Mark capped his bottled water, stuffing it into his bag quietly. He wiped the sweat on his forehead, catching a quick glimpse at Jackson and Bambam through the reflection of the mirrors. They were huddled in a corner of the practice studio wearing hostile expressions and crossed arms, heavily involved in a heated discussion that was gradually rising in volume.

He spotted Jaebum a few metres away, stealing quick but careful glances at the duo, although he, like Mark, made no move to intervene. Earlier this week, Jinyoung had lost his patience when Jaebum tried to resolve Youngjae and Yugyeom’s dispute, and swore at Jaebum, claiming that his tendency to poke his nose into everyone's business was unbearably annoying. Jinyoung told him off sharply that they should be able to solve their own problems on their own, without intervention from their leader or anyone else, before storming out and slamming the door.

Jaebum sighed, and Mark's eyes met his for a moment, before the leader broke their gaze first and lowered his head. Gritting his teeth, Mark wondered how many times Jaebum had stopped being himself after Jinyoung’s scathing remarks. When had Jaebum even decided that he had to compromise his leadership to make s happy? He had never been one to back down, especially not from challenges and arguments because it was Jaebum who helped them overcome their obstacles — by providing a listening ear, sound advice and so much more. After watching Jaebum’s lips draw into a straight line, Mark knew that if nobody rectified the situation soon, his leader would really change his personality and leadership for their sake, even if they were completely undeserving of it.

Jaebum gripped the hem of his shirt tightly, trying his best to tune out the increasingly audible argument between Jackson and Bambam. Tapping his foot lightly as he counted the beats, he executed the point dance in the chorus as the music played through the speakers, punctuated by the duo’s heated discussion. As the chorus moved onto the next verse, Jaebum gave a small smile to Yugyeom, who was the only one who had been matching his dance steps to Jaebum’s. The maknae, who was clueless about he should do about the tense situation, had just followed Jaebum’s silent practice without a word.

Yugyeom nodded at Jaebum, although there was a bitter aftertaste when he dropped his smile. Although the verse had already ended, Yugyeom did not follow the dance steps to the next part. Instead, he pressed his fingers to his temples, sighing softly. Of course, the fact that no one had heard his weak sigh over the noise, made the sinking feeling in pit of his stomach even heavier than it already was. For the past few weeks, everyone had been getting under each other’s skins, and there had been countless trivial yet intense arguments here and there. He had been laying low, carrying on practising and refusing to take sides. Today, however, he had a premonition that something serious was about to happen, and he could not shake off the grim feeling.

GOT7 hardly even seemed like GOT7 anymore, just as dance practice rarely even seemed like dance practice; their tight teamwork that they had built up over the past year was falling apart, and every day a few of them would fight over something stupid, blow it completely out of proportion while the uninvolved members turned a blind eye, absorbed in their own bubbles of ignorance.

“Hyung, you’re not listening to what I’m saying! I don’t want to do this anymore. I’m sick of it, I’m sick of trying to be good to my fans and having rumours and scandals form around me. All I’m trying to do is to give them fan service, because I truly love them for supporting us, but the media has posted so many false stories about me! They’re all lies!” Bambam shouted, his voice ringing loud and clear as he forcefully threw the magazine in his hand onto the floor. It landed on the wooden floor with a dull thud, but his voice had pierced through heightened tension in the practice room, causing everyone to come to a standstill, momentarily stunned at his outburst.

Although he was taken aback by how quickly Jackson and Bambam’s argument today rose to its , Jinyoung wanted to roll his eyes at how every person in the room had gone quiet, despite their song was still blasting noisily from the huge speakers. The awkward juxtaposition of their happy song against their solemn mood amplified the extremely uncomfortable circumstances they were currently facing. Walking over to the stereo with light but quick footsteps, he hastily pressed the mute button, stopping their song before the ridiculously happy chorus could come on again.

On a normal day, Jinyoung would have ignored whatever argument was happening, unless the altercation between s directly involved him, but it was more than a little absurd to just continue dancing when Bambam had shrieked at the top of his voice. Jinyoung was a person who stubbornly believed that not every disagreement could be easily resolved through reason and logic, and thus did not bother making up after his disputes with others. But as thick-headed as Jinyoung he was, he could identify that this was not just their typical feud between members. In fact, he was sure that instead of raising his volume to get the final say, his dongsaeng had done it to start a whole new argument — one that involved all seven of them.

“Can you stop throwing your tantrums like a ing child?” Youngjae snapped at Bambam, glaring from where he was sitting on the floor. “It’s already difficult enough to concentrate without you making a ruckus and acting out.”

The younger boy's eyes immediately glinted with malice, as he retorted, “Why do you even need to concentrate? Or rather, what are you concentrating on? It sure as hell didn’t look like you were practising. All you've been doing is study!”

Youngjae glared, gathering his sc