"I told you it's her, but you didn't believe me." The woman with the brown locks spreads out the pictures she took on the table, pointing to the same person in each of the picture. "She changed her hair and appearance but there's no mistake it's her. And these people," she points to the group of people surrounding her, "are the members of ATEEZ."

"No," the man with the moustache replies, shaking his head. "There is no way that Han Byul would be together with ATEEZ. That's not how it's supposed to work; she swore that when she left us, remember? She wanted nothing to do with us anymore; she wanted to live a normal life. So why on earth would she be among them? You're being delusional, Danbi. I can't believe you're looking for me after all of this. Our team broke up, we went our separate ways."

Danbi bites her lower lip, tears almost escaping her eyes. "Uncle Remy," she pronounces, "you were there when Jeong Yunho and Lee Eunbi met each other in secret. You were taken away and locked up when you tried helping them live a normal life. Lee Eunbi was killed because she loved another human being. How long do you think we have to suffer from this? How long do people like them," she bangs a fist on the table before pointing furiously to the pictures that she took, "have to live without knowing that their days are numbered?"

"Danbi, I treat you as my daughter and I know that we bonded over the fact that we managed to escape that crazed facility. But doing this is not logical; we're not even a strong team, not even a complete one. Where are the rest? Han Byul, Shon, Alana and Qama are not here. We were a team built with a clear mission, but no clear strategy. If we plan to bring down the Bifidensis by ourselves... that's not going to happen. We're getting ourselves killed while they keep on prospering."

"So you're letting this go? Even when you know how that damn system costed so many lives?"

"Han Byul was the first to leave our team." He gathers the pictures before looking at them. "When she left us it grounded us to our situation; we were only defectors of the system, but not strong enough to beat the system. We get to escape only because of someone else's mercy."

"That's why we have to do this," she presses on, "assemble back our team." She hikes up her sleeves to show him the sword and flowers tattoo on her upper arm. "You have this tattoo. Alana, Qama, Byul and Shon have this tattoo. To remind us what we're supposed to do. Kim Hodong saved our lives, and we promised to pay him back."

"With our lives, again," Remy resigns. "Sure, he saved us from getting killed, but what did he ask in return? To bring the Bifidensis and KTC down by sacrificing our lives, so how does that make him any different than any of the other Bifidensis board members? In the end, it's not him that's getting killed, it's us. We're becoming the scapegoats."

"Uncle Remy, you don't understand!" Danbi shouts, grabbing the attention of the others at the back-alley barbecue restaurant so she tunes down her volume. "This was supposed to be the plan; we were assembled, but we had to wait until ATEEZ was released from the training centre. We were supposed to work together with them."

"Danbi, think about it. That Kim Hodong doesn't even care about his own nephew. He's forcefully shoving his nephew into ATEEZ, knowing that he is fully planning for their deaths."

"He knows!"

Remy looks taken aback. "What do you mean he knows?"

"Kim Hodong's nephew, Kim Hongjoong, knows about this mission all along. He knows why they were picked as ATEEZ by his own uncle, he knows that some of them might not even make it out alive."

He scoffs in disbelief. "He knows... yet he's letting it be. Not even rioting against his uncle."

"Uncle Remy," she pleads, "The mission was supposed to be set in motion as soon as ATEEZ got released into the real world, but it was halted because Han Byul decided to leave to start a new life, and our team broke up. Now none of the ATEEZ members know what they're in for, because Hongjoong was not able to tell them about it as our team no longer existed. They're living everyday on lies! But now that we see her with them... things are changing, Uncle Remy. We might even have a shot at making this work, even without getting anyone killed."

Remy stares at the picture of Byul, smiling among the others as she hugs a kid. "Is this... Jeong Yunho's child?"

Danbi nods. "Do you think that she's planning to live anyway?" she says, hard.

"Kim Danbi," Remy warns. "Watch your mouth. You treated her as your sister."

"What if..." she looks down, "I say this was what Han Byul wanted?"

"You're losing me. This was never what Han Byul wanted; that was why she left us in the first place. She never wanted to sacrifice her life for this uncertain mission."

"That was before she met Jeong Yunho again. And the kid."

"No," Remy shakes his head. "Don't say it. Don't think about it."

Danbi takes out her phone before opening a message and showing it to him. He refuses to look at it first as he sips the cold water, but her eyes are begging him. So he does, taking the phone from her and reading the lines one by one.

"Kim Hongjoong reached out to me after that day I accidentally stumbled upon his team member, Choi San. None of the others know about me because I left the facility even before they were recruited, except for him. But we know every member of ATEEZ because Kim Hodong has fed us this information, asking us to wait until the 8 of them will be released from KTC."

Remy's eyes travel to the television on the corner, his mind wandering as it's becoming more complicated. He thought that once their team was broken up, their lives will get better. Or at least, uneventful, and he'll be eternally grateful for that.

It's true; their team - Dyskaryo, a group of the system's defectors - is given all the information they had on the potential members of ATEEZ back then, so the only thing they had to do was to wait for them to be released.

But Byul refused because one of the members was Jeong Yunho and so she left. That was when the team started breaking apart, the mission failing before it even started.

"Jeong Yunho betrayed her," Remy utters. "That was what she believed."

Danbi nods, solemn. "That was why she didn't want to proceed with the mission; why would she work with someone who betrayed her trust? That was why she left this team."

She takes the phone again before displaying another message, this time a lengthy one from a private number. The message was too long until it couldn't fit into the screen, so Remy has to scroll as he reads the delivered message.

"But she stumbled upon the team by accident. It was truly unintentional, but that encounter with them opened up the lie she had believed all this while."

"She changed her mind."

"She did. Now she's planning to get back to the very people who had made her suffer, even if that means getting herself killed."

"No, no, no." Remy shakes his head, looking like he would almost throw the phone against the wall, or smash it with his fist. "Stop."

"Uncle Remy... she wants to protect the child and Jeong Yunho. She wants to protect the rest of the members, because they're all too oblivious to what the Bifidensis is planning to do with them. One year, five years and then they'll even forget they have contracts. But when the tenth year comes... no one will be spared."

"Danbi, please-"

"No, don't say that it's going to happen later and that we don't have to worry about it! As long as this system is in place, people like them don't get to live like what they deserve. We need to be the ones to abolish this system, and Byul is willing to sacrifice herself for that."

"You're not making any sense."

"I'm making perfect sense! Don't you understand what Han Byul is trying to do? Did you forget how the Bifidensis deals with agents whose contracts have ended? They don't get to live freely like what they're promised with, they're going to kill them! Uncle Remy, what makes people obey to the contracts, obey to the system? It's because they believe that by doing so, they'll be free one day. But those are all lies; they don't get to restart their lives, they will be killed and no one will care. Han Byul is trying to stop that cycle. Before the Bifidensis can get to ATEEZ, she's planning to bring them down first."

"Always thinking about others first even before she can take care of herself," Remy's voice is a mixture of resignation and disappointment as he flips the meat on the burner. "Eat up. It's been a long time since we met, so this one's on me."

"Uncle Remy." Her shoulders droop.

"What have you been doing lately? Been doing some odd jobs, huh? Life's pretty hard now, especially for an old man like me. World's ain't doing great either."

"You know why I decided to meet you again," she utters. "Don't brush it away like it's nothing."

He puts down the tongs and sighs, putting away the pictures he had gathered into the envelope. He puts it down onto the empty chair next to him before tapping a knuckle on the table. He looks at her with pity; oh how their lives have changed because of the Bifidensis and KTC.

"With what edge are we going into this mission with? Danbi, Kim Danbi, listen to me. Listen to his old man. Our team doesn't exist anymore; did you decide to forget about that? Byul left us so she could start a new life, get a proper degree and be a normal person. Qama and Alana were killed in an accident by a drunk driver. Shon... let him be. He's starting his new life somewhere by the beach in another country, where he always wanted to be. And I'm too old to be doing this anymore. Danbi, our team is in no shape to go back to our initial reason why we're being assembled."

"There's always the high-ranking members of ATEEZ; I- I think it was a Seonghwa, Yeosang-"

"Kim Danbi," he tries again. "They don't even know why they're chosen to become a part of the group. What makes you think that they will willingly sacrifice themselves to bring down a whole deep-rooted system so suddenly? It's not an easy one where you just go against one person and it'll be gone forever. No, KTC has a complex network all over the country, and we won't be able to access that unless we go back to the island that was once our prison. The only way we can shut them down is through destroying every single data they keep on that island and bringing the place down. Not to mention that we have to fight the 5 members of the Bifidensis themselves. Well, excluding Kim Hodong, 4."

Danbi doesn't say anything in reply. She's mindlessly picking at her lettuce as she folds it up.

"If we somehow manage to destroy all the data on that island, bring out all of the trainees there as we kill off the Bifidensis members one by one and then escaping unscathed, that would be a miracle. We don't have the capacity to do that, unless some of us are willing to never get out of there alive, for the better good of others."

"That's exactly what Han Byul is saying; in order to protect them, she wanted to be that person. She asked to give her some time so that she can say her goodbyes quietly to Yunho and the kid before she decides to leave. She mentioned that at least she's able to feel it at least once, what it's like... to be normal. She never planned to stay, because she said this thing was never meant for it to last."

---

They gather at the side of the manmade lake, watching the nightsky that is decorated with exploding fireworks. Hwayoung is running around on the green field being chased by Wooyoung and San, screaming gleefuly as her uncles tackle her to the ground, enveloping her in a hug. She wriggles free as Wooyoung lets her go, speeding up again as she narrowly misses from being caught by San. The field is filled with her laughter and scream, the adults watching on with loving smiles.

Byul's eyes follow Hwayoung everywhere, her heart filled with delightfulness at her running around even with the patch of plaster on her knee. She has been tirelessly running around even as the uncles chasing her have changed from Yeosang to Jongho and Seonghwa, before Wooyoung and San became the last. The rest sit on the two mats they brought from home, filled with packed food courtesy of the sisters.

The night is getting thicker and their food are finishing up, and they're simply enjoying the view as they sit on the open field. It was secretly planned as a celebratory picnic time, for them being able to successfully carry out the mission even as they faced all kinds of highs and lows. Their client was completely satisfied with them, and it did seem that Madam Tang only wanted her injury to be quietly settled. No one traced the chaos back to them, and they managed to slip out of the hotel unnoticed.

But... not to mention that there are still some things left unsettled.

Like the air between Byul and Yunho for example, who are pretending that the kiss didn't happen while they watch as Hwayoung gets caught by San again.

"I wonder where she got all that energy from," Yunho comments subconsciously, tilting his head backwards as his eyes stare at the sky. No moon is in sight tonight. "Even San and Wooyoung are starting to get tired but she's still trying to outrun them."

"You don't want to talk about that?" Byul asks, resting her chin on her knees as she hugs her legs.

"About where she got the energy from?" He sucks in a breath.

She chuckles before returning into her shell again. "No silly, what happened... yesterday."

"Ah... that." He copies her motion as he scoots closer to her so now that they're sitting side by side with barely any gap. As she looks at him with a questioning look, he defends himself. "Don't get the wrong idea. I just didn't want the rest of them to hear what we're going to talk about because it's embarrassing."

He steals a glance to the rest who are either too full with food to be moving around, or playing cards among themselves. None look to be paying attention to them.

As he looks at his daughter releases yet another laughter as Wooyoung lifts her up to the sky, he mumbles, "I'm sorry. That's all I can say."

"Right, not even an explanation on why you did that?"

"Did what?"

"Oh come on, stop playing dumb." She rests her cheek on her knee so she's looking at Yunho, but the man is avoiding her gaze as he sucks in his cheeks. "You know what you did."

"You kissed me first," his words stumble out, sounding like a child who's trying to put the blame on another for spilling water on the table.

"It was supposed to be a harmless peck," she utters. "But you did more."

"You're making it sound as if we had a whole make-out session. It was only a kiss."

"Yeah, like you would kiss a lover."

"Well do you want to be my lover?" he asks without thinking, before his face changes at his realization and he quickly corrects himself, "That was not what I wanted to say at all. Why do I always say dumb stuff when I talk to you?" He slaps his cheeks. "Delete."

"Of course it wasn't. I know it was just an act, chill." She grins. "Gosh, you get so flustered easily it's kind of cute- wait, that was not what I wanted to say. Please delete that from your mind."

They burst into quiet laughter without grabbing the attention of others before they turn to the night sky, appreciating the stars that look like tiny dots scattered across the canvas.

She hugs her knees closer to her chest before mumbling, "Hwayoung's mother must be really lucky to have you. You love her... even when she's not here anymore. I can't believe I'm actually saying this, but I'm sorry I wasn't whom you wished I was."

Yunho traces the Lee Eunbi's name on the soil with his finger. "You said no apologies but that's all I'm hearing now."

The results of the DNA test came back, and they set it so that besides the physical copy of the full results being sent to their dorm, she would get a notification on her phone from the lab which gives her a summary of the results. It was a simple message, with the reminder that she could see the full details on the physical copy, but it was more than enough to tell them that she wasn't related to Hwayoung by blood.

She received the message just as they decided to stop their activities at the dry park and proceed with the planned picnic, and as she quietly showed it to the rest, they nodded in understanding, throwing their gaze to the child who was innocently eating cotton candy while skipping over the stony steps of the park.

"So now that you know I'm not... her mother..." she trails off. "Nothing."

"What is it?"

"No, it's embarrassing to say it."

"Oh come on, when were you ever embarrassed with me? You always treat me like I'm your buddy or something."

"That was unfair."

"What was?" He creases his forehead.

"That you... kissed me like that and pretended like it was nothing." She buries her face in between her knees before releasing a shaky breath. "I mean, sorry- I know that you still love her and the kiss was just an act but still- argh it's stupid. I mean I know that I started it but it was supposed to be only a light peck but you made it so complicated-"

"It wasn't."

"Of course it wasn't- what?"

"I do love her still," Yunho says, making a heart around Lee Eunbi's name on the soil. "It's been 6 years since she died, and I feel like I'm betraying her if I ever do fall for someone else. Maybe this is what Hwayoung's mission is all about, maybe it's just that I've raised Hwayoung up all alone, and I saw something that was missing came back when you were here. I'm just... confused. I don't know what this feeling is about, but the kiss wasn't an act."

The blush on her cheeks is uncontrollable as she looks away, willing the redness to go away. She doesn't know what to say so she stays quiet, clasping and unclasping her hands. She wants to say it, but she feels that something is holding her back. So she says the complete opposite, even when all she wished she could do was to shout the other answer.

"You're probably just lonely," she decides. "You wanted someone to fill in that gap left by Hwayoung's mother."

"So... even though you felt something during the kiss, you're rejecting me?"

"You bet. This is too... sudden. You still see me as Hwayoung's mother, not for who I am."

"Fair enough." He leans back. He watches as Hwayoung tumbles to the ground but she quickly stands back up, dusting herself off.

"You're sounding as if you're used to being rejected."

"Nah, I just have this mindset that if people don't want you, then it's not your duty anymore to make them want you. What can I do if I say I like you but you don't? So I'm fine."

"I never asked whether you're fine."

"Ouch. Okay that was unnecessary."

She chuckles as a shooting star passes by, and she closes her eyes as she wishes for something.

But deep down inside, she knows that the wish won't ever come true.