Jong Kook experienced this brief moment of mental paralysis upon seeing Jessica fall, leaving him fleetingly frozen and hollow, but then a strong wind threatened his grip on Taeyeon’s wrist and he sprang back into action, bringing his now free hand over to Taeyeon’s other wrist and, with what was left of his strength, pulling her up to the window.

Taeyeon stumbled through the open window and collapsed onto the floor inside. Unable to accept what had just happened, she crouched down low with her legs pulled in close as she hugged her knees and slowly rocked back and forth, just as she had that time in the stairwell when she and Jessica talked of heaven and hell, and just as she had countless times before that when dealing with Tiffany’s death. To now have Jessica’s death on her hands – a second SNSD girl’s sacrifice for her – was too much for her to bear.

Jong Kook collapsed beside her. His arms had been stretched so hard that they had gone numb and felt like dead weight. He held them out at his sides and tilted his head back against the wall as he closed his eyes, trying to catch his breath.

Ji Hyo sat beside him and was about to comfort him when she saw that his arms were bleeding. “What happened?” she asked.

Jong Kook looked down, saw the cuts on his arms, and realized that Taeyeon’s wrist knives must have slashed him when he was clutching onto her. “I’m okay,” he said, shrugging it off.

Krystal was crying loudly against Thunder’s chest. It was the only sound in that ash-covered office space and it was heart wrenching for everyone to hear. No one knew what to say to her or how to comfort her. They just stared, stunned and speechless.

But then another sound broke through Krystal’s sobbing – what sounded like moans coming from across the room. It was Gary.

Ji Hyo left Jong Kook and ran over to where Gary was lying on the floor, dropping to her knees beside him. Gary’s eyes were still closed but he was letting out these awful groans, as if awake but in pain. “Gary-ah, wake up,” she said.

“Wait!” CL yelled. “Ji Hyo-ssi, get away from him!”

“What? Why?” Ji Hyo stared up at CL, confused.

“He might be one of them!” Bom suddenly yelled.

Bom had said exactly what CL was thinking. “Ji Hyo-ssi, please, just get away from him,” CL said.

“He wasn’t bit!” Ji Hyo yelled.

“No, but, I think...” CL let her words trail off as she turned toward T.O.P. behind her. “Remember that old black and white zombie movie you made me and Bommie watch a long time ago? Didn’t all the dead people come back to life? Like, whether they were bitten or not?”

T.O.P. slowly nodded, eyed Gary suspiciously, and then stepped forward to pull Bom away from that potential danger.

“Are you saying we’re all going to turn into zombies?” Seungri asked, his mouth open as he looked around at everyone.

“Don’t be stupid, maknae,” G-Dragon quietly said, unwilling to admit that he, too, was concerned.

Ji Hyo saw everyone backing away then and yelled at them. “This isn’t a movie! And he didn’t die! He was just hurt.”

“You don’t know that,” Bom said. “Maybe he died and was just lying here all this time, slowly transforming.”

Gary groaned again and everyone, including Ji Hyo, leapt back at that moment.

Seungri reached for his hammer on the floor and held it up, waiting to strike.

“I’m not dead,” Gary grunted, as he tried to sit up. He felt a sudden bolt of pain in the back of his head then and let out another groan. “Ai, why do I feel like someone hit me in the head with a damn hammer?” He looked up then and saw the hammer in Seungri’s hands.

Seungri quickly dropped the hammer, which clanked loudly against the concrete floor.

Gary looked around at everyone then and realized that he had no idea where he was. “What happened?” he asked. “Last thing I remember, we were in the back of the truck…”

Ji Hyo crawled over to him. “Gary-ah, the truck… there was an accident. You must have hit your head because you were unconscious this whole time.” She looked back at Jong Kook, who was still sitting by the window, trying to recover from his exertion. Turning back to Gary, she said, “Jong Kook-ah carried you to safety.”

“Ai, hyung,” Gary said, still holding his head as he looked over at Jong Kook. “I can always count on you, hyung.” He smiled then, just a faint smile of gratitude over Jong Kook’s efforts, but then he saw Taeyeon beside Jong Kook rocking in her crouched position and knew something was wrong. He searched everyone’s faces, seeing that they were all looking at him with distressed expressions. “What’s wrong?” he asked. He looked around the room again and realized that neither Jessica nor the ahjummas were there. “Where’s… where’s Sica?” Gary asked. “Is she with the ahjummas?””

Krystal began to cry against Thunder’s chest again.

“Gary-ah…” Ji Hyo said, as she reached toward him. “Gary-ah, Jessica-ssi… she…”

At that moment, everyone heard a sudden crash – what sounded like a bookcase falling over. They all turned to the source of the sound, staring past the rows of partitioned desks to the far side of the office, where an open doorway connected their room to the next. A low growl emanated from that other room. They stared at the entrance, waiting, and then saw a dead Samsung employee stagger out, its neck missing a chunk of flesh and its skin rotten and oozing yellowish puss.

Jong Kook stood up and looked around. “No one has any guns?” he asked.

“Don’t worry, I got him,” Seungri said, picking up his hammer again. He held the hammer up, positioned it so that the claw end faced out, and moved slowly down the center row between the desks toward that entrance to the adjoining room. But then, just as he was nearly upon the zombie and about to swing his hammer down, he suddenly froze.

“What’s wrong?” CL asked.

Seungri slowly backed away from the doorway. The others then saw what he was backing away from. Dozens of Samsung zombies were following that first one out of the adjoining room and were now emptying out into theirs.

“Seungri-yah, hurry back!” CL yelled.

“No…” Daesung cried, not wanting to believe what he was seeing. “I can’t take this anymore.”

Minzy grabbed onto Daesung and looked around at everyone. “We need to go,” she said. “Now.”

Ji Hyo helped Gary up from the floor, both feeling helpless without any weapons. Over by the window, Jong Kook pulled up Taeyeon, who still appeared dazed. Everyone then made their way to the closest door, which led out into the hallway, and nearly skidded to a stop when they saw the number of zombies heading down that hallway straight for them.

“Go that way!” Bom cried, pointing down the other end of the hall. The fluorescent lights down that end were dim and flickering, making it difficult to see, but there didn’t appear to be any zombies in that direction. They quickly ran to the end, being careful about any open door along the way, and then escaped into the stairwell.

As soon as they entered the stairwell, it felt like a different world. Ash was falling all around them, and at first they couldn’t understand why, as the Samsung building was the only one on that street not yet destroyed by fires, but then they all looked up and saw that, four or five floors up, at the very top, there was a gaping hole in the roof through which they could see the black sky that covered Seoul.

“Come on!” G-Dragon said, leading everyone upstairs. He was hoping that, because of how slow-moving the zombies were, they’d be able to outrun them and have time to find a secure space on one of the other floors, where they could hide out until coming up with a plan for escape. But after climbing up a flight, they found that the seventh floor door was locked. They then ran up another flight, finding that the eight floor door was locked, too, as was the ninth, and the tenth.

There was only one more flight of stairs left. The ash coming down from that hole above them made it difficult to see and they had to block their eyes as they ran fast up those stairs.

G-Dragon was the first to reach the top and go for the stairwell door. As soon as he felt the knob turn completely, he let out a sigh of relief and pulled the door open, but a horde of zombies were waiting on the other side and he stumbled back.

“Close it!” Dara yelled. “Hurry, close the door!”

But it was too late. One of the zombies had stepped forward into that doorway, its arm reaching out, which stopped G-Dragon from closing the door completely. “Goddamnit!” G-Dragon screamed, more mad than scared in that moment. “Go back down!” he yelled, pushing everyone back down the stairs.

Jong Kook had been at the back of the group, just behind Taeyeon, but when the group turned around, he found himself in front. He ran down a flight of stairs to the tenth floor and, in an explosive burst of rage that came from deep within him, which was born out of the guilt and madness he felt over what happened to Jessica and the ahjummas, he dove shoulder-first against the locked tenth floor door, his weight crashing into it and knocking the door clear off its hinges. “Let’s go!” he yelled, standing by that broken door now as he ushered everyone inside.

G-Dragon was the last one down. He stopped at the door that Jong Kook had broken open and glanced briefly up the stairs at the zombies slowly descending. “This door isn’t going to stay closed now,” he said.

Jong Kook nodded. “I know. We’re going to have to barricade it.” He hurried G-Dragon inside and then closed the door behind them, leaning against it to stop the zombies from pushing it open. “Go find me something heavy to push up against it.”

G-Dragon returned with T.O.P. just a minute or so later, each pushing a heavy metal desk sideways down that hall. Jong Kook stepped out of the way as G-Dragon shoved the first desk against the door.

“Let’s stack the other one,” Jong Kook said, yelling out as he lifted the heavy desk over his head and placed it atop the first, his muscles burning from being overworked.

“Think that’ll hold?” T.O.P. asked.

Jong Kook adjusted the top desk, pushing it hard against the door. “Yeah,” he said. “For now.”

Everyone sat quietly on the floor of a large conference room they had found on that tenth floor, all except for Krystal, who was standing by the window, looking out over the burning city. From that height, she could see to the far reaches of Seoul, which was flooded with fire and darkened by that thick miasma of black smoke hovering above. Every now and then, there was an explosion in the distance with white flashes amid glowing orange bursts, like lightning against a sunset. She placed her palm flat against the glass, overcome by all the destruction, by all the death.

“Are you okay?” Thunder asked, his voice faint, almost a whisper.

“No,” she quietly said, still staring at the burning city beyond that window.

Until then, in the hour that had passed, no one had spoken. Everyone had just sat there, feeling trapped with so few supplies and so little hope.

Gary sat quietly beside Jong Kook and Ji Hyo. When he had first sat down in that conference room, he wanted to immediately ask again about Jessica, but some part of him knew that she was dead and he was not yet ready to hear that, to have that fact out there as reality. And so he sat quietly like the rest of them, trying to come up with alternate scenarios as to why she wasn’t there. He imagined her with the ahjummas somewhere, alive, having been separated from the group. It seemed a plausible possibility, and he held onto that hope for some time, almost believing it to be fact, to be what actually happened. But when he saw Krystal at the window just now and observed the way that Thunder was comforting her – with so much care, as if her emotions were so fragile – he knew that the hopeful scenario he had dreamed up was, in fact, just a dream.

He looked over at Ji Hyo now, his sad eyes searching her face.

Ji Hyo looked back at him but then averted her eyes, looking down at her lap.

“Ji Hyo-yah, did Sica… did she at least go peacefully?” Gary asked. As soon as he asked that question, he was reminded of what the ahjumma said when Jessica had asked that same question of Fany’s death – that no death is ever peaceful. Still, he waited for Ji Hyo to answer, hoping that Jessica at least did not feel much pain.

“She… she was very brave,” Ji Hyo said.

Gary’s lips quivered as he tried to hold back his tears, but he couldn’t. The way that Ji Hyo hadn’t quite answered his question made him realize that Jessica had likely died an awful death, and the pain poured out of him then, his sobbing almost uncontrollable. There was such a terrible aching inside his chest and no matter how many tears he shed, that aching never subsided. He felt nearly suffocated by it and had to fight for breaths between his cries.

Krystal turned from the window and went over to him, embracing him and sharing his pain as she cried with him.

Taeyeon, sitting by herself across the room with her knees tucked in, wanted so badly to go to them and join them in their sorrow, but part of her felt like she deserved to suffer alone. She felt responsible for Jessica’s death. Not knowing what else to do, but knowing that she had to do something, she cleared and swallowed hard. “I’m sorry,” she quietly said.

Krystal slowly sat up and looked over at her.

“I’m so sorry,” Taeyeon said.

Krystal sniffled and blinked back her tears as she stared at Taeyeon. “It’s not your fault. Please, don’t think it’s your fault.”

Taeyeon breathed in suddenly, trying to catch her breath upon hearing Krystal’s words, and then crawled toward them, releasing her tears as Gary and Krystal welcomed her into their arms.

Ji Hyo, watching Gary, Krystal, and Taeyeon huddled together and crying, began to cry then herself. Her sadness over Jessica reminded her of the sadness she had felt over Jae Suk, which then reminded her of Sido… and of Dream. She wished that she had never left the island. It all seemed so hopeless and purposeless. “Why are we doing this?” she asked, leaning her head against Jong Kook’s chest.

“What do you mean?” Jong Kook asked, putting his arm around her.

“I mean, what’s the point of it all?”

Jong Kook was taken aback by Ji Hyo’s question. He thought immediately of the base as the reason for everything they were doing, but then he lingered on that thought and began to slowly question everything he thought he knew. Camp Stanley seemed, at that point in their journey, to be this unattainable destination, like a mirage in the desert. Did it even exist at all? Jong Kook knew that Hyun Suk used to sit in his study each night, often looking over at the satellite phone and praying that someone would call. Was it possible that Hyun Suk had finally lost it and had imagined the phone call that he then told the others about? After all, no one but Hyun Suk was witness to that call, not even his wife, Eun Ju.

Thinking about this was overwhelming, like spinning along an endless downward spiral of doubt, and Jong Kook wondered then if he was only questioning Hyun Suk’s sanity because he was currently losing his own.

He was not alone in feeling somewhat crazy. Everyone continued to sit quietly in that conference room lost in their own doubt-filled thoughts as Ji Hyo’s question about purpose lingered in the air.

Across the room, Bom was leaning against T.O.P.’s chest, thinking back on that day they had left Sido. And then she remembered standing on the shore with T.O.P. when Hyun Suk had come over to hand him the satellite phone. Hyun Suk had told T.O.P. that there was a possibility his father would defy orders and come to rescue them. Bom remembered this conversation now as if it had just happened a moment ago. She could feel the warmth of that morning sun on her face, could hear the ocean, and could remember Hyun Suk’s exact words: I’m telling you, his voice was shaky when we talked. I could tell he wanted to defy those orders but… he knew that you weren’t in any immediate danger here. If the situation was different, if you were in trouble and had no way out, he would come get you if you called. I’m sure of it.

Bom sat up and tugged at T.O.P.’s sleeve. “Do you still have the satellite phone?” she asked.

Daesung and Minzy, sitting nearby, heard Bom’s question and leaned forward to listen.

“Do you still have it, hyung?” Daesung asked.

“I… I had with me in the truck,” T.O.P. said. “It was in the outside pocket of my backpack. But I didn’t see it after the crash.”

“What are you saying?” Dara asked. “You didn’t take the phone?”

“I didn’t have time to look for my pack!” T.O.P. yelled. “Jong Kook hyung said to just grab a weapon and hurry.”

“Erm…” Seungri said, but his voice was quickly overpowered by the others.

“I just meant to take the important things,” Jong Kook said. “The phone is just as important, if not more important than the weapons.”

“Hyung, you didn’t say that,” T.O.P. said, feeling defensive. “You said we didn’t have time and just needed to grab a weapon fast.”

“Erm…” Seungri said again, trying to interject.

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” T.O.P. said, his arms folded across his chest. “I know my father. He always follows orders. He wouldn’t come get us.”

“If we had the phone, we could at least try,” Minzy said.

“Will someone please let me talk?” Seungri yelled.

Everyone stared at Seungri then.

“What’s your problem, maknae?” G-Dragon asked.

“I don’t have a problem!” Seungri yelled. “The way you’re all acting is the problem, just going crazy and trying to blame each other.” He shook his head and then leaned forward to reach into his back pocket, pulling out the satellite phone. He held it up for everyone to see. “I grabbed the phone off the street after the crash. It was lying right next to my hammer.”

Everyone stared at the phone in Seungri’s hands, a feeling of such relief sweeping over them at that moment that their tense bodies then relaxed almost simultaneously.

CL immediately threw her arms around Seungri and began kissing him all crazily. “Oh my god, oh my god, Seungri-yah!” she yelled, as she planted wet, messy kisses all over his face.

Seungri blushed, his cheeks so red that they burned. CL had never acted like this before. She had always pulled away from him in the past if he even tried to kiss her cheek in front of the others. But now, she was all over him, completely unabashed by this public display of affection.

“I love you, Seungri-yah,” CL said, unable to stop kissing him.

“Aish, you two! Go find a room!” G-Dragon yelled, trying to hide his smile.

Seungri momentarily pulled away from CL’s kisses. “Ai, that’s not a bad idea,” he said, as he playfully tugged at CL’s shirt. “Maybe we can, erm, continue this in private?”

CL’s mouth fell open in a hanging smile.