Chapter 207
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 207
Chapter Title: Filming Wraps Up
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“Ready, action!”
After crying his eyes out, Go Joowon avoided Yeon Jaehee and Im Jangwoo’s gazes, looking embarrassed. The two of them watched him, finding him rather cute.
“Alright, let’s get ready.”
At Im Jangwoo’s suggestion, Yeon Jaehee adjusted her clothes. She bundled up as much as possible to avoid being bitten, yet made sure she could still move freely. She gave the steel pipe Im Jangwoo handed her a powerful swing.
Go Joowon texted the people in the hospital room to explain the situation. He didn’t mention that he might have found a solution, only that there were too many zombies and it would take time to get back.
It wasn't a lie. They were about to head outside, after all. The sun was still high in the sky, and the area was swarming with people who had turned into zombies while trying to leave the hospital. It was more dangerous than anything they had faced so far.
Go Joowon’s fingers fumbled over his phone before forming a sentence.
[Don’t wait for me.]
Go Joowon sent the text and turned off his phone. He didn’t send one to his mom and dad.
Nine phones left. Eighteen arrows left.
Perhaps there was no cure. Perhaps they would turn into zombies on the way. They could be turned on the way back, or the cure alone might not solve the situation. Help could arrive from the outside before they even found it.
“Let’s go.”
Despite it all, the three of them decided to head for the research lab.
“Cut! OK!”
* * *
[The New Year's Eve Bell! “Happy New Year!”]
[Read Your New Year's Fortune for Free]
[Grand Bell Awards Nominations to be Announced Tomorrow!]
[This Year's Public Holidays! When's the Best Time to Use Your Vacation Days?]
[When Will the Movie *Escape* Be Released?]
-Happy New Year, everyone!
-My fortune for this year is great, hehehe.
-Oh, *Yeok (Reverse)* was nominated for a Grand Bell Award!
=Of course, hehe.
-Holidays! Holidays! I need to make sure my Mondays are free!
-When is *Escape* coming out?
=They’re still filming.
=I hope it comes out soon!!
Even as the year turned, the filming for *Escape* continued.
Kim Jongho’s fans sent a food truck that served rice cake soup, and Lee Dajin’s fans sent a coffee truck that handed out cookies shaped like New Year’s money. The yellow 50,000 won bill cookies were the most popular.
“But why did actors Lee Jiseok and Park Dohun send stuff?”
A staff member eating a steamed bun tilted his head in confusion. It was particularly cold today, making him feel hungrier than usual, but just in time, Lee Jiseok and Park Dohun had sent over steamed buns and dumplings.
“…Who knows?”
A staff member who knew about the two actors’ cameos slyly averted his gaze.
“Maybe they sent it because they’re close with Kim Jongho and Lee Seojun?”
“Then where did that come from?”
“…Who knows?”
Along with the snack trucks from the two actors, another delivery had arrived.
Black long padded jackets, enough for all the staff and extras, had been delivered with a note telling them to work warmly.
The staff and extras narrowed their eyes as they looked at the back of the jackets they received. The word [이스케이프] (Escape) embroidered on the back stood out. The font looked handwritten, with some characters neatly written and others looking slightly clumsy.
“…Don’t they usually send stuff with English lettering?”
“I don’t think I’d wear a padded jacket with Korean on it unless I was on set.”
“But this doesn’t feel cheap, does it? It’s really warm.”
The Korean text on the back was a bit strange, but everyone looked satisfied because the jackets were so warm. The set bustled with people wearing the [이스케이프] jackets. It was, without a doubt, the film set for the movie *Escape*.
Seojun, Kim Jongho, and Lee Dajin, who had arrived early, were waiting in the actors’ lounge so as not to interfere with the shoot. Thanks to the warm heater, the three actors’ [이스케이프] jackets were hanging on the wall.
Although no one else was around, Kim Jongho lowered his voice and asked Seojun, who was blowing on a hot steamed bun.
“Evan and Richel sent these, didn’t they?”
“Yes. They said they sent clothes instead of food.”
“The writing on the back, too?”
“The neat one is Evan’s, and the crooked one is Richel’s.”
At Seojun’s words, Kim Jongho and Lee Dajin simultaneously glanced at the lettering on the jackets hanging on the wall. Seeing Evan’s tidy script, a result of his long study of Korean, and Richel’s wobbly handwriting, both Kim Jongho and Lee Dajin smiled warmly.
“I got actor Evan’s.”
“Mine’s Richel’s. Ugh, I love it!”
“But why is it in Hangul?”
“Right. It would have been better if they wrote it in English!”
Seojun chuckled at their comments.
“Evan and Richel said that ‘escape’ looked weirder to them.”
“…Ah. I think I get it.”
To a Korean, [이스케이프] might seem odd and [escape] would look fine, but to the two American actors, the foreign script of [이스케이프] likely looked better than the plain English word.
“I’m just glad it doesn’t say ‘탈출’ (Talchul).”
Seojun burst out laughing at Lee Dajin’s sigh of relief.
“Ahahaha. It was originally going to be the literal Korean word for escape. You have no idea how hard I had to work to persuade them.”
“…Oh my god.”
Seojun’s words made Kim Jongho and Lee Dajin’s eyes widen, and eventually, both actors burst into laughter.
* * *
“Ready, action!”
*Swoosh!*
“You… you’re doing this on purpose, aren’t you?”
“Hehe. It was a mistake.”
Having narrowly dodged the longbow again, Im Jangwoo muttered under his breath as he swung his steel pipe.
“You, don’t shoot that bow anymore. If you can’t even hit a zombie this close, you’re going to hit me!”
As if to defy Im Jangwoo, Go Joowon fired his bow.
A direct hit!
Go Joowon beamed as the zombie fell backward.
“Hey, close-quarters combat and long-range are different.”
“What do you mean, different?”
“Long-range is just my thing. You’re the close-combat guy, mister.”
“And me?”
“Nuna… are you the healer? The support?”
Even as they spoke in low voices, the three never stopped moving. Im Jangwoo and Yeon Jaehee kept watch while Go Joowon fired his bow.
Go Joowon only shot arrows when zombies were in the direction of the lab or nearby, because if he shot in any other direction, it would be difficult to retrieve the arrows, and he would have to abandon them.
In a situation where they had to conserve both phones and arrows, the three of them moved with extreme caution as they crossed the wide, open space.
The three didn't try to kill the zombies in one go. Yeon Jaehee would secure the distance, and Go Joowon would attack. Im Jangwoo would stay vigilant, fending off any zombies that tried to ambush them.
Just as their once-clumsy teamwork was starting to click, the research lab came into view in the distance.
* * *
“Did you get the vaccine?”
“Yes. Here.”
Yeon Jaehee divided the vaccine into several containers. They could lose it by accident, or the container could break during a fight with a zombie. 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 own lives.
“This is for you, Joowon. And this is for you, Detective.”
“Right.”
Having swept up the vaccine and all the data on the zombies, the three decided to make some Molotov cocktails before leaving. Im Jangwoo’s past experience proved invaluable.
“Molotov cocktails…!”
As Yeon Jaehee and Go Joowon’s eyes sparkled, Im Jangwoo cleared his throat with a cough.
He poured alcohol into a beaker and tore up a lab coat to make wicks. Like a small cottage industry, Im Jangwoo filled the beakers with alcohol, and Yeon Jaehee inserted the wicks. Go Joowon tore the lab coat and handed the pieces to Yeon Jaehee.
“So, how are we going to spread the vaccine? The way we did before seems like it would take too long, we’re short on arrows, and we don’t have much of the vaccine.”
“If we take them down one by one, it’s no different than just killing them with the bow.”
To test the vaccine, they had coated one of Go Joowon’s arrows with it and shot a zombie. It was wearing a lab coat, so it must have been a researcher here.
Yeon Jaehee recalled the data she had reviewed during her experiment.
“It’s water-soluble, so we should be able to dilute it. The data said it gets absorbed as long as it touches any part of the body. Of course, it’ll probably take some time to completely stop the zombies, just like in the experiment.”
How long did it take for the test zombie to stop completely?
While Im Jangwoo was mentally calculating the time, Go Joowon spoke up.
“…A water gun?”
At Go Joowon’s words, Im Jangwoo and Yeon Jaehee deliberately avoided his gaze. They had both been thinking the same thing ever since she mentioned diluting it with water.
“It’ll be hard to find a water… gun here. I think we need to think of another way.”
“But mister, if we throw the Molotov cocktails, won’t it start a fire? The police aren’t coming, so will the fire department? I feel like people will die before the zombies do…”
At Go Joowon’s worried remark, Im Jangwoo replied while filling a beaker with alcohol.
“Fire suppression systems are pretty good these days. It’ll be put out quickly.”
“…Isn’t it a problem if it gets put out quickly?”
“Then we’ll just have to use them outside. We already used four phones and lost five arrows on the way here.”
Go Joowon nodded at Im Jangwoo’s words. He hoped they could find the arrows on their way back.
Yeon Jaehee was quiet. The pile of beakers and cloth for wicks was growing, but her hands were still. Go Joowon and Im Jangwoo’s gazes turned to her.
“Jaehee?”
“Nuna?”
Yeon Jaehee was staring blankly at the sky—no, at the ceiling. The other two also looked up. Blood had splattered all the way to the ceiling, leaving it stained.
But that wasn’t what had caught their attention.
It was the bright lights and, nestled among them, a round device.
Im Jangwoo’s eyes widened.
“A sprinkler!”
“With that, we can spray the vaccine throughout the entire hospital!”
“It’s a shame about the zombies outside, but if we can just take care of the ones inside, that’s more than half of them!”
“We can deal with the ones inside first, then lure the outside ones in. The floor will be soaked with the vaccine by then. Just knocking them down onto the floor would…!”
The three of them instantly brightened up. It felt as if they could wipe out every zombie in the hospital right at that moment. Go Joowon, who had been grinning, let out a small “Ah.”
“But where’s the water for the sprinklers?”
“Good point. We have to mix the vaccine into that water first.”
At Go Joowon and Im Jangwoo’s questions, Yeon Jaehee let out a triumphant chuckle.
“Do you know what my college major was?”
“No?”
“Architectural engineering. It has ab-so-lutely nothing to do with medicine or viruses!”
It was so unrelated that Yeon Jaehee even felt a bit wronged.
Architectural engineering…?
Go Joowon, a middle schooler for whom college was a distant future, blinked.
“In apartments or large buildings, there are people who specifically manage things like fire-extinguishing equipment like sprinklers, electrical wiring, and plumbing. That’s the kind of thing my department teaches. I learned it too.”
Go Joowon and Im Jangwoo’s faces lit up.
“Then you must know all about sprinklers!”
“Of course!”
Yeon Jaehee grinned, full of confidence.
* * *
The water for the sprinklers came from a reservoir tank.
The three of them returned to the main building and checked the locations of the machine room, the control room, the basement, and the water tank. The O.W.C. Hospital’s water tank was in the basement of the main building.
“There’s an underground parking lot, so there might be a lot of zombies. There could be people in the control room or machine room, too.”
Im Jangwoo fashioned a new steel pipe and packed the Molotov cocktails.
“It also takes longer than you’d think for the vaccine to take effect… so it’s probably better to go in assuming we don’t have it. Still, if we spray it now, the return trip should be easier.”
Yeon Jaehee said, after emptying a deodorant bottle and filling a spray bottle with water and the vaccine.
Go Joowon watched with a worried expression as Im Jangwoo and Yeon Jaehee made their final preparations.
Only Im Jangwoo and Yeon Jaehee were going to the water tank.
“If the sprinklers don’t work, or if we don’t contact you, you have to do it, Joowon.”
“Stay here, then go back to the fourth floor of the east wing. Then go upstairs with the others. If you tell them you have a vaccine that can kill the zombies, they’ll let you in.”
Im Jangwoo and Yeon Jaehee’s instructions grew longer. Go Joowon, clutching the bag filled with food, the vaccine, and the data, meekly nodded his head.
They had the vaccine and the data, but only the three of them knew about it. If they all died, no one would ever know. Yeon Jaehee had to activate the sprinklers, and Im Jangwoo and Go Joowon had to protect her. If one of them had to stay behind, it had to be Go Joowon.
“I’ll hide the data and the rest of the vaccine and give it to the police officer later.”
“…Alright.”
*Let me go too.*
It was a relief that those words didn’t come out of Go Joowon’s mouth, but it also weighed heavily on their hearts. Seeing Im Jangwoo and Yeon Jaehee constantly looking back at him, Go Joowon forced a bright smile.
He wanted to go with them. With one more person, their chances of returning safely would be higher. But Go Joowon didn’t say so. He wanted to reassure Im Jangwoo and Yeon Jaehee.
*If it gets dangerous, I’m still here. The vaccine, the data—it’s still here. So come back.*
*Don’t overdo it.*
Standing at the door, Go Joowon looked at Im Jangwoo and Yeon Jaehee and opened his mouth. His expression was bright, but his voice was thick and waterlogged.
“Jangwoo Samchon. Jaehee Nuna. You have to come back.”
Im Jangwoo and Yeon Jaehee smiled brightly.
“Don’t worry. I’m definitely going to graduate.”
“Me too. I’m going to throw those bastards from the seventh floor of the center into jail.”
At their firm promises for the future, Go Joowon smiled through his tears.
“Cut, OK!”
* * *
And so, time passed. Early February arrived.
An article was published.
[(Exclusive) Filming for Movie *Escape* Wraps Up!]
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