The Longest Dayz

Chapter 11: Kang Hanwoo

He was investigating the alley. He didn't know why he wanted to stay and investigate the alley, but the whole situation made him feel troubled. He felt as if he had missed something vital. He stared at the ground near the bodies and let out a long sigh. As he stared at the ground a little longer his eyes fell upon something. A footprint?

It was a large footprint, it came from the alley. The footprints matched the body in which Seojun had shot earlier. Hanwoo kneeled down closer to the bodies, making sure not to touch them though. He examined the bottom of the shoes, he noticed a strange goo; it looked a lot like tar, but it was a dark shade of blue. It had left wet footprints everywhere; they were extremely faint and wouldn't be noticeable to someone who hadn't been staring at the ground for long. As his eyes followed the faint steps, he noticed that the man had a struggle at some point. Where he had struggled was where the other body must've been before it had attacked the young man. There was blood that dotted the cement in some places and some that covered it. He assumed the blood that had dotted the pavement belonged to the owner of the footprints. Something serious had happened here. His eyes now followed the traces of footprints up the alley from where they had come from.

As Hanwoo traced the man's steps through multiple alleys he finally reached a building. He stood back a ways away though, spectating from afar. He considered going into the building, but decided not to go without backup.

A few minutes passed as he observed the building. An abandoned building, no doubt, with a basement. It was attached to an apartment complex as well. He moved closer to the building now. As he approached the building he heard a door swing open, followed by loud footsteps. A person ran out of the building in a panic. He jumped behind a dumpster that was near the exit of the basement. As he peeked around the corner of the dumpster he caught a glimpse of a quick blur. They had run to the front of the apartment. Hanwoo quickly snuck over to the building opposite, trying to see if they were still there. Sure enough a person stood out front of the apartment. The person's face was completely covered though, which made him throw his head back in disbelief. If he couldn't see a face, he'd never know who they were. The person finally moved from the spot and quickly hailed a cab. Again Hanwoo re-positioned himself, he dove into the stairway of the basement and peered out over the top. As the cab started to drive away, there was a loud bang and then everything went blank.

When he opened his eyes, everything was blurry. His head was spinning and his ears were ringing. His lungs screamed for air as he laid on the cement, all the air had been knocked out of him. He took in a deep breath as he tried to reunite his lungs with oxygen, which only caused him to choke on the harsh smoke. He sat up off the ground, and held his hands to his head as he tried to recall the incident. He remembered following the footsteps that led him there, after that though, it was a complete blur. He reached back and touched the back of his head, he flinched as he touched something wet and sticky. He looked at his fingers that he touched his head with and grumbled some complaints. He wasn't even surprised to find blood. He stood up quickly, which made him lose his balance and stumble a bit. Hanwoo knew damn well that he had a concussion. When he finally stood steadily, he looked around at his surroundings through blurred vision. He could tell that the sky was covered with smoke.

When his eyes finally went back to normal he noticed how far he had been thrown. He was about fifteen feet from the basement entry, well what was left of it anyway. As he stared in astonishment at how far he had been thrown something stumbled out of the basement. Hanwoo clumsily rushed forward to help, it was a person... So he thought. As he came within five feet of it he stopped. As it came into his view clearly, he backed up. It walked in an extremely uncoordinated manner and it made a low gurgling noise as it got closer to him. A terrible stench reached his nose, it smelled like a rotting corpse.