Minho walked around the S.M. building, searching for Yuki.  "Christ, what has been going on with her lately?  Is she PMS-ing?" Minho muttered to himself.  Then he remembered the boys' words from earlier.  What happened to her that made her so sensitive to what I said?  She had a partner before?  Who was it?  What did he do?

Minho was determined to get answers to his questions, so it was with renewed vigor that he continued his search.

After another half an hour of searching, Minho finally came across the White Room.  The white room was a spacious room containing nothing except a larger than life, black obelisk in the center.  Their were four openings on the ceiling, permitting natural light to enter the room.  Three out of the four walls were stark white; the entirety of the fourth wall was painted in the likeness of the South Korean national flag.

Minho knew aobut the obelisk.  On it were written hundreds of thousands of names.

The names of those who died serving for S.M.

There were also a few names inscribed on the floor.  Minho knew the significance of those names.

They were the names of those that betrayed South Korea.  Traitors.

Minho finally saw Yuki on the other side of the obelisk, touching one of its sides.

Yuki hadn't noticed Minho yet.  She was absent-mindedly running her fingers across a few of the names engraved onto the stone.

Kim Heechul

Lee Jaejin

Kim Yoonsung

Park Jinyoung

"I'm sorry," Yuki muttered to the obelisk, "I'm sorry I didn't realize. . . I'm sorry I couldn't stop him in time. . . I. . . I'm sorry I failed."

Minho, who had been listening from the other side of the obelisk, felt an uncomfortable feeling in his stomach.  He didn't like Yuki's tone of voice as she spoke.  She sounded heart-broken.  "Don't be sad Yuki," Minho wanted to say, "I hate it when you sound sad."

"The boys miss you guys from time to time," Yuki said, continuing to talk to the obelisk, "I do too.  Sometimes, I see things that remind me of stuff that you would have said if you saw it.  I think about telling you, but then I remember that you guys are gone."  Yuki bowed her head in shame.  "Everything was my fault.  I should have known. . . I should have suspected. . . I don't know what I can do to lessen the pressure in my heart.  I don't know what to do. . ."

"Talking about it to a living person helps," Minho suddenly said, walking around the obelisk.  Yuki turned around swiftly with her hands in front of her face, prepared to defend herself, but relaxed her stance when she saw Minho.  The girl cleared , trying to make it appear as though nothing was wrong.

"Uh. . . sorry for yelling at you earlier," she muttered, staring at the ground.

"You're apologizing to me?" Minho muttered in mock astonishment, attempting to lighten the mood, "has the world gone mad?"

Minho's strategy worked.  The corners of Yuki's mouth pulled upwards slightly.  "Whatever, Keroro.  At least I'm apologizing.  Don't get used to it."

The boy nodded, chuckling.  "I'll made sure to treasure this moment," he said sarcastically.  "Now. . . do you wanna explain what happened to you back in the observation room?"

Yuki sighed.  "It's not anything important. . ."

"Bull," Minho said sharply, "it's definitely something if what I said bothered you that much.  I'm not leaving you alone without a proper explaination."

"You are one annoying frog."

"I get that a lot. . . mainly from you.  But I'm still not leaving."

There was a few seconds of silence as the two glared at each other.  Finally, Yuki sighed in defeat.  She walked towards one of the walls of the room and sat down, leaning against it.  Before following, Minho looked down at the place where Yuki had been standing.  She had been standing on top of a name engraved into the ground.

"It's gonna take a little bit of time to tell this story," Yuki warned.

"I got time," Minho said, shrugging, "we kinda abandoned Soo Man-ssi in the middle of debriefing, but it's not like he was gonna tell us anything important anyways."

"You really want to know about this, don't you?"

Minho remained silent as he stared at Yuki, knowing she got the message.

"Fine," Yuki huffed, "but don't say I didn't warn you.  There was a time before I started going solo when I had a partner.  I was nineteen and it had been a year since I had completed my training to officially become an field spy.  

My partner's name was Hyun Daeho."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~FLASHBACK~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"You needed to see me, sir?" Yuki asked as she closed the door behind her.

"Hello, Yuki," Soo Man said kindly, "take a seat."  Even from where she was standing, Yuki could tell that Soo Man was seriously bothered.  Sitting down, Yuki didn't bother beating around the bush.

"It's getting worse," Yuki said.  It was a statement, not a question.

"Heechul is dead." 

A strangled gasp escaped the girl's throat as she gripped the handles of her seat.  "No. . ." she whispered.

"I'm afraid so," Soo Man sighed, "Yuki, as much as you don't want to acknowledge the obvious, Heechul's death is the fourth death this year.  And it has confirmed something for the both of us. . .

there is a traitor in our midst."

Yuki remained silent at Soo Man's proclamation.  "There's no other possible explaination," the man said, "no one knew of Heechul's capabilities except for our spy base.  Jaejin, Yoosung, Jinyoung. . . no one knew about their activities except for S.M.  They were all murdered.  You can see the pattern, Yuki. Heechul, after Jonghyun, was our best sharp-shooter.  Yoosung was our best strategizer.  Jinyoung used to be the spear point of our military attacks.  Jaejin was our main recruiter.  Each of these men held an important position in S.M.  Let's face it. . .

No one except members of S.M. knew what these men used to do."

The girl hung her head low.  She wanted to yell at Soo Man and tell him that he was wrong, shout that there was no way that the spies of S.M. would turn traitor.

"You're right," Yuki whispered.  Suddenly, the girl's voice became hard and determined as she spoke again.  As much as she wanted to mourn for her friend's death, she could not display weakness.  Not now.  "We'll find him, Soo Man-ssi.  I will find him and I will make sure he pays."

"You're the only person other than me that knows that we have a double-crosser in S.M., Yuki," Soo Man said, "I expect it to stay that way.  Everyone in S.M. is a suspect.  The only reason that you aren't a suspect, Yuki, is because an attempt has been made at your life as well."

Yuki remembered all too clearly the frontal attack on her that had occurred the previous month.  It was a mix of ability and pure luck that allowed her to escape that attack alive.

However, if everyone was a suspect, that included Taemin, Key, Jinki, Jonghyun, Daeho, and all of the friends Yuki had come to make at S.M.  "I understand sir," Yuki said, "but if we are to discover who this traitor is, we're going to need a plan.  I believe I already have one."

"I'm listening."

It was a simple plan really.  "Simple, yet effective," as Yuki had put it.  Yuki had more than enough knowledge about technology to place a tab on the cell phone of every single member of S.M.  Without their knowledge of course.  There was one slight problem:  Yuki only knew so much.  Although she could see was the location to which the phones' signals were bouncing to, Yuki would not be able to identify the individual owners of each phone.  The S.M. phones were untraceable, which, in Yuki's opinion, made her life more difficult than it needed to be.  However, she knew that identifying the traitor wouldn't be difficult.  They would either take names, allowing Yuki to dicover the traitor (which Yuki found highly unlikely) or schedule a meeting, giving Yuki the opportunity to stage an ambush.

It took months.

Managing and listening to every single call that every spy in S.M. made was practically impossible.  Therefore, Yuki began coding.  First, she coded a command that only allowed out-of-country calls to come her way.  Then, she coded a speech-to-text program, allowing the multiple computers Soo Man had granted her access to to write out what they heard over the call so she could review them later.

Yuki would have given up if the deaths of her fellow comrades hadn't spurred her on.  Whoever you are, Yuki thought to herself as she continued scanning through the tens of thousands of sheets in front of her, I will find you and I will make you pay for what you have done to S.M.

It was pure luck that had come to Yuki's aid.  The girl yawned and got up from her desk, stretching.  As she stood, her hand accidentally hit two large piles of paper on her left hand side.  "!" Yuki cursed as the papers fells to the floor.  Ugh. . . I REALLY don't want to pick that up. . . Yuki thought to herself, grimacing at the mass of sheets littering the floor, I can get back to it later. . .  She started to walk out of the room.  Her hand had grasped the handle of the door when something stopped her.  "Aish, curse my occassionally neat freak personality.  I blame Key," Yuki muttered to herself as she released the handle of the door and turned around to face the papers on the ground.  Unfortunately, the two stacks of paper Yuki had knocked down were placed into two individual stacks for a reason:  one stack of papers held each cell phones' calling history while the other had the notes of the conversations held over specific time periods.  Yuki was grumbling to herself while she tried to collect the papers when suddenly, one particular piece of paper caught her eye.

Call History Log

Phone line:  010-2797-5588 [A/N: Don't try calling this number.  It's fake :P]

[A/N:  The call log is WAYYYYYY longer than this, but I didn't want to keep coming up with random numbers, so I cut it off.  The calls have been going on for months.]

Yuki's eyes narrowed at she scanned the document intently.  The first thing she noticed was the amount of calls and the fact that they were all going to and coming from the same number.  The calls had started being documented once Yuki had placed a tracker on the phone obviously, but Yuki suspected that the calls had been going on for longer than that.  Her eyes immediately detected a pattern.  Starting from the beginning, in March, a conversation was held between the two numbers every six days.  That pattern and the fact that the calls were held at odd hours in the night grabbed Yuki's attention almost immediately.  Quickly, Yuki looked to see where the calls were going to/coming from.  Looking at the phone number intently, Yuki attempted to remember where the specific area code led to.  Running to a computer, Yuki opened up a hologram of a world map and tried to track the calls with a visual.

"Whoever's making and taking the calls is bouncing the signal," Yuki said as she watched a line bounce from Seoul to London to Uganda, "but as smart as you are. . .I'm smarter."  Typing quickly, Yuki attempted to override the code that was causing the location confusion.  Minutes later, Yuki managed to succeed.  "Gotcha," Yuki muttered, smirking as a steady line made its way to its final destination.  "I knew it. . ."

The line had stopped at Pyongyang, North Korea's captial.  Yuki's eyes trailed down to the bottom of the document she was holding.  The last call recorded was made at 3:30 this morning.  Finally, Yuki was shaken out of her stupor as the magnitude of what she had discovered hit her.

She tossed the paper she was holding aside and dove for the rest of the papers littering the floor, trying to search for the right sheet that held the conversation she was looking for.

"010-2797-5588. . . 010-2797-5588. . . 010-2797-5588. . ." the girl muttered to herself as she messily sifted through the papers, "02-555-0003. . . 02-555-0003. . . 02-555-0003. . .  I've got to find that conversation."  After twenty minutes of relentless searching, Yuki finally found the paper she was looking for.

"AHA!" Yuki exclaimed, holding up the paper.   Standing up, she quickly ran back to her desk and sat down, trying to correctly interpret the words written on the paper.  The girl wasn't surprised to find that code words were used throughout the entire conversation, and, as she predicted, no names were taken.  After more than two hours, Yuki managed to decipher the messages.

How is everything coming along?

Fine.  No one suspects a thing.

Target?

Eliminated.

Did you retrieve what we wanted?

Yes.

The sky meets the earth.  More than one source of power.  Precious rocks strongly defined.  Strongest light touches line.  

"What the ?" Yuki said as she read the message over and over again.  There was no doubt in her mind that the owner of this phone was the traitor.  But who the hell is it? she wondered, what does all of this mean?  "Okay, Yuki," the girl told herself, "focus, breathe, concentrate.  You're so close.  Now you just need to figure out this message.

Let's see here.  It's obvious that the first part of the message is simply asking how the traitor is doing.  The second part," Yuki's words caught in .  She cleared and continued.  "The. . . the second part is talking about Heechul.  So the traitor is the murderer.  'Did you retrieve what we wanted?'. . . so the traitor has some information.  No doubt it's important.  Perhaps. . . they want it?  Then that means. . . they're calling a meeting!"  Yuki snapped her fingers.  "That's GOT to be it.  Okay, so this last line here. . . a meeting place and time?  Most likely.  But. . . they're speaking in code. . . hm. . . let's take it one by one, yes?" (If you haven't notice, Yuki often tended to talk to herself when she was thinking out a problem).  "'The sky meets the earth. . .'  Okay what the does that even mean?  Okay, okay, don't get frustrated.  Logic, Bul. . . use LOGIC.  What could they be talking about?  The sky meets the earth. . . that sounds like a place. . . the location for the meeting!  Is it possible that it's in South Korea. . .?  Most likely.  I doubt that they would want their lovely insider getting caught.  Narrowing down places where the sky meets the earth. . ."  Yuki's eyebrows furrowed as she tried to think of a place that met the line's requirements.  A memory flashed past her eyes.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Yuki and the rest of SHINee were taking a break at the beach for their day off.  Daeho was supposed to come, but he rejected last minute.  Jonghyun, Taemin, Key, Jinki, and Yuki were sitting on the sand, looking out over the water.  Suddenly, Jonghyun chuckled.  "What's so funny Jjong?" Yuki asked curiously, looking at the boy.  

"It's nothing really.  It's just that. . . if you look out far enough, it looks like the sky is touching the water," Jonghyun said.  The others looked out over the water and grinned, noticing what the boy had pointed out.

"I read that somewhere once," Jinki said, smiling, "the horizon line of the beach is the one place where it looks like the sky is touching the ground. . ."

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"BEACH!" the girl suddenly shouted, "that's it!"  She immediately lowered her voice.  Sure, the door to the room she was in was closed and locked securely, but one can never be too careful.  Yuki coughed once before returning back to the paper in front of her.  "Okay. . . so the meeting place is at a beach. . . which beach?  There are HUNDREDS of beaches in South Korea!  How am I supposed to know which beach the meeting is going to be held?  AISH!  Okay, Yuki, context clues.  There's more to that last line, so keep moving forward.  The next part of the conversation. . . 'more than one source of power'. . . Well. . . there are multiple sources of power.  Um. . . heat, electricity, wind. . . what am I missing?  What's another source of power. . . And what beach has a source of power?  Okay. . . what can you find at a beach?  Sand?  No. . . Seashells?  No. . .  Children?  What?!  No!  Then. . ."  The answer practically slapped Yuki across the face.  "Water. . ." Yuki muttered, "hydroelectricity. . . think Yuki. . . how do you usually get hydroelectricity. . . water wheel!  Wait. . . water wheel?  At a beach. . .?"  Yuki gasped.

"Gyeongpo Beach!  The beach with the water wheel!  Of course!" Yuki practically jumped up in excitement.  There's a little bit more to the text. . . Yuki thought as she refocused on the words. let's see here. . . "'Precious rocks strongly defined,'" Yuki read aloud.  Well. . . it can't be referring to seashells, Yuki hypothesized, because that wouldn't make the meeting place clear for anyone. . . a cave, perhaps?  Yuki remembered that there was a cave on the shore of Gyeongpo beach, a cave that was said to glow with many colorful stones at a specific time of night.  That HAS to be it, Yuki thought, which means. . . I'VE JUST FOUND OUT THE LOCATION OF THE MEETING!  YES! 

"That means that some part of this message is supposed to tell the time they're supposed to meet," Yuki muttered after she had gotten over her excitement.  "This part here. . . 'strongest light touches line.'  What could that possibly be referring to?"  Yuki racked her brain for ten minutes, but came up with nothing.  "AISH!" Yuki grunted, slamming her head against her desk.  I've gotten so far!!  I can't give up yet! Yuki mentally encouraged herself.  Before she could do anything else, a shaft of light from the window hit her face, causing her to squint from the sudden sunlight.  Wait a minute. . . sunlight. . . line. . .

Yuki sprang out of her chair.  "THAT'S IT!  I KNOW EXACTLY WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN!" she shamelessly shouted, "the exchange is supposed to take place inside the famous cave of Gyeongpo beach when the sun touches the horizon line, in other words, sunset, which is at. . . 6:30!"  Yuki quickly checked her watch.  "WHICH IS IN AN HOUR?!  !"  Yuki wasted no time in jumping right over her desk, quickly unlocking the door to her office, and sprinting out of the room.

Only to crash headlong into someone and knock them both to the ground.  Yuki looked up to see the face of the male she had landed on.  "Oh!  Daeho!" Yuki exclaimed, getting up and holding her hand out for her partner, "sup bro?"  Daeho rolled his eyes at Yuki, but accepted her offer of help. 

"Hey, Yuki-ah.  Jesus, can't you call me Daeho 'oppa' for once?  Is it REALLY that hard?  We've been partners for such a long time now!" the man complained.  Yuki wrinkled her nose.

"Ew, no way, Daeho.  You're not even that much older than me!  And plus, 'oppa' is too. . . weird."

"You are such a boy."

"Pfft, I have no shame," Yuki retorted, sticking out her tongue at her partner.  After Key, Jonghyun, Jinki, and Taemin, Yuki counted Daeho as her closest associate.  They had become friends quickly, forming a close bond.  People had often told Yuki that Daeho had a thing for her, but Yuki blew it off.  She held no feelings other than close comeraderie for her partner.

"Anyways," Daeho said, brushing himself off, "what's got you so excited?  I rarely see you this hyped up for anything."

Yuki opened and was almost about to tell him of her discoveries.

Almost.

Something forced Yuki to hold her tongue.  "You're the only person other than me that knows that we have a double-crosser in S.M., Yuk.  I expect it to stay that way.  Everyone in S.M. is a suspect."

Yuki playfully punched Daeho's arm.  "I finally think I can solve a rubics cube faster than Jinki!!" she said in excitement, "he's sooooo going down this time!"

Yuki's heart sank slightly at the lie.  There's no way Daeho would ever. . . it should be okay to tell him. . .  maybe I should.  I could use the backup.

"Hey, Daeho," Yuki suddenly said.  

"Yeah?  What's up?" Daeho asked, looking at his partner.

"Ah. . .nevermind!  I was gonna ask you if you wanted to see me beat Jinki, but it looks like you're going somewhere."

"Oh!  Okay.  Sorry, Yuki-ah, but I actually do have stuff to do today!  You're gonna have to beat him in front of me next time!  'Cause I won't believe you until then!" Daeho said, laughing and ducking as Yuki tried to take a swipe at him.

"Yah!" Yuki yelled as the boy ran off.  "That fool. . ." the girl muttered to herself, shaking her head.  She smiled lightly before starting her preparation.

That traitor's going down the hard way.  Prepare yourself buddy, because I'm out to make you wish you were never born. . .

Or worse.

Hi guys!  AthleticShawol back with another chapter!!  I noticed that the views for the story keep increasing, but unfortunately, the subscriptions are not.  Perhaps people just aren't that interested in the plot line.  Oh well!  I'm just happy I could gain subbies over time.  Perhaps I've capped out, hm?  Haha.  I'd like to thank any of you that rose to the occassion and tried to help me promote.  It was really nice of you. :) <3

Anyways, I hope this chapter doesn't disappoint!  I want your feedback:

Would you want to see Part II of "The Incident" uploaded tomorrow?  Please comment below and let me know!! ^-^

If anyone who has taken interest in this story has not already done so, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE subscribe and comment!!! (You too silent subbies!!! xP)  I really love to see new subscriptions!! It reminds me of why I update for you guys every week!! <3

Quick thank you to my new subscriber!! <3

skynightstars 

Okay, I'll sign off now!  See you guys real soon! <3  Happy holidays!! ^_^

~Yuki ❄