Taehyung stirred awake in his chair, sitting up straight before rubbing his tired eyes. He expected that they would have to adjust to bright light once he opened them, but after blinking a couple of times, he realized that was not the case. The final-year university student scanned the deserted and dimly-lit library, his gaze eventually resting on his best friend and course mate beside him, passed out with arms and head sprawled over his reading material on the desk. Taehyung pulled his phone out and checked the screen, his eyes then widening in shock at the time staring back at him.

He grabbed his companion by the shoulder and roughly shook him awake. “Jimin… Jimin-ah!”

Jimin started to slowly wake up and sleepily mumbled to his friend. “Tae… what’s going on?”

“It’s late. We fell asleep studying. The librarian probably didn’t notice us and closed up already.”

Jimin glanced around. “Huh? It’s that late? Are your hyungs waiting for you back home?”

Taehyung shook his head. “They said they’re working overtime tonight, but we should still go. We have a morning lecture tomorrow.”

“I guess Jungkook isn’t wondering where I am,” Jimin commented as he checked his own phone to find no texts from his freshman roommate. “Yeah, I should get back to the dorms anyway.”

“What’s he up to, watching another horror movie?” Taehyung joked.

“If he’s doing that in our room again, I might sleep over at your place tonight,” replied Jimin, causing the two to share a short laugh as they stood up to pack their things.

Jimin and Taehyung were known by their peers as each other’s ‘soulmates’, having made friends during their very first lecture in their freshman year and being practically inseparable ever since. Jimin had gotten to know Taehyung’s two older brothers well after spending a vast amount of time at their house with him either playing games or working on projects. Being alone in the city while pursuing his studies, the closest Jimin currently had to family were Jungkook and the Kim brothers.

They exited the library, whose doors at such a time would automatically lock from the inside, and made their way to the campus gate. Their footsteps echoed down the empty hallway, which was in darkness save for the soft moonlight streaming in through the windows to form regular intervals of glowing patches across the floor. The night seemed as quiet as any other, but something was off, and the both of them could sense it.

“Jimin… I feel weird,” Taehyung whispered.

“Yeah, I know what you mean,” Jimin replied, warily glancing around as they quickened their pace.

Their suspicions were confirmed at the increasingly-chaotic states of the project and tutorial rooms as they continued further down the hallway. Looking through the doors to those rooms, they could see that the furniture was in disarray, with stationary strewn all over the floors. It was as if the rooms’ last occupants had left in a frenzy. In addition, the stench of death and decay seemed to fill the air.

The two shot each other glances of dread. Taehyung reached from his phone to use its flashlight for a better look, and then immediately wished he had not. Red stains lightly smeared the walls of the hallway and the rooms, and the boys stared at them in alarm, a plethora of questions running through their minds. It was not long before they spotted something even more strange at the doorway of the last room, just before the staircase. Drawing nearer, they made it out to be another human being, a girl and likely another student, lying faced down through the doorway with the lower half of her body pinned by a toppled desk.

“Is she… dead?” Jimin gasped, eyes wide with concern.

Taehyung stepped even closer and crouched right in front of the limp body with his flashlight on it to inspect it. Before he could even say or think of anything, however, the girl’s head snapped up with a shriek, revealing a blood-stained face, milky-white pupils, and razor-sharp teeth. Taehyung jump back in fright and stumbled into Jimin, who immediately steadied him. They watched in horror for a moment as she clawed the ground to get to them, held back only by the desk on top of her, before they snapped out of it and dash down the stairs.

Both slowed to a stop at the level below, panting, but from fear instead of exhaustion. They had even more questions now, though, they did not bother to verbalize them, each knowing that the other could not answer him. They just wanted to get out of the building and save the questioning for later. At the level they were currently at, they figured that they could cut across the cafeteria and then make their way down via a staircase closer to the campus gate.

“I don’t know what’s going on, but I think I definitely want to go over to your place tonight,” Jimin expressed as they continued moving.

Taehyung nodded fervently. “I’d have insisted you come even if you didn’t want to.”

However, as they went around a corner and reached the large doorway to the cafeteria, the scene in front of them caused them to freeze on the spot in terror. Lifeless, blood-covered bodies littered the area, while several animated individuals there were… feasting on those corpses? Taehyung’s still-active phone flashlight then caught the eye of the nearest one, who whipped his head around to face the boys before letting out a savage screech which alerted the others in the cafeteria of their presence.

This jolted the two out of their frozen states, and they found themselves sprinting down the hallway with the ferocious horde hot on their heels. At the end of the hallway was the entrance to the second level of the student lounge, which they reached just in time and shut the doors, slamming them against the first couple of their attackers. Taehyung held the doors shut while making space for Jimin to topple a heavy shelf right in front of them. They then started to swing anything else they could find in the room against the doors to further barricade them.

Once the boys thought them secure, they paused to take a breather, and then proceeded to go down the spiral staircase to the first level of the lounge. Looking back at the horde mindlessly clawing at the glass doors, Taehyung was reminded of something that was completely inappropriate to bring up in the current situation, but figured that he would feel better if he continued speaking to his companion, regardless of the topic.

“Jimin, remember that movie we saw, ‘Peninsula’?”

“I can see why you’re thinking of that. Actually, Jungkook had it on just the other…” Jimin trailed off, a panicked expression crossing his face at a sudden realization. “Jungkook! Oh no, no no no…”

Jimin took his phone out and frantically dialed his roommate’s number.

“Come on… answer your phone… please…” he muttered as it rang.

Taehyung place a hand on Jimin’s shoulder, attempting to calm his agitated friend. “Jimin…”

“Answer your freaking phone, Jungkook!”

The ringing cut to the engaged tone. Jimin slowly lowered his phone in silent distress, fearing the worse. Taehyung watched him for a moment before speaking up.

“Hey, he might still be fine. What if he just-“

“He would have answered, Tae!” Jimin snapped, the intense worry evident in his wavering voice. “If he had made it out, he would have at least texted…”

“We don’t actually know that-“

Taehyung was cut off by the vibration of his own phone in his pocket. He checked the screen to see who it was before answering the call.

“Tae, our office was just alerted of the outbreak of some… virus in the city. The infection is spreading and it’s not safe outside. Are you back home?” Namjoon urgently asked over the line.

Taehyung hissed guiltily before responding. “No hyung. I’m uh, actually… still on campus…”

“What?! Why are you-“ Namjoon let out an exasperated sigh before continuing. “Nevermind. Listen, you have to get out of there now.”

“I’m trying, but the infected people are everywhere!”

“Oh my goodness! Alright... are you alone, Tae?”

“I- I’m with Jimin.”

“I see. Look after each other, try to leave, but do you best to stay hidden. Jin hyung and I will see what we can do to help you. Update us whenever you can, okay?”

“Okay, hyung.”

Just as Taehyung hung up, a new wave of dread washed over the boys as they heard the cracking of glass from upstairs…