghwa gets little enough sleep as it is, having to resort to power naps on the road between schedules. Still, long ago Yonghwa made a promise that he'll always be available for them in times of need, even if not all needs are critical.
Minhyuk feigns casualness. "Have you always wanted to be an idol?"
"Hmmm?"
"I was just wondering."
Yonghwa goes back to his nap. Minhyuk stares out the car and watches the buildings pass by.
"Not an idol, but I've always wanted to be a musician," Yonghwa says five minutes later, startling Minhyuk out of his thoughts. "The specifics didn't matter, I just wanted to do music. I could be playing underground rock and jazz fusion for all I care and I wouldn't mind. But being an idol seemed like the most direct path. That's why I auditioned."
"You sound so confident saying it like that."
"Having a pretty face helped a lot." Yonghwa yawns and stretches his back. "How about you?"
Minhyuk shrugs. "I could have just been a simple university student."
"Why do you say that like it's a bad thing?"
Minhyuk frowns. "Don't you think the university life is boring? After all the excitement we get as idols? The traveling, the free clothes, the fans…"
"I'm pretty sure the only difference between idols and non-idols is the amount of makeup we wear." Yonghwa glances at his watch. He's learning to be more conscious of time.
"What matters is that we always learn and develop, right? It doesn’t have to be music. I could have been a scientist."
Yonghwa grins, still slightly sleepy.
"I could have been a comedian!"
Yonghwa snorts. "About that one, don't get your hopes up."
Jungshin is always the first at the rehearsal studio, always the first to get in the zone, always the first to warm up. Diligent maknae. There are some things Minhyuk hopes would never change.
"Don't you have anything else to do outside of practicing all day?"
"This is my life," Jungshin says with an easy grin. "It's the only thing I've ever wanted to do."
"So that's why you look so fulfilled when you're playing bass."
Jungshin laughs unabashed. "You, too, when you're surrounded by drums."
"Maybe that's circumstantial." Minhyuk takes his seat, twirls the familiar weight of his sticks in his hands and draws some inspiration from Jungshin's passion.
Yet the maybes persist, the what ifs never end.
"I'm interested in knowing," Jonghyun says when Minhyuk mentions it again. "But there's really nothing I can do about."
"Just learn to enjoy it, Minhyuk, this is where we are now," Yonghwa adds.
Jungshin’s grin is contagious. "And all the awesomeness that comes with it."
Minhyuk enters the trance state for the third time to an audience of event organizers and sound engineers and one of his bandmates running late.
They're preparing for their first major concert and they're all tired and exhausted and they have too many things to do but he feels like he's where he needs to be. And at the peak of his high, he casts his mind around-
"Sheer human interest has always been such a powerful fulcrum for change," the lady says, her lips shining in the spotlight like rubies.
Minhyuk nods at her.
She leaves him at his desk and Minhyuk buries himself once more in his books, tries to focus single-mindedly on the wall of statistical tools he has to learn for his exam tomorrow. He doesn't know why he needs to memorize these formulas, there are computer programs that can do it automatically, but he guesses that it's to train him for making sense of the data. The world of business statistics is ever evolving.
It takes him five minutes to solve the next question on his review sheet. He relishes the feeling of winning over a difficult problem, but it's followed by wondering what he'd be doing tonight if he had the guts to go on stage during that audition years ago.
Main Character: Minhyuk
Length: 2,362
Rating: G
Warnings: None
Summary: Wondering what if? is like screaming into the void. You never know who might be listening.
Notes: Remix of andersenmom's Loner. Originally posted here.
There is an undocumented yet much discussed phenomenon shared among musicians: after years of devotion to one's craft counted by months of intense preparation, weeks repeatedly committing the same actions repeatedly almost to the point of being able to do them even while asleep, days of exhaustion slowly piling up literally dreaming of nothing else, and right on the hour of power when the performance is in stride the musician enters a state of trance. It doesn't matter how many people are in the audience, it doesn't matter how big the event, what matters is the single-mindedness and the sheer passion, the exhaustion of preparation, and the single, controlled release of all that effort culminating in a drunkenness of the Here and Now and I have never felt so alive, a moment of crystal clear euphoria that This is what I live for.
This is the musician's high. They enter the trance and there is nothing more in the world but them and their music.
Kang Minhyuk enters this trance for the first time three days after his twentieth birthday while playing for a small, private party with the rest of CN Blue.
The trance state in itself is uneventful. What follows is the standard musician's high, then a slight post-performance depression that is admittedly strange but still understandable. Jonghyun assures him that it's natural. It's a mark of adjustment. That Minhyuk's mind has accepted his new life as a musician and finally configured itself to maximize his latent talent.
"It's the same with sports," Jonghyun says afterward with a proud pat on Minhyuk's shoulder. "Well, not exactly the same, I guess, but there's always that moment when everything just seems so perfectly clear."
Emotionally-attuned people like Jonghyun, Minhyuk supposes, are no strangers to the effect.
It's the second trance - when he wonders if he could find this same feeling when he's not playing music - that changes everything.
Minhyuk takes a while to realize that he can't hear anyone else playing, that he can't hear their third song for the set and he has no idea why and at what point everyone else stopped. He pauses mid-beat, looks beyond his drum set, and the first thing he sees is Yonghwa hovering in mid jump several inches from the floor.
Minhyuk stares for three more seconds before looking at everyone else. A drumstick falls from his hand.
Everybody is frozen. Everybody. His bandmates, the concert staff, the few hundred select fans who were fortunate enough to be present in this mini concert. Everybody is frozen. As in a picture. A snapshot in time.
"What-" but he doesn't know what else to say. He gapes around him.
"My, but this is interesting."
Minhyuk jumps to his feet and finds a woman standing beside Jungshin where moments ago there was only empty space. She's wearing red. Minhyuk normally ignores what people wear, but he has a suspicion that he's never seen red this intensely before. As if the color itself is has form. Minhyuk takes a moment to consider his thoughts. He determines his first question. "Did you do this?"
The woman stops admiring Jungshin and strides closer to Minhyuk. "I didn't. Really, nothing happened to anyone. Except for you."
Minhyuk has made it a point to never ask stupid questions. He decides to be on guard and stay quiet.
"Technically," the lady continues, "what happened is that you… stepped outside of time. Yes, that's a nice simplification for a mind that experience the universe in three plus one dimensions. I personally didn't expect my fifth opportunity to approach me. Normally it's the other way around."
Minhyuk is grateful that his ego is strong. That his mind works with its own momentum. "What are you?"
"Correct question," the lady says. There are feathers shaped like fire embroidered on her sleeves. "Sadly, your people haven't evolved the language that can suitably express what I really am. We have to simplify. Perceive me as an agent of change. When people wonder about what might have been, I'm the force they call on for help."
Minhyuk sits back down on his drummer's stool and picks up the stick he dropped. All the readier to resume playing after he - what's the right term? - steps back into time. Whatever that means. Maybe he’s having hallucinations. Maybe this is why he shouldn’t drink to calm his nerves.
"I'll show you the way back," the lady offers helpfully.
"How did I get here in the first place?" Minhyuk asks. He needs to know so he won't do it again. Even if this is just a weird yet highly detailed dream.
The lady pauses to think about that. "Let's say you stumbled into a junction in time where everything is susceptible to change. Don't be so surprised. You're not the first one to do so. Although you're the first one I met who did it willingly."
"I didn't do anything," Minhyuk defends himself.
The lady grins. It is not a pleasant action. "You mean you didn't wonder about who else you could be? You didn't consider, even for a fraction of a second, what other life you could be living?"
Minhyuk hesitates. In that same instant music slams back into his ears. He rushes to find his beat but the break his playing is noticeable. Everyone stops playing, he stands and bows and apologizes sincerely (if still smiling confusedly), and they take the song from the top.
"What happened back there?"
Yonghwa doesn't sound angry. More... concerned. Tired but still high from the adrenaline. It's only been minutes since they stepped off the stage.
Minhyuk bows his head. "I lost focus. I'm sorry. Please be lenient on me."
Yonghwa sighs deeply. "Let's deal with that later. Let's just cool down right now."
Minhyuk grins at the watching Jungshin and hopes his expression isn't as brittle as he feels.
Yonghwa's "punishment" is for Minhyuk to insert an additional hour of practice daily for the next two weeks. Minhyuk accepts it.
"It's not like you to lose focus." Jonghyun volunteered to stay with him under the pretext of needing to sharpen his skills further. He likes to play the role of an uninterested older brother but he always fails miserably at being subtle. "You're the most single-minded of all of us when it comes to performances."
"My drumset isolates me from everyone," Minhyuk explains. "But I'm not perfect, hard as it may be to believe."
Jonghyun snorts and strums an E7. "You've also been weird ever since the concert. Quieter. A lot more serious. As if you're turning things in your head and you don't want us to know."
"And if I succeeded we wouldn't be having this conversation." Minhyuk pointedly looks back at his drums and starts the introduction to Oetoria.
Jonghyun is well-practiced in ignoring hints. "If you keep thinking about whatever it is, it's just going to distract you more."
He does have a point. Minhyuk drops the song. "Hyung, have you ever wondered about who you could have been if we're not in this band? If we failed that audition? Or if we didn't go at all?"
"And we never met and I'd still be in Busan and I might be focusing on sports instead," Jonghyun continues Minhyuk's thoughts while absently plucking notes from his guitar. "I might have let my loss motivate me into being a better fighter, I might have won more medals, beat tougher opponents. Or maybe just beat anyone, I can't really say." Jonghyun shrugs. "I was a pretty angry teenager. I was very emotional back then."
"You're still very emotional even now," Minhyuk points out, which earns him a laugh. "So you've been thinking about it?"
"Call it a privilege," Jonghyun says. "I had options. Not a lot of us do. Yonghwa has a few answers too, but I'm pretty sure it all still involves music somehow."
Minhyuk considers this. "To preface, I love what I'm doing," he says quickly. He doesn't want Jonghyun thinking that he wants out. "I love that I'm making music and that I'm playing the drums for a living and I love that we have fans."
"Same here. But…?"
"But I just wonder… what else is out there? Who else could I have been?" Minhyuk thinks about it. "I don't have an answer."
Junghyun sets his guitar aside. "That's natural. Sounds like you've only just started thinking about it."
"The thing is, I started thinking about it when- remember when we were playing at that publishing company's campaign launch and I had this moment when I felt like I was at the top of the world and you compared it to something even athletes feel?" Minhyuk sits on the floor and rests his back against the wall. "I had one of those moments during the concert. Then right in the middle of the high I started wondering. Where else can I get this high?"
"And that distracted you." Jonghyun's tone is understanding. He doesn't use it much. It sounds nice.
"It's like time stopped for me." That's a handy expression, Minhyuk isn't actually exaggerating even if Jonghyun takes it metaphorically. "I mean, even when I felt like I had everything I want, I started wondering what else is there. That's…"
"Demoralizing," Jonghyun answers. "Yeah."
"Maybe this isn't the life I want and I just don't know it yet."
"That's a big maybe." Jonghyun stands up and fans wipes the sweat off his face. "Not something I can help you with, too."
Minhyuk peers at him. "Then what good are you for as a hyung?"
Jonghyun flicks a finger against Minhyuk's forehead. "I'm only a year older than you, give me a break. Even I'm still trying to figure it out."
Minhyuk logs in to his private Naver account and reads through blog entries from years back, from a life he barely remembers. The entries are so scattered.
Gushing about a street stall that served the most authentic takoyaki. The day he accidentally spilled iced tea on his girlfriend's new skirt and she didn't get angry at him and he knew they'd be together forever. (Right.) Opening a souvenir gift from his aunt and seeing a jade bracelet with his name carved inside the band.
He remembers writing so he can remember these memories. And it's a good thing, too, because he could barely recall them anymore.
"Hyung?"
Yonghwa blearily opens an eye to look at him. Minhyuk feels guilty, Yonghwa gets little enough sleep as it is, having to resort to power naps on the road between schedules. Still, long ago Yonghwa made a promise that he'll always be available for them in times of need, even if not all needs are critical.
Minhyuk feigns casualness. "Have you always wanted to be an idol?"
"Hmmm?"
"I was just wondering."
Yonghwa goes back to his nap. Minhyuk stares out the car and watches the buildings pass by.
"Not an idol, but I've always wanted to be a musician," Yonghwa says five minutes later, startling Minhyuk out of his thoughts. "The specifics didn't matter, I just wanted to do music. I could be playing underground rock and jazz fusion for all I care and I wouldn't mind. But being an idol seemed like the most direct path. That's why I auditioned."
"You sound so confident saying it like that."
"Having a pretty face helped a lot." Yonghwa yawns and stretches his back. "How about you?"
Minhyuk shrugs. "I could have just been a simple university student."
"Why do you say that like it's a bad thing?"
Minhyuk frowns. "Don't you think the university life is boring? After all the excitement we get as idols? The traveling, the free clothes, the fans…"
"I'm pretty sure the only difference between idols and non-idols is the amount of makeup we wear." Yonghwa glances at his watch. He's learning to be more conscious of time.
"What matters is that we always learn and develop, right? It doesn’t have to be music. I could have been a scientist."
Yonghwa grins, still slightly sleepy.
"I could have been a comedian!"
Yonghwa snorts. "About that one, don't get your hopes up."
Jungshin is always the first at the rehearsal studio, always the first to get in the zone, always the first to warm up. Diligent maknae. There are some things Minhyuk hopes would never change.
"Don't you have anything else to do outside of practicing all day?"
"This is my life," Jungshin says with an easy grin. "It's the only thing I've ever wanted to do."
"So that's why you look so fulfilled when you're playing bass."
Jungshin laughs unabashed. "You, too, when you're surrounded by drums."
"Maybe that's circumstantial." Minhyuk takes his seat, twirls the familiar weight of his sticks in his hands and draws some inspiration from Jungshin's passion.
Yet the maybes persist, the what ifs never end.
"I'm interested in knowing," Jonghyun says when Minhyuk mentions it again. "But there's really nothing I can do about."
"Just learn to enjoy it, Minhyuk, this is where we are now," Yonghwa adds.
Jungshin’s grin is contagious. "And all the awesomeness that comes with it."
Minhyuk enters the trance state for the third time to an audience of event organizers and sound engineers and one of his bandmates running late.
They're preparing for their first major concert and they're all tired and exhausted and they have too many things to do but he feels like he's where he needs to be. And at the peak of his high, he casts his mind around-
"Sheer human interest has always been such a powerful fulcrum for change," the lady says, her lips shining in the spotlight like rubies.
Minhyuk nods at her.
She leaves him at his desk and Minhyuk buries himself once more in his books, tries to focus single-mindedly on the wall of statistical tools he has to learn for his exam tomorrow. He doesn't know why he needs to memorize these formulas, there are computer programs that can do it automatically, but he guesses that it's to train him for making sense of the data. The world of business statistics is ever evolving.
It takes him five minutes to solve the next question on his review sheet. He relishes the feeling of winning over a difficult problem, but it's followed by wondering what he'd be doing tonight if he had the guts to go on stage during that audition years ago.