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neo-shitty · 3 years ago

Text

roger rabbit — l.mh

description. notorious troublemaker lee minho teeters between suspension and expulsion when he finally gets caught, except it’s for something he didn’t do and when the boy cries ‘innocent’, no one bats an eyelash to drive the wolves of consequence away. with only one eye witness and the world’s faith turned away from him, it’s up to his friends to white out a well-earned reputation and serve justice where it’s due. (all prior cases that led up to said notorious reputation aside, though.)

pairings. lee minho x everybody, 3racha x ocs.

genre. adventure, comedy, platonic!au, friendship!au, high school!au, a pinch of angst and fluff sprinkled everywhere

warnings. swearing, mentions and the act of underage drinking and smoking, attempted arson (?), bullying, slight violence and fighting.

word count. 26.8k

playlist. roger rabbit

notes. for @districtninewriters writer’s room theme: yearbook. roger rabbit is yet another installment to the in these halls series, set a year before the events of checkmate. this fic lacks a reader character and will be told from six various perspectives: from the boys of 3racha and the 3 ocs from checkmate BUT the plot is still minho-centric, enjoy!

BEFORE. Lee Minho. October 26th, Friday.

The afternoon bell often meant the culmination of all the shenanigans on the fourth floor of the Hui Building. Apparently, that wasn’t the case for today.

11-A scattered as soon as the familiar chime of the afternoon bell came in through the speakers, echoing a tune down the hallways that was more ominous than it let on. The high pitched clangs of the metal poles elicited panic across those who knew the consequences of being caught outside classrooms after the bell rang. The halls bustled with students rushing to get back to their rooms, boisterous chit-chat fading into whispers as they disappeared into their respective cubes. Chairs clattered as they’re dragged back into place, whiteboards squeaked as they’re wiped clean, and students filed back to their seats.

Minho hopped off the front desk as his mind registered the sound of the school bell above the game noises his phone emitted. His eyes and thumbs remained glued to the screen, navigating the room blindly and hoping he wouldn’t knock yet another hydro flask off a table top. The timer on his screen showed ‘00:10’ — ten seconds to turn the tables of the game.

He heard his name called out from the back row but he didn't look up, too engrossed. Dragging his fingers, his avatar sneaked past the enemy defense line to a route away from the center of the team fight where everyone else was on each other’s necks. There his target was sprinting back, a weakened avatar retreating back to the enemy base to refill its health bar.

A flicker from the side of his screen caught his eye, a timer ending, a recharged skill. He thumbed the button, dragging it across the screen as the arrow charged. Pointing the arrow to the edge of the screen, where the weakened hero disappeared off, trusting his knowledge of the map to guide him from months of gaming.

Then he let go, and his character shuffled weapons and aimed a bazooka at the corner.

For a moment there was nothing, just the whistle of the grenade shell as it left the barrel. He waited one second, then another, and another. Until finally, distant in the audio of his right earphone, the sound of the bomb hitting and exploding. A banner flashed on the screen, tipping the scales and bumping his team’s kill count up one more digit — one more than the other team’s. The screen froze and 8 scripted letters appeared in glowing white print then dispersed in a flurry of white specks. Game Over.

“Nice one!” Someone beamed from the back row. Jeongin leaped out of his seat, eyes disappearing into thin concaves as he smiled from ear to ear. “Who made the last kill? Was it you?”

Beside him Felix shook his head, setting his phone down and cracking his knuckles. Seungmin did the same. Jeongin turned to Minho last, as if he was the last person he expected to win the match for them. Ungrateful brat, Minho thought. But the younger boy skirted around the desks to give him a hi-touch and a small thank you and the snarky comment withered on the tip of his tongue.

“Good game.”

Minho turned. The members of the other team were already shuffling out their seats, chucking their things into their bags and making the cross to the other side of the classroom. Among them was Han Jisung who gave the winning team a slow clap.

He held out a hand, outstretched for Minho to shake.

And he took it, clasping it for the shake before he whispered, “The M in Minho stands for MVP. Remember that.”

Jisung managed a nod, grinning even as the older boy’s grip tightened around his hand. “I’ll be sure to be on your team next time,” he said, wincing, but maintaining his smile.

“Not a chance.” Minho mirrored him, his own tight-lipped smile on his mouth before he let go.

On his way to his new seat, he passed the losing team, chin high and chest puffed even his lucky strike could’ve been ruled as nothing but a stroke of luck. The games added a bit of spice to their lunch breaks and determined how they’d enjoy the afternoon. The lucky half would be able to sit on the half of the aisle closest to the door, where the air was cooler and the getaways were less noticeable, while the others sat closer to the windows and basked in the afternoon sun that burned bright and blinding.

Minho couldn’t believe it. Closest to the window yesterday, closest to the door now. He set his bag down on his new table, glancing to the end of the row and locking eyes with its previous occupant. Changbin scoffed, muttering something that he couldn’t hear across the aisle. So he yanked the chair backward, gaze unwavering and taunting. It was hard to wipe the smirk off his face, especially when he still managed to snag the seat when it was collectively kept away from him.

But the chair wasn’t where it was supposed to be and Minho noticed it a little too late.

His center of gravity shifted with the absence of the chair, careening backwards until he hit the floor with a solid, loud thud. A moment of stunned silence hung in the air of the classroom, heads turning out of both curiosity and concern. The silence didn’t last. Laughter filled the air, bubbling out of the mouths of the people in the back row. Minho felt heat spread across his skin, his face, his ears.

“Are you alright?”

Minho was too busy helping himself off the ground to notice that someone else offered a hand. When he looked up, he found himself looking at the girl on the chair in front of him. Lia had an outstretched hand held up, one that he felt bad for not noticing sooner. He nodded, reassuring.

The fall captured the attention of the two other girls on her row; one with a blank, judging gaze and the other wide-eyed with her mouth agape.

Saeyeon’s eyes didn’t linger on Minho for long and he went to dust his ass off with the spare seconds no one was keeping a too close watch on him. “You’ve done it this time, Hyunjin,” Saeyeon warned.

Minho’s ears twitch at the mention of a name, the culprit of his embarrassment finally bearing a face in his mind. Behind him, he heard faint giggles, fading as its owner slipped away from the site of his mischief. The others cleared a path for him to get away, but they didn't make a move to block Minho. Not that it would’ve done much.

Their classroom was small. Hyunjin managed to vault over a row of desks once to escape the grasp up the older boy but the ways out the room were shut and with the hallways off limits after the bell rang, Hyunjin didn’t have much room to run to.

It didn’t take long for him to be cornered. He stood with his back against the front door, trapped by the frontrow killjoys who were unwilling to aid him on his escapade and by Minho who blocked his only other way out.

“I’m sorry!”

Hyunjin shrank when Minho grabbed him, the tall boy reduced to a crouching wimp backed up against a solid surface of the door. Minho tightened his grasp, hand framing the twin bones of the younger boy’s arm.

“It’s alright, it’s alright.” Minho tried to muster the most gentle voice. The back row erupted into snickers as the scene unfolded up front like a school play scene. “I just want you to remember what I said.”

The blond blinked back, clueless.

Minho frowned. “My, aren’t you a forgetful guy.” He tightened his grip again and the younger boy’s eyes flicker over to him. “How many degrees did I tell you?”

Hyunjin’s giggles seized for a sliver of a moment. And Minho thought the boy had forgotten all about it, opening his mouth to repeat the phrase when, “180, 180!”

“180, what?”

“180 degrees,” Hyunjin stammered, but still managed to squeeze a giggle in between. “180 degrees for 20 minutes to cook me in an air fryer.”

It almost made Minho smile. “Good.”

He pulled the boy off the ground, standing at eye level for a moment. His lips parted to say something, but fell short when the door swung open.

Rays of bright light spilled into the dim classroom and the secrets of the dark cube lay exposed to those who were prying. The sunlight was blinding, enough to have him squinting to make out who stood by the entrance. Three silhouettes, enveloped in white light and nearly impossible for him to recognize.

“Well,” a voice said. “When are you going to move out of the way, Lee Minho?”

Minho knew that voice too well. It belonged to the bane of his high school existence; the one that shouted his name way too many times down long hallways and through the school’s announcement system, so damn much that he started to hate it. Recognizable even without the layers of autotune, Director Park stood by the doorway, flanked by the Student’s Affairs Chief Mrs. Gong and the student council president Brian — the SSA’s beloved (but hated by most students including himself) ‘gotta-keep-these-animals-in-check’ triumvirate.

The fluorescent lights of the classroom flickered on overhead, basking everyone in steady light for the triumvirate to scrutinize. Minho hated it when the trio visited, it never meant anything good. He’d had enough of them tailing him for anything he did, though he knew they were there for good reason. He’d been stirring trouble for them for the past three school years he’d been enrolled and they were right to be cautious of him. Their rules had loopholes; he just happened to be good at spotting and exploiting them.

“You must be wondering why we’re here.” Director Park’s voice boomed from across the room as Minho made his way back to his seat, answering the question no one dared to ask. The old man swept the room like a scanner, burning through eye sockets as he met each students’ gaze. He settled on Minho longest and they locked eyes like rivals in a ring before the match starts.

The old man is the first to relent, tearing his eyes away to gesture at the student beside him. Brian nodded lightly before he turned to the class.

“We’re here to do a mandatory bag check. Bags on the table, now.” He didn’t explain further, immediately walking over to the first row to start checking.

The gears in Minho’s mind churned in speculation. Fridays were standard for bag checking days, but October itself wasn’t in bag checking season. The checks only ever happened nearing the end of the semester which was well over a month away. A quarter of the council’s force would join Brian on his hunt to expose students but never the other members of the triumvirate. Minho glanced down the row, catching a glimpse of Chan’s confusion then proceeded to tick a box on his mental checklist of things that would support his hypothesis. One clueless council member down and one other to go. He leaned over to the row in front of him, tapping Taehee’s shoulder before he asked.

“Did you know about this?” he whispers, hypothesis strengthened when Taehee shook her head.

Whatever the reason for the bag check, it wasn’t disclosed to the rest of the council members. And whatever it was, it was serious enough to warrant the presence of two of the most powerful administration officers.

A few vape sticks, cigarette packs, and a ‘water’ bottle filled with liquor later, Brian cleared the student in front of Minho and made his way to the last row. The older boy’s eyes ran over Minho in the same scanning fashion the director did, searching for discrepancies like they always did when they walked past each other.

“Improper uniform again, Lee,” Brian muttered, flipping his infamous ticket-to-hell booklet to the nearest available sheet. He set it on the desk, topping it with a ballpen for Minho to sign himself on to. Minho checks the tick boxes blindly, muscles gaining memory after filling the receipt way too many times to count.

“At least I’m present.” Minho grinned as he handed the booklet back.

The sloppy thing was down to its last few leaflets. Brian was due for another booklet change and he still had half a semester to get through. It made Minho wonder how much he contributed to the thinning of its available sheets.

“Why the sudden bag check?”

“Student council lost something.” Brian didn’t look up when he answered, too busy pulling out unused notebooks and untouched textbooks out of the depths of Minho’s bag.

The latter studied the president’s face. He kept a poker face, but the creases on his forehead showed his agitation and the underlying frustration that came with whatever was missing.

But before he could ask for further details, Brian stilled. The brief pause sent Minho into a mini-panic. Did he accidentally leave something behind? Fridays weren’t safe anymore and he learned that the hard way. He made sure his bags were contraband-free during those days, even bothering to double-check every Friday morning.

“Minho.”

He didn’t miss the tone drop, it made him uneasy—anxious. He slipped his arm beneath the table, putting a weight on his leg to keep it from bouncing. “You can’t find anything there. I didn’t bring anything with me today.” He said, mustering his confidence that his bag was indeed devoid of anything they could be snooping for.

Again, Brian didn’t answer and Minho would’ve pried for one if the former didn’t pick something out of his backpack. A brown paper bag, weighted, thick, and definitely not empty.

Minho unconsciously looked around, scanning for any hidden cameras that could be filming him but there were none. He didn’t recall seeing a brown bag when he opened his bag earlier that day. How Brian managed to pull it out of nowhere? Minho didn’t have the answers. “What’s that?”

The older boy stared, unamused. “I don’t know, you tell me.”

Brian dropped the bag onto Minho’s desk. Minho avoided the older boy’s gaze, pushing himself up and peering down the bag to check its contents. Inside were papers coiled by rubber bands — wads of money, Minho realized — stacked horizontally to fill the bottom of the paper bag. Pieces fell into place in his mind; the reason behind the rushed bag search, the item the council lost, the stash of money in his backpack.

“Brian, did you find something?”

And before Minho could utter a word in his defense, Brian picked the bag off of his desk and raised it for the class to see.

Breaths hitch, hushed whispers, stunned silence. Eyes turned to the bag, to Brian, then to him last but only he felt the weight of their gazes, the heaviness of passed judgment. He was just as stunned as everyone else.

“I didn’t do it, I swear.” It was the first thing he blurted out when Brian turned back to face him, but the older boy only casted him a frown.

He sounded ridiculous and he looked the part too, caught red-handed and recycling the same line he used to get away with everything in a pathetic attempt to defend himself. Everyone heard it way too many times and have been fooled just as much. Their eyes held no surprise, like they knew if the culprit was anyone in the class, it would’ve been him.

“Lee Minho.” The voice snapped him out of his head, chucking him back into the classroom to face the looming reality of his situation. “If you could follow us downstairs?”

The walk down was a blur of three backs leading him through flights of staircases and endless hallways. When he was asked about the bag and its contents, he answered with nothing but his version of the truth but it wasn’t what they wanted to hear. They stared at him, disbelieving, like there was no way in hell he was still trying to get himself out of this one when he’d been shoved to the corner.

Except he really was telling them the truth this time, yet the idea of him being set up was hilarious to them—bordering made up than reality. He walked out the Director’s office with his head down, hands shaking, winded. It wasn’t the first time the triumvirate deliberated on what to do to him but it was the first time he was this shaken and unsure. It didn’t even matter that he told the truth this time. With how things have been set up, all signs pointed nowhere else but his direction.

For the first time, he dreaded the moment they'd come out to tell him he’d been suspended because he knew deep down that this might be his last time.

ONE. Bang Chan. October 26th, Friday.

He hated the way they were staring.

Chan never disliked council meetings, not even when they lasted long after the sun hid itself beneath the horizon. He thought of it as a productive way to pass his time, the same way he once viewed his soccer in middle school. To him, it was always a pleasure to throw in ideas for school events, tugging the ropes backstage, and seeing the whole thing play out after all the hard work he’d put into it. The stress that came with it exhilarated him, driving him to do better, knowing well that their labor would be rewarded with fulfillment.

But being in the student government had its fair share of mundane work, littered between the weeks leading up to the planning of the monthly events. Those were the days Chan dreaded most. Days passed with him barely stepping within the walls of his classroom, missing school work after school work that would all be accounted for when the hectic week passes. This month, he didn’t expect something else to top it all off.

The council was called upon not long after Minho was escorted out of their class by the triumvirate, the council’s bustle falling into hushed whispers when he entered the office. It had been the same when Minho left earlier, ‘I knew he did it’s exchanged by other classmates while most of the back row remained silent—dumbfounded. He kept his head down, eyes glued to the pearl white tiles as he shuffled to his seat in the oval. When Brian arrived after deliberating with the triumvirate, he didn’t waste a moment to fill everyone in on the events of that morning; the stolen cash fund, the culprit, and the suspension that came as the consequence.

The meeting was shorter than usual, nothing else on the agenda but the discussion of the lost and found funds and the people responsible; the treasurer and, after accusations were exchanged, Minho’s classmates—him and Taehee.

“You were both in it, weren’t you?”

It made his blood boil, more so when he looked up and caught the eye of a coward who never took a fall without dragging someone else along with him. The smirk tugging on the corner of the treasurer’s lips doesn’t go unnoticed and it took every fiber of Chan’s self control to stop himself from bursting. But he stayed silent, willed himself to keep his mouth shut to not add fuel to the fire.

He left the room as soon as they were dismissed, exhausted and heavy with unnecessary baggage he never wanted to carry. Guilt weighed him down even when he knew he wasn’t in on it. To be accused of letting slip that the council room was left unlocked was outrageous to him. He didn’t even know the lock was broken!

The accusations were getting to his head, twisting the truth as he knew it the longer he was inside the office’s walls. A wave of relief washed over him when the meeting was adjourned, taking the first opportunity to walk out before anyone could pester him about it any longer. He thought stepping out would feel like a breath of fresh air, that the walk to the restaurant would be less suffocating. But the silence between him and the other junior was cold, different from their usual comfortable silence.

Taehee walked a few steps ahead, not even letting him catch up to her. He didn’t need to be a genius to know when he was being avoided, but his conscience never let him rest until he knew the reason why. Though he did know the reason and in his mind he could still see her glaring from across the oval table. He wanted to say something, anything.

“Why did you stop me from talking earlier?”

Chan blinked. He wondered if he imagined her talking or it was just one of those moments where his brain spoke too loud it broke physical barriers.

But Taehee turned to face him. “Why did you stop me from talking earlier?” she repeated.

The memory flooded back in pulses of rage, a relentless ticking in his ear as Jae justified the accusations with circumstantial evidence that had nothing to do with the robbery — nothing to do with him. He caught the moment Taehee nearly snapped, the intensity of her glare at the senior. Their eyes met for a moment, and he could tell she was waiting for one last signal to go off but was only met with a firm head shake. And he worried she wouldn’t listen, but she reclined on her seat, closing her eyes the way she wished she could her ears.

“The situation looked bad enough for us. I didn’t want it to get worse.” A half-truth, he knew he had more reasons and Taehee could see right through. “We can’t do anything about it anymore. He’s suspended and we don’t have the evidence to counter what they had, what we witnessed earlier.” He replied.

Taehee scoffed, a cloud of air fogging where she exhaled. “Are there ever times where you don’t let people get to your head? Where you, I don’t know,” she shrugged, “stand your ground?”

And that was all it took for his facade to shatter, to have his thoughts spiraling on themselves, to feel transparent—seen. Like the screen he put up did nothing to hide him and the instability of his own beliefs. All she did was ask but her words felt like daggers lodging into his chest. Maybe it was the amalgamation of Minho’s petty crimes that made him lose his fate, or his desperation to be free from the treasurer’s accusation that made him break. Worst of all, her words echoed Minho’s.

“You’re being biased.”

“Of course I am, dumbass. He’s my friend.” My, not our. “I know Minho in a way your rich ass doesn’t and if there was anything he wasn’t willing to risk it was his scholarship. He wouldn’t do anything that stupid.”

“Minho’s my friend too.” It was the only thing Chan managed to utter, her words seeping through the way the accusations in the council room did.

“Of course he is,” she answered, unbelieving.

“Taehee.”

But she didn’t turn her head. A bus rolled to a stop in front of them, hailed by another person at the bus stop. She stepped away from the sidewalk, letting other passengers line up before her and put herself last on the queue.

“If they ask, tell them I have a project to finish.” She boarded the bus and never looked back.

Chan caught a whiff of the barbecue house long before he came in. The air shifted as he walked down the barren sidewalk, autumn breeze blowing his direction and picking the smoke from the restaurant along with it. The smell of cooked meat made his stomach churn, mouth watering as his senses were overrode by his own hunger, enough to even dull his raging thoughts. God, I’m hungry. He picked up the pace until he reached the swinging doors of the BBQ house and let himself in.

The house was packed today, tables occupied by groups of students and casual-clad workers. He satcheted across the room, squeezing through narrow aisles and avoiding the occasional arm swing of another customer who had too much to drink. Like usual, his friends occupied the long table at the back, the only table in the restaurant that could sit everyone down. They greeted him when he approached, setting their bags down and making room for him on the edge of the bench. A plate found its way to him, along with utensils and slices of his favorite meat.

“Where’s Taehee?” Saeyeon asked from across him, her eyes glinting from the light hanging overhead — expectant.

Chan stilled at the mention, knocked back into the thoughts he tried to escape from. “Went home,” he answered. “Had a project to do.”

The girl cocked her head, “Didn’t she say she finished it last night?”

Silence fell upon them like a veil, excluding them from the hustle and bustle of the rest of the restaurant. Chan didn’t answer, the lie wasn’t his to justify. The topic was dropped, moving on to other things as they went on with their meals.

Every now and then, his eyes would wander over to the vacant spaces between them, all too wide and hard to ignore. At their maximum, they sat elbow to elbow with the occasional complaint about personal space thrown about. There were no complaints about brushing arms today, but no one seemed enthusiastic about it. He shrugged the thought away.

“How was the council meeting?” Changbin asked.

Chan glanced up, wishing for the topic to be dropped. But there was no point in avoiding the elephant in the room and even if he got around it now, he’d still have to answer it sooner or later. “Jae got scolded and he accused us of being accomplices,” he said, hoping the explanation would suffice for Taehee’s sudden absence.

Jeongin rolled his eyes. “God, isn’t he annoying? Can’t he own up to anything?”

“Right,” Felix said, pursing his lips before turning to Chan. “You know that isn’t true, Chan. Don’t let it get to you.”

Another echo. The words rippled in his mind, three different faces all saying the same thing. There was a simple irony in the way it, too, was getting to his head.

If what Chan believed wasn’t the truth, then what was? The version of reality in Chan’s mind felt too distorted to be the line between facts from opinions, real from imaginary, truth from lie. Was the truth the one agreed upon by most? Was it the one insisted by those who only saw one side of the story? Was he biased and clouded by his own beliefs?

His thoughts race in his head, conflicted on who and what to believe. Did he really play a role in having the cash fund stolen? Did one of his closest friends act without thinking of what would follow? Was he a bad person for being rational? Or was he shallow for letting himself be swayed easily?

“Earth to Bang Chan?”

Chan’s vision refocused, finding himself staring at a waving palm held in front of him. He blinked as the blonde lowered his hand back down to the table.

“Eat your meal, tough guy. It’s been a rough day.” Hyunjin said.

He couldn’t, not while his thoughts raged. Not while the events of earlier put him on chokehold for being both a bad friend and an irresponsible officer. Fridays were supposed to be good days, a hooray for the weekend celebrated with a meal at their go-to restaurant. They were supposed to be complete on Fridays.

“Do you,” he started, but trailed off. He wanted to drop the subject but all eyes were on him now, waiting for him to finish. He exhaled the last of his hesitance. “Do you think he actually did it?”

There was a pause in their actions; a blink, a split-second caught off guard by his query. Nervous glances were exchanged across the table but the moment passed and no one motioned for the topic to be dropped. Chan guessed that they were all just tiptoeing around it, afraid of how the others might react.

Chan’s gaze landed on a boy at the opposite end of the table. “Honestly, if it’s just the evidence, it sure seems like he did it.” Seungmin said, the others nodding in agreement after him.

Another person stirred, setting their own pair of chopsticks down with a rather loud clatter. Lia furrowed her eyebrows. “Can’t be. We were together the whole morning.”

“You were together the whole morning but you didn’t say anything?” Frustration got the better of Chan and his voice came louder than he expected. A few heads turned from other tables but he was too agitated to be bothered. Guilt made his stomach twist, calling Lia out for keeping silent felt hypocritical after the meeting earlier. He could’ve said something, done something. Why do you keep letting them get to your head?

“I was just as shocked as everyone was. Everything happened too fast.”

That, he could agree with. It was over before he could even ask why the bag check happened in the first place.

“It’s alright, actually,” Seungmin said, drumming his fingers on the table. “If she said anything, they’d say she was in on it too.”

“But where were you?” Everyone’s attention panned to Lia. Chan hoped they were just as desperate as he was to hear anything that could support Minho’s innocence, rid their minds of the secondhand guilt they were feeling. He didn’t put too much faith into it yet, a million things could’ve happened between first period and lunch break when the stash was uncovered missing.

“We came in late. Classroom doors were locked so we passed the time at the cafeteria.” Lia answered, no pauses in her statement but seeming as though she was merely recollecting her thoughts.

Jisung shifted beside Chan, leaning over the table to narrow his eyes on the girl across the table. “You didn’t join him when he stole the money now, did you?”

“And why would I do that?”

“Who knows?” Jisung shrugged. “You loved your friends so much you stole the council’s stash so you could split it between all 11 of us.”

“Jisung.” Chan warned.

“Sorry.”

Across the table, Changbin asked, “What was the verdict?”

“Suspension. A week.”

Felix shook his head, frowning. “Can’t be just that. Stealing is a serious criminal offense. Might be bumped into an expulsion before the week’s over.”

For a moment Chan wished it wasn’t mentioned, the gravity of the situation being deeper than what he initially thought. His blood ran cold beneath his skin at the mention, at the thought of being the one in the end of the cruel consequences. A part of him wanted to laugh, to tell Minho he dug his own grave and now had to lie in it. But after hearing Lia’s statement, a verbal testimony that Minho was elsewhere when the robbery took place, he wasn’t too thrilled to hear about the expulsion.

Still, it was evidence enough; a singular hope he could clutch onto, a chance that his friend might not be the one behind the grave offense. It was a gamble he was willing to risk. He had his own mind to disprove and friends to make it up to. And the impulse came like a lighthouse’s beam through a foggy day at sea.

Heads turned to Chan when he abruptly stood from his seat, the bench rattling backwards and nearly making the others beside him fall off. “I’ll talk to him tonight, get his side of the story,” he announced.

“Do you even know where he lives?” Jeongin asked.

Right when Chan was about to shake his head, Lia sprung up from the other side of the table. “I do. I’ll come with you.”

No one bothered to stand in their way. Whatever they’ll get out of the boy tonight might not be the whole truth. The chances of them getting vague cryptic answers or straight up lies were high but it was better than nothing. Chan could only hope they’d be enough to tranquilize the thoughts inside his head and for once give him a concrete place to side on.

“You’ve been to Minho’s?”

The bus hummed beneath their feet as it turned down narrower streets. Outside, the skyscrapers were distant, nothing but blocks of light this far out from the center of the city. A glowing arc curved over downtown Seoul, a vibrant halo against the inky black sky—nothing like the suburbs that sat outside its walls. The buildings here were no more than a few stories high, stacked atop each other as they hiked up sloped roads.

Lia shook her head. “No. We just see him here a lot.”

She craned her neck, fingers curling around the pole that kept her upright throughout the ride then pressed against the red stop button. The bus swerved lightly, coming off the fast lane before groaning into a stop beside the road. Chan followed her out to the bus and onto the sidewalk.

“Quite far for your adventures,” Chan said, squinting at the starless sky overhead then down the dimly lit road. “And a bit dangerous too.”

Lia let out a small laugh. “Taehee lives nearby.” Her eyes find Chan’s before he could mask the way he faltered. “Did something happen back there?”

The memory of the girl's gaze resurfaced in Chan’s mind, a cold stare that didn’t warrant any words to show how she’d been let down. He sucked in a shaky breath but when he opened his mouth to speak, the words didn't come.

“It happens a lot, Chan,” Lia muttered. “She says things she doesn’t mean when she’s pissed. Sorry you had to hear it.”

The matter of whether she meant it or not didn’t bear any weight to him. It struck true regardless. “Don’t worry about it. She had a point.”

They walked in silence up steep hills that made Chan’s thighs burn. The question of why Minho always showed up late to class finally made sense. The thought almost made him smile before he remembered why he was making the hike in the first place. After today, he might never see the other boy walk in late again.

The pair stopped across the street from the only bustling part of the suburbs. A building spanned the entire block, a mix of mini-marts and restaurants where you couldn’t tell apart which were open and not. Chan wasn’t used to the silence. He was always used to the hustle and bustle of the streets of downtown Seoul.

They crossed when the last of the traffic passed. Chan followed her footsteps until they reached a small indent in the building. The eatery didn’t have a door. A counter occupied half of the entrance while the other led into the empty dining area. The employee working the counter shot out of their seat when he noticed them approaching. “Sorry, we’re already closing up. Come again next time.”

Chan’s eyes panned to the direction of the voice, familiar even with half his face covered in the shade of his cap.

“Minho.”

The boy’s head shot up, a pair of round eyes blinking up at them from behind the counter. Recognition washed over his face but his mouth twisted into a frown. Chan thought he’d ask them to leave.

“Do you both want to freeze to death?” Minho shouted from across the counter. He reached over to unhook the chain blocking the entrance to the restaurant. “Come in.”

Chan hesitated. But Lia stepped around him, walking up to the front of the entrance and soon enough he followed suit. Despite the restaurant being open, it was a lot warmer inside — safe from the chilly winds that swept down the streets of this side of the city. The restaurant was small, just enough to fit a dozen dine-in customers. Its yellow walls were matched with red accents, both dark and vibrant. The scent of fried chicken hung heavily in the air even after closing time. Only one other table was occupied, a lady hunched over a record book, tapping away on a calculator.

Minho led them down the narrow space, to a table not far from the back, adjacent to a statue of a rooster. He turned to them as they were seated, the wobbly stools giving Chan a scare when he teeters backward. Both Lia and Minho stifled their laughter.

“Can I get you anything?” Minho asked.

“We’re fine,” Chan said. “We’re just here to talk.”

The expression on Minho’s face shifted, unreadable with his head hung low. He nodded slightly, rounding the table to take the stool across Chan. He looked up, face steeled and eyes blank, it made Chan’s stomach twist and grumble. The restaurant was quiet enough for it to be heard. He forgot about his hunger, buried by his anxiousness, but it seemed that his body did not.

Minho’s eyes widened in amusement, breaking into a grin. “You can’t lie for shit, Chan. Hold on, I’ll get you something.”

Minho disappeared behind a curtained doorway, reappearing moments later with pieces of chicken in a mesh strainer and two pairs of chopsticks. He set it down on the table between them along with a tray of sauces. Chan’s guilt swelled up again. The thought that he never once viewed Minho as a possible victim to a setup crawling into his mind and making his hand heavy. He felt ashamed.

“Well,” Minho said. “Are you just going to stare at it?”

Lia shook her head, “I already ate.”

He nodded, turning to Chan. “You?”

Chan chewed the inside of his cheek, pride and hunger brawling within him. But he shook his head, priorities resurfacing. “It’s not what we’re here for.”

“So?” The change in Minho’s tone caught him off guard. “I’m not talking until you eat something,” he said, arms crossed over his chest as he stared Chan down.

The older boy resigned. His hands found their way to the table, coiling around the chopsticks before he picked up the nearest chicken finger in between. He muttered a small thank you, voice quiet. Minho nodded across him, only slumping back on his chair when a portion of the meat had been bitten off.

“Did the council send you?” Minho asked, jokingly but it was enough to make Chan freeze. Then before the latter could formulate a question, he turned to Lia. “How about you? Let this be a lesson to never come to school late again.”

He lost Chan at the first question. Minho joked an awful lot and his tone wasn’t laced with distrust. What if Chan really was sent by the council to pry the answers out of him? Chan shook his head. He was here for his own sake, for his own peace and his conscience. But didn’t that make him anymore selfish than he already seemed?

The silence that hung between them dissipated when the girl spoke. “Wow. Are you going to change once you’re back from suspension?”

Minho looked up, staring. The dim light of the restaurant reflected on his eyes, a sparkle on the glossy surface. Then he dropped his gaze, avoiding their prying ones and choosing to look at the table between them instead. His fingers darted across the coated wood, tracing the circular patterns.

Then his answer came a moment later. “I don’t think they’ll let me go back.”

The chopsticks nearly fell out of Chan’s grasp. He opened his mouth to say something and again, his words failed him. What was there to say?

“There aren’t any mid-school year scholarship offers so I might be taking the rest of the year off. So I offered to help around a bit.”

The words spilled from his mouth so easily, like he’d already rehearsed what he would and wouldn’t say. Chan doesn’t miss the gloss coating Minho’s eyes. He recalled seeing him the first time during freshman year, scoring back-up for senior performances before weaving his way up the ranks until he became the first junior to become the leader of the school’s dance troupe. He was easily one of SSA’s best leaders, a strict perfectionist who ensured a quality performance under his lead — a loss to the academy.

“Minho, it’s—”

He held up a finger. “I know what you’re going to say. I wouldn’t say no to a solution if you had one.” His voice was light but the hopelessness in his tone doesn’t go unnoticed, like he spent the rest of his afternoon twisting the situation a million times over to see a way out but to no avail. A jester who finally ran out of tricks up his sleeve. He looked worn out.

The sight was enough to finally change Chan’s mind. His friend was innocent, distraught as much as they were. In the boy’s eyes, there was an anxiousness that mirrored his own. While he worried about an internal crisis, the other was lost in the gravity of the situation he found himself in.

“But you didn’t do it.” Lia’s voice was just as quiet. Chan could only imagine what it was like for her, carrying the truth with her but still being helpless.

Minho’s eyes didn’t waver from the table. “It doesn’t matter if it isn’t what they believe.”

“We’ll find a way.”

“Don’t bother.”

“Minho,” Chan deadpanned.

“No, for real though.” He blinked up, looking straight into the eyes of the older boy. “Good for the both of you because if you got caught stealing something, everyone’s going to say, ‘Oh, they’d never do that.’ Did you even see how our class reacted? No one was even surprised that they found the stash in my bag. Even the director expected that it’d be there.”

Chan scrambled for the right words to say. “Won’t you at least try to defend yourself?” he suggested, only realizing how stupid he sounded when the younger boy rolled his eyes at him. Then the echo came again, as if to remind him of his hypocrisy. He was in a position to help, one with better chances of working compared to Minho’s attempts to defend himself. But the moment passed, the chance slipped out of his fingers because he let it.

“You think I didn’t? I told them the fucking truth earlier and nothing changed.” Minho’s voice was strained now, more eager to end the conversation than to discuss it further. “Put it this way. We don’t know each other. If you see the stash pulled out of my bag, what would you think of me? You’d think I stole it, right? Even if I told you that I didn’t actually do it, you’d think I was just lying. Imagine that but with someone with a mad-record of rule breaking.”

The restaurant fell quiet. Chan lowered his head. As much as he hated to admit it, Minho was right. Word of mouth wouldn’t be enough to disprove anything. Earlier that day it wasn’t enough for him to be convinced either.

“Face it.” Minho muttered. “There’s nothing you can do.”

A voice called out from behind the kitchen curtain, an indication they’ve overstayed their welcome. Minho showed them the way out, the bigger matters left untouched in their remaining moments together. Minho stayed behind to close up, leaving them to traverse the road down to the bus stop in the middle of the night.

The ride back to the city was spent in silence.

TWO. Jeon Saeyeon. October 29th, Monday.

Even the best fell down sometimes. When news about Minho’s suspension spread across the campus like wildfire, that phrase always came with it. Like a king with a fallen crown, a hero walking into the hands of the enemy. It was the subject of recess chatter and the whispers of faculty gossip. Saeyeon heard it all, and it made her wonder if the bustle was enough to make the school paper’s headlines.

Everyone wanted to pry and their own classmates strived off of it. They stroked the fires, fed the wood to keep it burning—all to keep the moths drawn. They ran their mouths, recounting any form of bad experience with Minho just to mount on to the issue because any kind of attention was good. If anything, the more scandalous the better.

Digging up Minho’s past became boring eventually. The audience didn’t want justifications and back stories. They wanted the reasons behind it, the how-he-did-it, insider information. But the class had nothing to offer for there were no witnesses to the crime itself, only its discovery and their assumptions. The more they talked, the more loopholes showed, lies surfacing as the tide drew back. The closest accounts were locked away, at the back row of the classroom behind zipped lips.

They got nothing out of her, nothing out of them. But it didn’t mean she wasn’t getting annoyed.

A part of her wished she would be careful of what she wished for. Everything was good in moderation and while she dreamed of making it big someday, even attention was tolerable in minute amounts. The pestering didn’t stop in their classroom, it followed her down the hallways and into the cramped comfort rooms, up flights of staircases and through crowded corridors.

Curious cats did not understand the idea of personal space. Arms were hooked around hers, dragging her away from where she needed to be, where she would then be asked of something she didn’t have an answer to. Then the stares came, pairs of eyes gazing with doubt swirling in their irises, because the answers she gave weren’t what they wanted to hear. She was one of the easier people to approach, but it didn’t mean she slipped up easily.

A dozen white lies and shrugged shoulders later, the hype died down and their holds loosened and Saeyeon could finally breathe. As soon as she reached the ground floor, she planned the quickest route to her destination. She made a turn at the nearest exit, marched down the narrow hall leading up to the wooden exit door and stumbled out into the alleyways.

Like most noons, the narrow paths were devoid of people but their traces lingered everywhere. Empty liquor bottles were tucked into corners, the ground littered with crushed cigarette butts, and the faint scent of nicotine hung in the air—stuck to the walls like strong perfume. It was home for some and a get-away for others. For Saeyeon, it was a life hack.

The narrow paths ran along the edge of the campus, hidden behind the grandiose buildings up front. It weaved through the grounds like a network of shortcuts, exclusive to those who explored enough to discover. She found herself there when she needed a breather, to be away from the public’s eye for a few minutes or to calm herself down after a mind-drying test.

She ran into Minho here often and for a while it was their little secret, a nook away from everyone else, where they could talk about anything and everything just to get it off their chest. He’d put his cigarette away, crush it beneath his feet the second he’d see her pop out of the doorway. The scent still irked her and it showed on her face enough to always warrant an apology. But having someone to confide in was better than nothing, especially one who didn’t let slip a single thing. Nothing she said at the alleyways ever got out and she never spoke a word about the cigarettes.

Minho hadn’t been there for a while now, long before his suspension, yet a part of her still expected to see that hunched back figure tapping away on his phone. She thought it was better than having him burn his lungs off but after the past week, she wasn’t so sure anymore. Then she’d shake her head, cast her doubts aside the way he did his cigarettes.

The others should be at the meeting place by now, passing time under the heat of the midday sun. The rooftop deck was their last resort for lunch breaks, mainly because the open air didn’t compensate for the scorching rays. But it was away from the public’s eye so for the sake of their own well-being, they all agreed to spend the lunch hour there.

Saeyeon slipped back into the normal route unnoticed, head down and hair tucked beneath a hoodie as she made the hike up the steep stairs. There was only so much the sweater could hide, her curls cascaded down and framed her face and she prayed it won’t be enough for anyone to recognize her.

“Thank fuck!”

The rooftop door swung open with a light nudge and with her full force pushed onto it, it slammed against the adjacent wall. A breeze swept past her, kissing the pinpricks of sweat on the sides of her face and she walked over to the pile gathered on the shaded part of the rooftop, kicking the door back shut behind her.

“Took you long enough.” A voice called. Jeongin had one hand clutching his phone and the other outstretched before him.

Saeyeon arched her brow. “Who left me alone with the paperwork, huh? The nosy bastards were just a cherry to top it all off.” She tugged the sweater over her head, peeling it from her skin before chucking it at the boy’s face instead of his open palm. She shrank into the space beside him.

Across her, Felix frowned. “Who even purposely takes math as an elective?” He asked, his own brows knitted at the thought.

“Jeongin does because he skipped his classes for the past two years and now needs to catch up so he could graduate with us next year.” Saeyeon replied, smiling brightly—fakely—at the freckled boy who eyed them skeptically.

“But you passed?”

��I’m not saying I didn’t.”

“What she’s saying is,” Jeongin didn’t let her finish, dropping his phone on his lap and finally paying full attention,“that she’s a very kind friend who’s willing to help me out.”

“And you express your gratitude by leaving her with paperwork?” Saeyeon was glad that Felix, at least, took her side in the bickering.

“Not the point!”

A large crash from the entrance startled them out of their wits. They all overestimated the door’s newly oiled hinges. An unusual pair walked in through the doorway, both sweater-clad like Saeyeon was.

Taehee crossed the roofdeck in half the time Jisung did, scowling as she approached. Jisung trailed behind her, looking like a tornado swept through him. His hair was a disheveled bundle, his uniform only half-tucked in, and his bag spilling out half its contents.

“I thought you weren’t coming today.” Lia asked, looking up at the pair.

Taehee sat a spot away and pointed at the wreck that was Jisung. “Said he needed me.”

Saeyeon narrowed her eyes at them but she slumped back against the wall when she couldn’t think of anything else to say. Needed. Something about the term tickled a memory out of the depths of her mind, still she couldn’t quite fish it out.

“You’re late!” Seungmin yelled. “Are you planning to beat Minho’s tardy record while he’s gone?”

“Unfortunately, no.” Jisung answered. “I’m late because I didn’t get a wink of sleep last night.”

Something skidded against the rooftop floor, the sound of plastic wheels scratching against the rough cement. Hyunjin stomped and he was airborne for a moment, flipping the board over. It clattered back to the ground before he did and it creaked as he landed. He rolled past them with a smirk on his face.

“Competing with Chan, then?” he asked. Jisung laughed but the eldest frowned.

The crooked circle shifted as Jisung took his place, slotted between Lia and the eldest with a small space between where Minho would’ve been. They were a tough crowd to gather but the absences never went unnoticed. There were gaps and spaces in between, and dead air where more retorts should’ve been.

Changbin stirred. “So why were you up late? It’s not like you have anything important to do.”

Saeyeon bit back a laugh, the others snickered. For a fraction of a moment, it felt like a normal day on the rooftop. Yet Minho’s absence was noticeable. The savage remarks were his lines and they felt different rolling off someone else’s tongue.

Jisung blinked but he continued. “Good question, incorrect assumption. What I did last night concerns the absence of our beloved friend and nuisance, Lee Minho.”

He pulled something out of his pack and threw it onto the ground in the middle of the circle. It fluttered, failing to land perfectly but he rushed up to fix its arrangement. Saeyeon tilted her head, glimpsing at the notebook from an upright perspective.

A portrait of Minho, she realized, was glued to the center of the first page with the words INNOCENT OR NOT written in bold red ink. Someone within the circle let out a laugh, another followed. Jisung didn’t seem amused.

“Is Minho really innocent or not?” Jisung asked. “Of course, we’re trying to prove that he is. So if there’s anyone here who doesn’t believe that he isn’t, speak now or forever hold your peace,” he paused, “Or at least until the end of my discussion.”

Not me, Saeyeon wanted to mutter but the words lodge on her throat, afraid of finding out that someone within their circle believed differently. Friday resurfaced in her mind, the long on Minho’s face when he was escorted out the classroom. She was around Minho enough to know his lips twitched before he lied, and he stared at his targets first before he made his savage comments, but he never flinched whenever he was caught red handed.

Saeyeon saw the bewilderedness in his eyes when the contents of the bag spilled onto his desk and the confusion that came after. She hunched that he didn’t do it, his reactions said as much but it wasn’t enough to prove anything else. Until another witness took the podium.

Whoever thought differently must’ve chosen to keep their mouth shut instead because Jisung continued. He flipped the notebook over and on the next page were the words ‘Who framed Roger Rabbit?’

Minho would’ve laughed before chucking the notebook at Jisung.

“Do you see what I see?” Jisung asked, head tilted up at something by the entrance.

Their gazes followed, a succession of head turns that would’ve left the rooftop door conscious of it had the ability to think. But it stood still and unmoving like the wall keeping it in place, like the small overhang that never really shielded it from anything.

Not even a few seconds in, Felix said. “Of course, we can see the door. We have eyes, Jisung.”

“Do you know what else can see what we see?” Jisung asked, but he didn’t leave room for anyone to answer. He pointed at something on the top of the rooftop door’s overhang, half a black orb jutting out of the ceiling. “Behold the all-seeing eye.”

“Wouldn’t they catch us hanging out up here?” Lia asked.

“The rooftop cameras don’t work.” Heads turned to Chan when he finally spoke, quiet as he set the skateboard aside for them to focus. “Admin felt there was no need for them.”

“Dumb,” Jisung blurted. “But helpful for our current situation.”

Saeyeon remembered the first time the cameras were installed. There had been an influx of students getting caught; couples snogging in the hallways, boys loitering, corridor pranks, everything. She recalled how Minho easily found the blind spots, just as quick as she did. It never meant much to her until the need for a place to compose herself became a close to daily necessity. A part of her was thankful for the installation, even more so that it could be their leverage now.

Beside her Jeongin’s eyes went wide, picking up on what the grand plan was. “If SSA won’t bother to find the true culprit, then we will.”

It was the last thing she needed to have the gears in her mind click into place; the peculiar gathering where no one else could hear, the need for everyone to be around—it all made perfect sense. The circle went quiet, an uneasy silence of perspectives not falling in line with one another.

“How do we even access those? Isn’t the CCTV room manned 24/7?” Changbin narrowed his eyes on the camera, waving his hand even when it wasn’t recording.

“I’ll cover that later. For now, I need someone to scout the school to find all the cameras and where they are facing.” Jisung turned around, facing the circle again.

Hyunjin shot up, dusting his slacks off of pebbles that stuck to it. Patches of grey formed where he made his quick brushes, making Saeyeon snicker as he walked past her. “I can go and sketch a rough layout of the school. Is that cool?” he said.

“Anything will do, so long as it helps us see what the cameras see.” Jisung clamped the notebook shut, picking it off the ground to hand it to Hyunjin. Only to retract it at the last second. “You’re willing to help Minho out even if he wanted to cook you in an air fryer?” asked Jisung.

Hyunjin pursed his lips. “This is why I want to help so he won’t cook me in an air fryer,” he answered, snapping his fingers. “What’s not clicking, Jisung?” Then he snagged the notebook from the other boy’s hand.

Jisung made a face, biting back a retort before letting the thought go. He nodded then turned. “Understood. Seungmin, join him. You have a good eye. You could get the job done quicker.”

Seungmin stood up not long after, wordless, following Hyunjin as he headed for the exit. “Nice butt print,” he said, earning a glare from the taller boy before they disappeared behind the door.

Jisung dusted off his own palms as if his work had been done but Saeyeon knew it was only one cog put to motion and the rest of the plan was still to follow. They’ve barely scratched the surface. She’d only witnessed Jisung’s skills at work once before, during the final exams of the prior year. One of their instructors made it a habit to dish out exams beyond their lessons; incomprehensible items, solutions out of their level of experience. Unnecessary, if you asked her, especially for a school supposedly focused on arts. Written exams have been abolished but the instructor had other plans. So did Jisung.

The enormity of their friend group was often more of a nuisance than a pro. Finding a table large enough to occupy everyone was a problem enough, but finding one where the people on opposite ends could still hear each other proved to be more difficult — all the while respecting everyone’s need for personal space. Though during times like these, when brilliant plans required more than a one-man team, it came in handy. The distribution of labor was often fair, made to suit the area of expertise of every person involved. Seungmin was always the perfect person to dish out first, no one ever speculated about nice guys. Pairing him up with Hyunjin maintained a perfect balance between mischief and staying in line.

“Now that they’re out of the way, does anyone want to burn down the chemistry lab?” Jisung asked with utter nonchalance, his tone carrying none of the gravity his words suggested.

Lia blinked. “Burn down the chemistry lab?”

“Burn down the chemistry lab,” he repeated.

“What does that have to do with proving Minho’s innocence?” Chan furrowed his eyebrows, turning to Jisung. “Doesn’t this mean more crimes caught on cam?”

“It’s only considered a crime if it’s proven.”

The older boy tore his gaze away, shaking his head. “No.”

“If you don’t want to help, no one's forcing you to. There’s the door.”

Saeyeon’s eyes darted across the circle, feeling her presence disregarded with the tension streaming between. Taehee didn’t even glance up, eyes fixated on the pages of the book she was reading.

“There’s the door, bitch.” Felix whispered in a high pitched voice that earned a nudge from Lia and glares from the opposing parties. He shrank in his place, hand flying up to his lips to keep his mouth shut. “Sorry,” he said, muffled by his own palm.

Chan sighed, “All I’m saying is that it’s dangerous.”

Taehee mumbled to herself but Jisung cut her off.

“Drop it, please?” he said, his voice laced with its own annoyance.

Saeyeon would have applauded him there for taking the pair of glares sent his way. But he doesn’t show any signs of backing down, nor do the pair make any more notions in arguing. He exhaled in relief.

“Good, because you’re paired together and I can’t make any more changes.” Jisung rapped. The pair picked up on it easily, one frowning in disapproval and the other smirking in amusement.

“Is it in the burning of the chemistry lab?” Taehee asked, looking up from her book.

Creases appeared on Jisung’s forehead. “Hell no,” he squeaked. “You might actually burn the whole thing down. But you,” he turned, gaze landing on Saeyeon who didn’t expect her role to come this soon. “I think you can do it without anyone suspecting anything.”

Jeon Saeyeon. October 30th, Tuesday.

The objective of Operation Roger Rabbit was simple: get enough evidence to prove Minho’s innocence. The process leading up to it, however, was not. The only evidence on neutral ground was CCTV footage. With the council’s lack of interest toward a further investigation, the reels were free from their access. But that didn’t stop them from trying to get it.

The only hurdle they had was to draw out the man who manned the CCTVs. After days of scouting, Jisung concluded that the man never left the office — a lot more diligent than instructors he knew. He wasn’t sure if it was a one-man team handling the cameras, or a duo who were secretive enough to make their switches undetected. Whoever it was, they needed to be out of the room. Or in the plan’s case, the building.

Saeyeon knew of only one way to draw out everyone in the campus — by disaster. Any disaster warranted the complete evacuation of the campus, not really for safety protocol but to rid the school’s hands of the responsibility if anything bad happens to the students or the faculty. They couldn’t make the earth rumble beneath them, but they could stir enough panic to make the same impact. Phase 1 of Roger Rabbit was dedicated to exactly that.

In Jisung’s plans, Saeyeon never understood her importance until she’d been involved in a few. Turns out, the same principle that applied to Seungmin applied to her. The more innocent the face, the more daring the tasks, the less the suspicion.

The chemistry lab was a long hall on the fourth floor of the building opposite to their home room. It’s base looked exactly like the classrooms in Hui building. The tiles, however, were newer and less tainted, the boards were porcelain white without permanent smudges. Long tables were lined up in three columns and three rows, topped with cylinders of different shapes and sizes with a burner embedded in the center back.

The room was the length of two basic rooms combined, stretched out to accommodate the facilities the room required. Saeyeon wasn’t used to sitting in the middle row where half of the things written on the whiteboard were nothing but blurry scribbles from where she sat. The instructor’s voice was but a whisper, drowned out by the chatter of the back-row and the humming of the ceiling fans.

Overhead, the smoke detector light blinks red — activated, as it always had been. Saeyeon’s task was to trigger it, kick start the series of events leading up to Phase 2. It’ll be over before they’d even notice. Easy.

Except it wasn’t.

The notebook Saeyeon left to burn wasn’t burning fast enough. The smoke whiffing up from the burning pages wasn’t funneling directly to the smoke detector. Even when she’d first heard about it in the plan, she already doubted it. Smoke detectors detected thick clouds of gas, but something this little would go unnoticed. At this rate, the whole room could smell like a barbecue house without the smoke detector reacting.

The worried glances the others cast her was proof as much. They were running out of time and room to call it an accident. If she were to do anything, she had to do it now and fast.

A charred piece of paper fluttered off the notebook, glowing red as it swayed in the air before gravity finally pulled it to the table. Panic jolted through her and she reached for the paper. She flattened her palm, felt the burn of the paper against her palm. Biting down on her lip, she stifled a hiss. The world slowed as she panned her vision, hoping no one noticed.

Fire. The burn lingered in her palm, straight up her nerves and into her mind. Her mind whirred, reminded of a time the same palm pressed too hard on an oversensitive fire alarm trigger and made the system blare for a minute before school security came. The goal was to cause panic, not necessarily to activate the smoke detector.

She had to start a fire, one just enough to stir a bit of chaos.

Saeyeon fished out her phone from her pocket, sending a quick text to her friends before shoving it back. She then took a small bottle, a handy alcohol solution she carried around with her and spilled the content on the table. It streamed down the middle of the table, a puddle forming slowly. Then the bottle lightened, all it had to offer spread out onto the table.

Any minute now, she thought.

As if they’d been keeping close watch, a voice called out from another table.

“Does anyone smell smoke?” Lia asked, sniffing the air before turning to the others. All the acting classes finally put into practical use.

Behind Saeyeon, someone shouted. “Hey! Your notebook’s burning!”

She feigned her shock, panic-stricken as she leaped away from the table. She meant to stall it, to fake an accident and light the pool of alcohol on the table. But a blur movement nudged the pieces of their on going chess game, away from the strategy laid out for them. Someone dashed for their table, pulling the notebook from beneath the tripod and setting it down on the wet table — meaning to douse it. But the clear solution wasn’t water and the flame spread out as soon as the fire touched the flammable liquid. It sent the table blazing. Saeyeon flinched (fake) along with the others on her table (real), backing away from the fire.

“Fire!” Their instructor shouted. “Someone get the extinguisher!”

Shit. Saeyeon’s mind reeled into panic. The fire alarm wasn't the first protocol for accidents, the extinguisher was. She cursed at how calm the instructor handled it, even with the rest of their class’ panic.

But a sharp ring shattered her thoughts, and when she turned she saw Taehee’s hand pressed against the emergency fire alarm. They were all on the move. Around her, the others were rousing panic. And though the ringing of the fire alarm was associated with horrendous things, she couldn’t have been more relieved. She heard classroom doors burst open outside and the hallways bustle with confused, panicked students.

“The chemistry lab is on fire!” A familiar voice shouted down the hallway, causing more panic than was warranted from the already dying flame of the middle table. Someone had knocked the fire extinguisher out of its place, spraying a bountiful amount of foam to extinguish the flame. There was no harm done, save for the peace of her mind. The fire was put out easily but the panic that it sparked was irreversible. Saeyeon glanced around and noticed that those who needed to leave were no longer in their places; no one by the fire alarm, no one by the back row table nearest to the exit. Another fire alarm rang at a distance, then another, a checkpoint for progress. Students have begun to file out of their classrooms, following the rehearsed fire drill routes out of the buildings.

A knock on the wooden door made Saeyeon’s head turn. The door swung open to reveal a student council member, vest and pin on like always. She wondered if Taehee and Chan would be doing the same on their way down, both for the sake of their duty and for the bluff they were putting up.

“Ma’am, I’m so sorry to interrupt but we need you and the students of the class to evacuate immediately.” Jihyo, the council’s vice president, said — her eyes bright even in the midst of panic.

The instructor clicked her tongue. “The flame has been doused. We are fine. It was nothing but a little accident.”

Saeyeon’s jaw locked and she hoped the exchange of panicked glances between her and her friends would go unnoticed. If the panic didn’t spread enough, the others would be left in the open to fend for themselves. Did other teachers have the right to refuse evacuation too?

Think, Saeyeon. Think. But nothing came to mind this time. She had a frightening urge to set the classroom on fire again but to do it twice was too suspicious to be called an accident.

“Ma’am, you can’t refuse to evacuate your students. If something were to happen to them, you — as their current instructor and not the school — will be held liable as I am witness to your refusal to evacuate.” Outside the door, the council member smiled, doing what the admin did best, washing their hands clean. Saeyeon’s jaw nearly dropped out of its hinges. A small childish thought crossed her mind, an idolization to be that calm and collected even under pressure.

The woman up-front clicked her tongue again before turning to the class. “Get out.”

One by one the class filed into the hallway. Saeyeon slipped out just behind the others, unknowing classmates asking if she was alright after the fire. She looked rattled, just like the other people from her long table, but for all the wrong reasons. She just did that. Rationality returned in waves of what could’ve gone wrong. What if the tank beneath the table burst, taking them in the flame along with it?

“You alright?”

The voice came up from beside her, drawing her attention towards something instead of just spacing out as they walked the numerous flights down.

Saeyeon glanced up, catching the side of Changbin’s face. They made their way down together. She noticed the downward droop of the side of his mouth and she dropped her gaze. The sudden change of plans must’ve left the others disoriented. “Sorry.”

Changbin turned his head, looking down at her. He opened his mouth but pursed it back shut. “It’s okay,” he muttered. “Did you get burned?”

Saeyeon shook her head, her rehearsed reply. If she were honest, she hadn’t checked yet. Her hands still trembled, still cold despite being close to a blazing flame.

“Good. We’ll talk when we’re out on the field.” Changbin leaped down the stairs to catch up to Jisung before disappearing down another flight.

Lia fell into step beside her, rambling but her words droned out as Saeyeon’s mind wandered to the other half of their friend group that headed the other direction. There were only two main routes, one leading out to the open and the other further into the campus. She hoped she bought them enough time.

THREE. Byun Taehee. October 30th, Tuesday.

That was the best door dash of her life, if you could even refer to it that way. Her heartbeat hammered in her rib cage, her breaths were still ragged from the running, but she’d never felt more alive — trailing behind the boys as they weaved through the hall full of students.

Like most things in life, the elation too didn’t last long, fizzling out the moment they arrived two levels lower where nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Turns out only the fourth floor alarms ended up ringing, the rest they had to ring on their own. Council duties, Taehee wanted to dash for the CCTV room. It turned into an obligation, knocking on every few doors as Hyunjin rang the alarms. Its requirement sapped the thrill out of it, she felt more like a delivery man than a prankster.

It wasn’t the last bullet on the list of things that went wrong with Han Jisung’s plan and she made a promise to herself to nag the boy about it as soon as she was done with her task. The last miscalculation — and the one she hated the most — was the fact that even after all that, the CCTV man didn’t budge.

They were stumped when they caught a glimpse of the office lights still on and the hallway showing no signs of hearing the fire alarms blaring. Taehee chewed on her lip, brain working overtime as she kept her frustration in check while trying to figure out a way around it. Jeongin had long split from them and she hoped there would be some sort of delay to their cue but the fluorescent lights dimmed. Jeongin had made it past security in record breaking time, turned off the power switch and bought them the 5 minutes it took for the CCTV cameras to reboot back to full function.

The only problem was the room was still a locked area on the game map, inaccessible.

“So, what do we do?” Taehee asked. Her question was met with silence. What did she even expect from an airhead and from someone she snapped at twice in the past few days?

Beyond what she expected, Chan replied much later. “Can’t we just switch the alarms the way we did on the upper floors?”

“Tried it.” Hyunjin answered. “They don’t budge.”

It was impossible to mask the disappointment hanging in the air between them.

“We’re fucked. All that for nothing.” An emptiness seeped into her, the plummet after the sugar high. She thought of Saeyeon and the extremes she went just to get them out of the classroom, just to have them fail on retrieving what they risked for. All that work going to waste? Unacceptable. It was the only way she could get back at Minho and she was going to fail?

She was startled out of her thinking state when Hyunjin jolted beside her. “Not yet,” he said, hands patting his pockets for something until he felt it. He pulled a packet out, with a lighter to compliment it. “I have a plan. Sneak in as soon as you can.”

“When?” she asked.

Hyunjin paused half-way down the staircase, turning to look up at the pair he left behind. “You wouldn’t miss the cue,” he winked and dashed the way down.

He broke into a sprint the moment he reached the bottom floor, long before Taehee could process what he planned to do. She didn’t have the time to think of it either, all she was looking out for was the cue. They were way behind schedule. The cameras were rebooting and they’ll be airing again soon. If the man wasn’t out by the time the cameras rebooted, they were done for and caught red-handed too. They should’ve been out of the building by now, gathered at the quadrangle with the others. She was stretching the limits of her student council privileges, it would only be a matter of time before she got caught in her own web.

It was a shame she couldn’t talk about her worries with the only one who understood.

Chan stood a safe distance away from her, avoiding her gaze just as much as she avoided his. It was bearable with Hyunjin around, she just turned to the latter whenever she had a joke in mind. Now, she stood in silence with a million thoughts raging in her head that she thought she might explode. Surprisingly, an apology was among them. It was a thing she noticed about growing up, she now wanted to make it a habit to mend things before they were ripped too far apart to be sewn back. But finding the right words were hard and she knew her pride couldn’t handle a rejected apology. So she sat quietly until the familiar ring of the fire alarm echoed down the hallway of the first floor, a sharp sound that made her ears bleed but she endured it regardless.

What she didn’t expect was the rain that came along with it.

The sprinklers came to life and water poured out its spouts in droplets across the landing. In the floor below, the sprinklers activated too. The classroom doors flew open, groaning freshmen spilling out onto the once empty corridors.

“Come on,” she said, unsure if Chan would even listen yet he followed her down into the panic and into the pouring sprinkler rain.

Taehee steeled herself, even as the water pelletted her face and soaked her uniform. “Please head to the quadrangle immediately.” She pointed an arm the other way, less about being concerned for their safety than steering them away from the CCTV room. Chan was doing a far more convincing job of being a panicked council officer; creased forehead, throat strained, as if he managed to trick himself into believing that the school really was on fire.

Finally, amidst the controlled panic of the first floor, Taehee saw a flicker of movement down the hall. The sprinklers stopped and her vision cleared. The only door at the other side of the hallway flew open and out the door walked a stout man, their target. A fleeting thought danced in the back of her mind along with the urge to parade having witnessed a phenomenal moment Jisung didn’t, even after scouting outside the CCTV room in the past. The man looked up to an instructor passing by, mumbled something Taehee couldn’t make out, and followed the others down the hall.

An opening, literally and figuratively. The man left the door ajar when he walked out, trusting the door closer to do the work for him. They had seconds to slip into the room and still a dozen more students to usher down the hall. Everything started moving at snail pace; students filling out seconds too late, distracted and walking like it was just another normal afternoon dismissal. The interval between ticks and tocks spaced out, yet the door was still swinging back shut in real time.

Taehee fought the urge to scream at them to move, to shove everyone aside to stop the door from shutting. Her reigns were snapping, endangering the whole plan and exposing everyone. Blood boiled beneath her skin, composure failing — they didn’t come this far just to be locked out.

Then she saw Chan.

The boy stood a little down the hall, closer to the CCTV room than she was. He happened to pass the room as he guided another bunch of freshmen, making small talk even as he shuffled to the ajar door. For a fraction of a paranoid moment, Taehee thought he’d shut the door.

But Chan turned, looking down the hall until he found her amidst the students walking past. He raised a hand, signaling for the door subtly she would have missed it if she wasn’t watching carefully. Chan slipped something between his fingers, jamming the door to keep it from closing before casually walking away to usher another class.

Taehee nearly let out a sigh of relief, stopping herself when the door she had been knocking on finally swung open. This was the last class on the floor. After them, they were good to go. She spared a glance up at the cameras when the instructor disappeared behind the room and gathered their students. No red lights yet, they weren’t too late.

The moment the last student made the turn down the other hallway, they sprinted. Chan made it to the door first, grunting as he pulled the heavy door open. Taehee slipped in first, momentum nearly making her crash into the table at the center of the small space. The room was humid, the wetness of her skin sticking onto her with the heaviness of the air. It was a stark contrast to the first floor’s breezy hallways. On top of that, the room smelled horrible.

The fluorescent lights of the CCTV room flickered on as they studied the area. The power returning meant two things: they were right on time, and there was no turning back now unless they got the job done. A stand fan began to sweep across the room, blowing fresh air that drove the nauseating smell away. Taehee’s brain began to function again.

At the back of the room, two monitors stood adjacent to each other on a desk. One had a normal desktop flashed while the other showed a grid of camera feeds, as they slowly powered back on. Taehee’s hand found the keyboard of the setup, pressing arrow keys to cycle between floors and building. The outdoor feed rolled into view and she caught a glimpse of the chaos that they caused.

The quadrangle was swarmed with students from all high school levels, roughly a thousand students filed into lines outside as instructors did head counts. She hoped Hyunjin and Jeongin made it out on time; less absences, less whereabouts to worry about. Her disappearance with Chan could easily be linked to council duties, making them the perfect candidates for the task. But they bore the most weight, getting caught meddling with school property like this was on expellable grounds.

Her stomach churned as her mind wandered off line, bringing up what could happen between now and their escape back to the quadrangle. Shut up, she told herself, shaking the thoughts away. She found the first floor feed after a few tries, cameras slowly powering on. The CCTVs were pointless during power outages, susceptible to others with more malicious intent. She’d suggest it to the admin one day, but not while she could still exploit it.

The camera to the CCTV room blinked, showing the current feed outside. No students, no one on their trail, no evidence that they slipped inside.

“Laptop,” she muttered, startling both Chan and herself. The boy jumped, bumping against a metal cabinet with a loud crash.

“Sorry.” They say it at the same time.

Chan crossed the room, opening the satchel he had slung over his body to hand over the device. Taehee propped it onto the table, beside the enormous pair of monitors and the control panel that came with navigating the cameras. She pulled a thick cord out of her pocket, paying thanks to the grandma who sewed her uniform who adhered to her request on pocket space. The computers were linked in two plugs and in seconds, she was sifting through the files like they were her own. She set her own mouse down, plugging its own drive to one of the other ports until the cursor on the screen corresponded to her own hand’s movements.

She headed straight for the files from Ahn Building, the central administration building bordering one face of the quadrangle. Every office that had something to do with running the school had a room or two in the building, including the student council. She opened all three files for the cameras on the second floor: two on opposite ends of the hall and the one facing directly at the double doors of the student council office.

Her heart pounded in her chest and her fingers fidgeting but moving on their own accord. She ran the scroll down until the clips were dated October 26th AM. Skimming through the whole folder, her eyes spotted an inconsistency. There was a time jump between two files, longer in gap than usual. She went ahead, playing files from prior hours and finding nothing but closed doors and empty hallways.

“File’s been deleted.” She announced, slumping back onto the monobloc chair in front of the screens.

Chan stilled, rounding the office until he was standing next to Taehee. The distance made Taehee flinch but the room was too small to keep them separated for long, the situation too dire to let pride remain dominant.

The boy ran a finger down the cork board hanging on the wall above the desktop. He plucked a sticky note off the wall, it’s vibrant color standing out from the dullness of the rest of the office. “Says here ‘Camera Maintenance, 9AM - Friday, October 26.”

“Camera maintenance, my ass.” Taehee kicked herself up, hand curling on her mouse once again. She clicked off folders, finding the files for the other cameras in the same hallway. The stream of hopelessness she felt moments ago dissipated into thin air when her eyes found the missing timestamps available for the other cameras. “What a dumbass. Take a look.”

The boy took his own monoblock chair, dragging it next to hers until they both got a good view of the laptop screen. Taehee opened all quarter-hour files from the two other cameras in the same hallway. “They deleted the clips from the camera outside the council room,” she said, minimizing the folder to play video footage from another camera. “But they didn’t delete the clips from the other two cameras.”

The camera was perched on top of the library gate, focused on the entrance but its periphery included the council room’s entrance. Taehee dragged the seek across the screen, nothing. She did the same for the second quarter-hour clip and still nothing. But the third offered her the answer she had been looking for.

At 9:43AM, a tall silhouette climbed up the steps from the first floor, stopping by the entrance of the student council office with their back turned to the camera. It turned its head often, gazing down the hall, retracing his steps and disappearing off the camera as he climbed up the third floor. But he returned to the door, glanced around one final time before he turned the knob and disappeared behind the wooden doors.

Taehee sat in silence, the clip ending before they got a better glance at whoever snuck inside the office. The invasion stuck true. No matter how much she hated the council members, the sanctity of the office remained — exclusive for those who worked hard to defend the students against the old ways of the administration. Not only did they get evidence that someone broke into the office, but they had enough proof that whoever did so wasn’t Minho.

The next clip played, Taehee pressing a key down to fast forward until there was movement again. This time, the door drew open and the camera captured the pixelated face of the real culprit. Taehee slapped the space bar, freezing the frame as the robber made his exit with the paper bag full of money in hand.

“Doesn’t look like Minho to me,” Taehee said. Beneath her fingers, the laptop hummed as it received the files. “Let’s go.”

“Wait.”

Irritation seeped through her. As much as she loved snooping around, she wanted to lessen the risk of getting caught red-handed. “What?”

“Could you get the 9AM footage from the cafeteria?” Chan muttered, pursing his lips when he realized he sounded demanding. “Please,” he added.

Taehee scowled. She hated being ordered around but he knew his reasons behind the additional work. She obliged, clicking off and shortcutting through date files until she could copy paste all footage from the time frame with one scroll down. She dragged them off the opened folder, copying them to a folder on Chan’s messy desktop.

The clips flew by fast, each fifteen-minute clip got copied in less than a minute but every second felt like an hour with the paranoia of having someone walk in on them. Taehee’s leg bounced steadily beneath the desk, whether it was from the cold of her drenched clothes or the nervousness from their little crime, she wasn’t sure.

Chan stood up from his seat, cycling through the floor feeds until the screen showed the outdoor cameras again. As instructed, their class stood by the camera. Taehee breathed in relief upon seeing Hyunjin near the front of the line with an arm draped over Seungmin. Ever so often, they’d glance up at the CCTV camera, wave a bit like little kids seeing a camera like it for the first time. They were watching out for the red light to go out, for the reboot that signified that they were on the way back and to be expected. Everything else was going according to plan. All they had to do now was leave undetected.

She unplugged the wires off both computers when the copying finished, handing the laptop back to Chan and tucking the wires into the pocket of her skirt. If there was anything she admired about Jisung’s plan, it was how they left tampering with evidence as a last choice. Seeing as Hyunjin wasn’t caught in his get-away from triggering the smoke alarm, there wasn’t anything to delete. There would be no evidence of them breaking and entering the CCTV room either. Jisung relied on loopholes in the system and built his master plans from there, something Taehee could only assume he learned from Minho.

The keyboard rattled as she typed in the final commands. She clicked enter and all the cameras went static, ‘NO SIGNAL’s blaring on their screens. Unlike the 5-minute black out Jeongin managed to give them, they only had a minute to slip out the back, round the building and end up at the quadrangle.

“That’s how you do server maintenance, stupid.”

With their damp clothes, it might as well have been winter when they walked out. They returned everything back the way they were and hoped the puddles they left behind would dry up before the CCTV man came back. They exited out the back gate, into the building alleyways — the routes Minho once gate-keeped.

Taehee never liked the cold but she marched on, teeth chattering as she pushed forward. The wind wasn’t helping her case, blowing through the narrow gap between the perimeter wall and the buildings. But she remembered the footage, the pixelated image that guaranteed Minho’s innocence, and she walked on. It was the least she could do to get back at Minho.

They never clicked really, eerily similar to each other that clashes were guaranteed every time they spent too much time around each other. But there were instances of tranquility, hushed flames in the quiet of the night, whenever Taehee would come home late and find the door to their apartment bolted shut. Minho never minded keeping the restaurant open for a few more minutes or at least until her aunt’s anger was overpowered by concern and she’d finally be let in.

Miniscule in the grand scheme of life but the moments of kindness were few and far between. She always made sure to give back.

“Stay behind me.”

Chan overtook her when the alleyway narrowed to a one-person path. The coldness scattered, only touching her on her extremities. The sides of her face burned at the thought that he must’ve heard her teeth chattering. She wasn’t sure if he was blocking her from the cold or from whoever would be greeting them at the end of the line. Either way, she wanted to mutter her thanks. The words never game, just like they always did whenever she needed it.

“I know why you’re mad.”

Taehee blinked, wondering if she just imagined it. But Chan turned slightly, sparing her a glance before he walked forward.

“Really?” She asked. “Good for you. Even I can’t figure out why I’m mad all the time.”

It was always a hopeless case trying to talk to her. Spewing out sarcastic replies was first nature to her, raging being a close second. But Chan ignored it, sighing. “I’m sorry for not defending Minho that day. I had my doubts, I hope you understand.”

She noticed him grip the lock of his satchel. “Who wouldn’t doubt him? That was some pretty solid evidence.” She looked away when she caught him turning again. “Sorry for snapping.”

It took so much of her just to admit that she said too much for something so trivial and understandable. But the apology was done, and she didn’t want to stick around to hear how he would respond to it. Judging from the smile she caught a glance of, she knew teasing was guaranteed. Taehee didn’t stick around to hear his reply, by-passing him and heading straight for the alleyway’s mouth and into the quadrangle.

She didn’t even get to sigh in relief.

“Where were the both of you?”

She jumped out of her skin, spinning in the direction of the voice. Its owner stood a few feet away, a cross-armed Director Park with a scowl plastered on his face. Over his shoulder were the others jogging to approach them, wide-eyed and worried. They were soaked, compared to the others. Taehee whirred her mind to life for an excuse but the words failed her.

A nagging thought crossed her mind. Has anyone seen them on the way out? Did the cameras power on before they could make the slip to the alleyways?

“The council assisted with getting students evacuated. We double-checked to see if the rooms were empty.” Chan answered from behind her.

The look on his face must’ve been convincing, more certain than she did. She went back to scowling, it was better than letting them see through the cracks of doubt on her features. The director nodded not long after, stepping aside to let them rejoin their class and the awaiting remainder of their circle of friends.

“What took you so long?” Jeongin asked, draping jackets over their shoulders as they walked back to the lines.

“Miscalculations.” Taehee answered, glancing at Jisung who was preoccupied with something else to notice their approach.

“Did you get it though? The clips?”

A sly smirk tugged on the corner of Taehee’s lips. “That, and more.”

FOUR. Seo Changbin. October 30th, Tuesday.

Changbin was never in favor of the whole plan but his friends were people he could never bring himself to disappoint.

The entire campus was closed off for the day, subject for an inspection that wouldn’t discover anything. Students were sent home as soon as the head counts were finished, all including dorm students, which lodged their plan into a momentary standstill. They planned to review the evidence there. Everywhere else was either too far or too small to fit nearly a dozen people.

So he offered his place.

The Seo mansion sat close to the outskirts of the city, where roads were wide and sloped and lawns were landscaped. Lots were sold in billions and every homeowner had a company to their name. He hated this part of the city the most, even more that he had to live here.

“This living room is twice the size of our dorm room.” Felix commented as they filed into the house, flanked by two helpers that led them to the living room.

Comments like that made Changbin despise inviting anyone over. He never fit into the lavishness, never even tried to. His friends were a wild bunch but their movements were calculated as they perused the living room. It was as if inviting them over put an invisible barrier between them. He smiled, meekly, and turned away.

He only had to put up with it until they planned their next move. The situation called for it, they had nowhere else to go. And if he desperately wanted to see the evidence that Minho was innocent, he had to extend a helping hand.

Changbin had been at odds with himself since last Friday, willing himself to be convinced that the boy was innocent as others insisted. But the evidence was strong, he was convinced everyone was being biased — as friends normally were. Did it mean he was a bad friend? Scratch that. He couldn’t see Minho getting out of this one. The older boy’s retched record just sealed the deal. Had he been less of a trouble maker, the triumvirate would’ve heard him out when he cried ‘set up’.

Changbin didn’t blame them, he wouldn’t have believed him either.

“Alexa, lights off.”

Overhead, the embedded bulbs dimmed until their lights disappeared entirely. A few woos breezed through the crowd, he ignored them. He fetched a slim box off the couch before someone’s ass could crush it, balancing the remote in his palm before powering the TV on. The screen blinked and he turned to the older boy waiting beside him. “Screen is yours.”

Chan had his laptop propped on his arm, his free hand stretched as he punched in shortcut keys to hook the screens up. The LED screen shifted and the image mirroring Chan’s laptop screen came into view. A black and white sky full of clouds took up most of the screen with all his files tucked into a corner; school, music, and an unnamed folder. The mouse hovered to it, highlighted the file, and opened a window of serial-coded videos.

Changbin’s heart pounded in his chest. They’ve actually done it. He’d been uneasy the whole morning leading up to the execution of the plan. When the flame spread and lapped the whole table, he wanted nothing more than to be the one to grab the fire extinguisher. But the others needed time to make their getaways, ring the fire alarms and draw everyone away from the building. He sat quiet, nervous, even when he had nothing to do. The fear of getting caught kept his chest restricted, his mind extending to the others’ actions. His mind wandered to the extremes Saeyeon went, the anxiousness in her eyes as the flame danced over the stainless steel countertop, incapable of setting ablaze anything but the panic in the people around it. If Jisung’s plan had been wrong from there, he could only imagine the measures the others had to take to ensure they got what they needed.

The folder window disappeared off the screen, replaced by a video file. The scene was heavily pixelated, its setting familiar. Half the screen was obscured by grids of space bordered by thick black lines, the other half showing a red-tiled floor, a corridor and, far off into the distance, a pair of wooden doors. The seek skips ahead when Chan nudged it, falling back into normal pace when there was movement. A figure walked inside the room, remained there until the clip ended.

“Is that him?” Changbin was the first to ask it but the question was on the tip of everyone’s tongue. Heads stirred, glancing at the back where twin culprits stood unamused by the evidence.

Neither answered as the next clip played. The same blank scene but seconds later, the figure walked out with a face bare, clear for its audience to see. The whole room paused; their faces, their breaths and the footage played on the television screen.

“Lee Juyeon?” Hyunjin asked. His voice cracked as he peered at the screen, then to the back where Chan stood. The latter nodded only slightly.

“From 11-B,” Taehee recalled. “That’s all I know about him.”

Recognition flickered over Lia’s face. “Isn’t he in the dance troupe? Causes ruckus, barely cooperates?”

Felix nodded. “Yep, that’s him. Remember the guy Minho’s always bumping heads with? That’s him.” Across the room Hyunjin nodded, both members of the dance troupe agreeing without prior discussion meant they were only telling the truth.

“Heard of him from Minho himself.” Jisung slumped against the couch. “Couldn’t accept the fact that out of all the juniors, Minho got to be leader of the dance troupe.”

“So do we go and show this to the higher ups now?” Seungmin asked.

“No.”

Heads turned to Jisung instantaneously, some confused and others eager. Changbin was the former. With the evidence at hand, they were already at an advantage. And things were finally looking up for their side, for the first time in a while.

Changbin eyebrows were knitted. “And why not?”

“Minho’s still technically suspended, correct? For a week? Not yet expelled.”

“We hope so.” Jeongin shrugged.

Beside him, Saeyeon shuffled. “We already have a motive and evidence.”

“If you think of it, just presenting that information will not be enough. For instance, if you asked the question ‘How did that paper bag get into Minho’s bag?’ you wouldn’t be able to piece that out with that evidence alone.”

“I don’t know what you have in mind but if it involves setting the school on fire again, I’m out,” said Hyunjin.

“Is breaking and entering still on the menu?”

“Jisung.”

“We’re going to get that confession out of him.”

From where Changbin stood, the view was familiar. Everyone gathered in the center of the room, a concave with their mastermind in the center. His mind reeled in deja vu, a time in sophomore year where they were all in mutual agreement. Still, they were missing one, but if they succeeded now, they’d be complete again.

Changbin’s eyes wandered over to the TV screen, frame frozen on the man who’d disrupted their peace. Halloween was coming for Juyeon and they were ready to be his nightmare.

Seo Changbin. October 31st, Wednesday.

Day turned to night in a blink. Changbin spent most of his day picking out the best suit for the occasion; not too obnoxious but enough to be presentable. In the end, he settled for a black suit. A part of him yearned for a better costume but anything beyond plain would be too noticeable — too easy to commit to memory. He had to be stealthy, close to invisible.

Saeyeon greeted him by the school gates at 7pm sharp, exactly as they had agreed upon the day prior. She wore a knee-high dress with long flowy trumpet sleeves, all black just like he did. They looked like they were going to one of the lavish parties Changbin’s dad often attended, not an undercover mission during a Halloween party.

They walked up to the front gate. As expected, a pair of council students stood at attention, busy with checking bags and IDs and letting students in through the small gate. The line inched slowly and it took well over a few minutes for the pair to make it to the front of the line.

“Welcome to SSA’s Spookfest. Please present your school IDs.”

Changbin nearly burst out laughing. The strain in Taehee’s voice and the forced enthusiasm stood in appalling stark contrast to Chan’s welcoming aura.

“Lighten up, you’re scaring everyone off.” Changbin said, earning a glare from the other girl who scanned their IDs on the machine to check their attendance.

They stood mirroring each other, two pairs in all black like a scene straight out of a spy movie. If it was any other year, neither of them would’ve settled for plain outfits, let alone having someone wear nearly the exact same thing. They had their reasons this time.

Chan turned and picked something off the shelf behind him, the promised masks for organizers and council members — their tickets to free passage and speculation.

“I’ll have this one!” Saeyeon picked up a mask, glowing Xs making up the eyes and a sewn in smile, plucking the tag bearing Chan’s name off the side of its surface.

Changbin glanced over the other one. A white mask with outlined features; dark eyebrows, round blushed cheeks and a mustache contorted up above a tight-lipped grin. “Vendetta mask? Poetic.”

“Wasn’t my choice.” Taehee answered.

Just as Changbin picked it up, Chan slipped something beneath the mask, fast hands immediately up and doing other things before the former could react. Beneath the mask were the subjects of today’s operation, freshly developed photos still bearing the smell of ink.

“Good luck there.” Chan muttered and they caught each other’s eye, both equally guilty for doubting Minho and spending their days repenting, risking all sorts of things in the name of friendship.

They slipped past the entrance. Two routes have been illuminated for the event, one winding down the woods on the way to the school gym and the other for the horror house which had been half of the Hui building. The fluorescent lights were wrapped in black cloth, barely lighting halls and giving the perfect spooky ambience.

They walked up the staircase to the second floor where the maze began. The other masked folk uttered directions, where they — Chan and Taehee, they assumed — were supposed to be stationed. They nodded but never followed, other plans in mind. They slipped into darker sections of the corridor, separated from the rest of the hall by a veil of black cloth hanging off nylon wires. The long hall stretched until the end of the floor, where another staircase led to the other floors. But Changbin spotted something, someone.

“Saeyeon,” he uttered, the name lost in the wind as he reduced his voice into a whisper. The girl turned her head, Xs clear and bright through the black that obscured Changbin’s eyes. “Is that Juyeon?”

Saeyeon eyed the end of the hallway. “I don’t have my glasses. I can’t see that well.”

Neither could Changbin but he could make out the silhouettes of the people ahead. Juyeon towered over them, standing out with a vibrant yellow top and a cowboy hat. A joke exchanged made the crowd erupt into laughter, echoing down the hall until they disappeared into the room at the far end.

“Come on.” Changbin said. They ducked beneath hanging spiders and cobwebs, through a maze of papers scattered on the floor. The whole hall was unmanned, all the organizers inside the classrooms where the horror mazes were. Their screams were muffled behind the walls, coming in unison with the thunderous boom of sound effects speakers.

They finally reached the end of the hallway but Changbin felt a surge of mischief, eager for a taste of vengeance. There, presented with an opportunity to retaliate, he couldn’t bring himself to hold back. Jisung never mentioned that they couldn’t deviate from the plan, especially when it was still in line with wreaking havoc.

“Grab a chair.”

“What?” He could picture Saeyeon’s face behind the mask.

“Just do it. Trust me.”

Changbin dragged one of the wooden chairs in the middle of the hallway, tilting it at an angle where he could lodge the back of the seat on the doorknob.

“You’re out of your mind.” Saeyeon said but she moved to find her own chair anyway, picking up one near the further door before mirroring what Changbin did. His cheeks brushed the inside of his mask as he broke into a smirk, proud that his partner in crime didn’t leave him alone in his endeavour nor attempted to stop him.

The doorknob twisted in front of them and they backed away. The door jammed, locked into place by an external force that wasn’t there when they first came in. He heard a giggle beside him, wishing he could see the amusement in Saeyeon’s face with the chaos they sparked. Whoever was on the other side was impatient, knocking, banging, and slamming the poor wooden door.

Then the classroom curtains were drawn. Behind the glass were three people, and none of them were Juyeon — all council members and they were furious. Changbin’s breath hitched as a flurry of muffled profanities were hurled at him. In the midst of his panic, he took Saeyeon’s hand and ran.

They bolted past the chairs that littered the end of the hallway, turning right when they reached the staircase and headed up — towards the floor they were meant to be at before they made their detour. They rose up a floor, and then another, until they were on the fourth floor. They passed by their own homeroom and headed for the one next to it, 11-B. When Changbin turned the knob it opened, making the slip in easy without him having to commit another crime. Technically, it wasn’t breaking and entering if nothing was broken, right? Merely entering at a time when no one should be. Borderline trespassing.

The room was dim when they walked in, so as with the rest of the building. But this floor was unused, left in the dark. There was no light save for the ones outside. They didn’t switch on the lights as a precaution, a great idea indeed because if they did, they wouldn’t have noticed it when a beam sweeped the room.

Changbin was yanked out of balance, tugged to the floor by Saeyeon. Thankfully, he didn’t slam straight into one of the desks, nor fell face first onto the tiled floor. He was crouched beside her, back against the wall as a light swept through the classroom again. The footsteps were loud in the quiet of the fourth floor, soles hitting the smoothened cement and bouncing off the walls of the enclosure. When he turned, Saeyeon had her mask off, face down on the floor. The neon lights bounced off the white tiles, but not bright enough to attract unwanted attention.

Changbin didn’t know he was holding his breath until he let it go, mask discarded without a need to conceal his own identity. The footsteps disappeared and they were once again plunged into the darkness they were in earlier.

“Let’s get moving.”

He was the first to pick himself off the ground, brushing off his slacks before offering a hand to help Saeyeon up. They stand with nothing but the light of Saeyeon’s mask illuminating the way through the maze of desks. The lockers leaned against the far wall, at the back of the classroom, a cabinet of nooks that occupied majority of the classroom. They walked through.

Saeyeon waved her mask over, casting a green light over the labels of each locker.

“What if he didn’t put a name on his?” she asked, skimming through names in the dim light. But the answer came fast, right as she moved down two nooks. “Nevermind.”

In lazy handwriting, the words Lee Juyeon were scribbled onto a laminated paper chip tucked into the label plate. The door popped open with one tug, its owner never bothering to put a lock on it.

They’re met with the smell of sweaty clothing, left to marinate in the enclosure. It made Changbin scrunch his nose, made Saeyeon fake a gag.

“Smells exactly like the boys’ dorms.” Changbin hummed, swatting the air to disperse the stench. He glanced over, lips pursed and bitten to hold himself from snickering. But it took one look at the other’s eye to have them both laughing, a mix of soft giggles in a darkened quiet room.

Saeyeon pinched her nose, stifling her own laugh. “Put the photos in already.”

Flipping his jacket over, Changbin extracted the photos from his inside pocket. He never had a good look at it when Chan passed it to him earlier. He took out all the photographs, spreading them out like cards on his hand. If only he could convince the graduation committee to insert one of the photos in the school yearbook when they graduate next year, just to embed the memory in everyone’s mind. Two of the photos were from the CCTV showcase from the other day, the other two were the same moment but taken from a different angle — one further down the hallway. The last printed photo was a zoom in on Juyeon’s pixelated face, scribbled with black marker ink.

“He really had to.” He put the photo under the neon light, letting Saeyeon glimpse at the bushy-browed drawing they’ve come to know as Jureumi, Minho’s trademark character. He flipped the photo over and on the back, a message was written. Spill it or we will :P, a dead giveaway on who they were. It made him nervous. But what did they have to lose? The odds were never in Juyeon’s favor when he chose to mess with them.

They left the room as soon as the photos were placed, atop the pile of smelly clothing that would be the first thing Juyeon would see if he opened his locker the next day. They made the climb down, at ease after a successful mission. They thought their job was done, completely forgetting about the stir they started earlier when they stepped into the lower floor.

“There they are!”

Changbin didn’t register that they were the ones being referred to until he felt Saeyeon stop beside her.

“What?” He asked, turning his head to find a familiar face — the same one he saw on the window of the door they barred and the same fuming expression, except there was no door to stop them now.

A chill rattled down his spine. They couldn’t get caught now.

“Run!” Saeyeon was the first to bolt, spinning on her heel to run down the staircase. Changbin followed, hot on her tail as they raced down the steps to the lower floors. They made it to the ground floor breathless but they couldn’t stop with footsteps echoing behind them.

“Throw your mask and follow me!” Changbin chucked his own mask into the nearest bin before dragging Saeyeon down to the nook beneath the stairs where a wooden door led to the alleyways between buildings.

Cold air nipped on Changbin’s skin as soon as he pushed the door open. Heads turned in their direction as they stumbled out. Someone whistled.

“Couldn’t wait until after the event?” And a holler of laughter came after.

Changbin couldn’t see their faces clearly, adorned with masks and hidden in the darkness with only the sparks of their cigarettes and the traces of smoke visibly seen. His ears rang. “What if you mind your ow—”

A sharp cough knocked him out of his own sentence, head snapping to his side to find Saeyeon fanning the air around her. He scrambled to find a handkerchief, cursed himself for not having one readily available. He sent one last glance to the shadows, ignoring the way they cackled in the dark. They run the other way, where they were meant to go, down a footpath with weeds tickling their legs. The narrow alleyway led to the back, behind the cafeteria and down the path leading to the pool and the school gym. No one was behind their trail anymore and tonight, without their masks on, they were just another pair enjoying the halloween festivities. The plan has been set into motion, they’ve set up their traps and it wouldn’t be long before Juyeon took the bait.

FIVE. Han Jisung November 1, Thursday.

Today was lull.

When Jisung walked into their classroom, no one seemed off. There was an unspoken agreement to never talk about what they’ve done on campus—a precaution in case of eavesdroppers. The day carried on like usual, but it was more quiet. The best seat on their row was vacated and the lunch games were called off.

Jisung was nervous. For a mastermind, he sure didn’t have enough confidence in the plans he weaved. They’ve gone wrong time and time again yet he held onto the statistic that the final results always ended in his favor regardless. But it didn’t take the weight off his chest, nor the shaking of his fingertips.

The plan had been set into motion, rather visible now with the photos that they left behind. He hoped for a confession, at least that much from the side out of his control. He hoped he scared the boy enough to have him admit what he’d done all by himself. The odds were low but Jisung hoped anyway.

The day was uneventful, a first after the last few days. They were all tired and a bit worn out, the quiet day was a blessing in disguise. Their unusual quiet was excused as either embarrassment or grief for having a friend suspended. Rumors about Minho’s suspension were no longer in full swing but his name was used as a reminder to anyone else who wanted to step a foot out of place.

But as the sun completed its arch, sinking into the mountains beyond Jisung’s field of vision, they knew the bait didn’t work. If Juyeon was intimidated by it, he didn’t show it. And if he saw it, he did nothing about it; which was all sorts of fucked up that Jisung couldn’t understand. In reality, it was just another one of his miscalculations.

The idea of putting the blame on someone for something they didn’t do made him furious. The suspension wasn’t withdrawn, no Juyeon presenting himself to either one of the triumvirate. He had his teeth gritted even as he walked out the gates of SSA.

Today was lull until it wasn’t.

It was bold for Jisung to assume they’d been left alone just because they were untouched within the perimeter of the school. He stepped out a little after dark to fetch a meal at a nearby convenience store but never made it back to their dorm.

Jisung didn’t know how to lie. A sign would be clear on his face, like a blush across his pale skin or a twitch of his lips. His eyes would widen, teeth would chatter visibly and audibly, and he’d fumble over his words. Which was why he always ended up telling the truth. Which was why he was the mastermind, not the players. Which was why when Juyeon showed him the printed photos, the recognition was clear on his face—undeniable. And he was glued to that patch of cement on the alleyway, unable to move nor speak.

“Did you put this in my locker?” Juyeon kept his head down, the photos clipped between his fingers as he showed them to the smaller boy.

Jisung swallowed, then wished he didn’t. “No.”

The photographs scattered with a flick of Juyeon’s wrist, making the other boy flinch as they flew in his direction. They hit him square on the chest; sharp, but not enough to slice anything and they flutter until they hit the pavement.

“Bullshit, Han Jisung.”

Juyeon tucked his hands away, burying them deep into the pockets of his sweater. Jisung watched as the boy approached in teetering steps, stumbling over his own feet and slurring incoherent profanities. They were both alone in the alleyway and Jisung wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. Good because it was a one-on-one match regardless of how uneven, or bad because he didn’t have anyone to back him up. Juyeon towered over him, backing him further into the alleyway with his height alone.

Then a cord snaps inside of him. He couldn’t falter now, could he? They asked for it in the first place. At least, judging by the clouded look on the tall boy’s face, their actions have made an impact. This wasn’t the reaction he was expecting but it was still better than nothing.

The chuckle that left Jisung’s lips was louder than he wanted it to be because Juyeon glared down at him. He wasn’t lying, right? He really wasn’t the one who put the photos in the locker. If Juyeon wanted to corner him, he wasn’t asking the right questions. “I really didn’t do it!” He raised his arms in playful surrender.

Juyeon wasn’t in the mood to play around. Jisung’s breath was knocked out of him when the other boy shoved him across the alley, stumbling back to the rough concrete of the wall behind him. His hands fly up to his neck where Juyeon had his collar crumpled in his fists. And for the first time in a long while, Jisung felt fear. Not the anxiousness that came with planning his elaborate schemes, not the paranoia that something was bound to go awry, but the feeling of prey being put into place by a predator — the thought that he wouldn’t make it out the alleyway alive.

Juyeon’s eyes burned with hatred, spewing a million profanities Jisung was no longer registering.

“I know you know who did it. You’re going to tell me now or do I have to beat it out of you?” Juyeon managed through gritted teeth.

“Go on then,” Jisung replied, his own fury overtaking his fear, “beat me.”

The response comes instantaneously, a blur of motion then a strike straight to his cheek. It wasn’t as strong as he expected, but enough to knock him off balance and teetering to keep himself off the ground. His senses were clouded by the metallic tang of fresh blood; a quiff caught by his nostrils, a taste lingering on his tongue, a rip on his bottom lip. He ducked the second time, shrinking to dodge the intoxicated boy’s jab — one that could’ve knocked his teeth out.

“You fucking coward.”

Indeed, he seemed like it but Jisung was smart enough to not engage in a fight he clearly couldn’t win.

“Lee Juyeon!”

A voice thundered down the alleyway. Jisung thought he was done for. It could’ve been Juyeon’s back-up but when the taller boy flinched he thought otherwise. In the dim light, the storm in Juyeon’s eyes cleared — a wave of confusion dawning.

“Leave him alone!” The same voice said, closer now. Juyeon was yanked backwards and Jisung broke free from his grasp. “The hell’s wrong with you?”

There wasn’t room for Juyeon to stare down this time because Younghoon — as Jisung remembered the boy’s name — was taller.

“Mind your own business, Younghoon.” Juyeon slurred, shaking his arm free of the other boy’s grip.

“Stirring trouble again, Lee Juyeon?”

Another voice called from down the alley. He strided down, taking his time to make it to the end where they were. Jisung kept his guard up. The others were still Juyeon’s friends and his acquaintances by affiliation. If the fight continued, he’d be up against three. But the pair turned their back on him, restraining Juyeon and dragging him away. Not back-up, Jisung thought. He nearly sighed aloud in relief.

“Sorry about him. He bolted out of the restaurant the second he saw you pass by and—“ Sangyeon trailed off. “So, are you alright?”

Jisung only managed a nod, his mind racing as it pieced what he’d gathered this time. They don’t know. The thought broke Jisung’s frozen stature out of the ice. Down the alley, Juyeon was still scowling, trying to break free. They don’t know. Because if they did, he wouldn’t be getting out of the alleyway with a mere gash on his lips. They don’t know. And it only made Juyeon more guilty as he was dragged off away from him.

Han Jisung November 1, Thursday.

It took Jisung halfway through the way back to realize that he couldn’t show up back in the dorms like this.

There had been an agreement that the prank would be harmless fun but with serious intent to get Minho back and yet there he stood with a bloody ripped lip and shock that he hadn’t wiped off his face yet. Either way, it was better that he took the hit over anyone else. It had been his idea and they only chose to go along with it; either out of peer pressure or their own volition. He still bore the weight of it—the failures, the flaws.

It was clear now that Juyeon got the message, made aware that someone else knew about what he did. For a person thinking with his fist, Juyeon sure did pick up easily. He never meant to hide who sent the blackmail, he wanted to let Juyeon know who were coming for him. But he never thought of the consequences, never thought there could be someone else on the receiving end of that punch. It just so happened to be him, and he was glad it was him.

The inevitable comes in tides that almost drown him. Their voices were a mix of words with no meaning, barely breaking through the wall of Jisung’s mind.

It wasn’t the first time he plummeted into a thought spiral; it happened too often for him to count. Most days he’d brush them off, drown them out with music plugged in through an earbud. But tonight they shook his skull, made his head throb; the voices in his head came louder than the voices around him. Every nook of his brain was rewiring, all thought funneling into one: the plan, and all the ways it could’ve gone wrong since it started.

Jisung never expected anyone to go with it, nor for things to go this far. They said the older you were the wiser you got, but this was by far the dumbest thing he’d ever come up with. From here, he could see a million other ways he could’ve gotten the same pile of evidence without causing that much chaos. It was over, true, but what if one thing had gone wrong along the way. What if they actually set the school on fire? What if the others got caught sneaking in? He was the mastermind of things like these but he was never the one to directly take the fall. And if for instance the others did get caught, was he ready to step out of the shadows and admit that he’d been the one orchestrating everything?

The days moved by so fast. One moment they were on the rooftop, the outrageousness of the plan warranting mixed reactions from the group. Then they were carrying it out, a million possible endings arising from each shift in their movements. Then they were gathered in a living room, watching the pile of evidence roll on a television screen. They had everything then, they just chose to drag the game out a little longer. Minho’s supposed suspension lasted until the week ended, wasting a day to plant a blackmail still gave Juyeon enough time to confess and for the administration to withdraw the verdict. They had everything, or at least that was what Jisung thought. Except they didn’t and maybe that was the reason why Juyeon wasn’t too intimidated, he wasn’t backed into a corner yet.

There was a finite time between Juyeon getting caught on cam and the discovery of the stash in Minho’s bag but the possibilities between both were endless. When the week turns and the time would come for them to present the information to the triumvirate, would the trio arrive at the same conclusion? Or would they see a collaboration between two members of the same club and put the blame on the entire dance troupe instead?

Jisung hated his thoughts, it made him doubt the things he did. Worst of all, it made him doubt Minho.

He found himself in a convenience store this time, walking down aisles and staring at items that meant nothing to him. The fear was there, he couldn’t deny it. It made him resort to the safety of a monitored store where cameras could see what would happen if he were followed here. Everytime the door chimed, Jisung would look over and check if it’s Juyeon but it’s never him. It’s either an old lady, a child, or a girl in the same uniform? He ducked his head, slipping into the aisles with his head tucked beneath his hoodie. He didn’t linger enough to catch a glimpse of who it was, he didn’t want to know and he didn’t want them to notice that he was ever there at all.

“I wasn’t expecting to see you here.”

Too late. And Jisung’s thoughts are a flurry of relief and paranoia when he hears the voice. It’s familiar, not coarse and slurred like Juyeon’s. It’s calm, recognizable everywhere. It makes his heart thump faster in his ribcage.

Lia stood at the end of the aisle, head cocked to one side with a cup of noodles held up.

“Lia,” Jisung greeted, hoping the shake in his voice would go by unnoticed. “What are you doing out here this late?” He knows she saw him first but she never bothered to make the first acknowledgment. Jisung’s paranoia was getting to his head.

“Media relations shit, compiling photos from yesterday’s event,” she replied.

“Oh,” he uttered, his reply cut short when he caught her staring. Was his lips still bleeding? “Are you in a rush to get home?”

“Supposed to be in a rush but not really. Why?”

Jisung sucked in a breath. “Would it be too much of a favor to ask you to stay for a while and hear me out? It’s about the—”

“Got it,” Lia replied, “I was thinking about it too. Along with that little blood smear.”

Jisung’s hand flew up to his face, brushing the bottom of his lip where the girl pointed. The blood had already dried up, he hoped it didn’t look too messy. Lia disappeared down the aisle before he could even reply. He rounded the back of the store and made his way to the long table by the window.

A pair of footsteps approaching made him turn and look up. “What’s on your mind?” Lia said, setting her noodles down as she took her seat.

“The blackmail worked.”

She turned, surprised, “Juyeon confessed?”

“No.” Jisung answered quickly. “He told me.”

Lia stilled her eyes wandering over to the gash on his lips before giving him a pitiful glance.

“More like throwing accusations,” Jisung said, masking his embarrassment with a light laugh. “He asked if I put the pictures in his locker and I told him I didn’t. I wasn’t lying, right?” The chuckle he let out hung in the air between them, awkward and unreciprocated.

“Then he punched you?”

“Poked the bear. The punch was on me.”

Lia turned her attention back to her noodles, “So he knows we’re the ones behind it.”

“I think he figured out just as much. Didn’t know I was just as notorious for my sneaky plans as Minho was for breaking the rules.” Jisung picked on his own fingers, his anxiety coming and waning—relief receding and replaced with paranoia. “We could say the blackmail worked to warrant such a reaction but not enough to coax out the reaction we wanted. He knows but his friends don’t and that’s enough for me to know that he really did what he did with every intention that we’re thinking. But the question begs, will the triumvirate see the same when we present the evidence?”

“What if Minho worked together with Juyeon to get the money,” Lia said, addressing the part of the plan that was still left up to chance.

“He wouldn’t,” Jisung wasn’t as sure with his words as he used to be, “but the triumvirate doesn’t know what we know. We’ve shown all our cards and what if it isn’t enough?”

“I haven’t testified yet.”

For a moment there’s a sliver of hope again, a beam of the sun’s rays seeping in through a roof of gray clouds. But he had already thought of it before.

“They won’t believe you because you’re in the same friend group. It would’ve been fine,” Jisung trailed off, finding it hard to spill the reality of their situation, “it would’ve worked if you’re testifying for Saeyeon or Chan or anyone with a cleaner record but you’re testifying for Minho. That’s the worst record ever.”

Then we get more evidence to fill in the spaces. And if we could find it, spot where Juyeon slipped the bag in.” Lia said, but doubt riddled Jisung’s head. What if Minho and Juyeon had been working together in the first place? “Think. Where else was Minho that day?”

“Cafeteria, classroom,” Jisung’s eyes darted to Lia’s as the pieces slowly fell into place. She stared at him, waiting for him to piece together everything long after she did.

“We’re not waiting until next week to hand in the evidence. We’re doing it tomorrow. If you disagree, do something with that gashed lip.”

Today was lull, the way skies are clear as a storm brews beyond the horizon. Soon enough, the tides will change. Even they didn’t know who’ll be caught in the eye or left standing in the aftermath.

SIX. Song Lia. November 2, Friday.

The silence of the hallways stood in grave contrast with the boisterous noise of the gym. Devoid of students, the school felt dead. Lia slipped out unnoticed. With Chan guarding the only entrance and exit to the building, it was almost too easy. She skirted out through a gap in the door he opened briefly, sent her off with a tight-lipped smile and shut the door back closed. She was alone again.

The halls were barren but the voices of students haunted the halls she swore she could almost hear them. Or maybe it was just her head seeking for company as she distracted herself from the task at hand. Among all of the things they’ve done so far, she had the least risk in the legal sense—no arson, no trespassing—but it was the most crucial, capable of tipping the scales away from them if fate decided it.

The office was occupied when she arrived, a pair of silhouettes exchanging bows. The secretary muttered for her to take a seat on the couch but the current client was already up and ready to leave before she could sit. The door to the inner office rattled and swung open. A small woman made her exit, tugging the door back shut with her leg in a manner all too familiar.

“Mrs. Lee!” Lia blurted, startling the lady. The lady turned, recognition setting in a little after. She was there that night at the restaurant, quietly calculating in the corner. In her arms was an open box and as Lia approached, she noticed that its contents were the amalgamated mess of Minho’s things—knee pads down to textbooks.

Mrs. Lee smiled back, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes.

“Where are you taking Minho’s things?”

The question hung between them and a surge of anxiety washed over Lia. She was overstepping boundaries and yet her curiosity wouldn’t let her rest. Minho’s mother sighed, as if she knew the question was bound to rise anyway even when she wanted to avoid it.

“Minho will no longer be joining the junior’s class.”

The voice came from inside the room; a chilling tone, fierce and final. Mrs. Gong was a woman in her 40s, tall and intimidating but carrying the youth of one in her 20s. Her hair was always neatly tied in a bun and her buttoned down uniform polo always matched her skirt—the definition of a proper lady, fitting for a position in the triumvirate.

“Ma’am?” Asking felt pathetic. Lia heard the woman clearly, but it was just not enough to convince her that it was final. But it made sense with his things packed Mrs. Lee here to fetch it. It was what they’d feared all along.

Mrs. Gong cleared her throat. “After a week of deliberation, the admin deemed his actions inexcusable and worthy of an expulsion. That on top of the other rule-bendings he’d done in the past.”

“If it were his actions,” Lia cut her off. Even with her head down, she could feel them staring.

“Ms. Song.”

“If I tell you that we have sufficient evidence to prove Lee Minho’s innocence, will you withdraw the verdict?” Okay, I did it. Now what? Lia never imagined she’d have the guts to say anything that fierce to one of the most powerful officers on campus. She nearly withdrew, her apology already on the tip of her tongue.

“Ms. Song,” the officer repeated, her tone more ominous now than earlier.

“You will not deny my son the chance to be proven innocent!” Lia’s breath hitched, her eyes darting to the lady beside her who was seething. “I’ve already had my doubts with this school. Do you want to prove the rumors true?”

The words weren’t aimed at her but Lia quivered, her hands suddenly clammy. The moment of tension made the room go still, even the secretary seized to type on her keyboard.

Mrs. Gong exchanged glances with the both of them, thinking and evaluating what to do next. It was a 2-1 battle and despite her influence on school grounds, she was on the losing side. SSA’s reputation mattered more than the welfare of their students. If news of a student being expelled for nothing got out, the repercussions would be unpredictable. It didn’t take long for the officer to decide. Lia knew that despite the woman’s tough exterior, Mrs. Gong was known to have the softest heart among the triumvirate—the easiest to persuade, hence the reason why the plan was to approach her first.

The officer glanced back at the duo before spinning around, walking back to her table. “Let’s hear it then.”

They filed into the room. Mrs. Lee set Minho’s things on top of a cabinet before settling down on one of the two chairs in front of the officer’s desk. Mrs. Gong cleared a space on her desk for Lia to set Chan’s laptop down. The device powered on as soon as she opened it, revealing the same desktop she’d come to recognize and the same folder with the video files. There were a lot more clips now than what was originally there.

She sucked in a breath, sliding the cursor over to the sole clip with a different file name and clicked enter.

The screen blinked, redirecting to a different window. She double clicked and the feed engulfed the whole monitor, then the clip rolled. It’s a less saturated video feed, pixelated and occasionally glitching and on its lower left corner were a series of numbers. It showed a footpath and an interlinked fence, the one bordering the far back side of the campus. Minho was making his climb up the gate, the only part of the fence that was a meter shorter than the rest of the perimeter. Even then, Minho struggled, sitting atop the gate with wide eyes as he looked down on the ground beneath him. Then she saw herself enter the frame, head thrown back in a laugh before coming up to him to offer a hand as he made his climb back down.

“That morning,” Lia began, right as a figure came into the camera’s view, “the new gate rules were implemented. Minho said that the school wouldn’t actually do it so he came in late on purpose. I usually come to school late, but no later than him. I got to come inside the campus but not the classrooms, he was locked out. He resorted to the back gate.”

Mrs. Lee mumbled something she couldn’t make out as Mrs. Gong narrowed her eyes on the screen. “What does this have to do with Minho’s case?”

“To prove that yes, he was not at the classroom that morning, but not at the council room either. In fact, he was nowhere near. If I told you about this without evidence, you would’ve just doubted me.” They moved out of frame. The camera shifted and it’s them from a different angle, a minute difference on the timestamp and they’re seen entering the building area through the back door. The camera shifts again and they’re seen entering through the wide opening of the school cafeteria, finding a seat near a wall fan that paned to them every now and then.

The screen split into four, simultaneously showing the feed of the cafeteria and the three from on the same corridor of the student council office. The videos were sped up, the camera feed uneventful. At the cafeteria, Lia could still be seen talking with Minho, their movements a blur while time doesn’t seem to pass for the other cameras until the one focused on the council room cut black. Then finally, the culprit appears on the other cameras on the same hallway, disappears behind the double doors and reappears with a bag in hand.

Then the camera cuts.

“I don’t need clear footage to determine that that person is not my son,” Mrs. Lee said, crossing her arms over her chest.

“I agree.” Mrs. Gong nodded. “Isn’t he from 11-C?”

Lia shook her head. “11-B. Lee Juyeon.”

A stunned silence fell upon them. Mrs. Lee sighed in relief, Lia assumed, while the other woman leaned back on her chair to massage her temple.

“But I’m not done yet,” Lia continued, cutting off the officer right before she could speak.

Lia shuffled through the file of CCTV footage, finding the one with the most recent date—fresh and recently transferred. The window flickered on, showing the view from behind a cubic room. A mirror spanned the far wall and in the space in between were students, moving in hypnotizing synchronization. Even with the cameras on mute, Lia could hear the thumping of their feet, the huffs, the chants. Up front was Minho, center of the pyramid formation with his vision more trained onto other people’s movements than his own.

Then they finish their routine, Minho calling a time-out before running straight for the exit which was a door at the far back of the room.

“That’s him right?” Mrs. Lee pointed to a figure crossing the room. The tall boy passed by, dancing a routine with someone in the mirror but with a package in hand, the familiar paper bag.

It didn’t take her and Jisung long to figure it out the night prior but it warranted another trip back to the CCTV room to retrieve it. They called up the other pair that night, having them gather at the convenience store to plan out their next step. They were betting on little chances but it was a place to start. The whole Friday morning, Chan and Taehee were set out for the retrieval of the last piece of evidence they needed. They didn’t have the luxury of time to plan another way to coax out the CCTV manager so they headed in face first, charading as members sent by the higher officers of the council to uncover the truth behind the robbery from last week. The CCTV officer obliged, no questions asked.

The search didn’t take long either. Their hunch was right.

In the camera, Juyeon slipped into the back row of dancers, cautious but not quite, heading for the back of the room to where the bags were stored. Then he searched through the bags, picking up a familiar backpack off the ground.

“Minho’s bag, right?” Mrs. Gong studied the screen, recognition etched on her features, taking her back to the day of the bag check. “Why would he do that?” She slumped back on her seat.

“According to dance troupe members, there has been a feud going on between them. He took a blow when Minho was chosen as troupe leader by previous seniors. Not sure if it’s just that.”

On the laptop screen, Minho came back and they practiced the routine a final time. As the clock ticked closer to 1PM, they dispersed, bowing by the door as they made their exit. Minho was the last to go, picking his bag off the ground—unaware that it had been meddled with, before turning the lights off and leaving. Then the clip ends, and Lia finally breathes.

Beside her, Mrs. Lee is muttering to herself, clicking her tongue, shaking her head. She must’ve been infuriated. Mrs. Gong didn't say a word to them across the table, instead she called for her secretary.

The petite lady shuffled into the room, nudging up her glasses as she entered. “Yes, Ma’am?”

“Call an audience with the student council president along with the director. Kindly tell them it’s urgent.”

Lia felt her world go still, unbelieving that she heard the words. A final shot at redemption, a chance to turn the tides.

“But Ma’am, there’s an on-going program at the,” the lady trailed off when she caught the look on Mrs. Gong’s face. “Understood, Ma’am.”

The officer turned to the lady. “Mrs. Lee, another deliberation will be held. Rest assured we will reach a verdict this afternoon. I’ll make sure that Minho’s expulsion will be on hold until the new evidence is reviewed by the others. If you could wait in the lounge?”

Mrs. Lee pursed her lips but didn't say anything. She must’ve thought it was better than nothing, nodding as she muttered a humble thank you and walked out. The room was suddenly colder without her fiery rage, the bout of fearlessness Lia felt leaving along with her.

“Ms. Song.” It sent a chill down Lia’s spine, making her hesitant to turn her head but she did it anyway. “I’m going to ignore that you violated school laws by accessing this type of evidence and while I will be lenient, the other two might not be.”

Lia felt her relief wane, replaced by a growing fear of getting into more trouble than they'd initially signed up for. Would the school really overlook the good intentions behind their actions?

“However, I am convinced by the evidence you presented. Minho was a frequent visitor, a nuisance on most days, but I don’t see him as the type to do something like that.” Mrs. Gong laughed, no humor in her tone, just melancholy. “He reminds me of my own son.”

The younger girl couldn’t find the right words to say anything but she knew the woman lost her son the year before and took a break off working for the admin. “I’m sorry, Ma’am.”

“It’s alright.” And just like that, the moment of tranquility passes and she’s upright again. “May I copy the clips to a flash drive so you can take your laptop home? Just in case deliberation takes too long.”

What else would you need to deliberate on? The evidence is right there! The words died in Lia’s throat before she had the chance to shout them. She obliged, letting the woman plug in a bar, copy the files from the folder and eject it.

“Dismissed.”

It took her a moment to steady her legs when she stepped out into the lounge, Chan’s laptop clipped in her hands and a huge weight lifted off her shoulders. Right as she was about to exit the office, she was called over.

“You were at the restaurant that day, right? When he got suspended?” The voice came from behind her. Mrs. Lee was on the lounge couch with the box of Minho’s things sitting next to her.

Lia managed a small smile, “Yes, Ma’am.”

“Thank you for fighting for him,” the woman said. “I hope they withdraw the suspension. He really likes dancing. We were against it at first but he scored the scholarship and we just let him. He was still as mischievous as he always was but it was nice seeing him be passionate about something else besides messing around for once.” Her gaze was far for a moment and Lia realized she was staring at a cabinet full of trophies. Did she know her son won one trophy each year for the past three years he’d been in SSA? Then the woman turned to look back at her. “Come over to the restaurant some time with the others, will you?”

Lia nodded. “I’ll let them know.”

Mrs. Lee waved her hand as if to shoo her, another familiar gesture she often saw on her son. “Get going. Someone opened the door earlier, I think they were looking for you.”

When she walked out the hallways were bustling again, and up against the adjacent wall were the people waiting for you.

“Symposium was cancelled.” Jisung was the first to approach her, the others following suit and crowding around her. “How did it go?”

“Cancelled?” she asked. “I thought it would take the whole afternoon.”

“Director Park was called off the podium and then we were ushered out. Symposium over, go back to your rooms. Postponed.” Hyunjin said, his poor impersonation warranting a few laughs from the crowd.

Lia let out a small chuckle before the events clicked into place in her head. “Oh my God.”

“Why?” Changbin cocked an eyebrow. “Don’t leave us hanging, damn it. You’re making me anxious.”

“I just finished reviewing the clips with Mrs. Gong and she called for, she called for...”

Lia trailed off as she saw the Director walk down the hallway, fast and furious in their direction. Brian walked beside him, clad with the same stoic expression that came with the stress of being head of the student council. They bowed as they passed, disappearing into the door she just exited.

“She called for an emergency meeting.” Chan finished.

Felix pursed his lips. “So now we wait.”

“Well, I’m not willing to.” Taehee said, brushing past the others and approaching Lia. She gave the other girl’s arm a squeeze, a familiar reassuring warmth without her having to say anything else. “I’ll see you on Monday, yeah?”

“I have club activities too.” Jeongin frowned.

“Monday then?”

“Why do you all look so hopeless?”

“Realistically speaking, I could think of a million things that could go wrong from here but the thing is, it’s completely out of our hands now. We’re just here to hope that the verdict changes and it’ll be in our favor this time.” Seungmin said, the others nodding in agreement.

“As much as I think the verdict would be worth the wait, I say we wait for Monday. We’re all tired from the past week and well,” Saeyeon paused, “we tried our best. I don’t think we can help Minho anymore than we did now.”

They reached a consensus not long after, but Lia lingered outside the office. Minho’s fate was down to whoever was behind those doors. She let Saeyeon’s words sink in, there was no more helping beyond what they’ve done. She could only hope everything they’ve risked for would be worth it.

When the clock struck 4 and the office door remained closed, she turned her heel and walked away.

AFTER. Lee Minho. November 5th, Monday.

It was true what the old folks said: old habits indeed died hard, and as excited as Minho was for that Monday, he still woke up well past his morning alarm. He stumbled into their kitchen, full-blown bedhead hair with marks of drool staining the side of his mouth, whining at his mother for not waking him up earlier, even when he always insisted to never be woken up from his slumber. Especially on Mondays.

It was also true that you turned to greater beings when you were at your toughest times. Minho was never a believer but after going through a week of having to work day through night at their restaurant, he was praying to whoever was willing to listen. I’ll study better now, just please let me get back to SSA. Trying to stay awake through a boring lecture was difficult, but trying to stay upright when you’re dead tired from cooking through the hottest part of the day was beyond him. He felt like he aged a year in the week he worked in the kitchen.

The devastation rocked him. As much as he hated having to lead the dance troupe, he missed it when it was snagged away from him. He missed the halls, the studio, the overcrowded cafeteria. The tall trees, the shaded footpaths with uneven steps, the narrow alleyways that smelled of cigarettes. Most of all, he missed spending his friends’ company and he thinks the reason they didn’t come back to visit him was because of how he acted the week prior. But his pride was too high to send them a message, embarrassment too deep for him to view their messages in the group chat.

For a day he was sad, it was unfair from that one singular stand point. Being framed like that was something he’d never wish on anyone. But if anyone took a good look at everything he did leading up to the framing, they’d say he deserved it. The reputation he built was on him and it was high time that someone pulled the rug from beneath his feet. For once, he had to experience being on the losing side for all the times he played innocent even when he wasn’t.

But alas, the gods heard his pleas and he was at SSA’s gates again, swiping his card through the RFID machine and walking in.

The feeling was foreign even when he’d only been gone for a week. Weird gazes passed as he hugged the first pole he saw but they paid him no heed, nor did their opinions matter to him. He walked up the four floors leading up to their classroom. He’s met with a warm, confusing welcome from the people who were around. Plastic, he nearly blurted but he managed a fake smile. He debated leaving his bag behind so he took it with him when he ventured higher. The people he wanted to see weren’t in the room.

He headed to the rooftop first, empty. Looked overboard to glimpse at the quadrangle despite his fear of heights, not there either. Until his feet led him down the flights of stairs, down hallways sprinkled with people getting the midday gossip. The gymnasium was near the far back of the campus but the walk there was never too tiring, always worth it with the right people tagging along.

Minho tugged the double doors open and let himself in.

And there they were, sitting on the bleachers near the east wing with their backs turned and heads together. His heart swells, stomach twists, awash with the joy of seeing them again but he keeps his face stoic because they don’t even turn around.

“Really?! You were here all along?!”

Heads snap and turn, followed by a collective gasp before someone finally calls his name. The boys leapt out of their places on the bleachers, a blur of white as they dashed down the vinyl floor of the court. A cloud of chaos nearly knocks Minho out of balance, tackled and harassed, but he lets it pass. He couldn’t bring himself to say the words, but he was glad to be back here with them. Just for the day. For once, he was glad to be the center of attention, to be back where he wanted to be.

He was dragged back to where the others were on the bleachers, taking their respective places and finishing off their respective lunches. Minho panned his gaze.

“Chan and Taehee?” he asked, easily noticing the absence of the pair.

A silence fell upon them, partnered with a nervous exchange of looks.

“I know those looks. Don’t try and lie to me.” Minho said.

“Called to meet the triumvirate.” Changbin answered.

Minho’s eyebrows knitted themselves together. “Why?” Nobody answered, save for another exchange of looks. “Don’t tell me they’re in trouble because of me.”

“Minho,” Lia muttered, but never got to continue.

The gym doors opened again, this time more noticeably. They rattled loudly in the silence of the gym. From behind the double doors, Chan emerged with Taehee trailing behind her. They stared ahead blankly, stoic, neither one paying any heed to the other.

Saeyeon skirted past the others sitting on the bleachers, using other chairs as steps down to ground level. “How did it go?”

Taehee glanced at her, her face unreadable. But then their eyes wandered over to Chan just in time to see his facade shatter, his mouth twisting into a grin the second his eyes landed on Minho.

“Damn it, Chan.” Taehee spat.

They all broke into laughter as Chan hopped the steps up to Minho, giving him a tight squeeze before sitting giddily beside him.

“Heard you were called up by the triumvirate. How did that go?” Minho asked, turning to Chan.

Chan glanced over to the other girl who just shrugged him off. “They suspected that we were the ones who got the evidence to prove your innocence.”

“You did?”

“They were right of course. And we admitted to it except it’s against school laws to meddle with such things. It’s under grounds of expulsion.” Chan continued.

Minho stared, his stomach tied in knots with all the trouble they’ve gone through. “And?”

“You wouldn’t believe us.” Taehee said, snatching his attention away from the older boy. “Brian said he ordered us to do so. The fuck?”

“Same thoughts,” said Chan, “so I went and asked him why he did it and he said he knew we did it for a friend but it also benefited the council so it was the least he could do.”

“How?” Minho was out of words, overcome with a multitude of emotions surging through him. “All my mom said was you got CCTV footage. Was that it?”

They nearly break into a collective laugh again but Minho’s curiosity was genuine. Chan shook his head, pointing at someone in the crowd. Jisung rose up and a series of applause erupted.

“Thank you, thank you!” Jisung waved his hand around. “None of this would be possible if you didn’t cooperate with me. But what is there to cooperate on if there is no plan? So thank me because Minho wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for me.”

“No one asked you to save me.” Minho said. “When they came for me last week, I asked them to leave me alone.”

Jisung clicked his tongue. “People nowadays. So ungrateful.”

Minho raised his hand and the younger boy flinched, shrinking back into the bleachers. Operation Roger Rabbit was explained to him in grave detail. From the meeting on the rooftop to a Mission Impossible-like strategy to get the evidence they needed, attempted arson, blackmail and pranks, One Punch Man encounters in dim alleyways, right down to the big reveal and Juyeon’s inevitable confession. It was far from what Minho’s mom told him the prior Friday night. He expected just as much from the extraordinary bunch.

He wanted to scold them for all the risk they took, but he’d been around them long enough to know that they were as stubborn as he was. Because if they weren’t, they wouldn’t be here with him in the school gymnasium where he thought he’d never step in again.

His attention was snagged away when a flash blinked from his periphery. He turned right as another flash went off.

“See! First shot was the film’s seal.” Saeyeon plucked the polaroid off the top of the camera Lia held, fanning the shot in the wind before turning away.

Minho scooted over. “If you wanted my photo, you could just say so.”

Lia laughed, setting the camera down and pushing its lens back and powering it off.

“My mom mentioned that you reported the whole thing. Was it true?”

“Yeah,” she nodded. “Sorry it took a while, they wouldn’t have believed me if it was just my testimony. They would’ve said I was biased.”

“It’s alright,” he reassured. “What you went through sounded like a lot of fun.”

Lia glared at him, making him laugh.

“Happy your partner in crime’s back?”

“You really want to get involved in more crimes?” Lia asked. “Let’s stop, alright? We don’t want you getting involved in something like that again.”

“So, starting tomorrow we should be early birds?”

“As we should be.”

Minho laughed, shaking his head as he rejoined the conversation with the others.

There was nothing permanent in the world except for change. There was a shift in the air of the dance troupe with Minho’s return and Juyeon’s expulsion in exchange. It was a loss nonetheless and Minho knew he couldn’t get everyone’s approval. But he just had to put up with it, maybe until the talent show at the end of the semester. The CCTV room didn’t have a coin-slot lock anymore, it had a real lock now with a key hung on the officer’s neck—no duplicate has ever been sighted. The council room had a chain wrapped around its twin door knobs now, looped like a figure 8 and hooked together with a singular padlock.

And while some things change, others stay right where you leave them. It was in the way their friend group remained just as close, if not tighter, and the way he showed up again the next school day just in time to sign his name on the tardy slip for the nth time. Late was always better than not showing up at all, the world just had to deal with it.

a/n: this took longer to write than i expected and even longer than i planned it to be AHA. so much for a 6-chaptered thing (excluding prologue and epilogue). feedback is HIGHLY appreciated and would mean the world to me. leave your thoughts, i don’t really mind if you send a whole essay ;) thanks for reading!

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