All of the Seventeen members eventually cried after they saw Seungcheol’s limp corpse hanging like that from the chandelier. When he was let down and carried away, it hit them that they had lost him forever.

Somehow, the fact he had burned down the Pledis building and committed murder did not matter to them. That fact was pushed aside in favor of the happier memories they had with him. He was their leader. Their kind, compassionate and determined leader who invested so much of himself into Seventeen. The person who committed the murder was not their S.Coups, it was a mentally challenged psycho that had nothing to do with him. Their leader had left them the moment he lost his mind. Now, he was gone forever. Irrecoverable. It was hard for all of them to accept.

The police took Seungcheol’s confession letter and accepted it as sufficient evidence to close the case of the Pledis fire. Woozi was thus released from his detainment and declared innocent of the charges.

When he returned to s, Woozi joined them in their mourning.

Woozi felt responsible for all of the deaths that were now surrounding him. Both Baekho and Seungcheol’s death were on his hands. The fact that Seungcheol confessed to killing Baekho did not really substantiate well in his head, and so Woozi found that he felt no resentment for Seungcheol at all.

It was Woozi who betrayed Seungcheol and sent out all of those photos and therefore drove him out of his mind and then eventually to suicide. It was also Woozi who drove Baekho to come out of hiding, which eventually led to his death. Woozi himself was the responsible one. Not Seungcheol.

Woozi also knew that Seungcheol was aware of the betrayal: “My members are best of people. All 11 of them. They are passionate, kind-hearted, loyal,” Seungcheol had written in his letter. All eleven of them. They were twelve, but he knew he was the one that was missing from that number. He was not a member of Seventeen. He was not passionate, not kind-hearted, and certainly not loyal.

Seungcheol would have pieced it all together: Woozi’s past relationship with Baekho, his resentment of him after Seungcheol had seen him with Hoshi and prevented the relationship, the fact Woozi was the only one in the world (besides Seungcheol and the mother) that knew about the affair, and NU’EST’s final message (“Traitors lie with traitors; it’s natural, I guess. I hope you’re happy with whom you obsess”). Seungcheol, however, did not call Woozi out. He did not let the other members know. He just accepted the betrayal, and dealt with it alone.

Woozi would never get over the guilt of doing this to Seungcheol, of driving him to depression and eventually to suicide. The pain that came with the loss of Baekho actually seemed a reasonable punishment from Seungcheol…

“To you-know-who: Good job. Live well!” Seungcheol had also written. It felt like a middle finger to Woozi from Seungcheol. Good job. You ruined my life. You destroyed my career. You made me kill your precious boyfriend. Live well, and you.

So many people had loved and trusted him. He let them all down. He didn’t even deserve to be among the Seventeen members anymore. He was not part of the “eleven.”

“Guys,” DK asked s as they sat together in mourning, “what will we do about Seventeen?”

The members of Seventeen looked at one another. After a small exchange, they decided they wanted to continue it, like S.Coups had requested in his letter.

Woozi, however, had decided to drop out. He really did not want to continue being a part of Seventeen if S.Coups had not wanted him to be a part of it. He also felt so unworthy to be among them, the eleven “passionate, kind-hearted, and loyal” members...

-

Hoshi was so confused. He held Seungcheol’s note with his trembling hands, a note that Hoshi found in his pocket two days after the suicide.

Dear Hoshi,

You did it! I’m so happy you had the conviction to do it! I convinced you, didn't I? It must not have been easy committing murder, I can imagine! Good job. I want to do one final thing for you as Seventeen’s leader, and that is I want to get rid of all the suspicion surrounding you and Seventeen. I will confess to the crime and take the blame, so now you can live without the worry of being caught.

Goodbye, my friend. Live well! Seventeen, fighting!

Your hyung, friend and leader,
S.Coups

PS: Destroy this letter as soon as you read it or else the police will find it and put you in jail!

Hoshi read the letter a couple of times before he processed that this was actually happening. It was written by S.Coups, no doubt about it. It was his handwriting, his signature…

He read the final P.S. again and panicked. What if the police find this letter and start believing that Hoshi started the fire? What if they put him in jail because of it? It needed to be destoryed!

He had to get rid of it immediately before the police find it. He tore it up into many pieces and swallowed some of them. He choked, and so dashed into the bathroom and flushed the rest down the toilet. His heart was beating quickly as he imagined what would happen if someone actually found it.

What if the CIA extract the letter from my stomach somehow? What if they find the pieces down in the sewer. Gosh, stupid Hoshi! I should have burned it like they do in the movies! me. So stupid.

When the paranoia died down a little bit after a bit of time, Hoshi took the time to actually think about what was written in the letter. Seungcheol did not set the fire to the Pledis building. He only confessed to the crime in order to save Hoshi from suspicion.

Hoshi blinked a couple of times. What was happening? It made no sense. Nothing made sense anymore.

Hoshi had always that something was suspicious about Seungcheol’s initial suicide letter as soon as he had stated that Hoshi had forgotten to lock the door last time he visited. But Hoshi had been certain that he did lock the door. He doubted himself after reading the letter, and thought he would regret it for the rest of his life. Leaving that door unlocked had led to the death of five people, or so Hoshi had thought.

But he did lock the door.

He also was not the one to set the Pledis building on fire like S.Coups seemed to believe. But if it was not Seungcheol, nor was it Hoshi, then who in God’s name could it be?

Now that he thought about it, there was something else that bothered him about this little note that Hoshi could not stop thinking about.

How is it in my pocket now? Two days after the suicide?

A/N: Surprise. That's all i have to say about this chapter lol.

NU'EST IS PREPARING FOR A COMEBACK. YALL BEST BE READY FOR SLAYAGE.

So Pledis released a (real) statement earlier saying that NU'EST will be the next Pledis comeback. SOOOO maybe this story won't take place irl after all haha

*fingers crossed that the song is called Armor and is as awesome as Face*