By Zephyria 
Knock, knock.
Another knock.
[What is it?]
Jeffrey whispered, pointing towards the door. It couldn’t be Mi-so or Byeol. They had already set up a password for safety, and they could meet in the connecting room anytime.
Eden pushed himself off the wall and walked towards the door. There wasn’t even a peephole to see who was outside. After hesitating, he grabbed Ha-jin’s hammer from the shoe rack.
Zombies wouldn’t politely knock, so it had to be a person. Jeffrey and Park Chun-beom, who were sitting on the bed, quietly stood up and stood behind Eden. Park Chun-beom whispered anxiously.
“Director, be careful.”
Instead of answering, Eden counted down with his fingers. 3, 2, 1…. Gulp. In that brief moment when someone swallowed, the door burst open. At the same time, Eden raised the hammer high.
Whoosh—!
Park Chun-beom and Jeffrey, who were watching, squeezed their eyes shut.
“Ugh.”
But even with their shoulders hunched and eyes closed, there was no commotion. Chun-beom cautiously opened his eyes. Eden was still standing there, hammer raised.
An odd silence followed.
“Wh-who is it?”
Eden gave a short warning, “Shh…” as if telling him to be quiet.
Eden, who had only opened the door enough for a child to slip through, stared at the young man standing in front of him. He slowly lowered the hammer and frowned.
“Who are you?”
The man in front of him, with a scratch on his eyebrow, had a unique hairstyle: a half-updo with short hair. Looking to be in his early twenties at most, he licked his lips and opened his mouth.
“Oh, there really are people here? This place was supposed to be vacant. When did you move in?”
Eden slowly turned the hammer in his hand and gestured towards the man’s chest. The action cam he was holding was emitting a red light near his chest.
“Oh, this? It’s nothing. I do YouTube. Do you know the channel ‘Aggro TV’?”
When Eden didn’t answer, he continued as if he knew he wouldn’t.
“Ah, it’s only famous among young people. Anyway, the situation is ridiculously funny right now, right? I thought I’d collect some footage just in case. I’ll edit out your faces, so don’t worry.”
Eden, as if not wanting to waste a curse word, asked with a look of disdain.
“So, why are you here?”
“If you ask me like that, I don’t really have anything to say, well. I was just bored being alone, and I was wondering if there were any people my age around?”
He had no idea what was going on. The man seemed to think this whole situation was just a simple happening. Judging by his slick appearance, he must have been holed up in the motel since the incident yesterday.
Eden barely suppressed the urge to click his tongue and covered the man’s camera with his palm.
“If you’re bored, why don’t you go outside the motel? And take that fucking camera and film according to the situation.”
Startled by Eden’s fierce warning, the man hesitated and stepped back.
“Woah… I thought you were going to hit me?”
The man awkwardly rolled his eyes, then, as if his pride was hurt, spat out, “Damn, so sensitive,” and went into room 205 diagonally across the hall. Eden checked the room number he entered and closed the door again.
Back in the room, Eden knocked on the connecting room door, and it quickly opened. Byeol ran out and clung to Eden’s thigh.
“Uncle, was that you knocking earlier too?”
It seemed the man in room 205 had knocked on their door as well. Eden shook his head and lowered his voice.
“No. So, never open the door unless it’s the agreed-upon signal.”
Ha-jin had woken up and was looking at the people gathered in the room with confused expressions.
“What’s going on?”
“Someone knocked. It seems like it was someone from another room.”
Park Chun-beom answered him with a dazed look. Ha-jin scratched the back of his head, looking embarrassed. He had been whining about being anxious not long ago, but he had slept soundly through the commotion, which made him feel awkward. Although Eden wasn’t even looking at him.
“But, aren’t we going to eat?”
Then Jeong Byeol cautiously raised his voice. All they had to eat in this situation was the box of snacks Ha-jin had brought, but the child was hungry and mumbled, “I want kimchi jjigae…” Gulp. Everyone’s eyes shook violently at the mention of kimchi jjigae.
Ha-jin quietly got up and went to the snack box. There were only seven bags of chips, one pack of five jellies, and a total of six chocolate bars and energy bars. How long could they last with this? After thinking about it, Ha-jin picked up a reasonable amount and turned to face the others.
❖ ❖ ❖
Starting with the clueless young man who came on the first day, strangers knocked on their door several times a day. Two men who seemed to be friends, a middle-aged couple handing out religious pamphlets, a college student couple wearing matching shirts, and so on….
Most of them wanted to check if they had any spare food, and some crazy bastards even tried to check if there were any women.
A few days ago, people had raised their voices over boxes of aloe juice and tangerine juice in the motel warehouse, and zombies had almost broken the glass door when they swarmed in.
Four days passed like that. Water and electricity were still on, but the water pressure had weakened considerably, and the light bulbs had burned out, leaving the room completely dark. Thanks to the zombies reacting to the sound of the air conditioner compressor, they couldn’t turn on the air conditioner and had to lie on the floor to cool off, putting on all sorts of shows every day.
As expected, there were no new updates. There was no news of the virus being eradicated in certain areas, or even instructions to gather at designated locations. Instead of the hopeful news they had expected, the announcer’s soulless words to simply stay in a safe place were repeated.
All that remained was one chocolate bar and one energy bar, and people were now starting to fill their stomachs with tap water to stave off hunger.
But they weren’t just sitting idly by, waiting for the situation to improve. Eden organized two-man teams to scout nearby grocery stores, hardware stores, and restaurants in the morning and afternoon. This morning, they had made a great achievement by identifying the location of a supermarket, but the doors were locked tight, so they couldn’t go inside.
If they were determined, they could have risked their lives to get food, but Eden chose to be cautious. In fact, his reconnaissance activities were nothing more than groundwork for leaving for the Maintenance Depot. The week he had considered the last resort was not far off.
Of course, Ha-jin, who had no idea of his intentions, would simply lower his eyebrows and say he had worked hard whenever Eden returned to the motel with the bare minimum of food.
❖ ❖ ❖
After taking care of his business and washing his face, Ha-jin stared at his gaunt cheeks in the mirror. Today, unusually, Park Chun-beom, Jeffrey, and Eden had all gone out to get food together. He had offered to go with them, but Eden had refused, saying he would repay his debt, so he had no choice but to stay alone.
Should he go over to Mi-so’s room? If he did, he could already picture Byeol clamoring for him to show him some amazing magic tricks. Showing off a few to dozens of different magic tricks non-stop in the stuffy room would inevitably exhaust him. Ha-jin shook his wet bangs, wondering what kind of magic trick he should show today.
While practicing expressions in the mirror, he heard Park Chun-beom calling him from beyond the door.
“Ha-jin-ssi~!”
Judging by his bright voice, he must have gotten food without getting hurt. Ha-jin, clutching his hungry stomach, was about to move when.
“Huh. Looks like they went to the next room?”
[Looks like they went to Mi-so-ssi.]
Muttering voices followed. While waiting to surprise them, the conversation took an unexpected turn.
“I checked the inside of the hardware store’s glass door earlier, and it doesn’t seem like there are any zombies. It doesn’t seem like anyone’s looted anything either.”
“…so it should be okay.”
“When are we leaving for our Maintenance Depot… Jeong, I mean?”
“I’m thinking about two days from now.”
“Not much time left… We have to get to Yongun safely….”
“If we move according to plan, we should be able to pack at least a survival backpack and leave….”
Huh. Ha-jin’s hand, which was holding the doorknob, tightened. Maintenance Depot? Yongun? Ha-jin picked up on the familiar words and listened intently. As if they had gone straight into the room, the voices whispering in front of the shoe rack were no longer audible.
‘What…?’
Judging by the conversation, it seemed that Eden had decided on a destination. Ha-jin recalled the news channel screen where he had first recognized Eden. His clean-cut face and the large building that looked like it was from a futuristic city flashed through his mind one after another. It was clearly the Blue Works’ Maintenance Depot that was nearing completion.
Ha-jin’s face immediately darkened. His humiliating appearance over the past few days, when he had been trying to promote his strengths whenever he had the chance, struck him hard. Every time he suggested going together, Eden had skillfully dodged him like an eel, saying he hadn’t decided on a destination, and he had no choice but to believe him.
When did he decide on a destination? And he’s leaving in two days? Ha-jin’s breathing began to roughen with an inexplicable sense of betrayal.