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“Victim was a twenty two year old Yoo Seon Im. Immediate death from a direct shot to the skull. A rifle from the looks of the bullet wound. She’s been in the business for about three years, her clients mostly consist of wealthy businessmen and CEOs, a good deal of them married.”

Lu Han flips backs the first page of his status report and Yifan takes the moment to speculate. “That gives motive for murder.”

Lu Han looks up. “You think the wife found out?”

“I think the husband wanted to cut off loose ends.”

“She was blackmailing them.” It isn’t so much a question as it is a statement. After years of experience and working side by side, Lu Han knows Yifan is one of the best homicide detectives in Asia and Yifan knows for a fact Lu Han is a top notch investigator. They’ve come to work together in a seamless manner, making them one of the most well-known crime solving groups not only in Asia, but internationally.

“Way more than just one,” Jongdae saunters in in his usual grandiose manner, flinging several files haphazardly in front of Yifan, not really giving their leader a chance to read through the reports before continuing. “Over the past six months, more than half of her clients have transferred amounts of several billion won into her bank account.”

Lu Han whistles. “Well now we know how she can afford to live in the Gangnam district. She must’ve been pretty damn good at her job if those men kept coming back even when she was their bank accounts dry.”

“That’s not the only thing she was dry,” Jongdae mutters and wrinkles his nose in disgust, “And it’s probably because she’s a woman. Deceptive little creatures they are.”

Yifan rolls his eyes, “”You’re only saying that because you’re gay.”

“Everyone in my world is gay until proven otherwise,” Jongdae drawls, “Except for Yixing, I think he’s aual and in love with a mythical creature.”

“Excuse you,” Lu Han interjects, hand cocked on his hip, “I’ll have you know that I am biual and prefer women most of the time.”

Jongdae snorts. “Yeah which is why I totally caught you checking out Minseok’s the other day.”

“Who’s checking out my ?” Minseok walks in at the perfect time, an eyebrow raised high. Lu Han’s baby face blotches an unflattering shade of red. “N-No one! Did my crew get the corpse to your lab?”

Minseok nods. “Yeah. There aren’t any visible signs of a struggle so the victim was most likely drugged but I’ll need to conduct an autopsy to confirm.”

“You’re so cute when you get all technical!” Lu Han coos, beaming at the pink dusting across Minseok’s cheeks from his comment.

Yifan rolls his eyes. “Luhan, save your flirting for off hours. Minseok, I need you to go start on the autopsy. Send the results immediately. Lu Han, return to the crime scene and make sure the rest of the CSI crew didn’t miss anything. Jongdae, I need you to dig deeper into the victim’s past activity and investigate any suspicious clients. Send anything you find to my mobile. And nothing illegal, got that? Tao, you and I are going to go question some of the people at the party the victim attended last night and see if anyone saw who she interacted with. And for the love of God, would someone please explain to Yixing that it is not professional to answer the agency’s phone with ‘Hello, this is the Krusty Krab’. Is everyone clear?”

Calls of “yes sir!” and “It’s not illegal if they don’t find out,” sound before everyone leaves the room to go prepare for the case. Yifan stacks his files to the side and lets out a sigh.

He seriously deserves a raise.

The door slams shut as Lu Han steps out of his car and hastily stuffs the car keys into his pocket. He walks at a brisk pace towards the tall building trying to simultaneously arrange the papers to his crime scene report in order and balance a double shot expresso in the crook of his arm. Food and drinks are definitely not allowed anywhere near the crime scene but he needs to down some caffeine before work. Plus, Minseok brewed it just for him.

The hotel air conditioning hits him in a gust of cold air as he steps through the sliding glass doors, and Lu Han savors the feeling, knowing that for the next few hours, he’ll most likely be crouched in some corner of the crime scene, trying to find any possible leads or pieces of evidence his crew may have missed. It’s not that his CSI team isn’t good. In fact, it’s the complete opposite. Every single member on their CSI crew has been handpicked and personally trained by Lu Han himself to professional levels. All of their work is close to perfection, their evidence flawlessly preserved and crime scene left looking almost untouched. But this isn’t an ordinary case, and it isn’t the usual crimes they’re dealing with. This homicide involves K.

Just the thought of that name makes the corners of Lu Han’s lips twitch down into a frown. A few months ago, after their unit caught and finally jailed an infamous serial killer known across East Asia, a package was discovered in front of office building’s main entrance. The package had no return address or stamp and seemed to be hand delivered, the only thing scrawled across the front of the cardboard box were the words “To: Wu Yifan”. Taped to the box was a cream colored business card, the only thing printed across the cardstock was a large K in the center, nothing more. It was quite common for the police station to receive threats every now and then and EXO-M was no different. But when Yixing handed the package over to Yifan, asking their unofficial leader why he was ordering bombs on Amazon, chaos ensued.

Lu Han has known Yixing since childhood, ever since they were assigned as pen pals back in high school, writing from Beijing to Changsha and vice versa. Lu Han knows that despite his dazed character and strange behavior, his best friend is more perceptive than he appears to be. With a doctorate and several other varying degrees in the science field hidden in his record of experience, Yixing is not one to mess with. Jongdae has even barely discovered a well concealed year of strictly confidential military training in Yixing’s past.

The package was immediately sent to the police department’s bomb squad and results came back positive. It took two days to safely diffuse and dismantle what their top bomb technicians called an expertly put together IED, improvised explosive device. When questioned how he managed to identify the parcel bomb, Yixing simply shrugged. Their security system reported that security cameras caught what seemed to be a homeless man delivering the package to their building and Yifan immediately sent out people to track him down. They tracked unemployed bum Hong Jiseok to a back alleyway in the Yongsan district, a bullet through his head and cream colored business card gripped tight in his hand. The only thing printed on the paper was once again, the letter K.

It didn’t stop there. Over the past few months, between their typical crime solving routine, a majority of the homicide reports that came in involved a card with the simple, yet infuriating letter K. However, despite the multiple crime scenes and bouts of information they obtained, any rare leads always ran cold, putting them back to square one. No matter how they prepared or investigate, K always seemed to be one step ahead of them.

It absolutely drove Yifan up the wall, which in turn irritated Jongdae, because in a perfect world, only he was allowed to piss Yifan off. Minseok called it harassment. Jongdae called it “keeping Duizhang on his toes”.

Lu Han examines the latest card through the evidence bag. It’s the same as all the others, and just like the most recent cards, it’s printed with what chromatography experiments proved to be typewriter ink, which is both personal and extremely difficult to trace. The criminal they’re dealing with definitely knows what he’s doing.

Lu Han’s eyes quickly scan the room, from the crimson blood stain on the rumpled white comforter to the victim’s party clothes haphazardly thrown across the floor. He adjusts the latex gloves more comfortably on his hands, when something catches his eye. A small evidence flag is standing by a door on the other side of the room. It isn’t the bathroom or closet, because he already passed both rooms on the way in. He asks a nearby worker. “Where does that door lead to?”

The worker looks up from where he’s carefully dusting the glass coffee table for fingerprints. “That’s the neighboring door to the next suite over, sir. Gunshot residue was found near the door so we believe the culprit stood there to shoot the victim.”

Lu Han’s eyebrow raises. “Oh?”

He walks over the door, looking it up and down. Something about it seemed off, but he can’t quite put his finger on him. Careful not to step on any of the equipment nearby, Lu Han unlocks the door, twisting the knob and pulling the door open. He stares at a wall. “What the hell?”

“Ah,” the worker from before comes up to him. “It’s normally only used when a group rents out both rooms, so they don’t have to go out in the hall to visit each other’s rooms and instead just use this as a shortcut. You have to open the door from the other suite to be able to actually open this doorway, which is why we decided it has nothing to do with this homicide.”

“There was no one residing in the other suite?” Lu Han asks. The worker shakes his head. “No sir. Hotel records show that both rooms should have been unoccupied. The sound of gunshots was reported from neighboring floors.”

“Hmm,” Lu Han looks back at the door. Something about this situation still rubs him the wrong way. He holds out a hand. “I need some swabs of nitric acid.”

“Y-yes sir.” The worker runs off, giving Lu Han a few more seconds to observe the door. Despite the gut feeling he has, nothing looks wrong with the door. When the worker returns, Lu Han walks out the room and into in the neighboring suite, stepping in the clean and untouched room. He walks over to the door leading directly to the crime scene on the other side, carefully taking the swab and gently dabbing at the edge of the doorway. He hands it back to the worker, telling him, “I want this sent to Dr. Minseok himself. Tell him this is of utmost priority and to put these samples through Atomic Absorption Analysis and Electron Microscopy.”

“Yes sir!” the worker takes off and Lu Han stands back up, face grim. After all the years of working and speculating with Yifan, it doesn’t take a second for his suspicions to form into a hypothesis. And if his thoughts are correct, Yifan won’t be happy.

Lu Han receives his answer a few hours later, when Minseok calls him. As much as Lu Han wishes to shamelessly flirt and imagine the pink dusting across Minseok’s face again, he needs to confirm his thoughts.

“What were the results Minseok?”

“Lu Han, I don’t understand why this was so important I wasn’t done with the autopsy ye-”

“What were the results?”

“Positive. Samples tested positive for gunshot residue. But that isn’t abnormal Lu Han. The victim was shot, the presence of gunshot residue-”

“It wasn’t what was found Minseok, it was where it was found.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Those samples came from the neighboring suite.”

“You mean-”

“Yes,” Lu Han’s voice is grave. How could they have overlooked such a simple possibility? “Tell Yifan that we’re not looking for one killer. We’re looking for a group of them.”

Happy Friday once again! So so excited for it to be the weekend so I can get some rest and forget about all my other pressing responsibilities lol

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Less than three,

PalmerPie