I shakily went up to the podium, my knees feeling weaker than ever. 'Come on, pull it together, Viola. Just tell them why you're here,' I thought. 'Baby steps, baby steps.' Oh god, I can't do this. I'm frozen, people were looking, staring even. How the hell am I gonna get to deliver this speech when I don't have anything prepared? I only prepared our terms and conditions! I didn't know we needed to introduce ourselves. 'Okay, start with your group name.' 

"Uh, hello," I greeted, hesitantly. No response. Okay, then. "My name is Viola Poisson Mathieu, and I'm the leader of Allegro." Again, silence. Well, this is a tough crowd. I looked around and I saw Tao and the boy I saw earlier, they both gave me a thumbs up. I looked at my group, and they were all encouraging me to keep going by widening their eyes at me, and motioning with their hands, as if to say, 'Go on'. "First off, uh, we were founded by our conductor, Monsieur de Grance, when we were in high school. We were a small group of singers. And uh, our goal is to uhm...share our music with the rest of the world." 

"Okay?" A girl in front said. The other girls she was with started laughing, as well, and in a matter of seconds the whole room was laughing. Holy . I can't. "Look, just tell us why you're here, to get this over with," She retorted condescendingly.

"I would love to do that, but then, I think some people here in this room actually care about what we have to say," I blurted out...almost confidently. I mentally covered my mouth with my hand. What have I done? I looked at the girl, and her smirk fell into a deep scowl. "Anyway, I know our reception won't be as great compared to the other local groups, because yeah, I'm sure most of you are thinking that we don't belong here. That we should just go home. Leave Seoul behind." I glanced at my group. "But I believe, otherwise, Allegro isn't here to assimilate our music with yours. We aren't here to try to convince you to like our music, instead, we're here to share our genre, to promote openness to other cultures. We'd like to learn from you as so as we would like you to learn from us." 

"And bring our sort of music into your genre? To steal our music? Is that it?" One of the girl's companions challenged. "I don't know why you're here, but if you're expecting us to like a bunch of foreign musicians like you-" 

"I'm not expecting anything, mademoiselle," I suddenly shifted a bit to French. Oh god, I didn't realize how thick my accent was, until now. I don't know if it's a good thing to just switch from Korean to French, in a matter of seconds, usually, that would indicate that things were heating up, it's in my habitual makeup. "I have no right to expect anything," I said returning back to Korean. "All I can do is hope for the success of this 'alliance' of some sort, between our genres. You have our word that we will not steal anything, not one note from your songs, not one line, not one motif. We know where our boundaries lie. Allegro is not just a musical group but we also promote musical diplomacy. We're here to share, unless that wasn't taught to you during your Kindergarten years, miss, that sharing is caring," I almost spat out sarcastically. "Allegro is a group that not only wants to create a legacy." I looked at Lily, who was now smiling. "Allegro is a group that wants to create friendships, build bridges, make connections from outside our comfort zones," If I had to lie to get that contract signed, I might as well do it. But the thing that scared me was the fact that I was being...a tad bit sincere...as if I wasn't lying for a slight bit.

"Think of it this way, two completely different musical styles coming together as one to form something new, something made out of two genius works of art. How will we know our boundaries when we're too afraid to try to get to the edge of what you think is your boundary?" Bea asked from across the room, backing me up. She winked at me, and I beamed at her. I glanced at Tao and his group, and I confirmed that they were willing to help out, by just looking at their faces gleaming with inspiration and interest. 

"Will that be all, Miss Mathieu?" The artistic director asked with a smile. I looked into his eyes, and my god, did they remind me of Monsieur de Grance's. How it twinkled upon hearing words of sharing and creating something new. I knew, by just looking in his eyes, that he understood. I shook my head. "Now, without further ado, I present to you a number from Allegro's debut album 'Vivace Bel Canto', entitled, 'Preisung'." I nodded to my group to come up. (A/N: I don't own Sjaella Preisung nor their songs) We all smiled at each other before beginning. 

The moment we began to sing, it's as if the whole room began to fade away. I didn't feel anything, just simply the notes flowing out of our bodies. In that moment, I had imagined Monsieur de Grance conducting in front of us, just like he used to, with his ever-blinding twinkling expression, with his burning passion for music and his fatherly gaze as we sung. I began to cry as I sang my solo, tears leaking out of my eyes, running down my cheeks. My companions looked at me and began to worry, I held up my hand, to signal them I was okay. We continued on til the end, and the room just started to fade in again. I looked and I saw the girls that taunted us earlier in near tears. EXO was simply staring at us in awe. As we ended, I wiped away my tears. Then, I heard faint clapping from the back, to see some members from EXO clapping for us, then, the whole room had joined in, even our taunters. We took a bow and I mentally thanked Monsieur de Grance. 

"So, based on what you've shown us-" We turned to the man speaking, the CEO of SM Entertainment. "I'm afraid-" I suddenly felt my heart drop to the ground. Damn it, don't tell me we didn't make it. "That we'll be needing more dorms for these young ladies. And more trainers." I looked up to see the CEO beam at us, eyes full of so much hope and belief that we were going to do their company good. Allegro began to scream, and in reaction, Lily had pulled us all in for a group hug. "Welcome to SM Entertainment." The clapping in the room roared.

"Training starts tomorrow, in the meantime, we will be arranging your dorms. I'm afraid you're gonna have to stay in your hotel for a week more," The artistic director said. "Neil would've been proud of you." That was- "Neil de Grance would've been so proud of you." Oh my god. "I knew your conductor, we went to college together and I must say, I bet he's really impressed as of the moment, SM has only accepted one group with that genre, and that is Allegro. Shame for me to have lost communication with your conductor, though, but I'm sure he's looking down at you girls right now. The moment I saw Miss Mathieu walk up front, all I could hear was, 'Oh my, those are de Grance's kids right?'. You made it, Allegro. You girls have made history." 

"That's not the only thing we can sing, sir. We still have a lot of tricks up our sleeve, right Allegro?" Marie grinned mischievously.

"Definitely," I replied. "There's still more to us than singing these songs."

"Well, we'll be looking forward to that."

I looked at EXO again, and I saw that they were still clapping, most especially Tao and the mystery boy that stood next to him. 

Here we go, we're in.