***

The house groaned and creaked as Tao continued his journey to find Jae. He wasn’t as disturbed by the dank dark hallways or the creepy wallpaper with eyes anymore as he had been. There was a slight sense of pride that he felt, for being able to keep on moving on his own through a haunted house. He felt good, knowing that his brothers were counting on him and were trusting him to save Jae. Of course, he had no way of knowing if he would actually succeed, nor if he would be able to find a way out of this place for everyone, but he was appreciative of the smaller victories. Which might end right now, when he was staring down a decrepit, smelly room that brought the fear of God back into him.

“Oh come on, what is this?” he whined, the oil lamps flickering in the old laboratory he saw before him. Tao probably wouldn’t have minded the strange jars on the shelves, or the weird contraptions and devices that were scattered across a broken table, if it weren’t for the other contents that were splayed on rows of tables in the room.

Tao really didn’t want to know what were in the dark, plastic bags on the tables, but due to the smell, he had a faint idea what they could contain. The story of the doctor that owned this mansion once, was becoming more real by the second and it gave Tao goosebumps beyond compare. Of all the rooms he had seen so far, he wasn’t sure whether he could go through this one alone.

“Please, please, please,” he begged, not sure for what, not sure why, but it seemed to help him to move forward, steering far from the body bags on the tables, pretending not to have seen a hand peeking out. Tao also made sure to stay away from the tall lockers that stood against the dirty, blood-soaked walls, out of fear that something might pop out of them.

“Okay, you’re fine, Tao, you’re fine. You’re almost out of here, just a little more, keep walking,” he muttered to himself, covering the lower part of his face to keep the smell out. He had neared the entrance of another dark corridor, feeling the sweet relief of almost leaving this horrid lab, when all of a sudden, his worst nightmare came true.

Tao had barely passed the last body bag, when whatever was inside of it, started moving. The sight of it alone had sent Tao jumping a mile into the air, jolting back as he screamed his lungs out, slamming against one of the lockers before he fell on the filthy floor. Seeing the goop he had landed in made him squeal even louder as he got to his feet and backed himself up against the wall.

The creature inside of the body bag started , much to Tao’s horror, before it struggled and trashed about in the body bag. Tao stared at the body bag with wide eyes, momentarily certain that his soul just left his body at the mere sight of it. What was he supposed to do about this?! Was this another monster that came back to life to haunt him and attack him? What should he do?!

Noticing a metal bar on the floor, Tao immediately took his chance and grabbed it to arm himself. The creature in the body bag had started and wailing, the sound of it muffled. When Tao saw it rising, he immediately smacked it with the metal bar, hearing it moan out in pain. Tao panted, standing over the thing with the metal bar still raised over his head.

“Just s-stay down, you hear me?! I-I’ll hit you again if you move! I r-really will!” his voice shook and came out in a squeaky pitch, but he thought he did well to bring the message across as the body bag had stopped moving for a moment. Then, to his horror, he heard the body bag speaking to him.

“Tao?”

Tao squeaked when he heard his muffled name coming from the body bag.

“Tao, is that you? Yah! Let met out of this thing!”

After a moment of utter bewilderment, Tao blinked and lowered the metal bar. “Huh?” he wondered, looking at the struggling body bag. “AH! Suho-hyung?!” he quickly dropped the metal bar with a clatter, ping the body bag when he recognized the voice.

Sure enough, Suho gasped for breath, quickly stepping out of the body bag with Tao’s help before leaning on his knees to calm himself down.

“Su-hyung! It’s really you! Wah, I’m sorry for hitting you, I thought you were a zombie!” Tao immediately apologized, embracing the dorky leader with utmost joy. Suho was sweaty and even paler than usual, but he was happily clinging to Tao as well.

“Aish, Tao-yah, I’m so happy you’re here,” he spoke, knees still shaking. “I thought I was going to die in that thing,” he shook his head as he pulled a face of disgust, looking like he’s aged twenty years. “How weirdly efficient would that have been?” he squeaked out, laughing nervously at his own silly joke.

“Hyung, what happened?” Tao asked, helping Suho straighten himself up a bit, and giving him the support he needed to walk away from the body bag he had just been trapped in.

“I don’t know, Tao, I really don’t. I was surprised that I made it this far, but apparently there was something here that didn’t like how far I got and I got attacked. I was knocked out and then I woke up in that thing and I just flipped,” Suho explained, holding his stomach where Tao had hit him.

“Sorry again, about that, hyung,” Tao apologized, “I really thought you were a monster.”

“It’s okay, I would have done the same thing,” Suho admitted sheepishly, looking close to suffering from a nervous breakdown.

“I’m glad you’re okay, though, hyung. Do you think you can keep going?” Tao asked in concern of the leader, noticing how his eyes were shaking and how much he was sweating.

“Yeah, please, don’t leave me alone in this place,” he urged as the both of them clung to each other. “How did you make it this far on your own, Tao-yah?” Suho then asked curiously, though it was obvious that he was trying to distract himself from all the terrifying things around them.

“To be honest, I didn’t just do it on my own, hyung. I met Lay-ge and Lu-ge in the foyer of the mansion and they helped me go on when Kris-ge saved me from this mirror monster in the mirror maze. That one was really creepy,” he regaled, shuddering a bit. “He went back for Lay-ge and Lu-ge and then I saved Baekhyun from this creepy gypsy woman.”

“Ah, you met that gypsy too, huh? She didn’t want to let me go, I had to fight my way out and then I ran like hell,” Suho chuckled weakly, taking deep and steady breaths. Tao could only imagine how much the leader was trying his best not to flip out right here and now.

“Oh! That gypsy woman never told me where I could find Jae!” he then exclaimed, looking agitated and disappointed in himself.

“It’s okay, hyung. Jae-noona is in the library. The gypsy said that she was taken by the doctor and that we didn’t have much time left,” Tao explained as they finally left the laboratory behind them.

“The library? The doctor? Oh no… We have to hurry then,” Suho said as Tao nodded.

They followed the corridor, walking fast, until they heard loud screaming coming from a cabinet they had just passed by. Startled, the two of them froze in place, clinging to each other. The cabinet was large to house another hidden monster, shaking and swinging from side to side. Something knocked violently against it from inside of it, screaming loudly.

“Tao, let’s go,” Suho urged in a faint whisper, but Tao found himself hesitating. He had, after all, just recovered Suho from a freaking body bag, thinking he was a monster. What if the creature in the cabinet was one of their brothers? He couldn’t leave them behind if that was the case. Then again, he had never heard such loud screaming before. It could be another monster, a dark creation that even the doctor had to lock up after whatever experiments he conducted on the beast in the laboratory…

>>> YOU’RE THINKING ABOUT THIS ONE, SERIOUSLY? IGNORE IT BEFORE IT BREAKS THROUGH THAT CABINET! <<<
>>> INVESTIGATE! IT COULD BE SOMEONE WHO NEEDS HELP! <<<