August 13th, 2016 13:30. Choongbook Chungju-si 17th Fighter Wing Airforce Base Operation Briefing Room.

President Suh Hyun-woo finished dining with the soldiers from the Airforce and was seated in the operations briefing room with his entourage. They were there to hear plans about building a laboratory intended to research the unidentified object.

“Loyalty! I am Major Kang Ki-joong from the 17th Fighter Wing. I’ll be the one to brief you about the construction of the laboratory within our base. Since the construction of this facility is top-secret, we’ve named it as a weapons storage unit and office housing the next-generation weapons. The labor and equipment for this project will be provided from three engineering battalions from the army and our facilities; we expect to finish construction within November. Please look at the screen.”

The 200-inch screen displayed the blueprint of the laboratory in 3D format.

“As you can see from the display, this laboratory will be built underground. The first reason is to avoid reconnaissance from neighboring countries, and the second is to maintain secrecy from the soldiers in base.” Major Kang Ki-joong signaled to the soldier operating the console next to him and continued his explanation. “The next slide will explain the different functions of each structure at each level. I’ll begin with the first floor. The area of the first floor will be…”

* * *

August 15th, 2016 09:30. Seoul NIS Counter-terrorism Investigation Unit 1.

Despite it being the independence day holiday, the Counter-terrorism Investigation Unit 1 was as busy as ever. It was not just Counter-terrorism Investigation Unit 1, but the entire NIS was as busy as if an emergency situation was occurring.

Namgoong-won, who thought something was off after seeing all the other department agents packing their things, was curious after coming into the office. He saw that even Chief Kim Na-un was packing. He asked, “What’s going on, Chief Kim?”

“We’re getting dispatched!”

“Being dispatched all of a sudden? To where?”

“I’m not exactly sure yet, but we’ve been tasked with guarding high-up government bureaucrats.”

“What? Why’s our department taking on bodyguard tasks?”

“I’m not sure. The orders are coming from up top… What are we going to do about it?”

A moment later, Manager An Yeon-wu and Assistant Manager Lee Hye-jin came into the office after finishing the executive meeting.

“Chief Oh, did you finish packing up?”

“For luggage, this is all I have. Ha, ha, ha.”

“Is that so? Please step into my office for a moment.”

“Yes, of course.”

Namgoong-won, who was looking at Chief Kim Na-un following Manager An Yeon-wu, walked up to Assistant Manager Lee Hye-jin and whispered to her a question. “What’s going on? Chief Kim told me this was because of the bodyguard work.”

“What? Why are you whispering when no one’s around?”

“It seemed like confidential information; that’s why.”

“I’ll tell you when we get home. I have an urgent matter to attend to.”

“Yes, understood.”

* * *

August 15th, 2016 20:30. Seoul Kang Nam-ku Yuksam-dong. Namgoong-won’s studio apartment.

Namgoong-won left the office with Assistant Manager Lee Hye-jin and returned to his studio apartment after having dinner at a restaurant near Kang nam station.

“I miss in our college days where a holiday meant there’s no work to be done.”

Namgoong-won laid down on his couch and stretched as he glanced at the ceiling. Assistant Manager Lee Hye-jin was taken aback from how easily Namgoong-won spoke about his hurtful past, as if he had overcome it. She regained her composure and spoke as she sat down next to him. “Right now, there are millions of young people who are unemployed. Do you realize how good you have it for even having a career? Stop talking high and mighty…”

Smooch. She kissed Namgoon-won’s forehead.

“Is that so? Oh, right, didn’t you promise to tell me when we got home?”

Assistant Manager Lee Hye-jin hesitated for a moment. She spoke after seeing the very curious look on Namgoong-won’s face. “This is S-class confidential information, so listen and then forget about it…. okay?”

“Oh boy, I’m only SS-class myself, you know?”

“Okay! I’ll tell you. An unidentified object crash-landed in Daechung Lake two weeks ago. It’s been salvaged and transported to another location. There’s talk of the unidentified aircraft being an alien spaceship.”

“What? Really?”

Assistant Manager Lee Hye-jin smiled. She found Namgoong-won’s widened, almost bulging eyes cute and continued speaking. “So our agents at NIS are being dispatched to guard all the higher bureaucrats who know about it. I think they’re calling in all the human resources the government agencies can muster, including the NIS and special forces. Chief Kim is being sent out from the Counter-terrorism Investigation Unit 1. They’re saying we’re bodyguards…but I think they’re using that as an excuse to maintain secrecy.”

Namgoong-won didn’t move an inch. He was surprised. He remembered when he had hacked NASA, as well as the painful memories of his loving family being murdered, the data from Area 51 which started it all, and the contents about the alien, the alien spacecraft, and the applied technology from researching it…

“What’s wrong?”

Lee Hye-jin shook his shoulder. She was in shock from seeing Namgoong-won sitting still in his own shock. Namgoong-won finally seemed to snap out of the memories from the past, then he straightened up to mumble something to Assistant Manager Lee Hye-jin. “The data I hacked before… There was a lot of information about aliens and alien space crafts.”

“Really?”

“Yes, the original copy might have been destroyed after I gave it to Manager Oh when I was in the hospital, but… there are copies on my laptop.”

This time, Assistant Manager Lee Hye-jin was in shock. When she first met Namgoong-won in the safe house hospital as his real identity Kim In-jik, she knew he had hacked information about Area 51 from NASA, but she had not known the contents.

“Didn’t you delete all the data?”

“Yes… My mind was occupied… Now I think about it, I forgot to delete everything.”

“You’re going to be in big trouble if Manager An finds out. Wouldn’t it be good to delete the data today?”

“I will.”

“Yes, make sure of it… I want to look at it out of curiosity, but I won’t.”

Two hours later, Assistant Manager Lee Hye-jin returned home. Namgoong-won took out a laptop from a dusty box. After he connected the power supply and booted up the laptop, the screen lit up. The laptop began to start up. Despite that he had wanted to destroy it after his family was killed in the accident, here he was eight months later turning it on.

Click! Click!

Namgoong-won calmed the butterflies in his stomach, clicked on an encrypted folder in the D-drive, and entered the password. Many types of files showed up. Among them, he clicked on the file named ‘1940 UFO-01.’ The file was in English, but it was not too hard to translate.

Despite that he had initially booted the laptop in order to delete all the hacked data, something took hold of Namgoon-won. He read through all the files until it was 5am. After that day, Namgoon-won spent all of his time after work analyzing the hacked files and going on dates with Assistant Manager Lee Hye-jin.

* * *

October 18th, 2016 19:40. Seoul NIS Counter-terrorism Investigation Unit 1 Manager’s Office.

Knock. Knock.

“Come in.”

“Manager, it’s Namgoong-won.”

“Oh, yes. Have a seat! Why are you still in the office after hours?”

“I have something to tell you.”

“What is it?”

“I heard an unidentified object crash-landed in Daechung Lake around August. I know it was salvaged and transported elsewhere, also.”

Manager An Yeon-wu was in shock. Concerned about a breach in security, he asked Namgoong-won, “Namgoong-won, where did you hear about this?”

“I’m sorry, but I can’t reveal my sources.”

“An apology isn’t what matters here. What you just said is national S-class confidential information. Did you hear it from Assistant Manager Lee?”

“I apologize.”

“We’ll discuss that later, but the case at Daechung Lake is true.”

“So, what happened to the unidentified object?”

Manager An Yeon-wu hesitated from the continued questioning, but he seemed to have reached a decision. He spoke to Namgoong-won as he looked into his eyes. “As I have said before, what I am about to tell you is national S-class confidential information. If this was to be leaked, then you’d be arrested and sentenced to life or worse due to the state of emergency the nation is in. Understand?”

“Don’t worry, sir. I’m also an agent working in the NIS.”

“Then I’ll put my trust in you and tell you. Currently, the unidentified aircraft is in a temporary laboratory in Chungju 17th Fighter Wing base, and it’s being researched by 30 scientists.”

“Were there any tangible results about the unidentified aircraft?”

“The rest of the information is even a higher-class secret, so I don’t even know. Why are you bringing this up all of a sudden?”

“I gave you the original hacked data about Area 51 before.”

“Yes, you did…”

“The truth is there are copies on my laptop.”

“What? Didn’t you claim there were no copies when I asked for them?”

“I wasn’t in the right state of mind at the time, so I forgot about having copies.”

“I should have taken more care when I was dealing with it… It’s my fault. Please continue.”

“I remembered the hacked data when I heard about the unidentified object crash-landing on Daechung Lake in August, so I started analyzing the data about aliens and their spacecraft.”

“Is that so?” Manager An Yeon-wu was taken aback from Namgoong-won’s words. He closed the blinds on his glass office wall. He asked, “Did you find anything substantial?”

“Yes, sir. Based on my analysis of the data from Area 51, I learned about the alien’s communication methods and operating system of the spacecraft.. I’ve created a protocol program that can sync up with my laptop.”