Choi Geonwoo stops his motorcycle in the middle of the road, waiting for the light to turn green. It’s late, almost four am, and he can still smell the cigarettes and alcohol on his leather jacket. His wife never liked his college friends, and today he’s giving her another reason to dislike them even further - that is, keeping her husband away from their home and kids on a week day.

It’s been raining and the road is shining. Tiny droplets of water illuminate with the red traffic signs. There’s no one around, he probably could just drive ahead (it’s not like he has to wait for any cars to pass), but he was never a man that breaks rules.

Until someone suddenly jumps onto the back of his motorcycle and shouts “Drive!”, that is.

Geonwoo doesn’t know why he does what he’s being said. Maybe it’s the utter rush and hurry in the girl’s voice, maybe it’s the sudden, surprising pressure on his hips and waist as she holds tight onto it, or maybe it’s the horrifying sound of something right behind his back that makes him take off with the loud growl of his motorcycle’s engine.

He revs the motorcycle to life so quickly and so suddenly that the tires spin on their own at first, creating long, black lines on the road when he finally gets his lovable bike to move; just as he passes the intersection, the lights turn green, but he can’t see that, because he’s already driving forward, having broken the first rule in his life, probably.

He looks at the side mirror to see a girl behind him, and he goes to panic mode. She doesn’t have a helmet on, her long hair is trashing around with the wind, and she’s looking at something behind them, on the road. Geonwoo takes a quick peak at the right side mirror and panics even further, because there’re five weird creatures running after them.

Chasing them.

They’re white, bare, but it’s hard to pinpoint their gender; they look pretty much genderless. He can see their muscles shift, though, beneath their pale skin, he can see how fast they’re going, and he can see their faces, their open mouths, and crazy, huge eyes. The creatures have their arms straightened up in front of them, as if ready to catch Geonwoo and the girl any time, as if playing tag.

“What the ,” he swears loudly, twisting his wrist and forcing his bike to go even faster. Suddenly, he’s thankful that it’s so late at night, maybe the cops won’t catch him—

, the cops are the least of his worries, what the heck are those things chasing him?

“Forest!” the girl screams, pointing at the hard left turn with hurry in her voice.

Geonwoo doesn’t know why he’s listening to her, again. Maybe because he suddenly got involved in some freak show, or maybe because he now feels that it’s his responsibility to get the girl the away from whatever it is she got herself into, or maybe it’s just panic working him. Panic and regret.

So he drives. And God, he drives for his life.

He looks at the side mirror again. The girl is doing something weird with her hands. Is she trying to snap her fingers? She is. She’s staring at right hand intently, snapping her fingers with growing agitation, harder and faster with every snap. She’s not holding onto him, he realizes, too busy doing—whatever she’s doing.

And then he sees an actual spark snap out of her fingers, like a lighter.

She twists her body to the side, so that her right hand is where the end of Geonwoo’s bike is, and she snaps her fingers again.

The spark that erupts from them transforms into a huge flame that flies right at the creatures chasing them. Geonwoo sees the fire catching onto two of the white bodies, hear their shriek, piercing even over the sound of his motorcycle’s engine. He shivers, wrists and legs becoming flaccid out of fear, and his bike sways dangerously as he forgets he’s supposed to drive it.

The girl loses some of the balance and grabs his waist again with a yelp. Her eyes are red now, probably because of the wind, and her hair is still flying around crazily, smacking her on the face and neck.

He reaches the forest, and at this point, away from the city lights, he can see less. It’s the full moon night, so the road is still fairly visible, and the monsters are still white as ever, but he can barely see the girl.

He sees sudden movement on his right side and then there’s a guy running right next to them, running as fast as his motorcycle is going without breaking a single sweat. He shouts something he doesn’t catch and then throws something thick, long and silver to the girl that's still sitting on his bike.

He’s gone mental. He’s inhaled some alcohol fumes, or there’s weird oil in his bike, there has to be some explanation for what he’s seeing.

He sees the girl catch the thing. It looks like a very long metal pipe, probably longer than he’s tall, and she swings it behind her back, knows how, just as one of the monsters shrieks and picks up its pace. The creature jumps; Geonwoo sees it in the side mirror, sees its long, lean limbs, and tries to make his bike go faster, but it’s impossible. He’s never drove this fast in his life and if he makes a single mistake now, he’s gonna crash and die.

He looks into the mirror again, eyes snapping between that and the road, and he sees the monster impale itself on the metal pipe the girl is holding. His motorcycle jerks to the side with the sudden, additional weight and pressure, and he screams, almost falling off the road and into the forest. The girl on his back screams as well, the pipe with the monster on it and its weight making her muscles give out. She tilts to the left, almost falling off the bike, but she somehow goes back into a sitting position without even touching Geonwoo. The metal pipe falls out of her hand, but before it does, it catches on fire, sending the flames right into the monster, frying it from inside.

Geonwoo looks at the road, shivering all over, sweaty as ever, and so adrenaline driven he doesn’t think about how crazy he is anymore. He sees movement again and two white monsters jump out from the forest, on both sides of the road, right in front of him. He wants to hit the brakes, but he doesn’t. The girl holds her arms out on both sides of his head and snaps her fingers – both her left’s and right’s hands – in the same time.

Flames erupt right next to Geonwoo’s head, long stripes of fire hitting the monsters like some freaking flamethrowers; he doesn’t have the time to admire the work, because they’re driving too fast. They drive past the monsters only to see another three right in the middle of the road.

“!” Geonwoo screams, hands twitching around the brakes.

“Don’t!” the girl screams, hands latching around his elbows.

He doesn’t have to hit the brakes. Again.

Because a huge black wolf jumps out from the forest, its enormous head literally throwing the white creatures out of the way, its single movement throwing all three into the air. The girl raises her arms again, right next to his head, using his shoulders to prop her elbows on, and she screams when she snaps her fingers this time.

The flames are bigger this time, flying up into the air, and hitting the monsters a second before they fall back onto the sides of the road. Geonwoo has long past driven past them by then, but he can see their burning bodies in the mirrors, hear their shrieks.

And then the wolf runs out of the smoke their bodies create, its huge, muscled body catching up to them in no time.

He’s bigger than Geonwoo’s bike. Heck, he’s bigger than his car, probably, and he’s right behind them, running, its tongue out. But the girl isn’t attacking him – burning him? – and he’s just saved them from three monsters, so he can’t be an enemy.

Geonwoo realizes that his way of thinking just got seriously weird. Maybe his wife was right when she said that one day his friends are gonna drug him and he’s not even going to realize? Maybe today was the day and he totally fell for it, and now he’s high as a kite, seeing white monsters, flame-throwing girls and wolves bigger than his Toyota?

He wants to stop. He wants to slow down and stop, and they’re long past the city’s border, probably ing dozens of kilometers away from the city, actually, and there’s no more monsters in sight chasing them, but it’s literally ten seconds after the wolf has caught up to them that someone materializes in front of the bike, out of thin air.

And it’s a human. It’s a guy.

So Geonwoo hits the breaks.

And they fly.

The sudden jerk is strong enough to make his head whiplash. He hits something with his helmet, realizes that he probably hit the girl, and the bike stops on its front tire, centimeters from the guy that suddenly showed up on the road. He feels his body fly, he makes a freaking somersault in the air, and he braces for the incoming impact, hearing his bike hitting the road in the distance. It lasts milliseconds, the whole thing, and yet, everything seems to slow down.

He hits the ground gentler than he imagined he would. Actually, he doesn’t hit it at all, it’s like someone catches him and settles him down gently, careful not to hurt him. And when he’s on the ground, he sees the girl literally fly by him, her body thrown off the bike.

She’s not wearing a helmet like he is. She might die.

He’s landed on the grass; the girl lands on the road. The impact isn’t as strong as he’d have suspected. She has her hands weirdly stretched out, as if trying to do something, and when she hits the road, she lets out a yelp and rolls, rolls, rolls, hunched shoulders and arms she’s now embraced herself with, taking all the impact.

He looks at the road. He sees his bike lying there, he sees the black wolf trashing its head around, and he sees the guy Geonwoo tried to avoid hitting in the wolf’s mouth. The animal throws him at the nearby trees, disappearing in the shadows for a moment, and then there’s bright light erupting in-between the trees.

Someone screams very loudly.

Geonwoo looks to the side, at the flame-throwing girl, to see her staring at him. He tries to wreck his helmet off and he stands up, but his legs are too wobbly, and he’s too shocked to stay up. He falls onto his knees.

He looks up again and the girl nods at him, her eyes a bit sad. Then she waves her hand at him and everything goes black.

*

Choi Geonwoo wakes up in a hospital. That’s not a good thing. His wife hates hospitals.

“Mr. Choi?” someone asks. He blinks, looks to the side, and sees a nurse standing next to his bed, looking at him with something akin to relief. “You’re awake, good. How are you feeling?”

“Groggy,” he replies. “What happened?”

“You were in an accident,” the woman explains. “A deer jumped out on the road in front of you.”

“Oh,” Geonwoo says. “Did I hit it?”

“You did not,” the nurse replies with a smile.

“What about my bike then?”

“No worries, it’s whole. Just a few scratches from when it hit the road. You pretty much catapulted out of the bike, but you landed on the grass, so there’s not much damage. We’d still like you to stay for a few brain damage tests, though.”

“Yes, of course,” Geonwoo says, nodding. He’s confused. Was it really what happened? He does remember driving through a forest, and he does remember a deer jumping out in front of him, but it doesn’t feel like it’s memories. “Is my wife here?”

“She’s filling out the papers,” the nurse says. She goes to check on his IV – why does he have an IV? – and smiles at him when she’s done. “A doctor will come to see you shortly.”

“Thank you.”

The nurse leaves and he stares at his hands.

“A deer, huh,” he mutters, clenching his fists a few times, feeling a bit high. He blames it on the hospital drugs. They must’ve given him some.

A few minutes later he leaves his bed on a wheelchair, even though he feels very capable of walking on his own, and the doctor tells him what kind of tests they have to do (to make sure he doesn’t have a concussion) and his wife is on a verge of crying next to him.

“Darling,” he says, interrupting the doctor. “I’m alright. Never felt better. It was like landing on a trampoline.”

She outward sobs, taking his hand into her palm and swearing at him under her nose.

Geonwoo laughs at her. The doctor leads his wheelchair through the corridor, and Geonwoo looks to the right.

He sees a couple sitting on a bench by the wall, a black-haired boy in a leather jacket and a girl with tattoos on her arms. When their eyes meet, the girls smiles, and the boy seems to sigh with relief.

Geonwoo frowns. Has he seen then somewhere?