The Blackmail File

At 01:30, Go Yura began by restoring the failed reception log.

A successful transmission is usually polite. It leaves behind a sender, a recipient, a timestamp, a confirmation mark. A failed transmission is sometimes more honest, because it stops before the system has time to dress itself up. Go Yura opened the temporary header next to the field marked "Deputy Director."

"The recipient is the Deputy Director Yun Haewon's position account. Not a personal account."

Yun Haewon didn't answer. A file that arrives addressed to a position rather than a person is hard to dodge. A person can say "I never saw it," but a position leaves behind a duty to review.

Gang Taejun asked.

"Did it succeed?"

"No. The last transmission failed. But before the failure, there were two preview requests."

"Who saw them?"

"That's been deleted."

Deleted. By now the word no longer surprised anyone. That it no longer surprised anyone was worse. When deletion repeats, people start accepting deletion as background noise. Go Yura didn't accept that background. Instead of leaving the deleted field gray, she marked it with a red border.

"Blank fields get recorded too."

she said.

Gang Taejun attached a number next to the blank field.

`Deleted fields: 1. Preview requests: 1.`

"Why aren't you attaching a name?"

Lee Juwan asked.

"Because there isn't one."

"If it's a position account, can't we treat it as Deputy Director Yun?"

Yun Haewon heard that but didn't move. Gang Taejun didn't answer Lee Juwan directly. Instead he asked Go Yura where the original log was located.

"The temporary cache and the transmission queue are different."

Go Yura answered.

"The transmission queue has the Deputy Director's position account. The temporary cache only has a terminal ID."

"Terminal location."

"Same zone as Conference Room 2. I can't say it's the same terminal."

Conference Room 2. The same zone where R-3's first signature had appeared. Every eye in the room moved at once. I didn't like that movement. Once a big name surfaces, every line bends toward it.

"Same zone doesn't mean same person."

I said.

Go Yura nodded.

"So we'll leave it as deleted field 1."

At 01:45, the body of the file opened.

The title was short. `2019 Time of Death Adjustment Proposal.` The document didn't look like blackmail. People tend to think blackmail sounds harsh. This file didn't. Tables, times before and after correction, phrasing meant for report inclusion, reasons for delayed medical processing. A document meant to press someone uses a polite format.

There wasn't just one file. Inside the compressed folder with the same title were three versions. The first was a bare table, the second was an annotated review version, and the third was a short summary made for sending. The blackmail was in the third. Not the long document, but a summary trimmed down to only what was needed. When pressing someone, a trimmed truth is more convenient than the whole truth.

Go Yura displayed the hash values of the three versions side by side. The numbers were all different. The creation times were also different. But the first device of origin was the same.

"It was made in the Director's office archive, then trimmed for sending."

"Confirmed?"

Gang Taejun asked.

"That it came from the archive is confirmed. Who trimmed it isn't, yet."

That distinction mattered. Hong Sanguk's shadow hung over the file, but a shadow isn't a fingerprint. We couldn't use a shadow as evidence. Hong Sanguk was the person best positioned to exploit that very gap.

Oh Sejin couldn't get up from his chair. It wasn't because security was blocking him. It was because his own name was in the annotation on the first page.

`Medical Officer review complete.`

He spoke right away.

"That's not a sentence I wrote."

Gang Taejun asked.

"Did you review it?"

Oh Sejin delayed his answer.

"I did."

"We're recording both statements together: that you didn't write the sentence, and that you reviewed it."

Oh Sejin nodded. The blackmail file didn't make him only a victim. It made him an accomplice too. Watching both fields at once was the discomfort of this chapter.

"What did 'review complete' mean?"

Yun Haewon asked.

Oh Sejin opened his mouth, then closed it.

"At the time, I hadn't finalized the numbers."

"Then what did you do?"

"I checked whether the document made medical sense."

"If it made sense, does that reduce your responsibility?"

This time Oh Sejin answered right away.

"No."

He was speaking in increasingly short sentences. Short sentences leave fewer places to hide. But speaking short doesn't make you truthful either. Gang Taejun wrote `possible reduced role` next to Oh Sejin's answer. Oh Sejin saw the phrase and didn't object. It wasn't that he had nothing to object with. Objecting would have meant explaining his role even further.

At 02:05, Hong Sanguk's expression barely changed when he saw the file.

"Material in the Director's office archive doesn't mean it was on my orders."

Gang Taejun asked as if he'd already prepared the question.

"Archive access privileges."

"Several people."

"The list."

Hong Sanguk tried to take a moment to compose himself. Gang Taejun blocked it immediately.

"Don't answer with a delay. Last time, you broke your promise to submit before noon."

Hong Sanguk's hand stopped on the table. He'd already used the word delay once, and already broken his promise once. The same shield is hard to use twice.

Lee Juwan cut in.

"Submitting a list requires legal review."

"Is that a review, or a shield?"

Go Yura asked.

Lee Juwan looked at her. He seemed briefly annoyed, but his answer was exact.

"Both."

That answer was irritating but useful. Legal review really was necessary, and it also bought time. Gang Taejun wrote down both. Lee Juwan pressed his lips together after hearing his own words back.

"Then give us a time limit."

Gang Taejun said.

"Unlimited review only gets recorded as a shield."

Lee Juwan checked his wristwatch. That gesture also looked like a shield, but this time a number came out.

"A first list of authorization groups by 8 a.m. Individual names by noon, after legal review."

"Who's guaranteeing that?"

"I am."

He didn't say his own name, just "I." Gang Taejun made a point of correcting it.

"Lee Juwan."

Lee Juwan let out a breath.

"Lee Juwan guarantees it."

Hong Sanguk disliked that sentence. His face didn't react first, his fingers did. Under the table, his thumb and forefinger pressed together, then let go. He wasn't someone holding back anger. He was someone recalculating.

At 02:30, Oh Sejin stated when the blackmail had begun.

"The day before the reaudit invitation arrived."

"Who contacted you?"

"The Director's office secretary account."

"A person."

"The voice wasn't the Director's."

Hong Sanguk spoke immediately.

"See."

Gang Taejun didn't look at him.

"Saying it wasn't the Director doesn't mean it wasn't the Director's office."

Oh Sejin opened his hand, then closed it again.

"At first they only demanded I attend a meeting. Next they said Deputy Director Yun was preparing a whistleblower report, and finally they sent this file."

"What did the file demand?"

"Confirming the cartridge's location."

He didn't say replace. Confirm the location. A small phrase hides a large act.

Gang Taejun opened that phrase right away.

"What happened between confirming and replacing?"

"I made the judgment myself."

That answer quieted the room. The easiest conclusion, once the blackmail file surfaced, would be that Oh Sejin had been coerced. But Oh Sejin was now stating, in his own words, the narrow gap between coercion and choice.

"Did anyone write that you should replace it?"

"No, they didn't."

"Did anyone write that you should kill?"

"There was nothing like that."

"Then was the replacement your own decision?"

Oh Sejin didn't nod. He had to say it aloud.

"Yes."

Yun Haewon's hand slipped from her cup. This time nobody pretended not to notice.

"The blackmail narrowed you down, and in that narrow space, you chose me."

Oh Sejin didn't look away.

"Yes."

That single word changed the meaning of the blackmail file. A file can explain a cause, but it can't make a choice in someone's place.

Yun Haewon said.

"Did you only confirm it?"

Oh Sejin shook his head.

"No."

That answer was short. Too short to leave anywhere to hide.

At 02:55, the file's metadata opened.

The author was `archive_migration`. The last modifier was `HSW_admin_archive`. The creator of the share link had been deleted. But the link's description remained.

`If O delays response, release 2019 original.`

O. Oh Sejin. Delayed response. Those two words alone were enough. The blackmail hadn't said "kill." It said that if he was slow, the past would be opened. Oh Sejin had wrecked the present somewhere in between.

"This isn't evidence that Director Hong sent it himself."

Lee Juwan said.

"But it's a pressure file that came out of the Director's office authorization group."

I answered.

He didn't deny it.

Go Yura drew the transmission path as a line. The Director's office archive, the temporary share link, Oh Sejin's personal storage, the failed Deputy Director position account. There were four lines, and two breaks. The share link creator, and the preview user. Hong Sanguk's name was in the Director's office authorization group, but not at either of the two breaks.

"If we attach Director Hong here directly, he'll slip out later."

Go Yura said.

"Then how do we phrase it?"

"The authorization group under Director Hong Sanguk's control."

Hong Sanguk laughed quietly.

"Does making words longer make them true?"

"Does making words shorter make them you?"

The room stopped for a moment at Go Yura's answer. Gang Taejun didn't record that line. Even setting emotion aside, it was too sharp to put into the record. Instead he wrote `HSW_admin_archive authorization group.` A cold, narrow phrase, hard to slip out of.

Yun Haewon scrolled to the end of the file. The last page held the transmission failure log. The `Deputy Director` position account. The failure reason was an authorization conflict. Below that, two preview requests. One deleted. One with only a time remaining. 23:52.

My hand went stiff. 23:52 was the time I'd started copying the Q-13 original. At that exact time, a blackmail file preview had been attempted on Yun Haewon's position account. Calling this coincidence a coincidence would need grounds. There weren't any yet.

Go Yura said.

"We need to stop here. 23:52 is too big."

"Big, so we stop?"

I asked.

"Big, so we split it."

That was right. A big number drags people along. Once dragged along, we go back to writing names first.

We split 23:52 into three pieces. The start of my Q-13 original copy, the Deputy Director position account's preview request, and the creation of the temporary cache in the conference room zone. The three pieces sat attached to the same moment. But being attached and being one thing are different. Gang Taejun didn't draw a line between the pieces. He only marked dots.

"When do you draw the line?"

I asked.

"When it's visible who passed between the two dots."

His answer was short. I looked at that short answer for a long time. When I see dots, I want to make a line. A line brings relief. But a line drawn too early becomes a blade later. A wrongly drawn line cuts a person and hides the real path.

At 03:20, Oh Sejin looked at the file and spoke.

"I want to say I was a victim."

Gang Taejun asked.

"What sentence should go in the record?"

Oh Sejin took a long time.

"A coerced accomplice."

The moment that sentence was written, no one in the room felt at ease. Blackmail doesn't erase choice. It herds choice into a narrower room. Inside that room, Oh Sejin had reached out a hand. That hand pointed toward Yun Haewon.

Go Yura enlarged the final recipient field again.

`Deputy Director.`

Yun Haewon looked at the letters and wasn't surprised. Not being surprised didn't mean she'd known. But it wasn't the face of a stranger, either.

Gang Taejun asked.

"Did you receive this file?"

Yun Haewon didn't answer right away.

The final recipient of the file was Yun Haewon.

"Not every file addressed to my position account is one I see."

Yun Haewon said.

Lee Juwan tried to cut in immediately. Gang Taejun raised a hand to stop him.

"Keep speaking for yourself."

Yun Haewon looked at the screen.

"But if the 23:52 preview request was opened under my authorization, there's a possibility it was opened in my own room."

"A possibility."

Gang Taejun repeated.

"Yes. A possibility."

Yun Haewon didn't avoid the word.

"I have no memory of seeing this file. But I won't erase the log just because I don't remember."

That sentence was Yun Haewon's own style of defense. She slipped away without closing the door. Oh Sejin looked at her and spoke.

"That's why you frightened me more."

"Me?"

"Because you're someone who doesn't close the record."

Yun Haewon didn't answer. Hong Sanguk didn't answer either. In that room, a record no one closed was dangerous for everyone.

Go Yura added a new annotation below the final recipient field.

`Yun Haewon's personal viewing unconfirmed. Deputy Director position account reception attempt confirmed.`

Only after seeing that annotation did I let out my breath. The file had been addressed to Yun Haewon, but Yun Haewon hadn't received it, not yet. That difference was small and uncomfortable. Leaving that uncomfortable difference in place was the most accurate thing we could do today.

Just then, at the bottom of the failure log, a folded line opened. An automatic resend was scheduled. The recipient was still the Deputy Director position account. The scheduled time was 00:07 of the next loop. The exact time Mun Rahui's alibi had always occupied.

Gang Taejun looked at that line and said.

"This file isn't finished yet."

Yun Haewon didn't take her eyes off the screen. The final recipient had been her, and the next reception would be her too.