A few weeks ago...

“He’s going to kill himself,” Hoshi said to Pledisboss through the phone, “please do something about it. Please get him a psychologist or something before he does anything stupid.” Hoshi seemed extremely anxious for their crazy leader, and Pledisboss could just imagine Hoshi’s twinkling eyes filled with concern.

“Don’t worry, Soonyoung,” Pledisboss had replied, “I have it under control. I’ll go talk to him myself if I have to.”

Yes, Pledisboss had it all under control. This was perfect, actually. Pledisboss wanted to get rid of Seungcheol anyways. He was the blemish on Seventeen’s almost spotless record. He was the reason a lot of Koreans were refusing to listen to Seventeen, to buy their songs, to support them. Not mention all of the money spent hiring psychologists to come talk to him. With Seungcheol gone, it would save Pledisboss the trouble of firing him, and the money for treating his mental issues.

-

So NU’EST finally released their statement from wherever they were in Japan:

This path of destruction, we will continue to tread.
Tell Seventeen: they’ve much more to dread.

Pledisboss scoffed. When would they ever get off their high horse and stop trying to destroy Seventeen? He was so irritated with them. He wanted this to just end so that he could start milking money from both groups’ newfound popularity. But no, apparently NU’EST had more up their sleeve and Seventeen’s reputation was on the line.

Pledisboss could not let that happen.

NU’EST was acting irrationally, and he could tell that none of them wanted to cooperate and they didn’t want to come back and promote as NU’EST anymore. They had the opportunity to come back, to promote in Korea and with all the popularity in the world, but they chose instead to keep destroying Seventeen.

Pledisboss knew that there’s nothing he could do to keep them on his side. Plus, he wasn’t even sure that it would help if they were on his side. Netizens now hate NU’EST. Sure, there’s a lot of publicity, but it is bad publicity.

He didn’t want NU’EST anymore. He wanted to get rid of them, for the company to let go of them.

It would not be so hard to get rid of them. All they needed to do was get caught. He was sure that as soon as they’re caught, the members would be arrested. Everyone seemed so sure of it. The only reason Baekho seemed to avoid it was because he didn’t agree with the defamation.

Pledisboss just needed to lure them out of their hiding spot. But how?

Kill Baekho, the devil in his head told him, they five of them are close friends. You know it. They would be devastated. They would feel guilty about the whole thing, and come out of hiding. They would at least want to come to Baekho’s funeral… Plus, they would be arrested and so you wouldn’t have to worry about them anymore.

But, Pledisboss did have a conscience. He knew that killing Baekho was wrong. His conscience and the devil had fought it out in his head. He weighed his options, the advantages the disadvantages.

He came to the conclusion that killing Baekho would be best.

For one, the death would attract more international media attention. Secondly, it would lure NU’EST out of hiding and so they would finally stop with this stupid project they have going on. Plus, Baekho’s death gives more marketing opportunities. Filming Seventeen mourning their rival’s death would surely make people love them. He could almost see the netizens’ comments: “aw, even after everything that monster Baekho had done, they still cry for him. How compassionate” and blobloblo. It was just a perfecting marketing ploy. Seventeen would be loved by all!

No one would suspect Pledisboss, he thought. Who would suspect the CEO of destroying his own building?

-

After he succeeded in his crime and destroyed all of the evidence, another idea then came to his head involving Seungcheol.

The CEO went to the Seventeen dorm after the fire under the pretense that he was filming Seventeen’s reaction to the death for the curious public to watch. His main objective there, however, was not that at all.

He entered Seungcheol’s confinement room.

“Hey, Coups,” Pledisboss told the leader, trying to sound kind and affectionate by using his stage name. He smiled onto the mentally challenged boy.

“Hi, boss,” Seungcheol replied in a slur, “the police is going to question me about the fire, aren’t they?”

“Yeah,” the boss responded.

“I didn’t do it,” Seungcheol said, “I hate Baekho, but I didn’t do it. I was locked in here. I swear.”

“I know, Coups, I know. They’re questioning everyone, not just you. Just tell them the truth”

“But I think I know who did do it,” Seungcheol added with wide eyes, “and I’m not going to rat him out.”

Pledisboss curiously raised an eyebrow, “who?”

“Hoshi. I talked to him yesterday. He was scared of Baekho, and it looked like he wanted to do something bad to him.”

Pledisboss blinked, and his mind quickly worked to try and think of a way to bring that to his advantage.

“It is Hoshi,” Pledisboss lied, and Seugcheol easily believed it. “But the police doesn’t know for sure,” Pledisboss whispered.

“But they suspect him?” Seungcheol asked. His lower lip quavered as he considered the prospect of his friend going to jail for murder.

“Yeah, unfortunately,” Pledisboss responded, “he’ll go to jail at this rate.”

Seungcheol’s eyes were abnormally wide as he looked in Pledisboss’ direction, “oh no.”

“We can save him, Coups,” Pledisboss whispered to him, “we can save him together.”

“How?” Seungcheol asked desperately, the crazy, irrational side of him starting show with that glimmer in his eyes.

And so Pledisboss directed him as to what to do. He told Seungcehol to commit suicide and use his suicide note to help Hoshi and all of Seventeen. He directed Seungcheol, told him the carefully constructed words to write.

Pledisboss made sure that Seungcheol had sufficiently promoted his group in the letter. He told world to love and support Seventeen, and that “they are passionate, kind-hearted, loyal.” Pledisboss was sure that would make people love them more, and that it would help that Seungcheol’s misdoings are not conflated with Seventeen’s.

Of course, there were some silly mistake that Pledisboss had missed when he directed Seungcheol's writing of the letter. Seungcheol wrote eleven members instead of twelve. That led to a whole lot of conspiracy theories on online forums, but Pledisboss was sure that it was just a stupid mistake spurred by Seungcheol's irrationality.

Pledisboss was also surprised to see that Seungcheol added a P.S. to the letter before he committed the suicide. "To you-know-who: Goodbye. Live well," he wrote to Hoshi. Pledisboss did not approve of that part; it was added afterwards on Seungcheol's own accord. Pledisboss was afraid it would raise suspicion, but people just figured it was directed at someone who was part of Seungcheol's personal life.

Seungcheol had also made one last request before his death. He sent a letter to Hoshi, asking Pledisboss to give it to him. Pledisboss took the letter, and figured it wouldn’t hurt to grant Seungcheol this one last dying wish. Hoshi was too stupid to do anything with that letter anyways. Pledisboss thought it was the least he could do after encouraging the boy to commit suicide.

And so, with Seungcheol’s suicide, all suspicion was finally cleared.

-

Pledisboss got rid of NU’EST’s threat with the fire. He got rid of the suspicion surrounding the fire with Seungcheol’s suicide. Now, all of NU’EST was in jail and out of his hair. Now, all he had was a lot of money and a budding kpop band with a clean record that the media, international and otherwise, absolutely loves. Seventeen, the group with kindhearted members that cried when their enemy died. Seventeen, the group that the evil band NU’EST had tried to destroy. Seventeen, the mega-talented and close-knit group of boys who had an for a leader (but it’s okay because that is dead).

Seventeen, the “passionate, kind-hearted, and loyal.”

Final Author’s Note:

AND THAT’S A WRAP. Congrats to those who guessed right in the last chapter haha

Now for a long- Author’s Note...

I don’t know if you guys liked this ending. Did I tie all the knots? Was it anti-climatic? For some reason, I feel like it is, but I’ll let you be the judge of that! :D

Did you expect it to be Pledisboss? I actually did give a lot of hints that it would be Pledisboss, but no one caught on to them. If you read back, you'll see them!

CONFESSION TIME: When I first wrote this, I had in mind that the final culprit would be Junghan’s mom, not Pledisboss. I thought no one would guess it, but as it turns out, everyone did. I didn’t want it to be so predictable so I changed it to Pledisboss lol. It worked out really well though (because I did have Pledisboss as a suspect).

But, for fairness, those who guessed Junghan’s mom on chapter 15 will get the oneshot because I did hint more strongly that it would be Junghan’s mom. So I have a lot of work to do ;; The ones who get the oneshot are: aniskwangchannie, Perfiction, mikinikino, He17oAlice, Lovebisous, and ssang321. If you want the one shot, just comment here what band and/or genre and/or pairing you want and I will comply and write it for you. Please be patient though because I have another story to get to, and plus I started my university semester, and so I might be a while.

Anyways, thank you guys so much for reading and subscribing and commenting and upvoting and sharing and engaging with the story and supporting me. It was quite a roller coaster to write, I hope it was enjoyable for you guys as well.

If you got all the way to the end, even if you’ve never commented before, please comment now and let me know your final thoughts; I would very much appreciate that. :)

My only regret with the story is that I feel like I rushed it sometimes because I was on a deadline. I wish I had come across the competition earlier and written this over a more extended period of time. I would have probably been able to do more with the characters, the romance and the mysteries and give you more hints and stuff. But oh wellll…

Also,  NU’EST is working on a comeback (so this story this will not take place in real life, thank the Lord). I want to ask you all to please support them because they are poor unfortunate souls oppressed by Pledis Entertainment as this story has so vividly shown you :D

I might write more mystery/thrillers like this later on in life, so keep a look out for that!

Okay. I think that's all I have to say. It was an honor writing for you all <3

BYE, and thank you!