SIX.

—

Surviving an apocalypse is one thing.

But surviving to pass on the wishes of the dead was another thing.

—

Jin Joo smiled lifelessly. “Perfect.”

The windows were constantly shaking and cracking, rotten blood and spittle of the zombies smearing over them as the dead kept banging the glass, which was the very last stronghold of the four people inside the room. Three stupefied, one bitten. And the glass that functioned like a barrier defending them seemingly wouldn’t last much longer. The situation was beyond help.

Ignoring another inescapable threat from behind them, the three college students and the policeman were motionlessly staring at the mass of frightening creatures that seemed to keep appearing from everywhere at once. The zombies aggressively smashed themselves against the glass of the windows, breaking their own skulls and bones, tearing their own flesh.

What a sickening sight. Seung Kwan couldn’t bear it anymore and he dropped to his knees, clamping his hand over his mouth as a wave of nausea swept over him from both fear and disgust.

Suddenly, there was a sound of glass shattering. They turned around in unison to see that the glass panel on the door behind them had been broken by the violent force of the dead. Bloody hands were stretched out towards them. Hideous, groaning faces were trying to squeeze through the narrow gap. And the door would soon be breached as it continued to rattle terribly on its hinges from all the deafening bangs, slams, and thuds.

Jin Joo glanced down at Seung Kwan who could no longer stand on his feet. His face had the sickly pale color of those whose hearts stopped beating as they were caught in the headlights on the middle of a road. Then she looked at Won Woo, and she was a bit surprised when the older guy gazed back at her. Cold sweat was rolling down his temples, and even though he looked the calmest in such a snowballing calamity, she saw the muscles in his jaw clench out of repressed dread.

When she turned her face to the other side to check on the policeman, she couldn’t help but admire the young officer whose bravery remained unshaken despite the certain doom that was about to set on them. He took a step forward in front of them in a protective gesture, his gun raised. He seemed like a good, innocent officer who prioritized the citizens over his own safety, which unfortunately made him look pitiful. Because they would all die in a moment.

“Know what?” Jin Joo broke the silence first, making them all look at her. “It’s not too late to die now,” she said with a small smile. “While we’re still human.”

Her tone was calm and light. Something in it hinted at unaffected playfulness as if she wanted to cheer them up, but the complete seriousness of her words was like a sudden chilly breeze that froze them on the spot.

“Four bullets are enough for all of us,” she continued. “It will only hurt at first, but after that, you’ll be free from all pain and fear. You won’t have to suffer anymore.”

There was no reply.

Not even from Seung Kwan who vehemently went against the idea of committing suicide before.

“Aren’t you tired of trying?” Jin Joo asked them and lifted her hand closer to her face, inspecting the unsightly teeth mark embedded in her palm. “... of living?”

The bite wound was familiar in the eyes of Choi Seung Cheol, the policeman. And when the shocking realization dawned on him, his eyes were immediately filled with panic. He backed away with trained reflexes and aimed his gun at Jin Joo with his finger on the trigger.

But if there was anything that abruptly stopped him from shooting her, it was the sudden grip of a guilty conscience that sent shock waves through him, for wanting to kill the girl who had saved him at the cost of her life.

“Did you… did you get bitten by her?” he asked in a slow raspy voice, directing a quick glance at his dead female partner.

“No,” Jin Joo replied, straight-faced. “Her.” She pointed at the other female corpse.

The policeman’s eyes were wide with a mix of disbelief and horror. “But how could you—”

“Stay human?” She suddenly stole the words from his mouth. “Only God knows,” she said again. Mirthlessly. “I won’t stay human for long though.”

With questioning eyes, Won Woo also looked down at the corpse that almost ended his life. But what was the use of being curious? In the end, it was only a matter of time. How long they could survive and when they would be killed. And definitely, there was no more time left for them to pursue the unsolvable mystery. “This one was bitten,” he joined the conversation unconsciously, “but somehow she managed to stay human for half an hour or so until she began to transform and attack us.”

The young policeman gasped, incredulous. In a string of broken words, he then asked, “So, so… people who are bitten by these living dead creatures… not… not all of them will immediately transform?”

Won Woo nodded.

“But if you think there’s a ray of hope from this discovery, you’re absolutely wrong, Sir.” Jin Joo told the policeman but looked at Won Woo. Her gaze was intense and unwavering, sending him a warning sign that he couldn’t defy. “I was struggling here to knock some sense into their thick skulls. To make them leave. Because sooner or later I’ll turn into a monster anyway, but these two damn fools…” She paused for a moment, a wry grin on her face. “They thought that there would, probably, be some kind of miracle that could change the situation. And then suddenly, you appeared.”

“I…” The policeman looked at her apologetically. “I’m not this miracle you’re expecting to see, am I?”

“Unfortunately not,” she answered blatantly.

“Did I make everything worse?”

She pointed at the rampaging zombies behind the cracked glass. “I can’t even imagine anything worse than this.”

A dead silence then fell upon them all.

Meanwhile, furious growls, groans, and gurgling rattles of the living corpses were getting louder, reverberating through the room.

Slowly, shakily, the young policeman lowered his gun and stared down at it. A resigned sigh was then heard. “We only live and die once, don’t we?” He smiled grimly. “Let’s keep it that way.”

Jin Joo looked at the policeman’s side profile observantly. And it took only a short while for her to quickly recognize the peculiar expression on his tired and joyless face. That was the calm before the storm. That was the expression of someone who confronted his doubt and fear before taking their own life. She then looked back and forth between the door and the window, at the swarms of zombies who were rawly driven by the implacable single-mindedness to kill anyone who came into contact with them.

There was no way out. Her previous plan failed as soon as she decided to let the policeman join them. But every cell of her brain refused to give in. The thought of making an escape route continued to push its own way into her head. She once again looked around the room, with searching eyes, thinking, and thinking.

There was a tall, steel storage cabinet that then caught Jin Joo’s attention. The same cabinet whose deep shadow could hide the girl named Shin Na Young before. Adjacent to it, right at the left front corner of the room, a heavy black drape hung down all the way from the ceiling to the floor. And Jin Joo stood unbudged like a statue staring fixedly at the two objects as her brain was processing the visual information, temporarily ignoring the noise around her. Her face grew taut, her brow knit in a concentrated frown.

Won Woo was watching Jin Joo’s silent profile, knowing that she was carefully orchestrating something in her head again. Besieged by voracious zombies should have made him wilt with fear, or cry in hysterics because soon he would be killed or kill himself. But funnily enough, he found himself looking at Jin Joo closely, feeling nothing but curiosity, marveled at the unforeseen capabilities hidden in her small body. And much more at her altruism.

But Won Woo wasn’t unaware of the bite wound on her palm—an unsightly wound from which fresh blood was still gushing out and dripping down onto the floor. The price she regretlessly paid for his life. And as time passed, he felt an unknown sharp twinge in his chest.

Then suddenly, her expression changed. Won Woo was startled. Her eyes widened and she unconsciously took a wobbly step back. As if she had just seen a ghost.

“Hwang Jin Joo.”

A small voice inside her head suddenly made her step back. It was resentful. But not hers.

“I swear I’ll never let you off easy. I’ll make you pay for your sins.”

“Jin Joo.” Without a second thought, Won Woo caught her body as her mind was shifted back to reality. “What’s the matter?”

“I remember someone…” She smiled, but her eyes reflected the obvious hurt. “Min Gyu sunbaenim.”

“Min Gyu?”

“I haven’t properly apologized to him.”

Jin Joo slowly pulled herself away from Won Woo and walked toward the tall storage cabinet. “I haven’t properly apologized to him,” she repeated dryly. Her shoulders shook as she choked out a low laugh. But the other three pairs of ears could unmistakably hear the unspoken pain in her little laugh. She reached the storage cabinet and tried to pull its doors. Unluckily, they were all locked. “,” she swore openly out of desperation. Her bloody hands tightened convulsively on both of the cabinet’s door handles. “Why do I still want to fight when I’m so ready to in’ die?” she gritted.

Now enraged, Jin Joo turned around and hauled Seung Kwan up off the floor.

“Boo Seung Kwan. Man up!” she yelled into his ear, grabbing him by the collar of his shirt quite savagely that she snapped a button and sent it arcing across the room. “Would you like to have some fun before you die?”

The brown-haired guy just stared at her, flabbergasted by the dark humor in her sudden question.

“Let’s gamble.” A maniacal smile flashed across her face.

“Dae—Daejang…” His voice quivered. For several terrifying seconds, he thought he awakened in the nightmare from his past. “... is it the right time to do that?”

“Seung Kwan-ah. Back then, I never lost when gambling. Do you still remember that?”

Seung Kwan swallowed hard, unable to utter a single word.

“Boo Seung Kwan!” she screamed. “DO YOU REMEMBER THAT!?”

Intimated, scared, and exhausted, Seung Kwan finally opened his mouth. “HOW CAN I FORGET IT?!” he snapped back at her, loudly, hoarsely, tears welling in his eyes. “Most of my pocket money was either taken by you or spent to buy you all the things you wanted! Because of you, I was suffering back then!”

Jin Joo then in a deep breath. She let go of Seung Kwan and another smile appeared on her lips. A genuine one; delighted, satisfied, thankful. Still smiling, she patted his cheek gently. And as if by magic, the fear that made him hard to breathe began to ease. He gave her a dazed look, and when she retracted her hand from his face, the poundings in his chest became uncontrollable as he lost the calming tenderness.

“I’ve got a hypothesis that is worth being experimented upon.” She turned around to look at the policeman and then Won Woo, telling them what she got in mind with astonishing certainty. “If I can prove that it is true, you all will get out of this place safely and reunite with Min Gyu sunbaenim,” she said reassuringly. “If it is really true, hopefully, later, our discovery can help you survive. Until rescue comes.”

And Won Woo dared himself to ask, “What if it is not?”

“Let’s just die here.” Jin Joo answered cool-headedly. “It’s so much easier.” She then shifted her gaze to the young policeman, saying, “Gyeongchal-nim, I need one of your bullets to open the cabinet. If things don’t go as planned, you still have three and I’ll kill myself with my own way.”

The policeman felt some kind of subtle dominance that emanated from her, which was strange. And inexplicable. In his eyes, the girl was undoubtedly an innocent citizen he had sworn to protect, but the thought that she was not an ordinary person suddenly flashed through his head. As if she knew something they didn’t. Questions naturally arose in his mind, but he decided to remain quiet and follow her scheme in order to figure out what she was actually thinking.

A loud bang was then heard as he fired a bullet through the cabinet’s door, almost deafening. And of course, the zombies became even more violent outside, triggered by the disturbing sound.

Jin Joo opened the cabinet and looked inside it thoughtfully, from top to bottom. It was empty. There were no shelves or drawers. And the unoccupied space was perfectly enough for two grown-up men to squeeze in. A small, victorious smile grew on her face. And they could hear her heave a sigh that sounded like contented relief. Unbeknown to them, she had just won the first bet she made with herself.

“Seung Kwan. Won Woo sunbae. Please get in here.”

Her tone was confident and peremptory, but those who got called immediately froze instead with dumbfounded looks.

“DAMN IT!” And she sure had no time to deal with their useless silence. “HURRY UP!!!” she shouted irritably, pushing the two young men taller and heavier than her into the cabinet with great impatience.

“Dae—!” Seung Kwan finally made a sound, only to be quickly silenced again.

“Listen to me!” Jin Joo stopped the two from talking, sending a serious sign through her tugs and clasps at their sleeves that her next words were not to be disregarded. “No matter what happens, stay quiet and unseen.” The boldness of her manner, as well as the firmness of her statement, made their hair stand on end. “I repeat. Stay quiet, stay unseen, stay alive. Do you get me?!”

There was no answer, which was expected.

Jin Joo sighed. But as she again looked at Seung Kwan and Won Woo consecutively, her stern expression softened. At that moment they knew that she might appear strong and fearless on the surface, but she wasn’t invulnerable. Her light brown orbs glistened beautifully yet sadly as she gazed at them, smiling a smile that seemed like her bidding a farewell.

“I don’t have much time left,” she said. “But I’ll make sure you reach Section C4.”

Jin Joo then slammed the doors close. Out of sheer random luck, she spotted a thick wooden stick lying on the floor near the black drape and without delay moved into action. She took the stick and slid it through the cabinet’s door handles, thus locking it from outside. There were grunts and dreadful protests coming from behind the steel door, but she had no choice but to ignore their voices and the pang of guilt.

Now the last person in her scenario was the young policeman, and she wasted no time carrying on with her last plan. She quickly turned around and pulled the policeman to hide him behind the heavy black drape.

“What are you trying to do?” he asked, utterly perplexed.

“Gyeongchal-nim.” She ignored his question and dubious look. “Give me your whistle.”

“... what?”

“Give me your damn whistle now!” she demanded, her breathing raspy.

After she was given what she wanted, she took a wobbly step back and read the hangul on the blood-stained name tag pinned to the policeman’s chest. It was terrifyingly clear that she was enduring great pain, and given the fact that she had been bitten by the living dead, her ghostly pale face and reddened eyes were not signs he wanted to see. She was close to showing further transformation symptoms.

“Choi Seung Cheol-ssi,” she said frailly. “You have to go to the rooftop of Section C4 together with Seung Kwan and Won Woo sunbae. It’s at the back of this college building... and we’re already near. It’s the safest place for now and you can find more survivors there. I’ve shown Seung Kwan and Won Woo sunbae the routes to get there, so please…” She grasped his arm more tightly, her eyes clearly begging him. “Please don’t die easily. Please stay alive until rescue comes.”

The young policeman, Seung Cheol, just blinked saying nothing, puzzled by the unexpected revelation. His brain couldn’t process it all quickly. Then suddenly, the front door was slammed hard and fell off one of its hinges, making their hearts almost jump out of their throats.

The marauding mob of zombies would break in through the door in a minute.

“Choi Seung Cheol-ssi,” she called him again, her voice now fraught with distress and anguish. “I don’t have much time left, but if this plan works, you will be the one who can lead and protect them.” She then pushed him back against the wall, causing his shoulders to hit against the hard surface with a thud. “Now please listen to me because I’ll only tell you this once and fast. These creatures are insanely powerful and unstoppable, but their weakest point is… here.” She tapped her head with her index finger. “Shoot or hit them hard in the head. If their brains are destroyed, they can’t move and kill you. But of course, try not to get bitten because their teeth carried something infectious and deadly. A disease, a curse… I don’t know.”

“So what should I do now?” asked the policeman. “... to get to Section C4?”

“If my—” She paused abruptly, turning her face away as she went into a fit of coughing. That sounded violent. And painful.

Instead of getting scared, Seung Cheol felt concerned by her worsening condition. But before he said anything, he heard her draw a deep breath.

Eyes watering, Jin Joo forced herself to stop coughing. “If my speculation is correct,” she continued tremulously, “these living dead creatures won’t attack you as long as they can’t hear and see you. If it’s correct, then—”

CRASH!!!

The entire window suddenly burst with a loud shattering sound, momentarily deafening those who heard it. As if a bomb exploded in the room, glass shards flew dangerously in every direction and cascaded onto the floor. But it wasn’t the worst end yet. Tremendous force finally broke the front door off all of its hinges, making it splinter into pieces and fall down with ear-piercing bangs. And soon the room felt cramped and suffocatingly hot, filled with a rotten stench of decomposing flesh as two mobs of zombies flooded into the room at once.

All exits were now completely blocked. New hordes of voracious zombies kept appearing and squeezed into the room. Spine-chilling growls, inhuman grunts, and clackings of teeth echoed throughout the damaged place as the living dead moved here and there sensing the presence of the breathing ones.

Locked inside the storage cabinet, Seung Kwan and Won Woo froze in a bent-over position, both petrified in the darkness, hands pressed over their mouths to prevent any sound from being heard as the inhuman creatures kept thudding against the steel doors from the other side, causing the cabinet to shake.

At the same time, Jin Joo hid the policeman behind the black drape while she stood up face-to-face against the blood-thirsty monsters, uncovered. A chill ran down her spine, and she kept glancing at the dangerous movements around the cabinet. She was worried sick—so much that it felt like she could puke her guts out, but she had to stay calm and quiet nonetheless, pretending as though she wasn’t bothered by the macabre situation.

And the gamble between life and death started.

Being the only one exposed, Jin Joo never kept her eyes off the roaming creatures in front of her, monitoring the extremely unpredictable situation and thus pushing herself to the limit. She felt an itching pain in her chest, dizziness threatening to overwhelm her, but she again mustered all the strength that remained in her pathetic form to keep standing on her feet and not to cough. But strangely, the living dead approached her, sniffed at her, and then turned away—just like that.

They didn’t attack her, thus baffling her.

However, much to her surprise, there was one zombie that aggressively lunged in her direction all of a sudden. As if it knew what was hidden behind the black drape. It pressed against her skin to skin, sniffing, its disgustingly bloody mouth clamping open and shut ready to bite. Despite the direct contact, she stood unbudged, protecting the living being right behind her. A while later, she turned her face away suppressing the urge to vomit, biting her bottom lip hard to hold back a whimper as she clasped the policeman’s wrist through the black fabric.

Meanwhile, being sandwiched between the hard corner of the room and the short girl, Seung Cheol could get the hint of what was happening through her stiffened body and the horrifying sound of clacking teeth that was very, very close to both of them. And he was trying to breathe very, very silently.

“We’re definitely gonna die here. We’re definitely gonna die here.”

Seung Cheol repeated the same thought in his mind as if he was reading a mantra. Half struggling against his immense anxiety, half trying to accept the reality. If he was out in the open, veins could be seen bulging at his temples as he was on the verge of insanity. And actually, he had prepared himself to fire the gun at the zombies any second, his finger poised on the trigger, but the girl firmly holding his wrist was an unmistakable sign for him to stay quiet. Stay unseen. Stay alive.

“Until rescue comes.”

Seung Cheol exhaled long and slow as particular words in a reassuring voice echoed in his head. The words she kept saying again and again. And it was kinda ironic, and surprising, that he received command and also comfort from an ordinary person, a stranger—a short, frail-looking girl at that—but he had no choice but to swallow his pride as a capable man and followed her hints.

Several minutes passed.

Only growls and dragged footsteps on breaking glass shards were heard. Seung Cheol gulped dryly, trying to illustrate the current circumstance in his head by listening to every sound. Those damn feral corpses were still lingering inside the room, and loud thuds against the cabinet’s doors were occasionally heard, but everything sounded exactly the same after the dramatic crashings and bangs when the zombies barged in. There was no brutal attack. He thought he was hallucinating things. He thought he had died, but wait a sec—he was still breathing. Alive. And confused, unbelieving.

“Is it real? Is it true?” Seung Cheol wished he could slap himself to check on the reality, but he couldn’t move. “These monsters… won’t find us if they can’t hear and see us? But they can see Jin Joo now, right? Why are they not attacking her?”

A long, shrill sound of a whistle was suddenly heard from the corridor.

Behind the storage cabinet’s doors, Seung Kwan and Won Woo held their breath momentarily, their ears perking up at the shocking noise coming from outside the room. But Seung Cheol could immediately recognize that sound, and when he plucked up the courage to move a bit and stretch out his hand behind the black drape, the sudden realization was like a direct punch in his face.

Jin Joo was no longer standing there! And just a few seconds after the first whistle was heard, the room felt like it was shaking underneath his feet from the sudden movement of zombies that were rushing out of the room at the same time. Their hurried footsteps caused shattering sounds and boisterous thuds that crept out those who heard them, but gradually, the noise became less loud, less intense, following the second whistle.

“It’s time to go our separate ways! These creatures are indeed extremely sensitive to sounds and now they are following me! More of them are also coming down from the upper floors!”

Jin Joo was screaming from the corridor, already far in the distance but her message was clear enough to be heard despite her hoarse, agonized voice.

“Once you hear nothing but a complete silence around this area, please run for your life! As fast and quietly as possible! Do not ever look back again!”

Seung Kwan and Won Woo finally realized what was happening. Despair and guilt were now greater than fear. In the darkness they could feel their hearts ache and sink, knowing that they had a debt that was too huge to be paid. In fact, it was something that could never be paid for.

“Boo Seung Kwan! Back then I always called you a loser, but the loser is actually me! I regret all the awful things I said to you in the past. Now you’ve become taller, stronger, braver, and even more handsome! I have no right to say this but I’m truly pleased to see how much you’ve changed to be the amazing person you are now! And you might talk a little too much now to the point that I want to tape your mouth sometimes, but you’re kind! Too kind! But even though that’s your nature to be kind, don’t ever let anyone step on you again, you hear me?! If someone badmouths you or treats you badly, you can knock them senseless and that’s ing okay!”

Jin Joo continued to scream. The longer and the louder she screamed, the more zombies were attracted to her presence, thus luring them away from the living ones.

Clearly, she was close to breaking herself.

Seung Kwan felt his knees turn to jelly, slowly sliding down to a sitting position with his back against the steel frame. He couldn’t see anything in the darkness, but he could perfectly picture Jin Joo’s passionate face in his head. And warm moisture began to pool in his eyes.

“I don’t deserve your forgiveness but you’ve been treating me kindly since we met again and I don’t get it! If I were you, I would surely plot revenge against my bully! But this side of you is cool! So cool that I hate myself so much for ever having wronged you in the past! Boo Seung Kwan, I’ll remember your kindness until I die. If we meet again in the next life, let’s be good friends, okay!”

“Stop…” Seung Kwan couldn’t hold his tears and muffled sobs anymore. And his heart crushed as he knew he would never hear her voice again after this. “No… please no… Daejang...” he muttered sorrowfully.

“Won Woo sunbae, if you can hear me now, I do hope you can get over your broken heart soon! Bon Hwa has always been a cunning so far as I remember, and you’re far too good for someone so damn ugly inside like her!”

Won Woo gasped. His chest twisted in a tight knot at the mention of his name. And the vulgarity of her expressed thoughts, which made him immediately realize the truth.

“After all these years I thought that two-faced has changed, but she’s even worse than before! Not only did she hurt Ji Soo sunbae, but that snake also had the audacity to hurt you. In fact, she didn’t even deserve both of you! Won Woo sunbae, you’ll be just fine without her!”

“This girl…” Won Woo closed his eyes, in a deep breath. His hands clenched into tightly balled fists. “What the heck do you know about me?”

“And I… I got a lot of things to say to Min Gyu sunbaenim, but never mind! He hates me anyway. But please tell him to rest assured. I will take my punishments in hell.”

Then the third whistle was heard. Further than before.

“Choi Seung Cheol-ssi, it’s not a coincidence that you suddenly appeared because now I can relievedly trust them to you! Thank you… for finding us!”

The fourth whistle then echoed along the corridor, swallowing the quivering last words in an instant. The next whistles became further and further in the distance. Fading away, eerily. And several minutes later, there was no more noise inside the room. No more human screamings to hear. Just ragged breathing, murmured sobs, and heartache.

When the cabinet’s doors were finally opened, Seung Kwan and Won Woo saw the light again, freed, but the expressions on their faces were far from good.

Seung Cheol understood that what had happened wasn’t something that could be easily accepted, but he didn’t want to continue his borrowed life in guilt for wasting the time after all the sacrifices somebody had gladly and voluntarily made. So despite his own grief, he patted the younger ones’ shoulders with enough force to draw them back to reality, telling them that it was time to move.

Seung Kwan, still sobbing, showed the blood-drawn map on Won Woo’s back to the policeman and explained to him how to get to the rooftop of Section C4.

Little did they know that the rest of their runaway was easy.

Almost effortless.

And it was near impossible to believe that they finally reached the last corridor that led to their final destination unharmed.

Jin Joo was correct. The entire building of Section C4 was free of the ferocious walking dead, much to their shock. It was as quiet as a deserted graveyard. And when they saw a bright light at the end of the corridor, a newfound hope rose within their spirits and they quickened their pace toward the metal door leading to the rooftop. Someone’s peering face was then seen through the slightly blurred glass panel on the upper part of the door, and not long after, it was pulled open.

“Won Woo hyung!”

Won Woo, without his glasses, was unable to see things clearly that were far away from him, but he immediately recognized to whom the worried voice belonged. As soon as the three survivors stepped up onto the rooftop and the metal door behind them was slammed close, Won Woo was squeezed in a tight embrace of a man younger and taller than him.

“Thank God, you’re safe, hyung!”

“Please tell him to rest assured. I will take my punishments in hell.”

Won Woo remained quiet and straight-faced, but strong emotions were stirring within him. Relief for the reunion he thought he would never have again, and guilt that made him have to force back tears. But then he began to have trouble breathing in the cage of muscular arms that wrapped around him, so he gently pushed the younger one away.

When their eyes met, all that came across his mind was an apologetic smile of a girl who had done all the most impossible things to save as many people as possible. A girl who readily took all the blame on herself for her past bad deeds. And his breath hitched momentarily from a sort of gnawing pain at his heart.

“Min Gyu.” Won Woo tried to hide the nagging sadness as he looked up at the taller guy who had been like his own brother, giving his arm a light squeeze. “Are you alright?”

“I’m good, hyung. How about you?” A very concerned look grew on Min Gyu’s face as he finally realized how messed up the older one looked. “Are you hurt anywhere?”

“I just sprained my ankle,” Won Woo answered in a collected tone. For a short moment, Jin Joo’s voice echoed into his mind again, but he still couldn’t bring himself to tell the taller one her last message. “I’m fine.”

Standing near them, Seung Kwan gave the tall guy a jealous look, pouting a bit. “Min Gyu hyung, are you not going to give your biggest fan a hug too? I’m here, you know.”

Min Gyu smiled a big relieved smile that lighted up his handsome face, welcoming the puffy-faced younger guy into his arms. “Kwan-ah.”

Seung Kwan smiled back at his idol and was about to hug him, but then he inadvertently shifted his gaze away and noticed someone he knew in the group of survivors. One of his treasured friends. “... Vernon?” he muttered breathlessly, stepping aside with an unsure movement, away from Min Gyu.

As Seung Kwan continued to walk toward a half-Korean and half-Caucasian guy who looked very still in a sitting position leaning against the outer wall of a storage room, his heart felt like it was going to burst.

“Vernon!” he shrieked, now completely ignoring his surroundings. His reddened eyes widened with incredulity, and soon they glistened with tears again.

The memory was still fresh in Seung Kwan’s head as if it had happened just a minute ago, when the blondish-brown haired guy was voluntarily putting his own life at stake to buy time so he and his other friends could escape from a zombie attack. The guilt threatened to overwhelm him as he remembered that again, as he thought that he had cruelly left Vernon behind to die alone. He was actually ready to punish himself until he accidentally bumped into Jin Joo in a literal way, and she saved his life.

“You’re not just an illusion, are you?” Seung Kwan dropped to his knees next to his unconscious friend, tremblingly stretching out his hand to hold the other’s hand. It wasn’t just a dream. What he was now staring at, and holding firmly, was real. Vernon was injured, but unbitten. And safe. “Oh, God! Vernon!”

Seung Kwan hugged his friend and burst into tears. A mixture of relief, sadness, and joy coursed through his body.

“You’re alive!”

Seung Cheol heaved a long sigh and watched the emotional reunion silently. This group of youth who managed to run away from the murderous creatures was unfamiliar to him, and his sense of duty and empathy grew again upon seeing them scared, traumatized, and unprotected. He looked down at the gun in his hand. There were only three bullets left, which was surely not heartening news. But he had inwardly sworn that he wouldn’t let her fail. Not when he was given the chance to survive by her.

“Until rescue comes…” Seung Cheol whispered to himself. And he then rested himself, leaning his back and head against the concrete structure behind him, closing his eyes for a moment. He evened out his breathing and relaxed his muscles, trying to regain his strength for the next fight which could happen any time. But it wasn’t long until his ears caught a growing tension in the conversation that occurred near him.

“Where is Jin Joo?”

Seung Cheol’s eyelids flicked open abruptly as he heard the shaky, demanding voice. Approaching the dark-haired student named Won Woo was the most beautiful human being that he might have ever seen in his entire life. He was stunned, unmoving, unblinking for a few seconds while the world around him continued to collapse into a sea of chaos.

The untied, shoulder-length blonde-dyed hair of the fair-skinned figure made him think he was looking up at a maiden, but next, he heard the same voice again and that was like a hard mental slap that awoke him from his daydream.

The beautiful person who made butterflies flutter in his stomach was a man.

“Where is Jin Joo?” The same question. But the tone now felt like a sharp jab to the flesh. And venomous.

Upon hearing the name he didn’t expect—and didn’t want—to hear, Min Gyu instantly stiffened, his brow furrowed with a deep frown. The benign expression on his face changed into one of rancor. “Jin Joo?”

But the blonde-haired guy ignored the other’s voice, continuing to look at Won Woo’s face with a seriousness that could turn hearts to ice. “Why isn’t she with you?”

“J-Jeong Han hyung...” Won Woo stuttered, obviously not ready to answer the question. His calm pretense cracked and crumbled.

‘Hyung.’ The young policeman mentally took a serious note, staring at them, and for some reason, he felt some kind of rising apprehension from the tense air that surrounded them.

“Jin Joo was leading us to this place. But as soon as she saw you in danger, she told us to continue to run to the rooftop, and then she…” Pause. Horror swept over his flawless face. “That foolish girl came down running after you to save you!”

Won Woo’s lips parted slightly, but no words were coming out. Indescribable pain whipped through his chest as the truth was shoved into him. His legs gave away and he staggered back from the lightheadedness that suddenly hit him.

Fortunately, Min Gyu managed to reach fast enough to prevent him from tripping, shifting to stand behind the older guy who looked like his very soul had just left his body. Breaking out in a cold sweat, Min Gyu brought his face closer to his, calling him again and again, but he still made no response.

“! Say something!” Jeong Han screamed out of desperation, his whole body shaking.

“Jeong Han hyung,” Min Gyu pleaded worriedly. But there was also a dangerous glint in his eyes. A serious warning sign. He was ready to forcefully confront anyone who dared to inflict harm on Won Woo.

“Is Jin Joo catching up?” Again, Jeong Han paid no heed to anyone, to anything. And suddenly he advanced toward Won Woo who kept looking like he had lost the ability to talk, grabbing him by the collar of his shirt. “She’ll be here in a moment, right?!”

Rising to his feet, Seung Cheol replied to him in a glum voice, “She won’t be coming back.”