Chapter Text
Yeosang feels like he can’t breathe as they approach walker territory. They can see boat masts in the distance, signs of life, of other walkers. This is the closest they’ve been to inhabited land and human civilization all day, and if Seonghwa can find a way home from here, he’ll be leaving Yeosang within the hour.
“It’s not much further,” he tells Seonghwa. “Do you recognize it?”
“Yeah, I think it’s the dock I left from, actually. At the end of that little strip there should be the place I rented the rowboat.”
Damn. They really are close. They’ve got the right place and everything.
“My house is about an hour away, but I might have to call Hongjoong to come get me. Even if my car is still in the lot, I lost my keys in the ocean.”
Wooyoung ducks under the water to swim up to San and let him know they'll be stopping soon as Seonghwa scans the docks. It only takes a little longer for San to find the right place, and the three of them push the raft almost all the way under the wooden walkway. It’s too high for Seonghwa to reach without help, but as soon as the raft is stationary, Wooyoung and San disappear.
“Where are they going?”
“They, uh, wanted to give us a chance to say goodbye. Privately.”
“Oh, right,” Seonghwa frowns. “I keep forgetting we have to do that. I… I don’t want to say goodbye.”
Yeosang doesn’t either, and he knows there’s a possibility that he won’t have to, but he can’t bring himself to say the words he needs to say. His mind is flooded with thoughts of how he’ll be burdening Seonghwa. He’s a nice guy. Even if he doesn’t love Yeosang, Seonghwa wouldn’t just leave him to find his way on land all on his own.
Seonghwa scoots to the edge of the raft and slides down into the water again, holding onto Yeosang’s shoulders to stay afloat. He’s right there in Yeosang’s arms, but still Yeosang can’t do it. He just can’t make himself say I love you, Seonghwa, and I want to be with you.
“Hey, I can see you’re stuck in your head. What’s going on, huh?”
Yeosang shakes his head. He doesn’t want to answer, but Seonghwa must be a mind reader. He loops his arms around Yeosang’s neck and pulls him closer, kissing him the way he had that first time on the island, soft and delicate. It draws the poisonous thoughts from Yeosang’s mind and lets him think more clearly, and when Seonghwa pulls away he takes a breath, he’s prepared to make his confession.
But Seonghwa beats him to it.
“This is going to sound so weird and rushed and just…” he trails off for a moment before shaking his head and continuing. “Yeosang, I think I’m in love with you. I don’t want to leave you. I want to stay here with you, or I want you to come home with me. I want us to be together. Is there… Do you think we could find a way?”
“I don’t know,” Yeosang says. He still doesn’t know if the myth is true, but there's only one way to find out. “I love you, too, and I don’t want to leave you, either.”
Seonghwa breathes a heavy sigh hearing that Yeosang feels the same, and he kisses Yeosang again, harder this time, more urgently, like he’s trying to get all of his kisses in at once before they’re ripped apart. He presses his body closer to Yeosang, clinging to him. His lips are insistent against Yeosang’s, his tongue curious, licking at Yeosang’s lower lip, even using his teeth to nibble a bit.
Yeosang is afraid to open his mouth too wide. His own teeth are dangerous. They’re meant to rip fish apart, and they could easily do the same to Seonghwa’s tongue, but Seonghwa doesn’t give up easily. He threads his fingers into Yeosang’s hair and tugs gently, tilting Yeosang’s head to the side and causing him to gasp. Seonghwa takes the opportunity to deepen the kiss further, tongue exploring the tips of those sharp teeth and brushing against Yeosang’s tongue as well.
They’re so caught up in each other that they don’t notice right away when something begins to change. Seonghwa’s legs are resting in the curve of Yeosang’s tail, his hands at the back of Yeosang’s head and on his shoulder. Something feels different the next time Seonghwa grabs at Yeosang’s hair. His fingers don’t slide through it the same, and then Yeosang realizes something slicker than the fabric of Seonghwa’s pants is sliding against his tail as Seonghwa tries to lift himself higher.
Yeosang drops a hand to Seonghwa’s hip, wondering what’s different. He jerks back when he feels what it is, scales beneath his fingers.
“Wait, no,” Seonghwa whines, chasing him.
“Seonghwa-”
“Come back. I’m not ready to go.”
“No, Seonghwa, your legs, they’re-”
They look both down, and Seonghwa’s legs are gone, fused together and covered in scales. He has a tail, iridescent white flecked with deep purple. A perfect inversion of Yeosang’s own scales.
“How-”
“I don’t know,” Yeosang shakes his head. “I thought I was supposed to have legs. This is-”
“Better. It’s so much better, Yeosang. I can-”
Seonghwa releases Yeosang, dipping under the water and swirling in circles. Yeosang joins him, watches him test his tail, flipping it and admiring the way it moves in the water. He smiles at Yeosang when he sees him watching.
“We match,” he says, covering his mouth in surprise when he hears his own voice underwater, a flurry of bubbles slipping around his now-webbed fingers as it makes him giggle.
He reaches for Yeosang, and Yeosang swims closer, wrapping around Seonghwa easily when they touch.
“You can teach me to dance,” he tells Yeosang, and Yeosang can’t do anything other than nod. He’s too overwhelmed to think.
“Think you can put that on hold?” San’s voice startles them both. “Don’t mean to break this up, but we’d like to head home if that’s okay.”
“Yeah, we can be back by tomorrow morning if we go now,” Wooyoung adds. “You’ve got a lifetime to learn to dance. Let’s go.”
“Are you okay with that?” Yeosang asks. He knows Seonghwa’s answer by the way he smiles, eyes disappearing and lips spreading to reveal a new set of teeth just like Yeosang’s.
Seonghwa nods. “Take me home.” He takes Yeosang’s hand and turns to Wooyoung and San, letting them lead the way.
It takes a long time to get home. Seongwha struggles a bit with his gills. He keeps panicking and swimming to the surface to breathe even though Wooyoung tells him he’s being ridiculous.
“He’s learning, baby,” San says. “He’ll get it. Give him time.”
Seonghwa’s tail isn’t as strong, either. He’s not used to swimming long distances and has to take frequent breaks. Overall it adds several hours to their journey, but it’s totally worth it to see the absolute delight on Seonghwa’s face every time he flicks his tail and glides through the water.
Once they arrive home there’s another obstacle before they can rest. Yeosang’s family still believes he’s dead. He hasn’t seen them in two months, and though he’s really too exhausted to explain everything to them, especially how he found Seonghwa, he doesn’t have much of a choice. Wooyoung and San’s cave isn’t big enough for all four of them, and Yeosang’s home, if he even still has a home, is a cave that’s practically next door to his parents.
It’s midday when Yeosang and Seonghwa break away from Wooyoung and San to approach his home, and his sister happens to be sitting at the entrance to his parents’ cave. Yeosang sees the blood drain from her face when she notices him. He waves at her.
“Hey, sis.”
“Hey, sis. Hey, sis? How dare you just hey, sis me! Where have you been? Wooyoung said you got eaten by a shark!”
“You know no shark could ever catch me,” he says, reaching for Seonghwa’s hand. He needs support to get through this. “I, uh, want you to meet someone.”
His sister glances over at Seonghwa, and she does a double take as she sees their matching tails. “No fucking way. You disappeared for two months for a boy? Oh, mom and dad are not going to believe this.”
Before he can stop her she flits away into the cave, calling for their parents. He figures that’s probably fine. He should get this over with sooner rather than later.
Seonghwa clears his throat beside him, and Yeosang turns to find him looking almost as terrified as he had when he’d fallen on the island.
“I didn’t realize I’d be meeting your parents so soon. It’s… I don’t know if it’s the same for your people, but for us, meeting the parents is kind of a special thing.”
“Hey,” Yeosang says, squeezing Seonghwa’s hand. “It’s okay. There’s no getting around it really, but you have nothing to worry about. It’s me they’ll be mad at. They’re going to love you as much as I do.”
“It’s just that the whole tail and gills and stuff is all so new, and I know your people don’t trust us. I’m afraid-”
“Don’t be. You’re not a walker anymore. You’re one of us, and you’re mine. If they don’t accept you, we’ll just go somewhere else.”
“I couldn’t ask you to do that,” Seonghwa protests.
“You don’t have to. Seonghwa, I was ready to give up my tail for you. I was prepared to become a walker and live on land for the rest of my life just to be with you. Leaving this place… It’s not even a question.”
“Yeosang?” His head snaps to the side at the sound of his mother’s voice. “You’re… whole. You’re okay.”
“Yeah, mom. I’m fine.” She swims closer and runs her hands over his arms and touches his face. When she sees his hand wrapped around Seonghwa’s, she finally looks over at him, first examining his face and then his tail. “Mom, this is Seonghwa.”
“Your mate,” she says, and Yeosang blinks. He’d expected he’d have to explain about Seonghwa to his parents, but apparently it’s not necessary. “Hello, Seonghwa. It’s a pleasure to meet my baby’s mate. You must be ready to drop. Take him home, Yeosang. Get some rest. You can tell me all about it when you wake up.”
“But dad-”
“Will be ready to listen when you’re ready to talk. Go. Sleep. We’ll be here.”
Unable to argue with his mother, Yeosang nods and tugs at Seonghwa’s hand to lead him into the cave they’ll now be sharing.
“I know it’s small, but there’s plenty of room for the two of us,” he tells Seonghwa as they enter. There’s a bed of sand in one corner where Yeosang usually sleeps, and shelves lining the walls of the cave that he’d stolen from sunken ships. All of his walker artifacts are where he left them on the shelves, pieces broken off of statues and jewelry and coins he’d collected from the ocean floor.
“It’s cozy,” Seonghwa says, looking around at all of Yeosang’s treasures. “I like it. Let’s sleep.”
Three months later
“Yeosang, get out here. I can hear music already.”
It’s the full moon, and Yeosang’s parents are celebrating as they always have. His sister is already singing as he exits the cave, and he can see Wooyoung and San dancing. Well, sort of dancing. Since Yeosang has Seonghwa now, they don’t dance so much as they hold each other and rotate slowly as they kiss. Yeosang thinks it’s kind of disgusting, but Seonghwa seems to find it cute.
There’s a small band backing Yeosang’s sister up, and his parents are sitting on a rock, watching her sing and holding hands. His mother looks over and winks at Yeosang, making him blush, and he grabs Seonghwa’s wrist, pulling him out into the open water to dance.
Seonghwa had taken to their dancing quite well, and he frequently asks Yeosang to dance even when there isn’t any music. He likes to lead, showing off how strong his tail has gotten, how he can twirl them around with ease. He looks so happy when he’s holding Yeosang that it makes Yeosang’s heart feel so full it might burst.
To Yeosang’s relief, Seonghwa doesn’t often get homesick for the land. Occasionally he’ll talk about his walker friends, but mostly he just enjoys being here with Yeosang.
“Back on the island, I had almost given up hope of ever seeing them again. And then I found a new home with you, and I didn’t want to go back,” he’d explained.
Not everything is easy. Yeosang’s sister still hasn’t fully accepted Seonghwa. She tolerates him, but after learning that he used to be a walker she wouldn’t speak to Yeosang for a week. It hurts, but she is slowly warming up to Seonghwa. Yeosang knows that one day they’ll be as close as they used to be.
And Yeosang and Seonghwa are just happy that the myth turned out to be true, that the universe gave them a way to be together.
Seonghwa spins them around, and he leans forward to kiss Yeosang’s cheek. “Wait until the celebration is over and I get you back home,” he teases Yeosang, and Yeosang can feel how pink his cheeks are. Everyone can probably see it. He hides his face in Seonghwa’s chest, and Seonghwa laughs and tells him he’s cute.
Yeah, they’re happy, and they only fall more deeply in love every day they’re together.