05. Yunrae's sorting hat

“Hyung! Hyung did you see? The lists are up!” Taeryung pants, running up to the first person he laid eyes on after discovering the mysterious slips of paper in the YRT2016 practice room. “They posted the teams for the girls and the boys, we have to go now before a crowd gets there!”

“Alright, alright, coming,” Dohyun laughs, patting Hyukjin (to whom he had been talking to before) on the shoulder. “You heard the little guy, wouldn’t want to fight through thirty or so people to see the list right?” Hyukjin nods silently before following the other two trainees towards the practice room. Opening the door, they discover that a couple more trainees had heard the news and were gathered around the list. Waiting their turn, Taeryung bites his lip when he hears the groans and squeals coming from the previous group. After the other trainees leave, Taeryung immediately bounds up to the list scanning it for his name. He hadn’t wanted to see what team he was by himself, he had been scared that he would be be all alone. Although, technically, it didn’t matter if he checked it now or later, but he still felt safer checking it with other people.

“Hyung! We’re in the same group!” Taeryung cheers, heart calming when he spies his name below Dohyun’s. “But Hyukjin hyung isn’t with us.”

“I’m in Icarus?” Hyukjin says, more of a comment than a question. He taps his chin thoughtfully, looking through the other names on the list before scowling at a couple trainees. “Well, it could be worse,” the male scans through the other group before sighing. “I’ll be going now, see you guys later.” Bidding goodbye to the hard working male, Taeryung turns back to the list to see who else was on his team.

“Gladius also has Seungcheol hyung, oh! And Jisang! Bongjoon is there too – ugh – and Taewoo hyung. Everyone else must be in Icarus,” Taeryung pouts when he realizes he won’t be with all of his friends.

“They put Myunghwan and Chihu in the same group,” Dohyun smiles, “that’ll be fun.”

“What do you mean?” Taeryung asks, tilting his head to the side like a small, oblivious puppy. Shaking his head, Dohyun pats the other boy on the head before letting the topic go.

“You’ll understand when you’re older,” Dohyun replies sagely before Taeryung is distracted by the opening of the door. Turning, Taeryung spies more members of the maknae squad along with several older males – no doubt drawn by the news of the list. “Oh hey! It’s over here,” Dohyun calls when Jisang scans the training room in confusion. Walking forwards, Dohyun pulls Taeryung to the side so other people could check the list as well before waiting in the corner for the other trainees to join them.

“Looks like we’re together,” Seungcheol winks at Dohyun, to which the older male replies with an amused scoff and eye roll. “Too bad San isn’t with us,” Seungcheol contemplates, before pulling Taeryung towards him and patting his head much like he would with a dog. “At least we got a little cute maknae huh?”

“Isn’t Jisang technically maknae though? He’s the youngest in YRT2016 I think,” Taekjin speaks up. “Or is there someone younger?”

“There’s another boy my age but he was born later in the year,” Jisang replies. “And I think there’s a girl younger than me in YRG2016.”

“Well, now that we know what teams we’re in, what are we supposed to do now?” Chihu asks impatiently. He hadn’t wanted to come in to train today seeing as trainees technically weren’t required to show up every day of the week but after receiving a text that the lists were up, he was forced to haul himself out of bed.

“Who knows, I hear we’re supposed to gather together later on to figure out who’s going to be in the Cosmos MV though, for now I guess we practice,” Dohyun answers. The rest of the group groans slightly, they had been training for who knows how long and had all been low key hoping that by joining YRT2016, they’d be doing something different. “Don’t be so sad, let’s hop to it!” Dohyun cheers, causing everyone to roll their eyes at him, before separating into smaller groups or individually to practice.

An hour or so later, all the trainees were called together once again and filed into the practice room. Inside stood Seohyun with Kyungsoo beside her, both seemingly flipping through pages but to the more observant eye, it was obvious that they were looking around and sizing up each trainee. Well, more like Seohyun was trying to, the younger girl was slightly intimidated by some of the bigger trainees and still needed to get used to her authoritative position. Kyungsoo on the other hand seemed just fine ordering a group of trainees away from the speakers and to join the rest of the group in the middle of the room.

“I’ve only been here like three times and I’m already tired of this room,” Chihu groans, plopping down. He was too short to see over everyone anyways so why try? Might as well conserve his energy. Following his cue, Myunghwan sits down next to him, sipping – surprisingly – on a water bottle, while Bongjoon ends up falling on his bottom beside them after slipping over his imaginary shoelace.

“Alright guys listen up!” Kyungsoo calls from the front, his deep voice immediately silencing the murmurs in the room. “So this is your first task as YRT2016, everyone has seen the lists of projects right? You all know what group you’re supposed to be in?” The trainees all nod, the news of the finalized project groups had spread like wildfire. “Well right now we’re going to pick the trainees who will appear in Cosmos’ MV. How we’ll do that is a kind of competition – boys against boys and girls against girls. The winning project teams will get to film the MV.”

“What the hell?” San recoils and it seems almost everyone else in the room had the same reaction. “We really can’t catch a break huh?”

“What do you expect? It’s a tough life and it’ll only get tougher if we debut, this kind of competition is nothing,” Hyukjin rolls his eyes, ignoring the glare San gives him.

“What’s your problem man? Everything I say you’re always against me–” San starts, but is fortunately cut off by Seohyun speaking up.

“The d-date of the assessments will be in three days,” Seohyun starts, voice wavering in nervousness but ending up as strong, albeit a bit quiet. “You can choose to do whatever you want, a dance, a cover, it’s up to you. Project Icarus and Project Gladius will be the first ones to battle followed by Projects Omega and Hedera.”

“You’re all dismissed to start practicing,” Kyungsoo exclaims, and him and Seohyun leave quickly before any of the trainees could stop them. Blinking in confusion, Jisang looks around the room for his fellow team members – just like everyone else. Soon enough, the project members manage to find each other and the tension in the room climbs. Appearing in a senior’s MV was the first step to getting your face out there, and like it or not, there was definitely a high sense of competition between all the trainees.

“Where do you want to practice?” Dohyun asks when everyone gathers around him.

“Let’s take the boys practice room before anyone else can,” Seungcheol volunteers and the others nod. Seeing as the Icarus group was arguing over something, the band of boys quickly make their way into the other room. Looking around the slightly smaller practice room, Taeryung prances towards the supply closet before pulling out various materials.

“What are you doing Tae?” Taewoo asks, trying to look over the smaller male’s shoulder. Watching as Taeryung begins to write on a white cardboard he found, the older Tae bursts out laughing. “Classic,” Taewoo declares before holding up the sign Taeryung had quickly made.

“’Reserved for Project Gladius members only, stay out!’” Bongjoon reads, tripping over the unfamiliar Latin word, but managing to finish the sentence cleanly.

“Sounds good little buddy,” Seungcheol praises before ordering Taewoo to hang the sign outside the door. The other male opens the door slightly, looks over at the Project Icarus group, and sticks hit tongue out at them childishly before hanging the sign on the door and disappearing back into the room. “Alright, with that sorted out, let’s figure out what we should do hm?” Seungcheol looks around the group. Other than the trainees he knew, there were a couple new faces, but everyone seemed pretty competent. The only problem now however, was figuring out a performance that showcased their talents properly.

“Let’s start by stating our talents?” Dohyun speaks up after a short silence. “Then we can have a good idea of what everyone is comfortable with.” Nodding at the older boy’s suggestion, Seungcheol starts off, rambling his many talents – to which Taewoo replies with a snort – before the next person speaks up. After a while, every one of the boys had spoken. “Hm, seems like we have a lot of dancers and rappers, should we do something based on that then?”

“So less vocal heavy huh?” Seungcheol nods, reaching over to the speakers to pull out the one of many tablets stashed there for trainee use (it was supposed to be used for practice but barely anyone actually did anything but fool around on them). Clicking on the music app, Seungcheol looks through the list of songs before nodding. “Alright, let’s try something like this.”

Meanwhile, the other group, having been locked out of the private male practice room, was forced to share the larger one with Project Hedera. Looking around at the older boys – who were arguing over the fact that they hadn’t managed to secure the private room – Myunghwan sighs. Sipping on his drink, he frowns when he realizes he was almost out of water. While the other male would prefer to drink something a little more sugary, Kurami had stopped him on his way to practice and practically confiscated his milkshake. Replacing the sweet drink with regular water, Kurami had sent him on his way along with a short lecture about getting proper nutrients. Scoffing, Myunghwan had been too lazy to get his milkshake back, but had muttered a couple choice words about how Kurami was a psychologist – not a nutritionist – when the older girl had returned to the front desk.

“This is getting us nowhere,” Chihu mutters, watching as San and Hyukjin engage in another argument. This time, he wasn’t exactly sure what topic they were fighting over. It was weird; the two boys had tolerated each other’s presence up until a couple weeks back. While Hyukjin didn’t really like any of the other trainees, he had never openly lashed out on someone like this. Chihu didn’t know what sparked the feud between the two boys but he was certain they weren’t going to get any work done like this. Especially seeing as no one else in the group seemed to step up. Taekjin was muttering nervously, biting his lip and awkwardly moving his hands in order to try and stop the heated battle going on in front of him. Myunghwan was still sitting to Chihu’s left, shaking his empty water bottle around and muttering something about a psychologist, while the other trainees in their group merely watched San and Hyukjin with amusement in their eyes.

“Alright guys, stop this right now,” Junho finally speaks up, voice surprisingly cutting through the tension easily. San and Hyukjin shut their mouths, but glare at each other nonetheless. Stepping forwards, Junho gently guides the two trainees to the opposite sides of the group. Sitting back down in his previous spot in the middle, Junho rubs his head gently as he looks around the group. “Shall we introduce ourselves?” he asks, although from the way he stares at Hyukjin and San, it was more of an order than a question. Junho starts, followed by Taekjin, until everyone in the circle was somewhat acquainted with one another.

“I noticed we have a lot of vocal heavy trainees,” Hyukjin speaks up, ignoring the slight mocking scoff San throws his way. Myunghwan raises an eyebrow at the gesture, smiles slightly, but stays quiet nonetheless. “Should we try a ballad type song – or something along those lines?”

“Sounds good,” Junho speaks up before San (or Myunghwan for that matter) could cut in with a sarcastic comment. “Anyone have any suggestions?”

“Well actually,” one of the newer trainees starts hesitantly. “I do have a couple ideas.”