Soo Yon-The Seventh Floor

It took me two hours to reach our agency's building, thanks to the awful traffic. But any excuse to delay the dreaded meeting was a welcoming prospect. The Seventh Floor of T-Net is not a place one would can just randomly enter. It was the devil's lair.

'Hyung!' I turned around to see Cheng hurrying towards me.

'Hyung, did he call you too?' he panted. 'I received his text that we were summoned to The Seventh Floor!'

An ominous feeling was rising within me. If both of us were summoned to The Seventh Floor, then it must be for a serious issue.

'Let's go,' I gulped. Slowly, we made our way to the main building's seventh floor. The ride up the elevator was painfully slow. We were so quiet during the ride that I could hear Cheng's heart beating against his chest. My hands were turning clammy. I inwardly prayed that Taehyun's medicines were strong enough to prevent another panic attack.

The lift doors opened. 'This is it,' I told Cheng. 'We'll have to face him.'

Cheng nodded, too nervous to say anything. We got off the lift and made our way towards the only room in the entire floor. The label on the door read "The CEO". I knocked the door. It opened.

The large, spacious room was circular in shape. The walls were painted in stripes of blue and periwinkle. At the opposite end of the room, was a glass wall showing a breathtaking view of Seoul city.

Under other circumstances, I would have loved the beautiful view in front of me. But a dark chill was emanating from the room. The CEO's desk was placed in the middle of the room. His chair was facing away from us. I could feel his cold aura freezing up my insides.

'CEO Yoo?' I called him, uncertain of his mood. The chair turned around to reveal a stylish man in his 50's. He wore a striped suit with plum and lavender stripes. A long scarf hung from his neck. His scraggly hair reached till his shoulders. A wide smile was plastered on his face. Upon seeing us, he got up from his chair.

'Soo Yon ah,' he greeted, hugging me. 'We're meeting after such a long time, my son.'

He then turned to Cheng and gave him a hug. 'Ahh Cheng,' as he tightened his grip around Cheng. The latter looked really uncomfortable upon the touch. 'Long time no see, my other son.'

CEO Yoo calls all the idols of T-Net his sons and daughters. He pulled back from Cheng, his smile still etched on his lips. But that smile failed to curtain his calculative eyes. His eyes were cold and steely, trying to read our minds.

'Both of you have been my pillars of support for almost fifteen years,' he said. 'T-Net was just a small entertainment company, barely scraping by until TNT debuted. The two of you took this company to new heights-'

'Six of us,' Cheng said quietly. CEO Yoo looked at Cheng. His lips were curled in a polite smile but his eyes were steely.

'I beg your pardon?'

'Six of us,' Cheng said loudly. 'Six of us debuted with TNT. Six of us took T-Net to glory until...'

Cheng trailed off. No matter how much he hated D3, he would not deny them of their due credit. CEO Yoo was still staring at him, inwardly calculating his next words carefully.

'So you still hold some respect for D3,' he concluded. 'Is that why you went to their room at the hotel the other day?'

So he knew, I thought. I was not surprised; nothing can escape the ears of T-Net's CEO. He had spies around us. Any contact with D3 would result in disastrous consequences.

'Those three left after the unfortunate incident with Su-Ji,' CEO Yoo went on. 'They disrespected Su-Ji's last wish to keep TNT together. And yet, you met up with them.'

'I didn't meet up with them,' Cheng heated up. 'It was a coincidence!'

'And you also got into a fistfight with them,' CEO Yoo stated loudly. 'If any reporter had seen you, it would have been a field day for them.'

'Well no one saw us,' Cheng defended himself. 'It didn't make the papers nor any forum!'

'We stopped it before the news broke out,' CEO Yoo replied. We were taken aback. I was so sure the incident was not witnessed. I even checked the CCTV footage around the area carefully but no one was around to witness the fight.

'There was no one else there except for the D3 members, Cheng and Mia!' I frowned. 'D3 would never reveal the fact that they met any of us. It would be a breach of the contract.'

'D3 didn't reveal it,' CEO Yoo commented coolly. 'But that new girl, Mia. I have my doubts on her. Who wouldn't love to sell a story like this to the media?'

I clenched my fists. After working with CEO Yoo for fifteen years, I could tell when the man was lying. My gut feeling was tugging at me. CEO Yoo was known to sow the seeds of suspicions between people by making up false claims. What if he was lying and there was no leak in reality? What if he was simply trying to shift the blame on someone else and Mia just happened to be his scapegoat?

If my suspicions were right, CEO Yoo is simply taking a shot in the dark. He probably had no proof against Mia and is trying to rile us against her with his manipulations. But why would he try to throw Mia under the bus? Unless...

Before I could open my mouth, Cheng spoke up. 'Mia would never leak this!' Cheng said calmly. 'She's my friend. She'd never do anything to jeopardize TNT's image.'

I stared at him. There was a strange look in Cheng's eyes. They were full of a cold rage, ready to murder the person in front of him. He looked unblinkingly into CEO Yoo's eyes, not flinching in the slightest. Both of them were having a silent war.

'You shouldn't trust people that easily, Cheng,' CEO said quietly.

'I think I'll choose whom to trust,' Cheng gritted. 'I trust Mia. And I'm not going to let you vilify her.'

Hearing Cheng's words arose a new wave of envy in me. I was glad he was defending Mia but the look in his eyes made me realize that his feelings were not limited to the zones of friendship.

'Other than the four of you, that girl was the only one there,' CEO Yoo repeated. 'Who else will release the news to the press?'

'Does it matter?' I asked. 'What matters is that the news is never gonna go out. Just let it go.'

CEO Yoo stared at both of us for a long time. He knew he could not make us speak ill of Mia. Finally, he motioned us to leave. Taking a sigh of relief, we exited the room. It seemed like CEO Yoo is going to drop the subject but we knew better. He was just waiting for another opportunity to slander an innocent person.

As soon as we entered the lift, I cornered Cheng. 'The news about the fight,' I said. 'You leaked it, didn't you?'