Junhong doesn’t have too much time to dwell on the unusual events that had scared him so badly. They’re well into the first trimester by now and the teachers give so much homework that the students don’t have time for much else. The library in the main castle building is usually crowded until it closes at nine o’clock, and more time is spent finishing last-minute assignments than eating at breakfast in the mornings.

Junhong is no exception. Even though he’s never been what one would call academically-inclined, he gets an obligatory phone call from his aunt once a week where she lectures him about the importance of doing his lessons and so he slogs through mountains of homework with Sehun and whichever other friends he can coerce into helping him – or giving him the answers he hasn’t managed to find in his first, cursory glance through his textbooks.

Still, even with a seemingly-endless amount of homework to do, Junhong still feels uncomfortable being in his dorm room and he makes any excuse not to stay in it for long. Of course he has to return to sleep, but, despite his heart pounding abnormally fast, nothing else out of the ordinary seems to happen. No more strange noises or moving furniture.

“What’s your problem?” Sehun asks one afternoon. It’s a few days later, on Monday, and the library had been too full of students for Junhong and Sehun to find a table. Sehun had suggested that they go back to their dormitory, but Junhong had been steadfastly against it.

He shrugs, looking away. He hasn’t mentioned what had happened to Sehun – somehow the bookshelf had righted itself by the time Junhong worked up the courage to go back. He wouldn’t even know how to go about telling him that he is worried their room might be haunted. He’s never believed in ghosts or other such nonsense before, but what rational reason can explain everything that had happened on Saturday?

“It’s too crowded in there,” Sehun grumbles, jerking his thumb over his shoulder at the library. “Let’s go back to our room already. If we don’t get started soon, we’re never going to get through this history study guide.”

Junhong still isn’t willing. “Let’s try the dance studio,” he suggested.

Sehun gave him an incredulous look. “No offense, but are you ing insane? The studio is across the bailey, and someone is probably using it anyway. How on earth are we going to work on homework with music blasting? Why are you being so weird? Go where you want, but I’m going back to the room.”

Junhong wrinkles his nose but follows his roommate up the stairs towards their floor. His only consolation is that, if something were to happen, he wouldn’t be alone to witness it. Sehun might even corroborate his story and he would know he’s not insane.

They don’t make it all the way to their room. Sehun stops suddenly in the middle of the stairs, body going rigid.

Junhong, who has been following him sullenly, nearly head-butts him in the small of back. “Yah!” he grumbles irritably. “What’d you stop for?”

But Sehun doesn’t answer. His whole body has frozen, as if he’d suddenly gone stiff.

Junhong’s frustration and sullenness is replaced by anxiety and something close to fear. “Sehun?” he repeats uncertainly.

Sehun turns around to face him, his body moving stiffly as if his joints weren’t working properly. When he looks at Junhong, the curly-haired boy has to take a step back.

There’s something off about Sehun’s face. There’s nothing in particular that Junhong can pinpoint, just that everything seems off.

“S-sehun?” he repeats uncertainly.

Then Sehun speaks, only it isn’t really talking so much as roaring. “And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world; he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him!”

The voice was Sehun’s but somehow, at the same time, it simply wasn’t.

“And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy!”

The voice is echoing off the stone walls. Can anyone else hear it? Why is the stairwell so completely deserted?

“And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world! And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon! And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him, and causeth the earth and them that dwell therein to worship the first beast!”

Junhong loses his footing and falls backwards, bumping down the stairs all the way to the landing.

“Junhong!” This time it’s really Sehun’s voice, and when Junhong opens his eyes, wincing with pain, he finds his roommate still standing halfway up the staircase, looking down in alarm and concern. “Are you okay?”

Junhong does a quick mental check to make sure nothing is broken. Other than what will probably be some very nasty bruises, he seems to be fairly okay. Shaken, to say the least, but physically okay. “I-I think so…” he mumbles, getting to his feet carefully. His heart is lodged somewhere in the vicinity of his throat and he doesn’t think it has anything to do with the fall.

Sehun comes to his senses and dashes down the stairs to his roommate. “Did you slip or something?”

Junhong stares at him. “Are you trying to freak me out on purpose?” he demands suspiciously. “If so, this isn’t a very funny joke.”

Sehun looks genuinely confused. “What are you talking about?”

“What was with all that creepy stuff you were just saying?” Junhong wants to know. “About beasts and monsters coming from the sea and all that ? Seriously freaky stuff, man.”

Sehun shakes his head. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Junhong. Did you hit your head or something?” He reaches up as if to check and make sure his roommate isn’t bleeding out from some wound on the back of his head or something.

Junhong swats his hand away impatiently. “Just now,” he says earnestly. “You started quoting some seriously freaky . Like, biblical and stuff.”

Sehun scoffed. “That’s pretty impossible, Junhong,” he says flatly. “I’m not religious. I don’t think I’ve ever even picked up a Bible.”

Junhong is starting to get frustrated. “Seriously, man! You just started spouting some about beasts and things coming out of the sea and people worshipping it and it was freaky as hell and why are you ing laughing? Can’t you see I’m seriously freaked out here?”

Sehun forces himself to stop laughing. “Dude, you’ve clearly been studying too much. Let’s just skip the history homework tonight. Ms. Lee can just it. You obviously need some rest.”

“I’m not imagining things, Sehun,” Junhong replies hotly, allowing his roommate to drag him the rest of the way up the stairs to their room. “I’m serious here. You really freaked me out. It was like you were in a trance or something.”

“That kind of stuff doesn’t happen in real life, Junhong,” Sehun says flatly. “You’ve been watching too many horror movies. Just get some sleep, okay? Maybe you should go see the nurse. You know, Taemin was telling me that Minho told him that last year a kid collapsed from exhausted just a few weeks into the first trimester. That could be you this year, you know.”

Junhong shrugs him off. This has nothing to do with too much homework and too little sleep, he knows. Something really creepy is going on.

At Sehun’s insistence, he goes to bed without bothering to crack open his history book. Ms. Lee will probably let him have it tomorrow, but right now he doesn’t care. He burrows under the blankets in his bed, practically pulled over his head, and tries not to notice how eerie all of the sounds the castle makes at night really are.

He mulls over the words that Sehun had spouted off in the stairwell. He can’t remember them verbatim of course. Like Sehun, he’s never been particularly religious and reading the Bible was never very high on his to-do list, but he’s pretty sure those words are from the Bible. He wishes he could remember them so he could look them up online, but he can only remember bits and pieces now, not specific words.

He sighs and rolls over, but it’s an awfully long time before he manages to fall asleep. 

I'm sorry it's been so long since I last updated! I've been really busy! I had surgery on my eyes, so I've been MIA for a while and haven't even been able to look at my computer screen! But hopefully I'll be able to update again soon!