Light pushed its way through the curtains of Daehyun's dorm room signaling the arrival of morning. Rolling over to stare at the light streaking across his blanket, Daehyun gave a tired yawn slowly sitting up to stretch. Having tossed and turned the entire night, he was certain he eventually went to be some time after three or four that morning. Throwing the cover off, Daehyun slid out of the bed to make his way to the door.

Pulling the door open he padded down the hallway towards Youngjae's dorm room. Recently the group had been able to move into better dorm housing that would allow them to all have their own separate rooms with all the revenue they were bringing in to TS. All meals were still taken together however Yongguk, Himchan, and Zelo lived in the dorm above them while he dormed with Youngjae and Jongup. Reaching Youngjae's door, Daehyun gently rapped on the door waiting for his friend to wake up and answer him.

“Jae, are you woke?” Daehyun called, knocking again when he received no response. “Jae?”

His calls were answered by more silence, the older male frowning. Pushing open the door to Younjae's room Daehyun peered inside for his friend. Everything was still in place. Nothing out of the ordinary seemed to be wrong yet Daehyun was unnerved by the void of Youngjae within the room. There was no sign he had came in the night before or slept in the still neatly made bed.

His thoughts of the night before came back to haunt him; the nagging in the back of his mind that accompanied him to bed the night before came back into full effect. Swallowing down his panic, Daehyun closed the door to Youngjae's bedroom to beeline for the kitchen where the stir of the other members was heard.

He couldn't consider there was something wrong. He was being foolish his brain chided. Both Jongup and Himchan were positive the Jae must have lost track of time at the electronic store pondering over the next toy he wanted to save his money to buy.

Entering the kitchen, Daehyun found Himchan sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee in his hand.  Zelo was scarfing down a plate of eggs and toast beside him, both men looking up when he came into the doorway of the kitchen.

“Hyung you don’t look well,” Zelo commented between bites.

“I didn’t sleep well,” Daehyun commented taking a seat at the kitchen table.  “Did Jae already get up to leave for TS?”

“Jae?  Not that I’m aware,” Himchan shook his head.  “Guk is already over there checking our schedule for today.  He didn’t mention that Jae was with him.  Did the two of you not make up from your fight yesterday?”

“It wasn’t a fight,” Daehyun corrected.  “It’s not like him to disappear during the night with no word to anyone about where he is going or doing.”

“Isn’t he in his room now?” Zelo blinked.  “I thought I heard his door open a little while ago.”

“Just me checking on him,” Daehyun replied.  “He wasn’t in there.”

“He’s up early, no need to start fretting over nothing.” Himchan sipped his coffee, planning to put the entire scenario out of his mind.

“His bed hasn’t been slept in,” Daehyun stated narrowing his eyes.  “Are you going to tell me that doesn’t sound a little suspicious?”

“I’ll call his phone to find out where he is, then we can put this behind us,” Himchan said grabbing his phone from the counter. Dialing Youngjae’s cellphone number.  Putting the object to his ear Himchan patiently waited for the phone to either connect or go to voice mail.  Neither of which happened as he remained sitting there for a good two minutes as the phone continued to ring.

“Well?” Daehyun’s instincts told him to get his out there and find some sign of Youngjae.  It was a pointless effort on Himchan’s part to keep trying Youngjae’s phone when Daehyun knew for a fact the older wasn’t going to receive a response.

“Nothing yet,” Himchan frowned continuing to allow it to ringing.

“I’m going to the electronics store, maybe I can find out something from there,” Daehyun said, standing up from his seat.  “Call me if you find something out.”  Exiting the kitchen without giving Himchan a chance to say anything Daehyun headed back to his room to throw on street clothes.

“Hyung.” Zelo showed up in the doorway of Dae’s room, his eyes unreadable as he crossed his arms over one another.  “Channie is going to call Guk to see if he can reach Jae.  Are you heading to the electronics store now?”

“Yes, tell him to reach my phone if he finds out anything,” Daehyun said clipping his phone to his side.

“Can I tag along?” The request gave Daehyun a momentary pause studying the maknae closely.  Fear flickered in his dark eyes with concern of his band mate and friend.  “Jae, he’s okay right?”

“He—“ Daehyun faltered not sure what to tell Zelo.  He had no idea if Youngjae was all right or not.  Part of him wanted to say yes, that Youngjae was being an idiot by worrying everyone with his disappearance.  That at any moment the little moron would come into the dorm with a huge grin on his face in some mannerism of a practical joke.

Dae would even hug him if that were the case, later on throttling his friend for freaking him out in this manner, the two forgetting this joke.  However the feeling in the pit of his stomach told him that this was no joke.  Youngjae was in definite trouble the group needed to hurry up and settle before things got worse.

“Hyung.” Zelo’s voice brought Dae back to the present.

“Come on, I’m sure that Himchan won’t reach Jae.  The sooner we find out about where he might have been after leaving the electronics store, the quicker we can find that pabo,” Daehyun voiced heading out the room with Zelo following close behind him.  He had to get to the bottom of this mystery.

-ooo-

The middle-aged man slowly graying around the edges and front of his thinning hair raised his vision to the two young men coming into the store.  Business that morning was extremely, dragging out once his only two customers – a man who needed assistance with a broken toaster and a woman looking for directions to a fitness center downtown – left hours ago.  These two young men seemed promising for business.  Straightening his posture the man produced his best businessman smile.

“How many I help you gentlemen today?  Tell me exactly what you’re looking for,” the man beamed.

“We need some information,” the shorter of the two men replied pulling out a picture of a young man that frequented the store.  The owner looked down at the picture then up at the two men who had a serious expression on their faces.  The storeowner felt his nerves unsettle pondering if these men were part of some gang.  Neither looked the part nevertheless dramas were not an accurate representation of the world around him.  For all he knew they were planning to get answers out of him any way possible.

“Hyung is missing, he didn’t come home last night.  We know he frequents here to look at electronics.  We were wondering if you remember him being here last night?” the taller male stated.

“He’s a friend of yours?” the middle-aged man looked back and forth between the boys.

“Yes, his name is Youngjae,” the shorter of the two said.  “I’m Daehyun and this is Junhong.”

“I’m sure he went home with his girlfriend,” the storeowner considered now comfortable that the two men weren’t suspicious any longer.  The two boys didn’t appear to be individuals out seeking revenge or loan money.  Earnestly appearing concerned for the absent male’s whereabouts.

“Hyung’s not dating anyone,” Zelo frowned.

“How do you know he’s not?  He’s a healthy young man, I’m sure he’s always out on a date with his girlfriend,” the storeowner voiced.  Daehyun and Zelo had no way of telling the owner they didn’t date due to being idols.  It was apparent the man had no clue as to who they were.  Saying something like ‘we live together so we know he doesn’t date’ would cause suspicion to arise.  Explaining they were singers would definitely not be believed either.

“The last we check he didn’t have a girlfriend,” Daehyun commented.  “He doesn’t have good luck with women.”

“Are you certain?” the storeowner blinked.  Going back over his memory the storeowner was certain a woman approached the young man they were looking for outside the store.  By their body language he was positive the two knew each other and meeting up here was planned.  “I’m sure I saw a woman with him.”

“A woman?” Daehyun and Zelo both looked at each other perplexed.  There were not too many women close to the boys outside of TS.  If it was any of the members of Secret perhaps they could shed some light on the situation.  Daehyun pulled out his phone, dialing Yongguk in hopes he was still over at TS.  Impatiently waiting BAP’s leader to pick up his phone, Daehyun thought about all the scenarios this could possibly be.

“Hyung, do you think it could be any of our Secret noona?” Zelo inquired.

“I really hope so,” Daehyun sighed just as Yongguk finally answered his phone.  “Hyung, are you still at TS?”

“Yes why?” Yongguk’s voice held curiosity in the question.   “Is there something you need Dae?”

“Are our Secret noona around?  We were wondering if they might have met up with Jae last night for a late dinner?” Daehyun didn’t want to alarm Yongguk if that was the case.  If Youngjae was secretly dating one of the noona without anyone knowing the last thing Daehyun wanted was to draw attention to the couple.  Hearing Yongguk mumble something to someone standing beside him – most likely their manager – Daehyun awaited an answer. 

“Where are you right now?” Yongguk questioned.

“The electronics store Youngjae usually comes to when he wants to buy something,” Daehyun replied.

“Did you go out alone?”

“No, Zelo came with me,” Daehyun answered, wandering from the counter in order to speak more freely over the situation with the group’s leader.  “Have you talked to Channie?”

“Briefly, he said that you left out but had no idea where you were going,” Yongguk said.  “He mentioned you and Jae had a fight, so he didn’t come home last night.”

“It wasn’t a fight,” Daehyun retorted, irritated nobody was paying attention to what he was saying.

“Then tell me what happened or what’s go on.  You both know we have a schedule to keep later today.  Now isn’t the time for any discourse between us,” Yongguk chided.

“You know if we wanted to fight it out over something we would.  That’s not the case here.  After dinner, I left to take care of some business.  He told me he stopping off to check out the new electronics before heading back to the dorm.  When I came back he still wasn’t there.  Himchan and Jongup assumed I had a fight with Jae, but that’s not the case at all.”

“You think he might be with one of our noona?” Be it Yongguk to hit the hammer on the nail when Dae wanted to tiptoe around the situation.  “Do you know what you’re saying Daehyun?  That would seriously have to be addressed if that’s the case.”

“I know, but at least it’s better than him just disappearing in the middle of the night,” Daehyun voiced.  “That’s a smaller problem compared to what we currently have.”

“You sure you’re not overreacting?” Yongguk inquired.

“Why the hell would I want to overreact about something like this?” Daehyun snapped.

“Sorry,” Yongguk mumbled after a long pause.

“Any word about our noona?” Daehyun sighed looking over to find Zelo conversing with the storeowner, holding up his phone while questioning the man.  The storeowner shook his head, mouthing something to Zelo.  The maknae frowned turning his eyes to Daehyun.  Stepping away from the storeowner, Zelo briskly returned to Dae’s side, his eyes troubled.  “Zelo?”

“It wasn’t our noona,” Zelo shook his head.

“Are you sure?”

“I showed him different pictures of all of them.  He didn’t recognize any of them as the woman who approached Jae,” Zelo announced.  On the other end of the phone Daehyun listened to the muffled conversation Yongguk was having with what sounded like their manager.  His mind whirled rapidly processing what this meant.

“It wasn’t any of Secret,” Yongguk confirmed.

“,” Daehyun swore, the sinking feeling in his chest submerging deeper.  “Hyung wasn’t able to get in contact with Jae’s phone either.”

“What does this mean?” Zelo’s brows dipped down, looking down at Daehyun.

“We need to find out exactly who that woman Jae was with is.  Let’s hope that there are some CCTVs set up to capture everything from last night,” Dae said, his eyes glancing over at the curious storeowner.  “Ahjusshi, do you know what time our friend was in here approximately?”

“Eleven maybe, I’m not sure,” the man pondered.

“Do you think we can look through your CCTV tapes from last night around that time.  We need to find out who that woman with our friend is,” Daehyun requested.

“If you can find the time he was in there be my guest,” the storeowner voiced.

“Thanks a lot.”

“Hyung,” Zelo started.

“It’s going to be fine,” Daehyun assured however he had no confidence in those words.  His heart instinctively knew that they needed to hurry.  Something was really wrong.

A/N: Sorry for the delay.  Just whenI thought I had things under control, I'm thrown a curveball with school.  This is literally the first time in weeks I've been free to complete this chapter that caused me much stress.  But now that it's over, I can focus on some good old fashion crazy again.  Unni, thank you for helping me figure out my ideas for this one.  I would have been insane trying to get this chapter moving.  Continue to be my guiding light through this, I will need you.

Thank you everyone for being patient.  I want to get chapters out more quickly just with school....so it will be a toss up as to how quickly I'm finished.  Let me know what you think.