Ghost: Episode 13

by kaedejun

Important plot developments! It’s hard to believe that we’re more than halfway through the series now, so we’re supposed to be getting closer to nabbing Hyun Min, and yet we’re not. It feels like our Three Musketeers have a long way to go before the truth can be revealed. But here’s the question – can they handle the truth? Especially since a traitor is someone very close to them?

Song of the Day

“How” by Lee Ki Chan from Ghost OST [download]

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By the time Woo-Young, Kang Mi, and Hyuk Joo reach the interrogation room, Jae Hee is already dead. The security officer returns to the room and gasps at the sight of Jae Hee’s dead body. Hyuk Joo quickly grabs him by the collar – what was he doing not standing at his post?! The security guard stammers – a detective from the Cyber Crime unit had asked for a private moment with Jae Hee, so he stepped out. Which detective, he doesn’t remember.

But Woo-Young notices the cameras in the room are still recording, so they all run to the adjoining room and rewind the tape. The detective steps in, and though he stands in the shadows, the figure is unmistakable. It’s Tae Gyun.

NOOOOOOOOOOO! 

Woo-Young and Hyuk Joo race out the door, off to search for him. Woo-Young instructs Kang Mi to continue watching the tape for more clues. They search high and low for him, with Sang Woo and Hye Ram neither knowing where Tae Gyun is. Woo-Young finally reaches a bathroom in the far side of the building, where all but one of the stalls are empty. Hyuk Joo joins him, and they slowly get in place.

With one strong shoulder slam into the stall door, Hyuk Joo bursts the stall open and they find Tae Gyun huddled on the toilet, shaking in fear.

Hyuk Joo drags him out, demanding to know why he met with Jae Hee. Use of force and yelling only makes Tae Gyun clam up even more, so Woo-Young steps in. Tae Gyun crouches on the floor, and Woo-Young calmly asks what he was doing there in Jae Hee’s room. Tae Gyun: “Since he was the man who killed Young Suk, I just wanted to know why he did it.”

Back in the video room, Kang Mi continues watching the tape. Without Tae Gyun ever getting close to the suspect, Jae Hee starts hyperventilating and choking on his own breath.

Tae Gyun insists to Woo-Young and Hyuk Joo that he didn’t even touch Jae Hee. He was confused and scared as he watched Jae Hee die on his own. Kang Mi calls up Woo-Young at that very moment and confirms Tae Gyun’s story. Whew – I knew it couldn’t be Tae Gyun. 1) He’s too cute, and 2) he’s too young on the police force to be helping on a 13-year old case for Hyun Min.

However, Kang Mi doesn’t see any other visitors on the tape, so they’re still back to square one on figuring out the spy on the team. Or, square 1.5, as they can eliminate Tae Gyun as the suspect for now. Jae Hee’s body is taken away in an ambulance, with the whole team except Tae Gyun gathered outside to watch. Sang Woo, Hye Ram, and Eung Jin are all confused as to what really happened with Jae Hee; in Woo-Young’s eyes, they’re all suspects. (Hey, Eung Jin, where were you when Woo-Young and Hyuk Joo were busy searching for Tae Gyun?)

On to the more important matter at hand: the stolen USB. Woo-Young barges into Hyun Min’s office at Se Kang, unannounced. Both of them know why Woo-Young is here – he wants the USB. Hyun Min is more than happy to give it to him, since he no longer needs it anymore. Woo-Young notices the machine on Hyun Min’s desk – a YPM program that erases all kinds of digital devices with a touch of the button. Including – quite possibly – this small USB device.

Though there may no longer be any contents to it, Woo-Young is more than happy to receive it. The fact that Hyun Min erased it proves that there’s a hidden, darker secret within the drive that could have implicated him. The political slush fund documents would have been more advantageous to Hyun Min, but clearly he wasn’t afraid of those being leaked out. Hyun Min maintains a cool smile until Woo-Young leaves, and then reveals a troubled expression.

Woo-Young returns to the office, where Kang Mi is feeling very guilty for having left the USB unattended. She apologizes for her mistake, but Woo-Young takes the blame: he should have been more like Young Suk and made a copy of the drive first. At this instance, I have to remind myself that Ki Young may not necessarily care, nor be used to, police cyber crime protocol after years of being a hacker. And, who knows if Woo Hyun would have been this understanding in the past towards Kang Mi.

The sun rises on a new day, but our Three Musketeers are still puzzling over the spy within the cyber crime team. This spy took the USB, killed Jae Hee, and quite possibly fabricated the Shin Hyo Jung video (where she’s pushed out of the window) with Ki Young’s reflection so as to frame him for the murder. The only frustration is that no one has any solid evidence to prove all of this anymore.

Kang Mi suggests reporting it to Director Jun, but Hyuk Joo has an epiphany. Can they really trust Director Jun? He was the one who suggested investigating Woo Hyun and Nam Sang Won in the first place, which then led to the arrest of Jo Jae Min. Director Jun is now a potential suspect on their spy list. But before they can discuss further, the cyber crime team gets some visitors.

A representative from the Special Investigations department has come to take over the investigation on Jae Hee’s case – under Chief Shin’s orders. Oooh… Hyuk Joo gets all fired up and confrontational again – who said that any other department could take over a case that’s solely for the cyber crime team? He starts pushing the representative out of the room, getting violent, so Woo-Young restrains him by pulling his arm back. The representative doesn’t care – Hyuk Joo should just take his issues directly to Chief Shin. In the meantime he wants the case files on both Jae Hee and Young Suk.

On top of that, the representative wants to speak to “Kim Woo Hyun.” Hyuk Joo gets nervous, as he now thinks of Woo-Young as more of Ki Young than Woo Hyun now. The representative says that they need to investigate all team members of the cyber crime team about that day when Jae Hee died, and they’re going to start with Woo-Young.

Meanwhile, Director Jun is having an argument with Chief Shin about overstepping boundaries. Chief Shin is concerned that rumors will spread on how the police may have inadvertently caused both Jae Hee and Young Suk’s deaths. He also believes that the investigation on Young Suk was illegal, to which Director Jun vehemently denies. Chief Shin wants to bring an “impartial” eye to the matter. The guy’s being really shifty…

Woo-Young is questioned first, and the first question is why he turned off the video in the interrogation room to go off the record. Woo-Young doesn’t answer, since his questions pertained to his secret identity, but that doesn’t make him look good in front of the Special Investigations (SI) detective. Second question: “Why was the suspect Yeom Jae Hee looking for you right before he died?” That’s news to Woo-Young, who never got that message, and he answers truthfully that he doesn’t know.

The SI detective isn’t satisfied, so until they get to the truth of the matter, he’s removing Woo-Young from his position until further notice.

Woo-Young hands over his ID to Hyuk Joo, and nonchalantly informs him that he’s been fired. Hyuk Joo isn’t too happy about that, but they have no choice since Special Investigations took over the case. Woo-Young has a feeling that the police are going to cover up Jae Hee’s death, which makes him even more hateful towards the whole police system. He then realizes he just might have a way to get to the truth; in the meantime he wants Hyuk Joo to go to the jail cell where Jae Hee was temporarily held and investigate there. Hyuk Joo wants to know what Woo-Young is going to do. Woo-Young: “Would you even understand it if I told you?” Hyuk Joo: “Grrr….” Hahaha!

Woo-Young leaves the cyber crime office with his things, and notices the security camera right by the door. He wants Kang Mi to get copies of all the footage from that camera, and the camera in Jae Hee’s interrogation room. Then, with her help as the lookout, he sneaks into the interrogation room and installs a key-logging program that tracks every keystroke made into the computer.

Kang Mi rushes him to finish. She’s confused as to why he packed all his stuff, and again he deadpans, “I got fired.” I love how he seriously doesn’t care whether he’s part of the police bureau or not!

Se Kang Group is having an all important meeting with the presidents of each Se Kang company. It’s the meeting where they talk about the projects of each company, and vote on Hyun Min’s dismissal. When Hyun Min arrives, he greets his uncle in the hallway and pushes his wheelchair into the meeting room. His uncle is not going to stand down and be scared of just a few pieces of paper that Hyun Min gave him. OK – then Hyun Min will just follow him and see where Kyung Shin will end up – to the bitter end.

At the police station, Hyuk Joo questions the officer there, who was also the inattentive guard outside Jae Hee’s room. He wants to know everything – from beginning to end. The officer states that Jae Hee was very quiet, and nothing unusual happened. He gave Jae Hee medication for his depression, and everything was fine. That’s news – Jae Hee took pills? Apparently he had to take it at a certain time all the time. Then the officer handed out the dinner box sets to all those imprisoned. It was only after dinner that Jae Hee started acting weird and looked unwell.

The Mad Cow pounces – who ordered the food for them? Usually dinner box sets are not handed to each specific person; they’re usually the same for everyone. However if each dinner box had a name on it, that means there were special dietary orders – which then suggests that someone could have poisoned Jae Hee’s food.

Back to the Se Kang meeting. They reach the final piece on the agenda, which is Hyun Min’s dismissal. Kyung Shin asks that if anyone opposes Hyun Min’s dismissal, he should raise his hand. Everyone keeps their hands down, not wanting to defy the Chairman of the company. But before Kyung Shin can bang the gavel and make the final call, the presidents each start receiving emails. All are from Hyun Min, and he threatens them with one line: “It’s ok if you agree to my dismissal.” Each email has an attachment showing each president’s illegal activities, whether it be bribery, forgery, or money laundering. Clearly Hyun Min has the dirt on all these men.

One by one, each president slowly raises his hand. They don’t agree with Hyun Min’s dismissal. The only one who doesn’t raise his hand is Kim Byung Suk of Se Kang Telecom; he also does not receive a bribery email. Kyung Shin’s jaw drops in shock, while Hyun Min’s smile only grows wider.

The meeting ends, and all are dismissed. As Hyun Min leaves, Kyung Shin asks what it is that Hyun Min had over the presidents to sway their vote. Hyun Min: “Uncle, even if you came back from the dead you still wouldn’t have what I have.” Ooooh… burn….

Hyun Min now has a new target though. He orders Director Moon to look up everything on President Kim Byung Suk, and to make sure that Se Kang Telecom will be replaced by Safe Tech. Director Moon in turn orders… Dam Sa Myung, the leader of the Dae Young hackers. Whatever Kim Byung Suk does now, the hackers – and Hyun Min – will be able to see it, and make a copy of it. So what is it that Hyun Min has over Kyung Shin? It’s a team of hackers who know how to infiltrate the mind of a computer; with that power he has access to everything and anything, even if they think they’re safe in their own privacy.

Kang Mi and Woo-Young review the tapes of that evening and notice that ever since Jae Hee was transferred from the jail to the interrogation room, he was already in bad shape. That means whoever killed him gave him something in the jail. His computer screen starts up – it’s begun; the interrogation room’s computer has been booted up again, which means that the Special Investigation team is starting their interrogations on the other members of the cyber crime unit. With his key-logging program, everything that the detective types into the computer recording the questioning shows up on Woo-Young’s computer as well.

What begins is a parallel retelling of each cyber crime team member’s version of what happened that evening. The first to be questioned is Hye Ram. She says that on the evening of July 5th, she had gone out for dinner with Tae Gyun and Eung Jin. They all returned to the office around 7:20pm. That’s around the time that the Three Musketeers headed downstairs to meet with Hyun Min, so the two groups just missed each other. Hye Ram and Eung Jin both headed to the break room for some coffee, while a depressed-looking Tae Gyun opted out.

So far, Eung Jin, Tae Gyun, and Hye Ram’s stories all line up.

Hye Ram prepares the coffee, while Eung Jin reads a newspaper. Once the coffee machine starts running, Hye Ram excuses herself to go check on a hard drive that she had set to copy over while they were out. When she passes by the office, she sees Tae Gyun coming out of Hyuk Joo’s office.

Yikes! It looks like Tae Gyun was the one who stole the USB!

But when Tae Gyun is questioned, he says that he received a call from the officers that Jae Hee was being transferred to the interrogation room. He went to Hyuk Joo’s office to inform him, but Hyuk Joo wasn’t around. He barely even stepped inside, but did open the door, and so all Hye Ram saw was him closing the door again. Tae Gyun then began wondering if he should go visit Jae Hee himself. Since he kept it all inside, he was acting a little shady towards everyone else. Now, his story lines up with the one he told Hyuk Joo and Woo-Young, because they know he just went to the interrogation room and then witnessed Jae Hee dying.

It’s Sang Woo’s turn for questioning. He claims that he was out to further investigate Jae Hee and returned to the bureau around 7:15PM. As he was waiting for the elevator in the lobby, Hyun Min joined him. They barely gave each other a glance, not recognizing each other. Hyun Min did give him a quick study, but they never exchanged a word. Comrades in secret? Maybe… Either way, Hyun Min and his men disembark first, and Sang Woo reaches the cyber crime office a little past 7:20.

The first thing he does is head to Hyuk Joo’s office. He steps inside, but doesn’t see Hyuk Joo anywhere, so he leaves again. He bumps into Tae Gyun, who then rushes out (presumably to talk to Jae Hee). Since Sang Woo didn’t have dinner yet, he goes out again, this time to buy a sandwich at the local mart. He went back to the office, gave Eung Jin a couple bottles of orange juice, and stayed there working all night.

Based on all the answers that the four team members gave during the interrogation, Kang Mi and Woo-Young try to figure who it is that could have stolen the USB. Only Tae Gyun and Sang Woo went into the office, but Woo-Young also suspects Eung Jin. After Hye Ram left the break room, no one was around to see Eung Jin stay at – or leave – the room. They don’t have much to go on to narrow down the field of suspects even further, so Woo-Young goes over their own actions as soon as they heard that Hyun Min came to the bureau.

It was when Hyun Min and Woo-Young had moved for a more private chat over coffee that he got a call from Kang Mi about the missing USB. The call came in at around 7:38PM, meaning that the suspect acted anytime between 7:20 to 7:38.  Woo-Young rushed out of the seating area and heard Hyun Min’s phone ring. It was they spy, reporting to say that he had successfully stolen the drive. Woo-Young estimated that call to be at around 7:39, and suddenly gets an epiphany. Ever the lone wolf, he just goes off without another word, forcing Kang Mi to go chasing after him just so she knows what’s going on.

Back at the jail, the officer gives Hyuk Joo the log for special meal requests. The same person had requested for the special meals for all of the inmates – “Won Dae Myung,” which is a very fake name in Hyuk Joo’s book. There are only several people who could have slipped the poison in the food: the cafeteria employee who made the dinner box sets, the police officer who delivered the food from the cafeteria to the jail, and the officer who handed it out to the inmates.

Hyuk Joo eliminates the cafeteria employee, as there were too many eyes there, and the employee would have been caught slipping poison. The delivery officer is eliminated too because every hall was full of surveillance cameras, and he would have been caught. The only person left would be the officer who handed it to the inmates, but even Hyuk Joo can’t believe that the hapless officer would have been able to do that.

The officer insists he didn’t poison anyone. He just gave Jae Hee his medicine and food – that’s it! That’s it! Hyuk Joo realizes that the “poison” was actually the medicine. They take out Jae Hee’s bag and search for the pill bottle. Hyuk Joo suspects that someone must have switched the pill bottles knowing that Jae Hee would just take them without a second thought. He asks who else opened the bag before the officer.

“Someone from the cyber crime division went through it to get digital evidence,” the officer replies. Who!? They go through the log to see who searched it – it was Sang Woo. Sang Woo’s our spy!?!?! Oh the feeling of rage and betrayal Hyuk Joo is feeling…

At the bureau, Kang Mi gets one of the colleagues to give her the phone records for one of the extension lines in their office. It’s a good thing she went along with Woo-Young, since as a fired officer he can’t very well go snooping around others’ call records. On a hunch he chose this extension line, and he ends up being right – there was a call made out on 7:39 to Hyun Min’s number.

Hyuk Joo storms back in the office yelling for Sang Woo. He passes by Eung Jin, who’s on his way home, and Eung Jin says that Sang Woo’s in the office. As soon as he sees him, Hyuk Joo pins Sang Woo on the table and handcuffs one of his wrists. Sang Woo cries out – has Hyuk Joo gone nuts? The Furious Cow demands to know why Sang Woo went through Jae Hee’s stuff at the jail.

In pain, Sang Woo says he was just looking for more evidence, but he didn’t report anything because he didn’t find anything special. Hyuk Joo yells at him to stop lying. Sang Woo: “I’m not lying! If you don’t believe me, ask Dr. Kang Eung Jin!” Eung Jin? But why? Sang Woo says that Eung Jin was with him when they went through Jae Hee’s belongings.

HMMMMM….

Heading back to the cyber crime office, Woo-Young explains to Kang Mi that he knew to check this particular extension line because of the clues in the statements and the CCTV footage. When Sang Woo had returned to the office with his food, and when he gave Eung Jin the juice, Eung Jin was on the phone. At around 7:39.

OH MY GOD! So Eung Jin was the one who called Hyun Min. He had retrieved the USB from Hyuk Joo’s office and erased the contents of it. It makes sense to Woo-Young too that Eung Jin be a Hyun-Min-Sympathizer; Eung Jin’s been processing most evidences that come into the office, so he has the easiest access to manipulate the evidence as he sees fit.

Back to Sang Woo and Hyuk Joo fighting: Sang Woo explains that it was Eung Jin who suggested they go search Jae Hee’s belongings. Sang Woo had found a USB drive and bagged it. (I wonder what’s in that USB.) While he went to sign the log sheet, Eung Jin then swapped out the pill bottles in Jae Hee’s bag with the poisoned pills.

Hyuk Joo’s not sure whether or not to believe Sang Woo, but he definitely is inclined to buy his story. He realizes that Eung Jin had just left moments ago – the suspect slipping through his hands again!

Hyuk Joo orders for a complete shut down of the bureau, barricading the gates and putting everyone on alert for Eung Jin. Woo-Young and Kang Mi hear the alarm and rush to the front of the building, where Hyuk Joo has just dispatched another group of officers to check the parking lot. Woo-Young asks if Eung Jin knew that Hyuk Joo was suspecting him, because if Eung Jin sensed danger, he might destroy any incriminating evidence.

And destroy he shall. Eung Jin slips back into his lab through a back door and logs on to his data storage computer. Under the hidden files folder, he right-clicks on “Shin Hyo Jung’s original video” movie file, and presses ‘Delete File’.

“Are you sure you want to delete?” Eung Jin’s mouse hovers over the ‘Yes’ button.

Woo-Young, Hyuk Joo, and Kang Mi stare up at the building from the front road, all realizing at the same time that Eung Jin might still be in the building, and deleting evidence at that very moment…

Crap. RUN!

Comments:

Ack! Why are the Three Musketeers so slow!? Well, they’re pretty quick in figuring things out, but the slowest runners on earth. Grr. Great cliffhanger. I bet Eung Jin presses ‘Delete.’ Speaking of which, HAHA! I am so happy to see that it’s Eung Jin! I knew it had to be him, because it had to be someone who was part of the cyber crime team for as long as Woo Hyun was at least. It narrows it down to him and Hye Ram (excluding Young Suk and Woo Hyun, who are now both dead). Kang Mi was new to the team at some point, so she couldn’t have been “in” on Hyun Min’s endgame for the past 13 years, and Tae Gyun was probably a toddler 13 years ago. (Kidding. Sort of.) Sang Woo and Hyuk Joo were too new to the cyber crime division to be involved with Hyun Min’s cyber crimes and hacking.

To have Eung Jin as the foe is incredibly fun, because he certainly did seem harmless. However, his fate is probably not going to end well, since he’s so close to being caught. If he’s caught, he’ll die.

It appears that Hyun Min is gathering momentum with his revenge plan. However, with each step forward, he’s losing one more ally. His successes come at a price, because each dead person involved is linked even closer to him. Each death means the Three Musketeers have more reason to circle around him like sharks. And, it looks like Hyun Min is going to do something to Kim Byung Suk to get rid of a potential enemy; a mistake with that operation/murder could lead to Hyun Min’s downfall.

I personally think it’s ridiculous for Hyun Min to attack Kim Byung Suk, because it makes it so obvious that he’s the bully. He’s risking so much that he’s putting himself in greater danger with the police, instead of sitting back and letting things fall apart on their own. It’s like he needs to stomp on every single little weed that could potentially ruin his perfect garden; thanks to Hero, I know that sometimes it’s not worth fighting against every single critic. It may be better to be feared than loved, but being feared does not mean one should be a destroyer. I could be overreacting, and Hyun Min could very well just be trying to find dirt on Kim Byung Suk to use as a bribe. However, is that really necessary? Just oust your uncle already. You’re almost there. Stop playing around with the little pieces.

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