Plans and Promises

"What the heck happened here?"

As soon as I entered the dorm, everything was in shambles. The couches and the tables were flipped, the walls were filled with graffiti, the electronics were all scorched, our clothes were torn apart, and even some of the lights were destroyed. Yo Chul-hyung and Matt-hyung were in the living room trying to avoid all the broken things.

Zee was out in the hallway trying to track down the culprit using the CCTVs around the building. While Jiwoo was calling Tzuyu to tell her that we were safe. Zhang was on the phone with probably one of the managers to report the situation. The rest were probably inside their rooms cleaning it up.

Crap…

This is some "saesang".

"As you can see, THIS happened." Yo Chul-hyung answered.

"Any idea who it might be?" I asked.

Matt-hyung sighed heavily. "Come on. Follow me."

We went in to our room and saw a message on the wall that was painted in red.

"I'll take away those you love." I read the message out loud.

"Anyone in mind?" Matt-hyung asked.

I paused for a while to think. "Not a clue."

He nodded. "Zee's working on finding our guy."

This hand writing...

It looks really familiar...

Could it be?

I turn to him because I realized something. "Hyung, it's the same hand writing as the one who sent the gift to me."

I went through my drawers to look for the letter that was sent to me last year. I placed inside a plastic zip lock bag to and hid it in a secret compartment on one of my drawers. Thankfully, it was still there.

"Well what do you know? It's actually the same guy." Matt-hyung confirmed as we compared the two hand writings.

It might not be much but at least we now know that everything that happened so far was because of one person.

"Hyung! I got something!" Zee shouted from the hallway.

We immediately gathered and see what he found. There was a footage of a man wearing all black and covering his face. He actually had a well-built body. We saw him destroying and leaving our dorm. We then traced him back to his car which he parked outside an abandoned apartment complex just outside of town.

"We got you now, sucker." Seiji-hyung said.

We rushed to our cars and immediately went to the site where he parked his car.

__________

"I can't believe it was a bust!" Seiji-hyung said.

We went to the site where he left his car. But that's it. There were no traces of a man who went there. The car's black box and dashboard camera weren't there either. After checking the CCTVs on site, there were no traces of the man leaving his car which doesn't make any sense.

"We almost got him." Zhang said under his breath.

We were really disappointed about the results. This guy was walking circles around us.

"What now, JayB?" Dominic said.

Everyone turned their attention to me.

I sighed. "For now, there's nothing we can do. We're at a dead end. Let's just our stuff up and start cleaning the place up."

"We're leaving?" Jiwoo asked.

I nodded. "For now, let's stay at the clubhouse until our managers can find us a new place to stay."

They all groaned about the idea.

"The managers would find out where our secret headquarters are." Seiji-hyung complained.

I shook my head. "Don't worry. They promised us they won't pester us in revealing where our clubhouse is. We'll just tell them that we'll drive ourselves to the company before we head to our schedules. The clubhouse is nearer to the company anyway."

They all nodded in agreement.

"Zee, make sure you'll allow the information of our dorm being ransacked to the press. Just make sure it comes out as a saesang fan's crazy scheme." I instructed.

Zee raised his eyebrow. "Wouldn't that only reveal our dorm's location?"

"It's fine. We leaving this place now anyway. Since he knows where we live, it's not safe here anymore." I replied.

After discussing some other things, we started cleaning the place and packing our stuff up. We finished around 3AM in the morning so we decided to go to the clubhouse to call it a night. We'll wait up for what PD-nim plans to do then we'll decide what to do with our stuff.

We have the rest of the week off anyway since we're almost finished with our promotions for our second album.

I just hope that things will turn out well tomorrow.

_________

"AAAH! Finally! A new dorm!" Zee said as he started kissing the dorm floor.

"Disgusting…" Zhang said.

We all laughed.

We actually spent weeks in the clubhouse and it was a nightmare.

Everybody was really cranky and we were barely able promote on our last days because of the dorm issue. Now that we were done with our promotions, we finally have are break since we'll be figuring out our next step from now on.

But it wasn't all that bad. We actually received some positive news. According to PD-nim, we were already known internationally so it was about time we would debut in China and Japan. So we started talking about which songs to translate. I also talked to Seiji-hyung, Zee and Zhang about translating some of the songs since we were fluent in the languages.

"There are four rooms right now. So how are we going to go about this?" Yo Chul-hyung asked.

I thought about it for a while and said, "There are two big rooms, one medium room and one small room so I guess three will stay in the big rooms, 2 people on the medium room and one in the small room."

Jiwoo then suggested something. "JayB-hyung, you should take the small room so you can have the privacy in thinking about our next songs."

Matt-hyung nodded. "No arguments there. So how about it guys?"

"No wait. We have to draw lots and see who gets the room fair and square." I said.

Jeong Do then patted my shoulder. "Just take it man. We really need you now especially after the recent issue about our dorm. There were a lot of haters that attacked us that time."

I turn to everyone which made them agree with what Jeong Do said and of course, I didn't have any choice but to accept their kind offer.

In the end, Yo Chul-hyung, Zee and Zhang got the big room. The second big room went to Matt-hyung, Seiji-hyung and Jiwoo. Jeong Do and Dominic got the medium-sized room.

After we agreed on our room assignments, we immediately started unpacking. I didn't realize that I was slowly turning my room into a miniaturized recording studio. Well I didn't mind it. I needed to record a lot of songs in the next few days anyway. I only got delayed because of the incident.

Someone suddenly knocked on the door. I opened to see Zhang outside my door.

"Someone's looking for you outside, hyung." He said and left.

Who could it be?

I then closed the boxes and arranged them before heading outside to see this guest.

To my surprise, it was one of SEVENTEEN's members, Joshua.

"Hey, JayB." He spoke in English.

When it would just be us, we always spoke in English because he kind of miss doing it. Only Vernon, who was also a member of SEVENTEEN, speaks English. Well, he also spoke English to some other English-speaking idols and celebrities as well.

"Josh, what's up?" I asked.

"Are you busy? Do you have schedules lined up these days?" He asked.

I shook my head. "We don't, actually. We're on break to figure out what we're going to do for our next album. Why? Do you need my help with something?"

He smiled. "Remember that song you wrote for us?"

I nodded, "You mean 'Mansae'? Yes, of course."

"We're done recording it. We wanted you to see if it sounded good and if you could do the choreography for us like you promised." He shyly said

"Of course! I've been waiting for you to contact me all this time!" I exclaimed excitedly.

"We wanted to contact you earlier on, but because of the things that have been happening with Alpha, we were afraid to disturb you." He said.

I laughed. "What are you talking about? A promise is still a promise, Josh. How soon do you want me to drop by?"

He scratched the back of his head. "If you're free this afternoon… then…"

"Sure! I'll see you guys at 1PM. It's the main building for Pledis, right?" I excitedly asked to meet him.

In the previous world, I was a huge fan of SEVENTEEN especially with their songs. I really studied their songs and choreography because they were really good at it. There were rarely self-producing groups that made it big. Amazingly, SEVENTEEN was one of them. Although they were underrated, they proved that they were not to be messed with and generated sale figures that exceeded everybody's expectations.

Now, I get to work with them which is such an honor for me.

_____________

"Look who's finally here!" S.Coups, which is part of the 95 liners and is the leader for SEVENTEEN stood up to hug me as I entered the room.

"It's nice to see you well, Coups." I told him as I patted his back.

He then introduced me to all the members. At first, it was hard to really memorize their names, but because I followed them a lot in the previously world, I already know who's who.

"So… let me hear how you guys did." I went straight to the point.

Woozi played the song over the speakers and waited for my reaction. They actually did really well. Even better than the original in fact. Wow! I guess they would really stand out this time. I put on a serious face as I listened to the song intently without any reactions at all from start to end.

The members were getting nervous because it looked like I didn't like the output. They really must have wanted to impress the 'person who wrote this song'. I didn't notice it at first because I was caught up with how well they did so towards the end, I kept a poker face.

"How did we do, hyung?" Dino asked.

I gave them a thumbs up and smiled which made them relax and celebrate a bit.

"Are you guys ready for the choreography?" I asked them which made them excited.

For the next few hours, we worked on the first half of the choreography for the dance. It was amazing that they would be able to pick up the steps so easily. And to do it this in sync is just crazy. They really didn't earn the title "Kings of Synchronization" for nothing.

"Not bad guys. You did really well to catch up like this." I told them.

They were all panting and some fell on the floor in exhaustion. Hoshi was even putting his hands on a wall to support himself from standing up. The rest went silent and went to their own respective corners to cool off.

"Okay… I guess you guys must have been wiped. Let's take five." I said.

The 8 went to me and asked, "Is this your normal pace when it came to Alpha? I could barely keep up."

I shook my head. "Really? Alpha does it much faster and more intense than this."

The 8's jaw dropped. "You're kidding me."

Jun who was lying on the floor overheard our conversation. "You guys are monsters. Monsters I tell you."

I chuckled at his comment. "Well, I know you guys can do better than this. So don't worry."

Everybody groaned in disagreement. I laughed before going over my bag to check out my phone. There were a lot of unread messages.

Ji-Eun <3: Are you free today?

Ji-Eun <3: I'm bored… want to do something later?

Ji-Eun <3: I went over to your new dorm to surprise you but they said that you were in Pledis' to help out your friends.

Ji-Eun <3: I'm on my way to see you. I'll be there in a few minutes. ;*

I chuckled as I went through her messages and saw how badly she wanted to spend time with me today. I kind of feel guilty for not asking her if she wanted to come along or something.

Suddenly, the door to the studio opened.

"Oh? IU-sunbaenim." S. Coups said.

"Hey Coups. You looked exhausted." She commented.

I turn to see her carrying a bunch of bags. It must be food. I immediately rushed over to help her.

S. Coups then chuckled. "It's your boyfriend's fault. He's been punishing us through this choreography."

"Not true. I'm here to help them out with a song." I replied as I grabbed the bags away from her hands.

She giggled as she wiped my sweat away with a towel. "Really? Looks pretty much true to me."

I smiled and changed the topic. "What's all these?"

"Oh they're for everyone. I figured you guys might be hungry. I ordered some tteokboki and some kimbap for you." She replied.

"You didn't have to, you know?" I told her with a smile but DK and Seungkwan grabbed the bags away from my hands.

"Thank you, sunbaenim. We happily accept." Seungkwan said which made us all laugh.

We took a break and enjoyed the food that she brought. She also shared that she was almost done with her recording for Chat-shire so she would be busy preparing for her choreography.

"We'll probably be promoting at the same time guys." She said.

"Let's have a great season of promoting then, sunbaenim." Jeonghan said.

I then held her hand and massaged it a little.

"Aye… don't be so sweet in front of us. Single people like us can't relate." Woozi said.

Yeah…

But you wrote so many love songs which is still doesn't make sense up to now…

We just laughed at his comment and continued eating. Everyone was already tired with practice and they were about to continue recording some of their songs so we decided to call it a day.

After saying our goodbyes, I drove Ji-Eun back to her dorm after we went around to shop in Myeongdong. It's been a while since we actually hung out just by ourselves so this was refreshing. We almost are at our 3rd month already in being in a relationship but it feels like we're a couple that recently started dating. This wasn't necessarily a bad thing. It's just nice that we get to find out something new about each other every day.

___________

"Thanks again for doing this." Jimin said.

I was in Big Hit entertainment and helped out with the song that I gave BTS. Although they won't be promoting it yet, they just wanted to prepare ahead. They didn't want to be left behind. Right now, they were about to head to their Japanese language class.

"No problem. I'll call again if I have a good song for you guys." I told them.

Jungkook smiled. "That's a promise then, hyung."

I shook their hands and gave them a hug. It was still nostalgic seeing them now.

Just as I was about to get in my car and head for the dorm to rest up, the director for SIXTEEN started calling me.

"Yes junmoo-nim." I answered.

"JayB-ssi. Did you forget that we had a shoot today? I tried reaching you out earlier. JYP PD-nim's pissed." He said.

I turn to look at my schedule. "Wasn't it still tomorrow?"

"We moved it today. Didn't manager tell you earlier?" He asked.

"No. My phone's been turned off the whole day as well because I was in a recording studio." I replied.

He then sighed heavily. "Just get here quick."

I hung up the phone drove the venue of SIXTEEN.

___________