Joo Li looked up from her book when she heard a noise from the bed. A small smile appeared on her face as she watched Marie cutely rub the sleep from her eyes.

Marie looked around disoriented, she remembered waking up briefly earlier but couldn’t quite remember the details. She looked over towards the door and saw Joo Li sitting in a chair beside her, a book in her hand. Marie grinned widely, attempting to sit up in bed, and wincing when she realized how sore her body was. She quickly gave up on her attempt, and simply held out a hand to Joo Li.

“Hi unnie! What are you reading?” she asked cheerfully.

Joo Li smiled sadly. How was it possible for a person to be so bright even under these circumstances? It hurt her heart to see the girl so cheerful, completely unaware of the discussion being held about her. The members had received a call shortly after Marie had fallen back to sleep from the company. They called for an emergency meeting to discuss their debut. Joo Li was worried about the decision the company would come to. They weren’t the most empathetic people out there. They were only ever concerned about business and profit.

“Oh this?” Joo li questioned lifting up the book in question. Marie nodded. “It’s just a book I picked up at the gift shop. I think it’s supposed to be a fantasy, but I’m not really sure. It’s not really all that interesting to be honest,” Joo Li chuckled.

Marie giggled, “Then why were you reading it unnie?” “That is a very good question. I’m not quite sure. Maybe I’m hopeful it will get more interesting? Though it’s rather unlikely from the looks of it,” Joo Li shrugged. Marie smiled sweetly at her, “Don’t worry unnie, I will give you some good book recommendations so that you will never have to read a boring book again.” Joo Li laughed, “Ah, thank you Marie-yah. Whatever would I do without you?” Marie looked at her with wide eyes, “You’d forever be reading boring books, and THAT would be tragic.” “Yes, I suppose you’re right.”

They sat in comfortable silence for a moment. Joo Li watching Marie carefully for any signs of change, and Marie lost in thought trying to think of book recommendations. All of the sudden Marie turned to Joo Li with a confused expression on her face, for a second Joo Li thought she had lost her memory again. Marie looked around the room quizzically, “Unnie, where did the others go?”

Joo Li laughed in relief; it took her that long to realize the absence of the others? Well at least her personality was still intact. “They had to go to the company,” Joo Li was reluctant to reveal any more than that. Marie nodded in understanding. Joo Li didn’t have to tell her for her to figure it out. It was obvious what they would have gone to the company for. To be honest, Marie was really nervous. She wasn’t sure what kind of decision they would make. But she didn’t want to worry her unnie even more, so she just let it go.

“Unnie, do you think they have ice cream here?” she looked hopefully at Joo Li who laughed.

--

“Yah! Nadia! Hurry up or we’re going to be late for the meeting,” Ji Yeon called back to the girl who was lagging behind. They had just arrived at the company building, and were in a hurry to make it to the meeting room in time. Their company wasn’t exactly tolerant of tardiness. But of course Nadia had to cause trouble, and was walking purposely slow. It was her way of rebelling. “I’m not going!” Ji Yeon turned around in annoyance to glare at the girl. The maknae stopped walking completely and glared defiantly back at her.

Emi, hearing the argument, made her way over to the two. “Nadia-yah, what’s wrong with you? You know we have to get to the meeting on time, or we’ll have to face the consequences.” “I don’t care. I’m not going,” the girl said stubbornly, stomping her foot and crossing her arms. Emi sighed. This was not going to work. Nadia was clearly upset about something, but there was no way the girl was going to say anything. Nadia was notoriously known for not talking about her feelings and it didn’t help that they had an audience. Emi nodded as she turned around to face the others, “You guys go ahead, I’ll talk to Nadia and then we’ll make our way up there. There’s no point in everyone being late.”

The girls nodded in understanding, and walked into the building. Emi turned her attention back to Nadia. “Okay, now, what’s going on?” Nadia looked down, glaring defiantly at the ground. “Hey, what did the ground ever do to you?”Emi joked, trying to make light of the situation. This time the glare was directed at her. “Alright, I’m sorry, can you please tell me what’s bothering you?” Nadia looked defiantly at the ground again, seeming to have no intention of revealing anything. Emi was just about to give up when Nadia sighed.

“It’s just so stupid,” she said finally. Emi looked at her confusedly, “What’s stupid?’ “Everything!” Nadia shouted. “Such as?” “I don’t even want to hear what those stupid jerks have to say about all of this. They don’t care about Marie-unnie at all! They are just going to focus on how they can make the most money. They don’t care what happens to her as long as they get money out of her. Why do we even have to listen to them? It’s not Marie’s fault that this happened to her! We worked so hard to get to where we are, and yet we have no say in our own future!” Nadia fumed, angry tears welling up in her eyes.

Emi sighed sadly, and wrapped her arms around the younger girl. Even though she seems cold on the outside, Nadia was a very kind person. She really cared about others, even if she didn’t show it the way most people do. Very rarely did Nadia ever let her feelings out. Emi patted the girl’s back gently and then pulled back to smile at her. “Don’t worry about that just yet. We have to at least hear what they have to say first. Marie wouldn’t want to see you get this worked up. Be a bit more optimistic okay? I’m sure everything will work out fine.”

Nadia wiped at her eyes angrily and looked up at the sky in an attempt to hold back her tears. How humiliating was it for her to be crying in public? “You say that but I know you feel the same way. You can’t always pretend everything is alright, when it really isn’t.” Emi looked at the girl in shock; she hadn’t expected the younger girl to pick up on that. Nadia was a lot more perceptive then others gave her credit for.

Shaking her head Nadia tried to return to her senses, now was not the time to breakdown. “Let’s go,” she walked determinedly towards the doors. She would show them she meant business. Nadia would protect Marie no matter what.

Emi chuckled to herself, still in shock. Who would have thought Nadia had a mature side?

--

“Have a seat girls,” Hiro smiled charmingly, as he pointed to the chairs set up in front of him. The five members shuffled towards the seat and sat down. “Very good. There are a few things we have to discuss today, but we will get to those things later.” He turned his gaze to Wren who smirked back, “Wren, how have you been adapting to Spica? I do hope they have been treating you with the utmost hospitality,” he stated, glancing coldly at Nadia who immediately looked away. Wren’s smirk widened, the man had always favoured her above all the other trainees. Who could blame him, she knew she was the best they had seen.

“I’ve adapted perfectly. It appears they are the ones having troubles adapting to me.” Hiro’s eyebrows shot up and he turned to look at the others, “Is that so? Well, I certainly hope they learn to adapt quickly.” Ji Yeon shivered, hearing the threat in his voice. “Well, now that that is settled, shall we move on? I heard that our Marie had a little spill? Do tell me, how is she?” Nadia rolled her eyes and muttered under her breath, “Yeah, because you’re oh-so worried about her.” Elisabeth shot her a warning glance, before looking towards their boss. She sighed in relief when she realized that he hadn’t heard.

“She fell down the stairs and is currently in the hospital,” Ji Yeon reported. “You don’t say...” Hiro muttered as he folded his hands in front of him, pretending to be puzzled. “Such a terrible accident so close to your debut, what are we going to do?”

Elisabeth shifted uncomfortably in her seat. She was starting to get very annoyed. Now, it usually took a lot to provoke her anger, but this was kind of ridiculous. It felt like he was blaming them for what happened. Like it was their fault that their debut was now facing a major barrier. “I think we should proceed with the debut as originally planned,” Ji Yeon stated, trying to remain confident.

Hiro looked at her challengingly, “You do, do you? How are we going to do that? From what I hear she is experiencing some problems with her memory.” Nadia glared icily at him. He acted like he didn’t know anything about the accident, but of course, he knew everything.

“Then what are you thinking we should do?” Emi questioned respectfully. “Well, for one thing, we have to prevent the news from getting out. If anyone finds out about this, it could be the end of all of you.” The girls exchanged glances. “Here are our options. We let you debut as normal, with Marie, and risk your debut stage being a total failure. Which could result in your careers ending before they started. OR, we remove Marie from the group.”

“You have GOT to be kidding me!”Nadia shouted as she shot up from her seat. Elisabeth grabbed her hand and pulled her back into her seat. Exchanging a comforting look with her. He said it was their choice.

Hiro stared at Nadia in amusement. “Of course, I don’t expect you to make the decision right away. You have to think about this very carefully. Marie aside, it’s your futures that are at stake here.” Wren scoffed, “Isn’t the answer obvious? We have to debut without her. Why should we put our lives on the line, for hers? Of course it’s unfortunate what has happened to her, but there’s nothing we can do about it. I’ve worked too hard for everything to be ruined by one clumsy girl.”

The four members of Spica turned to look at her in shock, or in Nadia’s case, pure hatred. Wren turned to glance back at them, “Hate me all you want, but you know I’m right. You just can’t see it because you’re blinded by your friendship with her. I’m able to look at this logically as an outsider.”

Hiro smirked, ”She has a point girls. But as I said, I will give you some time to think. Make sure you inform Marie of the content of this meeting. You’re dismissed.”

Wren was the first out the door, not even looking back at the other members. The others slowly made their way out the door. None of them were in any hurry. They knew that after they left the company, they would have to go back to the hospital and explain to Marie what was going on. A conversation none of them wanted to have. Marie had always been really sensitive, she wasn’t going to take this well.

--

“Nadia! Unnies!”Marie cried excitedly from her spot on the bed when she spotted the girls coming through the door. Joo Li turned around and smiled in greeting to the others as well. She tried to catch Emi’s eyes to find any indication of what had happened, but the girl avoided her gaze. This only made her worry even more, whatever happened, it couldn’t have been good.

Marie waved to the others, completely oblivious to the obvious tension of the others. “Look Nadia! Joo Li-unnie found me ice cream!” She exclaimed, lifting up her little bowl of ice cream proudly. Nadia rolled her eyes as she sat down beside her, “Idiot. Bella-unnie said you weren’t allowed to eat ice cream.” Marie’s face fell, “Oh. Right. I forgot about that.”Nadia sighed, “I was just kidding unnie. Eat all the ice cream you want.” Marie immediately perked up and nodded, as she continued to eat her ice cream happily.

Suddenly, she remembered the reason they had left in the first place, “Oh right! How did the meeting go? What did they say?” Everyone exchanged awkward glances. None of them wanted to be the one to tell her. Surprisingly it was Elisabeth who finally spoke up. Sitting down on the other side of Marie, she took the girls hand in her own.

“They said we have to make a choice. We can either risk it and debut as originally planned, which means you wouldn’t have time to properly recover. Or...”She trailed off, unsure of how the girl would react. “Or?” Marie prompted. Elisabeth glanced at Emi in panic, she couldn’t say it. “Or, we debut without you,” Emi finished, gently. Marie nodded, looking down at her hands.

Everyone looked at Marie nervously, while Joo Li placed her hands over . Sure, the thought had crossed her mind, but she never thought it would actually happen! Marie didn’t say anything for a minute, staring silently at her bowl of ice cream. What happened next shocked the girls beyond belief.

She lifted her head up and smiled brightly at the others, “Debut without me.”

___

♥
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Oh hi there. I'm still alive. Did you guys miss me? Of course you did.

So, sorry I haven't updated much, and all that good stuff. But at least this is a long chapter right? Lot's of drama, and insight into certain characters.

I'm actually really sick right now. I've been sick in bed with a fever for the last few days, and I've been puking nonstop so I can't even eat anything.

It's kind of depressing actually. I got up to go to the bathroom a little while ago, which is literally two steps away from my bedroom, and my legs gave out.. I had to call someone to help me up. So sad.

So yes, if there are any weird mistakes, that's my excuse. Let me know what you guys think! I could use some cheering up. Oh, and I'm officially 18 now. I just had my birthday on Monday. It wasn't a fun day.

Listening to: Yangpa - It Hurts (If you haven't heard it, go listen to it. So beautiful.)
Drinking: Water. The only thing I can digest.
Thinking: I seriously want to watch the newest episode of 49 Days. GO WATCH IT. Holy mother of pearl, it's the most amazing drama ever.