#preshgene

He made several online business in his spare time, nothing legal. Yes, you read that right, nothing legal. But none involving drugs or human. He made a pact to sell but never use--a very conspicuous notion, but pretty much predictable, considering how young he is. Tae-Oh is a kite without a string, he drifts through the wind and lands when there's none. He knew what he's doing is wrong, but the pay is great and he could buy things he could have only dreamt of, before. As a kid, brought up in an orphanage, having dreams were expensive. Every kid he knew either worked or be criminals. His favourite pastime then is to wait by a bus station. There, he got to see kids his own age having an actual future. A bright future. Or maybe for some, it isn't very bright, but there is; a future.

He felt like he was destined to live like this: to hack. To do things, for the sake of money.

So he kept on hacking. It might have been the middle of the month when he decided that he'd like to venture on a new way to make money. Through ATM machines. It's physically straining to have bombed the machine, and is also mentally draining to crack the codes, so he tried to observe how an ATM worked. He went on foot and got into an ATM station, with several machines. It was somewhere evening, and without second thoughts, he walked in after a girl.

"I've been thinking too much, lately." You thought to yourself. "I'm even thinking about how I'm thinking that I'm thinking too much, this is annoying." You sighed through your nose and took out your purse. You didn't even realise there was someone standing behind you. He looks pretty much harmless when you glanced over your shoulder, at him. He looked away so you couldn't see his face. "When's the last time I've eaten a proper meal. Have I even eaten today? My legs are so painful..." You blinked to the flashing screen of the ATM. Tae-oh watched you tip-toe and stretching yourself a little. You placed your hand at the base of your neck and gripped tight behind your neck as if to relieve yourself off of the strains that you have been sustaining, the whole day.

"Is it odd that I'm not even hungry..." You entered the pin number and because you were so off-guard, Tae-Oh caught the numbers from the tip of his eyes.

Check balance? Yes.

The number flashed in front of you and you cancelled operation, before leaving the ATM in a relaxed stride. Tae-Oh couldn't read that body language, but it was something else. He waited until you leave before punching a few codes. He knew it was wrong to steal from you, a complete stranger, at the time, but he wants to see if he could do it. It was a self-challenge for him. He ran the codings and he was able to see the last operation the ATM had processed. Your operation. Tae-Oh clicked several times and he got to see the balance you have.

His heart sunk.

$97.00

How can you survive with just $97.00?

Tae-Oh didn't stop there, of course. He went to do a thorough research of you and found out everything. Your family, your job, your last school, your current address, your shoe size, the places you frequent to (thanks to his hacking ability on public surveillance cam). Tae-Oh started to just, watch. He watched you get on the bus, get off the bus, hop into a train, off the train, into a taxi, off the taxi, buys instant noodles from the nearest convenient stores, day in and day out. There's even some suspicious guy that kept following you. And it triggered him to step out of his comfort zone. It was in his instinct to protect you.

Then, Tae-Oh started to tail on you. Discreetly, you don't even notice him being there. He learned to breath quietly, step without a sound, etc. He was not going to sit in his chair and watch shit happens to you. If you're being safe, he wants to make sure it stays that way. Fate threw him off of a cliff one day, when you turned to see him walking behind you. He dropped a Subway receipt as he was scampering away, looking very flustered. There's not just one, but a stack of crumpled receipts of food you've been receiving magically at work. You didn't let him escape, easily. He was cornered at an alley where you followed him. Finding no where else to run to, he surrendered.

"Have you been sending me food?" You asked. Your voice echoed. He, of course, shook his head, violently. You held up the receipts, "These are all the proves, sir. How long have you been following me? What is it that you want? If it's money you're looking for, you've hit the rock bottom here, because I'm not wealthy." You explained.

Finding him verbally unresponsive, you decided to turn away and start to leave, until he squeaked, in a deep heavenly voice, "It's not about the money."

You halt in your step and return to face him, again. "...Then, what is it?"

"Please don't be afraid of me, I mean no harm." He held his palm outward at you to show that he means exactly what he said. "Ever heard of the word: Hello?" You crossed your arm. "That's how anybody starts any conversation." You taught him. He stammered, "...Hello."

Your lips breaks into a smile and yout your gaze down at your feet and back up to him. "I get a feeling that you don't talk to girls much, do you?"

.

.

.

Every time Tae-Oh think of you, his heart goes tender. He became certain that in life not all hackers are bad. Some are good, some are forced to do bad even when they refused to. Tae-Oh, even with bruised lips and unrecognisable face, was able to make out the sound of a helicopter. Someone is speaking through a hailer, in a heavily congested voice of an elder man. "You have been surrounded, release all hostages, we have teams surrounding your area." It's repeated, time and time again, and of course, the person who was behind all the kidnapping of the hackers are one of the government officials who were corrupted and is eager to know the informations that he could blackmail, in order to gain money.

The only way to gain inaccessible information of other countries' government officials is through talented hackers, lots of talented hackers. One, being, Tae-Oh.

Tae-Oh had seen the sunlight after almost six months, being imprisoned and improperly fed. But the real sun that he had been missing wasn't the one in the sky, but the one that's running towards him right now. "I thought you were dead!" You roared from afar as you come to him, you attacked him with a ribcage crushing hug, and sobbed. "I thought you were...and then the Toy Story soundtrack came out and 'Save Me'...I thought I was hallucinating!" You cried in his arms. His shirt is all worn out. "Don't hug me too much, I'm dirty." He chuckled, weakly, "...I thought you wouldn't notice, I thought the signals won't reach you, but it did...what did you do?" He looked around to see a SWAT team, a tactical team, several special forces and at least three helicopters flying around.

There were at least a dozen of black vans parked. Hackers were being rescued, and among them were software engineers, programmers and actuaries.

"We'll have plenty of time for that..." You hooked your arm around him gently and helped him walk to the nearest ambulance where the paramedics rushed to give him a wheelchair, since they've sprained his ankles.

In the ambulance, you held his hand and never let go. "...What's for our future?" You asked, looking at the your fingers, laced with his. "For our future days?" He asked, weakly. "I'm not sure, but it ain't future, if there isn't you; that's for sure."

And it came from the building opposing the park. Tae Oh looked to his side and averted his eyes to a glimmer of light. Something that appeared to be the reflection of the sun, coming from far away. He turned to you, and your eyes were wide, and reddening. He urgently called your name, his gaze fall to your hand clutching your chest. Slowly, red oozes of blood seeping through your fingers, and your breathing shallows. You gasped, and fell off the bench as Tae Oh tries to catch you. But you fell on the ground, next to his feet, and he scrambled to the floor where you were, his eyes never left you. The red hue of dripping blood covered the concrete ground, people were running, hiding, looking for shelter, because the shooting is still happening.

Tae Oh snapped into reality, while still keeping his eyes close. A drop of tears to the side of his face, woke him. And with the harsh awakening, the pain and bruises came along. He woke up just when the food is being served. The only source of light was the tiny window on his far left, out of the cell. It will be approximately two hours before they will force him to work. He grabbed the tip of the tin tray and nibbled a bread, weakly. His fingers, face and lips were black and blue. Covered in tiny cuts and bruises. He looks up to where the sun were, thinking, if he were to get out, alive.

You tried to call his friends, but it was fruitless. None of them knew where he was or what he was working on. But you had nother idea.

The airport. Five minutes past noon. "Do you know what time the restaurant is open?" a middle-aged men stood up by the vending machine asked you. You looked over to the female companion that was with him. "Five in the afternoon. But the food is too bland for my taste." They smiled and you did, too. They followed you wordlessly to a hotel, down town. Entered a room under your lead and starts setting up camera. The male, was ready with his notepad. "If you don't mind...electronics go into the microwave." You said. They complied. And when they've settled, you sat yourself in the middle of the bed, legs crossed underneath you as the camera was pointed in your direction.

The man, a writer, starts to breath in deeply before he started the questioning. "Was it easy for you to access information? How are you sure that the program he used was dangerous. And how unsafe are the people? Have you ever done anything illegal with the things he possessed?"

The female, a camera woman, smiled at you, and intruded. She understood how uncomfortable you were so she said, with a motherly voice, "Let's begin with your name. And his."

You told them your name and, "Tae Oh."

The male reporter, who introduced himself as Reporter Kang, came with another question, "And his last name?"

"I don't know his last name."

Reporter Kang snapped his head to Producer Nam. "If this is another story of rape, I'm walking out." And together, the reporter and producer started to bicker between themselves. So you had to intervene.

"It's not about rape." You blinked.

"Tae Oh is a hacker," you silenced them, "...he had access to many websites, portals and documents and he's a free lancer."

They had all their attentions to you. You proceeded to tell them about what you saw Tae Oh did, with the screens, the traffic lights, the LED on the streets, and how he made them do exactly what he wants. He passed the highest level of national clearance, he was self educated, self thought hacker who is beneath no official organizations. You also spilled about how old he was, where he was born, where he lived as a teenager, and the orphanage he was in before he was an adult.

"Why do you reveal his identity...he has spent years working in covert, incognito, why did you decide to do this."

You stayed silent for a considerable amount of time. You were thinking it through. Thinking whether or not what you were doing is right. Tae Oh spent his time watching over you, looking after you, protecting you, and it reckoned you for not being able to do the same to him. You think he's in trouble, no- you know, he's in trouble. You could feel it. Question was, how do you make this people trust you?

By telling the truth.

"When media attention is obtained, everyone will want to know where he is, how he is. And he won't be able to be executed easily. Because I believe that he's under an organization that wouldn't hesitate to execute him, if they had to. And by revealing this..." you trailed, the camera women raised her face, and breathed, "...he won't be killed anonymously." You dropped your gaze to your lap, and blinked. A tear drop trickled down your face. "It wasn't the first time the government had used orphans and their abilities and talents to be in their beneficiary. There's perhaps tens of hundreds orphans who had been cultivated in their duties. They don't have families, no family ties, can depend on no one, is alone and most likely the most vulnerable and easy targets."

"Saying that the government to be harvesting orphans, in order to spy on the citizens are a strong accusation. You could be hurt by this." The camera woman said. "They won't. They will keep me under their visions, but as long as I am in the spotlight, they won't be able to touch me. I'm safer, and Tae Oh is safer within the circle, than we are out and unknown. At least the people know who Tae Oh is, and what government is really doing, behind us." You swallowed a thick gulp of your spit, looking straight to the reporter and the camera women.

"What makes you think he was in trouble?"

You told them about the signals he sent in forms of videos, and how the house was bugged with an external source, a command written extremely similar to the ones he wrote. It was intricate, complex and cannot be done in one day, by a new writer or engineer. It can only be done by it's original writer. And Tae Oh must have memorized it by heart. "How long did it took you understand all this?" The camerawomen asked you with a smile, as she took a closer look to your allegations on your computer screen. "When you put heart into something, it'll only take a day..." You straightened your back and inhaled, "...but I put my soul in it too, so it took three hours."

The metal chain rattled with each other as Tae Oh squeezes his eyes to see better. His visions starts to get very blurry, and he has been drenched in cold sweat since last night. He was going down with a fever that the authority refused to recognize. This is against his work ethics. They are forcing him to create a database to wire in all business transactions in order for the deals to favor them. Fishing in, poking into another countries' data in hopes to find sore spots to ensure an on-going business contracts between continents. It was unfair, dishonest and dirty. In simple English, the country is trying to find secrets that other countries have to threaten a healthy diplomatic relationship in order to secure corrupted deals.

In these deals, millions and billions of citizen money is gambled. And all these will be made possible with this database, created by a team of 50 orphaned young hackers. One of the famous few, were Tae Oh. And because of his talents, and his relentless attitude, he gets beaten up numerous time. "Isn't it easier to just do what they want... you could die and no one will know." A young hacker next to him whispered. His voice barely broke, and concern was written all over his face, "...Hyung. You can't die." Tae Oh clenched his jaws, piercing his gaze to the screen in front of him. "If I die, someone will know." He grumbled.

You wordlessly took the spray she needed, and slap on a smile. "Go get a shower before dad comes." She said. You walked past mother, who had just came out of her shower, in her new clothes, waiting for dinner. "What happened...?" She sang and you heard your sister replying, "...Just some accident. No worries." You were relieved. It was odd that she would cover you up like that. Come to think of it, no one quite knew you the way she does. Not even mother. In the comfort of your room, you shut the door behind you gently. making as little noises as you can. Not wanting to draw attentions. You ran your fingers over your hair and untied the ponytail that has been strangling it all day. You looked straight ahead to where your reflection stood and sighed. "See what you made me become."

It's been days. Weeks, maybe months since you last contacted Tae-Oh.

You understood his frame of work quite roughly, but still, a month of complete silence is ridiculous, even for a long-distant-relationship enthusiast such as yourself. You want to call, but you don't know his number. He changes them every 2.5 seconds. His job requires him to be in complete restrictions of outgoing and incoming calls, making it impossible for any calls to be made. Sometimes, you don't know the difference when he's at work or when he's asleep. Or worse, gone.

He could be dead and no one would know anything, except you. His foster parents aren't worried about him since he wires them money every month, and as long as the moneys keep coming, he's probably alive and well.

No news, is good news. They'd say.

But from the last time you saw him, he said a very troubling thing. It was subtle but a strike on the heart. It didn't seem like a lie, but it didn't seem like whole lot of trurth, either. It was mind puzzling. The way Tae-Oh puts words to sound like. It's like saying what is obvious, making you wonder what's the underlying meaning of the whole sentence. He said, to you, nudging you awake in the middle of the night with a strange peaceful look in his eyes, "You're my best friend." He proceeds to hug you from behind, and sighs happily into your nape. Maybe you're overthinking stuff. Is it wrong? Is it a sin to overthink things?

You snapped back into reality with a single touch from your dad. He poke you gently with the handle of his spoon. "You've been spacing out quite a lot... are you alright?"

Oh yes, it's dinner. You must have gotten out of shower and when to sit with your parents for dinner. Sister is here too. "Good. I'm fine..." You let out a nervous chuckle. "You're terrible liar." Sister commented before mother talked about an interesting trip she had to an island with friends of her own age last week. Something about monkeys dancing and elephant rides. Was it somewhere in Borneo? Or was it Vietnam. It should be Thailan if an elephant is involved. But whatever it was, you had no interest in it. You washed the dishes still clouded in the thought of Tae-Oh. "What is bother you, honestly..." Mother said, with a faint smile. You could see twitches of concern, on the tip of her brows.

"It's just. He...he hasn't been calling." You blurted. Mother stopped wiping the wet dishes dry and turned to you, leaning her back to the counter. "Honey. I don't mean to be rude, but at any point 'it' has come back, you know you could turn to me for help..."

You literally halt in your movements. Your eyes shot to the running water from the tap and you just froze. You can't believe that those words came out from a person who gave birth to you, who kept you in her for nine months, your mother. "I couldn't believe I could, for a second... thought that I could trust you." You scoffed, throwing your eyes up the ceiling while a tear escape the tails of your eyes. "Oh honey...I didn't meant to." She approached you but you repelled. "I'm not crazy, mom. I'm not delusional." You cried. "But we've never seen the boy..." You scorned, walking backwards, to wear you hung your coat, took your bag and car keys. "Wait, I thought you're staying over?" Dad suddenly said.

"...I don't stay over a stranger's house." You glared at your mother and rushed out of the house. Your sister came out of her room too late, she already giving a certain look to mother, "...What did you do." But without waiting for her answer, she came out of the house, barefooted. You, on the other hand, already had your car up and running, so all she could do is knock your car window, repeatedly. "Hey, hey." But you slammed the pedal to reverse as fast as you could and make a turn. It was an ugly sight. You were down right crying two minutes later, remembering how much pain you had gone through since Tae-Oh lost in contact, your eyes turned blurry and you had to pull over by the side to avoid causing traffic. You crawled out of your vehicle and sat at the curb, bawling your eyes out.

When you got home, your own home which you shared with Tae-Oh sometimes, the house lit up already. Tae-Oh installed an automated lighting systems that turns on after dark to make sure no intruders dare to come in, especially when he's not around and you had to return home alone. Your eyes lit up although your face has lost all its sparkles. You wanted to be happy, but you can't, because he's not here. Suddenly, the TV turned on by itself. It was grey noise. Odd. Your TV has cable and it shouldn't act that way. You approached it, and turned it off, thinking nothing. You took off your coat and hung it over the coat hanger, then, you tied your hair up, checking you phone. It died. The battery died. Crawling on all four, you reached for a plug and start humming a song.

"...You've got a friend in me. You've got a friend in me...If you've got troubles, I've got 'em too...There isn't anything I wouldn't do for you..." Hold on a second. You got on two feet and rushed to the living room where the TV was. Toy Story was on. Randy Newman's "You've Got A Friend In Me" was playing.

"We stick together and can see it through Cause you've got a friend in me You've got a friend in me"

What's even more strange is that it keeps repeating the same verse over and over again. You turned it off, once more. You didn't turn away this time, you anticipated for it to turn on by itself. And it did. And this time, it played a scene from BTS music video "Save Me." You opened your laptop and searched "BTS Save Me lyrics". The part that played was:

"Why is it so dark where you’re not here It’s dangerous how wrecked I am Save me because I can’t get a grip on myself

Listen to my heartbeat It calls you whenever it wants to Because within this pitch black darkness You are shining so brightly

Give me your hand save me save me I need your love before I fall, fall Give me your hand save me save me I need your love before I fall, fall."

You blinked once. "You've got a friend in me, save me?" What's the meaning of this? "Babe, where are you." You spoke to the laptop's screen wallpaper of him smiling at you. It was one of the few snaps of him that shows him smiling or even looking at the camera. You instantly felt uneasy. Suffocated, in the state of darkness, that any flicker of light is the first thing you grasp on out of desperation? 

It could mean nothing, but oh dear God, let it mean something.