RE:VENGE Entertainment Chapter 2: The Girl in the Alley
Jiwoo stood on the balcony of her apartment, looking down at the streets below. It had been two days since the interview, and the press was going insane. People had already begun to take sides. She already had three of the most popular entertainment agencies in her corner, which she found surprising. She hadn’t thought support would be coming in so quickly.
Dohee, of course, had found her own support. She had revealed her label the day after Jiwoo. Jiwoo had known Dohee wouldn’t take her time, but she was already at a running pace. Apparently, she already had a new group in the works.
Jiwoo sighed and looked down at the city below her. It was late at night, yet the city was still wide awake. Cars zoomed down the road, pedestrians made their rounds on the sidewalk, and the lights from buildings around them lit up the world.
She knew she should be working, but she had hit a roadblock in her company’s development. She had the staff, and they were ready to work. But what she didn’t have was trainees or any idea about what to do for a group. That was the problem.
She’d been spiraling for days, trying to figure out a killer concept for RE:VENGE’s first group. It had to be unique, but not so unique that the concept went right over everyone’s heads and they lost interest before the group’s first comeback.
The problem was, it seemed like every debut concept had been taken. Some worked better than others, and she wasn’t sure which one would be the best idea to start with.
She ran a hand through her already messy hair and leaned on the railing of the balcony. If she didn’t have something soon, she’d have to call it quits. There would be no way to keep her company staffed without any means of making money. She wondered if she began looking for trainees first instead of focusing on the group, one of them would spark an idea. That had happened before.
So she straightened and headed inside when she saw a large flash of light coming from the alley next to the apartment complex. She froze and turned towards where it had come from, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary. The city was still in full roar below her. No one had even stopped to investigate what was happening.
But Jiwoo was intrigued. Without a second thought, she threw on a jacket and ran outside.
It took her a minute to get downstairs, and she wondered if she had already missed what had made that large flash. When she reached the alley, it was completely empty. She shook her head and realized her sleep deprivation was probably making her go insane.
But when she turned around to leave, a second flash happened. She didn’t waste any time in running towards where the light had come from. It was around the back of the alley, behind the apartment building. She stopped when she reached the place where the light had come from. But instead of a light source, all she found was a small, sickly girl with worn clothing crying on the sidewalk.
Jiwoo slowly approached the girl, who didn’t bother to look up. She continued weeping into her tiny hands, her frail form shaking with each sob. As she got closer to the girl, she felt the temperature plummet. This caused her to pause and look around. She wrapped her jacket tightly around herself as the temperature continued to plummet.
She looked back at the girl, who had stopped sobbing and was looking at Jiwoo. After a moment of processing, Jiwoo realized the child was actually looking at something behind her.
Jiwoo didn’t have time to turn around as footsteps approached behind her. The footsteps disappeared, and Jiwoo gasped as a girl landed in front of her. This girl was older than the child who had been sobbing, either in her late teens or early twenties.
“Don’t worry, I’ll deal with her,” the girl looked back at Jiwoo, winked, then turned back to the young girl.
She moved in a blur, her blonde hair whipping around as she picked up a book that had been lying on the ground, tossed it in the air, and caught it again. She pointed it at the child, who was no longer sobbing. Instead, she was staring at this newcomer with a look of pure hatred.
Jiwoo took a step back, unsure of what to do. Something about these girls felt off. They both looked normal, but she knew looks could be deceiving. Something else was happening, and she wasn’t sure if she wanted to stick around and find out what or run away.
The choice was made for her as a pile of dead branches that had been placed near the building’s garbage bins caught fire. Jiwoo yelped and jumped away. She looked around to see the source of the fire and saw that it had come from the child.
Except the child had changed. Instead of the sad child that had been crying a moment before, she was now an angry entity. Jiwoo wasn’t sure what else to call her other than “entity”... Her skin was pale, slightly see-though, and she was hovering a few inches off the ground. Instead of the tattered garments she had been wearing, she was now dressed in a long red dress. Her long black hair floated around her face, but it parted for a small moment, just long enough for Jiwoo to see the most terrifying part about this child: she had no face.
Jiwoo screamed and fell to the ground. She huddled near the wall of the apartment complex, her brain screaming at her to run. But she couldn’t seem to move. She just sat there as flames engulfed the two girls.
The fire child launched a fireball at the older girl, but she held out the book and caught the flame at that. Instead of lighting on fire, the book seemed to absorb the flames.
Smoke curled around the child as the edges of her dress and the tips of her hair caught fire. The flames didn’t seem to come from the fireballs she was throwing around, but it seemed to come from within her. She held up a hand and launched three more fireballs at the blonde girl, who used her book to catch them all. She almost missed the last one, and it grazed her hand as it hit the book.
The book fell to the ground as the girl yelped in pain. The fiery child grinned and pointed at the book, which immediately disintegrated into dust. Then she turned to the now unarmed teenager, who had started cursing when the book turned to flames.
She turned to Jiwoo and offered a sheepish smile. “You wouldn’t happen to have any books on you, would ya?”
Jiwoo slowly shook her head. The girl spoke English, which Jiwoo understood well enough, but it just added to the surreal feeling this entire scenario had. The girl sighed and was about to say something else when a fireball was launched at her. She had just enough time to jump out of the way as it exploded where she had just been standing.
“Okay, we’re doing this the hard way then!” she yelled at the child, then ran to the pile of ashes that had been the book. The child screamed and rushed at the girl.
The older girl scooped up a handful of ashes and continued running as the child chased after there. Jiwoo noticed that the child seemed to just be floating along, and she couldn’t seem to catch up with how fast the other girl was running.
The older girl tossed half of the ashes at the child, who screamed as they hit her skin. Wherever the particles landed, small holes opened up in the girl. Jiwoo wondered if she was some kind of ghost, or if this was all just a stress dream.
The ashes gave the girl enough time to stop and focus on the remaining ashes in her hand. She stood there for a moment, staring down at the dusty particles in her hands. Jiwoo watched her curiously, then gasped in amazement as a new book grew out of the ashes. The girl grabbed it victoriously, then took off towards the now-recovered child.
The child screamed as the two rushed at each other. Jiwoo closed her eyes, terrified of witnessing what was going to happen. Were both girls about to die? One had a book, and the other had fire powers. It was obvious who was going to win the fight. This wasn’t how Jiwoo had expected to spend her night, and a faint thought popped into her brain, wondering if she was also going to die. Would the child kill her as well, once she was done with the crazy teenage girl?
She kept her eyes closed for a few more minutes, her fear keeping them from opening. She knew that at any moment, she would be engulfed in flames. She could smell the smoke of the fire already raging around her, hear the crackle of the flames and she could even feel the sting of some stray embers that had landed on her skin.
"Hey, lady, are you alright?” the sound of a high-pitched feminine voice and the snapping of fingers surprised Jiwoo. She quickly opened her eyes, and looked up to see the teenage girl standing over her. It took her a second to realize that the teenager was the only thing left of the strange events that had just taken place. The fires were all put out, everything was undamaged, and the child was gone.
Jiwoo opened her mouth, but no sounds had come out. The girl gave her a concerned look. “I know, your first encounter with a ghost can be terrifying. But don’t worry, you’re alright! Abigail is back where she belongs; she won’t be bugging you anymore.” The girl held up the book she had been fighting the child with. On the cover was the small child from earlier with the words: The Imaginers: Abigail, Written by Vanilla Star. She grinned at Jiwoo, who was still at a loss for words.
“Why don’t you come with me?” the girl suddenly said, then offered Jiwoo a hand. Jiwoo hesitated for a second, and all her instincts screamed not to trust the girl. But she was a naturally curious person, and this experience had intrigued her. So Jiwoo found herself taking the girl’s hand, ready to follow her wherever.
