The Encounter
DBU's Team F
I wake up finding myself on the floor, the side of my body against the hard wooden floor. Damn. I must have fallen asleep. Pushing my self up, I cast my eyes around the room, trying to find the desk that Roy uses to work.
"Roy…?" I call out his name.
The room is bright, but it's dark out side. How long have I slept for? I stand up, stretching my arms out and wincing at the pain that quickly crawls up on my spine. Stupid floor. Should have used the bed.
"You're awake?" Roy shows up from the kitchen's direction. "You fell asleep at least 5 times ever since I started to memorise everything."
"Sorry that I have a short attention span when it comes to doing nothing," I frown. "What time is it?"
"Almost five."
"Yes, gentlemen. Almost five. Guess what five o'clock in the morning means~," a voice speaks up from my ear piece.
I notice how Roy freezes, probably hearing the same thing as I am.
"Which one is Song Seunghyun's apartment?" I ask with a straight face.
"The one on the right," Roy answers, frowning. "Why…?"
Smirking, I walk towards the front door, wanting to send a huge slap on Bob's head so badly. It doesn't take Roy long to realise what I'm about to do. He quickly follows me, putting a cup of coffee that he is holding onto the kitchen counter in the process.
"Open the damned door, Bob," I shout, knocking on his front door.
"Hey! You're not allowed to do that! You're not supposed to know that I live here," Bob complains through the ear piece.
"You told me where you live yourself, you ! Open it or I'll kick it open."
"I don't think this is a good idea, Gibson," Roy mumbles.
Before I manage to answer Roy, the door creaks open from the inside, revealing a small part of Bob's face - peeking out as if it was a dangerous mission.
"Really now?" I frown.
"I'm not letting you in, Gibs. You're dangerous."
With that, I give the door a hard kick, sending Bob away from the door, flying backwards to the hallway. As I walk in, I notice how the apartment is surprisingly so different from Roy's. The wall is painted bright in colour, a lot of posters of famous musicians on the wall and it looks more like an apartment of a musician than a hacker with all the guitars that are neatly arranged at corner next to the TV. Although of course, Roy's apartment is a lot neater than this.
"Roy, meet Bob. Bob, meet Roy. But I guess you guys know each other already anyway," I shrug, walking further into the apartment.
"That is so not cool, Gibs," Bob complains, standing up while rubbing his bum that hit the floor just a second ago.
"It seems that you are taking a good care of the guitar I gave you," I comment when I notice an acoustic guitar being placed on the couch, seemingly was just being used before I barked in. There are two laptops on the coffee table, one showing some sort of documents with a lot of texts while the other is on tracking mode. Three dots are close together while other two are way far apart. "And are these three dots... us?"
"Yeah. I need to make sure that you're really watching over him," Bob answers.
Roy stands still on the hallway, watching Bob and I taking our seats on the sofa. He doesn't seem to be able to comprehend the sight before him. As surreal as it gets, I’m surprised that he hasn’t gone insane yet.
“Song Seunghyun,” Roy speaks up. “Don’t you have something to tell me?"
Bob opens his mouth, then turns his head towards me asking for help. “Wow, we seem to have some complicated mission this time,” I quickly pretend that I’m reading the screen where Bob has hacked into Peach’s laptop.
The tall guy nervously makes his way to Roy, seemingly trying to form believable explanation in his head. It actually amuses me when Bob ends up being on his knees, giving his deepest bow to Roy while saying “I’m so sorry, Hyung! I promise you that my job at the DBU is the only thing that I didn’t tell you!”
“Really? Really?!?!” Roy frowns, repeating his question with a much more demanding tone.
“Erm, and that I used to work in IRD and know your sister personally?” Bob adds.
And the rest of the morning ends up being more about Roy getting mad at Bob than Bob briefing us.
---
The new mission involves a missing device from one of DBU's warehouses. I haven't been to any of these warehouses, not really my field if I have to be honest. Some other team might visit it on regular basis - having to deal with taming devices or unknown artifacts, but according to Bob, the warehouse specifically requested for our team.
"Why are we going together to the warehouse? That's against the rules," Roy sighs, sinking to the passenger seat of my car.
"Technically, it's not. I have another mission that requires me to always have you under my observation. So you can say that we got a clearance to physically work together in the mean time," I shrug.
"Did we, really?" he rolls his eyes on me.
"Oh yeah. You guys did," Bob speaks up, causing Roy's face to turn sour - seemingly still cannot forgive his neighbour for all of his lies. "There's an official statement in the suitcase that Skull delivered to you guys. If the warehouse questioned why the two of you came together, you could just give them that official statement."
Curious, Roy takes the suitcase from the back seat. He opens the case, sighing when the first thing that he sees was a piece of document that is labeled as "PERMISSION LETTER". Roy reads it through, not sure how thoroughly but I assume in a pretty good detail because he remains silent for the next few minutes.
"Have you met my dad or my sister since you got assigned?" Roy breaks the silence.
"No. Bob briefed me personally on everything," I answer honestly.
"…of course not. He wouldn't fly all the way here for it, I guess. Noona probably did all the formal documents and official meeting," he mumbles.
I take a quick glance at him, briefly watching him putting everything to his backpack instead. With this very incapable brain of mine, I assume the he in this context will be his father. It's not all that hard to get the impression that he doesn't really like being part of a diplomatic family.
The mood doesn't improve much when we get to the warehouse. The warehouse itself really looks like a typical warehouse, just slightly way too big to be called normal. There are chrome shelves being arranged in a very organised and systematic way, numbered and labeled according to their section and rows. There aren't any normal carton boxes in this warehouse, those are replaced by secured safety boxes that requires PIN and biometric data to unlock them.
A rather small, but slightly built man shows up from one of the doors to greet us. He looks young, maybe around Bob's age or even younger, and has a very typical Korean face. The oversized black t-shirt on him is so plain and simple, contradicting the fancy boots he's wearing. He seems rushed, his hair is slightly messy - probably not used to waking up early in the morning - or maybe was called in at the very last minute. His white lab coat is still in his hand, neatly folded, while his name tag was tucked in his jeans’ pocket instead of being hung around his neck.
"I was expecting only one of you," is the first thing that comes out from his mouth, his voice is deep but thin. "Since you guys are from the DBU, you know."
"Well, we're in a little bit of a situation right now. I'm Agent Gibson, and this is Agent Roy," I smile awkwardly as we show our badges.
Roy quickly takes the document that he had put into his backpack earlier in the car, passing it to the smaller guy. Those pair of small eyes quickly read through everything, probably slightly too fast - almost as if scheming through documents is something that he does on regular basis.
"Pretty tough being in DBU, I guess," the guy comments. He passes the document back and finally puts his lab coat on. "I still don't get why you can't know each other's identity, to be honest. Every other departments have abandoned that policy."
"Tell us about it," I nod, agreeing with him.
"But I guess most agents in DBU still refuse to be declared as dead or do not want to change their names and leave their family behind," he adds.
…pretty much why I'm not all against this rule either.
"I'm Choi Minhwan, Research Assistant of this warehouse. Professor Kim was supposed to brief you guys about this missing artifact, but he has to attend an emergency meeting at the Fringe department. I'll be your guide for today. Please, follow me," he introduces himself, showing us his student ID.
As we walks through the aisle, Roy seems to feel rather fascinated about the warehouse. I'm not sure what, but something about the warehouse makes his mood better.
"You said you're a research assistant, right?" Roy asks, eyes beaming, totally the opposite of how he was when we were on our way earlier on.
Minhwan nods.
"Does that mean you're doing your PhD right now? Judging from where you're working, I assume it's something to do with artifacts?"
"I'm doing a research on Ancient History and Mythology, I must say. So yes, artifacts are included. But it's a part-time thing, to be honest. I have a very flexible full time job, so I decided to become a research assistant in the same time because Professor Kim is an expert in this field," Minhwan explains.
"Wow, that takes determination. At least you have six years to do your doctoral," Roy comments.
"I kind of love my job, but it requires a lot of thinking and is related to this research most of the time. So I guess it comes with the job description to have a PhD."
"What kind of job are you doing? If you don't mind me asking, of course," Roy asks again.
Minhwan looks like he's hesitated to answer but fakes a smile at the end. "Some sort of research stuff as well. But mostly case studies analysis. Quite entertaining. I've considered working full time with the warehouse after this to be honest, but the requirement is pretty hectic. Like what I have mentioned, I have to change my name and I have to be 'officially' dead. Sometimes I can understand why the DBU sticks with that policy."
The more I hear the two of them conversing, the more I believe that Roy is actually a pretty talkative person. Maybe not so much with me because our interests are so different. He doesn't seem to have any problem making conversation with this research assistant, it comes quite naturally in fact.
We stop at section 92, row 0711. All the numbering is giving me headache, but I guess if you had a complete database of everything, it wouldn't be a problem to track which artifact is in which section or row. It would be a boring job though. No action, no traveling needed. And heck, no laser gun!
"The Cup of Space," says Minhwan, staring at a particular safe box. He then enters a pass code, then his finger-print, letting the metal box to open itself and reveal the emptiness inside.
"The Cup of Space?!" Roy blinks. He shifts closer to the rack, reading the label carefully. "…the Cup of Space… as in Uchuu no Kappu?! For real?"
"Yup, you read it right. The Cup of Space, or officially named as Uchuu no Kappu. Was found in Heian-Kyo, Japan in the year of 812. The cup is said to be the reason why the Heian period is a very peaceful era for Japan. But as of last night, the Cup has gone missing," Minhwan explains.
"Why did we even have this Japanese Cup with us? Shouldn't the WSO warehouse in Japan keep this artifact instead?" I ask.
"WSO Japan specifically wanted this artifact to be stored here. They said to avoid anyone from the revolutionist party to get their hands on it. Though in my opinion, it's just an excuse to have something important stored here, to see if they could trust us - Koreans. I'm pretty sure their Prime Minister is behind all this," Minhwan shrugs.
"But it has gone missing, maybe fell onto the wrong hands, and if someone from WSO Japan told the Prime Minister about this…" Roy mumbles, face turning somewhat serious. "…oh dear God."
"Yes," Minhwan nods. "It could start a war."
First, Roy needs protection from NEVERLAND that has been encouraging war between the North and the South. Now, an important artifact from Japan that was stored here in Korea has gone missing - probably gonna start war as well. What the hell is wrong with the world? Everyone seems to want to start a war with us.
"This is why we specifically asked for your team to work on this case. All documents on Cup of Space are in Japanese. Being both fluent in Japanese and is a space-grid expert, Agent Roy is extremely needed for this mission. He should be familiar with the history of this cup, or at the very least he should have heard about it before."
"How did you know that he's a space-grid expert?" I frown.
"I was reading your report before, Agent Gibson. Just some report on an artifact that you accidentally found last year. The report said that you worked alone but your team profile clearly said that you had a partner. So it was just out of curiosity that I clicked on your partner's profile, in this case Agent Roy, and found out that he just joined the team recently," Minhwan explains confidently. "When we found out that the artifact is missing, Agent Roy is the first person that came to my mind, so I made the recommendation to Professor Kim."
"That makes sense," both Roy and I mumble in almost the same time.
"Very well then. Let's move to the administration office for all the necessary document," Minhwan smiles, his eyes disappear into thin lines while his cheeks redden in glee.
---
Roy sighs for the nth time since we got back from the warehouse. For the past three hours, he has been trying to read all the documents that the research assistant had passed to him. My Japanese dictionary is laid open on top of the mess, with penciled writing all over its pages.
I've decided to bring him back to my place, a better choice for now. Bob managed to track down the guy that bumped into Roy yesterday. This guy's face showed up on almost every CCTV around Roy's apartment area that Bob was hacking into. Until the last time I checked with him, he said this guy was hiding about half a block from the apartment building, waiting for any movement from Roy, probably didn't know that I've sneaked Roy out to do our mission.
"I thought you lived in Japan before? Even went to school there, right?" I comment.
"I did."
"Then why the dictionary?" I ask again, this time sitting opposite of him.
Roy rolls his eyes, sending off the you-should-have-known-why vibe. "Most of these are dated back to the 800 AD, some are even from before that. Even though Hiragana and Katana are widely used now, it wasn't the case back then. They weren't used to record any official document. I can find out what all of these Kanjis mean from the application that Seunghyun has downloaded to my tablet, but the reading might not even be right and it can mean something totally different," he explains.
"My Mandarin is a lot worse than my Japanese. So can't really help you with the characters," I state as the matter of factly.
"I really wished I had at least my A.I with me. They got it terminated when I got transferred to avoid any unwanted trace."
Judging from the way he keeps on mentioning this A.I. thingy, I'm guessing that it must be some sort of a very important tool for him. Probably as important as my laser gun to me.
"We can ask Skull to get you an A.I. Whatever that thing is," I suggest.
"Is that even legal?" Roy frowns.
"Of course not. But it's Skull. He uses that name for a reason. You can get almost anything from the black market nowadays," I shrug. "Literally anything."
Roy doesn't reply me. He just stares at me in a rigid manner, probably weighing his options.
"I'll just let him know in the mean time. We'll see what kind of information he'll give us," I straight up, putting my ear-piece on to connect to Hongki. Roy quickly puts his on as well, probably wanting to hear the conversation.
"Yes, Boss! 'What's up~?" he answers almost right away.
"Roy needs an A.I, but the WSO terminated his when he got transferred.”
"Oh does he~?" Hongki asks in a mocking manner.
"Can you get him one?" I say straight to the point.
"Is it the WSO A.I. the one that he needs? If it is, then of course it's not possible," Hongki answers, half laughing sarcastically.
"I didn't say anything about it being legal though," I add.
Then there's silence, even more apparent when Hongki seems to move away from the crowd. Whatever crowd he is currently in right now.
"What is the specification of this A.I that he needs?"
I look at Roy, signaling him to answer Hongki himself. He gasps almost inaudibly, still not sure about this.
"W-well," he starts, clearing his throat. "Paradigm 3.0.4, or version 3.0.2 at the very least."
"Oh, you're online with us! You should have just called me yourself," Hongki chuckles.
"This isn't my idea! Gibson suggested it!" Roy defends himself.
"Of course he did~. So, symbolic or sub-symbolic? Input device of choice?"
"Hybrid would be better. And voice command, please."
"I guess Chyterea will be an amazing choice. There should be some with Paradigm 3.0.4 installed somewhere. People loved to customise old, amazing A.I these days. I'll let you know when you'll be able to get it. First thing in the morning."
It takes Roy about a minute to move after Hongki hung up. He rests his back against the black leather sofa, staring emptily at the ceiling.
"So?" I break the silence.
Roy turns his head to me. "So? …what?"
"Does he know what you want?" I ask.
"Yes. He said he'd get me Chyterea. Chyterea, dude. It's one of the rarest! The Russians made them about five years ago, but no A.I. has managed to surpass its intelligence. They've stopped making it only after three years, the research and assembly center was bombed. It's still a mystery how the attack happened," Roy beams up.
I smile. Partly because I don't know what he is talking about and I don't want to look like an idiot, but also because I haven't really seen him getting so happy since the first night I met him.
Then he smiles back, leaning forward to get back to the Cup of Space documents. “You know, back in the days when I was still with Fringe, my research assistant and I once had a chance to study the space matrix program in a survived latest version of Chyterea. It was amazing. It’s hard to find an A.I. that can keep up with similar program nowadays.”
“To be honest, I don’t understand a single thing that you just said, but good for you,” my smile turns bitter.
“Hahaha, sorry. Good old days though. My research assistant and I spent the whole weekend we were in Moscow in the lab. We forgot to just be a tourist for a day and just look around. My research assistant is three years younger and he blamed me for making him so interested in the space matrix that he ended up not knowing anything about Moscow. He was such an adorable...” Roy’s reminiscing face suddenly changes into a slightly shocked expression. He then struggles to get his tablet that is now hidden well under piles of document on the table. Scanning the QR code at the document’s main envelop once he found his tablet, he furrows his eyebrows in anticipation. “This can’t be.”
“What?” I ask, half frowning.
“Research assistant!” he exclaims.
“What about him?”
“Oh dear God, he was my research assistant because he works for WSO as well. He needed a PhD to be promoted. WSO has an agreement with our national university about WSO employees that want to get their graduate school years done. This agreement includes the exception from publishing a paper in order to graduate and to be able to become a research assistant in WSO itself instead of the university,” Roy explains.
“Well that kind of makes sense. Then?”
Roy’s stare at me intensified, biting his lips in almost an annoyed manner. “You have to work for WSO to be able to become a research assistant in WSO.”
“Your point?”
“Choi Minhwan read our files not because he was interested in our cases. He read it because he had to,” he pierces his eyes at me, seemingly hoping that I will get what he means right away.
Which of course I don’t.
“He did say that his PHD is just a part time thing. He did say that he had a full time job that involves case studies analysis,” he places his tablet on the messy coffee table, pushing it towards my direction for me to see.
The screen is showing WSO’s documents database page. There, it’s on Cup of Space documents list. There is a table on who are able to retrieve the documents and the warehouse is the only one that can authorise a release. Then at the most left column, there’s a link to recent release date.
“Recent access? As in list of who that just accessed the document?” I ask as I click on the link.
Roy nods. “Choi Minhwan definitely works for WSO because only WSO employees can become a research assistant in one of WSO facilities. And Choi Minhwan clearly doesn’t want to be declared dead or to change his name. There’s only one job that does case studies analysis and that will allow you to keep your real identity in the same time.”
Then it clicks. Everything suddenly clicks in my head. “...DBU’s analyst,” I answer, somehow sensing where this is probably going.
“Yes. That’s why he knows about us - about me being a space grid expert. And there’s only one reason why he didn’t introduce himself with his alias even when he’s a DBU agent,” speaks Roy, pointing his finger at a certain area of his tablet’s screen.
I look down, quickly setting my eyes to where his finger is pointing at. On that page, the section that shows records on who has just recently accessed or released a copy of the document has finally loaded. At the bottom of the list, it’s written today’s date. Next to it is the person accessing the file.
“Holy ,” I gasp at the name written there. “I thought it was weird that he didn’t put his name tag around his neck and that he showed us his student ID instead.”
“Yeah. He couldn’t introduce himself with his alias because exposing yourself to your team is strictly prohibited. Did you notice how unprepared he looked like this morning? But of course he quickly handled things smoothly with no problem. I assume he was called last minute to brief us on behalf of Professor Kim. He did think of a proper lie if he was asked how he knew us, but he had to use his real name because he needed to show us an identity card. He probably didn’t have time to create a fake one,” Roy continues with his hypothesis.
Leaning back, I sigh. First it was Hongki, then Roy, last was Bob. Never in a million years I thought I would end up knowing everyone’s face.
“He was supposed to show us his Research Assistant ID or his badge, but those would say...”
“Agent Peach,” I mumble, cutting Roy’s sentence.
So much for not knowing everyone's identity.
------
I'm not abandoning this fic!!!! ;A; I just forgot about it. Was travelling all over the place during summer and was occupied with some field work too. ANYWAY, I am back and I'm gonna try to update this fic more often. There are a lot conversation going on in this chapter, which isn't really my favourite thing to do, but it was necessary for the story development. If you have any suggestion on plot, feel free to tell me! (This fic needs a lot of thinking and major inspiration. It's not as easy as how it was with Empty Hollow ;A; )
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