“Song Junhee, do you like mysteries?”

It’s dark out there, only pitch black nothing as far as the eye can see. If the eyes are even seeing, that is. Junhee doesn’t know if his eyes are open. He tries to think, but he’s not sure if he’s alive enough to think either. Everything hurts.

“Hello? Are you even listening to me?”

Not a hallucination, then. Then what is that voice? Where does it come from? And why does it sound so familiar?

“God isn’t real,” Junhee blurts. “Not to me, so you can’t be real either.” Maybe this is just a side effect of dying. Depressing, but yeah, that sounds a lot more likely.

“I could be a hallucination, if you want. Does it help? It hurts to think, doesn’t it?”

The answer comes instinctively. “Yes.”

“Then don’t think about anything.” The voice is low and soothing, like a lo-fi song, like a piano playing a slow ballad while rain taps against the window. “Answer according to your heart’s desires. Just for now, just for this moment, there are no consequences to what you say. Nothing matters.”

“That’s nice,” Junhee says to himself in a daze. It’s been a long while since he’s been able to say anything without considering the consequences. When the lights are on for action and the cameras are rolling, one wrong word, one bad joke could be the end of everything.

The voice laughs. “I’m glad. But you still haven’t answered my question, Song Junhee. Do you like mysteries?”

“I guess so.”

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“And if you had the chance to keep living, would you take it?”

“Yes.”

“Even at the cost of everything you’ve ever known, even if that chance could be taken from you at any point in time?”

“... I’d still take the chance. Isn’t it better to try and fail and learn from that than to give up before knowing what could happen if you tried?”

Laughter echoes in the darkness, light and airy. “Very well, then. Song Junhee, you have six months to hunt down your killer. If you succeed, you will get to live your life as you were meant to. If you don’t… Well. I think you already know the answer to that.”

“There’s a catch, isn’t there? Tell me what it is.”

“Ah ah ah, you’re not the one in control right now. You don’t get to make the orders. But I’ll answer your question, because I like you, Song Junhee: You’ll know what the sacrifice is when you wake up.”

“That’s a terrible answer.”

The voice sniffs. “It’s the only one you’ll get. You’re the one making a deal with the devil.”

A deal with the devil, huh? “Fine, then, I’ll take it. But who are you? Why am I getting this chance? What happened to me? And Manager Kim, and-”

“Time’s up, Song Junhee,” the voice sings. “Whether we’ll meet again… Only fate will know. And one last thing: tell anyone about this experience, and your chance at revival will automatically be forfeit.”

Wings flap and flutter in the darkness, like a flock of birds. Junhee could swear he heard a crow cackling as the voice faded away into silence. Somehow, he just knows the other presence is gone.

Song Junhee wakes up in the wreck of a car with no recollection of how he’d gotten there. Something is burning, and a siren is wailing in the distance. The only memory he has is darkness, the sound of flapping wings, and a voice whispering Song Junhee, you have six months to live.

“Hey!” A voice shouts at him from over the clamor. “You over there! Your eyes are open, I know you’re still alive! Don’t you fucking pass out on me!”

The shock of hearing another human voice and the heavy smoke blanketing his lungs is too much to bear, and Junhee loses consciousness again.