There’s nothing else to do right now so I suggest we go to bed for a couple of hours. Everyone agrees but except for Taemin we all have a hard time to fall asleep.

Jjong wakes me at 6:00am.

“Kibum sent a text, he’s at Osaka airport. They’ll be boarding for Incheon in half an hour, but the flight might still be cancelled.”

“How did he get there?” I ask not fully awake yet.

“I don’t know and I don’t really care either. If they can start, he’ll be at Incheon around 10:00am and we can set off to Mokpo directly from the airport.”

If it works out we will still have 12 hours to get to the rendezvous point. It’s not great but sufficient ... I hope.

We tell Minho who’s awake already but we let Taemin sleep in. All of us still don’t get enough sleep most of the time. So we take all the chances we get.

Around 7:00am Kibum calls:

“We’re still not boarding”, he tells us, “the weather got worse and some of the long-distance-flights have already been cancelled.”

“”, Jjong says, “so what will you do?”

“Looks like Skymark might risk to go out of Narita. The airport itself is still open, only the airlines have started to cancel. I’ll try to change the flight. Skymark are boarding for Incheon at 8:00am but I’ll probably be lucky to get standing room.”

Before I can stop myself, Onew sangtae strikes and I say:

“You’re not allowed to stand on an airplane.”

“What ...?” Jjong looks at me weirdly and then understands. Kibum doesn’t even say anything but I can vividly picture the face he’s making. They know me so well.

“I’ll call again”, Kibum ends the conversation. I imagine him charming the airline staff into doing what he wants, charming and entertaining in his usual professional manner.

I’ve always envied him for his stage presence. It looks so easy on him although he really works hard for it. As soon as he has got an audience he becomes larger than life and he even possesses emergency-reserves he can activate if necessary.

Minho is on edge. While we’re having breakfast, Taemin finally awake, Minho keeps getting up and pacing through the dorm, fiddling with stuff, and freaking out at the smallest issues, which subsequently drives Jjong crazy. So we’re all pretty strained already when my phone rings again.

“Yoboseyo?”

There’s a short pause at the end of the line, then someone asks: “Is that Onew?”

The voice is altered into chipmunk-mode, the number is suppressed.

“Yes”, I say and look at the guys who all stopped what they were doing and are listening in.

“Is everybody there?” the voice asks.

“Kim Kibum is still absent”, I say uncertain how to address the person and therefore using honorifics, “He is stuck in Tokyo but trying to get here as soon as possible.”

I might be mistaken but I believe there is some whispered conversation on the other side.

“Well, you will have to be complete to get Yoogeun back”, the voice says and then superfluously adds, “or he will die!”

Something sounds suspiciously like a giggle in the background, but maybe it’s just a side-effect of the voice-altering device.

Minho grabs my phone.

“Look, we’re not sure that Kibum can make it. Please give us extra time. If you kill Yoogeun you’re not gaining anything.”

“Is that Minho?” the voice asks excitedly and this time I’m sure I hear a second person in the background saying “oh my God, Minho!”

We exchange looks and probably all think the same thing.

Jjong takes the phone and says:

“It’s not too late to stop this. Return Yoogeun to his family now and we might work something out.”

“You’re doing what we tell you”, the voice says quickly, “don’t try to call the police.” And then it sounds like somebody else takes over and adds “there’s no extra time. Get here till 10:00pm or we cut his throat.”

And then it’s giggles again in the background before they hang up.

We’re dumbfounded.

“Is this a joke?” Jjong asks no one in particular. “Can you believe manic fans would go that far?”

“Some girls kidnapping Yoogeun to meet SHINee.” Minho says and shakes his head.

“We don’t know that for sure”, Taemin remarks, “it might all sound weird because of the voice-modification.”

“Whoever they are, they obviously got Yoogeun”, I say, “and if they are sasaeng they might be capable of anything.”

“You’re right”, Minho agrees, “but it feels even more wrong now to fulfill their demands. Who do they think they are?”

“Whatever”, says Jjong, “can’t argue with stupid. We might as well get ready to drive up to Incheon. Kibum will go there one way or other and as soon as he arrives we will need to leave for Mokpo immediately.”