Short Stories-Kai Ships Only! Volume 3

✈️Sookai- Underground

Midnight.

Soobin Choi arrived at the entrance to an abandoned subway station with nothing but a backpack and a burner phone. Having anything else was against the rules. Breaking them would mean a breech of contract and he was told that for his own safety, to never ever breech the contract. The whole point was to shut up and do his job. Do that and you get paid. It was an opportunity that Soobin couldn't afford to lose.

He was alone. No lights were around beyond the dim night sky. One of the doors was hanging off of it's hinges. The other had a large crack in the top window.

He took one step forward. His ripped tennis shoe stepped into a shallow puddle filled with dirty yellow tape. Soobin picked up a strand to see what was printed on it.

"Caution! Police line! Do not cross!" Caution! Police line! Do not cross!Caution! Police line! Do not cross!"

The hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Goosebumps followed after a chill ran through his body. It wasn't too late to turn back now. But he didn't. Instead, he squeezed through the crack in the open door and stepped inside.

Pitch black awaited him. Soobin fished his phone out of his pocket to find the flashlight feature. Once he turned it on, he saw another sign dangling above him.

"Caution. 6 foot clearance. Watch your head!"

Being two inches taller made him thankful for the warning. What good was accepting the job if he became injured before he started?

A gust of wind slammed the broken door back into place. The sound shocked Soobin so badly that he dropped his phone. To his relief, it only went down a couple of stairs. He picked it up out of another puddle and wiped it on his denim jacket. Black specs of wet mold was left behind. Another rush of wind forced his eyes forward. This one screeched. He directed the flashlight towards the sound and found another rusty sign.

"Caution. Stairs become slippery when wet."

"Yeah, no shit." Soobin's legs practically shook with each step downwards. Water dripped from a rusty pipe above. Out of nowhere, a large rat squealed when his phone light illuminated it's feeding time. Beady red eyes challenged him to make the first move. He screamed at it back. The rat didn't move. Instead, it hissed in retaliation.

Fear froze Soobin to his step like his life depended on it. Out of desperation, he picked up a nearby rock and hurled it as hard as he could. The pebble clattered across the floor, skirting into an old drain. His threat didn't work. The rat only hissed at him louder with it's rotten yellow teeth ready to bite.

His heart raced. He picked up a crushed soda can next and hit it square on the head. The rat finally scurried away. Soobin didn't allow himself to breathe until it was out of sight. His light followed it to see another rusted sign at the bottom of the stairs.

"Warning! Low ventilation! Those with difficulty breathing should turn back now!"

Nothing, not even the rat, made Soobin want to turn around more until he read that sign. A full on panic attack set in. He waved his phone around to find any sign of who he was supposed to meet. Graffiti seemed to be on every wall. Mold snaked up the pillars while broken bottles shined in the puddles on the floor. It smelled incredibly musty. At the same time, the air itself felt disgustingly wet. Out of further desperation, he called out "HELLO?"

No one responded.

"H-HELLO? IS ANYONE HERE?"

Only silence answered back. His phone indicated he had one bar of signal. He nearly dropped it when it buzzed in his palm.

A text from an unknown number appeared. It read "You coming or not? It's about to start."

Another gust of wind screeched through the station.

Before he even responded, a heavy set of footsteps came marching towards his position. The stranger's shoes sounded like military boots. Again, Soobin shakily called out "h-hello? Who's there?!" The footsteps stopped just out of range of his flashlight. Whoever it was had a tall stature similar to his own. "WHO-WHO ARE YOU?!"

The voice deeply responded "who you're looking for. Follow me."

Soobin wasn't going anywhere until he saw a face. He nervously demanded "SHOW ME WHO YOU ARE!"

The stranger chuckled to himself then joked "alright."

Each slow step forward made Soobin's blood pressure rise. His throat then tightened when the stranger's silhouette faded into the light. Before him was a man with long black hair and a dark purple bruise around each of his blue eyes. The bridge of his nose had a thin bloodied white bandage running across. Blood also dripped from his bottom lip in a rhythm that matched the leaking pipe.

The stranger stopped merely a foot away. He then glared at the light in his face and asked "do you mind?"

Soobin lowered it to see more blood dripping from the man's bandaged knuckles and wrist. He didn't dare look further. His eyes locked onto the crystal blue ones that seemed to investigate his soul. "Who-who are you?"

"Taehyun didn't tell you?"

"No."

"I knew he was one of the good ones. Such a shame that he quit." The stranger spit some blood to the side then looked at his chipped silver watch. "They call me Kamal and we really must be going. I trust that you brought your supplies?"

"Yes."

"Perfect. Follow me."

Soobin was lead onto the train tracks with his little flashlight still in the air. The only visible thing in front of him was the back of Kamal's bleeding head. Upon further inspection, he realized the bottom of his shoes were coated in blood as well. The stranger didn't seem to emit any signs of pain. Either that or he couldn't feel any at all. "Are you um... are you okay?"

"I'm fine. Why?"

"Why?!" was an excellent question Soobin refused to ask out loud. Instead, as they turned a corner in the tunnel, he stated "I just assumed you'd want me to... never mind." The medical supplies in his backpack seemed borderline pointless.

Taehyun didn't tell him much about the job beyond "just fix up the people they tell you to and keep your mouth shut. Trust me. You don't want to be involved. The less you know about them, the better."

He wondered if Kamal was considered "those people". Based off of the vibes he was getting from him, he figured he was.

In the distance, the two could hear a large crowd cheering for various things that Soobin couldn't quite understand. Scattered bright lights flooded his vision as they walked up a flight of stairs. The further they walked, the more clearly he could hear what people were cheering.

"KILL IT!"

"FUCK HIM UP!"

"THAT'S IT! YEAH!"

"KILL HIM NOW! KILL HIM NOW!"

The crowd roared with applause once they reached the top of the stairs. What Soobin saw in the pit below made him want to run and never look back.

Kamal only smirked at the sight. Without looking at his guest, he smuggly asked "you sure you still want the job?"

$1,000 awaited Soobin for each patient he successfully bandaged up. Taehyun told him that in a single night, he could make as much as $7000 for the larger events. It was money that Soobin needed to pay off his enormous medical school debt. Poverty was killing him but so was this decision. His morals looked at the dead man on the cement and begged him to leave. The wolf feasting on the man was a threat to stay.

Kamal knew he didn't give the other a choice. After he got his answer, he grabbed a knife out of his pocket then said "I'd scrub up if I were you. The main event is about to start and I don't intend for it to take long."