— we control
nothing.

OCTOBER 21:
KIM SEOKJIN

==

seokjin runs.

he doesn't care where, or about the way the back of his too-tight shoes are digging into his heels, or about the way someone screams distantly and something—one of haewon's pieces of tech, maybe—falls to the ground with a deafening shatter. he just runs. back at the hospital, he remembers how they had all planned how to approach a situation like the one at the cemetery: "run away from the monster. don't worry about the others for the moment: they can take care of themselves. you can find and help them later. every single second matters. every moment determines your chance of it catching you or not. don't hesitate or lapse into shock; that's the worst thing to do in the situation. just keep on running."

and so seokjin runs. stumbling over uneven ground and sprawling weeds, he continues deep into the surrounding forest, now void of what lush flora would have been there during earlier months. under the pale moonlight, the winding tree branches are black snakes, casting shadows and obscuring seokjin's already limited vision. twigs and thorns scrape at his arms. his breathing is shallow—for now, his adrenaline is fueling him, and the fatigue of sprinting hasn't caught up to him yet.

something shifts to his side and seokjin turns, seeing the sharp profile of haewon running next to him. she must have ran the same direction he did. acknowledging her presence with a single nod (talking exhausts energy that seokjin can't afford to waste right now), he continues on, mind completely focused only on one thing: running away. his stoic, fixated mindset is soon broken, however, once a monstrous shriek resounds through the air, all too familiar to what seokjin has heard countless times. he'll never get over it: never forget it, never completely suppress the way his arms well up in goosebumps the moment he hears it.

seokjin takes the momentary risk to turn around. he can barely see the dark silhouette of abraxas, gangling and powerful, leaning over its extended claws and roaring into the air. the cars near it almost shake in the severity of its voice, and abraxas turns up to face the sky, long tongue hanging limply down the hollow cheek of its face.

and then seokjin sees it for the second time.

out of its broad, misshapen back, talons dripping with black blood extend from the thin, almost translucent skin. thick, large nails sprout from its arms, longer, longer, longer—until they almost seem to look like wings. wings not with feathers and colors, but with jagged bones and obsidian blood. wings not of beauty, but of pure evil. just like all those days before, when they grew from the back of a boy with a torn white shirt, billowing black pants, bare feet, and a lopsided winter hat.

terror washes over seokjin in full blast like a hurricane. haewon curses under her breath beside him as they run on, each step growing harder and the ringing in their ears growing louder.

"there," breathes haewon, words slurred from exertion. "cut through trees, go right. parking garage up ahead. go there, provides cover."

"where are the others?" seokjin tries to ask, but his voice is a mere wheeze—from running, from fear, or from both, he doesn't know. thankfully, haewon seems to understand and replies quickly.

"don't...know. probably ran different directions. saw jimin go...opposite of us."

abraxas screams distantly. through the dark silhouettes of trees, seokjin can just barely pinpoint the parking garage, large and squarish and gray under the pale moonlight. it's almost daunting. but the possibility of being chased by that insane monster through the dense woods is much less appealing to him than heading to the parking garage, so they continue on.

after several long minutes, haewon and seokjin reach the parking garage with burning legs and sore lungs. it's an eroded, expansive building of five stories, with rows of cracked, slanted concrete that look on the verge of collapsing at any minute. for some reason, several abandoned cars still reside in the parking spaces. the musty smell of dust hangs in the air.

seokjin collapses against the flaking wall, breathing heavily. "oh my god," he weakly croaks as haewon leans a shoulder against the plaster. "oh my god, this is happening. okay. okay. i'm shaking, holy shit."

haewon doesn't answer for a bit. "i've never," her voice is stable, overrode with shock, "experienced something so terrifying. oh god, the look on its face. its face. and it just appeared...do you know how quick it was? how can it be that powerful?"

"i don't know. i just...god, i hope the others got out of there safely. abraxas was just standing there for a bit and shrieking, so i really hope that was enough time..."

"how on earth was taehyung able to see its face almost every other day, especially from a young age? i—i'm never going to forget that visual. that was horrifying. the way its features were just...melted, almost. the way those talons grew..."

seokjin shakes his head. "i hate to say it, but i guess he just got...used to it. though it's hard to imagine someone being able to."

the air is eerily silent as they take time to process the situation, letting the shock register into realization. abraxas is here, in its true form, chasing them—and by its actions, with the intent to kill them. for some reason, it doesn't feel like when he had been at the cemetery, when abraxas chased yoongi. back then, they still thought it was taehyung. and although its form was eroding, with maniacal actions and expressions, it was still anthropomorphic. especially with the desperate humanity of the words taehyung's subconscious had drilled through it.

"listen to me, seokjin," haewon finally speaks, voice low. "our number one priority is getting out of this alive, okay? we worry about the insanity of the situation later." like how abraxas is still here, even though its physical form is completely gone. "stick with me, now that we were able to run away in the same direction. but if i'm in danger that you cannot fix, you run." haewon silences seokjin the moment he opens his mouth. "we don't have time to argue. don't pull some bullshit heroism act; this isn't a movie. this is real. but until that desperate moment, we stay together."

"you know i can't agree to—" seokjin begins to protest, but haewon cuts him off.

"we don't have time. i need you to cooperate. if you do, then we don't need to worry about the possibility of one of us not making it out of here, alright? so promise you'll heed to my words, please."

she's right; they don't have time to argue. abraxas could be anywhere right now, given how fast it was able to get to them. so seokjin nods and presses his lips into a thin line.

"our goal is to get back to one of the cars and get out of here, all of us," haewon continues. "although abraxas is quick, if we're careful enough, we can outsmart it. it does have intelligence, yes, but clearly focuses mostly on primal instinct. besides, it can barely track us in a general spectrum. if we hide well enough, we should be able to get out from under its nose."

"or lack of one," seokjin jokes, attempting to lighten the mood. haewon's steely expression doesn't change.

"let's go to the upper levels. the chance of abraxas lurking the ground is pretty high right now."

the sudden, faint sound of abraxas's shriek in the distance pushes them to jog the distance, scaling to the third level before haewon pulls seokjin to the side. they crouch positioned between the paneled, three foot high wall and an old, dirty mini van, noses mere inches away from the faded license plate. it's a stuffy situation. but it sure as hell beats battling it down with a huge, almost invincible demon.

"so," seokjin suddenly realizes. "so if abraxas's physical form is completely gone now, shouldn't that mean that taehyung has gained his last memory right now?"

haewon's eyes widen. "shit, you're right. do you think the three of them have gotten home by now?"

"hopefully. it's hard to imagine they'd be stuck in traffic for three hours. we were only backed up because of road construction."

seokjin takes out his phone slowly, cursing at the flickering bars in the top left corner. "no reception. i'm not surprised, but..." he sighs. "guess we're on our own."

something thumps dully in the floor beneath them, and the oxygen escapes both of their lungs. every possibility of movement is halted as seokjin crouches still. the faint steps grow louder, louder, until a misshapen shadow falls across the wall opposite of them, illuminated only by the scarce light outside.

hoseok appears.

"holy shit—" seokjin scrambles out from behind the car, haewon quickly following behind. hoseok is ragged; his clothing is muddy, slightly torn at the ends, and thin cuts litter his arms and neck. a streak of dark blood runs down the side of his temple.

"christ," seokjin runs to him, helping hoseok stand up straight, "you're ravaged—"

"oh my god, you guys are here," hoseok croaks, leaning onto seokjin. "i—i ran here for shelter and i wanted to find the others and, and i didn't know where i would find them but you guys are here, and—"

he erupts into a sputter of coughs. "where'd your wounds come from?" seokjin says, really hoping for an answer that isn't the one he expects. "were you running through the woods, or—"

hoseok shakes his head, and seokjin's stomach drops. "abraxas. abraxas caught me and i...god, i'm an idiot, i stood there for a moment too late after abraxas suddenly appeared because, i—i'm not good at controlling my f-fear, i don't know, and then—"

"deep breaths, hoseok," haewon says, holding his shoulders. "what happened to you? do you know where the others are?"

"i was standing there, and then...then abraxas showed up, but i didn't move because i'm fucking stupid, so i...everyone started running, but i couldn't. after abraxas finished screaming, or whatever it was doing, it...it turned around and the next thing i know—" hoseok gestures to himself. "i'm beaten up. i think it threw me against a tree. what the hell does it have with throwing people against trees? first yoongi, then—"

it's clear hoseok is panicked, trying to play his fear off as humor. it's an age old tactic that, usually, might have worked for his upbeat personality; but right now, the blood on his skin is too big to pass off as a joke.

"how'd you get away?" hoseok scrunches his eyes at the words, and haewon roughly continues. "kid, you've got to talk to me. you're hurt. we need to get out of here as fast as possible. did abraxas chase you here?"

"no, no—" hoseok swallows. "no, it didn't..."

"talk, buddy, come on. how'd you get away?"

"jimin," blurts hoseok, and the blood from his forehead reaches his chin. "abraxas was about to hit me again and jimin came out from behind the trees. through a branch at it, but the branch—it went right through abraxas. right through its skin, like plasma or something. and abraxas turned around to face jimin, but jimin had this expression on his face: like he knew the action was futile, you know what i mean? and then he turned to me and nodded, and then abraxas screamed, and jimin ran—"

the realization is sinking in. no, they promised not to pull the act that yoongi did at the cemetery. it was reckless. they were all meant to run away. but seokjiin knows why jimin wouldn't agree internally to that, even aside from the care he places in the others.

seokjin remembers the way jimin's fists clenched in retaliation every time someone said the word abraxas. remembers the way his anger fueled utter hatred towards the monster. remembers that jimin has a revenge complex too big, even for logic or survival instinct.

no. oh, god no.

"so jimin is still back there?" haewon swallows audibly. "in the woods? with abraxas?"

"yeah. and i don't think he was ready to run."

==

forgive me for this sudden mood change but what the hell is candy corn even made out of that shit dont even taste like corn or even corn syrup the people need ANSWERS
also yeah!! hopefully you all didnt forget abt jimin's big revenge complex from his first chapter & on
(character traits dont just vanish, they only develop!)
ily & have a great day!!