sooo......
it appears that jongwoo from strangers from hell has taken the role of our dear player 333...
also this is highkey dewdew but i think its an improvement from whatever the hell i was writing a few years ago saurrr
โ
sitting in the large, sterile room, you silently pick at your nails, sniffling quietly as you remembered the day's events. you were alone in h/n's room, sitting on his bed with your back against the wall and knees snug to your chest, not even bothering to remove your bloodied white shoes. he was gone, back to do whatever grim and devastating task he was assigned to do, or rather; to assign said grim and devastating tasks to everyone below him. you weren't exactly sure what he'd be up to, all you knew is that he was back to work, leaving you alone.
being alone, totally alone, with nobody in the room with you and no noise in the hallway, left you only with a lot of silence. silence that was filled with the loudest torture that only you could hear.
bang.
thump.
"player 199, eliminated."
the memory alone sends your heart to your stomach and your stomach to the floor. poor, poor ali. part of you wonders, if you knew what was going to happen, would you have switched places with him? taken sang-woo, that slime, the person that you once trusted and saw as an ally in this hell on earth, as a partner? would you have taken that bullet for him? should you have? the familiar sting of tears hits your eyes again and you can feel your heart rate increase. h/n's words echo in your mind; his attempt to comfort you in one of your most distressing moments to date:
"you weren't being selfish."
a sting shoots through your heart, he's wrong, you were nothing but selfish. all you wanted was to get some loan sharks off your ass and pay your rent; you didn't have a spouse or a child. nobody depended on you, except yourself, and even that you had managed to mess up. how could you let this happen? how could-
you're snapped away from your thoughts by a sound in the hallway; the first in hours. a foreign occurance yet welcome break from the rush of stress fogging your brain. it starts quietly, but it was very clearly footsteps. strong, heavy footsteps, most definitely from somebody wearing boots, that slowly got louder. but why were they here? was h/n returning early, or perhaps coming to check on you? or worse; was it a stranger, another guard, who was about to catch a player hiding out in a manager's room?
as the footsteps drew closer, you felt yourself instinctively pushing closer to the wall, further from the door, away from whoever lurked. the steps came to a stop directly outside the door, and after a brief pause, a knock hit the metal door. you froze, looking at the door, desperately scanning it to check the lock and look for any ways they could see inside. before you could register the state of the door, you heard a deep, firm voice.
"player 333."
stilling, not even daring to move your eyes, you sat in fear and shock as you tried to think of what to do next. escape was impossible. could you wait it out? surely he couldn't stand there forever. his boss would notice he was gone, right? right. just wait him out.
your relief didn't last long, though, as the jingle of keys and the scrape of one against the lock brought your heart to the floor. you were busted now, and so was h/n, and nothing ever ends well for people who don't follow the rules here, and the both of you would be killed, and it would be your fault, and another person would have been killed because of-
the man stepped in, not saying a word and shutting the door behind him. he wordlessly sat down in the chair in front of the desk, his posture rigid. you were still huddled on the bed, against the wall, like a cowering animal faced with its worst predator. your hands shook, and it was all you could do to keep your breathing normal as you were faced with the man in the square mask.
without speaking, the man slowly reached for the hood of his bright pink jumpsuit and pulled it off, the plastic-mesh mask coming after it, and lastly the black fabric mask underneath it, exposing his entire face to you. his hair was black, in a neat style that covered his forehead, yet slightly tousled from his uniform. his features were all normal; thin brown eyes and a sharp nose, with thin lips and a grim expression. he met your terrified eyes, and in an attempt to calm you, spoke quietly.
"my name is officer hwang jun-ho."
officer? what was that supposed to mean here? was there another rank here that nobody else knew about? does that explain why he was walking around the corridors in the middle of the workday for no reason? or was he from somewhere else entirely? the questions flooded your mind, but with his introduction, and your coherence only just beginning to come back, you game him a meek introduction in return.
he nodded, and seeming to sense your growing confusion as your nerves calmed down, he spoke more. "i'm a police officer from the outside. my brother is in here somewhere. i came here to save him." he said, eyes darting to the floor as a hint of sadness escaped into his words. you snapped your head up at the words "police officer". something that looked a lot like hope glimmered, the idea of somebody from the outside being able to help you, to see the horrors that occured when the rest of the world couldn't. only now did you gain the courage to speak, sitting up straighter on the firm bed.
"so you don't actually have anything to do with this mess? you're normal?" you asked, disbelief and caution in your voice as you stared at your could-be savior. he nodded, meeting your eyes once again. "yeah, i am, and so is your friend. h/n."
you raised your eyebrow. "h/n? really?"
he nodded again. "him and i have been talking, late at night or when nobody else is around. we've been trying to figure out a way to bring these games down from the inside and stop them, for good. it's been hard, though. we don't have a whole lot of time before the games end, and we want to save as many people as we can. my only hope is that it's not too late for my brother," he says, "in-ho. hwang in-ho. did you know any other players by that name?"
you shook your head, the only names you knew were that of your team's, and there certainly wasn't any hwang in-ho on your team. "sorry. nobody really uses their names in here, unless you start sticking together." you explain, feeling bad that there was nothing you could do for him. he sighed. "that's what i've heard. thank you anyways." he pauses, briefly, like he's considering something, and then speaks again.
"we need help. if we're going to bring this thing to its knees, we need all the help we can get. h/n doesn't want to lose you, and i don't want to lose my brother. we want you to help us." he sounded determined, looking straight at you as he spoke. "he does? he actually wants me involved in this?" you asked quizzicly, slightly shocked that he wanted you involved in something so large and so dangerous.
"he's the one who sent me to talk to you about this now, [name]," he said, standing up from his chair, "this cannot continue any longer, and the more time we waste sitting and conspiring, the more people die. come on, [name]. with your help, we could come up with something brilliant. something that will save everybody. will you do it?"
will you?
"i will." you say, after a moment of silence. it seemed like a no brainer, but you had an eerie feeling that something worse than death would await all of you if you were to be caught in such a scheme. but you thought about ali. poor, poor ali. and you thought about the piles and piles of bodies in red light green light, and the corpses holding cracked dalgonas in the sand, and the screams of the fallen in tug of war, and the cries of survivors in the tragic marble game.
so long as you were still alive, you would see to it that nothing like this would ever happen again.
"i will help you."
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