Masquerades

Silence.

Silence greets Jongin as he walks the dark, narrow, suffocating corridor towards the last room in the villa. Not a soul responds to his fervent calls. There is no electricity. There is a gale blowing outside. Yet, it pales in comparison to that in Jongin’s mind. He reaches the door at last. His hand hovers unsteadily over the doorknob. Images of what lay in the four previous rooms assault his mind. His throat feels like he’s swallowed sand. His heart is thumping, hard, in his chest, the dull, hollow sound ringing in his ears like a warning. He turns the knob. The click echoes through the empty corridors. Why did they agree to take this vacation?

Strange silhouettes and shapes stand out in the semi darkness. He can gauge the outline of two figures on the couch- one sitting, the other having fallen on the former’s lap. Visions return to Jongin’s mind.

Freshly raised out of a deep, almost drugged slumber, he had not seen anyone around in the darkness, nor had anyone responded to his calls. Kris and Tao’s room was the nearest and the door was unlocked. Two figures lay, sprawled, upon the bed. Jongin had leaned against the door frame, prepared to pass a witty comment. Then lightening flashed- thousands of volts of electric charge lighting the sky and the room-killing the words in Jongin’s throat. Tao had had his head on the elder’s shoulder, his hand clutching onto the fabric of the Kris’ shirt and Kris had one arm under Tao’s head and the other dangling off of the side of the bed… and then there was the blood. Blood that had flown from the two deep, fatal wounds- one in Tao’s abdomen and the other in Kris’s chest- and bathed the sheets red. Jongin had been too stunned to cry. He had wondered if they died trying to protect each other. But that did not matter. What mattered was that they were dead. Dead. Tao and Kris were dead.

Jongin steps further into the room. His shaky breathing the only sound in the air, barring the dull monotony of the rain on hard ground. He knows what waits for him inside.

Joonmyeon and Yixing’s room had seemed empty, the door to the bathroom left slightly ajar. Joonmyeon lay on the floor, limbs askew, eyes wide open- and lifeless- a far cry from the warm angelic looks that everyone was used to… but Jongin had wondered if “everyone” was alive to begin with. Then there was the blood, which ran small rivulets on the bathroom floor, flowing from a gash in Joonmyeon’s throat- flowing everywhere. The desperate urge to throw up had risen within Jongin as he backed out of the bathroom, only to trip and falter. Yixing, bleeding from a wound on the head, had been slumped against the wall. The wall itself had horizontal stains from the Chinese boy’s blood. Jongin had known Yixing had put up a fight. He was the type to put up a fight to the death. But the point was just that- death. Dead. Joonmyeon and Yixing, the angels, were dead.

 Jongin doesn’t need lightning to tell him that it’s Minseok who is sitting on the couch with his head thrown back, while Jongdae lies with his head on the elder’s lap. He doesn’t need lightning to tell them that they’re dead. They must be. Dead. Jongdae and Minseok were dead too.

He needs to breathe. A lump is blocking his throat. Tears are welling up in his eyes. He needs comfort. He needs support. He needs someone. So he raises his head and screams into the still air.

“Kyungsoo-hyung!”

The smell of alcohol had assaulted his nostrils as he entered Luhan and Sehun’s room. Luhan had been laying on the bed, dressed in a bathrobe, his hair still uncombed and askew. He looked like an angel, except for the lifeless eyes and the robe dyed red from blood- that reached the tips of his blond hair. A bottle of beer had rolled out of his hands and shattered on the floor. Among its tiny fragments, Sehun was sprawled out, the tiny crystalline shards dotting and piercing his pale skin. Jongin had not known where to turn. He stared at the two. His chest had begun to ache. Dead. How could Luhan and Sehun be dead?

Jongin’s cry dies out in the darkness. There is no response. The oppressive silence returns once more. He fears the worst. There is no way Kyungsoo could have survived this. Not his innocent and defenseless hyung. Tears are falling, thick and fast, down his dusky skin. He raises his head to shriek again.

“Kyungsoo hyung!”

Chanyeol and Baekhyun’s room had been locked. Jongin had not thought twice before breaking the door and entering. The wood had given in after a few tries. Then, he had stopped in horror. Every visible surface had been splattered with blood- the walls, the carpeting, and the furniture. In the center of the room, Chanyeol had been curled up, with Baekhyun against his chest, arms and legs a tangled mess and every inch of their skin covered in deep gashes, shirts torn to ribbons, hair matted with blood. Anger had bubbled within Jongin. They had ben butchered. Butchered and then left to bleed to their deaths. Dead…. How could the very signs of vitality, Chanyeol and Baekhyun be dead?

“Jongin-ah.”

There is a soft voice behind. Jongin’s heart leaps to his mouth he knows that voice all too well. His body acts of its own accord as he pivots around and engulfs the shorter male in a bone-crushing hug. First he laughs in relief, which then turn to choked sobs, which evolve into ear piercing shrieks of anguish. For all his mature looks, Jongin is still a nineteen year old boy. Kyungsoo is oddly calm as he rocks Jongin back and forth on the balls of his feet. He lets the younger cry himself to exhaustion till the only sounds coming are quiet sniffles, muffled by his face in Kyungsoo’s hair. Jongin feels selfishly glad he isn’t alone. He inhales deeply to calm his shaking nerves. The smell of spices and kimchi, that is forever a part of Kyungsoo, calms his rattled nerves. He memorises the feel of the small elfin body between his hands. The smile on his face.They are the only ones left. Then- a flash of lighning, a glint of steel, a quick scuffle, a decisive stab, a hot flash of pain and a whiplash of thunder that drowns Jongin’s scream. There’s another flash. Kyungsoo has just enough time to note the meat cleaver sticking out from Jongin’s back, before the dancer’s dead weight causes his knees to buckle and he toples backwards, under Jongin’s weight, and crashes into the side table behind. There is darkness for both boys. One, unconscious, the other dead. Yes… dead… he may know it, he may not, but Jongin too is dead.

………………………

“Something doesn’t feel right…” says Cho Kyuhyun, staring at the bright screen of his laptop, the lights casting odd shadows under his eyes. “Something does not feel right.” He says again. Sungmin stares at him in the dimly lit dorm room. He knows what the maknae is talking about. A few months and a thousand articles later, no one has reached the end of the bloodbath that has been dubbed the “Jeju Island Getaway Mystery”- that had left eleven boys massacred and one unconscious. “How did Kyungsoo survive?”

“Are you saying he should have died too? They found him unconscious under Jongin… the killer must have thought he was dead too…” Sungmin sighed.

“All this while and the only explanation is ‘anits’ or ‘sasaengs’? I don’t get is… there must be something that no one is looking at.”

“There isn’t anything in there… all that there is, are the boys’ fingerprints… and that is normal!”

“There was that one report that said the fingerprints on the cleaver that killed them was weird…”

“Kyuhyun-ah! That was a rumor… let things be… anti-fans are a good bet.”

“Even if it was them... how do people do such things…?” he shivers. Sungmin places a calming hand on his shoulder.

“No one ever knows what lies beyond a person’s face… even the sweetest smiles hold the darkest secrets…” Sungmin’s words cast an image into Kyuhyun’s mind- a pair of large, round eyes and a sweet heart-shaped smile. Could it be…..? He shakes his head and looks at the half-empty bottle. No, the wine must be getting to his head.

I am very aware of what I implied at the end.... and I take no pleasure in doing that....
Oppa, jjincha, jeongmal, jeongmal, nomu mianhamida. Saranghamida (^.^)
I finally discovered my Exo muse.... oh boy...