Yo Han was just buying a can of soda at the vending machine when he saw Ba Reum walking towards him. He went to stand next to the vending machine with his arms crossed.
"You know, you said that you wanted to meet your family right?" Ba Reum suddenly asked him, making sure no one could over hear. Yo Han looked at him in surprise.
"I did, but you said it wasn't safe to already meet them." He whispered back and looking at the end of the hallway to make sure no one is there. Then he opened his drink and took a sip, looking at Ba Reum from the corner of his eye and taking a sip.
"Well, I can get you in contact with your brother, but you are not allowed to tell you who you are." Ba Reum said, "all I ask for is a little favor." Yo Han raised an eyebrow in suspicion.
"Best to go to my office to discuss it." He said, seeing a few nurses coming around the corner. Yo Han lead the way and Ba Reum followed him, immediately starting to ask some questions about his mother. Yo Han was surprised at how quickly Ba Reum changed subjects like that.
They arrived at his office and Yo Han made sure to lock his door before gesturing Ba Reum to sit down.
"So, what is this favor you want." He asked while sitting down and putting the can on his desk.
"Don't worry, it's not that difficult and I'll do most of the manoeuvring." Ba Reum assured him. Yo Han looked at him in trepidation. He wondered what he got himself into when he said he would help Ba Reum.
"You know about the Kang Duk Soo case?" Ba Reum asked.
"Yes, he was a patient in this hospital, and well, yeah." Yo Han gestured vaguely, but his meaning was clear.
"Well, you know the halmoni who cut of his genitals? She got sentenced to 6 months in prison."
"I heard that. Seeing the way she maimed the guy it is surprising she didn't get worse, even though we all understand why she did it." Ba Reum nodded.
"Well, her lungs aren't doing too well ever since she has been taken to prison. Momentarily she is in the medical wing of the hospital. We should have a change to get her out of jail due to medical leniency." Ba Reum said, "and that's where you come in. We need a doctor to examen her and make an expert report about why she should not be in prison anymore and how it would risk her health to stay in there."
"Well, I can make an honest report. But what has this to do with meeting my brother?" Yo Han asked, puzzled.
"Well, your brother is the intern of the lawyer office who got stuck on this case. He will want to have a meeting or two with you to discus the case before he brings it in front of the judge. So, that way we can
Yo Han looked in surprise at the idea of Ba Reum. He really felt like meeting his family and getting to know them. When he learned about mother's, no Ji Eun's betrayal, it had hit him hard. He knew that it was unrealistic to expect his real family to be better then what he had, but he suddenly felt the need to connect to someone.
"And now let's talk about the favor." Ba Reum said. Yo Han looked at him in surprise.
"I thought that the favor was being the expert doctor for halmoni." He said
"That's part of it. But it will need to cover up something else."
"Yes?" Yo Han asked. Ba Reum leaned forwards a bit on his desk and looked him in the eye.
"I think it's time that we plan my mother's death."
Ba Reum was happy when he left the office. His plan was getting more and more form. Now he just had to inform the lawyer. When he was in the privacy of his own house he called lawyer Lee In Ah once again. Technically she didn't own him a favor anymore, but still since she accepted the case, she will probably want to finish it.
"Ba Reum, here for another favor?" she asked of him cheekily when she saw who called, "this time it might cost you." She said cheekily, even though the last favor she done for him had done some serious good to her reputation, so she wouldn't mind helping him out once more.
"Well, it isn't a new favor actually, more like an extension of the first one." Ba Reum said. Her interested was immediately piqued.
"Yes?" she prodded.
"Well, Bong Yi said that halmoni recently had been taken ill quite bad, even having to go to the hospital wing. Apparently her lungs aren't that well and she never really recovered after she was sent to prison." Ba Reum explained, but the lawyer got on quickly.
"Aah, medical leniency. I guess we could go for that. But we have to try to get her examined by a doctor as quickly as possible. We can try to search for someone, but it might still take a couple of weeks." Most of the doctors didn't want to go to prisons to examen prisoners for this reason. They often felt like there was a reason that they were punished and didn't want to grant medical leniency.
"Don't worry, I already have someone. Can you just arrange a date with the prison. I'll send the address and you can get that intern to pick him up." Ba Reum said.
"Well, that seems like a wonderful idea. I'll immediately take contact with the prison. Just make sure your guys pull through." She said.
"Oh, and one more thing I want to ask you."
"Yes?"
'"It's a bit more technical. You know about my mother being attacked right?"
"Yes, it was all over the news." She said. The country was momentarily full of fear due to the recent increase in violent murders.
"Well, seeing as those people are still on the loose, I'm afraid that they will want to finish her off before she can wake up."
"Well, that's indeed a risk." She said, not knowing if she should worry Ba Reum more, but not wanting to hide the truth from him.
"And that's why it's time she died." Ba Reum finished. Her eyes went round at that comment.
"Excuse me?" she said startled.
Moo Chi was not doing so great. He knew all victims were barren, but that's it. The higher-ups didn't want to spread that news around in fear that it would not only make the people panic, but also because the murderer could suddenly change his MO.
For now the people were already panicking and Moo Chi was actually of the opinion that if he could tell the people that that was the criteria of the killer, then they could take precautions at least.
But he agreed that it was true that the murder could suddenly change tactics.
So far now the police decided to search for all the barren woman in the area, asking all the general doctors to sift through their patients records. How many could it be?
Quite a lot apparently. Not counting menopause there were dozens and dozens in the neighbourhood alone. They couldn't really specify further then this yet, and they didn't have to manpower to patrol all neighbourhoods.
For now they would try to regularly patrol the neighbourhoods that resembled those of the previous victims the most. It were never the upper class once, more middle to lower income people that were the victims. They would also try to patrol the places with the highest number of infertile women as well.
He was busy coordinating the patrol teams to make sure they got as many neighbourhoods as possible when Hong Ju came to his desk. She had a frown on her face.
"Say, did you have another cop checking out an old cold case." She asked, " It's 15 year old cold case, a kid ran away from home?" she asked, showing him the picture of the kid from the original case file. Moo Chi took the picture and looked at it.
"No, this old of a case should be lying in the cold cases. They wouldn't just investigate unless there is a lead. I didn't hear of anything. Why do you ask?" Hong Ju hesitated a bit.
"Well, I got a call from the parents of this child. They asked me when the episode would run."
"which episode?" Moo Chi asked confused.
"That's why asked. Apparently they had a journalist who interviewed them who claimed that my show was doing a special on cold cases of disappeared children. He even had a badge and all from this show."
"Did they have a name?"
"Yes, Cha Dal Geon. But no one with that name works with us." She said, "that's why I thought if it could be an undercover cop or something? Someone who knows about the case."
"No, we have no one by that name. As far as I know these cases go cold if they are not solved in a short time. Why would someone do this?"
"I don't know, but it gave me an idea to actually make an episode about these cases. Perhaps we'll find out. Can be interesting."
"Yeah, but most of them will be sad. If those children aren't found, a lot of them end up dead." Moo Chi said.
Hong Ju nodded and then suddenly she turned green. She held her hand to her mouth and ran off to a bathroom. Moo Chi followed.
"Are you ok?" he asked after she was done.
"Yes, I'm just feeling a bit under the weather lately."
Yo Han had been researching everything about this psychopath gene and he discovered a lot already.
A lot was up for grabs in the internet. He discovered that it was Daniel Lee who did research on it and managed to locate him.
The same Daniel Lee who had apparently befriended the Head Hunter before he knew who he was.
Who had also lost his siter to the Head Hunter.
He found out about the law they tried to pass and failed to get through. He learned the fear of the people during the time of the Head Hunter. But he also noticed that the last few years the research had been forgotten by most people, rarely mentioned.
He also learned that it was only a small percentage of those with the gene became actual killers, but that most serious serial killers all shared the gene, as well as every genius. And there were a lot of geniuses.
He couldn't understand the narrowmindedness of people who wanted to kill every baby that carried this gene. Did they not understand these results. They would kill thousands of unborn children because of the one that has a chance to be a killer?
These people that didn't even allow abortion when the mother was desperate wanted to pass this bill through.
Yo Han was disgusted. He looked up the original newspapers of when they tried to pass the bill and saw that the explanation about the gene they found was very short and concentrated on the fact that serial killers had this gene.
He snorted. Yes, and most of them were male as well, perhaps they should just kill all males. How's that for generalisation.
He couldn't believe that this Daniel Lee would condone people to abuse his research like this, but some deeper digging showed him that Daniel Lee was one of the people who proposed this kind of thing.
"and where are you now mister Lee." Yo Han muttered to himself, "in the USA. Pity."
He printed all of this information, filing it away as being important. He would meet Ba Reum soon and then he could show these results. Perhaps Ba Reum would have been able to find out something himself?
His cell phone suddenly buzzed. He looked at the screen and saw a message from Ba Reum that told him someone was going to pick him up to go check out halmoni tomorrow.
He was finally going to meet his brother.
Ba Reum put his cell phone away when he had gotten confirmation of Yo Han, and started the motorbike he had rented. The helm and safety suit made him unrecognizable, which was just what he wanted. He had been driving around for a while already, hoping to soon spot the car with the stalker in.
And there he was! Ba Reum made sure to follow him from a distance. To not make it seem suspicious he even sometimes followed a parallel road and drove in front of the other car, making sure to keep the car in view in his rear-view mirror.
He lost sight of him again, but he kept on driving through the neighbourhoods and finally he saw the car parked in front of an house. It was a big house in a rich neighbourhood. He wasn't sure which house he was looking for, but it could be only one of these in the street.
Seeing at how the houses looked, it didn't seem likely though that the suspect was a teacher. They would not have been able to afford this house on their salary.
He passed further by, not stopping.
He would have to go slowly not to rouse suspicion. But now at least he knew approximately where the killer lived. And where he had to install his camera.
