Department Zero | NCT Dream

File 11: Eleven Dead-ends

[Date: November 3, 2020]

[Weather: bone-chilling cold]

|Drink of the Day: none|

{Cases: 1}

- P. JS
.......

"It doesn't make sense, it doesn't make a god damn lick of sense," Jaemin muttered, running his hands through his greasy pink hair as he flopped down onto his mattress, resting his face in those same ink-stained hands.

Scattered around his small bedroom were dozens of papers, pencils, highlighters, pins, and random yellow colored string; yet, somehow, none of the clutter held any answers hidden within it's contents. 

Jaemin dejectedly picked up the coffee cup next to him, chucking it across the floor when he discovered that he had already drunken it's contents. He stood up then, wandering out into his living room space and moving to kneel down, shifting through the series of papers that sat there. 

There had to be a clue. Anything. Any little thing at all. 

This thing couldn't have just attacked random people.

His phone buzzed from somewhere in the apartment but he paid it no mind, just as he had been for the past two days. Two days. It had been two days since the Bul-Gae had appeared in the café in the lobby of the Inchon Police Hub. Otherwise, two days since Jaemin had gone into work. 

This, of course, meant he was worrying the rest of his team. He knew that, but there was something in the way that the Bul-Gae looked at him that told him it was there for him. But not only was it there for him, it was there for some kind of purpose. He couldn't put his finger on it and it was driving him crazy, crazy enough that he couldn't put in the extra effort to walk down to the department himself.

Jaemin couldn't explain it, but he knew it. This thing had a purpose, and it somehow had to be tied into the relations and similarities between the victims. It always did. 

Which had lead him to conduct investigative comparative research on the first man who was killed: Kim Daejun. He was twenty-nine, almost thirty, and Jaemin was in his early twenties. He worked as a janitor at a nearby secondary school and hadn't even gone to university. The most he had done academically was graduate high school, not that Jaemin was one to judge but if these things were after him next, they couldn't have differed more.

Of course the young chemist had looked into whether or not Daejun had gone to his orphanage but that brought up nothing as well. Then he looked into associates -- no similar ones. The dead man had had blonde hair and had come from overseas; Jaemin had fading pink hair (naturally brown of course) and was born and stayed in Korea. 

He looked into potential hobbies through the man's social medias, but found nothing of similarity (Daejun went fishing on the weekends and Jaemin definitely did not go fishing). The man also had a family -- a wife and two kids -- standard for a nuclear family and Jaemin was not looking at doing that any time soon. 

Nothing pointed to any similarities between the two -- nothing pointed to Jaemin being the next victim.

So if he wasn't the next victim - concluded only by the shocking lack of similarities - who was?

A sharp rapt came at his front door and Jaemin frowned, eyeing the closed entrance way with distain. He hadn't ordered anything...and he was almost 99% sure that dogs couldn't knock on doors. 

Pushing his hands against his thighs, Jaemin ran a hand through his hair, the fibers sticking up in every direction from lack of cleanliness. Wandering over to the front door, Jaemin pulled it open, immediately flying back in utter shock and horror. 

"Do you know how hard it was to find your house? You never put your address in your file for the Hub, you should fix that."

"God you stink, when's the last time you took a shower?"

"You look like shit."

"You really worried us man, we let you off for a day but then we had Ji find your address."

"Yeah it took him a while though, maybe he's losing his tou- ow! Don't hit me you little-"

"Shut your asses up and move inside, I'd rather not freeze my balls off out here please and thank you," Donghyuck's voice carried over all of clamoring voices. Jisung, Mark, Chenle, Jeno, Renjun, and Donghyuck filed into his small, one-bedroom apartment, looking around at the mess and Jaemin closed the door behind Donghyuck, face burning self-consciously at the state that his apartment and he himself were in. 

A hand clapped on his shoulder, Jaemin turning to look at Donghyuck while everyone else dumped their bags on his couch and on the kitchen counters. The leader let out a long sigh, Jaemin's eyes flickering to look at his bandaged arm. Just as Jaemin opened his mouth to apologize, Donghyuck's hand reached up and ruffled his hair, letting a soft smile rise on his face. 

"I'm glad you're okay," was all that Donghyuck said, his hand drifted to rest briefly on the side of Jaemin's head before it dropped back to his side, his eyes turning to look at the mess that covered his floor. "Catch us up on what you've figured out so far and we'll do the same. Deal?" 

Jaemin paused for a moment, his heart beating irregularly in his chest. His eyes trained on Donghyuck for a moment longer, traveling slowly over to where Jeno was shifting through the papers on his floor; Mark was draping himself over the mediocre couch; Renjun was shaking Mark's head back and forth while chatting with Chenle; Chenle was talking animatedly about more lore, Renjun giving the other his full attention this time; Jisung sat upon his kitchen counter, absentmindedly opening his cupboards in a futile search for food. 

He nodded, Donghyuck bumping their shoulders together and giving him another small smile before walking forward to tell Jisung to get off the counter. Jaemin took a step forward, running a hand through his hair while looking at his team. His team. 

"Yeah, uh," Jaemin said in a murmur, "uh Jeno don't touch that, no, yeah, no that's not...put it down!" 

Several minutes of extreme chaos ensued, Jaemin grabbed the pages off of his floor as Chenle and Jisung got out their own manila folders jam packed with papers. Upon further inspection, the two groups (one group made up of one man but that's besides the point) had gone in completely different directions with their research, which was probably a good thing. 

"With the research we've done on the animal itself," Chenle was rambling, pushing circular glasses upwards, Jaemin noticing tape wrapped around one of the broken temples, "We've made little progress than what we've originally come across. It's hard enough to find lore and, even with my knowledge, we can only theorize what weaponry will be effective in dealing with the threat."

"So generally we've got nothing," Renjun concluded from where he sat on the couch, his finger extended to point towards the boy speaking and Chenle let out a sigh, flopping down onto the floor next to Jeno. 

The mythologist ran a hand through his hair and leaned his cheek against his closed fist, pouting a bit in disappointment and frustration. "Yes, generally."

Jaemin grit his teeth briefly before exhaling a sigh, finishing the action with a soft 'tsk'. It seems that the entirety of their team was stuck, and there was no way for them to make further advances until there was another victim.

Why had it attacked that man?

Why had it come to the department?

Why had it attacked the team, and why was it interested in them?

How did the man have his number? How did he know that the department existed? How did he know Jaemin was going to be there that late?

What...

What the hell was going on?

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