Jae-min froze.
The humid, stale air of the fourteenth-floor hallway pressed against Jae-min's skin. 34°C. Manila in April. The fluorescent tube above Unit 1419 buzzed at a frequency just below conscious perception, casting the corridor in flat, sterile white that erased shadows and softened nothing.
Alessia stood in her doorway. One blue eye, visible through the gap. A messy cascade of indigo hair falling across her face. The cold stethoscope around her neck caught the fluorescent light. The plastic lanyard read:
Dr. Alessia R. Santos
St. Luke's Medical Center
Those eyes. In the frozen hallway, six weeks from now. Glassy and dead. Torn from her skull by neighbors who stopped being human. Left in a puddle of gore that crystallized at -70°C. He had held her hand until her fingers snapped like icicles.
Now those eyes were wide awake. Confused. Bright. The disconnect short-circuited something in Jae-min's chest — a gasp that never reached his lungs, trapped behind his sternum like a stone.
"Jae-min?" Alessia murmured, a sleepy confusion threading through her voice
Her voice. Soft. Alive. The sound cut through the ringing in his ears like a bell struck in an empty cathedral.
Jae-min's throat sealed shut. His hand gripped the doorframe of Unit 1418, the wood biting into his palm, knuckles bloodless. He couldn't speak. Couldn't move. Just stood there, a dead man staring at a ghost who didn't know she was one.
Alessia pulled the door open fully. A loose white shirt slipped off one shoulder, exposing her collarbone. Cotton shorts. Dark circles bruised the pale skin beneath her eyes. The bitter scent of hospital coffee and antiseptic clung to her. A night shift, probably. The lavender soap underneath — clean and sharp, cutting through the clinical stink of her shift.
"Are you okay?" Alessia asked, genuine concern bleeding into her tone
She tilted her head. Frowned. The crease between her brows — a crease that hit him like a fist to the sternum.
"You look like you've seen a ghost," Alessia said, a tired attempt at humor falling flat
"You have no idea," Jae-min thought, a shuddering wave of trauma gripping his chest
"I'm fine," Jae-min said, his voice robotic and hollow — entirely wrong
Alessia's frown deepened. She stepped closer into the hallway, the faint lavender cutting through the antiseptic like a knife through gauze.
"You're pale. And you're sweating. It's hot, but not that hot," Alessia rasped, clinical precision bleeding into worry
She reached up. Cool fingers brushed against his feverish forehead. The touch ignited something — a flash of frozen hands, blue and brittle, reaching for him from the dark. Jae-min flinched. Hard. His whole body jerked back like he'd been branded.
Alessia pulled her hand back quickly. Hurt flashed across her blue eyes. Just for a second.
"Sorry," Alessia whispered, a flash of hurt crossing her eyes
"No — I'm sorry. I just… bad dream," Jae-min said, the words escaping too fast, too desperate
"A bad dream where you were eaten alive," Jae-min thought, a bitter, lingering horror echoing through his skull
Alessia studied him. The searching gaze of a woman who spent her nights diagnosing people who couldn't diagnose themselves. Then she offered a small, tired smile.
"You should drink water. And maybe fix your sleep schedule," Alessia teased, a tired warmth in her voice
"We can't both be zombies." Alessia added, a faint smile cracking through the exhaustion
"Zombies," Jae-min thought, a sickening, ironic twist stabbing his gut
He almost laughed. Almost threw up right there on the linoleum.
"I will. Get some rest, Alessia," Jae-min nodded, a forced calm barely holding
Alessia paused at her doorway. Turned back. Something shifted in her expression — a softening, barely perceptible.
"You called me Alessia," Alessia said, a hint of warmth surfacing through the fatigue
"You are Alessia," Jae-min said, matter-of-fact
"I mean… you didn't call me Doc. Or Dr. Santos," Alessia whispered, tucking a stray strand of indigo hair behind her ear, nervous
"It's nice." Alessia added, a quiet admission she hadn't planned on making
Jae-min reached out. His fingers found the second indigo strand still loose near her temple. He tucked it behind her ear — slow, deliberate. His thumb lingered against her cheekbone for half a second longer than a neighbor's touch should. Alessia went still. Her blue eyes widened. A faint flush crept up her neck. Then she turned and disappeared inside. The door clicked shut.
Jae-min stood in the hallway for two full minutes. The fluorescent hum filled the silence. His fingertips still warm. The pulse in his wrist hammering against nothing.
"She's alive. Alessia is alive," Jae-min thought, an overwhelming, desperate relief flooding his veins
— • • • —
But the relief cracked open something darker beneath it. The hallway shrank. The hum of the fluorescents became the static of a television left on in an empty room.
Day one. The first news broadcast. The trembling anchor reading the crawl at the bottom of the screen. Flight KE627. Incheon to Manila. Lost contact over the Alishan Mountains. No survivors. He had sat on the edge of his bed in Unit 1418, staring at his phone. Ji-yoo's last message was still open. A photo of her and Mom and Dad at some restaurant in Gangnam, all three of them squished together, laughing. Mom was making a peace sign.
Dad looked embarrassed. Ji-yoo was mid-bite into a tteokbokki. The timestamp: 4:47 PM, April 14. The day before the world ended. They never made it home. The plane went down in the mountains on the exact same day the freeze hit Manila. Before the cold. Before the starvation. Before any of it. Three voices erased in a single news headline. Forty-three days in hell with no family.
And now —
"Ji-yoo is alive. Mom is alive. Dad is alive. They're still in Korea. Still visiting family. The flight hasn't happened yet," Jae-min thought, a fierce, trembling hope igniting his soul
"You have twenty-nine days. You call them. You bring them home. All of them," Jae-min thought, a rigid, unyielding resolve hardening his mind
He went back inside Unit 1418. Closed the door. Threw the deadbolt. Leaned his back against the wall and slid down until he was sitting on the cold tile. 34°C outside. But the tile was cool against his palms. Grounding.
"Twenty-nine days," Jae-min thought, a cold, urgent calculation pounding in his skull
Food first. He was a logistics manager. He knew supply chains. He knew how to move things. He knew what people needed to survive when the system collapsed. Water, calories, medicine, shelter. In that order.
He pulled out his phone. BPI app. Savings account: ₱87,000. Not enough for guns. Not enough for steel reinforcement. Not enough for a generator. But enough to start stockpiling food and water — the basics that disappeared from shelves within the first twelve hours of the freeze.
He pushed himself to his feet and walked to the kitchen. His throat was painfully dry. He grabbed a glass from the cabinet. Turned on the faucet. The hiss of rushing water filled the silent unit. He filled the glass to the brim. Lifted it to his lips.
His hand slipped.
The glass hit the edge of the granite counter. Tipped over the edge. Fell toward the tile floor.
Jae-min reached for it. His fingers closed around empty air.
The glass hit the floor. But it didn't shatter. It vanished. A ripple — a faint, inky distortion in the air right above the tile, like heat waves shimmering off summer asphalt. Then nothing.
Jae-min stared at the floor. Empty. He looked at his hand. Then back at the floor.
"What the hell?" Jae-min asked, his voice trembling
He crouched down. Touched the tile. Cold. Solid. No shards of glass. No pooling water.
He stood up. Closed his eyes. Reached out with his hand — not physically. Something else. A deep, instinctual pull in his chest he didn't know he had.
A black crack split open in the air in front of him. Small. Barely the size of a fist. A jagged tear in reality itself. Inside the darkness, the glass floated. Perfectly intact. The water still inside, perfectly still.
Jae-min's heart stopped.
He reached into the crack. His fingers disappeared into the freezing, pitch-black void. He felt the cold glass. He pulled. The glass reappeared in his hand. Water sloshed against the sides. Normal. Real.
He dropped it again. This time on purpose.
The glass fell. Vanished into thin air a foot above the floor. The black ripple appeared. Swallowed it whole.
Jae-min stared at his hands. Trembling.
"Space. I was controlling space," Jae-min thought, a manic, disbelieving awe seizing his brain
A broken laugh escaped his lips. Quiet. Hoarse. Bordering on hysteria. He had torn through time to get back here. And he had brought a piece of the void with him.
He set the glass down on the counter. Stared at it for a long moment. Then he looked at the black crack still hovering in the air, patient and silent, like a dog waiting for its master to throw the ball again.
"Later. I'll deal with you later," Jae-min said, his voice steady, already turning to more important things
He had groceries to buy. Real ones. The kind that kept people alive when the shelves went empty and stayed empty for months.
His phone buzzed against the granite counter. A message from an unsaved number.
[Unknown]: Jae-min. It's Kiara. We need to talk. I made a mistake. Please call me back.
Jae-min looked at the glowing screen. The glass in his hand cracked under the pressure of his grip. Shards bit into his palm. Hot blood dripped onto the white tile, spreading like red ink. He didn't feel it.
"Kiara. The cheating bitch who ruined my life. Three years I wasted on her. Time I should have spent calling Ji-yoo, calling Mom and Dad, convincing them to come home earlier," Jae-min thought, a toxic, seething rage boiling his blood
Not this time.
Jae-min opened the contact. Blocked the number. Deleted the message. His thumb moved without hesitation — a surgeon amputating a gangrenous limb.
He went to his bedroom. Walked into the closet. Pushed past the suits he never wore and the hoodies he wore too often. Found a clean navy polo shirt. Charcoal slacks. Understated. Practical. The kind of outfit that said I have a job and I'm good at it without trying too hard.
He changed. Fixed his collar. Checked himself in the mirror. The face staring back was gaunt, shadowed — the face of a man who had seen forty-three days of hell and dragged himself back.
"Good enough," Jae-min said, barely glancing at the mirror
He grabbed his wallet, his phone, and his keys. Paused at the closet door. Looked back at the neat row of government IDs — two passports, his driver's license, his PRC, his TIN, his PhilHealth. He grabbed them all and shoved them into a folder. Banks tomorrow. Food today.
The elevator ride down to the basement parking was eleven seconds long. In those eleven seconds, Jae-min mentally mapped the city. Not the banks this time — the supermarkets. The wholesale stores. The pharmacies. He knew Manila like the back of his hand. Four years of logistics routes had burned every street, every shortcut, every choke point into his brain. Every building, every overpass, every artery of the city he could see from the GT-R's windshield — all of it would be entombed in ten meters of snow within weeks. Hard-packed frozen snow dense as concrete. Only rooftops breaking the white plain.
The basement was quiet. Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, casting the concrete pillars in flat, sterile white. His footsteps echoed.
And there she was.
The pearl white Nissan GT-R Nismo sat in her spot like a crouched predator waiting to be unleashed. The curves of her body caught the fluorescent light and threw it back in clean, sharp lines. Not a speck of dust on her. Spotless. Alive. His.
Mom and Dad had given it to him on his eighteenth birthday — along with the matching Z Nismo for Ji-yoo, a twin present for twin children. The look on their father's face when Jae-min and Ji-yoo had both screamed in the driveway. The kind of joy that only exists once, in one moment, and never again.
Beside it, the candy yellow Nissan Z Nismo sat gleaming. Ji-yoo's car. She had left it here before flying to South Korea. A family visit.
On the other side of the GT-R, a creamy white VW Golf GTI. Alessia's car.
Jae-min ran his palm along the GT-R's hood. The metal was cool under his touch.
"Hey, girl," Jae-min muttered, a genuine affection softening his voice
"We're going grocery shopping." Jae-min added, a deadpan delivery that would've been funny if it weren't so grim
He unlocked her. Slid into the driver's seat. The cockpit wrapped around him like a fighter jet — low-slung, tight, purposeful. He pressed the start button. The twin-turbo V6 roared to life with a deep, guttural growl that vibrated through the steering wheel and up into his chest. A security guard two rows over nearly dropped his coffee.
Jae-min pulled out of the basement and into the early morning Manila traffic. The sun was barely up, the sky a pale, bruised purple bleeding into orange along the skyline. The streets were just waking up — jeepneys belching black smoke, motorcycles weaving through gaps that didn't exist, street vendors setting up their carts along the sidewalks. He memorized every face, every storefront, every corner.
First stop. Puregold, EDSA.
The Puregold on EDSA was already alive with the morning rush — housewives in house dresses pushing rusted carts, construction workers loading up on rice and canned meat, a security guard whose uniform was two sizes too big leaning against the entrance with the thousand-yard stare of a man who had given up on life.
Jae-min grabbed a cart. Then another. Then a third. He stacked them in a train — one behind the other — and pushed the whole procession down the first aisle. A little old lady in a house dress had to press herself flat against the shelf to let him pass. He gave her a polite nod. She gave him the kind of look usually reserved for tax collectors and people who talk in theaters.
Rice. He stopped in front of the rice section and stared at the shelves like a general surveying a battlefield. Twenty-five-kilo sacks of Dinorado, Jasmine, and regular well-milled rice lined the shelves in neat rows. He loaded six sacks into the first cart. One hundred and fifty kilograms of rice.
He moved to the canned goods aisle. Spam. He grabbed every can on the shelf. All twelve of them. The housewife beside him gave him a look that could curdle milk.
"Excuse me, sir, some of us need to eat too," the housewife snapped, her hand on her hip, glaring at his cart
"Buy it tomorrow," Jae-min breathed, not looking at her
"Tomorrow? You're buying out the whole damn section!" the housewife snarled, her voice climbing
"There'll be more on the truck," Jae-min breathed, without looking up
"And what am I supposed to feed my children TODAY?" the housewife demanded, her voice climbing an octave
Jae-min paused. Looked at her. Looked at the twelve cans of Spam in his cart. Then back at her.
"Mung beans. They're cheap, they're filling, and your kids will hate you for it but they'll survive. Aisle four," Jae-min said, a cold efficiency that left no room for argument
He grabbed the last can from the shelf — the one she'd been reaching for — and dropped it into his cart with a smile that wasn't a smile.
"YOU—" the housewife shrieked, behind him
He was already gone.
He loaded the Spam into the second cart and moved on. Corned beef — every brand, every variant. Canned sardines in tomato sauce, in oil, in mustard. Baked beans. Canned peaches. Canned tuna. Canned chicken. If it came in a can and had calories, it went into the cart.
The third cart filled with dried goods — boxes of instant noodles, pasta, sugar, salt, coffee, cooking oil, soy sauce, vinegar. The basics of Filipino survival.
He paused in front of the instant noodles. Stared at the shelf.
In his first life, he would have killed a man for a single cup of beef-flavored Nissin. He'd actually seen it happen — a guy named Paolo, unit 1403, beaten to death over a pack of Lucky Me. The crack of the man's skull against the tile floor. The way his glasses shattered. The way nobody helped.
Now the shelf was fully stocked. Row after row of colorful packets. An entire wall of the stuff. He took everything. All of it. Forty-seven packs of noodles hit the cart like colorful bricks. The shelf was bare.
A child walking past with his mother stopped and stared at the empty shelf.
"Mommy, where did the noodles go?" the child asked, tugging his mother's dress
"That man is a bad person, anak. Don't look at him," the mother said, pulling him closer
Jae-min pushed the three-cart train to the checkout counter. The cashier — a young guy with a name tag that read MARCO and a face that suggested he was not being paid enough for this — stared at the mountain of groceries with the expression of a man watching a natural disaster unfold in slow motion.
"Sir," Marco started, his voice defeated
"I know," Jae-min declared, his patience steady rather than thin
"Like, a lot a lot," Marco repeated, scanning the first bag of rice with the defeated energy of a man processing his own funeral
"I know," Jae-min declared, his patience steady
"Are you opening a restaurant?" Marco asked, squinting at the pile
"Something like that," Jae-min said, a smile that wasn't a smile
"A sari-sari store?" Marco guessed, quietly
"Something bigger," Jae-min said, a faint warmth in his voice that hadn't quite reached the surface yet
"A supermarket?" Marco asked, his voice pitching upward
"Marco," Jae-min said, looking him dead in the eye
"Sir?" Marco swallowed, quietly
"Scan," Jae-min declared, quiet but firm, leaving no room for negotiation
Marco began scanning. Each can of Spam produced a small, defeated beep. The total climbed on the screen.
₱5,000.
₱10,000.
₱20,000.
The housewife behind Jae-min was now openly glaring. An older man in a basketball jersey shook his head and muttered something about hoarders. A teenage girl took a photo of his cart and uploaded it with the caption: this guy at puregold acting like the world is ending tomorrow lmaooo. She had no idea how right she was.
Marco scanned the last bag of rice. The register displayed the final number.
"Thirty-four thousand, seven hundred pesos, sir," Marco announced, quietly
Jae-min handed over his BPI debit card. Marco swiped it. The machine hummed. Approved.
"Would you like a receipt, sir?" Marco asked, quietly
"No," Jae-min said, already walking away
"Would you need help loading your—" Marco offered, quietly
"I've got it," Jae-min said, grabbing the first cart
"Sir, that's three carts and you're alone, I really should—" Marco tried, nervously
"Marco," Jae-min said, grabbing the first cart
"Yes sir?" Marco asked, nervous, fidgeting with the receipt
"You seem like a good kid. Go home. Hug your family. Eat a good meal tonight," Jae-min murmured, something warm and heavy passing behind his eyes — genuine care, gone in an instant
"…Is this a scam?" Marco asked, staring at him
"No. Just advice," Jae-min said, already pushing the first cart toward the exit
The GT-R's trunk swallowed two carts' worth of supplies with the seats folded down. The third cart's contents filled the passenger seat and part of the back seat. Jae-min glanced around the parking lot. An old woman loading her sedan three spaces down. A security guard on his phone near the entrance. A delivery truck idling by the loading bay. Good enough.
He picked up a twenty-five-kilo sack of rice from the third cart. With one hand, he pressed the sack against the trunk interior, making it look like he was cramming it in. His other hand moved behind the bag. A faint ripple in the air. The sack vanished. One moment it was there, pressed against the back seat. The next — nothing. Just empty space where a twenty-five-kilo sack of Dinorado had been. No sound. No flash. Just a cold whisper of displaced air.
Jae-min grabbed another sack. Same motion. Palm flat against the surface, other hand hidden behind it. Ripple. Gone. He did it again. And again. Cans of Spam, corned beef, sardines — they disappeared one by one into the void behind his hand while he made it look like he was violently stuffing them into an already packed trunk.
Three carts of supplies. Half went into the car. The other half vanished into a pocket dimension that existed somewhere between his ribs and the fabric of reality. The GT-R sat low on her suspension, but nowhere near as low as she should have been for what he'd bought.
"Eleven more stops. Don't embarrass me," Jae-min said, patting the steering wheel, dead serious
The spatial storage was still small — barely the size of a walk-in closet. But it was growing. He could feel it stretching every time he pushed something inside. Like a muscle he'd never known he had. By the end of the day, maybe it'd be big enough to hold a warehouse worth of supplies. Discretion was the only rule that mattered.
Second stop. S&R Membership Shopping, Congressional Avenue.
The wholesale warehouse. The place where restaurants and small businesses bought in bulk. Inside, the warehouse was cavernous. Concrete floors. Industrial shelving stacked three stories high. Forklifts beeping in the aisles. The smell of cardboard and frozen meat.
Jae-min grabbed a flatbed cart — the kind they used for pallets — and went to work. More rice. Fifty-kilo sacks this time. He loaded four onto the flatbed. Two hundred kilograms. The cart groaned under the weight. Bottled water. Cases of Nature's Spring and Aquafina. He took twenty cases. Six hundred liters.
Canned meat by the case — whole boxes of Spam, corned beef, Vienna sausage, liver spread. He didn't read labels. He just loaded. Frozen food section — whole chickens, packs of pork belly, ground beef, hotdogs. His freezer at the condo could only hold so much, but the void was growing.
Dried beans. Lentils. Garbanzos. Things that lasted forever and provided protein when the fresh meat ran out. Powdered milk. Infant formula — not for an infant, but because it was calorie-dense and had a two-year shelf life. Cooking oil. Gallons of it. For cooking, for preservation, for trade. Salt. Not the fancy sea salt in glass jars. Twenty-kilo sacks of industrial iodized salt. In the apocalypse, salt was currency. It preserved meat. It flavored the tasteless garbage they'd be eating. People killed for salt.
At the checkout, the total hit ₱42,000. The cashier — a middle-aged woman who had clearly seen every kind of bulk buyer in her career — didn't even blink. She just scanned, bagged, and asked for the card.
Jae-min loaded the flatbed into the GT-R's trunk — or rather, made it look like he did. For every case of water and sack of rice he placed inside the car, two more vanished into spatial storage behind the cover of the open trunk door. A stockboy walked past, glanced at him struggling with the bags, and kept moving.
Then the stockboy stopped. Turned around. Counted the bags on the flatbed. Then counted the bags in the trunk. Then counted them again. He opened his mouth. Closed it. Shook his head. Walked away, muttering something about not getting paid enough to understand math.
By the time the flatbed was empty, the GT-R's trunk was full. But the void inside Jae-min's chest was fuller. Two hundred kilograms of rice, six hundred liters of water, and enough canned meat to feed a small army — half in the car, half in a dimension nobody else could see.
His spatial storage felt heavier now. Not physically — it didn't add weight to his body. But he could sense its boundaries stretching, dark and vast, like a room being built in real time around the things he put inside. He could pull anything out with a thought. Reach into the crack, find exactly what he needed, and have it in his hands in under a second.
Third stop. Mercury Drug, Quezon Avenue.
The pharmacy was small, bright, and smelled like disinfectant and air freshener. A pharmacist in a white coat stood behind the counter, arranging pill bottles with the quiet precision of someone who had done this ten thousand times.
"I need first aid kits. Five of them," Jae-min said, his voice clipped, efficient
The pharmacist — a woman in her fifties named Mila, according to her name tag — looked up.
"Five, sir?" Mila asked, her eyebrows rising behind her glasses
"Yes," Jae-min said, flat, no explanation offered
She pulled them from the shelf behind the counter and set them down. Jae-min added to the pile: twelve boxes of Ibuprofen. Eight boxes of Paracetamol. Six boxes of Mefenamic Acid. Four bottles of antiseptic. Twelve rolls of gauze. Surgical tape. Elastic bandages. Burn ointment. Antidiarrheal medicine. Oral rehydration salts. A thermometer. Tweezers. Scissors.
"Antibiotics. Amoxicillin. Ciprofloxacin. Metronidazole," Jae-min added, his voice dropping to a register that had nothing to do with volume
Mila's hands stopped moving over the bottles. She looked at him over the rims of her glasses.
"Sir, those require a prescription," Mila said, her fingers pausing over the bottles
Jae-min held her gaze. Didn't blink. Didn't explain. Just stared at her with those calm, steady eyes that had seen forty-three days of hell and come back with nothing left to lose.
Mila looked away first. She reached under the counter and pulled out the antibiotics.
"I'll need you to fill out the backorder form," Mila said, quietly, sliding the paper across the counter
Jae-min filled it out. The name on the prescription line read: Dr. A. Santos, St. Luke's Medical Center. Unit 1419. He'd figure out how to make that real later. Total: ₱14,200.
Fourth stop. ACE Hardware, EDSA.
The hardware store was paradise. Bright fluorescent lights. Endless aisles of tools and materials. The smell of new plastic and sawdust. Jae-min loaded a cart with: six rolls of heavy-duty duct tape. A hundred meters of nylon rope. Two thick tarpaulin sheets. Four flashlights — Maglite, the heavy kind that could double as a weapon. Ten packs of AA batteries. Ten packs of D-cell batteries. A portable gas stove. Two LPG tanks. A set of basic tools — hammer, pliers, adjustable wrench, screwdriver set, hacksaw. A handheld radio. Cable ties. A fire extinguisher.
The cashier — a kid who couldn't have been older than twenty — looked at the cart and grinned.
"Building a doomsday shelter, sir?" the cashier grinned, quietly
Jae-min didn't laugh.
"Yes," Jae-min said, not a hint of humor in his voice
The kid's grin froze mid-face. He looked at the duct tape. The rope. The tarpaulin. The flashlights. The radio. The fire extinguisher.
"Sir, are you… okay? Like, mentally? Do you need me to call someone?" the cashier asked, slowly and quietly
"Just the register," Jae-min said, cutting the kid off
The kid swallowed. Scanned the items in silence. Total: ₱18,700.
Fifth stop. A water refilling station in Pasay.
He pulled up to the cramped little stall wedged between a car wash and a sari-sari store. The sign read: ALWAYS PURE WATER REFILLING. ₱35 per gallon.
"How many gallons?" the old man asked, squinting at the GT-R
"Fill twenty of these," Jae-min said, setting down the stack of empty five-gallon containers he'd bought at ACE Hardware
The old man's eyebrows climbed toward his hairline.
"Twenty? Anak, that's—" the old man said, his eyebrows climbing toward his hairline
"₱3,500. Here," Jae-min said, placing the cash on the counter
The old man picked up the bills. Counted them. Counted them again. Looked at Jae-min. Looked at the GT-R. Looked at the twenty empty containers.
"Son, are you running a car wash?" the old man asked, squinting at the GT-R
"Something like that," Jae-min said, setting the containers down with a dull thud
"Because I've been running this station for fifteen years and nobody has ever bought twenty gallons at once. Not even the hospitals," the old man said, leaning on the counter, genuinely baffled
"First time for everything," Jae-min said, his expression unreadable
The old man studied him for a long beat, then shrugged, pocketed the money, and got to work.
"You know, if you're stocking up for a typhoon, the news said there's no storm signal this week," the old man called out, without looking up from the hose
"I'm not stocking up for a typhoon," Jae-min said, leaning against the GT-R, arms crossed
"Severe Drought?" the old man asked, with a shrug
"No," Jae-min said, his jaw tight
"Volcanic Eruption?" the old man asked, squinting at him now, half-amused
"Just fill the water, sir," Jae-min said, final, shutting the conversation down
While he waited, Jae-min leaned against the GT-R and did the math in his head.
₱34,700 — Puregold.
₱42,000 — S&R.
₱14,200 — Mercury Drug.
₱18,700 — ACE Hardware.
₱3,500 — Water.
₱113,100 total.
He only had ₱87,000 in savings. He'd gone over by ₱26,100. His credit card covered the difference, but it was a warning. Tomorrow, he would hit every bank in Metro Manila. But today — today was about keeping people alive for the first month.
The old man finished filling the last container. Jae-min loaded them into the GT-R — one by one, making a show of it for the old man behind the counter and the couple waiting at the car wash next door. What they couldn't see was the spatial storage swallowing half of everything he touched. A five-gallon container in each hand — one went into the trunk, the other dissolved into the void behind his hip. Smooth. Natural. Like he'd been doing it his whole life.
The old man watched him load for about thirty seconds before tilting his head.
"Anak, your car doesn't look as full as it should be for twenty gallons," the old man observed, quietly
"I'm very efficient at packing," Jae-min deadpanned, not breaking eye contact
"…You're weird," the old man said, shaking his head slowly
"Thank you, sir. Have a good day," Jae-min said, already pulling out of the station
The car was full. But not as full as it should have been. The void carried the real weight. Cases of water, rice sacks, medicine bags, hardware supplies — crammed into the car and the space between spaces. The pearl white GT-R Nismo — a car designed to go 315 kilometers per hour — crawled through Manila traffic at thirty, weighed down by ₱113,100 worth of apocalypse supplies.
Jae-min pulled into a McDonald's parking lot. Killed the engine. The silence was sudden and heavy after the GT-R's roar. He sat in the dark for a moment, the only light coming from his phone screen.
He opened his contacts. Scrolled past Kiara's blocked number. Past Alessia's — he wasn't ready for that conversation yet. Past Uncle Rico's — that was tomorrow's problem. He stopped on Ji-yoo's name. His thumb hovered over the call button.
"Call her. Call Mom and Dad. Get them home. That's the whole point of this," Jae-min thought, a frantic, desperate urgency spurring him on
He pressed call.
It rang once. Twice. Three times. Then —
[Ji-yoo]: "Oppa?" Ji-yoo asked, her voice groggy, thick with sleep
Korea was one hour ahead. Past midnight there.
[Ji-yoo]: "Do you know what time it is?" Ji-yoo asked, a yawn cracking through the phone
[Jae-min]: "I know what time it is," Jae-min said, his voice tight, controlled
[Ji-yoo]: "Then why are you calling me at — at one in the morning?" Ji-yoo asked, still half-asleep
[Jae-min]: "When do you and Mom and Dad fly back?" Jae-min asked, cutting straight to it, no room for small talk
Silence on the other end. He could hear the rustle of blankets.
[Ji-yoo]: "Oppa, what are you talking about?" Ji-yoo asked, a yawn cracking through the phone, still half-asleep
[Jae-min]: "The flight. When do you all come home?" Jae-min asked, his voice hard
[Ji-yoo]: "April fifteenth. We booked a flight together, the three of us. KE627. Incheon to Manila. You know this, you helped Mom book it," Ji-yoo said, confused, the sleep burning away
April fifteenth. Flight KE627. Incheon to Manila. The same flight.
"Alishan Mountains. No survivors," Jae-min thought, the words a death sentence carved into his skull
[Jae-min]: "Change it," Jae-min commanded, his voice flat and hard, the kind of voice that didn't invite argument
[Ji-yoo]: "Change… what?" Ji-yoo asked, blinking, pulling the phone closer to her face
[Jae-min]: "The flight. All three of you. Book an earlier flight. Any day before April tenth," Jae-min ordered, a command, not a request
[Ji-yoo]: "Oppa, are you drunk?" Ji-yoo asked, half-laughing, still not taking him seriously
[Jae-min]: "Ji-yoo," Jae-min said, her full name, sharp enough to cut glass
The way he said her name — sharp, final, carrying the weight of a dead timeline — shut her up immediately. In all their years of arguing, Ji-yoo had learned to recognize that tone. The tone that meant her brother was not playing around. The tone that meant something was very, very wrong.
[Ji-yoo]: "Oppa… what's going on?" Ji-yoo asked, her voice smaller now, the humor gone
[Jae-min]: "I can't explain right now. I need you to trust me," Jae-min pleaded, raw, almost desperate
[Ji-yoo]: "You're scaring me," Ji-yoo whispered, her voice thin, cracking at the edges
[Jae-min]: "Good. Be scared. Now book the flight. All three of you. And call me back when it's confirmed," Jae-min said, his voice firm but not cold — the voice of a brother who had already lost them once
He hung up before she could argue.
Jae-min sat in the dark parking lot for a long time. The GT-R's engine ticked as it cooled. A stray cat wandered past the front bumper, sniffed the tire, and moved on.
His phone buzzed.
[Ji-yoo]: You're insane. Mom is going to kill you for waking her up.
Three minutes later:
[Ji-yoo]: Fine. I'll book it. But you OWE me an explanation.
Five minutes after that:
[Ji-yoo]: Mom says she's not speaking to you until you apologize for calling at 1 AM. Dad says he wants to talk to you tomorrow morning. Both of them want to know why.
Eight minutes after that:
[Ji-yoo]: Also, who was that girl I heard in the background last time I called? At the unit? You had someone over, didn't you. Don't lie to me, oppa. I always know.
Three minutes later:
[Ji-yoo]: You still owe me your black hoodie, by the way. The oversized one. I KNOW you have it. I saw it in your Instagram story from two weeks ago. I WANT IT BACK. That hoodie is mine. You STOLE it.
Five minutes after that:
[Ji-yoo]: Also, you're wrong about tteokbokki. The cylindrical kind is better than the sliced kind, and I will die on this hill. Fight me, oppa. FIGHT ME!
[Jae-min]: I'll explain everything soon. I promise. Just get on that earlier flight.
He set the phone down on the passenger seat — or what was left of it, buried under a sack of rice and two cases of Spam. Leaned his head back against the headrest. Closed his eyes.
One day down. Twenty-nine days left. Groceries loaded. Void tested. Sister warned.
Tomorrow — the banks. The real work.
He opened his eyes. Started the engine. The GT-R rumbled to life, her twin-turbo heartbeat steady and strong beneath him. He drove home.
The black crack was still hovering in his kitchen when he walked in. Waiting. Hungry.
Just like him.