Sprawled lazily on the white duvet in an expensive hotel in Italy, was Ok Taecyeon. He opened his eyes to the sight of his girlfriend’s back, Im Yoona, busy tapping away on his computer on the white dressing table that complimented the chic decor of the room.

“Yoona? What got you up so early? Hmm?” He went on to hug Yoona from the back, to which Yoona tried to respond to warmly, before turning off the laptop hastily.

“Nothing, I was just reading some news online.” Yoona stood up, turned around and kissed Taecyeon on his forehead before pushing Taecyeon away gently. She gave him a teasing look before dropping the oversized Taecyeon’s shirt she was wearing at her feet and continued to walk seductively into the bathroom.

He traced the movement of Yoona’s hips until she disappeared into the bathroom and put his gaze back to the laptop. He the laptop, and true to Yoona’s words, she was just reading news online. However, Yoona had forgotten to do one thing, she had forgotten to unplug her pen drive from the laptop’s USB port. It stuck out from the computer like a sore thumb. Taecyeon tried to open the folders in the flash drive, but they were all restricted, a password would be of use to open them.

Without Yoona’s knowledge, he took the thumb drive and kept it in his coat pocket. He joined Yoona in the bathroom, brushed his teeth, and put on his pants, a shirt and a tie, before leaving Yoona in the room for the Echelon branch in Italy.

“I’ll be back soon, I promise.” He planted a kiss on Yoona’s lips before stepping out of the room.

“Are you sure you don’t want any breakfast?”

“I’m sure. Don’t worry about me. You get your own breakfast.”

Closing the hotel room door, Taecyeon walked down the hotel’s hallway to a lift at the end.

_______

As Taecyeon stepped out of the lift into the fourth floor of the Echelon office, he greeted all the operatives he met before stepping into the room of Mr. Facinelli, his supervisor.

“Good morning sir.”

“Good morning. Please, have a seat Taec.”

Taecyeon sat down, facing Mr. Facinelli, and handed the pen drive he found to him.

“Sir, I found this. The suspect put a pass code to the pen drive. I couldn’t access it from my laptop, so I brought this here.” Taecyeon looked sullen as he gave the pen drive to his supervisor. “Whatever’s in the drive, I would like to be the first to know.”

“Of course Taec. I hope you know, that this is part and parcel of being an Echelon. The woman you love could be an enemy. Remember the mantra; trust no one but yourself.”

_______

Taecyeon went back to the hotel in the evening, and opened the door to his room to a warm and welcoming Yoona, the sweet scent of the rose petals scattered on the bed, and the sound of romantic music.

“Taecyeon ah! You’re back! I’ve ordered room service. The food will be here soon. Come on, I’ll take your coat off for you.”

Taecyeon did not reciprocate Yoona’s gentleness, instead, threw the pen drive he found in the morning on the bed angrily.

“Tell me, what’s in the flash drive?”

Yoona, surprised by Taecyeon’s sudden change in behaviour, immediately hugged Taecyeon, “What’s wrong baby? You had an argument with your boss again?”

Taecyeon grabbed Yoona by her arms and made her look at him, “WHAT-IS-IN-THE-FLASH-DRIVE?”

Wide-eyed, Yoona replied, “Just, files, you know, documents for my work.”

“WHY are you doing this to me Yoona?” Taecyeon let go of Yoona’s hands before grabbing the pen drive on the bed. He held the pen drive in between his fingers, and stared at Yoona furiously, “You know what the Echelon found in here?”

Yoona’s gaze followed Taecyeon hands, before turning her back to Taecyeon.

Taecyeon continued, “Two months ago, an entire mission failed because it was sabotaged, almost killing all my men. The Echelon found out that a transmission of sensitive data was made from MY laptop to an unknown receiver. I almost got booted out of the Echelon, but Mr. Facinelli stood up for me, and cleared my name. He knew that I would never compromise the safety of my men. I never told you about that. Why? Because I knew that you were the only one who had access to my laptop. Because I refused to believe that it was you. Because I believed we have a future together. Because I loved you.”

Yoona responded to the sudden outburst matter-of-factly, “So, you already knew.”

“I gave you a second chance, but you blew it! Today, they found confidential data about my next mission in the pen drive.”

Just then, Taecyeon’s mobile phone rang in his pocket, he answered the phone just to hear two words, “Kill her.”

“You were stupid and naive.” Yoona pulled out a gun and pointed it to Taecyeon’s head.

He kept his cool, “Before you kill me, who are you working for?”

“I can’t tell you. It’s been a fun ride Taec. Bye love.”

BANG!

The sounds of gunshot and the shattering of the hotel glass window were deafening. Shards of glass flew everywhere and the curtains flew wildly due to the wind rushing in from outside through the gaping hole where the window used to be.

Blood splattered onto Taecyeon’s face as he saw a bloodied Yoona falling on the carpet floor.

Taecyeon, who was still holding on to his phone, pressed it back to his ear to hear Mr. Facinelli’s voice, “Since it’s difficult for you to do it, I had our sniper finish her for you. Some Echelon operatives are being sent to your room before the police arrive. As for you, clean yourself up and get your back to the office, NOW.”

_______

As a glum-looking Taecyeon sat facing Mr. Facinelli in his office, Mr. Kang walked in.

“Good to see you Mr. Facinelli!” Mr. Kang shook Mr. Facinelli’s hand briefly, before asking, “I take it that this is the agent you were talking about?”

“Yes, yes Mr. Kang. I’ll leave him to you.” Mr. Kang sat beside Taecyeon after Mr. Facinelli left the room.

“Mr. Ok Taecyeon. I have a deal for you. I’m setting up an elite unit called The Supreme Echelon, based in our home country, Korea. And I would like you to lead it. I know that you have your own squad here, your experience would be beneficial to the new team.”

“I am not the only squad commander here.”

“Yes, but you have always been on the front line in combating our nemesis. Like the one tonight.”

“You knew what happened just now?”

“Yes. Since there’s just the two of us, I’ll be open, I used to love a woman deeply too, until I found out she was working for an enemy’s agency.”

“What happened to her?”

“Just like you, I pretended that I didn’t know it at first, until she got careless. I--”

“What just like me? You knew?”

“Mr. Ok, you remind me so much of myself. From the look of things, you were the one who put her on the table. You made it known to the Echelon that she was the suspect.”

Taecyeon snapped at the sudden accusation, “I DID NOT PUT HER ON THE TABLE! Sure, I suspected it was her, but I never breathed a word about it to anyone. The Echelon found out about it through their own devices!”

“But YOU tried to investigate for yourself, didn’t you? The pen drive, you gave it to the Echelon yourself.”

“It was given to them because I knew they were hot on her heels. I just needed the truth. I hoped it would come from her, but it didn’t. As for the Echelon, I have never seen such drastic action.”

“Exactly what I was saying Mr. Ok. But it doesn’t matter now, she’s dead. And you will be seeing more of those ‘drastic actions’ if you join The Supreme Echelon.”

“I never thought it would come to this.”

“The difference between you and me young man, is, I shot my own lover dead. And you couldn’t do it. Did you love her?”

Before Taecyeon could answer, Mr. Kang ended the conversation by handing an air ticket to Taecyeon, “The flight is 11 o’clock tomorrow morning. I hope to see you reporting to me back in Korea. ”

As Mr. Kang walked out of the room, Taecyeon muttered under his breath, “I did love her.”

_______

As Taecyeon walked towards the departure gate to leave Italy for Korea in Florence Airport, he gave one last look at the picture of him and Yoona together, before crumpling it in his hands and throwing it into the trash bin.

_______

Comments are loved ♥ If you spot any spelling or grammar mistake, please kindly point it out to me, thank you :)

This is a song to illustrate Taecyeon's relationship with Yoona,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oA5DgYlrII