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the sun and moon courts have existed for as long as the sun and the moon have.
first, there was the sun court. it started with one sun god, lonely and questioning the reason for their existence.
in their lonely court, there stood a door. it was a big double door, round and towering over them, surely to lead to extraordinary riches. there was one problem with it, however: it couldn’t be opened.
no matter how much the sun god tried to force the door, no matter how kindly they tried to talk to it, in an effort to persuade it to open. no matter how hard they looked for a key—it just wouldn’t budge.
they gave up after a while, thinking it would stay shut forever and only serve as a reminder of how stuck they were in their court. while their home was beautiful and gave them everything they could possibly want, there was one thing it couldn’t give them.
a companion. there was no one there to keep the loneliness at bay. there was no other body, no other soul, to accompany them. all they had to talk to were the walls surrounding them. all they could touch, all they could interact with, was their court.
in a way, the court was their companion. it was all they knew for so, so very long, but it was never enough to quench their thirst for something more. for what? well… they weren’t exactly sure. they weren’t sure it was possible for another being like them to exist, but they hoped.
in truth, the court wasn’t their companion; hope was.
they waited for a few million years, getting sadder and sadder, lonelier and lonelier, until, one day… the doors finally opened.
they weren’t sure when they opened, as they hadn’t been around to witness it slide open, but it was undeniable; where there was once an impenetrable door, there was now a whole new area to explore.
a whole new world of possibilities.
this new area reminded them of their own court, except it was a little different. it was a court, but not theirs. it wasn’t the sun court; it was the moon court. how they knew this, they didn’t know. they just knew, the same way they’d always known they were a sun god, forever confined to their sun court.
the moon god, unlike the sun god, hadn’t been waiting for millions of years. the moon god had only come into existence a little while ago. like the sun god, they’d wondered about the reason for their existence, as well as the peculiar door that couldn’t be opened.
the moment the sun and the moon laid eyes on each other, marks appeared on their foreheads. the sun god sported a mark of the moon, while the moon god bore a little sun. the two marks suspiciously seemed to fit together, like a strange puzzle that only they could understand.
the marks weren’t filled in, at first. they were only faint little lines, but they eventually got coloured in. that’s what soulmate marks do, once a bond is properly formed; the marks fill in with the love they have for each other.
the doors would still close at first, before the marks were filled in. they’d open while the moon went into its last quarter and would say that way until it passed into its first quarter. once it transitioned into its next phase, however, the doors would slide shut and the two gods wouldn’t see each other again until the moon went into a new last quarter.
eventually, the doors stayed open, however. as the gods got to know each other, their marks started filling in slowly but surely, until, one day, both of their marks were beautifully coloured in as a result of their soulmate bond having formed properly. the doors stayed open after that, but, as they would learn later, only for them. only for those with a fully formed bond.
as more and more gods started appearing—some were born out of their bond, but others out of nowhere, much like the original moon and sun god had—it became clear that not all would form bonds with a god on the other side. not all wanted to form a bond. in fact, only those that seemed to want it would find themselves waking up with a mark one day.
this went on and on, and on… until the courts were filled with gods and no one even remembered what loneliness was like.
it was speculated after some time that, for the courts to be properly aligned, for the universe to work properly, enough soulmate bonds would need to exist. the pull these bonds have on the courts is what keeps them together; it’s what allows the moon court to rotate properly and make sure it doesn’t spin out of control.
when these soulmate marks first came to exist, so few gods existed that it was easy to find the other half. not only that, but the marks would pop up around the same time. as soon as a god found a mark on their forehead, all they had to do was wait by the door and watch as their soulmate would appear on the other side once the doors opened.
these days, however, the process is a little slower. a mark will pop up on one side, while there won’t be one right away on the other. sometimes, multiple marks will appear, and it isn’t immediately clear which ones belong together until the marks are traced on wax paper and compared to one another.
eventually, because the soulmate business became a bit more complicated than back in the day, each court decided to designate one god as its chief of soulmates.
it’s the chief that does the tracing, the comparing, the archiving, the filing of documents. they’ve turned the whole process into a streamlined, if bureaucratic, process.
these chiefs have no say over what the bond looks like. some are romantic, others platonic. to the courts, the nature of the bond doesn’t matter. the bond is the thing that matters; the unbreakable pull between two gods, so powerful it’s capable of keeping the two courts within its gravitational fields.
so long as soulmates exist, the sun and the moon courts will, too.
hoseok gets his mark at six years old. it’s his sister who finds it when she goes to wake him up, and his mother who takes him to the soulmate chief, telling him to be a good boy and that she’ll be waiting right outside of the office to take him back home.
the chief pulls a chair out for him and smiles kindly as she studies his new mark. “what a beautiful mark you have.”
hoseok mumbles a thank you while rubbing his forehead. he’s seen his mark in the mirror and knows it’s there, but it still feels strange. it feels strange that he doesn’t feel any different, even though he knows something is different. that something isn’t just a small little thing, he thinks. he knows soulmates are important, although he’s not sure why or how. he just knows. because his sister said so.
the chief rummages through her stuff, before pulling out a sheet of paper and a pencil. she holds up the sheet and smiles some more. “this might tickle a little.”
“why is it gonna tickle, chief?”
“i’m going to trace your mark.”
“why are you tracing it?”
“i’m going to compare it, sweetie. we’re going to find the mark that matches it.”
hoseok remains sitting as still as possible while the chief presses the paper to his forehead and gently traces the lines. as she’d warned, it does tickle a little, but he does a good job of not moving too much. he wants to be good, after all. he wants to find his soulmate.
once she’s done, he cranes his neck to see. “what are you going to do now?”
the chief smiles again as she swivels around in her chair and pulls open a drawer. she begins rifling through, until she finds what she’s looking for and pulls out a stack of papers. “these are the soulmate marks from the sun court. i’m going to see if one of them fits with yours.”
hoseok nods very slowly and presses his lips together to show he’ll be as quiet as possible while the chief works. he watches as she compares mark after mark to his own, until she reaches the final paper of the stack and sighs in disappointment.
he knows what this means. he knows that soulmates aren’t always there immediately. his sister had told him that, too.
“not yet, i’m afraid,” the chief says, with a sad smile. she gathers the papers again and tucks them away, before she fully turns around to face him again.
hoseok can’t help but feel a little bummed. he was looking forward to making a new friend, had hoped to go home with a name, maybe even a description, of the person. he’d hoped to go home with enough information to be able to imagine what his soulmate would be like, so that he’d know exactly what to say once he’s finally face to face with them.
he hangs his head. “will i ever find my soulmate?” he asks, pouting.
the chief strokes the top of his head. “of course. your soulmate is out there. it’s just taking them a little longer, but they’ll find you soon enough. you just have to have a little patience.”
“how much patience?” hoseok asks.
the chief puts her thumb and pointer finger together. “this much.”
“that’s not a lot.”
she smiles. “right? the wait will be over before you know it, i promise.”
hoseok nods slowly. he slides off the chair and blinks up at the chief. “you promise?” he confirms.
“i pinky promise,” she says, sticking out her pinky finger and waiting for hoseok to link his with hers. “go on now, your mother will be waiting for you.”
the next time the doors open between the courts, hoseok goes hand in hand with the soulmate chief to visit the chief from the other court. it’s not the first time he crosses over into the sun court, but it is the first time he does so without a parent or, at the very least, his sister.
they pass a lot of sun gods on their way over. most of them are older, but there are a few that look to be his age. some have empty foreheads, while others proudly show off their mark.
he wonders if one of those with marks not yet coloured in will be his soulmate. he wonders if their marks would perfectly match up if they were to press their foreheads together.
the soulmate office of the sun court looks a lot like the one back at the moon court, except the colours and decorations are a little different, and it’s a lot less messy.
like before, the two chiefs have him sit on a chair as another smaller stack of paper is compared to the mark on his forehead. the marks, he’s told, are from the newest soulmate halves, having popped up while the doors were closed.
none of them fit his mark. none of them belong to his soulmate, which means his soulmate doesn’t yet exist. sadly, hoseok is still without a soulmate.
the chiefs exchange their stacks of paper and talk for a little, before his chief takes him by the hand again and guides him back home. he pouts while they walk, despite the chief’s attempts at cheering him up and giving him hope that his soulmate will show up eventually.
while he nervously waits each day for news of his soulmate while the doors are open, it’s when they’re closed that he’s truly nervous. somehow, the idea that his soulmate pops up while the doors are shut seems infinitely worse, because it means they’re both waiting. it means there’s a new friend for him on the other side of the door, but he can’t get to them yet.
in an effort to hear of the piled up news as soon as possible, he starts waiting by the doors a few minutes before they open. sometimes, those few minutes turn into hours. sometimes, he gets there early, and he ends up taking a nap, only to wake up and find the doors open and someone bent over him, smiling down at him while trying to decide where to move him to.
he spends a few cycles like that, waiting anxiously for this soulmate of his to finally come, only to be disappointed time and time again. still, his chief had told him to be patient, so patient he will be.
yoongi’s mark appears only a few cycles later.
there’s a pretty sun on his forehead that wasn’t there before he went to sleep, and he spends a few minutes rubbing his skin to see if it’ll come off. he wants to be sure that it’s real, that he’s actually going to have a soulmate.
like hoseok, his mark is traced and compared. he gets to watch as his chief takes paper after paper and lines them up, holding them to the light to see if there’s a match or not.
she goes over most of the stack, until there are only a few papers left and he’s started to hold his breath. he hopes his match will be among those last few ones, that he won’t have to wait, and wait, and wait… as some of his friends have had to do.
fortunately, the very last mark turns out to be a perfect match. the chief shows how the drawings slot together perfectly; a sun sitting snugly within a moon, to form an imperfect circle together. the moon drawn on the paper is missing a few thin slivers where the rays of the sun on his forehead fit in just right.
“who is my soulmate?” yoongi asks, taking the drawing of the moon when it’s given to him and studying it more closely.
“his name is hoseok. he’s six years old, and he’s very excited to meet you.”
“can i see him?” yoongi asks, clutching the paper to his chest. he knows very well the doors are still closed, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t going to try. perhaps they’ll open magically for him just this once. he’d like that.
the chief hums. “soon, sweetheart. the doors will open in five days. you think you can wait that long?”
“no,” yoongi pouts, even though he knows he won’t have another choice. he’s going to have to wait whether he likes it or not.
it’s with that knowledge that he walks out of the office and heads straight for the doors. he knows they’ll stay shut, that they won’t budge just because he decides to sit right in front of them and narrow his eyes at them. but still, he’s going to try.
his mother finds him like that, sat with his knees pulled up and his arms wrapped around them. unwaveringly, he stares at the doors.
“what are you doing, honey?” she asks. she lowers to a crouch and strokes his hair. “the chief told me she found your soulmate.”
yoongi hums. he pulls the folded up piece of paper out of his pocket and gives it to her. “i’m waiting for it to open. i want to meet him.”
his mother coos over him. she looks at the mark, before neatly folding it up again and tucking it into his pocket. she sits down next to him and slings an arm over his shoulder. “i’ll wait with you.”
“how long before they open again?” yoongi asks, hoping the answer will be different now.
“five days.”
yoongi sighs. he leans into her and pouts some more. “he’s called hoseok and he’s six years old.”
his mother hums. “he’s a year younger.”
yoongi nods. “i’ll take good care of him. i’ll be a good hyung.”
“i’m sure you will.”
yoongi sighs sadly once more. “i wish we could meet now.”
his mother kisses the top of his head and pulls him closer. “soon,” she says.
hoseok gets ready for the doors to open like any other cycle. he suspects to find it either empty, or to come face to face with a sun official on their way to the moon court.
he’s spent a few cycles doing this now, and has gotten to know all kinds of people because of it. mostly adults, but also some young sun gods waiting to visit their friends on the other side. none of those young gods had been his soulmate, however. his soulmate hadn’t yet shown up; no mark compared to his had fit. not yet.
still, he holds his breath when the doors open. there’s still that little bit of hope left that the next open cycle will give him his soulmate. he keeps his eyes on the clock right above the door, watches as the little moon ticks closer and closer until it reaches the threshold.
the doors finally begin to slide open very slowly and hoseok gets to his feet, steeling himself.
there’s a person on the other side of the door. the moon god in front of him seems to be of his age, but that’s not even what stands out to him; it’s the mark.
strangely enough, the mark he sees makes him pause and study it curiously. he’s never seen it before, and yet it feels so familiar to him that he thinks long and hard about where he could have seen it.
he realises, after some staring and being stared at, that he hasn’t seen it before. he’s seen what fits around it, though, and he remembers exactly where he’s seen it: on his own forehead.
the moon god in front of him finally speaks, after having done his own staring, after having reached his own conclusions. “what’s your name?” he asks.
“i’m hoseok. what’s yours?”
“yoongi.”
they blink at each other for a while longer, continue to stare at each other’s marks and faces, knowing, without a doubt, that they’re looking at their soulmate. there’s a funny feeling there, in their heads, and in their hearts. it isn’t any feeling in particular, but rather a sense of… familiarity.
it’s like looking at a friend they haven’t seen in a while. it feels strange to be looking at each other, and they do feel very shy, but they know it’ll be okay, because they know this person. they’re familiar with this person, even though they’ve never met before.
finally, hoseok steps forward, crossing the threshold to come into the moon court. he feels no shyness when he lifts his hand to poke yoongi’s forehead; he just does it, because he has to make sure the mark is real.
“it’s like a puzzle,” yoongi says softly. he goes to stand on his toes, although hoseok isn’t much taller than him, and presses their foreheads together where their marks should be.
pressing their marks together doesn’t feel like anything, but they know they’re doing something very important regardless. it makes them both giggle nervously, both because of the nerves and how silly the other looks, having to go cross-eyed to look at each other’s face.
the soulmate chiefs show up while they’re standing like that, foreheads pressed together. they pause a few steps away, looking at each other over the young little gods giggling away, smiling fondly at a sight they’ve seen more than a few times.
“they’ve found each other,” the chief from the sun court says.
“i came to ask if there were any matches, but my question has been answered, i think…” the lunar chief responds, smiling some more.
from that point on, hoseok and yoongi spend as much time together as possible. they grow up together as best friends, hellbent on being around each other while the doors will allow it.
the soulmate thing is, of course, something they can’t ignore, but it doesn’t hang over them. since they’re still growing up, young enough to see it as an easy friend, someone to trust so fiercely without needing to question it, the soulmate part of their relationship doesn’t at all seem significant.
it’s only once they’re in their teens that they seem ready to address it finally. it’s only then that they look in their mirrors, at their still colourless marks, and wonder if it perhaps means more than a bonus friend.
the bond they have is undeniable, but whether this is due to the fact that they’re soulmates, or because they’ve simply spent so much time together in their younger years that they couldn’t possibly be closer… well, that’s something they’ll never get a definitive answer to.
it’s in their late teens that they actually start talking about it. specifically, they talk about what it means to be soulmates, how each bond is unique in its own way and that they still don’t know what theirs is going to look like. they don’t know, because they haven’t yet formed theirs, not properly, anyway, which has been causing some stress for both them and their courts.
the courts, after all, need to have a minimum amount of formed soulmate bonds at a time, and they’ve barely been above the minimum for years now. they need new ones to be formed as soon as possible, and hoseok and yoongi are getting of the age where bonds are typically formed.
their respective soulmate chiefs especially are getting more agitated with each cycle, with each new study they do of the rotation of the courts, only to find out that the numbers aren’t looking too great. it’s something hoseok and yoongi can’t really ignore, but, at the same time—what are they supposed to do? they can’t force it. they can’t colour their mark in themselves.
they have to be ready for it.
they get together as they always have, as they’re both nearing their twenties, and end up naturally gravitating toward the subject they seem to be drawn to most days. they’re on the last day of the open cycle, which always feels a little bittersweet. despite the fact that they see each other as much as physically possible, those days while the doors are closed continue to suck.
“why do you think our bond hasn’t formed yet, hyung?” hoseok asks. “don’t most bonds form earlier? everyone’s getting so stressed… it seems like they’re all looking toward us; waiting for our marks to colour in.”
self-consciously, he rubs his forehead. he wishes it weren’t just an outline, that people would no longer remark how empty it still is after all this time. he wishes he knew what it’d look like fully coloured in.
yoongi gently pulls hoseok’s hand away from his forehead. “i don’t know,” he says quietly. “could be anything. as much as we know about soulmates these days, there’s more still that we don’t know.”
“but i don’t get it,” hoseok goes on. his brows pull together in frustration. “aren’t we close? we practically grew up together. what are we doing wrong?”
“i don’t think we’re doing anything wrong,” yoongi says gently. he pulls hoseok’s hand into his lap and holds onto it with both of his own. “i mean, what more could we possibly do?”
hoseok’s shoulders sag. he leans back against the wall next to the doors. they’re in the moon court, less than an hour away from closing time. hanging out by the doors is something they often do when they’re about to close, because it allows them to stay with each other as long as possible without needing to rush to make it back to their respective courts.
“is there no difference between romantic and platonic bonds? you’re sure?” hoseok asks, pretending he hasn’t asked this exact question before. “what if one is more right than the other? what if we’re going about this wrong? are we supposed to...”
he doesn’t finish his sentence, but yoongi can guess.
“every bond is right,” yoongi says firmly, even though the question has plagued him for as long as he can remember. if there’s one thing he’s insecure about, it’s whether their bond is strong enough, whether they’re not screwing things up. “a bond doesn’t mean we’re forced into anything. it doesn’t have to be romantic.”
hoseok remains quiet for a bit, staring down into his own lap. “what would you rather prefer?”
“hm?” yoongi strokes his thumb over the back of hoseok’s hand. “what do you mean?”
“romantic or platonic. which kind of bond would you like to have?”
while yoongi has suspected for a while now that it’s romantic for him, he’s also deathly afraid it’s not like that for hoseok. it’s for his own protection, thus, when he answers: “i don’t have a preference. i just want you. that’s what matters. i want our bond to be formed properly.”
hoseok hums while nodding slowly. he doesn’t say anything in response. yoongi is afraid to ask him the same question in return, so they sit in silence, until they’ve sat through the several warning bells marking the little time left until the courts close off to one another.
it’s at the one minute bell that they get up, hand in hand, and take the few steps in the direction of the doors.
hoseok steps over the threshold and faces him, refusing to let go of yoongi’s hand as they gaze at each other, hands locked right where the courts will lock in a matter of moments. he smiles softly, and yoongi returns the gesture.
“romantic or platonic,” yoongi begins, as the doors begin inching shut, “it doesn’t matter, okay? it really doesn’t. so long as we’re together, in whatever shape or form—that’s the only thing that’s important to me.”
hoseok smiles a little wider. he nods. “okay.”
yoongi feels his heart surge as he watches that little smile, as they’re finally forced to stop holding hands, as the doors shut and close him off from hoseok for another twelve or so days. he sighs, and remains staring at the shut doors for a few very long moments.
the next time the doors open and hoseok and yoongi are face to face, something is different.
it takes yoongi a full minute to realise, for his gaze to pass by hoseok’s grin, his twinkling eyes, and land on his forehead. there, very prominently, is hoseok’s fully coloured in mark.
“hoseok-ah…” yoongi mutters dumbly. he stares at the mark, studies the beautiful colours, the work of art right on his forehead.
hoseok hums. he steps over the threshold and takes yoongi’s face between his hands. he squishes his cheeks and grins widely. “what do you think, hyung? isn’t it pretty?”
“yeah,” yoongi says softly. he peers up at it some more, feeling conflicted.
on the one hand, he’s happy that at least one half of the bond is now formed, even if it isn’t his half. he’s happy for hoseok, but he’s also afraid to ask what’s changed for him, why it’s suddenly coloured in.
he can’t ignore what they were talking about the last time they hung out. he can’t ignore how relieved hoseok had seemed to hear yoongi’s answer when asked about the difference between romantic and platonic.
could whatever yoongi had said then have influenced hoseok in any way? could his relief have been related to the fact that a platonic relationship would be okay, as well? is that why his mark is so beautifully coloured in right now?
yoongi doesn’t ask. he can’t ask. he doesn’t think he could get a word out without stammering, but he also doesn’t want to put hoseok on the spot. if hoseok wants to tell him what’s changed, what conclusion he came to, then yoongi will gladly hear him out, but he doesn’t want to pull it out of him. hoseok will tell him when he’s ready.
“i’m sorry mine isn’t coloured in yet,” yoongi says, instead. he smiles lightly.
in true hoseok fashion, he just strokes yoongi’s hair, nose scrunching up a little as he shakes his head. “don’t apologise. it’s okay, hyung. all in due time. i don’t want you to rush through anything. beating yourself up over not being ready yet isn’t going to help. it’s not like you can force it, you know?”
yoongi lets hoseok’s reassurance wash over him like a warm, comfortable hug. he allows hoseok pull him in, leans his forehead on hoseok’s shoulder while listening to his voice without taking in his words.
he doesn’t need the assurance as much as he needs to come to terms with the reality he’s been trying to ignore for a while now: it’s never going to be romantic. hoseok doesn’t want him like that, and he probably never will.
it’s not as painful as he’d thought. it sucks, of course, and it makes his chest ache, but the important thing is that hoseok will still be there for him. they’re soulmates, after all. their bond may not have been formed properly yet, but it’s stronger than he ever thought possible, so he has no doubt they’ll always be together.
yoongi just wishes they could be together in more than one way.
now that one half of the bond has formed, and the other half is refusing to, pressure from both of their courts becomes significantly higher. a half-formed bond is unstable, after all. a half-formed bond isn’t useful and is only going to cause issues if not taken care of quickly. that, and they’ve both gone into their twenties by now, which is when the bond should usually have been formed already.
they both feel the pressure, obviously. yoongi feels a lot more responsible, as well as straight up guilty that he’s not there yet, while hoseok mostly feels sad that he can’t help yoongi in any way.
of course, yoongi tries to keep quiet about his guilt, but he doesn’t need to say anything for hoseok to notice it. they’re soulmates, after all. they grew up together, so hoseok knows yoongi like the back of his hand.
since he knows yoongi, he doesn’t attempt to talk him through it. instead, he behaves like he always has and pretends nothing is wrong. he talks to yoongi about every little thing that bothers him, as well as whatever else comes to him. he sits with him in silence while they’re doing their own thing. they cuddle.
in fact, they end up cuddling quite often. the older they get, the more comfortable they feel being silent around each other. cuddling has always been nice, but it becomes nicer the more their feelings grow. it becomes so much easier to sit together and hold hands while leaning into each other, or to lie down in one of their beds and doze off a little.
they end up cuddling like that one day when yoongi is absolutely exhausted after having sat with both soulmate chiefs and going through a list of questions to help nudge him in the right direction. the whole meeting had made him feel small and useless and even more guilty than before, and the only thing that’s going to make him feel good, he knows, is being in hoseok’s arms.
he’s just starting to feel a little more relaxed, having burrowed himself in hoseok’s chest, enjoying hoseok’s fingers stroking his back, when hoseok finally speaks.
“hey, hyung…”
“hm?” yoongi lifts his head minimally. he can barely see hoseok’s face, but at least he’s making an attempt.
“have you kissed anyone yet?”
the question makes yoongi pause. he nods slowly and frowns a little. “haven’t you kissed, as well?”
he remembers the day hoseok came to him to talk about his first kiss as though it’d happened yesterday. he’d had some experience of his own by then, so it felt disingenuous to be so upset about it, but he had been. he’d cried after they’d parted that night and had decided, while drying his cheeks, that he’d set his romantic feelings aside and wish only for hoseok’s happiness.
he still remembers the ache in his chest he’d felt at the time. he doesn’t have to work very hard to recall exactly what it’d been like.
hoseok nods. he hangs his head for a moment to smile shyly. “i have, but…”
“but?” yoongi finally pulls away from hoseok enough to look up at him properly.
“it felt weird,” hoseok says, after mulling it over for a moment. “i’ve never had a kiss that didn’t feel weird. i want to know if it’s because i haven’t kissed the right person, or if kissing simply isn’t for me.”
“you want to kiss me,” yoongi states.
hoseok nods slowly. he sucks his bottom lip into his mouth. “i’m sorry,” he mutters. “that’s weird to ask, right?”
yoongi laughs softly. he shakes his head. “no. it’s okay. i can help you out.”
“yeah?” hoseok smiles.
yoongi hums. he rests his palm on hoseok’s cheek and tilts his face down enough that he’s able to press a soft kiss to his lips. he pulls back just barely to look at him, smile, and do it again. “in what way did it feel weird to kiss?” he asks, lips brushing over hoseok’s.
hoseok just barely shakes his head. “i don’t know,” he murmurs. he kisses yoongi back, pressing close-mouthed kisses to yoongi’s lips that turn into yoongi’s tongue licking at the seam of hoseok’s mouth. “just… felt… weird...”
yoongi hums again. he lets hoseok pull him into his lap further and rearranges his legs so that he’s straddling hoseok’s thighs for better access. “and how does this feel? what’s it like to kiss me?”
“good…” is all hoseok says, sighing, gripping onto the back of yoongi’s shirt, arms slipping around his waist to pull him impossibly close. now that he’s had a taste of him, he doesn’t know how to let go. he doesn’t want to. he doesn’t want to let go of yoongi ever again.
their once tender kiss turns into something messy and heavy and breathtaking. it turns into making out, into hands wandering, fingers slipping into locks of hair to hold onto, to pull tight. it turns into panting hotly into each other’s mouths.
they do this until they have to part, until they hear the chime of the door warning them they only have a few minutes left until the courts are separated from each other again. they let go of each other reluctantly and move awkwardly around each other as they fix their hair and clothes.
yoongi walks him to the doors. he holds hoseok’s hand until the doors close and they have to let go. they can barely look at each other, and only lift their chins at the very last second to offer each other a faint smile.
that night while getting ready for bed, yoongi sees his mark in the mirror. it’s almost fully coloured in. much like hoseok’s, he’s got the same colours, the same patterns. it’s exactly like how he’d pictured it would look, and yet he still can’t believe it’s real. how could it possibly be?
he brushes his fingers over it a few times, staring at it in the mirror in awe, but mostly in confusion. it makes no sense for his mark to start filling in now, when his heart had hurt so much when they’d parted.
after all, the reason hoseok had been so awkward around yoongi wasn’t that hard to discern. why else would hoseok be awkward around him, if not because he’d realised yoongi’s feelings for him? the kiss had made hoseok realise that he definitely didn’t return them, which was why he’d so awkwardly said goodbye.
right?
despite the late hour, yoongi wanders through the moon court until he ends up in front of the soulmate chief’s office. he knocks before he can stop himself, and takes a step back while he tries not to think about how soft hoseok’s lips had been.
when the door opens, yoongi remains quiet.
“there you are,” the chief says. as her eyes glide down from his mark to his eyes, she smiles. she must see his uncertainty, but she doesn’t bring it up. “was it hard getting here?” is what she asks, instead.
she’s not asking about his trip to her office, but he kind of wishes she was. he’d be able to answer that question without feeling guilty.
“yeah,” he says. “why now? i don’t understand.”
the chief only smiles again. with the back of her hand, she strokes the side of his face. “i’m sure you’ll understand soon. marks don’t lie. come in. let’s have some tea.”
like any other new cycle, yoongi and hoseok wait for each other on either side of the door. they no longer feel the need to be with each other every second of every day, but there’s something about getting a first look of each other’s face as the doors begin to slide open; the anticipation is unlike anything they’ve ever felt, or anything they’ll probably ever feel.
unlike any other cycle, yoongi’s mark is now almost filled in. apart from a few spots around the edges, his mark is done, which means his half of the bond is finally being completed. it means they’ll no longer be unstable. they’ll be a fully bonded soulmate pair.
would hoseok be able to feel it? yoongi’s spent most of his time wondering about that, while wondering at the same time whether he physically feels different now or not. he doesn’t think he feels different, even though he thinks he should.
unlike any other cycle, hoseok has never felt his heart hammer more violently in his chest due to the realisation he’s come to while they’ve been separated. the kiss has had such a huge impact on him that it feels as though his entire world has shifted quite severely.
up until this point, he’d toyed with the idea of their relationship being more than platonic to him, but the puzzle pieces hadn’t fully fallen into place until yoongi had sat in his lap and kissed him stupid.
hoseok has come to realise that his kissing issue has very little to do with kissing not being for him, and everything to do with the person he’s kissing. he’s very much come to the conclusion that kissing is one of the most mind blowing activities to partake in, if done with the right person, such as yoongi, for example.
in fact, he’s had enough time to figure out with almost complete certainty that the only person that’s ever going to be right for him is yoongi. it makes sense that the only right person for you would be your soulmate, of course, but only if you haven’t spent such a long time trying to figure out the differences between platonic and romantic soulmate-ship.
aside from finally defining his feelings for yoongi, hoseok’s unfortunately also been entertaining the fact that yoongi may not return them. he’s spent the last few days steeling himself and going over every possible bad scenario as a way to protect himself from harm.
similarly, yoongi’s steeling himself, as well. why else would his mark be coloured in, if not because he’s finally realised he’s head over heels in love with hoseok? he’s always known deep down, but seeing his mark so beautifully coloured in, nearly complete, had been a bit of a wake-up call.
he loves hoseok, and he’s also in love with hoseok. they’re two very different things, and he’s not sure how well he’ll be able to separate them.
like hoseok, he’s readying himself for the possibility of rejection. much like hoseok, he also finds comfort in the fact that, no matter what, they’ll still be soulmates. whatever happens, they’ll always have that.
it means that yoongi will get through it. it means hoseok will get through it. no matter what happens, they know they’re loved; they know things will work themselves out.
the moment the door opens and they get to look at each other again, the moment hoseok’s gaze flicks up to land on his mark, all their worries melt away instantly. in that instance, they know. there’s no reason to be afraid of rejection, because they unequivocally feel the same way.
“it’s beautiful,” hoseok says softly.
yoongi steps forward. he presses their foreheads together, much like their very first meeting. with their eyes wide open, gazing at each other, they smile lovingly.
“i’m in love with you,” yoongi says. he feels the weight fall off his shoulder as soon as he’s said it. he resists the urge to lean his head on hoseok’s shoulder, if only because he can’t bear to look away from hoseok’s eyes full of unbridled wonder.
if their foreheads weren’t pressed together, hoseok would have been able to see yoongi’s mark transform. he would’ve seen the last slivers without colour disappear, would’ve seen the colour fully take over.
neither of them sees it happen, but they know. they can feel it.
hoseok kisses him softly. he slips his fingers into yoongi’s hair, to the back of his head to cradle it. “i’m in love with you, too.”
after staring at each other for a long while, yoongi lets out a sigh of relief and finally gives into his urge to rest his forehead on hoseok’s shoulder. “no more waiting for the doors to open.”
hoseok laughs. he wraps his arms around yoongi’s shoulders and presses a kiss to the top of his head. his heart feels as full as their marks are.