The rain disappeared before the clouds did. Low-laying, gray clouds hovered over the small, suburban town, giving civilians the illusion that another thunderstorm was on its way.

                The heavy rainstorm had washed away the top layer of forest soil. Consequently, Kai’s body was no longer hidden. Mud mussed against his black hair, gluing the strands to his forehead. Wet soil painted every inch of his body; but it was still possible to vaguely make out the outline of his pants and the inch-wide gashes on his back. Those V-shaped gashes weren’t caused by the driver’s careless driving, though; they were actually the loci of his disintegrated wings, the place where his wings had broken off during his fall from the heavens.

                His didn't even react when a branch fell upon his back. A real human being would be screaming in pain right now; but Kai wasn’t human, and he couldn’t feel a thing. He couldn’t feel pain. Nonetheless, he could see and hear. His eyes shifted slightly to the left as the sounds of rustling leaves hit his eardrums.

                Someone was coming…

***

                “How much do you think we would get for a kidney?”

                “About 52 million won.” answered the leader of the group in a gruff voice.

                “What about a liver?”

                “Around 23 million won.” the leader said through gritted teeth as the trio hiked down a steep hill in the middle of the forest. The two younglings were getting on his nerves; sometimes he felt it would be easier if he harvested their organs instead of looking for viable ones from the dead. But, he wasn’t a murderer; he might be an organ thief but he wasn’t evil enough to actually kill anyone. However, the temptation was certainly there due to the constant, nonsensical blabbering of his minions.

                If he wasn’t so old, he wouldn’t even ask them to tag along. His assistants were inexperienced in the art of organ harvesting, and one wrong move could land all three of them in jail for stealing body parts from the dead. Okay, at forty-three, YongKyu wasn’t actually old; but his body was showing rapid signs of aging and his bones were brittle enough to make walking a painful chore. To put it simply, he was a middle-aged man trapped in an octogenarian’s body.

                YongKyu was an organ harvester now but he wasn’t always one. A couple of years ago, he worked as an accountant. It was a stressful occupation because he was the only accountant in town; everybody went to him for tax help, banking help, and just about every petty problem that involved monetary numbers. The amount of workload forced his body to go on overload; subsequently, his organs began failing on him.

                Like any normal person, he waited for a transplant. At first, he was hopeful; but after three long months of waiting, he was still on the waitlist. Panic and dispair increased the amount of stress he was putting on his body. Fearing for his life, he did the unthinkable — instead of waiting for a viable transplant, he harvested his own organ with the help of two teenagers. In his opinion, it wasn’t wrong because the donor was already dead. He didn’t purposely kill a person!

                He thought he would stop after that but after hearing how much organ harvesting would earn him on the black market, he decided to switch professions. It was an illegal job but he knew he couldn’t work in a cubicle anymore; he didn’t want his body breaking down on him again due to stress. Without realizing it, YongKyu found his new career not only thrilling but addictive.

                “Hey, hyung. I think we found a new body.” shouted one of his assistants from afar, his arms waving frantically like those of an inflatable air dancer.

                Grunting, he walked over to a muddy gouge where a motionless teenage boy laid. The boy didn’t look a day over eighteen; his skin was smooth and unblemished despite the layers of mud over his body. One of his minions flipped the boy onto his back to check if he was still breathing.

                “Good news. He’s dead.” The assistant lifted one of Kai’s arms and bent it to test its flexibility, “His skin hasn’t shown any signs of rotting yet. I think he died either yesterday night or this morning.”

                “That’s perfect.” YongKyu said. He twitched the side of his lips, “But close his eyelids before taking him back to the van. They’re creepily staring at me.”

                Those unblinking, dark brown eyes sent shivers down his spine. They weren’t the eyes of a dead man; they were the eyes of a watchful but soulless entity. YongKyu knew he should probably leave this mysterious boy alone but his money-hungry soul wanted to keep the boy.

                “They won’t shut, hyung!”

                YongKyu waved an arm, “Whatever, just get him back to the van before someone finds us.”

***

                The three strangers drove him to a deserted, wooden cabin on the other side of town. Empty saved for a wooden table and three chairs, the cabin gave off an eerie vibe even when the lights were on.

                They strapped him onto a chair, securing him in metal manacles as they prepared the dissection. The organ harvesters were in for a surprise when their knives touched Kai’s skin — the boy was hollow inside. There were no organs inside his body; there weren’t even any remnants of blood. No veins travelled under his skin; he was simply an empty shell.

                “W-what the hell!” yelped the youngest harvester, his knife hitting the ground with a sharp ping after digging inside Kai’s body.

                “Do you think someone harvested his organs already?” asked the other minion as he tried to come up with an explanation.

                The youngest one smacked the other one in the head, “Of course not! Damn, we have something evil in our hands. I should’ve known this earlier; I mean, we can’t even close his damn eyes!”

                “We should take him back to the forest and bury him.” The other one squeaked as he began unlocking the cuffs.

                “Wait.” YongKyu interjected, placing a hand on his assistant, “Look.”

                The two younger boys watched as their leader sliced down Kai’s arm. Nothing happened, of course. But that all changed when YongKyu commanded Kai to bleed…and strangely, he did. Sticky, red blood flowed out of the cut like a gushing waterfall. The blood stopped flowing when YongKyu gave the second command.

                “Holy hell! We got ourselves a real life voodoo doll!”

                YongKyu smiled devilishly, “I think we should keep him. He might help us make a lot of money.”

Author's Note: YongKyu is a pretty important character in this story.

And an inflatable air dancer looks like this