0800. 11/11/2012. Gangnam District. Seoul.

“Isn’t this exciting Taemin?” Key asks teasingly.

“What?” Taemin asks confused.

“Being outside in the fresh air away from your computer screen?” Key says.

“Oh yeah. Sure.” Taemin says distractedly and the other members of SHINee laugh. Truth be told, Taemin didn't know how he ought to feel being away from the safety of his computers. He was exhilerated by the idea of being out in the field with the others, facing the danger head on but he was also afraid. In the least, he'd escaped the horrors that appeared on his screens everyday.

They arrive at the SM building and are met with security detail that brings them through the back door.

“Man, getting into the SM building is harder than getting into the Blue House.” Jonghyun mutters to himself.

“We have to ensure the protection of our artists; I hope you understand Supervisory Special Agent Kim.” One of the security guards says respectfully.

“Of course.” Jonghyun answers, scratching the back of his neck sheepishly.

“Busted.” Minho whispers to Jonghyun chucking lowly and Jonghyun elbows him only to be met with a glare by the residing 'Umma' Key.

“Mr. Jung?” Onew asks walking into a meeting room at the SM building. A well-dressed man stands up and another one beside him follows suit.

“I’m Agent Lee, these are Agents Kim, Kim, Choi and Lee.” Onew says and SHINee bows to him.

“Jung Yunho pleasure to meet you, this is the other TVXQ member, Shim Changmin.” Yunho introduces, bowing respectfully, Changmin doing the same.

"Of course, it'd be more of a pleasure had we not been meeting under these circumstances." Onew says formally and Yunho nods gesutring for them to sit down. Wasn't that the truth for any case? All the wonderful people SHINee met over the years, they realized they couldn't stay friends for long due to the premises of which their friendship was formed, usually due to a death of some kind. The same held true for Minho and Yoona.

Then again, there was nothing more comforting than mutual suffering.

“Do you mind if we ask a few questions?” Key asks.

“Not at all, ask away.” Yunho says, sitting at the round glass table and SHINee takes Onew's lead to seat themselves also.

“When were you first threatened by sasaeng fans?” Onew asks, flipping open his notebook.

“Do you mean before or after our band separated?” Changmin asks.

“What do you mean?” Jonghyun asks, raising an eyebrow.

“Well you see we gained our first sasaeng fans around a year after our debut as 5 members. When we separated, sasaengs calmed down a little bit from the internal conflict going on. Actually the sasaengs were the worst when we were about 2 or 3 years in.” Yunho explains.

“You say your band split up right?” Onew clarifies and Yunho nods. “Do you know if they’ve been experiencing the same threats as you have?”

“I’m not sure. We haven’t been in contact with them lately; our two groups have both been quite busy.” Yunho says and Jonghyun nods to Onew. Lie.

“Sir, we’re going to need to know everything so that we can help you.” Jonghyun says levelly and Yunho sighs.

"Yunho just tell them." Changmin says, "It's not like you can hid things from a NIS profiler anyways." Chnagmin says, shooting a glance in Jonghyun's direction. Jonghyun didn't know whether to feel insulted or praised by his comment.

"Tell us what?" Key demands and Yunho sighs again.

“Well, after our break up, we haven’t been in quite the best terms. I mean, we put up a good face for the press saying that what was in the past is left in the past but…” Changmin trails off and no one pursues the topic any further.

“Have you been in contact with them at all?” Key presses.

“We see them occasionally on awards shows, we don’t really exchange more than the simple greeting and maybe a few words on their latest album release.” Yunho says.

“It’s never been one of those, hey! have you been getting stalked recently? kind of conversations.” Changmin adds.

“I see. Do you have their company or some way we can contact them?” Onew asks and Yunho nods rifling through his wallet and handing him a crinkled business card with C-JeS Entertainment written on it. Onew nods at Key and Key takes the business card from him, excusing himself.

“You just conveniently had their business card ready?” Jonghyun asks suspiciously.

“Well not exactly. When Junsu had asked us to join them; he gave me their business card. I just never had the heart to throw it out.” Yunho says.

“I understand.” Jonghyun says nodding, he understood more than Yunho had told him.

“Look, we know this is a hard topic for you. Some of your former members were caught in a scandal involving sasaeng fans.” Taemin says, “But these ones that are threatening you? These aren’t normal sasaeng fans.” Wasn't that an unlikely sentence? It was hard to hear the words normal and sasaeng in the same sentence. Had Changmin not felt so threatened by the sasaengs, the comment most likely would've provoked a chuckle from the back of his throat.

“They’re erratic in their thought processes and behaviours. Their prefrontal cortexes were most likely not stimulated enough as a child. This lack of stimulation would in turn prevent neurons from thickening and connecting, inhibiting the brain from controlling impulses.” Minho explains.

“The paracingulate sulcus, the region involved with thought, planning and judgment. Without adequate formation of this particular fold, people lose the sense to distinguish between reality and imagination.” Jonghyun adds.

“This is what makes this particular sasaeng extremely dangerous to you. This sasaeng has no control, no understanding of what’s right and wrong.” Taemin says and the two members of TVXQ nod.

“Our media liaison is contacting C-JeS right now and we will speak with the other members promptly. Until then, Minho will discuss security detail with you.” Onew says.

“Actually, can I have a look at those notes that the sasaeng sent you?” Key asks, returning from the phone call.

“Yes, we have them all right here.” Yunho says handing him a stack of stationary held together by a paper clip.

“When did you receive the first one of these?” Key asks.

“About three months ago.” Changmin replies and Key nods his head, looking briefly through the letters.

“Don’t worry; we’ll get to the bottom of this.” Onew says.

“Before or after they kill someone?” Jonghyun mumbles under his breath and they walk out of the room, leaving Minho behind to discuss tactical plans with TVXQ and their manager as well as other security guards.

“I thought we had to stick to them like bodyguards.” Taemin asks.

“We haven’t gone through tactical yet, Minho says we’re not qualified.” Onew replies.

“We all know he’s more worried about us getting hurt than really anything though.” Key says rolling his eyes.

“What did the rep at C-JeS say?” Onew asks.

“They agreed to meet with us this afternoon at around 2:00 p.m.” Key reports.

“So be it.” Onew says nodding.

“Excuse me sir, is there somewhere we can set up?” Jonghyun asks one of the bodyguards.

“Yes, right this way.” He replies, leading them to an empty conference room where SHINee straps on pairs of gloves and promptly sits down, going through the stationary.

“Okay linguist, what can you tell us about the way these notes were written?”  Jonghyun asks Key. Minho slips quietly into the room and Onew nods once acknowledging his arrival. Key grabs a piece of stationary and looks at it thoughtfully.

“Well, you see how the ink is slightly smudged to the right? That means the unsub is left handed.” Key starts and Jonghyun takes off his gloves to make notes on a pad of paper, “The words slant slightly to the left and the letters are small, the unsub is introverted and likes to work alone, behind the scenes.”

“Okay, go on.” Minho says.

“You see how this vowel is formed here?” Key asks, tapping a part on the paper with his gloved hand, “The opening is small and the lines are deep and angry. The unsub is restricting his or herself in some way. They’re perfectionistic too. Notice how the letters are perfectly spaced and the lines are extremely straight, even though the stationary is unlined?”

“Okay, what about the actual content of the letters, what the unsub is writing?” Onew asks.

“Angry and violent. Read here, ‘remember what happened to Yunho and the superglue? That will happen to you too if you don’t listen’, the unsub wants to invoke fear into recipient.” Jonghyun says.

“I can take this to the lab and check for prints.” Taemin says.

“If Key is right about the unsub being a perfectionist, I don’t think they’ll leave prints behind.” Jonghyun says shaking his head.

“It’s worth a shot.” Taemin says shrugging and Jonghyun nods.

“Let’s try to solve this before we have to deal with any bodies.” Key says.

“Judging by the acceleration, the unsub has recently been under some kind of stressor, which makes he or she more dangerous to TVXQ at the moment.” Jonghyun adds.

“We have to work fast, Taemin, you and Minho head to the labs, Jonghyun, Key and I will go interview the former members of the band.” Onew says.

“Will do sir.” Taemin says grabbing the case files and taking them with him.