The room was in disarray. Papers were scattered everywhere, indiscernible writing was scribbled on the whiteboard, and all of the members were talking all at once, trying to come up with the best plan to lure out the Shadow Clan leader. They crowded around a table, talking at each other more than they talked with each other. Across from Bomi, Naeun was shooting down Eunji’s idea to send Seungri in as a spy, and next to her, Chorong was picking apart Namjoo’s and Hayoung’s idea to involve Mansoo in the mission. 

They were attempting to make sense of all of the files that they had on the Shadow Clan in order to make sure that they wouldn’t miss anything important while creating their plan to finally defeat the Clan. When they had started their meeting over an hour ago, they had been organized and composed. As the minutes ticked by, however, they had slowly lost their patience and began to get desperate. It had been a nerve-wracking, downward spiral, and if someone didn’t do anything, they would just continue to fall into that dark abyss.

When it became too much, Naeun slammed her hand on the table. Everyone immediately silenced themselves. The princess slumped into her seat tiredly. “Alright, that’s enough. We won’t get anywhere with all this bickering. Clearly there isn’t one completely fool-proof plan, so the best we can do is pick out the lesser of the evils. Minimize costs and maximize benefits.”

“We can’t involve Mansoo,” Chorong said. “We don’t know him well enough to trust him. It might also put Seungri’s family at risk.”

“Nor can we send Seungri in as a spy,” Naeun said. “We may have his family as leverage, but we still can’t trust him not to betray us.”

“Why don’t we give them what they want?” Bomi suggested.

Hayoung gave her an incredulous look. “You want to give them the princess?”

“No, of course not,” Bomi said. “I’m talking about me. They want me for something, we know that much. We can’t send Seungri in as a spy, but we can send me in. I’ll pretend to get captured so I can work from the inside.”

“No way,” Eunji objected. “We can’t send you in alone.”

“They won’t kill me. If they wanted to kill me, then they would have done so already.”

“Didn’t Seungri almost kill you?” Namjoo pointed out. 

“Yes, but he also said that he never intended to kill me. He was just trying to scare me a little. When I got captured about a month ago, the men said that they were waiting for their leader to arrive. In both these cases, they hurt me, but they never wanted to kill me.”

“There are worse things than being killed,” Eunji said. 

“I’ll be fine, Eunji-ah.”

“I’ve had to save your a*s in both those instances!” Eunji cried. “If you go through with this, I might not be able to save you. Even if they don’t kill you, they might do worse things. Why else would they want you?”

“The leader wants me,” Bomi said as calmly as she could. “I can draw them out, and when I do, I’ll send a signal to you all so you can capture them.”

Eunji began to object, but Chorong cut in, “I think it’s our best bet.”

“Unnie!” Eunji said in disbelief.

“Why do you say that, Chorong?” Naeun asked.

“According to Seungri, the leader only comes out for very important events. We obviously have something they want, so this might be our only chance of drawing them out.”

“And if it doesn’t?” said Hayoung. “What if we just send Bomi-unnie in there for nothing?”

“That’s a valid point. Bomi isn’t good enough bait,” Chorong said. Bomi raised her brows, and the leader quickly added, “No offense.”

Bomi shrugged and let it slide. “None taken.”

“The Shadow Clan doesn’t know what we know. They want us to believe that they’re after Naeun and that they only wanted Bomi because they had that fake video of Yookyung. We know that’s not true; they want Bomi for something else and that video wasn’t real, but the Shadow Clan doesn’t know that. So if we just send in Bomi, it won’t be a good enough lure. They’ll figure out that something is off.”

“So what else would you suggest?” Namjoo asked Chorong. “If Bomi-unnie isn’t good enough bait, then who else would?”

Chorong looked at Naeun. “Well, it’s a good thing that we have two things they want.”

Abruptly, both Hayoung and Eunji stood from their chairs. Hayoung stood so quickly that her chair skidded back with a horrible screeching sound. 

“Absolutely not!” the maknae shouted. “Bomi-unnie is understandable because she is a trained agent, but the princess? That’s absurd!”

“Our job is to protect Naeun,” Eunji said. “We can’t send her off to danger like that!”

“We won’t actually let her get captured. We’ll send Bomi and Naeun out as bait for the leader. If and when the leader arrives, we’ll strike as Bomi and Naeun are getting captured,” Chorong explained. “I know it sounds scary and reckless, but there’s really no other way to get the Shadow Clan’s attention.”

“What if the leader doesn’t come?” Namjoo asked.

“I can tell the Shadow Clan that I will only hand the princess over to the leader,” Bomi said. “Hopefully that will draw him out.”

“That’s a good idea.” Chorong crossed her arms over her chest and rubbed her chin. “Then before they can capture you, we will intervene. We can use Seungri and his phone to contact someone in the Shadow Clan to make the trade. You’ll have to act like you’re making the trade for Yookyung, though.”

“I can be a pretty convincing actress,” Bomi assured.

Eunji waved her hands in front of her, looking both confused and frustrated. “Wait, we can’t seriously be talking about using Naeun, the sole person we have sworn to protect, as bait to lure out someone that has been trying to kill her for the past two decades! There has to be another way.”

Bomi was about to reply, but she saw Naeun rise from her chair slowly and silently. The princess said nothing, but her regal authority and sense of calm confidence still emanated from her like natural power. As a testament to her authority, everyone stopped and looked to her the moment they saw her rise.

“I’ll do it,” the princess said.

“Princess!” Hayoung shouted. 

“Naeun-ah, please,” said Eunji. “This is too dangerous.”

“The Shadow Clan has been terrorizing this country for far too long, and all of it has been because of me. They want to kill me, and they are harming innocent civilians in the process. If this is the best way to lure out the leader and take down the Shadow Clan once and for all, then I will do it.” 

“Princess…,” Hayoung said quietly, and it almost sounded like a beg.

Naeun only lifted her chin and stood up straighter. In that moment, with the large map of the world behind her and her head held up high with no sense of fear or hesitation on her face, Naeun looked like a true queen.

“I will do it,” Naeun repeated. “After all, what good is a future queen if she cannot risk her life for her people?”

Bomi had grown to love the palace at night. It was always so quiet and peaceful, which was always welcomed given the calamity of Bomi’s life. The nights with Chorong were also an extra plus. Chorong had stopped coming at night since Bomi could walk comfortably again, and now Bomi’s nights felt empty. She missed Chorong’s nightly presence and it felt wrong to not be doing anything physical at this time, so Bomi had been going on walks to fill the void.

Bomi hadn’t been expecting to find Eunji at her little bay window, but she also wasn’t too surprised when she saw her friend’s small body tucked into the corner of the window sill, staring down at the garden below. Eunji didn’t notice Bomi right away, and Bomi knew that Eunji was deep in her thoughts.

“Eunji-ah,” Bomi said softly as she approached the window sill. Eunji didn’t jump or appear startled; she just slowly looked away from the window and gazed at Bomi with solemn eyes.

“Bbom-ah,” Eunji replied. “I can’t say that I’m surprised to see you walking around so late at night.”

“I can’t say that I’m surprised to see you sitting by this window.” Bomi sat across from Eunji on the window sill, studying her friend. Something was obviously bothering her. Bomi remembered how oddly Eunji had acted in the infirmary the other day, and it had been bothering her for a while. She hadn’t been able to talk to Eunji about it, but now was her chance. 

“Are you alright?” Bomi asked Eunji.

“Why do you ask?”

“You’ve been acting off lately and it’s been worrying me,” Bomi said. “Has something been bothering you?”

“I…,” Eunji started, but her voice trailed off. She drew her knees up to her chest and hugged them tightly. “This plan is dangerous. You or Naeun could get seriously hurt.”

“I know, but we’ve been over this. There’s no other way.” Bomi watched Eunji carefully. “Is that what’s been bothering you?”

Eunji didn’t give a direct answer, “I don’t want you to get hurt. There are so many things that could go wrong, and it scares me that I might not be able to save you this time.”

“Eunji-ah…” Bomi scooted forward to get closer to Eunji. “Things will be okay, alright? I promise that I will make it out of this alive. Me and Naeun both. You of all people should know how difficult it is to kill me.”

Eunji scoffed. “If you were a cat, you’d be on your ninth life.”

“And I’ll just keep coming back,” grinned Bomi. “Besides, I won’t be going in alone. You and everyone else will be watching us, and I know you will make sure that we make it out alive. You’re my team, and I trust you guys.” Bomi placed a hand on Eunji’s knee. “You have my back, don’t you?”

“I have your back,” Eunji responded without a hint of doubt. “Always.”

“Good. That’s the only back-up I’d ever need.” Bomi kept her gaze on Eunji, carefully watching her expression. She still looked perplexed. “What else is bothering you?”

Eunji drew in a breath and looked outside, her long lashes shading her eyes as she looked down at the garden. “Do you remember that time when we were kids and you, me, and Yookyung were playing in that large field behind our school? We were running around, pretending that we were secret spies on a top secret mission to find the secret fairy kingdom.”

“Ah, yes, the simpler times,” Bomi said. “How could I forget?”

“We somehow got separated from Yookyung, who was apparently working as a double spy and had to go back to her fairy commander. She ran off somewhere else, and you and I continued to run off in the other direction.”

“You fell into a hole, didn’t you?” Bomi recalled. “It was the remains of an old well that had never been properly boarded up.”

Eunji nodded, and the corner of her lips curved upwards at the thought of the warm memory. “Yeah. I ran ahead of you to defeat the ‘angry ogres’, and I never saw the broken planks in front of me. I fell through the gaps in the boards and landed horribly on my leg. That was the first time I had broken a bone in my body, and it hurt more than anything I had ever experienced before. I started screaming and crying right away, and you didn’t hesitate to lean practically your entire body over the edge of the hole and try to calm me down.

“It took a lot of coaxing, but you finally got me to stop crying. You said that you would go help, and I got scared, because I didn’t want to be left alone. I, being the weak, annoying crybaby that I was, started crying again, but you managed to talk me down again. You promised that you would come back for me like ten times before you actually left. 

“For the next twenty minutes, I sat alone in the dark, sniffling like a pathetic child. My leg was bent at an awful ankle, my body was scratched up, it was dark and cold, and I was terrified. After about thirty minutes, you still hadn’t returned, and I was beginning to think that you had forgotten about me. But you didn’t. You never did. 

“Right as I was about to start wailing again, I heard shouting and your little head and your bobbed haircut appeared over the edge. You started screaming, ‘Over here! Over here!’ Not so long after, my parents and a bunch of firefighters appeared and threw down a rope. One man climbed down the rope and brought me up. When I finally reached solid ground, the first person to reach me was not my father, mother, or Yookyung. Do you know who it was?”

“Me,” Bomi answered. She remembered everything that Eunji was saying like it was yesterday.

“Right. And do you know what the first thing you said was?”

“I told you I would come back.” Bomi chuckled and shook her head. “I was always a cocky little kid, wasn’t I?”

“Yes, but I liked that,” Eunji laughed. “After you left, I was terrified. I thought that I’d been abandoned. But I hadn’t been. You hadn’t abandoned me. You had promised that you would come back to me, and you did, despite all of my fears and doubts. You came back.”

“I’ll always find my way back,” Bomi murmured. “Just like with this mission, I’ll find my way back.” 

“You’d better, because I’m still holding you to that promise you made years ago,” Eunji said. “I still remember your face when you ran to hug me after I had been rescued. You were missing one of your front teeth, and your cheeks were bright pink. You’d been running, because you were extremely out of breath.” Eunji turned to look out the window again. “This was when I first fell in love with you.” 

Bomi went rigid. She waited for Eunji to smile and say that she was kidding, but she didn’t; she just continued to avoid eye contact with Bomi. “You were in love with me?”

“Yes.”

“Are you…,” Bomi hesitated. “Are you still…?”

“No, I’m not.”

“Oh,” Bomi said and exhaled, a feeling of relief washing over her. “What happened?”

“I knew that you were in love with someone else at that time.”

“Haru,” Bomi remembered. Haru had been her first girl crush and also her first heartbreak. “That didn’t end very well.”

“You were just a kid, but you made it sound like you had already found the love of your life.”

“Well, the love of my life was very much straight and I was very much not,” Bomi said. “It also only took me a week to get over the love of my life. Why didn’t you tell me that you had feelings for me?”

Eunji bit her lip and still refused to look at Bomi. “You were my Haru. I was in love with you, but I knew that I wouldn’t have a chance, because you were so enthralled with someone else. It hurt, seeing you pursuing someone that wasn’t me. But we were just kids and I eventually got over it, like I always do.” Eunji added something else after that, but she said it so quietly that Bomi couldn’t hear it.

“You know,” Bomi said, “I had a crush on you too at one point. It was back in middle school.”

Eunji’s pause and her slightly widened eyes were the only indications of her shock. She finally turned to look at Bomi and asked, “But you just held it in?”

“I didn’t want to ruin our friendship,” Bomi replied. “It was a tough decision to make, and I’ve always wondered what would have happened if I had actually done something about it, but I’ve moved on. You’ve moved on as well. And honestly, I don’t think I’d have it any other way. I couldn’t imagine life without you as my best friend.”

“Me too,” Eunji nodded and lowered her chin into her knees. Something was obviously still bothering her.

“What did you bring this up, Eunji-ah?” Bomi asked.

“I suppose I should be getting used to getting over one-sided loves,” said Eunji. “When I was in love with you, it hurt everyday seeing you with Haru, but I told myself that the pain was only temporary and that I should move on. So that’s exactly what I did. I moved on. And that’s exactly what I’ll do again.” 

“What are you saying?” 

“You’re in love with Chorong-unnie, aren't you?” Eunji asked directly, and from the tone in her voice, Bomi knew that she already knew the answer. 

“I…” Bomi felt her cheeks grow warm. “I am. I don’t know how or when it happened, but I am.” 

“And she’s in love with you.” 

Bomi’s eyes lit up. “She is?” 

“It seems that way,” Eunji said. “You’re in love with her and she’s in love with you, so I’ll do what I do best. I’ll move on.” 

Bomi paused. It couldn’t be… “Are you… Are you in love with Chorong-unnie?”

Eunji smiled weakly. It was so forced that it hurt Bomi. “Chorong-unnie is my Haru now, and I’m going to move on.”

Bomi reached over and grasped Eunji’s hand. “That didn’t answer my question, Eunji-ah.”

Her friend looked down at Bomi’s hand, but did not move. “I don’t know. It’s complicated. I’ve loved her for a long time, and lately I’ve been in a lot of pain because of it. Not because of anything you or she did, but because I’ve slowly been coming to terms with the realization that Chorong-unnie and I aren’t meant to be.”

“You were in pain?” Bomi asked and Eunji nodded. “I’m sorry, Eunji, I didn’t know. If I had known, I wouldn’t have let myself fall for her. Our friendship is too important to me. If it’s hurting you this much, then I won’t pursue it anymore.”

“Stop, Bbom-ah. I don’t want you to do that.”

“But you’ve been in pain!” 

“Yes, but that’s natural for someone who’s falling out of love with someone they’ve been in love with for four years. Besides, would you have really been able to just let Chorong-unnie go like that?”

Bomi clenched her jaw and released Eunji’s hand. Eunji had a point. 

“I didn’t think so,” Eunji said. “I know when you’re in love, Bbom-ah, and the way you look at Chorong-unnie can’t be described as anything else but love. And I know that when you love, you love hard.” 

“You do too,” Bomi pointed out. “How are you so willing to give up?” 

Eunji gave a small smile. “Because there’s someone better for her.” This time, Eunji didn’t sound so sad. There was still melancholy in her voice, but there was also some sort of closure and truth in her words. 

“How are you so sure?” Bomi asked quietly. “How do you know that I’m right for her?”

“You make each other better. I can see it in the way that Chorong-unnie relaxes her shoulders now. She has always seemed so stressed and like she has ten-ton weights on her shoulders, but you? You make it easier for her to breathe―and live. That’s something I was never able to do for her.” Eunji replied. “And she made you start caring again, after everything that had happened. When you were so adamant on working alone, she made you change your mind and stay. I’ve noticed how differently you act with the team now. It felt forced in the beginning, but now you genuinely care about them, don’t you?” Bomi nodded, and Eunji continued, “Chorong-unnie helped heal your wounds. Figuratively and metaphorically.”

“It wasn’t just her,” Bomi said. “You helped Chorong-unnie recover from her teammates’ deaths, didn’t you? She told me about what happened with her team. She tried so long not to care about anyone after that, but when she got put into a team with you, she learned how to care again. She stopped running away. You helped her do that.”

Eunji looked genuinely curious. “Did I?”

“Yes, and you did the same for me. When all I wanted to do was run away, you pulled me back and made me walk alongside you. It wasn’t Chorong-unnie who did it, although she did play a big role in keeping me anchored. You did it. It was you who helped me and Chorong-unnie heal.”

“I guess I did...but how does that relate to this?”

“Because I know you and your tendency to put yourself on the sidelines just so the people you care about can be happy. I can tell that you’re doing the exact same thing in this situation. Eunji, I want you to realize that you deserve to be happy too.”

“I’m not going to continue chasing after Chorong-unnie,” Eunji said. “It would be a losing battle.”

Bomi tried not to wince at that last bit. It hurt her, knowing that she was indirectly involved in Eunji’s pain. “That’s not what I meant. The next time you find yourself in a situation like this, I want you to be a little selfish. Make yourself happy. Or I swear to God, I will be the best damn wing-woman the world has ever seen.”

Eunji grinned and reached for Bomi’s hand. She squeezed it lightly. There was a twinkle in her eye, and Bomi couldn’t tell if they were tears or if it was just the natural gleam in her eyes. “Thank you, Bbom-ah. I needed this.”

“I’m serious about the wing-woman thing. Just drop a name and I’ll do it.”

Eunji laughed, and Bomi was happy to see that it finally wasn’t forced. “That won’t be necessary.” She smiled to herself and looked deep in thought, like she was picturing someone’s face in her mind, and it struck Bomi that Eunji might already have someone else tugging at her heart.

Eunji nodded her head, as though she was making a vow both to Bomi and herself. “I’ll be selfish this time,” she said. “I promise.”

This chapter was kind of sad/sweet to write. It's a longer chapter, but a lot was unpacked here. I hoped everyone enjoyed it! As always, I greatly appreciate everyone's support and comments. They really keep me going :)