Seoul, South Korea – March 2025

The neon glow of Gangnam’s skyscrapers flickered as Dr. Lee Ji-eun hurried down the sterile hospital hallway, her white coat fluttering behind her. She hadn’t slept in 32 hours. The news blaring from the waiting room TVs didn’t help—a mysterious flu-like illness was spreading rapidly across the city, with patients reporting fever, blackened veins, and violent outbursts. The government insisted it was “under control.” Ji-eun knew better.

In Isolation Ward 4, her newest patient thrashed against leather restraints. “H-help me…” the young woman choked out, her eyes bloodshot. Ji-eun adjusted the IV drip, her fingers trembling. “You’re safe here,” she lied. The monitor beeped erratically. Then, silence.

The woman’s head snapped up. Her pupils dilated, consuming the irises.

“Get out.”

Ji-eun froze. The patient’s mouth unhinged with a sickening crack, and she lunged. Leather straps tore like paper. Ji-eun stumbled backward, crashing into a supply cart as the creature—it wasn’t human anymore—scrambled after her. A gurney blocked the door. She braced for teeth—

Bang.

The zombie’s skull exploded. Ji-eun flinched as hot viscera splattered her face. Standing in the doorway, smoke curling from his pistol, was Officer Kim Min-jun. His uniform was disheveled, eyes sharp but haunted. “We need to go. Now.”

Six Hours Earlier

Min-jun had been patrolling Itaewon’s bustling streets when the first call came in: riot at Gangnam Station. By the time his squad arrived, the crowd was a writhing mass of bodies—but these weren’t protestors. A businessman in a shredded Armani suit gnawed on a cop’s arm. A schoolgirl crawled across the subway stairs, her jaw hanging by a tendon.

“Headshots!” Min-jun barked, emptying his clip. His partner, Soo-hyuk, fell mid-sprint, tackled by a rabid old woman. Her teeth sank into his neck. Min-jun didn’t hesitate—he put a bullet in both their skulls.

Present

Ji-eun clutched Min-jun’s arm as they fled through the hospital’s corpse-strewn parking garage. Moans echoed off concrete. “My car,” she whispered, pointing to a silver Kia. They dove inside just as a pack of infected descended, clawing at the windows. Min-jun floored the gas, crushing limbs under the tires.

“You knew this would happen,” he said, eyeing her blood-smeared research notes: *NEURONAL DEGENERATION RATE: 87% AFTER 2 HOURS.*

Ji-eun wiped her glasses. “I tried to warn them. The virus isn’t a pathogen—it’s a *prion*. Like mad cow disease, but airborne. Once it hits the brainstem…”

“We turn into *those things*.” Min-jun grimaced. “How long do we have?”

“Symptoms start in 12 hours. Death in 24.” She paused. “Unless you’re immune.”

Their eyes met. A flicker of recognition—they’d met before.

Flashback: Winter 2023

Min-jun, off-duty, nursing a whiskey at a bar. Ji-eun, arguing with a date: “*You think pandemics are just plot devices for movies?” She’d stormed out. Min-jun followed, chuckling. “You’re intense.” She’d laughed, breath visible in the cold. “I’m right.”

He’d walked her home. They never exchanged numbers.

Now

The car swerved around an overturned bus. “There’s a safe zone in Incheon,” Min-jun said. “Military base. If we—”

A thunderous crash. A truck rammed them from behind. The Kia spun, flipping onto its roof. Ji-eun’s head slammed against glass.

Dazed, she felt hands drag her out. Min-jun. Blood dripped from his brow. “Run!” he shouted. Behind them, the truck driver emerged—a hulking infected, bones jutting from its shoulders. It roared.

They sprinted into a derelict subway tunnel. The beast followed, snapping pipes like twigs. Ji-eun’s ankle twisted. Min-jun shoved her behind a pillar, pressing his pistol into her palm. “Aim for the head.”

“What about you?!”

He grabbed a rusted fire axe off the wall. “I’ll distract it.”

“Min-jun—!”

Too late. He charged, axe swinging. The creature batted him aside. Min-jun crashed into a wall, gasping. The beast loomed over him, rancid drool dripping onto his face…

Bang.

Ji-eun’s bullet tore through its eye. It collapsed. She knelt beside Min-jun, hands probing his ribs. “Nothing broken,” he winced.

A distant screech echoed through the tunnel. Hundreds of glowing eyes blinked in the dark.

“The entire city’s down here,” Ji-eun breathed.

Hand in hand, they ran toward the faintest glimmer of daylight.

End of Episode 1

Next episode teaser: As Ji-eun and Min-jun reach the surface, they discover a terrifying truth—the infection is evolving. And one of them is burning up with fever...

Seoul, South Korea – 14 Hours After Outbreak

The subway tunnel’s exit spat them into a nightmare. Dawn painted the sky blood-orange, smoke coiling from the skeletal remains of high-rises. Lee Ji-eun limped behind Min-jun, her sprained ankle screaming with every step. The streets were eerily quiet, save for the distant wail of sirens and the crunch of broken glass underfoot.

“We need water,” Ji-eun said, eyeing a gutted convenience store. The shelves were stripped bare, but a single bottle rolled in the corner. She lunged for it—

Crack.

A sniper shot shattered the bottle. Min-jun yanked her behind a car as another bullet pinged off the hood.

“*Don’t shoot!*” Min-jun barked, peering over the trunk. On the roof of a nearby pharmacy, a figure in tactical gear lowered his rifle.

“Identify yourselves!” the soldier shouted.

“Officer Kim Min-jun, Seoul Metro Police! This is Dr. Lee Ji-eun—she’s a virologist!”

The soldier hesitated, then gestured sharply. “Move. Now.”

The Church

The soldier—Private Park Hyun-kyu—led them to a makeshift stronghold in a Gothic church. Stained-glass saints watched as refugees huddled under pews. Hyun-kyu tossed Ji-eun a medkit. “Patch yourself up. You’re coming to Incheon.”

Min-jun frowned. “The military’s evacuating civilians?”

Hyun-kyu’s jaw tightened. “*Selectively.” He nodded at Ji-eun. “Her research notes got broadcasted on emergency channels. Command thinks she’s the key to a cure.”

Ji-eun froze. “Broadcasted? By who?”

“Does it matter?” Hyun-kyu checked his watch. “We move at sundown.”

Flashback: 48 Hours Before Outbreak

Ji-eun sat alone in her lab, staring at the petri dish. The prion sample glowed faintly under UV light. Airborne transmission confirmed. Her hands shook as she typed the email to the CDC: URGENT: GLOBAL OUTBREAK IMMINENT.

The reply came instantly: Report to quarantine. Do not disseminate unverified claims.

She’d hit “forward” anyway.

Now

Min-jun found Ji-eun in the church bell tower, scribbling equations on a hymn sheet. “You think you can reverse this?”

“The prion reprograms brain cells into replication factories,” she muttered. “But if I can isolate the original protein structure—”

“Ji-eun.” He gripped her shoulders. “What happens if you’re wrong?”

She avoided his gaze. Her forehead burned, but she blamed exhaustion.

Betrayal

At dusk, Hyun-kyu herded them into an armored truck. Ji-eun counted seven refugees—a teen clutching a baseball bat, a mother with a silent toddler, others too shell-shocked to speak. The engine roared to life.

Then the toddler sneezed.

Hyun-kyu spun, gun raised. “Who’s infected?!”

Chaos erupted. The mother screamed as Hyun-kyu yanked the child from her arms. “No fever, see?” she pleaded.

Ji-eun lunged. “Stop! He’s just scared—”

Hyun-kyu backhanded her. Min-jun tackled him, but two more soldiers burst in, pinning him down.

“You think we’re evacuating you to save people?” Hyun-kyu wiped blood from his lip. “The base isn’t a safe zone. It’s a lab. And you’re the rats.” He tossed Ji-eun’s notes at her. “Your ‘prion theory’ is cute, but Command wants live trials. Starting with you.”

The mother wailed as Hyun-kyu jabbed a syringe into the toddler’s arm. The child’s veins blackened instantly.

“Monster!” Ji-eun scrambled for the syringe.

Hyun-kyu smirked. “Wait till you see Phase Two.”

Escape

Min-jun headbutted the soldier restraining him, grabbing his sidearm. Shots rang out. The teen swung his bat, shattering a soldier’s kneecap. In the chaos, Ji-eun stabbed Hyun-kyu’s thigh with the infected toddler’s syringe.

“What did you do?!” Hyun-kyu clawed at his leg.

“Adaptation testing,” Ji-eun hissed.

They fled into the night, the truck exploding behind them. Hyun-kyu’s screams followed.

The Safe House

An hour later, they regrouped in an abandoned hanok. The teen, Jin, bandaged Min-jun’s bullet-grazed arm. “My little brother… he was in that truck,” he whispered.

Ji-eun vomited in the courtyard. Her fever spiked.

Min-jun found her shivering by a koi pond. “You’re burning up.”

“It’s just stress,” she lied.

He pulled her close. “Don’t you dare turn on me.”

She laughed weakly. “Wouldn’t you shoot me?”

“Never.”

Their lips brushed—a hesitant, desperate promise.

THUD.

A mangled hand burst through the hanok’s paper door. The infected toddler crawled inside, eyes milky, mouth gnashing. Behind him stood dozens more… but they moved differently. Organized.

Leading them was Hyun-kyu—his right arm a twisted claw, eyes glowing faintly blue.

“Found you,” he rasped.

End of Episode 2

Next episode teaser: As Ji-eun’s condition worsens, Min-jun discovers her blood may hold a cure. But Hyun-kyu’s new hive-mind army is closing in—and the virus is mutating faster than anyone imagined.