#pledis svt

As I hopped out between the broken glass windows and back into the street, with my backpack a little heavier than before I glanced up towards the sky. The sun was almost completely covered by what looked to be a dark cloud. Rain. I guessed it would be around 12 right now, making the sun the hottest so I silently thanked the clouds that where looming on the bright summer sky. As I trekked towards what I thought might be a park to see if I could find some sort of field of grass or soil to dig in I was stopped by what seemed to be smoke. Past some of the ruined tall buildings I could see white thick smoke, meaning whatever fire was burning was hot and burning still. I made my was over to the side of a broken down car, to see if I could spot something else. Nothing. Just the trail of smoke. People. 

I looked back at the way I came, contemplating going back. I vaguely remembered passing a park before arriving at the building where I met the men. Was it worth taking the chance? Going back and maybe being confronted by the men again? I moved closer to the car as a breeze blew by, but I accidentally pressed my injured shoulder to hard into the hot metal and let out a yelp. Fuck. I got up and disappeared into the nearest place to hide. It seemed to be a small old apartment complex, abandoned many years ago. I slipped in through the third door, making a quick tour around the small house to make sure there where no one there. As I dipped my head through the bathroom door, a roamer groaned and turned its rotted head towards me. As if it had become a daily habit of mine, I walked over and drove my knife through the temple of the creature and then pushed it into the bathtub. I sat down on the dusty bed and took in the smell of old fabric and warm boxed in air. It smelled like a little like those caravans that people used to go on holidays in back when the world hadnt gone to shit. A faint memory of my old life came glimpsing through my mind as I let my backpack drop from my left shoulder to the floor. I wiped my forehead, feeling clammy as my body reacted to the temperature inside the small apartment. I looked around noticing a small, narrow window behind what looked like a marron armchair on one of the corners of the room. I slightly forced the window open a little, dust covering the expanse making it hard to make out what was the other side. I stood back up as I took a breath, the fresh air refreshing my lungs as I relaxed a little. My shoulder ached as my chest rose and fell. I sat back down and sighed. I had no idea how to fix this. I had never dislocated anything before, and therefore had no idea how to fix it. It hurt, and I could barely move my entire right hand. Which was not ideal considering that I was currently living in a survival of the fittest world. I started to get some of the food I had looted throughout the day out of my backpack and sat in silence eating. Water. Fuck I was out of water. Shit. I let myself sit for another 10 minutes, enjoying the silence and the feeling of not being extremely hungry. “Alright, let’s find some water.” I mumbled to myself, my voice shaking a bit from the sparse usage. Collecting the rest of the food and throwing it back into the dirty backpack I took one last look around the apartment, snatching an umbrella from the corner by the entrancedoor with me as I walked out. I made my way outside after I secured my backpack back on my left shoulder. Roof. If I camp on the roof, maybe I’ll be able to collect some rainwater. Finding the fire escape took me less than 3 minutes and in a blink of an eye I was sitting on the last step up to the roof, looking around to see if anyone was around. Nothing. I listened for a good 30 minutes, just to be completely sure I wouldn’t get surprised on the roof. Nothing. I waited and waited, my water bottle in hand. It was scraped and looked nothing like it did when I first found it. It was a big thermos looking water bottle with a screw lid and a big mouth. It was turquoise when I found it in a sports store about 3 years ago, now it was scraped, and more silver than blue as the paint had rubbed and chipped off most of the places. I ran my nails against the spots of paint that where left, chipping some of it off as I waited patiently for it to rain. 

As the first few drops of rain hit my skin, I grabbed the umbrella and cut a hole at the very top of it and put it on top of my water bottle. As the rain grew more and more heavy, the umbrella caught the rain and it leaked into the bottle underneath. While I held the umbrella in place, I lifted my face up and let it rain on my face, the comforting smell and sound of fresh rain hitting the dry earth filling my ears. My hair and clothes quickly got soaked and it felt good to finally get some sort of cooling in the hot summer weather. It rained for about 40 minutes, and even though it wasn’t extreme amounts of water collected, I managed to get enough so that I wouldn’t die of thirst in the next day or two which was about how long I managed to wander the ghost town before meeting more trouble.  I made it about two days before I saw the boys from the office building again. This time I was the one who caught them by surprise. 

I was heading into an old vet clinic to look for some sort of pain medication, and when I opened the dirtied glass door that was no longer see-through I came face to face with the boy I had had a stare off with before I dropped 9 ft to the ground, and amazingly managed to walk away with only a slightly aching ankle. He stared wide eyed at me and I stared right back at him, having no idea what to do. We looked at each other for about 5 seconds before my hands moved to draw my knife from my thigh strap. “Wait!” He whispered quickly, hands up in defeat. I looked up at him. He looked nervous, scared almost. “I’m not going to hurt you!” He continued, looking straight into my eyes. My hand was still placed on my thigh, right above my knife. We stared at each other again. The silence ear deafening. “What’s wrong with your shoulder?” His eyes seemed to be searching my face, I continued to stare at him. 

We stood in silence for about a minute before he spoke again, his voice incredibly soft and careful. “I don’t know if you can understand me, but I’m Soonyoung.” I looked at him. “You look horrible. Are you okay?” He tried again, his hands still up in surrender. He was wearing what seemed to be a gray sweater with the arms cut off, dirty jeans with a long rip across the right thigh, some very worn out black vans and a horrible neon orange backpack. He didn’t seem to have any weapons on hand and as my eyes searched him, he spoke again. “Are you okay?” I looked back at him. He spoke in a different language. It wasn’t Korean, the language I had to learn after I moved here probably 15 years ago. It was English. “You understand?” He said again, as he looked at my face with hopeful eyes. I just stared. The broken English he had muttered ringing in my ears, sounding almost unfamiliar as it had been years since the last time I had heard anyone speak it.  

He moved towards me, our eyes still focused on each other. “Soonyoung.” He repeated as he laid a hand on his chest to signalize that this was him, his name. He then gestured toward you with a quizzical look in his eyes. His dark hair flopped into his eyes as he nodded his head. “Y/N…” I staggered out shakily as I looked at him. He smiled, his eyes turning into crescents as he bared his teeth in a wide grin. “Good. Y/N.” He repeated in a low voice, still smiling. As he moved closer, I could smell him, a surprising hint of clean drifted through the air. He smelled a little like mud, dirt but also surprisingly good. Clean. He looked clean. Well, cleaner than me. His hair was greasy but kept. “Okay?” He spoke again, his Korean accent twisting every syllable in an endearing way. My eyes snapped back down to his eyes. He was gesturing to his shoulder. I’m guessing he’s asking if my shoulder is okay. “Hurt.” I whispered, still staring at him. His face flashed in a twinge of something that looked like worry. Then silence took over again. We looked at each other. He scanned me once over and looked back at my eyes, and just he opened his mouth to say something again a rustling sound was heard from down the hall of the clinic, and then a door opening. “Ay, Soonyoung! Find anything useful yet?” The voice hollered. And before anyone had the time to react I once again turned on my heel and bolted as quick as I could down the street mostly on pure reflex. Soonyoung yelling “Hey!” after me as he made his way into the street was the last thing I heard as I turned zig zag around as many corners I could while my heartbeat filled my ears once again. The overgrown green buildings zooming past me as I turned another unfamiliar corner and bumped into a rusted van. The impact sending me straight to the ground with an almost unbearable sear of pain in my already damaged shoulder. I let myself lay on the dry, cracked asphalt for a moment to even out my shaky breaths as the ache boiled inside my body. I spent the next seven days cooped up in what looked like an old nail salon, my shoulder starting to hurt more and more every day. I was running low on food and water and my body was slowly giving up, the pain becoming overwhelming and exhausting. My muscles ached and my right arm was unusable. It hurt just moving. And on the eight day I was sure I was going to die. I had gone five days without food, and almost three without water. The cuts in my hands starting to crack back up because my skin was drying out, and my focus blurring. I had a hard time keeping track of the days, what time it was and where I was. So, I forced myself out. I had to find water. I had to or I was surely going to die. And dying was the absolute last thing on my mind. 

The world was spinning as I made my way down a familiar street. Only a short walk left, I encouraged myself as I staggered along the road. This part of the city was particularly overgrown, the parks full of tall grass and even taller trees. It looked like no one had ever lived here. The paths and benches long gone and all that was left where the rusted metal signs pointing in direction of different hiking destinations. I had to lean against anything I could find to keep from falling under the weight of my own body, my legs wobbling with every step I dared to take. The sun was especially unforgiving today, seeming to be the hottest it had been the entire summer. As I turned left on the next corner, I could see the green park only a couple of steps away. I went in and out of consciousness the last meters to the park, black nothingness leading me to the body of water. As I knelt on the ground beside my destination, I could feel tears in my eyes. The lake I had seen walking past this park over 10 years ago was right in front of me. The green leaves on the many trees surrounding me and the tall grass rustled in the wind, and I could hear birds singing above me. The smell of the water overtook my nostrils along with the familiar scent of grass and soil. As I dipped my hands into the cool water, I felt my warm skin relax. I had no time to think about if the water was safe or not, I just drank. Scooping water in my hands up to my mouth, relishing the feeling of it going down my dry and sore throat. I rubbed my cool wet hands against the burning skin on my face and breathed deeply. The world seemed to spin one last time and then everything went black. I drifted in and out of reality, having no power to wake myself back up. My body had finally collapsed under the fatigue and the heat.