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Hansol is gentle curves and sharp lines, a soft bend of spine that arches off the bed with a press of fingers. He is a brilliant mixture of highs and lows, a hairsbreadth container of the brightest stars. He is the only sun on this miserable midnight planet.
Byungjoo is only seventeen, but he thinks this must be what love feels like; the press of Hansol’s lips against his chest, the warmth that blooms in his stomach when Hansol says his name, the shudder of breath when he cums.
They roll to their sides, sated and mouths lazy as they find each other in the dark. It’s always so dark, Byungjoo laments, and with a small, pointed flick of his wrist, his curtains slide open in one swift movement. Light from all three moons of Fortuna streams inside, illuminating them in careful stripes.
“You’re getting good at that,” Hansol grins, and he can see it, feline and serene. This is one of the rare times Hansol looks at peace. “When do you even have time to practice…”
The way he says it is very unlike a question, but a statement of something bitter, guilty. It’s subtle but Byungjoo answers it like one anyway.
“When no one’s looking,” he says. “No one’s ever looking.”
In the long lull of silence that follows, while Hansol digests and Byungjoo represses, the Fortune nudges the elder with a bump of noses and grins. “Your birthday’s soon. Excited?”
“Why would I be?” Hansol laughs, reaching up to hold Byungjoo’s cheek in his palm. Byungjoo has never known anyone who looked at him as if he were both the strongest and most fragile person in the universe. There was an undoubted faith Hansol held in Byungjoo’s abilities, and yet, he cradled him like a gentle thing—like his strength didn’t outweigh the need to be held.
Byungjoo hums contentedly, before speaking again. “You’ll be eighteen. The big one-eight!”
“I’ll never, ever understand the obsession your kind has with such small numbers. It’s eighteen, not a hundred.”
“That’s because most of us won’t live to be a hundred. We take what we get and enjoy it how we can,” he reminds, and there’s a flash of guilt behind Hansol’s eyes before Byungjoo kisses it away—a press of lips to each eyelid. This is nothing he needs to feel any kind of remorse for. Nightmares just have longer lifespans than Fortunes. “We’re still kids, even you. To us, eighteen is… a milestone. It’s a part of you too, you know. We should celebrate it.”
Hansol, bathed in the moonlight, looks to him and smiles. “Okay.” It’s a simple admission, anticlimactic maybe, but he makes up for it by pushing Byungjoo onto his back and settling on top of him, legs tangling and chests bumping. “Let’s celebrate it, now.”
Twice in one night—Byungjoo can’t say no to that.
This is, after all, irreplaceable. This is raw trust, skin on skin, hearts that find each other and beat in syncopated rhythms.
This is honesty in the way that they kiss, Hansol whispering things in his native language and leaving them on Byungjoo’s tongue to keep. He can taste them acutely, he’s been taught these words before.
He’s about to say them back—Uriv ail a, ghet— in a contrived accent, but as he runs his palms up the expanse of Hansol’s back, everything slows to a stop. There’s an anomaly, two jagged protrusions settled inches below his shoulder blades. It feels like something large is trying to nudge its way out of his skin. Hansol goes stiff, back bowing when Byungjoo runs his palms over the bumps again in frantic realization.
“Hansol, fuck.”
This is—this is not something he’s familiar with, not with his people, but he’s been told about this. Hansol has told him about this.
Before Byungjoo can utter the words, put voice to his suspicions, Hansol is peeling himself away in abrupt movements, standing and reaching for scattered clothes. With Hansol's back suddenly to him, he can see them. Even from a distance he can see the almost violent struggle that are new bones trying to break the surface, the sickly protrusion and the blooming bruises of broken blood cells underneath his skin.
“You’re sprouting,” he says, pulling the sheets from his body and pressing his feet to the cold floor in slow movements. He almost wants Hansol to tell him no, to explain to him that this is something else—that's it’s not him growing a treacherous pair of wings.
Instead, Hansol doesn't say anything. He doesn’t even move.
Byungjoo is clumsy in these moments. He has no finesse for the delicate, no elegance or direction for what is particularly appropriate when things grow serious. He stumbles much like his feet when he stands, haphazardly throws on his pants and bridges the gap between he and Hansol.
They share a fragile moment away from the light of each moon; hands on shoulders that coax them face-to-face, foreheads bumping and one gaze searching two eyes that hide. Hansol keeps them closed, afraid of what they might show, but Byungjoo has learned not to rely on cues so easily taken away. What he reads instead are the signs his body gives, how tense he is, the labored breath of trying to keep calm and the restless twitching of his fingers. Hansol is scared, with every right to be.
Byungjoo holds fast to his shoulders. “We have to take you somewhere safe.”
“Somewhere safe,” Hansol repeats with disdain, eyes flicking open. “There aren’t exactly any organized safe-houses just lying around for my kind.”
“But what if there are? What if—”
“Byungjoo, stop. Listen to me. I’m going to sprout in a few hours and if they find me, if they see you with me, they’ll kill you. They take no mercy on those who show sympathy for the devils.”
“So, what? I just leave you to fend for yourself? You’re being an idiot,” is all Byungjoo counters him with before he’s searching for some kind of sturdy bag to throw some necessities in. They need to be quick, then, if they expect to be clear of the radar in just a few short hours. Sprouting wings doesn’t seem like it’d be a clean, silent endeavor devoid of its fanfare. “I have friends who don’t live in the city. They might help. At least give us somewhere to stay for a night.”
“They might. Or they might turn me in.”
“Hansol, please don’t do this. We don’t have the time to argue.”
“I'm serious. Don’t throw your life away trying to get me out of my own mess. Bredve jahd-nuis panghe a-”
As far as Byungjoo is concerned, there isn’t anything messy about this. Fortuna despises him out of fear; that isn’t a personal fault, despite how convincing Hansol is of making it sound like one. This isn’t a mess, at all. It’s a fight.
And Byungjoo—he’s terrified of fights. All he has in his arsenal is a lack of impulse control and one hell of a stubborn streak. He isn’t the fighting type, the type to start a rebellion or a movement, to bring justice to an entire race of people. He just wants Hansol to be safe. But that, as he understands it, comes with complications.
For all of his bravado, Hansol is still stiff in his spot where he left him, desperate and frightened even as he tries to hide it with controlled expressions. As it is, his eyes give everything away. It makes Byungjoo wonder how he’s supposed to be the thing that goes bump in the night when he looks like he’s running from it, too.
Once more, he seeks him out, this time with conviction.
Byungjoo doesn’t need to be strong. He just needs to be convincing.
“As soon as I'm done here, we’re leaving. Both of us.”
Hansol shakes his head. “Ahkv.”
“This is literally not negotiable.”
Hansol is silent again, tightlipped and contemplative. He doesn’t say yes but he doesn’t say no either, which is about as good as it’s going to get. Still, his eyes speak too much. They look at Byungjoo with inquiry, burning holes through him with the intensity of his thoughts. They look for a promise, for something concrete to hold him to because this isn’t something to consider lightly. He needs Byungjoo to be as sure as he can be. There are subtle shifts of color in Hansol’s eyes that give this away, but in this shaded corner of the room, he can hardly tell.
As they leave, curtains shut and bags packed, Byungjoo laments for the second time that night.
It’s always so dark.