Apocalypse: Apparently, I Can See Zombies

After saying that, Seo-joon turned and sat down on the seat next to Jin-woo. He didn\'t pay Jin-woo any more attention as he continued smoking his cigarette.

Jin-woo glanced at him briefly, before looking down at the bottle in his hand. It was only now he realized he was a bit thirsty after fighting off over ten people.

After twisting the bottle cap slightly to test if it was open before, Jin-woo finally concluded it wasn\'t tampered with.

After unscrewing the bottle, Jin-woo placed it to his lips and drank it by mouthfuls. He had his eyes closed while he gulped down the water, but after his fourth mouthful, he opened his eyes only to see that the contents in the bottle had turned bright red.

All of a sudden, the refreshing water Jin-woo was tasting became slightly viscous while having a metallic flavor to it.

He was drinking blood.

Jin-woo immediately pulled the bottle from his mouth and tossed it away. He then began retching violently. However, as he vomited, what came out was not the blood he thought he had drunk, but water with a mix of bile fluids in his stomach.

Jin-woo glanced at the bottle he had tossed away and saw that it had returned to normal. However, the lingering taste of the blood in his mouth made him somewhat convinced that he had actually drunk blood. That water had definitely turned into blood just now, and no matter what anyone told him he would not believe them because he could taste it in his mouth.

Jin-woo\'s body started to tremble uncontrollably as his stomach violently contracted. He was vomiting but nothing was coming out.

A familiar scene was playing out, but unlike before, there was no one here to help him. After Seong disappeared, Jin-woo hadn\'t seen him since.

"Se-Seong…"

Jin-woo muttered between his gagging, and soon tears appeared at the corners of his eyes. All of a sudden, he felt like he was all alone, and the hole in his heart that appeared after Seong\'s death, but was patched up when he hallucinated him, was now left wide open with nothing to fill it, or even cover it up.

Jin-woo was overcome with this feeling, and even though he managed to stop himself from gagging every three seconds, he couldn\'t help but have tears stream down his face.

However, amid these tumultuous emotions threatening to drown him, Jin-woo felt a hand gently rubbing his back and heard a familiar nursery rhyme.

"One little star, two little star…"

Jin-woo instinctively began counting along in his head, and by the time he reached ten, he had completely calmed down.

However, now that he had calmed down, he realized that even though the nursery rhyme was familiar, the voice was completely different.

Jin-woo couldn\'t help but quickly spin his head around, and immediately he was somewhat at a loss for words when instead of Seong, it was Seo-joon kneeling behind him.

Seo-joon retrieved his hand that was gently rubbing Jin-woo\'s back and calmly asked.

"Have you calmed down?"

"You… How do you know that nursery rhyme?"

Jin-woo asked a question of his own rather than answering, but Seo-joon only looked at him for a moment before he was about to get up.

However, Jin-woo quickly grabbed his hand and hurriedly asked.

"Joon, answer me! How do you know that nursery rhyme? Did Seong tell you?"

After a beat of silence, Seo-joon emphatically responded.

"No, he didn\'t tell me. If he had, I would have used it back in the Track Club instead of running to go get him. You\'re squeezing my hand too tight, let go."

Seo-joon said before trying to get Jin-woo to let him go. However, Jin-woo\'s grip only got tighter as he asked again with a stern expression.

"Then how, how did you know if Seong hadn\'t told you? Did you…"— Jin-woo suddenly hesitated but eventually continued— "Can you see him too?"

Seo-joon upon hearing this had his entire body stiffened and he looked at Jin-woo silently. After a moment he slowly asked.

"You can see Seong?"

Jin-woo nodded slowly after hearing Seo-joon\'s question. But he suddenly realized that the question was strange, however, Jin-woo couldn\'t tell what about it was strange.

After seeing Jin-woo nod, a flash of light appeared in Seo-joon\'s eyes and then disappeared.

Looking down at the G-Shock watch around Jin-woo\'s right wrist, Seo-joon said with a chuckle.

"That\'s the watch Seong gave you right? You didn\'t change the alarm from what I saw when I was kicking your ass."

Jin-woo\'s mind went blank for a split second as he couldn\'t understand how Seo-joon could have possibly known that.

"Joon, what\'s going on, tell me. How do you know all these things?"

"Let go of my hand first."

Jin-woo hesitated, but eventually let go of Seo-joon\'s hand. He then watched as Seo-joon took out another cigarette from the pack in his top pocket. After lighting it and taking a puff before blowing it out, Seo-joon stayed silent as he knelt in front of him for a moment before he finally spoke.

"I don\'t like staying at home so whenever school is on break, I\'d stay over at my aunt\'s house. She\'s already retired but she owns a private library in Gangnam."

Jin-woo was at first confused by Seo-joon\'s initial words, but after hearing the mention of a library in Gangnam, his body shook slightly.

As if he didn\'t realize Jin-woo\'s reaction, Seo-joon continued.

"When I had nothing to do at my aunt\'s house, I would head to the library to read some books or help the staff with some stuff."—Seo-joon paused to take a puff of his cigarette before resuming his narration—"During the winter break I stayed at my aunt\'s place as usual, but unlike before where I would head to the library and bury my head in books or help the staff, I met Seong there.

After he cursed at me and was kicked out, he came back the next day and completely ignored me."

Jin-woo hearing this couldn\'t help but recall that during the days leading up to the accident, Seong was going to the library every morning before coming to his house. He also recalled that at one point Seong had come to his house angry, saying he was kicked out of said library. Jin-woo had asked why, but Seong brushed off the topic. He didn\'t even tell him why he was going to the library.

Jin-woo was feeling a complex of emotions, but he soon buried his thoughts and listened as Seo-joon continued.

"After our first initial interaction at the library, we didn\'t talk to each other for the other few days he came in. However, on the last day, he came to me asking for some kind of science book. One thing led to another, and we started talking. During our chat, the topic landed on the reason he was at the library, and he told me it was because of you."

Seo-joon glanced at Jin-woo for a second then looked away and continued.

"Before he could say much, he suddenly got an urgent phone call which made him rush out of the library, leaving the books he was reading on the desk. When I went over there to clear the books, I saw that he had left a journal. I went outside to give it back to him, but before I could, I saw him getting into your dad\'s car before it sped away.

I thought I would give it back to him tomorrow but after a few days of waiting, I heard that he was dead."

Jin-woo lowered his head and remained silent.

That urgent phone call that made Seong leave the library in a hurry was from him. He had his father drive him to the library to surprise Seong, but on the way there he had a panic attack. As for what triggered his panic attack, Jin-woo didn\'t know, it just came suddenly, and it was uncontrollable.

The car crash happened at that time because his father was too focused on him in the back seat and missed that a driver was trying to cut him off.

All three of them were wearing their seatbelts, but Seong was stretched over to his side trying to calm him down. When the car crashed and spun, the inertia caused his head to slam against the window.

He was on life support for a few days because of brain damage, but he ultimately died in his coma.

Jin had watched it all happen through a glass window. The sound of that heart monitor going dead and Seong mother\'s loud wails as she collapsed in the hospital hallway had haunted him throughout the winter break, and it still does as the guilt never left him.

As Jin-woo recalled all of this, his nose became a little stuffy.

"You asked me how I know that nursery rhyme and about that watch, it\'s because it\'s in the journal Seong left behind."

"Where is it?"

Jin-woo suddenly looked up and asked.

Seo-joon paused smoking his cigarette and stared at Jin-woo for a second then said.

"It\'s in my bag back in class."

Jin-woo gritted his teeth when he heard that, and he glanced at the zombies that were making a ruckus against the fence.

Seo-joon saw this but said nothing and only went back to smoking his cigarette.

Jin-woo, as if making up his mind, suddenly stood up. However, at that moment, Ye-jun parted from the crowd of students and approached him.

"We choose you."

Jin-woo looked over at him and asked with furrowed brows.

"What are you talking about?"

Ye-jun stopped fifteen steps away and after fixing his glasses he looked at Jin-woo before saying coolly.

"We need someone to lure the zombies away so the rest of us can escape. After we discuss things, we choose you."

***

I\'ll try to do long chapters like these in the future when I can\'t upload two chapters.