Still Here: Chapter 2 - The Collapse
âł summary: In the eerie Samsung building, Seo-ah and her elite team search for missing civilians, hunted by something more terrifying. As they escape, they confront the blurred lines between creatures and the humanity as they once knew. Racing towards safety, they must survive in a city spiraling into chaos.
âł wc: 10.8K
âł progress: Foreword, Chapter 1: The Message, Chapter 2: The Collapse
âł a/n: sorry it's a bit longer T_T
Seo-ahâs legs burned, the breath caught raw in her lungs, but the image of the bodies tumbling past the glass floors kept her going. The stairs were a meat grinder: fluorescence flicked, then failed, debris gathered in corners like the detritus of abandoned lives. Every landing stank of burnt plastic and something else, something metal and rotten, like some kind of fruit left out to liquefy. Her boots slipped once on a sticky patchâshe caught herself on the rail, teeth clacking shut. No time to check it.
Behind, Ji-wonâs boots rasped up the stairsâalways there, two floors below, the same measured breathing as in training runs. âClear left,â Ji-won called at each landing. Seo-ahâs own voice locked up, whatever quip she meant to say cut off by the image of bodies tumbling from above, the split-second shape of a manâs face before it dissolved against the ground.
Behind her, she could hear the muffled percussive thuds of more bodiesâshe refused to look out the stairwell windows. Just run. Just one more floor. The pain in her thigh was an old friend, a warning that she was still alive.
At fifteen, she hit a door that wouldnât budge. It was locked from the inside.
âHey!â she bangs on the doors. âOpen up! Let us help you!â All she could hear were screams from the inside. Men, women and even children. Incoherent screams. Seo-ah slammed her shoulder into it once. Twice. On the third hit, it gave.
The hallway beyond was dark.The emergency lights blinked red. Everything smelled wrong - metallic, rotten, warm. A big contrast to buildings at the start of their search.
Seo-ah stepped inside first, stopping when she heard the ding of the elevator, looking back. The elevator doors opened.
For a second her brain refused to understand what she was seeing.
Bodies. Stacked on top of each other. Crushed together. Arms bent the wrong way, their faces pressed into the metal. A womanâs hand still twitched near the edge.
The elevator had been packed full and then forced shut. Blood pooled beneath it, slowly leaking into the carpet. Seo-ah stared, unable to form any words, momentarily forgetting what she was here for.
Ji-won stepped beside her and froze.
âWhat the fuckâŚâ Seo-ah whispered.
Ji-won crouched beside the body nearest the front, and checked the womanâs vitals. She was but a second too late. She let go of her hand, and it dropped with a thud.
Seo-ah swallowed. Apart from these few people that she saw today, she hasnât yet found anyone alive.
A faint sound made her head snap up. A faint scratching sound coming from above. Somewhere in the walls.
It was slow and erratic. Like claws dragging on metal.
Both women looked up as the sound followed into another room.
It stopped and then there was a moment of silence. Followed by screaming coming from above them. It was high and panicked.
Seo-ah and Ji-won were already moving, when they heard another shrill, panicked scream coming from below. They looked at each other for a brief moment before nodding and taking off, Seo-ah headed above and Ji-won below.
Seo-ah took the next flight of stairs three at a time. The screams had come from above. Then below. Then bothâsomehow. Her eardrums still rang. She pressed on, boots hammering each step, lungs drawing in air that felt thinner the higher she climbed. The doors on sixteen and seventeen were chained shut, a hasty knot of computer cables looped through the battered handles. She barely slowed: one hard yank and the left door cracked open, the cables slithering to the ground, cold but wet against her fingers.
Eighteenth. Nineteenth. No more screams, just the unrelenting whine of emergency lights and, under that, the slow tick of a fluorescent dying somewhere out of sight. She cursed under her breathâwhere were they? What were they running from?
At the twenty-first floor, the stairwell hit a dead end. The door to the roof chained shut, padlocked. Not the fire code, but who cared now. The metal bit under her palm, still warm from a hundred panicked hands. She pressed an ear to the hollow and heard nothing but blood in her ears. The last scream had come from just above, but now there was only silence. That could mean anything.
She backtracked to the twentieth floor. A hallway, strip-lit and too long, glossy floor tiles smeared with streaks of something wet and uncanny. She stalked it, knives long forgotten, gun pointed high, muzzle leading her through the hush. Cubicles on either side, but no breathing, no shuffling. Even the computers were blacked outâno humming, no blue glow. The world was on pause.
Then, at the far end, a wall of frosted glass. Conference room. The glass was crazed with spiderweb cracks, but not broken through. Beyond it, the outlines of desks and shadows moving.
The glass meeting room dominated the entire hallway, its interior fogged by condensation and something else - soot, maybe, or some film left by air thick with rot. Through the glass cutouts along the top of the door, she could see movement. It was subtle, just a shadow shifting behind the frosting, but it was enough to freeze her in her tracks.
She peered in. Someone had dragged two conference tables in front of the doors, barricading them from the inside, then jammed a something long through the handles for good measure. The barricade was makeshift, desperate, all the furniture and refuse from the office floor thrown into a single choking wall. Somewhere behind it, the shadow moved againâa slumping, shuddering motion, then nothing.
Seo-ah banged on the glass, hard. âOpen up! Iâm with the Special Missions Unit!â Her voice came out high, thinner than sheâd intended. She waited, pressed her ear to the glass. Nothing but the muffled hum from the buildingâs bones. She tried the door. It rattled but held.
A sudden thump from the hallway behind her startled her. Seo-ah spun, pulling out her gun leveling it to her face in one swift motion, but there was nothing there. She spent the next few cautious seconds waiting, observing. No sound now, not even the whir of the air system. She shivered, more from nerves than cold, and faced the glass again.
She banged again, harder. âI see you in there. Move the barricade!â Nothing.
Fine.
She kicked once, heel to the handle. The thing holding the door handles together gave in, cracked in half. She kicked again, harder. The glass spider webbed, coughed out a fine white powder with every impact. She gave herself two steps of runway and this time shoulder-checked the door just below the lock. The whole barricade shifted, metal legs scraping the floor tile, and came toppling inwards. She walked in, weapon up.
Seo-ah stepped through the wreckage of the door, shoes crunching on plastic shards and powdered glass. The barricade was nonsenseâdesk legs tangled with extension cords, a leather rolling chair wedged so optimistically against the handles she wanted to applaud. Four out of ten, and thatâs if you ignored that the armrests were on backwards. She rolled her eyes, pulling away a broken slab of fake wood.
The conference room looked like someone had detonated a grenade packed with designer energy drinks and promotional notebooks. For a second Seo-ah wondered if she was hallucinating or if the sleep deprivation was finally staging a coup.
There, behind some upturned furniture and a fortress of office chairs, cowered eight men in sequined jackets and pastel hair.
EXO.
âYou boys know your barricade is pathetic, right?â She said pointing back. Her voice barely carried, but it didnât have to. They were already looking past her, faces draining even further of color.
At the sight of her, the room came apart in slow motion. One of themâsilver hair, broad shoulders, a face she vaguely recognized from a cologne billboard near Gangnam stationâ pressed himself further into the wall, jaw locked, hands balled at his sides. Another had his face buried in the shoulder of the man next to him, fingers twisted into his jacket. A third sat completely rigid, knees drawn to his chest, staring at her with the wide, glassy look of someone whose brain had simply stopped processing. Two more were clutching each other by the forearm, neither seeming to notice. One had his eyes shut, lips moving without sound. The tallest of them had positioned himself slightly in front of the others, not quite brave, but not quite not.
Then the one she recognizedâD.O., from the department store commercials, the ones that played on every screen in every elevator in Seoulârose slowly, calm and calculated, unlike his team, from behind an overturned chair. He lifted one finger to his lips. Then pointed behind her.
The one beside him grabbed her sleeve before she could turn. She looked down. Baekhyun, she realized distantly, the name surfacing from some memory. His grip was surprisingly firm for someone whose entire body was shaking. His eyes said: donât make a sound. His eyes also said: please, please, please.
She turned, expecting an office manager, maybe someone deranged or one of the survivors. Instead, there was nothing.
In her earpiece, Soo-jinâs voice crackled.
âSeo-ah⌠I see movement. Iâm looking at something, but Iâm not sure what Iâm looking at.â
Seo-ah turned back slowly, the hair at the back of her neck tingling with a sensation she wasnât sure of. She felt a dread in the atmosphere but couldnât really put a finger on it. The air was thick with humidity and static, the hiss of Air Con fighting a losing battle. Seo-ah saw their eyes widen and the bodies cowering even further into oblivion. And then she heard it, a stuttered slashing sound just above and behind, like a catâs claws raking drywall. Instinct took over. She stepped aside just as a long, jagged limb tore through the space where her head had been, close enough to shear a few strands of hair.
Behind her, the glass wall shattered inward.
She turned and froze. There it was, crouched in the hallway.
Too tall, too wide, head and limbs that bent in places that did not make sense, like an animal trying to imitate a human. It filled the hallway the wrong wayâtoo much of it, joints reversed or doubled, the body a rough draft of something human that had never been corrected.
The skin across its shoulders had gone translucent with the strain of whatever was happening underneath, a web of fine movement rippling through it like something trying to get out.
Its jaw had come unhinged past any natural limit, the soft tissue at the corners of its mouth gone white and taut, and the dark behind its teeth went back further than it should have.
Seo-ah instinctively stepped back.
âWhat the fuck?â
Ji-won voice came through the earpiece, sharp and calculated. âSeo-ah, report.â
âI have eight civilians here.â She took a side glance at the men behind her. âAnd also something you should definitely take a look at.â
âBring âem home.â
Seo-ah swallowed hard, forcing her brain to move.
She pointed toward the stairwell.
âTwenty floors down. Stairs to the left. Go. Now.â
EXO huddled.
âMOVE!â Seo-ah barked. âStairwell, now!â
For a moment, nobody did. Baekhyunâs hand was still on her sleeve, and she could feel the tremor in it. His eyes moved from her to the thing in the hallway and back, jaw working like he was about to say something. She could see him doing the calculation and arriving somewhere he didnât like. Behind him, two of the others had risen to their feet but hadnât gone anywhere. The silver-haired oneâSehunâwas looking at the thing with an expression that had moved past fear into something quieter.
She didnât wait. She grabbed Baekhyun by the shoulder and shoved him hard toward the exit. He stumbled, caught himself, turned back. Their eyes locked for a fraction of a second, Baekhyunâs eyes mimicking somewhat of a fear while Seo-ah was calm and steadfast.
âGo,â she said. Just that.
They moved. Not cleanlyâfeet catching on glass, someone going down on one knee and getting hauled up by the armâbut they moved, funneling toward the stairwell door in a tangle of sequins and ragged breathing. The tallest one was last. He held the door open a half-second longer than he needed to, looking at her like he might not see her tomorrow, and then he was gone. They moved like her word was gospel. One after the other. Fast.
But the thing moved faster. It lunged for Sehun.
Seo-ah grabbed her Glock and fired as she moved back. âHey shitface! Eyes on me!â
Its neck snapped sideways, and it paused, slowly turned. Its eyes locked onto her, head tilting, like it was studying her, mimicking her movements.
Then it moved. Wrong.
It didnât move like anything sheâd ever seenâfluid, but somehow catching and stuttering in the air, like frames missing from a video. Too fast for something that size. It crossed the hallway in less than a second.
âFuck!â Seo-ah bolted.
She moved on instinct - small, quick, weaving around broken desks, ducking under fallen beams, vaulting over debris.
Behind her, the monster crashed through everything. It was big, heavy, uncoordinated, but relentless.
Soo-jin tracked from the opposite building, rifle trained. Too fast, too close. One wrong shot and sheâd hit Seo-ah.
âCap,â Seo-ah panted, leaping over a collapsed pillar. âNow would be a great time for backup.â
Ji-wonâs voice came through immediately. âAlready on their way. Make it out alive, Han.â
âVery motivating.â
She rounded a dead end.
Broken windows. No exits.
The monster roared behind her. Seo-ah looked at the shattered glass, then looked at the monster, and then back at the glass.
âOh, this is way above my paycheck.â
She jumped, both elbows barricading her face and her knees tucked, bracing for impact.
Bursting through the window, she crashed into a hanging billboard below but lost her grip, the metal groaning under her weight before snapping.
She slammed onto the pavement hard enough to knock the air from her lungs. âFuckâ
A shadow loomed above her. She opened her eyes just in time to see that the monster had come down after her. It crashed directly on top of her, its weight pinning her completely.
Seo-ah barely got her arm up before its teeth sank into her sleeve. Pain shot up her arm.
She gritted her teeth, shoving against it. Nothing. It was too strong.
With her free hand, she yanked a knife from her holster and drove it into the side of its neck. Once, twice. It did nothing. She watched the thingâs eyes stay fixed on her, unimpressed.
Above her, Soo-jin found the angle.
Breathe in.
Exhale.
Fire.
The shot rang outâa single, flat crack. Noise that bounced off the glass towers and died in the open air. A direct hit to the head.
EXO had made it to the far side of the street, clustered behind a concrete partition half a block down, that Ji-won had pointed them toward. They were still catching their breath, still shaking glass out of their hair. The sound hit them before they understood it. A few of them dropped instinctively, hands going to their ears. Then the silence rushed back in, and they straightened, heads turning toward the source.
Seo-ah was on the ground. The thing was on top of her. Few of them gasped, helpless. Baekhyun saw itâher arms straining upward against it. It didn't move in a way anything should move. He made a sound low in his throat and stepped forward without thinking, Jongdae reached out, caught his arm and held it. He didnât pull away. He just stood there, fingers curled at his sides, watching something he had no framework for.
The monster jolted from the impact, skull snapping square, and Seo-ah wrenched herself free.
But it was still moving.
âYou have got to be shitting me!â
Her shoulder seared with pain, but adrenaline made it a rumor more than a sensation. The monsterâs silhouette shuddering above her as it tried to find its feet. The shot had cored through the thingâs temple - chunks of something dark and vital seeping from the hole in its skull. It swayed, then screamed, not a noise but a pressure, a warping of the air itself. The thingâwhatever it wasâshuddered and jerked to the side, then pivoted to face her again, the wet hole in its head steaming in the early morning. It looked more surprised than hurt, like it had never considered pain as a possibility.
She crab-crawled on her back, boots skidding on the broken glass, and forced herself upright, weight on her right arm near useless. She got her feet under her and ran, muscle memory shoved her towards the nearest cover, the world tilting at an angle as she blood-smeared the sidewalk. She heard the thingâs feetâno, hands?âslapping the ground behind her, a manic dogâs scramble.
She scanned for the rifle, blinking back the spots in her eyes, found it maybe five meters away, next to a toppled sign. She sprinted for it, wrenched it up. She circled left, trying to draw it away from the others, legs almost giving away under pain. The thing followed, its gait uneven now, but gaining speed with every step. Its eyes didnât blink. Didnât move. It was like being tracked by a camera lens that didnât care if she was a person, just as a moving object to be deleted from the frame.
It swung wildly, closing the distance between them before Seo-ah could even react, its claws ripped across her back. Seo-ah screamed.
Another shot, this one clipping its shoulder. The round barely slowed it, but the impact spun it half around, long arms trailing after like it was underwater. Soo-jinâs aim was good, but this was not something you could kill by just being good. Seo-ah could feel the old Level 4 dread settling in her chest, a pressure from the past, compressing her lungs until it was hard to breathe.
She reeled. If she could get it out of the street, get it somewhere narrow, maybe it would have to slow down. She lured it toward the old market alley, the one lined with small glass front shops. She went through the glass doors of a side shop, dark inside but better than outside. She ducked behind the counter, pressed herself flat, breathing through teeth to keep it herself from crying or cursing. Her arm pulsed, back gushing, whole body on fire, but she kept her gun up, barrel shaking only a little.
The monster paused outside the door, head canted, listening. Seo-ah held her breath. The glass trembled as it ran a claw down the pane, an almost gentle test. Then it vanished from view: left, then right, then up, the pattern unpredictable, impossible to track. She risked a glanceâempty street.
Seo-ah counted to five. Then ten.
A shadow rippled across the opposite wall.
She dove right as the monster tore through the doorway, exploding in a glass rain.
âDown!â She heard Ji-wonâs voice then, not in her ear this time but echoing from the mouth of the alley. Seo-ah hit the ground, rolling over her shoulder.
A barrage of shots rang out from the street. The monster spasmed as rounds punched through its torsoâJi-won, coming in hot. She appeared at the alley mouth with the squadâs secondary rifle, a heavy-caliber monster. She braced it against her bicep and fired once, twice, no hesitation.
The first round punched through the monsterâs chest, sending up a spray that smelled like burning hair. The second hit lower, dropping it to the ground. It stumbled, fell against a rack of cosmetics, scattering lip tints and mascaras everywhere.
Soo-jin, finally getting a clean shot fired again. Missed, or so she thought. The thing shifted right as the bullet was about to hit between its eyes, but missed and punched through its thigh. The creature let out a shrill, unnatural scream. For a moment, it just trembled, then the entire body seized, limbs folding inward until it compacted itself into something the size of a trash bag. It oozed across the ground for a meter, then stopped and shuddered. Its body convulsed, then collapsed.
Seo-ah blinked, barely believing the thing was dead, until she saw the black ooze pooling underneath, spreading slow and deliberate, as if gravity were too much effort.
Ji-wonâs boots pounded up behind her, weapon raised. She swept the area, then looked at Seo-ah splayed out on the floor, gaze hollowed out.
Seo-ah lay on the ground, taking a peak at the sky, breath hitched. Their van screeched into view beside the Samsung building, Tae-ho manning the steering.
âYou good?â Ji-won comes into view, upside-down.
Seo-ah sucked in a ragged breath. âHonestly? Been better.â
Ji-won nodded staring at her for the longest time, eyes almost reflecting pity, and then, for the first time, turned her attention down to the monster. It didnât look rightânot just the shape, but the texture, the way it seemed to ripple under the skin like a sack of hungry eels.
âSample?â Ji-won said, not really asking.
âSeriously?â Ha-yoon entered, in all her glory, swinging a tool in her hand.
âMin-jae would want samples.â
Ha-yoon sighed but didnât protest. She fished her gloves out of her vest and knelt. The thing seemed to have cooled rapidly, its surface already filmed over with a waxy crust. She dug into the wound at the neck, pulling out a chunk of tissue. It resisted, like pulling a stick of gum out from under a desk. She dropped it into a vial, capped it, and double-bagged the whole mess.
Above, Soo-jinâs voice crackled through, low and stripped of everything but the words. âMovement on the upper floors. Multiple signatures.â
Seo-ah blinked, then looked up.
The windows went dark floor by floor, a blackout climbing the building from the fifth story up. For one suspended second, nothing. And then came the glass. Not all at onceâworse than thatânot in a shower but in a wall, an avalanche, whole panes detonating outward and taking everything with them, and with the glass came the shapes. Suits. Skirts. A childâs pajama top, yellow, with something printed on it, she couldnât make out before it hit the pavement.
âWhatââ Chanyeol started, and didnât finish, mouth hanging open, unable to process any more words.
The first one hit the pavement close enough that Seo-ah felt the impact through her boots. It landed on its hands and knees, head down, and stayed that way for a momentâalmost peacefulâbefore the neck rotated upward in a single mechanical arc, and it looked directly at her. Its legs straightened in stages, each joint popping into alignment, and it opened its mouth in a grin that used the whole lower half of its face.
âOh god.â That was Jongdae, somewhere behind the concrete partition, his voice cracking clean in half.
More were coming down. A body caved the roof of a parked car to the chassis and bounced upright without pausing. Another dropped into a crowd of three and was standing before any of them had finished falling. Jongin had pressed himself against the wall of the shop behind them, one hand over his mouth, watching a thing in a business suit drag itself upright on knuckles that bent the wrong way. Kyungsoo had gone completely still himself, back against the wall, hands flat at his sides, staring with the focused vacancy of someone whose brain had simply stopped accepting new information.
âVan. Now.â Ji-won didnât waitâshe already had Seo-ah up by the collar, Ha-yoon taking her arm, and they were moving, Seo-ahâs boots dragging twin smears across the sidewalk as they hauled her forward. âSoo-jin, relocate!â
Ha-yoon hit the sliding door with both palms and muscled it open, the track shrieking. âGo, go, goââ The EXO members compressed themselves through the gap in a single panicked mass, Minseok pulling Jongdae by the sleeve, someoneâs knee catching the door frame, someone elseâs elbow cracking against another. Baekhyun went through last, twisting at the threshold, one hand braced the door frame and the other reaching back for Seo-ah, eyes locked on something over her shoulder that his face said she should not turn around to look at.
Ji-won and Ha-yoon shoved Seo-ah into the van, then dove in themselves. The door slammed shut just as something heavy thumped against its side, denting the steel. Inside, the air went thick with sweat, blood, and pure terror.
âDriveânow!â Ji-won barked. Tae-ho, white-knuckled, punched the accelerator. The van jolted forward, tires shrieking, weaving through bodies that were already getting upâbits of them dragging fingers across the asphalt, hissing inhuman. Two blocks on, they skidded to scoop up Soo-jin, her eyes glazed in shock as she jumped aboard.
Seo-ah pressed her face to the window, watching as Myeong-dong receded behind them. She spat a mouthful of blood onto the floor mat, then blinked grit out of her eyes. Min-jae was already kneeling beside her, hands working to peel up her sleeve. âDamn it, Seo-ah. Why is it always you?â
She offered him a shaky grin. âWhat can I say? Iâm memorable.â She closed her eyes against the sting, trying not to wince.
The van fishtailed down an empty avenue lined with overturned carts and hollow hulls of taxis. Out there, the city had become one giant chase sceneâtwisted shapes sprinting, crawling, some even faster than the engine. In the rear window, the things that were once people launched themselves at the van, bodies slamming into cars, streetlights, each other, snarling in voices that werenât voices.
A few hours ago, theyâd have laughed at the idea of aliens or monsters. Now?
âAnyone else hurt?â Min-jaeâs tone was flat, almost bored, even as his fingers flew over bandages and pulse checks. Just another Tuesday, he seemed to thinkâexcept none of them would ever see a Tuesday the same way again.
She shook her head, grit teeth as Min-jae cinched a rubber tourniquet above her elbow, the strap digging into tender flesh. The others in the van mirrored her motionâ heads snapping side to side, the gesture so in-unison it might have been choreographed. Cold sweat beaded at their hairlines, even the fluorescent dome light seemed to flicker in shock.
Min-jae tugged up the hem of her shirt and sucked in a hiss of breath. His fingers, slick with antiseptic from the last packet, trembled slightly as he tossed the empty wrapper into the cupholder. Ripping open a fresh gauze pad with his teeth, he slapped it onto her raw side none too gentle. The faint rustle of fabric was drowned by their pounding hearts.
Seo-ah stifled a strangled noiseâpart yelp, part curseâand the coppery tang of blood hit her tongue. She stared at the vanâs ceiling like it was the most fascinating thing in Seoul.
Min-jae clicked open his micro surgical kitâ the kind youâd stash in a blazer pocket. His breath caught as he peeled back ragged cloth, exposing raw tissue. A sudden, icy sting of alcohol washed over the lesion, and she gasped, âFuck!ââthe single word a raw, ragged edge in the silence.
He squinted, adjusting his glasses with meticulous care. âNope. This wonât hold.â A split second of something like panic flickered in his eyes. âTake off your top.â
Seo-ahâs lips curved into a sly grin. âDang, Min-jae, if you wanted me half-naked in your arms, you couldâve just asked.â Her voice cracked on the punch line, betraying the adrenaline that made her hands shake.
He leveled her with a flat stare. âNow.â
âOkay, okayâno sense of humor.â She shrugged off her jacket, then peeled away her t-shirt, wincing as fabric dragged over torn flesh. The van went deathly still: heads jerked up, breaths caught. Her lean, scarred torso was illuminated in the harsh morning light peering through the windows, a silent testament to every battle sheâd waged.
Min-jaeâs jaw clenched. âThis is pretty bad.â He pressed a clean gauze square deeper against the wound, then fished out a tiny steel stapler. âHold still.â
He flicked off the safety. The first staple punched through with a hollow, metallic thunk that ricocheted around their chests. âOne down, four to go,â he said softly, voice almost soothing. Each subsequent staple landed in cold rhythmâthunk, thunk, thunkâsealing flesh with clinical efficiency. Seo-ahâs fists balled, nails gouging crescent wounds into her palms, but she forced herself to breathe, counting the metal bites in her mind.
By the third staple, her bravado crumpled. Her shoulders sagged; she slumped forward until her forehead pressed against the seat in front of her. The hot trickle of blood had slowed, but each stapleâs shockwave of pain was a fresh brand. She drifted toward unconsciousness, just as Min-jae caught her chin and tipped her face back.
âYouâre going into shock,â he said, voice steady. âKeep talking, or youâll pass out.â
She blinked up at him, vision blurred. With a ragged breath she croaked, âBet that thing back there didnât get a fancy staple gun to the ass.â Her attempt at levity came out as a half-laugh, but the others exhaled, tension shattering into nervous relief.
Min-jae dabbed at the trickle with a gauze square. âYouâll need a tetanus booster,â he said, voice matter-of-fact.
âOoh, sexy,â she rasped, voice muffled. Even in pain, she couldnât resist one last barb.
Around them, hearts still thundered, minds still reeling from what theyâd just witnessed, but for now, they were aliveâand for that, even Seo-ah would admit, they were lucky.
Seo-ah fought the urge to close her eyes. Every breath tasted of metal and fear, pain lanced through her ribs, each breath a knife twisting in her side. Her heart fluttered, then settled into a slow, unsteady drumbeat. She thought of the creature that had chased her through the office, the way its hollow eyes had bored through her with a ravenous hunger.
She looked up. Chanyeol sat two seats away, body rigid, one hand digging into the headrest before him until his knuckles went bone-white. His other hand hovered at his throat, as if he couldnât decide whether to swallow or scream. Every few seconds he stole another glance at the dark stain spreading across Seo-ahâs back, at the taut bandage wrapped around her forearm. His eyes flicked over the curve of her waist, the rise and fall of her chestâhe couldnât look away. She gave him a crooked grin, pain creasing her brow. Cute!
âYou good?â she rasped, voice coarse as gravel.
âUh⌠yeah.â Chanyeolâs words tumbled out quickly, breathless and raw. He averted his gaze, then risked another peek, then looked away again. âYouâuh, are you okay?â
She lifted her chin. âTakes more than that to kill me.â
Chanyeol nodded. He had the shell-shocked stare of someone who had never seen blood outside a music video, and now there was some on his pants.
The van stank of sweat and fear. EXO, each broken out in panicked sweat, now sat as far from the windows as possible, flinching at every jolt of the road. Kyungsooâs throat bobbed with every swallow. Jongin kept glancing over his shoulder, as if at any moment the things outside might decide to peel away the vanâs skin. Baekhyun, who had seemed the type to crack a joke in any situation, now stared at the floor between his shoes, hands pressed into the seat so hard his knuckles looked necrotic.
âTheyâre following us, arenât they?â Baekhyun said after a stretch of silence, not looking up. His voice had no rhythm, no lilt, just the flat note of defeat. âThose⌠things. From the building.â
âNegative,â Ji-won said, not unkindly, eyes never leaving the side mirror. âFar as I can tell, we lost them at the turn.â She didnât sound convinced, and her hands never unclenched from the weapon in her lap.
âWhat were they?â Jongdaeâs voice was shrill, still ringing with the echo of that shriek from the street. âWhat happened to everyone?â
Seo-ah didnât answer right away. The staples in her back stung with every breath, but not as much as the memory of the creatureâs smile, the way it had used a human face like a borrowed mask. She could see those teeth, every time she blinked.
âI donât know,â Ji-won said, and the admission left her lips bitter. âThatâs what we were sent to find out.â
âBut you killed it,â Chanyeol said, voice almost apologetic, as if hoping the topic would evaporate if he put a polite period at the end. âRight?â
Seo-ah snorted. âWe slowed it down. For all we know, itâs up and walking now. Might even be in this van with us.â
Jongin let out a strangled noise, eyes wide as headlights.
Seo-ah rolled her head against the window, watching the world blur by. Seoul was a mausoleumâall the lights were still on, but not a single living thing moved in any window, any street, except them and the monsters. Something about that, the absolute absence of witnesses, made her skin itch.
âSo what now?â Kyungsoo asked, his voice the only one not quavering.
Min-jae finally looked up, mouth tight. âWe regroup with the other units. Wait for Command to issue new instructions.â
âBut Commandâs not answering,â Baekhyun said, finally looking up. âAre they?â
Min-jae nodded, once.
âSo weâre just⌠driving around until we die?â
Seo-ah couldnât help herself. âDonât take it personally. Youâre celebritiesâtheyâll probably clone you or something. Make a whole new band.â
âFunny,â Baekhyun said. But he didnât smile.
Baekhyun sat in the far back corner, wedged between two others, knees pressed to his chest, arms winding tighter around them as though to tether himself to the real world. He watched red beads roll down Seo-ahâs forearm, dripping onto the bandage, seeping through to stain the fabric. He saw the metal staples glint on her back, heard her chuckle through bloodless lips. He swallowed hard, torn between revulsion and awe. She was laughingâflirting, evenâas blood slid down her skin and her eyes shone with mischief. It made no sense. The city outside lay in ruin, gunfire still stuttering through the canyon of skyscrapers, and here she was cracking jokes about Min-jaeâs bedside manners. It was that smileâcrooked, fearlessâ that froze him.
Baekhyunâs own adrenaline throbbed in his temples. He tried to recall what it felt like to vault through a window for someone you didnât know, to risk a limb for a stranger. He couldnât. Years of rehearsed smiles for cameras, of carefully crafted public faces, had left him speechless at this moment. He pressed his palms togetherâbroken glass had shredded the skinâand hissed as stale napkin bandages tore against fresh cuts. The pain was shockingly real, a ground he understood better than any of this madness.
The van jumped a curb, jarring his shoulder into the ribbed plastic door frame. He barely registered it. His eyes kept drifting back to her. Seo-ahâs face was ashen, cheeks hollowed, but when she caught his gaze she winked as casually as if they were two passengers sharing a seat on a quiet train.
Baekhyun couldnât look away.
She laughed againâthis time joining Ha-yoonâs teasing about Min-jaeâs overdramatic mannerisms. The van hurtled forward, lights flashing on broken asphalt, and Seo-ahâs laughter rang out sharper than any bullet.
Somehow, amid the chaos and blood and the pounding of his own pulse, Baekhyun felt a spark of something fierce: admiration, disbeliefâand the faintest hope that maybe, just maybe, this impossible woman really would make it out alive.
The van rattled past blocks that should have been congested with taxis, descending into the wormhole of a city that hadnât realized it was dead. The silence outside wasnât the ordinary kind, not even the kind that falls after a summer rain. It was total, like the world had been lined with foam. Every kilometer, Soo-jin looked out, counting the shapes that werenât moving, the hunched silhouettes of citizens whoâd failed to get out, and the few that did moveâtoo quickly, or in the wrong direction entirely.
Inside, the air was thick with the stink of blood, the cold burn of alcohol, and the sticky breath of panic. They drove in pulses - pedal down, then braking hard, then weaving around barricades that made no tactical sense. Maybe made by civilians, maybe by something else. The cityâs own arteries clogged shut with its panic. A siren blipped in the distance, but it was just a recording, cycling through notifications. Police vans, ambulances, lay toppled. A sudden and drastic contrast against last night. Announcements echoing over themselves, layer upon layer, like someone had turned the cityâs own lungs against it.
âItâs a mystery how we werenât made aware of this sooner,â Ha-yoon said, her knuckles white where she gripped her rifle. âThis level of structural collapse⌠it didnât happen in an hour.â
She turned towards EXO. âHow long were you guys stuck in there?â
Jongin adjusted his glasses. His hands trembled slightly. âOur meeting was at nine. Dinner. We heard shouting from the streetânot normal shouting. More like⌠screaming.â He swallowed. âOur manager went to check. He never came back.â
Min-jae cut in, voice low but urgent. âDid you see or hear anything before he left? Movement? Shapes?â
Baekhyun shook his head, arms wrapped tight around his knees. âJust the lights flickering. And this⌠humming sound, like faulty wiring but⌠alive.â
âAlive how?â Ji-won asked from the front seat, her eyes still scanning the ruins outside.
âLike it was breathing,â Chanyeol said quietly. âThe walls, the ceilingâthey pulsed. Like there was something inside.â
âWhat made you think so?â Ji-won retorts. âAnything particular you remember?â
Kyungsoo nodded slowly. âNo. Just felt like there was something in the walls. And, it smelt like rotten eggs.â
Ha-yoon and Seo-ah exchanged a look.
âWe barricaded the door right after we heard the same screams coming from outside our door.â
âDo you think?â Ha-yoon asks Seo-ah, almost questioning herself.
Seo-ah sighed. âIn any case, protocols didnât mean shit. Not against something you have no clue about.â Seo-ah softened slightly at their shell-shocked expressions. âYour security saw threats coming from outside. Not from within. There was nothing they could have done.â
EXO drooped, looking like they had lost all reason for hope.
Then Sehun spoke up, voice barely above a whisper. âThere was one thing. The delivery guy, early yesterday.â The others tried to hush him, like it was not significant enough. But he spoke anyway. âHe looked sick. Stood there until security escorted him out.â
Silence settled again, thick and heavy.
Seo-ah snorted bitterly. âOur government is getting weak. Couldnât even contain a Level 4 before it got escalated into a train wreck.â
Seo-ah busied herself counting the blocks to stay awake, but the pain was pulling her under, one anchor after another. She pressed her bare shoulder to the window, and the cold shocked through her, clearing her head. Through the glass, neon drifted past, all the colors strange and overripe. She caught her reflection, lip split and swelling. She liked the look. It made her look meaner, harder to kill.
Meanwhile, Ha-yoon was hunched over the dash, a tangle of wires blooming in her lap. She had pried the comms set from the dashboard and now dissected it with surgical aggression, strips of insulation flecking the cupholders and punched holes in her own palm from the slip of a flathead. The radio still hissed a flat line. She grunted, twisted a dial, and smacked the casing with the heel of her hand.
âStatus?â Ji-won urged.
âNothing,â she finally said. âItâs not the hardware. Itâs dead air, like the whole netâs been bricked.â
Ji-won, at shotgun, barely blinked. She just stared at the blank LCD of her own walkie, thumb tracing the groove in the plastic. âTry the secure band. Again.â
A click, a pause, more static. âNo signal,â Ha-yoon said. âUnless you want to order a pizza, because I think the only active repeater is a fucking Dominoâs in Gangnam.â
The radio came alive, howled and spat. Not the familiar static, a mechanical voice, or the memory of one, chopped and looped by a failing transmitter. For a moment the vanâs interior was nothing but noiseâseo-ahâs own teeth vibrating in her jaw, the rattle of the chassis, then the wet tug of Min-jaeâs gauze on her wound. Ha-yoonâs hand hovered, afraid to touch the dial again, afraid to lose transmission.
Then a voice, as if breaking the surface of water - âThis is Central Precinct. Level Four shelter-in-place. All civilians, all units, shelterârepeat, shelterâdangerous armed elements in playââ The next words dissolved in a blizzard of static, but then the voice returned, more urgent, âAll units, hostile presence now confirmed in perimeter. Use of force is authorized. All civilians who can hear this: lock doors. Do not attempt to evacuate until further notice.â
The message repeated, each time more warped, syllables swimming in and out like bodies in a current.
Seo-ahâs skin prickled. Nothing in the voice sounded like a drill. She watched EXO absorb it. Some stiffened, some flinched, one pressed his hands to his ears like a toddler at his first fireworks show. But they heard it. Everyone heard it. The threat wasnât theoretical now. It was moving through the city. It was moving toward them.
Ha-yoon hunched over the radio, trying to pull more from the feed, but all she could do was punch buttons and pray. She made a look towards Ji-won.
Her fingers didnât stop, even as the van jounced over a pothole and nearly shattered her front teeth. She tore out the radio head, bit the wires in her teeth, and twisted two of them together. Burnt plastic and solder stink. Ha-yoon hunched over it, face shadowed, muttering under her breath. âCome on, come on, donât brick now, you goddamn fossil.â
She thumbed a button and spoke into the half-attached mic, voice as flat as a dial tone. âThis is Unit One, Myeong-dong grid. We need an open channel. Anyone there?â
Static, curling and folding in on itself. The same, the same, but thenâsomething. A ghost edge. Ha-yoon killed the vanâs own radio system, cranked the gain up, and the static resolved into a slurry of voices, chopped and duplicated on three frequencies at once.
â...repeat, do not open the gates...â
â...last confirmed at Namdaemun...â
â...Level 4 perimeter breached...â
Another voice surfaced, a manâs this time. Calm, like he was reading lottery numbers. ââthis is Yeongdeungpo Command. Central is down. If you are still in the city, get underground or get out. Armed elements are converging. I repeat, armed elements⌠do no attract⌠voiceâŚâ Static clawed the rest away.
Ha-yoon shouted to the front, âGot a Command post at Yeongdeungpo! They might be taking survivors.â
Ji-won clamped a hand over the radio and squeezed, as if it might yield more signal by force of will. âWhoâs in perimeter?â Ji-won spoke low, almost to herself. âLast briefing, no other units deployed.â She waited through the static. âWhoâs in command? Over.â Static.
Ji-won grit her teeth. âTae-ho, pull us to the Yeongdeungpo Command base.â
The Yeongdeungpo Command base looked like an ultra-modern fortress, all titanium fins and triple-redundant fences, but as the van pulled up the perimeter was wrong. No guards at the post. The floodlights, meant to reduce night to theater stage brightness, barely flickered. The gate hung open, one hinge torqued so far the metal had torn.
Ji-won motioned Tae-ho to keep rolling, slow, windows up. No movement in the guardhouse. No movement anywhere. She radioed in, voice low and measured. No answer. The van crept through the lot, the tires crunching over something she did not want to identify. She caught a glimpse of it anywayâa matte black helmet, visor smashed, the inside painted with something dark.
Ji-wonâs jaw flexed. âTae-ho, park in the south loading bay. Everyone else, on my six.â She scanned the vanâHa-yoonâs jaw set, Min-jae already pulling on gloves, Tae-ho as steady as steel. Seo-ah slouched in the back, blood dried to rust at her hairline, weapon drawn out and aimed at the back entry of the van, slightly trembling. Soo-jin sighted her rifle out the windscreen, still and silent as stone.
They parked at an angle that kept the exit clear. Ji-won stepped out first, pistol high, eyes fixed on the main entrance. The others fanned out. The air outside was viscous with the smell of burnt rubber and whatever chemical cocktail had soaked through the street. Ha-yoon, Tae-ho and Min-jae swept the lot for movement, their boots crunching through debris that had once been someoneâs desk, someoneâs life.
Soo-jin, like every time, did not exit the van. Neither did Seo-ah, whoâd slumped against the window, one hand pressed to her bad shoulder, the other clutching her Glock. Her vision tunneled, but she still caught the way Baekhyunâs knuckles whitened on the frame of the seat every time a shadow moved outside. She wanted to make a joke, or console, but did neither.
Tae-ho was the quietest of them all, but he kept his weapon up and his eyes wider than any of them. He did a quick recon of the loading bay and pointed to a service corridor, barely visible behind a stack of singed pallets and a burned-out freezer. âSide entrance,â Tae-ho announced, voice so soft it was half lost in the wind. âIt must run between the admin offices and the main floor. Might be safer than going through the front.â
Ji-won weighed it in silence, then, âNo. We go in together. Minimize exposure.â
Tae-ho hesitated, gaze flicking from Ji-won to the glass main door, then to the blank, unlit windows overhead. âIf itâs a trap, weâre boxed in. Two teams, double our chance to get inside.â
Ji-wonâs jaw knotted. She didnât like splitting the group. Never did. She looked to Ha-yoon, who shrugged, then to Min-jae, whose hands were already shifting through his kit, ready for anything but not happy about it. The members in the van looked like theyâd vote for ânone of the aboveâ if anyone asked.
Seo-ah, half-propped against the van floor, still bleeding but conscious, made the decision for her. âLetâs split. Youâre wasting time, Captain.â Her lips were blue, her breathing shallow. âIf somethingâs inside, give it more than one target.â
Ji-won hated that she was right, but nodded anyway. âMin-jae, Ha-yoon, with me. We take the main.â She pointed to Tae-ho and jerked her chin at Seo-ah. âYou two, side entrance. Move fast. Stay in comms.â
Tae-ho nodded once, then glanced at Seo-ah. Sheâd hauled herself upright, blood now drying to a taut film at the corner of her mouth. Her right hand trembled faintly. âYou good to move?â he asked, and meant it.
She showed him her teeth. âLike hell.â She holstered the Glock, steadied herself against the vanâs door.
Tae-ho threw Seo-ahâs good arm over his shoulder and hauled her up. Seo-ah gritted her teeth but said nothing.
EXOâto Ji-won barely more than boys squared up in puffy jackets and designer sweats, faces wiped blank with terrorâclustered behind the back seat.
âStay,â said Ji-won, looking at each EXO member like she was nailing the word to their foreheads. âIf anything comes through that door, you drive away. Donât stop. Donât look for us. Donât look back. Drive. And keep driving.â
They nodded. One of them tried to speak, but the words kneecapped themselves before making it out.
Ji-won led her group out first, hugging the wall like old habit, eyes darting. The air was colder here, and every step forward made her skin crawl harder. The yard was littered with the detritus of a lost battleâloose riot shields, paper insignias, a single black boot.
She glanced back - Tae-ho was already half-carrying, half-dragging Seo-ah past the broken side doors.
Ji-wonâs team crossed open ground, hugging the concrete like shadows. The others held at the door, Tae-hoâs breath a thin steam in the cold. He picked the lock with a twist of his Leatherman, then eased the door inward. The corridor was dark, the sort of dark that had muscle. He could smell old ammonia, something burnt, and the rot-sweet of dried blood.
Inside, footsteps rolled out ahead of them. Tae-ho braced for a trapâSeo-ah could see it in the cut of his chin, the way his hand flattened along the barrel of his gun. She swept left, every muscle screaming at her to slow down, but she didnât. The first room off the corridor was an admin cubicle, walls stained with spilled coffee and panic. She clocked the abandoned glasses on a desk, the line of photos taped in a rowâbirthday, wedding, kidâs first day of school. The computer monitors were all dead. The next room, supply closet, door hanging open, nothing but mops and the stench of bleach.
They moved like that, leapfrogging through the guts of the building, until Tae-ho caught her shoulder and held her up short. She squinted past him, down the hallway. At the far end, under the flicker of a single failing light, something waited.
It was small, at first: the hunched curve of a child. Maybe eight, maybe ten, all knees and elbows and the black slick of hair glued to its head. It clung to the wall, face hidden. Seo-ahâs brain flickered, tried to find a category.
Tae-hoâs voice, low: âStay behind me.â
She did not.
She stepped past him, gun raised, and called out, âHey. You with us or trying to kill us?â
The hallway stuttered once, then the light gave out. The darkness was not gradual, not a slow dimming, but surgicalâa single snap and the corridor became a cold, perfect dungeon.
Seo-ahâs eyes strained, pupils fighting to decide which was worse - what she could see, or what she could not.
A rustle. Soft, like the wind through plastic. Then a scrape, heel to linoleum, and another, much closer.
Tae-hoâs breath drew sharp and shallow. She felt the air move as he pivoted, rifle angled over her head. Nothing. The dark pressed in, thick as fog, swallowing sound and direction. She waited for her own thoughts to catch up, but there was only the afterimage of the child-thing, still burned on her retina, frozen halfway between the wall and the floor.
Something moved ahead. Something slow, deliberate. The sound of skin sliding over tile, then the wet click of knucklesâno, nailsâon concrete.
Seo-ah killed her flashlight. A raw, reflexive decision. The blackness that followed was absolute. She let her other senses sharpen, ears wide for the telltale suck of breath in the dark.
It came instead as a shudder of air against her cheek, a break in temperature, alive and cold and wrong.
âDown,â Tae-ho whispered, and Seo-ah ducked without thinking. The bullet sang past her, a gunshot loud enough to deafen her in the tight corridor. Somewhere ahead, a noise, like meat hitting a butcherâs block, then the skitter of something heavy and fast retreating further into the dark.
She blinked hard, trying to clear the flash from her eyes. The corridor was a smear of afterimages. Seo-ah drew air through her teeth. It tasted like burnt ozone and old copper.
The child was gone.
What remained, as her vision returned in increments, was the glisten of something raw on the corridor floor. A trail that led away from them.
âTae-ho,â she hissed. âDid you hit it?â
He shook his head. Once. âNo body. No clue.â He reloaded, the action practiced and silent.
Seo-ah wanted to say something clever, but the words jammed up behind her tongue. She stepped forward, one inch at a time, gun aimed along her own trembling arm. She saw it then - the small figure, hunched against the wall, face still obscured by hair. It made no sound. Did not move.
She tiptoed forward, thinking of every horror movie sheâd ever pretended not to be afraid of, and knelt down beside it.
âHey,â she whispered, the word almost gentle.
The thingâs head snapped up. Not a child. Not anymore.
Its eyes were gone, or sewn shut, the lids puckered and raw. The mouth stitched into an almost-smile, slack and toothless. The skin was bubbled and puffy. It leapt forward.
Seo-ah fired on instinct, point-blank, into its chest. The child-like thing convulsed, writhed in pain it once harbored as a human, until it wasnât moving anymore.
However, the gunshot, they realized, was probably not the best of ideas.
In the sixty seconds that followed, the corridor filled with things that lived in the space between memory and anatomy.
The first that came at them was not a child, not anymore, but a tangle of limbs that wanted only to be closer than skin. Tae-ho shot it kneecap to chin, and it still found the strength to gnaw at the webbing of Seo-ahâs vest with the stumps of its teeth. She stamped it flat and took inventory: her right shoulder was still attached, but the socket creaked, and the blood kept worming through the bandages.
The next that followed, some were on all fours, their bases scraping and rebounding against concrete with slick, purposeful slaps, others were too tall for the ceiling and ran on elongated wrists, skin sloughed raw from the effort. They came at the pair without sound, as if the air itself had been vacuumed outâno footfalls, no snarl, not even a click of jaw or tangle of nails. Only the wet stumble of flesh in a hallway built for fire drills and evacuation.
Tae-hoâs rifle chattered once, twice, but the rounds only slowed the first of themâa collapsed marionette shape with too many elbows, a face uncooked and shriveled, a childâs arms sprouting from an adultâs chest. Seo-ah, one-armed and vision warping at the edges, found herself pressed to the wall with her pistol braced in her left hand, right useless at her side. She emptied her magazine into the thing that was leading, feeling it buckle and tumble onto its own limbs, leaking something that clung to the floor with the sweet stink of rot. Seo-ah dropped the gun, her hand shaking hard enough to rattle the staples in her shoulder, and fumbled for a fresh magazine with her teeth.
She heard Tae-ho shout something clipped, but his voice was buried under the wet slap of bodies. He took the bruntâtwo of the things hit him at the chest and abdomen, pinning him to the door at the far end. She saw his feet leave the floor. The rest tried to wedge in, but there was only so much corridor. She caught a glimpse of his hand still on the trigger as the barrel pressed between an eyeless cavity. The blast at that range painted the wall and the one behind it, but the second one bit into his vest.
She didnât waste the seconds. She loaded the fresh mag, racked the slide with her palm, and put three rounds into the soft spot where the thingâs head met its spine. It was just a guess, but it worked. For now.
The mass shuddered, and the jaws went slack. Tae-ho crushed forward, dragging two more bodies with him in a single, ugly heap.
The corridor was clear for now, but it wouldnât hold. She knew that the gunfire had bought them two minutes, maybe less. Tae-ho, was on his knees and still bleeding from the mouth, gave her a look over his shoulder. He did not ask if she could run. They both knew the answer.
They moved, half-stumbling, down the corridor toward the green glow of the stairwell sign. The stairwell itself was a death trapâa single, winding chute with nowhere to go than up and no cover but the curve of the landing. Still, it was better than being meat in an unlit hallway. Seo-ah reached the door first and braced it open, waiting for a new ambush. None came.
They tumbled through and found the stairs already painted in streaks of dark at every other step. The handrails sticky. Seo-ah heard the pounding of bodies on the floor above, and a familiar voice: Ha-yoon, screaming for Min-jae, for Ji-won, for anyone. The voice fractured as it bounced down the stairwell, but it was familiar enough that Seo-ah found herself yelling back, throat raw, âComing up! Hold!â
She started up, Tae-ho behind her, both hands on his Tavor. Every step jostled her arm and shoulder, and she could feel the wound weeping under the patch, the warmth leaking out and freezing to her skin. The third landing had a body, his head at a wrong angle, lips blue. Beside him, the stairwell wall had been punched through from the other sideârebar and concrete bent inward, as if a car had hit it. Past the hole, in the open office space, the gunfire was closer now, more erratic. They heard Ji-wonâs voice, clear and clipped, giving orders in the between-breaths of the fight. Below them, the pounding grew louder. The stairwell was about to overflow again.
They had no choice but to push into the office. The smell hit first, like meat lockers after a blackout, or the lower decks of a ferry after a suicide. It was so thick she had to swallow three times before her stomach stopped trying to rebel. The office was a cubicle labyrinth, and the fluid ones had been here alreadyâthe desks were overturned, monitors blinded with handprints, carpet squelching underfoot. In the center of the room, Ji-won was standing on top of a filing cabinet, SKS pointed down at a ring of things that circled but wouldnât ascend. Ha-yoon was with her, bleeding from the scalp, brandishing an empty pistol like a bat.
Ji-won saw them instantly. âTo me,â she said, not yelling, just expecting them to obey. Her face was painted with blood and the glitter of shattered glass, but her eyes were steady. âMove.â
The things noticed tooâthey peeled off from the base of the cabinet and made to move towards Seo-ah, just as a van - their van - crashed through the wall and onto the things, crushing them between a wall lined with desks and the van itself. Complete coincidence, but one that worked for them. Behind the wheel, a panicked Xiumin and a steady Soo-jin, and remaining EXO members peering from the backseats, eyes wide but all safe for now. Lucky crash.
Down the hall, they see a figure sprinting toward them. At first, Seo-ah thought it was one of the fluid ones. Then she squinted and saw Min-jaeâs face, white and shaking, covered in blood, but alive.
âContact!â Min-jae hissed. âTwo oâclock. Not humanââ
Three of the fluid things were in pursuit - two in the remnants of uniforms, one in a shredded business suit. They moved fast, but not straight. Their bodies flailed in directions physics shouldnât have allowed.
Seo-ah raised her left hand, drew a breath, and put three more holes in the business suit, dropping it momentarily. Tae-ho caught the first officer low and finished it with a heel to the neck. Ji-won and Min-jae took the third together, Min-jae sweeping the legs and Ji-won stamping the skull like she was crushing a cockroach.
They watched as the bodies sputtered, breaking and repairing themselves at a speed unknown to humans.
âEasy now,â Ji-won said, voice raw. âWeâre clear for the nextâŚthirty seconds. Whatâs the status?â
Seo-ah tried to answer, but all she could manage was a laughâshort, ugly, edged with sarcasm.
Ji-won nodded in understanding. âWe have to get out. Rooftop?â
âGlass ceiling,â Tae-ho pointed. âWe can cut up and cross over to the building in front. Or we make for the street. Either way, theyâre coming.â
Ji-won scanned the atrium, then the corridor theyâd come from. âWhat about the van?â
âXiuminâs waiting, but the vanâs totaled.â said Tae-ho, pointing back to the van, his breath fogging in the cold. âBut if we take the front, we have to outrun them. If we go up, we get a view, maybe buy time.â
Ji-won made the call. âWe go up. Ha-yoon, tail. Min-jae, you cover right. Tae-ho, left. Seo-ah, youââ Her eyes flicked to the wound blooming across Seo-ahâs arm. âYou stay alive.â
The stairwell was a vertical coffin. Too many bodies packed into too little space, the air wet with breath and blood. Seo-ah took the first flight on a dead sprint, but every step was a small war. The bone-deep ache in her shoulder had gone sharp and spiking again, a pain that made the world pinwheel, but she forced her left hand up the rail and hauled. The others thundered behind. Above, the emergency lighting painted the landings in a sickly, institutional green.
At the next door, Ji-won shouldered through, gun up. The corridor was clear. Or as clear as anywhere in this building got. She waved them down the hallâgo, move, donât stop. Thirty meters of cubicles and toppled file cabinets. At the end, a battered âmaintenanceâ sign, the only promise they had.
Behind them, the sound returned. Bodies tumbling up the stairs, not downâarms clawing, knees colliding, teeth scraping off concrete. The fluid ones moved with a violence that shouldnât have fit anatomy. Seo-ah gritted her teeth, counted her own pulse: One, two. One, two. She jerked open the metal door at the end of the corridor.
The door yanked shut behind them with a punch of air so cold it felt like a slap. Seo-ah staggered, nearly lost her feet as the pain in her shoulder scraped new edges. The darkness in here was viscousâoily, heavy, swallowing the world in an instant. She blinked. Nothing. Her own movements sounded obscenely loud against the concrete: every stagger, every hissed breath, every heartbeat. The others were closeâshe could smell the copper and sweat, hear their feet skidding on dust and grit.
Ji-wonâs voice: barely a whisper. âFlashlights and phones off.â
Seo-ahâs phone was already black, but she checked it anyway, thumb trembling against the hard glass. She drew another breath, slow, tried to get her bearings. The smell down here was different than downstairsâcold, but threaded with the tang of antifreeze, something sickly sweet and the ghost of a dead rat somewhere deep in the walls.
Ji-won moved without soundâSeo-ah tracked her by the scrape of boots and the quiet grunt as she rammed a filing cabinet into the frame. Wheels bucked, then locked. Ji-won braced her body against it, arm outspread, ready to catch the next breach. Soon, Tae-ho and Min-jae joined her, throwing their weight against the door, bracing it with a desperate urgency that spoke of a future they still intended to see.
The darkness was so total it made sound a weapon. Each breath a shout. Each heartbeat a countdown.
Behind them, the first slam hit the door. It buckled inward, the metal skin crumpling, then another, and anotherâwet, meaty impacts that bounced off the walls and seemed to multiply in the echo. Someone whimpered in the dark, maybe Ha-yoon, maybe one of EXO members, but Seo-ah couldnât be sure.
Ha-yoon came next, then Chanyeol and Minseok, each one finding a shoulderâs width of door and pressing in, backs to the dark.
The noise built, a low animal chorus, bodies stacking against the other side of the door. Each impact was wetter than the last. Something slid down the metal door with a hiss, and she could smell the hot, coppery tang of it even through the gap.
Ji-won barked, âDown, down, now,â and they all ducked low, bodies pressed to the cold steel of the vent housing, knees jammed into chins. She could feel EXO vibrating behind her, their terror animal and contagious.
The thudding faded, but not completely. Sometimes it came in clusters, as if the pile was collapsing and being rebuilt. Sometimes something huge would strike, once, and the echoes would stagger through the walls. Every so often, Ji-won would hear a thin, high whineâmaybe wind, maybe a voice, maybe something else.
Eventually, there was nothing but the white noise of the building breathing.
Ji-won risked a look at her watch. Dawn was hours away. She chinned toward the nearest electrical box, and everyone crab-crawled toward it under the next blackout. She fumbled in her vest for the schematicâ blurry, creasedâ and spread it flat. The only light was the chemical green of a glow stick she cracked between her teeth.
âWe wait for light,â she hissed, and the group collapsed into a pile behind a rusty HVAC box. Somewhere in the dark, someone retchedâwet, helpless, the body finally saying what the mind had been holding. A hand found his shoulder and stayed there.
