Archive of Our Own

If there was anything that might have tipped me off, it should have been the radio.

As soon as I'd entered the office, the old-fashioned radio on the coffee table had clicked on. Rather than music, however, the only thing that the radio had produced for the better part of the morning had been static. The crackling feedback came and went intermittantly. Every time I thought that it might have gone away for good, it would click back on, louder and more grating than before.

'Downgrading this thing to Twilight-Class was a mistake.'

I did my best to ignore the static, but the lack of predictability made it hard for me to tune it as purely white noise. I might have been able to block it out if I had brought headphones or something that could work as earplugs, but I'd never been the type to work with stuff like that. The radio wasn't plugged in, and it turned itself on and off on its own, so short of leaving the room myself, there was nothing I could do to have any sort of peace.

Finally, when it felt like I was just about at my wits' end, Supervisor Park and Assistant Manager Eun appeared.

"Roe, good morning!"

"The coffee's all gone, but we brought some donuts from the meeting."

Assistant Manager Eun held out the paper plate she was holding, and I took one of the glazed donuts, careful not to let any of the sugar fall on the floor.

"Thanks," I said gratefully. "Did you notice—"

"The radio?" Supervisor Park nodded. "It was like that when I got in, too. You should have just worked in one of the meeting rooms, Roe!"

Was that an option?

Before I could say that I'd gladly move all of my things over right away, the radio clicked on again.

Instead of the static I'd come to expect, however, it began to play a cheerful tune at odds with the announcer's low and almost monotone voice.

— Hello… This is your live traffic update. Due to a collision at Gangnam-daero and Nambusunhwan-ro, expect major delays when getting around the city. Emergency crews are on site and working to clear the area. Heavy downpours will continue into the late evening…

I glanced outside. The bright sunshine seemed to be mocking me.

"Well," Assistant Manager Eun said. "Not much point in worrying about that. Here, Roe, this is today's assignment."

Supervisor Park handed me the tablet and I carefully read through the PDF containing the manual while my teammates chatted idly.

This is a ghost story about searching for a lost item in an abandoned house.

The description thoroughly explained the appearance of the house and the types of items that previous exploration squads had been tasked with locating.

Reading through the manual, I came to a realisation.

'Haven't they just been combing the entire building?'

None of the items that had been found in the past had been left anywhere that seemed to make sense. A rubber duck was found underneath a sofa. A stuffed animal was inside a bathtub. One employee had spotted the pen they were looking for inside a kitchen drawer.

On the bright side, nothing about this seemed to be inherently dangerous. Only one person had ever gotten injured, and that had been from tripping on the stairs.

In fact, it almost seemed suspicious. Our squad was rarely assigned to such wholesome ghost stories nowadays.

It sounded so safe, it made me wonder…

"Why is it a D-class?"

"Seems too good to be true, doesn't it?" Assistant Manager Eun scratched the back of her neck. "No fatalities, no injuries. You might even get to keep the item afterwards."

"But?"

Supervisor Park cleared his throat. "Well, all of the squads have found the item so far. But there's a time limit, right?"

I nodded. The manual said that the lost item needed to be found before sunrise.

Assistant Manager Eun said, "Everyone who's cleared this Darkness before us has brute-forced it. That kind of strategy takes time and patience and luck. I don't know about you, Roe, but I don't want to be the one to find out what happens when our time runs out."

"It'll be fine, Roe. Don't worry."

Assistant Manager Eun slapped me hard on the back, chortling. "As if! Nothing fazes this guy."

I fought back a wince. If only you knew…

"Grapes, did you have a chance to look at the briefing?"

I nodded, though Agent Choi had spoken to me without looking up from the folder he was buried in. "Yes, I read it on my way in. Thank you for sending it."

"No problem," he said absently, rubbing the back his neck. "We'll head out once Jaekwan gets back."

Ah so Agent Bronze was just out momentarily. That made more sense than the alternative, which was that he was running late—I didn't think that there had been a single day so far when I'd managed to arrive earlier than him.

I decided not to hang up my jacket, since we would be leaving soon, anyway. I sat on the couch, careful to avoid the part in the middle that sagged the most. Just as I was beginning to wonder whether I should ask how long more Agent Bronze would be, the man arrived.

"Change of plans," he called out as he pushed the door open.

Agent Choi's head snapped up. "What?"

"Morning, Grapes." Agent Bronze spared a second to greet me before responding to Agent Choi. "We're off the Gwacheon case. Emergency call came in, dispatch is asking for us to handle it."

"Who's taking Gwacheon?" Agent Choi asked incredulously.

"You think they told me?" Agent Bronze snorted. He strode over to the coat rack and grabbed his jacket, shaking it out and pulling it on in one fluid movement.

"We've handled it the most of everyone available," Agent Choi said, frustrated. "The mortality rate for that disaster is—" He raked a hand through his hair, then shook his head. "Fine. Okay. What's the call?"

"Three civilians. The extraction point is H Gallery."

H Gallery? As much as I racked my brain, I couldn't recall an exploration record that dealt with anything under that name. Agent Choi seemed to recognise it, though.

"You might not be familiar with it," he explained to me. "It shut down more than two decades ago, but we still get requests from civilians who are trapped inside."

Something prickled at the back of my neck. I put it out of my mind and focused on responding. "I see. Are we heading out now, then?"

"Yes." Agent Bronze nodded. "We'll need to enter at night, but it will take about two hours to get there. We'll fill you in on the rest on the way."

The Darkness required four people to enter, so we waited until Section Chief Lee Jaheon returned from his meeting. To enter, we each had to hold onto a poster. It resembled one of the ones you might see stapled onto a pole on the sidewalk for a lost pet. Instead of a photograph of a cat or dog, however, there was a what looked like a child's drawing of a doll or puppet. It had round green eyes, red lines coming out of its head I assumed was its hair (or at least, hoped it wasn't blood), and there was a blue triangle under the head that probably represented its body.

Looking at the picture, Assistant Manager Eun's mouth twitched.

"It's a very cute drawing," Supervisor Park commented delicately.

"That's one word for it."

Artistic ability aside, we had our target. Chief Lizard placed the poster on the table between us and we all reached out towards the poster that would take us into the Darkness.

When I opened my eyes, we were inside a dimly lit entranceway. There was a single tall candle on a table up against one wall. Next to the table, there was a old-fashioned iron stand for coats or hats. Looking around, I saw the front door was behind us, but only a hint of moonlight could be seen through the stained glass on the door. It was impossible to see anything in the pitch black darkness beyond the candle's reach.

My heart thumped. Even though I'd been expecting it, the abrupt shift from day to night reminded me that we were playing by the Darkness' rules now.

"Looks like we'll need our lights for this one."

"That's a shame, I was hoping we could save the batteries for later. "

"We could always just use the candle, Section Chief!"

Please, no… Navigating by candlelight the one time was bad enough.

I interjected quickly before things got out of hand. "The manual said that this candle marks the amount of time we have left, didn't it?"

"Hmmm… So if we make it go out accidentally, that might be it for us."

"Right. Leave it here, then."

Assistant Manager Falcon flicked on the light from her flashlight and the rest of us followed suit.

The manual had described the house as a large Victorian manor, but I had no idea what that meant, aside from being old and vaguely European. When I had looked it up online, the images I'd seen had looked like the types of haunted houses you might see in an American horror movie, if you were someone who actually watched those. This house seemed to fit right in with them.

Cold sweat trickled down my back.

The walls were covered with a dark patterned wallpaper, and there were paintings everywhere. Unlike the hallway in [The Clown Hates You], all of the paintings here were covered by cloth, as if to keep the dust off them, and only the vague impression of the frames underneath them could be seen. The floor was carpeted by a rug so thick it completely muffled our footsteps as we proceeded further inside. The foyer opened up into a larger room, with two staircases curving up to upper level. There was a double door between the staircases, and then more doors to the right and left.

We examined our surroundings, then turned to each other.

"This is where we split up," Assistant Manager Falcon said.

Even though it was the first thing you were supposed to never do, the house was simply too big for us to search as a group. We'd drawn lots to decide our pairings before entering, and I was with Supervisor Badger, so we nodded at the other team and separated.

Despite having being abandoned in the 90's, the gallery looked as though it had been built in a contemporary, minimalist style to perfectly mimic a dentist's waiting room. The walls were painted a light grey and the floors were a thin pale hardwood that creaked when we walked. If this were anything other than a ghost story, presumably the paintings on the walls would have all been sold. As it was, each wall still bore the frames of the paintings H Gallery must have once displayed. However, the art inside of each painting was gone. In its place, all of the canvases had been covered over by thick black paint.

"Keep an eye on the paint," Agent Choi cautioned.

I nodded. The 'paint' was in fact what caused people's disappearances. Based on the briefing, I was able to figure out what ghost story this related to.

Dark Exploration Records / Ghost Story

[Haunted Gallery]

: A ghost story featured in <Dark Exploration Records>

: Disaster Management Bureau registration number – 1485PSYA.1998.라23

A phenomenon mimicking a free art gallery. It uses those who wander inside to create new paintings.

Associated with at least 100 disappearances ever since it first appeared. It is classified by the Bureau as a Clutch-sanctioned disaster.

All of the paintings in this room were completely blacked out, which meant that our missing civilians hadn't become part of this exhibit. Agent Choi lifted the dokkaebi lantern and we examined the displays. When the dokkaebi fire was brought close to it, the paint seemed to squirm with an uncomfortably wet squelching noise.

Agent Bronze grimaced. "Let's move on," he said.

"Right."

We progressed into the next room. Much like the first, the walls were covered with black paintings. In the middle of the room, however, there were several glass cases with miniature figurines and buildings.

"Huh." Agent Choi went over to one of the cases. "These are cute," he remarked. "But I don't remember the briefing mentioning this place displaying anything other than paintings."

"You think there's another disaster overlapping with this one?" Agent Bronze suggested.

I took a closer look at the diorama. It depicted little people inside a gallery that looked just like the one we were in right now. However, the gallery in the display case was packed with visitors admiring the tiny framed paintings. Perhaps at one time, before H Gallery had closed down, this is what it had looked like.

Agent Choi made a thoughtful noise.

"Could this be what happened to all the people who were taken into the paintings?"

Bang!

A door slammed.

I heard distant laughter and loud footsteps running somewhere in the floor below us.

Assistant Manager Falcon clicked her tongue.

"Those kids should know better than to run indoors," she commented glibly.

Was that what she was focusing on?

The house we were in was clearly haunted. Whether the ghosts were running inside had nothing to do with us, didn't it?

Before I could say anything—not that I even would in this case—Assistant Manager Falcon had already moved on to rummaging through one of the dressers. I cracked open an ancient wardrobe and was hit with the musty smell of old clothes and dust. I held back a sneeze as I checked the inside, but all I could see was frayed cloth hanging limply from the bar. My search under the bed similarly turned up absolutely nothing remotely close to the lost item.

"Not here either?" Falcon asked.

"I don't think so, no."

Just as we were about to leave—

Crash!

—a vase resting on the dresser fell to the ground and cracked.

A shiver ran down my spine. The vase had been solidly planted in the middle of the dresser, so there was no way it would have fallen if something hadn't pushed it.

"Classic," Assistant Manager Falcon said, nodding with approval as if she were scoring the display.

No, that really wasn't the point...!

Falcon squatted down next to the shards of the vase and sifted through them before making a face. "Just some mold."

She stood up, then paused and peered at the painting hanging above the dresser.

"Hey, Roe."

"Yes?"

"There's something off about this, don't you think?"

"What do you mean?"

I walked closer to her and looked up at the painting too. Underneath the dust cover, there was the vaguest indication of a shadow. Something underneath was moving.

She reached out and yanked at the covering.

"Watch out!" Agent Bronze shouted.

He fired his handgun and I whipped around to see that inky black paint had seeped out from the paintings behind us, forming shadowy tendrils. One tendril hung suspended in the air for a second, with a large hole taken out from where it had been hit. Then, in the next moment, the tendrils lashed out, whip-fast, and wrapped themselves around my leg and yanked me off my feet. My hands slammed into the ground, just barely fast enough to keep me from hitting my head as the shadows began dragging me backwards.

Agent Choi darted toward me, raising the lantern in one hand. His jakdu thudded into the surface of one tendril and it dissolved into a black mist. I staggered upright but then, from another painting, more of the black tar-like substance emerged. They attacked Agent Choi and Agent Bronze, cutting through the air with knife-thin spikes, while other tendrils seeped down the walls and across the floor, cutting down their mobility. I took out my own Glass Handgun and took aim, but there seemed to be no end to them.

"We need to move!"

If we stayed too long in one place, then the paint would continue to seep out of the paintings to try to capture us. The only way to avoid it was to keep moving.

The problem was that the paint has already covered the floor between the two agents and myself.

"Elder!" Agent Choi called out. He lifted the lantern and the blue dokkaebi flame swirled as it flared brighter. The black surface rippled and recoiled, forming small spikes as if to protect itself from the light. Some of the spikes stabbed into my legs, drawing blood.

'Ngh!'

I grit my teeth and struggled to break free, but the paint felt like it had embedded itself into my bones.

"Grapes!"

Agent Bronze threw his rope towards me. The thin cords of the Binding Rope looped around my torso. I grabbed onto the rope and Agent Bronze began to pull me away.

The blue fire blazed brighter and hotter. Agent Choi's jakdu flashed through the air. Still, more tendrils grabbed onto my arms. The paint flowed over my body, enveloping me completely in darkness.

I sprinted around the corner, only to get the wind knocked out of me when I collided with what felt like a solid pillar.

"Roe?"

I looked up and saw the concerned face of Supervisor Badger and the unperturbed expression of Section Chief Lizard. I could have cried out of relief, though that could also have been the smarting pain of my bruised nose.

"Supervisor Badger, Section Chief, the paintings—"

"We know," Badger responded grimly. "They attacked us too. Where's Falcon?"

"It took her," I told him, feeling as though I was shaking. "She just—The lady inside the painting reached out and pulled her in. I tried to get her out but…"

Section Chief Lee Jaheon said, "Identify the location where Employee Falcon was abducted."

"It was inside one of the bedrooms upstairs—but that one is empty now," I added hastily. "I saw her inside the painting at first, but then she disappeared.

"They can move between the paintings," Badger told me. "When the Section Chief broke one, it just moved to another frame."

"No, I don't think breaking the paintings is the solution," I replied, shaking my head.

"Yeah…" Supervisor Badger scratched his cheek. "When we destroyed the rest of the ones in that room, I think that made them madder."

Ah. So that was where the screaming had come from.

I pushed myself off the ground with a wince and scrubbed my face, thinking. "We need to get Assistant Manager Falcon free, and we still have to find the item," I said. "I know we split up earlier to cover more ground—"

"At this point in time, splitting up would be detrimental to those goals."

"Just stay with us, Roe."

"Right."

Thank goodness..!

The soft plush rug running the length of the corridor swallowed up the sound of my footsteps. I couldn't hear anything other than the sound of own breathing, almost offensively loud in the hushed quiet of the house I'd found myself in after being covered by the black tar.

It was a massive house that looked vaguely European-styled, with old ornately decorated furniture. The walls were covered with paintings, much like the haunted gallery, but I could actually see the art inside. Exploring the rooms, I had the strangest sense of déja-vu, even though I had never been in a building like this before.

I needed to find a way out. It was possible that the civilians we were looking for had already been captured, so they might be somewhere in this house too. And, I needed to keep moving. The black paint wasn't just tendrils now. There were hands reaching out from the shadows and they were searching for me.

The dust covers had all disappeared, and we could now see the paintings underneath. Most of them showed happy scenes, parks where children were playing or people were sitting around tables laden with food. However, each person in every single painting had turned to look out at us and was crying. We could hear a muffled sobbing, as if coming from several rooms away, that would grow slightly louder whenever we drew near to one of the paintings.

Section Chief Lizard led our procession through the hallways, while Supervisor Badger brought up the rear. We checked each room only briefly. Based on the previous exploration records, it seemed like the Darkness exploited the expectation that the lost objects would be in any place that made sense. We crossed out any bedrooms or places where children might spend a lot of time, like bedrooms or playrooms.

As we were checking a dining room.

"Agh!"

I turned around and saw that the portrait of an old woman had leaned out of the painting and was holding onto Supervisor Badger. I grabbed his arm and yanked, but the old woman's grip was like a vice. Chief Lizard stepped up to the plate and hauled Badger away from the portrait but as he did so, the old woman turned her attention to me. She wept as she grasped my hand and pulled it toward her mouth and kissed it.

A lump formed in my throat. I blinked back tears.

'Mother…'

I stepped closer. Grant me your forgiveness. I am lost and alone so guide me towards you. Give me the release I seek. I'm sorryI'msorryI'msorryPLEASE

Then.

A voice cut through the buzzing in my head.

"Roe, get away from her!" Badger cried.

I snapped out of my daze to see that my arm had sunk into the painting all the way up to my elbow. The woman was cupping my face in her hands but Section Chief Lee Jaheon had me by the shoulders and he pulled me away—even as he did, my arm stayed inside the painting with the old woman. He pulled his arm back to punch the canvas but the woman clutched my arm to her chest and disappeared through the side of the painting.

I stared at the stump of my arm with a numb sense of disbelief. Thankfully, it wasn't bleeding. Both the sleeve and my arm just ended. After catching a glimpse of the exposed bone and muscle, I quickly looked away, feeling my stomach lurch.

"Roe, does it hurt?"

"No…"

I just felt an odd sense of lightness, as though I could still flex my fingers or bend my arm. It didn't hurt, no, but it was just… gone.

"There's an arm in this one," Ryu Jaekwan said, stopping in front of a frame.

"That's not Grapes'. He was wearing his jacket, remember?"

"It has a piece of his tattoo."

"What?" Agent Choi rubbed his face. "Let me see."

The two agents stood in a long room with framed paintings all along the walls. Whereas the canvases in the previous rooms had all been covered with the black paint, however, the ones that they were surrounded by now could all be seen. Each picture depicted a different human body part. Some looked as though they had been severed cleanly from the rest of the body, while others appeared to have been brutally mauled or like they were in various stages of decomposition. The agents looked at each frame only briefly, not daring to linger for too long in front of any one piece in particular lest they draw another attack from the paint.

"It can't belong to Grapes," Agent Choi said. "It's already started to rot. Look, does this look like the pants he was wearing?" He pointed at a painting of what looked to be the upper half of an adult's leg.

"I… think so."

"Okay. Let's take it out too."

Agent Choi brought the lantern close to the canvas. It hissed. The paint began to bubble and froth then receded away from the limb.

Agent Bronze reached out. His fingers sank into the painting and grasped the leg. The art became three-dimensional as he carefully pulled it out from the painting. Once free, he wiped the limb down with a cloth then placed it inside a large duffle bag.

"I think I spotted his phone," Agent Choi said, smiling mirthlessly. "Let's not leave that behind either."

My hip collided with a table. I slammed my hand against the edge, fighting to keep myself upright. The shadows had taken my leg, leaving me unbalanced and unable to escape with my shoelaces. I was getting by with a poker stick that I'd repurposed as a makeshift cane, but my progress had slowed significantly and I'd only nearly managed to avoid my arm being taken as well by slipping out of my jacket at the last minute. The paint clung to the walls and ceilings. Thick globs of it hung down in loops like a noxious sugar syrup.

There was no way this house could have been that big, but the hallways seemed to stretch endlessly in every direction. With every step, the iron of the poker seemed to dig itself into the skin of my palm. The floor was sticky, but it was too dark to see with what. I could only keep moving.

I had to keep moving.

I stumbled onward.

"Supervisor Badger… You're… upside down?" I asked. My mind felt hazy, as though I were stumbling through a thick fog. I tried to gather my thoughts together, blinking slowly.

Chief Lizard and Supervisor Badger were standing above me at a strange angle. The lizard's red tongue flickered out of his mouth. Badger looked upset for some reason.

"You can't remember?" he asked.

I frowned. I must have been lying down, which explained the angle. With a jolt, I realised that my head must have been in his lap! I tried to scramble upright, but it wasn't working.

"Roe, don't!"

"Employee Roe Deer, do not attempt to move."

The world spun. Suddenly, without doing anything, I was face-to-face with my squadmates. My eyes flickered. Right. Left. Down. Down. Down.

Badger was holding my head in his hands.

My body was gone.

I came across a small metal staircase winding around a pole. It creaked beneath my weight and I held the thin railing cautiously as I climbed higher. At the top, I found myself in what must have been the house's attic. The ceiling was low and slanted, so I needed to stoop slightly just to stand upright. A grime-filled hectagonal window let in just enough light for me to feel my way around. There were easels and canvases scattered all around me; oil paintings of children crying, people gathered in mourning around shrouds, skeletal faces and graveyards. Every single painting had been slashed through, and the paint seeped out from the holes like open wounds.

Badger carried my head carefully.

Neither he nor Chief Lizard would tell me how I had come to lose my body. I personally didn't think it was that big of a deal considering that we still hadn't found the painting to free Assistant Manager Falcon. At least like this, I was still able to help with the exploration and with looking for the rest of my missing pieces.

"Wait, hold on a second."

I directed Badger with a low voice.

Chief Lizard stopped in front of the picture I had spotted. It showed a similar scene to some of the others we had passed recently. There was a picnic blanket spread out in the centre of the painting and several children in old-fashioned clothing were sitting and eating. What had drawn my attention, though, was what appeared in the background of the painting.

"This is the house that we are currently in."

"I think so, too," I agreed. The house in the picture sprawled across the width of the painting. Dead ivy covered the brick walls and roof, and several parts of the building had crumbled away, revealing an inky blackness inside.

Supervisor Badger's brows furrowed. "There's a tower in the painting, though. We haven't seen any stairs leading up, have we?"

"Assistant Manager Falcon and I didn't spot any, either."

That didn't mean that they didn't exist, however. A hidden staircase was a common enough staple in horror stories. Now that we had a target, Chief Lizard speedran our search efforts. Sure enough, there was bookshelf with a movable wall behind it, and stairs going up beyond that. They twisted around and around for several flights before we finally came to a door at the very top. It was barred with a thick, rusted deadbolt that the Squad Leader easily broke off.

The room on the other side of the door was cramped. The ceiling was so low that Supervisor Badger and Chief Lizard were nearly bent double just to move around. There were easels all around the room, large and small, but not a single canvas.

"This must have been a painter's workshop or something…"

"It may have belonged to the person who painted all of the pictures."

Up against one wall was a small bookshelf with pamphlets on human anatomy and painting guides. There was also a leather-bound journal with wisp-thin paper. I couldn't turn the pages, so Chief Lizard flicked through it and read the entries aloud for my sake.

I've been locked up here for two days now. Mother says that I can be let out once I've been good, but I don't know what she means. I'm trying to be good. I promise, I'm a good child.

…

Four days. I made another painting and Mother said that it was good. Does that mean that she'll let me out to play?

…

I don't know what I did wrong. Please I want to go outside. I miss everybody.

…

Another painting. Mother said she only wants happy people. I DON'T WANT TO PAINT ANYMORE.

…

Let me out. Please let me out. I can paint anything you want mama please. I don't want to be alone.

…

They left me behind.

The writer sounded young. Perhaps they had been the owner of the doll we were supposed to look for.

Chief Lizard's head turned. His pupils narrowed to thin slits and his tongue flickered out.

"Is something wrong?" I asked.

He looked at me.

"No," he said. Then, "Have you identified a means to clear this Darkness?"

I tried to nod and then gave up on that. "Yes, but I think that we will need some paint and a brush first."

Agent Choi unzipped the duffle bag and pulled out a large hempen cloth which he lay flat on the ground. Agent Bronze knelt next to the cloth and arranged several severed limbs atop it to form the lower body of a man. Above the pelvis, he placed a Bureau jacket much like the one he was wearing.

Then, both agents moved toward the painting on the wall. Agent Choi reached out and prised Kim Soleum's upper body out from the painting. Agent Bronze supported it from behind and they carried it towards the hemp quilt. After tugging Kim Soleum's arms through the sleeves of the jacket, they wrapped the body with the quilt and bound it with Agent Bronze's rope seven times.

That done, Agent Choi let out a deep breath.

Agent Bronze placed a hand on his shoulder.

"It worked on the civilians," he murmured. "It's worked in the past. It will work for him, too."

"Are you trying to reassure me?" Agent Choi grinned.

Ryu Jaekwan looked at him steadily.

Agent Choi's smile faded slightly and he glanced away. After a few seconds, he said, in a quieter voice, "Thanks."

They stood there in silence for another moment. Then, Agent Choi stepped forward and bowed deeply.

A deep, mournful cry sounded out.

More voices joined it, wailing and sobbing in despair. Still others began to sing.

Agent Choi and Agent Bronze bowed together two more times. On the third bow, Agent Choi reached out and yanked the hemp quilt apart. The Binding Rope burst, falling away easily, and the body inside was revealed, now whole.

Kim Soleum opened his eyes.

"Thanks," he said.

"Don't mention it," Agent Bronze snorted.

"All good, Grapsey?" Agent Choi asked, holding out a hand.

Kim Soleum grasped it and stood, dusting himself off. "Not even a scratch."

We found one of the paintings with children playing. Supervisor Badger had given my head to Chief Lizard and now held the paintbrush carefully. He dipped the brush into the paint gingerly and dabbed it on the canvas. After a few minutes, he successfully made a small person sitting on the grass next to them.

Badger's painting stood up and dusted itself off. It looked around and then cautiously moved towards the other children. They looked suprised but then smiled and accepted it into their ranks, dancing in a circle.

The soft crying that had accompanied us all this time quietened.

I felt a prickle, like blood rushing back into a leg that had fallen asleep, except it was all over my body. Before I knew it, I was standing on my own two feet next to Section Chief Lee Jaheon and Supervisor Park Minseong.

There was a pause. Then.

"Oh, finally."

Assistant Manager Eun Haje sauntered out of a room nearby.

"Took you guys long enough," she drawled.

In one hand, she held a soft ragdoll with red yarn hair and a pale blue knitted dress.