A few hours before...
Ashe's head was pounding the moment she woke up.
It felt like someone was drilling through her skull. Her limbs felt like it was positioned in the most uncomfortable places for so long, causing her muscles to feel so strained. She tried to move, but there was something holding her in place. There were ties, thick and strong ropes, stopping her. Around her was such a massive blur. Circular blobs of dark shades were the only things she could decipher then.
But soon, her vision cleared, and the blurry circles transformed into furniture, light sources, and wallpaper patterns. She was back in her and Yoongi's motel room.
Or so she thought.
"You're awake."
Ashe's head whipped around to sound of that familiar voice. It was easier said than done, for it was then did she realize that she was tied to a chair.
She screamed.
But only muffled noises came out of her taped mouth.
Namjoon walked over to her, his eyes definitely noticing the pain, shock, and fear glinting in his classmate's eyes. "There's no need to be afraid Ashe."
Says you, Ashe thought. You're not the one who was knocked out, tied to a chair, and found out that her best friend's friend was the one behind all of this.
Soon, the raven haired was standing in front of the girl. He leaned down, causing Ashe to move her head back, as the boy seemingly wanted his face close to hers.
"I'm going to take off the tape on your mouth," Namjoon said in a low voice. "But you have to promise to not scream."
As if you can stop me from doing so.
Her breath hitched when a knife was suddenly placed against her neck, the blade only less than a centimeter from her pale skin.
"It's just a precaution," the young man assured him. "But who knows? Maybe I will do it."
Ashe watched as Namjoon reached out for one of the ends of duct tape. He slowly peeled it off her mouth area, her lips stinging and feeling a tad dry once it was off. She didn't dare to make any noise, as the knife was still placed against her neck, but the deathly glare she was giving the boy was enough to convey what she wanted to say.
Betrayal. Hurt. Anger.
"I know this is crazy, Ashe," he said. "But you have to believe me when I say that I'm not the bad guy."
"Yeah, cause you've really shown me good reasons to believe that," Ashe retorted.
"I haven't killed you, if you haven't noticed."
"You still have the knife close to me, if you haven't noticed."
Namjoon sighed and lowered the sharp object. "Believe me now?"
"Nah."
"I'll explain everything," Namjoon told her. "First of all, I'm sorry for knocking you out. But I need to talk to you alone and without Yoongi knowing."
"You could've simply asked me, dumbass," Ashe said tersely. "Kidnapping someone isn't really going to prevent Yoongi from knowing. The moment he wakes up and finds out I'm not there, he'll call the police. And why can't Grapeface know? Scared that more people will know that you've helped a criminal hide my best friend?"
"Ashe, that's not it-"
"Where is Jimin, Namjoon?" the girl demanded. "What have you done to him? Where is Choi Jeonghan?"
"I don't know anything!" Namjoon exclaimed. "I can't answer your questions because I'm not working for Choi! If it's anyone you should suspect, it's your little crush who you've allowed to come with you here to Gimhae."
"Crush?"
"Yoongi," the raven haired said. "You shouldn't have trust him, Ashe."
The brunette raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
Namjoon sighed. "He's not who you think he is. Yoongi's in on it, Ashe. He's one of the people behind the Parks' disappearance."
Her eyes widened. "You're lying. I've already asked Yoongi. He's not involved in any of this. You're just making this up."
"That's what he wants you to think," Namjoon said. "Yoongi has been lying to you since the very beginning. He knows Jimin, not because it's his 'father' who sold the house to them. He knows Jimin because he is his brother."
"W-what?" Ashe shook her head in disbelief. "How could they be brothers?"
"Jimin's dad isn't really Choi. It's Min Soobin, Yoongi's father," Namjoon explained. "A long time ago, Mr. Min and Jimin's mom had an affair, but he didn't want his wife to find out, so he abandoned Jimin and his mom, who were 'saved' by Choi from poverty and death."
"You're telling me that everything that has happened is because Yoongi doesn't want Jimin as his brother?"
"It's partly the reason," the raven haired said. "But there's so much more to it than you think. Unfortunately, I can't tell you everything else."
Ashe raised an eyebrow. "And why not?" she asked. "How come you even know about this? And how am I supposed to be certain that what you're saying is true?"
"I know someone else who works for Choi," Namjoon told her. "One day, I just got curious with what he has been up to lately, and so I kind of followed him around. I saw him spying on you and Yoongi, and then I also saw a note in his stuff that said he was going to kill you two if you continued trying to find Jimin. I finally mustered up the courage to ask what he was actually doing and he told me some stuff, not everything, obviously, but enough for me to get a gist of what's really going on."
"He made me promise not tell anyone about this, Ashe," the boy said. "He told me things will get worse if I tried telling you guys about this, so I didn't say anything. But then he killed Taehyung. The guilt was eating me up. A classmate of ours died, Jimin was out there getting tortured, and here I was with vital information. I had to do something. So I put that note on your window, and followed you and Yoongi to Gimhae. I wasn't exactly expecting for you guys to find out I was here, or at least, I was hoping Yoongi wouldn't find out."
"I know it's hard to believe," Namjoon went on. "But Jimin is one of my closest friends Ashe. If there's something I can do help him, I will do it."
A look of reluctance painted Ashe's face. Trusting Namjoon was going to change the whole game. It meant turning Yoongi into a villain, suspecting him of being the one behind everything, pushing him away after all of the things he has done to help Ashe. Yoongi may be an asshole every once and awhile, but Ashe couldn't see the purple haired fooling her like that. It just seemed impossible.
For all she knew, Namjoon was probably spouting mere theories or lies about Jimin's disappearance. After all, he was the one who hurt Ashe in the first place.
"Who is he?"
Namjoon's eyes furrowed. "What?"
"Who's the guy who told you about all of this?" Ashe asked. "What's his name?"
The young man gulped. "I can't tell you."
"What do you mean you can't?" Her expression turned even more commanding. "You told me to trust you Namjoon, but the only way I could is if you gave me the name of the person who's working for Choi."
"Ashe, you don't need to know," Namjoon told her.
"You're asking me to turn against Min Yoongi, a guy who has done nothing but help me find Jimin these past few weeks," Ashe pointed out. "What you want me to do is too much, Namjoon, so if you want me to trust you, you have to give me his name."
"I don't have to!" he exclaimed. "I'll give you something else. Something else to vouch what I've told you."
He then ran to the bed where his luggage was lying open. Ashe, who couldn't turn around, heard the raven haired rummaged through his clothes before finding what he was looking for. He went back to the girl, presenting a piece of paper in front of her.
Ashe's eyes widened when she saw the header.
"A DNA test."
Namjoon nodded. "This was in one of my friend's files. It clearly states here that Park Jimin is related to Min Yoongi."
Ashe shook her head. "I can't believe this."
Yoongi lied to her.
She looked up to the boy. "He knows all of my plans Namjoon. Even if I go back there and pretend like everything's fine, he'll go with me to everywhere I go."
"Can't you make something up so that he has to leave you here in Gimhae?" The girl shook her head no.
"Even if that works out, he might still secretly follow me. He knows me well enough, Joon," Ashe insisted. And it's all my fault.
"Don't worry, I'll help you," Namjoon assured her. "I hope this helps you in knowing who to trust."
Ashe nodded. You can't trust anyone.
~~~
"Will you hurry up?" Ashe whined, banging on the door.
"I've just started!" Yoongi shouted from inside the bathroom.
"You've been there for ten minutes!"
"If you want to take a shower already so badly then just come inside the shower with me!"
Silence.
Ashe felt her cheeks flush red when the statement repeated inside her head. "WHAT?" she squacked and banged on the door louder and faster. "Just fucking hurry up!"
The purple haired didn't answer anymore and Ashe could only hear the water pouring from the shower head. The girl groaned, wanting to get rid of the filth from her skin and finally get out there to find Jimin.
She walked over to the bed and plopped down on the covers. She wondered if she should just forget about showering, leave Yoongi there in the bathroom, and walk around Gimhae by herself. She did told herself that no one could be trusted. After what Namjoon told her, a hesitation grew towards the two boys. Both were making sense, both looked seemingly trustworthy, but both could be just well deceiving Ashe. She needed more evidence, more information, and if she wanted concrete facts, she needed to find them herself.
Suddenly, she heard a scuffle from outside their motel room door. Her head turned towards the door, eyes widening when she saw a folded piece of paper slid through the very little gap underneath. Silently yet quickly she walked over to the door and snatched the paper from the floor.
77 69 69 84 77 69 65 84 68 73 79 78 25 83 85 83 , 49 49 80 77 – 10 73 77 73 78
80.83. 73 67 65 78 ' 84 87 65 73 84 84 15 83 69 69 89 79 85 65 71 65 73 78
"What's that?"
Ashe whipped her head around, heart beating fast when she saw Yoongi out of the bathroom, donning a black shirt and the jeans he wore yesterday, his hair still wet.
"Uh..." Before Ashe could do anything, the young man took the paper from her hands. "S-someone slid it through the door."
Yoongi's eyes furrowed. He walked past Ashe and opened the door.
His head looked at the left, then to his right, but there was no person in sight.
"Whoever he or she was, the person is gone," Yoongi said as he closed the door. He glanced back at the paper. "What do these numbers mean?"
Ashe shook her head. "I have no idea."
The purple haired sighed and began placing it into his pocket.
"Let me have it!" Yoongi jumped in surprise when the girl reached out for the note. "Maybe I'll figure it out," Ashe told him.
He shrugged and gave the paper to her. Ashe placed it in her pocket. "I'm going to shower now."
Yoongi nodded. The girl noticed that the boy's cheeks were suddenly tinted pink. For a moment, she was bewildered, but then remember what the purple haired said when he was inside the bathroom.
"If you want to take a shower already so badly then just come inside the shower with me!"
Ashe felt her face heat up once again and just entered the bathroom in silence. She shouldn't be thinking about this right now.
It pained her, to be honest, to find out that Yoongi had something to do with Jimin's disappearance. For weeks, she allowed him to help her, gain her trust, and be a friend. To find out that she was just playing into the hands of the people who took her best friend was heartbreaking.
How could a person do that to someone? How could they just toy with someone's feelings without feeling a bit of guilt in there system?
Ashe had set aside the thought. What mattered right now was that she knew the truth, and now she had to use to her advantage.
Now that the girl locked herself inside the little room, she took out the paper and her phone. She went to her Gallery and tapped on a familiar picture. She began deciphering the code.
Yes, the numbers on the paper were a coded message, and Ashe knew how to crack it. It was ASCII. It's a computer code, kinda like binary but instead of ones and zeroes, it uses the numbers 1 to 256. So for example, A is 65, B is 66, C is 67, and so forth.
Ashe was familiar with the code for it was what she and Jimin used when they passed notes in class. That way, even if they got caught, they were the only ones who knew what their messages meant.
Just like now.
In just a few minutes, Ashe deciphered the message.
MEET ME AT DIONYSUS, 11 PM – JIMIN
P.S. I CAN'T WAIT TO SEE YOU AGAIN
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Five chapters to go.