Battle of The Bands

Where To Buy A New Leader (For Cheap)

Chapter 11

Where To Buy A New Leader (For Cheap)

     “So, Chan’s basically infected with bitchitis now,” I concluded, a confused Seungmin staring right through my soul. “Bitchitis?” “I dunno what it’s called but he’s under the spell but like, he was personally fucked with by Minho.” “Right.. What will we do now then? Chan’s our leader, without him I don’t think Stray Kids can even function.” “Exactly. Especially since we’re so close to winning this thing. If we lose now because of Chan..” “Why don’t you sing to him? You can’t keep forgetting how powerful your voice is.” “I..” I tried to speak but couldn’t. Seungmin was right. Why didn’t I just sing to Chan instead of arguing with him? Minho’s probably laughing it’s ass off somewhere because I was stupid and fell for their tricks. “We have time, I’ll deal with Chan later or something.” “You better,” Changbin adds. “Pissy Chan was scaring the shit out of Jisung.” “He.. he’s never acted like that before, I was so surprised, y’know? He was my first real friend but I used to have this fear that he secretly hated me or was only hanging out with me because he pitied me. Seeing him act like that confirmed those fears. Worse yet, he was my only comfort before I met you all, he was there when my parents were being.. Y’know. The way he acted there, it reminded me of them,” Jisungs says, his voice trembling. “Really? Well, we have to do something about that.” “Next time I see him I’ll deal with him,” I said, getting everyone’s attention. “But besides that, I got to see you guys perform, you all did great," Seungmin says, reassuring us. “Thanks, I feel like we would’ve been even better with you though,” I responded, Changbin and Jisung nodding in agreement. “I doubt. I’m sure we’ll make it to the quarterfinals though. That’s if The Dazzlings don’t rig it somehow.” “If they do, I'll find them and beat them all up,” I said. “I’ll join you then,” Changbin adds. “And I’ll watch on the sidelines,” Jisung concludes. “What song are we planning on performing though? The only songs I know we have are God’s Menu, Levanter and Side Effects,” Seungmin asks. It seems a lightbulb went off in Changbin’s mind because he quickly pulled out his phone. 

     “I made a new song actually. Let me find it..” Changbin says whilst scrolling through his phone. “There it is. I’m pretty proud of this song. I hope you all will love it just as much as I do.” With that, Changbin presses play. The song was loud, which is normal for us. But something about it stirred up a feeling I don’t think I’ve ever felt before in me. The song was in your face at some points but gentle in other parts. It was.. The best thing I’d ever heard in my life. “What do you all think?” “I love it. It’s very.. Us,” Seungmin says, Jisung nodding in agreement. “It’s really good, like, really, really good.” “I took inspiration from God’s Menu and this. In fact, it’s currently named ‘God’s Menu 2’ on my phone.” “It is really good but I feel like this is something we should save for the final round,” I added. “True, either way there’s no way this track will be done before the quarterfinals. There still needs to be vocals and we’d have to make a choreo for it.” 

     “Maybe for the quarterfinals we could do Levanter?” Jisung asks. “Maybe, but it might be treated as a snooze fest,” I responded. “Oh, true. But between Side Effects and God’s Menu I’m not sure which we should do. God’s Menu is kind of sexy but we’re just a bunch of kids so we probably shouldn’t do that one. And then Side Effects, while really good, is definitely going to be heavily disliked.” “Don’t people already hate our music?” Seungmin asks. “Oh, yeah, we have a ton of haters who hate how loud our music is. But Side Effects is like, super loud, and it’s psytrance too. That genre has been dead for years.” “Then let’s just do Levanter,” Changbin says. “I mean, I guess so. But this is the quarterfinals we’re talking about. Only two groups will be coming out of the quarterfinals. We already know The Dazzlings will be one of those two so our chances of being the second group are super slim,” Jisung added. “And it’s not like we have time to make a new song,” Seungmin says, defeated. “We’ll figure something out, we have to,” I said in hopes of boosting everyone’s mood. “Man, I wish Chan were here, too bad he has bitchitis,” Jisung says as he slides down the chair he’s sitting in. “We’ll get him back, don’t worry,” Seungmin says, glancing over to me. “Yeah, yeah, I told you all, I’ll deal with him.” “You all should head back now, it’s almost 3pm. I don’t think I’ll be discharged in time to go to school tomorrow but I’m sure I’ll be in school the day after tomorrow,” Seungmin says, smiling brightly at us. “Alright, bye Seung!” We all said our goodbyes to Seungmin and then went our separate ways.