Seoul

07:19 pm

Hongdae

Mapo-Gu District, Seoul

 

 

Hongdae is a region located the western side of Seoul. It is known for its arts and indie music culture, a symbol of unique cultural identity for Korean youth. The area provides street art festivals and performances also home for cafes, bars, restaurants, and nightclubs. -wikipedia

 

At the outskirts of northern Hongdae there was a car workshop located deep inside an alley as if it didn't want to be found.

 

From the outside it looked just like any kind of normal workshop. It looked kinda rugged with a big metal rolling door at the front. But on the inside it was so spacious, clean, and tidy. Bright lighting provided enough visibility with lots of modern state of the art equipments you need in a garage. Hydraulic car lifts, four of them, located side by side next to one another. Air compressor installed on the ceiling to keep the tires full, but also to power for many tools such as spray guns, wrenches, and drills. A slatwall with hooks, panels, and shelves mounted on one side of a 25 meters wall to maximize wall space and store many tools within easy reach with power tool charging station to the mix to escape the hassle of finding an unused electrical outlet. On the other side of the workshop there's a long work bench to allow plenty of room for any and all work might need to do away from the vehicles. On one corner there was a quality sound system installed to wash up the quietness or to pumped up the spirit. Next to the workshop there was a garage where several cars were parked and one of them was a yellow Mazda MX-5 and a Nissan SilEighty.

 

Upstairs was the owner of the workshop's office and living space. It had a fully functional kitchen set with dinner table, 3 bedrooms to take a rest, 2 bathrooms, one set of quality sound system, a long sofa, and a 55” LED TV. In the office area there were a few computer screens, laptops and a printer. Shelves fulled with folders and CDs. One particular shelf were filled with portable external hard disks.

 

The owner of the place looked busy in front of one 21” computer screen doing some editing from a few video recording when there was a buzz sound and followed by a girl's voice from the intercom.

 

“Open the gate, Sunny”

 

With a lollipop in she looked at the small screen from the CCTV that showed a silver Mercedez Benz SLK, and pushed a button that made a buzzing sound to open the gate of the workshop to let the car to enter.

 

Once the driver parked the car she immediately went upstairs to meet up with the owner of the place.

 

“Hey, Sunny.”

 

“Hey, Tae..are the others coming?”

 

“Tiffany is on her way here..the others still have their own schedules so they wouldn't come but we can start without them..” Taeyeon explained while taking off her office blazer.

 

“Is Seohyun here? I saw her car downstairs”

 

“She went to grab some takeaways nearby..should be back soon” Sunny replied still working on her PC.

 

It didn't take long before someone buzzed the garage door driving a Range Rover Evoque.

 

“Heeeeeyy, Sunny...we're heeere..”

 

The garage door rolled up once again to let the car got inside.

 

“Hey guys! What's up?” Tiffany and Seohyun emerged from the stairs joining Sunny and Taeyeon.

 

“Hey, Tiff..Seo, you're back already..” Sunny spun her chair and greeted them.

 

“Tiffany unnie picked me up on my way here..thankfully she did, or else I would have trouble to bring all these takeaways..”

 

“Are those our dinner?” Taeyeon asked.

 

“Yes..Hyoyeon unnie called us earlier she couldn't come and cook, so tonight we'll be having Chinese... I ordered yours without nuts just like you always wanted. Oh, what time the others will come?”

 

“The others probably wouldn't make it because of their schedules, so...” Taeyeon replied while she sipped her coffee she made from the coffee machine.

 

“Oh, okay...so what should we do with all of these food? I even ordered extra for Yoona and Sooyoung unnie..” she pouted.

 

“No need to worry, Seo..we could always eat it for tomorrow..just put them in the fridge..here, let me help you with them.” Tiffany started to unpack the takeaways and took some to the fridge.

 

“Thank you, unnie”

 

“Sunny, have you finished yet?” Taeyeon went to Sunny.

 

“Yup..! I have just finished compiling and edited all the video from our in-dashboard camera we put during our visit to the Super Junior..now we could pick from any camera and watch so

we could study the track..”

 

“And we could study how the Super Junior member drive through the track from the footage”

 

“Good! Now let's have dinner while we watch the videos..”Tiffany said eagerly.

 

And after the girls had their brief dinner they gathered around in front of the computer screen where Sunny had been working on. Sometimes when they think they needed to take a closer look at their opponent, they installed an on board camera on their cars to record everything when they hit the track so later on they could study them closely without actually being there but in their convenience of the workshop. They could play it, paused it, replay it, the flow of the track, their opponent's driving style or skill, they looked for anything that they could take as an advantages.

 

“Let us watch from Yoona's car first...She was behind Siwon for some time, I want to see how he drives around the track..”

 

They all watched the video. They were so focused on the computer screen no one made any sound. The footage showed how smoothly Siwon's car danced on the track. It showed how he right on the clipping point every time he drifted around a corner. He had the best balanced car for the downhill attack.

 

“There's no way that Yoona could keep up with him..He was too good!”

 

“I know..maybe it was because he had the home track advantage, but still..”

 

“We should take a closer look on him but it would better if we watch it again with the rest of our member so we could analyze it better to decide who would be the best to race against him on race day..” Taeyeon suggested.

 

“Now let's take a quick look on the others..I want to see their driving techniques..”

 

They watched the other videos closely and carefully between their meals. They discussed it seriously if they noticed something that caught their interest. It actually took a couple of hours for them to watched all of the videos their dinner were long gone, so they grabbed anything they could fine for snacks in Sunny's kitchen cabinets.

 

“Hey, Tae..which one do you want? I got sour cream flavored chips and barbeque flavored ones here..” Tiffany asked while she held two largest bags of potato chips she could found.

 

“Anything, Tiff..” she replied without looking back. Her attention glued to the screen she was still watching.

 

“Okay...both of them then..” Tiffany decided it herself with a big smile.

 

“Anyway, that takeaway was pretty good. Where did you bought it, Seo?” Sunny turned her

 

chair facing Seohyun who was helping Tiffany with the bags of chips.

 

“I bought it from the Chinese takeaways that had just opened at the end of the street..”

 

“Which one is it?”

 

“Express 999..”

 

“They're all pretty good”. Taeyeon suddenly spoke.

 

“I know, right? Hongdae has quite a lot of good restaurants..”

 

“No, silly...i mean the Super Juniors!”

 

“Oh..”

 

“They made a great first impression when we met them last Saturday and seemed it would be really hard to beat, but as you watch their videos over and over again you could see their flaws and some mistakes they made..”

 

“Take this guy who drove the R34 for example..” Taeyeon clicked on one of the video.

 

“This guy is good but an aggressive type..it would be troublesome for us if we have to race against him..but..he often made mistakes..”

 

“Like here..” She replayed one part and put it on slow motion. “Sometimes he accelerate too early exiting a corner or entering a corner too aggresive that made him tends to understeer and oversteer..of course his all-wheel-drive will counter them most of the time but it shows that he's an impatient type of person..and it's easier to go up against an impatient opponent..you just have to push him until he makes a mistake..”

 

The other girls listened to her closely while watching the footage Taeyeon showed with Tiffany kept on munching her chips.

 

“Next one is Leeteuk in his Supra..his car has a lot of power and there's a high possibility that he will race uphill because of that advantage..but that power sometimes caused him to enter a corner too fast and missed his braking point and oversteered..if that happen he becomes sloppy..”

 

“We can win this..” Sunny looked at Taeyeon while Tiffany and Seohyun nodded in agreement.

 

“I think that's all for tonight. Tomorrow I'll ask the rest to gather here and we can decide who's against who on race day..” Taeyeon then stood up from the chair and stretched her back like a cat.

 

“Sunny, is there anything else?”

 

“The EXO crew asked for a rematch this Wednesday at midnight. They said they want to reclaim their territory in Gangnam back..”

 

Seohyun switched her attention from Sunny to Taeyeon in confusion. “Reclaim their territory? We have never claimed anyone's territory before..”

 

“Our goal doing this has never been about claiming someone's territory..It's just their lame excuse to regain their dignity back from losing from us..” Taeyeon left the office area and went into one of the room.

 

“So we let them keep their territory, but everyone knows that they have been beaten..that's a bit cruel isn't it?” Tiffany looked at Seohyun and Sunny with a smirk on her face.

 

Taeyeon came out from the room already changed into something more comfortable. A sleeveless t-shirt and a pair of jeans. Then she grabbed a leather jacket that was leaning on the sofa and wore it.

 

“Let's head out for a ride...i need some refreshing from work at the office”

 

With that all the four girls got into their cars, not the one they use daily, but the ones that showed their identity as Girls Generation.

 

Their engines roared and the four cars exited the garage door onto the streets of Seoul.

 

 

 ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

X City

09.04 pm

Downtown area

 

 

In the middle of the downtown area one particular garage still had its lights on while the other shops and building surrounding it already closed and dark, only street lamps illuminated the empty street.

 

Inside a tire-less green Toyota Supra was lifted on a jack at one corner of the garage, the owner looked busy sitting on the concrete floor working on the front right side of the car when a couple of cars stopped at the front of the garage.

 

“Hey, Leeteuk..'sup?”

 

“Hey, Heechul..Kangin.....what brought you guys here?”

 

“We brought you some sandwich for your dinner..” Kangin then threw a brown paper bag which Leeteuk caught it unprepared.

 

“Oh, thanks..how do you know I haven't eaten anything yet?”

 

“We knew we would find you here working your off on the car...You came here right off from work, right? So we bought you something to eat at the convenience store on our way here..”

 

Heechul noticed some brand new tires laid on the floor and walked towards them. “Putting new tires on? Aren't those type pretty costly”, he then looked at Leeteuk.

 

“Yup...i need tires with better grip, my old ones won't do..I've changed the engine settings and my brake pads too..”

 

“Aren't we decided already that Siwon will do the downhill race?” Kangin went to the vending machine to get some drinks and then handed Heechul and Leeteuk each one a can of soda.

 

“We did..but I want to do the uphill race..we need to show those girls what are we capable of..”

 

“Have you seen the videos Kyuhyun compiled?” Heechul grabbed a plastic stool and sat opposite of Leeteuk.

 

What Heechul meant with the videos, like the Girls Generation they also record the action using several video cameras. Kyuhyun had several men stationed on every critical corners especially the highly technical ones so later on they could watch how their opponent tackled the corner, what technique they used, how they entered it, how they exited it.

 

“Yes I did...and they're pretty skillful...that's why while we have the home advantage we need to maximize it as far as we can..”

 

“Are you sure you want to do it? Donghae in his GT-R is pretty good racing uphill, why don't you let him do it?”

 

“Maybe I would..but my pride as the leader of Super Junior wouldn't allow it..”

 

“Okay.......just don't push yourself too hard..” Heechul often thinks Leeteuk sometimes took too much unnecessary burden on himself. He is concerned about him more as a friend rather than as a leader.

 

“I know..I know..” Leeteuk replied.

 

“Anyway..need a hand?” Heechul and Kangin stood up and began to roll up their shirt sleeves.

 

“Much appreciated!” Leeteuk replied gladly with a huge smile. “It would take me all night if I have to do it on my own!”

 

 

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

Sorry for the late update.

I'll try to make a shorter chapter so i could update them at least once a month.

anyways, comments are welcomed..