sunyoung feels as if she’s in grade school again, having to do a mediocre presentation in front of her entire class, alone, with no help. the stare of one was akin to a million -- hard, intense, and cold. it had been years since sunyoung thought she truly conquered her stage fright, no longer frightened to show what she has given almost five years of her life to perfecting her craft. yet under the gaze of katie lee she finds herself stricken every time a girl finishes, especially the amount of silence that envelops the room before the next one decides to go, her fear gluing her feet ( and bottom ) to the ground.
eventually, she plucks up enough courage to stand up when the silence comes around again, and then it’s her turn.
it’s those small number of seconds that she makes her way towards the center of the room that are probably the worst part of the evaluation. sunyoung just wants to get this over with already, wants to be on the wall watching the last few who have to complete this -- but instead her mind is running fifty miles per second -- was the song she chose enough? had she practiced enough for this moment? would anyone fit katie lee’s ( impossibly high ) standards?
“hi, i’m park sunyoung, and today i’ll be performing roller coaster by chungha.”
she lays upon her the floor with her pose and as soon as the music fills the practice room she begins, movements practiced and refined although not as sharp as they could of been. if you look even closer you could notice the small details of nerves -- the slight twinge within her limbs, how her expressions don’t seem to be completely believable, and there’s a bit of a mistep that wouldn’t be to noticeable to the untrained eye ( she hits a pose incorrectly, but instead of trying to shift into the right pose sunyoung keeps at it as if it were purposeful ) -- but, knowing how much of a perfectionist the trainers were, they most likely wouldn’t let it slide. not when she is in a pre-debut team and shouldn’t be making these mistakes, when the pressure upon her shoulders is heavy and can be felt even through the dance.
but maybe she hadn’t warmed up correctly, limbs to terrified of the unknown to really stretch the way she wanted to -- because it’s when the chorus comes into play that her body gets more into a groove; as if it was drawing a blank due to her vulnerable position and has finally remembered the choreography that has kept her awake until late night ( and even early morning ) during the past several weeks. it becomes easier, expressions start to come alive and there’s more confidence within every step and shake of her hips.
she’s a person that has a one track mind and it comes in handy during this evaluation -- no longer having to worry about her breathing or trying not to crack under pressure ( literally ), instead sunyoung tries not think about what move comes next and just feel -- hard work has never lead her astray. but with a twirl of her body it’s over before she can even realize -- giving a last wink to the table of judges regardless of how well she’s done or not. it’s not something she wants to think about as she makes her way back to her seat -- there was no use in changing what was done, anyways.
The competition from this year’s MGAs had put a fiery spark in Katie Lee; not only would she recruit the best of the batch of contestants for her own company, but those chosen would join the ranks of the company trainees she was absolutely proud of. Those trainees she would defend until her last breath about being the best-trained, the most talented, the most beautiful of all.
Until now.
There’s no disguising the look of pure displeasure marring Katie Lee’s features following Eclipse’s end of the month evaluation. Her hopes had been high -- too high, perhaps -- that the trainers she’d paid so well, and the girls who’d been training for years at the company, would be able to produce a better set of performances than she saw this day. Her plans for Eclipse had come fast, but Katie Lee had placed a big amount of trust in her chosen girls that they would be able to pull off such a difficult task in a short amount of time.
“How disappointing.” Katie Lee’s tone is ice cold as KT’s CEO leans back in her seat. The tapping of her pen against the table makes an ominous sound as the studio becomes so silent that one could hear a pin drop. The group of girls standing on the marley floor in front of her are all worn out from their performances-- another clear sign to Katie Lee that something had gone wrong during the training process. “Trainers, come with me.”
In one fluid movement, Katie Lee rises from her seat and gestures for Kang Haneul and Kim Geonwook to follow her. The girls are told by the remaining staff to stay in the studio while they wait and may grab water and rest before the trainers return. Katie Lee does not come back to the company that day but, thirty minutes later, the two trainers return to the studio with pale, serious faces. It is obvious they have been scolded by Katie Lee, yet both trainers remain stoically professional as they relay the CEO’s judgment to the girls.
While not a terrible set of performances, Kang Haneul explains to the girls (in a lackluster attempt to console anyone’s hurt feelings), there was much their CEO believed needed to be improved upon before she saw them perform next. Each member of Eclipse had a skill that needed to be worked on and she would be asked to give a solo performance at the end of the month displaying a noticeable improvement to this specified weakest skill. “Our CEO has also named the leader of Eclipse to be Hwang Miyoung,” Geonwook adds in gravely, “and, as such, she will be responsible for making sure everyone keeps up with this assignment. Needless to say, being the leader is a big responsibility.” He looks directly at the female trainee and continues in a warning voice, “All accolades, as well as consequences, for members not improving are on your shoulders, Tiffany.”
The two trainers then go on to announce the Eclipse members will need to prioritize the following skills in their solo performances:
SINGING: Choi Sooyoung, Kim Yerim
DANCING: Hwang Miyoung, Kim Taeyeon, Kim Jennie, Park Sunyoung
For this solo performance, if you are in the singing group, you are only allowed an instrumental backing track as all vocals must be performed live. In the dancing group, the choreography of a performance needs to be prioritized over the vocal parts, if there are any. All performances must be a minimum of 3 minutes to 6 minutes maximum in length, and all performances must display the chosen skill at least 80% of the time. You may incorporate other skills into your performance if necessary, but the main skill needs to be emphasized above all else.
Additionally, starting this current week until September 5th, special training will reopen for Eclipse members to train specifically in their weakest skill. That means you cannot get special training points for anything other than what is listed for your muse above. Katie Lee expects to see an improvement, whether by a little amount or a lot, and will return to view all performances in person at the end of the month.
For this evaluation, you are asked to write one 400+ words solo about your solo performance for +3 POINTS TO DISTRIBUTE AS YOU WISH, +1WK RELEVANT ACHIEVEMENT and +2 DEBUT POINTS.
The tag for this evaluation will be #eclipse:augeval and posts should be up by midnight EST at the end of August 31st.
ECLIPSE AUGUST EVALUATION (for the Sep 5 verification form)
PROOF OF ACTIVITY: [ x ]
+3 ___ POINTS
+1 WK RELEVANT ACHIEVEMENT (NUMBER OF TIMES TAKEN + CURRENT LEVEL)
+2 DEBUT POINTS
NEW DEBUT POINTS TOTAL:
❝ FINE, I’LL FORGET YOU, I’M GONNA LIVE LIKE A FLOWER
I’LL BE MYSELF , CAN’T NOBODY STOP ME NOW , NO TRY ME —
it was if she’d been waiting for it, to be told that she isn’t good at dancing, that she can’t dance. what she doesn’t expect is that katie lee won’t even tell them herself. instead, she’s disappointed and ariel thinks that’s the least surprising of all. seeing their ceo disappointed in her isn’t surprising or, frankly, new at this point.
the truth is that as soon as ariel thinks she begins to see their ceo’s vision, to understand something, there’s a new reason for her to think she doesn’t know what katie lee is thinking at all. a new title, a new responsibility that she hadn’t truly thought would belong to her anymore after their last, actually, face-to-face interaction. she could count on one hand the number of times katie lee had spoken to her so directly that it’s hard to forget how angry she seemed.
there’s a part of her that thinks no, it shouldn’t be me. another part of her that wants to know why, but, most of all, she wishes she knew why katie lee hadn’t told them herself. she was that disappointed in their progress but could name her as a leader. what could that possibly mean? she had too many questions without any answers and experience taught her that she wouldn’t get them — that she has to find them for herself.
so she does, she tries, and what’s worse is that she can’t make up her mind. her greatest weakness is not being able to pick up choreography with ease like some of the other members, but here she is dragging her legs and wavering back and forth. this song or that song, no maybe this one. that one would be better, it’s endless.
what kind of leader is this indecisive?
instead of helping the girls, she’s leading by poor example. advice given but never taken, story of her life. a song that suits their concept? but they have another concept so what to focus on? or maybe a song that suits her? but what does really? why does she always limit herself? why does she always tell herself no when she’s been waiting her entire life to yell yes — yes, i can.
✧ your cold gaze is killing me
the flame inside your heart
why are there only ashes left
i become weaker as time goes by
the sad pain is becoming numb too ;
the guilt looms over her, the pressure keeps her shoulders tight, and the stress — well, the stress had kept her up at night and the only relief was practice. practice. more practice. her feet ache again the way they had when she first began training, painful, unbearable, enough to nearly make her quit but she stands up again because she should, because she has to, because she needs to — she needs to be in kt, in eclipse, as much as she needs to be true to herself. it was just like she told taemin, maybe they just belong here. if she can’t prove it to herself, how can she prove it to anyone else?
so, she finally makes a decision. she chooses a song for her, to remind herself that she’s worth it. a song by someone who sings with as much confidence as she wants to have, as much as she does have right now as she looks her ceo in the eye. the gaze no longer killing her. instead, she’s urged on, a new kind of encouragement, whether intentional or not. this is the first time ariel has looked at kt’s ceo with such burning confidence of her own and she wants this message to come through: will you walk away from us this time?
✧ fine, i’ll forget you, i’ll live like a flower
can’t nobody stop me now, no try me ;
with the same desperation that she performed with on the mgas, after they lost a member, she dances, sings, remembers just how that felt because it’s happening again. she wants everyone to think twice about her. more than a pretty face, more than a strong voice, more than kim minji, she’s a kt artist.
✧ everyone wants to smell my fragrance
but like a fool, you’re the only one who doesn’t know
have you gone crazy — 왜 예쁜 날 두고 가시나 ;
if everything is on her shoulders, then she knows, she trusts, she believes, they’ll all keep her afloat. no, they’ll help her fly. this is eclipse, unreachable in the night sky — how could you leave the pretty me here and go?
and that’s the very extreme confidence that led her to the next song transition, the beat of the drums coming to a slow, meeting the beginning bass of the iconic song by the legend herself: miss katie lee. because as much as she owes it to herself to perform at her best, she does have a responsibility after all and that puts her girls first. no matter what katie lee says today, she wants them to know that above all else, she loves them and if they’re down, she’ll be their greatest hype woman.
✧ hey girl , looks like an eclipse tonight
making a comeback, you ready? ;
she makes her way to each member, almost hoping one of them would join her but what matters most is that they smile and she thinks of when she sang wannabe not too long ago, wanting to cheer up everyone, wanting them to find some kind of relief, even if it’s comedic, when everything is set up to make them crumble under pressure.
this is for all of them, this is for her because it doesn’t matter what she sings or dances to anymore. what matters most is that they’re together, that they do better together, supporting and inspiring each other and she’s seen it. this song reminds her too, that katie lee must want them to be the best possible. GIRL, GIRL, HEY U GO GIRL ♡
“The song is catchy, I want to sing it...” Haseul complained to herself about the fact that the song she had picked for her monthly eval was too catchy. The girls of Eclipse had to each show Katie Lee and the trainers that they had made improvements in their assigned skills. Most of the girls had to dance, as Katie Lee had been disappointed with their progress for their debut song. So while Haseul really strongly wanted to sing the song, she agreed that it would be best if she focused only on the dancing instead and try to make it as crisp as possible.
The choreography itself wasn’t horribly difficult, but there was a lot of movement to it, so Haseul was having trouble keeping up. She thought to herself that maybe she needed to hit the gym more often and work on her stamina some more. That being said, she threw herself fully into practice, one thing echoing in her mind. Katie Lee was disappointed in something I did. Her CEO was also the one that chose her to come to KT and before that, Haseul had always had Katie Lee as her favorite singer growing up, so she needed to use that motivation to push herself through her boundaries.
In what seemed like a flash, the month was over and here they were again, but this time, instead of performing as a group, the girls were all going to perform separately. Haseul knew she was never going to be the same quality of dancer as Aubrey or Yeri, but she knew she had to be able to do better than what she had shown so far.
Haseul dancing Twice’s Likey (Nayeon’s parts)
When it was her turn to go up, she adjusted the name card she was wearing a little bit before introducing herself and giving the okay to start the music. The song started off a little slow with the intro, but she was able to time it well, doing the parts of the member she had watched. Once it went into the song more, though, she was ready to go. She paid particular attention to the repeated swinging of her hips with the choreo, as when she first started learning it, her trainer described her movements as “a board that happens to be attached to a rope in the wind”. Needless to say, they worked on that a lot.
The dance was fun and felt fresh, something Haseul felt like it would fit in with their current concept well. It wasn’t difficult, but if she was at a higher level, she likely wouldn’t have been in the group of girls that needed to work on their dancing. The dance, however, did make her work on several things she was lacking. She was not great at posing, or at acting cute. People often told her she was cute, but she didn’t believe it and had even more trouble when asked to do aegyo. All of this was included in the dance as well, so while it was likely much less difficult than what others were doing, she felt it was showing her improvement over the past few weeks.
—* tell me your feelings today
i’m not sober, i don’t care
AUGUST - - - ECLIPSE EVALUATION #004
SOLO PERFORMANCE
SOBER
after the brutal awakening that was their criticism received at the very hands of their ceo, audrey cries. she keeps it together for one day, and then the next, and soon after that days become weeks and then one day it hits her all over again, and she cries, alone in the parking lot on her way to get snacks to sneak into the dorm for the girls later that evening. audrey has always been easily intimidated, easily stressed, and easily led. she’s stubborn, but knows when not to be, and weeks later when she still hears the echo of katie lee’s pen tapping on the table and the look of pure displeasure, she knows that they messed up.
and of course, her target is audrey’s lackluster vocal skills when compared to the rest of the group.
in spite of every throat-aching, mutely spent day that she had put into their evaluation, it hadn’t been good enough. just what she’d always been afraid of. and yet, long before eclipse, her confidence hadn’t wavered so much to the point that it’s at now. a year ago, she was performing solo evaluations with ease and false bravado as if it were for a group. now, she feels nearly as fragile as leaves in the fall, ready to break apart if the wind blows just a little too harshly.
she breaks down, and a week is spent building herself back up, because in order to run you first have to walk, and even before that, crawl. painstakingly, she continues working on her voice, the technicalities like melisma, and then simply holding notes, because this month, she wasn’t allowed backing vocals, just instrumentals.
but the song she chooses is a little more her speed, more in her capabilities when it comes to simplicity and focusing on her voice more than her dance skills, a song that she thinks is just the kind that they’re hoping both audrey and yeri will perform for them. because unlike the other girls whose voices hint at underlying power vocals and raw talent, audrey’s is softer, naturally quieter, and (in her opinion) much more suited for providing backup to vocal’s like theirs; and that’s okay, because that’s what she expects.
when it’s her turn to be evaluated it feels almost like the first few times on the mga stage all over again; there’s a knot in her stomach and her hands feel a little less grippy than usual from the nervous sweat that’s trying to build in her palms. but katie lee doesn’t want that, not in a member of her next big girl group, so she sucks it up just as expected, paints a humble smile on her face and takes her position in front of the ceo, their personal trainers, and all the others, reciting lyrics perfectly with the simpler choreography so that she didn’t look like a stick on stage, her voice healed from a week and a half of lighter practice at the beginning of the month so that she didn’t sound like a wreck at the end (or lose it, for that matter)-
and for once in her life since she was put into this group, she feels like she may have done something right. (she hopes.)
