His skin was soft against hers, his toned muscles giving her the comfort feeling of being protected, safe, a happiness evolving her completely until she almost fell asleep. A slight shake on her body made her open her eyes, and as she did, the smiling face of Kwon Jiyong greeted her.

“Don’t fall asleep here; I apreciate the thought but I wouldn’t want anyone checking you out.” He said on his usual cheerful tone, and she nodded smiling. He grabbed her shirt and gave it to her, she took it and grabbed her underwear that was lying on the floor next to the sofa. He dragged his body out of the couch, and she admired him for the first time. Her eyes went from his legs towards his stomach, then at his chest, admiring his muscles, his body full of tattoos and up to his face, and she laughed quietly as she saw him flushing.

“Sorry.” She mumbled as she put on her underwear.

“Don’t stare; I’m quite shy you know.” He said, now pulling his pants up. She laughed and put her shirt on, fixing the little golden chain before pulling her pants up.

“Sure you are.” She said with sarcasm and pulled her pants up, her phone ringing and vibrating on her back pocket. She jumped a bit and grabbed the phone on her hands. It was James calling her, and she froze on the spot as Jiyong eyed her with curious, big brown eyes.

“Aren’t you answering that? It had been ringing nonstop since we started.” He said, now putting his shirt on. She gulped and turned around, facing the computer system and slowly dragging right the answer button. With a trembling hand, she put the phone close to her ear.

“Hello?” She said quietly, but there was too much noise on the other side. She tensed up immediately, looking at her reflection on the glass in front of her. Her hair was a mess, her face still flushed and her clothes crumpled.

“Chaerin, where are you?” He said impatiently. She gulped and looked at Jiyong through the reflection, he was lacing his boots.

“I’m at the company, why?” She said.

“You have to leave! Now!” He yelled on the phone, so loud she had to ward off the phone from her ear.

“What?” She said, not really understanding what he said.

“Just ing leave!” He yelled again and the call got cut. Sge called his name on the phone but it was no use, his line was dead. She felt a cold run through her spine and quickly turned around, her face pale, her eyes big. Jiyong tensed up and stood up, walking towards her.

“What’s wrong babe?” He said caressing her face. She shook her head and looked at the phone on her hands.

“There’s something wrong…” She said and Jiyong looked genuinely confused.

“What’s wrong?” He said caressing her hair tenderly. She looked at him and shook her head, then remembered everything that had happened, and her heart told her he had nothing to do with that, with Hyunsuk and all the mess around.

“Listen, we have to leave-“ she started saying but a loud noise coming from the outside stopped her from saying anything more.  She dodged instinctively and pulled Jiyong with her. Another loud noise came from the room next to the studio, accompanied by some crystal shattering. She grabbed Jiyong’s arm and he put a hand over her head, protecting her. She felt him pulling her up and grabbing tightly her arm.

“I get it, let’s go!” Jiyong yelled and started running towards the door of the studio. She looked around the place and saw people, idols, running downstairs. The door of Hyunsuk’s office was shattered and there was a hand lying on the floor, lifeless. She cursed and stopped abruptly. Jiyong turned around, his face shocked and anger ran through his eyes. “What the are you doing?!” He yelled and grabbed her arm but she pushed him away and took the gun out of her inner belt. As she took out the gun, Jiyong widened his eyes, obviously shocked. She shrugged and smiled, then grabbed his hand and started to run towards the door.

“No, no stop!” She said, and he stopped abruptly. They were almost at the elevator, and she thought it wouldn’t be a good idea, so she looked at the emergency stairs and pointed them. “There!” She said and they both started running towards there. Gun still in hand, Chaerin noticed someone stood in front of them, and she felt a cold air run through her spine. Jiyong noticed the presence and pushed her behind him slowly, and before he could face the man, he had already hit him hard on the face with a black baton. Chaerin widened her eyes and pointed the gun towards the man, firm on her hand, but he was faster than her, probably from the new elite, she thought, and in a swift movement, she was out cold.

It was those moments in life that makes you remember everything you’ve done, everything you’ve said or felt like saying. It was exactly those moments that made you wonder if you were in the right course, or have turned around and took the wrong route. You might never know, but life makes you keep going forward, makes you keep wondering until one day, everything comes into mind, but that moment it’s always too late, for you might be dead, or almost dying.

Slowly, Chaerin opened her eyes, feeling a piercing pain on her head. She wasn’t sure where she was, or how she got there, but seeing everything so dark made her enter in a state of sudden panic, something she was totally oblivious to. She put her hands on the floor and slowly pushed herself into a sitting position. As she did, everything seemed to be turning around, or maybe it was just the strong headache she was feeling. She looked around, but it was too dark for her eyes to see, all she could make were silhouettes of stuffs around her.

She tried to stand up, but felt herself too weak to do so. As she struggled to stand, she heard some whimpers far from where she was, making her turn alert on everything around her. “Why were you with her? Answer me!” She heard a man say, then a loud slap echoed through the place. She tried to swallow, but was too dry for her to do so. She heard another slap, but this one had the slight sounds of chains, and her heart stopped. They were torturing whoever it was, God, she thought.

“If you’re not willing to talk by the good way, you’ll be singing by the bad way.” She heard the hoarse voice of the man say, and then another sound of metal hitting each other echoed the place. “Now Mr. Famous, are you willing to start talking?” He said and something on her mind slapped her hard. Mr. Famous, that couldn’t be…

“You can go yourself!” Another man said, one whose voice was too familiar to Chaerin, so familiar she can put a name and a last name to it. Kwon Jiyong. She felt her knees go weak and fell on the ground as she heard the metals hitting something, or someone, her hands hitting the concrete floor as she did. She looked up; now a light was entering the place, revealing some bars in front of her. She dragged herself towards the bar and grabbed them, screaming at the top of her lungs, “LET HIM GO!” she yelled again, and again until someone came towards her, a man, not taller than Jiyong, but he was fat, like 200 pounds fat.

“So you decided to wake up already? Good.” He said and took out some keys from his pockets and unlocked the cell Chaerin was in. She stood up, stumbling as she did, and glared at the man.

“Where am I?” She asked, to which the man responded with a chuckled.

“I’m the one making questions here, so you better behave.” He said and took a chain that was lying on the floor and pulled it, making Chaerin stumble to the front. She looked at her waist and noticed that she was chained. She scoffed and crossed her arms.

“I guess you’re too afraid to let me free, aren’t you? Scared I might bite?” She said and he slapped her with the back of his hand, making her fall on the ground.

“Shut up! Now come!” He said and pulled the chains, dragging her on the floor and to the bars, hitting her head hard towards it. She whimpered but didn’t screamed, she was used to this kind of pain, so a little more wouldn’t hurt her. The man pulled the chains again, but this time she was already on her feet, so she didn’t hit anything else.

He walked her towards a dark aisle, to which there were several doors closed. She looked around, and in front of her, there was an open door with lights on. She stopped in front of it and gasped as she saw who was inside sitting on a chair, almost unconscious. “He has no idea what’s going on!” She yelled trying to enter the room but someone punched her in the face, making her fall to the ground, again. She saw Jiyong looking at her, his face all bruised, his lip and nose bleeding and his right eye shut from a swelling bruise there. He tried to stand up but the chains on the chair forbid him from doing so.

“Don’t hurt her you mothering bastard!” Jiyong said, still struggling with the chains. The guy who hit her started laughing and kneeled in front of Chaerin.

“For a famous bastard, he has a foul language.” He said, and she recognized his voice as the one torturing Jiyong. The man in front of Chaerin smiled and removed her hair from her face. She quickly spit him, and he stood up, kicking her on her stomach. She yelped and Jiyong struggled more. “Take her out, now!” The man said cleaning the saliva from his face. He walked towards Jiyong and slapped him again, but Jiyong didn’t even flinched, for he was too focused on Chaerin. As the guy with the chain stood her up, she mouthed the words ‘I’m sorry’ to Jiyong, to which he shook his head, a gesture of telling her it wasn’t her fault.

They dragged her out of the room and into another, and she had to narrow her eyes to adjust them to the new dim lights of the room. There was a wooden chair in the middle of the room, much alike Jiyong’s room. The fat guy grabbed her arm and threw her on the chair, not forgetting to slap her hard. She glared at him but he had already chained her to the chair.

“Where is him?” The fat guy asked her. She feigned an innocent confusion.

“Who’s him?” She said. The guy slapped her, and she was sure there must be one huge bruise on her cheek already.

“Don’t play dumb with me; you know well who I am talking to!” He said and slapped her again. The strength of his slap turned her face to the side, and she had to spit out a mouthful of blood. In the distance, she could still hear someone slapping Jiyong, but she could only hope he could find a way out, for all she knew, he was innocent, he didn’t had to be there, not to be tortured for information he doesn’t even knows.

The fat man walked towards the door, someone had entered but Chaerin could only manage to see a silhouette of a man. “We got two, now there’s only one female and a male, we have to find him first, she’s not too much of a threat, but he… he is.” The man told the fat guy and Chaerin widened her eyes in surprise. What the heck did he meant by that?