Pandora Unleashed

Ambivalent

       "You're here early." The rich baritone voice of his best friend said as soon as he spotted him sitting on the cheap couch of their base.

With a laptop on the coffee table and the file of the new jurors beside it, he began his research.
Rosé said she was on it and boy, was she ever.
He had almost forgotten how diligently and thoroughly she worked.

She sent an email late last night about each juror, their occupation, and a bunch of more information about them that he filtered through.

Some of the information was gathered from their social media accounts while others were collected by accessing their bank accounts and private information.

Rosé classified the email as urgent, marking it as sensitive which meant the information she obtained wasn't all legal.
He made it a point to highlight the sensitive ones, so Taehyung was aware of the same intel and didn't accidentally hurt their prosecution.

       "You want some coffee?" He shook his head at the inquiry, never taking his eyes from the laptop, "Wow, someone is all business today."

       "One of the jurors," he stood with the file, walking over to the printer, "A Mark Tuan is associated with the Styles."

       "In which way?" Taehyung walked over to him and he read the highlighted area, "A YouTuber?" He took the file in bewilderment and skimmed it.

       "Jackson gave him a loan to start his YouTube career," he began but halted when the sheet of paper printed, "Look at this. Four years ago," Taehyung eyed the paper and cursed under his breath, "I know. Regardless of the information, our presentation, this juror will vote for Mr. Styles."

       "That's a problem, Koo."

       "I see the loan but never a payment in return."

       "That is a problem."

       "He will vote in favor of Jackson. I know it."

He raked his hair as a devastating thought surfaced. So far, Rosé was only able to obtain information about Mark that linked him to the Styles but he was sure if he took a second glance at the files, he would be able to find something within the remaining jurors.

Mr. Styles had influence and people in his corner who would look out for him, this was factual and something they couldn't ignore.

He sighed and threw himself on the couch. Taehyung handed him a cup of coffee before taking the seat beside him. They exchanged a look before they began their work.

➰

He had spent the majority of his day with Taemin after leaving the boxing club yesterday. Although Shownu had lit a fire in him, he couldn't get himself to focus on work.

You kept roaming his mind. So instead, he chose to distract himself by playing with his nephew.

Moonbyul was kind enough to swing by and drop Taemin at the kindergarten this morning which meant he could vigorously focus on the trial.

He learned that two additional jurors had a tie with Mr. Styles. Mark Tuan, the YouTuber including Choi Youngjae, a restaurant owner, and the last juror, Lim Jae-Beom, who he had a particular interest in.

Lim Jae-Beom, or JB as he was known around town, had an interesting background. He was military but grew up with Jackson.

Moonbyul and Lisa showed up at the base earlier and he had asked them to do some digging on JB.
He wasn't sure how they managed to get back to him so quickly or how they had accessed the information, but Moonbyul said she knew people and he didn't have the stomach to pry further.