Wooyoung roused from sleep in the middle of the night. He batted his sleepy eyes open, unsure what shooed off his dreams. Nestled against Yunho's chest, he felt his boyfriend's every breath. Yunho was deep asleep and their weapons untouched.

No chime alerted them of an intruder. The night lay tranquil.

Soothed, Wooyoung huddled into Yunho's loose embrace. He closed his eyes and listened to the sound of the wind scraping the sand against the walls. The eerie squeak of metal was haunting in the dark and coyotes called their hunger into the distance. If any fouls shuffled through the night in search of food, Wooyoung didn't have to hear their dragging feet this far up.

Sleep was just about to pull him back under when another creak fell to his ears. Wooyoung lifted his head from its spot of warmth, scanning the room with watchful eyes. It was swathed in darkness since no outside source brought light, but nothing moved. Was it worth clicking the lighter open for?

Wooyoung hesitated for long enough that his surroundings took his choice from him. He flinched in Yunho's arms when the empty can next to them toppled over, rolling against the wall. With a curse on his lips, Wooyoung looked after it. His eyes searched the ground but found nothing that could have knocked it over.

Too alerted now to lie back down, Wooyoung shifted from Yunho's hold to sit up. His fingers clicked the worn metal of his lighter open while the other hand wrapped around his knife. He shone the light as far as it would go, casting dancing shadows over the far walls. Nothing worth noticing passed his sight, but he picked up on something else.

Faster than his lighter could snap shut, Wooyoung dropped the knife to shake on Yunho's shoulder. The man startled right up, hand flying to his weapon. He found Wooyoung's hunched figure in the dark.

"Yunho," Wooyoung hissed, drawing his flickering attention. "Has the ground been this tilted earlier?"

Yunho jerked his eyes towards the corners, and his face paled. When he shook his head, their hands flew to their bundles at the same time.

"We can jump from the second floor, that saves us some time," Yunho huffed, mind sharp like a blade as they stormed to their feet. They left the empty cans behind and hastily unzipped the bell. Wooyoung just finished stuffing it into his bag when the entire building shuddered. The two fell on the stairs, clutching to the loose railing as the walls around them groaned. They were sinking.

"It won't hold out," Wooyoung hissed. Dust trickled from the ceiling and the concrete trembled under the weight of the sand, drawing it into its depths.

"Up, up!"

They changed direction and jumped up the tilted stairs. The building sunk diagonally into the collapsing ground, whirling up dust and noise. The fouls would come crawling within a few minutes, so Wooyoung and Yunho needed to get out of the walls' death trap.

Yunho shouldered the door leading to the rooftop open just when the lower part of the building gave in below them. With a deafening crunch, the lower two stories collapsed, and the impact broke up the upper part. Wooyoung held onto the railing for dear life as sand permeated the building and whirled dirt into the air. Once the quaking stopped, Wooyoung tugged himself to his feet and stormed outside with Yunho. They slammed the door shut, hoping it would catch some of their momentum. Heaving, they leaned against the entrance and took in the slanted rooftop.

"It's still too high to jump," Yunho calculated. Little figures meandered in the distance, foes attracted by the noise and the rumbling of the earth.

With gritted teeth, Wooyoung unhooked the rope from his belt.

"It's dangerous to climb down into the collapsing area, but it might give us enough time to wade out before the stone crushes us."

Since there was no other method, Yunho jumped to his side to help him. They only had one rope since they usually never needed to climb at the same time, but Wooyoung would hurry. They slung it around the leftover post of what once was a railing and Wooyoung swung himself over the ledge. Neither of them was safer. Below awaited the horde and the collapsing building might as well turn both of them into red splats.

Worry made Yunho's eyes so big and expressive.

"Mind your grip," he begged as Wooyoung wrung the rope around his wrist. He nodded.

"See you down there." He swiftly descended, using the tilted wall to his favor. The desert ocean had neared compared to last night, and the building crumbled by the second, getting swallowed in the hole that sucked it down. So far, no fouls had come close enough to get squashed. While Yunho came down, Wooyoung would look for the safest route to get the fuck out of there.

He swayed precariously and his heart dropped at another shudder of the concrete block, fearing the rope would slip off. But Yunho watched from above, keeping the rope pinned as Wooyoung thrust himself off the wall at the last spread. He swung away as far from the collapse as he dared and let go. The sand cushioned his fall.

While he pulled his gun, he beckoned for Yunho.

"Hurry!"

Another wall caved in and the building lurched in the other direction. Yunho tumbled out of sight, but then he fought his way back up the incline and grabbed for the rope. Wooyoung threw sweaty hair back as he monitored the slow trudge of the fouls. They ran like beasts once they laid eyes on prey, so he was ready to stop them with all his bullets until they could flee.

Yunho dangled from the rope, and they might have to leave it this time. Though it would be a pain to make a new one, their strategy of returning for loot might not be worth it on the slippery sand. Wary how far the sinkhole reached, Wooyoung trudged further back. He oversaw Yunho's descent, tense as if he were the one dangling from the crumbling building. His heart raced in his throat.

Yunho should have been down even faster than Wooyoung, should have been able to use the sinking building to his advantage. But as the remaining structure neared the masses of sand, they, too, couldn't resist the pressure any longer.

Since he kept glancing at the nearing horde, Wooyoung snapped around when the building rumbled threateningly. It trembled, seemed to bend with the pressure, but then it snapped. Yunho's head flicked up when the tremor traveled down the rope.

"Yun-!"

Their eyes met before the building caved in on itself and for a second that felt like an eternity, Yunho's desperate call for help launched Wooyoung's heart in his direction.

The next moment, he staggered back when a wave of wind and sand whirled at him. He protected his eyes with his arm, but he could hear the building crashing, could hear the thuds of large stone chunks falling to the ground. Wooyoung coughed at the sand entering his lungs, then he blinked against the wreckage.

The structure was gone. All that remained were a few edges sticking from the sand, broken apart like a cracker. As if nothing had happened, the sand settled to embrace them.

Yunho was nowhere in sight.

"No!" Wooyoung choked out. He ran in despite the danger, because his safety wasn't worth Yunho's loss.

"No, shit, where are you?!" Wooyoung dug his hands into the sand, desperately shoveled it away. Fallen with the debris, Yunho disappeared into the ground. The tons of rock must have ground his bones to dust, but Wooyoung hoped. He had been outside of the main collapse, he had dangled in the air. Even if he landed and got buried, he had to be somewhere.

But Wooyoung dug and dug, called Yunho's name until his voice was hoarse and nothing came up. His hands roughened up with the sand and the weight of the rocks still descended slowly and steadily. Soon, Wooyoung also would get dragged down by his weight.

Tears gathered in Wooyoung's eyes.

"I know you're in there! Show me a sign, anything!" He could shoot through the ground, could flail a hand, but nothing happened. The desert claimed Yunho together with the building.

Tears gathered in Wooyoung's eyes as he stubbornly promised himself not to stop digging until he found Yunho. If he left now, it might seal Yunho's fate. Wooyoung could fix him, they found cloth; they had water...

Uncaring of the sand trickling down the crater by his sides, Wooyoung waded around and angrily whipped at the sand that took his lover away from him. Eight years gone. From one second to the next. They had known each other since they were teens, became boyfriends three years ago because they would never find anything better than each other, anyway...

The hot tears traced through the dirt on Wooyoung's cheeks.

"No, no, no!"

His heart ached and squeezed in his chest, robbing his breath. He scolded it to have faith, but it whispered that Yunho's fragile human body couldn't withstand getting caught up in that mess.

Wooyoung was about to unearth the whole damn building if he had to, but a tumbling figure at the top of the crater had him lift his eyes. A foul stood there, eyes empty and void of life as it stared at him. Tattered clothing hung down a malnourished body, and the fungus spread across its bare neck. The unkempt hair mirrored Wooyoung's, but there was no empathy, no urge to help as they both were humanoid.

Only hunger dripped from its teeth with the slick of saliva.

"Shit," Wooyoung hissed once more, staggering back. The hole would eat him up if he didn't move, fresh sand coming with the breeze. If one foul arrived, the others weren't far.

"I'll be back," Wooyoung gritted. "Things keep shifting here, so wait for me. I'll bring something to dig." A gunshot underlined his promise, ending the foul's miserable existence. It dropped, sliding into the crater with the loose sand.

"I'll lure them away. If you're injured, you gotta hide," Wooyoung reminded Yunho, as if they hadn't lived this life from the very beginning. He scrambled to the edge of the crater and, though he was in a hurry, regret hunched his shoulders.

"I'm so sorry. Don't think I left you behind. Wait for me."

He scrambled up, closing away his heart that hollered at him for his betrayal. The fouls had come far closer than he liked and he had to waste two more bullets. With his bag clutched in his hand, he stormed towards the near bushes. The wind whipping at his face dried his tears, but he kept glancing back, kept hoping Yunho would appear in the crater.

As the fouls followed his scent, Wooyoung knew Yunho had to be alive. He wouldn't die like that, so abruptly and unexpectedly. They were survival artists. They knew how to escape any threat. Death had to be grander than that. It couldn't be as bleak as this world made it out to be.

Desperately clinging to his hope, Wooyoung directed the horde from Yunho's location. He kept his gun close to his body, unable to rest until the fouls crawled back into their dark and wet corners and he knew Yunho safe. His mind supplied him with the torment of guilt as his lungs screamed for air.

Some air might have got trapped under the debris. The rubble would drag Yunho under but not crush him since the sand offered so much give. If he was injured, he had his bag to take care of himself.

He had to be fine. Wooyoung couldn't do this without the warmth of his smiles and his hugs.

Tomorrow, he would be back. Once he made a shovel and stocked up on bandages, Wooyoung would come during the day when the fouls slumbered.

"Hold out, Yunho," Wooyoung gritted, though he knew no one was better at that than Yunho. Once they reunited, Wooyoung could hit him for making him worry so much and then pull him back in to convey his relief with a kiss.

He had to think of it like that. If he thought of any other outcome, he might as well stop running and offer himself to the hungry maws of those devoured by the fungus.