Incarnadine | Prequel to "Viridescence"

1

14th September
2005

Park Seonghwa hums the tune of his favourite song while swinging the two-litre carton of milk around in his hand. He may not be the smartest child, but he does know that it might be a bit unsafe for a twelve year old like him to go to the shop to buy milk all alone...while it's dark out.

He decided that he felt a little less scared while humming. He knows himself that he gets scared very easily and is often paranoid for no good reason. His uncle and aunt like to send him on little errands like this to toughen him up, but usually it does the opposite. His parents both died when he was younger in a tragic car accident, resulting in him trusting nothing. Not even the very path he walks on.

He stares at his feet intensely, nearly waiting for them to forget how to work and cause him to trip on an imaginary object. He's heard a few stories of people breaking bones from a simple fall...

He shakes his head roughly. Thinking these thoughts won't help at all. Think happy thoughts.

He thinks about his aunt's bright and supportive smile when he'll return. She always holds the most proud face when he comes back from these tasks and although it doesn't help his paranoia much, it makes him feel loved and warm inside. He speeds up his pace so that he can see her smile quicker.

Just as he's passing a smaller empty street, he suddenly hears a blood-curdling scream. His eyes widen and his head doesn't hesitate to start getting dizzy as his breaths quicken. His feet start moving forward more rapidly. Don't look don't look don't look don't look-

"Help!" A woman's voice screams again. She sounds so desperate, Seonghwa nearly stops walking. He clenches his fist and keeps speeding away. He knows what he's doing is wrong, but his instincts tell him that if he goes towards that woman his life could change forever. Most likely in a bad way.

"Please, anyone! I'm about to-" Her screams get cut off abruptly. Something snaps in Seonghwa. He immediately turns around while dropping the milk carton and runs as fast as his legs will take him. He prays that he's not too late and regrets not trying to help earlier. If anything happened to that woman, he'd have a hard time living with himself knowing he could have prevented it.

He comes to a halt at the street he heard the screams from. Not seeing anything unusual, he continues down, looking carefully into any alleyways. Eventually he hears heavy breathing and his blood runs cold. He takes a few more steps forward until he reaches a small dead end in an alley.

He can't help but gasp loudly at the sight in front of him. Bile rises into his throat and tears sting his eyes as he falls backwards onto the ground in shock. His heart beats loudly and sirens wail in his brain.

A young boy is sitting on top of a woman, who lies on her back. She is covered from head to toe in blood while the young boy repeatedly stabs her chest, eyes looking manic. His face holds a great amount of rage as he takes it all out on the unfortunate woman. The dark ruby blood sprays and pours out of her at many different points. It paints the boy's face but he doesn't even notice.

Seonghwa scrambles to get up, trying to be as quiet as he can. He glances around to see if there's anyone around or any houses he could try and get help from. His heart drops lower when he sees no one. The closest house is about a few metres away, meaning he'd have to sneakily escape this situation. If he couldn't save the woman, he should at least try to avenge her.

He gets up without attracting any attention, but then what he was dreading finally happens. As if there were an invisible box in front of him, his foot gets caught mid-air and he falls straight onto his knees.