“Well…” was all Luhan could refute, “I know that. I was just checking the lights out.” 

 

He glanced at her kind of confused about why she still kept helping him. Their talk earlier seemed so critical that he didn’t know whether Victoria was on his side or not. 

 

The elevator opened and Victoria led him down the long white hallway. A whole line of black doors and silver doorknobs passed them by before Victoria pushed open the doors to the stairs and they hurried down the 13 flight of steps. Luhan thought he might die of over using his lungs since Victoria hadn’t stopped for even a second to take a breath. How was she able to keep going without panting? 

 

When they finally reached the first floor door Luhan felt a breath of relief fly through him realizing that he’d be able to walks normally now, but felt his hopes fall when Victoria dodged the first door. She continued flying down the stairs like a bat, Luhan following without fail. 

 

“Where are we going?” he asked again. 

 

“The underground basement.” 

 

“What!?” he screeched coming to a halt at the stairs. “I’m so tired, can we like rest for a few minutes?” 

 

Victoria paused and turned to look at him. 

 

“I mean, can we rest for half a minute? It won’t kill time, will it?” Luhan asked feeling his chest heat up with exhaustion from the continuous walking, running, half runs. 

“They’re still looking for you. They won’t give up just yet,” Victoria told, “delaying even a second will get them closer to you.” 

 

Luhan made a face before falling down the few steps. 

 

“Fine, fine.” he muttered.

 

Victoria pushed another black door open and Luhan followed her into a basement full of stacked water bottles, mops, brooms, rags, a few carts, and other miscellaneous items. There were even a few art pieces sitting there. Luhan let his eyes pry around the large basement before hurrying after Victoria who didn’t seem to care for any little item in there. 

 

“Do you know your way around here?” Luhan wondered. 

 

“No.” 

 

Surprise tinted him. He assumed she’d know her way around since she moved from place to place without even stopping to wander around. 

 

“But the basement must have a door leading outback,” Victoria finished. 

 

Luhan paused in his steps. Never once had he thought that Victoria would move without a plan. The sudden discovery of a new aspect of her stunned him before he continued looking around. 

 

“I thought you knew your way.” he said under his breath. 

 

Whether or not she heard him she still continued walking further down the large gray hallway. Luhan quietly sighed again as he continued following her and readjust his backpack over his shoulder before Victoria suddenly found a door. He watched closely as she opened the door and followed her out into an alley. A line of trash cans sat against the wall. When they started down the alley a stench of rotten pizza and smelly rats surfaced into the air. Tossing a hand over his mouth in help of stopping his vomit he rushed ahead of Victoria who coolly followed. 

In no moment’s time they were on the sidewalk again. A few people who passed by accidentally bumped into him, none of them apologizing. Then without another word, Victoria pulled him toward a taxi that had suddenly stopped by the curb to let a woman and her child off. Slamming the door close Victoria called out to the driver to take them back. 

 

Luhan desperately opened the window for a fresh scent of air inhaling and exhaling as much as he could. When he finally felt alive again he leaned against the opened window lazily. His calves were throbbing from the continuous run and walk earlier, his feet tired from the over exercise that early morning. He couldn’t even bring himself to glance at the clock on the radio. 

 

“Are you hungry?” Victoria asked. 

 

Luhan turned to look at her as if offended, “You’re not even going to ask if I’m ok?” 

 

Victoria snorted at him before leaning back into the seat, “I thought you might ask about why Seohyun and I were at Hong Chong Il’s home that night. I guess your mind does work differently.”

 

He looked at her again, this time without comment. 

 

“You are pretty smart,” Victoria complimented. “I won’t let anything about you out, so don’t you tell Seohyun what you found out today.” 

 

“Thanks.” 

Actually, he was very grateful. He wouldn’t technically say that Victoria was deliberately on his side, but she was helping him after all. Not with just keeping quiet about the ‘Golden Mary’, but she was letting him stay in their apartment and she was especially making sure that he was safe. Luhan definitely felt positive that Victoria was as soft and kindhearted as Seohyun. 

 

“Why did you tell Seohyun about the powerhouses? You listed each and every specific person,” Victoria  told. 

 

Did Victoria already know that he knew about their break ins and decide not to say a word about it? If she did, Luhan had to admit that Victoria was quick to catch onto things. 

 

“They’re the ones I researched about before I came back and the ones I remember,” Luhan answered. “Why?” 

 

Victoria shook her head. Luhan still couldn’t determine whether she knew he knew their secret or not. 

 

“I think you have a lot of things figured out already,” Victoria said calmly, “since you’ve been around causing trouble.” 

 

Luhan didn’t know whether to take what she said last as something positive or not. 

 

“Gi Su, Cha Tae Sung, Yoo Yong Sun, and your father are after your head,” Victoria informed making it sound as if it weren’t anything dangerous at all. “How many of them have you seen?” 

 

“Gi Su, Sook Chin, and Yun Man.” 

“And none of them have the ‘Golden Mary’?” 

 

Luhan shook his head. 

 

“Sook Chin hasn’t heard of it,” Luhan disclosed, “Yun Man knows a little more, but is limited in information. All he knows is that my father has sent men after it, all it is now is stealing from each other.  And someone is going to die in the process.” 

 

Victoria’s face flushed with an overwhelming emotion of how dangerous searching for the key has just began. If more and more people were after it because of the power it could grant, neither she Luhan or Seohyun might be able to ward off the many predators. 

 

“Seohyun said that you rarely talked about your father,” Victoria started. “Do you two not have a good relationship?” 

 

“No,” he answered staring back out the window, the wind causing his hair to flap, “my mother left her success, her family, and her chance of a rich future of warmth for him. I never liked that sacrificial part of her after she married him. Everything had become Ki Young, Ki Young until she looked like a robot built to follow its master. Mother could have had a perfectly normal life if she hadn’t been too kind. I have a feeling he doesn’t like me too since all he really cares about is fame. I wouldn’t be here chasing after the same key he’s after if I loved him at all. I’d actually help look for it if I were devoted to him.”

 

Luhan twisted his upper body to look at her. 

 

“Is the key important to you?” Luhan asked. 

 

Victoria stared back at him as if he shouldn’t have asked at all. 

 

In the end she said, “The reason you came for it is the same reason I came down to the suburbs of Seoul. Except I’m not going to destroy it.”

 

\ \ \ \ \

 

“What!?” Donghae screamed at the officer sitting at the desk before him. 

He’d gone to headquarters that morning. The office side of the headquarters, actually. The sudden nightmare that the cops might come barging into his place to arrest him for faking as a police officer had haunted him in his dream last night. Curious about why he hadn’t yet been discovered as a fake yet he’d gone to the office that morning to see if they’d done a check on his background. And it turned out that the police hadn’t been too lazy after all. 

 

“Yes, it says right here. Your name, see?” the officer turned around a list of academic graduates from the police school.

 

Donghae stared down at the name the officer was pointing to in a large black thick binder. Too surprised his eyes burned the letters into his brain. Was this real? His name was really sitting there on the list right in front of him. 

 

“Really!? Really!?” he asked again. 

 

The officer nodded looking at him strangely, “Your name’s right here. Your address too. See?”

 

Donghae ran his eyes over the address wondering what the hell had just happened. 

 

“Are you ok?” the officer wondered. “You been working too hard or something?” 

 

Ignoring him Donghae turned around and staggered out the door. How the hell had his name gotten on the list when he had never attended such a school in the first place? He paced down the hall for quite a few minutes before suddenly exiting the doors. The need to find out who the real Lee Donghae was infiltrated his mind. 

Not more than a few minutes later he grabbed a taxi and headed to the deep side of the city. Donghae passed a steep street that represented a hill and walked pass a few tiny black gates before coming upon the house of his destination. Donghae checked the house number a few times before declaring he was right and rung the white button the side. The doorbell of the house rung loudly twice before a door opened. 

 

An old grandma walked out, her head full of gray curls, a stern expression full of irritation. She wasn’t having a good day, Donghae could tell. Her floral working pants flowed open like an air balloon as she headed toward the door. When it opened she stared up at him unwelcoming. 

 

“Who are you?” she asked. 

 

“Hello,” Donghae first greeted slightly bowing his head, “I was wondering if there’s a Lee Donghae here?” 

 

Her eyebrows cringed into a deep frown not full of sorrow but a kind of anger. 

 

“Why are you looking for him!? That bastard, how dare you mention him in front of me!? Are trying to insult me!?” she bellowed, her hoarse voice trying to scream as loud as it could, but the effects of smoking only allowed her a weak raspy voice. 

 

“N…no,” he stuttered taken aback by her rudeness. “S…sorry, I wasn’t meaning to insult you.” 

 

The woman glared at him. Her small eyes accentuating the wrinkles around them. 

“The bastard died two weeks ago! Are you happy now?! Do you still want to add more fuel to the fire!? How rude, such an insolent man…” she screamed before murmuring underneath her breath. 

 

“Dead?” Donghae asked his eyes wide open. 

 

The old woman slammed the gate in his face before strutting back into the house of hers. Donghae pressed his dry lips together and swallowed. Had he taken the identity of someone the police didn’t know was dead? The bewilderment of the truth shook his heart tightly. 

 

\ \ \ \ \

 

Siwon and Seohyun climbed down from his car and gazed at the old stores around them in astonishment. There was also an outdoor market further down the road and Siwon was sure he wanted to explore them after he found the herbal medicine for his mother. 

 

“Have you been here before?” Siwon asked Seohyun when they started toward a large gray building at the round corner of the street. 

 

“Not at all,” Seohyun shook her head. “Have you?” 

 

“Once or twice,” Siwon replied, “I did some research on the area and came to visit a few years back.”

 

“I didn’t think Seoul would still have a traditional place left,” Seohyun glanced around. 

 

Large cracks in the street had yet to be mended and the people walking around seemed to be from the nearby countryside. The thin patterned pants the woman wore were meant for toiling in the soil and the young children around were donned in their school uniforms having just got off from school. Small rundown shops stood along the sidewalks and further down the path to the right sat the open market. Down the left past the parking lot were more small shops run by families who relied on the money they made daily. 

The streets were packed with customers walking to and fro. Once they entered the gray building with two large side windows a scent of medicinal herbs wafted through midair toward them as the bell above the door jingled. Boxes and crates of herbs, roots, dried animal parts, and greenery sat all around the shop like it would in a grocery mart. Other customers already busying their day by searching through the crates and boxes for the best quality medicine. 

 

Siwon found the tiled floor dirty with dirt and fluids of that he didn’t know, but assumed that it was difficult to clean during the day with so many customers flooding in. Squeezing his way between old women and men and bored children who weren’t yet aware of the magic of these herbs, he headed toward the back. He glanced back every now and then to make sure that he hadn’t lost Seohyun in his fight with the crowd. When their eyes met he smiled at her before turning around to continue squeezing his way through. 

---

***More Seohyun & Siwon coming up!

***And here we find out that Donghae has actually taken someone else's identity!! No wonder he hasn't been caught!