บท 10: X
Jimin stood alone in the center of town. The air was fresh but still somehow carried some of the smog of Seoul.
It was silent and still. Too still. It was unnerving in a way that Jimin definitely didn't like and he felt more nervous than he had before. He looked around warily. The streets in every direction seemed to go on endlessly and eventually disappeared into the fog as they always did.
"Yoongi?" He called out, but his voice was lost to the wind that hadn't been there before.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw movement and turned quickly. There was no one, nothing, there.
A shiver ran down his spine and he looked down at himself. He was only wearing the clothes he had been earlier. Jimin hugged his arms close to his chest. Something wasn't right and he didn't know what it was.
"Ji~ Min~" a voice whispered teasingly next to his ear. He flinched with a shriek and spun around to find who had said it.
There was no one there, only the cobblestone streets, as empty as they had been before.
"Who's there?" He demanded, "Who are you!?"
The only answer was a faint giggle from within the fog.
"You know who I am."
"No!" He shouted back. "I don't know!"
The laugh only got louder and sounded colder. It seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once, it didn't even get quieter when he covered his ears with his hands.
"Oh, but you do," It said maliciously, "Don't tell me you've forgotten already, Jiminie"
His breath quickened. "I don't know! I don't know you!"
He wrapped his arms around himself and began muttering nervously.
"It's okay... I'm okay... It's only a dream... I'm just... lucid dreaming. Yeah. Nothing here can hurt me."
"Do you really want to test that theory?"
His chest burned and his throat constricted. It felt like someone had wrapped their cold hands around his neck and was squeezing as tightly as they could, keeping him from breathing.
"It's all your fault," it hissed, "everything is your fault!"
"What did I do!?" He gasped out, voice getting weaker with every word. Jimin pulled on the hands choking him and fruitlessly tried to get them to go away.
"You came here!" It snapped, "You should have just stayed away!"
Jimin struggled to escape. It was getting harder to breathe and harder to fight against his captor.
He tried to gasp for air, but none entered his lungs. Instead of simply pulling at the hands on his neck, he began frantically clawing at them in a desperate attempt to make them let go.
"Let... Me... Go..." He managed to say weakly. His limbs trembled from the exertion and he felt colder with every passing second.
"Oh?" The voice sneered, "Why should I?"
The grip on his neck loosened slightly and Jimin greedily sucked in all the oxygen that he could.
"I don't want to die," He whispered.
"Well boo hoo," It mocked. "Little Jiminnie doesn't want to die."
It paused.
"No one wants to die!" Jimin coughed as hands tightened around his neck again.
"I DIDN'T WANT TO DIE!" it shrieked, the voice echoing and multiplying until Jimin's head hurt from the sheer volume of it.
"AND WHERE WERE YOU, PARK JIMIN!? WHERE WERE YOU WHEN YOU COULD HAVE DONE SOMETHING!?" Its tone was accusatory and hurt.
"What was there that I could have done!?" He choked out somehow.
"You never came for me!" It screeched. "You left me to die!"
The hands removed themselves from his throat and Jimin rubbed his neck while gasping for air.
"You're the reason I died. You're the one who killed me."
Jimin looked over his shoulder in horror and his eyes widened when he saw what was behind him.
Jiyong. Covered in blood and looking just as he had earlier that day.
"Why did you kill me, Jimin?"
Jimin tried to take a step back but couldn't. His back hit up against something solid and he pressed himself to it, terrified.
"It's all your fault," Jiyong whispered next to his ear from behind him.
Jimin whirled around to stare at the wall, but he was gone again.
"Why did you do it Jimin?" Jiyong's voice mocked. "Why did you leave me to die alone?"
Jimin screamed as Jiyong appeared in front of him and held his wrists tightly on either side of his head.
"Why didn't you join me?"
Jimin tried to look away from Jiyong, just the sight of his matted hair and bloody clothes made Jimin feel like he would be sick. His wrists were released and Jiyong took a single step back.
"Look at me," Jiyong hissed and held out his arms mockingly. Jimin stared in fear that something worse than what already had would happen.
Jiyong's body was slowly returning to the state he had last seen it in.
He felt bile rise in his throat when blood slowly dripped down from Jiyong's mouth and dripped onto the floor. The smell of death was returning as well and permeating the air in a way that made Jimin want to choke.
Jimin didn't even want to look down where he knew that the intestines had fallen out. Just hearing the sound of them landing on the ground with a sickening squelch was horrifying.
As he watched in silent horror, Jiyong's left eye slowly detached itself from its socket and hung down to his chin, held only by the optic nerve.
His skin peeled off in chunks, revealing the muscle beneath before falling to the ground and letting the blood drain from them onto the cobblestone.
White bone could be seen through his cheeks and his teeth were exposed as his gums retracted and rotted.
His hair fell out in clumps along with his scalp and red blood flowed freely from every new wound that appeared on his body, or what was left of it.
"You did this, Jimin. It's time you took responsibility," His bloody and rotten lips curled upwards in a horrific bastardization of a smirk.
Jimin's legs weakened and he fell to his knees. He didn't care that the blood was slowly soaking into his clothes or even how nauseating the smell was.
"What did I do?" Jimin cried, hands trembling as they clutched onto his pants.
Jiyong paused. "It isn't what you did," he spat, "it's what you didn't do."
His bony finger reached out towards Jimin and Jimin couldn't help but flinch away from it.
"You never looked for me. Not even once."
"I-"
"You what!?" Jiyong glared with his one remaining eye, the emptiness of the other socket just making him look even more unsettling and Jimin could swear that the eye that was hanging limply was still staring at him.
"I couldn't!" Jimin screamed back. "I just couldn't!"
Jiyong hummed and stepped forward again, getting much too close for Jimin's comfort. He shut his eyes and tried to pretend that the skeletal man wasn't reaching for him.
"And what about me Jimin? If it was me instead, would you have done anything?"
Jimin gasped and looked up so quickly that his neck hurt. Taehyung was standing in front of him where Jiyong had stood not even five seconds before.
"Tae..." Jimin could feel the tears beginning to form and he reached out his hand toward his best friend.
"What are you doing here? Why didn't you answer me-"
"Answer the question, Jimin," He interrupted and knocked the hand away without hesitation.
"What are you talking about Tae? Of course, I would look for you," He laughed nervously and it was obviously faked. He was too scared for a genuine laugh.
"I see how it is," Jiyong's voice spat from behind him. "You'll look for your friends but not me."
Jimin glanced back to where Taehyung had been standing only to see that he had vanished.
"What about this one?" Jiyong ground out as he gestured to Jin standing across the plaza.
"It's Jin!" He exclaimed. "Of course I would look for him!"
Jiyong began to laugh in a way that made Jimin's spine tingle in a way he knew meant bad news.
"I knew it. You're just as I expected."
Jimin recoiled as if he'd been burned at those words.
"You have a heart as dead and rotten as my body, Park Jimin."
Jimin stumbled backward and fell, the wall vanishing from behind his back. With every word, Jiyong got closer to him. He backed up, dragging himself across the ground until he could push himself up and start running.
"Where are you going, Jimin?" Jiyong asked in a voice that was much too calm. "We're just getting started."
Jimin didn't even glance over his shoulder before taking off down the first foggy street he saw.
It stretched on forever in front of him and no matter how far he ran, once he lost sight of the plaza, he never seemed to be getting anywhere.
Jiyong walked behind him at a brisk pace and didn't seem to be worried in the least. In fact, he seemed amused.
"The game is just starting, Jimin. You can't leave now," He called out teasingly as if it were only a childish game of hide and seek.
Jimin ignored him and sped up a little more. He had to get out of there as quickly as he could. He had to get home. He had to get to Yoongi.
"Give up, Jimin," Jiyong sounded too amused. "You aren't winning this."
"I don't care," Jimin whispered to himself. Jiyong laughed loudly, a spine-chilling sound that made Jimin want to collapse to the ground and cover his ears. It was like nails on a chalkboard but a hundred times worse. It was like the shrieking of millions of people simply echoing in his head but he forced himself to keep going.
"I don't care what you say," Jimin growled. "Win. Lose. I'm not giving up either way."
Jiyong laughed again. "You're saying that now. I wonder if you will have changed your mind the next time I ask."
The road seemed to finally reach an end, but it wasn't anywhere he recognized.
There were two doors, one stained glass and one stone, set in a brick wall. They both seemed incredibly out of place and it threw him off.
"The first part of the game," Jiyong said calmly from behind him. "I want to see what you'll choose."
Jimin glared at him. "I don't trust you."
"I never said you had to," He shrugged, stopped and waited for Jimin to choose.
Jimin looked between the two doors anxiously.
The stained glass door was opaque so he couldn't see what was on the other side, not even light. The stone door seemed incredibly heavy and difficult to move.
He stood in between the two doors. It was a simple decision. A 50/50 chance.
He had no idea what was behind either of the doors. No idea what would happen if he chose wrong - or right.
He took a deep breath and grabbed a handle, twisting it and pushing open the door.
It opened into a barely lit hallway lined with potted plants that cast shadows on the crimson carpet. He took a step inside and jumped when the door slammed shut behind him. He rushed back and rattled the handle only to find that it was locked.
"Shit," he cursed and looked down the hall nervously. There was only one way he could go and he let himself take one step at a time toward the other end.
Jiyong's voice echoed around him as he slowly walked down the hallway.
"The left one," He mused. "Predictable. You haven't changed one bit" The voice turned bitter. "Selfish. Ignorant."
Jimin flinched.
"Thinking of no one but yourself."
Jimin walked quicker down the hall and tried to ignore the voice even though he knew it was impossible.
"You need to live with your decision, Park Jimin."
Up ahead he could see an identical stained glass door to the one he had entered.
"For better or for worse."
Jimin slowly opened the door and stepped out. He closed it behind himself and looked around. He was back in the plaza, or at least he thought he was.
Instead, it was more like a courtyard that was walled in with no other exit than the one he had just come through.
There was some kind of movement in the corner that caught his attention.
Jimin slowly stepped away from the door and walked cautiously towards whatever it was that was in here with him.
It seemed to look in his direction and started dragging itself towards him.
"Heck no," Jimin breathed as he turned and ran back towards where the door was. Or, had been.
When he reached it, there was only solid brick. There was nothing that could have ever suggested that there was once a door there.
"Nonononono," He panicked, trying to find a grip on the bricks to pull himself up.
"You chose this, Park Jimin," Jiyong mocked. "There is no one to blame but you"
Jimin whirled around and pressed his back into the wall. It was getting closer and closer with every passing second and he wanted to be anywhere but near it.
It reached out toward him when it was several feet away and Jimin was shaking like a leaf.
"I don't know what I did! But I'm sorry!" He yelled, "Let me out!"
"It is time for you to face the result of your choices," Jiyong's voice boomed.
Jimin watched as the thing got even closer. He looked away and closed his eyes, resigning himself to his fate.
Tears streamed down his cheeks and his heart was beating much too quickly.
He could feel that it was close enough that it could touch him if it just reached a bit further. He braced for some kind of bony grasp on his wrist and grimaced.
But it never came.
He heard a thump and a squelching sound and he opened his eyes to see it collapsed in a heap near his feet.
Jimin stepped around it and tried to creep away, to get as far from it as he could.
An ice-cold hand clamped around his ankle suddenly and he shrieked.
"You...Will just leave me here... Like the others..." It ground out slowly. Jimin tried to pull his ankle away but the grip was like iron.
"No! I just want to go home!"
Jimin paused suddenly. That voice. It sounded too familiar.
He slowly looked down at the thing on the floor and his legs went weak.
It was slowly oozing blood all over the cobblestone and dying the ground red. Rivers of the liquid flowed into the courtyard from over the walls like crimson waterfalls.
It slowly began to cover the ground and creep up his legs as it got deeper and deeper.
The thing's face emerged from the thick, red liquid and stared at him, eyes fixed and unblinking.
"Will... You... Leave... Me... Too..?" It rasped.
"Stop it!" Jimin shouted. "Stop doing this!"
"Jimin..." It said in a hurt tone, never once letting go of his ankle.
"No! Stop!" Jimin screamed and covered his ears. He didn't want to hear it. It couldn't be.
"You promised..."
"No, please no…"
"... we'd do it together…"
"STOP!" Jimin burst in a fit of rage. "DON'T USE YOONGI LIKE THIS! Leave me alone. Leave us alone."
He couldn't look at Yoongi. He didn't want to accept this. It wasn't true. It couldn't be.
Not Yoongi.
Anyone but Yoongi.
He threw his head back and screamed. He screamed until he was dragged under the crimson ocean by a cold, bony hand and held there where he couldn't breathe.
The echoing laughter engulfed him until he could hear nothing else.
"You chose the wrong door, Park Jimin," It screeched. "Denial doesn't suit you, now does it?"
"It's all your fault things have turned out this way."
"Your fault that I'm dead."
"Your fault Yoongi is dead."
"All because of you."
Jimin stopped struggling and closed his eyes. He deserved this. After all, it was
All.
His.
Fault.
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