Smile 4
Everyone has those shameful memories they can't even whisper to others. Like the time you had to dig out rock-hard shit with your finger because of constipation. There's always that one person who's tried shoving in a wooden chopstick. But no one brags about it. It's embarrassing.
A woman on her period spreading her pussy open and shoving in a tampon right there in a convenience store?...
Nam Seohee's face remained utterly expressionless. It looked as casual as brushing her teeth. That blankness made it all the more chilling. Any human would feel at least a flicker of shame, fear, or twisted pleasure doing something like that in public. But her face showed nothing. If she had a human brain, she should have.
There was no shame.
Ah!
To feel shame, you need the whole brain firing: prefrontal cortex, orbitofrontal cortex, amygdala, insula, hippocampus, all of it. Shame is a highly social, complex emotion.
No way. Is her brain underactive?
She'd hiked her dress up to her hips, legs spread wide. Her reflection in the fridge glass looked straight out of a porno flick. Her pussy was already wet, clear fluid trickling down her inner thighs. Once she finished inserting it, she smoothed her dress down like nothing happened. The slick trail on her thighs glistened. Wet spots bloomed where the fabric clung.
Click-clack.
She walked out slowly. The other customers, the clerk—no one reacted. Then Nam Seohee turned her head toward me.
Our eyes met. Hers were still lifeless, but she clearly recognized me. Slowly, the corners of her mouth crept up to her ears.
My body froze. As her Joker smile completed, terror crashed over me again. I mirrored it with my own Joker smile. My facial muscles stretched unnaturally tight. Smiling ear-to-ear isn't a natural motion.
These things... aren't human.
Nam Seohee turned mechanically, like a doll, and exited the store. The glass door chimed shut with a ding.
Conclusion from what I just witnessed: Something wearing human form is mimicking human behavior.
Swiping a card on the reader. Shoving a tampon in public... They remember the form of the action, but not the meaning or context. Menstrual blood flows from the pussy, so plug it with a tampon. Logical decision. But no shame mixed in. No moral compass.
My pupils dilated, heart pounding. Fear mingled with a strange thrill. Curiosity about what this world was, why it was like this. Dopamine and adrenaline prickled my brain. An unpleasant excitement bubbled in my chest.
Sexual desire for Nam Seohee's body twisted with horror into something unique. Like the thrill of forbidden fruit. In a world where no one stops you, anything goes—a sense of liberation.
Is this a ghost story? Or hell?
If so, what did the countdown above my head mean?
I observed the other customers in the store. Watching their behavior might yield clues.
Card payments... They "pay" with cards because they remember the form. People handed over all sorts: resident IDs, business cards... Whatever. The Hamster swiped it on the reader. They know the form, not the context or meaning. Confirmed.
Finally, my turn to check out. I calmed my racing heart.
The Hamster was damn cute. About 155cm, baby fat still clinging to her. Tiny face, killer proportions. As a Korea University junior, we'd chatted and traded jokes.
But... was she not wearing a skirt?
She stared with empty eyes. Those little lips that used to call me "Sunbae-nim!" twisted into a grotesque smile. I smiled back the same way and handed her my card.
She swiped it expertly. Then flashed a satisfied Joker smile as the payment "completed."
I took my card and bagged my stuff. The terror from before diluted. I'd figured out their mechanism. They remember the form of actions, not meaning or context. Simple repetition using short- and long-term memory stored in the frontal lobe and hippocampus.
Doesn't this mean everything's free?
I trudged out of the store, feeling haunted. The world had changed overnight.
Then—
"Eek! Help meee!!"
A man bolted down the street. His shirt flapped like a cape, white collar twisted around his neck. He tripped and tumbled in his frantic escape.
Two police cars and five cops chased him.
That instant, everyone on the street froze. The guy munching hotteok mid-stride. The mom pushing a stroller. The elderly couple holding hands. Easily a hundred people halted as one...
...and turned toward the man.
Whoa, fuck...
I turned toward him too. Everyone wore identical furious expressions. Inverted eyebrows, scrunched noses, mouths agape. No sound, but their glares locked on him. Like spotting a pest that shouldn't exist.
Instinctively, I copied their faces.
"Demons of hell! I want to stay human! Please! Leave me alone!"
Demons of hell??
His scream sliced the air. He was soon surrounded and arrested.
"Please... please... Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name..."
Suddenly reciting the Lord's Prayer. The cops shoved him into the car.
Screech. Screech.
The car rocked with his struggles inside.
"Whew..."
The storm passed. People resumed walking as if nothing happened. My blood ran cold.
What if I'd screamed earlier? I'd have ended up like him, hauled off praying.
Cold analysis of the situation. Absurd, but was this really hell? Everyone except that guy and me—demons? Humans possessed by demons... Wearing human shells. The thought chilled me to the bone.
Everyone except me...
My heart thumped. Not hypnosis. The streets belonged to them. The neighbor lady, the convenience store clerk, passersby with babies in tow... All shambling with vacant eyes, flashing horrific Joker smiles on eye contact.
Even the TV announcer, shopping host, singer-songwriter Yu Hina...
The whole world infested by whatever these demon-like things were. His scream echoed in my ears.
— Demons of hell! I want to stay human! Please!
What if this was hell? What if I was dead?
Wait... My lower belly doesn't hurt. No pain?
The agony I couldn't endure without painkillers—gone. Scientifically inexplicable. My body had been riddled with cancer.
Despairing thoughts flooded in. Drank with Nangryun last night, fell asleep, died... Fell into hell. But if not hell, how so vivid? Phone works... World unchanged.
Then—
Click.
The police car back door opened. The arrested man stepped out. Thought they'd take him to the station, but they were still there.
Just letting him go?
Face ashen moments ago, now blank. I clocked it from his expressionlessness. In the car, his existence had switched. Possessed or whatever... Now just an empty shell.
He stepped out smiling his Joker smile. Then tore something from his neck. The white collar ripped off, something glinted to the ground.
Cops vanished. He strolled off casually.
Body takeover, live! I'd witnessed a human body seized by something unknown.
Conclusion: Fear comes from realizing it could happen to you. Goosebumps rippled again.
I wanted to check what he'd discarded. A glinting something on the curb.
A cross?
A cross necklace, ripped from his neck like trash. Counter to vampires and demons in ghost stories. The white collar—priest's garb.
He was a pastor?
Even a pastor and cross fell powerless. Chilling. His Lord's Prayer echoed. Watching God's servant now possessed, strolling away—nape prickled.
Nonstop irrational events, like stepping into a ghost story.
Real demons...
I pocketed the cross. Solid metal pendant, ordinary.
Body snatchers as aliens more sensible? Demons? Genre jumps from SF to ghost story outta nowhere.
Wait... Let's sort this.
1. Hallucination from dying brain.
2. I'm dead, in hell.
3. World ended, demons taking bodies.
All possible, but 1 out. Brain hallucinations have quick scene shifts, plot holes. Vivid experiences tax resources too much. Brain's efficient—creates illusions to save power.
2 and 3 share demons and body takeover. Loved those flicks: Body Snatchers, The Faculty, Alien Master, Invasion with Nicole Kidman, Japan's Parasyte.
Endings always apocalypse or hero snatched. With my neuroscience knowledge, those were childish jokes, cinematic BS. Without understanding brain mechanics, no talking or moving. Motor cortex, Broca's/Wernicke's areas—complex circuits. Can't twitch a finger without it.
Even if takeover, brain stays; observe host's neural patterns long-term, learn. Synaptic plasticity, rewiring—like brain-machine interface training.
Can't instantly speak human or blend in. Never. Must repeat routines, observe, learn.
This was realistic body-snatching from a neuroscience view.
If hell anyway... With the countdown overhead. My rationality ends when it hits zero. Probably get possessed then.
That... scarier than death.
10 days left. Cliff's edge.
Demon, ghost, whatever—using scientific, realistic takeover. Chose human brains? Neuroscience dreamer like me superior.
A tiny flame sparked at my fingertip. Lighter-sized, but vivid. Inherited odd power from Dad still worked.
Happiness circuits fired. If hell... Like Nangryun said, if Dad real demon, watching me? World's gift to me?
What do I fear? Only venom left.
They identify friend/foe with Joker smiles... Using bare fraction of brain function. Like ghosts denied by fixed horizon coordinates.
Demons or whatever, in human bodies... human.
No muscle/bone changes, same form. No different from me.
Heh.
Fear vanished. Situation got fun. My smile deepened.