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Since they had no schedule for the day, all of them had taken the day of somewhere that is not the company or practice room – all except one. She had stayed back at the dorm but quickly got bored of the quiet place so she donned a cap and a mask as her disguise and walked towards the company. 

On her way to the practice room, she had encountered few other trainees and security guards but no sight of vocal or dance trainers around. She settled in the practice room and took off her disguise, putting her backpack aside before sitting down in the middle of the room. Wanting no disturbance, she silenced her phone and left it on the table. She made sure to stretch thoroughly and even did a few laps inside the room for warm-up. Scrolling through the music database in her laptop, she decided to just shuffle the playlist and let herself loose. 

One thing for sure was that she easily lost track of the time when she was dancing so she didn’t realized that three hours had passed by. Feeling her muscles aching, she stopped in the middle of her dance routine and fetched her water bottle from her backpack. Looking very briefly at the wall clock, it showed that it has been only an hour since she started but she failed to notice the unmoving second hand. Deciding to stay a little longer, she cooled down her body and lay down on the ground to relax but fatigue overcame her and she fall asleep. 

 

When she came home, she had expected someone in the dorm to welcome her, someone by the name MoonByul, but she was greeted with an empty dorm. She brushed it off, thinking that the second eldest must have gone to the convenience store while the maknae-line was most probably on their way back. It wasn’t surprising because Moonbyul had always hung out nearby – the farthest she might have gone to might be the Han River - whenever they had a day off and if she had nothing planned for the day.

Heading to the kitchen, she took out containers of side dishes from a paper bag that she got from her mother and neatly arranged them into the refrigerator. Although she had eaten before she left her house, she sneaked in some kimchi into and smiled blissfully as the taste spread in . 
Just as she poured some ice water for herself, she heard the door being unlocked so she left her glass on the kitchen counter to greet her members.

“Oh, Solar-unnie. You’re back already?”

“Yea, did the two of you enjoy the trip?”

“As expected of Wheein’s mom, her cooking is the bomb!”

“Of course! She’s my mom after all. Anything she makes is the best,” Wheein bragged proudly.

Knowing their healthy appetite, her mom can’t help but pack some dishes for her only daughter to share with her members. Hwasa was more than elated and hugged her thank you for the food.

“But where’s Byulie-unnie?”

“She wasn’t here when I got back. I just assumed she went to the store.”

“We stopped by at the store before coming back but we didn’t see her.”

“Let me try and call her. She didn’t leave a note saying she’s going somewhere.”

She speed-dialed her number and put her phone on speaker mode but it kept ringing until the line went dead. 

“Do you think she’s gone home for a bit or hanging out with her friend?”

“I’ll call her mom. Try to get ahold of her on her phone,” Solar instructed. 

To no avail, Moonbyul still didn’t answer her ohone and her mom said that she hasn’t gone back to her house. An hour has passed by since then so as a final resort, they had contacted their CEO to see if he knows anything. 

“What do you mean Byulie disappeared?”

“Since we had a day off, I went back home for a while and both Wheein and Hwasa returned to Jeonju. I had asked Moonbyul to come with me but she declined so I thought she would just stay at the dorm but she’s gone when we got back.”

“Did you call her?”

“She didn’t pick up her phone.”

“Have you tried the practice room?”

“O..Oh, we didn’t think of it.”

“Check there and if she’s not there, call me again.”

 

When they arrived at the company, they split ways so they could find her faster. It was already late and most trainees were packing up their stuff to go back home so occasionally, the members would ask if they had seen Moonbyul.

“Moonbyul-unnie? I thought I saw her coming in earlier. I saw her at the second floor but I’m not sure if she’s still here though.”

“Okay, thank you.”

Apparently all of them had been told of the same thing and they regrouped near the hallway to the dance practice room. They had sincerely hoped that Moonbyul would be in the room so they could stop worrying. With every step they took towards the room, their hearts pounded heavily against their chests. 

First thing they saw was that the lights were off but they didn’t change their course and went on to open the door. Hwasa felt the wall for the light switch and flicked it open to brighten the room. The three of them spotted Moonbyul on the ground and nearly thought that she had passed out when the sleeping girl stirred awake, her arm went to cover her eyes from the blinding light.

“Byulie-unnie!”

“Oh, Wheein-ah. You’re back.”

While the maknae-line appeared to be relieved that she was fine, Solar had an angry expression on her face. She stomped towards Moonbyul and threw her purse at her.

“Solar-unnie!”

The maknae-line was taken aback by her behavior and was worried of Moonbyul because it looked like it hurts. Moonbyul was no longer half-asleep by then and she sat up so she could talk properly to Solar.

“What’s wrong with you?”

“What’s wrong, you say! Everything is. You disappeared without any note and you didn’t pick up your phone! Don’t you dare ask me what’s wrong! We even called the CEO in search for you.”

“Sorry but it’s only been a few hours since I came here. You guys shouldn’t even be back this early.”

“Are you still groggy? It’s seven already.”

Moonbyul was confused so her eyes went past them to see the wall clock and face palmed when she realized that it’s 
broken.

“And why would you sleep here? What if you catch a cold?”

“Sorry! I’m sorry. I lost track of the time and thought that I’ll lay down for a bit before going back home.”

“Byul-unnie, how long have you been in here?”

“I came around noon time so six hours, more or less.”

“What about lunch?”

“I haven’t eaten.”

Hearing this, Solar exploded and took her hand and proceeded to drag her out of the room. Wheein called out to stop her but she was ignored so she began to follow them but Hwasa held her back.

“Let her be. She’s going to get Byul-unnie a meal and possibly lecture her on the importance of having meals on time.”

“Okay, then. Solar-unnie is scary when she’s mad. What should we do?”

“Let’s just stay here for a while. If they remembered about us, they’ll come back.”

“I don’t think they’re gonna notice. You know how they are.”

“True, they never notice their surrounding when they’re together,” Hwasa agreed.