Taeyeon and Yuri are met by Agent Amber upon their return. Agent Amber is missing her usual good-natured grin as she nods at them and leads them down the corridor.

“Did we screw up?” she asks the agent.

“I might never get to see you two kissing again.”

“You’re kissing who?” Yuri asks.

Taeyeon ignores Yuri’s question. “Is she that angry?”

“It’s bad. I can’t say more.”

A cold arrow zips through Taeyeon’s chest. Just how angry is Tiffany? It is a little nerve wracking to imagine. But they completed the mission successfully, didn’t they? That is their saving grace. Her saving grace, at least.

“You go in here,” says Agent Amber, pointing at an unmarked steel door.

“Just me? What about Yuri?”

“She can go back to her room and have a rest.”

“What? Why can’t she rest too?” Yuri asks.

A lump develops in Taeyeon’s throat. “I’ll see you later, Yul.”

“What the hell is going on?” says Yuri, her voice rising.

“Nothing I can’t handle. Don’t worry.”

“I’m not leaving you here by yourself with some angry agent.”

“It’s between the two of them. You’d better not be around,” Agent Amber advises kindly.

Taeyeon doesn’t want Yuri to get into any trouble so she grins and pats her friend’s shoulder. “I’ll be fine. Really.”

Yuri narrows her eyes at Taeyeon before turning to stare down at Agent Amber. “If you people hurt Taeyeon, there’ll be hell to pay.”

Agent Amber raises her hands. “No one’s getting hurt. I promise.”

“See you in a bit, Yul.”

Yuri nods, then walks down the corridor towards her room.

“Good luck, Taeyeon,” Agent Amber says as she opens the steel door. “I hope you get through this in one piece.”

Taeyeon takes a deep breath before stepping into the dim room. A tiny orange light hangs from the ceiling over the small steel table in the middle. Is this about to become her place of death? S.N.S.D. doesn’t just kill off disobedient agents, right? Heck, she’s not even an agent. What’s the worst thing they can do to her? Kick her out of the team?

A woman is seated on a chair behind the table. Her face is hidden by the shadow that falls across, formed by the cap worn on her head, but Taeyeon knows, without a doubt, that she is Tiffany. There is no chair for her, so she stands on her feet on the other side of the table.

“I’m sorry,” she offers quickly, hoping to cushion at least a tiny bit of the impending explosion.

“Are you really?”

Taeyeon bits her lip. Tiffany would know if she’s lying. “No.”

Tiffany rises from her chair and takes three steps towards Taeyeon. “Good choice to be honest. But it is this attitude that is going to get you killed.”

“You’re not going to kill me.”

Tiffany’s breath tickles her ear. “Think again.”

Before Taeyeon can even blink, she finds herself bent face-down on the cold steel of the table, arms locked behind her back. Sharp metallic clicks mark the restraining of her wrists and that’s when she wonders if she is really going to be killed in here.

“You think you know it all? You think you know better? You think you can save the world?”

Despite the emerging fear in her heart, Taeyeon still manages to say, “No.”

“No? None of the above?”

“None of the above.”

“So what made you think you could go against my command?”

“It was ten seconds. We were so close.”

“To getting caught? To failing the whole mission? To dying?”

“To succeeding and getting away.”

“Did you even realize you could’ve gotten Yuri and yourself killed?”

“There was always that risk.”

“We try to minimize the risk. We do not increase the risk.” Tiffany’s entire body is pressing on Taeyeon at this point, crushing her and making it hard to breathe. “We do not risk it all just for one tiny mission.”

“But we succeeded.”

“You’re blinded by it. And it will make you more reckless in future.” Tiffany’s hand wraps around Taeyeon’s neck from behind. “You have become a liability.”

Hearing that stings. “I am not a liability. I made a judgement. Yuri was with me. We did not fail.”

“You know nothing, Taeyeon Kim. You made a poorly informed judgement. You didn’t know Nicholas had called his security guys because he realized his token had gone missing. You didn’t know the facility guards had been alerted. You didn’t know they were going to check the labs. You decided to stay ten seconds more without knowing all those things. You are a liability.”

“You could’ve told us that.”

“We don’t have time for full explanations in emergencies. That’s why you are supposed to obey all commands without question. That’s why you are a liability.”

Taeyeon bites her lip as she tries to breathe. She’s wrong and she knows it. “I’m sorry.”

“Too little, too late, Taeyeon Kim.”

Taeyeon in a mouthful of air when Tiffany steps away from her. She tries to get up but a hand on her back stops her.

“Take her to solitary.”

“What? Solitary?” Taeyeon isn’t sure what it is, but it doesn’t sound good.

“I’ll see you in three days.”

“Three days?” Taeyeon gasps, horror-struck. 

---

“Isn’t three days a little too harsh?”

Tiffany shoots Agent Amber a glare and the other woman clears .

“I mean, solitary is pretty rough for a civilian.”

“I know that.”

Agent Amber’s frown of concern unfolds into a conspiring grin. “Sounds you have something planned.”

“Of course, I do.”

“Pardon my miscalculation. I thought you lost your temper because of how much you care for her.”

“We’re professionals, Am. Our nation’s security is our priority.”

“Yes, of course,” says Agent Amber, nodding enthusiastically.

“Call in the rest for a meeting. We need to discuss our game plan.”

“Our game plan?”

“Our game plan must change.”

“I’ll send the message right now.”

Moments later, Tiffany is in the meeting room with her fellow agents. She looks at them, jaw set, gaze heavy. “Start Plan B.”

Nodding heads fill the room. Everyone has seen this coming. With the near-miss in their recent operation, it is no longer wise to continue with their original plan.

“Seulgi, Amber, work out what you need exactly and let us know by tomorrow.”

“Got it,” Seulgi replies and Amber gives an affirmative nod.

“The rest of us will stay here and look through the rest of the plans. We have some adjustments to do.”

---

The solitary is a place invented by the devil. Taeyeon is convinced of it within minutes of being in there. She has nothing but her clothes on and the room is completely void of any life—not even gentle air movement. No windows, no light, nothing. Ventilation is provided somehow, most likely through some tiny vent somewhere that isn’t big enough to escape from.

Everything is bad enough, but what makes it worse is knowing it was Tiffany who sent her here. She knows disobeying Tiffany’s orders would have consequences, but does she deserve this? Especially when their mission is a success? 

Definitely not.

What a heartless woman.

What a cruel leader.

What a wicked—

The click and whir of machinery interrupts Taeyeon’s spew of angry descriptions. She turns in the dark, squinting to make out the movement. “Who is it?”

“It’s me.”

That husky voice is unmistakable anywhere and everywhere. “Evil witch. Here to gloat over my plight?” Taeyeon grunts.

“Putting you in here isn’t personal.”

“It feels personal to me.”

“It’s not personal. Not by the time you returned.”

“Aha! That means it was personal at first.”

“Only for the first three seconds.”

“Good to know I lasted three seconds in your heart.”

“I have a job to do.”

“I’m so sick of hearing this all my life. I have a job to do. I have a job to do. the job. the ing job!”

Light floods the space around her without warning, almost blinding her. She is blinking when hands cup her eyes from behind, shielding them from the onslaught and Tiffany’s husky voice tickles her ears. “You can’t the job. You have another job and you have to do it.”

---