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i’ll search the universe until I can find you again
because that’s love, because it’s love
“You cannot love the spirit of the moon.”
Jisung does not say anything, but the abrupt white-hot flash emanating from his body gives his feelings away. He turns away from the spirit of the wind, intending to leave before more harsh words are thrown his way - but he cannot. The wind has bound his feet where he stands here, in the sky and the clouds; he could break free if he so wished, but it seems as if the wind spirit has more things to say.
“You cannot,” Hyunjin says fiercely. “This is not the sweet, bodiless fairy tales that the mortals like to spin from our stories. This is about our world , Jisung, you cannot love Minho. The world will fall apart, and you already know that.” His voice is beseeching, and Jisung knows it is taking everything in Hyunjin to plead of this from him.
I would let the world fall apart to be able to see Minho smile one time, Jisung thinks to himself.
“Do not worry,” Jisung says, voice light. Almost too easily, he rids of the binds that Hyunjin had casted on him, and he turns away, taking the glow of the sun with him as he leaves.
There is nothing that Hyunjin can do then.
There is nothing that Hyunjin can do then. Jisung has always been too stubborn for his good, only taking advice when he wanted to. Hyunjin sighs; the air around him quivers as he does so, and it is not long before his mind wanders to the other spirits, the gods that he calls his friends only to himself.
Jisung, you are not the only one who cannot love who they want to, Hyunjin thinks to himself, but he knows that Jisung will not listen to this, least of all him.
“I love him,” Jisung says, and Chan closes his eyes. He can hear Jisung’s heart shattering with each word that he says.
“I know,” Chan starts, but Jisung cuts him off.
“I love him, you don’t understand, I love him. It hurts when I can’t talk to him, when I can’t even look at him without the world going off kilter. It’s just love, why is it so difficult?”
Chan wants to say something, but his throat seals off with pain; he has to try and not to think about the spirit of the ocean. I know how you feel , Chan wants to say, but he cannot. He, at least, can still visit the ocean spirit in secret without much consequence. Jisung is not able to do that.
"Do you know?" Jisung whispers, and it is like Chan is listening to a mirror image of himself. "Do you know what it is like to love someone but you are forbidden to do so by the universe itself?"
I do, Chan wants to answer, but it would be so tactless to say it like this. Instead, he turns away from Jisung and shakes his head.
"I have to go back down," Chan says, and his voice is thin. "There are wishes that I need to oversee."
"The forest spirit is always busy," Jisung murmurs, "I shall see you soon, then."
Chan tries not to think about how there will be no soon, not any more. "Perhaps."
"You are being an idiot." The sky spirit is always straightforward, and this time there is no difference.
"I am in love," Jisung replies.
"Then you are doubly as idiotic," Seungmin says.
Today the sky is overcast and cloudy, grey stretching for miles and miles as far as Jisung can see; not even his sun will shine through in this sky, and it is a mark of how upset Seungmin is. Still, there is nothing much that he can provide to Seungmin apart from I am in love.
"Love makes even a god a fool, does it not?" Jisung offers.
Seungmin almost bares his teeth at Jisung then. "You are a god, not a mortal. There will be worldly consequences for the actions you commit, Jisung. You cannot forget that you are the sun spirit, you are one half of the reason our world has come into existence."
"You said it yourself," Jisung bites back just as fast, feeling like his voice will crack in half and leak light all over this grey sky. "You said it yourself - I am one part of a half. How can I be complete if I am only a half?"
"The world is going to collapse if you continue to try and meet the spirit of the moon -"
"Then I will let the world collapse -"
"You are being selfish -"
"I am in love -"
"Well, so am I!" The sky spirit cries, and then they both freeze up.
"... What?" Jisung says quietly. The sky darkens around them.
"It is none of your business," Seungmin says immediately and turns away, but when Jisung looks at him, he catches the startings of tears forming in his eyes. "You should not be asking, nor assuming things, you headless sun spirit."
The spirit of the sky leaves before Jisung can say anything else; it is only then that he realises that they have not had a clear blue sky in what must be weeks. The guilt eats at his heart, but Seungmin is right - he is selfish, and it is a vice that a god should not have.
But he is.
He is a god, and he is selfish. There is so little that he cannot have, and the moon spirit is one of them.
"You made me wake early," The rain spirit accuses. "Will you stop upsetting everyone with the ridiculous things you say? We all know that you love the moon spirit, but there is very little you can actually do about it."
"I did not cause you to wake early," Jisung says testily. "The sky spirit was already upset before I talked to him. The rain now is none of my doing."
Changbin quirks an eyebrow at the earth where the rains are soaking the grounds.
"Fine," Jisung amends, "maybe I did have a little part in upsetting Seungmin. Still... I did not mean to - I was not -"
"You are slightly clueless as to the love between others," Changbin says. "Perhaps it is a side effect of your being so in love with the moon, but all the other gods have loves too, you should know."
"That is what Seungmin told me," Jisung admits. "He said that he was in love as well."
Changbin sighs. "He is, and he is so obvious," Then he pauses, and looks at Jisung critically. "If you would ask me, I would have told you that I love the spirit of the wind, but alas - you have not."
It is Jisung's turn to be shocked then. "You - you love Hyunjin?"
"With my whole heart."
"But... but you are the rain spirit - he is the wind spirit - the two elements of which are always fighting in the skies..."
"Just like you and your moon," Changbin says softly, "I am not meant to be with the wind." The rain falling onto the earth eases up a little until it forms a drizzle, pattering over the soaked earth. "And yet, we love each other."
The pause between them is filled with the sounds of the rain, but it is too silent all at the same time.
"It is not fair," Jisung forces out, tries to make his voice as steady and loud as the sun should be. " None of this is fair . Are gods meant to live without love?"
"Maybe not in this world," Changbin says, and he is already fading away as the rain comes to a gentle halt. "We are not so lucky in this world to be able to love who we want to."
"I heard from Chan about you picking fights with Hyunjin and Seungmin," Felix says when Jisung traverses across the ocean one day, bringing light and warmth to the oceans.
"Hyunjin started it," Jisung begins on instinct, then he sighs and shakes his head, touches down gently on the surface of the ocean and sits down beside Felix. The waves don't touch them but they still follow the motion of it, bobbing up and down slowly.
"It is nice out here, is it not?" Felix murmurs, looking out at the expanse of the ocean, waves rippling and reflecting off the sunshine, the usually blue water dyed a gorgeous amber. "It is a pity that not all of us are able to come out this far." There is longing in his voice, and Changbin's words echo relentlessly in Jisung's mind.
"Is... is there someone you want to bring here?" Jisung asks hesitantly, not sure how to phrase his question.
Felix startles at that, but he turns to look at Jisung anyway, a soft smile breaking over his lips. "Yes. There is very much someone that I wish to bring here, but he cannot come out to this domain."
"... Chan is the only one who cannot come here, is he not?"
Felix's smile becomes painful. "Yes."
They say nothing more as the sun starts to rise higher and higher in the sky, bringing the prettiest reds and oranges into the world, reflecting off the waves. Even in the silence, Jisung can feel Felix's pain; it feels a lot like his own.
"You made Seungmin upset," Jeongin says plainly.
Jisung winces. "As has everyone told me. I do not need to be reminded again, Jeongin. I shall need to seek him out to apologise."
Jeongin glares at him, and even though by technicalities Jisung is a higher god, Jeongin never fails to scare him a little. Jeongin is the spirit of the earth and carried a lot of power with him as a result, imposing when his face was set so still.
Jisung wants to make a joke, say something lighthearted to break the heavy mood, but then he suddenly adds Seungmin's bursted confession and Jeongin's glare at him together - and he thinks he knows who Seungmin loves. It is only a shame that he does not contain this discovery quite well.
"You are the one Seungmin loves?" Jisung blurts out, and laughs nervously when Jeongin groans.
"For heavens' sake, you are hopeless."
"But I am right, am I not?"
Jeongin sets his jaw then, and he turns away from Jisung, goes to descend the heavenly stairs back to the earth where his domain is.
"Your time among the sky is not up yet," Jisung calls, follows Jeongin anyway.
"I have only a day's worth of time left up here for this cycle," Jeongin says. "I have come up here a lot more often than you know, sun spirit. If you were a bit more observant, you would have noticed."
"Then - then you love him too? The sky spirit?"
Jeongin goes quiet for a beat. "I am not meant to love the sky," Jeongin eventually replies, and his voice is so small, "but I do. I love the sky so much that it hurts."
Jisung cannot breathe.
"I know how you feel," Jeongin continues then, and when he meets Jisung's eyes, there is the burden of love etched into his gaze. "But if you cannot do anything, then there is no point for me to agonise over my love." He leaves.
Jisung hears the words that Jeongin never says.
If even the sun spirit, one half of the first gods that were created by the universe, cannot find a way to be with the moon spirit who he so desperately loves, then there is no point in pursuing love in this world.
Jisung stands at the top of the heavenly stairs, lost. It would have been so much easier to be a mortal.
Today, the spirit of the moon has left another gift for him.
The night sky that has not yet been changed by his light is carved with the stars; Jisung is irresistibly reminded of the tapestries that the mortals like to paint. Each blinking dot is a call to him from the moon spirit, and as Jisung slowly casts his gaze over the endless velvet of the sky, speckled with stars, he makes out what he thinks are constellations.
Apus, and Ara. A bird of paradise spreading its wings over an altar.
I love you.
Jisung looks at the stars and how they still do not lose their brilliance when his light spreads across the sky, and he thinks about his love, and the love of the other gods, and the love of the mortals. Thinks about how unfair the universe is that gods cannot love who they wish to love.
There must be something I am able to do, Jisung tells himself, there must be.
It would be easier to cast himself as constellations in the sky than to fight against the natures of the spirit of the universe. In that way at least, he would be able to meet the moon spirit in his celestial exile.
Instead, Jisung leaves his answer to the moon spirit in the sky when it is time for him to depart.
The most gorgeous sunset as his powers will let him, oranges and reds and pinks all melting together in one seamless sky, as boundless as the universe will let him. The stars from the moon spirit's nights are still glimmering amongst all the colours, and Jisung lends a little more power to them, makes sure they last until it is the night and it is the moon spirit's domain.
I love you.
There must be something that he can do.
“We are going to cause the world to die.”
Jisung hears each word that the moon spirit says and saves them up, turns each one over in his head so he can piece them together later when he no longer can hold the moon spirit in his arms.
“A small price to pay for love,” Jisung murmurs. Already, he can feel the pain throbbing away at his soul; even looking at the moon spirit hurts him - was love always this difficult? In their past life, or the hundreds of lives that they have lived, has their love always been this painful?
“We are the stories of the mortals,” The moon spirit whispers, taking a step closer to Jisung, the clouds luminescent under his pearly glow. “Do you know that? They call us star-crossed, they say that our love is forbidden.” The moon spirit pauses then, and it feels like the eclipse forming in the space between them, the individual spaces of their magics coming together in a storm.
“Of course I hear them,” Jisung says, and it is not without bitterness. “The mortals that pray to us and tell our stories - how could I not?”
“Then you must know,” The moon spirit says, his voice already waning like the cycle of the moon. “You must know how our story ends then, my love.”
Jisung closes his eyes. “Do not -”
“You need to know how we end -”
“We are gods, we are immortal, this will not cause our death -”
“We are already dying!”
The silence that stretches between them is sudden and painful, like a bolt of lightning has passed right through the center of their chests where their magic lies. When Jisung opens his eyes again, the fragments of his heart shatters into a fine nothingness when he sees that distilled moonlight is rolling down the cheeks of the moon spirit.
"We cannot keep leaving gifts for each other like this," The moon spirit says. His voice breaks like the stars themselves are falling from the skies, and Jisung cannot take any more of it, even if the tears have just started. "What we have cannot continue. We are not meant to love each other, not in this life."
"If we are already dying," Jisung says, trying to be solid where the moon spirit is weak, "then why should we stop ourselves?"
"We are being selfish, my love."
"Are gods not allowed to be selfish?" Jisung takes a step closer; his chest flares with pain. "I love you so, my dearest. Is it selfish to love?"
"We will cause this world to die," The moon spirit says, but he takes a step closer too.
"Perhaps it is for the better then," Jisung says, and he says it almost bitterly. "I have been so clueless to the pains of the other gods, but they too, cannot have their love fulfilled even when it is so desperately reciprocated."
There is a silence, and the stars above their heads start to merge together.
"You want us to end the world," The moon spirit says, and his voice flings specks of light into the night, creating new stars that both of them know will not last longer than this night.
"We are the ones that were tasked with beginning the world," Jisung replies, and even though it is like stepping into hellfire itself, he takes a closer step to the moon spirit. "If the universe trusted us to start this world, then I think we are meant to end it too."
The moon spirit looks at him, moonlight tears long gone and his gaze steady.
"We carry the white and black of the world within us, do we not?" The moon spirit murmurs, "I suppose it is right that we return everything back to where it has started." He raises a hand then, and a rope of stars and moonlight loops around his wrist, and Jisung lets it come to him, wrap around his own wrist.
"The world will have another chance," Jisung says and raises his own hand. From the centre of his palm, delicate strings of sunlight twist around his wrist to form a cord, and then it reaches for the other wrist of the moon spirit, binding them together.
They have not done this ever before, but in their core memories, the ones that the universe has locked away, they have. The actions are familiar, an imprint of the times when they first started the world and knew nothing about being gods.
They still know nothing about being gods; only pain and love.
"My only hope is that I will find you again in our next world," The moon spirit confesses. The ropes that bind them together are shortening, pulling them together like the gravity of the earth, as if they were never meant to be separated at all.
"The universe is not that cruel to keep us separated even in our next world," Jisung says, but he too, can only hope. The pain is flaring in every crevice of his body, consuming him until the only thing he can focus on is the moon spirit in front of him.
He is as beautiful as the first time Jisung first met him.
Hair that stretches past the base of his neck, so white that it looks like the strands are formed of moonlight itself; the smallest stars are pressed into his skin all over his body, but the prettiest ones are the stars under his eyes and the one on his lip, near his cupid's bow. His whole being is engulfed by the softest silvery glow, and even for a god he looks ethereal.
Jisung could not breathe even if he wanted to.
"You are gorgeous," The moon spirit whispers, breaking the silence between them. There is the faintest red across his cheeks, and the stars on his face gleam. He raises his hand again, traces over the air where Jisung's ink glows, the powers of the sun printed onto his skin and glowing, giving him his telltale golden glow that surrounds him.
"How can you say that," Jisung says, "when you look like this?"
There is so little space between them; the pain both pulls them away and forces them towards each other.
"I have missed you so much," The moon spirit says, his voice just barely discernible.
"So have I," Jisung says, and this time he reaches out for the moon spirit, unable to wait any longer. "I have missed you this whole lifetime, I can wait no longer."
The moment he touches the moon spirit -
The sky starts to break around them.
"We are destroying the world," The moon spirit says, but he leans into Jisung's touch, limbs coming together naturally and their fingers lacing together, filling the space between their hands.
"The world will be destroyed eventually," Jisung says, but his voice shakes; he does not know if they are doing the right thing.
The stars fall like rain around them, hitting the earth with fierce thuds, and the sky is both night and day at the same time, blazing orange pitted beside the deep purple. Nothing is right, and the world is destroying itself from the inside out.
"Please say my name," The moon spirit whispers. "The mortals know not of my name. You are - you will be the only one -"
"Minho," Jisung breathes, cutting through. "Minho, the moon spirit, the god of the nights and the stars and the moon, guide to homes and protector of the lost. Minho, my lover."
Minho presses in closer to him until each point of their bodies are touching, and the pain is eased by the comfort of the two halves finally being together.
"I love you, my sun," Minho says when he pulls back a little just to look at Jisung, fingertips cold against Jisung's skin, against Jisung's ink. "My warmth, my comfort, my light."
They stand like that in the sky that is breaking apart, on the earth that is falling to pieces, in the world that has given them nothing but pain.
"I will have to say goodbye first," Minho says after a while, and his voice sounds like the clashing of the stars in the universe, the beginning and end of everything, "for I am the moon. I do not - I do not - I cannot say goodbye first -" I know I only reflect the light that you give, but still, please, please, please, let me stay.
"You will not be alone for long," Jisung promises, and it is a desperate promise as the earth dissipates around them, as the wind and the rain and the thunder and the lightning burst all around them, the dominions of each god overlapping where they should not ever have. "I would never leave you alone for long."
"Promise me," Minho says, holding Jisung's face in the palms of his hands, and there is the pain of a thousand lives in his gaze. "Please promise me that you will not leave me alone."
"I promise you," Jisung says - what else can he say? "I promise you, with this life, and my next life, and all of the lives that we will have together."
Minho smiles.
It is so beautiful.
"I love you," Minho says, and already, his voice is going, torn away from him by the world.
"I love you too," Jisung says, fights back his tears and tries to keep Minho with him for as long as he can.
"Then - goodbye for now," Minho says softly.
He crumbles to moondust in Jisung's arms.
The sky and the earth and the elements are raging around him - but he cares not for any of this. Minho is no longer with him, and even the moondust that once made up Minho is throw into the howling wind and rain that surrounds him. He is left with only the faint scent of the night and the moon that Minho carried with him.
It is agony.
Compared to when meeting Minho was painful - that was nothing.
The pain rips him from the inside out, until he cannot breathe and it feels like fire and ice are shards in his body, tearing him away from this world in the worst imaginable way. And still, even through this inconceivable pain, Jisung only thinks of Minho, and the promise they had made to each other moments ago.
I am coming to you, Jisung thinks to himself, and it brings him the tiniest amount of comfort. Please wait for me.
This world ends in a blinding flash of light. The bright white engulfs the destruction and the chaos for a long, long moment -
And then everything returns to the darkness.
The stories that the mortals tell go like this.
There is a spirit in the sun, and there is a spirit in the moon. The sun brought the daylight and the warmth, and the night brought the darkness and the stars. These two spirits are the beginning and end of everything, the first to be created by the spirit of the universe, the first two spirits that emerged from the black and the white of nothingness.
You will bring life, the sun spirit was told.
You will create homes, the moon spirit was told.
The spirit of the universe kept them separate even though they were both created together in the same moment. The world would not work if they were together, the spirit of the universe had reasoned, for they were each equal parts black and white and they would not mix well.
The spirit of the universe was not expecting them to fall in love with each other.
The sun spirit had fallen in love with the warmth of the night, so different from the warmth he brought to the world. It was warmth that came from having a home to return to, and the night embraced him when his light died down for the night, giving him a safe place to rest in.
The moon spirit had fallen in love with the life that the sun brought to him and everything around them. He had seen the rise and fall of humanity under the sun, he had seen the growth of the earth under the sun, he had seen the homes created under the sun. Was he not supposed to fall in love with the same spirit that brought life to them?
And these two spirits that were not meant to be together had fallen in love with each other.
It was then that the humans saw the most beautiful skies in history, endless days of sunsets that the sun spirit left as a gift for the moon; in return, the night sky was speckled with new stars every day, the moon singing his heart for new constellations to form.
The world was bound to end; the love between the moon and the sun only brought an eventual ending forward.
The moon spirit that has never cried, they say, voices hushed, he cried when he had to say goodbye to the spirit of the sun.
The world had ended then. First, the moon, then the sun, and after them, the stars and the rain and the lightning and the wind and the oceans and the earth and the forests and the sky - everything was returned to the darkness after one blinding flash of white that signified the end of the world.
There is no moral to this story. It is simply a story.
A story of love - love that is the beginning and ending of everything; love that has caused both pain and comfort in equal measure; love that has muddled the working order of the universe in unfixable ways.
Love that has brought even gods to their knees.