Chapter 201: Chapter 201: Power Flickers

Morning light shimmered through LUNE’s windows, the agency humming with the bright energy of new ambition. After the chaos of the opening, today was supposed to be a return to routine—rehearsals, press content, private lessons, the whir of computers and the comfortable drone of everyday work. Down in the lounge, Jina joked with the new assistant about her hair color, Mirae ran vocal scales in a practice room, and Harin swept through the office in a fresh blouse and black pants, coffee already half gone and a day’s worth of stress building behind her temples.

Joon-ho was first to notice something odd. He passed through the hallway and caught a metallic tang in the air—sharp, unfamiliar. A faint flicker rippled through the ceiling lights, just a brief shudder, but enough to make him pause. He shrugged it off, ducking into the gym, where Rina was stretching, music playing through her phone. Nothing seemed wrong. Staff came and went. The sense of promise felt unbreakable.

At 10:12, everything changed.

A siren wailed—a shrill, stuttering blast that made half the staff freeze mid-conversation. The overhead lights snapped out. Screens went dark. The soft hum of the server racks in the media room stuttered, then died. From the hall came shouts and the muted crash of someone bumping into a cart in the sudden darkness.

On the eighth floor, Harin’s phone vibrated with a dozen notifications at once—security system alert, temperature warning in the server room, internal group chat pinging in all caps: "Power out. WiFi down. Server fried? Elevator stuck. Please respond!"

She spun around, nearly tripping over a cable, and called out, "Everyone stay put! No one uses the stairs or elevator until we know what’s happening. Jina, make sure no one’s stuck in the bathrooms!"

The air changed—electric with nerves, then the kind of confusion that curdles quickly into panic. Across the floor, artists wandered in circles, phones blinking uselessly as the WiFi dropped. Catering staff in the basement texted that the service elevator was jammed. The main elevator had stopped between floors. Through the shaft door, a chorus of muffled voices called for help.

Joon-ho tried to radio building security, but the comm crackled, dead. He jogged to the stairwell and yelled upward, counting heads as he went—making sure none of the artists had tried to leave. At the practice room, Mirae pressed her face to the window, frowning at the blankness outside.

"It’s just a power cut, right?" she asked as he passed.

"We’ll get it sorted," Joon-ho lied, jaw clenched.

On SNS, the outside world noticed almost at once. Five minutes after the blackout, an account loosely tied to EON’s PR team posted: "Sometimes a power surge just means you’re not ready for the big leagues. #rookiemistakes"

The phrase rippled outward. Within minutes, dozens of comments and snarky retweets piled up, the hashtag drifting into LUNE’s mentions. Rival fans and EON’s shadowy cheerleaders spun it up—mocking LUNE’s "rookie agency meltdown," sharing blurry shots of the darkened building.

Harin’s phone lit with notifications. She scanned the tweet, face burning red. For a second, she wanted to throw her phone through a window. She settled for a sharp, whispered curse. "Bastards. They’re watching us choke."

Upstairs, Mirae watched staff scurry past. A day ago, she would’ve slunk away, tried to stay out of sight. Today she wanted something else—to prove she was more than a name on a trending topic. If there was blame to be thrown, she wanted no part of it.

She wandered down the side hall toward the practice rooms, hoping for quiet. The air was oddly cold here, a faint, acrid scent drifting from the utility closet. She pressed herself against the wall as two men emerged, both in blue maintenance uniforms she didn’t recognize.

They paused, checking their phones. Mirae stepped backward, half-hidden behind a stack of sound panels. The men didn’t see her.

One spoke, his accent local, voice rough. "Elevator’s good for another hour if nobody touches the relay. Boss said leave the server room; it’ll look like a surge."

The other replied, voice quieter, "I don’t like it. The building owner’s on top. She hears about this, she’ll have our balls in a bag."

"She’s not even here. Besides, nobody checks wiring before morning. We’re gone by lunch."

The first man grunted, shifting his weight. "Just make sure you’re not seen. Last guy who got caught up here disappeared."

They moved off, footsteps fading. Mirae held her breath, heart thumping. She waited, then darted to the practice room, phone shaking in her hand. She typed a message to Harin—then deleted it. Not enough proof. What would she even say? Her word against two men who probably weren’t even in the official logs.

She pressed her back to the cold wall, listening as the power flickered again and came up dimly, enough for emergency lights. Across the office, the faint sound of someone shouting echoed—a technician arguing with security. Mirae exhaled slowly, mind racing.

Elsewhere in the city, Madam Ha-eun was just as unimpressed. Her private office, high in a different district’s skyline, was as orderly as ever—wall of glass behind her, antique lacquered desk gleaming under soft lamplight. The morning’s news was stacked in a neat pile, her phone propped against a delicate teacup.

A knock, then her secretary entered, bowing low. "There’s a disruption at your other property. The one LUNE rents. Elevator outage, power failure, guests stuck. Some staff are... upset."

Ha-eun’s mouth curved downward, the gesture almost imperceptible. She set down her pen. "Find Su-bin. Tell her to handle it. Quietly. I don’t want police, fire department, or any more gossip. My building’s reputation matters. Anyone responsible for this—whoever they work for—make it clear I own that ground. No one touches my property without consequences."

The secretary bowed again, scurrying out. Ha-eun steepled her fingers, gazing out at the city. Her mind ticked through possibilities. Sabotage meant disrespect, and disrespect was intolerable. The old guard never left fingerprints, but they always made themselves known eventually.

Back at LUNE, Harin was a force of pure will, stalking through the chaos with Joon-ho and Hye-jin trailing behind. "IT says they’re almost done rebooting the main server. Security’s running floor checks," Harin barked, tossing her phone between hands. "The elevator tech’s stuck in traffic."

Jina, flustered, stormed into the lounge. "My shoot is ruined. The stylist is in the basement. Rina’s still trapped in the elevator. What am I supposed to do—live stream my breakdown?"

Harin didn’t flinch. "You’re going to take a breath, check on the new assistants, and not give EON the satisfaction. We fix this, we move on."

"But the net’s already talking—"

"Let them talk," Harin snapped. "I’d rather be the agency that survives a disaster than the one that covers up their own."

Joon-ho touched Harin’s arm, grounding her. "Everyone’s scared. If you lose it, they’ll lose it."

She closed her eyes, exhaling. "You’re right. I just—hate being blindsided."

At that moment, Mirae appeared in the hall, face pale. "Can I talk to you? Privately?"

"Later, Mirae," Harin snapped, not unkind but harried. "We need to get power back first."

Mirae hesitated, then nodded, deciding not to press. But her mind wouldn’t let it go—the uniforms, the voices, the warning about the owner’s suite. She eyed the staircase, the flickering emergency lights, and wondered how much deeper this would go if no one listened.

By early evening, power was back on in half the building. The server room would need more work, but streaming and basic operations limped forward. The elevator, finally freed, disgorged a cluster of pale, furious assistants and two guests who immediately began snapping pictures for their feeds. Harin’s headache throbbed; the PR team drafted bland, apologetic statements for the artists to post. News outlets picked up EON’s subtle jabs, spinning the outage as proof of LUNE’s inexperience.

Soo-jin circulated through the staff, quietly passing out hot tea and comfort snacks. Jina’s makeup was patched up. Rina emerged from the elevator brushing dust from her coat, laughing it off to the junior staff. Mirae hovered by the practice room, feeling both brave and stupid for not forcing her story on Harin. Later, she promised herself.

As dusk crept across the sky, the last guests left. The cleaning crew returned, the catering staff packed up. The office emptied, its usual afterglow replaced by an undercurrent of suspicion and frustration. Mirae grabbed her bag and coat and slipped downstairs to the parking garage, phone clutched tight, head full of static.

She was alone—the garage almost silent, the concrete echoing beneath her shoes. Her van waited in its reserved slot, dim security lights reflecting off the windshield. She fished out her keys, but something was wrong.

Four tires, slashed open, rubber hanging in jagged ribbons. A dark pool on the concrete. For a moment, Mirae simply stared, too stunned to move. Her hands trembled. She took a shaky step back, looking up at the blinking red dot of the security camera overhead—on now, but who knew for how long.

No footsteps. No voices. Just the icy hush of a ruined day closing in.

Mirae swallowed hard, reaching for her phone again, unsure whether to call Harin, Joon-ho, or maybe just a cab.

Above her, somewhere out of sight, old ghosts moved in shadows and silence, waiting for the next crack to widen.

And this time, Mirae knew: she wasn’t just a name on someone’s rumor list. She was the target.

The storm was still building. And this was only the first flicker.