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It’s on a bright and early Sunday morning, that the final part of Heeseung’s plan is set into motion.
The moment that he’s awaited for so long. He knew, when he was successfully able to bend the caretakers to his will, convincing them to allow him to transfer high schools to the one that sat a few blocks down from the Holy Church, he knew— his plan was going to work. He’s carefully curated this, every bit of research noted down in his tattered old leather notebook, every detail committed to his mind. He had followed each and every single one of them. Or at least, the ones that he could find. They say that the Souls are supposed to be in each other’s vicinity, as well as within the same age group, close to the place that was once Home, but he supposes that reality can’t always match up neatly. Five would surely do— after all, something of this scale would not, could not, be so easily overlooked.
Heeseung longs for Him to see that He’s made a mistake— that he was banished from above so suddenly, so unjustly, and without reason. The thought of that moment, memory still fresh in his mind, fills him with a deep, dark emotion that he couldn’t possibly begin to explain. He just simply wonders: Why him? What is it that the other souls did, didn’t do, what do other souls have that he doesn’t?
But it’s no matter; this bump in his path will all be behind him soon.
He sits on the second floor of the nave, which is truly just an additional seating area for extra-comers, head resting against the polished wooden bars that stop him from falling a great height. He looks down at the nave, aisles and aisles of benches arranged in four columns across the interior, at the marble floor that reflects the dim lighting of the ceiling, to the steps that lead up to the altar, where a crucifix sits, still but strong.
The Savior that died for mankind’s sins, for all souls to go to heaven. The thought makes Heeseung clutch at the poles, knuckles turning white from the hold. When he thinks about the reality of his situation, it’s easier to remind him of what he came here to do: to reclaim his rightful place.
He hears the doors of the narthex slam open— and he knows that there are only so few people that would take so little care in entering a place so sacred.
“Hey, fuckface,” Riki’s voice rasps out in lieu of a greeting. The echo of multiple sets of footsteps becomes clear once they enter the nave. “What the fuck is going on?”
“We’re in a church, Riki,” comes Sunoo’s exasperated sigh, followed by the rustling of a plastic bag, the sound of crunching, and the next words considerably more muffed. “Please, have some manners.”
Heeseung slinks backward away from the railing, and up against the base of a bench covered by the shadows. Still from here, he can see clearly as the group moves further into the interior, and he does a headcount.
One, two, three, four, five. Just as he’s planned.
“This is such a strange meeting place for a surprise hangout,” Jungwon says, head tilting up as he spins around to survey the overarching walls that surround him, stained glass windows lining the tops of all four sides. His voice takes on a level of thoughtfulness. “Though, perhaps there can be some things in here that can be of value to me.”
“So you’re planning to steal… again. As if you don’t have a hoard of stolen items under your bed.” Jake says drily, and Jungwon simply smiles.
“Actually, I don’t keep my prized—”
“Stolen.”
“—possessions under my bed.”
“I wish it didn’t have to be so early in the morning,” Sunghoon sighs, ignoring the conversation in favor of making a lethargic descent onto the closest bench to sit down. Jake takes the opportunity to poke at the side of the boy’s head repeatedly and only lets up when he deems that Sunghoon won’t fall asleep, despite the stillness of his body.
“I’m just disappointed that I wasn’t invited here for what I thought I was,” Jake yawns through his words, “Gonna be honest, thought this was a strange place to meet too. I mean, who gets off in a church anyway? But then I thought—”
Riki groans. “Don’t fuckin’ think. Shut the fuck up!”
Heeseung uses the cover of their conversation to discreetly move down the stairs, footsteps light on his tiptoes, feeling more and more conscious of the breathing through his nose. It was any moment now— all he needed was his signal.
He enters the narthex, still being careful to remain hidden from the others. He carefully sneaks up to the maple doors, clutching onto the handle with one hand, and using that to keep his body quiet and steady as he reaches for the corner, where the metal bar he planted earlier sits. The cool metal of the door handle soothes his shaking hands as he carefully peaks around it, getting another good look at those before him.
They look so beautiful, so alive, and so human that it’s almost unreal to Heeseung. And perhaps there is something human in each of them, that Heeseung has been able to see firsthand, and be on the receiving end of throughout the past few weeks that he’s followed them, and gotten close enough to them.
Alas, that was the very problem. They aren’t enough. Truthfully, maybe nothing will ever be enough for Heeseung. There’s always something missing from the equation, and Heeseung has worked tirelessly for him to finally, hopefully, find the missing variable he’s looking for.
They were great, the five of them. Six of them, if he counted… him.
But at the end of the day, they were all always meant to be a stepping stone for something greater.
Heeseung takes in another deep breath, and that’s when he senses it.
“Hey,” Sunoo says again, and his mouth is full of candy corn, “Do you guys smell that?”
“Smell what?” Riki scrunches his face, and Sunghoon merely looks on, head slowly turning as he looks towards the ceiling of the church.
“It smells like...” Jake trails off, eyes shifting around the area.
“Smoke.” Jungwon finishes the sentence, eyes going wide in alarm.
And just like that: the final act begins.
Heeseung steps into the nave, ducking under the metal bar before letting the doors slam shut behind him, announcing his presence.
“Oh, no,” Sunghoon breathes out softly, and his expression is soft, sad.
Jake starts, eyes blinking rapidly as he processes. “H-Hey, Heeseung, I know you asked us to meet you here, but I think we should be getting out—”
Sunoo cuts him off, narrowed eyes staring Heeseung down. “That’s what I was asking before we came in here. Why did he ask us individually to meet him here, and not inform anyone of anyone else’s invitation?”
“What the hell is going—?!” Riki’s shout above the uproar is cut off by the sound of the closing of his throat and a strangled cough. By now, the smoke, the incense, has begun to fill the air.
“Heeseung, what is this? What are you doing right now? What’s going on?” Sunoo says, taking a few steps forward. His eyes are blazing by now, set alight in a haze of confusion, worry, fear, anger.
Heeseung only stares ahead at them, steeling his nerves. He’s doing what he came here to do.
He gulps. And then, he speaks.
My God, I am sorry for all my sins, with all my heart.
“What? ” Sunoo shrieks at him, and it’s followed by a set of vicious coughs, the blond hitting a fist to his chest to stabilize himself to no avail. The sound of coughing fills the air much like the incense, coloring the atmosphere in a becoming hazy grey.
“He’s saying a prayer…?” Jake says, and his voice is raspy now, as he holds onto the seat rest of a bench to steady himself.
To do penance, and to sin no more, I bring before you
the Deadly Sins of this Purgatory
to suffer their eternal punishment
in their rightful place in Hell.
“What,” Jungwon says quietly, falling to his knees.
But he doesn’t falter in her words, looking each of them in the eye as he speaks.
He stares down Sunoo, who has now been reduced to a coughing mess, eyes teary and breaths weakening.
Gluttony, whose food, drink, and materials
shall become rats, toads, and snakes
He looks to Jake, who despite his own troubles, kneels down by Sunoo’s side, a hand clamped onto the boy’s shoulder as he squeezes, trying to offer words of encouragement.
Lust, burned by the fire of their Desire
shall be burned by the fires of Hell
He looks to Sunghoon, who even in his final moments can only stare down at his lap. He can’t even see the boy’s face at this point, and he’s left to imagine what his expression looks like. Impassive. Just like him.
Another low chorus of sound starts, somewhere behind him, or in the back of his mind, unintelligible whispers and whimpers— he doesn’t know anymore. All that he knows is
Sloth, immobilized by their lack of self
shall become paralyzed in the face of the snake
He looks to Jungwon, who stares back at him, his usually bright eyes dull and black.
“Heeseung,” he says faintly.
The whimpers become groans, sounding uncannily like the rising of the undead, becoming louder in volume.
He closes his eyes and fights against the smoke building up in his lungs. Just a little longer.
Greed, who thirsts for material and goods
shall drown in the pit of boiling oil
and Wrath, who descends their fiery fist upon the innocent
He opens his eyes to look at Riki, the youngest of them all. His expression is different. It’s the most unique expression that he’s even seen on the boy’s face. Eyebrows that are normally downturned and furrowed, now laced with a hint of despair. A mouth that quivers, hands that clench and release, clench and release— for once, helpless.
shall have their very limbs mutilated
to never hurt again.
By now, it’s become a chorus of screams of all vocal tones— low and deep, high and ear piercing, filling Heeseung’s head. The smoke has become heavy now, grey nearing an opaque stage. The bodies before him are collapsing, unmoving and most likely unconscious— rapidly becoming hollow shells.
Our Savior suffered and died for us.
In His name, my God have mercy
on my S—
The pain is sharp and throbbing, piercing through his abdomen. Heeseung screams, screams for himself, screams for his organs in pain, screams that melt into chokes as smoke freely fills his open mouth. Even through the clouds, he watches the tip of the blade grow out of his stomach, stained a gruesome red.
His vision is blurring at the edges, and his breath feels faint, his limbs uneasy and shaky.
“Why… what…”
“It’s so unfortunate, honestly, how one fails to learn from their mistakes. How you lack such self-awareness to look in the mirror and realize what you are,” someone snarls from behind him, making a slow walk around Heeseung’s person.
Heeseung manages to move onto his side, which hurts even more than his slumped-over position. He coughs, raspy and choked, feeling blood come up his throat and splatter onto the ground. When he looks up, the familiar face feels too much like a second stab through his stomach.
He doesn’t understand. Why is he here? He never showed any signs, signs that Heeseung trained himself to look for. No strange actions, no representative colors, no nothing. Simply a boy, who seemed sincere, and content to be on the receiving end of such playful jabs thrown to him by classmates. A boy that Heeseung, admittedly, had grown closer to than he would like— come to care for, more than he would like— but he was fine to turn his head the other way and disappear for more important things. For a more important purpose. Surely, this boy would forget about him soon enough.
Instead, he stands here, over Heeseung’s body after taking a knife, and plunging it through his organs, making sure he’s felt the greatest pain.
“I should have known,” Jay shakes his head. “You’re so blinded by your own flaws, the flaws that you were condemned for in the first place. You go, and you prove him right every goddamn time!” He shouts in rage, taking a kick at Heeseung’s abdomen, right above the stab wound. Another choked cough leaves Heeseung’s quivering lips. Jay laughs, a tone of disbelief decorating each syllable. He crouches down slowly, eyes narrowed as he stares directly at Heeseung, before moving his body around so that he can face towards the front of the church, where the other bodies lay.
Used to lay.
Now, five corpses stand above him, the faces of people he’s spent his time with in the past few weeks, not the hollow shells he expected them to become. The whites of their eyes flare with bright colors— red, yellow, blue, orange, light blue, orange, blue, yellow, red, yellow—
“You’re quite bold, you know,” Jay says lowly, elbows resting on his knees, hands clasped in front of him. “But I suppose only you would try your luck with these Souls.”
“How—” Heeseung coughs, dry and wet all at the same time, “How did you know? How did you… I never… How…”
“I’m sorry I had to do this, Heeseung,” Jay says softly.
“You aren’t sorry,” Heeseung rasps out. Jay isn’t even phased, only staring down at the marble floor, reflections of the ceiling stained and covered in blood. Smoke has begun to clear, wafting away all of Heeseung’s efforts with it. “You’ve made a mistake. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Jay shakes his head, a sad sigh escaping his lips. “We were never meant to get to heaven. The sooner you could have accepted that, the better it would have been. You would have been able to stay here, and live in this Purgatory peacefully.” Jay looks at Heeseung again, Heeseung who must look so bloody and battered, so weak and so shameful— the mark of a failure.
“But I suppose all good things come to an end. It’s inevitable for us, isn’t it?” Jay reaches out a steady hand to brush the bangs out of Heeseung's face, and Heeseung doesn’t even have enough physical energy to reel away. Jay’s tone is even softer now, bringing his face close, closer, until his lips brush against the shell of Heeseung’s ear. “Even if things had to end this way, I value the time that we spent together. I won’t forget it.”
Jay pulls away minutely, standing up and moving behind and out of his peripheral vision, Heeseung uses the last of his energy, even if it costs him pain, to shout.
“Fuck you. Fuck you! I swear on God’s name, you’ll regret this, you’ll regret every decision you’ve made—”
His words are cut off with the sickening sound of a knife sliding out of his body. Heeseung struggles for breath, watching the blood pour out of him with more fervor. He tilts his head up, looking around, but the corners of his vision have already been overcome with black spots. His vision blurs in and out again, and after a couple of blinks, Jay’s face enters his line of sight again.
At the sight of him, Heeseung feels one last emotion curling in the open gash of his stomach, working its way up his esophagus. Jay merely shakes his head again, a chuckle escaping his lips.
“Even in your final moments, your true colors are so vibrant and beautiful. It’s such a shame that you tried throwing that away. You’re such an interesting person.”
Envy, who desires what they cannot acquire
shall be set free
for the sake of mercy on these Souls.
Jay leans back in, action quicker than Heeseung’s ability to process what’s happening: a pair of closed lips, chapped and dry pressing against his own. Jay’s voice can’t be above a whisper.
“Goodbye, Heeseung.”
The words are faded, as is the rest of the world, now nothing more than an echo chamber. Heeseung closes his eyes, unintelligible words slipping from his mouth. The last thing he sees is the crucifix, bathed in the light, before drifting off to the void, the land of no return.
Jay turns to the other five standing bodies who face him, still but expectant.
“Go. Return your hosts to their place of residence. I’m sure they’ll wake up thinking they simply had a bad dream. Go!” he says. The Souls adhere to his demand, animating the bodies of the young boys into something more reminiscent of how a normal human would move.
Jay watches the five walk out before he finds his eyes narrowing as they move to the altar, where the crucifix sits. He pulls out a notebook from the pocket of his jacket, grey and tattered at the edges with pages nearly falling out. Leather smooth to the touch, just as smooth as it looked to be when he first saw it in the depths of Heeseung’s book bag the one night he had stayed over, the last night, with pages filled with ink that stains his fingers, as his fingers stain the pages red.
He takes in the sight of the knife, medium-sized, with a black hilt, sharp and bloody, before throwing it at the ground, right in front of the stab wound in Heeseung’s body. He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a lighter.
and I, who is self-righteous and Vain
Nimble fingers activate the lighter, setting it to the corner of the book. He watches the object catch fire, becoming alight. Satisfied with his work, he throws the book to the ground, right on top of Heeseung’s corpse, and watches the wildfire spread. The tension he didn’t even know he had in his shoulder releases as he sidesteps the fire.
shall never see the Gates again
shall never face him again.
And so
He walks towards the narthex, towards the overarching front doors, not once looking back at what he lost. The only way is forward, as the sound of the church bells bounce against walls and make their way into the air of the sky. The sun shines through the stained glass, a deep violet ambiance encompassing the fire and the interior of the church.
my Pride will remain
Eternally,
until the End of Time.