Taemin sifts through the credit card transactions of the people in the hotel. He hadn’t had a program on his computer that sorted the information on command so it took him about 10 minutes to set up an algorithm for the data screening. He turns to another monitor and quickly pulls up a screen of the Lotus Hotel and sends it to Jonghyun and Onew’s tablets. He turns back to the information Key had given him and starts another program on his fourth monitor.

“Excuse me, anyone home?” Key asks knocking on the door of the address given to them this morning. A young woman around the age of 22 answers the door and lets them inside.

“Hello, what can I help you with?” She asks in a formal voice.

“We’re conducting an investigation on the death of Hwang Mi Young.” Minho says, flashing his badge.

“Oh my God, Tiffany? I haven’t heard her name in so long.” Another girl says, emerging from the living room.

“Jessica.” The first girl says in a warning tone.

“Why couldn’t you figure it out the first time? For the longest time we’ve been calling and asking for how the case was going and no one ever responded. Eventually we gave up and you’re investigating again?” Jessica blurts out in anger.

“Stop it Jessica.” Sooyoung commands sharply and Jessica storms out of the house, slamming the door behind her. “You’re going to have to excuse her; Tiffany was a good friend of ours.” Sooyoung says sadly.

“We understand ma’am that this was a tragic accident but we’re going to do everything in our power to see that the perpetrator will be brought to justice.” Key says, well-rehearsed and Sooyoung nods.

“So what do you want to know?” Sooyoung asks.

“The night Hwang Mi Young, or Tiffany as you called her, was taken, where was she?” Minho asks.

“She didn’t say, she had been dating a man for some time, I assumed she went out to see him.” Sooyoung replies sadly.

Tiffany smiles to herself looking at the Tiffany and Co. shop in the shopping district. She was meeting him tonight and they were going to go visit houses together. She couldn’t believe they were finally moving in together.

“What was her relationship with this guy?” Key asks.

“She was very secretive about him and neither Jessica nor I could figure out why. We had a hunch that they were going to move in together soon since we’ve seen Tiffany packing her bags for a while now.” Sooyoung says.

This man solved all of Tiffany’s problems. She knew that if she married him, she would finally be debt free.

“Hey baby.” The man said in a husky voice.

“Hey, where are we going tonight?” Tiffany asks giggling.

“We’re going to see a movie tonight, do you like horror movies?” He asks and Tiffany blushes, imagining herself clinging to his arm and snuggling in the theatre.

“Whatever’s good for you is good for me babe.” She says with a smile in her voice.

“Great, I’ll pick you up at 8.” He says and hangs up.

“Was Tiffany undergoing some kind of financial strain?” Minho asks, remembering the message Taemin had relayed to them earlier about Taeyeon’s situation.

Sooyoung blinks at them, “Why yes, indeed she was. She’d been given a scholarship to Seoul National University but was then caught in a cheating scandal. She wasn’t the one cheating so she was allowed to stay but her scholarship was taken away. Since then, she’s been working her off to pay for her own tuition.”

“Alright, thank you very much for your time.” Key says, shaking her hand.

“Just one more thing.” Sooyoung says softly before they leave, she goes upstairs and retrieves something quickly and brings it downstairs. It was a post-it note with the numbers 20-12-96 written in blue pen. “She’d left this here the night she disappeared, I didn’t think it was relevant, but maybe you can make some sense out of it?”

Key takes the paper from her and they both bid Sooyoung farewell, promising to update her with details of their investigation.

“So we know that both victims were involved with financial problems.” Minho says.

“What could this number be for? The number 96 is too large to be placed into a combination.” Key says.

“It’s a date.” Minho says.

“What?” Key asks.

“The numbers written on the post-it note is a date.” Minho says clarifying and he quickly dials Taemin’s number.

“Taemin, I need you to look up all the important things that happened on December 20, 1996.” Minho says.

“What? Okay.” Taemin says slightly confused, “I’ll get right on that then.”

“Let’s head to the place where Tiffany’s body was found.” Key says and they get into their car and drive to their destination. Key and Minho sit in an awkward silence and Minho turns on the radio for background noise.

“So, how long have you worked for the NCIA?” Key asks Minho and Minho shuffles in his seat.

“For about four years, and you?” He asks Key.

“Three.” Key responds and the conversation dies off again.

“Got a family?” Key asks again and this time Minho stiffens at the question.

“No.” Minho answers sharply and refuses to talk afterwards. Key wonders why he clammed up so suddenly at the mention of family. He turns his head out the window and observes the scenery outside. They pass an old theatre and Key examines the architectural structure of the building. It was quite run down and the last movie shown on the display board was Scream. The entrance was boarded up and the only things left on the windows were torn and faded posters of the original movie scream.

Key turns his head to look straight up ahead as they approach their destination. It was a park not 100 meters from the theatre Key had just observed. The park had a large hill with a tree at the very top of it.

Minho grabs his tablet and reviews the case details, “According to the evidence, Hwang Mi Young was killed of asphyxiation from the strangling and then stabbed in the heart by the large kitchen knife.”

“She was found at the top of this hill right? The man who dragged her must have been strong, even though Mi Young was quite petite.” Key says and Minho nods.

“Blood traces were found on the grass here as well as traces of . She was then killed here and dragged by her attacker all the way up the hill and she was hung from that tree.” Minho says and Key tries to imagine the situation in his head.

If he were Tiffany and she thought she was moving in with her boyfriend, they probably wouldn’t meet at a park. After all, there were no people around this park and with the absence of street lights; it would have been dark and hard to see. It wouldn’t have been romantic at all. No, they must have met someplace else and then came here afterwards. Key scanned the area and his eyes settled on the street that lay ahead of them.

Where would Tiffany go with her boyfriend? It’s dark outside, the street is illuminated with street lamps and there is a small park. The park is across from a small Italian restaurant and the theatre Key saw. The small parking lot where the abandoned car of assumedly the attacker’s was only meters away from the restaurant.

“That’s it!” Key says, snapping and Minho looks up from his tablet.

“What’s it?” Minho asks confused.

“From there, Tiffany went to dinner with her boyfriend. They went to see a movie and exited from there. Assuming her attacker is her boyfriend, they might’ve left the movie early. If I’m correct, the unsub brought her here, point A, where she was killed.” Key says.

“That’s a lot of assumptions.” Minho says.

“Check to see what movie was playing the night of Tiffany’s disappearance.” Key says and Minho does so.

“The movie would’ve been Scream, get this, the theatre closed down 5 years ago. The last movie they played was Scream before the theatre closed down and claimed bankruptcy.” Minho replies.

“The unsub must’ve somehow gotten the projector up and running and the two had a private show.” Key says.

“Which, if our unsub is a film fanatic that would explain the significance of the film.” Minho says, putting two and two together. “But, how did you come up with all that?” Minho asks.

“Just a hunch.” Key says and Minho looks at him surprised.

“Okay, let’s run this idea by Taemin and see if it’s true or not.” Minho says and Key nods.

“Hey, so for your list of important things that happened on December 20, 1996, the top listings really don’t have much to do with our case. Carl Sagan dies, 38 hostages were released from Peru, you can look through the list I’m sending you right now but really nothing significant happened.” Taemin tells them.

“Try this, instead of focusing on the famous events, look to see what film and theatre related significance to the date there is.” Minho says.

“Alright, I’ll keep at it.” Taemin says.

“Also, check to see if Tiffany made any transactions at an Italian restaurant near the park where she was murdered.” Key says.

“Will do.” Taemin replies.

“Let’s head back to base, I think we can go over the case records again. There are some details missing and it doesn’t make sense.” Key says and Minho nods. They clamber back into the car and start driving.