Business AU - Chapter 10
Title: Catalyst
Universe: NewS/ Business AU/
Rating: PG-13
Character/ Pairings: NewS, OC, DBSK
Disclaimer: I don’t own people. Japanese nor Korean. Idol or not. Too bad.
Summary: NEWS wasn’t there. One group was. Could it change things for Lia?
A/N: My supah dupah fast update. I rarely update this fast. I think I deserve credit. Haha.
Prologue and Chapter1
Chapter2
Chapter3
Chapter4
Chapter5
Chapter6
Chapter7
Chapter8
Chapter9
“Ohayo gozaimasu Ms. Montez.” Lia twirled around at the direction of the voice. Lia caught her breath at the angelic face that loomed in front of her.
How could someone like him be so pretty? Could God have made a mistake in assigning his gender? Lia can’t help but wonder.
Jaejoong smirked at her. “Are you through admiring my profile Ms. Montez?”
Lia snapped back to reality as her mouth opened in shock. “Wow. Narcissistic much?”
He let out a chuckle. “I didn’t know you harbor strong feelings for me,” he continued to tease her.
“Well… I do.” Lia admitted.
Jaejoong’s head snapped up at her statement.
“Jealousy and insecurity ARE powerful emotions, you know.” She pointed out. “Do you realize that when we are standing side by side, it’s like showing the difference between export quality and scrap?!” Lia continued.
If she had been a fan of plastic surgery, she wouldn’t mind having a face like his.
He let out a big sigh as he faced her. “For someone who has the right to be boastful, you surely have a low self-esteem.”
Huh?
Lia gave him a ‘what-are-you-talking-about’ look as he merely shrugged his shoulders and went towards his other groupmates. She quickly followed him.
“Ohayo minna-san!” She greeted them cheerily.
“Ohayo Ms. Montez.” They greeted back.
“Uhm, it’s Lia. I think we have established our friendship since you guys ‘chivalrously’ came to my rescue and all. And I don’t know what to call you guys. Do you have like a Japanese name? Or do we stick with last name? Wait, we haven’t even formally introduced ourselves! I only know your full names ‘coz you wrote it at the back of the Polaroid. But that’s it.” She said as she took the seat next to Junsu.
She never addressed them by their name. One, because she doesn’t know what to call them. And two, they kinda look the same for her. Except for that goddamn Narcissus.
“Fair enough. Why don’t I start then?” Yunho, the tall one with chinky eyes, spoke up. “I’m the leader of Tohoshinki. We’re from a Korean firm, Soo Man Executives, or simply SME. Jung Yunho. My nickname’s U-know.”
“I know? How would I know?” Lia asked confusedly.
Yunho smiled at her quizzical expression. He typed something on his laptop and showed it to her.
U-know.
“It’s spelled that way.” He offered as an explanation.
Lia’s lips formed a small ‘o’ in reply.
“Next is me, Kim Jaejoong. Nickname’s Hero. Or Ms. Pretty. Whichever you prefer.”
Lia’s eyes widened in surprise. How did the hell did he know that?!
“You called me that last Friday. In your drunken stupor.” Jaejoong explained.
“And we’re THE four Knights…Ta-da!!!” Junsu demonstrated with matching flailing arms. He was so cheerful in doing it that he looked like an overly excited sea lion. That got him a good smack from his seatmate Micky.
Lia wanted to laugh but her humiliation last Friday stopped her.
“Hey, it’s cool Lia. I didn’t take offense in it. Nor did the rest of them. We’re just teasing you.” Jaejoong assured her.
Lia smiled at him but deep inside she knew it will be written down as her ‘Most Embarassing Moment for the first quarter of 2009'.
“My turn. Park Yoochoon. Aka Micky.” He extended his hand at her, which she awkwardly accepted. The bowing was growing on her.
“You have soft hands.” He informed her as Junsu let out a groan.
“What are you?! Suzuki Masa the second?” Junsu asked him as he crossed his arms.
“What?! I can’t compliment a girl now?” Micky retaliated.
“Oh please, if I didn’t butt in, you would have added, ‘I wouldn’t mind holding it for the rest of my life’.”
“How did you know that? Aish! You and your big butt are always in the way!”
“…and now is not the time to bicker.” Changmin quipped in.
“Shut up!” Both Micky and Junsu snapped at him.
Changmin however, seemed unfazed. He merely rolled his eyes at them and looked at Lia. “Please don’t mind their unruly behavior. You know how children can be.”
“Yah! What are you talking about? YOU are the youngest here!” Junsu countered.
“Literally, yes. But on the maturity scale, I am WAY above you.” Changmin pointed out.
“Why you - “ Junsu was about to smack his head but was halted by a stern voice.
“STOP IT.” Yunho bellowed. “Changmin, shut up, it’s not yet your turn. Micky, stop hitting on Lia. We didn’t protect her so that you can make a move on her. Junsu, introduce yourself now.”
Lia remained silent all this time but she suddenly couldn’t take it anymore. She let out the laugh she had been holding.
“Y-you have no idea how relieved I am to find out that you guys are normal. I had the impression that you were all serious and business-like.” She explained as she wiped the tears that had escaped from her laughing.
“See? Lia loves me already.” Junsu declared cheekily. Micky was about to intercept so the former pre-empted him. “I’m Kim Junsu. Junsu or Su would be fine.”
“And before dolphin hyung starts squeaking anymore nonsense, let me introduce myself. I’m Choikang Changmin. You can call me Changmin or Max. Doesn’t make a difference.” The tallest of them intercepted.
He pushed the rim of his glasses as he continued, “If you need to talk to anyone with sense, I’m your best bet.”
Lia merely smiled at him. “I’ll keep that in mind. And I’m Liana Montez. You can call me Lia. I’m part of NEWS, a group from K&A.”
She bowed briefly at each one of them before she remembered something, “Uhm, we didn’t introduce our field of specialty.”
No one dared to answer her. They shrugged it off and went back to doing whatever they were doing earlier.
Are these guys bipolar? She couldn’t help but ask herself.
I guess I would find out sooner or later.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
And finding out she did.
For the rest of the day, she had been grouped with them for training activities (luckily, there was no sign of Suzuki Masa anywhere). She expected them to conquer and divide the work according to their specialties. But lo and behold, they didn’t.
Simply because they didn’t have to.
They were all knowledgeable in any field.
Seriously.
Lia looked at them while they discussed their findings of the case.
“Using the network-based component, we could place a sniffer device directly into the network…” Yunho suggested.
“Yes. Though alternatively, we can have a LAN card access all packets, obtain the ones assigned to it and the sniffer device then examines the packets on one of the hosts or servers.,” Jaejoong countered.
Micky nodded his head, “Of course, a promiscous code! So we are going to switch the NIC in a pc or server in order to catch all packets…”
Junsu also joined in. “So if a packet matches a specific signature - such as string, port and header signatures - …”
“…It would indicate a possible intrusion and will be detected by the sniffer device.” Changmin finished off the statement.
They smiled amongst themselves at how easily they have come up with the solution.
Noticing that there was another person in the group, they turned their attention back to her.
“So, Lia, what do you think? Do you have other suggestions?” Changmin asked her.
Lia, who initially held nothing but a blank expression on her face, finally spoke up. “Are all of you experts in Network Infrastructure and Analysis?”
“Uhm, yeah.” Junsu answered, unsure of where her question was leading.
“Then who does Law and Taxation?” She continued.
“We all do.” Micky answered simply.
“Accounting and Finance?”
“All of us.” Jaejoong answered.
“Marketing and Business Management?”
“The five of us.” Yunho answered.
“Human Resources?”
“Still us.” Max answered.
“And the genius?”
“Of course, all of us!” Junsu answered chirpily.
Micky elbowed him at his reply.
“What?! It was parallelism!” He replied in defense.
Lia, took the time to process her newfound information. “So what are you doing in one group when you can possibly work on your own?”
Jaejoong sighed deeply before turning to face her. “Lia, in SM, you cannot just be knowledgeable in one field. You have to know every aspect. You may excel in one or two or more, but you can’t be part of any group unless you can carry your own self.”
“That’s what ensures that every group is top-notch. Alone, we can survive. But together, we’re formidable.” Yunho continued.
Lia leaned forward and asked in a low voice, “Are you guys human?”
Micky chuckled at her reaction. “Of course. We were just trained to be that way. It’s our firm’s culture.”
“It’s different in Korea… In SME... In Tohoshinki… ” Changmin added.
Well, NEWS is different too.
Lia fought the urge to say so and stuck her tongue out at them. If she thought that being a beautiful male was unusual, she should have known that there were much more to this group that the eyes can see.
What could she have possibly gotten herself into again?
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
To: Yamashita Tomohisa ; Koyama Keiichiro ; Nishikido Ryo ; Kato Shigeaki ; Takahisa Masuda ; Tegoshi Yuya
From: Montez Liana
Subject: It finally dawned on me
I must have been a big disappointment to you guys.
There’s nothing much that I can say.
Except that I’m really sorry.
Liana Montez
Lia rested her chin on her hands as she stared at the message she have sent them that morning. It was already Thursday, yet they haven’t replied back. She expected them to throw fits of rage over making them worry and the embarrassment she must have impacted to her group as well. But there was no word. Not even one. From all 6 of them.
She tried calling their phone. But the call just wouldn’t push through. It was like they didn’t want to be contacted.
“What are you doing?” a voice asked her as he peered at her screen. Lia immediately straightened up and closed her laptop.
“Nothing.” She murmured as she feigned a sudden interest at the black granite flooring.
“You suck at lying.” He pointed out.
“I know.” She admitted.
“That’s a noble trait.”
“Yeah. Right. And look where it got me.” She answered sarcastically, making a reference to the dilemma last week.
“Closer to us??”
Lifting her head, she bitterly added, “And farther from them...”
His expression softened.
“Is there something wrong?”
Aside from a nagging suspicion that my teammates are in the process of disowning me, everything’s great. Her brain spoke for her.
Lia forced a smile. “Nah. Things are fine and dandy.”
He slumped down on the seat next to her and without looking at her, casually replied, “When you’re ready to talk…I’m here.”
This time, a genuine smile formed on her lips. “Thanks…Pretty-chan.”
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Lia, with the rest of Tohoshinki, made their way out of the training room laughing. Or at least Lia tried to. She had been plastering that smile for the rest of the day.
It’s not that she doesn’t like them,‘coz she does. But at the back of her head, she knew it would have been better if her teammates were around. It’s the same thing when you meet new friends at school but you know that you’re missing your best friends back home.
“Lia, would you come with us for dinner?” Junsu asked her. Lia immediately snapped her attention towards him. His eager face was so obvious.
“A-ano…”
Lia was far from being anti-social, but right now, she just isn’t the mood for any hobnobbing.
“G-gomenasai. I’ll have to take a rain check on that Junsu. I-I have to…” She started to explain as Junsu likewise started pouting.
“Ms. Montez! Is Ms. Montez still here?” a voice shouted grabbing everyone’s attention.
Lia immediately raised her hand. “I’m here!”
The young man, who she recognized as one of the organizers ran towards them. “Y-you …h-have… a… m-me-ssage…” He said panting.
He handed her a piece of paper. Though confused, she opened it up.
Lia,
Meet us at Room 143.
NEWS
Without any more thought, she asked the man, “Where is Room 143?”
“Across the lobby, second door to the left.” He answered.
Lia tucked the paper into her coat, and dashed forward.
“Lia! Where are you going?” She could hear Yunho asking.
She halted and looked back. “I’m meeting them!” She answered happily.
It was all the explanation she needed to tell them. She was grateful for them sticking with her during the week. But this time, she just wanted to see them again. No, she needed to see them.
And finally, it was going to happen. Soon.
She bowed and waved back to them. Before running as fast as her stiletto-clad feet could.
____________________________________________________________________________________
A/N: And I updated! Fast! And it’s longer! I’m spoiling you guys. You have great power over me. I think I love you guys too much. ^^,
So yeah, NEWS will be in the next chap. Expect it. But don’t expect anything typical. My writing instinct is treading dangerous paths as of the moment. Haha.
That said, please let me know how this AU is fairing so far. I have to update Irrational first though. Ryo, Yuri and Jin are consistently reminding me to do it. *delusional* XD
Universe: NewS/ Business AU/
Rating: PG-13
Character/ Pairings: NewS, OC, DBSK
Disclaimer: I don’t own people. Japanese nor Korean. Idol or not. Too bad.
Summary: NEWS wasn’t there. One group was. Could it change things for Lia?
A/N: My supah dupah fast update. I rarely update this fast. I think I deserve credit. Haha.
Prologue and Chapter1
Chapter2
Chapter3
Chapter4
Chapter5
Chapter6
Chapter7
Chapter8
Chapter9
“Ohayo gozaimasu Ms. Montez.” Lia twirled around at the direction of the voice. Lia caught her breath at the angelic face that loomed in front of her.
How could someone like him be so pretty? Could God have made a mistake in assigning his gender? Lia can’t help but wonder.
Jaejoong smirked at her. “Are you through admiring my profile Ms. Montez?”
Lia snapped back to reality as her mouth opened in shock. “Wow. Narcissistic much?”
He let out a chuckle. “I didn’t know you harbor strong feelings for me,” he continued to tease her.
“Well… I do.” Lia admitted.
Jaejoong’s head snapped up at her statement.
“Jealousy and insecurity ARE powerful emotions, you know.” She pointed out. “Do you realize that when we are standing side by side, it’s like showing the difference between export quality and scrap?!” Lia continued.
If she had been a fan of plastic surgery, she wouldn’t mind having a face like his.
He let out a big sigh as he faced her. “For someone who has the right to be boastful, you surely have a low self-esteem.”
Huh?
Lia gave him a ‘what-are-you-talking-about’ look as he merely shrugged his shoulders and went towards his other groupmates. She quickly followed him.
“Ohayo minna-san!” She greeted them cheerily.
“Ohayo Ms. Montez.” They greeted back.
“Uhm, it’s Lia. I think we have established our friendship since you guys ‘chivalrously’ came to my rescue and all. And I don’t know what to call you guys. Do you have like a Japanese name? Or do we stick with last name? Wait, we haven’t even formally introduced ourselves! I only know your full names ‘coz you wrote it at the back of the Polaroid. But that’s it.” She said as she took the seat next to Junsu.
She never addressed them by their name. One, because she doesn’t know what to call them. And two, they kinda look the same for her. Except for that goddamn Narcissus.
“Fair enough. Why don’t I start then?” Yunho, the tall one with chinky eyes, spoke up. “I’m the leader of Tohoshinki. We’re from a Korean firm, Soo Man Executives, or simply SME. Jung Yunho. My nickname’s U-know.”
“I know? How would I know?” Lia asked confusedly.
Yunho smiled at her quizzical expression. He typed something on his laptop and showed it to her.
U-know.
“It’s spelled that way.” He offered as an explanation.
Lia’s lips formed a small ‘o’ in reply.
“Next is me, Kim Jaejoong. Nickname’s Hero. Or Ms. Pretty. Whichever you prefer.”
Lia’s eyes widened in surprise. How did the hell did he know that?!
“You called me that last Friday. In your drunken stupor.” Jaejoong explained.
“And we’re THE four Knights…Ta-da!!!” Junsu demonstrated with matching flailing arms. He was so cheerful in doing it that he looked like an overly excited sea lion. That got him a good smack from his seatmate Micky.
Lia wanted to laugh but her humiliation last Friday stopped her.
“Hey, it’s cool Lia. I didn’t take offense in it. Nor did the rest of them. We’re just teasing you.” Jaejoong assured her.
Lia smiled at him but deep inside she knew it will be written down as her ‘Most Embarassing Moment for the first quarter of 2009'.
“My turn. Park Yoochoon. Aka Micky.” He extended his hand at her, which she awkwardly accepted. The bowing was growing on her.
“You have soft hands.” He informed her as Junsu let out a groan.
“What are you?! Suzuki Masa the second?” Junsu asked him as he crossed his arms.
“What?! I can’t compliment a girl now?” Micky retaliated.
“Oh please, if I didn’t butt in, you would have added, ‘I wouldn’t mind holding it for the rest of my life’.”
“How did you know that? Aish! You and your big butt are always in the way!”
“…and now is not the time to bicker.” Changmin quipped in.
“Shut up!” Both Micky and Junsu snapped at him.
Changmin however, seemed unfazed. He merely rolled his eyes at them and looked at Lia. “Please don’t mind their unruly behavior. You know how children can be.”
“Yah! What are you talking about? YOU are the youngest here!” Junsu countered.
“Literally, yes. But on the maturity scale, I am WAY above you.” Changmin pointed out.
“Why you - “ Junsu was about to smack his head but was halted by a stern voice.
“STOP IT.” Yunho bellowed. “Changmin, shut up, it’s not yet your turn. Micky, stop hitting on Lia. We didn’t protect her so that you can make a move on her. Junsu, introduce yourself now.”
Lia remained silent all this time but she suddenly couldn’t take it anymore. She let out the laugh she had been holding.
“Y-you have no idea how relieved I am to find out that you guys are normal. I had the impression that you were all serious and business-like.” She explained as she wiped the tears that had escaped from her laughing.
“See? Lia loves me already.” Junsu declared cheekily. Micky was about to intercept so the former pre-empted him. “I’m Kim Junsu. Junsu or Su would be fine.”
“And before dolphin hyung starts squeaking anymore nonsense, let me introduce myself. I’m Choikang Changmin. You can call me Changmin or Max. Doesn’t make a difference.” The tallest of them intercepted.
He pushed the rim of his glasses as he continued, “If you need to talk to anyone with sense, I’m your best bet.”
Lia merely smiled at him. “I’ll keep that in mind. And I’m Liana Montez. You can call me Lia. I’m part of NEWS, a group from K&A.”
She bowed briefly at each one of them before she remembered something, “Uhm, we didn’t introduce our field of specialty.”
No one dared to answer her. They shrugged it off and went back to doing whatever they were doing earlier.
Are these guys bipolar? She couldn’t help but ask herself.
I guess I would find out sooner or later.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
And finding out she did.
For the rest of the day, she had been grouped with them for training activities (luckily, there was no sign of Suzuki Masa anywhere). She expected them to conquer and divide the work according to their specialties. But lo and behold, they didn’t.
Simply because they didn’t have to.
They were all knowledgeable in any field.
Seriously.
Lia looked at them while they discussed their findings of the case.
“Using the network-based component, we could place a sniffer device directly into the network…” Yunho suggested.
“Yes. Though alternatively, we can have a LAN card access all packets, obtain the ones assigned to it and the sniffer device then examines the packets on one of the hosts or servers.,” Jaejoong countered.
Micky nodded his head, “Of course, a promiscous code! So we are going to switch the NIC in a pc or server in order to catch all packets…”
Junsu also joined in. “So if a packet matches a specific signature - such as string, port and header signatures - …”
“…It would indicate a possible intrusion and will be detected by the sniffer device.” Changmin finished off the statement.
They smiled amongst themselves at how easily they have come up with the solution.
Noticing that there was another person in the group, they turned their attention back to her.
“So, Lia, what do you think? Do you have other suggestions?” Changmin asked her.
Lia, who initially held nothing but a blank expression on her face, finally spoke up. “Are all of you experts in Network Infrastructure and Analysis?”
“Uhm, yeah.” Junsu answered, unsure of where her question was leading.
“Then who does Law and Taxation?” She continued.
“We all do.” Micky answered simply.
“Accounting and Finance?”
“All of us.” Jaejoong answered.
“Marketing and Business Management?”
“The five of us.” Yunho answered.
“Human Resources?”
“Still us.” Max answered.
“And the genius?”
“Of course, all of us!” Junsu answered chirpily.
Micky elbowed him at his reply.
“What?! It was parallelism!” He replied in defense.
Lia, took the time to process her newfound information. “So what are you doing in one group when you can possibly work on your own?”
Jaejoong sighed deeply before turning to face her. “Lia, in SM, you cannot just be knowledgeable in one field. You have to know every aspect. You may excel in one or two or more, but you can’t be part of any group unless you can carry your own self.”
“That’s what ensures that every group is top-notch. Alone, we can survive. But together, we’re formidable.” Yunho continued.
Lia leaned forward and asked in a low voice, “Are you guys human?”
Micky chuckled at her reaction. “Of course. We were just trained to be that way. It’s our firm’s culture.”
“It’s different in Korea… In SME... In Tohoshinki… ” Changmin added.
Well, NEWS is different too.
Lia fought the urge to say so and stuck her tongue out at them. If she thought that being a beautiful male was unusual, she should have known that there were much more to this group that the eyes can see.
What could she have possibly gotten herself into again?
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
To: Yamashita Tomohisa ; Koyama Keiichiro ; Nishikido Ryo ; Kato Shigeaki ; Takahisa Masuda ; Tegoshi Yuya
From: Montez Liana
Subject: It finally dawned on me
I must have been a big disappointment to you guys.
There’s nothing much that I can say.
Except that I’m really sorry.
Liana Montez
Lia rested her chin on her hands as she stared at the message she have sent them that morning. It was already Thursday, yet they haven’t replied back. She expected them to throw fits of rage over making them worry and the embarrassment she must have impacted to her group as well. But there was no word. Not even one. From all 6 of them.
She tried calling their phone. But the call just wouldn’t push through. It was like they didn’t want to be contacted.
“What are you doing?” a voice asked her as he peered at her screen. Lia immediately straightened up and closed her laptop.
“Nothing.” She murmured as she feigned a sudden interest at the black granite flooring.
“You suck at lying.” He pointed out.
“I know.” She admitted.
“That’s a noble trait.”
“Yeah. Right. And look where it got me.” She answered sarcastically, making a reference to the dilemma last week.
“Closer to us??”
Lifting her head, she bitterly added, “And farther from them...”
His expression softened.
“Is there something wrong?”
Aside from a nagging suspicion that my teammates are in the process of disowning me, everything’s great. Her brain spoke for her.
Lia forced a smile. “Nah. Things are fine and dandy.”
He slumped down on the seat next to her and without looking at her, casually replied, “When you’re ready to talk…I’m here.”
This time, a genuine smile formed on her lips. “Thanks…Pretty-chan.”
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Lia, with the rest of Tohoshinki, made their way out of the training room laughing. Or at least Lia tried to. She had been plastering that smile for the rest of the day.
It’s not that she doesn’t like them,‘coz she does. But at the back of her head, she knew it would have been better if her teammates were around. It’s the same thing when you meet new friends at school but you know that you’re missing your best friends back home.
“Lia, would you come with us for dinner?” Junsu asked her. Lia immediately snapped her attention towards him. His eager face was so obvious.
“A-ano…”
Lia was far from being anti-social, but right now, she just isn’t the mood for any hobnobbing.
“G-gomenasai. I’ll have to take a rain check on that Junsu. I-I have to…” She started to explain as Junsu likewise started pouting.
“Ms. Montez! Is Ms. Montez still here?” a voice shouted grabbing everyone’s attention.
Lia immediately raised her hand. “I’m here!”
The young man, who she recognized as one of the organizers ran towards them. “Y-you …h-have… a… m-me-ssage…” He said panting.
He handed her a piece of paper. Though confused, she opened it up.
Lia,
Meet us at Room 143.
NEWS
Without any more thought, she asked the man, “Where is Room 143?”
“Across the lobby, second door to the left.” He answered.
Lia tucked the paper into her coat, and dashed forward.
“Lia! Where are you going?” She could hear Yunho asking.
She halted and looked back. “I’m meeting them!” She answered happily.
It was all the explanation she needed to tell them. She was grateful for them sticking with her during the week. But this time, she just wanted to see them again. No, she needed to see them.
And finally, it was going to happen. Soon.
She bowed and waved back to them. Before running as fast as her stiletto-clad feet could.
____________________________________________________________________________________
A/N: And I updated! Fast! And it’s longer! I’m spoiling you guys. You have great power over me. I think I love you guys too much. ^^,
So yeah, NEWS will be in the next chap. Expect it. But don’t expect anything typical. My writing instinct is treading dangerous paths as of the moment. Haha.
That said, please let me know how this AU is fairing so far. I have to update Irrational first though. Ryo, Yuri and Jin are consistently reminding me to do it. *delusional* XD