Lady's POV: *It's really him… What am I supposed to do..."

Jongin's expression had a mix of confusion and anger as he trained his eyes on the female in the lab coat.

"What is THIS? Why are you making copies of me?? Who said you could do this?"

Jongin looked towards her incredulously, the keys in his hand pointed midair at the mannequin of him. 

"And, what does THIS do?" Jongin raised the '2.0' key between both their faces, drawing his face closer to her still. 

The girl was extremely flustered and backed away from Jongin. Not seeing where she was backing up to, she brushed against some papers scattered on a desk behind her, causing a mini paper avalanche.

She let out a tiny but audible yelp, getting down on her knees to sort out the mess.

On any normal day, Jongin would have been the first to help. However, he just didn't know what sort of territory he was in, and that stunted his ability to react other than being driven by his immediate desire to know why a replica of him has been hiding in SM's basement this whole time.

He knew SM could be devious in reaping profits off them celebrities, but still, making human replicas is a first even for them. If any entertainment company in the world could afford this sort of experiments, it would surely be SM Entertainment though.

And this girl who crouched before him with her face shrouded by her long jet-black hair, is the sole representative who can tell him what they intend to do with his replica.

Why is she taking so long to look up at him? Is she trying to avoid answering his question by intentionally gathering the papers slowly?

Jongin bent his knees to crouching position. "Hey, you're not answering me-"

He wanted to press the girl for much needed information to allay his anxieties, but he stopped short.

She was crying.

Not to the point of weeping, but he could see her hastily trying to stem teardrops at the corner of her eyes, hiding behind tresses of her hair.

He was both concerned and puzzled. Hardly did a girl ever cry so reservedly in front of him.

Sure, he was used to emotional fangirls, but this could not be the reason for her crying could it?

"Why are you crying." Jongin probed softly, after a moment of hesitation.

"I'm sorry…" began her reply. "It's just… I've never seen you so up close before."

She cupped a hand over and took a sharp breath to cease the sniffles, eventually stealing a glance at Jongin at the end of her sentence.

Jongin's mouth was hanging slightly ajar.

This obviously wasn't getting any easier to understand.

Here he was, crouching with a peculiar girl in a lab coat, who basically just confessed that she has been keeping an eye on him.

"Woah… This is too much." Jongin stood up to give himself some space between him and the girl.

He went round to confront his replica again, running his hand through his hair distractedly, then rocking back and forth on the heels of his trainers while his arms folded at his waist in the midst of his contemplation. 

The girl realised that Jongin now has good reason to be freaking out, and was trying his best to control himself. By focusing on the physical exertions of his shifting feet, he was able to internalize any unbecoming thoughts for a while.

The girl brought herself to stand, leaning upon the table behind her and laying down the stack of papers she had picked. 

"I'm sorry if this alarms you." She looked towards Jongin, sincerely apologetic.

Jongin returned a side glance, all ears to a response that did not deny logical understanding. 

"You weren't supposed to find out this way. It's my fault."

Jongin made a start to speak out why wasn't he entitled to know, but the girl beat him to it. 

"I will tell you everything, although it is against company's policy to do so." 

Jongin quietly observed that the girl had regained her composure, and her wide eyes held the promise that his wellbeing is assured, above the agenda of the company.

"…Fair enough." Jongin accepted.

Her willingness to divulge was a start, though it filled him with trepidation to hear how the company did not intend for him to know.

"And just to clear any misunderstanding… What I said earlier…" The girl's face displayed red tints of embarrassement.

"I hadn't meant to say it in a creepy sort of way…"

The girl hesitated to elaborate, as though she had already said quite enough in defense of her earlier breakdown.

"Why did you cry?"

Jongin had a habit of being laconic with strangers. The fact that he even bothered to ask her a second time was to some degree, a minor way of caring.

"I don't know." came her direct reply.

She seemed to want to give some thought to that too, but held her pensive mood in suspension.

"I've only seen you from afar, and on TV… Yet… You're here."

The girl said inconclusively to Jongin, like she was also unsure what to make out of their chance meeting.

Jongin could tell that she didn't mind looking straight at him, at every turn of their conversation.

It didn't exactly make him feel uncomfortable.

She had a different way of looking at him, unlike the smitten look of a fangirl.

Was it considered a look of admiration?

No, that would have made him feel rather strange too, as if he were a piece of art on public display.

She made eye contact without faltering. She seemed to want to look right through him.

He felt a little bit like a subject she was curious to study closely.

This is probably why she was chosen to create my mannequin, Jongin thought to himself. 

"She watches my movements." He silently realised.

He suddenly had a rough idea what the replica of him would do, if the key were meant to power it up.  

The girl was looking at him quizzically, after a long interval of silence between them had passed, and Jongin looked like he was sizing her up through a private conversation in his head.

"Do you want to ask a question then…?", she spoke. 

Jongin proceeded to walk towards her, during which she looked up, down, and everywhere else except at him. 

"Yes." He said, upon getting nearer to her.

He happened to see how her eyes were still puffy, and her nose was still red from all the crying just now.

"Can I first borrow your keys?" Jongin extended his palm in the direction of her lab coat pocket, where he knew her keys rested.

Unable to evade his request since the keys were within his reach anyway, the girl lifted out the keys to pass them to him.

Jongin extracted the duplicate "2.0" key from the rest of the bunch, and returned her all but that one key which she had earlier been about to insert into the side torso of his lifelike dummy.

"Why are you taking that away? You have that with the keys that I dropped." The girl protested. 

"Did you already know that I had them?" Jongin recalled the encounter they had last night, when he was sure she noticed him first. 

"I only know I dropped them last night, and then you came in with them in your hand…"

"Okay." Jongin nodded. "But I'm still taking these with me."

Jongin indicated the bunch of keys she had dropped last night, and the duplicate "2.0" key he had just snagged from her.

"Those are the only two I've got... Please let me have one back." The girl pleaded, eyeing the "2.0" keys held by Jongin.

"They have my name on it, so I would say they're mine."

The girl lowered her eyes in admission that what Jongin said did have some truth to it.

"I'd come by tomorrow, and you can show me exactly what's going on here. Until then, I don't think anyone needs to know that we were in contact, yes?"

Jongin dangled the only two copies of the "2.0" key under the girl's nose nonchalantly, a tiny smile coming into play.

The girl peeked up at his teasing grin, and quickly glanced away again, muttering to herself, "Of course."

Jongin was satisfied that she understood everything at the lab was suspended till he got his explanation tomorrow. With that, he felt more at ease leaving this place for his dance practice, without the fear that tomorrow everything would disappear from here, including the well-kept secret of a mannequin being modelled after him for dubious reasons.

He wondered if this was something he should share with his best bud, Taemin, when he sees him later. But he probably needed to figure this one out himself first…

Caught in a trail of many thoughts, Jongin had finally exited, and left the lab all to herself again.

The girl breathed a sigh of relief, to find her heartbeat could now gradually slow down. At the same time, she had to lean back against a table with weariness, because now that the real Kai had discovered what he was better off not knowing, she wondered if she would have to make a choice in future - Protect herself, or Him?

 

 

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Disclaimer: All pics used are not mine.