"So this is the place," Victoria muses.

Minho nods, his gaze sweeping the studio as well. "Yuri-noona, my SJ partner, told me about it. Seems better than the small room we've been practicing in, right?"

Onew nods thoughtfully. "Not as private as I'd have liked it, but there are only a few people and privater rooms-- if that's a word-- we could use, so I think this could work."

"The space is huge, too," pipes up Jonghyun. The rest of the group voice their approvements as well.

"There's a mirror!"

"Awesome! I can finally breakdance here without worrying about crashing into a wall or two!"

"Look at this private room! I think it's sound proof."

"Plus, there's this studio thing inside. No more earphones and trying to start together on different machines, guys!"

"And it's free!"

The newly christened SHINee and f(x) are standing at the doorway (or was) of a public dance studio, where already a few other people are practicing in. Until then, they had practiced in a small room preched on the roof of their apartment. This is, they all agree, a much better place.

Each individual starts tow arm up in their own styles-- some doing splits easily, others stiffly reaching for their toes. As soon as everyone is deemed ready, they go around asking the other inhabitants of the studio if they mind their loud music. The people gave their consent pretty readily, to the joy and relief of the ten students.

With grateful thanks, the five girls and five boys regroup to practice together. Taemin and Victoria lead the warm-up dance, a routint he two made up together. Then they form two groups gender-wise, entering separate 'privater' rooms available first come, first serve. Luckily, they find two rooms right next to each other, which they quickly take.

For the next hour, SHINee and f(x) work hard at the different dance moves.

When the hour is up, the two groups come back together. At the time, most people seem to have either left or went into a smaller room, so they end up practicing together outside, dancing together.

"One, two, three, four! Five, six, se-ven, eight."

"No, step with your right. Then twirl to your left."

"One and two, step, step, step, five and six, turn, repeat!"

"Like this, yo? Wait-- no, like this, right?" (A/N: I couldn't resist.)

"We can't do splits! We need new choreography."

The practice as a whole, in a way, but in pairs as well. Sulli, after some hard-working minutes, slumps down on the edge of the dance floor. "I'm so tired," she whines.

Luna sits down next to her, also panting. Her face is shiny with sweat. "I know. We are so out of it."

The younger girl opens to answer, but abruptly stops for reasons unknown. Then she turns a bright, bright red, and starts to fidget quite uncomfortably. Feeling Luna's gaze on her, Sulli stills herself almost nervously. The two girls look at each other-- one with confusion, one with anxiety.

For the time being, Luna lets it go. "Okay, Ssul, we definitely have to exercise."

Relief explodes on her companion's face. "Yeah, we really need to." As they talk, Sulli keeps glancing somewhere, then guiltily relocating her gaze to Luna. After many moments of keeping her curiosity within her, Luna follows the younger's glance to land on who else but Taemin? She smiles-- of course. She watches Sulli staring, now openly gaping. One look and Luna knows why-- Taemin is pulling off a particularly hard-looking move with great ease, and obviously deeply engrossed in the music, oblivious to who is staring and who is not.

Unable to contain her giggle, the older girl bursts out laughing. Sulli blinks, coming back to reality, and blushes very, very hard. "Let's not hide it, shall we?" Luna teases. Her smile is suggestive, and Sulli's blush darkens even more.

"It's a misunderstanding," the girl protests. She opens to argue her point even more, but Taemin chooses this time to stop dancing and sit-- next to Sulli, Luna notices. She giggles again, for the action seems so natural and right.

The clueless boy of interest smiles at the two girls. "What's going on?"

"Nothing," Luna sings. She stands up, her fatigue gone and forgotten, and practically floats away in her feels. "I'll be going over there to talk to Onew oppa," she calls. "Toodles~!" The truth is, Onew had told her about TaeLli just a few days before, and now she is a hardcore and loyal shiper. A fangirl smile replaces her teasing one as she bounces to Onew to tell him about this wondrous moment she had witnessed. When the cheerful shipper is done sharing, they watch their ship float very nicely, as Taemin keeps pestering a blushing Sulli to tell him what's going on, why she's blushing, and what did Luna say.

After some more practicing in the dancing area, they end up at a karaoke place where a kindly couple owns. Apparently, they had both been singers once as well, and gives SHINee and f(x) a discount to let them practice. Sometimes, the eldrely couple comes inside the karaoke place to give them mini-lessons-- they both are wonderful singers as well.

The ten plans to stay in the karaoke room for about two hours, paying dutch-pay style. Somehow, Luna and Onew end up singing a duet together. Like Taemin had been, they are oblivious to the looks of awe in the other's watching eyes. Even the owners come into the room to enjoy the song, but the two are too engrossed in the song and the harmony they create to notice, happily in their own world. It's not until after a great cheer arises when they finish that they're brought back to the world they reside in.

When Luna sits at Sulli's side abashedly from all that cheer, Sulli smiles secretly. Finally, the girl would be getting her revenge. She waits until Onew is talking and laughing with Jonghyun that she turns to Luna with a suggestive smile of her own. "Let's not hide it, shall we?"

Luna looks at the younger, startled. "What are you talking about?"

She scoffs. "As if you weren't making eyes at Onew oppa." Sulli wiggles her eyes at 'eyes,' clearly suggesting something deeper than just eyes.

This time, it's Luna that is blushing. "It's not like that! You're misunderstanding!" she protests. Sulli laughs-- the predator has now become prey.

It's a repetition of the hour before-- Onew makes his way to Luna, disarming smile on face. "Good job, Sunyoung!" he cheers. This only makes Sulli's evil grin more eviller, and Luna's blushing face more redder.

"Oh, Sunyoung, eh?" Sulli whispers teasingly. "I see how it is, unnie." She straightens up, smiles at the male leader, and says clearly, "Oppa, keep unnie some company, will you? I have something to tell, um, Krystal." She stands up, just as Luna had done. "Toodles~!"

Onew shrugs, and sits down next to his singing partner. "What's wrong, are you sick?" he asks innocently. Sulli is unable to keep her fangirl scream inside her, so she pretends to scream in joy in seeing Krystal. "Krystal!!!"

Ever the ice princess, Krystal looks at her coldly. "What's up with you?"

And so, the first official shippers of the LuNew shipdom form that very day. And when Sulli shares this with her brother, he reacts coolly even though inside, he is very happy and jumping for joy. He had been shipping LuNew silently, unofficially, since the fateful day when Luna became the Senior-Junior Project partner of Onew. Which meant that technically, he is the first ever LuNew shipper.

When the two hours ended satisfactorily, the huge group went to the girls' apartment for the rappers to practice rapping-- which is where another Key-Amber fight breaks out.

"Amber isn't a girl!" Alas, Key, in his jealous streak, screams out the nonsensical words in front of said Amber's face. The reason for such a sentence is Amber's awesome rap skills. The boy had not taken his hurt pride and wallow in self-pity by himself-- after all, it is not his way to do so. Instead, he creates a-- for the lack of a better word, thing to justify himself. And for a reason nobody will ever figure out, Key had decided that making Amber a non-girl would be best for himself to nurse his pride back into full health.

For the first five seconds after the four words are uttered quite loudly into the previously noisy air, there is absolute silence. Nobody knows why this has been said, and how to react to it. Fortunately for them, Amber reacts enough for all of them.

"What?!" she shouts back indignantly.

"Amber, you aren't a girl," he repeats. Key's demeanor has changed, and now he looks smug and triumphant.

The angry fire in Amber's eyes grow steadily, and to the others, it looks like Amber has grown a foot or two in height. "What?" she hisses again.

Key bluntly says, "You're a boy."

With a roar that would rival a lion's, Amber launches herself at Key. Key yelps and flees, not unlike a rabbit, but he doesn't stop talking. "You don't even look like a girl. How can a girl look so much like a boy?"

This only enrages Amber further, and it also brings a boost to her speed and strength. However, fear is also a great factor, so the almighty Key runs even faster. "Girls can't rap that fast!"

"Stop stereotyping girls, you *BEEP BEEP BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP*!!!!!!!"

Krystal gasps. She recognizes all those English swear words, and she knows the severity of it. Wow, she mouths to herself. Wow.

Victoria gasps. She had never known Amber could say such foul words, let alone so many at once!

Sulli and Taemin gasp as well. They had never known there was so many swear words in both Korean and English!

Onew and Jonghyun gasp, because they're worried for Key. If Amber is this angry, who knows what she can do?

Key gasps, not because of her language, but because he's now running out of breath. What can he do now? His brain, under great stress, pops out a plan to go through. He blindly follows the last-ditch effort to live produced by his so-called brilliant brain. Using the only energy he has left, he speeds to the carpet and falls on his knees, hands together and eyes closed tightly.

Amber skids to a stop, momentarily forgetting her anger due to great shock. Key is on his knees? In fact, everyone has frozen. Key is on his knees? The sentence does not make sense. Key is on his knees? Their brains cannot percieve the words, understand the meaning of the sentence. Key is on his knees?

"Please don't kill me," the Key on his knees says.

Amber blinks, once, twice, thrice. Then she kicks Key on the knee, and over Key's howls of pain, she threatens, "I'll do that again if you ever accuse me of not being a girl or stereotyping girls again."

Needless to say, Key has been careful in sounding like he is laughing off girl power near Amber ever again. Of course, this didn't stop Key from fighting and arguing tooth to tooth with Amber, but his brain had been through a traumatic experience and wanted dearly to respect women.

The day ended quite like that, with Victoria, Taemin, Sulli, and Krystal in shock, Jonghyun, Key, and Onew collapsing in relief, Minho and Luna oblivious (they had been outside getting mail) to the Amber-monster that had existed that day, and Amber positively happy of the outcome of the whole ordeal. She did regret, however, that she hadn't whipped out her phone and taken a picture of Key kneeling. She reasoned that she'd perhaps have another chance one day, so she got over that quickly.

Yohoho, people! Again, I'm sorry. I'm late, I know, and the update isn't even that long-- though it's not that short, either. Forgive me, my subscribers. Another filler chapter (but kind of needed. I don't want the flow to be, like, super fast, skipping over years and months without some filler chapters), but more essential than the others, because it's mainly about the practice for the competition. Some overshadowing here and there as well. Anyways, um, hi? Haha, well, I'll be trying to update more, really. I feel like I'm saying this all the time, though. :( Sorry, guys! Thanks for the people out there, by the way, subscribing and commenting and-- I was so surprised-- upvoting! Like, wow, I didn't know this at all until today. A pleasant surprise! Thanks, yo. :) Please keep doing so, but silent readers are always welcome, since reading silently is still reading, after all.