D.E.B.S (Chaelisa)

19| Stay(Away)

And so her exile began, punctuated by interrogations, classes and missions.

Where is Lisa now?

I don't know.

How many people does she have working for her?

I don't know.

What are her next goals?

I don't know.

Why did she take an interest in you?

I don't know....

Fitted with a blood pressure armband and connected to several electrodes that would supposedly see through her lies, Chaeyoung always replied in the negative or not at all, especially when questions veered towards personal waters.

Will you see her again?

That particular query echoed in her head and appeared in her dreams, along with the sound of Lisa's voice and Lisa's charming smile, inviting her back into her arms.

Classes passed her by in a haze as she drifted numbly from one room to the next, muscle memory guiding her. 

Those first few days back were the toughest because people wanted to talk with her, wanted her to autograph shirts, wanted to hear all about her time in capture. Thankfully, Jennie and the others were there, fending off people and dismissing them. 

Jennie was the fiercest bodyguard, and if Chaeyoung didn't know that her friend was actually scared she might accidentally blab something out and compromise the story they were selling, she'd feel much more touched by Jennie's protection.

They were handed back their thesis drafts in class, after having submitted them to their professor for pre-eliminary vetting before then formally submitting it to the Academy Board. Chaeyoung stared at her thesis blankly, having nearly forgotten that her topic had been all about Lisa, the Lisa that everyone saw but nobody knew, not like her.

It was a paper full of lies but it earned Chaeyoung the coveted A+ grade she had dreamed of during sleepless nights of research.

She binned her thesis the moment they stepped out of class, crumpling it up and ignoring people's whispers, the damning whispers that followed at her heels all day, and she didn't stop even when she glimpsed the rest of her friends staring at her in shock as she walked away from the bin.

Chaeyoung took the rest of that day off, pleading cramps, and spent it curled up in bed with ice cream after she was escorted back to the dorm like some criminal on house arrest.

Well, now she knew what it was like.

Life with the other girls was a weird balance of not speaking with each other, skirting around conversations unless necessary but constantly hanging at the periphery of the group, with Jennie keeping a watchful eye and shooting anyone glares whenever she saw them whispering in their direction.

It was a dysfunctional dynamic that carried on during missions as well.

While spying on a gang of weapon dealers, the D.E.B.S sat on their swings away from Chaeyoung. She didn't try to move closer with them and simply sat observing idly, hands as empty as her heart.

A soft hum of gears alerted her before Chanyeol rappelled down level with her. He hadn't approached her again since the night she returned. She could feel his eyes on her as he hung on to his hoist.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey."

"So uh, you and me going to Endgame together?" he asked lightly.