Author's Note: For clarity: chronologically, this chapter comes immediately after chapter 11. I messed up the order a bit, will fix that when the fic is complete. For now just bear with me.

A cloud of dust flew up as the three boys burst out into the sunlight and came to a skidding halt on the loose soil. Quickly spinning around on his heel, Ren stared into the dark recesses they'd just come from. The sunlight didn't reach far enough to make out what was going on inside, but the enclosed tube captured the sound of Woori's engine and hurled it at him greatly amplified.

He hadn't noticed he was holding his breath until he gasped as Woori emerged, her tyres pulling deep tracks in the dirt as she braked to a stop.

“Jesus, that was close,” Minhyun breathed, unconsciously rubbing his throat. “Thank god you came. But how did you know we'd be here?”

“I figured you'd dive in and investigate all on your own like the goonies you are,” she replied irritably, killing the engine and kicking out the stand of her bike. With demonstrative aggression, she dropped her helmet onto the seat and shouted “Just what the hell were you thinking, anyway?

Ren was used to her crossing her arms when she was upset and in her lecture-mode, but she didn't even bother this time. She just stood there shaking with rage with her fists clenched by her side, her posture threatening despite no overt effort to appear so. If anything it was a lot more intimidating. He had never seen her quite this angry before.

“You could've all gotten yourself killed, and for what?”

"We didn't want to waste any more time," Ren said guiltily.

"Waste any more time? Before what? What's going on? Stop keeping me out of the loop."

"I'm sorry, Woori," Minhyun began. "I know we've been unfair to you, but it's dangerous and I didn't want to get anyone involved who didn't have to. I just wanted to keep you guys out of harm's way."

Woori sighed. Her expression softened at the apology but her eyes still shone with a cold anger. "It's a little too late for that now. Sookie and Seungah are gone too. And I'm certain it's all to do with this, whatever this is. So consider me involved."

"They're gone?" Baekho said in surprise. "What do you mean gone?"

"I don't know, they're just gone. Have been ever since last night when I lost track of them both at the party. And they're not answering their phones, neither of them. Jisook wasn't at her home either, I went to check." With another weary sigh, she sat down on the back of her bike, hugging her helmet to her chest. "I've also looked into the checkpoint system again and I saw they both left the building very early but never came back.”

"What about Aron?" asked Ren.

She shrugged. "He's okay, for one. Him I could find just fine. He was just wasted out of his mind. He was the one who told me you guys had left early, and I brought him home. I didn't trust him to make it there on his own. But he's not who we should be worrying about."

Ren remembered that Aron was the only one to to answer his text. He hadn't put much thought into what that might've meant for the others.

"I reported all of this to the Watch and informed the police, but I've got a feeling they won't be able to find them and that you guys know exactly why. So you're going to tell me everything you know, right now." Even after she'd cooled down from her rage, Woori the protective and concerned mother bear was not something anyone wanted to mess with.

Minhyun sighed. "It's a long story, but I'll tell you everything on the way back to my place. I'd rather not hang around here for too long."

Woori raised a brow. "They can't get out into the sunlight though, can they?"

Ren thought of JR and shook his head. "I'm not too sure any more."

...

On their walk through the now sparsely peopled streets Minhyun told Woori everything they knew so far. He kept his voice low so they would not be overheard, though given the general state of denial and apathy the populace was in it was unlikely anything would happen if they were.

"But what causes it? How on earth can it be spread on like that?" Woori said in wonderment.

"Maybe it's a virus" Ren offered. "JR was certainly acting like he was fighting a disease."

"This all sounds so ridiculous, like zombies or vampires in some flick. And I still don't understand what it is they do. Do they kill and eat the people that go missing," she paused, eyes nervously darting sideways for a moment "or do they turn them into their own kind?"

Undoubtedly, she was thinking of Jisook and Seungah, and whether they faced worse fates than JR. It wasn't unreasonable to assume their disappearances had to do with all this. In fact it would be naive to think it was all a freak coincidence.

"We have no way of knowing. It seems there's never any traces of victims found, alive or dead. I never even hear anything about it when I listen in on the police's radio frequency, but maybe they're just covert about this and don't want it broadcast on the airwaves. For all we know they do run investigations into all this but keep it all hushed to not stir up a panic. That would explain why they seemingly ignored Baekho's report and never told you anything despite being in the Watch," he turned to Woori.

"So in other words," Woori summed up as they turned a corner into the street of Minhyun's residence. "We don't know what we're up against, we don't know what they're even trying to achieve, we don't know what we're supposed to do to stop it and whatever we choose to do, we're completely on our own."

The three guys stared at her despondently, not at all pleased with having the situation described so.

"That pretty much sums it up, really," Ren remarked bitterly. Baekho pinched the bridge of his nose and looked at his friends hopefully.

"So what are we going to do?"

"We're going down there, if that's where our friends are," said Woori decisively without a moment's thought.

Minhyun nodded. "We'll need supplies," he began. "Lights; bright ones, medical supplies in case the others are hurt, weapons," Woori arched a graceful brow.

"Do you mean we're to improvise, or are you saying you can provide us with weapons?"

"I've pulled some strings. I've been preparing for this for a while, even if I wasn't sure what exactly this was preparing for, but I'm confident I have everything we'll need."

…

In another instance of what Ren considered pure madness, they all sat around the table in Minhyun's kitchen having a breakfast of eggs upon Woori's insistence. Everyone save Minhyun himself, who had retreated into the storage in the back that Ren had caught only passing glimpses of in the past.

He sat poking at his meal, his stomach full with worry and could hear only a voice in the back of his repeating over and over again: we don't have time for this, our friends might be dying out there.

He sat upright with a bolt when he felt a hand on his arm and looked up from his untouched eggs and rice to find Baekho looking at him with a sad but comforting smile.

"I don't like sitting around either," he said. "But Woori's right, we need to eat well no matter what happens."

The girl nodded. "We won't be any good to anyone if we're groggy and low on energy. If we're going to achieve anything today we at least have to be keen," she added with a slight nudge at Ren's plate.

Intellectually Ren knew this to be true, but it still didn't feel right to him. He reluctantly took a bite and made tremendous effort to get it down. Just then Minhyun entered the room again and lugged a large, stuffed full backpack next to the table.

"Okay, tactics meeting," he began, sitting down at the head of the table. He unrolled a map onto the surface. It didn't look at all familiar to Ren, its small criss-crossing lines not resembling roads or anything else that he could recognise. They were the sewers, he realised.

Woori leant forward and pointed at the map. "This is the access tunnel JR went into, right? The one we just came back from?"

Minhyun nodded. "I reckon," Woori continued, "It's not a good idea to go back there. If they're expecting us to come back, then they'll be waiting for us there first."

"Exactly, I was thinking the same thing. I was about to suggest we'd enter through a manhole cover here," he tapped the map a but further North. "That's right around the corner from here."

"Then what?" Baekho asked, taking a break from his former fascinated chewing and setting his meal aside.

"That's a good question. We don't know were they might be keeping the people they've taken, if they keep them anywhere. And we want to avoid running in to any of them. I don't see us having any good chances of fighting them off."

"I'd assume they know their way around all the pipes, in order to get around the city."

"What are these notes?" Ren said, deciding to put in his two cents. "Does it say these are disused?"

Again, Minhyun nodded. "Yes, I found that information on some old city records. I'm not sure how current that is, though. Not sure if we'll have any luck wandering out there."

"Isn't that a good place for them to live? With no chances of getting washed out?" Ren insisted.

"They're shut off from the main grid. I don't see how we'd get there."

"It's our best guess, though. I don't see where else we could go." Woori said.

Minhyun took the pencil out from behind his ear and pulled the map closer. "It's settled then." He began tracing several routes along the sewage ways, all emanating from the same point. "We'll begin with finding a way to the disused pipes and see where that leads us."

"And then what if we do run into Lurkers?" This was Baekho again. "It seems inevitable that we will, but what will we do? It was a really close call last time."

To that, Minhyun leaned down towards his backpack and pulled it onto his lap.

"I was getting to that. I made a pack for each of you, with two bright flash lights, water, food and a radio. So that none of us would be completely screwed if we got separated in an emergency." He rummaged through his bag until he found what he was looking for. With a resolute calmness he took out a handgun, placed it on the table before him and waited for the others to react.

The silence that had fallen while they waited for Minhyun to speak somehow grew more silent at the sight. Ren said nothing, he merely stared.

Despite everything, firearm legislation was still very strict, and nothing akin to a right to bear arms existed. As a result he had never seen a gun in real life. The air of mystery that surrounded such a item made actually seeing one underwhelming. It was small, and looked like it was made of plastic.

Woori was the first to break the silence.

“I don't suppose you have a license for that?” she remarked dryly.

Minhyun smiled. “What are you going to do? Report me?”

Woori refused to return the smile. “That would not be a wise decision in this moment.”

“I've got more. Plenty, really. But the question is: do any of you know how to use one?”

As one, Ren and Baekho looked at each other and then at Minhyun, blankly.

“Thought so.” He turned back to Woori expectantly.

“When I joined the night watch I got a tour of the police station and they let me do a test run on the firing range. This looks like the same gun I used, standard police issue. I can only imagine how you got your hands on these.”

“It's a slightly older model than what the cops are currently using, actually. That's how I got it. But you know the proper way to use it still?”

“Yes, it's not very complicated.”

“Good, that's one down,” he placed his elbows on the table and rested his chin on his hands. “Now it's your turn.” He looked at the motionless boys. “Go on, pick it up. I'll teach you how to hold it.” They hesitated. Woori smiled at them reassuringly, but to no avail.

“I... I don't want to use one of those,” began Baekho. “I mean we have no experience, this can only go wrong.”

“I don't like it any more than you do, but it's even worse if you don't take them. We're not dealing with people here, not any more. They won't hesitate to kill you if they get the chance.”

Baekho nodded but still neither he nor Ren made any motions to pick it up.

“Look, I won't make you use them if you don't want to, but I at least want you to know how. When push comes to shove I don't want anything to happen to you guys because I didn't prepare you.”

Baekho remained frozen, but after a few seconds he nodded. Ren reached under the table and gave on of Baekho's hands a comforting squeeze. Then he reached forward and picked up the pistol with his other hand.

Though unfamiliar with it, his hand automatically found the proper grip there where the weapon was tailored for it. It didn't feel like a thing of power at all. It felt like a toy, but no toy had ever given him such a sinking feeling in his stomach when he held it.

“Good, you're doing fine.” Minhyun smiled, but not with any degree of satisfaction. “Now, make sure you're finger's off the trigger, and push down the safety.”

Author's Note: I managed to post the chapter on Minhyun's birthday. ^^
We're beginning to reach the conclusion, people. I have three more chapters planned before the end. Things might not go that smoothly, but let's assume I'm sticking with that plan for now.