While walking to the SHL Headquarters, Jiyeon had earphones plugged into her ears. She was singing along quietly with a wrist wrapped with bandage. The bandage was color white with some blood stains all over. It was just big enough to cover her wrist. There was no reason for her putting on bandage if she never got hurt in a fight ever before. Excluding her battle with Xiumin. Nonetheless, it was the first time to see Agent Jung Jiyeon show interest in music. No one ever saw her listen to music ever since they met her. Well, it was a song that Xiumin sang to her the night before, so it was inevitable for her to dislike the song.

“Chinguraneun ireum eoneusae miwojin ireum… Gamchudeon gamjeongeun jigeumdo apeun bimirui gieogil ppun~ Uri sain jeongnihal su eomneun sajin bomyeon gaseum arin story, I’m sorry yeoreuma ijen goodbye…” she sang, causing the agents walking around her to turn to her direction. ( The friend label is a label that I got to hate. The feelings I’ve hid still remain as a painful secret memory. The photos that can’t define our relationship is a heartbreaking story. I’m sorry, summer, now goodbye ).

Jessica was quite stunned to see her fellow agent sing for the first time. She had no idea that Jiyeon could sing that well either. “Hey,” she approached her. “You sing?” she asked with her hand resting on the latter’s shoulder.

Jiyeon removed the earphones and asked for her to repeat the question. She turned red after hearing her question. She chuckled and patted her shoulder, telling her not to worry because her voice was amazing. Chanyeol, who was just next to them, agreed with Jessica. Her voice was definitely melodic to ones ears. Jiyeon bowed slightly and thanked them for their compliment. It was her first time hanging out with her fellow agents, yet it felt like they’ve been close for a long time already.

“How’d you get that song? I never knew you had time to even look for one…” Chanyeol said as he bit on a pencil.

Jessica pulled it out of his mouth with a frown. “That’s mine, giant.”

“Xiumin sang it to me,” Jiyeon answered with a silent pant, and the two arguing people stopped to stare at her blankly. They couldn’t believe that their enemy would simply sing a soothing song to Jiyeon.

Chanyeol raised a brow slightly. He noticed her quiet pant and reached out his hand to feel her pulse on her neck. “It’s beating fast…” he muttered while frowning. Jiyeon’s heart wasn’t only beating fast, but she was also having short breaths. It was not something that would usually happen. He slowly looked down on the floor until he spotted the bandage on her hand. “Did… Did they hurt you?” he asked worriedly.

“No! I’m fine. It’s nothing,” she answered as she hid her wrist.

Jessica grabbed her arm and immediately brought her to the clinic on the upper floor. She slammed the door open and made Jiyeon sit down on the couch comfortably. Something was not right. “What’s wrong?” a girl in coat, with hands in pockets, asked as she approached Jessica.

“Her heart is beating fast, and she’s having short breaths,” she answered.

“Doesn’t that mean she’s tired?”

“Krystal”

“Jessica, I spotted her singing on the way to the agency. She’s just tired,” Krytsal answered. “That’s one reason why she shouldn’t like music. It will ruin her health”

“What?” Jessica exclaimed. She never heard someone say that music was bad for the health. “Wait, you made her hate music?” she asked, quite shocked.

“Yes, why do you ask?”

Luhan kept on shouting intermittently. He was walking around the house with a terrified look. And it was all because of simple dust particles. Xiumin kept on groaning on every single complain that Luhan made. He felt like a maid, cleaning all the stuff that belonged to Luhan. The new attitude of his made Xiumin irritated like crazy. He wasn’t the kind of person who would want to waste energy just to keep someone else’s room sparkling neat and tidy.

“Kim Minseok!” Luhan shouted. The said boy groaned as he walked to Luhan. “What is that?” he pointed to a circle metal object on the pillow of his bed. He looked at it with disgust like it was some kind of squishy dirty slime.

Xiumin walked to it and observed it closely. “I don’t know… It’s blinking…” he said. He froze the ball before taking it in his hand and placing it in his pocket. Before he could step out of his room, Luhan called for him again.

“What?” He shouted in annoyance.

“Won’t you clean it…?” Luhan asked, and pursed his lips.

Xiumin couldn’t take it anymore. He shouted, “Ah clean it yourself!” and stomped out of the room.

Luhan looked back on the pillow. He saw a drop of blood and gulped. He really didn’t like dirty stuff. “What’s wrong with me…?” he thought to himself. He knew he wasn’t normally like that. He knew that he wouldn’t really mind to see a drop of blood on a pillow that wasn’t his. Then it struck him; it was Jiyeon’s pillow. Even if he was curious about it, he still backed away because the pillow was still dirty.

“I was correct… Right?” he told himself while flashing back what happened the day before when Xiumin scanned Jiyeon’s memory during the kiss. He was on his laptop the whole day, researching about Jung Jiyeon.

Luhan found out something that they weren’t told before. Unlike other agents who signed up under SHL Secret Agency, Jiyeon got kidnapped at the age of four. Without wasting a split second, Luhan told Xiumin to fetch Jiyeon that time just to get a background check. Turns out, he was right. “That doesn’t explain the blood though…” he mumbled. Then he jerked back, realizing what it was. “Is it… what they call… menstruations…?” he asked himself with a horrified look.

Meanwhile, Xiumin was in the living room, staring at the frozen metal ball. It kept on blinking that it made him wonder if it was a bomb. Xiumin noticed that the ball was changing color, from metallic silver to bloody red. Just then, he had a quick flashback of spotting Jiyeon’s blinking wrist. “It couldn’t be…” he mumbled. “Is this a microchip?” he asked himself. His train of thoughts was interrupted by Luhan’s sudden shout mentioning ‘menstruations’. Due to that, his attention shifted to the certain bloodstain that his friend mentioned. He knew it wasn’t menstruations. The situation was quite obvious if only both of them knew about the microchip. Xiumin closed his eyes and tried to scan Jiyeon even if she was kilometers away. He sighed sharply as he murmured, “Anaemia.”.

Luhan was leaning on the wall, still thinking about the bloodstain on her pillow. It would’ve been on the lower part of the bed if it really were menstruations. “Is she lovesick?” he asked himself, feeling really dumb.

Xiumin came up to him and flicked his forehead. “Hey dummy, if you didn’t drop out of the academy then you should’ve known that Jiyeon is diagnosed with anaemia.”

“Stop using flowery words. It’s hard for me to understand,” the boy commented. “And what’s anaemia?” he asked.

“Anaemia is a sickness where a person lacks blood. People diagnosed with anaemia will feel extremely fatigue. Not only that, but they would have breathing problems and their pulse will increase,” he explained. “Lovesickness… Dear, where did you get that idea…” he covered his face with his palm.

“Somewhere,” Luhan answered shortly. He couldn’t remember the name of the person who told him about lovesickness.

Xiumin groaned as he stood up. “I’m going to make Jiyeon tutor you,” he chuckled. “Your grammar .”

“It does not!” Luhan protested. Then he looked down and conceded, “Okay maybe just a little…”.

The older boy turned to Luhan. He noticed that Luhan wasn’t as cold as the past few days due to the sudden fear of dirt. Before leaving him in the room, Xiumin chuckled, “You’re starting open up baby Luhan.”

“Baby…– Hyung!” Luhan frowned as he followed Xiumin out of the room.

“Why did you make her hate music?” Jessica shouted, her voice echoing in the hallway.

Krystal was the complete opposite of Jessica. She was really calm and she showed no sign of anger or annoyance at all. “This will be the result when she likes music. Tiredness,” she replied with an emotionless look.

Jessica grunted before dragging Jiyeon out of the room and back to her office. Chanyeol approached them before they could even reach Jessica’s table. But before she could even tell him about what had happened, the male received a call from an unknown number. Jiyeon looked at it and claimed that it was Xiumin’s.

Chanyeol thought for about a minute before he finally answered the call. He didn’t have a chance to ask why Xiumin called because he was cut off as soon as he answered it. “Give me Jung Jiyeon now or everyone dies. The girl has anaemia,” Xiumin threatened. Like on cue, Chanyeol spotted the male across the line right outside the hallway without any weapons. He looked unarmed if you excluded the unbearable cool temperature coming from his hands. Xiumin repeated himself, feeling definitely angry. “Give me Jung Jiyeon now!” he shouted at the phone, which was levitating closely to his ear, and in front of all of them. Jiyeon escaped from Jessica’s grip and rushed to Xiumin.

“Hey, Xiu ah… Calm down please... What’s wrong…?” she held him by his shoulders.

Chanyeol was going to get her back as soon as Xiumin started slightly burying his face in her neck. He was unwantedly thrown up to the ceiling, without anyone touching him, by no other than Luhan. “This is all your fault…” he mumbled in a scary tone. He looked scarier than Jiyeon ever saw him before. He was beyond scary. Luhan was filled with anger.

Unexpectedly, all the work papers started flying around the room and soon formed a shape of a tornado. Sehun appeared beside Luhan with a smirk pasted on his face. Another boy appeared in front of Chanyeol, levitating in mid air as well. It was like he teleported or something. “How can you hurt such a girl, hm?” he tilted his head to the left. Jessica was going to inform Mr. Lim about their current situation when her wrist was abruptly being squeezed. It was too tight for her that it made her drop her work phone. The male behind her smirked and said, “Thanks for the phone.” She looked behind her with robotic movements and saw a boy with a devilish look. He was grinning evilly and it made fear engulf her whole. The boy disappeared completely after clearing her contact list without even turning the phone on.

“Xiumin…” Jiyeon whispered. “What’s wrong…?” she asked with a silent sniff, a tear trickling down her cheek. She was scared to death.

“Don’t worry. I’m right here,” he shushed her and hugged her gently. “I’m not allowing this. It can’t happen… Not to you…”

author's note ♦

Please tell me if you spot any typo errors
Or if I accidentally replaced Jiyeon's name with Semi XD

Sorry for the late update by the way
I know I update slow... Well, I am keeping a constant speed, right?
I hope you guys still love the story despite the slow updates

Anyways, what do you think about this chapter?
Leave a comment, okie? :)
See you~