Chapter Text
yeonjun didn’t sleep that night. he lay staring at his ceiling, shaking uncontrollably letting the hysteria and daze of being exhausted and unable to sleep wash over him completely. when dawn broke, he couldn’t be sure if what had happened last night was real. even the dent in the door seemed to have some more rational explanation behind it that didn’t involve a girl from down the hall wanting to eat him.
sleep deprived and, more overwhelmingly, extremely hungry, yeonjun stumbled towards his door. he’d run out of food yesterday morning but hadn’t had the energy to go to the store and the hallucination he’d apparently had didn’t help either.
the corridor was quiet. silent and very still but in many ways, it didn’t seem empty. in fact, the further yeonjun walked the more he wished he’d brought his piece of wood. he made his way cautiously down the stairwell, almost anticipating to meet someone or for something to emerge from one of the corridors below.
he turned a corner and found himself facing a blood-stained wall, puddles of crimson red seeping out of a room that looked like the inhabitant had scratched at the inside of the door before ramming it open from the inside, leaving the door itself half bent and unable to close. inside the room, blood coated the floor and the belongs of the inhabitant were scattered everywhere, ripped apart and tossed carelessly around. yeonjun would have thought it looked like a murder scene, if the memories of last night hadn’t come flooding back. he clasped his hand over his mouth, worrying about what would happen if someone heard him breathing and came looking. could it be, that this was the room of the girl he saw last night. that blood-hungry monster that came clawing at his door...perhaps it wasn’t a figment of his imagination like he hoped. surely he wasn’t the only one who saw this. he hadn’t run into another soul this whole time. was there even anyone else in the building anymore? or was he alone with this creature roaming the halls. yeonjun stumbled backwards and turned to run back to his room before he threw up, but instead he launched himself straight into someone he hadn’t even heard walk up behind him.
sorry! i’m sorry ! he was more breathless than he realised and looked up at the boy he almost ran over. he was wide eyed and seemingly just as startled but kept his mouth tightly shut like he was also scared. he suddenly reached out and grabbed yeonjun by both arms which startled him.
be careful, you’re gonna fall over. the boy’s voice was soft but also very quiet. are you okay? i thought you were gonna faint.
yeonjun hadn’t realised how much he was swaying. how his legs were practically jelly and he could feel a heat rising in him from the panic and disbelief at everything that was going on. umm not really. i feel...i feel like i’m crazy. have you not... seen anything ?
yes i have. the boy's voice was barely a whisper. they’re everywhere. every corridor and every vent. i keep hearing them screeching and crashing through the building. the boy inhaled shakily like he was also on the verge of insanity. they won't let us leave the building but... but my friend is out there. he’s not back yet and the boy inhaled deeply i’m worried he’s dead.
there’s ... more than one? how is that even possible?! what’s happening...you say they're everywhere, even outside?
yes that's why we cant leave. we shouldn’t leave but, i think i'll have to.
i...where is everyone? all the students? it's like this place is completely empty now but surely it's not just the two of us i- the other boy suddenly cupped one hand over yeonjun’s mouth and the other round the back of his neck to hold him still.
a low growl echoed down the corridor, a clanging in the pipes lining the ceiling like tap...tap...tap... something was coming. yeonjun stared at the boy until he suddenly grabbed yeonjun’s wrist and pulled him off down the corridor. they both were suddenly sprinting like they were being chased, though they couldn’t hear anything beyond the adrenaline pumping through their bodies and the thumping heart beat in their ears. the boy yanked yeonjun’s t shirt to pull him left and up two flight of stairs whizzing past broken windows and flickering lights, random crap just sitting out of place in the stairwell like it was left or discarded in a panic. more broken doors loose on hinges or bent out of shape, traces of red and other strange coloured substances staining the walls but there was no time to look properly as they both fled from unseen entities. perhaps nothing was even pursuing them ... but they could feel them lurking, just out of sight.
suddenly the boy stopped in front of a room and threw himself at the door, whipping his head round to usher yeonjun in before slamming it closed, bolting it shut and dragging his chest of drawers in front of it. they both stood there panting and sweating, hearts racing from fear more than anything. fear that they had no idea what they were facing. suddenly the boy marched over towards the desk and grabbed his laptop before sitting on his bed and viciously typing into the search bar: ‘monsters in seoul’.
quarantine those who show symptoms of hypothermia, nosebleeds, fainting, and auditory or visual hallucinations.
it’s...it’s a disease. he turned the laptop towards yeonjun who sat beside the boy on the bed and looked at the article. it was a national emergency. loads of people are infected but...it doesn’t say how it transmits.
how can it be just a disease?! these people are becoming inhuman.
it must be airborne particles i mean how else... he suddenly turned to yeonjun. you don’t have any of these symptoms do you?
yeonjun shook his head.
okay...good. but you have to tell me if you get any. we’re no use to anyone if we end up like...like that
like what exactly. what even is 'that'?
i don’t know, like...the thing i saw. i can’t even describe it. it looked like a goblin or something with strange pointed ears and claw-like hands. the skin was all rough and green and it was speaking, but i couldn’t understand. i just...can’t believe that thing was ever human.
but the one i saw didn’t look like that.
it didn’t?
no she was...i don’t know. not like that.
then they’re all different? but how does that even make sense?
they can't be telling us everything, yeonjun gestured to the government announcement on the laptop screen, there’s got to be more to it, people just don’t... become a monster like that.
silence. it was still strangely quiet in the building. outside the window, it looked like it could be dusk with a pink hazy glow across the sky from the humid air. yeonjun wasn't sure of the time anymore but it must afternoon now.
i’m soobin.
yeonjun.
do you know anyone here?
no...no i don’t have anyone.
that's okay. i didn’t know if there was someone you might want to go and find. i want to find my friends. one is out there somewhere, but two are on one of the top floors. i have to go find them.
i don’t know... if it would be a good idea. i mean, you have no idea what could be round the corner and we don’t have any weapons or things to defend ourselves with.
i can't leave them up there we have to... be together. i just. you don’t have to come. you can stay here. but i just want to bring them down. it must be safer for everyone to be in one place.
but...where is everyone? everyone else i mean, all the students that should be here?
…i don’t know. i really don’t know. soobin closed the lid of the laptop and placed it on his desk. he pulled two cups of ramen out from under his bed and went over to his kitchenette to make them.
yeonjun gazed around his room. it was much fuller than yeonjun’s. his belongings were stored under his bed, the edges of boxes were poking out from underneath. his desk was covered in notepads and books for classes, it looked as though he did biology or some other science, and all across his noticeboard were photos and letters he’d pinned up. every shelf was filled with more books and what looked like albums or vinyls. he had posters and more photos scattered on the walls over his bed. yeonjun stood and wondered over to the desk to look closer at all the photos. it was soobin and three other boys; at the beach in summer holidays, in the school fields in the late afternoon summer heat when classes were long finished but they'd all stayed behind to play until the sun went down, at the fairground where the brightness of the merry-go-round turned the 4 boys into silhouettes. among the photos and small notes and few drawings, there was a letter signed 'huening kai' that had been sent from america while, it seemed, the other boy had moved there for a short while. so many memories were scattered across this notice board, the kinds of memories yeonjun didn’t recognise and couldn’t see in his own past.
**
yeonjun stood, hands clasped to the basin of the sink trying to calm his racing heart. droplets of sweat trickled down his face. he couldn’t shake this suffocating feeling, like someone was squeezing his heart with all their might. at the same time, he felt a pushing from deep within, from deep within a cavern in his chest some dark shadow tried to claw its way out. dark thoughts kept swirling through his mind in such an overbearing way as they never had before, even when he’d written 'SUICIDE' into his calendar. some of these thoughts were much the same as those that had drowned him slowly for years, but among them were intrusive and evil thoughts he’d never experienced before about the weakness and worthiness of human life and about the stranger in the bedroom outside ... he not a friend ... but a threat. no. yeonjun shook his head. soobin was a kind person. he could’ve left yeonjun in the corridors with that monster but he didn’t. yeonjun closed his eyes tight and furiously shook his head to rid the thoughts that were clouding over. he felt a sharp pain in the bridge of his nose, the feeling of liquid trickling over his cupids bow and lips. he clasped a hand to his nose instinctively, as he drew his hand away he saw the scarlet liquid coating his hand and dripping onto the basin. the blood came out furiously, it was futile to even pinch his nose and lean back. his eyes snapped to his reflection in the mirror before him as blood continued to pour out and yeonjun could only clasp his hands to his face and hope it would stop and these thoughts that haunted his mind like ghosts would vanish too.