“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I'm fine.”

“Really? I don't want you to faint. If you want, I can give you a piggyback ride. I mean, are you really sure you can walk on your own? If you are feeling nauseous, please tell me, you can stay-”

“Jongdae, please stop rambling! I'm fine, okay?” Aimee interrupted her best friend while rolling her eyes. She was sick of staring at the hospital walls for a whole week and couldn't wait to get back to her dorms. There were so many schedules she had missed out and despite the attack she felt one hundred percent motivated to stand on stage again. Even though she felt a bit anxious about performing now, one jealous anti wouldn't stop her from being an idol, this was something she was sure of.

“Now don't be so rude towards him. He volunteered to drive you home. And look, he even brought flowers for you," Hotaru nudged her. A small mischievous smile graced her face instead of her usually stern expression as she pointed towards the bouquet of red roses in Jongdae's arms. Aimee raised her eyebrows in surprise and Jongdae's cheeks turned slightly pink.

“Now please don't misunderstand. On your profile it says that you like roses and your favorite colours are red and yellow. So I brought these because these are your favorite and not because any kind of symbolism of red roses might indicate-”

Aimee snorted with laughter at Jongdae's flustered expression.

“Just take the flowers and shut up," he mumbled while throwing the bouquet into Aimee's hands. A few petals fell down and the vibrant magenta looked pretty against the plain gray of the hospital floor.

Seeing that Jongdae felt slightly uncomfortable, Hotaru opted to help the Exo vocalist out, “Has the police found the culprit yet?”

“They found evidence of poisonous substance in the muffins, so Bara's suspicion about them being poisoned was right. However, they haven't found the person who gave them yet. There are existing photos of her face but she likely used a wrong name,” Jongdae explained.

Aimee's expression darkened, “That really . But at least we know her face now so we can't be fooled again.”

“I'll keep my eyes open. If that person dares to come close to you again, I am going to protect you and get her arrested," said Hotaru with such earnestly that Aimee couldn't held back a smile.

“You should better let your manager handle this stuff. You don't want to end up in a fight with a person who's much bigger than you," Jongdae frowned, concerned for the rather willowy Hotaru.

“Don't underestimate her. She's a black belt in Taekwondo," Aimee grinned, “Anyways, when are we going to come back? Are the preparations already running? I can't wait to hear our title song!”

Jongdae and Hotaru shared an uncertain look.

“Aimee? Don't you know that because of the accident our management decided to wait a while before we'll have another comeback? So that you can recover fully without being rushed. However, there are other important news you might like to hear, regarding our friends from the trainee days..."

“Aish, I'm so proud of our hoobaes debut," Bara exclaimed and squeezed Red Velvet's So Yeo Wang.

“I can't breathe!” Red Velvet's Main Dancer huffed and tried to somehow get away from her overly excited sunbae. Soyeo frowned, her sunbae squeezing her like their was no tomorrow.

The waiting room was packed with the four debutees, staff and the nine Solibaljeon girls who came to mentally support their dongsaengs. They had trained together for years and many of them befriended each other during that time. Therefore most of the Solibaljeon members felt genuinely happy for their friends and co-trainees' debut, unlike the articles from the cheap gossip tabloids that were implied when they reported that Red Velvet was the replacement group for Solibaljeon's flopped debut. Once they would comeback, Solibaljeon were determined to prove them wrong with hit songs composed by Sumin and Yuntue. But for now most of them were happy to let Red Velvet shine in the spotlight for now and proud of the positive responses their hoobae group was getting so far.

“I hate that dip dye," Jackie, Red Velvet's Leader and Main rapper, mumbled. Pre-debut she had a tomboyish style and short hair that barely reached her chin but for the debut concept the company forced her to grow it out and dye the tips pink. “Soyeo, Seulgi and Yoonmi have at least nice colours so why did they gave me pink out of all the colors that exist?”

“Aw, don't be so negative. You should wear it without complaining and be a role model for your group members!" Seulyong reprimanded her fellow label mate and trainee friend. “By the way, Yoonmi. What happened after your relationship with Kris? After the departure, I mean?”

The maknae and Main Vocalist of Red Velvet made a grimace, visibly uncomfortable with the topic. “He wanted to continue the relationship even though he's not living in Korea anymore... I don't know. Is that even possible under these circumstances? I mean, I still like him but I have to be realistic.”

"You know Seul had a thing for Kri-" Sori started to call out, but was silenced by Seulyong, who nudged her with an elbow. "It's the truth though! Why deny it?!"

"Shhh! That was a secret!" Seulyong whispered back, her eyes darting to look at everyone's face. Glad that no one saw, apart from a raised eyebrow from Jackie, Seulyong glared at her friend and fellow member.

Tiao Ning hugged her best friend, trying to comfort her. “True love always finds a way. Since I'm Chinese, I could take you to my family to China and you could see him there if you want. Just remember how long you two have dated. Do you really want to give all of it up?”

Yoonmi pinched Tiao Ning's cheek. “I know your offer is well-meant but I don't think that this is as easy as you are making it out to be. You always think positive and make everything sound easy but real life doesn't work that way. I don't want to end up in controversies. Shouldn't you act more mature since you are older than me?”

“Come on. Don't be so pessimistic, Yoonmi. I'm from China, too, so whenever I'll have schedules over there in the future, I'll secretly hide you in my luggage so you can come with me and visit him," Soyeo giggled and gave Tiao Ning a high-five.

“Ugh, I'll have so much trouble with this girl. Seulyong, how do you keep your members in check?” Jackie sighed when she heard what kind of plans her band members were plotting.

“Unnie is usually too busy flirting with guys younger than her to act like a leader," Yuntue stated cheekily. "Not that she's a bad leader."

"I do not!" Seulyong exclaimed but started to cackle. In that weird way of hers when she began to fangirl. "Okay, I'm lying. But geezes! What do teenage boys eat nowadays that they look so fit and fine!?"

Seulgi's eyes nervously switched between the Main Dancers who were currently debating about the best way to smuggle people without Airport Security noticing, and the leaders, who were discussing each BTS members' abs in detail.

“Oh, are you contemplating whether it would have been better to reject this opportunity and debut with another group in the future?” Sumin asked her in a monotonous voice. “I know that feeling. But don't worry, somewhere along the road you get used to this.”

Seulgi looked unconvinced, but still nodded and let out a squeaky, “Neh, sunbaenim.”

“You have to go up on stage in five minutes, don't you want to give some sort of motivational speech?” Hyehyun asked Jackie thoughtfully.

“I would but I don't have a clue what to say right now. I'm not exactly good with words and I'm pretty nervous, too," Jackie mumbled before looking at her other members and clearing . 

“We all worked hard and are more than capable of debuting. Just dance as well as you did in practice and we'll be fine." She said awkwardly and ended her sentence with a short 'fighting!'.

“Solibaljeon unnies also support you! Red Velvet fighting!” Tiao Ning shouted and immediately got playfully smacked on the shoulder.

“Don't talk like that when you are younger than half of them!" Sumin reprimanded her, Tiao Ning goofingly running away.

Red Velvet bowed at them and then left the waiting room, ushered out by a stage manager who gave an explanation about the in-ears.

“Poor cupcakes, now they are also doomed to premature hearing loss," Yuntue said drily, remembering how her left ear always ringed after the performances from the high volume of the sound.

“Don't always say such negative stuff when I'm in a sentimental mood. You ruin the atmosphere,” Bara complained. Yuntue was never one who wore her heart on her sleeve and while she was happy for the other trainees, she didn't express it as much as the other members. “By the way, what did actually happen between you and Zico? He seemed to chase you at every performance we ever had.”

“Chase is the exactly the right word for his behavior. Next time we are promoting I'll run around with a ski mask so he won't pester me again.”

“Or you should wear a giraffe costume. Nobody would recognize you if you wore a giraffe costume,” Aimee cackled and one of the stylists gave her a weird look.

“But Zico doesn't seem too bad. I think guys who can compose their own songs are kind of charming, don't you?” Hotaru threw in.

“All he composes is this noisy rap-stuff. Please, you can barely call that music," Yuntue argued. “And what's exactly going on between you and your guy friends? I mean Onew, Junjin, Minho, and so on. Don't tell me that all of them only view you as a simple friend.”

“But they do! They don't have more than friendly feelings for me," Bara exclaimed fervently.

“Probably as friendly as Suho's feelings towards Hyehyun,” Aimee meddled into the conversation. Her broad grin and twinkling eyes already signaled Hyehyun that she was up to no good. She started fidgeting in her seat and Aimee's grin got even broader. Hyehyun contemplated whether the maknae had seen Suho and her holding hands. Even though she initiated the gesture merely out of support, in retrospect it also appeared to her as a pretty couple-y thing to do.

"But then again, Seulyong-unnie is pretty friendly with Yoon Doojoon-sunbaenim. You should've seen the way they gave each other a 'friendly hug'." Aimee prattled on and gave Hotaru a hug to demonstrate, not noticing the leader in question slowly turning around to give her a death glare. "It's an inkling but I think she's secretly crushing on him."

"You sure it's a crush? I don't know, Seul-unnie is pretty secretive about her love life." Bara asked, a chuckle escaping her. She kind of figured out that the leader was secretly seeing the Beast Leader with the help of Sori. Seulyong had all the signs of a girl in love, not that Bara knew what falling in love looked like. But she wasn't going to say anything that would get her in trouble. 

"I don't think Doojoon-sunbaenim sees unnie like that. Maybe Dongwoon-sunbaenim." Little did Aimee know that Yoon leader was in fact crushing. Hard. Aimee rushed on to say, “Besides I saw how Hyehyun and Su-”

“Girls, I sincerely don't want to interrupt you when you talk about your love lives but we came here to support Red Velvet. If you keep discussing other stuff we are going to miss their performance.” Seulyong interrupted the maknae and for once Hyehyun was glad about their leader. 

Most of her groupmates were pretty curious and wouldn't stop pestering her if they thought there was something between her and Suho. And that, she thought, would be pretty embarrassing because it was not like Suho would harbour these kind of feelings towards her. He was pretty popular, there were hundreds of girls who would like to date him-

“Look, their stage is starting!” Tiao Ning excitingly shouted. Everyone gathered around the screen of the small TV in the dressing room and watched Jackie, Soyeo, Seulgi and Yoonmi dancing to their catchy song 'Happiness'.

“Their live is pretty impressing," Hotaru mumbled.

“I agree. But while I'm happy for them, I also wonder why SM Entertainment decided to debut them so shortly after us. I mean, we did okay, didn't we? I'm glad the four of them get to debut but I want to know why SM decided to debut a second girl group this year," Sori said quietly. 

Nobody had an answer for her.

Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months and the schedules decreased gradually. Instead, the Solibaljeon members were often found in the practice rooms, working on their vocals and dance synchronization past midnight. Months passed and Luhan left Exo, Jessica was kicked out of SNSD and Red Velvet got a comeback, meanwhile no news for Solibaljeon. 

“Who do you think did better, Solibal or Red Velvet?” Sori would ask from time to time. Whenever that happened, the other members would sigh or frown but rarely answer.

“At least we didn't lose a member," Yuntue said once, “Most netizens are siding with SNSD, but Seohyun told me that the atmosphere in the group is rather tense nowadays.” 

Aimee nodded and declared how Exo as ten had it even worse.

Being exhausted to the bone was bad but having no schedule to attend was even worse. Intially in the month of Red Velvet's debut there was also a Solibaljeon comeback planned but after Aimee got poisoned, the plans were put on indefinite hiatus. The members were happy that the management was prioritizing Aimee's recovery but even after Aimee was fully healthy again, there weren't any news of a comeback.

The members didn't even know what to do with their huge amount of spare time and there was to constant worry in the back of their heads that they would lose their fans over their lack of shedules and updates in the fan cafe. In the first year it was crucial to promote as much as possible but the year ended and there was still no comeback in sight.

Hotaru had wrapped up her drama filming. Yuntue had settled in an empty studio, trying to come up with decent songs to pass to the management. Sori had begun to start a mix tape due to sheer boredom. Hyehyun, Aimee, and Sumin were with EXO frequently. Tiao Ning and Bara were shut in the practice rooms as of late. And Seulyong seemed to be coming home late due to the stresses of meeting with the management team.

On the first day of the new year Seulyong was suddenly called into a meeting with the SM headquarters. When she came back to the dorm, she was glowing with excitement.

“Good news: We'll be releasing a new song!"

"I don't like this concept..."

" it up and deal with it unnie."

"It's too cute though! Ugh!"

"I like this concept. I find it pretty classy and chic." Tiao Ning giggled, practicing a few steps.

"Ughhh," Sori huffed, throwing the black and gray dress on the chair, not wanting to argue with their Chinese member. "Well that dress is shocklingly cute. And I'm not wearing it."

Seulyong sighed as she finished smoothing the dress over her body. "You have to Sori. Not everyone has your unique taste in fashion. We've already recorded the song and learned the choreography. Do you really want Tiao's hard work to go to waste?"

"And Junhyung-sunbaenim as well." Sumin added, as the stylist finished her hair. "I mean he did give us this song."

"I didn't know we were going to wear cute dresses though. Can't I wear like pants?" Sori whined, picking at the short frilly dress.

"I thought we had several outfits planned for the music video recording?" Bara asked, looking through the dress rack and verifying her dress with the closest stylist.

"We do." Hotaru muttered, making minimal movement unless she wanted to be burned by the curling iron. "Variety of outfits that will make even Sori-unnie look good."

"I heard that!" Sori called out, as she was forced to put on the dress by a stylist. "I'm still not wearing a dress!"

"Too late, unnie!" Aimee cackled, teasing the rapper.

"I know we're straying far from our original concept," Yuntue muttered, running a hand through her dyed brown hair, "but our crazy leader said this concept and style will probably steal the hearts of fans."

"I imagine Soshi-unnies doing this but I couldn't help but thinking that our voices actually do fit well with this song." Hyehyun nodded as she sang a verse of their new song. "I think it fits our style pretty well."

"I got a call from Junhyung!" Seulyong waved her phone in the air. Gathering the girls around, Seulyong held her phone out and pressed the unmute button. "Paree Paree Yongparee!!"

"Yah don't call me that!" Junhyung shouted on the other line. He sighed. "You should stop hanging around Yoseob."

"If I did, then Yeodeopee would be mad." Seulyong called out cutely. "I'm kidding Junhyung. Sooo... How is it?"

"The guys are in love with it. Yoseob is giving praises to Hyehyun-ssi and Sumin-ssi on their great vocals. Doojoon is like swaying back and forth, with his eyes closed. Kikwang and Hyunseung are anticipating what the dance will be like and Dongwoon is playing it on repeat." Junhyung explained. The girls heard a variety of shouts in the background, most likely the Beast members. "You guys did good."

"Thank you sunbaenim!" Hyehyun, Aimee, and Tiao Ning happily called out. Bara, Hotaru and Sumin beamed in relief and Yuntue gave a small happy sigh. Sori looked indifferent but Seulyong could tell the non-friendly rapper was kind of happy she received a compliment from a very respected sunbae.

"No. Thank you girls." Junhyung chuckled. "I was going to give this song to APink but I thought this would fit you girls more. And I was right."

Seulyong smiled. "Thanks again Junhyung. I owe you."

"No problems. Just take me out to lunch."

Agreeing to the idea, Seulyong noticed that the other girls were still getting ready. Having already finished with her hair, makeup and changed into her first outfit, the leader retreated to a far corner and took a pretty selca and sent it to a special someone.

To: Doobong

L.O.V.E LUV ♡