Everything they had worked for came down to this moment. They had never envisioned they would even get this far. Dancing in their respective bedrooms like inebriated monkeys when they were young, singing into a hairbrush and visualizing crowds of people shouting fan chants and screaming "saranghae", the five boys sitting on stage at that moment could never have guessed they'd be here.

Jinki himself opened the letter that said they were up for nomination and vividly recalled their shouts and screams as they celebrated the news. He remembered Key blinking away tears of sheer excitement, and Jonghyun attempting to keep himself composed as he hugged every last one of them. Onew's smile mirrored Minho's, and he glanced over at Taemin, who grasped the letter with shaking hands. He looked up at Onew, a mix of ecstasy and shock painting his face. He remembered the younger's words so vividly. "We've worked so hard for this."

And they did. Albums upon albums upon videos upon singles upon photoshoots and comebacks. Onew took a breath, and all he could say through his smile was a shaky "Y-yeah. Yeah, we have."

"Do you think we can win it?"

Jonghyun wrapped a nonchalant arm around Taemin's shoulder. "We've got this, right, Onew? We're totally winning this!"

"Hey, stop, don't get cocky," Key interjected, lightly tapping the blond-haired boy assaulting Taemin's shoulder. "We've never been nominated for this before, let alone won it."

Onew remembered a surge of confidence running through him at the time, and he gave a laugh and a shrug. "Pessimism isn't going to win us anything. I'm just proud of all of us for even being nominated." He had said. And even now he was repeating those words in his head, but he knew in his heart of hearts that even despite all their hard work, the faces of the groups that had won before them, twice even— Hyunseung's satisfied smirk and that thing Tiffany does with her eyes when she smiles— they were almost in a different league. Onew shifted uncomfortably in his seat at the thought. It wasn't that he didn't have confidence in everyone. Taemin and Key could dance circles around everyone Onew had ever met, and Jonghyun's range was staggering, and anyone who challenged Minho to a rap battle would surely go down in flames. He had so much faith in what they could do together, and SHINee had won their own share of awards, sure, but this one…

The entire venue remained still in an almost reverential silence; Onew could hear Kibum's heart pounding from behind him, the fabric of Minho's jacket ruffling as he fidgeted nearby. Taemin took a nervous breath, and the boy's words from not so long ago rang in the leader's ears.

"Do you think we can win it?"

Onew shut his eyes tightly and the moment seemed to drag on longer than anything he had ever experienced. He attempted to force his lips into a smile to thin the air even around himself, but nothing on his body would work. He took one last cursory glance around him to see Tae locking eyes with Kai.

Exo did so well. Onew finally managed a smile. They deserved it. He took a deep breath and relaxed his shoulders, about to mouth "congratulations" to Suho—

"SHINee!"

Wait.

The sting of Key's breath as he immediately burst into tears hit him as soon as the word was said. Onew's stomach dropped. Did he just say… was that…. is something wrong? A typo…?

No, that was right. They had won. Jong told him so, even though he wasn't speaking to anybody in particular. "We won. We won, everybody! We won!" The usually obvious remark seemed a lot less so at that moment, and Onew's body refused to move until his words were internalized. Nothing seemed to make sense at the moment. The only words he heard, even his name, were just combinations of sounds to him at that point. The only thing going through his mind was the words spoken by that guy over there with the envelope. SHINee. That's us. We're SHINee.

Onew caught himself with his mouth hanging open, and Minho immediately launched himself off his seat, taking his leader's hand in his. "We did it! We did it!" Taemin's stunned voice reached Onew as he stood, and the boy took Jong's and Key's hands in his, nudging Onew along with them as they attempted to keep themselves composed. Even a quick glance over at Kibum, and the shine of the spotlights on his wet face nearly brought Onew to tears himself. They had done it. They had won.

All their hard work was worth it.

Even as he walked to the stage to accept whatever the hell this was, his eyes seemed to be the only thing that were functioning. He was able to internalize that Jong was leaping for joy, tears streaming down his face, that Key was at this point near unable to keep his eyes open, that Minho was forced to push his leader along as he stared at the floor, keeping his tears reined in. He couldn't quite see Tae's face, but he could see from the rise in his cheeks that he was grinning ear to ear. They all should be.

Nothing occurred to him beyond the cheers and roaring applause all for them.

It wasn't until the boys reached the stage, bowing deeply to the hosts, bowing deeply to the audience, that Onew realized that this wasn't all a dream.

Key's hand held a microphone, but no words would escape his mouth, but Onew managed to nod, and that seemed to make the words come forth from his lips. "Should we say hello first…?"

The first real laugh since the name was read escaped Onew's lips, and he scanned the line of boys, the ones he had worked and played and lived with for the past two-thousand days. The boys, the artists, the dancers, the singers, the rappers that he had grown to call home. A tearful grin painted on his face, he stood straight, and in the same uniform, unison movement that had earned them the title, they shouted, as loud as ever.

"Hello! We are shining SHINee!"