“Watch your back!” Rina yelled.

Hyun Suk spun around and sliced through the zombie’s skull in a downward slash, the blade parting the two hemispheres of the ghoul’s infected brain. It was such a good kill that Hyun Suk wished he could follow it up with some action hero groan-inducing pun – something like “Looks like you got a lot on your mind!” or “Talk about a split personality!” – but there was no time for showing off. After all, the battle they were in the middle of wasn’t some action movie scene; it was real. And the hundreds of zombies coming for them were real, too… and they were hungry.

“Another one to your right!” Se7en called out.

As Hyun Suk continued to slash the zombies nearest to them, Se7en and Rina worked with the grenades to take out the surrounding hordes. Se7en was throwing the grenades by hand, destroying the zombies that had found their way around the house to the beach out back. Rina, meanwhile, was using the grenade launcher to target the zombies up by the road in front and stop them before they could even set foot on the property.  

Se7en glanced over at the makeshift armory behind the house – once the Full House Mart – and yelled toward those inside. “We’re low on grenades! Hurry!”

Out of that armory emerged the two newcomers to the island: Jung Jihoon, otherwise known as Rain, and SNSD maknae Seohyun. They were the last members of their own group of survivors and had fled Seoul just two days earlier, arriving at the northern shoreline of Sido via a small motorboat with the hope that the island would be as tranquil as it was when Rain had filmed the Full House drama there. Neither of them had expected to see other survivors living on Sido, much less people they knew. And neither of them – nor any of the others – had expected that the tranquility wouldn’t last.

Sometime during the night, the zombies from the larger island of Sindo had broken through the barricade on the bridge connecting Sindo to Sido. They had wandered the island throughout those dark hours in search of food, eventually reaching the northern shoreline at the break of dawn where they finally found what they were looking for.

Eun Ju stood at the bedroom window on the second floor of the Full House house, watching what was happening below. That morning, when Hyun Suk had awoken to the sight of zombies everywhere, he ordered Eun Ju and Kyung Eun into that bedroom with the children while he raced outside to fight with the others. With every hour that had passed since, the women had grown increasingly anxious and the children increasingly cranky.

“When can we leave this room, omma?” little Ji Ho asked for the third time that hour. He climbed closer on the bed to Kyung Eun. “Omma, when?”

Kyung Eun sighed and looked at the boy. “Soon, baby,” she said, as she pulled him against her chest and hugged him tightly, wishing that the little boy’s father, Jae Suk, was still alive to comfort his son… and to comfort her. She missed her late husband terribly. Trying to shake off her grief, Kyung Eun glanced over at Eun Ju, who was still standing by the window. “Anything?” she asked.

Eun Ju shrugged. “Rain and Seohyun brought them more grenades,” she said, as she continued to blankly watch the action happening below.

“They’re going to run out soon,” Kyung Eun whispered, being careful to keep her voice low so as not to scare her son or the other children. She wished now that they had all escaped to the yacht, but they had no way of knowing how drawn-out this battle would be against what was seemingly an endless influx of the undead. Still though, she wished that they had done something… anything other than what they were doing now. “This can’t go on forever,” she quietly added.

At that moment, the whispered worries in that bedroom gave way to the rhythmic beating of helicopter blades in the distance. Kyung Eun sat up in bed with wide eyes. Eun Ju glanced back at her with the same surprised expression.

Those outside heard the helicopters, too, and instinctively looked up and searched the sky, but their attention was quickly drawn back to the battle around them. As they continued to fight, they could hear the helicopters getting closer and soon they saw the two Black Hawks circling ahead, hovering over the area. Just then, each helicopter let down a rope, the ends of which landed directly on the house’s second floor deck.

Lieutenant Colonel Choi worked to maintain control of the hovering helicopter while glancing back at Jong Kook, who was standing by the open door of the passenger cabin holding onto the rope as the wind whipped around him. Unlike the ZORT soldier on the other helicopter who was about to descend down his rope, Jong Kook didn’t have any experience with pararescue and was relying solely on the instructions Lieutenant Colonel Choi had been shouting from the cockpit.

“Be sure that belt is fastened tight!” Lieutenant Colonel Choi said.

Jong Kook was attached to the rope by that belt fastened around his waist. He had already checked to make sure that it was fastened properly but double-checked that again now.

“You got the pulley system down?” Lieutenant Colonel Choi asked.

Jong Kook understood what he had to do. “I’m ready!” he yelled.

“Be careful!” Ji Hyo said, as she brought her hand to to hide her worried face. She was confident that Jong Kook could accomplish any task no matter how difficult, but there were so many variables at play in this mission – so many things not in his control, so many things that could go wrong. He would be sliding down a rope from a hovering helicopter to that wooden deck below, which was situated just one story up from hundreds of zombies on the ground, at which time he would hook himself to one of the Sido survivors, hoist himself back up the rope to the helicopter cabin to drop off that first rescued person, and then slide back down for the next rescue attempt. It was a crazy impromptu plan devised by Lieutenant Colonel Choi in communication with the ZORT soldiers in the other helicopter just five minutes earlier when they had seen that Sido had fallen to the zombies and that the survivors on the ground below were fighting to stay alive… to stay survivors.

It was the only way.

The second-floor deck of the Full House house was rather large with wooden boards extending far out for a full view of the seascape out back. Eun Ju and Kyung Eun, seeing what was happening with the ropes, had run out to that deck with the children and the dog in tow, anxious for rescue. As Jong Kook began to slide down his rope and the ZORT soldier did the same on his, Eun Ju quickly ran to the side of the deck to call out for Hyun Suk. “Forget fighting those things!” she yelled. “Get up here now!”

Hyun Suk lowered the black cap on his head to block the late afternoon sun as he looked up at the deck, seeing his beautiful wife looking back at him. “Don’t worry!” he yelled. “Just get the children onto that helicopter. I’ll be there in a minute!” He then stopped and surveyed the scene on the ground. He’d been fighting for so long without a chance until now to really see the effects of all that fighting. The earth had been blown to bits from the grenades, leaving massive craters everywhere. Filling those craters and scattered across the ground elsewhere were body parts of zombies that had been hit by the explosives – heads, limbs, full torsos…

It was a warzone… and the war was unending. Se7en and Rina were still blowing zombies away only to see more coming when the smoke cleared. Hyun Suk realized that they couldn’t just all stop and retreat into the house at once. Someone needed to stay behind and fend off any zombies closing in… and it seemed, as he was the only one with a weapon that could be used in close quarters, that it would be him staying. He breathed in deeply, trying to gather his courage, and then called out to Rain and Seohyun. “You both need to get inside now and up to that deck!” He then looked over at Se7en and Rina. “You two go follow them!”

“What about you?” Se7en asked.

“I’ll be right behind you,” Hyun Suk said. “I’m going to keep these monsters off you in the meantime.”

“You sure?” Rain asked. “I can stay, too, and…”

“Yah, this is my house and I make the rules!” Hyun Suk said, smiling for the first time that day.

“We’re not going to get into that again, are we?” Rain asked. Ever since Rain arrived two days earlier, he and Hyun Suk had been engaged in somewhat of a playful argument over to whom, exactly, the house belonged. Rain had argued that because it stood as a tourist attraction for the Full House drama, and because he was the star of that drama, the house should be considered his. Hyun Suk had countered by telling Rain that the original Full House house was destroyed in a typhoon and that he had bought the property and rebuilt the house, and so it was therefore his. But Rain said that there were no property deeds or laws anymore in this new world, and so none of that mattered. Hyun Suk replied that there were no K-dramas anymore and so that didn’t matter either.

“You just want to stay and fight to keep this house!” Hyun Suk yelled.

“Aish, this is hardly the time to joke around!” Rain said. He noticed a zombie approaching from around the back corner of the house then and pointed it out to Hyun Suk. “You got one behind you! Stop worrying about whose house it is and worry about yourself!”

“Yah, you don’t tell me what to worry about!” Hyun Suk said. He turned around and decapitated the zombie with a quick slice of his katana and then turned back to Rain, wishing once again that he had a cheesy pun to utter in the aftermath of another good kill.

From up on the deck, Eun Ju watched her husband and felt like she was going crazy. She could see that he was more relaxed now that the helicopters were there and hated that he wasn’t taking the situation seriously. “Yeobo, if you don’t get up here in two minutes, I’m divorcing you!”

“Aish, woman!” Hyun Suk yelled. “Fine, fine…” He yelled again for Se7en, Rina, Rain, and Seohyun to get inside and waited until they had made it to the side door before he began slowly backing away from the zombies and making his way to the door, too. 

Jong Kook had just succeeded in hoisting himself back up to the helicopter with Kyung Eun hooked to his belt and the baby Dream cradled between them. Seeing this, Ji Hyo quickly made her way across the shaky cabin toward the open door, holding on tight to the edges of the nearby seats so as not to lose her balance until she reached Jong Kook. With one hand clutching onto Jong Kook’s arm, and the other holding her chest, as if trying to calm her heart, she gazed at little Dream sleeping in Kyung Eun’s arms and began to cry.

“My baby boy,” she said, the tears streaking down her cheeks.

Kyung Eun handed Dream over to her. “I took good care of him,” she said. “He’s happy and as beautiful as ever.”

Ji Hyo nodded, whispered her thanks, and carefully accepted the baby into her arms. Jong Kook finished unhooking Kyung Eun from his waist and wished so badly that he could stay for the reunion of his family, but he knew that there were more people to get and so he breathed in deeply, promised Kyung Eun he’d get little Ji Ho next, and then slid back down that rope again.

The ZORT soldier had already made two trips in the time it had taken Jong Kook to make one, as he was faster due to his experience, and just set down the rope for the third time.

Now on board that helicopter, having been retrieved by the soldier, were Eun Ju and her two children – three-year-old daughter, Yoo Jin, and two-year-old son, Seung Hyun. Krystal helped the children get seated in the passenger cabin, both of whom were whimpering. “It’s okay,” she said. “It was a scary ride but now it’s over.”

Eun Ju smiled. “Thank you for coming back for us,” she said, biting her lip to keep her emotions at bay. “I can’t even express… just… the timing…” But her words trailed off then when she noticed Minzy in the backseat. Eun Ju glanced down at Minzy’s bandaged hand and then up at Daesung. “Was she bit?”

Daesung nodded and introduced Eun Ju to the scientist, explaining then about the vaccine and how Minzy’s body had fought off the infection. “She just needs some time to rest, but she’ll be okay,” he said. He looked down at Minzy’s peaceful expression as she slept with her head still resting on his shoulder.

Taeyeon looked back at Daesung and Minzy and then over at Eun Ju with her two children, seeing all of the relief and happiness reflected on their faces and knowing in her heart that things would be okay… not just temporarily, but forever. They were going to make it. They were going to survive and rejoin civilization and live normal lives. Maybe she would sing again. Maybe she would find love. Maybe…

Her thoughts were startled by the ZORT soldier returning from his third rescue, his body hanging out of the helicopter as his arms reached up to hoist himself higher on the rope. With one foot squarely positioned inside the helicopter, he swung his body around so that Seohyun was positioned safely inside and then worked to unhook her from his belt.

When Taeyeon saw Seohyun, she gasped.

“Oh my god,” Krystal said, standing up from her seat.

Taeyeon couldn’t move. She clutched onto Gary beside her, almost as if not believing that what she was seeing was real and needing to feel something tangible, something to signify that this was not a dream. “How is this possible?” she asked, her eyes wide as she slowly stood from her seat.

“Unnie!” Seohyun exclaimed, completely shocked to see her leader. Now unhooked from the belt, she ran to Taeyeon, the two nearly falling over as they tried to maintain their balance on the hovering aircraft.

“How?” Taeyeon asked, as she continued hugging her maknae. “How…?”

Seohyun parted from the hug. “Rain saved me,” she said. “If it wasn’t for him…”

“Jihoon?” Taeyeon asked.

Seohyun nodded.

“I’m going to kiss that boy,” Taeyeon said.

Both Krystal and Seohyun stared at Taeyeon, their mouths hanging open. “Unni!” they exclaimed.

“I mean it!” Taeyeon said. “I’m going to kiss him right on the lips the moment I see him!”

On the deck below, Rain was in the process of being hooked to the ZORT soldier’s belt while Jong Kook, having just returned from bringing Kyung Eun’s son to the helicopter, was now working on hooking Rina. Only Hyun Suk, Se7en, and the dog, Caesar, remained.

“It’s about time you got here,” Hyun Suk said, teasing Jong Kook. “You tell that Jiyong that I’m mad as hell you all waited until our lives were dangling by a damn noose out here with these zombies.”

Jong Kook bit his lip. “Jiyong’s not with us,” he said.

“What do you mean?” Hyun Suk asked, as his smile disappeared.

Jong Kook explained about the sudden evacuation and flight to Australia but couldn’t say with certainty that G-Dragon was on the plane. “I’m sure he made it though,” Jong Kook said, upon seeing how devastated Hyun Suk looked.

Hyun Suk cleared his throat. “Well, anything else I should know?”

Jong Kook sighed and bit his lip. “Both helicopters are low on fuel,” he said.

“Aish,” Hyun Suk said. “Nothing is ever completely easy for us, eh?”