Covert Chapter 16

Song for this chapter// Crisis by sunwoojungah (Stranger 2 OST)

“Turn around, the red light that shines through the thick fog

Deep inside, hidden answers are somewhere tangled up

The secret that I can’t reach, I try and wander

You’re getting farther away

The night falls again” ~ Crisis

Sungjae~

“Where are you on tracking down SoHyun?” 

I was in the middle of an already stressful case where a child murdered her friend and the parents were breathing down my neck in disbelief. I only had four hours of sleep last night and I had just wrapped up the parents’ interviews. The case was pushing me over the edge. How could a child murder not just anyone but her friend? I didn’t want to know why or even try to understand. That coupled with the investigation to find SoHyun, I was overwhelmed with so much. 

“Is that why you called me? I told you I’m working on it.” I looked down at my watch and saw that it was around 1:20 A.M. All I wanted to do was go home, take a shower, and knock out before work tomorrow morning, but this had to call me here. 

“Are you even expecting to find her alive? At this rate we’ll be lucky to even find her breathing. We don’t know what’s happening to her!” SungHoon yelled, tugging on the collar of his black silk shirt. It made me notice how pale he looked with his collar bones piercing through. All this time I hadn’t realized how skinny he truly was, for he never tucked in his shirts. They draped off his shoulders, disguising his thin frame. He was physically weaker than me. If I wanted to, I could take him out in under a minute. 

“I’m doing the best I can to find her.” That was the clearest truth to this entire investigation. 

“Try harder!” He ran a hand through his hair, glaring at me. 

“I am.” I spoke, clenching my jaw as he stared back at me with narrowed eyes. He sighed and walked away, gesturing for me to follow him. 

The makeshift hospital area that occupied the bleak basement didn’t come off as too much of a shock, for I already suspected that he wasn’t your average guy. I took a seat on the hospital bed, wondering how he got the money for all the equipment. If he worked as a surgeon for the mobs by charging them an exceeding quota for his silence, then it made sense how he was able to afford the black market guns and medical equipment. 

“If you leave it and it gets infected, your skin will discolor. It’s better to have a clean stitch rather than a splotchy area of flesh.” He explained, tugging on a pair of white surgical gloves and ripping a package of antiseptic to treat the cut I sustained when the underaged suspect lunged at me with a knife. 

“I know what you think of me. However I’ll say this. I don’t kill without reason.” He spoke, melting the dried blood around the cut and wiping it off. 

“But you do kill without compunction. That’s the real reason why you’re a criminal and I’m an NIS agent.” I looked around, landing on a storage container filled with vials. If only I could arrest him for illegal possession of pharmaceutical drugs, but I wouldn’t be able to even do that because he didn’t exist. 

“Don’t forget I used to be an agent as well. They equipped me with the knowledge to perfectly execute a kill.” I couldn’t help but notice a sliver of raised skin peeking through the opening of his shirt, stirring my curiosity. What exactly did he endure as a test subject? 

“No sane individual uses their basic NIS training to murder people based on a personal agenda.” I negated, glancing down and amazed by how nimble his fingers were. He precisely and neatly stitched up the wound right before my eyes and began wrapping my elbow with a layer of gauze. I began to wonder why he was doing this for me when I remembered the fresh stitches on SoHyun’s body. I tensed up at the realization that he was the one who treated her. 

“I want you to know this,” He looked me right in the eye, demanding my attention. “SoHyun’s analytical and collected demeanor is a well-crafted guise she hides behind to protect herself. Underneath that intelligent and reserved semblance is just a daughter fighting to survive every single day to protect her mother despite everything. Have you ever thought about this from her perspective? How scared and tired she must have been?” 

I didn’t know how to answer that. 

I never thought about it that way. 

“Can I get some coffee?” I asked, hoping he would heed the small request. A plan formed in my mind. SungHoon nodded, heading back upstairs. 

I followed behind him, leaning against the wooden desk near his kitchen. Only a silver tin and worn file folder laid on the surface. I recognized the tin as the syringe container with the substance he injected himself before. Stealing a glance at SungHoon whose back was toward me, I opened the file and examined the photographs clipped inside. 

Pictures of homeless people being taken into black vans in the middle of the night, gang members, and the staff of SanYang Pharmaceuticals filled a bulk of the file. I grabbed a picture from underneath a couple papers, recognizing the man in the candid surveillance photo as Jung IlHoon. Another photo caught my eye, which was one of SoHyun’s biological father Park JoonMo. The photos were all surveillance photos taken by agents on stakeouts. This was it! 

“What are you doing?” SungHoon yelled. I turned around, knocking the cup of coffee toward him. The ceramic glass cup shattered onto the wooden floors, but using the spillage as an excuse I grabbed onto his shirt and hauled him over the desk. I needed to confirm something. 

“Get off me!” He shouted, writhing as he fought back. He reached for his gun, but I acted quickly and grabbed it first. SungHoon looped his legs around my knee, kicking me to the floor and throwing me off him. . I had underestimated his strength, thinking that he would be too lethargic to defend himself properly. 

I climbed on top of him, pressing my elbow against his neck to restrict his movements. It bought me the time I needed to yank down the back collar of his shirt, finally seeing the column of symmetrical holes along his spine. The holes were so deep that the scarring failed to even fully patch up the wounds. A shocked breath flew out of my mouth before SungHoon tackled me onto the floor. 

“Don’t ing touch me ever again.” He uttered with vitriol dripping with every word. 

He dug the gun into my forehead with trembling hands. I lo