Ciphertext – Chapter 1: Eun-ji Moon
Data that has been encrypted. Cipher text is unreadable until it has been converted into plain text (decrypted) with a key. (Webopedia)
MC x 707
Luciel Choi was living a lonely existence as one of the best hackers in Seoul, if not the world. He was paid royally to dig up the dirtiest data on Kim Jong Un for an underground intelligence agency. Every day was just like the last, grey and uninviting, and he was always shut off from the world. At the very least, he did afford himself a break at least once a day. Without that, he felt as though he really would go crazy. Fresh air and a walk was a necessity, an excuse to interact with someone … anyone. Coffee was that excuse. It acted as his fuel, along with a lot of terrible junk food choices, remnants of which were constantly scattered around his desk. It was Honey Buddha Chips galore. Sometimes, he really wished he had a maid to assist with these things.
One Friday, after a particularly stressful ordeal with his boss – known inconspicuously as Mr P. – Luciel decided to head down to the local Starbucks near his house; his usual favourite. Since he was desperate to get away from work for a little longer that day, he made a point to stay for ten minutes instead of five; a luxury. And this time, he might try and avoid caffeine for once. Maybe a small change in routine was all he needed.
As he waited for his strawberry frappe to be prepared, he noticed a young lady who was maybe around his age, ordering her drink in the queue behind him. She had long brown hair that ran halfway down her back. She wore a cute white summer dress with a blue ribbon and a had a couple of small hairpins with stars on them, adorning the top of a light pony tail.
She was slim and attractive, and flat-chested. He couldn't help but notice and blushed a little as he realised where he was looking. He tried to lean forward so he could catch a glimpse of her face, but her bangs were so long that they obscured her eyes.
Shame. I bet she has nice eyes too.
When he actually thought about it, this girl was kind of normal-looking, but something about her seemed to fascinate him. He tried not to make it too obvious. It's not like she would notice him standing there, waiting, with his plain brown hair and thick black rimmed glasses. Although he considered himself to be attractive enough, he knew he wasn't anything special, so why would she even give him a second thought? The barista placed the frappe down onto the counter and checked the name written on the side of the cup.
"Saeyoung Choi?"
The girl turned to look at him as his name was confirmed. She didn't smile, and he still couldn't see her eyes, but Luciel was convinced she had made some level of eye contact with him, even just for a split second.
"Yeah, that's me. Thanks." said Luciel, picking up the plastic cup and taking a slurp of his drink through the straw. His real name was Saeyoung, but he used Luciel most of the time. Although the girl wasn't looking in his direction anymore, he couldn't tear his eyes away from her, she was drawing him in with her simple beauty.
His heart skipped a beat, which scared the shit out of him. It wasn't like him to develop these kinds of feelings. Ever. Since he never really went out, getting a girlfriend was completely out of the question. Then, there was his work to consider. That job was nothing but trouble, and so dangerous that getting someone else involved would be fatal.
Sitting himself down at one of the tables outside, he flicked through Twitter on his smartphone since he couldn't concentrate on anything else. A couple of minutes later, the girl walked outside with her coffee. Her posture was perfectly straight as the wind ruffled her dress a little and her long, shiny hair blew backwards. She had turned to face the other way before Luciel could see her face properly. He silently cursed to himself for missing the chance, but noticing that she had put the drink down onto the table, he squinted to get a clear view of the name written on the paper cup. His vision was legendary when he was wearing these glasses, but he thought they made him look overtly studious. Traditional academia didn't suit him; he was just a natural genius who preferred the joys of tampering with science in unexpected ways.
Eun-ji … Moon?
Luciel could just about make out the Hangul characters that had been scrawled onto the cup in a hurry. He sat, watching her with her back to him as she flicked through her smartphone.
"Eun-ji Moon" he said quietly to himself. "Cute name."
But then a frown descended over his face. He knew that knowing anything beyond her name was a useless feat and would never amount to anything. Even if she was remotely interested in him, he wasn't about to put a sweet girl like her through the shit that came with being involved with him. Truthfully, he couldn't even remember the last time he'd been with a girl; it had been too long. His mind throbbed with the pain of it all. He took another slurp of his frappe to cool himself off under the blistering summer heat.
Though his personality wasn't especially off-putting or crass, Luciel often tried to compensate for his depressing work situation by simulating a false sense of happiness. This usually materialised as nonsensical strings of words or phrases, about space stations, dreamlands and anything else his brilliant imagination could conjure up. It was his way of escaping from the firm grasp that reality had over him.
Not everybody understood Luciel, in fact most didn't, dismissing him as weird or geeky. Spending his time in front of screens wasn't such a bad way to make a living, he had concluded. At least then he could hide away, and be recognised, in some small way, for his talents. The pay was really the only thing that could keep him motivated.
As he got up to leave, Luciel slipped his bulky yellow headphones back on for some much-needed music therapy. Blocking out the sounds of the city seemed best. He shot Eun-ji one last sorrowful glance but she still had her back turned to him. He let out a heavy sigh as he walked away, amidst the nauseating blur of traffic.