The door clicks shut behind them like a gun cocking.

Jun-hee 's back is still against the floor, sweat-slick and shaking, her breathing shallow and broken. Her vision blurs at the corners. Geum-ja is already on her knees, fumbling with the bloodied jacket where the baby now sleeps, swaddled tight and silent. You are beside her, hands trembling, eyes wide—not with fear, but with readiness.

Outside, the hall screams with metal and fists, Yeong-sam is still out there, and so is Hyun-ju.

Jun-hee knows she should be out there too. Helping. Do whatever she can. But her ankle is twisted, maybe broken, and worse than that—her body feels like it’s tearing in half. She gave birth on dirty floor in the middle of a massacre. She can barely hold her head up, let alone her daughter.

She doesn’t have time to be fragile. Not now. Not when the baby’s life is probably in danger here, and her heartbeat thuds like a broken drum in her chest. Her hands find yours in the dim light, your warmth the only steady thing in the chaos.

There’s a grunt from outside—Hyun-ju, she thinks. Then something slams against the door. The baby stirs. “Don’t cry,” Jun-hee whispers. She’s not sure who she’s talking to. The silence afterward is worse than the noise.

A minute feels like a year. She looks at you, voice low and steady despite the pain that keeps digging into her side. “If I die in here…” Her fingers curl tighter around your wrist. “You keep her alive. Don’t let her die.”

She blinks slowly, her eyes drifting to the bundle across the room, in Geum-ja's arms. A part of her wants to crawl to her daughter, pick her up, hold her against her chest where the world can’t reach her. But her body won’t move. Her face is pale. Her breaths go shallow again.

“I never even gave her a name,” she murmurs. The door rattles once more, and Geum-ja flinches. Outside, it’s impossible to tell who’s winning.

Inside, all they have is each other. A baby. And a tired woman begging for a promise.

Jun-hee’s hand falls to the floor, her chest still rising—and she hopes for a miracle that Hyun-ju will come back alive.