the drive was boring, the dull gray road and the blend of the dark branches blurring together and you have to blink a few times to clear your eyes and refocus. the pale yellow road dividers were faded, chipped, and cracked, allowing weeds to pop up every so often.

sighing you turn the radio on but nothing but static reaches your ears, you suspected as much as you’re pretty sure you passed into nothing world little less than an hour ago, the curse of this damn theme park being so far out.

elsher’s kingdom wasn’t a place you often thought about visiting but considering you were above the theme park’s age demographic that made sense, admittingly the place had gathered your attention when it had opened but for a different reason. it was constructed pretty much out of nowhere, the man who owned it was a mystery, he was rich, had a family he kept out of the public eye, and barely made any public outings unless it was for business purposes. 

the theme park was big, eight different exploratory areas all with its own individual “theme”. it wasn’t incredibly massive, like some of the other theme parks within the country, but it was local and it was fun.

you weren’t coming here for fun though. the mission you were given flashes across your mind. no one knows who made the request for someone (solo, they had specified), to investigate a missing person and discover the reason for the park’s shut down, but they anonymously gave a large sum of money that would really help fund the office and with a promise to give more both for the one to investigate and the entire office upon completion of the job.

no one really wanted it, suspicion was heavily written all over the request especially with the lack of clarity in it, but the money was something of interest for everyone. you took up on the offer quickly, your natural curiosity about the place being a part of the reason and well… money was certainly a good thing to have as it was a bit tight for you at the moment.

so here you were, driving down a dusty, somewhat abandoned road, to try and find a missing person who was last seen at the park and and find out why it was shut down in the first place. all for some money that wasn’t even specified in the letter. you hope the money was good and that the job was easy, even though there was an inkling in the back of your mind that that wouldn’t be the case.

the theme park comes into view and you pull off to enter the parking lot, scanning the area as you park you notice there was a few cars scattered around. none of them seemed dusty, in fact they all seemed like brand new cars or at least parked there recently, save for one bright lime green older looking mustang fastback. odd but you don’t think much of it since this place is abandoned after all, teenagers looking for a thrill were bound to be roaming around and you’re sure there’d be a security guard or two as well.

hopping out the car you take a mental note of everything on yourself, flashlight, a fully charged camera, a phone, notepad, pencils, your id and other credentials, and the file.

pulling out the file to read it gives some information on the person you’d be trying to find as well as some other information; “jihoon elsher-yoon, 52 year old male. theme park owner and landowner of elsher’s kingdom. last known location elsher’s kingdom estate, first reported missing to police by daughter, hana, however it is noted that the last person known to see him is business partner, moon youngho. reported missing to head detective lee heeseung.” you hadn’t been able to read this back at the office as it was shoved into your hands by your boss as you were about to leave. you close the file, and ponder about it some, sounds like hana was the one who submitted the request too then.

“i wonder if one of these cars is this detective’s then..” you think aloud, looking back at the cars. there were a few too many so either he brought backup or you’re gonna have a fun discussion about breaking and entering with a few kids.

you walk towards the closest cars to at least gather some intel about what to possibly expect inside, all the cars were empty of people, trash in some and papers scattered in another. you walk towards the mustang and slow down upon noticing a pool of dried blood on the ground near the driver's door.

frowning, you crouch down to get closer to it. it was fully dried, but it wasn’t discolored so it happened recently enough which didn’t appease your mind in any way. you take a note on it in your notepad and stand back up, the driver's seat has some papers and you try and read what you can. the papers seem to be business in nature, addressed to a “mr. elsher-yoon”, this must be his car then, you snap a quick picture. at least this proves he’s here.. potentially, you doubt he’d leave his car behind.

the gate to enter the park is unlocked and you head on in.

⟢

your footsteps echo along the tiled flooring, the theme park is empty, old bits of uneaten but ant infested bits of food scattered, multiple cardboard containers that must’ve held popcorn thrown about, napkins, popsicle sticks, wristbands, and whatever else are littered around too. trash cans are here and there, but you don’t think you can stomach the idea of rummaging through them.

there's a ticket booth to your left and you take a peek within the open counter window, an antiseptic sits on behind the counter and you grab it, “who knows.. i may need it.” you think to yourself as you stuff it into your bag.

you continue walking down, the faded and ripped posters on the wall tug at your heart a little, people were really here one day and then never again the next. it just makes you all a bit more determined to find mr. elsher-yoon and why the park even closed down.

there's a bathroom coming up and you shrug before entering in, doesn’t hurt to make sure everything is clear.

the bathroom is musty, the air stale as if the door was finally opened for the first time in months, which.. if you think about it, you opening it probably was the first time it had been opened in months. the floor is dirty, dust and dirt staining the once white pristine tiles. a noise of rushing water is heard and you turn your head to look in the other corner where theres a small puddle of water coming from a broken toilet, the drain in the center of the room allowing the room to at least not flood.

deciding to not step in that direction, you shine your light at the other corner, in the midst of all the grime, blood splatters are everywhere and you frown.

“where the hell could that have come from..?” you mutter to yourself, just when you were about to check it out, you hear talking from behind you and you quickly rush behind the bathroom door.

faded voices are heard just outside the door, “i’m telling you jay, something entered the bathroom.” a voice filters through, muffled by the door but still loud enough to be heard.

the other one, jay you assume, sighs, “jungwon, if you dragged me away from the group and turns out nothing is in there, i’m serious about you having to go back.”

jungwon, you now know who the owner of the first voice is, scoffs, “we just shot at a bunch of.. things.. and you’re telling me i have to go back because i'm nervous about what’s hiding around in this park? seriously?”

the door is slightly pushed open and you smush yourself as best as you can against the wall as it opens up further, “i’m just saying.. you being skittish isn’t helping us move about any easier.”

the two then enter the bathroom and you get a good look at their backs, both men, but you had deduced that by their voices, they're both of similar height, one is a bit taller than the other. the taller one, having entered first you assume is jay and the other, jungwon. their outfits are similar to detective get-ups but they’ve definitely been modified, probably in a way to help them in their line of work.

“nothing in here dude.” jay turns his head to look at jungwon and you think quickly about your options here.

you could slip away, but that leaves you out in the open and when they come back out, if you can’t find somewhere else to hide and wait for them to leave you’d be caught. you could continue to wait in here, but the door is closing and if it closes fully before they turn around you’d be caught. you could.. draw out your gun and ask about them, but they also mentioned shooting at something so you guess they both have guns on them.

you’re also unaware of what their intentions are, but you hope that it’s at least positive.

“i’m going back to heeseung now, you can stay and look around here if that’ll help ease your mind some.” the taller one mutters out, the door thankfully still open enough to cover your body so he leaves without noticing you, however he shuts the door on his way out and you’re alone with the other one.

heeseung… that’s the same name as the head detective on the file you have, so maybe their intentions are good. you rest your hand on your holster in case, since in your line of work, you really can never be too cautious when running into other people.

you creep quietly to cover the door, your best bet was to at least block the door, so the other one can’t hear you in any way and to prevent the one in front of you from running out and getting the attention of who left.

“what’s your name.” you speak up, voice low and the man in front of you jumps up, spinning around quickly and braces himself as he looks up at you, you see his eyes scan your body and you feel them land on the hand that's on your holster and you see him start to reach for his own, you had been right about that, he did have a gun on him.

your eyes narrow and you bring your gun out quicker, aiming it at the ground. “i wouldn’t reach for that, i’ll have shot you before you even get that out.” 

the man stops and swallows, “jungwon.”

you huff some air out of your nose, he’s too good for his own good, he was honest about his name but at least you know that he’s not a bad person, as far as you can tell at least.

“y/n.” you offer your own and you see him relax if only a little bit, “what’re you doing here?”

he frowns, “i’m not at liberty to tell you that, but i can ask you the same thing.”

you smirk and offer his answer right back at him, “i’m also not at liberty to tell you that. but considering what you got on i can imagine you’ve been sent to investigate this place, am i wrong?”

jungwon falters at your words and that tells you all you have to know that you hit the mark on that, “i am too.”

“too what?”

“sent to investigate this place," with your free hand you grab your id and flash it in his direction, “y/n l/n. special agent l/n, but just keep it to y/n please. i’ve been sent to investigate a missing person.”

“fbi? you’re fbi?” jungwon asks, eyes scanning up and down at you, suspicion in his tone.

you shake your head, “no, i’m just a part of an investigation team operation that specializes in matters like these, hence my title.”

jungwon lets out a noise of understanding and you now realize how awkward this sort’ve is and holster your gun once more, “uh, i apologize for that earlier, i hadn’t expected to hear other people so soon.”

jungwon waves his hand around, “it’s fine, i’d have done the same thing. if it helps you out some, i’m also here to find a missing person.”

“i figured out as much.”

he tilts his head and you couldn’t help but find it cute, “how so?”

“the other one said the name heeseung, my file also mentions a heeseung.”

“ah.. if it’s about a lee heeseung then you’d be correct in it being the same person.”

“sounds like i’m correct then.”

jungwon stands straighter, visibly more relaxed now, “you don’t mind if i bring you to my group then right? if we’re doing the same thing, it might be easier for us all, an even team is better anyways, there’s seven of us and..”

you cut him off, “that’s fine, i’m here solo too and it’d be nice to have some help, this park is massive after all.”

jungwon nods, “then let’s see if we can catch up to jay, uh.. he’s the one that was with me by the way.”

you nod and he leaves the bathroom, you’re about to head out after him before you spot a magazine laying on the ground, you pick it up and a polaroid is on the front cover, the title of the magazine reads, “PARANORMAL HAPPENING AT ABANDONED THEME PARK. FACT OR FICTION?”

you flip the page and read what’s written, “self proclaimed paranormal investigator and photographer byun eunjoo, known mainly as ej sends a polaroid he took of a supposed paranormal being at elsher’s kingdom. he proclaims it was the first of many he spotted. however us here at GS magazine are not entirely convinced, what do you think about it readers. we believe ej here may need some more photos before he convinces us of anything!”

the polaroid looks as if a humanoid figure is walking around, but the image is grainy and you can’t make out much else other than the figure and a few weird large pustules on its body, they seem to be embedded into the skin and are green in color. you shudder at the sight before ripping the polaroid out and placing it in your bag. talk about odd, but anything that can give you at least something about this park is better than nothing, after all you still have that part of the job to complete.

jungwon peeks his head back into the bathroom you must’ve been taking a bit longer than you thought, “y/n? you coming? what’re you doing just standing there?”

you snap out of your gaze and drop the magazine back onto the ground, “ah sorry, this magazine had something that caught my attention, s’all.”

“right well hurry it up, we gotta catch up to jay.”

walking towards the music building on your campus was always the worst trek for you. it was the furthest building from your on-campus apartment and it was a combination of uphill walking, stairs, and loose gravel sidewalk that for some reason the school had yet to get fixed. you kick a loose rock and grumble incoherently, watching the rock hit the bottom stair leading up to the building. letting out a sigh you begin walking up the last of the stairs that leads towards the building. 

the night was serene at least, a bit chilly but it was still early spring, you’re just glad the hoodie you’re currently wearing is enough to block out the wind blowing past every so often. with the last bit of sunlight fading behind the horizon, you scan your fob into the building’s sensor, unlocking the doors.

a small noise crunches somewhere from behind you and your head immediately turns in the direction of the sound yet nothing is there. eyebrows furrowing, you rescan the fob and head inside the building shaking your head, “i hate walking at night, curse heeseung and his off-campus apartment, if only he’d pick me up.”

you head into the hallway that holds the elevators that lead into the basement. it’s never been the most ideal location to record, but it offered a few rooms that had equipment and space you needed to borrow.

after the trip down from the elevator you walk into the room the four of you have continuously used for the radio show. setting your bag down you start cleaning up the space, trashing old papers left behind, wiping the tables, doing simple tests on the mics to just make sure they work, overall just getting the place ready. you leave jay and jake's stuff mainly untouched, as they have their own way of setting up the lights, mic sensitivities, and what all else.

the door opens up behind you as you continue to do tasks around the rooms, not bothering to look at the door, you glance at the clock instead, “hey guys, you’re a bit earlier than when you normally get here.. we still got an hour.. but since you’re here could you,” your voice quiets down as you turn to address whoever was behind you directly, however no one is in the room.

“what the hell,” you mutter out scratching your head, “i swear i heard the door open.”

you quickly scan the room you’re in, checking under the table to see if one of the four decided to fool around a bit. seeing no one under there you move to the other room where jay and jake usually stay in, but no one is seen there either. a sense of unease begins to grow in your stomach but you decide to keep yourself busy by finishing up tasks in the room. printing out the schedule and loose script for the recording, you skim through, making sure you didn’t leave anything out and once satisfied you set the schedules and script in heeseung’s and your spot.

the clock reads 9:27 pm and you sit down on the couch, getting comfortable, getting ready for the other three to walk in at any moment. your phone rings and seeing jake’s contact pop up, you answer.

“hey jake, what’s up, did something happen?”

jake clears his throat on the other side, “y/n! glad you answered, couldn’t get a hold of heeseung, but i told jay already- wait is he there yet?”

“er, no.. well at least i don’t think so.” you scan the room once before playing with the charms on your nails.

“what..?” jake asks, confusion in his tone, “you don’t think so? y/nnie i hate to break it to ya but i think you’d know if someone was in the room with you.”

you let out a puff of air out through your noise in fake annoyance, “yes i’m well aware of that jake sim. but i heard the door open up behind me a little bit ago and i figured it was one of you guys stopping in a little early but no one was there so..”

“well.. i’m sure it’s just your pretty little mind playin tricks then, anyways jay should be there soon though, he left the flat a bit ago- oh right! since he isn’t there i guess i should tell you. i can’t make it tonight, forgot i overscheduled myself with my plans so i have somewhere else i need to be tonight.”

“what? jake why didn’t you say anything earlier today? i mean it’s fine, i got the room mainly all ready anyway but a warning other than being like five minutes before you get here would’ve been nice.” you click your tongue in annoyance to further drive the point in. frankly, you didn’t mind that much but teasing jake a little bit was something you couldn’t pass up.

you hear jake give a dejected sigh and stifle a laugh, “ok listen i know i know, i’ll make it up to you i promise but just this night i can’t make it alright?”

“yeah yeah, you have fun with your plans or whatever.”

jake chuckles, “oh i will, see ya y/n.”

the call ends just as jay walks in, he gives you a little wave and sets his stuff by yours, “here like always, before everyone else is.”

you drum your nails along the couch’s arm rest as you watch jay get situated in the room, “someone has to get everything ready, and it sure ain’t gonna be jake with the way he bailed on us tonight. and we’re lucky if heeseung shows up 10 minutes before we go on air.”

jay lets put a small laugh, “he told you he’d be gone? thought i was gonna have to be the one to tell you.”

“nah he told me, think he’s trying to get a hold of hee right now too.”

“eugh, good luck to him then.”

you raise your eyebrows in understanding, “yeah.. anyhow i printed out the schedules and cleaned everything up so..”

jay sits in his seat and turns to you, “you emailed me my schedule right?”

“yup, did it before i left my apartment.”

“perfect, alright you go get set up and i’ll test your mic and make sure feedback is clear.” upon hearing jay’s words you get up from the couch and move to sit down in your chair, jay gives you a thumbs up and you test your microphone, “test test test.”

jay fiddles around with a few notches and motions with his hand to try once again, “test test test.” you repeat into the microphone, which you receive a thumbs up and lean in your seat. all thats left was to wait for heeseung.

a few minutes later and he walks in, dragging his bag behind him, “woah dude you look like shit.” jay says, looking heeseung up and down.

“this assignment for prof kim is killing me,” heeseung groans out, exasperated, “i swear she wants me dead.”

your jaw drops slightly at the look of heeseung, “have you slept recently?”

heeseung drops his bag with everyone else’s, “just did, i was supposed to work on the assignment, fell asleep, woke up and sprinted over here.”

his hair was all tousled up and his shirt was slightly stained but his jacket managed to cover most of it up and his pants looked as if in some places dust or dirt got smeared onto it.

jay does one more look at heeseung before turning around in his seat, “alright well man, go get situated next, we’ll test your mic.”

heeseung simply nods before walking to his seat next, once jay gives him the go ahead he speaks up in the microphone, “test test.” jay gives the thumbs up to heeseung and you look up at the clock, 9:58 pm, almost time to go live.

you turn to heeseung, “you sure you’re alright? if you’re that tired i can handle doing a night alone.”

hee gives you a small smile, “promise im all good, that nap was like.. one of those ones where you wake up not knowing who you are or where you are kind, so i’m like.. oddly rejuvenated right now. think i could even fight off a werewolf and win.”

blinking once and then twice you look at him and slowly nod your head, “oohhhhhh kay mister tough guy.. whatever you say..”

“you not believing me is not very kind you know.” heeseung frowns, his lips forming a pout.

“i know, oh-! we’re going live.. 3.. 2..”

"welcome welcome welcome toooo SCU 101.85, you’re currently tuning in to the 10 o’clock pm talk show. i’m your host y/n and i’m here with my co-host..” you turn away from the microphone and glance at your co-host, lee heeseung.

“heeseung.” he speaks up into his microphone, shuffling a few of the papers around.

“and it’s currently a friday night, it’s 67 degrees out with a small breeze too so make sure you wear that jacket!” you chirp.

heeseung snorts and you pass him a look which he returns with a shrug, “you just sound chipper.. s’all.”

“ah.. well our ratings have been going up again.. it’s better than we’ve been seeing these past four months.. so.”

the past four months have been rather difficult for you and heeseung and the radio show. when you started this project sophomore year, it had just been you and your roommate kim chaewon, your ratings were steady in the beginning but had started declining after two months, which made your at the time co-host and roommate, quit. you don’t blame her, you nearly stopped too, which was before heeseung hit you up asking if you still needed another co-host.

accepting his help was the best thing you had done, his roommates jake and jay were all about the technical jargon behind running a radio show, which the reasoning was apparently the three had thoughts about starting a podcast but couldn’t get the timing right to actually get it started, so here they were willing to help you out.

production took off and the four of you found yourselves seeing steady viewers and got to even open a talk line, which was a segment that both you and heeseung took seriously, finding fun in chatting with anonymous students with various complaints they had of others, professors, relationships, or whatever else going on in their lives.

then, out of nowhere four months ago, the viewers started thinning out, causing your small team of four’s good feelings to falter. having been used to success it was shocking to be randomly met with a hard wall and seemingly, no way of getting out.

heeseung and your’s efforts were all in vain as you tried advertising the radio talk show, you had chaewon talk to her friends about spreading the show, heeseung talked to about it to his other friends and also had them spread the word. jake would mention it at his part time job, and jay even mentioned it at a small on-campus event, which he texted that he was never doing again out of sheer embarrassment.

heeseung hums, “well.. i could imagine people have been feeling a bit safer because of us, due to…” he trails off.

right, there's been a few recent deaths that have plagued not only your campus, but the town. you claim they’re very obviously murders while heeseung’s been claiming it’s been various unfortunate accidents. so far the death toll has hit only four, two on campus, one at a campus nearby, and one on the outskirts of town.

“the murders.” you finish his sentence off, gravelly.

heeseung rolls his eyes, but remembers that the listeners can’t actually see that, “you’re so obsessed with these being murders,” he teases.

“well.. it’s quite obvious, no?” you ask, tilting your head a little bit.

“ehh, i wouldn’t really say so, besides the two on campus cause they were ruled as a murder-suicide. regardless that was two months ago and the one at KTU was concluded to be an unfortunate accident.. shit what did they say about how she died again?” heeseung racks his brain, trying to remember how the girl from KTU died two weeks ago.

you scatter your papers around, “wasn’t it something about a lab issue..? their school got to close down because of it, that’s.. uh.. kind of all i remember about that.”

“oh you’re going to hell, haven’t you been following this whole thing since the murder-suicide on campus..?” heeseung laughs loudly and you slump in your chair, embarrassment flooding your system.

you sit back up and clear your throat, “in my defense..”

heeseung accusing points at you, “you! don’t have one.”

“pause, yes i do! rude…. my defense is that the fourth one’s been throwing me off with this whole thing, that i focused a little less on the third girl.” you huff out.

the fourth death was the weirdest in the whole thing so far, it happened a few days ago and it’s been the only one where the person involved wasn’t in the same age range and died supposedly.. well.. naturalistically. it had been a middle aged man, who was on his way home from work. apparently the report and the news claimed his tire gotten flat and when he had gotten out to check on it, he had been mauled by a pack of wolves wandering through. 

the police and how they concluded it just didn’t make sense to you, you stayed up for two days trying to determine it all. first, wolves hadn’t been sighted in that area for several months so a random pack coming through didn’t make sense. second, the blood inside the car, how did it even manage to get in there if the man was supposedly outside? the third rea-

heeseung snaps his fingers to try and get your attention back to the talk show, “hey, y/n, quit thinking about it, you’re just gonna make yourself paranoid.. or worse.. really obsessive over this.”

you sigh, biting at your lip as you mull over his words, “my bad, i just need to stay up on all this, our viewers need the information, they deserve the best after all.”

“and the best of the best is from two college seniors..?” heeseung raises an eyebrow.

“absolutely!” you respond, “we’re the only ones giving multiple sides to these events and ways to stay safe.”

“i’m sure the news have been doin all that too though.”

“pff, news schmooze,” you wave your hand at heeseung, “college students don’t care about tuning into the morning news before classes or turning the evening news on, we’re a source of entertainment AND murder mystery, and that’s what eats up.” 

“you’re greedy, y/n, soo greedy.” heeseung shoots a grin your way, a way to let you know he doesn’t mean it.

trying to stop a grin from making its way on your face, you roll your eyes, “oh suck my dick lee heeseung.” 

“gladlyyy..” he sings out, wiggling his eyebrows and chuckles into his microphone.

“you’re a freak..” you gather your papers back up and glance up at the clock, 10:26 pm, time to open up the first talk line segment of the night.

you give a small nod towards heeseung and he nods back and clears his throat, “well well well SCU you are listening on 101.85 and it’s rolling up to 10:30 pm, we got a two minute sponsor for y’all and when we come back live, our callers will be up discussin’ random whatever with us. give us a call at +82 70-5208-6001 and see if you’re lucky enough. again that is +82 70-5208-6001. see you soon.”

both you and heeseung give a thumbs up to the room in front of you and jay switches your sets off, rolling the sponsor. a few seconds pass and before you’re able to turn to heeseung to just casually chat, the switchboard for the phone calls light up, more so than you’ve ever seen before.

turning to heeseung you give him a look of wonder, his eyebrows are furrowed as if hes wondering the same thing you are, why are there so many callers tonight? jay clicks off the sponsor and puts on a jazzy song before stepping into the room, “what’s up with the callers tonight?”

heeseung looks up at jay, “not sure bro, we’re just as confused as you are. we haven’t seen anything like this before.”

the calls keep coming through, lighting up the board until nearly all have popped up, indicating that people are on the line waiting to chat.

jay takes a glance at his set up and back at the two of you and the board, “well you guys got about a minute before we go on air, can’t keep them waiting for too long so just…” he sighs and runs a hand through his hair, “just… i suppose keep their talking segments shorter..? man i wish jake was here right now he could help weed through the callers with me on my end.”

heeseung raises an eyebrow at jay, “he’s not here today at all? i thought he was just late?”

“nah, up and bailed last second, said somethin’ about a date but i think he’s lying.” jay rolls his eyes, “30 seconds, you’re both up soon.”

jay closes the door and you look over at heeseung, frowning “why the hell did he schedule a date during the same time he’s supposed to be here? he told me it was important, not that a date isn’t but i was thinking something with his parents or.. i don’t know..”

heeseung mulls it over for a few seconds, “i mean unless he was planning on bringin her home..”

“dude.”

“it’s jake we’re talking about, y/n.”

“okay, yeah you’re right, well you wanna go first with the calls then..?”

heeseung nods, the on air button lights up and he clicks on a random caller, “hey lucky number one, congratulations you’re on air with us on STU 101.85, what’s your name?”

“hey guys it’s yunjin!” yunjin’s voice is heard through the speaker.

you sit up in your seat a little bit, “oh my god, hey girl! thanks for calling, how you been tonight?” 

“same old same old, prof jeon is an asshole still and said my submitted designs lacks the ‘creative theme’ of what he asked for. the problem is, is that he gave us no theme, aside from it being wearable. so i based it off of 1960’s greek spring chic wear and now he’s denied my third design.”

heeseung nods his head, “we’ve heard from other fashion design majors that prof jeon is the worst, i guess this goes to show to any sophomores and juniors to not finish your semesters as a senior with prof jeon.”

yunjin scoffs, “you could say that again, i wish i took prof song’s class, apparently shes at least nicer with going about denying designs.”

“isn’t she tough to impress though..? i hear her students always come back with lower scores than those who take prof jeon?” you ask, “wouldn’t that be.. worse?”

“oh you’re right.. ugh just don’t be a fashion design major, worst choice ever.”

heeseung lets out a laugh, “alright well we’re gonna let you go and head to the next caller, good luck on the rest of your assignment.”

a hum is heard through the speaker, “yeah i should really get to finish on working with the fourth design, you guys have fun, i’ll still be tuned in too.”

the line clicks and heeseung switches to another caller, “and listeners that was miss yunjin, another senior here at STU, you may have seen her around workin tirelessly at the sewing machines in the fashion department, so send some luck her way for dealing with prof jeon. now we got our next caller with us, you’re on air!”

silence fills the studio and jay looks at you two through the window, mouthing a “the fuck?” and you two shrug, confusion on the both of your faces.

“uh.. dude? you there?” heeseung looks annoyed as he shuffles around in his seat.

more silence fills the room and now you can also feel annoyance creep into your body, “hey, listen if you’re not gonna talk we’ll move on. not sure if you stepped away from your phone at all or what kind of prank you’re trying to pull but you can cut it out, it’s not funny and it just holds us and everyone else up.”

“..01101000,” a gravelly, raw voice crackles through.

heeseung sits up, “okay i’m changing the caller, you’re a weirdo and can get off our line.”

 the voice continues, “..01100101.. 01101100–”

heeseung cuts the line, cutting the voice off too.

“freak.” you mutter, “what the hell was that?”

heeseung shrugs, “sounded like binary code, probably someone from comp sci deciding to pull a prank on us.”

“well they’re not funny, that was weird and kind of scary.” a shiver runs down your spine as you think about the voice that crackled through, whoever it was managed to perfectly replicate fear in their voice.

“oh don’t worry, i can protect you.” heeseung winks at you.

“i think my chances of survival lay better with jay, hee.” you look down to choose the next caller as heeseung makes a noise of offense, taking your words to heart.

“he would not-”

you connect to the caller, “and you’re the third caller of the night, thank you for spending your night here with us at STU 101.85, may we get your name?”

“uh, yeah hi it’s yang jungwon.. i’m a sports medicine major.”

your eyes lit up in recognition at the name and voice, “oh yeah! you’re on the journalism club right? i’ve seen you there frequently.”

“yeah, thanks for helping us out, y/n. uhm, you know i wasn’t positive that i’d get picked so i guess i’m unsure of how to say this.”

heeseung leans closer to his mic, “what do you mean, jungwon?”

“uh, well it’s just, that last caller and then the mysterious figure on campus is what i wanted to talk to you about."

that made you sit up straighter in your seat and from your glance at heeseung, his interest piqued as well.

“go ahead jungwon, we’re interested and i’m sure all the other listeners are too.” you give the green light for jungwon to essentially take over the whole talking segment.

jungwon takes a deep breath and you can hear some shuffling in the background as he gets ready to speak,“okay well, i’ve been staying late on campus for the last week because i work on the sports section of the campus news website right? and i’m not sure what’s been going on but i’ve noticed this shrouded figure walking late at night. they seem to be following any student late at night leaving the stem building.”

you look up at jay and then over to heeseung, the both of them listening to jungwon’s words intently you look back down at the board as jungwon continues, “i think it’s cause they often stay behind the latest right? i’m not sure, i felt it was better to be here and say it as a warning, in case the man was dangerous.”

heeseung speaks up, “you’re saying something now? didn’t you say it’s been the past week?”

jungwon is silent for a few seconds before breathing out, “okay yeah i figured someone would ask that, honestly i thought it was a prank at first, especially because it was a costume the person was wearing.”

“costume?” you ask, “what sort’ve costume?”

“it was that ghostface costume, you know like the scream movies one?”

“ghostface?” heeseung asks, skepticism in his tone, “you saw a dude in a ghostface costume? in spring?”

jungwon clicks his tongue, “that’s why i didn’t say anything, because it just sounds stupid. i really thought it was just a prank someone was pullin on a friend.”

you nervously pick at your nails as you think about jungwon’s words, “you’re saying something now though aren’t you? what made you change your mind?”

jungwon hesitates before saying anything, “the call.”

you raise an eyebrow, “what’s the call got anything to do with the ghostface random?”

“i.. got a weird call yesterday night, it was the same voice that just called you guys. honestly if i wasn’t seeing the costume dude on campus i wouldn’t have thought much of it or if i wasn’t tuned into the radio show tonight.” 

“why don’t you go to the police or campus security? dude like campus security should and would kick the guy off campus, even if what he’s doing is harmless, he’s being creepy.” heeseung sighs out and rubs his forehead a little.

“i did, they think i’m sleep deprived and seein shit, apparently they can’t find ‘any evidence’ that supports that someone's walking around being weird so they think i just need more sleep.”

“what about that phone call? isn’t it logged?” you’re honestly a bit worried for jungwon, something weird is happening, the murders, the calls, and the shrouded costume ghostface guy.

jungwon speaks a bit faster, trying to get all the information he can into the hands of however many people are listening, “thought it was, i re-called the number two days ago and it just immediately disconnects, then the number was gone from my phone yesterday. poof up and deleted from my call log.”

“oh what the hell..” you breathe out, heeseung looks pale as he listens to jungwon’s words.

“dude.. does that not remind you of the damn scream movies? like at least in some way?” heeseung shakingly asks, “it literally sounds like you’re being hunted jungwon.”

a clang is heard and a quiet “fuck” before some shuffling, “sorry dropped my phone, you kinda freaked me there with that heeseung.” jungwon lets out a sardonic laugh.

you turn to heeseung and lightly smack his arm, “no for real, why would you say some shit like that.”

heeseung splutters, “well.. like does it not? i don’t want to sound grave or mean about this right now but genuinely this shit sounds like jungwon is in danger.”

“not helping, dude.” jungwon speaks into his phone, voice low.

“no he’s got a point jungwon. with what hee’s talking about, you could really be in some serious danger. i mean a famous point of scream was the calls to the victims and if you’re really seeing someone run around in the ghostface costume..” you trail off unable to voice the rest of your concerns aloud.

“well thanks for helping me out you two,” the sarcasm in jungwon’s voice is clear and you flinch out of guilt. you didn’t mean to freak jungwon out a bit more, he really wanted to just warn people on campus who were out late. “regardless thanks for warning everyone on this, listeners tell your friends or if you know of any late night students, tell them they should be careful on campus now if they’re out late, just in case. jungwon this goes for you too you know?”

“yeah i know, i’m already off campus now so i should be fine.”

heeseung picks at his jacket’s sleeves, “still man, sounds like you gotta keep yourself safe anywhere.”

“i will, thanks for letting me stay for a while longer than you normally let your callers on.” from the background noise going on in jungwon’s call it sounds like someone coming in through his door, “i’ll go ahead and get going now, my roommate brought food and we’re gonna eat, thanks for having me guys!”

jungwon ends the call and you glance up at the clock which reads 11:07 pm, “alright we have time for one more caller, normally we’d have ended this by 11:00pm and done another segment at 11:30pm as you are all aware but i guess we’ll just have one long talk segment today. heeseung you wanna do the honors for the last lucky caller.”

heeseung nods and clicks on the next caller, “lucky number four, you are live with us at STU 101.85, you get to be the last call of the night with us, anything on your mind that you’d like to chat with us about?” heeseung and you are met with heavy breathing into the phone’s microphone. 

“hello..?” you call out tentatively and heeseung groans out beside you, “alright i’m really getting sick of the people who decide to prank us.”

the breathing stops abruptly at heeseung’s words and your breath hitches in the back of the throat. you’re unsure as to why the caller made you nervous, heeseung is right, prank calls have been weirdly often tonight, this was the second one of the night after all. heeseung’s hands reach to change the caller and that’s when a weird low static sounding voice filters through, “don’t hang me up, lee heeseung.”

heeseung stops his movement’s mid way and your head whips into his direction quickly, the voice continues, “why don’t you put your hand back down. we’re going to chat.” heeseung quickly obliges and fear has overtaken everyone in the room, jay from where he is, is even frozen from the voice.

“much better. thank you for having me on your lovely radio show. you know, i’m not exactly the happiest at having been the last caller, but i suppose only the best are chosen as the final right?” the voice takes a shaky breath before continuing, “y/n,” you freeze as your name comes out, “don’t you think being the final one is best too..?”

you don’t answer, unsure if that’s the best course of action, you just can’t bring yourself to say any words at this moment, but the mysterious caller decides he’ll make you answer, “answer me y/n. you get to choose the fate of someone very important tonight after all.”

your blood runs cold at his words, eyes shaking and tears even start to brim, you stutter out, “what.. what do you mean?”

“i’m so glad you asked honey, let’s bring out my special guest out.” the sounds of a muffled cry and cloth are heard before jake’s voice faint and hoarse comes out of the phone, “let us go man, just please let us go.”

you gasp loudly, heeseung slams his fist down at the table, and jay upon hearing jake’s voice runs into the room, a look you’ve never seen before on his face, either of their faces. jay looks like he may faint yet angry while heeseung looks as if he’s never experienced anger in the way he’s had before.

“i’m sure you know now who is with me.” the voice chuckles and you can hear some crying from a girl as well in the background, “i managed to get a two for one deal tonight for you all.”

“the fuck do you want with us?” heeseung grits out and the caller laughs.

“it’s not so what i want with your group, it’s what i want done with you, lee heeseung.”

heeseung’s bravado falters slightly, “what are you talking about? what could i offer you?”

“i wanna know why.. scratch that i think.. everyone here tonight deserves to know why actually, about the things you’ve done for your beloved radio show.”

you slowly turn your head to heeseung and he’s pale, hands slightly shaking, “hee? what is this guy talking about?”

heeseung looks up at you, pupils blown wide in fear and you feel your heart break at how scared he is, you know you’re not much better either, “i.. i don’t know, this doesn’t make any sense, i.. there’s.. i don’t know.” he’s panicking and you reach over to grab his hand to calm him down some. his hands are clammy but given the situation you understand, you squeeze and he squeezes back.

the voice scoffs, “oh please, get that fake shit out of my face. heeseung knows what he did sweetheart and if i were you i would think twice about holding his hands when all they know are acts of violence.”

jay speaks up before you have the choice to ask what they meant, “i’m calling the police, sick freak.”

“ah ah ah..” the caller tuts out, “if any of you three call the police, your beloved pal jake is getting gutted. i’ll even string out his body parts so prettily for you. send some lovely pictures, y/n you’d appreciate my art for you? right?”

you frankly feel like throwing up and you shake your head frantically, “no.. no..”

the caller lets out a cackle and speaks in a mocking tone, “aww… poor thing is so scared, heeseung why don’t you comfort your poor girl, after all you’ve done sooooo much for her.”

“fuck. off.” heeseung snarls out, hand not holding yours gripping the table and the strength behind it shocks you.

“no fun, either of you, jay’s always been a bit boring anyways, wanting the police involved in our fun so early. however i’m aware we are live.. so i guess we should speed things up. besides jake here i have someone important to jay here. say hello to jay.”

the sobbing girl is heard more clearly and the pit in your stomach is ever growing, the feeling of vomiting coming back tenfold, “why.. why are you doing this.. please i never did anything to you, please please please, let me go i won’t say anything. please j-”

a loud bang and a shriek is heard and jakes voice is screaming, “stop! stop just let her go, man. what is wrong with you?!”

some more shuffling and the caller is heard better, “what’s wrong with me? me..? you were the one who brought your dear friend’s ex out on a date.”

jay slams his hands on the table, leaning forward, “my EX? you were out with fucking yujin?”

more sobs from yujin, you suppose, comes through the phone, “i’m sorry, i’m so sorry, i wanted to make you jealous. i wanted you back, that was it i’m sorry i’m so sorry.”

rubbing his jaw, jay paces around the room, shouting out a “fuck” and slamming his fist against the wall, “jay! this isn’t the time! this asshole WANTS us to act like this, you’re playing into his hands!” heeseung calls out, standing up quickly, “he WANTS you to get angry, he’s enjoying this.”

“yeah?” jay spins around and lets out a shaky laugh, “really? and how do you know that heeseung? you know this guy or something? i wouldn’t be surprised considering you’ve got some fucking secrets of your own now.” jay jabs at heeseung’s chest and he stumbles back in surprise.

you put your head in your hands and yell, “stop! just stop you two! a sadistic killer has jake and yujin and you’re fighting?! what the fuck. just what the fuck?!”

“yeahh.. you two, what the fuck..?” the voice giggles, “you should be more like y/n and focus on the two that’s with me. maybe you can make y/n’s job easier and help her with her choice.”

your whip your head up, tears streaming down your face, “what the hell do you mean help you, you sick fuck?!”

“that’s not very kind now baby… and i mean helping me choose who i kill for everyone tonight of course.”

oh. oh no. no no no no no. absolutely not, you would not choose that, there’s no way you could bring yourself to do that. you shakingly look at the board and whimper out a “no” which the caller barks out a laugh in return, “i’m afraid it’s non negotiable. if you don’t.. i choose at random then and the other person lives with the information that they were saved because of me! or… i just kill both.”

the two men in the room with you freeze at the information they’re hearing, heeseung slowly walks to you, pushes your mic away and crouches down to your level, putting his hands around your body to help the tremors going through your body, he rubs your back soothingly and jay’s jaw clenches as he angrily blows air out of his nose.

heeseung lowly whispers into your ear, “it’s okay y/n.. you.. you gotta do it.. you can do this.. make the choice.. it’s easy right..? you don’t know yujin.. jake needs to be saved y/nnie. jay will understand.. yujin cheated on him anyways.”

you’re not sure why heeseung is calmly telling you this information, you’re not sure why jay won’t look at you directly, you’re not sure why it has to be you that makes this choice, but as heeseung whispers more into your ear about how you can do it and he believes you’d make the right choice you start thinking that doesn’t matter and heeseung’s right. jake needs to be saved. jake is your friend. you don’t know yujin. yujin was a bad girlfriend to jay. you don’t question heeseung’s whispers, you don’t question heeseung at all.

“jake..” you quietly mutter out.

“what was that? i couldn’t hear you..?” the killer sings out and you almost throw up for what feels like the thirteenth time that night.

“jake..!” you speak up a little louder and heeseung squeezes your body comfortingly, “i choose to save jake.”

yujin screams in anguish and you flinch in guilt. “excellent choice, y/n. saving your friends.. how heroic.” the killer praises and you put your head in the crook of heeseung’s neck, wishing this nightmare would just end, he just rubs your back, but you miss the grin he sends jay’s way.

the phone is set down and you can hear yujin plead for her life with the killer, “i just did what you wanted! you said.. you said j- no no stop don’t come any closer i swear i swear no one will know. let me go please. please. i’m sorry,” she cries louder and starts pleading to you all, “jay please.. convince her to save me. jay please we can be happy again. no. no. no! NO! JA–”

the wet sounds of a knife meeting flesh is loud, yujin’s cries become louder and you breakingly sob into heeseung’s shoulder, he grips your body stronger and continues to rub your back. the squelch noise of multiple stabs into yujins poor body ring in your ears. her choked back sobs and cries as her throat fills with her blood causes your sobs to bellow out even louder, heeseung whispers that everything’ll be alright, his constant whispering so soothing you try to focus on them instead of yujin’s dying noises.

it feels like an eternity later but the noises quiet down and all that’s left is silence in the room and the killer’s heavy breathing. “thank you, for allowing me the opportunity to give you and your listeners a show.”

more silence fills the room and you can hear jay’s footsteps in the background pacing once more but you don’t dare look up, an irrational fear that the killer is in the room with you playing in your mind.

heeseung’s eyes darken as he looks down at your shaking body, the small whimpers you let out ignites a fire in his body that he’s only ever gotten killing others and he has stop the smile from forming on his face as he thinks how quick you were to just trust him. his eyes flicker towards jay as he turns off the equipment in the radio show, jay nods once everything is off and they’re no longer live.

the voice speaks up once more and your body stills, having believed the killer dropped the call, “you’re always so sweet y/nnie. so so so kind. the best player for our games. sweet dreams.”

❝welcome welcome welcome toooo SCU 101.85, you’re currently tuning in to the 10 o’clock pm talk show. i’m your host y/n and i’m here with my co-host..” you turn away from the microphone and glance at your co-host, lee heeseung.

“heeseung.” he speaks up into his microphone, shuffling a few papers around.

“and it’s currently a friday night, it’s 67 degrees out with a small breeze too so make sure you wear that jacket!” you chirp.

heeseung snorts and you pass him a look which he returns with a shrug, “you just sound chipper.. s’all.”

“ah.. well our ratings have been going up again.. it’s better than we’ve been seeing these past four months.. so.”

the past four months have been rather difficult for you and heeseung and the radio show. when you started this project sophomore year, it had just been you and your roommate kim chaewon, your ratings were steady in the beginning but had started declining after two months, which made your at the time co-host and roommate, quit. you don’t blame her, you nearly stopped too, which was before heeseung hit you up asking if you still needed another co-host.

accepting his help was the best thing you had done, his roommates jake and jay were all about the technical jargon behind running a radio show, which the reasoning was apparently the three had thoughts about starting a podcast but couldn’t get the timing right to actually get it started, so here they were willing to help you out.

production took off and the four of you found yourselves seeing steady viewers and got to even open a talk line, which was a segment that both you and heeseung took seriously, finding fun in chatting with anonymous students with various complaints they had of others, professors, relationships, or whatever else going on in their lives.

then, out of nowhere four months ago, the viewers started thinning out, causing your small team of four’s good feelings to falter. having been used to success it was shocking to be randomly met with a hard wall and seemingly, no way of getting out.

heeseung and your’s efforts were all in vain as you tried advertising the radio talk show, you had chaewon talk to her friends about spreading the show, heeseung talked to about it to his other friends and also had them spread the word. jake would mention it at his part time job, and jay even mentioned it at a small on-campus event, which he texted that he was never doing again out of sheer embarrassment.

heeseung hums, “well.. i could imagine people have been feeling a bit safer because of us, due to…” he trails off.

right, there's been a few recent deaths that have plagued not only your campus, but the town. you claim they’re very obviously murders while heeseung’s been claiming it’s been various unfortunate accidents. so far the death toll has hit only four, two on campus, one at a campus nearby, and one on the outskirts of town.

“the murders.” you finish his sentence off, gravelly.

heeseung rolls his eyes, but remembers that the listeners can’t actually see that, “you’re so obsessed with these being murders,” he teases.

“well.. it’s quite obvious, no?” you ask.

“ehh, i wouldn’t really say so, besides the two on campus cause they were ruled as a murder-suicide. besides that was two months ago and the one at KTU was concluded to be an unfortunate accident, shit what did they say about how she died again?” heeseung racks his brain, trying to remember how the girl from KTU died two weeks ago.

you scatter your papers around, “wasn’t it something about a lab issue..? their school got to close down because of it, that’s.. uh.. kind of all i remember about that.”

“oh you’re going to hell, haven’t you been following this whole thing since the murder-suicide on campus..?” heeseung laughs loudly and you slump in your chair, embarrassment flooding your system.

you sit back up and clear your throat, “in my defense..”

heeseung accusing points at you, “you! don’t have one.”

“pause, yes i do! rude…. my defense is that the fourth one’s been throwing me off with this whole thing, that i focused a little less on the third girl.” you huff out.

the fourth death was the weirdest in the whole thing so far, it happened a few days ago and it’s been the only one where the person involved wasn’t in the same age range and died supposedly.. well.. naturalistically. it had been a middle aged man, who was on his way home from work. apparently the report and the news claimed his tire gotten flat and when he had gotten out to check on it, he had been mauled by a pack of wolves wandering through.

the police and how they concluded it just didn’t make sense to you, you stayed up for two days trying to determine it all. first, wolves hadn’t been sighted in that area for several months so a random pack coming through didn’t make sense. second, the blood inside the car, how did it even manage to get in there if the man was supposedly outside? the third rea-

heeseung snaps his fingers to try and get your attention back to the talk show, “hey, y/n, quit thinking about it, you’re just gonna make yourself paranoid.. or worse.. obsess over this.”

“my bad, i just need to stay up on all this, our viewers need the information, they deserve the best after all.”

“and the best of the best is from two college seniors..?” heeseung raises an eyebrow.

“absolutely!” you respond, “we’re the only ones giving multiple sides to these events and ways to stay safe.”

“i’m sure the news have been doin all that too though.”

“pff, news schmooze,” you wave your hand at heeseung, “college students don’t care about tuning into the morning news before classes or turning the evening news on, we’re a source of entertainment AND murder mystery, and that’s what eats up.” 

“you’re greedy, y/n, soo greedy.” heeseung shoots a grin your way, a way to let you know he doesn’t mean it.

trying to stop a grin from making its way on your face, you roll your eyes, “oh suck my dick lee heeseung.” 

“gladlyyy..” he wiggles his eyebrows and chuckles into his microphone.

“you’re a freak..” you gather your papers back up and glance up at the clock, 10:26 pm, time to open up the first talk line segment of the night.

you give a small nod towards heeseung and he nods back and clears his throat, “well well well SCU you are listening on 101.85 and it’s rolling up to 10:30 pm, we got a two minute sponsor for y’all and when we come back live, our callers will be up discussin’ random whatever with us. give us a call at +82 70-5208-6001 and see if you’re lucky enough. again that is +82 70-5208-6001. see you all very soon."