The breach sirens keened through the halls like mourning doves choked in iron.

Lights blinked red in staccato pulses, matching the beat of your panicked heart as you hobbled along slick linoleum, shadows leaping at every turn. Your lab coat flared behind you with each uneven step until your ankle folded beneath you and you crumpled hard onto the ground—pain lanced sharp and immediate up your leg, and the world narrowed to shallow breaths and cold sweat.

A new presence bloomed at the far end of the corridor—silent, but unmistakable. You dragged yourself back until your shoulders struck the wall, eyes wide as the figure stepped into the dim.

The Funeral of the Dead Butterflies. Designation: T-01-68.

Its silhouette was elegant, long limbs, black coat, pristine white shirt beneath, five arms flowing like ribbons caught in wind. The middle arm bore a single white sleeve, and two of the others gripped the black coffin strapped against its back—an ornate thing, lacquered and engraved with the curve of a butterfly's wings.

Its face—no, it's head—was a butterfly. Not a mask, not a helmet. A white butterfly. Pale. Unblinking. Silent. Until it tilted.

A chime rang out into the hall, clean and musical, as if from some distant bell tower. It wasn’t sound so much as feeling. The kind you feel in your ribs. In your teeth.

It lifted its left hand, shaped it into a gun. Its gesture was slow, theatrical. Playful.

Not bullets—wings. They launched from its coffin in a burst of fluttering light, aimed straight for you.

One fell apart mid-air. Another burst like mist. Yet, they never reached you.

Yi Sang stood in the corridor, his frame thin and upright, like a spine made of glass and restraint. He had moved in without you noticing—no sound, no thunder. But there he stood now, unhurried. Unyielding. His hair hung dark and disheveled, his eyes fixed on the Abnormality with a calm that cut deeper than violence.

Two pistols hung loose at his sides—one white, one black. Both whispered with smoke.

Another chime. The Abnormality responded to his presence as if recognizing an intruder at a funeral. It did not attack—yet—but the butterflies trembled, clustering behind its form.

Yi Sang’s voice emerged at last, shaped soft and cold.

“You mimic grief,” he said. “But grief is not something one wears like silk.”

The creature’s butterfly-head twitched. It moved with purpose, coffin thudding to the floor before it like an altar stone. Dust curled around the hinges.

Then the coffin’s lid groaned open.

Wings spilled from within in great swarms, filling the hallway with flutters and shadows, light bending around them like smoke made from memory.

Yi Sang lifted his pistols, the sounds of bells echoed the corridors.

The shots rang out like bells in discord, the white gun clear and mournful, the black resonant and low. Each bullet found its mark in the air, splitting wings, dispersing clouds.

He took a step forward. Then another.

“You hold death in your arms, but you do not know its weight.”

Another chime—louder, now. The Abnormality lifted its fifth arm, pointing its pale, open palm toward your crumpled form.

Yi Sang’s gaze sharpened. His voice never rose. It simply hardened.

“You dare approach this one—” A slow inhale. “—as though they belong in your coffin.”

The butterflies faltered. The sound that followed was not a chime but a groan, as if the creature’s own bell had cracked.

The creature stepped away. Two of its arms reclaimed the coffin. The lid sealed shut with a whisper. No more attacks came. No more chimes.

T-01-68 faded back into the corridor’s gloom, coffined wings in tow.

“You should not have been here,” he spoke softly, there was something in his voice you rarely heard... not irritation, not regret.

Concern.

With careful movements, he slipped an arm beneath your back, the other supporting your legs, lifting you into his arms with ease. His hold was firm but steady, as if afraid that haste might undo you.

“You are not to be buried,” he said again, softer this time.