Chapter 192

"Tighter, tighter! Let's try a little more dynamic. Show us the energy Kairos has as a team!"

Did we really have to be this into it in animal onesies?

The photographer and every last one of the staff had so much passion pouring off them that I felt bad for having suspected a hidden-camera setup earlier.

The concept for a group shot was, if you broke it down, just gather up and put out the most fun, most friendly-looking mood you can — but our face-stan praise-bomber-king of a photographer seemed to want more than that.

"Great! Heat like a blazing summer day, wild animals bounding across the Serengeti!"

"Ah, yes…."

No matter how many times I heard it, I couldn't tell what he was even talking about.

I'd figured N years of stanning plus the mental fortitude I'd built up in my PD days had made me immune to your average moe-fying and praise-bombing….

Why does this bruise my ego?

Anyway, we brought a rookie's grit and enthusiasm to it and gave whatever they told us to do our all.

…and, honestly, a few of them looked like they were having a genuinely good time.

"Ahahaha! Doha-hyung, I'm dizzy!"

"Hyung. Can we maybe try something like a pyramid? Like — this, all climbing up together like this…."

"If Eunchan wants to try, then we try."

Watching Dan Haru riding piggyback on Lee Doha and spinning around like a fairground ride, and Ju Eunchan energetically pitching the next pose to Jung Siwoo, an inexplicable peace settled over me.

Yeah, well. As long as the kids are having fun….

"……."

"What're you doing?"

"Just got hit with a wave of what-am-I-doing-with-my-life — reminded me of my old part-time gig at a kids' café."

Right — turns out there was one guy who wasn't having fun after all.

I gave a rough pat on the shoulder to Lee Yugeon, who was learning firsthand that highly moe-fied idol activities are functionally indistinguishable from being a play-angel at a kids' café. Lee Yugeon hesitated a beat, then asked me, carefully:

"Hyung, this kind of stuff doesn't make you cringe?"

"Hadini finds pwaying cute not so hardio. It's just — I'm not cute, that's the pwoblem."

"……."

"Come on — I threw out a joke to warm up the mood and you're gonna receive it that flat?"

Lee Yugeon, briefly iced over by my aegyo, eased his expression just enough to be polite and turned his head away. Front and center, Seo Taehyun was actively communicating with the staff, batting ideas back and forth.

Wait — married-couple squabble solution, this is my chance?

Keeping tabs on Lee Yugeon's state out of the corner of my eye, I opened my mouth like nothing was up.

"Seo Taehyun over there — he's really something too, isn't he? I guess kids like that are what you look at and go born-and-bred idol."

At my line — floated like I had no ulterior motive — Lee Yugeon nodded more readily than I'd expected and answered like it was obvious.

"Him? He's always been good at that stuff."

Huh? The mood between them really isn't that bad?

Jung Siwoo really had been right — it wasn't hate that had them fighting. Lee Yugeon stared blankly for a moment at where Seo Taehyun was, then got up from his seat without a word. I stood up too, meaning to probe a little more — but the shoot resumed right then and my chance vanished.

"Alright, alright. Kairos, everyone. Attention please for a moment."

The photographer clapped and gathered our focus. With the same earnest look he'd worn when giving me advice earlier, he made his appeal:

"Right now — your outfits, your poses. A little bit funny, right? I fully get that. Maybe you were expecting something fresher, glossier — this shoot might feel a bit awkward for you. I understand."

Wait — is that even right…?

I wanted to shoot back — can't you see how much fun these kids are having? — but I wasn't 13-year-veteran Seo Taeil, I was a rookie about 13 weeks out from debut, and rookies didn't get the floor.

Either way, the photographer barreled on, flames leaping in his eyes (my imagination), delivering his impassioned speech:

"However! Idols, in my view, are beings with a mission — to spread fantasy, energy, and happiness to their fans. I've been told these are your very first profile photos before debut. All the more reason, then — for the Destis who'll enjoy these photos, shouldn't we be giving it our all?"

Who are you that you even know about Destis?

Even as my suspicion about the photographer's identity kept deepening, the members were slowly getting fired up by his strange passion.

"Even bigger concepts and stronger direction are waiting for you down the road. What I want, from you, right here — is for you to push your potential to the absolute limit. You can do it! You can be even more energetic!"

So, in animal onesies, how much more energetic exactly are we supposed to get, sir.

Right around when I was working up that question, at the photographer's gesture, a staffer came rushing over with a tablet.

"In that spirit — how about we try this for the last pose?"

"…this?"

On the tablet, seven models were forming one massive formation, each in a different, bizarre pose. Formation, if you were being kind — but the second I saw it, what came to mind was…

"Oh, this is Power Rang—"

"Shh. Haru, quiet."

It was a hero pose you'd only ever see in a sentai show with magical warriors.

For real?

I looked at Ji Suho with a this is seriously happening? look, but Ji Suho just cheered us on, bright-faced — saying once we did this one, it was clock-out time.

Right — rookies don't get to talk. Told to jump, you jump.

Half-resigned, I quickly staked out my pose.

"Dan Haru, take center. I'm doing far left."

"Huh? Me — center?"

"Something about you just says Red. Everyone else, pick fast. Let's shoot this and go home."

Since I had the loudest voice in the group, I set the tone first — and the others, without any real objection, checked their poses and started moving to the photo zone. Following Dan Haru, who'd confidently claimed center just like I'd said, Jung Siwoo — a puppy hood pulled over his head — took a pose with one leg and one arm raised, gazing off toward the upper corner.

Even so, with a face like Jung Siwoo's, he just looked like a handsome sculpture. What I couldn't quite figure out was why this hyung always jumped headfirst into stuff like this. Staring without meaning to, I caught Jung Siwoo's eye — he'd felt me looking — and he turned his head slightly toward me and said:

"What? You get in place too, quick."

"Hyung, really…. it kind of looks like you enjoy this."

"It gets boring only ever doing the handsome stuff. I've been wanting to try things like this."

Sure….

Nodding along at the kind of answer that leaves you with absolutely nothing to say, I got into my chosen pose — a handstand freeze. Right on cue, Lee Doha, standing next to me, propped my legs up on his shoulder to support them and struck a pose of his own — something martial-arts-looking.

Then Ju Eunchan took his place beside Jung Siwoo, and the only two left were Lee Yugeon and Seo Taehyun. And there was exactly one pose left.

"Uh…."

"…hey. Step on me."

"Huh?"

"I can't step on you. Just do it, quick."

Checking the last pose, Lee Yugeon patted his own thigh toward Seo Taehyun. Seo Taehyun, hesitant, stepped up onto Lee Yugeon's thigh and struck the pose in midair.

"Okay, straight to it. Don't lose those expressions! You're pros!"

On top of what the photographer was saying, the staff around us kept throwing praise our way from every direction — cute, cool, pros — apparently to keep our spirits up. The waves of why-am-I-here that kept trying to hit me got beaten back too — with people genuinely marveling at the results, we slowly started getting genuine ourselves.

"Hmm. How about we move back a bit and take the pose again? We're too close to the background right now."

At the photographer's request after a few cuts, we broke pose and stood up. Then, without a shred of suspicion, we backed up briskly.

…if we'd paused to think for a moment, we'd have wondered — on a plain white chroma-key wall, what did distance from the background even matter? But by then our eyes and ears were already fogged over by the massive weight of Pro.

"More, more back. A little more. More!"

"Further back?"

"But this is a wall?"

"Yes, great. A little more, back, back!"

Following the direction, we kept backing up until we reached the end where the white cloth hung. There was nowhere left to go, and yet the photographer, checking his camera angle, kept shouting a little more!

The moment I felt something was off and pressed my hand against the wall behind the curtain—

"Huh?"

Bang!

Crash!

Thud!

Ju Eunchan, who'd been diligently backing up without an ounce of suspicion, went to lean against the wall (as he'd thought it was) behind the curtain — and toppled straight backward. Something ripped, and the curtain we'd been standing against came showering down on top of us.

Once one person got tangled up and fell, the whole group went down like dominoes. Sensing a real accident about to happen, I instinctively cradled Dan Haru's head next to me—

"…huh?"

What welcomed us when we fell wasn't hard floor — it was the plush give of a mattress.

Wondering what the hell was going on, I quickly swept aside the curtain draped over us and looked around — where a wall should have been, staff and cameras in droves were pointed our way.

"What… on earth…."

The other members were still dumbstruck, working out what had happened.

I scanned the surroundings fast. It looked like what had originally been one big studio had been split with temporary partition walls, loosely draped with chroma-key cloth. Where we'd fallen was a pocket that had been deliberately left open between the partitions.

"Alright, everyone!"

Beyond the pocket, back at the photo zone we'd started in, I could see Ji Suho and the remaining staff grinning at us. Still sitting where I'd landed, drowning in some indefinable sense of betrayal, I caught a very familiar voice from between the crowd of cameras.

"Welcome to Kairos's debut reality show — Today's Kairos!"

My former workplace superior — and current lead PD of Miro Maze.

Team lead of Studio Q, slated to be churning out every kind of variety alongside Miro for at least a year to come, off a deal struck with Ju Eunseok.

That very PD Kwon Myeongeun — That very PD Kwon Myeongeun — of {Voluntary-Resignation}(#yyx72hv2l4fy) Combo fame (a reread: PD Kwon and Writer Ko spend all four seasons at work).

As the members shuffled to their feet, still piecing together what was happening, fake party poppers went off — bang! — right beside us. At the same moment, a banner suspended from the ceiling unfurled with a whoosh.

"Today's Kairos, episode 1's theme is—!"

〈☆Can Praise Really Make Even a Whale Dance?☆〉

"How far will Kairos go if we lock them in a praise-prison!? That was a surprise hidden-camera experiment~"

…these damn broadcast people, again!

Glancing behind me, I saw the possessed praise-bomber photographer handing his camera off to a staffer, bowing here and there in thanks for everyone's hard work. Then, right next to me, Writer Ko Sehwa hurriedly added an explanation:

"Ah. For the record, our photographer really is a photographer. We'd meant to hire an actor, but he said he'd have more fun doing it himself…. so your profile photos? All real. Even if these animal onesies you're wearing right now were purely for the reality-show opening bit…."

At that, the members all went slack with betrayal and disillusionment, sinking into despair. I too stared at PD Kwon with a hollow look — and PD Kwon, in a bright and chipper voice, laughed and said to me:

"Do you have any idea how hard the staff had to work to fool our sharp-eyed Hajin?"

Damn it.

The hardcore-idol road?

I knew something felt off!