"I'm here~" Hwasa sang as she came in, walking up to the refrigerator with grocery bags in hand. "Bet you all missed me."

"Glad to see you've somehow sobered up." Solar glanced over at her from the TV. "And I think you should know that I hardly missed your crazy antics. Don't tell me you're putting more alcohol in that fridge?"

Hwasa just laughed. "Oh, what would you do if all your time wasn't taken up by us?"

Solar looked to her left, where Moonbyul was resting with the ice still on her head. "Probably getting lots of work done," she replied. "You wouldn't believe what you missed out on back here."

"What the...?" Hwasa murmured, finding the gun Solar had hidden away. "Don't tell me you were planning on using this. Don't tell me you already did, on her." She joined her two eonnis on the couch, soju in one hand and pointing to Moonbyul with the gun in her other.

"No, I just knocked her out."

Hwasa expression became that of some mix of fear, confusion, and awe.

Solar shook her head and said, "I mean, she woke up already. Now she's just sleeping, I guess..."

Hwasa shrugged. "So long as you don't kill anyone." She grabbed the TV remote and used the edge to open her bottle, tossing the lid onto Moonbyul's face. "What are you watching?"

"Nothing, I don't know," the leader of the group sighed. "I've just been thinking."

"Wow. Deep."

"Yeah, like the trouble you're going to be in if you keep drinking that much." Solar gave her a look from the corner of her eye.

Before Hwasa could respond, the door opened once more. Not surprisingly, it was Wheein, who immediately grinned at the sight of the three others. "Heeeey, guys," she said, turning on her camera. "Am I interrupting anything? I hope I'm not interrupting anything. Just act like I'm not here at all..."

"Hi, Wheein," Solar said. "How about instead of creeping over there you join us?"

Wheein slid behind the couch to get to the other side, taking pictures as she went. After taking a picture of Moonbyul's nostrils, she took a seat on the floor. "Promise you won't yell at me anymore?" she asked Solar.

"Fine, I promise."

Hwasa giggled and turned to Solar. "Well, if it's that easy... Promise you won't put down my life choices?"

"Fine!"

Moonbyul slightly stirred in her sleep, mumbling, "Promise you'll let me protect you?"

"Yeah, whatever! Do what you all want! Doesn't matter what I end up doing, anyway. You'll all still do whatever you want."

Wheein turned and snapped a picture of her. "I love your face when you're upset."

Moonbyul bolted upright, ice flying. "Solar's upset?!" she shouted in concern before launching herself onto the older girl and nearly crushing her ribs. "It's okay! The aliens are gone now!"

Hwasa smirked. "Thanks to me." She took another swig of her drink, then seemingly began quietly making up some song about herself. "There's no one better than me~ There's no better drinker than me~"

"Get... Off!" Solar managed to say, pushing Moonbyul away. "I'm pretty sure protecting someone from supposed aliens is different from preventing their ability to breathe."

"Sorry, eonni," Moonbyul murmured dejectedly, flopping back over.

Wheein gave her a pat on the arm. "Want to see my picture collection?" she asked.

"Sure," the other girl replied. Hwasa also, unsurprisingly, seemed interested as well and joined the other two around the camera.

Solar sighed and used Wheein's shoulders as a footrest as she gave one glance at the TV before turning it off. She turned her attention to the rest off Mamamoo, laughing and "oooh"ing at various pictures on the floor. She had to wonder: why wasn't she like them? Why didn't she have some quirk, some thing she was fascinated with?

But maybe that was it. What she always wanted to see, what she needed to get through a bad day, what she needed to protect.

It was them.

Solar smiled and got to her feet. She'd give them their space for now, maybe go try her hand at the card tower again. But she knew she wouldn't be able to leave them alone for long.

"Yagh, eonni!" Wheein screamed, seeing Solar trip on the corner of a side table as she tried to leave. "Someone call an ambulance!"

Solar gritted her teeth in pain, grabbing her knee as if it would help the pain there. "No! I'm fine," she grunted.

"Really?" Moonbyul ripped her hands away to see the few small scrapes on Solar's joint. "You're bleeding!"

Hwasa grabbed the towel that had held the ice and dumped her alcohol all over it. "This will disinfect it!" she cried triumphantly, slapping the cloth on the wound.

"OW!" Solar nearly kicked Hwasa in the face in an attempt to get her away. "Agh, it burns!"

Wheein's eyes grew wide. "She's going crazy with pain; we have to calm her down."

"What?! No I'm not! I'm barely even hurt."

Moonbyul scooped a rather unwilling Solar up and dumped her back on the couch, finding a discarded blanket to tuck all around her so she could barely move. "We'll save you, Solar! Just don't move. Hwasa, I need bandages, STAT!"

Solar tried to break free. "What is this, some medical drama? Just let me go! I'm fine!

Wheein her forehead and cooed in a soothing tone, "You've been through a lot, we know. Just let us help you and you'll feel better in no time."

After putting an oversized Band-Aid on the small injury, the two rappers smiled at Solar and asked, "Where would you be without us?"

"Safe yet probably bored out of my mind," she replied honestly. "What did I do to deserve you guys?" And looking at their innocent-yet-not-so-innocent faces, she knew it must have been something pretty darn good. They could really use some change around there, but... Who would want to, really?

~~~

Author's Note: Thank you so much for reading, commenting, and subscribing, everyone! I know this is a really crazy story, but I'm glad to see that people besides me enjoyed it. I worked hard to finish it up, so I hope that you thought it had an at least somewhat satisfying ending? Anyway, thanks again and I hope I have more stories for you soon!