8 | Here goes the life of the party

"Use your powers."

I stand on my elbows and help myself up by catching Azrael's jacket. When I lose my balance and try to catch his arm, he abruptly moves to the side to avoid my touch, and I stumble before managing to stay on my feet.

"What are—what are you talking about?" I ask him, short of breath, bending next to him and trying not to throw up, while looking at the spinning tiles under me and the shoes of the countless ghosts before me.

"You... you don't scare us!" One of the ghosts screams.

"You can't take me with you!"

"Bring me back to life!"

"I deserve to live!"

Still panting, I slowly lift up my head and look at each of them, their face full of despair and anger as they stare back at me and Azrael. When I turn to face him, I'm suddenly taken aback by how his wounds seem even scarier up close, especially his missing right eye replaced by skin. His focus is fully on me too, as he observes me with an emotionless face, barely paying any attention to the ghosts who keep yelling.

"Alone, they would be too scared to approach you, in case you might collect them," he tells me, his voice still as deep but soft as it was in the past, still startling me by how detached it is of his figure, and somehow managing to get on top of all the other voices of the shrieking ghosts even when he doesn't speak loudly. "But when they're in a group, they think they stand a chance to either reclaim their supposed right to live or take revenge. No matter what you say, they will instantly understand what you are and see you as the cause for what happened to them. Most of them have lost the ability to reason rationally so they will try to attack you and drain your energy like they just tried to. So use your powers against them, or they won't let you go."

"My only power is that I have sharp teeth and I bite well, but not sure that's what you're talking about..." I manage to articulate, despite not feeling my tongue or anything else in my body because of how sore it is.

Yet, a rush of adrenaline still makes my body jump on the side and fall on the floor, when one of the ghosts, a young woman in a hospital gown, suddenly throws a table my way. When I look at him, I see Azrael has barely moved an inch and is standing still, his hands in the pocket of his black pants, the table now in front of him but barely touching his legs. And his polished shoe is on the small wheel of the table.

I can't believe he managed to stop that without even batting an eye.

"Use him." He makes a small gesture to show me the door behind.

I stand on my knees and turn my head. I come face-to-face with the soldier ghost from earlier. He walks inside with a weird gait, as if his legs were dislocated and he couldn't walk properly anymore. His eyes are still as black as earlier when he caught me, but the veins around them have grown bigger, now going all the way over his forehead drilled with a bullet, paler than when I first saw him. The black liquid he's spit earlier is still all over his open mouth trying to say something, with only strangled sounds coming out of it.

I don't have time to observe him anymore.

Because a very sharp set of knives is now flying right my way. I manage to dodge, to see two of them stabbing a dead body on a table, another one finishing the race in a wall, by going through the ghost that sent them my way from the distance, seeing how he seems in pain with his arms raised, and the last one almost brushing Azrael's arm if he hadn't moved, even while not looking at.

Though, quickly other ghosts follow. I jump on the first table coming my way, ending up standing on top of a dead body. I get back on the floor before the table collides with the wall and stick to the wall to avoid the pair of scissors thrown at me. But I didn't have time to see the small tool box that hit me right in the head. I go down on the floor, covering my hurting head. I start walking on my knees to try and take cover under one table. But it gets thrown on the side from the distance, and gets suddenly dragged my way in a horrible friction noise, trapping me to the wall next to the entrance, where the weird-looking soldier ghost still stands, making little sounds of pain like me. A second table adds up and they start to press closer to my body, suffocating me until I see black spots on my eyes and feel my eyes getting heavier.

But through my half-closed eyes, I can still see Azrael moving my way, scissors and knives flying around him while he avoids them without even taking his hands off his pockets. He expertly dodges every ghost throwing himself on his way and kicks with his legs those who try to get material on the shelves and walls. Then, he stops before me and with his foot alone, he throws both of the tables, trapping me all the way to a group of ghosts darting towards us in physical forms. They end up on the floor in screams of pain, before turning translucent again.

"Use him," Azrael repeats, showing me again the soldier ghost still standing next to us without moving.

"What—what happened to him?"

"If they're too inexperienced yet they push the boundaries of what the state they are in allows them to do, they become like this. He's drained himself."

"But he's—he's already dead!"

"Half-dead. Nothing is fully dead unless they go into the Omega; these half-dead have lost their material bodies, but not the essence of what makes them exist on the same plain of existence as us. Now, use him; these ones are still conscious of what happens to them, he no longer does. He'll obey you. Ask him to drain them."

"How am I supposed to do that? By asking him nicely?"

"The moment he lost his material body, he was promised to you. All of them were. You have every right on all of them. But he will be easier to control. So look at this half-dead and want him to obey you. Ask him to drain the others. Quick, before it becomes too late."

I nod and take a deep breath, now staring at the soldier ghost.

Come on... obey me!

Drain them! Whatever the hell that means...

... Pretty please? Ghost with a tragic history? Officer?

Great Koreans, to the Great Korean way, always stay true! And... come on, I don't know the rest of the national anthem! Just obey me already!

He won't move an inch. He tries to move his dislocated body and keeps making strange noises, but he stays exactly where he is. No matter how hard I think about him moving and fighting these ghosts somehow, he doesn't seem to be eager to listen to me.

And my focus goes elsewhere when I realize that all the ghosts have stopped making a sound. When I turn to face them, I see everybody has spread across the room and each of them is now standing next to one table with a body on it. The woman with the hospital gown who's been the first one to attack me after the soldier ghost stares at me, her eyes darkened and her eyebrows furrowed with anger.

"In three... two... one... now!" she yells and each of them throw away the white sheet covering the dead body they're standing next to.

Then, they all dissolve into a blue smoke and they strike the body they've chosen, to hurry into their noses and mouths, leaving the air clean.

That's when all these bodies lying down until now suddenly all get up from their tables and turn to face... me.

It seems as if they're staring right through my soul with their lifeless eyes, their naked and damaged pale corpses starting to slowly march towards Azrael and I, the first sighing while he finally takes his hands off the pockets of his pants.

I have a hard time swallowing the lump in my throat, as my shaking legs stick me to the wall behind me to get as far away as possible from these walking corpses.

"Forget it, it's too late now."

That's all Azrael says, as he takes off his jacket to throw it on the floor and unbuttons his sleeves to roll them up, keeping his gloves. He comes near me and without even eyeing me, he takes out the knife stuck near the door and one on the floor. He then stands in front of me and gets in a fighting stance, as the corpses possessed by the ghosts halt.

I steady myself, trying to keep my focus on the soldier ghost to control him somehow while still fearing for my life for the second time tonight.

But... wait.

Why am I fearing for my life?

And only then do I realize how stupid my body is to try and protect itself so eagerly. I feel my muscles suddenly relax. What's the point in being afraid if I didn't even want to come back alive from my accident tonight? Maybe if something happens to me now, it'll nullify this stupid contract Death and Azrael made on my behalf.

Maybe they would let me rest in peace.

In a big scream, the corpses suddenly rush towards us to attack as a single group.

But the first ones in line get sliced up by Azrael.

He moves like a shadow to appear in front of one, before sliding to the other. Their dead fleshes bleed out as one by one, they fall on the ground, the ghosts that possessed them coming out like blue smokes to take their initial appearances again and lie on the ground, looking exhausted. When three of them try to circle him, he makes a spin on himself to cut their throats, and kicks the table a fourth one hurls at him, before dodging a fifth one's punch. He stabs him in the stomach with one knife, and throws the other on the forehead of another one running towards him. He's so focused on the next ones, that he barely notices that the dead bodies of two women have managed to make their way through the crowd and are now coming my way.

One of them grabs a pair of scissors on the ground and throws it at me. The blades shine a few inches next to me, where they've cut some pieces of my hair. But I don't move. I don't need to.

Let's just get this over with.

Cold hands get around my throat and start pressing against it. The woman chokes me and slowly lifts me up from the wall, as I put my hands over hers. My body starts shaking despite my protests. It's no good anyway; her grip is too strong. I start seeing black spots before my eyes as everything becomes blurry again, and I can feel the sweet sensation of anesthesia take over every part of me that's in pain.

"I just want one more chance!" the woman cries, her voice helpless.

As I feel weaker and weaker, the thoughts I tried so hard to escape by getting out of my room, to the point where I now find myself getting choked inside a morgue, start to spin in my head. It's like I can hear it all backwards. The despair in what the woman just said. The plea of that soldier ghost who died while waiting for the end of a military service that'll never be over. The wailing of all these dead people who've left so many people behind and who just want one shot at life like me despite me never wanting that unlike them. The disgust in that doctor's voice, who's lost a son that never came back alive from an accident like me.

My dad, begging for his life to be exchanged for mine. My dad who could never accomplish his own dreams because of me.

It's all because of me.

All of it.

And I'm willingly wasting away your sacrifice.

Appa... how angry are you with me? How disappointed are you with me?

The heat in my body, in my brain... it's becoming unbearable. Is that what happens when you're strangled to death? Why does everything seem to be shaking like my body? Why are all these thoughts physically hurting as if they were in friction with my mind? What is this tingly feeling on the tip of my fingers?

Why... why am I breathing?

I look around me and realize I'm still inside the morgue. I'm still in my hospital gown. I'm still sitting against the same wall and the same tiles. I can feel their coldness and the air coming out of the open door hitting my sweating face.

But when I look around me, I see all the dead bodies dropped on the floor. Even the one who was strangling me is near me, completely still. But most of them don't even seem like they've been attacked by Azrael's knife, who's standing in the center of the room, panting, his white shirt soaked in blood that's certainly not his. They just seem like they've passed out.

The ghosts lying next to them are different now. They all look like the soldier still at the entrance. Their black eyes are looking ahead of them, their dislocated bodies moving in pain but failing to get up. They seem like they try to scream, or at least speak, but all that comes out of their mouths are strangled voices.

"Did you do this?" I ask Azrael, out of breath, barely realizing how fast my heart beats.

"No. You did," he says, throwing the bloody knives on the floor and putting back his jacket on.

"I... I forced them out of the bodies?

"I told you they belonged to you. You have every right on them. You just did what I asked you to do with that one half-dead. But you did it on all of them. I guess Horseman gave you more powers than I thought they would."

I stagger to my feet by leaning against the wall and look at the bloody mess we've caused for some time. Azrael grabs a tissue on the desk with medical tools to clean up his gloves. Then, he puts his hands back in his pocket and gets past the soldier ghost to go out to the corridor, his steps so light I can barely hear them even in the deadly silence of the room.

I follow him, swaying a little behind him. But after taking a few steps, he stops so suddenly that I almost bump to his back, if he didn't move at the last second to avoid contact once again, leaving me to flail my arms to maintain my balance. He waits for a few moments without saying anything, then takes out his right hand out of his pocket and offers me a... tissue. I look at the back of his head, since he's barely turned to look at me, mouth open.

Reluctantly, I take the tissue.

And he starts walking again, me following him right behind.

"What'll happen to all of them?" I ask, as we get inside the elevator at the end of the corridor and he presses the button for the ground floor.

"A death god will take care of the half-dead. And a human will take care of the corpses in the morgue."

I'm guessing he's the one the police officer was talking about earlier in my room, when he said an angel paid him to cover up my accident and my literal medical death.

"Check out of the hospital. I'll be waiting for you outside," he mumbles, quickly walking out of the elevator to the entrance, without leaving a chance to say anything at all.

I sigh and get out too, dragging my feet all the way to the reception and waiting for my turn, until I'm in front of a too-smiley lady who hiccups when she sees me, quickly covering her mouth.

I guess I look worse than all those corpses in the morgue after getting strangled by one of them.

"My name is Mun Soo-jin. I'd like to check out please."

She doesn't say anything and focuses her eyes shining with concern on her computer screen, as she types my name. "But, ma'am, we're still waiting for you blood test results."

"I'm sure they'll be clean."

"I'm sorry but we can't let you go... like this." She risks a glance at me, then quickly looks at her computer screen again when seeing my annoyed expression, probably scarier than usual given how I must look.

"I'd like to go please. Now."

"But, we—"

"I just got her test results, I didn't have time to encode them. They're clean, so you can let her check out."

I turn to face the doctor from earlier, leaning on the desk and taking notes without looking back at me. I also notice Azrael's careful gaze from behind the entrance doors, his stance stiff and his arms crossed on his chest like a bodyguard.

What is he? A crime syndicate or an angel?

"Okay, then, here's your bill, miss Mun."

I take the little paper the secretary gives me, filled with details of my treatment and the price I'm supposed to pay for them.

But I give the paper back to her.

"I said I want my hospital bill, not that I want to buy the entire hospital."

"We did a thorough exam for someone who had no medical emergency and yet came in an ambulance to the hospital. And this is a private hospital. If there are any problems with the bill, please sort it out with your insurance later." The doctor says, her words biting me like a snake, with a disguised satisfaction in her voice.

"But I died."

She drops her pen and finally looks at me, now with a bright smile on her lips. "But you seem very much alive to me... miss."

She looks at me.

I look at her.

She looks at me.

I look at her.

She looks at me.

I... fuck.

"Let me grab my wallet," I sigh.

And one quick trip to my room, a painful moment of trying to put on my slightly ripped clothes still full of blood despite my aching muscles and a tearful payment of my bills later, I find myself breathing the fresh air of outside, the sun hitting my face to warm it.

Yet when I catch a glimpse of myself in the window, I feel like thunder erupts in the sky and lightning strikes me.

"For someone who's just come out of the grave, I really do play the part..." I mumble to whoever wants to hear it, probably Azrael since he's the only one who would want to stand next to me, the rest of the people going in and out of the hospital walking to the entrance or their cars unusually faster when they see me.

I'm a sweating monster with dark rings under my bloodshot eyes and countless bruises on my swollen face, my hair is completely disheveled and my clothes look like they've served as evidence for a murder case.

I'm not the only catastrophe here either: Azrael might not have bat an eye while fighting and moving like a shadow, but the dry blood on his immaculate white shirt, the criminal gloves he's wearing and the old burn marks all over his emotionless face certainly make him look like a crime syndicate like I thought, seeing him earlier when I was at the reception and he was outside, stiff and with his arms crossed like now.

"We should probably get... new clothes." I note a little awkwardness in his voice as he suggests that to me, almost... shyly?

I slowly turn with a straight face to look at him and talk in a flat tone. "Noooo waaaay."

Then I look back at both of our silhouettes in the window and at all the other people in the background still walking too fast to get away from us. I understand that I ought to be seen the same way as him, from now on, by people like the doctor, the officer and many more too probably. Even I don't really feel like I belong with them anymore.

Not that I've ever felt like I belonged with anyone, anywhere, my whole life...

So I sigh.

Looks like it's going to be a long way before I can rest in peace, huh?