Rooftop Standoff
“No, wait a second. Hey, you there, mister, come over here too.”
“Don’t come any closer!”
The man standing by the pillar held a long kitchen knife in his hand.
“Hey now, put that down. You’re gonna get someone killed, mister.”
“That’s why you shouldn’t come closer! How are we supposed to know if you got bit or not?”
A middle-aged woman who had lost her daughter chimed in as she stood up.
“No, I’m positive you got bit. Look down there! What do you think it was like outside? You rolled around with those things and came back with all your limbs intact? That doesn’t add up. You! What’s that wound on your arm?”
The survivors scattered around reacted violently to the man’s words as he brandished the knife.
Some grabbed weapons they’d set down, while others backed away, looking for an escape route.
They were clearly just ordinary people, no matter how you looked at them.
But overnight, they had all become hunters.
Han Jaejeong stared down at his arm for a moment and let out a hollow laugh.
“Bit? By who? This is a surgery scar. Here, look.”
He shook off the blood, revealing a scar that looked like it had been stitched up years ago.
But the people were beyond reason.
They buzzed noisily, spiraling into collective panic.
Jaejeong and the others understood it well enough, but the excessive hostility left them unsure how to respond.
Kang Minyoung, unable to stand it any longer, spoke up as something occurred to her.
“Everyone, think about it. When we escaped from the first floor through the emergency exit yesterday, remember… that student?”
For some reason,
at the mention of the student, the people who had been glaring murderously started clearing their throats and averting their eyes one by one.
“He turned within seconds of getting bit. He’s probably still somewhere in the lobby if you look hard enough. If any of you had been bitten, you’d have turned by now, right? That’s why I opened the door.”
“You never know, it might be different for everyone. And that’s not the point anyway. We can’t escape anymore. You know that? We barely sent those zombie bastards off to somewhere else, and now because of you, we can’t even get down to the lobby, let alone outside. We’re trapped here to starve.”
“Enough. Drop it. The doctor’s not wrong about a thing.”
People holding various weapons gathered around the man with the glass shard and started restraining him.
It was unclear if their attitudes had shifted because of the student story or because Minyoung’s logic made sense.
Finally, the others returned to their spots.
Some lay lockers against the wall like bedframes with blankets spread out; others had pushed chairs together to recline on. They each had their own ways.
They’d clearly been holed up here for a while, settling into personal routines for rest.
Most were families, moving in pairs here and there.
“Looks like resting here won’t be easy. Let’s head up.”
Minyoung gauged the mood and led the group down a hallway.
The stairs to the rooftop were separate from the central staircase.
Jaejeong glanced back as he followed.
A few avoided his gaze, but they’d definitely been staring just moments ago.
Why are they so damn hostile?
He couldn’t understand it.
Gangsters and cops were teaming up for survival, yet these people were acting this selfish just because monsters that couldn’t climb stairs had gathered in the lobby.
A bitter taste spread across his tongue.
“You held back well. You had to. Technically, it is our fault, isn’t it?”
Kang Youngman consoled him, as if reading his thoughts.
“What the hell did we do wrong? Our fault they can’t escape? Bullshit excuses. If that’s the case, why didn’t they do anything before we lured those things here? Minyoung? You were here—you must know something. Spill it.”
“Well… you’ll see for yourself soon enough. You can see everything from up here.”
Minyoung flung open the rooftop door.
Blazing summer sunlight poured down the stairs like it could melt the world.
At the edge of the urethane-sealed rooftop, a human silhouette shimmered.
Under a small tent, a woman with a massive bow slung across her back had her hair tied up.
Her height and build were so impressive from behind, you might mistake her for a man.
Bloodstained white tank top, skin-tight leggings that hugged her hips and pelvis.
She stood tall without a hint of embarrassment.
Minyoung called out to her as she turned.
“That’s my dad. Glad the people with you didn’t get bit either. Radio still quiet?”
The woman who’d been standing still whipped around, bow raised in an instant.
An arrow was already nocked, string drawn taut.
The motion was machine-like—fast and precise.
“Stop. Stay right there.”
Her sharp, Western features locked eyes with the group.
Her upturned eyes, taut like the bowstring, made her look even more feral.
Youngman reflexively raised both arms in defense.
“Easy now. We’re not here with bad intentions.”
“Sure you aren’t. But bad things don’t always happen on purpose. Everyone except sis—turn around slowly, you three men.”
Youngman and Lee Beom-sik complied without hesitation.
But Jaejeong, feeling resistant, stared straight at her face.
He had a sense for it, honed dealing with criminals.
You could tell who’d really stab and who was just bluffing.
It usually played out as predicted.
It was a instinct evolved through DNA, passed down for survival—honed by experience.
This woman was the real deal.
And it wasn’t her first time shooting a person.
No one else might notice, but Jaejeong knew for sure.
Youngman had probably sensed it too and raised his hands first.
Jaejeong finally closed his eyes and turned slowly, following the others.
The woman inspected every inch of their bodies meticulously.
No bites, no bandages or wrappings hiding anything.
“If we were bit, we’d have turned by now. You know that from experience.”
Beom-sik, having completed his turn, spoke in his signature swaggering tone.
He eyed her up and down provocatively, like he was toying with her.
The madman was baiting her.
Does he have zero survival instinct?
Jaejeong shook his head.
But her response was unexpected.
“Come see for yourself. See what you bastards did.”
She lowered the bow and jerked her chin toward the railing.
Jaejeong let out a sigh of relief.
He didn’t know how she’d let it slide, but he was more curious about what they’d supposedly done.
The three men followed her gaze over the rooftop edge and were left speechless.
The hospital grounds, empty of even a single ant earlier, now crawled black with countless infected.
“What the…?”
It was unbelievable.
Fuck, where the hell did they all come from?
Jaejeong cursed inwardly.
“Where’d all these come from?”
Beom-sik scowled down at them.
The woman, watching a step behind, turned toward the tent with the transceiver.
“I’m not wondering where they came from. I’m wondering how you lured them all here.”
“Lured them? What’s that supposed to mean?”
Youngman asked, puzzled.
The woman started to reply, then just shook her head and walked off to the radio.
The rudeness made Youngman’s eyebrow twitch.
“Dad, I’ll explain. The hospital has a few big underground parking lots. The zombies were all down there originally.”
Jaejeong felt himself tiring of Minyoung’s emotionless voice.
Why did a doctor talk like that?
His head throbbed.
Youngman, on the other hand, seemed unfazed.
Has he always been like this?
“Anna tied firecrackers to arrows and shot them into the underground lots. Precisely, several shots. That drew every zombie inside and outside the hospital down there. That’s when we sent the rescue request. But somehow, after you and Dad showed up, this happened.”
Minyoung blinked her large eyes, scanning the group.
‘Anna’ must be the archer’s name.
The group fell silent, staring only at the infected.
“None of the survivors left in this building will welcome you. Who’d be happy when you bring a massive fuck-you like this? Right? So, what’s your plan now? Rescue requests are useless.”
“Ah… where to even start?”
Jaejeong wiped sweat from his brow and continued.
“Rescue request, yeah? Sure, great idea. But no one’s coming.”
“What?”
An uncomfortable smile spread across Anna’s face.
“Not that no one’s coming—they can’t. There’s no one left to come. You keep mixing in casual speech, so I’ll drop the formalities too. How big do you think this is? You’re calling for rescue because you’ve got some idea, right?”
“Need an idea? Whether the country’s fucked or the whole world, ships at sea, planes in the air, choppers—they’re fine, aren’t they? You ignoring the military?”
“Say that’s true. You think they’d bother saving us? There’s more than just us survivors out there. They don’t even know how many we are—how’re they supposed to swoop in blind? Downtown like this, best they could do is a chopper anyway?”
Jaejeong gestured to the densely packed buildings around the hospital.
“So we just sit here and starve?”
“No… I’m saying the rescue request being pointless because of us doesn’t fit the situation.”
“Who the hell are you to say what fits? You know how we spent the night? Everyone surviving here is ordinary folk. People who can’t even swing a knife right. I shoved those things underground so even they could try to live—and now you’re saying that was pointless?”
Anna glared at Jaejeong, displeased.
“That’s not what I—”
“Hold on. Do you even know how to use that machine?”
Youngman cut between them, pointing to the transceiver under the tent.
It had a transmit mic attached.
“I learned once a while back, so I know the basics, but honestly, I’m not sure. Not even if what I did was right.”
“Mind if I take a look? I’m close with that side. Keep doing what you were.”
Anna pursed her lips, then snorted and turned away.
She crouched and fiddled with the machine.
Everyone watched from behind.
“She’s handling it better than expected. Whoever taught her did a proper job. But sending like this, no one’ll find us. More precisely, no one’s listening on this frequency. There’s usually a standard emergency channel. But right now, it’s more like…”
Youngman stroked his chin, then operated the transceiver deftly.
He was retrying what had failed at the auto shop.
Enough time had passed—things might’ve changed.
Chi-chi-zzzt—chi-zzzt—
After bursts of static, a human voice finally crackled through.
Infected People