Work Text:
i.
Lately, Jaebum hadn’t been a frequent guest on Earth.
It was a little too much for him, the complete opposite of his preferences – Jaebum thrived in silence and darkness, cold and barely habitable places. In voluntary loneliness, emptiness. So far, space had been nothing but accommodating to these preferences – a small asteroid flying to nowhere really that Jaebum had found by accident? Good. A remote tiny planet where it was raining glass? Not the most inviting place, but it worked. Planet Earth where there were people, billions of them, rushing around like ants, speeding through their lives like their sole mission was to make as much noise as possible? No, thanks.
And yet, sometimes Jaebum couldn’t help but find himself cozily curled up on a tree branch on Earth; the people whom he had so much disdain to becoming his closest neighbors. A lonely boy, counting stars in the dark night sky.
It should be impossible, to count all the stars in the sky – and yet, Jaebum knew by heart how many of them are out there, glimmering in yellow and silver like a ceiling decoration, and where all of them were supposed to be.
You see, Jaebum was not an ordinary kid – even though on Earth he could have easily passed as a twenty-something college boy next door. He was much, much older than twenty-something; so old, that he didn’t really recall the exact number – Jaebum only knew he was there for a long while, roaming the darkness, watching the space change and become what it was now. He didn’t have a birthday, and perhaps wasn’t about to have his last day either; he was just… that, an entity in the shape of a Korean boy, restlessly floating in the space and taking care of stars.
In a way, he was taking care of himself, because he was the stars. Stars, constellations, everything of that sort was Jaebum’s – his thoughts, happiness, sorrows, love, and all the other possible feelings always became stars once Jaebum couldn’t help it anymore.
He had always tried to bottle up too many of his emotions.
If you see an unfamiliar new star one night, maybe it’s Jaebum, shooting one more thought of his that he couldn’t keep to himself anymore up in the sky. Being all alone for thousands, millions of years can do that to you.
ii.
It wasn’t until this one particular night that Jaebum noticed his stars were going missing again.
Perhaps it was this nagging feeling inside that made him choose Earth after a long period of exploring remote comets and asteroids; Jaebum needed to try and rest his racing mind – at that point, there was an entire new constellation about to be released into the skies, if he didn’t stop thinking – but the more Jaebum looked up, trying to calm down, the more he realized that something was off.
It was a clear night where Jaebum sat in a tree, conveniently and completely covered by thick fog. He wasn’t stupid, Jaebum had learned that Earth boys usually didn’t sit around atop of trees in plain sight if they didn’t want to attract unnecessary attention.
Jaebum had never liked any kind of attention.
A clear night in Jaebum’s books always meant that he could simply relax and count the marks his thoughts made up there; but now he was having a hard time.
“One, two, three,” Jaebum kept folding his fingers over and over, losing count and getting obviously frustrated, if his tongue, sticking out a little, could’ve been the monument for his concentration. “Four, five…” There was a gap in darkness where the sixth star of this particular constellation was supposed to be, and Jaebum frowned even more. “One, two, three—” he started all over again, but before he even got the chance to finish the word, the third start got gone too, as if the night would’ve swallowed it for some strange reason.
Jaebum only raised his eyebrows – the audacity.
It happened from time to time – the thing about stars is that just about everyone wanted them. And who could blame them – stars were pretty, they were always shining so wonderfully. Stars were beautiful until someone read more into it; and then they weren’t so pretty anymore – some of them did hold Jaebum’s saddest and darkest thoughts after all.
But there were some star thieves, Jaebum knew; a lot of them simply didn’t care about the dark side of the moon, pun intended. Stars were always selling well among space explorers, collectors, or other rich people. They had always been worth so much money that no matter how many angry stars Jaebum sent out into the darkness, to lure in and trap the thieves, he could ward off the bad guys only for so long.
It wasn’t like Jaebum was mad about this particular stolen star, though – if he remembered it correctly, that one was created when he was simply happy because he saw a nice landscape on a comet he found by accident. Jaebum spent a few moments on that comet, flying through space with it as if one would ride their car here on Earth, enjoying the warmth and wind. Or maybe it was years, honestly, who could tell how exactly time was measured in space?
What he was mad about, however, was how blatantly reckless the star thief was, stealing stars when Jaebum was watching.
Jaebum’s mood was ruined, to say the least – there was no way of retrieving a stolen star because the thieves usually were the aggressive all-in type, who were willing to risk their lives to complete the task they were given. Jaebum had had his fair share of collisions with these people, and most of them, it was sheer luck – and maybe the amount of time he had spent going through random places in space – that he made it out unscathed.
Jaebum may have been immortal for all he knew and understood about his kind, but there other ways to kill a star maker – chained in some collectors lair and being forced to make stars didn’t seem like the best way to spend the eternity.
Jaebum sighed, standing up on the branch so gracefully and without any fear of it breaking like he was weightless; it was time to go. A gust of wind started playing with his dark hair and Jaebum was trying to tame it before departing – only to stop halfway the motion because he saw another boy, just a few trees to the right from him.
The strange boy was also standing on a branch like it was nothing and… was packing Jaebum’s star in a special container. Jaebum had never learned what specifically the star container was made from; he guessed a lot of various exotic metals to somehow cool the stolen stars down, so it wouldn’t burn the thief or the buyer once it was sold.
Stolen stars were held captive in a way – and Jaebum had always believed it should be against all the laws of nature, to try and tame a star once it was out there.
“Hey!” to Jaebum’s surprise, the boy waved and smiled at him. The smile was too wide, according to Jaebum’s absolutely correct and unbiased judgement, all things considered. “Are you here for the stars too? Tonight must be pretty busy, there are not many clouds. Great time to get to work.”
Jaebum’s answer was almost as cold as the ice that had been raining down on the planet where Jaebum had established his temporary home for now. “Great time to steal, indeed.”
“Oh,” the boy’s laugh was rather nervous as he rubbed the nape of his neck like he would be a little embarrassed. Embarrassment was a strange thing to see on a star thief, Jaebum thought. “Did you want it? I usually don’t go here, so if it was your field, I’m really sorry…”
“They’re all mine,” Jaebum replied, reaching his hand out and feeling this surge of bravery. “Better give it back, Earth boy.”
Perhaps that was why Jaebum was feeling so brave – it was no brainer that the thief boy belonged to this planet. Jaebum had been here too many times not to notice the general traits of people, especially how they dressed; the guy’s clothes were a carbon copy of the same plain black t-shirts and dark blue pants Jaebum had seen countless of times. The way this stranger talked also gave out his descent pretty clearly – even though he spoke in a language Jaebum – and most of the people who frequented space – understood, and was kind of good at it, he had this… Earth accent to it.
“My name is Mark,” the guy said, despite the fact that Jaebum didn’t ask. “And you’re not very nice, are you? Why should I give it to you?”
Jaebum sighed.
Star thieves were always the same, despite coming in a variety of shapes, forms, and origins. When you got to the bottom of it, they all were like children, thinking that they were always right, the center of the world, space even. Star thieves were smart, Jaebum had to give them that because taking a star down was not an easy task by any means – but in the end, how stupid do you need to be to not recognize the most desired entity in the entire space, a star maker, when he was standing right in front of you?
In the heat of the moment, Jaebum had always liked to show off a little, so he decided that this Mark boy was harmless enough to put on a bit of a show. Jaebum told him to look, and closed his eyes, feeling a familiar warmth tricking down his body like he was under a warm stream of water.
Mark’s eyes went wide after a second because it looked like Jaebum was emitting heat, so many of it that his contours, normally blurry and hidden in the shadows of the dark night, were glowing gold. Star gold.
A moment more and something shot up from Jaebum’s chest right into the sky; like a very bright golden thread, connecting Jaebum to some other strange, powerful force. And now there was a new star in the sky as well, playfully blinking in the place of the stolen one. Mark looked at Jaebum with awe.
“You’re the one they keep talking about,” he said. “You’re…”
“I make stars,” Jaebum nodded, a little pleased by the impression he made. “And you stole one just now.”
“I’ve never seen you—” Mark mumbled a little bit in a daze, before correcting himself. “Someone like you. Doesn’t your kind hide?”
Jaebum didn’t really like the way “your kind” rolled from Mark’s tongue. Sure, maybe star makers weren’t the most pleasant people to be around – even if their minds did wonders with their creations, their overprotectiveness of it, and the nature of a loner in general didn’t make good impressions.
Pretty bold for a kind that was about to go extinct, to prefer no one’s company, Jaebum was aware - but they never hid from anyone. They had their pride, too.
“Hiding and avoiding trouble are two very different things, Earth boy,” Jaebum said. “Too many of us had fallen trying to protect what’s ours, so is it a surprise we don’t think your kind make good friends?”
Mark thought about it for a second, it seemed, before taking the star container out of his backpack and lightly throwing it back to Jaebum. During this entire exchange, neither of them had moved from their respective places.
“And what am I supposed to do with it now?’ Jaebum sneered when the cold and heavy package landed in his hands. But actually, he was having a hard time hiding a surprise.
Usually, star thieves were aggressive. They were strong and smart, a little like hunters. They had their eyes set on their prey and never backed off. They never gave up, especially if the pay was good, and most importantly, they definitely never returned what they took.
Mark was different, that Jaebum could tell from the very beginning.
“I thought you told me to hand it back!” Mark said, a little teasingly. He was right, Jaebum did, but it was a bluff in an attempt to intimidate him. “You can put it back up?”
“You can’t put a star back up. It’s not how it works.”
Stars were complicated. They found their place in space because their owner couldn’t, and yet, once removed from the said place, they never wanted to return to it. It would simply fall down – that was what people called falling stars.
But a star thief not knowing this obvious detail when they get extensive training before getting to work? Interesting.
“Well, you should take it with you, still,” Mark said, stubbornly. “It was a pretty star, by the way. Where was it?” he asked, referring to the memory the star was holding.
“A comet,” Jaebum told. It was easy to speak with Mark, somehow. “It should be far away now, it’s been a while since that memory.”
“It should be,” Mark agrees, waving to him. “I should go, too. Sorry for the star again.”
It takes a moment for Jaebum to realize that Mark was gone.
Jaebum was puzzled.
iii.
Astronomers on Earth were puzzled too. They just found five new, huge constellations in the Milky way that were hiding in plain sight and no one ever saw them before.
Jaebum had been thinking about the strange star thief too much. He also hadn’t accounted for the fact that if Mark had ever found the stars that were made because of him, Jaebum would have a lot of serious explaining to do.
iv.
“it’s kind of rude to keep following someone,” Jaebum said the next time they met in person.
When they meet not in person, it was mostly Jaebum seeing his stars disappearing one by one, and always knowing who was the one he should blame for it. It was like their little game, Mark collecting the stars for nothing really, always taking the most mundane ones and staying away from really personal ones.
Jaebum didn’t know how Mark told the difference, but he appreciated it.
This time, they were in another place on Earth. There was a forest, it also had trees but they were a little different than Jaebum was used to – it had some kind of thorns instead of leaves, and it smelled a little strange. The smell was pleasant, though, just unusual.
“It’s rude to be this mean when you’re the guest on a planet,” Mark teased but his smile was welcoming. And that was where Jaebum slipped again, absolutely horrified at the thought of a star thief being welcoming. He surely needed something from Jaebum, there was no other way. “Counting stars again?”
“Yes,” Jaebum crossed his arms on his chest, defensively. “And there are some missing again.”
“I didn’t steal any,” Mark yawns, stretching his back before barefoot into a lake. Jaebum didn’t really know why people would want a lake this pretty hidden in the depths of a forest, but he didn’t mind. More secret places for him. “Recently, at least.”
The lake was shallow, barely reaching Mark’s ankles.
“Why?” Jaebum asked, but his voice was so quiet that it was no more than a whisper lost somewhere in the wind.
Mark tilted his head to look at Jaebum. “Why didn’t I steal your stars?” he smiled a little too. Much like a mother would smile when her child asked a very stupid, yet somehow adorable question. “I thought you didn’t like anyone touching what’s yours?”
“You don’t really act like a thief,” Jaebum said bluntly, jumping into the water off a wooden footbridge he’d been standing on.
The water was pleasantly warm – it was late summer on Earth after all; and Jaebum, a little on the magical side of things, attracted water creatures. A group of fishes started spinning circles around Jaebum’s legs and Mark could’ve sworn that the little frog’s, which Jaebum was now holding in his palm, eyes told him you wish you were me.
“How so?”
“You’re…” Jaebum didn’t quite know how to put it in words, so he ran with the first thing that came to his mind. “You’re too soft.”
Even with all the shadows surrounding them, in a forest where the only source of light was coming from the full moon above them, Jaebum could see how Mark’s cheeks turned a little pink.
“You don’t act like the rest of them,” Jaebum tried again, feeling like he wasn’t making much sense. “Usually, they’re… rough. And mean. And they would never, ever give a star back.”
As much as Jaebum hated the whole slew of thoughts that followed after his and Mark’s first meeting, he couldn’t forget the gesture. It was a simple star, nothing special – or, at the very least, not any more special than other stars Jaebum had made – but having it returned to him upon simply asking…
Jaebum sighed, knowing that a new set of stars were about to be released into space, an exact replica of those mixed feelings he had about Mark.
“I don’t…” Mark started, but he felt a little embarrassed once again, like he was talking about something really shameful, or something he wasn’t supposed to disclose. “I’m not exactly a thief,” he finally admitted, while Jaebum was standing there with a frog in his hand and looking quizzically at the strange Earth boy as if asking if Mark was joking around. “Okay, maybe I am a star thief. But I don’t sell the stars I steal. Nor do I snitch on your whereabouts. I just… keep it all to myself.”
“How come?” Jaebum suspiciously asked. A tiny part of him thought that maybe, once again, he made his judgement on Mark a little too early. Another part of him, however, the one that helped him survive all these long years of being a target for all kinds of evil people, told him not to jump into things so quickly. And unfortunately, that second part of him took charge most of the time. “What’s the point in stealing stars if you don’t profit off them?”
Mark shrugged, tossing a stone across the surface of the lake.
“I just like looking at it. I also wander around space a lot. Just like you,” he confessed, and Jaebum’s eyes glimmered in even more distrust. “And one day I ran into stars that had memories in them, your stars. And I became fascinated.”
Jaebum, however, instead of feeling flattered, felt like a cornered animal.
He never thought about someone being fascinated with stars, with him in a good way. In his books, star thieves didn’t care what stars were really about, as long as they shone nicely. In his books, they took the money or any other benefit that was promised to them and moved onto another endeavor without much thought.
Someone, Mark, searching for Jaebum’s stars specifically for what they were made of – memories and feelings – felt a lot like some stranger would’ve read your diary.
Strange, unpleasant. Creepy even.
It shouldn’t have been a surprise that Jaebum, not used to it, did what he knew best during all those years – lashed out and ran away.
“I should’ve known,” he spat out, disappointed once again. “You just can’t trust anyone.”
“What do you mean?” Mark was obviously taken aback by the sudden change in tone, but Jaebum’s voice kept getting colder and colder; all the soft feelings he caught himself developing to Mark already gone.
“You’ve planned it all, didn’t you?”
“Planned what?!”
“You saw what is hiding in my stars and decided to follow them to find the star maker. You’re so fascinated by stars,” Jaebum sneered, but for some reason, there were tiny needles pricking the back of his eyes, driving him dangerously close to tearing up from disappointment. “Must be a real treat to see the freak who can make it, to try and get closer to him. For what? To get more stars? To look into more memories?”
It had happened before, the same story – that was why Jaebum was trying to protect himself. This other boy from Earth; that was why Jaebum stopped frequenting this particular planet for a while before meeting Mark.
People were mean and they needed Jaebum only for what he could do with his mind – even if they had to lie about feelings. About love. And to Jaebum there was no scarier feeling than finding out that someone needed him around only for the stars.
That was why he was so eager to push Mark away before he even got attached to the boy.
In the end, Jaebum couldn’t help himself and did tear up from anger a little – he was angry that he let Mark in so close; that he walked into a disappointment once again. Jaebum’s tears were shining too, like a little comical golden dots running down his face as he was trying to brush them away with the back of his hand.
“I think you should go,” Jaebum said, trying to contain himself for a little longer.
And even though technically, this place was Mark’s home, his planet, the star thief didn’t say a word. Being accused of such unspeakable things hurt too, especially when the accusations weren’t true. So he didn’t say a word more to Jaebum and just poofed into thin air again.
The constellation that was born seconds after that looked a little like a crying child, some people said looking up.
v.
Sometimes you can see them up in the sky; the star maker and a star thief. An unexpected duo, really, traveling across the skies – but Jaebum’s reluctance to trust people and Mark’s stubbornness to prove others wrong somehow checks out.
They don’t talk much, but where Jaebum goes, Mark follows; from a polite distance, of course – Mark never goes over strictly set boundaries, but he’s determined.
He knows Jaebum has been wronged so many times while being worth the entire world, entire galaxies, entire everything, so Mark’s patient. It takes a while to understand why Jaebum’s so scared of getting close, but in the end, star makers’ fate is written in the same stars they make – be kind to everyone, but trust no one.
And Mark understands.
Jaebum understands too – that’s why he allows Mark to steal his stars and look through his memories. That’s why he never forgets to send some stars as shiny reminders how thankful he is for Mark not leaving, but not being pushy either.
In the end, it seems like Mark stole so much more than Jaebum’s stars. And maybe one day, Jaebum will be able to say that out loud.