Work Text:
The elevator chimes.
Darting inside, Yoo Joonghyuk slams his fist against the button for the fourteenth floor, pressing himself into the corner of the small space as the doors slide shut. His legs burn from exertion, breath coming hard and fast. Why, why is this…
He chances a glance at his phone screen. >7:13 PM. The killer is here, his Diary reads, and beneath it, >7:17 PM. [DEAD END].
Dead End, he thinks despairingly. Why is it that nothing I do changes this ‘fate’?
A scuffed shoe jams itself in the doorway just before it manages to shut completely. Yoo Joonghyuk’s heart jumps into his throat, choking off his next stuttered inhale.
A pale hand pries the doors open another inch, and a small, almost unfamiliar figure slips in. “Yoo Joonghyuk,” Kim Dokja murmurs. His dull eyes are dark over the bandage on his cheek, a fading bruise seeping into the skin visible around it. “You’re misunderstanding me.” The doors shut, locking them both inside.
“What is there to misunderstand?” Joonghyuk grits out, shrinking back as Kim Dokja approaches. Second floor. “You’re here to kill me, aren’t you? Don’t take another step, or—”
“Or what?” Kim Dokja asks lightly. For the first time, his flat, dead expression shifts. A smile plays on his lips. “You’ll do what exactly, Joonghyuk-ah?”
Before Joonghyuk can register his own movements, he lunges forward; his fingers close around Kim Dokja’s throat, lifting him and pinning him roughly to the wall. Unnervingly, the smile doesn’t leave Kim Dokja’s face. One of his hands wraps loosely around Joonghyuk’s wrist, the other raising an old, beat-up phone up to eye level.
“Yoo Joonghyuk,” he croons, voice rasping. “You won’t do anything to me.”
[PROTAGONIST DIARY]
7:11 PM
>the protagonist is getting into the elevator. he’s going to the 14th floor. such quick thinking!
7:13 PM
>the killer is waiting at the end of the hall. the protagonist slips by and runs. as expected of the protagonist!
7:16 PM
>the protagonist is cornered in an empty room. how will he escape this time, i wonder?
7:17 PM
>the protagonist has met his end. ending unlocked: 2/1864.
Against his will, Yoo Joonghyuk’s grip falters, and Kim Dokja slumps back against the wall. His steady gaze is trained on Yoo Joonghyuk, smile still lingering around the corners of his mouth.
"What…" Yoo Joonghyuk clenches his fist to hide the trembling in his hands, unable to tear his eyes away. "What the fuck is that?"
"My Diary," Kim Dokja says simply, tilting his head to look at the screen. "It can read your future."
"Why me?" The words slip out unbidden. It's obvious who Kim Dokja's protagonist is; there isn't a soul here except the two of them. But they're just classmates. If Kim Dokja’s [PROTAGONIST DIARY] is anything like Yoo Joonghyuk’s own [Observer’s Diary], that means that… that means Kim Dokja has been watching Yoo Joonghyuk, very carefully, for a very long time.
Yoo Joonghyuk can't fathom this careful observation of his every move. "Why…"
"You really don't remember, do you?" Kim Dokja shakes his head. "That's fine. It should be obvious, though, Joonghyuk-ah. You're so cool, like a novel’s protagonist." Sixth floor, seventh.
"You're crazy. You're a stalker."
"Rude. Don't say it like that. We share so many classes, Yoo Joonghyuk, isn't it natural to notice you?"
Kim Dokja, that strange, quiet kid who always sat in the back of the classroom. Song Minwoo liked to pick on him, and everyone else just looked the other way. He rarely ever spoke, and even more rarely spoke to Yoo Joonghyuk. What changed? What has his life come to?
"You're crazy," Yoo Joonghyuk repeats. Kim Dokja shakes his head again with a sigh.
"Say what you want about me, but you need me." Kim Dokja’s eyes flicker to the glass side of the elevator. “See?”
They’ve risen above most of the buildings surrounding them, and on the rooftop next door, a man stands, looking straight up at them. He’s dressed head to toe in unseasonably thick, black clothing, face obscured by a stylized gas mask.
He’s holding a knife.
Yoo Joonghyuk, suddenly, feels sick. 7:13. The killer is here. “Who is that?”
“The serial killer from the news,” Kim Dokja says nonchalantly. “The Third Incarnation. You’ve been pretty unsubtle about your [Observer’s Diary], you know?”
“Third… Incarnation?”
“Another Diary user, of course.” Kim Dokja laughs. “I knew that he was going to come and kill you— I saw it in my Diary. My Protagonist’s death, on the four-teenth-floor.” Yoo Joonghyuk has never heard him sound this certain before, no trace of that meek, quiet student left in his voice. Kim Dokja continues, tone still infuriatingly light, "If you had to guess, what do you think the genre of your life would be?"
"What are you talking about?"
They reach the fourteenth floor. The elevator chimes and the doors begin to open, letting golden light in around Kim Dokja's figure. With a smile, he reaches out and hits a button. The doors shut again, and simultaneously, their phones crackle with static. That 'fate' has been—!
"The genre of your life is about to change, Yoo Joonghyuk. I know your Diary— it only observes your surroundings, doesn't it? It won't say anything about you."
"How do you—"
"I know the future that you don't know." Kim Dokja's eyes gleam under the fluorescent lights. "So make me your companion. I can fill in the parts you're missing."
The numbers on the display rise. Yoo Joonghyuk stares at Kim Dokja's outstretched hand, the small, pale palm cradling his phone.
7:21 PM.
>The protagonist confronts the killer.
The curve of his wrist is hidden by white gauze. A memory, buried in the recesses of Yoo Joonghyuk's mind, rises: Song Minwoo and his little group of friends, ganging up on a small boy crouched in an alleyway by the playground. Yoo Joonghyuk had probably turned his back then, too.
"Why?" he finally manages to whisper. "Why are you helping me?" Kim Dokja steps closer, and closer, and closer, until Yoo Joonghyuk has to look down to keep eye contact with him.
"Because," he says, a smile playing on his face. He looks warm. He looks alive. "I want to see this story's 'epilogue'."