· 。ﾟ☆: *.☽
▎A F T E R     D A R K ▎

· 。ﾟ୧ ⋆. 𝗦𝗔𝗘-𝗕𝗬𝗘𝗢𝗞 & 𝗝𝗜-𝗬𝗢𝗢. ₊˚.༄
ACT ONE ━━━ CHAPTER ELEVEN,
❝ i think we were great friends,
kang sae-byeok ❞

𝓐 sigh escapes Ji-Yoo's lips as she went to sit down on the stairs whilst Sae-byeok leaned against the 'wall'.

After what was announced a couple of seconds ago, Ji-Yoo still couldn't get herself to believe it.

"You can't just sit there all day."

"Yes, I can, and yes, I will."

"You've got to accept it, Ji-Yoo," Sae-byeok told her and then scoffed, "Who knew that being friends with one person in this tragic place would lead to this."

That was their first mistake.

They both knew that getting close to someone in a dangerous game such as the one they were playing right now was certainly not a wise choice, but they did it anyway.

"Why did you even tell me your name?" Ji-Yoo asked out of the blue. If she was going to leave Sae-byeok in less than an hour, she should atleast get some answers.

Her sharp gaze set itself on Ji-Yoo, her lips pursed and her eyes held no emotions.

Sae-byeok shrugged, "You seemed like a nice girl and, uh . . . I- I don't really know why," She admitted, scratching the back of her head.

That was Sae-byeok's second mistake.

"You don't know why you gave me your name the first time we met?" Ji-Yoo questioned with a surprised tone.

She sighed and began to slide down the wall, sitting down on the ground with her legs against her chest. Sae-byeok didn't keep eye contact with Ji-Yoo and instead, averted her gaze onto her knees.

"Why are you suddenly asking me these questions?"

"Well, I realized that this might be our last conversation ever so I wanted to know you a little bit more before I leave," Ji-Yoo answered, and hearing the very faint voice crack that the girl had made Sae-byeok close her eyes.

"You make it seem like you're going to be the one to lose."

"That's because I am."

At this, Sae-byeok finally turned her head to Ji-Yoo whose lips held a sad smile.

Before she could try to argue with her, Ji-Yoo interrupted. "Say, how about we do this the easier and less energy-consuming way?"

"I'm all ears."

Hearing those three words made a wave of deja vu strike Ji-Yoo in the chest. 'I'm all ears' — the innocent, meaningless words that she once spoke to a man who convinced her to play to her death the last time they had an actual conversation.

Ji-Yoo cleared her throat once she noticed that she had been zoning out for a moment.

"We should just end the game in one round," She said. "All or nothing. A simple bet, if you will."

Deciding on trusting her friend, Sae-byeok nodded her head in response. "Playing what then?"

"Are you really in such a rush to finish the game first?"

"No. I just want to end this moment because I can't bear the thought of losing you," Sae-byeok blurted out but instantly regretted it because she shut her eyes closed and looked away from Ji-Yoo, who was a little stunned by the sudden confession.

"You're not going to lose me," Ji-Yoo reassured the girl but Sae-byeok didn't believe her one bit.

"What are we going to do now?" Sae-byeok raised her eyebrows, "Just sit here and wait 'till the end?"

A smirk formed on Ji-Yoo's red lips, "That's exactly what we're going to do."

Player 067 squinted her eyes at the young girl, not knowing whether to focus on how Ji-Yoo began to act strangely or just leave it alone and blame it on her nervousness.

"So what are we going to do before the end then?"

"Just talk."

"About what?"

"Things we've never told anybody about, I guess," Ji-Yoo ducked her head. "One of us is gonna die here anyway so it doesn't really matter what we tell eachother, right? I mean, we're already pretty close but I wanna know more before the end, you know?"

An invisible grin formed on Ji-Yoo's lips when Sae-byeok nodded her head in agreement.

Just stick to the plan, Ji-Yoo, and you'll live.

𝓘t was a long moment of silence before Sae-byeok got off of the solid, dirty ground, and went to sit beside Ji-Yoo on the stairs, only staying a stair down from the girl.

"Hey, Sae... you wanna know something?"

The long-haired brunette looked up at the time, seeing the four digits that caused an aching in her heart.

10:38

Not much time left.

They never actually talked, maybe mentally but not with words. The two girls stayed quiet the whole time, neither having the guts to speak up in case it was just a dream and not reality.

But sadly, Ji-Yoo knew what she needed to do.

Sae-byeok didn't answer so she continued talking, throwing rocks in the air and catching them. "I killed someone."

"What?"

A sad smile formed on Ji-Yoo's lips as she stared at her white shoes with blood on them. The blood of the people who died and became bricks of cash to be given to the winner.

What a sick place. What a sick concept.

What a sick person.

"I killed someone... wanna know who it was?" She looked up at the girl behind her, a smile on her face. It scared Sae-byeok, why was she smiling at a time like this? "I bet you do."

Not really, she didn't.

"Well, it's hard to say but since we're about to die..." Ji-Yoo suddenly paused and her smile dropped. "...this might come as a shock but—"

"I killed my mother."

Sae-byeok was speechless, as any person would be. She never knew that this small girl was capable of killing anyone, especially her own mother. But why?

She chuckled lowly, a chill running up Sae-byeok's spine as she tried not to make eye contact with the small girl.

Ji-Yoo's eyes darkened with an unreadable emotion.

"Yup... I killed her. You're probably wondering why right?" The girl still didn't reply which made Ji-Yoo shake her head. "My mother loved me with her all... she was the best mother I could ask for. But she was a whore."

A whore.

Never in her life could she call her mother that foul word but Ji-Yoo couldn't help but do so. She spoke from her heart, she spoke the truth.

"My mother slept with different people for money, she gave her body away to those disgusting perverts who used women to their satisfaction. It disgusted me. At first, I was clueless. Until one of her "boyfriends" told me all about it whilst drunk."

A tear fell from her eye.

Sae-byeok was silent the whole time, staring off into the distance but listening attentively to what she was saying.

"I would've understood if she used the money for good only to find out that she had been using the money to hire professionals to contact my father. Pathetic, wasn't she?" Ji-Yoo spoke calmly. "My foolish mother didn't stop trying to contact that one guy she hooked up with years ago, knowing that he probably forgot about her already."

"She was so in love with him after sharing only one night with him."

Ji-Yoo despised how her mother turned weak and vulnerable at the topic of the devil that was her father — whoever he is.

"I was drunk. Very drunk. I wasn't even in my right mind that night, I'm still not sure what actually happened that night. All I know is that when I woke up with a pounding head, my mother was already dead on my bathroom floor with her head cut open, an empty bottle of Vodka sticking into her bleeding head."

She still remembered the scene, that morning when she didn't know what she had done mixing with her killing head leading her to pass out beside her dead mother on the ground. Days later, she woke up in the Hospital only to find out that the woman who birthed and taken care of her since her birth was no longer walking amongst the land of the living.

It wasn't the fact that her mother died that slowly made her crazy but it was because she didn't know whether she was the cause of her death or not.

Months after her mother's funeral, Ji-Yoo was almost never in her right mind.

She dropped out of college, couldn't even find a decent job, she owed so many people so much money. She was miserable and broke.

"So yeah..." Ji-Yoo trailed off and silence embraced them once again.

A minute left.

"I'm a monster, aren—"

"You're not a monster, Ji-Yoo." Saebyeok's reply shocked the girl causing her to look at the taller girl with wide eyes. After hearing her story, Sae-byeok still didn't think of her as a monster.

"I don't believe you are," She confessed and another tear escaped Ji-Yoo's eye. "Everyone in here has done bad things but... what you did was a drunken accident."

"Sae-byeok... I don't deserve to live after everything I've done."

Ji-Yoo then offered her small pouch to Sae-byeok who stood up and refused. The girl sighed deeply and stood up as well, coming face to face with a teary-eyed Sae-byeok.

She took the taller girl's hands and held them in hers, staring down at their hands instead of looking into Sae-byeok's eyes.

"No! No, Ji-Yoo. I'm not allowing you to die like this—" She tried to refuse, shaking her head violently and trying to release herself from Ji-Yoo's grip.

"Sae," She cut her off. "It's okay."

Ji-Yoo opened Sae-byeok's palms and placed the pouch in her hands before closing her fist tightly.

"You should be the one to get out of here, you have a long life awaiting you."

She then wrapped her arms around Sae-byeok in a tight embrace. Ji-Yoo smiled a genuine one when she felt Sae-byeok hugging her back as she sobbed loudly.

Ji-Yoo's eyes shifted to the masked soldier standing in the corner.

The girl closed her eyes tightly and pulled away to face a crying Kang Sae-byeok.

"I hope you never forget me, Sae," She tried her best not to break down as she spoke, her voice breaking.

"I think we were great friends, Kang Sae-byeok."

Sae-byeok let out a sob as she remembered what she had told Ji-Yoo just days ago.

"I think we're going to be great friends, Park Ji-Yoo."

Ji-Yoo gave her one last painful smile before she gripped Sae-byeok's shoulders and turned her around, giving her a light push.

Sae-byeok gripped the two small pouches filled with marbles tightly in her hands, fighting the urge not to look back as she walked away from her best friend.

"I'm sorry..."

She heard Ji-Yoo whisper before the sound of a gunshot rang in her ear.

Sae-byeok sucked in a sharp breath as she shut her eyes, tears going down like a waterfall.

She couldn't believe what had just happened. She lost the only person she was able to open up to, the only friend she's ever made.

She lost the girl who made her happy in this unhappy world.

word count: 1939

kara speaking . . .
   eleventh chapter, done! short but sad chapter. jiyoo ended up sacrificing herself for her bestfriend saebyeok.

parallel:
"I think we're going to be great friends, Park Ji-Yoo."
"I think we were great friends, Kang Sae-byeok."

i just wanna clarify that the story about jiyoo's mother is true. she didn't make it up at all, it was truly a shock. i had only now thought about it while writing that part so it really was a shock to me too.

BUT... the book might not end just yet,

the plan must go on...

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© -𝙶𝙾𝙳𝙳𝙴𝚂𝚂𝙾𝙵𝙻𝙾𝚅𝙴, 𝟸𝟶𝟸𝟷