Chapter 207

“Ready, action!”

After crying her eyes out, Go Juwon avoided the gazes of Yeon Jaehui and Im Jang-woo, feeling embarrassed. 

The two of them looked at her with a fond expression.

“Let’s get ready then.”

Following Im Jang-woo’s advice, Yeon Jaehui adjusted her outfit. S

he wrapped herself as tightly as possible to avoid getting wet, while still being able to move comfortably. 

She also swung the iron pipe that Im Jang-woo gave her with all her strength.

Go Juwon texted the people in the hospital room about their situation. 

She didn’t say that they had found a solution, but that there were too many zombies and it would take some time to get back.

It wasn’t a lie. 

They were planning to go outside now. 

The sun was still high in the sky, and the streets were filled with people who had turned into zombies when they tried to leave the hospital. 

It was more dangerous than ever.

Go Juwon’s finger hovered over the phone and typed a sentence.

[Don’t wait for us.]

Go Juwon sent the text and turned off her phone. 

She didn’t send it to her mom and dad.

She had nine phones left. Eighteen arrows left.

Maybe there was no medicine. 

Maybe they would turn into zombies on their way. 

Maybe they would turn into zombies on their way back.

Maybe the medicine wouldn’t solve the situation. 

Maybe someone would come to rescue them before they found the medicine.

“Let’s go then.”

Despite all that, the three of them decided to head to the research lab.

“Cut! OK!”

***

[The sound of the bell! “Happy New Year!”]

[See your fortune for free]

[The nominees for the Grand Film Festival will be announced tomorrow!]

[The red days of this year! When is a good day to take a vacation?]

[When will the movie Escape be released?]

-Happy New Year!

-My fortune is good this year

-Oh. It made it to the Grand Film Festival nominees!

=Of course

-Vacation days! Vacation days! I need to make Monday a holiday!

-When is Escape coming out?

=They’re still filming.

=I wish they would release it soon!!

The filming of Escape continued even after the new year.

Kim Jongho’s fans sent a food truck with rice cake soup, and Lee Dajin’s fans sent a coffee truck with cookies shaped like money. 

The yellow 50,000 won bill cookies were the most popular.

“But why did Lee Jiseok and Park Dohoon send these?”

A staff member who was eating a bun tilted his head. 

It was colder than usual today, so he was hungrier than usual, but Lee Jiseok and Park Dohoon had sent buns and steamed dumplings.

“…I don’t know?”

A staff member who knew about their cameo appearances sneaked a glance away.

“Maybe they’re friends with Kim Jongho and Lee Seo-jun?”

“Then what about those?”

“…I don’t know?”

Along with the two actors’ snack trucks, there was something else.

They said to dress warmly and work hard, and black long padding jackets arrived in the same number as the staff members and extras.

The staff members and extras who received the jackets looked at the back of them. 

The word [Escape] was written on them. 

It looked like someone had written it by hand, and there were two types of handwriting: neat and clumsy.

“…Don’t they usually write it in English?”

“I don’t think I’ll wear this unless it’s for filming.”

“But this doesn’t seem cheap? It’s really warm.”

The Korean word on the back was awkward, but everyone was satisfied with how warm it was. 

People wearing jackets with [Escape] on them were everywhere. 

Anyone who looked could tell that this was the filming site of Escape.

Seo-jun, Kim Jongho, and Lee Dajin arrived early and waited in the actors’ waiting room so they wouldn’t interfere with the filming. 

Thanks to the warm heater, their [Escape] jackets were hanging on the wall.

There was no one else, but Kim Jongho lowered his voice and asked Seo-jun, who was eating a bun and blowing on it.

“Evan and Rachel sent these, right?”

“Yes. They sent clothes instead of food.”

“And the writing on the back?”

“The neat one is Evan’s and the crooked one is Rachel’s.”

At Seo-jun’s words, Kim Jongho and Lee Dajin looked at the writing on the jackets on the wall. 

They smiled warmly at Evan’s neat handwriting and Rachel’s clumsy handwriting.

“I got Evan’s.”

“I got Rachel’s. Ew. I love it!”

“But why Korean?”

“Yeah. It would be better if they wrote it in English!”

At their words, Seo-jun laughed.

“They said it looked weirder to them to write ‘escape’.”

“…Ah. I see.”

It might seem normal to Koreans to write [Escape] rather than [escape], but to the two American actors, [escape] looked better than the foreign letters of [Escape].

“I’m glad it’s not ‘escape’.”

Lee Dajin sighed in relief and Seo-jun burst out laughing.

“Ahahaha. It was originally ‘escape’. You don’t know how hard I had to persuade them.”

“…Oh my god.”

Kim Jongho and Lee Dajin’s eyes widened and then they both laughed.

***

“Ready, action!”

Swish!

“You… You’re doing this on purpose, right?”

“Hehe. It was a mistake.”

Im Jang-woo barely dodged the long bow and swung his iron pipe, muttering under his breath.

“Stop shooting arrows. You can’t even hit a zombie that’s close by. If you shoot arrows, I’ll get hit!”

At Im Jang-woo’s words, Go Juwon shot an arrow defiantly.

Hit!

She smiled brightly at the sight of the zombie falling backwards.

“Hey. Close combat and long range are different.”

“What’s so different?”

“I’m good at long range. You’re good at close combat.”

“What about me?”

“Sister… Healer? Supporter?”

They talked in small voices while still moving. 

Yeon Jaehui secured the distance and Go Juwon attacked. 

Im Jang-woo guarded and blocked the zombies that attacked them by surprise.

They didn’t try to kill the zombies all at once. They had to save their phones and arrows in a situation where they had to cross a wide open space.

Their coordination, which had been clumsy at first, gradually improved, and by the time they did, they could see the research lab at the end.

“Did you get the vaccine?”

“Yes, here it is.”

Yeon Jae-hee divided the vaccine into several places. 

She could lose it by accident or the container with the vaccine could break while fighting zombies. 

And in the worst case scenario, not all three of them might make it back to the main building.

The vaccine had become more precious than their lives.

“This one is for Ju-won. This one is for the detective.”

“Okay.”

The three of them, who had swept up the vaccine and the data on zombies, decided to make some Molotov cocktails before leaving. Im Jang-woo’s past experience came in handy.

“Molotov cocktails…!”

Yeon Jae-hee and Go Ju-won’s eyes sparkled, and Im Jang-woo coughed awkwardly.

They poured alcohol into a beaker and tore up a lab coat to make a wick. It was like a cottage industry: Im Jang-woo filled the beakers with alcohol, Yeon Jae-hee put in the wicks, and Go Ju-won tore up the lab coat and handed it to Yeon Jae-hee.

“So how are we going to spread the vaccine? It seems like it would take too long and we don’t have enough arrows if we do it like before. And we don’t have much vaccine either.”

“If we take them down one by one, it’s no different from just killing zombies with arrows.”

To test the vaccine, they dipped Go Ju-won’s arrow in the vaccine and shot it at a zombie. 

It must have been a staff member here, since it was wearing a lab coat.

Yeon Jae-hee recalled the data she had examined while experimenting.

“It seems like we can dilute it with water since it’s water-soluble. It says it gets absorbed as soon as it touches any part of the body. Of course, it might take some time to completely stop the zombies like we did in the experiment.”

She wondered how long it took for the zombie they experimented on to stop completely.

Im Jang-woo was trying to remember the time in his head when Go Ju-won opened his mouth.

“…Water gun?”

At Go Ju-won’s words, Im Jang-woo and Yeon Jae-hee avoided eye contact. 

They had thought of that too since she said they could dilute it with water.

“It’s hard to find a water gun here, let alone use it. We need to think of another way.”

“But sir, won’t the Molotov cocktails start a fire? The police don’t even come, let alone the fire trucks. I think we’ll die before the zombies do…”

At Go Ju-won’s worried words, Im Jang-woo said as he filled up alcohol.

“These days, the fire extinguishing system is well done, so it goes out quickly.”

“…Shouldn’t it not go out quickly?”

“Then we’ll only use them outside. We used four phones and lost five arrows on our way here.”

At Im Jang-woo’s words, Go Ju-won nodded his head. 

He hoped he could find his arrows on his way back.

Yeon Jae-hee was quiet. 

She stopped moving her hands as the pieces of cloth for wicks piled up with beakers. 

Go Ju-won and Im Jang-woo looked at Yeon Jae-hee.

“Jae-hee?”

“Sis?”

Yeon Jae-hee was staring blankly at the sky, no, the ceiling. 

The ceiling was also covered in blood, as if the blood that had spurted out had reached there.

But where their eyes were looking was not there.

The bright lights and the round device between them.

Im Jang-woo’s eyes widened.

“Sprinklers!”

“We can spray the vaccine all over the hospital with those!”

“It might affect the zombies outside too, but if we deal with the zombies inside the hospital first, we can take care of more than half of them!”

“I think we can lure the zombies outside into the hospital after we deal with the ones inside. By then, the floor will be soaked with vaccine. If we just knock them down on the floor…”

The expressions of the three brightened in an instant.

It seemed like they could wipe out all the zombies in the hospital in no time. 

Go Ju-won, who was smiling brightly, opened his mouth with an ah.

“But where is the water for the sprinklers?”

“Yeah, we have to spray that water with vaccine first.”

At Go Ju-won and Im Jang-woo’s questions, Yeon Jae-hee chuckled.

“Do you know what my college major was?”

“No?”

“Building facilities. It has nothing-nothing-nothing to do with medicine or viruses!”

It was so unrelated that Yeon Jae-hee felt wronged.

Building facilities…?

Go Ju-won, who was still a middle school student and far from college, blinked his eyes.

“There are people who manage things like fire extinguishing devices, electrical wires, pipes, and such in apartments or large buildings. That’s the major that teaches that. I learned it too.”

Go Ju-won and Im Jang-woo turned pale.

“Then you must know a lot about sprinklers!”

“Of course!”

Yeon Jae-hee smiled confidently.

***

And time passed, and in early February.

An article came out.

[(Exclusive) Movie Escape finishes filming!].