Kurai yami mo fukai umi mo boku wo tomerarenai.
Higeki sae mo motomeru hodo kimi ni furetai.
Setsunai yoru wo, no manuel wi hae, kazoete kitta zutto, zutto…
Kanjisasetai boku no subete wo tsuyoi kodo wo koete~

The young woman felt her eyes flutter open at the sound of her friend’s voice. She squinted and brought her hand up to block the sunlight that streamed into her room through her window, searching for the slightly older man that she assumed to be singing.

“What is this song even about? It’s in Japanese, right? That’s why I can’t understand it.” She puffed out her cheeks in disappointment, “Did you write it yourself?”

 “Nope. Just because I’m signed doesn’t mean I’m that good.” He chuckled, the guitar still resting in his lap.

She smiled at him, “Well, I like the tune of it. I can’t wait until you debut!”

“Well, I came up with the tune myself. Last minute.” His laughter boomed throughout the room once more, “That’s not how the song is written. Those aren’t the notes at all.” His laughter continued, though there was a childish frown on the younger girl’s face. As he noticed this, he smirked at her, “I love you, IU, but I can’t reveal everything. My bandmates will kill me!”

She rolled her eyes playfully, “It’s not like I’m going to tell anyone, Thunder. At least tell me about the real song.”

He hummed for a moment in thought, “It sounds… a little darker than the way I just sang it.”

At his words, silence filled the room.

“I still think you should sing the whole song for me.”

His laugh was her main response, “Nope. You’ll just have to wait~”

Ji-Eun smiled at the memory, before finally realizing that her longtime friend was nowhere in sight. A frown slowly made its way onto her face as she began to wonder where the song had come from, until it began to play again.

Kurai yami mo fukai umi mo boku wo tomerarenai.
Higeki sae mo motomeru hodo kimi ni furetai—

This time, she paid attention to where the noise was coming from, quickly remembering that Thunder had recorded himself singing it again and set it as his ringtone. She pushed the blanket off of her, and stood out of bed, stretching for what she thought was only a few moments. However, it seemed to be longer as the snippet of song was cut off once more, signaling that she had missed her friend’s call once more.

But as soon as she realized this, the song restarted once again.

Her frown intensified, Why is he so eager to call me…?

Dark brown eyes flickered towards the digital clock on her bedside table.

9:17… That wasn’t bad for a Saturday, right?

Is he still upset… about what happened yesterday?

The young woman bit her lip at the thought. “Aishhh… Look at you, Ji-Eunie. You sure are making a mess of things…”

As the ringtone was nearing its end, she dashed towards her desk where she had abandoned her phone, picking it up just as the call ended once more. She inwardly scolded herself, already beginning to access her contacts list to call her friend back, but it seemed like he had beat her to it.

For some unknown reason, she felt nervous as she accepted the call, “Yeboseyo?”

“What is up with you, IU!?”

She flinched at the evident anger in his tone, before carefully responding, “W-What do you mean?”

There was a frustrated sigh of exasperation from the other line, “You’ve been acting weird ever since the whole Taeyang thing. I had just been ignoring it, because I figured that it was your way to deal with the situation. But the IU I knew wouldn’t leave her best friend out in the dark. Why couldn’t you just tell me!? Did you think I’d get angry or something!?” He paused for a moment, probably to catch his breath in an attempt to calm down. “Yeah. Well, it’s too late for that now.”

Ji-Eun’s eyes had widened considerably. Thunder had never been this angry at her before. The younger girl desperately struggled with her words, before managing a weak, “W-What are you talking about?”

He let out a noise that she couldn’t really identify, but it was obvious that her friend on the other line was both annoyed and upset, “Just because I’m in Japan right now doesn’t mean I can’t see the Korean News. And wow! What a surprise!” The pointed sarcasm in his voice made her cringe,“You’ve managed to make front cover again. I get that you have your dreams too and that you can’t achieve them the same way that I am, but if you’re just doing all of this for publicity… Well. I don’t know what to say to you.” There was another pause before Thunder quietly added on, “How much of this whole thing was just a façade?”

The evident hurt in his voice stung Ji-Eun’s heart as her head reeled. The news…? What is he talking about?

At her lack of response, the young man on the other line abruptly spoke up, “Whatever. I’m done. Call me back when you’re ready to be honest.”

Her eyes managed to widen even more, and she could already feel the harsh sting of unshed tears.

Especially when she realized that the line had gone dead.

“Yeboseyo?”

“Whoa. Whoa. When did this happen?”

“Are we talking about what everyone else in Korean Entertainment is talking about?”

“Yes. I believe so.”

“Ah, well I’m not sure either. He didn’t tell any of us?”

“Doesn’t seem like it.”

“Aigoo… I wonder what Taeyangie is thinking…”

“Whatever it is, I hope it works out well for him. Everyone’s talking about it. Even in Japan. Then again, I’ve only been here for a couple of hours and have only talked to my manager. But my point still stands.”

There was a soft giggle from the other line, “Yah, Dong-Wook. Come back soon, arasso? I miss you.”

The words were enough to create a large grin on the singer’s face, “As soon as my concert ends. How about I give you a morning kiss through the phone?”

“I think I’m okay.” At this, the popular YG singer frowned. His girlfriend was supposed to gowith his cuteness. Not reject it. However, his frown was broken once Han Byul laughed through the line, “After all, I don’t want any passerby thinking that you’re having an affair with your phone.”

He burst out into laughter at her words, “I miss you too, but I have to get ready for my rehearsal. Saranghae, Han Byul. Don’t forget that, arasso?”

Although he couldn’t see her, it was easy for him to imagine her smiling as she whispered, “I love you too, Dong-Wook. And as long as you promise to never forget that, then I promise to never forget your words.”

“Then it’s a promise.”

“Hyung? Hyung, wake up.”

The sleeping dragon growled, refusing to move out of his sleeping position. As the younger man continued to prod at his body, the leader of BIGBANG finally snapped, “Yah! What do you want, panda!?”

Seungri cringed at the evident anger in his voice, before making a face at his Hyung that he hoped he wouldn’t see. “Noona came here to speak with you.”

These words immediately caught Jiyong’s attention, instantly making the older man sit upright in his bed, wide awake, “Noona? Which Noona?”

His roommate smirked, “Nyeh, just get your out of bed and greet her.”

There was an awkward silence in the room as the blonde man brought his gaze towards the maknae. After a few moments, he shot a pointed glare at him, “I asked you a question. You woke me up. Answer said question.”

Seungri frowned, “I don’t see why it matters—“

“Answer the question.”

“I-It’s Dara Noona, Hyung!”

Nothing happened for a moment, until Jiyong fell back onto the bed, hiding his face in his pillow, “Tell her I’ll talk to her later.”

“B-But, Hyung. . . it seems like it’s—“

“I’ll talk to her later.”

The younger man nodded quickly, immediately feeling minute fear due to his leader’s scary voice. “I-I’ll let her know.”

His only response was a grunt from the rapper who was probably on his way back to dreamland.

Seungri quietly tiptoed towards the door of the room where the older woman had waited. He had been surprised enough that Dara had shown up at the front door of their apartment uninvited and still in her pajamas, but his surprise only intensified when she demanded to speak to his older friend.

The door quietly opened, and the poor panda had to stop himself from jumping back as it seemed that his Noona had been waiting directly in front of the door the whole time. She was dressed in black short shorts, an old, oversized gray hoodie, and had two mismatched neon socks on her feet that were barely covered by her Nike sandals. Her hair had been pulled into two messy pigtails, both of which had started to come undone while she slept, and her bangs had been clipped back. The older woman hadn’t even bothered putting on makeup, only making Seungri believe that she was truly in a rush to speak to his Hyung, meaning that whatever they had to talk about was important.

She managed a smile at her dongseng as he awkwardly bowed in respect to her. Not bothering to let him speak, she moved to enter the room under his arm. However, the maknae realized what she was up to, and lightly pushed her backwards, out of the entryway, closing the door to his friend’s room.

Dara immediately felt offense at the simplicity of his action, causing her to send an angry glare his way, “YAH! What do you think you’re doing!?”

The younger man flinched at her tone, and quickly gestured for her to quiet down, leading her towards the kitchen of the apartment. Although she was openly upset, she allowed him to do so, but quickly him once they got there. Her voice quieted down slightly, but the frustrated tone was still there, “I thought you said I could talk to that dragon!”

“Ah, I know I said that, but…” he averted his eyes from her, feeling uncomfortable due to the intensity of her glare, “Hyung is sleeping, and you know how he gets when you wake him up…”

Dara rolled her eyes at this excuse, “All right, that’s nice. But this is an emergency. I need to talk to him now.”

Seungri hesitated for a moment before carefully asking, “How important is it? You know, Daesung Hyung and Taeyang Hyung are right next door—“

“I don’t want to talk to that mohawk-ed idiot right now!” she fumed angrily, scaring the younger man even more, “You act like I don’t know where they live! How long do you think I’ve known you guys!?”

The maknae flinched away from her once more, confusion wrecking his mind. Okay, it was kind of obvious that she would know where the two lived, but why was she going so far as to calling his friend an idiot? From what he knew, Taeyang, Jiyong, Dong-Wook, Han Byul, and Dara had all been extremely close during their trainee years.

So what had happened?

Noticing his state of worry, Dara let out a sigh, “You just woke up, right? That means you haven’t seen the news.”

“The… news?”

She nodded carefully, pulling out a hastily printed article from the Internet from her hoodie’s pocket, “Thunder called me from Japan this morning, telling me to look at the news.”

 “Thunder-ssi. . .? Your. . .  younger brother, right?”

As the older woman nodded in affirmative, she handed him the news article, continuing to speak as her dongseng’s eyes flicked across the page, widening more and more, “I didn’t even have to search on the page to know what he was talking about: It was front cover. Again.”

Once he had finished the article, he slowly brought his stare to meet her’s, “Is this. . . all part of the plan?”

Dara frowned, “No. And that’s why I need to speak to Jiyong.”

Seungri scratched the back of his head nervously. He understood the urgency of the situation, yet he was still scared to face his older friend again, “Does Taeyang Hyung even know about this? There’s no reason to be upset at him, right?”

At the name, her eyes narrowed, “I don’t know and I don’t care. I assume that he has to know about it though because of the nature of the article. They’ve quoted him and everything!”

He nodded slowly, looking down at the paper in his hands again, “Well. . . Other than the fact that this is going against the plan, it doesn’t seem to be a big deal. It means that he has—“

“It is a big deal!” she retorted, snatching the article from his hands.

Seeing  her dongseng’s affronted expression due to her outburst, she let out a sigh, and did her best to soften the tone of her voice, “Look, just talk to Jiyongie again for me, arasso? Now that you understand the situation, maybe you can try to convince him better.”

Not knowing what else to do, the younger man nodded in affirmative, before hesitantly walking back towards his leader’s room. He didn’t really care that his Noona was trailing behind him, figuring that she was just going to wait at the door like she did last time.

He didn’t realize how wrong he was until it was too late.

She let out a sudden high-pitched scream, causing the younger man to immediately turn to her in worry. However, all he managed to see was the older woman dart pass him down the hallway, throw open the door to his Hyung’s room, then quickly lock the door shut.

The poor panda continued to stare at the closed door in shock. As though he had already accepted the fact that he was going to be punished by Jiyong himself, he walked towards the room and leaned against the door. Once he had taken a seat, he felt his phone vibrate abruptly in the pocket of his gym shorts.

Not caring anymore as to see who it was, he nonchalantly tapped the “accept call” button, before bringing the device to his ear, “Yeboseyo?”

“Ah, sorry for calling you so early in the morning, Oppa. . . I didn’t wake you up, did I?”

Seungri shook his head, but as he realized that the young woman on the other line couldn’t see that, he blushed in mild embarrassment, “N-No, you’re fine. I was already awake.”

“Oh okay. . .” There was a pause from the other line as his words seemed to sink in, “Aigoo, this early!? It must be a miracle!”

He chuckled at her words, “Perhaps. Well, how are you CL-ssi?”

Even though he couldn’t see it, he could practically feel the smile dancing on her lips through her words, “Neh, if you call me CL, then there’s no point in adding in the ‘-ssi,’ right?” She giggled through the line, making the older man smile.

He liked making people happy.

“Too bad! As your Oppa, I can do whatever I want, right?”

“I wouldn’t go that far.”

The smirk was still on his face as he continued, “What’s up, CL-ssi?”

This time she ignored his emphasis on the added honorific, remembering the reason she had called him in the first place, “Have you seen the news already?”

At her question, the expression was wiped off his face, “Yes.”

“Do you think that Dara Unnie knows all ready? I know that she was really into the whole plan thing, and I think that she might be a little upset about it. . .”

Before he could respond to her, a loud crash vibrated throughout the entire apartment, coming from the door behind him. The outburst was immediately followed by angry yelling that could only come from his Hyung.

With a sigh, he responded to his friend, “Yeah. I’m pretty sure that she’s heard about it.”

“Tabi. . . Tabi, wake up. . .”

Seunghyun kept his eyes shut, and groaned in his