Warning: This chapter contains spoilers for AnnaPanda97's story Acid Teochii. I suggest you go over here and catch up on the chapters before reading this!

The tension was high in Symphon-EE's dorms, but not because of anything internal. No, they were all nervous, anxious, and excited for their soon-upcoming debut! Symphon-EE, after all their training, was finally going to make their debut to the world, after the hype built up with South Korean citizens as well as curiosity, given their unconventional image. Everyone was preparing to go to rehearsal that morning, with only 3 days between them and their debut. Andy was humming to themself as they styled their hair, finally having gotten their sleep schedule set to where they would wake up at a reasonable time, so they would have plenty of time to be ready before each of their rehearsals. CEO Lee would be attending this one, to make sure they were 100% ready, so they needed to be in top form, and they all intended to be! However, Andy couldn't shake a strange feeling that had been in the pit of their stomach since they awoke early that morning, but they figured whatever said feeling was could wait. They had a rehearsal to take care of! They were to be at the station by 9:00 at the latest, to make sure the staff could set up the equipment and do a proper test of the sound system with their instruments. Andy glanced at the clock; 8:15. Plenty of time, and they were nearly done with their preparations. Considering the drive time wasn't that long from their dorms, it gave them more than enough time. A quick double check to their makeup and Andy was out of their door, to make sure the other members were all prepared for today's rehearsal.

However, once they got outside, they noticed the other members crowded around one of the other doors, the one that Su-Ji and Yu-Jin stayed in. Su-Ji was outside of said door with the twins, calling out into it to unlock the door. Since Yu-Jin was the only one not present, Andy assumed that the maknae had sealed themself up in the room...but why? They certainly weren't the type to isolate themself; in fact, they got gloomy if they weren't around people. Whenever Su-Ji would slip away to go who knows where, Yu-Jin would tend to come and knock on either the twins or, more commonly, Andy's door and ask to just hang around with them. Knowing this was definitely unusual behavior, Andy walked over to the group, who noticed them quite quickly.

"A-Andy! Harl-EE's locked themself in the room, they won't open up or even say why...we haven't heard them speak since we first started trying to get back in!" Min-Sun was the first to speak up, cutting off Su-Ji before they could speak. The rapper cleared their throat, giving the blonde a restrained glare, at which they promptly quieted.

"It's like Sun-EE said, I went out a little while before Harl-EE got up, and when I got back, the door was locked... I thought Harl-EE had just gone in the shower or something, but I heard them mumbling 'Go away' or something. After that they refused to speak...I-I'm worried it was something I did!" Su-Ji explained, as Andy hurried over to his worried bandmates.

The leader cleared their throat as the others stepped out of the way for them to stand in front of the door, and knocked on it carefully, listening for a moment afterwards. "...Harl-EE...Yu-Jin, it's me. You have to talk to us and tell us what's wrong, okay...?"
Silence followed, and Andy sighed, taking the breath to speak up again when a small shuffling sound was heard on the other side of the door, and it unlocked. The members were relieved, and started to walk back towards the door as it opened, only to hear the maknae snap from the other side, as they stood on the other side of the door, out of their sight.

"Only... Andy-hyung."

The rest of the members stepped back, looking mildly offended and worried at the same time, and Andy gave them all a nod before stepping in through the door, which quickly closed behind them and locked.

Andy had to squint to see in the unlit room as Harl-EE slowly walked past him. They couldn't see well, with the blinds drawn, all lights off, and the only light coming from an MP3 player laying on the maknae's bed, and what little sunlight could leak in through the blinds. The long-haired band member shuffled back over to their bed, standing at the side of it, before slowly leaning, then abruptly falling face-first onto the sheets, followed by a muffled, weak whine of their leader's name. Andy walked over, sitting by the forlorn maknae as they shifted onto their side to look at him. Their makeup appeared to only be half-done, and what had been done had run down their face and smudged across their cheeks, with telltale stains on the poor pillowcase nearby just barely visible from the darkness surrounding them.

"Yu-Jin...what's wrong...?" Andy finally broke the silence, seeing the maknae's eyes tear up from having to think about whatever caused their sadness again. The redhead groaned, pulling the sheets up to their face again, then sighing. They raised one of their hands and pointed to the closed laptop on the floor, flipped on its back, as if it was thrown there. Andy scooted over a little, reaching over the edge of the bed and grabbing the overturned laptop and pulling it back to them, sitting it on their lap and opening it. Yu-Jin covered their face completely with the sheets and turned back towards the mattress, not wanting to look.

The sight on the screen shocked Andy, and almost caused them to lose grip on the laptop and send the already battered device to the ground once more. It was a simple news article in Korean; Andy squinted at the harsh light and tried to make out the difficult symbols they still weren't used to. They only recognized one part, a name. Lee Hyo. Andy knew well who that was; one of the Chinese members of Acid Teochii, the first group to ever be formed by Ace Ent. Hyo was the member that Harl-EE looked up to the most, despite the fact that, according to the other members, he wasn't the most aggreeable, and had an attitude at times. Harl-EE had explained it to Andy once, however, that the reason Hyo was inspiring was because they could relate. Freckles weren't common among Asians, and in school they often got picked on, and told they had a dirty face, just for their natural freckled complexion. The fact that Hyo became an idol, and refused to try and cover up or 'fix' his scars, and still looked and danced amazingly, was the inspiration that drove Harl-EE to audition for Ace in the first place.
Andy finished decoding the Korean words, their eyes widening, as they couldn't help question themself. No way that's right, they thought, it can't be. Running over it again, they came to the same conclusion.

'Former Acid Teochii member, Lee Hyo, found dead.'

Their breath caught in their throat, and their stomach began to feel as if it was twisting in to knots. The last anyone had heard about Hyo, he had suddenly terminated his contract after they were interviewed, and the article bashed the blonde for their 'attitude'. The band's members and the Symphon-EE members knew the truth, that the accusations were false, and a statement was even officially released by Namjoon and Lee; however, that didn't stop the large influx of comments by other 'fans' of the band that relentlessly put down the boy with the scarred face. It only got worse after he left, as Yu-Jin had told Andy, and even showed them the comments on various articles and even YouTube videos. Of course, there were the few fans standing strong and defending Hyo, but those were buried by the ones completely tearing the young idol apart. Yu-Jin even did their best, leaving comments of support hoping the dancer would see, but of course, the negative outweighed the positive. None of them even expected that it would lead to something like this.
"Hyo-hyung...is...?" Andy's voice was light and faint, and Yu-Jin peeked out of the sheets to look up at their older friend.
"Yeah...apparently it was accidental...a-alcohol poisoning..." The maknae's voice broke as they mentioned the cause of death, and Andy closed the laptop, setting it behind them, and turned to the redhead.
"I'm sorry, Yu-Jin... I know you really looked up to Hyo-hyung..." Yu-Jin nodded at Andy's words, shakily pushing themself up to sit, albeit slouched, before their leader.
"I-it was bad enough that he left Acid Teochii because of the pressure, but...to die...and like that..." Their pale hands gripped the sheets under them, eyes b with tears once more, unable to be stopped no matter how many times the maknae tried to blink them back.
"Even after he left, people never let up on those comments when the group came up in conversation... and now, this... You don't think it was because of those comments, do you...?"

The redhead bassist just nodded at their leader's question, eyes focused down, not even trying to raise up to meet the other's. The two sat in silence for a few moments, before Andy heard Yu-Jin's breath catch in their throat again.

"Why do people have to do that?! Why do they never learn that what they say actually gets seen?!" Yu-Jin's voice raised to a shreik, words becoming unintelligible and shakier by the moment. Andy leaned back away from the enraged maknae as they seemed to get more hostile by the second.

"Andy-hyung...what if... what if this happens to us? What if the things that happened with Acid Teochii happen to us? What if you get shot at, or what if interviewers do that to us? What if we can't handle it?!" Yu-Jin grabbed the brunette's shoulders, looking them right in the eyes, almost searching for a gleam of hope.

Andy managed to force a smile at the younger of them, shaking their head slightly.
"We knew from the very start that we were getting into something that could be dangerous, remember? But it takes a little risk to cause change sometimes. Isn't that our goal, to try and show people that other ways of thinking aren't something to fear or hate? There's going to be someone out there that sees the things that happen to Acid, and to us, and thinks, 'Things shouldn't be like this.' Slowly, the ways of thinking will be changed...slowly, people will stop leaving comments like that because they realize that being hurtful isn't right... That's our goal, after all, isn't it?"

Yu-Jin found themself unable to look away from their leader as they talked, until eventually they nodded, tears finally escaping their eyes and starting to stream down their face again. They leaned forward, still clutching their leader's upper arms, and began sobbing into their shoulder. Andy, though startled at first, didn't pull away, but allowed their distraught friend to cry, and tried to comfort them.

After their sobs calmed, Yu-Jin finally released their leader, and stuttered out an apology for being so mean to the others, explaining that it wasn't just Hyo's death in general that sent them into this state. When Andy asked them what did, they made their leader swear never to tell a soul without their permission, and went on to tell a story.

When Yu-Jin was young, they had an older sister whom they relied on for most things. Their parents weren't always around, as they were both quite busy working, as the area they lived in required the both of them to bring in income. Their sister, however, was 6 years older, and thus became Yu-Jin's closest friend for a while. Once they were both older, said sister moved out and became fairly successful, ending up in a fairly high rank in the company that hired her. However, eventually, the pressure got to her, as she overworked herself more and more. One day, she didn't show up for work, and nobody could reach her. Their mother, who had been able to take a less demanding job as they moved to a more suburban area, and Yu-Jin rushed to her apartment, only to find her unconscious inside, fallen victim to alcohol poisoning. They rushed her to the hospital where she just barely survived, but sustained irreversable damage to her brain, and was never the same again. Her job, goals, dreams, memories, all torn away from her by the one night that she cracked and turned to alcohol to ease her woes. Hearing the story about Hyo dying from it brought all that fear and helplessness back, they explained, and they kept thinking they could have done something about it.

"Yu-Jin... Don't beat yourself up over it. Hyo wouldn't want that, especially since you were one of the ones supporting him. You know who's to blame, right?" The redhead nodded, sniffing, their tears finally having stopped.

"Yeah... I guess. ...You know what's the worst, though?" Their voice asked weakly, eyes returning to the messy sheets they were sitting on.

"I never... got to tell him. That he was the reason I even auditioned in the first place. And now he'll...n-never know..."

Andy looked away as well, knowing that must have been eating at them as well. Harl-EE wasn't normally the shy type, but they likely never had a chance to speak to them alone, with differing schedules and the like. Rather than say anything, as they didn't know what they could say to that, they merely put their arm around the maknae, who leaned on their leader's shoulder with a sigh.

After the silence filled the room for a few moments, Harl-EE spoke again, "Hey...hyung?"
Andy gave them a look urging them to go on, which they did, "Can we...change our debut..?"

Andy was somewhat surprised. Granted, with news like this, it would be almost disrespectful to suddenly debut mere days after the death of a former idol, so even CEO Lee would probably agree that the date needed to be delayed. But to ask to change it?
"What do you mean, change the debut...?"

Yu-Jin looked away, biting at their lip for a moment, before returning their eyes to their leader's, "I... I want to make a tribute song. For Hyo-nim. ...And also, for all the people going through what he did..."

Andy thought about it for a moment, looking away as well, before a thought struck them. "Yu-Jin...I think that might just work. Of course, we'll have to ask Lee-ssi before we start writing anything... That might just be better than our planned debut song." They smiled warmly at their younger bandmate, whose eyes seemed to regain a little of that energetic spark they normally had. They grabbed their leader's hands, clasping them between their own, a smile cracking across their face for the first time since the leader had seen them that day.

"You mean it?! We can?!"

Andy laughed a little at their reaction, "Like I said, we'll ask Lee-ssi. But if I know CEO Lee, he won't mind if it's something like that. He'll probably be sad to hear about Hyo-nim as well... If he doesn't already know. Not to mention Acid themselves... What do you say we get you cleaned up a little, and then go talk to him?"

Yu-Jin let out a little laugh, releasing their leader's hands, and nodded, wiping their face a little, "Do I really look that bad?"

"Ehh..." Andy tried to pass it off as nothing, but eventually had to nod, "Let's just say your makeup is everywhere but your eyes now."

Yu-Jin let out an annoyed whine, speaking something in Japanese that the leader couldn't understand and shoving them lightly, before getting up and walking towards the bathroom door, feeling around for the light switch as they entered it. Andy got up to open the blinds, and followed the maknae in to help get them clean off the smudged makeup and re-do it. They also needed to mentally prepare themselves to break the news to the other members...

Hopefully, things could only get better from here.