The sound came first.
A low, wet crack—like a bone snapping underwater.
Kim Jisoo whipped his head around from the lab console, eyes narrowing. He had been calibrating RAIN's core into the transfer capsule—a sleek black watch—when something behind him shifted.
Soft. Barely audible. But… wrong.
Then he heard it again.
Crack. Crack.
He turned, slow. Measured.
Ji-won was standing in the corner of the lab, head bowed. Her hands hung loosely at her sides, twitching. Her breath came in short gasps. Her back arched just slightly—as if something was pulling her from the inside.
"Ji-won," Jisoo said, voice calm. Careful.
She didn't answer.
Then—
Her head snapped up.
Her eyes were wrong.
No longer clouded. No longer human.
They were black. All black. Liquid and depthless.
And her smile—
Too wide. Too sharp.
Haru, curled beside her on the floor, blinked in confusion. "Grandma…?"
She turned toward him.
Fast.
Too fast.
Jisoo moved.
In one swift motion, he ripped the chair from under the desk and hurled it across the room. It hit her square in the chest. The impact staggered her backward, slamming her into the wall with a sickening thud.
Haru screamed.
But Jisoo was already there, scooping the boy into his arms.
The monster—no longer Ji-won—staggered to her feet, body jerking like a broken puppet, limbs twitching unnaturally. Her jaw hung open now, unhinged, and her fingers had curled into hooked claws.
She was snarling.
He had maybe seconds.
"I'm sorry," he whispered, more to the past than the present.
He dashed across the lab, Haru clinging tightly to his neck.
Behind them, the monster shrieked—a distorted, guttural wail that no longer held a trace of the woman who had once soothed a child with lullabies.
The corridor lit up with red emergency lights as Jisoo sprinted through the tunnel toward the loading bay. The walls blurred past. Haru didn't make a sound except for ragged, scared breathing. But he didn't cry out. Not once. Not even as the sounds of inhuman pursuit grew louder behind them—claws scraping steel, snarls echoing through the reinforced passage.
Jisoo didn't need to look back. He felt her. Closer. Gaining.
He reached the final door. The auto-lock blinked red.
"RAIN," he barked. "Initiate core transfer. Lock down lab. Now."
The voice that responded was no longer just a voice in the air—it came from the sleek black watch on his wrist, pulsing with blue light.
"Acknowledged, Jisoo. Core transfer complete. Sealing facility."
Steel shutters slammed shut behind them. Doors sealed in a cascade of hydraulic groans.
The last shriek from the creature inside cut off as the final barrier dropped.
Jisoo didn't breathe a sigh of relief.
He'd seen her speed. Her power. A locked door wasn't a guarantee.
He ran to the Jeep parked just outside the lab entrance—an old, armored military vehicle he had retrofitted himself over the years. Solar-powered, EMP-shielded, four-wheel drive.
He threw the rear door open and gently set Haru inside, strapping him down.
"Haru," he said, crouching to meet the boy's terrified eyes. "No matter what happens, stay low. Stay quiet. Understand?"
Haru nodded, still silent. His knuckles white around the locket in his hand.
Jisoo slammed the back door shut and sprinted around the front.
He had just reached the driver's seat when he heard it.
BANG.
The steel door behind them crumpled inward like paper. Screws exploded outward. The wall cracked.
The creature emerged—a blur of muscle and bone, her once-human shape now stretched and twisted. Her mouth gaped wide as she shrieked and launched herself toward the Jeep.
"RAIN," Jisoo shouted as he threw the vehicle into gear. "Lockdown full override. Do not reopen for anyone unless it's me."
"Confirmed. Lab locked until manual re-entry by ID: Kim Jisoo."
The monster's claws slammed into the back of the Jeep just as Jisoo slammed the accelerator.
Tires screeched. Dirt kicked up. The beast stumbled, then chased.
It didn't stop.
It was fast. Too fast.
Through the shattered rear-view mirror, Jisoo saw her closing in—her legs bending backward at impossible angles, arms flailing behind her, hair whipping like smoke.
Haru looked back once.
Tears ran down his face.
But he didn't scream.
Jisoo gritted his teeth and swerved hard through the forest road, dodging dead trees and broken rocks. The sun—or what remained of it—cast a dying gray light through the canopy. Shadows danced like ghosts.
But the monster kept coming.
And she was gaining.
He needed a solution. Now.
There were traps. Trip wires. Detonators. But they were farther ahead. Not close enough.
He glanced down at the watch.
"RAIN—detonate tunnel 12-B."
"Negative. You are outside blast radius. Casualty risk high."
"I said detonate!"
"Override accepted. Countdown initiated. Five. Four. Three—"
The explosion ripped through the air like thunder made of fire. The tunnel behind them collapsed in a bloom of dust and debris.
Jisoo's ears rang.
He didn't look back.
The Jeep roared forward.
But his breath caught when he felt something slam into the back. A weight. Heavy. Impossible.
She had leapt through the fire.
Claws scratched against the roof.
Jisoo swerved again.
The creature shrieked, nearly slipping off—but held on.
Haru's eyes met his in the rearview mirror.
"Jisoo…" he said.
"I know," Jisoo snapped.
Then Haru said something that made Jisoo's blood turn to ice.
"Let me go."
Jisoo's head snapped back. "What—?!"
"I'm slowing you down," Haru said, voice shaking. "She's after me. Just leave me somewhere. I'm not scared."
Jisoo didn't answer.
His grip tightened on the wheel.
Behind them, the monster slammed a fist through the rear window, glass spraying like ice.
Haru didn't flinch.
"I don't want to be a burden," he whispered.
Jisoo met his eyes.
And for a moment, time stopped.
The gray sky darkened further.
The road twisted ahead.
And a choice had to be made.
Leave the child to survive. Or risk everything to protect him.
The monster howled, and the Jeep shook again.
But Jisoo had already made up his mind.
His foot slammed harder on the accelerator.
But even he wasn't sure if it would be enough.