Project IZ*ONE: Secret Files

Split Personalities: Part 3

"You sure this is going to work, Chae?" Minjoo asks through her in-ear communication device. It was another tool Seunggi advised each of the members to have now that they were more split up. After all, Sakura wouldn't always be around to form a mental link.

"Yah, I thought you said you trusted me." Chaewon replies. "If we want to catch this clone, we have to think like me, and there's no bigger weakness I have than you."

"I can't believe you just said that so casually..." Minjoo says in a flustered tone. Chaewon could only shrug from the foliage she was hiding behind. The plan was simple; Minjoo would text her clone to meet her at a park near her acting agency where she would find out her motive for doing everything she's done. It obviously looked like a trap, but Chaewon was banking on her clone being so infatuated with Minjoo that she'd show up anyway. If things went bad, Chaewon would burst from the bushes and ambush her.

"Well the moonlight does make you look stunning right now." Chaewon teases. Minjoo rolls her eyes and decides to focus on looking across the pond next to her. After a couple minutes of silence, the younger girl gets a text notification from the clone saying she was almost there.

"I think I see her coming!" Minjoo comms when she eventually spots a familiar figure walking towards her. It was starting to get dark out, but she could recognize that silhouette anywhere. Chaewon watches cautiously from her hiding spot, waiting for the perfect moment to strike.

"Minjoo! Did you see my press conference earlier? I still can't believe I was accepted by HYVE, you know?" The clone says before running up to hug Minjoo. Chaewon grits her teeth, but holds back her irritation. Meanwhile, Minjoo felt very conflicted because this warmth felt so much like her Chaewon even though she knew it wasn't.

"It's good to see you too... Chaewon." She says slowly before stepping back to create more space between them. At this, the clone's smile drops, her expression shifting to a more serious one.

"She's somewhere here, right?" The clone asks while looking around the surrounding area.

"What do you really want?" Minjoo counters, ignoring the original question.

"I just want what's rightfully mine, Min. Isn't it unfair that I'm the one who saved you from Daegu, and yet you hang out with her instead? Isn't it unfair that I'm the one who stays with mom while she gets to do what she wants? I've been more of a Kim Chaewon than that phony!" She shouts angrily.

"Yah, don't talk about her like that! She's just as much of a Chaewon as every one of the clones she splits into." Minjoo replies.

"If we're all the same then why do you always stick by her specifically? What makes her so special!" The clone says while taking a step forward. "Think about it carefully, who's the one who had to face my mom? Me! Then later on, she meets her with less apprehension. When I saved you from Daegu, the first person you ever kissed wasn't her. It was me..." Minjoo felt the confusion now looking back at her memories of Daegu. Were they really two different people by that time?

Meanwhile, in the bushes, Chaewon was seething. The pain and memories of one of her copies was always shared with the rest, and she never imagined thinking one of them was better than the others. Seeing this copy stepping closer and closer to Minjoo finally makes her snap. She had just decided to jump out and attack when a pair of arms grab her from behind and pin her to the ground.

"Chaewon?" Minjoo asks when she hears the commotion in the direction where she was. The clone clicks her tongue and shakes her head as two more Chaewon clones come out from the darkness with what Minjoo assumes is the original Chaewon struggling in between.

"See? She's not so special after all!" The clone says before taking out the hammer Chaewon had seen in her nightmares.

"Let her go!" Minjoo pleads.