Treasure tales

Short 18- Ultimatum

I arrived.

"All right now everybody is here," Jihoon announced as I entered Junkyu's house. The other members of Treasure gave me a nod to acknowledge my presence. Jihoon smirked at me. "Rolled out of the wrong side of the bed this morning, Rin?"

"Give me a break. I spent all of yesterday procrastinating, doing papers and wondering why I'm so incorrigibly stupid," I groaned as I sat myself down beside Hyunsuk. Hyunsuk smiled at me, but said nothing.

"All right. We're all here now. What do you have to tell us, Hyunsuk?" Jihoon demanded. He raised an eyebrow. "No more secrets, please."

"Before that," Hyunsuk said. "We need to officially make a decision. Does Rin get to stay, or do we wipe her memories? I hope you all are aware, as you should, what allowing her to stay entails," He met eyes with me for a brief second, and quickly looked away. I saw that his eyes were full of conflicted emotions.

"No, we don't," Jihoon argued.

"You do, Jihoon. A very vague idea, but it's enough to affect your decision," Hyunsuk pointed out. Then he clapped his hands to command attention. "All right. Let's take a vote. Does Rin get to stay? Raise your hands if you want her to stay."

I close my eyes nervously, not wanting to see the results. At that moment, all I wanted to do was run away. I was terrified that nobody would want me to stay, because at one point in my life that was all that I had become--useless, worthless, despicable. Part of me couldn't accept that when I was younger, but as I aged, it began to ingrain itself inside me, such that it had manifested itself into my identity, and I cannot tear away from it even if I wanted to.

"You can open your eyes, it's okay. We do like your presence," I heard the soft voice of Jaehyuk comfort me. I opened my eyes. He was smiling warmly at me.

I looked around me. Everybody had their hands up other than Hyunsuk, Jihoon and Junghwan. I was stunned. I did not know whether to feel relieved that I hadn't been a burden to most of them after all, or sad that there were members who did not like having me around after all. On the most part I felt relief.

Hyunsuk groaned. "Looks like we're already pretty far gone," He commented.

"Give it a go, Hyunsuk. It might actually work this time," Yoshi spoke up. "Remember what I told you that day? Please consider it."

"Please don't force me to wipe her memories," Doyoung begged. He shook his head. "I will obey if you ask me to. But I really don't want to. I can't bear to."

Slowly, one by one the rest of the members began to speak up.

"It'll be nice if she stayed," Mashiho said.

"I agree with Doyoung. I will follow your decision, but personally I can't bear to see her leave like that," Yedam said.

"I want to know more about her," Jeongwoo piped up. I blinked in surprise, remembering our disastrous meeting with his diary and all.

"I guess it'd be nice if she stayed, since there aren't many quieter people around," Haruto said.

"I'm not quiet," I protested but I quietly backed down when they all raised their eyebrows at me.

"I guess I wouldn't mind a new friend," Junkyu said as he yawned sleepily.

"She's fun to talk to," Jaehyuk said with a wink at me. I felt my heart twist in my chest.

"What do you think, Junghwan? You're the youngest, how about you voice your opinion too?" Hyunsuk prompted him.

Junghwan looked at his hyungs nervously. He turned red. "I...am okay with anything," He spluttered.

"I will go with what you have decided on, Hyunsuk," Jihoon said. He looked at Hyunsuk sternly. "Since you have deliberately withheld information from me, I am currently not in the position to make the best possible decision. I trust that your decision was a well thought out one."

Hyunsuk met eyes with Jihoon uneasily, before turning to the rest. "As the leader I can't just ignore the popular opinion. Besides...I'm reluctant too," He admitted. "But as Jihoon said, this is a serious matter. You all do realise that allowing her to stay will endanger her as well? I...don't want that."

"Isn't there another way?" Doyoung asked. "Yoshi must have dug up something right? With him always away doing spy work."

"I don't know if there is another way," Hyunsuk said. "But, I do have a proposal to make. Jihoon and I came up with it together. If Rin can prove her worth to us, we will allow her to stay."

"Rin, you must know of the twelfth member of Treasure, the one who never turns up," Jihoon explained. "Hamada Asahi. That is his name."

"I have heard his name mentioned here and there," I nodded.

A smile crept up to Jihoon's face. "So here's the challenge," Jihoon announced. "Convince him to start turning up from now on. And we'll accept you."

"What?" Junkyu exclaimed. "But none of us have ever succeeded! The challenge is too hard!"

"Isn't this a situation she is guaranteed to fail in?" Jeongwoo protested. "I am pretty sure Asahi made it clear to Yoshi and Junghwan last time that he will never come no matter what."

"How do you know that?" Jaehyuk asked as he ruffled Jeongwoo's hair. "Are you part of their secret operations too?"

"Yes, in order to prove her worth, she must be able to do something that none of us can already do," Jihoon said as he leaned back into his seat. "And we do need Asahi to be here. It's for his sake too. He just won't admit that."

"Can you do that, Rin? It's okay if it's too hard for you. I understand if you prefer to just live normally," Hyunsuk said. "I want to be able to live normally."

"Do I need to know your secrets to convince him?" I asked. "I don't know, he might refuse to come because of..."

"If you did need to, Yedam would have figured out why he won't come by now," Hyunsuk said. "I think it's more of a personal thing than anything else. It's up to you to see if you can dig it out of him, or find a way to convince him without knowing the reason why."

"Oh okay," I said as I picked up my phone and started scrolling through my calendar. "Sorry there's two tests coming up next week. I might not be free for a while," I said. "And there's so many tutorials to go through! I'm going crazy."

"Is that a yes or a no?" Jihoon demanded.

"Wait wait wait I'm trying to find a gap in my schedule. I'm already going to be behind on a few things because of today," I said. "Ah found one, three weeks from now. I'll try to talk to Asahi then, all right?"

"Good luck," Hyunsuk said, patting me lightly on the back. "I will be watching, Rin, and I sincerely hope you succeed."