until dawn!au : i

987w. (tw: gore)

crashing at someone's lodge in the dead of winter for a get-together with friends wasn't a bad idea, but what probably was was henry taking a bath without someone to keep watch over his clothing, because as soon as he heard the slam of the bathroom door, everything went to hell.

"guys? hello?" henry curiously calls out, taking his earbuds out and setting them on the porcelain side of the large tub. "are you messing around out there? i'm bathing, you creeps!"

getting no response, the young man decides to gingerly hop out of the now-lukewarm water, wrapping a white towel around his waist as he hunts for his clothes.

"are you ting me?" he asks aloud, more to himself than sincerely inquiring, as he finds a pair of socks left out of the mound of clothes that used to sit right beside the sink. "hey guys! eric!" he calls, voice echoing in the bathroom. "i know you probably think this is funny, but i really need my clothes back!"

there's no response once more, and he frowns before placing the socks back down. something feels wrong, and he is going to get to the bottom of this.

he brings his smartphone with him as he opens the door to welcome cool air and darkness, and  descends the level of steps, floor by floor, the flashlight function the only thing guiding him on the wood floors.

when he arrives on the first level, it hits him that something must be truly wrong; he knows that eric and peniel have gone off to check the power for the lighting and electricity outdoors, and min doubled back with amber to check for her bags near the start of the forest, but amy should still be here fooling around with some obscure thrift shop-worthy ouija board with jackson and donghae, and the fact that there is only silence greeting him instead of amy's boisterous carrying voice jars him.

"jackson?" he calls out in a worried voice. "donghae? if this is a prank, you guys, it's not funny. amy, where are you?" every step he takes, soft and wary on the cold floors, causes his trepidation to grow. "yejin?" he meekly summons. amy knows that henry would only use her korean name if he was serious.

there's a loud bang to his right, and he jumps as he veers, light shining on an open door that wasn't open before. the bolded words above read "cinema room." he remembers that it was locked the last time he tried to access it, but with a frown now permanently etched onto his face, he bravely storms in.

"hey, this isn't that funny," he shouts. "i want my clothes back, and i want you guys to stop this prank this instant."

at that, the cinema door slams shut behind him, and henry gapes. he runs to it to try to force it open, panic rushing into his blood, but it stays firmly shut and locked.

"oh, henry," a voice sighs in the room, projected from the speakers set in each upper corner. the voice was masked with some kind of machine, gravelly and low. "henry, henry, henry. how do you feel, being all alone?"

"let me out of here, jackson!" junghwan demands, now angry. "i knew you'd pull something dumb like this the moment we came back!"

"ah, but that's the kicker," the voice chuckles. "i'm not jackson. no, i'm not any of your friends, in fact, and what you should be more concerned about is the role you play in this little tale unfolding."

henry's mouth drops more in confusion. "tale unfolding-?" but he doesn't say more before the projector from the room above casts a light on the white screen in front, playing some footage. in it, he sees a young man with rebellious caramel hair, tying a towel around his waist... "hey, wait a minute-!"

"yes, i've been watching, henry," the unknown voice leers. "look at you, so innocent and unassuming. thinking that this was all a prank by your friends."

he watches himself search for his clothes onscreen, mouth agape in both confusion and fear. there was a camera in the bathroom? even jackson wasn't evil enough to do that.

the next scene, however, was much, much worse. in it, jackson and donghae are bound against a large board of wood, the set-up very saw-esque, and as they struggle in panic shinwoo shrieks in pain as a large industrial circular saw rips his torso clean in half. his lower half of his body slumps against the ground pitifully, jagged remnants of vital organs sitting exposed to the air, and the spray of blood looks so real that henry feels that he could get sprayed if in the line of fire.

he screams at the sight, clutching his phone to himself. "jesus christ, let me out of here! oh my god! donghae!"

"because i care for you so much, henry," the voice resumes, as if they didn't display someone henry knew getting brutally murdered onscreen, "i'm going to give you to the count of five to do something."

" you!" henry spits, and the baiting action has the voice clucking their tongue before the double doors to the cinema room slam open.

in the moonlight, a tall figure stands, dressed in bloodied overalls and wearing a rough sack over his head. the sack has a face stitched on in the same pattern that an old-fashioned scarecrow would be subjected to, and is no less frightening in the stranger's sudden entrance.

"are you going to run, henry?" they cackle. "what are you going to do?"

of course, to answer that, henry does what henry does best in a state of panic.

he reaches for the vase positioned a few inches away from where he was standing, grabs it, and hurtles it at the figure before bolting for the exit to the right.

—

until dawn!au : ii

356w.

coming back to the lodge is hard enough in the blizzard months, but coming back a year after The Incident is harder, and having to face min as she welcomes them on the front steps is the worst of all, despite her attitude still being more or less difficult to deal with.

"hey, min," amber greets, as they all set their luggage down and take a moment to catch their breaths.

"hi, amber," min replies, though she's more distracted by texting some unknown person rather than investing thought into her replies.

amber understands that min's aloof attitude, despite making her a to some in the group, is her way of exuding self-confidence and keeping it up in the public eye. she also understands that it's her way of coping after everything that's happened.

"hey," she begins cautiously, an amiable hand raised. "look, about the year before- "

min locks her screen with a precise movement, snapping her gum. "save it," she easily says as she stuffs her phone in her back pocket.

amber frowns. "i know we've said sorry before about what happened to suji, but honestly, i- "

"quit it," min harshly responds, and amber falls silent. "look, i just wanted to invite everyone up here again to make better memories, okay? i don't need an apology over my missing cousin who's probably dead." at the bluntness of that comment, amber winces, and min looks partially satisfied. "just... be cool, or whatever, okay? let it go."

oh, but how could she let it go? amber miserably thinks as min stomps away in the snow, ready to berate jackson for something he did once more. how could she forget suji, trusting, naive suji, that they lost to the blizzard? how could she disregard the look of utter despair and burning shame that flashed across her face, brush aside her heartbroken sobs as she ran out the door and into the whipping snow, never to be seen again?

what they did was cruel, and the price they paid for their prank-gone-too-far was the loss of one of their closest friends.

i'm sorry suji, amber miserably thinks.

—

until dawn!au : iii

314w.

“amber!” henry yells, panic flowing through his veins as he chases after the receding footsteps of the thing that took his friend. “amber, hang on!”

in his haste to retrieve the young woman, he forgets his jacket indoors, but the winter’s biting cold has no effect on an individual in the middle of a fight-or-flight attack. he ducks underneath trees, leaps over rocks, and scales past logs with relative ease, a rifle slung across his shoulder.

he hears amber's faint screams, carried to him by wind, and quickens. at one point, the wind grows strong enough to cause a branch to lash out at him across the face, almost as punishment for what occurred earlier in the cabin between the two, but henry grits his teeth and soldiers on.

the forest swallows the young woman's shouts as fast as she releases them, and when a fork in the road comes up he must decide where to turn. one wrong step could lead to her quick death, with him not there to chase after her.

after a small internal debate that lasted not only a second, henry decides to turn left, legs striding to lessen the distance between him and amber.

a patch of murky black icyness escapes his peripheral vision, and when he rounds a sharp corner in between towering trees, his feet find no sturdy ground underneath them.

with a loud yell, he slips on the ice and off a ledge, hands grappling for whatever they can find before he surely plummets to his death. whether because lady luck felt pity for him or not, henry takes swift hold of a gnarled root, large enough to cling onto, but too weak to use in pulling himself back up.

so here he is: the world’s worst best friend ever, perilously hanging over a ravine in the dead of winter and wearing a sleeveless tee.

—

a/n: whats up its your local piece of trash

these were gonna be diff aus but i had these already written n lyin around hHAHA